DTLS Works are PG-13 - The images they invoke        are all in your mind.

..  The Works of Dawn the Last Slayer (DTLS) The immortal Key-born Slayer

A Cautionary Tale

by 'Dawn the Last Slayer'

Narrative Works of 'Dawn the Last Slayer'-  #TBD
copyright © 2001 gloryisagod.com/DS/G(G)
- Previous Narrative Work: N/A
- Next Narrative Work: N/A
- Primary Focus: Two Travelers, both with initials "J"
                         Faith & Tess
                             'Dawn the Last Slayer'
- Primary Location: Tavern beside the road
                                 On the road
- Initial Date/Time:  Unknown, presumably late Sept 2001 (Our dimension)
copyright © 2001 gloryisagod.com/DS/G(G)
[Editor- Received with no explanation. Obviously something has annoyed DTLS about the initial
              UPN Roswell and Buffy episodes. We'll have to wait and see them to decide what it is.]

copyright © 2001 gloryisagod.com/DS/G(G)
The two travelers met at the door to the roadside tavern, seeking shelter from the storm.

Both were carrying shouldered journey bags of fine leather. One was larger and more
battered by time and the weather, but otherwise the men were of a kind. Each extended
a hand as they recognized another of their rare craft.

By chance the initial carved on each's bag cover flap was a "J".

Inside the almost empty establishment, they called to the proprietoress for tankards of ale
with steaming bowls of the local stew and fresh bread. Her one helper was bustling about
the tables cleaning them.
copyright © 2001 gloryisagod.com/DS/G(G)
Both looked familiar to one or the other of the travelers.

"How goes your journey?" the one with the larger bag asked the other across the table as
the first of many ales arrived. Nodding, the other replied after a healthy swallow, "The last
leagues were treacherous, crossing from the land of World Brethren to this land of the
Upper Peoples Netherworld. This is the beginning my 3rd year on the road."

"Spoken well, " the questioner said with sympathy, "for I too have made that passage
successfully, having been on the journey now into a 6th year.

The woman brought trays with the food, As she turned, one asked, "Do I know you, good
woman ?"

"Aye," she replied. "I was one of your creations, discarded and now off the magic road plying
a trade," She smiled, "'tis not as glamorous, but it does pay the bills."

"Your name?  I forget," he looked harder at her. "And that of your serving wench?"

"She's not a wench, sir. She's a part owner. Her name is Tess."
copyright © 2001 gloryisagod.com/DS/G(G)
And my name is "Faith, sir, Faith,"  she walked away to her tasks, leaving them to the talk and
the meal.

After awhile of eating and drinking, both were in a good mood. "What do you craft for
the road ahead?"  the elder, more burdened man began opening his bag.

Putting his bag on the table to the side of the plates and bowls, the other pulled out
one his magic scrolls. "Excellent!" one exclaimed as  the other produced one of his
magic scrolls and they compared them.

The two scrolls were loosely bound with a ribbon that bespoke their magic contents.

"May I look and admire your craftsmanship?" both asked politely per the formal protocol,
but with undisguised eagerness to see the other's.
copyright © 2001 gloryisagod.com/DS/G(G)
Unrolling each other's scroll, they began to read the handwritten titles. "Bargaining,"
one read, the other read "Busted". After a few moments of reading the magic writing in
bold black ink, both carefully rolled them back up without finishing.

Silently, they raised their tankards and drained them. "More ale," both called out with
no enthusiasm.

As the ale arrived, one told the other, "I had thought of using the other scrolls, the
ones that must be written in the special ink," he said, "but I feared to get off the road
and start a new road."

"I, too," was the understanding reply. "The road we travel is long and difficult, but to
strike off it or to step onto a new road not traveled is a fearsome decision."

"Could we still change that decision?" the other asked.
opyright © 2001 gloryisagod.com/DS/G(G)
"Probably not, " was the answer. "We were both once bold and our magic scrolls first created the
worlds we wrote. I brought into my world girls of power, girls of magic, girls with no fear."

"Then," he said sadly, " I created, step by step, a girl of immense potential power, a bound
but weakened god. Soon I had them jousting in a great triangle, the girl of no fear, her magical
sister and  the deliberately almost helpless god."

The other recalled, "I, too, had girls of power, and boys of power, but the greatest was
my sweet new girl of power, also bound in some way from her great potential."

"And," the first continued, "I couldn't take my creation and unbound her as I should have.
I could not partake of the cup that was offered. The cup of a greater world, worlds without
number, worlds off the current road. I had been on the familiar road too long. I'd become
those I had once dethroned."

He reached for the ale again, finding the tankard empty and then ignoring it.

"Thinking my road was ending, I elected to transform my sweet girl of power to an evil
girl of power and dispatch her from the road carrying a bastard child," was the second's
tale.

After a long silence, they settled up their bill with Faith, hoisted the last of their
ale, following a curious toast, "To more small things and the road we know."

Faith and Tess watched them leave. "Think they'll ever realize that the magic scrolls
are simply a leakage from our real world?" Tess asked, pocketing the gold coin left
as a tip..

