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Chapter Two

Weeks went by and Buffy saw nothing of Spike. She avoided Restfield on her nightly patrols, knowing he would keep it clear of newly risen fledglings, but she couldn’t help hoping she would run into him somewhere during her rounds.

She didn’t see him, though. Nor did her slayer senses ever give her the slightest trace of his signature. A signature that she would recognize anywhere, any time. Finally, after several weeks, Anya asked casually one night, “Where has Spike been, Buffy? No one has seen him.”

Dawn turned to Buffy and demanded, “What did you do to him? He never comes by the house anymore. If I didn’t go to the crypt after school, I’d nev—” The teenager stopped, realizing she’d just given out way too much information about her afternoon activities.

To her surprise, her sister didn’t yell at her for going by Spike’s, just asked quietly, “Is he all right?”

“Of course he’s all right,” Dawn huffed. “He just said he doesn’t want to be around you anymore. Any of you,” she added, waving her hand in the air to include the Scoobies. “He has made new friends and he’s spending time with them. I told him he could bring them around too, but he just laughed. I think he’s worried we wouldn’t be nice to Emma, with her being half demon and all. And Clem is...” Dawn happily babbled on, oblivious to the stricken look on her sister’s face.

“We don’t need to meet the bloodsucker’s friends, Dawn,” Xander said firmly. “If he’s gotten over his ridiculous obsession with your sister and moved on, then that’s fine with me.” He turned to look at the quiet Slayer, “I guess you finally convinced him it was never gonna happen between you two, huh, Buff?”

“Yeah,” she responded softly, “I think you could say that.”

“Well, good for you!” he boomed happily, not noticing the looks exchanged between the other women in the room.

“Yes, good for me. I’ve got to go now. Will you bring Dawn home, please, Xander?” Without another word, Buffy leapt to her feet and bolted out the door, running with no destination but escape. Lack of oxygen finally slowed her down and found herself in a part of Sunnydale she hadn’t even known existed. Her Slayer senses were going off and she looked hard at the people going in and out of the shops and buildings. With a gasp, she realized most of them were demons of one sort or another.

She saw two just like Clem, and several others that appeared harmless, if not human. Just as she turned to find her way home, the door of a club burst open and a laughing group came out, led by the wrinkly demon himself. Close behind were several obviously female demons and one very pretty woman with pointy ears and a long tail trailing behind her short skirt. Holding the door for the woman, who looked back at him and smiled gratefully, was a well-built blond man who smiled back at her as he let it shut behind him.

Buffy ducked behind a car the instant she recognized Spike. She watched the little group clearly saying good night and splitting up to go in different directions. Her vision blurred with tears as she watched the small woman walk off with Spike’s hand on her elbow as he guided her to his old Desoto and held the door for her. Long after the street was empty, she continued to crouch behind the car, clutching her stomach and gasping for air.

She made no attempt to analyze what she was feeling. She wasn’t stupid. Buffy recognized jealously when it hit her in the solar plexus, she just didn’t seem to be able to overcome the physical effects well enough to stand up straight. After long minutes of trying to smother both the emotional and the physical pain, she forced herself to her feet. Clenching her fists at her sides, she put her chin up and began trudging home.

