ITLE: The Family Business
AUTHOR: JK Philips
RATING: PG
DISTRIBUTION: Not sure what all sites are out there, but if you want it, you can have it.
Just please email me your URL, so I know where my story is going. And of course, give
proper credit.
SUMMARY: After the events of The Ticking Clock, Buffy and Giles are still looking for their
daughter. Can they save her from a terrible fate?
SPOILERS: Everything up to “The Gift”
DISCLAIMER: I do not own these characters; they are the property of Joss Whedon,
Mutant Enemy & Fox. I simply am doing this for fun, and non-profit use.
EMAIL: jkphilips@hotmail.com. Would love feedback. This is only my third fanfic.
Well, technically my first if you want to lump Death Brings Clarity, The Ticking Clock,
and this together as one trilogy.
MY WEBSITE: (for archivers) www.geocities.com/jkphilips_fiction/

Part 5: Daddy’s Little Girl

Things were still tense between Buffy and Giles, but at least she had come home. And they had slept in the same bed, albeit on completely separate sides. When he woke in the morning, she was gone, having gotten up extra early to miss him as she left for work. That was a sure sign of her anger, because Buffy was not a happy morning riser.

Giles arrived at the Magic Box with Alex in tow and soon discovered that Anya had taken it upon herself to save his marriage. She was plum full of helpful advice for him and articles she had clipped from Cosmo and Vogue and oddly enough, Money Magazine.

“A good stock portfolio should win over any reasonable woman,” she told him.

The articles from Cosmo and Vogue, on the other hand, all involved sex. “Ten Ways to Make Her Scream” and “Bedroom Secrets Every Guy Should Know” and “What Women Want (But Are Afraid to Ask For)” and other titles that made him blush without even reading the content.

“Anya,” he protested, shoving the articles across the counter to her. “I assure you that this is not the problem we are having at the moment.”

She stared at him as though he were daft and shoved the articles back to his side. “Yes, but good sex can fix a whole lot of other problems, or at least make them seem less important.”

He blushed even more hotly, and then belatedly realized that they had forgotten about their possible audience sitting nearby. He was quickly reminded when his son asked the one question that every parent dreads: “What sex, Daddy?”

He floundered for several moments, before Anya stepped in to explain the facts of life. Giles immediately stopped her and carried his son into the side office where the boy could play dominoes without listening to lifelong-therapy-inducing conversations with Anya.

He returned to find two more articles she thought pivotal to his and Buffy’s reconciliation. He sighed. “While this is... thoughtful... in a strange sort of way, I don’t believe these articles are going to be of any help. I’m sorry.”

She glared at him. “Well, they certainly don’t have any articles called, ‘Six Ways to Get Your Wife to Forgive You After You’ve Given Away Your Only Daughter.’” Her brow furrowed in thought. “Or at least I don’t think they do. I haven’t read them all yet.”

Not knowing how to respond to that, he didn’t. He just returned to stocking his new shipment of books on the shelves. Sometime near noon, Anya decided that flowers were the way to go. He wouldn’t have known what she was up to, except that she asked him how to spell ‘transgressions’ and he got a look at the note she was composing for him.

“I can buy my own damn flowers,” he assured her.

“Then please do,” she retorted, sliding him the phone book, opened to where she had circled the more inexpensive florists.

The final straw came a couple hours later, when she involved Alex in her little quest. They were in the back office, looking through catalogs, and the boy was helping her pick out the perfect gift for his mother. He ratted her out as Giles walked by: “Look, Daddy! Pretty for Mommy.”

He scooped up his son and stared down Anya as he spoke. “Yes, son, it’s lovely, but your Mummy has enough pretty things. And while your Aunt Anya’s intentions are well-placed, emptying my bank account will not make your mother any happier.”

“It certainly couldn’t hurt,” she grumbled.

So it was with no small amount of relief that he locked up for the day and returned home. Alex had missed his nap at the store, and so promptly fell asleep in the car. He slept through dinner too, which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, because the ominous silence between his mother and father and Dawn would have only disturbed him. Giles thought the child might even sleep through the night, and so buried himself in research. Dawn was ignoring him now too, whether because of Spike or because Buffy had told her about Robin, he couldn’t be sure.

But Alex didn’t sleep through the night. Shortly after his mother had left for patrol, he came toddling down the stairs to find his father.

“Daddy?” There were tears on his cheeks, and his chin was quivering.

Giles set aside his book and moved to lift the child into his lap, but Alex resisted, tugging his father instead towards the front door.

“What is it, son?”

“Go Robin. Now.”

Giles knelt on the floor in the foyer and wiped the tears from his boy’s cheeks. “We all love Robin very much, Alex, but this isn’t going to be her home. Some very nice people are taking care of her for us.”

Alex shook his head and tugged on his father’s hand again. “Go Robin. Now.”

“I wish-”

“Now!” he insisted, stamping his feet. “Fire!”

Giles felt his heart sink into his stomach. All the color drained from his face. “What?” he whispered.

“Fire! Fire! Fire!” the boy chanted, stamping his feet.

Giles didn’t want to believe his son, he didn’t want to remember how the boy had known his sister’s name before they had, didn’t want to think that his child was having prophetic dreams. More than anything, he didn’t want to imagine that his daughter could be trapped in a fire.

His moment of hesitation passed, and he was on his feet, racing for the phone. LA was two hours away, and he would never make it there in time. Please, God, let Angel be in.

Only the answering machine.

“Angel, are you there? Pick up. Anyone? This is Giles. I have reason to believe there may be a fire at my daughter’s house. Please, someone check it out.”

He hung up, frustrated beyond belief. Angel had a cell phone. Giles found that number and tried it. It rang a couple times, and then there was silence, followed by a voice talking to someone else. “Wes, any idea how to work this blasted thing?”

He heard some static and then a clear voice, Wesley’s voice. “Hello?”

“Thank God,” he sighed. “Wesley, I need someone to run by Robin’s house. I believe there may be a fire. Don’t ask me how. Just... can you do that for me?”

