Sorry, guys. I mixed up Chapter 3 and 4 so there was the third one missing. Not it's rearranged into the right order. (sheepishsmile)
Disclaimer: see Part 1.
This part is beta's by Number5.
Thanks for review.
Chapter 4
"Fine, I'll listen," Mal said with an unhappy face and leaned back in his chair.
"However this might sound to you, the Watchers Council are the good guys," Book said and felt nervous under the suspicious glances of the persons he'd learned to call friends.
"Didn't you say, they are part of the Alliance? 'Good guys' and 'Alliance' are un-mixy things, ya know?" Mal said sceptically.
"Since the Watchers Council is many hundred years older than the Alliance - thousands of years even - this thesis is outdated. It's importance is indisputable since the occurrence of the first slayer."
He fell silent, his eyes turned to a point far away until Kaylee asked: "Slayer?"
Book got up and started walking around the table.
"On earth there was once a line of warriors. Girls, chosen by a higher power to carry the burden of responsibility. They were exceptionally strong and fast and they were the worlds only protection against all kinds of evil like that Vampire."
"Were they hot?" Jayne wanted to know and made a face when everybody stared at him. "What? They were women. I am a man. I have feelings, ya know?"
"Oh shut up, Jayne. Shepherd, go on."
"The Watchers Council did help the slayer. Offered information and trained them. There was an incident, that left the slayers weak and dying. That's all I know, I'm sorry."
"What has it got to do with my sister?"
Book sat back down and gave the doctor a sympathetic look.
"The Alliance is linked with the Council, of which I was a member, just like my father. I severed links with them when I found out, that they wanted to do experiments with human beings. But I had no idea, that it was River, you have to believe me. Getting on your ship was purely coincidence."
"You didn't answer my question," Simon stated. "You don't think they believe River to be…"
"Yes, I'm afraid they do. I think she was supposed to be their first slayer."
ooooooooooooooooo
The same suns, that had left the sky above New Athens only hours ago, now rose up on the other side of the planet. Caressing the dry ground, welcoming a new day. Birds chirping in the treetops, water glittering on the wet grass. A lonely hut stood at the bottom of a mountain range, hidden behind large pines. In the door stood a young man and shielded his eyes against the dazzling suns.
"Here we go," he murmured and stepped closer when the small transport had landed. The door opened with a hissing sound and he stood waiting in front of it.
"Spike? You in there?", he asked and stuck his head through the door. "Spike?"
"He can't answer. He's a fish," a female voice answered him.
"Oh, shut up, looney," Spike replied from the inside and started fumbling with the handcuffs. "One more word and your fish will be barbequed, got it?"
"Okaaay, so you found her," the young man concluded. With a smooth motion he pulled some loose strains back from his face.
"Of course I found her, moron. I never would have kidnapped someone that annoying on purpose if it wasn't for a damn good reason," Spike said and pushed the girl towards the exit. "Bring her in. And please, don't talk to her… oh and we will have fish for dinner."
"He's not a fish to eat," River called out, wrapped her arms even closer around the bowl and gave the the young man an angry glance. "He bites. Don't touch him."
"Okay, will do, sweety. Come on, I'll bring you in. Oh and by the way, my name is Gordon Summers." He extended his hands and pulled back when he realized that her hands were still tied. "Woah, that's awkward. Sorry." Wiping his sweaty palm on his trousers he felt terrible.
"No that's okay, I like you much more than the Vampire. He feels like sandpaper in my ear and smells like an angry puppy."
"If you say so."
'Is it worth it?' Simon wondered and guided her carefully into the hut. 'We are about to endanger a young girls life for what? We are not even sure, Buffy Summers is alive.'
His thoughts were interrupted when River Tam abruptly stopped in her tracks and stared into the far corner of the room, where another woman got up from a chair. She was short, even shorter than River. But standing in the shadows there wasn't much else River could see. The person made a careful step into the light and River discovered her to be an old woman. Her hair was kept from her haggard face by a loose bun and her eyes were nearly hidden by wrinkled skin. She was half smiling and kept herself upright by resting on a silver cane.
