Fic!
Requested by agilesreader; she wanted 500+ words and Giles as a main character in a Buffy crossover with Star Trek: The Next Generation.
Title: Where No Man Has Gone Before
Rating: FRT
Pairing: None, although there might be some slightly shippy overtones. I can't help it; it's in my nature.
Summary: Giles is transported to the U.S.S. Enterprise
Setting: Vaguely in season 5, post-Into The Woods; vaguely somewhere in amongst the Next Gen movies; no specific timeframe, really.
Disclaimers: Buffy is Joss’s baby; Trek is Roddenberry’s. All hail Roddenberry. All… do something with Joss. I don’t care. Sod off, all of you.
It wasn’t fair, Rupert Giles would later reflect. He hadn’t even had a chance to back up, to run, to escape; he had simply stepped down off his loft stairs and fallen into some kind of portal. He was inclined to think, when he allowed himself to think of it at all, that it wasn’t really fair play.
The day had begun quite normally. He had awakened at five forty-five, fifteen minutes before his alarm, and had gone downstairs to shower and shave. He came back upstairs to rummage through his wardrobe for something suitable to wear to the shop; in essence, he was going through his ordinary morning routine. Finally, dressed in a green button-up shirt and a pair of charcoal pants, he had collected his shoes and headed downstairs to see about a bit of breakfast and perhaps a spot of tea before he headed out to his shop. Buffy was scheduled to come in for training today after her mother’s doctor’s appointment; she’d become quite diligent about her duties since Riley had gone back to the initiative, and he was actually rather glad of it. When she wasn’t, he felt rather useless.
And then he was falling straight downward through a vast, semi-purple nothingness. He had the presence of mind to hold on to his shoes, but when he landed, he landed on his feet and fell, rolling on his back and just hoping not to hit his head on anything. The first thing he was actually aware of other than the hard floor he’d hit was a smoothly silky voice that was saying, “And there you are, Jean-Luc. I hope you can appreciate these little gifts. I do try so hard, but one never knows if one is appropriate. After all, what DOES one get for the Captain who has everything?” There was a sizzling noise that Giles recognized as the sound of dematerialization, and then there was a woman kneeling next to him and touching his head with warm, professional hands.
“Don’t move,” the woman said, and Giles opened his eyes to find himself staring into the most beautiful blue eyes he’d ever seen, set in a pixie’s face and framed by flame-red hair. There was concern on her face and she was waving some sort of small metal thing at him while alternating between looking him over carefully and looking at a device about the size of one of those PDA gadgets in her other hand. At last she sat back on her heels, nodding up at a distinguished-looking bald man with a hawk nose who stood behind her. “He’s uninjured,” she reported.
“Well, how very unexpected,” he mumbled to himself sourly, pushing himself into a sitting position and looking around. He was in some kind of control room filled with computers and he was surrounded by men and women in vaguely military dress. On one wall was a very large screen bearing a moving-starfield image. “I say,” he commented, “I wasn’t aware that the Initiative were using magical transport modes. Where exactly am I?”
“You are on the bridge of the U.S.S. Enterprise,” the hawk-nosed man replied. “I am Captain Jean-Luc Picard, United Federation of Planets.” He offered a hand to help Giles stand and Giles accepted it graciously. “I apologize for your presence here; we as a crew have attracted the attention of a capricious and very powerful being known only as Q, and he delights in pulling these sorts of tricks to cause trouble for us.”
“Sounds remarkably like a Chaos entity,” Giles replied sourly. “I’m familiar.”
Jean-Luc Picard tensed, studying him. “You’re familiar with Q?”
“No, with Chaos entities,” Giles clarified, thinking of Ethan. Then he glanced around. “Lost my bloody left shoe,” he grumbled.
A young, earnest-looking fellow with a red shirt located the shoe behind a chair and brought it to Giles, who slipped his feet into his shoes as he looked around the bridge. “U.S.S. Enterprise, you say?” he asked. “I had no idea the American military provided such comfortable quarters for their officers. This must be a remarkably new ship.”
“Er, no,” Picard replied, looking now distinctly uncomfortable. “We aren’t an, er, American ship.”
Giles noticed almost frantic glances being exchanged between Picard, a tall, bearded young man, the redheaded woman with the instrument, and a dark-haired woman with limpid eyes who was sitting nearby. He looked among them all in turn, deducing instantly that there was going to be very bad news. He sighed and folded his arms. “You might as well come out with it, then,” he said flatly. “Whatever it is, I assure you, I can handle it.”
The dark-haired woman was the one who spoke, and she did so with a strange, exotic accent that Giles could not place. “Why don’t we adjourn to the Observation Deck?” she suggested. “We could perhaps talk more comfortably there.”
--
Some time later, Giles stood staring out the Observation Deck’s windows at the moving starfield. “Four hundred years,” he said quietly to himself. “Four hundred years.”
Behind him, the dark haired woman with the limpid eyes sat in a chair at the long conference table, watching him sympathetically. She was the ship’s counselor, Deanna Troi, and she only wanted to help, but she seemed to know that she really couldn’t. Instead of saying anything, she simply sat there, silent, and for that he was grateful. This was really not something he could take in with someone else prattling at him.
Finally he turned away from the window and faced her compassionate expression. “Is there, perhaps, some place where I can be alone for a time?” he asked her. “I seem to feel the need for some quiet philosophical discussions with myself.”
“You’ve been assigned guest quarters,” Troi answered. “I’d be happy to direct you to them.”
“I believe that I would appreciate that,” he said simply.
She stood and he followed her out into a bland corridor. She explained to him quietly as they walked how he could use the wall panels to access the computer and learn his location. “It’s easy to get lost on a ship this size,” she explained.
“How many people are, er, on board?” he asked, intrigued by her mention of the ship’s size.
“The Enterprise is a Galaxy-class starship,” Troi explained, “the flagship of the Federation. She has twenty-four decks and is nearly 700 meters long. She carries a crew complement, including civilians, of slightly more than one thousand. Plus guests, of course, and the occasional visiting contingent.”
Giles blinked. “One thousand? This ship must be huge.”
Troi nodded. “She is, sir.” She took him into a small elevator and the doors slid shut behind them. Then she raised her voice. “Deck Ten,” she announced and the elevator began to move, but without the inertial lurch that usually caused Giles’s stomach to twist.
“What a very smooth elevator,” he marveled.
“It’s actually a turbolift,” Troi corrected gently.
Giles couldn’t help but smile. “I do apologize,” he said extravagantly. “I shouldn’t like to offend its sensibilities by calling it a mere elevator.”
Troi grinned back. She liked this man and his dry sense of humor. They stepped out of the lift and she led him down the corridor. “If you should decide that you… don’t wish to be alone,” she said tentatively, “Ten-Forward is at the extreme forward end of this deck.” She pointed in the correct direction. “You can obtain anything you wish to eat or drink from the replicator in your quarters, but there’s something about the ambience of Ten-Forward that… sometimes helps.”
