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The bell above the door rang out as the door swept in.
It was 2 a.m. Friday night, or Saturday morning as it were, and the "after drinking bar crowd" had been fairly steady since midnight. The trio that entered wore blue scrubs. A tradition of getting ice cream at the only ice cream shop that was almost always open, no matter what time their shift ended.
The bell rang out as each individual passed through the threshold.
It was magically imbued the bell. The long or short of the ring helped whichever girl was behind the counter to identify the influx. And why did only girls work here?
Not only was this ice cream shop always open, minus random holidays and the occasional full clean-up shut-down, it was all inclusive. Everyone was welcome here. Of course, certain clientele picked up more during the darker parts of the clock.
The redhead behind the counter perked up, happy to have customers. She smiled big. However, even as bright as her smile was, it was washed out with the loudness of colors in her shirt and the crazy pattern of lines over top the layered stripes of the colors.
She had heard the door sweep along the floor long before it had hit the bell. She also knew the people stepping inside were human before hearing the rings.
Visually it was obvious, as the trio were wearing scrubs… Plus they were regulars.
“Please tell me you have the coffee tonight.”
“What, Jen, no hello?”
“Hi, Vi” “Morning, Vi!” “Howdy!” The three called out.
“So… coffee?”
“I know it’s not in the soft serve. I just put the Matcha Green Tea in one and Mango in the other machine earlier. You'll have to check the tubs if we've got it scoopable.”
At the mention of matcha, one of the other scrub-ettes went “woo hoo” and started doing a happy dance.
“Actually it's October now, so I guess that would be Swamp Water and Maggots.”
The renaming of the regular ice cream flavors into gross stuff was accidental. When Tara and Willow first took over the shop, they were sorting out how best to serve their non-human customers. Part of that was creating flavors specifically requested by these other customers. So they actually had swamp water and maggot ice cream.
The first particular incident, a “day-time” demon had come in asking for bone ice cream was overhead by a human customer who proceeded to freak out. Tara, with her quick thinking and the cheesy Halloween decorations that had been just hung up, cleared it up for the lady that he really had been ordering vanilla. Since then every October they tagged their regular ice cream with the strange flavors. And when a similar incident happened after that, they’d just excuse it as silly people who enjoyed the Halloween names.
“Here it is.” Jen pointed to one of the 12 tubs in the windowed ice cream freezer. “Two scoops please!”
“Yuk, coffee flavored.” The nurse who was happy about green tea commented. The other gal in scrubs was staring at the abstract art hanging on the open wall in the seating area. A new month also meant a new artist has just installed a few pieces for sale.
“It isn't coffee flavored, it is coffee in magical ice cream form. There isn't anything that even comes close.”
“But yeah, still coffee.”
Vi just shook her head. She was fairly certain she'd heard this argument between the nurses before. She handed off the swamp water soft serve and got her scoops ready for the coffee.
“How does Tara do it? What is her secret?”
“You'd have to ask her yourself.”
Vi had been working for Willow and Tara since they bought the place and it officially became Tara's Handmade Ice Cream Shoppe.
It was originally a Baskin Robbins. The mass exodus when they had that little problem with The First had caused many franchise corporations to turn tail and run. After they had all successfully defeated the Turak-Han and permanently closed the Hellmouth, people started to rebuild. The people had come back but the corporations did not. And as the death rate no longer matched it's former quantity, the sleepy town of Sunnydale prospered.
Tara had taken a job at “Mom and Pop’s Ice Cream Shoppe” when Willow and Tara decided to stay. Then, when Tara started creating new ice cream flavors, and business boomed, Mom and Pop happily retired early, selling the business to Willow and Tara. Willow loved the original rhyme name but wanted to up the ante by using alliteration. Tara’s Tasty Treats was quickly vetoed, however.
Tara had a natural talent for creating wonderful flavors, and Willow understood the chemistry to take Tara's creations and turn them into recipes, especially for larger batch sizes.
Vi knew little about the creation process, some parts of which Willow had gotten trademarks and patents for. One thing she was fairly certain, however, it was Willow who created the coffee ice cream.
Sunnydale remained the original slayer headquarters but the bulk of the force was now needed elsewhere, near other Hellmouths, whose activity seemed to rise with the shutdown of the one. A few slayers remained. All of them were on the ice cream shop payroll. Vi was the only one to stay from the first group of potentials.
Not that they really needed to staff the shop with Slayers. The close of the Hellmouth also seemed to relocate the more violent and disruptive demon members. They sought the evil energies that leaked from the Hellmouth. The demons that stayed and patronized the business were the ones happy to live in society. Conveniently, most of them also didn't require killing humans as their food source. And a lot of them could guise themselves enough to live amongst them. Lame excuses about skin problems were still politely ignored in Sunnydale.
Vi watched as the nurses left with their ice cream. A few more drunks staggered in then a few demons.
It was about 5 a.m. after a good hour lull between customers that the door swung open again.
