A/N I'm severely bored at the moment and I was reading over my story 9
Months. I realized that Angel said that he had been a part of that whole
thing where Buffy went insane in "Normal Again" and I didn't put that in.
So, me being my bored self, decided to rewrite that episode so it
accommodates Angel and Conner.
Normal Again
Buffy walked through the darkened streets with her husband thinking not about what they were doing, but about Xander. He had been gone a week now and no one had heard from him. Willow kept her hopes up that he would e- mail her and let them all know he was ok, but that was a no go. Buffy just prayed that he would come home soon and relieve some of this worried stress.
She laid her hands on her small protruding stomach and looked over at Angel. He was concentrated on the houses they walked by looking for the number of one of the houses on the list he carried in his hands. *Hopefully the last.* Buffy thought. They had been walking around practically all night and her feet hurt. Usually they never hurt this bad, but she was pregnant after all.
Angel looked down at her and Buffy tried to stifle a yawn. "It's the last one. We can go home right after."
"I'm not tired. Just bored." Buffy replied.
"Sure, that's why those bags under your eyes are so big."
"Hey, don't make fun. I'm the hormonal one here. I'm like a ticking time bomb, one wrong move and I could explode in a blast of emotions."
Angel chuckled. He took her hand and led her up a driveway. They started to peek into windows that were darkened and dusty.
"I thought this place was rented out?" Buffy asked.
"According to the list it is."
Buffy sighed and left to find the back of the house. All she found was a dark alley with some trash and an abandoned car and a pickup truck. She was about to go back to Angel, but something dropped behind her and Buffy turned to face it. Of course, it was a demon.
"Oh, hi." Buffy said. The wax-like demon growled at her. "You didn't by chance happen to just eat a couple of nerds, did you?"
The demon took a swing at her and she leaned back to avoid it. It swung again and then tried a roundhouse kick, which Buffy ducked underneath. She blocked a punch and punched it in the stomach, then kicked it back. The demon hit her and she went down. It grabbed her and threw her against the car. She landed on the hood, sat up, and kicked the demon with both feet. As it reeled back, she stood up on the hood. The demon went to punch her and she leapt up onto the car's roof. The demon punched the hood where she just been.
It tried to hit Buffy's legs but she jumped up, crouched on the hood and kicked the demon again. She did a flip off the car onto the ground while kicking the demon again, and it went down. Buffy picked up a metal garbage can and slammed it down onto the demon. It got up as she raised the can for another blow. The demon shoved the garbage can out of Buffy's hands, and then hit her in the face. She spun around and ended up with her face pressed against the car window. The demon grabbed her from behind. She spun around again and hit it. The demon reeled backward. They traded kicks and the demon's head went through the car window, breaking it. A long thin bony spike suddenly shot out of its knuckle. The demon struggled with its head and shoulders still inside the car. Buffy grabbed it and it elbowed her off, turned around, grabbed her. It held her tightly against its body. The demon raised its hand with the spike still sticking out of it. Buffy saw the spike for the first time and looked alarmed. The demon stabbed the spike into her shoulder just as Angel rounded the corner. Buffy screamed.
Suddenly, a warm light enveloped her and then she was struggling and screaming as two men tried to put a needle in her arm.
"You're gonna hurt yourself!" One of the men said to her.
"She's gonna break the needle." The other one said to the man talking to her. He withdrew the needle from her arm. "We're gonna have to strap her down!"
Buffy looked wide-eyed around the room and realized where she was. Her struggles started to stop as she stared more intently out the door's window and saw more people milling around out in a hallway. The man with the needle inserted it again and finished putting the fluid in her. Her eyes slowly closed and she was enveloped again with the warm light.
Angel held an unconscious Buffy in his arms. He had come running when he had heard sounds of a struggle coming from the alley and found Buffy pinned in the arms of a demon with a long spike jutting out of its hand. Before he could get to her, the demon had shoved the spike into her arm and dropped her to the ground, running away. Now he held her in his arms leaning against the car. She wasn't that heavy, even with the weight in front of her.
"Come on Buffy. Wake up." Angel said as he stroked her cheek and hair.
