BtVS fic: And the Truth Shall Set You Free
Title: And the Truth Shall Set You Free
Author: SCWLC
Disclaimer: I own zip.
Distribution: (Hysterical laughter) Hem. If you want this you may have it.
Rating: PG-13 for safety I guess.
Summary: Two truth spells lead to a reunion.
Notes: This is a badfic. Very bad. Bad bad bad bad bad. I was just kinda feeling like a bit of completely senseless B/A reunion. Many thanks to all my feedbackers who put up with the angsty songfics I have been known to put out.
Feedback: Comments? Questions? Complaints? scwlc@yahoo.ca
Willow had just about finished casting her spell when Dawn tripped. That wouldn't have mattered, but Dawn was babbling something about Buffy being a big meanie while carrying around some salamander eyes. So, Buffy's sister tripped and dropped the jar of eyes all over the Slayer, and simultaneously managed to push her sister inside of Willow's casting circle.
"Dawn!" shouted two voices. Before either of them could reprimand the girl for her clumsiness, a blue light rose from within the circle and slammed into Buffy. Then it vanished into her, and left the three startled.
Buffy looked at Willow and said, "I'm not blaming you for this screw up. That's Dawn's fault. My question is what the hell is this gonna do to me?"
Her eyes wide, Willow said, "I'm not entirely sure, but I wasn't finished. So, I guess as long as the whiskey isn't added, nothing should happen." At Buffy's sidelong glance at Dawn, Willow added, "I was just doing a truth spell-y thing. It was supposed to make whoever was holding the crystal unable to speak anything but the truth. Actually, it was kinda supposed to make the person holding it say `the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.' y'know?"
Buffy raised an eyebrow. "So it's like having no verbal impulse control."
"Yeah." Willow shrugged. Since the spell hadn't been finished and all she had to do was take apart the circle to prevent it from being finished she wasn't worried.
"You mean I might say something like that Dawn is a clumsy brat who can't keep out of stuff that's none of her business?" Buffy asked, her voice rising slightly over Dawn's "Hey!"
Willow grinned at her friend. "I think that's just you being cranky at Dawn Buffy." Out of the corner of her eye, Willow noticed that Dawn was picking up the bottle, "Dawnie don't!" she commanded, and only succeeded in startling Dawn into dropping its contents all over Buffy. This made Buffy glow blue, and then she started to speak.
"God Dawn! You're always dropping stuff! Why is it I can't get you to act at all responsible? Hunh? I mean jeez! I have to work at the Double Meat Palace just to keep us from being evicted from our house and to pay for food and stuff, and all you can do is whine about how I'm ignoring you or being mean!" Buffy stood up furious, "I can't even ground you when you mess up deliberately because everyone tells me that I shouldn't punish you when you steal stuff!"
Suddenly she seemed to realise what she was saying, and clapped both hands over her mouth. Dawn burst into tears and ran off shouting, "I knew it! You hate me!"
Willow's jaw was somewhere around her feet. Then she reeled it in. "Oh God! Buffy I'll try to fix this as soon as possible."
Buffy just kept both hands over her mouth and nodded.
***
Over in LA, the Angel Investigations staff were dodging lightning bolts fired off by an insane witch. Finally the team had her surrounded. Suddenly she cackled wildly and shouted, "Goddess of truth aid me!" She was surrounded by a fuschia light which then streaked over to Angel and sank into the vampire. "Truth in actions and all that's done! Started by lies and by greatest truth undone!" Following that bit of doggerel she vanished in a puff of smoke leaving a very confused investigative team behind.
"Okay, what was that?" demanded Gunn.
Wesley looking quite perplexed replied, "I believe she cast a spell on Angel before she vanished. The only question is what the spell was intended to do."
Angel sat down and ran his hand through his hair. "Well, she invoked a goddess of truth and then said that invocation about truth and lies, so we know it has something to do with truth. I just don't understand what she means by truth in actions."
"Or what that part about `started by lies and by greatest truth undone' means." Fred added. They all started for the books, and began to try to find anything on truth spells that would unravel the mystery. Angel took his chosen tome off to one of the couches in the lobby and sat down to read. Cordelia promptly came over and joined her boyfriend by sitting on his lap.
Angel absently pushed Cordelia off, sending her to the floor with a thump. "Ow!" she shouted. "What the hell was that for?"
