Roman Prologue
Yet the Laws of Terminus were Sundered

by Mad Hamlet

Copyright © 2004

Mad-hamlet@usa.net

Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: All this belongs to Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy (Grrr...Argh).
Distribution: The Mystic Muse http://mysticmuse.net
Feedback: Thank you.
Spoilers: Season 4.
Author's Note: Terminus, like Janus and Eros, was a roman god. The God of Borders, Boundaries and Limitations in fact. Also of property. The Narrator is not Terminus.
Pairing: Willow/Buffy

The ground here is always ashes. The sky itself is ashes.

The only things of note here are The Road and The Door.

That was until recently.

A short time ago a girl came. She did not walk The Road and go to The Door. She sat by the side, in the ashes, put her head in her hands and nothing else. I've watched her since then. Sometimes she lifts her head and looks around forlornly, before going back to watching the insides of her hands.

Most of the time, when she is not looking about, she cries.

She's not the only one here of course. I'm always busy. Others come and walk The Road to The Door and then vanish forever. They don't see the girl, and she doesn't see them. This is because I wish it so as they do not have business with her, nor she with them.

She waits.

I know what she waits for, there is little I do not know. I know how much every tree grows in a day, I know all the directions the wind takes, I know all the patterns of the waves in all the seas.

So of recently the status quo is now as follows: The ground of ashes, the sky of ashes, the Road, The Door and The Girl.

It's her hair that gets my attention occasionally. It's the only color here. A dark, dusky hue of red. Other than that everything around is gray. Even her skin. All that is here is Grey.

I know colors; being there at the Beginning I know what they looked like fresh and new, and when I am there at the End I'll see them old. Still, having only memory and prediction is different to having them actually be here with me.

Others are on The Road.

A group of them are coming down, among them is a young woman, her hair tied up in a bun, being all gray as most of her ilk are I do not know the color. When the redhead first arrived she too was all gray. When she stepped off The Road though, turning away from the Door, and sat down to wait, her hair became red. This newest arrival looks like all the others though: Grey, placid, accepting.

She stumbles along listlessly behind another one; an old man who's step makes him seem younger than his companion. He is practically skipping down The Road. In contrast the young woman takes one heavy step after the other. Being dragged along like something on a tether.

I've seen it all before. Some come eagerly, ready to pass beyond The Door and continue, others fear it, trying to fight against the pull though none get far. Actually that's not quite true. On rare occasions one comes along and takes a few steps toward The Door only to turn around and go back the way they came.

Wordlessly the young woman stops. Without a complaint the others behind her move around her stationary form, The Road is very wide if it has to be, and continue moving toward The Door; still being lead by the happy looking old man.

The woman doesn't move. She stares at the spot where the redhead sits. She cannot be looking at the redhead as I do not wish it so. Still, she studies that spot like she knows something should be there. She continues to stare at the space the Redhead occupies. If I allowed it, the young woman would be looking directly at the Redhead.

After a time the Redhead herself looks up and turns her eyes to the space where the young woman is standing. Again, if I allowed it, they would be seeing each other. I do not allow it, despite this they continue to stare into what is, to their eyes, empty space.

No one has spoken here in a very long time. The place is heavy with the silence yet this means nothing to the woman as she opens her mouth and speaks.

"Willow?"

I must intervene.

I enclose the woman, taking elsewhere, creating a small pocket with similar properties of the Sphere she left behind. The sky and earth are still ashes. I copy the ways of her sphere, not the appearance. Having done so her gray fades away. Her hair is a dirty blonde color. I was right.

Good.

As 'real' becomes more so other colors leech slowly back, her clothes take on real texture and appearance, her wounds start to bleed again and pain makes itself felt. She falls to her knees with a stifled groan.

I appear before her. I do not care for it very much. It is exceedingly difficult for me to keep a form for very long. I feel...contained...limited. Less than my self and office.

"You are Elizabeth Anne Summers." I say letting her see me.

I know how much pain she is in, I know how she died. It was violent and now, with my influence willingly lessened that aspect of her reality is reasserting itself.

"Buffy." she groans out between clenched teeth. "Friends...call...me Buffy."

"I am not your friend Elizabeth." I reply.

