***************************************

Part 3: Tell-Tale Heart

The kitchen table is littered with the remnants of breakfast, but Dawn merely pushes a spoon around aimlessly in what threatens to become Frosted Sludge.

“Are you feeling all right?” Buffy asks. “You haven’t been eating much.”

Dawn shrugs, tries for nonchalance. “Maybe it’s a bug.” She can’t keep much down these days; she feels weird all the time now, like she’s seasick.

Buffy looks concerned and Dawn panics – what if Buffy keeps her home from school? She can’t stay home; she has to go. Has to.

Time for a diversionary tactic. “You don’t seem so hot yourself,” she replies. “Like you haven’t been sleeping.”

More of a fact than a guess on Dawn’s part; her sister’s eyes are shadowed by dark circles, and Dawn has heard Buffy stirring during her own sleepless nights.

Buffy smiles wanly. “Must be nervous about the job. Don’t want to…” she falters. “Screw up a good thing, you know?”

They do not meet each other’s eyes for the rest of the meal.

***************************************

“You look good,” Dawn observes, and it’s true. Spike’s face has lost some of its gauntness; her regular bequests of blood are beginning to show. Out of deference to her and her desires, his skin is scrubbed ruthlessly clean. But she cannot read his eyes; they are dim and opaque and reveal nothing of the trauma she senses churning within him. She wonders if he feels as desolate as she does.

They are quiet for a while. She knows he is afraid he will displease her by speaking. She told him as much, when this…thing first started, but now she burns to hear his voice – his voice, not the hoarse mutterings of the wraith that has replaced him.

It has been two days since she’s discovered she is the capital-K Key; two days since she’s faced the fearful, too-knowing gazes of her family; two days since she’s sliced up her arms in an effort to determine what, exactly, she is made of. And tonight Spike, her partner in crime and revelation, is standing outside the house, chucking rocks at her window with rather alarming force as he shifts impatiently from foot to foot.

“Oi! Smallness!”

She pokes her head out, casting a nervous look behind her before again assuming the sullen expression she’s worn lately. “What?”

“Come down here. Want to talk to you.”

A few minutes later she stands before him, all bratty teenage posturing to hide the queer hollowness she carries with her now. He stares at her for long moments, until she becomes self-conscious.

“Well? Let’s see what you’ve done to yourself.”

She pretends not to know what he means, but his eyes – jeez, they are so blue! – seem to bore into hers. She is briefly distracted from the contemplation of her own deadly design.

“Show. Me.” His tone is hard and implacable.

Sighing, she looks away from him into the neighbor’s yard as she yanks up her sleeves one by one, revealing her slashed forearms.

Taking her hands in his, he silently inspects the cuts. In a fit of pique earlier she tore the bandages off, and now dried rivulets of blood trail from the uneven gashes. His lips purse as he studies her.

“Made quite the mess, haven’t you?” he asks, and she scowls at him. He scowls back, and jerks her wrists so that she’s tugged unwillingly forward.

“Look at me,” he orders. She lifts resentful eyes to his.

“So you’re the Key. Good on you.” She frowns in confusion.

“All of them –“ he nods toward the house – “they think this is some Greek tragedy. They’ll bitch and moan and wring their hands, and by the end of all this likely try to hide you in the nearest bulrushes. But all that’s bollocks.

“You’re an unknown variable, pet, and that makes them afraid. But it can make you powerful. You think this is what you are? Who you are?” He gives her damaged arms a shake. “There’s no telling what you’re capable of, given the right…circumstances.” He quirks a single eyebrow at her.

Dawn is entranced. The cadence of his language enthralls her; she falls a little more under his spell with each word. He doesn’t talk down to her like Buffy does, doesn’t pity her like everyone else.

“But I’m…”

He waits. When she doesn’t finish, he gives her a little half-smile that makes her stomach flip.

“You’re something special. Nothing to be ashamed of, that. Don’t let them tell you any different – they don’t understand. They’re normal. Ordinary.”

