Chapter 27

Buffy rolled as she fell, jarring her shoulder painfully, but coming to a stand as she watched the Winnebago tip onto it’s side. Her heart was in her throat as she thought of the damage a rollover could do to a person—or a vampire. There was a lot of wood in that damn thing….

She ran to the motor home, her feet tripping over the ruts in the dirt where it slid across the soft soil. In a single leap, she was on top of it, kneeling by one of the windows on the side and smashing her fist through it, afraid to look at the carnage inside.

Surprisingly, she found little carnage. Willow and Tara were tangled up on what was now the floor of the Winnebago. Xander helped Anya to her feet, and Spike had Dawn wrapped possessively in his arms, her head cushioned against his chest. Giles….

Her breath caught in her throat as she realized that Giles was still in the drivers’ seat, his condition a mystery. She climbed down into the wrecked vehicle, and made her way to the front, ducking her head and gasping when she saw him there, the huge head wound bleeding profusely. Blood dripped down his nose to splash on the floor far beneath him, and by the looks of the puddle, it had been bleeding for a while.

“Spike!” she yelled over her shoulder. “Get over here.”

Spike appeared at her side, and she pointed at the Watcher’s forehead. “Can you seal that up? Lick it or something?”

“Buffy, do you really think….”

She folded her arms across her chest. “Spike, don’t get all girly on me now. We can’t afford to leave a blood trail to wherever we get to. Can you seal it up, or are you going to be worthless to me?” She knew she was being rough on him, but she needed him, damn it and he better well get to the helping.

Spike leaned forward, hearing Xander splutter uselessly behind him, and pressed a kiss to the Watcher’s forehead. Surreptitiously, he laved the laceration with his tongue, his lips hiding the action from the Scoobies over his shoulder.

Xander made a disgusted noise, and Willow gave a small eep of surprise, but Buffy’s glare in their direction silenced any objections. Anya watched the vampire with interest, and Dawn just stared with wide eyes. Spike pulled away, and the laceration was sealed and barely visible against Giles’ ashen face.

“We need to get out of here, get moving. Xander, start helping the girls out. Spike, help me get Giles out of this seat.” She reached for the seatbelt, thankful he had buckled in, and between the two of them were able to maneuver Giles out of the drivers’ seat and into the back of the motor home. Willow was assisting Tara out through the window, Xander reaching for her from the outside, and Dawn was the only one left beside them.

Spike reached for his Slayer, and her pain reverberated through him. “Buffy, you’re hurt.”

“Oh, I landed wrong on my shoulder. It’ll be all right.”

“Let me help.” He moved behind her, and while Xander helped Dawn out of the camper, Spike massaged her shoulder through her clothes. A little push and the tissues were mended. Another benefit of the bond, she thought, and sent her gratitude across to him. He smiled down at her, then together they lifted Giles to the waiting arms above.

She turned to Spike after Giles was up on the side of the overturned vehicle, and said, “You stay here until we’re all down. You can make the jump?”

“Easily, Slayer. I’m no nancy boy.”

“Good. I’ll call for you when we’re ready to move.”

Bunching her muscles, she leaped through the window and landed on the side. She almost had to laugh—Xander looked like he swallowed a bird, and Willow’s eyes were on the huge side. Dawn rolled her eyes, and mouthed ‘show-off’, and Buffy did let loose with a peal of laughter.

She shrugged off her friends’ stares, and started helping them get to the ground. When Xander finally got down, she picked Giles up and handed him gently down. She was a little concerned at him not waking with all the movement, but they couldn’t possibly stay here. If the knights were on their tail, she knew that Glory wasn’t far behind.

When they were all on the ground, Buffy concentrated hard, and gave Spike the go-ahead to jump out. He was by her side in two leaps, and swaddled in a blanket. Thick leather gloves covered his hands, and the goggles were back in place. The group started hoofing it, with Buffy and Xander supporting Giles between them in the lead, and Spike smoking from the sunlight, bringing up the rear.

In the distance, Buffy could see an old gas station. It seemed abandoned, from the looks of the outside, but in places like this, one could never tell. Still, she angled their path toward it, knowing that Spike couldn’t smolder like that for very long before he really did burst into flame. Plus, they needed to get Giles laid down and see about his injury.

