ORIGINALLY POSTED: July 31, 2001
TITLE: The Ticking Clock
AUTHOR: JK Philips
RATING: R (a little violence, a little sex, nothing graphic)
SUMMARY: After my resurrection of Buffy in “Death Brings Clarity.” Can Buffy and Giles live happily ever after? Or will the very nature of the Slayer tear them apart? Is it illness, a spell, or just the next level of her slayer powers? I got this idea from a challenge on the Watching You, Watching Me website. I won’t tell you which challenge, because that would give it away. :)
SPOILERS: Everything up to “The Gift”
DISCLAIMER: I do not own these characters; they are the property of Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy & Fox. I simply am doing this for fun, and non-profit use.
SECOND DISCLAIMER: I must be on a songfic kick or something, ’cause this is the third part in a row. That’s really odd, ’cause I’m not usually a big fan of songfic. This time it’s “Too Much in Love to Care” from Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Sunset Boulevard.
EMAIL: . Would love feedback. This is only my second fanfic. :)
MY WEBSITE: www.jkphilips.com
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Part 7: Half-Hearted

Giles woke to the steady bleeping of the monitors around him. His sensations felt deadened, as if a blanket of lead covered him. He opened his eyes slowly, as if that simple act took everything he had to give. Even still, they only opened halfway.

He was on a hospital bed, hooked up to various machines that hummed and reported his vitals in soft beeps and clicks. His mouth was dry, and he tried to swallow. That was when he noticed the tube in his mouth and down his throat, helping him to breathe. It felt strange, as if he wanted to gag on it, but it was so far down his throat he couldn’t.

He couldn’t turn his head, only his eyes, but he saw Xander sitting in a chair beside the window, reading a magazine. He watched his young friend for a couple of minutes before Xander noticed he was awake and pulled the chair up to the side of the bed.

“Hey, that was fast. They didn’t think you’d be out of the anesthesia for at least another hour.” Xander hit the call button for the nurse, and then slipped his hand into Giles’, giving it a little squeeze. “How you feeling?”

Giles closed his eyes for a moment before opening them and meeting Xander’s gaze again.

“That’s right. You can’t talk yet. Don’t worry; the doctor should be in here in a minute. They had to put that tube in you while you were up in surgery, but the doctor said they could take it out once you came out of the anesthesia.”

Giles gripped Xander’s hand tighter, the watcher’s eyes begging the question he couldn’t put into words.

Xander smiled, as if he could read the older man’s mind. “Buffy’s fine. The others are all upstairs with her now. You were in way worse shape than she was. You lost a lot of blood. Doctor said if the ambulance had gotten there even five minutes later, you would have been a goner. As it was, they had you in surgery for like hours, man. You had us really worried.” Xander ruffled his friend’s hair affectionately, probably because he knew he would have never gotten away with it if Giles were well.

Giles closed his eyes and continued to hold Xander’s hand tightly. Buffy was fine. He was fairly certain that he would be too. Now his mind was just spinning with how he would track down his children. Xander had said he’d been in surgery for hours. That meant Longsworth could have taken them out of the country by now. He would have to get on the phone to the Council as quickly as possible, pull in every last favor that anyone owed him. Longsworth couldn’t have simply vanished. He had to have left a trail.

The doctor entered then, and Giles opened his eyes when his name was called. His doctor was a tall, lithe redheaded woman, who reminded him something of Willow in the way she carried herself.

“Mr. Giles, I’m Dr. Webster. I was the chief surgeon during your operation. I’m pleased that you’re awake so quickly. Maybe the rest of your recovery will go as easily.” She was at his side, studying the monitors beside him, flipping through the reams of paper printouts they had produced. She smiled. “Everything looks good. We can extubate you now, get that tube out of your mouth. Would you like that?”

Giles nodded slightly. The doctor moved behind his head and removed the tape that held the apparatus in place, curling one hand under his jaw and the other around the tube. “I want you to take a nice deep breath, and then exhale really hard. Okay? Let’s go.”

Giles did as he was told, coughing as the last of the hose came from his mouth. He licked his dry lips and swallowed. He tried out his voice, and it was quite hoarse. “I need to speak to my wife.”

“What you need, Mr. Giles, is some rest,” the doctor insisted. She gave him a drink of water through a straw. “You’ve just come off an eight hour surgery to repair your shattered femur and ruptured artery. Add in the sheer amount of blood loss, and you are quite lucky to be having this conversation with me. That bullet did quite a lot of damage. But if you listen to your friendly surgeon, who if I might say was at the top of her form when I fixed up your leg, well then in three or four months you might have only the slightest limp. If you’re really lucky, maybe none.”

“I don’t have three or four months,” he insisted. “I need to…” He swallowed again. His mouth was so dry. She gave him more water, and he continued. “Buffy…”

Dr. Webster pulled up a chair beside his bed. She leaned her arms on the side rail. “I have it on good authority that your wife is just fine. I’m sure as soon as her doctor says it’s okay, she’ll come down for a visit. But for right now, I would like to discuss how you are doing. Would you like your young friend to go or stay?”

“Stay.”

The young redhead began to brief him on his medical condition, what they had done for him in surgery, what he could expect for his recovery. A metal plate in his upper thigh to hold in place the bone they had pieced together. A month in bed in the hospital. Another six weeks with a cast and crutches after that. Physical therapy after the cast came off. Giles was becoming frustrated. He didn’t have time for this. Every minute he spent in this bed was another minute’s head start that Longsworth gained on them. In three months, he could disappear so completely that no one would find him or the twins he had stolen.

When the doctor finished her recitation, he asked to speak to Buffy again.

“Have you been listening to anything I’ve said? You’re going to go to sleep now, Mr. Giles, even if I have to give you a sedative. We don’t generally allow visitors in the recovery room so soon after surgery. I made an exception for your friend here, because they were all quite persuasive. But he will have to leave as well. In a few hours, we’ll transfer you out of recovery and into your own room. And then tomorrow, if I’m satisfied with your progress, you may have one visitor at a time.” She grinned wickedly. “Now don’t argue with your surgeon. She assigns the duty roster for sponge baths. Your behavior could mean the difference between Carlotta and Bob.”

Xander raised his hand. “About this Carlotta? Is she pretty? And do you have to be technically a patient…?”

“Xander,” Giles groaned.

“Right, right,” he muttered. “Married man. I have to keep remembering that. Maybe Anya and I will have to play-”

“Please shut up,” Giles begged.

Dr. Webster chuckled as she rose from her chair. “Five minutes, Xander, and then you need to leave him to his rest.” She exited the room, leaving behind silence and the steady beeping of the machines.

“So, G-man, can I do anything for you?”

Giles took a deep breath. He couldn’t believe how tired he was. Just a brief conversation with the doctor, most of it quite one sided, and he felt as if he’d run a marathon. “You can tell me how Buffy is doing.”

“Fine.”

“You’ve said that already. I was hoping for a little more detail.” Giles closed his eyes and took a breath to steady his voice when he said the next. “The babies are gone. I need to know how she is coping.”

“I won’t lie. She’s sad. I don’t think it helps that they put her on the same floor with all the mommies and babies… But she’s doing okay. We got the whole gang working on how to bring them home. Willow’s got the laptop in Buffy’s room, trying to hack into Longsworth’s financial records and figure out where he might be headed. Anya and Tara borrowed books from the shop and are trying to find a location spell or something. So I think Buffy’s pretty hopeful that we’ll find them. Plus, she seems to be getting her slayer powers back. She’s recovering from surgery faster than any of the doctors can believe.”

“Surgery?” Giles exclaimed, coughing as the shout scratched against his sore throat.

“Oops,” Xander said. “It’s no big. Really. I wasn’t supposed to say anything. Buffy didn’t want you to worry.”

“Xander,” Giles warned. Even lying in a hospital bed, he could still make himself somewhat intimidating.

“Alright, alright, I’ll spill. I guess they had a hard time stopping her bleeding when they brought her in. I think some other stuff went wrong. I don’t know. I don’t really get all the medical stuff. They did a little surgery, and now she’s fine. Buffy says it’s no big deal. She couldn’t have children anymore anyway.”

Giles closed his eyes and groaned. “A hysterectomy? Dear Lord, what have I done?”

“See?” Xander cried, throwing his hands in the air. “This is exactly why I wasn’t supposed to tell you. Buffy knew you’d go all blaming yourself. She told me to tell you that it’s not your fault. In fact, she prepared a little speech for me to read to you.” Xander unfolded a piece of paper from his pocket and recited her words verbatim. “And I quote: ‘Dear Giles,’- She actually uses some more mushy words, but I’m not going to read those to you, because that would be too weird- ‘If Xander’s reading this to you, it means he keeps a secret about as well as old lady Thorton at her bridge game.’ -Hey, I take offense at that!”

Xander glanced up at Giles watching him intently before continuing on with Buffy’s letter in a singsong type fashion. “ ‘I want to pound it into your abnormally thick skull right now that none of this is your fault. I know you think if you hadn’t been making with the Eyghon orgies, Randall would still be alive. And if Randall weren’t dead, then his dad would have never come looking for you or taken our babies, blah blah bitty blah.’- She actually wrote the blah blahs,” Xander added, pointing them out on the paper for Giles, who only rolled his eyes and waited for Xander to continue. If Giles only had his glasses, then he wouldn’t have to sit through Xander’s leisurely reading and smart-ass comments.

“ ‘The fact remains that Randall’s death was an accident and not your fault. And that Longsworth creep is just a sick freaky guy, who probably would have gone postal over something else, like a long line at McDonalds or the rising price of gas. We just happened to be convenient. You can’t blame yourself for what he did. And no one could have done a better job helping me with the whole birth thing. Dr. Michaels said I probably would have had these problems in the hospital too. He thinks you did a pretty good job. And, yay me!, I didn’t even need stitches.’ Ughh, I sooo did not need to know about that.” Xander shuddered, before composing himself enough to continue.

“ ‘So they had to do a little surgery. So what? It’s not like I was ever going to use it again anyway. The whole one-shot-slayer-deal, remember? Not to mention that I would *never* repeat that experience in a million years. I’m fine, Giles, really I am. Super slayer healing powers now reinstalled, and I’ll be out of here way before you. The gang’s all working on the Longsworth problem. We’re going to find our babies, and you taking off on a guilt trip is not going to help us out in any way, shape, or form. What I need you to do is everything the doctor tells you to do and get better as quickly as possible. I’ll come visit as soon as they let me. Love, Buffy.’ Again, the end was more mushy, but I’m not reading it.” Xander folded the letter with finality and stuffed it back in his pocket. “There you have it. If I leave you here wallowing in guilt, Buffy’s going to have my head. So shape up, Mister, ’cause I’m not looking forward to having the Slayer kick my ass now that she’s the Slayer again.”

Giles smiled slightly. “Tell Buffy thank you for her letter and that I look forward to her visit, but that I won’t feel better until we can bring the twins home.”

Xander stood and took a bow. “I shall deliver your message to the lady with all due speed. God, I feel like the go-between in some cheesy romance novel.”

The doctor poked her head in the room at that moment. “Five minutes are up, Xander.”

Xander smiled at his friend, patted him on the hand, and then left. Giles fell asleep while cataloging spellbooks and friends in various governmental positions. He would find a way to bring his children home. He would make it right again for Buffy.

***

Willow stared at the computer screen for long moments. After hours of her most skilled hacking ever, she had finally found Longsworth, but Buffy wouldn’t like what she had found. Now Willow knew what went through doctors’ minds when they had to be all like “sorry we couldn’t save your loved ones.”

Buffy was stirring her Jell-O with a spoon, listening while Anya and Tara tried to cheer her up with an amusing story from the store. Dawn sat beside her in the bed, resting her head on Buffy’s shoulder. Down the hall a baby started to cry. Buffy looked up quickly, and then set her Jell-O down, pushing her tray away.

“Sorry, just every time I hear it, I think…” She trailed off, playing with the edge of the blanket across her lap. “Did I tell you how perfect they were? They both had the tiniest little feet and hands. He wrapped his little hand around my finger as soon as Giles put him on my stomach. There’s nothing like it, Will.” Buffy sighed and flopped her head back against the pillow, staring up at the ceiling. “I just miss them. I even miss them kicking me all the time and making me go to the bathroom like every five minutes. I can’t believe only two months ago we were trying to decide whether we wanted a baby or not. I know I used to be a big fan of the short pregnancy thing, but now I’m thinking nine months wouldn’t have been that bad. I would have had more time with them.”

Willow smiled sadly. “Are you feeling any better after getting a little sleep?”

Buffy shrugged. “Some. I’ll feel lots better when Xander gets back from Giles’ room. I just can’t stand this wondering how he is. But yeah, the sleep helped. I’m still a little sore, but the slayer healing is helping with that too.”

There was a pause, and then Dawn asked timidly, “What was it like? Having a baby? Well, two babies?”

Buffy kissed her sister on the forehead and wrapped one arm around her shoulder. “Not fun. And let me offer you a piece of advice, Willow. If you and Tara ever decide to have babies, if I were you, I would talk Tara into having them. Sorry, Tara.”

They all laughed slightly on that, and then the room drifted into silence. No one really knew what to say to Buffy to console her. Willow knew what she had to say, but she was hoping to stall as long as possible. Her time ran out when Buffy asked her, “So how you coming over there, little hacker girl?”

