Fiat Voluntas Tua

by Mediancat

A sequel to Demons, and another Buffy and Charmed crossover, set after Wrecked, in Buffy, and Black as Cole in Charmed. Buffy and Willow ask the Charmed Ones for a favor . . . and end up helping them search San Francisco for a missing evil artifact.

December 3rd, 2001

The phone rang at the Halliwells'. Cole picked it up.

"Hello?"

The voice he heard on the other end was a bit of a surprise. "You're about to get a visit," it said.

"Anya," he said bemusedly. "What are you talking about?"

"Remember how when you guys left Phoebe and Piper tried to put that spell on Willow? Well, Buffy and Willow are coming up there now."

"Not for revenge –"

Anya laughed. "No. Not revenge. If it were revenge, they'd kick your ass, but it's not revenge."

His fellow ex-demon's loyalty couldn't be questioned, even if her judgment could. "Then what?" Anya told him and he almost laughed. He would have if she'd thought she was being anything less than completely serious. Even so, he said, "You're kidding."

"I'm not. I'm just calling to let you know for when you open the front door so there's not a big fight or anything. I mean, I've read some of Xander's comics, that's the way it always happens. The heroes meet and fight and then join forces. I just want to make sure no one, you know, starts bleeding or winds up exploding. Exploding would be bad."

"So I've heard," Cole said. "Any idea when Buffy and Willow are going to show?"

"Any minute now," Anya said equitably. "They took the daily flight at about 9:30, and since the plane landed at 11:30 and it's about 12:30 or so now –"

Cole interrupted. "Thanks, then. I think I'd better tell them before –" he heard the doorbell – "they actually show . . ."

"I understand you gotta go," Anya said. "Let me know if anyone kills each other. Bye." Then Cole turned around and ran for the front door. Yeah, both the Slayer and her friends and the Charmed Ones and theirs were what might be called good guys, but when they'd met they'd parted on substantially less than good terms, mostly because of a binding spell Phoebe and Piper had tried to cast. So Cole figured he'd better be there in case things got hairy – though honestly, all he could do at the moment was throw himself in the line of fire and hope no one had an itchy trigger finger.

Phoebe opened the door as he swung into the foyer. Sure enough, Buffy and Willow were standing there. Willow looked –

Well, bluntly, she looked like hell. She looked like the fourth day of a three-day drunk. As Cole stepped forward, Phoebe said, "Um, yeah?"

Cole knew what was coming next. "You know that binding, that binding spell you and your sister tried to cast on Willow?"

"Yeah . . ." Phoebe said hesitantly.

"Cast it again."

Phoebe blinked. "Say what?" After a few seconds, she said, "Excuse me, but the last time Piper and I tried that, she got socked in the jaw." Not to mention the fact that Willow had picked Phoebe up telekinetically and spun her around a few times.

"I know," Willow said. "I – I know. Can we come in?"

"Sure," Cole said, even though it technically wasn't his place to do so. As Willow and Buffy walked in, Phoebe shot him a look, to which he responded with a shrug.

Once everyone had grabbed a seat – except Cole, who preferred to stay standing – Willow explained what had happened over the last week.

"About a week ago," she said, "I finally figured out a way to change Amy – she'd been trapped as a rat for a few years – anyway, I finally changed her back into a human. She'd been a witch until the whole rat thing, and it was nice having someone around to talk magic with. We went out and did magic until she took me to meet a guy named Wrack."

Cole's head shot up. "You're kidding."

"You've heard of this guy?" Phoebe asked.

"Warlock. Real slimeball. I wouldn't even have anything to do with him when I was Belthazor. He takes magic and makes it into an addiction."

"That's what he did with me," Willow said, "Well, anyway, long story short, under the influence of one of Wrack's spells, I smashed a car into a wall. Which wouldn't have been as bad if I'd been the only one in the car, but –"

"Who?" Cole asked.

"Dawn," Buffy said. "Fractured her arm. She's still barely talking to Will, not that I blame her."

"I don't blame her either," Phoebe said. "Now do you see –"

"Yeah," Willow interrupted. "Now I see why you and your sister tried to bind me not to do magic. And that's why I've come back to ask you to try again."

"It didn't work last time," Phoebe said, "Why do you think it would work this time?"

"Because we don't know why it didn't work last time," Willow said. "Maybe it had to do with the Hellmouth, or, or something. Maybe if all three of you tried, it would work. But –" she was on the verge of breaking down – "I don't want the temptation anymore. I've gone cold turkey for the last few days – do, do you know how hard it is to do that?"

"I do it a lot," Phoebe said. "It's never been hard for me because I never got started on using it to solve all my problems –"

"I didn't start out that way either," Willow said a little irritably.

"You got there, though," Phoebe said just as irritably.

Cole stepped in. "Okay," he said, grabbing Phoebe by the arm. "Can I talk to you a second?" and without waiting for her to answer, he marched her into the kitchen and said, "What's wrong with you? They're asking for help, not attitude."

"I'm just saying –"

"I told you so?" Cole said. "I think they've got that figured out by now. You were right, they were wrong, and the last thing they need right now is for you to go rubbing their noses in it." At Phoebe's sulky face, Cole said, "Let me reiterate that last part. You were right. They were wrong. But -- they caught it in time. She's agreeing with you, and before any chance of her switching sides. You don't need to gloat about it."

"It's no fun if I don't get to gloat," Phoebe said.

"But . . ." Cole prompted.

"Oh, alright," she said.

"Good." Then Cole smirked. "If it makes you feel any better you can gloat to me later."

"I'm holding you to that, buster," Phoebe said. They walked back out of the kitchen and she told Willow, "Sorry about that. You don't need a lecture right now. You came to us for help."

"Right," Willow said eagerly. "So, so, will you?"

"I'll give it my best shot," Phoebe said. "We'll need Piper and Paige, of course, but if you're willing to give it a go, we really can't say no."

"Good to hear."

"I can get Piper back here in about half an hour, but we're going to have to wait until Paige gets off work – do you guys have a few hours to kill?"

"Yeah," Buffy said, "It was a tight squeeze moneywise but we budgeted for an overnight trip." She looked to be fishing for something – of course. "Save your money. You can stay here."

"You sure?"

"Yeah," Phoebe said, wondering if it might not be one of the worst decisions she'd ever made in her life.



Part 2



December 3rd, 2001

After they made sleeping arrangements, Phoebe asked, "So you do you mind waiting for Paige to get home?"

Willow said softly, "Not really."

"Well then," Phoebe said, clapping her hands, "Make yourself at home."

An awkward silence followed, after which Buffy said, "So, you guys in the middle of something right now?"

"Around here it's safe to assume we're always in the middle of something," Phoebe said. "Right now we're looking for a necklace."

"Let me guess. It's not the kind of necklace you could find at Tiffany's?"

"Make our jobs a lot easier if it were," Cole said. "It's called Fiat Voluntas Tua. You guys know the necklace Anyanka wore?" Buffy and Willow nodded. "This one's a lot worse."

"I wore a necklace once, turned me evil," Phoebe said. "Combine mine with Anyanka's and toss in almost unlimited power over the minds of humankind, and you'll have some idea what we're looking for. It's got prophecies out the wazoo connected with it, but so far all we've figured out is that the Source didn't have a damn thing to with it, and that it has some kind of destined wearer. But we're not sure who."

"There's apparently some kind of wordplay involved," Cole added.

"Terrific," Buffy muttered. "Nothing I like better than an evil necklace with a sense of humor."

"It gets worse," Phoebe said. "To even TOUCH the thing, we need to have the magical equivalent of a radiation suit. We've been working on finding a way to destroy it, but so far we're not having any luck. Right now the best we can do is figure out how to get its guardian back to its little pocket dimension. It's loose in San Francisco right now, waiting for someone to either send it home or kill it and take the necklace. The one bit of good news is, even your typical evil spellcaster doesn't want anything to do with Fiat Voluntas Tua."

"But there's always someone," Buffy said.

"Wrack," Willow added.

Cole shook his head. "Wrack's not that stupid. But someone around here is. A couple of someone, actually."

"Well, you're going to cast a binding spell on Willow," Buffy said, "The least we can do is help you guys try to save the world."

With that Willow smiled for the first time since Phoebe'd met her. "I can help," she said, reaching into the bag she was carrying.

"Hey!" Phoebe said. "I thought you wanted . . ." she trailed off when she saw Willow pull out a laptop.

"Anywhere I can plug this in?" she asked.

"Um . . . over there," Phoebe said, pointing to a plug near a telephone jack.

As they all got up to take a look, Buffy said, "Try not to choke on all that humble pie."

Phoebe laughed humorlessly and they all waited for Willow to get hooked up.

Once she did, it was surprisingly easy. "You said a couple of other people were looking to track down this necklace?"

"Yeah, a pair of witches about your age," Phoebe said. "Kathleen O'Halloran and Rebecca Koch, both out-of towners with an attitude. Last night we had to break up a brawl between them behind a bank building. They damn near set the place on fire. We were lucky to even get between them without getting killed. And they made it pretty clear when they were making with the fire spells that they fully intended to take over the world when they got it. Kinda like Doctor Doom, only without the charm."

"I haven't done this in a while," she said, furiously typing. "It might – here we go." And she hacked her way into hotel registries throughout the city, and inside of half an hour had where both Koch and O'Halloran were staying. The funny thing was they were less than half a mile from each other down by the bay. "There we are," Willow said. "Two witches, no waiting." She seemed inordinately pleased with herself.

Since she'd just done in thirty-four minutes what the Charmed Ones plus Leo and Cole hadn't been able to do in the better part of two days, Phoebe didn't blame her. "Nice going," she said.

"Thanks," Willow said, beaming. Phoebe made a mental note to give the girl as much positive reinforcement as she could; it seemed to help. Just doing the computer work had made her seem a lot happier, though the drained look wasn't going anywhere.

"But if we're going to go look for them I'm going to actually need to use the phone line."

"Gotcha," she said, disconnecting.

"Way to go, Will," Buffy said as Phoebe started to make her calls.

"Thanks," she said. "I wasn't sure I could do it, what with having spent the last twelve months or so, you know, NOT using my hacking skills for reasons we don't need to get into right now, but there you go. Just like riding a bicycle. Only without the pedals . . . or handlebars."

First Phoebe called Piper, then she called Paige. It was easier for Piper to get clear than Paige – Piper had people she could hand P3 off to, but Paige actually had to make excuses.

Then Phoebe said, "Leo!"

The Whitelighter orbed in right behind her. "I'm here. What's going on?" Buffy and Willow both took involuntary half-jumps back.

"Leo," Phoebe said, "These are Buffy and Willow. Willow, Buffy, this is Leo . . . our Whitelighter." Buffy shook his hand.

"That's right, I talked with you a couple of weeks ago," Leo said. "Sunnydale, right?"

"Right," Willow said, shaking his hand. "I'd invite you down for a visit, but I've heard you'd kind of die."

"I would," he said. "Thanks, by the way. For saving their lives when I couldn't."

"No problem," Willow said. "But, um, I don't like to go into the details . . ."

Cole said, "They came to ask for another binding spell."

"I hurt someone," Willow said. "I don't want to do it again."

"Understandable," Leo said.

Piper and Paige showed up and again introductions were made. "By the way," Paige told Phoebe. "If you visit me at work, wear a sling." At Phoebe's puzzled look, she said, "I told them you broke your arm."

"You told them what?" Phoebe said.

"I had to come up with something good," Paige said. "I don't exactly get phone calls and run home from work every day. I mean, I know this is a pretty important gig, but still."

"Gotcha," Phoebe said. Then they came up with a fairly simple game plan: Go, find the two evil witches and get them out of the picture, then find Fiat Voluntas Tua's guardian and send him home.

It almost worked, but in not working . . .

Well.



Part 3

December 3rd, 2001

The first part was ridiculously easy. They caught Kathleen O'Halloran off guard as she was leaving her hotel. She took one look up, saw the sisters approaching, and began to cuss as she ran into a nearby alleyway.

Which had been more or less how things had been planned. Like most witches, O'Halloran preferred to avoid slugging it out in the wide open spaces. When the witch entered the alley, she found Willow standing there. "Hi!" Willow said. "Look up."

Almost involuntarily, O'Halloran looked up, and Buffy landed on her from the fire escape. After that, it wasn't really a contest; the witch hadn't had time to get off any spells, and wasn't anywhere near Buffy's league when it came to personal combat.