Angel looked up. "I don't know. I just suddenly felt as though I had to get you off me." He was quite confused. He and Cordelia had been dating for a couple months. They were in love. There was absolutely no reason for him to refuse her the right to cuddle.
Cordelia huffed and tried to plonk herself down on Angel again. This time she found herself sprawled on the floor. "Okay, what is your problem?" she glared at Angel.
Angel suddenly stood. "I have no idea. I don't know why I did that. It was like my arms had a mind of their own all of a sudden."
Fred leapt to her feet. "That's it!" she said excitedly. "Somehow, this witch is distorting the truth! Angel is in love with Cordelia, so she's trying to make him act the opposite way. Now all we have to do is get Angel to act normal again, and that should break the spell!"
During Fred's little speech, Angel had watched with first curiosity, then with a smile of understanding. When she finished, he walked over intending to pat her on the back for her brilliant deduction. Instead his hand had a life of its own as he reached out and swatted Fred sending her staggering a couple paces forward.
"You're welcome," the Texan said, while Gunn nursed her near miss with a concussion.
Only Wesley seemed skeptical of this, but he said nothing. Instead he watched as over the course of the next hour and a half the Fang Gang tried everything, including locking Angel up with Cordelia. That just caused him to break down the door, scuttle down the hall and climb into the shower to scrub away his topmost layer of skin.
Wesley, in the meantime, packed a bag for Angel and moved the convertible to the front door. He also parked Gunn's truck right behind the car and settled in to wait. At precisely two minutes after sundown, Angel came barrelling down the stairs looking quite confused, trailed after by the other three. The vampire vaulted into the car and roared off. The others arrived moments later to find Wesley behind the wheel of Gunn's baby. "Get in," the ex-watcher said calmly, "We might as well follow."
They all got in, and Wesley started down the street in the opposite direction Angel had gone. "Um, English, Angel went that way," Gunn said jerking his head behind them.
"I know," Wes replied, "But it'll be easier to get onto the highway this way."
***
Buffy spent most of the afternoon with both hands clamped over her mouth lest she say something else of badness. That was until Xander made a wisecrack about liking his `wimmin' better quiet. "Your women? Excuse me Harris but, in spite of what you seem to think, I am not one of `your women'. In spite of the fact that you can't seem to let
go of a high school crush on me, or get that I love Angel and will never love anyone but him - Yeah Willow, that's right! I. Love. Angel. Not Riley, not Scott, not anybody but Angel. He's my soulmate. I don't want to hear you tell me I'm going to get over my soulmate or tell me that I'm acting like a little kid just because I happen to know what I want!" She was beginning to get more and more incensed as she spoke, overriding any and all objections. "Of course what I want or need doesn't matter does it! All that matters is that I let Willow be able to feel sorry for herself whenever she wants and always be happy and cheerful because a slayer isn't human or allowed to have a bad day!" Her only pause was to take another breath. "Not that it mattered when I sent Angel to Hell hunh? Oh Buffy's the Slayer, she's just supposed to get over it. Nevermind that she's the one who's been the focus of all of Angel's torture and is seriously considering killing herself just to make the pain stop!"
The uncomfortable looks the others were exchanging just made her even angrier. "Oh that's right! No guilt from you guys! You're just uncomfortable that I actually feel angry and hurt from time to time! Like when I came back from a summer where I spent the whole time having nightmares and trying not to die from the pain it was so bad, and all you could do was push me away and blame me for everything that went wrong in your petty lives. . ."
All the fury and hurt of the past six years came spilling out of Buffy's mouth, until she started to rant about Angel's sins. Then she finally managed to put a cork in it. Anya was the first to speak in the profound silence that followed. "Well, I'm never going to believe you when you say you're fine ever again."
Dawn had been so protected from Buffy's perspective on life that she'd had no notion her sister had suffered at all in the years since she'd been called. So, the girl crept forward. "Buffy?" she asked hesitantly. The slayer turned to raise an inquiring brow at her sister. "I'm sorry," Dawn said, and hugged her. Buffy let go of her mouth long enough to hug her back before putting both hands over her lips again.
Willow just looked all hurt and upset, "I have been trying my best to get you the life you deserve. Is it my fault that all the boyfriends I found you can't measure up to your impossible standards?" Giles, Dawn, Buffy and Anya all turned to stare at the witch.
Giles hesitantly spoke, "Willow, don't you think it's a little beyond the call of necessity to `get' Buffy the life you believe she deserves?"