“Well, I think I might have found something.” When Buffy leaned forward anxiously, Willow shook her head. She didn’t want to get her friend’s hopes up. “It’s not a good thing. Last night, a few hours after you and Giles were brought into the hospital, a private jet owned by Longsworth went down over the coast of Newfoundland while en route to England. There weren’t any survivors. They pulled out some bodies of the crew, but Longsworth is missing and presumed dead. Some of the London papers already have elaborate obituaries printed for him. You know, local shipping tycoon, millionaire and sole remaining member of the illustrious Longsworth family, yadda yadda yadda. He will be missed. He names some undisclosed family friend in his will to inherit his entire estate. London society is reeling after the sudden loss of one of their own. I think one of the articles even has a quote from the Queen.”

“So Longsworth is dead?” Buffy clarified.

Willow took a deep breath and met her friend’s eyes. Did doctors get some kind of training for this? ’Cause really, she had no idea how to do this. “Buffy, the passengers included Longsworth’s personal secretary and her newborn twins, also missing and presumed dead.”

“My twins? No, I don’t believe it. He set this up. He wasn’t on that plane and neither were my babies.”

“Buffy-” Willow attempted gently, but was quickly interrupted.

“No! They weren’t on that plane. It’s like he did with me and the Jeep. You guys all thought I was dead, but I wasn’t. He did that so you wouldn’t look for me. See, this is his style. He set up the plane crash, so we would stop looking for our babies. But they’re alive. I know they are. I would feel it if something happened to them. I would. So you just keep looking, Will. You figure out where Longsworth really went, and then we’ll find our babies.”

The others watched Willow in silence, unsure what their response should be. Willow looked down at her laptop, ran her fingers over the keyboard. “Sure, Buffy,” she said softly. “Of course I’ll keep looking.”

If Buffy needed her to keep looking, she would keep looking.

***

Ethan lit the candles that circled him one by one. So Longsworth thought he could play their game, did he? He thought he could dip his fingers into the dark arts like one might audit a history course. He thought the magic couldn’t touch him, couldn’t taint him. But hadn’t they all learned that lesson with Randall?

Ethan hadn’t known the whole story until the moment Longsworth had taken the twins. He had known the man was Randall’s father, had known he was out for vengeance, and had known he blamed Giles more than any of them. Ethan had rationalized his own actions as a little chaos thrown into Ripper’s otherwise orderly little life. Ethan had thought it might be somewhat entertaining to watch his old friend worm himself out of his predicament. Much like the fun he’d had in turning his old mate into a Fyarl demon. After all, Ripper always managed to land on top. Ethan had been so wrong this time.

He hadn’t known that it was Longsworth who had summoned Eyghon the last time, who had killed Thomas and Diedre and Philip, who would have killed the last two of them as well if he could have. Ethan knew in his heart that Randall would have never wanted his father’s vengeance. Ethan knew, as Ripper did not, that none of them should bear the guilt for that death, that Randall himself would have never blamed any of them. Randall and Ethan had been much alike in their youth, and if Ethan had been in Randall’s place, he would have assigned no blame either. Ethan would have seen it for what it was, for what he had always known it to be: the hand of Chaos shaking things up a bit for the mere mortals who thought they could maintain control over anything for any length of time.

Ethan worshipped chaos. Chaos was not evil. It was not good either. Chaos served both in equal measure. It was merely the natural state of the universe: to be wild and unpredictable, to let things fall apart, to unravel the threads of an event until it ends as you could have never expected. A butterfly could flutter its wings in China, and you have rain in Sunnydale. That was such a simple metaphor, which failed to convey the full breadth of Chaos. Chaos was what made you oversleep for work, and you cursed it, until you passed the accident on the road and realized that could have been you. Chaos was also what made it that other person instead, who maybe could have left five minutes sooner or five minutes later and avoided his fate. Chaos was behind battles won and battles lost. The Titanic went down because Chaos willed it. It was responsible for all the close calls as well as all the times you were caught red-handed. Bad and good in equal measure. It was sometimes called coincidence or luck, but those were just other names for the raw power of Chaos.

That was the draw for Ethan. He could start a chain of events without any idea where it would lead. If he turned all of Sunnydale into their Halloween costumes, and the Slayer became a helpless 18th century maiden, would she die that night, or would there be other factors he couldn’t have foreseen? If he cursed the high school’s band candy so all the adults who ate it became irresponsible teenagers, what kind of glorious bedlam might ensue? In that particular case, he could have never guessed that it would bring Ripper out to play. From the way he and the Slayer’s mom had their hands all over each other in the factory, well Ethan imagined that Ripper should thank him for his handiwork. See, good and evil in equal measure.

There was another reason Ethan revered Chaos so, one that Ripper would never understand. In worshipping Chaos, Ethan paid homage to Randall and respect to the fates that took him. Ripper wanted to believe in order, in cause and effect, that everything had a meaning. Do this, and this will happen. They summoned Eyghon, and so Randall died. Thus they were all guilty. But that logic overlooked intent and denied Chaos. They never meant for Randall to die. Chaos forged his fate. Just as Ethan never intended to kill Buffy or Giles. If he had, well it would have been so much easier to slip the man some poison than turn him into a demon. That had been a tricky spell. The costumes, too. He could have cast a more deadly spell on the Slayer than give her that gown for Halloween.

Chaos was neither good, nor bad, and neither was Ethan. He served Chaos, and to those on the outside, it might appear that he switched teams an awful lot, but Ethan’s conscience was clean on which god he worshipped.

Longsworth summoned Eyghon with the intent to kill, and he succeeded. Thomas, Diedre, Philip, sacrificed not to Chaos as Randall had been, but murdered by Longsworth. And now Ethan overcame his usual drive for self-protection, because now the balance had been skewed, and Longsworth’s perfectly laid plans were rapidly unfolding just as he had intended. Longsworth thought he could control every piece in his little drama, he thought he could control the outcome of the events he set in motion, but he had never counted on Ethan. Ethan detested control. He did not delude himself into thinking he would ever have it.

And now, by all the gods that Ethan worshipped, he swore that Longsworth would feel the hand of Chaos. For Thomas, for Diedre, for Philip. And yes, even for Ripper. The hand of Chaos might not have been as black and white as vengeance and revenge, nor as swift, but it was much more insidious. Even Ethan wouldn’t know how this would play out, but that was the joy of Chaos. In the end, perhaps Longsworth would best Ripper and cheat the watcher out of his twins. If the old man could still win after Chaos had its fun with him, then perhaps he deserved to. On the other hand, perhaps this would give Ripper the luck he needed to prevail. If so, then Ethan might find some amount of pleasure in that.

Chaos was neither good nor bad, and Ethan could not use it for either means. But Chaos was about to make things a whole lot more interesting for one Everett Longsworth. And whether the outcome of that would be good or bad was up to the gods to decide.

Ethan bowed his head and began to chant. The candles circling him blew out. He called on his god.

***

Emily Lochter opened her door for her nine o’clock appointment. The secretaries in the waiting room were all gathered in a group, chatting and laughing. Emily cleared her throat, and they all looked up guiltily. The group parted, and Emily saw at the center a young woman and an older gentleman, leaning on a cane. They each held newborns, which explained the gaggle of gushing secretaries.

She stepped forward with a smile on her face. “You must be my nine o’clock, Mr…?”

“Mr. Hampton,” he supplied.

She looked down fondly at the baby in his arms, a little sleeping boy dressed in a darling sailor outfit, complete with tiny hat. “What beautiful babies. Are they twins?”

Mr. Hampton smiled graciously. “Yes, they are. They’re my grandchildren, by my son.”

Emily turned to the young woman holding the other newborn, a little girl wearing a tiny calico dress and white lace booties. The infant was awake, her eyes moving across the waiting room of the law office, her feet and hands constantly in motion. Emily smiled at the young woman holding her. “And this must be their mother then?”

“No,” the older man answered. “That is what I needed your help with. Perhaps we can continue in your office?”

“Of course.” Emily Lochter led them in, shutting the door behind them. Her white-haired client limped over to a chair and sank into it gratefully, resting his cane against the desk. The young woman stood behind his chair, gently bouncing the baby in her arms. Emily sat at her desk and motioned her new client to begin.

“This is Jolina, the governess I recently hired.” Mr. Hampton waved at the woman behind him, and then shifted the weight of the baby in his arms. “I’d like to thank you again for seeing me on such short notice, Mrs. Lochter. It is rather an emergency. I understand you arrange adoptions?”

Emily nodded. “My main specialty is mediating custody disagreements, but sometimes that involves arranging adoptions for step-parents and the like.”

Mr. Hampton stared down thoughtfully at the sleeping boy he held in his arms. “Then perhaps you can help me with my dilemma. You see my son died some months back, before he ever got to see his children. He was murdered.”

She gasped. “I’m so terribly sorry.”

He accepted her sympathies with a tilt of the head. “Thankfully they caught the man who did it. I guess whoever said you can’t get justice anymore wasn’t giving the American legal system its due.”

“You’re English?” she asked, guessing from the accent.

“Yes, although my daughter-in-law was American. They lived here in the States. Tragically, she died giving birth to my twin grandchildren. She was alone in the world after my son’s death, so now I am the only family these babies have left.”

“I’m so sorry for your loss,” she said again.

“Mrs. Lochter, I need to make whatever legal arrangements are necessary for these children. I am in somewhat of a hurry. I need to return home as quickly as possible. I have, of course, brought all the proper documentation: birth certificates, death certificates, my own identification.”

“Are you going back to England?”

Mr. Hampton shook his head wearily. “I have purchased a home elsewhere. The cold, rainy weather is more trying on my old bones than it was in my youth. But still, I will need to leave the country as soon as possible.”

Emily glanced over the paperwork he passed her. Everything seemed to be in order. “Only a day old? I must say, you are in a hurry. And the hospital keeps sending them home sooner and sooner. Well, let’s see what I can do for you.”

Just then, the baby boy started fussing. Emily smiled. She wanted a baby soon, but she would have to talk Rick into taking a break from Jet Ski racing first. They could never afford a baby if she stopped working, not if he continued to pour his money into that passion. “May I?” she asked.

Mr. Hampton held out the boy for her, and she came around the desk to claim him. The baby settled down in her arms immediately as she swayed with him, just staring up at her, one little fist clenching and unclenching beside his cheek.

“You’re a natural, Mrs. Lochter. Do you have children?”

“No. My husband and I have been discussing it.” The boy yawned, and she couldn’t help but laugh. He blinked up at her again. “My word, he has the greenest eyes of any baby I’ve ever seen. You truly have a beautiful grandson, Mr. Hampton. I can’t get over how small he is. He can’t weigh over five pounds.”

“Five and a half, actually. Twins usually start smaller. He’ll catch up, I’m sure.”

Emily reluctantly passed the infant back to his grandfather. “What’s his name?”

The white haired gentleman brushed his fingers across the baby’s cheek tenderly. He said the name almost as a prayer. “Randall.”

***

Giles finally flicked off the TV in frustration and tossed the remote onto his hospital tray. This was far worse than all those months he’d spent watching Passions with Spike. At least then he’d been able to curl up with a glass of wine and a decent meal. And he hadn’t felt this ticking clock in his head, constantly reminding him that every second he was stuck here diminished his chances of ever finding his children again.

He heard a voice at the door and pulled himself into a more sitting position. Hospital beds were another thing he couldn’t stand. They made rotten chairs, and he was always sliding down the raised back when he tried to sit up.

“Hey, there, visitor-getting guy.”

He smiled as he watched the nurse wheel Buffy into his room. It had been two days, and apparently both their doctors felt they were recovered enough to see each other. The nurse left them alone, and as soon as he did, Buffy jumped out of the wheelchair and practically leapt into Giles’ arms. He flinched slightly when she jostled his left leg, and she pulled back quickly.

“I’m sorry. Did I hurt you?”

“No, I’m fine. But Buffy, should you be quite so… so energetic?” He nodded towards the wheelchair, and she followed his gaze.

“Oh, that? That’s just to make the nurses feel better. I’m mostly all healed, just a little sore sometimes. Dr. Michaels is trying to figure a way to get me discharged that won’t seem too suspicious. I guess they classify it as major surgery, you know three or four weeks in bed. But two days and voila!” Buffy lifted her pajama top and lowered the waistband of her bottoms. There was now just the red scar below her navel to mark the incision. “A couple more days, and I’ll be a hundred percent, not even a scar.”

Giles’ fingers reached out to trace the five-inch line across her lower abdomen. She swatted his hand away and rearranged her PJ’s back to normal.

“Hey, now,” she scolded. “No guilt-tripping. I told you this wasn’t your fault.”

He looked away. “Buffy-”

“No,” she insisted. “This wasn’t your fault. None of this was your fault. I won’t hear another word about it.”

He met her eyes again. She seemed rather determined on the subject. Her arms were crossed, and she watched him with a steely glare. He sighed. “Very well.”

Her resolved expression transformed into a bright smile. Then she bit her lip and looked down shyly. “Would it be okay…? I mean I wouldn’t hurt you if I just…? You know, just on your right side…?”

Giles extended one arm and motioned her up onto the bed beside him. She carefully arranged herself against his right side, her head pillowed on his shoulder and her fingers absently stroking his chest.

“You sure this is okay? I know Xander said they’ve got you pumped up with some good stuff. But even if you’re feeling no pain, I don’t want to accidentally hurt you more.”

“I’m sure my doctor would frown on it, but I can’t see any harm. I’ve missed you.”

