“Willow?”
Buffy ran back into the girls’ showers, slipping a little on the slick
floor. “Willow, are you okay?”
Willow sat up
shakily in her circle. “I’m a little… confused. But, yeah,
okay. Mostly.”
“I—uh—called
Angel,” Buffy said tentatively.
Willow’s
head snapped up so quickly that Buffy was surprised her friend didn’t get
whiplash. “You what?”
“I called
Angel,” Buffy said, sounding hurt. “You did the restoration for
him, after all; I thought he might know something.”
“If I did
the spell right, he shouldn’t have felt anything,” Willow said
dazedly. “Oh, Goddess. Shut up!” she added.
“I
didn’t say anything,” Buffy protested.
“Not you,” Willow said witheringly. “Please be quiet.” That last comment
obviously included Buffy, so the blonde crouched impatiently outside
Willow’s circle as Willow drew in on herself, her eyes darting
everywhere.
The minutes
passed. Buffy twiddled her thumbs and hoped Giles, Xander and Spike would hurry
up. Finally she said, “You said something about Darla earlier, Willow.
What was that?”
It took a while
for what Buffy had said to register, and then it took a while for Willow to
answer. “Angel staked Darla five years ago,” she said blandly.
“B-but you
said that…”
“You
probably misheard,” Willow commented matter-of-factly. There was an underlying
note of condescension that Buffy didn’t like at all. The Slayer frowned.
“Wanna get
out of your circle, Willow? I was worried about you.”
“What?
Oh,” Willow said. Muttering under her breath, she blew out every candle
with one breath for each, moving counter-clockwise. Then she stood and stepped
over the low wall of melted wax. “There we go,” she said with
forced cheer. “All done.”
Buffy surged
forward delightedly to hug her friend, but Willow was noticeably stiff in her
arms. “Wills? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,”
Willow said tensely. “She just doesn’t like you, that’s
all.”
Buffy stepped
back to look Willow squarely in the eyes. “Darla is inside your head, isn’t
she?” she asked. “That’s why you’re being so…
mean. That’s Darla coming through. We have to do something!”
“Oh,
no,” Willow whimpered, her hand flying up to cover her mouth. “Her
body’s unprotected…”
“What?”
Buffy said.
“Did you
call Giles?” Willow asked. “I need to—you were right to call
Angel. I should talk to him too. He needs to know about this, so he can protect
her when we’re not there.”
“We?” Buffy said incredulously.
“We are not
going to go protect some psycho vamp-girl—” She paused. “You
didn’t mean we as in, me and you, did you,” the Slayer said slowly.
“You meant—when you were unconscious, you were in Darla’s head?” Willow nodded.
“And—and—now the both of you—you travel back and forth between each other?”
“Look,
Slayer, it’s not like this is some kind of fun vacation,” Darla
snapped with Willow’s voice. “I don’t want to be here, and
she doesn’t want me to be here. We both want this to be over without getting Angel involved!”
“You stay
away from him,” Buffy said to Darla. “Don’t you go near
him.”
“Oh, for
goodness’ sakes,” Darla said to Willow, aloud. “She thinks I
want to hurt the boy. I don’t even want to go near him!” she added to Buffy.
“Get me out of this stupid human body and I’ll go.”
Loud voices
could be heard from the hallway. Buffy dashed to the door of the showers and
pushed it open, yelling, “Guys! In here! She’s awake, but
we’ve got… a problem.”
Xander dashed
valiantly in, saw Willow standing in the middle of the room, and swept her into
a gigantic hug. “Oh, God, Wills, I’m so glad you’re
okay…” He backed off a bit when her body was limp in his arms, and
held her at arms’ length so he could look into her eyes. “Oh
my… Willow’s not alone in there.”
“I say,
Xander, that is most
far-fetched,” Giles said, looking to Buffy for support. When he saw the
grim expression on her face, his own face paled. “Don’t tell me—”
“I’m
right, aren’t I,” Xander said. “Willow? Can you hear
me?” The redhead in his arms blinked and smiled hesitantly.
“Xand, you
might want to let go… She doesn’t like strange humans with their
hands all over her.”
“Who’s
in there with you?” Xander asked, sounding scared.
