Giles heard the library doors swing open and wandered out of his office to investigate. If he was a betting man, he would have banked on it being one of their core group, seeing as an actual real student wanting a book would have constituted the latest apocalypse. He was mildly surprised to see Buffy and Xander. "Oh, Buffy," he said in greeting. "I thought you were going out tonight. I didn't expect…" Something about the sombre expression on both of their faces worried him. "What is it…?"

Buffy opened her mouth, ready to tell him that his favourite student in the world, the person who looked up to him the most – more than even Buffy did – was gone. She tried to say the words, but the words wouldn't come. She tried again, opening her mouth, and "Giles…" was she managed, but just as she found her voice, the loud crash coming from her right startled her and made her turn to where the noise was coming from.

Xander stood there, fury on his face that rivalled no one she had ever seen, not even Faith in the height of her slaying. The chair that had been close by was now thrown across the library, the distance between them seeming unreal because the last thing she remembered he had been right next to her and now he was on the other side of the room. His breathing was hard, coming so thickly from his chest that she could hear it catching loudly in his lungs. "Xander…" she said, taking a few steps forward to…she didn't know what.

"Don't!" he yelled at her. "Don't tell me to calm down!"

Giles, watching the boy who was usually the one to keep his head in a tense situation with a joke or an ill-thought out pun, felt his heart constrict in his chest. The title 'Watcher' seemed quite apt for him. Yes, it was his job to watch over the slayer, to train her and prepare her – or, at least it had been. But the word had taken many different meanings over the years he had spent in Sunnydale.

This job, whether it was still recognised by the Council or not, may not have been the first on his list of prospective employment …or even the last one, come to think of it. But he had to admit, being in the company of these three teenagers – the slayer and her friends – gave him a sense of something he had not felt in a long time. He felt like they were family, even though they'd all probably balk at the thought of that. He had found himself caring for the youngsters, something deeply frowned upon by the Council, hence the termination of his employment. He was apart from them, but also one of them. Maybe that was why he saw things that other people didn't.

Maybe that's how he knew that there was, more or less, only one thing in the world that meant more to Xander than everything else. That thing was his best friend. He had seen it in him a good few months ago, how he was different around Willow, different to how he used to be. And there was only one reason he would be reacting like this. He looked at Buffy, a desperation that he had not felt since Jenny's death creeping into him. "No…" he said quietly.

"Giles," Buffy said, for the moment side-stepping Xander and his grief to move to her now-defunct Watcher and his. "Something's happened," she told him in a voice that he didn't recognise as hers. "We were…"

"Willow's dead," Xander spat out loudly. "Can you fix it or not, Book Guy?"

Giles looked from the angry young man to the tear-stained girl in front of him who was supposed to be the strongest girl in the world, and then back at the boy again. "That can't be…" he said quietly, thoughtfully. "How can that have happened?"

Buffy took a deep breath and swallowed back the tears that were threatening her again. "Vampire," she told him, hardly able to say the word without her face crumpling again. "They turned her, Giles. We don't know…" she began. "We don't know when, but she was okay at school earlier today."

"I know," he said, unable to believe it. "I saw her here myself." he looked back at Buffy. "Are you sure…?" he asked her.

Buffy shook her head, trying to suppress the urge she felt to scream at him for the stupidity of that question. "Pretty sure," she told him. "I mean, it was her, Giles, unless she has some evil doppelganger."

"You still haven't answered the question," Xander said, interrupting them, his face still a mask of complete anguish as he charged toward them. "Can you fix it or not?"

"Fix it?" Giles asked. "How could I possibly fix this?" He looked at Buffy, searching her face and seeing only a hope there that he hated seeing, knowing it had to be distinguished. "You expect us to remedy this situation?" Giles asked her.

"If you mean try and solve it, yes," she told him.

"I don't want to go through this again," he said firmly. "But we had a conversation not dissimilar to this when we discovered Angel's true identity."

"What are you saying, Giles?" she asked.

"You know what I'm saying," he told her gravely. "You already know what you have to do otherwise you wouldn't be asking me for another option."

Xander glared at Buffy. "I told you," he said viciously. "I told you that coming here was a waste of time."

"Where else would we have gone?" Buffy bit back. "You want to go to Willow's house?" she asked him harshly. "You want to tell to explain to her parents why she's not with us?"