She tucked her head under his chin and hugged him tighter. “I heard you were especially missing me after I was kidnapped. Dawn told me about the Jeep in the river. My poor watcher thought I was dead again, and the babies too. She said you had a total meltdown.”

He returned her hug just as strongly. “Your sister may be exaggerating things a bit.”

Buffy lifted her head and studied him for long moments. Her fingers came up to trace along his brow and the contours of his face. “I don’t know. Willow seemed to agree with Dawn’s assessment.” And then she leaned forward to kiss him tenderly on the lips. His hands slipped through her hair, cradling the back of her head and pulling her in closer. He had forgotten how soft her lips were. She tasted of hospital Jell-O, and he broke off the kiss with a laugh.

His slayer merely sighed and rested her head once again over his heart and below his chin. “I missed you too. I was going crazy locked in that room all alone. And then when it started to hurt, I was so scared of having the babies by myself. I don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t come. I don’t remember being scared after you got there.”

“Good,” he replied, his fingers playing with her golden locks. “I was scared enough for the both of us.”

“You? I wouldn’t have guessed it.”

He chuckled. “You already knew I was a good poker player.”

There was a long silence between them. Giles knew they were both thinking of the twins, but neither of them wanted to voice the unspoken fear lest it come true. Buffy took the plunge finally.

“You think we’ll find them?”

“I know we will,” he answered, also knowing that she would see his bluff for what it was. “Have the others found anything?”

Buffy updated him on their progress. She told him about the plane crash and how she thought it was another set up like the Jeep. Giles wondered about that. People actually died in the plane crash, and Longsworth didn’t seem quite so cold-hearted as to sacrifice innocents to an elaborate ruse. Then again, he had held Buffy against her will, would have let her labor to death if there had been complications, had stolen the twins, and had Giles shot in the leg. Longsworth had probably only summoned the ambulance because Giles would have died without it, and the old man wanted his son’s killer to suffer. If Sulla had given him a less serious wound, Giles would have been forced to watch Buffy bleed to death before Longsworth would have called for an ambulance. Or maybe it had been Ethan who called for it. The ambulance did arrive fairly soon after the others left. In the end, Giles had to agree with Buffy, and not just because he didn’t want to believe that his children were dead.

So if the plane crash was a ruse, they needed to find Longsworth’s new name and where he was headed. Buffy brought him up to speed on Willow’s progress hacking into the estate’s financial records, which had so far turned up nothing useful. Whoever the undisclosed heir was must be Longsworth’s new alias. Unfortunately their prey had money enough for excellent computer security. Willow had been trying to breach it all day.

Dawn and Xander were scouring the Internet for adoption records on newborn twins. Willow had hacked them into some of the most likely private adoption firms, but there were a lot of records to pour through, and law offices didn’t provide handy searchable databases for possible hackers who were looking for something specific.

Tara and Anya focused on locations spells. Most of them required something belonging to the someone you were looking for, which of course they didn’t have. Tara thought they might be able to modify one of the spells to use Buffy and Giles as the key ingredient. But they would have to wait until they could sneak the group into Giles’ room on a night shift, and Dawn would have to keep the staff occupied until they could finish the spell.

Buffy herself had contacted the Council and actually lowered herself to ask Quentin Travers for help in finding Longsworth. Giles gave her the names of a few of his closer friends on the Council who might also be able to help. Dr. Webster hadn’t allowed him a phone in his room yet, knowing all too well that he would start working and stop resting as soon as she did. So Buffy would call them on his behalf.

Giles also told her that they needn’t bother looking for Randall’s father in America or England either one. Longsworth would have left the country as soon as possible and would be too easily recognized in his homeland. Giles suggested that they start looking for the man in other English speaking countries, possibly ones that had been former British colonies. When Buffy made a face, he explained to her that America hadn’t been the only British colony. And then he simply sighed and said that Willow would know where to look.

After Watcher and Slayer exhausted all the possibilities for finding their children, they again lapsed into silence. Giles continued stroking Buffy’s hair, knowing that she was aching for their babies just as he was, if not more so.

A moment later he heard her mutter “Uh-oh,” as she crossed her arms over her chest.

Giles frowned and glanced at his slayer, but Buffy ducked her head down, not meeting his eyes. “What’s wrong?”

“I… umm… I think it’s all the talking and thinking about our babies, but umm… I’m kinda… leaking.”

He smiled softly. And here he’d thought it might be something serious. He pulled her closer and kissed her on the top of her head. “It’s nothing to be embarrassed about, Buffy. It’s perfectly natural.”

She sighed. “Yeah, well, I’d better go back to my room. Dr. Michaels gave me something so I’d still be able to nurse the twins when we get them back.”

“A breast pump?”

Buffy studied him with a puzzled frown. “You know, there is such a thing as reading too many books. Sometimes it’s just a little freaky that you know so much about this stuff. No one likes a walking encyclopedia.”

He chuckled and brushed his knuckles across her cheeks. “I didn’t hear you complaining when I was delivering the twins.”

She laughed too and leaned into his caresses. “Actually, I think there was a whole lot of complaining on my part. Someday you’ll have to tell me just how big of a bitch I was, ’cause really it’s all a blur right now. I remember that it hurt a lot and that it seemed to go on forever. When were they born?”

“5:17 and 5:35 on Sunday evening.”

She laughed again. “So exact?” Then her eyes widened. “Sunday evening? It was Friday when my water broke, and maybe about 3:30 or 4 in the morning on Saturday when I started getting contractions. Oh my God, I was in labor that long?”

“Around thirty-eight hours, I’m afraid.”

She laid her head against his chest again. “Maybe it’s a good thing that the details are sort of fuzzy. I don’t remember much. I swore at you, didn’t I?”

“Only at the end. And it was understandable.”

“Sorry, sweetie.” She gave him another quick kiss before she carefully climbed off his bed. “Well, I’d better go change before I win a wet T-shirt contest. I’ll come back and visit when they’ll let me. But I swear, your doctor is like a prison warden. Someone must have warned her that you were a lousy patient. She’s got it figured out that you’ll only rest if she gives you no choice.”

He only glared at her as she climbed back in the wheelchair and rolled herself out of his room. Really, she did exaggerate at times. Over his years as watcher, he’d had plenty of opportunities to play patient, and he wasn’t as difficult as Buffy made him out to be. He always followed the doctors’ instructions. Well, usually. And he only disobeyed when there were matters of grave importance at stake, like apocalypses and demon sacrifices. Which, come to think of it, happened quite often. Alright, maybe his surgeon had the smallest justification for her over-protectiveness. And maybe there was a reason the Sunnydale doctors took his car keys away whenever he needed to come in after patrol nowadays. Giles had always suspected the new ER policy applied only to him.

He turned on the TV again, flipping through the channels and looking for something that wasn’t a soap opera or infomercial. What he wouldn’t give for a book right about now. Or even better, a phone or even, God forbid, a computer. Anything so he could feel like he was contributing something to the search for his children. He stopped on a familiar show. Passions was on. He hadn’t watched this in a while, and, he rationalized, he had nothing better to do at the moment.

***

Friday came, and the twins were now five days old. The Scoobies were no closer to finding them, but it was Dawn’s 15th birthday, and they would take a break to throw her some kind of party.

The mood was reserved and the good cheer forced, even on Dawn’s part. Five days and still no lead on the twins. Buffy and Giles were beginning to despair of ever finding them, and the rest of the gang was losing hope even more quickly. They all gathered in Giles’ hospital room by special permission of his doctor, who quickly ordered Dawn off his bed when she climbed up beside him. Dawn waited until Webster left before returning to her position at his side.

Buffy relinquished her usual place to her sister (it was her birthday after all) and sat on the windowsill beside Tara as Dawn opened her gifts. Dr. Michaels had found a way to get Buffy released. He had first transferred her to another ward, because staying in maternity with all the babies was not helping his patient who had lost hers. He had fudged the dates in her file as he transferred her, so the nurses in the new ward thought nothing of Buffy’s hospital discharge only a couple of days later. Buffy had completely recovered from surgery, not even a scar, and in fact one would never know she had been pregnant a mere five days before. Her leather pants even fit once again, much to her delight, and she gave bountiful thanks to her slayer metabolism. She still wore baggy T-shirts, however, since her breasts were producing milk and fuller than in her pre-pregnancy days.

Now the Slayer spent most of her time in her watcher’s room, sleeping on the pull-out couch and letting Dawn stay with Willow and Tara. Giles attempted to convince his slayer that she would probably get more rest in her own bed at home, but Buffy knew he liked having her around. And with his room becoming Mission Control, he was feeling more included in the search for their babies.

Now, watching Dawn open her gifts as she nestled against Giles’ right side, Buffy wondered if she shouldn’t let her sister sleep on the pull-out couch with her. Dawn missed Buffy, but they saw each other everyday when Buffy would drop off or pick up something from the two witches’ dorm. Dawn had seen Giles maybe once since his surgery, and it was obvious that the girl had been missing him. More than that, he had been missing her too.

Presents opened, and a mess of wrapping paper strewn across the floor, and it was time for cake. Anya displayed the birthday cake for Dawn, which the ex-demon assured everyone that she had purchased, not baked. After an off-key chorus of Happy Birthday, Dawn blew out the candles, laughing as they relit. She licked her fingers and extinguished the flames, but they relit again. She glared at Willow, who gave a sheepish grin, waved her hand, and let the flames blow out.

Even as the slices of cake were handed out, and the group seemed happy, Buffy couldn’t help but think of her twins and wonder if they would get to have birthdays like this. Would Willow have the chance to keep their candles lit with a touch of magic? Would Giles be able to sing to his children on their birthday? Would Buffy be able to wipe sticky frosting from each child’s fingers before they squirmed away to run off and play? Would Xander and Dawn gang up on the twins in a tickle fight, or would the three of them gang up on Dawn? Buffy sighed and tried to banish the longing from her expression before Giles noticed it. Too late. He gave her a sad smile from across the room, knowing exactly what she was thinking because he was thinking it too.

Birthday over, and Dr. Webster insisted they all leave Giles to his rest. Dawn kissed him goodbye, and Buffy had a flash of the last birthday, also in the hospital, when the girls had gathered in their mother’s room to celebrate not only Dawn’s birthday but Joyce’s successful surgery as well. They had been so happy then, so certain that Mom would recover and share many more birthdays and Christmases and Thanksgivings. Buffy tried to push that thought from her mind, but her goodbye kiss to Giles caught him off guard with its passion. She only smiled at his confused look and took Dawn home for a little musical marathon like they used to have with Mom. A little Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. Maybe a little Audrey Hepburn.

The days passed slowly, and then turned into weeks. The twins were exactly a month old when Giles was released from the hospital as promised. The crutches took some getting used to, and even more so, the cast that secured his leg from ankle to groin. Buffy mocked him in his baggy sweatpants and T-shirts, calling him Gimp despite his frequent protests, even as she waited on him hand and foot.

Neither Watcher nor Slayer would give up on their twins. Giles pulled in every favor he had coming, spending long hours on the phone with various old friends from around the world. Buffy hadn’t enrolled in college for the semester, not wanting to start classes at a full and unexplainable eight months along, and so spent her free days searching through whatever computer system Willow had hacked the night before. The location spells did nothing, even with Buffy and Giles as the matrix.

Buffy’s birthday came and went, but all she wanted were her babies back. She knew their friends were beginning to think it was a lost cause, but she would not give up. She knew Giles would also keep looking for as long as it took, and that provided her some amount of comfort.

Half a world away, Longsworth was feeling the hand of Chaos. Subtle at first, he wouldn’t notice it until it was too late. It had started at LaGuardia airport with a man reading the newspaper. He happened to be on the page with an article describing Longsworth’s death in a plane crash, complete with a photo of the shipping tycoon at a charity function. He looked up in time to see the very same man walking through the terminal, looking for his gate. The traveler dismissed it as a striking resemblance, but it was enough to warrant a mention to his wife as they talked on the cell. She in turn thought it made an amusing anecdote to tell her boss, who in turn mentioned it in jest while emailing an old university buddy, a friend who had been watching Longsworth’s company stocks after the CEO’s death. That friend in turn forwarded the email to another friend at the British museum who had only recently begun fishing for information on Longsworth. Turns out the recipient of that forward was not only a curator of the museum, but also under the employ of the Watcher’s Council. Six degrees of separation. That was how Chaos worked.

Chaos followed Longsworth to his destination as well. As soon as he disembarked, a small child snapped a Polaroid picture and then demanded five dollars for the print. The old man refused and pushed past with some amount of irritation. But a tourist took pity on the boy and gave him five dollars for her picture and another five for Longsworth’s as well. When she returned home, she was perhaps a bit distracted while scanning her vacation photos and didn’t notice that she had included the stranger’s as well. Someone else who happened past her website noticed the photo of Longsworth holding a small baby, and soon that found it’s way to the Watcher’s Council also.

Chaos continued to unravel Longsworth’s carefully laid plans even as he settled into his new home. The British ambassador heard of the wealthy Englishman who had bought a mansion overlooking the Mandovi River. He decided to pay a visit to his fellow countryman, perhaps hoping for some tea and hospitality and maybe even a little payoff for favors that could be done or strings that could be pulled. The ambassador was quite surprised to find that Mr. Hampton would not see him, and he complained loudly about it to his friends back home. Sure, he could hear the baby crying in the background, but that didn’t mean the man couldn’t agree to see him some other time.

