Watch me Fall

Summary: Set in season fives "Checkpoint". When the watchers council comes to Sunnydale, Buffy and Spike take an immediate disliking to their top young watcher Guinevere Price. But they soon discover that there is more to this young watcher then meets the eye. Eventual Spike/OC and Buffy/Angel Though that may be very eventual Rated M for future sexual content and probably swearing and violence.

A/N: Ok so this is my first attempt at a Spike/OC story so cut me some slack. Firstly, I will most likely stick to the basic story line of season five eg: Glory, the key but I wont stick to an episode by episode breakdown.

Prologue: "Death is your gift"

The streets of Sunnydale were completely empty, bathed only in the dim fluorescent lighting of a single street lamp that stood flickering on the corner. Dark clouds covered the moon, ridding the streets of its silver glow, and the shops lining the road were dark, empty; the only sound being the chirping of crickets and the distant barking of a dog.

Without warning the lamp on the corner flickered and died leaving the street in complete darkness. A howling wind began to violently toss the trees from side to side, causing a symphony of rustling leaves and creaking wood. However one sound rang out, dominant from all others; the sound of heels hitting the pavement, rushing closer and closer with every moment that passed.

As the clouds were pushed to the side, allowing a flood of silver moonlight to pour onto the empty lane, a petite blonde, no older then twenty-one, sprinted around the corner and rushed down the path; moving surprisingly fast for a girl so tiny. Her arms were brought up to her sides as she continued running in long powerful strides, her feet barley touching the ground; moving with the stance of a hero, though her pretty face was filled with angst.

The girl came to a sudden stop at the end of the road, her black leather heels digging into the asphalt as she bought her strong slender body to a halt, her blonde hair swirling around her like a sea of gold. The moon had once more been hidden by the ever darkening clouds, leaving the small girl alone in the shadows, standing completely still in her venerability, her hazel eyes moving steadily across the surroundings- searching for something.

"Looking for me honey?"

In the blink of an eye the small girl spun around, her eyes widening in dismay as she found herself staring into the deep blue eyes of a blonde woman barley taller then her .The woman's well manicured hands were placed on her slender hips and her curly blonde hair fell just below her shoulders, brushing against her tight fitting red dress, a deceitful smile pulling at the corner of her lips

"Glory…" the small girl whispered her name and as the words escaped her lips she looked like nothing more then a young girl- lost in the darkness and clinging to any shred of hope she could find.

Without warning Glory lashed out, smashing her fist against the other girls jaw. The small blonde went flying, as if the Glory's arm had been made of steel, landing with a thud on the road a few feet away, sending hairline cracks across the bitumen that surrounded her.

"And that just gets to be more fun every time I do it" Glory exclaimed with a wide smile, rubbing her hands together and flashing her pearly white teeth.

The small blonde dragged herself back onto her feet with a twisted sort of grace, like a deer that had broken its fragile legs and as she turned back to face her attacker, there was a new sense of determination shining in her hazel green eyes.

"What have you done with Dawn?" she asked quietly, her eyes locked to the deep blue eyes of the assassin that stood in front of her; suddenly she looked more like a hero then a child

Glory's crimson red lips twisted into a conniving smirk and she tilted her head to the side, arching one of her perfectly shaped eyebrows

"You mean my key?"

The blonde girls determined glare faltered for the briefest of moments and within the blink of an eye Glory was holding a whimpering teenage girl in her arms, her biceps locking firmly around the girls slender shoulders. The child looked barley fifteen, her large blue eyes filled with innocent fear as she stared at her sister in front of her, tears spilling from her eyes and winding their way down her rosy child like cheeks.

"Buffy please… don't let her hurt me" she begged her voice cracking with fight and emotion

Glory smirked and placed her pale hand over Dawns mouth. The young girls' eyes widened with panic and she attempted to scream but the sound was muffled under the woman's strong grip.

"Is it really worth it Slayer?" Glory asked, holding Dawn steady as she thrashed in her arms "The lives of your friends and your mom? This key isn't even your sister"

Buffy watched as more tears streamed down Dawns face from her ocean blue eyes. She was screaming her name over and over again like some sort of mantra, each word growing more desperate then the next, but the sound was muffled by Glory's hand.

Glory watched her, still smirking as she held Dawn in her arms, not even flinching as the teenager slammed her small fists against her capturers body in a desperate attempt to come free. Buffy watched and waited, feeling her whole body turn cold; freezing right down to her bones.

