Chapter Eight
The telephone rang shrilly and after six rings with neither boy picking it up, Buffy sighed, set down the book she’d been trying to read and walked out into the hallway to pick it up.
“Hello?”
“Buffy?”
The familiar voice made her heart miss a beat, and she wandered back into the living room and flopped down on the couch.
“Buffy? Are you there?”
“I’m here, Will,” she replied softly.
Silence stretched between them, before Buffy spoke again. “So, how have you been?”
“Good. I’m good,” said Willow awkwardly. “I heard about Spike,” she added, deciding to get to the point.
Buffy sat up and gripped the handset tightly. “Don’t you dare give me the ‘I told you it would end in tears’ lecture!”
“Oh, Buffy. I’m so not going to say that. I’m sorry that we argued and that I never picked up the phone until now.” Her voice hitched. “I’ve missed you, Buff. I’m sorry.”
Tears began to course silently down Buffy’s cheeks and when she spoke her voice was thick with emotion. “You don’t know how glad I am to hear your voice.”
“Are you okay?”
“No, Will. I’m really not. I feel like I’m going crazy. I know you didn’t approve but, God, I loved him so much and he was so good with the boys…”
Willow listened patiently as Buffy told her everything that had happened since they last spoke, years before.
“Come to stay with me. You need to get away from the house.”
“I can’t,” replied Buffy. “I can’t leave the boys.”
“The boys will be fine. Didn’t you just say that Craig is going to be coaching at Cam’s school? They are big enough to take care of themselves for a few days. Please come – you know it makes sense.”
It took Willow another ten minutes of persuasion before Buffy agreed to go for a visit.
“Buffy, are the boys there now?”
“Yeah, upstairs, I think, why?”
“Call them down. I want to talk to them.”
“Okay.”
Buffy yelled up the stairs for them to come down, the two of them appeared jostling each other as they ran towards her. Craig got to the phone first.
“Hey, Aunt Willow,” he said with a smile. His smile faded as his faced blanched and wordlessly he handed the phone to his brother.
Glancing nervously at Craig, Cam quietly said, “Aunt Willow, hi.”
His face also paled and he nodded once and gave the handset to his mother, then the pair raced back up the stairs as if the hounds of hell were after them.
“What on earth did you say to them? They looked scared half to death.”
A deep throaty laugh came down the line. “I just told them that if they got into trouble in any way at all when you come to visit me, that I’d cast a spell that would make their danglies shrivel up and fall off!”
Buffy snorted. “You didn’t?”
She sat on the bottom step and laughed at Willow’s reply. “I did. And I could do it too if I wanted to! That threat works every time, so now you don’t need to worry about them – they’ll be on their best behaviour.”
Hanging up the telephone, Buffy walked upstairs. If she was going to go stay with Willow, she needed to check out her wardrobe pronto. She hadn’t bought any new clothes for so long.
The door to Craig’s room was open and so she tapped on the door as she stepped inside.
“Tell him, Mom!” said Cam as soon as he spotted her. “I said that Aunt Willow didn’t really mean it, but he said she does. He’s just trying to scare me, right?”
Buffy bit the inside of her lip and stared at him seriously. “Do you really want to risk it?”
His eyes widened and he glanced at his brother who had regained his composure and was obviously enjoying Cam’s discomfort.
“Anyhow, there’s nothing to worry about if you behave yourself, is there?” she said. “You’re not planning on getting up to any mischief are you?”
“No, Mom,” said Cam, shaking his head rapidly.
She looked at him for a moment longer, making his heart beat faster. He’d almost cracked the code on the second disk and when he did, he’d have to contact Jerry again. He was pretty sure that that could be construed as mischief.
“The plan is for me to go the day after tomorrow and stay for four days. You don’t mind me going do you? If you do, I can stay…it’s no—”
“Mom. Go and enjoy yourself. We’ll be fine. I’ll look out for Cam.”
Cameron kicked Craig’s shin. “I don’t need looking out for!”
“Boys,” said Buffy in a voice that brooked no argument. “This is not making me feel confident at leaving you.”
“Sorry, Mom,” said Cam, standing up and going over to her. “I hope you have a great time.” He hugged her and then headed for his own room, eager to get back to work on the disks.
Buffy watched him go and then turned to Craig. “You will look out for him, won’t you?”
“Yeah, Mom. I promise. I didn’t say before, but thanks for going to Mr. Munnings about the coaching. I won’t let you down.”
“I know you won’t, honey. Right, now I need to go and start to pack. Thanks for calling Willow.”
“Wasn’t me. It was Cameron’s idea. It was a good one though, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, one of his best.”
Laughing, Craig said, “That’s not saying much!”
