[Reviews - 23]
-
Table of Contents [Report This]
Microsoft Word Chapter or Story | ePub eBook Chapter or Story | Printer Chapter or Story

Has been viewed 2635 times

- Text Size +




Chapter 4

(Same night. It’s been about 72 hours since the battle in the alley.)

Spike and Charlotte approached the hotel a few hours after they’d left, laughing over a joke. She kept telling the story as he opened the door for her.

“…and the menu said ‘freshroom fry frucks!” They collapsed into giggles again, failing to notice the new arrivals in the lobby.

Spike straightened up and jolted to a stop, still as stone. He looked paler than normal, if it was possible. “Buffy…” he whispered.

Charlotte looked at him with concern, and touched his arm. “Spike, are you okay?” she asked quietly.

“I’m fine, pet. Just had a bit of a surprise, is all. Turn around, luv, we have visitors,” he replied, just as quietly. “Buffy,” he addressed the elder Slayer, with a nod of his head. The light bulb went off in Charlotte’s mind. Oh.

“Spike,” the Slayer returned, her voice emotionless. She turned back around to talk to Angel, dismissing the pair. Dawn and Willow shared a look. The teen took the opportunity to approach her long-lost friend.

The first thing she did was reach out and twist his nipple hard through his t-shirt. “Ow!” He slapped her hand away.

“That’s for not letting me know you were alive.” She wrapped her arms around him in the next instant, squeezing him tight. “And this is for being alive again,” she whispered. “I missed you, Spike.”

He wrapped his arms around her right away. “Missed you, too, Bit. More than you’ll ever know.”

Dawn pulled back and regained her composure. “So, who’s your friend?” she asked, eyeing Charlotte.

“Dawn Summers, this is Charlotte Taylor. She looked lost, so I brought her home.”

Charlotte slapped him on the arm. “Quit it with the puppy jokes. He means that he saved me from being eaten, and offered me a place to stay after wrecking my building.”

“Hey, I didn’t do that. The bloody dragon did, and it was her Slayers that shot it down in the first place!”

“And who started the fight?” she retorted.

“My bleedin’ wanker of a grandsire.”

“Well, he’s got me there,” Charlotte said to Dawn.

Wow, the chemistry is just zinging between these two, the teen thought. “Well, now that we’ve got the introductions out of the way, is there some place we can get reacquainted, Spike?” she asked.

“There’s a private garden over there.”

“Cool. It’s nice to meet you, Charlotte. I’m going to steal my former best friend for a while,” Dawn added.

“No problem. I’ll probably head up to my room.”

Dawn dragged her vampire off in the direction he’d pointed. Charlotte saw the blonde woman roll her eyes, then turn back to Angel. The new red-haired woman was talking to Vi, so Charlotte thought she’d introduce herself.

“Hey, am I interrupting?” she asked softly.

“Oh, no! Willow was just telling me about the trip over. Willow, this is Charlotte Taylor. She’s staying in the Hyperion for a few days.”

“Hi, Willow Rosenberg,” she introduced herself. “Wicca extraordinaire for the Watcher’s Council.”

“The organization in charge of the Slayers – right. All this is new to me in the last 24 hours, so forgive me if I get the terms wrong.”

“Nah, don’t sweat it. Any intro into the supernatural is usually overwhelming. 7 years at the forefront, and I’m still learning all the time. So, how did you end up being taken in by Team Angel?” Willow asked.

“It was Spike, actually, who helped me out. I was loading things from my apartment into my car, and a group of vampires came up the alley with the goal of making me lunch, or worse. He swooped in, in the nick of time, dusting all five, coat billowing around him. I was still in shock for a while, but he helped, even so much as carrying my last box from my apartment to the car. I didn’t have anywhere to stay, ‘cause I was just going to find a hotel room when I’d finished, so Spike offered me a room here. Now, I’m apartment hunting while trying to finish the school year.”

“Oh, you’re a student?” Willow asked.

“Nope, first-year music teacher. My boss graciously let me have this week off so I can get resettled.” Charlotte looked over in the direction Spike and Dawn had gone, her brow furrowed.

“Don’t worry about Spike. Dawnie’s not going to inflict any more physical damage unless he says something really stupid,” Willow said reassuringly.

“It’s not his hide I’m worried about,” she murmured.
~+~
“Buffy, perhaps we should step into my office, where it isn’t so distracting?” Angel hinted. Her eyes kept shifting to the conversation taking place at the other end of the front desk.

“Uh, sure, Angel.” She followed him into the office, where he closed the door before taking a seat behind the desk.

