| The Dragon Part 4 Author: Juliatheyounger Disclaimer: Joss Whedon and all the talented people at Mutant Enemy etc own these characters. I am just playing with them. Spoilers: Season 5. The Gift. Rating: PG so far. Feedback: Yes please!!!!! Distribution: Also yes please!! (but let me know if you want to put my story somewhere just so I can feel special ;)) Summary: Dawn has been living with her father ever since the Gift. Seven years later she returns to Sunnydale and finds that things and people she no longer believes in are still very real. D/S *********************************************** Chapter 4: Re-acquaintance It had been five weeks since Buffy died. Spike lounged on his couch while Dawn sprawled next to him working on her English assignment. The television blared but Spike was concentrating on Dawn's math homework. It was algebra, the back of the book thoughtfully provided the answer but the problem was figuring out how it got there. "Why can't you have trouble with history or something?" he complained. "Don't worry about it Spike, I'll ask at school tomorrow or maybe Giles knows." Spike grunted at this and continued to scribble x's and 3y's on a piece of paper. "I'll figure it out," he said. "Just been a while since I done this, is all." "Ok, I've finished the rough draft, can you check it for me please?" Spike handed her the math's book and took the handwritten review of Hamlet in exchange. "Now this is something I can help you with. We studied Shakespeare at school." "You said that about algebra." "Yeah I did, but I actually remember this stuff." He looked it over. "You know I think you're supposed to base this on the play itself not the Mel bloody Gibson movie." "I did! I just understood the movie better, and besides they showed it to us at school." "Could've at least used the Brannagh film, four hour version mind you not the sodding shorter one. If you're going to watch Shakespeare you may as well suffer through the whole bleeding thing." He read the paper over and made some corrections. "It's good Nibblet," he said finally, handing it back to her. "You write well." Dawn glowed with pride at his praise. But she tried not to let Spike see that. She shrugged. "Its alright I suppose." Spike suddenly looked at the clock on his VCR. "It's late Li'l Bit, you'd better be getting home else Rupert will be coming after me with a stake." Dawn rolled her eyes. "He's so uptight, gees, who cares if we have dinner at 8.00 instead of 7.30?" Spike grinned. "Come on, I'll walk you home." "Fine whatever," Dawn said, secretly pleased for the company. It got spooky in the late evening walking through the graveyard, not that she would ever admit that to Spike. She wanted Spike to think she was tough, like him. "You know," he said as they walked out the door. "The Watcher just cares about you is all." Dawn shot Spike a half smile. "Yeah I know. But he's still uptight." "Whose car is that?" Dawn wondered aloud as they walked up the driveway. "Dunno," said Spike. He walked her to the front door, then turned to go. As he was walking across the lawn he heard the door open and Dawn say "Dad?" ************************* "You were my best friend and I didn't believe you existed." Dawn sat next to Spike on his lounge, her legs tucked under her. She looked at the vampire earnestly. "These things happen Lil' Bit." Spike paused looking at the grown woman before him, still young, but older than Buffy had been when she'd died. Her dark hair still framed her face like it had when he first knew her. She was like Buffy but had her own distinctive Dawness. Her fingers twisting the material of her sleeves and the way she was sitting underscored how young she still was. "Rupert told me why you'd gone. Told me why he didn't prevent it - if he could've. It was for your sake Nibblet - get you out of this town, away from the Hellmouth. Give you something normal." Dawn looked at him. "Its funny," she said almost sadly. "I spent seven years agonising over why I wasn't normal, trying to discover what was wrong with me. Then I come back here and find out that I'm not normal, that I can't be, that I'm not even a real person and suddenly it all makes sense." Spike considered her. There was a lot to be said for not being normal. But he wanted everything for Dawn, he wanted her to be happy. "You should just be who you are Dawn," he said seriously. "It wasn't right to make you pretend anything different, but you can still have a human life all the same." Dawn looked away, touched by his words. She noticed that he'd called her by her actual name. "You always made me feel normal. You're the only person who doesn't make me feel like a freak." Spike looked away briefly, a bit embarrassed by her sincerity. "So," said Dawn, moving the focus of the discussion away from her. "Why'd you hit Xander." Spike grinned. Then frowned as he remembered the reason. "Doesn't matter now." Spike looked at Dawn. So she knew about the chip. She had known he didn't have the chip and she still came, in the middle of the night, to see him. The knowledge that she trusted him that much touched him deeply. To hide it, he decided to tease her. "You aren't scared of me Lil' Bit?" He smirked. "What's to be scared of?" Dawn smirked back, flicking her hair. She raised an eyebrow, clearly amused. This was the Spike she remembered. Spike went game face. He bared his teeth at Dawn. She just looked at him. Spike shook of his vampire visage in disgust. "What's the bleeding point of being a creature of the night if helpless virgins aren't scared of you?" "I'm not a virgin." Spike stopped, suddenly ill at ease. "Oh yeah right, course not." He reached for a cigarette and desperately wracked his brain