My Brother, Set

Summary: No longer a Slayer, Buffy finds out she still has enemies to fight. Sequel to 'Goddess or Goa'uld'.

Timeline: BtVS - Season 2, a couple months post episode 'Halloween'. Stargate: SG-1 – sometime after season 5 episode 'Wormhole X-treme!'. I've changed the timing and details of the episode 'Seth'.

Disclaimer: BtVS characters belong to Joss Whedon / Mutant Enemy. Stargate characters belong to Robert C. Cooper and Brad Wright / SyFy Channel. I claim no rights to any copyrighted material. Please do not copy or take this story without my permission.

A/N: This is for those that wanted to see Buffy meet SG-1. WARNING –before any of you complain, this story is about the confrontation with Set, not any of the things I skimmed over at the beginning.

A/N2: Thanks to AshDawnSoulmates and zigpal for checking this out for me.

Chapter 1: To Catch a Brother

Sunnydale

Christmas Break…

Since Halloween when she was invaded by the demon, Bastet, and turned into the goddess, Bast, Buffy had gone through some serious changes. The first one was immediate: losing her Slayer abilities.

As it turned out, it didn't really matter to the Watchers Council. Her death the previous spring had already triggered the new Slayer, Kendra. And Giles was just as shocked to find out about it as Buffy was. Kendra and her Watcher, Sam Zabuto, showed up three days after Giles called the Council about the spell and sent Ethan to the coven.

The new Slayer was practically a puppet and Zabuto was holding her strings. When Giles or Buffy tried to make any suggestions, he informed them that the Council had no need for help from 'civilians'. Giles calmly reminded the other Watcher that he worked for the Council, too. Zabuto smirked and replied, 'Not anymore.'

Apparently the Head of the Council, a pillock – Giles' word – by the name of Travers, blamed Giles for Buffy losing her powers. If he had done his job properly, she never would have been in the costume that caused it to happen. Not to mention it was an old acquaintance of Giles' who performed the spell.

But the Council was being 'generous' about the situation…As long as they didn't interfere with the new team, Giles wouldn't be deported or Buffy 'dealt with'. When they revoked their support for him as the librarian though, Snyder took great pleasure in removing him and putting one of the Mayor's lackeys there.

However, Giles refused to leave until the mystery of Bastet's brother was solved. Therefore, the Scooby Gang – which now sported the new couple of Xander and Willow – set up their base of operations in Giles' apartment. Willow even convinced him to get an internet hook-up for his new computer.

It would have amused Jenny Calendar that he had finally moved into the 20th century, but after Eyghon came around, she wasn't speaking to him anymore. She was so terrified by the experience that she requested another member of her clan come to keep an eye on Angel(us) so she could leave.

The gypsies needn't have worried though. Once Angel helped defeat Eyghon, Buffy used her new goddess powers from Bast, and confronted Angel about the curse, asking him what he really wanted. Did he – the soul of Liam – want to keep seeking atonement for what the demon did in his body, or did he want to finally go to his eternal judgment, whether it was good or bad?

When he chose judgment, she let loose with her Royal Flame of Ma'at, which judged the dead. After the smoke cleared, a newly-human Liam stood where the demon perished. Knowing that he couldn't help her until he got used to his new life, Liam left Buffy to find himself again. He tearfully promised that he would be back, though.

Eight weeks had passed since 'The Change' and it took just over one for anyone to realize what was happening. It might have been less than that, except for it didn't affect Buffy's hair or nails. Another week passed before they were sure…Buffy was aging. Not by tremendous amounts, but after three weeks they couldn't hide the truth anymore.

They had to tell Joyce – which meant they had to tell her about magick and the supernatural. Needless to say, she didn't take it well. Without her Slayer abilities, Buffy had to resort to asking Bast to share her powers in order to convince her mother. A good part of a bottle of vodka later, Joyce asked if this was the cause for their problems in LA. She seemed relieved to hear Buffy say yes.

The problem they had at first was they couldn't figure out how much more Buffy was going to age. In eight weeks, she went from a 16 year old to somebody who looked like they were in their late 20s or early 30s. When they couldn't find the answer in the books, Willow had the brainstorm of asking Bast if she knew the reason. Turns out she did; she was the reason.

