What If, Books: Prologue
A/N: This is a new series I am working on, which is a spin-off from a series I've already started. Confused? Me, too. This story takes place in the FAA-verse, several years after that story, and it's sequel. You'll see when the timelines match up. The rest of the series will be made up of rather disconnected AU stories, most going back to BtVS Series cannon. I will also reference other fanfic, with the permission of the author. Hope you enjoy!
Creation
Buffy threw herself back in her chair and spun it around, giggling. She didn't remember the last time she'd been this drunk. Probably in Spike's crypt, in Sunnydale. Boy howdy, he was gonna kill her when he saw how drunk she was. "I miss that crypt." Buffy mumbled to herself, taking another sip of wine. Wine was such a beautiful beverage…
Willow squinted, trying to make blurry-Buffy come into focus. "You miss the crypt? You have mister heartbeat upstairs, waiting in your nest-y, love nest of love, and you miss the crypt? Huh, I say unto you."
Buffy giggled again, drunk Willow was really very amusing. "Was just thinking, 'bout memories and stuff. Remembering."
Willow nodded, somehow managing to look thoughtful, even though she was barely following the conversation. They'd been talking about Sunnydale ever since the others went off to bed. Strange as it might seem for two people who had been friends for almost nine years, this was the first time in years they had sat down to just talk and hang out. With a little, okay a lot, of wine to loosen their tongues, it had been enlightening.
"You remember Anya's alternate universe theory." Buffy broke the lull in the conversation, not quite ready to subside into silence and head upstairs. "You know, 'say you really like shrimp, or you really hate shrimp'?" Buffy giggled at the memory of how badly Anya had botched that explanation. Then she subsided into thoughtful silence. "Do you ever wonder about how different things would be, if things were different? Like, vamp Willow versus you? And other stuff. Do you think there's a universe where I dusted Spike?"
Willow wasn't sure where Buffy's mind was going, but it was very easy to hear the worry in her friend's voice regarding that last point. She hoped this wouldn't lead Buffy to feel guilty for what she might have done in another reality. "I think anything is possible. And sure, I wonder about stuff. Like, what if Tara had lived, or if I hadn't taken you out of Heaven. But, there's no use worrying about it. I mean, every decision we make changes the world. And not in a big way, like saving the world. Like, if we weren't drinking right now, this whole conversation would be different."
Both drunken friends lapsed into silence as they tried to wrap their minds around wondering what they would be talking about if they hadn't started drinking. Buffy figured she'd have headed up to bed already; Willow was trying to figure out the exact point in the conversation where alcohol had begun to affect her judgment.
"But, you know…" Buffy took up the thread of the abandoned conversation. "Don't you ever wish you knew, you know? Like, if you could not really, really see the world different, but maybe see it on TV, or read about it in a book or something. I think that would be neat. I'd like to hear the story of what would have happened to William if Emily lived longer, or what life would have been like for us all if Mom had lived longer…" Buffy nodded and rewound the last few sentences in her mind, to see if they made sense. "Wow, my imagination is really morbid."
Willow couldn't help but giggle, because to her drunken mind, the Slayer's sudden concern with morbidity was highly amusing. Despite the wine, and the slight case of blurry vision, she had picked up enough of what Buffy was trying to say to have an idea. "So, what you're saying is, if there were a way to peek into other realities, or other versions of our world, you would be interested?"
"Totally!" Buffy bounced in her chair in her excitement, and bounced so hard she landed right on her ass on the floor. Between the wine-induced numbness and her Slayer constitution, the fall was more amusing than painful, and the blonde popped right back up, and seated herself more carefully.
Willow got a good chuckle out of Buffy's clumsiness, but now that the idea was planted in her head, it refused to be routed out. Willow refilled her glass of wine, groaning as they hit the bottom of yet another bottle, and stumbled over to the cabinet where extra office supplies were kept. She grabbed two pads of paper, and a box of black pens, and carefully returned her precious cargo to the table between herself and her friend, next to their glasses and bottles.