Chaos was not swift, was not the sudden light bulb over the head and “Ah-hah!” of certain knowledge. Chaos could not arrange an anonymous package delivered to the Slayer’s door or a neon sign above Longsworth’s house, announcing: “Stolen children here!” But over time, like water carving through rock, Chaos could make itself felt. A butterfly flaps its wings in China, and you have rain in Sunnydale. A phone call, a photo, and an ambassador, and five weeks after their children were stolen, Buffy and Giles had the airport they departed from, their eventual destination, and Longsworth’s new alias. A day after that, and Watcher and Slayer were on a plane to India to claim them.

Buffy hadn’t wanted Giles to come. She thought Willow or Xander would be more useful, since Giles had only recently been released from the hospital and wouldn’t be very mobile with a full leg cast and crutches. But he had insisted, saying the twins were his children too and he would see them safely home. It was his responsibility. He had brought Longsworth into their lives. Buffy wondered if she could ever free her watcher from the guilt of Randall’s death.

He did reluctantly agree that having Willow along would be helpful with the computers and the more difficult magicks that he couldn’t do. Buffy added that another pair of working legs couldn’t hurt either. So the young witch asked all her professors for time off, which was granted, and joined her two friends on their mission.

Willow provided a necessary buffer for the newlyweds on the long plane ride and even longer layovers. Giles could find no comfortable position to sit in, and Buffy finally convinced him to rest his plastered leg across the laps of his two traveling buddies. They hit turbulence during the final nine-hour leg from Paris to Bombay, and he actually reached for the painkillers he hadn’t touched since before his release. That was when they realized the just-in-case medication had disappeared, was probably stolen, sometime during their layover in France. Buffy’s poor watcher was miserable for the duration of the flight, consuming several glasses of Scotch in lieu of the narcotics and gritting his teeth through every bump.

Buffy teased him by suggesting he do the Lamaze breathing and just relax. This was the part where Willow made a wonderful buffer, because Giles was not at all amused by Buffy’s remarks, and in fact was more crabby than his slayer had ever seen him. She wisely held her tongue and withheld her “I-told-you-so”s and her “you-should-have-stayed-in-Sunnydale”s. By the time they were an hour from Bombay, Giles had turned very pale and was white-knuckling his armrest. Buffy took pity on him and rearranged their seats so she could sit behind him and massage the tension from his neck and back. His leg rested mostly in Willow’s lap now, and she kept him distracted with inane chatter, factoids about India from a guidebook, and questions about spells she already knew the answers to. The plane set down roughly, and Giles gasped as each bump on the runway jostled his leg against Willow’s lap. Buffy sent the witch ahead to refill his medication as she helped her watcher onto his crutches and off the plane.

Bombay was hot and crowded. If Buffy had thought the LA malls were crowded during the Christmas season, that was nothing compared to the press of people surrounding them in Bombay. She was somewhat concerned to learn Giles didn’t speak Hindi, but he assured her that enough people spoke English for them to get by.

The threesome made their way to a small outdoor café near the airport, where they rested, drank chai, and ate samosas, while waiting for Giles’ medication to take effect. He seemed to be right about the English, because the waiter was able to talk with them quite easily, but Buffy wondered if that would be the case further from the airport. Willow started her laptop, pulling up a map of the area and planning out their next step. They would take a bus a few miles to the domestic airport, where they would hop a plane to Panaji, Goa. They had reservations in a fancy hotel that happened to be directly across the river from Longsworth’s mansion. With binoculars, they should be able to keep watch over the estate. Buffy wanted to just storm the place and take their babies, but Giles talked her into the more cautious approach.

If her poor watcher had thought the airplane turbulence was bad, well it was nothing compared to bouncing along unpaved streets in an overloaded bus with a score of children running up and down the aisle, occasionally tripping over his cast until Buffy thought he would hit the roof. They reached the smaller airport in plenty of time for their flight, and Giles took another dose of painkillers. He had been doing fine without them back in Sunnydale, but after over 42 hours in airplanes and airports and rickety old buses, Buffy was ready to ask him to share, which meant he most assuredly needed them. Broken legs were not meant to travel.

They arrived in Panaji and took a cab to the hotel, again bouncing over every pothole and then parking with one tire right up on the curb. Situated on the west coast, near the Arabian Sea, the air over the water cooled the city to a much more comfortable temperature than Bombay. They drove past the beachfront and numerous five-star hotels, which seemed to cater to the European tourists. Only about half the guests in the hotel lobby were Indian.

After checking in and finding their room, Buffy sent her watcher immediately to bed to recover from their long journey. She and Willow sat at the window with a pair of binoculars, watching for Longsworth and the babies on the other side of the river. Buffy screamed when she caught sight of one. A young woman was walking back and forth across a third story window, holding a squalling baby in her arms. Giles pulled himself out of bed and hobbled over to have a look as well. Buffy saw the smile light his face when he saw their child through the binoculars, and she pulled him down into a passionate kiss, which sent Willow out of the room to supposedly fill the ice bucket.

They took turns keeping watch, writing down who they saw in what windows and what times they saw them. By day three they had a rough idea of the layout of the house, it’s daily routine, and the number of staff they might expect to find. It was time to claim the twins.

The plan was to sneak in at night while most everyone was in bed, take the twins quietly, and leave undetected. They had seats booked on the very next plane and would be halfway home before Longsworth would realize what had happened. It helped that the Watcher’s Council had provided the necessary papers, so no one would question that the babies were theirs when they boarded the plane.

The Watcher rang up an old friend at the British embassy who was able to arrange a meeting with a black-market weapons dealer. Buffy and Giles obtained shortswords and tranquilizer guns for both of them. Willow had her magic, but they bought a tranq gun for her as well. Giles also purchased a 9mm similar to the one he had at home for himself. Buffy worried about what he intended to do with it, but he assured her it was only for show.

They waited in the hotel room until night had fallen. Willow cast the first of her spells. She slid one hand against the bare skin of Giles’ hip and the other against his ankle. Buffy poured a circle of sand around them and lit candles in the four corners of the room. A few words uttered in Sumerian, and then the sand poofed up into the air around them, disappearing like red mist and leaving the watcher’s leg restored as if he had never been shot. Willow stepped out of the room to pack the last of their supplies, while Buffy cut the cast off her husband’s leg. He stretched gratefully and itched along the length of his leg before pulling on pants that were actually real pants and not sweats. Buffy wished the spell could last longer, but as her watcher had often reminded her, the magical and medical weren’t meant to mix. A reprieve of a few hours would be all he needed, and in the long run, it would probably be better for him to heal naturally.

They donned dark clothes, strapped on their weapons, and headed out the patio door and down to the Mandovi River. They had a boat waiting, and glided silently across to Longsworth’s mansion. They docked the small boat beside Longsworth’s larger one and crept up to the back fence of the property. Willow cast the second of her spells, dimming their presence so they could slip like shadows past the few sentries along the gate and hallways. They left her in an empty sitting room, focusing her energy to maintain the spell that would keep Watcher and Slayer unseen and unheard.

They found the third floor nursery in minutes, Giles immediately striding across to one crib and lifting the baby from it. But Buffy was looking around at her surroundings. The nursery was decorated in reds and blues, with a firetruck motif in all the trimmings. But there was only the one crib. Ethan had told her Longsworth wanted the boy. Now where would she find her girl?

“Buffy?” Giles whispered.

“Where would he put the second nursery?” she asked.

That was when he noticed that there was no second crib behind him. He handed her the sleeping boy, telling her to go right while he went left, and they would search all the rooms until they found their daughter. Buffy only hoped that Willow’s spell would be strong enough to keep them unseen and unheard as they split up and frantically opened and shut doors along the hallways of the third floor and then the second. The baby began to fuss, and Buffy wondered if the spell would be strong enough to contain the sound of a screaming baby.

“Shhh, little Rabbit,” she soothed. “Please don’t cry. Mommy has to find your sister before the whole house wakes up and catches us. If you’re a good boy, Mommy will give you anything you want.”

Buffy reached the end of the second floor hallway and still no little girl nursery. More importantly, Giles hadn’t come down to the second floor yet. It couldn’t have taken him that long to search the other rooms on the third floor, and if he had found their daughter, he would have come down by now too. A sick, sinking feeling settled in the bottom of her stomach, and she raced back up the stairs to three and down the left hall where he had gone.

She entered an elaborate master bedroom, with gold plated doorknobs and a mahogany four-poster bed with silk sheets. The burgundy sheets spilled onto the floor where Longsworth knelt, a 9mm pressed to the back of his head and Giles’ finger hovering over the trigger.

Buffy held their son close to her chest and whispered her watcher’s name. He didn’t acknowledge her presence, but spoke softly to the old man at his feet.

“Where. Is. She?”

Buffy could see the way his jaw clenched, like when he had put the sword through the mayor, like when he had pulled Ethan from the library table by the scruff of his neck, like when he had faced Angelus in the factory. He was not Giles now. He was Ripper through and through. Longsworth’s eyes found hers, pleading with her, his voice shaking as he answered the man holding a gun to his head.

“I told you already. I didn’t keep the girl. I only wanted the boy. The girl never even came to India with me. She’s not here.”

“Tell me where I can find her.” Ripper’s tone was steel, and he pressed the barrel closer, forcing the old man to bow his head.

“I don’t know. That’s the truth. I don’t know where she is. She was adopted, and I don’t know where she is.”

Buffy could see her watcher’s expression harden, smoothing into the same stone mask he had worn while suffocating Ben. “How unfortunate for you,” he said.

She stepped forward and spoke urgently. “No, Giles, you’re not going to do this. You’re not what he thinks you are. You’re not a murderer. You’re not a killer.”

“What would you know?” he snapped. “I have killed, and I can kill again.”

“Randall was an accident. Ben was war. I know about Ben. I was in your dream, remember? Killing Ben was survival, was the only way to defeat Glory. If you pull that trigger, Giles, this will be murder. You can’t do this. You don’t have it in you. You have too much to lose. You have me. You have our children.” Buffy glanced down at the squirming baby she held tightly in her arms. She continued desperately, trying to reach her husband past this dark remnant of his rebellious youth.

“What do you want them to see when they look at you? Because the man I see, the man I love, is a hero. You save people night after night. You save the world like other people make a sale. You keep me alive battle after battle. You are a hero, Giles. That’s what I want to tell our children. I don’t want them to ever find out their father shot a man through the back of the head like judge, jury, and executioner. No matter how much you or I might think he deserves it. You do this, and you’ll be exactly what Longsworth thinks you are. You’ll be a killer, and you won’t be the man I love anymore.”

The gun wavered, and then finally lowered. Longsworth began to weep like a child, twisting the sheets between his hands and rocking with his fear and grief. Giles’ hand was trembling, and the pistol fell to the ground. Buffy quickly retrieved the 9mm, slipping it into the back waistband of her black leather pants. She pushed the baby into Giles’ shaking hands, admonishing him not to drop the boy.

“Make sure Willow’s okay. I’ll catch up in a minute, and we’ll go.”

“Buffy-” he protested, but she cut him off.

“I have to tranq him, or we’ll never make it back to the hotel, let alone out of the country. I’ll be right behind you. Make sure Willow’s ready to go.”

She shoved him towards the door, and he left. She turned her attention back to Longsworth, who was still blubbering on the floor, his head dropped in his hands. She pulled out the tranquilizer gun and prodded him with it. He jumped back against the bed, once again terrified for his life. She just let him believe it was the 9mm she poked him with.

“Everett Longsworth,” she murmured coldly. “Do you know who I am?”

The old man merely swallowed and nodded.

“No, not his wife, not the mother of his children. Do you know who I am?” It was clear from his blank look that he had no idea where she was going with this. She knelt down to bring herself level with him, the tranquilizer gun still pressed against his side. “You knew he was a Watcher. What did you think the Watcher’s Council watched? I’m surprised Ethan never told you. You see, I’m not just his wife, I’m his Slayer.”

Longsworth’s brow furrowed. He swallowed, still breathing heavily, still finding no voice to respond to her. Buffy grinned at his fear. She wouldn’t kill him, but he didn’t know that.

“You don’t know what a Slayer is, do you? One girl in all the world with the strength and skill to hunt the vampires, to slay the demons. My job description pretty much says I kill evil things.”

His eyes widened.

“Yeah,” she confirmed his fears. “I’d say a man who could kidnap a pregnant woman and steal her babies probably qualifies as evil. And you know what the best part about being the Slayer is?” Longsworth shook his head meekly, and she answered her own question. “I don’t need this gun to kill you. I’m strong enough to rip your limbs from your body with my bare hands.” She stroked his chest softly with one finger. “I could push my hand right through your chest and pull out your heart while it was still beating. I did that once, only to a demon, and it wasn’t a heart so much as a uranium power core, but hey, it should work just the same.”

Longsworth was shaking, and he found his voice. “Please, don’t hurt me. I loved your boy like he was my own. I would have given him everything. I only wanted a child to love as I loved Randall.”

“No,” she corrected. “You wanted to hurt Giles like you imagined he deserved. You want a kid? Adoption, buddy, look it up. You thought Giles killed your son, and you were after vengeance. Let’s not try to sugar coat this. Funny thing is, at the end of the day, you deserved everything you were trying to do to him. Giles isn’t the man you think he is. He’s a good man. He has honor and courage, two things you wouldn’t recognize if they were standing in the same room with you. You want to see evil? You want to see a killer? Go look in the mirror.”

