Chapter Text
Willow walked slow, her eyes glued to the master printout taped to the glass of the guidance counselor’s office. She checked the 'R' column for the fourth time. Nothing. Every other senior had a designated time slot, a colored routing slip, and a counselor assigned to dictate their life after graduation. She was completely blank.
She clutched her binders tighter against her chest, a familiar knot of academic anxiety tightening in her stomach. Being ignored by the popular crowd was standard, but being systematically ignored by a school database was a completely different kind of crisis.
"Willow?"
She spun around. Rupert Giles was stepping out of the library, looking distinctly out of place amidst the glossy corporate banners decorating the hallway. He pulled at his tweed jacket, his eyes darting toward the main gymnasium where the rest of the student body was being marshaled.
"Mr. Giles," Willow said, pointing a finger at the paper. "My name isn't on the list. Did the office mess up the database again?"
Giles adjusted his glasses, his expression turning uncharacteristically grim. "I don't believe it was a database error, Willow. I just came from the administrative office. A woman arrived twenty minutes ago. She isn't with any of the universities or corporations listed in the brochure."
Willow blinked. "Then who is she with?"
"She claims to represent a private estate," Giles murmured, lowering his voice as a group of freshman rushed past. "But she bypassed the standard registration completely. She had a direct requisition order for your academic files, signed by the school board before the doors even opened this morning. She is waiting for you in the auxiliary staff room."
Willow’s brow furrowed. "Just me?"
"Just you," Giles confirmed, his hand instinctively shifting toward his pocket, where he usually kept his journal of anomalies. "Willow, look at me. There are organizations—clandestine factions outside of the Watchers' Council—that monitor young people with... unique intellectual apertures. Be exceptionally careful with what you disclose."
Willow nodded slowly, her curiosity instantly overriding her nerves. She turned down the quieter, intersecting corridor that led away from the noisy gymnasium. The door to the auxiliary office was heavy wood, painted a dull school-board green.
She took a breath, knocked once, and pushed it open; stepping across the threshold into the stripped-down auxiliary office, Willow pushed the heavy door shut, and the click of the latch felt remarkably loud in the quiet room.
She turned to the desk, her eyes widening slightly as she took in the woman sitting before her. Based on Giles’s warning about a representative from an "estate," Willow had been expecting an elderly British solicitor or a stern, graying academic. Instead, the woman looking back at her looked to be in her late twenties. Her skin was smooth, her features sharp and classic, and her dark hair was styled in a precise, vintage roll that looked entirely deliberate.
Yet, there was a stark dissonance between her youthful appearance and her eyes. They were a piercing, calculated blue, holding the weight of someone who had commanded operations, looked down gun barrels, and manipulated global structures before Willow’s parents were even born.
"You're... the representative?" Willow asked, shifting her weight from one foot to the other, suddenly very aware of her own colorful, oversized sweater.
"I am," Peggy said. She didn't stand up, but her posture remained flawlessly upright, an absolute anchor of authority in the small office. "Sit down, Willow."
It wasn't a harsh command, but the sheer weight of Peggy's will laced through the words so naturally that Willow found herself moving before her brain even processed the choice. She dropped into the plastic chair opposite the desk, her backpack slipping to the floor.
"My name is Peggy Carter," the woman continued, her British accent crisp and completely unaffected by the California sprawl outside. She placed her hands flat on the desk, over the closed ledger. "And you are currently wondering why the school board erased your name from the public rosters today."
"Mr. Giles said you had a special requisition," Willow murmured, her fingers twisting together in her lap. "He seemed... worried. Is this about a scholarship? Because my grades are really good, but I didn't think private trusts sent recruiters in tailored suits to Sunnydale."
Peggy allowed a faint, knowing smile to touch her lips, though her eyes remained entirely focused, reading every micro-expression on Willow’s face.
"Rupert Giles is trained to look at the world through archaic, dusty lenses," Peggy said coolly, dismissing the Watcher with a slight tilt of her head. "He sees anomalies as folklore. I do not. I am not here on behalf of a university, Willow. I am here with an offer which will literally change your life.”
