The Rings of Hell

Oddness

Oddness

Sam had decided not to go out looking for anything mysterious tonight. She couldn't adequately articulate why (although she'd tried. Daniel had still gone out anyway) but as soon as the sun went down, she'd felt... odd. That was the only word for it, although to say that it was her feeling it wasn't exactly accurate. She felt odd outside her body. It was as though there were little patches of oddness running around Sunnydale, completely autonomous from her yet at the same time paradoxically part of her. It was impossible to explain.

So she'd stayed inside. Daniel had promised he wouldn't be long, he'd only look around the campus a little. Sam would stay awake waiting for him. She would. Really...

~*~

It was a nice night outside, thought Daniel. Completely devoid of any pieces of Sam drifting around. Just what had she talking about? Daniel had seen plenty of strange things - they all had, at one time or another - but this was Earth. There weren't any Goa'uld here. Probably.

So he couldn't understand what Sam had meant. It was possible that, as a side-effect of carrying Jolinar, she could sense nearby Goa'uld, but certainly not in the manner she'd described.

Still, he'd promised he wouldn't wander far, and, as he caught sight of a tiny blond striding purposefully towards him, it seemed as though that were true. The blond stopped a few feet from him, put her hands on her hips and demanded "What do you think you're doing out so late?". She was clearly too young to be a member of staff here, coming to tell him off, so he figured she'd mistaken him for someone else.

"I'm going to have to go with walking." Daniel replied, somewhat flippantly. He'd never gotten on all that much with young people, not even when he'd been one. He didn't even feel that comfortable around Cassie, and she was virtually his niece.

"Don't you know it's dangerous around here at night? You know, with muggings and... theives and... other stuff like that!" Daniel, using the his mighty power of deductive reasoning, suspected that she wanted him gone, but wasn't going to tell him why.

"So, if it's that dangerous out, why are you here?" he asked, fighting the urge to get away while he still could. This was why he'd never wanted to teach.

"I can take care of myse-" the diminutive figure began, before leaping forward and pushing Daniel to the side. He landed awkwardly, but was quickly on his feet when he heard the distinctive sound of an exchange of blows. However, before he could see the combatants, their was a curious hissing sound, and all he saw was the blond, who looked like she'd just fought someone off.

The fact that there was no one around, and nowhere for anyone to have run to or hide, sort of put paid to that theory though.

~*~

Sam woke up with a gasp. She hadn't even realised she'd fallen asleep, but she certainly knew why she'd woken up - the brief burst of burning fire she'd felt bursting through her chest. Yet she wasn't wounded. Just what was going on with her? She barely had time to think the question before she was asleep in her chair once more.

~*~

"Okay" said Daniel, a little shaken "What the hell just happened?"

The blond danced a little from foot to foot as she came up with what would doubtlessly be a cover story. "Umm, a robber. A really fast one. He went thataway" she said, pointing in a clearly arbitrary direction - Daniel could tell because it was the only one that led to a dead end.

The upside of working for a top-secret military organization is that the cover stories are good. Which meant that this girl clearly wasn't a part if what ever it was that meant that Airforce personnel shouldn't be here. Not that he'd ever suspected she was, she was way too young. So he just stared at her for a while, watching her squirm a little, before shrugging and heading back to Sam. She'd want to hear all about this.

~*~

Buffy let out a sigh of relief as she watched Dr. Jackson - for it was he, she had recognized him from the photograph - turned and left her to her patrol. Normally, citizens of Sunnydale would have blindly accepted whatever excuse she chose to give, due to all the weirdness they get from living on a Hellmouth, but he was probably too new here for the Sunnydale-syndrome to kick in.

Anyway, this would doubtlessly make her bring in his lecture in a few days rather awkward.

~*~

As Daniel went into the common room (he and Sam were staying in what had been a frat house, the Delta-Zeta-Kappa's.) he saw that Sam had crashed out on an old arm chair. For a moment, he was tempted to leave her be - neither of them had had much sleep in the last couple of days - but curiosity over what she'd say about his little outing won out.

He prodded her gently - Sam was a light sleeper, that normally got her up - but she just kept on sleeping without moving a muscle. He shook her lightly, but still no response. Beggining to get worried now, he checked her pulse. Steady.

It wasn't until Daniel poured a glass of water over her head (cringing with sympathy as he did so - Jack had done it to him once) that she woke up spluttering.

The fact that she wasn't spluttering in English alarmed him somewhat. The fact that it was Latin and she hadn't been anywhere near an Ancient repository alarmed him somewhat more. But what she was saying, over and over again whilst she seemed to be in some kind of trance, that downright scared him.

But the odd thing was, he didn't know why the words inspired such fear in him (besides, of course, those circumstances)

"Erus caelum redíbit. Erus caelum recederi. Erus caelum redíbit. Erus caelum recederi..."

It would be better if it were a mixture of Ancient Egyptian and Latin, but as I speak neither of these fluently (only a modicum of Latin) I just couldn't be bothered. If only these people spoke French. Or Spanish. Or even medieval French or Spanish.

I'll leave it up to you to figure out what it says. Or you could just read on...