I know I'm late, but the next one will be up soon I promise. I just thought that the denizens of No. 9 Wilton Crescent needed a bit of a breather some fluffy fun before we move one. More soon!
Chapter Twenty-One – A Spot of Violence
Despite the fact that they were teeming with supernatural energy, the various cemeteries of Sunnydale lacked the cob-webby, mossy, general creepiness of their London counterparts. There was just something about them and how long they had been repositories for the dead that gave them a constant damp chill, even if said olde-worlde examples tended to be dead metaphorically speaking. Or at least the ones near central London tended to be, because Hackney was hopping.
Which was good because Buffy wanted to rip something apart with her hands.
They swept into the cemetery and Alex dusted a minion not ten paces from the gate and Raj had already been attacked twice. Counting this time. He was currently doing his best to fend off a vamp with holy water and his patented method of girlish shrieking.
Buffy had gotten the last one so she had graciously allowed Alex to call dibs. A privilege the damphyr was so rudely squandering.
“One more failed attempt on Raj’s part at smacking it with a cross and I’m contesting the dibs.” She informed the teenager.
“Lex, this isn’t funny!” Raj said from his place pinned to the ground. He finally got the leverage to knee creature in its balls and managed to scramble away. He got five steps when the famished vampire grabbed his ankle. “You can’t still be punishing me for Holland House!”
“I think I am the one who gets to decide that.” Alex said sitting on a head stone and toying with a stake.
“Lex, is this necessary?” Buffy asked trying not to look amused.
“One of my classmates is named Ampersand.” The damphyr countered, daring either super-being to contest her. “Not ironically.”
Spike rolled his eyes, strode over and grabbed the vamp off Raj who was trying to place the stake and keep the vamp off his neck at the same time. He made short work of the attacking vampire, plunging a stake into its heart almost lazily.
“Oh, c’mon it’s a minion!” Alex said. “He would have gotten there.
“Where there’s a minion there’s a master.” He said knowingly as he offered Raj a hand up. The younger man accepted it gratefully, and brushed the twigs and vamp dust from his clothes.
“Right then, will you keep your minions in line?” he demanded of the master vampire.
“Have we not just established that minions are inferior creatures?”
“Yes.”
“Fuck you! I’m a bloody miracle. I’m a gift from the powers that fucking be!”
“And I’m just a wee bit addled from all the nearly getting killed I’ve been doing.”
Buffy had been scanning the headstones hopefully for a few more punching prospects when something occurred to her.
“You can tell a minion from a regular vamp?” She asked Alex. “and also follow up: there’s a difference between minions and regular vamps?”
Alex arched an eyebrow at her.
“Yeah. What did they teach you in Sunnydale?”
“Vampires, bad, stake them.”
“Ahhhhh, life was simple then.” Alex replied with a sly smirk.
Buffy rolled her eyes.
“But seriously I thought minions were just like fledges?”
Alex shook her head.
“Nah, fledges could be minions or childer, childer tend to be more precious, they are fed right away, trained—whole nine yards. They are turned to be family. Minions are turned for muscle or status so they tend to be weaker, less sire’s blood.”
She looked at Spike for affirmation. He looked impressed, so did Raj.
“What?” she said flushing a little.
“S’ about bloody time they taught you about vamps,” Spike said nodding approvingly. “Hierarchy and all that.”
“Huh, vampire hierarchy.” Buffy mused a little bit put out. “I’ve been a slayer for what 5 years now? They never bothered to make with the knowledge?”
Alex cut her eyes over at Spike. He lit a cigarette and shrugged.
“Don’t think the wanker’s council was too keen on teaching slayers about dynamics, better the vampires are a kill on sight prey.”
“Hey! I work for the council!” Alex protested. Then sighed. “or I did. They wanted to be sure we were armed with the knowledge of what we were getting into.”
“See, bit, you work for Rupes. And he has a head on his shoulders that he uses from time to time.” Spike replied and then noticed both Alex and Buffy’s incredulous looks. “Don’t go telling him that I told you that.”
Alex raised her hands in amused surrender.
Buffy chuckled knowingly.
“I knew there had to be some sort of bonding going on in that tiny apartment last year.” She said.
“There was no bonding, there was some chess.” Spike admitted, he had been kicking himself for bringing up Rupert and Sunnydale, a topic as of yet Buffy was rarely comfortable with. For once though it didn’t turn into a spate of moodiness. “But I’m glad to hear there’ve started teaching you chits what’s what.” He paused when he noticed Buffy’s appraising look. “what?”
“It’s just weird hearing you be huffy in the Giles accent”
“Why, pet? Is it getting all tangled up in your Jane Austen fantasies?”
