Warren's Bullets

Part 1 :The Shooting

SPLAT. Blood instantly splattered onto Willow's white blouse. There was a thump as Tara's body fell to the ground. Willow's eyes burst wide open and quickly fell to the floor next to her love, Tara. "Tara... Baby..?" She whispered quietly as she stared at the bullet hole in her chest, the stench of blood overwhelmed her senses. With her weak hands, she began shaking Tara's body. "Tara, Tara!" She yelped. This could not be true... She thought. Tears were gushing out from beneath her green eyes as she cradled Tara's body in her arms. Quickly, Willow crawled across the bedroom carpet and reached her hand out to grab the telephone. Hastily, whilst taking a few glances at her girlfriend lying on the floor, she dialed for the hospital and she listened as a glum voice answered. They said they would arrive at the house soon and Willow dropped the phone to the floor before crawling back to Tara. "I'm gonna save you, Tara..." She said softly but full of fear as she wiped tears away from her cheeks.

The door bell sounded and Willow hesitated before rushing down the stairs, the ambulance was there. With shaking hands and a pale face, she opened the door and beckoned the doctors upstairs. "W-we were talking... Next moment... I see her fall to the ground... A bullet hole in her chest..." More tears erupted as she stood, a sick feeling in her stomach, watching the doctors examine Tara. 

"It appears she may survive if we get her to the hospital quick... The bullet didn't go straight to the heart, though we don't have much time as she will lose too much blood if we don't hurry. She's not the only one who got shot..." 

"W-what..?" Willow's face went white and she ran down the stairs and out into the garden. She ran past another ambulance and saw her two best friends on the grass. Buffy lay still with Xander by her side, many doctors sat around her. "Buffy!" She slowly lowered herself onto the grass with Xander. "Buffy... X-Xander... what on earth happened..?!" 

"It was... It was W-Warren... He entered the garden with a gun... I was just sat here with Buffy and he shot her..."

"H-he got T-Tara too..." Willow put her head in her hands and continued to cry. Xander looked over at her with a face full of sorrow and put his hand gently on her back.

A few minutes later Willow looked up to see Tara be lifted and taken into one of the ambulances. She gasped and rushed over to hold her hand as the ambulance doors were shut behind them and they made their way to the hospital.

Hours past and Willow sat blankly in one of the few blue waiting chairs of one of the hospital corridors. The white walls and white ceilings. The white floor and the blue doors, occasional nurses and doctors shuffled past. Some slow, some fast. Not many visitors went down the same corridor and if they did, they were crying. Her stomach was aching and she thought she may throw up. After staring at the wall in front of her for so long, she decided to get up and go to the toilets.

The toilets were empty and she shifted into one of the cubicles, slowly closing the door behind her. She knelt down on the floor, pulled here hair out of her face and lent over the toilet seat. Twenty slow minutes passed by but she still sat there, expressionless before breaking down into tears again in reaction to what was happening. 

Another hour went and she was sitting blankly in the same waiting seat again. She heard more footsteps make their way closer though assumed it was just another member of staff. It stopped next to her and she heard someone sit down in the chair next to her. She rose her head up gradually to see Xander next to her with a solemn expression. 

"Hey, Will..." He spoke to her with a tired but caring tone.

"Hey... Where's Buffy..?" She responded quietly.

"She's being looked at by the doctors... Tara too obviously..."

"Where have you been..?"

"Oh... I was just waiting back near where Buffy was and decided to find you after a while... This place sure is big..." 

"Oh... Yeah... I've been sat here for hours... It's painful... Like, I don't know when the doctor is going to approach and give me the news... I don't know if she's going to be alive or not and the sickening feeling is slowly killing me... Y'know..?" She felt another tear coming through but blinked it away, her lip wavering.

"Yeah... I-I know... We've just gotta keep our heads up and hope for the best... But these things do happen... We've witnessed loads of... deaths... in our life... I mean, Buffy's the slayer and we're her 'slayerettes' as you once called us. We've been through a lot by her side... This is... This is normal..." Xander's small smile died as he slouched down on his chair and looked at the floor, expressionless. Willow did the same and they both sat there, silent.