Part III
Willow smiled again at the laptop screen. Even though she had spent the past two hours searching in vain for anything about the object in the box, she still felt somehow victorious. She was useful again. She was a Scooby. Even if it was a bit strange that the Slayer had suddenly decided to trust her with something this dangerous. Not gonna dwell on that. Moving forward
But there was still the box, or more importantly, its contents. It had taken her over ten minutes to get the nerve up to open it only to find that it didn't contain a boobytrap or a doomsday device that began counting down as soon as the top was lifted. Inside was an innocuous-looking, beautifully crafted metal object resting in black velvet. A series of small stars was etched into its otherwise seamless surface, but their arrangement seemed random. Not a constellation, or at least not one I recognize, which brought Willow's thoughts back to Tara and her universe of unique constellations. Well, if you close one eye it could be the Big Pineapple, she smiled wistfully and then shook her head as her eyes began to tear up. There was something compelling about those stars, something familiar and sad
Okay, not gonna go there right now.
Forward Rosenburg or diagonal maybe.
When she finished the minor tweaks to the search bot she fired off an email to Giles about their situation and was surprised to receive an autoresponder reporting that the Watcher was out of the office' until the end of the month. An autoresponder? From Giles? It was inconceivable from a man who took such pride in despising all things digital. It had taken Willow nearly two hours to show him how to simply open the email client. Another three to teach him to send and retrieve mail.
"Giles, you sneaky." What would make the Watcher go AWOL now when he knew she needed him? A rueful smile played across her lips. Because she needed him. And so did Buffy. The Slayer would undoubtedly try to contact the Watcher for a second opinion on the situation. An opinion other than Willow's. And the Watcher was forcing their hand. Forcing them to work together again. Or maybe he's got a hot date, she thought with a chuckle. I hope you have a hot date Giles, cause someone in the Scoobies definitely should be getting some
Her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the door slamming downstairs and then the unmistakable sound of the Slayer's angry footfalls on the stairs. Great, now what have I done?
Willow hit the key to launch her customized search bot and turned to face whatever fury the Slayer had in store for her, but Buffy stopped short at the door to Willow's room like a Vampire without an invitation. The blonde's forehead was deeply etched in angry lines. Willow took a deep breath waiting for the inevitable accusations and recriminations, but again, there was only silence.
"Buff? Are you okay?" The Slayer nodded once and gestured toward the wooden box.
"Find anything?"
Willow shook her head, her worry growing by the second. In her vast experience, a quiet Slayer was a dangerous Slayer. It was a warning sign: Hurricane Buffy ahead. "Um, no, not yet." She typed in a few more commands and turned back to the Slayer. "Did you find Dawn?"
"Uh huh." The Slayer nodded and then dropped back into her brooding, folding her arms tightly around herself.
Willow frowned at a new security feature in the Council's access codes and looked back to Buffy. She wanted to laugh and share the Council's pathetic attempts at security with her best friend, but knew she would draw at best a blank stare. So she opted for a loud, meaningful sigh instead. "Is this twenty questions? Cause if it is that's cool, but it would probably take less time"
"Dawn was at Rain's house-"
"Rain? As in forty percent chance of?" Willow couldn't mask her amusement.
"Yeah, I know — Willow tree" the Slayer almost smiled again, but immediately dropped into a terrifying frown.
"So I take it something happened?" the redhead prodded her friend gently. "Something besides your usual Summers sisters argument?"
The muscles in Buffy's jaw clenched immediately and Willow knew she was in dangerous territory. One misstep and the fury the Slayer was suppressing would be misdirected -- in her direction.
"Uh-huh."
And then she knew without any doubt the only thing that could put Buffy in such a state without actually hurting anyone. Well, except Spike.
"Faith." Willow whispered the word as if the Dark Slayer's name could somehow conjure her into the room. Felt the hissing of its soft sounds slip between them like a knife.
"Uh-huh."
"Did she hurt Dawn?" Willow asked and suddenly remembered the Dark Slayer's affectionate relationship with the younger Summers. Dawn was the only person in Buffy's world Faith hadn't attacked. Why would she try to hurt her now?
"No. No hurting. She'd never hurt Dawn.she just" Buffy let out an angry laugh and frowned. "She said she wants to help! Do you believe that?" And suddenly, they were too close to Willow's own situation. Her own desperation and need. To be believed. To be forgiven. How ironic that she and Faith finally had something in common. Buffy, thankfully, didn't seem to see the parallel.
"Do you?" Willow asked without thinking. "Believe that?"
Buffy turned on her, mouth open, face pinched in righteous anger and Willow prepared herself for the coming storm. But it didn't arrive. The Slayer stood above her in a threatening posture, finger pointing at the redhead accusingly, but there was only confusion in her face now.
