Chapter Twenty-Nine - Surprise
Alex cocked her head to one side, listening intently. She and Raj were standing at the base of the ladder leading up to the roof.
Alex was hovering near the top, ready to jump down at a moment’s notice.
“Well, they’re fighting.” She recounted. “And they are using strong language. Buffy is yelling.”
“Alert the media.” Was Raj’s sarcastic reply.
Alex smirked. She turned her attention back to the faint conversation that was happening upstairs. When she turned back to Raj he was staring at her.
“What?”
“Sorry.” Raj observed. “You just, you look just like Spike when you do that. Is your hearing as good as his?”
Alex nodded, she had always been told that she looked like Spike, but this time without the wistful expression everyone got when they talked about him. Even her Uncle Xander would get weirdly nostalgic about the vampire from time to time, though he was not usually so quick to admit it.
Shaking away the mental butterflies, Alex turned her attention back to the argument upstairs. Whatever they were yelling about seemed to be over, she could hear the faint sounds of crying. She refocused on the task at hand.
“Yep.” She said. “Got all the perks and none of the downsides.” That made her pause, that thought deserved a caveat. “Well, the physical ones anyway. It is always a little weird that I always know which one of my friends is hooking up with which.”
There had been one or two awkward moments at the Slayer Academy. Maybe a little more than two.
Raj raised his eyebrows.
“You mean that you—” he paused. “So you can always—”
Alex nodded. “It’s easy to ignore it, but yes, if I was looking for it I could.”
“So when they—” he jerked his chin towards the roof to indicate who he was talking about.
The damphyr heaved a long-suffering sigh.
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Oh, gross.”
“Meh.” Alex said. “It’s just part of the make up, I can smell almost everything, you understand, after a while it all kinda blends together. They’ve basically contaminated every room in this place. Every surface, come to think about it.”
Raj looked horrified. “Every surface?”
Alex shrugged.
“S'not so bad. It's layered over other smells like chocolate and coffee and chinese take out.” She said non-chalantly.
Raj, however, was fixated. “The research table?”
“I’m afraid so.” She said. She laughed at the devastation on Raj’s face. “But seriously when your nose is this sensitive, you have to turn off your brain because otherwise you will smell everything. It’s like how technically, you can kinda always see your nose, but your brain just ignores it so it’s not constantly in your line of vision. No big.”
“No big for you--maybe. But now I know about it!”
He immediately pushed off the ladder and brushed himself off, as if that would help for some reason. Alex laughed at him.
“Welcome to my world.”
“I feel dirty now, thanks for that.”
“You get used to it.”
The look on her face was apparently too smug for even Raj to be able to deal with.
“Oh, don’t be all smug and world-weary!” Raj shot back with a triumphant grin. “Just you wait until you get to school tomorrow and all your little friends are all hot and bothered and after Spike.”
That hit her with a pang. She was sure if she had friends at school they would likely be crushing all kinds of things on Spike.
“Yes, because everyone is lining up to be friends with the crazy delinquent freak.” She said trying to go for aloof and cool, but sounding more whiney than she intended.
She didn’t look at Raj, she didn’t want to see the horror and then shame and the pity parade across his face. He didn’t say anything, clearly reading her apprehension on the subject. They were silent for a little while, it was almost worse.
“Is it a big fight?” he said finally, and artfully changing the subject. “Are they still yelling?”
Happy to be on level ground, Alex nodded. “It’s a big fight, but I think I’d be more alarmed if I couldn’t hear them.”
She tried to keep the irritation out of her voice. She really did, but lately, all the emotions were starting to strain her.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be such a knob.” Raj said contritely.
Alex shrugged.
“No worries.” She said allowing herself to smile. “I’m just wondering how much of a shit your mom must have been to have gone through a school like Hell-and House.”
“My mum was Asian, there was a support group.” Raj deadpanned.
“Dammit.”
“You’re sure you can’t just fade into the background?”
Alex’s laugh was harsh.
“That ship has pretty much sailed.” She said. “I killed a Vengeance Demon in front of like half my class, that half includes a witch who hates vampires.”
“There have probably been worse things to happen at Holland House.”
“The witch is the leader of the popular crowd.” she said. "The queen B if you will."
Raj’s face fell.
“Yeah, you’re fucked.”