They made the hike in a surprisingly short amount of time, maybe because desperation was overtaking them all. They slammed through the boarded up door, and closed it behind them. Buffy and Spike pushed a vending machine onto its side and shoved it violently in front of the door. She turned, and rushed over to Xander, trying to lift Giles onto the countertop. They got him positioned somewhat comfortably, a rolled jacket under his neck, and Buffy turned to Willow.

“Do you know a barrier spell? A protection spell?””

“Yeah. Yeah, I can do that, Buffy.” Willow grabbed the spellbook that she’d brought along, and started chanting in Latin.

Buffy went to Dawn, who was shaking in the corner. “Are you all right, Dawnie?”

“I think so. I didn’t get hurt when we rolled. Spike saved me. I think he’s hurt, though.”

Buffy walked over to Spike. “How are you?”

“Think I cracked a couple of ribs when the Bit landed on me, but I’ll be okay. She bandaged my hands for me earlier, when the Winnebago was still upright. Go check on the Watcher, pet. He shouldn’t have been out this long.”

She went back to Giles’ side, and opened his shirt. She remembered something from watching the paramedics work on her mom, and ground her knuckles into his chest. He groaned and moved his head in response, and Buffy turned to the little group. “He’ll be okay. I think. He responded, anyway. Let’s sit him up, see if we can do anything with him.”

They propped Giles up, and eventually he came around. His glasses were gone, left back in the motor home where they had been knocked off his face in the accident, but he could clearly see the worry in the eyes of his charges.

“I do believe that I will be all right, after a bit. I had the strangest dream about Spike kissing me, however. It must have been from the blow on the head.”

“You know what they say about dreams, Rupert. Subconscious desires.” Spike licked his teeth with his pointed tongue, and Buffy’s mouth went dry at the memory of what that tongue could do.

“Spike, enough. He did kiss you, Giles. To stop your forehead from bleeding, and leaving a trail. Okay?”

She clearly saw doubt, but Giles voiced nothing. “What is our next move then, Buffy?”

“We need transportation. We need to get you seen by a medical professional. We need to get out of here before the chainmail dudes get here.”

“Too late.” Xander interrupted her with the bad news, but she was pleased to see that the barrier that Willow had erected was holding them and their weapons at bay. Two priests stepped up to the barrier, and she saw them reporting to the commanding presence behind them, then they laid their hands on the barrier and began to pray.

“Still, they can’t get in—yet. Giles, is there anyone we can call? Do you have any ideas?”

“None, Buffy. I’m not sure of the time frame that Glory has to work in, but it can’t be too much longer. Her search has been more frantic the last few days, so it must be soon.”

“Yeah. So, is that all that we’re waiting for? Glory’s metaphysical clock to go off?”

“I suppose it is, Buffy.” Giles badly needed to clean his absent glasses. Instead, he pinched the bridge of his nose between the thumb and forefinger of his right hand. “Until the time is up, Dawn is still a target. For Glory, and for the gentlemen outside.”

“Do you think if we told them about the time thingie, it would make a difference?”

Giles looked out the window, and turned back to his Slayer. “Perhaps, but I feel a certain doubt that it will do any good.”


Chapter 28

Buffy and Xander made their way to the barrier, and spoke to the General in charge. At least, Buffy thought he was a general—his forehead tattoo was much bigger than the other ones’, and he was the one everyone seemed to be listening to.

“So—what can I do for you guys?”

“We seek the Key. The Key is the abomination. The abomination must be destroyed. Such is the will of God.”

“Okay. Which God?”

The general looked stunned. “Why, the one true God.”

Buffy nodded, pretending to understand. “All right, we established that. Which true God. There are a lot of them, I’m told.”

The General frowned at her. What was this girl doing, asking about God? Did she never attend religious services? “There is only one God.”

“For you, maybe. For others? Not so sure. So, which God did you say you were doing this for?”

“We do not have to justify our actions to you. You are only a girl. We seek to protect the Key from the Damned one, Glorificus. She who has no name.”

“And I just thought you called her Glorificus. Hmph. Well, anyway—will you be stopping her when she gets here?”