Willow carefully wrote down all of the questions they'd had so far, and looked for common threads. The most obvious was that they could all be traced to people's decisions. Warren's decision to shoot at Buffy, Emily's decision to rush into that nest of vampires, Buffy's decision not to stake Spike, and a whole bunch of other decisions that could have been made differently. She took another sip from her rapidly diminishing glass of wine as she looked over the list, trying to piece together her idea and Buffy's suggestion into something concrete they could do to get their questions answered.
While Willow was occupied with her staring, Buffy snatched up the other pad of paper and started writing out questions she'd always wanted to know the answers to. She'd filled an entire page with questions before she got thirsty again, and reached for her wine glass. Barely looking up from the paper, Buffy tilted her glass up, and choked when she swallowed a gulp of air. She frowned as she sputtered, and glared at the empty glass as though it had done something wrong. When she grabbed the bottle and poured it into her glass, she squealed in frustration when nothing came out.
"Need more wine." Buffy groaned, lurching to her feet and heading towards the kitchen and Liam's wine rack. She supposed that she should feel bad; after all, she and Willow hadn't asked if they could open another bottle, and they were about to open number four. Lee was gonna be as pissed at her as William. And she could only imagine Giles' reaction to a hung-over Slayer at breakfast tomorrow… Buffy groaned, and grabbed another bottle before she could second guess herself, spinning on her heel to return to Willow in the conference room. Why were they in the conference room, anyway? The game room, or the lounge, would have been much more comfortable.
When Buffy returned with the freshly opened bottle, Willow was frantically scribbling on her pad, a maniacal grin on her flushed face. Buffy suddenly remembered what she'd asked Willow earlier, and worried that Willow would accidentally suck the world into an alternate reality. After all, weird things had been known to happen on Hellmouths, and they were sitting right on top of a freshly formed mystical rift.
"Hey, um Wills, maybe we should table this idea until we're a little more sober?" Buffy sank carefully into her seat, remembering her earlier fall.
"Sure, if you want." Willow replied absently, and continued her scribbling. "It's just, now that you've got me thinking about it, I came up with the best idea for a spell, and I want to write it all down before I forget it. You see, I was thinking that every decision we make has the power to change the universe, right? Like that saying about the butterfly flapping his wings? So, if I word this specifically enough, and ask for an account of what would happen based on one decision, and ask for the story to be put in writing, then I think we can do what you asked." Willow continued her scribbling. "The only problem I've come up against so far, is that I'm not sure which goddess to ask for permission in the casting."
Buffy quirked her eyebrow at Willow. She figured it was a mark of her friend's magical maturity that her first concern was making sure the universe wasn't going to slap her for arrogance. It was weird to hear her friend talk about writing a spell; Buffy usually wasn't involved in these conversations. She so didn't know how to help, or if she should feel okay with Willow doing anything at all; but she really was curious about things, and if Willow could find a nice safe way to get answers, then so much the better. "Um, so, like, this won't actually create an alternate universe, will it? Or, the stories won't just keep writing themselves, will they? They'll need to end at some point, otherwise we'll be over-run with new books for all of eternity."
"No, this won't create a universe, it'll record the shadow, the 'what might have been', of a universe that was never created." Willow glanced up at her friend, and watched Buffy nervously pour herself a glass of wine and take a sip. "Good point, though, about the never-ending stories. I'll make sure I said something about that." Willow nodded, and flipped back to the start of her notes. She read her ideas out loud, and they discovered that she had, in fact, forgotten to mention ending the books at some point. Willow also explained to Buffy why her TV idea wouldn't work correctly, not to mention that it might embarrass people to see themselves in compromising positions.
The more they talked about it, the more excited Buffy got. If her ass wasn't starting to hurt from her earlier bounce out of her chair, she would have bounced again in her excitement. Willow decided that they needed to meditate, to feel which influences would work on the spell, and Buffy cheerfully agreed to help. The girls crawled under the huge table with their notebooks and glasses, and settled facing one another tailor-style in the very center of the room. Buffy laughed at their position, a giddy smile filling her face. "This is just like what Will and I do when we reconnect to each other." Buffy explained to her friend.
