I WOULD STILL HAVE LOVED YOU…
 
Prologue
 
 
“You want me to what?”  Buffy stared at Giles in disbelief, her expression telling him that their relationship was not yet as mended as he’d like to think.
 
Giles squirmed and rubbed his forehead.
 
“I know this is asking a lot of you… especially after the events of the past year… But the coven and the other surviving Council members think this might well be the answer.”
 
“Then why don’t they go back and do something about it,” Buffy snapped. “Why me?”  She stared at Giles steadily, then said, “Just so you know, there isn’t much that’s happened in last three or four years that I’d be interested in reliving. Never mind this one.” She closed her eyes briefly, an expression of pain on her face, then opened them again.  “Exactly what do they expect me to do? It’s not like I wasn’t trying to beat Glory the first time around!”
 
“You would be facing her with so much more knowledge this time… You would know, well before the… end… what she was, how to avoid her, and… how to kill
her.”
 
“Yeah, okay, Troll hammer for the win. But that was still a tough fight, and… and people got hurt and died…”
 
“There is another way….”
 
“Buffy stared at him blankly for a second, then her eyes got wide.  “You want me to kill Ben? An innocent human who just happened to have a hellgod in residence?”
 
“Well, no. I realize that would not be your first choice. However, if it came down to his life or yours, I can assure there are several of us who would have no issue with it.” 
 
He didn’t meet her eyes, which were narrowed in suspicion.  Buffy knew she had left Ben gravely injured but alive when she ran to save Dawn. They’d never discussed the fact that once beaten out of him, Glory had not returned, even though she was probably capable of doing so.
 
“And just who would those people be… aside from you?” She watched him flinch and knew she had her answer to that question.
 
“Well… you do know some… people… who would have no qualms about it. One of them might have some difficulty, but I understand now that he would have been more than willing to sacrifice himself to save you.”
 
“You want me to get Spike to kill Ben. Spike, whose head would probably explode if he was even able to fight the pain long enough to do it.”
 
“Spike is an option, obviously. He is… was… quite a resourceful vampire. Perhaps he could arrange for another vampire or demon less… handicapped… to do the deed for him.  It would definitely be worth asking. Based on his fortitude in withstanding Glory’s torture, I suspect he would do almost anything to earn your affection and… gratitude… at that time.”
 
“I’m sure he would,” she snarled. “I’ll just go back and offer him my body if he kills Ben. That sounds like a plan! I can imagine the conversation now: Hey, Spike, if you just do me this one little favor, I’ll have sex with you. Assuming you survive it…”
 
Giles flinched again. “Rather crudely put, Buffy. I simply meant that he would do whatever you liked if it meant he could spend time in your company and perhaps have a chance to earn your affection.”
 
Buffy shut her eyes in pain again, remembering “…all I’m asking… just a crumb…” She shook her head.  “I’m not asking Spike to risk his life for a chance at something I wasn’t going to give him back then.”
 
Giles sighed and nodded. Buffy’s glare made it clear it wouldn’t be a good idea to remind her that she was going to make him a big part of her life eventually.
 
“There is another vampire….”
 
Her eyes went wide. “Angel? You want me to ask Angel to kill?”
 
Giles grimaced. “Angel, soul and all, is not quite the hero you would like to think he is.  As evidenced by his current status as the head of the Los Angeles branch of Wolfram and Hart. I’ve no doubt that he would take care of the problem for you if asked.”
 
“Wow. Just… wow, Giles.”  Buffy stood up.  “Let me think about it for the rest of the day. I’ll let you know.”
 
 
XXXXXXXXXXXX
 
 
“You want to send me back to where?  When?” Spike glared around the room at Angel and his friends.  “I just bloody well got here!  In the I’m-not-a-ghost-and-I can-touch-things kind of way. And now you want to send me back to Sunnyhell? Where I got a chip stuck in my brain and—”
 
“And where you met Buffy and became… friends… with her,” Angel said stiffly.
 
