Once Again

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Disclaimer: I do NOT own Buffy the vampire slayer or its characters. I make no money from this.

Warnings: Occurs after season seven. Spoilers: All seven seasons and the season eight comics.

Note: This one-shot occurs after Chosen but before the first Season eight comic.

She didn't know how they could reconcile. After everything that had been said it seemed insurmountable.

[With everything that's happened, I— I'm worried about your judgment.]

[But not without a price. I'm trying to see your point here, Buff . . . but I guess it must be a little bit to my left . . . 'cause I just don't.]

[No, I think you've taught me everything I need to know.]

[We are clearly demonstrating that we are not together on this!]

The bus made it to San Francisco without incident. Even though Los Angeles was closer to SunnyD, she hadn't been able to even think of going anywhere near Angel, not after Spike's sacrifice. Nobody had argued with her since that night, everyone too stunned and dazed to even think of offering suggestions about what to do next. There was too much and it was way too soon.

Giles had needed to call England, the coven still needed to be contacted about what had gone on in Sunnydale, or rather, former Sunnyhell, current crater. Xander was somewhere, Dawn was in a hotel room, sleeping the slumber of the exhausted, and Willow was taking a survey of the newly awakened Slayers in their current care. Faith and Robin had disappeared an hour ago, something about a surprise.

Their friendship seemed ruined, despite their talk before of going their separate ways in the high school. Her former Watcher couldn't stand to meet her eyes but it was only fair right? She could barely stand to look into his, not after what he had done, not after what Spike had sacrificed.

"Buffy?" a weak voice stirred her from her thoughts, from the bed where Dawn had been sleeping only moments before.

"Sorry," she started sheepishly, bowing her head, "didn't know I was thinking too loudly."

Silence reigned for a moment before a ball of brown hair flew into her lap.

"He's really gone."

She knew who Dawn was talking about.

"I never told him I still care for him."

Present tense. Buffy choked on a sob. So much loss, pain, and torment, and it all lead to this. Jumbled, broken fragments that would pierce half healed wounds for the next eternity. Her arms slowly closed around Dawn, her head coming to rest atop her sister's.

"Oh, Dawnie," she sighed, biting down on her lip, before finally letting her tears leak, spilling down her face and into Dawn's hair.

'Dad, Angel, Mom, Riley, Giles, and Spike. They all left and I was alone. I still am.' Buffy's arms tightened around Dawn as her thoughts pelted her, comforting Dawn through her own tears, 'Always the strong one.'

[The mission is what matters.]

Dawn hadn't been easy to soothe back to sleep. She had whimpered and groaned, begging Buffy to stay. Finally, she had dropped off and Buffy had been able to get away. She couldn't be in the same room with the sister she had told Giles she would be willing to sacrifice. No matter how untrue it had been proven to be, with the stunt she had used Xander to try to pull off.

Sacrifice. She had known the meaning of that word once.

[I sacrificed Angel to save the world. I loved him so much. But I knew . . . what was right. I don't have that any more. I don't understand. I don't know how to live in this world if these are the choices. If everything just gets stripped away. I don't see the point. I just wish that . . . I just wish my mom was here.]

Grief caressed her skin as she stepped out of the hotel.

[The last guy I was with, it got really— I behaved like a monster, treated him like— But at the same time, I-I let him completely take me over. Do things to me that—]

For Spike, the one that had been through it all with her. The only one she had . . . . The only equal . . .

[ You do have a superiority complex. And you've got an inferiority complex about it.]

God, Willow, Xander, how could she face them. Anya . . . It had been no secret they hadn't been each other's favorite people. She had been Xander's girl. Too newly human to ever really have been comfortable with them. Too new in her skin and too little time to get it right.

[You've never had anybody come up to you and say you deserve these things more than anyone else. They were just handed to you. So that doesn't make you better than us. It makes you luckier than us.]

She wasn't the only one who had lost someone, Xander had too. And Willow . . . they hadn't really ever forgiven each other. When Willow had come back . . . they had accepted each other but forgiveness hadn't happened, maybe it never would.

[I just— if you knew what I've done, what I've let myself become. My best friends don't even—You'd laugh, you heard some of the things I've done to them.]

Those last few days, no, months, years, on the Hellmouth had been trying, which was officially the understatement of the millennia.

[I didn't come here to take anything away from you, but I'm not gonna be your little lapdog, either. I came here to beat the other guy, to do right, however it works. I don't know if I can lead. But the real question is . . . can you follow?]

A test, that's what those months had felt like. In a way, it had been a final. It had taken everything she had learned those last seven years and more.

Buffy pulled out of her musings as she started down the street. She wasn't planning on walking far, she just needed some fresh air. The school bus had that old air quality about it that was ever present in all school buses.

