Chapter 1

2014

"Bloody Tyke!" Spike bellows as he runs after the blonde three year old boy squeeling with delight at being chased.

He catches up to him right quick, sweeping him up and depositing the boy on the lounge carpet of the shared townhouse. Vamping with anger and frustration he points at the popcorn littering the floor and with an earry calm punctuates every word through his fangs.

"Pick it up. Now!"

The boy laughs.

"Is a funny face." he says pointing at Spike's bumpies.

"No, this is my scary face." Spike sighs in resignation, then straightens, "That's it, I'm fetching Slappy." As he turns to leave the boy starts to whimper.

"Jeffrey wanna pick up." he answers as he begins to pick up popcorn, one piece at a time, depositing it in the bowl he upended with a gleeful expression moments earlier while looking Spike straight in the eye as if to challenge him.

Spike slips back into his human face, then swings around as he hears a chuckle behind him.

"Some big bad you are." Buffy starts... "Conquered by a three year old."

"The whole Guardian of the peace bringer wasn't my idea." Spike grumbles as he heads to the closed up porch area for a smoke.

Buffy sighs.

"Yeah, I know... This is probably the closest I'll ever get to motherhood, and I am extremely fine with that."

Spike looks up as Buffy plops down on the seat next to him, looking tired. Then again, since Jeffrey joined the household every one has looked that tired.

A few months ago, tired of putting up with her room mates, Buffy gave notice at the apartment she shared with 2 college students, Dawn at the same time gave notice, saying she and Xander couldn't live together when they're supposed to be taking a break, Willow found herself homeless, and Giles being sixteen again, and unable to convince the banks that he really is a middle aged librarian, was battling to get to his own nest egg. This meant that they all ended up in need of a roof at the same time. and since Spike had been squating mostly at any of their places since his ship got destroyed, that included the peroxided vampire. They were lucky to find a townhouse out in the suburbs of San Francisco through a mutual police friend named Dowling. Then The Powers and their extremely unpopular representative, especially in these sircles, Whistler, brought Jeffrey into their lives. Their task is to keep him safe. His destiny. The bringer of peace for this realm.

Not exactly a job one can say no to.

"You sure they got the right boy? He looks more like the destroyer of worlds, if you ask me." Spike grumbles, lighting a cigarette, and allowing Buffy to grab one from his box. At some point Buffy went through another... rebellious phase. Having lived past her "slayer due date" and feeling stifled by her calling, after many years of warrior-Buffy, Make-the-hard-decisions-Buffy, sticking to her calling and not allowing herself any real happiness, it finally resulted in some months of binge-drinking, smoking and hard-partying after patrol, Spike as always getting dragged along, if only to make sure she gets home. Of that, the smoking-habit stayed long after.

Buffy lights her own cigarette and sighs in answer.

"Maybe it's us? Maybe we don't know how to keep him in line?" she wonders aloud.

"What more can we do? We're old-school. We do everything from time-out, punishments and hidings. Half the bloody kiddies these days don't even know what a hiding is."

"Yeah." Buffy sighs. She has never been wordy Buffy, unless an apocolypse demands a speech, and that will probably never change.

"Hey Guys." Willow says as she unlocks the gate and enters the porch area. "I had such a long day." she sighs. "Please tell me there is something for dinner."

"Made burgers." Buffy answers.

Willow smiles gratefully. When it's Buffy's turn to cook, they know it'll be something build-able and/or easy. Like toasted sandwiches, homemade Burgers, reheatable Pizza or ovenbaked fries.

"Yay. Dawnie home yet?"

"In the shower."

"So, I can go make us some coffee in the meantime, and then we can eat?"

"Sounds good."

"Jeffrey!" Willow squeels as she enters the home, holding her arms open and then catching the boy boundng into her arms.
"Five minutes." Spike says to Buffy.

"Two and a half, she had a long day and she looks tired." Buffy answers, stubbing out her cigarette, checking her Samsung Galaxy for the time.

18:25

"Are we gonna check out that lair Dowling was talking about tonight?" Buffy asks.

"Might as well, but I think if they noticed the feds hangin' around, they pro'lly off already." Spike shrugs.

"Vampire-rights groups my ass." Buffy grumbles, "You'd think after the whole new vamps can go into sunlight and eat people during the day thing they'd let up a bit about me doing my job."

"I think they might. Heard that Harrison-fellow that lead the March last week disapeared."

Buffy lifts an eyebrow.

"They probably turned their biggest fan."

"Jeeeeeeeeeeeee-frey!" Willow screams from the kitchen, Spike's vampire hearing picks up the soft thuds of Bubblegum Otees hitting the tiles.

Buffy checks her phone.

18:31

"Six minutes. You win."

Spike smirks.

The following evening Buffy drags herself into the townhouse, having had a really long day, sitting through really boring meetings.

"Seriously? Who in their right minds drags their bodyguard along to every. single. meeting? And have meetings till eight PM?!"

"I need food!" Buffy calls dramatically as she enters the home.

"Buffy!" Jeffrey squeels, and runs to her with childish excitement.

Buffy can't help but feel the swell of heat in her chest, looking into those clear blue eyes. He jumps into her waiting arms, his warm body tight against her chest, and his little arms tightly wound around her neck. She can't help but wonder if she could love him more if he were her own. And yeah, pretty soon, they'll be back to fighting to keep the house clean, but moments like these makes all the hard parts just melt away. She plants several kisses on his temple, then in his neck, making him squarm and giggle.