By the time the Halliwells made it around the corner, they were pretty much reduced to standing around and watching Buffy in action. At least Phoebe was able to deliver the coup de grace by knocking O'Halloran to the pavement when she tried to escape.

"You do good work," Buffy told Phoebe.

"Back atcha," she said, rubbing her knuckles, "Though I could do with some of your superstrength every once in a while."

"Yeah, but I remember seeing you in Sunnydale," Buffy said. "You've got the Xena thing going. Me, I'm more or less bound by the laws of physics." Then she stopped. "When this is over maybe we could settle our differences in the ring?"

She was proposing a formal combat, Phoebe realized, not Celebrity Deathmatch. Hmm. She'd have to give that some thought; Buffy was better than her, but their skills weren't THAT far apart. And ever since he'd lost his powers Cole hadn't been up to doing any combat training. "I'll think about that."

"Cool." The Halliwells then officially bound Kathleen O'Halloran from doing any more magic – it worked on her where it hadn't worked on Willow. Then Leo dumped her off back at her hotel room while the rest of them hustled on to find Rebecca Koch.

The first thing they did was stop off at home again so that Piper could do another location spell on the big map. Unfortunately, Koch had moved; she was now in an alleyway a couple of miles away from the hotel.

They got there as fast as they could. The good news was that Koch hadn't gone much of anywhere. The bad news, unfortunately, was that the reason she was hanging around the alley is that she'd located Fiat Voluntas Tua's guardian beast and was busy giving the thing the magical equivalent of an acid bath. This wouldn't hurt the necklace, but eventually it would kill even something as indestructible as the guardian was.

They hadn't been able to do too much reading on the Guardian Beast itself; its main qualifications were loyalty, incorruptibility, and near- invulnerability. It looked like a jumbo-size German Shepherd.

"You don't want to do this," Piper called out. "That necklace –"

"Do you realize," Koch said, "How stupid you sound? I know exactly what that necklace does. That's why I want it."

"And that's why you're not going to get it," Buffy said.

The evil witch blinked. "Who the hell are you?"

"Let me show you," Buffy said, and led the charge towards Koch.

Unfortunately, Rebecca Koch was a couple of points more observant, and gutsy, than Kathleen O'Halloran had been. She turned and threw up some kind of magical force field. Willow, Paige, Piper and Phoebe slammed into it; Buffy and Cole sailed through it like it wasn't there. While the witches dusted themselves off, Koch looked at the two people approaching and chose the wrong one as being the most dangerous – she blasted Cole and knocked him backward into a pile of garbage cans.

Then she aimed at Buffy, but Buffy tackled her before she could get off another blast. This weakened the force field, but the poor guardian was still being tortured to death; apparently Koch had set up that spell as a kind of ongoing thing.

And the guardian beast was clearly suffering under the strain. Phoebe would have expected the guardian beast for something as dangerous as Fiat Voluntas Tua to be a little tougher than that – of course, it was being soaked in a stream of acid that looked like it could have chewed a hole in Fort Knox, so maybe she wasn't being fair. The Halliwells did their best to bring down the force field.

Cole got up and slowly began to edge his way around the alley; he wasn't sure what he could do but he was going to make sure Rebecca Koch didn't get her hands on Fiat Voluntas Tua. Buffy and the witch were still wrestling around on the pavement.

Piper had an inspiration. "Leo!" she called. The Whitelighter immediately appeared. "Can you get rid of this thing?" she asked her husband.

He experimentally probed it, then shook his head. "No. But I can get through it."

"Well, then, heal the dog!" Paige said. Leo nodded in agreement and walked over to where the beast was still being immersed in acid. He gave it the once-over twice and then extended his hands –

And jerked them back again, yelping. He ran back through the barrier and showed the sisters his hands. They were dissolving, themselves, and there were less of them with every second. "I have to get up there," he said. "They can fix this." At Piper's worried look, he said, "It can be healed. But I have to go." He orbed out.

And then the Guardian beast died. As it howled its deathcry and fell to the ground, Koch blasted Buffy away and turned off the acid bath. Then, she hurried over to take off the poor guardian's collar, right as the Halliwells finally brought the force field down.

As Koch opened the little box with the necklace inside, Cole slammed into her from behind and the necklace went flying.

Instinctively, a hand shot out and caught it.

And with that, the world as we knew it came to an end.



Part 4



Sometime in June, 2009

The world was not a nightmarish cesspool, though it had certainly tilted towards the darkness. All manner of evils lived openly now, and mostly did so in harmony with each other – HER will being done.

In a way, this made things better for humans. Most of those creatures who were immune holed up, whether that meant retreating into a deep cave, entering a hermetically sealed chamber at the bottom of Challenger Deep or simply taking a header into an alternate dimension. Any who were too stupid to figure out the new order of things were killed off quickly. Those few who had brains and courage usually joined up with some kind of resistance movement, their former allegiances put to the side.

The resistance, though, was not even up to the level that SHE had feared, way back when. Of the nearly six billion people on the planet, there were maybe two hundred thousand who could resist Fiat Voluntas Tua. Many of the immune were killed off, and the rest quickly learned to shut up and went along to get along.

The way in this was bad for humans is that vampires still had to feed. But humans eagerly let the vampires feed, even if this meant their deaths, as it often did. But they were happy to die. It was HER will.

There was a small resistance movement in northern California; there were none in Southern California, which was where SHE had chosen to place her throne.

They had to move from place to place; there was nowhere that would hide them long. Not where SHE was concerned, with her hunters and Will's Warriors always after them. The Warriors were preternaturally good. Some were witches, some were demons, some were vampires, some were something else; none were human. And in addition to whatever natural abilities the possessed, all had additional help. The witches had had their powers increased fivefold. The demons were granted additional strength.

The vampires, though – those in the Will's Warriors had Gems of Amarra. And not in puny rings, either, where anyone could just rip them off. They'd been implanted somewhere in the vampires' bodies.

Over the intervening years this particular resistance group had been reduced to a couple dozen. No one referred to themselves by their original names; most of them rarely even thought of themselves by those names. SHE had people, spells, listening for them.

This particular group, about to embark on its last bid to set things right, was led by four individuals, three women, one man.

Their combat leader was a woman known as Hood; she was the only member of the Resistance ever to defeat one of Will's Warriors in combat. Her fighting skills were as honed as they could possibly be, yet it still been a matter more of luck than skill that had let her win.

Her clothing varied, but fitting her name, her garment was always hooded. It had to be. Her face was such a morass of scars and burns that she would have been instantly recognizable otherwise. She stayed in hiding except when a mission was necessary.

Their spiritual leader, and head magician was a gentle, pacifistic witch who called herself Sheela. She was the most talented magician the resistance had; what she knew or had learned about protection spells, healing magicks, and detection had kept them alive for over seven years.

She was also blind. She'd been blinded early in HER world conquest, when it was learned she was resistant. It had been assumed that without eyes she would be no problem at all.

The specialist in dirty tricks was a fifty-plus-year-old man, the Servant. He was their strategist, their planner. He'd kept them alive with his wits almost as many times as Sheela had with her magic. He was a sorcerer of no small talent himself, but it was his mind more than his magic that was valuable.

Finally, their vocal leader was the Seer. She was a fierce woman, not fully human, who had been consumed by the need to set things right again. She was tall and lean and muscular, both a warrior and a visionary.

And now they had one last plan.

They'd decided on it a couple of months ago.

Hood and a couple of her fellow fighters had just come back from a failed attempt to get some ingredients from a magic shop – they'd been set upon, in the darkness, by a pack of werewolves sent by HER and, while they'd killed half of their pursuers, they'd lost two of their own. She'd sent the warriors back to resume their normal lives and called a meeting of the leadership.

"We can't do this anymore," she'd said. "We're not getting anywhere. We haven't even killed anyone major since we took down that one witch . . . god. Two years ago." That one witch had been right there up in HER inner circle, but it hadn't been anywhere near the crippling blow they'd hoped.

The Servant had added, "She's right. All we're doing is little piss-ant parlor tricks. It's not like we're hitting anything important. It's mischief, simple mischief, and while that's fun it's not getting us anywhere." He's laughed bitterly. "And you know what happened to the last person we sent to infiltrate the bloody place." The last person they sent had been hypnotized so thoroughly that she didn't even know she was a spy, and she'd been found out, tortured, and killed publicly (to cheering throngs) in less than a day.

You couldn't fool HER. No one could, apparently.

"Wait a minute," the Seer had said. "People, what's wrong with you? Are you suggesting we what? Give up? Yeah, way to win that fight against evil."

An argument had ensued, which stopped when Sheela'd said "Peace." When everyone turned to look at her, she said, "We must find another way. We, we're definitely going to lose the way we're going. It's like I've been saying. We won't be able to settle this by fighting. We must be creative."

They'd thought about it for a few minutes, then the Seer exploded with, "This is ridiculous. We CAN'T get creative now. The time to get creative was eight years ago, before SHE even got that damn necklace."

"Well, that's it," Hood had said. "We're screwed."

Suddenly the Servant had started laughing. "We're a pack of idiots," he said. "The Seer's right."

"I am?" the Seer had said. "About what?"

"We can't win now. There's no way we can beat her now. Bloody hell, we're lucky each night we get to continue breathing. But there WAS a way to beat her then."

Sheela had smiled. "A time travel spell."

"Hmmm," Hood had said. "Time travel. I've done – it's definitely doable. But –"

"I'll look the spell up," the Servant had said. "It's not my favorite thing to do on the planet but ever since our communications to most of the higher powers have been severed I've had to come up with other ways of doing things. There might be a few time elementals we can ring in. I'll see what I can find."

"Don't look at me," the Seer had said. "My links were severed a long time ago."

"There are still a few around," Sheela'd explained. "I'll see if I can contact them. Until then, I, I think we should lay low."

They'd all agreed and, with everyone's cooperation, had gotten the spell ready. It had to be cast at the height of a gibbous moon. More than a few seconds either way could put them off by hours, days, weeks, in either direction. Fine if they popped in before the event, but if they happened in afterwards they were as screwed as everyone else.

A few days before, they told the rest of their group what they were doing. To a man, woman, or, in one case, vampire, they all agreed to lay down their lives to stop the spell from being interrupted.

Someone would know. They always did.

Then the day came. "Okay, people!" the Seer said. "Today's the day! Everyone go all out to get the Warriors the hell away from us!"

But with an hour to go, one of their fighters ran into the courtyard in which they were casting the spell. "It's group two," he said. "They're coming."

"Hold them off," Hood said. "We can't be interrupted here."

Then silently she began counting down the minutes.

They'd cast the spell and fix history.

They HAD to.



Part 5



Sometime in June, 2009

"They found out about it," the Seer said. "Somehow, they found about it."

"They must have captured one of the soldiers," Hood said. "Damn. Why'd we have to tell them exactly what we were doing?"

"Because," the Seer shot back, "I'm not going to ask someone to kill themselves at my say-so without explaining why."

"Yeah, but it wouldn't take any of the Warriors more than five minutes to get everything out of them." This was nothing short of the truth. The three members of Group Two were exceptionally good. Two were master torturers and the third was a witch who'd never bothered with a conscience. The only good news, trivial as that was, is that it wasn't the Three coming after them.

Then they'd never have a chance of pulling this off.

Fifty minutes passed. The Servant and Sheela had begun to make the final preparations when the same soldier came running in. "They're here."

"Damn," Hood said. "I need to –"

"No," the Seer said. "You need to go back. You'll be more persuasive than I ever will." Hood handed over her crossbow, and then the Seer took the taser rifle from the frightened soldier. "Go," she said. "Over the wall. If this works – you'll never know it. If it doesn't – hide. Lay low. Blend in. You'll be okay."

"Got it," the man said. "Good luck." Then he vaulted over the wall and footsteps could be heard.

For about five seconds. Then the man stopped running and started screaming.

The Servant yelled, "Hood! Get in here!" Then, together – Hood had had some experience with spellcasting back in the day – they chanted, setting up the strongest magical shield they could.

Group Two came over the wall, the two warriors jumping, the witch just floating and landing in a perverse serenity. The Seer moved around the circle, to face them as best as she could.

They could only hope it would hold for the next seven minutes or so.

The leader of Group Two took a puff on his cigarette and threw it away. "Hello, mates," he said. "Wouldn't be doing any spells tryin' to tear down her will, now would you?" He walked towards them and ran smack into the shield they'd put up. "Right then. Rebecca, love, if you would?"

