"I don't know everyone here either, and I think it would be best if we all knew what was going on before anything else happens. Also, for the safety of everyone involved I need to know who and what we are dealing with." Giles told them.

"But first I think we all could use some rest. It's been quite the ordeal… for ALL of us." He continued. "Xander, why don't you show all of the new people to the rooms in the south wing. I think there should be enough rooms that they can each have their own for now. Why don't we all plan on meeting in the mess hall around noon and I'll speak with all of you then. Angel, Wesley, I am going to need to speak with you both. Meet me in my office around 11:30."

Xander left with everyone from Los Angeles behind him. Giles, Buffy, Dawn, Faith, Andrew, and Wood stayed behind.

"Buffy, why don't you Faith and Willow go get cleaned up and get some rest. I'll need you to be in my office though at 11:30 so that we can talk about what we're going to do. The rest of you…" Giles said to Andrew, Dawn, and Wood, "are free till noon when we are all meeting in the mess hall. However I should warn you that you should keep to yourselves until we have the meeting at noon. A lot of the girls will be asking questions, and I'm not sure how we are going to answer those questions just yet. Also, please do not bother the people from Los Angeles. I know that you all are curious, but they just spent several months in hell and I don't think it would be very nice for you to bother them right now. I am directing this primarily at you Andrew. You can wait till later to go talk to Spike. Now I will see you all later."

Everyone then went off in their own directions without complaint. Buffy, who only minutes ago had been dying to get out of there, stopped to talk to Giles before leaving.

"What are we going to tell the girls about all of this?" she asked. "Do you want me to talk to them before this afternoon?"

"Right now, all I want is for you to get some rest. You look exhausted. I'll think of something to tell the girls… and before you even go there, I am not going to say anything that you wouldn't like. I still think that I did the right thing by keeping our distance from Angel when he was with Wolfram and Hart, but for now I think it is better if they all stay here with us."

"Thank you." She told him.

"Now go get some rest." He said.

After Buffy left to go get cleaned up and take her much needed nap Giles went back to his office. For the life of him he couldn't figure out what he was going to tell these girls about what happened in Los Angeles. The idea of telling them that their friends and family just spent three months or so in hell was not appealing. Worst of all was the idea of telling them that the people responsible for all of that pain and suffering were going to be staying in the same castle with them. At least some of those girls would be out for revenge. Then there was dealing with the idea of telling the girls about Angel and Spike. He could still remember what happened when Faith found out that Angel was alive, and he didn't want that happening again, and the odds were that it would happen again if they ever found out that he was responsible for sending all of Los Angeles to hell. Angel could handle himself, but up against an army of slayers he wouldn't stand a chance. Telling them about Spike would be an even bigger problem. Most of these girls had dreams about the lives of past slayers, and while no one had ever seen Angel in these dreams to his knowledge, almost all of them had seen Spike. They had seen what Spike had done to the Chinese slayer during the Boxer rebellion, and what Spike had done to Robin's mother. These girls were not going to like the idea of letting Spike live after all that let alone be okay with him living in the same building. He had no idea what he was going to do, but he was pretty sure that there was not much he could do to convince these girls not to kill Spike or Angel. Only Buffy and Faith were going to be able to do that.

"Maybe some of the girls who were with us in Sunnydale last year could help." Giles said to himself. "They learned to accept Spike, and fight by his side. Maybe the other girls would be more understanding if they heard it from some of their peers." Giles picked up the phone and began calling some of the girls. He also called Willow and told her to bring Kennedy with to the meeting. She agreed, but she didn't sound to happy about it.

A few hours later Giles, Willow, Buffy, Kennedy, Faith, Angel and Wesley were all sitting in Giles's office. Everyone still looked tired, but they looked a lot better than they had a few hours ago.

"I'm still getting used to the idea of being alive again." Wesley told them. "Being a ghost for three months wasn't exactly a party.

"I'm still used to not being alive anymore." Angel responded. "I was vampire a lot longer than I was in hell, and yet it still taking me a while to get readjusted."

"I know how both of you feel," Buffy told them. "When I came back from heaven there was a real adjustment period for me too… of course my body had been rotting in the ground for three months, and I had to claw my way out of my own grave, so that might have something to do with it."

"That's never fun." Angel said. "I don't remember much about when I crawled out of my grave. I just remember hearing everyone's heartbeats and being really hungry. If Darla hadn't been there…"

"Okay… While I'm sure that you two have a lot of catching up to do… as we all do, maybe you could save the 'crawling out of my grave' stories for later. We have a lot to get through before we meet with the others." Giles told them.

"What do you want to talk about?" Buffy asked them.

