Chapter 10
Spike emerges from the dim hall, which seemed hushed but had as much susurrating background noise as a beach, into a brightly lit stark white interior. Computer screens on worktables line the walls and shackled vamps sit typing busily. You'd have to shackle most vampires to make them do data entry instead of killing and partying, Spike reckons. He prefers a simpler approach. He just kills a great big computer nerd and let him do all day what he likes best, namely sit behind the computer. Trick looks around proudly at the modern conveniences.
"Committing Internet crime?" Slayer says, a sneer in her voice.
Mr. Trick ignores her completely. Spike decides to take pity on the fuming Slayer and says, "Nice set-up. Yours?"
Mr. Trick smiles a wide toothy smile and his gold incisor keeps flickering as he talks enthusiastically. "I'm making so much money doing my thing on the web, this setup and everything be legal now. The big man don't get that these are not the old days, when you could get away with just inspiring terror. Government could just drop a bomb on this factory, we'd go poof. But it's legal, see, so they won't. The big man can get his mind around cars, just about, but he don't like electricity, never mind the Internet. Works just fine."
The pug faced vamp on the right gives him the finger behind his back. It makes her chains rattle and Mr. Trick is on her in a flash. "I don't like insubordination," he says silkily, "fucks up productivity."
Spike doesn't see how he does it, but the vamp falls apart silently and dust rains on the keyboard.
"Damn," Mr. Trick says. "Vampire dust is hell on keyboards. I go through keyboards something terrible. Call up a replacement from the holding tank," he instructs one of the other data vamps. "Make it quick."
Spike likes this Mr. Trick. He should get one of his own, let him run Sunnydale operations. He follows the vampire through another door. The cell into which he emerges closes in on him like a damp pillow clamped across his mouth, stiflingly soft and clammy. A middle aged, dun haired man sits at a small table, writing with a quill on a thick stack of parchment sheets. One of his legs is shackled to the wall with a long chain. Kakistos is really big with the shackling, he must be so popular with his workforce.
Mr. Trick greets the man by cuffing him sharply about the ears. "Got a customer for you, my man. Sit up straight and listen good. Kakistos want what Mr. the Bloody is offering so you better cough up the magic pronto this time."
The man looks up slowly, ignoring his bleeding ear. Buffy guffaws softly near Spike's ear. The magician looks right past him, sending a wide mirthless smile at the Slayer. They know each other? The wariness and enmity they broadcast reassure him a little. Even if they’re both human, they don't seem to feel like natural allies. Good. He doesn't want the Slayer to do a Bounty on him.
The Slayer's body language has been all over the place anyway since they fucked each other senseless in that motel room. One moment she's sending out come closer, fuck me vibes, the next inute she's all cold eye, I'm about to stake you, you horrible creep. Confuses a bloke alright. Sometimes a girl means no, apparently, even when she's throwing him on the bed and riding him like he's Black Beauty. Someone gave her quite an education. Never mind about that, they only need each other as long as their quest lasts.
"Mr. The Bloody. Ethan Rayne. What can I do for you?" the Magician says.
Spike grabs the other chair and sits down without waiting for an invitation. "Call me Spike. I need to find out how operate a magic device. Can you help me with that?"
Ethan shrugs and raises and lowers his sandy eyebrows. "Probably. Should I want to?"
Mr. Trick shakes his head. "Dudes, don't even try to make deals with each other. You be surrounded by hundreds of mean hungry vampires, there is no point. I'll even leave, I'm so not scared of whatever you can cook up."
He leaves. Ethan sighs. "He's right. Janus knows I'm more than interested in improving my situation, but I haven't managed to wangle my way out of this over the past five years , so….Let's get down to business."
Spike leans back and balances his fingertips together so he can think better. "I need to open a transdimensional portal to a specific dimension. I have a device that's capable of it but I don't know how to work it."
Ethan nods. "Show me."
Buffy nods at Spike. He doesn't need her permission, thank you. He gets the plastic bag from his duster and unwraps the portal opener.
Ethan's eyes narrow and he picks up the shiny bracelet with his feathered pen. "Interesting. I can make this work. Which dimension do you want and what do you want to do in there?"
Spike's eyes meet Buffy's briefly. "Slayer here's been exchanged with someone else; she's from that dimension originally. She wants to get back."
"Really? Well, it is true that you can't just travel between dimensions, there is always an exchange. The exchange can be controlled, but if you don't do that, the universe grabs the closest equivalent from that dimension automatically."
Spike looks thoughtful. "So if I wanted to travel to another dimension, what would happen?"
"If there was a Spike or something like it in the target dimension, he or it would be exchanged for you and end up at your starting point."
"And if the Spike in that dimension was dead, for example? As in dust in the wind?"
Ethan's brow furrows and he thinks for a few moments. "Tricky. An undefined situation. You could end up in hell, or in limbo, or end up not existing at all, depending on what happens to vampires in that universe. In that case, you'd better to do a special spell to define something else to exchange. Your weight in steer manure or something like that."
"Very funny, Rayne."
"Not really. You must appease the Gatekeeper of the gate you're going through. He's the one that keeps track of the balance. There's one for every portal between the universes, an infinite amount of them. If you weren't a vamp, a drop of blood would do it. If you don't keep him happy, he'll go for your soul."
"What does a gatekeeper look like?" Spike asks idly, watching Ethan's hands arrange spell supplies deftly and competently.
"Great big black toad-like things, voice like an avalanche."
"Oops," the Slayer squeaks.
Yeah, he was thinking something along those same lines. Great. They pissed off a gatekeeper? He tells Ethan about their Iowa encounter.
Ethan makes an amused noise. "You messed with a gatekeeper? Good job. I don't know if they are in communication with each other, but if I were you I wouldn't travel through the interstices more than strictly necessary… "
"Why don't you start doing the magic? Return the Slayer here to her dimension, and let me go along."
"What? No way. You think I'm going to let you loose in my dimension? Forget it," Buffy says firmly.
He can hear her heart pounding away. What is she thinking, silly bint, that it's a declaration of eternal love?
Ethan grins that too wide grin again. It doesn't reach his dark deep eyes. "Miss Summers, so nice to meet you again. I'm a little confused here. Who am I doing this deal with? You or your charming swain?"
The Slayer blushes. Blushing is good, all that lovely blood flooding about. Would it taste any different if he were to bite her pink cheeks right now? More heated, full of excited hormones?
"We're equal partners in this venture, Ethan. And it's Ms. Summers."
