Chapter Twenty-Three

Willow had always loved research. Okay, sure, it could be frustrating, and it didn’t always solve anything. And Giles sometimes got a little alpha-researcher, and it didn’t help that the Magic Box had blown up with all their books—okay, that she had blown up the Magic Box and all their books—okay, that was totally beside the point. The point was that research was comforting. It was only when she branched out and tried to become an action hero that she’d run into trouble.

She’d gotten past that and was all good-witchy, white-lighty, earth-magicky non-destructo girl now, but research was comforting in a way spells never could be. There was no such thing as overdosing on research, except for the way it made your eyes go wonky and your head hurt. But end-the-world craziness? Big no to that one.

And right now the best thing about research was that when she was doing it, she didn’t have to think about Giles sprawled on the library floor, or about the call she’d made earlier to Kennedy’s family. She didn’t want to think about that one ever again.

Because of the thing with the Magic Box, and then the other thing with the Watchers’ compound, they were seriously short on books. But sometimes, in other places in the world, other people knew things. And since she went and activated all the Slayers, they had people all over the world now. And? Some of them were research-friendly, too.

So after all these years, it wasn’t just the Scoobies against the world anymore.

Some of the new Slayers were smart. Really smart, like Giles with quads and lats and abs and … more lats? And unlike the Council of Watchers—the old, secretive council, not the new, teeny council—they actually provided help when asked. So she wasn’t surprised when one of them emailed her with a recommendation on how to take care of their problem.

She was just surprised at how simple it was.

***

“Mr. Gunn?”

The deferential voice at the door drew Charles away from the briefs in which he’d been absorbed. “Yeah, Scott?” For a moment he wondered how he’d recalled the flunky’s name, but the upgrade he’d gotten had all kinds of unexpected components.

“Umm, it’s about your client, Mr. Nayer?”

“God, he’s not downstairs harassing the secretarial pool again, is he?”

“No, no, that hasn’t been a problem since we introduced him to Mr. Yates. This time…it’s a little more serious. It’s … well … sir, his check bounced.”

Now the kid really had Gunn’s attention. Bounced? It took a serious death wish to hand Wolfram & Hart a rubber check. “Have you tried calling him?”

“Yes, sir, but we’ve been unable to reach him. The guys in Spellcasting said they’re not supposed to finish the job until payment goes through.”

“So we have a problem.”

“Yes, sir.”

Gunn considered the situation for a moment. Wolfram & Hart didn’t like loose ends. And for a firm that defended so many disgusting lowlifes, it was surprisingly strict about contract law … when it benefited them.

Hell, it wasn’t like Nayer wasn’t a repulsive waste of skin anyway. “Authorize the usual.”

“Yes, sir.”

***

“You were trying to get rid of me. That’s why you had her in here.”

Xander opened his eyes and there she was, sitting in the chair in the corner. She was very calm. Why wouldn’t she be? She’d had all night to think about it. She’d probably been sitting there for hours, planning her arguments, nursing her anger. Watching him sleep and deciding when it would be most effective to wake him.

He started to apologize. Didn’t know why, knew he was supposed to.

She shook her head. “Don’t worry about it. It doesn’t mean anything.”

He knew she was lying. If it didn’t mean anything she wouldn’t be there.

“Not to me,” Anya corrected. “You. It means something to you. If it didn’t I wouldn’t be here. I mean, I’m already dead. I don’t know how much more ‘getting rid of’ there can be.”

Xander hesitated. He hadn’t asked Cordy to his room. He wasn’t trying to get rid of Anya. But just admitting to Cordelia that Anya was haunting him had felt like a betrayal. All this time, all these months, it had been their secret, a confidence kept between him and a shadow. “I wasn’t trying to…”

“I’ve got an idea—why don’t you have Willow do that forgetfulness spell from a couple of years ago? That way you wouldn’t even have to remember me.”

Xander’s patience frayed. “Enough!”

The door flew open, and Xander jumped. “Okay, she’s here? Where is she?” Cordelia demanded, marching into the room and pushing the door shut behind her.

“Sweet zombie Jesus, stop doing that!”

“What?”

“Scaring me!”

“Scaring you? Excuse me, you’re the one who walked in on me when I was—”

“What? Innocently going through my closet?”

“Look, bub, I’m trying to help you!”

“Well, I’m doing just fine without your help, and if you’d—”

“That’s fine, just ignore me. I’m used to it,” Anya sniffed.

“I am not ignoring you!” Xander shouted.

“She’s over there?” demanded Cordy, looking over at the corner to which Xander had addressed his last remark.

