Buffy 2029

This was meant to be the first chapter in a novella, but as it stands it is a short story--or the beginning of a future novella.

Buffy 2029: Shades of Gray
By
Miles Fowler

Soon after the high-speed magneto train left Paris, bound for Geneva, Buffy fell asleep even though she was sitting in second class. She had not slept since New York, which was now more than twenty-four hours ago. Mercifully, she had no prophetic dreams. Only sweet ones in which she was sixteen again and with Angel. None of the bad that had come of that liaison haunted her now. When she drifted out of her dreams she was aware of a throbbing energy in the row behind her. She did not have to be psychic to know that it came from a young boy. His energy expressed itself in a steady output of noise. He talked loudly, squealed loudly and bounced off of the back of Buffy�s seat loudly and forcefully enough to awaken her. The boy�s father was beside himself trying to settle him down.

�Look, Rupert, a castle!" said the father in a London accent. �Do you see it?�

Buffy opened her eyes and looked out her window. The train was rushing through a deep green valley, walled by steep mountains. Fixed atop one of them was turreted gray castle, looking like something out of a storybook. Buffy smiled, watching the sight until it disappeared in the distance. She closed her eyes again and was about to drift back to sleep when young Rupert charged down the aisle past her.

�Woo-woo! Woo-woo! Woo!� he went, rapidly patting his lips with a palm in unmistakable if clich�d imitation of a Native American brave.

�Come back and sit!� called his exasperated father. Eventually the boy reached the end of the car, turned around and whooped his way back. He took his time, and when he came even with Buffy, he turned to her.

�Woo-woo! I�m a Native American!� he declared. His accent belonged as much to London as his father�s.

�And a fiercer warrior I�ve never met, Rupert,� Buffy said. �But I do think that the preferred term these days is �Indigenous American�.�

�Come sit, and stop bothering people,� said his father. The boy ignored his plea.

�How�d you know my name is Rupert?� the boy asked.

�He�s not really bothering me,� Buffy assured the man. She turned to look at him. He was casually if colorfully dressed in a pink, short-sleeved shirt and lime green Bermuda shorts. It struck Buffy as comical that it was the reverse of Rupert�s color scheme while being exactly the same abbreviated style. The family resemblance was also obvious. Both males had full heads of soft chestnut hair above regular features and liquid brown eyes. While the boy was about seven, the man was closer to forty. Both too young for me, thought Buffy. Even as she thought it, however, she recognized an unmistakable twinkle of interest in the man�s eyes. He smiled, but was almost immediately distracted by Rupert�s jumping up and down.

�See here,� said Rupert, trying to get Buffy�s attention, �How do you know my name?�

�I have my ways,� said Buffy, pretending mysteriousness but soon giving way to smile. Rupert smiled back. �Actually, I had a good friend once named Rupert. He was English like you.�

�Where is he now?� the boy asked.

�Right here,� replied Buffy, tapping the left side of her chest.

�What�d you name the other tit?� asked Rupert.

�Rupert!� cried the man. �I�m terribly sorry, Madam, I have no idea where he could have gotten such a notion.�

�But, Da,� said Rupert, �You said Aunt Meredith named one Jenny and the other one�.�

Buffy turned to her window and laughed as silently as she was able. The man kept offering apologies, but Buffy waved them off until she had herself under control.

�The boy doesn�t have a mother, you see,� he was saying. �She died when he was only two. He�s just gone through one au pair after another, so there�s really been no one to make him mind his ps and qs while I�m at work all day.�

�Look,� Buffy said when she was composed enough to face him, �I�m really not all that offended. In fact�. I�m Buffy. Tell me your name, and we�ll call it even.� She extended her hand over the back of the seat.

�Roger,� he replied sheepishly as he took her hand.

�Da, I�m off to the loo!� Rupert announced to the entire car as he dashed toward the rear.

�Wonderful, son. Come right back when you�re finished. And don�t forget to wash.� Rupert was already gone.

�Sorry about his mother,� said Buffy. �Not that I�m not sorry about your loss, too.� That�s right, she thought. Put your foot in it.

�Thank you, on both counts, I think.� Roger smiled. �And I�m sorry that Rupert stepped on the memory of his namesake.�

�Hmm? Oh, well, I suppose that Rupert�my Rupert, that is�would have been amused. Then again, maybe not. He was the kind of Englishman that makes Americans think that all Brits are stuffy.�

�But you loved him.�

�Yes, very much.�

�Do you mind my asking,� Roger hesitated. �Was he, perhaps, your husband?� This time Buffy let out a loud laugh.

