A/N: The thing that happens with Dawn at the beginning isn't something I really came up with, but I really can't remember where I read it. If whoever came up with that is reading this, please let me know and I'll give you credit and cookies. Rest assured that's the only thing I borrowed.

I hope everybody likes this. It's definitely AU, but I've tried to keep as close to canon as I could where things didn't need to be changed. Please do the reviewing thing. I like it lots. Concrit very welcome, flames laughed at. Don't worry about this not getting finished-- there's 30,000 more words where this came from, and I'm getting it posted as fast as I can. Enjoy!

Chapter One
Of Keys and Empty Houses

Demons. Corpses. Demon corpses. Survivors, maybe. Spike and Angel weren't dust, but they weren't exactly conscious either.

"We need to get them somewhere." Dawn's voice rang out like a shot in the silence. "The rest of the team is two hours behind us, at least."

Buffy nodded, mentally distancing herself from meanings at the moment, from ramifications and choices and feelings. Just another job. She couldn't let herself think right now. "Let's get them into the car. We'll find someplace. I think the Hyperion was burnt down, but there may be something left. We can try there first." She started trying to negotiate carrying the two knocked-out vampires to the car six blocks away, outside the wide radius of rubble and fallen buildings, and all but dropped them when she heard Dawn scream. She did drop them when she looked at her sister, seeing her surrounded by a blinding green light. "DAWN!" Buffy rushed toward her. The light was taking over everything, and Buffy only vaguely registered Dawn gesturing for her not to come any closer as she reached out to grab her. The light faded, the world faded and fell away, spinning, until they landed hard on the...grass?

"What just happened?" Dawn said, her voice trembling.

Buffy shook her head. "I don't know. Did you... did you touch something, do something?"

"No, I didn't do anything, I was just standing...oh my god."

Buffy and Dawn registered the sight before them at the same time, the house. As long as it had been, it was really no time at all, and they'd have known it anywhere. "Oh my god is right. We're either in Hell or Sunnydale."

"Or both."

"Point."

"Is this real?"

"Feels like it is... you must've done some...Key...portal...thing."

"I didn't mean to!"

"Shh. I know. We just need to figure out what's going on, where this really is, what this really is, like if we're..." Buffy forgot words as she looked down at her outfit. The shoes gave it away, idiotic as that was. They'd been ruined some three years ago by demon goo. "Dawn, we're..." A look at her hands clenched it. No scars. "Dawn. I think we've gone back in time somehow, put into our bodies from back then."

Dawn took stock of her own body, her centre of gravity awkward from a shorter height she wasn't used to. "I think you're right. I'm a lot younger."

Buffy held out her hands. "Look. The scars are gone. I haven't..."

Dawn immediately lifted her t-shirt. Her own scars were absent as well. "And Glory hasn't..."

"Oh my god." They both came to the same realisation, logic going out the window as they ran into the house.

"MOM!" They both shouted in unison. No answer. A quick look around the house confirmed their fears.

Buffy put her arm around Dawn. "I think we're too late for that."

Dawn sighed. "I don't think I could've gone through it again."

"Okay, so, we're back here. Is this an...an accident, or were we sent back to change something?

Dawn shook her head. "I don't know. I've never been much for the quantum leaping. But, I mean, considering, maybe it's about stopping Glory. With both of us alive."

"Makes sense. All we'd have to do is get Ben. But god, Dawnie, I don't know if I can kill a... a person."

"A person hosting a hellgod."

"Point taken."

"And, I mean, just think of all the things we could fix! Keep Tara alive, keep Willow from going all scary-veiny-destructo, keep Xander from leaving Anya..."

"Spike," Buffy whispered.

"Spike! Right!"

"I could do it right this time," Buffy said, more to herself than to Dawn. "But... we shouldn't get ahead of ourselves. I mean, how do we know we're here for that reason? What if this is just some fluke, and our past selves are all weirded out and stuck in the future?"

"Then they'll figure it out and find a way to switch back. They've got a thousand things working for them there that we don't. If they're even there."

"So maybe we shouldn't change things."

"Buffy, do you think for a second that you could just sit back and watch all those mistakes get made again?"

"What if they weren't mistakes? What if it was meant to be that way?"

"Fuck that. How many doom and gloom prophecies have you skirted around now? When that glowy thing happened to me, I felt something weird. It was like I... I don't know, I can't explain it. I knew it was right."

"Well, your glowing, I guess, your call." She sighed. "And you're right. If we're here past Glory, there's no way I could let things play out the way they did before. Too bad this isn't really Quantum Leap. We'd have that dude with the computer thing to tell us what to do."

