Chapter 4

Willow was in her zone, she sat on her floor surrounded by notes and papers with her homemade computer nestled comfortably in her lap. This computer was her baby, she had worked on it and improved it for over 15 years now, it was her hacker computer and could do practically anything, It was a completely closed system, and so souped-up, Batman and Ironman would be jealous. Willow knew that her friends knew she could hack, but she also didn't think they knew just how good she was at it. Actually, for the majority of her middle school days and up until Buffy, Willow was a white hat. Well, more morally grey than white considering she's on the FBI's most wanted list and a Columbia drug lord's hit list, well several hit lists by now... could you still be on a hit list if you were already technically dead? Gah, bad tunnel thoughts, focus Willow focus.

Right, Willow didn't have the original copy of the spell that Ms. Calendar had; she had given that to Giles, and she was pretty sure he destroyed it. Not that Willow blamed him—after everything that had happened, destroying the spell made sense. But now she needed it, and she couldn't exactly walk up to Giles and say, "Hey Giles, remember the restoration spell? The one Ms. Calendar died for? Yeah, I need to check that out, please." That was out of the question. So, she pulled out her big guns, Aka, her white hat alias Root, she thought it was a clever play on words as she was named after a tree.

The language of the spell wasn't all that difficult to transcribe—she could do that with her eyes closed—but just transcribing it wasn't enough. The wording didn't make sense on its own. Willow had seen some spells like this before; they only made sense once paired with the correct type of spell. It was like the Enigma code: without the right cipher, the text was just gibberish.

The trouble was, finding the right spell type was like finding a needle in a haystack. No, statistically, it was more like finding a specific needle in a pile of needles the size of a haystack. Willow sighed and rubbed her forehead. There was no way she was going to figure this out by chance; she needed a starting point. Taking a deep breath, she buckled down, ignoring everything around her.

Willow hadn't wanted to do this out of respect for Ms. Calendar, but she had no choice now. Ms. Calendar was the only one who had the restoration spell, and Willow needed to know how she had managed it. So, Willow delved into everything and anything related to Jenny Calendar or rather, Janna of the Kalderash.

Turn's out, Jenny wasn't the only one to go techno with her spells and witchcraft. The whole clan was techno and kept in touch through it. It was wonderful for Willow, It was more difficult to hack around, it seemed that they had warding and protection spell's mingled in with their coding. Thankfully, Willow had all of Ms. Calendar's information and access from when she had to take over teaching computer class. Willow used her computer to cloak her presence using Jenny's to bypass the spells. Once she was through, she could see everything.

There, in the most heavily guarded area was the spell, Oh how interesting, It looked like it was a subtype of a Whispered Madness Curse and a λύειν and δέειν binding spell, no wonder nobody ever figured it out before, it was a new type of spell, one that they invented on their own and had never been used since. Oh and look there's the original spell, wonderful, Willow can cross reference it to the one branded on her chest to correctly identify the word placement. Quickly Willow transcribed the spell and the spell type on paper, She wasn't stupid enough to try and take it. That would set off a ridiculous amount of alerts. It took her less than a minute and Willow slipped back out of the clan's presence while building up blocks and misdirection as she left so no one could try and back-hack her should they ever notice, but Willow doubted it.

Once Willow had it, Willow put all the information she found in front of her, she had the original spell, the one from her chest, and the spell types. Glancing back and forth Willow frowned, the one on her chest was different from the original, that shouldn't have happened. Willow bit her lip in worry, the one she had hacked could be a false one, designed to throw off, well people like her. It was the most likely answer, it's what Willow would have done. If it was then the words paired with the spell should be gibberish or would alert them that someone stole their spell. Willow thought for a minute, all spells needed magic to feed on to work. It was like a car, no gas, no go. As long as Willow didn't fuel anything with her magic she should be able to transcribe it at least. Nodding her head at her plan Willow began translating the spell. It took 10 minutes. The original said this.

What was lost, shall be found.

Not dead, nor not of the living.

Spirits of the interregnum, I call.

Gods, bind him, Forever curse his heart for the evil he did.

I call on you, Gods, do not ignore this supplication!

Neither dead nor living.

