Here's a little guide to help you keep things straight:

Amun - Patron of the pharaohs. King of the Gods of Egypt.
Anubis - The jackal-headed god. Anubis can foresee a mortal's destiny. Associated with magic and divination.
Atum - First of the Egyptian Gods. Self-created.
Bastet - Cat-headed goddess. Goddess of joy, music and dancing.
Hathor - Goddess of beauty, love and marriage. Also associated with fertility.
Horus - Falcon-headed god. Son of Isis that avenged Horus' (his father) death by banishing Set. Is depicted as the sky god continually fighting the darkness.
Isis - Goddess of Love and Magic. Thought of as a protectoress. Associated with red and serpents.
Maat - Goddess of truth and justice. Is often depicted with an ankh and/or feather.
Min - God of fertility and sexual potency.
Nun - God of primal waters.
Osisris - God of the dead and the Nile.
Ptah - The fount of all creation.
Ra - God of the sun. Creator of man. Depicted wearing a crown with a symbolic sun on it.
Sekhmut - Goddess of war and battles.
Set - God of evil and destruction. Associated with thunder and storms as well as the color red.
Thoth - God of wisdom, music, magic, medicine, astronomy, geometry, surveying, art and writing. Historian, scribe and judge.
Ankh - the ancient Egyptian amulet of life.

Spike awoke slowly, his head throbbing intensely. He carefully opened his eyes blinking them a few times to clear them.

Spike surveyed his surroundings. He was in a splendidly ornate room. Jewels and precious metals reflected the fire light from huge torches. Around him on the floor laid the Slayer, Watcher and their little friends, but Raksha could not be found. His eyes darted around the room searchingly for his lover desperately.

There... Raksha stood, shackled heavily, before an array of beings dressed richly in ancient garments. The beings were sitting in large jeweled chairs. Off to the side stood several people. Some were dressed like the seated creatures but much more plainly; others were dressed in clothing Spike had seen in his day. Spike glanced at them quickly but centered his attention to Raksha and those before her.

Spike got up off the ground and slipped over to where Raksha was standing. This brought him to the attention of the beings. "Ah," boomed one being, whose crown seemed like it had a large sun perched on top of it. "They are awaking. We can now proceed." The being's voice was indeed like the symbol he bore -- powerful but with an underlying warmth to it.

"Yes," agreed a neutral voice. A woman stepped forward carrying an ankh and a feather. "Bring the others forward," she commanded a group of guards.

The guards rushed to do her bidding. They dragged forward the newly awakened Slayer and her group. "Hey," Buffy yelled. She was appalled by the way the guards seemed to single her out. It was as if they knew the others would follow her. They were placed at Raksha's side, by Spike.

"Who among us will speak for this demon?" asked the woman with the ankh. She gestured toward Raksha.

"We will, Maat," a woman said as she stepped forward. Behind her stood a group of beings that had separated themselves form the others.

"Very well," the being named Maat said haughtily eyeing those in the group. "You will have until the torches burn past the hour mark." With that she turned and left Raksha, the group of beings and those who had been transported with Raksha to the place.

The woman who had said that she was for Raksha stepped towards her. "What have you gotten yourself into this time?" she asked her with a sigh.

"Nothing I regret, mistress," Raksha answered in a respectful tone.

The woman glanced over to where Buffy and Angel stood with their arms wrapped around each other. "No, I don't suppose you do," the woman said amusingly. Suddenly the female became serious. "But you've committed a great transgression. You have played with power that was not yours. You have played the part of a god."

"Dark Mother, no disrespect intended," Raksha began. "But you are the ones who made me god like. I can't die but by a god's hand and then it is difficult. I have hardly any weaknesses. You give me the power and then punish me for using it."

The woman smiled. "True." She glanced at the people who stood with Raksha. All of them wore confused expressions on their faces. "Perhaps you should explain what's happening to your friends."

Raksha turned and looked at those who had been brought with her to speak in her defense. The beings stepped away from her. "Hey," Raksha greeted them softly. "Let's go over there." She motioned with her bound hands to a corner in the room with some chairs. The group followed her over.

