Strange things happen in Sunnydale. Anyone who had ever lived or visited there could attest to that. One comes to expect these things; especially when one is the slayer. But the one thing she was not prepared for…was this.

Buffy stared at the slightly younger looking version of herself in shock. She looked confident, and ready to kick ass if needed. They both looked each other over, neither really knowing what was going on. Buffy was getting the feeling that they weren’t in Kansas anymore.

“Who the hell are you?” the younger of the two Buffys asked.

“I think she’s you,” Riley said.

“What? That’s not me. I’m me.”

“Yeah, but I think that’s you too,” he said looking at older Buffy, “I’m just not sure how.”

Younger Buffy looked at Spike.

“What did you do? She isn’t like a robot or anything is she?”

The older Buffy laughed despite the situation, and Spike glared at her.

“I didn’t do anything.”

“And I’m not a robot,” Buffy added.

“Why should we believe you?” Riley asked her.

“Okay, weren’t you on my side like two seconds ago?” older Buffy asked.

“So, if you’re not a robot, then what are you?”

“Demon,” younger Buffy supplied. “You know, you guys are really running out of ideas if you’re having to make yourself look like me to get my attention. What I don’t get is…what did you think you were gonna accomplish? And you really could have done a better job. You got the hair all wrong.”

“I’m not a demon,” other Buffy said defensively putting a hand to her hair. She had had one too many people accuse her of being a demon in the past few years. And her hair was just fine. “But I’m thinking you might be.”

“Me? I’m the demon. You’re the one hanging out with Spike.”

Buffy looked over at him. He seemed unfazed by her comment.

“Better company than Captain Cardboard here.”

Riley sent Spike a glare.

“You still haven’t answered my question,” younger Buffy said angrily, “Who the hell are you?”

“I’m Buffy Summers, and you are?”

Younger Buffy narrowed her eyes.

“You expect me to believe you’re me?”

“Maybe.”

Spike looked at her.

“You think that’s you?”

She nodded. Something about the other Buffy was too familiar. She looked and acted exactly like she herself had a couple of years ago.

“What’s today?” she asked suddenly.

“Huh?”

“The date…of today.”

“The 19th,” Riley told her.

“Of?”

“October.”

Buffy looked at Spike who raised his eyebrows at her.

“What year?” she asked Riley.

“What are you getting at?” the other Buffy asked.

“Just answer the question.”

“2000.”

Buffy and Spike exchanged a worried look.

“What?”

“I think we’re from the future,” she said.

“You can’t be serious,” younger Buffy said.

“I wish I wasn’t.”

Younger Buffy shook her head. “I don’t buy it. Whatever game it is that you’re trying to pull, I’m not falling for it.” She said the last part more to Spike.

“Me? And why the bloody hell do you assume this is my doing?”

“Hmm, let me think…cause you’re a vampire, and that’s what you do.”

He opened his mouth to protest, but older Buffy stopped him.

“So, what is going on?” Riley asked.

“We don’t really know. We should talk to Giles,” she told Spike.

“You really expect me to believe that you’re me from the future?”

“Right now I’m not even sure I believe it. But we need to find out, now don’t we?”

“We don’t need to do anything. You and…Spike need to stay right here while Riley and I figure out what’s going on.”

“This could take a while,” Spike said, causing past Buffy to glare at him and future Buffy to slap him on the arm.

“We’re not staying anywhere. I am gonna talk to Giles.”

“You go anywhere near Giles, or anyone else, and it’ll be the last thing you do.”

“That is such a me thing to say,” Buffy said with a hint of irritation. “I’ll talk to Giles if I want to talk to Giles. And I don’t see you stopping me.”

“Really? Care to test that?”

Buffy glared at herself and looked like she was ready to throw punches. Spike grabbed her arm and pulled her a few feet away from them.

“Slayer, we need to figure out what’s going on, and you fighting with yourself is not getting us anywhere. You know how stubborn you are.”