“Please don’t kill me,” he whispered even softer.

Buffy’s eyes held only contempt. “And a coward besides. Not so big and tough without your hired goons? Don’t wet yourself. I’m not going to kill you. But what was it you told that creep before he shot my watcher? Oh yeah, make sure he doesn’t follow us. I gotta make sure you don’t follow us. So which one is your good leg? Or should I just break them both?”

Longsworth looked panicked and tried to pull himself back tighter against the bed. Buffy halted him by grabbing one knee and dragging the older man closer to her. Her own knee came up with the force of a slayer and smashed the femur like a twig. Randall’s father howled in pain, and Buffy wondered if she hadn’t gone too far. She hoped Willow’s spell would prevent anyone else in the house from hearing the old man’s screams.

She leaned over him. “That was for Giles. This is for me.” She aimed the tranquilizer gun and shot him directly in the groin. He curled into a fetal ball, and as the tranquilizer took effect, she warned him, “You come near me or mine again, and I won’t need to stop Giles from killing you, because I might do it for him. You try to take my children again, and I will make an exception to the demon-only slaying rule.”

Longsworth was slowly relaxing, his eyes drifting closed. Buffy made sure she was the last thing he saw. She waited a moment longer to be sure he was unconscious, and then replaced the tranq gun in her waistband beside the 9mm. She dashed out, closing the master bedroom door behind her, and raced down to the sitting room to Willow, Giles, and her baby.

They were waiting for her, Giles absently swaying to keep the baby quiet, Willow still focused on her spell, and the baby solemnly staring up at his father. They slipped out of the estate as quietly as they had entered. They reached the boat docks, Buffy coming to a sudden stop when she recognized the man sitting beside their boat.

Sulla stood, stretched his long legs, and smiled at Giles. “Look at you, up and about. I thought I had messed you up more than that. Maybe my aim’s not as good as it once was. Maybe I should get a second chance.”

He reached behind him, but Buffy beat him to the draw. She held the 9mm steady, even though her insides were quaking. She had no idea how to fire the thing. Giles had never trained her to use a gun. She didn’t know if the safety was on or if she needed to do anything before pulling the trigger. She hoped Sulla wouldn’t notice her inexperience.

“Hands up,” she ordered.

He obeyed with a smirk. “I saw this little boat pull up and wondered who was paying us a visit. Thought I would come check it out, wait for the owners. Never imagined I’d see any of you again. Now tell me, little girl, you really gonna shoot me? I don’t think so. Especially not before I call the guards to come drag your sorry asses back in to answer to the Boss.”

Buffy knew if he drew attention to their flight, they would likely lose the baby as well as their lives. She glanced over at Willow to make sure the witch was still holding her spell. Willow’s eyes were half closed, her lips chanting silently. Buffy sighed in relief, knowing that they would still be unseen and unheard by anyone who wasn’t specifically looking for them.

That moment’s distraction was all Sulla needed. He lunged forward and disarmed Buffy, sending the gun clattering to the dock and over the side into the water. Giles stepped back, pulling Willow with him, shielding both her and his son from the battle. Buffy smiled. Sulla had made a gross miscalculation if he thought he could best the Slayer in hand-to-hand combat. Then again, he was probably as clueless as Longsworth on that point.

Sulla tried to hit her, and she ducked. Again and again. She blocked some of his blows, and he clearly felt the impact. He shook out his arms, his eyes widening as he looked at her in surprise. Buffy merely shrugged as if she had learned that from a few karate classes. He came at her again, and she danced around him easily.

“Stop playing with him, Buffy,” Giles scolded. “We don’t have the time.”

“You heard him,” she said to Sulla. “I can’t play anymore. I have to go home.”

She took his next blow in her palm, and then spun to deliver a right cross right across his jaw. Sulla dropped to the dock. But he was still conscious, his hands rubbing the mark she had left. Buffy had pulled her punch. She kicked him once in the stomach, and then leaned over to disarm him of his own gun, which winked out at her from its holster across his back.

“I have to warn you, I’ve never used a gun before. So I’m really hoping I don’t accidentally shoot you. ’Cause that would be a bad thing.” She casually aimed the gun and pulled the trigger. It fired. Hmm… guess there wasn’t anything to it after all. “Oops. And right in the leg. That’s gotta hurt. I guess Giles could tell you about that. If you get a good doctor, in three or four months, you might not even have a limp.”

“Buffy,” her watcher reminded her, “we need to go now.”

She tossed the gun in the water where hers had fallen while Giles helped Willow into the boat and then passed her the baby. Buffy withdrew the tranquilizer gun and knocked Sulla out before climbing into the boat herself. Willow held the spell until they could safely row the distance back to the hotel. Giles continually watched the coastline to see if anyone had heard the gunshot, but Willow’s magic was good.

Giles chided his slayer for her impulsive act. “You shouldn’t have done that. You might have ruined our entire escape.” This coming from the man who was going to blow Longsworth’s brains out. “How many times have I told you? Plunge and move on, plunge and move on. You should have taken the first opportunity to knock out your opponent and been done with it. And I can’t believe you pulled your punch.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Buffy agreed, as she rowed in time with him. “I guess I just had this compulsion to shoot him in the leg.”

Giles gave her a wry grin and let the subject drop.

“I tell ya,” Buffy added, “If we don’t find our daughter, I’ll be wanting to come back here and break both his legs.”

Giles bowed his head, but Buffy still saw the flash of guilt cross his face. “We’ll find her,” he whispered softly and said not another word the rest of the way across the river. He seemed to have drifted into his own world, rowing even after the boat hit land. Buffy had to call his name three times before he lifted his head, and even then he wore a dazed, defeated expression. Willow took the baby up towards the hotel, and Buffy had to urge Giles to follow. She led him up the embankment and through the patio door of their room.

“Hey, Will, can you go in the other room and call an ambulance for Sulla? Maybe tell them you saw something suspicious through your binoculars?” Willow nodded, and Buffy gave her watcher another look over. “After that, could you give us some time alone?”

“Sure, little Rabbit and I will be in the other room. But don’t forget: I can only hold Giles’ spell another hour maybe at the most. And our plane leaves the hour after that.” The witch closed the door to their adjoining hotel rooms behind her, still carrying the baby in her arms.

“Giles?” Buffy sat him on the bed and softly stroked along his forehead and cheeks until his eyes focused on hers finally.

“I’ve failed you,” he murmured. “She’s gone.”

“No, no, no.” Buffy placed feather kisses along his cheeks and jaw. “We found our son. That’s something. That’s a start. And you didn’t kill Longsworth. That’s a good thing. Tomorrow you’ll agree with me on that. And we’ll find her, Giles, we will.”

He bowed his head to rest against hers. Buffy wrapped her arms around his neck and reassured him, “I love you, Giles, and you have never failed me. You have been more than I could have ever hoped for.”

But there was only one way she could prove her love to him. She coaxed him back against the bed and slowly unbuttoned his black shirt. His hands stilled her progress.

“Buffy?”

She smiled as she leaned over to place a kiss on the tip of his nose. “Willow can hold the spell for another hour, and she’s watching the baby. It would seem like such a shame to waste two perfectly good legs. Who knows when you’ll get another chance to be on top?” She kissed him on the mouth, and he let her finish undoing the buttons of his shirt.

“It has been a long time,” he finally conceded.

They came together with a quiet desperation. They carved out this small window of time and made it theirs, trying to forget in each other all the pain that had come before and all the sorrow that would come after. He moved above her, each touch a promise, each kiss a vow. He would find her, he would find her, he would find her. He swore it, not in blood, but in heat and sweat and passion. Buffy opened beneath him, and welcomed him inside her. She gave him absolution with her body and redemption with each kiss. Time stood still for their lover’s dance until their twin cries of release echoed the cries of their single twin in the adjoining room.

They remained entwined in their embrace for long moments, and she could feel him shaking above her. She said it again and branded it into his skin with a kiss on each word. “You. Have. Never. Failed. Me.” She squeezed him against her possessively, showing him just a touch of her slayer strength. “You are my Watcher, my husband, my Giles. You are everything that Longsworth thought you weren’t, and everything I thought you were.” She paused. “Did that make sense? It was supposed to be all dramatic, but I think it just came out confusing.”

He chuckled and looked down on her. “How do you always do that? Make me feel as though everything will be alright? I believe that’s supposed to be my job.”

She combed her fingers through his hair and gave him one of her hundred-watt smiles. “It is your job, and you do it very well, Mr. Giles, but I should get to return the favor every once in a while.”

He leaned down and kissed her one last time, sighed, and resigned himself to his fate. “Come on, Mrs. Giles, time to return me to my plaster prison before the spell breaks and my leg with it.”

She dressed quickly and threw him his black button-down to slip back on. Then she rolled him onto his back and pulled out the supplies they had bought. She had watched the doctor do this the first time, and it had looked extremely easy. Ha. Things that looked easy never were. She focused intently, but tried to hurry, because with their little lovemaking delay, the hour was almost up. The baby cried periodically in the other room, and she knew she would have to feed him soon as well.

When she had finished, the cast was a lumpy mess, but it would hold until they got back to Sunnydale and Dr. Michaels could redo it for them. Dr. Webster would have a fit if she knew her patient had taken it off. Buffy turned to Giles with a proud smile, and that was when she noticed the mischief he had done while she was working on his leg. He had used her distraction to plaster up the toes that rested so unsuspectingly on the bed beside him.

“Giles!” she scolded.

He only grinned and said, “I was beginning to wonder if you would ever notice. You were quite absorbed in your work. Although, no one would know it to look at the finished product.”

“Hey!” she protested. “I’d like to see you do better. Especially on your own leg.”

He gasped, stiffened suddenly, and curled his fingers into the sheets.

“Giles? Are you okay? Is the plaster getting too hot?”

He exhaled slowly and shook his head. “No, the spell broke. It caught me off guard is all. For a moment it felt like getting shot again, but it’s starting to fade. Not bloody quick enough, though.”

“Does it hurt?”

He glared at her. “Why don’t I shoot you in the leg, and you can tell me if it bloody well hurts?”

“Okay, okay,” she said, fishing through their bags for his painkillers. If he would admit to it, then he must really be hurting. She smiled wickedly. “Just breathe, honey. Relax.”

He rolled his eyes. “Not funny.”

She handed him the prescribed dosage plus one, and opened a bottle of water for him. Just then, Willow knocked on the door. Buffy quickly covered her watcher with a sheet and told her friend to come in.

The redhead was bouncing the baby in her arms, but he was still wailing. “I can’t trick him with the finger in the mouth anymore. He’s got it figured out that there’s no milk there. And I think he’s pretty hungry.” She looked towards Giles. “I hope you guys finished with umm… everything… You know the recasting. I tried to hold the spell as long as I could, but it was starting to give me a nosebleed.”

Giles smiled weakly. “I appreciate the time you were able to give me.”

Buffy claimed the screaming baby from the witch. He settled down slightly in her arms, and she smiled at Giles. “Look, he calmed right down when I took him. Think he remembers that I’m his mom?”

“Of course he does,” Giles answered. “He lived inside you for nine... well for nine weeks. Granted, nine months does sound more impressive, but he still knows you.”

Buffy sat on the bed beside Giles and laid the baby across her knees. He curled up tight and started to fuss again, making plaintive little wails and turning his open mouth towards his father when Giles stroked the boy across one cheek. She unbuttoned the top few buttons of her shirt, unhooked her bra, and held the baby to her breast, more than a little nervous about doing this for the first time. A breast pump was not a wriggling, screaming baby. What if she couldn’t do it right? What if he wouldn’t nurse after over five weeks of bottle-feeding? Her fears were quickly quelled when her son latched on and began nursing enthusiastically. His eyes closed, his lashes still wet with his tears.

Buffy touched him along the apricot soft skin of his cheeks and arms and little kicking legs. “Look, Giles,” she whispered. “It’s working. He’s eating.”

Giles laid one hand over the baby’s head, and she leaned back to rest against her watcher’s chest. She couldn’t believe this tiny person in her arms was hers and she would get to take him home this time. Willow left quietly to pack the rest of their things, and Buffy continued to touch her son and examine him from head to toe as he nursed. Ten little toes attached to two little feet that pushed against her hand when she tickled his little arches. Ten tiny fingers that wrapped around hers with a strength that made her giggle. Two bright eyes that blinked up at her in solemn contemplation.

“Giles, look,” she whispered. “He has your eyes. The exact same green. He’s absolutely perfect.”

“Just like his mother,” Giles whispered in her ear, and then kissed along the nape of her neck.

“Feeling better?” she asked.

He nodded, wrapping his arms around both wife and son. “I think the side effects of the spell faded. And the drugs helped too.”

The baby finished nursing, and Buffy passed him to his father, where he snuggled contentedly and started to drift asleep. She did up her bra and shirt and packed the rest of their belongings quickly, calling for Willow to help her carry everything down to the lobby. She left the witch to babysit their luggage as the Slayer made one last trip to collect her menfolk. She helped Giles into a pair of sweats and carried the baby as he hobbled along on his crutches behind her.

A cab to the airport with a stop on the way for basic necessities like diapers, washcloths, and some baby clothes and blankets. Again the short flight to Bombay, the bus to the international airport, and then a long wait for their plane home. Giles tolerated the travel somewhat better, pleasantly numb from the narcotics and holding his baby boy for most of the time. He stayed with the luggage and the baby while Buffy and Willow went in search of the baby supplies they hadn’t realized they’d forgotten until the plane ride to Bombay.

