Buffy ignored Giles's irritated stare as she leaned back in her library chair, propped her boots on the table next to the cute little lamps with the dangling chain light switches, and brushed some vampire dust off her jeans and black long-sleeved blouse. "Any luck with the Mohra blood?"

"Not as of yet, but the work continues on a nightly basis," Giles replied as he placed an old, ponderous looking tome on the book counter and walked over to her. "Buffy, must you?" he asked as he gestured at her feet.

"What?" she asked as she arched an eyebrow in his direction. "This school, hell, this city,

is half-deserted, and we've basically been given carte blanche over the library and basement … shouldn't I be able to sit comfortably?"

Giles continued to stare at her until she dragged her boots off the gleaming, polished wood and planted her feet on the floor. "Happy?" she asked.

"Happier," Giles replied as he sat down across from her. Something in his expression gave Buffy pause.

This Giles is younger, but he still gets the same look on his face when he's getting ready to lecture me.

In an attempt to pre-empt the dressing down she was reasonably sure was coming, she tried to shift the conversation back to its original topic. "Spike and the guys helped me dust seven vampires tonight, Giles. Seven. That's seven soulless monsters, who, assuming our vamp-wrangling skills were up to the task, could be back home with their families or, more likely, in the psychiatric ward of a hospital, if we'd given them a dose of green demon goo instead of an oak stake through the heart. I feel like those deaths are on me, Giles."

"I understand, Buffy, I really do," Giles replied as his eyes shifted towards the office in which a securely locked mini-fridge protected what remained of the Mohra blood they'd managed to collect. "But we have to look at the bigger picture."

"I'm a slayer," she replied. "My bigger picture is that I'm supposed to be saving people, not playing god with the one thing that actually can save people who have become vampires."

"I share your concern, but Buffy, the chance to study a substance that can cure vampirism, a notion thought impossible for thousands of years, may not come again. If we can isolate the blood's properties and replicate it, or even figure out a way to amplify its effects and thereby lower the necessary dosage, we could save countless others." Giles removed his glasses, set them on the table, and rubbed at his eyes.

"That's assuming you can make more, or stretch it so it goes further, or whatever," Buffy pointed out. "And over the last two months, all I've heard is that you need more time. Well, one of the vamps we dusted today used to be a student here. Percy and Oz knew her, Giles, and we could have saved her, but we didn't."

Giles slid his glasses back over his nose. "This sort of moral quandary should bother you, and I can assure you that it bothers me, too, but foregoing the chance to save perhaps a few dozen people in exchange for discovering a permanent cure for all vampires, everywhere, is an opportunity I believe we must explore."

She rapped her fingers on the table, stared at Giles, and tried to think of a reason why he was wrong. "I don't like trading lives," she finally said. "That's not what I'm about. That's not what we need to be about."

Giles stared at her for a moment, then stood, walked around the table, and laid a comforting hand on her shoulder. "This isn't trading lives, Buffy. It's about trying to help as many people as possible. If one is faced with the choice of saving one person or a hundred, letting that one individual die may be painful, but it's the right decision."

The corners of her mouth turned down in a frown and she shook her head. "But we don't know if anything you think might work will actually work."

"I believe it's a chance we have to take," Giles assured her, "or I wouldn't have suggested this to you."

"I keep asking myself what the other Buffy would do," she admitted. It was hard to even think the words, but she needed to be honest with Giles. "She wouldn't let innocent people die if she could save them, I know that, and I've worried for a long time that somewhere in my life, I maybe stopped being her in some of the ways that really matter." She looked up at him, and even though it wasn't her Giles, not really, she tightened her grip on his hand and hoped that he would know how to assuage her fears.

"I've only known you for a few months," Giles replied, "but I'm confident that you haven't lost your way." He rubbed her shoulder for a moment, then continued, "Every slayer can only be in one place at a time, can only do so much, but for the first time we have an opportunity to develop a weapon … a cure … that can change the entire dynamic of how we fight vampires." He patted her shoulder with his other hand, then retreated to his chair and sat back down. "It's your decision, of course." A wan, wistful smile crossed his face. "You have seen things that the rest of us can only dream of, and while I am hesitant to lay any additional burdens on you, the truth is that we are counting on you to lead us through this brave, new world."

There is no right decision, that's the problem.

"We're going to pick an end date for your save-the-world's-vampires research project," she announced. "Take three or four more months, see if we can grow more of this Mohra goop, or whatever, and if you can't figure it out, we start healing the vamps that don't fight so hard that we have to dust 'em."

Giles nodded. "I have a few ideas to try, and then we can revisit this conversation." His voice took on a mournful air. "It's a pity that there was so little of the blood to work with. As you might imagine, there was only so much that I could harvest from a single severed arm."

Buffy issued a single derisive snort in response to Giles's mildly delivered rebuke. "The Mohra was a lot wilier than Spike and I expected, but at least we brought back something. When we find that fugitive one-armed demon, there'll be plenty more blood where that came from."

Giles shuddered.

Oz swung open the doors, entered the library, and as usual, he looked grim, unhappy, and bothered by something.

Is this version of Oz ever not bothered by something?

"I assume you're talking to her about what we were discussing with Larry yesterday?" Oz asked Giles.

Buffy raised her hand and said, "I believe that the her in question is sitting right here. Don't let the blonde hair and the ponytail fool you into thinking I'm an empty-headed ditz, I can understand the spoken word and, if the mood suits me, even join in on occasion." She stared at Giles. "Want to fill me in?"

Oz pulled a chair from the table, sat down next to Giles, and they both stared at her with solemn, serious expressions.

Angel.

She sighed, glanced away, and asked, "You want to talk about Angel, don't you?"

They both nodded.

"Hey, hasn't Angel been a huge help?" she asked, and she hated how defensive she sounded. "Thanks to Angel fighting with us, there's a smoking hole in the ground where a people-processing-factory used to be, a bunch of freed prisoners got to go home, or at least run screaming to some other city, and there were no White Hats casualties."