When she finally arrived back at the hotel, she found herself really not wanting to go in but . . .

Suddenly, Willow burst out through the double doors, looking every which way, dull eyes lighting up when they landed on her.

"Buffy," she exclaimed, a blush starting up and eyes flitting every which way, reminding Buffy of a lifetime ago, "there you are, I've, we've that is, been looking all over for you. Where have you been? Never-mind, there's a reason we've been looking for you, and let me tell you, we've been looking for a while," her eyes widened and she started back tracking, "Not that we blame you, because we don't, but-"

"Breathe," an echo.

Willow nodded, a sheepish smile tugging at her lips, "Right. So, reason; could you, uh, spend the night with Xander?"

Buffy's eyes widened, outraged incredulousness overtaking her features.

"No, no, not like that. I just meant, you know, you both lost someone, we're worried about Xander and you're not exactly . . . yourself . . . which is totally understandable 'cause you know, Spike and well, I know what that's like since with Tara . . . . Not that it's the same, 'cause it isn't but it's similar and well Xander just lost Anya and I'm not saying Xander would, you know but to be on the safe side, and I'd really appreciate it. I'd do it myself but Kennedy. Not that I don't care 'cause I do, but she needs me . . . not to say Xander needs me less or- but that sounds selfish doesn't it?"

Willow's breath was harsh and her words came out in a rush, reminiscent of when she was younger, with long hair and a shy smile.

"So, I'll stick with less and hope I don't sound like the bitch monster from the black lagoon but since you both just lost someone you'd be able to understand better . . . not that Tara's death doesn't affect me as powerfully as when it happened but the, what happened after, with the hair, black, bad, I don't want to bring up those memories and I'm afraid I will if . . . if . . ."

Tears made Willow's eyes glint as she choked, "Oh goddess, if I go to him, comfort him, and it brings everything back . . . I wouldn't know what to do," her voice cracked, trailing off into a broken whimper, "I can't go through that again and I wish that didn't sound selfish but I don't know what else to say, do, and-"

"All-," Buffy blinked, teeth gritting as tears threatened to flood her eyes anew, "-right. I can do that. What room?"

It would take years for Buffy to stop seeing Xander when he first opened the door. He looked gaunt, his one remaining eye red yet fixed on her unwaveringly. The eye path wasn't in place and the empty socket gaped at her. When Caleb had pushed his thumb into Xander's eye, it had ruined the eyelid. There had been nothing to stitch. It would be nothing short of a miracle if the socket didn't become infected.

He stared at her as if she was transparent before turning and walking back into the room. Buffy cautiously followed after the door didn't slam shut behind him. As she shut the door behind herself she noted a bottle of alcohol on the floor. Thankfully, instead of pulling another from a mini-fridge that was stationed by the bedside table, Xander sat on the one bed in the room.

"Willow sent me," Buffy announced to the silent room, flinching at the sound of her own voice.

[But you doubt her motives, you think Buffy's all about the kill, then you take the little bus to battle. I've seen her heart, and this time—not literally. And I'm telling you, right now, she cares more about your lives than you will ever know. You gotta trust her. She's earned it.]

As she watched Xander the words of his speech came back to her. What had happened? Where had that gone? Were they that shattered?

It was the first time their friendship seemed irrevocably finished. Time wouldn't heal these wounds, scars that had been opened and deepened too many times. For all three of them. The first time their friendship had seemed unfixable, Buffy had driven the nail into the coffin, ( . . . no prophecy about the chosen one and her friends). The second time, Willow had been taken to England by Giles (Daddy's home.).

It had been a build up, three strikes and you're out, and this had been the death toll. Now, they were so broken, more so than any other time.

"What are you doing here?"

"Willow . . ."

"Why . . . ?"

"Kennedy," Buffy said, intentionally avoiding the real question.

She wasn't ready or willing to deal with the answer. Maybe she hadn't really forgiven Willow, not for either transgression. . . maybe she never could but she had accepted what happened, and was ready to move on. Buffy dragged her feet a bit as she trudged over to Xander and sat besides him, releasing a sigh as she did.

"Anya-"

"I think I need to leave."

Buffy blinked slowly, eyes glazing over as if she didn't understand the words. "Leaving?"

"Just . . . until the hurt fades . . ."

"That could take forever . . ."

"Than at least I don't have that long," Xander said slowly, voice low.

"What," she already knew, "do you . . . mean?"

Xander looked down into his lap, mouth drawn into a tight frown, "I'm mortal Buffy, we die, we all die. Even you."

