A/N: I'm trying to make a set schedule for when I'll be posting chapters. It's looking like it's going to be Wednesday & Saturday, except clearly today is Sunday, and well, life happens. But I'm aiming for Wednesday-Saturday.
The first thought Beth had when she woke up was, Well, that's new. She hadn't yet decided if she meant that as a good thing yet, but it was definitely new. From the moment she had taken her exit from Dream Land into the world of the living, she felt at peace. A strange kind of feeling. It was not to say that she had never felt peaceful. Anytime she had ever been able to escape the torment of her own half-life existence and the people who belittled her for it, she had felt at peace. But this, this was something else. The two cogs in the back of her head, which tried—to no avail—to crank against one another, now ran smoothly together. There was no tension, no taut line that threatened to snap. There was a silence. And it was fecking weird.
She threw her blanket off herself, trying to decipher what this all meant. She had attributed the tension to her vampiric nature. Was it possible that it had somehow died off to leave her as a normal human girl?
She attempted to shift into her vampiric visage and, much to her dismay, did so without so much as a clench of her jaw. Well, there goes that theory, right out the window.
She wanted to contemplate this change in her head, but was interrupted by the loud call from her mother.
"Beth, are you awake yet?" she called out from the bottom of the stairs, undoubtedly waking every inhabitant of the house.
"No, but I am," Beth heard her father bite back, followed by the thumping of his footsteps as he made his way down the hall. He stopped in front of Beth's door, rapping on it and commanding that she wake up so Buffy wouldn't yell anymore and some people could get some "bloody sleep around here."
"I'm up," she assured, getting out of bed fully. Whether or not she was all here was another matter. While the tension in her head had never been a fun party goer, it felt weird not having it around. For the last fifteen years of her life, it had been a part of her. Now, it was gone. It was a lifelong ache taken away by modern medicine. It was an experience she'd never had before and it left her feeling off.
She hurdled down the stairs, hoping she wouldn't come off as things feeling a bit helter-skelter. Though, seeing as her mother was not among the most observant people in the world, appearing normal to Buffy's eyes would be a relatively easy piece of cake. Now, when it came to Willow and her father, well, anything goes, she supposed.
"Hello," Beth greeted, strolling into the kitchen, and taking a seat at the counter.
"Good morning," Buffy chirped happily, pulling a box of Pop Tarts out of the cupboard, and popping two in the toaster. Her mother seemed unusually chipper for seven in the morning. Maybe she had made a good kill last night. Or maybe…
"'Lo, Lizzie," Spike greeted as he walked into the kitchen, dropping a kiss on her forehead before pulling Buffy into his arms and nuzzling her neck. She giggled, swatting his arm.
"Quit it," she told him, though she didn't sound unhappy at all of the prospect of him not listening. "I'm trying to make breakfast."
His eyebrows rose. "You? Makin' brekky? Should I get the fire department on the line?"
Buffy stuck her tongue out at him. He got that look on his face that made Beth want to retch before he ducked his head, kissing his wife quite soundly.
Beth gave them their blissful marriage moment before the gross noises started to her nauseous. "Hey you two," she cut in. "Get a room."
Spike broke away from Buffy and Beth's nose scrunched up when she noticed the line of spit connecting her parent's lips.
"Oi, 'm your da' an' you should respect me," he told her, pulling his wife flush up against him. "An' tha' means I can snog whomever I want in my household."
"Oh, I respect you completely," she assured in all sincerity before her voice took on a sardonic edge, "but not when you two are going at it like a couple of teenagers. I mean, honestly, I'm the fifteen-year-old here. I should be doing that, not you two."
Her father's face contorted into a glare. "There will be no snogging boys in my house, little girl, not while 'm still kickin'."
"What if it's girls?" she inquired.
"No snogging. Not 'til your thirty."
"Thirty?" Buffy asked. "Isn't that a little extreme? I remember when I was fifteen and—"
"And you know what?" Beth began, "as much as I enjoy this little trip down memory lane when mom had googly eyes for Uncle Angel and Dad was off fawning over the Queen of the Damned, I think I'll just follow my own advice and get my own room."