Xander and Willow both stared at Giles as though he was slightly mad. "Giles, you said Buffy needed to grow up yourself!" Xander said.
The watcher fixed them with a Look. "That does not mean that I felt as though we ought to thrust her at anything male with two legs. You both seem to have it in your heads that Buffy is incapable of making decisions on her own." Buffy smiled gratefully at her watcher. She would have liked to speak in her own defense, especially now that all
her feelings of anger and inadequacy were being aired, but the verbal diarrhea that was coming out more rant than anything else didn't allow her to make any actual points, and it was really kinda tiring.
Anya turned to Buffy and said, "That's just the sort of attitude that can lead to vengeance. Do you want to wish anything?" Buffy just rolled her eyes in response.
Giles shook himself and said, "What any of us wishes is really quite unimportant. Right now we need to return Buffy to her normal state." He sighed and turned to Willow. "Let's go over this again. Your spell was supposed to use that crystal to cause the person holding it to speak the truth."
Willow nodded, "Basically if you made them hold the crystal and asked them something then they would have to respond and they would only be able to answer truthfully, and wouldn't be able to hold anything back."
"So, since the spell was cast directly on Buffy she essentially has an uncontrollable urge to speak truth constantly. Which no doubt means whatever is on her mind." The Watcher sighed, taking off his glasses and rubbing them clean. "Was there any way the spell you were planning to put on the crystal could be removed?"
She shrugged. "I know that the effect of the crystal was supposed to become less strong if you weren't resisting it. Kinda like if you were voluntarily telling the truth you would be more able to control how much of the truth came out." The statement about control made Giles send a look in Buffy's direction. If she was so unable to control what she said, that indicated she was lying about something a great deal. "Anyhow," Willow continued, "It was only supposed to work once. Once the person was answering questions, the spell would go away."
A sudden brainstorm hit him. "Perhaps if Buffy were to speak nothing but the truth about the one thing she is normally least truthful about the spell will remove itself." Everyone but Buffy smiled at this, and turned to the Slayer who looked positively terrified.
Xander laid a hand on her shoulder and asked, "Buffy, what's wrong?"
Her hands came off her mouth as the irresistible compulsion overcame her wishes, "I don't wanna talk about Angel!"
As everyone in the Magic Shop erupted into a babble of voices, Wesley burst in followed by Cordelia, Fred and Gunn. "Why are we here English?" the black man demanded, "Angel ain't here."
"Not yet," Wesley replied with unimpaired calm. "Hello Mr. Giles. It seems we have a difficulty with a truth spell that has bee cast on Angel."
"You too?" asked Anya.
Cordelia shrieked in irritation, "I don't care what's going on in this hellhole! I wanna know why Wesley's dragged us out here! What the hell does Sunnydale have that LA doesn't?!" Several responses were on the tips of several people's tongues when Angel burst through the door, flung himself across the room, and began to make out with Buffy.
Cordelia turned many interesting shades of purple. "What the hell do you think you're doing?!" she shrieked to her boyfriend.
"Being completely truthful in action if not in word or belief," replied Wesley for his sometime boss. At the looks of both the LA crew and the Scooby Gang he sighed and explained. "A spell was cast on Angel and the incantation used was `Truth in actions and all that's done, started by lies and by greatest truth undone.'" He took off his glasses and began to polish them, causing Giles to promptly put his back on. "I have come to the conclusion that Angel is
essentially being truthful in his actions. As he doesn't love Cordelia, no matter what the three have convinced him, he was helpless to avoid pushing her away. However, the one thing he wishes the most, and is therefore the most truthful thing he could do, is to reunite with Buffy."
Angel's mouth had finally left Buffy's and he was feverishly kissing his way down her neck, so she was able to respond, "So how are you guys gonna get him to stop? I mean, I love this, and I love him, and I want him to carry me away and make love to me until neither of us can stay awake, but I don't wanna do it in front of everybody."
Angel's hands slipped under Buffy's shirt and he was caressing the skin underneath when he spoke, "I thought you didn't love me anymore. You said-"
"Oh Angel," she cupped his face in her hands, "I was trying to make my friends happy. You told me you didn't want to be with me after all." She pouted. "And you're dating Cordelia."
He pushed her across the room, pinning her against the wall. "I never said that. I said that I didn't want your life to be in the dark with someone who couldn't make love to you." He stared deeply into her eyes. "I don't know why I ever thought I was in love with Cordelia. I love you."
