"Connor couldn't get out of his room?" Xander asked, looking at Connor's door.
"Not to mention the dead guy Dawn saw." Buffy said, watching Xander inspect Connor's door.
"I got that part, but this door is perfectly fine. It's not warped or broken in any way. He should've been able to get out fine considering his brute strength."
"I figured as much." Buffy sighed and followed Xander to the stairs. "Dawn and Connor ended up sleeping with Angel and I because they were so wigged."
"Guess that ruined your private house warming party."
"No, we've already done that." Buffy said without thinking. She looked at Xander's slightly shocked face. "Sorry."
"No. No. You had to put up with Anya's tales of our sexcapades, it's only fair."
"It's just, nothing happened that night."
"It's probably just a standard haunting, Buff." Xander noticed the look Buffy tossed him. "Not that dead guys in closets welcoming you to your house is normal."
"Gee, thanks for your input. It's so insightful."
"Once this dead guy realizes that you're here to stay, he'll probably just move on."
"I don't know. Maybe I should have Willow look into the history on this place. See if there's anything strange about it."
"She'll probably just find that some previous owner was either killed here or he committed suicide and that's the end of your story."
"And if you're wrong?"
Xander shrugged. "Then you can poke out my other eye and I'll live as a beggar on the street with a goat playfully prancing around with a hat to collect the money."
"You're a strange man, Xander."
"I try." Xander started to work on the banister as Buffy went downstairs and grabbed her purse. "I'm headed to the office. You coming?"
"Nah. I think I'll stay here and chat it up with the dead guy while I fix his banister."
"That's my banister now."
"I'll be sure to tell him that."
Buffy started to walk out the door, but another wave of nausea hit her. "Whoa." She gripped the door handle and steadied herself.
"Are you ok?" Xander asked, coming down the stairs to her side.
"Fine. I still feel a little sick, though."
"Sick how?"
"Nauseous sick. It only happens once or twice a day, though."
"How long has this been going on?"
"About a week or two."
"Think maybe it's Shy?"
"I don't know. Maybe."
"Maybe he put a spell or something on you when you weren't looking."
"Maybe. I better get going."
"You ok to drive?"
"Yeah. I'll be fine. It's passed."
"You sure?"
"Positive."
It was now four o'clock in the afternoon and Buffy had been so busy all day that she had completely forgotten to ask Willow to dig into the history of her house. Buffy glanced down at the papers she was working on and discovered that she didn't really understand them. Her mind had been fixed on Dawn's look of terror the night before. "That's it." She muttered. She got up and headed out to the reception area. "Willow?"
"Yeah?" Willow looked over at her from the filing cabinet. For some reason, a distant memory of Cordelia turning to look at her from the same filing cabinet hit her.
She shook her head and looked again at Willow. "Can you do something for me?"
"Sure. What do you need?"
Buffy leaned on the counter and bent over far enough to glance at the computer screen. "Could you get on this thing and look up the history of my house please?"
"I guess. Why?"
"Didn't anyone tell you?"
"Let's see, I haven't talked to Angel all day because he's been busy running errands, Spike and Faith are working with Tammy and Amanda teaching them more Slayer moves, Xander's working on your house, and Dawn and Connor have been at school all day. So, no. I haven't talked to anyone today." Willow sat down at the computer and looked at Buffy.
"I think our house is haunted. Last night, Dawn swears she saw a dead guy in her closet. She said he told her 'welcome home.'"
"'Welcome home'? That's unusual. Ghosts don't usually talk directly to the living. They try, but because they're on the Ghost Roads, they can only project their image into this plane."
"Yeah, and then to make thing weirder, Connor says when he tried to get to Dawn after she screamed, he couldn't get out of his room. His door was jammed. I had Xander look at it today when he came over and he said that there was nothing wrong with the door."
"This sounds more like a poltergeist."
"Again?"
Willow smiled. "It's really simple to get rid of them. Just a few herbs and some chanting…."
"We don't know if its dangerous, though. Can you just check for me?"
"Yeah, sure. Check back with me before you leave. I'll probably have everything on your house by then."
"Ok. Thanks Will." The phone rang and Buffy picked it up. "Buffy Summers, here. Oh hey. Hold on." Buffy laid the phone down. "Can you transfer that into my office?"
"Sure."
"Thanks."
Buffy sat in her living room going through the papers Willow had printed out for her on the house. A man, Brandon Clitter, was murdered in what was now Dawn's room in the early 1900s. Apparently a band of robbers broke into the house and he was trying to keep them from getting what they wanted, so they shot him in the head. But that was just the beginning. The house was definitely haunted by a poltergeist. Every owner after the murdered man claimed that they heard a voice whispering to them and a few even claimed to have seen him in the same closet Dawn had seen him in. Then, the owners were either killed or ended up crazy and roaming the streets.
"This is just great." Buffy said.
