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Chapter Six

There was dreaminess involved. Much with the dreamy that Buffy couldn’t wipe off her face, no matter how much she didn’t try.

“You should have seen it, Will. Sure, Angel wasn’t really much of a threat.” She paused and contemplated. “At least, I hadn’t thought so till he went all ridgy and fangy with the vampness. But anyway, where was I?”

“Drooling over the Spike kissage,” Willow gushed and then giggled. She was so envious of Buffy. The souled vampire had seemed so very different to what Willow would have expected a vampire to be like, if she’d ever known they existed. And she didn’t think it was even because of his soul, though that was a situation that definitely bore research requirements. And while she was happy her new friend had found love—or what was turning into the possibility of love—so soon after moving to Sunnydale, Willow couldn’t help the little pulsing jealousy that made her want to change places and be the one to have felt that closeness with someone. If she was honest, she even wished a little that it could have been with Spike.

It was hard to be too resentful though when she watched Buffy melt at the mere mention of the vampire.

“It’s so weird, Will. I mean, Angel has sort of been helping me out, you know, with giving me those cryptic clues about hellmouth badness, and his eyes looked so sad and he seemed to want to help, even if he was a little creepy. You’d think HE was the one with the soul, not Spike.” Buffy snacked thoughtfully on her apple and completely missed the shift in Willow’s comfort.

The redhead looked alarmed at that. “Do you think that’s possible? Two vampires with souls?”

“Pshyeah, so not. I mean, come on, Willow. Don’t tell Spike I said this, but don’t you think the idea of a vampire with a soul is totally lame? And to have it forced on you because you don’t have discerning taste in the people menu? Nope, I think it would be much more romantic to fight against the odds of your nature. To know that you were reborn into evil and yet fell in love with a beautiful girl and turned your back on it all, just so you could be with her forever.” Buffy fell neatly back into the dreamy land she’d been in earlier, her mind’s eye seeing a soulless Spike riding up on his swift black stead, sweeping her up into his arms and prodding the beast to gallop them away to safety.

“B-but wouldn’t that be kind of dangerous? In a Romeo and Juliet kind of way?” Willow asked with a slightly nervous tickle in her voice.

“Huh?”

A crease deepened between the redhead’s brows as she thought over the scenario. She could see the romance, just like Buffy said, but she could also see the danger, not least the possibility of herself being eaten on the vampire’s journey to redemption. The vision of Jesse on a gurney, looking too pale mixed with the reality of knowing how close he could have come to being dead—or worse, turned—kept Willow feeling a little on the skittish side when it came to considering soulless vampires and how much control they might even have over their demons. What Buffy thought was romantic might not even be possible. Those vamps they’d run into the other night certainly seemed to have nothing on their mind but draining Jesse. And her. Willow still had nightmares just imagining the reality of becoming lunch—or well, dinner was probably closer to the mark.

“Can soulless demons actually have enough free will to choose to be good?” Willow thought it was a good question, one that she was going to be thinking about the answer to alot. Not that it was relevant to anything, but she was nothing if not inquisitive and an overachiever. Still, she didn’t like that look of uncertainty and fear that clouded the Slayer’s eyes.

“I don’t know, Will. I guess not. They’re evil, right? So, I guess without a soul they have no reason to feel guilty about killing innocent people.”

Buffy looked so dejected, so unhappy that Willow wondered if she even realised that the existence of such an anomaly didn’t even apply to her.

“Buffy, Spike has a soul, so you don’t need to worry about it. Makes you wonder, though.” She’d dived into the philosophical and Willow felt the familiar excitement that came with learning new things and thinking about worlds of possibilities.

Buffy’s relief at being reminded that Spike was already restrained and fighting on the good side warmed Willow’s heart. She would have hated to be the one to make Buffy question herself—consider the validity and propriety of falling for a vampire, whether he was bound with a soul or not.

“Wonder about what?” Buffy had jumped from being worried right into intellectual interest. She nibbled again at her apple while Willow put her thoughts out on the air, knowing that Buffy’s attention span might not last. “Is everyone just born with a soul? I mean, do we all have a soul to lose? And if we do, how do some humans lose it. That could explain why some humans are beyond evil, right? There’s serial killers, rapists, Snyder.”

Buffy choked between a laugh and a chunk of apple in her throat. “Good one, Will. Not so sure we can lose our souls while we’re still human, but I guess the reverse makes my job a little less clear cut. If humans can go bad and act evil, what’s to stop vamps from trying to be good? And how can I dust them knowing they could have potential?”

Willow didn’t even have to think. A crisis of faith and conscience in her job could get Buffy really really dead and that was something Willow would prevent at all costs if she could. “If their snackin’, then you’re slayin’. No time to put labels on them when you have lives to save. I think it’s safe to assume that most vamps are out to put major holes in the population. Sure, there might be the odd vamp who wants something better. Maybe even one who falls for the beautiful girl and turns his whole existence around for love, but I don’t think you’ll find him in the graveyard, Buffy.”

Buffy nodded, feeling the expected confidence in Willow’s conclusions and recognising her need to eradicate evil from the world as something more than just her duty. It was something she needed. She never wanted to ever see another person she knew in a hospital bed—not if they were put there because she was being slack or Miss Avoidy Slayer. And if they ever made it to the morgue—well, that would only be because she’d gotten there first.

It was a quiet, contemplative walk back inside.

The library was filled with new soldiers to the cause. Xander sat at the research table, swapping jokes with a newly flushed Jesse while Giles flicked through some ancient tome in the background.

