Dead War

"What may not be possible in a place where there is no darkness?"

" "Please, Buffy. Don't you understand what you've done? We're more afraid of you than guilt. We're more afraid of you than hell." The serrations come to rest, whisper-light, across her spine from the incision already there. "You've won.""

"We will meet in the realm of eternal light."

DeadWar is a post-series Buffyverse tale (taking into account both Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel) written by Mabus. The basic premise is simple: Buffy herself has become a vampire. Hilarity does not begin to describe what ensues.

The vampire that results from Buffy's turning is dominated not by hedonism or simple bloodlust, but by Buffy's anger at the loss of any chance at a normal life and her overdeveloped sense of responsibility for the world. She continues her culling of the world's demons, adding to this a vampiric appetite for torture. Realizing that psychological torture will harm Angel far more than physical pain, she maintains the fiction that she has succeeded at being good even without a soul. For this reason, she drinks only from willing humans, despite her increased requirement for blood to maintain her additional powers.

Buffy's reign of terror, combined with the effects of the newly-empowered multiple Slayers, produces an unprecedented result. Believing that Angel's apparent immunity from her persecution stems from his soul, vampires in Buffy's path choose ensoulment over the prospect of torture and death. Some of the ensouled attempt to redeem their fellow vampires by granting them souls as well; more darkly, other vampires and demons use ensoulment as a weapon against those they expect to be destroyed by guilt. Soon the movement takes on a life of its own, apart from Buffy's actions, and inexorably, the balance between human, vampire, and demon begins to shift.

Not that Buffy gives a rat's ass.

Fancastings of major original characters:


 * Aishwarya Rai as "Sadha Kaur"
 * Ellen Muth as "Dena Greer"
 * Erica Hubbard as "Regan Stacey"
 * Ivana Baquero as "Solita Munoz"
 * Jenna Edwards as "November Hall"
 * Rachel Billings as "Brittany Morgan"
 * Alona Tal as "Michelle Foust"
 * Percy Daggs III as "Gabriel Keller"

Tropes appearing in DeadWar:


