Everything Buffy and Doctor Who don't belong to me. And if you catch any of the other little things I've stolen and used here and there (mostly just names) ... they don't belong to me either.

Buffy stared at the phone, willing it to ring. The past week had been boring beyond boring. Even the week before had been incredibly dull. There was just a fyarl demon in Old Town, a couple of vamps in the Gaslamp Quarter (fancied themselves Anne Rice vampires—could they get any more clichéd?), and an alien landing his ship for a camping trip in East County. One, camping was a uniquely human experience (which apparently was the alien's reason for trying it), and two, who would want to go camping out in San Diego East County?

There were no world-ending apocalypses or invasions. Normally the quiet would suggest the coming of an even greater bout of trouble than before, but that was not the case in San Diego. She was almost considering moving to the Los Angeles branch where at least the demon activity was fairly constant due to the evil lawyers Angel hated so much. Plus, Angel was in Sunnydale and not LA, so it wasn't as if she'd have to see him.

But she couldn't abandon her little UNIT team. She had served with them for almost two years now, and they were like family. It would take something a lot bigger than boredom for her to leave them.

'Maybe I could call Dawn and see if she wants to meet in LA this weekend for some sister bonding and shopping,' Buffy thought. 'But after the last one… maybe not.'

Buffy had tried to get close to her sister after she came back from her travels with the Doctor, but Dawn kept pushing her away. Angel tried to comfort Buffy by saying that it was just Dawn's way of dealing with the fear of losing Buffy again; after the years thinking her older sister died for her, it was too hard for her to risk getting close to Buffy only to lose her all over again. But knowing that didn't help. And added to that Buffy could see as plain as Whistler's bad taste in clothes that Dawn preferred the new family she had made for herself.

Tim walked into her office. Good old, reliable Tim. He was her techie genius, essential to her team, even if he did tend to make long, drawn out explanations in some unintelligible techno-babble only to have to then translate in ten words or less right after so everyone else in the room could understand.

"Hey, Buffy," he said with a smile. "I was wondering if I could take the rest of the afternoon off. It's been pretty quiet, and it is Friday."

"Sure, go ahead, Tim. Gotta date with Amy tonight?"

"Um… well… um, not till Sunday." He gave a goofy, absolutely Tim grin. "My parents are coming into town and they're going to meet her Saturday, and then Sunday we'll have to ourselves."

"Have fun," she said as he left. "Someone around here needs smoochies."

"I keep telling you, boss, that there is no reason why you can't get your smoochies on."

Buffy gave a mock scowl to the woman now leaning on her doorframe. "Thank you, Sam, but no."

"Come on, Buff, I was going to this great club with some friends. I know of one or two in particular who would love to dive straight into a meaningless relationship with you for a while. You don't need to commit if you feel you can't because of your job. Just a bit of fun, what do you say?"

"Have you seen my dating record?"

"Hmm." Samantha's eyes glazed over. "I've seen one dream boat you let sail away."

"Who?"

"The not very tall, bleached hair, British hunk of wonderful."

"Spike?" Buffy spluttered. "No, we never have… never will. He's delusional."

"If that's what delusional looks like, who wants to be sane?" With that Sam left.

Smoochies, family, Spike. It all brought back her original thought about Dawn and her new family. Spike was a brother or an uncle to Dawn, and even after all these years he held on to his promise to protect her. Then there was Dawn's new parental figure: Angel. Never in her most unsettling Slayer dreams did Buffy ever think that Dawn would come to like the souled vampire. But to imagine her having a father/daughter relationship with him was beyond wigsome. Of course, it was mostly due to the fact that Dawn was now engaged to Angel's miracle child, Connor.

Buffy nearly had a coronary the day she found them all living in Angel's mansion in Sunnydale. It was the day she first returned to Sunnydale three years before.

HXHXHXHXHXHXHXHXHXHXH

By the time Buffy and Tim were pulling up to 1630 Revello Drive the two were good friends. Buffy had shared stories of her time as a slayer and then with the Doctor, and he had told her about the different things he had seen with UNIT in Southern California.

"Home sweet home," Buffy muttered while she sat staring at the house that held so many memories.

"Do you want me to come with you, or should I stay here?" Tim asked.

Buffy turned to face him. "I don't know. I don't know if I'm ready for this."

"Sure you are. Nothing to be afraid. These are your friends, right?"

"Yeah, my friends… who think I've been dead for the past four years. What am I supposed to do? Just waltz in and say 'Hi Honey, I'm home?'"

"No, but you are going to have to go up there and see who is home."

"You're right… Wait! Dawn! She'd be at school. I don't think anyone will be here…"

"Buffy."

"All right," she grumbled. "I'll go and see."

She unbuckled her seat belt and slowly got out of the car. As she was turning from the door to step up to the curb, the front door of the house opened.

"Xander!" she called.

He stared at her in shock. "Willow did it. She really did it," he said. He recovered himself and ran to grab her in a tight hug. "My god, she actually did it."

"It's good to see you too, Xander," Buffy said. He released her and just stared as if he she would disappear if he even blinked. "But what did Willow do?"

"She brought you back." Then he looked at the car, and at Tim who was then standing on the other side. "She brought you back from…"

"No," Buffy said when he didn't continue. "I brought me back."