Though we did have to use a bit of Mohra blood to grow Kyle a new eye … Giles hasn't come out and said it, but I suspect he wants to keep some of that blood in storage in case one of us needs it. Which he knows I wouldn't approve of, so he's pretending it isn't one of his reasons and I'm afraid to ask him.

Oz crossed his arms and frowned.

"Angel's fighting prowess and strategy insights are not the issue, Buffy," Giles replied in a gentle, soothing manner that did absolutely nothing to calm her nerves. "You know that."

She knew it was childish, but she could not help but stand, stalk over to the book counter, and look away. "I don't feel comfortable forcing him, Giles. And you shouldn't either."

"C'mon, Buffy," Oz snapped, and his voice was a near-growl. "We've got a ticking vampire timebomb walking in our midst."

She leaned against the book counter and stared at Oz. There was no gray in his hair, he was clean-shaven, and he had never been a werewolf, but it was still the Oz that she knew. Except, of course, it wasn't.

"This isn't like you, Oz," she informed him. "You were always so patient and understanding, you'd see where people were coming from and try to offer occasionally-too-insightful advice."

Oz smacked at the table and both Giles and Buffy started at the sound.

"You promised you wouldn't do that," Oz complained. "You have no idea how creepy it is when you act like you know us better than we know ourselves because you met middle-aged versions from some other universe. That other Oz, he isn't me, and I won't ever be him."

"You're right," she admitted. "That wasn't fair."

"Familiarity will have to be built up naturally, gradually, you cannot rush the process," Giles said, and while the reminder was gently delivered, it stung, nonetheless. "And yes, as Oz has just suggested, it can be … offputting … to be continuously compared to some other version of ourselves." He sighed and stared at her with affection, which was a new development that she was happy to see.

"I'm trying," she said. "Just like I wish you guys would try with Angel. He can be moody, but …"

"Moody?" Giles interrupted her with a rueful chuckle. "Buffy, I've seen daytime soap operas that weren't as heavily steeped in melodrama as this particular ensouled vampire."

The library doors swung open, and Larry walked in. He had his letterman's jacket on, as always, and he looked angry … as always.

I can understand why everyone in this version of Sunnydale is so miserable, but we've had a few big wins recently … you'd think they'd cheer up a little bit.

A troubling thought occurred to her, and she whirled towards Larry with what she hoped was an appropriate level of concern visible on her face. "Willow and Xander, but mostly Willow, is someone watching them?" she asked.

Larry nodded his head, and she half-closed her eyes and breathed a sigh of relief.

"Percy is taking a turn," Larry replied. He turned towards Giles and Oz and asked, "You two bring up what we talked about yesterday?"

"Gee, guys," Buffy said in an acerbic, biting, just-short-of-nasty manner, "so glad you got together to chat about strategy without me."

"It's not strategy, Buffy," Oz replied, "it's survival."

Larry settled into a chair next to Oz and Giles and stared at her. "We dusted Nancy Doyle today, Buffy. I used to cheat off her in English class. Giles has his research project going on, but he also set aside a syringe filled with that green demon blood for Angel to use, because we need him, or something, and while he blows us off, we're killing people who could use that cure."

"Angel is hundreds of years old, knows more than the rest of us combined," she ignored Giles's blustering look of disagreement and continued, "and we need him. End of story."

"Fine," Oz said. "You say we need him, and you know what, I kind of agree. What we don't need is the risk that this curse will turn him into a vengeful vamp version of himself who will then proceed to torture and kill all of us."

It was moments like these that Buffy regretted being so forthright with Giles and everyone else about what she knew, particularly when it came to Angel. Still, she couldn't see a path forward that worked without honesty, and if Giles ever found out that she had kept something like this from him, he'd never trust her again.

"He does sleep, right?" Larry asked. "Just stick him in the neck, push the plunger, and presto … no more Angelus problem."

"We're not doing that," Buffy said. "Angel will see reason, he just needs time."

Larry shook his head and seemed to be trying his best not to scream at her. "Angel, who's a vampire … a vampire … is running around town, doing whatever he wants, and we're giving him safe haven. This is ridiculous."

"Was it ridiculous when Angel showed up to save your ass a few nights ago?" she retorted.

"Well, if he'd been on the patrol like your schedule said, maybe we wouldn't have had to be saved!" Larry replied, and this time he was screaming. "And if you'd come here instead of Cleveland, none of this would have happened. I only understand maybe ten percent of your crazy multiverse story, but that part I heard loud and clear."

A part of her curled up and withered at Larry's words, and she found herself without a ready response.

"Larry," Giles said, and though he did not raise his voice, the words nevertheless cracked like a whip through the air of the library. "That was uncalled for. Buffy had no choice …. after all, would a person not subject to a vengeance demon's power willingly decide to live in Cleveland?"

Larry held up his hands in an apologetic gesture. "Yeah, that wish by the girl whose body we had to clean up, I get it." He glanced over at her. "Giles is right, what happened to Sunnydale isn't on you … but what's happening with Angel is."

Oz opened his mouth to add something, but Giles put a hand on his forearm and he reluctantly settled back into his chair.

"Buffy," Giles said, "the bottom line is that Angel bears a terrible curse. He has helped us, that is true, and he has knowledge and connections that we desperately need if we hope to not only survive, but actually defeat the Master, but he is failing to recognize the risk he poses to the world. You need to make him understand."

"What is the rush?" she asked. "He's been cursed for a long time, what's wrong with giving him a few more weeks to process the notion of mortality?"

Giles shook his head and fixed her with a disapproving glare. "The possibility of Angelus resurfacing is too dangerous. You know this. In fact, you know it better than I do. It would not surprise me if the Master wasn't at this very moment searching for a way to unleash Angelus upon us."

"He needs to take the shot," Larry interjected, and Oz nodded in agreement. "Yeah, he'll become mortal like the rest of us, so what? He'll just have to deal."

"It's his body," she pointed out. "We're not just going to make him do something he doesn't want to do."