Ethan inclines his head graciously. "Do forgive me; I forget my American manners, surrounded as I am by people from other eras. Many of whom, by the way, were colleagues of yours once, now sadly limited in their freedom."
Spike gets it, of course, and he hopes the Slayer won't, but then her eyes snap open wide and she goes after the words like a dog after a bone. "Colleagues? What do you mean? Slayers?" He sees her get it. "All the shackled vamps are former Slayers?"
Spike tries to count how many he saw. Five hundred feet of factory wall, a vamp every six or seven feet? The mind boggles.
Rayne is obviously enjoying the Slayer's discomfiture and grins like a shark, and not the vegetarian kind either. "I bet my beloved Rupert and his council mates never saw fit to tell you just how many Slayers ended up in Kakistos' court, did they, Buffy?"
The Slayer clenches her teeth and the grinding is so loud even the magician must be able to hear it. She jerks her head at Spike. She wants to talk. Spike gets up and starts towards her. He doubles back and takes the device out of Ethan's hands and sees surprised approval on her face. Bugger it, he knows perfectly well he's no slouch, but it is annoying that it surprises the Slayer so. The chip thing must have ruined the other's brains or something.
"Spike," the Slayer begins tightly. "We have to do something. Free Faith and those poor Slayers. We can't allow that creep to torture them and…"
Spike casts his eyes to heaven. "Slayer, for God's sake, they are vampires, and have been for fuck knows how long. There's no bleeding point in doing anything for them. They won't thank you for it, they'll just kill you."
"Ethan could free them!"
"You'd free a cartload of psychotic vampires? Are you out of your mind?"
"No, you're right, we should kill them, that would be the kindest thing."
Is that what she thinks? That being a vampire is torture? "Wanna give me a merciful death, Slayer?" He extends his arms and crooks his head aside. "Go on then. Why wait?"
The Slayer looks cornered. "Not you. You're…never mind. Don't sidetrack me. We'll promise to free him, if he programs the device and frees all the ex-Slayers. I'm betting they'll go straight for Kakistos and give us an opportunity to escape in the confusion."
Spike whistles. She's on to something. "Slayer, I take it all back. This is just nifty. But, um, what about the magician? Got the impression you were old enemies. Or does he get a free pass because he's human?"
She shrugs. "Evil or not, in my book he ranks way below Kakistos on the evil scale. Win some, lose some. Should he happen to come to some harm between here and the door, I won't shed a tear about it."
"Right. Let's do it. Device, protection spell for me, free the Slayer vamps."
"Spike, you're not coming with me…" the Slayer starts, but gives up halfway.
He'll persuade her yet, but they have to get some more pressing concerns to take care of first.
"Ethan," the Slayer says without preamble, "could your magic dissolve your chains?"
Ethan flicks his fingers and the chains disappear. He flicks them again and they're back. He crosses his arms and looks at them with a superior little half smile. "Not a problem. It's the after I'm more concerned about."
Spike winks at Buffy. "Neat little trick, Mr. Sunshine. Can you do the same to a specific set of chains in the factory?"
Ethan leans back. "Possibly. My question always is, what are the benefits to me?"
The Slayer leans forward aggressively into his face. "How about your life and your freedom? That's about as much as you can expect!"
Spike sighs inwardly and has to exercise some prime self-control not to react. Will the fucking Slayer please stop interfering with his delicately balanced negotiations? She has no concept of the give and take that can exist between opponents. It could be vital to allow the magician to save some face, but what does she do? Spell it out brutally and deliver some none too subtle threats. He never had this with Dru; whatever she said could always be written off to her insanity, if it happened to make sense, so much the better.
"What she says, Mr. Magoo. You create the confusion, we help you get out, for the rest you're on your own."
Ethan nods. "Fair enough. But how will I know Ms. Summers is not going to wreak vengeance for my past trespasses?"
"Slayer?"
The Slayer shrugs. "This universe is not my responsibility. I'll leave you to the Slayer in residence."
"All right. I'll do it. Hand me the device."
Spike gets the bag from his duster again, but the Slayer stops him. "Ethan, lemme tell you about your present fate in my world," she says, and her voice is as hard and clear as glass. "You're in a government prison. No one knows you're there and you'll never get out. Just a little hint not to go gallivanting off on your own through the multiverse."
"I'm an honorable man," Ethan says, but doesn't even bother to put any sincerity in his voice. "I'd never do something like that. Anyway, we can't activate it in here. The whole building is shielded and also impenetrable to magic because of all the magnetic fields. Computer cabling."
"Just so we know that," Spike says and goes to stand close behind Ethan while he works. He starts making a protective circle from little pots and vials he gets from cupboards all over the room and starts scribbling spells, muttering multi-syllabic words under his breath.
The Slayer thinks this is the prefect moment to continue haranguing him. "And you were the one who sold Faith to Kakistos, you disgusting evil…monster! That she's a Slayer doesn't make it less horrible, it makes it worse. She served the Good. She's an innocent victim, Spike."
"So were we all, once. Remember? All vampires started out as human beings, not just the ex-Slayers. Doesn't stop them from being monsters, doesn't stop you from killing them. Is as it ought to be."
"That's sounds really logical in theory, but it doesn't feel like that! Faith can't be a number to me, she's no faceless vamp!. If you know people, you should treat them differently, because they make you feel different."
What is she beating herself up for? There is no shame in living by your feelings and instinct.
"Did you treat the other Buffy like that?" she asks.
"Please, love, all that yammering and clanking of chains all day long would ruin my enjoyment of life. Death, whatever. She's my minion, and as long as she minds me, she gets treated all right."
"Minds you?" the Slayer hisses. "You mean does exactly as your tell her to."
"Well, yeah! What are minions for?"
What the hell did she expect? He grabs her by the upper arms and presses her into the side wall of the little room to contain all that useless thinking. She's sending out such a deliciously mixed cocktail of signals, it's enough to make a man's head spin. The tears that glisten in her big eyes and her heaving little bosom tell him she's prey, vulnerable, her fists tell him there's power here, be wary, and the press of her springy belly against his cock is pure sex. What's he to choose? He wants them all, her blood, her pussy and her fists. He wraps a big hank of her long hair around his hand and bends over for a kiss.
Ethan coughs politely. "If you two can spare a moment of your time, the device is quite ready."
Spike eyes it suspiciously. "Ready to transport the Slayer and me to her dimension, complete with protection spell for me?"
Ethan nods. Both he and Ethan ignore the protesting sounds from the Slayer.
"How do we activate it?"
"You both have to grab it at the same time."