She stopped at a door and directed him to stand in front of it while the computer picked up his genetic signal, then the doors opened and she accompanied him into a very comfortable suite of rooms. She showed him the replicator and explained how to use it; she showed him the manual computer terminal and explained that he was free to access it for any information he would like; she showed him the sonic shower and, with some embarrassment (mostly on his part), explained how it worked as well. She finished with an explanation of the communication system and offered her professional availability to him at any hour, then slipped gracefully out of his quarters and left him to his privacy.
--
He paced. It was all he could think of to do. The computer and its promised excess of information was an overwhelming concept and he wasn’t prepared to even broach the barrier. He had no guitar, and he was not tempted to try the replicator machine for anything to eat.
“No,” he said aloud to himself, “what I need right now is a drink.” Deanna Troi had pointed him the way to Ten-Forward, which he understood was some type of bar or club where he might have a drink and not have to be alone with his thoughts and the neverending night sky outside. He stood, smoothed imaginary wrinkles from his pants, and left the room.
Ten-Forward was sparsely populated when he entered and he took a seat at the bar, glancing idly around at the other customers. They were all too polite to stare, but he was dressed quite differently from they, and he caught a number of sidelong looks and odd glances. He sighed and leaned his elbows on the bar, putting his face in his hands.
“Something to drink?” a whiskey-velvet voice asked him. He looked up to find a very attractive black woman in an outlandish hat standing before him with a smile. She reminded him vaguely of Olivia and he smiled back automatically.
“What do you have?” he asked her.
Her smile, enigmatic though it was, got a bit wider. “Anything you want. But you strike me as a Scotch man.”
“Indeed, madam. You strike me as a woman of remarkable intutition.”
She winked at him and went to fetch a bottle, then returned with it and a rocks glass. “On the rocks?” she asked, holding the bottle at the ready.
“Neat,” he replied, and she poured, then pushed the glass toward him. “On the house, Mr…. Giles, is it?”
“Rupert,” he responded. “And you are…?”
“Guinan,” she replied. “A pleasure, Rupert.” And she extended her hand.
He shook it and then took a sip of his Scotch. A pleased smile came onto his face. “Why, this is Glenmorangie, isn’t it?”
She showed him the bottle. It was indeed Glenmorangie Scotch Whisky, and the label said 2389. He did a quick figure in his head and nodded, saluting her with his next drink. She nodded graciously and then leaned on the bar. “So how are you adjusting to the Enterprise?”
“Not very well, I’m afraid,” he said honestly. “But then, it’s only been about six hours. Perhaps, given time, I might come to, er, appreciate it more.”
Guinan’s smile deepened somewhat. “You’re very open to the experience,” she observed. “I think most men in your situation would be panicking and demanding to be sent home.”
“Oh, I’m quite panicked,” Giles replied, deadpan. “It’s just that I’m British, you see, and one simply doesn’t panic visibly. It wouldn’t be proper.” Then he sighed. “Plus, I must keep faith that I shall someday find my way home. I’m afraid I should rather fall into despair if I lost that hope.”
Guinan nodded. “Very wise, Rupert.” She paused, then asked delicately, “Is there… anyone at home who misses you?”
He thought about that for a moment. His family of course was gone; the only people who were sure to notice his absence were Buffy and her friends. He was sure Xander and Willow would miss him in an absent sort of way; Anya would wonder when he was coming back to work again; Tara would almost certainly miss him. But the one who mattered… Buffy. Would she miss him? Giles pondered that. He thought of the many times she had abandoned him and ignored him, how she had betrayed him in the matter of Angel’s return from Hell. And then he thought of her face when she’d thought he was dead, and her desperate determination to avenge his ‘death’ by killing the creature she thought had killed him. “Yes,” he finally said softly. “Yes, there’s someone.” He finished his drink and then gave her a wan smile. “I believe I shall go and have a lie down. Thank you for the drink, and for being so friendly to a stranger.”
He returned to his quarters and lay down on the bed, looking up through the port windows at the ever-moving spacescape before him. God, what he wouldn’t give for a glimpse of plain, ordinary Sunnydale. He closed his eyes and heaved a very deep sigh which transmuted itself into sobs, and Rupert Giles cried himself to sleep for the first time since he was a boy.
--
It took him a week to finally work up the courage to ask the computer about Sunnydale. The news that it had in fact collapsed into a huge, empty crater in May of 2003 came as a hard shock and he frantically began searching for news of the Scoobies. He finally found them: in October of 2003, Buffy had purchased a townhouse in Rome; in February of 2004, Willow had enrolled in a graduate study program at Oxford; in April of 2004, airline tickets had been purchased for Xander to fly from Johannesburg to London, paid for by… RCOWII, Ltd.? What the hell?
He continued searching. May, 2004: Buffy sold her townhouse in Rome and bought one in London. August, 2004: RCOWII, Ltd. purchased an estate in east Scotland, including a manor house, assorted outbuildings, two small ponds and a river. October, 2004: the Inverurie School for Girls opened up. Scholarship at the school was by select invitation only, and the curriculum included such courses as ‘Advanced Projectiles’ and ‘Ancient Sumerian I, II and III’. There was no doubt in Giles’s mind that this was a Council training ground for new Slayers.
He kept searching. December, 2004: Dawn entered Oxford University, studying Archaeology. August, 2005: Xander married. It made the papers because his bride was a third cousin of the Princes William and Harry. There was nothing for quite some time. And then, in September 2006, a very small announcement in the Inverurie Herald: Professor Buffy Summers, Headmistress of the Inverurie School for Girls, was delivered of a son on 24 September. She named him Noah Giles Summers.
The next thing he found, though, startled him nearly out of his chair. His own name, listed as the Chairman of the Board of RCOWII, Ltd., and a writeup about a charitable donation from RCOWII to the Inverurie School for Girls, which was noted in the writeup to be RCOWII’s especial charity project.
Now, how the hell could he have ‘donated’ money to Buffy’s Slayer school if he was here in the future? Unless he was returned to his own timeline when… Eugenics Wars?
It was in an article next to the one about the charitable donation, and was explaining that a certain war criminal had been caught in Basingstoke and was going to be tried before the World Court. He stared at it for a long time, and a very sinking feeling came into the pit of his stomach. He looked up. “Computer,” he said aloud, “Could you please tell me where I might locate Deanna Troi?”
There was a beep. “Counselor Troi is in her office,” the computer responded.
“Is she seeing anyone at the moment?” he inquired.
“Negative; Counselor Troi is alone.”
He touched the comlink and said her name into it. A moment later, her face appeared on his screen. “Yes, Mr. Giles?”
“Counselor Troi,” he said quietly, “If you have a moment, I believe there is something I should like to discuss with you.”
--
Troi stared at him as though he’d gone mad which, he was very afraid, he might have. “No Eugenics Wars?” she repeated him. “What do you mean?”
