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Pinch Hitter by dreamweaver
 
Chapter 5
 
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Chapter 5


The Hadraden knew of a operating theater in the teachers’ college that would be deserted at this time of night. All the implements Hazlitt needed were there. With Buffy and the Hadraden standing over him, Hazlitt had no choice but to perform the operation and take the chip out. It was tricky work, but in an hour it was done and Spike, being a vamp, recovered rapidly from both the surgery and the local anesthetic he had been given.

“Gotta test it out,” he muttered once he was on his feet again.

“Oh, no, you won’t!” exclaimed Buffy. “You said you wouldn’t feed while you’re in Sunnydale.”

“Who’s feeding? Just want to be sure I’m really back to normal. Don’t feel any different,” he complained and she realized that the irritation and tenderness of the incision as it started to heal was no guarantee to him that the chip was really gone. “How about I go tear Finn’s head off? He only picked up a few bruises during that attack and he deserves a lot more.”

“No,” she said firmly, though she would have loved to kick Riley around a little bit.

“I could go sock the Watcher. Or clobber Harris. I’d like that.”

He was grinning. She gave him a look.

“No beating up on my friends. You’re going home. I don’t care if you’re a vamp. Having someone dig around in your brain has to have had some impact. You’re going to go to bed and rest.”

“As long as you’re in that bed with me.”

He deliberately shouldered hard into a passerby on the way home, almost knocking the man off his feet. Before, even a milder shove would have made the chip go off. Now nothing happened.

“Hey, watch it, bud!” the guy exclaimed angrily, regaining his balance.

“Sorry about that, mate,” said Spike with a huge grin on his face. “Bit wobbly on my feet here.”

The guy went off, muttering something about drunks. Spike drew a deep breath, flinging his arms out triumphantly.

“Oh, yeah,” he whispered. “It’s gone.”

He caught her up suddenly, lifting her right off her feet, and kissed her face all over.

“Spike! Put me down!” she protested, but couldn’t help laughing. “It can’t be good for you, picking me up like this until we’re sure that wound is healed.”

“You have no idea, you have no idea the way I feel right now! The chains are off and I can breathe again!” He whirled her around. “Look out, world! I’m back and I’m a bloody animal!”

Buffy shook her head wryly. “The killer. Aching to rip somebody’s head off. Well, you can’t. Not even Riley’s because he’s human. You promised.”

“Yeah, yeah. And I’ll keep that promise. But he comes near me, he’s gonna get booted clear to the eastern seaboard. Let’s go to Willy’s and celebrate!”

In the crazy-happy mood he was in, he was sure to pick a fight with somebody, which would do that hole in his head no good.

“Do that tomorrow,” she said firmly. “Right now you’re going to bed.”

He gave her a sideways, sloe-eyed look. “Yeah, there are other ways to celebrate.”

The high was wearing off though by the time that she got him home and the pain killers Hazlitt said he had to take made him sleepy. He didn’t protest being talked into bed, only insisted she join him.

“Why did you let Hazlitt take the chip out?” he asked drowsily as she undressed and slid into bed beside him. “Watcher’s gonna have a fit. You’ll be drummed out of the Slayers’ corps.”

“It wasn’t right, that chip. What it did to you. What it took away. Forcing a being, even a vamp, to go against his very nature, that’s cruel. But everything the Initiative did was cruel. It would have been kinder to have killed you outright.”

“Felt like that,” he agreed. “Almost did stake myself in the beginning.”

Only learning that he could at least fight demons had kept him from doing that.

“Knew I’d get it out in the end,” he said, yawning. “Somehow. That kept me going. The Buffy of this dimension would never have let Hazlitt take it out, whatever I swore. Why did you?”

“I know you keep your word.”

“You believed in me. That kind of leap of faith...” He touched her face delicately, his eyes shining. “You’re so different from her.”

“One learns in four years.”

“It’s not just that.” He turned onto his side to face her, drawing her to him to lean his forehead against hers. “She takes. You give.”

She put her arms around him. “You taught me that, Spike. You gave so much. You gave everything.”

“That’s the other Spike.”

“He’s you. It’s all in here.” She pressed a hand lightly over his unbeating heart. “I saw it with Dru. When you care, you give. You can’t help it.”

“Do you care?” he muttered blurrily. His eyes were closing. He was almost asleep.

