Disclaimer: Buffy-The Vampire Slayer and all related characters are the property of Mutant Enemy Productions, Inc., Sandollar Television, Kuzui Enterprises and Twentieth Century-Fox Television. No copyright infringement is intended. This work of fiction is for entertainment purposes only and no money has changed hands. The story and all original characters are the sole property of the author and may not be used or archived without permission.



Author's Note: See first part for warnings.



'Witching Anya (2)

by Darrin Colbourne







At first, none of us can speak. We're too busy goggling at the two Willows in our midst, looking from one to the other like we're watching a tennis match, taking in the contrast between the sleek, confident villain in black and the confused, battle-weary hero in tattered pastels. The "Big Bad" Willow hasn't done anything since she walked in and disarmed us. She's just facing us down with a slight grin, standing a few feet from Buffy with her hands folded in front of her. When she realizes that we're not going to talk, she breaks the silence.

"Nothing to say? No 'This is some sort of trick' or 'Show us what you really look like' or 'I don't care what you look like, you're not our Willow'? Anything? You don't have to keep looking at both of us. Physically, for all intents and purposes, we're both Willow, which means you're wasting your time trying to find surface differences. Still stuck for something to say? Okay, I'll tell you a little more. See, I'm the Willow from another plane of existence, one where she made...different choices."

"Wait," Xander says, "I get it. You're like that Vampire Willow, right?"

It's the first time I see Bad Willow's smile fade, and the expression on her face is a study in exasperation. "Yes, Monkey Boy, like 'Vampire Willow'. Damn, do I hate that phrase, almost as much as I hate the person associated with it! Do you know it's gotten to the point where I sometimes go dimension-hopping just for the sole purpose of hunting down and killing Vampire Willows? I made the mistake of letting one stay with me a couple of weeks before I staked her. Do you know how annoying it is to hear someone whine 'Bored Now!', 'Bored Now!' every five minutes?!!"

"Oh, good, honey." I whisper to Xander. "Make her mad. That makes so much more sense than getting ourselves out of here alive!" I cringe a little when I realize she's heard me, but then her smile comes back when our eyes meet, and she gives me a little wink, as if I shouldn't worry about dying at this particular moment.

She takes a deep breath and turns her attention back to Buffy, still smiling. "But that's not why I'm here, and I'm not here to take over your universe, although that would probably be a walk in the park. I'm here..."

"Wait a second!" Dawn says. "There are other Willows in other universes? Are there other Dawns, too? And other Buffies? And other Xanders?"

"Well, you're the Key," Bad Willow says, "don't you know? Okay, even if you forgot all that when you got made human, they should have told you..." A sudden wave of realization crosses the witch's face as she turns back to Buffy. "You're actually surprised I'm an alternate Willow, aren't you? None of you knew you were facing me? You didn't know what I was until I walked into this house?"

"Were we supposed to know?" Willow, Our Willow, Good Willow says.

"I thought you did know." Bad Willow says. "I thought the fact that you tracked me to Sunnydale High meant you'd figured everything out, or the fact that you were up against a bunch of witches gave you some clue. I at least thought the pendant would be a dead giveaway."

"The pendant?" Buffy says.

"Yes. The one you took off one of my minions. Didn't the Tree and Pentagram sign give you a hint?"

"We couldn't find any information on it." Tara says. "There was nothing in any of the books we looked in."

"Did you try a Botany book, precious?" Bad Willow says, getting blank stares in return. With an aggravated grunt she pulls her pendant out of her shirt and holds it out to us. "It's a Willow Tree, you nimrods! Willow Tree, Pentagram. Willow, Witch!"

I slap a palm to my forehead, getting it. "Of course! That makes perfect sense! Oh, my...don't you hate it when the answer is staring you right in the face and you completely miss it?"

They stare at me again. Everybody, including both Willows, gives me That Look. Bad Willow's face changes first, though. She gives me another smile before she continues talking to everyone. "Well. At least one of you has an imagination. Look, I don't want to stay here for too long. It was a lot of work setting up this little visit just to illustrate a point."

