Chapter Text
"Look at me!"
Vi shouted at her. Rona slumped against the bus seat. Dammit, she wanted to go to sleep. Hadn't had a good night's in a long time.
"This is nothing!"
Easy for her to say. Pain everywhere. A lot less, though, since Vi had dragged her out from under the seal.
"Stay awake!"
Oh, right. Must be shock. Probably not a good idea to drift off.
"This is nothing!"
Heard you the first time.
An angry sob.
"Don't die."
Won't.
++++
Rona woke up. About one second later, she decided that had been the worst move ever. She gritted her teeth against the lines of fire drawn over her entire body. Her right side throbbed with each breath. Ribs broken, had to be. Probably from that ubervamp who had gotten under her guard by her broken arm. Still busted, too. Cast still on. Okay, so not dead. Unless I'm in Heaven. Or Hell. Moving as little as possible, she patted around with her good arm. Covers. Sheets. Soft bed. Some kind of bars to the side, like a rail. Rona risked cracking her left eye. The other was swollen shut. White. A tube running down into her arm, full of red stuff. Blood. Her neck muscles did all sorts of angry things when she turned her head to the side.
Blond hair, green eyes looking back at her.
"Goddamn, I must be in hell," Rona said in a croak to Buffy Summers, "if I'm waking up next to you."
"Next closest thing," Buffy said. Both hands clutched her stomach. "Hospital ward. How are you feeling?"
"Like I got hit by a truck," Rona said.
"You mean numb and achy all over and dizzy?" Buffy asked.
"More like somebody stuck me into a blender," Rona said.
"Oh, that's technically a mauling." Buffy sounded way too perky. Damn white Cali-girl.
"How're you?" Rona stared up at that ceiling, her dreads spreading around her on the pillow.
"Perforated," came the reply.
"It hurt?"
"Like you wouldn't believe." Buffy sighed. "I'm off solids and liquids until I heal. Ice chips, not cutting it."
"Oh." Rona closed her eyes. "Good."
Darkness.
+++
Rona woke up again. Ow. Still was a really bad idea, although the volume knob on the agony had been turned down. Risking it, she sat up in the bed. More like a lurch. At least part of her was vertical. She squinted through half-closed eyelids. Even though the overhead lights were dimmed, it was like bright sunlight gleaming off glass. Blinding. Were her eyes fucked up? Great, just great. Hearing was crazy, too. A nearby heart monitor seemed louder than an MC rocking the mike down at a club. Whoa. Getting her bearings, Rona checked out where she was. Hospital. Line of beds along either wall, things going beep, steel carts, smell of antiseptic. Her stomach flipped. Wasn't too fond of those lately. Visited them a lot in Sunnydale: potentials getting treated for things they couldn't stitch up at Buffy's house, Xander after Caleb screwed up his eye, getting her cast. Of course, hospital was a step up from "down in a cave with a bunch of screaming bloodsuckers".
Smell was off the charts too. Right next to her came scent vibrant as the copper of a girl's blood: sweat, a hint of aftershave, just a bit of dry paper. Mr. Giles, his back to her. He sat next to a sleeping Buffy with a hand resting on her shoulder. When he leaned in, his expression just like her grams' those times she had nursed Rona through fevers. Weird. Mr. Giles had always been in the background during her time in Sunnydale. Old, distant, scary in the quiet way the real dangerous OG's back in the hood were. Veterans of the life, they didn't need to represent. Just be. Even the Potentials he had brought back-- Ah. Molly. Chloe. Dead. Amanda had gone too, in the Hellmouth. Was Kennedy still alive? Cho? Faith? Xander? Dawn? Her ribs complained while her chest hitched a few times. Tried to keep it quiet, so Mr. Giles wouldn't hear.
"Rona?" A quiet English voice. Mr Giles turned to her. A crack spiderwebbed one lens of his glasses. "Are you alright?"
"Feel like I went ten rounds with Chuckie." Rona dried her cheeks with a corner of the blanket. "Okay though. Go back, I don't want to disturb you none."
"You aren't." Mr Giles tucked up the covers around Buffy's neck. The Slayer moaned a little as he turned to Rona. "I am a Watcher, sworn to aid the Slayer. Not merely my Slayer, although that has at times been a failing of mine. Do you need anything?"
"Uh." Rona looked away from his glasses. Light still hurt. "My eyes are all weird. I'm hearing stuff. Itching all over."
"Ah, of course." Mr. Giles gave her a cheap pair of shades. Oh, mama, that was better. "An after-effect of the Calling. Your senses are adjusting to their new capabilities. The itching is from your wounds healing."