“Of course, but you should know we’re in hospital right now.”

“What’s happened?”

Wesley’s voice came through slightly more muffled, as if he were trying to shield the conversation from eavesdroppers. “Cordelia had a whole slew of visions, so many that she’s passed out. The staff are trying to keep her sedated, but it doesn’t seem to be doing the trick. Each time she regains consciousness, she’s in the throes of another vision until she blacks out again. It’s like when Voca turned up the intensity of her powers, except this time we don’t know how to stop it.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“We’re taking turns in the hospital with her and on the street. Fred and Gunn and some of his friends are patrolling right now. Unfortunately, without Cordelia being able to tell us what she’s seeing, we’re just blindly searching the city for trouble. But I will send Angel by Robin’s house.”

“Thank you, Wesley. Have him call me on my cell phone when he’s done that. You have that number, right?”

“Yes. You won’t be at home?”

Giles was already scribbling a note for Buffy. “No, I’m coming up there. It will put my mind at ease. And maybe I can offer some assistance for Cordelia’s condition. Thank you again for doing this. And thank Angel for me.”

He hung up, picked up his son, and dashed up the steps to Dawn’s room. “You have to watch Alex until Buffy returns. I’ve left a note for her. I have to go to LA. I’ll call as soon as I have more information.”

“Is this about Robin?”

“Yes.”

Alex only watched with wide eyes, his desperation gone now that his father was taking action. He crawled up into Dawn’s bed and lay down. Giles had his keys and was out the door a moment later. He wished he knew where Buffy might be patrolling, so he could bring her along. She would truly never forgive him if he went without her a second time. He watched the graveyards as he drove out of town, but he didn’t spot her, and he didn’t dare take the time to search for her. He felt his son’s desperation and urgency driving him to reach LA as soon as possible.

Angel called twenty minutes into the drive, telling him that all was fine at Robin’s house. No fire, no one lurking about. He would check again, and periodically through the night, but they were all still frantic to help Cordelia and to stop whatever evil her visions foretold. He called again a half hour later, saying that Robin was still fine, but that Cordelia had become coherent enough to direct them to a nearby hospital, where vampires were raiding the nursery, before she passed out again. Not another call the rest of the drive. It was the longest hour of Giles’ life.

He imagined Angel and the others were at the hospital trying to stop Cordelia’s vision from coming to pass, but while they were busy with that, Robin could be in very real danger.

Giles turned onto the side street leading to the McGregor’s house, and his worst fears were realized. Moonlight illuminated the thick cloud of smoke that billowed up from the two-story house where his daughter lived. He parked beside the curb and climbed out of his car without bothering to turn off the ignition. A neighbor who had seen the smoke was standing in the front yard in her nightgown, peering up at the second floor windows. He dashed up to her, demanding urgently, “The McGregor family... Did they all get out?”

She shook her head. “I haven’t seen them.”

He ran towards the house, paying no heed to the neighbor’s shouted warnings: “Don’t go in there! I’ve called for a fire truck. It should be coming soon.”

They were all inside. He knew it. Where else would they be? It was after midnight, and their cars were both parked in the driveway. The door was locked. Of course. He wrapped his hand with a handkerchief and smashed in the decorative glass beside the front door. He reached his hand through and turned the deadbolt.

He entered the house, coughing and bending over to stay below the worst of the smoke. The security alarm he had just tripped by smashing the glass now blared over the steady screeching of the smoke detectors. The smoke made his eyes water, and he shook the glass from his handkerchief before holding it over his mouth to help him breathe. Flames blocked one path, so he took the only other one open to him. He stumbled through the formal living room, past the formal dining room, into the kitchen, and came to a dead standstill before the kitchen table. He had found Shaun and Catherine McGregor.

He quickly turned from the gruesome sight, but not before he caught a glimpse of how their bodies had been mutilated and draped over the oak table, which now stood at the center of a symbol drawn in blood across the tiles. Giles had a strong stomach. He had to in his line of work. But even he felt his legs grow weak and his stomach heave at the sight of what had been done to the McGregors. He caught himself with one arm against the wall. He drew in several deep breaths, coughing as the smoke made it in with the air. He knew he would have to turn around and look again. He had to make sure his daughter was not lying with them.

He looked back at the pair, only long enough to be certain that they were alone. He gave silent thanks for that mercy and a brief prayer that the couple had died quickly and not endured the violence that had been done to them. He noticed also the symbol that surrounded them. The familiar symbol of crescent moon and lightning bolt.

He turned away from the sight again, noticing the trail of blood leading across the tiling and up the stairs. They had died, been dragged, and then placed here. He could not continue into the library. Already he could feel waves of heat bombard him as the flames licked ever closer, dancing across the bookcases and nearing the kitchen.

“Robin!” he called urgently, coughing with each breath. “Robin!”

Where would she be? It crossed his mind that she might not be in the house at all. Whoever had done this might have taken her. But he had to look for her on the off chance that she was trapped in a burning house. She would die if he left her here. He didn’t hear the sirens from the fire trucks yet, and the fire was spreading towards the kitchen, crawling closer to the staircase. The firemen would never make it in time.

He dashed up the stairs, forced back at the top by the flames down one hallway.

“Robin!”

Where would she go? Where would Alex go if he were trapped in a burning house after his parents had been murdered? Giles wasn’t sure the layout of the second floor exactly, only where her room was and that of her parents, but he had only one option open to him at the moment: the hallway that was not currently on fire.

He leapt through the edge of the flames and stumbled down the hallway, falling to his knees and choking on the thick fog of smoke. He pressed his handkerchief closer to his mouth and nose, squinting ahead to the open doorways on either side of the hallway in front of him. Sweat beaded down his face, and he blinked to see clearly.

“Robin! Please answer me. I want to help. Let me know where you are.”

