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emonySo, I promised I'd write various and sundry things this week - more DM AU, a Warren/Amy fic, something else that escapes me at the moment. None of the things I promised were this, but this still got written. They have a way of doing that, fics.
The idea just seemed so very obvious, I'd be quite amazed if no one's ever done anything similar before, but there you go. It's a bit weird. No, it's a lot weird, I think. But it wanted to be done, so here it is. It's set post-Chosen, post-Not Fade Away really. That's all I'm saying. But don't worry, no weirdass pairings or anything that needs a warning, I promise.
Unbetaed, so let me know if there's anything hinky, like if I suddenly change from present tense to past (tenses kick my ass) or if something doesn't make any sense. I think the ending's a bit shite, so I may rewrite it tomorrow, but there's a chance it's all a big pile of pants, so we'll see.
And hey, if you like it, feel free to let me know that too, okay? Thanks :)
*
They regard each other across the small room, and Tucker finds himself wondering when his little brother grew up and became such a prick.
Andrew folds his arms over his chest and blinks at Tucker from the other side of the bars. "So," he says, and he sounds almost the same as he did so many years ago when Tucker saw him last, the day he stormed out and vowed never to return to their aunts - one of the few vows made in his life that he's kept. "Are you ready to talk yet?"
Tucker just stares at him for second before breaking into a wide grin. "To you?" he asks, not sure whether to laugh or shake with fear at the thought of being held by an organization that willingly delegates power to Andrew. "What's the matter, all the real Watchers out at the company picnic, so they had to get you to pause in your busy schedule of photocopying and making tea to come talk to me? I'm touched. Really. But I don't have anything to say to any of you."
Andrew scowls, but doesn't take up the insult. "You have to talk to someone eventually," he says, all business and if Tucker were capable of feeling it, it might hurt to get such a non-reaction. "It'll probably be easier if it's me."
"What, because all the other Watchers are such assholes, but you just want to be my friend? Fuck off." Tucker pulls his knees up to his chest and concentrates on staring out of the little, barred window of his cell. He already knows help is on the way, he can feel it right down to the subatomic level of his skin, dancing.
"Because," Andrew says, and Tucker tries to tune him out because his whining voice is getting irritating now, "you're still my brother. We can help you. There's a program and stuff. You could be, you know, rehabilitated."
Tucker turns and stares. "And what, become a useful and productive member of society? Fuck that shit." He shakes his head, looking Andrew over as he stands, tight and tense, on the other side of the bars. He looks older, wiser, though that would hardly be difficult, and there's something in his eyes that says he's been through things Tucker probably doesn't want to know about. "What happened to you, man?" Tucker hears himself asking.
Andrew looks surprised for a second. "What?" he says. "Nothing. Well, lots of stuff, but .. Why?"
Tucker shakes his head. "Last I heard, you were hooked up with Warren and .. that short kid, what was his name?"
Andrew pales just slightly. "Jonathan," he says, quietly. Tucker tries to remember which one was Jonathan.
"Right, him. Messing around in Sunnydale, normal stuff. And now this?" He waved an arm vaguely in Andrew's direction, indicating the change - the clothes, the hair (what is that, post-modern hobbit?), the attitude. "What the fuck happened?"
Andrew looks down at the floor and starts picking at the thread of the button on the cuff of his jacket. "They're both dead," he says, after a while.
Tucker blinks. "They.." he starts after a few seconds of heavy silence, but Andrew cuts him off.
"When you decide you want out, ask someone to come get me," he says, turning away and walking swiftly out of the little prison area.
Tucker watches him go, then looks up at the back of the large man who's guarding his cell, and wonders how it is that he didn't already know.
*
"What the fuck is wrong with you?" Meg whines in his ear. "You've been a total bitch since you got back from that place. I keep expecting to walk in here and find you crying to Radiohead CDs."
Tucker continues to stare up at the ceiling from where he is lying on the pile of cushions on the floor.
"Seriously," Meg says, curling up against his side and closing her eyes. "What's wrong?"
"Did you ever meet my kid brother?" Tucker asks her. He feels Meg's head shaking against his shoulder, not that it needs to. He knows already that she and Andrew have never crossed paths. He met Meg a few months after leaving Sunnydale, and Andrew wasn't there when she came to break him out.
"He's one of them, you know?" Tucker says. "A Watcher."
"No way," Meg says, though she doesn't sound so surprised really. "And that's it?"