“Oi, Spike? Lex?”
“Oh, like hell, Spike.”
“Jane Aus—oh gross.”
“Shut up, Minion.”
“I’m not your minion!”
“Guys?”
“What is it, Prasad?"
Instead of answering he jerked his chin towards five vamps in the distance who had just taken notice of them. He looked at them in panic only to notice the identical feral gleam in each of their eyes. Sometime the familial resemblance was difficult to deny.
“Ooh! Ooh! Mine!” Buffy yelled as she took off towards the vamp cluster.
Spike barked a quick order to Alex to stay with Raj before tearing off after her.
*****
He let her get ahead of him when she had called back a terse “I can handle it Spike.”
He knew she needed this, they had all agreed that patrol was not something that their could risk, but today was a special occasion. He was a warrior just like her, and he knew what they had done to him, what they had done to her, the helplessness of it was crippling and she had had another taste of it today. Insisting that this patrol was more than necessary was the least he could do for faffing around and not coming to her sooner.
She needed to feel like herself, and to do that she needed to remember that she was a fighter, fighting is what she did best. And it was true, she dusted the first vampire before they even realized it. She grabbed one by the shoulders and threw it into the other two and traded blows with the last. He got one good punch but it was clear that Buffy was toying with them. Fliting from one to the other like an expert plate spinner.
“Know that you got it, luv.” He said. “I’m here to watch.”
“Do you have to make everything dirty?” she tossed over her shoulder.
“I meant nothing of the sort.” He replied. “That would be all your nasty little mind turned everything around.”
Buffy turned to glare at him. The vamp took that moment to try and attack her from behind, an attack she easily side stepped. She caught its ankle to throw it off balance then, as it fell she staked it unerringly and it exploded into dust.
“You’re a pig, Spike.”
“Been singing that tune a little too long, Summers, know anything new?”
She snorted indelicately.
“Like you would knew ‘new’ if it smacked you in the fangs?” she said as the others she had tackled earlier awoke. She grabbed one, smacked it into a headstone which she then flipped over to kick the other in the face. She landed on the other side and surveyed the cemetery for the other vampire. “Would you like a collection of NOW – 98 Beethoven’s 9th Sympho-snoozefest?”
She made quick work of the other two dusting the one on the ground where he lay and taking out the other as he lunged at her. It was almost absent minded.
“The last one?”
“He probably ran away when he saw I hit like a girl.” She quipped. “One girl in all the world to be exact.”
She turned to him with that sly smile and Spike couldn’t keep himself back. He had her pressed against the wall, hands above her head. The cloud of arousal that was her response to his rough handling was just about his undoing.
She was a vision, her was flushed from the fight her hair wild and her eyes bright. He loved watching her fight, he loved what she looked like after she fought, the blood screaming through her veins was a clarion call.
“You are bloody magnificent, pet, you know that?” he murmured against her lips. “and I might have been thinking just a little bit dirty when I said I like to watch.”
Her smile was wicked as she wrapped her legs around his waist. And then she was kissing him and the world fell away around them. Spike was wrapped in her, savoring the taste of her, the smell that was uniquely Buffy: vanilla, spices, and violence. He was drowning in her and he never wanted to stop.
“Spike, Duck!”
Her tone was laced with enough slayer authority that he complied without thinking. The third vamp had reared his ugly face. Spike wanted to dust him then and there, still this vamp was the master and he was never one to shy away from a rough and tumble.
The slayer had gotten there first, she had launched herself off the tree and right into the other vampire catching him in the chest and taking quick advantage. She sprung to her feet a kicking his face in, once, twice, the vamp caught her third kick and spun her to the ground. Spike was about the enter the fray when he was pinned in place by Buffy’s pissed off glare.
“He’s mine.” She said.
“Yes, stay back!” the vampire exclaimed. “You killed my childer, I’ma enjoy draining you dry.”
He barely finished the sentence before Buffy round housed the fierce look off his face.
“Don’t you know it’s rude to interrupt?” she demanded.
She had punctuated each word with a solid hit. The vampire reeled, unprepared for the slayer onslaught.
“What are you?”
“Me?” she said. “I’m just a girl. Having some smoochie fun; which I’m not now and it’s your stupid fault!”
A few more jabs and a round house. The vampire searched frantically, clearly out of his depth. He turned and latched onto Spike.
“You’re my kind! Come and help me!”
The elder vampire was already puffing away on a cigarette. He shook his head. “Not when watching her kill you is this much fun!”
Buffy grabbed him by the throat and slammed him into a lion shaped sarcophagus.
“Blood traitor!” the vampire spat.