The toaster popped and Beth grabbed her Pop Tarts, mindful of the hot pastry in her hands. "Cheerio," she told them, before bounding back up the stairs to take a shower.
Buffy looked up at Spike and smiled, running a hand over his chest. "I remember when my parents used to kiss in front of me. It was kinda icky."
"Well, there's no kid here now," he said with a mischievous grin, pulling her in for what he saw as a mind-blowing kiss. Buffy's assessment wasn't so different either.
Up in her room, Beth rolled her eyes in disgust, her newfound peace temporarily forgotten. It came back rather quickly, because as soon as she swung her bathroom door open, it smacked the wall with such a force it broke through the plaster. Well, holy damn.
"Beth, what was that?" Buffy's voice rang out. "Are you okay?"
"I'm fine," she assured quickly. "Everything is fine!" She slowly eased the door away from the wall, pulling more chunks of plaster off as the doorknob was pulled out of the wall. "Well, how about that." She was strong, but that strong? Oh no, that was-
She froze. "Oh my god." She raced into the bathroom, going straight for the curtain rod brackets above the window. No one should just be able to yank those out of the wall! They might as well have been screwed into pudding for how easily she pulled them out. Well, slap her silly and call her bobo, she was a slayer.
"Who'da thunk?" she asked the empty room breathlessly, dropping her curtains to the ground with a resounding clank.
-.-
Beth spotted Nadja over by the wall, headphones in her ears and otherwise ignoring the people around her. She had reason to, after all, since Beth didn't normally make it to school before the first bell rang. But today was important. She was a slayer and she'd be hard pressed to keep that little secret to herself.
"Nadja!" she hissed, yanking her friend up before remembering she shouldn't do that. She had strength unlike anything she'd experienced before and Nadja was much easier to break now.
"Beth," Nadja greeted with confusion, pulling her headphones out of her ear. "You're not here this early normally. And are you alright? I think you're gonna leave a bruise on my arm."
She looked down at where her hand was wrapped around Nadja's lower arm. "Sorry," she squeaked, dropping her friend's arm quickly.
"Something eating you? You know, beside the local baddies?" Nadja joked. Any humor left her face when she noticed Beth's stricken appearance. "Beth, seriously, what's the matter?"
No time for pretenses or tact, she decided. It was best she just say it. "I'm a slayer," she blurted out.
Nadja didn't respond immediately. In fact, she didn't even move when Beth told her. Not a flinch or a blink of an eye.
"Nadja?" she whispered, refraining from poking her friend.
"So wait, is this a bad thing?" Nadja asked slowly.
"What do you mean, 'is this a bad thing'?" she hissed.
"I want to respond correctly because you seem upset, even though I can't possibly fathom why."
"This is not good!" she clarified for her.
"But weren't you complaining about not measuring up in strength? You're like a slaying vampire now. A slaypire. Now, how many slayers can say that? I bet you're all uber-strong now."
"That's not the point!" she cried, though she still kept her voice low as to not garner unwanted attention. "The strength is good. It's all I've ever wanted, though I can't imagine my mum will be too keen about this."
"Then what's the problem?" Nadja asked. "We should celebrate. Not like a using-your-new-powers-type celebrate, but like going out for ice cream. I'll pay and everything."
"Nadja, you're not getting it. Where do they send slayers when they find them?" she asked.
Comprehension dawned on Nadja. "They wouldn't, would they?" she whispered, looking stricken. "I mean, you've only been here a year and from what you've told me, those girls were so nasty to you. They wouldn't send you back there, would they? The Council, they're not that cruel, are they?"
"I don't know," she admitted. "It's standard practice. All potentials go to the academy and if one slips notice until they're a slayer, they still go, albeit on more of a crash course program."
"But you could learn so much here," Nadja argued. "We've already fought here and I'm sure your mom knows just about everything about everything. And your dad! He was once a vampire. And he's like a bajillion years old! He probably knows a lot of stuff too! You could totally get your slayer education here."
"I don't think the Council will see it that way," she mumbled.
