The first thing Giles became aware of was the incessant thumping assaulting his brain. But, when that pounding was accompanied by a loud angry voice, he knew it wasn’t just his body’s reaction to the taser that’d lodged itself into his side causing his head to feel like a jackhammer had set up permanent residence inside him. Slowly, he crawled on his apartment floor towards the direction of the pounding and yelling, noticing with bleary eyes that all the occupants of his flat were in a state of unconsciousness.
Except Spike, who was nowhere to be seen.
“Giles! Let me in!” someone bellowed urgently from the other side of the door.
“Hold your bloody horses!” rasped the man nearly face down on the floor. He flopped like a caught fish trying to make his way to the entrance, finally flinging his hand up to hopefully catch the door latch.
Without so much as a thank you, Angel plowed through Giles’ entryway, taking no notice of the bodies strewn about until he tripped over one, sending his burden sliding across the floor.
“God, what happened here?” he growled, finally becoming aware of his surroundings while massaging his elbows from the fall. He then picked up Buffy and Cordy to sit them next to each other on the couch, heads tilted back on opposite sides.
“Initiative,” Giles managed with some effort, keeping his head on the floor. He still felt little shivers and tingles coursing over his entire body, making him quite nauseous and lightheaded. “Buffy?” he mumbled, his drool pooling at the corner of his mouth.
Angel looked behind to size up the girls’ condition then turned back to the man lying prone on the cold tile, rubbing his eyes and forehead. “She’s going to have one hell of a headache when she wakes up.”
“If it’s anything like the baseball bat that hit me, I feel her pain,” Xander moaned from a nearby spot.
“I suppose,” Giles huffed in a labored voice, “that it would be the epitome of foolishness to ask you to help us get off the bloody freezing floor?”
“Huh?” Angel frowned in confusion then realized he was just standing around while the others were starting to come around, groping for furniture to help steady themselves. “Oh, yeah! Right.”
“Pillock,” Giles muttered under his breath.
He chose to ignore the comment as he helped him to a sitting position on the short couch where Tara still lay zonked out, watching as Giles tried to focus his gaze on him, squinting and attempting to move his head forward a little more to see him better.
Giving up on trying to find the focal point of the bulky figure in front of him, he lost his patience. “Glasses, please?”
“Over here,” Willow offered in a dry, scratchy voice, pulling herself up to a somewhat propped position against the foyer wall. She and Giles had been hit the hardest since they were near the door.
Leaving Giles in a slumped posture next to Tara, Angel went and knelt down in front of Willow, who was barely able to lift her finger to point to the spectacles near where her head had been. Her eyes followed his movements slowly until he picked up something other than the forgotten glasses.
“What’s this?” he asked, studying the ring then looking at Willow.
Spike! Oh no! “It’s my mood ring… it must have come off during the scuffle,” she explained in a weary tone. She lifted her hand to indicate she wanted it back because there was no way she wanted Angel to be in possession of such a valuable item.
The brooding vamp narrowed his eyes on her. “This looks suspiciously like the Gem of Amara.”
She plastered a smile on her face and gave him a loopy giggle, hoping that she’d draw him away from the truth. “Funny thing that… I glamoured a toy ring I got from the claw machine to look like the gem and-”
“Why would a witch have a toy ring that looks like the Gem of Amara?” he interrupted her with a growl.
Willow’s eyes widened at the subtle threat. “’Cause I like green scarab stones and skulls?” she eep’ed out.
“Give it a rest, Willow. He isn’t even close to believing you.” Anya’s muffled voice drifted to the group, her nose firmly planted on the area rug in front of the couch.
“You know, Anya,” Willow groused peevishly, “sometimes you’re tolerable to be around… then you go and say things like that and I just hate you all over again.”
The ex-demon snorted and turned her face to the side so she could be heard. “Feeling’s mutual.”
“I think I’ll hold on to this until we find out what it really is,” Angel suggested with a smirk, pocketing the ring without giving a second thought to Willow’s scowl.
Xander had finally sat up and was leaning against an overstuffed chair, one arm on his upraised knee. “Man, that’s so not a good idea. Buffy’ll be livid, not to mention purple with the rage… and did I mention livid?”
As he said this, the Slayer cracked one eye open to look at him, slowly blinking into awareness. But Angel never registered her change in breathing, so he continued on with his rigid viewpoint of what he thought was best for Buffy.
“I highly doubt that. If this is the real Gem of Amara, and hell if I know how you guys came across it, if Spike were to find out, nothing would ever stop him from coming after all of you.”
“Apparently you’re not aware of Spike’s condition,” Giles sneered, tired of feeling like he had the worst hangover of his life and weary of the baneful vampire’s constant presumptions.