“Of course she’s there. She’s always there,” he said miserably.

The room looked empty to Cordelia. She’d never met a ghost who was so fussy about who she appeared to before. Kind of picky for a spook, as far as Cordy was concerned. “Do you want to get rid of her?”

Xander looked stricken.

“Well, do you just want to go on this way?”

He didn’t answer, and Cordelia felt a spurt of anger. What was she, some kind of social worker for demon magnets? If he wanted to wallow in misery that was his problem. She’d tried. She’d tried and she’d never make that mistake with him again.

“Look, if you want to pretend everything’s fine, go right ahead. Because plainly, things have been going great around here, what with all the murdering and the haunting and the possession. Far be it from me to interfere with anyone’s plan to entomb himself with the ghost of his dead girlfriend, because it’s definitely going to work out between you two. So I’ll just go, and I hope you and the ghost formerly known as Anya will be very happy together. Congratulations again on throwing your life away.”

His face whitened and she felt a nudge of what was probably compassion, but she ignored it because it was completely useless. This whole situation was crap, and pretending it was okay to just ignore it was something a mealy-mouthed so-called nice girl would do. They were all nice, every one of the Scoobies, and that was about as useful as spitting on a forest fire.

But for some reason she expected more from Xander. He might not have super-strength or research power or basic fashion sense, but at least he used to be able to face the truth. And now he was scrambling like hell to hide from it.

Cordelia turned her back to him. Tears were stinging her eyes, sharp and bitter. She couldn’t stay like this. She couldn’t look at him. She’d been wrong about him for the last time.

A hand closed on her elbow, and she tensed. Xander’s voice was hushed, as if he didn’t want someone to hear.

“Help me.”

***

The pain was the first thing that registered. Blooming from the back of his head, pushing its fingers through his brain, making him wish, desperately, that he was still asleep. It was merely one of many reasons he wished he were still unconscious.

But avoiding problems only served to exacerbate them, and the thought of that made his head hurt worse.

Giles opened his eyes. After the horror of the night before he half-expected to find himself in some parallel world. Instead he was in his perfectly normal room, with perfectly normal sunlight filtering through the curtains, and the highly imperfect sight of Spike sprawled in the chair beside the bed, thumbing through a magazine. “What are you doing in here?”

“Making sure you don’t go crazy and ax-murder anyone,” Spike returned indolently, barely glancing away from his periodical. “Slayer didn’t want you doing any more damage while she was busy.”

“She doesn’t appear to be concerned about my killing you,” Giles pointed out. “Then again, perhaps she’s considered the possibility and has come to her senses.”

“She’s got all her senses, thanks. She’s particularly sensitive right around her pretty little—”

“All right, all right!” Giles rushed, his stomach turning over. “For pity’s sake, can’t you at least pretend to be civilized? Just for a change?”

“Why would I do that? She likes a little monster in her man,” said Spike absently, flipping through the pages. Abruptly he stopped and looked accusingly at Giles. “You bastard. You right bastard! You did it on purpose!”

“I told you I don’t remember anything about last night,” Giles reminded him tightly. Which was true, but which provided no comfort.

“I’m not talking about last night, I’m talking about the bloody league! Manchester U won the title back! And you never even mentioned it! What kind of gratitude is that?”

“Gratitude? Why on earth would I be grateful to you?”

“Oh, I don’t know, let me think! There’s all those times I didn’t kill you—when I stopped Angelus from tickling you with a chainsaw—when I didn’t rip your head off for siccing the principal on me—when I killed the demon that was going to make chum out of you lot when the Slayer was off killing Adam—when I set fire to that vampire rather than let him have a little snack—”

“Yes, thank you for providing the least amount of assistance possible to prevent Buffy from killing you. I don’t know how I ever could have been so ungrateful.”

“And there was the part where I died to save the world,” Spike pointed out innocently.

Giles gritted his teeth. “Not that I’m not thrilled by your company, but where is Buffy?”

“Busy,” Spike grunted, returning to his magazine.

“Well, what about Willow?”

“She’s busy, too.”

“Everyone’s busy?” Giles protested in disgust.

“Yeah, it’s a thrillfest for me too. Look, I pulled babysitting duty, so you can just sit tight and play the quiet game until they remember you’re up here.”

“Easier said than done,” Giles muttered bitterly.

Spike’s smile was dry. “You’re telling me.”

***

They were staring at her. Willow hated it when they stared at her. Staring was like a more polite way of saying they thought she was nuts. It was a perfectly reasonable plan, formed on a solid basis of … guessing and crossed fingers and advice from a newbie Slayer she’d never actually met?

