Things Unsaid
William found the hospital in simmering chaos. Doctors and nurses sprinting in all directions. Gurneys piled in hallways. People
moaning, writhing in pain, weeping. Buckets of blood, piss, vomit.
He was glad for once that he no longer possessed a vampire’s heightened sense of smell. Double-edged blade of it, though, he
couldn’t suss out the boy’s location by scent.
At the nurse’s station he found an old battle-axe the size of a baby elephant barking orders and answering calls. He
approached her, waiting with bridled impatience, while she finished a running list of commands to a peck of wild-eyed
personnel.
When she turned to him, he was ready. “Looking for a patient named Wells,” he said. “Came in yesterday roundabout night-
ish.”
“No visitors,” she snapped. She turned away. He gripped her slab of shoulder and turned her back around, his black coat
swirling menacingly.
“Not a visitor, pet,” he said, feeling that old tingle at the look of shock in her appleseed eyes. “’m family.”
Three minutes later, having learned there were no Andrew Wellses on the roster, William had a list of six John Does brought
in within the last 24-hours, things being crazy as they were. Two were in the morgue. The other four were in ICU, which
made sense to William. John Does stayed that way till someone named and claimed, or they regained consciousness and
claimed themselves.
William thanked her genuinely, then left.
He checked the morgue first, his eyes watering with relief (maybe formaldehyde) at not finding the boy there. He then went
up to the fifth floor, with its glassed-in rooms like aquariums, where he found Andrew asleep within a cocoon of wires and
tubes.
And what was it William felt upon entering Andrew’s room? Pain, sure. Lad looked like he’d been ground as hamburger and fed
to lions. Anger – check – at Harris for chucking the boy out in the first place, and an undercurrent of sullen irritation like an
itch he couldn’t quite scratch.
But there was something else. Something that coaxed tears to his eyes. William stood, warring with whatever it was, the
fingers of one hand pressed to his eyelids, when Andrew awoke.
“Hey, Spike,” he whispered. “You came to visit? That is so sweet.”
Well, that was encouraging, William thought. He scanned the hallway for a wheelchair, when Dr. Chapman appeared from
around the corner, his black hair and beard greasy and poking out at odd angles. His face at seeing William was not one
you'd call replete with glee.
The doctor dithered in the hallway, like he was thinking of calling security. Instead, he said, “You can’t be here.”
“People say that, yet here I am,” William said, “’Sides, he’s awake.”
“What?” Dr. Chapman brushed by William, leaving a wake of sweat and black coffee. Soon as he was in the room, William
casually shut the door. Realizing too late he’d been trapped, the doctor wheeled around to confront him.
“What’s this, then?” he said, his bravado sounding plaintive. “Gonna hold me ransom?”
William dropped the blinds on the window with a snick.
The doctor went on, voice verging on panic. “Something odd about you lot. Girl that brought ’im in pulled a David Blaine, now
here you are: Clearly abnormal. What is going on?”
William considered. Andrew was still conscious but only just. He parted the blinds and studied the contrast between the
topsy-turvy ER and the relatively sedate ICU. He said, “You got a car, doc?”
The doctor blinked, incredulous. “That’s a way to answer none of my questions.”
“Spike…” Andrew moaned.
“Your name is Spike,” the doctor said flatly. “Brilliant.”
William strong-armed the doctor to the wall, knocking his horn-rims across the floor. “Look, much as I enjoy a good banter,
I needta take the boy home.”
“None doing,” the doctor began. “It’s impossi…”
William cut him off by clamping down on his vocal cords. “It’s not impossible, doc. You’re coming with me.”
Dr. Chapman struggled, shaking his head, his blue eyes bulging in his careworn face. William went on, letting the good doc
suffer. He said, “Wouldn’t do, if it wasn’t important, see? More important than you can imagine. Just might save the world.”
The doctor kicked and flailed some more, then stilled.
William released him. The doctor scrambled away, his fingers testing the grip marks on his throat. In the meantime, William
went to Andrew’s bedside and started to sort through the various wires like a bomb tech searching for the grounding wire.
“You can’t,” the doctor said, sounding strangled. “You move him, he dies. The knife transected his liver. He nearly bled out.
I’m amazed he managed to regain consciousness.”
“If I don’t move him, we’ll all die,” William said quietly. What he said next didn’t come easy. “Please,” he said. “Help us.”
William glanced back at the doctor, who leaned, limp and breathless, against the glass wall of the ICU cubicle. He shook his
head slowly, then closed his eyes. “Last night was the worst I’ve seen, and I’ve loads. The knife that got him – what the hell
was it?”
“Bone dagger,” William answered, off-handedly.
“Right,” the doctor said. “So, his wasn’t the only injury caused by those… whatever they were…”
“Kostzchie Demons,” William put in.