“What? The lack of Drusilla twisting him around her crooked little finger? I’d say that was a blessing, not a condition.”
Giles tried to stand on shaky legs, managing an unbalanced wobble as he held onto the arm of the couch. “As usual, Angel, you’re completely out of the loop as to what has been happening here in Sunnydale after you moved to L.A.”
The vampire smiled smugly. “I think I know what’s been going on here, Giles. I mean, I was here a couple weeks ago, and shortly after that, Buffy showed up in L.A. and we talked-”
“I wouldn’t call what we did talking,” she countered in a deceptively soft tone, her head still lying down on the sofa arm.
“Buffy?” Everybody but Xander had assumed she was still out for the count.
Angel whipped around the edge of the couch and crouched down in front of her as he pulled her limp hand into his, caressing it back to life, which Xander thought was highly stupid on his part. Apparently, he didn’t register the look of deadly intent on the Slayer’s face.
“I’d step away from the very pissed off Slayer if I were you, Angel.” Xander mulled his words over for a few moments and reconsidered, “On second thought, I’m not you. Stay where you are, I’m in the mood to be amused.”
“So am I,” mumbled Anya as she tried to push herself up to a sitting position.
Everyone who was awake watched Angel’s arrogant smirk slowly die from his lips as he registered her fierce look. Xander had a full view of Buffy’s eyes… her totally cold and feral eyes, and they were deadly in their passionate beauty.
“The only reason you’re still alive, Angel, is because the dart caught me in my slaying arm and I don’t have the strength to grip a stake hard enough to plunge it through your miserable heart,” she whispered, staring at him like he was nothing more than a piece of dirt on her new Jimmy Choo’s.
“I-”
“When I’m able to stand and am at my full Slayer capacity, you’d better have settled your affairs – for it will be the last night you’ll ever see again. I don’t care that you’re the Champion for the Powers That Be; they’ll have to find another.”
“Buffy, you’re under some kind of-”
“Spell? Go on… say it! I dare you to say I’m under some kind of spell or I’m lost in a thrall that Spike managed to pull off,” she threatened, finally sitting upright and removing her hand from Angel’s as quickly as she could.
“This isn’t you,” he argued vehemently.
“No… this is me. It’s just not who you want me to be. For the first time in my life, I know what I want,” she told him in no uncertain terms.
A slight cough from Giles interrupted the standoff between the vamp and Slayer. “Might I suggest we discuss Angel’s demise at a later time? Spike is missing.”
Tears sprung to Buffy’s eyes as she bit her lip, looking over at Xander’s wretched expression. “What happened?”
Xander went into great detail about everything that had happened that evening while she, Angel and Cordy hunted the Gentlemen. She couldn’t hold back her pitiful sob after he told her that they’d just gotten their voices back when Riley and the Commandos arrived, incapacitating everyone but leaving Spike awake and immobile. He couldn’t remember anything after that, finally waking up to the sound of pounding on Giles’ front door.
“Buffy? Spike doesn’t have the Gem,” Willow said in a tired voice from near the entryway.
“No!” she whimpered, desperately trying to stand, her legs buckling beneath her.
Angel tried to steady her, but she reacted violently and managed to shove him into Giles’ T.V. set. “Get your filthy hands off me!”
Xander was a little more steady on his feet by then so he grabbed Buffy’s hand and placed it on his arm to help her keep her balance while she fought the affects of the drug she’d been poisoned with. She turned pleading eyes full of tears to his big brown ones, begging him to give her a stake or something sharp and wooden to shove through the dazed vamp’s heart.
“Maybe he knows how to find Spike,” he offered, looking over his shoulder at Angel as he struggled to stand, a long gash on the side of his face where the screen glass had pierced his cheek.
Buffy shook her head in the negative but stopped, feeling too woozy to continue. “I won’t have him near Spike, Xander.” She wracked her brain, frustrated with the lack of options presented to her, settling her sights on Willow as a thought occurred to her.
“Willow, can you do that spell again?” she implored her best friend as Xander lead her over to where the red witch still sat.
“I-I don’t think I can… I don’t have enough energy to make it stick.”
Her lower lip trembled, so Buffy bit it to keep from sobbing. “Okay, we’ll just have to think of something else then.”
“We could both try,” a groggy voice came from beside Giles. Tara smiled hesitantly and patted her hair down, the electric shock she received having frizzed nearly every lock.
Giles went over to the kitchen alcove and bent down to retrieve the eyeglasses Angel never gave him, looking them over as he whipped out a cloth to clean off the smudges. “Why this particular spell, Buffy?”
