Author's Note: Here's a nice long chapter to make up for my rather infrequent updates. Keep on reviewing, please! Oh, and I said it before, but some of the dialogue is taken directly from "Becoming, Part 2".

Chapter 23: No Turning Back

The atmosphere of the small, crowded hospital room was sterile, cold and grim. Ms. Calendar sat perched in a chair crying softly as Oz fought tears of his own by Willow's bedside. He grasped Willow's hand as she slept, desperately clinging onto her out the fear that she could slip away at any time. Usually non-emotive, he sat whispering despairingly, "Come on Willow, baby. Come on, come back to me." He implored her unconscious form so fervently that he didn't notice a figure sidle up next to him and the bed.

"How is she?" Xander asked softly.

Oz didn't look up as he smoothed Willow's damp forehead. "The same," he murmured.

With Xander's entrance, Ms. Calendar brusquely jumped out of her chair. "Have you found him?" she demanded, her face pinched white with worry.

Xander shook his head gently, still staring down at Willow. "Buffy and Spike are out looking for him." He looked back up at Ms. Calendar gravely. "They want us to perform a spell."

Ms. Calendar wiped the tears from her eyes and frowned. "A spell? What kind of spell? A spell for Giles?"

"No. For Angel." He emphasized the last name with harsh bitterness.

Her frown deepened. "A spell for Angel? Why?"

Clenching his teeth, Xander settled into a hospital chair. "That seems to be the question of the hour. For some reason, Buffy and Spike think they have their reasons."

"Well what's the spell?" Ms. Calendar insisted impatiently. "If Buffy thinks it's useful in helping Giles, then maybe we could try it."

"No, Buffy thinks it's useful for no one besides herself!" Xander exploded, jarring everyone in the room besides the peacefully sleeping Willow. "All she cares about is returning Angel to his nice, sensitive-guy, soulful-schmoe package so they can go steady again!"

Ms. Calendar cocked her head and furrowed her brows. "She wants to restore Angel's soul? That's . . . oh my god." She suddenly turned from Xander and began pacing the room frantically. "Why the hell didn't I think of that sooner?!"

Xander widened his eyes in amazement. "You actually think you can----"

"Well I had the spell translated in front of me all of this time! That whole time Giles was kidnapped, and oh God, probably being tortured-----I had it! I could have stopped this before anything had happened to him!" She gripped her head in guilt, but then fumbled through the pocket of her dress for a crumpled piece of paper. "Here! Right here, I had it!" She scanned its contents quickly. "Here, the directions and materials are all listed. An Orb of Theselus, a couple of funky herbs . . . Angel could have his soul restored by nightfall."

"But why?" Xander exclaimed severely. "Why should we restore his soul? He's done nothing but cause pain as a vampire, and just nothing as a souled one. Why the hell should we even give him that kind of redemption when he doesn't even deserve it?!"

"Because it could save Giles!" Ms. Calendar cried sharply. "If we restore Angel's soul, then we know he'd let Giles go. And he would never open Acathla's portal. It's one of the best chances we've got!"

"One of the best chances?! One of the best?! How do we even know that Angel isn't killing Giles and opening the portal right now?! Try no chance! You said yourself that the restoration wouldn't work till nightfall! That's hours from now!"

"I don't know for sure. This kind of spell has been rarely done, and all cases vary. We don't how long it'll take for Angel to regain his soul, so if we do the spell, the sooner, the better."

"And why won't an average staking work? 'Cause last time I checked, lunging a piece of wood through a vampire's heart? Very efficient way to get the job done."

Ms. Calendar shook her head firmly. "Angel's from the Master's bloodline, Xander. He has extraordinary power, the kind of power that surpasses any other vampire's. Besides, I don't know if Buffy could defeat him even if she tried."

"Buffy's the Slayer. Chosen to protect helpless people like us who aren't in a position to doubt her abilities. Why do you think she can't------"

"She slept with him, Xander," Ms. Calendar stated flatly, causing both Oz and Xander to stiffen and stare at her.

Xander shook his head and began to fidget. "What are you talking about?"

"She's in love with him. So she slept with him. And it turned him. It made him loose his soul. I figured it out. That was the clause, Angel's "true moment of happiness". Don't you understand? It was Buffy's first time, the moment she finally let herself be with the one she loved most in the world . . . and he turned evil. It's enough to destroy her."