Willow frowned in surprise. She'd never really spoken to Buffy in depth about her mating, and she wondered if she would ever fully understand it. Before she had a chance to question, Buffy grabbed her friend's hands and positioned them. "Here, I'll show you." Buffy took Willow's left hand in her right, then frowned. "Wait, you're right-handed, right?" Willow nodded, watching Buffy's face as she pondered how to do this, whatever it was. Willow snickered when Buffy shook hands with herself, frowning as she examined the way her hands fit together.
After a minute, Buffy repositioned Willow's hands, then carefully clasped them in her own, so that their palms were pressed together. Willow was surprised to feel a slight frission of power as Buffy clasped her wrists, and encouraged her friend to mimic the position of her hands. Once Buffy was satisfied by the position of their hands, she leaned forward, closing her eyes. "Lean forward until your forehead is pressed against mine, and close your eyes." Buffy instructed quietly. Willow nodded, and leaned forward carefully, so that she didn't head-butt her friend. There was a little smack as they made contact, but not enough to really hurt; although, that could have been the numbing effect of drunkenness.
Once she was in position, Willow took a deep breath, and closed her eyes. Through her hands and her head, she could feel Buffy's mystical power flowing through her, and as she focused on her meditation, she connected with a jolt to the powers of the Slayer; it was like she could feel every part of the Slayer line, all the way back to the first, the primeval she'd met in a nightmare what felt like a lifetime ago.
Willow focused on the information she was trying to get, on how to safely discover the answers to their questions, on how to get the information into book form, on not disturbing the fabric of this universe, while she cast for the shadows of its possible offshoots. As she centered herself, and searched for the knowledge within the earth, Willow was surrounded and guided by the power of the Slayer tribe.
In addition to the knowledge she had set out to discover, she suddenly knew so much more about the Slayers she'd created. She gained a huge insight into just what she'd done when she 'created' them; except that it was more like she'd freed them. With the knowledge of all the Slayers, she saw the world changing, and regained the lost knowledge of how the first Slayer came into being. She searched for, and found, the creation of the shadow world Buffy had gone into in Sunnydale, the one Nikki Wood had gained possession of from her Watcher. She knew the truth, and also the spell that had created that particular alternate universe.
With a final sigh, and the blessing of a Goddess Willow only knew to call Athena, she pulled back from Buffy, first tipping her head away, then releasing her fingers. She knew innately to release the fingers of her non-dominant hand first.
When Willow opened her eyes, Buffy was staring back at her with tears in her eyes. "Willow, did you see that?" Buffy whispered, awe tingeing her words. Willow nodded, unable to speak past the lump in her throat.
Buffy scooted back a little, and grabbed the pad she'd started to write questions on. She began ripping the paper into strips, one question on each, and placing them between herself and Willow. After a minute of recovery, Willow grabbed the other pad and began to do the same. Once those questions were in a pile together, they each wrote down a few more. Fifty questions, each based on a decision made by someone who had touched their lives. Some of the earlier questions had to be re-written, to reflect their new understanding, but most of them had been worded correctly the first time.
Once the pile was done, they joined hands again over it, palms together, in the position Buffy had instigated earlier. They chanted together the words Athena had given them, with gratitude in their hearts for their new understanding, and their continued enlightenment. Once they finished, Buffy and Willow each pushed away from the pile, and, abandoning their wine glasses, they crawled out from under the table with their notebooks.
Once they emerged, the friends said their good-nights, and Buffy handed Willow her notepad and pen before heading up to her fiancé and their bed. Willow took both pads and pens, and after a moment of deliberation, walked down the side corridor in the opposite direction. Once she reached the elevator, she took it up to the penthouse floor, and headed to Merry's room. It was imposing, especially since they had agreed not to start anything while they were living in different countries, but she needed to be held tonight. Enlightenment was swell and all, but between the knowledge and the alcohol, she was wrung out.
