In your every inch and glance is the globe of genesis spun,
And the living earth your sons.’
Dylan Thomas
Shocked silence filled the room as Giles finished his prediction. Many of the new Slayers looked dazed and confused.
“So great leader,” Andrew enquired, “what does that mean for the New Girls on the Block? Are they going to get like Legionettes Disease, and waste slowly away?”
“Oh do shut up Andrew,” Giles scolded, while Kennedy and Rona threw him dirty looks.
“We think the passage seems to infer that all of the new Slayers would simply lose their Slayer abilities, possibly slowly over the course of a year. However they would likely be left with the enhanced strength and agility that they had originally as Potentials,” Giles offered.
“And where would that leave Faith and me?” Buffy asked calmly.
Giles came over to the centre of the room and stood beside Buffy as he spoke directly to her.
“We believe that you and Faith would remain Slayers Buffy, the only two Slayers. Neither of you are Daughters of Sagaria as your Slayer powers were not activated by Willow’s spell. Consequently, neither of you, strictly speaking are members of the Legion of the Light. You would of course have all the resources of the new Council at hand. But as the only two active Slayers it would have to be business as usual for the two of you.”
“Okay Giles, that sucks, maybe for both the new Slayers and the old, ‘cos it kinda takes away their choices,” Willow said thoughtfully, “but its not all with the world endage is it? And maybe, oh I don’t know, just maybe things should go back to the way to the way they were. After all, good intentions and all, but the spell did muck with the natural order of things.”
“Willow, I’d be inclined to agree with you. In fact, Gareth and Ashton and I all considered that as an option. But, there is one compelling reason we can’t do that. Ashton can you throw the Pergamum prophecy back up there?” Giles paused while the page changed on the screen.
“Look at this bit here,” he indicated. “See it states that to defeat the Scourge of Amroz, then the Legion of Chosen Ones must stand strong, lest the fading of their new powers signal sure defeat. If the New Slayers lose their Slayer status, then there will be no Legion and if we tried to create a Legion using every potential we could find, they still would not be strong enough; we’d lose. I don’t think we have any choice here. We must not only work towards making the spell permanent, but we must also set about finding and training every new Slayer that we can. We have no way of knowing when this battle will take place, but we will need to begin preparing for it as soon as possible.”
“Woooo, Giles, back up that little yellow battle bus a bit. How do the Slayerettes earn their permanent Slayer merit badges. It’s got to be more than doing a good deed each day huh? Unless its babysitting duty!” Xander winked.
“Yes Xander, thank you for that colourful interpretation. But the solution does indeed seem to do with an infant and his or her parents. A child that according to the prophecy was conceived the night before the battle, and whose two parents fought in the battle itself.”
Buffy’s heart seemed to catch in her chest as talk broke out around the room, particularly in the front two rows where speculations were being hurriedly made and discarded. Giles intervened quickly.
“Now the following discussion, of necessity, will be of a rather personal nature, I hope that no one will be offended if we ask all of you who were not in Sunnydale the night before the battle to please retire to the Stafford Room next door where refreshments will be served. We will inform you all immediately of any relevant information as it arises. Gareth, could you please show them the way.”
As people filed out of the room whispering excitedly, Althanea came across to Buffy. She put her hand on Buffy’s arm and leaned in, speaking quietly but clearly, “I think my dear child that I shall have to catch up with you later. We have much to discuss, of undoubted importance. Rowan and I are staying the night. Willow knows where our rooms are. Please come and see me later this afternoon.”
Buffy felt heat spread over her chest and up her neck as Althanea looked at her, squeezed her arm once more and walked out. Turning to face Giles again, she watched as he pulled a chair over to the middle of the room and sat down. He seemed to take a moment to compose himself, fiddling with his glasses before sitting up to address them.
“Yes, right, shall we begin then? Firstly, I must admit that the thought that any of you were, um, how shall I put it …” Giles stuttered.
“Getting busy? Making whoopee? Knocking boots? Bumping uglies?” Xander interrupted enthusiastically.
“Oh Good Lord, Xander, this is difficult enough as it is without you enlightening us all with your impressive mangling of the Queen’s English. Now, would you just shut up? As I was saying, I find it hard to believe that anyone in that house was involved in carnal relations the evening before an apocalypse.” Giles glanced up for a moment and was alarmed by the number of red faces and wistful expressions that graced the front row of the room.