"I don't think my life needs changing," Willow said, her voice small as she looked down at her trainers. "I'm just a high school senior. I do some tutoring, and I'm good with coding, but I'm really nothing special. If you're looking for someone extraordinary, you probably want Buffy."
Peggy’s smile faded into an expression of intense, quiet seriousness. "You are entirely wrong, Willow. And you are underestimating yourself precisely the way the rest of the world wants you to."
She leaned forward, resting her forearms on the desk, her gaze pinning Willow to the chair. "You and your friend Buffy Summers are not ordinary teenagers who stumbled into local folklore. You are what my colleagues and I classify as sub-operants. You are individuals born with the biological architecture for advanced, higher mind power."
Willow blinked, the unfamiliar words hanging heavily in the quiet office air. "Sub-operants? Like... a medical thing? Buffy is just really strong, and I just study a lot."
"Buffy Summers is a kinetic powerhouse who channels her raw mental focus inward to hyper-accelerate her physical speed and strength," Peggy explained, her tone completely matter-of-fact.
"And you, Willow, are a dormant generator. Your mind possesses an immense, latent capacity to manipulate the forces around you. You aren't nothing special; you are an untapped reservoir of high-tier ability living on a dangerous geological fault line without a single shield to protect yourself."
Willow looked at Peggy, her mind completely blank as she tried to process the words. "Sub-operants? Reservoirs? I don't... I really don't understand. Are you saying we have superpowers? Because that sounds like a comic book, and my life is definitely not a comic book."
Peggy didn't answer right away. Instead, she simply kept her eyes locked on Willow's.
Suddenly, a strange sensation washed over Willow. The ambient hum of the school hallway faded away, and the air in the room felt crisp and remarkably clear. She didn't hear a voice in her ears, but a series of distinct, perfectly formed concepts began to arrange themselves directly inside her head, bypassing her ears entirely. It felt like her own thoughts, but the vocabulary and the absolute calm behind them belonged entirely to the woman across the desk.
There are five grand faculties of the higher mind, Willow, the thought resonated clearly within her brain. Telepathy, which allows for communication and sensing signatures across vast distances. Coercion, which dictates control over another's will. Redaction, which heals or alters memories and mental structures. Creativity, which allows a mind to perceive and restructure physical matter at an atomic level. And Psychokinesis.
Willow blinked, her mouth slightly open as she realized she was understanding these definitions without Peggy moving her lips.
Peggy leaned forward, the silent mental link holding firm. Psychokinesis is the manipulation of physical force, movement, and energy. It is the ability to move mountains or stop a bullet with a thought. And based on what my great-niece detected from across the Atlantic, that is the faculty where your latent potential is strongest. You are a natural force of nature, Willow. You just haven't learned how to turn the key yet.
That is impossible, Willow replied inside her own mind, the thought shooting back instantly before she could even stop herself to wonder how she was talking without moving her mouth. You must be confused. You definitely have the wrong girl. Buffy has all the powers. She's the one who fights, she's the one who jumps off roofs, she's the one who saves the day. I'm just the sidekick who looks things up on the computer.
Peggy’s mental presence didn't waiver; it remained a perfectly cool, reassuring anchor inside Willow's brain. I am not confused, Willow. Your friend Buffy's abilities have simply emerged much quicker because they were forced open by what your archaic Watchers call her 'Slayer' legacy. It acts as an aggressive biological catalyst, driving her physical mind-power to the surface out of sheer survival.
Willow’s mental wall nearly crumbled, her thoughts scattering in a wave of sudden panic. You... you know about that? You know about the Slayers?
Yes, Willow, I know all about Slayers and vampires, Peggy’s voice resonated back, completely unfazed, her physical blue eyes never breaking contact. Which is exactly why Buffy is staying right here in Sunnydale. Her particular talent is tied to the physical defense of this fault line. But your path is different. The Watchers' Council wants to keep you in her shadow as a library assistant, completely blind to the fact that your mental capacity could easily eclipse the physical strength of a hundred Slayers if you are properly trained.