The pain stops, not because I care for her feelings, it's just very difficult to carry on a conversation if someone cannot speak. I could take what I want to know directly, it's easier this way.

She visibly relaxes as whatever agonies she had fade away; the sensations pass, her wounds still bleed.

Opening her eyes slowly she looks up at me. She studies me silently.

"Enemies call me Buffy too." she finally says.

"I am not your enemy." I say flatly.

She's silent a moment more. Still crouching on the ground, resting her knees in the ashes, she turns her gaze away from me deliberately; an attempt at dismissal. Her attention turn to the wounds she bears. Large gashes running horizontal across her chest expose to the outside what normally is not. I watch her eyebrows raise in first horror, than curiosity as she examines, for the first time, her own heart. Literally.

She pokes it.

It doesn't move.

I watch her as she examines it.

It doesn't move.

After a time she says quietly, "I'm no doctor but I'm pretty sure something like this should be fatal."

"It was." I say instantly.

She nods. Takes the news well.

She sighs. "That would mean you must be-"

"You are seeking out Willow Rosenberg." I interrupt her.

Her train of thinking is shattered. I watch the thoughts in her mind splinter and flitter away into the ashes sky.

I see panic and fear, warring with love and desire. Guilt wrests control away from her. Still on her knees she sways slowly in a wind that does not exist.

I wait. I'm patient.

She licks her lips, as she forces some semblance of order upon herself.

"Do," she pauses. "Do you know where she is?"

The tone she uses is both afraid and hopeful.

"She is here." I reply. "She waited for you."

I grow tired of this form and change.

"I have watched over her." We say.

Elizabeth Summers stares at the two of us now before her. One on either side.

"She waited for me?" She asks despite our having said as much a moment before.

"Yes." We reply.

"That whole time?" she asks again.

"The period of time between her death and your own." We reply.

We are children now. We haven't taken this shape in a very long time.

"It was years though." Elizabeth Summers protests. "How could she...the...light. Why didn't she..." she flails about for a word. "Finish?"

"Time moves-" I begin from myself on her left.

"Differently here." I finish with myself on her right.

Two is good, less limiting but I still feel uncomfortable.

I surround her with many. Our voice is a chorus now.

Elizabeth Summers turns her head slowly around looking at all of my faces. My young faces, my old faces, my first faces and my last faces. She looks at them all, turning slowly on her knees, perhaps looking at what she perceives as her enemy, perhaps looking for escape. It does not matter, there is neither. We are all around her.

"The years passed instantly?" she asks hopefully.

"No." We cry. "The time between her death and your own passed like an eternity."

Shock takes the strength from her, bleeds it away. She falls, slowly, with the power lost she slides through the still air like a leaf falling. Her arms comes up to arrest her fall but they too are weak and cannot support her. The blood from her wounds still pools around her, briefly. The ashen ground is thirsty.

"An Eternity," our chorus echoes in this shell similar to the Sphere. "Is a very long time. Imagine a ball of copper floating in a void. It is the size of your world. Every thousand years a feather falls from the void to brush against this copper orb. Think of the time it would take for that ball to be ground down to the size of a pebble."

Being more 'real' she now has regained the ability to cry. Her tears made manifest, not just a feelings locked within but now having physical expression once more. This is done so at our will, we made this pocket from her sphere and allow this. The ground drinks the tears as readily as her blood.

"Th...that's an Eternity?" She whimpers.

"That is the first day." We sing back to her.

She attempts to hide from our choir; lying in the ash, arms wrapped around her head as if to ward off what she now knows. Covering her ears, her face, her eyes, her tears. She no longer wants to feel, to hear or to see.

We take her back to The Road.

The Door is open wide now. The call is at it's strongest. Elizabeth Summers is pulled to her feet by it and takes a step toward The Door.

"No!" She screams. "No, please! She's here. Willow is here I know it, don't take me from her, don't take me from her now!"

Another step.

"Yes." I reply again, one once more. "She is here. She waits. She will join you soon. I will send her on after you."

"Willow!" Elizabeth Summers screams. Arms reaching back, reaching to where the Redhead sits, still holding her head in her hands.

"Willow I'm sorry!" Another step.