“When she gets here? You didn’t give her the Key, did you?”

“No. She found out by accident who she was. But I’m sure that she isn’t far behind, and so I say again—you going to stop her when she gets here?”

“G-glorificus is coming here?” The man almost looked sick.

“Well, I don’t know, you see. Any kind of spell that we could possibly do can’t get through the barrier, and we can’t drop the barrier to let you in, and without the spell, we really can’t tell where Glory is, so, yeah, she might be coming here. Why?”

The general paled even further, and his skin took on a greenish tone. “If we call truce, long enough for you to do your spell, will you inform us to Glorificus’ whereabouts?”

Buffy grinned. “Yeah, I think we can do that. If you call a truce, that is. Are you calling a truce? No trying to rush the place and kill my sister?”

“We knew that they created the Key in the form of a human girl, but we did not know that she was your sister.”

“Well, if it makes any difference, I’m not just a sister. I’m the Slayer.”

The General fell to his feet. “The prophecy!” he breathed. “The prophecy has finally come to pass in my day.” He put his forehead to the ground and started chanting. All around him, chainmailed men bowed their foreheads to the ground.

When the chanting became annoying, which was quickly, Buffy cleared her throat. There was instant silence. “Uh, why don’t you come with us, and give us a little background for all this. So far, we’ve come up with nothing, and a little storytelling will go a long way, at this point.” A door opened in the barrier, and Buffy reached and pulled the man through before they could react. “I’ll have him back to you in a jiff. Just—stay there. And don’t kill any of us. Or each other. Just stay there.” She marched the general into the abandoned gas station, and closed the door firmly behind her.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

“How are your hands?”

Spike looked up at the frightened girl, and his heart ached for her. Buffy was outside talking to the Renaissance Fair rejects, Willow was dividing her time between caring for Tara and Giles, and Anya was just…Anya. He held his arms out, and she almost fell into them, sobs already tearing from her throat.

“They want to kill me, you know. Because I’m the Key.”

Spike looked down at the top of her head. “Well, then, Bit. You gonna let them do that?”

She looked up at him, blue eyes falling into blue eyes. “I don’t want to die. I don’t think that any of us wants to die. But if there’s a choice…if it means me or Buffy—Spike, do everything you can to save her. Keep her alive.”

Spike silently considered her request, knowing instinctively that it went against everything Buffy had preached. He lowered his head, and the tone of Dawn’s voice brought it right back up.

“I know you love her. I can see it. I can see a lot of things now, and…well…I know what I have to do. If the portal opens. Buffy will try. But it can’t be her. It has to be me. Either way. Either you keep her safe, or we both die.”

Spike felt the hairs on his neck at attention, and he knew somehow that the closer it came to the ritual, the more Dawn came into her power. He could feel power thrumming through the lanky form that he held, and found himself curious how or if it could help.

Spike looked across the room to where Willow sat against the wall with her lover, trying to keep Tara from injuring herself. “Red. You got a moment?”

Willow climbed to her feet, and walked over to them. “Red—can you, uh, feel power?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I can do that. Why?”

“Put your hands on the Bit.”

Willow did as he asked, and he saw her eyes widen to platter size in her face. Knowledge filled her mind, knowledge the monks had poured into Dawn’s head until the right trigger, the right power released it. Dawn’s head snapped back, her eyes wide and completely green, green light flowing like a river from her eyes, nose and mouth.

Which was the first thing Buffy saw when she entered the garage with the General.


Chapter 29

“What the hell?”

Buffy was across the room and pulling Dawn away from Willow and Spike before either one of them could speak.

“Dawn. Dawn!” She shook her sister, her head unmoving, rigid, as Buffy flung her body with all her Slayer strength. The green light intensified, and then went out, and Dawn turned brilliant green eyes on the Slayer.

“Take me to the place. I must do what I was created for.”

“What were you created for?”

“I am a Key. I am also a weapon. To use the Key, the user must die. Must sacrifice herself. Glorificus will not be able to use the Key. Glorificus will die.”

The General stepped forward. “The Key is abomination! The Key must be destroyed! Such is the will of God!”

