"So, heroes. You may have dealt with my minions, but you have yet to deal with me. Think I’m beaten? Think again, fools!" The speaker paused to look down at the documents laid out before him. "One fireball coming up. I’m going to centre it right in the middle of the approaching party."

"What?" Johnathan reacted, frowning at the miniature figures clustered in the middle of the table. "Well … okay, I guess you have time. You want me to make saving throws?"

The dungeon master grinned. "You think you can survive all twenty five D6?"

"Twenty five?" Johnathan’s eyes went wide. "No way can your dark-elf mage cast a fireball that big. You said he was only twelfth level!"

The grin got a little wider. "Helm of brilliance, what else? I dropped lots of hints when I described him."
"Oh. Well, yeah ... Hang on a minute! Can a dark-elf wear a Helm of brilliance? Doesn’t it generate sunlight, or something?"

"Only if you use the right command word." Warren reached across his scenario sheet to pick up the dice and paused, frowning at the third member of their little group. "Andrew – what are you doing?"

Somewhere on the other side of the table, Andrew looked up from the pentacle he’d been abstractedly doodling in the now empty pizza box. He’d been trying to work out the appropriate sigils for a new summoning for a while now, but they still didn’t look quite right. "Mm?" he questioned, having missed the earlier conversation completely.

"Doing. You. What?" Warren repeated impatiently. "I’m about to unleash fiery mayhem on the forces defending all that is good and true and you’re sitting there finger painting with left over cheese."

"Am not," Andrew defended sulkily. "I’m … cogitating."

"Well, cogitate on your own time. I need the rest of your dice."

"Oh. Right." He pushed the pizza box onto the floor and reached to gather up the blue crystal cubes that were scattered over his character sheet. "What evil spell are you casting, oh master of darkness and magic?"

"My mighty twenty five dice fireball," Warren said smugly, putting out his hand for the offering of dice. "Which probably needs a command word too, now I think about it. How about – summus ignatis!"

He dropped the dice with a dramatic gesture, scattering them right across the table. A moment later he was lurching backwards, tipping his chair over in his haste to escape from the enraged creature that had popped into existance right in front of him.

Flame flared across the table as the scattered papers ignited from a sudden impact of heat. Johnathan leapt up and away with a startled yell, then dived back again to snatch up his character sheet. The creature immediately twisted in his direction, its wings sweeping through the dance of flames and setting smoke swirling across the room.

"Negatio," Andrew yelled in panic, his hands flailing in an attempt at a dismissive gesture. "Ah…ah … Dismissus. Exeunt sunt!"

He stumbled as he said the last, dancing back from the threat of beating wings. The bottom of the pizza box crumpled as he stepped on it, the lines of the oil smeared pentacle tearing and distorting under his weight. There was another odd sort of popping sound and the creature vanished as quickly as it had come, leaving behind the scent of scorched wood and burning plastic.

"What the hell was that?" Warren demanded, picking himself up off the floor and glaring at Andrew with decided hostility.

"Umm… I-I’m not entirely sure. I’m still working on it."

"Well, don’t work on it in the lair. It’s far too dangerous." Warren stared down at the remains of the gaming table, frowning at the charred embers of his dice and the puddle of melted metal in the middle of the scorched patch. "So much for the stalwart defenders of the good and the true," he muttered with irritation. "If only they could be dealt with as easily in the real world."

Xander and Spike followed the policewoman and her gaggle of shivering charges down the gangplank, already arguing over who was going to drive once they got back to the car. It was Xander’s car, but the vampire had been complaining so much about his careening, headlong dash to get to the docks that it had generated the inevitable if you can do better, why don’t you drive retort, which Spike was busy insisting Xander honour.

Buffy was trying hard not to grin at the exchange. It had nothing to do with Xander’s driving, which had been slightly less wild than it would have been with Spike at the wheel. It was because Spike had ended up sitting on the back seat next to Giles, with the two of them eyeing each other as if they had daggers drawn and plans to use them. Of course, it hadn’t been Spike’s fault that he’d been unable to keep up with the kidnapper’s departing car, but with Giles deeply worried about Dawn’s welfare and probably blaming himself for letting her get into the situation in the first place, the inevitable friction between him and the vampire had generated a moment or two of decided hostility.