He managed to catch an elbow and bring her down. He lost no time in kicking her in the stomach. The blow was deflected but it knocked Buffy off balance. He turned his sights on Spike.
“You sniveling coward!”
Buffy tried to sweep the leg but the vampire dodged. She sprung back up and received a fist in her face.
“Letting your O-bag do your dirty wor—”
The word triggered something in him before he consciously made the decision, Spike saw red. What happened next happened so quickly one of Buffy’s killer right hooks met air. Spike was snarling in full game face. And the vampire was flying into a mausoleum.
“Don’t you—o-bag—” in no time he was across the clearing. There was a loud roar and Spike ripped the head of the vampire with his bare hands and it exploded into dust around him.
Buffy arched an eyebrow quizzically at him. “O-bag?”
Spike sighed. He knew there was very little chance of picking up where they left off, he wished he had made that stupid fledge suffer just a little bit more. Didn’t mean he wasn’t going to try.
“Where were we?”
He swept her into his arms and kissed her soundly. Spike was a good kisser, he knew he was a good kisser, he had training. When he finally broke away so she could breathe, she looked dazed for a second but managed to shake it away and smirk at him, clearly aware of what he was trying to do.
“You were just about to tell me what an o-bag is and why it made you go all Spike smash?”
Bugger. She clearly identified this as one of those vampire heirarchy things she'd been missing out on.
“Do you really want to discuss this now?”
“Sparknotes.”
Spike groaned inwardly. This was edging closer and closer to dangerous territory. He had up to this point been so very careful not to discuss anything relating to whatever it was that was between them especially anything that even remotely hinted at is vampiric nature. Unable to resist one more try at distraction he grabbed her ass and slid his hands up her thighs, encouraging her to wrap her legs around him unsupported by anything else. He nibbled at her neck with his blunt human teeth.
She let him do it for a minute and slid away.
“I get that I’m learning on a curve here, but I will not be deterred! resolve face.” She said matter-of-factly.
Spike sighed, defeated. Maybe the neck nibble she so loved was not the best move in this situation.
“An o-bag is just a vamp thing. It’s slang for—humans who like to take part in bloodsharing.”
She stared.
"Like--"
Bugger he had forgotten all about Finn. He hadn't thought about Finn in a millennium. He kicked himself for even coming close to reminding her about that. He cut her off hoping that she wouldn't dwell.
“S’not about the feeding , I suppose that’s part of it. It’s not even the needing someone. Vamp bites can be—good.” He finished lamely. Bloodsharing was a deeply intimate experience. That stupid word made it seem cheaper than it was.
“So while I’m out there patrolling the world to keep it from backsliding into the clutches of the hell-fire and eternal shadows these people are actively offering their necks up to vampires?”
Spike was unsure if she was actually upset or merely being quippy.
“Some people like a little pain with their pleasure.” Wide, hazel eyes flew to his and Spike couldn’t resist a little leer—hoping she would then laugh it off, or just smack him and get on with it.
Bugger. He’d been so afraid to breathe trying not to chase her away and all of his efforts blasted by some random fledge. He was so caught up in bracing for the worst he almost missed her next words:
“Show me.”
*****
Buffy was biting down on her knuckle to keep herself from crying out, she couldn't help it. Spike was an incredibly talented lover, but this was something he was particularly good at. His tongue was everywhere and nowhere; and she had no idea where it ended and his fingers began. It was all blinding waves of good. So much good.
She dug her fingers deeper into the wet earth and bucked her hips, unable to properly control her response. She could almost feel his smirk against her.
“You sure about this, pet?”
Hadn’t they established that? Buffy was suddenly very pissed that he was questioning her when he had must more interesting things to do with that mouth.
“Love?” he repeated. “Don’t want you playing kick the Spike later.”
“Spike,” she bit out in warning. God, anything she would say anything just to make him go back to what he was doing. She nodded wordlessly and he returned to her.
“So wet, Baby, so slippery for me. Hate to waste a drop,” he lapped at her soundly until she was almost crawling out of her skin with the anticipatiion, and then he slid three fingers into her body, he pressed his thumb against her clit and she felt his fangs burn as they slid into the soft skin of her upper thigh.
Her scream was enough to wake the dead.
*****
Spike was unsure how it happened but somehow he was in heaven. He could feel the elixir that was Buffy’s blood sliding down his throat, his demon purring at the satisfaction that came with pleasing the women it considered its mate. Spike had deliberately left the mating bit of the biting out of his brief explanation of what the vamp had been talking about. But all that was baggage he was sure would pop the magnificent bubble they were enjoying.
