"Look, it's simple." Tyler held up a hand, the palm perpendicular to his face. "You get yourself a focal point, empty your mind, concentrate, and..." His hand moved away from his nose. "...you just slip over."

Willow shook her head. "There's no ritual?"

"None." He bit his lip. "It's like this. You're at the ocean, okay, and you've got a bucket. You can stand in the surf up to your ankles and dip water out with your bucket all day, or you can get on a board and surf. Your spells and stuff are like the bucket. You get the illusion of control, of dipping the water yourself, but you're ignoring the rest of the ocean. What I'm talking about is like surfing. All you can control is the board, but it's a helluva ride."

Willow stared at him for a long time. "Okay," she finally said. "Let's do it. After school."

***

Giles rubbed his hand over his face. He had done that many time during the afternoon, so many that one more pass would render his cheeks raw. He settled his glasses on the bridge of his nose and stared at the papers in front of him.

Some of the documents hadn't transmitted very well; they were faxes of copies and the quality was already degraded. Vellum, papyrus, leathers and berry ink were not the most stable media. Still, they were good enough, and the modern entries, the minutes of meetings and the transcripts of rituals, were damning in and of themselves. When Gerard Roland had suggested chicanery in the choosing of Lindsay Maeda, Giles had been inclined to scoff, but now he saw that even his old friend's suspicions did not go far enough.

The selection process had been interfered with and impeded at every step of the way. Worse, Giles knew who was behind the malfeasance.

Desmond Kirkland. Giles remembered him, a pale, jealous boy two or three years younger than the librarian, always trying to achieve through subterfuge what might have been attained by effort. He had possessed grasping ambition, a bottomless sense of having been wronged or ignored, and a pinchpenny soul that kept accounts and always, always tried to settle them. And now he was the Grand Inquisitor.

Something tapped against the window. Giles jumped, his elbow knocking a small pile of papers to the floor. He hurried to the window and peered out, standing with his back to the wall and looking around the edge of the frame. A wasp buzzed outside, veering into the glass at irregular intervals. Each collision reverberated through the room, at least in the Watcher's ears. Giles exhaled and realized that he had been holding his breath.

He noticed the papers on the floor and hurried to pick them up. He stared at the stack of documents, then scooped them up and took them to his bedroom. He put them on a shelf at the back of his closet, hurried down the stairs and out the door. The apartment suddenly seemed small and claustrophobic. It was an undertow, sucking him down into darkness. He needed to get out and breathe some fresh air.

***

Robert Woo did not look right or left as he crossed the deck and descended the ship's staircase. He was sure there was some nautical term for the stairs, but he could not remember it. He went directly to his berth (he remembered that term) and locked the door. Satisfied that he was secure for the moment, he sat down on the bunk and unzipped the brand new duffel bag. The bag was full of new clothes and personal items. Woo had purchased them on his way to the harbor. He began to unwrap the shirts and break his toiletries out of their packing.

He was not a particularly impressive figure. He lacked David Mangwana's charisma and physical force, Sofia Pellecanos' emotional intensity or even Gunther Koenig's vigorous intellect. He was a man of average height, a few years from full middle age, who dressed well and enjoyed going to films and romancing attractive women who were almost too young for him. He presented a bland, unremarkable façade to the world at large. He was accessible and approachable and a great many people would count him as their friend, but when pressed they would be forced to admit that they really didn't know much about his depths. That was because Robert kept those depths sealed off, secured by an airtight bulkhead barricaded with concrete-filled sandbags. But now it was different. The bulkhead had not been fully breached, but the unmistakable hiss of escaping air pressure could be heard. His enemy had done the unforgivable: he had attacked Robert Woo's home and now Robert Woo would visit him in his lair.

***

"I don't get it." Willow looked away from the wall, glimpsing Tyler from the corner of her eye.

"Well, you're never gonna if you keep breaking concentration." He stepped in front of her. His chocolate-brown eyes filled her field of vision. "You gotta stay focused."

"It's hard." Frustration seeped into Willow's voice.

"No, it's not. It's easy. You're making it hard." He blinked. Willow could see every perfectly curved hair of his beautiful lashes. "You keep trying to make it happen. I told you, it's not like a spell. You can't make it happen, you have to let it happen. Now, just look in my eyes. No, not in my eye. Look in both my eyes." He sighed in irritation. "Let your eyes unfocus so you can see both of mine. Now just relax. Empty your mind. Just look at me."

Willow tried to keep her exasperation at a manageable level. Tyler was an annoying little putz, but he did have beautiful eyes. This would be so much easier if there was a spell or something, something she could do to wedge open this door he talked about. She caught herself and made a conscious effort to empty her mind. He really did have beautiful eyes, the little schmuck. They had flecks of gold in the iris. One of the flecks became sharp-edged and clear. Her vision blurred...

And she was somewhere else. Or Somewhere Else. Or SomeThing Else. Everything was gray shot through with gold, only 'everything' wasn't the right word, because there was nothing around her. She was surrounded by gray-gold nothing, only 'she was surrounded' seemed a little pompous, because she couldn't determine whether she in fact had any physical form. Something suggested she did not. There was no up or down or left or right; but the voices were different.