�Sorry? Did I say something funny?�

�No, I�m sorry,� said Buffy, �but if you knew Giles, you�d laugh, too.�

�Giles?�

�His name was Rupert Giles. I met him when he was the librarian at the school I attended.�

�I see. He was an older man then. Something of a mentor, perhaps.�

�Yes, I�d say he was very much a mentor.�

�You attended a school in the U.K?�

�No. He came to America. California, to be exact.�

�Always wanted to go there,� said Roger whistfully. �Is that where you live?�

�Afraid not anymore. Been living out of suitcases for a year now. I have an apartment in New York, but I barely get a chance to trip over the welcome mat before I have to dash off somewhere or other.�

�What do you do?� asked Roger.

�I�m a public relations and organizational consultant,� said Buffy. �How intriguing. How did you get into that?�

�Well, it all started with a little make-work job somebody gave me as a kind of mentor-slash-guidance counselor without any kind of training at all.� �I�ll bet you were a natural.�

�Oh no, I was easily the worst guidance counselor in history. I was like the stuff that really incompetent guidance counselors scrape off of their shoes.�

Roger laughed in spite of himself. �Oh, you couldn�t have been that bad.�

�But I was. Anyway, I stumbled onto a great book called �Improving Therapeutic Communication.� It was really about improving listening skills. I was hooked. I wanted to learn more, and that led me to leave Sunnydale and eventually earn a degree in organizational psychology. After a few jobs in personnel, I got into public relations and finally into consulting.� Buffy neglected to tell Roger that in her spare time, she still fought vampires on a fairly regular basis, all the while honing her martial arts and meditation skills.

�What do you do?� Buffy asked. Roger proceeded to tell of a busy but boring life as a stockbroker in the City of London, taking a train home to a suburban cottage and his son each evening. Buffy found herself envying him a little. A tall and corpulent man in a tweed suit passed them just then. He was coming from the direction of the restrooms. Roger hailed him. �Excuse me, sir, did you by chance see a little boy�seven years old�dressed somewhat like me?�

�But with the opposite color scheme,� added Buffy helpfully.

�What?� asked Roger.

�Why, yes,� said the man in a heavy East European accent. �He was behind me in the cue, but when I came out, he was not there. Perhaps he became impatient and went into the next car.� He gestured in the direction of the next car.

�Thank you,� said Roger. His brow furrowed, he turned back to Buffy. �I had better go looking for him before he gets himself into real trouble.�

Suddenly, the car plunged into the deepest darkness. For a long, still moment, there was absolutely nothing to see, nothing to hear but the low hum of the magneto train. The hum was changing, however. With it, came the sensation of slowing down.

�We�re in the tunnel now,� said Roger nervously in the dark, "We're underneath the French Alps for the next twenty minutes. The lights, hopefully will come back on any minute now."

"Are you worried about Rupert?" asked Buffy.

"Just a little. He's afraid of the dark." The lights came up at that moment. �Here we are,� he said with a relieved exhale. Then after a pause, he added, "I'd better go find Rupert in any case."

At that moment, a sensation spread from Buffy�s solar plexus throughout her body. It was as if unseen feelers had been subconsciously gathering intelligence from throughout the train ever since she had boarded. Now, triggered by the sudden plunge into the tunnel beneath the French alps, these tendrils were reporting back to her, bringing vibrations from the adjacent cars into the center of her being and telling her that vampires had been aboard this train from the start, hiding in private compartments two cars away. Her senses also told her that they were on the move now that the only lights in the train were artificial.

�If you don�t mind,� said Buffy, trying to suppress her alarm, �I�d like to find him. Let him know there are no hard feelings re: the tit remark.�

�Oh, I�ll wager he�s forgot all about that already.� Said Roger. �I�m the one who�ll be eternally mortified.�

�Still,� said Buffy, showing a little more concern than she meant to, �I think I�d better look for him.�

�Why? What�s wrong?�

�Nothing, I�m sure.� But before he could protest further she rose and quickly made her way to the next car. There her alarm only increased. The electric lights had come on in her car but not in the next. And even above the hum of the train, she detected voices in the car even before she entered it. She doubted that the vamps had heard her come in, but she was on her guard just the same.

�So, you�re the Native American brave who has tried to sneak up on us,� said a male, French-accented voice in the dark.

�Indigenous American,� said Rupert. His voice was clear and only betrayed the slightest fear. Brave kid, Buffy thought.

�Wait,� commanded an American-accented female voice. After a pause, the French male voice whispered, �What is it?�

�Someone else is in the car,� said the female.

�Sure,� said the male, �but this little morsel is the only one alive.�

�No, it is a woman, and she is strong and not afraid of us.�

�That�s only because she doesn�t know what she�s up against.�

�But she does.�

�Here, take the boy,� he said. Then he called, �Come, show yourself so we can get to know each other.�

�Not necessary,� said Buffy. �We won�t be acquainted that long.�

�Marcel! She�s no ordinary mortal!� the female called after him. �This will only take a moment,� replied Marcel.

