The Night Remembers - Part 9
By Jill
Giles sighed and pulled his glasses down. "You aren't concentrating," he
scolded gently and began to wipe his glasses with a clean, white
handkerchief.
"Sorry," Buffy pulled her legs beneath her and gave her watcher an
apologetic smile. It wasn't that this demon stuff was boring - oh well,
actually it was terribly boring - but it wasn't the reason she couldn't
bring herself to listen to him. Or, well, at least only a part of it. The
major reason however was that her thoughts kept wandering. To the memories
she'd lost. And to Angel. Well, if she was honest with herself, she had to
admit that Angel was pretty much *the* major thought.
He had said he never stopped loving her and that made her feel wonderful and
terribly sad at the same time. Maybe it was the fact that she was looking at
their relationship like an observer at the moment, being robbed of all their
memories, but why in God's name hadn't they tried to find a way to stay
together. Daylight and normal were highly overrated she decided. And Sex?
Well, obviously she had had sex. She must have with Angel - because he lost
his soul and probably with Riley.
Her boyfriend of one year. You didn't have a boyfriend for over a year at
her age and not have sex, did you? But truth to be told, she couldn't
remember having any. And you could hardly miss what you didn't remember. So
it wasn't missing having sex, although Angel might, but of course the
temptation was there. It wouldn't be normal she decided, to not want Angel.
He was just too attractive to not want him.
On the other hand they were both responsible adults - or... whatever you
wanted to call Angel - **250 years. Oh Boy! Talk about experience.** But she
was getting off track here. The fact was that two adults should be able to
keep their hormones in check and being with Angel felt so right, Buffy
couldn't imagine him leaving - again.
"You're forgiven," Giles smiled too. "I know this isn't your favorite
subject," he put his glasses back on. "It never was, but there are certain
things you need."
"I know, I know," she flashed him a grin, "But it seems to go in one ear and
out the other. Besides, you're here, so you can be my brain and I'm just The
Slayer. I mean, that's the job description, right? I slay things. It doesn't
say anywhere The Knowing Slayer, just The Slayer."
He couldn't help but chuckle. God, he was glad she was back. Memory loss or
no, fortunately she was still Buffy and when he could believe Angel - and he
*did* believe the vampire - then she hadn't lost anything of her invention
in slaying vampires and demons. "Well, shall we quit for today then?" he
asked, although knowing that he didn't need to.
Buffy was about to answer when the door opened, "Hi everybody. I'm back."
Dawn deposed her backpack in the hall and entered the living room.
"Yeah," another voice said. "Her we are."
"Xander?" Buffy looked at her friend, a question in her eyes.
"I picked Dawn from school. Willow had an important appointment, she
couldn't cancel," he replied. No need to tell Buffy where the redhead was at
the moment.
"Oh," Buffy jumped up from her chair smiling at her sister. "Are you hungry?
Thirsty?"
"Uh-uh," Dawn nodded. "But I'm old enough to get something on my own. Want
anything Xand?" she asked over her shoulder already walking towards the
kitchen.
"No, thanks," he smiled at her retreating back, then turned to Buffy,
"Sorry, I'm in a hurry," he explained, flashing Giles a grin as well.
"Wedding preparations. All of a sudden my mother has realized she's got a
son and now she's driving Anya nuts." With a wave of his hand he was gone.
"Well," Giles stood up as well, "I better leave too," he bent down and
picked some papers from the table. "Could you ask Angel to come to my
apartment tonight after patrol," he asked. "There's something we need to
talk about."
"Uh... sure," she said. "Anything serious?" she asked feeling dizzy all of a
sudden. There was an image in her head. A flash. Angel hurt, his chest full
of blisters and *burn-marks*? And a dark-haired girl close to him. And
Spike?
"No," he shook his head, "just some..." he stopped when he saw how pale she
was. "Buffy?"
No reaction.
"Buffy?" he tried again and reached out to touch her shoulder. She almost
jumped out of her skin when his hand connected with her.
"What?" she asked, staring at him with wide eyes. "Oh... sorry," she
slightly shook her head. "There... there was another... memory, I think."
"There was?" excitement was written allover Giles' face.
"What happened?" Dawn came back from the kitchen and one look at the pale
face of her sister said enough. She deposed the plate she'd been carrying on
the table and came to stand beside Buffy, her eyes darting to Giles, "What
happened?"