Alex opened her mouth to reply when—very abruptly—she stopped and grabbed Raj’s arm. How she managed to get around him and be pulling him off the ladder was unclear, but she was suddenly leading him away from the door.
“Incoming!” She said as she hurried them into a storage room and closed the door behind them.
It was a small bare cramped space, smaller than all the others at the top of the townhouse, probably part of the servant's quarters. Raj peeked through the old-fashioned keyhole. Not a second later, Spike and Buffy burst through the trap door locked in such a furious make-out session that it wouldn't have mattered if Raj and Alex had even been there.
They traded exasperated looks.
“Really?” Raj said shaking his head in wonderment. “and here I thought this was a serious moment.”
Alex rolled her eyes.
“They were fighting remember?” the damphyr pushed Raj aside to peek through the small hole. “That always leads to—" she recoiled. "Well, I’m scarred for life.”
Neither super-being had bothered to close the door.
“Are we trapped up here?” Raj whispered. “or can we chance going downstairs you think?”
“If you think Spike couldn’t hear us in this room if he wanted to, then you’re off your gourd.” Alex said not bothering to try and speak quietly. “We could set up bloody Hiroshima to go off right next to them and I doubt they would so much as come up for air.”
She opened the door and marched down the stairs. Raj followed after her more tentatively. Alex didn’t look back until they were on the third floor.
“Did they notice?”
Raj shook his head.
“They didn’t even look up.”
*****
Alex bounded noisily down the stairs. Raj could hear her throw herself onto the couch on the front room and switch on the TV.
The front room was one of the first rooms Buffy finished when she went on her decorating jag. She had removed the large Chippendale table and put it in the library. She replaced it with a large, deep couch, the American kind, with a built in chaise lounge and huge cushions. it had taken no convincing to get Spike to invest in a great, big plasma TV, he programmed it, set up a cable connection, and proceeded to watch an alarming amount of soap operas. Alex bought an unpronounceable IKEA side table that opened ingeniously. She kept it stocked with the kind of snacks that made Raj’s skin crawl.
Raj wondered how Americans could down that swill.
She was already tearing into a bag of Doritos when he got downstairs.
“What’s showing?” He asked.
“The Matrix.” Alex replied not taking her eyes off the screen. “The good one.”
Raj raised an eyebrow, as far as he knew there was only one Matrix movie, but then, he had grown accustomed to Alex’s future slips. “Spoilers." He said lazily. "Should I be excited?”
Alex sighed. “Don’t get your hopes up.”
Dammit. At this rate he was extremely worried about the state of pop culture in the future, specifically since most of the references Alex made Raj understood. If she was from 2018 shouldn’t there be more that flew over his head?
“Great.” He said. “Phantom Menace all over again.”
That made Alex smile, it was a secret smile, the kind that wasn't disappointed. The one that he saw very rarely when she was talking about the future. He considered asking her what was in store of the Galaxy far, far, away, but decided against it when a positive answer could change the course of history, Star Wars or otherwise.
“Uh, excuse me?”
Both Raj and Alex whirled around to see Simon awkwardly standing in the foyer holding his equipment.
Raj felt heat rise up his neck. He had completely forgotten that his friend was even there.
“Listen, I suppose I’ll heading back home now.” He said, “I will send in these samples to Bettina. She’ll keep it quiet.”
Raj stood. He was just about to apologies for his trouble, when he realized that he had called his friend with no notice and Simon had been able to show up straight away. Either that was a misplaced sense of guilt, or he simply had nothing to do on a Thursday night. He wondered suddenly if this was a fluke or if his friend was just desperately lonely—lonely enough at least to drop whatever he was doing and come to Raj’s aid. It must be hard to get along with your co-workers when you know that you are experimenting on living sentient beings.
Raj didn’t hesitate. If anyone would get along with the Pratts, it would be Simon.
“Have you seen this movie, Si?”
Simon glanced at it and shifted his feet uncomfortably, Raj nearly smirked that would be the misplaced sense of guilt. He shook his head.
“You have to watch it then!” Alex exclaimed. She met Raj’s eye briefly and grinned. Raj was suddenly desperately happy she had inherited Spike’s uncanny ability to read people and situations.
On screen Trinity was running through the urban landscape being pursued by agents.
Simon hesitated.
