By Sauscony
E-mail: sauscony@forty-two.co.nz
Rating: R for a couple of rude words
Pairings: Buffy/Riley, Buffy/Giles (if you don't like either, stop reading now)
Summary: A prophecy says the Slayer's daughter will save the world. But's who's to be her father? And is there someone out to change things? (Set in the summer between seasons four and five.)
Disclaimer: Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel characters are copyrighted ©20th Century Fox, Joss Whedon, Mutant Eniy, UPN and the WB, and are used without permission. No copyright infringment is intended.
After a misspent youth he tried never to talk about, years spent training with the Watchers' Council and almost four years in Sunnydale, most of that time spent living over an active Hellmouth, Rupert Giles thought he'd either read about or seen it all. Of course, that sort of assumption has about the same sort of effect on Fate as a red rag does on a bull.
He certainly never expected to have a young woman appear out of the empty air and crash to a sprawling heap on his bathroom floor, all while he was cleaning his teeth.
He had the presence of mind to spit out his mouthful of toothpaste before going to her assistance. It was only as he held out a hand that he realised he was still holding his toothbrush. Not sure what else to do, he tossed it behind him, relying totally on instinct, and was gratified to hear the sound of plastic hitting porcelain. He wiped his hand surreptitiously on his pyjama bottoms and knelt beside his fallen visitor.
She had hit the floor at an awkward angle and was only now trying to raise her head, her expression dazed and a little confused.
Hardly surprising, he reflected, recalling her arrival. Remembering his own many brushes with concussion, he asked gently, "Are you all right?"
She blinked at him a couple of times, then shook her head, as if trying to clear it. All that did was cause her to scrunch up her face in pain and bury it in her hands. Cautiously, Giles laid a hand gently on her shoulder and she looked up slowly. The confusion began to clear a little, only to return as she looked around the bathroom and finally settled her gaze back on him.
"Where the f - " She caught herself, swallowed once and tried again, her voice a little steadier than it had been on those first two words. "Where am I?" A furrow settled across her brow as she frowned. "Who are you?"
Giles decided to answer the last question first. "My name is Rupert Giles," he said calmly. "And you're in my bathroom."
For the first time, there was a flicker of amusement on her face, replacing the pain and confusion. "So I am," she agreed. "Where's you bathroom?"
"In my flat," he answered automatically and she gave him a typical teenager's look, the expression well familiar to him by now. "In Sunnydale," he elaborated.
Still no response. Well, she had just popped through some kind of interdimensional portal.
"You're on Earth," he clarified. "In a place called the United States."
If possible, the look got even more pronounced. "Well, duh! I knew that, even if your accent is kind of out of place." She looked around the bathroom again, starting to look frightened for the first time. "I meant which State? I am still in I - ?" There was a pause. "Which State are we in?" she asked more calmly.
"California," Giles supplied.
"Whoa." She looked surprised. "I can't imagine them in California." She shook her head, an action that was clearly less painful this time, and decided to have a try at standing up. Giles moved instinctively to help her and this time she let him.
On her feet at last, she smiled at him, a sudden flash of brightness in her face. "Thanks."
Finally, Giles had a chance to really take a look at his unexpected visitor. He judged her to be about eighteen, with dark hair pulled back into a braid, only the escaped tendrils around her face showing it had a tendency to curl. She was wearing jeans and a white top with spaghetti straps and an embroidered ivy pattern around the bottom edge. Somehow, she managed to look completely at home and totally out of place at the same time.
She made use of the mirror to twist a few lose strands of hair back into her plait, and now she turned back to look at him. "I don't want to appear rude or anything, Mr ... ah ... Giles, wasn't it? But why am I in your bathroom, or even your house at all? I mean, I've never even heard of you."
It was, Giles thought, a very good question.
"How about I make us both a cup of tea, and we'll see if we can come up with an answer."
"Tea?" She sounded more intrigued by that than anything else that had happened so far this morning. "I've never drunk tea. I'd like that."
