Romantic Interference

DISCLAIMER: I don't own BTVS or Rifts Atlantis from where I got the tattoo ideas.

Author's note: This idea came to me one night and was still around in the morning so I decided to write it. This is set after the last episode of the TV series but I haven't read any of the comics that followed the seventh season so this won't have any of that canon. Dawn here is about nineteen and a student at Oxford University in Great Britain.

Chapter 1

"Xander!" Buffy shouted. "Dawn's been kidnapped!"

"Well it is a Tuesday," Xander said as he put down his woodworking tools and grabbed a stake and an ax. "It's been a few years though."

"Never mind the nostalgia!" she said. "Come on! Willow is scrying her location so we can gate right to her."

"Good," he replied. "I'm ready. Lead the way."

Soon they appeared in a large room where Dawn was tucking her shirt into her pants looking more annoyed than anything else.

"Dawn!" Buffy shouted. "Are you alright!"

"Yes, Buffy," Dawn said. "I'm going to need Willow to redo the wards on my room but other than add a little body art he didn't do anything to me."

"He broke my wards?" Willow asked wide-eyed. "They weren't the strongest I could make but they were as strong as they could be without glowing and being obvious even to those without magic. Maybe we can hide them behind paintings or something."

"Maybe you should just stay home and take online courses," Buffy said.

"I've been kidnapped from home more than from Oxford," Dawn said.

"That was in Sunnydale," Buffy said. "It's much safer here."

"You just don't want me away from home," Dawn said. "Worried I'll make friends or something weird like that?"

"No," Buffy said. "I want to keep you safe from shifty men."

Dawn snorted, "You're the one with that problem."

"What do you mean!" Buffy shouted.

Dawn started ticking off on her fingers, "Vampire, vampire, TA in your class that was actually part of a secret government program to capture demons and make a demon cyborg, an immortal thief who stole from you before leaving you, a half-demon sorcerer that you swore was trying to go straight and who Willow had to duel, and do I need to go on?"

"You ladies can continue this at home," Xander said. "Willow has the portal home already open."

Buffy stomped through the portal and the rest followed.

Once they were all on the other side Buffy started to loudly defend her choice of boyfriends. Five minutes of ranting later she noticed the others had left the room. Scowling she stomped off the infirmary where the sight of Dawn with her shirt off and bra showing made her shout, "Dawn! What are doing?"

"I'm showing them the tattoos the sorcerer left on me," Dawn replied. "Or at least the first two. He said he was paid to give me magical tattoos when I woke up and asked what I was doing there. Then he vanished and I started putting my clothes on." She frowned, "I wish he'd stuck around long enough for you guys to grab him but hopefully Willow and Xander will know what these do."

"Xander?" Buffy said incredulously.

Xander sighed, "You do remember that I went through Watcher school? Well, my specialty was arcane tattoos. So yes, I have as much of a chance of figuring these out as anyone on the new council. Unless you want to call Giles in from Scotland?"

Dawn made a face, "Ew, I'm not showing these to him. It would be incredibly awkward for both of us."

Willow added, "And Xander has been studying the subject much more recently. He's the reason we can track all the new Slayers that signed up and he also came up with one that boosted their healing."

"Why didn't I get one?" Buffy asked.

"You said you didn't want me to get near you with a tattoo gun," Xander replied.

"Oh," Buffy said. Then she scowled, "You probably gave them all tramp stamps like the one that immortal bastard convinced me to get."

"Nope," Xander said. "I let them pick where I put them."

"Buffy!" Willow scolded, "You know Xander better than that. He wouldn't treat them badly."

Buffy sighed, "You're right. I'm sorry Xander. You've always been there for us." She gave Dawn a dirty look, "I know Dawn will be all flirty and probably flash you and I don't care. She's over eighteen and you are one of my best friends. If she ends up dating you she'll be showing more taste than either of us had at her age and some would say any age." She sighed, "I'm going to go out and make sure nobody surprises you in here while you're looking at whatever. Please just make sure she's safe." She headed to the door and as he left she said, "And remember I still have my shovel."

Xander laughed, "Well that went about as well as it could." Then he sobered, "Now to see what he saddled you with. Five magical tattoos would kill a normal person. They run off your innate magic. I don't have enough even for one. Most people can do one. Slayers and other magically enhanced sorts can do two generally. I still check each Slayer first though. If a mage can cast fire or lightning they should be good for at least two and there are records of council mages having up to four. Five is a new one on me and I'm betting that if you weren't the Key you'd be dead."

"Which means whoever paid him either knew or wanted you dead in a pretty unusual fashion," Willow said. "Where are they all? Maybe placement will tell us something."

"Well I can only see two," Dawn pointed to the one showing around the strap of her bra, "But I feel five sore areas just like this one and the one below my navel."

