The Cost of Butterfly Kisses
Rated ADULT

"Right then, you get all your singing out, then?" Spike asked. He lit a cigarette and looked around the Magic Box. Slayer wasn't around. It was just the sad little puppy-boy behind the counter.

"What do you want, Spike?" Xander demanded, bristling with anger. Well, if Spike had to wait around for the slayer, he might as well entertain himself. If he was being honest with himself, he wanted to make a little trouble. If it weren't for the chip, he'd likely go out and gut some bloke and do something creative with the intestines. Days like this made him miss Drusilla.

"Just thought I'd check in and see if ya were stupid enough to summon any more demons lately," Spike commented as he leaned against the counter. Xander flinched back from the question, but then, he should. It was bloody stupid. Harris had been around long enough to keep his mitts off magical amulets, and making a wish was even more idiotic than usual.

Surprisingly, Xander didn't blow. "Go away, Spike," he said, his voice quiet, even if it was trembling with emotion. Now this was interesting. People sometimes got that same controlled tone when they were trying to hide their fear. Usually Spike saw it right before he started torturing them. That same tone, half bravado, half terror, inspired Angelus to some of his finest work.

Spike cocked his head and considered Xander. If the git was showing a soft underbelly, far be it from Spike to not take advantage of the chance to spread a little misery. Of course, Spike normally preferred to do his torturing with railroad spikes, but the chip had taught him to be flexible. Besides, if he killed one of the slayer's friends, he definitely wasn't getting shagged again. Spike took a deep drag on his cigarette and remembered the slayer's hands over his body. She was a soddin' demon in bed. The memory made him smile, but the thought of the emptiness in her eyes when she'd walked out of his crypt without even saying a word chilled him. Oh well, it wasn't like Spike hadn't dealt with difficult lovers before.

Spike took another drag on his cigarette and considered puppy-boy. American boys were so predictable. He could torture the boy a whole lot before Xander's manly pride let him go running to the slayer for protection, and it was better than just standing around doin' nothing. He waited until Xander started unloading little knicknacks and what-nots from a box.

"Did ya see that one bloke explode? Bloody waste of good blood, that was, but it was a soddin' beautiful death, especially since he was an innocent and all. I figure since I can't kill, I'll stick around and watch you do something stupid enough to get some other git killed."

Xander's fingers closed around a small pouch of something so hard that the thing burst and little green leaves tumbled to the floor. "Have I shown you the new stakes that came in?" Xander asked, his body stiff with contained fury.

Spike sniffed. Stupid git wouldn't be able to get a stake in him before he could get out the door, anyway. "More interested in any demonic amulets you might want to make a wish on." Spike dropped his cigarette to the floor and crushed it with his boot, ignoring Xander's frown. "So, thought Rupert and your squeeze were running this place. Did everyone else have somewhere important to go? Leave you behind?"

Xander started putting the little pouches under the counter again. A phone vibrated, and Spike frowned. The children didn't have cell phones, even if it was bloody stupid of them. At first, Xander ignored it and just kept putting things away. Spike leaned on the counter and raised an eyebrow.

"You plannin' on answering that?"

"No," Xander said, his lips thin with anger. Oh yeah, puppy hiding something. "A customer left it here," he snapped when Spike kept on looking at him. Trying to explain himself, that was a sure sign of guilt.

"Probably the customer callin' then, innit?" Spike pointed out. "They want to know who has their phone shoved in a pocket. Spike watched as Xander turned a darker color.

"Are you going to go away?" Xander asked.

"Wasn't plannin' on it. Not like I have anywhere to go, is it?" Spike asked, giving Xander a sweet smile that he knew would drive the boy crazy. Sure enough, Xander clenched his jaw tight. "Besides, if I want to keep the Bit safe, I need to keep an eye on you, maybe hire a babysitter. After all, you nearly got her taken for Sweet's new queen, didn't ya?"

That took the color right out of Xander's face. Spike didn't normally see a person turn pale that fast unless they had a vampire attached to their neck and sucking the blood out.

Spike pressed his advantage. "He would have raped her, spread her wide and raped her until she was screaming. Demons aren't generally all that careful with human bodies either," Spike stopped, so disturbed by the image that he could feel his own demon roar in anger. Xander had just about sent Dawn to a horrible death because he'd made a fucking wish. Stalking around the counter, he closed in on Xander. Xander was busy ignoring him, and that made Spike even more angry. "He would have broken her ribs with every thrust, broken her legs as he spread them. You soddin' piece of shite, don't you have anythin' to say about that?" Spike stopped right behind Xander.

Boy was silent now, motionless with his hands braced on the counter. "Go away, Fangless," he said quietly. The phone in his pocket started vibrating again. Spike reached out and grabbed Xander and shoved him face down on the counter hard enough to make the chip spark but not hard enough to set it off.

Xander exploded into motion, bucking and flailing, kicking his legs back in an attempt to take Spike down. Without the chip, Spike could have ended the fight in one second. A quick snap of his neck, and the boy'd be quiet. With the chip, and with his own desire to avoid brassing off the slayer, Spike had to work a little harder, grabbing Xander's wrists and pinning them behind his back, leaning his body in to trap Xander, kicking Xander's legs apart and then standing between them. Eventually vampire strength and a century of bar fighting won out and Spike lay on Xander's trapped and panting body.

"Get off," Xander gasped. Spike pushed down a little harder. If the boy had to fight to catch his breath, he couldn't say anything stupid. Reaching into Xander's jeans, he pulled out the small gray phone. The tiny green screen said "Harris" in small, black block letters.

"Seems like this is yours, mate," Spike pointed out. Xander squirmed, but he'd lost the fight and he knew it. Spike waited out his struggles and soon enough, Xander quieted back down.

Only then did Spike consider what he was doing. Slayer was going to be right pissed at him if she found him manhandling one of her crew, and pissing her off after he finally got a good shagging from her just didn't seem smart. On the other hand, Harris was hiding something, and a man with secrets would do a lot to keep 'em. So, until Spike figured out whatever secret Harris was keeping, he just had to make sure that he kept control of the situation.

Spike put the phone on the counter and grabbed Xander's wrists in one hand and his neck with the other. "Ya just about got Dawn killed. If I had my way, Sweet woulda taken you, would have broken your body and used you until you begged for mercy you never got. You're a bloody liability, wishing on a demonic trinket like that. You and Red, pulling a demonic power into the world with Buffy. The lot of you are dumb as soddin' rocks. Spike could feel Xander react to the words and shrink in on himself.

"We saved Buffy," he said softly, but he didn't sound as sure of it as he had before.

"You pulled her out of heaven. You ever try ta figure out where she was first, or did you just go charging in there like a pillock and do what you wanted? You didn't save her, you were so bloody terrified of having to live your own fucking lives that you pulled her back into the muck with you, you selfish bastards." Xander was holding his breath, and Spike suspected that he was trying not to cry. Git.

The phone vibrated against the counter, the glass amplifying the sound, and Xander gasped, his body going stiff. "Be a good boy," Spike warned before he let go of Xander's neck to grab the phone. He wasn't surprised when Xander made a last, desperate attempt to get free, kicking with all his might. Spike kicked Xander's leg, and when the human's knee hit the counter, he rode through the pain his own chip caused him. It wasn't bloody fair. He was actually trying to not hurt the moron.

Ignoring the pain, Spike thumbed the cell phone on and braced it between his ear and shoulder so that he could grab Xander's neck again. "Yeah?" Spike said.

"Um... Xander?" a woman's voice asked.

"He's right here, but he can't talk right now. Can I help ya, luv? Spike's the name." Spike turned on the charm. Xander made a strangled, panicked noise, and Spike tightened his hold on Xander's neck enough that the chip was tingling in warning.

"I don't know..." Spike could hear the high-pitched coughing of a child in the background. The tyke wasn't sounding healthy at all.

"Is something wrong with the little one, Missus?" Spike asked. He could feel Xander go stiff under his hands. Oh yeah, the boy had a secret here alright, and Spike was about to figure out what it was.

There was silence on the other end of the phone, and then the coughing child started coughing so hard that it ended in the sound of vomiting. "Missus, sounds like your little one needs to go to hospital," Spike offered.

"Bonnie has been coughing like this for two days now, but Curbat doesn't know what's wrong with her." For a second, Spike was too shocked to even react. Curbat. Curbat was the local witchdoctor who tended most of the demonic community, at least those who bothered with medical treatment. Plenty of demons just killed the sick and wounded. But the cough Spike could hear over the phone sure wasn't demonic in nature.

"How much human blood does Bonnie have?" Spike asked carefully, well aware that lots of demons would kill him for even asking that about their spawn. The woman on the other end didn't answer right away, but Spike could hear a hand patting against flesh, so he figured she was patting the little one on the back.

"Um," she finally answered, "I'm half human. How much is Xander?" Spike looked down at the puppy boy. Xander's eyes were closed, and Spike could tell from the body language that Xander had surrendered. Spike had imagined many things, but this wasn't even on the list of possibilities. Slowly, Spike let go of Xander's wrists and backed away.

"I figure Xander's the real deal, a hundred percent human, which makes the little one more human than not, mum," Spike offered. "From the sounds, she has a good case of whooping cough. It'll take a human doctor with human medicines ta fix that."

"Oh." The woman sounded worried. "I hate to bother Xander, especially after all that mess with the amulet, but could he..."

"We'll be right over, mum. You just get the little one ready, and we'll get her to the doctor," Spike promised her.

"Spike, thank you. I know this is awkward, but I really appreciate your help. I'll tell Bonnie that her daddy's coming."

"Sure enough, mum, Bonnie's daddy will be there in no time," Spike offered. Taking the phone away from his ear, he hit the disconnect button.

"So, you spend much time diddling demons, do you?" Spike asked. Dropping the cell phone into a pocket, he pulled out a cigarette and lit it. This was soddin' unbelievable. Then again, Anya was always complaining that Xander was bad with money, that he never could account for his whole paycheck. If the man was paying for a tyke on the side, it would explain a lot. It would also explain Sweet.

"Can I have my phone back?" Xander asked, his voice tight. He was still laying on the counter exactly where Spike had put him, a situation which made Spike's demon preen. Boy might be a moron, but he bloody well knew how to surrender.

"You got a car?" Spike asked. Xander pushed himself up from the counter and looked at Spike, fear and confusion and outright panic in his eyes. Oh yeah, that was a look Spike was right fond of.

"No."

Spike nodded. "Then we're takin' mine. Your girl needs a doctor, Harris, so shift your arse."

Xander didn't move. He stared at Spike with that same look of panic.

"It was your little one who made the wish for Sweet, wasn't it?" Spike blew a cloud of smoke out into the air.

Xander nodded.

"And you would've gone with Sweet before you told him about your girl, right?"

Xander nodded again, this time more slowly, more suspiciously.

Spike took a deep drag on his cigarette. "I have needs. I figure you have a good job, a nice flat, cable. So, we're going to go help your little girl, and then you're going to do everything you can to help me, got it?" Spike leaned against a shelf and watched Xander swallow nervously. It was a big opening bid for Spike to make, but he figured Xander would counter with a straight-up offer for money or blood. Spike just needed to wait out the silence and see what counter-offer Xander came up with.

"Anya will never..."

"Dump her," Spike suggested without mercy. It wasn't like those two were going to make it anyway.

Xander swallowed more, his eyes darting to the door, and Spike wondered if he was thinking of running for it or just worried about his girl. Finally Xander nodded. "Okay."

Spike raised an eyebrow.

Xander stood up straighter. "But only if Bonnie's okay. We have to leave now."

Spike dropped his cigarette and crushed it. The lack of negotiation was a surprise, but Spike had never been one to look a gift horse in the mouth. "Right then, let's go get this little one of yours. Is she going to pass for human, or are we going to have to snatch a doctor and have him treat her privately?"

"She'll pass," Xander said shortly. The lack of a name or insult surprised Spike, but the way the boy had capitulated without even negotiating made his demon howl with pleasure. Yeah, the slayer might treat him like shite, but having a human stink of terror and creep around, trembling with fear, made him feel like a real vampire again. When Xander walked out from behind the counter, Spike dropped a hand on the boy's shoulder and smiled as Xander jumped in surprise but didn't react.

"So, what type of demon is the mum?" Spike asked. He had to push Xander to get him moving, but that felt good, too. For the first time in a long time, he was in control. Xander obeyed his push silently.

"Half kwaini," Xander said before he reached up and flipped the sign on the door over to 'closed.'

Spike nodded. They were a harmless enough race, stronger than the average human but not quite as strong as vampires. And they were ugly buggers with deep-set eyes and heavy eye ridges that made them look like a sad dog, but then the mother was only half, so who knows how many demonic traits she had. "How old's Bonnie?" Spike asked.

Xander stopped with the door open. Spike could almost feel his need to argue, but if he did, Spike would be taking this straight to the slayer, and he had to know that. Buffy had a very narrow world-view when it came to demons, even the fairly harmless type like kwaini. Of course, if there was a kwaini clan around, they weren't all that harmless. They'd fight as fiercely as any parents to protect the family.

"When I was fifteen, I was infected with the spirit of a hyena," Xander said quietly. "I got K'wana pregnant then. Spike, just don't pull Bonnie and K'wana into the middle of this, Buffy isn't...." He stopped.

Spike knew exactly what he was thinking. Buffy wasn't at her most reasonable right now.

"You be a good little boy, and we'll take care of your family," Spike promised. He gave Xander a push, and Xander headed out into the night, locking the door behind them. "Right then, got the DeSoto over by Rest Hills, we'd better hurry up and get your little girl to the hospital, pet," Spike suggested. Xander hurried in the direction Spike indicated, and Spike let his senses stretch as he strode behind Xander, feeling very much like a demon for the first time in a very long time. Oh yeah, sex with the slayer allowed him to pretend to be a demon again, but manipulating and feeding off human fear made him a real one.

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Chapter Two

"So, your little friends never figured out that you'd knocked up a demon?" Spike asked as he got in the DeSoto. Xander was busy hugging his own stomach like some sort of kicked puppy. He shook his head. The boy had grown up a lot in the last few years, but now he was back to looking fifteen and lost. It was a good look for him, all big wounded eyes and trembling.

"You lot are so close, and if you diddled your demon chit back when you were fifteen, that's a fair bit of time to hide this second life of yours," Spike mused. "Maybe I just haven't given you enough credit when it comes to your ability to lie." Actually, right from the start, he'd thought it was pretty queer that Xander would make the wish. The boy was thick as pig shite on some subjects, like the way Anya would dump him like yesterday's rotting trash when he stopped being useful. Yeah, the slayer was using Spike, but at least he knew it. He knew it, and that gave him the power and the time to bloody change her mind. The boy was just blind when it came to birds. However, when it came to demons, he'd survived more than most humans. The second Sweet had vanished, suspicions had circled around in Spike's head, but Buffy and the others had just immediately believed that Xander had really been that stupid.

"You using magic?" Spike demanded. Xander had gotten in the car, and he just stared at Spike blankly. Bloody fucking hell, if he had spelled the Buffy and the Bit, chip or not, Spike was going to pull his intestines out. Reaching out, he caught Xander's hand and used it like a leash to yank the boy closer. Xander gave a squeak of surprise, but he didn't fight. "Did you use some bloody spell to cover up for yourself?"

"What? No. I’m huge with the avoiding of spells." Xander smelled terrified, but he didn't sound like he was lying.

"Then why the fuck did they buy that rot about you being stupid enough to summon a bloody demon?" Spike neatly left out the way he had put his own suspicions aside the moment it was clear that Buffy and Willow had.

"They just did."

Spike let his eyes turn yellow.

"We have to go get Bonnie." Xander pulled against Spike's grip, but Spike didn't budge. The chip might not let him hurt Xander, but it sure didn't stop him from holding him tight enough that the boy wasn't going anywhere.

"Then convince me you haven't done something just as stupid as summoning Sweet," Spike said, his voice silky with danger. That was the voice that told smart little prey to run for their lighted homes and their crucifixes and lured foolish prey right into his arms.

"Spike, my daughter was in town. My daughter. I would not be summoning demons with my daughter in the path of the destruction. Putting myself in danger, sure, but not Bonnie."

"And Buffy and Willow? Are you using some sort of spell to cover up your dark little secret?"

"No." Xander put on his stubborn face—either that or he really was panicking. Bonnie would wait until Spike got this sorted, though. If he was going to take control, that meant he had to bring Xander to heel now, before Xander had time to try and think through some way to get out of their deal.

"Convince me," Spike said firmly, tightening his hold on Xander's wrist.

"I didn't. I don't need to." Xander voice grew louder and strained, like a guitar string about to snap. "Spike, we have to go get Bonnie. Please."

"Still not convincing me, pet. Maybe we should take this to the Watcher... tell him about your demon lover and your little girl and my suspicions that you're dabbling in a bit of black magic to smooth over your friends' memories."

"I don't need to!" Xander's voice broke like an adolescent boy's. "They look at me and they think, 'Oh, Xander's just sick and tired of being the normal one, the one without brains or powers or skills, and that's why he does all this stupid stuff. That's why he puts himself in danger. That's why he was willing to send the entire town to hell because he wanted a fun day with a singing demon.'" Xander's voice took on a hard, mimicking edge that Spike had never heard from him before. "'He thinks we're overlooking him,' they think and they whisper to each other just loud enough so I can hear. 'So we just need to pay more attention to Xander.'" His voice had a desperation to it, a mocking, self-hating desperation that Spike didn't think the boy could fake. He wasn't that good of an actor, and the pain was too raw.

"Any of that true?" Spike asked quietly.

Xander answered with a half sob and an impotent struggle to reclaim his hand. They silently fought for several seconds, Xander twisting and writhing and Spike simply holding on and waiting for the boy to wear himself out. With a heaving sob, Xander finally stopped and sort of sagged into the seat. "Maybe when I was fifteen. When I was fifteen and this all seemed like some comic book, I wanted to be the one with the cape and the secret identity, but I've seen too much Spike. I don't want that. I'm okay being the normal one, but they still think I'm Dawn; they think I'm too caught up in jealousy to see that being special is huge with the sucking side-effects. Enormous, life-altering, happiness-sucking, never-ending side effects. I'm not Dawn, and they just never noticed that I grew up at the same time they did." Xander stopped and turned to stare out into the night, and Spike held his wrist captive and waited. Boy wasn't done yet. Normally Xander wasn't one for speeches. He would make a quip or a bloody stupid comment and then bugger off to the back to clean some weapon, but this had been building for a while.

"They never really noticed much, so keeping Bonnie a secret wasn't exactly hard. I thought it would be. Senior year I pretty much lived in terror of Buffy finding out. I practiced speeches about not judging a demon by its cover. I worked mowing lawns on weekends so K'wani would have money to run for it if Buffy found out. Turns out, I didn't need to worry." He closed his eyes and let his head fall back against the headrest. "Spike, please. Whatever you want here, I'll give it to you, but I have to go get my daughter." The whispered plea seemed to mark the end of Xander's talkative period and he fell silent.

"Whatever I want?" Spike asked, waiting for the stuttered caveats and the quick denials. Xander just sat with his eyes closed and his body limp like a doll that someone had only half-stuffed full of sawdust. A half-dozen good insults darted through Spike's brain, but it seemed unfair to kick a man when he was down, not that Spike had any compunction about fairness, but he didn't need a broken Xander serving him. "Just keep in mind that you made this deal," Spike said. He'd have to test the boundaries of just how far Xander would go later. Right now they needed to get to his little girl. "Which street?"

"Candlewood," Xander said, and Spike started the car and headed out into the night.

The DeSoto roared before Spike turned it off outside the small house where Xander had sent him. Other than giving directions, the boy had turned unusually quiet. Spike hadn't heard him this silent since the demons had stolen everyone's voice.

Xander gave him a quick and suspicious look before he got out of the car and hurried up the tattered lawn. The house looked normal enough, including a little ceramic garden gnome sitting in the middle of a brown lawn. Kwaini Demons generally tried to blend, even if they did look like the bloody ugliest humans ever. With a good glamour, they could trick most people into looking past the heavy eye ridges and the elongated nose that blended into their upper lip.

Xander knocked, and a demoness opened the front door. Spike got and leaned against the warm hood, a lit cigarette hanging from one hand. The one at the door was full demon and obviously didn't think much of Xander. Xander stood, his eyes down and his shoulders hunched, but his feet shifted constantly, nervously. Boy was a moron. Demons would never show him any respect unless he stood up and took it, preferably by rippin' their arms off and beating them about the head with 'em. Maybe another day he might have had the energy to work up to a decent glare or an insult or two, but today he didn't even seem to have the energy to bloody stand up straight. Idiot.

Throwing his cigarette into the street, Spike headed up the walk with all the swagger and arrogance he had at his disposal. Immediately, the demoness ignored Xander and focused on him.

"Right then, what's the problem. Don't have all day," Spike said, ignoring the demoness and focusing on Xander. Nothing showed your superiority like ignoring the bloody enemy. The demoness shifted nervously and wisps of fear curled into the air; Xander lost every bit of color out of his face.

"It'll just be a second, Spike. I need to get Bonnie." Xander sounded desperate. Wanker. They'd come for the girl, so it wasn't like Spike was going to drag him off without her. The whooping cough was nasty shite, and a little one didn't need to suffer through that when they could just take her to hospital. However, the fear from both Xander and the demoness made Spike's demon bask under on the feeling of power. This was familiar. This was comfortable.

"Please, Spike," Xander asked, his voice cracking like he was some fourteen-year-old kid. Spike shook his head. This one didn't just have a soft-underbelly, he ran around showing it to anyone who stopped and looked at him for more than two seconds. It was a wonder no one had eaten him. Actually, it was a wonder Spike hadn't eaten him. If Spike hadn't been distracted by Drusilla's illness, he would have considered Angel's little ploy a bit of a challenge.

"Simple enough," Spike said as he finally turned to the demoness. "I won't have Bonnie die of some fucking human disease. So, either you bring her out here so her da can take her to hospital, or I'll fucking burn the house down."

"You'd kill her too," the demoness said, but she looked worried.

"Yeah, but it won't be of some cough, will it? And I won't have to listen to my boy frettin' because some wanker kept him away, because he'll be visitin' her grave every day." Spike smiled. Now it was the demoness who was shifting nervously, her eyes going from Spike to Xander. Leaning against the rusting railing along the front steps, Spike ran his tongue along his lower lip and considered the demoness. She was full kwaini, her heavy brow ridges and bald head would never even pass for human. So, she was an aunt or grandmother, this one.

Taking out his lighter, Spike flicked the top open and allowed the small flame to flicker up.

"Spike," Xander said desperately, and the way he strangled the word and the fear pouring off the git must have convinced the woman that Spike wasn't kidding.

"K'wani!" the woman called. Another appeared behind her, and this one was definitely a half-breed. A crown of long black hair circled her bald head and her eyes were almost human, ugly by human standards, but almost normal, and she clutched a wiggling bundle in her arms. The deep kwaini wrinkles were softened so that she looked old, not deformed. Still, she wasn't what Spike expected puppy boy to go for.

"Xander," she said, her voice soft with hope and appreciation. The full kwaini demoness hissed her disapproval and turned back into the house.

"Is Bonnie okay?" Xander asked. He stepped forward and held out his arms. K'wani gently handed over the blue bundle of blankets in her arms. From the size, Spike was guessing the tyke was four or five.

"I don't know."

"She will be, mum," Spike offered. "The cough is bad, but the demon blood will keep her strong, and human medicine will make her well."

K'wani looked over at him, her dark eyes studying him up and down for a second. Spike didn't move from his spot leaning against the rail. If she wanted to check him out, it didn't make any difference to him. "My family doesn't like that she's growing so human." She ducked her head, clearly embarrassed by the fact that she had a spawn that didn't exactly fit the demonic mold. It had to be hard, not only having a child so weak, but having the family know that she'd chosen to mate with a full human. For demons, life was power, and linking yourself to the powerless was as good and declaring your own powerlessness.

Spike shrugged. "Seems like puppy boy wasn't all human himself when you two made her. Didn't any of that come through in the blood?"

She glanced over at Xander and then shook her head.

"We need to get her to the hospital, she's hot," Xander said, looking from Spike to K'wani with a sort of helpless anger.

"Right then, we're off," Spike said as he turned and headed back to the car. Xander followed without a word to the mother of his child. There was a story there, too. Spike started wondering if he'd been wrong about Xander sending money over to her, but that was the only thing that made sense given Anya's many vocal complaints about Xander and money. The git sure didn't have any other vices that would have claimed large chunks of money.

The bundle in Xander's arms started to cough as Spike started the car.

"Spike, hurry, please," Xander asked, his eyes on the child inside the blanket. Nodding, Spike floored the accelerator. Despite three near-wrecks and a hubcap lost on a curb, Xander didn't say anything until Spike pulled into the emergency lane at the local hospital.

A nurse in white came out. "You can't park here!"

Spike opened his door and stood by it as Xander scrambled to get out. "I think the little one's dying," Spike lied.

Xander made a noise like he was the one dying and froze right there in the drive as the nurse hurried over.

"I need a gurney!" she called as she pulled back the edges of the blanket. "Call pediatrics!" Spike got his first look at thick, dark curls spilling over the edges of the blue blanket.

"And get this car out of the ambulance lane," the nurse barked at Spike. Spike got back in and looked for a place to park. If this Bonnie was going to be his meal ticket, the least he could do is show a little interest in her recovery--and make sure the idiots knew it was whooping cough. If the girl died, the whole deal was going to go arse over tits.

Chapter Three

Spike stretched, arching his back and kicking his boots out into the aisle where he would trip any nurse who tried to pass through. Bright green eyes were watching him, inhumanly green. "You better then?" Spike asked.

The girl didn't answer. Instead her eyes traveled the room, taking in the bright cartoon characters painted on the walls and Spike. She might look human, but she sure as hell hadn't been raised by them. Her eyes were all suspicion and calculation. Most humans didn't learn that kind of wariness until they were grown.

"Asked ya a question, pet. Don't make me ask you again," Spike warned when she was silent too long, his voice soft, but his eyes flashing yellow. Didn't seem fair to go intimidating a tyke, that was more Drusilla's game, but Spike wasn't going to have her running out of here either. Like it or not, she was his meal-ticket, and he had a vested interest in keeping her safe and healthy.

"My chest doesn't hurt as much," she said slowly and carefully.

"The medicine should have you right as rain in no time," Spike nodded.

She seemed to be thinking for a second, and Spike watched her, not sure what to expect. Eventually those stunning green eyes found him. "Where's my mother?"

"No fucking clue. Probably back at the house," Spike answered, leaning back against the chair. It wasn't like she posed any danger, and having demon blood, he could snatch her up if he had to.

She swallowed, her hands clutching the pale yellow blanket. "My father?" she asked.

"At work. He wanted to sit here and watch you just keep breathin', but I pointed out that he had responsibilities." Spike stretched. "Had to really work to get him out of here. You have him wrapped around your finger, don't you?"

She considered him silently for several seconds. This one might look human, but she wasn't going to pass for human if anyone really looked at her for long. "You're a vampire," she finally announced.

Spike blinked. The girl had inherited her father's tact, that was for bloody sure. "I am," he agreed.

She tilted her head at him, and he could see the shadowed half-circles around her eyes where a full-blooded demon would have those ridges that made 'em look like mutated sheepdogs. But when she moved just a fraction of an inch, the shadows disappeared and she was a little girl with a round face and piles of long dark curls that she had clearly inherited from her father. Only her eyes stood out as inhuman.

"Grandmother says vampires aren't real demons. They're too much like humans because they take over human bodies and get their memories and everything." Her tone of voice made her admiration for her grandmother clear, and Spike had to control a growl that threatened to slip out.

Running his tongue along the inside of his lower lip, Spike leaned forward. "I figure you lot have families and grandmothers and give live birth, so you're more like humans than vampires are. We know better than to create offspring who are too small and weak to protect themselves."

She blinked and looked at him, but either she wasn't afraid or she didn't have the human scent glands. "I never thought of that," she said with a little frown. "You bite people and make full growns, don't you?"

"If I feel like it," Spike answered, suddenly not sure that he was controlling this conversation as well as he thought he was.

"My cousin said that I'm too much human," she told him in a sudden change of topic.

"You've got a lot of human blood," Spike said cautiously, not really sure why she would talk about that.

"He said I'm so much human that vampire would probably eat me. He said I would taste good. Do you plan to eat me?" She blinked up at him. Despite the question, there still wasn't any fear in the air. Either the girl was a little touched in the head or she didn't have any human glands at all.

"I figure your da would throw a wobbly if I did that."

"Are you my dad's new owner?"

Spike blinked. Clearly he had been spending too much time with humans because that was a logical question and yet, he hadn't expected it at all. "Complicated question, pet. That's something you shouldn't be talking about." She pressed her little lips together so that her mouth got so small that she looked like one of Dru's little dolls propped up on the white sheets.

Without warning, she stuck her hand out toward him. "Can you taste me and tell me if I taste human? Co'reck is really annoying and I want to tell him that he's wrong about me tasting like a human."

Spike took her small hand in his. "You shouldn't ever offer your blood pet, not to anyone."

She frowned. "But you came with Daddy."

"Yeah, but your da has some dangerous friends. You don't offer them anything, not even if they ask. Understand?" She got that doll-like frown again and then pulled her hand back slowly. Bloody hell, she wasn't supposed to be upset just because he wouldn't bite her. "Besides," he added, "you don't smell anything like a human. Smell always reveals the truth, and you smell so much like a demon that I'd have to be bloody starving before I'd touch you, and if I were starving, I wouldn't care what the blood tasted like; I'd eat Co'reck or any other full-blood demon to keep from turning to dust."

She giggled and pulled the sheet up closer.

"Bonnie?" a timid voice asked.

"Mommy!" Bonnie threw herself forward, but then she started coughing and ended up on her hands and knees in the middle of the bed, gasping for air.

"Bloody hell." Spike caught her as she just about ripped her own IV out with the force of the coughing.

"Bonnie!" The woman darted forward, and the headscarf she'd pulled over her head slipped back. Spike wasn't surprised the mother had come, but she was a bloody idiot for not using a glamour. She couldn't pass for human, not unless she ran into a blind man. "Sweetie, are you okay?"

Bonnie coughed as her mother helped her back into the bed.

"She'll be fine, mum. Just a bit of a cough, but she's demon enough to fight this off." Spike ran his fingers along the IV line, untangling the sheets from the delicate line.

K'wani made a little unhappy noise, something between a sob and a whine.

"Momma?" Bonnie asked between coughs.

"You're my girl. You're going to grow up as strong as a kita beast, aren't you?"

Bonnie nodded, and K'wani sank into the chair Spike had left, bending down to rest her forehead against the bed in a pose of perfect despair.

"I'm getting better, Momma. I promise." Bonnie's voice had just a little tremble in it.

"I know, Sweetie."K'wani sat up. "Granddame wants us to move back to hive."

Suddenly Bonnie looked a lot more demon. The curved patches around her eyes darkened into an imitation of an eyeridge and her eyes brightened. Spike moved closer to the door and kicked it closed with his boot. The last thing they needed was some screaming nurse. K'wani turned to look at Spike. "They won't accept Bonnie. They don't understand why I chose her father." Her face darkened, and Spike was guessing that meant distress.

"Xander's tougher than he looks," Spike offered. Didn't feel right to let the mother suffer so much. Spike liked torture as much as the next demon, but he preferred victims who weren't already quite so damaged. "I've seen him go up against Angelus and stop the wanker from finishing off the slayer when she was down and nearly out."

K'wani tilted her head. "How?"

"Damned if I know," Spike said with a shrug. "But he was in the battle for the high school against vampires and the mayor's minions, and he bloody survived. He helped the slayer fight a hellgod. The slayer died, and Xander was still there. I tried to kill the wanker. I knocked him upside the head with a microscope when I grabbed up one of his little friends, and he still survived."

"You didn't kill him?"

Spike shrugged. "Got distracted. But what I'm saying is that Xander might not be as bad of a choice as you lot seem to think. He wears that helplessness like a tiger's stripes, but if he were as helpless or as bumbling as he looked, he would have been some vampire's dinner a long time ago."

K'wani stood up, her hand still holding Bonnie's. "Bonnie won't do well at the hive. Xander needs to take care of her until we get back."K'wani's voice was steady, but Spike could read the lie like it was painted across her forehead. She wasn't coming back. The world lost its blues as his true face came out and his eyes yellowed. "Xander loves her. She loves Xander, even when everyone tells her that she shouldn't. Bonnie isn't even her name. Granddame named her Bo'yan'nea, and Bonnie was the closest Xander could come to saying it, and now she won't answer to anything else. He'll take care of her. I can't."K'wani's voice was high and sharp, her eye ridges in deep relief as they turned almost black. "They're going to be coming soon. Our house, it has a ghost and she likes Bonnie, so she agreed to hide the keys until I could come here, but they're going to come for me. Granddame is going to ask me to either bring Bonnie or renounce her. Please. They'll kill her. Please."K'wani's voice finally broke, and she gave a very human sob.

"Mommy?" Bonnie asked, her voice so small that Spike wasn't sure a human's ears could have heard. K'wani flinched.

"They say it's my fault a vampire knows where the house is. I've violated the rules. I'll live with that. Bonnie shouldn't." Her words came out in short gasps as she tried to catch her breath.

Spike looked, and Bonnie had pulled her hand out of her mother's grip. She was clutching the blankets around her, and she looked fully demon with dark ridges around her eyes swelling up and turning a deep bruise-purple. Spike moved to the end of Bonnie's bed. Bloody hell. Puppy-boy should be here to deal with this. It was his stupidity in shagging a demon that led to the whole mess, and now he should see the fallout when you went sticking your dick in where it wasn't wanted.

K'wani looked up at him. "Please," she whispered, and it was pretty clear she expected him to answer for Xander. Moron.

"The house... you have that magically off the grid?" Spike asked. This could still turn to his advantage.

K'wani nodded.

"How long?"

She hiccupped. "A century spell. It was just redone in the seventies."

Spike nodded. "The ghost... any problems with that?"

She shook her head, but the black was fading from her eyeridges.

"Who's taking over?"

"A clan of helpherin."

"Get back there and tell them they have one day to clear out before I show up and slaughter anyone who's left, got it?" she nodded. Turning she looked at her daughter, helpless despair still etched into her face.

"I'll protect her, mum, and Xander will love the stuffing out of her. Probably spoil her rotten by the time you lot get back."

K'wani looked at him and opened her mouth, and maybe she was about to tell him the truth—that she wasn't coming back. Maybe she was even going to die for her poor judgment. Maybe she was just going to be safely married off to someone with a kink for human hair. But Bonnie didn't need to hear any of that.

"Go on then, get out." Spike opened the door and waited as K'wani slowly moved out of the room, her eyes still on Bonnie until Spike finally let the door drift shut again.

Chapter Four

He stirred, sleep lifting from him sluggishly. A warm body rested next to him, which felt familiar. He looked over and there was a beautiful, pixyish woman with red hair and stunning eyes looking at him. "Hey," he offered in his most seductive tones. She returned his 'hey' with one of her own, but she had a confused look on her face, and he could understand the confusion because he didn't know her or himself. Definitely time to cut back on the drinking.

"Hello?" an older man with an English accent asked. A girl answered. "Who... who are you people?"

Well crap. Clearly he wasn't the only one with memory problems. A sexy blonde knelt down beside the girl, trying to comfort her, and his cup of weird was runnething over. "Okay, who are you freaks?" he demanded. If someone slipped him something in his beer, he was pressing charges.