“Care to tell me why you’re really here? I have no problem with catching up on your life, Buffy, but I don’t think it has much to do with why you, Willow, and Dawn showed up at my door at 9:00 in the evening.” He knew it wasn’t just a social call.

“Giles wanted people who know you to check on the situation, personally.”

Angel nodded, his suspicions confirmed “He thinks I might be manipulating your girls. Vi showed me her report before she sent it, Buffy. Every word was the truth. We set out to take down Wolfram and Hart from the inside out. I’m under no illusions that they’ll leave L.A. alone, but right now, they’re off balance. We took out every member of the Circle of the Black Thorn. They answered directly to the Senior Partners.”

“And considering the horde they sent at you, you really pissed them off. Did you really think just four of you could win against that?” Not even she was that suicidal!

He shrugged. “Didn’t know. We’d already accomplished our mission, so the battle didn’t matter. It was payback from the Senior Partners for what we did. Either we won against the horde, and they retreat, or we all died, and their vengeance would be satisfied. They like their balance just as much as the Powers That Be do. Neither side is going to try to press too much of an advantage over the other because it involves too much risk. They can’t take the chance they might lose and forfeit their influence on our world. We’re just chess pieces, Buffy. Every one of us on the planet.”

“Well, that’s morbid. And Spike? How did you convince him to fight alongside you? You guys hate each other.” Please tell me you made him stay…

“Being around each other every day forced us to come to an understanding. It was his choice to stay. You want his reasons, ask him.”

He really did choose to stay here over contacting me? And where does that new girl fit in to all this?

“Well, seeing as how Vi has informed me that their patrols have turned up none of the demons they saw the other night, I guess L.A. is as safe as it ever was. You know, the next time you’re going to take on a dragon, call me first?” she scolded.

“I was under the impression you wanted nothing to do with me or my team. Andrew said those orders came directly from you,” he replied, the anger he felt at his old allies over not helping Fred still present in mind.

“Andrew was here?” she asked, genuinely puzzled.

“You mean, you didn’t tell him that you couldn’t trust me as long as I worked at Wolfram and Hart.”

“No! I’d expressed my concerns over why you might be here, but I didn’t think you’d lost your soul, or anything. Why was Andrew here?” Why didn’t she get the memo?

“Geeze, Buffy, don’t you keep in touch with the organization you work for?! You know, I’m all on board for you having a normal, happy life, but you’re still a Slayer. Fighting the good fight isn’t something you do halfway! You’re either involved in this new thing you helped set up, or you’re not. Do you have any idea how Giles is running things? Hmm?!!” Angel was yelling by the time he finished.

“Is that what you really think of me? That I’m some selfish idiot?!” she yelled back, popping to her feet.

“Well, if the shoe shopping fits!”

“How dare you?! I earned my time off after Sunnydale!”

He lowered his voice. “I know you did. And if you want to retire, that’s your prerogative, but don’t expect me to support your choices when you won’t deal with the consequences. You wanted to create an army of Slayers. Great! But think about whom you put in charge. Do you really trust Giles’ decision-making skills 100%?” he argued. “I lost a member of my team, an innocent girl, because he denied us help when I asked for it, and he did it because of what Angelus did to him, but Fred didn’t have to suffer for it. All I asked him to do was get in touch with Willow.”

“He never mentioned you called.” ‘God, does everyone think I’m an idiot?’

“I doubt he would have. Look, Buffy, you’re always saying that you hate people making decisions for you, but they only get to do that when you give them the power to.”

“Include yourself in that one?” she reminded him.

“Yeah, I do, now. I can admit when I’m alone at night that I can be a jackass,” he admitted.

She chuckled in agreement. “What will you do now?” Buffy wondered.

“Contact a couple people I care about. Beyond that, I don’t know…L.A.’s pretty much home, so I guess I’ll go back to helping the helpless, like before. I managed to alleviate the company of some funds before I blew up the building, so I’ll be alright. Your Slayers are welcome to use the Hyperion if they ever need to be in town. I’ve got lots of space,” Angel replied with a smile.

She smiled back. “You sure do. Well, I’m suffering some horrid jet lag, so if you could point me to a bed, I’d be grateful.”

“Of course. Your girls are on the first floor, and there are still free rooms.”
~+~
Meanwhile…

Dawn had sat down on a bench, and waited for Spike to start explaining. He paced in front of her for a while, starting and stopping several times in his attempt to say the right thing.

“Start from the beginning. What happened after Sunnydale collapsed,” Dawn prompted.

“Using the amulet had burned me up. I was ash, and I was free. Next thing I knew, I found myself standing in Peaches’ office. That was 19 days after closing the Hellmouth. I tried to attack the Poof, convinced that he must have something to do with why I was there, and passed right through him. I was a bloody ghost.”

