Fix You

Author: enigmaticblue

Rating: PG-13

Disclaimer: Yeah, I don't own these characters, which is really too bad, since I'm a lot nicer than Joss ever was.

Summary: Desperate times call for desperate measures where the First is involved. In order to prevent the end of the world, Buffy asks Willow to do a spell that's supposed to fix everything, and Spike goes along for the ride.

A/N: Written for effulgent_girl, who requested that S7 Buffy and Spike be sent back to S4, which got me to thinking. Always a dangerous thing.

A/N: You'll probably notice that I've took some liberties with the timing in canon. Since I'm running the show, I'm allowed to do that.

Chapter 40: Ties That Bind

Giles straightened his clothing, feeling more than a little embarrassed. He had somehow managed to alienate both Buffy and Joyce in the brief time he’d been split in two; Xander had done quite a bit better with his disparate halves from what Buffy had told him.

He glanced up to catch Joyce’s eye, but she was already turning to go upstairs. “Would you guys like something to drink?”

“That’s okay, Mrs. Summers,” Willow replied. “It’s late, and we should probably let you get to bed.”

Joyce smiled at her over her shoulder. “I’m going to wait up for Buffy, so there’s no trouble.”

“Mom!” Buffy’s voice called from upstairs.

She hurried up the stairs, and Giles started after her. He had a feeling that it would be easier to fix things with his Slayer than with Joyce; he still couldn’t believe what he’d said to her.

Spike was already in the kitchen with Buffy, and he realized that Joyce probably hadn’t told the vampire not to say anything.

Joyce seemed to realize the same thing. “Spike—”

The vampire raised an eyebrow. “I was just tellin’ Buffy how we put Humpty Dumpty back together again.”

Buffy’s eyes narrowed suspiciously; Giles wondered if the relief on his face was mirrored on Joyce’s. Since she still refused to meet his eyes, he couldn’t tell. “I see.”

“Buffy,” Giles began.

She waved him off. “Forget it, Giles. You weren’t yourself.”

He nodded, relieved. “Thank you.”

Graham cleared his throat. “I should get going.”

“Thanks for your help tonight, Graham,” Buffy said sincerely.

He shrugged. “No problem. Let me know if you need me again.”

“He seems like such a nice young man,” Joyce reflected once he was gone.

Buffy smiled. “He is.” She looked at Spike. “Ready to go? I’ve got classes in the morning.”

“So do we,” Willow inserted. “We should get going.”

Giles listened to them leave, their shared laughter echoing back through the kitchen. When the door had closed behind them, he turned to Joyce. “I’m sorry.”

She looked at him, exasperated. “I didn’t want Dawn to find out like that.”

“I realize that,” he replied. “I didn’t either. If I could take it back—”

“You can’t.” Joyce shook her head. “As Buffy said, I know you weren’t yourself.”

“I meant what I said.” Giles felt a bit desperate. He remembered losing Jenny just as he was rebuilding his relationship with her, and with his knowledge of the future, he knew the same could happen again. “We can go as fast or as slow as you like, but I need you to know how I feel.”

Her face softened. “Rupert…”

“I lost one woman I loved. To lose you, if you didn’t know—”

She kissed him. Her lips were soft and warm under his, tasting, teasing. Her thumb stroked the line of his jaw. “To tell you the truth, I was tempted by the idea of two of you.”

Giles raised an eyebrow. “We might be able to recover Toth’s staff.”