"Delighted," the witch said, and placed both hands on the shield and began conjuring. Inside, the Servant swore and asked Sheela, "Can you finish this on your own?" She nodded. "Good. I'll do what I can." Then he ran back over to the shield and placed both of his hands against it as well.

"You think you can hold out against me, old man?" Rebecca asked.

"I'm bloody well going to give it my best shot," the Servant said, then began calling on a god who hadn't been heard from in years. "JANUS!" he yelled. "Aid thy faithful servant! Break the bonds that have been placed upon you and help me now in my hour of greatest need!"

"Janus can't help you," Rebecca said. The Servant ignored her and continued beseeching his aid.

The Seer, meanwhile, was standing off against the two warriors. "If you leave now," she said. "Maybe I won't kill you."

Group Two's leader snorted. "Right, love. Well then, maybe you and I'd best be going," he told his companion. "We can see when we've been licked."

The Seer said. "Uh-uh. Why don't I believe that?"

"'cause you got a brain in your head?" the third one said with an evil grin. Then, to the leader, "Why are we wasting time talking to her? We got places to go and blind women to kill."

"Can't get to them until Rebecca breaks through their shielding," he said. "May as well have some fun with this one first."

The Seer's response was in the form of a taser rifle to the vampire's chest. Gems of Amarra protected against staking, burning, sunlight and crosses, and stopped a vampire from ever tiring out. They didn't defend against the paralyzing effect of a taser, though they did increase recovery time. The leader was knocked backwards and down.

The third one, though, charged forwards, diving and rolling to dodge the next blast, and came up slugging. The Seer did the best she could; she'd been in training to learn how to fight when SHE took control and had been honing her skills ever since. She was in as fine shape as any human could be.

Which still made her no match for the third warrior, though the fight wasn't that short. By the time it was done, the leader had shaken off the effects of his tasering and was standing over the Seer's battered figure as well. "So," the third one said, "How come you didn't foresee this?"

Through bloody lips, the Seer spat out, "Bite me, Faith."

The leader said, "No, that's my job." Then he vamped out, leaned down and ripped out her jugular vein; after a few seconds of drinking her blood, though, he began yowling in pain and spitting out blood. "Bitch's been drinking holy water."

Inside the shield, Hood said, "The Seer's dead."

Sheela nodded and said, "May you see paradise, Cordelia Chase." Then, after a moment, she asked. Is the outline on the ground unblemished?" Hood confirmed that it was. "Good. What time is it?"

"We need four minutes," Hood said. "Yo! Servant! How's it going?" The answer was, not well; although the shield still held it had been greatly weakened by Rebecca's efforts. "Hold on," Hood said. "I'm coming –"

Gasping, the Servant said, "You will do no such thing. I . . . can handle this myself." Then, again screaming towards the heavens, "Janus! I understand your reluctance! But this world is NOT a safe haven for chaos! Help us make it so again! Help us, Janus, I beseech thee!" And as Rebecca Koch was about to spit out her retort, suddenly a red glow enveloped him, and the shield's strength tripled. "Go!" he said.

"Going," Hood muttered, then, looking up at the heavens said, "Sheela. It's time."

Sheela began chanting the final spell.

The leader pulled out a cellular phone and said, "Yeah. It's me. Bloody Servant's gotten his god to show some stones. We're gonna need some help."

Within seconds, witches began to pour their energy into Rebecca Koch. No human could stand the strain for long, but all she needed was enough energy to break down the shield.

Sheela finished the spell. "Servant!" she said. "Be, be ready!" A gate appeared before them.

The Servant said, "No chance." And even with Janus' help, the shield was weakening under the assault of all of the witches.

Twenty, nineteen, eighteen . . .

At eight the Servant breathed his last and the shield fell.

Sheela said, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant."

Then they jumped through the gate.



December 3, 2001, second try

They landed in the streets of San Francisco. Hood and Sheela stepped through and immediately ran, skittering through alleys and streets, moving closer to their goal and as far away from the gateway as they could.

Sheela said, "Did we make it? Are, are we here in time?"

"Only one way to find out," Hood said. Then she grabbed the nearest passerby and threw him against the side of a car. "You! What's today's date?"

"I hear violence," Sheela said.

"We don't have time for your pacifism now!" the other one said. "Not after –" She let the man down and said, again, "What's today's date?"

"December 3rd," he said. "2001."

"We're not too late," Sheela said. "If we could trouble you for the time?"

"12:17."

"Thank you." Then the man ran away.

"My way would have been faster," Hood muttered.

"Doesn't matter," Sheela said. "We made it in time. No, no pun intended." Then she said. "Seven years. We really came back seven years –"

"And unfortunately, because we had to jump a little early, we don't have as much time as we wanted," Hood said. "We wanted to get here this morning." She sighed. "Anyway, we're not here to sightsee. We've got 5 hours before she gets the necklace. All we need to do –"

"Is die," a harsh voice said from behind them.

They spun and saw the Three. The elite of the elite among Will's Warriors. One was a witch; the other two were almost impossible to beat in hand-to- hand combat. Certainly neither Hood nor Sheela could fight them. There were only two people alive at this time who even had a shot at taking them on, and one was in jail. While different in appearance, they all bore the same dark, dead eyes. This was wonderful. In getting away from the frying pan of Group Two they'd leapt straight into the Three's dire.

The leader of the Three said, "Did you really think your little time travel spell would work? We knew what you were doing. While the others distracted we whipped up a little mojo of our own."

"Yeah," the witch said. "Now come on. Move. We promised we'd get you back by lunchtime, and I'm starting to get a little hungry – I think you know what I'm saying. So could you make it easy on us? Surrender."

Hood said, "Sorry, I can't do that." Her voice was anguished, though. "You know why."

The other warrior smiled slightly. "I told you they weren't going to make it easy." He nodded theatrically. "That means we get to make it hard." And, grinning ferally, the two warriors moved forward.

Sheela grabbed her companion and muttered a few words in Aramaic. "Now, MOVE," she said.

They both took off running at superhuman speeds, easily outdistancing the Three – for the moment. When the spell wore off, five minutes later, they were at least five miles away, and a lot closer to their goal.

"That's only going to slow them down, you know," Hood said. "You know how well she tracks."

"They don't need to track us," Sheela said. "They know where we're going. We, we just need to get there first."



* * * * *

The Three stood there on the San Francisco streets, annoyed. The witch said, "I can't believe we let them get away –"

"I keep telling you," the leader said. "Just because the blind bitch won't fight doesn't mean she's not dangerous."

"Dangerous or not," the other one said, "We still have to catch up with them to win. History's a dangerous thing to mess around with. The way it has to be – is the way it has to be. Her will be done."

"Her will be done," the other two echoed. Then the leader said, "Okay then. They gotta walk, we don't." They walked out into the street, yanked the nearest driver out of his car, and piled in. As the witch took the wheel, the leader said, "Halliwell Manor. And don't spare the horses."



Part 6

Dec 3rd, 2001, second try



Meantime, at the Halliwells' residence, Phoebe was explaining about Fiat Voluntas Tua. "I wore a necklace once, turned me evil. Combine mine with Anyanka's and toss in almost unlimited power over the minds of humankind, and you'll have some idea what we're looking for. To even TOUCH the thing, we need to have the magical equivalent of a rad suit. We've been working on finding a way to destroy it, but so far we're not having any luck. Right now the best we can do is figure out how to get its guardian back to its little pocket dimension. It's loose in San Francisco right now, waiting for someone to either send it home or kill it and take the necklace. The one bit of good news is, even your typical evil spellcaster doesn't want anything to do with it. It's too much to contemplate, even for them."

"But there's always someone," Buffy said.

"Wrack," Willow added.

Cole shook his head. "Wrack's not that stupid. But someone around here is."

"Well, you're helping us," Buffy said. "Anything we can do?"

With that Willow smiled for the first time since Phoebe'd met her. "I can help," she said, reaching into the bag she was carrying.

"Hey!" Phoebe said. "I thought you wanted . . ." she trailed off when she saw Willow pull out a laptop.

"Anywhere I can plug this in?" she asked.

As Phoebe was about to show her, the doorbell rang. She opened the front door –

A woman wearing a blindfold, and one in a hood that completely covered her face, stood there. The blindfolded one said, "Can we come in? We need your help."

Willow's head shot up, and she put down the laptop and walked to the door. Phoebe said, "Um, I don't know what you've heard about us –"

The hooded one said, "You're the Charmed Ones. One of them, anyway. Your name is Phoebe Halliwell, until recently the youngest of the three. You're in love with Cole, who used to be a demon named Belthazor. You see the future and can levitate. And you defend San Francisco against demons and other nasties, and right now we really need your help. The people in the back are Buffy Summers and – Willow Rosenberg."

Now Cole and Buffy walked over to join Willow. "I think you'd better let them in," Buffy said. Phoebe turned and saw Willow standing there looking like she was in shock.

The blind woman smiled. "Hi, Buffy. Good to hear your voice." After a pause, a distant, "Been a while since I could say that."

"Why should I let them in?" Phoebe asked.

"Because that's – that's – that's," Willow said, pointing at the blind woman.

"Tara," Buffy said.

* * * * *

The leader of the Three said, "Hold it. Stop the car."

The witch pulled over and said, "Okay, why?"

"I'm just thinking," the leader said. "We need a backup plan. Insurance on the off chance they get away." All of the Three knew there was no chance that the forces arrayed against them could win.

"Her will be done, they WON'T," the witch said.

"Her will be done," the other two repeated. The third went on, "But this isn't the time of her will – much as it pains me to say that. We're going to need insurance."

"Which one?"

The witch shrugged. "It doesn't really matter to me; I can take both of them. But – I think Piper would be better. That way we can get that damned husband too. Paige – she's not a threat to anybody."

"Alright, then," the leader said. "We'll go to her club first and then head up to Casa Halliwell. Knowing the blind bitch, she's gonna waste a lot of time on explanations. We've got enough time if we hurry."

"Then we'll hurry," the witch said, stepping on the gas.

* * * * *

At P3, Piper Halliwell was going over the next month's schedule. Two bands had cancelled – none of the headliners, but she still needed to find someone to fill the spots. While making up her mind about which band to call, she – felt – something odd. She couldn't quite place what it was, until she noticed that everyone in the entire bar had stopped moving, except for her.

"Okay," she muttered. "I really don't think I did this . . ."

A voice from the entrance said, "Well, maybe yes, maybe no."

Piper looked and saw two women and one man walking towards her table. "Okay," she asked. "Who are you?" Their eyes were dark and dead.

"Exactly who you think I am," the one in front answered. "Only – with a twist. Her will be done."

The other two – one of whom Piper recognized – echoed, "Her will be done."

Piper caught halfway on. "This has something to do with Fiat Voluntas Tua, doesn't it?"

"Oh yeah," the woman laughed. "That's the ride we're on, all right. But in this ride – you're kind of what we call a spare."

Piper immediately froze the woman. Or tried to. She burst out laughing. "Did you really think that would work on ME?" she asked.

That was the last thing Piper remembered for a while.

* * * * *

Leo had been talking with some of his fellow Whitelighters, on the chance they knew something more about Fiat Voluntas Tua than they'd already let on. Not only had he not had any luck, he was informed that witches, even the Charmed Ones, were better off not looking for the necklace, because even they could be corrupted; better to let the few temporarily unattached Whitelighters try to locate the guardian and take it back, because they were the only known entity – demon, human or otherwise – who was known to be completely immune to its effects.

In a way, Leo'd seen their point, but barring orders he hadn't yet gotten he wasn't going to stop looking.

Then he heard Piper call him, urgently. "Leo!"

He immediately orbed down to P3 and saw that she was under attack from two dead-eyed warriors, and apparently her powers weren't working. As odd as she appeared, she must have been fighting them for a while. He stepped in to do what he could when suddenly Piper spun and put some kind of device on his chest. Knowing something was wrong, he tried to teleport out –

But couldn't?

"Having a little trouble with your orbing?" The Piper who obviously wasn't asked. "Aw, too bad." Leo noticed she had the same dead eyes as the warriors had. As he tried to run, one of the warriors grabbed him, threw him over the bar and said, "Buh-bye," as she punched him in the face.

After the second or third time he stopped noticing.



* * * * *

The Three shoved the unconscious Piper and Leo into one of P3s back rooms, and sealed the door off magically. Halliwell was frozen and would stay that way for a while; and without his ability to orb, the damn Whitelighter could batter his brains silly on the door and still not be any closer to getting out.