Her eyes suddenly snapped open and she struggled to grab her arm. Angel let her and she looked around in confusion and pain. Her eyes finally focused on Angel and she nearly fell to the ground.
"Whoa!" He caught her. "I got ya. Don't worry."
"Angel?" Buffy asked.
"Yeah baby, it's me. Are you ok?"
"Where.."
"Shh, let's just get you home ok? I wanna find out what that demon did to you. Can you walk?"
Buffy shook her head a little to clear her brain and then nodded up at him. They walked off towards their house. Angel's arm around her waist to make sure she was ok. As soon as they were home, he put her to bed and curled up beside her. She laid her head on his chest and wrapped her arm around his stomach as she twined her legs with his. Buffy slept fitfully and Angel had a hard time trying to restrain her. Whatever this demon had done to her, it was affecting him too. He could feel that there was something wrong with her. They would figure it out soon enough.
The next day, Buffy stood in the kitchen watching the water run as she was doing the dishes. Dawn walked in and Buffy barely even registered that her sister was talking to her. Angel walked in and stared at Buffy. He was worried about her. She had said that she was fine last night, that it was just the shock of being stabbed that had made her weird. Now that he saw her watching the water run and not listening to Dawn, he knew something was up.
"Buffy?" Dawn asked. Buffy didn't look up at first. "Buffy?"
This time she did look up, but it wasn't to look at her sister and her husband, it was to look at a doctor in a white doctor's coat.
"Come on, it's time for your drugs." The doctor said.
Buffy started to breath heavy and stare harder at the doctor, but the white light took her over and she was staring at her sister again. "What?"
"I said, if I didn't know any better, I'd think you were on drugs." Dawn said as she headed out the door and went to school.
"Okay. Good."
Angel walked up to her and put his hand to her forehead. She was her usual temperature. "Are you ok sweetie?"
"Huh? Yeah, I'm fine. Just dazed I guess."
"Are you sure?"
"Yeah. Hey, look at the time. At was supposed to call Cordelia and say hey."
Buffy walked out of the kitchen and went to the phone. Angel stared after her even more worried now that she was avoiding him. She just kept getting stranger. He needed to know what that demon had done to her. He needed to know if it was going to affect their 5 and a half month old baby growing inside of her.
Buffy walked down the stairs in an oversized beige turtleneck and comfortable jeans that rested below her stomach's bulge. She found Willow sitting at the table in front of her laptop. Buffy walked in and sat down.
"What'cha doin'?" Buffy asked.
"I'm online, checking to see if Xander emailed." Willow said.
"Any luck?"
"No such."
"Well, maybe Anya found him and they're trying to work it out." Willow shrugged. "How come you're all, home, hearth, and DSL anyway? I thought you were gonna go see Tara."
"Saw her. Saw her completely."
"Ouch. Just got a scratch from all that brittle."
"It's.." Willow shut her laptop. "..when I was seeing her, she was seeing someone else. A girl."
"You mean.."
"I mean ... not 'seeing' seeing. Well, maybe. I don't know, it was inconclusive, and I didn't stick around to find out. Might have magicked my fist through a wall or something."
"Will, I'm sorry."
"I mean, they're probably just friends. I press my lips against my friends' all the time."
"I'm sure they're just friends. Once you fall for Willow, you stay fallen."
Angel came in from the stairs and went to stand next to Buffy. "She speaks nothing but the truth Willow."
"Thanks guys." Willow said. She was about to say more, but the doorbell didn't let her.
The door opened and Xander walked in. "Hi."
"Xander?" Willow asked as they all walked to the door, Buffy in the lead.
"I'm back."
"Xander?" Buffy asked.
"Xander, you're here!" Angel said.
Buffy, Willow, and Xander shared a huge group hug and then moved away to allow Xander and Angel to hug.
"We missed you. Where were you?" Angel asked.
"I know. I tried calling, but I couldn't without.."
"Hey. You don't need to explain to us." Buffy said.
They all moved back to the dining room. Willow and Buffy taking their seats back up and Angel and Xander remained standing, Angel next to Buffy once again.
"Right. Is she here?"
"Oh, no..you wanna find her?" Willow asked.
"I need to. Her suitcase is gone and some of her stuff. There's a Closed sign on the Magic Box, which, like, chills me to the bone."
