The Best Revenge

Author’s note:
Sorry to bother, just one small detail. Kaear (Thank you for the review, love) sent me a review - on another site - asking about the characters age and pointing that Harry should be older than I say he is. True, he should, but for this fic to work I took the liberty of making him some three or four years younger. Is the summer after his fourth year, he is not yet 15 and Buffy has just graduated from High School, she is 18 as stated in ‘Helpless’, episode 12, Season 03.

Chapter 03

Rupert Giles was sitting at the restaurant table looking at the two most important people in his life, Joyce and Buffy, as they studied the city map deciding on what they would do today. He was forced to smile at their enthusiasm and pondered about how he got to this blessed place in life.

A little over three years ago he had received a mission from the watchers council. He was to go to Sunnydale, California and work with the new slayer. It was an important mission, the life goal of a watcher, to work with the active slayer… but Sunnydale was nothing in the middle of nowhere, or so he thought.

Talk about being wrong.

Sunnydale was on the top of a Hellmouth, the center of mystical conversion for all demon activities. A quiet week meant only the normal dozen vampires, not to mention their already traditional apocalypse almost happening at least once a year.

And yet, Buffy bloomed. The annoying child he had first met was fast becoming… well, an annoying young woman, but he loved her like a father. Yes, that he did, and it had cost him his job as a watcher(5), but he didn’t regret it for a moment. He had remained in Sunnydale and continued to work with Buffy and the scoobies fighting the forces of evil.

It was during one of these fights that a small problem with cursed chocolate had occurred. He was still embarrassed with the things he had done that night but at least that night had brought him and Joyce together. It was an awkward start, they still couldn’t look at a police car, but strangely enough, things were working out between them and now they were in England.

After they had literally blown up the school during graduation to get rid of the demon the Mayor had turned himself into, they decided to spend at least part of the summer in England where Giles had to pick up a few things and take care of some business and now there they were having lunch at a pub and deciding what to do with the rest of their afternoon.

The door opened and a pretty brunette with shiny black curls and a sweet smile came in. Giles noticed her because the pattern on her dress reminded him of his mother, the sweetest woman he had ever met and the only reason he had ever considered having a family of his own. Joyce and his mother would have loved each other. He could even hear them talking about taking care of the house and the family while still holding ‘real’ jobs. He couldn’t help but smile at the cozy little scene.

“You look happy,” he heard Joyce saying. Looking up he noticed Buffy still engrossed in the map and Joyce leaning towards him.

“I’m happy.” He said taking her hand in his and kissing her fingers, “I am very happy.”

“You must be, you are letting Buffy choose where to go… you do realize we are bound to spend countless hours visiting every shop ever known to men and a few obscure ones only known to women, right?”

“Yes, yes, I realize I’m signing up for a fate worse than death.” Giles sighed taking his glasses off his face and cleaning them.

“Hey, I heard that!” Buffy said from the other side of the table before going back to study her map.

“Did you ever consider having other children?” Giles asked hesitantly.

“Yes,” Joyce’s voice was a bit sad and she had a longing look in her eyes, “but Hank never wanted to hear about it and now… well, I’m not exactly young anymore. Did you ever want children?”

“Yes,” Giles murmured, “but I never found the right person… until now.”

“Oh, Rupert. But…” Joyce looked at him feeling lost. How could she tell him she couldn’t have anymore children?

“We could always adopt,” he offered, “I mean, if you do want… I mean…I-I-It’s n-n-not l-like…” he started stuttering.

“Yes. I do,” said Joyce coming for his rescue, “I would love to have a larger family with you, Rupert.” They smiled at each other keeping their entwined fingers on the top of the table.

Halfrek smiled. Another piece of her puzzle was in place. All she needed to do now was bring them all together, just two more little nudges in the right direction. On cue, a group of five people dressed up as doctors came in the pub and sat in the table right next to the Sunnydale trio.

“I’m just saying I’m sorry for the kid,” explained a petite female with brown shoulder length hair tied in a pony tail, “he seems like a nice kid who took one wrong step in life and now is being deserted by his family. They are signing away their guardianship for Christ sake, just because the kid dabbled with magic or some silliness like that. Is that enough reason to throw him in an orphanage?”(6)

Giles and Joyce’s heads shot up and they started to listen to the doctors’ conversation. Even Buffy was now paying attention to the table next to them.

“Apparently his uncle and aunt are very religious or something like that, they don’t want a ‘freak’ in the family” said a small oriental young man using his hands to do the quotes mark in the air as he spoke.

“God, some people can be so closed minded. What happened to his parents?”

