Half an hour later, they were trying to relax. Socialize as adults for a while, before Angel, Wesley, and Gunn came to their senses and decided to head back to Los Angeles and away from Spike and Xander, as fast as Gunn's truck could take them.

All of the robed ex-children were now dressed in their own clothing, and Rupert, for one, was overjoyed to be out of those infernal kiddie fashions. Really. Which didn't exactly explain why he was still holding his Dracula figure in one hand, absently playing with the cape.

Xander was still pouting over not being able to wear the Underoos anymore, but he was obviously only doing it to make Dawn giggle, or perhaps to convince Spike that Spike needed to convince Xander to buy something similar in an adult size on their way home. He didn't look as if he were *really* disappointed to be an adult again. Especially considering that a blue-jeaned Spike was sitting on his lap, still trying to tease Angel, and having a reasonable amount of success even without the huge blue anime eyes.

Buffy was talking animatedly to Wesley about the lengths she'd been able to push her vamp-sensing abilities to, recently, and whether it was something new and weird, or just due to the fact that she'd outlived any previous Slayer on record.

All in all, they looked perfectly happy to be restored to their previous selves. As well they should be.

So why was Giles still wishing he'd taken more time to enjoy his bendy straw?

He tried not to dwell on it, uncomfortable enough with the memories of being held to see onto the table of t-shirts, or even more embarrassingly, of crawling into bed with the others. Waking up *snuggling*, for god's sake. Which reminded him, he had to find and destroy their film.

Rather than think about things he felt it best to put past him, he turned his attention to the Urdeku. Wesley had been re-reading the book, his progress slowed by stopping to chat with Buffy, Willow and Tara, and stopping to fend off his companion's advances. Or not fend off, Rupert noted as he glanced away in time to avoid seeing where Gunn's left hand was trying to go.

The statue needed to be destroyed, but he had to be sure it was safe to do so. Perhaps it could be rendered powerless, and it could remain as a reminder? Which meant first determining the source and extent of its power.

Which meant going over to talk to Wesley, of course.

Wesley, whose *lap* he had sat on while the other man was reading the book for the first time. Wesley, who had good-naturedly allowed a four-year-old Rupert to correct his pronunciation of the word 'bisquiscalium' and never once laughed at his lisp. Wesley, who was even now noticing the fact that he was looking in that direction, and was motioning him over with a disturbing little smile.

Sighing, Rupert crossed the shop to the chair in which Wesley was seated. His unformed suspicions were confirmed when Gunn stood up from where he was perched on the arm of the soft chair, and indicated Wesley's lap. "All yours, G."

*His* grin was wide enough to make Giles scowl reflexively at Wesley. Big-mouthed little tit. Wesley merely held up the book. "Did you want to share?"

"Information, yes. Your lap, no."

"Ah." Wesley managed to look as though Rupert had embarrassed himself anyhow.

He gave the other man a stern look, and held up the book he'd carried over. "Is there a reference to the Urdeku there?"

Wesley frowned at the book in his lap, then nodded. "Yes, actually. Here." He pointed out the paragraph. Rupert read it twice before showing Wesley the passage he'd found.

"My word." Wesley sat up straight. When he looked up, Rupert nodded. "Do you think it's safe?"

"We certainly came out of it unscathed," Rupert pointed out. "I say that having not seen the photographs Willow is hiding."

"What's safe?" Buffy asked, wandering over. Rupert's hand closed on his Dracula doll, and he saw Buffy frown.

"The Urdeku still retains its power -- limited power."

"So we have to render it harmless?" Willow asked, giving the Urdeku a dubious look and a wide berth, as she walked around it.

Rupert shook his head. "It isn't dangerous, as such. The huge 'beware, beware' notices carved on the side, and the writings about it in the literature, are merely a warning not to play about with it without another adult whom you trust being present. It's an artifact that you wouldn't have wanted to touch in battle, for instance-- you'd be instantly powerless."

"So how did it manage to get all the way here from wherever you ordered it from, without anybody accidentally touching it?" Buffy asked. "And why did you order it in the first place?"

Rupert blinked at her. And blinked again. "I didn't." He called over to Xander, who was busy not remotely trying to stop Spike from doing inappropriate things to him. "Xander, have you called Anya?"

Xander looked up, startled, with that familiar 'I didn't do it, whatever it was' expression. "No! I mean... wait a minute. Yeah, I called her. Before we all started acting like real kids. She said neat, cool, she loves us, take lots of pictures."

