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They headed out of the alley planning to go to the high school and have the conversation with Giles that Buffy had remembered to dread again. Spike swung into step beside her and wrapped his arm around her shoulders, tucking her up close to his body. Dalton fell into step behind them.

They walked in a silence that fell somewhere in between companionable and awkward. There was really nothing to talk about just now, since Buffy refused to ease any of Spike's curiosity until they met up with her Watcher.'

After a couple of block's Buffy tilted her head to the side, putting Spike and Dalton both in mind of the RCA dog. After a few moments, she cursed under her breath.

"Is it danger, Mistress?" Dalton inquired worriedly.

"No, not danger. Angel's on his way back. And judging from what he's muttering under his breath he wants to talk to me." she answered, irritation evident in her voice.

"No problem, pet," Spike said cheerfully, pleased that she showed no desire to be with Angel. "We can talk to the big poof."

"He wants to talk to me in private. He is, in fact, rehearsing different ways of requesting a private audience with me." she explained.

Spike stopped and tilted his head, straining his ears to hear what could only be amusing. He heard nothing that sounded like the big poofter. "Sure you're not just hearing voices, pet?" he asked her.

"I'm sure. I can hear a lot better than vamps now. See and smell better too. I think I might be stronger now too, but I haven't really come across anything other than fledglings since I changed. What I really want is some huge angry demon to come to town so I can really test it." she said eagerly.

Spike smiled indulgently at her and she glared at him when she smelled the same patronizing scent coming off of him that Angel had exuded on that awful morning so many weeks ago. "You're just as bad as Angel is!" she accused.

"Oi! I resent that! I'm nothing like the great forehead! You better watch that mouth, little girl!" he shouted at her.

"If you don't want me saying you're like him, than you should quit acting like him! Think I can't smell what you're thinking? You've got the same patronizing, doubtful, let's humor the delusional little girl smell that he had when this started! I mean, shit! I couldn't count on him for help, and he was supposed to be in love with me! I had to go to a freakin' teenage werewolf, of all cliches to get the help I needed, and now here you go reacting the same way!" she shouted back at him, feeling pushed and persecuted beyond all endurance.

What the hell was up with these Master Vampires anyway? Couldn't they stand the thought of a teenage Slayer being better than them at something? They really should be used to it by now, considering that she had kicked both their asses already! She'd put Spike in a wheelchair and sent Angel to hell! She'd already been better than them before the changes that had changed her life so drastically, so they shouldn't be so freaked out about her improvements.

'A little egotistical much?' she heard Spike's voice, but she knew she hadn't heard it with her ears. She looked over at him cautiously.

'That's right, Slayer. There's a little bit more to the bond than great sex and delicious blood.' She could hear the smirk in his voice even though his lips didn't move and his face remained stoic.

'I never knew that.' she though cautiously. 'Dalton? Angel? Can you guys hear me?'

'They better not be able to!' Spike thought angrily. 'This 's a benefit of a mating bond.'

'So that's what we did then? A mating bond?'

'Don't bruise my ego here Slayer! I know you haven't forgotten that fantastic mating dance we performed against the wall already!'

Buffy blushed beet red and looked down at the ground, trying not to remember. If she thought about it, she'd want to do it again and he'd know it too, what with vampire smelling. He inhaled a deep breath and waggled his eyebrows at her when she looked up.

Too late.

Spike suddenly halted and cocked his head to the side. "I'll be damned!" he muttered. Buffy just looked at him with her eyebrows raised. She already knew what he heard, and couldn't help the smug feeling she was having.

"I hear the poofter, and he's muttering to himself, but I can't tell what he's saying. You really heard him clearly, words and all a minute ago?" he asked her softly.

"Told you so." she muttered, still upset with him.

"Yeh, you did, din't you, kitten? I'm sorry for doubting you, and I'm even more sorry that I did the same thing he did." Spike said softly tilting her chin up to meet his eyes.

Her eyes were wide and filled with cautious awe. 'You're forgiven. And you also stepped right out of the Angel mold. He's never apologized for anything. Ever.'

Spike frowned a little and opened his mouth to say something, but Angel spotted them and called out to Buffy before he could. She told Angel to wait a minute and turned to Spike, looking into his eyes and communicating silently with him. 'Look, you won't have to deal with him for very long. I don't particularly want to keep him as a minion. I have no plans to renew the claim, and since he was a Master to begin with, it will fade. He's free to go at anytime that he wants to, and now that you're in the picture he probably will. He might want to say goodbye right now.' She wasn't above pleading with him, as long as no one else heard. 'Please let me walk with him. I'll keep the link open so you can know everything I know. Can you trust me that little bit at least?'

