It had been decided that, at least until the current crisis had been resolved, that Dawn could not be left alone. Something that she ordinarily would have protested, being thirteen, but knew was a smart idea . Which is why everyone is taking turns spending time with her while Joyce is in the hospital having her surgery, especially after a patient at the hospital accosted her and told her, she wasn't real. An intern, Ben, told everyone he was a mental patient and was being sent home because the mental ward was overflowing. The idea that a crazy person might be able to tell that there was something different about Dawn, meant no one in the gang wanted her near the hospital with its overflowing mental ward.
It was currently Faith's turn to spend time with Dawn and they were heading for the Magic Box where Giles and Jenny, along with Willow and Jenny, were researching the Key and what the Abomination might be. Xander and Cordelia were patrolling while Amy was keeping Buffy company at the hospital.
The silence between them was awkward and Faith knew, that was largely her fault. A couple of days ago, Dawn had been Faith's best friend, Cordelia's protege, her 'mini-me', as she liked to call her. Cordelia had been teaching Dawn about fashion and how not to loose herself in popularity like Cordelia had. To seek genuine friendships, like she had with the Scooby Gang. Now Dawn was a child, five years younger then Faith, with half her genes. What do you say in a situation like this? Especially since, all of their memories of Dawn were fake, then Faith realized, not all of the memories were fake, since finding out the truth, they'd been making their own memories. And suddenly Faith knew what she wanted to say, something she'd wished someone could have said to her. Expressing herself was difficult for her, but thanks to Connie, much easier then it would have been before.
"I'm not your mother. Joyce Summers is your mother. I'm your bio-mom. It's like I gave you up for adoption because I knew I couldn't take care of you the way you deserved and made sure you had a family that could give you the stability I couldn't. Now it's kinda of like, you got curious about your bio-mom, not because you don't love your mother, you do, but because you needed to know who you came from. And whether or not your bio-mom could love you and be proud of you too, and because you needed to see, if your bio-mom was someone worth loving and being proud of. A few days ago, the memories of you, were fake. Now they're not, they're real. I've seen you struggle with some really big and scary things in the last couple of days, your mother being sick and the truth of your origins. I have seen you scared, but resolved to do your best. I can honestly say, I love you, Dawn Marie Summers and I am proud of you. And like Xander said, no one is getting past me to hurt you."
Before Dawn could muster a response, a very large, perhaps fifteen feet long, snake like creature with a torso, face and arms similar to a human slithered up in front of them, staring at Dawn. Whatever the Hell it was, it was clearly interested in Dawn. As it turned away from them, Faith leaped forward and grabbed it's head and twisted, hard. They both heard the distinctive sound of bones breaking. Not taking any chances, Faith kept twisting until the head was facing her direction, something gave her more then Slayer strength in that moment, because she twisted the head clean off. Blood gushed over her and she could distantly hear Dawn screaming. Praying something else wasn't attacking her, Faith staggered around, just as Giles and Jenny came out of the Magic Box and saw them.
Jenny hustled them both inside, while Giles cleaned up the carcass. Willow and Tara tended to Dawn, while Jenny took Faith to the bathroom. Not realizing she was in shock, Faith didn't object as Jenny gently cleaned her up and removed the blood soaked clothes and helped her into spares, she kept at the Magic Box for after workouts. Afterward, Jenny brought her out to where Willow and Tara were looking after Dawn. Dawn jumped up and ran for Faith and burrowed into her arms.
"You saved me." She whispered. "Thank you."
"You're welcome, kid."
"Hey, Faith?"
"Yeah."
"I've got a bio-mom I can love and be proud of, too."
Faith felt a warm glow spread throughout her body. She held her Dawn, there was no other way of describing Dawn, that suited the situation. Dawn just was.
Later, the gang speculated that this Abomination may have sent this creature to find the Key. They could find no reference to anything similar and diagnostic spells showed it was a cobra. Which meant this Abomination, had transformed it. That was some big Magic according to the gang's resident witches, Jenny, Tara and Amy. Also it was discovered that transmogrification like this required a Sobekian bloodstone, which it seems, Giles had sold to a nicely dressed woman earlier that day, maybe the same woman who backhanded Buffy into a wall.
They were able to find more information in regards to the creature Buffy and Amy encountered at the hospital killing the mental patients that same day. A Questor. A demon summoned by praying to the moon for help in suppressing waves of madness in the population. They wondered if the mental patients were connected to this Abomination in some way and she or someone else was covering up their tracks. Over two dozen people were dead and would never have the chance to recover from whatever had been done to them. It was a somber group that dispersed for the night, hoping tomorrow would be a better day.