"What are you talking about?" Gwen asked Fred. Everyone was staring at her now, making her uncomfortable. She remained seated, for the time being.
"Guys, this isn't really the time," Wes broke in, taking Fred's hand in his. Still, she never broke her gaze off of Gwen. Wes had to wonder why Fred decided to bring this up now. Illyria was inside Anne's system, and they needed to do this spell soon. They could deal with Gwen later.
"Yeah," Willow backed Wes up. "We need to do the spell, now. I need you guys to, like, all back away from Anne, you know?"
Gunn squeezed Anne's hand tight, and then let go. Already he missed the feel of hers in his as he started walking away. Drogyn also walked away from around Anne. There was no one left between her and Willow.
"I know this isn't the right time," Fred continued, "but something's going on. She's lying. Why would she do that?"
"What makes you think she's lying, Fredikins?" Lorne asked.
"I touched her before on accident, and there was no electricity. That means she's lying to us in some way."
Almost everyone in the room turned to look at Gwen. Willow and Anne stood staring at each other, though. Willow was trying to concentrate, but she couldn't do that with all of them talking. It was making her nervous. Nobody knew how much time they had and nobody seemed to be caring. Didn't they know what was at stake here?
"Guys, shut up!" Willow yelled, uncharacteristically angry. "I need to do this! I need to concentrate."
"She's right," Angel, still kneeling by an unconscious Connor's side, agreed. "Everybody be quiet."
Fred knew she should give up. They needed to freeze everything inside of Anne to stop Illyria from flowing all over and stop her from rising. But Gwen happened to look over Fred's way, and they looked each other in the eye. Fred couldn't shake the feeling that her eyes just looked…different. As if they weren't her own. As if Gwen wasn't really Gwen.
Granted, she didn't know Gwen well or anything. Maybe Fred was just being melodramatic. The bad feeling was still there, in her chest. What if Gwen was here to destroy the work they were doing here, or something? What if, when Willow was doing the spell, Gwen was to stop it? There were any amounts of possibilities, and Fred just wanted to be extremely careful.
"Look, I just wanted to make sure-"
Fred tried to start again, but was interrupted by Gwen.
"Fred, I understand. Just let them do the spell and then I'll explain everything, okay? The real truth."
"But what if that's your plan?" Fred countered. "To mess up the spell?"
"Fred's right," Spike weighed in. "There's somethin' odd about this girl. She could be here for any number of reasons."
"What reasons would I have to mess up your spell?" Gwen shouted, jumping out of her seat, almost seeming nervous. "I don't want the world to end by Illyria!"
"Shut up!" Buffy shrieked loud enough to quiet up the whole room. "Guys, Willow has one shot at this. One shot. And if we break her concentration, then guess what? She has to do the spell again. And if that happens, then we have a real possibility of an evil greater than any Old One coming out, okay? Deal with those problems later—we're running out of time and Willow needs to do this spell with calmness and not feel rushed."
Silence.
Gwen sat back down and Fred watched her out of the corner of her eye, just to make sure she wasn't going to try anything.
"Thanks, Buffy," Willow said. Lucky for Willow, she didn't need any sort of bizarre (or normal) ingredients for the spell she was going to perform. Thankfully, she remembered a spell that she thought would work. It'd stop everything inside Anne's body without really "killing" her. It would be like she'd be frozen without the ice.
Unfortunately, the spell was a lot of words and chanting. Willow wasn't even sure how long the spell was going to take.
"Ok," she whispered, more to herself than anyone else. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. I can do this.
Eyes still closed, Willow raised her arms, pointing her hands at Anne. Slowly, almost silently at first, she began to chant. Nobody could hear what she was saying, and even if they could, she was talking in Latin anyway.
