Chapter 1
Cue loud music…
In every generation there is a chosen one and the force will be strong with her. In times of great need she will be called, to lead her people against the demons and the darkness. Some go willingly, sacrificing themselves gladly for the higher cause.
Others take a little more persuading…
The rather dashing, late-middle aged man finished polishing his eyeglasses, carefully perched them back onto his nose and pulled his cloak around his shoulders. Shrouded in shadow he watched as the young blonde wrapped her ruby-red lips around the lollipop. She closed her eyes and pulled it slowly from her mouth with a soft pop. Then a small pink tongue wrapped itself sensuously around the candy sweetness, and she sighed.
O B Gyn sighed too. Then coughed, remembering why he was there.
The girl looked up, her gaze flicking around the courtyard until it came to rest on the corner where he was hiding.
“You can come out,” she said, hands on hips. “I know you’re there.”
O B Gyn adjusted his eyeglasses and stepped from the shadows into the light.
“I knew it,” the girl said indignantly. “This is seriously starting to wigg me out. Just what is it with you?”
O B raised his hands, trying desperately to calm her temper and at least get her to listen this time. “B…Buffonia, you’ve got to hear me out,” he stammered. The future of the entire planet rests on what I’m about to do.”
“Guards!” the girl screamed and looked around. “Guards! Urghh.”
O B slapped his hand over her mouth then let out a scream of his own as her teeth sank into his palm.
“Take that, you pervert,” she threw back at him as she turned and ran for the building.
He managed to corner her before she got there, backing her against the wall and flinging open his cloak. The girl’s eyes grew very wide as he fumbled with the bulge in his robe.
“There’s something I need to show you,” he panted. “It’s urgent.”
“Guards!” She screamed again as he finally managed to whip out his reason for being there and hold it in front of her frightened eyes.
“This is for you, Buffonia.” From the corner of his eye he saw two guards exit the building and look around. “I have to give it to you now,” he said, desperately. “I can’t hold on to it any longer. Please let me do this. At least just look and tell me what you think of it?”
Her eyes scanned the ancient, leather-bound book. “Vampyre?”
“Yes, Vampyre,” he replied solemnly. “Buffonia, you must listen to me. In every generation there is a Chosen one. The force is strong with her. She alone will, Ouch…!”
O B doubled over as the large book crashed against his temple. He staggered backwards, straight into the arms of the palace guards who seized him and pulled him roughly to his feet again. “Princess,” he cried as they dragged him away. “You can’t escape your destiny. You are the Chosen one. The time has come, whether you like it or not.”
“And this time, they’re going to throw away the key,” he heard her shout after him. “Crazy stalker guy.”
“I’m not,” he protested as the guards pushed him through the door, into the royal palace. “I’m from the Ancient Jedi Order of Watchers. It’s my duty to Watch her.”
“Yeah?” the guard said with a snigger. “There’s a name for people like you, you dirty old man. What is it with you and young girls?”
“It’s one of the perks of the job,” O B replied. “One of the very few perks, I might add. But that’s entirely beside the point. I need to talk to her. Look at me. Look into my eyes. You don’t want to be doing this.”
The guards looked at him, then at each other. “We don’t want to be doing this,” they both said.
“You want to let me go,” O B said, his voice low and hypnotic.
“We want to let him go.” The guards repeated and loosened their hold, staring at each other as O B ran back through the doors to the courtyard.
Dammit, why did he always get the awkward ones? O B spotted his book lying on the ground, but Buffonia was long gone. Damn, he said again, stooping to pick it up. But he found himself smiling as he rubbed at the bump that was beginning to form on his forehead. The force was very strong with this one and she was going to make one heck of a slayer. If only he could keep her in place long enough to make her understand that.
It was her destiny. And it was his job to make her see that. And train her, and initiate her into the ancient ways. Another perk of the job, he remembered. And he didn’t have much time, either. The Vampirian forces were gathering and war was very likely. The Symbolic Power of the Slayer would be needed now, more than at any other time in history. Only the Chosen One had the power required to bring down the Dark Lady. It would probably be the death of her, but the sacrifice would not be in vain, and he was more than willing to make it with her. Or perhaps that should be, for her to make it? He’d decide that when he was saw just how Dark the Dark Lady was.