That had never been a problem before. At one time Buffy had even found the interplay between the two Englishmen to be quietly amusing in an oh god, here they go again kind of way. But that had been then - back in the days when Spike’s chip had prevented him from responding to the put downs and the arch comments with anything other than arch comments of his own, and Giles had been sensibly aware that it wasn’t safe to push the vampire too far, whether he had a restraining chip or not. The fact that Spike thought Giles to be a pompous ass, while Giles considered Spike a general waste of space had slowly mellowed into mutual acknowledgement that they could probably both put up with the arrangement - most of the time. If pushed, Spike had even begun to acknowledge that his fellow countryman had some admirable qualities, while Giles had grudgingly accepted that Spike had become part of the gang whether he liked it or not.

Things had changed.

For one thing, Spike’s chip was no longer a restraint where Giles was concerned; if anyone had wanted proof that the transformation the Watcher had undergone was more than some mere arcane technicality, it had been amply demonstrated when – cockily attempting to prove otherwise – Spike had hauled back and deliberately hit him. It was hard to say what had surprised the vampire most: the realisation that his chip had indeed failed to fire – or finding himself pinned up against a wall with a couple of razor sharp blades nestled menacingly on either side of his throat. He’d been so thrown by the incident that he’d actually apologised. Surprisingly nicely, too.

That was another thing. It might have been thought that – without the chip to hold him back - Spike might have taken unfair advantage of the situation. But that startled moment of confrontation had served to remind him that the reason the chip no longer fired was also reason to be wary of somebody he might otherwise love to take down a peg or two. The vampire wasn’t a fool – even if he acted like one half the time – and not even he was about to start a fight with someone naturally armed and armoured, especially when that someone was turning out to be nearly as fast as the Slayer … and well versed in all her moves.

And the most significant thing? That was probably Giles himself, trying to come to terms with what he’d become, learning what it meant to wear a demon’s flesh and to have to drink blood in order to stay both sane and safe to be around. His perspectives on Spike’s situation, once set with hostile clarity, had sunk into wary ambiguity, a reluctant admission that maybe - just maybe - even a vampire might be able to earn himself a chance at redemption. If he really wanted one.

So the two of them were busy reassessing their standing with each other, a wary dance of distrust, suspicion and dissonant personalities. It was unlikely that it would end with them being the best of friends, but there were a few glimmers of respect emerging from the gloom – along with a common understanding that they could, and would tolerate each other for Buffy’s sake, if nothing else. She had hopes that it would become something more than that – but since her own feelings towards the vampire were almost as ambiguous as her Watcher’s, she’d contented herself with refereeing the exchange of hostile glares and making sure that neither of them did anything they might come to regret.

Tonight’s little interaction had produced an interesting performance from both of them. It was hard for Spike to feel guilty about anything; when he did, he covered it with defensive attitude and a pretence that he didn’t give a damn, one way or the other. Giles’ anxious and accusing scowl had triggered exactly that reaction from him – which meant that the vampire had been feeling responsible for losing track of Dawn, even if he hadn’t wanted to admit it. It was no wonder he was trying to inveigle a front seat in the car for the drive home. Buffy knew how uncomfortable those I expected better of you looks could be – although in Spike’s case the assessment might have been closer to an I had hopes you’d do better, but knowing you, I’m not in the least surprised.

Sometimes it was disconcerting just how much Giles could manage to say without saying a single word.

"You think they’ll be long?" Dawn asked, leaning over the ship’s rail so that she could watch Spike and Xander being swallowed up by the dockside gloom. Buffy sighed and turned her attention back to her sister.

"I shouldn’t think so. We left the car behind one of the warehouses – that big one, just along the dock. They just have to drop the Detective and the girls off somewhere near the police station, and then they’ll come back for us. Here – " She pulled her mobile phone out of her pocket and held it out. "Call Willow. She and Tara went back home to cast the locator spell we needed to find you. They’ll be worried. Tell them everything’s okay."