Dawn stood, suddenly graceful in her movements, and touched a fingertip to the man’s tattooed forehead. His jaw went slack and his eyes blank as a green spark shot through her finger to his brain. He blinked, and came back to himself, having seen in his minds’ eye the Key’s use. He fell to his knees, and murmured prayers echoed softly in the room.

“I thank you Slayer, for caring for the Body of the Key. Take me to Glorificus now, so the end might come, and the trials be over.”

“Dawnie, you’ll die. It’s your blood.” Buffy looked sadly at her sister. She had come to love her, and she certainly didn’t want to lose her. Not to the hellgod bitch. Not to anyone. If she did, she would be alone again….

No, never alone. Her eyes reached across the room to Spike, where he sat against the wall. Never alone again.

She turned back to the Key who was once her sister. “Okay, Dawnie. We’ll go kill the great big hellgod.”

“No. I alone must do this. I alone have the power. I alone am the Key.”

She watched Dawn walk across the room to lay her hand on Giles’ forehead, then turned to Spike. “What do I do?”

“She has her destiny, pet. We all do. You can’t keep her from it. But, bloody hell, we aren’t staying here. It’s the musketeers all over again, innit? All for one, and one for all.”

“Yeah.” She saw Giles’ sitting up, looking at Dawn with that baffled Watcher look. “Transportation?”

“I’ll give Clem a call. His cousin owns a used-car lot. I’m sure he can get us transpo.” He moved over to where Willow stood, spoke briefly to her, and they both went searching for the payphone they’d seen in their reconnaissance of the station.

Buffy turned next to the General. “Okay, and you?”

“We will not destroy the Key. We were…misinformed about her power. She is not evil.”

“So, she’s good then.”

“No. She is…neutral. Unable, and unwilling to choose a side. She tells truth about Glorificus. The hellgod will never be able to use her for her purposes. The rituals she has are worthless with the Key in its human form. It must be in another form for the ritual to work.”

“What form?”

“The Key did not see me worthy of enlightenment.”

Buffy rolled her eyes. God, talking to this guy was like…nothing she’d ever done before. She saw Spike return, and went to catch his arm, drawing him into the Scooby circle with Giles, Xander, Anya, and Dawn. Willow followed them, and she began to speak in low urgent tones.

“Forehead man over there said that Dawn is unusable to Glory in her present form. The rituals she has are useless while Dawnie is human. Is that right, Dawn?”

“Yes. She must distill me to my basic essence. Every moment wasted is another moment she could be destroyed. We must leave.”

“We will. We need a plan. She has to have time to…distill you?”

“Yes. It takes many spells, many days.”

“So she ran out of time a long time ago, she’s just too stupid to see. Okay. She wants the Key. We’ve got the Key. She doesn’t know she’s already screwed. We do. She doesn’t know the Key can destroy her. We do. As I see it, we have a big advantage over her now, don’t we?”

“Yeah. Yeah, we have the Key, and the Slayer, and a powerful witch, and…and Spike.” Willow ended lamely.

“Thanks Red. Feeling the love.”

“Sorry, Spike. A master vampire turned good. Was that better?”

“Yeah.” Spike looked over the witch’s shoulder, and nudged his chin. “What about Glinda? Can’t we do something for her?”

“We can heal her. If Willow will be a bridge, we can replace what Glory took. And more.”

Willow looked at Dawn, hope radiating from her eyes. “Do you think we can?”

“Yes. If you are willing to be the bridge, all can be repaired.”

“Spike?”

“Clem’s bringing a couple of vans. Figured the Watcher may need to lay down, and we gotta get there fast.”

“We’ll meet at the Magic Box, then. Any other suggestions?”

“How about the Dagon Sphere? That’s supposed to repel evil. Probably Glory, since Glory is evil,” Anya said.

“Good. Anything else?”

“What about the Troll God’s hammer?” Xander asked.

“Good.”

“We have the ‘Bot. Gotta have some use, all that Slayer programming.”

Spike’s voice was quiet, but all movement stopped when Buffy rounded on him. “A diversion. Good thinking. She won’t expect two of me. Much less anything like that.”

“She won’t expect anything we’re going to throw at her, pet. Not one bit of it. She’s a god. She thinks she can do anything.” Spike said.

“We’ll just have to show her that she can’t.”