"Oh fuck no, I don't care about him," Tucker says, without much real feeling. "No, but he told me something, news from home kinda thing."
Meg nods again and starts absently running one hand over Tucker's chest. "Bad news?" she says, though she clearly doesn't care.
Tucker thinks about it for a few seconds. "I guess it's bad," he says. "Did I ever tell you about Warren?"
Meg doesn't open her eyes. "You never told me about anyone ever," she says. "You never told any of us. We always kinda figured you just appeared one day, fully formed, like one of those freaky cabbage patch dolls."
Tucker frowns. "That's so disturbing," he says, and Meg nods, a small smile creeping onto her face.
"So, who's Warren?" she asks, a tiny, dark-red spark jumping between her fingers as she flexes them.
"A guy from home. Sunnydale, I mean. We were at school together, for a while anyway." Tucker shuts his eyes and runs a hand through Meg's short, black hair.
"And?" she prompts, after a few seconds.
"Well, he's dead," Tucker tells her, as if it's obvious.
Meg thinks on it for a minute or two. "Okay," she says. "So, some guy you went to school with 'for a while' is dead, and you're all end of the world depressed? I'm clearly missing something." She shifts slightly and looks up at him. "You were.." she begins, but Tucker cuts her off as if she hasn't spoken.
"We were friends," he says, and it feels like that should be enough to explain why this all feels so weird to him.
Meg doesn't seem to know what to say to that, and instead she turns and settles herself back against his arm, flexing her fingers and watching the magic crackle between them.
"It's just, it's weird that I didn't know," Tucker says, into the silence. "I feel like I should've just known."
Meg reaches up and traces a finger down the side of Tucker's face. By the time she reaches his jaw, he's drifted off to somewhere else, and he doesn't know anything anymore.
*
He knows they've been planning behind his back for a few weeks, but Tucker's first personal involvement in the plan is when Aaron drops a copy of "History of Witchcraft" onto the table in front of him.
It lands with a heavy thump and Tucker looks up immediately, ready to tear whoever decided it'd be funny to scare the shit out of him a new one. Aaron looks down, his eyes wide and black, and then glances over at Meg.
"So, we're all set now," he says, soft southern accent floating across the room. "Time to do it?"
Tucker looks down at the book as Meg crosses the room and peers at it over his shoulder. "Yeah," she agrees. "Yeah, it's time. We've got everything?"
Aaron nods, and a few other members of their unusual family stir and stand, gathering around the table.
"What the fuck are you talking about?" Tucker asks, running a finger down the index of the book. "Time to do ..what?" The last word tails off into nothing as Tucker's finger reaches the chapter entitled "Resurrection -- A Controversy Born."
He looks up at Aaron, and then back at Meg, who is clearly behind all this. She grins smugly. "Are you fucking kidding me?" he asks.
She leans down, wrapping her arms around his shoulders. "It'll be cool," she says, still smiling. "I've always wanted to try resurrecting the dead, but there was never anyone I wanted to bring back. Except Kurt Cobain, maybe. But all of us together, we'd have to power for it. It'd be a hell of a kick. And hey, if Jesus can come back from the dead, why shouldn't your friend whats-his-name?"
Tucker looks back down at the book again. "This is crazy," he says, turning to the chapter in question. "This is nuts. I didn't like him that much."
Meg laughs breathily somewhere near his left ear. "Sure, whatever. But it would be cool, just to see if we could do it. Wouldn't it?"
The text is written as a history, what happened in the past more than a step-by-step guide, but the information it gives is more than enough to lead them through the process. Tucker follows the paragraphs with a finger as he reads, each word turning out any doubts he had before.
"It would be cool," he admits, halfway through the fourth paragraph.
An audible ripple of excitement passes around the room.
"We just need one more thing," Meg says, rubbing a hand against his shoulder. "We got pretty much everything else off the market."
Tucker nods. "What?"
"A photo," Meg says, clear, focused. "We just need a photo of him, and we're good to go."
Tucker stops, thinks, tries to imagine where he might have any photos at all. Three options present themselves, none of them avenues he's eager to take.
"I don't have any," he says, and disappointment hangs in the air for a moment. "But I can get one. Three choices - my mom, his mom, or Andrew."
"Who's easiest?" Meg asks. There's no question, now that they've made the plan, they will carry it out.
"His mom," Tucker says, with little consideration. "Andrew would want to know why I want it, my mom .. well, is my mom. Warren's mom, I can just tell her it’s for a collage for my kid's bedroom wall, whatever. She's so stupid, she probably won't even ask."
