Willow squeaked and took several steps backwards. "Ah…hi."

Buffy exhaled and put the stake away. "Willow. Hi." She hurriedly wiped at her eyes, aware that they were still wet. "Sorry. Ran…ran into Giles…kinda got my hackles up. What's goin' on?"

Willow produced a small bundle of flowers from behind her back. "Great minds think alike?" she asked timidly.

Buffy smiled. "I guess they do."

Willow inched past Buffy and laid her flowers next to the Slayer's bundle. Then, her attention was caught by the roses. She smiled grimly. "Oh. Miss Calendar. Inside joke. Nice."

"Like I said," said Buffy bitterly. "I ran into Giles."

Willow winced. "Ooh. Well…it was kinda that whole messy situation that I wanted to talk to you about."

"Really?"

"Yeah." Willow took Buffy's arm and started leading her away from the graves. "It's…kind of a long story. Remember when Spike was chasing me, and…and I had to hide while you and Xander fought him off?"

"…yeah?"

"Well, it turns out that I was hiding in Miss Calendar's old classroom. I hid under the desk, and as I was crawling under there I saw a floppy disk that had fallen down the side. So the next morning I picked it up, 'cause I'd…I'd kind of been going through some of her stuff. Just her magic stuff, 'cause she had a pretty extensive collection. And so I could…get stuff in order for her. So I ran the program, and…" She looked at Buffy, her eyes intense and urgent. "Buffy, I'll understand if you don't want to go through with it. We all will. He wouldn't be the same, he'd be way different, but…"

Buffy felt her heart skip. "Willow…what did you find? What did Miss Calendar find?"

Willow smiled nervously. "I…I think she was going to try it on Angel the night we…the night she died. But…it's the spell. The curse. To restore a vampire's soul."

Buffy's jaw dropped. "Are…are you kidding me?!"

Willow shook her head. "Nope."

Buffy hugged her friend so hard that Willow almost fell over. "Willow, you're amazing! When can we do it?!"

Willow smiled. "Well…tonight, if you want. I…I took the liberty of stopping by the magic shop, in case you said yes. That's…kind of why we're headed back to the library."

Buffy stared up at the sky, her mind buzzing with possibilities. "Wow…we could have Giles back."

"We could have Giles back."

Buffy smiled. "I…have a lot of stuff I wanna say to him. The real him."

"Me, too."

"And the very first thing…"

"Yeah?"

"I'm gonna apologize until I'm blue in the face. The very second thing…"

"Yeah?"

"I'm gonna beat him up until he apologizes to me."

"Sounds good."

As the two Scoobies walked, Spike strode out from behind a mausoleum. He watched them vanish into the darkness, his eyebrows raised so high that they were in danger of disappearing into his head.

"Give the boss back his soul?" he mused quietly. "Ooh, dear. I don't think Dru would like that. She's quite attached to her new Daddy. I'd better go break the news."

Drusilla took the news quite badly. Whimpering softly, her bottom lip trembling, she leaned her head against Spike's shoulder. "No, Spike, no…" she moaned. "The bad Slayer can't take Daddy from us…"

"I know," said Spike grimly. "I thought Angelus was bad. This ponce is bad, too, but he's inventive about it. He was inventive about it as a human!"

"I love Daddy…" Drusilla whimpered.

"I know, pet," said Spike soothingly, running his fingers through Drusilla's hair. He'd been amazed but he'd come to the conclusion that, alive or dead, Giles needed someone to look after. Alive, that had been Buffy. Dead, it was now Drusilla. He treated them much the same, and Drusilla had taken to him like a rat took to a big hunk of cheese. He'd started training her, for God's sake! In weapons! And Drusilla was proving very, very good with them. Spike hadn't heard her call anyone Daddy and mean it in their entire relationship.

Giles himself had returned from his trip (to where, Spike did not know) about twenty minutes ago, and had been in an irritatingly good mood. Whatever he'd been researching round the clock for a week was apparently going well, and he'd mentioned something about getting a "crucial ingredient". Spike didn't know what the hell was going on, and suspected that he wouldn't until it was underway, but Giles had filled in Drusilla on the details. Whatever was going on, it had put Drusilla in a fabulous mood. She hummed softly to herself whenever she wasn't speaking, remembering old lullabies from her time as a human. Her voice was higher, lighter, breathier. Drusilla was in a very good mood.

He clapped his hands. "Well, then," he said. "We'll just have to stop them from taking 'Daddy', now won't we? A nice round of ripping their throats out should show our displeasure, don't you think, Dru?"

Drusilla nodded eagerly. "Yes, oh yes." She straightened up, suddenly motherly and attentive. "My Spike has such good ideas. Come. We must hurry."

Spike clicked his fingers. "To the school!"

At that moment Giles came out of the mansion's library, cleaning his glasses distractedly.

"Why are you going to the school at this late hour?" he asked.

"Gonna crash a party," said Spike innocently.

"The Slayer is being very naughty!" said Drusilla anxiously. "Not sweet and polite like me." She smiled dreamily, showing off her fangs. "Do you love me, Daddy?"

He looked up, and smiled at her. "Of course I do, Drusilla."

"Then maybe you'd like to join us?" asked Spike. "Because your Slayer and her mates are going to try a little hocus-pocus in an hour or so. They're gonna try and give you back your soul."

Giles…paused.

Then, he slid his glasses onto his face and re-entered the library. The two vampires watched him go, feeling nonplussed. Then, Spike shrugged.

"Ah, well. Old folks need their rest. Shall we, Dru?"

Drusilla nodded, and started towards the door. Spike reached for the knob. Giles, appearing apparently out of nowhere, reached past him and opened the door. Spike and Drusilla stared at him…and the man jingled the keys of his Citroen in front of them.

"Of course I'd like to join you," he said. "I just thought we could get there a bit faster by driving. As a matter of fact, I have some business at the school myself…"