Xander's face changed so rapidly it was like watching one of the despised vampiric creatures change back into its human form. "Oh, god…" he said, his voice full of emotion. "Her parents…" he looked at Buffy. "What am I gonna tell them?"

"Xander," she told him, letting the anger dissipate. "We can't think about that now."

He shook his head, his hands over his face as he walked over to the staircase that led to the stacks and sat down, his head hung low. "You don't get it," he told them. "After what happened before with the coma and everything, Mr. R. made me promise that I'd take care of her."

"This isn't your fault, Xander," Giles told him, walking over to him and sitting beside him, a hand on his shoulder, as Buffy joined them, dazed, as she sat down a few steps below them.

"I told him I wouldn't let anything happen to her," Xander said quietly as he pulled his knees up to his chest and hugged them to him, taking the cross from his pocket and clutching it tightly in his hand again. He shook his head sadly. "This isn't real," he said gently.

"I can't feel anything," Buffy said, in a daze. "Arms, legs, anything…"

"She was truly…the finest of all us," Giles said, full of honesty, as he stared into space.

"Way better than me," Xander said.

"Yes," Giles said, unthinking. "Much…much better."

"It's all my fault," Xander told them.

Giles looked at him. "What makes you say that?"

Xander shrugged. "I don't know, statistical probability."

"No, it's me," Buffy told them, her voice full of guilt. "It's me. I'm the one who called her 'reliable'. She must have gone out and gotten herself bit, which she never would have done if I hadn't called her 'reliable'. And now my best friend's--"

"What's going on?" Willow said brightly, dressed in one of her trademark colourful sweaters, as she breezed into the library and approached her friends. She watched as Xander flinched back tensely, while Giles and Buffy simply stared at her. "Jeez, who died?" she asked her sombre-looking friends. Her eyes became wide when they didn't respond and she suddenly looked panicked. "Oh, god, who died?" she asked.

Xander jumped to his feet, thrusting the crucifix in his hands into her face. "Back! Get back, demon!"

Willow felt her eyebrows rise at him, as she tried to figure out what he was doing. She watched as he pulled back, shook the cross as if it were a pen that no longer worked, before thrusting it back in her face.

"Willow," Buffy said, getting to her feet and approaching her, tears in her eyes and wonder in her voice. "You're alive!"

Willow looked at her. "Aren't I usually?"

The only response she got was Buffy throwing her arms around her in a tight hug, forcing the breath out of her, and even more so when Xander joined in.

"I love you guys, too," she said, unsurely. "Okay," she said after a moment. "Oxygen becoming an issue!"

Buffy and Xander both released her from their grip, standing back.

Willow began to feel uncomfortable as Buffy gazed at her, a smile on her face and her eyes glinting with unshed tears, and felt her gripping her arm. She looked at the more sensible of the group. "Giles, what's going on with these--?"

She was abruptly cut off by the watcher embracing her in a tight hug. She looked afraid as he released her, looking ever more embarrassed by the display of affection and relief. "It's nice you guys missed me," she told them. "Say, you all didn't happen to do a bunch of drugs, did you?"

"Will, we saw you," Xander told her. "At the Bronze. A vampire."

"I'm not a vampire!" Willow said defiantly.

"You are," Buffy said. "At least, you were…" she looked at Willow, obviously confused. "Giles, planning on jumping in with an explanation anytime soon?"

"Well," he began, unsure. "Something…something very strange is going on…"

Xander looked at him with a bemused smile. "Can you believe the Watchers Council let this guy go?"

"Giles," Buffy said firmly, easily switching back into slayer-mode. "We need to figure out what's going on here."

"Agreed," he replied. "But I don't see how. I can't think what on earth could have happened."

Buffy watched as Xander refused to let his eyes leave the very-much alive Willow at his side. "Maybe we should check the stacks," she suggested, taking Giles' arm and pulling him up the stairs. "See if there's anything in your infamous books about freaky, evil, leather-wearing vampires who look exactly like your best friend."

"The only thing I can think of is maybe a doppelganger of some sort, an evil version of Willow out there somewhere," Giles said thoughtfully.

"That's what I said!" Buffy said, rolling her eyes and hitting him in the arm. "Come on," she told him. "Stacks."