She looked at her Watcher with fear in her eyes. “Spike and I could hear each other’s thoughts. He knew where I was and vice versa.”
He frowned pensively. “I dislike the spell’s effect on me, and I think everyone will agree… it’s best if I weren’t in the room when it’s cast.”
“I can help with the focus, so that it’ll only be Spike and Buffy affected,” Tara said hesitantly, walking on wobbly feet to sit in front of Willow.
“Good, good! Is there anything you need for the spell?” Giles asked as he glanced over to see Angel mopping his bloodied cheek with a towel, glowering at them.
Willow folded her legs cross-wise and took Tara’s hands in her own. “No, it was a spur of the moment thing, really. But Buffy,” she said in a worried tone, “you may not want to hear the things going on in Spike’s mind when it starts working.”
Xander strengthened his hold on Buffy’s arm before she collapsed, her hand covering her mouth before she could scream or whimper. “He’s alive, I know it,” she ground out, refusing any other option.
“Don’t know why you’re all so worried about Spike… he’s taken out more than three guys at a time,” Angel grumbled as he sat on the back of the couch near a still unconscious Cordy.
“Spike can’t hurt humans, you brooding vainy-pire,” Anya told him with a disgusted eye roll. She’d finally made it to one side of the couch, her chin propped up on the edge so she could watch everything.
Everyone slowly turned to stare at her.
“What?”
“Brooding vainy-pire? Is that even part of the English language?” Giles grimaced and rubbed his forehead.
She shrugged her shoulders. “No, but it should be. He gives it new meaning every time he looks at her.”
“Guys, I don’t have time for this,” Buffy reminded her friends. “I need to know where Spike is and this spell is the quickest way to do it.”
Xander leaned over and whispered something in her ear, making her eyes narrow as she turned around and looked intently at the vamp with his arms crossed over his chest, a permanent frown in place. She then let go of Xander’s arm and moved to stand in front of Angel with her hand out, palm up.
“Give me the ring.”
“Now, Buffy, let’s talk about-”
“How I’m going to crush your windpipe and not give it a second thought,” she said menacingly as she grabbed his throat and squeezed hard.
For a vampire to turn blue, she must really be cutting off some major supply of blood, Xander thought, watching as his eyes began to bulge from their sockets.
Angel tried to pry her fingers from around his neck, but it was no use. Even with her strength at a minimum, she was stronger than he could ever be.
“You should be concentrating on giving me the Gem, not struggling like a dying fish.”
Fearing he was actually going to dust motivated him to dig his right hand into his hip pocket and pull out the ring, handing it to her and hoping she would release him. No such luck.
“Still have those chains, Giles?” she asked casually, keeping one hand tightly around the vamp’s neck and the other clutching the ring in a death grip.
“I’ve never removed them, so yes, they’re still there.”
She gave Angel an evil smirk. “Good. You’re going to have company.”
While Buffy dragged Angel to Giles’ bathroom to chain him to the tub, Willow and Tara began to focus on their energies, relaxing and letting them meld as one, which was easier than both girls thought. As each one achieved their center, Tara provided the focus and extra boost of discipline to mingle with Willow’s raw talent. It was like a live conduit for the magically inclined.
“Tempus vernum veritas,” the redhead whispered strongly, her thoughts only on Spike and Buffy.
As Buffy fastened the last of the chains around Angel’s ankle, images and sounds began to assault her senses, her brain a mass of pain and confusion, of fear and resignation. She gasped as she dropped to the cool tile of the bathroom floor, trying to sort out the feelings and things she was hearing into some sort of order.
“His resistance is considerable. Should we tranq him again?”
“Only if you want him slobbering all over you. We’ve pumped three darts into him within a span of two hours. Any more and his brain will be fried, if it hasn’t already.”
“He needs to remain awake. No more drugs. If he gets out of line again, I’ll be there to put him back in.”
“Oh, god,” she whimpered, her eyes wide with panic as she stumbled to her feet. “Riley, no!”
~*~
Spike lay on the floor of the military van, watching as the streetlights shone through the windows on the shadows clinging to the interior of the vehicle, moving rapidly until they faded to nothingness.
Kinda like he was about to do, only he didn’t think his fading would be all that peaceful an event.
He was trussed up like a Christmas turkey; complete with rope and ball gag fixings, hog-tied to maximize any pain he was capable of feeling. Which, thank the fates, wasn’t too much to bear, what with all those lovely chemicals running amok in his system. His sense of feeling was practically nil below his collarbone, so he concentrated on keeping his wits about him for the round of torture that was surely awaiting him at the end of this little journey.