"I can't lose you, Beth! I just got you. You're my best friend and Scotland might as well be Mars considering how easy it'll be to see you."
"Oh good, Beth you're here," Zack started, walking over and unknowingly interrupting a tense moment. "I'm gonna need time after school for something for Robotics, so if you two don't min—"
"Why do you have such impeccable timing?" Nadja snapped, rounding on her cousin.
He blinked, having been unprepared for Nadja's fury. "Call it a skill?"
"Could you go away for once in your life?" Nadja asked.
He frowned. "Hey, I don't see what I did to make you all nasty. At least tell me what I did wrong before you skin me alive."
"Nadja, it's okay," Beth interrupted. "Zack should know too."
"Know what?" he asked.
"Beth's a slayer now," Nadja grumbled, looking somber once again.
He looked between Nadja and Beth, both who sported sad expressions. "They're not sending you away, are they?" he finally asked, his voice taking on a slightly panicked-edge.
She shrugged. "I haven't told my parents yet and if the Council doesn't find you as a potential, they'll surely find you as a slayer. It's standard practice that a slayer be trained at the Academy."
"Screw standard," he responded. "It's only been standard for what, twenty years? The standard used to be one slayer being trained by her watcher wherever she's at. Standard wasn't school, so you can forget that excuse."
"Well, standard or not, it's what's done. I don't exactly get a choice in the matter," she snapped.
"Look, they can only really track a slayer down to general location," he began. "Normally the talk of the town is what brings them to the girl. So, just don't tell your parents. I won't say anything and I'm sure Nadja won't either. No one will know but us."
She bit her lip. "I don't know if I can just not tell my parents. They've done nothing to get such secrecy from me and I'd feel guilty for lying by omission. Plus, I'm still training on a weekly basis. At that point, my progress is going to seem a bit too spontaneous."
"Well, you have to do something," Nadja pleaded. "I don't want you to go."
"I don't want to go either," she promised, "but like I said, it's not like I have a choice. I can hide it for as long as I like, but at some point, the cat's coming out of the bag."
Zack looked frustrated. He ran his hands through his hair, making it stick up even more than normal. "We'll figure this out. Just, let's just keep quiet for now."
"Easy for you to say!" Nadja hissed, prodding him in the chest with her finger. "Your parents aren't a slayer and an ex-vampire. They've been around a million slayers. They're going to know something's up."
Beth bit her lip, her mind racing to find a way to make this work. So far? Diddly squat. Her parents were going to find out, they would alert the Council as it was their job, and she would be forced to go back to the Slayer Academy, a prospect that nearly made her want to off herself to avoid further ridicule. "I'll work something out," she assured them, though she did not feel assured herself. "I have a plan." That was complete and utter bullshit, but it sounded like something she should say.
Nadja raised her eyebrow. "Really? What?"
"Don't worry," Beth promised, "I got this." She most definitely did not have this, but maybe if she said it often enough, it would come true.
-.-
"You're holding back love," Spike said as Beth dodged another kick and sent out one of her own, albeit a bit limply.
"No, you're just forgetting how weak my kicks are," she contradicted with a tight smile. For the entire week she had been withholding her newly acquired slayer skillset, quite effectively too she might add. Within the week and her damaged goods total only came up to the hole in the wall, her curtain rod (which was on purpose, so it didn't really count), two glass cups, and the drawer on the desk up in the library that always stuck. Overall, not a bad rap sheet, if she did say so herself.
The problem wasn't broken glasses and drawers, though. Those could be written off with a shrug and a "I have no idea how that happened." She figured that from day one. Actual hand-to-hand combat, well, that was another story. And said story was that she felt this overwhelming urge to show her dad up by throwing him across the room and then proceeding to do a victory lap around his prone and bashed form. Such behavior would be frowned upon though, and lead to questions like, "How did you get so strong?" and "Why didn't you mention before that you became a slayer?" She didn't really feel up to answering such questions.
He sighed in that dad way she wasn't sure was learned or just acquired after years of dealing with a difficult child. "You're not weak, pet." Oh no, here started the "Beth-you're-worth-more" speech again.