"I don't know," she mumbled softly and her face tightened again, hands falling useless to her sides. "I mean, I want'cause even Angel's all with the forgivenessbut she's, like, the queen of the double cross and backstabbingand she took my Mom hostage and Angel with the poison" The Slayer threw her hands up in the air in angry frustration. "And I" Buffy's eyes found Willow's and looked deeply into them, as if she were searching for answers hidden there. The two women remained that way, Willow forcing herself to meet the pain and fear in her best friend's hazel gaze. "I just don't know if I can ever trust her again, you know?" the Slayer finally said softly.
Willow swallowed the sob that threatened to erupt into the room, but the tears, she couldn't hold those back. They streamed down her face as she nodded once almost imperceptibly to let the Slayer know that she understood. That they were no longer talking about Faith. Buffy's eyes were tearing up as well, her bottom lip quivering as she tried to keep her grief in check. At the sight of the Slayer's tears Willow felt suddenly detached, studying the strange mix of emotions as if from a distance. It was a trick Ruth had taught her. A way to buy time before acting out her grief and pain with magic.
She noted with sadness the part of herself that wanted to rise up in angry defense of her own actions -- Buffy had stabbed Faith for Angel, why couldn't she be forgiven for wanting to avenge Tara? -- but the larger part wanted to take her longtime friend in her arms and hold her, finally give Buffy the comfort she had been searching for. She wanted to forgive her friend for not being able to forgive her.
But she couldn't. Her arms were bound to her sides by fear and grief. She couldn't touch anyone. Not since Tara
"I'm sorry B-" Willow began, her voice hoarse with unshed tears, but she was interrupted abruptly by an insistent bing' from the laptop.
Both women looked up simultaneously to find the source of the intrusion.
"Um, search bot," Willow explained, wiping clumsily at the tears on her face. She turned with a mixture of regret and relief to the comfort of her laptop and away from the bright pain waiting between herself and Buffy. "It's probably nothing" she began expecting another long list of mis-hits, but there it was. It was obvious from the keywords that someone knew what they were talking about. She clicked on the promising link and began to scan the contents of the page rapidly.
"So, is it Tiffany? Can we take it on the Antiques Roadshow?" Buffy joked nervously and Willow noted in her peripheral vision that the Slayer was carefully drying her eyes.
"Um, it's demon," she answered absently as she was drawn into the star chart that matched the strange configuration on the object almost exactly. "So, not exactly Antiques Roadshow material. Well, maybe the English version" which elicited a grateful smile from Buffy. She returned her attention to the page and clicked on a few links. It wasn't much, but at least they had something. Her eyes returned to the object in the box and she felt the familiar feeling of sadness and longing wash over her again.
"Anything interesting?" Buffy prodded gently and Willow shook herself out of her reverie.
"Um, yeah. The stars etched into the surface. I thought they were just ornamental, but it looks like they're a constellation" she trailed off concentrating again on the text before her.
"Like the Big Dipper?"
Willow smiled slightly and looked up at the Slayer, "Not exactly. A constellation that's only visible in a demon dimension."
"Oh. So more like the Big Ripper?"
Willow nodded, but kept her attention fixed on the page before her. It was fascinating. If this page was accurate, she was reading a legend born in a different dimension. A demon fairy tale. But for all the differences it sounded strangely familiar. She felt Buffy move behind her in the room and deduced quickly that the Slayer was checking out the demon device. It struck her suddenly that she had only been alone in this room since her return. No other living human body had shared this space with Willow since that day four months ago
"Oh Orpheus!" Willow was shocked by her own outburst, but the realization had struck her like a thunderbolt and demanded release. "It's the Orpheus myth."
"Who?"
Willow turned to find the Slayer with her hand still in mid-air hovering over the device. "Orpheus. And no, I haven't gotten up the nerve to actually touch it yet," she answered Buffy's unspoken question. The Slayer nodded once and removed the metallic object carefully from the box.
"So who is this Orifice guy?" she asked casually.
"Um, Orpheus." Willow stifled a laugh at the Slayer's typical malapropism. It was comforting to know that some things never changed. "It's Greek mythology." When her explanation was met by a blank stare, Willow continued, "Okay, Orpheus was this superstar lyre player in ancient Greece who fell in love. Only, um, she diedhis love I mean." The redhead stumbled and took a deep breath, "But he couldn't live without her, so he went to Hades, played his lyre for the big demon god in charge and Big Demon was so impressed he said that Orpheus could take her back" Willow's voice trailed off again. The details of the legend eluded her for a moment, becoming mixed with the distorted details of the demon legend and her own experience.