“Yes.” She kissed him softly and he made an appreciative sound in his throat. “Oh, I care, Spike.”

“You give. So much. Never thought anyone would. Not to me...”

“It’s easy to give when one lo...” She broke off abruptly, not wanting to use the L-word.

But she didn’t think that he had heard her. His eyes were almost closed. He slid downwards a little until his forehead was against the hollow of her throat and his lips in the valley between her breasts. His body went lax against hers and his breathing slowed, then stopped entirely. He was asleep.

She laid her face against his hair. She was glad he hadn’t heard her. She didn’t want him to think of love between them. There was no future for them. Sooner or later, the PTB would send her back to her own dimension and bring the other Buffy back. She wanted him able to walk away from Sunnydale heart-whole. Wanted nothing to bind him, cause him pain. She wanted him free.

‘Set me free,’ he had said to her. And she would. Of the chip and of any other ties.

***

Spike was still sleeping when she went out the next day. Buffy was careful not to wake him. She had a fight coming up with Giles and it was better that she faced him and the Scoobies alone.

The minute Hazlitt got back to base, he would have told Riley about taking out Spike’s chip. The only way she could have prevented that was to have killed him or allow Rual, the Hadraden, to kill him. She couldn’t do that.

She called Giles on her new cell to tell him she was coming and, sure enough, when she got to his place, they were all lined up, glaring at her. Giles, the Scoobs, Angel, and even Riley and Graham. Riley had only a few bruises, as Spike had said, but Graham had his arm in a cast.

“You,” she said to Riley. “Out. Now.”

After one look at the icy contempt in her face, Riley went.

“And you,” she said to Graham. He was the more dangerous of the two with his quiet, prosaic competence. There had always been a weakness in Riley, a hollowness at his center. But one had to respect Graham’s unswerving loyalty, even if it was to an unworthy cause. “If you’re thinking of recapturing Spike and putting that chip back in his head again, don’t even try. You took him by surprise the last time. He’s on his guard now and he’s a very efficient killer. You and your toy soldiers won’t just be busted up, you’ll be dead. And I’ll be cheering.”

“Buffy!” Giles protested and she shrugged a shoulder at him.

“Absolute truth, Giles. Out,” she said to Graham and he went without another word. From the grimly resigned look on his face, she didn’t think any of the Initiative’s troops would be going after Spike in future. But she had Firoud watching them just in case and they would tell her if something was being planned. Those little demons made marvelous spies; they could get in anywhere and overhear anything.

“How can you condone demons attacking humans?” Giles demanded. “Buffy, I’m appalled at your attitude!”

“Those demons wouldn’t have touched anyone if Riley and his stormtroopers hadn’t attacked Spike. Spike has every right to defend himself.”

“Riley was only going to beat him up a little,” Xander snapped.

“And Riley couldn’t do it himself? He had to take seven men along to attack one lone vamp who couldn’t even fight back because of that chip in his head. Such an admirable thing to do! But demons beat him and his brave pals up instead. What a shame.”

“Buffy’s right. It is shameful,” said Willow angrily and both Tara and Anya nodded. “Did you know they were going to do that, Xander?”

Xander flushed at the way they were looking at him. “No, but I don’t blame them! Spike’s been asking for it!”

“Why? Because I choose to sleep with him instead of Riley? I choose who I share my body with!” Buffy said furiously. “What an incredible fool you are, Xander! Riley didn’t tell you everything, did he? He came here and told you what happened last night and that the chip was out. But I bet he didn’t tell you what he was really planning to do when he took seven men along with him to make sure Spike didn’t get away.”

“Really planning?” Giles turned to stare at her and everyone else’s eyes widened.

“He took one of Engelman’s surgeons along. They were going to change the setting on the chip. Make it fire continuously until Spike’s brain burned out or he killed himself. An experiment, the surgeon called it.”

“My God!” breathed Giles. Everyone was looking horrified, even Xander.

“Spike gave him the idea when he said Engelman should have set the chip to kill. But having Spike die in agony was Riley’s own idea. I had Spike’s chip taken out so that something like that would never happen to him. So that he’d be able to defend himself.”

“But he’s a vampire!” protested Giles. “He’ll feed and kill! You should be staking him, not setting him loose on an unsuspecting public!”

“He won’t kill. He promised me.”