Again, Vi heard the door before it hit the bell, she also knew before it rang that a demon had just entered.
She was unfamiliar with the demon. The demon was not a regular, and Vi figured she had not even seen one of its kind before. She did not spend any extra time studying any demon species, even though Willow would try to get her and the other girls to occasionally.
It looked around the cases with its pale green eyes. “One scoop, Pigs Blood, no cone.” It was a strange mix of tones but a soft almost questioning voice.
Vi grabbed a dish from the stack and reached in with the scoop. To most customers, it appeared the scoop went into the red velvet. Some of the demons could see the magic of the two separate freezers stacked in each other.
Vi handed the demon the dish and a spoon and went to type the order on the tablet connected to the money drawer.
“That will be…”
Vi wasn't able to finish her sentence as she caught a flying spoon while dodging the cup of ice cream as it whizzed past her head.
“Why did you feed us blood?” The voice sounded confused and curious but the vibe in the room was anger and rage.
…...............
The Scooby theme song started ringing from the iPhone on the bedside table.
Willow sat right up knowing if she checked her Fitbit, it would tell her it was early morning. It would also tell her that her heart rate had jumped significantly.
When she first programmed the song it was funny. The song was only associated with incoming calls that had dialed an extra number when they called. That meant it was an emergency.
When a particular song is only associated with emergencies the body will do some amazing programming of its own.
Willow grabbed the phone as her wife started to stir next to her.
“What’s wrong?”
……...............
The front door had a large fluorescent sign that blocked the entire pane of glass. “Sorry closed for cleaning” was written in a bold stencil font, and the curtains had been drawn on the rest of the windows.
Willow pushed through the door anyway and held it open for Tara to follow through. They paused near the door staring in awe at the scene as the door slowly closed having slipped from Willow’s fingers.
Willow had pictured the damage to be much worse when she’d taken that phone call. Most of the tables were in various angles of tipped over. Only two of the tables were completely upside-down. One table had been destroyed and was in pieces on the ground after hitting the far wall opposite the cash register. All but one of the artwork still remained, some askew from the jolt of the impact. The blank spot still held it’s placard “Blurred Lines - $150” but the canvas itself was ripped, taken its place amongst the rubble of the table from the direct hit.
Vi was sitting casually on the stool behind the counter.
“The demon?” Willow asked.
“Contained.”
Tara used her senses beyond her eyeballs. “No bad energies.”
“Well I did hit the suppression alarm, so would you?” Vi asked.
“Since it’s my spell I can sort out the other energies. Plus I’m looking for any ill intent and that would show up from before you hit the button.” Tara explained.
Willow smirked, maybe it was time to set all the girls down and review some magic basics.
“Well it was pissed off, but I did take it down easily.”
“No resistance?” Tara asked. Willow knew her wife was getting an inkling.
“Uh, no, I guess not.”
“So what happened, a little more specifically and now that I’m awake.” Willow jumped in.
“It asked for pig’s blood and then got mad and threw it at me.”
“I wonder if it actually wanted the red velvet,” Tara said.
“I thought the name thing was to prevent stuff like this from happening.” Vi’s tone exasperated.
“Some demons just want regular ice cream.”
Willow turned back to Tara. “So what do we do?”
Tara glanced around again. “We need to see how bad the damage is, because if it’s a lot then we’ll need to call the Insurance Adjuster, and if we do that…”
“We’ll need to call the police so they have a police report.” Willow finished.
“I think I should go talk to the demon.”
“Are you sure, Tara? Do you want me to…”
Tara reached out and placed her hand on Willow’s flat stomach. Next week they’d know for sure if it was going to grow.
“No.” was all Tara had to say.
And it was all she wanted to say because they hadn’t told the gang yet. Slayers could be gossipy and that was the sort of information they’d want to tell their family in person and not through the grapevine. Stupid slayer hearing.
“Go ahead and assess, if it’s okay then we can start cleaning it up. I’ll go talk to the demon and see if we need to call in the team.”
Tara proceeded behind the counter, slipping past Vi who was still just hanging out on the stool and passed through the archway to the space in the back.
The first door the blue eyes fell upon was the large walk-in freezer. To it’s left was her office and to it’s right was the breakroom.
She made her way to the office as its door was shut, hoping that Vi did not lock the demon in the freezer.
The hallway light illuminated the desk as the door opened. It was definitely Tara’s desk, just as it was obvious that the desk at home was Willow’s. The one at home being neat with everything in its right place in the various boxes, folders, and fancy plastic organizers all color coded. This desk was “organized piles” as Willow called it, changing it from “messy” after Tara proving time and again that she always knew exactly where everything was on it.
There was an envelope on the floor, it’s cellophane window that would have shown the shop’s address, only showed the lines from the folds on the back of it. Tara reached down and grabbed it, flipped it over and saw her own handwriting on the back. The top half listed when she’d inventoried Monday morning, while the bottom list was the order that she’d placed on Monday afternoon.