"And what point would that be?" Buffy says, making Bad Willow's mask slip a little again. The doppelganger gets very close to the Slayer then, and delivers her answer in a soft, threatening tone.

"That I could do a lot more damage, if it were my desire to stay longer."

She backs up again to address everyone. "But I'm not here to destroy this world, or conquer it, like I said before. I'm here on more of a personal mission. There's something here that I want, and if I can have it, I won't waste anymore of your time or mine here."

"So, if we give you this...thing, you'll just leave?" Dawn asks.

"That's the deal. Give me what I want, and I'll go away."

"What is it you want?" Tara asks.

"And why should we just turn it over to you?" Buffy says.



"You're a natural blonde, aren't you?" Bad Willow asks Buffy. "Okay then. I'll put it terms you can figure out. If I get what I want, I'll go home to my own world and take all my people and puppies with me. If I don't get what I want, I'll bring more of my people and puppies here...and kill everything that moves, starting with the people in this house. Is that a good enough reason to consider my offer, Buffy?

"Now, as to your question, Tara, what I need is something that helps to define what I am. What I am is the ruler of a vast interdimensional empire, and every imperial ruler needs three things: a First Minister to help govern, an Heir to will the throne to, and a Consort to share the throne with. I have two of these things, but the last one has eluded me since I decided to...let's say, make positive changes in the organization of the known multiverse. I could never find that special someone, that one person in all existence that I felt deserved to help me rule over 100 Billion living and dead souls...until several months ago, your time. That's when I scanned this world for the first time, and found my one true love, the one person anywhere that I'd share my life and fortune with.

"I'm here for my Mate, Tara. Nothing more. Once I have that person with me, I'll go, and leave everyone to their 'Scooby' meetings and liaisons with bloodsuckers."

Buffy starts to tremble at that 'bloodsuckers' remark, and her hands suddenly ball up into fists, as if she were going to pummel Bad Willow.

"Oops." The Bad Witch says. "Sorry, Buff. My bad. They don't know about those little adventures of yours, do they?"

"What adventures?" Xander says. "What bloodsuckers...Buffy, have you been seeing Angel again?"

Bad Willow chuckles. "Oh, yeah. That's it." She says, a little too sarcastically for my taste. "Look, its been real fun verbally sparring with you losers like this, but I don't have forever. It's decision time: Do I get my Consort, or do I turn this world into a parking lot?"

"You're not taking or killing anyone!!" Buffy growls through clenched teeth, then moves faster than I've ever seen her move. She whips a stake out of hiding in her clothes and attacks! She's a blur of motion! It's amazing to see!

Unfortunately, it's even more amazing to see Bad Willow gesture and freeze the Slayer in mid motion. The point of the stake stops two inches before plunging into the witch's heart. "Stake to the heart." She says. "So...you're a one-note natural blonde."

She steps around Buffy and comes closer, forcing the rest of us to take an instinctive step back. All except Tara, who steps right into Bad Willow's path. "Stop!" She says. "Stop! I'll go with you!"

"Tara, No!" Good Willow says. "What are you saying?!"

"It's the only way to save everybody." Tara says, then to Bad Willow. "I'll come. Just don't hurt anyone else."

This time Bad Willow's mask disappears. She sneers at Tara as she says: "Why on Earth would I want to be saddled with a sniveling, whining, stuttering little mouse like you?"

That makes Tara back up, feeling for Good Willow, who holds her by the shoulders. "I-I thought you w-w-would w-want me..." Tara says.

"Well, you thuh-thuh-thuh-thought wrong, McClay! Goddamn, woman! You've already emasculated one Willow! Are you trying to go for two?"

"Stop it!" Good Willow says. "You can't talk to her like that!"

"Oh? And what are you gonna do about it, Girl Scout? She's got you so afraid of exercising some real power you probably couldn't do a card trick right now! But, okay, prove me wrong! I'll give you one free spell! Hit me with your best shot."