“You can’t escape it,” he whispered. “Neither of us can. I am your Watcher, and you are my Slayer. It is our destiny to stand side by side and fight the forces of evil.”
He turned and walked wearily away. Tomorrow was another day, and he’d just have to try again. But time was running out. And he needed to make her realise that.
-------------------------------------------
That made three times in the last week. Dammit, but security around here was getting lax. Princess Buffonia made her way down the endless corridors towards her suite hoping that she’d seen the last of the weird man in the brown cloak whose sole purpose in life lately, seemed to be jumping out at her from dark corners and talking gibberish .
And she hadn’t hit him that hard. Had she? It had only been a light tap, but he’d crumpled like a paper doll.
“Princess.”
“Oh, no.” Buffonia groaned, looking around for an escape, but the Royal dressmaker and her retinue was already advancing on her.
“There you are, Princess. We’ve been looking for you all morning.” She raised her hands dramatically and pointed. “The dress is finished.”
“Buffonia ignored the hideous garment, side-stepped, and continued walking. “And I should be happy about this?”
“Marriage to Riley Sleepwalker does not make you happy?”
“No, no it does not.” Buffonia kept walking. “I’m not going to marry him. I’ll throw myself into the hell mouth before I marry a Sleepwalker.”
“But Princess,” the dressmaker said appalled. “Do you realise…”
Buffonia rounded on her. “If you tell me one more time how many turtles had to die to make this wedding dress, I’ll scream.”
"But Princess, four thousand eight hundred and thirty three shells had to be..."
"Aghhhhhhh"
“Buffonia’s scream was drowned out by a loud blast from a musical instrument with an unpronounceable name and seconds later, Queen Armadillo appeared followed by her considerable retinue. Princess Buffonia fell to her knees before her imperial motherness, mainly from force of habit rather than out of any respect. Her royal motherly figure patted her on the head as if she were no more than one of her hounds, then floated to a conveniently placed throne.
"My dear, what is all this fuss? Do you not like the dress?"
Princess Buffonia rose and advanced on her mother.
"I don’t like the dress, and I don’t like this marriage." She folded her arms and stuck out her lip. "I won't do it. I won't marry Riley Sleepwalker, so there."
"Oh dear." Her mother shook her head and held out her hand. "Some one has been neglecting to use her orgasminator lately. Look how tense you are."
"Mother. I mean your Royal floating Benevolence. What the hell are you calling yourself today? I do not want to have sex with a machine. Do you realise that if I marry Riley that's all I'll get? I want to have sex with a real man. I know it's possible because I read it in a book."
Polite laughter rippled through the crowd, coupled with a cry of yuck from someone at the back. The queen raised her hand and silenced them.
"What kind of book, my dear?"
"A history book. "Buffonia looked down at her feet, her cheeks turning a rather strange shade of violet as they always did when she was this agitated.
The queen looked around her with a satisfied smile. "And why do you think you only read about such things in history books?"
Princess Buffonia shook her head miserably. "I don't know. Maybe because we're all so uptight and clinical these days that we've forgotten how it feels to really enjoy ourselves?"
"Where do you get these strange ideas?" The Queen beckoned her forward and took her hand. "We have evolved past all that Buffonia. Have you any idea how messy it can be? There are bodily fluids involved, and it requires you to sweat and make unseemly noises. And touch a man's bare flesh. Surely you do not want us to go back to all that?"
Buffonia's mouth went dry as she guiltily thought of the bare- chested cover model on the illicit novel she'd managed to get smuggled in on the last shipment from Borderstonia. She wasn't supposed to know about this stuff. None of them were. But now she'd read it she couldn't un- know it, could she? Of course, they'd told her the clinical facts in science class at the academy, but it had always been presented in such a way that no one in their right minds would even want to attempt it.
And as for Riley Sleepwalker? Well, she couldn't imagine him ever wanting to do anything like that. He'd fallen asleep no less than nine times during the royal ceremonial engagement dinner and had had to be carried out eventually. It had taken three blasts from the atomic nucleator to wake him up and by then, he'd forgotten who she was.
