Disclaimer: I do not own Buffy the Vampire Slayer, nor do I own Battlestar Galactica. They are owned by Joss Whedon and Ronald D. Moore respectively. I merely play with their toys while they're away. Also, this series entirely ignores anything not directly mentioned in Battlestar Galactica, so ignore anything from Caprica. This was conceived before that, so I'm not letting it hamper my creativity.

"The Cylons are not a demonic entity, and thus are beyond the purview of the Slayer. Keep her on Aquaria and focus on the vampires! The new Fleet can deal with the Cy-"
-Last orders of Marcus Travers to active watcher Arthur Giles, seconds before the Siege of Tauron, First Cylon War.

Earlier today

Another punch, with a roundhouse kick sent the first vampire flying into the brush in one of the neighbor's yards, where Riley moved to stab him in the heart with a wooden stake. Buffy, meanwhile, followed up with several punches to the second vampire, throwing her to the street and leaning down, introducing Mr. Pointy into her chest. The vampires both, almost in synchronization, exploded into dust on the concrete and in the grass of Revello Drive.

"They're persistent tonight," Riley commented, dusting himself off as they went back to the sidewalk, walking through the streets of Sunnydale to Buffy's old house.

"Yeah," Buffy said, stopping to contemplate, "wonder if it has anything to do with what Cordelia told me."

"If you say so," Riley said. Despite everything he'd seen, he still didn't really believe in magic – or seers or prophets. Ironic, really, since he was so conservative, religiously. No Gemenese, certainly, but conservative. Seers went out with the Colonization Era, Riley had believed, until Buffy had brought it up with him less than an hour ago. It seems Cordelia had never come up in their conversations before, even when Angel had.

Ha, Buffy thought, that she would perpetrate that myth about Gemenese even in her mind, after Faith. Goes to show, old stereotypes die hard.

They approached the house, Buffy taking keys out of her pocket as they went onto the porch and to the front door. She unlocked it, opening, and immediately hitting the light switches nearby, and running up the stairs and pushing open the door to her mother's room quickly, where she found her mother asleep.

"Mom! Mom! Wake up!"

Joyce stirred, her eyes blinking, "Buffy? What is it?"

"No time, mom, we have to go. Get dressed."

"What, what is it?"

"Apocalypse situation, mom. We have to move. Get dressed, get things together. I'll go wake up Dawn."

"I don't think so! Dawn can't be-"

"MOM! We so don't have time. Get dressed. Get things together. Now. This is life or death. I'll go get Dawn."

Before her mother could protest, Buffy was out, banging on Dawn's door and forcing her way in, finding her sister just pulling on a pair of pants.

Buffy raised her eyebrows, and Dawn said, smoothly, "I heard you out doing the dusty-thing. When you were coming to the house, I knew something was up. Especially with Xander and Willow out of town."

"Whatever. Finish getting dressed, be ready to move in five minutes. Mom's getting ready."

"Alright, Buff."

Buffy went to close the door, before saying, "And, Dawn?" Buffy said, Dawn looking back at her, questioningly, "if you don't want me to know what you were doing, hide the magazine better."

Dawn blushed as Buffy closed the door, following up her impromptu visit to her sister by going into her own room, and flicking the light switch. She rushed through the room to her footlocker, quickly unlocking it and taking out a number of weapons and various other items of use against vampire and demons.

She and Riley, on the way over, had discussed how he apparently knew of a way, but honestly, he couldn't think of one besides breaking into the Sunnydale Fleet Base outside of town. He promised to keep working on it, but, for now – the demons were out. They'd killed more demons and vampires than there should have been between Riley's apartment and the Summers home, and, if that were any indications, Sunnydale was especially crawling with the beasties tonight.

After gathering the weapons, she packed a small bag – a few outfits, a few personal items, and so on, before running downstairs, where her mother and sister already were, small bags prepared and dressed. She handed Riley a medium sword, "Better than a stake, long term."

She looked at her little sister – "You been practicing?"

"Every other day."

"Think you can do it?"

