Disclaimer: I don't own or profit from BtVS.

Thanks ever so to ObscureBookWyrm. She is so very talented. And patient. Very, very patient.

The Dawning

Chapter One

Spike leaned his elbows on the granite countertop, one hand wrapped around a warm mug of blood, the other poised over the keyboard of his laptop. He was unnaturally still as he stared at the screen. There was no expression on his face, his eyes were shadowed, and his mouth was set in an unyielding line.

His face remained unchanged as the video came to life. Buffy's tinny voice through the laptop speakers was almost obscenely loud in the dark, silent loft.

"Ohmigod. What is this? It's like tar!" The camera panned away from the beautiful mural the witches had painted on the nursery walls to Buffy, who was standing in front of the changing station he had built with his own hands. She had an expression of absolute horror as she stared down at Dawn's diaper.

Dawn. She was utterly perfect. She had tiny, perfectly formed hands and feet, chubby legs, dimpled knees, and a round little belly. She had a rosebud mouth, apple cheeks, and eyes so blue they could only be Spike's. She had a surprising abundance of dark brown curls that tousled messily around her head. Strike him dead as a poetic ponce, but she was brilliant. Utterly effulgent.

In the video she was only about three or four days old, and still a little sleepy. She yawned, her mouth making a tiny 'oh'. She rooted around a bit, finding her thumb, and patiently withstood her mother's less than practiced ministrations.

"Remember what the doctor said, Buffy. She's got to expel all the-"

"Stop. Just stop. No need to rehash that conversation. Okay. So the tabby things are on the bottom, then I lift this between her legs. Hey, this isn't so hard."

"Make it a little tighter, dear."

"But I don't want to cut off her circulation or something," Buffy pouted.

He couldn't see Joyce, but he could hear her smile when she spoke. "You're not going to cut off her circulation, but you do want to make sure the diaper stays on. You don't want it to leak."

"Eww."

Spike watched as Buffy readjusted the sticky tabs on Dawn's diaper. When Buffy was done, she beamed down at their daughter. The expression of pure joy on her face made Spike's heart seize.

"All better, baby. You're all nice and dry. Yes, you are!" Buffy leaned over and blew a raspberry on the baby's belly. Unimpressed, Dawn opened her sleepy blue eyes and yawned. Buffy giggled in response. She picked Dawn up off the changing station and carried her over to a rocking chair in the corner to sit down. When she fussed with the ties of her gown, she looked over at Joyce.

"Turn that off, Mom."

"But, Buffy."

"But nothing. No one needs to see my boobies. Turn it off when I'm feeding her."

"Oh, all right," Joyce said ungraciously.

The last thing Spike saw before the video went dark was the yellow gaze of the wolf painted on the nursery walls.

He stared at the dark screen. Dekker expected him at Eden hours ago, but over the last few days, Spike had lost interest in the club. Had lost interest in everything. After a while, he closed the laptop and stared across his loft into the bedroom area. Against the wall, next to the side of the bed where Buffy usually slept, was the crib he had ordered from the baby store.

Spike pushed off the counter, stalking over to it. His knuckles blanched white as he gripped the guardrail hard enough to make the polished wood creak. He stared down into the empty bed, decorated with the pale yellow and green bedding Joyce and Buffy had picked out. Embroidered on the blanket were lazy honeybees and pink butterflies. In the corner of the crib was a stuffed lamb that hummed "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" when you pulled its tail. It was all perfectly unused.

Rage built in his chest so intensely that it threatened to spill out of his throat in a wave of bile if he opened his mouth. A week had passed since Buffy had given birth and he had yet to hold his little girl. Had yet to even see her in the flesh.

The guardrail cracked and a wave of ferocity swept through him. With a roar of rage, he picked up the heavy piece of furniture and bashed it into the ground again and again until it broke apart in his hands. He shredded the mattress, rent the bedding, and stomped the broken frame into kindling.

When he was finished, he was heaving. Great pants of air, forced through his lungs and past his fangs. He looked around the loft. At all the things he had gathered because he thought Buffy would like them. Because that's what a man did for his family. He provided. He provided comfort and safety and, God help him, love. Things his family didn't want or need from him.

Spike swept up his leather duster and shrugged it on as he stomped to the front door. He took one last sweeping glance at the home he had made, then turned his back. He locked the door as he left, knowing he would never come back.

"Mom, I wish you'd stop taking videos of everything."

