Title: Immortal Aid
Author: Sweetdoggie (stirling_summer@yahoo.com)
Pairing: B/G (implied)
Rating: FRC
Summary: Buffy talks to the Immortal and clears a few things up.
Spoilers: None
Disclaimer: No permission has been granted to use the characters. They are owned by their creator, Joss Whedon, Twentieth Century Fox, UPN, WB, and Mutant Enemy. This story is non-profit and is intended solely as entertainment. No copyright infringement is intended.

After the fall of Sunnydale, Buffy took Dawn on an extended tour of Europe, Giles having paid for it from the Council monies. If it was what Buffy needed to be happy, if it was her way of releasing the pressure of being the Slayer, of grasping at the shirttails of a normal life, then he felt she was more than entitled.

Buffy didn’t tell him that was only part of her ultimate goal. Three years after being raised from the dead and she was still having difficulties coping. She hid it well—she’d learned that wearing her pain and misery on her sleeve didn’t help and, in fact, brought her friends around her with irritating offers of sympathy and pep talks. So, she had quietly folded away her rage and grief at being ripped from the peace of Heaven and carried on with her life, though the pain of it was always burning inside her.

She scoured Europe looking for answers and had finally come to some understanding of her needs in Rome when she met the man they called the Immortal. Everyone, including her sister, thought they were having a raging affair, but Buffy wanted something much more interesting from him than mere sex. He had answers and she wanted them.

Dawn was spending the night with friends and the Immortal had stopped by Buffy’s to invite her dancing. “Not tonight, my friend. Tonight, I need to talk.”

He smiled and bowed slightly. “Then, I am, as always, at your service. Perhaps I could be a willing ear for your troubles?”

“Perhaps.” Buffy ushered him in. “Can I get you a drink?”

“Water, if you please.”

She got them both bottles of water and sat down next to him on the couch, studying her hands for inspiration on how to begin this discussion. He waited patiently. He had nothing but time.

“I don’t know how much you know about my background…” she began.

“I know you are a Slayer. A very great Slayer.”

“Yes. I’m a Slayer. I was called at fifteen. A difficult age for a girl. My folks were going through a separation that later led to divorce. We moved to Sunnydale, my mom and I.”

“Ah, the Hellmouth. Much is heard of this place. It is gone now, yes?”

She smiled thinly. “Yes. Sunk into the ground as if it had never been.”

“And this thing you wish to tell me, concerns this place?”

“Partly. When I was twenty, my Watcher took me out to the desert to find my Spirit Guide. We were facing… well, a bad time.”

He nodded. “And did you find this guide?”

“Surprisingly, yes. She told me that Death is my Gift. Typically cryptic. I took it to mean that death was my reward for being the Slayer, the one way all of us who are Called end our destiny.”

“Yet you are here, alive and well in Rome. I assume that this was not the correct interpretation?”

“No. Or perhaps it was only part of it, like all those mystical pronouncements. Have you ever noticed that? Prophecies only give you the tip of the iceberg. Usually just enough information to get everything totally wrong.”

He nodded with a wry grin. “It is the way of such things.”

“I’ve died three times.”

He looked startled. “Three?”

“When I was sixteen, I was drowned by a Master vampire. A friend found me and did CPR. I was only gone for a couple of minutes—long enough for a second Slayer to be called though.”

“And the second time?”

“We fought a god. Glorificus. Blond, pretty in a skanky sort of way. Psychotic in the extreme?”

“Ah, yes. I have heard of this. What is not known is how you dealt with her.”

“She shared a body with a mortal. Don’t ask how, it’s one of those weird things that I don’t entirely understand. They toggled back and forth between forms and personalities, though in the end, she pretty much wiped out the mortal half of herself. We fought. I beat her nearly to death with a troll hammer. Handy that we had that, but that’s the way of things too. Tools are provided. Anyway, the battle took a long time and one of her minions managed to open the portal to her world. It would only be closed by blood. I threw myself into the thing and it sucked me dry. I was dead before I hit the ground. They buried me and I was at peace for three months.” She shivered.

He reached out and took her hands. “You were dead and yet are now alive. How did this happen?” His look was strangely intense.

“My best friend was a Witch. She did some mojo and ripped me from my reward. I clawed my way out of my grave. For almost a year, I was so…not with it, that I could barely function. I didn’t know what to do and I didn’t want to be back. To come from Heaven to the life I fell into…it was like being in Hell. My Watcher left me, because I wasn’t coping on my own. He thought I needed to learn to deal with things by myself. I needed him but he didn’t understand how much I hated everything including myself.”

“A cruel fate.”

“My third death was less…dramatic and it only lasted for a moment. I was shot and died on the operating table. My Witch friend came in, popped the bullet out, and healed me up. She was angry and didn’t want to waste a lot of time, I guess.”

“I would guess you still have questions about your, ah, Gift.”

