Chapter 5

It was happening again, except in reverse. One moment she was crossing the livingroom of Revello Drive; the next, she was standing in Spike’s crypt. This time, it took only a second for her to orient herself and realize that she was back in her own time.

She staggered and leaned against a sarcophagus for balance. Some yards away, Spike was bending to look into the small fridge in his little kitchen corner. All he was wearing were his black jeans and the muscles of his naked back flexed beautifully in the light of the candles burning all around the crypt. The Spike of her time was just as gorgeous as the Spike of 2010, Buffy had to admit.

"What would you like?" he was saying. "I’ve got water and juice and even some cola."

"I thought you only drink blood and beer," she said, partly in surprise and partly to buy time to get her breath back from the transition.

"Yeah, but you don’t. Thought you might like something if you ever dropped by and..." He broke off abruptly as he turned and saw her. His eyes widened, the blue darkening to black as his pupils dilated. "Buffy?"

"Yes."

"This time’s Buffy." His voice went flat.

"Gee, how’d you guess?" she said sarcastically. "The other me must surely have been wearing different clothes."

He nodded automatically, then suddenly whirled and faced away from her so that his back was to her. She frowned at him, perplexed. He was leaning heavily on one arm on the fridge, his head down. All she could see was his back and just the edge of his profile. His jaw was clenched tight and the cords of his neck were standing out in strain. A muscle jumped in his cheek, again and again.

"What’s wrong?" she asked involuntarily. If she had seen this reaction on 2010's Spike, she would have thought that he was in pain.

"Nothing." His voice sounded oddly choked. Then he turned his head to look at her. "Why do you care?"

"I...don’t." She looked awkwardly away around the crypt. "Why was she here? The other Buffy, I mean."

There was a small pause. She looked back at him, puzzled. He straightened up and turned, his face completely impassive now.

"Came to ask whether I wanted to go on patrol."

"Oh. You’ve been patrolling together then."

"Yes."

He wasn’t looking at her. His gaze was off in the distance somewhere and his face was like a mask of stone, totally expressionless. It made her feel uncomfortable. It seemed so wrong somehow, used as she was to 2010's Spike with all his emotions vivid on his face. She remembered when this Spike first came to Sunnydale, all bounce and vitality, mocking, smirking, laughing, leering. His emotions had been out in the open then. What had happened to change him to this quiet, withdrawn man? Is that what she did to people?

She heard her own voice, scathing and contemptuous, constantly insulting him, rejecting him, beating him down. She winced.

"What...what’s been happening while I’ve been gone?" she asked hurriedly to avoid her own thoughts.

"Nothing much. Took out a few vamps."

"With the other Buffy."

"Yes."

"I did too. With the other Spike."

That made his gaze finally come to hers, narrowing a little in curiosity. "What’s he like?" Then, as she floundered, searching for words, he said under his breath, "Happy."

"Why do you say that?"

"She was."

She suddenly realized that he knew what those two were to each other. The other Buffy must have told him. She flushed hotly and panicked, not wanting to think about that. She needed to get out of here.

"I’ve got to go. Got to find the Scoobies..."

"They’re probably at the Magic Box, trying to figure out a way around whatever spell it is. Was, I guess we should say now."

"Yeah, I got to tell them they don’t have to bother with that any longer."

She hurried to the door, almost tripping over her feet in her haste to get out. She glanced back as she pulled the door open, fearful that she might find him at her heels as he usually was. But he hadn’t moved. He was still standing by the fridge, looking down at his left hand, his thumb worrying at a ring on his little finger.

It was strange. He was strange. But she didn’t want to think about that now. She just wanted everything to get back to normal.

Willow and Tara were at the Magic Shop, poring over books when she arrived. The tinkle of the bell over the shop’s door made them look around and brought Anya out of the back room.

"Hey, Buffy," Willow smiled before turning back to the book she had open in front of her. Tara waved.

The bell tinkled again as Xander came in with a box of donuts. He nodded to Buffy awkwardly as he stepped past her in silence without his usual effusive greeting.

"Something wrong, Xander?" she asked, startled

"He’s been sulking ever since you pushed him around," Anya shrugged. "It’s certainly put a dent in our love life."

"I pushed him around?"

Anya stared at her, then gasped. "You’re back! Hey, everybody, she’s back! It’s our Buffy!"

They all fell on her at once, shouting.

"Whoa, whoa!" Buffy exclaimed after being hugged nearly to death. "Let me get my breath back." She slumped into a chair. "Boy, is it ever good to be home!"

"Didn’t like it in the future then?" Willow asked.

"Oh, no, things were great. It’s just that everything was so strange. Not in a bad way. Just different."

"Were we there? Were we the ones who found out how to reverse the spell?"