Xander said, "If you want I can go and Willow can just show me sketches of the tattoos. I don't want to make you uncomfortable."

Dawn shrugged, "I certainly don't mind you seeing any part of me. I just wish it was for a more intimate reason." Then she grinned, "And this way Willow can tell Kennedy there was a chaperon with her the whole time I was naked."

"Well let's start with the top one first," Xander said with a smile. 'Can you move your bra strap so I can see it better?"

Dawn smiled, "Sure, and let me add for your information that I am now the same cup size as Cordelia was when you were in high school." She slid both straps down and threw her shoulders back.

Xander smirked then said, "A Phoenix huh? If that's magical that's a serious beneficial spell. Can you read any magic of it, Wills?"

"Can I touch it?" Willow asked Dawn.

Dawn smirked, "Sure, you can even grope and I won't tell anyone."

Willow blushed and touched the tattoo carefully with one finger then closed her eyes, "There's a hell of a lot of magic in that."

"It's supposed to activate just before you die and heal you completely," Xander said. "It saves up mana in itself to do it because the creator figured that if you're that hurt you'll be out of juice anyway."

"So, it's a good thing?" Dawn asked. "No doom or gloom?"

"Not even a little doomy," Xander said. "You'll have less power to cast spells while it's charging but you aren't a front-line fighter anyway."

"And it's on automatic?" she asked. "I don't need to manually trigger it?"

"Right," Xander said. "It's completely automated. As long as it's fully charged it will work."

"I wonder if I have enough mana for that one," Willow said. "Later, of course, after we're done here let me know if you can duplicate that one."

"Sure," Xander said. Then turning back to Dawn he said, "The next one is on your belly button?"

She said, "If we're going from the top down there is one on my back under the band." She turned away from him and unhooked her bra, "Oh, that feels better. Well taking this thing off always feels better but it was really irritating the tattoos as well."

"Glad you're comfortable," Xander said. "You'll probably like this one as well. It's another automatic one and it should allow you to translate anything written as long as it was written in a human language and isn't itself magical." He said, "A few Watchers have that one. It's a favorite of those who have enough mana."

"Cool," Dawn said. "So maybe whoever paid the guy is some really creepy admirer rather than a demonic threat? Not saying I'd be happy with him but it's better than tattoos of doom."

Willow nodded, "Yeah, an uncomfortable HR session is preferable to an apocalypse. I just hope we can find whoever it is."

"Well we can probably find the artist mage who did them," Xander said. "And he hopefully can lead us to whoever paid him. But first, let's make sure none of these are tattoos of doom."

Dawn smirked and tossed her bra towards the far side of the room, "Definitely. And since I have carte blanche to flirt and flash while I have you here …" she trailed off and turned around. Then she jumped up onto the infirmary table. She noticed Xander's eyes following each bounce as she did that. Smiling she hopped back off, "Oh, I forgot. My jeans cover half of it. Oh darn, I will have to take them off."

"Are you trying to kill me?" Xander asked.

"No, just distract you," she replied. "And make you horny," she added with a grin.

"It's working," Willow said then blushed.

Dawn laughed then shook a finger at Willow, "I wasn't aiming it at you. You're just collateral damage. Besides you're attached right?" She opened her jeans and slowly slid them down her legs. When she was done she kicked them into a corner then jumped back onto the table and lay down, "I'm ready for you now."

Xander groaned then shook his head before examining the tattoo, "How in the world did he do five of these in great detail in ten minutes or so?"

"Time acceleration spell maybe," Willow said. She was folding Dawn's shirt and pants. "He's obviously a well trained and powerful mage." She picked the bra off the floor, "You know this is really too nice a bra to be casually dropping it." After putting it with the rest of the clothes she wandered back over to Xander, "Have you figured out what it does or has she shorted out your brains with hormones?"

Xander laughed, "It's another good one. It's not on automatic but when triggered it produces a shield that will block damn near anything for five minutes."

"How do I activate it and what happens after five minutes?" Dawn asked.

Xander grinned at her, "It's activated by hand. You have to touch it with your fingers and channel mana into it. Then it will appear on that hand."

Dawn said, "Great, so I have to stick my hand down my pants to get the protection."

He smirked at her, "In your own words, oh darn, now you'll have to wear more low rise jeans. As long as you can touch any part of it you can activate it and it will appear on that hand."

"What type of shield is it?" she asked.

"Won't know until you activate it," he replied. "Did Willow show you how to activate enchanted items? It's like the ones that need magic to start them off even when they're fully charged."

Dawn thought about that for a minute then looked over at Willow, "Aren't you going to check it out magically? Make sure it's charged and safe and everything?"

Willow frowned then turned to Xander, "I think I'm going to be really glad you're here. Witness that I'm using only one finger on her." She blushed as Dawn giggled, "I'm only using it to see if the tattoo is magical and to make sure there are no magical traps. Although if you keep laughing I might decide to let you find any traps the hard way."