“There’s that,” Spike admitted.  He gave Angel a toothy grin. “Friends, huh? Is that what they’re calling it these days?”   The answering snarl made him grin wider before remembering what was being asked of him.
 
“So, let me get this straight, you want me to go back to Sunnyhell before it all fell apart, and prevent Glory from opening that portal so Buffy doesn’t have to jump, she doesn’t die, doesn’t get dragged out of her grave, and the First Evil never has a chance to rise like it did.”
 
“Basically,” Angel said. “You’d be saving… well not the world, I guess, but Buffy for sure. And all the people who died at the hands of the First Evil’s minions, including all the potentials killed by the bringers.”
 
“And preventing all the other potentials from getting their powers and giving Buffy a chance to have a life.” Spike raised a sardonic eyebrow. “I’m not sure she’d see it as all that good an idea.”
 
“So, you’d rather she died? “
 
“Don’t be a git. Of course not. Don’t want her havin’ to live through that year after her meddling friends brought her back either. Never want to see her that down again… or with that much of a death wish.  Even if it meant I’d never…” He shook himself.  “So what’s the plan then? Your new employers have time machines?”
 
“Not quite.” Gunn spoke up at a nod from Angel. “But they do have some thing pretty close to it. Needs a bit of help from magic, but….” He shrugged in Wesley’s direction.
 
“But Oxford there knows the right words?” Spike looked skeptical.
 
“I have the right sources,” Wes said, looking humble and confident at the same time.
 
“So all I have to do is say ‘yes’ and we’re good to go?” He snorted. “What if I say ‘no’?”
 
“Then we’ll throw your ass in there anyway and you’ll be on your own,” Angel growled. “We’re going to do this, Spike. If it was Buffy’s death that allowed the First Evil to rise, then she can’t die.”
 
“It wasn’t her death,” Wesley said softly. “She’d already died briefly once and broken the slayer line. But those few seconds weren’t enough to register with the Powers. It’s her resurrection after months of being genuinely dead and in… wherever slayers’ souls go—”
 
“Heaven,” Spike interrupted. “Are you afraid to say it? She was yanked out of Heaven and that caused all sorts of uproar in the good vs evil world.” He looked around at their determined faces. “Fine. Let’s do this, then—” He stopped himself. “I won’t have that damn chip, will I? And I’ll still have my soul?”
 
“I don’t know why not,” Wes answered, making it clear who was really in charge of the situation. “You’ll be going back just as you are. Probably while the other you is in South America, so there will be no disruption when old you goes missing.”
 
“Dru might notice,” Angel said, rolling his eyes.
 
“Doubt it. Time it to anytime after I left her to go back for the Gem, and she’ll never know. I was gone anyway after that.  Didn’t see her again except for a short visit she made the next year.”
 
Wes made a few notes and nodded. “I’ll let you when we’re ready.”
 
“Can’t wait.”
 
 
 
Chapter One
 
“Oh this is just awesome. I’m here ten minutes and I have to fight Spike when he has the Gem of Amara.”
 
Buffy rolled her eyes as the smirking vampire approached. She was still flustered about having arrived in the midst of facing Parker, with no idea if she’d made a fool out of herself yet or could salvage the situation. The look on his face told her she had, but she recovered quickly, calling him an asshole who was lousy in bed, and sending him hustling off with his new girlfriend.  She turned back to Spike, who was just as obnoxious as she remembered.
 
“Poor Slayer. Dumped again. Just can’t seem to hang on to a man, can you?”
 
Buffy cocked her head at him. “I’ll do okay once I find one worth holding on to,” she said. “Shouldn’t you be on fire now?”
 
“Oh my! How did I not notice the sun’s out?  I wonder if I’ll freckle?”
 
Buffy sighed. I’d forgotten what a pain in butt he was.  “So, are we going to do this or what?”
 
He looked disappointed. “We aren’t going to exchange insults first?”
 
“I’m busy, Spike. I’ve got a lot of stuff to do today to catch up on… never mind. Let’s just have our fight and get it over with.” 
 
