Disclaimer: All the characters belong to Joss Whedon, not me.

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Chapter 2
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It was nearly morning when Xander, Anya, and Willow dragged themselves into Buffy’s living room, utterly spent. They threw themselves onto the sofa, falling about like rag dolls. “I give up. I don’t know where on earth she could be,” Willow said mournfully.
 
“Are we sure that was her?” Anya asked for the eleventh time in two hours. “Because it was dark and…”
 
“Ahn, it was her,” Xander said, his patience clearly waning. “Nobody else fights like that. Besides, she was wearing what we… what we last saw her in.”
 
“Then why did she run away?” Anya asked.
 
“I don’t know,” Willow replied with closed eyes. They had tried to follow the fleeing Slayer, but between her speed and the pockets of demons they ran into, they were unable to catch up with her. They had rushed home, hoping she had headed there. They were relieved to see Dawn, as well as a little guilty – they had almost forgotten about her and Spike in the excitement. But it had been hard to hide their disappointment that Buffy hadn’t come home. After Spike left, Tara offered to stay with Dawn while they ‘went to check on the Magic Box’. In reality, they had spent the night combing the streets, fighting a few straggler demons, and trying to find Buffy. By the time they had the idea to use a locator spell, Willow was so drained from constantly using magic to fight the demons that she just couldn’t make it work. They had reluctantly made her way back to Buffy’s house, hoping against hope that she had finally shown up, but it was clear that she hadn’t.
 
“Do you think she’s… damaged somehow?” Xander asked quietly.
 
“We don’t know where she was, or what happened to her there,” Willow answered. “We don’t know how long she was there either. Angel came back all feral when Buffy sent him to hell. Maybe this is the same sort of deal.” Willow’s conscience piped up with the thought that maybe the spell had gone wrong, but she buried that thought as quickly as it came. I did everything right. It all went as planned, she told herself.
 
“So what do we do now?” Anya asked.
 
“Sleep,” Xander answered. He stood up. “Come on, Anya. I need to crash. Wills, we’ll come by this afternoon after we’ve had time to recuperate.”
 
“Yeah,” said Willow. They said their goodbyes and Willow made her way upstairs to crawl in next to Tara.
 
“Hey, baby, what time is it?” Tara mumbled sleepily.
 
“About five in the morning,” Willow replied.
 
“No luck I take it?”
 
“None,” Willow said. Then tears started falling as she said, “Oh Tara, what happened to her? She was so… different. Like she didn’t know us at all. Like she barely knew her own name.”
 
“Shhh,” Tara soothed, taking Willow into her arms and stroking her hair. “Whatever she went through was probably pretty horrific. It may take her a while to come back to us.”
 
“What if she doesn’t?” Willow asked, softly voicing the fear she had had all evening. “What if she’s this feral Slayer creature who can’t be controlled? What do we do then?” The tears came harder as Willow clung to Tara, burying her face in Tara’s shoulder.
 
“Hey, calm down,” Tara said. “You’re exhausted. Get some sleep. We’ll sort this out later, okay?” Willow nodded and succumbed to her tiredness, curled up with her head on Tara’s shoulder.
 
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Spike watched Buffy for a long time, searching for signs of her waking up, but after two hours he judged she was down for the count. He quietly picked up an unshredded t-shirt from the floor and put it on before creeping upstairs. There he put on his socks and shoes and coat, went to the door and looked out at the sky. Shit. Sunrise is awfully fucking near. He had originally thought to go to Buffy’s house to confront them, but now he didn’t want to leave her for that long, and he felt too tired for one of his usual dashes through the sunlight. Weighing his options, he dashed out to his bike and made a short ride to the nearest convenience store. There he grabbed some snacks and drinks for Buffy and availed himself of their payphone, dialing her number from memory.
 
The phone rang and rang. Where the hell are they? he wondered with impatience. The answering machine finally clicked on, and he said, “This is Spike. There is someone in my crypt who looks a fuck of a lot like the Slayer. If you know anything about this I’d appreciate if you got your asses over to my crypt as soon as you get this.” He hung up the phone in a state of annoyance, got back on his bike with his purchases, and raced the sun back to his crypt. He dashed inside with moments to spare, shedding his coat once more. He made his way downstairs to check on the sleeping girl and found she was still flat out. The exhaustion finally caught up with him, and Spike stretched out in his stolen lounge chair, closed his eyes, and joined her in slumber.
 
Buffy was falling past a long line of demons, clawed arms reaching for her, tearing at her as she fell. Then she landed hard on her back and that voice boomed out, “Osiris! Let her cross over!” The voice shook the pit she was in and dirt started raining down on her from above, smothering her as she struggled…
 
With a cry Buffy sat up, flinging the covers away desperately in terror. She scrambled back until she hit the headboard, panting like a marathoner and staring around her wildly. After a few moments her gaze landed on the still sleeping vampire and she realized where she was. Dream. I’m with the angel. Safe place, she told herself. She wrapped her arms around her knees, shivering while her heart raced. It took several long minutes for her to slow her breathing and stop shaking. When she did she looked around the room, puzzled by all the objects. For some a word seemed to float up in her mind –candle… book…cup - but there were so many holes in her mind that she couldn’t connect anything together very well. It unnerved her, so she decided instead to focus on the sleeping figure across the room from her. His blond hair had relaxed into a riot of curls that made him look young and boyish. His skin had healed, smooth and white and perfect. But as she stared, she sensed that something was wrong. She cocked her head and looked hard, trying to grasp what it was. Too still, she thought with alarm. His chest didn’t seem to be moving. Did something hurt him? Suddenly frightened for her protector, she got slowly out of bed and walked over to him. She stretched out her hand nervously and touched his arm.
 