"Mother, please don't make me do this."
"Buffonia, the security of our entire planet rests on this alliance with the planet Somnambula. With our combined forces we will defeat the Vampirians, but we cannot stand alone against them. If they invade as they are threatening, then it will be the end for our entire culture."
"But mother, what use is an alliance with a people who are so boring, they spend most of their time asleep?"
"Buffonia, Buffonia." Her mother patted her on the head again as she rose from the throne. "These are nothing but pre- wedding nerves. I was just the same when I married your father.” She clapped to signify that the meeting was at an end. “Enough, the wedding will go on as planned, and be careful with the dress dear. Did you know that four thousand eight hundred and thirty three hairy turtles had to die to make it?"
Buffonia glared as her mother swept out of the room followed by her crowd of hangers- on.
“I won’t do it, and you can’t make me,” she shouted at the retreating crowd, but no one took the slightest bit of notice of her protests. As they never did.
“I rather think she can,” the dressmaker said tartly. “Now, about this fitting…”
“This is what I think of your wedding dress,” Buffonia declared snatching it from the horrified maids. The hairy turtle shells were delicate and rare and they didn’t stand a chance as Buffonia trampled them underfoot before anyone could stop her. All they could do was cry and wring their hands until she’d smashed all their hard work to dust.
The dressmaker fled, shouting for assistance while Buffonia surveyed the damage with considerable satisfaction, and feeling much better for the outburst.
“Stop wailing,” she ordered the maids. “I’ll take full responsibility. And tell the Queen I’m taking her advice and spending the afternoon on my orgasminator. I’m going for the record and don’t want to be disturbed, okay?”
The maids managed a nod then fell to their knees weeping and gathering up the remains of the dress as the princess walked briskly away. Turning the corner, Buffonia checked the corridor carefully, making sure no one was watching her and that she was out of sight of the snooping cameras, then she took a folded paper out of her pocket and scanned the page. Her ticket to a new life. Her heart started a dull thudding in her chest as she looked at the picture and she wondered just how she’d ever thought she could bring down such a creature when the best bounty hunters in the galaxy hadn’t succeeded yet.
The reward was substantial, though and would buy her a ticket off this god- forsaken place with their artificial sex and their food that didn't taste of anything. And their weird wedding practices. She looked at the picture again and her heart sank. Perhaps she should start this new career of hers with something a bit more manageable? There had to be small, wanted beings, right? Something purse- sized, maybe, that she could knock on the head and collect the reward on. And there were women bounty hunters because she'd read about those too, and she knew that they had assets that could capture a member of the opposite sex as well as any man with their blasters.
Perhaps she could persuade it/him to exchange bodily fluids with her? He looked as if he had all the required parts. She would of course, tranquillise him first, so that he would pass out just at the crucial moment. Then she'd pop him in a transporter pod and have him sent by espresso delivery to the requisite place, adopt an assumed name and they would send her the credits. Then she was out of here with a one-way –ticket to the other side of the galaxy.
By the time she'd got back to her room it was all falling into place. A hair-brained plan, yes, but the only plan she had. She looked in the mirror as she threw off her ceremonial robes and began searching for her plainest, oldest clothes. Never mind about bounty hunting. Maybe she should just steal the money. Rob a bank vault or something. Enough to buy her transport off the planet would be a start.
Whatever happened, she was determined to make her own destiny. And this marriage was definitely not going to take place.
-----------------------------------------------
Sometimes space was so beautiful. A vast infinity of stars. Dazzling suns. Planets teeming with exotic life and just waiting to be explored. Unfurling before him like a magic carpet. Promising him riches and rewards beyond his wildest dreams.
What a load of bollocks.
Spike glared out of the portside window at the big. black, empty blur that was space. At this speed you couldn’t even see the planets as they whizzed by. And as for the dazzling suns? Well, right now he was thinking that pointing the Millennium Bug (De-soto class) straight at the middle of one wouldn’t be such a bad idea. At least it would be a quick ending. Not like the horrible, lingering death from a broken heart.
He had just enough energy to raise his head as the co-pilot entered the recreation room. “You wanted me?” he asked unentusiastically.
Chewackybacky replied with a series of guttural growls and Spike spluttered indignantly.