Dawn shrugged, "Sure."

Buffy handed her a crossbow, and a packet of bolts, and, afterward, put several bottles of holy water in her mothers' hands.

"Alright, plan – we need to get off Caprica. As soon as possible. We have hours. We cannot get to Saloniki first. We cannot get to Delphi first. We must leave, now. Until we know how we're going to do that, we need to plan. The plan right now – we go to Giles'. Any questions?"

Silence.

Buffy grimaced, "Then let's go."

Present

As they entered the hangar of the commercial spaceliner (which had identified itself as Colonial One), Buffy took a look at the surroundings. There was a man in a Colonial flight suit awaiting them, as the two raptors squeezed into the hangar's limited space. Buffy switched off the engines, pushing several buttons on instinct that turned off all the systems, and Dawn stood up, using what was, apparently, the release that opened the outer ramp of the military shuttle.

Giles stood up, mostly under his own power, and the three of them left the raptor as the other raptor began to open up, and a number of people began leaving it.

A woman from the other raptor went up to the pilot standing on the deck, "Excuse me, my husband, he's in the Colonial Fleet. In Gemenon?"

"Okay," the man said, "the Colonial Fleet on Gemenon, I'll see what I can do. If you can just head right this way?"

The woman who had been piloting the other raptor came out, and nodded at them, "Are you sure you don't have any training?"

Buffy shook her head.

"Then you're a better pilot than I am." The woman turned, back to the other pilot, "Captain Adama, sir! Lieutenant Valerii, Battlestar Galactica. I've got two communications pods left, sir, That's it. No jiggers, no drones, no mufflers, no nothing."

"Well, at least you've still got your electronic suite. That old crate of mine can barely navigate from A to B."

"That old crate may have saved your life, sir."

"How's that, Boomer?"

"The Viper Mark VIIs?" she said, as Buffy walked up closer behind her, with Dawn and Giles, "The Cylons shut 'em down like they threw a switch or something. And I've been hearing reports like that from all over. The only fighters that are having any success are either old or in need of some major overhaul."

"And, who's this, Boomer?"

"Ask them, sir. Apparently got the raptor, flew it on instinct off of Caprica. Escaped just in the nick of time."

Buffy interrupted, "Buffy Summer, Captain. I had, um, a boyfriend, discharged Colonial Fleet. Captain Riley Finn. He knew where the raptor was, but he got," she trailed off, before forcing herself to continue, "killed on the way there. I got lucky."

Captain Adama regarded her for several seconds, and nodded, "Well, that's good. We'll need good pilots if this goes on much longer."

Buffy was unsure, stumbling a little "I, I guess so-"

"Call me Lee, Buffy."

"Okay." Buffy was still shell shocked from all that had occurred, and, before she could continue, Lee indicated, "Why don't you go through to the bay? Ms. Lothian will get your family settled."

No, it couldn't be. Could it? "Thank you."

She walked quickly through, Dawn and Giles almost running after her, as they heard the conversation continuing behind them,

"That him?"

"Yeah. Hope he's worth it! Sorry, sir."

As they ran quickly into the bay, possibly the best sight Buffy had ever seen in her life was there – Tara Lothian, directing several of the other raptor's evacuees to a cargo bay.

"Tara!" Buffy cried, running for her.

Tara looked up and, uncharacteristically, called out her name, "Buffy!"

They hugged for several seconds, before both realized the awkwardness of the situation.

"Um, I-"

Tara blurted out, "Willow's been so worried about you."

Buffy stared into Tara's eyes, as Tara continued, "Sh-she hasn't been talking a-about it, b-but she's been speaking Mithrasarian, she's been swearing, she's been r-really off since Caprica got hit."

Dawn rushed past Buffy, hugging Tara deeply, as Giles, much more calmly, came over.

"Where is Willow, Tara?" he asked, his Tauron voice filled with more emotion than Buffy had, honestly, ever heard from her watcher.

"Sh-she's at one of the docking ports, with refugees f-from another ship. I'll take you."