Some of them were angry, some were pleading, others seemed full of joy. They were no longer just an undifferentiated mass of noise in her head, but took on some sort of coherence, even if she couldn't make out any words. She tried to turn to find them and a wave of vertigo swamped her and she began to spin, or at least it felt like spinning and the centrifugal force was shredding her essence...

She landed on her back with a thump. Her head bounced off the linoleum, causing little starbursts of light to fill her vision. As her sight cleared she could see Tyler leaning over her, hands on his knees. He was breathing fast.

"It worked, didn't it?" he said. "I knew it would. You got there, didn't you? Damn!" He jumped up in the air, punching one fist toward the ceiling. "I knew it. I knew it."

"Uh," Willow said as she struggled to a sitting position, "could you help me up?"

***

Buffy knocked on the door one last time, then shook her head and turned away. She was at a loss. If Giles wasn't home, she had no idea where he might be. She had assumed that his absence from school was due to illness; probably a fast-attacking case of the stomach flu. But here she was, just before dusk, and no one was home. Which meant that Giles wasn't sick. So where was he?

***

He was in a bar. Not a dark, seedy place for a man to drink cheap whiskey and savor past regrets, but some brightly-lit theme establishment not far from the university. The crowd was mostly Polo-shirted young men trying to impress Liz Claiborne-wearing young women. Giles hunched over a table in the corner farthest from the door. He had chosen this place because... he had to admit to himself that he wasn't sure why he was here, except that it was away from home and if anyone came looking for him here, they would surely be noticeable. And he needed time. To think. To reconcile what he now knew with what he believed. To try and find a way out.

***

Xander drummed his knuckles on the tabletop and looked around. No Cordelia. He shook his head. Cordy had many faults, but lateness was not one of them. She was now thirty minutes overdue.

"Hey, what's with you?" Buffy slid onto the chair beside him. "Jacket, tie--"

"It's a bolo," Xander blurted.

"Still. What's with the hair?"

He winced. "It's high, isn't it? I went with mousse. Is it really high?"

Buffy shrugged. "It's got a certain 'My Prerogative' thing going on." She patted his arm. "But it'll do, pig, it'll do. What's the occasion?"

Xander sighed, a sound that caused Buffy to frown. He looked down at his hands as he spoke. "Cordy and I have been dating for a year, so we're going to Domenico's."

"Has it been a year?" Buffy did some fast calculating. "Wow." She took a sip of her coffee. "That's very sweet. I hope you have a really good time." The last part stuck in her throat just a little.

"Gee, Buff, you almost made it to sincere," Xander said.

"I'm serious." Buffy couldn't help smiling. "It still seems perverse to me, but you and Cordelia somehow kinda bring out each other's good qualities."

"Possibly because we exorcise so much of our bile on each other," Xander quipped.

"Possibly." Buffy couldn't repress a small smile as she stood. "I gotta walk. Have a good time and don't dog her when she shows up. She's probably just taking time to make sure she looks good."

Xander's eyebrows arched. "What, twenty-four hours in a day isn't enough?"

***

Coyne held himself still as stone and willed the others to do the same. It was always hard to lay a trap for another vampire, what with the sensitive hearing and smell and all. This was what they should have been doing all along. Coyne had learned long ago not to question his master, but he could not figure why they had come to this one-horse town and then why they had been so obliging to that uppity black scruff across town (in addition to his many other unpleasant traits, Coyne had never outgrown the rather virulent racism that had been part of his human existence. It was the sort of trait that the demon savored).

Their quarry had slowed as they approached the alley. Coyne would have cursed, but they would surely have heard it. Instead, he forced himself to relax. This was why they had brought the bait. The four vamps in black BDUs hesitated at the mouth of the passage, their posture vigilant and suspicious. Coyne held his ground, then heard the scrape of nails being pulled out of wood. The four heard it as well, tensing in response. They were coiled like steel springs as the girl stumbled across the far mouth of the alley.

The sight of fresh defenseless prey overrode their caution. The quartet sprinted into the murk of the alley. Coyne held his place as they rushed past. When they reached the mark, he leaped out. His underlings followed suit. Trick's four vampires found themselves surrounded. They hesitated, puzzled by this show of aggression. They had no chance anyway, but the indecision made the battled even more short lived. Three were soon dust and the fourth, well, the fourth wished he was dust. Coyne surveyed the screaming mess on the floor of the alley, then turned to one of his compatriots.

"Bring the crate," Coyne growled. The underling slapped the vamp next to him on the shoulder and they raced away. They made a lot of noise dragging the box back, but as they appeared out of the gloom they brought a bonus. One of them held the bait firmly in his grasp. The girl struggled, but the demonic fingers dug into her neck and she winced in pain.

"You didn't run?" Coyne stepped up close, seeing the tracks of her tears glowing silver in the dim alley. His tongue flicked out, licking one of the salty tracks. The girl flinched away, shuddering. "Well," Coyne said, "at least we won't have to drag this bastard back thirsty."