Title:  Finding Heaven  (Part Three of Raison D'Etre)

Author: Aeneas

Rating: R (violence, language, nonexplicit sex)

Spoilers: Anything, everything and all spoilers you might have heard for the end of BtVS and season 4 of AtS.  Since Spike never stayed in Sunnydale, season 7 went down very differently and there's nothing to really spoil, so this is mainly a warning for the Angel viewers.

Pairings: Spike/Faith, Gunn/Gwen, Xander/OC, everyone else is pretty much single for now - will change soon enough.

Distribution: Archived at The Crypt (lovely site).  Ask me if you want it, I'll say yes.  Can also be found on my own website.

Feedback: Appreciated more than I can possibly express.  It's better than a happy ending for Season 7 - almost.

Disclaimer: It's Joss's sandbox - I just play there.

Summary and Recap:

Previously on Raison D'Etre - Spike's journey to get his soul and be a better man messed up the cosmic balance and set reality on its ear.  He managed to impress a few people in high places, who then stepped in to help when everything went to hell.  He staked himself to save Faith and the world.  In return, his demon was granted ascension, he was given a human body (William's) and returned to Earth without memory of his past.  No, I don't consider this to be Shanshu but that will become clear in time.  Also, the government has decided that the Slayer lines - which now end with Buffy, Faith, and Cara - need to be regenerated.

What to expect from Part Three - Each part has encompassed its own arc and its own theme.  Part One was Ethan Rayne and the past coming back for revenge.  Part Two was the grand scale, sweeping, higher beings getting their hands dirty, and world conflict type of story with the Incarnations of Reality.  Part Three is going out a whole new door.  Expect the nature of family and love to be some of the central issues.  With a large helping of intrigue, bad guys, and general Welcome to the Hellmouth goodness.

For those of you who have been so patient with me, thank you very much. I apologize for the long time it has taken me to update. Real life, fickle Muse. The hardest thing to do in this world is to live in it, right?


Finding Heaven
 

Epilogue

Sunlight had turned the ocean into waves of diamonds.  A lazy cloud drifted through the sky periodically and cast just enough shade to make staring out over the water possible.  Buffy enjoyed those few minutes, pulling her eyes away from her flowerbeds to watch the horizon.  She was never quite sure if she expected something to appear.  Faith had complained of similar behavior, unable to pinpoint the source of the prickling between her shoulder blades.  No more demons to slay made Slayers bored out of their brains, she liked to say.

Buffy smiled for no reason in particular and turned back to her flowers, adjusting the brim of her hat to keep the emerging sun away from her pale skin.  Her knees were beginning to stiffen and she'd have to get up and stretch soon enough.  Just a few more weeds.

"Sir?  A vehicle is approaching the perimeter."  Black military boots smudged with dirt and fertilizer stepped into her line of sight.

"That'll be Xander and Jane."  Shielding her eyes with one hand, she awkwardly got to her feet with the help of the gardening stand Xander had given her.  It had seemed silly at the time but she had been grateful as it got harder to get up and down with the awkward weight of a baby.  The young Marine stayed just far away to not be hovering but close enough to help if she needed him.  It had taken months to get used to the constant, if discrete, presence of the armed guards.  As it turned out, even without demons there were still plenty of enemies to go around. 

"We'll wave them through."  The young man nodded sharply, heels clicking as he turned and disappeared back through the flowering bushes that bordered the garden. 

Buffy rolled her eyes a little as she stripped off the gardening gloves and gently shook away the dirt and bits of weeds.  Slipping off the thick-soled clogs at the edge of the garden, she went the rest of the way barefoot.  The grass was cool and smooth beneath her feet; she wiggled her toes for a moment just to feel the blades tickling her skin.  Further down the pathway the grass thinned and pale golden sand took over, rougher against her feet but still pleasant.  It had been in shadow for the morning and was just now beginning to warm under the sun.