“Oh, demons, well,” the doctor said. “Great lot of people died from those dagger things, and the poison, and these…
demons… they’ll be back, won’t they? They’ll come back at sundown and finish us off.”
“Or,” William said. “Worse.”
Dr. Chapman took a moment to study his shoes, the flecked linoleum of the hospital room floor, the edge of Andrew’s bed. He
stooped to retrieve his glasses.
Andrew’s eyes rolled loosely in his head. He said, “Dawn?”
“She’s fine, Andrew,” William said. “Got her mind around this insane notion of a plan…”
“Gotta tell her,” Andrew said, and to William’s and the doctor’s great disbelief, he tried to sit up. “Blood. We forgot a
way…” he said, but trailed off.
William seized Andrew by the shoulders and shook him, which the doctor protested out of human decency, but which fell on
William’s ignoring him.
He said, “I know about the blood, Andrew. That’s why you’ve got to be there. To stop her.”
Andrew batted limply at William. “Don’t wanna stop her. Not stop…” Andrew looked ashen pale, his lips cracked like
parchment paper, but his wide eyes were determined. “I wanna help.”
William stared at Andrew, unable to speak, or scream, which was what he really wanted to do. No, what he really wanted to
do involved two hands and Andrew’s scrawny neck…
When Andrew said, “Not her own. See?”
“Not her own what, you bloody git?”
This time Doctor Chapman did step in to keep William from harming the patient he’d labored so long to haul back from the
brink of death. William shoved away and stared into the corner.
The room seemed to hold its breath until Andrew said, listlessly, “Blood. Duh.”
William rolled his eyes and swore. “Thellian’s,” he snapped. “I know!”
Andrew’s forehead beaded with sweat as he strained to stay conscious. He said, “Not his, silly. Not… that.”
William said, “Uh, doc. ’S he on pain meds?”
“Lots,” Dr. Chapman said.
“Andrew,” William said through his teeth. “You’re not making any sense.”
Andrew’s eyes rolled. Gripping William’s sleeve, he said, “Her life’s not her own, Spike. Her blood, either.”
“Her… blood,” William said, remembering something. Remembering back when Buffy fought Glory, when she’d jumped off that
bloody tower. What had she said, about Dawn?
Andrew’s eyelashes fluttered. He muttered “Make it so” and went out like a light.
William spun on the doctor so fast the man flinched back, bringing his arms in front of his face.
“Blood, doc,” William said, his eyes bright.
“Great. Yeah,” Dr. Chapman said. “Whatever.”
“Car, too,” William was saying. “Can’t leave him here. Like you said, demons’ll return. Be safer with us.”
The doctor rounded Andrew’s bed so that he could look William directly in the eyes. He said, “I’ll lose my license for this. But
if things are bad as all that - won’t matter. Right?”
William was listening.
Dr. Chapman nodded, his decision made. “I might have something.”
“Car?” William asked.
Dr. Chapman’s smile appeared like a slash of teeth under his brushy moustache.
He said, “Even better.”
The faintly swiney scent of gunpowder and boiled sage wreathed the kitchen as Willow and Maya completed the incantation
to enchant the crystal ball the Council had given them. The spells were sketchy, Willow knew it, but when she looked across
the bar at Maya’s resolute face, she thought that together they just might have a chance at pulling it off.
Willow set the crystal into the crumbling velvet box that once held The Looking Glass. She felt a fluttery panic in her belly at
the thought of The Glass, anxiety akin to what she felt in school when she was sure she hadn’t finished editing the essay
that was due next period.
Maya, Little Miss Empathy, closed the box’s lid, smoothing her palms over its teakwood surface with a sense of finality. An
expression passed between them then that said whether they were ready or not they’d done all they could. When Xander
and Dawn came back, they would be set.
Before Willow could drift into the choppy seas of Xander thoughts, Giles stormed in, wearing his tight-lipped disappointed-in-
you face. He said, “Willow, why did you not tell me that Kenshi Wayara was dead?”
Willow thought she felt the temperature in the kitchen plummet. “It… I didn’t…” she began. “And you were… and then
Connor, all Lords a-Leaping. I’m sorry.”
Giles wrenched his glasses from his face. “Another Watcher, gone,” he said. “Another good man.”
Maya glanced away. “You knew him?” she asked.
Giles pinched the bridge of his nose, making his words sound nasal and watery. “When I learned of The First and its
intentions, I left The Council. I knew they would impede my efforts with their bureaucracy. Wayara harbored me, helped me
infiltrate The Council undetected,” Giles said. “I absconded with what little information I could, but without his aid, it would
have been nothing. Wayara was a true Watcher. He believed in balance between ours and the demon world, not its
eradication, which was the Council’s goal at the time.”
