AUTHOR: 1stRabid/Rabid/Raeann
RATING: NC-17
COUPLE: Buffy/Spike
BETA BABES: Mary and Zyrya and Caia
SPOILERS: To S7 “Potential”& AtS S4 “Salvage”
WARNING: MAJOR CHARACTER
DEATH
Pain and suffering ahead, but don’t lose all hope…
SUMMARY: Well, there is this unstoppable hound and it has been called up to kill all the Slayers starting with Faith…and well…Buffy and Co. geared up for war…and won! Or did they? Things appear to be looking up…which, as you know, is always a bad sign in the Buffyverse.
DISCLAIMER: I have no rights. I’m a wild and impetuous rebel. Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, Fox TV, UPN and the WB own everything but my fancy new Windows XP operating system. That belongs to Bill Gates.
PART ELEVEN
“You think this is funny?” Dawn’s face was blotchy red and her lips curved pale lines. The strident note of hysteria in her voice raised the hair on Spike’s arms. “You’re making jokes?” She pointed a shaking finger at the bed. “I saw you…lying there…dead!”
“Good lord,” Giles exclaimed into the silence born of this pronouncement.
“You son of a…” Xander began.
Balling up his fist, he stepped into a swing but didn't get to deliver a punch. Anya seized his elbow and Spike glared at him. Both former demons spoke, almost as one, saying, “Not the time, Harris.” The verbal accord, under the circumstances, caused all three of them a moment's embarrasment. Darting and avoiding glances, they shyly ducked away from the encounter.
Only Buffy seemed unmoved. She made an impatient noise in the back of her throat as she whipped around to glare at her whey-faced sister.
“Dawn, why would you even say such a thing?”
“I saw. He was on top of you and…biting…and…there was blood.”
Closing her eyes as if sending up a silent prayer, Buffy eased a little of the irritation from her voice. “Dawn,” she said, quietly while leveling a steady look. “I’m fine. Not dead. Witness the hale and heartiness of me.”
“I know what I saw,” Dawn insisted.
“But do you know what you saw was real?” Giles said. His measured tone caught everyone off guard.
Spike recovered before the rest. “The First,” he said, nodding once. “Clouding your vision, Bit.”
“And who exactly asked you?” Xander muttered but his comment was lost in Dawn’s furious screech.
“Shut-up!” she screamed. “Don’t call me that.”
Turning the fury born of her fear on Spike, she launched across the few feet separating them, fingers curled, intent on clawing into him. The gathered Potentials and Scoobies scurried to forestall a physical escalation of the simmering hostilities. But it fell to Faith to grab Dawn as she past. Catching her around the waist, she held on tight as Dawn squirmed and ranted.
“Don’t call me that. Don’t you talk to me. Ever again! I hate you. I hate both of you.”
“Hey,” Faith exclaimed, surprised at the strength in the girl. “Ease up kiddo.”
“Why don’t you kill him?” Dawn suggested, ripping around to glower at Faith. “You’re a Slayer, too.”
“Dawn! That’s enough!” Buffy’s reprimand was a whip-crack silencing her sister. The mutter of sotto voce comments in the room ceased as well. Certain she had everyone’s attention, Buffy continued in a more moderate fashion, “Spike didn’t do anything.”
“Do we know that?” Xander asked, causing Spike to swivel his head around and lift one brow as if daring him to say more.
“Yes,” Buffy answered with deceptive sweetness. “We do know that. I know because I was here all night and I just told you, Xander…so, now you know.” The implied threat in her icy expression was unmistakable. She didn’t expect a challenge. She wanted the subject dropped.
“Buffy, this is serious,” Giles murmured.
“This is private,” Buffy countered.
Xander swallowed once but kept his shoulders back and his gaze steady as he stepped closer to the Slayer. “What I mean is maybe your mind is the cloudy one, Buff.”
“And so…what?” Buffy asked, cocking her head. “I’m really dead? I just don’t know it?”
“You were naked…”
“With Spike…”
“What are we supposed to think?”
“Andrew managed to figure it out,” Buffy returned.
“You said you would never do this,” Dawn reminded her. “You said it wasn’t love. You just felt sorry for him.”
Vulnerable in his nakedness, Spike flinched, darting a quick glance at Buffy, but he didn’t speak. He knew better than to let an enemy divide and conquer. Buffy, however, caught his tiny tells and her heart gave a little skip of concern. She sighed. This wasn’t going well. And any explanation was going to take a while. She looked down at her bed sheet toga.
“Mind if we put our clothes on?” she asked, almost conversationally. The assembled group exchanged nervous glances.