Meg nods. "Then let’s find her."
*
Getting the picture from Warren's mom turned out to be even easier than finding her. She hadn't seemed that surprised to see Tucker standing on her new doorstep in her new town some five years after she last saw him. She treats him as if he comes over every week, pours him some tea, offers him every photo album she owns, and asks nothing more than that he call her when he sees Warren again.
"I'm sure he means to call," she had said as Tucker left. "He's just so busy, I'm sure. Always busy, my boy, with some project or another."
Tucker smiled politely and made a mental note to do whatever he could to avoid the crazy old woman in the future.
Since they'd been in SoCal anyway, they'd decided that the actual summoning should be done in Sunnydale. "It makes sense," Meg had said, humming with energy as she sat in the front passenger seat of the van, between Tucker and Matt, who had driven them all with single-minded devotion that Tucker found quite unnerving. "Sunnydale's where he died, most likely. Sunnydale's where he'll be when we get him back. Plus, Hellmouth, wicked-bad energy, and a kick for the spell." She grins widely, and Tucker runs his finger along the thick edge of the photograph in his pocket.
It's not the one they use, just one that Tucker remembers being taken. That warm summer between junior and senior year, before Warren had fucked off to college, sitting out in the back yard, all of seventeen and still young enough to believe that life might get better. Warren's mom had appeared out of the backdoor with lemonade and cookies, and a camera in her hand, and despite their protestations had taken a few candid snaps before Warren told her to fuck off and leave them alone.
Sunnydale had seemed like the whole world back then. Now, now it was nothing but a hole in the ground.
It had been filled in since the collapse of the town, state authorities wanting to maintain the "natural disaster" or whatever cover story they'd used, and plants were starting to push through the sandy dust. The two vans were parked off to one side, and as a group, silently they had made their way to the epicenter. It wasn't hard to find, following the powerful vibrations of energy that emanated from beneath the soil to the point where the Hellmouth had once been, and still was, under all that dust.
They'd set out the scene, marked the ground, placed the candles and burned the herbs. A kind of peace flowed through them as a group as the moved through the stages, the calm of ritual overtaking them, and even as the energy grew, the power flowed around the circle, there remained a sense of magnitude, almost awe.
Dust flew up around them and Vanessa fainted, but it feels as if it has barely started when it ends, with no so much as bang, nor a whimper, but nothing at all.
As they sit on the ground, dazed and electric, Tucker looks over at Meg. Her eyes are wide and black, sparks twitching desperately at her fingers, and he knows he must look much the same to her. "What now?" he says, his throat hoarse and scratchy from shouting he doesn't remember doing.
"Now?" she says, looking over at him as if she's only just noticed he's there at all. "Now we wait."
Tucker lies back in the dirt, closes his eyes, and waits.
*
It's been three days, but when it finally happens it's not what Tucker expected. He'd thought Night of the Living Dead type crawling up through the ground, but instead he wakes up one afternoon to the sound of SUV engines approaching.
Meg is banging on the door of the van, yelling something, and gradually they're all hauled back to consciousness, standing between the two vans, each of them looking to the others from some kind of explanation.
"Do the dead drive SUVs?" Aaron asks quietly, and Tucker isn't sure whether to answer or laugh, until he sees the cars hovering on the horizon.
"Fuck!" he says loudly. "Fucking Watchers!"
Meg groans. "Don't they have enough to do watching all those Slayer chicks without stalking us?" She scuffs her black boots in the dirt and holds up one hand to shield her eyes against the low sun.
The SUVs approach fast, screeching to a halt next to the vans, black with tinted windows. Tucker looks, squinting to try and make out any figures inside, but it's impossible to tell how many there are, or even if there are people inside.
The front passenger door of the closest SUV opens and shiny, black, lace up shoes appear in the dirt. Tucker looks up and is disappointed but not entirely surprised to see Andrew looking back at him from behind thick black sunglasses.
Another door opens and another familiar face appears, also behind thick black sunglasses.
"What is this, Men In Black?" Meg mutters, scowling and folding her arms over her chest.
Andrew steps forward, but then stops and looks back, deferring to his colleague.
Rupert Giles looks over the group, leaning back against the side of the SUV he arrived in. "I wondered how long it would take," he says, smooth accent belying harsh words. "A Hellmouth like this, out in the open, it was only a matter of time before some dark group decided to use that power for their own purposes. I must admit, I'm surprised. I expected," he pauses, and looks the group over, "a slightly more mature group." Tucker hears Meg scoff at his side, and bites back a smile. "And I'm also rather surprised that you were stupid enough to stay here. Surely you knew we'd come for you."
