Okay, disclaimer first: I don't owe them, I'm just borrowing them for a little while

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Rupert Giles was sitting on the couch with a box of photographs. One by one, he took them out and looked at them, smiling at the memories they brought back. He stood up and headed for the kitchen to get himself some tea. Today had been a calm day; the Magic Box was closed on Sundays so he had not needed to go there. The gang had been doing their own stuff, but they would come over tonight.

That night, the entire gang was present and seated across the living. Willow, Tara and Dawn on one couch, Xander and Anya on the other with Buffy on the arm of the couch next to them and Giles was sitting on the corner of his desk. Everyone was talking to each other about daily stuff, when Buffy's eye caught sight of the box with photographs, now standing on a small table next to the couch. The lid was half open and she saw the pictures in them. She picked up a picture of an elder woman, standing in front of a white house with her arms full of flowers.

"Giles," Buffy said, holding the picture up, "your mum?" He looked up to the picture and nodded.

"Yes," he said. Buffy passed on the picture and took the box on her lap.

"You mind?" she asked, looking up to Giles.

"No, go ahead," he replied. Buffy put the box on the table and all came closer, picking pictures out of the box and asking Giles about them; most of the pictures where either himself, his parents and childhood home or friends of his.

Suddenly, Willow pulled out a picture of a young woman. She had long, black, curly hair and was holding a baby in her arms while smiling at the camera.

"Who's this?" asked Willow, while holding the picture up for Giles to see. He looked up but upon seeing the image, he turned pale.

"Oh, dear lord," he said softly and started breathing deeper. The surprise was visible on all of the gang's faces. Giles swallowed and sat down, looking at the picture he now had in his hand. Everyone was silent; they didn't know what to say. Eventually, Anya broke the silence.

"Who is she then?" she said, a little impatient, upon which everyone looked at her.

"What?" she said. Xander opened his mouth but Giles smiled shortly.

"It's okay," he said, softly, "She… eh was my… eh… wife."

"Your wife!?" exclaimed Xander. Giles just nodded.

"And… and the baby?" Dawn asked. Giles opened his mouth to speak, but couldn't and therefore just nodded.

"You have a child!?" Buffy said, astonished, "Why didn't you tell us?"

"It's… a long story," he replied, recovered from the shock of the photo.

"I... eh... I married her," Giles began, "Emma is her name, in my early twenties. She knew I was a Watcher and, even though she wasn't too pleased with it, accepted it. About... two years after our marriage she got pregnant." Giles smiled at the memory.

"We were very happy with it," he continued, "but in the end of the pregnancy, Emma got problems with her health and after the birth, it became clear that she could never have more children. Soon after Sarah's birth the Council visited us and informed us that Sarah would have to be a Watcher when she grew up." Giles looked around and smiled a little.

"I... well, agreed, I mean, I had known I was to be a Watcher when I grew up and had lived a good live; but Emma was dead against it. We had a huge fight about it and I left to stay with a friend for the night, to let things cool down. But when I returned the next morning, both Emma and Sarah were gone. All that was left of them was a note, in which Emma told me that she had left and didn't want me to look for her or Sarah, because I wouldn't find them." He paused, overtaken by the memory. All were silent, processing what Giles had told and feeling sorry for him.

"Of course, I didn't do as she had written, I searched for her. But after a month, I still had no trace and asked the Council for help," Giles said and smiled shortly, "they found her in a week, but told me that she had made clear that she didn't want any further contact. They told me to let it be. I protested and continued searching, but the Council would, purposely, hinder me in my search and finally… I gave up."

"When was that?" Tara asked softly.

"After a year or so, I don't know exactly, but I do know that when I finally gave up, the Council gave me a photograph of Sarah, taken when she was about nine, ten months old." He searched in the box and found the picture.

"That's all I have from her."

"How old is she now?" Buffy asked.

"She is twenty now, like you," he answered and laughed shortly, "I haven't seen her since she was a month old, but I never stopped thinking about her."

"And you have never known where they went?" Tara asked. Giles shook his head.

"I suspect they are either still in Britain, or in Holland," he said.

"Holland?" Buffy said. Giles nodded.

"Emma's mother was Dutch, she has relatives there."

Meanwhile, somewhere in the northern part of the Netherlands, a young woman, twenty years old, was standing in what seemed to be her room. She stared out of the window, looking upon a piece of land with horses in it. She had a slim posture and dark, curly hair.

Two walls of the room were covered with books, modern ones, but also quite a lot of old ones, leather bound and with funny letters. On her desk lay a pile of those old books. One of them was open and showed a page full of writing in Latin. The girl sat down at her desk and turned her computer on. Then she started translating the text and put it in the computer.

"Sarah!" a man's voice came from downstairs a little while later, "I'm going out for a while, I'll be back in an hour."

"Okay!" replied the girl, and kept on typing. After five minutes, when she was sure the man was gone, she turned the computer off and grabbed a bag that was under her bed. She threw some clothes in it, a few books, some photographs, a bunch of CD-ROMs and floppy disks and a thick wallet. She swung the bag on her back and descended the stairs. She walked out the front door and headed for the bus stop.

She sat down in the back of the bus and made herself comfortable, as far as that was possible on the bus seats. An hour later, she arrived at the train station and got out. She headed for the ticket sale and bought a train-ticket to the airport. It tuned out that her train wouldn't go for another hour so she bought a few magazines and went to wait in the restaurant.

An hour later, she got on the train and made herself comfortable, and now for real, because the first-class seats were indeed comfortable. After a long trip, she finally arrived at the airport and she collected her bags and entered the main building.

There she took the plane ticket out of her bag and headed for the check-in. It took an hour in total before she got on the plane and as soon as it took off; she relaxed, knowing she wouldn't be stopped anymore.