The redhead looked at him. "You don't know me?"

For one second, he considered bluffing. Telling a beautiful woman that you didn't remember her was all kinds of stupid. However, the next question she was going to ask him was her name, and getting caught lying to a beautiful woman was even more stupid. "Not a clue," he admitted.

"But you were just all like, 'oh hey,'" she said in a very insulting tone. Suddenly she wasn't looking quite as pretty.

"Yeah, 'cause I thought you were a girl," he pointed out. He could see his mistake the second that came out and he tried to recover, "and I'd remember, but—"

"Well, I am a girl!" She grabbed her own breasts like she needed to check, and something was definitely wrong with this whole picture. She stuttered on. "I'm ... not sure ... who I am exactly, but—"

He didn't wait for the redhead to finish; he blew up. "Okay, why was I on the ground? And why are you all staring at me? Is this some kind of psych test? Am I getting paid for this?" He had a vague memory of sitting in a small room with a monitor and a man in a tweed suit. He had to answer questions in order to get paid for test results, and he'd needed that money badly. He felt a vague sort of panic at the idea of money.

The English man got up. He looked a little like the man from the small room with the monitor, like he was a college professor or a university researcher or something. "It's not just you. Does anyone remember anything?" he asked in a tone that made it clear he was used to dealing with emergencies calmly and responsibly. Unfortunately, everyone answered with a shake of their heads.

"Well, maybe we all got ... terribly drunk and this is some sort of, uh, blackout," he suggested, which seemed not so responsible. The girls looked a little young for drinking, all except for the blonde with the straight hair that went all flippy at the end—the one standing near the English guy. She looked old enough to drink.

The youngest one, the brown-haired girl answered. "I don't think I drink."

"I don't see any booze," flippy-hair pointed out. She felt her head. "I don't feel any head bumps. I don't see Allen Funt."

"Who?" the English guy asked. He had been about to ask the same, but the flippy-haired girl waved English off, and he didn't want to get dismissed like that, so he kept his mouth shut.

If his weird cup runneth over before, it was now running over and threatening to flood the whole house. What the hell was going on? "Okay. I'm not panicking. I'm not. I'm not," he firmly ordered himself. Everyone turned to look at him like he was doing something strange. He was the only one having a normal reaction to waking up without any memory. "Stop looking at me like I'm panicking!" he snapped.

"Hey, hey, take it easy, guy," the blonde bombshell reassured him. "Okay, no one's hurt, right? And, and none of us look all hatchety-murdery, so ... we're probably safe. Here. Wherever here is." That was probably the worst case of reassuring he had ever heard.

The redhead wandered the room, her fingers brushing over jars and vials lined up on the shelves. "Look at this stuff on these shelves. Weird jars of weird stuff," she said. "Weird books with weird covers, like 'Magic for Beginners.'" Her face lit up. "Oh!"

"This is a magic shop. A-a-a real magic shop." A woman he hadn't noticed before stood up. Her light brown hair was pulled back and she had large doe-like eyes. Even without his memories, he was starting to feel just a little lucky because waking up in a room full of beautiful women was not the worst thing that could happen.

Blonde bombshell spoke up. "Well, maybe that's it. Maybe something magic happened—" she started, and clearly she was the dumb blonde. Before he could say anything, the English dude was all over that.

"Magic! Magic's all balderdash and chicanery. I'm afraid we don't know a bloody thing... except I seem to be British, don't I?" he asked like that hadn't been obvious already. "Uh, and a man. With ... glasses. Well, that narrows it down considerably." The blonde bombshell wasn't the only dumb one in the room.

The young girl turned to the bombshell. "I don't like this."

"It's okay, don't worry. We'll take care of each other," she promised, brushing the hair back from the girl's face. He had a memory, but it couldn't be real. The woman he remembered wasn't human; she was some sort of alien. She smiled, and a little girl with dark curls rose up in his memory. She ran toward him with chubby arms and legs, and he swept her up into his arms and he felt.... he felt whole. He looked around. Where was his little girl? What if something happened to her? But something warned him to not tell these people he had a little alien child somewhere. He couldn't trust them, not with that. Maybe they'd threatened to turn his alien child over to Area 51 government goons and he'd put some sort of memory whammy on all of them. Maybe he had a memory ray gun somewhere.

The English man was nodding now. "We'll all get our memory back, and it'll all be right as rain," he said in a tone that made it clear he was hoping that would happen.

Flippy hair gave a little squeal. "Look!" She held up her hand and he could see an engagement ring on her hand. "I'm engaged." She looked at the English man, and he blinked at her, but he didn't offer any denials. "It's a lovely ring," she told English like she was congratulating him on his taste in jewelry.

"Nothing like a little cradle-robbing in the morning," he muttered as he watched the two of them. English really was a little old for flippy-hair.

"Old?" English demanded. "I'm young enough to still get carded."

Before he could apologize, at the very least apologize for talking loud enough for anyone to hear, the redhead clapped her hands. "Carded! Driver's licenses!"

Thank god. Clearly the redhead had the brains in the group. He felt through his pockets and pulled out his identification. "It's me," he offered them a look at his card. "'Alexander Harris.' Cute picture. Hey, I exist," he finished with a cheeky grin.

The redhead smiled back. "I'm Willow Rosenberg. Heh, Willow. Funny name.

"I think it's pretty," the doe-eyed beauty said shyly.

Willow smiled back. "Whadda you got?"

"Tara, and look, I'm a student at U.C. Sunnydale."

"Me too! Hey, maybe we're study buddies."

"Jackpot," Alexander said as he pulled a cell phone out of his pocket. That was even better than a memory erasing ray gun. "Anyone want to find out who's on the saved number list?" He pushed memory 1 and the little screen showed the word 'home' in block letters. "I'm calling home."

"But you're here," the blonde-bombshell who didn't have a name yet pointed out.

"I'm... I'm called Rupert Giles," English continued with the introductions as Alexander listened to the phone ring.

Flippy hair smiled at him. "Rupert," she said in a tone of voice that made it clear to Alexander that she was the sort who was going to be practicing saying her first name with his last name just as soon as she figured out her name.

"Oh, hey, I have a name on my jacket. Harris," Willow said about the same time a voice answered the phone.

"Wot?" an English voice demanded.

Alexander frowned. Were they in England? "Is this the home of Alexander Harris?" he asked politely. He suddenly realized that he didn't know what he was supposed to say.

"Harris?" the voice asked. The aggression was still there but so was confusion.

"I believe so," Alexander answered.

"You... believe so?"

"Are you able to do anything other than parrot back my words?" Alexander asked in frustration. He wasn't sure why, but the voice from the phone created a general feeling of anxiety and frustration. Surely that wasn't a good sign.

"Bloody hell. What the fuck has gotten into you, Xander?"

"Xander? I go by Xander?"

"Xander?" Rupert echoed. Clearly he did not approve, but a man with a name like Rupert had very little room to complain about others' names.

"Yes, you bloody well go by Xander. Who else is there with you, mate?" the voice asked.

"Rupert and Willow and Tara and two others," Xander said. The youngest one held up her necklace.

"Dawn!" she provided.

"Dawn's there?" The voice on the other end sounded truly concerned now. Maybe they were friends. "You lot stay there."

"But—"

"Stay there!" he said firmly. "None you you set one bloody foot out the door. In fact, lock the door and make sure no one sets one foot inside, either. I can sort this mess out when I get there."

"Do you know what happened?" Xander asked.

"Bloody fucking magic is what happened. I don't know how many times I have to point out that magic always goes tits over arse, and still Red has to go stirring that pot. I'm on my way." He hung up before Xander even had a chance to ask him his name or point out that he didn't know where they were. Hopefully the man on the other end knew.

"Well?" Rupert asked.

"He says that Red always stirs the magic pot and that he'll fix it when he gets here," Xander said absent-mindedly. "He sounds upset."

"Do you think he's a brother?" Willow asked. "Because the coat I'm wearing says 'Harris' so it might be yours or your brother's. Maybe I'm dating one of you." Xander looked around. Willow was the only one who fit the name "Red" and the thought that she had erased his memory made him just a little uncomfortable. "We did wake up all snuggly-wuggly," she concluded.

"He was English, so I don't think we're brothers."

"I'm Anya!" The woman with flippy hair announced loudly. "My key fits this lock. And, uh, the forms ... next to the cash register say that," she paused as she read, "Rupert and Anya own the shop together."

Rupert looked at her in surprised. "This is *our* magic shop?" he asked. Xander felt for the man. Anya wasn't exactly tactful, and being both engaged to and working with her was going to wear thin pretty quick. "Uh, well, that's very, uh, uh, progressive of me," he finished weakly, clearly trying to recover from any horror that he might have shown.

"Did he say what my name was?" the blonde bombshell asked.

Xander shook his head. "No, but he was not at all happy that I didn't seem to know myself. And he acted like he knew exactly where we'd be. I really hope he's right because if none of us are where we're supposed to be, then he's going to be running around looking for us in places where we aren't."

"In which case he can simply call you on the portable phone," Rupert said dismissively, and something in Xander's memory nagged him. He didn't like being dismissed.

"Yes, but it might slow him down too much," Xander said defensively. "And he said we should lock all the doors and not go outside, so there may be some kind of danger we don't understand."

"Da-danger?" Tara asked. Willow edged closer to the woman like she wanted to reassure her but she wasn't sure how.

"Did he say what kind of danger?" Anya demanded even while she moved to the door and threw the locks. This place did have some pretty impressive locks. "Is this running for our lives danger or be careful because the IRS could take away everything you and your loving fiancé have spent a lifetime building up?"

"I don't know, but I get the feeling he's coming here as fast as he can," Xander moved to the counter and leaned on it.

Dawn moved to his side. "That's so sweet. He's rushing over here to be by your side. I bet he's your lover."

"Dawn!" Bombshell hissed in a horrified voice. Xander only managed to squeak out a weak, "what?" that was totally lost under the sheer volume of the bombshell's shocked response.

"I bet they are!" Dawn defended herself.

"That is so rude."

"Boy, you're a pain in the posterior," the bombshell said at the exact same time Dawn offered an equally unhappy, "Boy, you're bossy!"

Both froze and stared at each other for a second.

"Do you think we're—"

"Sisters?" The blonde finished Dawn's sentence. They smiled at each other and then threw themselves at each other in a hug.

"Still not gay," Xander protested. Both girls turned to look at him with a sort of fond exasperation that was somehow familiar.

"There is nothing wrong with being gay. Many great men were gay like Liberace and that guy who painted things." Anya's version of support was not exactly supportive. "Besides, it's not like you even know. We won't know you're gay until your gay lover shows up, scoops you into a hug and then offers to have comfort sex on the counter."

Xander immediately started choking. Over-share. Serious over-share.

"Now, dear," Rupert said. He was cleaning his glasses and looking distinctly uncomfortable.

"It's just the truth. People should not be so afraid of the truth," she defended herself. "If magic did this, I wonder if magic could undo it." She walked over and pulled a book off the shelf.

"Maybe we can tell when his roommate shows up," Dawn offered. "If he's wearing pink or purple or ruffles, that would mean he was gay, right?"

"Way to be insulting," the bombshell muttered, and this time, Xander agreed.

"Maybe we should just all do a whole lot of nothing until the man with the memories shows up," Xander suggested as he looked around the room. Tara nodded, immediately on board. Willow and Anya both had stubborn expressions, but both of them nodded when he kept looking at them.

"Good idea," the bombshell agreed, pulling her sister off to the side. Xander had called them freaks earlier, and he wasn't sure that was a strong enough word. An awkward silence fell on the room. Willow wandered the aisles looking at the strange supplies lined up on the shelves, and Tara's eyes followed her. Anya searched under the counter for record books and then seemed to get sulky when Rupert demanded equal time to look them over. And the bombshell and Dawn were having a whispered argument in the corner, complete with guilty looks in his direction. Clearly, Xander was the odd man out here, and somehow that was a familiar feeling. Damn. Did his life really suck so much that feeling miserable was somehow comfortable?

A pounding at the door jarred him out of his morbid thoughts.

"Open up!"

"We're closed!" Anya yelled back.

"It's Spike!" Inside the shop, everyone looked at each other in confusion. "Bloody hell, I'm the one Harris called for help!"

"OH!" Anya hurried over and unlocked the door.

Standing with the streetlight behind him was Spike. He had bleached hair slicked back and a long, leather coat that billowed out to show a deep purple shirt and well-worn jeans. Purple, Xander thought, why did it have to be purple? If the man was wearing all black, he would be less gayed up, but with his black nail polish and purple shirt, he was definitely on the gay side. And he lived at the number Xander had labeled 'home.' Oh he was so very, very gay. But at least he had some taste in men. This Spike was easily as beautiful as all the women in this room, and this room was definitely overloaded with beauty. Was he wearing eyeliner?

"Oi, nice job with this mess, Red," Spike said as he came in and pushed the door shut behind him. "Bit, you alright?" Spike asked, looking at Dawn. Xander walked closer and studied the man. He was older than Xander, maybe 25 or 30. At least there wasn't an age gap like with Anya and Rupert. Spike turned to look at Xander, his head tilted to the side in confusion.

"Mate, you alright?" he asked quietly, like the question was intimate.

"Freaked out," Xander answered honestly. "I'm just glad you were home to answer the phone." Xander patted the pocket with the cell phone. Spike's eyes darted down the pocket and his eyebrows went up. One was scarred, bisected by a line that looked like a tiny river dividing the brow.

"Sure enough." Spike sounded distracted and he studied Xander so closely that Xander could feel himself squirm under the gaze, his body reacting to the interest. Clearly Spike was the sexual aggressor in this relationship.

"They're so gay for each other," Dawn announced grandly, "I told you so."

"You told them he was gay?" Spike looked around like any of them had answers.

Dawn nodded. "Yep, with a lover who was at home and scared because he was hurt and who knew exactly where Xander was going to be. That's not a hard one to figure out." Spike's eyebrow did a dip and dance before going up even higher. The man was expressive.

"Right then, time to get the memories back," Spike said without actually answering Dawn. He turned to Willow. "You're going to have something on you—a piece of paper with names or a small branch with tiny pink flowers or a crystal or orb. We need it."

"Me?" Willow's voice went up an octave.

"I would think that if someone would be powerful enough to cast a spell this big, it would be me. After all, I own the shop," Anya pointed out. Then she sidestepped and caught Rupert's arm, hugging it closely, "Rupert and I do, anyway. But then, I'm sure I'm far too mature to make a mistake with a spell, isn't that right, Rupert?" she looked at him, and Rupert had a deer-in-the-headlights look.

"Yes, I'm sure it is," he offered vaguely.

Spike looked suddenly thoughtful, and the expression worried Xander for some reason. He hated not having his memories.

"So, you're attracted to Rupert? No one else?" Spike asked.

Anya looked at him oddly. "Rupert is very ruggedly handsome."

Spike pursed his lips. "You're not attracted to Tara or Xander over there?"

Anya barely gave either of them a glance. "I like older partners."

"Older?" Rupert demanded with some offense.

"No worries, you aren't old," Spike offered him without taking his eyes off Anya. "So, you're setting your cap for Rupert?"

"Why?" Anya let go of his arm and looked at Spike suspiciously. Xander had to admit that he was feeling a little suspicious himself. "Oh god," Anya breathed as she turned on Rupert, "we're breaking up, aren't we? Are we getting a divorce? I bet you took back my wedding band, and I'm wearing the only piece of jewelry I have left from you. What? Did you have affairs with other women? Were you bringing them into our bed?"

"I... I..." Rupert turned so red that Xander was concerned for him, and the nameless bombshell stepped forward, clearly about to get involved. "For all we know, you could have been acting like a tart, sleeping with every git who walked through that door," Rupert finally gathered the words to counterattack.

"If I did it's because you drove me to it!" Anya pulled off her ring and threw it at him. "I'm not giving up the store, I don't care what you do. It is half mine, and I will work here and make you miserable every day for the rest of your life."

Rupert looked stunned.

"That was bloody amusing. I hope you remember that here in a second, pet," Spike said. As he walked past, Spike gave Xander's arm a pat.

"Pig," Anya said to Rupert, her eyes shining with tears.

"So, you find what we need?" Spike asked Willow. She opened her hand and a black crystal lay in the middle of it. "I've never seen it before."

"You'll remember it in a second," Spike promised. He took the crystal and dropped it on the floor. Bringing up his boot, he brought it down with a sharp crack. Xander staggered back as all his memories slammed into him. Bonnie, the house with the demon spell that exempted it from mortgage or electric or water bills, the ghost that would float toys in front of Bonnie to try and cheer her up. And now they all knew... they knew that he had a home that he shared with Spike. Xander couldn't breathe. His chest ached with fear.

Tara started crying softly.

"Tara." Willow said the word with such helpless desperation that it pulled Xander out of his own fears. Oh god. The conversation. They were talking about trying to fix what they had done to Buffy, and Willow had promised to not use magic.

Tara shook her head and headed for the back room. Willow made a little sob, but she didn't follow.

"Buffy," Xander turned to her, "we wanted to help, to make it easier, but none of us agreed to..." Xander waved his hand.

"Do the brain whammy?" Dawn filled in. Buffy looked too shell-shocked to even answer. She sat on a stool and just stared into space as time returned all her memories—including where they had ripped her out of heaven.

"I'm telling you, pet, that is one disaster waiting to happen," Spike said, bumping Xander's shoulder and poking a thumb toward Anya.

"Hey!" Anya protested. "My ring!" She went diving under the counter in search of it.

"Speaking of 'hey,' why was Spike at your apartment?" Dawn asked.

Xander froze. It was all about to fall down around his ears. If he had to choose between his friends and his daughter, he would choose Bonnie—no question. But he didn't want to lose his friends.

"I wasn't," Spike answered for him. "Xander's been working his arse off to put a down payment on the shittiest little house I've ever seen. He let me stay there in return for keeping the demons from thinking it was condemned and abandoned." Spike shrugged. "Have to say, though, this is not the most loving relationship." Spike looked from Xander to Anya.

Xander flinched, well aware that Spike only wanted to get Anya out of the way. With Anya gone, Xander would be totally under Spike's thumb. Xander and his paycheck. But Xander had to admit that a little part of him was okay with that. He was tired of trying to be all things to all people. He wanted to go home to Bonnie. Three nights now, he'd laid next to Anya while she wheezed herself to sleep, and he'd worried about Bonnie, about Clem's babysitting skills, about what Spike would do in order to take control, because Xander did understand that Spike needed control. The more creative Spike had to get in order to assert his control, the more danger they were all in.

"I wanted to bring something to the marriage," Xander whispered, feeling like a heel. "But..." he stopped. Anya was looking at him with a slowly growing dismay. Xander knew he had to do this. He had to protect Bonnie, and there was a little part of him that wanted to escape from the trap he'd built for himself when he proposed. He loved Anya. He did. He just couldn't marry her. He'd really thought he could propose and then get killed by Glory, and no harm done.

"You bought me a house?" Anya sounded confused.

"He bought a death trap for rats," Spike corrected her. Xander glanced over. The house looked rough outside, but inside, it was beautifully kept with carved beams that told the story of Bonnie's demonic ancestors. But if the girls thought he had rats, they were less likely to drop by for coffee.

"Xander?" Anya called.

He looked at her, desperate for the world to just open and swallow him whole.

She gave a little hiccup. Xander let his gaze fall to the ground. He couldn't do this; he couldn't hurt her.

"Bloody hell. Even I can smell disaster coming in this relationship. Let it go before you two end up hating each other," Spike counseled.

"Spike!" Buffy objected. Spike walked over to her side, and he looked at her with this longing that Xander couldn't understand. How could Spike, as evil as he was, want someone as pure as Buffy? Or maybe getting pulled out of heaven had made Buffy something less than pure because she wasn't pulling away from him. God, what had they done? And the worst part was that Xander still couldn't bring himself to be sorry. He was a selfish bastard who wanted Buffy alive.

"Face it, pet, when she didn't have her memories, she wasn't attracted to him at all," Spike said with brutal honesty. Xander flinched away from that truth.

"Xander is a very good provider, and very good in bed," Anya said, but even she wasn't sounding sure now. This was Xander's cue, his chance to simplify his life. He had to. Bonnie needed him now like she never had before, and all her mature comments about understanding why he had to leave didn't change the fact that he should be there.

"You should keep the apartment," Xander said quietly. "I'll leave you with two month's rent."

"Xander." Anya whispered his name, but Xander didn't look up. He just headed out into the night, his heart aching and guilt like a stone in his stomach because, god help him, he was relieved.

Chapter Five

"Jingle bells, Batman smells, Robin laid an egg. Batmobile lost a wheel and the Joker got away, hey!" Xander sang as he pulled the heavy duct tape off the box of Christmas decorations. Bonnie laughed and reached out to pull on a plastic pine needle sticking out the corner of the box.

"Jingle bowels, jingle bowels, Daddy lost a..." she stopped.

"Peg," Xander sang. Bonnie giggled. "And you have been spending too much time with Spike. You are too young for bowel jokes."

"I'm not a baby," Bonnie said. She pulled on the needle, and it broke off. "I'm a growing girl."

"You are growing, but you're still a little girl," Xander disagreed. Sometimes it bothered him just how fast she was growing up. He'd looked up kwaini demons not long after he'd found out that his night of primal wildness was going to have some long-term consequences, and according the book, Bonnie was going to grow up fast... faster than a human, anyway. Xander had never had a chance to really talk to K'wani about it because any discussion seemed to come back to the family's despair that Bonnie was turning out more human than demon. Xander reached out and caught one of Bonnie's dark curls, and she smiled at him. Sadly, he didn't remember much about his night with K'wani. It was a long night stained with lust and fleeting memories of sweating flesh and sharp teeth. The last of the tape ripped away and the box came open, surprising Xander.

"I declare victory!" Xander said as artificial tree limbs popped up. His Christmases always sucked, but now that Bonnie was in a mostly human home, he was determined to give her some happy memories of the holiday.

"You're silly. The box isn't dangerous enough to defeat," Bonnie told him seriously.

"Oh yeah? Wait until you see how hard this is to put together," Xander pointed out. He pulled a branch out. "Every branch has a little bit of color on the end. We have to put up the big pole in the center and then match all the colors, and if we're wrong, we're going to have the ugliest Christmas tree in the whole world."

Bonnie pulled the first branch out, and then she froze, her eyes darting to the front door. Xander twisted around, watching the yellow streetlight shine in through the narrow slot window set into the door for a second before the lock turned and Spike came thumping in the room. It was early for him to be home.

"Hey, Spike," Xander said cautiously. If he was being honest, Spike was pretty easy to live with... easier than Anya anyway, but every time the vampire walked into the house, Xander could feel his guts knotting inside him. Bonnie was here, so damn vulnerable because her demon blood made it possible for Spike to hurt her, and Xander was intensely aware of the fact that he wasn't fast enough or strong enough to protect his daughter—not from Spike and not from all the other nasties that went bump in the night.

"Pet," Spike said, an endearment Xander was quickly growing to hate. It wasn't even that he hated the name itself. Anya's pet names for him tended to be on the therapy-inducing side. But Xander wasn't sure if Spike was showing some sort of weird, twisted sort of affection where he appreciated that Xander kept him in beer and smokes or if Spike was calling him a lower life form. And even worse, Xander couldn't do a damn thing to stop him.

Spike collapsed into the recliner looking absolutely exhausted. There weren't any big bads on the horizon, just some random harassing from the idiot triplets, so Xander wasn't quite sure what had left Spike looking like he'd just got beat on by his bookie friend again. Xander never would have guessed that a few Siamese kittens would have cost so much, but that was still less than one of Anya's spa days.

"Anything wrong?" Xander asked. He pushed himself up and moved to the center of the room.

Spike looked up. "Yeah, I don't see you getting me a fucking beer."

Xander flinched. He had always insisted that he was not going to grow up to be his father. So instead, he grew up to be his mother. Xander glanced at Bonnie, worried, but she was just sorting branches with the same intensity she used for everything. Rather than risk a fight in front of Bonnie, Xander headed for the kitchen.

When Xander had first moved to the house, he'd had nightmares about just what Spike would demand. Instead, Spike was way less with the demanding than Anya had been. If the refrigerator was stocked with human blood and ale and there were Jack Daniels, cigarettes, and Wheatabix in the cupboards, Spike was usually pretty damn content. Clearly not tonight.

Xander hurried through the carved mahogany arch that led into the kitchen. This was the one room that definitely wasn't human designed. Every inch of wall space was covered in carvings and the stove was a heavy iron monster built with wood-burning warmers to use for spell-making. If Willow wasn't already so far gone into the spell-making and if Xander wasn't trying to hide Bonnie from his friends, he'd love to show it off to her. But those medieval touches did look a little strange next to the full-sized modern refrigerator tucked into an inconvenient corner where you couldn't open the door all the way without hitting a stone pillar.

Going over, he pulled out beer and human blood, putting the second into a mug and then heading for the microwave. Spike was generally in a better mood after feeding, so if Xander wanted some happy Christmas memories, he was going to have to get the bloodsucker happy. His mother had always gone for the beer, but Xander figured if he brought Spike too much beer without some blood, they really were going to recreate the Harris household Christmas.

It was weird, sometimes Xander hated Spike, and other times he almost felt something almost sympathetic. He could weirdly understand Spike's frustration. Actually, he remembered the frustration because he'd spent all of sophomore year in a fruitless chase of Buffy. But still. Ick. As a vampire, Spike should be chasing vampires or demons or something. Not Buffy. There was wrong and then there was 'oh this is so going to end with someone's eviscerated guts in a steaming pile at their feet' wrong.

The microwave dinged, and Xander grabbed a box of Crawfords Garibaldi biscuits and stuck it under one arm before grabbing the beer in one hand and the mug of blood in the other. If the beer and the blood didn't cheer Spike up, hopefully the really crappy English cookies would.

Turning the corner, Xander found Bonnie standing at Spike's knee. His first instinct was to grab her away because if Spike was channeling Tony Harris, this was not going to end well. But instead of lashing out, verbally or physically, Spike smiled at whatever she had said and ran a finger over her cheek.

"Killed a Mohra once, poppet. Nasty buggers, those. Face like they just crawled out of their graves, those."

Xander opened his mouth, but then he snapped it shut again. Yeah, he would be happier if Bonnie never, ever heard about another big bad, but with Spike in the house, that wasn't going to happen. Instead he headed over and put the various treats on the table next to Spike's chair. Looking at the blood and the cookies, Spike's scarred eyebrow twitched, but Xander just headed back toward the Christmas tree. Bonnie had started pulling out the branches and organizing them by the color on the end, but she had all the red and and orange-red together. The colors looked the same, but red branches were long things for the bottom of the tree and orange-red were short and stubby.

"Bonnie, Spike looks really tired. Maybe we should leave the living room to him and we could go play with your video game," Xander suggested.

"How did you kill it?" Bonnie asked, crawling up onto his lap. Shit. Whatever he didn't want Bonnie to do, Bonnie pretty much did. Up until a month ago, Xander had really spent a lot of time blaming his parents for being unparental, but at this point, he figured they probably had done the best they could because getting a kid to listen obviously required talents that were not in the Harris gene pool.

Spike leaned forward. "It attacked Dru. It didn't even wait until she was looking, and it took an ax to her. Caught her right above the hip." Spike pointed to Bonnie's side. "She went down caterwauling, and I didn't have anything bigger than a knife on me, so I ripped one of the beams off the side of this shed and started swinging." Spike's got a gleeful look in his eye as he picked up his blood.

Bonnie's eyes got big. "You're strong."

That made Spike smile even more. "Bloody right I am, poppet. And I caught him right in the back of his knee. That's the trick, pet. If you don't know exactly how ta kill 'em, make sure you disable them so they can't come after you."

"Spike, this really isn't child-approved conversation," Xander tried to protest. Spike looked at him and gave him a look that might have been a grin or a sneer, Xander wasn't sure which.

"Not like Bonnie doesn't know about the things that go bump in the night, pet. I figure you lot only survived as long as you did because you bloody educated yourself. We don't want our girl ending up demon kibble because she doesn't know how to handle herself." Spike reached over and opened the cookie box.

"I'm going to grow up to be as strong as you," Bonnie announced firmly. Xander could feel hot jealousy turn his stomach sour, but then it wasn't like he had a whole lot of strength for her to admire. Bonnie's mother and grandmother had pointed that out often enough, and sometimes Xander could hear echoes of those women in Bonnie's voice. Spike tilted his head.

"Not likely, pet. Kwaini aren't as strong as vampires. But vampires aren't as strong as Mohra, and that big bastard that touched my Dru died, even if he was stronger than me."

"Because you disabled him," she said happily, pronouncing the new word carefully.

Spike laughed. "Didn't even come close, poppet. The wood broke, and there I was with a big, nasty demon with an ax and all I had was a bit of wood. And my sire was still down, crying out that I should rip the wanker's head off, like I hadn't already been trying to do exactly that. I bloody loved Dru, but sometimes she did tend to dwell on the obvious."

Spike offered Bonnie a cookie, and she took it and nibbled on in as she watched Spike. While Spike watched her, his expression softened. For a brief second, he wasn't the big bad.

"What did you do?" Xander asked, curiosity getting the best of him.

Spike let his hand rest on Bonnie's leg as she nibbled on her cookie. "I drove the broken end of the beam right into his stomach."

"Okay, please let's not get into descriptions of guts," Xander begged. Bonnie was eating, and Xander did not need to see any of her dinner or that cookie make a return appearance.

"What's the matter, mate? Weak stomach?"

Xander looked down toward Bonnie. Spike followed Xander's gaze and then rolled his eyes when he realized that Xander was concerned about Bonnie's stomach. Xander had no doubt that Spike cared about Bonnie, but his version of care and nurturing was not exactly child appropriate.

"Wanker," Spike said softly. He gave Bonnie a little slap on the back, and she came over and crawled onto the couch, laying on her stomach with her top half in Xander's lap. He rested a hand on her back.

"I don't mind evisceration stories," she offered, and it Xander really didn't want to even think about the fact that she didn't have to sound that word out. Disabled was a new word, evisceration she'd heard often enough to say comfortably. Sometimes Xander was sorry that he didn't just take Bonnie and run when she was a baby. He could have protected her from all this, but he'd been an idiot and he thought he could be a good father without giving up his life.

"Did that kill the demon?" she asked Spike.

"Ask your da," Spike said. Xander blinked for a second.

"What?"

"You spent the last six years mucking around with the slayer, fighting all the big bads. Did a broken bit of beam in the stomach kill the Mohra?"

Xander thought about that for a second. "Red crystal thingy right here?" Xander asked, tapping his forehead.

"That'd be it."

"You have to break the crystal or they just come back bigger and badder than ever," Xander said. "Not that they're exactly warm, fuzzy kittens the first time you try to kill them."

"True enough." Spike nodded. "Bloody wished someone would have told me that the first time I met it. I killed that git three times before Dru managed to tell me to break the stone. Every time it came after me, I thought the demon's bigger, badder brother was back for revenge."

"Wow." Bonnie's eyes were all big. "But a Mohra isn't going to come back from the dead and come in here, is it?" Bonnie looked at the front door with sudden suspicion. Given her age, the idea of demons breaking into the house should have terrified her, but Xander guessed the rules were different since she was a demon.

"No worries, poppet. No demon is coming through that door without my permission." Spike picked up his beer and took a big drink.

"Maybe we could start putting the tree together," Xander suggested. If Spike's mood was improving, he definitely wanted to be busy doing something other than aggravating him into getting pissed again.

"I bet I can put my half together faster!" Bonnie sang as she darted for the box. "Red, yellow and and blue are on the bottom."

"I guess that leaves me with all the branches at the top," Xander agreed.

"I'm going to beat you, Daddy," Bonnie said joyfully. Xander smiled and grabbed the center pole, setting it in the base so they could start putting the tree together. Yeah, Spike was stronger. Spike had all the cool demon stories that obviously impressed Bonnie's demon instincts, but Spike couldn't put a Christmas tree together with her or be her father or read her a story when he was trying hard not to cry about her mother. Those were Xander's jobs. And this was one job Xander was determined to not screw up.

Chapter Six

Xander yawned. The tree was looking definitely... odd. Bonnie had put almost all of the decorations on the bottom, and when Xander tried to move them, she got that bright-eyed stare that meant she was going to silently endure whatever you did even if she was miserable. So Xander had left most of them there. The living room twinkled with the Christmas lights from the tree, and the television droned so softly that Xander couldn't hear what it was saying, but the guy on it was happily chopping vegetables.

Spike took another drink of his beer.

"She's got you right round her finger, pet," he said mildly. Bonnie was asleep on her stomach under the tree. Xander's attempt to explain Santa Claus had been met with enthusiastic plans for traps and dungeons and stealing the reindeer until Spike had finally stepped in and explained that it was all some human rot to cover up for spoiling their children. Xander hadn't been able to tell if Bonnie was disappointed or amused, but she'd fallen asleep not long after that.

"Yeah, and you're just completely unaffected," Xander said sarcastically. Bonnie had spilled her milk over Spike's knee, and his jeans were an odd sort of gray from the dried stuff. Spike just shrugged.

"Spike?" Xander asked when the vampire stood up.

Spike stopped and looked down at Xander. Xander had long ago figured out that Spike was in a better mood for answering questions when he was both full of blood and standing over Xander. It was either a Spike thing or a vampire thing. Although actually, now that Xander thought about it, Larry had this weird way of being nice to Xander after knocking his face into the dirt in sixth grade, so maybe it was a bully thing.

"Wot?"

"Is there some sort of big bad in town that's got everyone stressed?" Xander hated that he had to ask Spike this. Spike was supposed to be the outsider, and he was one of the insiders, one of the three musketeers, only lately.... Xander refused to let his thoughts wander too far down that road. If he did, he was going to end up angry with Buffy for shutting him out or angry with Willow for thinking that Tara and her friends weren't enough or angry with himself for being too stupid to notice they were all falling apart.

Spike looked at Bonnie for a long time before he answered. "Just the human kind, mate."

Xander nodded. He wasn't even sure if Spike meant the idiot trio and their stupid techno tricks or Willow herself.

"Besides, not like you could do shit about it either way, is it?" Spike demanded.

Xander reached out and rested his hand on Bonnie's back as he looked at her. He didn't need to answer because Spike already knew the truth. Xander wasn't good at fighting, and after what had happened since Buffy died, he was starting to think he wasn't very good at friendship either. Xander got to his knees and gathered Bonnie up into his arms.

"She needs to be in bed," Xander said softly as he stood. Spike stood in his way for a second, just to show he could, and Xander waited. He was too tired for these games to even bother him anymore, and maybe that's why Spike stepped to the side and let him pass.

Shifting her onto his shoulder, he opened the basement door and headed downstairs. Most of the house was in two levels below ground. When the clan had lived here, Bonnie had shared a large room with her year-mates—family members born in the same year. But when Xander took over the house, he didn't want her in there alone. Sometimes she asked Spike things that made it pretty clear that her year-mates had been pretty cruel, and Xander wanted her to think better thoughts when she was in her room. Instead he had redone the smaller room next to the one he had claimed.

He went in now, flipping on the light. Bonnie had picked the color—a vivid turquoise with yellow trim that made Xander's eyes hurt and led to Spike commenting that the girl had clearly inherited her father's fashion sense, but Bonnie loved it.