"Oh, yeah, you were there, Willow. But no one reversed the spell. Apparently, it just ran its course and ended. Did you guys have any luck finding out what it was supposed to do?"

Everybody shook their heads.

"Oh, well," she sighed. "I guess it doesn’t matter any more."

"Can you tell us anything about the future?" Xander asked and all the girls groaned. "What? I’m not allowed to be curious?"

"If the other Buffy wouldn’t tell you," said Anya, "why do you think this one will?"

"Because she’s our best bud?" said Xander hopefully.

"Timeline," said Buffy simply and Xander sighed. But everybody else nodded approvingly. "So what was the other Buffy like?"

"Scary!" Xander shook his head eloquently. "What made you get so scary, Buff?"

"A couple of apocalypses, apparently."

"She wasn’t scary," said Tara. "She just wouldn’t take any shit from anyone, that’s all."

"She pushed Xander around, it seems." Buffy raised her eyebrows inquiringly.

"He wanted to stake Spike," Tara explained.

"That would do it."

Xander stared at her. "You mean, you go along with the no staking of Spike?"

"Have to, Xand. If it wasn’t for him, a lot of bad things would happen."

Willow shivered. "She told us something about that."

"What is he to her?" Xander demanded angrily.

"He’s her..." Buffy stopped abruptly before saying ‘mate’, realizing that Xander would just not be able to handle that concept. "Right-hand man. They patrol together, work together. They make a great team. I found that out when I went patrolling with him. We’re really effective together."

Xander banged his head on the table. "Oh, God, not you too. Tell me you’re not considering..."

"I am. I really am. If you’ve got this really great resource, it’s a shame not to utilize it. Oh! And Willow? When you’re researching things, you might call Spike in."

"Spike?" Willow’s jaw dropped.

"Think about it. He’s over a century old and you know what a sponge he is at picking things up. There’s a whack of stuff in his head that we’ve never suspected. Plus, who better to ask about demons than a demon? He knows all sorts of demon languages, reads Latin and Greek and stuff better than Giles..."

"Giles!" Xander interjected desperately. "What would Giles think about getting all best buds with Spike?"

"Well, I don’t know about this Giles. But future Giles is all for it. And talking about best buds? That’s what you and Spike are in the future."

"Nooo!" Xander banged his head on the table again "Don’t say it!"

"Saw it," said Buffy simply.

"I may kill myself."

"Oh, stop overdramatizing, Xander," said Anya without sympathy. "I’ve never really understood why you’re so freaked out about Spike."

"He’s a killer! He’s evil!"

"He hasn’t killed anyone for ages," Anya shrugged. "And as for evil, he seems about as evil as I am nowadays. Though he’d probably stake himself if you even suggested that to him, he’s so proud about being the Big Bad and all."

"He’s not even the Somewhat Bad these days," Tara murmured with a grin.

Buffy was looking at Anya with interest. "Were you evil, Anya?"

"I don’t really know what that means,"Anya said honestly. "Demons don’t, you know. I’m human now and I’ve got a soul, so now one would think that I’d know. But I still don’t. Maybe I am still evil. How does one tell? Only, I haven’t done anything bad that I know of. Doesn’t that make me good?"

"The other Buffy said that it’s what you do with a soul that counts," Tara said softly. "Anya hasn’t hurt anybody recently. So one can say she’s not evil any more. But then Spike hasn’t hurt anybody either. So what does that say about Spike?"

"But he could!" yelled Xander.

Tara’s brows rose. "Anybody could. Soul or no soul. It’s whether they do that counts."

"If the chip were out..."

"Chip’s out in the future, Xander," Buffy said slowly.

"What!"

"It malfunctioned and future Buffy had it taken out. And he still doesn’t hurt anyone."

"We haven’t really been fair to Spike, have we?" said Willow thoughtfully.

Buffy looked around at all of them. Willow looked like she was definitely reconsidering her position. Anya had never cared one way or the other, but as an ex-demon had always had a certain fellow-feeling towards Spike. Tara, whom Buffy didn’t know too well, but who read auras and whose instinct Buffy trusted, was all for him. Even Xander seemed to be weakening.

"He’s done a lot for us this last year," Tara said. "And we haven’t given him any credit for it."

Buffy flushed. He had done a lot. Saving Dawn, fighting demons...

Willow snapped her fingers suddenly. "That’s what I was trying to remember! Last year, Giles said something about the chip possibly being a means for Spike to achieve redemption. That was soon after Spike got the chip and he was resenting it pretty strongly then, so when Giles said that to him, he got mad and just blew it off. But, y’know, he’s been trying. He tries to do the right thing and it’s not like he knows how, I mean, it’s not something that comes naturally to him, but he still tries. And...and we shouldn’t be stepping on him the way we do, pushing him back down into the dark. I mean, we’re supposed to be good people. We should be helping him come out into the light."