Xander was shocked. He stared at the floor blankly as he tried to fight through the storm of confusion brewing within him. Finally, he gazed up at Ms. Calendar. "You think she won't be able to take him?" he asked quietly.

Ms. Calendar sighed wearily and rested her chin in her hand. "I wouldn't be able to."

Xander nodded slowly and gazed down at Oz. "What do you think, man?"

Oz still had his gaze fixed on Willow, his hand squeezing hers just a bit tighter. "I think . . . " He suddenly leaned over and kissed Willow's forehead gently before glancing back up at Xander. " . . . I think that the most important thing is stopping this before anyone else gets hurt."

Staring down at his best friend, looking so small in her thin hospital gown, Xander swallowed hard before nodding again. After a few moments of silence, he finally asked Ms. Calendar, "What do you need?"

Perking up, Ms. Calendar sighed a breath of relief. "Here's the list. You can find all the herbs at the Magic Box downtown, and there's an orb of Theselus back in my classroom." She smiled sheepishly. "I've been using it as a paperweight."

With the restraint of a soldier, Xander took the list from her and started to exit to the room. "Got it," he mumbled, but Ms. Calendar soon called him back, prompting him to turn around.

"Xander?"

"Yeah?

She clasped her hands tightly together. "Hurry."

******************************

Buffy and Spike decided to make a pit stop at Willy's before returning home. Under the threats of eminent beating and torture administered by Buffy as Spike sat back in amusement, Willy the bartender waveringly caved and provided them the address of Drusilla and Angel's haven.

"The old mansion on Crawford Street," Buffy murmured as they made their way down Revello Drive. "I should have known he would choose that place as a hideout. He was always a fan of the whole Gothic architectural thing."

Spike leered and pursed his lips. "And you still refuse to question the poofter's orientation? You must be thick in the head, Blondie."

Buffy merely responded by grimacing slightly. She was used to his playful insults by now. For Spike, it was like casual small talk. "I just hope Angel and Dru aren't performing the ritual as we speak."

Spike curled his slender fingers around a cigarette in his mouth as he puffed out a curl of smoke. "We'd be able to tell, wouldn't we? The atmosphere would suddenly go all "Ninth Circle of Hell", I figure."

Buffy rolled her eyes. "And we want to stop things before it comes to that, brain-trust." She suddenly gazed at the Summers house they were approaching absently. "I hope I have enough weapons left in my room. I swear, if Dawn did her little explore-y thing in my weapons chest, her name's Mud."

He dropped the cigarette to the ground and stared at her steadily. "So we're really doing this? You really plan to kill him?"

Buffy glanced up at him sharply and a little defensively. "We don't know . . . I don't know yet. It's just a our fallback plan, nothing's definite."

"Equipping ourselves with an armory seems a little extravagant for a fallback plan."

Buffy threaded a hand through her hair carelessly, stomping through her front lawn. "Well possible apocalypse calls for extravagant measures." Suddenly, she paused, reluctant to storm through the front door of her house so conspicuously. She hadn't been home for more than twenty-four hours. Her mother had probably noticed her absence and was waiting for her in a parental rage. And the last thing Buffy wanted to deal with was her mother. So she edged towards the huge oak with the branches that hung conveniently near her bedroom window and began hiking her boots up the rough bark. Grunting as she struggled, she turned around as Spike stood at the bottom chuckling at her ineptness at tree climbing.

"So you can save the world, but you can't climb a tree? I feel so much secure knowing the people has you as their protector."

Glaring at him, she hugged the tree only one foot up from the ground. "Well make with a chivalry and help, Sir Walter Raleigh."

Smirking, Spike brought his hands around her waist and lifted her up. She felt so slight in his arms, not a slayer, but the real, soft, well-shaped girl she was. And she smelled like vanilla. Holding her limber form as she ascended higher in the tree, he suddenly felt nervous and ill at ease. Backing away with speed, he waved a hand at her. "Umm . . . I think you can handle the rest."

He waited until she had made it up on the roof before he scaled the tree himself. Following her through her bedroom window, he grunted, popping his long legs in. Straightening, he wiped some leaves off his duster as she leaned down to grab some weapons hidden under her bed. "So you don't think we're jumping the gun here?" he said suddenly. "You don't think we should wait for Xander before we even worry about weapons and that sort?"

