TITLE: In Any Lifetime

AUTHOR: AmethystxX

CHAPTER: 5

RATING: R

PAIRING: A/S

Disclaimer: I don’t own anyone mentioned in my fic, and I also earn no money from creating this fic. Please don’t sue, I have nothing to offer or give anyway so there wouldn’t be much point.

Summary: AU What if the live you know wasn’t real. That your life was altered, changed, destroyed by the scorn of one woman. Will you be able to get your life back in order with the help of the only person who trusts you, or stay within the lie. AngelSpike SLASH!

IMPORTANT NOTES: Quotes are being used from the Buffy series to make it a little bit more...realistic I guess. The attitudes will change in later chapters.

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To Hell We Ride:

By lunchtime the gang all met up in the cafeteria to discuss what sort of action that they’d be taking towards Buffy and her friends. Although they were quite certain that magic did not exist in any way, shape or form but they all knew, excluding William and Dawn, that if Buffy was to fail she surely find a different way to deal with Will and Liam.

“W-well I must say that this ‘plan’ of Buffy’s is certainly peculiar. How she could come across the knowledge of ‘magic’ and even go as far to attempt to perform it...well I don’t think that even Buffy would go so far only to fail” Wesley said when he was filled in along with Gunn and Oz. The gang silently agreed.

“Actually the library has quite a large collection of books to do with spiritual, even magical, texts with actual spells in them” Willow replied, playing with her food absently.

“Well why the hell do they have that sort of thing floating around in the library...and how do you know what sorta books they got in there” Gunn asked curiously, Willow blushed and coughed shyly.

“It’s not like I’m the most popular gal around so I go to the library for a bit of peace. Mr. Giles didn’t seem to mind me being there so I read through a few books” Willow said, hesitating on ‘few’.

Oz leaned forward slightly, “A few?”

Willow shifted in her chair, “Ok so maybe nearly all of them but theres a few I haven’t read! And it was a long time ago that I read them! I can barely remember anything from them” Will stood up and laughed at Willow, patting her on her back. making her blush turn crimson. Xander snickered and Willow pounced onto him. Will was knocked backwards onto Liam’s lap as Willow dived over him, Will’s chair being knocked over in the process.

“That’s enough of that!” Snyder shouted as he came over, Willow scrambled back into her seat, “And you!” Snyder turned to Will and Liam, “Are we having a chair shortage!” Will flushed and sat in his seat, once he had turned it upright.

“These public displays of affection are not acceptable in my school. This isn't an orgy, people. It's a classroom!” Snyder stated, frowning down at them as he was slightly taller than them when they were seated.

“Yeah. Where they teach lunch” Xander muttered, then his face creased into in a frown as Snyder turned furious eyes on him.

“Did I say that out loud?” Xander whispered as he leant over to Willow, she giggled slightly.

“I don’t recall me asking your opinion on the matter at hand Harris, and if I did it’s not as though your opinion would matter” Snyder said cooly, even smirking slightly at Xander’s indignant look.

“My opinion matters!” Xander replied, inwardly cursing as Snyder turned towards him with anger and pity within his eyes.

“Your opinion’s worth nothing, Harris. Whatever comes out of your mouth is a meaningless waste of breath. An airborne toxic event” Snyder said, and Xander chose to keep his anger at bay.

“Well, I'm glad you feel comfortable enough to be so honest with me. And I can only hope that one day I'm in the position to be that honest with you” Xander replied cheerily as Snyder turned his attention to William instead.

“Whats in the bag?” Snyder commanded, trying to look into Will’s lunchbag.

Will looked at him, confused, “My lunch”

Snyder scoffed, and grabbed Will’s lunch and searched through the contents. “Is that the new drug lingo?” Snyder asked offhandly, as he continued searching.

“No its my lunch!” Will replied, grabbing his lunch from the principle as he stopped searching. Snyder looked at the faces on the table as they looked at him, obviously containing their laughter.

“Sit up straight!” Snyder demanded to Will as he turned and left the cafeteria, the laughter following him.

“Oh God! Snyder has seriously lost it!” Gunn bellowed, shaking with laughter.

When Will calmed down he scowled at his ruined lunch, “Paranoid old Git” he muttered, pouting as he threw it away.