Joyce just laughed.

~~~~~

Spike looked from the now-empty cavern to the ring on his finger. He didn’t want to give it up, but he’d heard the rumors for himself now. If he didn’t want the Gem of Amara to fall into the wrong hands, he didn’t have much choice. Even if he only went out during the day, it still wouldn’t prevent him from being attacked at his apartment, and the ring taken.

It wasn’t so much that he was afraid for himself; Spike knew what he would have done if he’d had the ring while still evil. It wouldn’t have been pretty, and he didn’t want to give Buffy one more problem to solve.

At least his plan to clear out the cavern and put away a little nest egg had borne fruit.

“Spike?”

He turned to look behind him. Buffy was giving him an odd look. “Are you okay?” She’d finally talked him into letting her see the cavern after he’d admitted that the tunnels were probably safe enough. Spike could understand her curiosity, but he didn’t get why she was so insistent on coming with him.

“Yeah, fine, luv.” Spike pulled the ring off of his finger. “Looks like I’ll be giving this up.”

She closed his fingers back over the ring. “Giles has his opening tomorrow. Keep it until after that.”

Spike slipped the ring on his finger again. “Alright.”

Buffy put her hand through his arm. “Come on. I want to talk to you.”

He wasn’t sure he was ready for this conversation. Things had been quiet over the last week. Glory was nowhere to be seen, Giles was busy getting his shop ready, and had already hired Anya to help. Joyce was still waiting for her test results. Everything else was business as usual.

“What’s goin’ on, pet?”

“You know how I said I’d marry you?”

Spike braced himself. He’d been wondering if she was going to back out; it wasn’t like they’d made it official yet. “Yeah?”

She turned to him. “Give me a leg up?”

He did as she asked, boosting her out of the tunnel and following a moment later. “What about getting married?”

“I think that if we’re going to get married, we need to be honest with each other, right?”

“Probably would be good,” Spike admitted.

“Then would you tell me what has you so worried?”

He frowned. “Worried? Who said I was worried?”

Buffy huffed. “Give me a little credit, Spike. I might not be quite as good at reading you as you are at reading me, but I know when you’re worried.”

“How much did the ring change things, Buffy?”

Her eyes went wide. “You think I want to be with you because of that stupid ring?”

The dangerous tone told Spike what the right answer was. “Uh, no.”

She crossed her arms in front of her chest. “Try again, buster.”

“’s just that I can walk in the sun with you, Buffy. I wonder how that’s goin’ to change when I’m not wearin’ it full time.” He rubbed the scar that ran through his eyebrow. “You might not want to marry me.”

Buffy took a deep, audible breath. “Okay, I think I get what you’re saying. To be honest, the ring was nice, but it wasn’t everything. And I seem to remember that you got around the sun problem before.”

“I know that.” Spike hated that she might think that he doubted her love for him; he didn’t. It was just that he still didn’t quite believe himself worthy of her. The ring allowed him the pretense of being human, and normal.

She took his hand. “If it makes you feel any better, sometimes I wonder when you’re going to wake up and realize that I’m not the girl you want.”

He turned startled eyes to look at her. “Buffy—”

“Face it,” she forged ahead. “This thing between us shouldn’t work. It shouldn’t, but it does, and it’s not because of the ring, or your soul, or anything else. It’s just us, not giving up.”

Spike plunged his hand into his pocket. “Then you won’t mind that I got you this.”

Her eyes flew to his face, then to the black velvet box. “Oh.”

“If you don’t like it, we can take it back, an’ you can pick somethin’ else out,” he said. “Figured I’d give you one last chance to back out before it was too late.”

Buffy shook her head. “Spike, it’s beautiful.” She pulled the ring out with a trembling hand. “I’m not backing out.”

“Didn’t think you would,” Spike said. “Not really. I just wondered if things were goin’ to change.”

“Not unless it’s for the better,” Buffy responded. She grinned. “All we have to do now is have a party.”

“Thought we’d already done that,” Spike said with a puzzled frown, referring to their impromptu celebration at the Bronze.”

Buffy shook her head. “That wasn’t official. Mom’s going to want to help plan this one.”

“I’m not going to like this very much, am I?” he asked wryly.

Buffy shrugged. “I think I can make it worth your while.”

Spike was sure she could. Seeing his ring on her finger was enough.

~~~~~

Tara entered the gallery, hearing the bell above the door chime, then stopped in her tracks. Joyce stood in the middle of the room, holding a baby in her arms. “Oh, Tara, I didn’t realize you were coming in today. You remember Judy, don’t you?”

She nodded, managing a strained smile. “Yes. It’s nice to see you again.”

“Judy brought her daughter in for me to see. Isn’t she precious?”

Tara had to acknowledge that she was; the baby was beautiful. The only problem was that this was exactly what she had seen in her vision, the one she’d told Buffy and the others about. The one they’d taken as evidence that Joyce would survive her illness.

She had no idea if this meant something. Scrying wasn’t an exact science. She might have seen Joyce holding the infant because she was going to be working at the gallery, or for another reason that had not yet become clear.

Pushing aside her confusion, Tara smiled, and accepted the offer to hold the baby. Judy stayed for another twenty minutes, until Joyce had to take a personal phone call. Then Tara grabbed the duster and began to straighten things up.

“Can you watch the shop for the rest of the afternoon, Tara?” Joyce asked as soon as she got off the phone.

Tara nodded. “Is everything okay?”

The older woman gave her a pained smile. “The doctor said my test results are in. He wants to speak with me, and he had an opening today.”

“Good luck.” Tara watched her leave, then sat down behind the small counter with a deep breath. She knew that she wasn’t to blame for whatever the test results happened to be, but she couldn’t help but feel that she should have been able to foresee more clearly.

The afternoon went by slowly; she kept looking at the clock and wondering how Joyce’s appointment had gone. Tara had grown very fond of her in the short time she’d worked at the gallery. Her mom had been very different, but there were certain qualities that they shared, and that certainly strengthened her desire to do anything she could to help.

She’d been helpless to save her mom; she still had time to help Joyce.

