all_inclusive | Like shadows in the faded light, we're invisible.

As if not being home wasn't bad enough, Dawn has been getting sicker and sicker by the day. She'd barely even been out of bed in a week. This morning she had rolled out of bed feeling just a little bit better after having slept for twenty-four hours straight. She had shuffled her way through a shower that only added to her feeling better. Wearing a white tank top with a purple glittered star on it and some purple pajama pants, she combed through the tangles in her hair and picked up a blow dryer to start working the heat through her hair. Today would be a straight hair sort of day, no curls because she didn't have the energy for it. As her hair dried, the steam slowly filtered away from the mirror, giving her a better image of herself in the reflection.

She dropped the blow dryer. Blinked. Looked again. Blinked again. Squinted her eyes. How could she see things behind her? Through herself? She looked behind her, just to check and make sure that she was seeing what was behind her through herself. Then she looked back to the mirror. She lifted her hand, seeing the bathroom counter through it. Her heartbeat thudded loudly in her chest. So loud that she swore she could feel it throughout her entire body inside and out.

And this is what had her barreling barefoot through the hotel hallways looking for Buffy or Angel or Peter or yes, even Faith who had no idea who she was. The ghostly see-through girl calling out as she ran from one place to another until she couldn't run anymore. "Buffy?" Each time she rounded a corner or hit a new floor or corridor of the hotel she called out. "Buffy!" She might run into people and apologize before she hurried on her way to find her sister. Or she might stop to talk if anyone wanted to.

Eventually, tired and spent, she would end up plopping down on one of the couches in the lobby, a box of kleenex beside her and a book in her lap. The couch could be seen through her and every once in awhile she lifted her hand to look through it at things, trying to gauge whether it was getting better or worse. Her eyes were puffy from crying. Her nose was red from sniffling. She was generally a train wreck of a person right now. But she figured anyone would be if they were slowly disappearing.

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Peter listens to her with a half smile. It's good rambling and it helps the whole weirdness/worrisomeness of her disappearing. He leans in and kisses her temple. "Tell you what, stick around, we'll take care of whatever this is and I'll see if I can do something about finding a way for you to do some sort of flying."

She dips her head as he kisses her temple, her eyes closing briefly. "How have I not weirded you out yet?" Because yes she had been vague and not given him the full story just yet. But he was still here. She was talking about staking vampires and he was kissing her and promising things that were so sweet.

"I told you. My weird factor is super high," Peter answers. Plus, he's seen a lot of weird here since arriving. Yeah, he didn't know that Dawn was involved in it, but that's almost comforting. He's not going to be the one to get her killed. She's in danger anyway, so adding more to it doesn't make him feel guilty, or at least it doesn't make him feel too guilty.

"Besides, once this over, I might tell you my own weird." Because he's got it.

"You have weird?" She asks curiously. Weird in her world could mean a lot of things. It could mean bad things. But she knows Peter isn't bad. Is he? She reaches out to wrap her hand around his wrist, fingers feeling for his pulse. "Just... checking."

He smirks at little at the way she feels for his pulse. He reaches up and takes her hand, placing it against his chest so she can feel his heart. "I'll tell you all about it once we get you taken care of, okay?"

"Okay." She nods, growing silent for a bit as he holds her hand to his chest. It's after that lingering silence that she sort of relaxes as much as is possible right now. "I was only created a few years ago. By some monks trying to protect and hide a key that can tear down the walls between realities and bring chaos to everywhere in a mythical and epic kind of way."

Peter ponders that. He'll worry about actual age versus apparent age later. Right now, he's concerned with comforting Dawn and figuring out how to get Dawn back solid.

"Maybe we can find some of these monks, have them do something to make you more solid."

"Buffy's trying... my sister is trying to find a doorway to home." She tells Peter with a nod. "So we can figure this out... with magic maybe." But could they figure it out with magic? They had destroyed...

Oh.

"Oh." she says, her brow furrowing. In killing the seed of magic had Buffy inadvertently killed her too?

Peter is with her until the oh. At that point, his brow furrows. "What? What'd you think of?"

His mind is whirling with ideas to help out with science, but at this point he's not sure..."Would you let me try to take some of your blood? I want to see if there's something going on at a cellular level that I can tamper with, either make it better or worse on the cellular level because even making it worse could give us some answers."

"Magic... we destroyed the seed of magic in my world." And she had just pretty much told him that she had been created with magic, without using those exact words.

Normally she would have said no to giving anyone her blood. But this feels like something they can actively do. And desperate times... So she nods. "Yeah. Yeah you can get all...blood draw-y. Just don't try to do a spell with it cause my blood kind of... does mystical kinds of things."

He's rolling with everything fairly well, but that doesn't mean he's immune to how weird all of this. He's simply putting it off so that he can deal with it later when he's alone. "Okay. That's...bad. The destroying bit, but the magic part is...wow. You know? I mean you're really a magic girl." He's not going to ramble about this. He's just not. Except he kind of is.

"Okay. I want to do it now." He gets up from the bed and moves to get a first aid kit out. There's a syringe and needle in there. "I promise I won't do any spells. I won't show anyone your blood. I just want to see if I can figure it out. Genetics are kind of my thing, looking at things on a cellular level and figuring out what makes it work, or not work."

He takes the syringe over to her, kneeling down next to her. "May I?" he asks, needle poised above the veins in the back of her hand, generally the easiest place to draw blood and it was going to be difficult enough to see a vein with her fading the way she was, which is why he didn't want to wait any longer.

Like shadows in the faded light, we're invisible.

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