 * Actual Pacifist: Regan Stacey (a Wiccan Slayer) is trying to be this. In practice, she wavers between this and a Reluctant Warrior.
 * Ascended Fangirl: November Hall, Slayer, is a Trekkie with a thing for Klingons. She attempts to use a wooden bat'leth. It doesn't work too well.
 * The Atoner: A lot of recently ensouled vampires, but sometimes averted in spite of the soul. Among major characters, Sadha Kaur. Atonement is not always nice, though.
 * Benevolent Genie: Mara, the vengeance demon, has switched sides. (She keeps her powercenter in a safe deposit box.) D'hoffryn wants her head.
 * Blood Knight: Subverted by Buffy (aside from the obvious pun). Both of Buffy's supernatural essences drive her to enjoy the rush of combat, but what remains of her human personality is desperate for an end to the fighting so that she can finally rest. Played straight by a number of Slayers.
 * Boomerang Bigot: Vampire Buffy.
 * Boy Meets Ghoul: See Did We Just Have Tea with Cthulhu?.
 * Child Soldiers: An as-yet-unnamed Ugandan Slayer is working for Roger Wyndham-Price as his personal Slayer and bodyguard. When necessary, he threatens to reveal that her brother is in the country illegally so that he'll be sent back to Uganda and, most likely, end up as one of these.
 * Cute Bruiser: Solita Munoz, whose Slayer powers seem to have manifested exceptionally early (she's barely twelve). She's at least on a par with Dena, who's been a Slayer for several years, and she can leap out a five-story window or be hit by a speeding truck and barely notice.
 * Dare to Be Badass: Played with by Brittany, who frequently dares Angel not to fight, but to find another, more effective solution to his (and the world's) problems.
 * Dark Fic: Did you have to ask?
 * Did We Just Have Tea with Cthulhu?: Our neighborhood demon magnet, Xander Harris, is now dating Illyria.
 * Did You Just Scam Cthulhu?: This has become the standard modus operandi for dealing with Illyria's alien perspective, though it only works off and on. Most recently,
 * Drives Like Crazy: Played with and partially inverted by Dena, who loves to drive--and must be good at it, or she'd be in a lot more wrecks than she is. She terrifies passengers anyway.
 * Dynamic Entry: When confronted with a pair of seeming angels, Dena decides to let them do as they please. Then the normally nonviolent Regan arrives on the scene in a borrowed pickup truck....
 * Extremely Dusty Home: One results from ensouling a vampire with lots of minions.
 * Extreme Melee Revenge: Amy re-ensouls Harmony expecting that it will incapacitate her. It...doesn't. No one is disturbed by this, not even Harmony, as Amy has just sucked out the power from Illyria and Dawn and transformed Willow into a pig with a wave of her hand; had Harmony given Amy a moment to clear her head, she'd have been toast.
 * Eye Scream: "...starting with the eyes."
 * Fantastic Religious Weirdness: Especially common in Schism, but also elsewhere at times.
 * Dena Greer is a Christian fundamentalist of the Charismatic variety. She understands her Slayer abilities in terms of a divine calling and tends to interpret them as miracles. Prophetic dreams? Check. Speaking in tongues? Check. (She has no idea what she's saying, or what the context is, so sometimes played for laughs.) Super-strength? Check. (She notes that when she first got her powers, she was afraid to style her hair, let alone cut it--as per Samson.)
 * Related to Dena's perspective: she is overruled on objecting to using a particular church as an ambush site for vampires. It proves to have almost no crosses and no holy water; dumping a vampire into a full baptistry has no effect. Her allies are reduced to tossing Bibles at the vampires. This is a (fairly common, though not universal) characteristic of the Churches of Christ (to which the author belongs), due to lack of belief in modern supernatural events and priorities leaning away from symbolism. Mabus normally keeps his church out of the spotlight due to the odd implications--that in the Buffyverse, the C of C is a combination of Fundamentalism and Flat Earth Anti-Supernaturalism.
 * Regan Stacey is Wiccan (that is, she practices Wicca as a religion, and is not merely a witch in the supernatural sense). Though she is pacifist in most cases, she makes an exception for vampires, concluding that they're outside the cycle of life and death. Other Wiccan characters are not so certain about her belief on the subject and question whether she's not being unduly influenced by Dena.
 * Sadha Kaur, Watcher and ensouled vampire, is attempting to return to the Sikh faith after over a century. She has the advantage of not having any strict dietary requirements, but (aside from having been evil in the moral sense) she's discarded certain ritual items she was supposed to keep at all times (and the one she still has is a dagger, of a ritual type usually no longer used as a real weapon), and she needs to stay covered up if outside during the day (Sikh women are not supposed to cover themselves as some Muslims do). In addition, Sikhism states that all beings are capable of redemption, which conflicts with the standard beliefs espoused by the Watchers. In spite of her problems, once she finally manages to contact a temple in Houston, the religious leaders there welcome her back and try to accommodate her.