Dawn took the phone, eyeing it a little doubtfully as she did so. "You think they’ll be angry with me?" she asked. "I mean ... I wasn’t supposed to ... well," she winced, "Giles was a lot nicer about it than I expected. But then he got mad ..."

"I don’t think he was mad at you, Dawny." Buffy glanced down the deck, making sure that the man concerned was still where he’d said he’d be. She caught the glint of light from tilted steel, a brief flash of movement in the shadows: her Watcher was still working on his blades, no doubt reluctant to drag coal dust under his skin. She didn’t blame him. The stuff was bad enough on it. "I think – well, the Detective is the cop that arrested him in Nevada. We never expected her to turn up here. And those vampires … they were just kids. Dead ones," she concluded with a shiver. "Ring Will, okay? I promise she won’t yell at you." She took a careful breath. "I’ll speak to Giles."

She left Dawn by the gangplank and picked her way along the deck, feeling the ship pitch a little under her feet as the tide tugged at its moorings. It was one of those dirty, unkempt tramp steamers, a vessel that had passed through the hands of innumerable owners and had definitely seen better days. Buffy could have said as much for the vampire who’d apparently been masterminding this particularly nasty nest: he’d been fat, arrogant, and dressed like a real slob.

It had been a decided pleasure staking him.

"Hey," she offered companionably, perching herself on the next packing crate down and considering her friend and mentor with a mixture of concern and sympathy. His first night back on active duty, so to speak – and it had to be this night, which had seen their careful plan turn into a desperate, panicked search, and had thrown him into a highly disturbing fight with a group of decidedly underage vampires. Killing over half a dozen at once was never easy – but killing things that had once been innocent children made it harder on the soul.

Especially on his.

"The Detective took the children?" Giles asked quietly, not looking up from his self imposed task. He was cleaning each blade with long careful sweeps, wiping the steel – not just clean, but gleaming. Every third or fourth stroke he’d pause to shake the handkerchief out, spilling accumulated coal dust onto the deck. The once white linen was now mostly filthy grey.

"Yeah. Xander offered to drop them off at the precinct and Spike went with them. He said something about making sure Xander didn’t get lost on the way back. I think he’s ... still feeling a little guilty about losing Dawn. Gets him itchy. Guilt, I mean."

"He’s a vampire, Buffy," Giles pointed out, flexing the blades on his right arm and checking that he’d cleaned them right down to the joints. "They don’t feel guilt. Or remorse. Or shame, for that matter."

"Spike does," she told him softly. "Well – maybe not quite the way you or I might, but ... he does feel something. And he doesn’t like it much."

The blades slid back against bone with a soft shnickt; their owner turned his attention to the set on his other arm. "It’s as much as he deserves. Although, on this occasion, it really wasn’t his fault." Giles looked up at her with a suddenly pained expression on his face. "Don’t tell him I said that."

She laughed. "I won’t. You did good down there."

"No, I didn’t," he denied, polishing a particularly stubborn spot off the longest blade. "I let the lady distract me. And I should never have let that one get past me and up the ladder."

"I got him," Buffy shrugged. "Giles – even I have problems keeping track of more than five or six at once. Low light, unstable surface – and you’ve only been fighting me up until now. We never have figured how to practice multiple opponents. You did good."

He shook his head, extending his arm to flick the remaining exposed blades back beneath his skin.

"The light wasn’t a problem. I could see … everything," he sighed, finally turning to give her his full attention. "But you might be right about the numbers."

"’Course I’m right," she said confidently. "I’m the Slayer. I’m always right. About that sort of thing, anyway."

He finally found her a smile. It was a slightly haunted one, but it held genuine amusement nonetheless. "Don’t get – "

" – cocky, Buffy," she capped in chorus, laughing at his expression. "I won’t. I promise. This was a nasty one," she observed, leaning back against the crate behind her and letting the last of the adrenaline slide away. "Don’t these kids know how dangerous the world can be? What are they running away from that makes risking this worth it?"