“I mean just that,” he responded, whipping his glasses off and polishing them furiously. “There was no Eugenics War where I had come from. There was no Khan Noonian Singh ruling all of Asia. The world was nominally at peace, except for the ongoing strife in the Middle East and a madman in North Korea with a nuclear warhead. None of those things happened.”
“But they did,” Troi replied. “They’re established historical fact.” She studied him. “There must be some explanation for this.”
“If only I had my books,” Giles moaned.
They talked awhile longer, and finally Giles left her office, determined to find some explanation for why his recollections were different from her records of facts. He wandered the corridors, thoughtfully, until he accidentally bumped into a young woman coming out of Sickbay. “Oh, my goodness,” he exclaimed. “I’m terribly sorry. Are you quite all right?”
“Oh, sure, I’m fine,” she replied with a grin. “No harm done.”
She was in her early twenties, he thought, with brown hair pulled back into a ponytail at her nape, deep brown eyes, and a smattering of freckles across her nose and cheeks. She was pretty in a conventional sense, if a bit on the ordinary side. But what caught Giles’s attention was the necklace she wore. It was a simple gold chain, and the charm was a cross-and-stake. He pointed at it with a finger that trembled only slightly. “That’s a very… unique charm,” he said cautiously.
Her hand came up to fiddle nervously with it, and her eyes went wary. “Thanks. I got it when I finished high school.”
“Really?” he asked. “Might one inquire as to where you went to school?”
“On Earth,” the girl replied. “Scotland, a private school in a town called Inverurie.”
“Oh,” he said softly. “Oh, I see.” He swallowed very hard, studying the girl’s eyes. “What did you say your name was?”
“I didn’t,” the girl replied, “but it’s Melissa Watson.”
“Miss Watson,” Giles said in a strained voice, looking around to be sure no one was in earshot, “Do you have a Watcher?”
Melissa jumped slightly. “How do you know - ?”
He smiled tightly. “I know quite a lot. Please. Is he on this ship?”
“Yes,” she responded. “Come with me.”
She took him down in a turbolift into the crew decks, then led him to one of the many similar doors. These doors opened for her, though, and he followed her inside. “James?” she called out.
A man came from another room into the main sitting room of the suite. “Ah, Melissa. What did the good doctor say?”
“The good doctor fixed it right up and I’m good as new,” she responded cheerfully. “But then there’s this enigma that I bumped into as I was leaving Sickbay.” She waved at Giles. “He wanted to talk to you. He knows about me - about what I am, I mean.”
The man called James raised an eyebrow. “Oh, really?” he asked. And how exactly did he come to know that?”
“I know a Slayer’s symbol when I see one, and the young lady is wearing one round her neck,” Giles replied. “I also know a copy of the Black Chronicles when I see one of those, and that’s it sitting on your writing desk there.” He pointed.
“And how is it, sir, that you know such things on sight?”
Giles smiled grimly. “Because I am a Watcher myself.”
The man’s eyebrows shot up. “Oh, really?” he asked, and there was skepticism in his tone. “I have never seen you at the Council compound.”
“You wouldn’t have,” he replied. “I’ve never been there. At least, not the new one. I assume you are speaking of the new one in Inverurie. I spent quite a lot of time at the Council compound in London, and once as a boy went to the Cotswolds with my father.”
James stared at him. “Impossible. You speak nonsense. The Council compound in London was destroyed by agents of the First Evil in 2003. Everyone there died. And the manor house in the Cotswolds burned to the ground in 2028.”
“That may be true,” Giles replied evenly. “It’s part of what I wish to discuss with you.”
But James wasn’t done asking questions. “If you are really a Watcher,” he asked, “where is your Slayer? What is her name?”
“She is dead now,” Giles replied, and the words tasted like ashes in his mouth. He wanted very badly to return to a place and time where those words were not true. “But while she lived, she was the greatest Slayer to walk the Earth. Her name was Buffy Summers.”
Melissa gasped audibly. “That’s impossible!” she exclaimed. “Buffy Summers has been dead for centuries.”
“You are a liar, sir,” James declared flatly. His eyes had gone narrow and his cheeks burned.
“I am not,” Giles replied. “My name is Rupert Giles, and my Slayer’s name was Buffy Summers. I became her Watcher in January of 1997 and am still her Watcher today, despite the fact that I have been dragged four hundred years and several billion miles away from her. And I am here, SIR, to ask for your help in returning to my home and my Slayer.”
James sat down and studied Giles for a very long time. At last, he reached into a drawer and pulled out a box. He unlocked the box and opened it, removing from it a small, battered, leatherbound book. “Mr… Giles,” he said hesitantly, “If you would, please, I should ask you to write a number of words on the PADD there on the desk.” He looked at the book. “If you would write your name, please, sir, and the name of your Slayer. Also the names of your Slayer’s friends, Willow and Xander. Also the words ‘demon’, ‘prophecy’ and ‘vampire’, if you will.”
Giles gamely picked up PADD and stylus and wrote the requested words, then handed the PADD to Melissa. She connected the PADD to a computer interface, and James slid the book under a scanning lamp. He studied the results with a blank face. Finally he looked up. “An exact match,” he said softly. He studied Giles’s face. “It would appear, sir, that I must take you at your word.”
“Thank you,” Giles replied.
“Don’t thank me,” James replied. “I am well known as a skeptic. There is a museum of sorts at the Inverurie compound. One of its exhibits is a small stuffed pig which is purported to have belonged to Buffy Summers herself. There are other memento of her life as well, but I find it almost impossible to believe that she could be distilled down to such a ridiculous token.”
Giles couldn’t help but laugh. If only Buffy knew how her little treasures were being worshipped, that even Mr. Gordo had become a priceless relic of generations. His laughter turned into tears as he was hit by a powerful wave of homesickness. He missed the children, he missed his Slayer. He wanted to go back.
When he had control of himself again, he explained to James Evans exactly what his suspicions were about where he had come from. Melissa, who was curled up in the couch, interjected an opinion. “Parallel universes,” she said simply.
Both men looked at her. “What?”
“Parallel universes,” she replied. “It’s basic quantum cosmology. In this universe, such and so happened. In another universe, something else did. It is possible to interact with and travel between universes. It’s been documented.”
“Clever girl,” came a disembodied voice, and a man’s face appeared in the port window. “Aren’t you quick on your feet? Allow me to introduce myself. We call ourselves the Q, or you may call us that; it’s all much the same thing. Here you are, Rupert, and here you’ll stay. We find that we like you here. You amuse us.”
Giles, who had sat down when he began to cry, surged to his feet in fury. “I am not your plaything!” he roared.
Q chuckled. “I think, my good man, you will find yourself mistaken.” And then he vanished.
--
The days rolled into weeks as Giles existed on the Enterprise, wandering aimlessly about the ship most restless nights and researching with James Evans during the day. They found nothing of interest for the most part, but they continued to research anyway. It was their job. Then came the evening when Melissa came back from her duties with an odd expression on her face.
