Chapter 4

Giles had watched Buffy's abrupt departure from the room with dismay, and from the corner of his eye he'd seen Angel actually lurch forward as if to stop her. Their mutual objection to a Buffy/Spike tete-a-tete was probably the only thing that he and Angel would be in agreement on, he thought.

"Giles, look! It's an Oz! It's OUR Oz!" Xander cheered, slapping the young werewolf happily on the back. Willow clung to Oz's arm, beaming from ear to ear.

"It's Oz, it's Oz, it's Oz," she chanted giddily. "Hi, Charles!" She caught Giles' withering look and stopped hopping. "Right. Serious now."

"Who the hell are you people?" Gunn yelled. He took a closer look at the two strangers swarming Osbourne, and a light clicked on in his head. "The witch chick! Willow, right? Angel, what's goin' on?"

"No idea." Angel glared at Giles. The watcher cleared his throat and raised his voice.

"We're here on behalf of the Council of Watchers. We want to check on the welfare of an unregistered slayer, Khiem Thu-"

"Thu Kheim," the tiny Asian girl corrected, and then clamped her hand over her mouth and looked aghast.

Giles turned his gaze on her. "You're Miss Khiem, I presume?" Thu peered over her fingers at Michael and Paloma with a desperate "What should I say?" expression in her eyes.

Michael stood up and said mildly, "I think you'd better leave her alone. That was a brand-new door, by the way."

Giles gave the man a once-over: thin; fair of skin and hair; probably a few years younger than himself, with a round, bland face that bore the scars of a protracted adolescent battle with acne. A harmless human, or another Ben?

He decided not to divulge their knowledge of the mysterious entity's presence yet, and spoke instead to Willow's former beau. "Oz, you're doing well these days?"

"Can't complain."

The boy was still the epitome of understatement.

Mr. Yoder appeared in the shattered doorway. "Is one of you Spike or Angel?" he demanded. "Because I've got a hell of a lot of questions."

Gunn stared at the strange little man and shook his head in helpless wonder. "Yeah, well, take a damn number."

"Spike's outside with Buffy," Willow answered. She bit her lip, suddenly concerned, and added, "I think I'd better go check on her." She squeezed Oz's hand in both of hers. "Be right back."

As she hurried out the door, Oz commented to Xander, "So you're not just here to enjoy the hellmouth?"

"Oh, yeah, that too," Xander sighed. "Wouldn't miss it. I just can't imagine why a hellmouth would want to open under Hooterville."

Kay narrowed her eyes at Xander from across her ample bosom. "Excuse me?"

"Sorry. My bad. Poor choice of an obscure pop cultural reference." Xander smiled at her sheepishly, then whispered to Oz, "I should be afraid of her, shouldn't I?"

Willow spotted her friend standing still and silent in the middle of the front yard. She came up beside her and touched her arm with a tentative hand. "Buffy?" she said gently. "Where'd Spike go?" She followed Buffy's gaze to the driveway, and her eyes widened considerably.

Fred straightened up in Spike's embrace, intending to pull her hair back out of the way before leaning in for another smooch, when she caught sight of the two girls watching them. She gave a squeak of embarrassment and a little laugh. "Oops. I didn't know we had company." Spike loosened his hold, and she thought she saw a peculiar look on his face as she took a step toward the visitors.

"Hi...Willow? Oh my gosh, WILLOW!" Fred threw her arms out and wrapped the witch in an enormous hug. "What're you doin' here? It's so good to see you again! Why didn't you tell us you were coming?" She released her and stepped back, waiting for Willow to introduce the blonde girl beside her.

Willow took a deep breath. "It's just some Council business," she said, trying to feign calm. "Fred, I don't guess you've ever met Buffy, have you? This is Buffy...Buffy, this is Fred. Fred helped me re-soul Angel a couple of years ago, remember? ...Oh, 'course you don't remember; you weren't there, duh - but you know I did, and she did; help me, I mean. 'Cause I told you about it." She trailed off, and then added idiotically, "Fred, this is Spike." She gave Spike a weak smile. "Hey. Long time no see."

Fred was pretty, Buffy noted with the tiny portion of her brain that wasn't screaming and throwing itself against the walls. Not beauty pageant pretty, but fairy-tale pretty: big brown eyes, long brown hair, pert turned-up nose...what was the word? "Waif-ish"? She'd been wearing a very pleasant smile, too, until she'd heard the name "Buffy," and suddenly that smile had wavered and she'd looked as if Willow had punched her in the stomach.

