Title:
All That Heaven Will Allow
Chapter
Title: Chapter Five- The Breach
Author:
Restive Nature
Disclaimer:
I do not own the rights
to BtVS. They belong to Whedon & Mutant Enemy. I also do not own
the rights to Charmed. They belong to the WB. No infringement is
intended and this fiction is for private enjoyment only.
Rating:
PG-13
Genre:
Crossover
Type:
Angst, Action, Humor
Pairing:
canon pairings in both shows
Summary:
Slayer dreams and Whitelighter-Witch hybrid powers collide when the
veil between worlds come close to collapsing. Can baby Wyatt survive
life on the Hellmouth?
Spoilers/
Time line: Season 4 (after “Harsh Light Of Day”) of Buffy and
Season 6 (after “Forget Me... Not”) Of Charmed.
Feedback:
Always welcome!
Distribution:
Ask first please.
A/N:
This was one of my contributions started for NaNoWriMo 2012. The
story was by no means completed in that month and I am looking
forward to continuing it.
A/N2:
There is a definite time difference between these two worlds and the
seasons that I am using. This will hopefully, be explained within the
fiction itself.
All That
Heaven Will Allow
Chapter
Five
The
Breach
“Okay,
how are we doing?” Piper demanded as she strode back into the attic
room that was in reality their witchy workroom. It was the room where
their altar was placed, where they kept the Book of Shadow and kept
the majority of their potion ingredients. Those that were not
innocuous enough for the kitchen cupboards downstairs.
Piper
had just gotten off the phone with the manager of her nightclub
called P3, to let him know that she would definitely not be in for
the next few days, citing an illness with Wyatt that was
transmittable. Her manager had cheerily wished her good luck with
that and Piper had had to refrain her urge to blow him up through the
telephone wires.
It
was difficult.
No
matter what anyone might say, there was no power on this earth that
could make her view this as just another one of the problems that
they routinely dealt with over the years since they had come into
their Charmed powers. This time it was more than personal. This was
her son. Her nearly defenseless baby boy.
Luckily,
no one was saying that, even if she tried to convince herself of it
once and realized the futility of it.
As
she looked around, she noted that things had changed very little in
the ten minutes she had been gone from the room for. Leo was still
communicating spiritually and metaphysically in that way he had,
searching the world over for his connection to his son to show up.
Phoebe was at a map, scrying tool in hand, while Paige, healed now
from her run in with the demon, was poring over the Book of Shadows,
seeing if she could make a match. Piper hoped desperately, if quietly
and to herself, that one of their ancestors had run into the thing
before.
“Can
you pass me the world map?” Phoebe muttered as she rifled through
the stack she had already accrued. Piper didn't waste time goggling
at her sister. She simply dug through the maps that they had needed
and pulled out a flat world map. She handed it to her sister. It
didn't matter that Wyatt wasn't in the city, state or country. They
would go to the ends of the earth to rescue her boy.
“Piper,”
Leo's voice broke gently through the room, but she had turned to
Paige.
“What
do you have Paige?” she wanted to know. “Any matches?”
“Nothing
solid yet,” her other sister shook her head. “I've been through
the book twice.” She held up a list, a pen between her fingers.
“Now I'm looking for any partial matches. We may have to look
outside our usual source material.”
“Then
we will,” Piper nodded.
“Argh!”
Phoebe snarled out, something slamming down behind Piper's back.
“Piper,”
Leo called out again, his voice still soft.
Piper
held her hand out to her husband, even if it was in name only at this
point and turned back to her younger sister. “What is it, Phoebe?”
The brunette that had so recently shorn her hair again, was tugging
at the shortened strands, apparently frustrated as she stared down at
the map and the crystal laying over it.
“I'm
getting nothing,” Phoebe complained. Her temper was running high,
though whether that was from her empathetic powers or her own
emotions, probably a combination of both, one couldn't say. “He's
not here, he's not anywhere! This is impossible.”
“No
it's not,” Leo broke in, his voice just as heated as his sister in
law's. He strode forward to take a stance beside Piper. “That's
what I was trying to tell you.”
