The Ghost of a Quarter Past

Author: LJ

Rating: PG-13. Kissing, death, ghosts, vampires - the usual, plus the teeniest touch of sexual innuendo.

Distribution: my site, ALSTSC, only. http://www.geocities.com/brigidharper/index.html

Feedback: like vampires for blood: ljensen1@gladstone.uoregon.edu

Disclaimer: I am not so brilliant as to ever think they're mine; I'm just borrowing them for a little bit.

Summary: Giles assists in a most unusual ghost investigation.

Spoilers: Through rumors of episode 16 of Season 6 or so, plus the occasional ATS spoiler as well. Takes place May/June 2002. I also like to think of this and my other current Giles story as…prequels or early episodes of "Ripper"…but that's just my own personal insanity talking…no spoilers for "Ripper", if any actually already exist.

Notes: Inspired by a single line of dialogue in another fic I’m currently writing; however, presenting that line in the header would ruin much of the story. I realize most spoilers and other information have Giles living in Bath these days, but, you know what? London is *so* much more convenient, so…let's just forget that whole thing.

Part One

"He’s there again, isn’t he," said Steven Murdock quietly.

"The third day in a row," replied his wife. Susanna stood in the foyer and contemplated the pale figure before her. Her dark eyes began to water.

"No, no, none of that now," whispered Steven, wrapping his arms about her waist. He nuzzled her shoulder, dropping a light kiss in the crux of her neck and shoulder.

"I’m sorry," she whispered back, leaning against him. "It’s simply…I feel somehow responsible for the poor fellow. All these years…stuck here, unable to communicate with the world, unable to even see the world, it seems. I mean, it’s my family’s house, and we don’t even know who he is, Steven. It’s so sad."

"Sh, sh," hushed Steven. "I’ll go and call that woman again. Let her know that he’s back. Maybe she has an idea or two, hm?"

Susanna nodded. "Please," she agreed. "I’ll watch him. See if he does anything unusual."

"You do that. I’ll make the call."

Susanna felt him leave and a few minutes later she heard his voice, muffled by the walls separating them. She nodded to herself, and then returned her watchful gaze to the figure of the young man before her. Quickly, out of curiosity, she glanced down at her watch, and then released her breath. A quarter past. Right on time, he was. As regular as clock work.

"She’s on her way," said Steven softly, coming out of the kitchen.

"About how long?"

"A full ten minutes, she said. Very likely more."

"But he’ll be gone by then. What good will that do?"

Steven hugged her again. "Not much, she told me, but it’s better than nothing, better than a random visit. Perhaps she’ll be able to pick up something from the air, or in describing it to her realize that he did something unusual this time. He has his routine, as always, but we’ve seen him vary it a bit a few times. Remember what she said? That might mean something, something important."

Susanna sighed. "As long as she’s coming."

"Indeed."

At that moment, as he had always done as long as they had been watching him, the ghost disappeared.

Part Two

Rupert Giles was awakened suddenly by a loud knock on his door. "Oh, dear lord," he sighed, rubbing a hand over his book-creased face, dislodging the sheet of paper that had stuck to his cheek overnight. Finding his glasses, he made himself stand and, checking to make sure he was at least somewhat presentable, went to the door.

"Carrie? What are you doing here at this hour?" he asked the woman standing before him.

Carrie Southworth was a woman of…slightly generous proportions, who managed to retain her dignity and her beauty despite her weight. Her brown hair was beginning to be lightened through scattered lines of gray, but Rupert could remember when it had been nothing but a dark blonde. Carrie had stood at the outermost edges of the circle of friends he had had when he had renounced Ethan Rayne and his chaos- and demon-raising lifestyle, but afterwards Rupert and she had become closer friends. Unofficially, they had gone on two dates, but had quickly realized that they were best together as simply friends. Through the years their friendship and correspondence had tapered off, but since he had returned to England - permanently, he reminded himself - their platonic relationship had, for lack of a better term, been rekindled.

"This hour?" scoffed Carrie. "Rupert, it's nearly eleven o'clock."

He glanced at the wall clock hanging over his desk and sighed. "You're right, of course," he conceded. "Please, come in."

Carrie smiled at the quick invitation and made a beeline for the couch as Giles closed the door. Once seated, she pulled a small notebook out of her large purse and made a quick note in it. Giles followed suit, settling down in an overstuffed chair (uncomfortably lumpy, but a housewarming gift from his mother and guaranteed to keep anyone awake as long as they sat in it) opposite his guest. "Is there anything I can get you? Tea? Coffee?" he asked politely.

She shook her head. "This," she said, gesturing to her notebook, "will wake you up more quickly than any caffeinated beverage."

"What is it then?" he asked.

She shook her head. "First, I need to know if you have any other…projects going on right now, anything you can't afford to put off or neglect in any way. Because if I tell you about this, I'll want your undivided attention for as long as it takes to figure it out, and I've already been working on it for a year. More than that, really."

He nodded. "I see," he said. "I haven't got anything particularly pressing at the moment, and you've certainly piqued my interest already, Carrie."

She smirked. "Nothing particularly pressing, Rupert? What were you up reading about all night? I can still see the creases in your skin. You fell asleep on your books."

