As We Were

Rated T for mild language, sexuality, and violence

I do not own any of these characters or things from Joss Whedon's shows: Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel.

Summary: Post Chosen as if Angel season five never happened. Season Eight of Buffy. The Scooby gang lives on a new hellmouth in Saline, Michigan. Buffy is having dreams of the deaths of girls, and life seems much like life in Sunnydale. Everything will come together in the end, and I think you will be very happy with the end result.

Chapter one:

Buffy wakes up again in a cold sweat. This is the third time just this week. It is pretty much the same dream excerpt for minor changes each time. The dream is of the battle with the First. Each night, she sees a new face of a dying SIT and feels the pain she felt. The physical pain is so real, but she also feels the pain of not being able to save the new face she sees each night. Tonight, she sees the face of a girl who looks only to be about 15. It is odd she does not remember the girl with such a face. The girl is fair skinned and on the short side. She has Dirty blonde hair and deep penetrating brown eyes. What Buffy remembers most about the dream is when an ubervamp grabs the girl by the neck, she looks up at Buffy with pleadings eyes and mouths "thanks a lot". As the girl finishes her sentence, the ubervamp snaps her neck, and she falls lifeless to the ground.

By now, Buffy has steadied her breathing. She looks over at the clock on her nightstand. It reads: 4:45. Buffy decides to get up now, She will only after to get up in 15 minutes anyways. Maybe this morning she will make a special back to school breakfast for Dawn.

It has only been four months since the battle with the First. All of the Scoobies had come to a consensus, that it is there duty to fight evil and decided to move to the Hellmouth in Cleveland, Ohio. Only some time after they got there, did they find out that there was another newly born Hellmouth in a small town in Michigan called Saline. The new Hellmouth was creating much more chaos than the one in Cleveland, so they made a decision. Faith, Andrew, and Wood would stay in Cleveland with the new Slayers including Kennedy who had just earlier called it quits with Willow and the Scoobies would Check out Saline and try to keep it free of oogly booglies.

Buffy now lives in a nicely sized house with Dawn and Willow. With all the new evil in the city, there just so happened to be another house for sale right next door to Buffy's house. Giles bought this house, and Xander bunked up with him. The area had a nice school district, so Buffy put Dawn into a school right there in Saline. The Schools did have a few openings due to unexplained deaths, so when Buffy applied for a counseling job, they practically suffocated her with hugs of joy.

Giles also found a new job in Saline. There was a quaint antique store downtown for sale. He was reluctant to buy it until he saw the basement full of magical goodies. Willow decided to attend college at the very prestigious University of Michigan. She was only fifteen minutes away from the campus in Ann Arbor, and only the smartest and most athletic got in. Willow also was still refining her magic skills and decided to help Giles run the store.

Xander was the only one who found it hard to find a job. No construction company would hire him due to his one eye, and he could not get much better than a job at Mc Donald's with only a High School diploma. He wouldn't admit it, but his lack of a job and his handycapedness was part of the reason he lived with Giles.

Life had started to settle down, and the Scoobies were beginning to get on with their new yet familiar lives. With the lack of a few friends that had been deeply been mourned for and now just being gotten over, life was almost like it was back in Sunnydale.

As Buffy finished squeezing the last orange dry, Dawn slumped sleepily down onto the stool.
"Where's Willow" Dawn asked as she yawned.
"She's at class, she had some scienceology type thingy to go to. She's crazy for getting up so early."
"Yeah. Hey, why are you up so early, and with fresh squeezed orange juice? You have never made me fresh squeezed orange juice? What do you want?" Dawn questioned with a sigh.
"Nothing, can't I make you a back to school breakfast without being accused of something? I mean, I owe you something after the hell you went through at the old school."
"I guess you're right, but you have been up a lot lately. You seem like you never get enough sleep. Is everything okay?"
"…….Sure, great. Hey at least the School here is not on the Hellmouth." Buffy replied deflecting Dawns question. Dawn didn't want to argue, and she also wanted to be in a good mood for school, so she accepted the answer.
"Yup, can't wait to find where it's located. Ooooo maybe we live on top of it!"
"Yeah, that would be just out luck. Finish you breakfast." Dwan smiled at Buffy and Buffy stifled one back. Yup, I'm dandy, only seeing and feeling girls dying in my dreams. It's probably nothing though. Maybe I'll talk to Giles or Will about it later.A honk outside pulls Buffy out of her thoughts. "Looks like our limois here to take us to school. Lets get a move on it Dawn you don't want to make Xander late for is date with the T.V."

I will continue my story if I get at least one good review! Thanks for reading this. And trust me, you will want to see what happens. I think everyone will really really like the ending. I already have a pretty good I idea of what I will have happen, but if you have any suggestions on the way, feel free to let me know!