"There are people who can't be here who want to share in these moments, Buffy."

The worn-out new mother rolled her eyes. "I don't think Aunt Darlene is interested in twenty hours of Dawn eating, pooping, and sleeping."

Joyce hummed noncommittally, continuing to video Dawn sleeping in her bouncer that was sitting next to the couch. Apprehension built in Buffy's stomach when she saw her mother and watcher exchange a glance.

"Joyce, if I may."

"Of course." Joyce nodded as she walked out of the living room, fiddling with her recorder. The exchange was ambiguous enough that Buffy knew they'd planned it beforehand. Her spine tightened as she sat up straighter on the couch.

"How are you, Buffy?"

Buffy pursed her lips. Giles always started with pleasantries before he lashed a stripe off her back.

"Tired."

"I expect so."

The silence lengthened between them. Buffy shifted on the couch, watching as Giles sat with unnatural stillness, studying the toes of his brown leather loafers.

"Spike came by my flat the other day."

Buffy started. Not because Giles spoke suddenly, but at the words. The last person she expected to mention Spike was Giles. For the last week, she had listened to her mother's subtle and not so subtle insistence that she was treating Spike unfairly, but Giles was supposed to be on Buffy's side. He was supposed to sympathize with Buffy's position.

"Spying on me? Trying to wheedle information out of you about Dawn? Have you done the disinvite spell?"

"No."

"Giles! Spike's dangerous. He could hurt you if he has access to your house." Buffy's furious whisper was barely low enough to keep from waking Dawn.

"He's not going to hurt me, and you well know it, Buffy."

Buffy inhaled at Giles' sharp words. She'd been the victim of Giles' censure many times in the past, but she didn't expect it now. For once, Buffy was acting responsibly. Unlike with Angelus, she was putting her friends and family before herself. Why wasn't Giles proud of her for that?

"I know no such thing," she replied petulantly.

"Lie to yourself, but not to me."

The silence was unbearably loud in the room as they sat across from each other. In the kitchen, they could hear Joyce preparing dinner. Buffy couldn't look her Watcher in the eye, nor could she acknowledge his words. The hollow ache in her chest that had been building steadily only worsened under his glare.

"We were discussing business."

Buffy leapt at the opportunity to change the subject. "Business? His strip club?"

"Uh, no." Giles shifted uncomfortably at the mention at the less than savory aspects of Spike's business dealings. "He wanted to know if the Council would be responding to the threat of the Initiative."

"What threat? Weren't they totally overrun?"

"Yes. Their losses were high, but that doesn't mean the project itself has been shut down. That's what we need the Council for. We don't want the Initiative to be a threat in another year."

"Oh. Yeah. I guess getting half their soldiers eaten and losing their test subjects is just a minor setback."

"Yes, something like that," Giles responded drolly. "However, there's another problem." Buffy looked up sharply, waiting for Giles to continue. "There's bound to be research files on Dawn's conception. We need to get them away from the Initiative and the Council."

"No." All the air in Buffy's lungs was expelled in a gush. It was imperative that they wipe away all traces of Dawn's supernatural origins. Buffy didn't want the Initiative to come looking for her little girl again, and she couldn't even begin to imagine what the Council would do if they found out that Dawn had a vampire daddy.

"What are we going to do?"

"Willow and Tara have already hacked their system and deleted all electronic files, but Spike and I are concerned that there may be hard copies in the base somewhere. I've been in contact with the Council and they claim that the Initiative has been defunded and will be closing operations in the next few weeks."

"What does that mean?"

"At best, it means that any data will be stored in some forgotten warehouse. After all, the government is notoriously unorganized. At worse, their research will be given to another party to analyze."

"That party being the Watcher's Council?"

"Yes."

"So we need to get in there and retrieve all the hard copies."

"Easier said than done. The Pentagon has sent General Ellison to take possession of the site and facilitate shut-down procedures. The data I've been able to collect indicates that he is conscientious and detailed. Because of the breach, security is airtight. There's no way to get inside without alerting them to our presence."

Buffy stood, rubbing her sweating palms on her thighs. The denim felt prickly under her sensitive skin. "Then what are we going to do?"

"I'm not sure yet."

"We can't just wait around. We have to act now."

"I'm aware. Spike and I are formulating a plan."

"What does Spike care anyways?" She was aware that she sounded slightly hysterical, but she didn't care. She'd thought after escaping the Initiative labs that the threat to her child was gone, but it seemed to be unending.