"Angelus is a danger," Giles said, and he made the name of Angel's vampire-self coil through the air like a snake. "If Angelus re-emerges, there may be more than our lives at stake … keep in mind that this Sunnydale still has a Hellmouth, Buffy."

She had never met Angelus, not really. She had, however, met the First wearing his skin, and if the copy was anything like the original, she had no desire to ever make his acquaintance. Still, she felt compelled to defend Angel's right to choose. "Angelus returning isn't some random event," she reminded them. "All Angel has to do is avoid …"

"Avoid a moment of pure, perfect happiness?" Giles asked as he stood, walked behind the book counter, and retrieved a legal pad filled with his neat, handwritten notes. He flipped through the pages, stopped at a particular portion, and stabbed at the page with his index finger. "Yes, I remember that particular part of the curse, but that's not the entire story, is it? Certain drugs can induce Angelus's appearance, as can spells that generate blissful moments."

"Or he might just get drunk and luck into a night with someone really hot," Larry said.

Somehow, Larry, I'm betting that you wish Angel would luck into a night with you …

"Precisely," Giles said. An instant after the word left his lips, he shook his head and turned to Larry. "Wait, perhaps not that last example, but …"

"Spells!" she blurted out. Three sets of eyes turned to her. "There are spells that could turn any of us evil at any time, but you guys aren't sitting here giving me the third degree about them."

Giles rubbed at his forehead again, and she could tell that he was losing patience. "That's true, Buffy, and if I knew a way to cast wards that could keep us safe from such a speculative scenario, I'd cast them, but I don't, so I can't … but we can get rid of the all-too-real Angelus threat once and for all."

"Fine, I get it," she said as she crossed her arms and stared down at the floor. "It's just … he doesn't want to."

"What he wants is quite irrelevant, I'm afraid," Giles said. "There is too much at stake."

She winced at his choice of phrasing.

"I'll go talk to him," she promised.

Giles, Oz, and Larry exchanged glances.

"I'm afraid we need more than that from you, Buffy," Giles said.

The walls of the library hemmed in close and pressed against her, and for a moment … just a moment … she recalled how freeing it had been when she slayed alone, with no one to answer to except a Watcher she routinely ignored.

Of course, I had no one to watch my back, and eventually, I spent my life alone and slept in an empty, cold bed.

"Are we really at the our-way-or-the-highway point with Angel?" she finally asked. "Really?"

All three of them nodded.

"We are," Oz replied.

Larry leaned on the table. "Angel injects the damn blood, or he leaves town and doesn't come back. That's it."

"When?" she asked.

"Tonight," Giles replied. "I hope you understand that this was not easy for us …" he glanced at Larry, "well, it wasn't easy for some of us, but the decision has been made."

She could have said no, of course, but she had promised them, and herself, that she wouldn't be like that. They were going to be a team, and while teams had leaders, they shouldn't have dictators.

"Okay," she said as she walked over and rubbed Giles's shoulder. He tensed for a moment at the contact, then relaxed and looked up at her with a hopeful expression.

"I think you can convince him," Giles said. "If anyone can, you can."

She nodded absent-mindedly for a moment, then the words registered. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Oz, Larry, and Giles exchanged glances, but did not reply to her question.

. . . . . . . .

"Two months just isn't enough time," Angel informed the two forlorn figures huddled on the couch. "But it does get better. Trust me, I know." He leaned against the doorjamb and crossed his arms. "That being said, if you do something you can't take back, Willow, nothing will get better. Ever."

Willow pulled her knees to her chest, put her face in her hands, and fought back a strangled sob.

Xander, who had grown gaunt and pale in the weeks after an injection of glowing, green demon blood had turned him human, stared at Angel with red-rimmed, rheumy eyes. "How do you live with what you've done?"

"The key word there," Angel replied as he pointed at Xander, "is live. In the ways that matter, you two were dead for a couple of years. You have the memories, you remember being there, doing those things, but you had no soul. With no soul, it wasn't really you. The longer you live, the easier it will be for you to realize that."

"I remember eating people," Willow said as she raised her eyes. A few of the White Hat gals took turns combing her hair and making sure she ate and bathed, and she had been watched twenty-four hours a day after Buffy had caught her trying to climb to the school roof with no ready explanation as to her intentions. "I drank their blood." She lowered her head back between her knees. "I'd be better off if Buffy had let me …"

Angel stepped away from the door, raised his hand, and exclaimed, "No!" He shook his head. "No, don't think like that."

"We were together," Willow said as she turned to Xander. "The things we did. I remember liking it. I remember really liking it."

Angel winced. "I thought putting you two in the same room might be therapeutic, but dwelling on your time as vampires isn't what I had in mind."

"I remember we tortured you," Willow said as she stared at Angel and covered her mouth with her hands. "For nearly a year, when we weren't starving you. Why don't you hate me?"

Xander raised his hand. "I only watched the torturing."

"It wasn't you," Angel reassured Willow. "Not really, that's what I'm trying to drive home here."

"I let the Master touch me," Willow whispered. "And I let other vampires touch me, with their cold, clammy, dead flesh. And I liked it."

Angel rubbed at the back of his neck. "Let's not go overboard on just how terrible it is to be with a vampire."

"The Master isn't a vampire like you," Xander said as he gestured towards Angel. "He's all deformed and warped, and you're mysterious, tall, and well-muscled."

Willow stared at Xander with narrowed eyes. "And you guys think I swing both ways," she muttered.

"You do," Angel and Xander remarked in unison.

Willow shrugged. "I still think the liking-women-in-that-way might have just been the vampirism talking."

Xander and Angel exchanged a meaningful glance.

"Fine," Willow admitted, "maybe I'm a little gay."

"Look," Angel said as he felt his patience begin to wane, "if you need a reason to live beyond the fact that you're human beings with souls who deserve a chance, consider this: Buffy says you two are important, and that we need you. That's why the rest of the Mohra blood is on ice, but you two we saved … well, that and we all needed to see it work before we could believe that a cure actually existed."

"Maybe if we weren't cooped up in this school every day, it would be easier to adjust," Xander suggested.