Xander settled her into the bed, but before he could leave, she reached out and caught his shirt.

"Daddy?" She sounded sleepy.

Xander knelt down next to her bed. "It's late, honey. You should be asleep."

"Are you really going to buy presents and put them under the tree?" she asked.

Xander frowned. "Of course I am. I've gotten you presents every Christmas."

The way she stared up at him told Xander that she hadn't gotten any of them. He closed his eyes and cursed K'wani and Bonnie's grandmother and every other demon who'd ever lived here. Yeah, maybe Xander hadn't been able to get the best presents, and maybe he got her things that were a little weird from a demon's perspective, but they were his presents to his daughter.

Xander opened his eyes when Bonnie slipped her hand inside his. "It's silly to say they came from Santa," she told him seriously.

Xander ran his fingers through her curls. "I just want you to have a good Christmas."

"I will," she said seriously. "If Santa Claus is just a story, then is Jesus just a human story too?"

Xander stopped. Oh shit. She was six; he shouldn't have to deal with the big meaning of life stuff yet. He wasn't prepared for this. As much time as Xander spent thinking about hell and hell dimensions and curses, he really didn't spend much time thinking about God and Jesus. She just laid there and silently watched him. The weird thing was that he could walk out. He could leave without answering and she would never complain. Xander hadn't realized how odd that was until he really thought about what ten-year-old Dawn had been like when she first came to town.

Xander got up and sat on the edge of Bonnie's bed. "I don't know," Xander finally admitted. Yeah, he sucked as a father, but his goal was to do everything the opposite of his own father, so the very least he could do was admit when he was clueless. "I know he was a great man—someone who died trying to get people to see that they should be good and nice. I know that he was someone who I would have really liked, but I don't know if he was a God or just someone really, really good."

Bonnie nodded. "Someone who makes people..." she tilted her head, "not really happy, but helps them be not so sad," she finished.

"Gives them hope," Xander suggested. She nodded and pushed herself up on one elbow.

"Can I ask for something for Christmas?" she asked, and then she sucked in her upper lip and chewed on it, shadows appearing under her eyes and her face markings darkened.

"Of course you can," Xander rushed to reassure her. "I can't always promise to get it, but you can always ask, honey."

The shadows faded and she gave him a smile, but it was a sly one that she seemed to have picked up from Spike. "Can I have snow for Christmas?" she asked.

"Honey, it doesn't snow in Sunnydale."

"It did one year!" Bonnie crossed her arms, very willing to debate this point, and Xander had to admit that she was right. It had snowed. He'd been laying outside in a sleeping bag, and the snow had drifted down. According to Buffy, it had been a miracle sent to keep Angel from dusting himself. If Xander was going to make a miracle, he wouldn't do it to save Angel, but that had been Buffy's story, and her and Willow had swooned over it.

"I don't know how to make it snow, then," Xander told her.

"Have you done a snow dance yet?" she asked.

"A snow dance?"

Bonnie nodded, and her dark curls danced around her face. "Yeah, you know..." she looked at Xander like he should know, but he could only shrug. He could do Snoopy dances, but snow dances or just dancing in general were not really his thing.

"You dance outside naked around a bowl of ice to make it snow the next day," she explained. Xander opened his mouth because he was not getting naked in front of his daughter. The world could come to an end, and that was one rule he was not budging on. Spike could tell his evisceration stories and he would even bend on the whole letting Bonnie have raw steak, but he was not getting naked in front of his daughter. Maybe she recognized his expression, because she hurried to keep going.

"Seriously. My family did it all the time!" she promised him. "Mommy started it."

"Your mom?" Xander frowned. K'wani usually just did what her own mother told her to do. It was one of the many reasons why they spent so much time fighting. Xander looked at Bonnie, confused. Her lower lip started to quiver, and he narrowed his eyes. Then she started giggling. "You little liar," Xander said, scooping Bonnie up and holding her upside down. She squealed and grabbed his belt. Xander tickled her, and she screamed some more. Upstairs, boots moved across the floor, stopping at the top of the stairs.

Xander dropped Bonnie back onto the bed where she lay gasping, holding his hand in her two small fists. "You loon," Xander called her. She smiled up at him, but then her smile slowly faded.

"So, if I ask for something really big, you won't get mad?" she asked again.

"I won't get mad, honey. I don't have a lot of money, so I can't promise you that I can get it, but you can ask." Xander could only hope she was going to ask for something he could afford. Around Christmas, he could always pick up a couple of extra shifts at the construction site. Clem was a cheap babysitter, and the guys at the site loved having someone to pawn all their unwanted kittens off on. Xander was just going to try very hard to not think about what happened to those kittens.

Bonnie looked up toward the ceiling. "Every time Spike comes home smelling like that woman, he's unhappy. Can you make her stop being mean to Spike?"

Xander frowned. "Woman?" An unhappy little bubble was forming in his chest.

Bonnie nodded. "Whenever they have sex, Spike gets unhappy. It isn't nice to make people unhappy, and you're really good at making people be nice." Bonnie sucked her lower lip in and chewed on it as she looked at him. Xander wished he could pretend that Dru was back in town or that Spike was lusting after the waitress down at Willy's—not that Willy had one. He wished he could come up with any explanation other than the obvious one. That, and he wished Bonnie didn't know what sex was.

"Maybe you're mistaking the smell. Maybe Spike only wants to have sex." Xander cringed even as he said it. First he had to have the Jesus talk, and now he was going into sex with his six year old. He was breaking even Tony Harris' record for number of inappropriate comments in one night. All Xander had to do was threaten to sell Bonnie to some Romanians, and he could call himself a proper Harris man.

Bonnie shook her head. "Human sex smells really strong," she said, wrinkling her nose. Xander made mental note of that one. Oh shit. He'd come over after having sex with Anya on Bonnie's first day out of the hospital. Xander's cock went on full retreat and insisted it wasn't coming out for the next twelve years. "She has lots and lots of sex with him," Bonnie kept right on going.

Xander patted her leg, not entirely sure how he was supposed to tell his daughter that she was completely creeping him out.

She got a thoughtful look on her face. "Maybe the sex makes Spike unhappy, but grandmother said that humans and vampires and primal were all funny about having sex all the time and really, really liking it. She said it made them slow and stupid because they got all worn out, and she said mommy wasn't thinking right because her reproductive organs were too human."

Yep, Xander was officially into therapy-land.

"I'll see what I can do, sweetie," Xander promised, getting up and giving Bonnie a quick kiss on the forehead before he retreated.

"Good night, Daddy!" she called happily. From her tone, it was pretty clear that she expected Xander to wave some magic wand and make this all better.

"Good night, Bonnie-girl," Xander answered from her door before her turned her lights off.

Well fuck. Spike and Buffy were having sex.

Chapter Seven

Xander stood in the middle of his room trying to decide exactly what he was supposed to do. Oh yes, he'd just stop Buffy from making Spike sad with all that sex. Fuck. Xander was actually a little more concerned about Buffy. If the great evil, blackmailing one was getting his feelings hurt, that wasn't exactly a great tragedy in Xander's book, but what was Buffy thinking?

Xander had no idea what to do. In the past, he would have called Willow and she would have come over and they would have talked, and in the end Xander still wouldn't have known what to do but it wouldn't have mattered because Willow would have done something. His job would have been done the second he put Willow on the trail of the emotional bad. But now. Shit.

Distracted by his own thoughts, Xander didn't notice Spike until the vampire and slammed into him from behind, putting Xander face first into his own orange satin comforter. Xander cried out, but Spike's hand caught him by the back of the neck and pushed him into the mattress. Flailing, Xander tried to free himself, but Spike was too strong, and since Spike was only technically holding him and not hurting him, the chip was not big with the helping.

With his face pressed to the bed, Xander's lungs started to ache, but still Spike sat on him, either ignoring the pain of the chip or crowing about the fact that he had finally found a way to kill Xander.

"Think about Bonnie, mate," Spike hissed in his ear, and Xander went still. Bonnie. Every bone in Xander's body wanted to fight. His lungs were burning with a need for air, but Xander forced himself to relax his muscles. If he fought, Spike was going to feel a need to prove to Xander that he had the upper hand, and he could do that entirely too easily. After a couple of seconds, Spike moved the hand on his neck, and Xander turned his head to gasp in air. Black and orange dots floated in his vision.

"Right then, we need to talk." Spike shifted, but his weight was still on Xander's back, pinning him to the bed, which was pretty much reminding Xander of every nightmare he had when he'd found out that Spike was going to live with him. But Xander's daughter was still sleeping in the next room, so Xander didn't complain. "I heard what Bonnie said, mate."

"She's a little girl, she doesn't know what she's saying," Xander tried, desperate to defend his daughter. When Spike's fingers came to rest on Xander's lips, he shut up with a shiver. He was so very screwed.

"That's where you're wrong, pet. Your little girl's a demon, isn't she? That means she's not some blind chit who can't tell a vampire from a zombie, and you need to start giving her a little more credit. It also means that the slayer is not going to be amused if she finds out about your little secret, is she? She'll be even less amused if she finds out that Bonnie's the one who summoned Sweet and nearly got the Bit taken off as a demon queen." Spike's voice practically purred in Xander's ear, and Xander knew when he was beat. It was actually a pretty familiar feeling. He closed his eyes and just waited on whatever Spike was going to say or do.

When Xander didn't answer, Spike sat up, his hand back on Xander's neck, but at least this time he wasn't pushing Xander's face into the mattress. "I won't let you hurt Buffy," Spike said.

Xander had told himself to just submit and hope this was over fast, but that made him snort. Yeah, like he was the one who was going to hurt Buffy. Spike's fingers tightened on Xander's neck until Xander gasped and Spike threw himself off the bed with a low growl, his hands going to his head. Clearly Spike had reached the limit of the chip's willingness to let him physically intimidate Xander.

Spike turned and looked toward Bonnie's bedroom, and the brief flare of gleeful vengeance Xander had felt died in his chest.

"Please, no. Spike, I'll do whatever you want. Don't hurt her. Please. Just tell me what you want, and I'll do it." Xander scrambled up so he was sitting on the edge of the bed. He could survive whatever Spike wanted because he was human. The chip wouldn't let Spike kill a human.

Spike's eyes narrowed and yellowed, and fear was an animal crawling around in Xander's stomach and scraping at his ribs. Spike straightened up, his spine rebar straight as he glared hate at Xander. "You bloody knob. You really think I'd go in there and hurt her because her father is a fucking moron?"

Xander frowned. Clearly he had missed some important piece of information because Spike was saying that like it wasn't possible, and that was pretty much exactly what Xander had been thinking.

"I was making sure she was still asleep, ya nit." Spike walked over and grabbed Xander's arm, yanking him to his feet, and Xander tried to keep all his limbs to himself. He didn't think Spike would be amused by protesting and flailing, and he definitely did not want to annoy Spike. Not now.

"Move," Spike hissed, pulling Xander out into the hallway. Biting down on insults and fears that wanted to crawl out his mouth, Xander let Spike manhandle him down the hall, down another set of stairs into the second basement and then to the end of the corridor where Spike had claimed the grandmother's room. It was a smaller room, but the lavishly carved woods and high-end electronics were definitely better than the rest of the house.

Spike pushed him into the room and the put himself in the doorway so that Xander was trapped. Yep, there were all Xander's nightmares right on schedule. First Angelus and then Dracula and now Spike—Xander was actually getting pretty tired of having every local vamp try its hand at intimidating him. It wasn't like he was even particularly hard to intimidate. For example, right now he was totally intimidated. Xander hugged his own stomach and just waited.

Spike pulled a pack of cigarettes out. "Go on then, get it out of your system."

"Get what out?"

For a second, Spike glared at him, and Xander fidgeted under the glare. Clearly Spike was not amused by the 'play dumb' strategy. "Whatever shite you have to say, you say it here, to me, not to Buffy." Spike pulled out a cigarette and poked it in Xander's direction.

"Okay, first, I really don't want to talk to you."

"Didn't ask if you wanted to, pet," Spike cut him off, and this time Xander was totally sure that 'pet' pretty much meant that Spike was calling him a lower life form. "I'm telling you have to."

Xander opened his mouth on the verge of saying "or what." But he knew the "what" already. He didn't answer because he really didn't have anything to say, not without putting his foot in his mouth or his daughter in the middle, and those were things he would rather avoid.

Spike huffed in disgust. "And what she said isn't true. The slayers got a lot on her mind, but I'm not bloody unhappy and I'm not walking out on her. Not like you lot who put yourself first over and bloody over again."

"Hey!" Xander might have said more only Spike was slightly right. Buffy had died, and their first thought was for their friend, but thoughts two, three, and four had turned pretty quickly to themselves. How were they supposed to survive? How could they go on knowing that the white hats didn't always win--that good and strong and beautiful didn't mean you were going to survive? And where did that leave the rest of them who weren't as good or as strong? Xander sat down on the edge of Spike's bed. Shit and more shit. He'd give anything to just not have this conversation right now. He fingered the black silk sheets and wished he could just rewind his whole life and try it over again.

"Spike, I don't know what's going on between you two," Xander said wearily.

"You want diagrams?" Spike's lewd words didn't really match the tightness in his body or the way his fingers nervously flicked at his pack of cigarettes.

"Okay, just no." Xander stood up, and he would have started pacing only Spike took a step forward so he commanded the center of the room and Xander retreated back to the side table where an overflowing ashtray and a bottle of Jack Daniels covered the inlay pattern. "Spike, maybe we can just pretend this isn't happening."

"Right, so you can go try to talk Buffy into staking me?"

Xander sighed. Okay, maybe a little part of him was thinking that, but a bigger part was wondering how he could avoid the issue all together, and mostly he was just worried about Buffy. "Spike, I'm not going to tell her to stake you."

"She wouldn't anyway, ya know. The slayer likes what I can do for her." Spike leered gleefully, and Xander tried to not think about what Spike might mean by that. Looking Xander up and down with disgust, Spike made a noise that made it pretty clear he found Xander lacking in more than one department. "A great bullock like you can't make her feel like a real woman the way I can," Spike announced grandly.

"Do I even want to know what a bullock is?" Xander looked up and tried to paste on a stupid grin. It always worked to distract the girls. Spike was not one of the girls.

"A bullock. A ruddy steer. A bull with the testicles cut off to make him nice and malleable. That's what you are, and the slayer doesn't fucking need a half-man." Spike moved forward, his body liquid grace that made every little prey instinct in Xander's body scream for him to run, chip or no chip. Instead he stood there caught between wanting to verbally strike back and wanting to just curl up and hope Spike finished with the verbal not-fun so Xander could go back to his room and start working on pretending that none of it mattered. After a second, Spike snorted and then turned his back on Xander, stalking over to the other side of the room where he finally lit his cigarette. "Not your business, mate."

And Spike was right on that one. Xander didn't exactly have a whole lot of room on the 'don't sleep with demons' self-righteous train.

"So, last chance. Say what you have to say right here and you get it out of your system." Spike blew a long plume of smoke up into the air.

Xander wanted to just shut up. This whole night could be over if he would just shut up, but shutting up was one thing that he really, really sucked at. One of many, actually, but it was pretty near the top of the list. "This is so going to end badly," Xander blurted.

Spike snorted again. "Right, and she'd be better off with you?" The disgust in his voice slapped at Xander.

"Okay, I'm weirdly agreeing with you that I wouldn't be good for her," Xander admitted. At least that short-circuited Spike's anger and made his hand drop down to his side. He cursed and pounded at his leg when he almost set his jeans on fire. Xander waited until Spike finally turned his attention back to Xander. "She doesn't want me. She's always gone for big and impressive, and I'll admit that you're on the impressive side. Impressive and lithe. But this... this is not ending well, Spike."

Spike was almost preening at the compliments now, and Xander sighed. He wasn't sure if Spike was the most arrogant or the most insecure vampire in all of history, but he really did have issues. And Buffy issues did not need Spike issues to deal with right now.

"Buffy is not really okay with the whole losing heaven thing." Xander stopped. Shit. He was too tired to have this conversation or to deal with his own guilt over conspiring in that bit of stupidity. The night after he'd figured out that their spell had forced Buffy to dig herself out of her own grave, he'd gone out and gotten so drunk that he threw up all over himself and woke up in an alley, half-surprised to find the majority of his blood still in his body. A few bruises and a nose bleed suggested he'd channeled some Tony Harris at some point during the night and picked a fight with someone, but at least Xander had managed to avoid picking a lethal fight with a blood-sucking demon.

"You mean the way you lot ripped her afterlife to shreds because you were wankers who didn't know how to stand on your own bloody feet?" Spike demanded with a sort of cruel glee that made Xander want to curl up and die.

"Yes, that," Xander agreed wearily.

"If you lot would have kept your word and gotten this bloody chip out, I could have taken over the hellmouth and protected the Bit."

Xander didn't point out that Spike's version of protecting Dawn would have included killing large numbers of people in order to make minions. Yeah, that was not exactly on the Scooby "to do" list.

"She's not okay, Spike," Xander said, struggling to make his point, which wasn't easy when Spike was being a giant pain in the ass.

"Bloody noticed, mate. But she has me, and that's more than she had when you wankers first pulled her out of heaven."

"Okay, that's the thing. Spike, she could have Willow and me..." Spike's eyebrow went all the way up. "In a non-sexual way. She could have us friend-wise. We're here for her."

Spike snorted again.

"And she doesn't really want us here for her." Xander kept right on going. "Pretty much anything and anyone she loved, she's pushing away as fast as she can. She pushed Dawn off on Giles until he thought he had to leave just to get her to pull her head out of her ass."

Spike's eyes yellowed, and Xander figured that he had a few seconds before he got tossed out of the room or possibly just tossed around. Spike was reaching a breaking point, and Xander really didn't want to test how far he could push the chip, so he hurried to make his point so that he could just flee. Fleeing would be good.

"She's pushing away anyone she cares about, so if she's pulling you close, that means that she doesn't care about you. You're like the anti-love relationship. Spike, Angel was her first love. Angel. The big, stupid, doe-eyed idiot. The man who thinks that a daisy he picks out of a cemetery is a romantic gift. The big man of mystery who made it snow in Sunnydale and has the big quest to be, I don't know, a saint or something. You remember Angel, the dude who avoids any invention after 1920 with the exception of hair gel and hair spray? That guy? The guy who is pretty much not you? That's who she loved, and I'm pretty sure that who she still loves, so she's going for pretty much Angel's opposite, which is you. It's like it's backwards day in Buffy's brain so she's hugging what she doesn't love and pushing away what she does."

Xander finally stopped and really looked at Spike. He was in full gameface and furious yellow eyes glared at Xander.

"Which might be why she's so happy making you miserable," Xander finished weakly. He should have just kept his big, stupid mouth shut. Who was he to call Angel stupid when clearly he had far fewer working brain cells?

"Right, and you're worried about my feelings," Spike said sarcastically.

Xander opened his mouth, prepared to make a smart-ass comment, but then he closed it. He sighed. "If I were a good person, maybe I would be. I know you were there when we needed you. You love Dawn, and that's creepy and slightly horrifying, but it counts for something." Xander took a deep breath and tried to gather thoughts that were scattering away from him.

"But I'm not that good of a person, Spike. I'm watching my world pretty much fall apart. Dawn is turning into Robin Hood only with less giving to the poor and more taking from everyone. Willow is..." Xander stopped. He had no words for Willow. "And Tara is hurt and Giles has exiled himself, so he's off doing the falling on his own sword thing trying to save Buffy—either that or he's trying to protect himself because she was emotionally draining him, I don't know which. And my daughter is trying to pretend she doesn't miss her mom and that she isn't hurt, and that is totally freaking me out.

"Spike, I don't have the energy to care about anyone else. You're right. I don't care about you. But I care a lot about Buffy, and when she figures out that she's having sex with you because she doesn't love you, that is not going to be pretty."

Spike moved so fast that Xander didn't have time to retreat before he was backed up against the wall, Spike's forearm against his chest pinning him as neatly as a butterfly to a collector's box.

"You got it all out now?" Spike asked. Xander's stomach did a few summersaults, ended with a half-twist and then curled into the smallest space possible. This close, Spike's yellow eyes and long fangs were pretty much entirely fucking terrifying, and Xander had seen enough demons that he was not terrorized easily anymore.

"Yep," Xander agreed. Little baby nightmares started crawling through Xander's brain.

"Don't want to hear a word out of you ever again, pet. You don't say shite to me, you don't say fuck-all to Buffy, and you don't say anything to anyone else you can think of with that tiny little brain of yours." Spike tapped Xander's forehead.

Xander opened his mouth and then closed it again. This was his deal. Bonnie was safe as long as Spike was happy, and if he wasn't, he was going to bring Xander down into the misery with him. Closing his mouth, Xander nodded. He was just going to have to pretend that he didn't know.

Spike pushed a little harder, pressing until Xander had trouble breathing. And then he turned and walked toward the connected bathroom.

"Get the fuck out of my room, Harris," he snapped.

Happy to obey, Xander darted for the door. Yep, it was definitely time for some avoiding of the vampire. Xander and Bonnie were going to be spending some long hours at the park, and this conversation was going into Xander's top ten list of stupidest moves ever, right after sneaking into a frat house and before facing down a soulless Angelus armed with one stake. Xander really honestly wasn't sure how he'd lived this long, but he'd better figure out how to play nice with Spike or he wasn't going to last much longer--chip or no chip.

Chapter Eight

Xander picked at the hem of one of his few good shirts. He'd had meetings at work today--the foreman had asked him to explain to the boss why they were having problems with the materials. Xander still wasn't sure whether Frank really trusted him or whether he was afraid the boss was going to fire someone on the spot and he just didn't want to be the one standing in the spot at the time.

"I can't do this," Willow sobbed. Xander scooted closer and put his hand on her back awkwardly. He wasn't sure the proper words of comfort when your friend was the one who had totally screwed up instead of the one getting dumped on because of someone else's screw up. He had lots of practice with that last one. It seemed like Willow was always taking the blame for him or Jesse in school, and then Buffy had shown up and Willow had suddenly become half of the Buffy-and-Willow team of destruction. If it weren't for the fact that Willow's test scores made the whole school look smarter, Snyder would have put Willow in detention right along with Buffy. But now... now it was pretty much Willow's fault.

"She doesn't love me anymore." Willow's voice trembled with emotion. Either that or withdrawal from dark magic looked a lot like withdrawal from heroine. One of the guys on the site had come to work all shaking, and Frank had chased him off with an order to get into a clinic and not touch a power tool until he could stop shaking.

"I know that's not true. She loves you."

"She hates me," Willow sobbed.

"Maybe a little," Xander admitted. When Willow flinched back, he mentally kicked himself. Good job with the not-so-comforting. "But she loves you too," Xander hurried to add. "There's lots of love there. If Tara didn't love you, she wouldn't be so angry."

Anya looked up from the box of supplies she was counting in. "He's right," She said, shocking Xander. They'd never agreed this much when they were dating. Then again, when he looked back, he'd spent a whole lot of his time telling her how bad she acted, and she'd retaliated at pretty much every turn, publicly and privately. Yeah, his technique in bed had definitely improved, but no man appreciated bullet listed critiques of his performance.

"Like I am really angry with Xander right now," Anya said in a voice that didn't actually sound angry. "If I didn't still love him, I would say that we should have broken up a long time ago because our life goals are incompatible and every time I took a quiz in a magazine I would have to lie about Xander's traits in order for it to tell me that my relationship was healthy. If Tara didn't love you, she'd just move out without caring." Anya delivered her little speech, and then closed the box. "Xander, watch the front while I go to the bathroom, and if a customer comes in, try to keep them from seeing Willow. Crying is bad for business." Before Xander could even gather a thought, Anya was striding away.

Willow sniffed, and Xander scooted closer to her. "That was actually Anya's version of comforting," Xander pointed out.

"Fifty percent less comfort," Willow said quietly, the joke falling flat. Her hand was still trembling, and Xander reached out to take it in his own.

"Tara adores you."

"She doesn't trust me." Willow stared down at her lap, and Xander had the feeling that she wanted to pull her hand back away from him. He held on tighter, in part because he really didn't know what to say. Tara had good reason for not trusting her after all the lies. Xander was feeling a little of the not-trust himself. After Willow had wiped all their memories, Xander thought she would go cold magic turkey. Instead she seemed to be making bigger mistakes. He couldn't figure out why she had gone to Rack for the big magic upgrade because her normal magic was enough to get her in big trouble.

"She just needs time to learn to trust you again," Xander finally said. At least, he hoped that was true. That's what he was feeling.

"You don't understand. You've never loved anybody like I love her." Willow stopped and chewed on her lip, her eyes darting to the back where Anya had disappeared. "I'm sorry," she said softly, "but it's not the same. You and Anya were never going to make it. Not really." As soft as Willow's voice was, that was her stubborn tone.

"I know," Xander agreed. Willow's eyes darted up to him, probably checking to see if he was lying to make her feel better, but Xander had pretty much came to the same conclusion. He loved the idea of Anya, the idea that someone needed and loved him. He really liked the sex. But no matter how much he tried to be okay with her choices, he couldn't. He never stopped resenting her for wanting money and every time she said something horribly demonish, he cringed. It was funny, Spike was demonish all the time, and that didn't bother him, but Spike was safely lodged in the demon part of his brain. Anya was in the human part of his brain, so he wanted her to act like a human. That was probably not fair... not fair and not nice.

"Tara looks at me, and I feel so bad." Willow whispered as she finally moved toward him, leaning into his shoulder. "You can't know what it feels like to have someone you love look at you like you're the biggest screw up in the world."

Xander closed his eyes. Shit. He did know that. From the time he was five years old, he'd known what it was like to have someone look at you like you weren't worth their time because you were the little kid... the geeky kid who wasn't good at sports and clearly wasn't going to be a chip off the old block.

And now... now sometimes Bonnie stared at him with this blank expression, like she was trying to hide her feelings to avoid upsetting him, and Xander just felt like the worst father in the world. Bonnie probably wished Xander wasn't her father at all. Spike was big and impressive, and Xander was just the stupid human who brought home the groceries, and when his daughter asked him for something, he couldn't do anything. Not anything at all. It would all be so much easier, he thought despairingly, if he could just be honest about who and what he really was.

He was a father who was terrified that he didn't know what he was doing. He was the blackmail victim who brought his paycheck home to Spike and then tried really hard to not notice the human bitemarks on Spike's shoulders or arms. Spike with his vampy senses might think that was love, but now that Xander was paying attention, he was more and more convinced that Buffy was losing it. And yet, he couldn't be honest about any of it. He didn't trust Willow, not with her addiction, and not now that her own fears were swallowing up her life. He didn't trust Buffy, not around his daughter. Buffy was being unBuffyish, and Xander didn't know what to expect. And with Giles gone...

Xander sighed. It left no one. Spike wasn't someone he could rely on and Dawn was too young to burden with this and Anya.... Xander looked in that direction. Anya seemed pretty happy to be out of the personal relationships. She didn't even pretend to care about Willow or Tara or Buffy, not anymore. Even when Xander was engaged to Anya, he couldn't trust her to keep his secrets, and now that they were broken up, he really couldn't tell her about Bonnie or the Spike and Buffy wrongness.

And so, he was left muddling around through the confusion. He'd never been good with this part. He was the comic distraction, not the one who fixed things—that was supposed to be his girls. So he slipped his arm around Willow and sat there in silence.

Willow sniffed. "I put Dawn in danger."

"Which is huge with the bad."

"Tara moved out." Willow whispered so softly that Xander almost didn't hear her.

"Oh, Willow." Xander stopped, not sure what to say. Tara had a reason for wanting a little space, but Xander still ached at the thought of Willow alone through this. Well, not totally alone because she was living with Dawn and Buffy, but still.

Willow pushed away from him, and Xander moved his arm to let her. His side felt cold. "I shouldn't be in here. You know." She waved toward the shelves. "There's a lot of magical stuff in here. Buffy and Dawn are going to demagicfy the house tonight and tomorrow. I promised that I wouldn't do even little spells."

"I can walk you home," Xander said, standing up. Willow was already shaking her head and walking backwards.

"You don't need to."

"Ah, but my self-esteem is tied up in my ability to play the part of the white knight protecting my girls."

Willow ducked her head. "I'm okay."

"Door to door service is my middle name, which his still weirdly better than the middle name my parents picked." Xander took a step forward and then stopped as Willow flinched back. "Unless you want some space," Xander finished weakly.

She looked up at him. "I really need some. It's not you," Willow hurried to add, and there wasn't a phrase in the world more likely to make Xander feel like it was him. However, he plastered on a fake smile.

"No problem. I'll just annoy Anya for old times' sake." Xander took a step backwards. Willow nodded again and then turned and darted out the door without looking to either side.

"Ahn!" he called.

The door to the employee area opened and Anya sighed loud enough for him to hear her all the way across the room. "Since we are no longer dating, I have revoked your right to yell at me from across a room. It's rude. And as you have spent much time and effort to explain to me, others do not appreciate rude behavior."

Xander cringed. "Sorry, Ahn. I just wanted to let you know I was leaving. You know, so if there was a customer, you'd be out here. I won't yell at you again." Xander headed for the door. He was just screwing up all over the place.

Anya stepped out and called his name. When Xander turned, he almost thought he saw pain on her face. "You're an idiot," she said, and Xander didn't contradict her. With a huff, she put her hands on her hips. "Tara has got to be feeling at least that bad."

Xander frowned. This was just a giant mess, and after striking out with helping one half of the Willow-Tara disaster, he wasn't sure he wanted to get called useless again. Of course, his other option was to go home, and while he loved Bonnie, he tended to distract her from her lessons. He didn't need to have Clem give him another crap look. According to Clem, Bonnie was a genius, which clearly meant she had not inherited Xander's brain genes; however, her mom's family had not been big with teaching her about human culture and the human world. She'd learned more demony things... things that made Xander wonder if he shouldn't find a good demonic therapist, either for Bonnie or for him. Clem, who adored all things human, had made it his project to teach her about humans.

"I could stop by the dorms," Xander said. He supposed it wouldn't hurt. He turned and headed for the door.

"Xander?" Anya called when he had the door open. Xander turned to look at her. "Do you still hurt?" she asked, her head tilted the way she sometimes did when human ideas confused her.

Xander thought about that for a second. "A lot," he agreed.

"Good." Anya looked pleased as she turned and went back into the storeroom, closing the door with enough force to tell Xander that he'd been dismissed.

Great. If Xander could just get himself rejected by Tara, he'd have a perfect hat trick without the hat. Maybe he could show up at Tara's dorm room claiming that he needed to know what 'hat trick' actually meant. Yeah, like that wouldn't be pathetically transparent. Then again, Xander was starting to think everything he did was some variation on pathetic.

Chapter Nine

The sewers under the Sunnydale campus smelled of beer and hormones, so by the time Spike came up into the shadows of one of the main buildings, he was horny and feeling loose. His plan to retrieve his lighter from Buffy's house and talk to her had backfired when Buffy had taken off to talk to Tara, but he was flexible. He was flexible in all sorts of ways; Buffy could certainly testify to that.

The archways created weak pools of light as the sun started sinking in the sky. In morning, this area would be bathed with light, but right now it was nicely shadowed. A young woman walked past and gave Spike an appraising look, and Spike offered her a quick leer. Another day he might have pursued that. Back then, he would have made her into a quick meal, but even if he could get rid of the soddin' chip, a coed looking for a big bad couldn't compare with a slayer.

No, he had other prey, and goals that didn't include killing. He just had to wait until Buffy came through here. Stretching, Spike lit a cigarette as he settled in to wait. One of the stone half-walls had a little round pot, cat's eye green with some sort of carving along the edge. Curious, Spike strolled over and ran a finger along the sun-warmed rim. The pottery was cooling now, but it had been out in the sun quite a while. It looked empty, but white sediment suggested something had evaporated.

Picking it up, Spike suddenly realized what it reminded him of. Joyce had once shown him a green pot with stylized hunters and lion, all inscribed with swirls and lines. She had touched it lovingly, explaining how the Arabs had used alkali, lime, and silica to make their special pottery so hard that it survived three thousand years just to end up in her hands.

This pot could be the twin to that one Joyce had showed him. It was smaller, but the color and the carvings were so close that Spike remembered Joyce's smile as she'd explained the process. Sitting in her kitchen as she unpacked one artifact after another, Spike had felt something he'd been missing for a hundred years: acceptance.

Joyce hadn't wanted him to be a better killer or take a whip to her back while pretending to be Angelus. She'd offered him cocoa and listened when he'd complained about losing Dru or getting chipped. When the others, especially Xander, had gone out of their bloody way to make him feel worthless, Joyce had always been there to listen. She'd tell him about her day, and he'd threaten to eat whatever wanker had given her shite, and she...

Spike pulled thoughts away from those lazy evenings. He'd been newly chipped and Buffy was off being college girl, and Joyce had been about his only refuge, right up until she'd bloody died. Spike still felt a sort of helpless rage over that. If he were still a real demon, he could have saved her. True, his stomach just about turned inside out at the thought of Joyce as a vampire, but that would be better than leaving her for the fucking worms.

Spike could feel rage flowing through him, and he very carefully put the pot back on the low wall. His demon wanted to rage out of control, but Spike was too old and too powerful to lose control over the beast inside his heart. Besides, demons shouldn't bloody need acceptance. They shouldn't need to cling to some pathetic human just to keep from walking out into the sun. Power, wealth, jewels, even sex—those were bloody respectable pursuits. Acceptance, no.

The chip might have crippled him, but he was still the big bad. Spike cracked his neck and watched restlessly. A coed with one of those small computers you could carry around had camped out on the lawn. Her feet kicked like a bloody metronome, and Spike started counting each kick. The chit looked a bit like the slayer, all blonde hair and white smile and sunshine.

But she was just one more weak human—a walking happy meal waiting for something big and bad to come eat her. His Buffy might look like some breakable doll, but she was steel and strength. She'd come back from the dead, Buffy had. Death couldn't even hold that one, but Spike could. Spike could hold her hips and feel the strength rolling under her skin as she slammed him into a wall.

And she'd get tired of these soddin' games sooner or later. If she was going to be stubborn, she'd just better remember that he'd put up with Dru for a hundred years, and he'd wait a hundred years if that's what it took for Buffy to realize that he was the one who was loyal. All her little friends had abandoned ship, and he was the one there to take her anger. Every welt and cut and bite mark was proof that she did need him, and one day, she'd realize that she could trust him.

Xander had his fun, trying to make Spike jealous with all that rot about how Buffy loved Angel, but Angel had left her. The fucking nob had taught her that she couldn't rely on anyone, and her worthless friends were just reinforcing that. But Spike would show her just how loyal he could be, and then he wouldn't just have her in his bed; he'd have her. She'd be his in a way that she never belonged to Angel.

That thought amused Spike. When he and Buffy had truly settled in, they'd take a trip down to LA and show Peaches just how much he had lost—twice. Angel had walked away from both of them, after all. And Spike would be more than happy to have a little talk with the wanker.

If Angelus hadn't come up with that idiotic plan to end the world, Spike never would have started sitting with Joyce. That would annoy the unlife out of Angel. But the fact was, without Angelus, Spike would have missed the quiet conversations, and even the time she'd threatened him with a butcher knife the size of a bloody Lamk demon's arm. Before Angelus and all his schemes, humans were food. Spike hadn't noticed them any longer than it had taken him to drain them of blood and drop their cooling bodies to the ground.