Lifting the brim of the sunhat, she scanned the beach in search of the rest of her visitors.  The figures in the distance were too far away to tell who they were but she counted four.  That left three more somewhere.  The sound of giggling gave away the position of at least one of those and before Buffy had time to turn around, a wild tangle of chestnut hair on legs came barreling out of the trees.

"Aunt Buffy!  Hide me!"  The girl darted behind Buffy, covering her mouth in an attempt to mask the laughter and peeking out from behind her sundress.  Branches rustled again and this time Willow appeared.

"Hey Buff.  I don't suppose you've seen a little person...yay tall?"  She winked at Buffy.

"You know, I think she ran that way."  Buffy pointed toward the beach.  "Is she dangerous, Will?  Should I be worried?"

"I don't know about dangerous but she's very wily."  Willow edged closer, pretending not to see the mass of curls appearing to spring from Buffy's dress.  "Oh well.  I guess she doesn't get any ice cream then.  I'll have to eat it all by myself."

That was too much for the girl and she burst out of her hiding place.  "I'm right here, Aunt Willow!"  Her thin arms wrapped around Willow like a starfish.

Buffy grinned and started toward the porch steps, "Did someone mention ice cream?"

"I want chocolate!"  Wide blue eyes sparkling, the girl took Willow's hand and pulled her toward the house.

"I think there's some chocolate just for you."  Waving the girl into the house, Buffy took one more look at the beach.  "Are they going to wait until they're lobsters or did anyone think to take sunscreen?"

"Leia left her sunscreen there when she came back to the house.  I think she wanted to get a head start on lunch."  Willow adjusted her ponytail with a twist, pulling out a few stray leaves that had hitched a ride through the foliage. 

"She knows she doesn't have to cook."

"I think she enjoys it, makes her feel useful."  Willow grinned as they entered the kitchen.  "And she knows I think the apron's sexy."  

"Very funny."  Leia rolled her eyes as she pulled a carton of ice cream out of the freezer and set it on the counter.  "Where's the rest of the gang?"

"Angel's hunting for seashells with Alex but I think he's really making up for lost tanning time.  I think Spike and Faith were," Willow paused and cast a quick look at little girl already covered in chocolate ice cream.  "I think they were making a sandcastle."

"Right.  Sandcastle."  Buffy fetched a bowl for herself and batted her eyelashes at Leia.  "Ice cream for the enormously pregnant lady?"

"Are you sure?  The midwife should be here soon."

"And this will be my last ice cream for days, yes, I'm sure."  Buffy eased herself carefully onto a stool beside the little girl.  "Did you have fun at the beach, Addie?"

"Yup."  Another heaping spoonful of ice cream disappeared into her small mouth and the
rest of her sentence was garbled beyond recognition.

"Once you've finished your ice cream, make sure you wash up.  And then you and Alex and I are going to into town and see a movie with Alex's daddy, okay?"

"Can my daddy come too, Aunt Lee?"  Addie paused her eating for a second.

"Of course he can."  Leia swept away the bowl before the little girl could try to lick it clean.  "Will you guys have everything under control here?"

"I think so."  Willow wrapped her arms around Leia and laid her head against the blonde's shoulder.  "One Slayer, one witch, and a former vampire?  Plus the armed forces.  I think we're covered."

"It's silly to worry, I know."  Leia still sounded nervous.

"Don't worry.  After last month's kidnap attempt, half the movie audience will be plain clothes Marines."  Buffy tried to reassure her.  "And the little sprog here is hardly helpless."  She beamed proudly at Addie, who had managed to scream loud enough to raise the dead and bruise her attacker quite badly before security had apprehended him.  The black market price for a Slayer's child, even now that Slayers were nearly obsolete, was exorbitant. 

"My mum says daddy's not supposed to call me sprog.  She says I already have a bloody name." 

"Adelle Davis!"  Leia gave the girl a stern look.

