Wrecked

Cartoons are playing when Tara and Dawn wake up the next morning on the couch in the Summers living room, where they were waiting for Willow and Buffy to come home. The girls start worrying as they realize no one came home; Tara tries to reassure Dawn that everything's all right. But Buffy would beg to differ with that assessment, since on the other side of town she's waking up naked next to Spike. Who is also naked. [For some reason, she seems to have a problem with this. Personally, I'm enjoying the view...] The building is pretty much rubble around them; Spike wakes up as Buffy starts panicking and scrambling for her clothes, asking., "When did the building fall down?" Spike answers groggily, "I don't know. Must have been some time between the first time and the, uh..." He has to stop to count and finally settles for simply smiling like every other man in the history of the universe on the Morning After what was apparently mind-blowing sex. [I could have been a lot snarkier and much more ribald about that last comment; I'm restrained only by the knowledge that my father is going to be reading this, and he choked at my last mention of Red Shoe Diaries. So.... < g >] Buffy clutches Spike's coat closer around her and moans. The bad kind of moan, I mean. [I'm sorry, the jokes are just too easy. I refuse to synopsize these scenes -- or, in fact, any scenes that involve Spike naked -- without snerking.]

Buffy scurries around trying to locate her clothes and get dressed as Spike watches her, utterly unconcerned with the clothes thing. It's hard to tell whether she's freaking more about the 'sex with Spike' thing, or the 'left Dawn alone all night' thing. Spike just looks like he really wants a cigarette. Or two. Packs. He tries to treat this as your usual morning after; Buffy blows him off with "Last night was the end of this freak show." Spike grabs her, hauling her down to his lap. "Don't. Say. That." Buffy demands to know what he thought was going to happen. Spike proceeds to demonstrate what he thought was going to happen; Buffy fights him off for about three seconds before they're back with the snogging. Things are progressing predictably until Spike makes the mistake of opening his big mouth: "I knew it. I knew the only thing better than killing a Slayer would be--" Buffy shoves him away, scrambling to her feet. "Is that what this is about? Doing a Slayer?" He retaliates by throwing her track record with vampires in her face; she throws back, "A vampire got me hot. One. But he is gone. You're just... You're just convenient." Spike blinks in shock and hurt, but shakes it off, pulling on his clothes [off camera, damn that Standards and Practices thing ]. "So, what now? You go back to treating me like dirt until the next time you get an itch you can't scratch? Well, forget it. Last night changed things. I'm done being your whipping boy." Buffy: "It was a mistake" Spike: "Bollocks! It was a bloody revelation!" The conversation devolves to Spike telling her she'll come back for more, her deriding his belief that he's "God's gift." Buffy heads for the door again, but Spike stops her, locking his wrists behind her neck. "I may be dirt. But you're the one who likes to roll in it, Slayer." She threatens to kill him if he tells anyone; he looks back at her steadily, then hands her her panties. She punches him in the nose and flees.

Tara is busy making pancakes for Dawn, who is busy freaking. "What if they're all in a ditch somewhere? Ditches are bad. Mom always used to talk about the ditches." Tara assures her that nobody's in a ditch and they don't need to call the rest of the gang yet. Willow and Amy arrive through the back door, having apparently had a very good night, and Willow freezes when she sees Tara. After an awkward moment, Willow introduces Amy. "Everything's different now," Amy starts chattering. "The Bronze, for one," she says, with a very pointed look sideways at Willow. "And Willow! She's a freaking amazing witch! I could barely keep up with her last night." That goes over like the proverbial lead balloon; Amy finally realizes it and shuts up, but too late. Tara leaves suddenly as Buffy comes in the front door. Dawn greets her happily but notices, "You're all sore and limpy." Buffy denies any problems, but has problems sitting down. "I had a fight. An all-nighter." Asking about Tara leads to the answer that Willow was out all night; Buffy would be a lot angrier if she hadn't just done the same thing. And if Willow wasn't so visibly bummed after the encounter with Tara. They both excuse themselves to go get some badly needed sleep, and Amy goes home to face her father. "No problem," Dawn tries to smile, suddenly alone in the kitchen. "I just go... try to find some awake people." Upstairs, Willow wanders into her room and collapses on the bed; she gestures at the curtains with a magic gesture to get them to close. But nothing happens. After a second try, she has to get up to do it by hand before she falls asleep.