“What
do you mean?” Piper demanded as both Paige and Phoebe broke off
what they were doing and turned to face the only remaining male of
the household. They didn't really count Chris yet, because he was too
new of a newcomer. Even if he was a Whitelighter from the future that
apparently held too much information for them to know. Piper had to
wonder if the young man had known this was coming. She had to wonder
at everything he knew, because Chris didn't share.
“I
can't sense him,” Leo sighed. There was immediate protest's from
all of them, loudest from Piper.
“He
has to be somewhere!” her voice rang out stridently. Her finger
descended into Leo's shoulder harshly, making him wince, not just
under the fury of her physical assault, but her emotional one as
well. He didn't need Phoebe's power to feel it. “Don't you just
tell me that my son is nowhere. He is somewhere and we will
find him. If I have to blow up every rock and tree and the oceans out
of their beds themselves. We will find him. So keep looking buddy!”
The other sister's emphatic nods made
Leo sigh. “That's what I'm trying... I'm not saying he disappeared
completely Piper,” he implored. “Just that he's not on this
earth. He's not up there,” he gestured upwards, indicating the
plane that Elders and Whitelighters resided on when not in the act of
performing their earthly duties. “So that just leaves...”
“Oh God, no!” Piper breathed out,
her eyes going wide, even as she felt her sister's closing around
her, supporting, but just as pained as one would expect of loving
aunts. “No, no, no,” she shook her head, the words coming
rapidly. “That's not acceptable. We have to go get him.”
“I don't know that we can,” Leo
denied and then reached for her hands that were coming up
automatically, unconsciously. They were physical representation of
her devastating powers. “Piper, there are literally hundreds of
miles of caverns in the underworld. My powers don't work as well
there. We'll search. Of course we will. But you need to be prepared
for... for...”
“No!” the word twisted and bubbled
it's way up out of her throat. “I will not accept that. We will
find Wyatt and we will do so immediately! The alternative is
unthink-!” Her face twisted further, crumpling, even as her body
did, folding in upon herself.
Her sister's, bolstering her
physically as they were, were able to catch her before she collapsed
all the way to the ground. Working together, they half walked her,
half carried her to an old sofa. Leo followed after, anxious to
reassure her and perhaps himself, that they would do everything
possible to find Wyatt.
“Leo?” Phoebe turned, seating
herself beside her sister, to try and rub soothingly at her hair,
even as she addressed her brother in law. “You're an Elder now.
Isn't there anything you can do?”
“I've tried thinking of everything
possible, every scenario we could be facing,” Leo protested with
the restrained pain that only a parent could feel.
“Everything we know,” Paige
paraphrased and squatted down to take Piper's hand. She glanced up at
Leo, knowing that she was pushing buttons, but it hardly mattered at
a time like this. “Maybe there's someone who knows more.”
Piper stared at her sister for a
moment and then her eyes widened. “Chris. Of course.” Her head
snapped around to look to her husband. “This is what he says he
came here to prevent. Chris!” she called, pushing away from Phoebe
and rising to her feet again. “Chris! We need you!”
There was the familiar zinging of an
incoming orber and then Chris had coalesced in the attic. “Hey,”
he greeted casually. And then with some sense, whether it was from
being a Whitelighter, or perhaps something else, realized that things
were terribly off. “What's going on? What's wrong?”
“Chris,” Piper sighed, rising from
the sofa and approaching the young man that was still such a stranger
to them. “Wyatt's been taken. A demon took him and we can't find
him anywhere. Leo can't sense him. We need your help. Do you know
anything,” she inhaled sharply, “anything
about this?”
“Wyatt's gone?” Chris repeated
harshly. “How-? What was it? Did you see?”
“I have the description,” Paige
volunteered. Chris nodded absently, looking... haunted, scared, as he
turned to Leo.
“And you can't find him anywhere?”
he demanded of the Elder.
“Not on earth,” Leo confirmed
quietly.
“Then that means you need to look
elsewhere, now!” Chris snapped at the older man. “You know what
this means.”
“I do,” Leo confirmed, his heart
and voice heavy. He looked to Piper. “You won't be able to contact
me while I'm down there. I'll check back with you periodically.”
