In the next morning, the couple enjoyed a calm breakfast together, then made their way to the Magic Box where Willow needed to restock some of her supplies; as always when she took her girlfriend along to the store, Anya immediately enlisted the taller woman for helping with a delivery, making Pat wonder out loud if she actually waited with putting them away until she'd drop by every now and then.
"Actually, I do that with the heavy boxes", the ex-demon admitted freely, "Xander usually is too tired after a day on the building site to lift them for me and not as strong as you anyway, and I'm weaker than he is, so…"
"I knew it", Pat grumbled, "but, fine, I'll help you… But only if you'll give Willow a twenty-five percent discount on whatever she'll buy now!"
"Fifteen", Anya started the usual haggling, Willow watching and listening with a slight smirk on her face; shaking her head, Pat crossed her arms over her chest, her voice strict when she replied. "Twenty-five and no less."
"Seventeen and a half", the ex-demon still tried anyway, frowning when Pat shook her head, not even dignifying that with a verbal answer.
"Twenty?" Anya tried again, grumbling when again the demon only shook her head; they stared at each other in silence for a few more moments, then the smaller woman threw her hands up, sounding so annoyed that it was comical when she cried out "Fine! Twenty-five then! Jeez, you're greedy!"
"Look who's talking", Pat smirked, then turned to her girlfriend, a mischievous sparkle in her good eye when she told the witch to better buy a lot now.
"Oh I will", Willow reassured her at once, smiling as well, "thanks for getting me that discount."
"While you choose what you will use that discount on, you come and help me", Anya demanded, still sounding annoyed; she grabbed Pat by the sleeve and dragged her into the backroom, pointing to several large and heavy-looking boxes waiting there for her.
"The one in the middle should go up on that shelf", she explained, making the demon growl at her as she always did whenever Anya wanted her to lift heavy stuff up on high shelves, "and the three others to the back of the storage, they are awfully in the way here."
"No shit", the demon grumbled, deciding to start with the lifting of the heavy box first; she grunted as she bent down and hoisted it up, the muscles of her arms bulging visibly beneath her jacket when she carried it the few steps to the shelf, then lifted it up and placed it on the board Anya had pointed out to her, the smaller woman nodding at the questioning look the demon gave her afterwards.
"It's just fine there", she then confirmed, "now the three others, I can't believe I agreed to a twenty-five percent discount for so little work…"
"Too late now", Pat smirked, moving to pick up the second box; just when she bent down though, a shriek suddenly came up outside in the shop area of the store, prompting her to freeze in mid-movement as she immediately had recognized the voice as Willow's, the unmistakeable sound of a roaring fire following moments later, the distinct smell of smoke drifting into the storage room.
"Fire!" Anya shrieked, now sounding as if she was close to panicking, "there's a fire in the store!"
"Get out through the back door", Pat ordered immediately, pointing out said door to her, "I'll make sure Willow's okay and take her outside, meet us in front of the store, call the fire fighters!"
For a few moments, Anya looked as if she wanted to protest, then she just nodded as she saw the thick, black clouds of smoke which by now were drifting into the room; she hurried to the backdoor without another glance at the demon, and after making sure that she really was going outside and not hanging back to retrieve the cash register or something equally stupid, Pat made her way back to the store's main area as fast as she could, her heart nearly jumping up to her throat when she stepped through the door leading there.
Thanks to her demonic side, fire neither scared her, nor could it harm her; still, the raging inferno that had formed in the store in that shockingly short timespan made her fear for her partner's life, the witch standing with her back pressed against the wall, the flames raging all around her, forming a half-circle around her and keeping her from moving more than an inch or two.
"Pat!" she cried out when she spotted her girlfriend, then coughed heavily as the shout had prompted her to breathe in a lungful of smoke, "help me…!"
Glad that fire couldn't harm her, Pat started moving over to her, walking as fast as she dared to on the burning ground, not wanting to have it break beneath her and make her fall God knew where; to her relief, she made it to Willow's side without any unpleasant incidents, quickly grabbing the witch and lifting her up on her arms moments later.
"I'll try to keep you away from the flames, just hold on tight, it'll be okay", she mumbled, hoping that she sounded soothing, already moving back to the door which lead to the storage area – the path to the front door was blocked by too much fire to allow her going through without endangering the redhead too much, and as far as she could tell, the fire hadn't reached the storage yet.
Clutching to her, Willow gave her best to make herself as small as possible without actually moving too much, not wanting her partner to drop her; she gave her best to breathe as little as possible, but still had to cough every now and then, a shudder running through her as she thought of the last time Pat had taken her out of such an inferno. But back then, the burning place belonged to our enemy, not to one of our closest friends, she absurdly thought to herself, flinching in the demon's grasp when several flames came dangerously close to her feet; she tried to pull them up even further, relief filling her when a few moments later, Pat stepped through the door leading to the storage room with her, kicking it shut behind herself, making sure that the flames were kept away at least for a little while.
"I hope Anya called the firemen by now", she muttered, more to herself than to her partner, while she hurried to the back door; thankfully, the ex-demon had thought of leaving it open, and moments later, the couple was outside on the sidewalk, breathing the fresh and clean air.
