Chapter 5
“Spike!” She tugged at his wrist, the tips of her fingers barely peeking out from beneath the sleeves of his coat. She could see the outline of it now, a small cottage huddled among the trees, trying to look all innocent and fairytale-like. She knew better.
“Why are we hiding behind a bush, Slayer?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” she whispered, annoyed that he didn’t get the importance of subterfuge when faced with a possibly evil Christmas-y cottage crawling with demons. “We’re scoping it out.”
“Maybe we should actually, I don’t know, go inside? I’m freezing my balls off here.”
“If you don’t shut up, I’ll rip them off and feed them to you. How’s that sound?”
“Kinky.”
Speaking of kinky, she was still holding onto his wrist. What was wrong with her lately? It was as if her limbs just went off doing what they wanted without her brain’s permission. “Ugh,” she said, letting go. He was still close though, too close, his chest now pressed against her shoulder blade.
“Oh come on, let’s go. We can take on whatever’s inside.”
She scoffed. “Duh. But I’d rather know how many of them we’re up against befor—”
He was up and striding towards the cottage, weapon-less no less. Stupid, reckless vampire. If Faith was still around the two of them would have got on like roll and butter.
Better not go there, she thought, running after him. She caught up to him right as he walked up the front porch’s steps and stopped in front of the front door.
“Well, no nasties popping out.”
“Not yet anyway,” she said. “It looks like the light is on inside.”
Spike peeked in through a window right next to the door. “A bit dim, but yeah. Seems empty though.”
“Maybe they’re asleep?”
He nodded, his back to her when he suddenly tensed. “Slayer?”
“What?”
“I feel dodgy.”
“You want to play dodgeball now?” Since when was Spike into sports?
He sighed. Heavily. “I meant ‘weird’, you bloody Yank.”
“Okay, jeez, someone forgot to take his dose of Valium today.” She withdrew a stake out of her inner pocket, gripping it tightly. “What do you mean by ‘weird’ anyway? And by the way, if they were asleep, they’re probably wide awake now.”
He turned on his heel to face her. “Well stop with the chatter then!”
Huh. “What’s wrong with your bumpies?”
His hands flew to his face, searching, his eyes wide in panic. “My face feels off.”
She caught his wrists and pulled his hands away, her fingertips traveling over the planes of his face. “It’s like they’re… smaller. Almost non-existent.” She pinched his upper lip between her thumb and forefinger and lifted it, to which he for some reason took offense and pushed her hand away.
“I’m not a dog!”
“You still have your fangs. And your eyes are gold, but… it’s like there are blue bits in them,” she said, peering up at him and oh God, her finger had kind of been in Spike’s mouth. She stepped away, almost tripping in her haste. Ew. Ew. Ew! Gross and disturbing and there was a bit of his saliva on her thumb and somebody should just tie her up and douse her in holy water because she’d definitely been possessed.
“Well, don’t look so disgusted, Slayer. You were the one who stuck her finger in my mouth.”
“I didn’t stick… I just touched your lip!” She wiped her thumb repeatedly on his coat. The feeling of dirtiness remained. There may never be enough soap to make her feel clean again.
“Why the hell isn’t anyone attacking us?”
“I don’t know!” She needed action right now before she self-combusted out of the embarrassment and overall weirdness being around Spike made her feel. “I’m kicking the door in.”
He caught her elbow just as she was about to do just that, dropping it just as quickly, which… good. At least she didn’t have to remove his hand by force.
“How about we try the doorknob first, Xena?”
“Oh.” It was probably locked anyway and then who would look like a dumbas—
The door opened.
Someone up there had it in for her, she just knew it.
He made a sweeping gesture with his arm. “After you, milady.”
“You just want me to get attacked first.”
“Me? Never.”
If he thought she missed that smirk on his face, he was deeply mistaken.