“I’m not sulking Chewie. Have you any idea what she meant to me? Drusilla was the face of my salvation and I…” Spike paused for dramatic effect, sneaking a peek to see how he was doing. The eight foot tall Wookie shook his head, his lush, silky fur rippling as he contemplated his friend.
“She didn’t just take all the money Chewie, she took this.” Spike jammed his hand over his heart. “Have you any idea what it’s like to have your heart ripped out and shoved in your face?”
Chewie nodded slowly.
“Oh, right, I forgot.” Spike stepped away from the window, sighing as he flopped onto the bench. “You’ve got to understand, Chewie, what it’s like for me. I’m a Vampirian and when we love we do it with heart and soul. Metaphorically speaking, of course,” he added hastily at Chewie’s skeptically raised eyebrows. “Drusilla was everything to me and I’m not just going to get over it like that.” He snapped his fingers.
Chewie’s eyebrows rose even higher.
“This is different, Chewie. Yes, I know she hit me over the head before stealing all of our money and running off with a slime demon, but that’s just Dru.” Spike smiled fondly, then shook himself. “I’ve figured it out. All we have to do is go find her, catch her, tie her up, torture her a bit and then she’ll love me again. What is it?
Chewie thrust the hand-held monitor, that Spike had only just noticed he was carrying, into his hand. Spike glanced at the screen and his heart sank. “Bloody hell," he murmured under his breath. "Jasmine, she’s found us.”
At the flick of a button, the screen crackled into life. Jasmine, who was quite possibly the widest humanoid that Spike had ever seen, appeared, resplendent in her ceremonial robes. Reigning monarch of the planet Hutt, the dubious distinction of which was awarded to the being having the most given chins at any one time, Jasmine the Slut was aptly named.
“Spikey, darling,” she drawled in what Spike recognised as her bedroom voice. His insides lurched as he remembered.
Chewie looked at him, pulling a shocked face out of his considerable repertoire of expressions.
“Yes, I bloody well did,” Spike hissed, in response. “How do you think the last instalment of the loan got paid?”
“Can you hear me, my little blondie bear?”
Chewie snorted.
Spike paled. Which actually meant that he went so white he looked blue. “Yes,” he managed to squeak out. “Er, coming in loud and clear.”
“Good,” she replied, her face undulating towards the screen. “Now then, just calling in to make sure you haven’t forgotten our little bargain.”
“Spike swallowed hard and went for the little boy, head tilt. “Umm, what bargain was that?”
Jasmine tutted, and waggled a meaty finger at the screen. “Naughty boy,” she said scolding him. “Why, the little matter of the marriage proposal, which I’ve decided to accept, by the way.” Her voice hardened. “You weren’t thinking of going back on your promise were you?”
“Who me?” Spike tried his best to look insulted. “Why, it’s all I think about. My, umm, little Jasmine,” he added, getting a loud but surprisingly girlie giggle out of her. When she’d stopped wobbling he continued. “The reason why I’ve not been in touch is, umm, er, that it’s, umm, unlucky for a Vampirian to look at his bride before the wedding day.”
Jasmine giggled again. “I can’t stop thinking about you Spikey. Those things you did to me. That dance. Do it for me now.”
Chewie covered his eyes as Spike clutched dramatically at his back. “Sorry love. Pulled something, physician says no dancing, especially of the exotic kind for at least, six vectors.”
“Then call me by that special pet name you used only for me.”
Crap, could this get more embarrassing. Chewie was shaking with the effort not to laugh and Spike knew that if Jasmine heard them laughing, they were dead. He motioned him frantically to leave, but he wasn’t having any of it. Determined to milk Spike’s misfortune for all it was worth.
“Er, My widdle Jasminie, Wasminie? Was that it?”
“Yes,that’s the one.” Jasmine bounced in her seat, hardly noticing that she’d crushed one of her attendants, then she leaned towards the screen again, lips puckered and planted a large slobbery kiss on it. “Don’t keep me waiting much longer, my widdle blondie bear. I can’t wait to do it with you again, and again, and again…”
Spike tried not to look too appalled as she ran her hand suggestively down her considerable torso, lingering over each of her eight breasts, and licked her lips. “You won’t be able to walk for at least a vector when I’ve done with you.” She promised with a wink.
