Title: Dawn of the Son

Author: Spichik453

Chapter 12

Dawn let Giles' words sink in for a few minutes. The earthquake happened just as Buffy and Jake met. There was no question of that. Dawn took a few seconds to explore the possibility that it was just a consequence. But she had been involved in demons for too long to consider it for very long. Not when there was a prophecy about earthquakes they were studying. And the Hellmouth. It made logical sense that Buffy was the daughter of the earth and Jake was the son of the earth. Except that it didn't. She wasn't the only one that went through that thought process. She could see everyone else working out the same thoughts, and from the confused looks on everyone's faces, Dawn could tell that they were thinking the same thing.

"But the Slayer is part demon. That is not 'of the earth'" Buffy finally vocalized.

"Well the particulars don't make sense, but the rest of it all connects. It would explain Jake's slayer-like powers, it would explain the earthquake, it explains everything."

"Except the dreams." Buffy added.

"Oh yes, I quite forgot about those." Giles said. Buffy looked at Dawn. While both knew that the dreams had taken a back seat to the prophecy neither could forget about them. The now long gone Sunnydale graveyard. The demon. The tentacles. Her mom. Her mom laughing. And no matter how far she ran, there was always one more gravestone with her mother laughing, and the demon always catching up. It would seem like the run of the mill reoccurring nightmare, except that she and Buffy were having the exact same one. On the same nights, and their mom was always laughing. A demon Dawn can handle. Buffy taught her how to wield a sword. She knows when to run for help. But it was the way her mother laughed that unnerved her. Like there was some dangerous secret her mom was in on and it would lead to Dawn's death.

"Then lets figure out the particulars." Buffy sighed. She turned to Jake. "I guess this makes you a vampire slayer."

"Not a freak?"

"Oh no, still doesn't make sense. The slayer line has been female from eternity until now." Buffy said. "But it means you've officially entered training."

"Which means you study with us." Xander and Willow said together.

"And you train with me."

"Would his watcher be a girl?" Xander mused out loud. Buffy, Willow, Xander and Dawn turned towards Giles. "Since we've mostly been able to uncover guy watchers since the demise of the last council, would we have to search out and find some girl watchers to restore the balance now that the balance has been overthrown.

"Well, don't look at me. This is uncharted territory. We're going to have to use all of our resources to figure this one out."

"That earthquake means that the Hellmouth has shifted." Buffy said. "We're going to need a team here."

"Perhaps even a new branch." Willow said. "I mean Faith, Wood and Andrew are holding down London fine, and Cleveland is ok, but with a new Hellmouth means a whole new set of demons."

"Demons?" Jake whispered. "I've only ever seen vampires." His comment went unnoticed as everyone was trying to make sense of all that had happened and their next step.

"Before we even think about getting people out here to train, we need to think about what are we going to do tomorrow? And these dreams are prophetic. It is not as clear as my other prophetic dreams but it means something when Dawn is having the same one." Buffy reminded.

Suddenly, everyone was talking at once.

Jake was going on about he was ready to fight any vampire that came his way but he wasn't as sure about a demon. Would Buffy and the gang be willing to help him learn to fight?

Willow was talking about possibilities of opening a new training center branch in Seattle. The Scoobies would obviously stay together. Life isn't the same without everyone around. Would it make sense for them to move to Seattle? Who would be qualified enough to run Cleveland?

Xander was still thinking about which watcher to assign to Jake. Now that the Slayer line was all messed up, did that mean things would change for the watchers? Where would they even begin to look for a new watcher?

Buffy was just recanting the dream. Was some clue that they had missed that coincided with the prophecy about her meeting Jake and the move of the Hellmouth?

Dawn was still upset by the fact that Buffy came from a demon, not from the Earth. There was demon in her, which she used for good. And that was the slayer line. And yes, the slayer line has been messed up with all of the dying Buffy did and with the calling of the potentials, but was it messed up enough to call a male slayer? And was Jake just a fluke or was there going to be a male and a female line? Or was the whole line going to shift?

Giles couldn't help but try to answer everyone's questions while throwing out his own. It was time to get London actively involved. Should we call Faith now or should we wait until morning?

Dawn felt her pager buzz beside her. After a long shift at the hospital, which she just got done with a few short hours ago, the last thing she wanted was to be called back. She looked down, left the group, which was still talking all at once and called the hospital.

"This is Dr. Summers. I was paged?"

"Dawn, good." Dawn instantly recognized the voice of Timothy, one of her housemates.

"What are you doing answering call Timothy?"

