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Giles arrived home late that night after leaving the Watcher’s Council. It seemed like he was never home anymore; that he never had any time to himself. He’d thought that after getting the Council rebuilt that maybe he’d have time to himself. What he hadn’t known was that he’d be appointed the head of the Watcher’s Council, but he’d dealt. He’d started bringing his work home and relaxing by the fire at nights with a cuppa. Everything was going along swimmingly, for him, anyway.

He’d known Buffy was going through a hard time, but with all the new slayers coming out of the woodwork, Council work, and the fact that Buffy had told him to stay away, he hadn’t been around much. After Buffy had found out she was carrying Spike’s baby, it only brought more research. Then Buffy’s dreams of men attacking her to kill her baby had added even more research. He was so busy that he barely had time to sleep these days, never mind the stress.

His days consisted of training young girls, which always tired him out, physical and mentally. Only sometimes would one of the Scoobies come to his rescue and take things over, but most of the time he was left to his own devices. Then he would have to go through pile after pile of paperwork to allow the young ladies that were currently in England to stay under the Councils care – though they were posing as a boarding school for the officials – not to mention the girls that had yet to even arrive. Next, he would come home research all he could on mystical pregnancy’s and occult leaders with a specific tattoo that Buffy had – not very well – drawn. He was about to say that the Powers That Be were behind it just to get some sleep. He would have – in fact, if he wasn’t worried about what was growing inside of Buffy he would have – but he was concerned that the child could turn out to hurt her, as he’d heard news of Cordeila’s recent state of being, and he would never allow any harm to come to Buffy if he could stop it.

His and Buffy’s relationship had suffered greatly in the last few years, and he was determined to make up for all the damage he’d done, if it wasn’t already too late.

As Giles made his way inside his home to retire for the rest of the evening, he noticed an envelope that had been crammed under the crack of his door. After setting his work down on the coffee table, he cautiously began to open it. Giles looked at the contents of the envelope. There were two pictures; one – an old photo, yellow with age – of a man he was certain he’d never seen before with a tattoo over his left eye, the other a symbol that matched Buffy’s poorly drawn copy. He flipped them over. On the back of the picture of the man there was a name. Henry Jameson Pratt. On the back of the second picture there were numbers. Not a date, nor a location, but a call number; but from what library? He quickly checked the envelope for a clue as to who had sent it. Written on the front of the envelope was ‘Barbican.’

Who the hell was Barbican?
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Xander looked at around the room at his fallen friends. Buffy was passed out on the couch, an arm curled protectively around her stomach and Willow’s head was resting on book. He’d have to wake her soon because he knew she’d be upset if she drooled on it. But at the moment he was glad for the silence. It gave him a chance to think, though he didn’t know whether or not that was a good thing. Of all things that the Scoobies had done, he’d done the worst. Willow had tried to end the world and he was confident that what he did was still worse. If anybody knew… he didn’t want to think about it.

What would they do they found out that… that he… Maybe he should just tell them? Do it quick, kind of like ripping of a Band-Aid. But the look on their faces, he couldn’t stop picturing the disgust. Now he knew how Buffy had felt once upon a time, when she couldn’t tell them about Spike. He hadn’t understood it then, how she could lie to her friends about something so important, but now he understood perfectly.

He hated himself for what he was doing, but at the same time, he couldn’t stop himself. He couldn’t stop his feelings.

Last year he wouldn’t have even have thought about something this crazy, but during the last year they had all changed so much. They weren’t the people they used to be. It was understandable that feelings could change when you’ve been through all that they had. But he’d known her since she was eleven, was her friend for seven years, real or not.

His concentration was broken at the sound of feet coming down the stairs. And there she stood, uncertain, at the foot of the stairs, dressed for her morning jog. She looked beautiful, as always.

“Are they…?”

“Asleep?” Xander finished. “Yeah, they passed out about an hour ago.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah,” Xander replied awkwardly.

There was a moment of silence broken only by a snore coming from the blond on the couch.

