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Author's Chapter Notes:
Thank you: Amelia-Jane, Im_bloody_English, Bridget, cordykitten, TammyAsh666 and slayercaro, for reviewing. We’re very happy you’re enjoying the story.


This chapter is an exception, I will be out of town for the weekend so that’s why I’m posting it today instead of Sunday. Next chapter will be posted hopefully on Sunday, July 9th, just in time to celebrate the end of the World Cup. :D
Chapter V

It was almost 2:00 a.m. when Buffy finally headed back to her home. Patrolling with Spike had taken longer than she’d thought it would and that was why she decided to go back to her house instead of her dorm room.

A soft smile lit her face as she recalled how endearing it had been to see him act like a kid who was having so much fun on his favorite ride in the fairground that he never wanted to stop. But after a little more than three hours, she had decided that it was time to stop patrolling and find him a decent crypt where he would spend the night.

She had to accept that it had been kind of fun to see Spike fight again, especially since this time he hadn’t been fighting her. It definitely was a sight to behold, from a fighter’s perspective, of course. It was not like she’d practically had to clean the drool from her mouth after Spike ditched the duster over a gravestone to fight a vampire or that she enjoyed watching how his muscles flexed under the tight t-shirt he wore or how his lithe body moved with panther-like grace as he played—yes, played, he had been enjoying it too much for it to be anything else—with the other vampire. Nope, that was just showing appreciation for a fellow fighter.

Oh God, she truly had to be tired if she was actually trying to convince herself that she hadn’t been checking Spike out!

She exhaled a relieved sigh when she finally arrived to her house. She climbed the tree located outside her room, jumped onto the windowsill and then went through the open window into her room. It was a good thing that she’d remembered to leave it open before she went out, otherwise she might have woken her mother up and she would have given her the reprimand to end all reprimands for the late hour she was coming back. That was the one thing she didn’t like from coming back home to sleep, her mother tended to forget she was out patrolling and not partying at the Bronze like any girl her age might be.

A few minutes later, after bathing and putting on her favorite pajamas, she was turning and tossing in her bed. She was tired, but something kept her up. She just couldn’t sleep knowing that she’d done something as foolish as that. So, she turned on the lamp on her night table and then she got up and padded towards the desk, determined to open the secret drawer, take her letter out, rip it in itty little pieces and never think about it again. But when she opened the drawer and took out the envelope, she gasped. It wasn’t the same she had placed there. Sure, the envelope was similar, but it was addressed to her not to ‘William’.

She had to pinch her arm to assure herself that she wasn’t dreaming, and after yelping a little at the pain, she realized that that wasn’t the case.

Not even for one single moment did she thought that it could be a joke.

First of all, no one knew about the letter she’d found in the desk, not even her mother. Oh she’d tried to tell her, but her mom had been too busy sending her off on her little ‘rescue Spike mission’ to listen to her at that moment.

Second, she had recognized William’s beautiful handwriting on the envelope. This time he’d put her name on the envelope, hers, and she had never liked the name ‘Elizabeth’ as much as she did in that moment, as she saw it written elegantly in the envelope she held in her hands. The letter couldn’t be from anyone else but the man who had written the first touching letter and now she was just dying to read this one, because this time it was for her!

Third, and most important reason, she knew for sure that demons, vampires, witches and every other sort of magical creatures existed for real; so why shouldn’t she believe that there was a desk that could let her communicate with a man who lived more than a century ago?

She remembered the odd gust of wind that had invaded her room and surrounded her that afternoon after she read the poem, so she made a mental note about asking Giles about it at the first chance she got.

Deciding once and for all that this was really happening, she opened the envelope with trembling hands, unfolding the paper inside cautiously.

Her previous assumption had been right, it was a letter and everything inside her begged her to read it, so she did, with unusual eagerness.

‘Elizabeth,

How I wish that what I am presuming right now is possible, that somehow we would be able communicate with each other through this desk.

