Family of Eternity

Chapter 7

Buffy tried her best to wrap her mind around the concept. Her sister wasn=t her real sister. It sounded easy enough. She'd certainly heard it often enough. Her heart just wouldn't let her accept it. This was a little girl that she remembered growing up with. Daddy's little angel. Mom's favorite. She remembered her little sister falling out of a tree and needing stitches on her ankle, healing with a tiny scar. Dawn's first sleep over. The move from Los Angeles to Sunnydale and how heartbroken she=d been in leaving all of her friends behind.

There were all these memories, a shared past...and it didn't exist. According to the Watcher's Council, Dawn is actually some mystical Key. Monks used some type of spell to transform her normally glowing state into an innocent, a child with no memory of what she was. She'd been created several months prior and everything before then had been a fabricated lie. As far as Dawn was concerned, she was a Summers. Buffy didn't think anyone had the right to take that from her.

The funny thing was that in order to make Dawn from the green glowy ‘key’ she had been, the monks that made her had to use the essence of another. Two others in fact. She knew from what they’d found out that she was one of the two. So essentially Dawn was really her daughter. And whoever the ‘immortal guardian of the Hellmouth’ was, is her father. It creeped her out a bit that there was this unknown person who could lay claim to her sister, yet he hadn’t stepped forward yet. Perhaps, like her, he hadn’t known.

There had been a heated debate about what should happen to the girl. The Council wanted her brought back to England with them so they could study her. Her mom was still weak from surgery to put up much of a fight but Buffy told them no, flatly. She didn't care what Dawn was or had been. All that mattered was that the young brunette was her sister now. And she knew that Spike had her back, who thought of the young Summers as his own sister.

It was also decided that she would never find out. Buffy didn't care if it was sheltering her from a threat to her life. As a Slayer, she couldn=t have a normal life. She refused to deny her sister what she wanted more than anything.

Then there was the other problem. A godling from another dimension by the name of Glory had come to town. Her purpose was to use Dawn. Buffy's sister was the key to opening the portal back to the dimension Glory was banished from. Fortunately, the hell beast had no idea who or what was the key but it was only a matter of time.
Sighing softly to herself, Buffy decided to head downstairs to train a little with Spike. He’d been kinda bored lately so she knew he could use the company. Plus, she could silently drool from watching him fight shirtless. And he did have his uses along with being an excellent sparring partner. He always had a way of making her forget her problems.

***

Quentin Trevors, one of the more powerful watchers of the Council, sat at the table and sipped his tea. Giles was quiet, studying his mentor. He’d already called each of the Scoobies and his slayer, telling them a ‘friend’ was coming over. And while they would silently assume he meant his normally scarce lover, it was an illusion he had intentionally led them to. A few more moments of silence past, “Is there any particular reason you have journeyed all the way from England, Quentin?"

The older man put down his cup and waved his assistant forward. The petite girl with mousy hair came forward with a dossier which the man was quick to snatch. She backed up again, head down slightly. Trevors flipped open the cover and rummaged through for a few moments, clearing his throat on occasion. Turning back to the first to reveal Joyce’s picture and dossier, “Joyce Summers, divorced and moved from Los Angeles. Bore two daughters, one of them your Slayer and the other the Key of Glorificus, also know as the god who has no name."
He flipped another page, this time of his slayer. But the picture was rather old and she looked more child than the current woman she had become, “Buffy Summers, the Slayer and an incorrigible brat that you do not restrain..."

Feeling his ire raise, “Now see here..."

“Is the girl here now? Training, as she should be doing. Does she patrol alone nightly? Has she cut off all communication with her friends? When I start seeing results from you I might change that remark." He flipped one last section to a rather thick segment. There was no picture this time so Giles was forced to listen blindly, “And then there was your little secret. A vampire with his reputation, allowed to be kept alive and near your slayer. It is beyond reckless, Rupert, it's deadly. This one more than any other. Thank the gods he's been destroyed thanks to some well placed vampires." Giles frowned at that statement, “You needn’t concern yourself with it, Rupert. The Codex has begun to reveal another prophecy. And while the passage is a little rough, it blatantly pointed a finger at that vampiric oddity as a catalyst to a world wide apocalypse...the love of the slayer and all that..."

"I don't understand. He wasn't destroyed."

Quentin looked up sharply before snorting in disgust. He gave his assistant a glare that had her meekly backing into the shadows, “I see. It seems I was not informed. Your slayer saved him, no doubt. Typical. He will be the death of us all, you do realize."

Shaking his head, not willing to believe it. Spike was a nuisance and an annoyance but the ex-watcher no longer believed the demon was capable of what other demons could do. Not with Buffy in his life, running his life, “How can one vampire who can't even harm a human..."

"He's helpless against us?"

Without a doubt Giles knew he'd said far too much. To say more would assure Spike's death for whatever was foretold, not that he would grieve, it was his slayer he was concerned about. He knew Buffy had come to care for the blond vampire. He decided to err in the way of caution. They'd found out too much. If he said more she might come to harm because of those feelings. Or harm him.

"Quentin..."

But the man was not listening. Instead he turned to his assistant, “Contact the Council...report to them of our findings. We shall be leaving within the day."

Standing up, “Quentin you cannot!"

The older man turned to study his protege, wondering why Rupert would make such a fuss over one souled vampire, “This creature is dangerous. Surely you see that?”

Sighing, taking off his glasses and rubbing them, “While I agree Spike's past is rather gruesome..."

"Spike?”

Giles’ mind was in turmoil. The Council had payed off, probably handsomely, demons to do their dirty work. They hadn’t sent those vampires to attack and kill Spike, just for the vampire closest to his slayer. And the vampires had assumed Spike. The Council had been thinking of a different vampire, a certain brunette of Los Angeles who wasn’t so far away. Slowly Giles replaced his glasses, just now realizing they’d been after Angel all of this time.