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PART 2

Rupert Giles, Buffy Summers, and Tara Maclay sat in conference at the end of Tara and Willow’s bed.

"Yes, well, from what I can determine, another person in another dimension has created some sort of rift in the dimensional fabric centering around Willow," said Giles, worry etched clear on his face.

"I know the dimension," Tara spoke softly. "I’ve felt this dimension before, seen my other self there." She shuddered coldly at the images of Willow as a vampire.

"What’s there that’s so bad?" asked Buffy, glancing worriedly at her best friend and gently wrapping an arm around Tara.

"Willow is a vampire."

Giles glanced up sharply. Buffy met his eyes. "Again?" they both asked in amazement. "That’s the second alternate dimension where Willow’s been vamped," added Buffy.

Tara looked at them both blankly. "I don’t know what’s causing the rent though. Unless..."

"Unless what?" Giles asked.

"Unless someone tried to re-soul that vampire version of Willow. Badly resoul her. I have a connection to that dimension, I don’t know how. Perhaps the spell that was used honed in on that fact, and partly pulled Willow into it, for her soul. I don’t know..." Tara trailed off and shook her head. "I’ve only encountered one spell for that though."

"A Gypsy curse?" inquired Giles.

"Well, yes. My family has a bit of Gypsy blood in it, we at one time even souled a vampire, but it’s hard to do without a human sacrifice. If the spell was adapted..." she trailed off again.

Buffy only shook her head. "So your family souled Angelus? This world is too small."

Tara looked up, surprised, "Well, yes, we did. Another branch of the family though. My side only had a few notes on the spell, not the actual one that was used. Without the full spell, I don’t know how we could go about reversing it, or at least fixing the tear in the dimensions."

"I can get you the spell," said Buffy softly. She picked up the phone and dialed a number quickly. "Hey, Cordy, could you put Angel on?" she said into the receiver. Speaking for a few minutes, she then hung up. "He’ll have Cordelia email it to me. Thank god Wills taught me how to use the email program."

Giles shook his head. "Can you contact your double from that dimension? Perhaps she could be of assistance."

"I’d need your help. To anchor me. Willow usually does it, but..."

"Quite, I understand. Shall I help you prepare?" Tara only nodded, and rose to collect the spell supplies.

"When we were sixteen we contacted each other once. We needed to know what we had been seeing since childhood. Hopefully she’ll be okay with our intrusion into her dimension," Tara said softly, sadly. She glanced at her prone, unconscious girlfriend then turned back to Giles and began the spell.

****

Tara ate her food silently, eyes glued to her lover. Willow had yet to awaken, and Giles had brought blood back hours ago for her. The Watcher had gone to freshen up in the men’s bathroom on the other side of the hall when Tara felt her double begin the spell to connect them again. Sensing the other Tara’s urgency, she allowed the spell to overwhelm her senses. Her bag of baby carrots fell to the floor.

****

"Why?" she demanded simply of her double.

"My Willow is in trouble. Did anyone try to give yours a soul back?" stated Tara Maclay bluntly.

"Yes, Angel did. Hers was returning anyway, she needed the help."

Tara fumed, "He messed up. They’re caught between dimensions together. We need to get them out." Taking a closer look at her double, she noticed the girl’s pale complexion and the fang marks on her neck. "You let her feed off of you, didn’t you?"

"She... I love her, she needed the blood. She’s my soulmate," replied the weakened Tara.

"I understand... but it’ll make things more difficult, you understand that?"

"Yes, I understand."

****

Willow growled, and felt her fangs lengthen. The dreamscape was flat, almost like linoleum flooring, a dull white all around her. She could smell someone else with her, someone who smelled... no, that wasn’t possible. The vampire rose from her sprawled position and looked over at her companion. It was like looking in a mirror almost.

Willow Rosenberg was far less than happy to discover herself in a dreamscape with yet another vampiric version of herself. At least this one didn’t seem as skanky, and was instead of in the leather dominatrix outfit, in a pair of soft pajamas. It was still disconcerting, however.

Their eyes met, and they sized each other up warily. "Are you evil?" squeaked the mortal finally.

"Not anymore, apparently," replied the vampire. "I have a soul, I think," she replied, to her mortal self’s silent question.

"You think?"

Vampire Willow shrugged.

"Okay, then."

"So where is here?" asked the vampire. "And how can we get out, because I want to get back to Tara."

"Tara?!" squeaked Willow.