“It’s a good place to come in.” Alex assured him. “Drop your stuff and sit. You’re going to be around a bit, I think, with the triplets. You might as well get comfortable. Welcome to No. 9.”
“Thank you.” He said. “I really appreciate it."
He sat stiffly on the couch, on the edge, trying to be as unobtrusive as he could. Raj was sprawled out on a large beanbag chair that had been Alex’s other decision in the décor.
Raj wondered for a second why his friend was being so formal, but then he realized that it was because he really didn’t know the Pratts. Despite being the main topic of conversation between the two friends, Simon just didn’t actually know any of them.
Alex, however, handed the Doritos over to Raj who offered the bag to Simon. Simon ate them hungrily.
They sat in companionable silence as Trinity raced through the damp alleyways and then turned to face her pursuers.
“Oh! This is so boss.” Alex said. “I love this shot. Carrie Anne Moss is so cool. I wish she stayed with action movies. She does this one this kick,” she shook her head in awed appreciation. “It’s a scorpion kick, it took me weeks to learn. I appreciate an actor who tries to learn the moves, so those of us who actually fight don’t want to actually punch them in the face.”
Trading sharp, practiced blows, the leather clad hacker fought the agents back. Suddenly, the scene froze with Trinity in midair about to deliver a devastating blow.
“That kick took you weeks?” Raj asked.
"No, that kick took a couple of days, the Scorpion Kick--which you sort of pitch forward and kick your opponent in the face." She stood and demonstrated. "This kick, this kick took weeks. I was five."
“Like that’s supposed to excuse you? Five-year-olds are crazy little elastic things.” He said with a chuckle. “Slayers should be even more so.”
Alex shoved him good naturedly, but still firmly, as if she was reminding him that she could kill him with all the energy in her pinky finger. He slid across the floor and crashed into Simon who helped right him with a half grin.
“Couldn’t get the balance right until I was taller.” She said.
“Not much—”
“Taller.” She finished for Raj. She grabbed her Doritos back. “That’s just lazy. You’re playing with the big boys now, Prasad.”
“Yeah, Big boys—” Raj said fondly, he was about to make a comment about how even Spike wasn’t the tallest creature at No. 9, when something horrible occurred to him. “Oh God, at some point I’m going to have to babysit one of your little siblings aren’t I?”
Alex who, it seemed, already figured this was going to happen didn’t look away from the screen.
“Well, that depends on whether you would be able to catch them.”
Raj suddenly felt the weight of what any toddler aged offpring of a vampire and a slayer would be like.
“Bugger it all. Little versions of you? And three of them? Not a one of them knowing their own strength? Buffy wouldn’t be that cruel.”
“She may not have a choice.” Alex shot back easily.
“They would ransack the place!”
Alex thought for a moment.
“I don’t know, I was a weird studious little kid.” She said. “ I think maybe because I was born a slayer and everyone encouraged me to be crazy and destructive, I kinda went the other way. I hid a lot in nooks and crannies, read a bunch.”
“Really?” Raj asked hopefully.
“No!” Alex snapped. “I was a hyperactive, out-going, precocious, little peice-of-shit. I broke everything! Like all the things! I spilled anything i could get my hands on and swung from ceiling fans, I had sand on me all the time, I was the Tazmanian Devil in pink bows.”
It was very clear then what the triplets would be like when they grew up. It would be pandemonium. There would be crayons on the walls and sprinting through the halls and peeing on the runners. And hyperactive superchildren and him completely out of his depth.
Shit.
“So enjoy that.” Alex said gleefully.
“They’re your siblings.”
“When we eventually have to save the world from some sort of impending doom, who do you think is going to make sure that the kids are alright?” She popped a chip in her mouth. “I might be needed at the front. What are you going to contribute there, Alice? Your girlish shreiking, while effectual in some situations, is not exactly the omnibus defense we could use in the arsenal."
The color that Raj turned must have been pretty alarming because Alex quickly relented.
“Spike’s probably going to be a pretty involved dad. In a half a decade or so he would probably cultivate quite the following as a Dad-Blogger.”
Raj arched an eyebrow. He knew what a blog was. He could infer what a “blogger” was, but he wasn’t sure how that context would make any sense.
“A blogger? That’s a job that someone can do?”
Alex arched a questioning eyebrow and then grimaced.
“Whoops.”
