Part 39:
Giles knew at the moment he, Spike and Buffy exited the tunnels of the Initiative that the watcher training program needed to be revised. Giles was already breathing deeply by then, while Spike and Buffy were keeping up a steady pace, showing no signs of exhaustion. By the time the threesome reached Sunnydale High School Library the Watcher felt like he was dying. Still, he pressed on, slumping into a chair as soon as he reached one.
"What's wrong?" Willow asked, noting Giles tired state, and the slayer's slightly deep breaths.
"The Initiative alarm sounded. The soldiers are after us," The Slayer explained.
"What do we do, Buff?" Xander asked.
"Run," Cordelia suggested sarcastically.
"Exactly," The slayer answered, earning confused looks from Xander, Giles, Spike, and an excited look from Cordelia.
"What do you mean love?" Spike asked, narrowing his eyes as he looked at the Slayer in confusion.
"Right now our biggest priority is to stop the mayor's plans. I don't think we can afford being interrupted by guys armed with tazer guns," Buffy explained.
"Where can we go?" Willow asked.
"The mansion. It should be safe," Spike suggested.
"No good. They've seen us there. They have pictures of us there," The Slayer reminded Spike.
"Damn," Spike cursed softly.
"I have an idea," Buffy said. "Everyone grab the books that we need and follow me."
"Where are we going?" Tara asked.
"To a friend," The Slayer replied.
"Buffy," Angel said. The vampire had opened his door a crack when he heard an impatient knock and was startled to see the Slayer and Scoobies in the hallway. "What are you doing here?"
"I know that I have no right to ask this of you, but I need your help," Buffy said.
"What's wrong?"
"I'll explain inside," The Slayer replied, walking through the door that Angel had fully opened in silent invitation for the Scoobies to enter.
It was quite a site. Nine people trying to fit into a small apartment that barely had enough room for one. Willow sat next to Tara and Oz. Books spread in front of the three of them. Cordelia and Xander sat a few feet away from Willow. If the Scoobies hadn't been so busy they probably would have noticed that they were sitting very close to one another, and Xander's hand rested on the cheerleaders knee. Buffy, Spike and Angel all stood in the corner by the door, quietly discussing the situation. Giles stood in another corner, overseeing everything, as well as scanning through a book of magical rituals. There was only a small space left in the apartment, and the slayer figured that if Initiative soldiers did find them it wouldn't matter, there probably wasn't enough room to open the door.
"What exactly are we looking for?" Willow asked the slayer. "I mean, I've been looking through the folder that you and Spike took from the mayor, and it explains a lot, but I can't figure out how to stop the ritual."
"I don't even understand why it matters," Xander said, "The mayor doesn't have the folder, don't you think that not having the spell will make it a little bit hard to complete the ritual?"
"We're assuming that the mayor was smart enough to make copies of the information in the folder," Giles explained to the young brunette.
"Not assuming, we basically know for sure. The Initiative has access to the latest computer technology. The folders must be in ten different databases. Even if Spike and I had attempted to delete all the copies it would have been impossible to completely wipe the records," Buffy said.
"Still, I've been looking through books and maps and I don't even know what to say. Are we trying to stop the ritual…to kill Mayor Wilkins and Professor Walsh?" The redhead asked.
"Not kill them!" Buffy said quickly. "I think we just…" The slayer tailed off.
"I think what we need to do is to stop the mayor and Professor Walsh. From there, who knows? We can't kill them, and we don't exactly have enough evidence to get them behind bars," Spike said, making his way over to where Willow was and sitting on the floor across from her, taking a book out of the witch's hands. The vampire flipped a few pages in the spell book Willow had been looking at. "Here. This spell should help. It's hard, but you and Glinda should be able to manage," The vampire said, nodding his head towards Tara.
Willow took the book back from Spike.
"What's the spell do?" She asked, slightly embarrassed about her lack of knowledge.
"It stops the fabrics of time from bending in circles," Spike explained. At Willow's confused look he paused for a moment before taking an unnecessary breath and continuing. "See Red, every object is connected to every other object, as well as to the core of the earth. As time progresses all objects send information about what they're doing to the center of the earth. Kind of like a machine in a hospital takes recording of the movements of someone's heart. The shape generally associated with the messages sent is a circle. This spell is designed to send a message to the center of the earth. The message would ask that a specific object, one that you specify, stop sending messages to other objects. That would give you a window of time in which you could pull a certain object from its location and move it to another one instantly."
"I don't understand the last part of what you said, about pulling an object from its rightful location in the universe," Willow said.
"It's like this," Spike said, standing and picking up a random book from in front of Willow. Objects generally travel like this." The vampire walked across the room and handed the book in his hand to Buffy, giving her a peck on the cheek when he reached her. "The spell would allow an object to travel like this." Spike moved back over to Willow and then threw the book he was holding to the Slayer. Giles opened his mouth to protest, however, Buffy caught the book. "There's no travel time. The book would be taken out of one location and automatically appear in another. No physical movement."
"It would be like…" Xander trailed off.
"Magic," Oz supplied.
"When they ask me
what I liked best, I'll say it was you."
from City of Angels