"Yes. Did you not know that about yourself?" inquired the vampire, willing her fangs to recede.

"We’ve been together for awhile now," replied Willow indignantly.

"Ah, okay."

"So yeah."

Two Willow Rosenbergs, and they couldn’t think of anything to say.

****

The two Taras widened their meeting place to fit the two Gileses that joined them shortly.

"Nice to meet you," said one to the other.

"Quite a pleasure, I assure you," replied the other.

Both girls giggled at their Gileses. "Back to business," said the weak Tara.

Her counterpart nodded, "We have to get our Willows back. The right ones to the right dimensions even."

A thought suddenly occurred to one Tara. "Who’s grounding you?" she asked her counterpart.

"Buffy is. You?"

"Angel for us. Who’s Buffy?"

"The Slayer," said both Gileses.

"My Slayer," said one.

"Yours?" asked the other one, intrigued.

"Yes, well..."

"Giles!" said both Taras together.

****

The spell would be complicated. The two Gileses would ground their wiccan companions, who would then enter the Willow dreamscape and pull the correct Willow back to their proper bodies, souls, and dimensions. The blending of souls hopefully wouldn’t adversely affect either, and with luck all would return to their proper places, in effect sealing the dimensional gates once more.

They could only pray that the two Willows had not combined.

****

"So you’re a vampire," said Willow Rosenberg finally.

"Yes. For about two years now. Sophomore year of high school I was turned by William the Bloody."

"Spike? Spike, ew!" She shuddered at the idea that her vampire counterpart had been so intimate with Spike of all non-people.

The vampire shrugged, "He’s not a bad sire. Especially since I killed him. Xander and I pretty much run Sunnydale at this point." She frowned, "At least, we used to. I don’t know what will happen now."

"That you have a soul?"

"Yeah..."

"How did that happen?"

"I don’t know exactly. Angel said that because I’d been with Tara, because we’re soulmates, that it would return naturally, somehow. I woke up this morning wanting to throw myself on a stake, and that’s the last thing I really remember. But not that I would throw myself on a stake, because that would mean Tara would have to vacuum me up, and I couldn’t do that to her, and she doesn’t keep stakes around anyway, and I’m babbling aren’t I?" She looked forlornly at her counterpart.

"Well, yeah," giggled the mortal Willow. "But, I mean, what about Buffy? How could she let you be turned?"

"Buffy? Who’s that?"

Willow stopped, and her smile slowly faded into confusion. "Buffy - best friend, Slayer..."

"Not ringing a bell here."

"What about Oz, Cordelia, Giles?"

"Oz, that musician? He was a nice meal. Cordelia’s been gone since sophomore year, we got our revenge on her. And Giles is that Watcher, isn’t he? We don’t go anywhere near him, he’s friends with Angel," state the vampire dryly. She frowned at the look of dismay and horror on her mortal version’s face. "I suppose things were different in your universe?"

Willow only nodded. "But you’re in love with Tara, right?"

"Of course!" replied the vampire indignantly. "She’s why I have this soul!"

Willow gulped, "Well, see, there’s an upshot to every dimension."

****

"Are we all ready?" asked Buffy impatiently as she watched her Giles and Tara prepare for the spell.

"Yes, we’re ready," replied Tara softly. "Mr. Giles?"

"Of course, just a second," he replied stiffly, seating himself in the center of the grounding circle opposite Tara.

They began the chanting softly, as Buffy stood in the corner watching. Soon the last words were spoken and Tara simply collapsed backwards, still within the circle, but propped up on a mound of pillows.

"What now?" asked Buffy softly.

"Now we wait," replied her Watcher.

****

"Do you think you can handle this, Tara?" asked Giles. "You’ve been fed off of in the past week, that is going to make you very weak magically."

"I have to do this, Mr. Giles. I have to get Willow back," stated the shy blonde firmly.

"Well then, let’s get started," replied the gentle Englishman, his heart going out to the young lovers.

****

The dreamscape seemed timeless. Together, eventually, the two Willows began to speak, to laugh and cry and share the stories of their lives. They didn’t know how long they’d been there, didn’t know how to escape, but both had a simple faith in the fact that one or the other Tara would eventually get them out. As time passed, they seemed to feel more and more like the other, to see how their lives, no matter the details, were similar. After awhile, it seemed like they’d known each other forever.

****

The two Taras met in their dreamscape. "Ready?" one asked the other.

