Humanity
by Espresso Rabbit

Chapter five
Buffy, Xander, and Willow walked up to the school. Willow spent a moment magically surveying the security system.
“Can you get us in?”
“Piece of cake.” She raised her hands to perform the spell.
“Wait,” there was a call from across the street.
They turned to see the creeped out girl walking towards them.
“Umm…” she said when she was closer. “I’m…supposed to go in with you.”
“Are you?” Willow asked.
“Says who?” Buffy asked.
“Umm…God, actually.”
Buffy looked at her critically for a moment. “Oh. Well, it all makes sense now. See, Will, I told you she was human. That’s all right then. Sorry, I forgot your name.”
“Joan.”
Xander chuckled. “Joan of Arcadia. Pretty cool. Willow dressed up as Joan of Arc for Halloween one time. And another time, Buffy lost her memory, and thought her name was Joan.”
“Oh.” That was rather weird, Joan thought. Especially since he said it so casually. She decided not to mention it.
Buffy had glared at Xander, but then she turned to Willow. “Open the door, Willow.”
Willow appeared a bit startled by the new situation, but she turned to open the door. Joan’s eyes widened as she watched light sparkle from Willow’s fingers, and the door magically open.
Xander followed Willow in, but Buffy stopped Joan. “If you’ve got a Mission to be here, then that’s fine, but you do as we say, got it?” Joan nodded. “Okay. Let’s go.”
“So…” Joan asked hesitantly. “What is this ‘rift’ thing?” “We don’t know exactly,” Buffy said. “What do you know about it?”
“Umm…God just said that it was a rift between here and a Hell dimension—which I thought was weird, cause I thought there was only one Hell. He said that I needed to be here when you tried to close it, otherwise the world would be destroyed.” Buffy nodded.
“And who are you people?” Joan asked.
Buffy smiled. “I’m Buffy. The Vampire Slayer. Willow is a witch, and Xander’s been helping us out for seven years. We’re used to this type of thing.”
Joan tried very hard not to think about all that those words implied. Vampires, witches? Saving the world is normal?
The four of them approached the stairs. Willow frowned. “Can Joan feel it?”
“Uh…Feel what?”
“On the third step.”
Joan walked up to the third step, and moved across it. She looked back down. “Feel what?”
Buffy grimaced. “If you felt it, you’d know. Maybe it’s just because you and I have connections to the demon-y world,” she told Willow.
“Maybe. Fortunately, I brought stuff that should close it anyway.” Willow opened up the bag that Xander had been carrying. She started pulling out candles, herbs, and various other objects.
“We’re not going to need weapons, are we?” Xander asked. Joan paled.
“Don’t think so,” Buffy said. “Remember, I know God. I don’t think he’d send her,” she gestured to Joan, “if we were going to be in a big fight.”
“You know God?” Joan asked, curious now.
“Well, I was dead for a while. I met Him then.”
“Oh,” Joan said weakly. This was quickly turning into the oddest day of her life. Given recent events, she thought that was saying something.
“Ready?” Willow asked. She had a little display set up around the third step. Buffy directed Joan to stand back a few steps. Then the blonde nodded.
Willow began reciting something in a language Joan didn’t recognize. The air above her began swirling and glowing orange.
Just as Joan was starting to wonder why she had to be here for this, an image formed in the light. She thought it was a face, but beyond that, she was too frightened to really interpret it. It very clearly wasn’t human.
Buffy stepped towards it, but it lashed out at her, knocking her across the hall. Willow was frantically chanting a binding spell. Buffy got up quickly, but the entity was already heading for Joan.
It lunged at her, seeming to want to eat her. She was too terrified to even scream.
Then it bounced away from her.

It was pushed back, shrinking. Willow’s binding spell took hold, and it was reduced to about the size of a candle’s flame. She recited one more spell, and it popped out of existence.
Joan was pale-faced and slumped against the wall. Buffy looked around. She walked through the third step. “Nothing. That was easy.” She appeared bewildered by events.
Willow was looking at Joan. “You’re an instrument of God.”
“Yeah, and?” she tried to be snippy to cover up how terrified she was.
“I sensed power on the way here. I didn’t realize it was you.”
“What just happened?”
It was Xander who spoke first. “You saved the world. Be happy.”

Joan had refused a ride home on the grounds that she wanted to get away from these people and forget the entire incident as soon as possible. Buffy had laughed and said she didn’t blame her. They had still insisted on walking her to the bus stop.
As she sat on the bus, letting her mind drift into a numb haze, she wasn’t too surprised to see God get on the bus, this time looking like the cute guy she had first seen Him as.
“That went well,” He said as he sat down near her.
“I guess.”
Then she asked, “Why could I do that? How?”
“You remember what we talked about in the park?” She nodded. “The thing that allows you to see me is the same thing that the demons couldn’t bear. There is something that makes you special, Joan. And whether you actually save the world, like you just did, or you just do the little things, like taking AP Chemistry, you’re working to make the world better.”
“Why me?”
“Like I said. You’re you.”
“But—”
“I can’t answer that, Joan. There are some things that you—everyone—are not meant to know.”
Joan stared ahead of herself for a moment. “Is that…going to become a regular occurrence.” God shrugged. “No way to tell, really. There’s always some new threat to the world. But you are not the only person equipped to deal with it. Chances are, most of the apocalypses will be averted without your help, but I won’t say that you will never be needed again.”
“Aren’t you omniscient?”
“Yes, but time doesn’t mean nearly as much to me as it does to you. While I am better than anyone else at predicting what will happen, free will occasionally makes it difficult.”
The bus stopped at her stop, and she looked at God for a minute. He didn’t appear to have anything else to say. She stood to leave the bus.
“Joan?” She turned back to look at him. “Thank you for saving the world.”
She smiled weakly and nodded.
Then she stepped off the bus. Maybe she’d be able to get back to normal life now.

End.

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