Author's Note: Plot! Hopefully, because this section is short, I'll get another one up today, as well, but I'm going on vacation soon and have to do some work, first. So we'll see when I get around to it.

Willow burst through the door to Giles' house. "Buffy?" she asked.

"She's not here," came Giles' voice, from behind a large stack of books on his desk.

Willow tentatively came over, to find Giles looking quite a bit worse for wear, a book open and a yellow pad of paper beside him, upon which he'd scribbled notes and diagrams and computations. Willow flicked her eyes over to the trash can by his desk. Sure enough, it was filled with yellow sheets of paper, all containing similar notes.

"You've been busy," said Willow.

"I can't make it work," Giles confessed. "I've tried a thousand times, and everywhere I look, the answer's the same. The world should have ended, last night. The artifacts needed were all gathered, the entities were clearly prepared to carry it out. The only way we could possibly be alive today is if—"

"Someone stopped it?" Willow guessed.

"And seeing as none of us knew about it until today, that clearly cannot be the case," Giles concluded.

"Unless it wasn't one of us," said Willow.

Giles frowned. He glanced up at Willow, for the first time since she'd arrived. "Who?"

Willow just shrugged at him, a small smile on her face.

"Oh," said Giles, as he worked it out. He looked back at his calculations, a thoughtful expression on his face. Then his face fell. "Oh, dear." He put his face in his hands. "I don't know how I'll be able to tell Buffy."

"Tell her what?" asked Willow.

"That the Doctor is dead," said Giles.

Willow blinked. "Wait, he's dead?"

"Almost certainly," Giles agreed. "Stopping this ritual would be insanely dangerous, unless you were to kill those performing it. And seeing as the Doctor is… well, himself… I doubt he would have done that. Which means… last night, the world was saved, and the Doctor died."

"Um, I'm pretty sure he didn't," said Willow. "I mean, I saw him a few hours ago, and he seemed pretty alive to me."

"Alive?" Giles asked. His eyes lit up. "But that's splendid news! If he managed to stop the ritual before it even started, then we won't have to worry! Willow, you must tell me, it's terribly important. Did he retrieve the red crystal or the Kalenford of Corcheck?"

"I didn't get major details from him," Willow confessed. "I think the commandos got their hands on him. He's sort of brain damagey."

"Sorry, sort of what?" Giles asked.

"Well, he was all weird, and couldn't remember stuff," said Willow. "And he was all burned and cut up and…" She noticed the increasingly worried look on Giles face. "And that's bad?"

"Terribly," Giles agreed. He took off his glasses, and massaged his forehead. "For all of us."

"Why?" asked Willow.

"I suspect," said Giles, "that whatever happened to the Doctor's mind had nothing to do with the commandos." Giles showed Willow a book with an illustration of the red crystal. "The red crystal used in this ritual is incredibly powerful," he explained. "If the Doctor touched it while the ritual was taking place, it would have sent a massive surge of mystical energy through his entire body. It would turn a normal human body to ash in a matter of moments. Really, it's a miracle he survived at all. It should have been impossible."

"So… he's alive, and the world is saved. What's the problem?" asked Willow.

"The problem," Giles told her, "is that if this ritual was begun, but interrupted, the demon that began the ritual has two extra nights to complete it. Since the world hasn't ended, yet, I suspect the Doctor might have taken the crystal with him, when he interrupted the ritual. And if he's sustained enough neurological damage—"

"He won't know he has it," Willow realized. "Or what it does. Or that someone's looking for it." She started to get worried, fidgeting with the sleeve of her jacket. "He said he had to run," she remembered. "He didn't know why, but he was sure it was really important that he keep running." She froze. "Buffy."

"What about her?"

"She doesn't know!" Willow said. "She says he always runs away from everything. The moment she sees him all memory-lost and stuff, she's going to assume that he's just running because it's an instinct. She'll make him stop! And the moment he stops running, those world-ending demons will find him."

Giles mused the predicament over in his mind. "Actually, it's a rather ingenious plan," Giles said. "He comes to, running, and knows that, based on his own instincts, he'll have to continue running. Unless he finds Buffy, who will make him stop, but only so long as he stays with her. Once Buffy discovers him, she can protect him and keep the red crystal out of the wrong hands. Really, considering that he rarely constructs a plan, it's terribly clever."

"One problem," said Willow. "Buffy might know she has to protect the Doctor. She doesn't know he has the red crystal. And she doesn't know that the demon has three extra nights. She thinks the danger's over."

"Oh, dear," said Giles.