"All in all," the leader said, rubbing her hands together, "A job well done."

"You got to hit him," the third grumped. "I didn't get to hit him."

"You'll get all the hitting you want to when we hit Halliwell House," the leader said. "By the way, nice acting job."

The witch bowed. "Thank you, thank you," she said, bowing theatrically. "Two shows a night, three on weekends."

The third snorted. "Yeah, good job, but still, take away that time serving her will, and there's still no one better to play Piper Halliwell than the lady herself."

Piper smiled and nodded. "Her will be done," she said.



Part 7

December 3rd, 2001, second try

Phoebe looked confused. "Your ex?"

"Kind of," Buffy said. "Sure looks like her. But the Tara we know isn't blind." She looked at Tara's face more closely. "She's not quite as old, either . . ."

Almost off-handedly, Phoebe said, "Yeah, come in." Tara and the hooded woman entered and shut the door behind them.

Tara said, "Willow?"

"I'm here," Willow said. "What's going on? How did this happen?" Then, "WHEN did this happen?"

"All in its time," Tara said. "First – you all are, are discussing Fiat Voluntas Tua, right?"

"Right," Phoebe said suspiciously.

Tara turned to the hooded woman. "You were right."

"I've got this day seared in my brain," the hooded woman said. "I couldn't forget it if I tried." The hood covered all of her face except her mouth. "Look. You guys were about to volunteer to help them find the necklace, right?" Nods all around. "Don't. Stay away from it. Don't touch it. Bad things are going to happen."

"What kind of bad things?" Buffy asked. "I mean – you are futuregirl, right?"

"Evil. Pure evil," Tara said. "The world is overrun with demons, vampires, and other assorted evils, many of them human. All subject to HER will."

"What about the side of good?" Cole asked, knowing the irony.

"There isn't much of one," Tara said. "Only a bare handful of people are immune to HER will. I'm, I'm one of them. But there are only a few of us – maybe a few thousand at most in the entire world. And everyone's looking for us. Everyone. It's – "

"It's a frigging nightmare is what it is," the hooded woman said. "Evil, evil everywhere and not a damn thing we can do about it. For every one person we save, another ten die. And they're happy about it, too. That's the worst thing about it. They're HAPPY to kill themselves for her. And if you resist –"

"Tara's blindness," Willow asked.

"That's not even close to being the half of it," the hooded woman said. "Look at what they did to me." Then she pulled off her hood and revealed a hairless head crisscrossed with badly healed scars and burn marks. A head that had been beaten countless times, and a neck that had been slit repeatedly, which no doubt accounted for the raspiness of the woman's voice. A head that had seen countless abuses.

But still unmistakably Phoebe Halliwell's.

The other Phoebe put her hood back on. "Now you see why I wear this thing," she said. "It's not exactly a fashion statement. I'd really rather other people not have to look at this. I'm – it's my name, now. I'm not Phoebe, I'm Hood. And," she continued, "Before you ask what happened, I'm going to say, don't." She fixed an eye on Cole and said, "Especially you." Then she sank onto the couch.

Cole opened his mouth and closed it again. He wasn't stupid.

Tara felt her way over and reached for the hooded Phoebe's – Hood's -- hand, saying, "It's okay. It's okay. We're almost done." Hood said nothing. "But we do need to tell you what happened. Sit down."

Willow, Phoebe and Buffy all took a seat. Cole stayed standing until Hood gestured him over and said, "You, in front of me." It wasn't said with any kind of affection. Cole shrugged and moved over until he was standing behind Phoebe. "I'm not the one here who likes history," Hood said, "But I was here the first time. Tara wasn't."

She took a deep breath, then started. It was strange hearing a replay of a day that hadn't happened yet.

There were only a couple of interruptions. The first time, Hood was saying, " Anyway, we told you about the pair of witches who was actually looking for Fiat Voluntas Tua, though they weren't feeling too cooperative. The day before the three of us had to break up a brawl between them behind a bank building. It was a pretty damn hard brawl to break up, let me tell you – "

Phoebe said, "Yeah, that's right. They damn near set the place on fire. We were lucky to even get between them without getting killed."

Hood looked at her and said, "Hey, who's telling this story, you or me?" But she was smiling just a little as she said it.

Then, later, when she was describing how Rebecca Koch was attacking the necklace's guardian, she said, "The good news for us was that Koch hadn't gone much of anywhere. The bad news, unfortunately, was that the reason she was hanging around the alley is that she'd located Fiat Voluntas Tua's guardian beast and was giving it a magical acid bath. This wouldn't hurt the necklace, but eventually it would kill even something as indestructible as the guardian.

Cole asked, "What does the thing look like?" The hooded Phoebe answered, "Like the biggest German shepherd you ever saw." But very carefully, she didn't look at him when she answered, and she wasn't smiling at all.

Finally, Hood was talking about their struggle against Koch, and how it ended. "She opened the box with Fiat Voluntas Tua inside, but before she could grab it Cole slammed into her and the necklace went flying. And – and SHE caught it. And that's when – that's when it happened."

"She," Buffy said. "You mean after all that, the Koch woman won."

"No," Hood said. "It's – it's just, we've been trained not to say HER name for so long that it's a hard habit to break."

"It was there in the name of the necklace all along," Tara said. "It, it was like when the necklace was made those centuries ago, it was waiting for her to get it. Maybe someone else wouldn't have been able to take advantage of it like that. It's almost a pun, but you know sometimes the best magic is founded on wordplay." She took a breath. "The name of the necklace. Do any of you know what that, that means in Latin?" Everyone shook their heads. "Fiat Voluntas Tua. Thy WILL be done."

Willow squeaked, "Me?"

"You," the hooded Phoebe said.

"But I wouldn't! I mean, even at my worst I'd never have –"

"It doesn't matter what you'd have done, now," Tara said gently. "The necklace corrupted you. It was made to do so. It would have corrupted the Pope. But – it was

"If I can go on?" The hooded Phoebe asked sourly.

And if they thought what she'd already said had been frightening –

What happened next scared them out of their wits.



Part 8



December 3, 2001, first try



Immediately all eyes in the alley turned to look at Willow: Buffy's, Cole's, Paige's, even Rebecca Koch's.

"Everything's alright," Willow said. "I got it." Then she put Fiat Voluntas Tua around her neck. It settled against her skin like it had been made to go there, and nowhere else.

"Yeah," Buffy said. "Everything's okay. Will caught the necklace. Everything's going to be alright."

Koch's eyes struggled for a bare ten seconds; then she came over to Willow and said, "I'm sorry I tried to delay this. Can you forgive me?"

"For now," Willow said.

Piper looked at Paige and Phoebe. "Wonder why we thought this would be a problem – you know, someone getting the necklace. 'cause it doesn't really seem like a problem to me."

Paige's dulling eyes widened. "Me neither." She looked at Phoebe. "Why'd you have to get us in an uproar over this?"

But Phoebe never got the chance to answer. Willow instead said, "That binding spell you were going to do? I don't think we need it now."

Piper shook her head. "Of course not, Willow."

Cole bowed; after a second, everyone else did as well.

Willow laughed. "Well, this is . . . cool." She looked at Phoebe. "Why WERE you so worried about the necklace?"

After a second, Phoebe shrugged and said slowly, "Beats me."

"Me too," Willow said. "Wow, this – this is GREAT. You!" she said to Rebecca Koch.

"Yes?" Koch said, her eyes dying.

"Go round up as many other witches as you can. Bring them to Halliwell manor."

Koch bowed her head slightly. "As you will it," she said, and walked away.

"As I will it," Willow said. "I like that. Everyone . . . do my will!"

"Sure thing, Will," Buffy said. "So how much do I get?" Looking at her, Willow shook her head in displeasure. Without thinking, Buffy threw herself to her knees. "Sorry, Will," Buffy said. "Really sorry."

Will looked over the rest of them. "And why aren't the rest of you on your knees?" she asked. Quickly Cole, then Paige, Piper, and finally Phoebe, threw themselves to the ground. "Good. I like that."

"Your will be done," Piper said.

"I like that too," Will said. "It . . . fits." Then she clapped her hands, "Okay, people, everyone up. You!" he told Piper, "Go get O'Halloran, bring her to the Halliwell's house as well. You guys are going to unbind her. The rest of us," she said, "Well, we've got a world to take over." Piper bowed and left.

"Your will be done," Buffy said. "But, um, Will – why do you need a plan? I mean, why WOULDN'T anyone want to do what you wanted?"

Will shrugged. "Beats me, Buffy. But you know how these things go. There's always someone around to try to mess them up."

"Well, they'll have to go through me first," Paige said.

"And me," Buffy said.

When Phoebe didn't echo it, Will fixed a steady gaze on her. "And why aren't you making with the eternal devotion, missy?"

"Do I really need to say it?" Phoebe said. Will nodded vigorously, her eyes steely with irritation. "Then sure, they'll have to go through me too."

"Good to hear," Will said.

"Your will be done," Phoebe said.

"Durn' tootin."

"So, Will, any idea who these enemies are going to be?" Buffy asked.

"Not sure. Keep an eye out." Then she had a thought. "Whitelighters."

"Ya think?" Paige asked.

"Oh yeah. Remember what Spike called them back in Sunnydale? Bloody interfering sods. Betting they won't go along willingly."

"Piper is married to one," Phoebe murmured.

"Yeah," Willow said, thinking. "So we'll give him a chance to join up. If he doesn't – we kill him."

"Your will be done," Buffy said.

* * * * *

Rebecca Koch laughed at her own stupidity as she talked to witches all across San Francisco. Imagine –

Imagine! She'd tried to stop HER rise to power.

Hers.

How the hell could she have been so dumb?

Why didn't she read the signs right? All the prophecies pointed to a 20- year old, red-headed woman, and she'd been stupid enough to think it meant her.

But she'd ignored the wordplay. Stupid, stupid, stupid! The prophecies spoke of the wordplay in the name of the necklace. In her arrogance, Rebecca had assumed that – since she fit the rest of it well enough – she'd figure out the wordplay later.

She'd just learned what happened when you tried to do an end-run. If she were lucky, maybe she'd get to serve Will and not be killed for her presumption.

And if she did get killed, well, HER will be done.

* * * * *

As they made their way across San Francisco, people threw themselves at Will's feet, pleading undying devotion and eternal loyalty. Two of the people, Cole bemusedly told Will, were actually disguised demons.

Them Will told to come along, for muscle.

"The Source isn't going to be happy, you stealing his demons," Cole said.

"So?" Will said. "I can deal with the Source."

"You said you didn't know where the threats might come from," Cole said. "Just pointing one out."

Smiling, Will said, "That's sweet. You just go on pointing out threats. Even if I already know about them."

"Your will be done," Cole said.

Another woman, a gorgeous black-haired woman in leather pants and a sleeveless blouse, knelt before Will. "I, I, I, –" she said.

"You'll do anything I want?" The woman nodded. "Pretty much as I thought," Will said. "You can come with me."

"Gladly," the woman said.

Will laughed. "So who needs Tara?"

A few minutes later, Will told everyone to wait for a second while she went inside a McDonald's.

"Let me get that food for you," Buffy said.

"Buffy, Buffy, Buffy," Will said. "Do you really think they'll make me pay? I have to go do something that, well, no one else can do for me. No matter how much they want to."

After she walked inside, Phoebe asked Buffy and Paige – the two demons and the woman being a short distance away – "Are you both sure about this?"

They both nodded enthusiastically.

"Come ON," Phoebe said. "Think! A few hours ago we were saying how dangerous it was, how it would make anyone who wore it into an instant dictator. Don't you remember ANY of that?"

Paige shrugged. "We were wrong."

Meanwhile, Buffy's eyes were narrowing. "What's your problem with it?" she asked.

"Nothing," Phoebe said placidly. "Just checking for resistance. You know? In case anyone's trying to defy HER will?"

Buffy didn't look entirely convinced.

Phoebe muttered something to herself, and when Will came out of the restaurant, knelt before her, saying, "Your will be done. Forgive me."

"What for?" Will asked.

"This." And, with the best preparation spell she had protecting her, Phoebe Halliwell tried to rip Fiat Voluntas Tua off Will's neck.

She was inches away when Buffy grabbed her and threw her into a parked car. "I KNEW it," Buffy said.