“Hey! I heard that!” Cam’s indignant voice came from the next room.
It was nice to hear laughter in the house. It had been devoid of it for too long.
*~*~*~*
Spike was standing outside the house that signified the end of his hunt. His mouth was watering with the need to go in there and rip the throats out of the demons within. Ever since killing the Beast of Dartmoor, Spike found it hard to obey his handler and stay outside. He wanted to give in to the bloodlust and have that warm blood spurt into his mouth. He wanted to come without it being at the whim of some git with a controller.
A twig snapped behind him and he turned, just in time to avoid being staked in the back. The sharply honed wood grazed his arm instead. Even though his long fangs had only been removed a week ago, he snarled and bared his teeth.
Laughing, the creature in front of him vamped out and hissed, curling his lips back from his perfect teeth. “My fangs are bigger than your fangs!” he sang, still chuckling.
Spike didn’t hesitate, he lunged forwards hands clutching the vampire’s shoulders and teeth sinking into his neck. Without his fangs to neatly pierce the vein, Spike settled for tearing out a huge chunk of flesh. Disorientated by the pain, the vampire sank to its knees. Spike’s metal right knee hit the vampire’s chin and the creature went out like a light.
The blood didn’t flow from this body as it had from the panther’s, forcing Spike to worry at the wound and suck deeply to draw it into his mouth. But the lukewarm blood still excited him enough to climax just as the vampire turned to dust. Grinning broadly and panting with the thrill of the kill, Spike didn’t hear his name being called until a short burst of pain ripped through his head.
“Seventeen! Present yourself!” Mark’s voice rang out clearly.
Reluctantly, Spike stood up and walked out of the undergrowth towards his handler.
“What the fuck have you been doing?” snapped Mark as he took in the filthy and bloodied condition of his vampire.
“There was a vampire…” mumbled Spike.
Mark strode up to him and grabbed hold of his chin. “And you just had to help yourself to some blood.”
“It was going to attack me,” said Spike, just as his head jerked to the side from his cheek being slapped.
“Hey, boss,” called out one of the Capture Squad. “Got ourselves a body out here.”
“Come with me,” snarled Mark, not trusting Spike to obey his orders if told to stay.
He gripped the vampire’s elbow tightly, his fingers unerringly pressing on the nerves. Spike groaned and shuffled at the side of his handler, trying to ease the pressure. The wind was blowing away from the body and so Spike didn’t smell the blood until they were almost upon the body of a young girl. She looked no more than eighteen.
Spike hadn’t realised he’d made a sound until Mark shook his arm and glared at him. He licked his lips, as his mouth watered with the intoxicating scent of a recent kill.
“She hasn’t been dead long, boss,” said Derek, the man who’d discovered her. “Man, it nearly ripped her head off. Look at the wounds.”
Mark glanced down and took in the torn flesh where he’d expect to see just four neat puncture marks and he turned to look at Spike again. The vampire was almost fully erect and drool ran from the corner of his mouth.
“Holy crap! Get on the radio. Tell them we’ve got a situation here,” snapped Mark, not taking his eyes off Spike. “Looks like Seventeen has killed a civilian.”
“What?” yelled Spike. “No! No I didn’t! It was a vampire! It was going to stake me!” He tried to back up, but Mark held him firm and then pain like he hadn’t felt in years burst through his brain and everything went black.
“Do you think he’s telling the truth?” asked Derek.
“I dunno – he’s never done this before – well not to humans. Can get a bit aggressive when we use him in training, though. The DNA from the girl will tell us whether he fed from her or not. Once we’ve got her bagged up and him on the transporter, I’ll have a look to see if I can find the dust from the vampire he says he bit.”
Rain began to fall softly and by the time that Mark could go to look around, any trace of dust had long been washed away. He didn’t spot the stake on the ground in the shadows as he turned away and jogged to the transporter.
*~*~*~*
Buffy stepped off the plane at JFK and couldn’t believe she had actually got a few days away from her normal life. She’d never seen Willow’s apartment in New York before as the witch was relocated there by the Council several months after they’d stopped talking to each other.
Dragging her suitcase behind her, Buffy walked out into the arrivals hall and scanned the crowds of expectant faces. She grinned broadly as she spotted Willow, a vision of purples and greens midst the more soberly clad people. As she got closer, Buffy noticed strands of silver running through the shoulder length hair of her friend and with a shock realised that they were getting old.
Why is it a shock? I have a twenty- one year old son!
Shaking her head at the thought, she found herself enveloped in yards of incense smelling fabric as Willow ducked under the rails and hugged her as if her life depended on it.
“Need to breathe, Will,” gasped Buffy.