If anyone noticed Buffy’s bitchier-than-usual behavior and attitude over the next few weeks, they didn’t mention it. She didn’t hang around her friends or sister any more than she absolutely had to, instead staying in her room playing Sarah MacLachlan CD’s and refusing to go out except to patrol. The vampire population of Sunnydale had never been smaller. The Slayer was taking her job very seriously, and she didn’t go home at night until she had dusted every undead creature she could find.

~~~~~~~

Dawn was so used to not seeing much of Buffy that it was well into the afternoon when she suddenly realized that she hadn’t seen her sister for two days. She went into Buffy’s room and found that the bed had not been slept in and there was no sign that Buffy had been there recently.

Fear seized her throat and she ran to the only person she could think of to help her. Bursting into Spike’s crypt without knocking, she was already in frightened tears when the startled vampire looked up from his book.

“Dawn! What’s wrong, Bit? Stop crying, love, and tell me what’s wrong.”

“It’s Buffy,” she hiccupped, regaining control of herself. “I haven’t seen her in two days. She hasn’t slept in her bed and I’m such a bad sister, I didn’t even notice until just now. My sister is missing and I didn’t even notice!” She started crying again and the vampire sighed and pulled her close, rubbing her back soothingly.

“Stop it now, Bit. You’re not a bad sister. Buffy stays out all night sometimes. You know that.” He cringed mentally, wondering if his insistence that Buffy stay the night occasionally had ever caused this kind of panic in her little sister.

“She’s always home by daylight. And she always stays awake until I leave for school so I know she’s all right. She hasn’t been home at all. Not yesterday, not last night, and not today. Spike, I’m scared.” Her big blue eyes fastened on his pleadingly. “I know you’re mad at her about something. That you don’t... don’t love her anymore, but, please, will you help me find her? Please?”

“Where’d you get the idea I don’t love your sis anymore? Mad at her, yeah. Wouldn’t deny it if I could, but I don’t stop loving that easily, Niblet. That’s like saying I wouldn’t love you any more just cause I caught you going through my personal things.” He stroked her silky hair softly, smiling to himself at her guilty start.

“She thinks you don’t,” she muttered. “She told Xander you didn’t. I heard her.”

“Stupid bint,” he growled under his breath.

“And you’ve got a girlfriend,” she added sternly. “I’ve met her!”

“I don’t have a girlfriend, Dawn,” he said, rolling his eyes. “Emma is a nice bird, but she’s just keeping me company so I don’t get myself into too much trouble when I go out drinkin’. She’s doing it as a favor to Clem. He’s her cousin and he asked her to help him keep me from gettin’ myself dusted.”

Dawn pulled back from him and asked softly, “So, you’ll help me find her, then?”

“I’d help you find her even if I didn’t love her, Bit. You have to know that. I don’t suppose you have any idea where she was last?”

Dawn shook her head. “No, she goes out slaying by herself and comes home and shuts herself in her room and plays stupid music. She never says where she’s going. But you can find her, can’t you?” she asked anxiously.

“I’ll find her, pet. Now you hustle home before dark, just in case she comes back.”

“Ok. Thanks, Spike.” She turned to go out the door, then stopped with her hand on it. “I’m glad you still love Buffy,” she said without looking at him. “I think she misses you.”

The door closed behind her and Spike began pacing the floor impatiently, muttering to himself. “Stupid, stupid bint. Going out alone. She could have at least taken the whelp with her.”

Deciding he couldn’t wait for the sun to go down, Spike dropped down to the lower level and headed off through the sewers, stopping occasionally to sniff the air for any trace of the Slayer. He’d tried to be confident for Dawn, but now that she wasn’t around, he allowed the worry to surface.

Finding Buffy – he refused to consider the thought that he might be looking for Buffy’s body – was not going to be easy. He started with the logical places, popping up as close as he could get to the local cemeteries and sniffing the air for any sign of her. As soon as the sun was below the horizon, he came up and began to cover ground quickly and systematically. When he found no trace of her in any of the graveyards, he stopped by Willie’s to see if she’d been there or if anyone had seen her.

With a sneer, a drunken Cherola demon told him his “slayer girlfriend” was chasing a vamp gang into an alley the last time he saw her. He laughed about the Slayer’s venture into the warehouse district. “Maybe she’s decided to change her luck,” he leered, just before Spike pulled his head off and rolled it across the floor.

He ignored Willie’s protests about the mess on his floor and bolted out the door, heading for the industrial part of Sunnydale. He prowled up and down the streets and alleys, seeking any trace of Buffy and trying to smother his growing fear. Telling himself there was no way she was killed by an ordinary vamp, he continued his frantic search, jumping up to peer in windows and bending to look into basements.

Suddenly, the faintest trace of a scent came to him and he vamped out, the better to follow it, snarling when he found blood droplets leading down an alley and into a ruined building. His stomach clenched when he recognized the building into which they led.

“Oh, Buffy, love, what have you done?”

Throwing caution away, he burst through the open door and looked around desperately. The first thing he noticed was the complete absence of a floor. The building had crumbled even more since the night he and the Slayer had begun its destruction with their violent foreplay. A small ledge around the edge of room was all that was left to stand on.