Spike swallowed hard, in his mind already five million light years away, and counting.
Jasmine clapped her hands, suddenly business like and Spike’s blood ran cold. Or rather, colder, since he was a Vampirian. “You have five vectors to get that very cute ass of yours to me for the wedding. You will be husband number…” she glanced at the tablet held up by one of her attendants. “Four hundred and sixty five. I intend to honour you with position of favourite husband, therefore you will be required for marital duties every night. You will be here for the wedding. You will wear a tuxedo. Or you will be dead. Now is there anything there that you didn’t understand?”
“What was the bit about the tux?”
“Spike!” Jasmine leaned back into her throne and lifted her chins regally. “Don’t be fooled by this soft, girlish exterior.” She swept her hand down the length of her body again. “In here beat four hearts of steel and one of argonite. You will be here for the wedding. Unless you’d like to pay me the five million credits you owe me?”
“I don’t have five million credits.” Spike lifted a weary face to the screen. “You know I don’t have that kind of money.”
Jasmine smiled. Spike counted twelve dimples. “That’s just what I hoped you’d say. You belong to me, Spikey, every last bit of you. I’ve got the dress. The cakes have been made. Be here.”
The screen fizzled and mercifully, Jasmine’s ugly face faded away. Spike threw the screen against the wall and watched as it shattered into a million pieces, then he kicked Chewacky, who was on the floor silently shaking with laughter and clutching at his sides. Chewie stopped laughing and sat up indignantly.
“Don’t give me that look, you stupid lump,” Spike shouted. “We are in the biggest load of trouble, since…since…the last time we were in this kind of trouble. Crap, can it get any worse? First Dru and now this. How the hell did she remember that I’d proposed? She was supposed to be drunk on Alterian brandy. It was just to get me out of there in one piece.” He started pacing while Chewie stood up. “Okay, this is what we do. Get out of here fast. Hyperdrive to the other side of the galaxy and bloody well stay there. Smuggling opportunities are played out in this sector anyway. And don’t give me that look. It was your idea to jettison the cargo when that Vampirian customs and excise cruiser appeared. Which is what got us into this mess in the first place.
Spike paused for breath, as Chewie interrupted him with an indignant protest.
“Okay, I’ll admit to some of the responsibility,” Spike conceded, “and hell, I thought having sex with her would shut her up and give us more time to find the money to pay back that loan. And you can bloody stop laughing, it’s a good job one of us is prepared to make sacrifices, or we’d both be dead by now. Have you the slightest idea what it was like having to do that?”
Chewie went a slightly darker shade of brown.
“You do?” Spike narrowed his eyes. “When?”
Chewie nodded, still grinning.
“Well, that’s bloody great,” Spike said when Chewie had finished his very lengthy explanation. “You couldn’t have told me this before I nearly got myself crushed to death?”
Chewie shrugged.
“Okay, I know that technically, being a Vampirian I can’t die that way, but hell, this isn’t helping us out of this mess. Fire up the hyper-drive before this day goes any further down the toilet. We’re out of here Chewie.”
Chewie made another series of guttural growls.
“Dru’s knackered the hyper-drive? Shit, why didn’t you tell me?”
Again with the growling.
“Okay, I admit that I’ve been distracted of late. I was upset, right? Not every day the love of my life leaves me for a big pile of slime.” He jammed his fingers in to his hair. “Right, this is obviously her way of telling me she doesn’t want me following her. Okay, I get that. Where’s the nearest planet we can get replacement parts?”
“Summeria?” Spike stared out of the window. “Hell, that’s a bit close to Vampiria for comfort. Weren’t the Vampirians threatening war on the Summerians last time we checked in?”
Chewie nodded enthusiastically.
“Well, the last thing I want is to be press- ganged into the army. Which is what I hear they’re resorting to. Can you sneak us past the sensors?”
Chewie made a piffling sound and waved an arm.