Chapter 30

Two vehicles full of people left a deserted gas station in the desert toward a little town west-southwest, where they were going to attempt to avert apocalypse. Again. Spike drove a sedan with Buffy next to him, with Giles and Dawn in the back seat. Clem drove the van, his cousin Clyde in the passenger seat, and Willow, Tara, Anya and Xander on the bench seats in back. Spike drove like a bat out of hell, and Clem right behind him, all the way back to Sunnyhell.

They pulled the car and van in back of the Magic Box, and Clyde took the wheel of the car when Spike got out. “Clem, catch up with me later, okay? I owe you kittens.”

“Anything for you and the Slayer, Spike. Good luck, you guys!” Clem drove off with a wave. He was one of the few harmless demons in Sunnydale, and Buffy wondered idly if it ever would be necessary to kill one such as Clem. She highly doubted it. He respected her, Spike, and her friends more than that.

She watched the taillights disappear, then turned to Spike. “Why can’t there be more friendly, harmless demons like Clem, and fewer hellgods?”

“Not as much fun. Not nearly as much, pet.”

She went into the shop, where Giles sat at the table, drinking tea. His head was plastered, and his color was better. He had found an older pair of glasses, and was polishing them when she sat down next to him.

“So, lets go over this ritual again.”

“Glory believes that Dawn’s blood will open a portal. As living energy, Glory knows that some essence of Dawn must be ‘poured out’, so to speak, much as you would empty a vessel. Once the energy stops the portal closes. In actuality, we cannot ascertain exactly what will happen.”

“Why blood?” Xander asked, confusion on his face.

Tara yelled into the moment of silence, “Please, I have somewhere to be, someplace to go.” After a brief glance, the group looked back at Giles for Xander’s answer.

The answer, however, came from Spike. “It’s always got to be the blood. Blood is life. It’s what makes you burn. What makes you alive. What makes you warm, and hard. It’s always the blood. Pretty simple, even for you, whelp.”

Xander started to rise from the chair, and Giles extended his hand, placed it against his chest. “Spike is right.”

“Hey, mark it down, Buffy, Rupert said I was right.”

“Much as I hate to agree with Spike, and I do hate it, it is usually the blood sacrifice. However—this new power that Dawn is exhibiting right now is a variable that we cannot predict.”

“What if the ritual begins?” Willow asked innocently.

“If the ritual begins—” Giles started, and Buffy interrupted him.

“We are so not talking about this.”

“Buffy—“

“No, Giles. You can’t expect—you can’t ask—“

“Buffy, we bloody will talk about it!” His voice was harsh, but his face was tortured by what he had to say. “If the ritual starts, then the ritual must end—with Dawn.”

Dawn looked at the group surrounding the table, her green glowing eyes peaceful. “There will be no need. Glorificus cannot use the Key in its present form.”

“See? No need. From the Key, who knows.” Buffy waved her arms at Dawn. “And if the ritual does start—the last thing that she’ll see is her sister protecting her. She’s part of me. Maybe the only part that will last. The memories can be faked, but the feelings can’t, Giles. Believe me, I know.” She looked over Giles’ shoulder at Spike. “I love you all, but I cannot and will not kill my sister to save you.”

She turned her back for a moment, shoulders slumped, then she straightened, and when she faced them again, she was in complete control of herself. “Okay. Willow, you and Giles work on the bot. See what you can do with her. Xander, you and Anya go look for the Dagon Sphere. Dawn, are you in there?”

“Dawn inhabits the Key.”

“Yeah, but will the Key listen and follow orders?”

A mulish look appeared on her face, and her lip protruded in a pout eerily reminiscent of Buffy’s. “The Key will follow the orders of the Slayer.”

“Good.” For once, Buffy thought. “Dawn, you take care of Tara for me. Watch her, don’t let her get out of the shop. But don’t hurt her.”

“I will. Buffy.”

“Spike—you come with me. We’ll need weapons to fight the minions.”

He followed her to her house. She opened up the front door, talking over her shoulder at him the entire time. It was only as she started up the stairs that she realized he was still on the porch.

“You don’t have to—just hand me the weapons through the door. I—“

“Come in, Spike.”