"Ready," confirmed Tara Maclay. "Let’s do this," she said, and then began to chant. Her double joined her quickly, allowing the lyrical Romanian to create a vortex of power before them. With a nod, they touched hands and saw a blinding flash of white light.

When Tara Maclay awoke, she found two very worried Willows staring at herself and her counterpart.

"Do you think it’s really our Taras?" asked one of the other.

"Yeah, I think so. This one smells like mine, and look, bite marks," replied the vampirical Willow, with a great amount of guilt at her last statement.

"And this one’s obviously mine, I recognize that outfit." As her Willow reached forward to touch her, she opened her eyes fully, and the redhead started. "Hey, love," she said, gathering her wits back.

"Hey," replied the slightly groggy Tara Maclay, smiling up at her girlfriend. "Tara?" she said, turning to look at her double. The twice-bitten version of herself was still unconscious. And very pale.

She turned her body, and tried to sit up, her Willow gently offering her support. "Oh, no," she whispered. "I had a feeling this would be too much for her."

"What is it, love?" asked her Willow, an anxious look on her face, a look that was mirrored and doubled on vampire Willow’s face.

Tara Maclay inched towards her double’s body, gently touched the pulse point and extended all her senses, including her sixth and seventh ones, trying to reach her double’s mind. "No," she whispered, over and over again.

"Love, you’re scaring me," said her girlfriend.

"And me," echoed the partially souled vampire.

"She’s unconscious, but more than that, she’s weak," said Tara finally. "This took a lot out of her; I mean, I just want to go to sleep right now and pass out for a week. But she’s been fed off of recently, and it’s been too much for her."

The souled vampire moaned and agonizingly touched her lover’s pale cheek. "Oh, Tara," she whispered, as her two companions turned away respectfully.

"Wha-what?" replied her Tara weakly, struggling to open her eyes. With that slight word, her vampire crumpled against her and began to weep.

"I-I’m sorry to interrupt," stuttered Tara Maclay, "but we have to be getting back. Tara," she addressed her double gently, "do you think you’re up to it?"

"I have to be," replied the weak young blonde firmly, taking her lover’s hand in her own.

Tara Maclay nodded, and locked eyes with her Willow, seeing the joy and love there. She directed her lover to grasp the vampire’s hand, and she herself took the hand of her double. Slowly, the two blondes began to chant, slowly, softly, weakly on one of their parts, but continuously. The power was raised gradually, molding to their bodies and fixing their souls. Eventually, there was a great flash of light, and the dreamscape emptied.

****

When Tara awoke, she felt the lukewarm body of her lover lying against her. Heaving a soft sigh of relief, she pulled the vampire closer, and went back to sleep. The last thought she had reached across dimensions, where she felt her double happily back with her Willow. Smiling, she escaped into slumber.

****

Three years previously she had fled Sunnyhell and moved to Los Angeles. Her mother and father were dead, gutted before her eyes in revenge by two classmates turned vampires. In L.A. she’d become what the polite termed a vigilante. Cordelia Chase termed herself instead a desperate person out for desperate measures. One night, upon finding a new nest of vamps, she’d arrived with her super-soaker full of holy water (stolen from the nearest Catholic church), a bag of stakes (carved from stuff she nicked from the junk yard), and an axe (conveniently missing from a firehouse). Only to meet up with a young woman already dusting the vampires with just a single stake and her fists.

She’d moved in with Buffy and Joyce Summers two weeks later, content to live with her girlfriend and her motherly figure. But two teenage girls against the forces of darkness didn’t seem to be enough. There were always so many vampires and demons to kill, too many to count or even chart. Her girlfriend’s Watcher, a snooty Brit called Wesley, had tried, but one night he’d been turned then dusted. They’d tried with the help of a half-demon named Doyle, but he’d died, handing over his visions and their migraines to his unrequited love of Cordelia. Plagued by visions of a future she couldn’t always prevent, her relationship with Buffy deteriorated. She’d gone for a walk to clear her mind two days ago, and come home to discover her lover and Mrs. Summers dead, ambushed by several dozen vampires and at least a dozen minor demons.

Now she was hitching across country, intending to lay low in Boston for a few months. California hadn’t been good for her, and she had a vision that needed to be listened to. Cordelia Chase was going to intercept the next Slayer before the Watchers got ahold of her. She was going to find a girl named Faith. And then they were going to go back home. To Sunnyhell. And she was going to personally bury a stake in the heart of the vampire formerly known as Willow Rosenberg.

The End, for now...