"No ticking! No tickling!" he gasps, as she moves from kissing his neck making playful growling sounds, to attacking his sides and armpits with her fingers, giggling along. When Spike walks in, annoucin' that some propper food is ready, she finds herself rolling around on the floor with Jeffrey.

Spike has grin on his face.

"Funny! Save me!" Jeffrey screams as Buffy allows him to escape and jump into "Funny"'s arms.

They had barely sat down to eat when their is a knock and then someone walks in.

"Whistler?" Willow asks-says, looking up.

"Got a situation with the Bringer of Peace." he announces.

"Hallo to you to." Buffy grumbles around a mouthful of spaghetti.

"Sorry, Doll. Hallo. How are you? Can we get down to bussiness now?"

"You get down to bussiness. We eat." Buffy answers.

"Okay." Whistler shrugs, pushing himself up onto the kitchen counter opposite the breakfast nook. He swings his legs like a little kid.

"Well, here is the deal. Grafanor survived as you know..." he lets the thought hang.

"Yeah, so, didn't he go through a portal to some other dimension?" Buffy shrugs.

A few months after Jeffrey were brought to them, he was kidnapped. Grafanor, a couple of thousand's of years old demon, needed the boy for yet another earth-ending ritual. They found the sword they needed to kill him, and chopped of his head with it. Or rather, young Giles did as the demon needed Buffy for the ritual and kidnapped her and Willow and Xander and Spike with some spell that works with the new seed, not knowing about the now young Watcher. Unfortunately, they found out later, once he had regenarated and dissapeared, that young Jeffrey's blood on the sword was needed to power the magic that will kill him. They also found out that if Jeffrey was cut with the same sword and Grafanor killed, he would take the boy with him. They all decided all's well that end's well.

"No, he jumped through a portal, but not to another dimension."

"Cryptic much?"

"Spit it out Wanker." Spike grumbles.

"He went back in time. In our timeline."

Willow groans.

"When?"

"Not sure, the spell will link to the time and place he is at."

"So, we need to go back there and save the present?" Willow asks.

"Something like that. The thing is, we can only send one. And that has to be Jeffrey. He is the only way to kill grafanor."

"But that'll kill him!" Buffy cries.

"You'll find a way to save him." Whistler shrugs.

"How? I had no clue..."

"Memories." Whistler interrupts with an eyeroll, as if they are being stubbornly stupid.

"I will send your current memories to your past selves."

"So we'll know the future?" Willow asks.

"No, you won't. Only the guardians will."

"Bloody hell." Spike whispers.

They spent the rest of the night tearfully spending time with Jeffrey. All the times they wanted to strangle the energetic little guy forgotton.

"I feel like I'm losing a part of myself." Buffy whimpers, as she sits on the bed. Jeffrey blissfully asleep, not used to all the extra attention. She gets in next to him, folding him in her arms.

Spike gets onto the bed as well.

"Gonna miss the little tyke too, Pet." he answers softly, brushing the hair from Jeffrey's face.

Since the townhouse has only three bed rooms, Spike just kind of ended up sharing with Buffy. No-one really discussed it, and since the first time he fell asleep there, everyone just assumed that is where he would be staying. Long after both Spike and Jeffrey had fallen asleep, Buffy lay staring at the two guys in her life.

She and Spike is in a good place. He makes no demands on her, and she curbs lusty-Buffy well. And yet, looking at the two sleeping forms, she had never felt more like she is losing her own little make-shift family. She cannot help but regret not allowing herself to love. The whole point of not being with Spike, is not being able to get hurt, not being able to lose someone she loves, but that is kind of pointless now, isn't it? She's losing her little boy. Yet, another thing the world is stealing from her.

When a noise rouses Spike it is to see Buffy's sleeping form, a lone tear dried on her cheek. Jeffrey isn't between them anymore. When he touches her face, she wakes up, drowsily feeling the warm, empty spot between them. She sniffs, and another tear starts rolling down to the pillow below. She turns away from the offending empty spot, the scoots back against Spike. As he puts his arm around her, and she burrows deeper into his body, he whispers, giving her a feather soft kiss on her ear.

"I know, Slayer, I know..."

"Um, Buffy." Buffy wakes up with a start as something soft and fluffy hits her head.

"Huh?"

"There's a kid in our room."

"Wake-up Buffy... Wake-up." little fingers poke at her shoulder.

Buffy turns around. As she looks into those blue childlike eyes, everything she dreamed comes back to her in super high definition clarity.

"Jeffrey?"

As she struggles to sit up, Jeffrey points at Willow, nodding.

"It's Wed, Buffy, it's Wed..."

"Red with an R." she corrects automatically.

"Buffy? What's going on?" Willow asks, big-eyed from her twin bed at the other end of their room as UC Sunnydale.

"Um... Maybe I can tell you on the way to my Mom's?" Buffy asks. "I think Jeffrey needs an off-campus place to stay... And... And... Giles needs to meet us there." A little disoriented, Buffy starts to get off the bed, only to be climbed like a tree.

"Monkey." she grumbles, good-naturedly, pushing him back to her lap and off his path to her shoulders and pulling the boy's face level with her as she smillingly chides.

"Jeffrey is a monkey."

"A monkey."

"Yeah, a monkey."

"Look Buffy..." he points towards Willow again, "s' Wed..."