He looked at the door, wonder in his eyes. He touched the doorframe, whispering, “Three little words.” At her look, he snapped back to himself, and headed to the weapons chest in the front room. “I’ll get the big stuff—“

“Spike—“

He busied himself until he could no longer ignore the call of the claim. Her energy buzzing around him, through him, he couldn’t deny her anything. He came to her, stood calmly in front of her, and looked her in the eye. “You know, we’re not all gonna make it.”

“That’s okay, Buffy. Always knew that I’d go out in fists and fangs. Better that way.”

“Spike…if…take care of Dawn for me. Please?”

“I promise, love. Until death.” He started to reach for her, and paused. She didn’t need more on her mind.

She started up the stairs, and sudden need prompted him to speak. “I know you’ll never be able to tell me you love me, but you treat me like a man. You don’t know what it means to me.”

She turned, and came back down. “What do you mean?”

He couldn’t answer. He couldn’t even look her in the eyes. He stared at the carpeting on the stairs behind her, and waited. She lifted her hand, and caressed his sharp, sculpted cheekbone, down into the hollow, and back around to the short curls gracing his neck. “I love you, William. William Atherton, William the Bloody, Slayer of Slayers. I love you.”

Tears formed at the corners of his eyes, and she kissed them away. “Come with me—we have some time yet.”

She took him by the hand and led him up the staircase to her room.



Chapter 31

She paused inside her doorway. She turned to him with hooded, faraway eyes, and caressed the palm of his hand. “I thought you could see into me, with the claim and all. I thought that you could tell.”

“Sometimes a man just needs to hear the words out loud, princess.”

“Spike, I love you.” She dragged him to her, his feet unwilling to move, and she covered his mouth in little kisses. “I love you.” She kissed down the side of his neck to her mark, pushing his shirt aside to expose it completely. “I love you,” she whispered against it, and she took it in her mouth, worried it with her teeth and tongue for a moment, then bit down. As the blood seeped into the shallow depressions of her teeth, she licked gently at the scar, and whispered against his skin, “I love you, and you’re mine forever.”

“Yours forever,” he said, a dreamy look in his eye.

She pulled aside her shirt to give him her throat. “Your turn.”

His game face slipped into place, almost unconsciously, and he grazed his mark with his teeth and fangs. Laving her sweetness with his tongue, he slipped his fangs gently into the skin, then pulled them away from her, allowing her sweet nectar to ooze into his mouth. “Mine.”

“Yours. Only yours, Spike.” She reached for him and he for her, and they met in the middle. Their actions were almost fumbling in their haste, but clothing was thrown helter-skelter and she was ready for him when he pushed into her. She pushed his back against the wall, grabbing his biceps with incredible strength, and rammed her body onto his cock until it crashed into the deep end of her tight quim.

He threw his head back, growling deep in his throat, and grasped her hips, his fingers indenting her skin. There was primal need and wanton lust in their every move. Once again, the world depended on them, and they had to steal this moment, but it was a moment that they would take for themselves. He looked into her gorgeous eyes, eyes that drank his every move, and poured himself into her. He opened the claim wide, and realized she’d already done so when they were blinded by the scintillation that was their love, freely given and freely admitted.

Tears blurred her face as he watched her move on him. She ground her clit against his pubic bone, twisting him inside her to touch everywhere, her heat, her love. Her mouth ground against his, tongues clashing and battling for dominance. Her nails scored his arms, the scent of blood crisp on the still air.

She clenched herself around him like a fist, and lowered her mouth to his neck, grinding her teeth into her mark. The sensations went straight through his gut to his cock, and he erupted inside her, the cool semen oozing out as she continued to grind on him. His fangs slipped down and into his mouth as he jetted inside her, and he gripped his mark on her in them, not loosening like he usually did, but kept her clamped in place with his hands and mouth.

He loosed his grip in time for her to come, her body bowed and wracked with spasms of ecstasy, her mouth gibbering love and want and need as she jerked on the end of his cock. She tossed her head, whipping them both with her hair, and screamed his name before she hung on him limply, completely spent.