“He doesn’t have a soul,” Angel said harshly from where he stood watching on the sidelines.. “He won’t keep his word.”

“Very big on this soul thing, aren’t you, Angel?” Buffy said scornfully. “I’ve had four more years to see the things you do with that soul. You cause more damage with that soul of yours than Spike ever did. But forget that,” she said as Angel’s mouth opened in shock. “The main thing is that Spike keeps his word. I’m surprised you don’t know that.”

Angel’s eyes shifted. He did know, but he had hoped she didn’t. “He’ll feed.”

“Yes!” said Giles. “That’s the whole point. He’s a vampire! He has to feed.”

“Not in Sunnydale. He promised me. And when he leaves here, he’ll feed, but he won’t kill. He gave me his word and I believe him.”

“Not in Sunnydale?” Angel flung at her angrily. “Do you really believe that? Do you really think he’ll go on drinking pig’s blood when he doesn’t have to?”

“Not pig’s blood and not human’s.” Buffy gave him a nasty smile. “He’ll be drinking Slayer blood.”

There was an immediate outcry. “No!” gasped everyone except Anya.

“It’s not like he needs more than a sip. Slayer blood’s powerful. I can spare it.”

“Letting a vamp suck on you!” exclaimed Xander. “That’s disgusting!”

“Not really,” said Anya and grinned at Buffy. “It’s a real turn on, as I guess you’ve already found out, Buffy.”

“Oh, yeah.”

“Ahn!” Xander gaped at her.

“You have no idea how good it feels, Xander.”

“You mean...you let...”

Anya just shrugged. “Oh, sure. Lots of times.”

“Getting back to the point,” said Buffy, trying not to grin at Xander’s appalled face, “no one hurts Spike. He and I have an understanding and I don’t want any of you taking matters into your own hands for my own good. I decide what’s for my own good and, if you have any problems with that, both Spike and I will make you very, very sorry.”

She gave them all a hard stare. The girls nodded, but Buffy was pretty sure that Giles, Xander and Angel weren’t through yet.

Giles and Xander made their move the very next day. Crossing Tranquility on his way to meet Buffy for patrol, Spike suddenly found two crossbow bolts flying at him. Neither of them reached him. Before they came anywhere near him, Spike had jumped lightly backwards. The bolts, which had come at him from two different sides, simply crossed, then plunged into the ground.

“Really, Watcher. That’s pathetic.”

“You knew?” Giles was struggling to reload as fast as he could. “You were expecting it!”

“Watcher, I’m a vamp. I can smell the two of you. And it wasn’t hard to judge the trajectory once I knew where you were standing. Don’t try again. I can have you by the throat before you even pull the trigger. Only the Slayer is faster than I am.”

“We’ll see about that!” Xander yelled. “Giles, shoot!”

Giles aimed, then found himself staring at a Hadraden.

“We really cannot permit,” said Rual mildly and removed the crossbow gently but firmly from Giles’ hands. “The Slayer does not wish Spike to be hurt.”

He broke the crossbow in half with not the slightest effort and tossed it away negligently.

“Fasra, don’t kill him!” Spike called suddenly and ran forward to where the Brachen female had lifted Xander in both hands and was poised to break his back over her knee. “Slayer wouldn’t like it!”

“But I wish to kill,” she growled. “Why do you keep preventing me?” She glowered down at Xander who was white with terror and struggling desperately. “This one would not be a loss.”

“Yeah, but he’s one of the Slayer’s friends.”

“They act strangely for friends.”

“Both a bit soft in the head,” shrugged Spike. “Especially the one you’re holding.”

“Then it would be kinder to put it out of its misery.”

Spike grinned. “True. But we are not kind, are we?”

Fasra sighed deeply and tossed Xander onto the ground. “The Slayer is too tender with these humans.”

“The Initiative sods are who you’re really after. Go kill Finn, why don’t you?”

“The Slayer says not without cause. They have given no cause. But I live in hope.” She turned and stalked away into the trees.

“Good Lord!” whispered Giles, looking after her. “Is she...are they your bodyguard?”

“Nah. Don’t need a bodyguard now that the chip’s out of my head. They’re not watching me. They’re watching the two of you.”

“What?”