“Well, McCormick told me that when he went over to talk to the family there was only the uncle and the aunt. They said something about the boy’s parents dying in a car crash when he was one year old, and get this, apparently his parents were also in this magic stuff.”

“A lot of people are in this sort of thing now a days. A couple of neighbors of mine are witches… wicky, I think they call themselves.” A brunette offered.

“Wicca. Wicca is the word you’re looking for. I was one you know,” said the first doctor and getting strange looks and raised eyebrows from her colleagues, “it’s true, I was. In the first few years at the Uni there was a large group of us who would do all these crazy spells and rituals… nothing ever happened, but still.”

“You were a Satanist?” asked another girl in hospital scrubs.

“What? No! We were Wiccan. A completely different religion if you really want to know. It has to do with respecting nature… it’s very cool.”

“And this kid is one of those?” asked a tall blond man. Upon receiving a nod from his companions he shook his head, “and now they are dumping the kid on the street… so to speak. What did he do that was so terrible anyway? Invoke the devil? Danced naked with the next door neighbor’s daughter?”

They all laughed and joked about it, never noticing the glances the Sunnydale trio was exchanging at their table. Joyce didn’t know any specifics but it did seem right up Buffy’s alley and Buffy and Giles had an uncomfortable sense of déjà vu. Unconsciously, Giles rubbed his hand over the mark of Egon(7) still in his arm. Perhaps it would be a good idea paying a short visit to the hospital and checking up on a certain young man there.

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Less then 30 minutes later the Sunnydale crew was making their way down the hospital hall on the fourth floor to see this kid who was about to be shipped off to an orphanage and try to decide if he was just another victim of the New Age trend or a serious dabbler in the dark arts, in which case it could be a problem for the slayer.

Buffy was still complaining about inconsiderate warlocks and ruined summer vacations when they heard voices coming from inside the bedroom they were heading for. Demon voices. Buffy and Giles immediately went into battle mode, handing their bags over to Joyce, who took a look out position on the hall.

The slayer and the watcher crept closer to the door grabbing two crutches on the way and listening as the voices became clearer.

“Are you sure this is the one? He looks rather small for a hero.” Mused a small grayish demon with red robes.

“Yes, I’m sure and he is not a hero yet, that is why the boss wants us to kill him now and get it over with before he gets to train properly and becomes a problem,” was the answer of a similar demon in brown robes who seemed to be the leader of the duo.

“Oh! That is a good plan” pondered the first one as he watched the other demon take a big hunting knife out of his robes, “Wait! Shouldn’t we say a few words for our dearly departed first?”

“What? No, we don’t even know him, he can’t be a dearly departed… he is not even departed yet.” Snapped the demon in brown.

“I suppose you’re right.” He sees his friend raising the knife again, but this time is the other demon who hesitates. “What is the problem now?”

“The boss said it should look like natural causes. Do you suppose the humans would be suspicious if he died of a knife wound?”

“Why would they be suspicious? Most creatures die when stabbed in the heart. It’s as natural as it can be.”

“Oh, please” a new voice startled them, they turned around to see a small blond girl and a fully grown male human at the door, “You two have got to be the dumbest demons I’ve ever come across.”

“Get out, little girl, let us do our work and you’ll live to see another day.” The one who seemed to be the boss snarled at them.

“Um… nope, sorry. No can do.” Said the blond, the older male seemed amazed by the whole situation, “You see, my job is to stop you, so I do my job and you DON’T live to see another day.”

“And who do you think you are to stop us?” asked the demon.

“Oh, my bad, I didn’t introduce myself. Did I? I’m Buffy Summers, the vampire slayer, and you are?”

“THE SLAYER!” yelled the demon in red before jumping out of the window, leaving his companion alone in the room with the slayer and her watcher.

The remaining demon looked around, considered the situation for two seconds and jumped out of the window after his friend.

“Hey, that was not fun. The least they could do was put up a fight.” Complained Buffy looking down to the spot where the two dead demons where melting in to a jelly like substance and disappearing, while Giles signaled Joyce to come in the room with them and closed the door behind her.

“Yes, yes, most annoying,” agreed Giles absently minded, “I’ll make sure to write a formal complaint to the proper authorities. Now, Buffy, we have to tend to the matter at hand. This… young man here is apparently important and obviously some demon boss wants him dead.”

“Well, why is he important?” asked Joyce setting the bags in a chair and moving closer to the bed where the small teen rested, none of them noticed the door opening silently, “and who is he?”

“His name is Harry,” said a new voice by the door. The three of them turned to see a smiling brunette wearing a white doctors coat, “Hello, I’m Hallie, Harry’s social worker. I’m handling his case.”

