WDWG - Chapter 3: Revelations

Giles fared no better in his tent. The forced isolation caused him to replay the events of the morning and the night before. Was Buffy flirting with him? She took his hand as a lover would, not a friend or a daughter. She clung to him for dear life well after her crying subsided. And she was definitely going to kiss him. Maybe it was emotional overload from everything - but damn, it felt good. No. Better than good! He felt whole. Done analyzing her actions, he decided to seek her out and try to figure out what was going on. It did him no good to try to run anyway. He knew he'd never leave her again. Not like he once had. He would have no choice but to go to England and start rebuilding the Council. However, he would make sure that he would be available to her whenever she needed, and he would ensure that he had a permanent residence near her wherever she ended up. He was her Watcher. His place was with her. Somewhere along the line, he had forgotten that, but never again!

He exited his tent with his plate and brought it out to the cleaning station. One of the new Slayers came over to take it from him, but he gently waved her away. "No, no. I've got it, thank you. Go do whatever it is you girls do in your spare time." He then proceeded to wash and dry his plate and utensils.

"Hey G-man!" Xander called as he walked up, recognizing his father figure's patented glare reserved for that abomination of a nickname. "Wanna take the big yellow cheese wagon out for a spin to the strip mall and see what else we can find?"

"Did you see if we passed a liquor store back there?"

"Ha Ha, Giles, and so not with the funny. You okay?"

"Not really, but I am in no mood to talk about it right now. Let's head out and see if there is something we can do to make our stay out here more comfortable. Why don't you go notify Buffy what we are about, so that she doesn't worry when she sees the bus gone and doesn't find us?"

"I'll let Willow and Faith know. Buffy crashed out in her tent after checking up on Robin, Rona and the others. Seems the spoon didn't stand up on it's own in the coffee this morning or something." Xander joked. Giles didn't look amused, he only turned and headed towards the bus.

Xander sighed and went to let Willow know the situation. Andrew overheard and begged to be brought along, but after a little persuading and a detailed description of the Watcher in Ripper mode, the geek decided it would be best to tend to his comic book collection rather than get in anyone's way that day. Some tempers were flaring high with the heat and all the stress leading up to the battle.

XxXxXxXx

Noting that Giles was in a mood, Xander kept it to light conversation for a while. They returned to the grocery store and procured more water, sodas, canned goods, various personal necessities for the group, and a lot of extra bold coffee. Giles truly missed his tea, but looking at the selection and not having a proper kettle or tea pot, he figured he would have to stick with the black gold. They avoided perishables since there was no power to the store and most of the produce was rotting. Anything needing to remain cold was by now growing new life forms. Instead they decided to pick up a huge amount of the necessary junk food upon which teenagers and young adults seemed to survive during uncertain times.

Afterwards they headed to the camping store where they grabbed a few more cots, blankets, camp chairs, a couple more tents and more clothes just in case. Giles made note of the store owners making sure he would provide restitution once things returned to some semblance or normalcy. This little town was close enough to Sunnydale that it could very well remain abandoned, but either way, the owners deserved to be compensated. They also grabbed some hunting equipment in case they were happened upon by some unfriendly wildlife or residual nasties fleeing from the Hellmouth.

After a while, Xander decided he was feeling brave enough to talk about more than just the weather. "So, Giles, yesterday you talked a bit about having a lot to do going forward. What plans are you making in that big brain of yours?"

"Still mulling a lot of things over, Xander. You already know most of the issues. What to do with the current group of Slayers, what to do about the Slayers we don't know about yet, what to do about the Council, and what to do about our little family. I suppose we should sit down and discuss these things, but..." He trailed off.

"I take it from the drama we witnessed this morning that things aren't getting better between you and the senior Slayer?" Xander offered.

Giles sighed, "I honestly don't know. I don't even know where to start with any of this. I don't want to make plans without her." He and Xander exchanged a small grin. "We both know how well that will go over. And yet, she's holding back."

"She's waiting." Xander observed.

"On what?" Giles' voice raised half an octave in disbelief.

"You." And with that, Xander picked up some of the boxes and headed towards the bus knowing he had gotten the Watcher's attention. Giles stared after him dumbfounded, wondering what sort of insight the young man really had. He followed Xander out with his load of supplies.

"I'm not sure what you mean."