Buffy realized what was happening even if Marcel did not. The American female, now presumably holding Rupert, was extremely psychic. She probably had �heard� Buffy�s thought about Rupert�s bravery. That had been the first thought Buffy had allowed herself since leaving her own car. Marcel, whose vibrations screamed vampire, evidently had only the basic psychic package of a vampire and no more, while the female, who seemed able to cloak her identity from Buffy, had enough ESP for both of them. Buffy kept getting the memory of Drusilla as the likeliest explanation for the female�s abilities. For now, what was of more concern to Buffy was her feeling that there were other male vamps on the next darkened car and that they were headed for this one.

�Believe it or not, Miss,� Marcel was saying in a patronizing tone, �I can almost see you, even in the dark. Do you wish to know how I do this?�

Buffy said nothing. Marcel was helping her to keep track of his position by the sound of his voice. She had no intention of returning the favor.

�Marcel, you fool,� called the female, �she can almost see you, too! She�s the Slayer!�

�A Slayer? I have always longed for the taste of Slayer�s blood.�

�Then suck on this,� said Buffy, driving a stake into the vampire�s heart. With an anguished groan, Marcel disintegrated into ash, which momentarily glowed in the dark as it sifted toward the floor. Before they reached it, Buffy felt three more vamps enter the car.

�Let the boy go and I�ll let you off this train alive,� said Buffy.

�Watch out, she�s the Slayer,� the female warned the two new players. �She�s already killed Marcel.�

�That isn�t quite accurate,� said a vampire with a German accent. �I�m the only one who ever killed Marcel. It was during the war. I was in the Gestapo. He was with the Resistance. Death put us on the same side. Rather heart-warming, actually. Nicht war?� As the vamp spoke, he moved directly toward Buffy while his two companions stealthily, silently, crawled over the seats to her left and right, as rapidly as men could walk on a level surface.

Suddenly, the car door behind Buffy opened, letting in a little light from Buffy�s own car.

�Goodness,� said Roger, �why aren�t the lights on in here?�

�Daddy, help!� called Rupert from the other end of the car. Buffy was relieved to know that the boy still lived.

�Rupert!� said Roger. �Where are you?� He stepped forward tentatively in the dark, unaware that Buffy was less than a step in front of him.

Without turning around, Buffy hit him full in the face with the back of her fist. She heard the sickly crunch of cartilage before Rupert slumped into the nearest passenger seat. He lay there unconscious with his feet upon the armrest and sticking out into the aisle.

Now the two vampires moved to flank Buffy, but she swiftly placed a palm against each one�s solar plexus and lifted him easily as if her hands were glued to them firmly and they were ultra-light. For all their strength and fighting skills, the two vampires could only wriggle with the futility of flies on flypaper. Holding them aloft, Buffy swung extended arms to her sides. This left her front vulnerable to the direct approach of the former Gestapo officer, but when he rushed into the space before her, Buffy swung the helpless vampires fixed to her hands together like a set of cymbals. The German vampire was crushed between them as all three demons� bones audibly shattered due to the force. Buffy spread her arms a bit so that the German was no longer held up by the cymbal vamps. He crumpled to the floor. Then Buffy used her mind to project her cymbals into the corners of the car�s other end. They sped as if they had been shot out of a pair of cannons.

�Talk to me, Rupert,� said Buffy. �How are you doing, little guy?� There was no response. Buffy took a step forward. Suddenly, the German grabbed her ankle, but Buffy drew a stake and threw it down, directly into the vampire�s heart. In the darkness, Buffy reached out to sense everything in the car. Roger was still unconscious behind her. The two vampires she had hurled lay broken but still animated at the other end of the car. The only other being in the car was a small human several rows in front of her, close to the floor. Unless the female was cloaking her presence, she must have dropped the boy and fled during the fight. Buffy scanned the car and then as much of the entire train as she could. Somehow, the female had escaped and, puzzlingly, had left no trace at all.

�What happened?� he asked. �Oh, my nose!�

�You banged yourself into a door,� Buffy lied as she urged him through the passageway and back to their car so that neither of them would see the massacre in the car they had just left. �You must have run smack into the open door just as Rupert came out of the restroom.�

Gingerly she helped Roger to his feet and guided father and son back to their assigned seats.

Later, while Roger snored loudly, but rather endearingly, Buffy thought, she suggested that Rupert not tell his father about his adventure because his father would be even more frightened than Rupert had been.

"I wasn't frightened," protested Rupert.

"I know you weren't," said Buffy with a smile, and she carressed the boys cheek tenderly.