Wondering what the Hellmouth had thrown at them this time, Giles led the way out of the bathroom.
With the tea brewing in the china teapot sitting on the coffee table, his visitor sitting at one end of the couch and himself at the other, Giles was beginning to feel a little more in control of the situation. Of course, the fact he'd also taken the time to dash upstairs and get dressed was probably helping. All the same, he didn't know how long the feeling was going to last - probably not very long at all going on past experience - so he was enjoying it while he could.
She looked calmer now, curious even, and he hoped that meant that between them they might be able to work out what was going on.
He started with a easy question. "What's your name?"
The girl blinked, as if she didn't know the answer. "Becca," she answered finally. "Rebecca. Rebecca, ah ..." She trailed off into silence for a moment. "Smith," she added after a second's thought. "Becca Smith."
Giles believed the Becca. He didn't buy the Smith for an instant, but he sensed this wasn't the time to push it.
"Where did you come from?" he asked instead.
"Home," she answered instantly. "Indiana."
"So you're from our dimension," Giles said thoughtfully. "Hopefully that's a point in our favour. How did you get here?"
Becca glanced around the apartment for a second. "I don't know," she said in frustration. "I don't know who you are, and I haven't got a clue why I'm here."
Giles frowned. "Tell me exactly what happened," he suggested gently, as he picked up the pot and started pouring the tea.
For an instant, an almost regretful expression crossed Rebecca's face, followed immediately by a resolved, calculating look. Giles, busy with the teacups, didn't see either. "I was happily minding my own business at home and now I'm here," she said with a shrug. "That's about it."
Giles handed her a teacup, which she took with a nod of thanks. "There must be more than that," he insisted. "Home is in Indiana, right?"
Becca nodded. "We live on a farm in Indiana."
"And how did the portal appear?" Giles persisted.
"Portal?" She looked up at him, her cup half raised to her lips. "What's a portal?"
"A portal is ... well ... ah ... " Giles took a sip of his own tea and started again. "Basically, a portal is a hole in space. You must have gone through one at your end, because you came out of one here."
"Oh." Understanding flooded her voice. "You mean the green swirly thing." She swallowed a mouthful of tea, frowned thoughtfully and then took another one. "You know, this isn't half bad."
"Thank you," Giles answered ironically. "The portal?"
Her gaze, normally sharp and piercing, went a little unfocussed as she remembered. "Well, it just sort of appeared. When I got close to it, it kind of dragged me in, and then I was face down on your bathroom floor." She looked up at him, a sudden smile on her face. "It's been a weird day all round, you know?"
Since coming to Sunnydale, Giles had a lot of weird days. He nodded. "I know."
"It was like ... like walking through jello," she said slowly. "Or maybe swimming. Oh, and it was lime," she added unexpectedly.
Giles blinked. "Lime?"
"The jello," Becca explained. "It was lime."
He couldn't decide whether to laugh or frown. "Let me get this straight. Travelling through a translocational portal was like walking through lime jelly?"
"Or swimming," Becca agreed. "But it was jello, not jelly. Or is that just an accent thing? Cause yours is weird. Where do you come from anyway?"
"England," Giles answered automatically. "And ... " He stopped, seeing the stricken look on her face. "What is it, Rebecca?"
"I'm sorry," she said breathlessly. "I'm so very sorry. That was really rude." She hesitated. "I think I've been rude ever since I got here. I'm not usually, I promise. My father brought me up better than that." She gave him a lopsided, apologetic smile. "I'm sorry, Mr Giles."
Something about the whole exchange made Giles profoundly uneasy. For a moment he was thirteen again, spending the holidays with a school friend. He and Billy had been teasing the Thorpe's cook about the trifle she was making for dinner and whether or not sherry was appropriate for the young men they thought themselves to be, when he had suddenly heard his father's voice, dangerously quiet and cool, chastising him for his insolence. He had apologised profusely, exactly as Rebecca had just done to him. But Cook had only laughed and fed them both on bread straight out of the oven and freshly made jam. He had realised that day that life wasn't as black and white as his father always proclaimed. There were some people with whom you had to be properly polite, with most people though, being yourself and applying a little common courtesy was more than appropriate.