Paige looked at her sister with pity and disgust. Shaking her head, she said, "I can't believe you'd do this to HER."

Willow said, off-handedly, "Kill her."

As the two demons, Buffy and Paige advanced, Phoebe began to think that maybe she should have planned a little bit first . . .



Part 9



December 3rd, 2001, first try



Knowing there was no point in trying to get through to Buffy, Phoebe said, "Paige! I'm your SISTER."

"Yeah, I know," she said. "I'll be trying to live THAT down for years."

There was no chance in hell she'd be able to outfight all four of her attackers; and if by some miracle she did win, then she'd still have an enhanced witch with the ability to throw hundred of people at her until she succumbed. She dodged Buffy's attack by jumping backwards onto the car, then evaded the demon's blasts by jumping from car to car up the hill.

What clinched her next move was seeing Cole grab a wooden rod from the street and come towards her, his eyes as dead as everyone else's.

So she ran, narrowly missing being hit by another blast as she did so.

After she dodged onto the second side street, she turned around to look for pursuers and didn't see any. Still, to be safe, she ran another several blocks, then, when she was POSITIVE she wasn't being followed, called out to the only being on the planet she still trusted. "LEO!" she yelled at the top of her lungs. "LEO!"

The Whitelighter orbed in right in front of her. His hands were bandaged, which would have been very interesting otherwise. "What is it – where is everyone?"

There was no point to beating around the bush. "Fiat Voluntas Tua."

Leo caught her tone right away. "Who?" he asked.

"Willow," Phoebe said. "Oh God, Leo, you should have seen them. As soon as she caught it – it was like they started practically worshipping her. EVERYONE. Paige, Piper, even that Koch woman. They've knelt and bowed and everything else and Cole was doing it too and they are all like "Her will be done" and everything and WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO?" Then, more quietly, "What are we going to do?"

Leo immediately hugged her. "It'll be alright," he said.

She looked up at him. "You don't really believe that, do you?" she asked.

"I do," the Whitelighter said. "I just have no idea how." After a minute or so, he said, "Are you sure about Piper? Maybe she was faking too –"

Phoebe hated to burst his bubble, but she had to. "Her eyes were as dead as everyone else's."

"After I go tell the Elders," Leo said, "I'll be back. We'll – we'll figure out something. Right now the other Whitelighters need to be warned."

"Got it," Phoebe said. "But – hurry? I don't know how long I can handle this by myself."

Leo delayed orbing and frowned. "Lack of self-confidence usually isn't one of your problems, but –"

"This is different," she said. "If we don't get this stopped fast we're going to have the whole world against us."

"Not the whole world," Leo said. "If you're immune others will be as well. We WILL get through this. I swear. We haven't come this far to let the world go to Hell because a witch accidentally caught a necklace."

Slowly, Phoebe murmured, "I'm not that sure it was an accident."

"Hold on – what do you mean?"

"Fiat Voluntas Tua – it didn't seem to go to her by accident. It was like it was drawn to her. And then when she put it around her neck, it fit. You know? Like it was ridiculous anyone else could have ever worn it."

"That's something we were afraid of," Leo said. "That the evil warlock who made it had someone in mind. But in five hundred years, the best minds on the planet – and off it –haven't been able to figure out who."

"I wish they'd worked a little harder," Phoebe said.

"Keep that protection spell on," Leo told her. "We may need it."

"Right," Phoebe nodded.

Then he was gone.

* * * * *

At Halliwell Manor, Will was speaking to a group of a couple of dozen witches, three demons, plus Paige, Piper, Buffy and Cole. Piper and Paige were busy flipping through the Book of Shadows; Buffy and Cole were flanking Will in the center of the living room, all the furniture having been pushed to the side. Rebecca Koch and Kathleen O'Halloran were in a corner of the room, producing weapons en masse with a spell they'd never heard of before Will told them. She was so – wise, so smart. She deserved to rule the world.

They were the only ones standing; everyone else was kneeling, happily. They'd finished a protection spell covering the whole area, to ward off long-distance attacks, and with two dozen witches' power behind it was a strong spell indeed.

The woman was upstairs in one of the bedrooms, eagerly awaiting Will's entrance.

"Okay," she said. "You're all in agreement with me?"

"Your will be done," they said in unison.

"Well, I hope so," Willow said. "How's that research coming?" she asked Piper and Paige.

"We think we have something," they said. "A kind of funnel spell."

"Well, let me come over there and just take a look," Will said. After she looked for a second, she said, "We can do this."

"Of course we can," Piper said. "With everyone here – we'll be lucky we don't kill them right away."

"That was kind of the general idea," Will said. "You wouldn't be having any second thoughts there, wouldja?"

Rapidly, Piper shook her head no. "Of course not."

"That's what I like to hear," Will said. "Aw, don't worry, he'll get his chance. I promised you, didn't I?"

"Yes, you did," Piper said. "But if he doesn't come around, your will be done."

"Oh, it will be," she said. Then, to Koch and O'Halloran, "How's it going?"

"Going fine," Koch said. "We got twelve of them all ready to go."

"Give one to Buffy," Will said.

O'Halloran nodded and tossed one to Buffy, who, understanding what Will wanted said, "Okay now, these things can be kind of tricky. Fortunately, you don't have to be great shots, not at the kind of distance we're gonna be firing at . . ."

* * * * *

A few hundred feet from the house, Leo orbed in, right in front of Phoebe. "Okay," he said. "Everything's set. We have a dozen of us ready to go in – we'll do our best to distract them and keep them busy while you try to reach the necklace. You have that other spell ready?"

"I do," Phoebe said nervously. "But by myself I'm not sure how well it'll work." Phoebe wasn't used to chanting spells without her sisters backing her up. It wasn't impossible, she knew, but they were a lot less powerful.

The plan was this: The Whitelighters would orb in and start teleporting people around the room, out of the area, etc. It was a lot more aggressive than they usually got, but this was a VERY unusual situation. Other Whitelighters were breaking their silences and telling their charges who they were (if they didn't know), letting them know of the desperate situation in San Francisco. There were good witches around the world preparing attacks and protection spells even as the Whitelighters began their desperate gambit.

As they did so, Phoebe would go in and rip the necklace from Willow's neck and then send it off into a pocket dimension of darkness – which was the magical equivalent of sticking it in a safe deposit box. Not exactly primo security, but better than nothing until they could figure out what to do from there.

"You have about thirty seconds," Leo said after he orbed away and came back. "Go."

Phoebe nodded and began running towards the house.

But what she expected to see when she got there and opened the front door wasn't what she saw.

There were about twenty-five witches surrounding a tightly knotted cordon of Whitelighters, who seemed unable to do anything but stand there and look very nervous.

Piper said, "Hey there, sis," adding just the tinge of venom to the final word to make it sting. "Watch and learn."

Buffy yelled, "Ready!" And she, Cole and half the witches drew crossbows – and Phoebe KNEW they'd been prepped to kill Whitelighters, she just knew it. "Aim!" she shouted.

"Piper!" Leo protested. "Please don't do this. This isn't right!"

"I love you, Leo," Piper said. "But if you say one more thing bad about Will I'll kill you myself. Don't hit him!" she yelled.

"Fire!"

And the crossbows all fired at once . . . and every Whitelighter except Leo was killed.

He looked at his wife with pleading eyes. She walked up to him – the barrier came down – and said, "I made Will promise to give you one chance. Come on, join up. It'll be fun. We finally know what our REAL purpose is."

"You know I can't do that," Leo said. "Piper –"

She kissed him once, coldly, and then knocked him down. "Your will be done," Piper said to Willow, then took a crossbow from Buffy and loaded it.

Leo stayed as long as he could, but he orbed out right before Piper fired.

Despite the situation Phoebe almost sagged in relief. "Don't look so happy, missy," Willow said. "He's not coming back to rescue you. Right, Piper?"

"You see, sis, it's like this," Piper said. "Willow here came up with a contagion for Whitelighters. We made sure Paige was safe – " Her younger sister waved and smiled shyly, which was just too too strange – "And then we infected me."

"So when your little friend warped out of here," Buffy said. "He just took a big nasty disease back to all his pals."

Willow laughed, coldly, evilly. "Within hours there won't be a Whitelighter left alive. Which, hey! Still beats your estimated period of survival."

Again, Phoebe ran out the door, this time with Buffy, two demons, and half a dozen angry witches chasing her.

And this time she was truly alone.



Part 10

December 3rd, 2001, second try



Phoebe spoke first. "All the Whitelighters dead? Piper killed Leo?"

"Without breaking a sweat," Hood said. "Didn't bother her in the least, just like it didn't bother them trying to kill me."

"It's just that – she loved him so much –"

"What's love got to do with it?" Hood said bitterly. "Trust me. Fiat Voluntas Tua kinda blanks out such petty things."

"How'd you get away?" Buffy asked.

"I didn't," Hood said. She didn't seem inclined to elaborate.

Cole'd figured it out though. Somehow he'd done this to her – somehow this necklace could make him torture the woman he loved.

It wasn't going to happen again.

"Eventually, though, I got away," she said. "But SHE – Will, I can say the name now, c'mon, Hood – but WILL was already well on her way. After essentially taking over San Francisco, she went to Sunnydale and then Los Angeles. Soon all of California – most of California. There was resistance, but it wasn't much. I rescued Tara here early on, though she'd already lost her sight by then. Cordelia Chase. This guy from Britain named Ethan Rayne –"

Buffy snorted. "ETHAN joined the resistance?"

Tara said, "It, it was Armageddon, Buffy."

Hood said snappishly, "We had vampires joining us. Demons, too. And Ethan was a servant of Chaos and what SHE provided more than anything else was order. Everything running like the smoothest machine you could think of. It was his worst nightmare. Naturally he'd fight against it."

Then Tara gave them a capsule of the rest of the history, though she skimmed a lot of it. "We don't have time for lots of details," she said. "Let's just, just take it on faith that it's the dystopia of your worst nightmares."

"It's certainly mine," Willow said. "By the way, Buff, dystopia's the opposite of a utopia –"

"I knew that," Buffy said with a trace of wryness, "And thanks for that estimate of my intelligence."

"This isn't funny!" Willow said. "I'm the evil dictator of a world that bows to my every whim! That's –"

"That's exactly what you want," Tara said.

The energy drained out of Willow and she sank further into her seat, if such a thing was possible. "Don't, don't get me wrong," Tara continued. "I'm not saying you're evil now, or that you want it consciously, or anything. But you didn't find Fiat Voluntas Tua. It found you. Somewhere inside you, Willow – isn't there part of you that, that just thinks the world would be a lot better place if everyone would just shut up and do what you told them?" Willow still said nothing.

"It was designed to reach you at your weakest," Hood said. "This is pretty much it. You're still struggling with your decision to get us to do that binding spell, to swear off magic forever. People in withdrawal can have some funny thoughts."

"You know," Buffy said, "If your goal here was to make Willow feel really crappy, well, nice job."

"I think," Cole said, "That their goal was to make us understand how desperate their situation is."

Phoebe looked around the room. While Buffy was pissed and Willow once again looked miserable, everyone seemed convinced of what Hood and Tara had said. "Well then," she said, "I think you can assume we understand, and move on. 'kay?"

"Yeah," Buffy said. "Now that you've told us this, what do you want us to do now?"

Hood said, "I was thinking of killing Willow. Would that be a problem?"

* * * * *

Leo had given up on trying to unfreeze Piper – his Piper, anyway – and was instead concentrating on figuring out ways to get out of the back room. Whatever the device was had removed his ability to orb – and to call on his fellow Whitelighters for assistance. He could still heal, so Piper's bruises were gone.

The door was stuck, whether magically or physically he didn't know. They hadn't been dumb enough to stick him in a room where there was a phone, and he'd been shouting and banging on the wall for the last twenty minutes and all he'd managed was a sore throat and bruised knuckles. Nor were there any convenient vents for him to crawl through – those things seemed to be limited primarily to action movies.

And he wasn't dumb enough to try to break his way through the wall. He was a Whitelighter, not a battering ram.

He stood back and thought about what had happened. Whoever that had been. Just not – just not the one he knew and loved. It wasn't an incarnation, either. Which meant that this was another instance of some future history, or somehow they'd been visited by an evil Piper from an alternate universe.

If forced into it, he would have guessed the former. That Piper had seemed . . . older. And the eyes – her eyes had been dead and dark –

Leo resisted the urge to start swearing. Just like, he'd been told, those under the influence of Fiat Voluntas Tua would be. It was the future, all right.