They went back to watching the movie. The perspective had switched to Neo and his depressing little cubicle job. Raj snuck a peak over at Simon who was looking at him like he was insane. He shrugged and turned his attention back to the movie. For a little while they all just watched.
“Say what you want about his acting,” Alex said shaking her head. “But Keanu will always be my Neo.”
“Spoilers!” Raj said more sharply now.
“Spoilers?” Simon questioned. It was the first time he had spoken up since he sat down. He was still sitting very stiffly at the edge of his seat, clearly trying not to take up more space than he needed to.
Raj wished he could tell Simon to relax, but he knew it would be a fool’s errand. Simon had a very strong sense of what was proper and what wasn’t and in his mind he was somewhat responsible for everything that was happening to them.
Alex turned her attention to him and Simon shied away from it seeming to trying look even more unostrusive.
“What was that?” The damphyr asked.
“Spoilers. You keep saying that.” He said. “What do you mean?”
Before Alex could reply, Raj interjected.
“You fuckers pulled Lex out of another dimension where it’s already 2018.” Raj explained to him, smirking at Simon’s astonished face. “There was another Neo?”
“Don’t worry about it.” Alex said refocusing her attention on the movie. She looked embarrassed.
Simon arched an eyebrow at him.
“Well, what did you think she was doing here? Half-vampire half-slayer? You thought she was born to some other vampire and slayer?”
Simon grimaced. “I didn’t really think—fuck, I’m sorry.”
Alex smiled kindly.
“Hey, now, don’t freak.” She said offering him the bag of crisps. “I did my brooding, and bargaining and all that. Worked through my feelings, got the t-shirt. So hey, I’m all shiny and new.”
Raj grabbed the crisps and shoved a fistful in his mouth.
“And we’re getting a crash course in twenty-first century pop culture.”
Alex shrugged and didn’t take her eyes of the TV.
“Not too much to study.” She said. “Khaleesi means Queen, Flammingo-ing, Something about potatoes on the internet I never really got.”
Simon stared at her.
“Khaleesi means wife of a khal." He said simply, ignoring his friend's puzzled stare. "That’s a thing in the future?” He asked, then it seemed to dawn on him the most important part of that sentence. “They took you from the future?”
“Well, they took me from a future.” She said emphasizing the article. “but maybe not the future.”
She said this casually, as if she often though about temporal semantics, which come to think about it, she probably did.
“You know what Khaleesi means?” Raj demanded, but Simon didn’t answer him.
He was studying Alex closely. He looked like he was about to ask her more, but then he seemed to remember himself, and he relaxed back on his heels.
“Right.” Was all he said.
Raj scrambled for something to say, of course there was a lull in the action on screen so the silence felt oddly tense, like it was meant to be filled. He was about to silently beg Alex to say something, anything when Simon’s voice cut through his reverie.
“Have you been tempted to make some extra money down at the race track, then?” he asked conversationally.
Alex looked impressed. Raj wasn’t surprised, Alex liked people who could carry on a conversation. She and Spike had that talking knack, the ability to have a conversation with anyone, but she always looked relieved when there was a bit of a parry.
“Alas, I have left my sports almanac flapping uselessly in my temporal wake.” She said. “but Spike and I did make a fair bit on the Superbowl.”
Raj’s head whipped around, this was news to him. He had been suggesting they make bets on things since the second they knew Alex was from the future.
“You did not!” he exclaimed. “You told me you wouldn’t do that because of the butterfly effect Or some such nonsense! How the hell did you bet on the superbowl?”
Alex’s smile was evil.
“Spike is a resourceful creature and likes a good gamble.”
“It’s not a gamble if you know you’re going to win.” Raj grumbled.
“How do we know my coming squished a bug that was supposed to eat a firefly so it didn’t light up its butt and distract someone who didn’t call someone else, who broke up with them keeping them from having dinner with the old friend of quarterback who was worried and didn’t have time to send a good luck text and that was the tipping point that made the Ravens loose?” Alex asked. “And besides, Spike loves a get rich quick scheme.”
“Spike needs a get rich quick scheme?” Raj said incredulously.
“He’s gotta—” Alex lowered her voice to do a fairly accurate Spike impression. “Keep the slayer in baubles and Blahniks.” She shrugged. “And Buffy and I are the same shoe size so: win.”
Raj and Simon chuckled at that. They went back to watching the movie.