Spike and the others the others from the Hellmouth sat down in the chairs. Capturing Raksha around the waist, Spike pulled her down on to his lap. Raksha tensed and started to pull away. But Spike held her firmly. After a few seconds of ineffective struggling, Raksha relaxed and leaned back against Spike. There was nothing she could really do against him chained as she was. She might as well allow herself the small pleasure of being pressed against Spike's body, despite the circumstances.

Raksha sighed. "I'm sorry that you all are here," Raksha began. "When they condemned me this time, I thought it was only going to be me... That I was going to die. My soul went into the ether. Anubis began weighing my crimes against my good deeds to see if I would be allowed into... Nirvana, I guess you could call it. But some of the gods, namely the one I serve - Isis, started demanding that I have a fair trail." Raksha grinned at that. "I'm the only one ever to be at one of these trails twice. Of course, I am the oldest of their followers. You all were transported here, along with my body, to speak in my favor."

"All of that happened in what?" Cordelia asked. "A minute?"

"Time moves faster in this plane than ours," Raksha answered.

"What exactly will this trial consist of?" Giles asked.

"The gods that will speak for me will be on one side and those against me will be on the other," Raksha answered. "The goddess of truth and justice, Maat, and Amun, king of the gods will preside over the trial. I won't be allowed to speak in my defense. Only you all will. The ones against you will question you... They will put you through the greatest emotional torment you have ever faced." Raksha looked down, refusing to meet the eyes of those present. "You see those people over there?" Raksha pointed to the group of *humans* Spike had saw when he had first regained consciousness. "They are souls of people who are dead. Among them are people I've killed. People Spike has killed. People who Angelus has killed. People who Buffy and Mr. Giles have failed to save. People all of us have hurt. Osisris, god of the dead, is on our side but those against us still have the power to manipulate them to some extent."

"What gods are on our side and which ones are on the other side?" Oz asked.

"Those on our side are the goddess Isis, the goddess of love and magic. The ultimate woman, wife and mother. The protectoress. The healer...."

"Why are there so many things that she is?" Willow interrupted.

"The gods were different things during different times and different areas. Our religion was never set in stone. I was born in one of the first dynasties of our empire so I have a lot of different perspectives," Raksha answered. "The there's her *husband* Osisris -- he's the god of the dead like I told you -- and her son Horus, the god of goodness and light -- The Sky God. Then there's Hathor, the goddess of beauty and love. Bastet the goddess of joy and happiness is one of our advocates. Then there's Anubis, god of divinity. He determines your fate in the afterlife. Then surprisingly, there's Thoth. Thoth is the god of wisdom among many other things. He hates my existence. He ordered to have me killed at the first one of these things."

"People change," Angel said. Raksha looked at him in surprise. She expected him to still be a bit muddled but he seemed fine. Perhaps it was the divine atmosphere. "You've done a lot of great things. You've helped millions of people in your life."

Raksha smiled. It was very kind of him to say something like that given the circumstances. "Yes," Raksha agreed. "But how many people have I caused their deaths? Spike's, the people Spike has killed because of my inability to slay him, other people who I could have saved but was too busy wrapped up in myself to notice. My gods made me like them. They'll expect me to be like them. But I'm not. I have human feelings and emotional human weaknesses."

Nobody knew what to say to that. They all knew that Raksha could indeed be right. She could die.

Finally, after a few minutes, Giles cleared his throat. "So which gods are the ones that are against us?"

"There's Atum," Raksha answered, "first of the gods. There is also Min the god of sexuality and Nun the god of primal waters. Then there is Ra, the sun god, and Ptah the god of creativity. There is also Sekhmut, goddess of war. Then, of course, there is Set. He will be my main persecutor."

"Do we actually have a chance in Hell of winning this thing?" Spike asked.

Raksha shrugged. "I don't know. It can go either way. I have some very influential gods speaking for me but some of the strongest are against me."

Spike tightened his arms around her. He had just rediscovered her. There was no way he was going to willingly lose her again.

The goddess that Raksha had identified as Isis came over to Raksha and the others. She smiled slightly at Raksha. "It's almost time. This will be very hard for all of you."

"Mistress?" Raksha asked. "Can I speak to you? Alone? For a minute."

Isis nodded and started to walk away. "Come. We shall talk."

Raksha propelled herself off of Spike's lap and followed the goddess.