To silence any further comments, she shot out and cuffed him real good on the chin, splitting his lip and making his head jerk back. She winced. Okay, maybe too much strength in that punch, but she had to shut him up.
He looked back at her with a positively feral grin. "Now that's more like it." How could she possibly forget? Her father liked pain.
She blocked his flurry of kicks and punches, having decided not to resign herself to being a punching bag like she had been before. Maybe she couldn't fight better, but she would sure as hell block and dodge better. And despite her fear of showing her parents her true power now, she couldn't help but wonder how much stronger she would be if she vamped out. Always having the demon in the driver's seat enhanced her abilities. She opted out of training like that though, even though Spike had no qualms with it. He never wanted her to think he didn't accept that part of her.
"Are you done beating the snot out of my husband, Bethie?" Buffy asked with a grin as she descended the stairs into the basement. "Willow's coming back from her Seek-a-Slayer trip tonight and I don't want you two all gross and bloody." She gave her husband a once-over and frowned. He only grinned in return.
"S'only a lil' blood, sweets," he assured, wiping his lip with his hand. "Got me real good, she did." He grinned at Beth is such a proud fatherly moment. Good, he thought her improvements were because of his training.
"See, I told you you'd get better," Buffy said to her daughter with a warm smile. Beth smiled back to the best of her ability, hoping it reached her eyes. Her mother was none the wiser. "Now, I want you two upstairs and showering before dinner."
Spike and Beth exchanged glances as Buffy climbed back up the stairs. Despite living the fight for many years, Buffy still insisted on always being clean and looking nice, something that could be hard for a slayer to reach. Always the priss, one might say.
"You seein' the improvement?" Spike asked Beth once Buffy had shut the door.
She shrugged. "Yeah, I guess so." Yes, absolutely yes. Did you see the hole I left in my wall? Of course, you didn't. I covered it with a poster, but OH MY GOD IT IS HUGE.
"S'not gonna come quick, Beth," he reminded her. "You're always gonna be workin' for it."
"Even slayers?" she asked casually.
He shrugged. "Can always improve style and skill. Slayers are all about power. Got lots of it. Now, what they need is something to channel it through. S'what fightin's for. Brute force is good an' all—I love a good bar tussle—but a slayer's got to be on her toes. Needs to know how to fight. Got to be creative. An' to be creative, you got to have a place to build from."
God, she hated not telling her parents. She really wanted to, honestly. Her parents were always there for her, supporting her every step of the way. They wanted her to always be her best and think the same of herself. By not telling them, she felt immensely guilty. They'd always been there for her, except for now. She'd like to think it was because she was growing up and now didn't need her parents at every turn in her life. But she was fifteen and that was a really dumb reason to lie. She should be proud of her newfound slayer abilities. All the other girls had been. Being a slayer was nothing to be ashamed of.
"I know," she told her father. "Well, now I do. It's going to come slowly. I just have to be patient." Maybe she could slowly introduce her new power, bit by bit until she didn't hold back and her parents just believed she was naturally that strong, that she had that potential all along. She didn't see why they wouldn't believe it. After all, no one really knew anything about half-vampires, seeing as they weren't supposed to exist, and she only came around due to a prophecy.
"Well, c'mon then, let's get cleaned up before your mum gets fed up and jus' takes us out back to spray us down with the hose."
Beth snickered. "She wouldn't actually do that."
"Don' want to give her the chance," he muttered with a lopsided grin.
-.-
"Oh, I love to travel, but all that constant movement makes my back all achy," Willow said with a grunt, sitting down on the couch. She had dropped all her luggage outside the door to her room before falling onto the couch, still yards away from her final destination at the dining table.
Beth looked up from where she was setting plates to smile at her tired aunt. "But all is good in the Slayerdom?" she asked.
Willow nodded, face still smooshed into a throw pillow. "Four weeks and almost two dozen girls. I keep hoping the numbers will dwindle but looks like they're not letting up. How many slayers does one world need?"