The Morning After
William preceded Buffy into the dining hall the following morning, still trying to decide whether he was more pissed at her or concerned for her welfare. He'd woken up to a Buffy who reeked of red wine and magick, and in his mind neither was a good thing. The next few weeks would be very busy, and with the new Hellmouth opening the Slayers would all be wrung out. She couldn't afford to be off her game right now, or to take stupid risks with magick. He still had no idea what she and Red had got up to the night before, but once he got rid of her headache, damn if he wasn't going to find out.
Buffy waved and offered pained smiles to the students who greeted her, as she wove her still-a-bit-drunken way through the room to one of the faculty tables. She dropped into her chair with a groan, then winced as Liam moved to sit across from her. "So, I walked through the conference room this morning, and imagine my surprise to find three more empty wine bottles than there were when I went to bed." He arched his eyebrows, taking in Buffy's pale complexion and pained grimace.
"Yeah, sorry about that. We kinda got carried away, with the reminiscing, and when our glasses ran out, we just kinda decided to open another bottle. And then another, and…"
He smiled at her apologetic panic, and stopped her with a placating hand motion. "Hey, it's no sweat. I mean, yeah, I'm a little pissed that you didn't ask, and I was saving one of those bottles for dinner on Friday; but trust me, your pain is enough to make up for it." He smiled boyishly, and Buffy stopped being apologetic and got a little pissed.
Before she could reply, Colleen came up behind her boyfriend, and smacked him in the back of the head. "Liam Michael, you leave Buffy alone. The poor girl said she was sorry. Let it go." He rubbed his head and shrugged.
"Sorry, Buf." He sighed, looking over at Colleen from the corner of his eye. "Force of habit, I guess."
Buffy nodded, because it was nice of her to give him a little leeway, and she didn't have the energy to fight this morning. "Hey, Buffy." She looked over at Colleen, who was practically inhaling a ham and cheese omelet. Wow, she needed food, Buffy thought as her stomach growled. "What's up with the big pile of books under the table? What, did you guys get drunk and raid the library, or something?" Colleen giggled.
William came up behind Buffy in just enough time to hear the question, which pinged in the back of his mind as somehow connected to the magick he'd smelled on Buffy. After all, as far as he knew, and he knew her pretty well, there was no way in hell she'd get drunk and go on a reading spree. He'd given in to his concern for her welfare, and had gotten her a huge mug of coffee, and filled a plate, both of which he put in front of her before taking his own seat. Buffy smiled her gratitude, and sipped at the coffee. Then, she realized what Colleen had said. "Ooh, there's books already?" She bounced a little in excitement. "That's so great, I thought it would be a day or two before they showed up!" Buffy lifted her fork and started shoveling in her own eggs, which were just scrambled with cheese.
Once she'd gotten some nourishment into her, and William had made a good start on his own plate, he re-started the conversation. "Not to be a nag, love, but what the bloody hell were you two doing last night that you're making books appear?"
"Ooh, ooh, are you guys recovering the library at Alexandria?" Colleen started bouncing in excitement herself, and Buffy rolled her eyes; just her luck that most of her closest friends were really big academic geeks. It made her feel dumb, sometimes. Although, that reference she knew well.
Buffy chuckled. "No such luck, oh learned one. Willow and I kinda did this thing last night, where we asked questions, and the books answer them." Buffy looked over the rim of her coffee cup, at three confused faces. "It's really no big. We were going to do it today after we'd sobered up, but last night we meditated, because Willow wanted to know if it was possible to do what we did, and we were visited by this warrior-goddess, who said the best time to get our answers was right then, so we did it right then. But, we figured it would take a few days for fifty books to write themselves." Buffy frowned and looked at her watch. "I didn't think they'd all be done in a few hours."
"Fifty?" Liam arched an eyebrow at her. "You guys sure had a lot of questions."
"Yeah, what the heck were you ladies so nosy about, anyway?" Colleen did her Groucho Marx impression, which made Buffy giggle as usual.