Piper simply nodded. “Find him Leo.
Fast.”
There was nothing more that he could
say and orbed out, presumably to head into the lower region of the
underworld. The moment he had disappeared completely, Piper rounded
on the young man. Her finger made another appearance, jabbing quickly
into his chest. Her mind was swirling with hints of plans. She was
going to get what she needed and then she was going for her son.
“You
are going to tell me everything you know and you're going to tell me
now!”
“Yes Mo-ma'am,” the young
Whitelighter stuttered.
AtHwA~AtHwA
Buffy
inhaled sharply and stared straight ahead. She felt the comforting,
reassuring presence of not only her Watcher, her mentor and friend,
but Xander, solidly determined Xander at her other shoulder. The
devastation of the high school was all one that they were aware of.
It was obvious that it was destroyed, because they were the ones that
had done it. But over the months of summer, with the usual drop off
of slaying as the big supporters of the Mayor's bid to become an
elevated demon going back into hiding, it had been ignored. And not
only that, but the kids had moved on to college. The campus that lay
on the outskirts of the town to accommodate it's size, was in the
opposite direction of the high school and so there was no real reason
for them to go that way. But seeing it again after all this time, the
enormity of it seemed to settle on them once again.
"Wowzers,"
Xander chucked out in a nervous laugh. "That's a lot of rubble."
"Well,
it was a lot of school," Giles commented mildly.
"And
now there's a little boy in there," Buffy pointed out, her voice
sharp. "A little boy that needs my help."
"Are
you sure about this Buffy?" Giles asked gently, laying a hand,
the one that wasn't holding the equipment they'd managed to pick up
on the way, on her shoulder.
"I
wouldn't be here if I wasn't," Buffy retorted.
"Don't
kid yourself Buff," Xander sighed. "Kid in danger, you'd be
there at even the first hint. Or the twentieth. That's just the way
you are."
"Yeah,"
Buffy nodded, tiredly. She couldn't deny what he said. She was going
with her gut here and all that Willow and Anya were doing, with Oz's
help, was just to confirm what she was already sure was the truth.
"Into this hell's mouth. I'd be less afraid if there were lions
involved," she commented with a hard grin. "I think I could
handle lions. And their gaping maws."
"Well,
I'm afraid it won't be lions," Giles snorted, adjusting his
glasses as they moved forward, across the deserted street. "It
most likely won't even be the beast we fought the night you killed
the Master."
"No,
that one slinked back down it's wormy hole," Buffy agreed.
"Makes you wonder what else there might be."
"No!"
Xander protested immediately as they moved up the steps to the main
foyer of the old burnt out shell of a school. "No wondering. I
already have enough nightmares about the demons that are actually
here now."
"Well,
whatever I find, I think I'm prepared," Buffy sighed. "I've
got a dagger, my axe, Mr. Pointy, holy water," she patted
various points on her clothing as she itemized her lists. "Hopefully
there won't be too many fights. Just sneak in, find Wyatt and get
out."
"Wyatt?"
Giles noted sharply as they crept in the front door. The word echoed
sharply around the area and they all felt a little spooked, like they
had committed a sin. Like talking loudly in a public library. It was
amazing how quickly certain habits were gained and lost in so short a
time. His voice calmer and quieter now, Giles continued, "you
never mentioned this."
"Sorry,"
Buffy apologized, even though she wasn't quite sorry. It was more out
of habit. "But I told you I heard people calling for him. That's
the name they used. Or at least, what it sounded like to me. So I've
been calling him Wyatt in my head. I guess it just slipped out."
"Ah
well," Giles sighed philosophically. He didn't want to encourage
this, but he also didn't want to have to explain why. He had
phenomenal faith in his Slayer. No, not his Slayer. He had faith in
Buffy. She was an amazing girl that always went above and beyond the
call of duty, even as she might bemoan and belittle those very
things. But not everything worked out according to plan. No one knew
that better than he and the rest of the team. It was Giles' position
to need to be the adult, to pull the children back when they went too
far, but also allow them room to make the mistakes that they could
recover from. Losing a little boy to the depths of the Hellmouth? He
wasn't sure that Buffy would bounce back, yet he was very prepared,
as he was for other things, for that very thing to happen. Plans and
platitudes were already swirling through his mind. But he knew that
should the worst happen, he would talk from his heart when he talked
with her.