 * Flat Earth Atheist: Examined via Michelle Faust, reluctant vampire. She gets better rather quickly.
 * Food Chain of Evil: Mostly averted. Although Buffy is certainly willing to feed on vampires, blood that has already been used by another vampire isn't very "nutritious".
 * Friendly Neighborhood Vampires: Sometimes. You still can't count on it.
 * The Fundamentalist: Dena Greer, Slayer. See also Knight Templar.
 * Groin Attack: Harmony gives Xander a vampire-powered one . Dena Greer delivers one to a jock who calls her a "dy-".
 * Hilarity Sues: A group of vampires and demons threaten to have some of the Slayers arrested.
 * Hybrid Monster: Buffy still has all her Slayer powers. Some of them are stronger than before.
 * I Knew It!: Vamp!Buffy's attitude toward vampirism in this fic is extremely similar to vamp!Gunn's perspective in Angel: After the Fall, which began over a year later. Very unlikely that it's a Sure Why Not, though nothing's impossible.
 * I'm A Vampire-tarian: 's fate, and not just in the blood-drinking way.
 * I Hate You, Vampire Dad:  certainly came to regret turning Buffy. Angel's not too pleased about his partial responsibility either.
 * I Just Want to Be Normal: And she never will be, ever again.
 * Ineffectual Loner: It's a good thing that Buffy has become this.
 * Knight Templar: Buffy herself is just the beginning.
 * The Ladette: Dena Greer is a mild case--she's crude, obnoxious, violent, and a notorious Big Eater (keeping in mind that Slayers are supposedly "hungry and horny" after a fight). Her religious leanings keep her from actually indulging in beer or sex.
 * Loads and Loads of Characters
 * Looks Like Orlok: Not yet, but Buffy's over-powered nature is causing her Game Face to "age" prematurely.
 * : Normally, decapitation kills vampires dead.
 * Mistaken for Gay: Buffy thinks Faith's Combat Sadomasochist tendencies are coming out in her attempts at training Harmony to fight, and accuses her jokingly of "molesting vampires". Er...not so much. (Regardless of Foe Yay with Buffy, Faith regards Harmony as utterly boring for being The Ditz. Harmony just isn't into that, period.(Unless you're Charlize Theron.))
 * Because she's both The Ladette and The Fundamentalist, characters are prone to assume that Dena Greer is pulling a Larry Craig. Her real issue is that she prefers people stronger than her, which is no longer true of her boyfriend--or indeed, any human male.
 * Nay Theist: Brittany Morgan, Slayer. Not surprising, given who her Aunt Lilah worked for; the only "gods" she's familiar with are jerkasses or worse.
 * Pragmatic Villainy: Played with, beginning with a vampiric bartender whose main evil trait is greed rather than sadism or a love of fighting.
 * Preacher's Kid: Dena manages to play both variants at once--incredibly straight-laced fundamentalist who indulges in massively violent beatdowns on any demon within reach.
 * Put Down Your Gun and Step Away: A Jasminite demon tries to use this on . He's Genre Savvy enough to keep the hostage's head mostly in front of his own, but Michelle uses vampiric dexterity to plug the demon anyway. (The hostage gets grazed in the ear.)
 * Script Fic: The two sideline plots, Schism and Haven, are currently written in this format, as it was popular on BuffyWorld forums at the time the fic began. This may change.
 * Shell-Shocked Veteran: Buffy, oh so very much. The number of Slayers who also fit the trope is rising suspiciously fast. Hint:
 * Shout-Out: Many, naturally, but makes a rare foray out of Buffyverse territory when Regan arrives on the scene with two other witches. Theme music from Charmed begins to play...then stops when they tell her she needs to fight this fight herself.
 * Standard Female Grab Area: Utterly subverted. Grabbing a Slayer or female vampire this way will get you punched in the face or slammed against the wall, if you're lucky. Angel in particular makes this mistake with Brittany.
 * Stringy Haired Ghost Girl: A rare non-Japanese example, namely.
 * Suicide Attack: "We belong dead."
 * Took a Level In Badass: Harmony's taking combat lessons from Faith. It's working.
 * Transhuman Treachery: Averted by Buffy...which makes the situation worse than it would be otherwise.
 * Unresolved Sexual Tension: Inadvertantly created between Giles and Sadha Kaur (who, after all, does look like Aishwarya Rai). The author was soon asked for Lemon fic involving the pairing. Soon thereafter, though, Sadha left Giles' cast herd.
 * Vampires Are Sex Gods: Averted, more often than not. Vampire Buffy is nearly Asexual.
 * Vampire Refugee: Subverted by Buffy, who (usually) believes that she's got enough Heroic Willpower to ride this thing out and keep doing her job. And the fact that she now enjoys torture and death a whole lot more? Just a bonus.
 * Van Helsing Hate Crimes: Killing a soulless monster is one thing. But what happens as the proportion of ensouled vampires increases? And then there are the soulless vampires who begin to at least try to follow the rules to avoid being staked.
 * Vegetarian Vampire: Used and averted. Most vampires can manage to survive on animals, if they're willing, but Buffy's Slayer powers require more "juice". Feeding only on animals will leave her disoriented and weak in about a week's time.
 * War Is Hell: Almost literally. Hell is not war, though.
 * What Measure Is a Non-Human?: Vampires, demons, and various forces, oh my.