Jenny's diagnostics revealed something very interesting. As well as something that would send Xander's protective instincts beyond supernova levels. Joyce had agreed to Dawn being evaluated after hearing about the attack. After talking to Connie, who insisted that keeping anything about this from Dawn would be detrimental to Dawn, Joyce agreed to the whole gang being told the results, minus the Key part for now. Connie and Joyce would discuss that with her privately.
"Well, the results show, Dawn is Faith's child. How they did it, well we may never know the specifics, but if I was to guess, they magically obtained an egg from her, fertilized it and accelerated her growth. It's actually who the father is that might be more interesting."
"How?" Faith asked. "I'm trying to wrap my head around being a bio mom without doing any of the necessary bits to get there. How can who the dad is be more interesting?"
"I meant in terms of our group's dynamic."
Silence greeted that statement and then Amy said. "Are you saying that one of the guys in our group is Dawn's father? But right now there's only Giles and Xander, Oz isn't here and we haven't seen him since his visit a couple of months ago when he told us he found a way to suppress the wolf."
"My diagnostic shows, Xander is the biological father of Dawn."
"Huh?" From Xander.
"Xander?! My Xander?!" Cordelia yelled.
"Well, he's of a similar age to Faith and very protective. And since their goal in creating Dawn was to protect her, I suppose their thinking was that he'd probably not let anything stop him from protecting her."
"Then why the fake memories? If they wanted Xander and Faith to protect her why make fake memories and give her to me and mom to protect?" Buffy asked.
"An extra layer of protection, perhaps." Giles said. "Or they may have believed we would never find out. That this Abomination seeking her would never learn of it and thus she would be safe."
Something clicked in Xander and he said. "Well they're right about me wanting to protect her. I'd be protecting her anyway. She's a child I love in my territory. That alone would be enough of a reason to protect her. Because now it's personal. I know her, she's not a nameless person that just lives in my territory. She's my little Dawn-patrol. So I'd be doing what I could to keep her safe anyway. This doesn't change that. If anything, it increases it. Because no one and nothing is going to lay a hand on her and hurt her. I won't allow it."
"Actually, I feel the same way." Cordelia said. "Regardless of her origins, I love my mini. Nobody's going to be allowed to hurt you, Dawn. I'll die first."
"Um, this may be a dumb question." Dawn said. "But what about the fact that Xander's a hybrid? Am I part hyena now?"
"No, I found nothing of the hyena in you. Which means one of two things is likely. Either they filtered it out or they somehow obtained your genetic material before you accidentally became a part of that ritual at the zoo. Which might involve time travel or they were or had seers that saw your involvement in this group. Any are possible and we will probably never know which, given that the people who actually did this are all dead." Jenny said.
"Yeah, dead because someone or something wants to somehow use me to destroy us all." Dawn said.
"Dawn you are not responsible for other people's choices and actions. You are only responsible for your own choices and actions." Connie told her. "Do not take blame for other beings choices and actions, you don't deserve that misplaced guilt."
"She's right, Dawn. You're also not responsible for my choices. I choose to love you and protect you." Xander said.
"Same here, mini-me." Cordelia told her.
Later when Joyce and Connie sat down with to Dawn to explain to her why she'd been created.
"Dawn, there's a reason why these monks made you." Connie told her. "They made you to be the bearer of something known simply as the Key. We're not sure what the Key actually is. What we know is, they placed it inside you. Everyone in this group, we're here to protect you, so you can protect this Key. You've been given a very big and scary responsibility. But you are not alone in this. Your family, in all its strange permutations, is here to keep you safe. The people who did this obviously felt you could handle this. I want you to know, I'm here to help you if you need to talk about this. But they are right, we love you and we believe in you."
"You're still my little pumpkin belly, nothing's changed." Joyce said. "Except now, both of my daughters have very big responsibilities that they didn't ask for, but the universe believes they can handle. You can do this, Dawn. You can keep the Key safe. And we can keep you safe. I promise, like Xander said, nothing and no one's getting past us to get to you."
Back at Giles and Jenny's place.
"Giles what did that monk mean about Faith being the Slayer and me not being the Slayer? That doesn't make sense." Buffy said.
"Actually, it does. It just never occured to us before. Probably because there's never been two active Slayers at the same time before. Jenny's diagnostic shows, Faith holds the Essence of the Slayer, that which creates the Slayer. It passed on from you when you drowned, to Kendra and from Kendra to Faith when Kenda died. That's why Faith is the Slayer and you are a Slayer."