Let the orb be the vessel to carry his soul to him.

So be it! So be it!

Now! Now!

The one on her chest said this.

What was lost, shall be found.

Not dead, nor not of the living.

I call you, spirits of the interregnum.

I call on you, Gods, do not ignore this supplication!

Let the orb be the vessel to carry the soul to the body.

It is written, this power is my people's right to wield.

So be it! So be it!

Now!

Well, damn. It looks like she does have the right spell, and not only does she have a permanent soul but so does Angel, Shit, what should she do about that nugget of information?

Buffy's thoughts raced as she automatically dodged and swiped at a big nasty of the night, some sort of slug-looking monster, it was fat and slimy, probably twice her size with a giant mouth, lined with razor-sharp teeth that could swallow Giles up whole. It wasn't too difficult to deal with, She, Riley, and Spike were distracting the thing while Anya, Tara, and Giles were caging it with salt. Xander was blasting the thing with an old potato gun, transformed salt gun. The whole thing took, maybe ten minutes before the big bad was dead, and boy did it smell rank.

"Whew smell's like the aftermath of a bad enchilada," Xander said wrinkling his nose.

"Ugh, I think it's worse," Buffy replied, wiping some slime off her face. "We need to bury this thing or something before it attracts more trouble."

Giles cleared his throat before wiping off his glasses "Well done everyone, Let's dispose of this creature properly, Xander do you have more salt on you? The salt should burn up the rest of the body,"

Xander nodded while patting his bulging bag strapped around him.

"Right here G-man" he said before moving to dump a bunch of salt on the remains, Giles sighed wearily at the nickname before moving on.

"Yes well, That was good thinking with the salt gun, Xander. That was really quite an ingenious solution,"

Xander grinned, clearly pleased with himself. "Yeah, well, desperate times call for desperate measures. Plus, Anya's idea of using salt was genius."

Anya beamed. "I told you, salt is a natural repellent for many creatures. You should listen to me more often."

Buffy chuckled but her mind was still racing. Something about Willow had been off. She couldn't quite put her finger on it, but it was gnawing at her. She'd been acting strange, distant. Buffy made a mental note to check in on her as soon as possible.

"Ahh man! I got demon slime on my new shoes" Xander cried as he hobbled away to try and wipe it off in the grass, Spike snorted before lighting a cigarette. "Willow's so lucky she's not here right now." Xander continued wrinkling his nose in disgust.

"Where is Red anyway's she ran off on me earlier," Spike asked as he released the smoke from his long-dead lungs.

"What do you mean she ran off on you earlier? Why would she even go to see you?" Buffy questioned, hands on her hips and scowling at him eyes narrowed. Spike rolled his eyes.

"Daft bint. Red visits me every day." he sneered at her, and Buffy felt her hackles rise up.

"No she wouldn't!" Xander piped up ignoring his slimy shoe to go on the defense. "Our Will's would never willingly hang out with you." Anya cocked her head to the side and looked confused.

"Yes, she does," Anya said looking at Xander like he grew another head, and Xander and Buffy whipped their heads to look at her. Spike rolled his eyes before dropping his cigarette and crushing it beneath his boot.

"Uh Honey, no she doesn't," Xander said carefully.

"Actually she does," Riley piped up wanting to flinch at how fast Buffy and Xander looked at him. "Willow gives Spike his pay and blood every night, I see her heading there almost every night while on patrol." Riley clarified trying to ease Buffy's concern.

"Oh," Xander said wind knocked out of his sails. "But she doesn't like hangout, hangout with him right?" Xander said giving Spike a side eye.

"Christ you lot are dense," he said shoving his hand in his pocket and shifting his weight. "Look all I asked was where Red was tonight," he said while giving them an annoyed look.

"Umm, she's sick." Tara's small voice piped up as she nervously picked at the loose threads on her sleeves and looked down to avoid his gaze. Spike raised his brow at them.

"Really?" he asked although his tone told them he didn't believe them,

"Yeah, really," Buffy said, trying to sound convincing. "She wasn't feeling well, so she's at home resting."