“Someone needs to stay with you,” Xander said.
“Spike will stay with me. The rest of you out.”
“Someone less evil,” Xander said, folding his arms across his chest.
“What am I, your crazy aunt?” Buffy exclaimed. Her over-stretched patience twanged. She tapped her chest. “Slayer, remember? I don’t need a babysitter.” Not one of her friends could meet her eye. “Look, Dawn had a scare. Are the rest of you delusional too? I haven’t joined the Dark Side. Willow, there’s some holy water on the dresser. You want to anoint me? See if I burn?”
“I…don’t…”
He shook his head. “There’s no need to get snide,” he said, dryly. “Xander has a point.”
“No, he doesn’t,” Buffy said, baring some teeth. “What Xander has is a prejudice.”
“Luv…” Spike’s mumbled warning did nothing to check Buffy’s mounting anger.
“That’s what you want to know, right?” She asked. “If I’m vamptastic this morning? If Spike sucked out my soul?”
“Don’t be absurd,” Giles said.
“Yeah,” Molly added, “If you was dead, one of us woulda been called, right?”
“We’re your friends, Buffy,”
Ignoring the others, Buffy stayed focused on her former Watcher. “I’m okay,” she said.
Giles cleared his throat, shuffling forward a step. He bobbed his chin toward Spike.
“But you’re…sleeping…with him.”
It wasn’t quite a question but Buffy treated it as one.
“Yes.”
“Still? Again?”
“Now.”
“It’s wrong.”
“No, it’s not.”
“You think he’s good, like Angel?”
“No.”
She didn’t specify which part of his question she was answering but Giles understood. Spike wasn’t Angel, he wouldn’t turn on them. It should have been happy news but it settled on Giles like a sack of cement, the weight of it making him look years older. He didn’t know what to say to this woman standing in front of him. He’d raised her, loved her, as a daughter. But when he wasn’t looking, somehow she’d grown beyond him.
He glanced at the remaining Potentials. What was he doing here, working without guidance, outside the rules? Had the Slayer ever truly needed a Watcher? Or was the formal arrangement of diaries and pledges a quaint panacea for humanity? Was he acting out some primitive ritualistic role? Giles shook off the greater doubt to concentrate on the problem at hand.
“I see,” He began in a deliberate attempt to maintain his air of authority. “Not like Angel? Because it’s not as serious?”
The suggestion came off as wishful thinking. Buffy responded by exchanging a rueful glance with Spike. He let his gaze go to the ceiling and snorted audibly as if to say, ‘What can you expect from this lot?’ Seeing the exchange, Giles pinched the bridge of his nose, shoving his glasses aside for a moment. He should, he reflected, be used to playing the fool by this time.
“No, of course that’s not what you meant,” he said, huffing out the painful words. “Look at you two. I can see it in your eyes.”
“I love him, Giles.”
A chorus of choking sputters greeted this announcement.
“He’s a rapist,” Dawn said.
“And a serial killer,” Xander added.
“A demon.”
“Hey, no demon-bashing.”
“A vampire, then.”
Andrew had been writing furiously. He tapped on his board holding it up for the others to read. “Maybe he’s her undead concubine.”
“He’s killed for the First,” Rona remarked.
“Who knows what he’s programmed to do next?”
“Don’t they have some kind of 12-step for vamp-sluts, B?”
“That’s it,” Spike said, causing several of the gawking bystanders to jump. He pointed a finger at Faith. “You and I are going to dance, ducks.”
“What?” Buffy squeaked.
“Any time, Blondie,” Faith smirked, rocking up onto the balls of her feet.
Breaking from the wall with a rush of pent up energy, Spike strode briskly across the room, triggering Faith's defensive instincts. But instead of taking a swing at her, he shoved between her and the foot of the bed. Puzzled, she lifted out of her fighting stance and watched him make for the bathroom door. His jeans lay in a crumpled heap on the floor there. He bent to snatch them up.
Stepping into his pants, Spike announced. “Show’s over! Buffy needs a minute. Everyone but Bit and Rupert…downstairs.”
“What?” Xander puffed. “Hang on. I don’t think…”
“Noticed that about you,” Spike said as, back to the crowd, he maneuvered his naked parts into trousers and zipped.
As soon as he was decent, Spike pivoted on his heel and raked the assemblage with a commanding eye. “Try to remember you are all guests here,” he said, with the chillingly precise diction of one born to the best ton. He indicated the hallway with a hand. “Ladies? Gentlemen? If you will…”
‘Man of the house,’ Giles thought and then hard on the heels of the thinking came the gut twisting reaction, ‘Good Lord! This can’t be happening.’
