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“You could have at least told me you were going to call him.”

“You would have told me not to.”

Anya’s simple, matter-of-fact explanation put a momentary end to the discussion – that, and the customer who had just approached the counter with an armload of candles and incense. The vengeance demon put on her brightest smile and explained to the customer how his items were to be used – and how they were most definitely *not* supposed to be used – and happily took his money.

When the customer had been successfully serviced and satisfied, and was on his way out the door, Anya turned her attention back to the Slayer, who was still standing by the counter with her arms crossed over her chest, giving Anya a death glare…

…which was not exactly a comforting look for a vengeance demon to be getting from a Slayer.

“I just thought he might be able to help you. I thought he probably wouldn’t, if he knew why I’d called him,” she explained with a careless shrug.

“Well, you’re right about that, anyway!” Buffy retorted, leaning back against the counter with a sigh. “I just wish he’d had a *little* warning – or I had, for that matter – or something, Anya. He screamed at Spike before I could explain anything to him. He was terrified.”

“Keyword ‘was’,” Anya pointed out; she had already heard this part of the story once. “At least it gave you the chance to prove to Spike that you really meant what you’ve been telling him – right? That he’s safe with you and you’re not gonna let anybody hurt him?”

Buffy gave her a dark, dubious look for a long moment – before relenting with a sigh. “Yes, it did,” she admitted.

“So it turned out all right in the end,” Anya concluded, satisfaction in her tone.

“We are no where even remotely close to the end,” Buffy informed her with a weary sigh of resignation.

Anya finally stopped whatever it was she was doing in the cash register for a moment, turning her full attention on the Slayer with genuine sympathy in her eyes. “Giles loves you, Buffy,” she reminded her. “He’ll do anything he can to help you. And you have to admit – you *do* need the help.”

“I’ve got Dawn – and you – and heck, even Angel if I want his help – which I’m still not really sure if I do or not,” Buffy frowned thoughtfully, then shook her head and looked back up at Anya. “I just don’t see any reason for you to have called Giles all the way from England to come here and help someone he pretty much hates…”

“He doesn’t hate you, Buffy…”

“*Spike*, Anya!” Buffy clarified, irritation in her voice. “Giles hates Spike – or at least, he did, before he found out there’s not much of what he hated left in him right now. Yes, he says he wants to help me, but I’m just not so sure how much he can do when – when his heart’s not really in the cause, you know?”

Anya was quiet for a moment, her eyes back on the cash register, before she closed it completely, and leaned on the counter, looking Buffy in the eye.

“Dawn wants to help – but she’s just a child, Buffy. There’s only so much she can take. And I want to help you, but the truth is -- my expertise is more in dealing out this kind of suffering than in knowing how to heal it. Honestly, Buffy -- Angel and Giles are probably going to be able to help you more than anyone -- at least until you find out who did this."

Anya stood up straight again, smiling brightly as another customer approached the register. "Then," she continued to Buffy in a calm, casual tone of voice, as if they had been discussing something much less crucial than blood vengeance, "I'm your girl."

Buffy waited until the customer had left, her questions brewing in her mind the entire time, to look up at Anya with a puzzled frown.

"Can't you do it anyway?" she asked her. "Even before I know who did it? Like, can't I wish for their crimes to be revealed, and then for them to have to pay for them, or something like that, and then -- *make* them pay for them? You wouldn’t even have to do the vengeance yourself – just tell me who needs vengeancing.”

“Vengeancing? Is that a word?” Anya asked, one eyebrow raised dubiously.

“I don’t know. I don’t care. Can you do it?”

“No,” Anya answered simply, sorting through the bills in the stack she had just added to in the register. “I can’t just exact vengeance on someone without knowing who they are. It’s kind of a legal protective clause that D’Hoffryn writes into all of our contracts. You know, so that if someone comes up to me and says, ‘I wish for the person who ruined my life to have their eyeballs rot out of their skull, I don’t accidentally – you know – put my own eyes out,” she shrugged with a sheepish smile. “I can only grant a wish if it’s specifically vengeance – and I can only do vengeance if I know who the target is.”

She paused, then added with a grim little smile, “But let me know when you find out who it is. I’d love to take some creative liberties with this one!”

“I’d love to let you,” Buffy replied without hesitation. “Whoever did this to Spike needs to pay – and they’re *going* to pay!”

Anya gave her a sharp look of alarm, unnoticed by the Slayer, whose eyes were focused on the wall across from her, and whose thoughts were consumed with avenging what had been done to her vampire lover. The vengeance demon wisely decided not to bring up the issue, not just now when it was still so fresh and strong in the Slayer’s emotions.