She pulled out her stake to prove she meant business, driving it into his unprotected chest and praying that he was wearing the ring.  Which he obviously was, laughing when the hole healed up right before her eyes.  He snapped two quick punches to her face, driving her back against a table.  Reminding herself that this was evil, unsouled and non-Buffy-loving Spike, she leaped at him, but instead of punching him she grabbed for his hand and wrestled the ring off.  It was a toss-up which of them seemed most surprised, although Spike had no time to wonder about it as he began to smoke and had to run for the shelter of the woods nearby.
 
“Damn, that was stupid,” Buffy muttered to herself. “Now he’s going to wonder how I knew where it was. I should have waited until he got cocky about it.”
 
 
XXXXXXX
 
As he retreated into the woods, Spike was also muttering to himself. “How the bloody hell did she know what finger to grab? She didn’t even give me time to beat her up or show her what I could do—” He stumbled, then stood up and glanced around the woods with a groan.  “And now my ring’ll be on its way to the big poof.  Thirty seconds here, and I’ve already fucked up. This is gonna go well…”
 
 
He lurked in the cave where he’d found the ring, noting the gold coins and other gems and shaking his head at himself. “I could have been the richest vamp in town if I hadn’t gone running off to LA to try to get that ring back. This time I’m going to spend some of this money.”  He loaded his pockets with some of the loose gems and gold coins before leaving when the sky darkened.
 
He muttered to himself as he wandered toward Giles’s apartment. “Reckon I’d best do my spy on the Slayer thing, so I know when wolfboy takes off for LA. Maybe I can waylay him before he gets there and snatch my ring back. Having it would be a big help when the soldiers show up. I’ll be buggered if I give them a chance to chip me this time.  Means no excuse to have Angel tortured, but wouldn’t want to bring that sadistic old child molester here anyway. I’d just have to kill him myself.”
 
Satisfied he was making the right decision, he lurked outside the apartment, finding to his surprise that Buffy had no intention of sending the ring to Angel. She shook her head at Giles’s insistence that it be destroyed, saying, “I might need it someday…”
 
Well that cocks things up a bit. Now to figure out how to pretend I’m chipped without actually letting those bastards near me.
 
XXXXXXXXX
 
A week or so later, when a pale, shaking Spike showed up at Giles’s door, begging to be allowed in before he caught fire, Buffy shocked everyone by immediately pulling Spike into the room.
 
“Buffy! What are you—“
 
“It’s okay, Giles. I think he’s got information we need… about those commando guys. Don’t you, Spike?”
 
He gaped at her, forgetting for a second that he was supposed to be weak and starving.  This isn’t how it went the first time. What the hell? When she narrowed her eyes at him, repeating, “Don’t you, Spike?” he snapped out of it and tried to sound like his newly chipped and starving self.
 
“Right. I’ve had a run-in with a pack of over-fed soldiers and mad scientist types. Don’t know what they did to me, but Spike can’t play with the other puppies anymore.”
 
“Meaning?” Buffy tapped her foot.
 
“Meaning, I can’t bite anybody. Can’t feed. Feels like my head’s gonna explode if I even think about it too hard.”
 
“Huh. Can you prove that?” Xander spoke from the safety of the other side of the room.
 
“Ask the witch.  I tried to bite her and I couldn’t.”
 
“You tried to eat Willow? Give me one reason I shouldn’t throw you right back out that door!”  
 
“I didn’t do it! And I didn’t go there looking for her anyway. I was looking for you. Thought you set me up for those ninjas wannabes and was gonna—” He stopped himself, but Buffy had no doubt what he’d started to say.
 
“And you were gonna what?” She poked him in the chest, knocking him back a little. “What were you gonna do if I was there? Huh, Spike? What?” She kept poking him, hoping to make him trigger the chip and prove he was harmless.
 
Forgetting he was supposed to be weak and helpless, Spike’s fangs dropped and he snarled back at her, leaning forward as if he wanted to bite.
 
