AUTHOR'S NOTE:
In astronomy, the closer light gets to an observer, the more it shifts into the blue spectrum.
**************************

LONDON, ENGLAND-

She bit her lip, this was a simple telegram, and it wasn’t physics. What was taking him so long? Lydia looked at her watch again, Twenty minutes. Have to get in before sunset, just to be safe.

She’d searched all over town, the bits of Travers’s conversation running through her head. She hadn’t even meant to hear it. And, if she had not been working late and gone back for her neglected notes, she wouldn’t know about it now. She was trying to be random in her movements, to be certain she wasn’t followed and she’d finally found what she thought was a secure location to send the wire to Giles. He had to know what Quentin was planning. “William the Bloody” was indeed endangered. He had to be protected. Her loyalty to science overrode her allegiance to the Council. She finally found a “Western Union” transmit station, in the back of a tiny ironmonger.

Only now, as she watched the day slowly fade to evening, did she wish she’d found this place sooner.

The young man looked up from the transcript of what was to be sent and slid it carefully across the counter, “Is everything in order, Miss?”

“Of course,” Lydia said, too distracted by the lateness of the hour to really care. She nodded absently, “Yes, make sure that that gets to Rupert Giles, in Tsavo, Africa, right away. It’s very important.”

“Of course, Miss,” the clerk said as he took the slip of paper back, “Do you wish to stay while I send this?”

Lydia looked at her watch again, “What time do you close up shop?”

“Not for another hour, Miss.”

Lydia looked nervously out the door, and noticed the light fading slowly from orange into indigo, and took a deep breath, “No,” she said tremulously, trying to control the rhythm of her heartbeat and breath as her fingers fumbled to hand over the two pound note, “just send it. I must be going now.”

“Have a nice evening,” floated on the air after her as she hurried out the door.

The sprint to her car felt like a marathon. What Travers had planned made her breath come in heaving gasps. And, the thought that he might somehow know that she had discovered his secret, had the adrenaline rushing through her system, making her hands shake and her blood boil with anger. If she were found out… I’d rather face William before the Colonist’s butchers put their hands on him. The emotions flowing in and through her made starting the ignition nearly impossible.

When the key finally found its way, by some miracle, into the ignition and the engine sparked to life, Lydia forced the pedal to the floor and sped off for home, and safety, before night had a chance to fall.
***********************************************************

KENYA, AFRICA-

Panya finally let himself relax as he spoke with the old man, “It is good that Simba is sleeping now,” Giles noticed that the boy’s face seemed much older than the rest of him, “It is good that his Shujaa is with him now. Perhaps he can rest now?”

Giles sighed as he took in the scene in one corner of the cave. To his eye, Spike looked weak and frail. Buffy had not left his side since he’d bluntly told her that Spike now had a soul. She looked as though she still didn’t believe what he’d told her. She still had the wide-eyed look that told him that she was still expecting to be awakened at any moment. He could still hear her murmuring low, trying to be brave.

That was his Slayer. The brave warrior, to the last. A thought struck him and he turned to the boy and asked quietly, “What does ‘ Shujaa’ mean. I heard Spike use the term, and now you have as well. What does it mean?”

Panya smiled, “The closest English word is, ‘hero,’” he nodded in Buffy’s direction, “Or, in her case, ‘heroine.’ I heard Simba call her, ‘Slayer,’ so I guess it means that for him.”

Giles smiled. The more things change…

Suddenly, the crack of rifle fire rang out from somewhere in the night. The more they stay the same. Reflexively, Giles covered his vital organs, crouching low as he hissed, “What the buggering Hell was that?!”

Panya put his finger to his lips, his eyes held a dark seriousness as he begged the man’s silence. He quickly darted over to Spike’s corner of the grotto. Once he was certain that the vampire was still safe, despite his ever-present state of unrest, he answered the old man’s question, “Poachers,” he said, in a low voice, fearing that any rise in pitch would arouse the vampire, “We must keep Simba calm,” he said, clearly worried for his friend’s state of mind. At the confused look on the elder’s face Panya realized that, in his concern, he had failed to answer the man’s question, “Ivory trade,” he whispered low, “ They hunt the elephants for their tusks.”

Buffy tried to soothe Spike, who was quite obviously in the throes of a nightmare. But at least he was asleep, “But, the game reserve…there are rules!” she breathed, “They can’t just…”

The scathing look she received from both her Watcher and the boy stopped her words in her throat. They both looked like they could kill her with their bare hands. And, being the Slayer, that was saying something.

The boy mouthed the words, “Keep Simba quiet! ” as he crept toward the opening to investigate.

The heat in the boy’s dark eyes helped Buffy to realize that he was very serious. And judging from how uneasy Spike seemed, even with her close, maybe she was looking into the eyes of experience.

Buffy looked down at Spike’s face. She could see his eyes moving quickly under his eyelids. She could feel him straining weakly under her light hold on him. She hoped her presence would calm him, but somehow she knew that his mind was reliving something horrifying.

She felt the muscles in his body tense, ready to pounce, and she hoped she would have the strength to hold him back if he awoke.

She loved watching him sleep, but not like this.

