Destined for Good

Destined for Good
part one: Bridges between the Worlds
chapter two: More than a Fraction too Much Friction

=Sunnydale: Anya and Xander's apartment =

Anya turned off the television and stood in her guest's line of sight. "You were going to work on your math, remember?"
Dawn sighed, took the books from Anya, and went over a new problem. She had tried to explain that she understood it by now, but no one would listen. "You do realize I can cite these chapters from memory by now, don't you?"

"I didn't think this up. If you want to blame someone, blame your mother," Anya said.
"I know that, Ahn, but everyone's freaking out," Dawn complained.
"How about some breakfast before the big bad exams, hmm?"

Dawn didn't tell Anya that she hadn't been planning to stay for her physics exam and followed her to the kitchen. Her principal had decided that if she would get a B or higher in math, she would pass, whether or not she had made the rest of the exams. "Thanks for letting me stay at your house, Anya."

"It's just as much a favor to you as it is to the rest of us, believe me," Anya said.
Dawn laughed, but Anya wasn't joining in. "You weren't kidding, were you?" she asked.
"No," Anya said seriously.
~~~

Dawn looked around again to make sure that no one had seen her fight with the demons, and when she was certain no one was looking, quickly put her gladius sword back in to her backpack. She broke into a run while trying to put on her coat to hide the gashes in her shirt. New evils were always so inconsiderate, breaking the unspoken rules between the Scooby Gang and the Evils of Sunnydale: fighting is done at night. And then to go and attack me on the one day I can't be late for school, she thought angrily.

Dawn pushed the door open and marched down the hall quickly. She knocked on the door and waited for the invigilator to acknowledge the knock. "I'm supposing that's you, Summers?" the cutting voice of Laetitia Daniels said.

Dawn cringed; she'd forgotten that her German teacher would be supervising the math exam. "Yes, it's me," she said through the door.
"You're too late; we've already begun," Daniels said, in a tone that meant the matter couldn't be discussed.

I'll just go talk to the principal then, Dawn thought and stalked off. Dawn had been given permission to discuss anything she wanted at any time with the principle, whom she thought to be an old school friend of her mother's. She opened the door and walked into the principal's office.
"Correct me if I'm wrong, Dawn, but aren't you supposed to be working on a very important math exam?" Sam asked, staring at her from behind the desk. Dawn explained why Daniels wouldn't let her in and decided to push her luck and ask if she could do the exam in Sam's office.

"Daniels? Someone must have made a mistake when putting together the timetables; I was wondering why I wasn't on the list to oversee you young people. Fine, you can work on it here, if you promise not to do anything to Laetitia for not letting you in."

Dawn sighed and sat down at the little table in the corner. "I'll get your exam from Laetitia. Don't you go anywhere," Sam said and closed the door behind her. When Sam was gone, Dawn danced through the room.

"Of course, you realize you'll be doing your physics exam in here too, don't you?" Sam said when she got back and placed to stacks of paper on the table. Dawn nodded and looked through the physics exam.
"Piece of cake," she said. Dawn had been reading a book about magic and science that covered all this for the past week.

"I don't care which one you do first, or if you just write 'I don't have to do this' on your physics exam; so long as you do the math and have something written on your physics exam."
Dawn considered not doing her physics exam, but decided that while she was at it she might as well just ace it.

Seventy minutes later, Dawn stood up and handed the two exams to Sam. "I finished them both," she said and walked out.

"Dawn, wait just a minute!" Sam called after her.
Dawn turned around and waited. "I want to see you here Monday."
Dawn shrugged but nodded, and then she walked away. She had a German exam that Monday, and Dawn had spent every summer in Germany when her parents were still together. She wouldn't miss that one for the world. Missing out when she finally had a chance to show Daniels a piece of her mind? Hardly. She couldn't think of anything better that moment.
~~~

Dawn looked at herself in the mirror. The white leather suited her, but the damn thing cost over three hundred dollars, and Dawn just wasn't going to pay that much for a coat, no matter how beautiful it was or how much money she had. Dawn took it off, and brushed her hand over the tag. To her surprise, it came loose. Dawn smirked and threw it into a bystander's purse, put on the coat again and walked out of the store.

The security guard stopped the unfortunate woman who had received the tag of Dawn's new coat when she tried to walk away. Dawn stayed behind to see if there would be a scene when it was proved that the woman hadn't done anything, but she was disappointed. The brunette shrugged and walked on.

Ten minutes later, in another store, Dawn pulled her hair over her shoulders and examined the top. She liked it, even if Buffy was going to kill her because it was so short. She held up her old top and examined it. Six parallel gashes graced the back. "Oops," Dawn whispered and quickly shrugged on her coat.