Hold on a moment, Aunt Peggy, a new, vastly younger voice suddenly burst into the mental link. Is she there? Did you find her? Is my long-range calculation correct?
Willow jumped slightly in her plastic chair, her eyes darting around the empty auxiliary office as the unexpected, energetic thoughts flooded her brain. The voice belonged to a young girl, crisp and distinctly British, buzzing with an absolute, unrestrained academic excitement that bypassed Willow's mental defenses entirely.
Jemma, please clarify your thoughts, Peggy’s mental presence instructed, a thread of sharp, disciplinary control cutting through the link to stabilize the connection. You are crowding the channel. I am currently mid-evaluation.
I’m sorry, I’m sorry, it’s just that the tectonic feedback loop from California shifted three minutes ago and I knew you must be talking to her! the young girl's mind rushed onward, completely ignoring the scolding out of sheer enthusiasm. Did you tell her about her latent psychokinetic tier yet? Is she excited? Is she as brilliant as her school records say? Oh, Aunt Peggy—is she pretty?
Willow’s face flushed a deep, immediate crimson under her oversized sweater, her own thoughts twisting into a chaotic knot of embarrassment and sheer disbelief. Wait, who is that? Who is talking? And why is a little girl in England asking if I'm pretty inside my own head?
That is Jemma, Peggy explained mentally, her physical features remaining entirely composed while a faint touch of fond amusement filtered through the telepathic connection. My great-niece, and the paramount detector who mapped your exact neural coordinates from five thousand miles away.
My apologies, Aunt Peggy, Jemma’s young voice chimed back in, buzzing with a sheepish but rapid energy. I was late launching my EE because Mum absolutely insisted I brush my teeth before bed. She refuses to believe that an eleven-year-old running an Escorpial Excursion across the globe still needs a strict bedtime.
Willow blinked, her internal clock instantly trying to do the math. Bedtime? But it’s only two o'clock in the afternoon here.
Eight hours ahead in Sheffield, Willow, Peggy’s mental presence interjected, smooth and perfectly disciplined. Which is precisely why we must be efficient. Jemma, hush for just a moment while my own mind locks into your Excursion. The background noise over the Atlantic is particularly heavy today.
Across the desk, Peggy’s physical features remained completely stone-faced and composed, but Willow felt a sudden, weightless shift in the room's atmosphere. The mental static cleared out instantly as Peggy's mind extended across the distance, stabilizing the young girl's projection and leaving the three-way telepathic channel pristine.
Oh, the connection is perfectly clear now! Jemma’s thoughts bounced back into Willow's mind, practically vibrating with relief and curiosity. Hello, Willow! I’ve been observing your school records and tracking your signature for a fortnight. You solved that localized routing anomaly in your school network using an incredibly elegant recursive loop. Did Aunt Peggy tell you that your brain is naturally wired for that kind of force manipulation? You aren't frightened, are you?
Willow sat completely frozen in her plastic chair, her fingers clutching the hem of her sweater as she looked at the young, composed woman across the desk while listening to a literal child chatter inside her skull from across the world. I... I think my brain is short-circuiting, Willow thought back, a wave of sheer bewilderment overtaking her panic. You observed me? From England?
Willow sat completely motionless, her knuckles white where she gripped the hem of her oversized sweater. Her logical, structured worldview was fracturing right down the middle, leaving her with a cold, hollow sensation in her chest.
You’ve been in my lab, Willow thought back, her internal voice sounding fragile, small, and completely overwhelmed. While I was studying? While I was eating my lunch? I... I thought I was alone. I thought it was just a quiet room where I could code. But you were just... standing there? In the corner? Like an invisible camera?
