Chapter 50: Exile
Year 1
Buffy, Giles, Willow, Dawn, Anakin, Padme and Faith stepped out of the portal in to the New Watcher's Council to find Xander waiting. He immediately grabbed Buffy and Dawn, each, in a bear hug. "Welcome home." He then noticed Anakin and Padme. "Who are they?"
Dawn smiled. "Let me introduce you to my brother and his wife. Anakin and Padme Skywalker."
"And let me introduce you to my sister and her husband. Padme and Anakin Skywalker," Buffy said as she and Dawn laughed.
"What?" Xander asked.
"I was adopted into Padme's family," Buffy said.
"And I was adopted into Anakin's family," Dawn said. "And of course Anakin and Padme got married making our family a complicated one."
"I'd say," Xander said.
0 – 0 – 0 – 0 – 0
Buffy, Dawn, Padme and Anakin sat on one side of the conference table while Giles, Faith, Willow and Xander sat on the other.
"Well let's see. Faith had a run in with a group of bad guys, mortal," Willow said. "I delved into dark magicks after Tara was killed and almost destroyed the world."
Buffy looked across the conference table at Willow, "Oh I'm sorry Will."
Willow smiled, "Its ok, Buffy. It's been two years now. I miss her, but it's not as bad as it was. And when I say bad, its an understatement. I was evil, pure and simple."
Giles nodded. "Xander actually talked Willow down. She returned with me to England to learn from the Coven. After her return to Sunnydale. The First Evil started some trouble, killed a lot of potentials, and blew up the old Watcher's Council." He then motioned toward a wall on which hung a red and silver scythe. "Then Faith found that Scythe. Willow used it to activate all the Potentials as Slayers. With this mystical amulet Angel gave Faith who gave it to Spike. They managed to close the Hellmouth. Now Sunnydale is nothing more than a crater."
Buffy blinked. "Dang you guys did a lot in our absence. Ok since were telling stories. Dawn and I found ourselves in that other dimension. We were enslaved almost immediately. I for about a year. Dawn for closer to two. About six months after our arrival Dawn was taken to Tatooine where she was adopted into Anakin's family. Six months later I was rescued by Ruwee Naberrie who would become my father when he adopted me into his family. We were reunited on Tatooine a year and a half after Dawn was taken from me. Through the help of Obi-Wan and his master Qui-Gon Jinn. We were able to free both Anakin and Dawn from slavery. We were taken to Coruscant where we were tested by the Jedi Council."
"Jedi?" Giles asked. "What are they?"
"The Jedi are protectors of the peace," Anakin said. "We are much like your Slayers. Or that's how Buffy more or less explained it to me."
"Dawn, Anakin and I were eventually accepted to be trained as Jedi and we spent the next ten years doing just that. Then war broke out. The short version of that was it was a war between good and evil and evil won. Palpatine when I first met him was a senator. He maneuvered himself into being elected Chancellor and then staged the war in a bid to wipe out the Jedi and to set him up as ruler for life."
"The Republic," Padme said. "No longer exists. It is now an Empire."
"During that time Dawn and I started receiving visitations from our ancestor, Revan. It was he who allowed us to say goodbye to Giles and Willow. Dawn and I don't know his true name, but we know were descended from him and his wife Charissa Hanas," Buffy said.
"Charissa Hanas?" Giles inquired.
"Yes," Buffy said. "Does that name ring a bell?"
"I would have to check the histories to be sure. But I believe there was a Watcher by that name," Giles said. "About eight hundred years ago."
"That would be around the time Revan came to Earth," Dawn said.
"It might explain why you were not discovered till after you were called Buffy," Giles said. "Never before has a Watcher family had a Slayer in it."
Buffy nodded as she remembered what Yoda had said just days before. "Strong the Force runs, in the Skywalker line. Both blood and adopted lines."
"The Force is strong in my family," Buffy said as she looked at Dawn. "Gave me the gift that would set me on my path."
"Gave you two gifts," Dawn said.
"Right you are, Dawn," Buffy said as she smiled at her baby sister. "First I was called. And then I was given a sister. Of course of the two gifts that I am proud to have had." She looked pointedly at Dawn who returned her smile. "We seem to have gotten off track. Revan explain to Dawn and I that Earth is actually not supposed to be in this dimension. It was shifted here by Revan. He created the Key and in using the Key he shifted Earth into a pocket dimension. One in which time moved slower. He did this so Dawn and I would be born at just the right time. And he told us that this dimension is unstable that it will fade away and Earth will revert back in four years time. Just before it does Dawn, Anakin and I will use a portal to return."