“God, this shot is so fucking cool!” Raj declared as Morpheus tempted Neo with a choice of pills. With each the red and blue perfectly framed in his glasses. “We need to wear more patent leather.”
“Absolutely not.” Said Alex in concert with Simon’s: “Fuck yes! I told you there’d be a reason to go to Leather Sluts!”
Both Raj and Alex stared at him incredulously. Simon’s bashful demeanor didn’t change. He smiled shyly and looked down at his shoes.
Alex cracked up first and then offered Simon the packet of Doritos.
“I guess we can keep him.”
Simon caught Raj’s eye and winked, the move was so quick and subtle it was almost imperceptible. Raj shook his head and turned his attention back to the movie.
****
Hard as it was to get out of bed, Buffy managed somehow. She could baely keep herself up, though. Her knees had gone all nobbley and quivering—but she wasn’t about to let the smirking vampire know that. She pulled on a pair of pyjama pants and one of the billion black t-shirts Spike kept in his armoire.
God, what a waste of fancy antique furniture.
It had started to rain hard outside, the sound of it lashed against the window panes and every couple of minutes thunder would rumble in the distance. God, it would be so easy to curl up in bed with her vampire and sleep forever.
“Mmm,” Spike flopped back onto the bed. “Slayer, you shouldn’t be able stand on your feet much less be padding about. Not after what I just did to you."
She couldn’t let him know how right he was or else he’d be truly insufferable.
"Brag. much?"
Spike's eyes twinkled, but Buffy side-stepped his lunge knowing that if he touched her right now they would spend another couple of hours rectifying the being-able-to-walk situation.
Spike pushed himself up, somehow managing to look sexy and swashbuckling on the ground.
"Next time then, it's a promise, sweetheart."
Buffy suppresed a shudder.
“C’mon There’s got to be some Kung Pao goodness and a dumpling or two left!”
Spike chuckled darkly. He was naked, stretched out and looking at her through his ample lashes. When he was like this Buffy had to concentrate to stay on her feet.
"Don't bother, pet," he tapped his nose and winked cheekily. "Can smell it, remember?"
Buffy's blush quickly turned into general irritation. Spike chuckled in response.
"With the Minion in the house, the kung pao's a bit of a stretch.”
“Puh-lease. If she wasn’t eavesdropping and reporting back to Devraj; I’ll eat my hat.”
Spike smirked, he darted out suddenly to pull her into bed. And he was kissing her and the world melted away.
God, Could Spike kiss.
His tongue pressed against the seam of her lips his blunt teeth nibbling lightly at her bottom lip. And she very quickly felt her resolve to grab something to eat start to crumble. He teased her mouth open, slipping inside, and buried his hands in her hair. He tasted like smoke and whiskey and power. She was kissing him back just as earnestly.
“’ve done a fair bit more since we were fightin’ there, Pet.” He said pulling away, he bit his lip and wiggled his eyebrows lasciviously.
Buffy was flushed just thinking about it. God, this felt so good. It was unlike her to just give in to wild abandon like that, but Spike tended to bring that out in her, whether they were fighting or fucking. She pushed herself up, and tried to slow her heartbeat. Spike remained sprawled out, infuriatingly rubbing his hand across his belly, just above the sexy indents that drew her eye lower.
She shook her head to shake away the cobwebs.
“What was that place?” She asked trying to distract herself. She pushed back and slid out of his arms. “Ah, Ah, no cheating, mister. Eating for four remember?”
Spike thought for a moment, and then sucked on his teeth. Not one of her favorite habits, God, he could be so gross sometimes, and it was pissing her off that what used to be gross now made her tremble girlishly. She forced herself to step back and follow her rumbling belly.
“Those'd be the servant's quarters, pet.” He said. "Prob'ly a maid's room."
“Quarters? They lived here in this house?”
Spike nodded and Buffy felt a sudden pang. He had known it was a maid's room. They lived here, in this house and he was obviously some sort of lord. No one lived in a house like this who wasn't some sort of lord.
“How rich were you?” She demanded trying to distract herself from the thought of some maid looking at Spike's razor sharp cheek bones and shirking her duties. She suddenly hated all maids, the insuffrable temptresses they were. And they lived here! They had access to Spike all the time.
Crap, was she seriously having weird retrograde jealousy? What was wrong with her?