Your letter filled me with confusion at first, because how could it be? How could someone send me a letter from the future? Then that confusion turned into expectation that perhaps this is happening because it simply has to. Have you ever felt that something is meant to happen, Elizabeth? That it is stronger than you and you can not do anything else but follow your instincts? Because I do. No matter how much my common sense is screaming at me that I am nothing but a fool for answering to your letter and for believing in this, when I should be thinking that this must be some kind of cruel joke, I simply can not.

When I wrote the poem and the letter you read, I was not referring to anyone in particular. The words simply came from my heart and were written for a special lady I wished I could meet someday. I hope you do not judge me too forward for asking, but could it be you? Could it be that destiny is intervening to let us meet through time in a way that some might think impossible even if there is no chance of us ever meeting in person?

If you get this letter and I get an answer from you, I will be sure that this desk is letting us correspond through it and that somehow it will let us continue. And I will be waiting with baited breath until that time.

Yours,

William’

Buffy sighed dreamily, saying, “Oh, wow, William, you really know how to rock a girl’s world with your words.”

She moved back to her bed and after she found a comfortable position, she re-read the letter another three times, her eyes filling with happy tears and her heart beating faster each time. She couldn’t believe this was happening to her, he had answered to her. He had asked her if she could be the special lady he had written to. Oh, how she wished she could be, how she wished there was some way she could meet him. She didn’t know how this had happened, but it had, and she was definitely going to embrace the opportunity with open arms.

After a while, Buffy fell asleep with a big smile plastered on her face, holding William’s letter tightly to her heart as she thought that she would answer him in the morning.

* ~ * ~ *

“My dear William,” Buffy read out loud what she’d written so far, swinging her pen between her index finger and her thumb.

Now that she knew that he had received her first letter, she’d decided to use a pen instead of the dreaded quill. It was easier and more practical and she wouldn’t leave all those ink spots like she’d done the last time she had used it. It was truly a miracle he’d been able to understand anything she’d written then.

‘C’mon, Buffy, you can do much better than this. He melted your heart with his letter and ‘My dear William’ is all you’ve written so far? Okay, so maybe writing to a guy that lives in the past, but due to mysterious reasons can write back to you, is not something you do everyday, but try to concentrate!’ the blonde girl scolded herself, nibbling on her pen nervously.

She would have liked to talk with her mother about this, but she had already left when she woke up in the morning and she wouldn’t be back from the gallery until later that night.

Buffy had decided to stay home studying instead of going back to her dorm room that day; after all she could study better there since she had no distractions and had the added incentive of her desk, of course!

It was strange to think that just a week ago she could hardly wait to go back to campus, mostly because she would see Riley there. But all thoughts of Riley Finn, T.A. extraordinaire, all around normal guy and until last week, possible love interest, had flown completely away from her mind, to the point that it was almost as if he’d never existed. All she could think about now was a still faceless William and how romantic he was, and the never welcomed memories of the fateful day she spent engaged to Spike and that kept surfacing when she least expected, even if she kept trying to suppress them in any possible way she could.

So, after deciding that she had done enough studying for that day, she had resolved to something she knew she would really enjoy, answering to William’s letter.

Although it wasn’t easy to concentrate on that after all she’d found out the previous night.

Number one: She wasn’t as unbeatable as she’d thought. It seemed that being a Slayer wasn’t enough sometimes and finally she’d learnt that after finding an enemy so much stronger than her. She hadn’t felt so close to dying in a long time, and that death would’ve probably been much closer if Spike hadn’t intervened.

And that had led to discovery number two: Spike’s chip didn’t work with demons, so now he could deal with them on his own, and that was such a relief for her. She grimaced in horror at the thought of having to spend time with him every night. That would be just horrible... no matter if her body seemed to think different!

And then, the third discovery, the most pleasant and amazing of last night: She had one more reason to love her new desk, because it seemed to be magical and have the capacity of somehow allowing her and the mysterious William to exchange letters through time. And she had the odd feeling that that could only happen through the secret panel of the desk, why else would it be secret if it weren’t for that?

‘But if you don’t continue writing yours, you won’t be exchanging letters with him any time soon!’ the blonde reprimanded herself. She was about to start writing again when the phone rang.