"The nurses are all helping in trauma. I just happened to be picking up a chart when you rang. It seemed like my duty to answer. The earthquake has sent a huge number of trauma patients here. We could really use you here. There is a lot of blood and injuries and this guy just came in with the corner of a photo frame in his skull. We're talking like a frame! He cannot tell us how it got there but that's just the beginning! Someone else was lighting a fire and stumbled into the fireplace! Dawn there is some major carnage here, and tons of experience and hours are waiting for you."

Dawn was not entirely surprised that she was paged to come in. She didn't want to go. It was her time off. But at the same point, Dawn could feel herself being pulled in. She needed the trauma practice. Especially now that things were going to get worse with a Hellmouth in Seattle and Willow was talking about starting a slayer-training branch. Hellmouth plus slayers always equaled injuries. "I'm off. I've got family thing. And the earthquake messed up my sister's apartment pretty bad."

"So help us with the fun clean up here, and leave all of the unpleasant cleaning up for your sister."

Dawn sighed. "Who told you to page me?"

"Dr. Atul. He told me that we needed more trauma doctors, and you're one of them. Get your ass down here Summers. I'm not taking no for an answer."

"Ok." Dawn finally agreed. Dr. Atul, her attending, knew how much getting lots of experience meant for Dawn. He also was strict, to the point, and if you were paged in on Dr. Atul's request you did not say no. If you did, he would punish you by giving you less exciting patients or not paging you again. Dawn needed the experience too much to turn down the opportunity and experience the backlash later.

She hung up with Timothy and grabbed her jacket. Everyone stopped talking when they saw this. "That was the hospital. They need me there to help with some of the damage from the earthquake. I shouldn't be more than 5 hours or so. Most of the people will be reporting their injuries earlier rather than later." Dawn explained.

"But what about what we just discovered?" Giles seemed almost hurt by Dawn's need to leave.

"Figure it out. Call me at the hospital."

She left, and went about the routine of helping people at the emergency room. Without books on demonology, that were both dusty and beginning to smell, Dawn was excited to spend some time doing what she also did best. The traumas that Timothy said they needed help on were all taken by the time Dawn arrived. Dr. Atul also was a little bit peeved to hear Dawn's reluctance to come in when called. As such, Dawn had to settle for suturing people. She sat down at the side of one bed, without looking at the patient yet, Dawn began setting up the suture kit.

"I am Dr. Summers. Where were you cut?"

"You have grown into such a brilliant young doctor. If you had asked me 20 years ago if you were going to be a doctor I would have been hesitant, but look at you. My little Pumpkin Belly."

Dawn glanced up. The woman in front of her looked just like her mother. Talked just like her mother. The same curly hair. The same smile. Everything about her was the same. Right down to the sweater she was wearing. Dawn knew that sweater well. It was her mother's favorite sweater. The woman was looking down at Dawn with a mother's pride at seeing their daughter be a doctor. But her mom was dead. She died perfectly natural and human death almost fifteen years earlier. There was nothing in any of the books that she read about a spontaneous resurrection for someone who died such a death. And even then, such resurrections happened in a much shorter time span. Logic and most magic that Dawn knew told her that this was not her mother. Still, Dawn had to fight every muscle in her body to fight her desire to hug this woman. She looked like her mother, not even a day older than the day she died. She talked like her mother. Everything about her said Joyce Summers. Dawn sat there stunned. "M-m-mom?" She stumbled out.

"No. I just look like her. And talk like her. I have the same memories but I am not your mother." The woman said.

"Who are you?" Dawn stood up, frightened by this woman. She stumbled back a few paces. "You're the first."

"No."

"Who are you?"

"Someone that cut their leg and needs stitches."

"You, you, you have to find another doctor." Dawn said. "You cannot just call me Pumpkin Belly, tell me you're not my mother, and then ask for stitches on your leg. Who are you?"

"I am here to help."

"Why does mystical help need stitches?"

"Because I am bleeding."

"Demon?" Dawn cautiously took a couple of steps closer to the woman.

"Born that way. Sort of morph depending on my needs."

"Your need is to look like my mother."

"I don't have any power over what I look like. What form I take, or if I am able to bleed. By the way, my leg hurts. Can you please take care of that soon? I began to look like this a few days ago. And I'm sorry about what I said before about you being a brilliant doctor and being my pumpkin belly. Like I said. I have no control over who I am, and sometimes that leads me to say things."

"What are you?"

"Here to help. And that's all you need to know. Tomorrow I will be on the graveyard. Go there. Bring your sister. The information I have relates to both of you."

"Which one? Which graveyard?"

"Trust your instincts Dr. Summers. You'll know." Dawn began to clean the leg. "I was planning on going to your house this afternoon and telling you there. I was not planning on meeting you at your workplace. Work and demons should never mix."

"So you are a demon."

"Born that way. But it's complicated now."