"From what I heard," the Slayer says, "I won't get to meet my counterpart? She'll be flung right back to this dimension?"
"That's right."
The Slayer looks disappointed. "Too bad."
"What were you planning, love? Staking or reforming?"
"Ha ha. Staking, of course."
"What? You weren't gonna try and convince her to get herself a soul? You'd make a poor missionary, pet."
She always rises to his bait, so cute. Spike takes the transdimensional device and puts it away carefully.
Ethan mouths some words and they can hear a sudden ringing sound from the big hall; all the chains tumbling to the floor at once. There is a moment of petrified silence and Spike notices with chagrin that he's holding his breath in anticipation, like a human being.
Then a single sobbing scream rents the air. As it reaches crescendo a thousand other voices join in and for a second it's like attending a pop concert, all these female voices screeching on one high note. Then the unity breaks and a random caterwauling and thudding starts up.
"Okay, people, now's the time. Run."
The Slayer and him grab Rayne under his arms and push through the door, through the stunned ranks of the data entry vampires and into the dim confusion of the hall. It's all milling bodies and waving lights. One vampire has become a living torch and runs shrieking into a huddle of other vamps, setting them on fire. This is all good. No one will be paying attention to them.
He meets the Slayers eyes and knows they'll take off at the exact same second.
They are running through the hall. Screams echo through the big space, the scent of old blood tickles his nose. Rayne hangs like a rag doll between them; they're running faster than any ordinary human could. Everything is confusion, no one is minding them at all. He rips off a skull-like head from one of the freed vamps. It's like tearing off wet toilet paper. He runs through a spray of blood like a kid running through a sprinkler and licks his lips in appreciation. Only vamp blood, but better than that pig swill the Slayer made him drink.
The Slayer is glorious as she runs beside him. Her power and determination arc around her like shining wings. She twists and wends between the milling vampires, now kicking, then thrusting out with her stake without breaking stride. Her face is open and accepting, seeing all, no shame now, she and her power are one. She's beautiful like this, a queen. His heart yearns towards her, should he throw it at her feet?
They explode out into the brightly lit night and slow down. Ethan doubles over coughing, and then stumbles on towards one of the ridiculous limos.
"Come," Spike pants to the Slayer, and pulls at her hand.
Her wings are folding back in, she's pulling all that gorgeous energy back inside, making herself small, crossing her arms before her heart. He aches to see her withdraw her radiance and go dark and dull. Her Slayerness makes an almost palpable wall between them, and yet it is the only thing that connects them, makes them equals, where ordinarily just the ephemeral thread between hunter and hunted would span briefly. He toys with the thought of killing her now, at the apex of her powers, which might make it different from when he killed her the first time. But no, he knows what the very essence of her glorious nature would turn into, that her holy conviction would turn inside out and become warped and rancid. A joyless love of torture and submission into eternity. Some people are not made to be vampires and can ruin even the limitless freedom of that existence with their self-made shackles.
She wrenches loose and stands firm beside the door, stake ready. "No. We should kill as many as we can. Torch the place."
"With what? We have to go, we could do it right here, let's just move, Slayer! Let these creeps kill each other, none of our business."
Her face is so small and tight. "I have to kill the Slayers, Spike. They deserve to die. I owe it to them. I owe it to Faith. "
She sets her mouth and turns back. "I have to free Faith. I'm going back in."
Chapter 11
Buffy is just about to hurl herself back through the factory entrance when a small form in game face bursts out of the door. It halts and swivels its head toward Buffy like a snake, as if there is no human spine in there at all. The face melts with a crunching sound and a grunt from the vamp. Buffy looks in vampire Faith's haunted dark eyes and she's paralyzed. This Faith must have been killed pretty soon after arriving in Sunnydale, hadn't even had time to choose the Mayor and turn evil. She was more innocent than the living Faith she knows. She was a victim. How can she kill her?
Faith shifts back and forth from game face another time and says with a big grin full of fangs, "Howya doing, B.? Any last words?"
Buffy opens her mouth to answer, although she has no clue what she's gonna say. Before anything can come out Faith turns gray and disintegrates before her eyes.
Spike looks at her levelly, stake still held at the height of Faith's heart. "Thought I'd spare you the decision, love."
What should she say? Thanks? He's the one she blames for selling Faith to Kakistos and at the same time she knows she's being unfair. Faith never stood a chance against Kakistos without her, Spike or no Spike. Still, her grief feels muted. Things that happen here don't really matter because this is not home. This was not the real Faith.
Spike gently takes her hand and tugs her towards where the truck was parked. He is not Spike. She shakes her head to get rid of the fuzziness and looks back to where Faith's dust speckles the concrete.
"Bugger! It’s gone!" Spike says. She bumps into him because he's stopped. "We'll take a limo then. Always fancied me a ride in a hearse, got cheated of that when I died."
"Spike. Help me burn down this building. We can't afford to leave Kakistos alive."
Spike hesitates only a second. He nods at her and streaks off in a burst of vampire speed. It seems in direct opposition to his assent until Buffy sees him return with a kicking and struggling Ethan, carried by the scruff of his neck.
"Calm down, mate. You can't afford to let Kakistos on your tail either. Do a fire spell or something," Spike says.
Ethan straightens himself and brushes down his black star-spangled coat. "I told you, the building is impenetrable to magic. Cabling, remember? Magnetic fields?"
Spike paces up and down a few paces. "Think of something else. Collapse it? Trap them inside until the sun comes up?"
Ethan shakes his head. "Won't kill them. Tunnels."
Spike glances at the cars. "There's gas in the tanks. Let's get that out and douse the building."
Ethan gets a crafty look on his face. "I've got it. The building is protected against magic and people entering, but not against inanimate objects. We'll put the cars on fie, drive the cars to the gate and jump out. They'll explode Inside, in a purely mundane way. We've got a dozen limos here, ought to do the trick."
"Brilliant. Save two for our own getaway, though. Alright, go make the other two ready. Slayer and me'll drive them up and jump out, won't harm us."
Ethan's very quick and efficient when his safety is at stake. In no time the first two cars are ready for take off. Buffy drives the first one up to the gate at a modest thirty miles per hour, and jumps out at the last minute. She's calculated it a little too narrowly and almost crashes in to the wall. Spike falls on top of her and takes the time for a quick grope before he rolls off and hastens to the next car. Buffy's determined not to be out-speeded by him and races after. The first explosion rolls out of the gate, closely followed by the second. A few vamps try to storm out but Buffy gets the first one and sees Spike hurry after the other two.