Evidently, the power that Buffy took into her body when she became the temple of Bast was so immense, the only way to keep it from burning her from the inside out was to age her more rapidly – in order to use up the energy. Fortunately, the energy was at manageable levels now.

What that meant for the former Slayer was she couldn't remain in Sunnydale as Buffy Summers anymore. She had practically gone into hiding since her mother was told. Too many people had commented on how much older she looked. Of course, they thought she was just doing her make-up differently or something.

Willow started working on new identification for her blonde friend. They decided to go with the name Anne Celia Markson; Buffy's middle name, her cousin's name and Joyce's maiden name. For the sake of irony, they picked Halloween as her new birthday and decided she was 29. That got giggles from the women that the men didn't understand.

So Buffy was relieved to hear that Willow finally found something on Set – or Seth, as his new worshippers were calling him these days. Turned out he had himself a Waco-style compound for him and his brainwashed followers. Bast helped Buffy find out more from Bastet about what to expect when they went to confront him.

The demon's arrogance was astounding. Even though the Goa'uld – the kind of demon it was – knew it was locked in Buffy's subconscious without its body, it still felt it would eventually win the upper hand. Buffy rolled her eyes when it proclaimed that she and her friends would bow down in fear when it did.

But Bastet wasn't her problem right now, Set was.

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Giles' apartment

When Xander and Willow arrived, they found a stack of luggage by the door. They looked at the former Watcher/Slayer pair in confusion. Buffy handled the explanation, "So here's the deal: Giles and I will go and take Set out and try to free his sheep. After that, I'm going to have to leave Sunnydale for good."

"Buffy is right; eventually the Council will start to ask questions, and when they find out that she has aged so much in so little time-- Well, let's just say they won't be pleased," Giles added, suppressing the shudder that wanted to come at the thought of what they might do to Buffy.

But Xander must have read something in his expression anyway. "You think they would hurt the Buffster?"

Polishing his glasses, Giles nodded grimly, "I'm afraid so. Either that or they would try to study her. I'm not sure which alternative is worse."

Willow bit her lip to keep from complaining about the unfairness of it all. Instead, she leveled her 'resolve-look' at the blonde and asked, "But you'll keep in touch, right?"

"You bet. I couldn't live without you guys. We'll just have to make do with the long distance thing now," Buffy promised. In a way, this might be a blessing in disguise for her friends. Without her in Sunnydale, they might feel more free to leave once they graduated.

There was still an issue that bothered Xander, though. "What about your mom?"

Giles responded to give Buffy the time to compose herself. The conversation with her mother had been most unpleasant for everyone. There were a lot of accusations thrown around – most of which were directed at him. "We've explained the dangers of staying to Joyce. While she is not happy about our solution, she understands that we know more about this kind of thing than she does."

"Doesn't mean she didn't threaten to kill me if I don't call every once in a while," Buffy added with a smirk. It turned out a lot better than she had expected it to. What probably swayed her mom to their arguments was she wasn't that far from being an adult, and that by leaving Sunnydale, Buffy would have a fresh start from slaying.

The plan was for Joyce to report her as missing after some weird behavior the past month and a half. With luck, everyone would think the 16 year old ran off to be with some man. And while the older version of Buffy looked similar, she was clearly not 16.

"What will the Council think of you taking off like this?" Willow wondered, concerned what those stuffy poopheads would do. The new Watcher took all the respect the gang had for the Council and flushed it down the toilet with his snarky attitude.

Shrugging his shoulders, Giles regretted admitting that the Council was a wild card, "I don't know. I'm hoping that it will be a while before they can find her. Maybe by then we'll have figured out how to handle them."

Buffy needed to get the farewells over with. Even though she knew that this was the best thing for everyone, it still ripped her heart out – even more than saying goodbye to 'Liam'. He was her crush-turning-into-love guy, but these were her best friends. "Bye, you two. I love you. Make sure you take care of each other or I'll come back and go goddess on your asses," she threatened them teasingly, pulling them into tight hugs.

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A/N: Next…The SGC plans their own take-down and run into Buffy.