Their claim thrummed through the small room, reverberating off the walls and ricocheting throughout the house. Spike looked at his Slayer, and the power they had invoked hit them both with a rush, energizing them. She pulled her hair into a knot as she strutted through the room, dressing quickly and gathering various items. He rearranged himself, and watched her in awe, the concentration on her face, the electrical pull of her.

She paused, and smiled at him, and he saw the Warrior deep in her eyes. She pressed her lips to his, and he tasted his own borrowed blood.

“Let’s go kick some ass, baby,” she said, flying down the stairs.



Chapter 32

Glory wasn’t hard to find. They followed Tara’s addled musings through the streets of Sunnydale all the way to the tower over in the warehouse district. It rose malignantly into the night sky, and they could clearly see tiny people and showers of sparks as last minute things were fixed and built.

Buffy, Dawn, and Spike walked closely behind Tara and Willow as the group approached the construction site. The others trailed closely behind, watching their backs as they approached.

Tara entered the site, knowing she was needed to help the others. She picked up a brick, and was stopped by a hand on her arm. “Hey, it’s that witch, the one who hangs with the Slayer. Who let her in here? They’ll just let anyone come to an apocalypse nowadays, won’t they?” Glory said, about to turn away.

Willow stepped between the two girls, grabbing Glory’s hair. “She’s with me,” she said, then twisted her hand and pushed with power into the hellgod’s head. The other hand she pushed into Tara, and the three were joined by blinding blue-tinged light as Willow chanted under her breath. She funneled Tara’s borrowed essence out of the hellgod, draining her of Tara, and pulled out everything she could, before the power of the spell overwhelmed all three, blowing them apart. Willow crawled to her lover, cradling her head in her lap as she waited for her to come to.

Glory picked herself up off the ground, dizzy and weak. She felt so empty inside, as if she had been forced into the dark, dirty room. She put her hand to her forehead, whimpering, “What did that little bitch do to me?”

“I don’t know, but whatever she started, I plan to finish.” Glory looked up to see the puny Slayer, flanked by her vampire and her Key.

“Well, at least you’ve learned some manners. Thanks for bringing me my Key, finally. Let’s go, sugar, rituals to do.” She reached for Dawn, grabbing her by the hand, and started to walk away, and was jerked to a halt when Dawn didn’t move. “What the frick is going on here? I need you to do my ritual. Come on.”

Dawn’s voice was eerie, and the green glow started to form behind her eyes. “Buffy, Spike, move back.”

They stepped away from her, and she started to glow even brighter. “Glorificus, your search has been for naught. The Key is of no use to you in its present incarnation, and your window of opportunity has closed. There is no return to your dimension. No place where you are welcome, especially here.”

The Scoobies watched, awestruck, as Dawn began to rise off the ground, a silent wind whipping through her hair. Emerald light shot out of her eyes as she rose, and Glory was pinned in place, her minions around her frozen with terror and the power emanating from the Key. Her arms at her sides, she began to spin, her voice all around them as she moved, echoing in the still night air.

“The Key chooses—you do not like this dimension, then we will send you into the void, with nothing and no one. You will be alone for all eternity and beyond.” Beneath Dawn’s feet, a small pinhole of black nothingness began to grow, and she spun even faster, her features a blur in the light.

To Buffy, the world was moving in slow motion, her sister spinning like a crazy top, and the green light blinding her. She reached for Spike’s hand as he reached out to her, and they gripped each other in the growing maelstrom of light and sound that was coming from where Dawn had been moments before.

Together, they watched as Glory seemed to stretch, then pull like taffy, then she was sucked into the baseball-size black hole in the center of the green spinning light. The lumpy minions followed her one by one, and when the last were through, the hole closed with an audible pop that pressed against the eardrums and eyes.

The spinning light slowed and Dawn stood in front of them again, looking like herself. Then she slumped to the ground, and Buffy rushed forward to grab her before she hit, Spike right behind her.

Dawn opened her eyes, and Buffy saw the irises had changed from clear blue to jade green. As the glow faded, the color remained, and the strange voice echoed around them once again. “The Key is finished, and needed no more. The Key will now depart.” Dawn closed her eyes, and her head fell back onto Buffy’s arm.

Buffy raised her voice to the sky and howled.