“What’s wrong?” James asked immediately.
“We picked up a delegation from Verashi Five today,” she said slowly. “One of them made me very uncomfortable.”
“Uncomfortable how?” Giles asked, leaning forward.
“Twitchy,” she replied. “Like a low-level buzz at the base of my skull.”
“Your Spidey-sense,” Giles muttered. Tell me about the people from Verashi Five. What sort of people are they?”
“They’re humans,” James answered him, calling up the information on the computer. “They settled Verashi Four and Five a hundred years ago. The Verashi Four colony failed; a huge number of settlers died. The remainder were evacuated to Verashi Five.”
“Died?” Giles asked. “Of what?”
James scrolled, then stared at the screen for a moment. When he looked up at Giles, his expression was bleak. “Neck ruptures.”
Giles turned to Melissa. “You’re to keep a stake on your person at all times. We must find a way to kill this vampire. Unfortunately I’m not sure how to do it without exposing us to the crew and possibly being charged with murder.”
“I think I can come up with something,” Melissa said. She thought about it for a moment, and then outlined her plan.
--
Giles wandered nonchalantly through the corridor on deck ten. The Verashi delegation had been housed on his deck, and he was hopeful of running into them. His luck was with him and he happened to pass their suite just as two of them were coming out. One of them was a young woman with a golden tan and blonde hair who reminded him forcefully of Buffy; the other was a pale and anemic-looking young fellow with limp black hair. “Good evening,” Giles said nonchalantly.
“Good evening,” they both replied. The young man continued. “Could you show us the way to the Ten-Forward Lounge?” he asked. “My colleague and I were interested in having a drink.”
I’ll just bet, Giles thought. “Certainly,” he replied aloud. “Right this way.” He led them to Ten-Forward, which was packed that night, and settled himself in a place where he could watch. It didn’t take long before the vampire moved, separating a young ensign from the crowd and moving with her to a corner. They talked for quite some time, body language flirtatious and friendly, and then they stood. The vampire put his hand on the small of the ensign’s back and they left Ten-Forward. Giles immediately moved to the comlink. “Melissa Watson,” he said, and Melissa’s voice came back. “Yes?”
“Deck Ten, Melissa. The vampire is alone with his victim. Hurry!”
“I’m on my way!” The comm channel shut and Giles turned to find Guinan standing directly behind him with an inscrutable expression on her face. “Vampire?” she asked softly.
Giles stared at her. “Please,” he finally said, “there’s no time if I’m to prevent that young ensign from turning up dead of a ‘neck rupture’.”
Guinan stepped back. “I’ll expect a full story later,” she said softly before vanishing into the crowd.
Giles darted out into the hallway. The vampire and his victim were disappearing into the delegation’s suite. The door slid shut just as Melissa, still in her duty uniform with its mustard-yellow tunic, pelted up. “Where?”
Giles pointed wordlessly to the door - the door which was locked against them. Melissa grinned. “See this shirt?” she said. “It means I work for Engineering. Believe me, I can open that door.”
“You might want to hurry,” Giles said mildly.
The Slayer moved to a wall panel beside the door and opened it, then began to tinker with the circuits inside. Then there was a scream from within the rooms. “Faster, Melissa!” Giles exclaimed.
“Almost… Got it!” The door slid open and Melissa pulled a stake from somewhere in her uniform. She darted into the room, Giles right behind her.
The vampire had his victim bent backward over the dining table. She was putting up a good fight, but it was clear that she was outmatched. He was in full game face, his hungry mouth straining for the young ensign’s neck, when Melissa moved up behind him and plunged her stake into his back. He looked down at his chest where the point of the stake protruded out, and then collapsed with a scream into dust.
Melissa helped the terrified girl up off the table. “Come on,” she said. “We’ve got to get out of here before someone comes back and catches us.”
They made their escape into a nearby turbolift. “What was that thing?” the young ensign asked when she was finally able to speak.
“Er…” Giles and Melissa shared a glance. “He… it… er…”
“It’s a drug,” Melissa blurted out. “Makes them go crazy.”
“Really?” the girl asked, skeptically.
“PCP,” Giles said almost to himself. God, how history repeated itself. He patted the girl on the shoulder. “Best, really, not to mention this to anyone.”
The girl stared at him. “Who’d believe me?” She got off the lift at the next deck and vanished into the ship.
Giles smiled at Melissa. “You did very well.”
“Thanks,” she replied. “I haven’t actually staked a vamp since I went to Starfleet Academy. I was afraid I might have lost my touch.”
Once back in James and Melissa’s suite, Giles made notes in James’s Watcher’s Journal about the incident and recommended to the man himself that he get in contact with the Council and have a team of Slayers sent out to the Verashi system. Then he returned to his own quarters, ruminating over a job well done.
--
The bell over the door rang as the door was pushed open. Giles looked up from his place behind the counter. “Ah, Buffy, good. Now that everyone’s here, let’s all have a seat.”
The assembled Scoobies - Buffy, Willow, Xander, Dawn, Anya and Tara - all claimed seats around the big research table and turned their attention to him. He paused, seeking words, and took his glasses off to clean them.
“What’s up, Giles?” Buffy asked. “You sounded on the phone like it was of the major and possibly bad.”
“Well… you see… I’m going to have to leave you.”
Choruses of protests rang from his young companions’ voices and he held his hands up to stem the flood. “Please,” he explained, “you must understand that I haven’t a choice. I shall return if ever I am capable, but… I wanted to tell you all goodbye. I… I shall miss you all, very much. But I have to go, and I have to go essentially now.”
“We’ll miss you, too, Giles,” they told him. Willow cried. Xander looked like he wanted to. There was a great deal of hugging and handshaking. The Scoobies one by one filed out of the store, all giving him sad glances over their shoulders as they left. All but one.
Giles turned back to the table and was now alone in the store with Buffy. She stood and walked up to him. “You’re not coming back, are you?” she asked him softly.
“I may not,” he told her sadly. “I don’t know if I shall ever find a way. But if I do, I shall return to you; this I swear to you upon my honor as your Watcher.”
“How about your honor as my friend?” she asked him softly. Tears were trickling down her face now. “Giles, I’ll miss you. A lot. You’re my best friend, and my Watcher, and my other half. I’ll be all kinds of empty without you here. But you say you have no choice, and I believe you. But I also believe you’ll come back someday.”
Giles hesitated, then decided the hell with decorum. He reached out and pulled Buffy to him, embracing her tightly. “I shall miss you, Buffy Summers,” he whispered into her hair. “You are without a doubt the most extraordinary person I have ever met, and you are the greatest Vampire Slayer to ever walk the earth. It has been my privilege to know you.” He closed his eyes, fighting back his own tears, as she hugged him back tightly.
Then he opened his eyes and let her go. He stepped back to look at her again, to study her and memorize her features, locking them forever in his mind. Then he looked up toward the ceiling. “Computer,” he said in a choked voice. “End program.”