“I was going to rip your throat out for being such a coward that you’d use soldiers to capture me.  What the bloody hell do you think I was there for?” Buffy’s eyes narrowed as he showed no ill effects from what should have been a headache-inducing action. She stood firm and glared right back at him.
 
They stood face to face for a full minute, never breaking eye contact as anger faded to confusion and then to a mix of disbelief, fear, hope, and complete bewilderment. They backed away from each other, still holding each other’s gaze. Buffy put her hand to her mouth to muffle her “Oh my god”, and Spike’s face softened back into his human mien.  “Bloody hell….” he breathed softly.
 
Giles frowned as he watched them staring at each other in what was undeniably shock rapidly morphing into awe and then into a tentative, hope-tinged excitement.
 
“Both of us?  How is that possible?”
 
“Who cares? It’s bloody brilliant! That bitch doesn’t stand a chance now.”
 
“But, how… who?”
 
“You first, love. How and who?”
 
“The Council – what’s left of it.  And Giles—“ She remembered who was watching them and whirled to face him. “Um Giles. Giles who is here and he’s not….”
 
“He’s not amused by watching you trade incomprehensible and highly alarming conversation with William the Bloody.”
 
“Um… no. No of course you aren’t. And I’m not… not conversing with Spike. He just… and then I … but of course it’s crazy and—”
 
“What the Slayer is trying so eloquently to say, is that she expected me to leave Sunnyhell once she got those soldiers out of her dorm room and I escaped them...  again.  She’s just a bit surprised to see me.”
 

“That hardly explains why she let you into my home,” Giles said stiffly, picking a stake up off his desk. “Nor why we shouldn’t take advantage of your presence to rid the world of a dangerous vampire.”
 
“No, Giles!” Buffy placed herself in front of Spike. “Spike has… he’s been in those labs. He can tell us about the commandoes and what they’re doing down there. And, and he’s harmless—”
 
Spike went into game face just long enough to make sure Giles had seen it, then screamed and fell to the floor holding his head. He lay there, moaning until Giles had put down the stake and asked Buffy, “What’s wrong with him?”
 
“Um… the soldiers… or their boss, I guess, put a thingie in his brain. If he tries to bite anybody, it hurts him… really bad. So he’s helpless, see?  He can’t hurt us and he can’t feed himself, so we have to… to feed him and find out what else he knows about the commandos.”
 
“How do you know all that?” Giles gave Buffy one of his glares that meant he was well aware she was hiding something from him.
 
“I, uh, I ran into him last night. Just for a second or two, but I told him it wasn’t me that put the soldiers on him and he told me what they did to him… more or less. I mean, it’s Spike, so he doesn’t know… and then he got away, so he didn’t see that much. But he saw some stuff, so he needs to stay here until we’ve learned everything we can from him.”
 
Giles glanced down at Spike who was sitting up rubbing his head, but no longer wearing his fangs.  He chose not to point out that what Buffy had just said directly contradicted Spike’s excuse for why she was surprised to see him.
 
“What will we do with him?”
 
“Well… don’t you have some chains we can put on him? Or… we could just tie him to a chair…”
 
Spike’s snarl was real and Buffy cuffed him across the back of his head, “Shut up, Spike,” she said, the warning clear in her voice.  His muttered, “I’ve got it, Slayer,” told her he realized they were going to have to play out the events as they occurred until they could talk about what was going on. She relaxed as he stood up and stared at the chair she was pointing to. With a sigh, he sat down and put his arms behind his back. Buffy tied him with a piece of rope Giles pulled from the weapons chest. She did it as quickly and comfortably as possible, but couldn’t resist a soft stroke of her thumb over his wrist. He responded with his own quick squeeze to her fingers.
 
Satisfied that she hadn’t imagined what she was still trying to convince herself was possible, she whispered, “We’ll talk about this as soon as we can. I’ve got to be ready to fight pissed-off Indians now.”
 
“Can we just avoid the arrow to the chest and the bear this time?” he muttered before noticing that Giles was frowning at them again. “Ow! Take it easy, Slayer. I’m delicate,” he said in a louder tone.
 
