AN: Thank you for reading. BTVS doesn't belong to me.
Buffy woke up in a strange place for a moment not recognizing where she was until the previous night came back to her. She started to feel more tears come to her eyes as she remembered Riley telling her he was leaving. She knew she ran crying after yelling at him to go and ended up at Giles' place. She threw herself into Faith's arms and cried into the brunette's should for the third time. Seeing said slayer sleeping while she leaned on the wall like she was keeping watch, the blonde felt guilty about pulling her into the drama that was her life and even more guilty when she realized that she had left Dawn for the night.
Buffy jumped out of the bed she had slept on and tried to leave quietly without waking Faith. The blonde slayer only made it to the bedroom door before she heard a chuckle from behind her. Buffy turned and saw the trademark smirk from her brunette counterpart.
"Usually, I'm the one sneaking out of a bedroom." Faith said as she stood up.
"Sorry, I just realized that I left Dawn all night." The blonde apologized quickly as she walked from the room.
"Don't worry, L's still with her so it's not like she's unprotected." The brunette slayer tried to reassure the worried woman. "Besides, I think I'm due an explanation as to why you knocked on the door in tears and all I got was a Riley's gone."
"He… uh… he took up a job from some special ops group, that's like the Initiative, and he left me. Well, I screamed at him to go but it's over between us and I didn't think as I ran." Buffy explained as she felt tears come to her eyes again and Faith pulled her into a hug but broke apart soon after when someone cleared their throat.
"Ah… yes… well… um…Since you're here, I have something I would like to tell you and I don't think either of you will like what I'm about to stay. I'm going to London for a week to try and convince the council to help us with our Glory situation." Giles informed uncomfortably.
"I think you are wasting your time on this. The last time they tried to kill me they said that we wouldn't get any help from them." Faith advised the ex-watcher.
"I think I can make them see reason to let go of old grudges. The world is at stake and they should be more that intelligent enough to realize that Earth is more important than a redemption seeking slayer." The British man responded trying to stay positive before he looked to his slayer, who'd been silent so far.
"Just don't tell them about Dawn. I will take whatever information they can give us but I can't let them find out about Dawn. The Council isn't exactly known for their approval of anything that isn't human." Buffy agreed reluctantly.
"Of course, Buffy, I was planning to tell them about the key but I won't be telling them the whole story." Giles remarked with a smile at the approval from the blonde.
Over at the Summers' house, Dawn ran down the stairs hoping to find Buffy in the Kitchen or something after seeing her sister's room was empty. As she reached the last step, she noticed a figure on her couch still sleeping. Lilith had stayed the night to keep Dawn safe when Faith had called to tell her that Buffy wasn't going to be making it home just then. Dawn shook the sleeping soldier awake but didn't expect to be pinned and have a knife shoved to her throat with a snarling slayer on top of her. A whimper of fear escaped from the scared key and it seemed to wake Lilith from wherever she was. The clone jumped off down like she had been hit and immediately looked down at the floor in regret.
"Dawn, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean for that to happen. I'm so sorry." Lilith apologized.
"Um, it's okay. I probably shouldn't have tried to wake you up by shaking you." Dawn tried to play it off but there was still some fear in her eyes. "Um, do you know where Buffy is?"
"Yeah, Faith called last night while you were sleeping and said Buffy was going to stay there for the night." The brunette slayer explained.
"Why would she stay there?" The youngest Summers wondered.
"I didn't think to ask." Lilith shrugged. "But, I'm sure it's nothing important."
"It's not like they tell me anything anyway." Dawn scoffed.
"I thought you would be happy to have the life that Buffy can't have. You don't have to worry about fighting evil every night and wondering if it's doing any good. You can have the social life your sister wanted. I just don't see why you get so upset about not being with the Scoobies when you get to focus on having fun." The cloned slayer was confused as to the Key's complaint.
"Like you would understand, you're not excluded from anything having to do with demons." She stormed off in a huff as she ran back up stairs and as her door slammed the two chosen slayers came in, hearing the bedroom door slam they looked at the clone.
"I don't understand people." Lilith said shaking her head in confusion.
Later that day, Anya and Willow conjured a troll accidentally during a fight about who Xander agreed with more. During a fight at the Magic Box, the three slayers got the Troll's hammer from him and Buffy proceeded to let her frustrations out on him about breaking up with Riley. The troll was knocked unconscious and sent back to where it had come from while Xander and Anya made up. The next couple of days were spent fixing the damage done to the Magic Box again.
AN: Please review and tell me what you think. Thanks again for reading.