“Balance,” Willow said quietly, thinking of Thellian. “He mentioned that.”
Giles replaced his glasses. “Yes, well, there is more. No one in the Council or on earth knew more about the Looking Glass
than Kenshi Wayara.”
“Oh?” Willow said.
“And so we have no idea what’s become of the Glass,” Giles said.
Willow frowned. She felt she should say something, about how she tried to find Connor, how she felt guilty for having been
drawn to it, but secretly jealous that it had chosen him and not her. She said nothing.
Into the uncomfortable silence Giles said, “Not that it matters, in the end.” With a pained shrug, he left them to stare at
the assembled pieces of the rituals they would perform.
Willow picked up an amethyst crystal and rolled it between her palms. “Guess we know why Giles never pursued a career as a
motivational speaker,” she said, knowing that it was something Xander would have said, had he been here.
“He’s just…” Maya said.
“At the end of his rope?” Willow supplied. “At rock bottom? Deep in the pit? Captain of the HMS Titanic? Pick a cliché, that’s
pretty much where we are.”
“But it’ll work,” Maya said, dutifully packing spell bags, books, and crystals into her Hello Kitty messenger tote. “I know
they’re piecemeal, but the spells we made…” Maya’s enthusiasm wound down like a busted wristwatch. She raised her eyes
to Willow’s. “Is there any hope?” she asked.
Willow smiled at her. It was supposed to be encouraging, but she knew her terror was showing. “Of course,” she answered.
“Of course there is.”
Giles’ words hung in the air like a bank of snow-burdened clouds. Maya averted her gaze, and continued to pack.
Faith listened to Willow and Maya from the entry hall, her palms resting on the scuffed pine of Morna’s crate. At Willow’s
hollow attempt at reassurance, Faith turned away. She found Connor sitting up, staring absent-mindedly forward, his ratty
hair plastered to his narrow face.
Seeing him startled her, made her stomach somersault and her heart pound. She fought to conceal her excitement, which
left her feeling unsettled and disgusted with herself.
“Hey there, Scrapper,” she said, “Look at you, all vertical.”
Connor raised his eyes to hers. “Wayara,” he said.
Faith stared at him, said nothing. She schooled her features, keeping all of the mixed-up weirdness bottled inside.
“I killed him,” Connor confessed. His voice sounded vacant. He looked down at his hands. “I don’t know why, Faith. I don’t
even know how, but I did. All I remember is fire…” he looked up then, eyes aglow. “And you.”
Faith had to catch her breath. She knotted her fists against her thighs. She thought, no one should have eyes like his. She
understood vulnerability in that one unwavering gaze, and it scared her. Scared her bad. Demons, monsters: Faith had
those cornered. But she’d never encountered anything like him.
Connor tried to stand then; she could tell how that was gonna go. She caught him before he could sprawl like a felled tree on
the braided rug.
“Whoa now,” she said, making a circle of their arms. “I have nursing skills only of the naughty kind. Maybe you should…”
Connor snorted derisively. “I should what?”
She guided him back to the couch, and put him back there with a shove. “They’d all get it, y’know. If you wanted to bench
this one.”
Connor’s shoulders dropped. His hair curtained his face. She could see his labored breath through the rising and falling of his
bony ribcage. After a moment, he surprised her by taking her hand in his.
“You know I won’t do that, Faith,” he said hoarsely. He turned her hand in his and traced a finger along the lines in her
palms.
Her instinct was to pull away, to kick him in the face and run. She told instinct to fuck off.
“I know that,” she said.
Connor caught her eyes again. “So,” he said. “What’s the plan?”
Faith saw he was bone-tired and beaten thin, but there was something else, too. Took her a minute to figure it, but when
she had it, she felt a prickling of nausea. He felt guilty. Like he had to make up for something.
That was when she went ahead and let him in. In spite of all her instinct and solidarity, Faith risked telling Connor about
Spike’s plan.
“That’s it?” Rachel said.
“Basically,” Giles told her.
Rachel pushed her chair back against the bookshelf. “We’re boned,” she said.
“As fish.”
“I could try my Uncle Piers,” Rachel offered. “He specialized in the Mezzo-American mythos, but he might know something
about the Glass.”
“Certainly,” Giles said. “He might come in handy at fending off some of the less stalwart demons.”
Rachel chuckled. “He is rather austere.”
Giles stared at her long enough to make her shift uncomfortably. Then he said, “Rachel, there’s something I’ve been
meaning to say.”
Rachel eyed him obliquely. “Oh now don’t.”
“No. Let me,” Giles said. “There’s not been opportunity to adjust my will…”
Rachel stood abruptly, but the chair and the stack of Andrew’s books hemmed her in on one side, and Giles blocked the
other. Her eyes flashed. “Don’t.”