But as she closed the register and moved away from the counter to help a beckoning customer, she muttered to herself under her breath,

“Don’t know what she thinks she needs *me* for – I think the Slayer’s got this vengeance gig down already. She better be careful – or she just might get herself recruited!”

************************************

Spike could not quite place the new emotion that was growing in his fragile heart, playing teasingly about the edges of his mind, elusive and nameless and barely daring to even exist – yet – but if he could have remembered the word for what he was beginning to feel, it would have been…*happy*.

The house was empty that morning when he woke up, except for him and Dawn.

He would have panicked at not seeing Buffy – until he had awakened enough to become aware of the soft, slender arm draped across his waist…and the sleeping teenage girl it was attached to. He had taken a moment to regroup, to get his bearings – and had then settled back down into the bed to sleep for a couple more hours, content that he would be safe while he did so.

Dawn was not exactly Buffy – but she was the next best thing.

When next he had awakened, it had been to a gentle nudging on his shoulder, and a kind voice calling his name repeatedly.

A little louder than he would have liked – but still kind.

Almost immediately, he had looked at her, asking his question in the only way he knew how, his eyes anxious and searching as he said simply, “Buffy?”

Dawn’s smile had almost seemed a little sad for just an instant, before she had replied, “She’s at work. She has to – she’s gonna be out for a little while today. It’s just us!”

Spike had frowned, puzzled, and frustrated with himself for once again having very little idea what she was trying to tell him. He understood from her words that the two of them would be alone for a while today – but that was all. As for “work”, he had no idea what the word meant.

*So stupid,* the words of his tormentor echoed in his mind, as he thought again how true the words had been. *Don’t know anything – so stupid…*

He and Dawn had gone downstairs, where she had fixed him breakfast. He found himself fascinated – and a little awed – by her quick, natural movements as she put the blood in the heating machine, pushed several buttons in rapid succession, and a few moments later, took out a perfectly heated mug of breakfast for him.

When she saw him watching her, Spike had quickly looked away, feeling presumptuous in staring at her – but Dawn had not been in the least upset. In fact, she had motioned him over to join her at the strange machine, and had actually gone so far as to show him how to use it!

He had shaken his head, looking down a bit bashfully, not quite sure how to tell her that there was no way he could possibly comprehend it. He knew that he was very stupid – not anywhere near as smart and capable as she and Buffy were. He knew, by the way the words seemed to come so easily to them, while he struggled just to understand and speak the few that he could.

But Dawn had pressed him, insisting that he watch her again, and then try to do as she had done.

A sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach, sure that he was about to disappoint her, Spike had done his best to imitate her actions with a second mug of blood – and to his amazement, it had come out perfectly!

It had been a wonderful start to his lessons for the day.

Dawn would point out various items in the house and say the name for them, and then tell him to try to say them himself. It was easy enough to repeat after her, to say what she had just said only moments before, but Spike was certain that he would never remember it all later.

Until she went over every last one of them again – and he *did* remember.

“What’s this, Spike?” she asked him with an encouraging smile, patting the large piece of furniture they were seated at.

“Table,” he replied slowly and carefully, struggling a bit with the sound on the end, but getting the word out, and looking up at her hopefully for her reaction.

Her reaction was to be absolutely thrilled.

“Good!” she exulted. “Spike, you are so smart!”

He looked away from her, his smile fading slightly with his uncertainty, as he shook his head a bit bashfully. “No,” he replied softly.

“Yes, you are!” Dawn insisted. “Look how fast you’re getting all this! How quickly you’re learning! Buffy is going to be so proud of you when she gets home!”

Spike looked up at her, his eyes widening with excited interest, his smile slowly spreading as he considered what she had said. A warm, comfortable sort of feeling spread through his stomach at the thought of pleasing her – of Buffy coming home from wherever she had gone to find out how much he had learned.

And suddenly – he could not learn fast enough.

He immediately rose from the chair he was seated in and went to the device she had used to heat his blood. Patting the top of it awkwardly, he looked at Dawn and asked slowly but very clearly, “What’s…this?” echoing the question she had posed to him over and over during their session.

Dawn’s eyes lit up with pleased surprise at his initiative and anxious desire to learn – but then widened slightly as she took a deep breath and said, “Spike – that’s a tough one – okay? Microwave – it’s a microwave.”

Spike looked away from her, frowning thoughtfully at the interesting contraption with the difficult name – the difficult name that a few seconds later, he managed to say, if not perfectly, definitely recognizably.

Dawn’s elated response was all the encouragement he needed to go rushing from the kitchen into the next room. Dawn hurriedly followed him, momentarily alarmed – until she found him in the living room, asking his same question about the television set.

“This one’s harder,” she warned him gently.