The teenager tore out of the store, causing the alarms to go off immediately. However, Dawn was long gone by the time the store clerk made it outside. "It's hard to catch up on a Summers in a hurry," Dawn smirked and zigzagged out of the way of an old lady with a dog.
---

She threw open the door and collided chin-first with Buffy's head. "Watch it, Buffy!"
"You're the tall one, you watch your step," Buffy shot back.
Willow shook her head and made a separating motion with her hands: "Separate."
Anya could see where this was going and hurriedly whispered a spell to protect her products against flying Summers.

When the two sisters had calmed down enough and their friends were holding them back to prevent any further fights, Dawn explained the situation to her sister. Buffy and Xander grabbed two handfuls of weapons and left to kill the remaining demons.

Anya put an arm around Dawn. "You and I are going to go home, and then I'm going to tell you a little story."
---

Anya sat down on the couch and took a few deep breaths. If she refused to acknowledge her past, Rowena would still have won. "Listen carefully, because I'm not going to repeat anything," Anya said. Dawn nodded and leaned forward.
"The school where Spike is going to be teaching was founded by my sister, Rowena Ravenclaw, and her friends. There were four Founders, Rowena, Salazar Slytherin, Helga Hufflepuff, and Godric Gryffindor. Out of the four of them, Godric was the oldest. Helga came after him, a year younger than he was; then came Rowena at ten years younger than Godric; and then Salazar, a year younger than Rowena. Edrin Slytherin and I were both another decade younger than Salazar... are you still with me?"

Dawn nodded "Four Founders; two little sisters. Oldest one: Godric Gryffindor. Second oldest: Helga Hufflepuff, one year younger than Gryffindor. Second youngest: Rowena Ravenclaw, ten years younger than Gryffindor. Youngest one: Salazar Slytherin, eleven years younger than Gryffindor. And you and Edrin Slytherin were ten years younger than Slytherin, and twenty-one years younger than Gryffindor."

"Exactly. Now, after Rowena's birth, my mother could not have children anymore, even if she wanted to very badly. She had a Veela friend, though, who offered to carry a child. I technically have two mothers and one father, so I'm one-third Veela. Rowena always used to hold that over my head as a reason why I wasn't really her sister but some sort of freak instead. Edrin was my best friend, closely followed by Salazar. Though you're gonna have to give me some time to separate truth from myths spun by my lovely manipulating sister. How much have you already read about Hogwarts?"

"The main opinion is Slytherin is for evil Watcher-ly and manipulating types; Hufflepuff for the kind and hardworking souls; Ravenclaw is for the smart ones; and Gryffindor is for the good and brave," Dawn said, her tone indicating that she didn't need Anya's explanations to doubt the truth in those theories.

"Well, I'll start with Salazar. He was a nice guy, kind and gentle; and he definitely wasn't anti-muggle. Salazar had black hair, unlike what everyone thinks, and light brown eyes that always used to sparkle with joy. And he was tall, he was really tall. He..." Anya continued on for quite a while, speaking fondly of the man everyone thought of as a homicidal maniac.
"Helga Hufflepuff was a short, muscled warrior, with the strangest eyes... they were such a light brown they were almost yellow, and she must have had a thousand hair colors. She was a nice woman, but she did have some nasty drinking habits; and was short with dark blond hair and soft grey eyes. I've never really liked her, although I don't know why. She was always a fair person, but she never saw Rowena as... what she really was. Her empathy couldn't stretch as far as that." Anya was silent for a while, thinking. "If I ever met her again, I would thank her for just being herself, I think.
"Godric had wild red hair and dark brown eyes and he was crazy about gardening. He was a herbologist, and a damn good one at that. He was a nice enough guy. There's really not a lot more about him, but that's not to say he was boring.
"Last and also least favorite in my opinion, is my sister. Rowena had beautiful brown hair, (she always said it was bronze), and had deep blue eyes. Not deep as in dark, like Spike's; but deep as in bright. Have you ever seen the sky at its deepest blue? Her eyes were that color. She was anything but sweet and loving though." Anya spoke bitterly, and a frown creased her forehead. "Rowena was the worst manipulator I've ever met; and don't forget I've been a Vengeance Demon for over a millennium. I've seen my share of manipulators. You got it so far?"

"I think I do," Dawn said quickly. She wanted Anya to continue with her story.

"Yeah. When I was thirteen, the four of them started to make plans for a school of magic. The plans had always been there, but it was nothing solid and they'd just been kidding around. They planned to build a huge castle and to create the best school of magic there was in that time. They intended to become better that the schools in Asia, North Africa and East-Europe, schools that had been around since the Egyptian times at least. But, Helga said it right: A school is only as good as its teachers. And the teachers they had in mind just happened to be the best there were. Rowena would teach Charms; Salazar was going to teach Transfiguration; Godric would teach Herbology; and Helga was going to teach History of Magic. They were hoping Edrin would agree to be a Divinations teacher and that I'd teach Potions. The rest of the staff they'd hire when needed." Anya gave a sad smile, something Dawn wouldn't think she was capable of.