Once Dawn had mostly stopped laughing Willow touched the tattoo and closed her eyes, "It's magical and I sense no traps set to go off when you activate it."

Dawn said, "I should be vertical for this part." She got off the table and made a big show of rubbing the tattoo, "Oh genie of the lamp I wish for a shield." The shield was suddenly on her arm and it was huge! "Whoa! This is heavy but I could hide all of me behind it."

"It's a Scutum," Xander said. "Roman legionaries used them and it's that it's big enough to cover all of you. Just remember that it disappears after five minutes."

"I'm timing it," Willow said. "Just to be sure. If you expected five minutes and it lasted three that would be bad."

"Thanks," Dawn said. She propped it up against a wall so it wasn't blocking what she was flashing and five minutes after it appeared it vanished.

"Five minutes exactly," Willow said. "That's a good tattoo."

"Are thinking of getting it?" Dawn asked.

"Well no," Willow said. "I have the increased healing one already and one that helps me find missing Slayers so I'm not sure if I can add any but even if I can I wouldn't pick that one. I have magical shields that cover a full globe around me so I don't need it. It's good for you though, especially on Tuesdays."

Xander said, "I almost hate to ask but where are the other two?"

Dawn grinned and got back on the table then rolled over so she was on her stomach, "Well if I were wearing a thong then you could see the next one but I'm not so you'll have pull down my little white cotton panties to see it."

Xander backed away from the table, "Oh no, you can do it yourself or ask Willow to do it."

Willow said, "Not me! I'm just here to check the magic. I'm not doing anything I'll have a hard time explaining to my girlfriend. It's bad enough already. If you want them down do it yourself or convince her to stop teasing you and do it herself."

Dawn wiggled her butt and giggled and Xander muttered to himself while Willow just watched them both. Xander broke first and taking a deep breath he gripped them on either side and pulled them down and off in a single motion.

"There," he said. "That's what you wanted right?"

She giggled, "Yep! Can you see the tattoo?"

Xander said, "Yes, I see it. It's called "the fortitude of Atlas" and gives you immunity to disease and poisons. Completely non-doomy. Are you sure you didn't arrange this yourself?"

Willow snorted, "Where would she find someone to do this?"

"I don't know but you notice she's not denying it," Xander said.

"Well yeah, she likes making us wonder," Willow replied. "That doesn't mean she did it." She turns to Dawn and makes a gesture, "For the record, did you hire someone to do this or arrange for it to be done?"

Dawn smiled, "Nope! I have no idea who did it but since it seems they were trying to help I'm not going to worry about it. I'll just concentrate on my play for Xander."

"Do you actually want to date me or just see if you can get me to ask you out?" Xander asked.

"I actually like and want to date you," Dawn replied. "And that's under a truth spell."

Xander smiled, "Oh, in that case, would you like to get dinner after we finish finding out what sort of non doomy thing your last tattoo does?"

Dawn smiled brightly, "Sure!" Then she rolled over, "The last one is right here on my inner thigh."

"You didn't need to roll over to show him that one," Willow said.

"Nope!" Dawn replied. "Can you please cancel that truth spell? Or put one on him too?"

"Oh sure," Willow said and gestured.

Xander smiled and said, "Which one was that?"

She grinned, "Guess! So what does the last tattoo do?"

"It's called 'the Favor of Aphrodite'," he said. "I doubt you need it but it boosts your charisma." He turned to Willow, "Time to check for magical traps."

"You swear you'll back me up if Kennedy somehow walks in while I'm checking?" Willow asked.

Xander raised his right hand, "I swear."

Willow walked over to Dawn, "It might be best if I checked. It might be altering your personality or something."

Dawn smirked, "Sure Willow, you can look all you like and I already offered you a free grope." When Willow was leaning over she spread her legs as wide as they would go. Then giggled at Willow's blush.

"I didn't need to see that!" Willow said.

"No, but it was fun getting that reaction from you," Dawn said.

Willow glared at her then smiled, "That extra charisma might explain a lot. Just be careful with how you use it." She touched the tattoo and soon announced, "No traps but a whole lot of magic. I guess you;re clean, so to speak." She headed for the door, "I'll just let myself out. You two should take this somewhere more private if you're staying in the building or better yet Dawn could get dressed and you could take her out on that date."

After Willow left Xander said, "So where do you want to go eat?"

Meanwhile, many years in the future, the man who kidnapped Dawn speaks to his employer, "It is done. I avoided harming anyone and only the girl I kidnapped saw me."

The Sorceress Dawn Harris nee Summers smiled and paid him, "Excellent, thank you."

He looked at the money, "Thank you for the prompt payment. I don't suppose you want to tell me why you had me do that in that way?"

She smiled, "Let's just say it was a gift, from me to me."