Buffy flushed even harder. She had been the one doing most of the ‘stepping on’-- pushing him away, insulting him, kicking him down every chance that she got. Because she wanted him, but hadn’t wanted to admit that to herself. Because he was hot and sexy and turned her on, but she was living on that river in Egypt, as she always did, and didn’t want to see it. Easier to focus on the other things—evil, bad, soulless—all refuted now by the Scoobies themselves.

"He could be so much more," Tara said very softly beside her.

Buffy had seen for herself what he could be. Lover, friend, partner, champion. She had seen how good it could be between them. To throw all that away, all that love and caring and passion and tenderness, which was what she had always wanted but never received from Angel and Parker and Riley. To turn her back on that...

Tara knew. Buffy could see that in her eyes. She didn’t know whether the other Buffy had told her or whether she had just guessed. But it was clear that Tara didn’t condemn her; Tara was all for it and would convince Willow. Anya didn’t care. Dawn adored Spike, whom she thought was coolness personified, and would be entirely jubilant about any relationship between her sister and him. Xander was the rub, but, if the future was anything to go by, even he would reluctantly come around, as long as she didn’t get his back up by rubbing his nose in it too soon.

So that left just her. And whether she had the courage to do this. She had always been a coward where relationships were concerned. But one thing was certain: there would be no abandonment issues here, not with a Spike who had stood by an insane Drusilla for over a hundred years until she had dumped him, not when the future had been shown to her with a clarity that was simply impossible to deny.

"A lot of re-thinking to be done," she said. Xander was sulking, but all the others nodded.

***

It was not so easy to change one’s modus operandi as Buffy had thought it would be. It was one thing to know that one was wrong and should change, and quite another to figure out how to go about it. She thought of the way Spike had changed. It had taken him nearly two years—first fighting it both visibly and vocally: "Can't any one of your damned little Scooby club at least try to remember that I hate you all?" Then helping Adam against them by setting them at each other’s throats, and finally coming back to their side when he realized that Adam wouldn’t help him get his chip out. Then helping on patrol because demons were the only thing he could fight and he loved fighting. Then helping against Glory because...because of her she realized now.

Okay, when exactly had he changed towards her—because that was the real change, the major change. She tried to think. Little piles of cigarette butts behind the oak tree in her yard. What had that been about? Had he been stalking her or—things were starting to reshape in her mind— or watching over her? Future Spike’s words when she asked him about stalking her on patrol: ‘Just watching your back.’ The look on his face when he had tried to kiss her in the alley behind the Bronze after their evening discussing his past: ‘You know you wanna dance.’ She had been so horrified, yet there had been that heat between them, the heat that she had not wanted to acknowledge.

And she had said, wanting to hurt him for making her feel that way, "Say it's true, say I do want to..."

And that look on his face when she said that, that look of absolute vulnerability and terrible hope.

And then the devastation when she had finished cruelly, "But it wouldn’t be you, Spike. It would never be you. You’re beneath me," and shoved him away, down onto the ground.

She had hurt him, she saw that now, really badly because he had laid himself completely open to her. And even then, in her back yard that night, he had still wanted to help: ‘Is there something I can do?’

God, she’d been such a bitch! So what could she do now, go up to him and say, ‘Hey, you turn me on. Always have. Wanna shag?" Yeah, right, like that would fix things, even if she had the courage to do it. What had Future Spike said? ‘Just be a little easier on him...don’t be so hard on him.’ Baby steps. Right. She could do that. She was still trying to come to terms with her own feelings, so baby steps were all she was capable of herself.

In the Magic Box that night, she found that Willow and Tara were still trying to figure out the spell.

"But why?" she asked. "It’s over now."

"Yes, but don’t you want to know what the wish was and who made it?" Willow said.

"You’re right. I do want to know that."

"We’ll keep working on it."

"I’m going to go patrol." She slid a stake into its sheath at the small of her back. "And I’m going to ask Spike if he’ll come with me."

Xander snapped bolt upright. "No!"

"I want to see whether we’ll make as good a team as we do in the future." She looked around at the rest of them. Tara was smiling, Willow looked thoughtful and Anya was indifferent.

"You don’t need him. You’ve got us."

"Like we’re such a big help," said Willow ruefully. "Face it, Xander. He’s way more useful to her than we are."

Buffy could feel Spike outside, waiting for her to start her patrol so that he could shadow her. She opened the door of the shop, leaned out and yelled into the darkness.

"Spike! Get in here!"

After a moment, he materialized out of the shadows, looking rueful and a little embarrassed.