“Your motives are suspect,” said Rual. “The Slayer has advised us. Should we see some weapon in your hand when you are not accompanied by her, a stake or a grenade or some other such tool of destruction, we are ordered to relieve you of it. We will attempt not to harm you in the doing, but that can sometimes be difficult as you are fragile and break easily. Fasra, for one, tends to forget that her strength is much greater than yours.”

“And she doesn’t care what she breaks,” murmured Spike.

Buffy ordered this?” gasped Xander disbelievingly as he staggered to his feet.

“That is so,” nodded Rual.

“How could she!”

Rual jerked his chin towards the crossbows lying on the ground. “Has she not cause?”

“A Slayer setting demons against humans!” Xander snarled, outraged.

“‘Has she not cause?’” Spike mocked. “She’s the Slayer. She gives the orders. They’re only here to make sure you follow them. You don’t like it? Take it up with her.”

He whacked Xander happily across the back of his head. It was a light slap, but it sent Xander staggering forward helplessly. Spike grinned widely.

“Just a demonstration how it is without the chip. And that was just a love tap. Come at me with weapons, Rual and the others will stop you. Come at me without, there won’t even be an oily smear left on the ground, wimp.”

“I’ll...I’ll...get you!” snarled Xander. “Somehow!”

“Yeah, yeah. Try. I’ll enjoy busting every bone in your body. Just because I promised the Slayer I wouldn’t bite doesn’t mean I can’t get really physical. Promised her I wouldn’t kill you. But you’ll wish I had.”

Xander flinched and Spike laughed, then gave Giles a cold stare.

“You bunch make me sick. You think you’re exempt from everything. Even Fasra, a Brachen, has more morality than you do. You heard her. She won’t kill without cause. But you would. The only good demon’s a dead demon, right? Doesn’t matter if it hasn’t harmed anyone and doesn’t intend to. What’s the difference between you and the Initiative, Watcher, between you and a demon, if you’re willing to kill and torture the way they do?”

“You’re twisting things around!” Xander flung back.

“Am I?” Spike was watching Giles who was looking disturbed. “Still seeing things in black and white, Watcher? That’s not the way the world is. The Slayer knows that. This Buffy sees the grays. She’s using those grays and it’s working for her, isn’t it?”

“This Buffy,” said Giles slowly.

“It’s the only one you have now. And that’s your own fault, y’know. Told you Whistler’s bright ideas could backfire, but you wouldn’t listen. You’ve sown the wind. Now you’re reaping the whirlwind.”

Giles suddenly spun and walked away. Xander stared at him, then at Spike, and finally hurried after Giles.

‘And now for Angel,’ thought Spike happily, watching them go. He had promised not to harm humans, but he hadn’t promised not to harm demons and Angel was a demon. Spike was looking forward to a really good fight.

But Angel’s appearance a couple of days later was a complete disappointment for both of them. The moment he and Angel came in sight of each other, several S’Vek stepped out of the shadows and formed a wall between them. Since S’Vek were eight feet tall and weighed about four hundred pounds each, this presented a major problem to even two master vamps.

“Oh, come on, you gits!” Spike yelled. “I want to fight him!”

“Is not permit,” one of them rumbled. “Slayer say you, he, no fight.”

“Now listen...”

“We no listen you. Listen Slayer. Want fight, go speak Slayer.”

Angel and Spike exchanged deadly and exasperated glances. Then Angel turned on his heel and stalked off. Spike headed at speed towards Tranquility where he knew Buffy was patrolling.

“Okay, what’s with the S’Vek?” he demanded the minute he caught sight of her.

Buffy grinned. Spike was spitting mad, all the bones of his face standing out and his eyes blazing.

“Oh, so Angel turned up.”

“Think I have to be protected from him? Don’t like being wrapped in cotton wool, Slayer! I can bleeding well take him! I almost did the last time, but you got in between!”

“Yeah, I know the two of you would like to beat each other to bloody pulp. But I can’t let you do that. I don’t want either one of you hurt.”

His jaw came out suddenly and his eyes narrowed. “You still have a thing for him, Slayer?”

“Hey, you can dust him if you like. Personally wouldn’t care if you did. But his patron saints, the PTB, would just bring him back. They need him for some reason. The trouble is, the other Buffy will need him too. You’ll go when she comes back and I want you to go. But that leaves her with no back up for certain things that are going to happen. She’ll need Angel then. I don’t know how much use he’ll be to her—you’re the one who really helps—but I can’t take that option away from her.”