"Too many things," he considered bleakly. "Bullies at school, bad parents, abusive situations … Drunken fathers that beat and abuse them – or their mothers, come to that. Restrictive discipline, unbearable living conditions … We deal with demons and monsters, Buffy, but not all the misery in the world is due to their influence. Well," he added, with his usual penchant for accuracy, "not directly, anyway."

"So why do they come to Sunnydale? You think the hellmouth has anything to do with it? Misery attracting misery, I mean."

"I don’t know," Giles shrugged. "Why does anyone come to Sunnydale? Putting aside the demons, the vampires, the cultists, the rogue gods – and the chosen one," he included, with a wry look in her direction. "This town doesn’t really have a lot going for it."

"Huh," she laughed, "there goes your job with the Sunnydale tourist board. But you’re right. Without the hellmouth this would be a pretty ordinary kind of place. Kinda like – oh, I don’t know. Wilton Meadows in Nevada?"

She made the reference casually, wanting to see his reaction. What she got was a look that told her she’d managed to be about as subtle as a freshly whittled stake.

"She shouldn’t be here," he said bluntly, reaching to brush coal dust off his shoulders with unnecessary force. "She wouldn’t be here, if I – " He broke off, swallowing the rest of that sentence with an angry, distraught gulp. "I – I don’t want her on my conscience, Buffy. There’s enough innocents at risk in this town as it is – without needing us to entice - a-another one to join them. She has no idea what we face here – and she’s going to get herself hurt. Or killed. Or corrupted," he concluded with a small shudder.

Buffy frowned a little worriedly. He was taking this all too personally – the fate of the runaways, the appearance of the policewoman … He never talked about the business in Nevada – hadn’t done so since their long drive home, and even then his focus had been more on the Tyrant bugs and his dealings with them. She’d wondered, once or twice, if she should broach the subject, but had never found the right moment to do so. There were too many issues tangled up in those few short days; the crime he’d been accused of and the treatment he’d received; the emotional storm he’d been forced to weather because of it - and the quiet, anguished confession he had made to her, his soul besieged by unbearable memory and his heart harrowed to the core.

"Sometimes I just don’t get you," she admitted thoughtfully. "You have so many reasons to be angry with her. Because of what she did, what she let happen. And yet, here you are, worrying about her. Worrying that because of you – because of us – she might get hurt. Or worse. You chewed her out to protect her," she realised with bemusement. "Not that she didn’t deserve it," she acknowledged, "but – no, I don’t get it. You can’t possibly like her. Not after what she did …"

"You don’t have to like someone to be concerned about their welfare," he defended quietly. "She’s a human being with a human soul. Isn’t that what we’re all about? Protecting people like her?"

He had a point – but it was a remarkably generous one, given that the dark haired policewoman had failed in her duty to protect him. Okay, so what she’d done afterwards had gone some way to make up for it, but even so …

"I’m not questioning the job description," Buffy said. "Look – I know it would have been – difficult – to make a complaint, to address what happened back there. There was too much at risk. You, me, the whole ‘let’s save the world’ setup. You’ve spent long enough drumming the need for secrecy into me over the years – and, I get it. Some of it, anyway. But what they did to you was wrong. And I can’t believe you aren’t a little resentful about it. No-one’s that noble. Not even you."

He’d been staring out into the night, his expression virtually unreadable in the dim light. The look he threw in her direction was a vaguely puzzled one. "There was too much – Buffy." His admonition was pained. "Is that why you think I let it go? Because of the risk?" He assayed a half smile, shaking his head as he did so. "No. No, it wasn’t that at all. I – " He paused to assemble his thoughts, regarding her with wary consideration. "I have never blamed any of them for what they did, " he announced quietly. "It was honest, human reaction. You and I – we face horror and death almost every day … Well," he corrected pedantically, "not every day, but y-you know what I mean. For them – what they saw, what they found – that was more than they could deal with. I won’t condemn them for that."