"Yeah, Slayer. What do you want?"

"If you’re gonna trail me, you might as well be where I can see you."

"Who said I was gonna...?"

"I can tell when you’re there, you know. An irritating tingle on the edge of my awareness."

He hunched his shoulders a little, his gaze down and his face expressionless. Both of them were avoiding looking at each other.

"She may not need us," Xander said angrily. "But she doesn’t need him either!"

"Yes, I do," said Buffy. "I find that I like having a partner."

Spike’s head came up and he stared at her disbelievingly.

"Does it have to be him?" Xander yelled.

"Who else is my match?" Buffy said simply.

"Well, Deadboy here..."

"Shut up, Xander!" said all four women at once. Then all four grinned at each other.

"I thought we agreed that there would be no name-calling," said Buffy.

"That was Future Buffy." Xander was scowling. "How...?"

"I told her," said Tara smugly and shrugged a shoulder when Xander glared at her.

"And I go along with what the other Buffy said." Buffy frowned at both men sternly. "There’ll be no insults. From either of you."

Spike’s gaze was moving incredulously from one face to the other. He looked completely bewildered and taken aback. "Uh, sure, Slayer, but..."

"C’mon then."

"I’m going along as well," Xander insisted angrily. "I wanna see this."

Willow and Tara stood up also, but Anya shook her head, not wanting to close the shop.

"Okay," Buffy shrugged. "But stay out of our way. I want to see how the two of us work together."

The first cemetery yielded up one demon, the second another. Both times, Spike just leaned against a headstone and smoked, leaving Buffy to do the killing.

Xander looked at him with disgust. "Way to go, Evil D...Spike."

Spike shrugged indifferently. "Easy kills. Slayer wouldn’t like me spoiling her fun."

"Got that right." Buffy looked down at the last demon dissolving away into goo. "Easy cleanup too. Sweet. Pretty tame so far, though."

"Uh, no longer," said Willow, looking towards the cemetery gates.

"Oh, shit," said Xander, following her gaze. "That’s a pack."

"Yeah," Buffy nodded. "What do you think, Spike? Ten, maybe twelve vamps there?"

"Twelve. Willy said a couple of vamps were creating fledglings. Guess they decided to pool their resources."

"That’s too many, Buff," said Xander nervously. "We should come back tomorrow. See if we can track them down in the daytime."

"Hell, no. They might scatter tonight. We want them dusted, not just out of Sunnydale, eating people in some other town. What do you say, Spike?"

Spike was grinning like a shark. "We can take them. Toss me your stake, Glinda. I want an extra."

"The three of you stay out of sight," Buffy ordered as Tara handed Spike her stake. "No spells either, Willow. The two of us will handle it."

"There’s too many, Buffy!" Xander protested again in a desperate whisper.

"Pfft." Spike sneered at him. "Mostly fledglings. Piece of cake. But don’t play with them, Slayer. Just dust."

Buffy nodded, all business now. "I’ll take Big Ugly in the middle there, you take Ratface on the left, and then we’ll do cleanup."

"Right. Let’s do it."

They headed towards the unsuspecting vamp pack, two alpha predators running smoothly in step, hunting down their prey. Buffy had hunted with Future Spike, Spike with Future Buffy; they had both learned from the experience. They knew each other’s moves now and were almost perfectly in sync. The pack never knew what hit them. The two leaders were dusted before they even knew what was happening, then the fledglings desperately tried to fight the whirling dervishes that had suddenly appeared in the middle of their group.

It took about five minutes, if one counted the fledgling who tried to flee and whom Spike ran down like a wolf and dusted before he got even half a block away from the cemetery.

Spike came swaggering cockily back as the somewhat shell-shocked Scoobies crept out of hiding.

"Well, that was a bit of all right," he said with satisfaction. "I liked that move you did at the end there, Slayer. The underhand one. How did that go?"

Buffy grinned at him. "This one?" She demonstrated.

"Yeah." Spike copied the movement. "Neat. I can use that."

"I think they make a good team, don’t you?" said Tara and Willow grinned.

It was undeniable, though Xander of course glowered.

"So you get a partner," Xander muttered, "and you get used to having him around. And then he gets bored or decides being evil is more fun. Then where are you?"

"Same place I am right now, Xander."

"Oh, yeah? Remember when Angel took off on you. You were a wreck for months."

Buffy’s eyes flashed and Xander quailed. "I loved Angel. I don’t..."

"You don’t love Spike. Well, that’s one good thing, at least."

"Love has nothing to do with this. Why are you bringing that up?" Buffy made an irritated, slashing gesture of her hand. "You’re missing the point here. He’s not Angel. He’ll never be Angel."