The comfort of her familiar high school routines vanished in an instant. The idea that her private thoughts, her late-night studying, and the unique energy footprint of her brain had been tracked and evaluated by an eleven-year-old child in England made the room feel incredibly claustrophobic. It wasn't magic, and it wasn't a standard computer hack; it was a total violation of her own mind.
I'm sorry, I really didn't mean to make you feel uncomfortable! Jemma’s mental voice spiked with sudden anxiety, her childhood enthusiasm twisting into immediate regret. It’s a standard protective protocol, Willow, I swear! I had to keep a continuous telepathic lock on your coordinates. If I dropped the excursion for even an hour, the background static over the California fault line would have swallowed your signature, and we would have lost you completely.
Willow pulled her gaze away from Peggy, looking down at the spartan wooden desk as tears of sheer frustration pricked the corners of her eyes. I’m not a signature, she thought, a rare spark of defensive anger cutting through her bewilderment. I’m just a person. I'm just Willow. You can't just slide into people's rooms and watch them like... like a science experiment.
Jemma, step back and close the channel, Peggy’s mental voice commanded, cutting through the three-way link with the absolute, clean precision of a surgical blade.
The little girl's anxious thoughts vanished instantly, leaving the mental landscape quiet. Then, Willow felt a sudden, profound shift in the air around her. It wasn't a physical touch, but a wave of immense, smooth authority gently wrapped itself around her racing thoughts. Peggy’s Paramount Coercion didn't crush Willow's mind; instead, it acted like a heavy, stabilizing blanket, firmly lowering her heart rate, smoothing out her frantic breathing, and forcing her rising panic to recede into a dull, manageable calm.
Willow’s breathing slowed down against her will, her tears drying up as an artificial but deeply welcome sense of absolute safety took over her nervous system. She looked up, her mind suddenly clear enough to piece together the clues she had just been handed.
Great-aunt, Willow's mind thought, a sharp, logical click echoing through the telepathic link as her analytical brain finally caught up to the vocabulary. She looked across the desk at the flawless, smooth skin, the sharp jawline, and the dark hair of the woman sitting opposite her. Wait. If Jemma is eleven... and you are her great-aunt... then you must be decades older than you look.
Peggy allowed a faint, genuinely impressed smile to touch her lips, though her physical posture remained as unyielding as iron.
Very good, Willow, Peggy replied telepathically, her voice carrying a resonant, ancient weight that completely shattered the illusion of her youthful face. The longevity gene within our lineage is incredibly fickle. My cellular structure locked when I was exactly twenty-eight years old during a battlefield catalyst in the Second World War. I have watched empires fall, S.H.I.E.L.D. rise, and rogue factions compromise global intelligence, all from behind this very face. I am older than your grandparents, Willow, and I am telling you that your current life is an illusion.
Jemma? Peggy’s mental voice carried a warning tone, but before she could firmly shut the channel, the eleven-year-old’s thoughts slipped back into the link one last time, sounding thoroughly defeated.
I’m so sorry, Aunt Peggy, I’m really going this time! Jemma chimed in, a heavy, exaggerated sigh echoing through the telepathic connection. Mum just walked into my room with the final warning. She says it is absolute bedtime now, even for precocious young masterminds like me. She’s literally standing by the light switch.
The young girl’s mind shifted its focus entirely toward Willow, the lingering anxiety from moments before completely replaced by a warm, hopeful burst of childhood sincerity.
It was incredibly nice to meet you, Willow! Jemma’s thoughts buzzed directly into Willow's mind. Please don't be cross about the Excursion. I really, truly hope you take Aunt Peggy up on her offer and come to Oxford. I’ve looked at your mind’s frequency for so long, and I just have this brilliant feeling that if you come to England, we’d become absolute BFFs. Goodnight!
With a sudden, soft pop in the mental atmosphere, Jemma’s signal vanished completely, leaving the Atlantic channel silent and empty.
Willow sat completely still, the forced calm of Peggy's Coercion keeping her chest from heaving, though her mind was still spinning from the sheer velocity of the last ten minutes. A little girl five thousand miles away had just casually declared they were destined to be best friends, all while projecting her consciousness across an ocean.