If Rebecca hadn't had a chance to learn that important lesson yet, he was damn well going to make sure she did now. He might only have known her for approximately an hour, but he could already tell she had too much spirit and character not to express herself fully.
"Just Giles is fine," he assured her. "Almost everyone I know just calls me Giles." He reached out and lifted her chin so that she was forced to look at him. "And I don't think you were rude. Overwhelmed and a little tactless perhaps, but we all have our bad days." He saw her almost smile and grinned at her. "That's better. You be yourself, I'll be myself and we'll figure out exactly how you got here and how to get you home again."
For a moment she still looked dubious, then she nodded. "Okay."
"Right." Giles took a relieved sip of his tea and was annoyed to find it had started to cool past the point he liked it. He put it down again with a sigh. "Unfortunately, I think it's going to take us a little while to work out how you got here and how to get you back again. Unless we just put you on a bus back to Indiana."
He looked up to see Becca shaking her head vigorously. "Don't you think I came though this portal thing for a reason? Shouldn't we find out what it is?"
Giles looked at her a little more closely, surprised by the desperation in her eyes. What is it you're not telling me, Miss 'Smith'? He considered pushing it on the spot, but the last thing he wanted was for her to bolt on him. Better to let it rest for the moment.
"Perhaps you're right," he agreed carefully. "But I think first we need to find you a place to stay for the duration. You can't stay here."
"Why not? If they sent me here, maybe I should stay here?"
"If who sent you?" Giles queried, his suspicions rising again.
"Ah..." For an instant Becca looked cornered, then she shrugged. "Whoever opened the portal and pushed me through it. Someone must have."
"Well, such things can open spontaneously," Giles said thoughtfully, side- tracked by the puzzle at hand. "But you're right - usually it takes some outside force to open a portal, especially when it closes again so neatly behind the traveller like that one did. Hmm..." He was already mentally cataloguing his books, deciding which ones to check first.
"So I can stay here?" Becca said.
"What?" Giles forced his attention back to the girl across the sofa from him. She had put down her teacup and was looking at him with a beseeching, oddly familiar look.
"No, you can't," he said firmly. "You're what - seventeen, eighteen?"
"Nearly eighteen," she confirmed in a small voice.
"Having an unknown seventeen year old suddenly staying with a confirmed old bachelor like me would not exactly be the best course of action."
Becca's face fell, and for a second she looked closer to fourteen. "But I don't know anyone else. Just you."
"It's all right," Giles reassured her. "I know someone you can stay with. She's got a daughter not much older than you and they are both very used to weird things. You'll be fine." She didn't look particularly convinced. "We'll sort everything out," Giles insisted. "I promise."
The grateful look she gave him clearly showed she believed that promise implicitly. He just hoped he'd be able to live up to it.
"Giles. Rupert. What can I do for you?" Joyce Summers stood in her doorway, a little surprised at the identity of her visitor. Usually Buffy disappeared to Giles' apartment, rather than him arriving on her doorstep. "I'm afraid Buffy's not here."
"Actually, I'm not looking for Buffy." Giles looked vaguely uncomfortable. It was an expression she had seen on his face before, back when... Well, back when that thing they were never going to mention again had happened. But this time she was sure it didn't have anything to do with her. Or cursed candy. Or... Well, or that. All the same, it wouldn't hurt to be sure.
"You're looking for me?"
"Yes. Exactly. Well, sort of. I mean yes."
Unable to help herself, Joyce laughed. "Relax, Rupert. How can I help?"
"I, ah, I have someone who needs a place to stay. I thought it might be best if she stayed with you."
Joyce was getting more and more curious by the moment. "Do I know this person?"