"I believe she had another flashback," the watcher told her. "Buffy?"
"Yes," she nodded. "Yes, I did. There was Angel, but he was... hurt. His
chest was full of blisters. And then there was a girl. Pretty. Dark hair
and... Spike?"
"That's Drusilla," Giles explained gently, forcing her to sit down on the
sofa and taking the spot beside her. "The girl. Her name is Drusilla. She's
a vampire. She was... er... I think you could say Spike's paramour for many
years."
"And his sire," Dawn added.
Two pairs of eyes turned towards her. "What?" she threw her hands in the
air, "Am I supposed to be completely ignorant?"
"No, of course not," the watcher cast her another irritated look, then his
eyes went back to Buffy. "That is right. Drusilla is Spike's sire."
"Is she," Buffy hesitated for a moment, "Did Angel sire her?"
"Yes," Giles nodded. "How did you know?"
"Uh... Spike said... When Angel came, he said he was his grand-sire and
later he said it again, so I assumed..." the blond shrugged slightly.
"Ah... yes... I see," Giles nodded again. "Did you see anything else?"
"No, but..." suddenly the slayer frowned, should she tell Giles? Was he the
person to trust with this, she wondered?
"Yes?" he looked at her expectantly.
"I... I felt," she said finally.
"You felt?" now it was Dawn who frowned, not understanding. "What do you
mean, you felt?"
"When I had the first... flashback, I just saw Angel and Riley, but... this
time... I felt," she shrugged a bit sheepishly, "I felt... fear. I was
scared... for Angel."
Dawn's mouth formed an 'o' at her words, while Giles' brows drew quickly
together. "Anything else?" he wanted to know.
"No. That is, I was afraid and," she glanced down at her hands for a moment,
then back at her watcher, "No," she shook her head, "just fear."
He relaxed visibly and Buffy was glad she hadn't told him the truth, because
besides fear she could clearly remember feeling love.
***
"No."
Willow's head jerked up, her irritated eyes falling on the dark haired
vampire sitting opposite to her. She and Tara had left the dorms after their
last class to get to the mansion as soon as possible. The redheaded witch
felt guilty enough already, and she didn't want to delay bringing Angel what
she hoped were good news.
With a mixture of guilt and excitement in her gut she had told Buffy's
former boyfriend about their discovery.
She had expected a lot of things after that. Like Angel shouting at her for
not trying to find out earlier or him dancing through the hall in happiness
- although, Angel didn't really dance - or at least not very often and truth
to be told, she just couldn't picture him jumping around like some hyper
teenager.
But the last thing she'd expected was that quiet, but firm, 'no'. "What do
you mean, no?" she asked frowning.
"What I mean is that I'm certain the happiness clause is still firmly in
place. And I am certain, because I already once reverted into Angelus after
I came back from hell," Angel told her, his face showing no emotion.
Willow's frown deepened, "You did? Do you mean that you..." she trailed off,
looking at him with sudden anger. Sure he and Buffy were separated, and
Buffy had been with Riley, and before the commando there had been Parker,
but that didn't mean... "I see," she said folding her arms in front of her
chest, not even trying to hide her disappointment, caused by his supposed
behavior, the fact that she'd obviously been wrong about the curse, and to
see her romantic illusions shatter. Buffy wasn't the only one who could make
him lose his soul.
"No, you don't," Cordelia sighed, coming back from the kitchen with drinks
for everyone. "He didn't do *it* with a woman. Not like you think anyway.
Some crazy actress, all afraid of getting old and unattractive, wanted him
to turn her. He, of course, refused. So she drugged him, to get him relaxed,
that's what she said," the brunette shook her head, "The drug she used
initiated happiness. Bliss. And his soul wasn't really gone, it was just...
temporarily absent. Fortunately Wesley and knocked him out and chained him
to his bed, after that he was his old brooding self again."
Willow's face brightened, "Oh, I see. Well... That's good." She frowned
again, "Or not. I mean, it's not good that I was wrong about the curse and
the clause, but good that you didn't..." she smiled sheepishly at the
vampire, "You know."
"Yes, I do," Angel smiled as well.
He had a nice smile, Tara decided. She liked Angel. There was a lot of
wonderful white light in his aura, which meant he had to be a good person.