And while he could still see shadows and shapes, his visual clarity hadn’t returned, knowing he’d suffered some sort of ocular damage from the misfiring of the damnable chip. Even the Gem couldn’t prevent the consequences of one too many knocks to the old bucket of nails. Sure, it could prevent death and keep the wearer from starving, but it didn’t seem to heal that little side effect of science.
Just what had those Initiative wankers done to him?
“Copy, base, recapture of Hostile Seventeen confirmed.”
Looks like he was about to find out.
~*~
“I’m going alone.”
“This is not up for discussion, Buffy… you need back up, or help… or-or something!” Giles admonished his Slayer.
She continued to pack a black bag full with as many weapons as she could carry, paying no heed to his words. “Spike’s my responsibility. I got him recaptured and I-”
“No you didn’t,” Cordy murmured from her hunched over position on the couch, an ice pack on the back of her head. “Could you guilt-trip yourself any more?”
“Shut up, Cordelia.”
Cordy turned her head to glare at Buffy. “Fine, whatever. And you know what? I’m done here! I did my Jamie Lee Curtis thing, now I want to go home!”
“That’ll be kinda hard since Angel’s chained up tighter than Houdini’s escape box,” Xander said with malicious glee. “And with your head injury, you’d be all over the road… some cop will pick you up…” He smiled devilishly. “Bet they’d pay top dollar for a mug shot of Cordelia Chase, former socialite.”
“You’re a loathsome dung beetle on the refuse pile of the world, Xander Harris,” she retorted without much venom. She was in too much pain right now to enjoy verbal sparing with her ex.
Xander ignored her and pulled Buffy to the side. “Have you tried to talk to him, in his mind, to find out where he is?”
She closed her eyes and blew out a heavy sigh. “I’m afraid I might do more damage. I mean, he was pretty bad off before I left, who knows what his condition is now.”
“How do you propose to get in there then? It’s not like you can walk up to their door and demand to be let in or you’ll huff and puff till their instillation blows down.”
“Buffy! Get me out of these god-damned chains!” Angel bellowed from the bathroom, cutting off her train of thought.
Her nostrils flared in irritation. “Do you have some sort of gag, Giles? One he can’t bite through?”
“I don’t believe-”
“I have one in my purse,” Anya offered, retrieving her bag and pulling out a wicked looking mouth gag, complete with a metal ball and leather strap.
Everyone turned to look at Xander, who was a mottled bright red with mortification. Buffy raised her eyebrows in question and Willow snickered while Giles just looked dumbfounded and flustered. No one said a word.
“I-I’ll just, uhm… just clean it off and uhm, well use that on Angel,” Giles stuttered. He grabbed the offending item from Anya and hurried into the bathroom, soon after which, Angel’s roars were silenced.
“Make sure I get that back,” Anya called down the hallway. “It’s Xander’s favorite sex toy.”
“Ahn!”
“What? It is!”
“Never mind,” Xander grumbled. “Buffy, I think you should at least try to communicate with him. Maybe he’s awake and can help direct you to where they’re taking him.”
The idea had merit so she agreed. Moving away from everyone, she sat down on the floor and concentrated on Spike, hoping she wouldn’t inflict more pain than she was sure he was already in.
~*~
He surmised he’d been in the van for about twenty minutes before they’d pulled away from the Watcher’s flat, heading west towards what he knew was the college campus. It made sense really. Grunts needing a base of operations, and if their cover was being part of the frat scene, well, it fit perfectly.
“Spike.”
It was the sweetest sound he’d ever heard, her voice calling his name. Maybe he’d already died and this was his punishment, listening to her call his name over and over until he was a complete nutter.
“You’re not going crazy… it’s me.”
Spike closed his eyes to savor her presence within him once more. He’d missed her constant company in his mind once the spell was broken, but he didn’t think he could tolerate the pain of watching Buffy choose another and especially listening to them. It didn’t make him long for her any less.
“Please talk to me, if you can.” her voice begged.
“Is that really you, Slayer?”
Immense relief flooded his mind from her. “Oh, thank God! Where are you?”
Spike gave no indication he was communicating with anyone, knowing at least two of the Commandos’ had their eyes trained on him. “Military van, pet, heading west towards the campus.”
“Are you okay? Did they hurt you?”
“I’m whole for the mo’, but not likely to remain that way for much longer.”
Fear gripped his mind as it filtered from her causing him to panic. “Ease up love, gotta have my wits about me. Can’t give ‘em the satisfaction of breaking me.”
“Stop it, Spike! This is serious!” she nearly wailed, fear overriding her better judgment.
“So am I.” Spike’s voice was stern with determination.