“And then what?”

“My first question was if Buffy was alright. Had all of you made it out okay? He mentioned your sister was in Rome, so, out I went. I got as far as the city limits before the amulet yanked me back to Evil Inc. It was horrible, Bit. I couldn’t leave, couldn’t touch anything, couldn’t even smoke. And then, I started disappearin’, and every time felt like I was straddling the jaws of Hell, trying not to get sucked in. Turned out, another ghostie haunting the place, Pavayne, had made a deal to trade other ghosts for his place in eternal damnation. Tried takin’ me, but he let on to some of his secrets, too, like if I wanted it bad enough, I could touch things, move things. Fred built a machine to make me corporeal again, but he tried to kill her, so I knocked him into the circle and he got the body, instead. Peaches locked him up in the basement of Wolfram and Hart. He had a front row seat to the building collapsing on his head.”

“I bet you’re all torn up about it,” she said dryly.

“You know me, luv. So, I’m a ghost still, but I’ve got some new tricks, so at least I can entertain myself a bit more. Was still hell. One day, I get mail. I’m thinkin’, ‘Who the hell is sending me a box here?’ So, I get H – someone to open it for me, and poof, I’m a real boy again. Walked into a bloody door before I realized it.”

“Was there security footage? That’s something I’d like to see!”

“Hush, you! Anyway, after I pick myself up off the floor, I’m ecstatic, see? I hugged people, drank Peaches’ mug of blood…But, of course, things start going haywire. Phones ringin’, static noise from every piece of electronics, and then, the people started going crazy, blood dripping from their eyes and attacking their coworkers. Found out later it was all a manipulation by a bloke that had it in for the Poof, but the best part at the time…” he paused for effect. “Me and my grandsire had a great, full blows fight, and I won!” It still felt bloody brilliant to recall that feeling of finally besting Angel.

“I don’t doubt it,” Dawn said proudly.

“And you’re a doll for saying it. So, the prize turned out to be nothin’ but Mountain Dew, but the victory was still mine, ‘cause I wanted it more. I get back to L.A., and all I can think about is seeing your sister again, and you. I buy a boat ticket, say my goodbyes to everyone, got money in my pocket, and I get to the dock, and it hits me what I’m about to do…and I couldn’t go. Watched the boat sail away, then headed for a bar. And I know you’re thinkin’ why, so just give me a minute to explain where my head was at.
It sounds ridiculous now, but, I’d gone out in a blaze of glory, see…and there’s no way I could ever top that. I’d been dead, there was no way for you all to doubt it, and I thought of how much time had passed while I was a ghost. For all I knew, your sister had found her true amore, and was blissfully happy. Did she tell you what she told me, down in the cave?”

Dawn nodded. “She said that she told you she loved you.”

“Well, after six months, I couldn’t be sure that she’d really meant it, not after our history, and I was too bleedin’ scared to show up on your doorstep and have her reject me again. I couldn’t bear it, Niblet. So…I decided to stay here with my memories, then risk having my heart broken again.” His voice was gruff with emotion, remembering all those feelings.

“Oh, Spike…”

“And I didn’t blame you for how you acted that last year. I deserved it, I know I did. So, I didn’t think you’d want to see me, either.”

She grabbed his hand, pausing his pacing. “I’m sorry for how I treated you that year. Buffy finally told me about your relationship, after Sunnydale, and I realized that I had acted really immature. You were my best friend, and I didn’t even give you a chance to explain your side of the story. I don’t even know why I chose to believe Xander’s version…and all Buffy would say, was that it wasn’t completely your fault, and there were circumstances, which just sounded like victim’s excuses to me. I think…no, I know, that I was madder at you for leaving, that summer, than what had happened with Buffy. You’d been my big brother, and suddenly, you weren’t there, and you didn’t even leave me a note…” She started to cry, old feelings coming up, and sniffed back the tears.

Spike sat down on the bench next to her and wrapped his arms around her. “I’m so sorry, Bit. Honestly, when I left that night, I was in no fit state of mind to leave anybody anything. All I knew was that I had to change, for I couldn’t go on like I had been…couldn’t risk hurting you or Buffy again…” He brushed the tears away from blue eyes as expressive as his own. “Look at you – grown like a weed and so beautiful. I bet you’re breakin’ hearts all over Rome, aren’t you?”

She blushed under his praise. “Not so much…I had school to make up for over the summer after Sunnydale, and I’m pickier than Buffy. I have Willow run a background check on every guy before I go out on a date.”

“Smart girl, with the Summers’ luck, and all.”

“Exactly, so no demons or mystical pasts. And I just graduated second in my class,” she said proudly.