"I was scared!" The blonde girl, now gray again, calls out. "I was so scared. Scared I didn't deserve more. Scared of being more afraid. I'm sorry Willow, please!"

She wants to cry, to mourn at this perceived injustice. She cannot as I have revoked 'real' and she is once more bound, and gray, to the limitations and demands of The Road. She can scream though.

She is nearly at the threshold, becoming more insubstantial as she nears The Door.

"I love you!" Elizabeth Summers screams.

The Redhead, Willow Rosenberg, hears her.

I did not allow this.

I watch.

She steps upon The Road.

"Buffy?" I hear her speak for the first time. She is on the road, yet her hair...

It is still red.

Neither can see the other, Willow is looking about frantically. "Buffy! Where are you?"

She is at the threshold.

"Willow!" Elizabeth Summers cries out. Her arms are reaching back, back down The Road, toward me, toward the Redhead, toward the Sphere from where they came.

Her feet carry her through The Door.

"Go." I say. "Others are waiting as well."

Her face, a mixture of terror and despair falls across the threshold gone from even my sight. Her hand reaches back and flails briefly about the air slowly being dragged through the door and across the thresh-

Willow grabs it.

I am surprised. That's never happened before. I know I certainly didn't allow it.

"No!" Willow shouts. She braces herself and pulls.

It is at The Door where my knowledge ends. What lays on the other side I am not sure. I do know it's ways though and when Elizabeth Summers begins to reemerge from it I am fairly sure that this is now how things are meant to work.

I think.

Her other hand free, still half across the threshold, her torso back on this side, while the rest of her still on the other, Elizabeth Summers reaches out and Willow takes her other hand, and pulls again.

Slowly, slowly, she emerges, her feet once again resting solidly upon The Road. They are in each others arms. Saying nothing, making no noise, or sounds. Just resting.

Behind them I see The Door swing shut. Almost. It never closes entirely. It will not. Not until I myself cross it.

They separate and look at each other. Elizabeth Summers raises a trembling hand and lays it against Willow's cheek.

She says nothing at all.

Reaching up the Redhead covers the hand on her cheek with her own, her eyes never leaving Elizabeth Summers'.

"I forgive you." she whispers. "I love you." she adds at the end.

Elizabeth nods. My influence is complete now, they are on The Road and yet she cries. Her tears fall to rain upon the surface of The Road. The Redhead's own join in the cleansing of The Road.

Murky gray fails where there tears fall. The clean white grows, spreading across the surface and wiping away all trace of ash. The Road is pure again. It has been a very long indeed since the last time. It will not last but in the interim...

I appear before them.

Willow looks up at me. "Hello." she says politely.

Summoning the existence of an arm and a hand I point behind them. "Go to The Door." I say.

Willow glances over her shoulder at The Door, Elizabeth Summers' head resting against her shoulder, than the Redhead turns back to look up at me.

"Why?" she asks.

That gives me pause. "It is your place now." I finally say.

Again the Redhead glances over her shoulder at The Door. "What's through there?" She finally asks.

"Endings." I reply.

She thinks about that for a moment.

"No thanks." she replies with a shrug.

I move closer to them, "You will go." I intone.

Elizabeth Summers says nothing; her arms are wrapped about Willow's waist. Head resting against the Redhead's breast, eyes shut.

I move closer still, adding more to the self to tower above the pair.

Her eyes snap open and she too looks up at me.

Interesting. I see her will fold itself out of the fractured remains that she had been a moment before. It is formidable.

"The lady said no." the blonde growls at me.

Blonde. Her hair is blonde now.

Her denim jacket is blue, her jeans a darker blue. Her boots are black and shiny, reflecting the light of The White Road. The Redhead's sweater is pink, with a red rose in the center of her chest. Her dress is a dark, cool, midnight black as well.

They are real.

I have no power over them.

I move aside.

Without a backward glance, hand in hand, the two of them march past me, and away. As their presence lessens the White begins to change back. The Road before them is still white, but as they pass by, it begins to change back to that flat, neutral gray I know so well. Soon the two of them are beyond my sight.

This is very odd.

I am curious. I have not been curious in a ... a while.