Peggy slowly opened her physical ledger again, picking up a fountain pen from the desk. The ancient, heavy silence of the room returned. "Her mother is remarkably strict about the biological requirements of a growing brain," Peggy murmured out loud, her physical voice breaking the quiet. "Now, Willow. The channel is clear, the child is asleep, and your panic is managed. Let us speak plainly about your transition to England."
Willow looked down at her hands, her fingers still trembling against the fabric of her skirt. The spoken sound of Peggy’s voice had broken the spell, but it didn't fix the sheer impossibility of what had just occurred inside her head.
"I... I just had a conversation," Willow said, her actual, physical voice coming out as a faint, dry whisper that felt completely clumsy after the silence. She looked up, her wide eyes locked onto Peggy's calm face. "A real, actual conversation. With an eleven-year-old girl. In England. Who... who wanted to know if I was pretty."
She shook her head, a tiny, breathless laugh escaping her lips because if she didn't laugh, she was going to start crying again. "How is that even possible? She's five thousand miles away. There are oceans, and mountains, and telephone poles, and my brain just... we were just talking. How can a brain do that?"
Peggy didn't offer an immediate, sweeping explanation. She simply dipped the nib of her fountain pen into the ledger, her hands perfectly steady as she let the reality of the question hang in the air.
"Because a brain is not just a collection of tissue, Willow," Peggy said quietly, her blue eyes tracking the ink on the page. "It is an instrument. And yours happens to be tuned to a frequency most people cannot hear."
"Every operant human possesses basic telepathy, Willow," Peggy said quietly, keeping her eyes on the ledger. "It is the fundamental baseline of the higher mind. But holding a connection over vast distances, across oceans, while projecting your entire sensory awareness into a room... that is reserved for Grand Masters of the art. Like Jemma."
She set the pen down, the small click resonant against the wood. "It requires an immense amount of metabolic energy and absolute concentration. At eleven years old, Jemma is flexing a muscle that should terrify her, yet she treats it like a school project. But like everything else in biology, it becomes easier with practice. Your brain adapts. The pathways stabilize."
Willow stared at the space where Jemma's voice had been, her fingers curling slightly against her knees as she tried to map that clinical explanation onto the warm, eager child who had just wished her goodnight. "Practice," she whispered, the word sounding completely inadequate. "You make it sound like learning the piano."
"It is exactly like learning the piano," Peggy replied, her blue eyes shifting back up, unblinking and cool. "Except if you hit the wrong note here, your mind collapses into static. Which is why you cannot remain in this library."
The auxiliary office door did not open so much as explode inward.
It slammed against the wall with a violent crack that rattled the windowpanes and sent a stack of forms skidding across a nearby filing cabinet.
Rupert Giles crossed the threshold first.
His tweed jacket was rumpled, his glasses crooked, and every trace of composure had vanished from his face. He looked less like a librarian and more like a man who had spent the last several minutes sprinting through a nightmare.
"Willow!"
The relief in his voice was immediate and overwhelming.
Buffy was already moving.
She came through the doorway at Giles's shoulder, her body low and coiled, her attention fixed entirely on the woman seated behind the desk. There was no hesitation in her posture, no uncertainty. Willow recognized the stance instantly. It was the same one Buffy wore in graveyards, dark alleys, and abandoned warehouses seconds before a fight began.
"Get away from her!" Giles shouted.
Buffy took a single step forward.
The movement carried enough intent that the small office suddenly felt much smaller.
Peggy Carter looked up from her ledger.
She did not rise.
She did not retreat.
She did not appear particularly concerned.
For a moment, the room held perfectly still.
Then Peggy spoke.
"Stand down, Miss Summers."
Her voice remained calm, almost conversational.
Something unseen swept through the room.
Willow felt it before she understood it. A sudden pressure. Not force. Not pain. Simply the unmistakable sensation of a stronger will asserting itself.