"Buffy, I'm not sure…" Giles looked back at Willow and Xander, and then turned his attention back to the slayer's wide eyes and cocked head that was gesturing emphatically towards the bookshelves. "Oh. Right," he said finally. "Yes. Books."

Willow watched Giles and Buffy leave them, heading for the supernatural section of the stacks, still feeling confused at what had just happened. "I still don't get…" She trailed off as she turned to Xander, his eyes shining with tears, his face full of sadness and an extreme pain. It was something she wasn't use to seeing in Xander, not since they were kids. It scared her, sending chills darting up her spine at his forlorn expression. "Xander?" she asked gently. "Xander, are you okay?"

He blinked hard. "I thought you were dead," he said quietly, almost whispering, afraid that if he said the words louder they would be true.

She reached out and took his hand, feeling the clamminess and the trembling. "It's okay," she whispered, tears springing to her own eyes at seeing his concern. "I'm okay." She had been about to let go of his hand when she suddenly felt his arms around her, crushing her to him.

"God, Willow," he said into her hair, his voice breaking with emotion. "We thought you were gone…"

"I'm right here," she whispered, feeling him squeeze her tighter than anyone ever had before. "But if you don't let go soon I might not be."

Xander laughed as he pulled away from her. "Sorry," he told her, trying to disguise the tears in his eyes, using the sleeve of his sweater to dry his face, the relief palpable on his face.

"So, there's an evil me out there somewhere, huh?" she asked him, moving across the library to hop onto the table.

"Looks like," he said, moving to sit next to her.

"How could that even happen?" she asked, confused again.

He absently took her hand again without thinking, just wanting to feel her warm hand in his, wanting any kind of contact with her to remind him that she was really there and ignoring the 'no-touching' rule she had imposed on them not long ago. "I don't know," he said with a shrug. "At this point, my brain is pretty much working on the 'I thought Willow was dead and now she's alive. Yay!' principle," he admitted, and felt her squeeze his hand a little in reward. "I don't think I could handle anything other than that right now."

Willow smiled, overwhelmed at his admission. "You were really upset?" she asked.

"I've never been to hell like Buffy," he said, "but if I did, I imagine it would pretty much be like how I felt earlier. The word 'upset' doesn't even begin to cover it."

"Really?" she asked. "Cos lately…I don't think I've been a very good friend. I mean, I know we still see each other and stuff, but…it's not the same."

"I know," he said. "But I think we should make this the thing that makes us change the way we've been acting."

"Agreed," she said, a wide smile forming on her face. "I want my best friend back."

He put his arm around her and she leaned into his shoulder. "Everything's gonna be better now," he told her. "You'll see."

"Promise?" she asked, wrapping her arms around him, hugging him.

"Yeah," he said. "I promise."

As she broke the embrace, somehow she knew where things were going. But she didn't resist when his hand came up to her face, and pushed back the hair that had fallen into her eyes. She closed her eyes as he leaned forward and placed a soft, chaste kiss on her forehead. It was innocent, or that's how he had meant it, but it felt like so much more. And when she opened her eyes and saw him smiling sadly at her, she couldn't find enough inner restraint to stop herself from kissing him. It was something brief, just pressing her lips against his for a second or two, and he looked surprised at her action when she pulled away. She had been ready to apologise, to say something about it being because she wanted to reassure him that it was okay, and to blush and move away from him. But she couldn't. And when he took her face in his hands, his eyes taking in every line, every freckle, every strand of red hair, she allowed him to kiss her. She let him put his lips on hers, and allowed him to use his tongue to coax her mouth open as one of her hands came to his face and the other gripped the wooden table so hard she was sure it would bear the nail marks for years to come.

"Guys!" Buffy called from the stacks, jolting them out of the moment, causing Willow to bolt halfway across the room and position herself in the corner, a guilty look on her face. "No luck," she told them, as she and Giles reappeared from the stacks. Sensing the tension, she looked from one to the other. "Everything okay?" she asked suspiciously.

"Fine!" Willow piped up, altogether too cheery and shrilly. "Great. Everything's great! I'm not dead and I'm not a vampire!"

"Good to know," Buffy said, her eyes narrowing suspiciously as she took a seat close to a pale and blank-looking Xander. She was sure there was something going on here. She just wasn't sure what.