During the entire time everyone was relaying what had happened to each other. Giles had kept looking at Buffy and Dawn, in particular the lightsabers that hung at their hips. "Buffy," Giles said, "what are those things at yours and Dawn's hip."
Buffy and Dawn looked down at their lightsabers as Buffy uncliped hers from her belt. "This is a lightsaber. It is the weapon of a Jedi," she said.
"May I?" Giles asked indicating Buffy's lightsaber.
"Of course." Buffy said and handed it to him. "The top switch on the controls activates it."
Giles stood as he activated the lightsaber and a silver blade of light sprang forth. "Interesting. Is it created by magic?"
Dawn shook her head. "No. It is created by technology far more advanced than what we have here on Earth."
"How is the beam of light created?" Giles asked.
"High levels of energy are created by a diatum power cell and sent through focusing lenses that convert it to plasma and then the plasma is projected through a set of lightsaber crystals." Dawn said. "Once focused by the crystals, the plasma is sent through a series of field energizers and modulation circuitry within the emitter matrix that further focuses it, making it into a coherent beam of energy that is projected from the blade emitter."
"And the color?" Giles asked.
"The lightsaber crystals regulate the color of the blade. Mine is the only one to ever be silver in color." Buffy said as Giles deactivated the lightsaber and handed it back to her. "I get the feeling there was a specific reason you wanted to see it."
Giles nodded. "Yes. Though I'm not certain but I think I've seen that before in the archive catalogues. I'll have to search through them but the council is a mess after the explosion, even if I find the catalogue I wouldn't know if it has survived if it's what I think it is."
A week later
Buffy stepped off a plane in Los Angeles. Willow had told her that Angel had been made mortal. And she had known in that instance of Willow telling her what Revan's cryptic message had been about. He had been talking about Angel.
She spotted Angel waiting and smiled as she entered the airport.
Angel walked over to her and nodded, "Hello beloved."
Buffy smiled as she could feel his heartbeat, "Willow told me you had been made mortal. But she didn't explain how."
"There was this prophecy about a vampire with a soul becoming human," Angel said. "I fulfilled that little prophecy and am now, human. I of course still have my vampire abilities, but I'm alive now."
Buffy smiled. "That's great Angel," she said as they walked out of the airport to a waiting car.
That night Angel took Buffy to a restaurant where they had a nice quiet candlelit dinner. "Buffy I never gave up on you coming back. Now that I am human there is something I want to do. If you will have me that is." He got out of his chair and down on one knee as he produced a ring from his pocket and held it out to her. "Will you marry me?"
Buffy smiled and nodded, "Yes!"
At that same moment in England
"Faith, you didn't have to come patrol with me." Dawn said.
Faith smiled. "I wanted to see if you're as good as your ole sis and that brother of yours with that lightsaber thing. Besides I just wanted to talk with you."
"About?" Dawn asked as she looked at the senior Slayer.
"About you. B gave a lot of her story but yours was vagued up towards the end." Faith said.
Dawn let out a sigh. She knew someone was likely to notice that. "As you know when you, Giles and Willow found us. I was pregnant. I was engaged to be married to Jacen. He was my world for a while. I fell in love with him. Attachments are or were forbidden by the Jedi Order. The only reason Buffy and I were allowed our attachment was because of this Force Bond we share. While I always had an attachment with Anakin, I was never allowed to show it. Of course that didn't stop me or Buffy."
"Sounds like the old Watcher's Council. Giles told me that most potentials were taken from their families and taught that attachments are bad," Faith said. "Makes me glad that B and I weren't put through that."
"Yeah so am I," Dawn said. "The monks might have sent me to you if Buffy hadn't had her attachments. Anyways as I said I fell in love. I was all set to live the rest of my life with him, to turn in my resignation from the Jedi order. Just so that I could be with Jacen."
"How did B feel about this?" Faith asked.
"She was happy for me. While she never said it. I am sure she would have resigned from the Order also if not for the fact her experience was needed to help end the war." Dawn said. "Anyways when Obi-Wan and Anakin came to rescue us. I was telling them about Jacen when we came upon his body. I …"
Faith nodded in understanding.
"Anyways," Dawn continued, "I left with Buffy, Anakin and Obi-Wan. As you know several months later I gave birth to my daughter. To Aurora. And for a brief moment it was like I had Jacen again. Then Buffy said I had to leave Aurora behind. And my heart broke all over again."