Awake people are apparently Xander and Anya [sporting a truly frightening bleach job, I might add], hard at work doing research at the magic shop, with no results. "All these demons are starting to look alike," Xander says. "You got reptiles, reptiles with horns, reptiles with gills, and I'm still finding nothing of the "steal a diamond, kill a guy" variety. Anya seems to be too deep in her research to respond, until Xander checks and finds out she's reading bridal magazines behind the covers of the books. She points out the pointlessness of research when they're not finding anything, and she's not wrong. When Buffy arrives to ask for a status report the best they can gives her is that Anya thinks Martha Stewart is a witch. "Nobody could do that much decoupage without calling on the powers of darkness." Obviously she's still in WeddingLand: "I can't decide whether to put my bridesmaids in cocktail dresses or the traditional burlap with blood larvae." [Tina, thank you for not going with the blood larvae. In case I haven't said it before.] Buffy pulls the bride and groom out of the debate, but the research results are still a big fat zero. Xander suggests asking Spike, which Buffy ixnays with lots of enthusiasm. The next idea is getting help from Willow, but Buffy tells them about the witch's late night. She's worried about Willow, and she's not the only one. Xander comments that Willow's "making herself a playmate to do magic with. Someone who monitor her like Tara." Buffy counters that Willow is a grown-up and should be left alone to work out her own reasons for acting like she is. "So what if she crosses a line? We all do stuff. Stupid stuff, and... we learn. We learn and we don't do it again," she assures herself, Spike's peroxide image totally not running through her brain. Xander backs off, but retains the right to be worried.

That night, Amy and Willow wander through Sunnydale trying to find something to top the previous night's fun. Willow tells Amy that last night wiped her out; it took her all day to be able to do magic again. [insert eloquent roll of eyes here] Amy grabs Willow, telling her, "I know this guy. And he knows spells that last for days, and the burnout factor is.. nothing... I'm not kidding you. This guy will blow your mind." Willow looks dubious. "Is it dangerous?" Amy smiles. "Will that stop you?" A little later, Amy leads the way through an alley; she stops at thin air and announces, "This is it." There's a door there; Amy backs through and disappears. Willow follows and finds herself in a crack house waiting room [only possible description]. Amy tells Willow the place is cloaked and moves around, to keep "Rack" out of trouble. The door on the opposite wall opens and Jeff Kober walks out, with long hair and that John-the-Baptist-after-a-40-day-fast expression happening. One of the girls in the waiting room immediately starts begging Rack for her fix, but he walks straight to Amy and Willow. "I believe these two are next."

Rack shows the girls into a back room; Amy has obviously known the guy for a long time. She tries to blow off her time away and he says flatly. "You were a rat. I hope that taught you not to mess with spells you can't handle. You should leave that in the hands of a professional." He rubs his together and they start glowing a rather nasty red as he advances on Willow. "This one's giving off vibes." She tells him she's getting tapped out too fast, and she's used all of her spells; he demands, "What do you want me to do about that?" She stammers, and he finally brings up the question of price, advancing on her. "You gotta give a little to get a little," he says. Amy gives her an encouraging look, and he lays a hand on her chest. "I'm just gonna take a little tour. Willow's head goes back as red light flares around them; Rack has the look of a man smoking some really good drugs. The lights dies and he leans forward, whispering in Willow's ear, "You taste like strawberries." Her eyes are still closed, and she smiles, weaving slightly from side to side.

Amy apparently gets her fix, too; Rack watches from the floor as she spins around the room wildly, so fast she's a blur. Willow lies back, enjoying her trip... from where her back is plastered against the ceiling. The rooms is swallowed in blackness; a voice chants in her head as she rolls around, looking down at a jungle, and a monster that suddenly comes through, snarling at her. She shrieks and falls from the ceiling to land hard against the floor. Then she's standing again, roaming from Rack's room to the magic box, her eyes black with magic. When she finally comes back to herself, she's on the floor of her bedroom, wit no idea how she got there. She makes it to the shower and stands under the water, crying. When she comes out, she sees Tara's box of stuff, left behind when she left, and pulls a shirt and skirt out of the box, taking it with her over to the bed. She gestures, and the clothes suddenly stand up as if there's a body in it; Willow leans into its ghostly embrace.

