Chapter Twenty-Four
As Buffy pulled the trigger, the creature leapt off the floor, arms outstretched. The bullet, instead of hitting between the eyes, slammed into the centre of its chest. Its triumphant roar turned into a scream of pain that sounded all too human to Buffy’s ears.
The force of the gunshot had thrown her attacker to the side, and Buffy let out a cry of her own as she registered the hands that flew to the creature’s chest. The left hand had no thumb but the right had one made of metal. That meant that the beast was…
“Spike! Oh, no! Spike!”
A bullet couldn’t kill a vampire but it could incapacitate it. Without thinking, Buffy ran to Spike where he lay writhing on the floor. The bullet had torn through his sternum, and she shuddered to think what the exit wound would be like. She reached out with her hand, but when her eyes fell on his face, she stopped. The fangs. How could it be? His lips were raw where the elongated fangs rubbed over them – too large to be contained inside his mouth.
Spike’s eyes flew open and he hissed, baring his teeth. He shuffled backwards, the pain in his chest confused him as it vied with the pain in his head for dominance. Then the hunger inside took over and his hand snaked out, lightning quick, grabbing Buffy by the throat.
Frantically scrabbling at the hand at her throat, Buffy kicked and squirmed in his grasp. Her vision started to grey out, and then human and vampire alike spasmed as the electric shock hit them and she collapsed on top of the now inert Spike.
“What were you thinking?” Cam wheeled himself up behind Mark. “You almost let Seventeen feed. Slayer blood is potent to vampires! We can’t afford him to get stronger.”
“Yeah, well, he’ll be able to eat her soon enough, when we string her up in his cell.”
“No!”
Mark spun round to face him. “What?”
Forcing himself to calm down, Cam said, “I want to study her. Think of what fun we could have testing her…chipping her…”
“Does Maggie—”
“What? Approve? She’ll agree to anything I suggest.” Cam met Mark’s eye coldly. It wasn’t difficult. He remembered now – it was Mark who’d put him in this chair. He waited until the older man dropped eye contact before speaking. “Take them both to the OR. Make sure you strap her down with the vamp proof restraints. I’ll be right there.”
“Okay,” said Mark, looking up.
Cam sneered. “Okay, what?”
Gritting his teeth, Mark managed to spit out a ‘sir’ before assisting to put Buffy and Spike onto the gurneys that has just arrived. He rammed a metal gag into Spike’s mouth and ratcheted it open until Cam thought he’d dislocate the jaw. His heart hammered in his chest as his mother was strapped onto the other gurney and swiftly pushed away. Taking a moment to compose himself, Cam took a deep breath before wheeling himself slowly along in their wake.
*~*~*~*
Craig couldn’t stand being still a moment longer. Dora was sitting at Willow’s bedside waiting for the witch to regain consciousness, leaving Maurice alone in the kitchen. The old soldier looked up as Craig strode to the door.
“Where’re you going, son?”
“I’m…I just...” Craig looked at him helplessly, unable to verbalise what he was feeling.
“Going stir crazy, huh?” Maurice nodded to the chair opposite.
Instead of taking it, Craig paced back and forth. “I can’t take it. I should be there with Mom.” He stood still. “I’m going for a walk, being in here, it’s—”
“I know, lad. Promise me you won’t do anything stupid.”
“I won’t, but I just can’t stay inside.”
Maurice dug in his pocket and tossed some keys to Craig. “Take the quad bike. Blow off a bit of steam, eh?”
Craig caught them with his left hand and grinned. “Really?”
“Really. Just stay off the roads and don’t go too far. Have you got your mobile phone with you?”
“My cell?” Craig patted his jacket pockets. “Yeah, I’ve got it.”
“Call in every fifteen minutes. I’ll call you when Willow wakes up.” He gave Craig the landline number for the cottage and watched as he went outside.
A couple of minutes later, Maurice heard the quad roar into life. Sighing he got up and went to put the kettle on, sure that Dora could do with a cup of tea.
