Disclaimer and stuff in the first part.

The Night Remembers - Part 20
By Jill


Giles' small apartment was already full of life when Willow and Tara joined
the rest of the gang around nine o'clock in the evening. The two watchers
were deeply buried into books, Cordelia was searching the net again, and
even Dawn had been given a task with reading through one of the older
watcher diaries.

Willow raised a brow at that, so far, Giles had always refused to let her
know the real terrifying facts of life, but then this situation was urgent
and every pair of eyes was needed. Dawn even seemed to like what she did,
her forehead was furrowed in concentration, and her nose wrinkled from time
to time, the witch guessed whenever she found a rather disgusting detail.

Xander sat next her, also reading a book. He seemed oddly pale and tired.
And didn't look up when the door closed behind the witches.

With a sweep of her head, noticed that five people were missing. "Hi," she
announced her presence, and Tara beside her gave the others a smile.
"Where's the rest?" Willow asked.

Giles looked up from his book, "Buffy and Angel are on patrol, as are Spike
and Gunn -"

"And we all hope they don't kill each other," Cordelia cut in without taking
her eyes from the screen. "Gunn can't stand people or non-people who talk
too much."

Dawn giggled, Xander didn't. Well he usually didn't giggle, but he didn't
even look up, or anything. No smile.

"And Anya?" the redhead wanted to know.

Uncomfortable silence. Giles cleared his throat, while Dawn and Cordelia
seemed extremely busy with reading or searching the net. "What happened?"
Willow demanded. "Oh God, she wasn't attacked, was she?"

"No," Xander finally looked at her and she stifled a gasp the very last
moment. His eyes were red-rimmed, his face strained. He shrugged, tried to
control his voice, "She ran. Did what she knows best, running in the face of
danger. I shouldn't have been so surprised. She did it before."

"Oh, Xand, I'm so-"

"No," he held up a hand, giving his childhood friend a sad smile. "Don't say
you're sorry. I'm sorry enough, and I'm not sure I can stand pity at the
moment," he said, turning his head back to the book in his lap.

Willow's eyes met Giles' and the watcher just shook his head. Yes, she
thought, he was right. This was not the time to try to help Xander. He was
hurting, feeling betrayed, and certainly not ready for comfort. The pain was
too raw, too new. Seeing Giles smile at her understandingly, she felt a stab
of guilt. Giles was the only one who had no idea what was going on with
Buffy and Angel so far.

She and Tara hadn't seen them either after the events of that afternoon.
They'd gone straight back to the dorms, feeling drained and exhausted,
needing rest. Casting spells or curses, especially such powerful ones, was a
hard thing to do. Tara had been tired as well, and told Willow that she had
felt the attacks against the protecting field and had a hard time keeping it
intact.

Spike and Dawn didn't know what had happened either, Willow guessed, but
they were present when she and Cordelia had talked to Buffy in the morning
so they at least knew about the plans. Giles on the other hand was
completely in the dark, and that, Willow decided, wasn't right. Still it
wasn't her place to tell him. This was Buffy and Angel's story, she did her
part in it, but she felt she had nothing more than a supporting role.

Shaking herself out of her thoughts, she joined Cordelia at the table,
opened her notebook and connected it to the net. The women exchanged a short
understanding glance, then the witch whispered, "How are they?"

In response, the brunette rolled her eyes, "What do you think? All over each
other. It was almost sickening. When we came back they still weren't out of
his room and when Buffy finally gave an appearance she was glowing.
Literally."

The redhead chuckled, "I'm happy for them."

"Yeah, I'm too, but you don't have to live with them. I swear, they even
forgot all the trouble around them," Cordelia shook her head again, then
turned back to the screen.

*

They heard the voices before the door opened. Well, actually they heard Spike,
Gunn just grunted. And it sounded rather annoyed.

"That's just not the point mate," the blond vampire was saying when he
pushed the door open. "Oh, look, Red and friends are here too," he smirked.
"Just the two lovebirds still outside, I see." He caught Willow's warning
gaze. He shrugged and gave her a wicked smile, already thinking about how to
break the news to Giles, when the witch turned to her lover.

"You know, Tara, I just remember that spell we found yesterday," she said
casually, smiling when she saw that the blond witch had understood
immediately.

"Y-yes. You mean the one that can turn a man or a vampire into a toad. Yes,
I remember," she nodded at Spike, then smiled sweetly.