Dawn decided not to press the issue any longer and finished the stitches on the woman's leg and watched her walk away. It was like watching her mother walk down the hall. The idea of it all unnerved Dawn. What was this woman doing? She knew that she could not stay at work any longer, and went home, much to the annoyance and disgruntled approval of Dr. Atul. Dawn knew the professional price she was paying but decided it was needed.

After telling the Scoobies about the encounter with the unnamed demon that looked like her mother, they stood there mouths open. A stunned silence that did not seem to match their usual talk all at once with theories and plans and ideas. The silence was making Dawn unusually uneasy. She slowly shifted her weight from one foot to the other, waiting impatiently for someone to say something. There was nothing more she could add to her story, so it wasn't her turn to say anything. Xander just had his arms around Buffy, and was clearly waiting for her cue. As soon as Dawn mentioned that their mother was at the hospital that afternoon, Buffy's body tensed up and Xander went into protect and comfort mode. This led to putting his arms around Buffy. The result was an instant relaxation. Buffy, on the other hand, was waiting for Giles' cue. Giles, on the other hand, thought Buffy should have the first word. Willow, amazingly, had nothing to say and was still stunned by the news. Jake sat on the couch, listening but not understanding. He should have been out with the other slayers, but he was way behind them on training and they had not returned yet; fact that added to the uneasiness but not enough to mention.

Dawn had had enough of everyone staring at each other. Time was running short. There were demons, apocalypses, and more vampires running around that needed to be taken care of. "Is someone going to say something?" She finally said.

Xander opened his mouth as if he was about to say something, but then changed his mind. Willow was next to do the same.

"Your mom is dead, right?" Jake said from on the couch.

"Yes." Dawn said. "For a while now. A completely natural and human death."

"Just making sure."

"When was the last time we actually had a demon admit that they were a demon when they were in human disguise?" Xander asked.

"It's only happened like once or twice." Willow confirmed.

Giles took off his glasses, and pulled his white handkerchief out of his pocket and cleaned them. "I think meeting with this demon is a bad idea." He said, sliding the glasses back onto his face. "This could be a trap or an ambush. And with those dreams you've been having they could be an omen as to what this demon has in mind."

"That's why we go." Buffy said, gently freeing herself from Xander's embrace. "We go in with backup. We'll take the other slayers and put them into position. And Dawn's encounter with this demon was perfectly civil. There is a chance this demon is on our side."

"Because that is usually what happens when a demon decides to make a heart to heart appointment in the cemetery. I'm sorry, I agree with Giles on this one." Xander added

"That is why we go out with a full force. We will just put everyone into position before the meet, and wait it out. If it turns out to be a fight, we fight, and we fight with a slayer's army. If it's peaceful then it's just a nice evening in a graveyard, and we do patrolling."

Jake stood up and joined the circle. "Will I be able to come to this?"

Buffy took a moment to assess how battle ready Jake was. Dawn did the same. She knew he could fight, or at least she knew he could tell stories about a good fight. The others actually knew what his fighting abilities were like. He had that determined look in his eyes. Determined, enthusiastic, with just a glitter of excitement. But she also knew that she had stitched him up three different times over the past week. From a doctor's perspective she would have to strongly discourage it. From someone who worked closely with slayers, her opinion was that he was probably an enthusiastic and sloppy fighter. A bad combination. Dawn suddenly found herself feeling protective of Jake.

"No." Dawn said. Everyone stared at her. When it came to fighting, no one ever asked for Dawn's thoughts. Nor had she ever offered them before. And if she ever came close to offering them before, it was never as strongly as she had just insisted.

"Excuse me?" Buffy asked, taking charge.

"As his doctor, I really don't like the idea of him going out to fight. I have now stitched up his head, his leg and his arm this week. And that is in the past three nights that he's gone patrolling. I will have to be at the graveyard with you, and I cannot be here to do the medical side of things. Besides, he's not as trained as the others. Probably a sloppy fighter. Which would explain the constant need for stitches."

"Hey!" Jake began to defend himself but one glare from Buffy shut him up.

Everyone took a second to listen to Dawn. Just as they were realizing that Dawn's argument had some weight, Giles spoke up. "Although, there is probably a reason why the slayer line is co-ed. Maybe Jake and Buffy are strongest when they fight together," While Giles was talking, Dawn suddenly had flashes of a possible future. Of Jake and Buffy finding out how strong they were together, and the great foes they defeated. Of Buffy and Jake realizing that the fights actually brought them to be best friends, and then lovers. Of a heartbroken Xander. But more importantly, a heartbroken Dawn. "The original slayer for this generation and the first male slayer have to possess some powerful bond.

"Then let's get some practice in." Buffy agreed. "Jake, head down to the basement so I can see what you fight like."