"Unfortunately, Rowena went out hunting six months later and accidentally shot Edrin in the chest. Edrin nearly died and left for the European mainland. No one knows what happened to her, and I'm the only one who even remembers her. Rowena effectively wrote her out of history. That same year, she married Salazar. Salazar stopped talking to anyone about everything but the school and he seemed almost zombie-like to me.
Three years later, 'Hogwarts' opened for students. None came from the mainland. But no matter what, the school was huge and its staff magnificent. I taught Potions there for three years, even if I was only sixteen. O--"

"What year are we talking about?" Dawn interrupted, trying to picture a year with the information.

"I was born in 859, so I was nineteen in 878. We're talking 878. I was with a guy back then, a terrible loser now I think about it. His name was Olaf, but he's a troll now. He cheated on me with a Swedish bar matron called Rannveig, and I turned him into a troll. Then I had a brief thing with Gryffindor's son, and when he left... let's just say D'Hoffryn took me to Arashmahar and offered to make me a Vengeance Demon."

"The rest is history, so to speak. Right?" Dawn asked with a grin. She'd been hoping for details about what had happened with Gryffindor's son, but if Anya wasn't comfortable talking about, she wasn't going to push.
"Uhuh."
---

"Honey?" Anya turned around to see Xander standing in the doorway with a cut just above his eyebrow.
"Did you and Buffy kill the demons?" she asked, hugging Xander.
"Yeah. Damage suffered was not because of the demons but because of some thorn bushes we hid in to take them out," Xander smiled.

Anya dragged him to the couch and made him sit down. "We're having pizza. Dawn and I picked the things we didn't like for you."
"You're forgiven by the fact that I like everything you don't like on a pizza," Xander said, giving Anya a quick kiss on the cheek.
Dawn came in with three huge pizza boxes and dealt them out. She took a slice and opened her mouth, but Xander beat her to the talking. "You're not singing your ode to anchovies in this house," he said sternly.

Dawn closed her mouth again and was obviously singing her anchovies song in her head. "It's just a song," she muttered, chewing on the pizza.
"It's a song about anchovies that you've been singing for years and years and years," Xander said, quite plainly annoyed.
"But it's just a song!"
"Xander's right, you know. I've known you for a year and I can't stand it."

Later that night, when Dawn had been sent to her bedroom, so that Xander and Anya could have some quality time together, Xander and Anya were lying on the couch in each other's arms.
"I've got a story to tell you," Anya whispered and leaned into Xander's embrace, "just a warning so you know what I'll do if you leave me."
"Are you kidding?"
"A little. Now shut up and let me tell it. When I was young..."
~~~

Kris, Joyce and Buffy were sitting at the table. "Explain to me again why Aury isn't here?" Kris said, her hands cupped protectively over her mug.
"You can let go of the mug, Kris, I'm not gonna steal it again," Buffy pouted, trying to change the subject to something that hadn't been brought up every day for the past week.
"Dawn isn't here because it seemed better to all of us that she and Buffy were kept apart, so that no one gets hurt," Joyce said with a glare in Buffy's direction.
Buffy held up her hands to show she wasn't going to get involved in another argument with her mother about her behavior. She'd been having enough of those over the past two months.

"I don't understand. Why are things so bad between them that they can't live in one house together?" Kris said, still not understanding the problems even if they had been explained to her numerous times by numerous people over the past few days.
"Your guess is as good as ours," Joyce said, shooting another glare in Buffy's direction.

"Ellizabuffy? How about you show me the mall in this town?" Kris said, after they finished breakfast.
"Sure, Kris. If you stop saying that, of course," Buffy tried hopefully.
"Forget it, Buff. I'm not gonna stop calling you that," she said with a small smile.
"B, Ellizabuffy, Annie, why can't anyone call me things I like to hear?" Buffy complained laughing, and grabbed her wallet off her bed.
"You get so easily upset, sweetie, that's why," Kris said smiling. Buffy grumbled something vaguely based on words and the two left the house together.
~~~