Another two explosions, and two more. It gets to be routine, drive up, jump out, roll, stand up, hop into the next one. When Buffy's heard explosion nine she gets up to find only one limousine left. The other one is already accelerating in the direction of the gate. Ethan's understandably hasty to leave here and so should they. Now they can think about getting away.
She's just in time to see Spike rip out the door of the last car. She hurries to the other side and opens the passenger door. The dashboard covers are ripped open and Spike's fiddling with a piece of wire. Hotwiring, Buffy knows this from TV.
When they've plowed through the goons and the gate and are safely on the road again, Buffy puts her hand briefly on Spike's arm.
"Thanks," She says. For Faith, she means. It's important to say it to him, because she so often hasn’t said it to the other Spike.
"I know," he nods but keeps his eyes on the road.
"We could use the portal opener right now," Buffy says. "Why wait?"
"Don’t like to do it from a moving vehicle, Slayer. Also, we can't be sure if the Amazing Rayne didn't try and double cross us. Don't trust too much on other people's skills. Maybe it'll work, maybe it won’t. We best be gone. Might even think of stocking up on flammable goods in case we meet a Gatekeeper in the portal and it's as cranky as the one we saw in Iowa."
"Okay. Let's drive to my house? Or where it is in my dimension? If we cross near there we'd be safe after the transition. And I don't think the vampires are gonna be organized enough to follow us there."
"Yeah, vampires are the least of our concerns now, I reckon."
Buffy can't keep herself from checking the rearview mirror many times, though. She sees that Spike can't either. No driverless vehicles show up behind them and after ten minutes or so she relaxes in her seat and breathes out deeply. The moment she does the next hurdle pops up in her brain, grinning like a tumble doll on crack. Spike intends to cross with her into her home dimension for reasons he's kept secret so far. How do you solve a problem like Spike? The answer according to Giles would be devastatingly simple, but as she pleaded about Faith a few minutes ago, once you know a person the rules change.
It's like one of those decision trees. Staking: when impossible, go to box X: prevent him from entering your dimension. When impossible, go to box Y; please contact one of our employees at the following number. Only there is no one to call, the buck always stops with her. A leaden feeling descends. She remembers it well; she's been wearing it with varying degrees of confidence for years. Now that it’s back she can be grateful for the days of reprieve, having a lighthearted adventure with a trusty companion.
She tries to sigh the heaviness away. She needs more data.
"You sound a little blue, pet. What are you thinking of? Feeling sad because this is nearly goodbye?"
Admitting that would be crossing a line she doesn’t want to cross.
"I'll miss you, Slayer. Never thought I'd say that. Started feeling different about you."
Okay, so two minutes ago she thought this would be exactly what she wanted to hear, but now that he's almost saying it, she dances away from the feeling like a skittish horse. No another vampire lover. Not the unsouled version.
"Spike, you're a great warrior and the perfect partner on an adventure like this, but I don't...I mean…"
The amused glint in his eyes makes her stop. "I'm not the guy you love? I got that, pet. You're not the woman I love either. There's the possibility - if we continued to work together - feelings might develop. But we won't. No hard feelings?"
"No, no, God, no. I'm glad we agree on this. I was afraid…" Buffy hesitates.
"You thought, me being Spike and all, I'd fall for you head over heals like my departed look-alike? Yeah, well, let's face it, I'm the real thing. Not a muzzled caged sad sort of vampire but the real Big Bad. I eat your kind, and I'm not planning on changing that. Wouldn't go down too well with you, I wager."
"You wouldn't, like, go to Africa to get a soul?"
"Emphatically, no."
Spike emphasizes his words with one of his sweeping gestures, making the limo swerve a bit. Limo swerves go on longer than ordinary car swerves, Buffy can feel it in her belly.
"Okay. I'm glad that's settled, then." Buffy says.
"Yeah, me too."
"Yeah."
The silence returns. Spike drives on. He fishes a cigarette out of his pocket and lights it one-handedly. Buffy wishes that the limo had a radio or CD-player but there's a gaping hole where radios normally are. Maybe Kakistos couldn’t get his head around radios either. She doesn’t want to look at Spike again, but she doesn't want to close her eyes and fall asleep either. She's done enough sleeping the past few days, and the adventure part is almost ending. Her neighborhood is approaching, and with the device in their possession, it won’t be too hard to get back to her own dimension or universe.
She sees his right hand lying motionless on his jeaned leg. She's never looked really closely at Spike's hands before, and they are pretty big for a man as modestly sized as he is. Are his feet big too? There was only one thing she'd cared to measure in the old days, but it's embarrassing that she doesn’t know this already. She stretches her neck to get a look at his feet. They seem enormous, but that could be due to his battered thick soled combat boots.
She returns her gaze to his hands. The black polish has nearly worn off. She opens her mouth to sat something about it but shuts it abruptly. All this getting friendly with him will lead nowhere. She could pretend she was making up for lost time, but the hard truth is, it's too late. Her eyes fill up and she looks away into the dark hole on her right. Stupid tears. Too late.
Spike puts his hand over hers for a moment. Never heavy, his hands or limbs. He only weighs on her conscience, never making her feel physically trapped and pinned like a bigger guy would.
"What do you want in my dimension, Spike?" she asks as the limo turns onto her street.
Spike cruises along slowly, both hands lax on the wheel now . He looks at her, his face tilted slightly down at her, eyes thoughtfully slitted.
"Something that's missing in mine. You think if you know, it'll help you decide whether to stake me or not?"
He grins at her confusion. Still reading her like a book, just like the other one. She used to hate him for that, but now she welcomes it. She smiles back, she can't help it.
"Here is the house."
It looks the same as hers. She and her friends haven't started personalizing it in the three wintry months they've lived there.
Spike stops and kills the engine. "This is it, eh? Moment of decision. What'll it be, Slayer?"
Buffy swallows. "What can you give me to make it easier? What promise?" Her voice sounds hoarse, no doubt telegraphing her feelings to Spike, who probably already knows about them from dozens of other signals.
Spike looks back steadily and takes her hand again. As the coolness of his palm enfolds her much smaller hand a sob sticks in her throat. She brutally forces it down and nearly chokes from it.
"One: I won’t stay there forever. Once I find and take what I want, I'll return home. Two: You have the portal device at your end, so I'll always need your help to return. Big incentive for good behavior."
He's still not saying what he's gonna do in her world, which she takes to mean that she won’t like it.
"What does good behavior mean?"
She wants to bare her neck and say, here, take it all, but knows it for folly. Spike doesn't make a bid but balances his fingers together, stretches his arms and pops his knuckles loudly.