“Same
bloody question I was about to ask,” Spike commented from the doorway. He
strode forward and peered into Willow’s eyes. “’Allo?”
“Oh, no,
it’s you!” Darla exclaimed, dismayed. “What on earth is this
silly boy doing here?”
Spike’s
eyes widened. “No way,” he gasped. “That’s
impossible.”
“Spike?
Who is it?” Xander asked, tugging on the vampire’s duster sleeve.
“It’s
my great-grandsire, for Christ’s sake,” Spike hissed. “Get
out of there, you bitch!”
“Watch who
you’re calling names, little boy,” Darla growled. “I own you. Back off.”
“Whoa,
whoa, whoa,” Xander said, stepping between them. “I’m sensing
some tension here. What say we talk it off?”
“Xander, Darla’s in Willow’s head,” Buffy
murmured.
“Dar—Angel’s
sire? The one he killed?”
Xander yelped.
“Why do
people keep bringing that up?” Darla asked, sounding affronted.
Willow and Darla
were rudely and rather painfully jolted back into Darla’s body in Los
Angeles.
This, said Darla to her
‘roommate’, is getting bloody
tiresome.
I
couldn’t agree more,
Willow hissed in reply.
They were in a
darkened room—a small office, it looked like, though the furnishings were
expensive. Wolfram & Hart,
Darla muttered. They brought us back. Damn that Lindsey.
It’s kind
of creepy not knowing where your body’s been, Willow observed with a shiver.
Yeah, and
this isn’t your body,
Darla snarled. I hate this. I hate you!
I
didn’t ask for this,
Willow pointed out, hurt. And I’m trying not to think thoughts that damn
you and your sire and his
sire and that one’s sire, and all you’re doing is being rude!
Sorry, Darla said, slightly cowed. Over
four hundred years of doing and saying whatever you want kind of ingrains
itself into your system.
The door to the
small office they lay in opened, and Lindsey’s handsome face was
silhouetted by the light from the room beyond. “You’re
awake,” he observed.
He always was
a smart one, Darla
snickered to Willow. “Yes, I am,” she said aloud. “What do
you want?”
“We
didn’t want to capture you,” Lindsey said, shame-faced. “I
was just sent to ask you to come. But you fainted, and I didn’t want to
leave you there.”
“How
sweet,” Darla said. She took complete control, shoving Willow to the back
of her mind, so that she wouldn’t get dizzy while walking. She rose
calmly from the couch and made her way across the room to where Lindsey stood.
“Well?”
“And how
is Ms. Rosenberg?” Lindsey asked. “Are you tight for space in
there?”
Darla’s eyes
widened, and Willow took the opportunity to push her way to the front, squished
next to her hostess. “I’m fine, Lindsey, thank you,” she
said. “Now, where were we going?”
“To my
office,” Lindsey said. “This way, please.”
A walk down a
very long corridor and a quick elevator ride later, Darla and Willow sat,
ankles crossed demurely, on the couch in Lindsey’s office. The couch here
was much more comfortable on the one they’d woken up on, Willow observed,
but decided to keep quiet.
Darla was
seething at Willow’s attempt at seizing control. Though the younger woman
hadn’t succeeded completely, they were each equally balanced, which did
tend to make them each dizzy.
Lindsey coughed.
“We’re waiting for Holland,” he said in the awkward silence
that permeated the room.
“I should
have guessed,” Darla said with a sneer.
Who’s
Holland? Willow asked
her.
Bastard in
charge of this place,
the blonde replied. You’ll hate him, just wait and see.
Light footsteps
could be heard in the hall, and Lindsey fidgeted with a piece of paper. What
happened to his hand?
Willow asked.
Tell you
later, Darla said. The
fun’s about to start.
“Thank you
for coming in,” Lindsey said formally.
Darla snorted
softly. “Did I ever have a choice?”
Good question, Willow told her.
Lindsey’s
drawn face looked slightly hurt by Darla’s casual remark. “Of
course,” Holland interrupted, entering the room. He nodded to the hulking
security guard at the door, who quickly left.
Holland sighed
and shifted the large envelope he held in his hands. “We would never
force you to do anything against your will, Darla. Ms. Rosenberg.”
I see what
you mean, Willow
whispered to her hostess. He looks like someone’s grandpa, but he kind
of exudes something that makes you want to run away.