Giles went on as if he’d not heard her. “Everything I own, I’ve left to Buffy and Dawn,” he said. “But there is something you
should have.”
Rachel remained inert, her face leeched of expression, as Giles drew a pocket-sized envelope from the inside his tweed coat.
He shook it twice so that she could hear its contents rattle before he slid it across the glossy mahogany surface of the table.
At first she didn’t reach for it. Giles collapsed into his swivelly chair. He said, “In my office at the Watcher’s Council, there
is a wall safe. You will find the combination on a slip of paper in that envelope. You will also find a silver key, which fits into
the lock of a music box hidden within that safe.”
Rachel reached forward, her fingers itching to touch the worn paper of the lumpy little envelope. “What’s inside it?” she
asked.
Giles considered for a long while. He could feel the cold of his wound creeping into sinew and bone, turning the flesh to ice.
“Had I one wish,” he said. “I would ask for time. Such an abstraction, don’t you think?”
“Giles…”
“Take the key, Rachel,” he said. Giles turned, too quickly, and lurched in stumbling retreat into the entry hall where he
collided with Dawn, who had just entered with Xander. Dawn toppled into Xander and recoiled from him like he was on fire.
“S-sorry,” Giles muttered. He clutched her shoulder in a half-hug.
“Why does everything happen in the foyer?” Xander mused, his expression sour.
“Did you, um?” Giles began. He was sweaty and nervous, Xander noticed. Then he saw Rachel staring out at them through
the gathering gloom of the dining room. She wore the mask of the recently disappointed.
“I did,” Dawn said. “Is everyone ready?” she asked.
Giles opened his mouth to speak, but closed it again. He realized he didn’t know the answer to the question. There were so
many questions at this point, so many things he wanted to say.
Dawn shook her head, dismissing him. “Tell them to be ready. It’s almost dusk,” she said. “I have one more thing to take
care of,” she said.
Dawn loped up the stairs, mottled hair flying. Xander and Giles a moment of shared wonderment at how much Dawn had
sounded like Buffy, but both men said nothing. It was too painful at this point even to mention.
William found the hospital in simmering chaos. Doctors and nurses sprinting in all directions. Gurneys piled in hallways. People
moaning, writhing in pain, weeping. Buckets of blood, piss, vomit.
He was glad for once that he no longer possessed a vampire’s heightened sense of smell. Double-edged blade of it, though, he
couldn’t suss out the boy’s location by scent.
At the nurse’s station he found an old battle-axe the size of a baby elephant barking orders and answering calls. He
approached her, waiting with bridled impatience, while she finished a running list of commands to a peck of wild-eyed
personnel.
When she turned to him, he was ready. “Looking for a patient named Wells,” he said. “Came in yesterday roundabout night-
ish.”
“No visitors,” she snapped. She turned away. He gripped her slab of shoulder and turned her back around, his black coat
swirling menacingly.
“Not a visitor, pet,” he said, feeling that old tingle at the look of shock in her appleseed eyes. “’m family.”
Three minutes later, having learned there were no Andrew Wellses on the roster, William had a list of six John Does brought
in within the last 24-hours, things being crazy as they were. Two were in the morgue. The other four were in ICU, which
made sense to William. John Does stayed that way till someone named and claimed, or they regained consciousness and
claimed themselves.
William thanked her genuinely, then left.
He checked the morgue first, his eyes watering with relief (maybe formaldehyde) at not finding the boy there. He then went
up to the fifth floor, with its glassed-in rooms like aquariums, where he found Andrew asleep within a cocoon of wires and
tubes.
And what was it William felt upon entering Andrew’s room? Pain, sure. Lad looked like he’d been ground as hamburger and fed
to lions. Anger – check – at Harris for chucking the boy out in the first place, and an undercurrent of sullen irritation like an
itch he couldn’t quite scratch.
But there was something else. Something that coaxed tears to his eyes. William stood, warring with whatever it was, the
fingers of one hand pressed to his eyelids, when Andrew awoke.
“Hey, Spike,” he whispered. “You came to visit? That is so sweet.”
Well, that was encouraging, William thought. He scanned the hallway for a wheelchair, when Dr. Chapman appeared from
around the corner, his black hair and beard greasy and poking out at odd angles. His face at seeing William was not one
you'd call replete with glee.
The doctor dithered in the hallway, like he was thinking of calling security. Instead, he said, “You can’t be here.”
“People say that, yet here I am,” William said, “’Sides, he’s awake.”
“What?” Dr. Chapman brushed by William, leaving a wake of sweat and black coffee. Soon as he was in the room, William
casually shut the door. Realizing too late he’d been trapped, the doctor wheeled around to confront him.