"And that you lot should keep track of everything annoying we do and give her a list, so she can punish us for it when she gets back," Spike added with a straight face. The frightening thing was that he probably wasn't lying. So did that mean that if they really wanted to fix Spike, they should all tell Anya that her boys had been as good as gold?

Rupert shook his head. Not the question at hand. "What I'm concerned about is whether she mentioned having placed the order for the statue in the first place."

"Nope. In fact, she'd never heard of it. I guess it's not exactly vengeance-related magic." Xander shrugged.

"Does it make any difference where it came from, if it's not dangerous?" Willow asked.

"No, I suppose not. Though it should still be drained of its power, if only so no one else gets regressed by accident, without the..er...extended support system that we had to help us deal with it."

"So how do we drain it of power?" Buffy asked.

"Well, actually, that's rather a...interesting thing." Rupert looked at the statue again, and stifled the urge to explain its origins and apparent purpose for being created. Normally he wouldn't have resisted the chance to explain, but he wanted to see the looks on their faces when he told them what they needed to do to render it inert.

He found them all waiting, looking at him. Except Wesley, who was staring at the statue as if worried it might tip over and land on someone.

"OK, enough with the dramatic pause," Xander said. "What's so interesting?"

"We can safely and effectively drain it of its power by using it again. Four times, to be precise."

Instead of the confusion -- and possibly complaining -- that he expected, there were general mutterings of 'cool' and 'who's next, then' and 'I'm *not* letting Angel play with my bubble foam.'

"I have no *intention* of playing with your bubble foam," Angel answered Xander with great dignity.

"Oh, come now, you *are* gonna get kiddified, aren't you?" Spike asked him. "You need to be raised up proper, after all."

"By you two? I don't think so."

Xander shook his head. "Oh no. All three of us. Anya gets back on Tuesday."

"I repeat: no. And also no."

"But Cordelia will be so disappointed," Wesley teased him.

"Nah," Gunn said, slapping shut the book that Wesley was holding, and pulling it from his hands. "She'll be too busy snappin' pictures of you, English."

"Me?" Wesley looked startled. "I won't be touching that thing."

"Why not? I bet you'd have fun." Dawn grinned at him.

Willow was waving her hand. "Me? Me and Tara? We get to, right?" She gave Tara a look, and Tara shrugged, then nodded with a small smile.

Willow grinned back. Xander said, "Hey! A four-year-old Willow. Who wouldn't want to see that?"

"And you better be nice to me, Mister," she told him, already pouting. "I expect fries. Lots of 'em."

"Oh?" Buffy asked. "And who was it took pictures of us playing in the sprinkler, naked?"

"Who was it who took her clothes off, Missy?" Willow countered.

"I was *four*!"

"And Xan was just born to strip," Spike added with a grin. Which got him a smack -- from Buffy.

"You promised never to repeat that story," she hissed.

"What story?" Spike asked innocently. "We were talking about you naked in the sprinkler, right?"

"No, we were talking about what we're gonna do to Willow when she turns four. Like play airplane," Xander said gleefully.

"And read her bedtime stories," Spike said, a nasty gleam in his eye.

Willow nodded. "Yup. *My* choice in bedtime stories. I think you bozos might just manage to finish reading 'Little Women' in two weeks. If you get through that one, I figure we can start on the Camille Paglia." Rupert decided he didn't want to know why Spike and Xander just kept grinning, as if they were actually looking forward to it. From Willow's expression, she didn't either.

"So who else is touching it?" Buffy asked, looking around the room. "We need two more volunteers! Dawn? You want a go?"

But Dawn shook her head. "Nah. If we had a statue that made people older - I'd like to be twenty." She looked hopefully at Rupert. He shook his head. Dawn's face fell. She pouted well enough that he was rather glad she didn't want to be four.

Buffy looked at the others. "Gunn? How about you?"

He just shook his head. "Nope. Somebody's gotta take care of the little pansy-ass squirt for two weeks, and it ain't gonna be Angel. Look at how *his* kids turned out." He nodded at Spike and Xander, who were back to...Rupert blinked. It almost looked like perfectly innocent necking. Perhaps he needed a new prescription.

"I am *not* going to..." Wesley was protesting again.

"Yeah, yeah, tell it to the guy who *doesn't* know your teddy bear's name," Gunn said.