"I can do it!" Dawn angrily snapped at her mother, who was giving her a third degree in German.
"Really?" Joyce asked sceptically, raising a questioning eyebrow.
"Yes, really," Dawn sighed. "And I've got the feeling that this is all about Buffy and me."
"It isn't."
"Yes, it is. I can tell you what is says, letter by letter even. I've memorized the entire book. You know that." Dawn grumbled sullen and started folding the pages of her French textbook.
"Don't do that," Joyce snapped, going back to English.
Dawn smirked in triumph and put her school things away. She took out a book Anya had given her at breakfast, 'Amas Elter' by someone named Edrin Chase. Anya hadn't known the answer to both Dawn's questions, 'Is she related to Edrin?' and, 'Is she related to Cordy?'. Anya had told her that no one knew where Edrin had gone, and that as far as she knew, Cordelia was simply a Muggle with that particular last name.
~~~

"What do you know?" Dawn hissed at Buffy. The two sisters were standing opposite one another and were both already in a fighting stance. None of the Scoobies moved to stop them, knowing that it wasn't going to do much good. If they managed to separate the sisters at all, they would have been back at each other's throats in a fraction of a second.
"Let me ask you the same question," Buffy yelled.
It seemed that Buffy's eyes were becoming greyer and that her irises were slowly expanding. Dawn's eyes showed the same thing, only were her eyes like heating metal, changing from their normal blue to red, to white. Anya caught on to what was going on and once more drew up protective barriers around the shop, herself and Xander. Willow and Tara could feel Anya's magic, joined hands, and did the same thing. Although they didn't know exactly what was happening, they could feel raw power rippling through the Magic Box.
An unexpected gust of wind suddenly slammed Dawn backwards, and Buffy found herself surrounded by a ring of flames. Buffy's eyes looked like moving mist, Dawn's like nearly molten metal.

The sisters tore into each other, wind blowing through the shop and sparks and bouncing off the energy barriers. There was a miniature end of the world going on right inside the shop, but the only things it was harming were Buffy, Dawn, and their clothing.

"That's enough," Joyce' voice cut through the shop, and a gust blew the two apart. Buffy had burn marks on her face and her nose seemed to be broken. Dawn sported bruises from where 'bullets' of wind had hit her.
Anya judged the situation to be under control and dropped the barrier. Joyce collected her daughters, almost threw Dawn into Anya's arms, and dragged Buffy out of the shop.
Anya and Xander brought Dawn to their apartment and her temporary bedroom, and then called Joyce for instructions.

"Don't let her out of the house, understood?" Joyce ordered.
"But they're hurt!" Anya protested.
"They'll heal. You've seen them at it, haven't you? One of our ancestors is a Pyros warrior, my father is the King Zephyr, so you see, they're both Nymphén. We heal quickly. Buffy's even a Slayer," Joyce said. There wasn't even a trace of worry in her voice.
Anya sighed and gave in. "Fine. We won't let her out."

Anya turned to Xander and explained the situation to him, Nymphén parts and all. Xander wasn't happy with it either, but they both realized they weren't parents and that Joyce probably knew best. "I'm more worried about what she's going to do to our apartment," Xander muttered.
~~~

"Mom! Open the door!" Buffy yelled angrily.
"Forget it, Buffy," Joyce said from the stairs.
Buffy sat down on her bed and picked up her stuffed pig. "Oh Mister Gordo, what am I gonna do?" Mr. Gordo just stared at her.
She sighed and threw Mister Gordo against the door, and sulkily turned on the radio. 'Tainted Love' by Soft Cell blasted out of her speakers. Buffy quickly turned down the volume and waited for her ears to stop ringing.

It can't have been my fault that he left, she thought sadly. Now she had some perspective on the past few months, she hoped she'd be lucky enough to be on the receiving end of one of the blond's piercing glares.

It seemed like her mother had made up her mind, and that meant she'd be enjoying her own company for a while. She picked up Mister Gordo at the door and the book she'd hurled at the window earlier (instead of going through like it should've, it had bounced back and nearly hit her in the head) and set them both on her bed. Sighing, she cleared her desk of weapons, stray make-up items and textbooks. Buffy turned up the volume of the radio very slightly and took her book, continuing where she'd stopped the previous night.
~~~

"Why won't you let me get out of my room?" Dawn complained furiously.
Anya sighed and looked at Xander. "Don't give me the 'you-talk-to-her' look," he warned. Anya however was not impressed and Xander gave in.
"Because your mother was very clear about a certain Dawn: after this fight she had with her sister, Buffy, she was not to leave her room."
"Ugh," Dawn said and punched the door.

"Leave my door alone," Anya ordered, brushing a hand over it when Xander's back was turned (better to be safe than sorry, after all).
She and Xander moved to the kitchen. Dawn's ranting could be heard as if the brunette were standing right beside them, so Anya suggested going out to eat at the Bronze. Xander agreed without hesitation, and quietly the two left the house.
---

Dawn yelled on for an hour before she realized there was no one in the house anymore. Sighing, she turned on the radio and under a song by a punk-rock group she didn't know the name of, hung up her dartboard and put a picture of Riley up on the board. Dawn collected her darts and spent the next three hours throwing holes into her sister's boyfriend, several of her teachers and Anne Adrian.

During those three hours, the music slowly picked up decibels, and by eleven o'clock there was a solid wall of heavy bass tones and screamed lyrics blasting out of Dawn's room. The teen was singing along to the songs in German, sometimes in French and a few times - when she heard a good one - in English.

Around midnight, Dawn turned down the volume a little and started picking at the loose threads on the Iron Maiden patch on her backpack. She was planning to superglue it to Anne's perfectly white coat, along with a nice sticker from Greenpeace about polluters.
~~~

Buffy woke up from the bright light streaming into her face and squeezed her eyes shut. She rolled over to be outside of the beam of light, but found herself on the floor instead. "Great," she muttered, getting up.

