DISCLAIMER: Joss owns the canon.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Must…finish…fic…

SMALL PACKAGES: Chapter Thirteen

The earth shook his beneath his feet, but Lindsey McDonald saw nothing except for his Claire's face. Her eyes were closed, her skin pale. Her mouth was open like she was about to yell something out, but looking at her motionless body, Lindsey knew that his little girl would never speak again.

He remembered the day he'd found them, his little ones. Their mother had been his sister, a drunken teenage mother who didn't recognize the preciousness of the little girls she'd given birth to. He saw Claire as he'd seen her then, a cheerful two year old with a dirty face and a loud mouth in the threadbare clothing that signified the kind of poverty he'd known firsthand. Claire, his daughter from the moment he'd set his eyes on her, from the moment her mother had given her up. Claire, his salvation. His inspiration to be a good man. His baby.

Dead.

"Third blood," Dawn said, repeating the words Talot had said upon his death bed. "I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess that it's not a happy third blood. More like a world endy third blood."

Lindsey stared into Claire's face. The world was ending around him, and all he could see was his dead child's closed eyes.

"Claire?" Brandon's voice broke into Lindsey's thoughts.

"Honey, no," Kate said, trying to pull the boy back and shield him bodily from the sight of the girl's body and from the debris falling as the earth shook.

"Claire, you stupid girl, get up," Brandon commanded imperiously.

"Claire-y?" Brookie whimpered. Why was Claire so quiet? Claire was never, ever quiet.

"Claire?" Brandon's voice broke as he looked at her. "She's not dead," he said suddenly, looking up at his mother. "I won't let her be dead. Being dead's for girls and Claire's not like normal girls!" With those words, the little boy broke free of her grasp and rushed to Claire's side.

"Wake up, Claire," he said. "You're so bossy, only now it's my turn to be bossy, and I say get up."

"She's not getting up." The words stuck in Lindsey's throat.

"Yes, she is," Brandon said. "Get. Up. Claire." He laid his hands on her, and Willow's eyes widened. It was so easy to forget that, beneath the little boy bravado, Brandon was one of the most powerful magical children she'd ever encountered, and his desire to perform the spell was great.

Willow flashed back, seeing herself at Tara's side, kneeling the way Brandon was kneeling next to Claire.

"Don't be sad, Willow," Val said in an almost inaudible voice. "Don't be sad. I'm here now."

"Come back, Claire. Come back. COME BACK." Brandon's voice grew louder. Power surged from his hands into the dead girl's body, and Willow, in the midst of the chaos of the falling debris and shaking ground, suddenly pictured his eyes growing black. Evil Brandon, now that was a scary thought.

"COME BA--"

Brandon's voice was cut off as a deep and intense silence fell over the room. The silence grew heavier and heavier in the air, not to be shattered by any voice or movement or sound. Then, through the silence, came a single voice. The voice, a baby voice, shook with power so ancient that it hurt just to listen to it.

"Come. Kaya say come."

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Faith felt the power emanating from her daughter, and as the final words left the toddler's mouth, all she could do was wonder what in the world her daughter had been born into this world to do. The bodiless voice had told her that Kaya was a child of neither life or death, that she was the heir to a legacy that mortals couldn't even begin to understand, but to Faith, she was just a kid. Her kid.

"Come," Kaya yelled, the same way she yelled when the swings were full on the playground or when someone took the last graham cracker. "Kaya say come."

Faith felt a ripple of power go through her body, and she found herself staring into Spike's eyes. He stared back into hers, and in that moment, she remembered everything she'd forgotten.

Their bodies, melding into one. Seeing into his past, his soul. Her heart beating next to his chest, and knowing, in that instant, that this was what she'd been missing all along. They were as one person, and for the first time in her life, when he held her, she knew she wasn't alone.

The same memories scoured through Spike's mind, and when he looked back into Faith's eyes, he knew. Kaya was their child because a greater power had brought the living slayer and the dead vampire together, but once they'd come together, in his memory, Spike couldn't seem to even imagine that it had ever been any other way.

This was what they had forgotten. This was the love from which Kaya had been born, and this: this moment, this power, this was the child's destiny and their destiny in her.