“Ok guys enough of this, we really need to dixcuss what we’re going to do here” Liam stated, and the others all sighed with apprehension.

“I say that we go and find Cordelia, I mean she knows the most about the plan. She told us little tidbits of it so she must be leaving out a hellova lot of stuff” Xander said picking up his pizza and pausing mid-bite when everyone stared at him.

“Whot?” He tried to say around the pizza.

“That’s what I was going to say. The sooner we find Cordelia the better we can interprit Buffy’s moves. Agreed?” Willow asked and nodds went around the table.

“Ok so lets boogie” Xander said, getting up from the table with the others. As they left, A girl came up beside Willow and tapped her on the shoulder, making her jump, startled.

“Oh I’m sorry I didn’t mean to scare you” The girl said smiling.

“Oh that’s ok. Is there something you wanted?” Willow replied, smiling back uncertainly at the girl.

“Erm yes actually. I’m a friend of Cordelias,” Willow inwardly groaned, “Oh fun” Willow groaned, “And I need your help with something”

Willow sighed, “Is it homework? Because I can help with homework, that’s me homework-gal” She rambled and the girl chuckled slightly.

“No, it’s not for homework. It’s to do with” The girl leant forward to Willows ear, as if telling her a secret, “Magic” The girl finished.

“Magic?” Willow repeated, her curiousity perking up. If this girl knew about magic or believed in it then she probably had some information that they needed, Willow thought. The girl smiled hopefully and Willow sighed.

“Well I don’t turn down people who need help so if I could get your name I’d be happy to help” Willow replied.

The girls eye brightened, “Anya”

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“So we’re just trying to do a temporal spell right? To restore your family heirloom. Nothing else right?” Willow asked nervously as Anya lit the candles in front of them.

“Oh come on Rosenberg, don’t be such a coward. Be wild!” Anya replied, sitting back on her heels.

“Oh, I don't get wild. Wild on me equals spaz.” Willow mumbled back and Anya rolled her eyes with impatience.

“Ok so we ready?” Anya asked.

“How does the spell work?” Willow asked, sitting back on her heels, imitating Anya.

“You read the card that’s on the floor, the line’s shaded in red are what you’ll be reading out.We both call on Eryishon, the Endless One, offer up the standard supplication, then there's a teensy temporal fold” Anya smiled weakly, “We hope. Um, then I pour the sacred sand on the representation of the necklace, and Eryishon brings it forth from the time and place it was lost” Anya stated happily and Willow smiled nervously.

“Ok” Anya held her palms over the sacred circle.

“Eryishon. K'shala. Meh-uhn” Anya started,

Willow also reached out with her palms out, keeping hers tip-to-tip with Anya's.

“Diprecht. Doh-tehenlo nu-Eryishon” Willow responded,

Anya held a bottle of sacred sand over the circle.

“The child to the mother”

Willow held the bottle as well when Anya spoke.

“The river to the sea”

Anya closed her eyes, “Eryishon, hear my prayer”

Willow closed her eyes at those words and there was a low rumbling and a pillar of energy appeard in front of the two girls, then Willow heard and saw various people, talking, most of the people looked familiar.

(A/N: Every new paragraph is a new scene, warning: it will be slightly confusing. The bold is one person talking in background, echoing)

“For a thousand years I wielded the powers of The Wish. I brought ruin to the heads of unfaithful men” A voice echoed,

“Hello, my life, how I’ve missed you” Buffy said, facing a group of people.

“... I brought forth destruction and chaos for the pleasure of the lower beings...”

“Due to the severity of the spell young Miss. Summers asked for, there were certain...aspects we had to take into consideration” A man said.

“Which were?” A familiar man asked.

“...I was feared and worshipped across the mortal globe...”

“For the sake of this Earth! You must go back!” The man shouted.

“...And now I'm stuck at Sunnydale High...”

William turned to Buffy coldly, “This should be a kick” He stated, Buffy smiled at him nastily, “I violently dislike you” Buffy replied.

“...Mortal. Child. And I'm flunking math because I granted a wish to the wrong person...”

“...that anyone who comes to know William Collins will forever...” Buffy’s voice was broken off throughout her speech, as Willow became increasingly panicked. The voice didn’t let up in the background though, instead it became louder.