"Besides the obvious," Giles growled.

Buffy ignored the censure. A wave of exhaustion assailed her and she sat heavily on the couch. It was all unending. The fear, the worry, the constant battling. She was never going to have peace.

"He also wanted to know when it would be safe to start looking for orphanages above ground. The underground rooms he provided for the children are crowded. Very few parents returned for their offspring."

"Which means all those kids are parentless. Orphaned by the Initiative." Buffy smoothed Dawn's unruly curls. Her baby's skull felt very small cupped in the palm of her hand.

"So it seems."

"Spike…he's still looking after them?"

"Why wouldn't he?"

Buffy shrugged.

"Spike doesn't strike me as the kind of man who abandons his responsibilities."

Buffy didn't take her eyes away from Dawn. "He's not a man," she whispered, her words barely audible. Giles didn't reply, but his disapproval was heavy in the room.

Buffy shook herself, looking back at Giles. "That's all you discussed?"

"Of course not. It barely factored. He wanted to know about you and Dawn. If you're eating well and getting enough sleep. If Dawn's healthy and gaining weight."

"A man asking about his family." Again, Buffy's words were barely audible.

This time, Giles didn't let it pass. "Quite."

The silence between them was less strained, but there was a low-level energy vibrating from Giles that made Buffy uneasy.

"Buffy. I must confess something to you."

"I'm not up for confessions, Giles." There was no strength in her voice. The last week had been exhausting for Buffy. Between the strain of giving birth and the lack of sleep afterwards, she hadn't quite returned to the level of vitality she had before the labor. Hell, since before she found out she was pregnant. Exhaustion was her constant companion. Sure, Joyce helped, but a small traitorous part of Buffy wished that Spike was there to get up in the middle of the night to bring Dawn to her bedside when she cried or to be the one to change her diaper and comfort her back to sleep at three in the morning. Just a little more sleep, she promised herself, then she'd be on her game.

"Perhaps. But you need to know this."

Buffy shrugged in agreement, keeping her eyes on her tightly clasped hands in her lap.

"When we tracked you in the Initiative laboratory, we encountered Dr. Patel, your OBGYN."

"Oh. What did that bitch have to say?"

"Quite a bit, actually. Much of it revolved around how she was going to hunt you and Dawn down. What she wanted to do to your child, and how she was going to accomplish said atrocities."

"She's insane," Buffy swallowed around the lump in her throat, remembering how it felt to have the fanatical woman pinned beneath her foot. How easy it would have been to snap her neck and walk away. But she couldn't. Heroes didn't murder humans.

"She was."

Buffy looked up, her eyes hard. Her mouth worked before she finally spit out a single word. "Spike?" Yet another mark against the vampire, but somehow she couldn't quite add it onto the mental tally she kept.

"No." Giles waited until Buffy's eyes settled fully on him. "Me," he confessed without a hint of hesitation. Buffy's eyes widened and he plunged forward. "Spike refused. He had her in his grasp while she threatened Dawn, but he couldn't do it. He said you'd never forgive him. So I did it. I took responsibility."

"That was wrong," Buffy whispered. "It's murder."

Needing a moment to gather himself, Giles took off his glasses to polish them. "In war there are casualties."

"This wasn't a war."

"Wasn't it?"

"No."

"What defines a war, Buffy?"

"Well…" she trailed off, a crease between her brows. "It's a fight between two countries."

"It would be better served to say a fight between two factions since countries engage in civil wars frequently."

"Oh. Yeah. I guess. But there weren't really two factions." The misery she had seen from inside the labs flashed through her mind. All those demons tortured for science, all those demon families destroyed by the Initiative. "I mean…like an organized army or something."

"Quite right. The demons weren't organized. But what you are really saying is that because demons aren't recognized as sentient creatures as such they have no rights, isn't that so?"

Buffy frowned. "No," she answered unsteadily. At one time she would have agreed with that sentiment, but that time had long passed. There were evil demons in the world that gave up their right to existence when they preyed on the innocent, but for the most part those poor creatures in the labs didn't deserve being the victims of the Initiative's sick experiments. "They weren't a faction. They weren't an opposing military force." Horror dawned on her as she said the words. "For the most part they were innocent."

"Quite right. It wasn't a war. It was genocide. A superior force decimated an entire species as if they had the right. The demon community, and mark my words, Buffy, they are a community, had no legal recourse to fall back upon, no military to protect them, no hero to champion them."