"She left a couple of days ago."
"Was she looking for me? Before she left, did she say anything?"
"You mean, between sobs? There was mostly just wheezing."
"She was a little.. She was.. kinda broken." Buffy said.
"I don't know how stuff got so mixed up! I blew it." Xander said.
"No. Well.. maybe it wasn't the best time to break up with her, but.."
"No. It wasn't about breaking up. I love her, and god, I miss her so much."
"So, you left her at the altar, but you still wanna.." Angel started.
"You still wanna date?" Buffy finished.
"I guess. I know that I'm a better person with her in my life. But things got so complicated with the wedding, and with my family, and with her.. demons, and.. what if it all goes to hell, a..and forever? But then I left.. and ever since.. I've had this painful hole inside. And I'm the idiot that dug it out. I screwed up real bad." Xander said.
"Hey, we all screw up."
Xander just looked at Buffy.
"You'll get her back." Angel said. He laid a hand on Buffy's shoulder and she responded by putting her hand over his.
"Yeah, well.. there's not really an ancient prophecy that can force us back together." Xander said.
"It didn't force us Xander. It was out choice. Prophecies don't rule our lives. We made our own decisions." Buffy said. "And it'll be the same for you and Anya. You have choices to make. Whether you make them together, well, that's up to you." Xander stared at the floor.
Buffy and Angel walked hand in hand through the graveyard. The talk with Xander earlier that afternoon hadn't been the best reunion in the world. Not to mention that Angel was still worried about Buffy. She was still avoiding him every time he brought up the demon that had stabbed her.
"You lookin' for me?" Spike said behind them.
"Really not." Buffy shot back. She and Angel kept walking.
"Oh. Right then. Off you go. Did you cry?"
Buffy stopped, pulling Angel with her. "What?"
"The wedding. Two hearts joined for eternity, great pelting showers of rice and so forth."
"You didn't hear." She looked at Angel and walked back towards Spike.
"What? Families get out of hand? Tear the place apart?"
"No. Well, yes, absolutely. But.. Xander left. The wedding didn't happen."
Spike sat down shocked. "Well. Gotta say.. I didn't see that coming."
"It was awful. Anya was devastated." Angel said as he helped Buffy sit down.
"Is that right?"
"And, Xander.. thinks maybe they can still get back together, but.. he hurt her a lot." Buffy said, looking slightly at Angel. She sort of knew of Anya felt.
"Yeah, well.. some people can't see a good thing when they've got it."
Spike and Buffy glared at each other as Xander and Willow walked up to them.
"Spike." Xander said. "I shoulda known you'd be tagging along."
"Hey, guys. I, uh.. I found Spike and was, uh, trying to figure out what kind of dangerous contraband he had." Buffy said. Angel knew about Spike and Buffy, but Xander and Willow didn't. He had promised her that he wouldn't tell them.
"Tell you what, Slayer. Let me get out of your way. I'll stop bothering you. I got a slayer of my very own waiting somewhere for me." Spike said.
"Yeah, maybe you should do that, Spike, just run along." Xander said.
"You know, I guess you know all about that, don't you? The king of the big exit. Heard it brought the house down."
"I don't need this crap from you."
"Right. Let's not listen to Spike. Might get a bit of the truth on you." Spike said more to Buffy as he got up in Xander's face.
"Okay, okay. Hey. Calm now. Let's, uh, turn around and release this very manly thing the other way." Willow said trying to step between them. The two wouldn't budge and Angel came over to help pry the two men apart.
"I forgot. Willy Wannabite can't hurt me. Dumb to pick a fight, I guess." Xander said.
"Xander." Angel warned.
Buffy watched as a wave of dizziness grabbed her and she sank to her knees. "Guys.." No one heard her.
"More than happy to beat you right through the pain, you pathetic poof." Spike said.
Xander punched Spike in the face and Spike went down.
Buffy managed to get up on the stone bench. "Guys..don't"
Suddenly that warm light washed over her again and she was back in the mental institution. A man stood in front of her.
"Buffy, can you hear me?" the man asked. He was in a doctor's coat.
"What is this?" Buffy asked. She was curled up in the corner again.