Everyone stands still as we wait for Good Willow, wondering if she'll take her counterpart up on her offer. After several long seconds, she backs away, pulling Tara with her, as Bad Willow advances.

"Is she that good?" Bad Willow hisses at Good Willow. "Is a roll in the sack with Peasant Girl worth being so pussywhipped?"

"Willow..." Tara says softly to her girlfriend, "...you're hurting me." Good Willow's nails are digging into Tara's shoulders, and again I wonder if it's such a good idea for her to give up magic entirely. If we ever needed her to blow something away...

Her chance passes as Bad Willow brushes past them and closes on me and Xander. Dawn, ignored in the confusion, is trying her best to reanimate Buffy. Meanwhile, I cling to Xander with all my might. If she doesn't want Tara, he's the next logical choice. "You can't have him!" I say. "He's mine! I'll fight you if I have to!"

She smiles at me when I say that. "How?" She asks.

I admit, she has me there. "Well," I say, "I could...sic the IRS on you! Hey, if you control the destinies of 100 Billion souls you must be dodging a tax law or two. Not even a witch can avoid the Death of a Thousand Paper Cuts!"

She keeps smiling, then starts laughing. Great. All I did was put her in a good mood. "That's not something I've been hit with before." She says. "Well, don't worry, Anya. I don't want Xander."

"You don't?" Xander says. That better not be disappointment in his voice.

"No." Bad Willow says. "Different Universe, Same Gayness...or could you not tell from the hordes of gorgeous witches I have working for me?"

"Oh, yeah." Xander says. "Right, that makes sense. Hey, no hard feelings. Maybe you just need to find your main squeeze in a different town..."

"Well, now I'm confused." I say, because, well, I am. "You don't want him because he's not a she..."

"Right so far." She says.

"And you don't want her," I say, indicating Tara, "because she's...her?"

"You're right with me."

"But you said before that physically you were pretty much the same as our Willow, right?"

"You're three for three."



"But as far as I know, our Willow's only had intimate physical relations with three people, two of which are guys, one of which is a werewolf and the other the one you just rejected. That just leaves the girl, who you've also just rejected. If you have the same...urges as her, who else could she have been in love with that you'd want to take?"

She's still smiling, and I'm still trying to figure out the joke. "Your logic is...kinda reasonable, Anya, but it has flaws. I'm not really bound to love everybody your Willow has loved, but let's take it literally, the way you have. Suppose there were some other person in her life that she might have spent a brief moment desiring. Maybe a flash of them being together in a dream, or a fleeting thought where she wondered what it would be like to take this person for a night or a short fling. Suppose that thought, that flash, that small romantic twinge she experienced here flared into a full-blown love for me there. What would you say then?"

"Is it Buffy?" I ask, and she smiles wider.

"No, it's not Buffy." She says.

"Then I say let's find that person and send you on your way! Whew! I thought this would be hard...I mean, you'll treat her okay, right? Wouldn't want to have to go all 'Anyanka' on you."

"She'll be the Queen of the largest empire in mortal and immortal history."

"And what girl could resist that, I say. So...do we know this lucky girl?"

"Yes. Let's go."

When she says that, I notice her hand is held out, waiting for mine. "You want me to help you find her?"

She shakes her head.

"You need me to help convince her to go with you?"

She shakes her head again.

"You need me to...help plan the wedding?"

She shakes her head again, and suddenly it begins to dawn on me why I was her favorite "Scooby" tonight.

"Anya," she says, softly, "your empire awaits its Queen. Let's go."

The only time I've heard such a tone in Willow's voice is when our Willow talks to Tara about...intimate things, about loving things. All that romance, all that emotion that I expect to be aimed at Tara has suddenly been offered to me...and , uncharacteristically, I'm speechless.

The others are just as shocked as me. "ANYA??!!" They all yell in unison.

"Why not 'Anya'?" Bad Willow says.

"Because she's...she's... 'Anya'!" Good Willow says.

"Oh, good comeback." Bad Willow says. "Does Tara talk for you, too?"