And not a good one.

And obviously he wasn't going to be able to do anything about it.

He started shouting and pounding again.

* * * * *

"If that was a joke," Buffy said, "It wasn't funny. And if you were serious, I'll kill you."

"I've spent seven years fighting against beasts you couldn't take on on your best day," Hood said. "If you—"

"Why does this seem so familiar?" Phoebe murmured.

Before any actual punching started, Tara said, "Peace!" and stood up. Towards the sound of Buffy's voice, she said, "We're not going to kill anyone." Then, to Hood, she said, "I thought we agreed on that."

Hood said, "You agreed on it. I still think it's the easiest way to stop it from happening." She took a deep breath. "Look. I'm not being frivolous here, I'm not suggesting it to be funny. I haven't said anything to be funny in a long time. But – you didn't live through it." She pulled off her hood again. "You didn't live through this. I did. And I'll do anything to stop it from happening again. ANYTHING."

Tara reached forward for Hood's arm and slid her hands down towards her hand. "Shhh," she said, squeezing. "Shhh."

"I don't want to shhh," Hood said, but she didn't move her hand. "Look," she said more calmly. "If it comes down to our future happening, or killing Willow – I'm going to have to kill Willow. It's not a contest."

Buffy began to protest, but Willow said, "If it comes to that, I'll kill myself."

Buffy said, "It won't."

Then a period of silence, after which Cole said, "Well then, since we seem to have solved who will or will not be committing suicide, what do we do in the interim? Because from what I remember of that original timeline we still have to stop Rebecca Koch from getting the necklace."

"Well –" Phoebe said. "Since we already know that, there's nothing stopping us from going after them now. But we're going to need help –"

"And I'm not going to go anywhere," Willow said.

"That might not help," Tara said. "Fi, Fiat Voluntas Tua was built for you, for now. Events would conspire towards you getting it, if not right then or right there. It's not, not FATED, not exactly, anyway – Koch could get it, we could send it home, we could kill you – but it's going to be harder. We're working against magicks that have been able to foil the best minds on the planet and bring you here, now, within miles of it." Hood gently pulled her hands free and took hold of Tara's, squeezing reassuringly. Tara inclined her head towards her and smiled.

"Like I was saying, we're going to need help," Phoebe said. "I'm going to go call Piper and Paige." She walked over to the phone.

"And it gets even worse," Hood said. "We've got the Three chasing us."

"We can handle a pack of warrior vamps," Buffy said steadily.

"Not those Three," Tara said. "We told, told you about Will's Warriors. The Three are the elite of the elite: a powerful witch, a vampire equipped with a Gem of Amarra . . . and a Slayer. In other words," she said, "Piper Halliwell . . . Angel . . . and you."



Part 11



Sometime in June, 2009

The gibbous moon reached its peak in the sky, but some people never slept.

Will was one of them. She'd given up sleep a long time ago. She no longer needed it. And when she needed to dream – well, there were ways to do that as well.

She sat there above her throne, eyes closed, legs folded beneath her, magically tuning herself all over the planet. Fiat Voluntas Tua rested against the bare flesh of her neck, having moved not a millimeter since the first time it had been placed there. The throne room itself was lined floor to ceiling with gems and crystals to assist her perceptions. The throne itself was pure white gold, with comfortable cushions.

By and large, things were going well; the pocket of resistance in New Zealand had been essentially destroyed, fewer humans were being killed by fledgling vampires than ever, and her latest bed-partner was asleep in the nearby bed, still quivering with pleasure.

Also, her personal choices for presidents, queens, and other assorted monarchs were going along smoothly, and everyone joyously accepted her social decisions. Social ills, prejudice, hate were all a things of the past. The only ills that plagued humanity were natural disasters and occasional demon princes or rogue deities, and she was working on those.

Omniscience and omnipotence were impossible, she'd been told once in a philosophy class. But she was as close as it came. The world was completely unified, with a few niggling exceptions.

Unfortunately, they were still there. One was the group led by Will's damnably resistant ex. They'd been quiet for a while, but a few days ago she'd received word of a new plot against her – and this one, unlike most, had a chance of succeeding.

Two guards entered the throne room.

"Group Two is back," they told her.

"Send them in," she said, opening her eyes.

"Your will be done," they said, bowing and leaving.

Soon the second most esteemed squadron of warriors on the planet walked in, first Spike, then Faith, then Rebecca Koch. All three performed the necessary obeisance, kneeling and saying, "Your will be done."

"I damn well hope so," Will answered. "What happened? I know you failed –"

Spike said, "Of course you did, Red. I didn't catch the Three anywhere nearby, so I'm guessing the contingency plan kicked in?" Spike was the only being on the planet allowed to call her anything except Will. He wouldn't be Spike otherwise.

"You guess correctly," Will said. "What happened?"

They explained their final assault on the California resistance, how they'd killed Cordelia Chase and Ethan Rayne but how the blind witch – Will never let them say her name – and the former Phoebe Halliwell had vanished through the portal.

"So you would have succeeded if Rebecca'd been able to break through that shield faster."

"Pretty much," Faith said. "Though it's not all Beck's fault."

"Yeah," Spike said. "How the hell could we have known Janus would've picked NOW to come out of hiding?"

Rebecca Koch threw herself prostrate on the throne room floor. "A thousand, thousand apologies, Will," she said. "I failed. Do what you will with me."

Will giggled. "Rebecca, Rebecca, Rebecca," she said. "C'mon, get up, grumpy puss." Reluctantly, nervously, Rebecca Koch stood. "Spike's right, you couldn't have known Janus would have come out then." She frowned, rose a foot higher, and closed her eyes once more. "It won't happen again. This time the god dies," she said when she reopened them.

"Thank you, Will," she said. "Thank you –"

And this time the laugh wasn't nearly so cheery. "That doesn't mean you get off with a warning, missy," Will said. "You go spend a day or two in deep meditation with the demons." "Deep meditation" was, of course, a euphemism for things better not said.

Will closed her eyes and concentrated. When she was done, the head of the demons on earth had appeared in front of her.

Stark naked.

With Faith unabashedly looking on, Will conjured up a robe. "You're no fun," she said.

"I'm lots of fun, as well you know," Will said. This only made Faith's grin wider.

As the demons' leader put the robe on, he bowed and said, "Your will be done. So why'm I here?"

She pointed to Rebecca Koch. "She messed up. She gets to meditate with you guys for a while. Nothing permanent, though. I still like her."

Cole gave a half-smile. "As you will it."

* * * * *

December 3rd, 2001, second try



Unlike most of the earlier revelations, this one Buffy took in stride. "I suppose Spike, Xander and Angel's buddy-pals in LA are also in on this?"

Tara said, "Spike, Xander, Anya, Giles, men named Wesley and Gunn and a woman named Fred, plus Faith, Cole, and Paige."

"It's a big party," Willow said sourly.

"There is so much about this future I find myself not wanting to know," Cole said.

Bitterly, Hood said, "Good call."

"I do wish you'd told us about the Three earlier instead of just sitting around, though," Buffy said.

"Would you have believed us if we hadn't told the history?" Tara asked.

"Probably not," Buffy answered.

Over at the phone, Phoebe said, "Yeah, I hate to ask you . . . well, just go take lunch early and take a look. This can't be a coincidence." Then she hung up and yelled, "Leo! Leo!"

No Whitelighter appeared.

Phoebe and Cole exchanged worried looks. "LEO!" she shouted one more time.

Still no answer.

"What's going on?" Tara asked.

"There was no answer at all at P3. Even if Piper wasn't there there should be people setting up, doing cleanup . . . there was no one. Now, the thing is, maybe she stepped out for lunch or something . . ."

"But Leo answers," Cole said. "And he's not. If he's not, he's in trouble."

Phoebe said, "I'm just glad I was able to get through to Paige."

"She's safe at least," Buffy said. "But still –" all eyes turned to look at Hood and Tara.

Hood said, "It's the Three alright. Neither Koch nor O'Halloran bothered attacking us in the original timeline, and no one else was on our case either. It couldn't be anyone else."

"And they could have gone for Paige if they'd wanted to –" Buffy said. "But they didn't. Which means they're coming here."

Tara nodded. "Yes, that, that makes sense. We should probably take off before they get here –"

Right then the front door exploded inwards, and Buffy, Angel, and Piper walked into the house.

"Are your ears burning?" Angel said theatrically to his companions. "Because my ears are definitely burning."



Part 12



Phoebe hadn't had time to give her more than a two-minute summary on the phone, but what Paige had heard unnerved her something fierce. Willow Rosenberg – girl she'd never actually met – becomes ruler of the world. Another version of Phoebe and a blind witch back from the future to stop it.

That it wasn't the Halliwells' first encounter with time travelers added just that touch of extra craziness to the situation that drove it over the edge into complete lunacy. Unfortunately, lunacy seemed to be a way of life in this family.

Fortunately, Phoebe's call had come partway into her lunch hour, which for once she was eating at the office. Given the situation with Fiat Voluntas Whoziwhatis, she'd figured out she was probably better off hanging by the phone.

Still, if this thing with Piper and Leo turned out to be more complicated than a little case of afternoon delight, she'd have to come up with some excuse why she couldn't make it back to work. Maybe Phoebe broke her arm, or something.

She pulled to a stop not far from P3 and walked around to the employees' entrance. When she got to the club area she said, "Piper. PIPER!"

No one answered, which was really weird. This time of day there should have been a couple of cleaning crew and maybe the assistant manager around, but the club seemed deserted.

Hold on. What was that?

She could hear a muffled sound from somewhere in the back area. She went back and yelled again,

This time she definitely heard Leo's voice saying, "Paige!" He seemed to be in one of the storerooms. She walked over to the door and tried the knob – and couldn't even touch it. It didn't hurt her, exactly; it was more like she was trying to force her hand into a giant rubber ball.

"Paige!" Leo said. "Are you out there?"

"I'm here," she said. "You got Piper in there too?"

"She's frozen," Leo said. "Like she'd do to someone else, but I can pick her up and move her like a statue."

"Well, orb her on out here and let's get –" Halfway through the sentence Paige realized what a stupid thing she'd said. If Leo could orb, he wouldn't be stuck in a storeroom at the back of P3. "You can't orb, can you?"

"No. I-I'll explain why later," he said.

"I think Phoebe already gave me the Reader's Digest version," she said. "So what do we do? I can't shove my way through this spell and I'm pretty sure I'm not strong enough to dispel it." She wished she had a lollipop to suck on.

"You're going to have to come in here and get us," Leo said.

Of course she would. "You do remember that I go all Ralph Hinckley when I orb, right? I'll be lucky not to end up inside a wall."

She could almost hear him sigh. "Well, then," he said. "If you can't get to us, you're going to have to get us to you."

"That's a lot bigger than I've ever tried before," Paige said.

"Not exactly true. You managed to get that shrinking wand to you when it looked as big as a cannon. You can do this. Okay," he said, "Don't think about this, just do it. I've put her as close to the door as I can."

And Paige took a step back and concentrated . . .

And Piper's frozen form orbed in, fell, and knocked her to the floor. Leo called out, "Did it work?"

"More or less," she said, gently disentangling herself. "We're here and we're intact." She took a deep breath. "Okay, now you."

"I'm in the same spot," he said. "And . . . "

And there he was, staggering, but okay. The spell around the door still seemed to be there. "What happened?" she asked.

"A . . . double of Piper's," Leo said. "She called me down here and stuck some kind of device on me. I can't orb at all. I think she was from the future –"

"She was," Paige said. Then she gave Leo the same condensed version Phoebe'd given her.

"A world where everyone bends to Willow Rosenberg's will – because she caught the necklace."

"Not only did she catch it," Paige said hesitantly, "According to Phoebe she was kind of SUPPOSED to. The magic's been waiting on her for 500 years."

Leo shook his head. "We can do the alternate history lesson later. These three came after me and Piper to get us out of the way. And since they didn't get you . . ."

"They're going after Phoebe next," Paige said, catching his meaning. "We have to get there –"

"Hold on," he said. "I think we should try to . . . fix what's wrong, here. They have a big enough head start and I'm afraid –" he paused, "I'm afraid of getting there only in time to mop up."

"So what can I do?" Paige asked.

"Grab my hands. Interlock. And think. I'm a Whitelighter. Think about that energy coming into me. I'm going to apply my healing power to your hands at the same time."