Buffy shrugged. "Lots of things, well obviously, you know, fifty things." The other three chuckled at her, and Buffy rolled her eyes. "Hey, has anyone seen Willow this morning? I'd like to wait until she's with me to check on the books; she's the one who knows all about the spell stuff, you know?"
Colleen cleared her throat, and turned to her boyfriend with big green eyes. "Liam, my Angel, could you please get me some more coffee?" She batted her eyelashes and held out her mug; and sure enough, Liam turned into a big hunk of goo, and rushed off to do her bidding. As soon as he was a few steps from the table, Colleen turned back to Buffy, and leaned across the table so she could whisper. "She went up to Merry's room last night, and she was sick this morning, so Merry asked Chas to look after her while she went to class. She should still be up in the penthouse."
"And why don't we want the big lunk to know about this?" William whispered, leaning towards the girls.
"Because, he and Merry were arguing yesterday about the kind of example she sets for the students by having such a…Varied personal life, and I don't want to set him off again. It's bad for his blood pressure." Colleen blushed a little; the last thing she wanted was to tell two of Merry's best friends that her boy had basically called Merry a whore. That would just start another unpleasant fight, and she really hated fighting. At least, the kind that involved yelling.
William growled a little, probably reading between the lines, and Buffy coed and rubbed the back of his head to calm him. "Spike, hush, baby. It's not worth getting worked up over. Merry can fight her own battles." He calmed down, but neither girl trusted him not to pick a fight with Liam. "Come on, let's go check on Red." Buffy pulled her slightly-resisting fiancé out of his seat, and sent him to the kitchen for a travel mug; she really wanted more coffee, but it seemed like today was going to be one of the now-rare days when the two former vampires couldn't be in the same room without fighting. "Hey, Col, can you make sure no one bothers the books until Willow and I come down?"
Colleen agreed with a smile, and the two parted ways.
Discovery
By the time Willow felt up to getting out of bed, and the four friends reached the lobby, a small crowd of both teachers and students had formed outside the conference room. Willow and Buffy both sighed, but resigned themselves to having an audience. After all, it would just start arguments if they told everyone to clear off, and although they were feeling better, neither was up to a lot of drama today.
Buffy opened the door, and held it for Willow to precede her. The redhead crouched down next to the center of the huge table, and ducked her head under it. "It's done." She reported, crawling under the table to get closer to the books. She returned with the empty glasses from the night before, and handed them to Buffy, who had followed her to the edge of the table. Buffy, in turn, handed the glasses off to Chas, who took them into the kitchen while Buffy joined Willow under the table.
The two girls faced each other, surrounded by piles of books, some very small, others larger than 'War and Peace'. "Wow, so I guess it worked." Willow whispered, glancing at the group of legs she could see over by the lobby door.
"As Apple would say, boy howdy." Buffy replied, staring in awe at the books. "Do you think we did the right thing? I mean, it felt like we did, when we were doing it, but…"
"This is a good thing." Willow cut her off. "I kinda freaked out when I woke up; drunken spell casting is a huge no-no. So I checked, I mean, I meditated and stuff, and searched for all of that stuff we saw. And it was all good, you know? We did a good thing." Willow smiled, and picked up a book, opening it to the first page. "What would have happened to Darla, Liam, Drusilla, and William if they had never become vampires? I'm guessing that was your question?"
"Yup." Buffy blushed a little, she was actually dying of curiosity to read that one. "What should we do with them? I don't think leaving them here is a good idea. They're kind of personal, you know?"
Willow nodded, thinking of all the questions she'd asked that were basically about her love life. "I think we should move them up to your living room, if it's okay with you and William. That way the girls won't get at them."
Buffy crawled back to the edge of the table, bringing two books off the top of a smaller pile with her. "Hey, handsome!" She gave William a big smile as she met his eyes. "Do you think we can take these upstairs, and keep them in our living room?" Buffy batted her eyes shamelessly.