Buffy’s snort of disbelief was genuine as she stood up and walked over to Giles. “Let’s get this show on the road,” she said.
 
“Show? Do you mean the rather large meal you have taken over my kitchen in an attempt to show off your, up until now invisible, culinary skills?”
 
“Oh. Right. Yes. Thanksgiving dinner. That’s what we were doing. C’mon guys. Let’s get back to work.”
 
“You’re just going to leave the evil undead sitting here?” Xander spoke up for the first time since Spike had come into the apartment and sent the Scoobies all retreating to the far side of the room. Only Willow seemed willing to be in the same room with the vampire, and in fact, was edging her way in his direction.
 
“He’ll be all right there. He’s tied, and I’m right here if he tries anything.” Buffy glanced at Willow who was staring at Spike with clear confusion.  “Wills, did he really try to bite you and couldn’t?”
 
“Um, yeah, he did. I already told you about it.  But I just thought… I mean it was you he wanted, he was just settling for me… He was really nice about it, but I knew it was you he really wanted.”
 
“Nice about it?” Xander stared at Willow as if he’d never met her before.  “This is Spike. Willow and Xander-napping, broken bottle to the face, Spike!”
 
“Well, he was even sort of nice then,” Willow said. “Off and on, when he wasn’t being terrifying… I guess that’s not helping, huh?” She gave Spike a quick glance, surprised to see him smiling softly at her. A smile he quickly dropped when he met her gaze.
 
“Wouldn’t have hurt you,” he muttered. “You were my insurance that the Slayer wouldn’t kill me before I got the book you needed to do my spell.”
 
“You knocked me out!”Xander said. “And I lost my girlfriend because of you.”
 
“Didn’t bite you, did I?” Spike met Xander’s glare. “And I didn’t make you decide to pass the time snogging Red. That’s what cost you the cheerleader – who was way out of your league in the first place, by the way.”
 
Xander picked up the stake and stalked toward Spike. “Buffy, I’m going to dust him. You’re okay with that, aren’t you?  I mean, listen to him. He’s—” He froze, his eyes going wide. “How did you know that? That Willow and I… and Cordelia saw…  How did you know that? You weren’t even there – and you never came back until—”
 
“Look! Indians!” Buffy shouted, pointing the arrow sticking out of wall. “Everybody find something to hide behind before I can…. do whatever I need to do to get rid of them,” she finished with a weak smile at Spike. 
 
In the chaos that followed, everyone forgot about Spike’s seeming knowledge about something that happened while he was fighting vampires in the magic shop with Buffy and Angel.  When she’d banished the bear and the other ghosts began to disappear, she went to the door, pulled it open and said, “I’ve got this, Angel! Go back to LA!” She slammed the door before he could respond and turned to face the surprised looks. Only Giles’s obvious embarrassment indicated that he’d known of Angel’s presence. Buffy just glared at him, her “Really, Giles?” not making sense to anyone but him and Spike.
 
Giles just shrugged. “It seemed best you not know. I was trying to spare your feelings.”
 
“FYI, in the future, worry less about my feelings and more about keeping things from me that I probably need to know.” She didn’t explain what she meant by that, only walking to the kitchen. “Now let’s get this meal on the table before something else interrupts it.”
 
Spike’s steady growl during the meal, as he sat tied to his chair with an empty plate in front of him, had Buffy kicking him under the table. He gave her a glare, but subsided and went into the whining about having something to eat that he’d done the first time around.
 
This time, Buffy stomped to the kitchen and came back with the raw turkey neck and innards that had been in the sink. “Here,” she said, slapping them down on his plate. “Now shut up.”
 
He gave her a very real snarl, but maintained his role as a starving vampire by lowering his mouth to the plate and swallowing whole the raw liver and kidneys. He looked up at the sounds of disgust from around the table and flashed Buffy a grin before biting into the neck and growling as he shook it.
 
Buffy’s sigh and rolling eyes were meant only for him, as she ducked her head to smother a smile. 
 