Buffy tried the door, which to her surprise opened. There was a letter from her mother on the door. "Buffy, Kristina and I are going to San Francisco for the day. There's lunch and dinner in the fridge, all you have to do is put it in the microwave. Don't even bother trying to get out of the house, you can't. There's a chance I won't be back until Monday. Behave yourself and leave the house alone. It hasn't done anything wrong. Mom," she read, and crumpled up the Post-It Note.

"Whatever," she said. Buffy grabbed her book again and went to the bathroom. She filled the bathtub, and threw a few bottles of bath foam, fragrant oils and salts into the tub.

Hurriedly she ran down the stairs and took two cartons of Ben & Jerry's out of the freezer. Buffy raced back upstairs and stepped into the full-length basin meant for those who wanted to read in a bath.

Buffy loved this bathtub. You could read in it but at the same time, it was twelve foot long, nine foot wide and seven foot deep. "Gee, I wonder how much this is gonna cost Mom," she said sarcastically.
Her mother was always telling them how expensive completely filling the tub was. She was right, of course, but both Buffy and Dawn knew that Joyce could afford filling it once every hour, all year long easily.

Well, maybe not that. That was thousands of gallons each day. But definitely often. Buffy opened the first carton and sighed happily. She was alone in the house, taking a bath with a good book and the best ice cream in the world. This was a piece of heaven on earth. Who was she to complain?
~~~

Dawn munched on her cornflakes and imagined the sound to be that of an avalanche, earthquake, or otherwise very unpleasant natural phenomenon crushing one Riley Finn. Anya and Xander had left fifteen minutes ago for some kind of festivity regarding a Veela feast or something.
She guessed by the looks Anya had been giving Xander that it had something to do with sex. Knowing she had the choice between studying for a Chemistry exam she knew by heart and could write down in Russian if necessary (not that Dawn could speak, read or write Russian, but given a dictionary and a few hours, she could), look into her German textbook and correct the mistakes, perforate Riley some more, or reading through Anya's books, it wasn't hard to pick an activity.

Dawn walked into Anya and Xander's bathroom and searched underneath the bed. People could be so predictable sometimes. There were three crates full of books under Anya's side of the bed. Dawn pulled out the first one. They were all written in another alphabet and language, by the looks of it made by better presses than ordinary human ones.

The second crate contained books like the Kama Sutra, and again most were written in that foreign alphabet. They were far too graphical to even open. Just thinking about it made her blush.
In a fit of puberty, she put one book under her shirt and pulled out the third crate.

That one contained many books about Potions, but at least they were written in English - archaic English, but English. Dawn took out the books about Potions to see what lay beneath them. "Written in English, check; about Veela, also check," Dawn said triumphantly.

She went back to her room and put the books on her bed, and shoved the one under her shirt into her pillowcase. Dawn opened the first one and started reading.

A ringing phone broke Dawn's concentration and she dug out her cell phone. "Dawn Summers," she said moodily.
"Not in such a good mood anymore?" Spike asked.
"Spike! No, it's just ... eh ..." Dawn searched for the right words to describe the latest problem in the series of fiascos between her and Buffy over the past two months.
"It's what?" Spike asked suspiciously.
"Is there anything you don't notice?" she asked.
"Don't change the subject, Dawn."
"I guess not," she answered her own question, "but you called me by my real name, so you must be serious."

"What happened between you and Buffy?" Spike pressed on.
Damn, Dawn thought, now I'm gonna have to tell him. "We fought."
"That's nothing new."
"For real. Buffy made wind blow through the shop and I made fire from my hands. And I broke her nose," Dawn said, by nature excited by any kind of fight.

"What?"
"Eh..." Dawn was speechless again, and was drawing little circles on her sheets with her fingers, "nothing?"
"Nice try, Bit. I'm going to have a little talk with your mother about that later. But the reason I called was to ask you to keep me updated on the goings on in Sunnyhell every Saturday, s--"
"It's Sunday today," Dawn interjected.

"So?"
"Just saying," she said, shrugging.
"Bit, can you keep me informed, yes or no?"
"Sure," Dawn said.
"I'll call you every Saturday around noon," Spike said.
"Your noon or mine?"
Spike sighed and said: "Your noon. And don't even start. Noon in California. I'll speak to you next week then."

Dawn put the phone away and was soon engrossed in the book again.
~~~

Spike sighed and shook his head to get rid of the last fragments of the dream that were still floating about in his mind. The word nightmare didn't even begin to describe it.
He held a hand to his head and leaned against the table. Spike took a few deep breaths and tried to banish the strange images from his mind. It wasn't helping any.

He had to lean against a wall to keep his balance. There was a blinding flash of light. When his eyes had adjusted to the sudden darkness, he could see he was in a dungeon of sorts. Torches were suspended on the walls six feet above the floor. Cardia was standing in the middle of the room. "Car?" he whispered softly, not daring to take his eyes off her.
"Of course it's me, who else could it be?" Cardia smiled.
The torches made her hair look like strands of gold.
"Someone less dead?" he suggested.