trying to think of something to change the subject. "Er�did I ever tell you about how Angel got his Shanshu?" Dawn smiled, pleased with herself. Making Spike uncomfortable had been sort of fun, evil, but fun. She hadn't seen his vampire face in so long, but she really hadn't been scared by it. They sat there until morning. Spike told her all about how Angel or rather Willow and Giles, had roped him into going to L.A. to help destroy one of Wolfram and Hart's Members of the Board. A particularly scary one. Or as Spike preferred to think of it, a particularly bloody irritating one. They had succeeded and Angel, for reasons Spike couldn't be bothered to find out, got his humanity back. Spike didn't admit that during the time he spent in L.A. he and his grandsire had gotten very drunk one night and bonded over their shared loss of Buffy. Dawn was still impressed by Spike's stories and his ability to make her shiver with his calm, skilful retelling of events. Spike still enjoyed both impressing Dawn and making her shiver. The slight scent of fear, the dilated pupils, the quickened heartbeat. Hell, it was fun. His eyes gleamed with an almost evil light as he embellished already luridly gruesome tales to new heights of sock scaring off-ness. Dawn's eyes were as wide as saucers, but her adult self, all of twenty-one years, managed to maintain a modicum of incredulity and cynicism. "He got up again Spike?" she asked, folding her arms and looking skeptically at the vampire as Spike described the demise of one particular demon. "He was bloody hard to kill!" Spike protested. "Ok, the second time was it, but I thought he might get up again, so I chopped off his head and took it back to show Angel." "I bet Angel loved that," Dawn smirked. Spike laughed remembering the big poof's reaction. "Not when it started dripping all over his nice new carpet." Dawn laughed, then smiled at Spike. She looked at her watch. It was nearly 7 in the morning. "I should go," she said. Spike nodded. He wanted to ask her to come back again but knew that was foolish. She had another life now. Dawn took a sudden deep breath. She suddenly couldn't bear the idea of not seeing him again. "I - I'll drop by before I leave," Dawn said. "And I'll be coming back soon." They had to keep in touch. "If I write letters - I could send them to Willow - you-" Spike nodded. "That'd be nice Lil' Bit." He gave her a crooked grin. "Might even write back." She glared at him. "If you lived somewhere that had a phone -" Spike looked at her apologetically, then suddenly remembered. "Wait, I do!" he triumphantly retrieving a slim cell phone from his pocket. "You have a cell phone?" Spike grinned and nodded. "Angel got sick of to track me down. Bloody irritating it was in Los Angeles, always bloody calling me�" He flipped the phone open and showed Dawn. "Neat little thing. You can even send letters through it." "You mean text messages?" "Spose you could call em that, yeah." Spike didn't mention that "Sod off" was saved as his standard reply. Dawn grinned at him. "Aren't you all 21st century Vamp then?" "That's me pet, moving with the times. None of that castle and coffin crap for me." He winked at her. "Next thing you know, I'll have one of them computers and I'll be buying my blood on Ebay." He pressed some buttons and entered 'Nibblet' in his address list. "Put in your phone number," he said, handing her the phone. Dawn gladly obliged. Then she pulled her own cell from her handbag. "Now yours," she said handing it to him. Spike grinned, entered 'spike' and his own phone number once he'd remembered what it was. "Promise to keep in touch, ok?" Dawn said. "Course." Spike smirked. "Not getting rid of me that easily, just 'cause you're flying to the other side of the country." Dawn smiled. "Bye Spike," she said, and stepped out into the light. ************************* Dawn had left this visit until last. She had seen the few friends from highschool that were still in Sunnydale. She had caught up with Tara and had seen Xander and Anya again. Dawn knew this visit would be particularly painful. She was going to go and see her old home. She had a decision to make but had to see something first. Dawn still owned the house, it had been left to her and held in trust. It had been rented out to various tenants but at this point in time it was empty. As she pulled up outside 1630 Revello Drive, Dawn caught her breath, the place had been let run down. Badly. She felt like crying and dreaded seeing what it would be like inside. She opened the door and went into the house. Not much had changed, the furnishings had been left in the house. Everything was old and ratty looking but they were the same things. Dawn went upstairs. She saw her old room, her old bed still there. Giles had sent her possessions onto her when the arrangements were made. Buffy's room, bare except for the bed and dressing table. Her mother's room, the same. More memories came to Dawn. The place was old and worn, but somehow Dawn felt at home. As Dawn walked down the stairs she made up her mind. Dawn knocked on the door to Spike's crypt. She thought she ought to be polite. After all, it was his home and she wasn't some kid running away anymore. Spike opened the door a crack. It was still day. He ushered her inside. Dawn noted that his hair was all sticky up. He looked like he'd just woken up. "Hi Spike." "Hey Nibblet," he said, still half asleep. "There's been a change of plans Spike," said Dawn. "I'm going to be staying in Sunnydale for a while longer." Spike's face broke into a wide grin. He looked at her curiously. "What brought this on, Lil' Bit?" "I went home - to our old home. I'm going to stay and fix it up." To be continued. |