“Geez, how could anyone pretend I concentrate if they keep interrupting me?” she grumbled, picking up the phone.

“Hello?” she said, her voice laced with annoyance.

“What the hell were you waiting for before telling me that you almost died last night? You thought that it wasn’t important enough to let your Watcher know?” A very annoyed Giles snapped at her. “I expect you to come to my house immediately!” he told her, hanging up the phone without giving her the chance to answer.

Buffy was left listening to a busy signal on the other side of the phone, while she tried to imagine what had that been about, but the one thing she knew was that she couldn’t waste any time, not when her Watcher was in that kind of mood.

“Sorry, my dear William, sacred duty comes first and you’ll have to wait!” she sighed, taking the piece of paper from the desk and putting it inside her night table. After all, she couldn’t leave it anywhere near the secret panel, otherwise he might receive her very incomplete letter.

She sighed once more and grabbed her jacket, leaving in a hurry.

She was on her way to Giles’ house when she began replaying the strange phone conversation on her mind.

‘Wait a minute! If I didn’t tell anyone about what happened last night, how can Giles know?’

And finally it hit her and she began running towards her Watcher’s house. She was so going to kill him!

* ~ * ~ *

Buffy knocked on the door insistently, and when Giles opened up, she rushed inside, without even acknowledging him. She headed straight towards the living room, and just as she thought, she found Spike there, sitting on the armchair, welcoming her with one of his cocky smirks.

“What the hell are you doing here? It’s not even sunset!” she yelled at him.

“In case you haven’t noticed, it’s cloudy enough outside for me to wander without turning into a Spike flambé. So I was out and about and I passed by and thought it would be nice to pay a visit to dear old Rupert,” he responded.

“Yeah, right. And of all the things you two could chat about, you chose to tell him about last night!” she accused him.

“I just said...”

“We were supposed to tell him about that together!” she whined, but Spike promptly look anywhere else, before he could see the dangerous pout that would surely follow.

“Please, do go on; don’t mind me, after all I’m just the owner of this house!” Giles grumbled, rolling his eyes at the pair, as he watched them—or rather as he watched Buffy, since the vampire hadn’t been able to say much—argue, from the threshold.

“Anyway, Buffy, Spike only told me that you had been in a life-threatening situation last night, and after that I immediately called you,” he explained.

“Oh,” she said flatly, almost regretting that she’d attacked Spike so harshly. Almost, since she was sure that before the visit was over, the vampire would have done something to deserve that attack anyway. “So what did you two do while you waited for me?” she wondered, but her two interlocutors kept silent.

And then, she glanced towards the kitchen, seeing a teapot, two cups and a plate with cookies over the table. “What? Did I end up in some alternate dimension where you two are best friends?” she commented surprised.

“No way! You know... it’s just that we both are Englishmen and tea is always tea,” Spike justified.

“Let’s just say that the need for tea is stronger than our mutual hate,” Giles added.

“I can understand tea, but what about the cookies? Or did you forget you’re a vampire?” she asked Spike.

“One of these days, you’ll have to repeat the whole taste speech to her!” Spike winked at Giles conspiratorially.

“So, Buffy, tell me, what happened last night?” Giles wondered, he was curious as hell since the vampire had refused to give him more information than saying that Buffy had been involved in a life-threatening situation.

“Well, the Slayer and I were walking through a graveyard, when a demon appeared out of the blue and smashed her to the ground, starting to punch her. She tried to hit him back, but couldn’t. It was kind of weird if you ask me. I kept waiting for her to begin beating the crap out of it. But after the third blow, she started whining and crying desperately: ‘Spike, please, show me how powerful you are and save me. And then I swear I’ll do whatever you want!’ So, mate, what can a man do after such a request?” the bleached vampire said before Buffy couldn’t even begin talking.

“Buffy!” Giles exclaimed with a disappointed tone.

“What? Don’t tell me that you believed him?” she replied, more than a little insulted that her Watcher could believe the lies the vampire had just said.

“So, how did things really go then?” he turned to her.

