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(This is original creative material copyright Chris Kenworthy, based on characters that he has no right to owned by someone else blah blah biddy blah...) |
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"Huh? Oh, yeah, come on in," she said, and Jesse did. Right through the door, of course. Willow was sitting at her work table, which was piled high with several books that Giles and Jenny had told her where to find: Micchelsson's Comprehensive Reference of the Beasts Fell, A Profusion of Drakes, and The Watcher's Guide to demonic monsters and beasts. Willow was reading intently from a fourth huge book, balanced precariously in her lap.
"So, how're you doing?" Jesse began awkwardly.
"Fine," Willow replied absently, not taking her eyes away from the page.
"No, you're not," Jesse told her. As if for emphasis, he waved his hand between Willow's face and the book. She brought her own hand up as if to push it away, and their hands passed through each other without contact. "You're seriously wigged about something," Jesse asserted. "Why can't you tell me what it is?"
Willow looked up at her long-lost friend. "You'd never believe it."
"Yeah I would!" he countered. Willow gave him a disbelieving look, but the teenaged ghost held his ground. "Yeah I will! I may not have had as much experience with these kinds of weirdnesses as you, Will, but I trust you. You're my friend, and so if you tell me something, I'll believe it."
"Maybe you shouldn't believe it," Willow told him. "I'm not even sure if I believe it."
"Then stop worrying about whether or not I'd believe it and tell me about it!" Jesse insisted, frustrated.
"Uh, okay," Willow agreed quietly. She paused a few long seconds, took a deep breath, and began, "I think that Buffy and the others are under some kind of a spell."
Jesse nodded calmly. "Yeah?"
"From the dragon..."
"Yeah, yeah," Jesse said. "Giles told me how it cast a spell on them."
"Except everyone else assumed that it was just to stun them for a few seconds," Willow continued. "I'm worried that there might be longer-lasting effects."
Jesse nodded more seriously. "Go on," he urged her.
"Buffy and Xander got hit with the spell at the same time, and they were acting all nasty and competitive with each other afterwards."
"And Angel and Oz..." Jesse continued. "Sounds serious. Shouldn't you have called off the dragon hunt?"
Willow smiled knowingly at Jesse. "And they'd have gone along with it, of course," she said with a dry smile. "People under spells generally aren't very reasonable, and all of them were very determined to continue the hunt."
"Yeah, I get your point. The last thing you want is to aggravate Buffy or the others," Jesse said. "Well, I can pop over to there and see what's going on as it happens. Meanwhile, you need help with this research. It has to be done, and it has to be done soon."
"Okay, Willow agreed. "I can tell Giles and Jenny about my theory; they may have suggestions as to where to look, even if they can't turn pages or call up files themselves. And maybe I should call in those two young witches from over at Cordelia's."
"I'll handle that, on my way over," Jesse assured her.
"Oh, and thanks," Willow said, just as Jesse was about to fade out. "For being so supportive."
"Any time, Willster."
"You know," Willow murmured to herself once he was gone, "death has really been a good influence on him." It took her a full minute to stop giggling at that thought.
* * * *
"Hey!" Jesse called out, popping in next to a sad-looking garage. "Xander? Oh, there you guys are." Team X was slowly stalking down the alley the garage was accessing, Angel leading, carefully looking from side to side as he crept along. Amy turned towards Jesse, shooting him daggers, and put a finger to her lips imperiously.
"Oh, hey, I got it," Jesse replied in a stage whisper. "Be vewwy vewwy quiet, we huntin' dwagons, is that it?"
"What are you doing here?" Vanessa asked him.
"Oh, I thought I'd do a ride-along with the big dragon-hunt; not much else goin' on. I can't really be of much help, I know, but you wouldn't deprive a poor ghost of a little joy in afterlife?"
"Okay, but keep quiet," Vanessa hissed in a whisper that was a good deal quieter than stage.
"So, what's the big deal with getting this dragon, anyway?" Jesse asked quietly as he fell in closely with the others. "I mean, why the big hurry to whack it?"
Xander shrugged. "I just want to get rid of the darn thing... there's enough monsters running around here, we don't need one more."
"And you want to show Buffy that you can be the one to kill the beastie and be the hero?" Jesse prompted.
"Oh, yeah."
"There could be other benefits to slaying this dragon," Vanessa joined in, "especially if we can track it to its lair. Dragons are said to possess magic secrets... if we can comprehend the secret of the dragon, it may help us defeat Queen Kaliya or escape Limbo."
"And they hoard expensive and gorgeous jewelry, too," Amy added.
Hmm... this was getting interesting, Jesse figured. Might as well ask the last member of Team X for his thoughts... "So, Angel... what would you wanna take if we kill the dragon?"
"One of its tears," Angel said shortly, still tracking intently.
"A tear? Why? What use is that?"
Now Angel turned and looked back at him. "I probably shouldn't tell you," he said simply, and then returned his attention to his work.
Stranger and stranger, Jesse thought to himself.
* * * *
"Hey, what are you all doing in here?" Joyce Summers said, knocking the door to Willow's room open.
"Uh, just..." Giles began, then ran out of steam on the way to a persuasive excuse.
Oh, sheesh, Willow thought to herself, why do we instinctively try to cover things up from Mrs. Summers? No wonder she doesn't hardly trust Buffy... or us. "Researching Dragons, Mrs. S." she said.
"Really? Why?" Joyce sat carefully down on Willow's bed, picked up A Profusion of Drakes, flipped it open to one of the thin ribbon-like bookmarks, and read aloud. "Legendary curses of dragons?"
"Uh, well, we're wondering if..." she faltered, not quite sure how to tell the protective mother that her daughter might be not only hunting down a dangerous creature, but already under the dragon's magic influence in some weird way.
"We're just seeing if we can find out anything useful," Jenny Calendar temporized for her.
"Uh, okay," Joyce said, unconvinced. She flipped back a few pages in the book and read aloud again. "From time immemorial, the dragon has been a mythical archetype for some of the worst of human traits, most noticeably greed and envy." She shuddered. "Eww."
"Hello all," Jesse called out, popping into the room. "Game warden reporting for... a report, or something like that."
"Game warden?" Joyce repeated blankly.
"Never mind," Willow assured her, getting up and heading into the hallway. "What up?" she asked Jesse.
"Definitely spooksville over with the hunters. They're obsessed with that dragon... and in very weird ways."
"Oh?"
"It's the same thing with one person from each team. Xander and Buffy seem to want to kill the dragon for its own sake, and to get, (or keep,) the reputation as the local hero. Vanessa and Darrell are talking about a dragon's mystic secrets, Cordelia and Amy keep going on about treasure and jewelry, and both Angel and Oz mentioned a dragon's tears, though Oz said he had no clue if there was anything special about them, he just thought they would be cool."
"Hmm," Willow muttered. "And those are the pairs that the dragon used its spell in, for sure. Something is definitely weird."
"Yeah," Jesse agreed. "The question is, what?"
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