My Life is Different Ch. 02

Then an inspiration came to me. If we went to his funeral, we could see who else showed up. The odds were very good that other secret paramilitary guys would show up for Chip's funeral.

"Oh, no," A confident male voice said from behind Buffy, Spike and me, "I can't allow you to do that."

Almost in unison, Buffy, Spike and I turned to see who had snuck up on us. The light in the classroom wasn't very good, but even in the dim lighting, I could see that the guy looked exactly like Chip. Not just similar to Chip, but identical, like as if he were an identical twin.

"Oh, bloody hell," Spike exclaimed, apparently noticing the intruder's identical appearance to the dead guy at our feet.

"If you tell people that Chip Manning is dead, it's going to ruin all my carefully laid plans, and I really can't have that," the sinister newcomer said.

And then he favored us with a grin that displayed lots of perfectly, straight, white teeth.

According to my math, everything about this guy added up to equal bad guy. He was smiling happily while standing just a few yards away from a freshly killed corpse, he was telling Buffy and I what to do and he had "carefully laid plans" that involved hiding a dead body.

Also, his identical appearance to Chip probably meant he was some sort of shape-shifter, or possibly an evil robot, or maybe a vampire version of Chip conjured up from an alternate timeline.

"No offense," said Buffy taking two steps closer to Chip's doppelganger, but you're on my turf, and if anybody's going to be making carefully laid plans, it's going to be me."

My chest kinda felt like it was swelling with pride when Buffy said that. She was so brave and heroic. And even though we were both the same height, she seemed like she stood at least six feet tall when she said stuff like that.

"Such overconfidence," Chip's doppelganger said, "I like that in an opponent. It's amusing."

He was still grinning that disconcerting grin when he darted forward with superhuman speed and grabbed for Buffy's throat. Buffy did a series of backflips that propelled her backwards at superhuman speed.

Buffy's maneuver prevented the doppelganger from grabbing her throat, however his hands changed as he lunged forward and grew some sort of sharp, inhuman-looking claws. When both Buffy and the doppelganger paused, I saw that Buffy's jeans had been ripped in three places and three incisions down one of her shapely thighs.

Once I saw that this guy had wounded Buffy, my heart began to beat painfully fast in my chest. Buffy has a lot of enemies, however she's usually too strong, too fast and too resourceful to allow any of her enemies to wound her in combat. Apparently Chip's doppelganger was a bigger threat than most of the things Buffy ran up against.

Spike didn't seem the least bit upset about the threat that Chip's doppelganger presented and indeed, seemed rather thrilled with the situation.

"Yeah, Big guy! Kick her ass!" Spike shouted and pumped one fist in the air, pretty much like he was a football fan, cheering on his favorite team.

The doppelganger didn't seem to share Spike's sense of solidarity. Ignoring Buffy for the moment, the doppelganger spun in Spike's direction and punched Spike in the midsection. He moved so fast, you would have missed the entire thing if you weren't watching intently.

Spike let out a startled whuff as the inhumanly fast fist slammed into him, knocking him back and sending him flying until he hit the wall on the south side of the classroom. When Spike's body hit the wall, it was with so much force that I think every wall in the school shook.

Spike collapsed to the floor, annoyed, but not visibly afraid. Spike was over a hundred years old and had battled plenty of dangerous opponents. He didn't scare easily.

Then he gave the doppelganger an intensely annoyed look and exclaimed, "Oh, very nice! I was on your side!"

"The three of you aren't exactly human, are you?" the doppelganger asked in a creepy, inquisition tone, "What fun. I do believe that this will make your deaths more entertaining. Please, do attempt to put up a spirited fight."

While the doppelganger had been directing his attentions at Spike, Buffy had apparently managed to improvise a weapon with some of the debris in the classroom. With the doppelganger attention focused on Spike, Buffy swung a galvanized iron pipe across the back of his skull. There was a satisfying thunk sound when iron pipe smashed into the back of the doppelganger's skull, and an even more satisfying bellow of inhuman pain from the doppelganger's lips, however the doppelganger didn't even stagger under the blow. He barely even flinched.

"Naaʼahóóhai," the doppelganger swore at Buffy, then he swung his clawed hand around to backhand Buffy across the face.

