Ontogenesis
Chapter One:
It was five o’clock on a crisp, Sunnydale morning; the sun was just beginning to peer above the horizon, gilding the world with a rim of pale gold. The courtyard was a pattern of burgeoning light and velvet shadows, filled with the sleepy silences of a lazy dawn. No-one was stirring in the surrounding apartments; no-one was awake to witness the arrival of two dishevelled figures, staggering together into the sanctuary of the emerging day.
Two figures; one tall, with short, dark hair, wearing dark jeans, a rumpled sweater and an earth brown corduroy jacket, the other short, blonde, and dressed in what had once been a very fetching assembly of bright red silk and black leather. He was leaning on her heavily, favouring his right leg, which could barely hold his weight. She was supporting him with anxious care, half carrying him as they staggered across the courtyard. Both were filthy, spattered with mud and other, less savoury substances, and both looked very much the worse for wear.
"Easy," Buffy advised, steadying her companion as his next step faltered and his injured leg buckled under him. "Nearly there. Few more steps. Baby ones. There ya go."
"I’ll make it." Giles gasped, pausing for a moment to catch his breath and rest his weight on her shoulder. "I-I think." Everything was spinning; he felt weak and nauseous, some of which was shock - and some of which was loss of blood. The sharp, stabbing pain that accompanied every step didn’t exactly help, either ...
"Still think I should have taken you to the ER," Buffy muttered, guiding him to his front door and carefully propping him up against the wall. "Keys?"
"Here." He dug in his pocket and held them out. "It isn’t that bad, Buffy. Besides -what possible explanation could we provide for why I have a crossbow bolt buried in my leg? Especially when it happens to be tipped with silver and carved with nordic runes?"
"It’s there because I shot you," she noted acerbically. A twist of the keys opened the lock and she pushed the door open with unnecessary force. "Me. Slayer. Meant to kill the bad guys girl. Shot you."
"Wasn’t your fault," he told her, for the umpteenth time since it happened. "The o-other demon jumped you, just as you fired at the first. I was just - standing in the wrong place at the wrong time."
"And now you’re barely standing at all," she grimaced, clearly not ready to be absolved of her guilt. "Where now?"
"Couch," he recommended, waving in that general direction. He didn’t think he could make it upstairs - and even if he did, he wasn’t going to get down them again in a hurry. Which, for a man whose bathroom happened to be on the ground floor might not be an entirely satisfactory arrangement. Besides - the wound had to be cleaned and the bolt extracted, both tasks that would be easier to pursue if there was sensible room to work in.
"Okay," Buffy agreed, then slid one arm around his waist, the other under his knees, picked him up, and carried him inside.
Giles quirked a wry smile at the absurdity of being carried over his own threshold by a slip of a girl, even if that girl was the Slayer and gifted with supernatural strength. He appreciated the gesture though; despite determined protestations to the contrary he was actually in considerable pain - and he seriously doubted that he could have covered the remaining distance under his own steam.
"Ah - " Buffy was hesitating in the middle of his living room. "Should we cover that with a sheet, or something? We both have sewer stink. And you only just got the blood off the sofa from the last time ..."
"Yes. Right." Giles hadn’t thought of that. Actually, he wasn’t thinking of much, right there and then. Mostly ow and dear lord that hurts, and wondering about the etiquette of vomiting on one’s Slayer, and whether choosing that moment to faint might be a better idea ... "Clean sheet in the airing cupboard. Top shelf, I think."
"Okay." She turned towards the bathroom, carefully putting him down so that he could lean against the living room wall while she got herself organised. That probably smeared mud across the decor, but he could deal with that. The blood and ooze dripping onto the carpet was a slightly more worrying concern, but then he could probably deal with that, too. Buffy bustled into his bathroom, and then out again, chattering inanely about laundry and dry cleaning and other meaningless things as she tried to cope with growing unease and her sense of anxious guilt. Giles wished he could allay both concerns; he really didn’t think the wound was that serious, even if it was disturbingly uncomfortable, and it hadn’t been her fault, not in the slightest.