“Sod it,” he muttered, but his face had softened.

She came and put her arms around his waist and leaned against him, smiling. “You don’t really want to dust him.”

“Hate his guts. Things he did to me when I was a fledgling. Things he did to Dru. Way he behaved a couple of years ago when I was in that wheelchair...”

“I put you in that wheelchair.”

“Yeah, but that was your job. Don’t hold that against you anymore that you hold it against me I tried to take your throat out. But him, taking Dru away from me like that. Oh, there’s a lot I’d like to make him pay for! But...” He sighed. “Guess I wouldn’t really dust him.”

“He wants to dust you though. For the same reason as Riley. Because I’m sleeping with you.”

“Yeah, that chews him up. That a Buffy from any dimension would let me have her.” He grinned suddenly. “Good reason for leaving him undusted, that is. Gonna burn him for centuries that you chose me.”

“He hates you. So those S’Vek stay until he leaves for L.A. or the other Buffy comes back and you leave Sunnydale. Don’t give a damn if you think I’m wrapping you in cotton wool, Spike. I’m not going to let him get at you.”

“Care, do you?”

“Yes, I care. That’s what’s bugging them all. Except for the girls, I think. That I care for you. That I’m yours.”

His hands took her head, tipping her face up to his, twining her hair around his wrists.

“Are you mine?”

“Oh, yes.”

There was a soft, silken look in his eyes that was somehow familiar. When had she seen that? In the basement of Revello Drive before the battle with the First? She couldn’t remember. But that look was melting her bones so much that she couldn’t concentrate and think of why it should be significant.

He kissed her deeply and sensuously, taking his time so that her knees gave.

“Whoa, Spike,” she sighed. “What’s gotten into you?”

His eyes were smiling, but the heat in them was very evident.

“Want you. You through patrolling for the night?”

“I am now.”

They laughed breathlessly against each other’s mouths, as always honest and unashamed about their mutual greed.

Honest now, she thought; she had always denied it before. He had always been open about his desire, but she had always fought it and hated him for making her want him. All those issues that she had had and it had taken his death to make her realize that they didn’t matter.

“Here?” he murmured with a laugh in his voice.

In the cemetery where anyone could see them. But she wouldn’t have denied him anymore than she would have stopped him from taking her up against that wall in the middle of Main Street.

“I’d let you.”

“Would be fun.” He was grinning, his eyes soft. “But I want to take my time.”

“Oh, yes.”

Even going home was sweet. Their arms around each other, his lips against her temple, the care in the way he held her.

Something was different. This wasn’t the way he had walked along beside her before, wasn’t even the way he had teased and caressed her at the Bronze.

“What’s happened?” she asked and he tilted a brow at her as he opened the door of the flat.

“What are you talking about?”

“You’re different.”

“Am I?” He caught her belt buckle and pulled her into the bedroom. “How?”

“Let me think...No, wait,” she said as he started to undress her, his lips sliding over every inch of her skin as he uncovered it. “I can’t think when you do that.”

“Good.”

“Stop distracting me. This is important.”

“Can we discuss psychological states later?” He yanked his T-shirt over his head and flung it away. “Women, even vamp females, always want to think at the wrong times.”

“If you’re going to bring gender into this...”

“There’s only one thing I want to bring into y...uh, this.”

She had to bite her lip to keep from laughing. He grinned, stripping off his jeans.

“You’re a tease, Slayer.”

She was teasing, but she did also feel that she was missing something critical.

“Just give me a moment to think.”

“Gonna be difficult, pet. Right at the moment, I’m thinking with the wrong head.”

She giggled involuntarily, looking down him. That much was obvious.

“When don’t you?”

He pulled her against him. “And you love it.”

“Yeah,” she sighed, giving in, and wrapped her arms around his sides, loving the feel of him against her, smooth deep muscle and solid bone.

He tipped her down onto the bed, leaned over her, smiling. “Let’s go slow for once. Never done that, have we?”

They had always just about eaten each other alive before, driving each other feverishly to climax, unable to hold back even when they started all over again and it was the second or third time around. And in her own dimension, it had always been frenzy and desperation.

This lovemaking was different, was rich and slow as honey, voluptuously sweet.

He turned and twisted her to his will, mouth and hands tracing every inch of her bone structure, shaping every curve and hollow, sliding down her spine, over her ribcage, along her inner thigh. She was shuddering with delight, her bones gone molten, her skin shivering, her whole body turned to fire, sparks flying along her every nerve.