"Like I said, it's not a pressing issue." At her maintained look of disapproval, he conceded. "The Council found another book about Glorificus and the Key. A year too late, mind you, but the information about the Key could still be pertinent," he told her. He didn't need to clarify who or what the Key was as one of their longer conversations upon his return had revolved around the insanity of the previous year in Sunnydale.

"That poor girl," said Carrie. "She's gone through so much. I image she must have quite the mix of complexes buzzing about her head, thinking she's not real, then flipping it around and knowing she's a vessel of undefined power."

"Yes, well, the latest communiqué from California indicates that her greatest worry at the moment is whether or not she'll be asked to the Prom, so I do believe she's sorted most of those issues out for herself," said Giles with a faint laugh. "I'm honestly not that worried about her; the research is simply a…an additional safety measure at this point, beside my own personal curiosity into the matter. So I assure you, Carrie, whatever it is you have to share with me won't be distracting me from anything crucial."

She smiled. "Excellent. Well, as you have probably already guessed, it's about a ghost."

Giles laughed. "Is there anything else you ever deal with?" Carrie was something of a medium and a psychic, using her talent to investigate rumors of hauntings and the like; most of the time, her efforts simply resulted in accounts that she compiled into books for tourists, describing the best locales in London and the surrounding area for finding ghosts. She had also used her expertise to write a few works of fiction under an assumed name. While she was by no means a member of the Watchers Council, nor officially affiliated with them, she had on occasion assisted them in eradicating harmful spirits. The fact that she was approaching him for help in investigating a ghost already indicated that it would at the very least be interesting.

Carrie contemplated the question. "I've dealt with a few possessions and several handfuls of poltergeists. But you're right; it's usually a ghost. And quite a ghost he is this time, too."

"He?"

Carrie launched into storyteller mode. "They call him the Ghost of a Quarter Past, the owners of the house he haunts. They've clocked him for about twelve years now, and he always shows up at a quarter past nine o'clock in the evening."

"That in itself isn't that unusual."

"No, but the rest of the when he appears is. The current owners are the latest in a long line of familial inheritors of the house, and every single previous inhabitant swears up and down that the ghost would appear exactly once a year, on May seventeenth. According to the current owners, that was true up until about four years ago. The ghost appeared as usual on May seventeenth, but then reappeared on the twentieth, twenty-fourth, twenty-seventh, and June third of that year. As Mrs. Murdock, one of the current owners, said, it nearly scared her to death. A few months passed, and then it appeared again, in October and November, only to disappear until its scheduled appearance in May."

"Scared her to death: it startled her, or it purposefully frightened her?" Giles asked.

"It simply startled her and all twenty of her guests at a dinner party. The family's learned not to have guests over on May seventeenth, as this is a highly visible ghost. Anyone can see him, not simply select individuals. Obviously, they weren't expecting him to crash their party on the twentieth."

"Goodness," exclaimed Giles. "That is highly unusual. Has the ghost continued to appear irregularly then?"

Carrie nodded. "Most definitely. He always makes his May appearance, as he has always done, but every year his other appearances increase. Last night they called me in again; it was the third appearance this week, and it's only Wednesday today. The only consistency is the time of day: nine fifteen p.m. There's no other pattern that I've been able to discern, and I've even run the dates past some mathematician and astrologist friends of mine. No one's come up with a pattern."

"Intriguing. Have they been able to establish who this fellow was before his death?" asked Giles. "Or even how and when he died?"

Carrie shook her head. "They've spent some time researching it every time the house passes to a new owner, but they've never established anything definitive. The sightings began about 1900 for certain, possibly earlier, but the first written notation about him was in 1901 in a diary. The author describes him as…oh, where was it?" She flipped through the notebook. "Ah, yes. She wrote, 'he is a pleasant-looking gentleman, in unfashionable clothing. A very handsome and earnest fellow. He seemed very sad. It is unfortunate that he appears to be a ghost, as despite his shortcomings he looked to be just that sort of man I would have liked to have spoken to.' My best guess is that something happened that year, or the year before, which brought him out of the…the between-space between life and death, between this world and the afterlife, where he had been stuck for whatever reason, and somehow he was brought into this world instead of passing on. I think he died much earlier, perhaps as much as fifty years earlier, and he appears regularly on the day he died, although I've never actually been able to see the motions of his death to verify it."

Giles considered this. "How much research have you done yourself?"

Carrie grimaced. "Honestly? Not much. Most of the work I've done has been in observing the ghost and in verifying and reviewing what the homeowners had already established. That's where you come in, Rupert. I'm not sure where to begin, but I bet you've already thought up three or five theories from what little I've told you! I'd be most grateful if you'd help me."

Giles laughed. "Of course I'll help you, Carrie. And I know just where to begin…"

Part Three

"Mrs. Southworth! Come in, come in," exclaimed Susanna Murdock. "I was hoping you would come by." She held the door wide open and let the medium and her friend enter.

Carrie smiled. "Mrs. Murdock, this is my friend Rupert Giles. I've asked him to assist me. That is, if you don't mind…?"

"No, no, of course not!" replied Susanna. "I'm open really to any suggestion you have, Mrs. Southworth. I really would like to get to the bottom of this." She extended her hand to Giles. "Pleased to meet you, Mr. Giles. If you don't mind my asking, are you a psychic yourself?"

Giles shook the woman's hand politely. "No, ma'am, I'm not. However, I've spent most of my life investigating one supernatural phenomenon after another. Carrie and I hope I'll be able to bring a…fresh perspective to the situation."