"Kill her…"it was as if she wasn't even aware of what she was saying- only that she didn't want to fight a losing battle anymore.

Glory smirked and took Dawns pretty little head in her hands, leaning forward to whisper in her shell like ear.

"Hear that honey? Not even big sis can stop me…"

Dawn pupils dilated in disbelief and single tear rolled down her cheek, falling onto her lips as Glory's hand came free of her mouth.

"Buffy?" she whimpered

With one quick movement Glory snapped Dawns neck to the side sending a loud crack rippling through the cold night air. Buffy watched her sister's lifeless body drop to the ground, her head lolling vulgarly sideways on her broken neck, innocent blue eyes hollow and her pupils dilated.

Glory kicked the child's dead corpse making it jolt and Buffy felt a rippling pain strike through her upper chest. The Slayer fell to her knees and let her head hit the hard floor, tears instantly forming in her hollow green eyes. .

Glory showed no sign of sympathy as she watched Buffy gasp in pain and sob in desperation. After a few moments she moved forward and grabbed the Slayer by a hunk of her golden blonde hair, wrenching her tear stained face upwards.

"You killed her bitch..." Glory told her with a twisted smirk "You killed your sister"



Buffy Summers awoke with a gasp, her chest heaving as if she'd been running for miles. Her hazel green eyes darted around the room, squinting into the darkness in an attempt to decipher her whereabouts; it took only a few moments for her to realize that she was lying fully dressed on her living room couch with the television still on in front of her, now displaying one of those late night shopping shows that nobody ever watched.

Buffy's eyes lingered for a moment on the handsome man who was now holding up a large steak knife and showing how it could cut through a soda can, before she reached over and switched the set off, easing herself up off the couch. The Slayer wiped away the beads of sweat that had formed on her brow and tied her long blonde hair up into a messy ponytail, still shaken from her violent dream.

But it hadn't been the first; nor the second; or the third. These dreams had been coming to her every night, like some sort of manipulative nightmare that wouldn't leave her and it was always the same- Glory, Dawn, and Buffy encouraging the beast to kill her little sister, then simply watching as the life evaporated from her deep blue eyes. Now Buffy was beyond worried and far from scared- She'd been having prophetic dreams since she was barley older then Dawn, it was one of the many quips that came with being the Slayer, and the sinking sensation in her lower stomach told her all she needed to know- she was having these dreams for a reason.

Suddenly a loud sound broke the silence making Buffy jump in spite of herself. The deafening ringing of the phone split through the sleepy silence like a hot knife through butter and Buffy made a grab for it, not wanting to wake her slumbering mother or sister.

"Hello?" she whispered groggily into the phone

"Buffy?" the voice of an anxious British male rang in her ears as the slayer stretched her arms up above her head.

"Giles?" Buffy pushed her sweat ridden hair out of her eyes and glanced up at the digital clock on the mantle. The shining red numbers told that it was just past two in the morning.

"Yes… How are you?" her watcher asked sounding strained as Buffy arched an eyebrow in mild surprise.

"You know here in America we have this little tradition where we don't call people at two in the morning the find out how they are" Buffy informed him cynically, stifling a yawn as she leant on the wall, still holding the phone to her ear.

"I know it's late…" Giles sounded flustered as he cleared his throat loudly "But I'm afraid I have some urgent news we need to discuss"

The Slayer closed her eyes and sighed loudly; waiting for her anxious watcher to continue his speech

"I just received a call from the watchers council…" he informed her "And it seems that they have found some vital information… about Glory"

Buffy's eyes snapped open at the sound of her name and the images of the curly haired blonde snapping her sister's neck flashed through her mind making her stomach muscles clench with trepidation.

"What about her? Have they found out how I can kill her?"

"Well…" Giles voice trailed of as if he were bracing himself for Buffy's reaction "They wouldn't tell me… they insisted that they had to come here in person"

There was a deadly silence as the slayers grip tightened on the phone, threatening to break the flimsy plastic in half.

"What? But why? Couldn't they just tell you over the phone? Why do they have to come here?" she demanded angrily, as if it were her watchers fault that all this was happening

"They assured me that the information was vital and that it must be given to you in person…" Giles sighed and Buffy knew that he was busy cleaning his glasses on his sweater "In fact our good friend Quentin Travers in on his way here as we speak"

"Giles…" Buffy felt her heart begin to thump as a new thought crosses her mind "You…you didn't tell them about Dawn did you?"