She glanced back at younger her. He was right, and she knew it. They really did need to figure out what was going on and arguing about who was gonna be in charge was wasting time.

“Fine, but I am so talking to Giles.”

Spike sighed. He loved the woman, but sometimes she acted like such a baby.

“Okay listen, we’re not making any progress here. So, why don’t we all go see Giles together?” Buffy asked. “That way you can…keep an eye on us.”

The younger Buffy seemed to contemplate this. It was obvious she wasn’t crazy about the idea, but she nodded her head yes.

“Alright. But if you try anything…”

“It’ll be the last thing we ever do. I got it.”

“Good.”

“Let’s go then,” Spike said.

The four of them started walking, future Buffy and Spike about ten feet ahead. Past Buffy wanted to keep her eyes on them. She still didn’t trust them.

“So, do you think they’re telling the truth?” Riley asked her.

“I don’t know. There’s something familiar about her, but I just have an uneasy feeling about the whole thing.”

“We’ll keep an eye on them.”

“And if they make a wrong move…”

“We kill them.”
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“So, this big ugly demon sends us on an adventure through time. That’s new.”

“Makes sense though,” Spike said. “First wants us out of the game.”

“You think?” Buffy asked, becoming instantly worried.

“Trying to get us out of the way.”

She nodded. “So it can move in on everyone. My God, how did we let this happen?”

“We didn’t exactly let it happen, luv. We didn’t even have a chance to fight the bloody thing.”

“Maybe if we’d have been more prepared…”

“For a surprise attack by a time traveling demon? Yeah, we should have been prepared for that.”

“I’m just saying…we should have been ready for anything the First threw at us. I didn’t even think about it pulling something like this.”

“What I don’t get is if it was going to send us somewhere, why would it send us to the past? We could stop it from here. If we really wanted to, we could change the entire future.”

He had a point. If they wanted, they could make sure the First never found a way back into this world. And Buffy couldn’t deny that changing the future had entered her mind. It would be easy to prevent a lot of the bad things that had happened to her; like dying, or being brought back. But she knew that it was wrong. She didn’t know much about time travel, but Giles had mentioned it once or twice, and the way he made it sound, changing anything in the past could destroy the future.

“I don’t know. Maybe it was desperate. Or…maybe it wasn’t the First.

“Well, if it wasn’t the First, then who was it?”

She shrugged.

“It’s not like we don’t have other enemies.”

“Enemies that would choose the night before the biggest battle we’ve ever faced to take you and I out of the picture? I just don’t think that’s a coincidence.”

Buffy didn’t think it was much of a coincidence either. Even if it hadn’t actually be the First that had sent them here, it had to one of it’s henchmen.

“We’ll know more after we talk to Giles. Then we can decide what to do.”

“What if they ask about the future?”

“We can’t tell them anything,” she said quickly.

He looked over at her. Did she mean she didn’t want them to know anything, or that she didn’t want them to know about how close they had become? Whereas everyone in the future had become at least partially accepting of their relationship, no one in the past would understand.

“As much as there are things I would like to change, it’s not right. Besides, we don’t know how much we’ve already changed by just being here. If we mess with too many things, there might not even be a future to go back to.”

He nodded in agreement. Time was not something to mess with. He had heard of demons and vamps that had attempted time traveling and had faced dire consequences. Spike certainly didn’t want he and Buffy to end up like many others had.

Buffy looked around the cemetery. Everything looked familiar, but it still wasn’t clear whether this was actually the past or not. It was possible they had been sent to another dimension that was made to look like their past. At this point she wasn’t sure of much. But if this really was the past then there would be a lot of familiar events soon occurring. If it was October that meant it wouldn’t be long before Glory made her appearance in town, and as much fun as that had been the first go round, she didn’t really want to stick around for it again.

Something suddenly occurred to Buffy and she stopped dead in her tracks.

“Spike,” she said, grabbing his arm and pulling him back.

“What is it, pet?” he asked, worried by the look on her face.

“Mom.”
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