private | she doesn't know just where she belongs

[dontcallmesammy]

[It's been a week or so since Sam encountered Sarah in Memphis, and for some reason, he can't get it out of his head. The lore on fairies he checked out said something about people losing their memories and ending up somewhere else, and honestly, it fits. After all, the one they were hunting when she disappeared was powerful enough to put up a convincing glamour, at least until one of them found the metaphorical thread and started unraveling the whole thing.

Updating Buffy's friends on that little development proved somewhat difficult, but hey, he did. Granted, none of them took the news particularly well (he had to keep Dean and Dawn apart from each other, if he ever managed to pull Dean out of Purgatory), but he's not alone in looking for her, at least. And since hunters can be such a gossipy bunch, most of those he's met are on the lookout for a petite blonde chick with a bad memory.

Sam is...well, he's running himself ragged, looking for Buffy, looking for a way to get Dean out, killing what few Leviathans are left, hunting things, and saving people, all at the same time. He barely even sleeps, with all the research and graveyard-digging and monster-killing.

The latter of which, he's doing right now.

...or trying to.

See, Sam has been going two days without sleep. And now this jiang shi ("hopping corpse" - don't ask) is pinning him up against the wall and about to suck his life out.

Dammit, really. With all the changes lately (from having no partner to having one to none again), he hasn't had time to adjust to being on his own yet again. At this point, either Dean or Buffy would have come in and blasted this rotting corpse to kingdom come, but they aren't here.

And Sam?

Sam's about to die.]

Comments

[destructogal]

[ Sarah walks out of the alleyway after Sam leaves and realizes she knows absolutely nothing about her life. She uses the funds they provided to get on a plane, heads back to New York and promises to raise holy hell on Wolfram and Hart unless they start giving her some answers. She gets nowhere. They insist that what they told her was true, provide her with more files and photographic evidence than she can shake a scythe at and they think that's it; Sarah placated, case over.

They give Sarah her next target - Amalia Mercer, a witch - and she gets on another plane, looking for something different in Amalia's file; a reason why Wolfram and Hart want her dead. Like Sam's, there's nothing in there and when Sarah gets out of the car at her house, she's weaponless, unsure if she's even doing the right thing. She asks Amalia for her help. She has to figure she's pretty powerful if Wolfram and Hart want her dead and when she explains her predicament, Amalia nods. She'll help her, of course, asks for nothing in return and pricks Sarah's finger with a dagger. She hands her a crystal, one she's chanted over in Latin for the last half hour and tells her to turn it over in her hands three times. It takes fifteen minutes for things to start coming back.

Her name is Buffy Summers. A Slayer - The Slayer, until she activated a bunch of girls all over the world, making Potentials-into-Actuals, changing their fate for the greater good and pissing off a law firm in the process. Wolfram and Hart. It's not altogether clear why they didn't kill her. They saved her from a life in prison, turned her into a trained assassin that would wipe out a large portion of the demon-fighting world and Sarah was only too happy to oblige. She barely makes it to Amalia's bathroom before she throws up and when she comes out, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, Amalia is wearing a grim expression and handing her a glass of water.

She tells her she won't remember right away. The fairy glamour is one of the strongest one's Amalia has ever seen and it's not gonna be easy to break. Sarah knows enough. She thanks Amalia, gets in her car and starts to drive. She goes back to Memphis - the last place she saw Sam and her heart sinks when she realizes she's a day too late. She doesn't even know why it's important that she sees him, it just is.

Slowly but surely, Sarah is starting to remember. It's coming back to her in flashes - hunting with Sam, some weird flashes of Elvis and her actual sister, not the version Wolfram and Hart showed her. She knows now why she was so not incensed over Demon-Husband guy 'cause Buffy had been married, yes. But not to blonde guy. Buffy had been married to Sam (Left hand, third finger... Where the hell is my wife?) and she thinks she maybe even loved him.

She follows the trail of energy-sucked bodies to Coldwater Creek, Georgia, and when she talks to the coroner it's the first bit of hope she's had in three days. Agent Hamill, Buffy's 'partner' was here earlier today, following up on the same lead. She learns that they're all happening around the same area (abandoned building near a cemetery, what else?) and Buffy hotfoots it back to her car, breaking every speed-limit in town to get to Sam.

She finds the Impala first and it's the first time in a month and a half that she sees something tangible to connect her to her life pre-Wolfram and Hart. She almost cries. She grabs her gun from the seat, goes into the place the same way she assumes Sam did and--There he is. She's almost too late. The thing has Sam pressed up against the wall and Buffy is pissed. She blasts the thing from the side, sends the rotted corpse flying across the room. She's not quick enough to catch Sam when he drops but she wouldn't have had time anyway.

A shot to the side is not enough to kill it. The thing comes at her again, Sam barks out an instruction (thank God for insanely-smart guys who research before going into a hunt) and this time? She shoots it in the head, watches the dirty, rotten corpse fold to the floor. She decides it is really most sincerely dead when it doesn't get back up again, turns back to Sam. She mostly resists the urge to touch the bruise at his temple, frowns a little at how tired he looks and then she realizes she has no idea what to say to him beyond- ] Hey.

[destructogal]

Yeah. You're awesome. [ Buffy points out softly. ] 'Cause you often almost get life-sucked by a hopping, bunny-corpse thing...

[ She recognizes the look on his face almost immediately, frowns. ] Hi. Remember me? Partner. Wife. Sometime back-up against the forces of evil? I can help. [ She can. Research, demon-pounding, whatever it is he needs, that's what she's there for. That's kinda the point. ]