The trail of blood continued on in front of him, leading straight to the room at the end of the hall. Her parents’ master bedroom. He crawled along beside it, calling out to his daughter every few feet. He passed the bathroom on the left, an office on the right. He reached her bedroom beside her parents’ room. He could see the flames licking up through her bedroom window, tasting her curtains and her walls and the little stuffed animals that rested on a shelf beside the windowsill.

“Robin!”

He started into her room, but stopped when he saw the little blood footprints. If he hadn’t been kneeling on the floor to avoid the smoke, he might have missed them in his haste to reach her.

The first set of prints tracked through the thick trail of blood and left little barefoot shadows leading into her bedroom.

Dear God, no! Her prints came from the direction of the master bedroom and led into her own room. She must have witnessed her parents’ murder, and then ran into her own room after their bodies were dragged downstairs.

He pushed aside the thought of what his daughter must have gone through: her terror and confusion and grief. He had to find her first, and the second set of bloody footprints would surely point the way. They crossed the blood trail left by her parents and went into the office opposite her bedroom.

He darted into the room, still staying low to avoid the worst of the smoke. Even then, he couldn’t stop coughing.

“Robin!”

Still no answer. The little blood prints faded quickly as they trailed across the rose carpeting further into the office. He wasn’t sure where she would have gone after entering the room. He checked under the computer desk and in the closet.

“Robin!”

Then he noticed the thin, straight crack in the wall beside the bookcase. He wedged his fingers into the space and pried open a half-door made of simple wood paneling. Behind lay a dark crawlspace too small for a grown man.

But just the right size for the three-year-old who huddled in the far corner.

Giles reached one arm in, but he was a good foot short of touching her.

“Robin, give me your hand.”

She didn’t move, just sat curled into a little ball, rocking and shivering. She watched him with wide, frightened eyes. Giles kept his hand outstretched to her, remaining very still and patient, even though his mind was screaming at him that he had to get her out of here now before they both burned to death.

“I’m not going to hurt you. You’re safe now.”

He wedged himself farther into the opening, as far as he would fit, and still it only bought him inches. The dim moonlight barely penetrated the cramped crawlspace, illuminating just the outline of her features and glinting off her wide eyes.

“It was very smart of you to hide here where they couldn’t find you. But it’s time to come out now.”

She just stared at him, not moving. Each second lowered both their chances of getting out alive.

“You remember me, don’t you, Robin? I read you a story when I came to your house. We had a tea party with the Queen. You’re safe now. I won’t let anyone hurt you. Come on, luv, give me your hand.”

Very slowly she uncurled one arm from its grip around her tucked up knees. Her hand tentatively drifted towards his.

“That’s a good girl. Just a little more.”

Her arm straightened and her fingers stretched to touch the tips of his own. Not quite close enough.

“Robin, please just come a little bit closer. I’ll keep you safe. I promise.”

She leaned forward slightly until her tiny hand slipped into his. Giles smiled and gave it a comforting squeeze before pulling the girl into his arms by their joined hands. She clung to his shirtfront immediately, burying her face into his neck and trembling against his chest. She had her stuffed rabbit clutched under one arm, and its fur tickled his cheek.

“Shhh... It’s going to be okay,” he soothed, rubbing her back as he unfolded himself from the crawlspace entrance. He turned back to the office. The smoke had gotten thicker in the short time it had taken him to retrieve Robin. They were both coughing. He pressed his handkerchief over her nose and mouth, and she squirmed away from the cloth.

“You won’t cough so much if you breathe through this.”

Her struggles ceased, and she let him hold the handkerchief over her face as he crossed to the door.

The fire had spread further down the hall, blocking their escape down the stairs. The heat was intense, and Robin began to cry. Giles shielded his daughter with his body as he skirted the edge of the flames and headed down the only path open to him: into the master bedroom.

He stooped to stay below as much of the smoke as he could, and he turned his head to cover his mouth and nose with his shirtsleeves. Even still, his eyes watered, and he coughed against the smoke insinuating itself down into his lungs. He would probably be hospitalized for smoke inhalation. But hopefully, if he got them out soon enough, Robin would not.

He saw the blood covering the bed, handprints on the wall above it. The McGregors had been alive through their ordeal. And Robin had likely seen the whole thing. She was still sobbing in his arms and trembling, and he tried to block her vision of the bloody bed. He made his way to the window and looked down on the front porch. Flames had reached the front of the house now as well, and were climbing the walls to this window. They couldn’t go out and down. They certainly couldn’t stay here. The only option was out and up, onto the roof.

He adjusted his grip on the girl and instructed her to wrap her arms around his neck and hold tight. She obeyed, still crying, still clutching the stuffed rabbit by its ear. He held her tight around the waist with one arm. His other opened the window and gained a solid grasp on its frame. He hauled himself out onto the ledge, looking up at the roof just above him. He would need both his hands to pull himself up.

“Robin, hold tight to my neck.” He slowly released his grip from her waist, making sure she had him tight enough that she wouldn’t fall. She had him tight enough that he could barely breathe. He reached up for the edge of the roof and gained purchase with both hands. He pulled at the same time that he swung his legs up and to the side. Solidly over the edge, he rolled onto his back and rested for a moment, Robin lying across his chest.

“You don’t have to hold so tightly now, luv,” he whispered, as he tried to ease her chokehold on his neck.

Giles stood, and Robin screamed. She began thrashing in his arms, and his balance on the sloping shingles was already precarious at best. Her frantic struggles sent him stumbling to his knees to keep from falling to the flames below.

“You have to stop that, Robin. Everything’s going to be fine.” She still didn’t stop screaming or squirming in his arms, and he tried a less gentle, more parental approach. “Robin Deanna McGregor, stop that this instant!”

That didn’t seem to work either. He twisted to the side to see what her hands were grasping for. She had dropped her stuffed rabbit on the roof behind them. He rescued the thing and returned it to her. She settled back down against his chest immediately.

“Well, that was easily fixed. Careful not to drop her again.”