"Do you know where you are Buffy?"
"Sunnydale?" she asked, confused.
"No, none of that's real, none of it. You're in a mental institution. You've been with us now for six years. Do you remember?"
Buffy frowned in extreme confusion and lifted her head again to look at the doctor. The bed with the restraints was still there. The light came again and she was back in the graveyard.
Spike knocked over his groceries as he continued to fall from Xander's punch. Angel noticed Buffy as soon as Spike wasn't there to block his view of her. He rushed over to her and held her up.
"Buffy? Are you ok?" Angel asked.
"What happened?" Willow asked.
Buffy tried to say something, but the light came again and the doctor was back in front of her instead of Angel. He reached out to touch her, but she jerked and tried to shove herself further into the corner. Out of pure panicked confusion, she turned her head and slammed it continuously against the wall.
"It's ok Buffy. Buffy, it's ok." The doctor said. He turned his head to look at someone behind him.
"Buffy?" Joyce's loving voice asked.
Buffy stared at her in amazement as Joyce came forward and crouched down to bring herself to Buffy's level. Hank stood behind her leaning down with hands on his knees.
"Welcome home sweetie." Joyce said.
"Mom?" Buffy asked.
"Oh, baby, you're really here."
"Dad?"
"She's lucid. Keep talking, maybe the sound of your voice will ground her." The doctor said.
"Sweetheart.. we've missed you very much. Honey, can you hear me?" Hank asked.
Buffy started to cry. She laid her head in her hands and tried to lean forward.
"Oh, Buffy, stay with us, please." Joyce said.
The light came again and Buffy was hunched over, head in her hands and leaning into Angel.
"Oh.. No" Buffy said.
"Here, let's get her back to my crypt." Spike said. "It's just over here."
"Spike, just go, okay? She's my wife, I'll take care of her." Angel growled.
Angel and Willow helped Buffy to stand. Her hand went to her stomach to check to see if her bulge was there. It was.
"No guys, I'm ok. I'm ok." Buffy said.
"Come on, Willow, help me get her home." Angel said.
They walked off and left Spike to fend for himself. After a little bit, Angel swept Buffy into his arms and carried her. She protested at first, but Angel told her it was just a precautionary.
Normal Again
Buffy walked through the darkened streets with her husband thinking not about what they were doing, but about Xander. He had been gone a week now and no one had heard from him. Willow kept her hopes up that he would e- mail her and let them all know he was ok, but that was a no go. Buffy just prayed that he would come home soon and relieve some of this worried stress.
She laid her hands on her small protruding stomach and looked over at Angel. He was concentrated on the houses they walked by looking for the number of one of the houses on the list he carried in his hands. *Hopefully the last.* Buffy thought. They had been walking around practically all night and her feet hurt. Usually they never hurt this bad, but she was pregnant after all.
Angel looked down at her and Buffy tried to stifle a yawn. "It's the last one. We can go home right after."
"I'm not tired. Just bored." Buffy replied.
"Sure, that's why those bags under your eyes are so big."
"Hey, don't make fun. I'm the hormonal one here. I'm like a ticking time bomb, one wrong move and I could explode in a blast of emotions."
Angel chuckled. He took her hand and led her up a driveway. They started to peek into windows that were darkened and dusty.
"I thought this place was rented out?" Buffy asked.
"According to the list it is."
Buffy sighed and left to find the back of the house. All she found was a dark alley with some trash and an abandoned car and a pickup truck. She was about to go back to Angel, but something dropped behind her and Buffy turned to face it. Of course, it was a demon.
"Oh, hi." Buffy said. The wax-like demon growled at her. "You didn't by chance happen to just eat a couple of nerds, did you?"
The demon took a swing at her and she leaned back to avoid it. It swung again and then tried a roundhouse kick, which Buffy ducked underneath. She blocked a punch and punched it in the stomach, then kicked it back. The demon hit her and she went down. It grabbed her and threw her against the car. She landed on the hood, sat up, and kicked the demon with both feet. As it reeled back, she stood up on the hood. The demon went to punch her and she leapt up onto the car's roof. The demon punched the hood where she just been.