"Of course not!" he hastily assured her "Look I don't know why they've chosen to do this but its best we just play along. If their information is as vital as they tell me then, we're not in any position to be passing this sort of offer up…"

Buffy sighed long and hard, massaging her temples with the tip of her fingers. The watchers council- coming here? The last two times Buffy had come to blows with the council they had tried to kill her and barley missed on both occasions.

One such occasion was when she was still back in her senior year of high school; apparently it was some twisted sort of tradition that when a slayer turned 18 she was stripped of her powers and forced to fight a psychotic vampire using only the skills of her mind. Buffy had been successful- barley, but even though she had passed the test, Giles had not, and Quentin Travers had proceeded to fire him, later replacing him with the bumbling Wesley Windom-Pryce.

The second occasion had been only last year, when the mentally unstable slayer, Faith had awoken from an eight month coma and used an enchanted contraption to switch bodies with Buffy. The council had then attempted to kill Buffy, while she was in Faiths body, ignoring her desperate pleas that Faith was going to try and harm her family and friends. Again Buffy had got away, but only just, managing to switch their bodies back as Faith fled the town.

Though she had warned the council to stay away from her on many occasions they were always trying to be a part of her life- interfering when ever they found to opportunity to do so. Still- if they had information that would help her protect Dawn- there was no way she could turn them down.

"Okay…" she finally surrendered with an exasperated sigh "I'll tell the others tomorrow and I'll meet you in the Magic Box for some training"

"Alright….have a good rest Buffy- you're going to need it" Giles advised her

"I don't doubt that…Goodnight"

As she placed the phone back on the hook, Buffy sighed loudly and buried her face in her hands. It was all getting to be too much for her; her inability to fight Glory, finding out that Dawn was the key, Riley taking off so suddenly, her mom getting sicker and sicker… and now this. Buffy dragged her fatigued body over to the stairs and pulled herself up them one by one.

To make matters worse, these dreams had been becoming more frequent and more violent and she knew they meant something. Usually her nightmares ended up being a prophesy for some new way the world would end- but these ones meant much more- she could feel it. The slayer paused as she came to the closed door that lead into her sister's room and leaning forward to quietly twist the handle, she poked her head around the corner, letting her eyes rest upon her slumbering little sister.

Dawns eyes were shut peacefully and she lay on her side, clinging onto a battered little plush toy pig that's colour had faded from pink to white. Buffy remembered giving her that stuffed animal when she had moved out of home and into one of the dormitories on campus- insisting that Mr Gordo would look after Dawn when her big sister was not around.

But that memory was not real- Buffy realized that now -None of the memories she had with the small girl she'd shared so much of her life with had been real. Not the time when they had played endlessly on the merry-go-round the first birthday Dawn had spent in Sunnydale, or the time when she, Dawn and Angel had made a snowman so long ago when the miracle snow had fallen from the sky; all the Thanksgivings dinners, Christmas Mornings, birthday parties- they were all just some illusion the monks had created only a few months ago.

Buffy moved into the room, and shut the door behind her, still watching her little sister sleep peacefully, so blissfully unaware of the world that was falling apart around her.

Somehow, none of that mattered anymore. There was a part of the slayer that just didn't care what Dawn was- she was her sister through and through- if not by blood then by the love she felt radiating out of her every time she watched her sister live.

As she lay down on the bed next to Dawn, and pulled the covers around her, Buffy knew that this was the beginning of some sort of new battle she would be forced to fight. Her arms wrapped around the small girls body and she felt her sisters' heart beating against her chest, as she snuggled closer to her.

Buffy didn't care what happened anymore. Let them come. Let everything come. She would protect her sister till the end of the world and kill everyone and anyone who tried to hurt her. She had made a promise to herself when she had seen Dawn in her parents arms the night they returned from the hospital; she would always look after her, no matter what. The slayer would stand by her side and let the world crumble around them as she held her sister close.

In the end, if it came down to it, Buffy would die for her. She knew that now; and as she watched Dawns mouth curve into a small subconscious smile, she felt her body relax for the first time in months. The slayer laid her head down on her Dawn's soft shoulder and closed her eyes, drifting into a rare and peaceful sleep.

She may be the key; and maybe these memories were just some spell that had been burnt into her mind- but the love Buffy felt for Dawn was not something that could have just been conjured by a magic book and a couple of Latin words strung together. It was the love of one sister for another and it was a love she would die for.

No matter what.

A/N: Please review and tell me what you think!