A period of silence followed as Buffy’s thoughts became too disjointed to form a cohesive thought, random ideas assaulting her brain and likewise his in a vain attempt to find a way to rescue him. His concentration on their conversation was abruptly severed when one of the grunts laid a booted foot on the back of his neck, pressing hard until Spike’s head was arched into a painful position.
“Hey, Riley,” Forrest called up front to the man driving the van. “Didn’t Walsh say that this hostile’s chip was malfunctioning?”
Riley caught his friend’s eyes in the rearview mirror. “Yeah, it’s one of the reasons she wants him so badly, wants to find out what went wrong.”
Forrest snorted and bent down until he was eye level with Spike. “Hear that, you fanged freak? Your pale ass is gonna get dissected.”
Spike showed no emotion or even a twitch of his body to indicate he’d heard the prick. Let them think that he was beaten, that he was broken inside as well as out. A person who underestimated him was always an advantage. And this time would be no different.
~*~
“He’s heading towards the college campus,” Buffy said as she got to her feet, grabbing the wall when a wave of dizziness caused her to lean too much to the left.
“Riley’s frat house!” Xander suggested enthusiastically. “I bet there’s an entrance somewhere in there.”
“Good thinking, Xan. Now I just need to figure out a way to get inside without getting myself turned into an experiment.”
Giles returned from gagging Angel, scrubbing his hands profusely under hot water with lots of soap in the kitchen. “I still say it’s ludicrous to think you can do this by yourself, Buffy.”
“I can go with her,” Xander offered. “I mean, I still remember all that military training that got stuck in my head during Halloween.”
“Tara and I could help with a glamour spell,” Willow said, grinning at her new friend. “I think it’ll last longer than the one I made for Spike.”
Buffy smiled tremulously. Three weeks ago, she never would’ve thought of Spike the way she did now. Neither would she have counted on the help of the Scoobies to get him out of a jam either. It said a lot about how much all of them had grown in the past few weeks.
“That sounds-”
“Remember these numbers, Slayer… six-one-five-two-three-eight.” Spike’s voice pushed her to memorize the code.
“What is it?”
“It’s the code to the door that leads-” But then he was silent again.
Dread filled Buffy as she quickly finished gathering her weapons and flinging the rucksack to land near the door. She then grabbed Xander and stood in front of Willow and Tara expectantly.
“Okay, you witchy women, make us soldiers.”
~*~
“Damnit, the elevator’s still broken. We’ll have to use the stairs,” Graham growled, slamming the heel of his hand against the panel in a vain attempt to get the lift to work.
“This fucker’s heavy, too,” Forrest added in a strained voice as he had Spike hefted over one shoulder. “You’d think his scrawny ass would be light as a feather.”
Spike barely stopped the rising snarl in his chest. Instead of remaining stiff and unwieldly while the Commando’s manhandled him, he let his whole body sag so they’d have to do most of the work. He knew it was a petty torment, but it produced the desired effect – pissing off Finn and getting him eye level with anything that he did.
“Give him here, you pussy,” Riley ordered, hauling Spike’s bound form over his left shoulder. After settling him there, he glared out of the corner of his eye at his two troop members. “Pathetic.”
He turned to the door that had a keypad above the handle and entered his code, Spike watching the entire time. He descended four flights of stairs with Graham and Forrest following as it emptied out into the main Initiative area containing the jail cells. Walsh was waiting for them as expected.
“Excellent job, Finn. You and Forrest take him straight to lab three-fourteen,” she directed. “Graham? Have experiment one-twenty-three prepped and brought to the room.” She then left to gather another scientist, knowing her orders would be followed.
Forrest slapped Spike on the back of his drooping head as he walked behind Riley. “Man, you’re gonna have lots of fun in there… hope you’re not squeamish!”
It was a reflex that Spike tried to clutch his head from the blow with his bound hands. It didn’t stop the muffled sounds that spluttered around his gag though.
“You say something, animal?” Riley stopped and hauled Spike over to stand in front of them, removing the restraint from his mouth.
“Seven percent of Ireland’s barley crop is used in the production of Guinness beer,” the weary vamp stated, unable to stop himself.
Forrest and Riley looked at each other, evil intent broadening their smiles. “Well, I’ll be damned!”
They quickly dragged Spike to the lab and bound his body to the table, three steel cuffs on each arm and leg, another set across his torso as the final set strapped his head to the table. His beloved duster lay discarded on the floor, kicked into a corner, as his upper body was bared by having his t-shirt cut from neck to navel with a pair of scissors. His jeans followed in much the same fashion as well as his boots, the frigid metal slab causing his temperature to drop further than it already was.
“Hit him again, Forrest,” Riley instructed, watching as the other man took a wicked swing at the side of Spike’s temple.