The next day, wakes up to find Dawn in the kitchen, flipping her new invention, peanut-butter-and-banana quesadillas, with her fingers. Willow's only up for water, her stomach upset. Buffy is already out for research and patrolling; Willow takes the chance to apologize for not coming home, which Dawn accepts cheerfully. Willow offers a meal out and a movie to make it up to her anyway; Dawn says she thought Willow was going out with Amy. Willow smiles and tells Dawn she'd rather be with her. Dawn smiles back and cheerfully ditches the quesadilla. "Remind me to never invent that again." They leave a message on the refrigerator and leave. Buffy comes home well after dark, and doesn't check the refrigerator; she heads straight upstairs, calling for her roommates. They're not in the house, but Willow's box of magic supplies is lying open, like someone's been rummaging through it. Buffy senses someone moving behind her and spins around -- to find Amy trying to sneak away. She pins the witch against a wall, relieving her of the plastic baggie she's holding. "It's not what you think it is - it's sage!" Buffy demands to know where Willow and Dawn are; Amy doesn't know ("They didn't let you in?" "Not that they know of..."), and Buffy shakes her down for whatever else she's taken, as Amy begs her to give it back, telling her that she needs it and Willow understands. "Understands what? Breaking into someone's house for kitchen spices? No, I don't think so!" Amy tells her, "She's as bad as I am. Worse. I bet she's at Rack's right now." Amy tells all about Rack, and says that Willow's probably there now. "With Dawn," Buffy realizes, and tries to make Amy tell her where Rack is. Amy throws up before she can be any help.

After dinner, Willow and Dawn head for the movie theater, but Willow, who didn't eat and is looking progressively worse. They talk for a second about Dawn's slumber party with Tara, and Dawn tells Willow that Tara misses her. She asks if Willow's okay, and realizes they aren't heading for the theater; Willow tells her they're making one quick stop. She and Dawn find Rack's without any trouble, and she takes Dawn in with her. Willow promises Dawn they'll still make the movie. "It doesn't matter if we miss the trailers," she says as she vanishes behind Rack's door. "I like the trailers," Dawn says quietly, all alone in the lobby.

A quick minute turns into long time, as Dawn sits on the couch in Rack's lobby hugging herself. Another junkie comes in and sits next to her and she moves away. Inside, Willow is suspended near the ceiling in a glowing orb of light, her face slack with pleasure. "What do you think, strawberry?" Rack asks from his slouch below her. "Can you handle some more?" He shoots another shot of energy up at her and Willow is flying through a starry universe, reaching out to try to touch the very 3D stars. Until a huge red hole opens in the sky, and something very scary begins to claw its way out. Rack laughs as Willow screams in terror.

Spike is asleep when a heavy candle suddenly bounces off his chest and he wakes up to find Buffy standing over him impatiently. He sits up [showing all of us that he's naked again and, again, none of us except Buffy mind in the slightest] and starts in on the sexual innuendo without missing a beat. "Get dressed. Dawn's missing," Buffy tells him, throwing his clothes at him. "Again?" Spike asks. "Ever think about a lo-jack for the girl?" Buffy tells him Dawn went out with Willow; he blows it off until she mentions Rack's name. "He deals in magic," Spike tells her. "Black stuff. Dangerous." He can find Rack's place because he's a vampire, and stands up to get moving. Buffy turns away [ see above re: naked] and he snarks, "Oh, that's right -- hide your blushing eyes," as he starts dressing. Dawn is still in Rack's lobby, waiting for Willow, when she finally loses her patience. But just as she's about to invade Rack's room, Willow comes out, her eyes black and every word of her body language screaming, "Stoned!" They leave, Dawn telling Willow she just wants to go home, but Willow wants some action. "Come on, Dawnie. It's grownup time. Do you want to play with the grownups or not?" Show her some and she might want to; right now, she wants to get the hell home and away from Willow. And the ugly thing that's stalking them down the alley, the same nasty thing that came out of Willow's hallucination rift.

Buffy and Spike are wandering the streets themselves, trying to get a fix on Rack's hideout. Buffy accuses Spike of dragging it out to get time with her; he tells her to get a grip. "things have changed," he reiterates. Buffy tells him to quit that. "The only thing that's different is that I'm disgusted with myself. That's the power of your charms. Last night... was the most perverse, degrading experience of my life." He smirks. "Yeah. Me, too." They start walking again as Buffy tells him, "That may be how you get off, but it's not my style." Spike: "No, it's your calling. Gave me a run for my money, Slayer." He continues, more seriously and with his usual appalling degree of honesty, "You've got me by the short hairs. I love you. You know it. But I got my rocks back. You felt something last night." Buffy: "Not love." Spike: "Not yet. But I'm in your system now. You're gonna crave me like I crave blood, and the next time you come calling, if you don't stop being such a bitch, maybe I will bite you." Buffy finally loses it and tells him she wants him out of her life, out of her home, out of her work. "Too late. You invited me in." He points out that she needs him, for things like finding Rack's place: "You really gonna put your little sis in danger just to spite me?"