If anything, he was the idiot for having got in the way ...
He heaved a weary sigh and began gingerly peeling himself out of his soaked and gunk-stained jacket. He’d find a way to tell her that. Somehow. But not now. Right now, he needed to lie down.
Before he fell down.
"There," she announced, coming back to assist him in shucking the reluctant corduroy and help him across to the sanctuary of the, now covered, couch. He sank into its support with gratitude, offering no protests as she removed his glasses, bundled cushions for his head and started to tug off his shoes. It felt good just to lie there, to not have to make the effort anymore ...
The fingers that fumbled at his belt and trouser zip refocused his drifting senses with a vengeance. He opened his eyes in startled alarm. "Buffy? What are you - ?"
"Hello," she said, giving him a patient look. "Wounded leg, remember? Need to do the field first aide thing. I could just rip your pants off - they’re ruined anyway - but I figured this way wouldn’t hurt as much?"
"Oh. Y-yes. I see," he acknowledged faintly. "I-I’m sorry, Buffy, I ..."
"No sweat," she grinned, then grimaced tellingly. "Well, lots of sweat, actually. And blood and sewer water ... That can’t be good. Not in an open wound."
"Kettle," he instructed, lifting a shaky hand to point towards the kitchen. "In there. First aid kit - under the bookshelf. And Scotch. In the cabinet."
"Scotch?" She’d half risen to her feet, but paused to look down at him with concern. "No antiseptic stuff in the kit?"
"Plenty." He managed a pained look. "That’s for the wound. The scotch is for me."
"Oh. Oh." She looked briefly embarrassed - then frowned. "That a good idea? You’re in shock, you know."
"I know." The world was fading in and out with interesting regularity. Pulsing in time with his heartbeat. "But that bolt still has to come out - and I need something to kill the pain."
"Pain. Ah. Okay. Got it." She vanished for a moment, leaving him to relax back into the pillows and concentrate on breathing. His mind drifted back, recalling the frantic struggle in the sewers. It had seemed such a simple task to begin with; hunting down a lone Sifur demon - one that had been spotted lurking around the town dump. Sifurs weren’t particularly dangerous, just nasty in their habits and even nastier in their living conditions. It had been easy to find the right binding rituals, and it had only taken him a couple of days to inscribe the necessary runes on a few crossbow bolts and a pair of silver bladed daggers; Buffy had fretted while he’d been doing it, anxious to hunt down the beast and deal with it once and for all. She’d been all set to rush off and skewer the thing the first chance she got - until he’d patiently pointed out that simply slaying the thing would not be enough. Once bound, a Sifur had to be banished - and that took a precise runic rite, and did she know the difference between ‘mannaz’ and ‘eiwaz,’ or know how to petition Heimdall to open the door between Midgard and Nifelheim?
She’d grumped good naturedly about ‘stupid mystic demon thingies’, and then invited him along on the hunt, having the grace to admit that she couldn’t always deal with these things on her own and she appreciated that he was there to help out when she needed him. It was nice to feel needed, especially since he’d come very close to leaving Sunnydale precisely because he’d felt that wasn’t the case. For a while, he’d seriously believed that she’d outgrown him. That he no longer had a relevant place in her life. Even after Adam; in fact, he’d spent the whole of the summer getting ready to not be there. He’d been days away from taking the plane home, his heart already bleeding from the rip that leaving her would tear in it, when Dracula had hit town. And after that, she’d come to him, asking for his help, asking him ... well, there was more to it than that, but he didn’t really care. She’d asked him. And, much as he hated to admit it, he needed that. Needed her to need him. Their descent into the sewers of Sunnydale had almost felt like old times again; the Slayer and her Watcher, hunting for the beast.
It had felt good. It had felt right. And he knew that Buffy had felt that way too, had recognised something in his company that she’d not realised she’d missed.
Which had been round about the point that things had got extremely complicated.
They’d tracked the Sifur, locating it in a particularly squalid sewer tunnel, where it had been busy eating a dead dog; they’d even crept up close enough for Buffy to get in a good clear shot at it. He’d held back a little, giving her room to work, getting ready to conduct the banishing ritual once she’d rendered the demon powerless - and the second Sifur had leapt out of a side tunnel, just as Buffy was lining up the shot.