But it might as well have been the simplest word ever, for the relative ease with which Spike managed it. He tore through the room from one spot to another, rapid fire questions seeking out the answers for everything he could lay his hands on – and then making another trip around the room, repeating what she had taught him, his wide blue eyes seeking out hers for affirmation that he had spoken the right answers.

Every single time – he had.

“Spike – you’re a genius, you know that?” Dawn laughed as she took his hands and pulled him down on the couch beside her, wanting a few moments to catch her breath from the intensive learning session they had just had.

Spike just tilted his head to the side slightly, frowning in confusion.

“Smart,” she clarified. “You’re very smart, Spike.”

This time, he did not try to deny it. His smile was still a bit shy, and he tucked his head awkwardly at her praise – but he knew that she was telling the truth, not just trying to make him feel better.

He could not remember the last time he had felt this happy – had felt any emotion, in fact, that was not tinged with the terror of knowing that at any moment, he was going to do some bad thing to earn pain.

He settled back on the couch beside her as she reached for the remote control to the television, thinking that this must be what it felt like to do something *good* for a change.

The knock at the door shattered that fragile security in an instant – and Spike was immediately, automatically, trembling as he pulled back against the far corner of the couch, his eyes focused in terror on the door.

“It’s okay,” Dawn said softly, putting her hand to his cheek to turn his face to meet her eyes. “It’s okay, Spike. I’m gonna see who that is, okay? It’s all right. You’re safe – okay?”

Spike nodded, only because he knew that it was the response she wanted – but he could feel the black, consuming terror filling him up again, as he huddled back into the corner of the sofa, one single thought filling his mind.

*Buffy’s not here…Buffy’s not here…he can hurt us…Buffy’s not here…*

When Dawn opened the door, he recognized a slightly familiar scent – the scent of the man Buffy had talked to the night before…the man who had wanted to hurt him.

But – he *hadn’t* hurt him.

Giles had stepped cautiously into the living room, regarding him for a moment without raising his voice or moving toward him at all – and Spike had found some of his fears abating with the realization that this man did not seem inclined to hurt him just at the moment.

He felt a swell of pride for his beautiful protector, his wonderful Buffy who had rescued him, as his mind reached the only logical conclusion for how he could be in the presence of someone he knew wanted to hurt him, and yet not be in pain.

*He must be afraid of Buffy – she told him not to hurt me.*

That comforting thought gave him the courage to at least look up at the man, though he could not quite hold the piercing sapphire gaze that was, yet again, studying him -- though not unkindly.

Dawn stood uncertainly between the two. Buffy had told her about Giles' previous visit, so she was not really afraid that he might try to hurt Spike, but she knew that any sudden, unexpected move on his part might terrify the vampire, and she wanted to do everything she could to make sure that Spike felt safe.

At the look in Spike's expressive eyes, both fearful and brave at the same time, the guarded interest in Giles' eyes seemed to soften a bit. After a moment, he spoke softly.

"Hello, Spike."

Spike just stared at him, recognizing his name, but not the other word, and unsure how to respond.

"He really has been brain damaged, hasn't he?" the Watcher observed, though there was no cruelty in his voice -- just shock, at seeing Spike so different from how he remembered him. He had seen it before, a day ago -- but it was no less stunning the second time.

Defensively, Dawn hurried to inform him, "Yes -- but he's not stupid, Giles. He's learning a lot! Just today he's learned so many new words...Spike!" She turned to him expectantly, determination in her eyes to prove Spike's ability to Giles. "What's that?" She pointed at the television.

Dutifully Spike responded, stating the word very clearly and precisely.

"Dear Lord," Giles said under his breath, his eyebrows raised in surprise.

"See?" Dawn retorted, gratified, and pointed out the couch, the floor, and several other items, all of which Spike correctly identified. "Isn't that awesome?" she asked Giles, giving him a pointed look that clearly said that the wrong answer just might result in his slow, painful death.

"It's bloody dreadful's what it is," the Watcher replied, a quiet indignation in his voice, though to his credit, he was careful to keep it calm and nonthreatening.

"What?" Dawn's indignation matched his. "How can you say that?"

"Because vampire or no, he's bloody English, Dawn! And you and Buffy've got him butchering the language as horribly as you do!" He heaved a weary sigh as he sat down slowly on the opposite end of the couch, taking in the wary, but calm, vampire with appaising eyes as he spoke again.

"I believe I may have found the way in which I can help in this situation."

Dawn still seemed a bit puzzled by his last statement, frowning uncertainly.

"Well, if he's going to learn to speak English," Giles explained with mild exasperation, and a solemn resignation, "he'd best learn it from someone who's actually -- well, *English*!"