The vampire narrowed his eyes, studying them, trying to figure out if they
were telling the truth. But then, they were both quite powerful now. It
would be fun getting to the watcher, but becoming a toad wouldn't. With a
shrug of his shoulder he turned towards the kitchenette to get some blood
and heat it.

Gunn grinned at Willow and Tara, and removed his coat. He caught the
watcher's eye and Giles asked, "How did it go?"

"Alright, although I thought vamp-boy here, with all his super powers wasn't
that impressing."

"Hey!" Spike protested, but they all ignored him.

"We dusted eight, but man," Gunn shook his head, "they're not like the vamps
I'm used to."

"What do you mean," Giles wanted to know.

"Some of them were bloody stupid," the bleached blond vampire returned,
holding a mug in his hand. "They were stupid the last couple of nights, but
tonight hits the floor. Who ever made them had not even the slightest idea
how. Angelus would turn away in disgust."

"I thought you were just his grand-childe." Willow looked up from the
screen, suddenly interested.

"Sure, Dru made me," Spike replied, "but she was so nuts already, no way she
could teach me how to behave, or to hunt. Angelus might be a real bugger, but
the Poof really has style."

"As interesting as this may be," Giles cut in, "but can we please return to
the matter at hand. So you killed eight vampires."

"Yeah," Gunn nodded, walking over to the counter and taking a can of coke.
"You know the vampires in L.A., some of them have style. Living like
human beings - mostly. In apartments, big houses, they drive expensive cars
and hire the more expensive lawyers. Around here you get the idea they're
second-class. Some of them are actually living in crypts."

"Hey," Spike shouted again.

When Gunn turned confused eyes on him, Dawn explained, "Spike sometimes
lives in a crypt. Whenever Buffy's cross with him, he moves out of our
basement."

"You mean he lives in a crypt?" the African American chuckled, ignoring the
vampire's growl, "And living in your basement is actually an improvement? Oh
man," he was laughing so hard by now that he had to put his coke down, that
was in danger to spill over. "You should've told me earlier."

"Shut up," Spike muttered, walking to the television and switching it on,
shutting the others out.

Dawn giggled again, then turned her eyes back on the book.

The same moment the door opened again. Buffy was the first to step in, her
eyes shining, a smile lighting up her whole face. Angel came behind her, his
fingers tightly entwined with hers. His smile wasn't quite as huge, but it
was there and his eyes... Cordelia had to look twice. They were actually
smiling too.

"Hi everyone," Buffy greeted enthusiastically. "The slayer is back from
patrol," she joked, trying to stand like a soldier, although she was
laughing all the time. "Dusted 15 vamps... but it was cake. All of them were
incredibly stupid."

"Fifteen?" the book almost fell from Wesley's lap.

"Oh dear, oh dear," Giles muttered. "That makes 23 together."

"You had eight?" Buffy turned towards Gunn and when she saw him nod, she
grinned, "We win!" She looked at Angel and he couldn't help but chuckle.
They were about to enter a dangerous situation, but her happiness and
excitement was infectious. She'd always been good to seize the moment, and
this time was no exception.

He entangled his fingers from hers and shrugged off his duster, throwing it
into a corner as all chairs - except one - were already occupied. Maybe it
was involuntarily, but they had saved the loveseat for them. With a slight
smile on his lips, Angel sat down. "I've never seen such stupid vampires.
They aren't even like fledglings, they're just plain stupid."

"You had no problems killing them?" Giles asked again.

"None," Buffy shook her head. "Giles, they almost begged to be dusted. They
didn't even threaten us. I think some of them didn't even know what a slayer
was." She sighed and then without thinking placed herself in Angel's lap,
resting her head against his chest.

Maybe it was Angel's arm that almost automatically wrapped itself around the
slayer's waist or the fact that nobody in the room looked particularly
surprised, but Giles voice sounded more than slightly irritated, when he
asked, "Could anybody explain what's going on here?"

Willow's head came up with a jerk, "Wrong?" she asked, "Did something
happen?"

"I think the watcher's referring to the fact that soul boy got his hand on
the slayer's intimate parts," Spike said with a smirk, then turned back to
his favorite soap opera. There were certain disadvantages to living in a
crypt he had to admit.

"Spike, shut up," Buffy shouted, but didn't try to change her current
position. Then - looking rather uncomfortably all of a sudden - she turned
to Giles, "Angel and I are an item again," she admitted hesitantly.