He entered slowly, edging around the room until he was sure there was nothing and no one there. He became very still and listened for a full minute until he heard the very faintest of heartbeats.

Following his ears, he dropped carefully into the debris-filled basement and quickly looked around. He didn’t see Buffy, but he could still hear the very faint heartbeat. It seemed to be coming from a pile of broken wall supports in the center of the room and he approached cautiously, not wanting to cause any more to fall.

When he determined that the heartbeat was coming from under the pile, as was the scent of Buffy’s blood, he abandoned caution and began flinging pieces of wood off as fast as he could, talking to her the whole time.

“Hang on there, love. I’m coming. Don’t you die on us again, you hear me? Can’t leave the Bit alone, pet. She’s worried about you. Don’t know what the hell you were doing here. Bloody stupid, if you ask me. ‘Bout as stupid as thinking I don’t love you anymore. Could never stop loving you, Buffy. Don’t you know me better than that? Come on, Slayer. Say something. Give me a sign. Tell me you’re alright. Bloody stupid woman...”

“If I was all right, I wouldn’t be here, you moron,” came the faint whisper from under a large beam.

Spike felt tears prickling his eyes when he heard her strained voice coming from under the beam. He quickly moved everything else off her, until all that was left was the heavy beam lying across her upper body and effectively pinning her shoulders and arms in such a way that even if she hadn’t lost a lot of blood, she wouldn’t have been able to get enough leverage to push it off.

Her face was covered with dirt and dust, blood was crusted above one eye and her hair was gray with drywall dust. Her eyes were barely focusing as she struggled to maintain consciousness.

“Hi, Cutie,” he said softly, gently pushing her hair out of her face.

“You found me,” she whispered through cracked lips.

“I did,” he agreed as he examined the beam for the best handhold. Buffy didn’t speak again and her heartbeat slowed and became even fainter as she struggled for breath. With a frightened roar, the vampire picked up the entire beam and threw it across the room.

While the remaining building creaked and moved around them, he scooped her up and ran to the last staircase just in time to watch it come crashing down. Using his supernatural strength in ways he rarely did, he bent his knees and jumped up onto the tiny ledge of the doorway. Without swaying or struggling for balance, he jumped out the door and sprinted up the alley, getting safely away before the entire building fell in on itself.

He didn’t slow when he left the alley, but continued to run, holding her light body against his chest and heading straight for Sunnydale Hospital’s busy emergency room.

Two hours later, when he was finally allowed into the ICU for five minutes, he crouched beside her bed, afraid to touch her for all the tubes and wires. He thought she was asleep, but her lids fluttered and he was soon looking into her tear-filled eyes.

“I thought I was going to die. Again,” she said softly.

“Not on my watch, pet,” he growled back. “Not going through that again. You die; I dust. Promise or no promise, the Bit will have to deal.”

“Does that mean you still love me?”

He wanted to snort with derision at the stupid question, but the fear in her eyes told him she was serious.

“How could you think I didn’t? Bloody hell, Buffy, you think I could stop loving you just like that?”

“But you were so mad at me...”

“Yes, I was. Still am, truth be told. Wished to hell I could stop loving you. Life would be much less painful. But I can’t, Buffy. God help us both, I can’t.”

The nurse put her head in and told him his time was up. He stood up.

“I’ll go tell the Bit where you are. You make good use of that yummy O pos they’re pourin’ into you and get that slayer healing going,” he said, leaning in for a second as if to touch her, then shaking himself and backing away.

“Spike?”

“Yes, love?”

“Thank you. For saving me.”

“Anything else just wasn’t an option.” He walked out without looking back.



By the weekend, Buffy was not only out of the hospital, but almost completely healed and anxious to resume slaying. She was disappointed that Spike hadn’t come by the house in the evenings to see how she was doing, but Dawn assured her he asked about her every day.

“Buffy, he just really doesn’t want to be here where everybody calls him evil and disgusting. I don’t blame him. He has a good time when he’s with Clem and his new friends.”

Buffy clenched her teeth to keep herself from snapping at her sister. Even though Dawn had found a way to work it into the conversation that Emma was not a girlfriend, Buffy still didn’t like the idea of Spike spending so much time in the company of the cute little demon.

She asked Dawn to give Spike a letter for her, making sure it was sealed tightly and threatening her with grounding until she was fifty if she tried to peek. The teenager rolled her eyes and stuffed it in her backpack, promising to drop it off at Spike’s crypt on her way home from school.

When she came home late in the afternoon, Buffy was waiting for her in the living room.

“Well?” she demanded. “What did he say?”

“Sheesh!” Dawn tossed her head. “Why don’t you guys get cell phones? Here.” She tossed the envelope back, indicating the folded paper inside.

Buffy took it out carefully, turning her back to run her eyes over his reply. When she finished reading, her eyes lit up and she ran upstairs to dress. Dawn shook her head and went into the kitchen talking to herself.

“Why didn’t she just ask me to tell him she wanted to go to the Bronze tonight?”





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