“Ah, yes, Buffy and Willow. I assume lunch was satisfying.” Giles ducked back into his book, not waiting for an answer to the inane question and so missed the girl’s conspiratorial amusement.

“Sure, Giles. It was a veritable feast and we had waiters and hey, even the merry ole Queen of England pulled up a square of turf to eat with us.” Buffy watched Willow, an expecting smile tilting her lips and then broadening as Giles betrayed his preoccupation.

“Really? That’s quite wonderful. Now, about this Angel you met on patrol last night—”

“So, Jesse, all up and about. How’s all that blood pumping through your body?” Buffy rushed out, somehow feeling guilty yet not sure if he knew about what actually happened to him or if Xander had tried to keep him in the dark so as to not make himself look like a nutcase.

“It’s the strangest thing, you know? I mean, I leave with this really hot girl, and wham…in the hospital with a chunk out of my neck. It’s like some kind of corny Anne Rice novel. If I wasn’t so sure I was hallucinating, I’d say that gorgeous blonde was a vampire. Freaky I know, but the accident must have caused me to hit my head or something. Stranger things haven’t happened, right?” he joked, smiling around the table at his friends as Giles coughed in the background. It brought Jesse’s attention to the strange group and he leaned over to Xander, his eyes watching everything warily. “Hey man,” he whispered. “What’s with the hanging around with the school librarian and making with the friendly? Did something happen while I was laid up?”

Xander giggled nervously, checking between the girls and Giles before he abruptly pushed his chair back with a screech. “You have no idea,” he grinned before leading the way out of the place. Jesse shrugged at Buffy and Willow and followed.

The sudden silence echoed in their absence until Giles stepped forward and nervously approached Buffy with anxiety inspired hand wringing. “I do apologise, Buffy. I had no idea that it was your intention to not confide everything in this boy. I just assumed—well, we have all learned it is dangerous to assume, so I will keep my peace until you advise differently.”

“No biggie. There was no harm done. Jesse’s got some serious denial in his life, though.” Buffy found it kind of amusing. She didn’t mind if he knew her secret, but as much as it was Xander and Willow’s choice to start accepting the darker side of life as real and to support her, it was their right to decide if their friend should know too. She’d already been a bad slayer and let the cat out of the bag. She didn’t want anymore responsibility, though she wondered how smart it was to let him continue his oblivious life while living on the Hellmouth. Without the knowledge and the tools to adapt to the danger, he may not live for much longer. She’d managed to save him once—or rather, Spike had—but she didn’t relish the opportunity of doing it again. She’d rather he made like a Star Trek guy and live long and prosper.

It was something she was beginning to accept she could never do.

“We’ll tell him soon,” Willow confirmed, somehow reading Buffy’s mind. If not then the frown on her face had extra special revealing powers.

Buffy nodded, but still there was something niggling at her, and even though it was daylight, she couldn’t help but feel whatever it was, it was too late.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Jesse stood and watched the blonde. Last night he’d gotten lucky and was able to walk by her side right out of there. Last night he’d looked cool to all those Sunnydale High sceptics that had expected him to finish school a virgin. He’d held his head high, strolled out confident and excited. Almost cocky. And then it had ended—he wasn’t quite sure how. Or rather, he believed he knew how, just thought he had to be insane for it to be so.

Tonight she was back—but probably couldn’t bear to look his way again. If what he remembered happening was true—and despite Xander’s weird story about a pack of wild dogs knocking him over and almost mauling his neck till he was bled to death, he really believed it was—then he’d shown himself to be a loser. Whatever purpose she’d chosen him to fulfil, he’d failed. He’d bailed by knowing a pretty scary girl with superpowers and some bleached blond stranger that bounced out of nowhere. He’d been saved and the beauty that had smiled his way, had tasted his blood, wouldn’t want to look at him again.

There was something locked far away inside that tried to argue that his way of thinking could very well get him dead, but that seductive thrill he’d felt at having sharp teeth slice through his soft skin like a heated knife through butter kept it weak and heading toward silent. She was dangerous. He couldn’t deny it—and yet that precarious link she held between life and death thrilled him beyond anything he’d ever been able to grasp.

So it was that he was pulled forward and across a crowded dance floor to be once again within her grasp, despite his heart pounding the warning that she didn’t want him—would only kill him, and without biting him at that.

Her eyes shone when she looked up and saw him. Recognition made something flare to life—anger at being made to look foolish, disappointment to find she’d wasted time on the likes of him, or eagerness to once again sip from his neck—but though he saw it, he could never put a name to it. He just wasn’t that clued into women, into people, and so whatever truths he could have discerned from her gaze became something unreachable for the likes of him.

Her smile was enticing, cheeky as a perfectly manicured set of nails came out to lightly scratch down his neck—scraping while she stared in fascination at the bandage that covered her bite. Suddenly he felt aflame, didn’t want the cover as the puncture marks flared to life and sought contact with their creator. The heat grew bolder, sharper and became so piercingly deep that he almost lost his breath. Sweat broke out on his skin as her hand wandered down over his chest. Last night had been all about appearances. Tonight was all about the pain, and he felt disturbed for craving more. Her hand caught at his and her fingers twined around his stiff digits, the tug on his hand a little more brutal than he would have expected from such a girl if he hadn’t known what she was.

It was wrong, he knew that, yet as she led him to the door, pausing to lick purposefully, seductively on the unmarked side of his neck, he couldn’t recall anything else feeling so right.

And so he was drawn out and back into the night.





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