First on the list were pacifiers. Buffy had needed to nurse the baby the entire flight to keep him quiet, which was easier done on a 45-minute plane ride than a nine-hour one. Giles had said the constant nursing probably kept the baby’s ears equalized while the pressure changed. Buffy hoped a pacifier would do the same trick, or else they and all their fellow cabin mates would likely suffer through hours of baby’s screaming.

She returned to find her watcher singing softly to the fussing baby, and he immediately passed the boy to his mother on her arrival. Buffy frowned, but Giles insisted the child was hungry, which he wasn’t, but he calmed down as Buffy strolled around the terminal with him. She stopped at a payphone to make several calls and update everyone on their progress. The baby started fussing again as she talked to Dawn, and her sister asked Buffy to put the phone closer so she could hear the cries more clearly.

“A couple weeks from now,” Buffy said, “and you’ll be a little less excited to hear him cry.”

Her flight was being called, and she had to hang up and rejoin the others.

***

The plane set down, and Giles woke up, glancing around at the other passengers in confusion. He couldn’t have been asleep for that long. He looked down at his watch; they had only left Paris two hours before. “Buffy, why have we landed? We haven’t been in the air more than a couple hours.”

Buffy smiled sheepishly, and he began to get suspicious. “Willow arranged a stopover when she booked the tickets.”

He glanced over at the redhead, but she was concentrating on trying to make the baby laugh, to the purposeful exclusion of his questioning stare. Giles focused again on Buffy. “Where?” he asked, with some amount of dread.

“Spain.”

Giles groaned. “That’s hardly a stopover. That’s a set up. Possibly even a conspiracy.”

Buffy stood and passed him his crutches. “Dad’s going to hang out in the airport with us for a little while and meet his grandson.”

“How little of a while?”

She took their son from Willow before answering his question very softly. “Five hours.”

Giles pulled himself up onto his crutches. This was likely to be the longest part of their 46-hour journey home. And her father was very likely to blame him for the missing granddaughter. Not that Giles didn’t think he deserved the blame. He just didn’t need Hank of all people to remind him of his failure.

They waited their turn to disembark. Buffy started to bounce the baby in her arms to settle his fussing as Willow gathered their carry-ons. Just as they started down the aisle, she told her watcher, “Maybe just before we get back on the plane, I could maybe tell him you’re his new son-in-law.” She caught his withering stare and changed her mind. “Or maybe not. Maybe that’s a phone call thing.”

Hank snatched his grandson the moment they reached the gate. The child took an instant liking to the man, even smiling and giving him little baby gurgles. Giles thought his son would have been a better judge of character than that.

“What’s his name?”

Hank sat at a table near the food court, and they all joined him, his wife and daughter on each side, while Willow ducked out of this family time to go make phone calls to Xander and Tara. “We haven’t decided yet,” Buffy answered.

Buffy leaned against her father’s shoulder, and Hank put one arm around her, still not turning his sight from his grandson. “Seems like only yesterday you were this small. And then Dawn. God, time goes by so fast. Don’t waste it, Buffy. Don’t make the same mistakes I did.”

She leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. “So you’re not mad at me anymore?”

“At you? No, never.” Buffy spared Giles an apologetic look before her father grabbed her attention again. “Look, honey, he has the greenest eyes. You ever seen such green eyes?”

She touched the baby’s hand softly, letting him curl his fingers around hers. “Actually, yes. He has Giles’ eyes.”

Hank scoffed at that, lifting the baby into the air a few times until he elicited another smile. “I prefer to think of it the other way around, that your no-account husband has my grandson’s eyes.”

Buffy gave her watcher a panicked look. “Husband?” she repeated timidly.

Hank had the baby curled against the crook of his elbow again, tickling the boy mercilessly. He answered Buffy’s question while speaking in baby talk to his grandson. “The nice priest told your grandpa, didn’t he? Yes, he did. He told me during the reception. And did your mommy even think that I might like to give her away? No, she didn’t, did she? But I would have, even if I thought she was throwing her life away to spend it with your father. Even if I thought he didn’t deserve her. Because all I ever wanted was for your mommy to be happy. Yes, it is. Yes, it is.” Hank laughed then as the baby scrunched up his face, smiled, and made a sound somewhat close to a giggle. “You’ll make your mommy happy, won’t you, little…?” He turned to his daughter and admonished her, “You’ll have to give him a name soon, Buffy, or I’m just going to start calling him George.”

“Dad!” She gave him a playful swat on the arm.

Hank rose from the table. “Honey, would it be okay if I just took him for a little walk? Just around the terminal?”

“Of course.”

After Hank was out of earshot, Susan reached across and grasped Buffy’s hand, giving her a knowing wink. “I told you he would come around. Babies have a way of melting even the most stubborn hearts.”

Buffy sighed. “Yeah.”

“Give him a little more time, and he might even come around on the subject of your Mr. Giles. He was a little hurt that you left him out of the wedding. Well, after he was done being ticked off about you getting married at all. I actually had to remind Hank that he was currently dancing at his own wedding reception with his much, much younger bride, and that my parents were okay with it. I just wouldn’t expect him to ever call your Mr. Giles ‘son’.”

Buffy laughed at that. “Thanks, Susan.”

Her new stepmother looked down at her hands and continued shyly. “One more thing. It might be nothing. But I know you’re still looking for your daughter, and it might be a lead.”

Giles leaned forward, his attention caught. “Go on.”

Susan glanced between them, and then pulled out a small slip of paper with a name and a phone number. “I have a lawyer friend in LA, who occasionally arranges adoptions. We talk on the phone sometimes. Her name’s Emily Lochter. She said an older man came in about five or six weeks ago after his daughter-in-law had died giving birth to twins. It bothered her, I guess, because he had her arrange all the paperwork so he could be official legal guardian to his grandson, but he had her find an adoptive home for his granddaughter. Emily couldn’t believe he wouldn’t keep them both. He had money enough to hire help.”

Buffy’s eyes lit up, and she threw herself into Giles’ arms. “It’s her! I just know it.”

Giles patted his slayer’s back affectionately. “Thank you, Susan.”

She shrugged. “I don’t know if it’s the same guy, but it might be worth a try.”

Hank returned with the baby before too long, and Willow rejoined them soon after. The small group made light conversation for a few hours, consistently avoiding the topic of the little girl who was still missing. Hank wouldn’t give up his grandson to anyone, allowing Buffy to take him only to nurse, and then claiming him again as soon as she finished. Hank even changed the child’s diapers, which was more than Giles ever expected him to do.

Hank’s mood seemed much brighter than the last time they’d seen him. He recounted tales of Buffy and Dawn’s first days, embarrassing his daughter terribly when he confessed to Giles that they’d had a helluva time getting her to keep her clothes on between the ages of two and three. His animosity towards Giles seemed to have lifted somewhat as well, and he even offered the watcher some advice about women and babies.

“Joyce was always telling me it was my turn to get up with the baby. So I’d just get up. Wouldn’t be until the next morning that I’d realize she hadn’t gotten up once. Buffy’s liable to try the same thing on you, just wait and see.” Hank paused for a moment as they announced something in Spanish. “They’re calling your flight, Buffy.”

Susan reached for the baby. “Can I hold him even once before they leave, Hank?” He passed the child over, and she carried him to the gate.

They milled around, waiting to board, Giles constantly adjusting his crutches beneath him. Another passenger came over to admire the baby, speaking in Spanish to Hank and Susan. Giles translated a little for Buffy, knowing she was feeling left out. Hank looked up at that, asking the watcher if he spoke Spanish fluently.

“He speaks like five languages fluently,” Buffy boasted proudly. “He can carry a conversation in like another three or four.”

Hank looked reluctantly impressed. Giles blushed humbly. “Yes, well, Spanish tends to fall in the latter category. I never used it enough to become completely fluent, although as Buffy said, I can generally get by with it. If we were talking about archaeology or the occult, I might even pass for a native speaker.”

Hank seemed uncomfortable with the brief mention of the occult, even knowing that Giles owned a magic shop. The watcher wondered what Buffy’s father would think if he knew his daughter was the Chosen One, the Slayer, the very reason they still had a world in which Hank could disapprove of his new son-in-law and then go home to his secretary-turned-wife and continue to neglect his family for the almighty dollar, or in this case the peseta.

The stewardess called for pre-boarding, first in Spanish and then in English. With Giles’ broken leg and their tiny baby, they certainly qualified. Willow politely said her goodbyes and then boarded with their carry-ons. Buffy gave Hank and Susan each a hug goodbye, retrieving her son from her stepmother. Susan gave Giles a hug as well, and Hank actually offered out his hand. Giles took it awkwardly, balanced as he was on his crutches. The two exchanged some words in Spanish as they shook hands, and then Giles and Buffy boarded the plane.

As soon as they were seated comfortably, Buffy turned to her husband and asked, “So what did my dad say to you?”

Giles sighed. He was only surprised that she had waited until they’d gotten to their seats. “If he had wanted you to hear it, I’m sure he would have spoken English.”

Buffy pouted at him as she adjusted their baby in her arms. “Come on, spill! You’re not supposed to keep secrets from your wife. I think that’s in the vows there somewhere. Just tell me, was it bad or good?”

Giles smiled patiently. “It was good. It was an apology of sorts, or at least as much of an apology as I’m ever likely to get from your father.”

Buffy settled up against his side with a smug grin. “See? My dad’s not always a total jackass.”

***

Emily Lochter was with another client when her secretary buzzed over the intercom. “Shirley,” she said with an apologetic look at her client. “I’m still with my two o’clock.”

“I know, but these people insist that it’s an emergency. They said Susan Summers sent them.”

Emily sighed. Susan was an old friend, had been her secretary when she was just starting out in the offices across town, and if they were Susan’s friends, she would make time for them. “I’m so sorry, Mr. Caufield. Would you mind waiting for me for five minutes? I’ll be right back.”

She stepped out in the lobby, where she was greeted with a middle-aged man on crutches and two younger women, a redhead and a blonde carrying a baby. The blonde looked very familiar. “Can I help you?”

“I certainly hope so,” the man answered. “My name’s Rupert Giles, and this is my wife, Buffy, and our friend Willow. Susan told us you might have some information about Mr. Hampton and an adoption you arranged for him.”

Emily finally placed where she had seen Buffy before. “Weren’t you a bridesmaid in Susan’s wedding?”

“Yes,” Buffy answered, swaying with the babe in her arms. “I was like hugely pregnant, though. With twins.”

Twins. Emily leaned over to get a good look at the baby, who was awake and content in his mother’s arms. He had such distinctive green eyes, just like the boy Mr. Hampton had brought in. “Oh my God! Are you saying that man stole your twins?”

Mr. Giles simply nodded, and Emily led them to a side conference room. “Wow. I never imagined. I did think it was odd that he could give up his own granddaughter so easily. But he seemed genuinely attached to the boy. I guess I just believed that it was his grandson. And he had all the necessary paperwork.”

“We’re not blaming you, Mrs. Lochter,” the man on crutches insisted. “I’m sure he was able to make it all appear completely legitimate. We just want to know where our daughter is.”

Emily felt a wave of sympathy for these people. To have their children stolen… She couldn’t imagine what they were going through. And she couldn’t help but feel guilty for her part in their tragedy. She wished she could just give them what they were looking for. “I’m sorry, Mr. Giles,” she said, “But I usually only arrange adoptions within families. You know, stepparent to child. I had to contact a private agency to find an adoptive home for your daughter. I’ll give you their name, and the lawyer I worked with, but private firms are notorious for keeping their adoption records extremely confidential. That’s why so many couples use them. You might have to get an order from a judge before they’ll turn over their records.”

Buffy looked on the verge of tears and focused her attention on the baby in her arms. The man simply thanked her, took the names and numbers she gave them, and left with his two companions.

***

Longsworth could not have anticipated using a lawyer who was friends with Buffy’s new stepmother. That was the hand of Chaos. Ethan had set his spell in motion without knowing the possible repercussions it might have. It could bring the Watcher and Slayer closer to their children, or tear them even further apart. But that was the joy of chaos, in its unpredictability. So far it had worked both for them and against them. Through its trail of coincidence and luck, it had led the two parents straight to the man who had stolen their twins. But as Chaos often did, it threw them unexpected curves. Chaos gave them their son, but denied them their daughter. For Longsworth did not have her. Emily Lochter did not have her. The private adoption agency did not have her. They had only a name and an address to give Watcher and Slayer. And when the two parents went to claim her, they found only more misfortune. The baby girl at that name and address was Hispanic and not theirs. The agency pleaded computer error and misfiled papers and incompetent secretaries. The truth was Chaos had swallowed Buffy and Giles’ daughter. She was gone.

***

Buffy, Giles, and Willow sat in the taxicab outside the adoption agency for long silent moments. Buffy could think of only one more thing to try.

“Where to?” the driver asked again with irritation. “The meter’s running, and you’re going to have to pay either way.”

“The Hyperion,” Buffy said finally. She met Giles’ surprised stare with a determined one of her own. “If he can help us find our daughter, then you’re going to swallow your pride and ask him for his help.”