"But they were wrong," she protested, trying to understand why he couldn’t see that. Maybe – back then – he’d believed he deserved it. But not now. Not after the Aslewaugh. "They didn’t just slap you around a little. They practically beat you to a pulp. Probably would have done if you weren’t armoured the way you are, but ... I was so angry about that …"

"I know." His smile held a hint of warmth – and gratitude. "And then you went all Slayer and noble on me and decided we both had to endure it because that’s what the cause required." He half chuckled at the thought. "All these years, thinking you’d missed the point – and that’s when you finally get it. Well," he allowed, "maybe you were right. It would have been a risk. But that wasn’t why I ..." He shook his head again, heaving a quiet sigh. "I-I just didn’t have the heart for it, Buffy. I couldn’t see the point. What would it have achieved? Look at Deputy – Detective – Zaherne. She’s a dedicated officer, she believes in what she does. And those men – men with families to support, careers on the line. They were under stress and trying to cope with something that – that they just weren’t prepared for. If I’d complained – I could have ruined them. Got them disciplined, even got them dismissed. And for what? A little personal satisfaction and some meaningless compensation? Where’s the justice in that?"

Buffy stared at him, considering his words and trying to fathom what lay behind them. She knew what he’d gone through – was still going through, every day, every moment. It was never going to be easy learning to live with the Incandescent’s legacy. She’d have understood if he’d wanted to let the matter drop simply because he had other issues to deal with. But while his words might support that interpretation, wrapping it in considered excuses, the tone of his voice - the way he’d said what he’d said - suggested otherwise. This was a fight he’d chosen to walk away from; not because he lacked the strength or the will to see it through, but because he’d considered the consequences and found them morally unacceptable. There was a breathtaking generosity in that choice; a magnanimity of soul worthy of the angel who’d fought beside her to save him.

"You know, Giles," she observed with a smile. "Sometimes you’re just … too nice a guy."

He threw her a startled look – which turned into a affectionate frown; one of those ‘really, Buffy’ looks that managed to acknowledge, appreciate and deny the compliment all at once. "I seriously doubt that," he muttered, sounding vaguely embarrassed at the idea. "Besides, you’re right. Nobody’s that noble. I am angry a-about what they did. But not angry enough to ruin lives because of it. It all worked out in the end. At least," he sighed. "I thought it did."

"Hey," Buffy said, "you and I might be the reason she knows about what goes on in Sunnydale – but she was the one who chose to come here. You’re not responsible for that. Give her a chance, Giles. You never know – you might actually get to like her."

He shook out the borrowed handkerchief, scattering a flurry of coal dust across the deck. "We’ll see," he decided dryly. "She’ll be lucky if she lasts that long …" 

 "I took the missing children back to the precinct – and told JG exactly what had happened. Leaving out names and faces, of course. I didn’t want to put Buffy – or Rupert at risk. They had just saved my life. He just grunted, told me I must have a touch of concussion, said he’d take care of things and sent me home. I don’t think he really believed me, but, as I said, you never know with JG."

Sky paused to sip her coffee, her expression briefly creased with thought as she considered her Captain and his approach to policing Sunnydale. "I had to make a report about my missing gun, of course, but apart from that my first real case in the SPD was closed almost before I’d had a chance to open it. ‘Sign it off, move on’ I was told. Happens a lot in our division. I didn’t really mind. After all, the girls had been found, and I’d made contact with the Slayer.

"I almost wished I hadn’t."

Her husband threw her a knowing smile.

"I’m rather glad you did," he noted warmly. "Although I’m afraid I didn’t think so at the time. We had rather a lot on our hands: Buffy being plagued by that dreadful trio with their ambitions to be ‘supervillains’; all that business with the missing runaways; Willow getting ambitious with her magic, despite my telling her she was moving too fast to be in control. And then there was Xander and Anya’s wedding to plan." He grimaced tellingly. "Now, that was a nightmare."

Cordelia frowned. "They sent me an invitation to that," she said. "Then Xander wrote to say it was all over and to tear the invitation up. He never said why."