Cardia threw her head back and laughed merrily. That was something he was hoping to see the current Slayer do anytime soon. "And you yourself are just overflowing with life?"
"I'm just another result of the bloodbind."

"Will, I love you. You know that. You haven't forgotten I love you," Cardia said.
Of course he hadn't forgotten that. "But you did forget that death isn't always the end," she said.
"Sometimes it's only the beginning," the change in her voice indicated that this was Buffy speaking, not Cardia.
"Of more death," Spike said sarcastically.

Buffy, Cardia, or whatever it was faded away, as did the room, leaving him a view of the constellations of the zodiac. One by one, the stars of nine constellations faded out, leaving only Scorpio, Capricorn and Aquarius.

Both Capricorn and Aquarius materialized, one into Buffy as a centaur, the other into Cardia as the water-carrier. "Death leads to a new beginning", the two said. They turned around and walked away. In his zenith every star of Scorpio turned dark, accept for Antares. Instead, it grew in size and magnitude. It was getting closer.

Antares stopped moving, and morphed into a scorpion. Orion came tearing through the heavens chasing it, but never gained on Antares. He was watching the eternal chase, with the slight difference that Orion was female now.
Spike rolled his eyes, and nearly missed the scorpion stinging another star, which turned into a woman. She started to cried black tears, and when they rolled off her face, the skies returned to normal.

Spike saw another flash of white light and then nothing. He opened his eyes. Ilsa Sinistra's face was hovering above him, and he realized he was lying on the floor. "You got a fag?"
Ilsa wordlessly handed him a cigarette. When Spike had taken a few drags and was standing again, Ilsa asked if he was all right.
"I'm fine, it was nothing," he muttered, and added mentally, 'although I now seem to be hallucinating'.
~~~

Dawn slammed the door shut with a typical 'Honey, I'm home' gesture, but there was no one there to see it. Dawn shrugged and walked to her bedroom. Anya and Xander were standing in there. Anya was holding the top she'd... 'forgot to pay for in your 'hurry' to tell Buffy of the case of the bad demon last Friday', her mind supplied eagerly.
"How much more is there?" Anya demanded furious.

Dawn knew she was busted, and sat down on the bed. Of all the people who could've found out, it had to have been the shopkeeper. "My new coat; those earrings you liked so much; three pairs of jeans," Dawn looked at Xander and Anya, who were waiting for the rest.
"That was just last week."

"What?" Anya asked coldly, barely holding her temper in check.
"That was what I ... you-know-ed ... last week," Dawn said guiltily.
"How long have you been doing this?"
"Since May..." Dawn was picking at the loose threads where the Iron Maiden patch had been until last Saturday.

"The magical month May," Anya said sarcastically, "Xander, honey, do you think we missed our dose of misbehavior? I hear it was dealt out in May."
Xander put his arms around Anya to calm her down. "I said I was sorry," Dawn said annoyed.
"No, you didn't," Xander pointed out.

"Then I'm saying it now," Dawn said.
"We're going to have a little talk with your mom about this," Xander said.
Dawn watched them leave. When they were gone, she took out everything she'd stolen, and laid it all out on the table. She put Anya's books back in their respective crates and sat on her bed.

She put a Britney Spears picture up on her dartboard, and started throwing her darts at it. This wasn't how she had expected her holidays to begin.
~~~

Dawn threw another dart at Riley Finn. Every single dart she owned was already lodged onto some part of his face, and she liked the look of it. So, she grabbed the nearest sharp thing. One of Xander's screwdrivers. If she could just slam one of those through his face for real.
Dawn held the screwdriver like Buffy held her knives and threw. It landed an inch over his eyes, smack in the middle of his forehead.
Dawn grinned like a madwoman and answered the ringing phone. "Hey, Spike."
"What are you doing?" he asked suspiciously - when Dawn was cheerful, she was doing something awfully awful.

"Puncturing Riley on my dartboard," Dawn said brightly.
"Hmm... Anything happened lately?"

It was quiet on the Sunnydalean side for half a minute.

"Buffy and Willow killed a Belcla," Dawn said.
"What else?" Spike asked, voice clear and clearly emphasizing both words. He knew there was something she wasn't telling him, but it didn't take a genius to know that.
"I passed a bunch of tests."
"Little Bit, I'm getting tired of this game."

"Anya's Ravenclaw's little sister."
"Stop beating on another bush entirely and tell me whatever it is you're not telling me now."
In a last attempt not to have to answer, Dawn feigned not understanding the question.

"You know bloody well what I'm talking about and you're going to tell me right now," Spike suddenly thundered.
"I've been shoplifting for the past two months. Anya found a top a stole," Dawn admitted softly.

"What?" Spike asked, his voice immediately softening and concern fighting its way into the single word.
"I've been stealing for the past two months... "

"Dawn ... why?" it was all concern, now.
"I don't know," she said through gritted teeth, "why are Buffy and me at each other's throats?"

