Damsel in Distress, My Ass

Buffy took the subway because she can't bear to take the time to walk down to the precinct and she can't run full speed through the city at noon. Mac had called and told her they had some information about Danny. That had resulted in immediate panic but she had pushed it away. Whatever was going on, Danny needed her now and panicked Buffy was not going to help anyone. On the subway ride over she'd stood with her fingers pressed against the door, harder and harder until the glass cracked and she pulled. When it finally slides into the station, she's the first one off, shoving her way through people as she runs, just keeping her speed in check to the high rise that the lab is housed in. She doesn't bother with the elevator, it would only make her crazy, and she knows she can run stairs faster than the elevator will move. Once the door shuts behind her, she doesn't hold back, taking the stairs so fast she almost blurs. She pulls up to a stop at the right floor and bursts through the door. The receptionist directs her to Mac's office and her nerves flutter up again.

Buffy smooths her hand over her hair. It's a wreck and she knows it. She pulled it back in a knot after the rain last night and she hasn't looked at it since. She spent the whole night killing vampires, pounding on demons and decidedly not sleeping or eating. She's got on a wife beater that's seen better days and a pair of jeans that hang low on her hips. The knees are torn out and that happened only hours ago. She opens the door to Mac's office with a slight knock then steps inside hesitantly.

"Mr. Taylor...uhm, Detective Taylor...thank you for calling me. Buffy Summers," she says to jog his memory even though he's the one that called her.

RP Prompt: Everyone needs to get away sometime. Here is a chance for your muse to make their great escape. Where they go and with whom is all up to you.

Lately things had been a lot darker between Danny and her. Not bad just more needy, more desperate, more like the life she had to live instead of the life she wanted to live. Taking a vacation right now was out of the question. Danny couldn't get the time off but Buffy still thought they could use a vacation and she missed the beach. The California beach. Sure they had beaches in New York but they were different. And also they were full of people.

Since they couldn't go to California, Buffy had decided to bring California to them. Danny had the day off. Buffy sent Danny out for bags of ice while she put everything together on the roof. She didn't tell him what she was up to, just that she had a surprise and she needed ice. On the roof she had a sandbox full of sand, lawn chairs sitting so that they could put their feet in the sand. She also had a kiddie pool full of water, a cooler with bottles of water and beer just waiting for ice, sunscreen, and her ipod dock. She had her ipod set to play nothing but beach boys songs along with a few other California, sun and beach related songs by various artists. There was also a smores maker off to the side. They could use it to roast hot dogs as well. She considered a fire pit but she was pretty sure that was in violation of some kind of fire code or the other. She had a baseball and a couples of gloves so they could play catch later. She was wearing her bikini and she'd left Danny a note on top of a pair of swim trunks in the apartment.

Put these on and come up to the roof

Buffy and Danny were walking along, weaving between people. Buffy had one arm around Danny's waist and she was holding a beer in the other hand. This was the Mermaid Parade. It'd only just started, sending a parade of floats and people in mermaid costumes by them. It was hot and Buffy was wearing the pink bikini top with the white skull and crossbones on it she'd bought at Victoria's Secret along with a pair of cut off shorts that weren't Daisy Dukes but short enough. She had a pair of pink two inch heels on as well.

"Sorry, Boyfriend, you have to wait for the mermaid costume later when we get home," she teased him.

Her day had been awful. She'd spent the whole day snapping at her classes. Some of the boys had been understanding and others had been just little crapheads. She'd responded in kind by being bitchy. Frappachinos had been mainlined because she hadn't gotten any sleep the past two nights and she felt like she was jumping out of her skin. Danny had kissed her when he'd left that morning but he hadn't slipped in the shower with her, which was how they usually started their morning out. In the end she just went straight home after work, took a bubble bath, drank a glass of wine and tried to unwind. It didn't really work, there was too much on her mind and too much on her shoulders. She got out of the bath, tossed on a wife beater, a pair of shorts and stabbed a chopstick through her damp hair. She put her ipod on her Boy Bands playlist (N'Sync was good, thank you very much) and decided to try some Tai Chi. It couldn't hurt and it might center her enough that she could deal with everything and even help Danny deal. The wooden floor was cool and hard beneath her bare feet so she focused on that as she went through the Tai Chi motions in an attempt to lose herself. Every once in a while she'd glance at the clock -defeating the purpose- knowing Danny would be home in a little while, barring any complications at work.

Buffy and Danny were on the subway. She had her hands wrapped around one of the poles in the aisle of the subway. There were seats but she never could sit on the subway. It made her restless, the whole being several feet underground thing. It didn't send her claustrophobia over the edge the way riding in elevators did but it set it on edge enough that she didn't want to sit. Danny was standing behind her, his arms around her and his hands above hers on the pole. She leaned back slightly and rested her head against his chest. She looked up at him.

"Last chance to get out of this, Boyfriend. You sure you want to own a dog with me?"

She was nervous because whether they were calling it or not, the dog wasn't just a commitment to an animal. It was a commitment to each other and there were huge gaping things that Danny didn't know about her. While she was keeping those things secret from him on purpose and she was still waiting for that 'right' moment to tell him, she knew she'd breathe easier about the longevity of their relationship once he knew and hopefully accepted everything about her.

Buffy took the subway mostly because walking would take too long. She had stakes tucked in her bag, she'd left a note for Danny (who was working a homicide case)and now she was walking through Central Park. She had her phone on vibrate because nothing ruined a sneak attack like a cell phone ringing. She was supposed to meet Pyro here and they were going to find some vampires to light up. It shouldn't be hard, they loved Central Park like Buffy loved shoes.