"He wouldn’t have done." Giles’ observation was arch. "It was really just an unfortunate combination of circumstances – but, once the damage was done …"

"Hey," Sky interrupted with a grin, "that came later. And it won’t make much sense without the rest of it. It might not even have happened if you or Buffy - or Will had realised what was going on soon enough. But you were all a little distracted. Partly by me," she added ruefully.

Lorne grinned. "Well, like that’s a surprise," he noted dryly, then frowned. "No – wait a minute. I can see the Witch and the Watcher getting distracted, but not the Slayer. Unless she’s started swinging both ways, of course. Well?" he defended, at the looks his colleagues were giving him. "The lady’s got some extremely distracting qualities. We were all thinking it. One of us had to say it."

"No we didn’t," Angel muttered discomfitedly. Fred had just got there; her frown became an oh of comprehension – and then she blushed a little and didn’t quite know where to look.

Sky laughed. "That’s very complimentary," she said, not at all put out. "But that wasn’t why I was being distractive. Was it?" she asked, with sudden suspicion. Her husband gave the question a moments thought.

"Only a - little," he decided matter-of-factly. "Then. I - I can’t speak for Willow, of course," he went on, "but I suspect she had other things on her mind. And … as far as I know," he concluded warily, giving Lorne a slightly worried look, "Buffy does not ‘swing both ways.’"

"I should hope not," Angel agreed, looking just as worried for a moment or two. He shook the thought from his head and smiled apologetically at Sky. "Please – go on. I suppose you went to look Buffy up the next day?"

"Not the next day, no," she admitted, thinking back to the events she was describing. "Or the day after that, for that matter. It took me three days to find the courage to seek the Scoobies out. I’d been very shaken by what I’d seen."

"Well," Wesley allowed, "if the only vampire you’d seen before was Spike …"

"Wasn’t the vampires." Sky shook her head. "Not entirely, anyway. You have to understand: nearly a month before I’d stood by and watched while three grown men took out some very aggressive feelings on what I’d thought to be a helpless prisoner – and that night, I’d seen that same man unsheathe razor sharp steel and fight off nearly a dozen snarling creatures, each twice the strength of any of those officers. Those weird rumours about West County were making a lot more sense – and I kept getting cold shivers, thinking about what he could have done had he decided to resist the arrest …

"I didn’t know him then, you see. I didn’t know him at all. And I couldn’t quite reconcile the quietly haunted man I’d driven back from jail that day with the furious demon that I’d seen in action down in that hold."

"You weren’t the only one …" Giles muttered, half under his breath. Wesley caught the remark and threw him a sympathetic look.

"I seriously considered taking his advice," Sky went on, giving her husband’s hand an equally sympathetic squeeze. "I even started repacking a couple of my boxes – which was when I found myself staring at my father’s books. He was a very wise man, my father. He’d always taught me that I only knew what I knew, and that expanding that knowledge was always worth taking risks for. That I had to believe in what I believed in – and that the best way to deal with my fears was to confront them. That’s when I realised that I couldn’t turn back; that all the reasons which had brought me to Sunnydale were also the reasons why I had to stay.

"It was also the point when I remembered about the books Rupert had had in the back of his pickup. Old books, like my father’s. Hand written things with leather bindings and odd symbols inscribed on the spines. I had no idea what they were. I’d just put all that stuff together in a box after Max died, and hadn’t had the heart to throw them out. He’d always said they were the second most precious thing in his life – after me, that was.

"I had no use for them. I couldn’t even read them. But it occurred to me that – maybe – if I turned up with some kind of peace offering, Buffy and her Watcher might be prepared to give me more than just the time of day …"

 Long Sea Crossing-Chapter Three. Part A-Two. Disclaimer:This story has been written for love rather than profit and is not intended to violate any copyrights held by anyone - Universal, Pacific Rennaisance, or any other holders of Hercules: The Legendary Journeys or Buffy the Vampire slayer trademarks or copyrights.
© 2005. Written by Pythia. Reproduced by Penelope Hill