In which the remaining Sunnydale residents call in the big guns.
"'Gone'? What do you mean she's gone?"
"I mean she got back from LA in a terrible state, had some sort of breakdown, and she and Tara tore the robot apart and left town without even bothering to pack... and you DID hear what I said about Angel and Spike?"
"Yeah yeah, we'll go shopping for holy water and champagne later. Right now I'm still trying to deal with the important news." Xander had barely had time to roll Anya's wheelchair across the threshold before the look on Giles' face had told him something was very wrong, but this was much worse than he could have imagined. He finally took the piece of paper Giles had been holding out to him; just a few lines in pencil.
Xander,
Dawn, Giles
So so
sorry. Have to get out of here. We'll be in touch. Get out of
Sunnyhell. Love you all so much. Please don't hate us.
Willow+Tara
He read it quickly, nodded and handed it back to Giles. "OK. So how do we get her back?"
"Xander... I don't think she'll want to come back. Not now, at any rate. You should have heard her..."
"Look, I'm sorry, but I don't care. I know I haven't been Supportive Guy lately, but..." He could barely remember a single day of his life where Willow hadn't been around, and now she'd left town without even telling him? No. No way he was going to let this stand. He took a deep breath to calm his nerves. "This is Willow we're talking about. The whole best friend thing aside, she's the only one of us with power right now. Without her, we're roadkill and you know it, Giles. If she needs more help, we'll give it to her, but running away isn't going to solve anything. She needs us, and we need her – at least we need to know how to get in touch with her. This is a really bad time for those two to go Thelma And Louise... what?"
Giles actually smiled briefly. He hadn't done that in some time. "Oh, um, nothing... just... for once you reference a movie I've seen. I watched it with Dawn and Buffy a couple of days after Joyce's funeral. Apparently, it was Joyce's favourite." He didn't remember much of the movie; he'd spent most of it taking care of the Summers girls, who insisted on watching the whole thing even though it was obviously too emotional for them. They'd used up Kleenex like it was oxygen, but by the end there had been smiles beneath the tears... Still devastated, but starting to accept and move on. He hoped he'd be able to do the same some day.
"God, Dawn..." Xander sat down, shaking his head. "How's she taking it? Where is she?"
"She and Angel had to talk. They're downstairs."
"Alone? And you're absolutely sure he won't go evil and rip her throat out?"
"Oh, give it a rest already. He said he needed to talk to her, and quite honestly, we can't keep Dawn drugged up any longer. If she's ever going to get past this, she has to handle it sober. Right now I should think they have a lot in common. Meanwhile, we need to decide what we're going to do... if Willow doesn't want to be found, then there's no one here who can fix the robot. And without it -"
"What about that Warren creep? I mean, he built it, he must be able to fix it."
"Um..." Anya had been reading the morning paper, waiting for them to get around to something interesting. "Would that be Warren Meers?"
"Why?"
"Well, there's an article here about him. He was killed in an accident last night. Got hit by an unidentified car and thrown off a bridge. Apparently it took him hours to bleed to death... Oh. And he was partially eaten by a badger."
"Good Lord, that's..." Giles searched for a word. They all looked at each other, no one wanting to be the first to say it. "Er, am I the only one who..."
"...feels like he had it coming?"
"Yes, quite. I don't know why, but..."
"Oh well. That's that idea down the drain. Oh look honey, there's a Charles Bronson movie about vengeance on TV tonight."
Xander gave his fiancée an affectionate smile before getting back to business. "So, at the risk of sounding like a broken record, we need Willow. We should try a locator spell."
"Oh, a capital plan. Except the ones who could do that are the ones we cannot find."
"What about Angel's people? Wesley?"
Giles scoffed. "Wesley's half the magician I am. Besides, it seems Angel had a falling-out with them. Something about a recording. He spoke to Wesley earlier and... well..." Giles indicated the smashed phone in a corner.
"OK, but this is Sunnydale, we must know someone who's into magic?"
In the basement, Dawn stood at the table, listlessly trying to piece the robot together. Angel sat on the stairs and looked at her for a long time. He wasn't sure if he was here to comfort or to be comforted, to forgive or to be forgiven.
"Dawn..."
"He was my protector, Angel. My friend. He fought side by side with her while you were –"
"The Spike I knew was one of the most evil creatures I've ever met. I should know, I taught him myself. One of the things I've regretted most over the last century is not staking Spike when I had the chance. He's killed so many, I've seen him do things to girls your age that... when I saw him I never even considered that he might, I didn't even give him a chance to explain..."
"I know all that. I know."
Angel slowly got up and walked over to her, standing close enough so she could reach him if she wanted to but not so close as to crowd her. God, that robot was lifelike... just plastic and silicon, but just looking at it, its face frozen in shocked confusion when Glory had kicked it off, hurt him to the bone. "Can you fix her... it?"
"No. She's broken." Dawn looked at Angel, her eyes red but dry. She could see he was close to losing it, having to carry so much... "I-it's not her, I know that." They stood in silence for a while.
"Dawn... I wasn't myself last night. I know she and I could never be together, but the thought that she died without me being there to at least try to help her..."
"Look, just... don't, OK? Everyone's been beating themselves up about Buffy, blaming themselves, wanting forgiveness. But she chose this. They call it fancy things like sacrifice and destiny, but the bottom line is she killed herself. Right now, that's number one with a bullet on my trying-to-forgive list, and you, me and everyone else is gonna have to get in line."
"Dawn... you shouldn't..."
"Why not? She told me the hardest thing in this world is to live in it and that we'd have to be brave, and I guess if we don't, then we're even bigger quitters than her. I'm done with this." She tossed a burnt-out circuit on the table without a second glance at the robot and headed upstairs. Angel stayed behind, Buffy's last words ringing in his ears.
At least the rest of them CAN live in it. What the hell am I supposed to do?
"You want me to do a what?"
"Locator spell." Xander tried to be patient. "Willow's gone missing, and we need to find her. Make sure she's alright. Figure out a way to at least talk to her."
"O...kay... but why me? You all hate me."
"We don't ha... never mind." Kind Uncle Xander face. Resist the urge to yell at him. "For starters, you already know about this stuff... vampires, Slayers and so on. You can do magic, and believe me, that's a memory I'd repress if I could. Plus, you're mostly harmless and wouldn't try to mess with us."
"Hey, some compassion here? Like, one of my best friends was just killed in a horrible accident."
"Well, join the fucking cl... wait, you mean you actually miss him?"
"Well... no, but... you know, still."
"Thought so. Look, point is we really need your help. We need you. Are you game?"
Jonathan shrugged. "I guess so."