Buffy stopped.
The tension vanished from her shoulders.
Confusion flickered across her face.
She blinked once, then again, as though trying to understand why her body was no longer responding to the alarm that had propelled her through the door.
"What..." Buffy swallowed. "What did you just do?"
"I prevented you from making an avoidable mistake," Peggy replied.
The words were delivered with the same tone someone might use to discuss the weather.
Buffy stared at her.
Peggy met the look without the slightest trace of hostility.
Then she turned her attention to Giles.
"Close the door, Mr. Giles."
The request sounded remarkably like an instruction.
"The corridor has already witnessed enough excitement for one afternoon."
Giles remained frozen for a moment, his eyes moving from Buffy, to Willow, to Peggy.
Only then did he reach back and slowly push the door shut.
The latch clicked into place.
The sound seemed unnaturally loud.
Peggy folded her hands atop the open ledger and regarded the three of them with quiet patience.
"Excellent," she said.
"Now perhaps we can begin again without anyone attempting to rescue somebody who is not presently in danger."
Giles did not immediately move away from the door. He adjusted his crooked glasses with a hand that shook slightly, his gaze fixed on Peggy’s smooth, youthful face. "You bypassed the standard registration," he said, his voice tight as he tried to regain his footing. "You had a direct requisition order for Willow’s academic files signed by the school board before the doors even opened. Who exactly do you represent, Miss Carter? The board has no record of your agency."
"The school board answers to bureaucrats, and I do not," Peggy said, resting her hands flat on the ledger. "Sit down, Mr. Giles. We are past the point of introductions. Your girls are not ordinary teenagers who stumbled into local folklore. They are what we classify as sub-operants. They possess the rare biological architecture for higher mind power, and they require immediate training to burst into full, stable operancy."
Buffy looked at Willow, then back to Peggy, her brow furrowing as she crossed her arms. "Higher mind power? I'm not a psychic. I'm the Slayer. I kick things until they turn into dust."
"You are a physical powerhouse who unconsciously channels your mental focus inward to hyper-accelerate your biological speed, density, and strength," Peggy corrected, her eyes scanning Buffy with a clinical, evaluating gaze. "It is a highly specialized branch of force manipulation. And Willow is a dormant generator. Her latent capacity to alter the forces around her is immense. But she cannot learn to turn the key while she is hiding in your shadow."
"Which is why Willow must accompany me back to Oxford," Peggy stated firmly, her voice leaving no room for negotiation. "I have a select group of students currently at Trinity College who are undergoing advanced structural training. Willow belongs with them."
"Absolutely not," Buffy said instantly, her protective instincts flaring right through Peggy's lingering mental blanket. She stepped closer to Willow's chair, her eyes narrowing. "We don't do separate. Wherever Will goes, I go. You can't just split us up because of some weird science classification."
Giles stepped forward, his knuckles white as he gripped the back of the second plastic chair. "And why Oxford, Miss Carter? If Willow truly possesses these... unique intellectual apertures you speak of, why can she not be trained here? Under my supervision? In a familiar environment?"
"Because Willow will blossom better around like-minded individuals," Peggy countered, her eyes scanning Giles with cool precision. "I would have liked to have Buffy join us as well, but her added role as the Slayer means that she cannot at present leave Sunnydale. Her immediate physical presence is required on this fault line."
Willow sat completely still, the words hitting her like a physical blow. The artificial calm Peggy had wrapped around her mind didn't stop her chest from tightening as the reality of the demand finally settled in.
Oxford.
She was being asked to pack a bag, get on an airplane, and leave everything she had ever known. She would be leaving her parents. She would be leaving the safety of her school network. She would be leaving Giles, and the library, and Buffy. She was being told to walk away from her chosen family to go to a foreign country full of strangers, all because she showed signs of higher mind powers. The sheer scale of the isolation felt completely overwhelming.
Peggy watched the color drain from Willow's face. Her tone softened by the smallest measurable degree, extending a precise, calculated lifeline across the desk.