Little sis is already in danger, since Willow is getting more and more irrational. Dawn hears a bad noise behind her and starts to run, but the Ugly Thing meets her at the front of the alley, and she pulls up short. "You summoned me, witch?" the Ugly Thing hisses at Willow, who desperately wants to believe it's not real. Which is pretty much disproved when it hits Dawn and she yelps in very real pain. Willow gets Dawn behind her, backing away, and magically knocks Mr. Ugly back. The two girls run, and Willow magically steals a car, steering by gesturing emphatically, and laughing as she careens recklessly down the street. She looks over her shoulder to throw a taunt at Mr. Ugly, so Dawn is the only one who sees the wall coming at them. Before Willow slams the car right into it.

The car is totaled, steam coming from under the crumbled hood, and Dawn and Willow aren't in much better shape. Dawn gets out of the car, holding her arm, and goes around to check on Willow. Before she can get there, Mr. Ugly jumps out at her and grabs her. She knocks him away and dives under the car, and he starts trying to drag her out. She screams; Buffy and Spike hear her a few streets away, and take off running. Mr. Ugly finally drags Dawn out, but she brings a handful of dirt with her, throwing it in the thing's eyes. It's not enough; it grabs her again and throws her down the alley, where she lands hard. It scuttles after the stunned girl, but Buffy tackles it from the side before it can touch her. Buffy begins fighting the thing as Spike goes directly to Dawn. The fight ranges up and down the alley, blow for blow, kick for kick, with Mr Ugly coming out on top. Until it starts trembling violently as it faces Buffy. "Now you're scared? Better late than never." But it's not the Slayer he's fighting now; he slowly vanishes into a cloud of fire and dust, revealing Willow standing behind him, power still arcing between her hands. She walks unsteadily forward, facing Buffy silently. Dawn's cries break the deadlock; Spike stands away as Buffy rushes to her sister. Dawn babbles an explanation through painful tears as Buffy starts trying to see how badly she's hurt. All three of them ignore a frantic Willow as she asks if Dawn's okay. "Stay away from her," Buffy says through her teeth, but Willow gets in front of them anyway, frantically apologizing to Dawn. The younger girl just stares at her with cold eyes and a face covered with sweat and blood, then slaps her. Spike supports her as she walks away, and Willow falls to the ground behind them, still crying and trying to apologize. Buffy finally stops; Spike goes ahead with Dawn as she turns back to her friend.

At home, Willow sits on her bed wrapped in a blanket, staring sightlessly at the bedspread. Buffy comes in to tell her Dawn's asleep from the pain medicine. "But she's gonna be all right?" Buffy leans against the door frame, watching her. "It's a fracture. It's gonna take some time." She finally tells Willow she doesn't understand -- why Willow went to Rack, why she Dawn along. Willow can't give her a reason. "I thought I had it under control. But then, Tara... It started before she left. It's why she left." She can't really explain any of it, but asks Buffy, "If you could be plain old Willow or Super Willow, who would you be?" Buffy shakes her head, but her voice in gentle. "Will, there's nothing wrong with you. You don't need magic to be special." Willow: "Who was I? Just some girl. Tara didn't even know that girl." Reassurances that she is more than "just some girl" and that Tara loves her don't seem to help much; Buffy tries them anyway, and Willow tries to believe them. "It took me away from myself," Willow says quietly. "I was... free." That strikes a chord with Buffy, as more visions of Spike stride almost visibly through her head. "I get that. More than you... But it's wrong. People get hurt." Willow: "I was out of my mind. I did things, I can't even.... It won't happen again. I promise. No more spells. I'm finished." Buffy nods, identifying way too much. "Good. I think it's right. to give it up. No matter how good it feels." Willow says, "It's not worth it. Not if it messes with the people I love." And there are things about magic she won't miss, like the nosebleeds and the headaches and the "stinky yak cheese in my bra". The two sit quietly.