Buffy looked lovingly into his eyes before kissing him. Then she said, "I love you too. If only your soul was permanent so we could be together-"
Angel interrupted, "Actually it is." This caused Buffy to squeal happily and leap up, wrapping all four limbs around Angel. They started kissing again, ignoring Xander, Willow and Cordelia's incoherent cries of rage, Fred's plaintive denials and reaffirmations of the moira of Cordelia and Angel, and the mutters of embarrassment coming from everyone else but Anya who was merely watching in avid interest.
There was a faint popping sound and a fuschia light appeared haloing Angel and a similar blue one around Buffy. The two glows then faded away, and Buffy and Angel pulled apart suddenly as the compulsions that had held them moments before faded with the lights. Buffy flushed and stepped away from Angel saying, "Umm. Well I guess I'll
see you around."
Confronted with Cordelia's smirk and the hostility of Buffy's friends, Angel started to take Cordelia in his arms. At that Wesley shouted in irritation, "Damnit man! You've both just admitted you love each other and that there's nothing holding you apart! What's wrong with you!?"
Both Slayer and vampire paused, then by mutual unspoken agreement sprinted for the door. "Bye!"
"We'll be at the mansion!"
Cordelia returned to her previous purple hue, "Angel is mine! He loves me! What does little miss I'm-a-slayer-I'm-so-good-and-perfect-and-selfless have that I don't?"
"I think you just answered your own question Cordy," said Dawn. "By the way Wes, Tara says you owe her big time for the spell."
Wesley grinned at his co-conspirator, "So I do. How did you pull your end off though?"
Dawn smiled back, "Once I convinced Willow the truth spell was a good idea . . . well. . . all I had to do was add some eye of newt."
"But . . . but . . . but . . ." Xander sputtered.
"You sound like an outboard motor Xander," Wesley said. "You can express your outrage at the triumph of true love later." He turned to the Slayer's sister, "Would you like to join me for some ice cream?"
"Woo-hoo!" was Dawn's reply and the pair left the completely baffled teams of evil fighters staring confused at the doorway.
And Buffy and Angel lived happily ever after.
The End
Author's Post fic note: No, Dawn and Wesley didn't get together, they were just working together.
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Author: SCWLC
Disclaimer: I own zip.
Distribution: (Hysterical laughter) Hem. If you want this you may have it.
Rating: PG-13 for safety I guess.
Summary: Two truth spells lead to a reunion.
Notes: This is a badfic. Very bad. Bad bad bad bad bad. I was just kinda feeling like a bit of completely senseless B/A reunion. Many thanks to all my feedbackers who put up with the angsty songfics I have been known to put out.
Feedback: Comments? Questions? Complaints? scwlc@yahoo.ca
Willow had just about finished casting her spell when Dawn tripped. That wouldn't have mattered, but Dawn was babbling something about Buffy being a big meanie while carrying around some salamander eyes. So, Buffy's sister tripped and dropped the jar of eyes all over the Slayer, and simultaneously managed to push her sister inside of Willow's casting circle.
"Dawn!" shouted two voices. Before either of them could reprimand the girl for her clumsiness, a blue light rose from within the circle and slammed into Buffy. Then it vanished into her, and left the three startled.
Buffy looked at Willow and said, "I'm not blaming you for this screw up. That's Dawn's fault. My question is what the hell is this gonna do to me?"
Her eyes wide, Willow said, "I'm not entirely sure, but I wasn't finished. So, I guess as long as the whiskey isn't added, nothing should happen." At Buffy's sidelong glance at Dawn, Willow added, "I was just doing a truth spell-y thing. It was supposed to make whoever was holding the crystal unable to speak anything but the truth. Actually, it was kinda supposed to make the person holding it say `the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.' y'know?"
Buffy raised an eyebrow. "So it's like having no verbal impulse control."
"Yeah." Willow shrugged. Since the spell hadn't been finished and all she had to do was take apart the circle to prevent it from being finished she wasn't worried.
"You mean I might say something like that Dawn is a clumsy brat who can't keep out of stuff that's none of her business?" Buffy asked, her voice rising slightly over Dawn's "Hey!"
Willow grinned at her friend. "I think that's just you being cranky at Dawn Buffy." Out of the corner of her eye, Willow noticed that Dawn was picking up the bottle, "Dawnie don't!" she commanded, and only succeeded in startling Dawn into dropping its contents all over Buffy. This made Buffy glow blue, and then she started to speak.