Buffy raised the iron pipe up in a reflexive attempt to parry the blow and she managed to protect her face, however the doppelganger's backhand hit with such force that it knocked the iron pipe out of her hands.

As the iron pipe clattered to the floor, Buffy kicked the doppelganger in the solar plexus. This caused him to double over and make an oof sound, however within an instant he counterattacked, claws out, aiming to rip a hole in her ribcage.

Buffy's reflexes are superhuman-fast and she evaded the brunt of the blow, although he tore her shirt open and left four ugly lacerations across her flat belly and her ribcage. He had made Buffy bleed again and I was starting to get really worried.

And then; without warning; Spike picked up an entire filing cabinet, lifted it up high and brought it down with extraordinary force across the back of the doppelganger's skull. There was a deafening sound of thunderous impact as the metal structure of the filing cabinet buckled, crumpled and twisted upon violent impact with skull, spine and shoulders of our inhuman opponent.

"Bloody amateurs," Spike exclaimed when the doppelganger lay prostrate on the floor, apparently defeated.

"Kick her ass?" Buffy asked, looking annoyed and raising an eyebrow at Spike.

"Yeah, well, we're not exactly friends, are we?" Spike asked. "This bloody chip in my head means I can't hit you, but I'm still a bloody vampire, and you're still a slayer. It's only natural for me to want to see you get your ass handed to you."

And then, even though I was incensed by Spike's attitude towards my girlfriend, that's when the big revelation hit me.

"Spike, the chip," I said excitedly, the science-nerd part of my brain taking over.

"Yeah?"

"You bludgeoned that shape-shifter to death and the chip didn't do anything. I think maybe the chip is only designed to keep you from hurting humans."

For a long time, Spike didn't say anything. He just stared at me with big, thoughtful eyes. Then he looked down at the doppelganger and smiled. His smile wasn't as creepy at the doppelganger's smile, but it still looked abnormal and disturbing.

"I can hit a demon," Spike said reverently. He said it with such awe in his voice, he seemed almost like a holy man who had just met his deity face-to-face.

For a few seconds, Spike looked so happy I could almost believe that a vampire and a vampire-slayer could be friends. Spike jumped ups and down, lifted his arms up above his head as if he had just scored a touchdown and screamed something about not being neutered anymore. I'd never seen him emoting with this much joy and enthusiasm before.

And then, all hell broke loose.

Much to our surprise, the doppelganger wasn't really dead. He wasn't even really wounded. And when he resumed moving, he moved with inhuman speed. He grabbed the twisted, metal debris that was once a filing cabinet and hurled it at Spike like a missile.

The impact knocked Spike a good ten feet across the room.

Buffy immediately snatched up the iron pipe and held it up like a club, intent on using it as a weapon. Buffy was wounded and bleeding, and the doppelganger was crazy-strong, but Buffy was still defiant in the face of danger.

Apparently Spike intended to be defiant in the face of danger, too. He hurled himself at the doppelganger and grappled with him. He got an iron-like grip around the shape-shifter's shoulders and the back of his neck and held him in a full nelson.

"Let's see you use those funky claws of yours now," Spike said defiantly as he yanked back, forcing his opponent to arch his back and look up at the ceiling.

Buffy sprang forward to take advantage of the doppelganger's partial immobility, however before she could hit him with her pipe, the doppelganger changed.

It was a freakish sight to see. The doppelganger's neck, skull, shoulders and arms all increased in size, while his lower body remained unchanged. There was such a wrongness and such a lack of symmetry to this creature, it seemed like something from a lunatic's nightmare. And then it looked at me with its grotesquely large eyeballs and said, "After I kill them, you're next."

Buffy screamed and charged the doppelganger, however the doppelganger broke free from Spike's grip and then used Spike like a club. He held Spike by one of his wrists and swung Spike from left to right, bludgeoning Buffy with Spike's body.

I had never seen a villain pick up an opponent and use him as a weapon to beat another opponent, but apparently this creature could do it. Spike struggled, but he was helpless to break free from this thing's grip.

Buffy deftly maneuvered out of the doppelganger's range, but then the doppelganger just threw Spike at her and before Buffy could react, Spike slammed into her like a guided missile and she and Spike went down in a tumble of arms and legs.