When the clock finally struck six, Tara gathered her things and closed up the shop. She found Mairead waiting outside for her, hands tucked into the pockets of her jacket. “Hello.”

Tara was relieved to see her girlfriend. Mairead was one of the few people who could make her feel as though everything would turn out for the best. “Hi.”

Their kiss was brief, but Mairead must have picked up on her anxiety, because she frowned. “What’s wrong, love?”

“I—” She hesitated. “Let’s not talk here.”

“I’m a bit peckish,” Mairead admitted. “Do you want to get something to eat?”

They headed to one of the few restaurants in town that had both good food and was inexpensive enough to suit them. Once they had placed their orders, Mairead reached across the table for her hands. “What’s wrong?”

“Did I tell you about the first scrying I did here?” Tara asked. When Mairead shook her head, she briefly explained what Spike and Buffy had asked her to do, and what she’d seen. “Buffy wanted to know if Mrs. Summers made it, and when I looked in the bowl, I saw her with a baby. I guess we all thought it was Buffy’s baby, or maybe Dawn’s—in the future.”

“And today?” she prompted.

“I saw it. I saw Mrs. Summers with a baby when I walked in the gallery. It was exactly what I had seen in the bowl.” Tara took a deep breath. “I don’t know what it means, though, or why I would see that. It doesn’t seem to relate to anything.”

Mairead frowned. “It could be a pattern. What else did you see that day?”

“That was the last thing,” Tara replied. “It’s what I saw when Buffy asked me if I could see anything with her mother.”

“And did you try again soon after?”

“A day or two later,” Tara admitted.

“What did you see?” Mairead asked.

She looked away. Her family had been one topic she’d said little about, for any number of reasons. “My family coming for me.”

Mairead’s grip tightened. “Just because they come for you doesn’t mean you have to leave with them.”

“I know that.” Tara smiled. “I know the truth about who and what I am. The coven gave me that.”

She nodded. “Then perhaps that’s why you saw what you did. Your birthday is only a few days away.”

Tara hadn’t really thought of that, but it made sense. “I saw Mrs. Summers holding a baby because my family was coming.” Her heart sank. “What am I going to tell Buffy?”

“Nothing right now,” Mairead advised. “We can try scrying again, this time for information specifically about Mrs. Summers.”

Tara’s eyes widened. “I didn’t know you could do that.”

“What? Two at once?” Mairead asked. “It’s not easy, but it can be done, assuming that both want to see the same thing. Often, each wants to see something different, and nothing is accomplished. We shouldn’t have to worry about that, and with two, there can be more power, and a clearer sight, if there is any sight at all.”

Tara thought it was a good plan. The last thing she wanted was to tell Buffy that her mom might still die when they knew nothing of the sort, and Mairead’s explanation made sense. She’d had thoughts of her family in the back of her mind the first time she’d tried to look into the future. It had likely been enough to influence the vision.

“When should we try it?”

“Tonight,” Mairead replied. “I don’t think you’ll rest until we do.”