Spike looked unconvinced "Didn't seem all that sick to me when she dropped my blood off and took off like she had hellhounds on her tail,"

Buffy's eyes widened, and she exchanged a quick glance with Xander and Giles. "She... she what?" Buffy stammered, struggling to keep her voice steady. Anya frowned.

"That doesn't make sense, We saw her earlier, she looked like shit," Anya said in her usual blunt way. Spike shrugged carelessly.

"I'm off, it was a pleasure as always Slayer." he mocked as he stalked off into the night in that predatory way of his before disappearing leaving the group in worried contemplated silence.

"Running is bad for sick people isn't?" Anya demanded tuning to Xander for answers. Giles nodded.

"Yes well, she probably was feeling ill and wanted to get home as quickly as possible so she could rest," Giles concluded fiddling with his glasses as he usually did when in thought.

"But why wouldn't she just ask someone else to do it if she's ill?" Tara asked while squirming. This time it was Xander who sighed, his shoulders slumping under an invisible weight.

"It probably never even occurred to her," Xander said unusually serious.

"What do you mean?" Riley asked.

"Willow doesn't ask for help, not with anything," Xander said crossing his arms defensively. Buffy frowned feeling hurt for some reason.

"Why not? Were her best friends, she can ask for help with anything," Buffy insisted hoping that this panging of betrayal would go away. Xander's jaw clenched, having an internal war with himself before his face pinched into something uncomfortable.

"Me, Willow, and Jessie were best friends because we had similar home lives, that is to say, not good ones," he said before clamming up. The air became thick and uncomfortable, and Xander sighed. "Look, Willow will be just fine, she'll come back in a week because god knows she can't stand being away from school for so long and everything will be fine."

Everyone nodded, already gathering their materials. As the group worked together to clean up, Buffy's thoughts kept drifting back to Willow. She needed to make sure her friend was okay, and soon.

"How much longer?" Cordelia questioned for the 14 time, and it was all Angel could do to keep from snapping, his nerves were frayed thin as it is without her anxiousness. Instead, he took a calming breath.

"45 minutes." He said, Cordelia nodded wordlessly and went back to tapping her nails insistently on the window, Angel tensed and gripped the steering wheel harder before relaxing his grip, he didn't want to break it. Instead, he pushed down harder on the gas. Make that 35 minutes.

Spike had watched the little do-gooders in the shadows and quietly listened to their conversation. Spike wouldn't admit it, not even under pain of death, but Willow was his friend. For months now Spike and Willow would talk after she brought him blood. She had a curious mind, not just because she liked learning, he did too not that many people knew, but also because she was asking questions the others would be horrified by.

She asked him things like, If you're dead and your heart has stopped, how are you functioning? If you don't need your heart you at least need your brain right? You need oxygenic blood to the brain, don't you? Is your brain functioning on the borrowed blood you drink? How does it get to your brain? It was questions he had never considered before and they spent hours debating the ways his body still functioned now that it was dead. It wasn't just that, she asked about him too, about his life as a vampire, how his perspectives changed from when he was human, and whether the adjustment of Black and Women's rights were hard on him after his many years of such a closed-minded belief.

Willow had learned about his favorites, blood, human food, music, alcohol, marshmallows, and brought him what she could while they had engaging debates over anything and everything. Spike had never had somebody in his life that he could simply talk to. When he was human, his mum was sick, he never wanted to upset her fragile health so he only spoke of pleasant things with her. With Cecilia, well she wasn't interested in the first place. Dru, Well he couldn't speak to her, she was batshit crazy, god he loved her but by the devil, it was hard to be with her, that girl was toxic. Darla was always on about some fashion thing and Spike couldn't care less. Angel, well the less said about Peaches the better, always stroking his own ego, among other things, the bastard.

But Willow, she was something else, she even thought Angel was a Peachy bastard. Course she was nice about it, "He's...If Angel could be seen by a camera, he would play a perfect Edward from Twilight," Spike had nearly died laughing at that one.

Spike actually enjoyed being around her. Spike knew Willow wasn't sick like her friends thought, he could smell illness on others, he would have smelled it on the bags she left. No something was up, and Spike was going to figure out what it was. And if what Harris had said about her past was true, well, it sounded like Willow could use someone to look after her once in a while.