Spike sighed loudly. "Haven't a clue, Bit," he said. "Has the world ended yet?"
Dawn said it hadn't, if it had, surely he would have known.

"Has the Hellmouth been opened?"
Again, the answer was 'no'.

"Is the Soldier Boy dead?"
Dawn said she didn't think he was worth going to prison for. Spike told her to sick a band of vampires on him, but Dawn reminded him of Riley's arsenal of grenades, stun batons and tasers.
---

Buffy hugged Mister Pointy closer to herself and shivered. It was a surprisingly cold night, and it was raining. Buffy wished she'd brought along a coat, or at least an umbrella. No one in their right mind - not even evil ones in their right mind - would be out now.

Buffy saw someone lying by the side of the road and approached the form cautiously. From up close, she saw it was Riley. He was in terrible shape, looking like he'd been run over by a garbage truck. He smelt that way, too.
Buffy averted her eyes and walked on. She wasn't in the mood for him, and he looked the way she had felt when she discovered he was with another. He deserved this.
~~~

Riley fumed and raged, tearing through her room. He'd already thrown both Mister Gordo and Mister Pointy out of the window, and was holding up a picture out of it. "It's on the picture. It wasn't supposed to be. Did you let it?"
Buffy stared at the floor and willed it to open up and swallow Riley. If possible, could it leave the photograph?
"Spike is not an 'it'. Athens isn't either, is she?"
"Shut up. Her name is Athena, not Athens."

Buffy looked up angrily. "You don't get to talk to me that way," she snapped angrily.
"Why not?"
"I'm your girlfriend, you bastard," she yelled.

"Didn't seem to bother you when I was lying on the streets last night. I saw you smirk and walk away."
"You have no right to talk to me like that. You come in here, spouting off the superiority of the human race - more specifically the male half of it - and start telling me what you think is true, when it isn't. I'm more experienced with this."
"Leaving your loved ones half alive in the gutter?"

"Vampires," Buffy said, trying to hold back her tears.
"Animals."

"Your girl too? If I pushed Harmony into your arms, would you stake her?"
Riley hesitated. His eventual answer was of the 'yes, but' variety.

"Because she has a pretty face? Because she's still so ..." Buffy couldn't believe she was going to say something other than naïve about Harmony Kendall, "still so innocent?"
"I ..."
"Do you dream about going to her - Spike's crypt - in the middle of the night with all your fancy weapons and taking her?" she asked ruthlessly.
Riley had the decency to look disgusted. Buffy felt sick; to her, vampire Harmony was the same Harmony she'd seen the first day in Sunnydale, fourteen years old, the same Harmony at eleven in a picture at Cordelia's house. Still a little girl, who hadn't grown up and was quickly losing her chances to.

She didn't believe she was thinking this about Harmony, the same girl who she made fun of with Xander and Willow at night, because of her childish behavior. But last Friday, while she was being debriefed about the potion to kill a demon she'd neglected to tell Anya about, she'd seen something in her; a flash of something more than a whiny, insufferable, childlike brat. A flash, nothing more than a fraction of a second, but it had been there.

Riley sat down next to her and put an arm around her shoulders. "Shss," he tried to soothe her.
"Don't touch me," she screeched and flew to the other side of the room.
I wish Spike were here to give him a verbal taste of his own medicine, she thought sadly. A tear rolled over her cheek, and Buffy looked away, determined not to let him see.

"Get out," Buffy whispered harshly.
"Get out of my house, now."
Why couldn't she just end things between them?
~~~

Dawn proudly held the document in front of the camera. 'Doctissimi SHS Praeceptores Dawn A. Summers, classis decimae discipulam, propter laudabiles eius in disciplinis liberalibus progressus in classem superiorem traducere decreverunt. Sunnydali XIIIX VII MM.'
"I passed," she grinned.