“Let's just say the sprog'll have nothing to worry about college-wise.”
Buffy's eyes widened. "You still have money?"
Spike didn't reply he just smirked.
“You made us pay you for information!” she accused.
The insufferable pile of soon-to-be-dust shrugged.
"Couldn't just do it out of the evilness of my heart. Could have you lot thinking I'd gone completely soft."
Buffy rolled her eyes.
"Yeah, but what's $200 bucks when you had live in help?"
"You think I went a century without an investment portfolio?"
"Yes." She replied without hesitation. "Aren't you all about taking what you want and all that crazy vampire psycho jazz?"
Spike churcked.
“Well, pet, right you are. This is pretty much it.” He said indicating the house. He was leaning back on his elbows idly stroking her ends of her hair in a way that was incredibly distracting. Annoyance seemed to work better han anything else to allow her to wiggle out of his stare. "Bit on the side from some treasure I've found, the odd poker winnings, an old pile that's on a long lease to a school."
She stared at him uncomprehending.
Spike shifted uncomfortably. "What did you think we did with all this room, love?"
"How many people lived here?”
“There were nine of them. Mum and I.”
“What?”
“You’ve met Bromley. We had a few parlor maids, a valet, lady’s maid, cook. Now exactly what were you expecting?” Spike said with a shrug.
"Honestly?" Buffy said. "I don't know figured you grew up as like a Chimney Sweep or something."
"Dickens, eh?" Spike said tilting his head to the side, "Never figured you for a reader of the classics."
"If by classics you mean movies." Buffy said with a shake of her head. "I can sing the entire hook to Sweet Yellow Roses."
The smile on his face was genunine. Buffy was struck by how rarely Spike smiled like that. Like there was nothing on his mind but books and amusing Buffy awkwardness.
"Oh, do tell me this is something you do when you're drunk, sweetling."
"Not on your life."
Spike chuckled.
“Right. Unlife. Whatever." Buffy said before she really realized it. It struck her a second later just how that sounded. She made the adjustment so quickly as if it were normal. As if it were nothing. To cover her momentary freak out, she changed the subject. "I pity the poor parlour maids if they had you to terrorize them.”
Spike’s bark of a laugh was not what she was expecting. He shook his head and curled his teeth behind his tongue.
“Right menace I was.” he said.
There was something about the way he said it that made Buffy pause. Spike was a cocky bastard, but that, felt poignant. She made a mental note to try and wheedle the story out another time. He was doing the thing he did when he accidentally let her have too much information about his past and was distracting her by running his hands up and odwn her back and making her shiver.
He pulled her back into his arms and kissed her carelessly on the forehead. The contact made Buffy tingle in all sorts of naughty ways.
“Mm, Pet, you keep that up and you won’t be gettin’ downstairs anytime soon.”
Buffy smacked him good-naturedly and slipped out the door before he could grab her and tempt her otherwise. A few seconds later he appeared wearing the clothes he had been wearing earlier.
It felt so natural to just wait for him, she knew he was coming, she didn't know how she knew. She let him precede her down the stairs where Alex, Raj, and Simon made an interesting tablaeu on the couch. They were watching the Matrix.
“Bloody brilliant film.” Spike pronounced, he pressed her forward from the base of her spine. “Sit, love, I’ll go get us some nosh.”
Buffy shivered a little. It was so strange to her to feel those little butterflies whenever Spike brushed her skin. And then there was the sudden dotiness. Where had that come from? Buffy shook the thoughts from her head. She could feel a comparison coming on, to an Angel shaped sore spot and once she did that, there would be no going back, it would open a can of worms that couldn't be un opened.
Thankfully there ws a very convenient action sequence involving several gunshots that caught her attention.
The TV room was a good idea, Alex had convinced her to buy this long couch with a chaise lounge attached to the end. At the store Buffy had thought the couch was too massive, but the Chaise had become her favorite place to sit.
“This was a good investment.” She said sinking back into the cushions squishing up to Alex who shoved her aside.
“Didn’t I tell you this would be better than that thing you wanted to get that had the push pins in it?” Alex demanded. “This is the only way to watch movies.”
There was a sudden movement from the other side of the couch as Simon shifted.
“Simon, you’re still here!” Buffy glanced over, surprised.
“I—I’m sorry I can head out.”
But Buffy waived him away.