Spike’s vision tunneled as the blow started the chip firing again. “Sunlight can penetrate clean ocean water to a depth of two-hundred and forty feet.”
“Again.”
This time the hit speared a frisson of pain across Spike’s left cheekbone and he knew it was broken. “A bar of gold the size of a matchbox can be flattened into a sheet the size of a tennis court.”
A slamming door stopped the next strike in midair as Walsh’s angry voice echoed in the sterile room. “What are you doing?”
“I think we’ve discovered the glitch in the hardware, ma’am,” Forrest said with a contrite look on his face.
Dr. Angleman stood behind Walsh and looked at his subject with a frown. “He’s barely conscious! And look at that swelling!”
“You’re both dismissed,” Walsh ground out, brooking no argument from the Commandos.
Forrest excused himself, but Riley lingered, wanting to know what would happen to the hostile.
“Is there a problem with your hearing, soldier?” Walsh glared at him over her glasses.
Riley gritted his teeth at her sharp tone. “It seems this hostile is in possession of some obscure knowledge. Maybe we should-”
“That is none of your concern, agent Finn. Return to your duties or I’ll have you escorted out.”
His body tense with anger, he nodded curtly before leaving the lab and taking up his post in the security room. It was his turn to man the cameras tonight, and with a little jerry rigging of the wires, he could watch everything that they did without being caught.
~*~
“I look like Geraldo Rivera,” Xander said, staring at himself in the mirror.
“At least that’s better than looking like Demi Moore from G.I. Jane,” Buffy complained as she took in her new appearance.
Both friends were unrecognizable in the glamour that they wore, complete with military gear and flack vests. Xander’s body had been thinned down and given a mustache-goatee so no one would look too closely at his facial features. Buffy looked like a starving boot camp reject with spiky short brown fuzz and hollow cheeks. There would be no way anyone in the Initiative would identify either of them on sight.
“Now, Buffy,” Giles reminded her of the plan. “Anya, Tara, and Willow will be waiting in the car after they drop you and Xander off near Lowell House. We’ll give you an hour to get in and get Spike out. If you don’t return by the allotted time, I’m calling the authorities. Is that understood?”
Buffy looked over her military issue rifle as she tried to force a loaded clip into the chamber. “Yeah, Giles,” she grunted with exertion as the clip finally clicked into position and she smiled proudly.
She also forgot to set the safety. A shot pierced her Watcher’s ceiling as everyone ducked when she swung her gun around again.
“Maybe she would do better with knives?” Xander stated with exasperation, taking the rifle from her.
She pouted but then her eyes glazed over with desire when he presented her with a rather large Bowie knife, newly sharpened. “Ooh, shiny!”
Her smile instantly disappeared as Spike’s thoughts suddenly took a decidedly ghastly turn.
“Need to switch off now, Slayer… not fit for your pretty sensibilities.” The voice in her head was slurred and laced with pain.
“Again.”
“Spike?”
Nothing.
Terror coursed through her. “Guys, we need to be there like five minutes ago!”
~*~
“Computer, run diagnostic scan of cranium.”
Spike heard a mild hum start up around his head as he lay on the chilly table, wishing his ego or pride – or maybe it was his stubborn constitution - would let him slip into unconsciousness. He could discern a thin line of bright light moving across his face, but he knew that his sight was damaged beyond repair at this point, the chip having severed the ocular nerve.
“See here, Dr. Angleman? The chip has completely dislodged itself from the hypothalamus and become wrapped around the cerebral cortex… amazing,” Walsh breathed in excitement as she studied the images.
Dr. Angleman concurred. “It’s truly fascinating… but we’ll need to start over. The chip isn’t viable with its present placement in the subject’s brain. Plus, I believe there’s damage to the hardware that will have to be corrected before reimplantation.”
Bollocks! It was Spike’s only lucid thought.
“I’ll just prep the area if you’ll open a surgical kit,” the doctor directed.
Spike could feel the razor scrape along his scalp, shedding his platinum curls in order to obtain their precious piece of junk. He also felt the alcohol burn its way over the sensitive area to keep it sterile, which he didn’t know why they bothered since he didn’t get infections… or did he? He didn’t remember anymore.
He couldn’t move or yelp in pain when the scalpel sliced into his scalp, any and all of his energy gone with the previous beatings, feeling the blood drip down to collect in a basin below his elevated head. It was an unnerving sensation to listen as the doctor recorded his operation while his skin was being pulled back from his head.
“Removal of scalp tissue just above the parietal bone of skull.”
Let me faint, you fuckers!
The whirring of the bone saw caused Spike to struggle against his restraints until the motor shut off.