“Well, if you take off the part where I begged him to help me, the rest is as close to the truth as Spike can get. Spike rescued me because...” she stopped, and then she narrowed her eyes at the vampire. “Spike, why did you rescue me?” she asked him.

“Yes, Spike, why did you rescue her?” Giles asked him with the same puzzled expression his Slayer wore.

‘Yeah, Spike, why did you rescue her?’ the vampire asked himself, much more puzzled than them.

“Well, it’s pretty clear. I rescued her because if someone is going to have the bloody pleasure of killing her, it’s going to be me!” he justified with an evil smile.

“Awww, that’s so sweet from you! You really know how to melt a girl’s heart!” she commented sarcastically as she thought of someone who could melt her heart for real.

But was that the real reason why he’d rescued her? Spike mused, preferring not to keep asking himself that question. One never knew what answer he might get.

“In fact, once I killed the demon, pretty easily I might add and without my chip giving me a hell of headache, I thought I was finally free, so I tried to kill the Slayer. C’mon, love, tell him that I tried to kill you!” he added.

“Spike tried to kill me...” she said flatly.

“Twice!” the vampire pointed out.

“Twice,” she repeated, rolling her eyes.

Anyway, even if he’d had the chance, would he have killed her? That was another thing that he didn’t want to ask himself.

“Wait a minute. What does it mean that your chip didn’t work with that demon?” Giles wondered confusedly.

“Geez, is it so hard to figure? Spike’s chip doesn’t work with demons, he can hurt them as much as he pleases,” Buffy explained.

“Fascinating,” Giles commented, caressing his chin with his hand.

“Yeah, and I have this sudden urge to fight Evil, protect people and be a bloody hero, I want to do it for Christmas’s sake, for the kids, the puppies, and...”

“Oh, shut up, you only want to do it to indulge your killing nature!” Buffy struck back.

“You read me like an open book, pet!” He sneered in delight.

“Returning to last night; Buffy, did you really have that much trouble fighting against that demon?” Giles asked her.

“Yes, it was almost as when you took away my powers due to that stupid test...” Buffy admitted.

“What test was that? You were as weak as a lamb and I wasn’t informed?” Spike wondered astonished.

“First, you weren’t in town when it happened. And second, you already had your chance once that Halloween when we turned into our costumes and you failed. Opportunities like that happen only once in a lifetime... well, un-lifetime in your case,” she pointed out, smiling at the sight of his disappointed pout.

“Buffy, can you describe that demon to me?” Giles asked her.

“Sure, he was tall... no, wait, maybe he was short, and was all black... or was it grey? And...” she stopped, keeping silent for a moment. “I don’t remember,” she admitted, desolated.

“What? A demon almost killed you and you don’t remember anything about him?” he scolded her.

“Hey! Freud or some other guy like him says that when you have a big shock your memories can be blocked. So... I must have blocked them!” she justified.

“Don’t you even remember any particular details?” he insisted.

“Nothing,” she sighed dejectedly.

“That’s not good; I can’t do any research on this demon if you don’t help me...”

“Can I say something?” Spike intervened.

“If you want to mock us about this… c’mon, Spike, have your fun!” he rolled his eyes.

“Actually, I wanted to say that the demon was tall, over six feet tall, purple with white eyes, three to be exact. About the particular details, I picked the ones that might help you the most, ‘cause the demon in question had four arms, a corn in the middle of his forehead and a fin on his back, too,” Spike finished, amazing the Watcher with the details he’d remembered.

“And you couldn’t remember that?” he turned to Buffy in disbelief.

“Shocked. Blocked it all,” she defended herself.

“Well, Ripper, I guess that you already imagined that that very important info wasn’t for free,” Spike pointed out with a smirk, stretching his upturned hand towards the Watcher.

“I should have known better!” Giles muttered, searching inside his wallet and handing the vampire some bills before he began skimming through the pages of one of his books. “Dear Lord! It’s just what I was afraid of...” he commented, once he found the page he was looking for.

“What do you mean?” Buffy wondered, starting to get worried. She didn’t like his alarmed tone. It never brought anything good for her.