Wesley looked hurriedly at Rupert, then away, and it took him a second to puzzle it out, before he had to grin at his countryman. Ah well, he did owe Wesley for being so patient with him when he was a child, Rupert supposed. "Gunn, we're British, and over twenty-five. *Everyone's* teddy bear was named Rupert."

"Not mine," Spike corrected him.

"Spike, they didn't have teddy bears when you were four," Angel said.

"Who's talking about when I was four?" Spike responded, giving Xander a mostly chaste bear-hug.

"Right, so we have Willow, Tara, and Wesley, as three of our four volunteers?" Rupert said quickly, before he got any closer to upchucking than he already was.

"I am *not*--" Wesley began again. Gunn took his hand, said, "Excuse us," to the group, and pulled Wesley away a few steps. Everyone pretended not to listen, though everything they said was perfectly clear. "Come on, Wes. It's a perfect chance. Be a kid again."

"No. I didn't enjoy it the first time; I have no desire to do it again."

"But he ain't here. You'd--"

"I said 'no'. I realize he isn't here, but I have no desire to be a child."

There was a pause, and Rupert glanced over to see Gunn facing Wesley, cupping Wesley's face in his hands. "I ain't gonna let anyone hurt you, Wes. You can be a kid, again, and actually *be* a kid. I'll make sure of that."

There was more silence, and Rupert didn't have to glance over to know they were either kissing, gazing deeply and meaningfully, or about to do either.

Wesley said something that was too soft for him to overhear, but Gunn responded, "You don't have to be. I'm gonna watch over you. Promise."

Rupert moved a bit further away, looking pointedly elsewhere. He wasn't sure why -- this lot explored their deep, personal relationship issues around him -- usually loudly -- just about every day. There was something different about this, though. Whether it was just that it was the L.A. group, or Wesley being another member of the no-fuss-please-we're-British club... at any rate, it felt wrong to listen in any further.

He was quite chuffed to know his conclusions were correct, however, when Wesley moved slowly back to his chair, Gunn at his side, and nodded. "All right. I do this under protest, however, and mostly because if I don't, Gunn has threatened to do nasty things to my bone china tea set."

"The Royal Doulton," Gunn muttered. "With the hand-painted friggin' periwinkles. Crash. Tinkle. Tinkle."

Rupert frowned. "Really, Charles. If he doesn't want to...." Not that he particularly cared about Royal Doulton, but it was the principle of the thing. Now, if it were Wedgwood, that would be another case entirely...

"I need pictures of him as a kid," Gunn replied, straight-faced and serious as though that were his only true motive. Rupert decided not to press -- Wesley was a grown man...for now...and could surely talk himself out of doing something like this, if he chose.

"Well, that leaves one more. Who would like it?" He glanced about the room, and found several people staring at Angel.

"No," the vampire said. Firmly. Politely. To Willow. To Spike, he said something in Latin that indicated his vocabulary was far too advanced for a potential four-year-old, in more ways than one.

"I know what that means, you know," Spike said, looking at Angel for all the world as if he were still four years old and his Sire had said 'Hell' in front of him.

"So do I," Willow informed him, "and you still haven't explained why. We wouldn't really let Spike and Xander take care of you, if you didn't want them to. Gunn and Cordelia could do it."

"Oh, even better," came the pained reply. "No, thank you, no."

"But it'll be fun," Willow insisted. "Don't you wanna be four again? No worries, no guilt, no brooding." She smiled, taking the edge off the teasing words.

"No curse?" Angel asked.

"Oh. I didn't... you think you'd be...um...happy?" Willow frowned, thinking. "Were you guys-- ok, dumb question. Anyone who can laugh for an hour over cereal commercials is completely happy."

"Hey!" Buffy protested. "It was a funny commercial."

"Erm, actually-" Spike interrupted, his tone one that made everyone look at him, and most sane people take a step back or grab a stake. "He wouldn't be *completely* four. Ish. Maybe 180."

Xander was the first one to speak after the few seconds of confused silence that followed. "What exactly are you saying? In English, Spike."

The sandy-haired vampire -- he had reacquired his scar, but not his peroxide-stripped locks -- squirmed a bit on Xander's lap. "Er...well... I might not have exactly..."

Willow shot him a sharp look. "You didn't regress! You were just acting like a brat because you were cute and could get away with it."