“College plans?”

“I’m deferring a semester so I can travel a bit. Willow and Giles have been in London this whole time, and all I’ve seen is the airport. So, I’ll do that, maybe head over to Paris, too. I’m ready to be more than ‘Buffy’s little sister’.”

“You always have been, luv. Just all the others were too blind to see it. I’m so proud of you, and you’re so much smarter than I was at your age. Braver, too.”

“Will you stop?” she admonished. “You’re going to give me a swelled head. And then what’ll I do with all my cute hats?”

He grinned and ruffled her hair. She sighed happily, and leaned on his shoulder. Spike sat back against the wall, just happy to sit with her again.

“You know, I’m amazed Andrew kept his mouth shut. Never took the boy for being able to keep a secret.”

Dawn’s head shot up. “Andrew knew? Oooo, I am so gonna kill that little nerd when I get home…”

“Now, now, pet…it’s not the boy’s fault. I made him promise not to tell. I wanted to share that info on my own time. Apparently, he respected my wishes more than I gave him credit for.”

“Well, I get the importance of keeping a promise, but he still should have told me, if not Buffy. And after I taped Star Trek for him…So, what happened here in L.A. after you decided to stay?”

“Wallowed in my own loneliness for a bit, until a bloke approached me about helping the people, patrolling the streets. He played me, but the sentiment was still the right idea. I had skills I could use, and there were plenty of demons to kill. Even tried to help that crazed Slayer, for all the good it did me.” He held up both hands and wiggled his fingers. “Took weeks before they felt right again.”

“What happened?” Dawn was almost afraid to ask.

“She mistook me for the wanker that had tortured her as a little girl, and cut off my hands. Wolfram and Hart has the best doctors, though, so now they’re as good as new. Not even a scar left.”

“My God, Spike…did you spend your whole time here trying to get killed?” Dawn exclaimed, horrified.

“No! Spent the rest of my time here relatively unscathed, thank you very much. Anyway, somethin’ was always going on, and then Illyria infected Fred, and then we had an Old One to contain before she blew up the entire West Coast…and finally, Peaches shared his plan for the Circle of the Black Thorn, and Wolfram and Hart. We got one last free day to do whatever we wanted, and then it was time to go to work. We each had assignments, and once they were done, we were to meet in the alley there. The Poof figured it was more than likely the Senior Partners would retaliate, if we succeeded. I saved a baby from becoming a ritual sacrifice,” he shared proudly.

“How very noble of you. So, how did facing the demons in that alley compare with the Ubervamps down in the Hellmouth?” Even with being nearly 18, she still loved his stories.

“Whole different kettle of fish, without a bunch of Slayers backing me up, luv. I really thought I wouldn’t be lasting the night, until I saw Vi and Rona’s group. Fire-breathing dragons are a pretty scary sight for a vampire.”

“Hmm. Do you think Charlotte will stick around for a while? She seems pretty nice,” Dawn said, shifting the subject.

“She is. And a very good friend, though I’ve only known her for a day. She has that same quality, like your mum, or Glinda, where you end up telling her things you never planned on. She already got the highlights of my time in Sunnyhell, last night.”

“Right after you rescued her?” she chided him.

“Not right after…later, over Chinese food. I’m telling you, the girl could get anyone to confess with just a look.”

“Ooooo, is the Big Bad afraid she’ll learn all his secrets,” she taunted.

“Pfft! I’m not that easy to crack. It’s not like she’s gettin’ my account numbers, or anythin’,” he huffed.

“Oh, of course…Marshmallow Man…”

He looked upon her in horror. “You swore you’d never use that again!! Pay up, Bit.”

“Aw, man!”

“Deal’s a deal, luv. Cough it up.” Spike put out his hand to accept payment.

She pouted. “My purse is on the counter. You’re going to have to wait, unless you’re ready to run into my sister again.”

He shook his head. “Not tonight. There’s not enough liquid fortitude in the building.”
~+~
Charlotte heard them laughing as she approached the doorway, so she thought that was a good sign. She rapped on the frame to get their attention.

“Hi…sorry to interrupt, but I just wanted to say goodnight. It’s been a long day.”

“Sweet dreams, luv. Doing more apartment hunting tomorrow?”

“Yep. Don’t know when I’ll be back, you know how these things go. It was nice meeting you, Dawn. I’m glad somebody else makes him smile.”

Spike ducked his head, while Dawn just beamed. “Yep. He’s just a fluffy teddy bear inside, with fangs. Don’t let the bed bugs bite!”

“Thanks.” Charlotte waved, and left the two alone again.

She climbed the two flights of stairs, wishing the elevator worked.





You must login (register) to review.