"Spike…" she said weakly, calling out to him with her mind as well as her voice.
"Sir, it looks as if the girl is awake."
"Well, get her back out then. The last thing we need is the vampire barging in here before we've had a chance to get a good look at her."
"So we're going to keep her out indefinitely then?"
"No. The vampire won't be a problem for long. I've taken care of it. Just put her back to sleep now, before she causes trouble."
Buffy's groggy mind managed to make sense of the voices she heard nearby, and she frowned. The vampire…Spike? And what did that man mean when he said Spike wouldn't be a problem for long?
Buffy tried to push herself up. She had to find Spike. She had to make sure he was okay.
"Easy now, ducks. You just stay put."
She looked up, trying in vain to make out the blurry face that now loomed over her. But then she felt a sharp prick to her arm, and the world went dark again.
"Spike…"
Buffy's voice sounded clearly in his mind, and Spike immediately jumped up from where he'd been sitting on the cot in the basement. Buffy was awake. She was in pain, and she was confused, but she was awake.
The sun had not yet set, though it would soon, and for Spike, that was good enough. He'd had enough practice in the past century avoiding the sun's deadly rays, and he didn't have any time to waste in responding to Buffy's call.
Spike went up the stairs and to the back door, coming to an abrupt stop moments after flinging it open when something slumped into his arms. With a start, he realized what he was now holding.
The drained body of the Slayer…
Spike let her go, and Nancy tumbled lifeless to the ground. He didn't have time to deal with her now, nor did he have the sympathy to particularly want to. He needed to find Buffy before…
She lost consciousness again…
Spike cried out as the connection Buffy had made with him slipped away, and he found himself once again cut off from his mate. He tried desperately to find her again, but all he felt was the fuzziness that told him she'd been heavily drugged. Tears stung his eyes even as he clenched his fists tightly enough for his nails to cut into his palms.
He heard when Giles and Willow came into the house, knew when they found him in the kitchen. He heard Willow gasp as she saw Nancy's body, and he saw Giles as he ran to his Slayer, checking frantically for signs of life. But he didn't snap to focus on the moment until Giles had grabbed him and slammed him up against the wall.
"You killed her," the Watcher accused, his tone cold.
Spike shook his head. "No, I didn't. I found her like that just now. I opened the backdoor and she fell onto me."
"You're lying! You wanted revenge for whatever role she may have played in what happened to Buffy!"
"Yeah, I did," Spike admitted. "But I didn't take it. Buffy woke up for a moment, and I was hoping I could find her, but before I could leave, I found Nancy instead—already dead."
"Giles, I think we should trust him—at least for now," Willow said from where she was now kneeling beside Nancy's body. She had tears in her eyes, seeing someone she'd known like this hard to take even with the certainty in her mind of Nancy's betrayal. "We're going to need him to find Buffy."
"If I'd killed the bird, I wouldn't be denying it—and certainly not from fear of you, Watcher." Spike brought his arms up faster than Giles could blink and pushed him away.
Giles stumbled backwards, grabbing on to the edge of the kitchen island to right himself. It was one of the few times in his life that he could remember truly being at a loss for what to do. Nancy—his Slayer—was dead on the ground, her young friend Willow kneeling beside the girl's body. It was a moment Watchers spent their whole careers preparing for, the one when the Slayer they had trained and protected lost her final battle. Yet, Giles didn't feel prepared at all. His grief warred with his anger at Nancy for the possibility she may have in fact betrayed someone he cared about and therefore, him as well. Furthermore, they were still in the middle of a crisis, with a girl he felt something akin to a father's love for at the mercy of the same people who had killed her mother.
And to top it all off, the girl's lover—a vampire whom Giles was not completely convinced hadn't just killed his Slayer—was standing in his kitchen. Life on the Hellmouth at its finest.
Giles needed to shut off his emotions and prioritize. As much as it pained him to admit it, Nancy's death was not the most pressing issue. It was done, and nothing could be done to save the Slayer now. Instead, they needed to move forward with rescuing Buffy before she was added to the body count. "Willow, go into the living room and begin setting up for the locator spell. I'll join you shortly."
Willow looked up, her eyes shining with tears. "What about Nancy?"
"There's nothing we can do for her right now," Giles replied. He bent down and picked up Nancy's body, cradling her in his arms. "I'll be in soon, Willow."
Willow stood up, letting Giles walk past her and up the stairs to Nancy's room. There, he gently laid the girl on the bed. A sob lodged itself in his throat, but he kept it down, having no time for tears. His tenure as Nancy's Watcher had been a difficult one, the girl's attitude frequently testing the limits of his patience, but he couldn't help the sense of failure he felt now.
If Nancy had indeed betrayed them to the Council despite what they had done to a fellow Slayer, had it been some failure on his part that would lead her to believe she should make that choice? Had he let his personal clashes with the girl get in the way of instilling in her a sense of true loyalty and justice? Had he been too detached, led her to feel more of a connection with people all the way in England than she did with her own Watcher?