“What’s this, then?” he said, his bravado sounding plaintive. “Gonna hold me ransom?”
William dropped the blinds on the window with a snick.
The doctor went on, voice verging on panic. “Something odd about you lot. Girl that brought ’im in pulled a David Blaine, now
here you are: Clearly abnormal. What is going on?”
William considered. Andrew was still conscious but only just. He parted the blinds and studied the contrast between the
topsy-turvy ER and the relatively sedate ICU. He said, “You got a car, doc?”
The doctor blinked, incredulous. “That’s a way to answer none of my questions.”
“Spike…” Andrew moaned.
“Your name is Spike,” the doctor said flatly. “Brilliant.”
William strong-armed the doctor to the wall, knocking his horn-rims across the floor. “Look, much as I enjoy a good banter,
I needta take the boy home.”
“None doing,” the doctor began. “It’s impossi…”
William cut him off by clamping down on his vocal cords. “It’s not impossible, doc. You’re coming with me.”
Dr. Chapman struggled, shaking his head, his blue eyes bulging in his careworn face. William went on, letting the good doc
suffer. He said, “Wouldn’t do, if it wasn’t important, see? More important than you can imagine. Just might save the world.”
The doctor kicked and flailed some more, then stilled.
William released him. The doctor scrambled away, his fingers testing the grip marks on his throat. In the meantime, William
went to Andrew’s bedside and started to sort through the various wires like a bomb tech searching for the grounding wire.
“You can’t,” the doctor said, sounding strangled. “You move him, he dies. The knife transected his liver. He nearly bled out.
I’m amazed he managed to regain consciousness.”
“If I don’t move him, we’ll all die,” William said quietly. What he said next didn’t come easy. “Please,” he said. “Help us.”
William glanced back at the doctor, who leaned, limp and breathless, against the glass wall of the ICU cubicle. He shook his
head slowly, then closed his eyes. “Last night was the worst I’ve seen, and I’ve loads. The knife that got him – what the hell
was it?”
“Bone dagger,” William answered, off-handedly.
“Right,” the doctor said. “So, his wasn’t the only injury caused by those… whatever they were…”
“Kostzchie Demons,” William put in.
“Oh, demons, well,” the doctor said. “Great lot of people died from those dagger things, and the poison, and these…
demons… they’ll be back, won’t they? They’ll come back at sundown and finish us off.”
“Or,” William said. “Worse.”
Dr. Chapman took a moment to study his shoes, the flecked linoleum of the hospital room floor, the edge of Andrew’s bed. He
stooped to retrieve his glasses.
Andrew’s eyes rolled loosely in his head. He said, “Dawn?”
“She’s fine, Andrew,” William said. “Got her mind around this insane notion of a plan…”
“Gotta tell her,” Andrew said, and to William’s and the doctor’s great disbelief, he tried to sit up. “Blood. We forgot a
way…” he said, but trailed off.
William seized Andrew by the shoulders and shook him, which the doctor protested out of human decency, but which fell on
William’s ignoring him.
He said, “I know about the blood, Andrew. That’s why you’ve got to be there. To stop her.”
Andrew batted limply at William. “Don’t wanna stop her. Not stop…” Andrew looked ashen pale, his lips cracked like
parchment paper, but his wide eyes were determined. “I wanna help.”
William stared at Andrew, unable to speak, or scream, which was what he really wanted to do. No, what he really wanted to
do involved two hands and Andrew’s scrawny neck…
When Andrew said, “Not her own. See?”
“Not her own what, you bloody git?”
This time Doctor Chapman did step in to keep William from harming the patient he’d labored so long to haul back from the
brink of death. William shoved away and stared into the corner.
The room seemed to hold its breath until Andrew said, listlessly, “Blood. Duh.”
William rolled his eyes and swore. “Thellian’s,” he snapped. “I know!”
Andrew’s forehead beaded with sweat as he strained to stay conscious. He said, “Not his, silly. Not… that.”
William said, “Uh, doc. ’S he on pain meds?”
“Lots,” Dr. Chapman said.
“Andrew,” William said through his teeth. “You’re not making any sense.”
Andrew’s eyes rolled. Gripping William’s sleeve, he said, “Her life’s not her own, Spike. Her blood, either.”
“Her… blood,” William said, remembering something. Remembering back when Buffy fought Glory, when she’d jumped off that
bloody tower. What had she said, about Dawn?
Andrew’s eyelashes fluttered. He muttered “Make it so” and went out like a light.
William spun on the doctor so fast the man flinched back, bringing his arms in front of his face.
“Blood, doc,” William said, his eyes bright.
“Great. Yeah,” Dr. Chapman said. “Whatever.”