--End--
Title: Where No Man Has Gone Before
Rating: FRT
Pairing: None, although there might be some slightly shippy overtones. I can't help it; it's in my nature.
Summary: Giles is transported to the U.S.S. Enterprise
Setting: Vaguely in season 5, post-Into The Woods; vaguely somewhere in amongst the Next Gen movies; no specific timeframe, really.
Disclaimers: Buffy is Joss’s baby; Trek is Roddenberry’s. All hail Roddenberry. All… do something with Joss. I don’t care. Sod off, all of you.
It wasn’t fair, Rupert Giles would later reflect. He hadn’t even had a chance to back up, to run, to escape; he had simply stepped down off his loft stairs and fallen into some kind of portal. He was inclined to think, when he allowed himself to think of it at all, that it wasn’t really fair play.
The day had begun quite normally. He had awakened at five forty-five, fifteen minutes before his alarm, and had gone downstairs to shower and shave. He came back upstairs to rummage through his wardrobe for something suitable to wear to the shop; in essence, he was going through his ordinary morning routine. Finally, dressed in a green button-up shirt and a pair of charcoal pants, he had collected his shoes and headed downstairs to see about a bit of breakfast and perhaps a spot of tea before he headed out to his shop. Buffy was scheduled to come in for training today after her mother’s doctor’s appointment; she’d become quite diligent about her duties since Riley had gone back to the initiative, and he was actually rather glad of it. When she wasn’t, he felt rather useless.
And then he was falling straight downward through a vast, semi-purple nothingness. He had the presence of mind to hold on to his shoes, but when he landed, he landed on his feet and fell, rolling on his back and just hoping not to hit his head on anything. The first thing he was actually aware of other than the hard floor he’d hit was a smoothly silky voice that was saying, “And there you are, Jean-Luc. I hope you can appreciate these little gifts. I do try so hard, but one never knows if one is appropriate. After all, what DOES one get for the Captain who has everything?” There was a sizzling noise that Giles recognized as the sound of dematerialization, and then there was a woman kneeling next to him and touching his head with warm, professional hands.
“Don’t move,” the woman said, and Giles opened his eyes to find himself staring into the most beautiful blue eyes he’d ever seen, set in a pixie’s face and framed by flame-red hair. There was concern on her face and she was waving some sort of small metal thing at him while alternating between looking him over carefully and looking at a device about the size of one of those PDA gadgets in her other hand. At last she sat back on her heels, nodding up at a distinguished-looking bald man with a hawk nose who stood behind her. “He’s uninjured,” she reported.
“Well, how very unexpected,” he mumbled to himself sourly, pushing himself into a sitting position and looking around. He was in some kind of control room filled with computers and he was surrounded by men and women in vaguely military dress. On one wall was a very large screen bearing a moving-starfield image. “I say,” he commented, “I wasn’t aware that the Initiative were using magical transport modes. Where exactly am I?”
“You are on the bridge of the U.S.S. Enterprise,” the hawk-nosed man replied. “I am Captain Jean-Luc Picard, United Federation of Planets.” He offered a hand to help Giles stand and Giles accepted it graciously. “I apologize for your presence here; we as a crew have attracted the attention of a capricious and very powerful being known only as Q, and he delights in pulling these sorts of tricks to cause trouble for us.”
“Sounds remarkably like a Chaos entity,” Giles replied sourly. “I’m familiar.”
Jean-Luc Picard tensed, studying him. “You’re familiar with Q?”
“No, with Chaos entities,” Giles clarified, thinking of Ethan. Then he glanced around. “Lost my bloody left shoe,” he grumbled.
A young, earnest-looking fellow with a red shirt located the shoe behind a chair and brought it to Giles, who slipped his feet into his shoes as he looked around the bridge. “U.S.S. Enterprise, you say?” he asked. “I had no idea the American military provided such comfortable quarters for their officers. This must be a remarkably new ship.”
“Er, no,” Picard replied, looking now distinctly uncomfortable. “We aren’t an, er, American ship.”
Giles noticed almost frantic glances being exchanged between Picard, a tall, bearded young man, the redheaded woman with the instrument, and a dark-haired woman with limpid eyes who was sitting nearby. He looked among them all in turn, deducing instantly that there was going to be very bad news. He sighed and folded his arms. “You might as well come out with it, then,” he said flatly. “Whatever it is, I assure you, I can handle it.”
The dark-haired woman was the one who spoke, and she did so with a strange, exotic accent that Giles could not place. “Why don’t we adjourn to the Observation Deck?” she suggested. “We could perhaps talk more comfortably there.”
--
Some time later, Giles stood staring out the Observation Deck’s windows at the moving starfield. “Four hundred years,” he said quietly to himself. “Four hundred years.”
Behind him, the dark haired woman with the limpid eyes sat in a chair at the long conference table, watching him sympathetically. She was the ship’s counselor, Deanna Troi, and she only wanted to help, but she seemed to know that she really couldn’t. Instead of saying anything, she simply sat there, silent, and for that he was grateful. This was really not something he could take in with someone else prattling at him.
Finally he turned away from the window and faced her compassionate expression. “Is there, perhaps, some place where I can be alone for a time?” he asked her. “I seem to feel the need for some quiet philosophical discussions with myself.”
“You’ve been assigned guest quarters,” Troi answered. “I’d be happy to direct you to them.”
“I believe that I would appreciate that,” he said simply.
She stood and he followed her out into a bland corridor. She explained to him quietly as they walked how he could use the wall panels to access the computer and learn his location. “It’s easy to get lost on a ship this size,” she explained.
“How many people are, er, on board?” he asked, intrigued by her mention of the ship’s size.
“The Enterprise is a Galaxy-class starship,” Troi explained, “the flagship of the Federation. She has twenty-four decks and is nearly 700 meters long. She carries a crew complement, including civilians, of slightly more than one thousand. Plus guests, of course, and the occasional visiting contingent.”
Giles blinked. “One thousand? This ship must be huge.”
Troi nodded. “She is, sir.” She took him into a small elevator and the doors slid shut behind them. Then she raised her voice. “Deck Ten,” she announced and the elevator began to move, but without the inertial lurch that usually caused Giles’s stomach to twist.
“What a very smooth elevator,” he marveled.
“It’s actually a turbolift,” Troi corrected gently.
Giles couldn’t help but smile. “I do apologize,” he said extravagantly. “I shouldn’t like to offend its sensibilities by calling it a mere elevator.”
Troi grinned back. She liked this man and his dry sense of humor. They stepped out of the lift and she led him down the corridor. “If you should decide that you… don’t wish to be alone,” she said tentatively, “Ten-Forward is at the extreme forward end of this deck.” She pointed in the correct direction. “You can obtain anything you wish to eat or drink from the replicator in your quarters, but there’s something about the ambience of Ten-Forward that… sometimes helps.”