William rolled his eyes. Great, just what he'd always wanted in his home. Magically generated books. He wanted to say no, and part of him really wished he could be mad at the girls for creating them, but his Goldilocks just looked so cute and hopeful; and there were students in the room, it wouldn't do for them to see a fight…Ah hell, he was whipped, plain and simple. "Sure, love. Want me to get a cart or something to move them on?"
Buffy popped up to her feet, murmuring her thanks against his lips as she kissed him. Then she handed him the books, and dove back under the table for more.
Once the students realized that Buffy and Willow were more interested in the books than they were in telling anyone about them, most of them wandered out of the room. They could always corner Buffy or Willow at lunch, and some of them had classes starting soon. Penny offered to run up to the library to get William the book cart, and Tom gathered most of the straggling students, and escorted them back out to the lobby.
Chas returned to find his buddy Spence with his nose buried in a book, and the crowd of nosy onlookers mostly gone. He nodded at Lise, Jackie, Keisha, and Carolyn, who had taken up positions around the door to the lobby. "Hey, man." He thumped Spence on the back, startling the shorter man. "What's that about?" Chas had heard from Willow earlier in the morning about the spell, and had been there when she meditated, so he was mostly just curious.
William flipped the book back to the first page, and read off the question. "What if the Initiative doctor Spike and Harmony kidnapped had actually removed Spike's behavior-modification chip?"
Chas frowned. "'S kind of a strange question to ask, isn't it? I mean, Shorty got them to take the chip out of you, didn't she? So, it's not like she thought you would kill her."
Will smiled at his friend's nickname for Buffy, and shook his head. "Yeah, I mean, I don't think she thought I would; but this kidnapping thing was 'bout two years before the chip came out, so I guess she wanted to know. And, I'm happy to report, that according to this, I wouldn't have."
Chas rolled his eyes. "Dude, Spence, of course you wouldn't have. She's your mate, man."
He shrugged, not willing to admit how relieved he was by the little bit he'd read. Since becoming Buffy's mortal mate, he'd lived with the fear of what he could have done to her while he'd been a vampire. He'd always thought that luck was on her side, but maybe he truly wouldn't have killed her.
William placed the books he held on the table, and the two men knelt down, taking books as Buffy and Willow handed them out. By the time Penny got back with the cart, the books were out from under the table, and so were Willow and Buffy. As the five of them loaded the cart, occasionally flipping open a cover to read a question aloud; (What if Warren Meers, Jonathan Levinson, and Andrew Wells had never tried to be evil? What if Dawn had jumped into Glory's portal to close it? What if the Initiative had never come to Sunnydale?) the school bell rang, signaling the end of the morning's second class. Chas dashed off to teach third period, with a promise to meet up after dinner and see if they needed any help. Penelope offered to start cataloging the books for placement in the library, but Buffy and Willow remained adamant that they keep the volumes locked down until they were sure it was safe for the girls to look at them.
Then Giles wandered past with Jezzie, and the couple froze at the sight of the large pile of books, then turned their attention to Buffy and Willow, neither of whom had been at first breakfast with them. "Good morning." Jezebel said politely. "Are we working on a research project? Do you guys need any help?"
"Well, it's going to be a research project." Penny stroked the cover of a book lovingly. "Or, it will be if Buffy and Willow let anyone else look at them."
Buffy shot the librarian a fierce glare. "They're personal. Mostly. We just want a chance to go over them first."
"Personal, you say?" Giles stepped past the four-woman barrier in the doorway, and walked over to pick up a book, opening it to the first page when he saw no title on the cover. "What if Warren Meers had not shot Tara McClay and Buffy Summers?" He raised his head and met Willow's wide eyes. "What on earth did you do?"
Buffy watched her Watcher and her best friend of nine years face off, and tried to diffuse the situation the quickest way she knew how. "Well…" Giles turned his attention to her, and Buffy's lips formed an impish grin. "Say you really like shrimp…"
Oddly, William and Willow were the only ones who laughed.