After Giles gave me his background information speech, it became time to talk about Buffy's current situation, and what happened.
"So what happened before Buffy ran away?" I asked.
Giles cleared his throat.
"To tell this story, I need to start with Angel," he said.
"Angel?"
"Buffy's ex boyfriend."
Giles paused, then took a deep breath. Xander started to fidget.
"When a vampire changes a victim into a vampire, it first kills the person. This is a very important concept. The person dies just as certainly as if she got a bullet to the head. The victim's soul departs. The vampire drains the victim of most of her blood, then has the dying victim drink its own blood, essentially replacing the victim's blood with its own. Vampire blood is toxic in large doses, hallucinogenic in small doses.
"The vampire is in essence a blood demon. The demon resides in the blood, the blood is essentially a living thing that mystically recycles through the veins of the corpse it inhabits. There are other aspects of vampire biology that I won't get into now, but the important thing is that a vampire is not the person it was. It is a demon wearing the corpse of the person its sire murdered.
"A vampire generally hates human beings, and in particular is inclined to torture and kill the people closest to the victim it inhabits. Mr. Spenser, if you were to become a vampire, the vampire would have all your memories, all your mannerisms, but would not be you. It would find its way back to Boston and…"
Giles looked at Hawk.
"Susan?" Giles said.
Hawk nodded.
"It would find its way to Boston and target Susan and anyone else loved by Spenser the man."
"OK," I said. "I get all that."
"Good," Giles said. "Now, imagine something happens, and the soul of the man you were is forced into the vampire that your body became. Suddenly, you have essentially come back to life only to find yourself inhabiting the body of the thing that killed everyone you loved. The thing has done other horrible and reprehensible things that make you absolutely sick. The vampire is still inside you, raging to get out but it can't. You are now in control of the vampire's body. What do you do?"
"Probably kill myself," I said.
"Ah, that makes sense at first glance. But through the vampire's own memories you remember encounters with other creatures as horrible as yourself. If you kill yourself, you allow the evil to perpetuate through them."
"OK, that makes sense," I said. "I try to stop others from being victimized by the thing I was, and the other things out there. I fight. I've got a vampire's strength, so I try to use it against them."
"Precisely," Giles said. "Now here's where it gets complicated.
"There was once a young man in Ireland, no more than 21 at the time. He was attacked, killed, and turned by a vampire. The vampire he became went by the name of Angelus, and even by vampire standards he was a cruel and monstrous creature. Nearly a century and a half after his creation, in 1898, Angelus tortured and killed a prominent Romany, or gypsy, princess in Romania. The girl's tribe, however, had access to a curse. The curse returned the soul of the man Angelus was back into the vampire. Angelus was replaced by Angel, who was absolutely horrified by the things Angelus did. After some years of disorientation and depression, Angel tried to protect people from vampires and other demons. Eventually, he found himself in Sunnydale.
"Angel appears as a handsome young man, somewhat dark and mysterious. He starts to help a girl named Buffy Summers, who is engaged in the same fight he is. She is, for all her abilities, a sixteen year old girl. She finds herself attracted to him."
At this, Xander got up and excused himself, saying he needed to go to the bathroom.
Willow looked at me after he left. "Xander didn't like Angel much."
Giles coughed and then continued.
"Angel, for his part, probably tried to resist his own attraction to Buffy. She was, after all, a sixteen year old girl. But she was also isolated by the same sort of power and responsibilities that he had. They had a unique connection that I doubt anyone else, and I include myself, can ever really understand. Against all odds and all common sense, they fell in love.
"Unfortunately, Angel's curse, really a curse on the vampire Angelus, had an Achilles heel. If the man within should forget even for a second, by way of complete and total happiness, his responsibility to hold the vampire within him in check, he dies again. His soul is ejected, and the vampire is again in charge."
Giles looked at me. It took a second for what Giles said to completely sink in. I felt a tightness in my chest. If I was less manly, I think I might have been in tears. Willow already was. Even Hawk's face was grim.
Finally, I said, "Buffy and Angel made love."
"On her seventeenth birthday," Giles said.
No one said anything for a few seconds, then Giles continued.
"Literally overnight, the great love of Buffy Summers' life was transformed into a mortal enemy, one determined to torture and kill everyone she ever loved. Worse, two members of Angelus' old circle, powerful vampires named Spike and Drusilla, were already in town."
At the mention of Spike's name I saw Hawk flinch, very briefly.
Giles continued. "It was an extremely stressful time. I myself lost someone very close to me. Angelus eventually found an alternative way to open a gateway to Hell, by awakening a dormant demon named Acathla. The other slayer, Kendra, was sent from Jamaica to assist in stopping Angelus and his allies."
Hawk interrupted.
"Another slayer?" he said. "How is that possible?"
"Last year," Giles said. "Buffy was briefly rendered clinically dead by the vampire known as the Master. Xander used CPR to revive her, but she was gone long enough to activate the next slayer."
"OK," Hawk said. I was really curious about Hawk's apparent knowledge of and interest in slayers. I knew there were things he never shared with me, but in all my time with him I never had any hint of vampires and slayers in his past.
Giles continued.
"Unfortunately, Drusilla killed Kendra almost immediately after her arrival, injured Willow and Xander, and kidnapped me. Angelus didn't know how to wake Acathla, you see, and I did. I was brought to Angelus, and he tortured me. Spike, who was jealous of Drusilla's relationship with Angelus, sought out Buffy and made an alliance with her. Together, Spike and Buffy attacked Angelus, Drusilla, and the other vampires. Xander rescued me, but not before Drusilla duped me into revealing to Angelus the correct procedure for waking Acathla."
Giles stopped.
"And then what happened?" I asked after a few seconds had passed.
"I don't know," Giles said. "I assume Buffy and Angelus fought. Since the world still exists, I assume she killed Angelus."
"So, she killed the love of her life," I said.
"Maybe not though," Willow said.
I looked at Willow.
"Why not?"
"Because Miss Calendar found the spell to restore Angel's soul, and the night Buffy fought him, I cast it."
I looked at all of them. Xander walked into the room after Giles finished his story.
"Wow," I said.
Giles nodded.
"I assume that you will want to talk to all of the principles in this case," he said to me. "I will suggest to all of them that they tell you everything they remember. I will rely on your discretion."
"OK," I said. "There is one person I would like to talk to about all this."
Hawk nodded at Giles.
"Who would this person be?" Giles asked me.
"Doctor Susan Silverman," I said. "She's my girlfriend, but she is also a very good psychologist. I think she will be able to help."