-Two nights later-

"It's not just cartoon characters. They do pieces from operas and ballets. Ryan Boy Tado doing Carman is a life changer. He doesn't actually play Carmen, but a lot of sophisticated people go," Buffy says.

"I thought your father was going to take you to the ice show," Giles says nervously. He's already supposed to have administered two weakening shots to her by now, and he's scared the council is going to figure out what he is doing.

"It turns out that his quarterly projections are unraveling, and he can't take me," she pouts. "It's usually something that families do together. If someone was free they could take their daughter, or student or slayer…" Buffy says, marveling at the fact that she isn't exactly sure which category she fits in anymore with him.

"Let's all go to the ice show. It's in LA, right? We could make a weekend of it, the three of us."

"The whole weekend? I'm pretty sure my mother couldn't get away from the gallery that long."

"She already agreed to it," Giles tells her.

Buffy blinks at him, "My mom already agreed to a weekend away?"

"Yes," he says.

"With you?" she says raising an eyebrow.

"Well, with both of us."

"What, does my new little sibling have some sort of mystical powers that completely change her personality from inside the womb?" Buffy asks in sarcasm.

"No mystical powers, I checked," he says.

"You checked?" Buffy says staring at him.

"Just a little precautionary aura check. In the middle ages it was rare for a baby to be born without one having been done," he defends.

Buffy stares at him some more.

"It's a boy by the way," Giles says, letting a smile sleek past his Britishness.

"Ok, let's forget about the fact that you're doing voodoo on my little brother before he's even born, and focus on the fact that my mom's acting weird," Buffy says.

"It's not voodoo. I don't know a single voodoo spell, I'm much more familiar with the ancient tradition of…"

"You're changing the subject again!" Buffy says in exasperation.

Giles looks at her, and lets out a sigh, "Buffy, your mother isn't doing anything out of character. She moved to another city to make sure that you were safe. I don't think it's odd for her to go on a trip for a week for the same reason."

"Safe? Why wouldn't I be safe?" she asks.

His face doesn't move.

"Giles, is this another prophecy? Am I going to die?"

"No, nothing like that, just let me take you to the ice show," he says softly, touching her arm.

She pulls away. "Not until you let me know what is going on."

"Buffy, I left the counsel. They wanted me to drug you so your powers would disappear for a couple of days. Then I was supposed to let them lock you in a room with an insane vampire as part of a test. I couldn't do it."

She stares at him in horror.

"I think the whole thing has been called off, but I can't be sure. For all I know they have a back-up plan, and are going to find another way to drug you. I just think it would be best to get out of town for a couple of days."

"And the ice show?" she asks.

"I don't see any reason why we can't have fun while we are running from the council," he says with more lightness than he actually feels.

They are standing a couple feet apart, and she leans in for a hug without moving her feet across the distance between them. He takes a couple of steps forward to make the hug less awkward. "Thank you," she says with a voice so choked in emotion that some of it threatens to come out as water.

"It's nothing really," he says bashfully.

"You just gave up your job for me, Giles. That isn't nothing," she says, pulling away to look at him in the face.

"You should go home and get packed," he says.

-That night-

Buffy can't believe what she is seeing. Giles and her mother are in the front seat of the car singing along to someone called "Cream" that Buffy has never heard of before.

Giles does a head bang, while driving.

"You guys didn't have any band candy, did you?" she asks nervously.

"No, honey, we're just enjoying ourselves," Joyce says with a giggle.

"Is there magic of any kind involved here?" Buffy asks.

"Of course not," Giles says.

"Ok, because you have used magic to peak in at the baby's future before. I thought you might have done something so we could have a nice family trip," Buffy says.

"You used magic on the baby?" Joyce asks with terror.

"Not on the baby, about the baby. I just did a little spell to check on him. See his aura, make sure he was healthy. It's a harmless spell."

"You can tell that it's a boy?" she asks.

"Well, the spell I did is only fairly accurate. Only about 80%. There is another spell with more accuracy, but we don't have all the ingredients for that one."

"Maybe we should get the ingredients," Buffy says helpfully from the backseat.

"Well, one of them is…a wedding ring," Giles says.

"I have one of those," Joyce says.

"Well, it doesn't work if there has been a divorce. Besides, it would have to be a marriage of the baby's parents," Giles says awkwardly.

There is a long awkward pause.

"I don't even know why we're talking about doing magic on this baby anyway. I don't want any more spells done on him," Joyce says.

"I swear, Joyce, it was perfectly safe. I mostly did it to make sure there was nothing medically or, you know, supernaturally wrong with him," Giles says.

"And he's fine."

"He's really good. He likes to laugh," Giles says, glancing away from the road for a second as he delivers this news.

Joyce smiles at this, and puts her hand on her stomach.

"Why don't we turn on some music that you like?" Giles asks Buffy.

"It's ok, you guys were having fun. Turn back on your old people music."

"I think we can all have fun to some music that is a little bit younger."