Surprised, she glared at him, still crouching on her knees. "I don't get you. First you're telling me to dust Angel, now you're for restoring his soul?"

Spike shrugged. "I dunno. I've been thinking about it is all. About this whole idea of a vampire with a soul."

She stared at him, mystified. "What are you talking about, Spike?"

He fixed his intense, sapphire gaze to her in a flash, sending an unsettling shiver down her spine. "If it'd work for Angel, it'd work for Drusilla too, wouldn't it?"

Understanding, her eyes went wide. "You aren't saying what I think you're saying."

"You think whatever you damn please. I'm serious."

"You want to restore Drusilla's soul? That's insane!"

"What's insane? Why the hell can you consider it and I can't?"

"Because . . . because it's different!"

"What's different about it? You're gonna restore your boyfriend's soul so he'll go back to being your boyfriend. Why can't I do the same for Dru?"

"That's not why I'm restoring Angel's soul. I'm restoring it to save the world. This isn't the semi-annul soul sale where we dole out souls to every vamp that comes a-knockin'. This is special."

"No, it's special because it's you," Spike sneered harshly. "Face it Buffy, you have some convoluted sense of moral superiority that you wield over the rest of us. You think that being the Slayer gives you a license to do whatever the hell you want. You make up your own idea of what's right and wrong, even when it contradicts itself." He neared her, rasping out sharp words with a scowl. "You're just a bloody hypocrite."

Her teeth on edge, Buffy glowered back at him. "I may be a hypocrite, but I'm the Slayer. And as the slayer, I'm saying that this isn't even about Angel."

"It isn't? So you're telling me that you haven't even thought once of what it'd be like to get your beloved poofter back after all the shit goes down? You aren't thinking of how bloody marvelous it would be to have him back to his studly, brooding self, worshipping the ground you walk on? That thought hasn't even popped in your head?"

Taken aback, Buffy twitched with discomfort. Spike had struck a chord. Which wasn't so surprising. Damn him for being so damn intuitive. "No . . ." she said in an unconvincingly meek voice.

Satisfied, Spike laid back on Buffy's bed. "Right. And here I was doubting you."

Buffy shook her head resolutely. "Still, Spike, it's different. Angel is the main player in this whole impending Armageddon thing. This isn't all about what I want. You just want to turn Dru back out of your own selfishness."

Incensed, his eyes went wide and his voice pitched up in anger. "My own selfishness? My own selfishness?! I'm not the one who caused this out of her own selfishness! I'm not one who unleashed a killer out on the world just because she gave her boyfriend a happy! I just want things back to the way they were! I want my life back!"

Buffy flinched at his attack of her, but didn't relent. She maintained her even, adamant gaze. "But what about Dru? You want her to be back to the way she was, but guess what? She never will be. She's a vampire, nothing will change that. You want to impose a soul on her. You don't care how much that'll torment her for all of eternity----"

"She hasn't done anything wrong! She's just been a pawn of Angel's, she's never---"

"She's killed already. She's tasted blood. She can never come back from that. And if you give her a soul, she'll remember it forever." She shook her head solemnly. "That's not fair to her. The guilt over what she did . . . and how she is . . . it'll kill her, everyday . . . believe me, I know. You don't have a relationship with a person like that. It's too hard and . . . and heartbreaking. It hurts you almost as much as it hurts them." She paused, suddenly realizing that she wasn't speaking to Spike anymore. She was taking the words from her heart, trying to convince herself of the truth.

Spike was still filled with quiet anger. "We're both suckers for the pain," he mumbled softly, staring down at his hands. He glanced up at her pointedly. "Especially you."

She swallowed hard. "I don't want to be. I----You have to know that this isn't about how I feel for Angel. And it shouldn't be about how you feel for Drusilla. They're . . . the people we fell in love with are gone." The words fell like a heavy thud in the air and hung at the bottom, daring either one to speak. Spike stared at her and opened his mouth to say something, but instead fell to playing with the contents of Buffy's cluttered bedside table. Flipping through strewn and scattered papers, he suddenly picked up a wavy piece of red wood.

"Mr. Pointy," he murmured, smiling a little as he turned it around in his hands. He looked up at her. "You kept it."