"Let's start with who everyone is." Giles responded and then looked at Angel and Wesley to step in.

"What do you want to know?" Angel asked him.

"I want to know who and what I am dealing with here. Are they Demons, vampires…?"

"Lorne is an empath demon. He is from another dimension. The Groosalug or Groo as we call him is from the same dimension as Lorne. In his dimension he is considered to be human, but I'm not sure what he is by your standards. Nina is a werewolf. Gunn is human. Gwen is human, but she can conduct electricity using her hands. Illyria is an old one wearing the body of Fred, one of our friends, and Connor is Angel's son, so we're not exactly sure what he is. He's human, but he has all of the abilities of a vampire. That's about all we know." Wesley told them.

"What dimension are we talking about here?" Giles asked, curious to know more about Lorne and Groo."

"Pylea. It's a hell dimension of sorts. We visited it a few years ago after Cordelia accidentally got sucked into a portal. That's where we met Groo and Fred." Wesley explained.

"What happened to Cordelia? I know that she was working with you guys…" Giles asked.

"She died." Angel said

"She became a higher power one summer and when she came back she was possessed by an evil thing that used her to give birth to itself. That's part of why Willow had to come to Los Angeles to help us last year." Wesley explained.

"After that thing violated her it left her in a mystical coma which she never came out of." Angel finished.

"That sucks. Comas. Not fun. I should know." Faith added.

"We would've called, but it was made perfectly clear that you didn't care." Angel said.

"It's not that we didn't care… but that you couldn't be trusted. You joined up with Wolfram and Hart, joined the other side, and I hate to be blunt but its not the first time either." Giles explained.

"That was different. I didn't have a soul. You know that. Besides I had my reasons for going to Wolfram and Hart." Angel told him.

"How was I supposed to know whether or not you had a soul, not that that really matters anyway. I've seen plenty of people join the other side for a lot less than what they gave you. It wasn't just me that I had to think about either. We had an entire army of new slayers that were going to need as much help and protection as possible. I couldn't risk having a confrontation with Wolfram and Hart. As far as the reasoning behind your little transgression I'm still not clear on what that was." Giles explained.

"I did it to save Connor." Angel said.

"What?" Giles asked "Why?"

"I wasn't going to take their offer. They tried to get me to take it in return for information on the Sunnydale apocalypse. I told them that Buffy could handle herself." Angel said smiling at Buffy. "Then they showed me what Connor had done. A lot happened that year that you don't know about, that you won't even want to know about. Connor had finally lost it and was holding a bunch of people hostage at a store. He also had Cordelia with him. He was going to blow them all up if I didn't stop him, and there was nothing that I could do to help him. He had been through too much. Wolfram and Hart offered to alter reality so that Connor could have a normal life. No one would remember what really happened except for me. Connor would never know who we were. Who I was. He could have a new life, a better one. It's what he always wanted, so I made the deal. I worked for them, and Connor got to have the kind of life he always wanted. No more vampires, demons, or hell dimensions, just everyday life."

"I remember Connor. I remember everything that happened last year, or at least I think I do. What happened?" Faith asked

"I broke the spell, and everyone got their memories back. The old memories are mixed in with the new ones. If you think about what happened last year you'll know what I'm talking about." Wesley explained.

"Why did you do that?' Faith asked. "I remember what Connor was like last year. He was seriously troubled. The kid I saw today was nothing like that. Why isn't he all angsty?"

"He still has all his old memories. To Connor, he grew up as a well adjusted kid. All of the real memories are like one very long, detailed, nightmare." Wesley told them. "I didn't mean to bring everyone's memories back, and believe me when I tell you that most days I regret what I did, but I thought that by destroying the Orlon window I could bring Fred back. I had learned that Angel had altered reality, but I didn't know why. I would've done anything to save her."

"You loved her." Willow said

"Yes, I loved her." Wesley said. "I still do."

"Fred was a special woman" Willow told him. "She was one of the kindest people I ever met. What happened to her?"

"It's a long story." Wesley said avoiding the question. He knew that talking about it was going to bring up a lot of old memories that he was trying to suppress. He also knew that if they started talking about Fred it would lead to a big argument, and he wasn't sure that that was such a good idea right now. "…and I think Giles wants to get down to business."

"Well… yes… I do. I imagine you are all wondering why we have brought you here considering what you have been told by Andrew," Giles told them. "You've been brought here for two reasons. One is that it's not really all that safe for you anywhere else because Wolfram and Hart may still be after you. The other is that we need your help."

"That's ironic." Wesley said. "…because when we needed your help you wouldn't even hear us out."

"Yes, I do realize the irony behind all of this, and I realize that I am probably the last person that you want to be helping right now, so if you won't do it for me do it for the others," Giles told him.