Once he'd worked through his railroad spike days trying to impress his sire, he'd forgotten humanity. He'd forgotten the simple joy of sitting at a table and listening to a beautiful woman talk about pottery. Angelus had reintroducing him to humanity, and just as soon as Spike had well and truly claimed Angel's lost human, Spike was going to enjoy telling him that in exquisite and glorious detail.

The door to Tara's dorm came open, and Buffy was standing there, the afternoon sun catching her blonde hair so that she was caught in an illusion of fire. Spike had an irrational urge to write a poem. Buffy just stood there, her expression so weary and lost that Spike wanted to walk across the lawn and sweep her into his arms, but there wasn't anything Spike could do until Buffy reached the shadows.

Tara appeared behind Buffy. Buffy turned, and for a few minutes, the two women talked, but Spike couldn't tell who was doing the comforting and who was getting comforted. If Buffy needed to forget her pain for a while, Tara wasn't the one she needed. Tara with her doe eyes was too much like Joyce, all about the giving. But Buffy, she needed to take—she needed to rip and tear and demand. Tara couldn't give her that, but Spike could.

He only needed to wait until she reached the shadows. She had to know he was here—either that or some random vampire was haunting the bloody campus while the sun was still high enough to fry an incautious vampire. But Buffy didn't even search the shadows for him. She played him, forcing him to wait as she stood in the sun.

A familiar smell drifted on the breeze, and Spike's eyes yellowed. Fuck. Puppy boy was on campus, and he sure as fuck wasn't here for the classes. If that worthless git said one world to Buffy.... Spike jerked back, slamming his shoulder into the wall as the chip fired a warning shot. The girl with the computer happened to see him, and she frowned and pushed herself up with one hand, like she might come over to see if he needed help. He sure as hell didn't need some happy meal offering to hold his hand because his head hurt.

Now Spike spotted Xander across the lawn. His hair was cut close, and his tool belt hung low on his hips so that he looked absolutely out of place walking past all the nice college boys and girls with their books and their punk hairdos.

"Buffy!" Xander called out, actually managing to sound surprised. Spike stepped into the deeper shadows, waiting to see if the wanker had the balls to tell Buffy that he knew about the sex. Spike was pretty sure he'd made his point last night, but Harris did have the bad habit of growing balls at the absolute worst time.

Spike still remembered the night Angelus had come back full of piss and vinegar because Xander had kept him from killing Buffy. Angelus had planned a long night of flowers and seduction with a side of rape and torture, and Xander had stood in the middle of the hallway and forced Angelus to back down—Spike still didn't know how the puppy-boy managed that one. However, Spike's back had been a mass of whip marks and bites before Angelus had finally worked through all his frustration. Sadly, if Xander did open his big gob, Spike couldn't even properly punish the boy. Oh, he could torture him in a dozen little annoying ways, but the damn chip kept him from acting on the fantasies he'd had ever since Thanksgiving.

"Hey, Xander." Buffy looked at him with a smile, but Spike could see how forced the expression looked.

"Buff, what brings you to the land of the over caffeinated and whorishly dressed?" Xander asked as he looked around. "Wow. None of these people would get past a first interview. Do you think they know that?"

"I'm thinking they don't actually care about dressing to impress," Buffy answered. Tara stepped back, disappearing into the dorm before Xander ever spotted her. "Or they're trying to impress, but it's probably not the impressing of bosses on their mind."

"Those of us who work for a living are a little more about the impressing of the bosses instead of the showing of the boobs, not that I have boobs. Because I'm very much not boob-having man." Xander verbally stumbled to a halt. "Although I'm thinking I might be a boob," he finished when the silence continued too long.

"You aren't a boob," Buffy hurried to reassure him. Nob. Spike wanted to rip Harris' tonsils out. Buffy needed loyal soldiers and warriors to stand at her side, and Harris was blundering around looking for reassurance. If he'd been a minion, Spike would have staked him years ago.

"That's debatable," Xander said with a shrug. "So, are you visiting Tara or just gracing the university with your beauty so they don't forget what beautiful... um... beauty looks like?"

Beautiful beauty. Moron. The poet in Spike wanted to take a knife and carve those pathetic words into Xander's flesh. The chip gave another warning jolt. Wankers.

"I was with Tara." Buffy looked back into the building, but Tara was long gone. "Seeing if she was okay."

"Yeah, that was what I was doing, too. Great minds and all."

Another awkward silence fell, and Spike rolled his eyes, annoyed at being stuck listening to this drivel. If Xander weren't bloody good at providing a comfortable and well-stocked lair, Spike would hire someone to kill him. Problem was that Spike would have to take Xander's money to hire someone for the hit, and that seemed soddin' wrong, even to Spike. Raping nuns and hiring killers with the victim's own money—those felt like Angelus' sorts of games.

"So, is she?" Xander asked.

"Is she what?"

"Okay. Is Tara okay?"

Buffy sighed so loudly that Spike could hear her from the other side of the campus.

"Yeah, that's about what I figured," Xander said with a grimace, as if he were in pain. "Willow's pretty much the same."

Spike could see Buffy curl into herself. Her arms hugged her stomach. The body language screamed her unhappiness, but that moron couldn't bloody see it. Spike ached to take Buffy in his arms and draw out the inner strength that was still there under all the pain. Get Buffy going, and the slayer came out, hungry for sex and power and pleasure, and Spike knew exactly how to feed each of those needs.

Xander cleared his throat. "Well, Willow's the same except for the part where she'd pretty much to blame and Tara is the whammie instead of the whammer."

"Whammer?"

"One who puts the big wham on those she should not be whammieing," Xander said. His big grin did suggest that he found himself funny, but Spike was having more and more homicidal thoughts with every passing second.

"She did do a little too much whammieing," Buffy agreed, her voice so soft that Spike had to strain to hear over the other conversations on the wide lawn that separated them. "Or a lot too much."

"I would vote 'a lot' only my position as the whammier's oldest friend requires me to abstain."

Buffy nodded at Xander's innate conversation. "I should go home," Buffy announced.

"Oh, yeah." Xander took a quick step back, and his arms crossed over his stomach as he just about hugged himself. The gesture looked ridiculous on a man his size—a man who was wearing a huge tool belt full of soddin' phallic symbols. Some days Spike wondered why the hell Angelus hadn't ever claimed the boy. He was a walking pile of sniveling and groveling, and Angelus did appreciate a good grovel.

Buffy started walking away, but then Xander called out her name in a voice that almost cracked with emotion. Spike held his breath. If the wanker was going to grow the balls to betray Spike, it'd be now, and Spike was helpless to do anything about it.

"Yeah?" Buffy looked like she was on the knife's edge of panic. She wanted out, and Xander was standing there, his sad gaze holding her in place as she shifted from foot to foot.

"Buffy, if you're every feeling whammied, you know you can come to me, right?"

"Sure," Buffy answered quickly, and that seemed to make puppy-boy even sadder.

"I mean," Xander went on as if Buffy hadn't just agreed with him, "we've all had some pretty big hits this last year, and you definitely got the fuzzy and dirt-encrusted end of that lollipop, but we get through because we always stick together." Xander dropped his gaze to the ground in front of Buffy. "You know that, right?" he asked softly as he looked back up. "I mean, I'm going to pretty much stick by you way after you're ready to go your own way because I'm not good at letting go. So I’m going to be here for you no matter what, come hellgods or you keeping secrets because you don't want to hurt the rest of us. And I really hope that's okay with you because it's going to be awkward to be at your side if you go and get a restraining order or something."

Something in Buffy, something dark and wounded, seemed to show its small head. Her expression twisted, and Spike could feel his own guts twist in response. He should be out there at her side, and the fucking sun trapped him away from her. She had to feel him. Her slayer sense had to be screaming at her, but she wasn't coming over where he could stand at her side and throw barbs back at this man-child who had the audacity to say things that so clearly hurt Buffy.

"Buffy, I love you. I know we were big with the stupid and hurtful and magically irresponsible, but I'm here. You know that, right?" Xander put all his insecurities out in the open for everyone to see. Spike sneered.

Buffy didn't answer, but she gave a tiny nod. Xander took a step forward, and Buffy threw herself into his arms.

Spike's mouth dropped open as he watched Buffy cling to Xander, her cries spreading across the lawn. A few students looked over, curious. Others turned away, giving Buffy and Xander some privacy. The world turned sharp-edged and the colors faded as Spike's eyes yellowed. The burning rage made the burning pain in his head bearable as the chip flared in his head.

"I will always love you. You're bright-shining Buffy, even when you're snotty and sort of blotchy," Xander promised, and Buffy fisted his shirt and let him carry her weight as she leaned into him.

"I'm not," Buffy finally got out between sobs.

"Snotty and blotchy? You kinda are, but hey, I’m into snotty and blotchy."

Buffy aimed a punch at Xander's stomach, but she was clearly not using her strength because Xander smiled.

"But you'll always be bright and shining Buffy. Anyone else would have curled up and died, so if you can get from Tuesday to Wednesday without major trauma, you're way better than the rest of us. Willow and me... we just have normal girlfriend stuff, and we pretty much screwed it all up and are all screwy in the head. You're so much stronger."

"No, I’m not. I'm really not." Buffy made a strange sort of hiccup, and Xander patted her on the back.

Spike snarled, and the chip flared so strongly that he stumbled back against the wall and fell to one knee as the whole world wavered and dimmed.

"It's okay to feel like the big screw up. Hey, voice of experience here—you get used to feeling like that. But that doesn't mean you are one bit less amazing."

"Okay, stop. You're making me more snotty and blotchy," Buffy said, and this time the sob was mixed with laughter.

"I'm just trying to even the playing field for all the other girls who can't hold a candle to you," Xander said in a loud conspirator's whisper as he looked around the campus.

Buffy aimed another punch at his side before she backed up out of his arms looking stronger than Spike had seen her for a while.

"Go give Tara the pep talk. I have job hunting to do," Buffy ordered, wiping at her eyes.

"Yes, ma'am. Oh, there's a job down by the docks, but I really don't know if you're going to be okay with it."

"Right now, anything that pays is looking pretty good."

"Clem told me about it. The boss is slightly demonic."

"Demonic? Okay, you know what I just said about anything looking good? Scratch that." Buffy took a deep breath and cleared her throat.

"Consider it scratched," Xander agreed. He gave Buffy a pat on the arm and then turned to go into the building. Spike watched as Buffy stared at the doors leading into the dorm for a long time before she finally turned away and scanned the campus. Stepping away from the building, Spike stood between two pillars, neatly framed by one of the arches of the covered walkway. But Buffy turned her back and started walking the opposite direction.

Spike stood perfectly still for long minutes, not breathing or blinking as he watched college students wander aimlessly through their pathetic lives. Then he stepped forward and picked up the small pot with the designs carefully carved into the clay and he threw it as hard as he could. The pot hit the brick wall and shattered, a million green shards of jagged pottery flying in every direction.

Turning his back, Spike strode back toward the sewer entrance.

Chapter Ten

Spike walked through the door and looked around the living room. Bonnie was on her stomach in front of the television, and for a second, Spike thought she might have picked up the trick of levitating. It took him a second to realize that he was the one weaving forward and back and that gave the illusion that she was floating. He reached up and grabbed the door frame, frowning as he tried to get control over his limbs. Soddin' embarrassing to be pissed on cheap American booze.

"Hey, Spike," Xander said. He stood up and watched Spike warily. Fucking right he should be wary. The boy was his. It wasn't even like Spike ever wanted puppy-boy, but puppy-boy was his and the nob had the nerve to try and take the slayer from him.

"You fucking git," Spike snarled. He cut his tongue on his own fang, and the taste of blood, even his own, made his demon sing.

"Spike?" Xander sounded confused, and the confusion and fear were music to Spike's ears. Crossing the room, he grabbed Xander by the back of the neck. The chip gave a warning jolt, and instead of throwing the moron through the wall, Spike threw him toward the couch. Xander hit the back, rolled to the cushion and then slid to the floor. Spike stood, still weaving, a smirk on his face. It took a bloody worthless piece of shite to get thrown around in his own home. But then, this wasn't Xander's home. This was Spike's home. He'd chased the demons out, and he'd laid claim to it.

Looking around, Spike realized that he owned everything he saw. His gaze fell on Bonnie who was sitting near the wall, her eyes bright and green and her cheeks deeply shadowed and puffy. Spike stared at that for a second, not seeing Xander until the git had tackled him from behind.

"You leave her alone!" Xander landed a punch on Spike's kidney, and that bloody hurt. With a roar, Spike twisted around and backhanded Xander. The man's arms flew wide as he sailed across the room, but Spike only had a millisecond to enjoy that before he was on the ground, screaming as the chip burned a hole through his skull.

"Fucking chip." Spike pushed himself back up, his sense of danger pulling him to his feet even when his vision was still clouded by the pain. He caught a broken chair leg an inch from his chest and wrenched it out of Xander's hand. Throwing himself forward, he caught Xander even before he could see him.

"Bonnie, run to Clem!"

"Daddy!" Bonnie's voice was panicked, and Spike snarled at the tone, but the pain and the alcohol was definitely slowing him down.

"Run! Now!" Xander screamed the words, and Spike shook the man as hard as he dared in order to shut him up. Spike knew the moment Bonnie darted out of the room, and he snarled at Xander. He soddin' liked Bonnie, and if he was going to spend the evening with someone, he'd sure as hell rather be telling the ankle-biter stories from his glory days than he would sit around and watch puppy-boy be depressed.

Spike threw Xander back at the couch, and he heard the thump as the boy landed somewhere near it—somewhere that wasn't as soft. But the chip didn't even give a chirp. Spike wondered if he could take a knife and just gut the moron as long as he wasn't looking at him at the time. The chip gave another little warning zap, and Spike snarled.

"Why the bloody fuck did you send her away. Now I have to go get her back," Spike snarled. He started toward the door, but Xander crashed into him from the side. They both hit the wall, and the mirror hanging on the wall shattered. Glass tinkled to the tile entryway, and Spike shook his head to get the glass bits out of his hair.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?"

"You leave Bonnie alone." Xander was between him and the door, his body poised for a fight.

That made Spike laugh. "You plannin' on stopping me, mate?" Spike ran his tongue along the inside of his lower lip and considered the human in his way. The chip might not let him hurt Xander, but it sure as hell would let him dump Xander on his oversized arse. Reaching out, he caught Xander's arm. The boy fought, but a human was no match for Spike. Spike tried to throw Xander to the side, but Xander had caught Spike's belt and was now holding on for dear life.

"Let go you moron." Spike tried to pry Xander's fingers loose, but the chip gave another warning spark as Xander grimaced in pain.

"You leave Bonnie alone. You want to take out your bad day on me, fine. But you leave Bonnie the hell alone or I will have Buffy stake your worthless, undead heart."

Spike snarled and reversed direction. Now he was holding Xander and forcing him back. Xander's thighs hit the arm of the couch, and then he tipped over onto the couch itself, and Spike landed on top of him. "Do you think you get to tell me what to do? What do you think Buffy would do to a little demon girl? Huh? I bet I could even convince her that Bonnie isn't even your kid... that she isn't a tyke at all but another of those demons that looks like a rug rat to get people's emotions all tangled up. Joyce told me that whole story, and I bet that memory would make the slayer willing to listen to good old Spike and his hundred years of experience."

"You wouldn't." Xander's voice was a whisper.

"Try me." Spike gave his nastiest grin.

Xander exploded, bucking up and punching, but he couldn't get Spike off him. "She won't believe you," Xander yelled. Spike snarled as he remembered Buffy standing in the sun, Xander's arms wrapped around her. Maybe she wouldn't. Spike let go of his prisoner and sat back.

While Xander's hands were free, Spike was still sitting on his feet. Spike sniffed, wiped his nose, and braced his one hand on the back of the sofa to keep from falling over. Bloody slayer. She probably would believe Xander.

"I'll do anything to keep Bonnie safe, but if you threaten her, I will find a way to stake you," Xander said quietly. "I will find a way to turn you back into dust that I will walk all over. I'll spread your ashes at the city dump where you belong."

Spike fell forward, his hand catching Xander by the throat. Xander gave a little choked off cry, and Spike's chip gave another twinge, but Spike was just drunk enough that the small warning jolt was only a tickle.

"Just what would you do to keep her safe?"

"I'd stake you," Xander offered, but the fear pouring from him made it pretty clear that Xander knew that wasn't going to happen. On the other hand, Spike was drunk and enjoying the scent of terror and submission.

"I was thinking about staking you." Spike tilted his hips so he could grind his erection against Xander's body. The pain was one more aphrodisiac.

For a second, Xander froze. And then, he gave a weak and twisted sneer of his own. "You want to rape me? Fine. It's not like I can stop you, but you hurt Bonnie, and I'll..."

"You'll what?" Spike shut Xander up with a hand over his mouth. "You'll tell the slayer how you’ve been hiding a demon child? You'll tell her how you offered to sell your ass to me just to keep a some demon chit safe from the big bad slayer? You'll tell her how you soddin' pulled her out of heaven and then didn't even trust her with your own flesh and blood? You moron."

Spike pushed himself back up. "'Sides, I don't rape. My lovers are always willing participants, even when they've only got minutes left to live. It's a talent." Spike smirked and stretched his neck. The world warbled in and out of focus, and Spike had to blink to clear his vision. During that moment's distraction, Xander managed to slip away to the far side of the room.

Rolling his eyes, Spike leaned back. The git wouldn't get two steps toward any door before Spike was on him.

"I won't let you put Bonnie in the middle of this." Xander crossed his arms across his stomach like the little boy he was.

"She's not in the bloody middle. You sent her toddling off into the night, didn't you?" Spike felt a flash of satisfaction as Xander lost all the blood from his face. The chip might keep him from killing the boy, but it couldn't stop all forms of torture.
"I'm going—" Xander didn't get more than two steps before Spike was up and in his path.

"You're not going anywhere, mate. Seems like you've been a very bad human, and we're just going to have to get creative about how to provide a little discipline."

"Bonnie needs me." Xander tried to push past Spike, but Spike caught him easily, holding on even when Xander started kicking and biting like a wildcat. Laughing, Spike threw Xander toward the couch again, watching as he caught the back of the couch and twisted around to meet Spike's attack. Only Spike was still standing in the middle of the living room watching Xander. This was the boy-child that Buffy turned to. He was bloody weak. He wasn't fit to play minion to her, and she couldn't see that.

"I thought you liked Bonnie," Xander said, his voice a quiet accusation.

Spike shrugged. "I do. You shouldn't have sent her out into the night, but seeing as you did, I'm willing to have a little faith in the bit. She'll get to Clem safe as houses or she'll leave some soddin' wanker bleeding on the street for his trouble."

"She's a little girl!" Xander practically wailed. Git.

"She's a demon, mate. She's a demon armed with a knife I bloody gave her and taught her to use, and she's a right treat when she uses it—all innocence and quivering lip until she strikes. She's got her mother's sense in fighting, that's for fucking sure." Bonnie might have inherited Xander's thick curls and god-awful love of color, but she had a power to her that puppy-boy certainly didn't have.

"You gave my daughter a knife? She's six, you asshole." Xander threw himself at Spike, but Spike easily forced him back again, pushing him to the couch and practically sitting on him.

"You think you're so bloody perfect with all your human rules. You just about drove Anya round the twist with all that rot about how she had to fit into the mold, and now you want to do the same with Bonnie and with Buffy. You'd fucking clip their wings and make them smaller just so that you could neatly fit into their shadow. You're fucking pathetic." Spike breathed the words into Xander's ear, holding the puppy-boy down easily. "I won't let you destroy them." Spike pushed himself up just enough to look Xander in the eye.

Xander's brown eyes were dark with fear, and Spike smiled. "I won't let you destroy the girls just to make them fit into your tiny little life."

"Spike, I would never..." Xander verbally stumbled to a halt. Funny that. Usually the git had diarrhea of the mouth. "I love both Bonnie and Buffy," Xander finally managed to say.

"The slayer's mine." Spike snarled the words, grabbing Xander and shaking him until his head flopped like a doll's and the chip forced him to let Xander go. With a cry of pain, Spike grabbed his head and rocked back and forth as he tried to see past the agony. When he got this chip out, he was going to hunt down every soddin' soldier-boy on the west coast and eat 'em.

"Spike," Xander said slowly. He raised his hand and rubbed at his neck, " Buffy pretty much belongs to Buffy."

"And you think you can have her?" Spike sneered at the weak human below him. He could hold Xander down with one hand. The idiot had already offered up his ass, but Spike didn't need to put Xander in his place, the git already knew he was lower than Spike. Even with the chip, Xander couldn't compete with a very drunk Spike, and Spike knew just how very drunk he was.

"No, I don't think I'll ever have her," Xander said softly. "I think I’m lucky she doesn't kick my ass for playing games with her destiny. I think I’m lucky Anya doesn't call down some kind of vengeance on me because I acted like a giant jerkface. So, hey, I’m not arguing about how I'm not always the nicest person, but I have never tried to keep any of my girls back. Never."

"So, you just ruin their lives by accident, then?"

Xander flinched back, and Spike could feel his demon bask in the sadism. The blood left Xander's face. "Yeah, that would be me. Ruining lives with good intentions ever since 1997."

Spike sniffed again, rubbing his nose which was oddly cold. Staring down at Xander, he wanted to hurt the boy. Bloody cheeky, hugging the slayer like that, offering her comfort when she was always trying to pretend that she didn't need anyone. But Spike could smell Xander's misery, and the boy wasn't lying. It hadn't been any play for Buffy's attention.

A knock at the door distracted him, and he nearly fell off the couch. Clem was probably bringing Bonnie back. At least if he liked all his skin still attached to his flesh, he'd bring her back. Spike nearly lost his balance as he stood, but Xander was a good pet and stayed right on the couch like an obedient little puppy-boy as Spike headed for the door. It was suddenly hard to remember why he was angry with Harris. Hell, Harris' life was pathetic enough without Spike torturing him. Besides, torture was like picking a fight... you always wanted to have an opponent strong enough to really be worth your time and trouble. He smiled as he remembered Angel in chains bellowing as hot pokers were driven through his flesh.

Strolling across the room, he threw the door open. The flash of light was so bright that Spike thought he'd somehow missed sunrise, that the sun had come up and he hadn't even noticed it. His skin burned, flesh shriveled and he fell back into the living room with a wordless cry. Spike felt someone rush past him, and the smell of Xander's aggression trailed behind a half-second later.

"Tara?" Xander sounded bewildered, and Spike blinked, white spots still dancing through his vision.

"What the soddin' hell was that?" Spike demanded. Tara was standing there with a small pouch still in her hand and her mouth set into a grim line. Oddly, Xander was standing in front of her, his body angled for defense. True, he was handling the defense all wrong, but he was definitely trying to defend the house.

"I... I heard," Tara said. She took a step forward, her expression as hard as ever.

"So you attacked me?" Spike demanded. "What the fuck do you mean, 'you heard'?"

"Tara?" Xander sounded about as confused as Spike felt.

"I answered the phone. At Buffy's house."

"Oh." Xander's voice was sounding oddly guilty.

"What the fuck did you do, you moron?" Spike demanded. The world was still blotchy, but Spike wasn't sure if that was the alcohol or the spell Tara had clearly used on him.

"Hey, you're the one who lost your mind and went all Hannibal Lecter."

"You're the one who stuck you nose in with Buffy. Git."

"I was very much not sticking my nose anywhere. Not even when I probably should have been, but no, I’m all 'letting you two make your own mistakes' man!"

"Not bloody likely." Spike snarled as Xander got right in his face. He might have started throwing Xander around again, but Tara took a step forward, raising the pouch in her hand. Spike knew that type—all velvet and silk outside but with a core of steel. Tara wasn't all that different from Buffy when it came down to it, and he wasn't feeling up to dealing with a brassed off magic user. "I saw you on campus," Spike said with a bit more control.

"And? What, do you think we were sneaking off into the shadows and doing it?" Xander was sounding like a petulant child now that he had Tara to back him up.

"You don't have the bollocks for that." Spike snapped.

"Then what the hell is your problem?" Xander poked a finger at Spike, and Spike grabbed it with a snarl.

"No!" Tara said firmly. She stepped forward and pushed both of them back away from each other. "Have both of you lllost your minds?" She demanded. "Sit down. Now."

Spike glared at Tara, but the fact was that he was bloody tired, and the chip had gone off on him so much that his whole body ached and his muscles were threatening to start shaking. Only sheer determination was keeping on his feet. So instead of arguing, Spike turned and dropped down into his chair.

"Get me some blood," he ordered Xander. Xander's expression turned murderous as he stood staring down at Spike. Spike twitched one eyebrow up and just waited. Puppy-boy clearly had some balls, but Spike didn't think his new-found defiance would last long.

"Get it yourself, blood breath." Walking over to the couch, Xander threw himself down on the end and then reached behind him to the windowsill where he took his cell phone out from behind the curtain. Spike watched curiously. "So, did Buffy catch any of the call?" Xander asked Tara.

Tara shook her head. "Buffy and Willow and Dawn were fighting. I don't think they even heard the phone ring. But I heard. I heard about Bonnie." Tara was looking at Xander, but when all the blood left Xander's face so that he turned pure white, she looked away.

"You called Buffy?" Spike demanded. "You bloody idiot."

Xander's head whipped around. "Hey, you were threatening Bonnie."

"I was threatening you, mate. I happen to like Bonnie. The chit's got good sense she clearly didn't get from you."

"Hey!" Xander protested, but he didn't disagree as he turned his phone off and then curled into himself. His flash of anger vanished into a sort of despair. Spike sighed. Bloody hell, this was not going down as one of his more pleasant evenings. "I have to go check on Bonnie," Xander said softly. He started pushing himself up from the couch.

"Can you call?" Tara asked. For a second, Xander got his stubborn look, the one that meant he was going to do something more idiotic than normal. However, he pulled his phone out and dialed. Spike listened as Xander checked on Bonnie and asked Clem to bring her home. Tara asked for the kitchen, and Spike waved her in the right general direction.

Fucking hell. This was a right mess. The second Tara told Buffy about this little set-up, Spike was going to be out a lover and a place to stay and the dosh to keep himself in smokes and booze. He was bloody tired of staying in a crypt, but with the chip, the normal ways of making money just weren't available. Blackmail had been the most profitable thing he'd found since the bloody army had shoved the chip in his head.

Oh, Fect'v had a line on some business, babysitting Suvolte eggs if Spike was remembering right, but he'd have to be soddin' desperate to try anything that dumb. Those buggers were mean as hell the second they hatched, and killing the newborn in order to use the bits and bobs in spellmaking might be profitable, but it was like as not to get you dead. Fect'v even had a few human clients—people who wanted live Suvolte demons to use as attack dogs. Mind, those would be more like personal miniature Armageddons instead of Dobermans, but the money was damn good.

Spike sneered as he realized that he probably still wouldn't make enough to live as good as he did here. Stupid git had to go and call his friends. What kind of man went crying for some woman's skirts the second things got a little dicey? Spike glared at Xander as he asked Clem to walk Bonnie back home, promising that they had finished fighting.

Spike sniffed at the smell of fresh human blood, and Tara handed him a warm mug. "Ta," he offered her, raising his mug in a quick salute before drinking. The blood drove back the headache and the worst of the alcoholic daze, only now Spike was feeling even grumpier. If Xander weren't such a bloody white knight none of this would have happened. Spike indulged in a quick little fantasy of what Angelus should have done to the boy the night Xander stopped the poof in the hospital. Wankers. Both of them were world-class wankers.

"Are you two done fighting?" Tara asked softly, but her gaze was hard as steel. Spike just glared at Xander, daring the boy to say anything.

"I didn't do anything!" Xander finally said as he exploded up off the couch. "Whatever your problem is, you just need to remember that I will stake your scrawny biteless ass if you even think of touching my daughter."

"Never thought that, ya nob. I was thinking of backhanding you. You lot are bloody worthless—leaving the slayer to fight your fucking battles, dragging her out of heaven, expecting her to just pick up and toddle on like a good little soldier. She's fucking amazing, and you lot are a bunch of soddin' leeches sucking the life out of her. I'd call you vampires, but you aren't even as strong as a fucking minion."

Spike stopped as he realized that Tara seemed to be taking his words to heart a mite bit more than Xander. She was looking pale enough to fall over any second. Bloody hell, he was definitely off his game because he was usually smarter than that. Tara struck him as the sort to hold some mighty big grudges once she got well and truly brassed off.

"Oh yeah, and you chasing after her... that isn't creepy or life-sucking, not at all." Xander's sarcasm wasn't subtle.

"Xander," Tara said, "Spike has a point."

"Spike... what? No, no Spike does not have a point. Spike is pointless. If Spike wants, I can get him a nice wooden point, but as of right now, he is big no-point-having man." Xander turned on Tara with an incredulous expression, like she had just driven a knife into him and he couldn't quite figure out why.

Tara ducked her head. "We pulled Buffy out of heaven. And now w-we have problems that are making her life harder."

"I'm not. I am handling my own problems." Xander crossed his arms. "Yep. I have a problem, I deal with a problem. I put up with my problem moving in with me and ordering me around using threats and blackmail."

Tara nodded. "You have. How long have you had your daughter?" She looked up, her expression honest and open even though she was manipulating the hell out of Xander. And it was working. The second Xander started thinking on his little girl, Spike could see the man's expression soften.

"Her mother only left a month ago, but I've always visited her. Her family weren't bad people, not the type to sacrifice virgins or open hellmouths, just the sort to twist someone's head around so they think they're not as good as everyone else, which is making me not so happy with them. If they show up again...." The expression on Xander's face was murderous.

"Bloody hell, I may not be able to fight humans, but let one of those wankers show up and try to touch her, and I'll rip their soddin' heads off their bodies," Spike finished for him. No way were they getting their manipulative hands on either Bonnie or this house ever again.

"So humanish evil?" Tara asked, looking from one of them to the other.

Xander shrugged. "Actually, I think they were probably less evil than my parents, although I do still sometimes want to find the grandmother and have a little talk with her. Only I would use fewer words and more sharp edges. She let the other kids call Bonnie names. I think that's ass-kicking worthy even if it's not exactly slay-worthy."

"I would agree with that," Tara reached out a hand, and brushed it over the couch seat, and Xander settled back down next to her. "Does she go to school?"

"Um, home school. Kinda. Clem is awesome, and he's teaching her all things human since she already has a little too much background in all things demonish." Xander glared at Spike, and Spike lifted two fingers in return. "Um, Tara." Xander chewed on his lip. "I know this is really unfair to ask you, but maybe you could not mention this to Buffy and Willow. I mean, I normally wouldn't mind Willow knowing, but if Willow knows then she'll tell Buffy, and Buffy is not big with the demon love. And then there's that whole very creepy scene with Willow and Rack and the magic overdose, I... um..." Xander stopped.

"Don't trust Willow around your daughter?" Tara finished for him.

Xander visibly cringed. "Yeah, that. Only I would never say that because Willow's my best friend."

Tara didn't answer immediately. She studied her hands and Spike could smell the grief on the air. No wonder Buffy could never get her emotional balance back with this lot around her. "I love her too. It doesn't mean I have to ignore how dangerous she's becoming." Tara stopped again. "I can keep this a secret as long as you two aren't going to keep fighting." Tara looked from one to the other.

"He keeps his sad, little fantasies away from Buffy, and I can do that," Spike agreed. He was sobering up a little too fast, and a flash of memory caught him. Buffy yielding to Xander's embrace, leaning into him, slipping her arms around him and letting all her emotions slip out. Spike growled and shook his head to clear the memory.

"I am not having sad, little fantasies about anyone. I'm just trying to work and raise a daughter and not think about the fact that my daughter can smell lust. Although really... I'm so very glad to know that she still thinks human sex smells icky because sex and Bonnie will not be happening for about... oh... fifty years."

Spike snorted. "She'll be grown inside ten, Harris. She's not a human."

"And yet she will still not be having sex for fifty years," Xander said firmly. Tara smiled, her hand resting on Xander's knee. "Maybe sixty," Xander added mulishly. The idiot probably would have kept adding decades, but the door came open and Clem carefully stuck his head inside.

"Hi, guys," he said, his grin as fake as his pleather coat. He inched into the room, and Bonnie peered around the corner of the door. "So, how you doing?" Clem looked from one to the other.

"Bonnie!" Xander called. "I'm so sorry, sweetie. Spike was just being a poop head, and let that be a lesson about never drinking because drinking bad." Xander held his arms out, and Bonnie darted around Clem and threw herself at her father. He scooped her up and held her close. Spike watched as her eyes traveled the room only to land on him. Bloody smart little chit. She knew who was the fucking center of this household. He nodded at her and leaned back, propping one foot on the coffee table. Immediately, Bonnie relaxed.

"Bonnie," Xander said, utterly unaware of the exchange, "I want you to meet a friend of mine. Bonnie, this is Tara. Tara, this is my daughter Bonnie." Xander looked about proud enough to burst as Bonnie held out her little hand and solemnly shook with Tara. He didn't even seem to notice that she had looked over at Spike first, checking to see if this new addition to her universe had his approval. Spike just appreciated that at least one person still knew he was the bloody boss in this house. He just had to start handling things a little smarter. He had to start handling Harris a little smarter because he'd gotten entirely too used to having a little dosh and a lot of comfort.

"It's very nice to meet you," Tara greeted her.

Yep, Spike liked this life. It was time for him to start thinking about putting a little effort into keeping it because tonight had come entirely too close to disaster. Harris wasn't the only idiot around here, but unlike Xander, Spike knew when he needed to make a change. He wouldn't have lived this long without learning how to adapt.

Chapter Eleven

Spike's cell phone rang and he grabbed it off the side table. "This had bloody well better be good," he snarled, not even fully awake yet.

"That would depend on your definition of good."

"Anya?" Spike swung his legs over the side of the bed and groaned. Fucking hell, he actually managed to give himself a hangover. A mug of blood would fix that problem, but Spike wondered what it would take to fix the mess he'd made with puppy-boy. Yeah, the twit was a nuisance, but he also paid for the cell phone and the blood Spike was about to drink. Since the chip, Spike had learned to be a little more flexible about how he got his needs met, and he'd mucked it up badly last night. "Something better well have blown up," he warned her as he stood and headed for the kitchen.

"Buffy is annoying and invisible."

Spike stopped. "She's what?"

"Annoying. Just because she has a problem, she thinks I'm going to stop having a life to deal with it. Actually, she started by expecting me to drop everything, and then she just announced that she was going to have some fun with it, and she wandered off."

"Did you say invisible?"

"If someone was trying to attack her, that seems like a very foolish way to start. Now they can't see her fist coming at their face."

"Is she there? Put her on the phone," Spike said.

"I already said she wandered off. I don't know where she went. I don't even know why I bothered to call you about it." The phone went dead. Fuck. Spike could tell from the itch in his bones that the sun was still up, so he couldn't exactly go wandering around town looking for an invisible slayer. However, anything powerful enough to turn someone invisible was dangerous. If Red had done something stupid, Spike was going to lock her in the basement until she learned to give up the mojo. He indulged in a quick fantasy of bringing her to heel. At one point, she was the one he most wanted to turn with all that insecurity and anger right under her skin. She'd make a lovely vampire. But even if he could find a way to bring her over, he wouldn't. It would destroy Buffy and put Dawn right in the line of fire.