Angel smiled. "Going stir-crazy and wanting to get back into the world is a good sign."

"You know what's waiting out in the world for me?" Willow asked. "The graves of my parents and a lot of my friends … some of those friends, I ate."

"That wasn't you," Angel said, and he was beginning to feel like a broken record. "You, Willow, have a soul. The vamp-Willow, did not." He knocked at the door and a few seconds later it swung open.

A tall, heavy-set teen with short brown hair, a twice-broken nose, and a letterman's jacket stepped into view. He frowned at the sight of Angel, then turned to Xander and Willow.

"All done in here?" Larry asked as he glanced about the room. The storage rooms and offices in the basement of Sunnydale High School had been converted into makeshift sleeping quarters, dens, and … in the present case … a safe space filled with couches, chairs, and not a single sharp object.

Angel nodded. "Yeah. They just need more time."

"Don't we all," Larry said as he walked over to an easy chair leaning against the wall nearest the door and sat down. "I'll keep an eye on them … vampire." The last word was spoken in an angry mutter, and Angel paused on his way out the door to fix Larry with a questioning stare.

"Something you want to say?" he growled.

Larry shook his head and studiously kept his eyes fixed on Xander and Willow.

The moment lingered for an intensely uncomfortable few seconds, then a short young woman with shoulder length light brown hair, blue eyes, and a green and brown dress appeared in the opening.

Tara knocked on the still-open door and stared at Angel. "Am I interrupting?"

"No, of course not," Willow interjected. "Come in, Tara."

For the first time during the conversation, Angel saw Willow smile.

"Lotta visitors today," Larry said as he folded his arms behind his head.

Angel and Tara switched places, then Angel lingered at the door as a question occurred to him. "Xander, Willow, I've been meaning to ask … that night we found you, why did the Master have you two in cages at the Bronze?"

"He thought we were crazy," Xander explained, "what with the talk of interdimensional twins and alternate worlds."

Angel nodded. "That makes sense. It all does sound a bit crazy."

"More than a bit," Tara added, and she and Willow both giggled at the comment.

Angel closed the door behind him as he left. The concrete corridors, storage rooms, and abandoned spaces of Sunnydale High School made for convenient training spaces and barely livable makeshift apartments, but over the past few weeks they'd begun to give him the same trapped feeling that he'd been subjected to while chained in a cell.

It must be dark outside by now … after a microwaved cup of B-positive, I'll head out.

There were people in Sunnydale who needed help, and a lot of vampires on whom he could work out his frustrations. When he reached the metal door to the room he'd converted into his flat, he worked the knob, swung it open, and found Buffy Summers waiting inside for him. She wasn't going through his things, and she didn't look angry, she was just waiting with a determined look on her face.

If he had any breath, the sight of her green eyes, blonde hair, and slim figure would have taken it away. The moment he'd seen her through the bars of his cell, he'd known that there was something about her. He felt something when he looked at her, and though she denied it, he thought that she felt it, too. He wanted to run his finger along the scar bisecting her lip and hold her close and tell her that she wasn't alone, that there were people in this world who would help. The way she moved, the way she looked, it was like a poison coursing through his cold, dead veins.

The thought of Spike touching her made him sick to his stomach.

. . . . . . . . .

"I really appreciate you taking the time to talk to Xander and Willow," she said as Angel stepped into his apartment. He didn't seem irritated to find her waiting, but if he had, she would have reminded him that he had told her that she was welcome anytime.

Angel had made his space comfier than she and Spike had managed in their only slightly larger room, but the apartment still felt cramped. Rugs covered the entirety of the concrete floor, black and white photos adorned the walls, every lamp and item of furniture looked like it had been made back in the 30s or 40s, and the bed was …

No, I'm not going to be looking at Angel's bed.

She gathered her thoughts and continued. "They're having a really hard time, and you understand what they're going through."

"When your soul is returned, the memories are overwhelming, to say the least," Angel replied, "but they'll get over it. Eventually." He narrowed his eyes. "Xander and I were business partners? Really? Him?"

She nodded. "People grow up."

"I guess so," Angel said, though he sounded entirely unconvinced. "Now then, Buffy, I don't think you traipsed all the way down here to my corner of the basement just to say thanks. What's on your mind?"

Here we go.

"The guys could have used you on that patrol a few nights ago," she informed him. "The one you were supposed to be on from the beginning, and not only at the end when they were jumped by an entire nest of vamps."

Angel pulled on his black coat, ran a comb through his already combed hair, and tucked a stake into a pocket. "I was there when it counted," he reminded her. "Saved Larry's ass, if I recall, not that he displayed any gratitude."

"He probably would have been more thankful if he'd known he could count on you following the schedule."

Angel turned to her, and her breath caught in her throat and her heart fluttered as he stared down at her with his dark eyes. His chest didn't move, the vein in his neck didn't pulse, and he loomed over in a way that he had never quite managed when she'd met him in life.

His skin would be cold to my touch, but if he took a hot bath, he'd probably feel … what am I thinking?

"I don't work for them, or for you," Angel reminded her. "I appreciate you pulling me out of that cell, and I'm here to help, but it will be on my terms, not on your schedule."

The flutter in her chest was immediately replaced by bristling irritation. "Don't do that," she scolded him.

Angel blinked a few times in confusion. "Do what?"

"Don't give me the brush off like I'm some random asshole. You came all the way to Sunnydale to help me, got tortured for months for your trouble, and now you're going to pretend like you don't care that I need your help? That's bullshit, Angel."

Her words seemed to cow him a bit, but not enough. "Buffy, all I'm saying is that you've got your thing, and I've got mine."

"Is your thing leaving patrols hung out to dry?" She stepped closer and she didn't think it was her imagination that he tensed at her nearness. "Cause if that's your thing, your thing sucks."

"The White Hats were fighting long before I got here."

She laughed and folded her arms. "Long before Spike and I rescued you, you mean?"

"I just said thanks about twenty seconds ago!"