Without waiting for reply from the stunned Scoobies, Spike marched toward the broken bedroom door. He skirted around Faith, giving her and Dawn a wide berth. A Slayer's right to choose was the only concession he seemed willing to make. As he passed Xander, he seized an elbow and steered the young man along, herding the rest of the gathering ahead of them like a gaggle of geese. Stunned, Buffy and Giles watched the others depart in quick order, wedging through the door two at a time.
Waiting for the exit to clear, Spike spared a scathing glare for Andrew and his board. “Concubine?” he said. His sarcastic mutter was a slap on the wrist. Andrew had the grace to blush and quickly scrub the side of his hand over the words on his board, erasing them.
Faith alone seemed immune to Spike’s air of command. She didn’t move from her spot at the end of the bed. Hanging back to allow the crowd to navigate the doorway ahead of her, she turned to look first at Dawn before cocking her head at Buffy. “Is he for real?” she asked, indicating Spike with a jab of her right thumb.
“I don’t know,” Buffy said. “But he’s not wrong. I need a little time. Can you help him?” She made a shooing gesture.
Faith took a second to consider and then shrugged. “Yeah, sure B, if…”
“What?”
She glanced over her shoulder at Giles. “If you’re really okay?”
Buffy turned her weary gaze to Giles, appealing for his cooperation. “Go,” he told Faith. “Keep an eye on things.”
Faith studied the three of them, Dawn pale and haunted, Giles and Buffy, both grimly determined. Aware of Spike waiting for her at the door, she hesitated long enough to satisfy her Slayer senses. There was no imminent threat in the room, no monsters lurking under the bed. Despite the wild accusations being tossed around, Buffy didn’t have the whiff of evil around her. She smelled like hot sex. As far as Faith could tell, the worst thing that had happened in this room was Buffy getting a multiple orgasm while better women went without. Reassured, Faith turned on her heel and strode for the door.
“Alright, people you heard the Vamp Flavor of the Month. Let’s clear this hall.”
As the elephantine thunder of feet on the stairs faded, Giles moved to the door and tried to close it. He struggled with the damaged latch. The knob had flown off when Faith kicked the door in, and the hinges were bent. The second time the door edged open, Giles slammed it shut with an open palm and dragged a chair over to brace it closed. Once the busy work was finished, he stood looking down at the floor, lost in thought.
“Can’t you look at me?” Buffy whispered her voice husky with emotion.
“I can’t,” Dawn said, bitterly.
“You’re making too much of this.”
“Too mu—! You lied to us.”
“I know,” Buffy admitted. “I’m sorry. But I couldn’t just…I'm sorry but what Spike and I have, Dawn…it’s real.”
“No it’s not,” Dawn flared. “Why can’t you just stay away from him? He’s evil. He kills people. And you promised me you wouldn’t start up with him again. You promised.”
“I didn’t mean…I meant we wouldn’t start some nasty sex thing…like before.”
“What if he kills you? What would happen to us if…you…if…”
Dawn gulped air as her anger dissipated suddenly. Her shoulders started to shake. She glanced again at the disheveled bed. Her eyes were luminous and large silver tears slid, unnoticed, down her cheeks.
Seeing the obvious heartbreak, Buffy’s heart melted. She didn’t want to see Dawn suffer. She didn’t even understand what had happened. The last thing Buffy remembered was falling asleep, cradled in Spike’s arms. She woke to Dawn’s scream of terror. Springing out of bed, she’d only had a second or two to check on her sister, to see she was unharmed, before the hall door was kicked in. The immediate threat to Spike, Faith’s stake heading for his heart, had taken precedence over consoling the obviously uninjured Dawn. With the rush of adrenaline over, Buffy’s gentler nature reasserted itself. She stepped close to her sister and reached out a hand.
“You saw something, Dawn but it wasn’t what you think.”
Dawn backpedaled away from any consolation. She didn’t want sympathy. She wanted answers. The memory of her mother’s warning rang clear in her head. And the meaning seemed obvious to her now: Buffy would side with Spike against her…against all of them. Moving in a semi-circle, eyes never leaving her sister, Dawn backed across the room.
She came up hard against Giles and he dropped a comforting arm around her shoulders. Protective, Buffy thought, like a father. Seeing the two people she considered her only family ranked against her, Buffy sighed in defeat. She let her arm drop to her side and tilted her head, targeting Giles with an imploring look.
“I’m still me, Giles.”
Her Watcher’s expression was nearly identical to Dawn’s, mistrusting and stubborn. But he cleared his throat and stood a little straighter, as if willing his upper lip into stiffness.