"Yeah, that's a major change," Xander snorted.

"I *did* regress," Spike insisted. "Just... well, I'm a vampire. Our body chemistry's different from yours."

"Regressed to what?" Buffy asked, her eyes narrowing in that 'pre-slay taunting' way she had.

"Er, well, I dunno. Felt like I was 60!" Spike looked insulted by the insinuation that he hadn't regressed at all, then returned Xander's grin. "Was having too much fun to really worry about it."

"You sneak," Xander told him, and Rupert could tell that in another moment he was going to have to be looking elsewhere if he didn't want to get an eyeful of Xander-Spike tongue-hockey.

"See? It wouldn't have any effect on me," Angel said quickly, as if he didn't want to be seeing it, either.

"Who, then? We *do* have to render the Urdeku powerless." Rupert turned his attention back to the statue. "I suppose someone could have a second go. There's no harm in it, according to the books."

"We could wait for Anya," Xander suggested, meanwhile doing something with his finger and Spike's ear that suggested they had no intention whatsoever of waiting for Anya, for anything.

"Ew, stop that, it's disgusting," Buffy said, wrinkling her nose. The she looked seriously at the two men. "You think she'd want to miss out on male companionship for *another* two weeks? Even yours?"

"Point. 'Kay, who wants to go again, and don't say you do, Spike."

"Wouldn't dream of it. Wouldn't be any fun without you, anyhow."

"Besides, he's already used to you being the short one. Wouldn't be any different," Dawn retorted, then looked innocent when Buffy, Willow, and Giles all gaped at her.

"That's it, she's not spending any more time with them. Ever." Buffy folded her arms and glared at the two oblivious guys who had corrupted her little sister.

Rupert was only half-listening, as Spike flipped Buffy the bird and got threatened with a wooden hairclasp in reply. It really was necessary that *someone* else utilize the statue's power. For the safety of...of unsuspecting adults the world over. Or something like that. So why was he glad no one seemed to be jumping at the chance?

"I say we take a vote," Xander announced. Startled by what sounded like a sensible suggestion, Rupert looked over to find Xander raising his hand. Xander wanted them to vote for him? Well, not surprising, and if Xander really wanted to he didn't think anyone would say 'no'.

Xander shocked him by saying, "Everyone who thinks Giles should go another round of kiddie-hood, raise their hand."

There were seven yeas and one abstention. Rather, one Rupert Giles protesting half-heartedly that there was no reason it had to be *him* and why didn't Buffy take another go and who said anyone got to vote on what would be his personal decision anyway...

"Giles, I'm the Chosen One," Buffy explained gently. "I don't know if you knew this or not, but into every generation is born one girl. One girl, in all the world, born with the strength and the skill to hunt the vampires, to stop the spread of their evil..."

"To open stubborn pickle jars with just the gripping power of her two dainty knees..." Spike chimed in.

Rupert couldn't decide who to glare at, so he sent a general nasty glance at that corner of the room. "Yes, I was aware of that, thank you. Did you have a point?"

"The first time was an accident. I can't get away with slacking off the Slayage for *another* two weeks. It would be..." She pursed her lips, and gave him a deeply troubled look. "Wrong. You wouldn't want me to do something like that, would you, Giles?""

"Ah. Quite," he said dryly. "And the reason Xander shouldn't take a turn?"

"Like we said, earlier - wouldn't be any fun without me," Spike said.

"No, you said it wouldn't be any fun for you without...oh, forget it. Dawn, are you sure..?"

Dawn grinned. "I'm sure. I still remember being a kid. I mean, I know I *wasn't*, really. But I don't wanna be little again. Buffy will make me do all my chores."

"And that's different from now, how?" Buffy asked her.

Rupert looked to Gunn, the only other one who could do it. But he knew he wouldn't ask -- Wesley would never take his turn, without his lover there to watch over him. Then they'd still need a fourth....

Sighing, Rupert nodded. "Fine. But only because the thing *has* to be rendered powerless."

"And so you can finish that Lego-Land castle."

"I have no desire to finish..." Rupert looked down at the action figure in his hand. Dracula did need a place to live, after all. And if he pouted nicely enough, Buffy would probably buy him the Weird Sisters to fill out his collection.

Plus, they had a whole box of bendy straws to use up, and he'd be damned if he was going to let Wesley take off to L.A. with them.

Dear God, he was thinking like a four-year-old already.

The End