"What is?" Angel asked, walking in with a bottle of wine and two wineglasses.
"What Willow dug up on the house." Angel handed her a wineglass filled with red wine. "No thanks. I don't think it'll stay down."
"You still feeling sick?"
"A little." Angel took the papers from Buffy. "Hey."
He laid them on the coffee table, wrapped his arm around her shoulders, and pulled her to his chest. "Rest."
"But the poltergeist…."
"Will still be here. Rest."
Buffy yawned. "Fine, but not because you told me to. Because I wanted to."
"Anything you say lover." Angel kissed the top of her hair and listened as her breathing slowed and she fell asleep. After a while, he began to fall asleep himself. He had thought that he had been asleep for a while when he heard the crash come from the second floor.
"What was that?" Buffy asked, bolting off the couch and already heading to the stairs.
"I don't know." Angel said, following her.
"Buffy!" Dawn yelled. "Angel!"
"Mom!" Connor yelled. He saw them rush up the stairs. "I can't get in." He was pounding on Dawn's door, but the thing wasn't budging.
"On the count of three." Buffy said. "One. Two." Buffy and Connor kicked at the same time, but they were thrown across the hall.
"Are you guys all right?" Angel asked, helping them up.
"Buffy!" Dawn screamed.
"Dawnie! We can't open the door!" Buffy yelled back.
"Help me!"
"You have to open the door!"
"It won't open!"
"We need Willow." Connor said.
"I'll call her." Angel said, rushing into Connor's room and picking up the phone. "It's dead."
"What do you mean it's dead?" Buffy asked. "We had the phone turned on yesterday!" She took the phone and held it to her ear. With a sigh of desperation, Buffy reached into Angel's jeans and pulled out his cell phone. "What are the odds? This is dead too."
"Buffy!" Dawn screamed.
"Dawnie!" Buffy threw herself against the door, but it wouldn't budge.
"That's it, I'm going to get Willow." Angel said.
"I'm coming with you." Connor said.
"No, you stay here and help your mother get Dawn out."
"But…."
"No buts. Stay." Angel walked down the stairs and Buffy heard him try to open the front door. "What the…. This one won't budge either!" He called up.
"Get away!" Dawn screamed.
"Dawn? What's going on in there?" Buffy yelled through the door.
"Buffy, make him go away!"
"Dawn…." Connor called. "Do you remember that spell you did when grandma was trying to talk to us?"
"I don't have the stuff!"
"Just say the words. It should be enough to weaken the ghost guy."
"Are you sure?"
"No."
"Just do it Dawn. It might help!" Buffy said as Angel ran back up the stairs.
"Ok. Uh…. I cast you from this place. It is your poison and your bane. It is the skin that is cut from your flesh!" A loud groaning noise came from Dawn's room.
"Keep going Dawn!" Connor yelled over the groaning.
"Oh…. I cast you out with every prayer from every god that walked the Earth and crawled beneath. I cast you out with the strength of those who love me. I cast you out with the strength I have inside me! I cast you out into the void." The groaning died down and Dawn's door opened.
Buffy was about to go to her sister, but the extremely dead guy standing the middle of Dawn's room stopped her. He stared at her and then said, "This is my house."
"Not anymore it isn't." Buffy said.
"Get out!"
"No!"
"Get OUT!" A strong wind came from nowhere and hurled Buffy, Dawn, Connor, and Angel down the hallway and down the stairs. The front door banged open and the wind picked up even more, sending them sprawling into the front yard. "Stay away from my house." The dead guy whispered on the wind.
Buffy walked up to the door and tried to open it, but it was jammed once again. "He's locked us out!" She said angrily. She started to kick the door, but to no avail.
"We need Willow." Connor said.
"My phone's inside." Angel said.
"We'll just have to go get her."
"I'm not leaving." Buffy said. "This is my house and I'm not leaving." She started to pound on the door. "Let me in, you son of a…." The door opened and she fell inside, the door slamming behind her.
"Buffy!" Angel ran up to the door and started to pound on it, but it was suddenly gone. All the windows and doors disappeared and the house became a death trap. "Buffy!"
"What happened?" Dawn asked.
"She pissed off the ghost." Connor said. "So, who's going to go get Willow?"
Angel tossed Connor his keys. "You and Dawn go get Willow. I'll stay here and try to get Buffy out."
"You're letting me drive?"
"You're letting Connor drive?" Dawn asked. "Haven't I been scared bad enough tonight, now you've got to let him drive?"
"Go!" Angel bellowed.
Buffy suddenly found herself in the 19th century. When she had been pulled through the door and then locked in, the house began to tinkle with laughter and drinks clinging together. People appeared all around her in fancy corseted dresses and tuxes with long coattails. They didn't seem to notice her save for one. He was handsome and familiar.
"You're him." Buffy said to him. "You're the dead guy. Brandon Clitter."