"God Dawn! You're always dropping stuff! Why is it I can't get you to act at all responsible? Hunh? I mean jeez! I have to work at the Double Meat Palace just to keep us from being evicted from our house and to pay for food and stuff, and all you can do is whine about how I'm ignoring you or being mean!" Buffy stood up furious, "I can't even ground you when you mess up deliberately because everyone tells me that I shouldn't punish you when you steal stuff!"
Suddenly she seemed to realise what she was saying, and clapped both hands over her mouth. Dawn burst into tears and ran off shouting, "I knew it! You hate me!"
Willow's jaw was somewhere around her feet. Then she reeled it in. "Oh God! Buffy I'll try to fix this as soon as possible."
Buffy just kept both hands over her mouth and nodded.
***
Over in LA, the Angel Investigations staff were dodging lightning bolts fired off by an insane witch. Finally the team had her surrounded. Suddenly she cackled wildly and shouted, "Goddess of truth aid me!" She was surrounded by a fuschia light which then streaked over to Angel and sank into the vampire. "Truth in actions and all that's done! Started by lies and by greatest truth undone!" Following that bit of doggerel she vanished in a puff of smoke leaving a very confused investigative team behind.
"Okay, what was that?" demanded Gunn.
Wesley looking quite perplexed replied, "I believe she cast a spell on Angel before she vanished. The only question is what the spell was intended to do."
Angel sat down and ran his hand through his hair. "Well, she invoked a goddess of truth and then said that invocation about truth and lies, so we know it has something to do with truth. I just don't understand what she means by truth in actions."
"Or what that part about `started by lies and by greatest truth undone' means." Fred added. They all started for the books, and began to try to find anything on truth spells that would unravel the mystery. Angel took his chosen tome off to one of the couches in the lobby and sat down to read. Cordelia promptly came over and joined her boyfriend by sitting on his lap.
Angel absently pushed Cordelia off, sending her to the floor with a thump. "Ow!" she shouted. "What the hell was that for?"
Angel looked up. "I don't know. I just suddenly felt as though I had to get you off me." He was quite confused. He and Cordelia had been dating for a couple months. They were in love. There was absolutely no reason for him to refuse her the right to cuddle.
Cordelia huffed and tried to plonk herself down on Angel again. This time she found herself sprawled on the floor. "Okay, what is your problem?" she glared at Angel.
Angel suddenly stood. "I have no idea. I don't know why I did that. It was like my arms had a mind of their own all of a sudden."
Fred leapt to her feet. "That's it!" she said excitedly. "Somehow, this witch is distorting the truth! Angel is in love with Cordelia, so she's trying to make him act the opposite way. Now all we have to do is get Angel to act normal again, and that should break the spell!"
During Fred's little speech, Angel had watched with first curiosity, then with a smile of understanding. When she finished, he walked over intending to pat her on the back for her brilliant deduction. Instead his hand had a life of its own as he reached out and swatted Fred sending her staggering a couple paces forward.
"You're welcome," the Texan said, while Gunn nursed her near miss with a concussion.
Only Wesley seemed skeptical of this, but he said nothing. Instead he watched as over the course of the next hour and a half the Fang Gang tried everything, including locking Angel up with Cordelia. That just caused him to break down the door, scuttle down the hall and climb into the shower to scrub away his topmost layer of skin.
Wesley, in the meantime, packed a bag for Angel and moved the convertible to the front door. He also parked Gunn's truck right behind the car and settled in to wait. At precisely two minutes after sundown, Angel came barrelling down the stairs looking quite confused, trailed after by the other three. The vampire vaulted into the car and roared off. The others arrived moments later to find Wesley behind the wheel of Gunn's baby. "Get in," the ex-watcher said calmly, "We might as well follow."
They all got in, and Wesley started down the street in the opposite direction Angel had gone. "Um, English, Angel went that way," Gunn said jerking his head behind them.
"I know," Wes replied, "But it'll be easier to get onto the highway this way."