"Kaya say come!"

The air around them shuddered with power, and in the next instant, a light so bright that mortal eyes could not look upon it shined from the child, pouring out of her very pores.

Born from death

Born from life

Born from both and neither

As the loudly unspoken words faded from the air, so did the light streaming out of Kaya's body, and the little girl fell from the air where she'd been floating, into Spike's arms. Immediately, Faith threw her arms around the girl. "Are you alright, baby girl?"

Spike stroked a hand over the back of Kaya's head. "Gave us a scare there, Bitlet," he said. His hand brushed against Faith's, and they looked at each other, the memory of their joining still nearly palpable between them.

"Kaya been busy," Kaya said, and with that, the child pointed over Spike's shoulder. "Hello, others," she said wickedly. "Hello, Sunny!"

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Willow felt the power surging into the office from the lobby below, but she couldn't guess at its source. All she knew was that a power more ancient than that of hatred was at work, and something was about to happen.

Born from death

Born from life

Born from both and neither

Willow wasn't sure whether the others heard the words or not, but as soon as they were spoken, the air trembled and filled with light. Willow felt Val slip from her hands and onto the floor, and as she tried to shield her eyes from the light, the Wiccan saw the little girl's form blurring.

"Val," Willow whispered, horrified. "Tara." She'd only just gotten her back, and they'd already lost so much today with Claire. Willow wasn't sure she could take it if something happened to Val, too, and she was about to turn her resolve face on the unbearable light when the boundaries of Val's body blurred and another form emerged from Val's. It stepped out of her body and uncurled into the shape of a woman.

Then, as suddenly as it had appeared, the bright light was gone, and Willow stared at the little girl in front of her and the woman standing beside her.

"Willow." Tara only said one word, but it was all she needed to say.

"Tara," Willow said.

"Xander," Anya cried joyfully across the room. "Now we can have sex and you can cease your nocturnal masterbations."

"Anya," Xander hissed, but in the next instant, he realized what he'd just said and realized that the woman he'd lost was actually standing there in front of him. "Anya?"

"Let's kiss and then find a more convenient sex location," Anya said with a cheerful smile. "And I would like to hold some currency. The lack of ghost currency is shocking." Without waiting for Xander to respond, Anya pulled him into a long kiss.

"Cordy," Doyle yelled jovially. "You're alive." Following Anya's move, Doyle pulled Cordelia into an equally passionate kiss. Cordy kissed him back and then broke off and smacked him.

"Doyle, you're alive, too," she said. "It's not like you haven't seen me in, oh, I don't know, the last five minutes?"

Doyle shrugged and then, with a mischievous grin, kissed her again, soundly on the lips. After a long moment, he pulled back. "Angel," he said inclining his head.

"How?" Angel asked.

"Is this just a dead come to life party or something?" Dawn asked. "You know, BYOB- bring your own body?"

"Can't say I know," Doyle said, "but I'm not about to be looking this gift horse in the mouth." He paused. "I could use a drink."

On the ground, below all of the commotion, Brandon stared at Claire. He'd done the spell. He knew he'd done it, as best he could, and it should have worked. Where was she? Why wasn't she coming back?

"WHY CAN'T ANYONE HEAR ME?" Claire demanded, stomping her foot. "LISTEN TO ME. I AM CLAIRE!"

"Claire?" Brandon turned to look over his shoulders. There, standing behind him, he could see the outline of her body. His heart sank. His spell had only partially worked. He hadn't brought back. He'd made her a ghost.

"YOU CAN HEAR ME, CAN'T YOU BRANDON? BROOKIE, CAN YOU HEAR ME?" Ghost-Claire stomped her foot. This ghost business was no fun, not if no one could hear her. How was she supposed to boss people around if no one could hear her?

"Claire-y!" Brookie jumped up and down excitedly. "You're see-through, Claire-y. Like jello."

Lindsey glanced over his shoulder, hoping against hope that Claire would be standing there. He saw nothing. Some power had brought the long dead back to life, but Claire, his Claire, was still dead.

TBC… this just keeps getting longer and longer. The next chapter is the last for sure… the dead and the living catch up, ghost Claire wreaks havoc, and a few more mysteries are explained.

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