He stood once more, carefully picking his way along the perimeter of the roof, constantly watching over the side for a safe place to climb down. A few feet ahead of them, flames suddenly sprouted from the shingles. He turned around to backtrack, but the fire had followed them and closed off their path. He tried to see the driveway from where he was standing. Where were those damn fire trucks? It had to have been at least fifteen minutes since he entered the house. He looked down. A two-story drop might be painful, but it would not be life threatening, and they were rapidly running out of options.

He chose a spot that looked to be fairly flat and relatively free of foliage and was the furthest from the fire that he could get. He turned around and cradled Robin close to his chest, making sure her arms and legs were no longer wrapped around him, but instead tucked close to her body. With any luck he could drop to the ledge beneath the second story window before falling the remaining distance. He would rather try for a second jump to the first story ledge before dropping to the ground, but the flames had already climbed higher than that.

He knelt beside the edge of the roof and gripped the overhang with one hand as the other clutched Robin tightly to his chest. Slowly he lowered himself over and down, their combined weights too much for one arm to support.

He fell.

Ten feet from the roof to the first ledge, and the impact jarred up his legs even as he bent his knees to absorb some of the shock. He stumbled slightly, nearly toppling off before catching the window frame with one hand. He coughed against the smoke cloud they seemed to be standing in. He could feel the heat of the fire directly below them. Next stop: the ground. And this time he wouldn’t be able to lower himself from the ledge first. They needed distance between them and the fire. This time Giles would have to jump.

He glanced over his shoulder. Less than ten feet left to fall, but the smoke formed a veil of mist below them. From Giles’ perspective, it seemed as if they could fall through the haze forever.

He took a deep breath of acrid air and fought back the coughing impulse that stung the back of his throat. He bent his knees, and then pushed off with his feet, so he could put as much distance between them and the burning house as possible. Robin squeezed her eyes shut. If it were Alex, he would have taken it as an amusement park ride and begged to go again when they hit the ground.

That was the only thought he had time for before his back struck the ground. The impact knocked the wind out of him, and he couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t move either, and pain shot straight up his spine. He could feel the heat from the flames less than five feet away, but at the moment all he could concentrate on was trying to breathe. His mouth opened and closed, his attempts becoming more desperate, his hand massaging his chest, trying to force air into his lungs. His vision swam. He felt hands beneath his shoulders. Neighbors were dragging him back from the house. Robin was screaming. They couldn’t pry her from his arms.

His first breath came like fire in his lungs. He rolled to the side and started coughing violently. He heard the sirens now and saw the indistinct blur of fire truck and ambulance. The neighbors were asking about Catherine and Shaun. He couldn’t answer, could only focus on each breath between the coughing fits. A man in a white uniform knelt beside him and slipped an oxygen mask over his face. Another man tried to help Robin, but she would not loose her grip on Giles’ coat. She screamed, and actually grabbed a fistful of his hair to hold her place. Giles lifted one hand to slide down the oxygen mask. He smiled at her softly. Breathing was somewhat easier, and he attempted speech.

“S’okay, Robin.” He coughed again, and it burned the back of his throat. “They’ll help you.”

But she continued to cling to him for dear life and scream and cry. It was only because he was lying on the ground that he noticed the blood on the paramedic’s shoes. A chill ran through him. He turned to the paramedic on the other side of him. Blood on his shoes as well.

He pulled Robin into his arms, holding her close to his chest. He slipped a crucifix from his coat pocket and simply rested it against her back as he held her. The paramedics took one look at it and slowly backed up, disappearing into the crowd.

“Where are they going?” one neighbor lady asked.

“Shouldn’t they be taking them to the hospital?” The small group watched in bewilderment as the ambulance drove away without its patients.

“I can get there myself,” Giles insisted, stiffly raising himself to his feet.

“I’ll drive you,” someone offered.

“No, no, I’ll drive myself.” He started coughing again, casting serious doubt on his ability to make it to the hospital on his own, but he was not about to trust anyone with his daughter’s life. He limped to the car and belted her into the seat. She screamed and clawed frantically at the belt buckle until he was in the driver’s seat beside her. He reached across and took her hand, and she was calm as long as he was touching her.

They made it to the hospital in incremental bits. He needed to pull to the side of the road for each coughing fit. Robin, thankfully, had stopped coughing as soon as they escaped the fire. And he had taken the brunt of the fall with his body, so she was relatively unharmed. Physically, at least. Her eyes were haunted, and she spoke not a single word the entire drive.

At one point, she started shivering in her thin nightgown, clutching her little stuffed rabbit tight to her chest. He pulled to the side of the road and removed his jacket, wrapping it around her. He was cold then, too, so he put up the top and turned on the heat. Her hair and face were greasy with smoke, her hands too, so he cringed when he saw her begin to suck on one dirty thumb.

The phone rang just as they pulled into the hospital parking lot. He turned off the ignition and answered it, still holding Robin by the hand to keep her calm.

“Giles? It’s Angel.” The vampire’s voice sounded panicked, and Giles almost smiled, knowing what was coming next. “After we finished at the hospital, we went past Robin’s house again. I don’t know how to tell you this. I don’t know what happened exactly, but-”

“There was a fire,” Giles finished.

“Yes, and the firemen said they thought there were still people trapped inside.”

“It’s alright, Angel. I got Robin out of the house. She’s with me, and we’re at the hospital right now.” He started coughing again, and it was a moment before he could continue. “The McGregors are both inside, but they’re already dead. There’s no one else.”

“They can’t go inside. The fire’s too intense. They’re trying to put it out.”

“Assure them that there’s no one left to save inside. That should make them feel better.”

“What hospital are you at?”

Giles peered up at the sign and coughed again before answering. “Good Samaritan Hospital.”

“Cordelia’s in the neuropsych unit there.”

“I’ll be sure to pay her a visit.” He started on another coughing fit, this one lasting nearly a full minute.

“Sounds like you should maybe go in there yourself, Giles.” Angel signed off.