Glancing down at Dawn, he asked, “Might you have seen…something…else…possibly misunderstood…?” Dawn shook her head. Her glassy eyes were fixed on the bed, again. Giles hesitated gathering his thoughts and then addressed his next question to Buffy. “He didn’t harm you? Not even consensually?”
Buffy couldn’t believe what she was hearing. She puffed up like a territorial lizard.
“I’m sorry, Buffy, but I have to ask.”
“No! No, you don’t. You don’t have to ask me if I like rough sex with dead things, Giles. That never has to come up.”
“You wouldn’t be the first Slayer to succumb to that particular fetish.”
“Fetish? This isn’t Lady Heather’s Domain.”
“I didn’t mean to imply…”
“Why not?” Dawn countered, her eyes flashing with tears and anger. She tore free of Giles’ grip and surged toward her sister. “Why not say it? Everybody knows it’s true. You like it when he hurts you, don’t you Buffy?”
“You’re wrong.”
“Am I?”
“Yes. Spike was right. What you saw was the First. It’s trying to come between us. But just for the sake of argument…if I did like pain…so what? I’m an adult. This is my house. What I do in the privacy of my own bedroom is none of your business.”
“It’s my house too,” Dawn declared. “But you keep forgetting that!”
“And if your pet vampire is a danger to those girls,” Giles said, pointing after the departed Potentials. “If your clouded judgment is a threat to our survival…that is my business.”
“You don’t think they’re safe here?” Buffy couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “Giles, how could you possibly think I’d let anything happen to…” She switched gears as the full impact of his words hit her. “No! You know what? Maybe you should take the Power Puffs somewhere else. If you don’t feel safe in my home…if you think I’m a threat, maybe you and Faith could just…”
Buffy felt tears prick her eyelids. She dashed them away with an impatient hand but her tirade faltered. A wave of exhaustion crested over her. Last night’s marathon sexcapade, the last few weeks of doubt, the death of all those little girls, finally caught up with her. She sank to the edge of the bed and drew her sheet-sarong in tight to her chest, one hand crumpling the fabric. Giles and Dawn simply stared at her, waiting for her reassurance. Buffy combed a hand through her hair and fought for composure.
“Look,” she began, sucking up the pain of betrayal, trying to see the other side of things. “He’s changed. We both have. Spike wouldn’t hurt me, now, even if I wanted him to.”
Dawn made a rude noise. “He killed people, Buffy. Like…last week! Remember?”
“I remember,” Buffy said. “But he didn’t kill me. Or you. Or Xander.”
“And that makes it all okay?” Giles remarked, arching a condescending brow.
“That’s not what I meant,” Buffy huffed. “I just meant…Spike cares about us. He wasn’t faking it. I needed him to change and when I showed him that…”
Giles straightened, his eyes glittering behind his glasses as he acknowledged it. “He got a soul.”
“Yes! And how…amazing is that?” Buffy held his gaze, willing him to understand, even as she addressed her sister. “Do you remember how many times he saved you, Dawn? How he took care of you while I was…gone?”
“He used me. Pretended to care so he could get close to you.”
“He wasn’t pretending,” Buffy insisted, coming off the bed with a surge of frustration. “That doesn’t even make sense. I was dead.” At the word, Dawn’s gaze flickered to the twisted blanket at the foot of the bed and Buffy tried another tack. “I don’t understand why you hate him so much.”
“Because you don’t hate him at all,” Dawn said, eyes darting to meet her sister’s. “You don’t. You learned to hate Angel when he was evil. But Spike…” She used one hand to wipe away any excuse Buffy might offer. “He keeps dragging you down to his level. He makes you a monster and you just don’t see it.”
Buffy shook her head. How could she explain? Spike didn’t make her a monster. She was one already. That was the giant elephant in the house of Slayerdom. Nobody wanted to see it, but Slayers weren’t like other people. Buffy had finally accepted her fate. She didn’t want to pretend anymore. She was tired of playing the good little girl for her friends.
Spike had traveled a road with her, through pain and pleasure. They had hurt each other. But they had also grown, learned and held onto the good. There was a chance now. A chance they could build a new life, have something wonderful.
“What will it take to convince you?”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“There’s nothing you can say,” Xander said, holding up a hand, to forestall Spike’s next comment.
He had taken the inquisitor role in the little drama
downstairs. The Potentials,
Jury, judge and executioner, Spike thought wryly. Fed up with playing the gentleman, he tossed both hands in the air and growled, “What is wrong with you people?”
