A New Beginning
Pairings: Dawn/Connor; Buffy/Angel; Fred/Wesley; Spike/Faith; Eventually Willow/Oz.
Rating: Pg-13 to start out. Might get to an R
Disclaimer: I own nothing! This is all Joss, and my story is strictly for entertainment purposes.
Author's Note: This story is set a couple of years after Season 7 of Buffy. Season 5 of Angel didn't happen, mainly because I didn't like that story line. Connor is also in the picture and him and Angel somewhat get along now.
Summary: Unable to keep Dawn in check, Buffy sends her to stay with Angel. Angel teaches her how the system at AI works and lets her patrol with them. Things start to heat up between Dawn and Connor.
Chapter 1
Dawn was in trouble…again. She was in trouble lately, or so it seemed. It wasn't really her fault, Dawn reasoned, she absolutely hated living in Rome. She missed her friends from school…even though the school was no longer there. She missed Angel and being able to hang out with scoobies, but most of all…she missed Spike. The thing that grated on her the most was that they still treated her like she was the fifteen year old klepto from the past. She was twenty now and none of them seemed ready to accept it. Her latest rough patch with the group was a testimony to that. Dawn hadn't done anything wrong. She'd taken to patrolling and fighting on her own…she was good at it. Buffy had freaked when she found out about it, telling her that there were enough slayers in the world now and they didn't her help…nice. Well, what else was she supposed to do around the place? She couldn't go to a University because Buffy had her on lockdown. Faith had caught her this last time and had apologetically brought her back, and she was currently waiting on Buffy to come back. As if on queue, Buffy barged through the door with a slam, looking pissed.
"Dawn, what the hell am I going to do with you?" Dawn stood up, equally as angry, if not more.
"You can stop treating me like a child, Buffy! I'm old enough to take care of myself now, but you and your stupid slayer squad, won't let me! You've even got Xander following me around now, what the hell is that about? I'm not a kid anymore, Buffy, I'm twenty years old. You are going to have to accept that I'm an adult and you can't tell me what to do anymore!" Buffy crossed the room to stand in front of her.
"I will treat you like an adult when you start acting like one, Dawn! We've got over a thousand slayers now, yet you continue to put yourself at risk. You should be taking your online courses, but I've been getting emails about how behind you are. Am I going to have to lock you in your suite from now on? I really need you to grow up here, Dawn and take responsibility for yourself because I can't keep taking care of you." Dawn stared at her sister for a long moment, tears starting to form. She took a deep breath and spoke really quietly.
"Then let me go, Buffy. You're killing me here. I have grown up, but none of you seem to see it. I can take care of myself, but you won't let me. You guys are slowly suffocating me to death." Buffy scoffed and shook her head.
"Dawn, just where do you think you're going to go? You're not going anywhere where I can't keep an eye on you." Before Dawn could respond to the harsh words, Giles walked into the room and spoke for her.
"She can go to Angel and his group, Buffy." Buffy spun around and glared at him, clearly not liking the suggestion. Dawn wasn't sure she liked it either.
"That is so very not helpful, Giles!" Giles took his glasses off and sighed at his slayer.
"Buffy, I've been watching the way you treat Dawn recently. She hadn't really done anything to warrant your behavior. You don't let her research anymore, you don't her in the meetings anymore…you've completely shut her out. Now, I've spoken with Angel and he thinks it's a great idea. He needs some help with research, since Cordy is in a coma. He agrees to keep an eye on her for you because they've got a small crew. Buffy, you have to let her go or she'll grow to absolutely hate you." Buffy stared at Giles for a moment before turned back to Dawn, with a tear running down her cheek.
"You will not accompany them on patrols, Dawn. That's my one condition for letting you go." Giles intercepted again with a soft look at Dawn.
"Supervised, she can do what she wants, Buffy. She's been very well training by you, Faith, and the senior slayers. Plus, she is an adult…and you can't stop her."