“Don’t. Sit. Make yourself comfortable.” She said, “This thing can seat a football team. The pushpin one was smaller but it was a lot prettier. I just liked to look at it. All fancy and velvet.”
“Cozy over comfy any day.” Alex insisted.
“But velvet!"
"If you wanted it so much why didn't you just get it and put it somewhere slse?" Alex asked.
"it felt silly buying two couches. " The slayer said with a shrug and turned her attention back to the TV screen. She watched for a few seconds to get oriented. “Did I miss the part with the super awesome kick? The one Trinity does? That’s in the beginning right?”
“Yep.” Raj said.
“Fooey. All anyone talks about is Neo’s phantom limbo and the gunshot time thingy. Whatever. That lean back is like all core strength. I can do that.”
Simon and Raj traded looks while Alex sent them a triumphant grin.
“See? I appreciate a good fight coordinator.” She said. “I mean in my world those are a dime a freaking dozen.”
“Yeah? Have action movies gotten better? Because I am all for showing more than three punches and explosions.”
Alex shrugged. “Now we have the opposite problem of fight scenes for fight masters,”
“I’d like to see what that looks like.”
“Insurance salesman’s wet dream.” Alex said turning her attention back to the screen. “We’ve had to start inventing cities. I’ve seen San Francisco destroyed like eight times.”
They sat in companionable silence for a few minutes before Spike bounded up the stairs. He handed Alex a mug, handed Buffy a bowl full of dumplings then settled himself onto the broad couch next to her. In the Matrix, children were bending spoons with their mind.
“Did I miss the part where the sexy leather chit kicks the agent over her head?” He asked taking a sip from one of the large coffee mugs. “I fucking love that move.” He turned to Buffy and asked curiously. “Can you do that?”
Buffy’s cocky triumphant grin was enough to make the vampire’s raise his eyebrows in interest and everyone else to keep like maybe they shouldn’t be in the room.
“Gross.” Alex pronouced.
“Isn’t it your bedtime or something, nibblet?”
Alex didn’t even look away from the telly.
“It’s eight-thirty.” She said.
“I can still ground you.”
“Don’t make me laugh.”
"You watch your mouth--"
"Or you'll what? migrane at me?"
“You did just get suspended today, missy.” Spike shot back without even thinking.
Buffy watched Simon’s reaction, it was nice to see the wonderment on someone else’s face. Spike got on with Alexis like gangbusters and their banter was lightning quick. Simon looked overwhelmed, though he hid it well. It he seemed to be the more meditative type and said nothing.
They had all settled into a companionable silence when, out of nowhere there was a sudden long trill. They had never heard it before and then twice in one day.
Everyone froze.
“The doorbell?” Simon reminded them.
“Who could it be?” Buffy asked realizing the cliché in her words and feeling a bit ridiculous for being the one who said it.
Both Spike and Alex looked like they were concentrating, Spike eyes narrowed.
“Can’t you smell them whoever they are?” Raj asked.
Spike shook his head.
“Not in this rain.”
One by one the Pratts looked from one to the other trying to decide who should be the person who answers the door. Finally, Alex rolled her eyes.
“Oh, don’t be ridiculous.” She said. “We know it’s going to be me. It has to be. I’m the only one that comes in and out regularly. You two are just trying to find a way for it not to be. Put down the stake, stop coming up with the crazy misguided plan brought about by a sense of protectorship. I am trained, remember? because I am a slayer. So maybe ease up on the over protective hovering?”
Spike and Buffy traded looks.
“Don’t look at me, you rattle off like that all the time.” She said to Spike.
He narrowed his eyes.
“Is it that annoying when I do it?”
“Yes.” Raj and Buffy said seriously.
Alex rolled her eyes and turned to go answer the door, Buffy and Spike scrambled to provide her back up. She peeked through the seeing hole.
“Guys, don’t freak! If it was some sort of threat do you really think they would ring the door bell?”
Her reasoning was sound but they didn’t move a muscle, staying just out of the line of sight of door for maximum element of surprise.
“Who is it, nib?”
Alex didn’t answer she threw open the door. Outside in the pouring rain stood a tall, skinny girl dressed poorly for the Late February damp; Wesley Wyndham-Pryce; and a baby.
*****
Author's note: There! Much quicker! I have most of the next chapter done as well!
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