She considers briefly and tells him the bottom line. "Don’t kill anyone."
Spike leans forward and puts his hand on her thigh. "Slayer," he says, "that's unreasonable. You can’t ask me to live like that!"
Buffy just raises her brows and withdraws her hand. He exerts the subtlest of pressures on her thigh.
Buffy stares straight ahead. She's afraid that if she looks into his eyes she’ll waver. "My world, my rules."
"Slayer…"
She crosses her arms securely.
Spike sighs and his voice is very close to her ear now. "Pig's blood it is."
She turns into the voice, her arms fall loose from their tight folding and she finds her lips and inch from his. His face is so close to hers that she can’t focus on his eyes, a blue and white blur swimming in front of her. His arms have snaked around her back.
"One for the road, Slayer?"
The kiss is honey and smoke, his nose resting against her cheek, his fingers threaded in the hair at her neck. His lips are softer than sugar and more sweet. Buffy flows like molasses against his skin and wishes she need never solidify. Spike pulls away first and after a breathless second or two she opens her eyes to find him far enough away from her to get a really good look at him. The bright sodium lights of the street lamps make his skin milky white, his hair silver and his eyes darker than the night. The silence between them is prolonged and solemn. She looks back without saying anything.
Spike blinks and the connection is severed. They turn away from each other as if on cue. Spike reaches for the plastic bag with the magic device. He holds up the portal opener with Ethan's swan quill.
Buffy nods and they reach out to grab the blue ring of fire simultaneously.
Blink.
Buffy is stretched like spaghetti and strung around the universe's fork. Black strings creep in of their own accord next to her pale limp strands, crowding her out, smelling of squid, no, oil. She struggles against the sticky black tentacles, it's her fork, her sauce. The vortex spits her out. Metal clangs and she finds herself in her own Cleveland basement. She's chained to the wall and handcuffed in a very uncomfortable position. She didn’t know she owned any. The handcuffs are a little too high. The other Buffy must have been wearing really high heels.
She's galvanized into action when the realization hits. The other Buffy! She's home! The basement is silent but is a silence that rings with the absence of a great noise the moment before. Where is Spike? She needs to see him, remind him of his promise. She needs to see him once more.
"Xander!" she bellows, straining against the cuffs. "It's me, I'm home! Get me out of here!"
But those can’t be Xander's footsteps she hears tip-tapping lightly and rapidly down the stairs. Dawn!
"Dawnie!"
"Buffy!" Dawn hurls herself around Buffy's neck and doesn’t let go for a long time. "I was so scared, Buffy…"
Buffy's nose is squashed against Dawn's breastbone. She can't have grown this much in three days, can she?
Dawn looks her over with a smile. "You look as if you've been without a comb or moisturizer for days."
"Hey!"
Remarks like these will go stale very quickly, but it’s good to be under a sister's scrutiny again.
"I'll tell you about it later. Unlock me, I need to go find Spike."
Dawn guffaws. "Spike who's in the insanely big hearse? He's wrapped around our front porch right now, not going anywhere soon. How did you find him?
"Dawnie, stop yammering and get me loose. It’s not the Spike you know, it’s one from another universe and he's unchipped, unsouled and dangerous."
Dawn jitters up and down from nervousness, unable to decide what to do first. "I have to go warn Xander."
"Dawn. First, cut me loose. Then go warn the others."
Dawn unlocks the cuffs with shaking fingers and Buffy sprints up the stairs, Dawn on her heels.
Buffy finds less mayhem and slaughter than she expected. Xander is standing on the porch, staring at the limo. Spike is still sitting in it, looking a bit dazed. Its crumpled nose is pressed up against the side of the house as if it was trying to get in, barring Spike from exiting through his missing door.
"Spike! You alright?"
"Bit shaken. I seem to remember the car wasn’t moving?"
So does Buffy. "Maybe," she says slowly, circling the car, "you were aimed for the basement like me, where the other Buffy was. But you don’t have an invitation so you bounced off the magic barrier, car and all. For which I'm kind of grateful, because it would have been hard to get the car out of the basement."
Spike grunts and feels his head. "Not exactly grateful here. On the upside, at least I have wheels."
He crawls out of his seat and manages to kick open the passenger door with Buffy's help. She grabs his arm to steady him when he almost falls out. The pointed silence behind her reminds her that they’re not alone.
"Slayer, help me get this car down to Mother Earth."
Spike completely ignores Xander and Dawn, and Buffy realizes she can't do the same.
"Hey Xander."
Xander walks up to her but doesn’t hug her like she expects. "You look...different. No time to shower I guess?"
"What's with you guys? Here I am, back from a harrowing adventure through different dimensions, driving halfway across America, and all you can do is comment on my personal hygiene?" Buffy says automatically, but her eyes have already swiveled back to Spike.
The front end of the limo lands on her front yard with a thud.
"Let me give you a hand, Spike," she says.
"Ta, pet."
The back of the car follows the front. Spike starts to move to the drivers' side but Buffy halts him with her hand. The black leather of his coat feels stiff and cold.
Spike picks off her hand gently but firmly. "I'll be back here, Slayer. Dunno when."
She watches him clamber in the driver's seat and start the car. With a lot of wheel-churning and cursing Spike gets it positioned pointing to the street. "I'll be off, then. Cheers!"
And he's gone. Buffy stands and watches the car drive off in the direction they came from. Just before the turn the taillights wink on. Responsible driver, Spike. The sound of the receding engine goes on for a long time in the quiet suburb.
She turns to the house with a sigh and meets the avid stares of Xander and Dawn. Xander makes the universal gesture for 'well?'
Explanations seem unavoidable. "So, how much do you guys know already? You met vampy me, I guess?"
Xander's hand goes to a bandage on his neck she hadn’t noticed yet. "We did, Buff, right when she landed on your chair with a big bang. The unrestrained type, you as a vampire. Not like I remember from when our nightmares became true."
"I'm sorta glad I didn’t meet her. It must be so weird seeing yourself as a vampire."
Xander nods. "Willow has been giving many and detailed accounts of her personal experiences with this phenomenon. So, we didn’t stake the Buffy vampire right away like Kennedy wanted, and researched first. Will realized we needed her if we wanted you back, like when Spike got the demon when you went to the Slayer dimension? Right now, Will and Ken are off buying spell supplies. And doing a movie. We would have tried a spell first thing tomorrow, Buff."
"Hey, that's cool. I can take care of myself, remember? I hooked up with the Spike from that world-"
"The same one who vamped you there?" Dawn says.