Neither one of them got up after they hit the floor, and without Spike or Buffy to worry about, the doppelganger gave me a look of malicious intent and I only had a few seconds to make a decision.

I looked over at the recumbent figures of Buffy and Spike, raised a shaky hand and shouted, "Effugio!"

Instantly a portal opened up in the fabric of reality. I had no idea where the portal would lead, but wherever it led, it would have to be better than where I was. Buffy and Spike got drawn into the portal first because I formed the portal directly around them, then I hurriedly leapt into the portal with Buffy and shut the spell down so that the doppelganger wouldn't be able to follow us.

I'm pretty sure I could hear the sound of the doppelganger screaming in rage and frustration as the portal closed.

* * * * * * * * *

The portal closed up, and I found myself outdoors, underneath a moonlit sky on what looked like some sort of dirt path with Buffy and Spike laying at my feet. Both Buffy and Spike were unconscious and the claw marks on Buffy's thigh and torso looked awfully deep. Her shirt and her jeans were both stained with disturbingly large amounts of her own blood.

I had no idea where we were. I didn't see any signs anywhere to indicate where we landed. The portal spell could have taken us anywhere on the planet. For all I knew, we could be in Brazil or Uganda or Mexico. I was hoping that we ended up somewhere that the locals spoke a certain amount of English, on account of I never really mastered any foreign languages, and Buffy was pretty badly wounded. Asking for help in Bantu, Portuguese or Spanish would be pretty difficult when the only language I've ever really mastered is English.

Then I heard a woman's voice excitedly exclaim, "Oh my God! That was awesome!!"

Okay, that was a good sign. That totally sounded like English.

I looked up the dirt path and a woman emerged from the darkness. She was wearing hiking boots, had a hiking stick and just generally looked like she was fixed for hiking. She also had a look of rapt fascination on her face.

"You just appeared out of nowhere," the woman said wildly, "That was incredible! There was a bright light and suddenly there you were! Are you a wizard or something?"

"Um, hi," I said, taken somewhat aback by this woman's enthusiasm. I hadn't considered the possibility of someone actually seeing the portal open when Buffy and I came out. "Yeah, something like that."

Then I added, "Listen my friend here is wounded and I really need to get her someplace where I can see how her injuries are and maybe bandage her up."

The woman reached into her pack and pulled out a flashlight that was smaller than my fist and shined it down on the ground near my feet. She saw Buffy and Spike lying there unconscious. Buffy's clothes had been torn up really bad and there was a lot of blood where the doppelganger had clawed at her.

She gasped and then she asked, "Is she a wizard too?"

"No, she's not," I answered. "Look, she's not a wizard, but she's one of the good guys, and I don't want her to die, okay? Can you help me move her and get her to a hospital?"

"Sure, I can help," the woman replied. "What about the guy on the ground next to her? Is he one of the good guys too? Or is he the one who gave her all of those cuts"

I had to think about that for a few seconds. Was Spike a good guy? He had tried to kill both Buffy and me several times, however he had changed significantly ever since that chip had been put into his head.

"That's a hard question to answer," I replied. "He used to be a bad guy, but now his status is a little confusing. He's helped us a few times."

Eventually we decided to move both Buffy and Spike.

The woman's name was Justine and she had a pickup truck parked about three-hundred yards from where my portal had opened up. We were in a place called Coyote Hills Regional Park and the dirt path I met her on, was a hiking path that ran through most of the park.

I grabbed Buffy around the shoulders and upper torso and tried to pull her unconscious body along as I walked down the hiking path. Buffy's feet dangled and dragged along the ground and I huffed and puffed, but managed to bring her along with me.

Justine; on the other hand; just picked Spike up and threw him over her shoulder. She carried him like he weighed about as much as a sack of potatoes. Damn, she was strong.

Spike was laid down in the bed of the pickup truck, while Buffy was wedged into the front seat between Justine and me.

"So, can't you do a healing spell?" Justine asked, "I mean, you're a wizard and all. You can do stuff like that, can't you?"

Justine's question was a simple, straightforward one, but the answer was somewhat complicated. Healing spells were real, but there were many different kinds, and I hadn't mastered any of them.