"But you will not be as isolated as you think, Willow," Peggy said quietly, her blue eyes locked onto her. "Once we reach Trinity College, I will have Jemma teach you the mechanics of an Escorpial Excursion. If you have the discipline and the focus to master it, your mind will be able to travel across the globe at will. You will be able to project your sensory awareness right back into Sunnydale while your physical body is asleep in England. You will be able to stand right beside Buffy in the library, miles apart, yet completely together."
Willow’s breath hitched, her analytical brain immediately catching onto the lifeline. An Excursion. I could project myself right back home.
Buffy looked from Willow's wide eyes back to Peggy, her expression a mix of anger and sheer disbelief. "Project her awareness? Like, ghost-walking? You're talking about mind tricks while you're trying to send my best friend to the other side of the planet."
"I am talking about a highly advanced biological function that will allow her to remain connected to you while she secures her own safety," Peggy said, her posture completely steady.
Giles shook his head, his hand tightening on the back of the plastic chair. "Miss Carter, you cannot simply arrive in this town, bypass every established authority, and dictate the relocation of a young woman under our care. The Watchers' Council has explicit protocols regarding—"
"The Council is completely blind to the global arms race happening right under their noses," Peggy interrupted, her voice dropping to a low, commanding register that silenced the room. "While you are translating ancient texts, rogue factions are actively tracking these signatures to harvest them as living weapons. I have already bypassed your Council entirely to ensure Miss Summers' safety."
Giles flinched as if struck, his mouth opening to mount a defense, but the sheer weight of Peggy’s absolute certainty cut the air from his lungs. He looked at Buffy, then back to the ageless woman behind the desk, a cold dread settling deep into his chest.
Buffy stepped forward, her eyes narrowing as she picked up on the tactical shift. "What do you mean, 'ensure my safety'?"
Peggy met her gaze without a flicker of hesitation. "I've assigned you a trainer."
"A trainer?" Buffy’s voice cracked with sharp, defensive disbelief. "I don't need a trainer. I have Giles. Who do you think you are to just—"
"Who?" Willow interrupted.
The single word was small, dry, and entirely devoid of its usual teenage stutter. Willow was looking at Peggy, her analytical mind already calculating the sheer scope of the security grid being dropped over their lives.
Peggy allowed a tiny, disciplined pause to hang in the quiet office air.
"Her name is Anne Remillard," Peggy said. She allowed the name to settle before continuing, her tone smooth and entirely final. "She will be flying in tomorrow, and she is uniquely suited to help you hone your faculties, Miss Summers."
Buffy let out a sharp, incredulous breath, her eyes darting toward the closed green door and then back to the desk. "Uniquely suited? You're just dropping some random person into my life to 'hone' me?"
"She will teach you the structural discipline required to govern your own neurology," Peggy replied, her expression completely unyielding. She turned her gaze slightly toward Giles, acknowledging him with a brief, efficient nod.
"Mr. Giles will, of course, remain your Watcher. S.H.I.E.L.D. has no intention of disrupting your Slayer duties. He will continue to guide your operations here. But he cannot hide your mind from a global metapsychic dragnet. Anne Remillard can."
Giles took off his glasses, his hands shaking so violently that he nearly dropped them onto the corner of the desk. He rubbed the bridge of his nose, his voice raw. "Miss Carter, this is... it is simply too much to take in. You are asking us to dismantle an entire network of trust based on the word of an invisible agency."
Peggy stood up from her chair and moved to the front of the desk, resting her bum against the edge of the dark wood with an air of absolute, unhurried composure.
"I am not about to whisk Willow away to Oxford today, Mr. Giles," Peggy said, her tone softening to a reassuring, measured cadence. "We are not running a clandestine abduction. I will remain in Sunnydale for the next week or two to oversee every aspect of Willow's transition. Her fellowship will be finalized, her parents will have every opportunity to ask their questions, and the necessary arrangements will be completed before she ever boards a plane."