Dawn groaned as her cab pulled up outside of Angel's new Hotel. He'd bought a newly closed down one so that it wasn't as run down. He'd also done some construction to the rooms, though she wasn't sure what. Dawn paid the cabbie and stepped out to the front stoop of the place. She contemplated leaving right then, they couldn't really stop her now. She stepped up to the door that read "Angel Investigations" and walked through to a deserted lobby. She stepped further in ad saw that it was completely empty. Smiling to herself, Dawn turned around, thinking Angel was giving her an out. When she turned her back on the room, however, a soft voice sounded behind her that made her jump.
"You're not leaving already, are you Dawnie?" Dawn turned around to see Angel, who was being followed by Wesley and three other people she'd never met before. Angel had been the one to speak, so Dawn just shrugged her shoulders, defeated.
"No, just taking a look around your digs…tis cool." Angel smirked at her obvious lie, but didn't say anything.
"Sorry we weren't out here to greet you, Dawn, we were in a meeting. How was your flight?" Again, she shrugged. She liked Angel a lot, it just felt like another prison to her.
"It was long." This got a chuckle from Wesley.
"You really are Buffy's sister, that's for sure." Angel smiled in agreement and Dawn fought to keep the frown and annoyance off of her face. Angel stepped forward from the group, careful to stay away from the sunlight streaming in.
"Dawn, I don't know if Buffy's told you about him, but this is Connor…my son. This also Fred and Gunn. Other then Lorne, who is at our club, that's the team. Well…and Cordelia…anyway. Connor will take you to your suite. Go ahead and get some sleep, and we'll talk tonight about things, okay?" When Connor stepped forward, Dawn's breath caught in her throat. She'd had absolutely no idea how gorgeous Angel's son was. He reached down to pick up one of the three bags she'd brought, but Dawn protested.
"That's okay, you don't have to do that." Connor raised an eyebrow, then grabbed two of her bags.
"It's a pretty long walk…humor me." Dawn sighed as she followed him to her room.
"So…you're Angel's son?" The boy turned to look at her briefly. Dawn blushed because she knew it was the lamest line ever.
"Yep." Dawn didn't speak again, just enjoyed the view of his backside. When they finally stopped walking, they were on the fourth floor. Connor used a key he had in his pocket, pushed open her door, and walked into a living room. Dawn stopped in the doorway, completely shocked at what she was looking at. Connor sat her bags down and turned to look at her when he didn't hear her.
"Hey, are you okay?" Dawn nodded after a moment, then moved into the room with him.
"Yeah, it's just…it's so much bigger then I expected." He nodded his head in understanding.
"Yeah, dad went kind of crazy when Giles first called him. He immediately started construction on four of the rooms to make you an apartment of sorts. You've got a living room, huge bathroom, bedroom, and a walk-in closet. The kitchen is off of the lobby." Dawn paused and turned back to look at him.
"Wait, when did construction on this place start?" Connor shrugged, not seeing her confused look.
"Dad started the day after Giles called, so about two months." Dawn gasped and stared at him. Connor faced her and gave her a questioning look.
"What's wrong?" Dawn felt her emotions finally getting the best of her. Giles had seen it two months ago and hadn't told her anything. Dawn was completely horrified when she felt a tear start slipping down her cheek. She immediately turned around so he couldn't see her. It was just her luck! She meets a hot guy and she starts bawling in front of him. She stiffened when she felt to soft hands on her shoulders. When she turned around to ask him to stop, he pulled her into a light hug.
"Hey, don't cry…please? Dad didn't say much, just said that you were having major issues with your sister and needed to get away. We're kind of short handed around here, so we're hoping that you stay. Look, I'm just down the hallway and I know you want to be alone., but if you need anything, I'm in room 424." Dawn lifted her head, recomposed, and smiled.
"Thanks, Connor, that's really nice of you. I mean, you don't know me from Eve, so I appreciate you being nice to me." Connor, clearly embarrassed, shrugged.
"It's no big deal. It's like six in the morning, so you should get some sleep. Dad usually gets up around eight every night, so you've got plenty of time to relax. I'll leave you along now, here's your key." Dawn accepted the key that he held out to her. So…he was sexy and sweet…nice. When the door closed behind him, Dawn looked around the suite and was pleasantly surprised by how nice it was. When she found the bedroom, she crawled into, hugged a pillow, and immediately started sobbing. She felt as if she was being exiled here because they didn't want her in Rome. Sure, she didn't want to be in Rome at all, but her family was there…and she wasn't wanted. Dawn fell asleep sometime later, her sobs echoing through the room.