Giles turned to watch the streets pass outside the cab window. Buffy knew her first lover and her last could work together if they had to. After Angel had returned from hell, Giles had reluctantly taken him back into the gang, never again the friends they had been, but still cooperative colleagues. The watcher had even sat beside the vampire’s deathbed in the very same room that had echoed with his own screams only the year before, sat beside his torturer as Angel slowly died from Faith’s poison. Giles had sided with Buffy when Wesley had informed them the Council would deny the vampire his cure. He had hosted Angel in his home as a guest over Thanksgiving the following year, when the vampire had returned to Sunnydale without Buffy’s knowledge.

Giles had done these things, because intellectually he knew that Angel had a soul as Angelus had not. Intellectually, he couldn’t hold Angel responsible for the things Angelus had done, not for Jenny’s murder, not for his own torture. And above all, Giles was an intellectual man. But Buffy could see it in her watcher’s eyes when she mentioned Angel’s name and every time the two of them were in the same room. Buffy knew that Giles’ mind and heart were at war where Angel was concerned. She didn’t blame him for it. She understood it all too well. Her own mind and heart had warred over Angelus, her mind trying to convince her that he was a killer and a demon she should slay even while her heart continued to whisper to her that some part of him was still Angel.

When he had returned from hell, whole and souled, she had felt peace. Angelus was no more than a bad memory for her, and when she looked at Angel, she only saw her Angel, who she loved. But Buffy knew that Giles would always see Angelus in those eyes, would always feel the primal jolt of fear, and would always return to those memories of the factory and the mansion. No matter how he tried to intellectualize it. Buffy knew that he would likely have terrible nightmares tonight, but it was a price she was willing to pay to find their daughter.

She stepped out of the cab with their son, Willow and Giles following a few steps behind. It would be the first time she saw any of the LA group since her death. She had spoken to Angel briefly on the phone all those months ago, but she had asked him not to come.

The hotel lobby was large and spacious, elegant couches and a wide staircase leading up. She approached the desk, leaning over to catch a glimpse of Cordelia in the back office. The phone rang, and she answered it.

“Angel Investigations. We help the hopeless… Omigod, Buffy!” Cordelia caught sight of the slayer halfway through answering the phone and simply hung up on their potential client. “Wesley! Angel!” she screamed, heading around the desk to greet the new arrivals. “Willow! Giles! What happened to your leg? And whose kid?”

Angel and Wesley came running moments later, probably thinking Cordelia was having another vision. They stopped short when they saw the small group from Sunnydale.

“Hi, Angel,” Buffy said quietly.

“Buffy.” Angel always seemed to say her name like a prayer.

“Come meet my son,” she told him.

“Your son?” Cordelia exclaimed. “It hasn’t even been nine months since you came back to life. God, Giles, you sure didn’t waste any time.”

They didn’t bother to explain the Slayer heat or the short pregnancy. None of that mattered. They were here on business. Buffy watched Angel as he watched her. He seemed hurt. Wasn’t this what he wanted for her? Didn’t he leave her because he wanted her to be with someone who could walk in the sun with her, who could make love to her, who could give her children? He had hated Riley for being that man. Would he hate Giles even more for giving her the children that Angel never could?

“I didn’t know you were coming,” Wesley said.

“Neither did I,” Buffy responded. She handed over the baby to Cordelia when she asked for him and stepped closer to her ex-lover and ex-watcher. “We need your help. We had twins. A son and a daughter. But they were stolen, and we’ve only managed to find the boy.”

Wesley frowned, polishing his glasses just as Giles did. Buffy wondered if that habit was taught in watcher training. “They could have been taken by someone wanting a Slayer’s child.” He replaced his glasses and looked past her towards Giles. “Have you checked the Rohannon Chronicles? I think I recall reading about a couple different cults-”

“No, no, no,” Buffy interrupted. “We already know who took them and why. We totally took care of that already. But the guy put our daughter up for adoption through some LA firm, and now they can’t figure out who they gave her to.”

Cordelia gasped. “The LA firm isn’t Wolfram and Hart, is it? ’Cause those guys are seriously evil.”

Buffy looked at her blankly. “No. It’s just a small private adoption agency. I guess they’re getting huge fines for shoddy record keeping, but that doesn’t help us find our daughter. I thought a private detective might be able to get the job done. And hey, I just happen to know one.”

Angel nodded. “Of course. I think I know where we might start.”

The LA investigators took their new clients to a bar. Buffy thought it was a strange way to conduct business, but she didn’t argue. The place was filled with patrons and employees of the demony persuasion. It reminded her somewhat of Willy’s back home, except with class. A Chaos demon with a large dripping rack of antlers was standing on stage singing.

“Look, Giles, karaoke!” Buffy said brightly. Giles only groaned.

A green man with horns and the most hideous purple suit that Buffy had ever seen came over immediately. “This is neutral territory,” he said to Buffy. “So don’t go slaying any of my customers, chicky.”

Buffy wondered how the man knew her so quickly. Outside of Sunnydale, demons didn’t usually recognize her on sight. Before she could ask, the green man addressed Angel.

“So this is the infamous Buffy? Now I finally see what you’ve been mooning over. Not bad.” He extended one hand to the slayer. “I’m the Host. Pleased to meet you.”

Buffy shifted the baby in her arms and shook his hand.

“What a cute kid you got there, too. We don’t usually get kids in here, as you might imagine. Angel, you didn’t tell me your slayer had a kid?” he scolded.

“I didn’t know,” Angel muttered. “Look, we need your help. Their daughter is missing, and we thought you might give us a lead on where to find her.”

“Twins!” the Host exclaimed. “Well, this should be interesting. I’ll need the daddy to sing too. A duet.”

Angel nodded towards the watcher, but Giles was aghast. “Sing?”

The Host motioned them further into the bar, clearing a nearby table of a couple lingering customers. “Go up to the bar,” he told them. “They’ll give you a free drink.” The three from Sunnydale and the three from LA sat together at the table, the Host hovering behind them. He addressed Giles, sparing Buffy a few glances as he spoke as well. “Here’s the score. I can see things, visions if you will, a little peek into somebody’s future. But you gotta be singing for me to see anything.”

“I rather think not,” Giles stated plainly.

The Host shrugged, waving a waiter over with drinks for his new guests. “You want me to find your missing kid? Then I need Mommy and Daddy on stage singing together. You can’t be any worse than Angel singing Manilow.”

Buffy laughed, mouthing the word Manilow as she threw Angel an incredulous stare. He dropped his eyes down to his drink quickly. Willow giggled too, and Angel grew even more uncomfortable.

“He’s really bad,” Cordelia assured both women.

“Alright, alright,” Angel snapped. “I thought we were talking about Giles and Buffy singing.”

“Very well,” Giles conceded with a sigh.

Watcher and Slayer rose from their chairs. “Angel,” Buffy said, “hold the baby while I’m on stage.” She didn’t know it was possible for a vampire to pale, but he did. “Come on. You can’t tell me in 250 years, you’ve never held a baby.” She placed the child in his arms before he could argue further. She could feel Giles’ cold stare boring into her back, but she didn’t care. Angel wasn’t going to hurt their son.

Angel smiled slightly, and then the baby began to kick and wave his little fists in the air. Buffy wasn’t sure if he could sense the coolness of the undead hands holding him, or if he missed hearing a steady heartbeat, or if he could just sense vampires as his mother did, but her son began to scream in Angel’s arms, and she passed him quickly to Wesley who seemed just as uncomfortable. Men. Cordelia and Willow smiled at her in silent collusion. The baby settled in the ex-watcher’s arms, and he was just stuck with the child for the time being.

Buffy turned and followed Giles as he hobbled up to the stage. She didn’t miss his irritated stare, and replied quietly, “Come on. You can’t deny it. Part of you enjoyed knowing your son doesn’t like Angel anymore than you do. Another part of you is really hoping he spits up all over Wesley.”

Giles hid his smirk behind the song list, as he tried to decide what they should sing. Buffy begged him to pick something that wasn’t opera and was maybe written in the last decade. He rolled his eyes when she pointed to Sonny and Cher’s “I Got You, Babe.”

“I was kidding,” she insisted.

“It has to be something you both like,” the Host informed them, startling them when he strolled up right behind them. “The words, the meaning, none of that’s important. You just have to sing something you like, and I’ll get a flash of what you want to know.”

Watcher and Slayer finally agreed on a song, a showtune from a musical they had taken Dawn to at the beginning of the school year. Dawn had liked it, and Giles had enjoyed it as well, although he wouldn’t rank it on par with any of the classic operas. Buffy had claimed to dislike it, but her mother had given her a taste for the old musicals. Surely from their collection of black and white movies, Giles could see that. Once, he had caught her listening to the CD Dawn had purchased at the show, and Buffy had finally admitted that she’d liked the musical too. Although, that didn’t mean she wanted him to drag her off to the theatre every month. She’d much rather go to the Bronze.

Giles sat on a stool, and Buffy leaned his crutches against the wall. They each took a mike and began their duet for the green demon standing off to one side and watching them intently.

Buffy started alone, nervous, but hopeful that this would bring them closer to their daughter. “When I was a kid, I played on this street. I always loved illusion. I thought make-believe was truer than life, but now it’s all confusion. Please can you tell me what’s happening? I just don’t know anymore. If this is real, how should I feel? What should I look for?”

She was grateful to stop singing and give Giles his turn. He really did have a much better voice than she did. He didn’t even need to look at the words scrolling across the monitor. He had a really good memory.

“If you were smart, you would keep on walking out of my life as fast as you can. I’m not the one you should pin your hopes on. You’re falling for the wrong kind of man. This is crazy. You know we should call it a day. Sound advice, great advice, let’s throw it away. I can’t control all the things I’m feeling. I haven’t got a prayer. If I’m a fool, well, I’m too much in love to care. I knew where I was. I’d given up hope, made friends with disillusion. No one in my life, but I look at you, and now it’s all confusion.”

Buffy took her turn again, smiling at Giles. He reached for her hand and laced their fingers together, giving her a little squeeze to bolster her confidence. She did okay as long as she didn’t look out into the audience much. And then she had finished her verse, and it was time for them to sing the last one together. Giles’ beautiful tenor made even her voice sound good. Buffy thought they might actually be almost in harmony.

“I thought I had everything I needed. My life was set, my dreams were in place. My heart could see way into the future. All of that goes when I see your face. This is crazy. You know we should call it a day. Sound advice, great advice, let’s throw it away. I can’t control all the things I’m feeling. We’re floating in mid-air. If we are fools, well, we’re too much in love to care. If we are fools, well, we’re too much in love to care.”

The music died, and Buffy blushed as Willow and Cordelia hollered from their table. She turned quickly to pass Giles’ his crutches, and then exited the stage without waiting for him.

She reached their table in record time and noticed the way Cordelia was watching Wesley with the baby. Buffy thought the two were just friends, having tried and failed at romance, but there was something about seeing a man holding a baby that really upped his desirability. She left her son with the ex-watcher for the time being. He was happy enough in Wesley’s arms.

Giles sat at the table a moment later, and they both waited anxiously for the Host’s advice. The green skinned demon patted her watcher on the back, telling him, “You got a good set of pipes on you, boy. I don’t know why you were so embarrassed to sing. I could keep this place full if I had you in here every night.”

Giles gritted his teeth. “I’m not interested in your comments on my musical talent.”

“Right, right,” the Host said, glancing at Buffy. “You didn’t do so badly either, Slayer. Although, I hope your kids get their father’s voice. You could send them on tour.”

Buffy could see that Giles’ patience was wearing thin. “Just tell us what you saw,” he snapped.

The Host bristled and glared at the watcher. “You want the message? Let me tell it in my own way.” He pulled up a chair between Wesley and Cordelia, looking straight across at Giles and Buffy. “You’re not going to like the message much, I’m afraid. You’re not getting your daughter back anytime soon. I see her as a little girl in someone else’s house.” He held up a hand to forestall their questions. “I didn’t see enough details to give you any idea where. Could be LA, could be Canada for all I know. But you do get her back as a little girl. And from there, it could go one of two ways. I saw two possible futures. Dark and light. You might be able to keep her, which would be a very good thing. Or you might lose her again, in which case she would be raised into the ways of darkness. Through all of it, through her and both of you, I sensed the hand of Chaos. I sensed magic twisting events. And whichever way it plays out, whether she will belong to you or to the darkness, I sensed that magic will be what tips the scales in either direction.” The Host rose from his seat, straightening his suit. “That’s all I saw.”

“Perhaps if we sang again?” Giles asked.

The Host grinned. “Feel free. I could listen to you all night. But it won’t buy you anything I haven’t already told you. The Powers That Be only send me one message, and it’ll be the same no matter how many times you sing. But I would like to hear you do Billy Joel. ‘The Piano Man’ is one of my favorites.”

Giles pulled himself to his feet with some amount of irritation. “Let’s go,” he told the others.

Buffy reclaimed her son, Angel thanked the Host as they left, and they returned to the Hyperion. Giles seemed to think the entire trip was a waste of time. Wesley reluctantly informed him that the Host had never been wrong to their knowledge. Even if it wasn’t something Giles wanted to hear, it did seem unlikely that they would find their daughter.

Giles turned on Angel with a cold fury. “You owe me. You owe me for Jenny. You owe me for every hour I spent at Crawford Street.” Buffy gasped. Giles never talked about it, especially not with Angel. It was one of those things people pretended never happened so they could stand to be in the same room with someone. But Giles continued, getting right in Angel’s face, somehow making himself intimidating even on crutches.