"But, Me?!!" I say. "That doesn't make sense at all! Willow has never shown any romantic feelings for me, and 'Monkey Boy' here can attest to the fact that I haven't exactly thrown myself at her!"

"I can!" Xander says. "When she's throwing, I'm usually the target!"

"Anya," she says, her tone still loving but slightly scolding (just like Xander sometimes. This is getting eerie), "I told you I don't need to follow your Willow's desires exactly. I have my own desires, my own needs...but, fine. We'll do it your way. Would it help if you knew that your Willow has had those fleeting moments when she thought about being with you?"

"Have not!" Good Willow says.

"Have too," Bad Willow says, "and I can prove it." She turns and approaches Willow and Tara as she continues. "You have no idea how closely I've been watching this realm. I know all of you better than you know yourselves. It's like watching a TV show when you know all the creators and writers personally.

"I can tell you the exact moments you think about Anya that way, Willow. It happens every time she makes you mad. Every time, because your train of thought at that moment follows the exact same course. You think about how angry you are, then think about who made you angry. You wonder if she'll ever learn, if she'll discover the concept of tact, or correctness, or Modern Humanity. You think about your poor friend Xander, who not only seems to genuinely love her, but is willing to commit the rest of his natural life to someone that must make him twice as crazy. So you inevitably ask yourself, 'What does he see in her?', 'What is there about her to love that I can't see?'. Ultimately, you end up asking the same question about her that I asked about Tara: 'Is she that good?'

"Most girls would stop wondering at that point, but then, most girls are straight. You're not, and it's your sexual preference that allows you to make that tiny mental leap to actually trying to picture in your mind what having sex with her would be like. It never lasts more than a second--You don't let it--but in a second of thought, you can live a lifetime. In a second of thought, you can imagine a thousand experiences with Anya, in her bed or yours, in a car, in the Magic Box, in the park, in the cemetery. A thousand experiences, one goal: Discover what there is to Anya that would make you want to love her, worship her, possess her the way Xander does.

"Consider me the tiny part of you with the balls to act on that goal, and the clout to do it right. I came here to take a prize you've coveted from afar but would never let yourself take, because it might hurt your best friend and your current piece, and...well, like you said, she's 'Anya'. What would people think?"

It isn't often that I get to give The Look to someone else, but I'm giving it to Good Willow right now. So is Xander, and though I can't see her face from where I am, I'm sure the look Tara is giving her is a lot worse, because Good Willow is looking right back at her, with an expression that gives all the evidence of someone getting caught in a really big fib.

Bad Willow confirms my theory when she addresses Tara. "Don't worry, Peasant Girl. She still thinks about fucking you a lot more often." Then she turns and comes back toward Xander and me. This time he gets between us.

"Then why My Anya?" He says. "If there are so many Willows out there, then there's gotta be just as many Anyas."



"Not quite, Xander." She says. "There are thousands of Anyankas out there, over thousands of realities. Some have been destroyed, some have Ascended, but most waste their eternities getting petty revenge for whiny women who don't deserve true happiness, but in all those permutations there is only one Anya. This is the only place I've found where she became human, and developed this particular way. She is literally the most unique thing in the known universe. That's really what it is about her that you love, isn't it? That's what I love, too. That's why I came for her."

"You're powerful enough." Xander says, and I hear real anger in his voice. "Find a way to get another one. Anya stays."

I peek around his shoulders to see Bad Willow's reaction. If looks could kill, I'd be cradling my fiancé's lifeless corpse in my arms right now.

"What is it about my demand that is so hard for you people to grasp?" She says. "Give me what I want, and I'll go away. I want Anya. If I can't have her, no one can, and I'll guarantee that by turning this world into a desert!"

Xander doesn't respond. He just throws all his weight into a left hook. It doesn't get any closer to her face than Buffy's stake got to her heart. She stops his fist with a gesture, than twirls her hand. As she does, Xander screams as his arm twists out of its socket and breaks with three sickening pops.