“Nothing a little vampire slaying couldn’t fix,” Faith remarked from her vantage point on a chair arm.
“You don’t want to tangle with me, Charity,” Spike returned, leveling a glare at her.
“Don’t kid yourself, Sparky,” Faith said, calmly. “I’m just working out if you’re worth another knife in the gut.”
“So that’s it then?” he said, turning back to Xander. “Made up your mind about me? Time to get on with the ritual castration?”
“I was thinking stake,” Xander said.
“Hey, if he wants to linger…” Rona shrugged.
Spike swept them with a bitter look. “Buffy has saved all of you, risked her life,” he accused before turning to Xander. “And she loves you.”
“Okay,” Xander admitted, grudgingly, folding his arms across his chest. “There’s something you can say.”
“You’re her soddin’ family. And I’m her…” He searched for the right word. “…partner. So you and I have to find a way to get along.”
Xander shook his head regretfully. “I don’t want to disagree with the sociopath but based on long-standing Harris family traditions going back to the feud of the 1963 Hamilton Beach Mix-o-Matic, I’d say you got that wrong, Focker.”
Spike took a step back. “Fine,” he hissed. “Jus’ hit me then.”
“And I see we’re still working on that pesky schizophrenia.”
“No hitting,”
Distressed by the need to play mediator, Faith rolled her
head so her hair swished across her shoulders and groaned out a protest but she
got up and tried to intervene, pushing between the men. Spike sidled around her to prod Xander in the chest.
Xander slapped his hand away. Faith glanced at
“Sit down, both of you,” she ordered.
“He started it,” Xander said, every inch the sulky six year old.
“Let’s finish it,” Spike goaded, circling Faith to confront Xander again. “You hate the sight o’ me. Get it out of your system.”
“How does B put up with you?” Faith snarled. “Either of you? I’ve known lifers with better people skills.”
“From the
“And if your right hand offends,” Amanda quoted. Her whisper carried to the enrapt Molly who turned and frowned at her in confusion.
“Another time and place maybe I’d be flattered by your pun-and-tussle offer, Slayer. But right now we got more trouble than we can handle coming down the pipe and this little set-to has been brewing between me and Xander for four or five years, now. So? You want to give me a little room to maneuver?”
Faith had her fist cocked back. Her smoldering gaze never wavered as Spike addressed her. ‘Again with the tight-ass butler routine,’ she thought and then, as suddenly as she’d gone on the defensive, she relaxed into insouciance. Her fisted fingers uncurled, hand reaching into her jacket pocket. She drew out a pack of cigarettes, pulled a smoke from the pack and proceeded to light up. A couple of puffs surrounded her with a blue haze, softening her steely expression. She watched Spike through the miasma for a beat before recapping her lighter with a flourish. As she holstered the lighter, she took another slow drag on the cigarette, holding the inhale for a few seconds before letting it out on a long sigh.
“Besides the obvious asshole part,” she asked, tossing the
question over her shoulder at Xander and
“Vampire?” Xander suggested.
“Bollocks!”
“Kinda how B’s tastes run though isn’t it? Thought you’d be used to it by now.”
“Then there’s this soul of his,”
“’Cause the soul-having worked out so well for us before,” Xander sniped as he dabbed at his face with a tissue provided by Vi.
“He’s been helping us train,” One of the nameless Potentials mentioned. “And fight.”
“True, luvie,” Spike said, flashing the pixie-faced girl a grin. “But that’s just so I can murder you in your beds some night when your guard’s down, right Xander? By the way, how's your nose? Yeah," he purred as Willow's shocked doubletake showed she'd caught on, "the soddin’ chip obviously doesn’t work and probably never did.”
“What do you mean, ‘probably never did’? Okay so it stopped working but that chip was all
that kept you from killing me that time,”
“Maybe I didn’t want to kill you, Sabrina. Maybe I just thought I did…being a monster and all. Or maybe the chip worked at first. I don’t know. But it definitely stopped working last year. And nothing else those Initiative gits did held up for long, right?”
“Wait a minute," Xander objected. "You just decided to go good?”
“Matter of fact I did, at one point. But I might have decided subconsciously even earlier than that. Dru said the chip pain was ‘all in my head.’”
“Oh, Dru said,” Xander exclaimed. “There’s a reliable source, the undead Jon Edwards.”
“Drusilla, was a headcase, won’t argue it. But for all her rambling, she knew things. Sometimes you had to suss out the deeper meaning from all the daisy chains and calla lilies. But after this last killing spree, my guess is she got the chip figured dead to rights.”
“Your chip pain was psychosomatic?”