“Spike..!” Her body arched to his; her hands clung to him.

“Not yet.”

He eased her down from that moment of desperate urgency, then started all over again. Took her to that height and eased off again with a hopelessly erotic, devastatingly sweet cruelty that had her writhing and gasping helplessly.

“You’re going to kill me!”

His eyes were dark with wicked laughter and intensity. “Tell me you don’t like it.”

Oh, she liked it, stretched out on this rack of unendurable pleasure as she was. He was shuddering too. She could feel the deep tremors racking him as her own hands and mouth moved over him, clenching across his body, raking up his thighs, gripping his taut ass to try to drag him to her. But he refused to lose control, even when she tried to bite his neck, that trigger point for a vamp.

“Greedy,” he murmured, smiling, and pushed her hand away from the velvet smoothness of his rigid cock when she tried in desperation to force the pace.

He was halfway in gameface, his tongue raspy as a cat’s as it slid over her from brow to ankle, exciting her mercilessly. He lifted her breast to his mouth and sucked hard, her nipple tightening almost to the point of pain under the rasp of his tongue.

“Oh, God!” She arched helplessly to his mouth, feeling the prick of his fangs. “Bite me!”

“No. I take your blood and we’ll both explode.”

She was so turned on that it was painful. “Dammit, Spike!”

What was in his eyes as he looked down at her, laughing? She lost the thought again as he suddenly slid right down her.

She almost shrieked as his lips fastened on her clit and that wicked tongue rasped over it. Her whole body bucked and he had to hold her down, his grip firm on her hips and his thumbs spreading her. His tongue went deep, seeking out her essence, sucking and licking. Unbearable heat flooded her.

“No,” she gasped, pulling at his shoulders, trying to drag him upwards. “Want you.”

“This is for you,” he purred and that vibration against her clit almost sent her over the edge.

“Want you in me. Want your cock. Want your fangs in me. Want all of you!”

“God!” In a second he was up over her, covering her. “And I want...”

“What?”

“...everything.”

“Take it,” she whispered. “I’m yours.”

His eyes blazed. Then he surged into her in one sure, powerful thrust and she cried out. He was always just a little bit too big; the Slayer muscles of her sheath were just a little bit too tight. That first thrust was an excruciating rapture. Through the haze of her pleasure, she saw his eyes close helplessly, his lips part on a shudder of breath, drowning in sensation himself.

Then his fangs were in her neck and her whole brain was splintering in ecstasy as he took her blood and there was nothing but the pounding, driving rhythm of his body. They thrust against each other, savage and straining, almost feral now, their breath coming in little grunts of effort, moving faster and faster towards that peak just out of reach.

She came shatteringly hard, her whole body seizing up in unbearable rapture, clenching upon him with all her strength, and felt him gasp and spurt into her at the same moment.

“Right,” he muttered when the world finally fell back into place around her again. “Gonna need a little break at this point, Slayer. I’m exhausted.”

She giggled involuntarily, barely conscious and blissfully sliding into sleep. “Spike, if you dare start again anytime soon, I’ll stake you.”

“Yeah, there are bloody limits, aren’t there? Even for a vamp and a Slayer.” He cuddled her into him and she could feel him grinning against her forehead. “Sleep then.”

It seemed only minutes later that the lights flashed full on.

“What the fuck?” she heard Spike snarl beside her. They had turned off the lights when they fell asleep.

“There you are!” said Whistler. “Do you know how hard it was to track down this place? I actually had to get an override from the Powers.”

“This is our fucking bedroom, you berk! Haven’t you ever heard of the concept of privacy?”

“What does a vamp care about privacy?”

“Slayer does!”

“She certainly does,” grumbled Buffy, turning onto her back under the sheet Spike had pulled over the two of them when they fell asleep. “Hand me that sword, Spike, and I’ll take care of him permanently.”

“Fangs should be good enough,” growled Spike, starting to get out of bed.

“Hey!” Whistler backed away hurriedly. “I thought you’d want to hear the good news!”

Buffy yawned. “What good news?”

“You’re off the hook, Slayer!” Whistler beamed at her. “The PTB are bringing our missing Buffy back tonight. We can send you home right away.”


TBC
 
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