"B-but," she said, reaching in her pocket and producing the paper with the
printout of the curse, "Th-this d-doesn't have a cl-clause."
The vampire was suddenly interested, "That's the curse?" he asked.
"Y-yes," Tara nodded, handing him the paper. "Th-that's the v-version,
M-Miss C..." she looked at Willow. "What w-was h-her name?"
"Miss Calendar," the redhead replied. She saw Angel flinch at the name and
instantly felt bad for bringing it up. She sighed inwardly. "We had Anya
compare the two versions," she explained, gazing at the vampire, "the
original one and the translation."
"You mean, Jenny Calendar was talking ancient Romani?" Cordelia asked
surprised.
"She did. She was Romani after all," Willow said as if it would explain
everything.
"Yes, but... Miss Calendar was," she paused for a moment, "you know. She
always wore nice clothes and was very modern. But then," she shrugged, "she
had the hots for Giles." When three pairs of eyes turned to her, she rolled
her eyes, "Alright, love is blind, I know. But please, Giles!"
"He i-is v-very n-nice," Tara came to the watcher's defense.
Angel shot the girls an irritated glance, then said, "So Anya speaks ancient
Romani as well."
"Well, duh," the former cheerleader replied, "She's old. More than 1100
years."
"I know that Cordelia," the vampire was clearly annoyed now. It didn't
happen often, but sometimes the brunette could test his patience.
"Sorry," she held up her hands.
"What you're saying, Willow," Angel emphasized the name, showing clearly he
wasn't talking to Cordelia, at which she rolling her eyes. "What you're
saying is that the versions aren't alike?"
"That's right. The original version has the happiness clause, the
translation doesn't. My guess is, that Miss Calendar tried to make certain
it would never happen again. The soul-losing-thing, I mean." The redhead
took her orange juice and sipped, "That's what I don't understand. When I
re-cursed you, I used the translated version. So why is your soul not bound?
Why is the happiness-part still there? When Anya explained the whole thing
to us, I was so certain."
Angel didn't look up he was too busy reading the text of his curse, while
Cordelia seemed to think about something. So silence settled for a while.
Then it was Tara who spoke first, "D-didn't you say s-something a-about that
y-you s-started chanting and s-some spirit t-took over r-right in the
m-middle?"
"Yeah, that was weird, it was working great, I started chanting in English
and suddenly I was sort of possessed. Oz was there and he said I was looking
really strange, my eyes were glowing and my voice changed and..." and
suddenly it hit her. Her heart was pounding furiously in her chest and she
grabbed her lover's hand.
"That's it," she shouted triumphantly and when she saw she had Angel's
attention, she explained. "Don't you se?. I started chanting in English. I
started re-cursing you in Miss Calendar's version. So what if some spirit
didn't want me to. What if some force, a witch maybe or whatever, a Romani,
was interfering, to make certain you'd suffer further on?"
"Th-that c-could explain it," Tara gave Willow a proud look. "B-but that
w-would mean w-we could try a-again. W-we just n-need a p-protection spell,
to p-prevent the sp-spirit from interfering a-again."
"You mean you could remove the clause?" Cordelia was now exited too.
"That's exactly what she means," the redhead replied.
The brunette turned towards the vampire, "Angel, that would be great," she
was beaming at him. "Just imagine, you could--"
"No," his word was sharp as a knife.
Cordelia could only stare at him, then she stuttered, "Wh-what do you
mean... no?"
"It won't work," he threw the piece of paper he was reading on the table,
stood up and began to pace the room. He was holding his dream in his hand. A
permanent soul. It would push the door open to so many possibilities. The
permanent fear would be gone. And Buffy...
"Why?" Cordelia couldn't understand. Someone was giving him a precious gift
and he...
"I know you are afraid, Angel, but think about the consequences. No more
fear of becoming Angelus again," Willow tried to argue.
"No way, Willow," the vampire was too agitated to sit down again.
"But..."
"Could anybody please tell me what the hell you are talking about?" Cordelia
shouted finally, feeling completely left out. "What. Is. The. Problem."
"The problem is," the redhead said slowly, "that in order to curse Angel
with this," she pointed at the sheet on the table, "we'd need to remove the
current curse and that would mean lifting his soul."
... to be continued