Willow let her arms fall away from her friend’s but snatched hold of her left hand and gripped it firmly.
“I’m so glad that you came. You’ll love the apartment – can you believe it’s actually got a view of Central Park? And the Council pretends it has no money! They own real estate in prime locations all over the freaking world!”
Buffy could feel the tension in her easing as she listened to her friend babble on as if she were still a teenager.
*~*~*~*
Jerry nearly leapt out of his seat as the cell phone in his jacket pocket began to ring. He cursed his choice of Eye of the Tiger for the ringtone as six pairs of eyes turned to him as one.
“Sorry. Sorry. I have to take this.” He fairly ran out of the conference room and pressed the button to answer it as soon as the door closed behind him.
“Yes?”
“Got the second one done.” Cam’s voice was tremulous.
Shit! What has he found out? “Same place? An hour?”
“Make it thirty minutes,” blurted Cam and then disconnected before Jerry could respond.
One advantage of being the head of your department in the Initiative meant that you seldom had to explain your actions. He poked his head around the door, said simply, “See my PA about rescheduling – something’s come up.” Then walked out of the building.
*~*~*~*
With his heart feeling like it was trying to claw its way out of his chest, Cam slipped out of the school gates and half walked, half ran down the street heading for the coffee shop.
Craig spotted Cam’s escape out of the corner of his eye and set of in pursuit, only to be thwarted by the ringing of the bell for afternoon class. Torn between following his brother and going to do the job that he already knew he loved and didn’t want to screw up, Craig opted for the latter and ran towards the locker room. Cursing his brother under his breath as he did.
*~*~*~*
Jerry spotted Cameron as soon as he got in. The teen was sitting with his back to the room and Jerry could see him shaking before he even got close. He slid into the seat opposite and stifled a gasp when he saw Cameron’s face. If he didn’t know better he’d think that this white faced, twitchy kid with sunken, bloodshot eyes was coming down from a high and starting to suffer withdrawal.
Wordlessly, Cameron pushed a pile of papers towards Jerry.
“Are you al—”
“Read it,” said Cam quietly, leaning towards him. “R-read it first.”
As Jerry watched, a fat tear spilled over from Cam’s left eye and rolled slowly down his cheek, before it dripped onto the table. Tearing his eyes from the boy’s distraught face, Jerry began to skim over the papers.
The first few were full of things he’d read countless times in reports on vampire operatives in the Initiative. They listed the procedures that had been done to Spike. Only they weren’t the things that had been done to him when Jerry had been his handler. The eyes were different specification and there was mention of a sort of bionic knee. Had Cam realised that these were done recently? None of the entries had dates which in itself was odd.
With only a couple of pages left to look over, Jerry looked up at Cam.
“They did it to him,” the boy whispered.
“Yes, I know. But it’s what the Initiative does, Cam. You know that.”
“No,” said Cam, hoarsely. “Not Spike.”
Frowning, Jerry glanced down at the papers again. “I don’t understand?”
“Last page.”
Then he saw it and for a moment he thought he was going to pass out as a wave of nausea hit him.
“Oh, sweet Jesus,” he said slowly.
“There was video footage.” Cameron’s voice almost inaudible. “I saw them attack Craig. They knocked him down and then one of them…one of them…” He put his head in his hands and tried desperately to keep from crying. Taking a deep breath, he lifted his head and managed to continue. “Looked right at the camera and twisted his arm until it snapped like a twig.” Cam buried his face in his hands again, his words were muffled. “They knew what it would do to him. They knew that he’d never recover well enough to play.” He raised his head and met Jerry’s eye. “Why did they do it? What has Craig ever done to deserve that?”
“I don’t know, Cam,” Jerry replied but his blood ran cold as he thought it likely that it was done as punishment. Since Craig had nothing to do with the Initiative, Jerry’s best guess was that it was to make Spike obey them. They’d had the house under surveillance long enough to know how much Spike thought of the boys.
“I’m going to find out,” said Cameron, coldly.
The face that Jerry saw when he looked up was still swollen with tears, but the anguish in the eyes had been replaced by a glint of steel. Cameron was the son of a slayer after all. He’d been brought up to fight for what was right.
“We’ll find out,” said Jerry. “I promise you, that we will.”
[Reviews - 161]
-
Table of Contents [Report This]
Chapter or Story |
Chapter or Story | 
Chapter or Story
Has been viewed 1933 times
- Text Size +
-
Table of Contents [Report This]
Chapter or Story |
Chapter or Story | Chapter or Story - Text Size +
Author's Chapter Notes:
Betad by dawnofme :D
Chapter End Notes:
Please don't lurk! If you're reading I'd appreciate a comment :D Thank you.