Buffy hands up a CD, and in seconds they are car dancing to something that Buffy calls "sounds to kill vampires by."

-That Night-

By the time they get to the hotel it is too late to do anything but head to bed. Buffy is asleep the second that her head hits the pillow. It's a survival method that she picked up shortly after she became the slayer. You don't get a lot of time in bed, so what you do get better be used in actual sleep.

Giles can't help but stare at Joyce over her head, and this causes Joyce to giggle. "Do you feel a little like we are a married couple and our kid has climbed into bed between us?"

"Did you want to be?" Giles asks suddenly.

It's a long time before Joyce answers him, because she is certain that she must have heard him wrong in the dark. When she does manage an answer it is nothing more than, "What?"

"Did you want to get married? We could get married before the baby came," Giles offers. Even from across the room she can hear the tension in his voice. The poor man, he fears nothing more than a 'yes' right now.

"I don't need to be rescued, Rupert. It's an unexpected pregnancy, not a demon attack."

"I'm sorry about all of this, Joyce," he says.

"I'm just as much to blame as you are," she says.

"No, I was the one who was really stupid as a teenager. I'm the one who took a gun from a cop, and stole from a store. If I hadn't been around…" he protests.

"Rupert, if you are under the impression I'm an innocent flower who never has sex without a magic spell you'd better get rid of the notion right now."

The dark room allows Giles to ask a question that he wouldn't have the courage for in the light. "Joyce, how do you feel about having another baby?"

"When Buffy was young, I didn't know how fast it went. I was working hard trying to get my career going, and I was trying to be a good wife and mother. I don't think…I stopped to enjoy it enough. I feel bad about that a lot. Not just because I wasn't the mother that I should have been, but because I missed out on all the fun parts of it. I'm looking forward to getting another shot at that. I'm not exactly looking forward to all the diapers, and I worry about how old I'm going to be by the time it…he is ready to be on his own. It's a mixed bag of excitement and terror I suppose."

"You know, she's not grown-up yet. She may be eighteen, but there are a lot of those moments left for Buffy."

Joyce turns toward him more in the dark. "She's not ready yet, is she?"

"For what?" Giles asks.

"For college, for living on her own, for being a grown-up. I haven't prepared her, have I?" Joyce voices the ancient primordial fear of every parent.

At first Giles has the urge to laugh at her fear. After all, it is the slayer that they are talking about. She saves the world on a regular basis. What is laundry or finances compared to that?

But if he's honest with himself, really honest, he knows that she is nowhere near ready. That as much as she does for herself, both he and Joyce have been sheltering her from bits of the real world for a long time.

It amounts to no more than mopping Atlas's brow as he holds the world on his shoulder, but it has eroded her independence, bit by bit.

"She's not an ordinary girl," Giles offers by way of answer.

"But she'll be all right, won't she? In the end?" Joyce asks.

Giles doesn't like the words that she chose. 'The end'? None of us are all right in the end, and for a Slayer the end is more likely to come sooner rather than later. But out loud he only says, "Indeed," and closes his eyes for sleep.

-The Next Night-

"You should take her to the ice show, Joyce. She's your daughter," Giles protests.

"I know, but she asked you. I offered to take her when we were back home, but she didn't want me," Joyce points out.

"I'm sorry, Mom, I didn't mean to hurt your feelings…" Buffy begins.

Her mother cuts her off. "I know honey. This has always been a father daughter thing for you. Giles is a lot more of a father to you than I am."

"Do you mind?" Buffy asks, with a face full of hope and fear. Just last night he was worried that she wasn't grown-up enough. Now, he finds himself hoping that she would stay young for a really long time.

"I would be honored," he says pulling her into a hug.

-Later-

"I thought it was impressive that I've been taking my daughter to this for twelve years. It looks like you guys have a couple of years on us," a man says, sitting down next to Giles with his young teenage daughter.

"Oh, she's not actually my daughter," Giles says, flustered.

"Oh, I'm sorry. You're not dating, are you?" the man says, alarmed.

"Eww!" Buffy says, at the same time that Giles says, "Certainly not!"

"Good," the man says, relieved.

"We're somewhere in the father/daughter zone," Buffy says.

"She's my pupil," Giles explains.

"He got my mom pregnant. That's a father-like thing, right?" Buffy offers.

Giles gives her an incredulous look for letting that information out to near strangers.

"Well, it's nice that you are bonding with your stepfather…" at the mutual flinch he modifies, "mom's boyfriend." Another flinch. "Enjoy the show," the father says turning away.

Giles and Buffy turn back to the show, which thankfully begins…with a ballet.

"You know, ballet is something like fighting. Some boxers train in ballet..."

"You're not teaching me ballet," Buffy interrupts.

"That's probably for the best, considering that fact that I don't know any ballet."

"Giles, how long ago did you run out of training ideas?"

"We worked through the manual two months ago. I've been making it up since then."