Anti-pheromones? Darla suggested. “It wasn’t
my will to be here in
the first place,” she said coldly, aloud. “I never asked for this
life.”
Holland gave her
a smile that sent chills down Willow’s spine. “But no one ever
does! God doesn’t give us a say in these matters.”
Please, Willow snorted. “The
Goddess,” she said, interrupting what Darla was about to say,
“Isn’t the one who brought her back!”
Holland raised
an eyebrow at Willow’s usage of both ‘the Goddess’ and
‘her’, and then realized who was speaking. “Ms. Rosenberg.
Good evening. And, true…”
Move over, Darla said to Willow, and then to
Holland: “So. What do you want us to do now? Go back to him…? It won’t
matter even if we did. None of us have… anything.”
“You
misunderstand,” Holland said, almost gently. “We didn’t
invite you here to discuss Angel.”
“This is
about you,”
Lindsey said. Darla gave him a sharp look, but his dark features were
unreadable.
“You’re
not our prisoner, Darla, Willow,” Holland continued, with a glare for his
employee. “You are, however, our moral responsibility.” He leaned
forward to hand Darla the folder he’d been fidgeting with earlier.
Morals? Willow repeated dubiously. They
haven’t got any
morals.
Willow, shh, Darla said. She took the folder and
flicked the catch open with a fingernail, then tilted it slightly so the files
inside would slide into her hand.
“No
doubt,” said Holland, “You have little memory of your first weeks
with us. No one ever really recalls their first days of life… But
that’s when these were initiated.”
Willow’s
eyes darted quickly over the printouts her hostess held, her own mind rapidly
processing what she read. Oh, no,
she moaned. Oh… Darla, do you know what these mean?
Why
don’t you tell me instead of stuttering like a fool? Darla demanded, and then outwardly
blanched as Willow whispered their fate into her mind. Oh, no…
“…
are prepared to deal with this situation any way you see fit,” Holland
was saying. “It’s up to you… we just thought you should
know.”
“This
can’t be real,” Darla muttered hoarsely. “Explain these at
once!” Even as a victim, her voice was commanding.
“Your
soul… wasn’t attached to your body, ever, after you were
turned,” Lindsey said quietly. “There’s a sort of recycling
system, as far as we can tell, for souls. When vampires are made, their souls
get shelved somewhere, but the older they get, the more irretrievable the souls
become. By the time you were staked, I guess the Powers That Be had figured
there was no way you would ever recover your soul, so it had been sent out to
be used again… by Willow.
“Once you
were staked, the soul became a permanent fixture to Willow—you could say
it was super-glued in, guaranteed. But when you were brought back…
there’s only one soul allotted to each person, ever. Darla came back around May, Willow.
Have you been feeling…”
“…Stretched
thin?” Willow supplied timidly. “Kind of… I thought I was
just tired.”
“The
restoration you just attempted only sped the process up, you understand,”
Lindsey continued with a nod. “Sooner or later, your soul would have
gotten too tired to be stretched between two places, and one of you would have
snapped into the others’ body, just like you are now. It’s
just—the anchoring of Angel’s soul puts your own soul in a very
precarious position. I suppose it just got ‘loose’ enough to snap
back to Darla’s end.”
“But…”
Darla looked helplessly at the different diagnoses she held, scanning them over
and over again, one after the other. “We’re going to be skipping
back and forth between each other’s bodies forever? I’m going to be stuck with this infant until I die?”
Or until we
both go insane, Willow
said softly. Never thought I’d go this way…
“She
ain’t here, bro,” Gunn announced as he kicked in the door of the
motel room. He looked around distastefully.
Angel leaned
against the threshold and sniffed slightly. “No… But she was. And
not long ago; scent’s still fresh. A lot of fear…”
Gunn made a face
as he glanced back at his employer. “I don’t envy that particular
talent, not based on what I’m gettin’ with just my standard-issue
human smeller…” He took another step into the room and grimaced at
the dirty bedspread. “Man. Not even for free cable TV, you know what I’m
sayin’?”
Angel nodded his
understanding and entered the room, standing slightly hunched as a reaction to
the low ceiling. “…She chose this neighborhood for a reason.”