It tried to hit Buffy's legs but she jumped up, crouched on the hood and kicked the demon again. She did a flip off the car onto the ground while kicking the demon again, and it went down. Buffy picked up a metal garbage can and slammed it down onto the demon. It got up as she raised the can for another blow. The demon shoved the garbage can out of Buffy's hands, and then hit her in the face. She spun around and ended up with her face pressed against the car window. The demon grabbed her from behind. She spun around again and hit it. The demon reeled backward. They traded kicks and the demon's head went through the car window, breaking it. A long thin bony spike suddenly shot out of its knuckle. The demon struggled with its head and shoulders still inside the car. Buffy grabbed it and it elbowed her off, turned around, grabbed her. It held her tightly against its body. The demon raised its hand with the spike still sticking out of it. Buffy saw the spike for the first time and looked alarmed. The demon stabbed the spike into her shoulder just as Angel rounded the corner. Buffy screamed.
Suddenly, a warm light enveloped her and then she was struggling and screaming as two men tried to put a needle in her arm.
"You're gonna hurt yourself!" One of the men said to her.
"She's gonna break the needle." The other one said to the man talking to her. He withdrew the needle from her arm. "We're gonna have to strap her down!"
Buffy looked wide-eyed around the room and realized where she was. Her struggles started to stop as she stared more intently out the door's window and saw more people milling around out in a hallway. The man with the needle inserted it again and finished putting the fluid in her. Her eyes slowly closed and she was enveloped again with the warm light.
Angel held an unconscious Buffy in his arms. He had come running when he had heard sounds of a struggle coming from the alley and found Buffy pinned in the arms of a demon with a long spike jutting out of its hand. Before he could get to her, the demon had shoved the spike into her arm and dropped her to the ground, running away. Now he held her in his arms leaning against the car. She wasn't that heavy, even with the weight in front of her.
"Come on Buffy. Wake up." Angel said as he stroked her cheek and hair.
Her eyes suddenly snapped open and she struggled to grab her arm. Angel let her and she looked around in confusion and pain. Her eyes finally focused on Angel and she nearly fell to the ground.
"Whoa!" He caught her. "I got ya. Don't worry."
"Angel?" Buffy asked.
"Yeah baby, it's me. Are you ok?"
"Where.."
"Shh, let's just get you home ok? I wanna find out what that demon did to you. Can you walk?"
Buffy shook her head a little to clear her brain and then nodded up at him. They walked off towards their house. Angel's arm around her waist to make sure she was ok. As soon as they were home, he put her to bed and curled up beside her. She laid her head on his chest and wrapped her arm around his stomach as she twined her legs with his. Buffy slept fitfully and Angel had a hard time trying to restrain her. Whatever this demon had done to her, it was affecting him too. He could feel that there was something wrong with her. They would figure it out soon enough.
The next day, Buffy stood in the kitchen watching the water run as she was doing the dishes. Dawn walked in and Buffy barely even registered that her sister was talking to her. Angel walked in and stared at Buffy. He was worried about her. She had said that she was fine last night, that it was just the shock of being stabbed that had made her weird. Now that he saw her watching the water run and not listening to Dawn, he knew something was up.
"Buffy?" Dawn asked. Buffy didn't look up at first. "Buffy?"
This time she did look up, but it wasn't to look at her sister and her husband, it was to look at a doctor in a white doctor's coat.
"Come on, it's time for your drugs." The doctor said.
Buffy started to breath heavy and stare harder at the doctor, but the white light took her over and she was staring at her sister again. "What?"
"I said, if I didn't know any better, I'd think you were on drugs." Dawn said as she headed out the door and went to school.
"Okay. Good."
Angel walked up to her and put his hand to her forehead. She was her usual temperature. "Are you ok sweetie?"
"Huh? Yeah, I'm fine. Just dazed I guess."
"Are you sure?"
"Yeah. Hey, look at the time. At was supposed to call Cordelia and say hey."
Buffy walked out of the kitchen and went to the phone. Angel stared after her even more worried now that she was avoiding him. She just kept getting stranger. He needed to know what that demon had done to her. He needed to know if it was going to affect their 5 and a half month old baby growing inside of her.