“Car, too,” William was saying. “Can’t leave him here. Like you said, demons’ll return. Be safer with us.”
The doctor rounded Andrew’s bed so that he could look William directly in the eyes. He said, “I’ll lose my license for this. But
if things are bad as all that - won’t matter. Right?”
William was listening.
Dr. Chapman nodded, his decision made. “I might have something.”
“Car?” William asked.
Dr. Chapman’s smile appeared like a slash of teeth under his brushy moustache.
He said, “Even better.”
The faintly swiney scent of gunpowder and boiled sage wreathed the kitchen as Willow and Maya completed the incantation
to enchant the crystal ball the Council had given them. The spells were sketchy, Willow knew it, but when she looked across
the bar at Maya’s resolute face, she thought that together they just might have a chance at pulling it off.
Willow set the crystal into the crumbling velvet box that once held The Looking Glass. She felt a fluttery panic in her belly at
the thought of The Glass, anxiety akin to what she felt in school when she was sure she hadn’t finished editing the essay
that was due next period.
Maya, Little Miss Empathy, closed the box’s lid, smoothing her palms over its teakwood surface with a sense of finality. An
expression passed between them then that said whether they were ready or not they’d done all they could. When Xander
and Dawn came back, they would be set.
Before Willow could drift into the choppy seas of Xander thoughts, Giles stormed in, wearing his tight-lipped disappointed-in-
you face. He said, “Willow, why did you not tell me that Kenshi Wayara was dead?”
Willow thought she felt the temperature in the kitchen plummet. “It… I didn’t…” she began. “And you were… and then
Connor, all Lords a-Leaping. I’m sorry.”
Giles wrenched his glasses from his face. “Another Watcher, gone,” he said. “Another good man.”
Maya glanced away. “You knew him?” she asked.
Giles pinched the bridge of his nose, making his words sound nasal and watery. “When I learned of The First and its
intentions, I left The Council. I knew they would impede my efforts with their bureaucracy. Wayara harbored me, helped me
infiltrate The Council undetected,” Giles said. “I absconded with what little information I could, but without his aid, it would
have been nothing. Wayara was a true Watcher. He believed in balance between ours and the demon world, not its
eradication, which was the Council’s goal at the time.”
“Balance,” Willow said quietly, thinking of Thellian. “He mentioned that.”
Giles replaced his glasses. “Yes, well, there is more. No one in the Council or on earth knew more about the Looking Glass
than Kenshi Wayara.”
“Oh?” Willow said.
“And so we have no idea what’s become of the Glass,” Giles said.
Willow frowned. She felt she should say something, about how she tried to find Connor, how she felt guilty for having been
drawn to it, but secretly jealous that it had chosen him and not her. She said nothing.
Into the uncomfortable silence Giles said, “Not that it matters, in the end.” With a pained shrug, he left them to stare at
the assembled pieces of the rituals they would perform.
Willow picked up an amethyst crystal and rolled it between her palms. “Guess we know why Giles never pursued a career as a
motivational speaker,” she said, knowing that it was something Xander would have said, had he been here.
“He’s just…” Maya said.
“At the end of his rope?” Willow supplied. “At rock bottom? Deep in the pit? Captain of the HMS Titanic? Pick a cliché, that’s
pretty much where we are.”
“But it’ll work,” Maya said, dutifully packing spell bags, books, and crystals into her Hello Kitty messenger tote. “I know
they’re piecemeal, but the spells we made…” Maya’s enthusiasm wound down like a busted wristwatch. She raised her eyes
to Willow’s. “Is there any hope?” she asked.
Willow smiled at her. It was supposed to be encouraging, but she knew her terror was showing. “Of course,” she answered.
“Of course there is.”
Giles’ words hung in the air like a bank of snow-burdened clouds. Maya averted her gaze, and continued to pack.
Faith listened to Willow and Maya from the entry hall, her palms resting on the scuffed pine of Morna’s crate. At Willow’s
hollow attempt at reassurance, Faith turned away. She found Connor sitting up, staring absent-mindedly forward, his ratty
hair plastered to his narrow face.
Seeing him startled her, made her stomach somersault and her heart pound. She fought to conceal her excitement, which
left her feeling unsettled and disgusted with herself.
“Hey there, Scrapper,” she said, “Look at you, all vertical.”
Connor raised his eyes to hers. “Wayara,” he said.
Faith stared at him, said nothing. She schooled her features, keeping all of the mixed-up weirdness bottled inside.
“I killed him,” Connor confessed. His voice sounded vacant. He looked down at his hands. “I don’t know why, Faith. I don’t
even know how, but I did. All I remember is fire…” he looked up then, eyes aglow. “And you.”