Off Gunn’s startled expression, he explained. “Motel’s a
public accommodation; she doesn’t live here.”
“I
wouldn’t call it livin’, neither,” Gunn muttered.
Angel’s cell phone rang shrilly. The vampire cursed and started patting
his pockets.
“Where is it? Ah… Gotcha.” He flipped
the cover open and pressed ‘talk’. “Cordy?”
“Angel.”
She sounded upset, even through the slight tinny tone the phone lent to her voice
as well as the static.
“What’s
wrong?”
“Buffy
called. Willow was
awake, but she collapsed, and now she’s out cold. She said Darla’s in
her head, Angel, and
before, when she was unconscious before, she was in Darla’s head here in LA. I don’t know how,
or why…”
“I’ll
take care of it,” Angel said stiffly. “Bye.”
Cordelia’s
protests were quickly silenced by the pressing of the ‘off’ button;
Angel shoved the phone back into a pocket and turned to Gunn. “I’ve
got to go. Go back to the hotel, start researching body-switching, anything
like that.”
“What’s
going on?” Gunn wanted to know.
“If I
knew, I’d tell you,” Angel muttered. “I’ll meet you at
the hotel later.”
Then he was
gone.
“How does
he do that?”
Gunn cursed. “Stupid vampiric vanishing acts…”
I can’t
believe I’m going into a place like this, Willow muttered, reluctantly letting
Darla do the walking for them.
Honey,
I’ve seen way worse than this,
Darla retorted. She pushed open the cheap screen door. Okay, maybe not way worse…
The bar was
dark, dingy and surprisingly reminiscent of their motel room. The cracked and
clouded mirror at the back of the bar was clear enough to make it obvious that
quite a few of the patrons were vampires; the rest were mostly unidentifiable.
I can’t
thank you enough for doing this,
Willow said tearfully. If we were in my body, we could…
Yeah, yeah, I
know, Darla said, almost
comfortingly. But… you don’t want to be a vampire; I do. And
once we get sired, the soul won’t have a place here anymore; it’ll snap right
back to you, and we’ll all be happy. Kind of. I suppose.
Let’s
just do this before I loose my nerve,
Willow said, with more conviction than she felt.
Yeah, Darla said. Let’s. She moved forward into the bar,
swinging her hips ever-so-slightly but managing to attract the attention of all
of the male—and some of the female—patrons. “Showtime,”
she said aloud, almost a prayer, before she sat gingerly on a dirty barstool
and waited.
Their winner
came right over. Could he be any
dorkier? Willow
murmured, amused. Darla gave her a mental flick but allowed herself a smile.
“Hey there,” she said, trying to sound bored.
“Hey,”
the vampire said, obviously thrilled that she’d made the first move. He
sported the ugliest mullet that had ever seen daylight—or moonlight,
whatever—and a dark brown leather motorcycle jacket with some
suspicious-looking stains on it. He bared yellowed teeth and grinned.
Oh,
that’s repulsive,
Darla told Willow, but said with a lump in her throat, “That’s
great, really. Very
threatening.”
The vampire
preened. “Getting to you, isn’t it? It’s funny, when I was
human I never really had much luck with women.”
Why am I not
surprised? Willow said
with a roll of her eyes. Be
quiet! Darla told her, and forced a smile. “Hard to believe,” she
said insincerely, and the vampire shrugged modestly.
“I had
kind of a skin condition…”
“Mm,”
Darla said with a grimace.
“But
now,” the vampire said, not to be stopped, “… Something about
the teeth, I guess. Chicks go crazy for it.”
What chicks
are these? Willow
sighed. Geez, they must be desperate.
Don’t, Darla giggled. I’m trying to
warm up to him.
Straightening her face, Darla continued: “You’ve got girlfriends
everywhere, I imagine.”
“Heh,”
the vampire said unintelligently, batting his eyes. “Mostly, I just kill
‘em. Dump the bodies.”
How romantic, Darla snorted.
You’re
losing it, Willow said. He
needs sympathy. I can do sympathy.
One try, Darla cautioned. Don’t lose
this one. Remember our plan.
“That must
be very lonely for you,” Willow told the vamp, sticking out her lower lip
the teeniest bit.
