When Buffy awoke later, she tried to put a hand to her aching head, but she was still strapped to the bed. She groaned. There must have been something else in her medicine besides whatever that anti-Slayer stuff was. Until she figured out what was going on, she had better play along. Dawn had warned her about "Dr. Giles" before, maybe she could find out other useful information from her sister.
"So you're finally up, Sleeping Beauty." Right on cue, Dawn's voice interrupted her thoughts. "It's dinnertime and the orderlies are gonna be coming to take you to the cafeteria. Remember, it's Mexican night, so be careful not to eat too much, you know they don't like patients having to run to the bathroom in the middle of a meal cause they ate something they shouldn't have."
Buffy turned her head to look at her sister. "So how long have you been here?"
"A year. My parents found my stash of stolen goods after I got caught stealing a leather jacket at the mall. Like I haven't told you all of this before."
As soon as Dawn finished her sentence, the orderlies came to unstrap Buffy just as her sister said they would. They looked familiar to the Slayer but she couldn't quite place them. She decided not antagonizing them would be good, so she'd play nice.
"Thank you for taking me to dinner." she said to them as they led her out the door. She meant it too, since she didn't know how to get to the cafeteria, and she needed to know more about the layout of this place, but they ignored her. Dawn followed them out, and as they all walked down the various halls, Buffy noticed that the other patients avoided looking at them. When they got to the cafeteria, she wasn't sure whether or not it was a good thing that there were so many other patients. The orderlies led her to an unoccupied section of a table and sat her down, then walked off to the serving line. Once they left Dawn sat down across from her.
"Aren't we supposed to get our own food?" Buffy asked.
"Yeah right like they'd let any of us crazies handle food except to eat it. I can't believe you don't remember the rules. You must be amnesiac as well as schizo. At least I'm just a klepto."
The orderlies returned with food and gave Dawn and Buffy their own tray complete with plastic utensils. The orderlies stood watch over them and Dawn looked down at her food, not saying anything more. Buffy did the same, until she heard a commotion coming from the entrance. She looked up and saw…Spike? He was wearing a facemask a la Hannibal Lecter. And he was also giving the orderlies trying to get him to a table a lot of trouble. The orderlies standing guard over her and Dawn left to go help since Spike was now trying to make a break for it.
"Who's that?" she asked Dawn.
"Again with the questions to things you should already know."
"I'm Question Girl." Buffy shrugged her shoulders.
Dawn sighed. "That's Randy Williams. He has some sort of disease that makes him allergic to sunlight, and so he decided he was a vampire and developed a serious biting problem. Only thing they can get him to eat is a tomato/beet juice combo made to look like blood that's stuffed with all the important vitamins and minerals a body needs."
"Who is this 'they' you keep mentioning?"
Dawn stiffened up at the question and looked around to make sure no one was close enough to overhear. "You know, them. The people in charge. Just took over the place. Heard Dr. Giles is gonna be talking the new owner tonight, should be meeting right about now." she whispered.
Giles got to the receptionist's desk of his new boss with only two minutes before the scheduled meeting.
"Dr. Giles here to see…"
"Yes, he's expecting you. Go right in." the receptionist said.
"Thank you, Miss…"
"Maclay. Tara Maclay."
"Thank you, Miss Maclay." Giles said as he headed for the door to his boss' office. He opened it into a stately office, not too posh, but definitely elegant. There stood his new boss, sitting in his chair facing the window. He saw smoke drift up from the chair. He cleared his throat to announce his presence.
"I'm Dr. Giles. I was told you wanted to see me, Mr…"
His boss turned around in his chair and put his pipe down on his desk. "Ah yes, Dr. Giles. Please call me Quentin. Mr. Travers is too formal for the close business acquaintances I hope we'll become." He gestured to the chair in front of his desk. "Please, sit down. Now tell me about what happened today with this Summers girl you've been treating..."
