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Chapter Nine


Giles screeched around the corner onto Revello Drive as Spike and Buffy hurried down the street toward the school. Giles dodged fallen tree branches and a trashcan that had fallen onto its side. Someone’s front door had been ripped off the hinges and was half in the front lawn and half in the middle of the road, and she could see Giles curse as he barely missed the corner of it in his swerving.



Slamming the breaks on his candy apple red convertible next to Buffy and Spike, Giles rolled down the window on the passenger side. “Get in!”



Buffy exchanged a glance at Spike, who shrugged and began struggling to close her mom’s big umbrella, which he was carrying just in case the sun peeked through the clouds above.



Pulling open the car door, Buffy slung in her small bag of weapons and slid inside.



Spike cursed at the umbrella, which was misbehaving, somehow managed to wrap it up, and slammed into the back seat. “Where’re we going?”



Giles ignored him and drove onward. “This is quite an unusual storm.”



“Hello to you, too,” Buffy said. “I was worried about you.”



Buffy noticed that Giles’s hair was a mess, and his shirt was disheveled. This was unusual for her Watcher; he usually was neat as a pin even in the midst of long research sessions. “I’m fine.” He gave her a brief once-over as he turned the next corner. “You?”



“We’re fine.” Buffy tried not to think too much about how she and Spike had snuggled up on the cot in her basement. “Lots of trees fell into the house.”



Giles was completely unfazed. “I’m not surprised.”



“And into powerlines,” Spike spoke up from the backseat.



Looking out the window, Buffy saw what Spike was referring to. A large tree had been ripped up by the roots, taking a large chunk of the earth below and the powerlines above with it. “That’s why we don’t have any power.”



“It’s out almost everywhere,” Giles said.



“What’s unusual?” Buffy asked. “You seem – ”



“Like your tailfeathers are all ruffled,” Spike concluded.



Buffy didn’t miss a beat. “What Spike said.”



“Well, the hurricane being here is unusual, which we already know, and cloud cover is uncommon in the eye of a hurricane.”



“Oh,” Spike said, purposefully moving away from the window to the middle of the backseat.



Giles continued, “I spoke briefly with the Council. They were of little help as usual. And I’ve spent hours scouring my books. There is nothing more than what I already shared with you. But I suspect that it does have something to do with Glory.”



“Scouring books by candlelight. I’ve been there many a night,” Spike mused. Buffy wondered what he meant but didn’t question.



“So, we go to the source?” Buffy played with the tip of the stake in her lap. She had a feeling she would need something different than a stake to slay this problem.



“Precisely,” Giles said. “Well, the hellmouth since we don’t know where Glory is.”



Buffy pictured Spike leaning back in the seat with his hands behind his head though she didn’t give him the satisfaction of looking back. He sounded thoughtful. “We’re headed to the husk of a high school. Where are the students studying this year anyway? They didn’t throw up a new school in a year.”



“You’d be surprised by how fast the construction teams around here work,” Buffy said, glancing back at Spike, who was surprisingly not smirking. “At least, that’s what Xander says.”



“I do believe that the high school students are borrowing the junior high school as they did last school year,” Giles supplied, completely running through an intersection with no working lights. No one was around, so it didn’t matter anyway.



“The older students go in the morning, and the younger in the afternoon,” Buffy added. “Not at Dawn’s school though. She wishes. I would have loved that, but I would’ve wanted the afternoon slot for classes. Then, I could have slept in after a long night of slaying.”



“A Slayer working longer hours on account she has late classes? No, bloody thank you.” There was a teasing lilt in Spike’s tone that was very different than what would have been biting sarcasm not too long ago.



Instead of popping him in the nose like before, Buffy simply glared at him. “Better be glad I didn’t work longer hours. You might be dust by now.”



“Pffshh. You hardly tried to kill me. If you’d really have come my direction, we might’ve had a right deadly fight.”