"Got that right," said Spike harshly. But Buffy noticed that he had turned away and was staring off into the distance, his face grim and set.

"At least Angel had a soul," retorted Xander.

"And he’s way off in L.A.," shrugged Spike. "Fat lot of use that soul of his is to Buffy. I may not have a soul, but I’m here." He turned his head to look at Buffy. "I’ll always be here, Slayer. You might as well make use of me."

Buffy nodded. "I’ll make use of you."

Instead of looking pleased, his face tightened. He nodded abruptly and turned away, his lashes down so that she couldn’t see his eyes and the corner of his mouth twisted. Okay, what did I do wrong? she thought and glanced at the others. Willow and Xander were oblivious, but Tara was shaking her head slightly.

She suddenly realized how she had phrased that. She hadn’t meant to say it that way. She had just picked up on his sentence and only now realized how it must have sounded.

"I think we’ve done enough for one day, don’t you?" Tara murmured. "Why don’t we call it a night?"

Buffy nodded with relief. "Let’s. Tomorrow is another day."

That trite platitude was meant as a joke to ease the tension and everybody did smile weakly. Except Spike. He was looking down at his left hand, the ball of his thumb rubbing at a ring on his little finger.

"Why don’t you all head back to the Magic Box?" she said. "I’ll catch you up in a minute."

They nodded and began to move away, Xander looking suspiciously over his shoulder as he went.

Spike gave her an abrupt nod without looking at her and began to move away as well.

"Spike, wait."

He stopped, his face averted. "Yeah, Slayer?"

"I..." She didn’t know what to say. "That came out wrong."

"What did?"

"Dammit." He was definitely not going to help her here. "I’m trying to apologize and I’m not good at it. I didn’t mean to say that I was using you."

He gave her a brief, expressionless glance. "That’s what I’m here for, Slayer. You know it. I know it. Make use of me. I don’t mind."

"Spike..." She flung up her hands. "God! You get me so frustrated I could hit you!"

"Do me a favor and don’t hit the nose this time. I’m tired of having my nose broken whenever you’re in a bad mood."

"Dammit!" She hit a headstone with the flat of her hand. "I’m not making use of you!"

"If you say so, Slayer."

"Spike!"

She caught his sleeve as he turned away and yanked him back towards her. The movement pulled his left hand towards her and she found herself looking down at the ring on his little finger. It was a woman’s ring, three braided strands of variously colored gold.

His right hand flew to cover it, then stopped.

"She gave that to you, didn’t she?"

"Yes." He wasn’t looking at her. He was looking over the top of her head and there was no expression at all on his face.

"Why?"

He didn’t answer, just kept looking off into the distance. She was amazed to find a flash of intense jealousy strike her with painful force right in the heart. He was hers. That other Buffy had no right to touch him. She had her own Spike. Why did she have to mess with hers?

"You fucked her, didn’t you?" she accused.

He looked down at her and she saw something intense and painful flash through his eyes.

"No," he said. "We made love."

He pulled his sleeve away from her loosening grip and spun on his heel. She watched him stride swiftly away into the darkness and felt shame heat her face. It was the same rebuke that the other Spike had given her. ‘My Buffy loves me,’ he had said. ‘We made love,’ this Spike said. It was the same delicate and profound distinction. And it was the same Spike who made it.

"When will I ever learn?" she whispered.

***

"What was she like?" she asked Tara. "The other Buffy, I mean."

They were alone in the Magic Box. Anya was downstairs, storing away a new consignment, and the others hadn’t arrived yet.

Tara shrugged a little. "She was you."

"There must have been some variance. Sp...None of you seem to react to her the same way you react to me. Was she so different from me?"

Tara frowned thoughtfully into space. "She was sure of herself. It’s the kind of surety and confidence that comes with maturity. She’s older than you. You’ll get there pretty soon. Just takes time."

"That’s all it is? Confidence?"

"Confidence in who she is, what she stands for, what she wants. She knows what’s right for her and she doesn’t let anyone else’s opinions sway her. You should have seen her when Xander tried to give her a hard time about Spike. She just took him down." Tara giggled. "Hee. It was hilarious."

Buffy gave her a hard look. "You’re on her side about Spike."

"See, that’s the difference. Why does it matter to you what I think? Or anyone? She didn’t care what anybody else thought. The impression I got was that she simply asked herself: is this right for me as a Slayer and as a person? Then whatever answer she came up with, she stood by it."

Buffy was starting to understand where her other self was coming from.

"What was Spike to her?"

"Her exact words?" Tara’s eyes were serious. "‘My lover. My dearest and best friend. My everything.’"

Oh. Buffy scowled.

"She loves him. Why are you asking, Buffy?"

"She slept with him."