"Well, I think Mr. Wells did the math once and the yearly average is-"
"No one bloody cares what Andrew averaged," Spike grumbled, cutting Beth off.
"Oh, be nice," Willow mumbled. "Giles said he's doing very well teaching slayers. He wants to give him his own team again."
That made Spike's eyebrows raise. "The boy? His own team of Slayers?" he snorted. "Maybe one, but not a whole bloody team."
Beth frowned. "I think he could do it," she defended. "He can be very passionate, I think."
"Ooh, that reminds me," Willow said, pushing herself off the couch with a groan of protest. "I should put the Scythe back up before I forget to." She reached for the discarded weapon by the door and froze. "Whoa."
"Whoa?" Beth asked. "Whoa what?"
Willow brought the Slayer Scythe close to her face, her eyes narrowing as she studied it. "There's a Slayer nearby, I think."
Beth froze. Well crap. She forgot all about that stupid Seek-a-Slayer, Scythe unfortunately not sold separately. Of course, Willow would pick up any stray signals so soon after using it. Residual magic and all that annoying crap.
"Maybe it's the neighbor," Beth suggested casually, busying herself with napkin folding.
And if only it had been her mother and not Spike who was in the room to notice her behavior. He was the more observant of the two and Beth's nervous movements did not escape his notice. He studied her for a moment, head tilted to the side in restrained curiosity. She avoided meeting his eyes.
"Something you want to tell us, pet?" he asked softly, still looking at her. Not restrained enough.
She bit her lip and shook her head, doing her best impression of an unassuming teenage girl. "No, like what?"
Before he could continue his line of questioning, Buffy swung into the dining room, a basket of rolls in her arms. "Look, they didn't burn," she announced happily. "I pulled them out just in time." She placed the basket on the table, taking no notice of either her husband or her daughter. "Wills, just put the Scythe down. I'll deal with it later."
"There's a slayer nearby," Willow told her with confidence.
Buffy's eyes widened. "Really? How close?"
"Really close," Spike said, his tone making Beth wince. It was a wonder that Buffy didn't pick up on her husband's implications, what with all the staring and hint dropping he was doing. Instead, Buffy ploughed on, ignorant of the object of Spike's attention. Said object decided it was about time she learned how to make those fancy swan napkins.
"Well, Seattle is a big area. It's about time there was another Potential or at least a slayer here," Buffy decided. "We can make a job out of it tomorrow. Right now, it's dinner time and they're not going anywhere."
"Love, you're strangling the napkin," Beth's father told her softly, albeit a little humored at her nervousness over the subject.
"I thought I would try and do napkin origami," she informed him, lying the napkin down on the table and smoothing it out as best she could.
"Is there something you'd like to tell the rest of us?" he continued, his voice just as gentle. God, why did he have to sound like that? All accepting and just a hint of sadness that she hadn't confided with him in the first place. She was not going to feel guilty about this. But then she made the mistake of looking him in the eyes and ah yes, there was the gut-scraping guilt. Spike had, after all, been her supporter, her shoulder to cry on. She was a Daddy's Girl through and through and—dammit, she said she wasn't going to feel guilty about this.
"I suck at origami?" she joked weakly. It was met with a grunt of disapproval from him and she ducked her head, going back to her napkin strangling.
"Spike," Willow began, looking between him and Beth. "Are you telling us that—?"
Buffy, bless her heart, finally caught on. In disbelief. "Oh no," she started. "We would know that. I would know that. I'm a Slayer. I'm the Slayer. More importantly, I'm her mother. If anyone would know, it would be me. Beth would tell me that."
"An' what am I?" Spike asked, throwing his hands up.
"Oh, it's just a-bird-of-the-same-feather-type of thing," she said with a wave of her hand. "Beth's not—"
"But I am," Beth finally interrupted. She was cornered anyway, might as well go down her way now. "It's only been a few days, but I've known the whole time."
Her confession was met with absolute silence, something she did not think was possible in their household, considering how much noise Spike made all on his own.
"What?" Willow finally said, her voice squeaky. "Really?"
Beth nodded numbly.
