Episode: "Tabula Rasa" Season 6, Episode 8
Missing Scene: In the episode we're shown a few very brief shots of Giles and Anya trying to find a spell. This scene connects the quick snips we see together.
Disclaimer: The characters and locations contained in this piece are property of Joss Whedon. This piece is intended solely for the author's enjoyment and those who read it and will not be used for any monetary gains. Dialogue in italics are taken directly from the episode.
The Wrong Book
Anya stood starring at a shelf of books while Giles examined the plane ticket he had pulled from his pocket. He looked confusedly at the ticket. He had no idea why he would have a one way ticket to London, although, that wasn't too surprising considering no one in the group he had awoken with seemed to remember anything. Anya pulled a large tome from the shelf. Beaming with pride, she walked over to Giles as he stuffed the ticket back into his pocket.
"This is the book for us!" she said.
"Oh good, does it focus on mind control or memory loss?" Giles asked.
"Not exactly," Anya explained. "I just, um, my intuition tells me this is the book and I figure being a magic shop owner and a natural at the supernatural I should trust my intuition."
"That fine but, as you recall," Giles began as he stroked Anya's hair, "I too am a magic shop owner."
"True, but my intuition says that you're not so much the magic guy and more of a paper-work type." Anya lays the book on the table and opens it to a random page. "Here we go."
"You don't even know..." Giles tried to interject.
"Bara bara himble gemination," Anya recited. A bunny appeared from thin air on the table in front of Anya. Anya screamed in terror and latched on to Giles at the mere sight of it.
"Well I'll be, it actually did something," Giles said amazedly. "I suppose I take back that remark about magic being balderdash and chicanery. Cute as it may be though, it's not exactly helpful."
"Cute?" Anya exclaimed. "Cute? Are you kidding me? Look at that tiny twitching nose and those massive legs! That thing needs to go!" She looked again at the book and said "Maybe it's like Beetlejuice – say it's name three times and it goes away. Bara bara himble gemination!"
A second bunny appears appeared on the table. Anya suppressed a shriek and recited the line a third time. However, this only served to create another pair of bunnies.
"Anya dear, I don't think that's going to work, try a different spell please." Giles asked.
"Bara faloom quint alee," Anya read aloud from the book. "Damn it!" Anya yelled as the table filled with a half dozen bunnies. A few of the bunnies scattered from Anya's yelling to various parts of the store.
"Perhaps we should try another book?" Giles tried to reason.
"No, I can do it," Anya snapped back. "Hem sallim trog anon," she read angrily. This time, two dozen bunnies appeared in various parts of the store. Shelves, counters, and tables were covered in bunnies of various colours.
Giles picked a bunny up from a nearby shelf that had begun to nibble on a book and placed it on the ground. Another had found an open jar of dried herbs labelled "mageroyal." Though he had no idea what it was, Giles assumed it wouldn't be the best thing to have one of these magically produced bunnies eating magic supplies. He pulled the bunny away from the jar and put the jar's lid back on. During this time, Anya had climbed on top of the table, with the book in hand, to escape the increasing sea of bunnies on the floor.
Giles removed his glass and said, more angrily than before, "Perhaps we should try another book!"
"No! This book made the little fluffers, this book's gonna send them back," she said. "I've got it this time! Ok. Himble abree abree boyon!" A bunny appeared at Giles' feet.
Giles looked down at the bunny as it hopped away. He put his glasses back on and looked up at Anya as she looked down with sheer terror at the bunnies. "Yes dear...that seems to be working perfectly doesn't it?"
Giles walked over to a chair near the table, removed a bunny that was on it, and sat down. "I'm just saying that perhaps another book would be more useful. We're trying to get our memories back and you're just up there making bunnies faster than...well, faster than bunnies make bunnies," he explained. After looking around at the critters he continued, "And if we don't hurry up and figure it out I'm sure they'll begin taking matters into their own hands...or paws as it were."
"Cruse allor naga trim!" Anya shouted. A large green cloud began to form near the ceiling of the shop. Lightning crackled inside of the cloud for a few seconds before a bolt of lightning shot from the cloud and hit the jar of mageroyal, shattering it.
"Anya!" Giles exclaimed, "reading random spells is not going to work and now you've graduated from harmless bunnies to actual dangerous things!"
"Random?" Anya asked. "Oh no, that wasn't random, this one pretty clearly shows this green cloud thing and the lightning and such. I figured maybe frying the little buggers would be a way to get rid of them."
Giles looked up with her with a look of disbelief. "Could you please stop it then? As "the paper-work guy" I think it would be best if our merchandise wasn't destroyed..."
Anya huffed and read from the book, "Allor trim artet." Anya looked up from the book at Giles, "There, are you happy now?"
Giles looked up at the green cloud, still undulating above them.
"Well," Anya said, "I can only stop the lightning, the cloud sticks around for an hour or so..."
"Clearly that is not a helpful book darling. Come down and we'll go about fixing this in a sensible fashion!" Giles exclaimed.
"Sensible? You think it's sensible for me to go down into that pit of cotton-top hell and let them hippity-hop all over my vulnerable flesh?" Anya yelled from her perch on the table with the book clutched to her chest.
"Well fine, then just stay up there and keep making bunnies," Giles shouted as he put his glasses back on, "that's a capital plan!"
"What capital?" Anya angrily asked, "I never know what you're talking about. Loo, shag, brolly – what the hell is all that?"
"What? There's no way you could remember me saying any of those words."
"Ahh bugger off you brolly," Anya said as she dismissed him with her hand and returned to the book. "Anim callim brom trop!"
The pair looked around the shop to see what the latest spell created. However, nothing seemed amiss.
"Wonderful dear, we've graduated from making bunnies to torching things with green lightning to doing absolutely nothing!" Giles shouted.