Some have come upon The Road very, very briefly and than turned away to return whence they came. Never, in my memory, has any come away from The Road and The Door after being away from their sphere for so long.

I do not know what will happen.

I am going to find out.

I move to their Sphere, where they will be when they finish walking on The Road.

I find myself in the middle of woods. At the base of a large tree I see the two of them asleep. The morning sun is at the horizon, warm light sweeps across the ground. A ground not made of ash but of yellow, red, and brown leaves that reflect the morning light back into the sky. A blue sky.

I stay and watch the two of them, alive and breathing. Elizabeth Summers rests with her head in Willow's lap. The Redhead's fingers tangled in blonde hair. Both are caked with dried blood, their faces, clothing and hands.

I watch them sleep, and breath. I watch them be alive. I watch the line of morning light slowly crawl across the leaf covered earth toward them.

With a quiet cry and a great gasping of breath the two of them awaken. Elizabeth Summers sits straight up, tearing her hands from the friendly clasp of the Redhead's fingers. If she feels any pain she doesn't protest. Willow too lurches away from the trunk, bolting to her feet eyes wide in panic.

The Redhead standing and Elizabeth Summers still sitting upon the earth they look about them. Taking in their surroundings carefully, they are afraid. They look everywhere they can, to the tree, the sky, the sun, the earth, the leaves, they see it all around them. When there is finally nowhere else to look they turn to each other.

Elizabeth Summers stands up, automatically brushing caked leaves and dirt from her clothing. Willow is clasping her hands in front of her, their eyes never leave each other.

They both speak at the same time.

"Willow I remember everything!" The blonde says forcefully.

"Don't you dare tell me your forgot." The Redhead says, shaking her finger in the blonde's face.

They pause.

"What?" Elizabeth Summers asks.

"What?" Willow asks.

Again an awkward silence.

Moving as one they step into each other's embrace, their eyes closed but they know the way, the path is carved into each other. Their lips meet, hands slide up the others back to get tangled in mussed and oily hair.

A lesson then.

I borrow matter from one place and more from another. Shaping it by my will I leave my gift at their feet. Lessons work best when remembered.

Being in this sphere forces me to take a form, and that form works by rules that I do my best to ignore as they make me feel uncomfortable. Now these rules instruct this form and whisper to me.

'This is good', They tell me. 'This is right.'

It is best to go along with the rules sometimes. I do not struggle against the pull of form and rules of this Sphere.

I watch them kiss.

I smile.

So.

That's what happens when they turn from The Road and The Door. I look forward to the day when they return. I will watch for them.

Their kiss ends. They pull away slightly to look at each other in the morning light. The cool air dancing around them, causing the parts of their hair sticking up to flutter slightly.

"I..." Elizabeth starts to say. "I...had the weirdest dream Will."

"So did I." Willow replies.

One last exercise of will and my gift rolls across and, in defiance of the rules, up the slight incline they stand upon. It bumps into the blonde's foot.

"Ow." She says and glances down.

Bending over slowly she picks up my gift in a trembling hand.

"Buffy? What is it?" Willow asks, her eyebrows raised in worried curiosity.

Her face pale the blond silently holds out her hand. The sunlight glistens and bounces off the shiny, polished surface of the copper ball resting in her palm.

I return to The Road and The Door. Most find their way, some do not, some return to their own Sphere, some move willingly across, others are pulled. I am there for all of them. Mostly to watch, sometimes to guide. I am there, I am always there.

In that Sphere from whence came my short time companion a year passes. Again curiosity moves me and I go across to find them again. It is the day a year later. They sit in their dorm room at their college. They sit on either side of a small table in the middle of the room. Willow upon the right, Elizabeth Summers on the left. On the table, directly in the middle, resting on a small metal tripod sits the copper ball. With a trembling hand the blonde picks up a long black feather that lay in her lap. Smiling at the Redhead across from her she gently strokes the length of the feather across the surface of the copper ball once then sets the feather aside.

Willow smiles warmly and, standing up, reaches over the table with both hands to pull her other to her feet.

I leave them then.

The lesson has been learned. For the second time in my existence I have been there, not for an ending, but a beginning.

A Beginning.

The End

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