Paige clasped his hands and concentrated mightily, trying to orb just beyond her hands. She could feel – something –

Then suddenly Leo yelled and they broke contact. She stepped back and she could see energy playing over his body and he began to thrash around. Right as she was beginning to think that maybe she should try to do something, he stopped shaking and took something off his chest, efficiently stomping it to pieces on the floor.

And vanished, reappearing seconds later. "YES!" Paige squealed, jumping up and down and hugging him.

He smiled for a second, then said, "We're not done yet. We have to see what we can do to unfreeze Piper." He looked at his wife's frozen figure and frowned. "I don't think I've ever seen anyone else do this – unfreeze Piper's victims, I mean, though there are a few demons who are immune. I don't even know if this will work –"

"Less talk, more action," Paige said. "You're going to try to heal her out of it, right?" Leo nodded. "Okay. You put your hands down and I'll add my energy to yours. I dunno if I can heal but it's worth a gamble, right? Plus, there's that whole Charmed One vibe."

"It can't hurt," Leo translated. "Okay then." They both grabbed the same spot on Piper's arm. "Okay now," he said. "You need to –"

"Yeah, I figured it out. Concentrate."

And long story short is, it worked. Piper suddenly jerked into life again. "If you –" she began, then saw Piper and Leo. "What the –"

"Alternate future," Paige said. "Long story."

Leo grabbed both of them. "Okay, we have to go check on Phoebe, Cole, Buffy and the others."

Piper said, "Buffy was one of them."

"No . . . not really," Paige said.

Piper looked at her oddly. "I'm pretty sure."

"Like I said. Long story."

Then they orbed into the foyer of Halliwell Manor.

Where a vampire and an older version of Buffy and Piper were busily beating up their friends.

The older Buffy looked at them. "Hail, hail, the gang's all here."

Then she attacked.



Part 13



December 3rd, 2001, second try



Buffy had rarely had her clock cleaned so efficiently, so thoroughly, or so fast.

While the bad guys overmatched them, Buffy hadn't thought it was by so much. She felt she was the equal of her counterpart and certainly everyone else combined could hold off Piper and Angel, right?

Wrong.

While she wasn't horribly outclassed by the Buffy of 2009, that Buffy had had seven years to lose her ethics and develop into an efficient if oddly perky killer. The rest of the fight combined was barely a contest, and this was in spite of the Three's stated desire not to injure any of them too badly.

"We're not sure if those devices'll work," FutureBuff had said. "Better keep 'em alive just in case. Piper, this means no blowing anyone up."

"You are NO FUN," Piper'd said.

"Doesn't mean you can't freeze them though," Angel'd said. "Doesn't mean we can't do some pounding. Willow! Don't you worry. We're not going to hurt you. Her will be done."

"Her will be done," the other two Three had echoed.

And unfortunately where spells were concerned Willow'd been the only one who might have given the future Piper a run for her magic, but Willow hadn't been having any of it. Her contributions to the fight had been limited to breaking a chair over the back of Angel's head and getting almost gently knocked into a wall.

Piper's first action had been to freeze Tara before she could open her mouth; then she'd narrowly missed Hood with the same maneuver.

Hood, though, had gotten off four or five blows to Angel – including one very cool Matrix-y level kick to the head – before Angel had decided he'd had enough and thrown her the length of the house. Meanwhile, Phoebe and Cole's fight against Piper had been almost equally brief. Phoebe'd been blasted backwards by a demony-looking ball lightning thing, and Cole, after actually managing to catch Piper in a chokehold, had found himself flipped over and frozen. After she froze him, Piper'd muttered, "Do you think I spent the last eight years doing needlepoint?"

Which more or less left Buffy fighting all three of them. She could have beaten her future self, though she wouldn't actually have laid odds on it. But against all three, she didn't have a chance.

She'd lost consciousness for a minute.

Now, when she regained it, they'd stopped hitting her – though Angel was still standing there – and the other her was saying to three people she couldn't quite see, "Hail, hail, the gang's all here," before jumping in and slugging away.

Or trying to. Quickly, the other Buffy was frozen. Which meant one of the newcomers was the Piper Halliwell that damn well belonged here.

"You know," Angel said, charging forward, "If your other devices work as well as this one her will is screwed."

"Shut up," Future Piper said, unfreezing FutureBuff with a wave of her hand.

Renewed slightly, Buffy staggered forward and slammed her future self in the back before she could move. Then she turned and hit the most dangerous member of the Three as hard as she could at the base of her skull.

The future Piper Halliwell staggered and went down. Buffy turned towards the two warriors of the group. Over against the wall, Willow woke up. The only one still fully down for the count was Cole.

Joined by Phoebe, who'd understandably taken a couple of minutes to recover being thrown twenty feet into a wall, Buffy started in on her duplicate. In the meantime, Angel was resisting all efforts by Piper to freeze him or explode him.

That meant that their only way of stopping him would be to forcibly remove the Gem of Amarra stuck in him somewhere, and Buffy doubted he'd hold still for any exploratory surgery.

While they were tag-teaming her older self as best they could, Buffy said to Phoebe, "Too bad Will's given up on the teleportation business." Hood staggered to her feet and came over to assist.

"She has," Phoebe said. "But Paige hasn't . . . Hood?"

"Gotcha."

"No you don't," FutureBuff said, reaching out for the scarred woman from the future.

Buffy grabbed her arm. "Yes she does." For her troubles she got punched in the face.

Hood shoved Angel to one side and yelled to Paige, "Call the Gem of Amarra. It's inside Angel's body."

Then Hood grabbed the vampire; Leo orbed over and did the same thing, and Piper dove for his legs.

They'd only be able to hold him for a very short time. But that was long enough. Paige concentrated and Angel started yelling. A white, sparkling light appeared in her hands, followed an instant later by a darkly glowing gemstone.

Angel threw off his human restraints and came at Paige as fast as he could. "STEP ON IT!" Buffy yelled.

Paige tossed the stone to the ground and stepped on it. A half-second later, Angel grabbed her around the neck and began choking her. "What good do you think that did?" he said.

"This," Piper said, freezing him in place, then coming over and extricating Paige.

Meanwhile, Buffy, Phoebe and Hood were delivering the knockout blows to the Buffy of the future. When she went down, she and Phoebe did a handslap and then offered one to Hood, who reluctantly returned it.

Cole shouted, "Watch out!" and then Hood –

Vanished as the future Piper slapped something on her back.

Then she stepped towards the still-frozen Tara.

"What the hell did you just do?" Buffy asked.

"Removed her from history," the witch said. "And as soon as I slap this –" she help up another device – "on her, it'll be like none of this ever happened."

Willow's breath caught. "I don't WANT to be the ruler of the world," she said.

The future Piper smiled. "You will. Your will be done."

Phoebe caught Piper and Paige's eyes and mouthed a phrase. Then, as the device was being slapped onto Tara, they chanted to the person most likely to still be able to alter the future,

"When time reboots

You will recall

The history

Behind it all!"

And then there was nothing more to say.

Because there was nothing more, period.

* * * * *

Sometime in June, 2009



The ruler of the earth still floated above her throne.

Angel, Buffy and Piper teleported back in right in front of her.

They all kneeled. "Your will be done," they said in unison.

"It worked," Will said. "Any difficulties?"

"I lost my Gem," Angel said. "Otherwise, bumps and bruises."

Will giggled and clapped her hands. "Oh, pish tosh, bumps and bruises," she said. "You guys get worse when you have sex."

"We try," Buffy said, putting an arm around Angel's shoulder.

"And as for the Gem, worry not," Will told Angel. "I'll just make you a new one. Because I like you and you're one of my favorite vampires."

"Thanks," Angel said. "You're one of my favorite all-powerful rulers."

"Only one of them?" Will asked. "You're not gonna get a better offer and you know it, buster."

"Of course we do," Piper said nervously.

"Piper, after seven years you still haven't learned to relax. I LIKE you guys. You can tease me." Piper smiled at this, but Will could tell she still didn't fully believe her. Oh well, she was obedient, powerful, and damn sexy in her witch getup. Will could live with the rest. "Still, bumps and bruises – better go get them looked at."

Piper, Buffy and Angel bowed. "Your will be done."

They walked out of the room and the doors were locked behind them and the ruler of the world floated ever higher.

Will was on her throne.

All was right with the w—

No. No, it wasn't.

Angrily, she transported Buffy back. After a second of being startled, she said. "Your will be done, Will, but –"

"Not now, Buffy. Open your mind."

Buffy bowed and Willow watched the last thirty seconds of the vanished timeline through her eyes and ears. She heard the Halliwells chant, "When time reboots you will recall the history behind it all!"

Someone still remembered the future.

She called first Angel – but he'd been frozen – and then Piper, but neither had seen who'd been told.

It wasn't one of their own. Buffy'd been looking at the other Buffy, and Piper'd seen a couple of others . . .

They'd reminded the most potentially dangerous person in the past.

They'd reminded WILLOW.

She dropped to the throne, stood up, and prepared a spell of time travel, first telling Fiat Voluntas Tua to turn itself off while she was in the past. Wouldn't do to have it start influencing people too soon, nosirree bob.

Then she traveled back to December 3, 2001.

If you wanted to do something right, apparently you had to do it yourself.





Part 14



December 3rd, 2001, third try

As they finished up their assault on Kathleen O'Halloran, Willow staggered.

"You do good work," Buffy said to Phoebe after Phoebe delivered the coup de grace to the redheaded sorceress.

Willow suddenly looked around the alleyway nervously.

"Back atcha," Phoebe said, rubbing her knuckles, "Though I could do with some of your superstrength every once in a while."

Willow said, "I –"

"Yeah, but I remember seeing you in Sunnydale," Buffy said. "You've got the Xena thing going. Me, I'm more or less bound by the laws of physics." Then she stopped. "When this is over maybe we could settle our differences in the ring?"

"I'll think about that," Phoebe said, apparently recognizing it for the friendly challenge it was.

"Cool," Buffy answered. They prepared a binding spell but as they finished casting it on O'Halloran Willow yelled, "STOP!" She spun to look at Leo. "This means you too. Don't orb out yet."

"Okay," the Whitelighter said. "But if someone looks into the alley and sees us standing around an unconscious woman we're going to have to do some fast talking."

"What's wrong, Willow?" Buffy asked, clearly concerned.

Willow waved her arms. "This. All of it. We're headed right for Armageddon –"

"Have you been possessed by Pat Robertson?" Piper asked.

Willow shook her head. "No. Listen."

Then she explained what she'd suddenly remembered – all of it.

After a minute they were skeptical.

After five they were horrified.

Once Willow had finished her narrative, Buffy said, "I don't believe it, Will. You wouldn't –"

"I would," Willow said. "I did. Apparently I'm supposed to. And don't call me that for a while."

Leo orbed out to take O'Halloran back to her hotel room.

Cole asked practically, "When do we catch up to Rebecca Koch – when did we, I mean?"

"About 6:15," Willow said after a second. "Sorry. I'm trying to sort through two universes here and I don't have an eidetic memory. I'm remembering what – Hood – told the rest of us the first time." She'd decided not to reveal Hood's true identity, or Tara's either. There was no point in making the situation any more emotionally distressing than it already was. "But this time we know where she is – we don't need to go back to the house so Piper can do her location spell."

"Which means we can get there faster," Paige said. "Which means we can what? Save the guardian beast?"

"Sheela – the blind witch, you know – she said that Fiat Voluntas Tua was supposed to come to me. So it might be harder than we think. It's not like we're fighting against prophecy, but it is five hundred years of magic coming home to roost."

"Sounds like a pretty big chicken," Phoebe said. "Where's Colonel Sanders when you need him?"

Willow glared at her. Orbing back in, Leo held out his hands and said, "Okay. Let's see if we can talk about this without killing each other."

"Don't touch the guardian beast," Willow said. "Apparently it burns you."

"Thanks," Leo said.

Buffy said, "Look. You think if we say sent you to Alcatraz or dumped you onto the next flight at the airport it wouldn't work ---"

"I can't say that for sure," Willow said.

Piper said, "I have an idea. Things are converging so that you get the necklace. So let's follow what we did originally as closely as we can, so we don't start worrying the magic or anything."

"Magic doesn't worry," Phoebe said.

"It's a metaphor," Piper said irritably. "Run with it, okay? Anyway, then at the last minute or so, Willow doesn't do what she did originally. She stays out of the alley; she doesn't catch the necklace. Then we pick it up with our protection spells and we dump it back into a pocket dimension until the Elders can whistle up a new guardian beast."