“Wish I was confident as you. Look Chewie, marriage to Jasmine is going to seem like being locked in a harem full of earth-women compared to being a soldier in the Vampirian army. This is my ass on the line, and I am talking literally here. Okay,” he said with another sigh, “here’s the plan, and I’m keeping it simple. Get us to Summeria, we knick us some hyper-drive spares then we’re out of here for good.”
Chewie grunted his approval and left the cabin. Spike turned back to the window and pressed his face against the glass, his arms wrapped around himself as he tried to stop the unbearable ache in his un-beating heart. Bloody Dru. Why did she have to go and leave him? And now, when he needed her more than ever? He wiped angrily at tears he couldn’t stop falling. He’d always cried for her. “Why Dru?” he shouted at the vast infinity of space. “You made me what I am. I’m nothing without you. Why did you have to leave me, baby?”
He heard Chewie calling him to go help plot the course, but he ignored him. Chewie had no idea how it felt to be a Vampirian who’d loved and lost. There was the brooding and the stalking and the sulking and the getting very very drunk. All time- honoured rituals.
Which would have to wait, he told himself sternly as a picture of Jasmine in the nude popped into his mind and his stomach flip-flopped again as he remembered just what that had been like. And how much he never wanted to have to do it again.
Hell, he hadn’t asked to be this fit and handsome, he thought catching his reflection in the glass. Sometimes he wished he was just Joe-normal and not the Adonis who stared back at him with the cut-glass cheekbones and white-blond hair to die for. Was it his fault that every female who set eyes on him, wanted him? All except the one who counted, of course.
Bloody women, they were so shallow. All the same. Show then ten inches of man-meat and it was Give it to me Spikey you great big Vampirian stallion, you. And so what if he could go on all night without missing a beat? There was more to life than phenomenal sex. He had a brain inside this gorgeous head of his, but were any women interested in his theory on relative dimensional hyperdrive? Or the fact that he had three university degrees? Heck no. All they wanted was a piece of him. And if one more woman shouted get your shirt off at him he wasn’t going to be responsible for his actions.
“I’m coming,” he shouted back at Chewie who was demanding he join him, because it wasn’t as if they had time to spare, and did he really want to end up as favourite husband to Jasmine the Slut?
Spike shuddered. The horrible thought jolting him into action. Even a super-stud had his limits. They needed to get those parts, and get away fast. Or get their hands on five million credits. Maybe rob a bank vault? The Summerians were rich, right? How difficult could that be? He entered the cockpit and sat himself down next to Chewie who was punching numbers into a keypad.
“Okay, what’ve we got?” he said leaning across and inspecting the figures with an approving nod. “Looks good, feed ‘em into the computer and let’s get on our way. Quicker we do this, the quicker we’re gone.”
Chewie busied himself while Spike returned to his brooding. He was a Vampirian, he couldn’t not brood. Hell, he should be sitting in his cabin stroking one of Dru’s sweaters and thinking sad thoughts right now, not contemplating grand larceny and risking getting drafted into the army from hell.
“Thinking of giving up on women,” he said morosely.
Chewie stopped what he was doing and flicked him a worried glance.
“Yeah,” Spike said, warming to his subject. “I’m fed up of just being a sex object. Is that how I come across? As just a pretty face and a mean set of rock-hard abs? Because sometimes it feels like it.”
Chewie thought about it for a moments then nodded.
“Hell, life really sucks sometimes. Why couldn’t I have been born with silly brown, curly hair that looked like a bad wig. And worn eye-glasses, they make you look intelligent, don’t they? And I could write really dreadful poetry so that women would laugh at me. And I could pretend to be a virgin.” He sat up, suddenly feeling cheerful for the first time since Dru had disappeared. “No female would want to do it with a virgin, would they? Then perhaps I’d get some peace and quiet?”
Chewie gave him a big, toothy grin, then reminded him about Jasmine, who was most certainly expecting Spike, or five million credits, not some curly-haired, intelligent, but sexually- clueless virgin.
“Damn,” Spike said. “I hate these plot holes. And just when I’d thought of something really clever too. Hell, I’m going with it. It’ll be a good disguise, anyway and we’ll just have to make sure she doesn’t catch us, because if she does, I might as well be dead anyway so it’s not going to make any difference.”