"But there was a catch?" the Slayer's comment brought Willow back to the room and her explanation.
"Um, yeah."
"There's always a catch," Buffy smiled proud of her correct assessment.
"The deal was that Orpheus could have his love back, that she could follow him back to the surface, but he had to keep playing and not stop."
"That's all," Buffy asked obviously disappointed.
"Well, he also couldn't look back to make sure she was behind him," the redhead answered, careful to keep any emotion out of her voice.
"I take it he looked."
"Yep," Willow nodded once and Buffy rolled her eyes in disgust.
"Just before he got to the surface." A strange silence had descended on the room and Willow found herself automatically filling the empty space. Just like Old Willow would, she thought as the words tumbled out of her. "The last thing he saw of her, was her soul being pulled back into hell." She shivered at the image that had haunted her since childhood. For some reason her mother had decided that the myth of Orpheus was suitable bedtime reading for a nine year-old. "Gotta love those Greeks and their flair for gut-wrenching tragedy"
"Oh my God. That's" the Slayer began and then trailed off shaking her head.
"So sad, I know," Willow finished for her.
"No, it's so stupid!" Somehow Willow had stumbled unwittingly onto the trigger for the Slayer's pent-up fury. She was expecting the Slayer to draw a parallel between the myth and her own experience sending Angel to hell, but Buffy never did the expected. She was now pacing angrily, clenching the demon device tightly in her palm as she muttered about Xander leaving Anya at the altar and then something indecipherable about Riley.
"Um, Buffy" Willow began, motioning carefully toward the Slayer's clenched fist. Oh god, we have no idea how this device actually works. Anything could set it off.
"I mean, what is wrong with these people? Can't they just"
"It's just a myth," Willow interrupted gently hoping to defuse the situation automatically closing her eyes to begin one of Ruth's meditation techniques gently extending the circle of calm to include her friend. "And the device"
"Yeah, I know it's just" Buffy paused and removed the demon device from her iron grip. "Well, at least we know it doesn't crush easily," she offered with a smile releasing her anger with a shrug.
Willow blinked slowly and allowed herself one more cleansing breath before focusing once more on the metallic object that Buffy now held between her thumb and forefinger. "That could be a good thingor a bad thing if we actually want to destroy this demon-end-of-the-world machine."
The Slayer studied the object carefully as she mumbled absently to her friend, "Are you sure it's a machine? Cause I'm not seeing any screws or seams or anything"
Willow turned her attention back to the keyboard, quickly modifying a program to break the Council's weak security precaution. "No. I don't know what it is. So far the only clue we have is this demon myth and whatever Cordy told you." Buffy again rolled her eyes at the mention of the Seer.
"It doesn't sound like much of a demon myth to me. I mean, what kind of demon plays a liar and gets all mushy over love and"
"I said it sounded like Orpheus. The demon version was some kind of warrior-cannibal whose love slave gets killed so he goes and defeats all of the underworld god's gladiators to get her back and" Willow trailed off as the look on Buffy's face turned to one of focused concentration. "Did you find something?"
"Yeah," the Slayer mumbled absently and then scraped at something with her fingernail. Willow cringed visibly trying to hide her growing panic and disapproval. Delicate was never a word used to describe the Slayer and delicacy was definitely an asset when dealing with an apocalyptic demon device.
"There's something written here" Buffy squinted and held the device closer to her face.
"Wait! I'll get a magnifying glass," she crossed the room quickly to search through her nightstand. The soft sounds of the Slayer's muttering were barely audible over the noise of her desperate search for a glass. "Um, and you might not want to hold it that close to your"
"Oh! What does Tempus Fugit?"
"No!" Willow practically leapt across the room to cover her best friend's mouth with her hand, but it was too late. The spell was cast. "Oh God Buffy" As the energy coalesced around them she felt herself involuntarily reaching down into her own power to protect them or worse, to strike out against the magical charge. As the power poured out of her she felt it circling with the energy of the device in a terrifying feedback loop. Okay, this definitely has the potential to become an apocalyptic event, she had to give Cordy that much.
"Wha-" The Slayer's words were lost in the energy cyclone of the spell as it spun around then, distorting timespace and drawing them into a smaller and smaller space. Willow was rapidly losing her internal battle for control and the Slayer's panicked gaze locked with her own only made the pull stronger. Everything in her was screaming that she needed to protect them, to save Buffy. That no one else she loved could be lost. And the dark magic moved in deepening waves through her system like nausea. Like pain and grief. The riptide of magic and power pulling her farther and farther from the shore of herself until
With sudden clarity her eyes found a small photo of Tara visible on the shelf behind Buffy's head. It was the only photo of the blonde she allowed herself. Willow had taken it at that first birthday of Tara's at the Bronze. The first birthday they had shared. Her blonde hair was tousled from a stolen moment with Willow in the bathroom. Her lips were red and swollen from kissing, but it was the smile in her eyes that mattered. That lopsided smile that was only for Willow. A smile of promise and love.