“You want to trap it?” Buffy repeated with a faint frown.

“Exactly. Easy-peasy.”

“Easy-peasy?” repeated Dawn dubiously. Willow felt a pang; a few years before, Dawn wouldn’t have doubted that Willow could come up with a magical solution to any problem. She really was growing up.

“Well, maybe not easy-peasy, but pretty easy, yeah. Easy-adjacent,” Willow assured them, just a little forced. “Moderate with a really expensive view of easy.”

Wood looked puzzled. “If it was so easy to just trap the First, why didn’t we do this last year?”

Willow shook her head, stomach churning. “Last year it was really powerful—it had been growing stronger for thousands of years. Now it’s weak. It’s barely … well, it’s not alive, per se. More like it just is. But after the whole big Sunnydale thing, it’s barely an is. It’s almost a was. And it’s not like this kind of thing is far out—I mean, it’s a classic! Remember how Olaf was trapped in a crystal?” she added to the room at large.

“I remember someone letting him out,” reminded Xander a little caustically.

Willow winced. Olaf really had never been a good subject to raise with Xander. “But you remember how he was trapped? Same theory.”

As if Wood would leave it at that. “Who’s—”

“Long story,” interrupted Faith, waving her hand.

“You know what happened with Olaf?” asked Willow, puzzled.

“No, I don’t know it. I just know it’s gonna be long and boring. Sorry,” Faith added carelessly.

Willow squirmed a little but didn’t protest.

“Could it work for the First?” asked Buffy.

“It worked for a troll god,” Willow reminded her.

“And we just … what? Hope we can get the box shut before it escapes?” Xander asked skeptically.

“No, the spell takes care of that. I mean, it would be hard to outrace ephemera. The spell will bind the First it to the vessel. It can’t get out unless a counterspell is cast. And not to brag, but someone would have to be really good to break this spell. I mean, I don’t want to say me-good, but … yeah.”

Cordelia shifted in her seat. You’d think they’d actually sit on the furniture before they bought it, but that never seemed to occur to some people. “Uh, in my experience no matter how carefully these things are planned, whatever it is you want to happen always gets screwed up somehow. The royal you, not the you you. If you don’t want someone doing a counterspell, it’s going to be counterspell city.”

“Cordelia … look, you haven’t really seen me in action in a long time. I’m really good.”

“Will. What if something does go wrong?” Buffy asked quietly.

“It won’t.”

“If it does.”

Willow hesitated. She couldn’t make any promises. Magic wasn’t mag—okay, it was, but it wasn’t perfect. But she was out of answers, Giles was out of commission, and they were out of options. “If it does, we’re back where we started. No harm, no foul.”

The others glanced around, seeking consensus, but Buffy’s eyes remained on Willow, and her voice was steady.

“So why wait?”

***

She’d gone over the spell repeatedly. Mostly before she’d even told them about it, because she didn’t want to raise their hopes for nothing. She had everything she needed—the spell was a rather basic one; its strength was drawn from her power, rather than the ancillary materials. And her grasp of ancient languages was improving! The words had been spoken, herbs scattered, twigs twisted and burned.

And the box was empty.

“It worked. I know it worked,” Willow insisted, rubbing her forehead, trying to pinpoint where it went wrong. This was impossible—the spell was foolproof.

You’ve thought that before, a little voice whispered to her. She felt incipient panic nudge at her and shoved it down ruthlessly. If she listened to that voice every time it said something she’d spend her life hiding in a closet, curled up in a ball.

“Willow…do you remember when you did that spell to see if I was a potential Slayer?” Dawn asked tentatively. “The spell worked, it just went a little sideways.”

Willow didn’t seem to hear her. She stared at the spell in front of her, tracing the lines with her finger, shaking her head in frustration. “This is right, I know this is right. I went over the translation again and again, every part of it.”

Andrew peered over her shoulder. “Is it supposed to command the First to enter the box specifically? Because I think you messed up your definite and indefinite articles. Proto-Pictish is tricky like that.”

Willow gasped and stepped back, her eyes growing large with horror.

“So what does it say?” demanded Xander, his voice edging up.

“Instead of saying to enter the vessel meant to hold it, the spell says a vessel meant to hold it,” Andrew supplied. “That could be anything.”

“Or anyone,” added Faith. “But we’re all cool?”

For a moment they just all glanced around at each other, taking inventory. Suddenly Buffy muttered a curse and raced from the room. The others could hear her steps as she pounded up the stairs.

“Giles,” whispered Willow.