*~*~*~*
Cam baulked when he got to the treatment room where Spike and Buffy were strapped to tables about ten feet apart. The techs had stripped his mother and he averted his eyes from her nakedness. Biting the inside of his lip to try to keep his focus, Cam pushed himself towards her.
Her eyes fluttered open and he scowled at her.
“Cam?” Buffy blinked a couple of times and glanced down at her body. “What are you doing?” She tried and failed to be able to sit up.
“What? You think that kidnapping me and ramming the soul back in me would make me forgive what you did to me?” His voice flat and his eyes hard.
“But—”
“God, you’re so gullible! Even managed to get you to bring me home when I asked.”
Mark loomed over Cam’s shoulder. “Do you want her gagged?”
Buffy’s eyes widened with disbelief, her son had tricked her. They really had turned him into a monster.
“Oh, Cameron,” she whispered.
Ignoring her, Cam glanced up at Mark. “No, I want to hear her scream.”
Mark grinned and Cam turned back to face his mom.
“What are —”
Cam placed his hand over her mouth, effectively silencing her. She stared at him, horrified at what he had become, and then to her surprise he winked. Realisation dawned - Cam was playing the role of what he had been. He must have thought they suspected something. Even with the dangerous position they were all in, Buffy was glad that Cam’s hand was covering her mouth as her lips twitched and tried to stretch into a smile. He’d always had trouble winking; it looked more like a squint really. Cam nodded minutely, pleased that his mom understood what was going on.
Keeping his hand where it was he glanced at Mark, who was standing at Buffy’s feet ogling her naked body. Cam felt his face heat up as rage bubbled within him.
“Get out!” He stared at the couple of techs still in the room. “All of you. I’ve got lots to do and I’d rather do it without distraction.”
“But—” Mark began.
“Are you going to question me for the second time tonight?” Cam snorted derisively. “I’m sure Maggie will be delighted to hear that when I see her later.”
“No, I didn’t mean it like that. I just thought you might need some help.”
Cam stared him down. “You thought wrong.”
After a moment, during which Cam held his breath, Mark turned on his heels and strode out with the techs following in his wake. When the door slammed shut, Cam took his hand from Buffy’s mouth. “Thrash about a bit,” he whispered. “There are cameras in the room.”
Buffy stared at him for a moment and then did as he asked, tugging at her restraints and pleading with him to let her go. Cam wheeled himself to the computer in the corner and tapped his fingers impatiently as he waited to log on. He had no idea how he knew to disrupt the signal to the cameras in this room, but he did. He could only guess that whoever’s knowledge they’d rammed into his head, had done it from time to time to keep some elements of his work from being observed.
“Sorry, Mom,” said Cam when he returned to her side. “They know you took me – I managed to convince Mark that I made you bring me back.”
He began to untie her and flinched at the growls and snarls Spike started to make as he came round. Once Buffy’s arms were free, Cam rolled over to where there were some spare sets of hospital scrubs, selected a small pair of green pants and a top, and pushed himself back to his mom. To his relief, she was bent over reaching to unfasten the straps on her legs and so he was spared another glimpse of her nudity.
“Um…here you are.”
He practically threw them at her and wheeled over to where Spike was lying. As soon as he got close, the vampire turned to stare at him as he struggled to get free.
A soft sob made Buffy look round and she saw her son fighting to keep his composure. She bit back a sob of her own as she took in the feral state that Spike was in. After slipping into the scrubs, Buffy padded barefoot to stand beside Cam.
“His fangs,” she said, resting a hand on her son’s arm.
“I did that to him, but, Mom, I screwed with his mind. I’m not sure that he’s Spike anymore.” Cam’s voice cracked.
As if to reiterate what Cam had said, Spike roared even louder and thrashed frantically.
“Oh, God! Do something.” Buffy turned away, unable to bear it.
“I’ll anaesthetise him,” said Cam.