***
Buffy spent most of the afternoon with both hands clamped over her mouth lest she say something else of badness. That was until Xander made a wisecrack about liking his `wimmin' better quiet. "Your women? Excuse me Harris but, in spite of what you seem to think, I am not one of `your women'. In spite of the fact that you can't seem to let
go of a high school crush on me, or get that I love Angel and will never love anyone but him - Yeah Willow, that's right! I. Love. Angel. Not Riley, not Scott, not anybody but Angel. He's my soulmate. I don't want to hear you tell me I'm going to get over my soulmate or tell me that I'm acting like a little kid just because I happen to know what I want!" She was beginning to get more and more incensed as she spoke, overriding any and all objections. "Of course what I want or need doesn't matter does it! All that matters is that I let Willow be able to feel sorry for herself whenever she wants and always be happy and cheerful because a slayer isn't human or allowed to have a bad day!" Her only pause was to take another breath. "Not that it mattered when I sent Angel to Hell hunh? Oh Buffy's the Slayer, she's just supposed to get over it. Nevermind that she's the one who's been the focus of all of Angel's torture and is seriously considering killing herself just to make the pain stop!"
The uncomfortable looks the others were exchanging just made her even angrier. "Oh that's right! No guilt from you guys! You're just uncomfortable that I actually feel angry and hurt from time to time! Like when I came back from a summer where I spent the whole time having nightmares and trying not to die from the pain it was so bad, and all you could do was push me away and blame me for everything that went wrong in your petty lives. . ."
All the fury and hurt of the past six years came spilling out of Buffy's mouth, until she started to rant about Angel's sins. Then she finally managed to put a cork in it. Anya was the first to speak in the profound silence that followed. "Well, I'm never going to believe you when you say you're fine ever again."
Dawn had been so protected from Buffy's perspective on life that she'd had no notion her sister had suffered at all in the years since she'd been called. So, the girl crept forward. "Buffy?" she asked hesitantly. The slayer turned to raise an inquiring brow at her sister. "I'm sorry," Dawn said, and hugged her. Buffy let go of her mouth long enough to hug her back before putting both hands over her lips again.
Willow just looked all hurt and upset, "I have been trying my best to get you the life you deserve. Is it my fault that all the boyfriends I found you can't measure up to your impossible standards?" Giles, Dawn, Buffy and Anya all turned to stare at the witch.
Giles hesitantly spoke, "Willow, don't you think it's a little beyond the call of necessity to `get' Buffy the life you believe she deserves?"
Xander and Willow both stared at Giles as though he was slightly mad. "Giles, you said Buffy needed to grow up yourself!" Xander said.
The watcher fixed them with a Look. "That does not mean that I felt as though we ought to thrust her at anything male with two legs. You both seem to have it in your heads that Buffy is incapable of making decisions on her own." Buffy smiled gratefully at her watcher. She would have liked to speak in her own defense, especially now that all
her feelings of anger and inadequacy were being aired, but the verbal diarrhea that was coming out more rant than anything else didn't allow her to make any actual points, and it was really kinda tiring.
Anya turned to Buffy and said, "That's just the sort of attitude that can lead to vengeance. Do you want to wish anything?" Buffy just rolled her eyes in response.
Giles shook himself and said, "What any of us wishes is really quite unimportant. Right now we need to return Buffy to her normal state." He sighed and turned to Willow. "Let's go over this again. Your spell was supposed to use that crystal to cause the person holding it to speak the truth."
Willow nodded, "Basically if you made them hold the crystal and asked them something then they would have to respond and they would only be able to answer truthfully, and wouldn't be able to hold anything back."
"So, since the spell was cast directly on Buffy she essentially has an uncontrollable urge to speak truth constantly. Which no doubt means whatever is on her mind." The Watcher sighed, taking off his glasses and rubbing them clean. "Was there any way the spell you were planning to put on the crystal could be removed?"
She shrugged. "I know that the effect of the crystal was supposed to become less strong if you weren't resisting it. Kinda like if you were voluntarily telling the truth you would be more able to control how much of the truth came out." The statement about control made Giles send a look in Buffy's direction. If she was so unable to control what she said, that indicated she was lying about something a great deal. "Anyhow," Willow continued, "It was only supposed to work once. Once the person was answering questions, the spell would go away."
A sudden brainstorm hit him. "Perhaps if Buffy were to speak nothing but the truth about the one thing she is normally least truthful about the spell will remove itself." Everyone but Buffy smiled at this, and turned to the Slayer who looked positively terrified.
Xander laid a hand on her shoulder and asked, "Buffy, what's wrong?"
Her hands came off her mouth as the irresistible compulsion overcame her wishes, "I don't wanna talk about Angel!"
