AUTHOR: Goddess Isa
EMAIL: goddessisa@aol.com
SUMMARY: Buffy and Dawn talk. I waited and waited for this scene, but did it come? No.
SPOILER: No Place Like Home
DISTRIBUTION: Sure, just email me & lmk where it's going - I like seeing my name in print =)
FEEDBACK: Please, I'd hate to have to Slay for it. =P
RATING: TV-PG
DISCLAIMER: Joss owns 'em all. I have to deal with it, you do too.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: Was anyone else grossed out that Buffy said she wanted help from Riley with the whole trance thing??? I had to leave the room. I roared when Buffy told Dawn she was doing her boyfriend though. Too bad the boyfriend in question wasn't Angel. Sigh. (This is why I love the Buffy novels. Even though they're cheesy and poorly written at times, they're all set in S3 with no Fish Boy. Me love dat, yo.)
AUTHOR'S NOTES 2: No matter what anyone else says, and no matter how much Michelle Trachtenberg bugs me, Dawn is cool. If the show gets a sixth year, she'd better be on board.
10/25/00
"Dawn?" Buffy tiptoed into her sister's room a few hours later. Dawn had said she was going to bed after their previous talk, and Buffy had gone downstairs to watch old episodes of iThree's Company/i on Nick at Nite with their mother. "You awake?"
"No," was the reply. Dawn sat up in bed and rubbed the tears off her cheeks. She took her headphones off and *NSYNC music could be faintly heard coming from them. "What do you want?"
"I wanted to talk," Buffy sat on the bed beside her "sister" and smoothed the hair out of her eyes. "I need to tell you something. It's gonna be sort of difficult to understand at first....I know it's going to confuse you because I'm used to this sort of thing and it confuses me...but I have to tell you because it's killing me, and it has to do with how I acted earlier."
"Whatever it is, why don't you put it off until morning?" Dawn reached for the headphones but Buffy intercepted them and set them on the floor.
"It can't wait. We need to talk."
Dawn sighed and crossed her arms. "So talk."
"I went to find out about that orby thing I found the other night--"
"The one Willow and Giles didn't want me to hear about?" Dawn interrupted.
"Yeah, that's it. I found this monk who'd been hurt pretty bad. I tried to help him, but it was too late."
"Buffy, that's awful," Dawn said sympathetically.
"That's not all. Before he died.....he told me things...about us."
"Did he know anything about Mom?" Dawn asked anxiously. "Why she's sick?"
"No, unfortunately he didn't. What he knew concerns you and me."
"I don't understand."
"Dawn, you're not......the reason I said those things earlier was that I did this spell/trance thing to find out what was wrong with Mom. I thought a demon had put a curse or something on her. But when I did the spell, all that happened was the pictures of the three of us--you, Mom and I--all around the house, they became just Mom and me. And when I went into your room, it looked just like a storage room for all Mom's extra paintings and stuff for the gallery."
"What are you trying to say?" Dawn demanded.
"The monk told me.......I don't really understand all of it myself...but he said that they created you....made you my sister....so I could protect you."
"I don't understand!" Dawn cried. "How can they....it's not true. It's *not*. I remember our whole lives together and they cannot just make that stuff up."
"I think they can," Buffy whispered.
"It's not fair," Dawn started to cry and leaned into Buffy's chest when she opened her arms. The girls hugged for a long time, both crying, until finally Dawn sniffled and pulled away.
"I won't believe it," she told Buffy honestly. "I won't. Not until someone can prove to me that....no. I still won't. Ever."
"It's late," Buffy stood up. "I should let you sleep. Good night."
"Buffy, wait."
She turned around. "What?"
"Will you.....I don't wanna sleep alone tonight."
"Okay." Buffy kicked her slippers off and got into bed with her "sister".
"Your feet are cold," Dawn commented. "They've always been like that."
"And your toenails have always been sharp." somehow, saying that felt wrong in Buffy's brain, but right in her heart. She couldn't explain why, but it didn't seem right that this little girl lying beside her was just a creation of some crazy monks for God knew what reason.
"I love you, Buffy," Dawn whispered before drifting off to sleep.
Buffy smiled. "Love you too."