The affect wasn't so instant. Anne just stood there as Willow spoke and pointed at her. She didn't know what to do. With everyone staring at them and Willow doing some kind of magic, it was kind of awkward for her to just be standing there. As far as Anne could tell, Willow wasn't doing anything yet. But then again, if she didn't know any better, she wouldn't think that Illyria was doing something inside of her. Anne felt completely normal. It was only a matter of time, though. Willow was doing the spell, and Anne was just standing here. She stole a glance at Gunn, who was intensely staring at Willow, watching her do her magic as if he understood completely what she was saying and doing.
Out of the blue, Anne became short of breath. She panicked. What was going on? Was this Willow or Illyria?
A small bright light appeared coming from Anne to Willow's hands. She was drawing out some of the life force in Anne, which would make it easier to do the rest of the spell. It was difficult. The life force seemed to be fighting Willow, trying to pull away.
Somehow, someway, even though Illyria hadn't fully risen yet, she was trying to fight back.
Small tips of Willow's hair were starting to become black. It would grow faster if Illyria kept fighting this.
"Willow," Buffy whispered, off to the side, worried for her friend.
With a shout, draining some of Anne's life force became easier for Willow. She could still feel the pull, the fight, though. It wasn't over yet. Willow stopped draining from Anne.
Anne fell to her knees, weakened, breathing heavily. She felt ready to fully collapse. She could hear her heart pumping, pumping, pumping faster and faster and the blood pushing something through her body that wasn't blood. It was Illyria. In this new state, she could feel Illyria inside of her, running through her body, as if getting ready to rise. Willow's spell which was stopping Illyria and causing her to fight was also quickening Illyria's process in taking over Anne, now that she was almost weak enough to be taken over.
More Latin, more chanting.
A strong gust of wind appeared in the office. Loose papers flew around. Angel's desk got knocked over. Almost everybody grabbed on to something or someone else to keep themselves steady. The strong wind made its way to Anne. And then, it flew through her.
Or, at least, that was what it felt like to her.
A sharp, cold gust seemed to come into her body, go through her heart (causing it to dramatically slow), and then come out her back. It was freezing, and she felt like ice. Tears welled in her eyes.
Illyria was going to take over if it wasn't over soon. Illyria took control over Anne's body just slightly. Inside of Anne, she pushed her heart to beat faster to block the gust going through her body. Blood was rushing again, and Illyria was spreading fully again. Almost done. Then she could take over and stop this witch from doing this.
Willow pushed harder, fighting Illyria with all of her strength. The struggle was causing not just the tips of her hair to turn black, but for large portions to turn black. The red all over her head was fading, turning dark. A few veins began spurting over her face. Her eyes weren't black yet, though. She could still go one. This needed to be done.
Willow shouted, pushing the gust through Anne with all her might. It worked.
Her heart came to beat extremely slow, dangerously slow, but not enough where it would kill Anne. From her heart, the gust spread through every organ, every body system, and even over Illyria inside Anne. Everything in Anne just seemed to stop, her heart frozen mid-beat, her blood frozen in place. Even her brain stopped, frozen along with everything else—but not before she had one last thought: It's finally over.
Then, everything stopped. No more wind. Willow took deep breaths and fell to her knees, like Anne. Although, now Anne was frozen on her knees, like a statue. Willow took as many deep breaths as she could, calming herself. Even she felt the black in her hair going away along with the veins. She was getting better.
She looked up at Anne. Frozen, now a statue. Everything in her body (including Illyria, Willow was sure) was stopped. Not by killing Anne, but by stopping everything. It was like everything in her was locked in place, and it would never become unlocked.
Anne's eyes were staring exactly in Willow's direction. Willow met her gaze, her empty gaze. Could Anne still see? Or was it like she blacked out, or something? Willow didn't know.
Inside of Anne, things weren't overly complete. Everything a part of Anne was locked in place. Except Illyria. Illyria wasn't a part of Anne, Illyria was just inside Anne. She could still rise. She could still become in this shell. It would take longer. But she was still there. Illyria made her way through Anne, all the way to the locked-in-place heart. Took one gargantuan hit, using all her strength.
Willow gasped as Anne's eyes changed within an instant. They were still unmoving, still statues, but they became blue. Not Anne's regular blue eyes, but Illyria blue.