Buffy sat frozen, wondering if she was really hearing what she was hearing. Xander had always been there for her, the past two years aside, with the death and destruction, the heartbreak, and the . . . bathroom. The incident had brought all sorts of nightmares and memories to the surface. Intellectually she knew that the incident with Spike and Xander hadn't been different in intent but there were factors. For one, her state of dress. Two, Xander was human, and she was stronger than him. She had been at full strengthen, fully clothed, and Xander had been possessed. He hadn't even gotten as far but that didn't excuse it. It had been years however, seemingly a lifetime ago, and so much had happened.

She melted, letting herself lean against Xander.

"What a mess," she sighed quietly.

"Yeah," Xander echoed.

[I love what you are, what you do, how you try. I've seen your kindness and your strength. I've seen the best and the worst of you. And I understand with perfect clarity exactly what you are. You're a hell of a woman. You're the one, Buffy.]

Dwelling aside, she had come to the room to make sure Xander didn't do anything stupid, maybe so they both didn't.

'Well,' she thought wryly to herself, 'at least she didn't use magic this time.'

That was her Willow, trying to fix things for people, help them to make it better.

'At least this one won't backfire,' Buffy thought as she put her arm around Xander's waist.

"Where are you going?" Buffy asked quietly a few minutes later, the silence oppressive.

"I don't know. Somewhere." Xander's eye fixed on his lap. The anguish in Xander's voice echoed with something inside her.

Quiet reigned over the room for another fifteen minutes, each occupant lost in their own thoughts, before Buffy moved away from Xander and laid down. Xander stayed on the end of the bed, but he glanced over at her in askance.

"Let's just sleep. All this grief is making me tired." She tried for flippant but the tears threatening to drip down her face told a different story.

For a moment Xander only stared at her. For a minute she thought he was going to leave but than he got up, walked over to the other side of the bed, and laid down besides her. For a minute they laid there stiffly but than Xander rolled onto his side and reached for her. Once she was flush against him he wrapped his arms around her and put his face against the top of her head. They stayed that way for a second before it shattered and Buffy could feel wetness on her head even as her own tears streaked down her cheeks.

They stayed like that for the rest of the night. They were finally home.

If she had ever needed words, she needed them now.

She and Xander has spent the night sleeping but before that they had held each other and cried. Waking up had been a bit of an ordeal. Both of them had still been fully dressed and both had been entangled with each other, their clothes, and the sheets. Upon untangling themselves Xander had adorned the eye-patch and gone about the hotel room before finally heading for the shower after gathering supplies.

Before he entered the bathroom however, he stopped and spoke, "Thanks. Last night, it was good to have someone near. I hope I gave you some measure of comfort too. I never made it a secret I disliked Spike, understatement of the year aside, but he saved us, the world. That means something . . . it has to."

Buffy trembled, a tremor traveling through her frame before she spoke up, "I don't think Anya . . . I think she's in heaven."

She could seem a similar tremor travel through Xander's frame at the words before uttering one last sentence before disappearing in the bathroom. "After, all those years, as a vengeance demon I don't think . . . god, I hope so, she deserves it, heaven, despite . . . everything . . . she was trying . . . and I know she wasn't your favorite person but thanks for saying it."

Buffy felt the world freeze as Xander shut the bathroom door, the words hauntingly familiar.

[ . . . don't. But thanks for saying it.]

Grief blurred her eyes and chilled her skin as she stood from the bed and walked out of the hotel room. She needed to get back to her room, to get ready to face a day she desperately wanted to hide from.

[You think we haven't seen all this before? The part where you just cut us all out.]

It was a clear, crisp day, sun shinning bright. It should have been raining. The weather had been like this the first time her world had ended, when everything had seemed like it was ending and that nothing would begin again. It hadn't been the first time she had been proven wrong.

But this really was the end, the end of seven years of hellmouthy goodness.

The end of a chapter, of several chapters, and yet it was just beginning. It was always just beginning. Was there always a beginning or did it ever end?

[You think you know . . . what's to come . . . what you are. You haven't even begun.]

There was so many of them now, Slayers. She and Faith the last to be chosen by death.

[Before Adam? Not a man among us can remember.]

They were many now. She had done it to have a fighting chance, but had she upset the scales even more? Only time would tell. Still, she was nervous. If the first slayer had shown up because of that essence spell, what was she going to do now that they had essentially done the same thing? Giles, Willow, and Xander had mixed their essence with hers and now she had infused countless girls with the essence of slayer power, with her essence.

[I talk. I shop, I sneeze. I'm gonna be a fireman when the floods roll back. There's trees in the desert since you moved out. And I don't sleep on a bed of bones.]

Honestly, she didn't want to think about it. She'd deal with it when, and if it happened.

She was soon knocked out of her thoughts by Willow. "Hey, Buffy. How's Xander?"

Buffy smiled wanly. She had been leaning against the side of the building, lost in thought. Now, Willow was in front of her, probably having spotted her as she walked out of the hotel.

"A wreck but dealing."