“Well,”
the vampire said in his best long-suffering tone, “We’re a lonely
sort, we creatures of the night. Doomed to walk the earth, that kind of
deal.”
Willow raised
her eyebrows, struggling not to burst out laughing. “How long have
you…”
“…Been
an eternal child of the darkness?” the vampire finished for her, warming
up to the question. He paused for effect, preening. “Since
’92.”
Darla gasped,
dismayed. “Nineteen
ninety-two?”
The vampire was
obviously very proud of himself. He sighed reminiscently. “Hard to
believe it’s already ‘last century’.” He punctuated the
emphasized words with hand quotes, an aren’t-I-so-funny laugh, and a
snort that would have put Steve Urkel to shame.
Willow had to
extend all of her control to stop Darla from bolting. “And in all
that… time,” she said through clenched teeth, “You’ve
never considered making yourself a mate?”
“How do
you mean?” the vamp asked, confused.
“Well,”
Darla said, pushing past Willow to try once again, “Isn’t it true
that some vampires choose a mortal, someone they can sire, someone who, too,
will walk those lonely nights…”
Willow smiled at
the wistfulness in Darla’s voice. Despite her reluctance to go back to
him, Darla had truly loved Angel when he had been the great Angelus.
“…Hunting
with them… Feeding with them…” Darla paused and licked her
lips, giving the vamp her best sexually-loaded stare. “Joining with them…”
There was a pause
in which the vamp considered and Willow applauded Darla’s handiwork.
Then:
“Nah. That’d just be weird.”
Darla’s
shocked reaction left her reeling, so Willow had to jump to her defense.
“ ‘Weird’? It’s mythic!”
* * *
A whole lot of
pouty smiles, sex appeal and I’m-so-much-stupider-than-I-look lines
later, Darla and Willow finally managed to maneuver the eighties Joe Dirt
wannabe into the back alley.
The vampire,
obviously nervous, tried to dissuade them once again. “How do you know I
won’t just kill you here—drain you and leave your body?”
Inside their
mind, Willow and Darla exchanged nervous glances. Darla just shrugged and
sighed resignedly. She took a deep breath, ran her tongue across her teeth,
grabbed the vamp’s shoulders and kissed him soundly.
Ew! Willow moaned.
You’re
telling me? Darla
gagged. I don’t think he’s brushed his teeth since he was turned!
I think
you’re being optimistic,
Willow said, rolling her eyes. Wait,
what did he just say?
“…
Probably mention that I’m not real clear on how this works…”
The vamp coughed discreetly.
“What.”
The flat word was not a question.
“Well…”
The vampire squirmed a little. “I never actually did this before. And, I
was kinda out when it happened to me…”
Weakling, Willow scoffed.
Child, Darla agreed with a sneer. I feel
like such a grandmother—‘in my day, people stayed awake during their sirings, and their
sires taught them
things…’
Are you sure
you want to do this? We could find a proper BDSM vampire club and get turned by
someone who’s a good century or three old… Willow offered.
No, Darla said. I want to get this over with. She took another deep breath and told
the vampire impatiently, “I’ll walk you through it: drink. When you
feel my heart start to slow, stop.” She gently pulled down her collar and
bent her head back to bare her neck.
Oh, Goddess,
Darla, please change
your mind… Willow
whimpered. Don’t let this idiot sire you…
There’s
nothing else we can do,
Darla hissed.
Darla, he
doesn’t know what he’s doing—he’ll make you a minion, for God’s sake,
he’ll invoke Right of Sire and make you screw him for
hours—he’s got a mullet,
what are you doing with a guy who has a mullet—
Do you want
to live or not? Darla
yelled, and pulled the vampire towards her.
Oh no, oh no,
oh no, Willow muttered. Oh
no…
And then the
vampire’s stupid face froze centimeters from Darla’s slender neck,
shocked, and exploded into dust.
Willow breathed
a deep sigh of relief along with her hostess before they realized who,
precisely, was their savior.
Angel.
“What the Hell do you think you’re doing?”
they screamed together.
Angel
immediately exchanged his
sure-I’m-you’re-heroic-avenger-but-really-ladies-one-at-a-time look
for his best oh-no-what-did-I-do-wrong-now-but-please-don’t-kill-me look.
“Saving you…?”