“Hello, I’m Rupert Giles, my fiancée Joyce Summers and her daughter Buffy.” Giles made the introductions purposely ignoring Buffy’s smile and inquiring look at the ‘fiancée’ announcement.

They all shook hands and Hallie signaled for them to follow her into the hall where they could talk without disturbing the sleeping teen.

“I didn’t expect the orphanage to send someone so soon. I take it his aunt signed the papers then. The poor kid,” Hallie sighed and shook her head walking down the hall before they had the chance to correct her, “I’ll just go get his files.”

“What do we do now? We can’t leave this kid all alone. What if this ‘boss’ person sends another demon?” asked Buffy.

“We’ll stay for awhile,” decided Joyce, “Buffy, could you go downstairs and maybe buy us a magazine or something? Rupert, perhaps the Watcher Council knows something we could use, I don’t mean for you to contact them directly, but maybe you could talk to a friend still working with them?”

“Ok, mom.” Said Buffy already out of the door.

“Good thinking, darling.” Giles fished a small leather address book from his pocket, “I’ll be down the hall making a few calls… and, oh! Look at this.” He bends down and picks up the discarded knife the demons left behind. “Oh, my. It’s a ceremonial dagger of rebirth. Seems unused… that is strange.”

“Rebirth? I though they meant to kill the kid. Why would they use a ‘rebirth’ dagger?” asked Joyce looking at the dagger. She couldn’t tell what seemed so special about it, but found very amusing the fact that she was already picking up a few things on her daughter and fiancé’s line of work.

“If memory serves, the use of this dagger would not only kill the kid but also… mask his identity.”

“What?” Joyce blinked confused.

“The hospital staff would have found an unidentified body laying on this bed. They would not be able to tell who he was. It’s a total wipe of his records so to speak. I have to make those calls right away.”

“You go. I’ll stay here and scream at the top of my lungs if anything unusual happens,” offered Joyce already pushing Giles out of the door and turning to look around the room, “well, unusual for most people anyway.”

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Downstairs Buffy was looking at the magazines, deciding which ones she wanted to buy when a movement outside the window caught her attention. On the lawn three more demons were trying, and failing miserably as far as the slayer was concern, to get in the hospital unnoticed. Putting the magazines down, Buffy ran upstairs to alert Giles and her mother, she had seen those three but it was possible that more of them were already inside and making their way to the kid’s room. Giles could defend himself but her mother was a completely different story.

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Giles sat his little phonebook down and started to search for change in his pockets when he heard Harry’s name in a whispered conversation.

“So, where is that so called hero?” asked a muffled voice.

“Harry Potter is somewhere on this floor. I can’t tell exactly, there are too many people here for us to cast the spell again. We’ll be seen.” Answered a second one.

“It doesn’t matter. We are close enough as it is. He is in one of these rooms. We’ll search them all and make sure the kid is gone for good before the end of the day.”

Hastily gathering his things, Giles ran down the hall before who ever was around the corner had the chance to see him. They were fast running out of time. As Giles left, two aurors peeked around the corner to see if anybody was near and spelled their clothes to look like something muggles would wear and proceeded to check each room in search of the escaped prisoner. Their orders were to take him back to Azkaban as soon as they found him.

Buffy and Giles got to the door almost at the same time.

“We have to get him out of here, there are at least two warlocks searching the floor for him,” said Giles as soon as they closed the door.

“That is not good. There are three more demons downstairs. I think their boss wants the job done pretty bad.” Offered Buffy while removing her jacket, it would only slow her down in a fight.

“Pretty badly” corrected Giles without thinking. “We must do something fast, we can’t fight our way out of this hospital. It’s too crowded to avoid hurting innocent bystanders, besides, we don’t know if he can be moved.”

“Can’t we just hide for awhile?” asked Joyce.

“No, they got locater spell tracking the kid. They would find us anyway.” Muttered Giles while picking at the hallway trying to calculate how much time they had.

“The window is no good. Too high.” Offered Buffy looking out of it.

“The dagger” yelled Joyce. Buffy and Giles stopped looking at her. “You said it would mask the boy’s identity. Couldn’t we do something with it? I don’t mean kill him, but…”

“It might work.” Mused Buffy.

“The risk…” started Giles.

“It’s better than certain death.” Interrupted Joyce.

“But it’s not that simple… h-h-he would need a new identity, not simply lose the old one.” Stuttered Giles.

“Adopt him.” Ordered Joyce.

“What?”


Notes:
(5) Refers to “Helpless” episode 12 in Season 03 of BtVS.
(6) The doctors are offering the explanation it was given to them as close as possible to reality so that attracts Giles attention, as per Halfrek’s plan.
(7) Refers to “The Dark Place” episode 08 in Season 02 of BtVS.