"They had Spike," she whispered.

"Yes."

She inhaled deeply through her nose. When she looked at her Watcher, only honesty shone in her eyes. "If what the Initiative did is wrong, then am I wrong to be the Slayer?"

Giles slumped, looking a wearied. "It's a moral quandary, isn't it? Is it wrong to torture a sentient being? Most definitely. Is it wrong to hunt down evil and destroy it? I think not. You're a champion, Buffy. It's who and what you are."

"Yes. But I realized something down there in those labs, Giles."

"What's that?"

"My protection shouldn't be limited to only humans. If I'm to be the Slayer. A True Slayer. Then I need to be balanced to keep the balance."

"What does that mean?"

"It means that I'm no longer on the 'just for humans' champion payroll. For now on, I protect all benign creatures. Human or demon. They should all be able to come to me for help, and I won't judge creatures by their race any longer."

"Yes. That….that sounds wonderfully ambitious."

She flashed him a small smile. "I need you to help me. I need to learn more about demons than I ever have before. Not just how to kill them, but what makes them tick. Their customs, their practices. I need to know which ones need my protection and which ones I need to slay."

"I have a great deal of books on demon types."

"No Council books. I don't trust them. They've been telling Slayers for years that all demons are bad. I'm starting to suspect that it's more than just a lie to keep their Slayers safe."

"How so?"

"I think Slayers were always meant to keep the balance, but the Council perverted our calling. I think they took over Slayers as a tool for their own purposes, instead of allowing us to fulfill our purpose of maintaining the balance for all creatures."

Giles sat back. "I hadn't thought of it. I'll see what I can find."

She nodded, and Giles' face clouded. "Buffy, we need to talk about Dr. Patel."

She held up her hand to ward him off. "I don't know how I feel right now. I'm starting to understand my place in the universe, but it goes against everything I am to kill humans, even evil ones. I don't know if I'll ever be able to do my duty if it comes to that. And I don't know how I feel about you doing it."

"And Spike?" he asked softly.

"Spike did more than kill a human who pointed a gun at Dawn and me. He ran off and committed a slaughter."

"Did he confess to that?"

"He said as much. That chip is out…and now…"

"Buffy, if it's any consolation, I truly don't believe that Spike would feed again."

She was silent for a long moment, studying her blanched knuckles. "I'm not sure if I believe he will either."

Giles sat back with a huff. "I don't understand. Why are you keeping him away?"

"It's hard to explain. For the last months I pushed away the knowledge he's a killer. I just ignored it. Denied it to myself." Buffy looked off into the distance, seemingly lost in herself.

"But when he killed that boy in the woods," Giles prodded.

Buffy nodded. "It was just so in my face, you know. Giles…he's killed a lot of people."

"Yes, but-"

"Buffy!" Joyce shrieked from the kitchen. Giles and Buffy jumped to their feet, rushing into the other room.

Joyce was standing by the open door, staring out into the back yard. Buffy shoved her aside and peered out. At first all she could see were shadows, but as the moonlight filtered in from the canopy of leaves, she began to make out forms.

Two dozen vampires were arrayed in her backyard.

Buffy took a step back, shocked not at the amount of vampires, but at their position of reverence as they knelt in the dirt before her.

"What the hell." Buffy was more than a little confused.

One vampire separated from the rest. He was a giant, well over six and a half feet tall, with skin so black it seemed to absorb the moonlight. His braided black hair and beard fell to his waist, and she could see glints of amber beads and coils of bronze and copper woven into the plaits. Buffy was still inside the doorway, but she fell back into a fighting stance automatically. The demon was the embodiment of intimidation.

He stopped just inside the square of yellow light that spilled out the door into the back yard. With the light now illuminating his face, Buffy could see that on either side of his wide, squat nose were black dots tattooed across his cheeks and on his forehead there was an engraved burn scar that could only be caused by a holy symbol. Except this holy symbol had no basis in Christianity. It was the sun cresting the horizon, stylized sunrays beaming off the half circle. It was a very simple depiction of the dawn.

The giant knelt in the square of light, his eyes respectfully averted toward the ground. "Ama-gi, we have come to pay our respects to you and The Miraculous One."