Giles stepped sideways, and it was only then that Joyce saw he had someone with him. A girl, a little younger than Buffy she guessed, who was watching her cautiously.
"Hi," Joyce offered. "I'm Joyce Summers."
The girl stepped out from behind Giles, staring at her as if she was some kind of apparition come to life. She smiled, a brilliant, sparkling smile that made her look momentarily beautiful. "I'm Becca. But I'm Joyce too. Becca Joyce."
"Smith," Giles added dryly, but neither woman seemed to notice. Joyce was looking bemused, Rebecca almost awed. He felt like he'd just been handed another piece to the puzzle, he just didn't have enough of them yet to make any kind of coherent picture.
Becca had bit her lip, still smiling at Joyce. "I can't believe I've got to meet you. And you know Giles and..." Her voice dropped away into silence. "Mom," she whispered. "My mom, she, you..."
"Rebecca?" Giles prompted.
She seemed to come back to earth with a bump. "Ah, my mom will be wondering where I am."
Joyce shifted automatically into mothering mode. "Your mother doesn't know where you are? Do you want to call her? She'll be worried about you." She was remembering the summer Buffy had run away, the awful, gnawing worry that never went away until the day her daughter had reappeared on her doorstep. She wouldn't wish that fear on any mother. "We should call her."
Becca looked up at Giles. "Can we do that?"
"I don't know," he admitted honestly. "We could try. It would at least give us an idea if you only crossed space, or if there was some kind of interdimensional travel involved as well. Some alternate realities are very close to our own."
Hellmouth stuff, Joyce thought with an internal sigh. So much for the possibility of a normal visitor.
"You'd better all come in," she said firmly. "Becca, you're very welcome to stay with us until whatever-it-is gets sorted out." She turned a firm gaze on Giles. "And you're not leaving this house, Rupert Giles, until I know what's going on. And how it affects Buffy."
"Right now, I have no idea if this will involve Buffy or not," Giles admitted as he followed Joyce and Becca inside. "Right now I'm not even sure exactly what this is."
Joyce closed the door behind them and ushered her guests into the living room. "So tell me what you do know."
"What's an alternate reality?" Becca asked suddenly as she sat in the armchair across from the couch.
"Well..." Giles began and was immediately interrupted by Joyce.
She pointed at the couch and said flatly, "Sit."
Giles opened his mouth, closed it again and obediently sat, looking a little shocked.
Joyce crossed the room and disappeared for a moment, returning shortly with a portable telephone. She handed it to Becca. "Call your folks," she said in that same firm, flat voice. "Then we'll talk."
"Ah, Joyce..." Giles tried again, but she silenced him with a glare.
"Call," she repeated.
Looking a little as if her fingers were working on automatic, Becca started punching numbers into the phone. Watching her, Giles was struck by a sudden sense of familiarity, something in the way she sat, the way she held herself. The phone made a succession of little beeps as she pressed each button and it was only as she lifted it to her ear that he realised she had dialled too many numbers. Unless she was calling overseas - And Joyce will love that when she gets the bill - but she'd said she was from Indiana. That was states away, not continents.
Rebecca listened for a moment, then wordlessly held the phone out to Joyce. Buffy's mother took it, listened and frowned, then passed it on to Giles. He listened to the high pitched tone that indicated an out-of-service number for a moment, then ended the call as a woman's voice began a recorded message.
"Are you sure you got the number right?" he asked Becca, remembering the sound of one or two too many beeps as she dialled.
The girl nodded firmly.
"If you tell me the number, I could try again," he offered and was surprised by the swiftness and vehemence of her refusal.
"I got it right," she insisted. "There's nothing there." She stared at him for a moment, a sudden, inexplicable vulnerability on her face and then repeated her earlier question. "What's an alternate reality?"
Giles frowned, exchanging a glance with Joyce. She shrugged and he sighed and tried to answer the question without sounding too much like a text book. Of the bizarre.
