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Stars in the Bright Sky by Lilachigh



Chapter 3 Close your Eyes

It’s Christmas Eve and thoughts should turn to presents, fun and laughter - not tracking through a sewer on your way to kill the man you love


Buffy stared at the heavy wooden door of Spike’s crypt, her heart thundering. She couldn’t, wouldn’t believe it, but her senses never lied about blood. Spike had someone in there, someone who was bleeding, someone in pain.

Was he feeding again? No, that was ridiculous. He couldn’t hurt anyone with the chip in his head. And anyway, he was different these days. He said he loved her, she’d slept with him; she had done things with Spike, to him, that .... the words pushed themselves to the front of her mind - oh god, she had feelings for him.

But what if the chip had failed. broken, dechipped itself. Bits of Willow’s computer were breaking down all the time. Had there been some sort of warning that she’d missed?

Was it when they’d played with the handcuffs the other night, when he’d fastened her hands together above her head to the leg of a chair and made her come and come and come until she’d dissolved into a screaming, liquid mess that gloried when he’d climaxed inside her, roaring his love and passion into the dark crypt around them.

Would the smell of their sex soaked night still linger in the crypt as she imagined it did on her body, no matter how many times she showered?

And if he does have a helpless victim in there, a voice whispered inside her brain, what are you going to do then?

‘I’ll have to kill him,’ she whispered out loud to the deserted graveyard.

But it wasn’t deserted. Just as she was about to kick down the crypt door, a voice behind her said, ‘Now Miss, this is no place for you to be tonight. Cut along home, straight away.’

Buffy swirled round, her hands reaching out to attack. Then she dropped them to her side. It was a policeman, holding a torch. She could see others patrolling through the graveyard, the torch lights swinging through the darkness, looking like a scene from ET.

‘What’s going on, officer.’

‘Escaped convict, miss. Very dangerous. I want you to go home and shut all your doors and windows. Talk to no one. Okay.’

Buffy nodded dutifully. ‘Whatever you say, officer,’ and drifted away from the door. She watched as the policeman tried the crypt door, shook it, then moved off, obviously satisfied.

Why don’t you tell him? she asked herself angrily. Just call out that you think there’s someone in trouble inside that crypt. But she couldn’t. This was between her and Spike. If anyone was going to kill him, it had to be her. For all he’d done for her, he deserved that.

She cut back across the cemetery, ducked down a back road and dragged aside the covering to one of the sewer entrances. She knew the passage underneath ran back towards the graveyard, and she was pretty sure it was one that Spike used to travel across town during daylight.

‘Uggh. Gahh. Smelly.’ she moaned as she splashed her way along, but eventually the floor of the passage rose and became dry underfoot. Dim light filtered down occasionally from gratings above her head. Sometimes she could hear people laughing, the rumble of traffic, the wail of a police siren as the hunt for the convict spread out through Sunnydale.

She realised that it was getting very late. It must be Christmas Eve by now.

‘Spike owes me a new pair of boots,’ Buffy muttered grimly. ‘These are the only one’s I’ve got and they’ll never be any use to man, woman or beast again. Why can’t I fight some battles in nice, clean places with nice clean floors. Ice-cream parlours, shopping malls, shoe shops...why is there always gunge and grime and gloop.’

She knew she was rambling, anything to keep her mind off what she was going to find and what she might have to do. She fingered the stake in her jacket pocket. Would she be able to use this on Spike?

She tried not to imagine Dawn’s face on Christmas morning. No, sweetie, we can’t take your present round to Spike because I dusted him. He’s gone. He’ll never wear a T-shirt again, black or otherwise.

‘Xander will be pleased,’ she whispered. ‘He’ll probably phone Giles and they can have a big celebration. Tara will be sympathetic, Willow - ’ her thoughts ground to a halt as she realised she didn’t know what her oldest friend would think.

‘At least I can keep those poems for myself,’ she muttered, remembering the little blue silk covered book she’d bought at a garage sale and pushed to the back of her underwear drawer. The book she’d refused to admit to herself that she’d planned on giving Spike as a gift.

Oh God, how she hated Christmas and every year from now on, it would be the anniversary of this final act in their rocky relationship.

‘Stupid tunnel, it’s making my eyes water.’

Because that was what it was. The dark, dank air. She certainly wasn’t crying. She was the Slayer. She would never cry over a stupid, peroxide blond vampire who had made her believe that perhaps there was one person in the world she could rely on, when she’d always known there wasn’t.

Suddenly there was a dim light shining at the end of the tunnel. ‘Which can only be the on-coming train,’ Buffy thought dully.

She stopped as the smell of blood came wafting towards her and there was the moaning sound again. No, whatever pain this was going to cause her, there was no option, she thought drearily, there never had been. This was her calling, this was why she’d killed Angel, this was what she did, even at Christmas, she killed the man she loved.

Without stopping to think about the words she’d just thought, Buffy leapt forward, stake in hand, and swung round the corner into the underground room of Spike’s crypt.

‘Buffy!’

Spike was leaning over someone lying on the bed - their bed that they so often didn’t bother to use. Up to the sleeves of his T-shirt, his pale arms were stained in blood.

‘Get away from the bed!’ Buffy ordered.

‘Slayer.’ He stood up slowly, looking at her in disbelief, his blue eyes, shadowed by - if she hadn’t known better, she would have said hurt and a sort of weary resignation.

‘Come to kill me, pet, have you?’ His voice was sharp, very English and Buffy was reminded of Giles when he was in a temper with her and trying not to show it.

‘Just move away, Spike, please.’ She was shaking like a leaf. Ridiculous. She never reacted like this when she was hunting.

‘Can’t do that, luv.’

Buffy steeled herself to strike, then hesitated. Every slayer instinct told her to kill him, get it done. What right had she to expect anything but unhappiness? With Spike gone there would be nothing left in her life but grey, unfeeling dreariness. Perhaps that was what she deserved, needed to do her job properly. She’d been neglecting Dawn, ignoring her friends, all because of this man standing in front of her, with an innocent’s blood all over him.

She tightened her grip on the stake. Why was she hesitating? She’d loved Angel as deeply as a young girl could, but she’d still pushed her sword deep into his flesh. She’d sent him to hell. Why couldn’t she kill Spike?

‘Close your eyes,’ she commanded, her mind rocking as the words echoed deep inside her.

Spike gave her a crooked grin. ‘Bugger that, luv. Go ahead and do it.’

Buffy felt a strange pride rise up inside her. Against all odds, she was proud of Spike. Because this man would never close his eyes. He would face death with that burning, blazing blue gaze, smiling at her, loving her to the very end.

A groan from the bed jerked her forward.

‘We’ll have to do this later, Slayer. She needs us now,’ Spike said softly and turned his back on her.

Puzzled, Buffy peered round him and gasped. Lying on the bed in a tangle of red velvet covers and black silk sheets was a young girl in her late teens. Her dark hair was tangled and matted, her face contorted with pain, but Buffy could see that she was probably very pretty.

It looked as if Spike had ripped the skirt of her dress apart. Her legs were splayed open, she was naked underneath.

She was also heavily pregnant and even as Buffy looked, half rose up off the bed, grabbing for Spike’s hand as her next contraction hit her.


to be continued





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