Spike shrugged. “I love Buffy. Can’t have her and go on killing, right? Way I figure it I found a way to get close, one I could swallow and still call myself evil.”
“You expect us to believe…”
“No, Harris, I expect you to go on loathing me. But at least get it out in the open: tell me what’s really eating you.”
“What’s eating me?” Xander pretended to consider. “Oh, let’s see. Not you. Not yet. But…alright…okay! Let’s talk about the last time Buffy was ‘in love’ with a vampire. We trusted Angel when he was ‘Buffy’s right hand’ and he helped us out. All the way up to that time he booked us on a one-way trip to Deadsville.”
“Now, we’re getting somewhere,” Spike encouraged. “What else?”
“There’s an evil brewing ‘beneath’ us. And it’s bigger than any boogata we’ve ever faced and oh…here’s something interesting…it’s using you, Spike, to slice and dice the population.”
“But it tried to kill him. Doesn’t that mean he’s on our side?” Amanda asked.
“You think it will use me again?”
“Correction, I know it’s using you now. Scaring the stuffing out of Dawn, boffing Buffy for the home team. You keep her under your watchful eye, don’t you? And she just happens to be the key to our staying alive. But what…me worry?”
“You think I’d hurt Buffy?”
“I think you already have.”
“Right and even after that, with me out of the picture and Angel off to L.A., she didn’t spare you a second look. She’s giving it up for the undead and she never even noticed you.” Spike tapped his chin. “Go on then. One solid punch. Do it for the self-righteous wankers.”
“You really are delusional.”
“Here you are standing by all loyal and true and I’m the one gets the girl. Must sting.”
“Hey,” Anya protested. “Xander and I are engaged again. He no longer masturbates while fantasizing about Slayers. He has moved on to Beach Volleyball players. Women,” she added, noting Andrew’s renewed interest.
“Damn! I knew I should have traded my body for that Sunnydale Times subscription,” Faith said with a smirk. After slinking gleefully to the side of the room, she lazed against the entryway. “I’m behind on all the local news.”
Molly muttered, “This is better than
As her fellow Potentials tittered, Xander shifted in his seat to glare at his fiancée. “Again, with the too much information, An.”
“You don’t want to be me?” Spike asked, seeking confirmation.
Xander stood up, addressing Spike
seriously for the first time. “I don’t want to be you. First, vampire, ergo dead! Second, I don’t
even know you. Some demon stole your
body…now your back in it? Isn’t that
what everyone says? The soul is gone…the
person is gone…some monster is wearing a familiar face?” He got a number of
head bobs from the girls on the sofa. “And we’ve all seen that first hand. Over and over again at Hellmouth High.” He ticked off the names of the
fallen on the fingers of one hand. “With Angel…with my best friend, Jesse…with
Harmony and…okay…not so much with Harmony.
Point is: you can’t be the person you were before you toddled off to
“Let me get this straight: if vampires could love people…which according to you we can’t…I can’t love Buffy because that would mean…?”
“There’s hope for anybody?”
“No,” he said. “It would mean everything Giles told us about vampires and Slayers, everything the Watcher’s Council teaches, is a pack of lies.”
“I don’t have a problem with that,” Spike said.
“It would mean we were killing people we might have been able to save…”
“People have to save themselves,” Faith said. She felt a warm flush mount her cheeks when Spike favored her with a beatific smile.
“Truer words never spoken, pet,” he purred.
“All I know,” Xander insisted, stubbornly, “…is…when you break-up with Buffy and start breaking her and us…I’m the one who’s going to stop you. Just like I stopped Angelus.”
“Funny…not how I remember it.”
“You don’t have all the facts. Trust me when I say, I won’t let you hurt her.”
“I would never…” Spike caught himself in the middle of the denial and amended, “I only hurt her…once.”
“And why don’t I believe you?” Xander remarked.
“Prejudice?” Spike suggested, snidely.
Just as
“What?” Xander yelped.
“There was give and take,” Spike acknowledged with a dip of his chin. “Not proud of it…but…” To Faith’s surprise he glanced at her for confirmation. “Angry Slayer’s got needs.”
“Xander got a test ride in exchange for his cherry,” Faith grunted, as she leaned over to put her cigarette out on the rim of a decorative candleholder.
A dozen pairs of curious eyes focused on Xander. Anya was surprisingly quiet, waiting. But Xander didn’t rise to the baited remark. Instead, his pensive gaze went from Faith to Spike. After a brief contemplation, his glance slid toward the staircase, his eyes trailing up as if he might see through the ceiling to Buffy. She and Faith were almost opposites. Faith was the evil Slayer, everyone accepted that. Buffy was responsible and heroic.