“Sedate him please, Maggie.”
A slight prick to his bicep was the only warning he got before the burning fluid sluiced through his veins. His muscles relaxed and his face became numb… but blessed oblivion did not come. He could hear everything, but was unable to react. What the fuck had they given him?
The motor started up again and he was somewhat relieved that because his face and head were numb, he could only feel the pressure of the bone saw, not the actual cutting itself.
“Triangular three inch section of skull bone removed to reveal the dura and pia-arachnoid mater. Malfunctioning hardware also located. Maggie, hand me that clamp.”
Spike’s body strained against his cuffs the moment Dr. Angleman placed the clamp on the chip, regardless of the drug in his system. It was like a live, hot wire and his thoughts were set on fast forward.
“Hot dogs originated in China. A bad move in chess is called a zugswang. A neuroblast is a newly formed nerve cell. Parsley is the most widely used herb in the world. A single bale of cotton will yield two hundred and fifteen pairs of jeans. The range of a medieval longbow is about two hundred and twenty yards. The animal with the highest worldwide output of farts is the termite.”
Dr. Angleman removed the clamp and Spike sagged like a limp rag. “My god, how intriguing!”
“Do you still wish to start over, doctor?” Walsh asked as she began prepping the kit that Graham had placed in the lab.
The doctor studied the device that had embedded itself in Spike’s brain, albeit in the wrong spot. “It’s tempting to keep it in place for study, but I still want to remove it and see what we get. Besides, if this subject fails, we have others.”
Before Spike could slur any objections, the ‘live hot wire’ was completely withdrawn from his head, replaced by a blissful nothingness.
~*~
Lowell House was empty.
At least, Buffy and Xander hoped against hope that it was.
“I think we need to be looking for a door that has numbers on it,” Buffy whispered. “Spike told me a code and I think it leads to the Initiative.”
“There are only bathrooms doors on the first floor, so let’s try the second.”
The crept quietly up the wide staircase and scanned the hall for any signs of movement. Seeing none, they began checking doors on each side, praying they found what they were looking for. Buffy stopped in front of a floor to ceiling mirror.
“This is an odd place for this, don’t you think? I didn’t know army types were vain,” she snickered, looking it up and down.
Xander came to stand behind her, staring intently at the edges of the frame. “I think it’s a decoy.” He rapped his knuckles on the wall next to the mirror. “Yep, hollow.”
“Woah, look at you,” she beamed. “Maybe you should join the real army.”
He looked at her with a raised eyebrow.
“Yeah, on second thought, that’s a big fat no! They’re turning out to be the bad guys and while I can’t shoot worth a damn, I’d really hate having to beat you up if you got outta line.”
He started to roll his eyes but stopped as he focused on the door next to the mirror. “There! A keypad above the latch!”
She wanted to squeal in delight but refrained as she tried to remember the code. “Okay, here’s the sequence… I think.”
“You don’t know?” he spluttered. “One wrong number and this whole place might go into lock down!”
“Way to go, Xander… now I feel NO pressure,” she spat.
He grabbed her by the arms and looked her in the eye. “Just calm down and concentrate really hard. I know you wanna get Spike outta there, but screwing this up won’t allow that to happen.”
“Remind me to never go to you when I need a positive pep talk,” she said with a glare. “Six-one-five-two-three-eight.”
They both blinked in shock. “Woah. Guess it just takes a bit of attitude to produce the desired effect.”
She punched in the arm. “Shut up and enter the code.”
They held their breath as he entered the code, waiting for alarms to start sounding because of a wrong digit or something. They exhaled their relief when nothing happened but the door opening with a beep.
~*~
Riley watched as Hostile Seventeen’s brain was dissected, smirking in contempt for his species.
He was about to zoom in on the procedure when his attention was drawn to the Lowell House stairwell camera, two figures dressed in fatigues descending to the compound. He brought the picture into focus to see who would be in the frat house at this time of night, not recognizing either agent. They were dressed to the hilt though, so he figured they were returning from a bag and tag mission, Lowell being the closest access.
He turned back to watch Walsh and Angleman insert several needles into the hostile’s arms and femoral arteries, knowing what was coming next, but keeping an eye on the strange soldiers.
~*~
“Can you hear me hostile?” Walsh said loudly.
“Spike,” he whispered through cracked and dry lips.
“Is that what you call yourself? Spike?”
“Get bent!”
She cocked an eyebrow, but continued inserting needles into key veins and arties throughout his body. “We’re going to bleed you out, vampire.”
Spike’s eyes widened. “You’re fucking off your rocker!” He tried flexing his left arm against his restraints, but he couldn’t gain enough leverage to do more than make the metal cuff groan in protest.