He whirled the chair around and without hesitation got the required drug from the shelf, then returned to Spike.
“How do you know what to do?” asked Buffy.
“They screwed with my mind too, but instead of wiping it, they gave me knowledge.”
Cam squeezed his eyes shut as the implanted personality tried to take command. The need to study the affect the changes had had on the vampire was almost irresistible.
“Cameron?”
His mother’s voice grounded him and he opened his eyes, smiled weakly at her and painted the liquid on Spike’s abdomen. They remained silent as Spike’s inhuman snarls dwindled to whimpers and finally to nothing.
Cam released the gag that Mark had put in Spike’s mouth. His fingers traced the outline of the elongated fangs.
“I gave him something that made his teeth regenerate faster than they should and it made the fangs like this.” He gently wiped the blood from Spike’s lips.
“Can it be reversed?”
“I have no idea,” said Cam. “But I can clip them back to normal size.”
Buffy flinched with each snap as Cam broke off the fangs so they weren’t much longer than his other vampiric teeth. When he’d finished he gently eased Spike’s mouth closed.
“We need to get him out of here, Mom. Where’s Aunt Willow?”
Shaking her head, Buffy said, “I think she must have become too exhausted to teleport. When she brought me back, it should have been in the room where the souls are stored, but luckily we ended up near to your room so I knew which way to go.”
“We’re not going to make it are we?” said Cam in a small voice.
“Don’t even think that! I came here to get you and I’m not leaving without you!”
“I’m not leaving without Spike. And he’s not going to cooperate with us.”
“Cam, sweetie, you said yourself that it might not be Spike anymore, maybe—”
“Don’t say that! I’ll fix him! I will! I’ve got to or else…or else I’m as bad as they are.” He looked down.
“I just don’t see how we can do it without outside help. They’ll catch us for sure. I can’t let them kill you, Cam, I can’t!” Buffy reached out to him but he spun the chair away and moved to the cupboards lining one wall.
“There’s got to be a way!” He turned to face Buffy. “The computer! I wiped his mind with a program on the computer! If we got that—”
“We might be able to reverse it?”
Cam nodded excitedly. “I’ll tell you where it is!”
“Um…I’m crap with technology remember?”
“Yeah I know, but I just want to steal the whole unit.” Cam scanned the room for a pen, when he found it he wrote directions to the room where he’d worked with Gunn.
Buffy stared at Spike for a second, seeing the lumpy brow made him seem less like her lover and more like the demon he was. She touched the bullet wound and shuddered. God knows what they’d done to him in the time that they had him back. Would staking him be the kindest thing? She held his right hand in both of hers, and in that instant, she knew. She could no more kill Spike as kill one of her boys.
“We’ll fix you,” she whispered, and placed a kiss on his filthy cheek. “I love you, Spike.”
Cam watched his Mom with a lump in his throat. He coughed a couple of times. “Mom, time’s running out.”
“Right!” She smiled at Cam. “I’ll be back.”
He grinned. “Couldn’t resist saying it, huh?”
“Had to be said!” Her smile faded. “If anything goes wr—”
“It won’t.”
“It won’t,” Buffy said. I’m a slayer! I was the Slayer – I can be again. A deep breath later and she jogged out of the room.
As soon as she was gone, Cam crossed to the telephone hanging on the wall, dialled the number that made sure the line was unmonitored - tried not to think of how he knew how to do that - then dialled a number that he knew from heart.
To his delight, it answered on the first ring.
“Hello?” The voice was cautious.
“Craig. It’s me! How’s Aunt Willow?”
“Is it safe to talk on the phone?”
“Yeah, yeah. How is she?”
“Okay, but not teleporting anytime soon,” said Craig. “Is Mom okay? Spike?”
“Look, I can’t stay on long. There’s something I need you to do…”
Craig listened for a while as Cam outlined his plan.
“So, big brother, can you do it?”
There was no hesitation. “I’ll do it. Even if it kills me.”
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