"I'm not sure I want to get that close to it," Willow said.

Buffy shushed the objections Piper was about to raise and told her friend, "We need to do something."

"I know," she sighed. "Let's do it this way. Just remember, do EVERYTHING to stop me from catching the necklace. Knock me out if you have to."

"We will," Buffy and Phoebe said simultaneously.



* * * * *

Because they didn't need to stop off at the mansion, they got to the alley this time about five minutes earlier. Leo, of course, orbed out, waiting to be called, because he hadn't been there the previous time either.

Fiat Voluntas Tua's Guardian Beast was undergoing a magical acid bath, just as had been advertised. The group pulled back around the corner before Rebecca Koch saw them and Paige said, "Okay, now what? Do we let the creature suffer and die? Because something seems not right about that."

"I think I could take her out with a crossbow shot from here," Buffy said. "If I had a crossbow. But I don't."

"We could sneak around the other side, some of us, and take her out that way," Cole said

Then a voice from behind them said, "What you're all going to do is sit here for the next five minutes. Just in case one of you actually comes up with a way to change the future." They spun in place and saw Willow standing there.

Only not. This Willow had longer hair, almost down to her waist; and her outfit was a sheer black robe with a big leather belt around the center and, oddly, sensible shoes.

"Will," Paige said.

"That's me," the woman said cheerily.

Noticing Fiat Voluntas Tua wrapped around Will's neck, Piper raised her hand said, "So how come we don't all feel like doing everything you say?"

Will sighed theatrically. "I'm interested in preserving the future, not ruining it. So –" she waved her hands and they all found themselves unable to move – "None of you are moving for five – no, four – minutes. This won't hurt. Promise!"

And for three and a half minutes no one moved. Will didn't bother entertaining them, either.

"Okay," Will said, clapping her hands and unfreezing them. "There you go! And you'd better hurry."

"And if we decide not to?" Buffy demanded. "You don't want Rebecca Koch getting that necklace any more than we do."

"You want to play a game of chicken," Will said, "I can wait just as long as you can. Which is about, oh, another minute or so."

Within seconds Piper grabbed Buffy by the arm. "We need to stop Koch," she said. "We can worry about her later." She winked, though not at Buffy.

And they ran around the corner into the alley, from which sounds of fighting could soon be heard.

Will smiled and began to extend her perceptions, before she figured out she wasn't alone.

She figured this out when Willow smacked her in the face.

"What the hell was that for?" Will said. "I'm doing this for you, Will."

Willow smacked her again. "Don't call me that."

Before Willow could hit her again, Will slapped her arms away and said, "If you don't want to do this . . . I'm going to have to MAKE you want it."

Then she took her hands, chanted, and stuck them into Willow's head.

* * * * *

Things were playing out exactly as they had in the first timeline.

Rebecca Koch threw up the magical force field and just like before Buffy and Cole went sailing through while the sisters were stopped.

Just like before, Koch misjudged the more dangerous of her foes and blasted Cole into some garbage cans.

Just like before, Buffy tackled her before she could get off a second blow; just like before, this weakened the magical shield, and just like before, the Halliwells redoubled their efforts to bring it down.

Just like before, Cole recovered and tried to figure out what to do.

Unlike before, when Leo was called in he didn't get his hands burned, because he didn't try to heal the suffering of Fiat Voluntas Tua's guardian beast.

But just like before, the guardian beast still died. Just like before, Koch blasted Buffy away, turned off the acid bath and ran to take off the collar as the shield came down. And just like before, Cole rammed into her, sending the necklace flying

And a hand shot out to catch it.

Just like before.



Part 15



December 3rd, 2001, third try



Willow felt the hands enter her head and then –

It wasn't painful at all.

Instead, she was getting a grand tour of the future through Will's eyes.

No war.

No suffering.

No pain.

No hatred.

Disease vanishing.

Natural disasters on the way out.

People living in harmony – people, demons and vampires, all working together for the common good.

It was every dream she'd ever had come true.

And she was responsible.

Will Rosenberg, through the power of Fiat Voluntas Tua, was responsible for this paradise.

She was responsible for it.

She was.

"So you see," Will's voice said, "Why you have to catch Fiat Voluntas Tua. Without it – without it, the world will keep on going to hell. The four horsemen will continue to ride. And you have the power to prevent this, Will."

It was an amazing vision.

It was utopia.

And as she was ready to succumb – to round that corner and pluck the necklace from the air – two more visions floated before her – Hood's and Tara's faces -- and she knew.

That wasn't paradise. It couldn't be.

"I. Am. NOT. Will," Willow said. "I am not you. I will NEVER be you. I am Willow Rosenberg and you will get the HELL out of my head."

She reached up and grabbed Will's hands and forced them away from her temples.

Then, before Will could react, Willow hauled off and hit her as hard as she could, a solid right cross to the jaw. Will went down like a piano'd been dropped on her head. Almost smugly, Willow said to herself, "So who needs magic?" Then Willow kicked her until she rolled over, reached down, and plucked the for-the-moment nonfunctional duplicate necklace off Will's neck. When she took it, she felt no urges to rule the world. It had been a calculated risk; but an even bigger risk would have been letting Will wake up still wearing it.

She shoved it in her pocket and went around the corner, just in time to see the guardian beast die and Rebecca Koch send Buffy flying.

She only had seconds. As she shield came down she ran forward, only to be wrestled to the ground by Phoebe Halliwell. "We're not going to let you near the necklace," she said.

"I don't want to be near the necklace," Willow said. "Keep me down, though, just in case." Cole tackled Rebecca Koch and Willow kicked Leo. "Ow!" he said –

Then caught on.

The necklace flew free –

And a hand reached out to catch it, just like before.

Only this time the hand belonged to Leo.

And with that, the world as we know it continued to spin.

* * * * *

Rebecca Koch was no problem. As she struggled with Cole, Buffy came over and punched her in the face until she quit complaining. The Halliwells hustled over and bound her from doing magic.

As Leo held up the necklace, the Charmed Ones continued to hold Willow down, "just in case."

Willow completely understood, although she did ask Phoebe to dig something out of her jacket pocket. When Phoebe realized that she was holding a copy of Fiat Voluntas Tua, she yelped, dropped it, and threw herself backwards. Then, glowering at Willow, she said, "How out of your mind have you gone?"

"I gave it up, didn't I?" Willow said. "Leo –"

"On it," the Whitelighter said, already reaching down.

With both necklaces safely in Leo's grasp, Piper and Paige let Willow stand up. "I assume that was Will's necklace?" Piper asked.

"I, I know what you're thinking," Willow said.

"I'm thinking you were being a moron," Phoebe said.

Willow nodded "Like I said. I know what you're thinking. But – I knocked her down, I had to come to help you, and I wasn't going to leave her behind with a necklace that might suddenly decide to start working. We'd still get her utopia. And," she said fiercely. "I WASN'T GOING TO LET THAT HAPPEN."

"Will – ow," Buffy said. "It worked. That's the important thing. Still, it was a big chance."

"I had to take it," Willow said. "It would have been a bigger one leaving her behind."

"YOU HAVE THAT RIGHT," came a voice from the head of the alley. They all turned and saw Will standing there once again.

"Leo, get out," Piper said.

"Gone," he said, and he and both necklaces orbed away.

Will chanted something and everyone except Willow froze.

"LEO!" She yelled. "Get back down here or I'll kill them!" No answer. "I mean it!"

"I think he knows you're bluffing," Willow said. "You need them. ALL of them. It wouldn't be your world without them."

"And how do you know so much?" Will demanded.

"I've seen your future," Willow said. "It doesn't work."

Shaking her head, Will said, "I don't get you. That was your paradise. Everything was perfect."

"No!" Willow shouted. "It wasn't. Phoebe was burned and scarred. Tara – the woman you loved – was blind. That's not perfection."

"They wouldn't go along with me," Will said. "What was I supposed to do?"

"Let them," Willow said. "What kind of paradise is it where you blind a woman you love?"

"My kind," Will said.

Willow shook her head. "Not mine."

"It will be once you put Fiat Voluntas Tua on."

"What part of the necklaces are gone are you having trouble understanding?" Willow said. "It's NEVER going to be your paradise. The time for me to grab it has come. And, and it's gone. Your world is gone."

"In that case," Will said coldly, "There's no reason for me to keep them alive." With another gesture she raised them all into the air. They began choking.

"Yes there is," Willow said.

"Really," Will said. "And what's that?"

"If you kill them, I'll kill you."

"Impotent threats from a woman who's sworn off magic," Will said, sneering. "You don't scare me."

Walking over until they were face to face, holding her older version's undivided attention, Willow said, "Do you think after you'd killed them that that would stop me? Do you think I'd rest until I saw your bleeding body? Do you think there's a part of the world I wouldn't go to, a dimension I wouldn't visit, a hell I wouldn't dare, if you did that? Do you think any power on earth would stop me?" Then, she yelled, "DO YOU?"

Will said, "No, I don't."

"Good." Then, once again, she swung and connected with a right cross to Will's jaw.

This time, it didn't knock her out, though, and she said irritably, "I'm getting tired of that."

Then she felt a tap on the shoulder, turned, and was met by a similar right cross from Leo, who'd orbed in about thirty seconds previously. This, too, didn't knock her out, but it shattered her concentration long enough for her spells to be broken.

Five seconds later the Charmed Ones chanted,

"From here on out

You cannot freeze

Those you call

Your enemies!"

And suddenly Will was facing three witches, a Slayer, a Whitelighter, an ex- demon, and a normal human who'd vowed to kill her.

But she knew who her most dangerous opponent was. Before Piper could freeze or explode her, before Buffy could stake her, Paige teleport her or Leo orb her to Switzerland, she looked directly into Willow's eyes and said, "This isn't over."

"Yes it is," Willow said.

Then Will chanted and blinked away.

* * * * *

In the Halliwell basement, on some padding, Buffy kicked Phoebe in the jaw.

Phoebe dodged the attack and punched Buffy in the stomach. Buffy blocked it and returned the blow.

They'd been going at it for half an hour or so. Both were tired, both sweaty, both bruised, and neither one wanted to stop.

"Ten bucks on Buffy," Willow said.

Cole snorted. "I'll take that action."

On their way back from the alley, Leo had orbed Rebecca Koch back to her hotel room, then told everyone what had happened with the duplicate Fiat Voluntas Tuas. The Elders had been nonplussed ("translation," Phoebe'd said. "They freaked.") at the two necklaces, but had taken them more or less in stride. They were now under the protection of even more powerful guardian beasts in even more remote dimensions. This wasn't a perfect solution, obviously, but it was the best they could do at the moment.

Add to that the fact that they had a thoroughly pissed-off and extremely powerful witch after them who felt cheated out of a world, and their victory had been a mixed one at best. "Still," Cole had said. "At least this time, though we've made enemies, they're not each other."

"Amen to that," Buffy'd said.

And they got back to the mansion and Phoebe'd taken Buffy up on her offer of a little one-on-one, to be settled after three knockdowns.

Piper, Paige, Cole and Willow stood there watching the combat. Buffy'd gone down once, Phoebe twice.

A few minutes after Willow and Cole made their bet, Piper nudged Willow. "You still want that binding spell?" she asked.

Willow shook her head. "I don't think so. If I can get through today without casting – I can handle anything the world has to throw at me." At Piper's slightly worried look, she said, "Don't worry. I haven't suddenly swung into a major case of self-confidence. But now I think I can manage on my own."

"Just so you know, if you ever do want it –"

"I'll know who to ask."

Buffy connected with a blow to the temple and Phoebe went down. "Here's your money," Cole said to Willow, taking out his wallet and peeling off ten dollars.

Buffy came over to see what was going on and said, "Willow! I can't believe you!" Willow looked slightly chagrined. "Only ten bucks. Phoebe owes me fifty."

Toweling herself off, Phoebe muttered, "Yeah, yeah, the check's in the mail."

Paige said, "Time travelers. All powerful necklaces. And two alternate universes. I thought I was used to the Halliwell life, but now –"

"You can't go back," Piper said.

"Not even to visit?" Paige asked wistfully. Piper shook her head with mock severity.

"You're wrong," Buffy said. "It wasn't two universes. There was the timeline that produced Will, the one Hood and Sheela traveled back to, and this one."

"Third time's the charm," Cole said.