His attitude wasn't budging, and she needed it to budge, and she decided that she was going to have to say things that she was hoping could be left unsaid indefinitely.

"Do you think I haven't noticed?" she asked. "You've started sulking, and moping, and you've become all about the lone wolf attitude, and I don't think it has anything to do with fighting evil on your own terms. You took a few weeks to heal, you seemed to be on board with how we were doing things for maybe a month, and then you began commencing with the cold shoulder a few weeks ago. I'm pretty sure that I know what your change in attitude is really about."

"And what is it really about, Buffy?" he asked.

"Oh, c'mon!" she said in a manner that she hoped captured how exasperated she was with having to tiptoe around Angel's feelings. "I can't be the first girl who's turned you down. You're putting people's lives at risk cause the exciting new slayer you just met is already seeing someone."

Angel blinked a few times, shuffled his feet, and crossed his arms. "I don't know where this is coming from, but I can assure you that …"

She held up a hand and interrupted him. "Stop. Just … stop."

He ignored her and continued. "I was already getting food delivered, I wanted to watch a movie, and you seemed bored. That's all it was."

She hoped that his excuses sounded as cringeworthy and awkward to him as they did to her. "Oh really?" she asked. "Inviting me for pizza, movie, and chill in your storage room-turned-vampire-bedroom-lair? On an evening when Spike happened to be gone on an overnight trip doing something I'm not at all curious about?"

At least Spike came back with enough money that we won't have to worry about finances for a while.

"That was a strictly platonic invitation," Angel protested, "so that we could get to know each other better."

She narrowed her eyes. "A platonic invitation to watch Ghost?"

"It's a good movie!" he spluttered. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got things to do, so I'll let you get over yourself on your own time."

He sidestepped to maneuver past her, and she matched his movements and blocked his path.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"You weren't nearly as whiny when I knew you last," she informed him.

Angel rubbed his forehead and frowned at her. "You know, everybody hates it when you do that, including me."

"Do what?" she asked, even though she knew very well what he was talking about.

"Pretend you know us," he explained. "You don't know us." He made a brushing motion with his hand. "Would you mind stepping aside? I'm leaving."

She shook her head. "You can't."

Angel stepped forward, and she wondered if he meant to take her into his arms or try to toss her out of the way.

Wait … what?

"Are you going to stop me?" he asked. "If you quit dropping your shoulder before you throw a left, you might have a chance."

Goddamn it, I thought I'd broken that habit.

"Don't be like this, Angel," she told him, and she kept her voice carefully neutral and threat-free. "We have to talk."

"Talk?" he asked as he turned away, walked over to a cubby-hole lined, rolltop desk, and straightened a green-shaded lamp. "Okay, let's talk. Let's really talk." He turned back to her. "What was I to you in that other world?"

Shit.

"We were friends," she answered immediately. "We fought together for about a year, knew each other well, faced a lot of heinous evil side by side."

He had begun shaking his head halfway through her response. "No, not you you, I'm talking about the other Buffy, the one who did go to Sunnydale."

Double shit.

Now it was her turn to shift on nervous feet. "Why do you ask?"

He moved close to her again, and she was certain that he'd put on some sort of old-fashioned sandalwood cologne. "You know why I'm asking."

"I don't want to talk about that," she told him. "That world's business is that world's business."

"Hey, you promised all of us, no secrets, remember?" he asked as he spread his arms wide and flashed her a cartoonishly wide grin. "What you know, we know. Didn't you say that?"

She grimaced at the accuracy of his recollection. "I was talking about the job, about saving the world, not about personal life choices that are none of your business."

He pointed at her, and though he was still grinning, his eyes did not shine with any semblance of humor. "You don't have to say it … I know what the answer is, and it's what I figured. I think, somehow, I knew the second I laid eyes on you."

Gulp.

She steadied her emotions and got a grip on herself. "Have you been moping in here, not helping with patrols, not being there as backup, because you're pining over some imaginary romance that you can't be sure even happened?"

"Oh, I'm sure," he said with a nod of the head.

She reached behind her back, Angel stiffened as though he expected her to draw a stake, and she froze and shot him a reproachful glance until he relaxed. When he was at ease again, she pulled a long, gleaming syringe filled with glowing green fluid from the rear pocket of her jeans.

"This is what I really came down here to talk about," she said as she held up the hypodermic needle. "Let's cut to the chase, take the shot, Angel."

"No," he replied.

She lowered the syringe to her side and shook her head. "Because of your damned pride? Still?"

"Do we have to go over this again?" he asked. "Becoming human means that I become useless. I need to fight, I need to …"

"If you whine any version of I-need-to-atone-for-my-sins, I swear to the Powers that I will squirt gun you with holy water right now."

Angel backed away with a look of concern.

"That wasn't a serious threat, Angel," she informed him while rolling her eyes. "C'mon."

"Oh," he said he straightened himself up. "I knew that."

She sighed, raised the syringe, and stared at the hypnotically glowing contents. "Kill Angelus, Angel. He hurt people I care about, and decades later you can still see that they suffer from what he did to them. You're being reckless with people's lives."

"I don't see any moments of pure happiness in my future, so I doubt Angelus represents a danger to anybody," he replied, and his voice was so laden with pathos and self-pity that it was all she could do not to laugh.

Giles is right, he's like a walking soap opera, and wow is it ador … mind on business, Buffy!

"I didn't want it to come to this, but everybody is in agreement," she said as she walked over to the coffee table sitting in front of his small, ancient-leathered couch, and set down the syringe on its glass surface. "You either take the shot or you leave."

"Fine," he replied in a studiously indifferent manner. "I'll find a new place to live. It's not like this school basement has much going for it."

Other than the fact that I sleep about a couple hundred feet away, which is why you're here.

"Not another basement, Angel, another city."

That seemed to catch his attention. "What?"

She pointed at the needle lying on the coffee table. "I mean it. If you walk out that door as a vampire, you may as well be carrying a bag packed with whatever is important to you because we don't want to see you in Sunnydale ever again."

"Buffy," he said, and he actually sounded wounded, "I know we just met two months ago, but I came here for you. You can trust me."