He unbuckled his daughter first and pulled her into his lap, rather than endure her screaming as he came around the car to get her. He walked into the ER, past a woman bleeding from a nasty gash on her forehead and a mother holding a screaming infant and a slightly drunk man with a large nail protruding from his hand. Off to another side were a trio of teenagers, each wearing a high school football jersey and watching down one hallway intently. The triage nurse seemed tired as she took his information and then pointed him to a chair he could wait in until a doctor was available.

***

For as much time as he spent in them, Giles really hated hospitals. He reclined against the back of the hospital bed, Robin’s weight against his chest as she began to doze. The oxygen mask seemed to be helping his breathing, as did the medication they had made him inhale earlier, although it had sent him on a coughing fit that had lasted almost five minutes. They had given the same treatment to Robin as a precaution, but she didn’t seem nearly as affected by the fire as he.

She had fought against the oxygen mask at first, and then screamed when they had tried to draw blood. She was overtired and cranky and terrified and traumatized, and from where Giles was sitting, her lungs had sounded quite healthy. He had leaned down close to her and had begun softly singing to his daughter, her crying stopped mid-wail as she turned watery eyes up to him in fascination. He had attempted to wipe away her tears, but only managed to make sooty smears across her cheeks.

Right now, Robin slept soundly in his arms, a peaceful, dreamless sleep for which Giles gave thanks. He could not risk sleep for himself, not while she was still in danger. Every figure that passed their door sent a jolt of primal fear, the most basic fight-or-flight instinct, straight up his spine. A stake and a cross in his jacket pocket, and he kept his hand always near to them.

He suspected he was not a favorite among the hospital staff at this moment. He had refused to change into a hospital gown or to allow them an examination of his back after his fall. He had refused the X-rays. In short, he had refused any treatment that would separate him from Robin for any length of time. The pediatrician, even, had to care for the girl while she sat in Giles’ lap. He saw the looks they gave him as they passed outside his exam room, and he didn’t care. Someone had tried to kill his daughter, had succeeded in murdering her adoptive parents and burning her house down while she was still inside, and had most likely killed the two paramedics they had impersonated just so they could snatch Robin from his grasp. Giles wasn’t about to allow his daughter out of his sight for a moment. He wasn’t about to give them another opportunity to hurt her.

He was impatient to leave. His breathing had improved, and Robin seemed unharmed. The doctor wanted to at least wait for the results of the blood tests, although he would rather keep them overnight for observation. But Giles could only imagine the two vampire paramedics hunting them down, and he didn’t want to wait for anything, and he most certainly wasn’t saying overnight. How hard could it be to find a man and a girl who had escaped from a fire? Giles wanted to go home now. They could receive the rest of their treatment at Sunnydale’s own hospital.

The doctor returned, reading over something on a clipboard. The nurse followed in behind him. Giles hoped the blood tests were back and they could leave now. But when the doctor glanced up, his eyes were cold and stern, filled with more than his simple annoyance with a difficult patient. “We brought up Robin’s medical file. It appears that you are not her father, Mr. Giles. Her grandparents have been contacted and are on their way. Social Services have also been alerted. I’m afraid you won’t be allowed to leave with the girl.”

Giles glanced down at the child in his arms. In spite of all the activity surrounding her, she remained sleeping, physically and emotionally exhausted. He tenderly brushed a stray lock of hair from her face, and then lowered his oxygen mask before answering the doctor’s unspoken accusation. “I am her father. She was stolen from us at birth, and we never consented to her adoption. We have been searching for her all this time.” He raised his eyes and met the other man’s gaze. “I have court documents. I can have my lawyer send them over.”

The doctor mulled this over for a moment. It probably wasn’t an everyday occurrence in the ER. A simple kidnapping would be the more logical explanation. Luckily for Giles, the police had already taken his statement, and the witnesses had corroborated the facts of his arrival on the scene after the fire and his heroic rescue of the child from the burning house. It also helped that one of the officers had known Buffy from the Academy. If the McGregors’ neighbors hadn’t been so blessedly nosy, then Giles would probably already be in lockup on suspicion of setting the fire and murdering Robin’s parents. But thankfully, the neighbor who had called for the fire trucks had also seen the perpetrators leave before Giles ever got there.

“Yes,” the doctor finally replied, “we’ll need you to do that before she can leave. And we’ll need your permission to run a paternity test on the blood samples we’ve already taken from both of you.”

“Of course.”

“Fortunately, we have excellent lab facilities right here in the hospital.” The doctor frowned. “Even so, it will take a few hours to run a DNA test, so you might as well let us have a look at your back, Mr. Giles.”

“I’ll pass, but thank you.”

The doctor’s jaw clenched slightly, and he turned on his heel. No, Giles most definitely wasn’t a favorite among the staff.

As the doctor left, it didn’t escape Giles’ notice that there was now a security guard stationed outside the door. He sighed. He wouldn’t be leaving any time soon after all. He wondered if the guard would at least discourage would-be attackers. Then again, they would likely be dressed as hospital staff and rouse no suspicion.

The nurse smiled at him kindly as she replaced the oxygen mask. Long, thick, raven black hair curled around her face, her nametag read “Carol H.” and she at least seemed somewhat sympathetic to him. She nodded to the phone on the side table. “You can call your lawyer with that phone. No cells in the hospital. Just dial nine to get an outside line.”

She left him to make his phone calls. First call to Buffy, and he needed to persuade her to stay in Sunnydale and wait for them. But she would take the day off of work; she couldn’t be talked out of that. Dawn knew nothing; she would go to school as normal. It would be better to start Robin out with the least amount of people possible. Just Buffy hopefully at first, and then Alex would wake, and later Dawn would come home from school. One at a time Robin would accustom herself to the people who would now be part of her life.

The second call was to Thomas Stockwell, and he faxed the court documents to the ER with all due speed, sounding rather pleased that they had finally found their daughter, after he recovered from the annoyance of a nearly two in the morning wake up call.

The final call was to Angel’s cell, but Wesley answered this time. He had said they were taking turns at Cordelia’s bedside, but Giles wondered if the young man had yet left her side.