"I hope it stops soon." Fingertips scrabbled through her gown. There were a lot of bandages underneath. "I have to go."
"I don't think it is wise for you to leave until--"
"I mean, go, Mr. Giles." Rona squirmed. "Really, really go."
"Ah." He dragged a wheelchair over. "I'll bring you to the facilities."
"Nah, I can get up myself." Rona grabbed the nearby IV pole for support. She froze at the screech of tortured metal crumpling at her touch. "Or not!"
Rona kept her hands in the air and waved them like she didn't care while Mr. Giles eased her into the seat. She stared at the section of the IV stand she had just crushed. I did that? Mr. Giles hooked her IV to a hook on the wheelchair. He pushed her down the center of the ward to the bathrooms. There were a couple of other potentials--no, Slayers--in the beds across from her and Buffy. Nafisah and Gretta--well, at least a couple others besides her and Buffy had made it out. Principal Wood slept in another section farther down the line. Rona tried not to oggle him. Damn, minute he stopped getting freaky over the white girls, she was making a play. Schwarzenegger body with a Denzel face, right there! Mr. Giles stayed outside while she did her business. Rona bit her lip to stop from moaning with relief. Hesitating at the sink, she chinned the taps open to wash her hands.
Mr Giles waited outside by an empty bed wearing rubber gloves. A bunch of bandages and other things were spread out on a cart. He draw the privacy curtain closed after Rona hobbled over. She paused for a second before raising up the hem of her nightgown, covering her lap with a blanket. Mr. Giles was safe, pretty much. He was a Watcher. She had seen him treat Buffy, wearing only a bra above the waist, after that fight with the first Turok-Han. Didn't even look at her that way even once. Rona wondered if maybe all Watchers were on the down low. Made sense if your job was to spend so much time around young girls. Even Xander--a guy who never once put the moves on any of the potentials--snuck a look every so often. Not to mention what she'd caught Xan muttering once when she went to get him to fix a broken toilet. Mr. Giles was strictly pro while he examined her wounds. There were so many of them. She had seen less stitching on the quilt her grams had said came from the slave days. Was she going to be scarred up like this for the rest of her life?
"Two days, I believe, for these to heal," Mr. Giles said. "A day more for the arm."
"Fast." Rona lowered the gown off her shoulders so he could check up top. "Mr. Giles? How many of us made it out?"
"We lost--" The Watcher suddenly looked even older. "Seven, beneath the Hellmouth. As well, Faith had to leave soon afterwards. She was worried her fugitive status could cause us problems. Don't worry. Your friends Kennedy and Vi escaped, as did Caridad and several others."
"Damn, this sucks." Rona sniffled. "Dawn? Xander?"
"They are fine." Mr. Giles was quiet while he checked a slash beneath her clavicle. "I am afraid Anya died. Apparently heroically. She always did say we were a bad influence."
"Huh." Rona fidgeted. "All your friends are dead, aren't they? The Watchers?"
"My colleagues, yes." A ghost of a smile flickered across his lips. "The ones I love--it seems they have weathered this year's trials. For the most part. You and the others did very well. We are proud of you."
"Yeah." Rona smirked. "We kicked ass, didn't we? Talk about a miracle. Everyone knows the black one gets it in the end."
"And blonde cheerleaders die when they investigate strange noises in the attic." Mr. Giles adjusted his glasses. "I have learned that certain young women have a habit of defying conventional wisdom. Rona, will you be able to stay awake for a while?"
"Sure, why?" Rona swallowed heavily when Mr Giles handed her a kukri and a stake. "Oh."
"I have been awake for nearly a day," he said, that hint of cool scariness returning, "and age and human nature limit even my abilities to stand guard. The First's grand plan may have been defeated. It still exists, and has influence. And hospital wards are public places."
Rona gulped, hiding the weapons under her gown.
"Good girl."
Rona sat up, spine rigid, when Mr. Giles left her in her bed. Great, just great. Near get killed and you still have to worry about vamps and demons. What a mess her life had become. Sulking, she glared over at Buffy. Thanks for nothing, fearless leader. After a moment, though, she noticed the other girl in the bed. A Dawn still in the filthy clothes she had worn to the final battle curled up next to her sister. Mahogany hair mixed with gold. Just peeking out from under Buffy's sister was the pointy end of a stake. Nafisah and Gretta were out cold. Only Rona was up. If anything came in... Rona pinched herself, hard. Not going to fall asleep. We came this far, and we're not gonna die now. Not the girls who had my back. Not my sisters.
Rona stood guard through the rest of the night.