“...In which they broke my necklace and therefore took away my power” The echo finished.

Suddenly Willow was thrown into her ‘vision’ only to see a fist flying towards her face.

Anya turned over the bottle of sand, most of it sifting though Willows fingers and hitting the plate in the circle. Willow was thrown out of the scene and stared at Anya with a look of surprise as the pillar of energy faded. She jumped up breathing hard,

“What the hell was that!” Willow shouted, gesturing angrily to the circle.

“Oh its not here!” Anya said frantically as she search the circle, Willow looked at her uneasily, “I may know a little about magic but that’s a little blacker than I like my arts” Willow stated.

Anya smiled sweetly, “Look, we’ll just try again and..”

“No! not again! I think emphatically not!” Willow cut in, grabbing her bag and heading for the door.

“I can’t do this by myself!” Anya shouted out to her desperately.

“That’s a relief!” Willow replied, walking out of the door and heading to the gangs meeting point. The library.

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“Oh my God! Giles what’s happened!” Willow asked as she entered the library, instantly noticing the lack of books on the shelves.

“They’re confiscating my books” Giles replied, cleaning his glasses furiously. Willow smiled sadly at him.

“Oh Giles I’m so sorry!” Willow said sympetically.

“Sorry! Giles we need those books!” Liam said frantically.

Giles turned to Liam with exasperation, “Believe me I tried to tell that to the nice man with the big gun” Giles said, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“Big guns?” Xander whispered to Will, “Government” Will replied as Xander went ‘Oh’.

“Well we’ll figure something out. Any luck with Cordelia anyone?” Will asked. The people in the room shook their heads no and Liam sighed with frustration.

“Well since we no longer have the library books I have another source of information but she’ll need a lot of convincing to come here or a swift kick up the arse” Willow said.

“Who?” Oz asked.

“Anya. She’s in our year and she asked me for some help on a ‘Spell’ and I was curious so I went along with her. We done a ‘Temporal Spell’ to recover a broken necklace and I don’t know what happened but I suddenly heard voices and saw a lot of people who looked like us but different. The main voice I heard sounded a lot like what Buffy was planning” At their confused looks Willow continued.

“I think I may have seen the events leading up to Buffy’s plan then what happened when her plan came into effect” Willow finished.

“Wow” Oz whistled, taking perch on the table, trying to sneck a peek down Willow’s low-cut top.

“I must say that does sound quite exciting. Magic has always been considered as ‘Myths’, fairytales even. But you’ve just faced magic head on and seen into the near future” Giles said, literally vibrating with pent up energy from his excitement.

“Exciting? ....no. Pain-stakingly shocking in the most horrifying forms? I don’t think that, that even covers it” Willow replied, shuddering slightly and sitting in a chair behind Oz, much to his disappointment.

“Ok before we get too hyped up on this piece of information, Willow what are you suggesting we do with ‘Anya’?” Xander asked, his attention soon caught by the storage cabinets in Giles office, labelled PRIVATE.

“The only thing we can do. I think she has a valuable source of information, the sort that we need to help Will. We bring her here, against her will or not, and lock her in a cage” Willow said, slightly nervous at what the other’s reactions to the plan would be.

“Cool! But only if I get to lock her up! Mr.Giles you got the keys for this cagey thinga-ma-bob?” Will said excitedly, blushing slightly as Liam grinned at him from the table.

“Will, I think the question your meant to ask is ‘why the hell does a school have a cage in the library’ then all will fall into place” Xander yelled from Gile’s office, only to be dragged out by a red-faced Giles not more than a second later.

“Hm...Oh yes of course. But only if you fill me in on what you kids are up to! Because frankly I am sick and tired of being kept in the dark and having you lot lounge about in my library as if you own the place!” Giles shouted.

“Someone really needs to remove the England flag from that guys ass. One word: uptight” Xander muttered, sitting down next to Liam.

“How dare you! If I was your father you’d be over my knee right now young man! What makes you think you can act like this?” Giles sputtered pathetically.

“Nothing, nothing at all. For I am Xander, King of Cretins!. May all lesser cretins bow before me” Xander bragged.

“OK!” Liam shouted, making Xander flinch at the voice, obviously caught unawares, “This is what’s been happening...”

TBC...

 

 

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