“You do this, Angel, you find my daughter…” His voice broke, and his gaze dropped to the floor. “Find her, and you’ll have a clean slate with me. We’ll be even.”

Angel nodded solemnly. “I’ll try.”

Giles met the vampire’s eyes again. They stared each other down for long moments. Buffy wondered what unspoken things passed in the air between her first lover and her last. Neither of them had ever told her exactly what had happened in the mansion on Crawford Street. She had seen some of the scars, but Giles would never tell her which were from Angelus and which were from his Ripper days. And he would never tell her how he got any of them. Whatever passed between the two men, who each loved Buffy so deeply, harkened back to that day spent in the mansion, back to words and deeds that both had tried to leave behind them. But Giles’ eyes now said plainly that he remembered all of it, and Angel’s answering shame revealed plainly that he did too.

“I’ll try,” Angel said again.

Giles accepted that answer and left the hotel. Buffy and Willow said their goodbyes. Cordelia held the baby one last time, and Wesley offered his congratulations to his former slayer. Angel merely laid his hand on the child’s head, and then leaned forward to kiss Buffy on the cheek.

“You look happy,” he stated.

“I am,” she answered.

“Good.”

Willow left, and Buffy followed, leaving the three figures from her past behind her. The May Queen and Reigning Bitch of Sunnydale, who had been first friend, then snobby social superior, and then friend again. The ex-Watcher, who had tried to take Giles’ place and failed, who had in the end swallowed his pride and allowed her to lead him in the fight against the Mayor. And the Vampire with a Soul, who had loved her from both afar and right up close, who had lost himself by loving her, who she had sent to hell to save the world, who had done the noble thing by leaving her so she could have the kind of life he could never give her, who she had once thought would always be the one true love of her life. She was wrong. What she felt for Giles had eclipsed whatever bright passion she thought she shared with Angel and had consumed whatever part of her heart she thought belonged to her first love. Now she felt only friendship for Angel. And pity for the knowledge that he still loved her.

Buffy and Willow passed a young black man as he entered the hotel. He stopped and gave them a second look. Buffy smiled. This must be Gunn, who she had heard the others talk about. She introduced herself as Buffy, and it was clear that he knew who she was too. But then the cab driver was honking, and Giles was waving for them to get in, and she said goodbye to Gunn as well.

***

Buffy heard a scream as she turned the lock and opened the door. Dawn came running down the stairs, hooking one hand out on the archway to slow her momentum and stop in front of Buffy.

“Omigod,” she breathed, reaching for the baby boy. Buffy handed him over, smiling as Dawn walked into the living room with him. “He’s so tiny. How much does he weigh?”

Buffy laughed. “I don’t know. Get out the scale and weigh him.”

She helped Willow bring in the luggage, sitting down beside Giles on the couch when she was done. The other Scoobies were circled around Dawn, admiring the baby too.

“He’s got the cutest little feet,” Tara said.

“He has Giles’ eyes,” Xander added.

“He is very small,” Anya stated. “Is he supposed to be this small, or is he a runt?”

Giles seemed offended, and Buffy patted him reassuringly on the arm, before correcting Anya. “He’s not a runt. Dogs and rabbits have runts. He’s just a little smaller than most, because he’s a twin, but he’ll catch up. He’s probably eight or nine pounds now, which is what most babies are born at.”

“Oh,” she said. “Can I hold him?” Dawn passed him to the ex-demon and newlywed. Anya stroked the soft hair on his head. She smiled when the boy did and touched his little fingers and nose. “He’s so small and helpless. His skin is so soft, and he has a distinctive smell. I feel an overwhelming desire to reproduce and have my own short person.”

Xander looked panicked and reached for the boy. “Okay, An, you’re done holding the baby now. It’s my turn.”

Xander seemed at ease with the infant, and Buffy was somewhat impressed. She never pegged him as being good with babies. She always pictured him as more of the climbing trees and playing tag type of Uncle. She looked over at Giles, and he nodded at her to go ahead.

“So, Xander,” she began innocently, “how do you like your namesake?”

“He’s a lot cuter than I thought you or Giles…” He trailed off and looked up at the two of them. Very timidly, he asked, “Namesake?”

Buffy exchanged a smile with Giles before answering Xander’s question. “We thought he should be named after you and Willow.” She stood and walked to her friend, tickling her son under the chin as she said to him, “William Alexander Giles, meet your Uncle Xander.”

“William?” Willow sighed with some amount of satisfaction. “Wow, guys, that’s… Wow.”

Buffy stood behind her sister, slipping her arms around the girl’s waist. “When we find his sister, she’s going to be Tanya Dawn, after the other three most important people in our lives.” Tara, Anya, and Dawn smiled brightly at that announcement, and then fell back into a brooding silence as they each wondered if Buffy would ever find her daughter.

The Slayer saved them all from the silence a moment later, when she retrieved the boy from Xander’s arms and told her friends, “There’s one more person I want to introduce Alex to. I want to get there before dark, if you guys don’t mind.”

Giles took his crutches and followed her out. He held the baby while she situated the car seat in his BMW. “We need another car now that my Jeep is gone,” she told him.

“Yes,” he agreed. “And you need some driving lessons.”

“Hey!” she protested, but he continued on.

“I’m quite serious, Buffy. That Jeep in the river scared me beyond belief.”

“I wasn’t even driving,” she answered defensively.

“No, you weren’t, but I’ve seen you drive, and the idea that you could put your Jeep at the bottom of a river wasn’t so far fetched. For my own peace of mind, I’d just like you to become more skilled.”

Buffy reluctantly gave into his demands as she belted the baby into the seat. Then she stretched out her hand for the keys. “Now’s as good a time to start as any. You can be my first instructor.” He hesitated, and she scolded him. “Giles, you can’t drive with a broken leg. Fork them over.” He did, and they arrived at their destination without incident, although Giles had marks in his palms from the armrest.

Buffy sat in the grass, Alex laid across her legs, his little hands trying to catch a dragonfly that kept buzzing in and out of his field of vision. She had her body turned to block the setting sun from his eyes, and she shooed away the pesky insect whenever it got too close. Giles leaned against a tree some distance away, giving them a little privacy.

Buffy plucked a few weeds from the base of the headstone and tossed them aside. Her fingers traced the lines of her mother’s name in stone.

“Look, Mom,” she said softly. “I’m a mom now too! His name’s Alex, and he’s perfect. But you knew that already. I know I haven’t visited in a while, but you wouldn’t believe how crazy the last three months have been.

”I know I’m probably too young for this, and I hope you’re not mad at me for having a family so soon, but it was my only chance at a baby. One more drawback of being the Slayer. I hope you’re not mad at Giles either. He’s really a good man, and he loves me a lot. We both thought really hard about it before we decided on a baby. He was really great through the whole thing. Oh, and we’re married now! It doesn’t feel much different, but I guess I’m Buffy Giles now.

“I only wish you could be here to see Alex grow up, and make him hot chocolate, and watch old sappy movies with him. But I’ll tell him all about you, and so will Dawn.”

Buffy sighed and leaned down to kiss her son on his soft cheeks. “Mom, I have a daughter too. Twins, can you believe it? We’ve looked everywhere for her, but she was stolen and we can’t find her. We won’t ever stop looking for her, but I’m starting to think that we won’t get her back. We have to build a life for Alex and Dawn, and we can’t do that if we’re searching for our daughter 24/7 forever.

“I guess I would feel better about it if I knew you were watching over her. She probably has a nice home with two parents who love her. She was adopted. I miss her, and I want her back, but I have to think about Alex too. So could you just… I don’t know… Just be her guardian angel or something? Make sure she’s happy and safe. I think I could be okay if I knew you were watching.”

Buffy looked over to the setting sun. It would be dark in less than an hour, and she would need to get home before then. Alex was much too young to take slaying. In fact, he would always be too young to take slaying. She waved Giles over, and he approached somewhat unsteadily, his crutches sinking into the ground on each step. He placed a bouquet of flowers on top of the gravestone, not even attempting to bend over and lay them on the ground. His hand rested briefly against the granite.

“Joyce,” he said. “I’m doing my best for your family. They’re my family now too. But I’ll never be able to take your place, nor would I ever try. You are missed.”

Buffy smiled and wiped tears from her cheeks. She lifted her child to rest against her shoulder and stood beside her husband. They studied each other, no words needing to be spoken, whole conversations passing with a single look. She placed her ear over his heart to hear the steady thrumming, and he bent his head to kiss her lightly on the forehead. Then they turned and left the cemetery, walking towards the car and their home.

***

Giles nudged Buffy gently, but she only groaned and rolled away from him. He poked her in the ribs, calling her name softly.

“What?” she finally said, sitting up and wiping the sleep from her eyes.

“The baby is crying,” he told her.

She listened for a moment and didn’t hear anything. “No he’s not.” She flopped back into her pillows, but mere seconds later the wailing came through the baby monitor again. Giles nudged her once more. “I’m going. I’m going,” she muttered.

Buffy climbed over her husband, pausing as she straddled him. She glared. “You’re really milking this broken leg thing for all it’s worth, aren’t you? Let me tell you, I’m keeping count, and when you get that cast off, you’re going to owe me a lot of sleep filled nights when you can get up with the baby.”

Giles chuckled and pulled her down for a kiss. Their son cried even louder, so they could hear him even without the monitor. Buffy sighed and rolled off of Giles and out of bed, stumbling down the hallway. Giles heard her over the monitor a moment later as the baby quieted and she explained to the boy that his father was a lazy gimp. The boy’s father only grinned, settled deeper into his pillows, and returned to a peaceful sleep.

He woke when he felt a slight weight on his chest. Alex was looking up at him with wide green eyes, while sucking on one little fist.

“Buffy?” Giles asked groggily.

She climbed over them to her side of the bed, snuggling up against her watcher’s side. “I fed him. I changed him. I rocked him. He still won’t go to sleep. I think it’s time for Daddy to sing to him.”

Giles sighed and hooked one arm around Buffy, pulling her against his chest, and the other arm around his son, gently patting the baby on the back. Giles sang a soft lullaby until mother and child were both asleep. He kissed them each on the forehead, deciding to leave them as they were rather than wake Buffy to put the baby back in his crib.

He thought about how quickly his life had changed, each turn unforeseeable and irreversible. For years he had lived alone, content to be a watcher and defined by that destiny. When Buffy had died, he had found himself forced to play father to Dawn. And then Buffy had returned, had loved him as he never expected, and he was no longer alone. It seemed like they would be like that forever: he and Buffy and Dawn, living in the house and forming their own family. But Fate had decided they were ready for a baby, even if they might not have agreed. Buffy’s last chance at a child, and he had reluctantly opted to become a father for real. In only two months, he had not one child but two, both stolen by a ghost from his past.

That’s all that Longsworth was now. A ghost. Buffy wanted to believe that her beloved watcher was not a murderer, so he would let her believe that. But Giles knew better. Even Tara had known better, when her insanity had allowed her to see through illusion and self-deception straight to the core of naked truth. She had called him a killer, and she was right. He had killed, not once, not twice, not thrice, but four times. Randall. Ben. Longsworth. Sulla. Buffy might have stopped his hand, but Giles could kill with a phone call as easily as a 9mm. He had pulled in one last favor from a friend on the Council, who had ordered Weatherby and two other special ops to finish the job Buffy had stopped Giles from doing. Longsworth and Sulla’s bodies would turn up near the plane wreck he had engineered over Newfoundland, and that would be the end of the mystery. To protect Buffy. To protect his son and his daughter. To protect them, Giles could kill.

Alex squirmed on his chest, and Giles sang softly for a moment until the baby stilled. Becoming a father was perhaps the biggest change in his life, especially without the time that most men got to accustom themselves to the idea. Two months, and he had twins. And a wife.

Giles knew he should be happy. He had Buffy and their son, but he still felt as if half his heart belonged with the daughter he had held for scarce minutes. He felt the weight of his wife and child against his chest and wondered how arms that were so full could still feel so empty. His daughter had disappeared into an endless sea of strangers, and Giles knew that half his heart would remain with her always. He traced the tiny fingers with his own, eliciting a small shudder from the sleeping boy before the baby shook his head and cuddled up closer. Giles kissed the child again, and then closed his own eyes. He drifted to sleep and dreamt of a daughter with Buffy’s blue eyes.

***

She stirred when she heard the baby crying. She climbed over her sleeping husband and staggered to the nursery for the fourth time that night. The child quieted when lifted from the crib, and she hoped that she could simply rock the baby back to sleep. She felt her husband’s arms slide around her waist, and she smiled.

“What are you doing out of bed?”

“I thought I should take a turn,” he answered in his deep voice.

She passed the fussing baby to him and made her way back to bed, pausing in the doorway to watch father and child together. He swayed until the fussing calmed and the tiny mouth opened in a yawn. He touched the soft wisps of hair tenderly.

“Come on, Robin, be a good little girl for your daddy.”

He sat down in the chair beneath the moonlit window and rocked his newly adopted daughter to sleep.

~Finis~          July 30, 2001

Ok, when I was first writing this, I had a “name the baby contest” after posting the last chapter. I must admit, it was a shameless attempt to garner feedback, but it worked splendidly. And that’s how their daughter was named Robin. If you’re curious and want the details, here’s the link:
Baby Name Contest Winner!

DBC Home Back: Part 6: And the Cradle Will Fall Next: Book Three: The Family Business
Part 1: Momma’s Boy

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