So that meant he had to clean up whatever mess Red had made without killing her. Spike cursed and headed for Xander's room. Puppy-boy was a moron with the survival skills of a suicidal lemming, but he wouldn't get turned to dust if he walked into the sun. Spike threw the door to Xander's room open, but it was empty. The strong smell of him clung to the unmade bed, but no Xander. However, Spike could still hear a heartbeat. Spike stepped into the room and tilted his head as he pinpointed the source.

Walking to the closet, Spike slid the door open. Bonnie looked up at him.

"Poppet?" Spike crouched down and rested his hands on his knees as he looked at her. "Where's Clem?"

"He didn't come today. He had to do something with kittens and he said it would take too long for him to come back and teach a lesson." Bonnie looked up at him, her cheeks darkened with anxiety even though he couldn't smell any. She had her father's god-awful love of ugly colors, but not any human scent glands.

Spike pushed a couple of Hawaiian shirts to one side so he could see her more clearly. "Why are you in here?"

Instead of answering, she just stared at him.

"I asked you a question, pet. I expect you to answer." Spike let a little yellow leech into his eyes. He had a situation with the slayer to deal with, and he didn't have time to coddle a demon who knew better than to test him.

"I wanted to be here when Daddy came home."

Spike frowned. "You could wait for him upstairs, pet."

"That human witch is up there."

"Tara," Spike corrected her. He wasn't sure Xander would appreciate Bonnie's tone, but for a demon, a human witch was a significant threat. Most humans were talented at ignoring the supernatural, but witches were not only aware, but plenty of them hunted demons for certain body parts to use in magical spells. "She's a friend of your da. She wouldn't hurt you."

Bonnie's lips pressed together so tightly that they almost disappeared.

"Come on, we can go upstairs together." Spike stood up and offered Bonnie his hand. Instead of taking it, she crossed her arms and pressed herself back into the corner of the closet. "Now, pet," Spike said.

"No."

Spike dropped his hand to his side and raised his eyebrows as he looked at her. Bloody hell. Her father was clearly teaching her a few manners that were not going to impress any demons. The small and weak did not challenge the strong. Spike had learned that at Angelus' feet, and while he had no intention of using Angelus' teaching methods, he wasn't going to let someone half his size challenge him. Reaching in, Spike caught Bonnie by the arms and lifted her out.

"No!" Bonnie yelled. She kicked out, catching Spike in the shin.

"Bloody hell, what the fuck is wrong with you?" Spike flashed into gameface, but Bonnie just kicked harder. Going over to Xander's bed, Spike put her down on the edge of the bed and held her. Her bare feet kicked at him; she was almost as strong as an adult human, but she wasn't anywhere near strong enough to hurt him. He just held her arms, waiting as she finally wore herself out.

"You done?" he asked when she finally went still.

"No." Bonnie pressed her lips together, the swelling under her eyes nearly black with distress, but she had gone quiet. Spike still had no idea what the fuck was wrong with her. Every once in a while, her idiot father's genes definitely showed through.

"Well then, you let me know when you're done and then you can tell me why you're being such a git." Spike carefully let go of her arms and tried to back off, but she launched herself at him, her small fists windmilling wildly.

"Fucking hell!" Spike caught her around her chest, pinning her arms to her sides and holding her close. She still didn't smell of aggression the way humans would. It was an advantage he'd tried to teach her how to use in a fight, but he soddin' resented her bluffing him into dropping his guard. "You'd be one hell of a poker player if it weren't for those kwaini markings."

"Let me go!" She tried to kick backwards.

"Not on your life." Spike sat on Xander's bed, still holding Bonnie. "Right then, first lesson—don't attack if you can't keep a good head on your shoulders. I don't bloody well know what attack strategy that was, but it sure as hell wasn't one I taught you. Second lesson—never attack someone when you know you can't bloody win. Discretion is the better part of valor, and those who run like hell live to not get decapitated by some soddin' enemy."

"Are you going to decapitate me?" Bonnie demanded.

"Bloody.... No." Spike was so shocked that he couldn't even say anything else.

"For real?" Bonnie tilted her head up.

"'Course not. Don't know how that rot got into your head, but have I ever done anything to make you think I'd hurt you, pet?" Spike studied her. If it weren't for her deeply colored and swollen cheeks, Spike wouldn’t be able to tell that she was upset—her voice was even and she still didn't smell of anything other than little girl's soap and pancakes. If Xander was playing some game to turn the bit against Spike, Spike was going to hire someone to pull his intestines out through his nostrils.

"You hurt Daddy." Bonnie's eyes narrowed.

Well fuck. Spike let her go and leaned back on the bed. She moved away from him, her eyes still watching him suspiciously. "You know about the chip, poppet. I can't hurt your da, even when he annoys the unlife out of me."

"You tried."

"If I'd have been trying, he'd still be laying in this bed healing," Spike pointed out.

"You did try."

"He rubbed me the wrong way, is all."

"You tried." She crossed her arms and stamped a foot on the ground in an imitation of every Shirley Temple movie Spike would never admit to having seen. Dru had been bloody obsessed with the things, and Spike could get in some good hunting in the dark. Right now, that wasn't helping him much. He doubted Bonnie's rich father was going to sweep in and fix everything before the closing credits rolled.

"I've been trying for going on three years now, and your da is still breathing. Bloody hell, my sire before me tried hurting him, and he's still here. I wouldn't worry too much about him if I were you."

Bonnie's expression twisted, and for one horrible moment, Spike thought she was going to cry. "You say nice things like how he's stronger than he looks and then you try to hurt him when all he does is try to make you happy."

That made Spike raise his eyebrows. He doubted puppy-boy had ever given two thoughts about making Spike happy, but for all her maturity, Bonnie wasn't going to understand their relationship, and Spike really didn't want to explain blackmail. "It's complicated."

The second he said it, Spike mentally cringed. Bonnie wasn't some human child who would believe trite answers like that. Oh, she'd accept them. She was demon enough to know that you couldn't force someone stronger than you into talking, but she wasn't some human child to be distracted by a bright bauble or pushed to the side. Demon children were considered miniature adults and included in adult conversations and business long before they could understand most of it, and Bonnie for all her curls and smiles, was a demon.

"Fucking hell." Spike sighed. "He drives me 'round the twist half the time," Spike snapped. "There are days I don't bloody know whether to lock him in his room or just soddin' sit on him because he puts on this helpless display that is bloody annoying. And then he goes and does something that shows he isn't half as helpless as he pretends and it's fucking—" Spike waved his hand. "So, yeah, I tried to hurt your da last night." Spike stood up before he said more. He'd tried to kill Xander last night. In the cold, sober morning, he knew that Xander hadn't been moving in on Buffy. Fuck, Buffy's idea of sex would probably break the human into so many pieces that the doctors wouldn't be able to put him back together. But watching Buffy turn to the village idiot....

Walking over to the door, he slammed it open so fast that it crashed into the wall with the dull cracking sound of something breaking. "Slayer's in trouble, and your da is going to get his knickers in a twist if we don't do something to help her," Spike said over his shoulder as he headed up the stairs.

Upstairs, Tara was at the kitchen table, her eyes wide as he looked at him.

"Morning, luv," Spike said as he headed for the refrigerator. He wondered if she'd stayed the night or just shown up this morning. Clem might have called her, but Spike wasn't comfortable with the thought of a human just wandering into his lair, especially since he couldn't defend himself from them. He worked silently, pulling the warmed blood out of the microwave before he turned to really face her.

"Morning," Tara said softly once Spike had settled back against the counter.

"You stay the night?" Spike drank his blood and put on his best poker face. Last night she'd been quick enough to take his side, so having her around might prove useful, but at the same time, Tara being here was sure to catch Willow's attention. With the chip, Spike couldn't protect himself from Willow, and he was experienced enough to see that she was becoming dangerous. Oh, the children would never admit that one of their own was on the path to becoming one of the bad guys, but she'd tasted power, and she liked the taste. If it weren't for Bonnie and Dawn and Buffy, he would enjoy the mayhem she was going to cause.

"I stayed in the room next to Xander." Tara straightened up in her chair, clearly prepared for some sort of verbal attack.

Instead, Spike shrugged. "Good to have allies around when the shite is about to hit the fan," Spike told her. "But let's get some things straight."

"Ththings?" The stutter was back. Spike rolled his eyes. It wasn't like he was going to demand blood tribute or rape her. Even before the chip, he'd never treated humans as anything other than food, and a person didn't rape and torture food. Not unless he was trying to impress Angelus. Now that wanker loved to torture his food—like it took a big demon to terrorize some helpless human.

"I don't want you bringing random people over here. No college co-eds or study parties or covens in my house, got it?" She nodded. "And no Willow. I don't want that bint anywhere near this place or Bonnie. If you break that rule, I will find a way ta kill you, got it?"

"Got it," Tara agreed; her voice was shaky, but she gave him a firm nod. "I wouldn't put Xander and Bonnie in the middle."

"See that ya don't," Spike told her. "Otherwise, you're welcome ta stay here."

Bonnie had shown up by then. She hovered near the doorway, her cheeks just starting to fade to the dull reddish stain that might pass as sunburn. Right then, he had both the girls sorted. Hopefully. From the way Tara sat at the table, ramrod straight and her fingers curled around a glass, she had a lot to say.

"Slayer's in trouble," Spike announced.

"What?" Tara blinked in surprise. The first rule of engagement was to not let the enemy predict your moves. Spike glanced over toward Bonnie, hoping that she understood what she was seeing.

"Anya called. Apparently someone's gone and turned her invisible. Three guesses about who might be mucking around with magic."

Tara slumped, her eyes closing for a second in utter despair. "Either Willow or Amy," Tara said softly.

"I was going to guess Red, but if her little mate is into magic, that's possible," Spike said with a shrug. "According to Anya, Buffy is enjoying being invisible a little too much. I'm thinking Red might have tried to make Buffy's worries disappear or some rot like that. She has perfected throwing the baby out with the bathwater, that one."

Tara seemed to physically shrink, but then she had encouraged Willow's pursuit of magic, so Spike wasn't giving her a free pass and he sure as hell wasn't going to offer any emotional support. She'd turned her head the other way until Willow had put Buffy and Dawn and everyone else in danger.

"I'll go to the dorm and get my magic supplies. I know their magical signatures, so I can search for any active spells they've laid in the last day." She stood up, her face determined. She had real steel at her core, Tara did. Spike could respect that.

"Have plenty of magical supplies right here." Spike walked to a corner of the kitchen where the stone counters were particularly thick and rough. The cabinet above was heavy wood with scrolls of iron across it, and Spike could feel the magic skittering over his skin like spiders as he opened the door. "Help yourself."

Tara moved closer, her eyes wide as she studied all the herb bottles and charms carefully lined up. She had to have felt the magic, but she had waited for an invitation. She was a real lady. In a lot of ways, Tara reminded Spike of Joyce. If she broke the rules and brought Willow here, he was actually going to feel bad about hiring someone to kill her.

"Where did these come from?"Tara raised her hand, but stopped just short of touching the ingredients lined up on the thick shelves.

"No bloody idea. Came with the house," Spike headed back to get another mug of blood to get rid of the last of his headache.

"My mother gathered them," Bonnie said. She was clinging to the side of the door, but her voice was strong. "Her father was a powerful mage, but she didn't inherit a lot of his magic, only a little."

Ah, that explained why the grandmother had been diddling a human. Must have been a real slap in the face when her spawn had ended with human hair and very little magic. Spike smiled at that. Bonnie's grandmother was a right bitch who deserved every moment of unhappiness life threw at her. Spike drank his blood and watched as Tara explored the cupboard. If he'd had his way, he would have dumped the whole lot of it, but you didn't just flush magical herbs down the toilet, not unless you wanted magical cockroaches crawling back up out of the sewers.

"These will be very useful," Tara said with a smile for Bonnie. Bonnie still watched her with wide, suspicious eyes. "I'm going to do a magical trace spell. Would you like to watch?" Tara invited her. Bonnie still didn't answer, but she went up on her toes so she could see which bottles Tara pulled off the shelf. Her vigilance spoke of distrust, but Spike figured Tara could win the tyke over. He had other problems to deal with. Heading back downstairs, he pulled out his cell phone and dialed Xander's number. It was late enough in the afternoon that he should be off work, so hopefully he had the soddin' thing turned on.

"Hello?"

"Buffy's in trouble," Spike announced.

"What? Spike?" Xander sounded about as confused as ever.

"Who the hell else would have my bloody phone?" Spike demanded. "Anya called, and someone's gone and made the slayer invisible. She didn't give me much to go on, but Tara's looking to see if Red's been mucking around with the mojo again."

"Shit, it just never ends, does it?" On the other end, tires squealed as Xander turned his car around.

"That's life, Harris. Tara will know soon enough if Red cast the spell. She's doing some of her own mojo back here. I need you to go by the slayer's house. Check to see if Bit is alright and see if her sis is with her. If not, see if she left any messages."

"Buffy's house? But what if Willow is there?"

"Try not to let her turn ya into a toad," Spike suggested and then he turned his phone off. Xander was safer around Willow than anyone else, and part of Spike really resented that. He was afraid of Willow. Deep in his unbeating heart, he knew just how damn unstable she was, and Xander would walk in there without any fear at all. Moron. If life were fair, Xander would be the first to get turned into a toad, but like he'd told Bonnie, Xander always did seem to survive. Bloody annoying that.

Chapter Twelve

Spike growled as he stood outside the arcade. The idiot trio might be invisible, but he could smell them well enough to track them. Unfortunately, they were human which meant that even if he could get his hands on them, he couldn't do a bloody thing to stop them. As if to remind him of his weakness, the chip sparked while Spike thought about what he would like to do to these idiots.

His phone vibrated, and Spike moved farther back into the alley to answer it.

"Wot?" he demanded.

"Did you find them?" Tara asked softly.

"Followed their bloody van to an arcade. Can't do anything else other than watch."

"But... Willow and Xander..."

"The idiots who took 'em are human. I don't suppose you've found a way to disable the bloody chip so I can rip their entrails out," Spike snarled. The silence at the other end told him the answer to that. He'd been a soddin' moron for thinking they'd ever tried looking for a way to get his leash off. They liked him leashed. Spike moved forward and leaned on the building where he could see Xander through the front windows. With one hand, he was holding onto Willow, and his other was fisted at his side, but from the jerky and uncoordinated movements, they were both getting yanked around by invisible opponents. The boy didn't have the reflexes or the senses to deal with something like that.

"I might—"

"Find a way to help or stop bothering me." Spike turned the phone off and barely avoided smashing it against the wall.

"Temper, temper," a voice whispered.

"Buffy?" Spike looked around, but all he saw were the little happy meals toddling through their meaningless lives. Then a hand pushed him back against the wall. "Bloody hell." Spike breathed the words as all his other senses registered the slayer. Tingles of danger crawled down his spine, the heat of her hand pressed into his chest, her warm breath slid across his skin. Spike could already feel his cock harden as she held him against the wall.

"I looked for you at your crypt," Buffy said.

"I'd have been there if I'd known you'd come looking. Last we talked, you were singing another tune," Spike pointed out. He'd known Buffy would come looking for him, but it didn't hurt to remind her about how she'd been treating him. A little guilt could go a long way.

"Yeah, but now things are different."

"Because you're invisible," Spike guessed.

"Well... yeah. I'm free. I'm free from rules and reports. Oh, you should have seen it, Spike. There was this social worker who was giving me grief about Dawn, and I made her think she was totally losing her mind. This is wonderful. I feel free from life!"

Spike's eyebrows went up. Yeah, he was the first to admit that he had issues, but that wasn't sounding mentally healthy, not even to him. "Got another word for that, luv. It's called dead."

"You're supposed to be in my corner,"Buffy's hand withdrew, and Spike wished he could reach out and catch her. She sounded upset, and he wanted to pull her close and run his hands over her hard curves until she forgot how much she hated this life. Unfortunately, without being able to see her, he was going to end up flailing around trying to catch the air.

"I am, luv. Always," he promised. "I also think you're going to be kicking yourself if Red and Harris get shot by those morons over there," Spike jerked his head toward the arcade.

"Oh yeah. Some dork called me at home and said that I had to come or they were going to hurt Willow and Xander. He was sounding way too much like a low-budget movie to be a real threat."

Spike raised an eyebrow. Maybe they had different definitions because from where he was standing, those three could definitely hurt Xander or Willow and Spike couldn't do a bloody think to stop them. "From the smell, I figure it's three humans, but they're invisible."

"Well then, it's a good thing I am too. You coming?"

"They're human," Spike pointed out. There was nothing he wanted more than to go with Buffy, to stand at her side as her hunting partner, but rolling around on the floor and clutching his head wasn't going to impress anyone. Instead he pulled out a cigarette and lit it. "Go on then, go save the kiddies."

"They won't know what hit them," she said with a cheerfulness that bothered Spike. He'd seen the slayer go into a fight angry and fearful and confused and arrogant, but he'd never seen her acting like a bloody fool, and right now that's exactly what she sounded like. Spike could track her path across the street from the whistling. Through the windows, he watched as Willow and Xander shifted around.

The sun had only just slipped from the sky, and Spike had to step around the last weak rays to get closer. Willow and Harris had moved to a back corner, along with a floating ray gun that looked like a bloody movie prop. Suddenly the gun slammed Willow, and Xander wrenched himself away from whatever invisible enemy was holding him, and he tackled the air. The ray gun flew up into the air, and then the arcade broke out into chaos. Spike watched the screams with a sort of warm nostalgia. Dru would have loved the whole scene... little kiddies all shoving and scratching at one another to get out the one door.

Light arced through the air and then Spike could see Buffy and some little twit who looked familiar. Buffy dropped the boy and lunged after another enemy, leaving the first one just standing there looking confused. Spike took a step closer. What in the bloody hell was she doing, leaving an enemy on his feet? Soon she had three twits lined up in front of her. Willow stood at one side, but at least Harris on the other side had the good sense to be brassed off. He lunged forward, his hands reaching for the blond one. The blond one fell back, windmilling his arms with a look of panic on his face, and Spike figured Xander had finally managed to pick a fight he could win, but Buffy held him back. Oh yeah, Harris was in a right tizzy now. He yelled, his words were indistinguishable from this distance, but the tone was pretty damn clear.

Spike snarled. If these twits were anything other than human, he'd have skinned them alive by now. Instead, Buffy looked like she was considering inviting them in for a spot of tea. While Spike often didn't understand Buffy... he didn't understand her willingness to align herself with weaker allies, he didn't understand her resentment of Dawn, and he didn't understand her bloody obsession with fashion... never before had he been so frustrated with her. One of the trio threw a smoke bomb, and Spike growled at the idea of them escaping. He started for the door. Chip or no chip, he could soddin' well backhand one into the wall and then deal with the pain of the chip later.

A security guard was talking to Buffy and the others. Xander had his arms crossed and was almost vibrating with fury, while Red looked downright smug about something.

"We should be going. Good luck with that ghost problem," Buffy told the guard with a smile as she headed toward Spike and the door. Spike backed out of the door again. Clearly the enemy had already fled, and Buffy wasn't doing much to try and chase 'em down.

"Oh my god, Buffy!" Willow sang out.

"I know, they're gone. I guess we should chase them." In one second, all the joy had drained from Buffy, and she seemed to shuffle, all the energy that made her so vibrant drained in a moment.

"No, your hair! It's adorable." Willow gave Buffy an enormous smile as they passed Spike. Buffy's face lit up with honest joy. Spike frowned. Why in the bloody hell would a comment about hair make her that happy?

"Hey, can we go back to that part where we should chase them part?" Xander asked.

"How did you guys find them at all?" Buffy asked. Xander clenched his teeth, and Spike wondered if he noticed the way Buffy neatly ignored his questions. Normally, Spike was all in favor of ignoring the puppy, but this time, he was right. Those three were nuisances that needed to be taken care of, preferably with a sharp edged blade and a lot of blood.

Willow sat down right on the curb. "The hard way. The spell-free way. The oh-my-god-my-head's-gonna-fall-off, my-feet-are-killing-me way. And I might have hacked the DMV." Slipping a shoe off, she started rubbing her foot.

"And back to the chasing them down part, those three were going to kill you, Buff." Xander crossed his arms and continued to stand, even when Buffy sat on the curb next to Willow.

"I say we focus on the important thing. Willow got through the day without magic. Go Willow." Buffy leaned into Willow, their shoulders touching, and Spike felt a flare of jealousy. She'd knock boots with him, but something as simple as a touch in public would never happen. Some days, he thought Buffy was as difficult of a lover as Drusilla ever had been.

"Right then, good on you for not blowing up the town," Spike told Willow, "now are we going to track those three?"

"What he said. Wait." Xander grimaced. "Did I just agree with Spike?"

Willow nodded solemnly and Xander grimaced again. "Okay, first... ick. Second... what he said." Xander poked his thumb in Spike's direction.

Spike glared at all of them, struggling to not explode. They were all blathering about while those three escaped. "Got bad guys to hunt down, people," Spike said, his voice carefully controlled because if he didn't control it, he was going to bloody explode.

"We don't hunt people." Buffy didn't even bother looking at him.

That bothered Spike more than he could say. "You may not, but they bloody well do. They hunted you down."

Willow reached over and put a hand on Buffy's knee. "They were going to use the ray to make you turn to goo."

"Exactly, there was goo talk," Xander jumped in.

Buffy just shook her head. "You two heard them. They didn't even want to fight me."

"Warren was sounding oddly serious about killing." Xander shifted from foot to foot, clearly uncomfortable about arguing with Buffy. Either that or he was uncomfortable about being around both Buffy and Spike. Spike studied him. Ever since Xander had found out about the sex, he'd carefully avoided being in the same room with both of them. Let Spike show up at the Magic Box, and Xander quickly found he had a chore elsewhere. The girls might think he was avoiding Anya, but Spike figured he was trying to avoid the temptation to say something that would get him in more shite than he knew how to get out of.

"It's funny," Buffy said, sounding more pensive than amused, "not too long ago I probably would have welcomed it. But I realized ... I'm not saying that I'm doing back-flips about my life, but I didn't ... I don't want to die."

"Hey, that's progress." Willow gave her a sad smile, and Spike just gritted his teeth. Willow was the one who'd ruined Buffy's life to start with, pulling her out of heaven and making her dig her way out of her own grave. Harris certainly didn't have the balls to try that on his own, and Tara had more sense when she wasn't listening to Red. But now Willow sat here with her sad smile, her hand resting on Buffy's leg while the soddin' enemy walked away.

"Right then, you lot even know why the trio of twits came after you?"

Buffy finally looked at him. Spike stared down, willing her to open up and trust him to have her back, to share intel and form a plan together. Instead she shrugged. "Something about being my arch-nemeses."

"Oh bloody hell. And you let them walk out?"

"Give it up, Spike. I'm not going to hunt humans just so you can get a vicarious thrill out of it." Buffy's words cut into Spike, and he went absolutely still. He'd bloody well given her his loyalty and he'd let her take his body in ways so brutal that even Drusilla couldn't have matched her ferocity, and still she thought he would use her for his own ends.

"Okay, then how about you hunt them down for me? I promise I'm not into vicarious thrills, but they tried to kill you, Buffy. I vote that anyone who tries to kill you is a bad guy."

"Fine." Buffy stood up and faced off against Xander. "I hunt them down. Then what? What do I do if I find them Xander?"

Xander opened his mouth, but then he shut it again without saying the obvious answer. She should cut the gits into small pieces and dump their rotting bits into the sewer. Seemed logical enough to Spike.

"They won't stop coming after you," Spike commented. He'd already lost this fight, and he knew it, but he couldn't just walk away. He'd seen the look on the one's face. He knew hatred when he saw it.

She sighed. "They aren't demons, Spike. They aren't on some quest to kill a slayer and cement their place in history. They'll get bored."

Willow stood, brushing her pants off. "She's right. I mean, that was Jonathan. He was one of the sweetest guys in school."

Xander looked over to Spike, clearly begging for some sort of backup. This wasn't the conversation he'd intended to have when he got up, but if he had to ally with Xander to knock a little sense into Buffy, he would.

Spike stalked forward, his body prowling toward the group in a way that made Xander skitter away like the good little prey he was. Buffy squared her shoulders and faced off against him, and Spike smiled. She was all strength. The alpha defending her territory. The head of the clan demanding tribute. Spike lowered his head and ran a tongue along the inside of his lower lip. "I told you once that love was about blood, about your blood screaming inside you, demanding... wanting." Spike closed in on Buffy, his hands ghosting over her hips without actually touching, his body crowding hers. He could smell her desire; he could almost taste it on the air.

"If you have a point, make it." Buffy's words were brittle, and he could feel the need racing under her skin. She wanted to grab him, to push him down and run her nails over his skin until he bled, and she knew he wouldn't stop her. Spike smiled.

"Oh, I have a point. Love is blood, but hatred is pleasure—the longest pleasure. Hatred is the trinket that men hold onto for years, polishing it, clinging to it. That one in the middle, he hated you, and he's going to keep polishing that hate until he destroys himself or you or both."

Buffy took a step back, and Spike let her, watching as she struggled to get both physical and emotional distance between them. She was breathing heavy, her breath coming in ragged gasps that even the humans had to hear. Spike waited.

It took several minutes for her to gather together her wits and stop staring at him, her hands clenched just to keep herself from reaching out and grabbing him. When the tension and strain finally drained from her body, she shrugged. "He can try," she commented. "I need to get home."

Buffy turned and headed down the street. Spike wanted to call out, to shake her until some sense managed to get through her; however, he didn't. In their relationship, she was the dominant one, and if he really wanted to make her listen, that would have to change. He'd have to dominate her, force her to heel, and if he did that, part of Buffy—the part he'd first learned to love—would be destroyed. Instead, he was the soddin' pet on her leash, watching as she bloody well fucked up. Love's bitch indeed.

Willow looked at each of them, clearly torn. Spike leaned against a light pole and pulled out a cigarette.

"I should... you know." Willow bit her lip for a second and then she was trotting down the street after Buffy, playing the good little follower.

If Spike had a minion in his court who played at following while running all her own little schemes, he'd dust it. He'd dust it just like he'd track down enemies and gut them for challenging him, even if he didn't think they were a serious challenge. The problem was that Spike figured these three were serious. They'd made the soddin' invisibility gun. They'd taken two of Buffy's little minions hostage, and still she wasn't taking them seriously.

"Is it just me or is this feeling like a really big mistake?" Xander asked. Spike looked over his shoulder and Xander was still standing there.

"Aren't you going to go trailing after her like the good little puppy you are?" Spike asked with a sneer.

"If I could make her listen, sure. Hey, I'd dress up in a puppy suit and do the Snoopy dance in the town square if it would make her listen. I'm thinking she's past listening."

Spike snorted and turned back to the street, watching all the little happy meals on all their little pointless chores. The streetlights were on, and a few other vampires were out, early hunters looking to find weak prey before the real big bads came out.

"Look, Spike, I know you hate me."

Spike turned around and stared at Xander.

"Okay, really, really hate me?" Xander stepped back. "What is up with that look, and please tell me you still have the chip in."

Spike thought back to what Bonnie had said to him about Xander always trying to make Spike happy, and he frowned. Xander wasn't a vampire, and he wasn't offering to change alliance. Spike knew that. He also couldn't help feeling the same contempt he always felt for weaker vampires; he couldn't help feeling fury that Xander was saying something that might be taken as defying Buffy's leadership. Spike recognized that none of his feelings were actually warranted, but it didn't make them less real.

"If I didn't have the chip, do you think those three would still be breathing?" Spike turned back around and leaned on the light post again.

"Point. So, I'm thinking that even if we hate each other—"

"Bloody hell. I don't hate you, Harris," Spike said. "Don't feel strongly enough about you to hate you, even if I did dislike you."

Xander didn't answer. Spike listened as he shuffled his feet several times before inching closer. "Okay, was there a compliment in there somewhere?" Spike looked over with one raised eyebrow. Xander sighed. "So, that would be a 'no.' Maybe even a 'hell, no.'" Xander looked down, the picture of submission.

"For fuck's sake, stop showing your underbelly like some sort of git who needs reassurance that he isn't a waste of oxygen," Spike snapped.

"Walking upright means the belly shows," Xander said with a crooked grin and a pat on his stomach.

Spike rolled his eyes. "That is what bloody annoys me. You don't follow the rules, Harris."

The grin vanished from Xander's face, and he watched Spike with a guarded expression. "If there are rules I'm supposed to follow, you're going to have to spell them out. Completely. I was never good at Wheel of Fortune."

Spike took a deep drag on his cigarette and thought about that. Bonnie'd been right. No wonder Xander was always creeping around like the lowest ranking minion when Spike complimented him one day and ripped him up the next. Both were valid enough responses to Harris' stupidity, but clearly the man needed the rules clearly explained so he understood just why he was such a thorn in Spike's side.

"For starters," Spike blew out a long plume of smoke, "when a human goes up against Angelus, the human dies."

Xander waited. After a minute, he started to frown, and finally he asked,"Can I buy a vowel?"

Spike twirled around, snarling, his real face pushing forward, and Xander stumbled back until he hit the wall of the arcade and stayed there, stuck like a bug pinned to a card. "So, you face down Angelus, but you act like a bloody moron who doesn't understand what I'm saying."

"Hey, not acting," Xander said, his hands up.

Spike reached up to slap him, and then fell back with a cry as the chip sparked. Not bloody fair. He hadn't even gotten to slap Harris before the fucking thing fired.

"Okay, if you're going to have a murderous phase, maybe I should be somewhere else." Xander started to leave, but Spike reached out and caught his wrist. He couldn't hurt Harris, but he could hold on until they'd had this out. Spike only had one potential ally in his quest to protect Buffy from the three twits, and he wasn't going to let even that small advantage slip away, not when he was fucking helpless against humans. He snarled again at the unfairness of the entire situation.

"Spike?" Xander's voice went girlishly high.

Spike shook his head, freeing himself from the last of the pain before he stretched his neck in one direction and then the other. Harris was smelling of fear now, and that went a long way toward soothing Spike's frayed nerves.

"So, let's try this again." Spike moved closer and threw an arm around Xander's shoulders. Xander was taller, so it was an awkward gesture, but vampire strength meant that he could control he man easily. "I don't hate you. I bloody hate not knowing if you're going to zig or zag. You face down Angelus, but then you turn around and call yourself a moron."

"Actually, you called me—"Xander stopped when he saw Spike's face.

Walking down the street, Spike forced Xander to keep pace with him. He thought about the time he'd come to town seeking revenge on Angelus and then decided to force Willow to make a love spell for him. "Here's a rule for you, pet. When I take a hostage and threaten to kill them if a witch doesn't finish a spell, and that witch never finished that spell, I bloody well kill them. Like as not, I'll torture them a bit just to make the witch more cooperative and then I'll kill them."

Xander shivered. "So, the rule I'm breaking is breathing? Spike, I'm not liking this rule."

"Here's another one. If a human gets used as bait by one vampire to distract another, the human's going to get eaten by one side or the other."

"Parent teacher night," Xander whispered. "I always meant to put holy water in Deadboy's hair gel for that stupid stunt."

"Wasn't stupid," Spike said, "it distracted me for that half second. I could smell the slayer on both of you, and I could smell your honest terror of Peaches. It did throw me off my game a bit." Spike sucked in air through his front teeth. "I just can't figure out how you walked out of there alive."

"I didn't. I ran. I flailed and ran."

"Shouldn't have mattered. The way you go around putting off submissive signals, some vamp should have scooped you up and had ya for dinner."

"Submissive." Xander squeaked. They were at the edge of a park, and Spike pushed Xander toward a bench that sat under a weak lamp that cast a yellow glow that didn't even reach the ground.

"You aren't dominant."

"How about neither. I'm neither. I'm a big old in the middle man. Only not in the middle as in middle of a threesome, and why did I say that? Spike, you're freaking me out here." Xander nearly collapsed onto the bench, and Spike sat next to him. If they were going to form an alliance to deal with the trio, they were going to have to talk this out. "If this is some attempt to get me all confused so I don't bring up your drunken impersonation of Tony Harris last night, can I just say that I plan to never mention it again." Xander buried his face in his hands, a move which should signal every big bad in the park that he was easy prey. That didn't bother Spike nearly as much as his suspicion that Harris would get home in one piece if Spike abandoned him here.

"The rule you keep breaking isn't one I made, mate. I can't bloody figure out why you're still breathing, and it's annoying the unlife out of me." Spike leaned back and spread his arms across the back of the bench.

Rolling his head to one side, Xander looked at Spike without taking his hands away from his face. He didn't say anything, he just looked at Spike with big, confused eyes.

"You shagged a demon, Harris."

"I think I noticed." Xander rolled his head back so that he hid his whole face again. "Actually, I didn't notice right away, but the memories started coming back about a day later."

Spike looked down at the boy who was still crumpled in on himself. "Why the bloody hell didn't the grandmother gut you?"

Xander sat up. "You're upset that she didn't kill me?"

"I don't bloody understand why she didn't kill you. I don't understand why Angelus didn't kill you." Spike leaned back and stared at the stars. "I can't even figure why I didn't finish the job when you got between me and Red back when I wanted her to do that spell."

"You tried." Xander rubbed the spot on his head where Spike had hit him with a microscope.

"That's exactly what I mean, Harris. You act like a submissive. You crawl around talking about yourself like you can't possibly compete—"

"I can't, Spike. Buffy's the slayer, Willow was a computer goddess long before she got her witchly powers, and you're a century-old vampire. I can't compete."

"Then why aren't you dead? You throw yourself into every fight, so if you're all that bloody average, why aren't you six feet under? Why haven't you been turned?" Spike sprang up off the bench and started pacing. "When Angelus came home that night after the hospital, he was bloody furious. He planned tortures for you, described them in such brutal detail, I almost felt sorry for you." Spike stopped. "Almost. I thought he was a bit of a wanker for caring all that much about a bit of nothing like you. But then you were the one who talked Buffy into sacrificing the big ox. Angel went to hell for a century because of you."

Spike stopped and looked at Xander. He was staring back, his eyes so wide in the darkness that Spike could see the white of them all the way around.

"You're pissed about the hell thing? I mean, I explained that to Buffy, and I apologized. A lot."

"Bloody hell, no. I wouldn't care if you sent his fat arse back there now," Spike lied. "I just don't see how you could have done it. You took the watcher away from my Drusilla. A century of watching her play with her pets, and I've seen her starve them, torture them, kill them, or just give them away, but once someone gave her a pet—human or not, I never saw her lose one. Never."

"So I was lucky."

"And the troll, that bloody monstrous beast that Anya used to date? And Dracula? And the Initiative? And the fucking first slayer hunting you through your dreams?"

Xander's lips curled back in disgust, and expression that looked a lot like a snarl, only the boy would never snarl. "Okay, put together like that, I was really, really lucky."

Spike sighed. "You don't even know, do you?" He collapsed on the bench next to Xander. "You have no bloody idea why you're still breathing."

"Nope," Xander agreed. "Is that why you're so..." Xander let his voice trail off.

"Round the twist?" Spike asked.

Xander gave him a confused look.

"Not logical around you," Spike explained.

"Oh, yeah, that would be one way of putting it."

"Well... yeah." Spike frowned. Now that he said it out loud, it seemed like a pretty frivolous reason to try and kill someone. Not that he needed a reason to want to kill a walking happy meal. "Can't figure out whether you’re a safe ally or not. Every time you're around the slayer, sets my teeth on edge because I can't tell if you're going to go and do something stupid that's going to get her killed. Luck runs out, mate. Luck always runs out."

