Title: Soul to Squeeze  

Series: Leave it Behind

Author:  Autumn

Email: autumnleaves@autumnpenguins.com

Disclaimer: Joss et.all own everything. 

Archive: API, others please ask first.

Summary:  Continues from previous chapter.

Story Order:  Equilibrium, The Lesser, Of Two Evils, Lost, You Can't Go Home Again,  Warning Signs, Soul to Squeeze

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Giles remained quiet long enough to cause the Scoobies to shift uncomfortable.  The possibility of having Dawn back was pleasing, but the fact that it was potentially without a soul weighed heavily upon them.  "I substituted Spike because I was rather hoping the difference in his-makeup would negate the usual price." 

"You can't make bargains with magic.  Especially not with magic that powerful!" Anya admonished.

"Had you ever performed this spell before?"  Tara queried.

"When Randall was killed, we tried to raise him."  Giles said with hesitation.

At the Scoobies shocked looks, Giles elaborated.  "He came back as a daemon.  The witch wasn't powerful enough to complete the spell properly and Randall came back without a soul, and without a spark of humanity." 

"You're a very stupid man." Tara shouted harshly as she looked on Giles with disgust. 

"Tara" Willow ran after her girlfriend's retreating back. 

While the witch's berating had gotten to him, it was when Giles caught Buffy's silent crying that he finally understood the magnitude of what he had done.  Xander and Anya stepped outside of the Magic Box, leaving the Slayer alone with her Watcher. 

"She doesn't know, does she?"  Buffy asked in a hollowed voice. 

The sparkle that had returned to her face when she saw Dawn was gone.  The momentary silence was broken by Buffy's fist crashing through the table.  "How could you do that to her?" 

Buffy began throwing books, broken pieces of table and anything else she could get her hands on.  Giles hadn't seen her so angry since the night she discovered he had participated in the council's 18th birthday test with Zachary Krelick.  Despite his training with Buffy, he wasn't fast enough to duck as she through a table leg at him.  It caught him in the left forearm.  The resounding splintering of bone was heard first before Giles felt it. 

            "Fuck!" Giles called out as he sank to the floor in pain, attempting to cradle his broken arm. 

            "Shut up Giles."  Buffy spat, as she roughly tore Giles jacket from his body. 

            "That bloody hurt!" Giles gasped.

            "Good." She returned with a steely gaze. 

            Despite her absolutely livid anger at him, she ripped a strip from the cloth to create a tourniquet for Giles' arm.  "Xander, call an ambulance" Buffy shouted, aware that Anya and Xander were on the other side of the door. 

            When the two returned bustled back into the shop, Buffy rose from Giles' side.  "Take care of him, I can't look at him right now." 

            Buffy left the store, and began running towards Sunnydale University. 

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            "Spike?"  Dawn called softly. 

            The vampire rose from the floor and strode back into the young woman's room.  "Yeah pet?

            "What was it like when you came back?"  She was sitting up in her bed with her legs drawn up to her chest. 

            "Confusing.  Scary, to be dead honest.  I didn't know where I was, or why the hell I was in a box.  I remember very clearly that I needed blood, that things would feel better once I got some." 

            "But, do you-did you feel different than when you were alive the first time?"

"Yeah.  I can't really explain it too you, but I knew there was something missing.  It turns out it was my soul, but at the time I didn't know what it was.  Once I figured out what I was, I started killing people and it felt better.  Drinking someone's blood was satisfying, not just at a thirst level or a sexual level.  It felt good to take someone's life.  I was taking something from them and it completed me."

            "When you were dead, were you in heaven or hell?"

            "That's a complicated question bit." Spike meditated on the question. 

            "I guess it really depends on what your concept of the afterlife is.  But, if you wanna simple it down, I was happy enough, but I don't think I was there for that long.  Drusilla sired me, and I rose again in three days, all Christ-like." 

            Dawn fell silent again, and Spike didn't feel the need to push.  She'd say what was on her mind if he just gave her time enough.        

****************

            "Buffy."  Willow said as she opened the door to her best friend. 

            "I need to know about Dawn." She said as she stepped into the witches' dorm room. 

            "Where's Gi-"Willow started.

            "Let's not talk about that." Buffy cut her off

            "We don't really need any supplies, we just need a personal object from Dawn." 

            Buffy slipped the chain around her neck off. It turned out to be Dawn's necklace bearing her name.  "Will this work?" 

            "Yes.  This won't take long."  Tara tried to reassure the slayer. 

            Willow and Tara selected the text that the two needed, and followed the directions which told them too place the necklace in a circle of sand with four crystals around it.  They sat side by side and joined hands, with their free hands hovering over Dawn's necklace.  Tara recited the text, and the object began to glow emerald green, with black surrounding the borders.

            As they finished, they looked at each other and looked back at the text.  "Maybe we didn't do it right?" Tara questioned.

            "Well we saw it, so we had to have been doing something right." Willow said slowly.

            "Guys! What did you see?" Buffy asked, visibly tense. 

            "She has a soul Buffy, but it's fragmented."  Tara started.

            "Spike has part of Dawn's soul."