Buffy shifted in her seat so that her knee pressed into the center console. “What do you call the fight in broad daylight on campus last year?”



Spike set his jaw, and his cheekbones moved with the motion. “Hardly your best moment.”



Buffy lifted her chin. “Hardly yours. I remember you losing that fight.”



“Barely.” Something about Spike’s eyes made Buffy think he was softening there as if what he’d said to her then was a tiny regret – the tiniest.



Giles, of course, didn’t pick up on it. He snapped, letting every ounce of irritation shine through, “Will you two shut up?” He turned another corner without pausing to slow down.



Buffy gave Spike one little glare to get in the last word before she dutifully turned around in her seat.



Spike was silent for several seconds before he asked, “What is it with this Glory bird anyway? Why do you even care?”



Buffy and Giles exchanged a glance.



She lifted her shoulder in a single shrug. Maybe Spike could help them. He was strong, and all Buffy knew was that Glory was incredibly strong and wanted her sister to open a doorway that could destroy the world. Spike being an evil (but chipped) vampire was beside the point.



When she looked at Giles, he lifted both eyebrows at her as if telling her what she was about to do was crazy.



Spike pointed toward the windshield between them and practically shouted, “Person. There’s a person!”



Buffy gripped her seat as Giles slammed on the brakes, narrowly missing a hunched, stumbling man with an odd expression on his face. Without looking at the man or Buffy, Giles sighed in resignation.



Inhaling, Buffy said, “This does not leave this car.”



“That Rupert almost plowed over someone?” Spike gestured at the man who pushed past some shrubbery without giving it much notice.



“No, about Glory.”



“Ah, right.” Spike was silent for a moment, and instead of assuming the worst, Buffy gave him a moment. “It doesn’t leave this vehicle.”



“Good. The short version?” Buffy asked as Spike leaned into the front seat to listen.



“Preferably,” Giles muttered.



“Monks created my sister out of me.” Spike’s eyebrow lifted, but his bright blue eyes told Buffy that he was listening to her with rapt attention. “The reason they did so was to hide her from Glory, who is this creature they called a beast of some sort. Dawn is Glory’s key to her home dimension.”



“Let me guess. Opening the dimension will destroy the world,” Spike said with all seriousness.



“Right. And I. . . we have no idea how to stop her or where she is. All I know is that she’s super strong. Much stronger than me, and,” Buffy made clear eye contact with Spike, “you’re strong. I need your help.”



“Well, then. I’ve always had a soft spot for your lil sis ever since she braved up and talked to me that first time you had me over.”



“You act like that I asked you to come over for dinner,” Buffy said with a mixture of sarcasm and relief. Spike knew her sister, too, even if the whole timeline was made up and inserted. There was some comfort in knowing that the monks gave Spike a connection, too.



“So, what’s your answer?” Giles asked with urgency.



Spike slid back into his seat. “Of course, I’ll help.”



“For money,” Giles stated flatly.



“No,” Spike insisted softly. “I’m fond of the lil Bit. Don’t need money for helping her.”



Buffy’s treacherous heart thumped in her chest. “Thank you.”



“What do you really want?” Giles was still skeptical.



And Spike complied by being defensive. “Why do you always think I want something? I’ve helped before.”



“Only when you couldn’t hit anything but demons or when Adam betrayed you,” Giles countered.



Buffy bit her lip. “Actually. He helped you.” Giles’s startled eyes met hers, and she continued, “He stepped in when Angelus was torturing you. Made sure you didn’t get killed.”



“Because I wanted Dru,” Spike admitted.



“You helped Tara, too. You didn’t have to,” Buffy added, watching Giles’s face, which softened with disbelief.



“Don’t make me out to be something I’m not, pet,” Spike said. “Shouldn’t we get after Glory? Before the storm makes up its bloody mind to move on and bring back the gale force winds?”



Giles didn’t reply and hit the gas, speeding toward the charred remains of Sunnydale’s former high school.





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