“Right! Well! Obviously I missed the sign that read ‘Den of Iniquity – Vacancies available’. I feel quite left out now. Was anyone not partaking of sins of the flesh that night? Don’t worry that was a rhetorical question. I think we need to get back on track. Given the limited number of male candidates and my own very sorry lack of action, there seem to be only two candidates for father of the year. This is more information than I have ever wished to know but Xander and Robin, did you both engage in sexual relations that evening?”
“Yeah, but not with each other G-man. I’m sorry but you’re just not my type Robin,” Xander deadpanned.
“Yeah well I think I’ll survive,” retorted Robin.
“Hey Xander, I don’t think you should be rejecting Robin quite so quickly,” Dawn interrupted. “ I seem to remember you announcing a little change in orientation last year.”
“Oooh yeah, that’s right. You asked me to ‘gay you up’. I’m still not sure how to take that?” Willow frowned in good humour.
“Uh, and hold on a minute,” Andrew spluttered. “Haven’t you missed someone out? I’m a man too you know. How do you know that I wasn’t having sex that night?” he added indignantly.
“I think Giles meant sex with another person, not just yourself geek boy,” Xander teased, relieved that Andrew’s outburst had taken the focus off himself.
“Eeeeewww,” screeched Dawn. “Thanks a lot Xander. Now I’m stuck with the visual.”
“Would you all just shut up and take this a bit more seriously. Now, you two, I assume that your partners were Faith,” Giles glanced at Robin, “and Anya,” this said more gently as he looked at Xander. Both men nodded, Xander with tears in his eyes.
“I’m sure Anya would have made a wonderful mother Xander. But it is obviously not she that the prophecy speaks of.” Giles turned to face Faith.
“Hold your horses there, Big Chief.“ Faith folded her arms defensively. “What are you looking at me for?”
“Faith is it possible that you could be pregnant? Could you tell us with any certainty that your not?” Giles pressed.
“Well anything’s possible I guess. I mean I’ve been pretty busy lately, and what with the apocalypse and all I might have lost track of things, but I don’t think I’ve got a bun in the oven,” Faith scowled defensively.
“Faith, just listen for a minute. The prophecy states that both parents are mighty warriors. Well that certainly describes you Faith, and Robin did fight in the battle. It then states that one is dark and the other light. Now if we took that literally, it could be referring to your skin colouring. It’s the best fit we’ve got.”
“And if this is happening, I’ll be right by your side the whole way.” Robin took Faith’s hand and squeezed it gently.
Faith was clearly unhappy, but she put on her cockiest smirk and looked up at Giles.
“Yeah, yeah, whatever G. We’ll deal.”
“Thank you. In the meantime, as you can see here,” Giles indicated towards the side table, “I took the liberty of purchasing several home pregnancy kits. Please take one Faith and let me know the results as soon as possible. Thank you everyone. We will meet again at 10 am tomorrow and review all the facts. There’ll be research to do, and tomorrow night I think we should start some patrolling. I’ll do a run into London, so let me know who’s interested.” Giles dismissed them and went over to talk to Faith and Robin.
Buffy had sat through the entire meeting without saying a word. But her mind had been going at a million miles an hour. For the first time in five weeks she felt absolutely calm and very, very determined. As they walked through the door, Willow turned to her and said, “It must feel great that you’re not prophecy girl this time, Buffy ‘cos you always get stuck with the doom and the gloom. Unless maybe you feel left out, in which case shame you didn’t get all groiny with the Principal, huh. But …” Willow was prattling away when Buffy grabbed her arm and pulled her to one side.
“Willow, shut up and listen to me for a minute. I mean it, don’t say a word, or a noise, or anything. Now, I want you to go back into that room and get me one of those testing kits.” Willow’s eyes almost popped out of her head and she was about to ‘eeeek’ when Buffy quickly shoved her hand across her mouth.
“Try and do it without anyone seeing you, but if someone does question you, tell them it’s for one of the baby slayers, but you’re not saying who.”
“But Buffy …” Willow started to say when Buffy turned her around and pushed her back towards the Music Room.
“Meet me up in my room. Don’t tell anyone and use resolve face if you have to,” she hissed.