"Hello River, it's so good to see you again. I'm not sure you do remember me but I know you."
River tried to take a step back and was stopped by Gordon, who kept her in place.
"It's okay, River. We won't hurt you," he tried to soothe her. "She won't hurt you."
Rivers eyes filled with tears, when the old woman came nearer and memories - dark ones, painful ones and despairing ones – flooded her mind. She felt herself back with the alliance, stuck with needles and images that didn't belong. Her breath stuck in her throat and she pointed a shivering finger in the direction of the nightmarish figure.
"You," she screamed. "You filled me with dread, with broken dreams. You gave me the voices. They're calling. They keep calling. Will they ever stop? Murky gloominess... all over you. It's ... it's penetrating me. Stop it! STOP IT!" She kept repeating over and over again, sinking down on her knees but never wavering in her stare.
"I am Sorry, River. I am sorry to put you through all this pain," the woman said and made a gesture towards Gordon, who pressed a hypo spray on her upper arm. The medicine discharged with a SWUSH and River felt herself falling asleep immediately.
She hoped she would not wake up again.
Spike checked the ship one last time and then headed toward the house, a blanket carefully thrown over his body.
"Five hundred years of science fiction-y advance an no one had the idea of inventing a working sunblocker. Ridiculous!"
"Hey Summers," he said when he entered the hut. "Did it have to be such a..." He grimaced at the shabby interior. "... shabby place."
"It was supposed to be for one week tops. And I didn't know when you will arrive so I had to find something fast. We will be gone tomorrow anyway so stop whining. By the way, your ship could use some cleaners too."
"Buggers," Spike winked and concentrated on his 'hostage' who lay sleeping on a cot. "Hell, why didn't I do this? Her stupid chitchat made me go bonkers. What did you guys do with her at the academy?", he asked the old woman.
"We made her special, Spike. Especially you should know what I mean with it."
"I'm pretty sure, Buffy never talked like little Miss chatterbox. Ya sure you didn't just take her brains out and filled her with the 'Doom'n Gloom Dictionary'?" he asked and studied her sleeping features.
And again the little voice in the back of his head started to whisper.
He could hear Gordon move beside him and gave him a optimistic tap on his shoulder. He knew this young man since he was born 27 years ago. And he had known his father and his grandfather. And the father before. Right back to the year 2013 when Dawn Summers had born her first child, Nicholas William Summers.
There were times when Spike felt like some dinnerware to be given from one generation to the next. But every generation felt like a piece of Buffy and Dawn, like a family. Someone to care for. And so he had followed this path with his heart. He had lost Giles' family sometime around the flight from earth-that-was. He had not searched for them, he had his hands full with the Summer family. Until Virgina Giles had found him seven months ago.
The Giles's had stuck to the Watchers Council. They had kept it alive and working. They had supported it, followed and formed it right to the point, where some stupid member decided to take their path in another direction. Obviously their passive role wasn't enough anymore.
But the only link to their long lost power was the frozen body of the young slayer deep down in the misty cellars of their secret past.
Virgina Giles had once been a woman of priorities. She was successful and aggressive. Scruple was a word that existed in her vocabulary. But one day, she had learned to know young and delicate River Tam who turned out to be her new project. Virginias experiences as a genetic engineer made her responsible for the new development of the Watchers Council and for the recreation of the Slayer line. The first step of many into a cryptic future.
The look in the haunted eyes of the child made her thinking. In the end, she had turned away, her academic faith broken by her conscience. Searching for someone who'd help her to make things right again. For the young River girl as well as for the slayer, of who's existence she had learned when asking hesitant questions of her own works purpose.
She had followed the cold tracks of the ghost called Spike and found him far away in a distant corner of the universe. And she had asked for his help which he was willing to give after he heard the story of the sleeping slayer.
So they had planned. A family not bound by blood but past and heart and history.
"She isn't just special, Spike," Virginia whispered with a thin voice an lay her with liver spots covered hand on the girls cheek. "She is a part of Buffy and Buffy is a part of her."
TBC