Tara.
The world spun around her, but the pull receded until there was just the two of them. Tara soothing her with gentle fingers of calm weaving through red hair, through the everything of them.
Tara
And then the light and the heatand nothing.
****
"Willow!"
The room was too bright, migraine-bright. She raised a heavy hand to shield her eyes from the glare.
"Wha?"
"Willow what did you do?" Blinking her eyes against terrible white, Willow tried to focus on the source of the sound. Buffy. A very angry Buffy. What did I do?
"Buffy?" she croaked and opened her eyes slightly, still struggling to orient herself. Everything seemed slightlyoff. She couldn't seem to find her balance in the blinding room. Thankfully she was sitting on something soft. The bed? But the room shouldn't be bright, it was dark outside.
And then she remembered. The device, the demon myth and Buffy speaking something in Latin. And then the Dark Magic.
Tempus Fugit.
Don't say it. Don't say it out loud.
Time flies
"What did you do Willow?" The Slayer's voice was rising in pitch moving rapidly toward angry hysteria.
"WhatI didn't do anything." Willow mumbled and opened her eyes a little further.
"I saw your eyes! They went all black and thenand then we were here!"
Oh god, where are we? Some demon dimension?
Willow opened her eyes through a stabbing headache of white to find that they were in their dorm room on campus. She looked around in disbelief at the twin beds, their stuffed animals and the Chocolate Okay, this is strange. Our dorm room? Doesn't seem too demon-y yet
Her mind began to cycle rapidly through the possibilities: demon device so I'm thinking either alternate reality where Buffy and I still live in the dorms orthis is some kind of joint hallucination
"Undo it!"
"What?" Willow looked up to find the Slayer staring down at her with hands on hips. Everything about her posture was threatening.
"You did this Willow," the Slayer gestured at the familiar objects in the room, her voice rapidly dropping into a growl, "so make with the undoing. Now."
Willow took a long breath and tried to center herself.
"I didn't do it Buffy" she began calmly only to be interrupted by a desperate Slayer.
"I saw your eyes"
And that was it. She had tried for so long to win her best friend's trust. To earn it through her actions, not with explanations and promises, but this was too much.
"You did it Buffy! You! Not me!" Willow yelled and then put her hand over her eyes again to shield them from the light and her own blinding rage. Buffy still stood above her and Willow sighed deeply, "It was the device. The demon device. Remember?" Buffy's expression was still angry, but her head tilted slightly to the left.
"How"
"The engraving on the back," Willow got up and walked past her friend to the mini-frig. She pulled out a water, pressed its cool surface to her forehead and turned back to Buffy. "When you said the words out loud it must have activated it."
"Temp-"
"Don't!" Willow's eyes flew open and she noticed that the muscles in Buffy's jaw were knotted with pent-up fury. Well, at least if she beats me to death I won't have to deal with this migraine. Careful to keep her voice calm and low she approached the Slayer, "I wouldn't say it again. We don't know what it'll do."
"So if that's true then what was with all the black?" Buffy challenged suspiciously, but Willow noted with relief that the Slayer's shoulders were relaxed slightly. The threat had passed. Almost.
"I tried to stop it," she replied in a matter-of-fact tone. "The spell," she added as an afterthought and then began to study her surroundings. She couldn't remember exactly what was in their dorm room, but this definitely felt right. The anonymous stuffed animals on her bed, Mr. Gordo on Buffy's. And Buffy's outfit was sofreshman year. The incessant whine of a Britney Spears song was audible from next door. She looked down to find that she was dressed in a long blue skirt she'd thrown out a year ago and a favorite t-shirt that she hadn't been able to throw it out even though it was so worn as to be unwearable. Because I wore this shirt the first time Tara and I kissed
She looked down again at the bright colors of her t-shirt.
And it looks brand new.
"Oh God," Willow looked around the room wildly, searching for something to confirm her suspicions.
"What is it?" Buffy's voice was tight with concern. "Wil what's going on? Where are we? I mean, okay, I know we're in our dorm" All of the anger was gone from her friend's body and voice replaced now by fear.
"I don't" Willow began and then scanned her friend's clothing before letting her eyes rest on the calendar above The Slayer's bed. She couldn't see the date, but she didn't have to, looking instead to the black bulky watch on her wrist. "I'm thinking maybe it's when we are that matters."