"Well, this is great news!" Willow cheered, a wide smile stretched across her face. "We can celebrate, maybe throw a party or-or—" her voice drifted off as she took note of the varying expression from the other occupants of the room. Buffy looked shocked, Spike saddened, and Beth was the poster child of guilt-ridden. "Or not. We could not have a party. I'm confused. Isn't this good news?"
Spike shrugged. "Dunno. Beth?"
She shrugged back, equally as apathetic.
"Why didn't you tell us?" her mother finally asked. "Did you think we wouldn't get it? I'm a slayer too, Elizabeth, just like you are now. I know it's hard and—"
"No, you don't," Beth cut in. "You're normal. I'm not."
"You think I felt normal?" Buffy's sharp tone made Beth flinch. "I wanted that, God, did I want that. 'One Girl in the World;' does that sound familiar? It was only me, Beth. I didn't have anyone until Kendra came along and I had to die for that. I know that your life hasn't been the easiest, I know that. I lived that. I might not be some vampire-human hybrid, but I've never been normal. I was a freak too once, before slayers went forth and multiplied and now everyone's all gung-ho about slayerhood."
"Why didn' you jus' tell us?" her father implored. "Beth, we're your parents. We love you no matter what. This is nothin' to be ashamed of."
"I know!" she burst out. "I wanted to, I really did. But if I did, then you'd send me to the Slayer Academy, like you're supposed to. It's your job and I get that. I wasn't going to make you choose."
"If you think we'd send you back there, you're daft," he snorted.
Beth's head shot up. "What? Repeat that."
"We would never send you back there," Buffy assured, nodding at Willow and Spike. "You've finally got a life here, Beth. We'd never take that away from you."
She knew what her mother was implying. They'd still never admit to it, but the main reason they left Scotland was because of the ridicule and isolation Beth had faced from the potentials and slayers. Here, she had friends. Okay, she only had two, but as Spike frequently pointed out, they were both roughly her age and one wasn't a middle-aged man obsessed with science fiction and most likely harboring a crush on him.
"But that's where all slayers go," Beth argued. "It's tradition."
Buffy made a little derisive noise in the back of her throat. "Tradition? Tradition is a watcher training a potential into Slayerhood at home."
"Yeah," Willow agreed. "Giles trained Buffy in Sunnydale. This whole school thing is new-fangled and convenient, but as a special case, I'm sure the Council can make an exception."
Beth gaped at the two women. "Are you serious?" she asked.
"Course, pet," her father agreed. "'S bloody mad to take you all the way to Washington just to send you back. Besides, with your previously enhanced strength, 'm sure you make a right perfect 'special case'."
"I'm sure Giles will see things that way," Buffy promised, "since I see them that way. I was always for the old-fashioned way anyway." She ignored the snort from Spike.
"So I can stay? And be trained here? In Bellevue?" Beth asked excitedly, all her previous fears rapidly evaporating into the air.
Her mother grinned. "I just said that, didn't I?" She sobered up and continued, "Beth, I want you to know that we would never do anything to purposefully put you in a bad spot if we didn't think it was for your own good. Forcing you back into the lion's den just because the Council says things work that way doesn't make their word law. I am the law. Slayers are the law. More than that, I am your mother. I would never put anything before you. Not even my own life. Do you got that?"
"You're doing good here, Lizzie," Spike added with a soft smile. "Look at you, all glowin' with your friends, even if I don' like all of them. We'd never take that away from you."
Beth had enough sense to look ashamed. "I know that. Well, I know that now. I guess finding out just made me think default slayer rules and I was afraid of that."
"S'alright now love," he assured. "You were a bit scared an' it made you irrational; happens to all of us."
"I don't think it was irrational," she told him.
"An' 'm hurt you didn't tell us sooner, so shut your gob," he snapped good-naturedly.
"Oh, come off it," she snickered.
"'M serious!" he continued, feigning a pained expression, hand over his heart. "'M real hurt."
"Whatever," she muttered. "Can we have dinner now? And can I get a nicer looking napkin? This one is all wrinkly."