"You're what?" the watcher came off his chair like a rocket, not able to sit
anymore.

"Before you get all excited, Giles," Willow cut in, "you should probably
know that Angel's got his soul for good. No happiness clause." She almost
crumpled in her chair when he directed his glare towards her. "I just
thought this would help... uh... shutting up now." Quickly her eyes darted
back on the screen.

"Could somebody please explain all this," the watcher looked back to the
vampire and his slayer. Then his gaze swept to Wesley, who cleared his
throat. "You," he asked incredulously, "were in this too?"

"Er... yes," the younger man admitted.

"Maybe I should think about my decision to install you as Buffy's future
watcher. Because I get the feeling you're all bloody mad!" he shouted.
"Willow."

The witch's head jerked up again, she was staring at him through wide eyes.
"I... uh... found the curse Jenny had translated. And we suddenly understood
what happened three years ago," she explained hastily. "When I was
re-cursing Angel for the first time. As soon as we knew where the problem
was, we had no problems to solve it. This afternoon we removed the old curse
and used Jenny's version. It was actually quite easy," she was eager to add.
"Really."

Giles closed his eyes for a moment, and then took a deep breath, "You are
not only bloody mad, you're worse. Are you aware that we're going to face a
serious battle in only two days and you've got nothing better to do than
playing with curses," his eyes went back to Angel and Buffy, "and God knows
what," he added with a pointed look, that made the slayer blush. "This was
absolutely-"

"Before you're going to drown us with all your righteous anger, Giles,"
Cordelia's sharp voice interrupted him, "you should probably know that part
of the threat will be that they were going to remove Angel's soul. So we
thought we should fix it now rather than later. Don't you think?"

The watcher stared at her, as if he'd seen her for the first time, took
another deep breath, and tried to calm himself. Shouting rarely helped. Then
with slow, controlled movements, he sat down, pulled his glasses off his
nose and began to clean them. Not looking up, he said, "So what you're
telling me is that you investigated Angel's curse, found the problem,
removed the old version and restored his soul with the new. With the result
that there aren't any clauses anymore, the soul is now his forever?"

"That's right," Willow confirmed, her voice sounding small and a bit guilty.

Giles put his glasses back on, and then looked at Buffy and Angel. For a
long moment, he didn't say anything, then, "I'm sorry," he said honestly, "I
... just don't know what to say. If we'd found out earlier, we could've
saved you from a lot of heartache. Both of you."

"There's no need to apologize, Giles," Angel's reply was heartfelt the
watcher could see it in his eyes. "Nobody could've known that. When Willow
told me what she had found I couldn't believe it at first. Not in my wildest
dreams had I thought this possible." As to emphasize his point he planted a
gentle kiss on Buffy's skull.

The slayer smiled at that, "Angel's right, Giles," she said, "Whatever we
went through is over, I can't even remember half of it. I regained more of
my memory today, but the most details are still fuzzy. Angel and I talked
today. A lot. I even remember sending him to hell," she told her friends.
"But just the act. The actual emotions are still missing. But if my memory
loss has taught me one thing it's that the past is where it belongs. In the
past. This is the present, and hopefully we're going to have a future, but
for this we need to plan and research, right?" She gave Giles a warm smile.

The watcher blinked several times, then cleared his throat, "Right," he
nodded. "Wesley already told me some of the details you found out in L.A.,"
he said, his gaze on Angel, "Gunn filled in the rest. I agree, it's very
disturbing. And more so as we have no idea who this ancient vampire might
be."

The dark-haired vampire nodded, "I asked Cordelia to search all the
databases, but she came up with nothing. It's too bad Lindsey wasn't told
the name. But that also tells us that it was top-secret and there has to be
a reason. I assume this vampire might live with some sort of fake identity.
The way lots of the vampires live in L.A., almost like humans."

"Yes," Giles agreed. "Gunn already told us about that. And of course he
isn't eager for everyone to know about it. We should really-"

He was cut off by a knock on the door. The persons in the room looked at
each other, irritated, Xander even looked a bit hopeful, then Dawn got up to
see who was there, Gunn hovering over her back, ready to strike if some
demon would try to attack them. The slayer's sister pulled the door open and
gasped. "H-hi," she managed to stutter.

"Hi Dawn," came Riley's voice. "I know it's been a while, but I really need
to talk to Giles and Buffy."

... to be continued