Reunited

As soon as this is beta'd I will be reposting it.

Thanks to everyone who has reviewed and stuck with this story. As for right now the Bunny seems to be demanding Xander/Spike/Dru/Faith/Graham. This may change as my Muse is a flake!

Chapter 12: Regrets

Joyce Summers had many regrets in her life, she regretted that she ignored her children up to the day she found out her husband was cheating on her with his young secretary. She regretted ignoring her oldest daughters calling. She regretted blaming Rupert for Buffy running away, it was when things changed between them.

However, one thing she will never regret is getting to know the children that her daughter had become friends with when they moved to Sunnydale. Nor would she regret talking Angel into going to LA. As she sat surrounded by an army Joyce paid attention to the stories told, the feelings expressed and the bonds that were being formed. This was what her child's calling had brought her to and she mourned that her daughter would someday die, probably before her, and she thought of the saying 'no parent should outlive a child' and thought bitterly how true that was.

Buffy had already died once, the proof of it was the young woman Buffy and Xander were cuddling between them. The teasing was there between them, but there was also a sense of sorrow and fear. Joyce knew that they feared she would slip away from them once again.

Willow was babbling happily pressed against the legs of both Xander and Faith, while Cordelia was happily exchanging barbs between herself, Faith, and Xander. Oz seemed to be soaking in the exchange happy with his place, while Wesley and Giles looked on in happy pride. Tara and Riley, who were late arrivals to the Scooby Gang were pressed in on each side of their lovers openly accepted and laughing at the stories.

The vampires Dru and Spike sat close to Xander, Dru practically in his lap, while Spike was holding her. Angel sat beside the green eyed man he had brought, and was obviously in love with, and interjected a tale or two to the mix.

All around them people listened and laughed, and learned what it meant to be a teenager fighting the dark with only a handful of people on your side. They were an army set to fight an army, but at the heart the army was led by a group of teenagers and the people who backed them up.

Joyce stood and made her way over to the group smiling as they shifted to make room for her and Dawn, who had been quiet since they left Sunnydale, and she thought that while she regretted many things, she could not regret her life now, nor could she regret the children and friends that it had brought to her. She lifted her eyes from Dawn and looked into Rupert's eyes, she smiled, and he returned it. Old or young, these were their children and Maggie Walsh would regret the day she harmed one of them.