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Reunions / Part 17

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“Oh my Goddess” Willow said again. “Spike, are you sure, about her being a Guardian I mean?”

“I don’t know for sure about anything, Pet” Spike said calmly, “but I’ve got some friends that are pretty sure she’s more than a slayer.” To emphasize his meaning he held up the cross so she could see it again. “They’re pretty powerful in the magic mojo stuff and they think so.”

“What does that mean” Robin asked “being a Guardian?”

“It means she could live for thousands of years, for one thing” Dawn said quietly.

“Do you mean she’s and Immortal like Bu…. like the ‘Immortal’ I mean” Robin stumbled through the question?

“No, I don’t think so” Willow replied to him. “I think they just live for a really long time. Caleb killed the last Guardian, so that sort of eliminates being immortal. But I don’t really know what else it means. We never even heard of the Guardians until Buffy got the Scythe. Giles and the Coven have been looking all over the world for references to them for years and haven’t found anything. We don’t even know what it is that they did. Buffy said the Guardian told her that they came before the Slayers and that they killed the last true demon with the Scythe. The Guardian told her that the Watchers watched the Slayers and the Guardians watched the Watchers. That‘s all we really know about them.”

“Bloody hell” Spike said with a sharpness in his voice as he looked at Willow intently. “Do you mean to say that after all this time that’s all you know? The only reason I told you anything about Joy at all was so you’d share information about the Guardians. If I’d known you didn’t know anything I wouldn’t have bothered.”

“Spike, that’s not fair” Willow said “with the last Guardian dead and the temple in Sunnydale destroyed there wasn’t anywhere else to go for information. We’ve looked all over the world for temples like the one that was in Sunnydale and we’ve had researchers going through every ancient text we could get our hands on. But when the Bringers destroyed the old Council they destroyed the library too. We’ve spent eight years trying to build it back up, but we haven’t found anything about the Guardians anywhere.

“Well, you can add this to what you didn’t know before. Joy has slayer speed and strength, she heals quickly and doesn‘t get sick, she’s a telepath and an empath, and if she wants to she can walk through a crowd of people and no one will notice she‘s there” Spike told them. “My friends also tell me she may someday develop powerful magic abilities, they can see the potential in her.”

Spike had just finished saying this when Joy touched the side of his face and everyone noticed for the first time that she was standing next to him. Spike reached up and brushed a lock of hair out of Joy’s eyes and smiled at her. Joy made a little cooing sound and Spike stood up. When he was standing he picked her up in his arms and said to the others still sitting on the floor, “My girls feeling tired now, were going to rest up for a bit.” He stepped between Robin and Willow and walked to their little room and carried Joy inside.

************

“We should tell him the truth, all of it” Dawn plead emphatically to the others. “Spike has a right to know what happened that day. He needs to know about Buffy.”

Willow sat with her head bowed playing with the little blue stone in her hand. “What do you think Faith?” she finally asked, still not raising her head.

“I think Dawns right. Spike does have a right to know. I just don’t know if we should be the ones to tell him” Faith said to the group. “If Giles has told Buffy that Spikes alive you know she’ll be here in a day or two and Giles will probably be with her. In fact, I’m certain he’ll be with her. Why can’t it wait until they get here. It’s Buffy’s secret to tell, not ours.”

“It’s our secret too, Faith, all of ours” Dawn said vehemently. “We came here looking for Spike and asked him to trust us. What kind of trust are we showing him if we don’t trust him enough to tell him the truth.”

“What do you think Robin” Willow asked, this time looking up and looking into Robins eyes as she asked the question.

Robin didn’t say anything for several moments as he thought about his answer. When he answered he looked at Dawn instead of Willow. “Dawn, I’m sorry, but I don’t think we have a right to tell Spike everything yet.” When he saw the hurt in Dawns eyes and then the anger that was building there he spoke again. “Look, I know you trust Spike, you’d trust him with your life. If you want the truth, I’d probably trust him with my life too. But were not talking about your life, or my life, were talking about Buffy’s life. Spike hasn’t seen or talked to Buffy for eight years. Not once in all that time did he call her, or any of us, to say he was alive. I just don’t think we have the right to tell him until after we’ve had a chance to talk to Giles at least. We learned some pretty interesting stuff tonight, especially about the little girl. The fact that she might be a slayer is one thing, but being a Guardian is something else all together different. As far as we knew the only people affected by the change were in the Hellmouth when it happened. Now we’ve got a young girl that was apparently born at the very moment of the change and she has powers we’ve never seen before. I just think we need to wait awhile longer.”

“Willow, please!” Dawn was almost begging now. “It’s not right.”

“No, Dawn, I’m sorry.” Willow said as she raised her head again and looked over at Dawn. “Your right, Spike has a right to be told. But we don’t have the right to tell him. Not until after we talk to Giles, and to Buffy. They’ll be here today, or tomorrow. Spike hasn’t know for eight years, another day or two won’t matter, not in the long run.”

“Your wrong, all of you, your wrong” Dawn said as her anger and frustration at the others made tears come to her eyes. Dawn suddenly leaned over the cushion and picked up the brandy bottle that Spike had set down on the floor when little Joy had come for him. She picked it up and finding about three inches of brandy still in the bottle turned it up and swallowed it down as fast as she could swallow. The burning in her throat made her gag , but she kept swallowing until it was all gone. She looked around and seeing the bottle that Spike had passed to Faith sitting next to her, she said angrily “You gon’na drink that or keep it as a souvenir?”