Epilogue

Buffy stretched her arms above her head, watching the dust motes dance. She smiled a lazy smile, her heart pitter-pattering in her chest as she looked down on the head of the vampire next to her.

Who rolled over to look her in the eye with one blue orb. “And why are you waking me up with that pulse o’ yours, pet? If you want the touch, all you have to do is ask.”

She grinned down at him. “Oh, I want the touch, mister, but I think the house is too full for us to be doing much of anything right now. Let’s get dressed, and see what all the ruckus downstairs is about.”

She watched him dress, marveling at the way his body moved, and the way it moved her. She belonged to him and he to her, and the moments stretched to encompass all of eternity that she would spend fighting and fucking and loving this man.

Spike knew she watched him, and shook his ass in her direction. “Come on, Slayer, you know you wanna shag that ass.”

She blushed, caught in her fantasy, and threw her shoe at him. “Stop it. When everyone is gone. Pervert.”

“Well, that could be never, pet.” She flounced out of the room with him hot on her heels, and they spilled through the kitchen door at about the same time.

Tara was at the stove making pancakes. Still recovering from Glory’s mind rape, she was making great strides, head high. She looked lovingly on while Willow and Anya admired the ring on Anya’s third finger. They too were joined forever, due to the mental bridge Willow used to replace Tara’s essence. In doing so, there had been an equal exchange of power and balance, and the coven that Giles had spoken to believe that the exchange was for the good of both. They tended to talk telepathically to each other now, and Tara nudged Willow’s attention to the new arrivals.

Xander handed Buffy a cup of coffee, while Spike busied himself warming his morning cup of blood. Buffy joined Willow, and looked at the ring, compliments on her lips, and happiness in her heart for her friends. She looked across at Spike, and wondered if he would think it redundant for them to get married. She supposed so, especially since their bond was far more binding than the human ceremony.

They heard a crash overhead and the clump of feet as they chased down the stairs. Buffy rolled her eyes, and her sister bounded into the room like a newborn colt on shaky legs. Two weeks and she still wasn’t any better.

Dawn stumbled to the counter and grabbed a stool, pulling her legs underneath her. “Don’t know why she took any kind of balance I had. She’s a freaking Key, she didn’t need it.”

“Dawnie, it’s okay. Giles thinks that it’ll come back to you. You just have to be careful is all.” Buffy put her arm around her, and squeezed her gently. “It will just take time.”

“Still, why didn’t she take all the power? Like I’m gonna need it, right? I need to be able to walk, not light up streetlights when I walk under them.”

“We think that we can teach you to control it, Dawnie. It can be a useful tool, and you could help Buffy.” Willow’s comment scratched at her throat, and she resolved to try to talk more often. The mental speech was cool, but she wanted to remain connected with her friends.

Dawn’s jade green eyes brightened at the thought, and her eyes glowed as she smiled. “That’s cool, I can help now, Buffy. Maybe that’s the reason she left some of it.”

Spike watched his woman and his Bit across the island, love shining in his eyes. He didn’t realize that he was under scrutiny until Xander spoke. “You love them a lot, don’t you?”

“‘Til dust, Xander. Thought I made that clear.”

“Yeah, but sometimes seeing is believing. We’re gonna be thrown together a lot, seeing we’re the only guys. I don’t want it to be like it was, Spike.”

Spike turned to look at the boy becoming a man, and thought back to his own days. With a shrug, he nudged Xander with his elbow, Xander nudged him back, and the girls completely missed the birth of a friendship.

Dawn ate her pancakes, feeling the love that flowed around her in the room. There was peace now, with no hellgod to fight, and all differences mended. She was a real girl now, with power of her own to help her sister make a difference in the world. And she had all these people who loved her, and treated her like she belonged to each of them. She looked at the smiling faces, the loving eyes, and thought, yes, I’m home now.




A/N: Gosh, I cannot tell you all how good this feels, to finish this—especially since this is the first one I’ve ever finished. There are many to thank for all their lovely comments and praise, but most of all, I need to say thank you to Sandy, my lovely life partner and ‘wife’, who encourages and praises, and pushes when I need it, and lets me write. I couldn’t do it without her. Thank you for reading this, and I hope I can catch your minds and hearts with the next. Blessings.