Tara didn’t disagree. The sooner they could find out, the better, in her opinion.

~~~~~

“Mom?” Buffy entered the house, Spike right behind her. Joyce hadn’t sounded great on the phone, and she had a feeling that she knew what was wrong already.

“Hello, sweetie,” Joyce said from the living room. “Thanks for coming.” She smiled at Spike. “You, too, Spike.”

He stopped in the doorway. “I can leave if you want.”

“No, you should be here,” Joyce said.

“Where’s Dawn?” Buffy asked.

“At a friend’s house. I didn’t want to worry her.”

“You went to the doctor, and it’s bad news,” Buffy said flatly, sitting down next to her mom on the couch.

Joyce nodded. “The doctor said he could see something that concerned him on the scan. He wants to do a biopsy.”

“When?”

“Tomorrow. There wasn’t time today, or he’d have done it immediately.” Joyce reached for her hand. “I don’t want you to worry.”

Buffy tried to smile and couldn’t quite manage it. “I can’t help it.”

“Think you should get a second opinion,” Spike said. He was leaning against the wall, as though he didn’t want to intrude on their privacy.

Joyce frowned. “I’m sure the doctors here are good.”

“Maybe so, but this is Sunnydale,” Spike replied. “There might be better doctors, who could do a better job.”

Buffy immediately saw his point. “Spike’s right. There have to be doctors who specialize in this kind of thing and remove brain tumors all the time.”

Joyce shook her head. “I don’t think I’d be able to afford that, Buffy. The insurance—”

“I’ll take care of it,” Spike broke in.

Her eyes widened. “I can’t let you do that.”

“Sure you can,” he replied. “Half of what I found in that cavern is Buffy’s by right, or it will be when we make it official. An’ I’d like to keep you around, too.”

Buffy could see her mom blinking back tears, although she wasn’t sure why. The fact that Spike thought the world of her was no secret.

“What about Dawn?” Joyce said. “And the gallery?

“We can take care of Dawn,” Buffy replied. “I think you took a medical leave the last time. You could get another manager to cover for you. It wouldn’t even be that long. Just to get a second opinion, and then for treatments.”

Joyce was quiet for a moment. “I have to get through the biopsy first, and the test results. The doctor wasn’t sure how long that would take, but it could be a couple of days.”

“Whatever you decide to do, Mom.” Buffy hugged her, feeling her mom grab on just as hard.

She wished there was something she could do to ensure that Joyce would be okay, some spell, or drug, or anything to keep her around for a long time to come.

Joyce finally released her, saying, “I should probably call Rupert. I wanted to tell you first.”

“When is Dawn coming home?” Buffy asked.

“Another hour or so,” Joyce replied. “Michelle’s mom was going to bring her back.”

“We’ll stay until then,” Buffy promised.

When she’d left the room, Buffy turned to Spike. “You don’t think we should send Dawn away, too?”

“Would your mum allow it?” he asked. “She’s got school. Figure if it comes down to it, we can ship her off. Let your Watcher get both of them out of town for a bit. We know when Glory is goin’ to want to do it.”

Buffy nodded in agreement, knowing that he had a point. It wouldn’t help her sister to start disrupting her life now, although they were probably going to have to tell her she was the Key soon. She didn’t want to, but she remembered how Dawn had found out the first time, and that had not been a good situation.

“We’re gonna get through this,” he promised in a low voice. “I love you.”

“I know.” Buffy rested her head against his shoulder, taking a few moments’ respite. Now, as before, Spike was the only person she would allow to see her weakness. “Do you remember when Mom went in for tests the first time?”

She could hear the nostalgia in his voice. “Yeah. I’d planned on killin’ you, an’ you looked up at me, an’ I knew I was lost.”

“You were pretty sweet, and I had no idea what to do with that,” she confessed. “You were the only one I let see me cry when Mom was sick.”

“My shoulder is always available.”

“I know.”

That, at least, she could take comfort in.

~~~~~

Tara took a deep breath. “Okay, so how are we going to do this?”

“You’re going to guide,” Mairead replied calmly. “I will merely lend power and focus.”

She had never done this before, not even with her mom, and Tara was both nervous and strangely excited. It felt more intimate than a lot of the tandem spell-casting they’d done in the past, and she knew that the answers they received could dictate much of their future. “Okay.”

The ritual was familiar by now, and this was one area where the coven had not been able to help her. Scrying took practice, and once you’d mastered the basics, it was a matter of learning how to see.

It also took talent, and Tara took pleasure in the fact that in this area, at least, she was very good. Miss Harkness had told her that her sensitivity and intuition were top-notch. Tara figured that meant if she ever wanted to set up shop as a palm reader, she could. She might even be able to make some money at it.

The water flowed slowly into the bowl, and she focused in, picturing time as a stream, and the bowl a window into the stream. Whispering the incantation under her breath, Tara put her hands on either side of the bowl, feeling Mairead’s hands settle over hers.

For a brief moment, she could see nothing—and then the vision came.

Her family was there and gone in the blink of an eye, maybe because she had no fear of them anymore. They would not be able to bully her again, and that was all she needed to know.

Tara concentrated on Joyce, and on Buffy. She could see Joyce leaving on an airplane, Dawn with a green light surrounding her, and Joyce in the backyard of her home, wearing a beautiful dress. The picture faded as soon as it appeared, however, and Tara couldn’t tell if it had any meaning at all. Perhaps, as with the first time, it could only be interpreted in light of what had come before and after it.

The picture disappeared, then Tara saw Joyce again. The Christmas tree behind her told her what time of the year it was, but nothing gave her any clue as to what year it was. It could be this year, as Christmas was still a month away.

This time, when the picture cleared, she could see nothing else.

“That wasn’t very helpful,” Tara said ruefully, as she looked up at Mairead.

Mairead gave her a sympathetic smile. “We are not always shown what we would most like to see.”

“I know,” Tara replied. “What should I do, though? Do I need to tell Buffy what I know?”

Mairead raised an eyebrow. “What do you know? Are you sure that Joyce was holding the same infant she was in your vision?”

Tara frowned. She couldn’t be absolutely certain, and visions of the future were notoriously unreliable anyway. “What do you think?”

Mairead shook her head. “This is your decision. Whatever you decide to do, I’ll support you.”

Tara wished that there was a clear-cut answer, but that wasn’t possible, of course. “I’ll sleep on it,” she said finally. “I can decide what to tell Buffy in the morning.”

She hoped things would be clearer by then.