"Well, yeah..."

"Our Spike. She slept with him."

"Oh!" Tara’s eyes widened, then narrowed. "Why are you so upset?"

"He’s mine!"

The words were not even out of her mouth before she bolted to her feet, blushing wildly.

"Is he now?" said Tara. She was smiling.

"I didn’t mean...I...I..."

"Buffy, what do you feel for Spike?"

"I don’t know!"

"That’s the problem, isn’t it? Maybe you’d better find out."

"It...it doesn’t matter what I feel. She didn’t have the right! She’s got her own Spike. She didn’t have to take this one too!"

Tara’s brows were up as far as they would go. "She? There is no ‘she’, Buffy. She’s you."

Buffy’s mouth fell open, but no words came out. She could feel her face flaming bright red and her hands flashed up to try to cover her hot cheeks.

The door opened and Willow, Xander and Spike came in. Buffy whirled to face the table and pretended to be absorbed in some crystals there, to give herself time to get her equilibrium back and stop blushing.

"Anya’s downstairs," said Tara, apparently in response to some voiceless question that Xander made. He turned and went towards the stairs. Willow headed towards the bookshelves in search of some tome and Spike went to lean his back against the counter, his weight on his elbows bent back upon the glass top.

"Which cemetery did you want to start with tonight, Slayer?" he asked in a neutral tone.

She slanted him a glance from under her dropped eyelashes. He was carefully not looking at her. His eyelashes were down too and he was studying the floor.

"It’s pretty quiet," she said stiffly. "I don’t think I’ll need you tonight."

"Right," he said and she heard the relief in his voice. Neither of them wanted to be near each other after the awkwardness of their last meeting. "I’ll head on over to Willie’s then."

Anya came out of the door leading to the basement and gave him an irritated glare. "Spike, stop leaning on the counter. If you break the glass, I’ll make you pay for it."

He shrugged and pushed away from the counter. Buffy found herself watching the subtle movement of his hips thrusting forward as he did so. She suddenly had this vivid sensory memory of those hips against hers, his naked body upon her, in her, the scent of him, the feel of him thick and hard within her. Her thighs clenched together and her whole body grew hot.

Halfway to the door, Spike paused, his head whipping around. His eyes were narrowed and his face puzzled. Buffy scowled at him, biting her lip, and after a moment he shook his head, dismissing whatever he had apparently sensed in the air, and continued on to the door.

She gave him ten minutes to be well on his way to Willie’s before heading out herself to the first of the cemeteries she had chosen to patrol that night.

It was, as she had said, a quiet night, not even one lurking vampire to be seen. She slogged doggedly through cemetery after cemetery, finding every single one silent as the grave and as peaceful as their hopeful names implied. Two hours of absolute boredom later, she decided to call it a night and head on back home.

She was just passing the gates of the Shady Rest cemetery when something struck her and threw her with tremendous force against the concrete pillar to which the right gate was attached. She bounced off it and tumbled to the pavement, skinning her hands.

"Ow!"

A roar reverberated in the air, splitting the peaceful silence of the night. She looked up at a hulking shape eight feet tall, looking like a bunch of boulders thrown together and covered with a gray, warty skin.

"Boy, are you ugly!" She picked herself up and dusted herself off. "Anyone tell you the bigger they are, the harder they fall?"

It roared again. Two reddish-orange eyes glared at her from a lumpy, misshapen face. There was no intelligence in those eyes, just a ravenous hunger.

"No sentience," she muttered. "Just an animal. No point wasting any clever quips on this one, even if I could think of one."
She ducked as it swung at her. Four-inch black talons raked the air above her head. She danced away, considering her options. She only had a couple of stakes with her and, sharp as they were, she doubted whether they would penetrate that thick, gray hide and, even if they did, she didn’t think they’d prove more than a pinprick to something as bulky as this monster was. The Hulk was nothing to it. She needed a weapon and there was none. Knock it down? The massive feet were solidly planted on the pavement. Her slight weight wouldn’t even rock it.

She had to get around it, get up on its back somehow. She might be able to break its neck from that angle or drive her stake into the base of its skull. But it was fast for all its bulk, kept turning to face her despite every effort she made to maneuver around it.

She ducked as it slashed at her once again and its claws scraped across the concrete pillar behind her, with the sound of a thousand nails screeching down a blackboard. The nape of her neck shivered.

"And I say again: ow!" she muttered, and the thing itself shrieked and reared itself up in pain. "Oh, shit."

The other arm was swinging at her, talons glistening in the moonlight. She tried to fling herself away from the pillar, but it was moving too fast and she knew that this time it would connect.