"Not now, it's too late for them, I suspect," Faith walked to the door and watched them
round the curve that hid them from view beyond the trees. The storm had let up and
the sky was bluing quickly.

"They still have one more chance, at the top of the next hill," Tess joined Faith. "The
other roads join below there."
copyright © 2001 gloryisagod.com/DS/G(G)
"We'll see," Faith closed the door and they went back to cleaning up for the evening
patrons from the roads over the hill.
opyright © 2001 gloryisagod.com/DS/G(G)
The two well-lubricated travelers stopped suddenly as they topped the low hill and
gazed at a wonder. Below them were two roads branching from theirs. To the
left was one with a prominent new sign that said, "Leaving Roswell",  a sign near
the road on the right read "Leaving Sunnydale".

The road they were on became narrower, more rocky and with grass on it in places.

Battered and broken signs, one on each side, barely legible, noted, "Sunnydale, next
44 leagues, no exits". The other similarly proclaimed, "Roswell, next 44 leagues,
no exits".

The two other roads widened out and in the distance they could see more branches
and signs that would require optical aid to discern. One traveler retrieved such a device
and looked long up each road.

He handed the device to the other.

"It appears we're being given a chance to rethink our decisions to stay our safe course
on this dwindling road, friend," the first traveler said.

"I see on one road, the road I could take," the second said, removing the optical device from
his eyes, "that there are roads to more worlds and crossovers to your road that go under this,
our narrow road," he pointed and drew the ways with a hand. "Also, a tall blond and a short
blonde girl waiting at one crossover for me."

"Did you also see on what could be my new road practically a parade of people, gods and more,
also waiting for me?" the first traveler looked indecisive.

"I did," he handed the optical device back. "There's also a girl in black leather pants, boots, a
purplish shirt-thing and with incredibly long dark hair waiting for us at the point where we must
make the decision," the other responded.

They wallked down the hill and approached the slender teen-looking girl.

One knew her, sort of.
copyright © 2001 gloryisagod.com/DS/G(G)
"Dawn? How can you be real ?" the first traveller asked. "We create you and your worlds with our
magic scrolls. Off the road, or before we arrive, you and they cannot be real," he told her.

"Your error is your failing," she smiled at them. "The worlds the magic scrolls reflect are but a
pale image of our reality that leaks through to yours."

"...The worlds the magic scrolls reflect are but a
pale image of our reality that leaks through to yours."

copyright © 2001 gloryisagod.com/DS/G(G)
"You must make a choice. The narrow, safe road or the roads that lead to things you cannot
now conceive," she held out her hands, palms up. "Give me all your magic scrolls, for your
toll of passage safely on this narrow road is to sink or swim by your own wits, not magic."
copyright © 2001 gloryisagod.com/DS/G(G)
Both travelers, being seasoned on road ways, decided that they could force their way past her
without much effort. One displayed a short cudgel taken from his clothing somewhere, the other
a shining blade from his boot top.

They were badly mistraken.

Dawn blurred.

As they picked themselves up with several brused ribs each, they rethought their plan and began
pouring out their scrolls and writing instruments onto the road, shaking in terror.

From somewhere, more girls that should not exist in reality walked up. Dawn introduced
them as they paraded past and then stood behind her in a loose chatting crowd.

They kept coming. New faces, new powers, old faces, new powers, pregnant, not pregnant.

FInally, Dawn motioned the travelers past. "You're free to go. May you find solace
in small things."

"Wait," the first traveler turned as they strode painfully past the girls, all smiling at them
happily. "What will become of the magic scrolls? None but those gifted in the craft
may use them to create roads and worlds."

Dawn leaned down at the two piles and picked up one scruffy scroll each, and two
writing instruments. "For you, "The Gift" and you "The Departure". She gave one each
to them.

"But,"  both protested," You've mixed them up, we have the wrong ones."

"If you trade them, both  will vanish forever. When you write, use the back of the scroll and
write small or lightly without ink so erasure is possible. Hold them up to the light and you
can view the other side reversed through the new writing."
copyright © 2001 gloryisagod.com/DS/G(G)
"That's your departure gift. To be reminded of what could have been and to always see
behind your writing one another's similar lost opportunity."

"As to the gifted and the scrolls..."

Dawn, picked up one of the scrolls with the gold ribbon, untied it and held the writing
instrument in her right hand. "I write, perhaps not as you do, but I create worlds
based on my reality. I write what I live. I have lived what I write."

With that, she wrote at the top of the scroll open in her hand,

              "Dawn the Last Slayer"

                      a work of

              'Dawn the Last Slayer'

And it was.
copyright © 2001 gloryisagod.com/DS/G(G)
Parable meanings:
      - sic transit gloria
      - All things have an end.
      - And all things have a beginning.
      - But some things never really end.
      - Sometimes reality bites you on the butt, and you think it's a mosquito.

Editor- Received with no explanation. Obviously something has annoyed DTLS about the initial
              UPN Roswell and Buffy episodes. We'll have to wait and see them to decide what it is.]
copyright © 2001 gloryisagod.com/DS/G(G)
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