As she piled it back on her desk she heard the demon speak.
“I’m sorry.”
The demon was sitting on a folding chair in “the cage.” Willow said it reminded her of the high school library. Only this one held banker boxes of receipts and records, as well as paper goods and cleaning supplies. One thing they did share in common was the occasional locking up of demons.
Tara met its eyes and saw regret and sincerity before it dropped its head to hide in the hooded sweatshirt.
It looked remarkably human behind its pale green colored eyes. But its skin had a pallid green tone, like that time Willow and Tara took that Olivia Cruise to Alaska. Turns out Buffy’s driving doesn’t cause motion sickness but large ocean liners do.
“Can you tell me your side of the story?” Tara looked upon the demon, not with anger or even pity. It was genuine interest and little judgment.
The demon looked back up but stayed silent. It squinted seeming to be analyzing Tara. Then it brightened.
“So it is true. We were told Sunnydale was a safe place. We could be accepted by humans.” The voice was soft, melodic like three octaves speaking as one. It brought to Tara’s mind a field of flowers, but she wasn’t sure why.
Tara’s features softened even more. “So you are new here?”
“Yes, we came to escape the city, where we don’t fit in.”
“Los Angeles?” Tara asked.
“How did you know? Other demons could be mean to us and mean to humans and we did not like.”
It wasn’t the first time newcomers found their way to Sunnydale. But that wasn’t the topic of discussion. Tara knew, as Tara always seemed to know, the demon wasn’t a bad one. They just needed to sort out the misunderstanding she was sure that had happened.
“So why did you throw ice cream at my slayer?”
Tara didn’t particularly like the phrasing, but Vi was her employee and the girl was a Slayer. Ultimately all of the Slayers were a lot like family. Since it was she and Willow that did the spell to turn them all into Slayers, Tara also couldn’t help but be protective over them.
“We did not realize.” The demon finally showed fear over the incident as it sank in just how lucky it was to be sitting in the cage right then.
“So you didn’t see the Slayer’s symbol?”
Tara could have also asked if the demon had seen the signs about careful ordering on the “only visible to demons” signs and symbols displayed in the shop. She knew though that there was no way possible to cover all known demon languages or if the demon could actually read any demon language at all. Plus there was the whole thing that sometimes, no matter how many signs or how big of signs you post, that beings (human and otherwise) just plain didn’t bother to read them.
The slayer symbol though, that had become universal. Even regular everyday humans were beginning to recognize the outline of the scythe, knowing a woman bearing that symbol was someone who could help. Although a lot of them just thought it was some sort of woman-power lesbian martial-arts biker gang or something.
“We did not notice the signs. We did not mean to be angry. We just saddened with expectation not met and we being treated as demons. We do not consume blood. We just saw amusing name for ice cream.”
There was a knock on the door frame and as Tara turned towards the sound, Willow peeked her head in.
“I’ll be right back,” Tara told the demon.
Tara followed Willow out to the archway where she paused. Vi had already placed most of the tables in their proper upright position.
“It really isn’t that bad, the cost of the damage isn’t any more than it would be having the insurance go up. How’d it go with the demon?”
“Not malevolent. Just seeking refuge in Sunnydale.”
“So release in exchange for information, promises to behave, and possibly some restitution?”
Tara re-entered the office while Willow hung back by the door.
“What kind of demon are you?”
“We are the kind that want to be accepted.”
Tara sighed. “I understand your plight, truly I do. Unfortunately, we require more information so we can determine if it is safe to release you. So the most important question is are you sorry and do you promise not to hurt anyone again?”
“Did we hurt someone? We did not mean to.”
“No one was hurt.”
“We never wish to hurt anyone.”
Tara glanced back towards Willow. It wasn’t worded as a promise but Tara had to make sure Willow understood it as she did. Willow’s nod was all she needed.
“Do you have a name for your species?”
“We know the old name, we are Eragrost, we do not know modern equivalent.”
“Wait, like Eragrostis?”
Tara turned back to Willow with a questioning look.
“We have that in our yard, those ornamental grass? It’s lovegrass.”
The demon lifted its arms up and pulled down its hood. Its hair was straw-colored, like dried grass with the tips fanning out in purple hues.
“So you’re good with plants?”
The demon nodded.
“Would you be willing to do yard work to help cover the costs of the damage?”
“We wish to repay this great debt.” The demon said with excitement.
Tara went and unlocked the door to the cage. The demon heading towards the doorway, and thus towards Willow, spoke directly to the redhead.
“We wish you a congratulations.”
“For what?”
“We understand it is custom to say for those who grow tiny humans.”
Willow and Tara just paused in shock with their mouths open. The demon looked confused at the reaction.
What they all missed was Vi had come up to inform Willow the mess was cleaned up. So they certainly didn’t see her make a sharp right and head back towards the breakroom, taking her phone out of her pocket. “Rona, you won’t believe what I just heard.”