"Of course!" exclaimed Susanna. She asked for their coats and hung them for them, and then invited them into the front sitting room. "I suppose Mrs. Southworth's told you a bit about our ghost, Mr. Giles?"

"Yes, a bit," he replied, taking in the room. It was rather large and tastefully decorated - except for one chair in the nearest corner. It looked worn and the fabric faded, and it matched nothing else in the room. Puzzled, Giles approached it.

Susanna noticed what had caught his attention. "You're very observant, Mr. Giles."

"Am I?" he asked leadingly.

"You are," she replied. "That's where the ghost first appears."

"I see." He touched the upholstery gently. "There doesn't seem to be anything unusual about it."

Susanna laughed. "Except for the fact that no matter where we try to move it to in the house, the moment the ghost appears it's back in its place against that wall."

Giles jerked upright and looked back at her. "Truly?"

Susanna nodded. From her spot on a more modern couch Carrie smiled. She knew Rupert would enjoy this.

"My goodness, the sheer magnitude and power of this specter must be…well, practically tipping the scales! There have been reports of small objects moving in conjunction with ghostly phenomena, but a large chair such as that?" he exclaimed. "Most intriguing." He examined the chair for a few more moments. "Perhaps now would be a good time to show me the ghost's pattern, Mrs. Murdock," he said. "Carrie told me that he moves about in the house, even leaves it, as part of his usual routine?"

"He does," replied Susanna. She moved towards the chair and sat down in it. "When he first appears, he's sitting here," she explained. "He sits for a few minutes, then gets up and walks a little in the room, stopping here and there like he's holding a conversation. After a few minutes of that, he moves on to this little room back here and sits down." She gestured and Giles followed her movement to see a small room with a couch and a few chairs, similar to the chair in the sitting room. "Have you ever tried moving those chairs?" asked Giles.

Susanna frowned. "Not that I can remember. We tried moving that chair from the front room into here once, but the ghost apparently didn't like that and the chair went back as usual."

"Interesting," commented Giles. "Please continue."

Susanna moved into the little room and sat down on the couch. "He sits, like so," she said, gesturing to herself, "and apparently holds a little conversation. But the end result of the conversation apparently upsets him. He's quietly upset, though; he's always very calm, quiet, composed, reserved -"

"Unless he's in one of his moods."

Part Four

"Unless he's in one of his moods," interrupted a male voice. They turned to see Steven Murdock enter the room.

"Steven!" exclaimed Susanna. "You startled us." She turned to Giles. "This is my husband, Steven Murdock. Steven, this is Rupert Giles, a friend of Mrs. Southworth's. She's asked him to assist her with the ghost."

Steven's gait was proud and determined in nature, his handshake firm, Giles noted. "Pleased to meet you, Mr. Murdock," he said.

"Same to you, Mr. Giles. I see Susanna's giving you the ghost tour," said Steven.

"Indeed," murmured Giles. "What's this about his moods?"

Steven laughed. "Obviously, Susanna hasn't gotten to the good stuff yet. Our ghost is a tricky one these days, showing up whichever day he pleases and so on. If I didn't know better, I'd say he's sick," he explained. "We don't necessarily want him gone, Mr. Giles; we're really quite accustomed to having him around. But if there was some way of figuring out why he's changed his schedule of appearances these last four years, some way of getting him back on track, so to say, then we'd be much obliged."

"Certainly," replied Giles. "You've seen the ghost yourself then?"

"Absolutely. Most of the time he's no trouble, really, but every once in a while he'll…get into a bad mood, for lack of a better term."

Giles frowned. "What do you mean?"

Steven sighed and moved closer to his wife. "As Susanna was telling you, normally he comes into this little room, sits down, converses with someone we can't see. He becomes a bit upset and then leaves, walks right out the door and onto the street."

"Through the door?" inquired Giles.

"Of course. Why? Did you suppose that he opened the door, walked through and then shut it again behind him?" asked Steven jokingly.

Giles shrugged. "If there's a power linked to him that's strong enough to move furniture on the corporeal plane, I would think opening a door and shutting it again would be rather on the easy side."

"Oh," said Steven, almost as if embarrassed. "No, he walks right through the door, as if it wasn't there. You know the routine - ghosts walking through walls and such? That's what he does with the door."

"I see. What then? Does he continue out on the street?" asked Giles.

"Most definitely," piped up Susanna. She stood and pulled back the curtain of one of the windows. "He walks down the steps and continues down the street in a huff, still upset. He's startled any number of motorists over the years - they drive through him and then nearly crash, thinking they've actually hit someone with their car. It's one thing when he used to appear once a year, Mr. Giles, but now that he's back so often? It worries me on all sorts of levels."

Giles exchanged a look with Carrie. "I wouldn't worry to greatly, Mrs. Murdock. Carrie and I will get to the root of this. Now, Mr. Murdock, you were saying that the ghost…gets into moods?"

Steven nodded. "Every once in a while, he'll appear to get more upset than usual and as he walks through the room to leave the house, he starts injuring himself, you could say: he claws at his skin, pulls at his hair, and so on. We can't hear what he says, but it looks like he begins screaming, yelling, shouting. He claws at himself so terribly that he even begins to bleed, but whatever ghostly blood falls to the floor disappears within the next few seconds."