The whole situation left him at a loss. He didn't know what to feel about anything: Nancy, her assumed betrayal, or even his own abilities to function as a Watcher.
Perhaps he had been too successful as a Watcher. He'd shaped Nancy into the kind of Slayer Quentin Travers had wanted, one who would remain loyal to the Council above all others. She had been the sort of Slayer that Joyce had refused to be.
Giles could spend no more of his time now thinking about all of this. Buffy was still in danger, and they had not a moment to lose. He unfolded Nancy's quilt from the bottom of her bed, then draped it over her body.
Spike sat on the couch, trying his best to stay seated and not fidget too much as Giles and Willow performed the locator spell. Willow had told him she needed concentration and the pacing he had been doing was breaking it. So he forced himself to sit. They needed to do this to find Buffy.
Small lights began to hover over the map that lay between the Watcher and the witch, and Spike's eyes were drawn to it, his attention caught now. The lights moved faster, then came together, falling down to the map and illuminating a spot brightly.
"We did it!" Willow exclaimed, a smile breaking over her face as she looked down at the map. "The spell worked!"
"She's in the warehouse district," Giles announced before shaking his head and adding, "How very cliché."
"Yeah, well, villains can't resist a good cliché. Take it from a former one," Spike announced as he got to his feet. "If we know where she is, let's go."
Giles and Willow stood as well, and Giles went around to the couch and pulled a leather bag out from behind it. "Weapons," he explained. "I'm sure we'll need them."
"Well, then, now that we're loaded up, we can head on out," Willow said.
Giles turned his attention to her. "Are you sure you're up to this? I know you've accompanied Nancy on patrols before, but we have no idea what we're facing here. Furthermore, the members of the Council are human."
Willow crossed her arms over her chest. "Giles, these guys killed Nancy, kidnapped Buffy, and made me hit my head. They are so going down."
Despite the gravity of the situation, Spike smiled a little at that. Willow was a tougher one than he'd ever given her credit for in the past. He was glad he hadn't managed to kill her. "Keep your eyes open, Red. Don't think that just because they're human they aren't as dangerous as any demon you've faced," Spike told her. "If things get too hairy for you, stick with me. I'll see to it that you walk out of there."
Willow gave him a nod. "I will."
Giles found himself taken aback by their exchange, Spike proving to be more and more of an anomaly the longer he knew him. The vampire's concern for Willow appeared to be nothing but genuine, as was his promise to protect her if things got too rough. Despite what his Watchers' Council training told him to believe, Giles was having definite doubts that the scene he'd walked in on in the kitchen with Spike standing over Nancy's body was quite what it seemed, even if Spike had killed Slayers in the past.
After all, so had Quentin Travers…
Giles wondered if Travers had come to Sunnydale himself, or if he'd merely sent his lackeys. His hand tightened around the handle of the weapons bag, and Giles hoped he would have the chance to face Travers one on one. Buffy was not the only one who wanted blood to be spilled for the crime of Joyce's death.
"Let's go," Giles said to the other two. "Buffy's waiting for us."
Without a word, Willow and Spike followed him out to the car.
"Mr. Travers, we're getting reports that the vampire is accompanying Rupert Giles and the former Slayer's witch friend from their base of operations."
Quentin Travers frowned as he was brought that piece of news. "They're leaving now? All three of them? What about the Slayer's body?"
"We received visual confirmation that it was found, sir; however, they seem to be abandoning her for now."
This was certainly unexpected… Travers had counted on Rupert Giles having a softer heart than this, hoping his grief for the loss of his Slayer would take him out of the game—and compel Giles to take that meddlesome vampire out as well. "Very well then. It appears we will not be able to remain any longer on the Hellmouth. Prep the jet and make sure the girl is drugged enough for the trip back to England. I can begin my tests on her there."
Travers's young lieutenant saluted. "I will, sir. I'll tell the men now we're leaving for home." He turned and exited, Travers now on his own again.
Travers walked across the room to the cell they'd placed Buffy in, smiling cruelly. She was the only daughter of a Slayer he'd ever heard of, the only other Slayer in recent history to give birth having had a boy. Furthermore, if Nancy had been correct in her assertion that this girl was indeed mated to a vampire like William the Bloody, well, little Buffy was quite a special find indeed. Travers wondered what sort of power the girl held in her small body, already surprised to see how quickly she recovered from the doses of tranquilizer they'd been giving her. Perhaps with the certain incentives, he could persuade her to put whatever special talents she possessed to good use—as in, to use for him. She could turn out to be quite useful against his enemies, even more so than the Slayers, who tended to have those unfortunate moral issues.
Surely a woman who shared a bed with a vampire as cruel as her lover was reputed to be wouldn't have many of those.
She could be his secret weapon, the force he wielded in the dark while he paraded a good, loyal Slayer in front of the rest of the Council. With Buffy by his side, he could finally gain the complete control he'd been searching for.
He would hunt down his enemies, and she would crush them.
His smile grew.
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