[Rp for stillacrime This is involved in the Sam's Army storyline. The phone call happens ICly Wednesday night.]

Buffy kicked Angel out of the room, sent him patrolling then she changed into her pajamas, pulled her hair up into a ponytail and sat against the headboard of the bed. She pulled her knees up to her chest and rested her chin on her knees. She had already talked to Danny like six times that day but she hadn't really been able to talk to him for long. He'd been at work and she'd been either in layovers, running to a plane or trying to arrange her motel room. Now she had Angel out of the room and she could talk. Not that she wouldn't have talked with Angel in the room. She just would have thrown things at him every time he made an expression. He knew better than to talk. Things had been awkward with Angel at first but they'd kind of ironed things out and Angel had asked if she was happy and when she'd said yes, he'd accepted it. There was still that tension between her and Angel but that tension was always always going to be there. It was too much a part of Buffy and Angel to go away.

Buffy hated this whole being away from Danny thing. Once she got through this whole battle thing, she swore even if the world did decide to end, she was not leaving New York City for a nice long while. It could decide to end in NYC or one of the other slayers could take care of it. Of course this was a little bigger than one slayer. In fact she was a little bit worried about this battle. Not only was she going to end up killing possessed humans, but they could do nasty, nasty things to her. Angel had instructions to actually go to New York and talk to Danny if anything happened to her. Of course he had to tell everyone else, but everyone else would understand. They knew the deal. Danny would be taken completely by surprise and she hated that. So she was kinda hoping not to die or end up in a week long coma this time. It would be nice.

After staring at Danny's number for five minutes, Buffy finally pushed call. She listened to it ring and when he finally picked up, a real smile curved her lips.

"Hey, Boyfriend."

Buffy had been in a funk since the dream about Angelus. She was pretty sure Danny had noticed 'cause he'd been more clingy and attention-y than usual. Lots of holding her and she'd only been able to explain it as a bad dream. She spent a lot of time with her head against his chest, her hands against his overly warm skin, assuring herself that it had only been a dream. Angelus hadn't turned him to fuck with her. Because seriously, it'd be just like him. Now they were lying in bed, an attempt at make Buffy smile--which had worked, for a little while. Danny was on his stomach and Buffy on her side. She reached over and grabbed Danny's tee shirt from the floor, pulling it over her head then found the purple glitter pen she used to write in her diary on the nightstand. She moved so she was sitting on Danny's butt, knees on either side of him. She leaned over, forearms and elbows resting on his back and started drawing on his shoulders. Her name went first: Buffy Anne Summers starting at one shoulder and sweeping across to the other in bubbly, cursive letters.

RP for stillacrime

The flight...yeah that had been impossibly long. Buffy had contemplated whether torture could make the pilot fly faster or maybe Will could do some magic hoodoo on the plane to make it move faster. Either way, taking too long. And there had been that creepy guy in the seat next to but she'd gotten moved to first class because she didn't play well with others. Whoever said being a problem child in life would get you no where clearly had not been a problem child confined to the small space of a plane in mid international flight. She half hoped the guy was okay and half hoped his pinky really was broken. Either way, she needed to let Giles know what she'd done. In case he sued. She didn't think he was going to sue. Right now, at this very moment Buffy was stuck behind someone's Scottish grandma with fifteen pieces of carry on luggage. The old woman was trying to maneuver herself, her bags and this giant shawl that looked like a shetland pony down the aisle. Buffy really wanted to pick the woman up, shetland pony and all, set her aside and get the hell out of this plane. Normally, planes did not make her claustophobic but at this moment, when Buffy wanted out, claustophobia was clawing at her throat and sending the freaking eagles in her stomach swooping all over the place. Buffy leaned forward slightly, putting on her best fake!cardboard Buffy smile ever and whispered through her teeth:

"Lady if you don't move I'm go to puke all over you."

Success! Only Buffy really wasn't making any friends this flight. The old woman looked at her alarmed, shuffled off to the side and Buffy shoved past her, taking care not to hit the woman with her carry on. See! She could be nice...ish...when she got her way. And then, the perils of being short came in. She was stuck in the middle of a moving mass all headed toward customs. Oh Customs. Her nightmare of nightmares. She hated customs and she was pretty sure customs hated her. It was not her fault that they didn't believe NYC was infested with rats that could only be killed by lethally sharpened stakes or wicked awesome scythes. Lucky this time, she didn't have the stakes or the scythe this time--okay one set of chopsticks possibly sharpened to lethal limits but really, you couldn't expect her to travel without anything! Hell hounds attacked her prom. Like they're going to avoid her international flight?--Anyway, she thought she looked perfectly acceptable and not terrorist-y in black capris, tee shirt --and oh...that could have been what gave creepy guy that idea-- and cute, black, kitten heeled slides that were doing nothing for letting her see over the masses of people. However, apparently the customs guy remembered her because they searched her, complete with pat-down--maybe the tee shirt was giving him ideas?--and carry on search.

Finally, finally and did she mention finally? customs gave her the all clear and she slipped through the security gates looking for Danny on the other side. It only took her 2.8 seconds to see but during those 2.8 seconds she was pretty sure he'd given up, gone home or gotten called away for work. She preferred the latter since the first meant she was stuck in New York on her own and that was just all kinds of sucktastic when she didn't know anyone here except Danny and via online chatting, Anna who was Danny's best friend and who exactly did she think was getting Anna in the divorce? Anyway--2.8 seconds and she saw him across the airport, which was obviously her clue to give him the once in a lifetime--who are we kidding, this is the start of many, get used to it bucko--chance to experience precisely what it was like to be full body tackled by 100 pounds of slayer. She had warned him ahead of time to brace himself.