"Think about it, Giles. She just created and executed a battle plan that put Alexander the Great and Generals Eisenhower and Patton combined to shame! She's a Slayer, a single parent to her sister, she came back from the dead twice and was ripped out of Heaven once by her best friends, she battled one of said best friends, lost her very best friend to Old Blighty," Giles winced, "and ended a seriously destructive love affair which resulted in an attempted rape, only to have said ex-lover come back to dump a huge load of guilt in her lap as he brought back his soul for her. She's beyond "fire bad, tree pretty" and yet, she's still trying to take care of everybody. She's tired, Giles. She'll do what she has to, but she's waiting for options. But, those options have to come from you, they won't mean anything coming from me or Will. If you ask her to jump up and down howling like a hyena, she'd do it right about now."

"I wouldn't presume to tell her what to do, Xander. Buffy needs to make up her own mind."

"We have nothing left, Giles! There is no home for any of us to return to! It all imploded! You, at least have that. Look, I know you carry pain in your heart, too. I can see it. But, where do we go? How do we start over? Buffy, Dawn, Willow and me? Willow could find her parents, I guess. They are in Africa somewhere doing whatever it is that they do. But you know she won't. Mine... well... who knows. I tried to get them to leave Sunnydale, but they never listened to me before. And really, I can't even deal with that right now..."

Giles put his hand on Xander's shoulder. "I'm sorry. We can -"

"No, Giles. No! This is not about them. This is about our family. We need to stay together. But mostly it's about you and Buffy. And you and Buffy need to kiss and make up." With that, he started the bus and headed back to camp.

Giles went to the place he was trying to avoid. Kissing. Buffy. Earlier. Of course he wanted it to happen. He'd just never believed it could. He sighed. And as always, Dawn had perfect timing. Could the whole issue with Spike have been about guilt? Had they not become lovers again over the last few months? He believed they had. He knew she spent the last few nights leading up to the battle with him. And yet, she said she hadn't been in love with the vampire. Giles looked at his hand, remembering the feel of her warm hand in his and the sensation of Buffy enjoying his embrace.

Watching the passing scenery, Giles realized that he had looked on the destruction of the Hellmouth as an opportunity, not as a loss - and in talking to Xander, he suddenly saw the impact of the destruction of Sunnydale through their eyes. The Scoobies now had nothing. They had to start over with nothing. When he asked Buffy what she was going to do earlier, he certainly hadn't expected the answer he received. He was expecting her to embrace her freedom and dreams, instead she was being pragmatic, trying to figure a way to deal with the harsh reality of the responsibilities still imposed on her despite the destruction of the Hellmouth. And still, through it all, she was playing the part of the General to her troop of newly battle tested Slayers and making an attempt to heal the rift with him. He looked out the window and sighed, 'What to do?'

XxXxXxXx

Buffy awoke to Willow shaking her shoulder, "Buffy, it's been a couple hours. You wanted to get up."

"Hey, Will." She said rolling over. Her face was still a bit puffy from crying earlier.

"Hey." Willow's eyes grew wide with concern as she saw the evidence of distress on her best friend's face. "Umm... are you going to be alright?"

"I don't know. There's nothing left anymore. It's honestly a case of never being able to go back again, isn't it?"

"We're not just talking Sunnydale here, are we?" Willow asked with her resolve face fully in place.

"No. We're not. We changed the world, Willow. You and me. Like that, we just changed it. There's no Sunnydale, no home. And at this time, countless Slayers and no active Hellmouth that we know of. I can't read Giles to know what is going on. I think he's as shell shocked as the rest of us and I'm not sure he knows whether he is going or coming at this point, but whatever it is, I just make it worse for him."

"Well, you know Giles. He's got so much rattling around in that hard head of his, he has to take some time to sort it out and I am sure that's not the case. You making it worse, I mean."

"He's gonna go back to England, Will." Buffy stated, her voice betraying the bravado she tried to show.

"Well, that's kinda where the Council is, or rather was."

"Yeah. I get that." A tear escaped and she violently wiped it away. She was sick of crying. "I guess I need some time too. I'm grabbing some supplies and heading out for a walk. I know the area, I won't get lost."

Buffy got up and left the tent with Willow on her heels. She immediately stopped dead in her tracks. The bus was missing. "Will?" She asked with some desperation as she scanned the campground looking for Giles.

"Oh, don't worry, Giles and Xander went back to the stores to get more supplies. They should be back soon." She noticed the tension in Buffy's shoulders ease slightly and watched as her best friend took off to the supply tent and then down the path. Well, now she understood some of what was going on between the Slayer and her Watcher... at least from the Slayer's perspective.