She failed. It wasn't working. Illyria was going to start everything back up again. Willow had lost, did the wrong thing. Panic flowed through her veins.
It was a sudden move, the only move anyone in the entire office took. Everyone else was too stunned over the spell Willow did, and a few others saw what was happening to Anne's eyes. Nobody could move out of fear and shock.
Except one.
Gwen.
She wasn't in a position to see Anne's eyes, but she jumped out of her chair and practically ran to Anne. Nobody was sure what to do.
Fred (who was wrapped in Wes's arms, and he in hers, because of the gust of powerful wind that had come through) saw Anne's eyes but also saw Gwen running towards her. The bad feeling in her remained. Someone had to do something. "No," she cried, her voice muffled.
Even so, everyone saw Gwen anyway. Nobody stopped her.
Nobody stopped her as she placed a hand on Anne and a burst of electricity came shooting out of her hand, into Anne. Anne seemed to take one last moving flinch at the electricity, and then stopped moving again. Gwen pulled her hand away.
Anne's eyes remained Illyria blue. But that was as far as it went. Nothing else changed for several minutes.
The electricity that entered Anne's system, along with everything Willow had done, fought against Illyria. Once everything was locked in place again after Anne's last flinch, the electricity inside of Anne's system was locked in place as well, inside and out of Anne's heart. The jolt of electricity locked in and out of Anne's heart fought against Illyria by merely touching Illyria. The electricity, being frozen in a frozen heart, froze everything it was touching. Including Illyria. The electricity was like a chain, connecting Illyria to Anne's heart, causing both of them to lock in place—to freeze—at the same time.
Gwen stood by Anne, unmoving.
Nothing happened.
Nobody knew what to say. That meant…it worked? Right? But what did Gwen do? Everybody was just staring at the statue of Anne, unsure of what to say or how to react.
"You're welcome," were the first words to be spoken, coming out of Gwen's mouth.
Gunn circled around Anne. She really was like a statue, now. She was essentially gone, without being gone. It was insane. Mind blowing. Paradoxical. He wanted to reach out, stroke her hair, to know that she wasn't really a statue, that she was really still a human, just frozen. He fought the urge.
"What...? It didn't work," Willow spoke slowly.
"Again, you're welcome," Gwen grinned. "I helped you guys."
Fred was even more confused than before. She didn't know what to make of what Gwen did.
"Guys!" Gwen shouted. "This is good! We should be celebrating. We did it! Well, okay, you guys did it, but I helped. Don't even try to deny it."
"What's going on?" Spike asked the great question.
Gwen looked over at Wes and Fred. "Come on, guys. You can't figure it out? You guys are the geniuses here. Don't make me ask Angel if he understands," she joked.
Fred saw into Gwen's eyes again, and saw the difference she couldn't quite place. "You're not Gwen, are you?" Fred questioned.
"Well, I'm Gwen's body and Gwen's terrible tastes in clothing. But mentally, you're right, Fred. Mentally, I'm not Gwen."
"Who are you then?" Angel spoke up.
Gwen looked at Angel and smiled. "Angel," she said slowly. "Think."
There was something about the way she said his name that he…recognized.
Her first words after this whole ordeal: You're welcome.
Coincidence? Did Angel even believe in coincidences anymore?
"You see," Gwen continued, "the Powers That Be weren't just ignoring this whole situation down here. They knew you needed help. Not that you're not a great witch, Willow, but they just wanted to make sure there was some extra help, just in case it didn't all work out. And besides, electricity was what you needed, even if you didn't realize it. So, I didn't really have a choice in taking over Gwen for a little while. They kind of just pushed me into this body, knowing about her electricity and knowing what was missing. Gwen was in a severely weakened state of mind, anyway, so it all worked out for the best."
Angel frowned. Gwen wasn't Gwen at the moment. Gwen was just a body, being taken over by someone else. And now, because of her, Anne was locked, like she needed to be. Illyria was defeated.
"I think you have a lot of explaining to do," Angel said.