Buffy gave him a small grin and nodded. "I told you I liked it."

He sniffed. "I thought you would have used it for scrap wood."

She came to the bed where he was still reclining and took it from him. Sitting next to him, she held it with a bewildered little smile. "Why did you think that?"

He played with one of her throw pillows darkly, not facing her. "Well I dunno, we seem to have this thing between us, don't we? This 'hating each other thing'."

Buffy frowned, shifting her weight uncomfortably. "I don't hate you. I never did. Unless you hate me . . ." she trailed off nervously, looking down at her hands. Looking up, she found Spike squinting at her with a soft expression.

"I should, shouldn't I?"

Falling silent again, the two locked eyes in a lingering, serious look that contained something neither one wanted to recognize. The air was thick with something indistinguishable and it was making both of them nervous. But suddenly, the bedroom door slammed thunderously, breaking the moment of confusing unease. "What the hell is going on here?!" a voice raged.

Buffy turned around with lightening speed, widening her eyes in dismay. "Mom?"

************************************

"Quod perditum, inventieur . . . Not of the dead, nor of the living. Spirits of the interregnum, I call . . ."

Ms. Calendar sat with a bowl of herbs and a round, crystal orb in front of her. Her body convulsed as she whispered each word with her eyes closed.

Xander glanced worriedly at Oz, who gripped Willow's hand at her bedside. "Is this supposed to happen?" he yelled through a sudden windy roar that ripped through the room.

"Te implor, Doamne, nu ignora aceasta rugaminte . . ." Her breath was coming out in sharp, rough pants and her eyelids fluttered maniacally. Her body was slumping in her chair as she appeared to get weaker and weaker with every word uttered.

"Ms. Calendar?" Oz called out in vain, getting up to shake her.

Her head suddenly whipped back and her eyes snapped open, pools of terrifying ebony. Her voice suddenly came out as the howling cry of a banshee. "Nici mort, nici al fiintei . . ."

"Ms. Calendar!"

The words were tumbling out of her gaping mouth in a frenzied maelstrom. "Lasa orbita sa fie vasul care-I va transporta, sufletul la el!"

"Stop it!" Xander shouted as a small circle of furious wind surrounded Ms. Calendar, shaking everything in the room in a mad rumble. Willow suddenly began crying in her unconscious state as the bed quaked beneath her. Oz covered her body with his own to keep her from falling off the bed. But Ms. Calendar continued on relentlessly, as if possessed.

"Asa sa fie! Asa sa fie! Acum! Acum! Acum!" The tornado swirling around Ms. Calendar suddenly spiraled together with a loud whooshing noise and streamed into the small orb on the table, causing it to glow. Her body still shook, but her head snapped back down as she shrieked her first understandable word. "NOW!"

Everything stopped. The wind died down like nothing had happened. Exhausted, Ms. Calendar sank into her chair as Xander and Oz looked around cautiously. Seeing that it was all over, Xander neared Ms. Calendar and shook her gently.

"Is it done?"

Her eyes opened again and her breathing slowed to normal. "Soon."

*******************************

"I said what the hell is going on here?!!"

"Mom it isn't what it looks like-------"

"It had better not be what it looks like!! Because I'll tell you what it looks like! It looks like you were about to have sex with Spike! In my own house!"

Spike sprang up from the bed in horrified protest, but Buffy clenched her teeth. "Mom, we were just sitting on the bed-----"

"You had a boy! Alone! In your room! And not only that, you've been gone for more than twenty-four hours! God Buffy, what the hell am I going to do with you?!!" Mrs. Summers paced the floor, gripping her forehead in fury. "Did you know that I almost called the police, Buffy? I've been worried to death about you! You don't call, you're out all hours of the night, and you bring boys up to your room! You're out of control, Buffy!! How am I supposed to control you?! Tell me, Buffy how?!" She gave her daughter a hard, infuriated look with her arms crossed.

"Mom, I didn't-----"

She threw her hands up in the air. "Don't even try Buffy," she yelled. "Don't try and give me another excuse. Because I've been struggling. I've been struggling to understand how I can try so hard to relocate my life in another town because you get expelled from school . . . for setting your school gym on fire!"