"Maybe we don't care," Tucker says, leaning back against the backdoor of the van.
Giles looks over at him, considers him for a second. "Ah, yes, you must be Andrew's brother. Yes, Buffy told me all about you."
Tucker scowls. Andrew's brother? As if. Andrew is his brother, not the other way around.
"Why are you here," Andrew asks, a little less confident than the last time Tucker saw him, which Tucker puts down to his boss being only a few feet away.
He shrugs. "Maybe I got homesick," he says, squinting against the sun. "Wanted to see the old place again. That's not a crime."
"No," Giles agrees, "and nor is magic of the degree you were playing with three days ago, but we're still here to deal with it."
"You're a little late to stop us, don't you think?" Meg says, twisting her fingers around the pleats of her skirt.
Giles regards her for a moment, eyes dragging almost unconsciously over her figure. "We're not here to stop it, we're here to stop you."
"Us?" Meg says, her voice all sweet and empty. "But we're just a bunch of stupid kids, what harm could we possibly do to you big, strong Watchers?"
"It's not harm to us," Andrew says, step forward again to stand in front of his SUV. "It's harm to the universe. It's not right, messing with stuff like that."
"And what gives you the right to dictate what's right for us?" Matt says, Vanessa nodding at his side. "Do you even know what we did?"
Andrew and Giles exchange a look. "No," Giles admits. "But we know it was big, big enough to catch our attention. Anything that big, can't be good."
"You know what last pinged our radar?" Meg says. "Your little spell to make Slayers of every pre-pubescent bimbo in the world. Remember that? You want to talk about big spells, maybe you should start there. We all felt that one."
"That was white magic, good magic," Giles says, just a hint of defensiveness creeping into his voice. "Its purpose was just."
Meg smiles, triumphant. "And who gets to decide what's 'white' magic, like it even exists." She kicks up some dirt. "For all you know, we were doing healing spells, communing with nature or some shit like that."
"Somehow I doubt that," Giles says dryly.
"Whatever we were doing," Tucker says, stepping forward and back into the action, "it's none of your fucking business, and you have no right to tell us what to do."
"We followed you," Andrew says, quiet in the harsh, open space of the dessert, "to Warren's mom's house. She said you wanted photos."
Tucker pauses, momentarily thrown. "Yeah," he says, as casually as he can. "So what?"
Andrew's brow creases, and Tucker is fairly sure he's weighing up his desire to ask against his reluctance to hear any possible answer. Curiosity wins, and with a glance over at Giles, Andrew asks the question. "Why did you want a photo of him?"
Tucker smiles. "Because," he says, and that's it. "Don't forget, kid," he says to Andrew, "he was my friend before he was ever yours."
Andrew stares back at Tucker for a few minutes, silence heavy across the dessert and Tucker almost forgets there's anyone else there at all until Meg coughs on the dust and Matt starts shuffling his feet off to Tucker's right.
"Warren was never my friend," Andrew says, a mixture of sadness, anger and resignation, before turning and getting back into the SUV, slamming the door behind him.
Giles watches him go before turning back to the group before him. "A photo?" he says, looking at Tucker. Tucker nods, Meg grins widely, and Giles shakes his head. "It won't work, you know," he says, not so much Watcher giving a warning as elder passing on advice to the next generation. "It never does, not the way you want."
"Yeah," Meg says, because Tucker can't find seem to answer, "but what a rush."
Giles looks out over the group, then shakes his head. "Don't say you weren't warned," he says, turning back to his car.
The first two SUVs are already revving their engines, and Tucker watches them all until they've faded into the sunset.
Meg appears at his side, linking her arm through his, and rests her head against his shoulder. "So," she asks, "did we just .. win?"
Tucker stares at the horizon. "I don't know."
*
It's a day later and the dust is swirling when they find Warren, sitting on the ground with his knees drawn up to his chest, sketching pictures in the dirt.
They wrap blankets around him, coax him into the van, and take him back to a home he's never seen in Flagstaff, Arizona.
Tucker sits in the back of the van all the way, watching Warren as he stares out the window, sleeps, and watches Tucker right back. Meg crawls over from time to time, leaning down to stroke Warren's hair and whisper words Tucker can only guess at.
"He's one of us now," she says, by way of explanation, curling up closer against Warren's side.