"Good Lord," Giles muttered from behind her, but all Buffy could do was stare. She remembered the strange occurrence a few weeks ago of the gangly vampire who'd staked his own sire to protect Dawn. At the time there'd been a weirdly religious vibe to the whole event that she'd shaken off, but now, staring at the collection of reverent vampires in her back yard, Buffy realized there was more to it than she'd originally thought.

Sensing that Buffy was at a loss for words, Giles stepped forward. "Are you referring to Buffy's child?"

"Yes," the vampire nodded, his eyes still averted. "The child of the Slayer and the Slayer of Slayers. She is to be our Dawning."

Giles swallowed, racking his brain for any hint that he'd ever heard the term Miraculous One or Dawning while he had frantically searched for answers to Buffy's mysterious pregnancy. "Are you saying she's prophesied?"

The vampire shook his head slowly, looking up at Giles for the first time. "That is beyond my knowledge, but we don't have to be aware of her destiny to know she's important."

A bubble of anger built beneath Buffy's breastbone. She pushed past Giles to glare at the behemoth. "You don't know anything!" There was no way that she was going to allow her daughter to become a prophecy girl like her. Dawn was going to have a wonderful, destiny-free life, unlike her mother.

The vampire rose to his feet, and Buffy took an unconscious step back. The vampire was stoically calm as he spoke in a deep, melodious voice.

"I've seen over five millennia, Ama-gi. In all that time, never has there been such a child as The Miraculous One."

"Five millennia," Giles said faintly. "I had no idea there were any vampires that old."

The vampire ignored him, continuing to address Buffy. "We are here to pay our respects and offer our services."

Taken aback, Buffy gaped. "Services?"

"We have all sworn to protect The Miraculous One with our unworthy lives. She is our Dawning. She is destined for greatness."

"Oh, no!" Buffy spat, her cheeks flushed with fury. She advanced on the vampire, stake at the ready. "No way am I letting you freaks anywhere near my daughter. I'm the Slayer and if any of you think you can take her for your own evil, perverted agenda, you'd better think again."

The vampire looked at the point of the stake pressed firmly above his heart, then back into Buffy's eyes.

"I know not what The Miraculous One's purpose is. She may be destined for evil or for good. It makes no matter to us."

"Right, the evil, bloodsucking vampires don't care if the Miraculous One is destined to wipe them from the face of the Earth."

A mountain of muscle rippled as he shrugged. "All that matters is that she succeeds in her destiny. We are pledged to see her through. To protect her at all costs. Even at the cost of our existence."

As Buffy stared up at the vampire, she had no idea what to think. All she had to do was shove, and he would be fertilizer for her mother's azaleas, but there was a small nagging doubt deep inside her. From inside the house she could hear Dawn start to wail and the soft sounds of her mother shushing her.

There had never been a satisfactory explanation as to why Dawn existed. She was a biological impossibility, but a factual reality, yet no one knew how or why.

Why was Dawn here, and what if she was in danger? If she did have a destiny, was having a battalion of vampire bodyguards part of it?

She looked at the other vampires. They had risen to their feet, watching her interaction with their leader with great curiosity, but they stood far enough away to be unthreatening. From where she stood she could see the same rising sun glyph on their foreheads.

"What's your name?" Buffy demanded.

"Gilgamesh."

Behind her, Giles choked. "The Gilgamesh?"

The man bowed his head regally. The exchange was lost on Buffy.

"Whatever, Gilly. I don't give a hoot."

"Buffy." Giles sounded appalled. "You don't address a-"

"A vampire. That's all he is, Giles. And I don't trust him." She reaffirmed her gaze on Gilgamesh. "I don't trust you or your little battalion of butt monkeys. You understand me?"

"Nor should you, Ama-gi."

"Don't call me that. Whatever it is."

"How will it please you to be addressed?"

"Slayer. Just Slayer."

"But you aren't 'just' Slayer. You are as miraculous as your child."

Something warmed inside her, but she pushed it away. She took a step back, removing her stake from his chest, but not lowering her guard. "I'm going to let you go for now. But I'm watching you."

Gilgamesh pressed his hands together and bowed deeply. "We will not fail you or The Miraculous One."

"Buffy?" Joyce appeared in the doorway and the vampire collective fell to their knees as one. The action was so startling that Buffy jumped back a few feet. She watched as the vampires leaned forward, pressing their foreheads into the dirt.

Buffy looked back at her mother, who stood framed in a halo of golden light. In her arms she held Dawn, who looked over the contingent of vampires with a bearing as regal as any queen.

Then the week-old infant giggled.