Joyce and Sam stood behind the camera, silently discussing something. "I think that's best, you?"
"Always in support of Grame," Sam grinned, "really, it's the best idea to keep her here. She won't get into New Moon Bay without that extra year of schooling, and let's face it; it's too late for other schools."
"There should be exceptions for people like her," Joyce muttered, looking at her daughter. "Either of getting into New Moon Bay early, or spending a year at Salem's."
Sam folded her arms. "Why don't you teach them to control their powers?"
"Because I can't stand to think what they might do. Buffy is turning twenty in January... when she Dreems, she'll know. If Dawn is curious enough, she'll learn to on her own."
~~~

There was a knock on the door. Spike looked up from his laptop - which was surrounded by tools - and muttered 'come in'. Dumbledore stood in the doorway. "I just came to ask if you remembered to make the list of books students need for the next year. Minerva wants it in tomorrow."

Spike said he'd get to it. McGonagall was not a person he felt comfortable around. She was far too strict. Snape he just couldn't stand - it was that inexplicable feeling of dislike he also felt with Angel and Harris, and between Angel and Harris.
As for Dumbledore, Spike knew him to be at least two-hundred years of age. Spike had a deep respect for the Headmaster, but also half-suspected him of owning a Philosopher's Stone. Wizards hardly ever aged past two-hundred and were still as vital as Dumbledore still was - it was simply impossible because for whatever powers they possessed, they had human bodies. When they did and were still as vital as Dumbledore still was ... then there was either demon or magical sentient blood running in the family. Such was not the case with Dumbledore. The old wizard had another trick up his sleeve somewhere.

Spike shrugged and teleported himself to Manchester. Apparating on Hogwarts' grounds may be impossible; such rules weren't applicable to those of magical sentient blood. He'd teleported directly to the Wizarding Library, another place where Apparating had been made impossible. Teleporting was such a delicious way to get around that. He could have just flown in, he could have taken the Knight Bus, he could have taken the train, and he could have Apparated to Manchester and walked. But he'd just had to teleport, breaking rules was much more fun than obeying them.

Spike sat down at a table, and started thinking. He knew things would be easier for both students and teachers if every subject was taught according to set standards, but that could not expected at a school like Hogwarts. But he could - for his years at least - build a structured education, each year divided in trimesters, each with a theme.

As the most basic fundament of a magical child's education, magic should have a part. Defence was undefined enough to do this. Magic, then. Should he include the magic of demons and magical sentients? Probably; their magic after all came from the Elverin.
'Magic > magical sentients - Elverin, Atlanteani, Maresear
- Veela
> demons - Toth
- several other kinds - no need to elaborate, they can read
> humans - Romani - include guilt-curse [am not holding grudges or being childish]
- Wiccan - include most basic things about Earth Magic, the specific laws of it
- Wizarding - i. e. the theories behind it
- Will magic'

Spike looked over the list and crossed out the part about holding grudges. He was nearly a century and a half old and he was acting like a twelve-year-old.
He read it again. Covering theory wasn't enough; he should teach them something about specific spell groups. Specific spell groups, and the human families who possessed some high-level powers akin to magical sentient or in some cases to demon powers. The Chase family with their Katzen-like powers; the Keepers of Magic, who could use Thought Magic; and there was of course no getting around the old Council families, who still possessed some of the powers their magical sentient ancestors had from long before the vampire race - or the Council of Watchers - came into being.

Vampires, of course, followed by the Slayers, and the Council of Watchers. Spike had a feeling he was going to be saying those words a lot more times, than he would like the coming year.
He smirked, remembering the time he had broken into the archives of the Council. He'd gone straight to the rolls of film that held their prized knowledge - the Council used the technology of the old, pure as the official word was, demons and magical sentients, the endless miles of books were to fool those who weren't familiar with the Council's true roots. Only the Third Organ knew the Council's history.

Twenty-one topics to cover; so little time to come up with them. Well he had two, so that left nineteen more to go. No, eighteen, he would cover basic magical theory in a semester in the fourth year, and then follow that up in fifth year with extended information.

First years would cover muggle weapons, technology, and in the last trimester he would conclude how that and magic worked together to form a bigger picture.
Second years ...

Hours later, Spike took his list and started selecting books. Maybe he could go out in the city after he got this done. Too bad there was no football for at least another month.
~~~

At the staff table at Hogwarts later that night, Spike was unfortunate enough to sit in between professors McGonagall and Snape. While on one side, Snape was giving him suspicious looks; McGonagall was reprimanding both of them to act their ages. Spike, who was used to ignoring those who liked to show off their authority, paid her no attention. Snape was pointedly ignoring her, as well. "Don't ever think that I will trust you, Montgomery." Snape's intonation was clear enough.
"I'm not asking for your trust," Spike said slowly, in a low voice.
"Albus and Minerva fail to see that they need someone they can trust to teach here," Snape hissed back.

They were talking softly enough not to be heard by anyone, but anyone deaf, blind, and comatose across the Great Hall could feel the waves of hostility radiating from the two professors. Spike calmly examined his chipping nail polish, and looked at Professor Severus Snape. "You seem to believe there is only a select group that can be trusted. What kind of group, I wonder." Spike indeed wanted to know which group, and he was tempted to bring up the Council, for some strange reason. 'Some insane fascination, no doubt,' he told himself.
"Rather than that, I believe there is a large group of individuals who cannot be trusted," Snape said tonelessly, black eyes hard.

Spike's own blue eyes widened. Individuals, Snape had said. Any ordinary person would have used persons or people; and although assuming that Snape referred to 'individuals' because of some relation to the Council was unlikely, it wasn't unthinkable. "There are far more who can be," Spike finished somewhat lamely, and went back to his food.
He was annoyed at the lack of fun he had in arguing with the Potions Master. With Angel, it was the knowledge of what lay underneath everything Angel pretended to be; he knew what Angel was and that he could bring it out. Their fundamental differences and their underlying similarity made it a pleasure to get under his skin. With Harris, it was something like that, coupled with something he somehow liked to describe as playfulness. Snape just irritated him a lot.
***