Something black and silver flashed between her and the claws. She was knocked several feet away onto the pavement. She heard a grunt of pain, then the thud of a body hitting the ground and the clatter of something metallic striking the pavement. She rolled onto her hands and knees.

"Spike!"

"Chiriwan..." he gasped. "Willy told me...I’ve been looking for you...Talons poisonous..."

He did a complicated duck and weave, staggering oddly. The Chiriwan bellowed in outrage and she saw that Spike now had a death grip on both its forearms.

"The axe!" he yelled at her. "Cut off its head!"

She saw the axe lying on the pavement where he had dropped it when he had pushed her out of the way. She somersaulted to it, caught its handle in both her hands and came up swinging. Spike had the Chiriwan leaning forward as he dragged on its forearms, giving her a clear shot at its neck. She took it, chopping down with all her strength, the axe describing a silver wheel in the moonlight, from over her head straight through the Chiriwan’s neck. The head bounced on the pavement, the body collapsed with a thud, then to her astonishment the whole thing dusted, just like vamps dusted. Must be some sort of connection between the two kinds of demons.

"Way to go, Slayer," said Spike in a shaky whisper.

Then his eyes rolled up and he collapsed.

She caught him just in time, before his head smashed against the pavement. His weight dragged her to her knees.

"Spike!"

His head fell back like a rag doll’s against her arm. No breath, no pulse, no sign of life. The only thing that told her he still existed was the fact that he wasn’t dust.

"Spike, wake up!" She was terrified. She wouldn’t be able to bear it if...

She heaved him around awkwardly till she had him lying with his back against her and his head lolling in the curve of her shoulder. His duster had fallen open on either side of him. The T-shirt beneath was slashed into ribbons. She tried to pull it up and it tore open in her hand, revealing four great gashes across his chest. They were so deep that bone showed within the wounds.

"Oh, God, Spike," she whispered. She ripped the T-shirt the rest of the way off him and wadded it up against his chest, trying to stop the bleeding.

He had taken the blow for her. Using the axe would have kept him out of range of the Chiriwan’s claws. But he had had no time to use the axe. ‘Talons are poisonous,’ he had said. Even a scratch would have killed her. And so he had knocked her away and taken the slash of those claws himself.

"Spike! Spike, wake up!"

The hand lying limp on the pavement twitched. She shook at him desperately.

"Spike, are those claws poisonous to vamps as well as humans?"

His eyes opened just a tiny slit. She shook at him again.

"Don’t..." he protested weakly, still struggling back to consciousness. She shouted the question at him one more time. "What? No...Not to vamps...Immune..."

"Oh, thank God," she sighed in relief. He was still badly hurt, but at least she wouldn’t have to try desperately to find an antidote in time.

He was trying to sit up, but only succeeded in turning sideways before sagging back against her, his face in the curve of her shoulder.

"Hurts..."

She held him gently, one arm across his back, the other around his neck.

"Yes. Just rest, okay? Then we’ll try to get you fixed up."

"‘K."

She could feel his lashes fluttering against her skin. Then his head turned on her shoulder. She looked down to see him blinking at her in astonishment.

"Slayer," he said, identifying her with surprise.

"That’s me. Think you can sit up? I want to do something about that bleeding."

"Bleeding will stop soon...Not dust...Will heal." He turned his face back into her shoulder. "Give me a minute."

She rubbed his back reassuringly. "Take your time."

She realized that she liked holding him, the weight of him in her arms, the scent of him, the softness of his hair against her cheek. She was almost sorry when the sudden tension of his body told her that he had all his faculties back and was finally fully aware of where he was. He sighed into her shoulder, a deep, regretful sigh, then drew back. She found herself releasing him only with reluctance.

"Sorry," he said.

"It’s okay. Let me check that bleeding." She eased the wadded T-shirt away and saw with relief that the bleeding had almost stopped. "Do you think you can stand? I’d like to get you home where we can take care of those slashes."

"My crypt. ‘S closer."

"Okay."

She stood up, got his arm across her shoulders and her arms around his waist, then braced him as he heaved himself to his feet. His legs slid out from under him though when he tried to take a step. He leaned against her, hunched over in pain, trying to stay upright and to keep his knees from folding.

"If you want to wait here, I could go get the car," she suggested.

"No. Restfield’s not that far. I’ll be okay in a few minutes." He leaned back against the gate pillar, breathing deeply, his eyes closed. After a little while, he straightened. "Right. Let’s try again."

This time his legs were steady and he could walk, though he still bent over in pain. The gashes had gone deep. It took them twice as long to get to his crypt than it normally would have. Once there, he collapsed gratefully into his worn green armchair.

"Right then. I can take it from here."

"No," Buffy said flatly. "You need to be fixed up and you can’t do it alone. Do you have any bandages?"