"Um, yeah. Well, he had a car. We figured the device came from Cleveland, and we had to get there to find one."
"We?"
"Yeah. We made a deal. I wanted to get home, he wanted his Buffy back," Buffy says defensively.
Why does she always have to defend her choices? Can’t her friends trust her after all this time?
"It was an emergency. I allied with who was at hand," she says, going for stern and lectury. "No time for the fine points of morality."
Xander looks up at nowhere, in that remembering look he has, which comes out disconcertingly lopsided because his new eye doesn't quite track that far. "Wasn’t it you who said, 'you can't beat evil by doing evil'?"
"I didn't do evil. I temporarily decided not to take immediate action on evil. That's not the same."'
"I thought there were vibes, Buffy. You two were vibey. And there were beseeching looks and hands on sleeves. I may be one-eyed but I'm not blind."
Buffy looks to Dawn for support, but her sister crosses her arms and nods. "There was vibeyness."
Great. She's back, in every sense of the word.
"But Buffy, I don't see why he's here, in our dimension. Unchipped and unsouled, I guess? How's that work with your so-called deal?"
If you put it like that it does sound wrong. The suspicion what she ought to have done nibbles uncomfortably at her peace of mind. Knowing what's right and being able to do it aren't the same thing at all, though. Blue eyes, knowing exactly what to do to her next, long strong fingers plying her body, they cloud the issue where they shouldn't.
"He gave his word he wouldn't kill anyone. He needs something in this world."
"But you don’t know what? And you accepted a vampire's word? Playing a risky game, Buff. How will you feel when he breaks it?" Xander says, and she hates him for asking the question. He's never exactly been Spike's advocate, or Angel's, even when they were souled, so this comes as no surprise, but usually she finds it easier to dismiss his opinions.
"Well, I'm off to take a shower since my smell and appearance are so offensive. I'll wait until the others ar home to tell the gripping tale of my adventures. "
She has one foot in the door when a car turns onto their street. Her heart does a little double take but stands down again quickly. The engine sounds different. Never mind, shower and moisturize first. She has missed her personal care products and she's so gonna burn these clothes.
Chapter 12
"What was he like, Buffy? The other Spike?"
Buffy sits stretching idly and watches Willow work the vortex generator. Willow delicately manipulates settings that apparently only witches can sense.
"Different. Wild. Evil."
"Uh-huh. I sense a certain…lack of disapproval in your voice, Buffy Summers."
"I meant, obviously, that he had no chip and no soul, and he'd never fought by our side."
Buffy turns around and raises her arm up behind her head, pulling with the other arm until it creaks. The gradual loosening of winter's hold on Cleveland has made running a daily exercise once more. She's just come back and is keeping Willow company while she stretches and cools down. Willow's preparing the dimension device for Spike's return; she and Xander don't want to take any chances with the unchipped Spike when he returns. If he returns.
"Come on, Will, quit the fishing expedition. Ask outright if you wanna know something."
Willow looks at her from under her lashes. "We talked about this before, Buffy. Wicked energy?"
"What do you want me to say, Willow? Was I in love with the original Spike? I guess. Do I mourn him? Yes. Do I wish I could move on? Maybe. Not with Jean Pierre the would be magician or Lorenzo the black belt, anyway. Talk about lame."
"That must have made Spike happy, that you loved him back."
Buffy shakes out her arm muscles fiercely, concentrating too hard to be able to look Willow in the eye. "I kinda told him at the last minute."
She throws Willow a quick look. Willow looks back with a softness in her eyes that makes Buffy squirm inside. "I thought you two were making the most of your moments together in the basement. I'm sorry, Buffy."
There's not much to say in answer to that.
"Look, Buffy, I'm done. See the change in frequency?"
"Huh. Not really. And did you program in the extra thingy Ethan told me about, the exchange thing because there is no Spike in this universe?"
"Yeah. I used a drop of my blood. No other Spikes in any universe whatsoever will be harmed by the execution of this spell. Hey, remember Lorenzo? I though he was particularly good looking. What was it exactly that was lacking with him?"
Buffy flicks her towel dangerously close to Willow's grinning face. "Wicked energy. Need I say more?"
"I rest my case. Did you get to see what Ethan used to protect your new Spike?"
"Not my Spike," Buffy says automatically. She tries to replay before her mind's eye Ethan's actions in the stuffy little room behind Kakistos great hall. "I don’t think I did, or I didn’t know what I was seeing. Why? Everything went well, didn’t it?"
"Sure. I just did some research on the Gatekeepers, and it's not wise to get on their wrong side, is all."
"Nothing happened last time. I'll just make sure never to use these gateways again."
"Sounds sensible to me," Willow says absently, checking her work one more time. "What is the alternative Spike after, Buff, do you know that?"
"No. He wouldn't tell. But if it’s the gem of Amarra he won’t find it."
Willow makes a face. "He could find it in his own dimension, couldn't he?"
Buffy shrugs. "Let's not mention it at all, huh? Anyway, he certainly wasn't invincible when we fought the Gatekeeper, so I feel safe in assuming he doesn’t have it. I can’t think of anything else he'd want here."
"Me neither. Except you."
"No way, Will, no way. Not this one!" Buffy says, but Willow's words set off a thrill down her spine and her heart does a drum roll.
*
Buffy enters her bedroom and throws down her bag. Normally the sun has already set when she comes in at this hour, or the heavens are grey and somber with imminent snow or rain, but now the last rays of the sun shine on something white just outside her window. She opens it - it takes Slayer strength to do that - and leans out.
The lone tree in their depressing little yard, which she's so far seen as a white ghost, or a black dripping skeleton, has transformed itself into something straight off a Japanese scroll. The bare dark brown branches are dotted with the cutest little white flowers. The setting sun gives them a pink sheen as they curl around the writhing bark, a veil that clads their nakedness with beauty.
Growing pretty petals, preparing for spring. She decides it's a symbol for herself. This is who she’ll be. It's a sign.
She goes to sleep with the window and curtains wide open. She opens her eyes again after a while and finds the room glowing with sourceless blue light. It sucks the color out of her furnishings and her hands seem grey. She gets up and walks to the window. Spike is lying on one of the thin branches of the little tree, arms behind his head, staring up at the moon. He's bare chested and bare footed and the top button of his jeans is open. She says something to him but can't hear her own words. He hears them anyway and grins at her.
He holds up his bare arm, pale blue in the full moon's spotlight and she sees he's hurt. Black fluid drips out and spatters on the white blossoms.
