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Chapter 10

“Hey guys, what’s the what?” Buffy came bouncing into the library; she seemed to be positively bubbling over with happiness.

Smiling indulgently, Giles came out of his office. He had voluntarily sequestered himself, in an effort to avoid the brooding brunette vampire and keep his temper from erupting. “You seem happy, dear?”

“Yeah, definitely lookin’ like you took your happy pills there, Buffster.” Xander joked, mentally doing a happy dance that the object of his desire hadn’t given the hated vampire any special greeting.

“Did something happen, Buffy?” Willow grinned at her friend and picking up on Buffy’s apparent happiness, she felt her own happiness bubble inside her in solidarity.

“Mom! She totally slammed Snyder,” Buffy gushed enthusiastically, “She told him that if he were like, an example of the people responsible for her child’s education, then it was no wonder that I had average grades. Which I should totally be mad about, ‘cause, hello, grades not that bad, but then she told him that he came across as a man that didn’t even like kids so maybe he should like, look for another line of work! So…not so much with the madness. I’m happy-Buffy.”

“Oh wow, can she be my mom too?” Xander asked, in awe. He momentarily thought of his own parents and stifled his groan of friendly jealousy, why couldn’t his parents be like that?

Willow, on the other hand, bit her bottom lip, internally debating whether to speak her concerns or not. Her belief that forewarned is forearmed convinced her to speak up, “You don’t think he’ll, like take it out on you, do you Buffy?”

“Don’t care,” Buffy shrugged, “The look on his face will stay with me forever.” Her smile seemed to light up the room.

“Buffy,” Angel waited until he had everyone’s attention, “You don’t have to worry about the Anointed One or his minions anymore. They’ve been taken care of.”

Buffy gave a happy squeal and raced to give him a human-breaking hug.

“Angel, are you saying that you are responsible for vanquishing the Anointed One and his minions?” Angel really didn’t like the disbelief that seemed to lace Giles’ question. Pausing briefly, he looked the watcher directly in the eye and replied firmly, “Yes, Giles. I am responsible.”

~*~*~

Silently Buffy and Spike manoeuvred the boxes filled with treasure into the safe at the Gallery; Joyce had given them the combination and alarm codes earlier. When they’d placed the final box, they made their way out of the walk-in safe, and reset everything before heading back to Giles’ with only the box of magical items. As they walked, Spike looked over at the still fuming slayer and attempted to refocus the direction of her thoughts; it was never a good thing to be around a brassed-off slayer and he didn’t want her to take her mood out on him. “Slayer, can I ask you a question?”

Looking at him warily, Buffy ventured cautiously, “What?”

“How does the memory thing work?”

“Oh that,” she was relieved at his question, she was seriously freaked by the other Buffy’s dream and in no way did she want to even think about the fantasies that the other her was now having, “It’s really weird. I know I should be wigged by having my memories disappearing, or I guess being replaced is really more accurate, but I’m not. I’m not losing the things I’m doing now, but my past is changing and that’s kinda scary ‘cause, you know, what if it gets worse or something? But then, what if it gets better?

“Right now, I don’t remember when I first met you. I remember you and I remember the whole Halloween incident and that I knew you then, but I don’t remember meeting you before then so how could I know you at Halloween? You get what I mean?”

“Yeah, I get it. But, when something happens to the other Buffy that changes your memories, you get a warnin’, right?” He tried to clarify the confusion.

Nodding excitedly in agreement, Buffy continued, “Its sooo cool, I get this like vision and it plays like a movie in my head, with me in the starring role. I see the situation so clearly and it’s like I’m suddenly reliving my memory, but it only happens with memories that are being changed, so that gives me a heads up that something’s different. Like before, I now have this memory of Angel telling us that he took care of the Anointed One, and although I don’t remember what happened in my time, I know that he didn’t take credit for it then and I know that you did it then. But I also know that you and I took the annoying one out this time, because that’s not a past past memory for me, I mean like four years past, twenty year old Buffy was involved not sixteen year old Buffy, so I know that memory can’t be altered.”

“I hate to bring this up luv, but since you mentioned the Poof, did you tell Giles about the Gypsy?” Spike knew this was going to be a difficult conversation for Buffy, but he honestly believed they had to get it out of the way before they got back to the watcher.

“No, did you?”

“No, but I think we should.” Spike offered his opinion, “Look we’re already changing history and yeah, we have to be careful, but, we might need the curse, luv.”

Thinking about it, Buffy knew he was right, but her own ambivalent feelings towards the teacher remained. She didn’t want the teacher to die. She didn’t want Angelus to make an appearance. If talking to Giles about Jenny Calendar could stop either or both of those things, then there really wasn’t much choice. “You’re right.”

~*~*~

When Buffy and Spike let themselves into Giles’ apartment, they found the agitated watcher pacing around his living room. Before they could say a word of greeting, he had launched into his tirade, “Do you know what that bastard did? Have you any idea of the height of that vampire’s gall? He actually berated me for hiding things from him. He told me that because he was the all mighty bloody champion, that the Powers That Be had called him to be MY SLAYER’S protector, that he should be the one to make all the decisions relating to Buffy. He told me that he EXPECTED a full report as to why I felt it necessary to go behind his slayer’s back and tell her mother about her calling, when I had previously been against the idea. The very idea, that that sanctimonious bore deems himself worthy of my slayer is farcical in the extreme and if that wasn’t enough, he then waited around for Buffy and took credit for the demise of the Anointed One and his minions!”

Buffy had never seen this side of her watcher. She had absolutely no idea what to say or do. She was terrified that if she said the wrong thing, she would set him off again and that was seriously the last thing she wanted. Looking to Spike for inspiration, Buffy watched in awe as the unfazed bleached blond calmly put down the box he was carrying, made Giles a drink and handed it to him. Spike then waited until Giles had finished his first and offered him a second. With the second drink, Giles seemed to calm down considerably and this helped Buffy calm down too.

Spike watched the watcher visibly relax, when his heart rate had slowed to a healthier speed, Spike took the opportunity to add some levity, “So, what you’re sayin’ is, that the Poof’s been sniffin’ his own hair gel and that he’s a bloody wanker.”

Giles started snickering, his snickers soon escalated into chortles and then onto a full out belly laugh, tears included. It didn’t take long for the other two to join him, his laughter was infectious. When their laughter had finally died down, Buffy took the opportunity to broach the subject of Jenny.

“Ah…Giles, you know how we told you about Angel’s curse being kinda shaky?” Buffy started, hesitantly. The idea of telling Giles about Jenny scared her; she didn’t want to hurt him.

“Yes?”

“Well I sorta didn’t mention that we knew of a way to get all the information on the curse that you need.” Buffy offered.

“How?” Giles was beginning to suspect that, as much as he wanted the information, he was not going to be happy about where that information was coming from.

“Jenny Calendar,” Buffy began, “She’s a member of the Calderash Clan, they’re the ones that cursed him in the first place.”





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