But despite his loyalty, his need to protect his friend, Xander couldn’t deny Buffy had a power he didn’t completely comprehend. There was a well of darkness in her. It made her the Slayer, gave her the courage to stare down monsters. But what if it went further than that? What if Buffy shared the same lust for blood and pain Faith had shown him in their brief sexual encounter? Xander had first hand knowledge of the way Faith used people. Buffy had used Spike. How much scarier did that make her?
“Someone has to hold the line for humanity,” Xander said.
For the first time, Spike felt he truly understood, Xander Harris and the self-imposed burden he'd carried all these years. A pang of sympathy made him rest a hand on the man's shoulder as he said, “It doesn't have to be you."
“Yeah, that's kinda my job, sport,” Faith agreed.
Before anyone could marshal a response or another argument, a tangle of raised voices at the top of the stairs broke the moment’s peace. Buffy barked a command. Giles recommended temperance in a ringing tone. The bathroom door slammed. The crash was immediately followed by the sound of running footsteps. A chair scraped down the bedroom door and hit the floor with a bang.
“You just don’t care what happens to anyone,” Dawn declared as she thudded down to the foyer, her backpack swinging against her legs.
Buffy was close on her heels. “That’s not true, Dawn. Listen to me.”
“I have,” Dawn said, spinning around as she reached the door. “I’ve heard all your excuses. And I’ve heard it all before. Remember what you said about this? How many times, Buffy? How many times did you tell me not to worry, your dark period was over? And now you expect me to believe it was all normal.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Right,” Dawn’s voice dripped with sarcasm. “This time you’re in love. With him?” She pointed at Spike. “The crazy freak that tried to rape you and killed all those people?”
“That’s enough, Dawn.”
“Tell your friends ‘you’re like him.’” Dawn challenged, twisting away from Buffy’s attempt to reassure her with a touch. “You want to be a monster. Fine! That’s what you are. Do what you want. You always do. But don’t expect me to stay here and watch!”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Robin Wood stopped his car a block from the Summers’ house. He stared ahead, his knuckles cracking as they tightened on the steering wheel. Wrestling with his desire to lash out at the cause of his humiliation, he bowed his head as if in prayer. Ethan was right about one thing, now was not the time for unfocused rage. The final solution was only a few days away. Every move they made, from this point forward, needed to be calculated. When he was sure he was back in control, he abandoned the car and approached the Slayer’s last stronghold on foot.
He didn’t have a precise plan.
Ethan hadn’t given him much to go on, saying only, “You’ll be needed there, soon.”
“Needed?”
“To advise. To comfort. Go and…watch.”
With that scant encouragement, he’d come to the home of his enemies, ready to take advantage of any break in the defenses but still uncertain of his role in the overall scheme. He adjusted his tie as he climbed the front stoop.
On the other side of the closed front door, Dawn yelled, “Don’t expect me to stay here and watch!”
The door swung inward suddenly in the wake of her remark and she barreled out it. Robin jumped to one side to avoid Dawn’s forward rush as she charged down the porch steps. He pressed into the newel post and she swerved, just enough to keep from bowling him over, but otherwise gave no indication she’d noticed him.
“Whoa! Hey, Miss Firecracker!” He yelped, taking a sharp clip on the shins from her flailing backpack. He rubbed the sore spot as he advised, “Slow up there.”
Dawn was half-way to the street by the time he finished checking his injury. She kept on walking, shoulders defiantly set, as a score of Potential Slayers spilled out of the house to watch her retreat. Clearing the front lawn, she turned down the street. She was nearly out of sight before Buffy, hurrying after her, reached the curb. Dawn’s dark hair flagged out behind her as she stomped along. Buffy followed as far as the public sidewalk before giving up the pursuit. Tugging at the trailing end of her sarong-like garment, reeling it up into her hand, she stared after her sister with a mixture of apprehension and frustration in her eyes.
When she turned back toward the house, her troubled gaze fell on Robin Wood as he came down the walk to join her. “What are you doing here?” she asked, obviously exasperated.
“Right at this moment: admiring your fashion statement.”
After a quick glance down at her bed sheet toga, Buffy let her head fall back in an exaggerated plea to the relentless fates. Head tilted, eyes squeezed closed, she addressed, Wood, saying, “And now, so very glad you aren’t really my boss.”
“This would definitely be a black mark on your evaluation,” he teased, prompting Buffy to meet his eye and even offer him a sheepish grin. “Catch you at a bad time?”
“We don’t get too many good times around here.”