"I know that, Spike." Xander gave a rough laugh. "I expected mine to run out a long time ago. You want to hear something stupid?"

Spike didn't answer; he just waved Xander on.

"Sometimes I think Jesse is up there watching out for me."

"Jesse?"

Xander rubbed a hand over his face, and Spike could smell the heady mix of emotion: grief, love, loss, and anger, all twisted together. "Darla killed him to try and get at Buffy. We lost him the first night we found out vampires were real."

Spike ran his tongue along his lip and looked up into the sky. "That'd be a pretty powerful ally—an angel."

"Do you believe in angels?" Xander leaned toward Spike, desperate for something.

Spike shrugged. "Demons exist. Seems right that angels would too. Mind you, I’m not in a hurry to meet any."

"Jesse would like you."

Spike frowned at the thought of an angel even noticing him. For a demon, that wasn't a comforting thought. However, the boy might actually be onto something. If he had some powerful ally, it would explain how he could be so soddin' submissive and still survive. "So, what if this luck or angel of yours fails, pet?"

Xander shrugged. "I guess I'll die doing what I think is right, but I can't worry about that, Spike. There are too many things that go bump in the night, and if I worry about them all, I'm going to hide under my covers and end up on a television program about a six hundred pound man who hasn't left his bed in a decade. That's really not the future I want for myself."

Spike pursed his lips. "That's what most people do when they find out."

"I can't do that Spike. I can't stand back when other people are in danger. You know the old saying, for lack of a nail, a shoe was lost. For lack of a shoe, a horse was lost. For lack of a horse, the battle was lost..."

"For lack of a battle, the war was lost," Spike finished.

"Exactly. I'm the nail, Spike. I know that. But sometimes the nail matters. And as long as luck or my guardian angel keep me alive, I just have to keep nailing things."

Spike raised an eyebrow.

"Not sexually, of course. I mean, my daughter can smell sex on people, so I pretty much plan to be celibate, oh, forever."

"Nob," Spike complained.

"Hey, that's just wrong. She's six."

"She's a demon, mate."

"She's a six-year-old quarter demon, Spike."

Spike rolled his eyes and started back toward the arcade.

"Hey, do you think it's too late to try and track those three?" Xander hurried to catch up.

"I think whatever trick Red used to find them, Tara can replicate," Spike said confidently. Xander gave a wolfish smile and fell in beside Spike. Either by accident or because of his guardian angel, Xander managed to end up a half-step behind Spike. Any demon who saw them walking would definitely think that Spike had managed to turn one of the slayer's little minions. In the demonic world, misinformation could be nearly as valuable as information, so Spike tucked that tidbit away for now and led them back toward home.

Chapter Thirteen

Xander sat at the kitchen table, smiling as Bonnie stood on a stool and stirred the pot.

"You're looking for the color to change," Tara said. She was pretending to read the book propped up on the kitchen counter, but she kept sneaking looks into the pot."When the color turns, it means that the two ingredients have become one and we can move to the next step."

Bonnie was biting her lip and staring into the pot with such intensity that Xander had to hide a smile behind his coffee cup. He had tried so hard to give Bonnie something that looked like a normal life, but it took Tara to bring out this little girl who struggled so hard to learn something new.

"Are you sure it will turn?" Bonnie asked, her voice worried.

"Almost sure," Tara said. "Sometimes the two plants just don't combine, and you have to start over."

Xander recognized the look of dismay on Bonnie's face. "Hey, I bet even Tara has that happen sometimes. I know if I touched it, the plants would never combine."

A frown flickered over Tara's face before she turned to look at Bonnie. Then she ducked her head and gave a shy grin."When I started, I couldn't get them to join a lot. Sometimes I used the wrong amounts. One time, I confused Virginia creeper and poison ivy. There was all this smoke, and I gave everyone in the house this really terrible rash."

Bonnie sucked in a breath. "What did they do?"

Tara looked away, her whole body coiled and tight, and that was all the answer Bonnie needed. Reaching over, Bonnie slipped her hand in Tara's.

"Yeah, I met your family, and can I just say they suck worse than mine?" Xander stood up to get coffee, but first he moved to Tara's side, resting a hand on her arm. Tara gave him a shy smile and sort of shrugged.

"They are... d-d-difficult." Tara stopped and took a deep breath.

"They're dorks," Xander said. "Giant poop-faced dorks." Tara gave him another small smile. "Which does not mean you have permission to call anyone poop-faced!" Xander quickly added, pointing a finger at Bonnie.

"I like nancy-boy pillock," Bonnie announced grandly, the words coming out with an English accent. Xander groaned at the same time that Tara laughed. "What?" Bonnie looked from one of them to the other, her cheeks slowly darkening.

"Sweetie, those are just Spike words," Tara said.

"That I was hoping you would never ever learn to use," Xander sighed. "Just like if I had my way, you would never grow up and never take knife lessons with the bleached one and never, ever look at boys." Xander stood behind Bonnie's stool and hugged his daughter.

"Boys? Ewww." Bonnie made a disgusted face.

"That's my girl." Xander kissed the top of her head. "Hey, look!" Xander pointed to the pot where the liquid was slowly turning a vivid purple.

"It turned! It turned! I thought maybe it wouldn't because I'm—" Bonnie just stopped.

"Because you're what, Jelly Bean?" Xander held her close and waited. She looked up at him and whispered something. "What?"

"Human," she said so softly that Xander barely heard her. Xander felt another flare of hatred for Bonnie's grandmother. If Spike offered to gut the old woman, Xander wasn't even going to make a token protest. Hell, he'd hold Spike's duster while Spike did it.

"Being part human doesn't make the magic weaker," Tara promised.

Bonnie looked over, and Xander could tell from the shininess of her eyes that she was close to crying. She hated crying, but Xander hated seeing her struggle so hard to hide every emotion. He'd done that as a kid—he'd tried so hard to smile at his mother and make jokes with his father and make everyone happy when everyone was so damn miserable that it wasn't funny.He'd always sworn he would do better for his kids, only he hadn't. He'd kept right on having the same life he'd had before that night with Bonnie's mother, and Bonnie had been left in a house where people made her feel like she had to hide her tears.

"Granddame said—"

"Honey, your granddame is..." Xander stopped. Oh, he knew what he wanted to say, but after all the times he'd told Spike to not swear in front of Bonnie, he really couldn't say what he wanted to. "Your granddame doesn't know anything about humans. And hey, she had a daughter by a human, so humans can't be all that bad."

Bonnie sniffed. "Did I ever tell you about my family?" Tara asked gently. She scooped out some of the crushed leaves from the mortar where she'd been grinding them and sprinkled the powder over the top of the purple stew. "They told me I was part demon and that being demon m-made me less of a person." The slight stutter was the only way that Xander knew that this still upset her. Tara had walked away from her birth family and had then tossed them out of the Magic Box when they came looking, but Xander figured that part of her would always feel some sort of connection, just like Xander was always going to be Tony Harris' son and Bonnie would always remember her cursed grandmother.

"Being demon made you less? But most demons are stronger." Bonnie tilted her head and frowned in confusion.

"But lots of demons are..." Tara looked to Xander for help.

"Poop heads," Xander said. "Fledges just crawling out of their graves will kill anything. They're too stupid to even stop and check if they should kill. And Bezoar need hosts, usually humans, to even live and that Kindestod guy had to prey on children because he wasn't strong enough to even take on an adult, and that thing in the basement of the frat house needed humans to throw girls down its hole because it couldn't even hunt for itself. Demons are not always the sharpest crayons in the box," Xander pointed out.

"My family tried convincing me they were all evil," Tara explained, "which is wrong because you and Clem are the nicest people I know." Tara reached out and stroked her hand over Bonnie's forehead, pushing back a stray curl that had escaped her ponytail and tucking it behind Bonnie's ear. "But they tried telling me that I was wrong... that there was something wrong with me. They said when I got old enough, that my demon would show through. But they were lying. I wasn't part demon, and demons aren't all evil, and I'm strong enough," she paused. "I'm powerful enough to take care of myself," she finished.

"Were you disappointed when it turned out you didn't have any demon blood at all?"

Tara looked at Xander, but he didn't know what to say. Bonnie would probably always see being demon as superior to being human, and he sure hadn't been able to convince her otherwise.

"No, I'm happy just being me," Tara said."But sometimes families say things that are really wrong, and we just have to ignore them. Now, the dried rosemary leaves give the protective potion strength. Rosemary is associated with the sun and it can draw on the power of the sun, but you don't want to use too much. If you do, it can overpower all the other ingredients and then you lose the balance in the potion. You'll end up with something strong, but it won't stay strong for long enough to use it. Watch the color fade. The lighter the color, the more powerful the potion, but the shorter the amount of time it will last. If the potion turns pure white... well, let's not let it get pure white."

"Do I want to know what happens if it's white?" Xander asked. For the first time, it occurred to him that potion making with Tara might be, in its own way, nearly as dangerous as knife lessons with Spike.

"Nope, you don't," Tara answered playfully.

"Just don't blow up the house," Xander joked. Tara didn't joke back; she just looked at him, and Xander looked in horror down at the pot that his daughter was now dutifully stirring. "Please tell me you aren't going to blow up the house."

"Not as long as the potion doesn't turn pure white," Tara promised. She gave Xander a small smile, just enough to reassure him that she wouldn't actually blow up the house.

"I'm growing gray hairs, here," Xander said, but with a defeated sigh, he went over to get more coffee, leaving his daughter stirring a pot of potentially explosive potion. Fatherhood sucked. He really wanted to snatch Bonnie away, but if he did, he would definitely get that quivering lip that meant she was willing to accept his rules even if his rules made her utterly miserable. He hated that look.

Xander jerked as the front door slammed hard enough to make the walls shiver. "Bloody fucking hell. Harris, your plan is rubbish." Spike stormed into the kitchen, his eyes yellow and blood streaked across one swollen and split cheek.

"Spike." Xander stood, his guts twisting. Damn it, he shouldn't have let Spike spy on the idiot triplets alone, not when they were human and Spike couldn't defend himself. "Are you okay?"

Spike stopped in the middle of the kitchen and turned to just glare at Xander.

"And of course you're okay. You're Spike. Those three couldn't actually hurt you," Xander hurried to say. Spike's glare just intensified. "And many, many more dangerous things than those three wouldn't even be able to hurt you." Xander frowned, not sure what he was supposed to say to sooth Spike's wounded ego. Yeah, it sucked to get knocked around by humans, but it wasn't like Xander didn't get knocked around all the time, and you didn't see him getting all yellow-eyed and growly about it.

"Your plan is rubbish." Spike poked a finger in Xander's direction. "I can't believe I even considered such a bloody stupid plan. Coppers in this place couldn't find their arses with both hands."

"When it comes to real criminals, no. But hey, all they have to do is follow the nice little frame-up and presto... no more idiot trio."

"Your plan is a giant cock-up, mate." Spike slammed the refrigerator door open so hard that it crashed into the pillar that partially blocked the door. "They killed some bint."

"That's not good," Xander said, but he still wasn't quite understanding Spike's problem. Spike wasn't really big on caring about humans. Hell, he hadn't even recognized Warren as the guy who made the Buffybot until Xander pointed it out, and even then, Spike had just gotten all snarky about how Xander wouldn't recognize which cow he'd gotten his morning milk from, and humans were nothing more than cattle. Given that kind of attitude, a random dead girl shouldn't have Spike all homicidal.

Spike drank his blood straight from the bag, still cold. Xander made a disgusted face, but Spike just glared even more viciously. When he stopped drinking, he wiped the blood from his lips. "They convinced Buffy she'd killed the bint."

"They what?" Xander stood up so fast that his chair fell over.

"I got rid of the body... mostly." Spike frowned. "But Buffy was still soddin' determined to go throw herself on her sword or some rot like that. She was all about right and wrong. Some days, I swear, a soul is nothing more than lard that gets stuck between your ears." Spike threw his mostly empty blood bag at the sink. It hit the backsplash and splatters of blood fanned out across the stone counter.

"Did you tell her that Warren—"

"Wot?" Spike whirled to face Xander, his game face pressing forward. "Should I tell her that I'm bloody ignoring everything she says and still hunting those nobs? How would that go over, Harris?"

"M-maybe we sh-should all calm down." Tara's voice trembled, but her hands were steady as she stepped between them, one hand held up toward each.

Spike sighed and took a step backwards, his human face reappearing. "She was ready to throw her whole soddin' life away. All the good she's done, and all she cares about is some bint that she thinks she might have killed by accident. Don't make a lick of sense." Spike's voice was softer now, and it was easier for Xander to recognize the helpless fear behind Spike's anger. Little hands reached around his legs, and Xander put his hand on Bonnie's shoulder, reassuring her. "As bad as Dru most days," Spike finished.

"You said she 'was' determined. You talked her out of it?" Xander asked. The look he got was cold rather than furious, and Spike reached up to touch his split cheek. Shit. Buffy had done that. Living with Spike was twisting his brain inside out, because he was starting to have more and more sympathy with Spike, and Buffy's willingness to hurt him was starting to piss Xander off. Yeah, Spike was a soulless monster, but he was a monster who felt things—like love—just as fiercely as any human. Bonnie and Dawn were both in his heart, and Xander had no doubt that Spike would fight until he was dust for either of them. That should earn him some credit.

"Don't bloody know what talked her out of it. She went into the station, but she came back out muttering about Warren."

"Well, that's of the good, right?" Xander asked. "I mean, if she knows that Warren has stepped up to murder, she'll finally do something."

Spike gave Xander a withering look. Tara pulled her hands close to her chest and clasped them over her heart.

"Oh dear," Tara whispered. "But if they're killing..."

"They're human," Spike snapped. "She's got blinders the size of Camden Town firmly in place."

"So, it's okay for humans to kill?" Bonnie asked, her distress clear in both her voice and her darkening cheeks.

"No!" Xander said firmly. He felt loyalty to Buffy, even this new harder Buffy who had come out of heaven, but that loyalty wouldn't ever interfere with him as a father. "Buffy is hurting." Bonnie's eyes flickered to Spike's face, and Xander could practically see her confusion because Spike was the one who looked hurt. "Buffy isn't thinking straight. She knows it's not okay for humans to kill, but she thinks it's not her job to get involved."

"But they're hurting family," Bonnie protested.

"Soddin' right. Good to know one person doesn't have her fucking head up her fucking arse," Spike muttered. Before Xander could complain about the language, Spike had turned and gone back to the refrigerator.

"Can't you explain it to her, Daddy?" Bonnie looked up, and hands down, this was the worst part of fatherhood. When Bonnie looked at him like this, Xander wanted to have the power to fix the world, but he just didn't.

"Sweetie, let's not forget the potion," Tara said, going over to the stove and picking up the spoon Bonnie had abandoned.

"Oh yeah." Bonnie went over to the stool, but she kept glancing over her shoulder at Xander.

"Time's up, mate. We tried it your way, and now it's just time for you to shoot the gits." Spike made that calm announcement with the sort of smug happiness that Spike often got when talking about killing, but Xander's guts twisted in revulsion.

"Spike, I can't do that."

"Sure ya can. You're aim's improved with practice." Spike still had that expression that meant he was satisfied with himself.

"No, I mean I can't just kill someone."

"Ya kill demons." Spike gave Xander a cold look, his gaze flickering over toward Bonnie just long enough to remind him that little ears were listening, and judging.

"No, I usually don't. I'm more the carry and fetch boy. The only times I kill anyone are when fledges go for my neck and when hell goddesses are trying to end the world." Xander frowned. "Scratch that. I didn't even do the killing then. Hell, when Angelus was trying to suck us all into hell, I was grabbing Giles and running for cover." Xander knew that Bonnie had a bad habit of judging people based on strength, but he couldn't compete with Spike in that department, and trying was just stupid.

"So, you'll be standing on the side with Buffy, letting them take shots at her until they win? You bloody—"

"No!" Xander interrupted Spike before he could go off on one of his rants. "No, I'm voting a big no on the letting of anyone take shots at Buffy."

"Well your plan is rubbish, so it's time for mine. Get a weapon, mate." Spike crossed his arms, clearly daring Xander to argue with his logic.

"No, my plan B is clearly rubbish, which leaves us with my plan A."

Spike rolled his eyes. "Are you totally 'round the twist?"

"Hey! It could work."

"Aliens could land at Stonehenge."

"I'm not shooting them." Xander thought about that for a second. He thought about the possibility of Buffy in prison for murder and Dawn back with a father who had largely ignored her for most of her life. In Dawn's case, someone might think that the monks were to blame for that since they had created Dawn's past life; however, that didn't change the fact that the asshole hadn't talked to Buffy in years. Xander looked over to where Tara was trying to distract Bonnie by helping her pour protective potion into small bottles. "Not yet," Xander amended himself.

Spike snorted.

"Spike, they're dweebs."

"They're bloody dangerous ones. You're starting to sound like Angelus—always underestimating the enemy. Look where it got him—all stuffed down under that soul."

"Yeah, I'll watch out for stray souls flying around," Xander said sarcastically. Spike slammed his mug down on the counter and took two strides across the kitchen, which put him in striking distance. Out of the corner of his eye, Xander could see Tara put a bottle down and wipe her hands on a towel.

"Listen ya moron, they're going to get someone killed... someone important."

Xander sighed. "Spike, I happen to think that someone important was killed if they killed some innocent woman. But I can't just kill them without doing everything to try and fix this first. Just let me try plan A. Just let me talk to them. Or maybe just talk to Jonathan because Warren is starting to creep me out."

"Talk?" Spike crossed his arms.

"Yes, talk. Spike, you know demons, so when there's a demon threat, you're the first person I go to. But these guys are dweebs. I know dweebs. I am a dweeb."

With a snort, Spike shook his head. "These wankers aren't anything like you. You had the bollocks to stand up to Angelus in his prime. He was barmy as hell, but he was at full strength, and you faced him down. These three would try to get one of their toys to work, and failing that, they'd piss in their pants."

Xander shrugged. "So, I'm a prince among dweebs. I still understand them, Spike, and I'm telling you that I can talk to Jonathan. I just need to get him away from Warren and that other guy... Tucker's brother."

"He is the magic user. Might be an interesting piece to keep around." Spike sucked air through his front teeth as he thought.

"Spike, you do not get to keep him," Xander said.

"I do if we catch 'im and you can't convince him to stop acting like a nancy-boy running around after Warren."

"You... no, no you don't." Xander couldn't come up with any better argument than that because he knew where the discussion of slavery-bad would go with Spike. As far as Spike was concerned, if you were strong enough to get away with something, you should go for it.

"If you don't want me to put him on a leash, you'd better hope that you know how to speak dweeb well enough to convince him. Glinda, I need you to enchant a chain. This one's not half bad with magic, so I need something that will hold him and bind his magic so we can keep him safely."

"Spike," Xander said, nearly growling in frustration.

Tara looked from Spike to Xander and back.

"Can I help with the binding spell?" Bonnie asked with the same sweet smile she might use when requesting pancakes.

"Sure," Tara said, her voice soft but steady.

Xander sighed. Clearly he'd lost this round. Now he just had to talk really, really fast. If Spike brought home a slave, Xander had no idea how he was supposed to have the slavery-bad talk with his daughter.

"You're a bad influence," Xander hissed at Spike before heading toward the closet for his jacket.

"Bloody right, I am," Spike agreed cheerfully. This time it was Xander who glared.

Chapter Fourteen

Xander hid behind the corner while Spike messed under the hood of the idiot trio's van. Xander still wasn't sure about this plan, but it was better than Spike's plan A, B, or C. Even if Xander physically could shoot them, he didn't want to, and he was voting no on any plan that involved widespread arson. He voted 'no' twice when Spike got this gleeful expression at the thought of setting half of Sunnydale on fire. Spike finished and slammed the hood down before strolling over to Xander's hiding place.

"Hurry up," Xander hissed, watching the door to their sad little basement hideout.

Spike cocked an eyebrow at him. "Prat," he announced calmly. "Vampire hearing."

"Yeah, yeah, but—" Xander stopped, not sure what to say. Vampire hearing did seem to make the whole sneaking around part a little unnecessary. "Stupid unflappable vampire," he settled for saying.

Spike gave a sniff, and Xander got the impression that Spike didn't mind being called 'unflappable.' "Big word for you, that," Spike commented. He took out a cigarette, but instead of lighting it, he just let it hang from his fingers as he leaned against the building.

"It was one of Willow's words of the week." Xander shrugged. "She had this whole experiment where she was going to make me and Buffy into some sort of vocabulary geeks and that was supposed to trick the SAT people into letting us into college."

Spike looked him up and down, and from the expression, he was finding Xander wanting. "Not one of her more successful plans, mate."

"True," Xander agreed; he couldn't exactly argue the point. "At least I can do a condensate line installation."

Spike snorted. Clearly, he was not impressed.

"Hey, if the air conditioning or heating goes out, that is way more important than knowing ten different words to mean stubborn. If the heat goes out in winter, you'll actually appreciate me."

"Not bloody likely. I'm a vampire, mate."

Xander was not buying that argument at all. Deadboy might be willing to live like a monk when he had the soul attached, but Spike was a pure hedonist, through and through. Hedonist—another Willow word. "You're a vampire addicted to your heat sources. You run the hot water out every single night, Spike. You use the fireplace anytime it gets below 70 and don't think I didn't notice the electric blanket."

"No need ta be miserable when you can get all the little luxuries handed to you." Spike looked at Xander, and his expression made it very clear that he expected Xander to be providing those luxuries.

Crossing his arms, Xander glared at Spike.

"Wot?"

"When did I start understanding all your weird English looks?"

"English looks?" Spike actually looked confused at that.

"Like all your English talk with prat and prams and biscuits that aren't biscuits, only more with the twitching eyebrow and narrow eyes," Xander explained. Now that he thought about it, Spike actually managed to say a whole lot without actually saying anything.

"A look can't be English, you prat."

"Hey, you have English looks, and I'm just wondering when they started making sense."

"Really?" Spike leaned against the wall and ran his tongue along the inside of his lower lip as he considered Xander like a bug under a microscope. "Right then, what am I thinking about now?"

"That I’m a moron," Xander answered with confidence.

Spike's mouth came open like he was going to protest that, but then he closed it again. "That was too bloody easy," he complained. "'Sides, the real morons are coming. Let's get to the car."He headed for the alley, and Xander scrambled to follow.

"At least I'm the moron who knows how to keep a job and not spend my whole life living in a basement making invisibility rays." Xander thought about that for a second as he got into Spike's car and shoved aside a mountain of crumpled paper and enough empty bottles of Jack Daniels to build an altar to drunkenness. "Actually, that doesn't sound very moronic. That sounds a whole lot ofsmart."

Spike snorted and started the car. "If they were smart, they'd bugger off before turning themselves into a target. Those three don't have the common sense ta come in out of the rain. You'd be doing the human race a favor if ya took 'em out of the gene pool."

"Forget it, Spike. I'm not killing them." Xander kicked a bottle that rolled into his ankle from the force of Spike taking the corner too fast. "Okay, shouldn't the van be breaking down at this point?"

"It will." Spike had that grim look on his face—the one that said his plans weren't going exactly the way he'd planned.

"Uh-huh." Xander crossed his arms and glared at Spike. "Tell me you didn't screw up."

"I didn't bloody screw up, moron."

"I'd feel better if you didn't have your 'oops' face on when you said that."

Spike turned to glare at Xander for so long that Xander could feel the growing panic as the car kept barreling down the street—right toward a dead end, emphasis on dead.

"Spike!" Xander pointed out the front window of the car. "Road! Spike!" Spike slowly smirked as he definitely didn't bother looking. "You're going to kill us!"

"Already dead here." Spike's smirk got just a little wider before he finally turned back toward the road. His eyes went wide. "Bloody fucking hell." Jerking the wheel to the right, he barely avoided a pole as the wheels jumped the curb and they took out a bench. Spike wrenched the wheel and the car bounced back into the road.

Xander clutched at the dashboard, his heart pounding so fast that he could hear his own blood pounding in his ears. "You... you... moron!" Xander gasped. It wasn't the best insult in the world, but it was the best he could do when most of his concentration was going into not peeing his pants.

"Don't get your knickers in a twist." Spike had his cool firmly in place, but the car had a weird thump-click in the transmission it hadn't had two seconds ago.

"Hey, my knickers have every right to be twisty. Geez, Spike, some of us would like to survive our twenties."

"All downhill after twenty-five, mate. Be better to get turned young and handsome."

"Um... what? That's a no. How did we even start talking about turning because I will never be turned. I'm going to be old and wrinkly and grandfatherly with all the little grandkids."

Spike looked over, but this time, it was only a glance. "That's not going to be easy. Not when you don't plan on letting the bit have sex."

"It's called immaculate conception," Xander countered. Ahead of them, red lights flashed as everyone put on brakes. "Spike!"

"I see 'em. Bloody hell, you're going to give yourself a heart attack before you're thirty. I'm all in favor of dying young and leaving a soddin' pretty corpse—" Spike smiled wide and preened just enough to make it clear that he considered himself a particularly pretty corpse. "But a heart attack would just be a bloody waste. If you're going to kill yourself, slitting the wrists is a better way to go."

"I'm not letting you drink me," Xander said, his words clipped. Part of it was aggravation with Spike, and part was good old-fashioned terror because this was his first official kidnapping. "Are you sure they're going to split up?" Xander asked.

Spike snorted. "If you were stuck in a van with any two of those three, would you want to stick together?"

"Point," Xander conceded. They were working together, but from what Spike said from his spying missions, they didn't exactly like each other. Xander was starting to understand bits of Spike-thought just by watching which parts of the idiot trio confused Spike the most. Spike sure as hell couldn’t figure out why Jonathan and Andrew kept having the same fight—one that usually started with one of them touching the other's stuff. His comment that one of them should just kill the other and get it over with did make Xander think that maybe Spike didn't understand horseplay. At least, Xander was pretty sure it was horseplay. If Andrew was touching Jonathan's comic books, it might have been semi-serious, but the whole fighting without expecting anyone to win was definitely not impressing Spike.

Spike pulled the car over to the side, and now Xander could see the van's hood up, smoke pouring out from the engine. "Worked like a charm," Spike said smugly.

"Phase one, anyway. We still have to get through the kidnapping part."

"Easy enough. I've done it a million times," Spike commented with a shrug. That made Xander look over at him.

"Okay, that's just creepy."

"Wot?" Spike turned to Xander, and clearly they had reached another piece of human logic that was not working its way into Spike's brain.

"Please do not remind me that you're a mass murderer, not when we're in the same car." Xander could feel his stomach roll at the thought. He was kidnapping an ex-potential-friend with one-quarter of the Scourge of Europe driving the car. At sixteen, his whole vampire-bad rule might have been simplistic and stupid, but at least it never left him wanting to throw up in his mouth.

"I am evil, mate."

"See, I know this. I'm just trying really hard to forget it," Xander said. Before Spike could answer, Xander pointed out the front window. "Jonathan!!" They'd already decided to target either Jonathan or Andrew, whichever one ended up on his own, but Xander was a little relieved to see the short, dark-haired man get out and start walking down the street. From the body language, he was pissed.

"Oh yeah! Double back at you!" Andrew yelled from the side of the van, waving his fist toward Jonathan who just started walking faster.

"Good crossbow, and you could take him out easy from here," Spike said, curling his lip in disgust as Andrew started complaining to someone in the van—more than likely Warren.

"I'm not killing anyone."

Spike sighed, but he pulled back into traffic so they could pass the van. Since Spike had traded the old clunker with spray painted windows for a medium-old semi-clunker with tinted windows, hopefully Warren and Andrew wouldn't notice them. And if they did... well, Xander would revise his policy of not killing people if he had to, he just really didn't want to have to. "Daft gits," Spike muttered as they passed the van, and Xander chose to believe he was talking about Warren and Andrew who were now loudly arguing about whose job it was to keep the van running. From the little bits Xander could catch, Warren seemed to think that as grand-master poopah dork, he was above chores like getting the oil changed.

"Right then, you still sure this is going to work?" Spike asked. They passed Jonathan and a half block farther down, Spike pulled the car over to the curb again.

"Sure? No. But hey, the advantage is that if it doesn't work, he won't be dead."

Spike gave Xander a withering look, one that made it perfectly clear that he was fine with any plan that ended in death. However, instead of having another round of calling Xander stupid for not wanting to commit murder, Spike just arched his back and slithered into the backseat in a move that would have made a pole dancer envy Spike's flexibility.

"You ready?" Spike asked from the back seat. Xander nodded. Spike could grab Jonathan, but the chances were that he couldn't hold him for long, not without hurting him, and with the chip, that was not going to be pretty.

"I'm ready," Xander said as firmly as he could. Shifting around, he got on his knees and prepared to jump on Jonathan as soon as he was in back. The handcuffs dug into his ass, the metal making hard circles in his flesh, but Xander ignored that and just tried to not hyperventilate.

Throwing the back door open, Spike sprang out just as Jonathan went to pass the car. Jonathan gave a startled yelp, but Spike half flung, half stuffed him into the backseat before he could really get any defense together. Xander squirmed over the front seat and sort of flopped on top of Jonathan, yelping when Spike slammed the car door and Xander's shin got in the way. Colorful British curses answered, and Xander knew that Spike was hurting bad, but he really didn't have time to worry since Jonathan turned into a bucking bronco under him.

"Help! Help! Fire! Kidnapping! Rape!" Jonathan seemed to be calling out random crimes, and Xander struggled to get a hand over his mouth before he attracted too much attention. Yeah, this was Sunnydale, but sometimes people did actually notice things. Not often, but sometimes.

The driver's side door opened, and Spike was still cursing as he threw himself into the seat and started the car. "If you can't fucking convince him, I'm having him for dinner," Spike snarled. He then gave a roar of pain that suggested his chip didn't like that plan. Xander cringed in sympathy, but with Jonathan fighting the handcuffs, he really didn't have time to worry about it. The car pulled away from the curb, and for better or worse, Xander had just committed his first felony with Spike. If this went wrong, Buffy was going to kill both of them.

Spike pulled the car up next to a storm drain big enough for a cow to walk through, and Xander struggled to get the collar with Tara's magical un-magic spell on it tied around Jonathan's neck. He might not want to hurt Jonathan, but that didn't mean he wanted to give Jonathan the chance to magically fry him.

"This is kidnapping!" Jonathan cried out as Spike opened the back door and reached into grab Jonathan's shoulder. One unhappy look, and Xander knew that Spike didn't like Jonathan's hands being cuffed in front of him, but Xander just felt lucky to have gotten the cuffs on at all. Jonathan might be small, but he was a wiry little fighter.

"'Course it is. It's not like I invited ya over for tea." Ignoring the handcuffs, Spike started for the storm drain, dragging Jonathan with him. Xander locked up the car and went running after them.

"Xander, you have to help me," Jonathan begged, and Xander felt little stabs of guilt at that.

"Okay, I hate to say this, but we aren't on the same side anymore, Jonathan," Xander said, and that actually hurt. Jonathan was the other dork Cordelia had dated. He was the other one that the demons always seemed to target. He was the alternate Zeppo, and Xander had always felt a bit of a connection to him. Maybe that's why Xander avoided him, because sometimes looking in a mirror was just not good for the ego.

Spike dragged Jonathan to a hidden door in the side of the tunnel and pressed a rune into the side of a brick. Xander wondered how Spike had found the hidden catacombs under the house, but the man had been way more secretive about that than Xander had expected. Spike wanted to have his secrets, and Xander couldn't really do much about it. The room Spike pulled Jonathan into was pretty clearly part of a dungeon. The center room was barely high enough for Xander to stand up without ducking, and there were two cells set into the stone walls on either side, both so narrow that Xander wouldn't be able to fully stretch out, and both so low that he'd be forced to crouch. Either they were built for really small demons, or grandmother did like to torture people.

Jonathan tried to stop, but Spike just pushed him forward and pressed him down into a chair in the middle of the room.

"You can't keep me!" Jonathan tried to stand up, but Spike stepped so close that Jonathan would have to get in Spike's face, and even knowing that Spike was chipped didn't stop him from being seriously terrifying. Jonathan settled back into the chair. Xander felt more than a little guilty, but he followed the plan and wrapped a rope around Jonathan's chest and arms, tying him to the chair even though Jonathan was looking at him with big, tragic eyes.

Xander was tying the knots before Spike leaned down and got right in Jonathan's face. "Mate, as far as I'm concerned, you're nothing more than chattel."

"Spike!"

"Wot?" Standing up, Spike gave Xander a contemptuous look. "I made it pretty clear that I'm not letting him loose to threaten Buffy." Xander sighed, not sure what to say because a big part of him agreed with Spike. He just really didn't think that slavery was an actual option.

"Me? I'm not threatening her." Jonathan's voice was shaky, but Xander didn't know if it was guilt or fear affecting him.

Xander moved around to the front and tried to put on a friendly face. With Jonathan looking at him like Xander was a serial killer, it was hard to keep focused on the plan. "Jonathan, I'm on your side," Xander promised. "I'm voting a big old 'no' to any plan of Spike's because Spike's plan are just a little evil."

"Then why did you kidnap me?"

Xander crossed his arms. "Why did you try and kill Buffy?"

"I didn't!"

"Invisiray Buffy! Ringing any bells?" Xander's voice went all high, but Xander was still more than a little pissed about that.

Jonathan was already shaking his head. "That was a mistake. I like Buffy. I wouldn't kill her."

"And Warren?"

Xander's question made Jonathan freeze like a deer in the headlights. He stared up at Xander and swallowed several times. "I like Warren, too. Kinda," he finally said, but from the tone, Xander could guess that Jonathan was intentionally misunderstanding the question.

Spike snorted. "He's a bigger prat than you are," Spike told Xander.

"You're not helping, Spike."

"Not trying to." Spike leaned back against the stone wall and watched with all the calm of a vampire who had already decided that slavery and death penalty were options if Jonathan didn't listen to reason. Xander back was sweating. He really didn't handle pressure well.

Instead of thinking about Spike and his ultimatums, Xander focused on their prisoner. "Jonathan, you know Warren doesn't like Buffy," Xander said calmly.

Jonathan frowned and started staring at his own knees. "Well, yeah."

"Okay, so you know Warren hates Buffy, that's step one. How many times has he threatened to kill Buffy?"

"What?" Jonathan looked up. "Never."

"Really? Doesn't he call himself Buffy's arch-nemesis?"

More silence and more swallowing. "Well, maybe," Jonathan admitted.

"And what is Lex Luther always trying to do to Superman? What is Black Manta always trying to do to Aquaman? What is the Joker always trying to do to Batman?" Xander pulled a second chair over and put it in front of Jonathan so he could sit down to talk to him. "Come on, Jonathan, you're not this dumb."

Spike snorted again, and Xander glared at him.

"He doesn't mean it." Jonathan quietly defended his friend. His evil friend.

"Really? So he didn't have the invisiray thingy set to turn Buffy into jello?" Xander waited, but Jonathan didn't answer. He was staring at his own knees like he could just make himself disappear if he tried hard enough. Maybe he really was trying to do that, but Xander had faith that Tara's magic collar would keep that from happening. "Maybe I even heard it wrong and he didn't kill some girl while trying to make her a sex slave," Xander said softly. Jonathan looked up so fast that he probably gave himself whiplash. "As someone else who is not exactly talented with women, can I just say that rape and sexual slavery is squicky to a level that I actually had to consider Spike's suggestion that we just kill you."

"You did?" Spike stood up straight, but Xander focused on Jonathan who seemed to have lost most of the color out of his face.