“Giles? Angel tells me you’re at Good Samaritan as well.”

“Yes, in the ER. How is Cordelia?”

Giles could hear the concern in the other man’s voice, even as he tried to couch his words in the most optimistic way possible. “The visions seemed to have stopped. She hasn’t regained consciousness yet, but the staff are still trying to keep her sedated. Sleep is probably what she needs most right now.”

Giles nodded thoughtfully, even though the man at the other end wouldn’t see it. “Angel and the others?”

“They’ve gone out patrolling again. They were unfortunately unable to save the babies from the hospital nursery. The vampires got there first.” A deep sigh. “The visions Cordelia was sent are rather pointless if she cannot tell us what she saw. We cannot stop them if we don’t know what we are trying to stop until it is too late.”

Giles didn’t need to be in the same room with the man to imagine the frustration etched into Wesley’s face. He could hear it in the other man’s voice as clear as his underlying fear for Cordelia’s well being. “Cordelia will be fine, Wesley. And you have all done everything you can do. The Powers can ask no more of you than that.”

There was a long silence. “Thank you for that. And at least your daughter is safe. We can be grateful for that mercy.”

Giles looked up as Carol entered his room, clutching a small bundle close to her chest. He signed off with Wesley, promising he would stop by before leaving for Sunnydale.

“I thought these might fit Robin. We get donated clothes and stuff sometimes. Well, I just thought you both might like to clean the smoke off while you’re waiting. There’s a full bath down the hall you can use. Sorry, no shoes, though. She’ll have to go barefoot.”

He took the small stack of clothing. “Thank you. These are appreciated.”

The nurse smiled at him warmly as she tucked one long strand of black hair behind her ear. She led him to a room down the hall, the security guard also shadowing them five steps behind.

“Do you need a hand?”

“I’ll manage,” he answered with a smile, before shutting the bathroom door.

He sat on the edge of the tub and started the bath. He wasn’t eager to wake the child in his arms, but neither did he want to leave the residue of her ordeal on her any longer than necessary. It could only serve to remind her and conspire to rob her of her sense of security. He wanted his child to feel like a normal little girl again, and a bath was a good place to start.

He dipped his hands in the warm water and began to wash the dried blood from the bottoms of her feet where they dangled over the tub. He wanted to clean her parents’ blood from her body before she woke. He wished he could just as easily wash the memory of their murder from her mind.

She stirred as she felt the water on her feet. She blinked up at him and rubbed at her eyes with one fist. Giles smiled. “What do you say we clean you up? How does a bath sound?”

She pointed one finger to the toilet behind them.

He knelt on the bathroom tile as he dried off her feet so she wouldn’t slip. “Do you need help?”

She shook her head and handed him her stuffed toy before climbing on the toilet. He turned away, slightly embarrassed. He wasn’t accustomed to caring for a little girl yet, and he wondered how awkward he would feel bathing her. Even turned away from her, she still held onto him by the collar of his shirt, as if by letting go of him she might lose him. He could empathize with that feeling.

She finished, and flushed, and tugged for him to help her up to the sink.

“You’re going to take a bath in a minute anyway.”

But she insisted, and he helped her wash her hands, marveling at how her parents had managed to teach her better habits than they had accomplished with Alex so far.

He stripped off her nightgown, laid the rabbit safely out of the splash zone, and set her in the tub. It wasn’t nearly as bad as he had feared it might be. It was almost the same as bathing Alex. Except Giles didn’t know what to do about her long hair. He tried the shampoo, but the suds dripped in her eyes, and she started crying. He felt terrible as he washed her face and tried to soothe her. Just a few hours in his care, and he was already making a mess of it.

“Don’t cry, Robin,” he murmured. “The bottle says ‘tearless.’ How was I supposed to know? I’ll be more careful. I promise.”

She settled down after a few moments, and he was able to rinse her hair without further incident. He examined her closely: pink and rosy, without a trace of soot left. Which was more than he could say about himself. Robin seemed to have a remedy to this problem and began to splash him quite enthusiastically. He held up his hands to stop her, but she was smiling, and it was the first time he had seen her smile since pulling her from the house. So he splashed back, hoping for a little girl’s giggle, but having to content himself with her smile, because her laughter was not forthcoming.

When they had emptied enough of the tub onto the floor, Giles finally ended their war and pulled her out of the tub and into a dry towel. She still hadn’t spoken, and it was beginning to worry him. So he sat her up on the counter beside the sink and tried to engage her in conversation.

“Would you like the pink shirt or the blue?”

She pointed to the pink, but he tried to get her to say it. “I’m sorry, which one?”

She shook her finger at the pink one, her face screwing up in frustration, and he could see a tantrum coming. So he just gave up and dressed her. Pink shirt and little blue jean coveralls that were just a tad too big. The nurse had left a comb, which he tried to run through her wet hair, but he was terribly clumsy with it. He kept pulling her hair, and she would whimper and hold onto her scalp with both hands, which made it even more difficult to accomplish. And to think, Giles had once had even longer hair himself. But he couldn’t remember it being this difficult to care for. He eventually admitted defeat. What did he care if her hair was tangled? At least she was clean and dressed.

He fixed himself up a little as long as they were there. He rolled up his shirtsleeves and washed his hands and arms and face in the sink. Robin watched him quietly, and then reached out to touch his Eyghon tattoo in the bend of his elbow. He smiled. Alex had been curious about it too.

He touched her finger with his as she traced the outline of the symbol. “It reminds me that I can make mistakes sometimes.”

She looked at him with wide somber eyes. Giles dried his arms and face. She was too young to understand. He scooped her up, and she started to whine and squirm as he moved to leave. Her hands were reaching out, clenching and unclenching in desperation. He turned to see what she wanted and spied the little stuffed rabbit still sitting on the ground.