She stopped at a door and directed him to stand in front of it while the computer picked up his genetic signal, then the doors opened and she accompanied him into a very comfortable suite of rooms. She showed him the replicator and explained how to use it; she showed him the manual computer terminal and explained that he was free to access it for any information he would like; she showed him the sonic shower and, with some embarrassment (mostly on his part), explained how it worked as well. She finished with an explanation of the communication system and offered her professional availability to him at any hour, then slipped gracefully out of his quarters and left him to his privacy.
--
He paced. It was all he could think of to do. The computer and its promised excess of information was an overwhelming concept and he wasn’t prepared to even broach the barrier. He had no guitar, and he was not tempted to try the replicator machine for anything to eat.
“No,” he said aloud to himself, “what I need right now is a drink.” Deanna Troi had pointed him the way to Ten-Forward, which he understood was some type of bar or club where he might have a drink and not have to be alone with his thoughts and the neverending night sky outside. He stood, smoothed imaginary wrinkles from his pants, and left the room.
Ten-Forward was sparsely populated when he entered and he took a seat at the bar, glancing idly around at the other customers. They were all too polite to stare, but he was dressed quite differently from they, and he caught a number of sidelong looks and odd glances. He sighed and leaned his elbows on the bar, putting his face in his hands.
“Something to drink?” a whiskey-velvet voice asked him. He looked up to find a very attractive black woman in an outlandish hat standing before him with a smile. She reminded him vaguely of Olivia and he smiled back automatically.
“What do you have?” he asked her.
Her smile, enigmatic though it was, got a bit wider. “Anything you want. But you strike me as a Scotch man.”
“Indeed, madam. You strike me as a woman of remarkable intutition.”
She winked at him and went to fetch a bottle, then returned with it and a rocks glass. “On the rocks?” she asked, holding the bottle at the ready.
“Neat,” he replied, and she poured, then pushed the glass toward him. “On the house, Mr…. Giles, is it?”
“Rupert,” he responded. “And you are…?”
“Guinan,” she replied. “A pleasure, Rupert.” And she extended her hand.
He shook it and then took a sip of his Scotch. A pleased smile came onto his face. “Why, this is Glenmorangie, isn’t it?”
She showed him the bottle. It was indeed Glenmorangie Scotch Whisky, and the label said 2389. He did a quick figure in his head and nodded, saluting her with his next drink. She nodded graciously and then leaned on the bar. “So how are you adjusting to the Enterprise?”
“Not very well, I’m afraid,” he said honestly. “But then, it’s only been about six hours. Perhaps, given time, I might come to, er, appreciate it more.”
Guinan’s smile deepened somewhat. “You’re very open to the experience,” she observed. “I think most men in your situation would be panicking and demanding to be sent home.”
“Oh, I’m quite panicked,” Giles replied, deadpan. “It’s just that I’m British, you see, and one simply doesn’t panic visibly. It wouldn’t be proper.” Then he sighed. “Plus, I must keep faith that I shall someday find my way home. I’m afraid I should rather fall into despair if I lost that hope.”
Guinan nodded. “Very wise, Rupert.” She paused, then asked delicately, “Is there… anyone at home who misses you?”
He thought about that for a moment. His family of course was gone; the only people who were sure to notice his absence were Buffy and her friends. He was sure Xander and Willow would miss him in an absent sort of way; Anya would wonder when he was coming back to work again; Tara would almost certainly miss him. But the one who mattered… Buffy. Would she miss him? Giles pondered that. He thought of the many times she had abandoned him and ignored him, how she had betrayed him in the matter of Angel’s return from Hell. And then he thought of her face when she’d thought he was dead, and her desperate determination to avenge his ‘death’ by killing the creature she thought had killed him. “Yes,” he finally said softly. “Yes, there’s someone.” He finished his drink and then gave her a wan smile. “I believe I shall go and have a lie down. Thank you for the drink, and for being so friendly to a stranger.”
He returned to his quarters and lay down on the bed, looking up through the port windows at the ever-moving spacescape before him. God, what he wouldn’t give for a glimpse of plain, ordinary Sunnydale. He closed his eyes and heaved a very deep sigh which transmuted itself into sobs, and Rupert Giles cried himself to sleep for the first time since he was a boy.
--
It took him a week to finally work up the courage to ask the computer about Sunnydale. The news that it had in fact collapsed into a huge, empty crater in May of 2003 came as a hard shock and he frantically began searching for news of the Scoobies. He finally found them: in October of 2003, Buffy had purchased a townhouse in Rome; in February of 2004, Willow had enrolled in a graduate study program at Oxford; in April of 2004, airline tickets had been purchased for Xander to fly from Johannesburg to London, paid for by… RCOWII, Ltd.? What the hell?
He continued searching. May, 2004: Buffy sold her townhouse in Rome and bought one in London. August, 2004: RCOWII, Ltd. purchased an estate in east Scotland, including a manor house, assorted outbuildings, two small ponds and a river. October, 2004: the Inverurie School for Girls opened up. Scholarship at the school was by select invitation only, and the curriculum included such courses as ‘Advanced Projectiles’ and ‘Ancient Sumerian I, II and III’. There was no doubt in Giles’s mind that this was a Council training ground for new Slayers.
He kept searching. December, 2004: Dawn entered Oxford University, studying Archaeology. August, 2005: Xander married. It made the papers because his bride was a third cousin of the Princes William and Harry. There was nothing for quite some time. And then, in September 2006, a very small announcement in the Inverurie Herald: Professor Buffy Summers, Headmistress of the Inverurie School for Girls, was delivered of a son on 24 September. She named him Noah Giles Summers.
The next thing he found, though, startled him nearly out of his chair. His own name, listed as the Chairman of the Board of RCOWII, Ltd., and a writeup about a charitable donation from RCOWII to the Inverurie School for Girls, which was noted in the writeup to be RCOWII’s especial charity project.
Now, how the hell could he have ‘donated’ money to Buffy’s Slayer school if he was here in the future? Unless he was returned to his own timeline when… Eugenics Wars?
It was in an article next to the one about the charitable donation, and was explaining that a certain war criminal had been caught in Basingstoke and was going to be tried before the World Court. He stared at it for a long time, and a very sinking feeling came into the pit of his stomach. He looked up. “Computer,” he said aloud, “Could you please tell me where I might locate Deanna Troi?”
There was a beep. “Counselor Troi is in her office,” the computer responded.
“Is she seeing anyone at the moment?” he inquired.
“Negative; Counselor Troi is alone.”
He touched the comlink and said her name into it. A moment later, her face appeared on his screen. “Yes, Mr. Giles?”
“Counselor Troi,” he said quietly, “If you have a moment, I believe there is something I should like to discuss with you.”
--
Troi stared at him as though he’d gone mad which, he was very afraid, he might have. “No Eugenics Wars?” she repeated him. “What do you mean?”