Spike growled and let her know that he wasn't happy with her turning it around like that. It wasn't her that he didn't trust. It was the ponce who seemed to delight in making him miserable with or without a soul. But when she put it that way, he really had no choice. At least not if he wanted to be allowed to touch her again anytime soon. He had some first hand knowledge of how women worked, after all. 'Fine. But only if you'll make him cluck like a chicken.'

Buffy laughed and craned her neck for a kiss. "Not gonna happen. He's been punished enough for what he did. Go to Willie's later and ask about him. You'll see what I'm talking about." With one last kiss she walked away from him to go see what Angel wanted.

They walked quite a few blocks away to let Angel feel comfortable that he wouldn't be heard. Buffy couldn't resist asking Spike every few seconds through the bond, 'Can you hear me now?' and she was kind of surprised that a one hundred and twenty some year old vampire would be knowledgeable enough about current fads to get the joke.

When they finally reached a point far enough away that Angel felt comfortable, he stopped, turned to her and asked, "Why haven't you renewed the claim you made on me? Do you really like Dalton that much more than me? I thought what we had was special, but now you don't seem to care."

Buffy was, quite simply, shocked into silence. Her eyes were huge and she had to bite her lip to keep from laughing along with Spike.

"I...uh...I thought you didn't really want to be a minion?" she phrased it as a question. "You pissed me off and I just automatically did something I knew you would hate, but I didn't intend to keep it up forever. That would be way too mean, even for me."

"Look, I know I was wrong for trying to claim you like that, without your knowledge." She barely controlled her wince as she heard Spike's roar in her head. Yep. There was the possessive jealousy she had been worried about earlier.

'Stay there, Spike!' Wow. She hadn't realized she could scream in her mind. 'Remember what I did to him! His claim failed, he's my minion and you're my mate! Just let me figure out what he wants so I can handle it.'

Unbelievably, she could actually feel him pout through the claim, but at least he quit running in their direction and tried to calm down his anger. 'Still think you oughta make him do something. The hokey-pokey maybe?'

"...I never would have done anything like that in my right mind, but I wasn't in my right mind." Shit. Angel was still talking. She hoped she hadn't missed anything important. "But what's done is done, and I think you should renew your claim on me so that I can stick around and help out and make sure you do the right thing."

Buffy's eyebrow rose into the stratosphere. The hokey pokey wasn't nearly enough for this display of ego. "Excuse me?" she bit the words out, using every ounce of will power she had to keep her anger from leaking through the bond to Angel. Spike felt it though and even caught the drift of her thoughts. He was laughing wildly and jumping up and down in anticipation.

"Well, Buffy, obviously you're not thinking straight. You just haven't gotten a handle on your demon yet. Otherwise you never would have put a mating claim on Spike. But if I help you out and keep you from renewing it, eventually we might be able to find a way to break it." he told her, looking at her with his sweetest puppy dog eyes. The ones that had always melted her teenage heart before.

For the first time in her life, Buffy could see the benefits of kicking puppies. Instead of kicking him, she released the hold she'd had on her anger and let Angel feel the full force of the rage he had pushed her to. She could hear Spike running towards them now, yelling for Dalton to hurry before he missed out on all the fun. And he was still laughing wildly.

Angel's eyes got real wide and he opened his mouth to say something, but before he had the chance Buffy growled at him and then told him exactly what she wanted him to do.

A few minutes later Oz pulled up in his van with Willow in the passenger seat, and Xander and Anya riding in the back. None of them had any idea what to make of the scene before them.

There was some guy that looked like a friend of Giles' laughing softly and shaking his head, while Spike, the evil vampire that wanted to kill Buffy, was laughing like a lunatic while he swung the Slayer around and sang her praises.

Weirdest of all though, Angel was in the middle of the deserted street with his arms held out straight in front of him and moving jerkily around while he was singing.

Willow was the first one to make the connection. "That's Thriller! The dance from the video about the undead rising and trying to take over! Kind of funny, really, but I never thought that Angel actually had a sense of humor."

Anya started laughing and Oz pulled out his cell phone so he could make use of the video recorder. Xander couldn't peel his eyes off of Spike with his arms around Buffy.

The Slayer of Slayers was holding her and she wasn't fighting! She was laughing! And oh no! Did she really just kiss him! Sick!

Sometimes he wished he was undead. Maybe then he'd have a chance.





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