“Yes. Now that I have some leisure time, I’ve traveled throughout Europe looking for answers. I’ve explored lots of mystical places and talked with a lot of people who supposedly know stuff. It hasn’t been all that satisfactory, to tell the truth. I still don’t understand.”

He was silent a moment, studying his hands. “Do you know my story?”

“I know they call you the Immortal. I assume it’s because you don’t die, right?”

“Again, truth up to a point. I was born about two thousand years ago in a small town called Bethany. My name was Lazarus then. I lived with my two sisters, Mary and Martha. I grew ill and though I received tender care from them, died and was placed in my tomb. Four days after I was buried, my friend came and resurrected me. I had been gone four days.” He emphasized that point. “I was at peace. When I came back, everything seemed so harsh, so difficult—I didn’t know how to cope. My friend was sad, but he had other things to do. He left me.”

Buffy looked at him and realized they shared an experience that only the two of them could understand. “So you know, then.”

“I know.”

“How do you deal? Does this mean I’m immortal too? Crap!”

“I don’t know about your immortality. The fact that you died a third time might indicate that your resurrection wasn’t…permanent. Have you, have you aged at all?”

Buffy shrugged. “I don’t know. I feel older, but that could just be the awful things that have happened to me since then. I was twenty, now I’m twenty-three. It’s not like you show a bunch of age related differences in those years.”

He nodded. “True. I suppose only time will tell. If you find out that you are truly immortal, please seek me out again. It is the bane of my existence to be always alone. It would be—pleasant—to have a companion.”

“I will, if that turns out to be the case. But I have unfinished business to take care of first.”

He raised an eyebrow. “The Watcher?”

She nodded. “I was too young before, and then when I wasn’t too young, I was too messed up. I’m, well, less messed up now.”

“Does he know how you feel?”

Buffy grinned. “Not a clue. I’ve known the man eight years and I barely understood what was going on till this last couple of years myself. Death really does clear things up.”

He returned her grin. “Yes, it certainly gives one a bit of perspective.”

She gave him a curious glance. “So, what happened with you after?”

He shrugged. “I was a nine-day wonder at home. People came to see me and the Temple priests questioned me pretty thoroughly. I just went back to my trade and took care of my family. People didn’t live to be terribly old then, as a rule. Both my sisters died in their fifties. I hadn’t married so there was no one to tie me to that place. I sold my home and possessions, took the money, and traveled. I moved to places where nobody had heard of me. I’d stay for a few years, then move on. I’ve lived all over the world.”

“Is it hard setting up new identities?”

“Not really. I’m very wealthy now and money can buy you virtually anything you need, even a new name.”

“How do you learn to cope with the death of your non-immortal friends?”

“I don’t make close friends anymore. That helps. Also, I move frequently enough that I rarely see them die. I know, theoretically, that they are dead and gone, but in my heart and mind, if I just went back to that place, they would be there. It makes it less painful.”

She nodded her understanding. “Pretty harsh way to live, though.”

“Indeed.” He was silent, contemplating the choices he had made.

Buffy looked up at him as a thought struck her. “Lazarus? Like the guy in the Bible?”

“The very same.”

“So, your friend that brought you back?”

“The one they called Jesus.”

“Wow.”

He grinned at her understatement. “Yes.” He was surprised when she didn’t question him further about that. The few people who knew his story inevitably asked about the one who had raised him.

“So, any deep thoughts you’d care to share?”

He flashed her a quick smile. “I have a thought, not my own, about the nature of immortality that I might be allowed to share with you?”

She nodded. “I’d appreciate any help you can offer.”

“I was on one of my journeys between identities when I met a very wise old man. We talked for days. I told him my background. He said that he believed that we are each put here on this Earth for a purpose and that we are not released into death until that purpose has been served. Most lives are lived, culminate in old age and then end. That mine has not indicated to him some hidden purpose, some goal or task that I had yet to complete. I would be allowed to return to the vale of Heaven when I had finished it. Perhaps he was correct. Clearly, the fates have marked you as having a destiny as well. It may be that your task has not yet been fulfilled.”

Buffy was silent for a moment while she contemplated his message. “Maybe. I’m willing to buy into the theory, at least. But how do you find out what your ultimate goal should be?”

“We can never know it, child. It could be something as simple as crossing a street at a certain time—or it could be saving the world from the ultimate Evil.”

She grinned. “Did that.”

He raised an inquiring eyebrow.

“How do you think we took out the Hellmouth?”

“Ah. Interesting.”

She shrugged. “You kinda had to be there. It had its moments, I guess.” She stood and looked down at him. “I have to go. I have to find my Watcher and convince him that I've finally grown up. Maybe that's my purpose in this life.”

“To tell him?”

“No, to love him.”

“A worthy goal.”

“Thanks. Um, keep in touch, OK?”

“I shall do so. Be well, be happy.” He touched her hand gently. “Remember me.” He stepped outside her door.

“Always.”

Buffy closed the door, turned and walked away. She had a new life to start and was anxious to get about her business.

END