As everyone in the Magic Shop erupted into a babble of voices, Wesley burst in followed by Cordelia, Fred and Gunn. "Why are we here English?" the black man demanded, "Angel ain't here."
"Not yet," Wesley replied with unimpaired calm. "Hello Mr. Giles. It seems we have a difficulty with a truth spell that has bee cast on Angel."
"You too?" asked Anya.
Cordelia shrieked in irritation, "I don't care what's going on in this hellhole! I wanna know why Wesley's dragged us out here! What the hell does Sunnydale have that LA doesn't?!" Several responses were on the tips of several people's tongues when Angel burst through the door, flung himself across the room, and began to make out with Buffy.
Cordelia turned many interesting shades of purple. "What the hell do you think you're doing?!" she shrieked to her boyfriend.
"Being completely truthful in action if not in word or belief," replied Wesley for his sometime boss. At the looks of both the LA crew and the Scooby Gang he sighed and explained. "A spell was cast on Angel and the incantation used was `Truth in actions and all that's done, started by lies and by greatest truth undone.'" He took off his glasses and began to polish them, causing Giles to promptly put his back on. "I have come to the conclusion that Angel is
essentially being truthful in his actions. As he doesn't love Cordelia, no matter what the three have convinced him, he was helpless to avoid pushing her away. However, the one thing he wishes the most, and is therefore the most truthful thing he could do, is to reunite with Buffy."
Angel's mouth had finally left Buffy's and he was feverishly kissing his way down her neck, so she was able to respond, "So how are you guys gonna get him to stop? I mean, I love this, and I love him, and I want him to carry me away and make love to me until neither of us can stay awake, but I don't wanna do it in front of everybody."
Angel's hands slipped under Buffy's shirt and he was caressing the skin underneath when he spoke, "I thought you didn't love me anymore. You said-"
"Oh Angel," she cupped his face in her hands, "I was trying to make my friends happy. You told me you didn't want to be with me after all." She pouted. "And you're dating Cordelia."
He pushed her across the room, pinning her against the wall. "I never said that. I said that I didn't want your life to be in the dark with someone who couldn't make love to you." He stared deeply into her eyes. "I don't know why I ever thought I was in love with Cordelia. I love you."
Buffy looked lovingly into his eyes before kissing him. Then she said, "I love you too. If only your soul was permanent so we could be together-"
Angel interrupted, "Actually it is." This caused Buffy to squeal happily and leap up, wrapping all four limbs around Angel. They started kissing again, ignoring Xander, Willow and Cordelia's incoherent cries of rage, Fred's plaintive denials and reaffirmations of the moira of Cordelia and Angel, and the mutters of embarrassment coming from everyone else but Anya who was merely watching in avid interest.
There was a faint popping sound and a fuschia light appeared haloing Angel and a similar blue one around Buffy. The two glows then faded away, and Buffy and Angel pulled apart suddenly as the compulsions that had held them moments before faded with the lights. Buffy flushed and stepped away from Angel saying, "Umm. Well I guess I'll
see you around."
Confronted with Cordelia's smirk and the hostility of Buffy's friends, Angel started to take Cordelia in his arms. At that Wesley shouted in irritation, "Damnit man! You've both just admitted you love each other and that there's nothing holding you apart! What's wrong with you!?"
Both Slayer and vampire paused, then by mutual unspoken agreement sprinted for the door. "Bye!"
"We'll be at the mansion!"
Cordelia returned to her previous purple hue, "Angel is mine! He loves me! What does little miss I'm-a-slayer-I'm-so-good-and-perfect-and-selfless have that I don't?"
"I think you just answered your own question Cordy," said Dawn. "By the way Wes, Tara says you owe her big time for the spell."
Wesley grinned at his co-conspirator, "So I do. How did you pull your end off though?"
Dawn smiled back, "Once I convinced Willow the truth spell was a good idea . . . well. . . all I had to do was add some eye of newt."
"But . . . but . . . but . . ." Xander sputtered.
"You sound like an outboard motor Xander," Wesley said. "You can express your outrage at the triumph of true love later." He turned to the Slayer's sister, "Would you like to join me for some ice cream?"
"Woo-hoo!" was Dawn's reply and the pair left the completely baffled teams of evil fighters staring confused at the doorway.
And Buffy and Angel lived happily ever after.
The End
Author's Post fic note: No, Dawn and Wesley didn't get together, they were just working together.
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