When Dawn woke up, she looked at the clock and saw that she'd been asleep for almost twelve hours. It was almost seven at night and she sat up, completely groggy. She got off of the bed, and went into the living room to grab her shower bag. After she'd showered, changed, and cleaned herself up, she exited her room, not bothering to lock it. When she got to the lobby, she found Gunn sitting at a table reading a book. Dawn tried not to disturb him, but she was in desperate need for some food. When she walked past him, he looked up and smiled.
"Hi, Dawn, I'm Gunn. Were you looking for something?" Dawn looked back at him with a sheepish grin on her face.
"I was looking for the kitchen. I'm absolutely starved, I didn't mean to sleep as late as I did." Gunn chuckled and stood up.
"Hey, you just flew across the world, of course you're tired. It's my night to cook anyway and the gang will be down shortly. You can keep me company while I cook." Dawn followed him to the kitchen and found that she really liked Gunn, he was funny. They talked about her life in Sunnydale, he told her about his sister getting turned, and she told him about being the key. When she finished her story about Glory, he whistled.
"Damn, Dawnie, you've been through hell, haven't you? We'll let you relax if you want, though we are in desperate need of a good researcher. I'll admit I'm not that good, so that only leaves Fred, Wesley, and Angel. The kid and I are more artillery aficionados. We've even started inventing some stuff to make slaying easier." After a few more minutes of talking, people started to trickle in to investigate the progress. Fred came in first, and propped herself on the counter, looking shyly at Dawn. Wesley came in next and wrapped his arm around Fred's shoulder. He smiled over at Dawn.
"How did you like your room? I told Angel that it was way too much pink, but he insisted." Dawn giggled and shook her head.
"The room is totally awesome. I was just in a room in Rome. It was bigger then like a roadside motel, but it's a closet compared that one upstairs. You guys didn't have to go all out for me, you know." Angel entered the room next, and spoke as he was reaching into the fridge.
"Eh, it was no problem, Dawn, I rather liked designing how the room would look. After we eat, we'll all sit down and have a talk, okay? I don't really keep things from my crew, so they pretty much know the whole story as to what happened over there. We're going to have to discuss patrolling that you're wanting to do." Dawn felt her face go red in mortification and she started to get angry. As if he could smell her mood, Angel held up a hand in surrender.
"I just mean, Dawn, that I don't want you going out there alone. If you feel the need to hit something, take Gunn or Connor. You can even go down to the basement, we've got a full gym down there." Dawn stood up from her leaning position and looked at Angel suspiciously.
"You'll let met patrol?" Angel smiled sadly.
"Dawn, you're a grown up who knows that the boogeyman exists. You can also handle yourself from what I've heard from Faith. Just so you know, I don't let anyone go out by themselves. If Connor or Gunn do it, I ream them for it. It's just simple precautions really." Dawn looked around the room to all of the smiling faces.
"Wow…" Gunn laughed and pulled her into a brotherly hug.
"Don't worry, kid, anytime you want to fight some uglies, I'm there." Angel stepped forward and spoke to her very softly.
"I'm not going to smother you like Buffy did, Dawn. Sure, she was just worried about you, but she did go a bit overboard. We'll discuss this more in detail after dinner, but I just wanted you to know that." Dawn felt herself getting emotional again and quickly excused herself. When she darted into the lobby, she found Connor sitting on one of the couches. He glanced up when he saw her and was instantly on his feet.
"Hey…it's going to be fine, you just wait and see." Dawn nodded, not knowing how to describe her feelings at the moment. She was elated that they were going to treat her like part of the team and like an adult, but at the same time she was still very sad. She missed Willow and Faith already. Angel stepped into the lobby carrying trays.
"Dinner is ready, you two, come on." Connor smiled at Dawn and motioned with his head for her to follow them, which she did. She had a good feeling about this situation.