Faith looked at Dawn with sympathy as she had gone through more than anyone should ever have to, herself and Buffy included. Her Slayer senses told her there was something else that had not been mentioned. Something about someone named Shmi. "Dawn, who is Shmi?"
Dawn blinked and looked at Faith. She was sure neither herself nor Buffy had mentioned Shmi's name in their story. She wondered how Faith knew. And then she felt it in the Force, that the Force flowed through Faith. "My adopted mother. When I was a slave on Tatooine after Watto bought me from the slavers. She took me into her family. Cared for me and raised me till the day I was reunited with Buffy. I came to love her as much as I do my own mother. Ten years after Anakin and I left Tatooine, we returned. The Force was giving us visions of mom. She was in pain. We found her too late. We barely had time to say goodbye before she died. At that moment I felt such rage and hate that I along with Anakin killed every single Tusken Raider, whether they were men, women or children for what they did to our mother. They were slaughtered like animals, and I have regretted it ever since."
Faith sighed knowing how it felt to kill someone and regret it later. She still regretted the Deputy Mayor's and the professor's deaths after all this time. "I wish I could say that regret will go away. That you will feel better eventually. But it won't go away; I still regret what I did. I took someone's father and husband away and there is nothing I can do to make that right. But you can seek forgiveness, redemption and I will help you."
Dawn looked to Faith with tears in her eyes as the brunette Slayer pulled the Jedi Master into her arms and held her.
4 Months Later
In the chapel of the International Slayer's Council Dawn stood beside her sister smiling as Buffy looked into Angel's eyes. They had decided to have a simple private ceremony with only their friends and family in attendance. Behind Dawn stood Faith, who had reluctantly agreed to be Buffy's maid of honor. And behind Faith stood Willow. Beside Angel stood Wesley Wyndam-Pryce, Lorne and Connor, his son.
Dawn looked to Giles and smiled, hers and Buffy's sort of father figure had consented to Buffy's request that he would give her away. And so after months of planning they were finally standing there.
"Do you Buffy Anne Naberrie take Liam Angel Beirne to be your lawfully wedded husband in sickness and in health, for richer or poorer?"
"I do," Buffy said, love evident in her voice.
"Do you Liam Angel Beirne take Buffy Anne Summers to be your lawfully wedded wife in sickness and in health, for richer or poorer?"
"I do," Angel said.
"I now pronounce you husband and wife. You may kiss the bride."
Angel leaned in and kissed Buffy passionately.
"May I present… Mr. and Mrs. Liam Naberrie."
Angel had decided he would take Buffy's family name. While the Irish name the Powers had given him when he was made human was nice. He had hated it. And so he gladly took her name as his.
Year 2
Dawn sat meditating in her rooms at the Council when a knock came at her door. "Come," she called as the door opened and Faith walked in.
"Hey D," Faith said with a smile.
"Hey Faith." Dawn said.
Faith looked at Dawn and instantly knew something was up. In the year since Dawn and Buffy had returned, she and Dawn had become friends. How that had happened still baffled her. Especially after what she had done to the brunette Jedi when Dawn was thirteen. She remembered the day when she held Joyce and Dawn hostage. She had said some things and had regretted it ever since. She had really liked the kid as well as her mother and only held them to get at Buffy.
"Dawn, what's wrong?" Faith asked.
Dawn sighed. "It's been a year for you, me, Buffy and Ani; Aurora would be about five years old now. I've missed so much of her growing up. I just wish I could have stayed, or brought her with me."
"According to you, Buffy and even Anakin, she had a destiny to fulfill." Faith said.
Dawn nodded. "Yeah I know. While I wish I had more time with her I know Revan was right when he told Buffy and Ani she like Luke and Leia had to stay. There are only five masters left, two Padawans, and four potential Padawans. If Aurora had come with us she would not be able to fulfill her destiny. She and I must reshape the Jedi order. She can't do that if she is still an infant."
"And when you see her again she will be a beautiful young woman. Ready to see her mother and learn from her," Faith said.
"What are you saying, Faith?" Dawn asked.
"Buffy and Anakin said you have yet to take a Padawan learner. Anakin has begun training Angel since you all found that he and I were Force sensitive. Little Padme and I are the only ones who do not have a master. And we both know little Padme is still too young to be trained. So why do you think you haven't taken me as your Padawan?" Faith asked.
Dawn thought about it and then smiled. "So that I can train Aurora. Faith do you think I'm ready to train someone let alone my own daughter, to become a Jedi?"
