Xander burst into the library, clutching at the stitch in his side.
"Xander," said Giles in mild alarm. "What is it?"
"Something took Buffy's mom," he said, thrusting the Polaroid into the Englishman's face.
"When did you find this?" Giles demanded urgently.
"Five minutes ago." He looked around. "Is Buffy on patrol?"
"No, I thought she went home," said Giles, his brow furrowing. "An entity known as the First Evil has been tormenting her for the past few days by masquerading as Angel. We decided patrolling would be inadvisable until we could put a stop to that."
Xander looked past Giles for a moment, frowning. "Then I think I know where Buffy is," he said, and departed again at top speed.
[o]
Joyce could hear the vampire who had kidnapped her walking down the hall outside of the room where she was bound and gagged. Tiny blue boxes were still burned into her retinas from the blinding flashes of latest two dozen or so photographs he'd taken of her. The vampire was insane, but at least he seemed to be waiting for Buffy to arrive before he would do anything worse than scare her—not that he wasn't doing scary well enough. Joyce was frightened nearly out of her wits. But Buffy would come, and everything would be all right. She strained against the ropes binding her arms and legs to the chair, but he had tied them so tightly that her extremities were starting to go numb.
"No getting away now, Mother," said the vampire, reentering the room with his camera. "May I call you 'Mother'?"
Joyce closed her eyes and leaned as far away from him as the ropes would allow her to.
[o]
The tree lot was closed for the night, but that didn't do much to slow Faith down. The chain link gate clinked loudly against the fence as it swung open at her kick, and she jogged across the lot until she reached the cluster of dead trees. She stamped her combat-booted foot hard on the ground there. It cracked and sank a few inches under the pressure, and she jumped aside and swung her axe repeatedly into the spot. Soon, a hole big enough for her to jump through had opened up, and she leapt down without a second thought. It was a short drop, and when she stood up, she saw that the cavern was lit by candles, and in the widest section of it, three figures were hunched over a low stone table covered in more candles as well as bones and talismans.
"Sorry guys, but it's time to break this up," she said. The Harbingers' eyeless faces turned to her, and she brought the axe around in a great arc that took off the head of the nearest one. With a violent yell, she went after the other two until they both lay dead on the ground like their fellow, and she quickly swept the stone table free of its ritual ingredients.
"Looks like I went after the wrong one," came a voice from behind her. Faith whipped around, raising the axe. The speaker was Buffy. Or appeared to be Buffy.
"What's that supposed to mean?" she asked.
The thing pretending to be Buffy walked slowly around Faith, looking at her with keen interest. "It's been a long time since I met a Slayer with so much potential for darkness."
"Save the smoke and mirrors crap. Giles told me what you are," said Faith, her lip curling.
"Did he, now?" With a smirk, it turned into her Watcher. The one who had been killed by Kakistos.
Faith let out a bellow of rage and swung the axe at it, but she might as well have swung at empty air. "You don't get to wear that face," she snarled.
It laughed with her Watcher's voice. "You think you can fight me? I'm not a demon, little girl. I'm something you can't even conceive."
"This gonna be one of those 'since the dawn of Time' speeches? Because you've seriously got the wrong audience."
"Oh, I don't need the speech. You'll be coming to me on your own."
"In a non-'killing you' capacity? Wouldn't bet on it."
Her Watcher turned abruptly into an enormous horned demon with long arms and deadly claws. "You will be mine!" it said in a horrible rasping shriek of a voice, before disappearing.
Feeling more than a little disconcerted, Faith left the cave and made her way back to her motel room.
[o]
Xander didn't think he'd ever broken more traffic laws than he did during the drive to Crawford Street. He barely remembered to put the car in park before leaping out and sprinting towards the mansion. "Buffy!" he shouted. Two seconds later, he came to such an abrupt halt that he stumbled. Buffy was crouched there in the courtyard. She looked so small that he almost hadn't seen her. Her head was in her hands and her whole body was shaking with silent sobs.
"Buffy," he said again, much more gently. But again, she seemed not to hear him. He ran up to her and reached out to touch her shoulder. She flinched away violently.
"No! Don't touch me!" she cried, her voice small and frightened. "You'll just get hurt like they did."
"Who 'they'? Vampires?"
She shook her head. "People. So many innocent people are dead because of me."
"What are you talking about? Do you have any idea how many innocent people are alive because of you? Try six billion, a couple of times over." He grabbed her by the shoulders and forced her to look him in the eyes. "Buffy, listen to me! Whatever you think is your fault, there wasn't anything you could have done about it!"
"But—"
"No! You can't blame yourself for the people you couldn't save. You do everything you can. You even gave your life to save us once already, and you think you're not doing good?"