"Extraordinary!" exclaimed Giles. "I've never heard of a ghost that does that only occasionally. Usually, they have one mode of action and they stick to it. It seems that this fellow is quite unusual on a number of counts."

"Indeed," said Susanna. "So, Mr. Giles, do you think you can help us?"

Giles exchanged another look with Carrie and then turned towards the Murdocks with a smile. "Yes, certainly. I do believe I can."

Part Five

They spent the next several hours going over the research that the Murdocks had done when they had acquired the house, but Giles found very few leads. The house had been built in 1830 and some descendant of the original owners had lived there ever since. No mention of the ghost was made until 1901, but according to the Murdocks, Carrie was right: based on his clothing, he had died sometime after about 1850, but well before 1900. In all of the diaries and record books kept by the families who had resided in the house, there was no mention of any individual, related or not, who would have had such a deep connection to the house just before his death. It was highly puzzling, but, as he reassured both Carrie and the Murdocks, Giles loved a good mystery.

Quickly, the hour of nine o'clock came and they began to anticipate the ghost's appearance. "There's no guarantee that he'll show," whispered Carrie, "but if he does, it'll be any moment now."

"What time is it?" asked Giles softly. They had situated themselves on a couch in the sitting room, close enough to get a good look at the ghost, but far enough as to not interfere with his routine.

Carrie glanced at her watch. "It's time," she replied -

- And sure enough, the ghost appeared.

Giles stood and approached him carefully. He was a young fellow of about twenty, dressed in old-fashioned clothing. The Murdocks had been correct; the ghost was of a vintage a bit older than turn-of-the-century, but not by much. For the minutest of moments, the spirit's image seemed familiar, but then quite quickly that feeling left him and he refocused his attention to the ghost's actions.

Cautiously, Giles observed the ghost as he held a quick dialogue with an unseen figure and then returned to what he had been doing beforehand: writing. Giles wanted to chuckle a little at that - who had heard of a writing ghost? - but reined in that urge. The ghost looked up suddenly and said a single, multiple-syllable word.

Giles stepped back and contemplated that word while watching the ghost continue about his routine. Ten minutes later, the ghost was gone. "Well?" said Carrie excitedly. "What did you think?"

"I'm not sure," replied Giles. "He certainly is an intriguing fellow." He turned and looked back at the chair, miming the movements that the ghost had made with his mouth. An idea sprang into his head. "Carrie, do the Murdocks have a family tree that I can look at?"

"I believe so," replied Carrie. "You caught something, didn't you? You devil!" she exclaimed jokingly. "To think, I've been working on this case for over a year, and you catch something important the first night. What would I do without you, Rupert?"

Giles smiled, but gave her no reply.

"What is it that you want to see?"

"I'm thinking that this poor fellow may have been an…admirer of some daughter of the house," Giles told her. "I want to know if there was ever a girl living here named…Cecily."

Part Six

"Ah-ha!" said Steven Murdock. "Here she is."

The others gathered nearer to him at the kitchen table. "You found her?" asked Carrie.

Steven nodded. "Look - right here." He pointed to a name on the family tree that Susanna had produced for them from the boxes of notes and research done on the ghost over the years.

"Cecily Eliza Addams Moore," read Giles aloud. "Born in 1860, died 1903. She wasn't terribly old, was she?" The question was rhetorical in tone.

"My grandmother's…grandmother's mother, correct?" asked Susanna.

"Looks to be, Su," replied Steven. "When did she live here?"

"Give me a moment." She searched through some papers. "She married in 1883, according to this," Susanna announced, presenting a piece of paper. "Her brother remained in the house. His youngest daughter first saw the ghost in 1901. Oh, wait a mo'…Cecily was born in the house. So if the ghost is somehow connected to her, it would have occurred between 1860 and 1883."

"Interesting," said Carrie absentmindedly.

"What is it?" asked Giles, turning to her.

"What? Oh," she said quickly, realizing that she had attracted everyone's attention. "It's simply that I've read her diaries several times, and while she had an amazing number of suitors, I'm certain we've accounted for all of them."

"Are you sure?" asked Giles.

"Fairly certain, but I may just as easily have missed something. Susanna," she said suddenly, turning to the other woman. "You have her diaries there beside you, don't you? Why don't you quickly go through and read off the names that appear in her entries for the seventeenth of May, starting with…" She considered it for a moment. "How about starting with 1875? She would have been fifteen. That would have been about the appropriate age, don't you think, Rupert?"

"Indeed," murmured Giles as reply.

"Perhaps a scorned suitor of some sort, I think," added Carrie. "Someone who didn't find another girl to-to marry."

Susanna gave them an odd look but complied. "Let's see…1875…She mentions a Richard Feinley and an Archibald Doone -"

"Feinley married her best friend; Doone became a pastor. Both lived long into the twentieth century," said Carrie. At their looks, she added, "I said I had accounted for all her suitors."

"Oh," said Susanna and then continued thumbing through the volumes. "1876…Alexander Wyndam?"

"Married Juliette Pryce. Lived a stern but successful life in academia." She turned to Giles. "I believe you know one of his descendants," she told him with a smile. Giles smirked. The Murdocks exchanged a puzzled look; they, of course, knew nothing of the Watchers Council.

"Moving along," said Susanna. "1877…Michael Tate."

"Died of influenza the same year," said Carrie. "But he was a dark-complexioned fellow. The ghost is fair, very…sweet looking."