“Anything I can do?”
“No,” Buffy said, with quick impatience. Then she considered him anew, adjusting her expression. “Or yes.” She waved a hand after her departed sister. “Could you keep on eye on her?”
Wood doubted he’d heard correctly. He stared with wide-eyed wonder. “You want me to follow your sister?”
“Just…watch! Make sure she stays out of trouble.” Buffy smiled sweetly at him. “If you would?”
“Where was she headed?”
“The school? Maybe her friend, Janice’s. I know it’s a lot to ask.”
“No, not at all,” Wood said, waving away her apologetic tone. “It’s what I do.” He gave a self-effacing shrug as he clarified, “Watcher.”
Buffy acknowledged his point with a graceful tip of her head. Without another word, she stepped aside so Wood could pass and he dutifully set off after Dawn. He broke into a trot, thinking she’d covered some ground. But he found her quite easily, once he turned the corner at the end of the street. She was perched on a low stone wall a few blocks away. The wall was wet with dew but she didn’t seem to notice. She was staring into the middle distance, her heels drumming against the wall. Her head was pillowed on the backpack in her arms. Hearing him approach, she glanced up and then stood, bracing for a verbal battle.
“I’m not going back there,” she said.
“I don’t have an opinion on that,” he said, moving beyond her and taking a seat on the wall. “But just out of curiosity: where are you going?” When she didn’t answer he said, “School’s closed. There was an announcement on the late news.”
“Oh,” Dawn mumbled, looking up the street. “I guess I didn’t see the news.”
They sat in companionable silence for a time. Finally, Wood asked, “You running away?”
“No, I just,” She broke off, confused about her
motives. A cold hollow had opened up in
her stomach. “I need…a place…to think.”
She touched her backpack, flat palm finding the edge of the laptop inside. Maybe
The principal assumed an air of understanding. “About your sister?”
“I don’t want to talk about it,” Dawn said, with ready suspicion.
“I know she’s taken up with the vampire again.”
“He’s got a soul,” Dawn countered, loyally.
She didn’t want to discuss her family troubles with a stranger. Buffy was her sister. They might disagree but that didn’t mean Dawn wouldn’t defend her. Unfortunately, she couldn’t quite lose the note of resentment in her voice.
“You don’t believe his soul matters,” Wood said, recognizing her dilemma. “And neither do I.” He studied her steadily for a moment, his dark eyes penetrating. Very softly, he asked, “I wonder…can I trust you?”
“Trust me?”
“With the truth.”
“I should get back,” Dawn said, glancing over her shoulder. Wood made no attempt to stop her as she turned and walked away. She halted after only one or two steps. Looking back at him, she asked, “What truth?”
“Your sister died,” he said, matter-of-factly.
The strap on Dawn’s backpack slid through her nerveless fingers as she processed this revelation. “Nobody knows about that,” she gasped on a slight breath.
“I know,” Wood said his manner paternal. “She died and she came back wrong.” Dawn squeaked a soft protest, prompting him to hold up a forestalling palm and correct himself. “Or rather…to be more precise…something wrong came back with her.”
“We killed it.”
“You severed a limb. The whole is so much more than you can imagine.”
“The whole what?” Dawn whispered, easing closer to him after checking over her shoulder for listeners.
“They’ve been calling it…the First.”
“Evil,” Dawn breathed.
“Yes, a very old evil,” Wood said. In a measured, matter-of-fact tone, he delivered the complete truth. “From beneath you it devours. From inside your sister. Beneath her…within her…behind her every move. It’s making her do things.” He saw Dawn’s reluctance to believe and took a chance. “Like trust the wrong people…and lie to you.”
The spark in Dawn’s eyes let him know he’d guessed correctly.
“Can we stop it?”
“That’s why I’m here,” Wood said. “Why the Watcher’s Council sent me.”
“What about Giles?”
“He was too close to the problem.”
“Because he trusts Buffy?”
“Yes.”
“But you don’t?”
“I know she’s not herself.”
“What can we do?”
“We have to watch and wait. The evil will move soon. We need to be ready if we are to have any hope of saving your sister. Will you help me?”
Dawn hefted her backpack onto the wall. “I might have a way
to find out more,” she said, unzipping the tote. “Andrew and I think we can contact
“Indeed?”
“
“I had no idea you were so resourceful,” Wood said, silkily. “You can be sure I would have talked to you much sooner, if I’d known.”
Dawn glowed with pride at the compliment. “I’m research girl. I just need a quiet place to do the spell.”
“And I know just the spot,” Wood said, hopping off the wall.
END THIS PART