"Well no, I mean yes, I mean maybe," then I took a deep breath and tried to elaborate, "I can't do anything for Spike because technically he's not human. He's sort of undead and healing spells never work on the undead."

"What? You mean he's a zombie? I touched a zombie?"

"No, he's not a zombie. And technically zombies aren't undead. They're just dead...I think. Spike is a vampire, but he's a really special case."

Justine had been driving, but she slammed on the brakes when I told her Spike was a vampire and looked at me with a sort of angry panic in her eyes.

"How special?" she demanded. "I may not be a wizard, but I've seen almost every vampire movie ever made, and the vampires are always killing humans and if Spike is going to go on a killing spree, I can just dump him out on the side of the road right now and never look back!"

So, we sat there with the truck's engine idling while I explained all about computer chip in Spike's head and how it kept him from killing people. It was weird watching Justine's facial expression change from angry panic to stunned disbelief.

After a long, stunned silence, Justine finally responded, "You wizards live a strange life," and the truck started moving again.

"So, you can't do a healing spell on Spike, on account of he's a vampire," Justine said as she drove away from the park, "But what about Buffy? Could you do a healing spell on her?"

I looked over at Buffy, still unconscious and bloody from the mauling that doppelganger had given her, and I had a sick feeling deep down in my guts. She was my strong and beautiful Buffy and that damn shape-shifter had cut her up like he was trying to skin an orange. I had to make Buffy alright again. I just couldn't let her stay like this.

"I can do it," I said with all the passion that comes from feeling the pain of a wounded soulmate, "I can work a healing spell for her, but I'll need water to make it work. I'll need lots of water."

"Not a problem," Justine said, "I can get you all the water you need."

* * * * * * * *

Justine parked her truck in the garage of a single-family home. Once again, she carried Buffy as if my girlfriend weighed no more than a bag of groceries.

Justine carried Buffy through the dining room and kitchen and turned on lights as she went. The house was silent except for Justine and me. It seemed to me that we were alone in the house. That was a load off my mind. I really didn't want to explain Buffy's injuries to anyone else. It was awkward enough explaining things to Justine.

Justine carried Buffy into the bathroom and turned on the bathroom lights as well. She set Buffy down in a bathtub that was about twice the size of the one Buffy and I had back in Sunnydale, and removed Buffy's shoes.

That was a good idea actually. Once sneakers get wet, they're almost impossible to get dry again.

"Run the water," Justine told me, "You can have as much as you need."

"How big is this thing?" I asked as I grabbed the stainless steel knob and began to fill the bathtub with water.

"One-hundred-twenty-five gallons," Justine replied, "I like to stretch out for long, hot baths after a long workout or a long hike. Do you think that'll be enough water?"

"This'll be plenty," I said, smiling.

I took off Buffy's socks to keep them from getting wet as well. I'd need to immerse her somewhat before I could make the spell work, and filling up a tub that big took a certain amount of time.

"Is it okay to bring the vampire into the house?" Justine asked.

I thought about it for a few seconds. As long as Spike had the chip in his head, he shouldn't be able to hurt anyone, and if we didn't bring him in before sunrise, the sun would kill him.

Eventually I told Justine to bring Spike in, although she'd have to invite him. Justine thought this was one of the stupidest things she had ever heard; especially since Spike was still unconscious; but she really didn't know much about vampires.

The water level in the tub kept going up and when it was high enough to submerge Buffy's thighs and torso, I plunged my hands into the water and focused my mind on the goddess Aceso. Her temples had all been destroyed centuries ago, however she still took pity on mortal beings that remembered and respected her, and let her healing magic flow into the hands of human vessels.

And according to some of the ancient texts she was also the patron goddess of lesbians, so that would probably act in my favor.

With my hands deep in the water, I reverently whispered the words, "Salutaris Lacus," and almost instantly felt a powerful tingling sensation in my fingers and the palms of my hands. The water glowed for a few seconds with an inner-light and then I felt a smile spread wide across my face as Buffy's eyes finally opened and she looked up at me, licked her beautiful lips and opened her mouth to speak.

"Will, where am I? And why am I all wet?"

"Buffy!!" I squealed with delight. My healing spell had worked!