Buffy walked down the stairs in an oversized beige turtleneck and comfortable jeans that rested below her stomach's bulge. She found Willow sitting at the table in front of her laptop. Buffy walked in and sat down.
"What'cha doin'?" Buffy asked.
"I'm online, checking to see if Xander emailed." Willow said.
"Any luck?"
"No such."
"Well, maybe Anya found him and they're trying to work it out." Willow shrugged. "How come you're all, home, hearth, and DSL anyway? I thought you were gonna go see Tara."
"Saw her. Saw her completely."
"Ouch. Just got a scratch from all that brittle."
"It's.." Willow shut her laptop. "..when I was seeing her, she was seeing someone else. A girl."
"You mean.."
"I mean ... not 'seeing' seeing. Well, maybe. I don't know, it was inconclusive, and I didn't stick around to find out. Might have magicked my fist through a wall or something."
"Will, I'm sorry."
"I mean, they're probably just friends. I press my lips against my friends' all the time."
"I'm sure they're just friends. Once you fall for Willow, you stay fallen."
Angel came in from the stairs and went to stand next to Buffy. "She speaks nothing but the truth Willow."
"Thanks guys." Willow said. She was about to say more, but the doorbell didn't let her.
The door opened and Xander walked in. "Hi."
"Xander?" Willow asked as they all walked to the door, Buffy in the lead.
"I'm back."
"Xander?" Buffy asked.
"Xander, you're here!" Angel said.
Buffy, Willow, and Xander shared a huge group hug and then moved away to allow Xander and Angel to hug.
"We missed you. Where were you?" Angel asked.
"I know. I tried calling, but I couldn't without.."
"Hey. You don't need to explain to us." Buffy said.
They all moved back to the dining room. Willow and Buffy taking their seats back up and Angel and Xander remained standing, Angel next to Buffy once again.
"Right. Is she here?"
"Oh, no..you wanna find her?" Willow asked.
"I need to. Her suitcase is gone and some of her stuff. There's a Closed sign on the Magic Box, which, like, chills me to the bone."
"She left a couple of days ago."
"Was she looking for me? Before she left, did she say anything?"
"You mean, between sobs? There was mostly just wheezing."
"She was a little.. She was.. kinda broken." Buffy said.
"I don't know how stuff got so mixed up! I blew it." Xander said.
"No. Well.. maybe it wasn't the best time to break up with her, but.."
"No. It wasn't about breaking up. I love her, and god, I miss her so much."
"So, you left her at the altar, but you still wanna.." Angel started.
"You still wanna date?" Buffy finished.
"I guess. I know that I'm a better person with her in my life. But things got so complicated with the wedding, and with my family, and with her.. demons, and.. what if it all goes to hell, a..and forever? But then I left.. and ever since.. I've had this painful hole inside. And I'm the idiot that dug it out. I screwed up real bad." Xander said.
"Hey, we all screw up."
Xander just looked at Buffy.
"You'll get her back." Angel said. He laid a hand on Buffy's shoulder and she responded by putting her hand over his.
"Yeah, well.. there's not really an ancient prophecy that can force us back together." Xander said.
"It didn't force us Xander. It was out choice. Prophecies don't rule our lives. We made our own decisions." Buffy said. "And it'll be the same for you and Anya. You have choices to make. Whether you make them together, well, that's up to you." Xander stared at the floor.
Buffy and Angel walked hand in hand through the graveyard. The talk with Xander earlier that afternoon hadn't been the best reunion in the world. Not to mention that Angel was still worried about Buffy. She was still avoiding him every time he brought up the demon that had stabbed her.
"You lookin' for me?" Spike said behind them.
"Really not." Buffy shot back. She and Angel kept walking.
"Oh. Right then. Off you go. Did you cry?"
Buffy stopped, pulling Angel with her. "What?"
"The wedding. Two hearts joined for eternity, great pelting showers of rice and so forth."
"You didn't hear." She looked at Angel and walked back towards Spike.
"What? Families get out of hand? Tear the place apart?"
"No. Well, yes, absolutely. But.. Xander left. The wedding didn't happen."
Spike sat down shocked. "Well. Gotta say.. I didn't see that coming."