“Coward,” she muttered, stepping over the threshold and straight into a small living room out of a holiday postcard, complete with an unlit red-brick fireplace built into the wall ahead, two red giant armchairs and a small matching sofa that looked so plush her butt couldn’t wait to try out.
“Better be a coward and unlive to fight another day. Besides, if something jumps you and you get pummeled, it’s a free show for me. Got a front seat, no less”
“Shut up and stop breathing down my neck.”
His chuckle stirred the hair at the back of her head before she heard the door click closed behind her. Spike moved to her side then, snow stuck on the soles of their shoes melting onto the polished wooden floor.
“Is it just me or does it feel like there’s nobody here?” she asked, not letting herself relax despite the warm glow suffusing her flesh through the layers of clothes. It was probably a trap. A trap with full-on Christmas holiday décor. A giant wreath hanging above the unlit fireplace and on the door? Check. Lights strung up over the windows and various knick-knacks littering the shelves? Check. Several boxes of decorations for a tree that was nowhere to be seen discarded in the corner? Double check. Someone sure loved Christmas.
“Maybe they went out to get a tree. Good thing too because now we have a jumpstart on them. Can off them once they set their feet back inside, won’t even know what hit them.”
“Well, they better hurry up so we can have it over with. I could use a nap.”
“Something’s not right here,” Spike said and eyed the space around them, a crease between his brows. “And I don’t just mean their hard-on for decorating.”
“That’s what I was thinking!” She coughed awkwardly. “I mean not exactly what I was thinking. Didn’t think about the… uh… just the decorations part.”
“Right,” Spike said, looking at her in a way she just knew meant he was laughing at her inside his chipped little head. “Want to go check out the loft then?”
And there it was, a rickety looking ladder, with a closed door next to it, leading up to a dark loft. It didn’t seem too stable. “How about you check it and I’ll do the rest. Down here.”
“I see how it is. You’d better remember I’m not your minion, Slayer,” he grumbled but started to climb the ladder anyway. And if she watched his progress to see if he’d fall down and her eyes strayed to the way his tight jeans hugged his butt, no one had to know.
The kitchen in the left corner of the cabin had cabinets and appliances arranged in an L-shape with the window above the sink showing off the still falling snow. The fridge was full of food. Human food, her growling stomach nagged. What kind of demons were these anyway? And they had to be demons, otherwise Spike would never have been able to get in the first place. Not without an invite.
No baby heads in jars or severed limbs stashed in the freezer and ew, she’d been a slayer for far too long.
The door next to the kitchen led to a bathroom. Thank god because she really needed to pee.
“Slayer!”
She jumped and whirled around to see Spike jumping off the loft like a cat and looking paler than usual. Maybe he’d found the baby heads.
“I think I know what felt off to me.” He hooked his thumb over to the loft. “It’s the smell of this space. Couldn’t pin it down because it’s all muffled, almost. There’s something wrong with this place. Must be why I can’t vamp out fully and smell as clear as I do back in SunnyD. But upstairs it’s… stronger. The scen—”
“Can you get to the point already?”
“Impatient bitch,” Spike muttered. “It smells like you, all right? Like you and me and…” He swallowed hard, trying to block out the other hot-and-heavy scent he never wanted to think of in relation to him and the Slayer. Unless it ended up with him sucking her dry with endorphins still dancing in her blood. “Not exactly, but close enough. It’s more of a variation. Like a blurry watercolour of us.”
“Well, that doesn’t mean anything. You said it yourself, this place is weird. Maybe you’re just getting it wrong.”
“Think what you like.” She never really could take his word for anything, could she? Stubborn, self-righteous cow.
“Whatever. I found nothing. No weapons or dead people or icky murder-y trophies.”
“Did you check everything?”
She pointed over his shoulder. “Not that one.”
“Let’s do it then, shall we?”
“After you, milady,” she said, sticking her tongue out.
“Watch it, pet. Do that again and I’ll bite it off.”
She rolled her eyes and whined low in her throat. “I’m hot.”