“I mean just that,” he responded, whipping his glasses off and polishing them furiously. “There was no Eugenics War where I had come from. There was no Khan Noonian Singh ruling all of Asia. The world was nominally at peace, except for the ongoing strife in the Middle East and a madman in North Korea with a nuclear warhead. None of those things happened.”
“But they did,” Troi replied. “They’re established historical fact.” She studied him. “There must be some explanation for this.”
“If only I had my books,” Giles moaned.
They talked awhile longer, and finally Giles left her office, determined to find some explanation for why his recollections were different from her records of facts. He wandered the corridors, thoughtfully, until he accidentally bumped into a young woman coming out of Sickbay. “Oh, my goodness,” he exclaimed. “I’m terribly sorry. Are you quite all right?”
“Oh, sure, I’m fine,” she replied with a grin. “No harm done.”
She was in her early twenties, he thought, with brown hair pulled back into a ponytail at her nape, deep brown eyes, and a smattering of freckles across her nose and cheeks. She was pretty in a conventional sense, if a bit on the ordinary side. But what caught Giles’s attention was the necklace she wore. It was a simple gold chain, and the charm was a cross-and-stake. He pointed at it with a finger that trembled only slightly. “That’s a very… unique charm,” he said cautiously.
Her hand came up to fiddle nervously with it, and her eyes went wary. “Thanks. I got it when I finished high school.”
“Really?” he asked. “Might one inquire as to where you went to school?”
“On Earth,” the girl replied. “Scotland, a private school in a town called Inverurie.”
“Oh,” he said softly. “Oh, I see.” He swallowed very hard, studying the girl’s eyes. “What did you say your name was?”
“I didn’t,” the girl replied, “but it’s Melissa Watson.”
“Miss Watson,” Giles said in a strained voice, looking around to be sure no one was in earshot, “Do you have a Watcher?”
Melissa jumped slightly. “How do you know - ?”
He smiled tightly. “I know quite a lot. Please. Is he on this ship?”
“Yes,” she responded. “Come with me.”
She took him down in a turbolift into the crew decks, then led him to one of the many similar doors. These doors opened for her, though, and he followed her inside. “James?” she called out.
A man came from another room into the main sitting room of the suite. “Ah, Melissa. What did the good doctor say?”
“The good doctor fixed it right up and I’m good as new,” she responded cheerfully. “But then there’s this enigma that I bumped into as I was leaving Sickbay.” She waved at Giles. “He wanted to talk to you. He knows about me - about what I am, I mean.”
The man called James raised an eyebrow. “Oh, really?” he asked. And how exactly did he come to know that?”
“I know a Slayer’s symbol when I see one, and the young lady is wearing one round her neck,” Giles replied. “I also know a copy of the Black Chronicles when I see one of those, and that’s it sitting on your writing desk there.” He pointed.
“And how is it, sir, that you know such things on sight?”
Giles smiled grimly. “Because I am a Watcher myself.”
The man’s eyebrows shot up. “Oh, really?” he asked, and there was skepticism in his tone. “I have never seen you at the Council compound.”
“You wouldn’t have,” he replied. “I’ve never been there. At least, not the new one. I assume you are speaking of the new one in Inverurie. I spent quite a lot of time at the Council compound in London, and once as a boy went to the Cotswolds with my father.”
James stared at him. “Impossible. You speak nonsense. The Council compound in London was destroyed by agents of the First Evil in 2003. Everyone there died. And the manor house in the Cotswolds burned to the ground in 2028.”
“That may be true,” Giles replied evenly. “It’s part of what I wish to discuss with you.”
But James wasn’t done asking questions. “If you are really a Watcher,” he asked, “where is your Slayer? What is her name?”
“She is dead now,” Giles replied, and the words tasted like ashes in his mouth. He wanted very badly to return to a place and time where those words were not true. “But while she lived, she was the greatest Slayer to walk the Earth. Her name was Buffy Summers.”
Melissa gasped audibly. “That’s impossible!” she exclaimed. “Buffy Summers has been dead for centuries.”
“You are a liar, sir,” James declared flatly. His eyes had gone narrow and his cheeks burned.
“I am not,” Giles replied. “My name is Rupert Giles, and my Slayer’s name was Buffy Summers. I became her Watcher in January of 1997 and am still her Watcher today, despite the fact that I have been dragged four hundred years and several billion miles away from her. And I am here, SIR, to ask for your help in returning to my home and my Slayer.”
James sat down and studied Giles for a very long time. At last, he reached into a drawer and pulled out a box. He unlocked the box and opened it, removing from it a small, battered, leatherbound book. “Mr… Giles,” he said hesitantly, “If you would, please, I should ask you to write a number of words on the PADD there on the desk.” He looked at the book. “If you would write your name, please, sir, and the name of your Slayer. Also the names of your Slayer’s friends, Willow and Xander. Also the words ‘demon’, ‘prophecy’ and ‘vampire’, if you will.”
Giles gamely picked up PADD and stylus and wrote the requested words, then handed the PADD to Melissa. She connected the PADD to a computer interface, and James slid the book under a scanning lamp. He studied the results with a blank face. Finally he looked up. “An exact match,” he said softly. He studied Giles’s face. “It would appear, sir, that I must take you at your word.”
“Thank you,” Giles replied.
“Don’t thank me,” James replied. “I am well known as a skeptic. There is a museum of sorts at the Inverurie compound. One of its exhibits is a small stuffed pig which is purported to have belonged to Buffy Summers herself. There are other memento of her life as well, but I find it almost impossible to believe that she could be distilled down to such a ridiculous token.”
Giles couldn’t help but laugh. If only Buffy knew how her little treasures were being worshipped, that even Mr. Gordo had become a priceless relic of generations. His laughter turned into tears as he was hit by a powerful wave of homesickness. He missed the children, he missed his Slayer. He wanted to go back.
When he had control of himself again, he explained to James Evans exactly what his suspicions were about where he had come from. Melissa, who was curled up in the couch, interjected an opinion. “Parallel universes,” she said simply.
Both men looked at her. “What?”
“Parallel universes,” she replied. “It’s basic quantum cosmology. In this universe, such and so happened. In another universe, something else did. It is possible to interact with and travel between universes. It’s been documented.”
“Clever girl,” came a disembodied voice, and a man’s face appeared in the port window. “Aren’t you quick on your feet? Allow me to introduce myself. We call ourselves the Q, or you may call us that; it’s all much the same thing. Here you are, Rupert, and here you’ll stay. We find that we like you here. You amuse us.”
Giles, who had sat down when he began to cry, surged to his feet in fury. “I am not your plaything!” he roared.
Q chuckled. “I think, my good man, you will find yourself mistaken.” And then he vanished.
--
The days rolled into weeks as Giles existed on the Enterprise, wandering aimlessly about the ship most restless nights and researching with James Evans during the day. They found nothing of interest for the most part, but they continued to research anyway. It was their job. Then came the evening when Melissa came back from her duties with an odd expression on her face.
