Chapter 20: Undone

Buffy and Spike swept into the emergency entrance of Sunnydale Memorial, their combined shouts drawing the attention of half a dozen medical professionals. Spike cradled Willow gently in his arms, her limp body showing no signs of life. Just behind them, Xander staggered in, a groaning Rupert Giles still not fully conscious.

A man in scrubs brought a wheelchair over to Xander, who set Giles down in it. The nurse wheeled Giles away as Xander trailed to explain what had happened so Giles could be treated.

"Help!" Buffy called, her voice sharp with panic. Doctor Hernandez, the same trauma surgeon who had treated Giles a month earlier, ran over.

"Miss, what's wrong? Are you hurt?" Doctor Hernandez's eyes scanned Buffy quickly, looking for signs of injury.

"No, no," Buffy explained, "it's my friend."

The doctor turned and looked at Spike. "Sir, where are you hurt?"

Buffy and Spike exchanged a look of alarm. "No," Spike said, trying to speak clearly, "she's hurt," he insisted, looking down at Willow, still lifeless in his arms.

Doctor Hernandez's eyebrows drew together in a look of confusion and concern. "I don't understand. Could one of you explain what's going on?"

Buffy looked square in the doctor's eyes. "My friend, Willow, is going to die if you don't do something."

Spike, beginning to guess at the problem, got the physician's attention. "Hey, doc, do you see a girl in my arms? Red hair, kinda bloody, looking even paler than me?"

Narrowing her eyes, Doctor Hernandez looked at Spike. "What are you talking about?"

Buffy grabbed the doctor's right hand and placed it on Willow's head. Doctor Hernandez yanked her arm back, paused, then reached out again. To Doctor Hernandez, she was touching thin air, but that air sure felt a lot like a head of hair. "Oh my god," she breathed. "How?"

"Let's go," Buffy ordered, leading Spike down the hall. Locating an empty trauma suite, the pair placed Willow gently on a gurney. Doctor Hernandez and several other staff weren't far behind. Buffy turned around and faced the medical team. Gesturing towards the bed, Buffy cried, "Can't any of you see Willow?"


Across the hall, Giles was beginning to come to. His brain told him that something important was happening, but he couldn't form a single thought inside his head. Someone was shining a light in his eyes and it was incredibly painful. He heard noises from across the hall, familiar voices. "Can't any of you see Willow?" That was important. He needed to…do something. He knew something. He just didn't know what he knew.

Giles tried to sit up, but he was overcome with a wave of nausea and vomited over the side of the gurney he was on. Someone was trying to push him back down and he struggled against their hands. He tried to see what was happening, but it was too painful to open his eyes. His mind began to clear just slightly, and the meaning of the earlier words came to him. "They can't see her," he groaned, still fighting the hands that tried to restrain him. "They can't see Willow."

Xander wedged himself between the doctor and Giles. "Why can't they see Willow, Giles?"

"Spell," Giles grunted, the pain in his head immeasurable.

"How do we undo it? Giles, how to we break it?"

"Bring me…" Giles' voice trailed off as another wave of nausea came over him. He breathed deeply, then continued. "Bring me to her."

Giles heard Xander arguing with the doctors. He would have sprinted to Willow's side if his body had let him. Willing himself to shout despite the pain in his head, Giles commanded, "Now, Xander!"


Buffy and Spike were doing their best to guide Doctor Hernandez in treating Willow despite her invisibility; it was clearly a hopeless endeavor, but they were at a loss as to what else to do.

Behind them, Xander half-carried a still-bleeding Giles into the room and barked an order for everyone to clear a path. Standing at the foot of the gurney, Giles gathered his strength and planted his feet firmly, standing up straight. His eyes, still nearly closed, landed on Willow's limp body on the bed. As if an electrical current ran through him, he felt his pain shrink to a much more manageable level.

Gripping the rail at the foot of the bed with one hand to steady himself, Giles extended his other hand forward, palm angled toward Willow. Doctor Hernandez and the others turned to stare at him, mouths agape.

When these words have thus been spoken

Let the glamour spell be broken

Doctor Hernandez turned back to the bed and was shocked to discover a red-haired girl lying in it. Her face was smeared with blood and she was barely breathing.

"Jesus," the doctor breathed.

Buffy looked from Willow to Doctor Hernandez, then barked, "Okay, you can see her, now treat her!" The doctor shook her head, clearing her thoughts, and immediately began to work on the witch.