“Sorry. Didn’t mean to forget her.” He retrieved the slightly wet toy and passed it over. Robin clutched the toy like a life preserver and quieted down against his chest immediately. Giles took one last look around the bathroom to see if they had forgotten anything else. They had definitely made a mess. That was the one perk to a hospital bathroom, he supposed, that he didn’t have to clean it.

He returned to their room, the guard following them back and resuming his station outside their door. The nurse saw them as they passed and joined them a few moments later.

“Wow, looks like there was a real pretty girl under all that dirt.” Carol smiled at Robin, but the girl ducked her head into Giles’ chest. “Looks like Daddy could use a little help with your hair. May I?” she asked him as she reached for the comb.

“By all means.”

Giles sat at the edge of the hospital bed as Carol gently combed through Robin’s golden tresses. The child seemed frightened at first, digging her hands into the front of his shirt, but she relaxed after a few moments, after she realized the woman was not going to take her from his arms.

“Never had a girl before?”

It didn’t seem so much a question as a conclusion, but he answered her anyway. “She’s my only daughter. I have a son at home, but...”

“Yes, well, you want to start at the bottom and work your way up. That way you can hold on above where you’re combing and not pull on her hair. And a little conditioner or detangler wouldn’t hurt either.” Carol smiled as she finished. Robin’s hair was softly curling as it dried. “Don’t you just have the prettiest curls? You’re going to have the men lined up for you.”

Giles groaned. “Yes, in the far, far future.”

Carol laughed. “How about a nice braid to keep it neat?” In less than a minute she had expertly woven the long gold curls into a lovely French braid. She pulled a rubber band from her pocket and tied off the ends.

“You must have a girl of your own. You’re quite experienced at this.”

“Two actually. But mine are a little more rambunctious. She seems like such a quiet little thing.”

Giles sighed and glanced down at his daughter, so timid and withdrawn now. “She didn’t used to be. I wish I could get her to talk.”

Carol tenderly stroked her hand across Robin’s face, and then met Giles’ eyes with a kind smile. “Kids are amazingly resilient. She’ll bounce back. You’ll see. All she needs is a little love and patience. And maybe one of these,” she added, pulling a lime green lollipop from her uniform pocket.

Robin refused the treat.

“How about a red one?”

She twisted her hands tighter into Giles’ shirt and turned her head away. He frowned and kissed the crown of her head, his heart breaking for his child’s grief. He had wanted to shield her from death and vampires and demons, but he had only ended up abandoning her to face those things alone. And now her parents were dead, and there was nothing he could do to protect her from the pain of that.

Their doctor entered at that moment, carrying a clipboard. “Well, Mr. Giles, it seems you were right. Your lawyer sent us the documents, and the blood tests came back. To a ninety-nine point nine percent accuracy, you are Robin’s father, and you do have a legal claim to her. I must sincerely apologize for doubting you, but it did seem like such an outrageous story.”

“I understand.”

“I must admit: I called a friend at the precinct to check up on your claim. I was quite skeptical, and well... anyone could have faxed us those papers. But he found the police report from three years ago and verified the judge’s rulings that your lawyer sent us. Plus, it seems there’s a pending lawsuit against the adoption agency. So... stolen baby.” The doctor shook his head. “Again, my deepest apologies, but it just seemed like something out of a movie-of-the-week. Social Services say I should let you take her, as the adoption was illegal and is now invalidated, making you her legal guardian now. In any case, we can’t keep you from leaving with her, although you should know that her adoptive grandparents will be here soon. And no matter what your court orders say, they’ll probably want to fight you for custody.”

Giles nodded, not wanting to deal with them at this moment. “I’ll contact them later. Right now I just need to get home.”

“Well, the blood work shows a clean bill of health for Robin. I’d like you to go in for a follow-up with your own doctor and have some X-rays taken, but I think I already know how likely that is.”

“You’re beginning to sound like my wife,” Giles complained as he signed the release forms. He noticed the doctor had written AMA on his papers with the X-ray circled beside it. “Now where’s the neuropsych unit?”

The doctor gave him a puzzled look.

“I want to check on a friend.”

“Third floor.”

He thanked the nurse Carol as he left, and he would have thanked the doctor too, but the man had already moved onto the next patient. Almost five in the morning, and the ER waiting room was still half full. Such was life in LA, he imagined. There were several drunks, a few homeless people who were most likely looking for beds rather than medical attention. A woman who was probably a prostitute, pressing her hand to a bleeding wound on her neck. Giles imagined she had found a vampire rather than a human in her bed, but somehow she had managed to survive the encounter. The high schoolers from before were still waiting and watching down the same hallway, except now their numbers had increased. It seemed as if the entire football team were waiting for news of some kind, and some of them were crying.

The neuropsych unit was quiet in contrast. The nurse at the front desk glanced up as he passed, but made no move to stop him. She had probably gotten used to people coming and going from Cordelia’s room and had given up on enforcing visiting hours.

Cordelia was alert when he entered, only Wesley at her side. She smiled weakly, her head resting back against her pillow. But she managed to muster up some of that patented Cordelia spunk as she took in the sight of the little girl in his arms.

“Giles, you brought me a present. Isn’t she just the cutest thing?” Cordelia reached a hand over to tickle Robin’s feet, but the girl jerked them away and tucked them tighter beneath her. “Cranky! I think you should get a refund.”

Giles shifted his daughter’s weight in his arms. “She’s had a trying day.”

Cordelia sighed and closed her eyes. “I know how you feel, kiddo.”

Wesley was sitting on the other side of Cordelia, holding her hand. “I am very glad you were able to get her out in time. And I am sorry we were not there for her sooner.”

“I understand,” Giles told them, and he truly did. “My concerns were unsubstantiated, and Angel did check on her as often as he could. Besides which, you had Cordelia’s very real visions to attend to.”

“We couldn’t save the babies,” Cordelia murmured softly, and Wesley returned his attention to her. He lifted her hand tenderly to his lips. She was barely holding back the tears. “We couldn’t save any of them. The visions just kept coming and coming, and they didn’t let up long enough for me to tell anyone anything. I saw so many of them: women and girls and babies, and they were all being killed. There were just too many of them in too many different places.”