"Xander," she choked out, burying her head against his chest. He held her tightly.
"I'm so sorry, Buffy," he said hoarsely. "I should have told you. I should have been there for you."
She pulled away and gave him a tremulous, watery smile. "You're here for me now. That's what counts."
With a great jolt to his stomach, Xander remembered the other reason why he'd come to find her. "We've gotta go."
"Why?" she asked, wiping her eyes. "What's wrong?"
In answer, he handed her the Polaroid.
Her eyes widened. "Let's go," she said.
As dire as the situation was, Xander couldn't help the smile that briefly lit his features. This was the Buffy he knew.
[o]
The hinges of the front door to the crumbling old house whose address was given on the Polaroid were unequal to the force of one solid Slayer strength-enhanced kick. The door fell flat on the grimy floor, to reveal Buffy and Xander, both of whom clutched stakes.
"Here I am," Buffy called loudly as she stepped onto the fallen door and into the hall. "So, what games did you have in mind?"
A vampire loomed out of the shadows and chuckled. "Looks like Mama's little girl has spunk."
"Oh, I know a game," said Buffy, not listening to him. "Ring Around the Rosie. But, since I mostly just want to go to bed, we can skip to the end." With that, she launched her attack.
"You're a Slayer!" he said in shock while he attempted unsuccessfully to fend off her blows.
"Yes, I am," said Buffy with conviction as the stake plunged through his heart.
"Ashes, ashes, we all fall down," said Xander, grinning.
"Come on," said Buffy.
It took them about thirty seconds of searching the house to find Buffy's mom. After freeing her from the ropes tying her to the chair and the cloth gagging her, Buffy threw her arms around her. "I won't let anything happen to you," she vowed.
"I know, sweetie," said Joyce, hugging her back just as fiercely. "Let's go home."
[o]
Christmas Day arrived, just as ridiculously warm as the rest of the month had been in Sunnydale, but this had little effect on the serene happiness of the holiday. Buffy and Joyce opened their presents, drank eggnog, watched black and white films, and didn't bother to change out of their pajamas all day. Xander and Willow watched A Charlie Brown Christmas in the farthest room in his house from the rest of his family just like every year, Willow even giddier than she normally was, thanks to the wonderful Christmas Eve she'd spent with Oz to look back on in addition to the tradition and her restored friendship with Xander.
But Christmas was rather different than usual for Wesley Wyndam-Pryce. Receiving a rare old book from his Secret Santa at headquarters was perfectly routine, of course—it seemed to be the only sort of gift Watchers would exchange, in fact. But his mind could not have been less occupied with the gift. Instead, it was focused on the final portions of Angel's tale. He was sure now that the ring had belonged to the girl from that story. None of the other side characters from it could remotely compete for the role.
It was ironic, really. Wesley's initial goal regarding Angel had been to learn the details behind the ring and whether or not it was significant in his return from Hell. Instead, he had found a friend, and that initial goal seemed trivial to him. Though Wesley's curiosity was not dead, somehow he just knew that the ring was too personal of a subject, and he couldn't bring himself to ask. It was time to give it up.
[o]
"Morning, Wes," said Angel when his cell door opened.
"Good morning," Wesley replied. He had said it in a slightly subdued voice, which Angel did not fail to notice. He gave him an inquiring look, but Wesley responded with a brief, reassuring smile, before his expression grew serious once again. They went through their daily routine of bottle and book exchanging in silence. Finally, when that silence had dragged a couple of minutes longer and was even becoming awkward for Angel, Wesley stopped fidgeting and slowly put his hand into his pocket.
Angel watched as he drew the hand back out just as slowly. It was now closed over what must have been a very small object. He then stretched out his hand towards Angel, who lifted his own automatically, and dropped the object into his palm.
"Happy Christmas, Angel," said Wesley, and he left the cell before Angel could reply. Angel looked down at what he was holding. It was a Claddagh ring. More specifically, Buffy's Claddagh ring, he was sure of it. He had no idea how Wesley had obtained it, but he wasn't about to complain. His fingers closed over the cool circle of metal, and he pressed it close to his heart. He had lost his own ring many years ago in Hell, and he didn't know how long it had been since she had died. Having her ring now was like having a piece of her, and he would keep it forever.
No, Angel and Wes are *not* going to find out about the whole confusion with Angel thinking it's 2098. They're both way too guarded in their phrasing, even with people they trust, to let something that helpful slip. Also, since Angel is not an essential player in "Gingerbread", I get to skip it and head straight for "Helpless"! Which will hopefully make up for the frustration caused by the former point.