She was happy to see the façade of indifference melt from his features as he spoke.

"You're not the problem," she reminded him, "and I know I can trust you. In fact, we need your help, and losing you may get a bunch of us killed, but we can't have you around when you're carrying a demon inside you. Angelus needs to end, Angel, and you deserve to really live. I know you want to play the martyr, but I've seen you alive, and you were a hell of a lot happier."

Of course, that might have been because you had me.

He paced back and forth a few times, dark coat swirling behind him, then turned to her with an upraised palm. "I'll make you a deal. After the Master is dealt with, once he's dust, I'll think about it. I'll really think about it."

She shook her head. "No. Not after, not later, not even tomorrow. You become human now, or you leave town." She walked forward, reached out, and grabbed one of his hands. As she expected, it was cold, but it was also large, and strong, and …

Focus!

"If for no other reason," she whispered, and she knew what she was doing was horribly unfair, "do it for me. Please." She released his hand and pointed at the needle. "You want salvation, Angel? It's sitting right there."

The moment hung for a long time, she couldn't meet his eyes, and when he gave the answer she suspected, she found that she could not bear to spend one more second in a room with him.

"I can't," he said. "I'm sorry."

She backed up a few steps so he couldn't see the terrible disappointment in her eyes. "I'm going to miss you, even if you are incredibly stubborn and pig-headed."

"I'll miss you, too," he said. "I heard that you were special, that the world needed a slayer like you, but I didn't expect you to be so …"

His words trailed off, and she found her curiosity unbearably piqued. "What?"

"Strong," he replied. "Smart … beautiful."

Danger!

"I appreciate that," she said, and she tried not to sound encouraging as she spoke. "I really do, but also, don't."

"Don't what?" he asked in an obnoxiously innocent fashion.

"You know exactly what, Angel."

He nodded and smiled at her. It was his first genuine smile of the conversation, and the room suddenly felt like far more of an agreeable place to be. "You're right, I shouldn't."

He left his lips parted slightly after the words left his mouth, and the urge to take his hand again to try to convince him to change his mind was near overpowering.

I will not beg him to do the right thing.

She stood there in silence, unsure of what to say next, and Angel glanced in the direction of her and Spike's room.

"Spike?" he said, and somehow, he made the name sound like a question.

She nodded. "Spike," she confirmed.

Angel scratched at the back of his head, furrowed his brow, and said, "I don't mean to pry, well that's not true, I most definitely mean to pry, but I have to ask … Spike?"

She shrugged. "Cheekbones aren't enough?"

"Hey forget it," he said. "It's your business, not mine."

I'm the one who ventured to another world and saw all of our fates, and I suppose a little curiosity is fair.

"Look, Angel," she tried to explain, "Spike was willing to risk everything, including his own life, to save me. I was a mess back then, maybe I still am, I don't know, but I do know I wouldn't have made it without him … and I don't just mean physically, either. I mean mentally, emotionally, everything. I needed someone who was mean enough to fight through all the walls I'd put up, who cared about me as a person, not as the Slayer, and who didn't mind that that my head wasn't screwed on right. Spike was always there for me, and also, yeah, cheekbones."

"Fair enough," he said in a wistful, melancholy, decidedly soap-opera-ish manner. "I guess this is goodbye, Buffy Summers."

"You'll change your mind," she said with a confidence she absolutely did not feel. "I know you will."

When he shook his head, it broke her heart. "I won't, but hey, it may have taken a while, but I'm glad we met."

She didn't know what to say to that, so she nodded, opened the door, and stepped outside. After she'd closed the door behind her, she turned to find Spike leaning against the concrete wall of the fluorescent lit, labyrinthine basement.

"Spike!" she gasped. "Were you eavesdropping?"

"Of course," he replied in a nonchalant fashion while he burnished his nails on the white shirt that he wore beneath his customary black leather coat. "Sounded very dramatic in there. Positively CW, in fact."

"Listening in on other people's conversations is one of your nastier habits," she informed him, "but it does mean a lot that you trusted me to handle that on my own."

He seemed surprised by her comment. "Hey, I trust you."

She moved to the side and stared in the direction of the stairs leading upwards. "I'm feeling the need to get out of this basement. Library?"

Spike glanced at Angel's door. "I'll be up in a second … I think Nosferhairspray and I need to have a little chat."

Oh, come on …

"Spike," she whispered, "didn't you just say you trusted me?"

He frowned and shook his head. "Not about his puppydog infatuation with you, about the magical-healing-demon-blood." Spike glanced her over and chuckled. "Not everything is about you, slayer."

"Fine," she said as she moved to go. "You see if you can talk some sense into him."

. . . . . . . . .

"Spike," Angel said when he stepped into the room without knocking.

Somehow, he made the simple recitation of his name sound like an insult.

"Yup, it's me," Spike confirmed. "Thought you and I should have a chat. I know you probably think that we've spent quite a few decades together, but the truth is that I don't think we've exchanged more than a few sentences at a time since we sprung you from the Master's clutches."

"You're the same guy," Angel said. "You know it, and I know it."

He walked over to the couch, sat down, and interlaced his hands behind his heads. "Except I'm alive, that's a big change. Immortality is overrated, and nothing matters much unless there's an end-date."

"Here it comes," Angel said with a shake of the head. "You playing bad cop with Buffy's good cop? Here to tell me that if I stay a vampire, I'll be your enemy, or something?"

Spike laughed, and it was a harsh, barking sound. "You're not any brighter in this world than you were in mine. No, you won't be our enemy, but you will be persona non grata, and that means we won't have your help." He put his hands on his knees and leaned forward. "That means Buffy won't have your help, and this Sunnydale, the state it's in? She needs all the help she can get."

"I can't help anyone if I can't fight."

Spike waved him off. "That's not what your stubbornness is about, and you know it."

Angel frowned at him, then sat on the bed and stared across the room. "What's it about, then?"

"You think you deserve this," Spike said, and his voice had become serious. "Because of what you've done, because of the blood on your hands."