"You're a rapist." Xander said the words quietly and firmly. Jonathan turned nearly pure white.

"He never..."

"What? He never got around to raping her, so that makes you only an attempted rapist, because I'm not really seeing the moral line there, Jonathan. I mean, you're smart and talented, and yeah, you're a little dorky, but I never would have thought you were a rapist."

"I wouldn't have." Jonathan whispered his denial.

"No, you just would have helped others." Xander sighed. This was harder than he thought. "Newsflash, Jonathan, that's the same thing. If some demon catches me, do you think he's going to care that I don't usually get a chance to kill the demons? That I'm more backup for Buffy than an actual fighter? No. I help Buffy do her thing, so that means I'm morally right there with her." Xander left out all the other ways he was morally responsible for others. He'd helped Willow pull Buffy out of heaven. When Faith came to town and was living in a cockroach infested hotel, he hadn't even mentioned it to Giles because he was too afraid of making him angry again after the whole Valentine's day spell and then the "kick his ass" lie. Actually, he should probably feel morally responsible for the lie, but he was still feeling pretty justified on that one. He just hadn't wanted to put himself out there and get everyone mad at him again. It was a pretty lame reason to not help someone who really needed help, and Xander still felt guilty for leaving Faith hanging like that.

"And you," Xander continued, "are right there morally with Warren, which would make you a raping, killing, back-stabbing arch-villain."

"A bloody poor excuse for one, too," Spike chimed in.

Xander glared at Spike. The stupid vampire had promised that Xander could try this his way, and now he was sticking his nose in. However, Spike just stared right back without even pretending that he'd back off.

"Okay, normally I try hard to not ever agree with Spike, just on principle, but you are more Maxie Zeus than Ra's Al Ghul," Xander told Jonathan. "Seriously. But you're still much with the morally creepy. I mean, if I told Buffy that there was this demon that was trying to mind-wipe women to rape them and killing and stealing, I’m pretty sure that she'd be right there with a big honking sword to cut them into little pieces. If you're doing things to earn yourself a spot on Buffy's kill-list, that makes you a giant creep. And I'm guessing that the girl you helped Warren kill would call you a psychopathic bully." Xander could see that the one word—bully—had reached Jonathan more than anything else he'd said.

"I'm not a bully," Jonathan snapped.

"Really? How do you define bully because I'm thinking pushing people around using your fancy equipment is pretty bullyish."

"I—" Jonathan just stopped. Xander could see him squirm, and it didn't have anything to do with the ropes.

"I just wanted—" Jonathan stopped again, but Xander didn't need him to finish that sentence. He'd felt the same way often enough to understand Jonathan. Hell, he'd wanted so much to make a difference—to have a place where he fit in—that he sacrificed Bonnie's first few years of childhood. He'd left her with a vindictive and cold grandmother while he went running around playing Buffy's sidekick. Yeah, the need to not be the worthless, in-the-corner guy was pretty hard to deal with when you grew up with so many people calling you worthless.

"I get it," Xander said softly, "but Warren? Seriously, sidekick to evil makes you Harley Quinn, and I'm pretty sure that's not really what you're going for."

Jonathan shook his head without looking up. Xander suspected he was trying to not cry. Walking over, Xander started untying the ropes.

"Oi, what the bloody hell are you doing?"

"Untying him. Duh," Xander answered.

"If I didn't have this chip." Spike just about growled he words, so Xander figured he really was good and frustrated. Unfortunately, Xander didn't know any other way to handle Jonathan and letting Spike keep him was just not going to happen.

"Yep, you'd eat me in a second, got it," Xander agreed. "And I'm really hoping that chip was made with German engineering because I am very well aware of that." Spike glared murder at him, but Xander finished untying the ropes so that Jonathan could reach up with his cuffed hands and rub at his eyes. No man should have to cry in front of people without being able to hide it. He couldn't remember how many times he'd been reduced to near-tears after the whole Cordelia thing, and if someone had tied him to a chair and kept him from hiding it, he would not have been happy.

"I tried to get Warren to go to the police," Jonathan said softly. "After he killed Katrina, I told them that we should pay for our crimes. It isn't right, and now the police are saying that she killed herself." Jonathan's breathing grew shaky. "It isn't right," he whispered.

"Jonathan, have you ever thought about L.A.?" Thinking about Cordelia had suddenly give Xander a whole new idea, and as a bonus, Spike was going to hate it.

Jonathan sniffed. "Sure. They have some neat magic shops. I can't go to the one up here much anymore because... well... you know." He shrugged.

"Yeah, even if you weren't fighting for the side of evil, Anya can be a little difficult to deal with," Xander admitted. "But I was wondering if you would like to maybe learn a little magic without working for Warren, because you know that's going to end badly." Xander grimaced. "Strike that. It already has ended badly. Someone's dead, so going back..."

"Is not an option," Spike cut in. "You targeted the slayer. Either you'll get the fucking hell out of her territory, or I'll find a way to split you open, chip or no chip," Spike warned.

"And as creepy as this sounds, I'm going to be siding with Spike on that if you keep trying to hurt Buffy." Xander didn't move as Spike walked up to stand at Xander's side. Yep, they were a united front on this issue, and being all 'united front' with Spike was badly rearranging his brain.

"So, L.A?" Jonathan looked up. His eyes were red and swollen, but he'd either fought back or wiped away the actual tears.

"Yep. Hey, you'll like this guy. He was totally dweebish, only he was all geek boy with demonology books instead of comic books."

Spike looked over in horror. "No!" Spike crossed his arms.

"What?" Xander looked up with his best innocent smile as he pulled out his cell phone, but Spike's glare just got fiercer. Clearly he was not amused at Xander's big plan.

"You are not giving that wanker a valuable piece like a magic user."

Xander dialed the number. "Hey, look at the bright side," Xander said with a smile, "Angel is going to rip his hair out wondering where the trap is." Xander turned to Jonathan. "Angel is Spike's souled up sire, and he's a giant pain in the ass. He spends a hundred years crawling around alleys doing absolutely nothing to help anyone, and he thinks that makes him a champion. Personally, I think he's just a walking commercial for Prozac, but does anyone listen to me?"

"Not usually," an unhappy voice answered over the phone. Xander closed his eyes and cringed as it occurred to him a little too late that the phone had stopped ringing.

"Deadboy!" Xander faked enthusiasm, and Spike snorted his disgust at the whole mess.

"Is something wrong?" Angel was sounding a little more testy than usual, but Xander didn't actually care.

"I wanted to talk to Wesley. Is he around?"

"Wesley?"

"Yeah, Wesley. Former watcher. Demon expert. Rogue demon hunter. You know, Wesley."

Angel didn't answer.

"Or I suppose I could ask Spike to drive me down to L.A. so I could talk to him in person," Xander offered. Spike's scowl turned into an amused smirk as Angel immediately called for Wesley to come to the phone. "Wanker," Spike whispered before he pulled out a cigarette and walked to the far side of the room to lean against the wall and light it.

"Mr. Harris?" Wesley asked in a confused voice.

"Hey, Wes. Long time no verbally torture."

"Yes, I had rather enjoyed our growing schism."

"That sounds vaguely insulty, and I was actually calling to do you a favor."

"Oh?" Wesley sounded a lot more interested now.

"How much natural magic would it take to create a time loop that traps a slayer?"

"Buffy's trapped?" Wesley sounded alarmed, and Xander could hear a half dozen voices in the background. Angel probably had them all ready to come riding to Buffy's rescue, which wasn't all that comforting because when she really needed him, like when she was emotionally drowning and doing her weird sex thing with Spike, then he wasn't anywhere to be seen.

"Not anymore. She broke loose, but not after really having a really bad day. Over and over," Xander said. "And then the same guy, and keep in mind this guy has very little training. He's doing this mostly from reading spell books, but anyway, he cast a spell over the entire town, and everyone thought he was perfect and worshipped him, only that somehow created a monster that was just as horrible was we all thought this guy was wonderful. So, how much trouble could this guy really be?"

"Good lord," Wesley breathed, and for a half a second, Xander could almost hear Giles in his voice. It made his chest tighten because things hadn't been the same since Giles left. Part of Xander could understand Giles because it was pretty much ripping Xander to shreds to stand back and watch Buffy self-destruct, but Xander still thought Giles should have stuck it out with the rest of them, miserable or not. "Xander, this person could be an extreme danger to all of you. Are you sure that he has no formal training, that he can control this sort of power without opening a channel to tap other sources?"

Xander turned to Jonathan. "Has anyone ever trained you?"

Jonathan shook his head. "A girl showed me the glamour spell and people in L.A. sold me books that they said I could use, but no one really taught me anything."

"Any chance you're channeling energy?"

Jonathan shook his head even more vehemently. "I would be too afraid that someone might drain me. Rack, he does that. He tells people that he's helping them and he taps into their power to either take their magic or to dump his magic into them when he needs to get rid of a lot of power fast. They say one witch blew up." Jonathan lowered his voice as if Rack might hear him.

"Rack that Willow went to, that Rack?"

Jonathan nodded solemnly.

"Okay, ew."

"Xander!" Xander blinked as he realized that Wesley was almost yelling into the phone.

"What?"

"Is he there? The man with this power, is he right there?"

"Well, yeah. That's why I was asking him about your questions, and he says he definitely hasn't trained and he's scared of tapping into others' power because he doesn't want his own to get drained. So, do I take it that this is interesting?"

"Interesting?" Wesley's voice went up. "Interesting? Someone with that much power could be exceptionally dangerous. You should get Buffy to handle this."

"Oh." Xander smiled at Jonathan. "So, you would say it would be a bad idea to, I don't know, kidnap him, tie him to a chair, and let Spike threaten him with slavery if he doesn't stop playing games in Buffy's territory?" Xander nearly laughed as Wesley started spluttering. Tilting the phone out and leaning forward, Xander let Jonathan listen to the random noises of borderline panic. Every dork needed to sometimes feel like maybe he had something a little dangerous going for him. Xander remembered when he'd faced down Jack O'Toole. Jonathan deserved that moment.

Jonathan actually smiled.

"I don't plan to throw any fireballs in here," Jonathan said into the phone.

Xander took the phone back, and listened to the absolute silence on the other end. "Wesley, Jonathan's friends are just getting more and more with the creepy and potentially felonious, and he really needs someone to show him the magical ropes. I was thinking maybe you could do that."

"Me?" Wesley sounded genuinely confused.

"Sure. I mean, you have all the book learnin'," Xander said. "And I know you wouldn't go trying to blackmail or strong arm Jonathan into putting Buffy into a time loop, so that's a plus."

"Jonathan?" Wesley's voice got quiet. "The young man who tried to kill himself his senior year?"

"Yep," Xander agreed. He waited, but the silence on the other end told him what he needed to know. Wesley was just like him and Jonathan... one more dork looking for a place to belong. "Wesley, he can't even go home because Warren is getting really dangerous, and it's not easy for Buffy to see a human as a real threat, so we're trying to work around some stuff here."

"We have rather a lot going on here as well." Wesley sighed. "But I could use a hand with all these blasted prophesies. I'm feeling rather buried alive in parchment."

"So, it's settled. You'll give Jonathan the low down on how to not blow anything up with his powers and not ask him to break any major laws—"

"I can hardly promise that. I seem to find a new one to break on a weekly basis, but I can assure him that I would never ask him to act unethically. Xander, perhaps I should speak to Jonathan."

"Sounds like a plan." Xander handed the phone over to Jonathan. Spike raised an eyebrow, but he didn't protest as Xander headed for the door they hadn't come in. "I'm assuming this goes up to the house."

Spike strolled over, giving Jonathan a look as the man tentatively said 'hello?' into the phone.

"We done then?" Spike asked.

"Yep," Xander agreed. He'd have to come back down and take the cuffs off and figure out transportation, but he figured they really were just about done with Jonathan. He couldn't go running back out the sewers without Spike's magical rune, so they could give him some space. Hopefully he'd find someone to cling to other than Warren.

"If the poof can't be bothered to drive up, I'll take him down."Spike glanced over at Jonathan who had the phone clutched in his cuffed hands, but after just a second, he turned back to the door and unlocked it. It led into a narrow passage with stairs Xander had never seen before. The walls had an odd glow that suggested something other than electricity worked down here. If Willow had gone all dark magic and Buffy hadn't come back from the dead, would he have turned into Jonathan—following the wrong person just because he needed to follow someone? His head said that Willow would never go that dark, and that Xander had more sense to follow if she did. Xander wasn't so sure that his heart agreed.

Spike reached the end of the narrow passageway and pushed his shoulder into what looked like a solid wall. The whole thing slid forward, and Xander found himself following Spike out into his room. Grandma had her secrets, that's for sure.

Walking over to the bed, Spike flung himself down so that he was leaning back on the pillows. Xander narrowed his eyes and stared at Spike. If Spike was the big bad, who was making his bed so that all the pillows were set up like a fancy hotel?

"Wot?" Spike glared at Xander suspiciously.

"Nothing. I'm just a little freaked out over our first felony." Xander walked over to a chair and sat down. "And can I just say that I'm so very happy that we aren't going to take up slavery, because this house is kinda screwy and dysfunctional now."

"As long as the git is under control and out of Buffy's territory, I can't say I care what happens to him."

"Yeah, I got that," Xander agreed. Spike had way more to him than the normal fledge who cared about blood and not getting dusted, but that didn't mean that you could expect him to have actual morals.

"I didn't understand two bloody words you said down there, pet. You need to read something other than comic books."

"I did say that we nerd types had our own language, didn't I?"

"Don't know." Spike shrugged. "It's not like I listen to anything you say."

"I'd believe you more if you didn't offer to give Jonathan a ride."

"Just want him out of my territory." Spike sat up. "If he pulls any more stunts around Buffy or Dawn or Bonnie, I'm going to have to rip his intestines out, and that's going to be bloody painful."

"Well, yeah. Intestine ripping usually is."

"Not for him, you nob." Spike frowned for as second, but before Xander could point out Spike's illogic, Spike kept talking. "Well, actually it would be for him, but I don't bloody care. I meant for me. The damn chip would make the job a mite bit more difficult than it should be."

"Uh huh," Xander said, not even pointing out that if Spike were really thinking about eviscerating Jonathan, the chip would be going off now. Sometimes, just sometimes, Xander did not understand Spike. Most of the time, Spike was just Spike. He was a vampire who wanted to feel good and control his world and eat and have sex until he felt good. That part of Spike was actually pretty damn easy to understand. But sometimes there were parts that Xander really didn't understand.

Chapter Fifteen

"Harris!"

Xander turned off the saw and pulled his ear protection off. "Hey. What's up?" Johnson poked a thumb toward the ground level. "Boss said someone was looking for you."

Looking down through the bare-stud walls, Xander tried to see who it was. The lack of cat calls meant it wasn't Tara or Willow or Buffy, but the sun would keep Spike away. Xander just prayed that Jonathan wasn't coming to visit.

Leaving his eye and ear protection at the table saw, Xander fingered the cell phone in his pocket as he headed down the stairs. With Jonathan gone, Warren seemed to be panicking, and Xander braced himself to run like hell and dial for help if the twerp was trying another one of his crazy schemes. Of course, Xander wasn't exactly in a whole lot of danger, not unless he was standing near Buffy.

Xander was ninety percent sure that Warren had set the fire the night that Dawn's wish trapped them all in Buffy's house. That could have been so very, very bad. The worst part was that he, Spike, and Tara were all in the house, trapped and watching a fire take out a good chunk of Buffy's backyard.

Xander should have been worried about himself or his friends who were facing death by fire, but all he could think about was that Bonnie was going to be left with Clem. Not that Clem was a bad guy, but Xander would rather not have his daughter raised by someone who considered hiding under a pile of rotting trash an effective fighting strategy. His lecture on the various types of garbage smells and using that as camouflage had made Xander totally skip dinner. Even Spike had turned a little green.

When he came around the corner, Xander stopped and started at the familiar face. "Riley?" he called. He headed for the hard-hat line before pulling his hat off.

Riley stood near the manager's trailer. "Hey, Xander." He was smiling, but Xander could just feel something wrong. Considering just how many secrets Riley might have discovered, Xander wasn't sure he wanted to talk to Riley. Had they even told Riley about the whole bringing Buffy back from the dead?

Xander plastered on his best smile. "Hi, Riley. Long time no see."

"It has been a while. I was wondering if maybe we could... go out to lunch." Riley didn't even bother to hide the awkward pause in the middle that suggested he had an agenda that didn't include food. Well, that and he was wearing his camouflage uniform. He wasn't being subtle.

"We can hold the fort, take off," Paul called from the window of the manager's trailer. Xander opened his mouth to protest because he needed the money, but the fact was that he really didn't. Spike was cheaper to keep than Anya had been. He just didn't want to spend a whole lot of time with Riley. Unfortunately, Riley caught him by the arm and was hurrying him off the site before Xander could even stage a token protest.

"It's my treat," Riley said, his voice making it sound like he was best friends with Xander, and Xander really couldn't protest without things getting really weird really fast.

"So, how's life been treating you?" Xander asked. "You aren't here for any..." Xander stopped and looked around for any eavesdropping coworkers before he finished. "demon problems, are you?"

Riley steered them out one of the gates and toward a chicken shack set up on the corner. Most of the guys ate here, but lunch was over, so the tables were empty and the woman in the shack was wiping down the same bit of counter over and over. "Actually," Riley said quietly, "we had a Suvolte demon egg infestation, but it's taken care of now."

"Demon eggs. Ick."

"They weren't fun," Riley agreed.

"They weren't fun last time, either. Last time they burrowed into people's brains and made them serve the momma demon." Xander sat at one of the bent metal benches attached to the table. He looked up to find that Riley was looking at him with a vague sort of horror. "I'll take a soda and some fries," Xander said.

Riley shook his head and then headed over to buy the food. The town was quiet this time of day. Xander had a few more hours on shift before he could go home. He'd promised Bonnie a zoo day, which meant he was probably going to have to pass on patrolling tonight. He'd thought they were demon free, which is why he was skipping the Scoobie thing, but maybe he should drop by Buffy's instead.

"So, is there still an egg issue?" Xander asked when Riley sat down with the food.

"It's all taken care of."

Xander grabbed one of the fries. "So, it's all good. Good." And with that, Xander was pretty much done with the small talk. Riley used a French fry to push some ketchup around on his paper plate.

"Spike knew about the Suvolte and hadn't told anyone."

"Color me unsurprised." Xander shrugged.

"He's working with you, and he withholds information. You're okay with that?" Riley mangled his French fry and glared at Xander.

"It's Spike. Spike would fight tooth and fang to protect Buffy or Dawn, but if there's someone eating John Doe right in front of him, he's not only not going to care, but he's not going to understand why you do."

"And you're okay with that?" Riley was looking way too tense for someone who was just concerned about Spike's ethics in general.

"Okay? No. But Riley, he's one of our strongest fighters, and I guess it's like working with someone who's blind. You just get used to making sure you steer them around the furniture. Spike's just Spike, so if you have some moral rule that really bothers you, you just have to tell him because he's never going to get it." Xander thought about that for a second. "Actually, you and I would tell Buffy or Dawn and THEY would talk to him. If we're unhappy, Spike would consider that a bonus."

"And you're okay with that?" Riley asked the question softer this time.

"Okay would be too strong a word." Xander sighed. "It's complicated, Riley."

"Is it complicated for Buffy, too?"

Xander stopped chewing and just stared at Riley. His brain started spinning, planning lies and denials.

"You know," Riley said quietly.

"Know?" Xander tried for ignorance, but Riley wasn't biting.

"You know about Spike and Buffy. I walked in on them, Xander." Riley made a disgusted face, but in Riley's defense, Xander made that same face every time he thought about it too much.

"Oh. That." Xander swallowed and then started pulling one of his French fries into little tiny potato bits. "Yeah. I just try really, really hard to repress."

"But... Is she..."

Xander held up a hand to stop Riley from verbally flailing into territory where Xander just didn't want to go. "Whatever you're about to ask, the answer is probably going to be 'no.' As in 'no' she's not thinking right, but also 'no' that she's not getting taken advantage of. Weirdly, she seems to be doing more of the taking than the getting taken in the advantage department."

"Oh." Riley's face twisted in disgust.

"Yeah. Oh." Xander's expression matched Riley's.

"Xander, is there anything I can do to help? I just... I never wanted any of this for Buffy. I understand that she just couldn't love me, but—"

"She came after you," Xander interrupted.

For a second, Riley just blinked at him. "She what?"

"The night you left. She came after you, Riley."

Most of the blood left Riley's face. "Oh god."

Xander shrugged. "Sometimes she just takes a little longer when it comes to boys. Men." Xander laughed grimly. "Men shaped vampires."

"So me showing up here probably is not helping." Riley ran his hands through his hair and leaned back.

"Why?" Xander asked suspiciously. Riley's face had a whole lot more guilt in it than it should. A whole lot. "Didn't things go well with her?"

Riley gave a feral laugh. "I introduced her to my wife."

Xander cringed. "Ouch."

"I didn't know, Xander. I thought that she let me go over a year ago. And I really thought she would never sleep with Spike." Riley fell silent, and they both stared at their French fries. This was going down in Xander's list of all-time most uncomfortable conversations, right up there with the Jesus talk he'd had with Bonnie.

"Buffy sleeping with Spike," Riley muttered unhappily.

"I don't think they sleep much."

"Yeah, I got that. In Technicolor." Riley grabbed his soda and drank as if the very thought put a bad taste in his mouth. Xander could relate because he found himself decorating cupcakes with Bonnie every time he spotted a new hickey or trail of fingernail marks on Spike. "Xander, are you sure he's not using her somehow? I've seen a lot of stuff in the last year—mages that can make people see things... spells to control people."

"I've been seeing that shit since I was 15, Riley," Xander said before Riley could really get going and convince himself he had to save Buffy. "Trust me, this is good old fashioned screwy in the head stuff. Spike's not using her; she's using him. She's going to wake up one of these days and realize that beating the shit out of Spike isn't exactly a nice thing to do, and then the shit and the fan are going to have an up close and personal relationship." Xander stopped. His voice was getting high and fast, and he was breathing hard, and he had to take a second to really get control. It was like being on a train that was headed straight for a cliff and knowing that you couldn't do a damn thing but stay quiet and hope the engineer stopped the train before it turned into a brilliant ball of fire in the bottom of a ravine. "But Buffy's going to have to come to that conclusion on her own," Xander added. "For once in my life, I am staying out of it."

"Even if she's hurting?" Riley's question made Xander look up, but Riley's expression wasn't accusatory, just confused.

"Especially if she's hurting. I don't know what to do without hurting her more, so I'm going to wait and then help pick up the pieces after shit and fan have that meeting."

Riley stared at Xander sadly. "I am sorry. I really had no idea that things were so bad here."

Xander laughed. "You know the weird thing? They really aren't. I mean, last year we were in all kinds of hurt because Spike was our only fighter, and he was running himself ragged trying to keep everything together when that chip was like the biggest handicap ever. Before that, we had a goddess trying to end the world. Before that, we had... well, you know. If anything, it's quiet around here."

"So, it's not as bad as it looks from here?"

"Oh no. It's way worse," Xander quickly corrected him. "I just can't quite figure out why, but it's way, way worse. I'd be telling Buffy and Dawn to take a long vacation anywhere other than here, but I'm pretty sure the hellmouth would implode because everything feels like this big balloon that's about to explode, and I can't figure out how to stop people from blowing more and more air into it. Even Spike's getting twitchy, and anything that makes Spike twitch pretty much terrifies the rest of us."

Riley sat up. "Spike's twitchy?" Yep, that was proof that anything that made Spike twitch terrified everyone because Riley was looking alarmed. He hated Spike, and he still didn't dismiss Spike's instincts.

Xander nodded. "In a Spike sort of way. It's like he's always looking around and ready for something to jump at him, but that might be because of Warren. For Spike, having our villain of the day be a human is just a little uncomfortable."

"Warren? What's going on, Xander?"

"Buffy didn't give you the sitch?" Xander wasn't sure what to think of that. Yeah, Riley wasn't exactly one of them anymore... if he ever was... but she'd always been share-girl with Riley.

"She said there weren't any problems other than employment and broken plumbing. She didn't even know that someone was raising Suvolte demons. She said that was the most demonic activity she's seen since—" Riley fell silent. There were a lot of awkward silences in this conversation.

Yeah, he and Riley had never exactly been buddies, but Xander thought that they understood each other. Now they were just two guys who didn't understand each other at all. Xander could see that Riley expected something out of him. Since Xander was the one still in Buffy's circle, he should be the one to do something to help get Buffy out of this hole she was digging for herself. Maybe it was his desire to keep Bonnie safe or maybe it was just his growing realization that he couldn't live other people's lives, but Xander really didn't think there was anything he could do. He'd help pull her out of heaven, and now there was nothing he could do. But maybe there was something Riley could do.

"The evil these days is coming in a human package. Did you see Buffy's backyard?" The fire that had almost taken the house with everyone trapped in it had scorched the grass and left black soot stains all over the back. Warren was getting desperate, and Xander was starting to think that he just needed to shoot the duo of destruction as they were calling themselves now.

Riley cocked his head to the side in confusion. "Buffy said a barbeque got out of hand."

"Actually, a barbeque missed its mark since we were the main course. Warren tried to burn the house down when we were trapped inside. Weirdly, it was Anya that saved us."

"Anya?"

"She knew a demon—you know, nevermind. Long story." Xander sighed. There was so much going on, but none of it really mattered, not when it came to Warren. "But the short version is that Warren has killed a girl, attacked Buffy, robbed banks, summoned demons, and is now going for the ever-popular arson. He's pathetic as far as evil minions of hell go, but Buffy won't confront a human, and Spike can't."

"Are you asking me to turn the chip off?" Riley's voice was slow and careful.

"God no. Riley, Spike has been staying with me, and you know how much fun that always is. Exactly how long do you think I'd live if you took that chip out?"

Riley seemed to sag in relief. "Thank god. I thought maybe you wanted me to help turn it off."

"Could you?"

Even though Riley didn't answer right away, Xander could see the truth without Riley saying anything. There was a way to get the chip out. And he had no idea how he felt about that. Eventually, Riley nodded. "If there were a good reason, yes. But it doesn't sound like this Warren is a big enough problem to warrant taking that risk."

"Which leaves me." Xander couldn't keep the bitterness out of his voice. He didn't want to be in this position, but if Spike couldn't and Buffy wouldn't do anything, then he had to do something.

"Xander?" Riley sounded worried.

"Can I ask you a hypothetical and confidential question?"

"One that's not so hypothetical, maybe?" Riley leaned forward and gave Xander his best psychology major expression.

"Maybe," Xander agreed. "How do you decide when you have to use deadly force? I mean, I still have little fragments of my soldier memories, like little floating bits of information that don't really make all that much sense anymore, so I have this sense that soldiers talk about these things, but I don't have any useful memories at all."

"Whoa." Riley leaned back and blinked. "That's a big question. Xander, is this problem with Warren that serious?"

Xander rubbed a hand across his face and vaguely wondered if he was talking himself into a nice long stay in Leavenworth by confessing this. If Warren showed up dead now, Riley was going to ask some really uncomfortable questions. Xander was a little disturbed to realize that he trusted Tara and Spike to look after Bonnie if worse came to worse. "He was threatening one of his friends, Jonathan. Warren got Jonathan to use some pretty strong magic to attack Buffy."

"Crap."

"But I talked Jonathan into going to work with a friend who would teach him magic without the blackmail. So, that's all unpromblemy."

"Good thinking. That sounds like a good solution. But from your expression, I'm guessing the rest doesn't end as well," Riley said.

"Not really. Twit number two is really good with demon summoning and controlling magical beasties. I talked his brother, Tucker, into trying to get Andrew to leave, and Andrew turned his brother into a hell mouse."

"A what?" Riley's voice rose an octave and something that sounded suspiciously like a laugh slipped out at the end.

"A hell mouse." Xander held up his hands to indicate something really small. "Like a hell hound only really extra tiny and weirdly cute. It took Tara a week to change Tucker back, and he is definitely not interested in talking to Andrew again."

"So, we're talking a major threat."

"Hugely. And our only two fighters are out for the count," Xander said. "Oh, Spike would love to eat them, but with the chip, that is not going to happen."

"So you're wondering if you should step in."

Xander shook his head. "Oh, I know I should step in, only after that fire, I'm thinking maybe I need to start listening to Spike's plans instead of trying to play nice."

Giving a big sigh, Riley turned and stared at the cars that were passing them on the road. "Xander, that is not an easy call," he eventually said.

"Which explains all my avoidance, but if I wait until Warren actually kills us, that's going to be an even worse call," Xander pointed out. Riley made an unhappy face that suggested that he agreed with Xander, even if he didn't like agreeing with Xander. Considering that Xander wasn't so hot about having to kill someone, he didn't mind Riley being not enthusiastic about it. "So, where is that line when you can call something justified? I mean, if I had shot him when he was setting the backyard on fire, that would be justified, but if I shoot him in his bathroom... I just don't know what to do, Riley."

"Have you talked to Buffy?"

"Hell no. Riley, she's having trouble enough with her own shit, and clearly she's not willing to deal with the duo of dorkitude, so that leaves me with Spike and Tara."

"Spike wants you to kill them."

"And Tara is spending so much time not commenting that I'm guessing she kinda agrees. And honestly, if Warren came anywhere near my family, I would not hesitate, but going out with a plan to kill him is feeling not good."

"If it ever starts feeling good, that's when you need to worry about yourself," Riley said seriously. "Right now, it sounds like you're asking yourself the right questions, at least."

"And how about the answers?"

It took Riley a long time to answer. "Those ethics classes that you remember... they didn't give answers, Xander. As soldiers, we have to assess the threat and make the decision, and if people at HQ disagree, we have to live with the consequences. However, there aren't any easy answers."

"You do know that's not what I wanted to hear, right?"

"Sorry about that." Riley gave him a sad smile. "I can do you one favor. If Warren and Andrew are summoning demons, my unit can go over there and ask a few questions—poke around some."

"Arrest them and throw them under the jail?" Xander asked hopefully.

"Not unless I see a felony that I can swear to in a military tribunal. However, if they're as reckless as you're suggesting, having two soldiers show up on their doorstep might provoke a reaction.

"You're using yourself as bait?"

Riley gave Xander a wicked grin that would have made Spike himself proud. "If it works, it means I can take care of this problem for you."

"Or it means you could end up a hell mouse."

Riley's grin faded. "Have Tara keep the anti-mouse spell handy, but I'm going in with an entire team, including a shaman of my own, so Andrew might find me a little more formidable than his brother. And if he tries a hell mouse spell, our shaman will definitely testify in a military tribunal. Andrew could end up under the jail for that kind of an attack."

"Just...." Xander chewed on his lower lip.

"Xander?"

"I don't think Andrew is actually the evil one," Xander blurted. "Warren made it out to be a big game, a chance to live out some comic book and Andrew and Jonathan went along, but their plans are all out of some kid's fantasy: an invisible ray, a mind control devise that gets them women, a time loop to annoy Buffy to death by making her please the world's pickiest customer. Riley, these aren't exactly the plans of someone with a whole lot of good mental hygiene."

"Which is why you don't want to shoot them."

"Well, that and killing people is generally not of the good."

Riley leaned closer. "Xander, no offense, but I've fought next to you. I never had any doubt that you would kill to protect the people you loved. If you're hesitating to use lethal force, it's because you don't think you should. So, my unit will head over there and shake the tree and see if we can't get one or both of them to panic. If they do anything threatening toward us, that will be enough to arrest them."

"And if they don't?"

Riley stared off into the distance. "Collect evidence. Because you aren't in the service, the tribunal will require something in the way of proof because you won't be allowed to testify. So, if you can get enough evidence that five officers would look at the file and believe that these two are a danger to society, you call me back and I'll make the arrest."

Xander thought about sneaking around the duo of dorkitude trying to take pictures or record their stupid fights. "That's sounding more dangerous than Spike's big plan."

"Which is?"

"Shoot them," Xander answered. That was pretty damn obvious. Or not. Actually, Spike's favorite plan involved long detailed descriptions of evisceration and the drinking of blood, but plan A usually ended up with the chip firing, and Spike colorfully cursing as he clutched his head.

Riley nodded. "Xander, you have to trust your instincts. If getting evidence is going to put you or others in danger, then you do what you have to. Killing may not be easy, but it's better than allowing the innocent to die, and you know that. Don't second guess yourself."

"Is it okay if I just pray that they try to attack you so you have to deal with this?"

"No, that's fine. I'm actually hoping the same thing. Look, I should go. We have to ship out in three hours, and if we're going to make an extra stop, we're running short on time."

"Hey, thanks for stopping by. Actually, was there a reason you stopped by? I sort of hijacked the conversation."

Riley stood up and offered his hand. "I just wanted to get your input on what's going on with Buffy. I guess I just wanted some sort of reassurance that someone had her back and understood that she was heading for an emotional cliff."

Xander felt weird shaking Riley's hand like two men making a business deal in the middle of the street. "Knowing that doesn't mean I know how to actually help."

"Like you said, just be there for her when the shit hits the fan." Riley turned to leave, and Xander could feel a tightness in his stomach. He didn't want Riley to leave. He wanted one person in his life who wasn't falling apart—one person who he could be weak around. But Riley just headed down the street. Closing his eyes, Xander tried to banish all these resentments that crawled up through the cracks in his brain. He didn't want to be the strong one. He didn't want to be the fighter. He didn't want to watch his friends for the first signs of a complete emotional meltdown.

Yep, and hell mice in hell wanted ice water. They were all going to have to learn to live with disappointment.

Chapter Sixteen

Spike struggled to not show his gameface as Buffy sat on the bottom step of the basement trying to explain why she'd tied up her friends and tried to feed them to a demon. Actually, she mostly seemed to be explaining to Anya since Buffy had already told the others about the demon who had infected her with the delusion that her whole life was part of a hallucination that she needed to kill.

Bloody fucking martyr. Everything had to be about her, that was for bloody sure. All this because she wanted to pretend that none of them mattered. That he didn't matter. That Dawn hadn't ever existed.All this because she wanted to imagine that she meant it when she told him they were done. He'd been through that song and dance once already, and he hadn't bloody liked it the first time around.

Actually, he'd been through it twice. Angelus and Drusilla had both treated him like he was a soddin' chess piece to move around. "Oh boyo, it's just us men tonight," Angelus would promise with that idiotic smile of his. Yeah, until Angelus felt like fucking Dru right in front of him and calling him weak.

William had followed Angelus around like a fucking puppy, and when Angelus had finally given in and pushed William over a table and fucked him raw... well William thought that meant something. He thought he'd earned the keys to the fucking kingdom and that he would finally be part of the clan. Instead, Angelus had pretended it never happened. William had sat with drying semen and blood streaked across his legs, and Angelus pretended that none of them could smell it. Darla had just smirked, and all William's stupid, silly confidence had just vanished. And Drusilla. As much as he bloody loved her still, he hated her. She would push him one way or another just so she could pretend he was her precious Daddy. He lived for the days when she looked at him and saw him, but there were too damn many days when her eyes would glaze over and she'd imagine Angelus' hands holding her down.

It was ironic that the gits in the Watchers called him one-quarter of the Scourge of Europe because he'd never been anything more than their fucking toy. And now, Queen Buffy was tending her court, apologizing for just about feeding her little minions to a demon, and she couldn’t even spare him a look. When he stood too near, he could still smell her desire, and she wouldn't even fucking look at him. Spike bit the inside of his lip hard enough to taste blood.