"More than ready," Faith said. She had seen the person Dawn had become and knew that Dawn was indeed ready.
Two weeks later
Buffy held her swollen stomach as she sat at the table of the conference room with Anakin, Dawn and Willow. Not long after Buffy and Angel had returned from their honeymoon they had found out Buffy was pregnant.
"Willow," Anakin said. "Have you made any progress on the portal remote so that it can be used to return us?"
"I have," Willow said. "But I have also made a discovery. The barrier between the pocket dimension and the rest of the galaxy is as unstable as this dimension itself is. If we use the portal remote now we will cause the destruction of the barrier and Earth will revert much sooner than if we leave it alone."
"What does that mean?" Dawn asked.
"It means," Willow said. "If we use the portal remote to open a portal now. Earth will revert now instead of in another two years."
"Which means," Buffy said. "We would reappear in the galaxy at least ten to fifteen years before Luke, Aurora and Leia are of an age to be trained."
Anakin sighed. "Padme wanted to see Luke and Leia. I will tell her its not going to be possible."
"I feel for you, Ani," Dawn said. "I would like to see Aurora."
Anakin nodded and pulled his sister into an embrace, "I know, Dawn. I know."
A week later
Buffy watched Willow move through a kata. "Feel the Force flow through you. It surrounds us, binds us."
Willow stopped and looked at Buffy, "So it's more than just the magic, then?"
Buffy nodded. "Yes much more, in fact I believe that magic is another application of the Force. The Force is waiting to be felt and used. And a witch uses it in their own ways. Take for example telekinesis. I remember you used to be good with telekinesis when you first started learning witchcraft." She turned toward a filing cabinet and using the Force lifted it two feet off the ground. "With the Force size matters not. I could lift a car as easy as I am this filing cabinet."
"Master... Ack why do I have to call you that again?" Willow said.
Buffy laughed. "Because you are my Padawan Learner. Just be glad I didn't have you cut your hair in the traditional Padawan style, short hair with one long braid. Who am I kidding; you've been my best friend for years. It's kind of weird to me also to hear you call me Master. I will make you a deal. When were not with Anakin or Dawn, you can go back to Buffy, ok. But when they walk in its back to the Master business."
"Thanks Buffy. Anyways when will I be ready for the next step?" Willow replied.
"Dawn said pretty much the same thing when she was a Padawan." Buffy said with a laugh. "She always bugged Master Windu to be allowed to undergo her trials. You're not that far in your training, yet. But we don't have the time to train you the way you should be trained. Jedi training takes years to complete. We only have a little over 2 years to complete the majority of yours in. I think we can move on to lightsaber forms though."
"That's that laser sword thing isn't it?" Willow asked.
"It is," Buffy said as she picked up a practice sword and threw it to Willow. "Engarde."
They begun working on the lightsaber forms.
"Not bad Willow," Anakin's voice came from the door.
Buffy nodded. "She is a quick study."
Willow smiled. "Well it helps that I always excelled in school."
Buffy lunged with the practice sword as Willow blocked it. "Too bad we don't have lightsaber components, I would have you build one now."
"Agreed," Anakin said. "I believe that you are progressing faster than we expected. Don't you agree, Buffy?"
"Yes," Buffy said.
A month later
Angel, Padme and Dawn stood on either side of Buffy as the doctor delivered her baby. "It's a girl."
Buffy smiled and looks up at Angel. "Padme Dawn Naberrie."
"I think that is a good name, beloved," Angel said.
Dawn smiled at her niece, "Thank you, Buffy. I'm honored you would name your child after me."
"I am as well," Padme said as she gave her niece a kiss on her forehead.
Buffy smiled as she looked first at her sisters and then her husband and nodded.
On Tatooine
Ten year old Aurora Hope Skywalker stood at the rim of the Lars homestead looking at the twin suns.
Beru stepped up beside her as she looked at the horizon knowing what the girl was doing, "Looking to see if Dawn is coming, again?"
"Yes. I know you and Uncle Owen say she's gone and she's not coming back. Still I would like to see her just once." Aurora said.
Beru nodded. "I understand. Even though you never met her, you still miss her."
Aurora smiled and looked towards her aunt. "Yes, Aunt Beru."
"Why don't you go help your cousin and uncle, while I go start dinner." Beru replied.
Aurora nodded and disappeared in a flash of green. "Dawn, I wish I knew where you were so I could send you a message. Let you know how she is doing," Beru said. "And tell you about the ability she seems to have that no one else does."