Faith bristled at Dawns tone and attitude and was about to snap a reply back at her when Robin touched her arm. She glanced over at him, still riled up. He shook his head, just a little, to signal her not to say anything. Faith clenched her teeth, picked up the bottle and handed it neck first to Dawn.

Dawn took the bottle without responding to Faith. She checked the bottle and could see that there was still about half of it’s content left. She turned up the bottle and took a couple of large swallows. With the bottle still in her hand she scooted back on the cushion until she could lean against the wall. She looked at the others, still angry, and took another drink.

“Dawn” Willow said quietly, trying to get Dawn to respond to her. When Dawn refused to even look in her direction, Willow said soothingly “Dawn, please sweetie, it’ll only be another day or two.” Dawn looked in Willows direction angrily, then turned her head away as she took another drink from the bottle. “Dawnie” Willow said, her voice almost a plea “please understand!”

“That’s enough Will” Robin said quietly. “If she wants to act like a child instead of an adult, that’s her choice. Just remember Dawn, it’s not your place to tell Spike anything. It’s a Council decision and the vote is three to one against you telling him any secrets.”

“You bastard” Dawn said angrily! “You still hate him don’t you? He died and you hate him for coming back, don’t you?”

Before Robin or anyone else could respond, Spike said in a commanding tone of voice “That’s enough Bit, you‘ve said to much already.” Dawn looked up and the others looked behind them. None of them knew how long Spike had been standing there or what he had heard. Dawn raised the bottle to take another drink.

Spike stepped around Faith and knelt down next to Dawn and stopped her from drinking anymore of the brandy. “You’ve had enough Pet. You drink anymore and you’ll be bloody sick in the morning.”

“I wan’na be sick” Dawn said softly as tears ran from her eyes. “I don’t wan’na wake up and feel good Spike, I wan’na feel bad.”

“Don’t worry Love, you’ll get your wish. Let’s just not make it any worse than it has to be” Spike said quietly. “It’s time to put you to bed where you’ll be nice an safe.” Saying this Spike scooped Dawn up in his arms and stood up. He looked down on Willow, Robin and Faith with a cold distant look. “I don’t know what you said to hurt her so much and I don’t want to know, but I think it’s time you go.”

“Spike” Willow said pleadingly “we didn’t say anything to hurt her on purpose. We just had a disagreement about something. Please don’t be mad at us.”

“I’m not mad, Red” Spike said with a cold distant voice. “Dawn can stay for as long as she wants and leave when she wants. The rest of you have out stayed your welcome, that’s all.”

Spike turned his back on the three sitting on the floor and carried Dawn over to his little room and ducking down carried her inside. He knelt down and carefully laid her in his bed next to Joy. He stepped out of his room and signaled to one of his older boys. When the boy came over Spike talked to him briefly. The boy nodded his head and walked over to where the CD player was still playing music for the few people still dancing. He reached down and shut it off. The sudden quiet drew everyone’s attention. The boy gave a few quiet orders and all of Spikes kids separated themselves from the slayers they had just been socializing with a minute before.

The slayers didn’t know what was going on and looked over to Willow, Faith and Robin for guidance. Faith and Robin had gotten to their feet, Willow was still sitting on the floor with her head bent. When Vi and Sara approached her to see what was going on they saw that Willow was crying quietly. All of the slayers started congregating around their leaders, still not understanding what had just happened or why Willow was crying.

Before getting up, Willow pulled her ’magic bag’ over to herself and opened it. She started pulling things out and laying them out on the floor. The last thing she pulled out was a rolled up cloth bag. She put all of the other things into the cloth bag and standing with her ‘magic bag’ in one hand and the cloth bag in the other she walked over to Spike. “Dawn might want these in the morning” Willow said quietly. The tear streaks down her cheeks were plainly visible. “It’s just a change of cloths, and stuff she’ll need.”

Willow held out the bag to Spike and after a few long moments he accepted the bag from her without saying anything to her. When Willow heard the steel door being opened she knew it was her signal to leave. She turned away to see if everyone else was ready to leave. When she turned back to Spike he had already walked away from her and was entering his little room. A fresh tear ran down her cheek as she led the way out the door.

***************

When Spike reentered his room he saw Dawn laying on her side sleeping. Joy had moved into Dawns arms, which were wrapped around her protectively. Spike adjusted the blanket over both of them and laid down next to them. He laid there for quite awhile staring up at the ceiling trying not to think, about anything.

When he heard Dawn making sounds in her sleep he sat up. He could see she was having a bad dream and that her dream was affecting Joy, causing her to become restless too. He laid back down and rolling on his side he spooned himself up to Dawn and draped his arm over both her and Joy in a protective way. They both seemed to quiet down almost immediately and he could hear their breathing deepen as they both fell into a deeper sleep.

Spike continued to lay there but could no longer pretend even to himself that he wasn’t thinking. His mind was focused on this young woman who was so different from the young girl he had once known, and at the same time so much like her. With time and distance he’d thought he’d gotten past those feelings. He thought that his life with Joy and the love they felt for each other was all he needed. But the past day and two nights had shown him that he was wrong. This woman/child still had a hold on his heart and he laid there quietly praying to whatever gods might be listening that he wouldn’t have to lose her again to soon. He knew she would have to leave, she had a life of her own out there in the world where she lived. But another day, or two, wasn’t that much to ask for, was it?

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