“What? Is an apocalypse coming soon?” Spike asked hopefully.

“Worse, much worse. Buffy, the demon you faced was a Frakor demon... and I was sure they were extinct!” Giles explained.

“Well, that one seemed to be anything but extinct!” Buffy commented. “So? Do I need a special training to fight it if I ever find another one?” she asked.

“You should be wishing that you’ll never find another. They are immune to a Slayer’s attack, so you can’t do anything against them. And they are feared by many other demons, because they are almost invincible,” Giles explained.

“You’re kidding, right? It took me less than a minute to snap his neck, so where the hell is its so much feared immunity?” Spike asked in disbelief.

“That’s why I said ‘almost’. Truth is that vampires are the only ones that can kill them!” Giles informed him.

“Really? Well, well, it seems that I was at the right place, at the right time!” he smirked smugly at Buffy.

“And until we are not completely sure that there aren’t any more of those demons around, you’re not safe patrolling on your own, Buffy,” Giles made her notice and she nodded in concern.

“Well, since I’m the only one who can kill them, I guess I could be pretty useful to you, Slayer, in case you find another one. I don’t think that any other vampire in town would be willing to do such a big favor to you, but I could... for fifty bucks a night!” Spike said, turning to the Watcher as he put Giles’ previous reward for his info inside his duster’s pocket.

“Fifty? Forget it. I won’t give you anything more than ten!” Giles protested.

“Thirty five!” Spike suggested.

“Twenty five, and that’s my last offer!” Giles answered.

“Deal!” the vampire sneered.

“What? I can’t believe that you accepted!” Buffy exclaimed.

“Well, Buffy, it’s not only for that. Since you started College, your patrolling has been less than stellar, so I imagine that some help won’t damage you, quite the contrary! After all, Spike can’t hurt you...” Giles made her notice.

“Yeah. Thanks for reminding me that!” Spike growled, pissed off.

“So, I’m being punished... because I’m dedicating too much time to studying? Dammit, this is so unfair!” Buffy grumbled. “And why does he have to get paid, while I...”

“Don’t start with that again, Buffy. It’s your sacred duty, you’re the Chosen One and you can’t escape from your destiny. On the other hand, Spike is going against his nature and since he will be helping you, all the other demons around will see him as a traitor, so he’s risking a lot here... and that’s why I must give him a... uh... incentive!” Giles justified.

“Right. Plus, do you have any idea about how much does pig blood cost? Bloody hell, butchers are the real bloodsuckers!” Spike grumbled.

“Well, being the Chosen One sucks even worse!” Buffy snapped, crossing her arms at her chest.

“Well, sweetheart, just wait for me to take this sodding chip off my head and I’ll be more than glad to help you quit!” Spike winked at her.

‘One way... or the other. Bloody hell, what am I thinking? And for the record, you’re bloody flirting with her once again, stop it!’ he scolded himself.

“Although I appreciate the concern, especially coming from you; no thanks, I’ll keep my job. But please, find a way to take off that chip soon, since I can’t wait to dust you good and proper!” she answered, winking back at him.

‘Geez, am I really flirting with him? I must be feverish! Too much study, that’s it!’ she observed.

“You don’t know what you’re missing...” the vampire singsong.

‘What bloody part of ‘stop flirting’ you didn’t get?’ he reminded himself.

“Whatever, we’ll meet at the graveyard tonight, at 9:00, and be on time!” he instructed her, leaving before he ended up disgracing himself.

After saying goodbye to Giles, Buffy also left, a storm of thoughts swirling inside her head.

‘I’m so relieved for not having to be Spike’s vamp-sitter anymore... but now Spike’s turning into my own Slayer-sitter… that’s so humiliating... and so damn unfair! Now I’ll have to spend all that time with him, fighting side by side, every single night...’

So, why wasn’t she more upset for that? Having to spend time with Spike was bad or wasn’t it? She preferred not to answer that question.

When she had arrived home, her mother hadn’t returned yet, so she had time to write back to William, hopefully without any more interruptions. She finally knew how to complete her letter.

TBC





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