"Yeah, but then we'd be Scott Bakula, and that's never good."

"Please don't start on the Enterprise rant again."

"Sorry. I wonder if that's even on yet." Dawn sat down on the couch and turned on the TV.

Buffy flopped down next to her. "This is so not the time for TV-watching."

"I'm trying to figure out the date!" she exclaimed, flipping to the Weather Channel. "God. Mom's funeral was yesterday."

"Okay, so, where are we today, and what are we doing?"

"Uh, looks like we're here."

"I mean the last time, but-- oh, god! What if the past us...es...the past you and me...are still here?"

"We wouldn't be, not and have these bodies."

"Oh, good. I really hate time paradoxes. Why do you know that, anyway?"

Dawn smirked. "I read. You should try it. Okay, so, today... oooh. I'm probably angsting and trying to raise Mom. I'm not sure what you're doing."

"No raising Mom."

"That goes without saying."

"I think I was just around here moping. Do you think we should tell Giles about this?"

"Nuh-uh. I know this isn't exactly the Sci-Fi channel, but if people are sent back to do something, they're not really supposed to... y'know, tell. And that'd be soooo hard to explain. We can do some research, but I think for now we need to operate on the assumption that we're here to change the Glory badness and concentrate on that. But I don't want to say anything to anyone until we're sure what this is."

"Okay, Watcher-lady, you're the boss. All right, so, we're grieving. Probably not too hard to pretend. Everyone already knows you're the Key, so no worries there. Can't be too nice to Spike, or I can't, anyway. Have to work up to it. Or, wait, do you think I should keep that the same?"

"I think we should try to change anything that we think was a mistake."

"Well, the way I treated Spike was like, mistake-o bellgrande, so that definitely falls under changing. At least Riley's gone. I don't think I could deal with him, knowing what I know. I think thing number one is to get Ben gone, keep you from those knight guys. Oh! And no shoplifting, missy!"

"Don't worry. I don't have to learn that lesson twice."

"Okay, so we're agreed? We tell no one?"

"No one. And I think we should like... discuss it before we try to change anything major. But I think we're pretty much agreed on it all. God, I just hope we don't screw up."

"We'll do okay. One apocalypse at a time. But Dawn, I don't think we're going to be able to save everyone every time. We might lose people still, and we've got to be ready for that. But we have to be able to do some good, right? There's no bad here, right?"

"You sound like you're trying to convince yourself."

Buffy sighed. "Maybe I am. I guess it's just... the whole meant to be thing again."

"I think that if there's any set-in-stone destiny for anything, it's going to happen anyway. Maybe differently, but happen. Like when you tried to dodge the Master prophecy."

"So I might die anyway."

Dawn drew a ragged breath. "I don't know. Maybe. I don't want you to. And... Buffy, if you do again, I'm going to have to let them bring you back, you know that, right?"

Buffy nodded slowly. "Yeah. I understand that. But...god, just promise me I won't have to..." She looked down at her hands.

Dawn understood. She didn't want to have to claw her way out of her own grave again. "Don't worry. If it comes to that, I'll make sure... OHGOD." She looked at Buffy, eyes wide. "The Buffybot. Warren."

"Let's get Glory first, okay? Though I'm so taking out that bot the first chance I get. We don't have long for Glory, a few weeks at most. God, I can't believe I'm thinking about murder."

"Buffy, it's the only way. He died anyway, the last time."

"I know. Too bad I don't know any hitmen. If Spike didn't still have that chip... Oh, damn. The chip/soul thing. As in chip, but no soul. And I'm all non-resurrected, so he can't hurt me and... Daaaawn, it's so complicated!" Buffy buried her face in a cushion.

"Hey, one apocalypse at a time, you said. We get Glory, go from there if we're still here. Hey, I bet you could get Angel to eat him!"

Buffy snorted. "Yeah, right. He'd do a lot of things for me, but I don't think murder is one of them. Besides, I'm more than a little peeved at Angel right now, since that whole mess in LA was an Angel-made disaster."

"Spike would."

"I know he would. But he can't."

"Buffy... if Spike doesn't get the soul, could you still..."

She sighed. "Yeah. I think I could. But he's still got some changing to do. Glory first, then we'll see. I need to take out Ben and get you the hell out of town, where those knights can't get at you."


And one more note... I'm kinda new to the whole Buffy thing, so I'd love to have an experienced and picky beta for this. I've got an RL friend doing the job right now, but it's not really her thing. So if you've got mad beta skills (like the kind where you'll rip my writing apart with a rusty fork), please email me and we'll talk! 3