Father Figure

A father should never outlive his children. As we stand over their graves, I realize that is what he really was. Giles was never just her watcher; he was the one who raised her from a war torn teen into the woman she was when she died. We were too late to save them, the two people who had forever reshaped our lives.

Graves both rather symbolic, in fact. There were no bodies. Buffy had been cremated, scattered to the winds of fate that ruled her existence. Buffy had died a warrior’s death, saving the world one final time on her twenty-first birthday.

A few months ago, she lost Riley. She had taken it hard, and had turned to the one man who had understood. The man who was now with her for eternity.

No, Fathers should never outlive their children. As a sire should never outlive his childe. Angel knelt and placed a red rose on Buffy’s grave, then a yellow one on Spike’s. The tombstone was beautiful, the message heart aching.

Buffy Summers & William Anton

May death bring them the happiness life never could,

For worthy are those who sacrifice all.

January 2001

The two men who had been at odds since they first met were suddenly joined together in the sorrow of the ages. It wasn’t a vampire and a watcher standing there anymore. It was just two grieving fathers.

Voice Over: Death is the tie that binds. It is one Slayer’s final sacrifice that finally brought the two men she cared for most away from their painful memories, and for one brief moment, allowed them to live in the light.