"I warned you." He said. "I warned you to get out, to leave here, but you couldn't just leave it, could you?"
"It's my house."
"No."
"You're dead, dude. Time for you to let go. Move on. Get the hell out of my house."
"It doesn't matter anymore. You'll die too."
"What? No I won't." Brandon walked up the stairs and headed towards Dawn's room. "Hey! Don't walk away from me." She bounded up the stairs after him. "Hey!"
"Why are you so persistent?"
"Because you're haunting my house! What don't you get about 'you're dead, move on?' What's so hard about that?"
"No one can stay here. They're not safe."
"Because you keep kicking them out!"
"I do it to save them."
"Save them?"
Brandon stopped and stared at her for a moment. "You have power."
"Yeah, and?"
"You've been brought here for a reason."
"What are you talking about?"
The dead guy looked at the clock. It read 11:45. "We have fifteen minutes."
"Till WHAT?"
"Till they come."
"Who?"
"Follow me." The dead guy took her hand and led her into Dawn's room. He stopped in front of the closet. "I hid it from them. I had to. They would have been unstoppable if they had gotten their hands on it."
"I'm starting to sound like a broken record here. What are you talking about?"
"The Powers."
"The Powers shot you?"
"No. They sent those men after me."
"Ok. What are you hiding?"
"The key."
"My sister?"
"What? No. The key to their salvation."
"Who's salvation?"
The dead guy opened the doors and walked into the closet. He bent down and lifted up the floorboards in the corner. "It's here. Hidden from them by spells."
"Brandon, what does the key do?"
"It will release them. It will stop the Powers from destroying good."
"You knew about the Powers?"
"Yes. That's why they had me killed. How do you know about them?"
"I'm the Slayer. They've been sending really powerful demons after me to try and stop me."
"And they haven't yet?"
"Not yet."
"Then you must take this. You must take the key and free the Ancient Ones."
"The demons you mean?"
"No. You don't understand." Brandon looked at the clock. They had five minutes. "The Ancient Ones were the real Powers That Be. They were the ones on the side of good."
"What?"
"They were the ones that pushed the demons out of this world. All was peaceful for six hundred years, but then the demons banded together and created their own alliance. They destroyed the Ancient Ones' dimension and locked them away forever."
"And this key will release them."
"Yes, but unfortunately I don't know how."
"Well, how did you find the key?"
"I didn't mean to. I was trekking through Africa, trying to discover the origins of life when the earth gave way beneath me and I fell. I fell into an immense cavern and the deeper into it I went, the more…. Peaceful I felt."
"The Ancient Ones?"
"Yes. This was the entrance to their prison. I didn't get to go any farther, but I managed to find a box that contained what I learned to be the key to their prison."
"And when you got back, the Powers…. They had you killed?"
"Not immediately. I don't think they realized I'd had it for so long."
Screams came from downstairs and Buffy turned to Brandon. "How do you unlock their prison?"
"I don't know. They killed me before I could find out."
"The key? It's still in the closet?"
"Yes. That's why I'm still here. I'm guarding it."
"Brandon, you can rest now. I'll guard the key for you."
"But…."
"It's what I do. I promise you that I will do whatever I can to free the Ancient Ones."
"They still have some power in this world."
"They do?"
"Yes. They sent you to me." Brandon shoved her under the bed. "Protect it."
"I will." Buffy ducked under the bed and heard the door slam open.
"There you are Critter." A man said. "Time to die." There was a gunshot and then a thud as Brandon fell to the floor, dead.
Buffy stayed silent and closed her eyes, willing the men to go away. She opened her eyes when she heard her name being called. "Buffy?" Angel yelled.
"Mom?" Connor called.
"Buffy? Where are you?" Dawn said, rushing into her room. "Buffy!"
Buffy slid out from under the bed just as Willow, Connor, and Angel caught up with Dawn. "I'm fine."
Dawn helped her sister to her feet and hugged her tightly. "I was so worried. What happened?"
"Why were you under the bed?" Angel asked.
"Are you ok?" Willow asked.
Buffy ignored their questions and went over to the closet. She opened the doors and went to the corner where Brandon had showed her the box was hidden. "Buffy?" Angel asked. She ignored him and ripped at the carpet until the original floorboards were reveled. Pulling those up, she reached into the hole she'd made and pulled out a medium sized box.
"What is it?" Willow asked.
Buffy held the box up. "The key to our victory."
"I'm confused." Dawn said. "It's the what?"
"We're gonna win."
"What is that?" Angel asked, walking up to her.
"Brandon showed me. He told me that this is what will save this world from the Powers." Buffy looked at them. "Problem is…. He never figured out how to make it work."
"Make what work? What's in there?" Connor asked.
Buffy opened the box to reveal a glowing orb of perfect white light. Peace emanated from it and Buffy smiled as she felt hope restored in everyone in the room. "It's a key to a prison where the real Powers That Be are being held captive."