Spike stared at Buffy as he began to shake with laughter. "You----and----fire------school," he panted through gagging laughs, but soon quieted down when both Summers women glowered at him.

Buffy turned back to her mother. "You don't understand."

"Damn right I don't understand! I don't understand how my daughter neglects to see how hard I work to give her a good life and instead runs wild with boys and------"

"Mom, I'm not like that!"

Mrs. Summers sighed, trying to regain her composure. "Buffy, I understand that you're young and reckless and think you can get away with everything-----"

"I'm not young! That's the point! I've never gotten to be young!" Buffy sprang up from the bed and faced her mother with the same fire she employed before staking a vamp. "I've been through things you've never imagined. I've had to put up with so much---"

"Buffy, I've read the parenting books. I know you think you've got this big teen angst cloud hanging over your head, but it's no excuse to---"

"You don't know anything! Don't you get it Mom? Haven't you ever even suspected?" Buffy was wavering, imploring her mother to see the truth so that she would not have to say it. "Didn't you ever wonder why I have so many crosses in my room? And why I always slip away at night? Or why, every week, you have to wash bloodstains out of my clothes? Or do you just refuse to see what's been staring you in the face all this time?"

"I'm not here to learn about what kind of crazy things you do at night, I just-----"

"Well I'm telling you, Mom. You don't want to learn it, but here it is. I'm a slayer. Not 'a' but 'the'. The Chosen One. In all the world, I was called to kill vampires-----"

Mrs. Summers shook her head with disgusted disbelief. "Oh God, Buffy, please! If you think this acts as a valid excuse for your behavior, you are sorely mistaken."

"It's not an excuse! It's the truth! I hunt vampires and save the world on a daily basis! I don't have time to go running around with boys and set fire to gyms just because I've got a raging adolescent itch! And I'm sorry that it doesn't say anything about the Slayer in all your parenting books, but it's for real, Mom. This is what I am."

Mrs. Summers stared at her defiant daughter with a set jaw before finally shaking her head again. "No. No, I don't believe it."

Buffy threw her hands up in the air. "I don't care if you don't believe it! If you don't, there's nothing I can do for you! And you know why? Because I have to save the world . . . again." Picking up a hefty axe, Buffy ignored her mother's aghast shock and moved towards the door, but Mrs. Summers soon blocked her.

"Where do you think you're going?" she stated in a cautionary, hard tone.

Buffy stared at her. "I told you. I have to save the world from the apocalypse."

Mrs. Summers laughed bitterly in Buffy's face. "Don't be delusional. Apocalypse, monsters, demons, vampires, they don't exist. It's just me and you, Buffy. You can't run away from this."

"I'm not running away! For once, I'm finally not running away!" She tried to walk past her mother, but Mrs. Summers grabbed her solidly.

"You're not going anywhere."

Buffy shrugged her mother off with more force than she intended, sending her sailing into her closet door. Picking up a sword and a bag of weapons, she cocked her head at Spike, who began to follow her out of the room. But Mrs. Summers stood up with a severe look of anger and said in a shaking voice, "You walk out the door, don't ever expect to come back."

Buffy stared at her mother, her eyes welling with tears. But she put one foot gingerly in front of the other and walked out of the bedroom. Mrs. Summers heaved a heavy sigh and slumped back down to the floor, beginning to cry.

"You okay?" Spike asked gently as they descended down the staircase.

Buffy shifted the bag on her shoulder stoically. "Yeah," she lied. "I'm fine." Going to open the front door, she was suddenly advanced upon by Xander, who burst in.

"Buffy!" he gasped, slumping over on his knees.

"Xander?" She furrowed her brows at him. "What's going on, what's happened?" Paling, she gripped his arm seriously. "Is it the spell? D-did it work?"

There was something blatantly hopeful and expectant in her eyes that Xander couldn't stand. He wished he could be a bigger person and see past it and be the bigger person. He wished he could forget about an ego that had been bruised a year ago, but at the same time, he honestly believed that this could be the right thing to do. He was helping the world, not harming it. Buffy was better off, Spike was better off, they were all better off. So he said firmly. "No. It didn't work. I just came to tell you . . . to kick his ass."

Buffy's eyes widened, but she willed herself not to crumble. Instead, she turned around and motioned to Spike. "That's the cue," she said simply. "Let's go."