"1878…She's abroad with her aunt and uncle. She's in Paris that day. No mention of suitors whatsoever. Eh, 1879…George Fredericson, Allan Brisbey, Laurence Wells."

"Let me see…" started Carrie, looking up at the ceiling as she pondered. "Fredericson married, I know. Brisbey was involved in the navy, married some admiral's daughter, I think. Wells moved to New York and became involved in…in some sort of business there. Textiles, I think. Go on."

"1881…Ah, she talks about attending a musical performance of some sort with the Feinleys and a Robert Moore. Her future husband, yes?" asked Susanna.

Steven nodded, his eyes still fixed on the family tree.

"1882…more of the same. Robert Moore. And in 1883 they're already married." Susanna closed the book with a perfunctory but quiet 'thud'.

"Wait a moment," said Giles slowly. "You skipped a year. What happened in 1880?"

"There wasn't an entry for that date," she said, passing that volume to him. Giles opened it and began flipping carefully through the pages until he found the entries for the month of May. Silently, he read them. After a few moments he looked up and smiled. "Ladies, Mr. Murdock, I believe I have found our ghost," he announced.

Part Seven

"I believe I have found our ghost," Giles announced. He cleared his throat and began to read. "'May 15th: Already we are making preparations for the little dinner party on the 17th of this month. The formal invitations were sent out three days ago, although most of our guests are already confirmed to be attending. It is unfortunate that we must extend our invitation to certain individuals that I would rather not have in attendance, but such are the rules of civilized society.'" He paused.

"'May 18th: I have returned from Henrietta and Mr. Feinley this evening in a most peculiar mood. The police have been visiting the homes of our guests from the dinner party yesterday, as it seems that one of our gentlemen guests has gone missing. My brother delivered to them a list of our guests as asked. In speaking with Henrietta, I have learned that this lost fellow is none other than young Mr. Carlisle, who surprised me greatly in even attending our dinner party, as he often shuns any gathering of such a large company and apparently prefers more intimate settings, though anyone I know is loathe to invite him to such. I spoke to Henrietta at great length about the matter of Mr. Carlisle, who had the audacity to approach me at the party. Greater still, he embarrassed me considerably with one of his dreadful poems and openly admitted that they are based upon his affection for me.'"

Giles looked up. "She goes on to mention that she is glad it was this Mr. Carlisle who went missing, and that she didn't even notice when he left the party. This fellow may very well be our ghost."

"But there's still the question of why he's a ghost in our house," said Steven.

Giles stood and slowly made his way back into the sitting room. The others dutifully followed. "Imagine this: it is 1880 and you are young Mr. Carlisle. You fancy Cecily and compose poetry in her honor. She invites you to her dinner party and you realize that this might be a good time to announce your intentions to her. But, being the unliked, artistic fellow you are, you do not realize that she doesn't like you at all until you finally speak to her and she rejects you completely. You have a choice: either you stay at the party, where you and your 'dreadful' poetry are only to be ridiculed, or you leave, quite upset, and march down the street, unheedful of what you may encounter."

"Quite obviously you leave the party," said Carrie. The Murdocks nodded in agreement.

"Most certainly you leave," continued Giles. "And, quite surprisingly, something happens. Any one of a million tragedies besets you and you die, quite unexpectedly."

"And because you are so terribly upset, and angry, and so on, your soul is stuck between the mortal plane and the hereafter, re-experiencing that terrible, unhappy evening over and over again in this house," Carrie concluded. "Yes, of course. That makes perfect sense. But a number of questions remain. Why did it take until 1901 for him to become visible. What could have possibly happened to cause that change? Why has he changed his schedule of appearances? Why has he started to harm himself?"

The Murdocks swung their eyes towards Giles, who frowned. "Now that," he admitted, "I haven't got the foggiest idea. Carrie?"

Her eyes grew wide and an anticipatory smile grew upon her lips. "Séance."

Giles grinned. "Séance."

Part Eight

The next evening found the four sitting in a circle in the front room shortly after nine o'clock. Candles were lit in a circle around them and they all held hands.

"What time is it?" whispered Steven.

"Sh!" said Giles. "It's almost time."

A few silent moments passed.

The ghost appeared.

Softly, Carrie began chanting. "Restless spirit, wandering soul," she intoned, "commune with us. I implore you, speak through me, tell us of your sorrows, tell us of your joys. Speak to us, spirit!"

The ghostly figure collapsed to the ground at the same time Carrie did. Quickly, Giles took control of the séance. "Tell us, spirit: what is your name?"

The voice came from two directions. "William…Carlisle…" it said slowly.

The Murdocks' eyes grew wide and they almost broke the circle, but Giles held on to them as tightly as he could and continued.

"Tell us, spirit: in what year did you leave us?"

"Never…left…remain…here…"

"Tell us, spirit: why do you remain here?"

The voice screamed and then spoke again. "I…remain…here…twofold…"

"Tell us, spirit: what happened to pull you back into our plane of existence?"

"I…remain…twofold…here…and…else…where…"

"Tell us, spirit: what happened elsewhere?"

It screamed again. "Death…love…death…and…love…"

"Tell us, spirit: how can we set you free?"

Carrie sat up slowly, her eyes blackened and unseeing. In a cocky tone, the voice said, through her, "What can I tell you, baby? I've always been bad."