But he wasn’t thinking about that now, he wasn’t thinking about anything, couldn’t really. His world had narrowed to a single sensation and that was slayer’s blood. It made every ounce of pig’s blood he drank worth it.
He wanted to write poetry. Verses and verses about how she felt underneath him.
That Buffy was keening like a banshee under his fingers, holding his head to her thigh was enough to bring a man to his knees metaphorically speaking. As it was the trust she had put in him was staggering.
After a few pulls he licked the wound closed and returned his attention back to her core, laving at her relentlessly as she came and stroking the mark he had made knowing it would be an erogenous zone until it healed up. He and prolonged the aftershocks until she was quivering and boneless against him.
She lay on the grass unable to do anything breathe for a few moments.
“Wow.” She managed finally. “Just… Wow.”
He couldn’t resist a smirk as he crawled back up to press his lips to hers.
“But you didn’t—”
“I’m sure you’ll make it up to me.” He was about to say something else but the unmistakable sounds of a scuffle a little ways away interrupted him. “C’mon, let’s go see about Abbot and Costello."
*****
“Guh, Why do I even ask her why she’s wearing a skirt to patrol?” An irritated Alex asked Raj, they had known better than to stick around. “Because I’m going to have illicit smoochies in the bushes and then awkwardly pretend that I’m not having sex every five minutes. I hate supernatural hearing.” she paused for a second. “Do they really think they’re being subtle? Because if that’s—” she glanced around her, Raj was gone. “Wait--Raj? Raj!”
Raj wasn’t really listening, he was instead scanning the tombstones so intently that the damphyr was sure he was going to bust a vein or something.
He stalked out in front of her, she crouched and pinched his ankle in one fluid momvement and then ducked out of the way for his delayed reaction.
“ARGH AH!!!”
“Dude, if you don’t lighten up we’re going to stop letting you come to these things. You can’t fight if you’ve given yourself a concentration headache.”
“Easy for you to say, I wasn’t trained from birth in the art of slaying. I have to be ready.”
Alex, almost carelessly stuck her foot out and caught Raj’s leg. He tumbled to the floor.
“There’s being aware of your surroundings and then there’s being so focused on one thing that you forget to actually watch where you are going. Eyes and instincts, grasshopper.”
“This is extremely patronizing coming from a teenager.”
Alex smirked. “Trained from birth and all that. Make you feel any better?”
The look on his face made it clear what he thought of that.
“Make all the cracks you want,” she said with a shrug. She thought maybe she heard a rustle. “You’re never going to level up if you don’t listen to your training and your instincts.”
“You really think I’m all hacking and video games, don’t you? I am a member of the watcher’s council you know.” Raj said getting up and brushing dander from his jacket. “and I don’t have those instincts.”
That was definitely a rustle. It didn't sound like a vampire.
“Not yet.” Alex conceded shewas concentratingon the sound, waiting for it to betray its position. “but you develop them. Until then you have mine.”
Raj rolled his eyes. “Oh yeah, and what are they telling you now?”
There.
Alex stopped and turned to him and blanched.
“Get Down!”
Without thinking Raj hit the ground. He babbled something about fully expected to scramble to his feet moments later to see her laughing her head off but he had ducked anyway. And it was a good thing that he did because Alex was face to face with a large angry as hell, honest-to-hellmouth demon.
It was massive and growling, it was covered in leathery armour-like skin. It was segmented, but with very smal gaps between plates.Alex swung her axe and managed to catch it in the shoulder near where the shoulder and neck met, but that didn’t seem to do much more than anger it. She did her best to wrench the axe out of the demon's flesh but it held fast and her momentary lapse in concentration cost her. With a swipe of the demon's arm, Alex was flying into a tomb stone.
“Shit.”
Raj’s exclamation caught the demon’s attention and it turned to him, Raj reacted quickly, shooting the bolts of his crossbow into the demon’s chest.
That didn’t seem to kill it but his distraction had allowed Alex to recover. She scrambled to her feet and procured a dagger from nowhere. She circled the demon trying to find a good opening to attack.
“Raj, do you know what this thing is?”
Raj was too petrified to move. Alex finally found an opening in its back and struck, the demon roared and tried to reach behind his back but Alex was too fast for it, she attacked savagely and then danced out of its reach.
“Haxil Beast maybe?”
“Did you just inflect? Was that a question?” she shot back incredulously.
“It’s a Haxil Beast! I'm sure of it!”
Alex was a blur, she may not be as strong as the massive demon, but she was way faster. It could barely keep up with her to smack her down.
“Do you know how to kill it?”
“Cut its head off?”
Alex had dodged a swipe of its claw and then another. Her dagger was looking pathetically small.
“Do you want me to shoot it?” Raj called to her.