Spike jumped at her touch. “Who’s there?” he said, momentarily forgetting his visitor. His sudden jolt into consciousness startled Buffy in turn and she jumped away with a cry, backing toward the wall. Instantly Spike remembered himself and got up saying, “It’s okay, Buffy. It’s alright. Sorry I scared you. Just woke me up, that’s all.” A look of relief crossed Buffy’s face and she suddenly moved to fling her arms around him, weeping into his shirt. Spike was stunned for a moment, but then tentatively put his arms around her, patting her back and trying to calm her sudden weeping. “I’ve got you, love. Gonna be okay.” He lost track of how long he held her, but at last her sobbing slowed and he gently unwound her arms from around his waist. Tipping her chin up with his fingers he said, “Are you hungry? Don’t think you’ve eaten in a few months.” She showed no sign of comprehension, so he led her to the chair and sat her down. He rummaged around in the bag from the convenience store until he found a protein bar. He unwrapped it and handed it to her, but she looked at it, and him, with a confused face.
 
“Need to eat, Buffy,” he said. He bit off a small corner to show her the idea, and motioned for her to do the same. She did so, keeping her eyes on him the whole time. Then a look of understanding came across her face as the sweet taste hit her tongue. It was as if she had forgotten what eating was, forgotten that it was something that felt good. She took another bite, and another, until she had wolfed down the whole bar. She looked at her empty hands, and at Spike, and he smiled and handed her another, watching as she inhaled it as well. He handed her a bottle of water to wash it down, which she did greedily. She belched softly then looked at Spike as if wondering what to do next.
 
“I called your mates, pet,” he said by way of making conversation. “I don’t know if they had anything to do with this, but we’ll soon get it sorted.” She showed no sign of understanding him, and instead pulled her knees up to her chest again and rocked herself back and forth. Spike wanted to scream and destroy things at the unfairness of it all. She was the Slayer. Savior of the universe twelve times over, and she had been reduced to this traumatized husk who seemed incapable of speech or understanding. Not bloody fair. Oh, Slayer… Tentatively, he took her into his arms. When she made no move to escape he sat down on the chair and cradled her close, willing her to come back to him.
 
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Tara was awakened by the sound of the telephone. She had dozed on and off since Willow had crawled in to bed with her, but the telephone now jarred her awake. She looked at the clock and saw with some alarm that it was seven o’clock. Shit. Dawn’s going to be late. Willow was so tired she didn’t even stir, so Tara ran downstairs to get the phone. “Hello?” she gasped as she grabbed it on the sixth ring. It turned out to be an automated message from Dawn’s school, saying there would be a two hour delayed opening due to the ‘large fire on main street’ caused by a ‘ruptured gas main’. Tara shook her head as she hung up, amazed as always at how good Sunnydale was at self-deception. As she was about to go upstairs, relieved that Dawn would have a little extra time to get ready, she noticed the blinking light on the answering machine. Odd. I don’t remember there being any messages when we got home last night. She pressed the button, and the electronic voice of the machine said, “Call received today at 4:47 am.” Tara’s eyes widened as she heard the message from Spike, and it was barely done before she was running up the stairs to tell Willow.
 
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Willow was drinking some very strong coffee while she waited for Xander to come pick her up. Dawn had gotten off to school for her late start, after a little nudging from Tara. Willow and Tara had debated for a short while, but ultimately decided not to tell her Buffy was back until they had assessed the situation. The current plan was for Willow and Xander to go to Spike’s and see what was going on with Buffy. Since Willow and Xander had known her the longest, Willow had reasoned, it might be better if they approached her first, rather than overwhelming her with too many people at once. “I still wonder how she ended up at Spike’s place,” she said to Tara, who was finishing her own coffee across the table.
 
Tara shrugged. “No idea. Maybe she remembered it somehow. She took her mom and Dawn there for safekeeping a couple of times. Maybe it felt safe to her.”
 
“I just hope she’s recovered more,” Willow said worriedly. “She wasn’t herself yesterday.”
 
“Willow,” Tara began. “You’ve got to prepare yourself for the possibility that she’s going to take a very long time to come back from this. You’re going to need to exercise a lot of patience.”
 
“I know,” Willow sighed. “Maybe once we see her we’ll be able to figure out how to help her.” Just then the kitchen door opened and a still tired looking Xander came in.
 
“Morning, ladies,” he said. “Coffee? Please?” Tara handed him a cup and he drank it gratefully. “So how did Buffy end up at deadboy’s house?”
 
“No idea,” said Tara. “His message just said she showed up there and that if you knew how she got there to come over.” She left out the four letter words that had been sprinkled throughout the message. “I must have slept through the phone ringing – he called shortly before you all got home.”
 
“I guess we’d better get over there then,” Xander said as he tossed back the rest of the coffee. “Last thing we need is for the bleached wonder to start warping her mind.”
 
“We’ll be back soon,” Willow said to Tara, giving her a quick kiss. She followed Xander out to the car and soon they were on their way to Restfield.
 
“Hope she’s in less of a feral cave person mood today,” Xander muttered. “Why would she run from us like that?”
 
“She must have been disoriented, confused,” Willow said. “Things were pretty crazy last night.”
 
“It wasn’t…” Xander paused, wondering how to put this delicately. “It didn’t have anything to do with the spell, did it?”
 
“No!” Willow said, instantly wishing she sounded less defensive. “The spell worked exactly as I thought it was going to!”
 
“Yeah, but the demons smashed the urn of Cirrhosis…”
 
“Osiris.”
 
“Whoever,” Xander continued. “Couldn’t that have done something?”
 
“I doubt it,” Willow replied, sounding more confident than she felt. “But anyhow, we just need to see how she is and bring her home so she can recover.” They drove on, both nervous about what they would find. 

TBC