She slumped over. The ghost disappeared.

Quickly, Giles said the incantation to open the circle and release the spirit's power from Carrie. The Murdocks were more than happy to finally be able to release their hands. Giles opened his mouth to speak, but -

A telephone rang.

Silently, the Murdocks and Giles looked at each other in befuddlement. Suddenly, Giles realized that it was his phone, the cell phone that the Council had commissioned him upon his return to England. Quickly he found it in his overcoat. "Hello?"

"Oh, God, Giles, you have to help me!"

"Dawn? Why on Earth-"

"Giles, it's Spike. He's sick or something. All of a sudden he started, like, flailing about and screaming and yelling things. Giles," she added in a whisper, "I'm scared."

Suddenly, it was as if every thought in his mind clicked, as if every thing they had learned in their research made sense. "Dawn, listen to me very carefully," he said. "Is Spike injured? Is he still flailing about and yelling?"

"No. He's-he's calmed down. It's like he fell back asleep."

"Is Buffy there?"

"Yes," replied Dawn. "It was her idea to call you. We tried Angel but no one answered."

"Very good. Put her on the phone, please."

"'Kay." There was a long pause with unintelligible voices murmuring, during which he exchanged a look with Susanna Murdock, as if to say, 'Oh, terribly sorry, I'll be as quick as possible,' and then he could hear someone pick up the phone again. "Giles?" It was Buffy.

"Buffy, is what Dawn just told me true?"

The Slayer took a deep breath. "Most definitely. At first I thought that maybe there was something wrong with his chip, you know? Like he was having a…a something-or-other in the brain, but…it felt off."

"Listen, Buffy, I think I know what caused it."

"How? You're over in England, we're here." She paused. "Unless you cast a spell on him. Giles, why would you cast a spell on Spike?"

"Don't worry about that now. Buffy, the moment Spike wakes up, I want him on the first possible plane to London. I don't care what it takes, what it costs; I'll find some way of reimbursing you for the expense."

"You want Spike to fly to England? Giles, are you feeling all right?"

"Buffy, unless you want Spike to have another…episode, another seizure, I need him to come to England. As soon as possible."

"Fine, fine, whatever you say. I'll do it."

"Good. Call me again when he's on the plane. I'll try my best to meet him at Heathrow, but if not, I'll want him to meet me at an address that I'll give you in a moment. Do you have a piece of paper and a pen at hand?" Buffy murmured some affirmatives and then Giles gave her the address of the Murdock residence. "Spike might recognize the address and may not want to go, but I trust you to do whatever it takes to get him here."

A few minutes later, he powered off his cell phone and turned to the Murdocks. "What on Earth is going on?" asked Steven.

Giles cleared his throat. "I have discovered the root of and at least part of the solution to your ghost problem, Mr. and Mrs. Murdock: William Carlisle did not simply die an unfortunate death, resulting in his haunting your sitting room. There is a reason why the police never found his body. William Carlisle died and split into two: his soul came here, but his body transformed.

"William Carlisle became a vampire."

Part Nine

Saturday evening. It was surprisingly dark and rainy already at seven o'clock, as if a stronger storm was simply biding its time before arriving and letting loose its destructive force.

Or, Buffy mused, as if the Powers That Be knew that a vampire had just arrived in town.

It had taken the combined efforts of the entire Scooby Gang to convince the chipped vampire even leave Sunnydale and return to England. They had each tried their own form of trying to indulge Spike's weaknesses - free cigarettes, a new TV for his crypt, free merchandise from the Magic Box, and so on - before resorting to threats. Nothing had worked. Finally, Xander had threatened to knock him out and stick him in a crate as someone's checked-in luggage (they still had the gun and sedatives from the old days when Oz had still been around), or worse yet, in a coffin. This final threat - and the vampire knew that Xander was serious - combined with the headache he still had from his 'episode' made Spike give in. If Giles wanted him in England, and if Giles wanted him to go to that damn address, he was going, he had said. They weren't entirely convinced.

Which was why Buffy and Dawn had accompanied him and had not let him out of their sight once since they stepped onto the plane until now.

The three weary travelers found themselves standing before a beautiful and well-kept Victorian house. Spike had been surprisingly quiet the entire trip, not even complaining about the food on the plane, but now he was making up for it with rather unique and colorful metaphors.

Buffy giggled. They had been watching Star Trek IV on TV when Spike had had his little episode two days before. She had always liked that line.

"Come on, Spike," said Dawn, tugging on the vampire's sleeve.

Spike seemed to pout. Any second now, Buffy expected him to say, "Nuh-uh. Don't wanna go."

Instead, he said, "No, Bit, I'm not going in there. It's bad enough the Watcher - and you two - dragged me back to the Mother Country. Worse, you made me come here and I have to stare at this damn house. We're not making it three-for-three. I'm not going inside."

Buffy raised an eyebrow. That had been the adult equivalent.

"Look, Spike," she said finally, "I don't really care at this point whether or not you want to be here, or if you want to go inside, or whatever else is going on. I'm tired, hungry, and in desperate need of a long, hot bath. Preferably with bubbles and scented candles. I'm sure Dawn's feeling the same way. In fact, I bet you do too. Giles wanted you to come here, so I know that whatever the heck is going on, it has got to be pretty damn important. And somehow it's connected to whatever happened to you Thursday. So, unless you maybe want to keep having stuff like that happen to you, and, oh, I don't know, die, I suggest you work with us." Without waiting for an answer, the Slayer marched up the few steps and rang the doorbell.