 
XXXXXXXXX
 
 
It was only much later, when Giles had driven the Soobies home, that they had a few minutes in which to talk about their situation. Some minutes of which were wasted as they shared soft caresses to assure themselves that the other one was really there. Buffy had untied his hands, but left his legs tied to the chair in case Giles surprised them.
 
With her hand resting on Spike’s cheek, Buffy asked, “How did you get here? I saw you burning up.” She dropped her hand. “And what was that ‘No you don’t’ crap? I spend all that time denying I love you, and when I finally say it, you go into denial. You let me think you died believing I was lying!”
 
Ah, no, love.” He leaned forward and took her hands in his. “I’m sorry, for that. I was being stupid. Just wanted you to get out of there before it all fell in, and was afraid if we had some big romantic moment, you wouldn’t go. Not one of my better decisions maybe, but my intentions were good.”  He pulled back to meet her still-angry gaze. “And you did get out, didn’t you? So it worked. A few more seconds and you never would have caught that bus.”
 
Buffy blinked. “How do you know about that? Have you been looking down on us from… heaven… or something?”
 
He shrugged. “No, the big poof told me how everybody got out. Just before he told me I was insane to think you could possibly…. Never mind. The short version is I got sucked into the amulet somehow and popped out a few months later in Angel’s fancy new office. Was just a ghost for a while, couldn’t touch anything or go anywhere except that building. Knew you were all right, and that you were in Europe somewhere, but that’s all he would tell me.”
 
“Asshole,” she muttered, adding quickly when she felt his flinch. “Not you. Him. For not calling me. Ghost or not, I’d have been there as soon as I could.” Her eyes searched his. “You know that, right? I would have come to you if I’d known.”
 
He nodded. “Do now. At the time, I just figured I was stuck like that and maybe it was just as well you were thinking I was a dead hero.”
 
“I prefer my heroes alive,” she said, bringing his hand to her face and nuzzling it. “Or ghostly… I could have handled that… I think.” She sat back on her heels. “But you aren’t a ghost now, so what’s the deal?”
 
“The deal was to send me back to… to make sure that hell-bitch doesn’t make it close enough to the portal date that you have to jump.  Or if she does, that I find a way to keep you from jumping. Or from coming back if you do… but that’s not my idea of a good fix,” he growled before continuing.  “It seems it wasn’t your death that allowed the First to get so strong, it was your resurrection and the forces of darkness involved in that. So, no dead Buffy, means no resurrected Buffy and no First Evil.”  He sighed. “That’s what Oxford and the love of your life think, anyway. And as soon as I was solid, they figured yours truly was the one to send back to fix it.”  He looked around the room and nodded at his tied feet.  “I don’t think I was supposed to end up quite this far back though.  Seems like a bit of overkill, doesn’t it?”
 
“Oxford? And, just so you know? Right now I don’t think I even like Angel very much, so forget that ‘love of my life’ stuff.”
 
“Oxford. Exwatcher. Said he knew you.”
 
“Oh, Wesley. Wesley sent you back here?”
 
“It was a group effort, but he did the mumbo jumbo part.” 
 
“Wow.” Buffy sat back on her heels. “Just when you think you know somebody…”
 
“What about you, love? What are you doin’ here? Wanted another shot at having a normal life with Capt’ Cardboard?”  His voice was light, but she could hear the uncertainty behind it. 
 
Before she could respond, Giles had opened the door and started into the room. He froze when he saw them, then pulled out a stake, hesitating as neither of them seemed inclined to move.
 
“Oh,” he said, letting his arm drop. “You’re all right, Buffy. I thought perhaps he’d got loose and you were trying to kill each other.”
 
Buffy blushed and stood up. “We were just exchanging insults with less yelling than before. I’m going to get Spike some more turkey blood before I leave.”
 
She brushed past Giles and hurried to the kitchen.  He remained standing in the doorway, studying Spike and frowning. He couldn’t see from his position that Spike’s hands were being held behind his back, clutching the ropes that had been holding them.
 