They
picked their way through the fallen fixtures and broken building
until they found the library. Buffy, feeling her way instinctively,
found her feet picking up the pace as Xander and Giles raced to keep
up with her. Even without any light other than the pocket light that
Giles carried with him, she could pinpoint right where the entrance
to the Hellmouth was. The fallen down mass of bookshelves were simply
a confirmation.
"Okay,
you guys get your gear set up," she commanded, striding forward.
"What
are you doing?" Xander wondered as he reached for the bag that
Giles had slung to the floor.
"I'm
gonna make myself an entrance," Buffy sighed as she paced over
the floor, testing for weaknesses that would make this easier. She
thought she'd finally found a spot and knelt down to put pressure on
the floor. Even among the slow, soft creaking of the now ramshackle
building, she could hear the stress indicators on the floor. "Here,"
she murmured. Looking around for anything that she could use to break
through, she found there was nothing. Bemoaning the thought for just
a moment that she hadn't thought about this and brought appropriate
materials, she sighed internally. The extra tools wee usually Giles'
department. And he had purchased what he thought necessary. Maybe he
had thought that they'd done more damage, since the library was where
she had drawn the Mayor in for the final kablooey. Finally, she
pulled off her jacket, wrapping the sleeve around her fist and began
to punch through the floor. She ignored Giles' and Xander's startled
exclamations.
"Nice
way of drawing the demons here," her friend snorted, gesturing
to where she was pounding on the floor.
"Given
the dynamics," Giles commented, glancing overhead at the
ceiling, "I doubt the demons down there can make heads nor tails
of what noise from up here, if any, has meant these last few months.
They'd more likely be attracted to the fact that there are humans
here once more."
"Nice
Giles," Xander frowned. "Way to add to my complete sense of
well being at being here."
"Got
it!" Buffy exclaimed as she made the final punch. From then it
was just a matter of breaking away pieces to widen the hole. And as
she had thought, it was a large tunnel that went down. Just… down.
With a hidden gulp, she squinted through the dust and plaster that
she had decimated. "How far down does that equipment go?"
she asked nervously.
"One
hundred feet," Giles muttered as he threaded the end of the
mountain climbing rope they had stopped to purchase, through the
safety pinion that they would control from the topside. "It was
the most that they had available."
"Well
let's hope it's only fifty feet or less down," Xander shrugged.
"So are ya gonna tug on it when you're ready to come up?"
"Not
a good idea," Buffy shook her head. "Anything could come
and grab the rope and who knows what you guys would pull up."
She adjusted her clothes as she stood and then gestured to the rope,
before picking up her coat and donning it.
"'Kay,
not to be the pooper of the party or anything," Xander
interrupted, "but how were you planning on carrying a baby up
out of there?"
Buffy
gestured to the large scarf that she had grabbed while they were down
town. "You think this is just the latest in a long line of my
impeccable fashion purchases?" she teased. Xander smirked and
gave her a simple shrug. "Doubles also as a weapon and a sling,"
Buffy explained as Xander nodded, seeing the logic in that. Prepared,
she turned to Giles and accepted the end of the rope that she would
be taking down with her.
"Are
you ready?" Giles asked quietly. Buffy nodded and then looked up
into his eyes.
"I
am," she confirmed. "I can do this. I'll find him Giles."
"And
then get back here as quickly as possible," Giles added. He
helped her adjust her weapons and equipment and then stepped back as
she turned away, ready to make that all important leap.
"You
guys remember that Willow will be coming to help get us out, once
she's got the spell stuff," Buffy reminded them gently. "So
don't shoot first, okay?"
"We'll
take care of things up here," Xander directed gently, "you
just get in, get the kid and come back to us."
"Will
do," Buffy nodded. She stepped up to the whole that she had made
and with one more deep breath, muttered to herself, "into the
breach."
And
jumped.
Chapter Six- Ready For Action
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