Willow raised her hand slightly, a small, tentative gesture that looked absurdly formal in the heavy silence of the room, as if she were requesting permission to visit the restroom.
"Um... my parents won't really be an issue," Willow said, her physical voice returning, though it still sounded strangely distant to her own ears. She glanced down at the green blotter on the desk.
"I've been an emancipated minor for about a year. Since I turned sixteen." She gave a small, almost apologetic shrug. "It was just... simpler. They spend most of the year travelling for research anyway, and it meant they didn't have to keep flying back because of residency paperwork or school forms."
Peggy's gaze shifted to Willow. Her expression remained unreadable, but she quietly noted the matter-of-fact way the girl dismissed her own isolation.
Buffy looked at Willow, her mouth opening slightly as a fresh wave of protective hurt mixed with the confusion already swirling in her chest. "Will... you never told me you were completely emancipated. I knew they traveled, but you're legally on your own?"
Willow gave the smallest shrug, as though she were talking about a change in class schedule instead of her own life.
"It wasn't a big thing."
"Will..."
Willow finally looked up.
Buffy looked genuinely hurt.
"You never told me."
"There wasn't really anything to tell." Willow tried to smile, but it never quite reached her eyes. "Mom and Dad were already gone most of the time. The paperwork just... caught up with reality."
Buffy crossed the room without another word.
She rested a hand on Willow's shoulder.
It wasn't dramatic. It wasn't an embrace.
It was simply there.
"You idiot," Buffy murmured. "You don't have to keep acting like you're fine all by yourself."
Willow let out a shaky laugh that sounded dangerously close to another cry.
"I'm kind of discovering that."
Giles gripped his spectacles tighter, his eyes darting from Willow to Peggy as the administrative reality of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s insertion became terrifyingly clear. If there were no parents to object, there was no legal wall left to stand behind.
She took a breath, letting her hands uncurl from her knees before turning her head to look back across the desk at the older woman.
"Since you’re staying for a couple of weeks to handle the logistics, Miss Carter," Willow said, her voice stabilizing as she slid back into her natural habit of being hospitable. "The guest room at my house is completely empty. My parents won't be back from the European circuit until the winter term. It seems silly for you to stay at a motel on the highway, and it would give us a perfect opportunity to actually get to know one another. Before the transfer."
Peggy regarded her for a long, silent beat. Her blue eyes remained entirely unblinking, tracking the subtle, earnest shift in Willow's posture, but she recognized the invitation for what it truly was: a bridge being offered by a young asset trying to find her footing in a fractured world.
"That is a remarkably practical suggestion, Willow," Peggy said, her expression softening into a genuine, disciplined smile. "Thank you. I accept."
Buffy looked between the two of them, her hand remaining firmly on Willow's shoulder. The anger hadn't left her eyes, but the defensive panic was slowly hardening into a quiet, tactical acceptance. If a shadow war was coming to Sunnydale tomorrow morning, she wasn't going to let her best friend navigate the perimeter alone.
"Great," Buffy said, her tone clipping through the remaining tension in the room. "Then we're all having dinner tonight. My house. My mom is making pot roast, and we are all going to sit down and talk about exactly how this 'neurology' training is supposed to work before anyone flies into our town."
Peggy met Willow's eyes.
The familiar clarity returned for the briefest instant. The sounds of the room softened, not disappearing this time, merely slipping into the background as the telepathic channel opened between them.
Welcome to a larger world, Willow.
Willow recognized the sensation immediately. Only minutes earlier it had been terrifying. Now it felt... familiar.
She smiled despite herself.
I'm still frightened, she admitted.
Good, Peggy replied. It means you understand the size of the journey ahead.
The connection dissolved as quietly as it had formed.
The office returned. Buffy was still watching her with open concern. Giles was still trying to reconcile decades of certainty with a single impossible afternoon. Outside, students drifted through the corridors worrying about universities, scholarships, and graduation.
Willow realized her life had divided into two parts.
Everything before she opened this door.
Everything after.