Dawn gave Spike a Look. "Come on, Spike, how bad can this be?"

Spike was tempted to return that Look with one of his own. "Nibblet, you have no idea what's going on here. I have very specific reasons for not wanting to be here -"

"And Buffy has very specific reasons for wanting you alive." Dawn paused. "Or, un-alive or whatever. Still around. Spike, she likes you."

Spike went ahead and gave her the Look.

Dawn ignored it. "I know you guys had a thing going on. And I know it stopped and things happened and now you're doing the sorta-kinda friends thing. But you love her. You're still in love with her. And she's finally getting it in her head that it's okay for her to love you too." She smirked at the vampire's confused look. "I'm the little sister. I snoop. I sneak. I figure things out."

Then, in the style of her sister, Dawn marched up the steps.

Spike sighed and looked up at the house. Throwing out a few more colorful metaphors and squaring his shoulders, he launched himself up the steps-

Only to trip on the last one and tumble into the house as someone opened the door, knocking over Dawn and Buffy in the process.

Part Ten

"…he all right? He hit the floor pretty hard…"

"…fine, Dawn. I think…"

"…can't have done as much damage to him as those seizures did Thursday…"

"…thought you said vampires…without an invitation…Mr. Giles?"

Groaning and lifting his hand to his forehead, Spike regained consciousness. He discovered himself to be sprawled out on an expensive-looking couch that he didn't recognize. He pulled his hand back into view, squinting a bit to try to focus his blurry vision, and noted almost absently that there was a little blood on his fingers.

"Here, Miss Summers. I knew we had some bandages somewhere…"

He tried to sit up, but was immediately pushed back with a judicious use of Slayer-strength. That's my girl, he told himself absent-mindedly. Then, aloud, he whispered, "Buffy?"

The Slayer came into view and his sight began to sharpen. "Just lay still for a sec, Spike. I need to bandage the cut on your forehead." Her arms moved over his head and he felt her rub something onto his face, just above his eyes.

After a moment, she helped him sit up and his vision finally cleared. They were not alone. Behind Buffy stood two very familiar faces - Dawn and Giles. To Buffy's left stood a man he had never seen before, holding a first-aid kit and looking at him with complete fascination. Behind him and seated on a footstool, a plump woman whose aura felt…shiny and glittery: a psychic of some kind. But to Buffy and Dawn's right, standing at a slight distance, as if curious and afraid at the same time, was a dark-haired woman who seemed slightly familiar.

Spike stood, shaking off Buffy's attempts to keep him seated, and made his way to the woman. Carefully, he looked her over, examining her face and searching in her eyes for any hint of recognition. At the same time she kept her own eyes on his face. She trembled a little - not enough for humans to notice, but Spike's vampire senses caught it easily enough. It was a tremble of not only the faintest hints of fear, but also excitement, curious excitement.

After those few moments of silence, he stepped back. "You're not her," he announced, "but you look like her. You…you have her eyes. Her…hair, and her lips. Yours are thinner, though."

"Cecily, you mean," said the woman softly.

He nodded.

"It's true then," she continued, casting her gaze to the floor. "It's all true." She lifted her head and stepped towards him, her hand out as if to shake. "Cecily…was my ancestor."

Spike took her hand, but instead of shaking it, he curled it in his hand and kissed her knuckles once, very softly. "What's your name, luv?" he asked, still holding onto her hand.

She blushed faintly before answering. "Susanna," she told him. "Susanna Murdock. The man over by your Miss Summers is my husband, Steven."

Spike turned his head slightly to glance at the man, catching the Slayer's eyes for a moment in doing so. "My Miss Summers, eh?" Buffy blushed.

Susanna murmured some sort of affirmation and Spike turned back at her. "I-" she started and then tried again. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Carlisle."

Spike dropped her hand. "What did you call me?"

"That is your name, isn't it? William Carlisle? I admit, you don't quite look like what I had imagined, but you do look just like him-"

"Just like him?" said Spike angrily. He turned and walked over to Giles. "Watcher, you have about thirty seconds to explain to me what the bloody hell is going on here!"

Giles stepped back, startled slightly by the fact that the vampire's anger had caused him to go into game face. The Murdocks gasped behind them. Dawn giggled faintly. "Spike, calm down," Giles said finally.

"I will not calm down. I want to know why you had me cross an entire continent and an ocean, and how the hell you managed to find the one house in all of London that I would never voluntarily enter into, but that I apparently can without invitation, and how on Earth that woman knows my name!"

Suddenly, Spike found himself relaxing under Buffy's hands, which she had placed softly on his shoulders. He turned towards her. "Spike," she said softly. "Please calm down. Giles has a really bizarre story to tell you and I need to have you sit down, okay?"

He nodded, and caught Dawn's eye. The younger girl grinned at him, the same grin she would give when she came up with new and bizarre recipes to try, or more exquisite tortures for Angel when he came to visit next. She had a more devious mind than he did.

They sat. Giles cleared his throat and then began to speak. "As Buffy said, this is indeed a bizarre story. Spike, I'm not sure how you'll take this, to be honest. You see, it has to do with your soul."

Part Eleven

The vampire stared at him. "My soul? Eh, hello? Vampire here. In all but the rarest and…poofiest of instances, that means no soul. You should know that, Watcher."