Faith had to catch her breath. She knotted her fists against her thighs. She thought, no one should have eyes like his. She
understood vulnerability in that one unwavering gaze, and it scared her. Scared her bad. Demons, monsters: Faith had
those cornered. But she’d never encountered anything like him.
Connor tried to stand then; she could tell how that was gonna go. She caught him before he could sprawl like a felled tree on
the braided rug.
“Whoa now,” she said, making a circle of their arms. “I have nursing skills only of the naughty kind. Maybe you should…”
Connor snorted derisively. “I should what?”
She guided him back to the couch, and put him back there with a shove. “They’d all get it, y’know. If you wanted to bench
this one.”
Connor’s shoulders dropped. His hair curtained his face. She could see his labored breath through the rising and falling of his
bony ribcage. After a moment, he surprised her by taking her hand in his.
“You know I won’t do that, Faith,” he said hoarsely. He turned her hand in his and traced a finger along the lines in her
palms.
Her instinct was to pull away, to kick him in the face and run. She told instinct to fuck off.
“I know that,” she said.
Connor caught her eyes again. “So,” he said. “What’s the plan?”
Faith saw he was bone-tired and beaten thin, but there was something else, too. Took her a minute to figure it, but when
she had it, she felt a prickling of nausea. He felt guilty. Like he had to make up for something.
That was when she went ahead and let him in. In spite of all her instinct and solidarity, Faith risked telling Connor about
Spike’s plan.
“That’s it?” Rachel said.
“Basically,” Giles told her.
Rachel pushed her chair back against the bookshelf. “We’re boned,” she said.
“As fish.”
“I could try my Uncle Piers,” Rachel offered. “He specialized in the Mezzo-American mythos, but he might know something
about the Glass.”
“Certainly,” Giles said. “He might come in handy at fending off some of the less stalwart demons.”
Rachel chuckled. “He is rather austere.”
Giles stared at her long enough to make her shift uncomfortably. Then he said, “Rachel, there’s something I’ve been
meaning to say.”
Rachel eyed him obliquely. “Oh now don’t.”
“No. Let me,” Giles said. “There’s not been opportunity to adjust my will…”
Rachel stood abruptly, but the chair and the stack of Andrew’s books hemmed her in on one side, and Giles blocked the
other. Her eyes flashed. “Don’t.”
Giles went on as if he’d not heard her. “Everything I own, I’ve left to Buffy and Dawn,” he said. “But there is something you
should have.”
Rachel remained inert, her face leeched of expression, as Giles drew a pocket-sized envelope from the inside his tweed coat.
He shook it twice so that she could hear its contents rattle before he slid it across the glossy mahogany surface of the table.
At first she didn’t reach for it. Giles collapsed into his swivelly chair. He said, “In my office at the Watcher’s Council, there
is a wall safe. You will find the combination on a slip of paper in that envelope. You will also find a silver key, which fits into
the lock of a music box hidden within that safe.”
Rachel reached forward, her fingers itching to touch the worn paper of the lumpy little envelope. “What’s inside it?” she
asked.
Giles considered for a long while. He could feel the cold of his wound creeping into sinew and bone, turning the flesh to ice.
“Had I one wish,” he said. “I would ask for time. Such an abstraction, don’t you think?”
“Giles…”
“Take the key, Rachel,” he said. Giles turned, too quickly, and lurched in stumbling retreat into the entry hall where he
collided with Dawn, who had just entered with Xander. Dawn toppled into Xander and recoiled from him like he was on fire.
“S-sorry,” Giles muttered. He clutched her shoulder in a half-hug.
“Why does everything happen in the foyer?” Xander mused, his expression sour.
“Did you, um?” Giles began. He was sweaty and nervous, Xander noticed. Then he saw Rachel staring out at them through
the gathering gloom of the dining room. She wore the mask of the recently disappointed.
“I did,” Dawn said. “Is everyone ready?” she asked.
Giles opened his mouth to speak, but closed it again. He realized he didn’t know the answer to the question. There were so
many questions at this point, so many things he wanted to say.
Dawn shook her head, dismissing him. “Tell them to be ready. It’s almost dusk,” she said. “I have one more thing to take
care of,” she said.
Dawn loped up the stairs, mottled hair flying. Xander and Giles a moment of shared wonderment at how much Dawn had
sounded like Buffy, but both men said nothing. It was too painful at this point even to mention.
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.Chapter Index.
Anywhere Out
of This World
Blood, Pressure
The Drawing Board
All's Well
Anywhere Out of
This World
Mourning Sickness
Welcome to Hell
Relative
Matters of Time
& Fishes
International Calls
Empty as Houses
Lusty Wrong Feelings
Enthralled
Thanksgiving
Seduced
Innocents Lost
Burn
Flashback
Not A Chance In Hell
Empty Rooms
Two Roads Diverged
Starfall
Blindsided
Not Her Own
Outta Here
The Valley of the
Shadow of Death
Comes the Rain
Smoke and Mirrors
Drawn to You
Team Angel
By Fire Reborn
Salvage
Ashes to Ashes
Life Is...