Tucker watches them silently and wonders if this is what Giles meant about things not working out the way they were meant to.
*
end.
The idea just seemed so very obvious, I'd be quite amazed if no one's ever done anything similar before, but there you go. It's a bit weird. No, it's a lot weird, I think. But it wanted to be done, so here it is. It's set post-Chosen, post-Not Fade Away really. That's all I'm saying. But don't worry, no weirdass pairings or anything that needs a warning, I promise.
Unbetaed, so let me know if there's anything hinky, like if I suddenly change from present tense to past (tenses kick my ass) or if something doesn't make any sense. I think the ending's a bit shite, so I may rewrite it tomorrow, but there's a chance it's all a big pile of pants, so we'll see.
And hey, if you like it, feel free to let me know that too, okay? Thanks :)
*
They regard each other across the small room, and Tucker finds himself wondering when his little brother grew up and became such a prick.
Andrew folds his arms over his chest and blinks at Tucker from the other side of the bars. "So," he says, and he sounds almost the same as he did so many years ago when Tucker saw him last, the day he stormed out and vowed never to return to their aunts - one of the few vows made in his life that he's kept. "Are you ready to talk yet?"
Tucker just stares at him for second before breaking into a wide grin. "To you?" he asks, not sure whether to laugh or shake with fear at the thought of being held by an organization that willingly delegates power to Andrew. "What's the matter, all the real Watchers out at the company picnic, so they had to get you to pause in your busy schedule of photocopying and making tea to come talk to me? I'm touched. Really. But I don't have anything to say to any of you."
Andrew scowls, but doesn't take up the insult. "You have to talk to someone eventually," he says, all business and if Tucker were capable of feeling it, it might hurt to get such a non-reaction. "It'll probably be easier if it's me."
"What, because all the other Watchers are such assholes, but you just want to be my friend? Fuck off." Tucker pulls his knees up to his chest and concentrates on staring out of the little, barred window of his cell. He already knows help is on the way, he can feel it right down to the subatomic level of his skin, dancing.
"Because," Andrew says, and Tucker tries to tune him out because his whining voice is getting irritating now, "you're still my brother. We can help you. There's a program and stuff. You could be, you know, rehabilitated."
Tucker turns and stares. "And what, become a useful and productive member of society? Fuck that shit." He shakes his head, looking Andrew over as he stands, tight and tense, on the other side of the bars. He looks older, wiser, though that would hardly be difficult, and there's something in his eyes that says he's been through things Tucker probably doesn't want to know about. "What happened to you, man?" Tucker hears himself asking.
Andrew looks surprised for a second. "What?" he says. "Nothing. Well, lots of stuff, but .. Why?"
Tucker shakes his head. "Last I heard, you were hooked up with Warren and .. that short kid, what was his name?"
Andrew pales just slightly. "Jonathan," he says, quietly. Tucker tries to remember which one was Jonathan.
"Right, him. Messing around in Sunnydale, normal stuff. And now this?" He waved an arm vaguely in Andrew's direction, indicating the change - the clothes, the hair (what is that, post-modern hobbit?), the attitude. "What the fuck happened?"
Andrew looks down at the floor and starts picking at the thread of the button on the cuff of his jacket. "They're both dead," he says, after a while.
Tucker blinks. "They.." he starts after a few seconds of heavy silence, but Andrew cuts him off.
"When you decide you want out, ask someone to come get me," he says, turning away and walking swiftly out of the little prison area.
Tucker watches him go, then looks up at the back of the large man who's guarding his cell, and wonders how it is that he didn't already know.
*
"What the fuck is wrong with you?" Meg whines in his ear. "You've been a total bitch since you got back from that place. I keep expecting to walk in here and find you crying to Radiohead CDs."
Tucker continues to stare up at the ceiling from where he is lying on the pile of cushions on the floor.
"Seriously," Meg says, curling up against his side and closing her eyes. "What's wrong?"
"Did you ever meet my kid brother?" Tucker asks her. He feels Meg's head shaking against his shoulder, not that it needs to. He knows already that she and Andrew have never crossed paths. He met Meg a few months after leaving Sunnydale, and Andrew wasn't there when she came to break him out.
"He's one of them, you know?" Tucker says. "A Watcher."
"No way," Meg says, though she doesn't sound so surprised really. "And that's it?"
"Oh fuck no, I don't care about him," Tucker says, without much real feeling. "No, but he told me something, news from home kinda thing."
