summer_of_giles | Fic: Two men (and their dog) in a boat 14/15

Disclaimers in Part One

Part Fourteen

Coventry turned out to be a solemn coda to what had been – in the end – a quiet and restful vacation, despite the momentary excitement on the Hatton flight. They spent a leisurely afternoon wandering around the city, and ended it with a visit to the Cathedral, the new building built beside the ruins of the old. The statue of St Michael – standing in victory over the prone figure of the devil – provided an imposing welcome, and the sweeping architecture that he guarded took Xander’s breath away.

“Thought you’d be impressed,” Giles smiled, watching the way he studied the workmanship of the old and the design of the new. He’d been there before, of course, and now Xander understood why he’d been so insistent that they find the time to visit. The message of the bombed out building – reduced by fire and fury to a mere shell of itself – next to the open strength of its successor, was not lost on someone who’d survived the harrowing of Sunnydale and the cataclysmic closing of the Hellmouth. This was what Giles was trying to do with the legacy of the council. Not rebuild the old, but to build anew, drawing on the strength of the past but using it to create something for the future. Something strong, something that defied the horrors that had created the necessity for it – yet did not ignore the lessons those horrors taught, or hid them from sight, either.

“We don’t forget, but we do move on, right?” The simplicity of the modern – well, not so modern now, but certainly newer than the old – design drew him into the vaulted spaces of the Cathedral, seeing the way it was filled with light and colour.

“Right.” Giles walked beside him, letting him set both pace and route, keeping him company as he explored and admired and celebrated as he was supposed to. The triumph of the human spirit, the determined rebirth from the ashes of the past – and the quiet dignity of accepted sorrow, written deep into the stone. The bombing of Coventry had been an all too human apocalypse, and somehow that deepened the significance of it, and emphasised the resonance of the experience - the echoes of loss and the determination to fight on, to live and live well.

“Thanks,” Xander said, once they’d made their way out into the ruins and up the East Tower, where they could stand and look out over the city below. “For bringing me here.”

“You’re welcome.” Giles wrapped his hand over his where it rested on the rail and they stood like that for a while, just taking in the view.

“You think – well, we could do something, like this, back in SunnyD? Not – rebuild the whole town, of course, but – something? A memorial, or a visitor’s centre, or something?”

Giles didn’t answer for a moment. Something settled over him – the mantle of authority, the burdens he’d given up this fortnight past – and it was the head of the Watcher’s Council, the Knight Commander of the Ancient Order of Watchers, who finally spoke.

“That,” he said softly, “is the construction project I’ve been wanting to talk to you about. Not so much in Sunnydale – although we can build beside the crater if you want – but constructing a series of centres for our work. Safe houses for the girls, right across the world. A distributed network, rather than everything being focused in one place.” He leaned forward, resting his forearms on the rail and heaving a weary sigh. “We lost so much – and we nearly lost everything. So stupid, in this modern world of ours. A little forethought, and a little less arrogance, and … You know, Buffy talks about the girls as champions? Warriors chosen to lead the fight. And they are. They will. But they need us. The Watchers and the Witches and the White Knights … and yes, Xander, I know how you earned the title – and if I can, I’m going to get her Majesty to make it an official one, one of these days – but we aren’t champions. We are guides and guardians, and we must watch the world as well as the slayers. Doing the things they can’t, so they are free to do what they must. We must never be so vulnerable again. Nor so – hidebound and bloody complacent, either.”

He straightened up, setting his shoulders and with them the weight that lay there – the weight that the death of the old council had brought, and which Buffy expected him to bear with barely a moments thought as to what that really meant. Xander knew – and knew that he’d have taken it up anyway, that his commitment to his Watchers oath ran far deeper than mere duty or loyalty might demand.

“Build me - this,” he asked, his gesture taking in both the old and the new Cathedrals below. “And help me create something that will outlive us both – something that will last for generations to come. The new rising out of the ashes of the old, but bringing with it a legacy of vigilance and preparedness. One that will mean no Potential is left unguarded, no Slayer is left to fight and die alone, and no demon gets a chance to destroy everything we’ve worked for in a single, pre-emptive blow. You – think you can do that?”

Xander reached out, catching his shoulder so that he turned – and looked him straight in the eye. “I can try,” he said, making the words a solemn promise, one every bit as binding as the one he intended to make that Halloween. “Hell,” he drawled, “If I could, I’d hammer shut all the Hellmouths, turn the Deep Well into a parking lot, and stick a Closed sign on every gate, portal and dimensional door I could find. Either that, or charge a toll so steep no-none could afford to use one. I can’t. I know I can’t. But Buffy and Willow and Faith, and Dawn – and all those others out there, fighting the good fight? They can. And you’re right. They need you and they need me – to build them something they can stand on and fight from. Places to train, places to prepare, places to supply and support them. Places they can seek refuge in – and places they can return to, when their part in the fight is done. Maybe,” he considered pensively, “all we’ll manage to do is lay a few foundations, but … if I learned anything working construction? It’s that - once you have foundations – strong ones – it gets easier for people to build places like this. So – yeah. Sign me up. Count me in.” He grinned, finding inspiration in the vision as well as the man inspiring it.

“Building I can do.”

Concluded in Part Fifteen