There were times, last year that she had stayed, sometimes, until after the day sleep came over him, just to watch it change him. His face became soft, almost innocent, like a marble carving by a master artist who had worked for years to lovingly and patently coax out the beautiful thing that he had seen trapped within the stone. In those moments she could forget what he was. He was beautiful then.

He was beautiful now. Buffy wondered what kind of new thing he would be. She could feel it trying to escape. She wondered what was trapped under his skin, and what kind of pain he’d been through. And, how much more he would have to endure.

Here he was again. Watching it all unfold as if it were a bloody “Passions” rerun. At least he knew it was a dream. There was comfort in lucid dreaming. The happenings were mystical this time, not physical.

Oh, bugger that! Mystical or not, this hurt like bloody Hell. He could remember telling that sod of an Ms’awlo’icckl demon to do his worst. But this was beyond the pale, even for him. Still he endured it all, so that he could get what he needed to take care of the Slayer, and her family.

The gladiator was no problem, only a few minor burns there, a few broken ribs. I’m dead. What are a few broken ribs if I’ll have what I want, in the end?

The I’oaebtohf’eref was a bit more of a challenge. Beady eyes that one, got a good enough look at them. He did have five heads, four eyes each. Cunning too. The thing just wouldn’t go down. Got to respect that. He almost felt sorry about separating that last head from its body. Almost sorry enough to give up, but not quite.

A bloke’s got to do what he can.

Then came the carrion beetles. Crawling all over his skin, he’d been an irresistible smorgasbord. Finally at the bottom of the food chain, he was food for the critters that crawled in the earth. He had to keep reminding himself that any change was painful. Birth was painful. It must be, otherwise people would remember their arrival. Death was painful, he knew that too well. But this…this he almost wished he could forget. The numbing migraines the chip in his head dished out were nothing to the feeling of those things eating, drinking and being merry on the feast of his innards.

The Chinese water torture with the Holy Father’s private vintage, oh yes, that hurt more than he had words for. But it would be worth it, to take care of her, to protect them like he’d promised.

He thought he’d come through the trials, but now he knew the worst was yet to come…

Not again. No! No, stop. Stop…please…stop. No, don’t. Don’t!

He still felt the heat clawing at his chest, and then there was the light and the burning. The pinpoint of light radiated out from his chest and blinded him. One last gasp, and he was gone. The chip flared brightly on its way to supernova. Sending one last searing headache to remember it by. He remembered it fondly now, because then he didn’t know how much worse “worst” could be.

He knew now, though.

Blind and groping, he reached for what he knew, but they weren’t there. They were lost. Empty. He was empty.

Then he saw it. Warren, he raised the gun. No. No! Stop. Don’t do it! He had tried to scream. He remembered his chest burning with the need to scream. Did I scream?

I’ll kill you! Do you understand that? You do this, and soul or not, I will kill you. You won’t hide from me. I. Will. Kill! You!

It was no use. He watched Warren raise the gun. He heard the snap and saw the flash. And, Buffy…oh, God!
*******************************************************************

DEVON, ENGLAND-

Meditation was the hardest. It meant that she had to examine what she’d done. Meditating meant she had to see it all again, in slow motion. She didn’t like doing it. But, if she wanted to get out of here, and back to her friends, she had to.

Friends. Did she have any anymore? Or, had she driven them all away?

She’d killed. She’d killed, and she wasn’t under the influence of a foreign substance when she did it. She couldn’t blame some drug, although she had tried to convince herself that that was what magic was for her, the truth was, it wasn’t. It wasn’t some poison that would work itself out of her system. She had done it. Willow. She had done it all by herself.

The magic was an easy scapegoat. It was an easy crutch. But the truth was, she could have resisted. She didn’t have to let it control her.

No. There was a choice. She had a choice, and now she had to live with that choice.

No one but she had killed Xander. She was the one who killed Rack. It made no difference to the karmic cycle that he was an evil man. He was still dead. And she killed him. She’d tried to kill Giles. Someone who, she knew now, had tried to pull her soul up from the dark place she was in when Tara was killed. If it hadn’t been for Buffy, she might have killed Giles too.

The worst though, was Warren. She’d killed him and it did make her feel better, for about one zillionth of a second. It still didn’t bring Tara back. It hadn’t filled the hole Tara left in her heart.

She was a killer. She knew that now. She was no better than Warren. She was no better than a vampire. She was no better than Spike.

Suddenly, Willow’s mind flashed on Spike, and how he’d taken care of Dawn last summer. He’d been tender, and patient, almost kind with her, with all of them, really.

Willow gasped at the revelation. She was no better than Spike. Spike was better than she was.
************************************************************

HOLLYWOOD, FLORIDA-

Dawn was frustrated, “But, Aunt Darlene, you don’t get it. Spike’s a bad guy!”

Darlene Christopher was clearly unimpressed with the argument. She shook her head in disbelief, “You can’t mean the nice boy who took care of you after your Mom died? I saw how he stayed close to you. Whenever I flew over to visit the gravesite, and I admit, I was only there a few times, he was there until well after dark. He even sent me a very thoughtful letter of condolence. I still have it. You can’t tell me someone like that is all bad.”

“But he is! You don’t know what he did.”

“Dawn, honey. We all make mistakes. No one is perfect. It’s time you grew up, and started learning that lesson. Think about it. And when Buffy gets back, you can show her how much you’ve grown.”
*********************************************************************