“Nuh-uh.” She shakes her head with the certainty of adolescence. “Buffy’s –"

“The Slayer,” he snorts. “Pit bull for the Powers.” But Dawn notices those beautiful blue eyes spark. “Plus two half-time witches and a chit who gave up the demon gig right quick if you ask me. Harris?” Spike makes a point of shuddering. “The less said the better. And every one of them whinging about their lot in life.”

Even in her newly enraptured state Dawn knows this to be false, and can hear the deep vein of bitterness beneath his swagger. But it’s easy to ignore with his hands holding hers – how can she feel warm when he’s so cold?

One black-tipped finger tilts her chin up. “You’re something special,” he repeats. A second later he’s gone, leaving her with the lingering traces of cigarette smoke and the beginnings of infatuation.

Everything is different now, filtered through the knowledge that Spike would do anything, anything to have Buffy. Spike, standing on the tower opposite that old man – “I made a promise to a lady.” To Buffy. Spike, arms folded and jaw clenched tight as he paces across the floor of the Sunnydale Memorial emergency room. An angry, hissing argument between he and Buffy, his eyes constantly drifting to where Dawn winces and fidgets while her arm is casted. Spike, slumped in his chair in the crypt, hardly bothering to explain himself as Dawn hovers in the doorway, trying to understand his betrayal. Spike, a solid, unwavering presence beside her as demons destroy Sunnydale – but Buffy was dead then, Dawn thinks, and he didn’t know she was coming back.

“Did you ever care about me?” she whispers now.

He starts to laugh. It’s an awful, hopeless sound and she has to fight not to cover her ears. He laughs and laughs and laughs, spiraling out of control into hysteria. Dawn feels the prick of tears.

“You asshole,” she hisses. She hurriedly gathers her things, tosses them into her backpack. “Buffy should have dusted you years ago.”

He just keeps laughing, but his head is in his hands now and he’s rocking back and forth. She nearly hesitates at the cobwebby doorway – he looks so desperate. But then knowledge punctures her heart like a syringe full of adrenaline: he is laughing at her.

She doesn’t stop running until she’s out of the basement.

***************************************

Dawn is jerked from a fitful sleep by movement across the hall. Real movement, not the muted rustlings of Buffy’s sad insomnia. She rubs gritty eyes and swings her legs out of bed. “Buffy?”

“Go back to bed, Dawn.” Now she can hear the water running in the bathroom. She drags herself up and out of her room. “What’s going on?” She stares blearily at her sister as Buffy splashes water on her face.

“Wissenschaft demon,” Buffy mumbles, still not entirely awake herself. “Apparently making a midnight snack out of the Science Lab.”

“It’s at school?” Dawn can’t keep the panic from her voice. “Buffy, how do you know? What are we going to do? We have to –"

“Willow told me; she woke me up from a very pleasant Kiefer Sutherland dream to tell me how everything’s connected and she can sense these kinds of disturbances. Ugh.” Buffy dries off and begins pulling her hair into a ponytail. “This whole Jedi thing really loses its appeal at one a.m. Anyway, if the Wissenschaft ingests enough of the right kind of chemicals – don’t ask me which ones – he’ll graduate from middle-of-the-night-annoyance to Sunnydale-destroying-ubermonster.”

“Make Willow kill it!” Dawn bursts out. Buffy stares at her.

“She can’t. She tried to weaken it, and couldn’t. Guess this is one beastie that only responds to brute force. Fortunately, that’s my specialty.”

“I want to go with you.”

“Are you kidding? I don’t even want to go with me.” Buffy frowns. “That made more sense in my head. Look, it’s late. Or early. Or something. I’d prefer if at least one of us wasn’t a complete zombie tomorrow. Figurative zombie,” she adds.

“But Buffy –”

“Dawn.” Buffy is in full Slayer mode now. “Go to bed. This’ll be an easy kill, as long as I don’t have to deal with my cranky, tired friends and family. Okay?”