"Much better", Willow commented, "and you can put me down again now, Sweetie, I'm fine…"
"Are you sure?" Pat demanded to know, making her partner nod; for a few more seconds, the taller woman remained looking sceptical, then nodded as well and carefully put Willow down, keeping one arm around her waist though, to catch her again the moment she'd show any signs of falling or even fainting.
"Poor Anya", the redhead commented as they started walking – after she had reassured Pat once more that she was okay and that she could walk just fine – and made their way back to the front of the shop, "she must be devastated now, the shop burning down, this is—" She fell silent at once as she reached the store's front with her girlfriend, her eyes going wide; next to her, Pat had a similar expression on their face, and both of them were mimicking Anya perfectly, the ex-demon looking quite dumbstruck as well.
"What the…" Pat finally brought out, saying out loud what everyone else was thinking as they stared at the perfectly intact store, the flames and smoke gone, looking as if the fire had never existed.
"What was that?" Anya finally demanded to know, turning to look at the two other women, "did you try a spell, Willow? Admit it!"
"No!" the witch immediately gave back, still unable to take her eyes off the store, her mind racing as she tried to figure out what had happened – after all, she had been in there just minutes ago, had felt the heat of the flames and had smelled the smoke, she knew that the fire had been as real as it got.
"Well, I'm glad it was fake fire, or whatever it was", Anya went on, making her way to the front door and opening it, momentarily looking weary, as if she was expecting the flames to reappear the moment she'd set foot inside the store, "losing the store to fire is one of my worst nightmares, and just think of all the money! It would cost so much to repair all that damage, not to mention the ruined merchandise!"
Those words snapped Willow out of her train of thought, and she stared at the ex-demon with wide eyes, sounding just a tad excited when she asked her to repeat what she just had said.
"I said, it would cost so much to repair the store, and not to mention all the ruined merchandise", Anya gave back, frowning in honest confusion when the witch rolled her eyes at that, then said "No, before that", making the ex-demon's frown deepen for a moment before she realized what Willow was aiming at.
"You mean that part about the store burning down being my worst nightmare?" she wanted to know, raising an eyebrow when Willow nodded in excitement, pouting when a moment later, the redhead turned to her partner and asked her if this didn't seem weird.
"I'm sorry, but I'm not sure if I'm following you here", Pat gave back, looking a bit sheepish, "I mean, I understand why that would be Anya's worst nightmare, but what about it seems weird?"
"Think about it", Willow gave back, "at first, I had this nightmare about you dying because of me, then Buffy had a nightmare about you, her and me getting killed, and now the store seems to burn down, but then the fire is gone, and Anya says that would be one of her worst nightmares?"
"Well, now that you put it that way, I do see a certain pattern", the demon agreed after thinking about this for a moment, "but what does it mean? Our nightmares aren't coming true, are they, I mean, we're all still alive and the fire vanished again, as well."
"Thank God", Anya threw in while Willow nodded, now looking thoughtful again as she tried to put the few puzzle pieces that suddenly had been made visible to her together, frowning to herself as she worked on figuring this out.
"We better call Giles, and Buffy", she decided after a moment, "because, to be honest, I have no idea what to think of all this. Maybe Giles will know something… Hey Anya, you didn't happen to see a little boy around while you waited for us, right?"
"Um, no", the ex-demon gave back, sounding confused again, "why do you ask such a strange question?"
"Yeah, why?" Pat wanted to know, as well, making the redhead shrug with a slightly sheepish smile on her face before she explained the reason behind her strange question. "Well, we had something similar happen to all of us, back then when we were in High School, and it was kinda the fault of a little boy in a coma, even though he didn't really mean it, so I was wondering…"
"No, I didn't see any little boys", Anya told her once more in reply, "and I think Xander told me about the incident you just mentioned. His nightmare involved a clown. He punched him."
She sounded so absurdly proud at the last three words that Willow and Pat just had to smile; the redhead nodded her agreement, briefly shuddering as she thought of what her nightmare had been about back then, only to shrug it off moments later, telling herself that this didn't matter anymore now.
"I'll go call Xander", Anya tore her out of her thoughts once more, "and ask him to come to Giles' place! Will you call Buffy and Giles?"
"Yes", Pat gave back, already getting out her phone, "the sooner we speak of this, the better."
Nodding, Willow watched how her partner at first called Giles, then Buffy, settling a meeting with all of them in half an hour; at the same time, Anya talked to her boyfriend and told him to come to the Watcher's house as well, ignoring his protest about how he had to work and reminding him of the fact that the Magic Box and thus the money was in danger, the smug smile on her face when she hung up showing that she had convinced him in the end.
"He'll be there", she confirmed the expression, "let's go now then so we'll be there on time, too!"
This made both Willow and Pat nod, the demon lighting up a cigarette as they started walking, exchanging worried glances as they tried to figure out what was going on and how much worse things might become before they'd find a solution, none of them noticing the cold pair of eyes watching them from a dark side alley on the opposite street.