Buffy nearly choked on her ice cream, laughing so hard that her eyes watered despite the looks from Leia and Willow, who were trying desperately not to laugh.  When her throat cleared enough to speak, she shrugged, "From the mouths of babes."  That didn't seem to appease them.  "You should hear some of the bedtime stories Angel tells Alex.  I should stake him."

"What does Xander think of that?"

"As long as Xander's one of the heroes in said bedtime stories, he's fine." Buffy grinned, slipping off the barstool to dump her bowl in the sink just as the doorbell sounded.  "Speaking of Xander."

"I'll get it!"  Addie bounded out of the room before the others could move.

"I don't know how Faith keeps up with her."  Willow was still leaning against Leia.  "She's worse than the energizer bunny."

"I should round up my son so you guys don't have to wait."  Buffy checked her watch.

"I'll go," Willow offered immediately.

"Thanks but no thanks, Will.  I need to stretch my legs a bit.  Why don't you get the room ready?"  Buffy gave Willow what she hoped was an enthusiastic smile.  As ready as she was to no longer be pregnant, the actual labor part had no appeal.  She reclaimed her sunhat on the way out the back door, fitting it over her hair and squinting into the bright afternoon sun.  One last walk down the beach before the day got down to business.  It would be awhile before she could wander around on her own again.

The sand was hot beneath her feet and the sound of the waves lapping rhythmically against the beach soothed her nerves.  In all the brightness and wonder around her, the one shadow was that her sister wasn't there to hold her hand.  That Dawn had never been Aunt Dawn and had never known her nephews.  She paused for a moment, stroking her swollen stomach absently.  Still out of range from the group on the beach but close enough to see them.

Faith and Spike were taking advantage of a few quiet moments away from their precocious daughter, walking hand in hand through the surf as though they hadn't a care in the world.  Angel was crouched beside a monumental pile of sand that had probably been intended as a sandcastle but had been reduced to rubble by the five year old doing his best Tyrannosaurus Rex imitation.  Moments like that made it all worthwhile even if everything hadn't turned out the way she'd planned. 

Sunnydale had been replaced by new town with shiny glass and fresh paint on every building.  Even the cemeteries sported new fences and repaired or replaced headstones.  While the unexplained explosion had only killed the demons, most of the buildings had been too damaged from the battle to be repaired and they had settled for bulldozing the town to give it a fresh start.  Xander's construction company had gotten quite a few of the lucrative contracts and he had opted to put down roots, and run a comic store, with Jane.  Willow and Leia had stayed as well, finding positions on the rebuilt university campus as professor and curator of the folk art museum, respectively.  The museum had conveniently come into possession of a great deal of bizarre artifacts during the renovation and was able to arrange for frequent consultations with one of Britain's foremost authorities of the mystical and weird, Rupert Giles.  More than once, Buffy wondered if apocalypse had been the best thing to happen to Sunnydale.

Faith and Spike hadn't managed to stay in one place for more than six months in the last five years but they were talking about settling in Sunnydale the coming fall so that Addie could start school with Alex.  At first they were on the run, making sure they kept their daughter out of the hands of whatever demons remained.  Then they simply enjoyed traveling together, sending back trinkets and postcards.  Addie seemed to possess the same wandering, carefree spirit as her parents. 

Even the Watcher's Council had evolved, becoming an entity dedicated to the history of the Slayer and all else supernatural.  They were the world's leading organization for the investigation of anything that went bump in the night or howled at the moon.  Iverson had gone so far as to set up satellite branches in strategic cities around the globe, particularly those with Hellmouths.  Buffy's fledging business had gotten the Sunnydale contract for a rather unnecessary amount of landscaping.  It was Iverson's way of offering support now that she was no longer in active Slayer duty.  Although she hadn't ruled out that he might be trying to assuage lingering guilt over Cara.  Her smile faded a little.  They had searched in vain for Cara's body when they'd returned to Sunnydale. 