“What’s wrong?” James asked immediately.
“We picked up a delegation from Verashi Five today,” she said slowly. “One of them made me very uncomfortable.”
“Uncomfortable how?” Giles asked, leaning forward.
“Twitchy,” she replied. “Like a low-level buzz at the base of my skull.”
“Your Spidey-sense,” Giles muttered. Tell me about the people from Verashi Five. What sort of people are they?”
“They’re humans,” James answered him, calling up the information on the computer. “They settled Verashi Four and Five a hundred years ago. The Verashi Four colony failed; a huge number of settlers died. The remainder were evacuated to Verashi Five.”
“Died?” Giles asked. “Of what?”
James scrolled, then stared at the screen for a moment. When he looked up at Giles, his expression was bleak. “Neck ruptures.”
Giles turned to Melissa. “You’re to keep a stake on your person at all times. We must find a way to kill this vampire. Unfortunately I’m not sure how to do it without exposing us to the crew and possibly being charged with murder.”
“I think I can come up with something,” Melissa said. She thought about it for a moment, and then outlined her plan.
--
Giles wandered nonchalantly through the corridor on deck ten. The Verashi delegation had been housed on his deck, and he was hopeful of running into them. His luck was with him and he happened to pass their suite just as two of them were coming out. One of them was a young woman with a golden tan and blonde hair who reminded him forcefully of Buffy; the other was a pale and anemic-looking young fellow with limp black hair. “Good evening,” Giles said nonchalantly.
“Good evening,” they both replied. The young man continued. “Could you show us the way to the Ten-Forward Lounge?” he asked. “My colleague and I were interested in having a drink.”
I’ll just bet, Giles thought. “Certainly,” he replied aloud. “Right this way.” He led them to Ten-Forward, which was packed that night, and settled himself in a place where he could watch. It didn’t take long before the vampire moved, separating a young ensign from the crowd and moving with her to a corner. They talked for quite some time, body language flirtatious and friendly, and then they stood. The vampire put his hand on the small of the ensign’s back and they left Ten-Forward. Giles immediately moved to the comlink. “Melissa Watson,” he said, and Melissa’s voice came back. “Yes?”
“Deck Ten, Melissa. The vampire is alone with his victim. Hurry!”
“I’m on my way!” The comm channel shut and Giles turned to find Guinan standing directly behind him with an inscrutable expression on her face. “Vampire?” she asked softly.
Giles stared at her. “Please,” he finally said, “there’s no time if I’m to prevent that young ensign from turning up dead of a ‘neck rupture’.”
Guinan stepped back. “I’ll expect a full story later,” she said softly before vanishing into the crowd.
Giles darted out into the hallway. The vampire and his victim were disappearing into the delegation’s suite. The door slid shut just as Melissa, still in her duty uniform with its mustard-yellow tunic, pelted up. “Where?”
Giles pointed wordlessly to the door - the door which was locked against them. Melissa grinned. “See this shirt?” she said. “It means I work for Engineering. Believe me, I can open that door.”
“You might want to hurry,” Giles said mildly.
The Slayer moved to a wall panel beside the door and opened it, then began to tinker with the circuits inside. Then there was a scream from within the rooms. “Faster, Melissa!” Giles exclaimed.
“Almost… Got it!” The door slid open and Melissa pulled a stake from somewhere in her uniform. She darted into the room, Giles right behind her.
The vampire had his victim bent backward over the dining table. She was putting up a good fight, but it was clear that she was outmatched. He was in full game face, his hungry mouth straining for the young ensign’s neck, when Melissa moved up behind him and plunged her stake into his back. He looked down at his chest where the point of the stake protruded out, and then collapsed with a scream into dust.
Melissa helped the terrified girl up off the table. “Come on,” she said. “We’ve got to get out of here before someone comes back and catches us.”
They made their escape into a nearby turbolift. “What was that thing?” the young ensign asked when she was finally able to speak.
“Er…” Giles and Melissa shared a glance. “He… it… er…”
“It’s a drug,” Melissa blurted out. “Makes them go crazy.”
“Really?” the girl asked, skeptically.
“PCP,” Giles said almost to himself. God, how history repeated itself. He patted the girl on the shoulder. “Best, really, not to mention this to anyone.”
The girl stared at him. “Who’d believe me?” She got off the lift at the next deck and vanished into the ship.
Giles smiled at Melissa. “You did very well.”
“Thanks,” she replied. “I haven’t actually staked a vamp since I went to Starfleet Academy. I was afraid I might have lost my touch.”
Once back in James and Melissa’s suite, Giles made notes in James’s Watcher’s Journal about the incident and recommended to the man himself that he get in contact with the Council and have a team of Slayers sent out to the Verashi system. Then he returned to his own quarters, ruminating over a job well done.
--
The bell over the door rang as the door was pushed open. Giles looked up from his place behind the counter. “Ah, Buffy, good. Now that everyone’s here, let’s all have a seat.”
The assembled Scoobies - Buffy, Willow, Xander, Dawn, Anya and Tara - all claimed seats around the big research table and turned their attention to him. He paused, seeking words, and took his glasses off to clean them.
“What’s up, Giles?” Buffy asked. “You sounded on the phone like it was of the major and possibly bad.”
“Well… you see… I’m going to have to leave you.”
Choruses of protests rang from his young companions’ voices and he held his hands up to stem the flood. “Please,” he explained, “you must understand that I haven’t a choice. I shall return if ever I am capable, but… I wanted to tell you all goodbye. I… I shall miss you all, very much. But I have to go, and I have to go essentially now.”
“We’ll miss you, too, Giles,” they told him. Willow cried. Xander looked like he wanted to. There was a great deal of hugging and handshaking. The Scoobies one by one filed out of the store, all giving him sad glances over their shoulders as they left. All but one.
Giles turned back to the table and was now alone in the store with Buffy. She stood and walked up to him. “You’re not coming back, are you?” she asked him softly.
“I may not,” he told her sadly. “I don’t know if I shall ever find a way. But if I do, I shall return to you; this I swear to you upon my honor as your Watcher.”
“How about your honor as my friend?” she asked him softly. Tears were trickling down her face now. “Giles, I’ll miss you. A lot. You’re my best friend, and my Watcher, and my other half. I’ll be all kinds of empty without you here. But you say you have no choice, and I believe you. But I also believe you’ll come back someday.”
Giles hesitated, then decided the hell with decorum. He reached out and pulled Buffy to him, embracing her tightly. “I shall miss you, Buffy Summers,” he whispered into her hair. “You are without a doubt the most extraordinary person I have ever met, and you are the greatest Vampire Slayer to ever walk the earth. It has been my privilege to know you.” He closed his eyes, fighting back his own tears, as she hugged him back tightly.
Then he opened his eyes and let her go. He stepped back to look at her again, to study her and memorize her features, locking them forever in his mind. Then he looked up toward the ceiling. “Computer,” he said in a choked voice. “End program.”
--End--