The two men grew very quiet, and Wesley stroked her softly along the length of her arm. She turned dark, weary eyes towards Giles. “I felt something in each of them, Giles, in my visions. I think... I may be wrong, but...I think they were all mini-slayers like Robin. You know, with the potential or whatever.”

He shared a glance with the ex-Watcher. Someone targeting potential slayers on that kind of scale was unprecedented. It chilled him to the very core.

“I’ll speak with the Council,” Giles assured them.

Cordelia smiled faintly and licked her lips. “I don’t mean to be Miss Rude-Get-Out-of-My-Room, but could ya get out of my room? I’m beat.”

Giles smiled and reached out to give her shoulder a friendly squeeze before stepping out into the hallway. Wesley was standing, moving to follow him, first bending to place a kiss on Cordelia’s forehead.

They softly shut the door behind them.

“If they’re targeting potential slayers, then Robin is still in danger,” Wesley whispered softly, glancing up and down the hallway to make sure their conversation would be private.

“Yes, that is why I am rather eager to return to Sunnydale.”

“Will you need an escort? Protection?”

Giles considered for a moment, but Angel Investigations had enough problems of its own to worry about at the moment, and he had a Slayer at home who could offer better protection than any of them. “No. But if Cordelia remembers anything from her visions, any clue about who might have done this, you will call me?”

“Of course.”

He said goodbye to the ex-Watcher and left the hospital at five thirty in the morning, while it was still dark out. Robin had fallen asleep in his arms again during their visit to the neuropsych unit, and he held her tightly against his chest, his cheek pressed to the top of her head. The possibility of anything happening to her burned his lungs and stole his breath more cruelly than the smoke inhalation ever could. And he didn’t even want to consider what might have happened to her had he not heeded Alex’s warnings, had he made it there even ten minutes later.

He may have refused Wesley’s offer of an escort, but he wasn’t above asking a security guard to walk them to his car, not wanting to present too tempting a target to any vampires that may be laying in wait for them. And Robin remained asleep even as he buckled her in.

He drove past sunrise before stopping for gas. Robin woke slightly while he was standing at the pump and panicked when she didn’t see him. It took him five minutes to calm her. She was trembling and sobbing long past when the pump had shut off. There was a side diner attached to the station, and he took her inside to feed her and settle her down before continuing on to Sunnydale. It wouldn’t do for Buffy to meet the girl while she was still so upset.

But Robin wouldn’t eat. She wouldn’t drink either. Giles wasn’t sure what she might like, so he kept ordering things, one after another, but she refused them all. Eggs, cereal, pancakes with syrup, he even tried chocolate cake. What child could resist cake? Buffy would never let him live it down if she knew he was trying to tempt their child with dessert for breakfast, but he just wanted her to eat something.

She reached for the fork, and he let her have it. Maybe she just needed to feed herself. She stabbed herself a bite of pancake, but she turned in his lap and tried to feed it to him instead. He accepted the mouthful and insisted that the next bite would be for her. But Robin only seemed interested in feeding him. After twenty minutes, he gave up on the idea of getting any breakfast in her. Nor any water, or milk, or orange juice, or even soda. Not even the twisty straw the waitress brought made any of them appealing to her.

He buckled her in the car, and she snuggled up against her stuffed bunny, one hand holding tight to the cuff of his shirt. She fell asleep again before they even merged back onto the highway. Not surprising, since she had spent half the night awake. He was tired as well, but they were only a half hour from home.

Buffy came out to meet them as they pulled into the drive. She had probably been waiting at the window for hours. Robin didn’t stir when he pulled her from the car, so she didn’t protest when he handed her over to her mother.

“Oh my God,” Buffy whispered, touching the soft cheeks resting against her shoulder, running her hand along the braid down the back, tracing the outline of fingers that held firmly to a little stuffed rabbit.

“Let’s go inside,” Giles murmured, ushering her up the steps. “Dawn?”

“At school.” Buffy never looked away from the sight of her daughter. “I can’t believe it’s really her. I feel like I’m dreaming.”

“Alex?”

“Sleeping. I kept him up late after I got your note. I figure he should sleep in for a while. Look at the way her forehead crinkles up while she’s sleeping. You do that.”

“Do I?” he asked with a kiss on her cheek.

She turned to him, perhaps seeing him for the first time. “God, you’re filthy.”

Giles chuckled. “But alive. It’s refreshing to know you are so overjoyed to have me back in one piece.”

“That’s not what... You know I’m happy you’re okay... Just go up and shower.” She gave him a shove towards the stairs. “Wash the smoke and dirt off you and change your clothes. You smell like Spike’s crypt.”

“In that case, I’ll be eager to do so.”

She laughed as he started up the stairs. “Grass stains on the back of your jacket? Rupert Giles, have you been having midnight trysts in the park without me?”

He flashed her a wicked smile. She was teasing him. That had to at least mean the beginnings of forgiveness. “Now where would the fun in that be?” he answered.

He grabbed some clean clothes from the bedroom before starting his shower. It felt blissful to wash away the layer of grime left by the fire. And relaxing. He hoped Buffy hadn’t been counting on his company, because he was starting to feel really tired. With any luck, he could sleep all morning.

He was just toweling off, when he heard Robin start screaming. He threw on his clothes as quickly as possible. He heard her little fists pounding on the bathroom door and Buffy’s voice trying to calm her. She practically fell into his arms when he opened the door. Little feet stomping on the ground as little hands attempted to climb up his body.

“Shhh,” he soothed, scooping her up and gently swaying with her. “Everything’s alright. I’m right here.” Her tears slowed to little hiccupy sighs, as she slowly relaxed in his arms. “This is Buffy, Robin. She’s been waiting to meet you for a very long time.”

But the little girl only wrapped her arms tighter around his neck and turned her head into his chest.

Robin wanted nothing to do with Buffy.

***

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