"But you were in a hell dimension." He didn't sound certain as he looked at her and the car.

"No, no, I wasn't in Hell. Where's Dawn? Is she okay? Can I see her?" Buffy moved to go inside.

"She doesn't live here anymore," Xander said.

"But this is our house. Our mother left it to us. Why doesn't she…"

"Buffy," Tim interrupted while looking around the street. "Maybe we should talk somewhere more private."

"I want to see Dawn," Buffy told Xander.

He seemed reluctant. "All right. I'll take you to where you can find her. It's the mansion on Crawford's Street."

"The mansion on… but that's where… huh?"

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At the mansion she learned that Dawn was living there with Spike, Angel, and Connor. Spike had explained that it hadn't started that way. After Buffy had disappeared, Dawn stayed at Revello Drive with Willow and Tara. But Willow became obsessed with bringing Buffy back with magic—with the horrifying side effect of becoming addicted to magic. Her power-hungry obsession drove Dawn away; it even drove Tara to leave. Dawn ran to Spike for help, but his crypt wasn't for a teenage girl. Only because of his promise to take care of Dawn did he swallow his pride and feelings about the mansion and took her to Angel's place. Neither of them fully trusting the souled vampire, he stayed there too.

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"Buffy?"

Buffy brought herself out of the memory and saw the last member of her team standing in her office: right hand man, Thomas Motts.

"Sorry, Tommy, I was thinking."

"Hmm, never a good sign. You know thinking is dangerous to your health. It leads to ideas and then it all goes downhill from there. Concepts, actions, reactions. Best not to tempt it."

"I'll keep that in mind," she said with a smile, having heard this philosophy several times before.

"Can I give you a ride home?"

"Sure."

As he drove them to her apartment, he glanced over at her. "Is everything alright?"

"I don't know," she answered honestly. "I just have a feeling that something has to happen soon. Things have been too easy, too quiet."

"I wouldn't call that fight with the Tallaxian bittersnout four weeks ago easy or quiet. Man, that was one hell of a demon. I still say that I could have sworn it broke your neck when it threw you. Thirty feet and you landed against that building head first. I thought for sure your neck wasn't as it should have been, and you were out for at least two minutes."

"If I had broken my neck, I wouldn't be alive, Tommy. It must have been the light or something. Because look! Not dead. I think once and almost twice was more than enough to come back from."

Tommy didn't say anything more, but Buffy knew he still didn't agree. He still thought that she had broken her neck and should be dead. It wasn't a comfortable thought for either of them. She decided to change the subject to get both of their minds off of it.

"I think I'll do a few extra sweeps during patrol tonight. Do you have any plans, or do you want to come with?" She knew he was still suffering from a bad breakup from the month before.

"Just plans with my couch, a few good films, and some popcorn. We could do that after together."

"Sure." She was glad he dealt with his feelings with movies rather than magic. She didn't need to end up groping with the enemy again. And why were all her thoughts today going back to that stupid bleached vampire?

"What movies?" she asked as they stepped out of the car.

"Well, all the alien and monster movies are out. I'm not really up for that much of a laugh. How about a Hitchcock night?"

"Just what I need right now," Buffy said with a fake sigh. "An unhealthy fear of the shower."

"Oh, come on! You could kick Norman Bates' ass any time."

She laughed and started to walk away to her apartment as he got into his car again. She was still smiling, only a step from where she was by the car when she heard the shots. Even as she heard it she felt the punch to the chest and fell back onto the pavement. She knew she hit the ground, she knew she was in pain, but she didn't feel anything. Everything was numb. Her vision was going black even though her eyes were still open. Then the black took over completely, and she was lost in nothing.

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"Oh, come on! You could kick Norman Bates' ass any time." Tommy had no doubt that had his boss been at the motel that the plot would have taken a very different turn. Although, he couldn't really see her ever being so desperate for money that she'd steal forty thousand and run away either.

She was laughing and turning away and he ducked down into his car. He was reaching to close the door when shots echoed around the apartment complex. He jumped out of the car and scanned the buildings. Nothing. No glint of a gun or shadow of the shooter on the rooftops or the windows. Then he realised Buffy wasn't standing nearby anymore.

He ran around the front of his car and stopped in complete shock when he saw her. She was on her back, eyes open, blood seeping out from her chest over her blouse, more blood on the pavement coming from the back of her head where it had hit hard.

The shock lasted less than a second. In the next he was kneeling by her side and putting pressure on the chest wound, yelling for help. He held the wound with one hand and used the other to grab his cell. But his cell wasn't at his side; it was still in the car. No one seemed to be around to call for help. For the first time in his career as a cop and then with UNIT he felt panic wash over him like being covered in ice water and being on fire at the same time.

In only a few seconds since hearing the shots, Buffy was dead.

Tommy stood slowly, still not wanting to believe all the signs. But he had to call for the UNIT M.E. He stood, turned, took one step, then another.

From behind him came a gasp. He turned back to Buffy. She was sitting up and breathing deeply and raggedly. She looked at him with wide eyes. He just stared back, and then his eyes went down to the wound. Though there was a bloody hole in the shirt, the skin was perfect.

"Why aren't you dead?" he asked.

She winced. "Ow."