Meg nods again and starts absently running one hand over Tucker's chest. "Bad news?" she says, though she clearly doesn't care.
Tucker thinks about it for a few seconds. "I guess it's bad," he says. "Did I ever tell you about Warren?"
Meg doesn't open her eyes. "You never told me about anyone ever," she says. "You never told any of us. We always kinda figured you just appeared one day, fully formed, like one of those freaky cabbage patch dolls."
Tucker frowns. "That's so disturbing," he says, and Meg nods, a small smile creeping onto her face.
"So, who's Warren?" she asks, a tiny, dark-red spark jumping between her fingers as she flexes them.
"A guy from home. Sunnydale, I mean. We were at school together, for a while anyway." Tucker shuts his eyes and runs a hand through Meg's short, black hair.
"And?" she prompts, after a few seconds.
"Well, he's dead," Tucker tells her, as if it's obvious.
Meg thinks on it for a minute or two. "Okay," she says. "So, some guy you went to school with 'for a while' is dead, and you're all end of the world depressed? I'm clearly missing something." She shifts slightly and looks up at him. "You were.." she begins, but Tucker cuts her off as if she hasn't spoken.
"We were friends," he says, and it feels like that should be enough to explain why this all feels so weird to him.
Meg doesn't seem to know what to say to that, and instead she turns and settles herself back against his arm, flexing her fingers and watching the magic crackle between them.
"It's just, it's weird that I didn't know," Tucker says, into the silence. "I feel like I should've just known."
Meg reaches up and traces a finger down the side of Tucker's face. By the time she reaches his jaw, he's drifted off to somewhere else, and he doesn't know anything anymore.
*
He knows they've been planning behind his back for a few weeks, but Tucker's first personal involvement in the plan is when Aaron drops a copy of "History of Witchcraft" onto the table in front of him.
It lands with a heavy thump and Tucker looks up immediately, ready to tear whoever decided it'd be funny to scare the shit out of him a new one. Aaron looks down, his eyes wide and black, and then glances over at Meg.
"So, we're all set now," he says, soft southern accent floating across the room. "Time to do it?"
Tucker looks down at the book as Meg crosses the room and peers at it over his shoulder. "Yeah," she agrees. "Yeah, it's time. We've got everything?"
Aaron nods, and a few other members of their unusual family stir and stand, gathering around the table.
"What the fuck are you talking about?" Tucker asks, running a finger down the index of the book. "Time to do ..what?" The last word tails off into nothing as Tucker's finger reaches the chapter entitled "Resurrection -- A Controversy Born."
He looks up at Aaron, and then back at Meg, who is clearly behind all this. She grins smugly. "Are you fucking kidding me?" he asks.
She leans down, wrapping her arms around his shoulders. "It'll be cool," she says, still smiling. "I've always wanted to try resurrecting the dead, but there was never anyone I wanted to bring back. Except Kurt Cobain, maybe. But all of us together, we'd have to power for it. It'd be a hell of a kick. And hey, if Jesus can come back from the dead, why shouldn't your friend whats-his-name?"
Tucker looks back down at the book again. "This is crazy," he says, turning to the chapter in question. "This is nuts. I didn't like him that much."
Meg laughs breathily somewhere near his left ear. "Sure, whatever. But it would be cool, just to see if we could do it. Wouldn't it?"
The text is written as a history, what happened in the past more than a step-by-step guide, but the information it gives is more than enough to lead them through the process. Tucker follows the paragraphs with a finger as he reads, each word turning out any doubts he had before.
"It would be cool," he admits, halfway through the fourth paragraph.
An audible ripple of excitement passes around the room.
"We just need one more thing," Meg says, rubbing a hand against his shoulder. "We got pretty much everything else off the market."
Tucker nods. "What?"
"A photo," Meg says, clear, focused. "We just need a photo of him, and we're good to go."
Tucker stops, thinks, tries to imagine where he might have any photos at all. Three options present themselves, none of them avenues he's eager to take.
"I don't have any," he says, and disappointment hangs in the air for a moment. "But I can get one. Three choices - my mom, his mom, or Andrew."
"Who's easiest?" Meg asks. There's no question, now that they've made the plan, they will carry it out.
"His mom," Tucker says, with little consideration. "Andrew would want to know why I want it, my mom .. well, is my mom. Warren's mom, I can just tell her it’s for a collage for my kid's bedroom wall, whatever. She's so stupid, she probably won't even ask."
Meg nods. "Then let’s find her."