The impact had knocked her over; her arm had flailed back - and the bow had fired wildly, barely a moment before it had flown out of her hand. She, of course had leapt up, fighting mad and spitting sewer muck, dragging the silver dagger from her belt and charging to the attack. He’d been leaning against the tunnel wall, trying to battle with the white hot point of pain where the bolt had sunk into his leg, feeling the magic he’d put into it wreathing out of the wood and into his flesh. He wasn’t a Sifur, of course; the binding hadn’t held for long. But it had briefly frozen him to the spot, held him long enough for the other demon to dodge the frenetic battle in the tunnel and reach hungrily for what must have seemed to be a helpless victim.
He’d frantically fought free from his own spell, groping for the second dagger, which he’d been keeping in reserve. Buffy had dispatched her opponent with a flourish and turned in triumph - in time to see the Sifur leap and the two of them tumble into the sewer stream together. They’d gone down in a tangle of limbs, the demon’s own weight driving it onto the point of the dagger - the same weight which had then pinned him, struggling and panicked, beneath the surface of the water. Old regrets, things left undone, things left unsaid, had flashed though his mind. He’d pushed and he’d fought without success; his lungs had just about reached bursting point when Buffy had heaved the beast away from him and dragged him, gasping and choking, back to the blessed welcome of the air.
She’d been frantic, he remembered. Shouting his name and clutching at his shoulders with a strength hard enough to bruise. He’d struggled to his feet, panting for breath and clinging to her with relief - and for a long moment there’d been nothing but the two of them, standing there, wrapped in each other’s arms, sharing an emotion that would be hard to put into words, and even harder to explain.
It was then of course, that the pain had registered, and Buffy had realised that he was bleeding and why, and they’d started that whole exchange of ‘god, Giles, I’m sorry’ and ‘it wasn’t your fault’ that they’d probably still be working through for several days to come. Somewhere in middle of that conversation, he’d got Buffy to drag the bound demons into the circle he’d managed to scribe on a semi-dry area of concrete - using his own blood as much from convenience as anything else - and they’d successfully banished the Sifurs back to their home dimension.
"Here ya go." Buffy was back, gently pushing a glass into his hand. The scent of the Scotch stirred his stomach, but he tipped it back anyway, letting its mellow warmth burn its way down his throat and hammer his rebellious guts into startled submission. Even that little gulp made him feel a whole lot better; he relaxed back with a sigh, deciding, with wry consideration, that the events of the day could have been a whole lot worse - and that there were a lot more terrible places to be than lying on the comfort and safety of his own couch, at the receiving end of some very tender ministrations from a contrite and remorseful Slayer.
His Slayer. The best gift his life had ever given him.
Even if said Slayer was busy using his kitchen scissors to cut through blood-soaked denim so she could ease the trousers off of him and - bloody hell, that hurt!
"Sorry," she said with a wince. "I’m trying to be gentle here."
"I know." Giles forced himself to relax again, taking long slow breaths to calm the pounding of his heart. "Just pour me another Scotch."
She did as he asked, frowning a little as he gulped down the second glass as speedily as the first. A few more like that and he probably wouldn’t care what she did. Which was the point, really. He should probably be in the emergency room, surrounded by trained doctors with prescription pain-killers and local anaesthetics and other such necessities - but the reason for his distress precluded that, dictated that they make do with this makeshift field hospital. Maybe later - when the bolt was out, when they could claim some cock and bull story about his having fallen, or something ...
Off a ladder. Into a toolbox, perhaps. A screwdriver might do similar damage in the right circumstances. He probably had one somewhere.
But first he had to get drunk just enough not to feel the pain and persuade Buffy that she’d be doing him a favour pulling the bloody thing out of his leg and - what exactly was she doing now?