Angel shrugged. "Just because you don't feel like you owe the world anything, doesn't mean I have to feel the same."

Spike continued as if Angel hadn't spoken. "Mate, take it from me, you don't deserve what's been done to you." He gestured towards Angel. "I mean, I completely, utterly, and entirely hate you, and I don't think this is fair. That should tell you something."

"I thought Buffy wanted us to give each other a shot," Angel replied. "We're at hate, already?"

Spike rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "There's other stuff besides hate, too, but hey … it is what it is." He crossed his arms across his chest and continued, "Let's come at this from a different angle. Becoming human, it's a big change. You have this whole vision of your life, being the ensouled vampire fighting evil from the shadows, fighting darkness with darkness, and I'll admit, you had that working for you for a time, but it didn't last." Even though Angel, as always, looked ridiculous with his affectation-of-a-jacket, protruding brow, and hangdog expression, Spike tried to maintain a serious tone. "I once had a conversation with a bloke who I was so angry with I could kill him. I mean, really kill him, and make that killing hurt a long time."

"Are you going somewhere with this?"

Spike waved off the question. "Let me finish. Anyway, I tried to tell this eminently-killable-bloke that he and I had lived it up and had a good time, we're talking blood, fun, immortality, the kind of existence from which legends are made."

Angel stared up at the ceiling. "This bloke was me, wasn't it?"

"That's right," Spike confirmed. "We had our problems, but we were together a long time, and then you had to go and get a soul and muck it up. I thought I was angry enough to kill you, but what I was really angry about was that you had changed, and I hadn't. You tried to make me understand that, and I kept telling you that you were wrong, that nothing had to change, that we were the exception to the rule."

"Your point?"

"My point, mousse-for-brains," Spike replied, "is that you were right, and I was wrong. We were just going through the motions, walking through the parts of living that we could manage, but we were dead, empty things, and it was being alive that finally changed that for me."

Angel's brow furrowed in surprise. "You, admitting you were wrong?"

"Like I said, things change," Spike admitted. "I was wrong. Our lives, our miserable, eternal lives, were a dead end. I should have listened to you, it would have saved me a lot of heartache." Spike stood up, looked down at the syringe lying on the coffee table, then continued. "It's wrapped up in your head that you should suffer, but I've seen what comes of you carrying Angelus around inside you … you think you'll manage, but you won't. A spell, or something, will come up, and that vampire will hurt people. He'll try to hurt Buffy most of all. I've seen it before, and I promise you, he will do everything he can to make her suffer."

At the mention of Angelus hurting Buffy, for the first time during the conversation, Angel appeared to truly listen.

"Not that I'm scared of Angelus, mind you," Spike hastily continued. "I'd off you if you turned, you can be sure of that, long before the rest of these White Knickers …"

Angel interrupted and said, "White Hats"

Spike waved off the correction, "Whatever, the point is, I'd deal. But you should take the shot anyway."

"Why?"

"What those gypsies did to you, it was wrong," Spike informed him. "Their vengeance curse is bullshit, and you should be done with it."

"This is easy for you to say," Angel said, but Spike could tell that he was beginning to mull over what he was hearing. "You're alive, but you can still make a difference. You still have powers."

"Maybe," Spike admitted. "But I'm not what I was. I mean, I carry a squirt gun of holy water around, for Pete's sake, how unsporting is that?" A notion occurred to him. "You know, Buffy lost her powers in the other world, and she got them back. Giles, the other Giles, he knew all about it and he always took notes. I'm sure there's something that can be done."

"How'd she do it?" Angel asked, and his voice was eager and curious. "Get her powers back, I mean?"

Spike waggled his finger at him. "First things first. Take the bloody jab and stop putting everybody else in harm's way." He picked up the syringe, tossed it through the air, and Angel with a panicked expression snatched the glittering needle out of the air.

Angel held the needle in his hands, stared down at it for a long while, then looked at Spike.

"I know you don't want me around … around Buffy, I mean. I thought you'd be coming in here to make sure I left town, and to remind me that once I was gone, I should stay gone."

Spike pursed his lips and shook his head. "Angel, I may want you gone, but Buffy doesn't. She has her reasons, and I want her to get what she wants, even in this particular case." He shrugged his shoulders. "Besides, if I felt I had to ask you to stay away from Buffy, what she and I have wouldn't mean very much, would it? I think a hell of a lot more of her than that, and that's why I know you two haven't, and I know that she wouldn't … at least not without first giving me the courtesy of a head's up that she was seeking greener pastures."

"You've changed," Angel said. "It's odd to see, Spike. I mean, you're still a complete asshole, but a different kind of asshole."

Spike laughed, Angel joined in, and for a few seconds they didn't hate each other's guts. "Buffy is a good person, Angel … a lot better than you and I ever were, and you should trust her." He pointed at the needle. "We'll work on getting you your powers back later, but for right now, get rid of that monster inside you." He stood up, straightened his jacket, and moved towards the door. "Besides," he said as he reached for the doorknob, "the first time you taste hot chocolate with working tastebuds, you're going to cream your pants." He swung the door open, turned to go, and called back. "You also probably don't want to spend eternity as a eunuch."

"I'm not a eunuch!" Angel called out as Spike walked through the door and closed it behind him.

. . . . . . . . .

Buffy was leaning with crossed arms against the concrete wall when Spike emerged into the basement corridor.

"You were listening in on Angel and my conversation?" Spike asked with an aggrieved expression on his face.

She shrugged and the corners of her mouth turned up in an impish grin as she replied, "I learned it from watching you."

"Fine," Spike said heatedly. "I'm heading up to the library to figure out where we're killing things tonight."

He began to walk past her, and she reached out and touched his arm. She didn't need to grab it, as soon as he felt her touch he stopped.

"What?" he asked.

"Spike, what I just heard in there, that's what you were like when I first met you … in that alley," she said.

Her green eyes glittered in the lights, her hair was the most lustrous shade of blonde, and Spike, as always, was overcome by how much he wanted her. This wasn't the time or place, he decided with reluctance, so he simply waited and listened.