Dawn remains in the bathroom after Buffy leaves. Buffy’s…focused, when she slays. Will she remember Spike, down in his homemade hell? Will she deign to check on him? Does she realize, truly, how helpless he is?

Her mom’s Jeep is still in the garage. Buffy wouldn’t sell it, reasoning that although the money would be nice it was important to have a car around in case of emergencies. Buffy, of course, refused to touch the thing.

But Spike had taught Dawn how to drive. That endless summer, when they were both half-crazed for something, anything to take their minds off grief, he would spirit her away to back roads and empty parking lots. It had been a project for the two of them, a private one that they chose not to justify to Giles or Xander or the rest. Dawn had loved getting away, and Spike enjoyed the idea of being a bad influence. “Don’t get that much anymore,” he’d told Dawn mournfully. She rolled her eyes. “Whatever, Big Bad.”

The keys hang innocently next to the back door. Dawn swallows. She can do this.

The engine starts easily, but the car seems huge and uncontrollable around her. She reverses slowly, foot pounding the brake every half-second. There’s a scary – and loud – moment as the bumper scrapes their abandoned lawnmower. Dawn refuses to inspect the damage, instead concentrating on getting out of the driveway. A few more feet…stay on the concrete…success.

Hey, this isn’t so bad.

She cruises for about two blocks before she realizes the parking brake is on. And the headlights are not. Shit. Isn’t it enough that she has to avoid Buffy’s usual route? Nervous laughter bubbles up in Dawn as she imagines Buffy’s astonished gaze following their Jeep down the street as Buffy foots it over to Sunnydale High.

Her hands never relax from their death-grip on the steering wheel, and she ducks her head every time another vehicle passes. But after ten minutes of terror and NPR (she’s unwilling to dart a hand out to change the radio station; it was her mother’s favorite and she decides to accept it as a good omen), she arrives at school. She parks in the West Lot, closest to her usual entrance to the basement. She sees no sign of a lumbering demon, but she doubts somehow that it would leave a trail of beakers. She also sees no sign of Buffy.

Now. The best way to get in?

She doesn’t really have the luxury of figuring that out. Buffy will turn up soon, and Dawn would like to put off that meeting as long as possible. She grabs a rock and heaves it through the window of Mrs. Lefcort’s homeroom.

She cringes briefly; petty vandalism has never been her thing and part of her expects alarms and a swarm of police cars. But there’s nothing except the dying tinkle of glass on linoleum. She pushes away the last of the shards and climbs through.

Weird, being here at night. She feels like the intruder she is, and exits the room swiftly. Out into the hallway, and then down the basements steps she knows too well. Past three piles of broken desks, the props from a production of The Music Man that took place five years ago, turn the corner that has splattered Mayor Snake bits in the shape of a Christmas tree – that’s gotta be karma – and finally, skidding into the storage room –

He isn’t there.

Dawn looks around wildly, although there really isn’t anywhere he could hide. It doesn’t make sense. He hasn’t strayed from here lately, now that she visits. He stays put, where he knows she can find him. He doesn’t leave. He doesn’t.

She backs out of the room, slowly, and then her steps pick up speed as she tears through the basement. Down random corridors, tripping over unfamiliar trash.

“Spike! Where are you? Spike!” Nothing, barely even an echo of her own voice. She’s scared, really scared and all she can think of is her broken, wretched vampire and a wandering Wissen...whatever.

“Spike!” She’s screaming now. “Spike! We have to get out of here! There’s something in the school, something bad…” She flies around a sharp corner, breathless with exertion and worry.

And is suddenly hauled up by her collar, to find herself dangling from a powerful, unyielding grasp. She looks up, and manages a small, surprised “eep!” before her voice fails her utterly.

Spike holds her in one hand, and the severed head of a Wissenschaft demon in the other. He leans in, and Dawn is mesmerized by vicious, frigid-blue depths.

“Someone,” he shakes her roughly, “has been a very –” shake— “naughty—” shake – “girl.”

Part 4: Surrender

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