"You should put a band-aid on that, Spike. Simpsons or Powerpuff girls?"
"Bart please," Spike says faintly. He holds out his arm for her but it's too far away.
She can see the branches shine through his pale torso, he's fading. No, she has it wrong. He's hollow. He's made of glass and the moonlight fills him up, gives him substance. She leans out of the window further, perilously close to losing her balance. Too late. She falls. She sits bare-assed in her front yard, surrounded by cartoon band-aids. She looks up at the sky. Spike is gone, and so is the moon. Mocking laughter sounds from the utter darkness around her.
"He's mine," a forgotten voice says. "I drew my starry hair around him like a veil and you will never find him."
Buffy stands up, she's not going to take this lying down. She stumbles into a hole she hasn't seen. She tries to get up again but silent black stuff rushes in, filling up the hole, and she can't swim. The lid slams on with a soft click and she's back in the coffin.
"Spike! Spike! Help me! Get me out!" she screams but the sound is muffled and weak.
She'll have to do it herself, like last time. Grimly she sets to work for the thousandth time, she has the routine down pat now. Rip the satin with the little blade she's never without these days for just this emergency, punch through the wood, claw through the earth. When she emerges coughing all is still black. She has to save Spike. She jumps up as high as she can, she has to storm the bastions of heaven. At the third try she catches the hem of the night's black garment and tears it down. Grateful stars twinkle down at her and there is shining Spike, lying unscathed in his twiggy bower.
"Took your sweet time, Buffy. Did you forget about me?" he chides her.
He turns his head away in sad reproach and the night darkens again. A hot wind strikes up and blows Buffy away.
She awakes gasping in bright spring sunlight. She's way too hot under her thick duvet and sweating with heat and fear. She throws it off and lies listening to the frantic pattering of her heartbeat. That was some nightmare. She hasn’t had digging-herself-out-of-the-grave dreams in a long time.
She goes to check on her flowering tree first thing. It's still there. The blossoms are bright pink. Weren't they white last night? Maybe someone has bled watery ghost blood on them. She shivers in spite of the mild temperature.
A shower and new spring clothes make her forget the momentary wiggins and all is so utterly normal at breakfast that the nightmare seems just that, a random dream because she was too warm. Willow and Kennedy bicker, Andrew and Xander discuss obscure comic books and Dawn is reading. This means she can sip her coffee and eat her yogurt in peace.
Funny that she expected something to be different. Dreaming of Spike, of course. Doesn’t mean anything, because she does that all the time. Rational thought doesn’t lift the heaviness from her heart. Could she have saved Spike? Forced him away from the cave with her? She rolls her shoulders and plans to go out for a long run tonight after class. Nothing better than a hard workout to dispel deep thoughts and vampire cooties.
That evening, she's lacing up her running shoes in the hall when a car rumbles to a halt outside. The laces snap and she's on the porch before she knows she's moving. It feels as if there should be a Buffy-shaped hole in the door and little dust clouds hovering. Wile. E. Buffy.
Her Roadrunner is standing in her yard already, deep black against the dusky sky. Behind him the blotched pink of another DeSoto makes for an incongruous fashion statement.
"Spike!" She cringes inwardly at the transparent joy in her voice.
"Slayer."
He doesn't move, just stands there with his hands in his pockets. Buffy's running shoes have stuck to the path and she sways but doesn't go forward.
"Hey," she starts again. "You're back. You got your prize?"
"Yeah."
Spike shifts the lapels of his duster. It's ripped in many places. Buffy would like to know what happened to it but her tongue is as paralyzed as her feet.
"You still got the portal device? I'm ready to get back home."
"Spike. You could…" Buffy begins, but Spike swiftly steps forward and puts a finger on her lips.
"Don’t say it, Slayer. Wouldn't lead to anything good, don't we both know that?"
Tears prick in her eyes. Spike sighs and brings his hand around her face to cup her cheek. Buffy leans into it for the few seconds he allows his hand to remain there. There's still an arm's length of empty space between them and Spike makes no move to bridge the gap. She swallows. He steps back and runs a hand through his hair. He inclines his head in the direction of the car, where Buffy now sees a dark shape sitting on the passenger seat.
"Who…" but she doesn’t really need an answer. Of course he'd go and fetch her.
"Aren't you afraid she's gonna dump you a fourth time, Spike?"
Oh God, she sounds like a jealous ex.
Spike is unfazed and looks at her calmly, though his feet are starting up a little shuffle. "I'm not the remake, Slayer. I have every confidence I'll manage to keep her in line."
"But you can't know that for sure!"
"You never can, with love."
"So you still love her, six years after her death. Wow."
"I do. I'm love's bitch and proud of it too."
"I'd want to be someone like that," Buffy says wistfully.
"And very bad you'd be at it, Slayer. You've got all the empathy of a park bench. You're a leader, a wanter, and you'll find someone to take care of these wants for you. As long as you admit to them, is all."
He's really going to leave. He's going to take Drusilla and leave forever. By the sinking of her heart she knows she expected something else. Foolish heart. She might have known. Men leave, even the real Spike did.
"Slayer? The portal device?"
"Yeah. Sure. I'll go get Willow."
There is a silence after that and Spike looks at her as if he's waiting. She replays the last thing she said in her head and scurries back into the house.
"Willow! Spike's back!"
Willow comes down the stairs, with mussed hair and still buttoning her blouse. "What?"
"Can you get the dimension thingy? Spike's back, we need to get him to his own world. He's taking Drusilla."
"He's taking who? Right. Okay. I'm on it."
Willow returns with the device floating a few inches above her hand. If you're a witch you don’t need a pencil. Buffy walks back outside, Willow close on her heels. Safe behind the Slayer, although these days Willow could probably zap Spike with a look at twenty yards.
"Tell your witch I want the car as well."
"I'm standing right here," Willow says.
Buffy can hear what expression she has on her face. "Never mind, Willow. He has a different view of human beings from our Spike."
"Huh. Well, I'm ready."
A tall shape, her head crowned with a mantilla and comb, moves faster than her eyes can blink and stands next to Spike. She cradles a stiff unmoving creature with spotty orange and white fur. A dead cat?
A high voice speaks. "Spike, the stars are calling me their daughter and I must see them better to hear what they are riddling about me. We must be off now or they’ll be cross with us."
"See?" he says. "I'm needed. Goodbye, Slayer."
He grabs Drusilla's hand and strides off a few paces, but then turns and holds up a finger, as if he almost forgot something. He opens the trunk of the car and heaves a tall oblong package out of it. It's a dark green tarp, wound and wound about with several colored nylon ropes, orange and blue. Duct tape is used in many places to seal loose flaps shut.