"The guy in the alley, the one who talked to Angel, that's who I want to be with." She rubbed at his forearm. "I know you've got a rep to maintain, and I will admit that the macho posturing has a certain charming excitement to it, but what's happening in Sunnydale is real. People are dying, I have to make a lot of tough choices, and do you understand what I'm saying?"

"Nobody has used the word macho in decades," he informed her.

"That was then, this is now," she replied. "You've been around the block a lot more than I have, way too many blocks, actually, and this is hard for me, but I just need you to be more real, Spike."

She seemed so vulnerable that he couldn't help but try to reassure her in the best way that he knew how.

When the lengthy kiss had finished, Buffy peeled herself away from the concrete wall and stared at him with mussed hair and smeared lipstick. "I'm not sure that was an answer."

"I get it," he said. "Now then," he gestured towards the stairs, "shall we?"

Buffy glanced at the door to Angel's room. "Should we wait and make sure he does it?"

"Naw," Spike called back as he headed towards the exit. "He'll do it."

. . . . . . . . .

"But you didn't actually see him inject himself with glowing demon blood?" Larry asked. Giles, Oz, Larry, Percy, and half a dozen other White Hats had gathered for the night's patrol, and Buffy felt very much alone as she tried to convince everyone that Angel had been convinced."

"He'll do it," Spike announced in a loud, firm voice while he tested the weight of an axe plucked from a rolling trashcan full of weapons that someone had been kind enough to wheel into the library.

Giles cleared his throat loudly enough that the chatter ceased. "If Buffy and Spike say that the problem has been taken care of, then we should believe them."

Not everyone seemed convinced, but nobody argued the point.

"Now then," Giles said, "we have another matter to discuss."

"Good news or bad news?" Someone called out.

Giles smiled. "Very good news in fact." The smile vanished. "Albeit, very confusing news."

"Confusing good news is better than confusing bad news," Oz observed.

Buffy smiled at the remark.

Now that sounded like Oz.

Giles turned to Buffy. "Did you know someone named Kendra in the other reality?"

Buffy blinked a few times in surprise. "Kendra? I knew of her … she was a slayer, she came to Sunnydale, and she died in Sunnydale."

Spike stiffened, and then Buffy remembered a few of the details of how Kendra had died.

They don't need to know about Spike and Drusilla's involvement.

"Well," Giles continued, "she apparently is a slayer in this reality, as well. She is very much alive, the Watchers Council has taken her in hand, and she is on her way to Sunnydale." An irritated expression fluttered over Giles's features. "The Council appears very unconvinced, Buffy, that you have not shuffled off the mortal coil. The fact that you will not even speak to them over the telephone, I might add, makes it rather difficult for me to argue the point without sounding like a raving lunatic."

"You shouldn't speak to them either," Buffy pointed out as she put her hands on her hips and stared at him with an angry expression. "If you knew what I knew, you'd block their numbers and put their texts on read."

Everyone in the room exchanged confused glances, and Buffy had to remind herself that cellphone technology was still rather primitive in the late nineties.

"In any event," Giles said, "a new Slayer has been called and thus they assume you are dead."

"But I'm alive," Buffy pointed out. "Maybe when I left this dimension it triggered a new slayer?"

Giles shook his head. "Slayer magic … all magic, actually … is demonic in nature, and that means it ripples across dimensions. You traveling between worlds shouldn't have triggered a new slayer, only your death would have."

"There were two slayers in my world for a long time," Spike said by way of interruption. "Buffy and Kendra, then Buffy and Faith."

"How did that happen?" Giles asked. "There are no recorded occurrences of multiple slayers in any literature I have ever come across."

"I died," Buffy said, and the room fell silent. "Not me me, but the other Buffy, in that world. She drowned, a new slayer was called, then she got CPR'ed after a few minutes."

"Quite the loophole," Oz said.

There were a number of nods in agreement throughout the room.

Spike rubbed at his forehead. "Buffy, you drowned."

She stared at him for a few seconds, then asked, "So?"

"You drowned," Spike said again. "Not the other Buffy, but you. Don't you remember? You jumped off a bloody cliff, I dragged you out of a bloody lake, and after the water got pumped out of you, you came to."

Spike's right … I had forgotten.

"I drowned," she said. "That's right. Shit."

"Doesn't sound like the worst thing in the world to me," Larry said as his shoulders shrugged beneath his letterman's jacket. "Two slayers are better than one, aren't they?"

"How many times do you think we could drown Buffy and get new slayers?" one of the White Hats called out.

A number of piercing glares were fixed in the speaker's direction.

In a chagrined, chastened manner, the White Hat added, "Just brainstorming here."

"In any event, Kendra should arrive in a matter of days, and I imagine she and her Watcher will wish to …"

Giles's words trailed off mid-sentence, and he stepped away from the book counter to stare towards the twin, swinging doors of the library. A tall, dark-coated figure stepped in with hesitant footsteps and surveyed them with a cautious, wary expression.

"Angel," Buffy said. She stepped close to him and examined his face.

He's alive.

A flush brightened his pale features as he neared, his chest rose and fell with true breath, and she could see the pulsing of the blood in his neck.

"You did it," she said. "Thank you."

"I did," he confirmed. "Though I will admit, I'm still not sure it was the right thing."

I heard what Spike said … he did it because he feared he might someday be a danger to me. That's not the best of reasons, but I'm just glad it's done.

Spike set down the battle axe, walked over, extended his hand, and after a moment of uncertainty, Angel took it. A second later he winced, and Spike smiled in satisfaction before he released his grip.

"Quite the handshake," Angel said to Spike.

"Welcome to the land of the living," Spike said. "What's the first thing you want to do?"

Angel rubbed at the back of his head. "Actually … anyone else in the mood for a donut?"

A thought occurred to Buffy, and she turned to Giles and said, "Now it's safe for you to call Jenny."

Buffy was fairly certain that Giles smiled far more broadly at that comment than he had at Angel rejoining humanity.