“So, um, about the other night…”

“Forget it,” Xander interrupted. “It was a mistake. You know, two people that have known each other as long as we have, sometimes get confused. And with everything that happened…”Xander trailed off. “It was a mistake right?”

Dawn looked up from where she had been staring at her feet. He thought it was a mistake. Oh god!

She forced a smile, “Yeah, totally. I mean… you and me? That’s crazy. It would never work out, even if we wanted it to, which I don’t, because we’re friends – best friends, right?”

“Right,” Xander agreed.

There was another moment of tense silence with no snores from either of the two that were sleeping to break it.

“Well, I was just on my way out,” Dawn nodded towards the door.

“Of course,” Xander nodded.

Dawn walked quickly towards the door, not wanting to be there for another second, not knowing if she could hold her tears back. She felt dirty, used. This is how Spike must have felt during his relationship – if you could call it that – with Buffy. One thing was for sure. She was never going to sleep with Alexander Harris ever again.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
As Dawn jogged across town – something that Giles said she should do to keep in shape – the feeling of being used was momentarily gone, replaced with anger. Xander was so glad he wasn’t here. She would have pounded on his stupid face if he was. Mistake! Yeah right, he’s the mistake! What was she thinking, getting involved with Xander? He’d left Anya at her wedding! Shows how good a boyfriend he’d make.

Dawn came to stop at the edge of town where she usually turned back, but she didn’t feel like going home at the moment. If she kept going she knew she would run into the woods sooner or later and the last thing she wanted was to get lost in there, but she kept going anyway, walking now, trying to catch her breath. She’d turn around before she got too far, she just wanted to peace and quiet, some time to think.

Dawn had wondered a little deeper into the forest when she started hearing a buzzing in her ear. She swatted a hand through the air, thinking it was just a bug, but the noise only increased. Dawn covered her ears, but the noise was still as loud as ever. Not watching where she was stepping, she tripped over a log and down she went. Only she didn’t hit the ground. Instead she kept falling, as if she had fallen off a cliff. Eventually she hit the ground, losing consciousness as her head hit the dirt floor.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Hey, Buffy, I’m going for a walk. Wanna join?” Willow asked.

Buffy sighed, “Yeah, I might as well start my exercising now since I’m gonna be fatter than a whale in a few months.”

Willow rolled her eyes but smiled happily as she waited at the door for her friend to get her jacket. It wasn’t really cold out, but the wind could be chilly sometimes, so better safe than sorry. The two had walked for several minutes when Buffy decided it was time to break the silence.

“Willow?”

“Yeah?”

“I don’t think I can help with this apocalypse, or whatever, and I know that’s selfish since I’m the one they’re after, but… I just can’t risk getting hurt right now. Not while I’m…”

Buffy pointed to her stomach to indicate her pregnancy.

“Pregnant,” Willow finished with a smile. “You can say it you know.”

Buffy shrugged, “I just don’t wanna get my hopes up. Something could happen and I just…”

“Oh, Buffy,” Willow put her arm around her friends shoulder and pulled her into a hug. “It’s okay to be happy, and no, it’s not selfish. You’re doing this for your baby, not yourself. We know that under normal circumstances you’d be right on the front line, fighting the big fight right along with us, but right now, you can’t think of what’s best for you, you gotta think about what’s best for your baby.”

“Wow,” Buffy wiped her tears away with the back of her hand. “You sound like your talking from experience.”

Willow smiled shyly, “Well, ever since you found out you were pregnant, I’ve been reading a lot of books to, you know, help you through it all.”

“Oh, Willow, that’s so sweet,” Buffy cried.

It wasn’t long before the two friends were walking again, talking about anything and everything, including Xander’s weird behavior, the distance between Buffy herself and Giles, and Dawn’s abnormal giddiness.

“I think she’s met someone,” Willow guessed, not noticing that Buffy had stopped walking. “I mean, it would explain the giddiness, right? Buffy, what’s wrong?”

Willow followed her friends gaze, her own eyes landing on a mailbox of the house they’d stopped in front of. On the mailbox was a symbol. The same symbol that Buffy had drawn the other day for Giles.





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