Giles collapsed on the floor in a heap. He only vaguely recognized that he was being carried somewhere, and then the blackness took him again.


The heart rate monitor beeped, its steady rhythm reassuring. Willow, hooked up to a half dozen machines, looked like she was surrounded by tiny snakes. Her face was covered in cuts and her hair was matted with dried blood. Thankfully, however, her skin had recovered its healthy pinkish hue and she was breathing on her own.

Giles sat by her bedside, himself still dressed in a hospital gown and a large bandage evident on his head. Nearly 24 hours had passed since he and Willow had been admitted to Sunnydale Memorial, but his concussion and bleeding had been so severe that he was being kept another night for observation. He wasn't supposed to be out of his room, but the nurses who had seen the events of the previous night weren't going to tell Giles what to do.

With a book in his lap, Giles quietly read Willow some of his favorite poems. It felt maudlin and juvenile, but he didn't care. He was worried about her and this made him feel better. Most importantly, he didn't want her to wake up alone.

He took a break from reading, his head feeling heavy and full of fog. Although he had started to recover from his head injury, it was difficult to concentrate. He felt as though he were perpetually on the edge of a migraine. He closed his eyes and breathed deeply, trying to relax his mind.

After a few minutes, he returned to his book.

"This next one," he whispered to Willow, "is rather on the nose, but I feel compelled to represent the Bard." He read:

When, in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes,

I all alone beweep my outcast state,

And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,

And look upon myself and curse my fate,

Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,

Featured like him, like him with friends possessed,

Desiring this man's art and that man's scope,

With what I most enjoy contented least;

Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,

Haply I think on thee, and then my state,

(Like to the lark at break of day arising

From sullen earth) sings hymns at heaven's gate;

For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings

That then I scorn to change my state with kings.

He looked up from the poem and saw Willow's eyes were open. She was staring at him, her eyes filled with tears.

She opened her mouth, but she produced only a croaking sound. Giles leaned closer to her and grabbed her left hand in both of his. "Shh," he urged her. "You're alright. You're in hospital, I'm here with you. You were hurt. Badly. But you're out of surgery now and the doctor says you're to make a full recovery."

Willow blinked, tears sliding down her face. She tried to speak again, but met the same result. She brought her hand up to her throat and looked at Giles with questioning eyes.

"You were intubated during surgery," Giles explained, "and even though the tube is out now, they say you'll be sore for another day or two. It might take you a couple of days before you can speak normally."

Willow nodded slightly. She mouthed, "Are you okay?"

Giles smiled with some amusement, recalling how he asked her this same question when their positions had been reversed. "Yes, I'm alright. Concussed, but otherwise just fine. They say they'll release me in the morning."

Willow reached her right hand across to stroke his face but couldn't quite reach him. Even that slight effort made her wince with pain.

Giles brought himself as close to her as he could, still holding one of her hands in his while moving his other hand to cup her cheek. "Don't move," he urged her, his voice breaking with tender sadness. "I'm right here."

Willow closed her eyes at his touch and steeled herself, breathing deeply. Opening her eyes she weakly gestured in the air, miming the motion of writing. Giles grabbed the legal pad and pencil from the table next to the bed and passed them to Willow. She scribbled in large, uneven letters:

What happened to me? Injuries?

Giles told her. "Doctor Gruden threw you against a shelf, and it fell on top of you. You had a collapsed lung and several cracked ribs. You also broke two bones in your right leg. You're going to be here for several more days at least, but the doctors say your outlook is very good." He was trying very hard to be cheerful and upbeat, but Willow saw the sorrow in his eyes. Willow returned to the notepad.

I'm okay, Giles.

She smiled at him weakly, trying to be reassuring. Tears sprung to his eyes and fell down his cheeks. "Willow, you very nearly weren't okay. You never removed that modified invisibility glamour you performed after I got hurt at the cemetery. None of the staff here could see you when Buffy and Spike brought you in." He took a ragged breath, trying to collect himself. "You nearly died."

Giles brought Willow's hand to his cheek and they cried together. Willow had so many things she wanted to say to Giles, but they would have to wait. For now, they wept. After a few minutes, their tears began to slow. Willow took up the pencil again and wrote:

Read me more poetry?

Giles let out a surprised laugh and wiped his face. "Alright," he agreed. "I shall do my best to inveigle you with other people's love poems. Prepare to be wooed."