TITLE: What Would Happen If...Part 7
AUTHOR: Ragna (Obsessive-Compulsive Spike - WritingGoddess@aol.com; SpikeGrrl1@aol.com)
RATING: PG
CLASSIFICATION: Buffy/Oz friendship.
SUMMARY: Buffy and Oz get sucked 100 years into the future, and it's a mess.
SPOILERS: All of season 4 BtVS and season 1 A:tS
DISTRIBUTION: Any sites with my fic up; you all have unspoken permission. I write it, you can post it. Everyone else just keep my name on it and let me know.
ARCHIVED AT: http://www.envy.nu/allthepain/index.html
DISCLAIMER: If you don't recognize it, chances are it's my own creation. If you do, Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, Kazui Sandollar, FOX and the WB own it or them. Various friends of mine are holding characters hostage. You may see them by appointment only.
FEEDBACK: Sorry I'm not home right now I'm walking in the spiderwebs so leave a message and I'll call you back...in other words, I want it. Don't care if it's onlist or not.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: Thank you, everyone, for the support. I've been having such a rough time lately, and I normally garner the support I need from this online community, and when I felt it wasn't there...dedicated to everyone who feedbacked, everyone who visits my sites, everyone who loves "BtVS" and "A:tS" as much as I do...dedicated to everyone.
~*~*~*~
"You still have the wolfiness under control?" Buffy asked as she and Oz sat, sharpening stakes.

Oz nodded. "Yeah. I know it's a full moon tonight."

Buffy kept staring at the wood, whittling it to a point. "Angel's coming with us, tonight."

"You okay with that?"

Buffy looked up. "Do I have a choice, Oz? Do *we* have a choice?"

Oz didn't reply. He simply leaned back and looked at the sunbeams wafting in from the draped window. There wasn't much natural light in the room, but Oz didn't need to see much to know it was a bright, sunny day.

He could hear distant sounds of laughter, of a bouncing ball and a jump rope hitting the ground at a rhythmic pace. There was the simple schoolyard chants and the talking between friends.

It was probably the only semblance of normalcy those children would ever have.

"What do you hear?" Buffy asked suddenly, breaking Oz out of his trancelike state.

"Children, playing," he said, standing up and going to the window. Pulling back the curtain, he was careful not to let the sunlight hit Spike in the chest, but he had to see something decent, something innocent...

And there they were! A small group of children, laughing and playing and enjoying themselves as the warm noontime sun beat down on them.

Oz smiled to himself as Buffy stood next to him, her small smile growing increasingly larger as she saw the scene before them. "They deserve better than this," she thought aloud, her smile fading slightly.

"And we're going to help them get it," he replied, taking her hand in his for comfort and support.

***

"No sign of them in the last 200 years, Giles," Xander said, barely lifting his resting head off the book. He had been sustaining himself on coffee for the last forty-eight hours, going through every book Giles hadn't.

"And nothing before that," Graham said, adjusting his glasses slightly. Never before had he had to do that much reading from a computer, and his eyes and head were hurting because of it. He shut his eyes, leaning back in the chair. "So...can we rule out that they're in the past?"

Giles nodded. "I'm afraid so. I had wished it to be otherwise, of course, but..." The phone rang, and Giles answered. "Hello?"

There was head nodding on Giles' face, then an abrupt change of expression as a smile lit up on his face. "Olivia, I shall never forget this." He laughed at her reply and ended the conversation with "I'll remember that for the next time."

Xander lifted his head up enough so Graham could see the raised eyebrow. "Don't want to go there."

"Me neither," he said, shaking his head. "Since she isn't in the past...how are we going to find them?"

Xander ignored the question. "You have a thing for her, don't you?"

"What?"

"You like the Buffster in that more than friendly way."

Graham was on the spot. "Well..."

"I think she likes you, too."

Graham looked at the other man near him, now awake with his chin rested on folded hands in front of him. "I came here to ask her out on a date, for later in the week. I knew she'd be here because Willow told me," he said. "I wonder if she has any idea..."

***

Buffy tossed the stake at the tree as Oz shot a basketball into the hoop. Some of the neighborhood kids who'd been playing before were also watching.

"It's usually more effective with knives," she muttered, watching the stake hit it's mark and then bounce off. She gestured to a small girl nearby. "Can you get that for me?"

She nodded, retrieving the stake quickly. The little girl had the same shade of red hair Willow had had...

"What's your name?"

"Annie," she said, handing over the stake. "You look angry."

Buffy looked at the girl. She couldn't be more than five or six, really. "Well, most of the people I love are dead."

"Who isn't?" she asked.

"Well," Buffy pointed to Oz, "That's my friend Oz, the one over there playing basketball with the other kids. And there some others, a man named Angel and--"

"You mean the good vampires?" Annie said, her eyes lighting up.

"Yeah."

"I think Graham's the nicest."

"Oh, really?" Buffy asked. She sat down on the grass, forgetting about training for a moment. "Why's that?"

"He likes us kids. We'll go over to the house and if he's awake, he tells us stories and stuff." Something crosses Annie's mind, and she looks up. "Is your name Buffy?"

"Yes...how did you know?"

"He talked about you before, and how pretty you were and how nice you were," she said. "Why'd he say were? You're here now."

Buffy smiled. "It's a long story."

***

"Basically, Olivia has found a way to transmit messages to the person who needs then, whether they are in the past or future," Giles said, handing Xander another cup of coffee. "We need either Willow, Tara or Anya here...where is Anya, anyhow?"

"Tailing Spike," Xander said. "To make sure he doesn't do anything else that's stupid."

Giles nodded. "Graham? What have you--" Giles looked at the young man at the table, who had crossed his arms in front of him and rested his head so he could sleep. "I suppose I shouldn't wake him."

"You could wave some coffee under his nose," Xander suggested, getting a glare from Giles. "What? It was just a suggestion..."