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A/N Thanks to April who got this chapter proofed days ago. The delay in getting it up is totally my bad and I apologies profusely. It is also short, again I am sorry.

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They kept moving, dragging the wounded along with them as they fled towards the relative safety of the town. Buffy heard Faith ahead of her calling for an ambulance on the group’s communal cell phone, her voice urgent over the sound of running feet. The girls moved together, keeping close, the injured Rona at their centre.

Faith was making another call, but Buffy didn’t hear her over Xander’s sudden cry of pain as he stumbled, slipping from her supporting arms. Spike had him, supporting the heavier man’s weight with ease, keeping them moving. She looked over at the pair beside her, Xander’s bulkier frame leaning heavily on the vampire, his breath coming in painful, noisy gasps.

“Hang in there, whelp,” she heard Spike mutter, his voice low and compassionate despite the insult. “Nearly there.”

Streetlights lit their way now, casting an eerie orange glow across Xander’s face. ‘Oh God,’ Buffy stifled a sob, ‘Xander, no.’ The left side of his face was a sticky mess of blood, black in the artificial light against the paleness of his skin. His right eye flashed wide and frightened, tinted yellow around its dark centre. His left eye was no more than a gory shapeless stain above his cheek.

They slowed their pace as they reached the low-lit car park of an out of town DIY store. “Told the ambulance to meet us here,” Faith informed her, dragging her attention away from her friend. “Rona’s arm’s broken but the rest just have bumps and bruises. Giles is coming to take them home.” Buffy nodded mutely, glad that the dark slayer was taking charge.

She turned back to Xander, just as Spike settled him down on a low wall. She bit her lip and fought back tears. She needed to be strong now; she’d cry later when she was alone, when she could conjure Xander’s bloodied face, Molly’s vacant eyes, the dark haired potential’s—God, she didn’t even know that girl’s name and she had gotten her killed. ‘Looks like it’s not just people I care about that die,’ she thought bitterly, moving towards Xander as he raised a trembling hand to his face.

“Don’t, mate,” Spike stopped him gently, catching the young man’s hand just before the fingers touched the surface of the gory pool that had once been his left eye. “Don’t.”

Xander swallowed hard but nodded to the vampire and dropped his hand. Spike caught Buffy’s eye and inclined his head in a subtle suggestion that she come to sit with her friend. She complied immediately, slipping in against Xander’s side, her arm wrapping comfortingly around his thick waist. “Oh, God, Xander, I’m so sorry,” she whispered as she pulled herself close to his warm body.

She felt rather than heard his shaky sigh and stroked her hands gently up his back. “The ambulance is on its way,” she told him in a whisper. He didn’t acknowledge her, so she just kept gently stroking his back.

The sound of an engine broke the stupefied silence of the car park and Buffy looked up to see Giles and Dawn hastily getting out of her mother’s SUV. Giles went to Kennedy, giving instructions too quietly for Buffy to hear. Dawn rushed to join Faith and Spike; she hadn’t even realised he’d moved from Xander’s other side. Faith’s worried, “What happened?” just loud enough for Buffy to catch. A brief exchange of words and Dawn was turning towards them. She heard Faith’s gentle, “Don’t, kiddo, not yet,” but for a moment thought Dawn would come anyway, until Spike caught her arm and shook his head slowly, keeping the girl away.

She watched the three of them form a triangle, talking in urgent whispers, Faith occasionally gesturing with her arms. She saw Dawn’s shoulders shake violently, and knew that she was sobbing. Spike opened his arms and her sister went easily into his embrace, burying her face in his chest. Buffy could see his lips moving, as he soothed her with quiet words of comfort. Faith’s hand came up to stroke the young girl’s back as she mouthed something to Spike, who nodded and disentangled himself from the clinging teenager, transferring her into the dark slayer’s care.

Giles was there suddenly, appearing at Xander’s other side. He opened his mouth to say something, but she beat him to it. “Stay with him,” she ordered curtly as she stood. She saw Spike and Faith exchange words briefly over Dawn’s head before he turned away, his long coat uncharacteristically sluggish as it swirled lazily around his body.

She ran. A handful of accelerated strides and she was able to catch up with him at the car park’s edge. “Spike.” Her voice stopped him but he didn’t turn to face her.

“Go back to the whelp, slayer,” he told her, his voice devoid of emotion. “He needs ya right now.”

“I will. I just…” she trailed off. She just what? Why had she come running after him? Why had she felt it so important to say something to him before he left? When he turned to face her, his eyes were so soft, so impossibly regretful, so understanding that she found she couldn’t hold back the tears any longer. Her hand came to cover her mouth, as if trying to physically contain the sound of her broken sob.

“Oh, pet.” Again he found himself weak in the face of her tears. He moved a hand to her shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze. It was all she needed; she threw herself into the comfort of his arms, tears flowing in salty torrents over her cheeks to soak through the thin cotton of his t-shirt and burn his chest.

“Shh, pet,” he mumbled softly, his hand moving to stroke her hair. “Hush, baby, it’s not your fault. “ How did he always know what was going on in her head, even when she herself had no idea how to extricate herself the sticky web of her own tangled emotions?

She shook her head against his chest in denial of his assurance. “I didn’t listen,” she told him tearfully. “Faith said to hold off, she said he was too strong, but I didn’t listen.”

“Hey now.” He pulled back slightly, gently tilting her face up to look at him. “Don’t do that. You couldn’t have known.”

“No, but I could have listened.” Her voice was harsh, the anger in it unmistakable, but he knew that her reproach was not directed at him, it was turned inward; self-recrimination burned bitterly in her eyes.

“Don’t beat yourself up, pet. You did your best.” He realised his mistake the moment he spoke, just a moment before she jerked violently out of his arms.

“I did my best?” Her voice was too loud in the still night air, and she dropped it to a disgusted whisper, self-loathing dripping from the words like tar. “I did my best?” she repeated with a rueful shake of her head. “You tell that to Xander or Molly or--” she bit her lip, screwing her eyes shut against the onset of more tears. “God, I didn’t even know her name.” The anger was gone, and she sounded so lost, so despairing, that Spike had to risk going to her again.

She only resisted for a moment, before she succumbed to the cool consolation of his embrace. He rocked her gently, swaying their bodies as if dancing to some sultry love song. “Her name was Katie,” he whispered in her ear, gently forcing her body to keep moving when she stiffened in he arms. “I overheard her talking to Rona after Chloe died.” He petted her hair and paused for a moment before continuing. “Rona was shooting her mouth off as usual, complaining that you weren’t protecting them all well enough.” Again her body tensed in his arms, but he ignored her. “Katie was a quiet sort of bird but she spoke up. She said that you were doing your best and maybe they needed to look out for each other as well. She told them you couldn’t protect them all 24/7, so they’d all have to learn to look after themselves.”

Buffy frowned against his chest, the potential—Katie, she corrected herself—had spoken up for her when all the others had done nothing but question and complain. Katie had believed in her and now Katie was dead. She tried to pull away. Was he just telling her this to hurt her? Just to rub it in?

He held onto her arms firmly and made her meet his eyes. “What I’m saying, pet, is that Katie wasn’t here for your protection. She was here to help, to fight. She knew the risks and she was ready to face them.”

She absorbed his words—not very comforting, but she suspected they weren’t meant to be. Spike didn’t do platitudes; he did hard painful truth. “Pretty soon these girls are gonna have to be your army,” he continued. “It’s a hard way to learn the lesson, but now they know. They know they’re not ready and they’ll train now. They’ll buckle down and they’ll get ready, because now they know. They know what happens if they’re not.”

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A/N

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