All the light seemed to go out of Fred's eyes. She stole a glance at Spike, but he looked as unhappy as she. It was only by the bloodline of generations of gracious southern ladies that she was able to muster herself to say, "Y'all want to come in and sit down?"

"Sure; that'd be nice." Willow nodded at both Fred and Buffy sympathetically, and put her arm around Buffy. "C'mon, let's all go inside, where it's indoors." Spike slipped his own arm around Fred's waist and pulled her close, as much to comfort himself as to comfort her.

Buffy allowed herself to be steered toward the big square house. At the foot of the porch steps she turned back and looked at Fred. "Hi," she said mechanically.

They returned to the living room to find Giles and Angel still glowering at each other. Vague introductions were being made by everyone else, with little hope of anyone remembering afterward who was who. Willow found a seat on a sofa and pulled the shell-shocked Buffy down beside her. At the sight of Fred, Angel snapped, "Here's someone I'd REALLY like you to meet, Giles. This is the woman whose life you refused to save."

"Whatever are you talking about?" Giles couldn't remember ever having seen the girl whom Spike was escorting. She appeared to be somewhat upset. She gave Giles a long, odd look and then shook her head at the taller vampire.

"Angel, maybe this isn't the right time to bring it up. It's really not important anymore."

"Oh, I think it's very important, Fred. I think Willow ought to hear it, too." Angel turned to Willow, and his voice dripped contempt. "Just before we left L.A., Fred was infected with an entity. It took over her body, and over a period of days it melted all her internal organs, while she lay in a hospital bed in agony. Nothing we could do would stop it. I tried to call you for help, but Rupert here wouldn't let me talk to you. He said that you were visiting another astral plane, and didn't want to be disturbed. And that Fred's suffering was our problem."

"What?" Willow's jaw dropped.

"Oh, it gets even more interesting. She died. That thing hollowed Fred out and threw her soul into a hell dimension and marched around for months in her stolen body, and would have happily annihilated every living thing on the planet."

Giles cut him off. "I had no way of knowing if you were telling the truth. You and your colleagues chose to join forces with an organization known for its support of evil. You knew you were playing with fire. You've no one but yourselves to blame." He spoke with conviction, but he found it difficult to meet Fred or Willow eye to eye.

One look at Fred's pale face confirmed Angel's story for Willow. She stared at Giles in horror.

"Willow-"

"Fred was my FRIEND! She helped me get Angel back, and she gave us the history book, and...and she WASN'T EVIL!" Her astonishment mounted with each word. "Giles, how dare you not tell me?"

Xander interrupted the argument with a raised hand. "Question. Where's the happy planet-annihilating entity now?"

"Her name's Illyria," Spike spoke up from the seat he'd taken near the fireplace hearth. "Most of her powers are gone now, an' Wight figured out a way to bring Fred back to us. 'Lyri sort of comes and goes these days."

Xander and the other newcomers were obviously baffled by that explanation. Gunn clarified it. "Illyria's an Old One." He averted his eyes from Winifred as Giles had done. "An ancient race of big-ass rulers. God-kings, warriors. Solid demon. They look kinda like Rodan from the Godzilla movies."

"Glorificus?" Yoder asked suddenly. Buffy, Giles, Xander, and Willow simultaneously gasped.

"Hell, no, not Glory," Spike snorted. "Illyria's a whole 'nother ball of wax. Although I wouldn't have wanted to be between the two of them in a boxing ring when 'Lyri was in her prime." He paused and lit a cigarette. "You just missed Big Blue, as a matter of fact. She was here yesterday. She 'n Fred have worked out a little time-share system."

Xander dropped his head into his hands. "I don't know whether to feel relieved or stupid." He held out his palm in a halting gesture at Spike. "Don't answer that."

"The mysterious entity," Giles sighed. "I suppose we should be thankful."

"She must have left a residual bit of her essence behind," Willow reasoned. "Strong enough for my tracer stone to pick up." Then a new thought occurred to her. "Where's Cordelia?" she asked. "And Wesley and that nice green guy. And..." She knit her brow, thinking for a fleet second that there'd been someone else, too. "Are they still in L.A.?"

For a long moment, no one said anything. Finally Angel replied in a bleak and pain-tightened voice, "We don't know where Lorne is. Wes and Cordy are dead."

The Scoobies were stunned into silence. Tears welled up in Fred's eyes; she wiped them with her sleeve and leaned her head tiredly on Spike's shoulder.