Spike rose and indicated Chewie to take the helm. “Take us to Summeria, Chewie. I’ve got a little make-over to do.” He wandered back to his cabin with a new spring in his step. Why the hell hadn’t he thought of this before? Geek, Spike was going to be such a turn-off. He stood looking in the mirror and ran his fingers through his short, platinum hair. It was a long time since he’d seen his curls, but maybe it was time to bring them back. A small dose of super hair-growth should see to that. And a quick dye job.
He flicked the screen on his computer and brought up an image of his face.
“Brown curly hair,” he ordered.
The image changed.
“No, too cool,” he told it. “Make it just a bit too long and sort of flopping over the eyes, with a ridiculous curl right on top.”
The image changed again.
Spike smiled. From super-stud to complete prat in one simple hairstyle change? It shouldn’t have been possible, but it was. “And now add eye-glasses,” he commanded. “Small, round ones.”
Even better. It was him, but not him. A shy, awkward, but very intelligent-looking young Vampirian looked back at him. No woman in their right mind was going to want to go anywhere within spitting distance of that, Spike thought, with considerable satisfaction. The hell with the lot of them.
The thought did strike him that this might be a good test of a woman’s sincerity. Anyone who could fall for someone who looked like that, had to be looking beyond the physical, right? He typed a request for brown hair-dye into the valet-unit and stripped off his shirt. Maybe he’d put on some weight too. But, then again, maybe not. As long as he kept the goodies covered up, there shouldn’t be a problem. A hideous shirt, and baggy pants should keep everything a secret.
“Goodbye, Spike,” he muttered dropping his pants and stepping into the shower. And hello…who?” A name, he needed a new name. Spike was way too cool for the nerd look. “Give me a name,” he asked the computer. “Something really boring, but nothing that stands out too much.”
Quentin, the computer replied in its monosyllabic voice.
“Naa, try again.”
Clement, Aristotle, William, David, James.
“Hold on, backtrack three.”
William, the computer repeated.
“William?” Hmm. Staid and solid. Just a hint of manliness but without the unfortunate phallic connotations that the name Spike conjured.
William it is then, he thought as he scrubbed his hair. The hair growth usually worked within a sunrise and the dye was instantaneous. Already he looked different.
Chewie buzzed him on the com-link to let him know their ETA to Summeria and Spike glanced at the chronometer on the wall as the water sluiced over him They’d be arriving soon. Just enough time for the obligatory wank and then he needed to find something nerdy to wear. The eyeglasses he’d have to steal when he got there.
He felt a lot better for the manual relief and as he watched his cold, dead seed washing away under the rain of water he contemplated the irony that was his life. A Vampirian as good-looking as him should have been able to find one woman who was prepared to actually see him. It was all he wanted really. A soul mate – metaphorically speaking, of course - to travel the stars with. Someone who understood relative hyper-drive theory and wasn’t afraid to challenge him on it.
He towelled off and opened the closet. The only garments that were the remotest bit nerdy were the gaudy shirt adorned with parrots and palm trees and the baggy shorts he’d had to borrow from a friend, following a laundry disaster the last time he was on earth. He’d never worn them since, but they were about to come in mighty handy.
Not exactly what he’d had in mind, he thought as he surveyed the effect. He didn’t look so much an intellectual as a complete lunatic. Still, nerd, or lunatic what did it matter? Just a long as the women left him alone, and Jasmine’s hench-beings didn’t recognise him.
That thought sobered him as he went forward to strap himself in for the landing, ignoring Chewie’s explosive laughter as he spotted his new look. They needed to get their hands on the money, and fast. As the craft bumped down into the docking park he was already punching in the co-ordinates of the top five banking vaults in the capital.
The loud crunch told him that Chewie had done it again. He could outrun imperial Vampirian cruisers. Execute handbrake turns in hyperspace. But could he park the bloody thing? Could he hell.
Spike walked down the gangplank and peered underneath the Millennium Bug. Yep, there it was. The large metal sign, now rather dented and mangled. He tilted his head and read.
Welcome to Sunnydale.
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next, Buffonia and Spike meet….only she thinks he’s William, and gods does he need a make-over…..and boy does she need a lift off the planet….and then there’s that creepy man in the brown cloak again…
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