“There’s no need to struggle. We’ve taken three pints so far. I imagine it’ll only take about ten more minutes before you’re completely drained, you don’t have much weight to your body.”
He looked down to see several tubes with deep red fluid flowing through them and into glass bottles, feeling himself get weaker and weaker by the second. He didn’t even have the strength to ask why they were doing it. Wouldn’t it be easier just to dust him and save on all the medical supplies? Then he remembered he was dealing with scientific sadists, and no cost was too high in the name of research.
~*~
Buffy grabbed Xander’s arm before they entered through the compound door. “Who do we say we are?”
“I’m Sergeant Harris and you’re Private Summers.”
“Think of something else, Summers is a dead give away!”
“Anderson?”
“Fine.” She blew out a nervous breath. “Okay, let’s go kick some Initiative ass!”
~*~
They say that the senses die one by one, as someone is crossing over.
Spike hoped that was true. He no longer felt his legs or arms as his life’s blood seeped from his veins into containers meant for who knows what, a heavy weight settling on his chest. His sight became crap long ago so he wasn’t surprised when everything went completely black.
He could do without the panicky feeling that was threatening to engulf him, like a swimmer who’s grown tired and can no longer tread water in the deep end, but it hovered just out of reach. Faint sounds echoed in the background, as if he were on a high cliff and listening to a war in a valley far away in the distance, thundering booms and shouts of rage and pain. Maybe the good guys were winning, he mused idly.
The good guys… Buffy. His golden Slayer, the ultimate goal for his sad, pathetic life. At least, that’s how it had started out, but somewhere along the way it became a tangled mess, and now, at the end, he wanted nothing more than to be wrapped in her embrace and to sleep… sleep until the darkness receded and she was all that he knew.
“She is the grass that I lay my head upon…”
“Spike? I’m coming, hang in there!”
“She is the rain that quenches my undying thirst…”
“NO!” The scream echoed in his mind and ears, as if she were really near.
“And I love you as the flowers love the sunshine.”
With his last unneeded breath, Spike gave up, and was no more.
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Author's Chapter Notes:
Many thanks to the awesomest (yeah, that’s my word) beta’s around, Dusty273 and Im_Bloody_English! Thanks for all that you do, you make it so much better!
This story is very much on the home stretch; only about 3 more chapters left – honestly – and they’ll all be long. This is probably the longest chapter I’ve ever written, and man, were my piddies all tuckered out! Thank you to everyone that stuck with this story and the reviews you were kind enough to leave, cause they always made my day brighter!
Sotia, I’m soooo very sorry hun, I couldn’t do as you asked. (please don’t hurt/malign/maim and or kill me, cause then you’d never know the ending ;) )
**WARNING** This chapter contains torture of a graphic kind! (those NOT in the medical field, please don’t hurl) It’s nothing along the lines of torture I use in Hunter’s Bane, if that’s any consolation – but if blood squicks you out (and if you like vamps, why does blood squick you out?) then you might want to wait until the next chapter…
Tina, this chapter is all for you, babe! You posed the idea and I ran with it, hopefully I won’t crash into the wall! And I SOOO enjoyed our time while you were here, Nini misses you terribly! Well, so do I, but I’m not a cat and I can deal. Omar wants to be your slave and Dave thinks you’re cool ;)
All facts come from Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader. Yeah, I have a lot of them.
This story is very much on the home stretch; only about 3 more chapters left – honestly – and they’ll all be long. This is probably the longest chapter I’ve ever written, and man, were my piddies all tuckered out! Thank you to everyone that stuck with this story and the reviews you were kind enough to leave, cause they always made my day brighter!
Sotia, I’m soooo very sorry hun, I couldn’t do as you asked. (please don’t hurt/malign/maim and or kill me, cause then you’d never know the ending ;) )
**WARNING** This chapter contains torture of a graphic kind! (those NOT in the medical field, please don’t hurl) It’s nothing along the lines of torture I use in Hunter’s Bane, if that’s any consolation – but if blood squicks you out (and if you like vamps, why does blood squick you out?) then you might want to wait until the next chapter…
Tina, this chapter is all for you, babe! You posed the idea and I ran with it, hopefully I won’t crash into the wall! And I SOOO enjoyed our time while you were here, Nini misses you terribly! Well, so do I, but I’m not a cat and I can deal. Omar wants to be your slave and Dave thinks you’re cool ;)
All facts come from Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader. Yeah, I have a lot of them.
Chapter End Notes:
Okay, you really can't kill me! (even thought I'm sure you'd like to at this moment) But as I told Sotia, if you wanna know the end.... *evil laughter ensues*