With A Little Help
Appearances Deceiving
Familiarity
Sweetness
Not All Who Wander
That Old Black Magic
For Lorne
Drawn Together
Lost to Sand
Fall of Triumvirate
Parallel Lives
The Lovers
Avenger
Double Cross
Pursuit
Ripper's Girl
Pandemonium
Negative Space
Raveled Threads
Asunder
Human Hands
Singular
Fragmented
Symmetry
Plans
Rogue Squadron
Legends
Mea Culpa
Things Unsaid
Home Sweet Gone
Eleventh Hour
Last Call
Anywhere Out
of This World
Blood, Pressure
The Drawing Board
All's Well
Anywhere Out of
This World
Mourning Sickness
Welcome to Hell
Relative
Matters of Time
& Fishes
International Calls
Empty as Houses
Lusty Wrong Feelings
Enthralled
Thanksgiving
Seduced
Innocents Lost
Burn
Flashback
Not A Chance In Hell
Empty Rooms
Two Roads Diverged
Starfall
Blindsided
Not Her Own
Outta Here
The Valley of the
Shadow of Death
Comes the Rain
Smoke and Mirrors
Drawn to You
Team Angel
By Fire Reborn
Salvage
Ashes to Ashes
Life Is...
With A Little Help
Appearances Deceiving
Familiarity
Sweetness
Not All Who Wander
That Old Black Magic
For Lorne
Drawn Together
Lost to Sand
Fall of Triumvirate
Parallel Lives
The Lovers
Avenger
Double Cross
Pursuit
Ripper's Girl
Pandemonium
Negative Space
Raveled Threads
Asunder
Human Hands
Singular
Fragmented
Symmetry
Plans
Rogue Squadron
Legends
Mea Culpa
Things Unsaid
Home Sweet Gone
Eleventh Hour
Last Call
Warning: This chapter receives a PG-13 rating for profanity.
.Chapter Index.
Anywhere Out
of This World
Blood, Pressure
The Drawing Board
All's Well
Anywhere Out of
This World
Mourning Sickness
Welcome to Hell
Relative
Matters of Time
& Fishes
International Calls
Empty as Houses
Lusty Wrong Feelings
Enthralled
Thanksgiving
Seduced
Innocents Lost
Burn
Flashback
Not A Chance In Hell
Empty Rooms
Two Roads Diverged
Starfall
Blindsided
Not Her Own
Outta Here
The Valley of the
Shadow of Death
Comes the Rain
Smoke and Mirrors
Drawn to You
Team Angel
By Fire Reborn
Salvage
Ashes to Ashes
Life Is...
With A Little Help
Appearances Deceiving
Familiarity
Sweetness
Not All Who Wander
That Old Black Magic
For Lorne
Drawn Together
Lost to Sand
Fall of Triumvirate
Parallel Lives
The Lovers
Avenger
Double Cross
Pursuit
Ripper's Girl
Pandemonium
Negative Space
Raveled Threads
Asunder
Human Hands
Singular
Fragmented
Symmetry
Plans
Rogue Squadron
Legends
Mea Culpa
Things Unsaid
Home Sweet Gone
Eleventh Hour
Last Call
Time Is Running Out
Primal
Anywhere Out
of This World
Blood, Pressure
The Drawing Board
All's Well
Anywhere Out of
This World
Mourning Sickness
Welcome to Hell
Relative
Matters of Time
& Fishes
International Calls
Empty as Houses
Lusty Wrong Feelings
Enthralled
Thanksgiving
Seduced
Innocents Lost
Burn
Flashback
Not A Chance In Hell
Empty Rooms
Two Roads Diverged
Starfall
Blindsided
Not Her Own
Outta Here
The Valley of the
Shadow of Death
Comes the Rain
Smoke and Mirrors
Drawn to You
Team Angel
By Fire Reborn
Salvage
Ashes to Ashes
Life Is...
With A Little Help
Appearances Deceiving
Familiarity
Sweetness
Not All Who Wander
That Old Black Magic
For Lorne
Drawn Together
Lost to Sand
Fall of Triumvirate
Parallel Lives
The Lovers
Avenger
Double Cross
Pursuit
Ripper's Girl
Pandemonium
Negative Space
Raveled Threads
Asunder
Human Hands
Singular
Fragmented
Symmetry
Plans
Rogue Squadron
Legends
Mea Culpa
Things Unsaid
Home Sweet Gone
Eleventh Hour
Last Call
Time Is Running Out
Primal