"What exactly is it that you need our help with?" Angel asked Giles.

"Everything" Giles said. "We have an entire army of slayers, none of which have watchers of their own, and all of whom need to be trained. Without proper training they are sitting ducks. Worst of all though we have something called Twilight after us, and they have the entire United States Military behind them. They're goal is to take all of the magic out of the world in order to get rid of the slayer. They think that they are saving the day, but the reality is that without magic, this world wouldn't be able to exist."

"So in other words, this twilight wants to bring an end to the world?" Angel asked.

"You could say that." Giles explained. "He's been working with the military amongst other people in order to take out the slayers. They're primary target is, of course, Buffy. They know that she is responsible for what happened in Sunnydale, and they know that she is the leader. They figure that by taking her out, they can strip our army of its leader and through the other girls into chaos."

"So what is this Twilight thing?" Wesley asked. "I've never heard of it before, and when we were running Wolfram and Hart we knew of almost all of the major players in this dimension and others. They all had files in the archives."

"We're not sure," Buffy told them. "But I've faced him, and he's strong. He also seems to know me, as if I've seen him before. I have no idea who he is. I think he may be some sort of witch though because he can do magic, and fly like Willow. Will, do you know of anyone else who can do that?"

"I'm not sure… it's not like people go around wearing signs of their chests that say 'I can fly'. Obviously they would have to have a lot of power, but since we don't even know whether or not Twilight is human the list of possibilities is pretty long. For all we know, it could be Dracula." Willow explained.

"It's not." Buffy said. "He wouldn't have helped us in Japan if it was. Besides he's sort of the pro-magic type don't you think?"

"True" Willow said. "Besides I think that he likes Xander and he kind of has a thing for you too."

"ugh… don't remind me." She responded.

"You…. And Dracula?" Angel asked her.

"No!... Oh God NO! Nothing like that! She just meant that the last time he we saw him he was kind of… obsessed with me. He kept visiting me at night and trying to use his thrall. Needless to say it didn't work and I staked him… not that staking him really does any good."

"I wouldn't say that his thrall didn't work…" Willow said. "After all Buffy, You let him drink your blood."

"You WHAT?" Angel asked surprised.

"Oh please! It's not like it was the first time! I'm a vampire slayer. It's a hazard of the job." Buffy said exasperatedly.

"She said 'LET'" Angel pointed out.

"If by let you mean that when I was BRIEFLY under his thrall I didn't try to stop him… then yes, but other than that…"

"He got you to drink his blood too." Willow told them. Everyone looked at Buffy.

"Would you stop that!" She said to Willow. "You're REALLY not helping here. Okay, so I guess his thrall worked a little bit… but it's not like I didn't get over it. I learned to fight it off, and I haven't been under it since then."

"You drank his blood Buffy." Angel said. "You could have been turned."

"No. I didn't drink enough, and he didn't drink enough of mine. I didn't really drink it either… more like tasted. He kept trying to tell me that he was showing what a slayer really is, and I was kind of curious. Mostly though I did it in order to distract him. It was nothing. REALLY!"

"As fascinating as all of this is, we really have to get going. It's almost noon, and we have to meet with the others to go over all of this with them too. I just wanted to fill you in and make sure that you were willing to help us with all this." Giles said suddenly.

"I'm in" Angel told them. "I'm always up for saving the world."

"Good" Giles said. "Wesley?"

"I will help, but only if you are going to trust us and treat us like equals. I am not going to be anyone's servant to be pushed around. If we're going to be in on this, I want to really be in." He told them.

"Of course," Giles told them. "You are one of only a few remaining people who actually finished the watchers academy. I invited you and Angel to my office here because I want you two in on this."

"I'll work with Illyria, and see what I can learn about her if you want." Willow offered.

"I think that would be a great idea Willow. It would be best to learn as much about her as possible." Giles said.

"Thank You" Wesley told her. "Alright, I'll help. I can't speak for the others though. Lorne already wanted to go his own way before this whole ordeal, and Gunn probably won't be jumping up to help after what happened to Fred."

"Spike will help" Angel said.

"How do you…" Wesley asked.

"He likes to hit stuff." Angel explained. "Besides saving the world and getting another opportunity to impress Buffy… He'll help."

"Good. We're going to need as much help as possible. This is a lot bigger than some of the things we've faced before. We're talking about the well being of thousands of girls. We're talking about taking on what is probably the most powerful military in the entire world." Giles told them.

"We should get going." Faith said suddenly. "The others are going to be waiting for us."

"You're right. We should go." Giles said, and then proceeded to leave the office. The others followed him.