Dawn giggled again.

"I realize that, Spike," said Giles, "but this is indeed a rare instance, as you put it. You see, Spike, normally when a vampire is made, the soul leaves the mortal plane altogether, usually entering into one of the heavenly dimensions. It appears, however, that in rare circumstances, the soul can enter into the space between the mortal and the heavenly realms, where it remains indefinitely. I would assume that it would then make its proper transition into the heavenly dimensions when the vampire is destroyed."

"In rare circumstances?" repeated Spike hesitantly. Dawn sat down beside him and snuggled up against him. Automatically, his arm went around her shoulder, his hand clasping at hers. Buffy tightened her hold on his other hand. There observe the evil vampire, surrounded by the women who love him, said Buffy to herself with a giggle. Wait a sec…love?

"Yes," said Giles. "It seems that your soul, or rather, William's soul is still here on the mortal plane."

"Oh." Spike looked over at the Murdocks. "Reincarnated or something, you mean."

"No, Spike," said Giles gently. "As a ghost."

"A ghost?" whispered Spike hesitantly. He seemed to collapse into himself. "The whole time? The entire one hundred and twenty-two years?"

Giles nodded.

"Here?"

He nodded a second time.

Spike stood and slowly made his way over to the infamous moving chair. He sat down in it, his gaze landing on the stairs across from them, past the entrance. In that very moment, Giles was struck with the realization that Spike and William Carlisle were indeed the same person, simply from the way the vampire sat in the chair that his soul's ghost was so fond of.

"I can remember sitting here," whispered the vampire. "I remember that I…I liked to sit here."

"As does he," said Carrie finally, breaking her long silence. "Whenever the ghost appears, he is first seen sitting in that chair, just as you do now."

Spike jerked his head towards her, shifting in his seat as he did. He looked at her with a puzzled expression and then suddenly he knew. "I've seen you before. The other day, when…whatever that was happened to me. I saw things. I saw you."

Carrie nodded. "I'm not surprised. You see, William-"

Spike stiffened at her use of his human name.

"-we didn't know it was you. We had no idea. We decided to hold a séance and try to communicate with the spirit, and I acted as the medium. Somehow, there is still a connection of some sort between you and your soul. When we attempted to communicate with the soul, the connection was…agitated, for lack of a better word, and it affected you physically."

Spike mulled this over. "A connection?" he said hesitantly.

"Yes, Spike, a connection," said Giles. "It's not the same as with Angel. His situation is different in two ways: first, his soul actually resides within his body, and two, his soul and his demon are constantly at war with each other. With you…with you, there is a connection between you and your human soul, but it does not influence you whatsoever. At the same time, the demon that is within you does not conflict with the connection with the soul."

"Then what's the problem?" asked Spike. "As long as no one tries to do something about the ghost, about…the soul, I'm fine. Right?"

"You see, Mr. Carlisle, the ghost has had some…problems of late," said Steven Murdock slowly.

Spike turned his head toward him, giving the human man a glare, and then turned back to Giles. "What's he talking about?"

Quickly, Giles outlined the history of the ghost: how it had started appearing in 1901 once a year, how it started appearing more often in 1998, and how it had taken to harming itself. Spike paled at the descriptions. "I take it you have a theory, then, Watcher?" he said softly.

Giles nodded. "Spike, do you remember what happened in May of 1998?"

"Of course I do. Me and the Slayer-" He stopped, eyes wide open, as if suddenly seeing a connection.

"Exactly. You and Buffy joined forces to defeat Angelus, to save the world. You did an act of good, Spike. That's what happened. You went against the basic nature of your demon and helped save the world. You would have been able to do this, I think, even if your human soul had passed on to the heavens as it should have. But because it is still here in the mortal plane of existence, and there is a connection, that connection was activated. No, that's not quite the right word: the activation of the connection, which had been dormant, must have been what caused the ghost to become visible-"

"When I killed the Chinese Slayer," offered Spike. "July 1900. The soul probably didn't like that too much."

"Resulting in it fighting its way out of the between-space, but not being able to appear visibly until the next March, on the anniversary of his…your death," said Carrie. "Yes, that makes a bizarre kind of sense."

The Murdocks and the Summers continued to sit quietly, watching the discussion unfold.

"You see, Spike," continued Giles, "except for the yearly appearance, the ghost appears whenever you do an act of good or have a-a noble thought or something of that nature. Something that appeals to the innate goodness of the human soul, which is touched by it through the connection. It doesn't happen at that exact moment; it still waits until the same time every evening, collecting good deeds, as it were, as if those good deeds were charging its battery. Ever since you teamed up with Buffy to stop Angelus, the ghost has appeared more and more because, slowly, you have been performing more and more good deeds or having powerfully good thoughts, which in turn send a 'charge' to the ghost."

"So…it's really my fault," said Spike slowly. "I'm the one keeping him here." Buffy realized that she didn't like the guilty look on his face.

"No, Spike," said Giles. "It's not your fault. What's wrong is that the soul, William, hasn't come to terms with whatever it was that happened that night. He relives it without being able to change it. Something needs to be done to change the cycle somehow, to get him to realize that he's still here after all these years, and that he can leave. These times when he injures himself, clawing at his face and whatnot - it's because he's frustrated. He can feel you out in the world, and he's much rat