"It was awful. Anya was devastated." Angel said as he helped Buffy sit down.
"Is that right?"
"And, Xander.. thinks maybe they can still get back together, but.. he hurt her a lot." Buffy said, looking slightly at Angel. She sort of knew of Anya felt.
"Yeah, well.. some people can't see a good thing when they've got it."
Spike and Buffy glared at each other as Xander and Willow walked up to them.
"Spike." Xander said. "I shoulda known you'd be tagging along."
"Hey, guys. I, uh.. I found Spike and was, uh, trying to figure out what kind of dangerous contraband he had." Buffy said. Angel knew about Spike and Buffy, but Xander and Willow didn't. He had promised her that he wouldn't tell them.
"Tell you what, Slayer. Let me get out of your way. I'll stop bothering you. I got a slayer of my very own waiting somewhere for me." Spike said.
"Yeah, maybe you should do that, Spike, just run along." Xander said.
"You know, I guess you know all about that, don't you? The king of the big exit. Heard it brought the house down."
"I don't need this crap from you."
"Right. Let's not listen to Spike. Might get a bit of the truth on you." Spike said more to Buffy as he got up in Xander's face.
"Okay, okay. Hey. Calm now. Let's, uh, turn around and release this very manly thing the other way." Willow said trying to step between them. The two wouldn't budge and Angel came over to help pry the two men apart.
"I forgot. Willy Wannabite can't hurt me. Dumb to pick a fight, I guess." Xander said.
"Xander." Angel warned.
Buffy watched as a wave of dizziness grabbed her and she sank to her knees. "Guys.." No one heard her.
"More than happy to beat you right through the pain, you pathetic poof." Spike said.
Xander punched Spike in the face and Spike went down.
Buffy managed to get up on the stone bench. "Guys..don't"
Suddenly that warm light washed over her again and she was back in the mental institution. A man stood in front of her.
"Buffy, can you hear me?" the man asked. He was in a doctor's coat.
"What is this?" Buffy asked. She was curled up in the corner again.
"Do you know where you are Buffy?"
"Sunnydale?" she asked, confused.
"No, none of that's real, none of it. You're in a mental institution. You've been with us now for six years. Do you remember?"
Buffy frowned in extreme confusion and lifted her head again to look at the doctor. The bed with the restraints was still there. The light came again and she was back in the graveyard.
Spike knocked over his groceries as he continued to fall from Xander's punch. Angel noticed Buffy as soon as Spike wasn't there to block his view of her. He rushed over to her and held her up.
"Buffy? Are you ok?" Angel asked.
"What happened?" Willow asked.
Buffy tried to say something, but the light came again and the doctor was back in front of her instead of Angel. He reached out to touch her, but she jerked and tried to shove herself further into the corner. Out of pure panicked confusion, she turned her head and slammed it continuously against the wall.
"It's ok Buffy. Buffy, it's ok." The doctor said. He turned his head to look at someone behind him.
"Buffy?" Joyce's loving voice asked.
Buffy stared at her in amazement as Joyce came forward and crouched down to bring herself to Buffy's level. Hank stood behind her leaning down with hands on his knees.
"Welcome home sweetie." Joyce said.
"Mom?" Buffy asked.
"Oh, baby, you're really here."
"Dad?"
"She's lucid. Keep talking, maybe the sound of your voice will ground her." The doctor said.
"Sweetheart.. we've missed you very much. Honey, can you hear me?" Hank asked.
Buffy started to cry. She laid her head in her hands and tried to lean forward.
"Oh, Buffy, stay with us, please." Joyce said.
The light came again and Buffy was hunched over, head in her hands and leaning into Angel.
"Oh.. No" Buffy said.
"Here, let's get her back to my crypt." Spike said. "It's just over here."
"Spike, just go, okay? She's my wife, I'll take care of her." Angel growled.
Angel and Willow helped Buffy to stand. Her hand went to her stomach to check to see if her bulge was there. It was.
"No guys, I'm ok. I'm ok." Buffy said.
"Come on, Willow, help me get her home." Angel said.
They walked off and left Spike to fend for himself. After a little bit, Angel swept Buffy into his arms and carried her. She protested at first, but Angel told her it was just a precautionary.