Ctrl Alt Del (or: The Napravení Strategy) by pfeifferpack

Summary: Time Travel fic begins twenty years after NFA then returns to BtVS S4. Dawn meets someone from her distant past that may hold the answer to how she could be the ‘key’ to setting events on a better and happier course for those she loves the most. Can she make enough changes to keep tragedy from taking so many loved ones away before their time and those who survive live less than full lives?
No comic events involved in this story. Prompted by this story request during the Spikeslovebite/Kain auction: “I’d like to see another time-travel Spuffy story! However, unlike most time-travel stories where it’s Spike or Buffy themselves that go back to fix things, I’d like to see Dawn be the one. In a post-Chosen, post-NFA future that is not comic compliant and in which both Spike and Buffy are dead (the circumstances are entirely up to you, but they were not together and not happy), Dawn explores her latent powers and discovers that she can not only travel between dimensions but also in time. She decides to go back (how far back is up to you) and sort out Spike & Buffy so they won’t die miserable and apart. Maybe she also helps her younger self come to terms with being The Key and what that means, if applicable? I don’t mind who writes it, but would prefer for it to be long-ish so the Spuffy can develop slowly rather than fall-into-each-others-arms-at-the-drop-of-a-hat scenario. The only thing I’m adamant about really is that the chip either never gets put in or it comes out asap, allowing for Spike to *choose* to change rather than be forced to.”