“What? Have a grown a horn in the middle of my forehead or something?”
 
Giles shook his head and kept running his eyes over the noticeably nervous vampire. “No. But there is something very off about you. Something quite different from the other times I’ve seen you.”
 
“Don’t think we’ve actually spent enough time together for you to know me at all, Watcher. Buffy might know me that well, and maybe even the witch, but not you. You know nothing except the drivel in your old books.” Spike settled back against the chair. “You know nothing,” he repeated.
 
“I know there’s something going on between you and my Slayer,” Giles replied in a cold tone of voice. “And I don't like it.”
 
“Sod off, old man,” Spike said. “Slayer’s not a little girl for you to order around anymore.”
 
Buffy came back with a mug of blood and glanced back and forth between a visibly angry Giles and a defiant Spike.
 
“Didn’t you guys place nice while I was gone?” She tried to ignore the tension in the room as she knelt and held out the mug for Spike to sip from.
 
“When you are finished here, I wish to speak to you, please,” Giles said. He gave Spike one last glare and turned his back on the scene of his slayer feeding a vampire that had killed two of her sisters, stomping into the kitchen and putting the teakettle on.
 
“Well, that seems to have gone downhill in a hurry. What did you do?” Buffy said quietly enough that Giles wouldn’t hear.
 
“Me? Nothing!” Spike took a deep draw from the mug and swallowed before he continued. “Your watcher isn’t a stupid man, love. He knows something’s up with us – and he thinks I’m different.”
 
“He doesn’t know you well enough to think you’re different. He hasn’t figured me out yet, and he hasn’t seen you since you were in a wheelchair, has he?”
 
“Not that I’m aware.”
 
“I guess you don’t look as wasted as you did the first time around, but he doesn’t know that. I wonder if he can see the soul?”
 
Spike shrugged. “Well he knows something’s up. We’re going to have to be careful.  And what’s he… the he that’s running the Council years from now… have to do with you being here?”
 
“Well, kinda the same reasons as Angel and Wes had, I guess. The First and his minions really trashed the old Council, and wiped out a lot of Potentials. They figure if we take out Glory before she builds her tower, then I won’t be resurrected and the First won’t rise.”  She frowned. “Which is going to kinda change everything… including us.”
 
“It can’t change us if we’re already here, can it?”
 
“I don’t know. This time travel stuff makes my brain hurt.” She looked at him with wide eyes. “What if it does change us?  If I don’t have to die and come back as depresso-girl, I might not go to you for… whatever… and then we—”
 
“It’s not gonna change how I feel about you, Buffy. I was already half-way in love with you when we were in this position first time around.”  At her rolling eyes and disbelieving snort, he added, “I was when I wasn’t wanting to rip your throat out because I thought I hated you. Dru saw it. She said you were floating all around me. Thought she meant I was too obsessed with killin’ you, but now I wonder.”
 
“But I didn’t love you! Except during that spell of Willow’s, which we need to talk about… I guess I have to let it happen again.”
 
Before she could continue, Giles returned to the room. “Buffy, If you can tear yourself away from William the Bloody, I need to speak with you.”
 
They looked at each other. “Should we just tell him?”
 
“Don’t know, love. Nobody gave me any bloody instructions. Didn’t expect to be here this early on.”
 
“Giles didn’t tell me what not to do either – he just said to get you or Angel to kill Ben if I wouldn’t do it myself.  But I don’t think he meant for me to come back this soon. I thought I was going to show up sometime next year and all I’d have to do is get rid of Glory and keep her from getting Dawn.”
 
“Reckon we’d best tell the Watcher what’s going on, then. Before he gives himself a stroke over there…” He flashed a look at Giles who was once again turning red as he tried to understand what they were talking about.
 
“Okay, let me just finish untying you.”
 
“Huh, I thought we’d a chance to play some games while you had me tied up,” he said, leering at her.
 
“Behave yourself.” Buffy blushed as she stood up and moved back. “Speaking of giving Giles a stroke…. “