Willow returned her thin smile with one of her own, "Giles got through to the coven. Long, extensive speeches aside, I managed to decipher and piece together bits of it. There's Cleveland and than there's Scotland. Supposedly, there's a castle there that would be perfect for a base."

Buffy's eyes shifted to the ground before looking back up, a flinty determination in them. "Family."

Willow looked startled, eye's locking with Buffy's.

"We screw up for good reasons, or not so good reasons, but it's what we do. We're family. We accept and move on, even if it's not quit forgiveness." While Dawnie was family, her daughter really, all things considered, the cracked relationship she had with Dawn was for another time and place.

"Buffy-"

She didn't let Willow finished her sentence. Just pushed off the wall and started walking, throwing over her should one last line before walking back into the hotel, "Get Xander, have him meet us at the cafe down the block."

The world at large was ignorant. They liked to hide, conjure explanations from the ether that comforted them at night. The dark used to be something feared, for the things that devoured silently. Now, brightly harsh lights illuminate the dark, lining highways and streets, buildings and hallways. Only those open, vulnerable, and weak, feared the dark these days.

[Not one of them cares about you.]

The cafe was small, probably about the size of the Expresso Pump. It was why she had picked it, they weren't likely to be happened upon here. She had been waiting for twenty minutes now but she didn't mind. They'd be here. She was right, as less than a minute later, Willow and Xander walked in, holding hands, Xander leaning subtly into Willow. She envied Xander that. He could be weak in front of them, he could let go, lower his defenses. She didn't have that luxury. She had the dark, and the radio, and running water to hide the sound of her sobs.

Willow was stronger than either of them at the moment but her own inner pain was evident in her eyes. Even after the black hair and sharp eyes and razored words, Willow still expressed her emotions freely. She was strong in her pain. A lapse, a blood drenched mistake, hadn't changed that.

[Every single person down there is ignoring your pain because they're too busy with their own.]

Willow sat opposite her, and Xander sat to the side, in between both of them. Tension held their bodies immobile. A waitress broke the stillness for the length of time it took to take down three orders of black coffee. The silence stretched once the waitress left until Willow broke it.

"We're going our separate ways for a while, aren't we?"

They all stared at each other, gazes heavy.

"I think," Xander started, tone awkward, "I'm going to, find . . . Dracula . . . maybe, stay for a while."

Buffy and Willow stared at Xander, gaping. Xander scowled.

Willow interrupted the conversation, clearing her throat before adding in her own plans, "I'm gonna take Kennedy, somewhere. But I'll be back, help with . . . whatever you decide to do, go wherever you decide to go."

All three looked to the table top, silent again for a moment before Buffy finally spoke.

"Scotland. I think I'm going to set up in Scotland."

Silence, again, before Xander spoke, "Think I'll help you get settled . . . than, go."

[The loneliness. The confusion. It looks quiet down there. It's not. It's deafening.]

Crippled, their friendship was crippled. That was the word. Maybe not insurmountably irrevocably unfixable.

"Guys, I-" she was cut off by a voice being cleared.

They turned as one towards the voice, and an echo of memory resounded in the silence, (Daddy's home.)

Giles. Buffy could vaguely recall the stuffy British librarian who had worn tweed and seemed to have something jammed up where the sun doesn't shine. Now he seems old and worn, tired beyond the telling of it. Buffy thinks if he was any older he'd be dust. As it is, he's hunched over slightly, as if he requires a cane, as if his muscles just aren't up to supporting him any longer.

After everything, she's unsure if she can trust Giles anymore, not completely. She loves him, the father figure whose pride had made her feel more confident, and more vulnerable all at once. He had once lost his job for caring too much, for tenderly treating her wounds and acting like she was his wayward daughter who needed a guiding hand. They all had needed that, her, Willow, and Xander.

Maybe they'd never repair what they had. Maybe she won't trust Giles ever again.

[You may not be wanted, but you will be needed.]

But that's a risk she won't throw away. To be able to trust him again . . . Buffy wants to and she won't miss a chance to do so due to being too cautious.

"Ah, you may, uh, want to know," in a familiar gesture, Giles takes his glasses off and wipes them on his shirt, "the castle in Scotland only needs to be inhabited and," he slipped them back on with a sigh, "and you can settle in whenever you're ready."

Giles seemed to have come for what he had needed to say for he turned and started to walk away before Willow spoke up, "We were, well sort of, just, uh, discussing the future."

The man she had once, and still, if she wanted to dig, considered father turned and walked back, taking a seat opposite Xander. Broken, skittish gazes connected and parted, wounds new and old aching.

Broken but together. Shattered yet connected. Spider web cracks littering the fragile glass of their trust yet still willing to try.

[Well, I still care about them. That's why I'm here.]

Her family.