*
Getting the picture from Warren's mom turned out to be even easier than finding her. She hadn't seemed that surprised to see Tucker standing on her new doorstep in her new town some five years after she last saw him. She treats him as if he comes over every week, pours him some tea, offers him every photo album she owns, and asks nothing more than that he call her when he sees Warren again.
"I'm sure he means to call," she had said as Tucker left. "He's just so busy, I'm sure. Always busy, my boy, with some project or another."
Tucker smiled politely and made a mental note to do whatever he could to avoid the crazy old woman in the future.
Since they'd been in SoCal anyway, they'd decided that the actual summoning should be done in Sunnydale. "It makes sense," Meg had said, humming with energy as she sat in the front passenger seat of the van, between Tucker and Matt, who had driven them all with single-minded devotion that Tucker found quite unnerving. "Sunnydale's where he died, most likely. Sunnydale's where he'll be when we get him back. Plus, Hellmouth, wicked-bad energy, and a kick for the spell." She grins widely, and Tucker runs his finger along the thick edge of the photograph in his pocket.
It's not the one they use, just one that Tucker remembers being taken. That warm summer between junior and senior year, before Warren had fucked off to college, sitting out in the back yard, all of seventeen and still young enough to believe that life might get better. Warren's mom had appeared out of the backdoor with lemonade and cookies, and a camera in her hand, and despite their protestations had taken a few candid snaps before Warren told her to fuck off and leave them alone.
Sunnydale had seemed like the whole world back then. Now, now it was nothing but a hole in the ground.
It had been filled in since the collapse of the town, state authorities wanting to maintain the "natural disaster" or whatever cover story they'd used, and plants were starting to push through the sandy dust. The two vans were parked off to one side, and as a group, silently they had made their way to the epicenter. It wasn't hard to find, following the powerful vibrations of energy that emanated from beneath the soil to the point where the Hellmouth had once been, and still was, under all that dust.
They'd set out the scene, marked the ground, placed the candles and burned the herbs. A kind of peace flowed through them as a group as the moved through the stages, the calm of ritual overtaking them, and even as the energy grew, the power flowed around the circle, there remained a sense of magnitude, almost awe.
Dust flew up around them and Vanessa fainted, but it feels as if it has barely started when it ends, with no so much as bang, nor a whimper, but nothing at all.
As they sit on the ground, dazed and electric, Tucker looks over at Meg. Her eyes are wide and black, sparks twitching desperately at her fingers, and he knows he must look much the same to her. "What now?" he says, his throat hoarse and scratchy from shouting he doesn't remember doing.
"Now?" she says, looking over at him as if she's only just noticed he's there at all. "Now we wait."
Tucker lies back in the dirt, closes his eyes, and waits.
*
It's been three days, but when it finally happens it's not what Tucker expected. He'd thought Night of the Living Dead type crawling up through the ground, but instead he wakes up one afternoon to the sound of SUV engines approaching.
Meg is banging on the door of the van, yelling something, and gradually they're all hauled back to consciousness, standing between the two vans, each of them looking to the others from some kind of explanation.
"Do the dead drive SUVs?" Aaron asks quietly, and Tucker isn't sure whether to answer or laugh, until he sees the cars hovering on the horizon.
"Fuck!" he says loudly. "Fucking Watchers!"
Meg groans. "Don't they have enough to do watching all those Slayer chicks without stalking us?" She scuffs her black boots in the dirt and holds up one hand to shield her eyes against the low sun.
The SUVs approach fast, screeching to a halt next to the vans, black with tinted windows. Tucker looks, squinting to try and make out any figures inside, but it's impossible to tell how many there are, or even if there are people inside.
The front passenger door of the closest SUV opens and shiny, black, lace up shoes appear in the dirt. Tucker looks up and is disappointed but not entirely surprised to see Andrew looking back at him from behind thick black sunglasses.
Another door opens and another familiar face appears, also behind thick black sunglasses.
"What is this, Men In Black?" Meg mutters, scowling and folding her arms over her chest.
Andrew steps forward, but then stops and looks back, deferring to his colleague.
Rupert Giles looks over the group, leaning back against the side of the SUV he arrived in. "I wondered how long it would take," he says, smooth accent belying harsh words. "A Hellmouth like this, out in the open, it was only a matter of time before some dark group decided to use that power for their own purposes. I must admit, I'm surprised. I expected," he pauses, and looks the group over, "a slightly more mature group." Tucker hears Meg scoff at his side, and bites back a smile. "And I'm also rather surprised that you were stupid enough to stay here. Surely you knew we'd come for you."