“Clearly!”
“Don’t act like that’s obvious! I don’t have your instincts!”
"Quick lesson: if it's coming for me and you have a loaded shot take the damn shot!”
She pushed off a tombstone and flipped over its head to deliver a swift kick to its backside. The demon roared and tried to tackle her, it launched itself in her direction but she was gone a split second later, leaping up to vault herself off its head. She landed a few feet away but the demon apparently had a tail which whipped around knocking the damphyr back to the ground.
“Alex!”
“I got it.” She had sprung back to her feet.
“If you have secret future technology now is the time, Lex.”
She wasn’t listening to him. She dodged another swipe of the thing’s tail and it surprised her with a too-fast for something so big swipe of its claws. One of which raked across her left eyebrow. It grabbed her by the shoulders and despite all of her kicking she couldn’t shimmy out of its grasp.
It roared in triumph squeezing her harder and harder clearly meaning to do so until she popped. She renewed her struggling but to no avail when suddenly the demon’s snarls were replaced with a gurgling sound as a crossbow bolt came through one of its eyes.
It dropped to the ground, collapsing on top of Alex. She heard a loud growl and braced herself thinking that Raj’s bolt had not done the job when she felt the huge demon lifted off and Buffy was pulling her to her feet. She was engulfed in a crushing, slayer-power aided hug.
“I’m okay!” she called over Spike’s creative profanity.
He had found her axe and had been hacking at the dead demon, cussing up a storm that was three-languages deep and threatening it with redundant bodily harm.
“Are you okay?” Buffy demanded suddenly shoving her violently, and holding her at an arm’s length. She studied the younger girl with a practiced eye.
“Yeah, I had back up.” She said simply. She jerked her chin at Raj and looked proud. “Not a bad shot, were you aiming for its heart?”
Raj shook his head, He was still holding onto the crossbow, but his face had drained of blood. He was staring at the now definitely dead demon. Alex considered him for amoment before she was distracted by Buffy's fussing over her. She tried and not to look thrilled, but it was hard to keep the pleased look off her face even as she tried to give Buffy the brush off.
“Look at that, Whelp’s got his first kill!” Spike said finally leaving the peices of demon to steam in the chilly air and proudly clapping Raj on the back. “Haxil beast too, not bad.”
He paused to flash Raj an encouraging look and the younger man immediately threw up.
Spike stepped forward and around the puddle and blatantly ignored Raj’s dry-heaving.
“Couldn't aim.” Raj managed weakly. " I only got as far as shoot the big thing!"
Spike was studying the beast’s head impaled on Raj’s crossbow bolt. “Suppose there’s no arguing with that.” He turned and focused on Alex. “And you, what happened to all this rot about your bloody training?” He demanded. “I have half a mind not to let you out of your bloody room ever again! Scared us half to death you did.”
“We were handling it,” Alex said with a shrug, ignoring both Spike and Buffy's thunderous looks. Rolling her eyes Alex adopted a studied innocent expression and pretended to think. “Hey, where were you guys anyway?”
That seemed to shut both of them right up.
She smirked knowingly and Raj’s managed a weak smile. She handed him a stick of gum.
“So, I just saved your life.” He said accepting the gum from her.
The way he said it made her immediately suspicious.
“I gave you gum, I knew you’d probably heave at some point and I brought gum so keep that in mind for what you are saying next.”
“I saved your life; you have to stop whining about my school choices now.”
“Might I remind you of the gum?”
“It was my mother’s school!”
“It was a lucky shot.”
“One that, had I not taken, you would be demon food.”
“I would rather be demon food.”
“That is a gross exaggeration.”
“One of the electives there is flower arrangement.” She said. “Flower arrangement is a class! I could get grades in Floral positioning! In the aesthetic placement of visually pleasing vegetative sex organs.”
“I am so very glad she was born so that she can be the death of me.” Raj said turning to look at Buffy.
“I heard that.”
“I didn’t whisper.”
They headed off towards the exit arguing about Alex's ability to contribute to her Floral Arrangment Class. Buffy looked back at Spike and the small smile she had on her face spoke volumes on how patrol had managed to restore her. She was a warrior, she needed to feel useful, able and nothing like the shell that had stumbled out of their facility. She took his hand and lead him out after Raj and Alex. She didn't let go of his hand once he had caught up to her and she never caught the big dopey grin that flashed across Spike's face.
[Reviews - 185]
-
Table of Contents [Report This]
Chapter or Story |
Chapter or Story | 
Chapter or Story
Has been viewed 1216 times
- Text Size +
-
Table of Contents [Report This]
Chapter or Story |
Chapter or Story | Chapter or Story - Text Size +