"More Scotch," he demanded, holding out the glass and trying very had not to think about where her hands were and what that was going to mean. Buffy chuckled quietly and complied with the request, letting go with one hand to reach for the bottle and tip its contents into the glass. She sounded as embarrassed about this as he was, and this wasn’t something they were going to talk about. It was just something she had to do, because he’d been completely submerged in that pool of filth, and everything was soaked in the stuff, right down to his underwear.
Which he wasn’t wearing anymore, and he was extremely glad that none of the other Scoobies were around to witness any of this, although he might have coped with Xander helping, although then again, maybe not ...
"Shirt and sweater too," she decided, sliding her hands under the sodden fabric and starting to peel. "God knows what’s in this stuff." She was in his line of vision now, her nose wrinkled in disgust and her expression pained. She was just as filthy - and she’d have to clean up too, before she started work on the wound, just in case. Of course, it was probably infected already - but there was no point in taking chances.
"There’s a couple of clean shirts airing next to the sheets," he told her quietly. "Soap and shampoo in the cupboard under the sink. Ten minutes in the shower," he explained, because she was giving him a puzzled look, "and I will be well into this bottle a-and you can do whatever you like with me ... did I-I just say that?"
"Yes," she laughed. "But - I know what you meant. Good thinking. Clean me, clean you, and then we worry about surgery." Her expression dropped back into one of concern. "You sure you’ll be okay?"
"Buffy," he sighed patiently, "I’ve been walking a-about with this thing in my leg f-for well over an hour. Ten more minutes isn’t going to make a-a lot of difference. Especially since I have no intention of moving. Ever again," he concluded with feeling. She smiled.
"Okay. Let me just - " She dropped the rest of his clothing on the floor and moved down to check the damage, being very careful not to touch the protruding end of the bolt as she did so. He was grateful for that. The thing might have struck at an oblique angle rather than passing straight through, but it had burrowed deep all the same; there was barely an inch and a half jutting above the surface. The whole of his leg was throbbing, and there was a tight band of pain clamped between his groin and his knee. He’d been incredibly lucky. If the angle of the shot had been heading towards the sewer wall rather than the floor, he’d have been in serious trouble; the bolt would have undoubtedly broken the bone, might well have damaged nerves and almost certainly caught an artery. As it was, the wooden shaft now lay buried point down in the meat of his outer thigh, and only the intervening layer of denim had kept the fledge from chafing the skin from his leg as they’d made their way home. ‘Flesh wound’ he’d called it, as much to reassure Buffy as anything else, but he was beginning to think he might have underestimated the extent of the damage. Walking on it probably hadn’t been an entirely sensible idea. Of course, had he been facing Buffy when she’d loosed the misfire he might have found himself conversing a good octave higher for the rest of his life. So he had that to be thankful for, at least. "It’s swelling up," Buffy reported anxiously. Giles found himself hoping she meant the wound, giggled, and then tipped the now empty glass towards him so he could look into it suspiciously. He’d had three shots. And he was already half way towards being drunk ...
"Damn," he muttered, realising he’d probably lost more blood than he’d thought. The alcohol had hit his system with a vengeance. On the other hand, that’s what he’d wanted it to do, so - what the hey.
Buffy was giving him a very odd look. Why would - ah. Yes. He’d giggled. He hardly ever giggled. Not in front of the Scoobies, anyway. But then again, he was lying stark naked on his couch, having been stripped by his Slayer - which was probably a lot further up the ‘never’ list than giggling would ever be.
So he did it again.
"It’s - ah - good Scotch," he reported, dropping the glass and reaching down for the bottle instead.
She didn’t look entirely convinced. "I’m not sure you should be doing that," she said, her frown deepening as he brought the bottle to his lips and took a decent chug. "Giles ..."
He lowered the whiskey and gave her a patient look. "Buffy," he countered. "I am in considerable pain, here. A-and - in a few minutes, you’re going to have to make it a-a lot worse. Damnit, girl," he added forcibly at the look of distress that chased across her face. "It was not your fault. The sooner you get your pretty backside into my shower and get rid of all that crap, the sooner you can get this bloody thing out of my leg. Got it?"
"Got it." She nodded, although her expression still looked a little bemused. "I won’t be long."