Buffy left the coffee shop and headed towards the Magic Box sluggishly. She was having one of those days. The kills were adding up and the fatigue felt like a boulder in her stomach. She fidgeted with the strings on her sweatshirt. The coffee makes her twitchy, not more awake. Artificial energy is just never reliable. As she pushed open the door to the shop, Giles greeted her with an enthusiasm that could only mean one thing. Research day. Willow was already immersed in a particularly revolting text with a tentacle-covered demon spewing green pus illustrated on the cover. Xander was out getting donuts. Buffy sat down and flipped open to a random page. She didn't feel like actually reading it so she just stared at it for awhile until she saw Giles out of the corner of her eye giving her a questioning look.
"How're you holding up?" he asked softly.
"Like a fortress," she mumbled bleakly. Then, "that's just been hit by an onslaught of trebuchet," under her breath.
"You look tired. Did you sleep okay?" Giles fretted.
"I'm fine," Buffy looked back down at the book she wasn't reading.
"I think we've got things covered here."
"Yeah we'll manage if you need to..." Willow spoke up.
"Go get some rest," Giles suggested. Buffy finally gave in and went to the back room to sleep. She laid down on the couch in the corner but she saw it again. The flash. Every time she closed her eyes. She saw in an instant the suffering of those who had died in the apocalypse. The people she could've saved. Children, mothers, doctors, firefighters. Every individual had a complex life. But she had failed them.
"You're not responsible for them. Don't think you have to carry the weight of the world on your shoulders just because you have the ability to save it. You still can't win every battle. But that's how it was always going to be. You could never have saved them." Xander's words startled her.
"How do you know..." Buffy started to say. Xander shushed her and gave her a knowing look. He always understood. Buffy started to cry and he hugged her silently.