"Box on top of the fridge. Slayer..."

"Shut up, Spike."

He gave a little breath of a laugh. "Ah, there’s my Slayer. Wondered where you’d got to."

"Don’t look a gift horse." She opened the first aid box and frowned at the contents. "You really should have stitches."

"Vampire healing is fast. Stitches can get healed over, then they’re a bitch to get out. Really hurts. Know that from experience. Just slap something over it to hold the edges in place so that the cuts close up properly."

"Okay. But let me clean them first."

"Don’t have to. Vamps..."

"Spike, are you going to fight me every step of the way on this?"

He grinned crookedly. "Probably."

But he fell silent and let her do what she wanted after that. She cleaned his wounds, put butterfly bandages over them to keep the edges together, and finished up by taping gauze over the whole area. She was very aware of his gaze on her face the whole time she worked. She was careful not to meet his eyes because she didn’t want him seeing what she felt. She wasn’t sure herself exactly what she felt.

"Do you realize that if those claws had gone even a little deeper, they might have scooped out your heart? Then where would you have been?"

"Dust," he said simply and shrugged.

This time she knew what she was feeling and it was terror. She just didn’t want to face the reason for it.

"Don’t you care?" she said furiously and he tipped his head onto the back of the armchair, his eyes closed.

"Worth it," he said so softly that, if it wasn’t for her Slayer hearing, she would have missed it. Then, in a louder voice, he said, "Painkillers in the box. Could I have a couple?"

She handed them to him, passed him a glass of water, then studied him as he drank. He was paler than she had ever seen him, bled nearly white as paper.

"You need blood." He had lost too much.

"Fridge."

There was only pig’s blood in the fridge. Those gashes were deep and he would be a long time healing even if it had been human blood there. What he needed was...

She sat down on the arm of his chair. He looked up at her in surprise. His eyes were glazed over with pain and blood loss, and he had to squint to keep her in focus.

She held out her left wrist to him. "Drink."

He recoiled so violently that he gasped involuntarily with pain when the movement jarred his wounds. "No!"

"Don’t want to bite? Okay, I’ll put it in a mug."

"Don’t want to drink your blood!"

"Don’t be silly. Slayer blood. It’ll help you heal."

"I won’t drink your blood!"

"If you don’t, I’ll knock you out and pour it down your throat," she said with determination. "You’re so weak right now, I could do it easy."

He looked at her helplessly. "Slayer. Why are you doing this?"

"Owe you."

"You don’t owe me anything!" he said furiously.

She touched the gauze on his chest very lightly. "There’s a kind of balance to everything. You took this for me. My blood will fix it. It seems right."

"Slayer..."

"You’ve a knife in your boot. Shall I cut my wrist?"

"No," he said very low, in defeat. "Give me your hand."

He went into full gameface, looking her right in the eye, deliberately trying to make her recoil in disgust, make her change her mind. Every Slayer instinct in her body shouted Vampire! and demanded that she go into either fight or flight mode. She shoved those instincts down and held out her hand calmly. The yellow eyes, the ridges, that whole, dangerous, deadly, predator’s face neither frightened nor disgusted her. It was simply another aspect of Spike. And there was a beauty to it, like the face of a lion or a wolf. She too was a predator, after all. Unlike other humans, a Slayer is not prey. The balance was there. They were matched, just like when they fought. Something in her recognized that now.

She had expected it to hurt when he bit her. But his fangs slid into the vein at her wrist with such exquisite delicacy that she hardly felt it at all. And then, when he began to drink, another sensation took over, a voluptuous sensuality, a languorous pleasure thrilling through her body. She leaned against his shoulder, her free hand settling lightly on the back of his neck. She could see how this could become addictive, could understand Riley a little better now.

After a few minutes, he drew back and licked the puncture wounds on her wrist to close them.

"Was that enough?" she asked quietly.

"More than enough." He was looking up at her, his eyes awed, his hand holding her fingers against his lips. She saw the power of her blood moving in his eyes, in the color coming back into his face. He frowned in concern. "Are you okay? Did I take too much?"

"I’m fine."

His eyelids were drooping. He was falling asleep in the armchair, his body shutting down as it went into healing mode.

"Can you sleep in that armchair? Don’t you have a bed or something?"

"Rather not move for a while," he muttered, fighting sleep. "I’ll go downstairs later."

"You have a downstairs?"

He laughed a little. "Yeah, I do. Show you tomorrow."

"Okay."

His hand tightened on hers as she rose to go. "Slayer. Why?"

She looked down at him and saw that unguarded look of vulnerability and terrible hope in his eyes.

"Because you’re not beneath me, Spike."

His gaze followed her all the way to the door, incredulous and disbelieving.



TBC