"Little present for you. Do with it what you will."
Spike lopes off to the other side of the car and opens the door for Drusilla, who’s still stroking her motionless furry companion and staring at the cloudy April sky, her head thrown back ecstatically. She graciously folds herself in the passenger's seat and sits regally waiting until Spike is back at her side. He drives off in a roar of faulty exhaust pipes.
Buffy watches Spike and Dru pull away. She doesn't see what Willow does, but the car doesn’t even reach the end of the driveway. It shimmers blue and vanishes. Long after it's disappeared the sound of the Sex Pistols and the rumble of the old engine still echo down the street. Well. She's almost sad it's over. Weirdest adventure ever.
Maybe Willow says something to her, she's not sure, but Buffy hears her go back into the house. She's still staring down the empty street. The sun has set completely now and although the sky is still pale purple, the only things she sees are streetlights and the glowing curtained windows of neighboring houses.
"So he's going back to 1985?" Xander says right behind her.
Buffy jumps up. "Jesus, Xander, you startled me."
"I suppose you were too enthralled with what his majesty was saying?"
"Why d'you call him that?"
"It's the way he acted, as if you'd obey his every command. That alone would clue me in he wasn’t our Spike. Come, it's getting chilly and Willow is brewing mead."
"Mead? What's mead?"
"I don't know but it smells good."
They turn to get back inside, but the package gives off a small grunt. Buffy jumps in surprise for the second time in two minutes. The package almost blended with the driveway surface in the rapidly falling darkness.
"What the hell is that?"
"Present from Spike," Buffy says. "I dread to think what's in it. His sense of humor is not refined. You got a knife?"
Xander puts on his can do face and produces a Stanley knife. "Take care, Buffster, I keep them wicked sharp."
"You are the Yoda of tools," Buffy says gravely.
She starts sawing at the multiple orange nylon ropes and the duct tape and the triple folded tarp that Spike has wrapped his present in. It's getting chilly, and although the hard work is keeping her body warm, her feet are getting really cold.
"Come on, Xander, help me get it in the house," she says.
The others are all snugly ensconced inside, so together they lug the protesting present up the front yard and onto the porch. They can't get it in, so it's a vampire. Why the hell would Spike give her a vampire as a gift?
"I don’t wanna invite it in, Buff," Xander says worriedly. "If this misfires…"
He's right. She waves him in, indicating that hot chocolate would be very welcome. The package sighs. Maybe the vampire would like chocolate as well, although the ones she's met generally prefer blood. She tries to rip straight through the three layers of tarp, but it's hard going with her little knife, however sharp it may be.
Xander comes out with mugs of hot chocolate and a saw.
"Let me do this Buffy," he says importantly. "This is taking too long. You get warmed up, okay?"
"Thanks, Xan." Buffy says. "Give a shout when you need help, but don't stake it. That’s my call."
She goes inside and leans against the radiator in the kitchen to get warm. April, they call it. The trees seem to agree that it's spring, but it's not a temperature a normal human being would call mild.
It's very silent out there. She gets a nervous feeling and since she's all warm and toasty again goes back outside.
Xander saws.
The saw slips for a few seconds and the vampire utters a muffled yelp.
"Shut up!" Xander says nervously.
Then Buffy takes a turn. She saws and cuts and wrestles with the miles of duct tape Spike has used to wrap the demon up. She hears her friends talking and walking about in the warm comfy house. Damn Spike and his damn present. She could just stake it, or leave it on the porch all night. The sun would take care of it in the morning. She sighs but sticks to her work. She's not completely sure but she doesn't think Spike would give her something useless or annoying.
Finally her knife cuts through and she can rip off a triple thick flap of tarp. She lugs the package under the porch light and drops it with a thud when platinum curls are revealed. What the? This looks like another Spike. Where on earth did Spike find yet another version? She saws on with a vengeance, and after another quarter hour the complete and only slightly cut head of a Spike is revealed. The rest of his body's still trussed up like a turkey and his mouth and nose are taped shut. When he sees her his head falls back. He just looks at her for a long time and then turns his face. Thanks a lot, Spike two, she really needed to meet Spike three.
"Xander!" she bellows.
Xander comes out, wiping his mouth. A sickly sweet odor wafts from his cup. Willow follows after him.
"Look guys, another version of Spike."
"I don’t really get all these Spikes, Buff. How come there are so many?"
"Willow?"
Willow puts on her lectury face. "Every time someone makes a decision, a universe in which the decision is different splits off. So you get all the possible universes."
"So what decision did this one make, Buffy?"
"How should I know? Version two killed me when we were still in high school, before Angel turned into Angelus and everything. This one may never even have met me. Willow can find out what kind this one is and send him back," Buffy says.
"And if it’s a souled version? Wouldn’t you consider keeping him?" Willow asks.
Buffy shakes her head. "Like a pet? Believe me, I have my belly full of other Spikes after having had number two's company all across America."
A need to punish this Spike wells up in Buffy, she'd like to get in some payback for the indignities she suffered on that journey. She leaves the tape on his face undisturbed and starts sawing away at his ropes. What possessed the other Spike to use orange nylon rope? Nothing harder to cut, dammit. She has to bite her lip from time to time when she catches the worried, impatient look in Spike's face. Serve him right. Where did the other Spike find him, she wonders. From what time line? He could be from anywhere, any alternate universe.
She relents and tears off the duct tape with a quick jerk, remembering from childhood experience that this hurts the least.
"Buffy," is Spike's first word.
How dare he call her that! The use of that name is reserved for one Spike only. Buffy slaps his face in a fit of uncontrolled fury. "Slayer to you, you creep."
She'd like to kick him, punch those false blue eyes, destroy the cheekbones and the pretty skin. They're beautiful packaging for lies and deceit, and as thin and flimsy as tinsel and tissue. She's fallen for it once, and she's learned her lesson. She can't trust her instincts, which are loudly telling her once again that this is Spike and go for it, girl. She needs an instinct transplant, a gut makeover. Her hands tremble and she feels sick. She could almost rip his head off with her bare hands at this moment. Almost. She suspects that if she couldn’t kill a Spike she knew for certain was evil, she might have a little more trouble with this unknown quantity.
She slams the Stanley knife into Xander's hand. "You finish him," she says curtly to Xander. "I’m going to run like I planned, or I won’t be responsible for my actions.
"But Buffy…" Xander protests weakly, but she's off after another yank on her laces.
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