Where Angels Normally Fear to Tread

She was tired.

Buffy slipped on a pair of clean jeans and tossed her traveling clothes into the pile for laundry.

It was nice to get away for a few days, she thought. But for some reason the bus trip from L.A. had seemed longer this time. It might have something to do with Sunnydale being unstuck in time.

Time.

She looked at the clock. It was too early for patrol. She pulled on a fresh t-shirt and prepared to make her way downstairs. Maybe a little snack would help.

All at once, there was a great flash and a rushing sound of air displaced.

The light in the room was suddenly of a better quality and there was a sharpness to everything. Even the colors of the wallpaper seemed fresh and vibrant. The atmosphere itself felt vitalized as if she could fill her lungs for the first time. Her tiredness simply melted away.

Buffy turned and there standing in her bedroom was an angel... not Angel.... but rather an angel. The snow wing variety.

"Your destiny has only just begun, Buffy Summers!" declared the being. His voice echoed with a clarity that thrilled the blood, a quality of gentleness that dispelled doubt.

Terrific, thought Buffy, but just once I'd like 'Destiny' to knock and use the door.

Faith and Doubt

The broken ground crunched beneath her sandals as Buffy made her way to Angel's Mansion.

It had been over a week since the gang had confronted Ethan Rayne. Over a week since she had learned that one of the "Dark Cloaks" that Ethan served looked like Willow.

She wasn't sure she understood all of Ethan's cryptic riddles but it seemed as though these Dark Cloaks were playing both sides - good and evil - against one another. She wasn't sure what that all entailed, but she was sure about one thing: the human race was caught in the middle.

Buffy pushed door of the mansion and it swung open with a creaking sound. She could smell the warm, welcoming scent of a fire burning in the hearth.

She had planned to lay low, stay quite and wait until she had more information before she would act, but certain thoughts kept nagging at her.

Was this Dark Cloak really Willow? Had she turned dark again? Was this a new Willow? Or was it something that took her form perhaps just to engender these very doubts?

Buffy passed the kitchen, crossed the living room and entered the inner sitting room.

So now she was here in Angel's Mansion. She had come to meet the one person that more and more she found herself placing her trust.

"Hello Faith," she said.

There were many things Not Dead in Sunnydale. Irony, it seems, was one of them.