and finish writing this.

Definitely a good plan.

Oh, my, that is really lovely.

Wonderful.

No, that's wrong. This story is not full of wonder, although it fills me with wonder at your logical extrapolation of a plotline these characters might take, given a certain set of circumstances and a given impetus.

So, how about, "Of course. Certainly."

And thank you.

Dayum, Plei. Was this the one you were wondering about, in terms of plotty? I don't see this is plotty. I just see it as damned fine.

Plei, I can't wait to see more.

deb, wow. And. Wow. I love you, man.

Plei, I had to hunt down the first parts in your LJ to make sure I was remembering it correctly. I have to say, I love the way you bring the hurt.

Deb, I think this would be wonderful for the pornanthology. Very sexy. Love the image of the baby boar being devoured.

Heh. Sent "Notte, Sanguina" (a nice mixed-meaning title, if translated properly) to Roz, since it was sort of a prezzie for her, the way "Emma" was for Fay. And Roz immediately pinged back with "hills above Fiesole!"

Yup yup yup.

Danke!

Lizard, wasn't Deb's thing simply splendid???

She reduced me to not being able to use my space bar last night.

It was just-- wow and guh. And mmmm. And we're back to wow.

I have this beginning of a Willow story.

Willow is having that dream again.

It's bright light on hard surfaces, her limbs moving slowly, a hand she can't identify on the back of her neck. It's the dream where someone is talking to her, quickly and loudly, and she knows she should be listening but she just can't make the sounds coalesce in her mind into something she can understand. The words swim around her and she reaches to catch them but meaning, that slippery fish, squirms just out of reach. Like biochem lecture Thursday evenings when she hasn't had enough sleep and the blackboard is blurring in front of her eyes. The professor's voice crackling into static.

Giles is staring at her. She nods. He asks her if she's all right, if she wants to eat something or find Anya to watch Dawn so that she can lie down for a moment-- and it hits Willow, the absurdity, that she should try to go sleep within her dream. What would happen then? Would she pass into another dream? It seems exhausting: an endless progression deeper and deeper into her unconscious mind. Or maybe the sleep-within-a-sleep would fade to blackness, silence thick and immutable, the softest velvety heaviness blocking all her senses. She blinks at Giles. No, she's fine.

She lifts her arm off the counter and turns her body in a slow semicircular motion, squinting as the kitchen blurs and changes into the empty back room of the Magic Box, its side wall smashed in and the cinderblock dust still fresh on the floor. Cool night air blows in through the hole. The lights are dark, blown out on the ceiling, but the orange glow of a streetlight coming in through the far window illuminates the way to the door. And it's very important, suddenly, that she make it through that door and into the main room of the Magic Box. There's something she's left on the table, what is it? She'll remember when she gets there. Everyone is waiting for her. Everything depends on her getting that object. Willow takes a step forward but the ground turns to pudding under her feet and she's sinking in, struggling; she's up to her knees into the not-so-concrete concrete floor and she's trying to wade but it's quicksand, she's dropping, it's to her hips and her chest and she flails forward, blindly. Eyes shut in terror and Willow *reaches* with her mind, grabs whatever she can and *pulls* herself to it--

-- Rush of wind and air and power, shrieking in her ears. Then silence, and ground under her feet, and Willow opens her eyes again.

She's standing in an unfamiliar graveyard. The night sky overhead, cloudless, is thick with time. All the hours of this night, and all the nights before and after, have accrued to the surface of the sky. It's like a cat's shed hair clinging to your sweater. It's like a picnic table sticky with the ghosts of long-ago spilled sodas. As Willow watches, the dark blue wavers and blurs and is still again. The stars zip along their paths, silently encircling the earth with their tiny pricks and flares of light.

There's motion in her peripheral vision and Willow turns around to see Xander limping towards her, shirt torn, gaze fixed on her steadily.

"You're not supposed to be here, Will."

She tries to take his arm, but Xander's rigid with the tension that comes after battle and doesn't seem to even notice her hand brushing his elbow. "Xander? Was the sky always like this?"

The expression on his face doesn't change.

"You should be back at the house. Willow-- Dawn needs you."

As he stands there his scratches heal; the shirt re-fuses. Then silver streaks through his dark hair, and shoots away again. The word *time* appears in Willow's mind as if emerging to the top of a deep dark pool, calm and rippling the surface of the water. I can't get rid of this, she thinks. This seeing in *time*.

"It's okay, Xander, I'm just dreaming," she tries to tell him, but his face is set with pain, even though it flickers from spotted and wrinkly skin to the babyface he had had in junior high before he started having to shave. Willow is dizzy with the constant motion. Can he even hear her?

The nagging feeling returns. Something. She's missed *something*. "Xander," she starts to say, even though she knows it's a dream, even though she's sure she can wake up in a minute if she tries stretching her eyes open wide enough. "Xander, where's Buffy? I need to ask her something," and he flinches visibly, as though he's been struck. Willow whirls around to see their attacker, but when she turns back Xander is gone. Only the continuous pattern of white gravestones gleaming dully with reflected starlight, the dark earth stretching forward endlessly into an even darker night.

"Huh," she says aloud, and rests her hand on one tall gravestone. It crumbles beneath her touch, falling gently into dust. Willow can't help it and she gives a little shriek that's half-submerged in her throat because, oh, big solid stone, not supposed to poof away, like some staked vampire, like that! She tries to remember the name that had been on the stone, but she can't recall even glancing at the inscription. Tombstones and mausoleums have become part of the ordinary backdrop of her life, and Willow doesn't even consider the people decaying beneath them, any more, or imagine a family of mourners draped in black and stifling graveside tears. She barely notices the graveyards she walks through, beyond scanning for the freshly-turned dirt that might mean a freshly-turned vampire.

The stone dust is settling onto the grass of the graveyard, the leather of her shoes. She almost tries hitting another stone just out of curiosity, to see if it'll disintegrate, too, but stops herself in time. Instead Willow brushes the dust off her feet, and after one last look at the distant, shaking sky, she chooses a direction at random and starts w

(curtseying and bowing madly in all directions, bonking head on desk, being stared at contemptuously by decidedly amused cats)

Plei, I want more Buffy/Wes. This is insanelly compelling stuff, and I doubt anyone out there does Wes better.