"Maybe we don't care," Tucker says, leaning back against the backdoor of the van.
Giles looks over at him, considers him for a second. "Ah, yes, you must be Andrew's brother. Yes, Buffy told me all about you."
Tucker scowls. Andrew's brother? As if. Andrew is his brother, not the other way around.
"Why are you here," Andrew asks, a little less confident than the last time Tucker saw him, which Tucker puts down to his boss being only a few feet away.
He shrugs. "Maybe I got homesick," he says, squinting against the sun. "Wanted to see the old place again. That's not a crime."
"No," Giles agrees, "and nor is magic of the degree you were playing with three days ago, but we're still here to deal with it."
"You're a little late to stop us, don't you think?" Meg says, twisting her fingers around the pleats of her skirt.
Giles regards her for a moment, eyes dragging almost unconsciously over her figure. "We're not here to stop it, we're here to stop you."
"Us?" Meg says, her voice all sweet and empty. "But we're just a bunch of stupid kids, what harm could we possibly do to you big, strong Watchers?"
"It's not harm to us," Andrew says, step forward again to stand in front of his SUV. "It's harm to the universe. It's not right, messing with stuff like that."
"And what gives you the right to dictate what's right for us?" Matt says, Vanessa nodding at his side. "Do you even know what we did?"
Andrew and Giles exchange a look. "No," Giles admits. "But we know it was big, big enough to catch our attention. Anything that big, can't be good."
"You know what last pinged our radar?" Meg says. "Your little spell to make Slayers of every pre-pubescent bimbo in the world. Remember that? You want to talk about big spells, maybe you should start there. We all felt that one."
"That was white magic, good magic," Giles says, just a hint of defensiveness creeping into his voice. "Its purpose was just."
Meg smiles, triumphant. "And who gets to decide what's 'white' magic, like it even exists." She kicks up some dirt. "For all you know, we were doing healing spells, communing with nature or some shit like that."
"Somehow I doubt that," Giles says dryly.
"Whatever we were doing," Tucker says, stepping forward and back into the action, "it's none of your fucking business, and you have no right to tell us what to do."
"We followed you," Andrew says, quiet in the harsh, open space of the dessert, "to Warren's mom's house. She said you wanted photos."
Tucker pauses, momentarily thrown. "Yeah," he says, as casually as he can. "So what?"
Andrew's brow creases, and Tucker is fairly sure he's weighing up his desire to ask against his reluctance to hear any possible answer. Curiosity wins, and with a glance over at Giles, Andrew asks the question. "Why did you want a photo of him?"
Tucker smiles. "Because," he says, and that's it. "Don't forget, kid," he says to Andrew, "he was my friend before he was ever yours."
Andrew stares back at Tucker for a few minutes, silence heavy across the dessert and Tucker almost forgets there's anyone else there at all until Meg coughs on the dust and Matt starts shuffling his feet off to Tucker's right.
"Warren was never my friend," Andrew says, a mixture of sadness, anger and resignation, before turning and getting back into the SUV, slamming the door behind him.
Giles watches him go before turning back to the group before him. "A photo?" he says, looking at Tucker. Tucker nods, Meg grins widely, and Giles shakes his head. "It won't work, you know," he says, not so much Watcher giving a warning as elder passing on advice to the next generation. "It never does, not the way you want."
"Yeah," Meg says, because Tucker can't find seem to answer, "but what a rush."
Giles looks out over the group, then shakes his head. "Don't say you weren't warned," he says, turning back to his car.
The first two SUVs are already revving their engines, and Tucker watches them all until they've faded into the sunset.
Meg appears at his side, linking her arm through his, and rests her head against his shoulder. "So," she asks, "did we just .. win?"
Tucker stares at the horizon. "I don't know."
*
It's a day later and the dust is swirling when they find Warren, sitting on the ground with his knees drawn up to his chest, sketching pictures in the dirt.
They wrap blankets around him, coax him into the van, and take him back to a home he's never seen in Flagstaff, Arizona.
Tucker sits in the back of the van all the way, watching Warren as he stares out the window, sleeps, and watches Tucker right back. Meg crawls over from time to time, leaning down to stroke Warren's hair and whisper words Tucker can only guess at.
"He's one of us now," she says, by way of explanation, curling up closer against Warren's side.
Tucker watches them silently and wonders if this is what Giles meant about things not working out the way they were meant to.
*
end.