“Should have known you’d be into biting.”
“Shut it.” She shrugged off his coat and instead of striking him in the chest with it as he’d expected, she just offered it for him to take with something approaching a genuine smile. Would wonders never cease?
And then she said, “Thanks.”
Apparently not. “Welcome.”
Gratitude from the Slayer. She always knew how to throw him off balance, didn’t she?
“Come on, don’t just stand there.”
He gripped her shoulder before she could touch the doorknob and pressed his ear against the door.
“Do you hear anything?”
“Shh!” It was as if he had cotton stuffed in his ears. Standing so close to her wasn’t helping either, not when he seemed so tuned into every shift of her muscles, the way her heart pounded in a way that made his demon roar and purr at the same time. And… wait. There it was, steady and out of synch.
“I hear a heartbeat. Another one, I mean. Beside yours.”
“And I am yet to be creeped out by this.”
“Used to the creepy, I reckon.”
“Don’t remind me,” she whispered as he twisted the doorknob and opened the door.
The lights were off but the moonlight pooled through the window, silvery wisps spilling over the lump hidden beneath the covers on the bed.
“There’s something there,” he said, the thing shifting at the sound of his voice.
Buffy only nodded, stake in her fist as they wordlessly split up to sneak over to the sides of the bed.
He looked down and pulled the top of the cover down the tiniest bit and… fuck. Anything but this.
Buffy was wide-eyed, gaze flickering between him and the thing in the bed.
He nodded towards the door and together they tip-toed out and closed the door.
“Spike!”
“I know.”
“This is bad. In a freaky ‘I don’t think I can kill it way’.”
“You can’t.” He had a hunch now, one he desperately hoped wasn’t true even though his gut was telling him it was.
“But if it’s a demo—”
“It’s not a demon. It’s a girl. Human. Can tell by the rhythm of her heart, okay? The scent too.” Her arm with the stake lowered, lips pulled into a thin, worried line. “Want to know what I’m thinking?”
“Actually, yes because right now I’m all thoughtless.”
“Think when we got zapped here… we might have switched places. With… uhh… well, us. A different version of us, that is.”
“So, you’re telling me we somehow ended up switching with our other selves? If this is true, which we don’t know, how do you know they’re still not out there somewhere?”
He scratched the back of his neck, wondering if he could spin it. Only he’d never been good at lying on the spot. She’d see right through him. “Right, how we got here… Don’t punch me.”
“What did you do?” She crossed her arms over her chest, hip popped out. Never a good sign.
“Followed a trail of footsteps that led only one way… as if they just vanished. Kind of as we did, which means… they’re likely back in Sunnyhell. In our place.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Her voice was low and angry and… puzzled.
“Thought you’d think I was leading you into a trap or something. Wouldn’t put it past you.”
Her nostrils flared. “Okay, new rule. If one of us knows anything important about this wiggy situation, we say it. Because as much as I hate this, we’re stuck here and we’ll never get back if we don’t work together.”
“Deal. If you promise to give me some bloody respect and start treating me like a partner instead of your punching bag.”
“Hey! I don’t treat you—” At his raised eyebrow, she deflated and stuck out her hand. “Deal.”
He accepted her handshake, her palm warm and soft against his, and if he felt electricity shoot up his arm, no one had to know.
“Mommy, daddy, what’s going on?”
Startled, they broke apart, and he realised both of them had been too deep inside their own little bubble to notice the door being opened. He didn’t want to think about it, couldn’t, not when the words of the little girl looking up at them hit him like a ton of bricks.
Guess my gut feeling was right. Bugger.
TBC
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Author's Chapter Notes:
Previously: Spike and Buffy got zapped into a place that most certainly isn't Sunnydale. Where are they? What perils await them? Will Spike ever get his coat back? Read ahead and find out.
Beta'd by the lovely All4Spike.
Beta'd by the lovely All4Spike.