Days in the Sun
December 2nd, 2029 – Council
Christmas ghosts haunted Lisa as she curled up in an armchair by the tree, but they were happy ghosts, reflected in the glass and crafts ornaments the family had hung earlier. She and her siblings all had their own homes now, but on every first weekend of December, they still came back to the nest, Will and Jay with their significant others and Lisa by herself. They would all leave the next afternoon and return only for Christmas itself; but this one tradition of decorating the tree together remained unchanged.
Reaching out toward the tree, she touched a crystal bell with the tip of her finger, and it rang, a clear chime made louder by the night’s silence.
Within seconds, a familiar silhouette appeared by the room’s entrance; Spike must have been in his office. Something else that didn’t change.
“It’s late, luv,” he needlessly pointed out. “Shouldn’t you be all tucked in?”
“I’m not sleepy.”
By the blinking lights of the tree, she could read on his face that he understood all too well.
“Do you think…” she started, but cut herself short.
Spike gave her a few seconds before prodding. “Do I think what?”
Do you think I’ll ever find someone who doesn’t mind that I’m a night owl, like mom doesn’t mind you are, she wanted to ask, but bit back the words. The last thing she wanted was to worry her father with her relationship problems. She would sort them out herself, eventually. Maybe.
“Do you think we could do a quick patrol together?”
His lips curved up in an amused little smile. “Not much left to slay in Sunnydale, baby.”
She stood and stretched, pulling her arms high above her head. “Then whatever we do slay will be more fun to catch.”
His smile a little more pronounced now, he nodded. She watched him go up the steps and to his room; seconds later, he returned, a long, black leather duster enveloping him. He handed her a second one – her mother’s, Lisa realized as she slipped it on. The leather was clean but well worn, and to her acute sense of smell, it held the scents of both her parents. There was something in her father’s eyes as he looked at her that Lisa couldn’t quite identify. Fondness? Pride? Fear? A bit of each?
“You know, this’d be a nice Christmas present,” she hinted, not so subtly, as they started walking down the street side by side.
Her father laughed. “Keep dreaming, luv. Your mother’ll never let it go.”
“Since we’re all here,” Lisa said suddenly, taking advantage of a pause in the conversations, “there’s something I wanted to tell you.”
All eyes turned to her.
“I’m moving to England in January. I found a new job there.”
Buffy caught Spike’s gaze across the table; his congratulatory words were as fake as hers, she realized. How often would they see Lisa once she had moved abroad?
“So, what’s the new job about?” Joy asked, and she, at least, was sincerely glad for her sister.
Lisa dabbed her napkin to her lips before setting it down next to her plate. Judging by the deep breath she took, she was nervous, but why…
“Three years ago, a Hellmouth opened two hours North of London. I’m going to be its resident Slayer.”
Silence fell on the room, heavy and crackling with tension. Buffy noticed, from the edge of her vision, that just about everyone was looking at her, waiting to see how she would react, but her attention was focused on Lisa and she was trying very hard to understand if her child was joking or if she was truly considering this insanity. It was one thing to know she regularly patrolled the streets of Philadelphia, quite another to imagine her standing guard over a Hellmouth.
Then, it got worse.
“I won’t be alone. The Council is going to give me a Watcher. And they’re paying me, so I won’t…”
“The Council?” Spike cut in, his eyes wide and glittering with gold.
Lisa nodded.
“They promised,” Buffy heard herself say. “They swore they’d leave us alone. They can’t…”
“I went to them. Asked Uncle Giles to introduce me. I’ve been negotiating with them for a few months; and we finally reached an agreement.”
She looked in turn at William and Joyce Anne. “They won’t come to you. That’s one part of what we agreed to. If you are ever interested, you…”
“No!” Buffy interjected, impulsively rising from her seat. “It’s the Council! They’re going to try to manipulate you and use you! They always wanted to have you and now…”
She choked on the words as memories flooded her mind. The Council had kidnapped her and Spike, kept them caged for almost a year, all of it to lay their hands on their children. The simple idea that Lisa was now willingly going to them was sickening.
“They changed, mom,” Lisa said quietly. “They changed the way they operate and how they treat Slayers. And I have a contract with them; if they don’t respect the terms, I’ll be out of there and they know it.”
Too upset to listen to more, Buffy left the table and slipped out on the back deck. She could hear silence behind her, broken only as the door closed on her and Spike calmly asked their daughter if she was out of her mind.
“Please tell me it’s just a nightmare,” she asked quietly.
He shook his head even though she couldn’t see him.
“Afraid not, luv. She thought it through, left nothing to chance. She really is doing it.”
Despite himself, Spike couldn’t prevent a tiny bit of pride from coloring his words. That had always been how he saw their children’s fight; with fear and pride woven so tightly, he could barely distinguish them. From Lisa’s excited call in the middle of the night to the accidental discovery of Will’s extra-curricular activities or Jay’s casual revelation, he had always been too proud of them to deny them the right to choose their own path, however dangerous it may be.
“But a Hellmouth!” Buffy protested weakly. “And the Council!”
She turned to him, and he was glad to see that, despite her distress, she was not crying. If he knew her – and after all these years, he was quite sure he did – it meant that she was upset but would not fight Lisa’s decision any more than she already had.
“I know,” he said soothingly, and opened his arms to her. “But if she really wants to be responsible for a Hellmouth, then maybe it’s a good thing that she has help.”
He sighed as she finally came to him and found her place in his embrace.
“It’s going to be OK, luv,” he murmured. “She’ll be fine.”
Somehow, the reassurance wasn’t hard to give. He had seen Lisa fight, the previous night – had she asked him to patrol so that he could see her in action? She was good. Better than good. Better, maybe, than Buffy had been at her top form, perhaps because she enjoyed the hunt more than Buffy ever had. Where her mom had often considered her calling as a burden, Lisa wanted to be a Slayer more than Spike had ever known her to want anything else. He couldn’t help but wonder, though, how much of it was truly her choice, and how much was dictated by the damn prophecy that had started it all.
He wondered, also, and worried, whether her siblings would decide to follow her footsteps. Hopefully, for Buffy’s sake, they wouldn’t announce anything quite like their sister had anytime soon.
The characters and names used in these stories do not belong to me. All copyrights remain with Fox and Mutant Enemy. No profit is made from this fanfiction.