As for Angel's circle of friends, they had returned to find one of their own taken over by a creature known as Illyria.  Buffy had only met the self-proclaimed God-King once before the Watcher's Council had enlisted the resources of the Devonshire Coven in controlling the wake of destruction left behind.  Iverson sent out quarterly memos about her adjustment to the human world, which Angel read with a poignant combination of sadness and reverence. 

Those from L.A. had lost too much and once Illyria was out of their hands, they had drifted apart.  She knew that Angel had remained in contact with Gunn and Lorne after choosing to leave Los Angeles and come to Sunnydale, wondering if he and Buffy could have some sort of a future together.  They could be silent together; they could stand in the cemetery and feel the same grief at the same headstones.  It was a commonality that Buffy didn't have with anyone else and while it wasn't the storybook ending she had imagined so many years earlier, neither of them truly fit anywhere else. 

The sound of wind through the trees caught her ears and she looked back to watch the leaves toss and twirl.  She held her breath, too afraid to hope for what she wanted to see.  No word of it had ever left her lips and part of her clung to the lack of explanation because it meant that she could choose the one she wanted.  Her heart leapt in her chest as a thousand fluttering wings poured out of the trees, deftly navigating the breeze that carried them along.  Black, yellow, blue, orange; every color imaginable came spiraling toward her in a crush of butterflies.  She held out her hands, laughing as she felt the brush of feet and wings against her skin.  It brought back memories of her childhood, of chasing butterflies with Dawn.  If there was a world of only shrimp then there was a world of butterflies and every world had a door.  Every door had a key.  She wanted to believe it was Dawn's way of being with her.  They were gone as quickly as they came, flying away in crazy drunken spirals on multi-colored wings.

"Mommy!"  Changing from dinosaur to little boy in an instant, he bounded off of the sand pile and raced up the beach toward her.  "Come see what Angel found, mommy!"  He grabbed her hand and started pulling her back toward the water.

"Is it a seashell?"

"It's way cooler than that."

She raised an eyebrow at Angel when they were close enough, "And what have you two been up too?"

"Innocent fun." Angel winked.

"Right."  She turned her attention back to her son as he dug into the sandcastle and unearthed a gnarled piece of driftwood about three feet long.  "Ooo...what's that?"

"It's a staff.  Like a wizard's staff."  Alex told her authoritatively.  "I buried it to hide it from the demons."

"Did you now?"  She gave Angel a smile that was a little too bright.  "Does it have special powers?"

"Yeah.  It does...stuff."  Alex waved it around for a second before dropping it back into the sand pile and reburying it.

"Buffy," Angel started.

"Why don't you help him bury it, Angel?"  She ruffled Alex's dark hair and pressed a quick kiss against his head.  "Then it's time to go into town with your dad."  She scanned the horizon out of habit before waving to get Faith and Spike's attention.  They leisurely turned back toward the house.

"Are they here?"  Angel seemed to suddenly be conscious of the position of the sun in the sky.  "I didn't realize we'd been out here so long."

"At least you remembered sunscreen."  She tried to bend down to pick up the picnic basket she'd sent with them.  Angel stopped her before she gave up, gathering up the pieces of their lunch and the supplies she'd packed. 

He slipped an arm around her shoulders and smiled down at her.  "It might be a wizard's staff."

"A very short wizard."

"Stranger things have happened."  He nudged Alex gently with the picnic basket.  "Come on, Alex.  It's safe now and your dad's here to take you to a movie."

Alex lingered over the sand pile for a second before deciding everything was all right and reaching for Buffy's hand.  "Can you come to the movie with us, Angel?" 

"I need to stay here with your mom."

"To protect her from demons?"  He looked up at her with wide brown eyes.  "Are there demons, mommy?"

"Just the one.  But he's a good demon now, isn't that right, Angel?"  She gave him another smile that let him know he could dig his own way out.

"There aren't any demons, Alex.  Your mom is perfectly safe.  And when you get home, you'll have a baby brother." 

Alex seemed to think about that for a moment before he nodded, "Okay."  They were nearly to the house when he tugged on her dress.  "Mommy?  Are baby brothers demons?"