"Well at least I'm trying something!" Anya snapped at him. "You're just sitting around being all critical and Englishier-than-thou!
"I'm just saying we should try another book," Giles explained. "There's several hundred here and this one doesn't seem to have much use!"
As the pair continued to argue loudly, their voices, and the crackling of the green cloud above them, covered the footsteps of the creation of the last spell. From the back storage room walked an animated skeleton – minus a head and a right hand.
The skeleton stumbled around, feeling its way towards the front counter with its one boney hand. Upon reaching the counter it scrounged around, knocking against jars and various objects, before it found what it was searching for – a skull. Carefully with its one hand, the skeleton lifted the skull and set it on top of its spine. It knocked on top of the skull a couple times and then looked back and forth to test it out. It looked at Giles and Anya who were still heatedly arguing with their backs to it. It turned to examine the shelves behind the counter and spied a skeletal right hand on the third shelf. It grabbed the hand and held it in place at its wrist until the invisible magical musculature holding itself together attached the hand.
The skeleton turned around and pulled out a short sword from under the counter. In the process, it accidently knocked over a solid wood idol which fell to the floor with a loud thump. The noise alerted Anya and Giles who quickly turned around to see the sword-brandishing skeleton intruder behind the counter.
"Anya..." Giles began, "get rid of that thing!" He ran to the wall behind him and grabbed a sword that was on display as the skeleton leaped over the counter and charged at him.
The skeleton took a strong swipe at him which he barely managed to block. Giles returned with his own swipe which the skeleton easily side-stepped. The pair continued to fight while Anya flipped through her book, searching for a spell that would work.
"Keep it up Rupey!" she yelled.
"Get a different book!" Giles exclaimed as he continued blocking the skeleton's attacks. "Put that book down, do you hear?" he continued as he ducked undera swipe that would have lopped off his head. "Not that book!"
Anya looked up from the book for a moment and watched the fight unfolding in front of her. The skeleton hit Giles' sword hard, knocking it from his hands. The skeleton let loose an otherworldly cackle as it raised its sword high. Giles watched the sword in terror as it came down towards his neck.
"Bora alla jambo mek!" she shouted. She looked up and saw the sword fall harmlessly to the ground. Where the skeleton had stood, sat a bunny.
Giles, out of breath, looked up at her. "Well, that book did something right after all!"
Anya looked at the bunny at his feet and back up at him with anger in her eyes. "Is that a joke?" she asked. "Alright, I have it. This will get rid of them all," she said. "Gara toom gara dar."
A yellow light burst through the front door of the Magic Box. It traveled through the shop pulling in bunnies as it passed. As it passed Anya and Giles it pulled in the green cloud. It continued to the back of the shop where it stopped. Not a single bunny was left in the store.
"See, I did it just fine with that book," Anya said as she carefully stepped down from the table. "Yellow light, poof, everything back to normal. I think you owe me an..."
Anya's sentence was interrupted by a growling from the back of the shop. The pair looked back towards the yellow light which was growing in size. In the light they could see a pair of jaws with large sharp teeth. Wasting no time, they ran to the front counter and hid behind it. As the light reached the height and width of one of the grand storage bookcases, it began to take shape. Within seconds it had formed into a massive bunny with large, sharp-tooth filled jaws, and glowing red eyes. It let loose a growl as it looked around the shop.
Anya whispered, "See, that bunny clearly doesn't eat lettuce and get cuddly with children! That's the incarnation of all absolute evil that lives inside every one of those damned creations!"
"Shh, we don't want to attract any attention to ourselves," Giles whispered back. "Regardless of your insane fear of harmless rabbits I don't really feel inclined to go and pet that one! Give me that book." Giles took the book from Anya's hand and set it aside. He raised his head above the counter to look at the creature again. It was still looking around the store. Whether it was searching for them or a carrot he didn't know. It let loose another growl and he ducked back below the counter.
"Look what you've done you lunatic woman," he whispered as he began searching through the books under the counter.
"Don't blame me you snobby, snotty, thinks-he's-so-great-kinda-jerk!," she spat back. "I feel compelled to take some vengeance on you!" she whispered as she hit him over the head with the book she was holding.
"Ow!" Giles exclaimed. "God, no wonder I'm leaving you!"
"What?"
Giles pulled the plane ticket from his coat pocket. "One-way ticket to London and out of this engagement!"
Anya stared at him with her mouth agape. Visibly hurt she whispered, "of all the nerve!" She removed her engagement ring and threw it over the counter. It hit the floor with a clang, causing the giant bunny to roar and turn its attention to the source of the noise.
"Now look at what you've done," Anya said, "that thing is gonna eat my ring!"
Giles huffed and turned his attention back to the open book in his hands. He quickly flipped through some pages, scanning them for anything that would help. "Fatas...venga...mata...waray," he whispered.
A bright blue light flashed in the store for a brief second. Once it finished, the growling was gone. Anya and Giles stood up and examined the shop. Everything that had troubled them was gone.
"Well that's better," Giles said.
Anya quickly left the counter and ran over to the middle of the floor. She kneeled down and picked up her ring and put it back on her finger. "Oh thank goodness," she whispered to herself.
"I'm so sorry dear," Giles offered.
"No, Rupey, I'm sorry," she replied, "you were right – that was the wrong book."
"Oh, um," Giles mumbled as he removed his glasses, "yes it was. But I'm still sorry."
"Don't leave me," she said with sadness in her voice.
"Oh Anya," he said as he walked to her. He wrapped his arms around her and kissed her, dipping her down. She moved her hands up to his hair and passionately returned the kiss.
Then the memories come flooding back.
They both stopped, in mid-kiss, and opened their eyes. Realizing what he was doing Giles let go of Anya, dropping her to the ground with a thud.