"Xander!" I yell as he collapses to the floor in front of me. He's groaning through his teeth and tears are streaming down his face as he fights the pain. I hold him and try to comfort him as best I can. I look up in time to see Tara move. Her face is a study in rage and she's tearing as well, and for a fleeting moment I hope she's developed a killer instinct. She disappoints me again, moving instead to Buffy. She lays hands on the Slayer with a grunt of strain and breaks the freezing spell. Buffy looks around, quickly assessing the situation, then lets her stake fly, headed right for Bad Willow's head.

The Witch turns around and stops it in mid-flight with a wave of her hand, then a slashing motion sends it back at Buffy in a blur. The wooden shaft goes straight through Buffy's abdomen! She looks like a rag doll on its feet for a second or two, clutching her stomach and looking confused as she bleeds profusely, then she crumples to the floor with a whimper. "Buffy!" Dawn screams, following her down. "Buffy, hold on! Please!"

Tara advances, gritting her teeth. Now she develops a killer instinct! It's too late. Another gesture sends her flying through a wall! That just leaves Good Willow.

"Fight me," Bad Willow says, "deal with me. I don't care if you fight for Tara or Anya or whoever. Just show me some of the power you keep denying yourself."

They stare each other down for several seconds, then Good Willow moves...to the poker stand by the fireplace. She picks up a big poker, but before she can advance Bad Willow sends her right after Tara.

Then Bad Willow stands there, surveying the carnage she created. "Smashed, and wrecked," she says quietly, raising her hand for the final blow, "and now gone."

"STOP!" I scream.

She turns to face me. "Stop me." She says.

I don't have any choice. "I'll go with you." I say.

"Anya, No!!!" Xander grunts through his pain.

"I love you, Xander." I say, then I talk to Bad Willow. "Leave them be, and I'll go with you."

She smiles and crouches down to respond. "You've just made me the happiest woman ever. I'd do anything for you."

"Anything?"

"Anything."

"Fix them." I say, indicating everyone else. "Fix them all. And the house."

She looks around, then back at me. She stands and extends her hand. "Everything will be whole after we walk out the door."

I look at the hand, then at her, and then I take one last look at my one true love, then set him gently on the floor. "No, Anya, don't!" He says. "We can stop her."

No we can't. Not now. I reach out with a trembling hand and take Bad Willow's. She helps me up, then offers me her elbow. I take it like a good girl, and we walk out side by side. Her hat jumps off the couch and flies into her free hand, and she dons it with a flourish.

"Anya! ANYA!!" Xander screams at me. I'm afraid to look back, or sob out loud as we move, afraid of what she'll do to him if I do. She's happy right now, singing under her breath.

"'Steppin' out, with my baby...'"

She gives a wave of her arm as we walk down the front steps. The wolves start disappearing into a heavy mist, which turns into tiny charms that the witches outside tuck into their pockets. When the wolves are gone, the witches walk away, presumably to rendezvous wherever we're going.

The others run out of the house as we get halfway down the walk. I can hear them all calling to me. Since they haven't run down to get me, I can only assume that my escort has them trapped in the house. I can see it when we reach the limo. I turn to look back at the front door. Buffy and Xander are pounding the air just beyond it, calling out.

"Anya!!" He calls. "No matter what happens, I'll find you and bring you home!!"

I almost break down then. That's a promise I'll definitely hold him to.

The chauffeur of the limo is a tall, slender girl, in a uniform with a skirt so short that her taste in lingerie will be revealed the minute she bends over. She holds the door open for us. I get in first and sit in the backwards seat, then Bad Willow gets in and sits opposite me. The door closes and I look at Buffy's house once more before the car pulls away.

Bad Willow looks, too, then tries to comfort me. "The barrier will come down after we've left this reality." She says. "It's for the best, really. Xander may have loved you, but none of them appreciated you like I do. You'll see, dear, that I can give you everything you've ever dreamed of."

I look at her then, see that familiar face, hear that familiar voice, and realize that no matter what she says, she's not "Willow" at all. She's just a monster wearing my friend's body, and I've just committed myself to spending eternity with her.

That's when I start crying.





TBC...