"Spike's right," Anya said. That distracted Spike from his inner monolog. "You're making this all about you. You did not imagine me. I was alive and cursing men's genitals before you were even born." Anya crossed her arms and glared at Buffy. "And if you call me over to ambush me again, I will find a way to make you pay." Coming from a bint like Anya, Spike would suggest Buffy take that threat seriously. Instead she just rested her elbows on her knees and hung her head.

"Hey, how about we all play nice here? I mean, it's not exactly Buffy's fault what with the demon venom," Willow hurried to say. "So maybe we should all go find some aspirin and ice packs and x-rays." Willow said the last with a look over toward Xander.

His eyes were still a little unfocused, and Spike was guessing he had a good concussion going. Getting clocked by a slayer was tough, even on a vampire, so the puppy boy's head was no match for a frying pan swung by an insane Buffy. Spike shifted uncomfortably. Xander was hers to do with what she wanted, and if she wanted to gut him and hang him out for some demon, that shouldn't bloody matter to him. The problem was the git spent so much time submitting to Spike and hiding things from Buffy that Spike was having trouble remembering exactly whose minion he was. If he were a proper vampire minion, Spike would stake him just for making things uncomfortable by blurring the lines of ownership.

Anya looked down at the demon. "Wait. This is the demon you killed?" She sounded pretty brassed-off about that.

"He tried to kill us first," Xander pointed out. Anya gave him a withering glare.

"He's Glarghk gu'ul kashma'nikt, innit he?" Spike asked from his spot at the top of the stairs.

Anya gave him a look that, once upon a time, he would have disemboweled her over. Soddin' chip. "Which means he isn't predatory. Glarghk gu'ul kashma'nikt are reality demons. Some people say that D'Hoffryn is half Glarghk gu'ul kashma'nikt."

"Vengeance demons are part Glargy gull Kashmir?" Xander looked from the demon to Anya like he was trying to see a family resemblance.

"No, you idiot. Anyone who can impress D'Hoffryn can become a vengeance demon. D'Hoffryn is just part Glarghk gu'ul kashma'nikt." Anya gave a very unladylike snort. "I don't have time to explain this to people who are clearly incapable of understanding. And I'm losing money." With that she headed for the stairs. Spike leaned to one side to let her out.

Xander groaned. "This whole conversation is giving me a headache."

"That's probably the frying pan lump," Willow said. She reached up and touched his head where Spike could see swelling from the far side of the room. When Buffy decided to cure her delusions by killing all of them, she'd done a bang up job of getting started.

"I'm so sorry," Buffy repeated for the tenth time.

"Hey, none of this is your fault." Willow glared at everyone in the room, making sure that they all knew the script she expected them to follow. Right then, time to pretend that Queen Buffy could do no wrong. She sure as hell wouldn't be knocking boots with him, would she now? Irony of it was that puppy boy and Tara both knew about him and Buffy. Willow was so caught up in her own drama that he doubted she cared, and Dawn.... Spike watched as Dawn hovered near the far wall like a wounded beast. He liked to think she wouldn't mind. Spike wasn't even sure who Buffy wanted to hide from anymore.

"Hey, I know you would never say that about me," Dawn said, her voice shaky. "Not without something being really wrong."

Buffy looked up. "I really wouldn't. You know I love you," Buffy told her. She held out her hands and Dawn nearly threw herself at Buffy, allowing herself to be pulled into a tight hug. Spike looked away. He bloody loved the Bit, so it hurt to feel so fucking jealous of her.

"Are you okay?" Willow asked Tara softly.

Tara nodded. She was pale, but then she'd thrown a lot of power around. Spike could still feel her magic like spiders over his skin. Willow inched closer to her, desire rising from her like a mist.

"Right then. I'm off." Spike stood up to leave.

"Spike, wait!" Xander sort of stumbled forward before he got his legs coordinated enough to cross the basement. "The sun's up."

Spike shrugged. "Got a blanket, don't I?"

"Oh." Xander looked dazed, but that was probably the concussion. "I should... you know..." Xander just fell silent. The man was crap at hiding things. It was a wonder that the others hadn't found Bonnie yet, but Spike figured they weren't actually paying much attention to Xander.

"Come on, then," Spike said, rescuing the puppy from his own idiocy. Xander hurried up the stairs, and Spike headed out into the main house.

"Thank you for coming to the rescue," Xander said once they reached the kitchen.

Spike grabbed his blanket off the floor where he'd dropped it. "Didn't actually rescue anyone, mate."

"No, but you showed up when I called, and considering the big ball of light in the sky, that means a lot, Spike."

Spike snorted. He'd been too bloody late to do much more than sit on the sidelines while Buffy ignored him.

"So, sewers or car?"Xander asked cheerfully, and the boy never did cheerful when talking about the sewers. Spike'd never seen anyone who complained about a little shite as much as Xander.

Spike stopped and really looked at puppy-boy. "What are you hiding?"

"Me?" Xander blinked, all exaggerated innocence and big brown eyes.

"Yes, you. I'm not in a mood for games, so just spit it out," Spike warned with a glare.

"Oh... it's not bad. I just...." Xander sighed. "It was supposed to be a surprise."

Spike just stared at Xander, not sure what the hell he was supposed to think about that. He assumed they'd gotten past surprise gifts like a sudden stake to the heart, but he wasn't entirely sure. Sometimes Xander was remarkably hard to understand. Instead of explaining, Xander held up a finger. "Wait here," he said before he darted out the back door. Swearing, Spike leapt backwards to avoid a stray sunbeam.

He didn't have long to wait before a white panel van pulled up. Xander jumped out of the driver's side and opened the back doors. Spike could see a heavy curtain hiding whatever he had in the van. With a huge smile, Xander waved.

"Come on!" he called with excitement in his voice. Reaching in, Xander pulled the curtain aside to show an empty van. Spike looked at the distance, and he could feel something suspiciously similar to fear in his guts. If he ran for the van, that took him in the opposite direction of any shade. All Xander had to do was block his way, and he'd be dust before he could even protest.

"Any day now, Spike." Xander's excitement was turning to frustration now. The boy had no patience, but Spike pulled the blanket up over his head, braced himself and ran for the van. His skin was smoking, and he could feel the heat soaking into him by the time he leaped into the back of the van. The heavy thud of a slamming door followed, and Spike threw the blanket off, pounding at his own body to put out the fire he could feel threaten to eat his flesh. After a second, he realized that he was only smoking, and he sank down onto an uncomfortable bench bolted to the side of the van.

"So, what do you think?" Xander stuck his head through a second dark curtain that divided the cab from the cargo area.

"I'm not on fire," Spike commented. Other than that, there really wasn't much to say.

"No, about the van."

"It's a van, Harris."

"It's my van. The company was buying two new vans, and I thought that with our sun problems, we could use something without windows, and can I just say again that Angel is an idiot. A vampire with a convertible really is just about as stupid as they come. Oh, but before you even think it, if you paint the windows, I will put holy water in your blood supply," Xander threatened.

Spike opened his mouth, not even able to quite figure out what the bloody hell was going on before Xander disappeared into the front cab and started the van. The git had bought a van because of Spike? And then he'd threatened Spike with holy water. "Bloody barmy wanker," Spike muttered as he looked around. The van's engine sounded solid, and the interior could be fixed up to be a little more comfortable. If a minion had gotten this for Spike back in the day, he might have lived another day before Spike dusted him just because he didn't bloody like minions.

"Drop me by the sewer entrance to our tunnels," Spike ordered.

"Um... I was hoping...." Xander stopped.

"Just spit it out, Harris."

"Do you know someone who could sell me a gun?"

Spike looked at the curtain separating them. It was about bloody time Xander did something other than bloody whine about Warren, but Spike hadn't imagined he'd reach his breaking point today. The road noise under the van changed and then the van stopped. Spike was guessing they were in a parking lot. This was better than a trunk, but it was still pretty damn annoying.

The van shifted into park and then Xander turned it off before pushing the front curtain back. He'd parked in the shade of store so Spike could see all the little happy meals toddling around the parking lot with their carts of food. "Well?" Xander asked.

"You ready to shoot Warren, then?"

"Enough's enough, Spike."

"It's been more than enough for a while now. Why get your knickers in a twist now? I thought your big plan was to find evidence." Spike crossed his arms and tried hard to not point out that Xander was an idiot who should have listened to him a long time ago.

Xander clenched his jaw, and Spike saw a flash of something hard and angry under the surface before Xander just sighed. "When Riley arrested Andrew, do you know what he was saying?"

"No, no, I'm too pretty of a nancy-boy for prison," Spike sing-songed in a high pitched voice. That forced a rough laugh out of Xander.

"Okay, something like that might have come out. But Spike, "Xander looked up at him, "Andrew said it wasn't fair because soon enough Buffy wouldn't be the slayer anymore."

Leaning back, Spike ran a tongue along the inside of his lower lip where he'd bit. He could still taste the blood.

Xander's voice got dangerously quiet, but every breath was louder and more strained than the last. "Andrew and Warren did this. They did something to make that Glargy demon go after Buffy because they wanted her to not be the slayer."

"Could be," Spike agreed. It was the sort of sad little plan those two would come up with.

Xander's breath was so ragged that Spike thought he might start sobbing. "Spike, Anya said that the demon was something like D'Hoffryn."

"And?"

When Xander looked up, he had a wild expression Spike had never seen on the boy. "Anya said that wish universes have lives of their own. It's like digging a new channel on a river. You can divert the water, but then you can't control where it goes or force it back into the same river."

Spike raised an eyebrow and waited for the part of the explanation that actually made sense. Xander's face twisted and he turned away, slapping his hand against the side of the van so hard that he must have hurt himself.

"Somewhere out there, some version of Buffy is still in that asylum because Warren and Andrew did this. She's alone and hurting and she always will be because someone she never met ruined her life." Xander stopped, the rage pouring from him. If Spike had any doubts about Xander's willingness to kill, and he had a lot of them, this version of Xander pretty much answered any doubts. Spike suspected that Xander was having trouble not just rushing over there and choking Warren with his own two hands. As far as Spike was concerned, his Buffy was safe and any other Buffys were on their own, but if this was the motivation to get Xander off his arse, he'd use it. Warren needed to die.

"Right then, so we need a weapon. You any good with a gun?"

"I can use one." Xander's expression was blank, but the fury still poured from his skin. Any demon in a mile would give the boy a wide berth right now.

"Anyone can use one, Harris. Pulling a trigger isn't difficult. However, are we looking for a rifle so you can take him at long range, a pistol, or a shotgun? You might have to take a couple of shots with the shotgun because those pellets aren't always good at penetrating the vital organs, but anyone can hit a target with one of those."

"A pistol," Xander said softly. Spike studied the boy wondering whether lack of confidence or a need to be up close and personal with his kill was inspiring that choice.

"I can get you that," Spike agreed. "In the basement, you had a regular armory. What happened to that?"

"I sold it when I was trying to keep the apartment and still pay Bonnie's mom," Xander said. "Where do I go for the gun?"

"Franklin cemetery... just north is an abandoned church. Demon I know runs a business out of the basement."

"Of a church?"

Spike shrugged. "Keeps the minions and fledges away, and Buffy doesn't usually go in churches."

With a nod, Xander got behind the wheel again, letting the dark curtain fall shut. As he started the van, Spike called home to Clem. Might be best if Clem took Bonnie out for a bit. Spike had a feeling that Xander was going to be out of sorts for a while, and Bonnie didn't need to see that. Yeah, she saw Spike ranting about as often as not, but Xander was her da. Xander never came home smelling of blood and death, and Spike just preferred to keep it that way.

Seventeen

Xander stood at the corner of the house and fingered the gun he had tucked under his shirt. The metal was cold against his skin.

"Best best if you just knocked and shot him before he had a chance to react," Spike said. He'd said some version of that same thing about ten times now.

"If I didn't know better, I'd think you were worried about me," Xander accused him. The sun was barely down, and yet Spike was standing next to him, an unlit cigarette hanging from his lips. Spike just shrugged. At this point, Xander was so mixed up he wasn't sure if Spike wanted to help or just watch as Xander screwed this up and got turned into Xander-meat, extra rare.

"I have to do this my way," Xander said firmly, despite the fact that his stomach was knotting. He'd talked Jonathan down. Hell, from the sounds of it, Jonathan and Wesley were best friends, and Angel was ready to pull his hair out because Jonathan was almost worshipping the giant dork. On one hand, Xander was not in favor of anyone worshipping Angel. On the other, anything that caused Deadboy to pull his hair out in frustration couldn’t' be all bad.

Spike's lighter made a familiar clicking noise as he lighted his cigarette without comment.

Taking a deep breath, Xander headed for the small house where Warren had set up his new shop. It was a small house with a white picket fence that leaned drunkenly in every direction. Xander wondered how many of Warren's little toys were pointed at him as he walked up the front, but he fought the urge to reach under his shirt and touch his gun.

Stepping around a rotted hole in the front porch, Xander knocked at the door. Inside, he could hear a television click off and footsteps scramble around, but he just waited. After several minutes, the door flew open and Warren stood there with a shocked expression on his face.

"Warren," Xander said calmly.

"Xander?" Warren stood staring at him for second and then he pointed his finger at Xander. "Freeze. Just freeze right there."

"Usually people have guns when they say that."

"Shit." Warren reached for something beside the door, and Xander's whole body clenched. His hand reached for the gun out of fear, but if he pulled it out, he was going to have to shoot Warren. The man had forgotten to bring a gun to threaten Xander at all, so shooting someone that dorky just didn't feel right. Xander was still debating with himself when Warren pointed the end of a freaky looking ray gun at his stomach. "Okay, now freeze." Warren had a sadistic grin on his face.

"I haven't actually moved," Xander pointed out. "I came here to talk."

"Talk?"

"That thing people do with their mouths."

"I know what talk means, moron." Warren backed up a step and raised the gun. "Inside. Close the door behind you." Xander figured Spike was out there cursing him in British, but Spike couldn't do anything, and Xander really didn't want to back Warren into a corner where he felt like he had to shoot, so Xander stepped inside and pushed the door closed. The house was small and they stepped right into a tiny living room that Warren was clearly using for a workshop. Xander recognized a few of the things on the tables—a clip from an automatic weapon, the guts of a coffeemaker, something that might be a shoe horn. But for the most part, it just looked like a junkyard had thrown up in the room.

"So, the slayer sent you to negotiate? She's finally willing to parlay with me?" Warren asked, nodding his head faster as he got excited. Xander ignored the large quantities of dorkiness Warren was showing by using the word "parlay."

"Okay, that would be a no and an even bigger no. Buffy didn't send me; I just came to talk. Man to man. Nerd to nerd."

"I am a genius, not a nerd. I was going to Dutton Technical College when you were all memorizing Spanish verbs. They saw my talent." Warren's face twisted into something dark, and for the first time, Xander could actually see the killer lurking just under the surface.

"Okay, scratch that last one, but we can still talk man to man," Xander said carefully. "This is gone too far. We're so far past 'too far' that you can't even see it from where we are."

"I say when it's gone too far, and it hasn't until Buffy and her band of do-gooders is defeated."

"Which would be never," Xander said slowly. If hell gods and giant snake demons couldn't take them down, Xander really wasn't too worried about Warren making the big move to rule the Hellmouth. Now Warren killing someone out of sheer stupidity—that might happen.

"That's what Buffy thinks."

"Buffy doesn't think much of anything about you. She mostly is worried about paying the bills, and if she even found out that I came over here, I'm pretty sure she'd smack me. Actually, I'm very sure she'd smack me." Xander shrugged. Buffy seemed to think he was always her backup, there to follow her lead, and nine times out of ten, he was. However, if he needed to lie about a little soul spell or face down Angelus in a hospital or even hide a daughter he fathered by a demon, he would.

Warren frowned in confusion. "Buffy didn't send you?"

"That would be a huge 'no.' If she knew I was here, she would give me that look that meant she was questioning whether I had fat blocking up the brain cells. I guess I hoped that maybe we could figure out a way to stop making each other miserable. Or rather a way to keep you from making Buffy miserable because Buffy is pretty much not doing anything to you."

"She's not doing anything to me?" Warren's voice rose. "She's not doing anything?" he demanded in a voice so high it nearly squeaked.

"Pretty much, yes. She has other fish to go fishing for."

Warren stood up straight, the barrel of the gun dipping towards the floor as he seemed to pose. "I am her arch rival."

Taking a deep breath, Xander wondered just how screwy in the head Warren was and how to talk him off this ledge before the man jumped. 'Cause going after a slayer was so many kinds of stupid that Xander couldn't even count them. "Okay, that's not making sense to me. You know about the whole slayer thing, so why would you want her to come after you? As someone who was recently hit in the head by Buffy, I can say that it is not fun."

"She has to come after me."

"Why?" Xander's question stopped Warren. He opened his mouth like he was going to answer, but then closed it without saying anything. Xander watched as a dozen emotions crossed Warren's face, and most of them inspired pity, not fear.

"I'm her arch rival," Warren said in a small voice. However, then grimaced and stood up a little taller. "When I kill her, people are going to know who I am. They will know my name. They will."

Xander just stared at Warren, struggling to come up with an argument against that. He was starting to feel like he was talking to Spike. As much as Xander was starting to realize that Spike had more going than bloodlust and weird curse words, the vampire didn't seem to understand that other people existed outside of him. Buffy's pain from being ripped out of heaven was something that Spike had to fix or something that he resented, but he never seemed to think about how it just affected Buffy.

Even the people he loved, like Dawn and Buffy and Bonnie, he looked at how they fit into his life or how he fit into theirs. If Dawn wanted to go away to college, Xander figured they were all going to have their hands full trying to deal with Spike. The vamp would either want everyone to move with Dawn or Dawn to stay home. And no matter how much Xander tried talking around that roadblock in Spike's mind, he couldn't.

Up until now, he'd thought it was the missing soul that made it impossible for Spike to really consider people separate from himself. However, Warren had a soul, and he was doing pretty much the same thing. Xander existed to carry a message. Buffy was nothing more than an obstacle to throw himself against so that he could prove himself. Give him some yellow eyes and fangs, and Warren was already a vampire.

"Hey, did you hear there's a mated pair of Kiest demons near the library. Those things are ferocious, but I bet you have some fancy gun that could make short work of them," Xander said with the largest smile he could paste on. If Warren was going to think like a vampire, maybe Xander could distract him from his Buffy obsession using the same sort of bait a vampire would fall for—the promise of greater glory.

"Kiest?" Warren snorted. "They're nothing compared to a slayer."

"Can we maybe do a logic test here? I know that you think the whole arch rival plan glitters with greatness, but all that glistens is not gold or even gold wrapped or gold colored. Sometimes those sparkles are the yellow in the eyes of the vampire that's about to eat you. Only in this case, it's going to be Buffy's fist coming at your face if she decides that you're a real threat." Xander didn't say that Buffy never would. Warren had shot at the house, he'd sent demons after her, he'd turned her invisible and then nearly turned her to goo, and she still had this weird hands-off policy because Warren was human. If Xander wasn't feeling guilty about the whole pulling her out of heaven mistake, he'd kick Buffy's ass, only with less kicking and more words about being stupid.

Warren was shaking his head. "No. She will realize that I'm a serious threat, and then she'll have to come after me, and I'm ready. You guys got Andrew, but I'm not going down that easy. I'm going to kill the slayer, and the very fact that she sent you means that she knows it. She won't even face me." That last thought made him smile.

"I don't think she's worried about—"

"Why won't she face me?" Warren interrupted.

"Maybe because she's got work and a kid sister to raise and a house that—"

"She isn't a slayer anymore, is she? That's it, isn't it?" Warren was talking faster now, too excited to actually listen to Xander at all.

"What? Okay, we've officially left the logic tracks here and we're heading for the cliffs. Warren, are you maybe not feeling well?"

"The demon. It did its work. It changed reality, and now Buffy isn't a slayer. She's totally helpless, so she sent you to beg me for mercy." The wide smile on Warren's face made Xander want to punch him. "She knows I would never listen to her, but she's hoping that maybe you could get through to me."

Xander sighed. "And here we go off the cliff."

"It all makes sense now."

"Yeah, all except for the part with the not making sense," Xander said. "Warren, I know about the demon, but Willow broke the spell."

Warren was shaking his head again, his gun pointed at the floor like he felt totally safe now that he'd won. "No. No, she couldn't have. Andrew promised that this plan would work, and I didn't believe him. Once I take over Sunnydale, I'll have to break him out of prison and apologize."

"Which is not happening," Xander said firmly. "None of that is happening. Warren, Buffy is still the slayer, and if you go anywhere near her, she will kick your ass. I am trying to keep your ass from getting kicked, and I have to tell you, I'm starting to wonder why I'm bothering."

"Oh please," Warren looked at Xander with this expression that was a cross between pity and disgust. "You're so unimportant that I'm not going to even bother shooting you. I should go after Spike, though. He's important enough to kill." And again, Warren was sounding creepily like a vampire. Xander briefly wondered if a person could lose his soul without getting vamped.

"I guess I should thank you on the not killing of me, but Warren, you are not tracking with reality," Xander tried again. "Your plan failed. Yeah, the demon made Buffy think that she was in some mental institution and if that demon's magic is anything like vengeance demon magic, that means that somewhere out there, some version of Buffy is still sitting in an insane asylum, but our Buffy broke the spell. She figured out that she's real, and she broke the spell. When she died, she came back out of heaven. Do you really think your stupid little spell could hold her?" Xander stopped himself just short of calling Warren a pathetic little pimple. He really didn't want to get shot in the guts by a ray gun.

Warren looked Xander up and down. "You sound desperate," he said in this haughty voice.

"Well, duh. I kind of am. What does it take to get you to see that you lost? You lost. L. O. S. T. And if you keep this up you're going to be dead as in not breathing as in... dead. You have to stop this."

"No, you wouldn't be here if you weren't desperate, if you hadn't already lost." Warren leaned against one of his tables and pursed his lips like he was deep in thought... or faking being deep in thought, anyway. "So Buffy isn't the slayer, and now I just have to decide how to split up the spoils of war."Putting his ray gun down on the edge of the table, Warren actually rubbed his hands like some sort of comic book villain. "You can go back to whatever little life you have, but Willow... I have always wondered what a redhead would be like in bed. I'm going to find out."

"Do not go there," Xander warned. This wasn't working the way he'd planned. Warren wasn't listening.

"Or maybe the slayer herself will be my reward—the old queen reduced to nothing more than a blonde bimbo chained to my bed." Warren's eyes seemed to glaze with lust, but when Xander took a step forward, he grabbed his gun. "Oh no. No, you do not get to stop me. I beat Buffy, the great slayer who returned from the dead. Me. I beat her, and everyone's going to know it."

"And you're going to celebrate by raping Buffy? That's kinda slimy. Actually, no. That's seriously, huge, enormous layers of slimy."

Warren narrowed his eyes. "Fine. If you're just a fan of the slayer, maybe I'll let you have her if you're nice to me. I can take the sister—Dawn."

Xander felt the pull of the gun in his hand, smelled the hot air and heard the thunder-like explosion as it went off. He saw Warren fling his hands up as he body fell back, a tiny red stain on his shirt like a flower blossom. He felt the wave of warmth, either from the gunpowder or from his own adrenaline. He saw his own hand rise up, pulling the gun farther out from its hiding place under his shirt and felt his finger tightened again the warm metal trigger.

He watched Warren hit the wall, his hands still spread, fingers wide as he slowly started sliding down. He couldn't hear as dozens of trinkets and weapons, mostly in pieces, clattered to the floor when Warren caught the edge of the table in his slow slide down the wall. Behind him, Warren left long streaks of red, and the twin flower blossoms, red-stained, ragged circles on Warren's green shirt, seeped blood. The stain spread and then drifted down, the blood turning into a teardrop as gravity pulled at it.

Xander watched, some part of his brain not understanding what he was seeing as Warren's lips moved. They were stained red now. Warren's hands ruined the perfect teardrop pattern forming on his shirt by ripping at the cloth with clumsy fingers. But those desperate movements slowed and soon only Warren's chest was moving, slower and slower until it just stopped.

Xander stood looking at the mess. Hands tugged at him, took the gun from him, and Xander stared at the inelegant pile of twisted limbs that had once been Warren. His mouth was open, a small trail of drying blood at the corner.

Xander was shifting backwards now, his body moving even though his brain hadn't sent any messages. It couldn't. The door started closing, and Xander had one last look at Warren's tangled body, small pieces of his inventions scattered around like rose pedals. Then the door blocked his view. Xander blinked, his brain struggling to restart.

"Bloody hell, you're a fucking nob. You never should have put yourself in the same room with him. Considering that you have the survival instinct of a soddin' lemming, I don't know how you've lived this long." The voice was familiar, but Xander wasn't ready to deal with it. He was cold. So cold. He started shivering, and hands pushed him up into a seat.

"Drink this." Something cold was shoved into his hands, but Xander couldn't seem to get his fingers to close all the way. He couldn't feel his right hand. He let it drop into his lap as he flexed his pointer finger, struggling to get back feeling in it.

"Oh for.... If this were the old days, Angelus would be saying you were ready for the charnel house, mate."Hands lifted the cold flask and brought it to his lips. Xander almost choked as the fire ripped a path down his throat.

"Shit." Xander choked and spit whiskey all over the inside of the van. "Holy shit." He coughed, his whole throat burning. He got control of the coughing, but his heart kept pounding so loud that Xander couldn't hear anything other than the rush of blood through his own veins. Spike was standing in the open passenger side door, his hands on Xander's thighs.

"I killed him," Xander whispered. His stomach jolted, and he might have thrown up, except he couldn't without throwing up on Spike, and even with half his brain stuck somewhere between panic and horror, that didn't seem like a good idea.

"That was the point."

"He's dead." Xander closed his eyes, and he could see Warren's body falling.

When Spike slapped his face, Xander's eyes flew open. "Don't even start that shite. He was threatening to rape Buffy, rape Dawn. What do you think he'd do the first time Willow insulted his manhood? He was a worthless git with less morals than a common vampire, and you don't get your knickers twisted about staking them."

Xander opened his mouth, but he couldn't come up with any argument for that. Warren had wanted to hurt them all just to make himself feel better, which was pretty much what vampires did. But that didn't erase the bone-deep cold he could feel when he thought about shooting him.

"You need to get pissed, pet."

"Don’t have the energy to get angry." Xander wasn't even sure he had the energy to stand up. His legs felt shaky, like he'd been running for miles. Spike gave him a disgusted look, but Xander just looked at him. He was too tired to try and figure out Spike weirdness.

"Drunk, pet. You need to get good and drunk."

Xander shook his head. "Harris family genes and alcohol do not mix."

Spike snorted. "Well, they will tonight. We're going to get you good and drunk—drunk enough that you stop brooding."

"Not brooding," Xander complained softly, but Spike slammed the passenger side door and Xander was left sitting in the seat still clutching Spike's flask. He wasn't brooding; he was wondering how things had gotten so out of control. When he was sixteen, Giles had stood in the library and promised him that the world was simple. People were good. Demons were evil. His hand had held the stake that turned Jesse into dust, and he'd ordered himself to not grieve because Jesse had been a demon, and demons were evil.

The driver's side door opened and Spike dropped his cigarette to the ground, crushing it under his heel before he got into the driver's side. Xander watched Spike as he started the van and then carefully backed out of the driveway. "Wait." Xander looked at the house, and Spike braked.

"Wot?"

"The...." Xander stopped. He couldn’t call Warren a body. Warren wasn't a body, he was a pain in the butt, a nerd, a geek with a robot obsession. He was a person.

"I already arranged to take care of it, pet. Just drink up." Spike started backing up again, and Xander watched Warren's house until they turned the corner and he couldn't see it any more.

Eighteen

Spike ended up carrying Xander since the boy's feet kept crossing each other and threatening to make them both tip over into the lawn.

"Not a girl," Xander muttered. At least that's what it sounded like. The boy definitely couldn't hold his whiskey.

"Never thought you were, pet. You're too bloody heavy, for one," Spike answered. Propping Xander up on the porch, he dug in his duster's pocket for the key to the front door. Despite the fact he had two perfectly good legs, Xander started to slide to the ground, and Spike used a hip to pin him to the wall and keep him upright.

"Your rule is still stupid." Xander laid his forehead on Spike's shoulder.

"You chuck on me, and I'll make you eat it," Spike warned with a glare, but Xander was too drunk to take much notice. "And my rule is not stupid. It works better than your bloody 'demon bad, human good' rot. I thought you were smart enough to recognize that as rubbish."

"Rubbish. Rubbish, roobish, rubbage." Xander chuckled, and Spike tried to remind himself that he'd set out to make sure that Xander wasn't brooding, so ripping out his intestines for being in a good mood would be a mite bit hypocritical. Finally getting the key in the lock, Spike kicked the door open. The house was perfectly silent, so everyone had to be in the lower levels. "But it is," Xander said. The git didn't even try to help as Spike tried to maneuver them through the door.

"Is what, pet?" Spike propped Xander up against the corner of a wall, and Xander clung to it, his whole body swaying.

"Is stupid. The demon-bad rule is stupid. Really stupid. Giles shouldn't be that stupid. Being stupid is my job."

Spike locked the front door and headed into the living room to make sure all the drapes were pulled. Sun was going to be up in less than an hour.

"Giles was supposed to be the smart one. He gave us that demon bad rule, you know. Demons don't have souls, only that doesn't really explain Clem. Clem is a very soully demon."

"That he is." Spike stood in the middle of the living room and considered Xander. Getting the git down the stairs without head trauma would be hard, but Spike felt he owed Xander something after he'd taken care of the problem.

Curling a lip, Spike snarled at fate, at the chip and at the whole bloody government. He wasn't weak, but with the soddin' chip in place, he couldn't even protect Buffy like he should. It felt too much like the time Dru had been ill, wasting away before his eyes and he couldn’t do a bloody thing about it. Spike always had felt a certain gratitude toward Dalton for helping him through those days. Mind, he hadn't been grateful enough to protect the vampire from the Judge. Actually, thinking back, he'd been amused at the sight of the bookish vampire getting immolated, but that was another matter. He'd gone out of his way to not kill Dalton himself. And now he could feel that same reluctance to rip out Xander's intestines.

"Giles was wrong."

"Bloody right."

"But you're wrong too!" Xander pointed a finger at Spike and nearly fell over.

"Am not. My rule actually makes sense."

"Perfect sense except where it doesn't make any sense at all. If you kill everyone who isn't family, that means you have to kill...." Xander frowned, and for a second Spike thought he might actually be trying to count that high in his head. Next time he had to cheer Xander up, he was just getting him stoned.

"I didn't say you *had* to kill everyone who wasn't family."

"Yes you did."

"No, I didn't."

"Did!" Xander grabbed the wall again as he nearly fell over.

"I bloody well did not. I said you *could* kill anyone as long as they weren't family. Not the same, is it?"

"Is it?" Xander echoed.

"You can't hold your whiskey," Spike accused Xander. He turned toward the stairs where quiet footsteps were creeping up the treads. "Tara, that you?" Spike called. He'd asked Tara to make sure Bonnie was out of the house, but it wasn't like either Tara or Xander went out of their way to follow his every rule to the letter. It was like having someone else's minions around... even if he did like these two more than minions.

Tara stuck her head around the door and looked around like she was expecting a demon attack. Spike dropped down into the chair and gestured toward Xander. "I brought the boy home. Bonnie out?"

Tara nodded and came the rest of the way into the living room. "She's with Clem. Are you two okay?"

Spike snorted. He was right as rain. With Warren dead, he almost felt good about life. Now all he had to do was get Buffy over this weird insistence she had that she wasn't going to have sex with him anymore. That would last about two days. The bint had the sexual appetites of a demon, she did.

"Tara! Hey, you have to be the tie... tiebroker," Xander blurted out.

"Tiebroker?"

Xander looked at Tara like she was a little crazy. "Tiebroker? Like a broker of ties." He laughed. "Nope, tie breaker! You're so silly."

"He's as pissed as a rat," Spike offered.

"Pissed rats." Xander laughed again."Do they have little rat protest signs. No more rat poison. Down with cats!"

Tara walked over to him and rested her hand against his shoulder. "Xander, you need to get some sleep."

"And water. The boy's going to hurt come tomorrow," Spike said. Tara tried to guide Xander away from the wall, but Xander fought her, clinging to the casement and giggling like a five-year-old girl.

Eventually, Tara turned to him. "Spike, what happened?"

Xander answered before Spike could. "Warren happened. Buffy happened. Warren and Dawn was not happening." Some signs of anger started showing through all the drunken happiness. For all the helpless, bumbling vibes the boy put off, he had some darkness in him. He'd put two bullets right into Warren's heart and stood there without blinking. True, he'd then gone as loony as Dru on one of her bad days, but he'd done the killing without a twitch.

"Warren and Dawn?" Tara sounded confused.

Throwing out an arm, Xander leaned on her. "So, you have to break the tiebreaker. Spike says the rule is that you can kill anyone who isn't family."

"Kill?" Tara's voice got shrill with shock.

Xander put his weight onto her, and she stumbled before she pushed him back toward the wall so it could hold him up. "I had a couple of ideas, but I can't find them right now," Xander said sadly.

"Spike, what happened?"

"Boy went over to talk to Warren. Git sent the demon after Buffy and he thought it had worked, that Xander was there to beg for mercy. He was trying to figure out who to rape first as part of his victory dance." Spike ran his tongue along the inside of his lip and tried to ignore the curling wisps of hatred and panic and fear that still plagued him. The fact that Warren was human meant that he couldn't do a bloody thing as the git threatened Spike's family. If Xander hadn't shot him, Spike would have, even if the soddin' chip burnt his brain out. "Seems he'd settled on raping Dawn."

"Oh goddess." Tara's hands flew to her mouth.

"He is not raping Dawn," Xander blurted out. "Not that I'm okay with the raping of Willow or Buffy, either. I'm voting no to all forms of rape. Rape bad."

"You're absolutely right, Xander. Rape is always an evil act." Tara patted his arm, but she looked to Spike for answers.

"When the nob threatened to rape Dawn, the boy finally took care of the problem," Spike said with a shrug. It was over now, and he was ready to head down to his room, turn on the music and have a good wank.

"Took care of it." Xander giggled. "What a nice way of calling me a murderer."

"Murder? Oh heavenly goddess. Xander." Tara's voice got all sad, and Spike braced himself for another round of moralizing. Bloody annoying the way they could talk anything to death. No wonder they were all so set against killing when every death seemed to bring on hours of talking.

Xander shook his head. "I'm not a heavenly goddess. At least I don’t' think so." Xander felt down between his legs, and Tara blushed and turned her head as he inspected his cock. Spike would call him an idiot, but this was more the drink than any actual stupidity. "Nope, still here," Xander announced with a bit of pride.

"I'm sure it is," Tara said with amusement. But as soon as her smile appeared, it vanished again."Did you really kill Warren?"

"Shot him. I think I shot him. It's a little fuzzy. I had the gun in my hand, and he fell down from being shot, so I'm saying that I probably shot him." Xander frowned like he couldn't quite remember, which was good as far as Spike was concerned. He couldn't obsess about what he didn't remember.

"At least he's not brooding over it anymore," Spike pointed out. "Warren needed to be put down. Eight months I've put up with those three attacking, and the fucking chip kept me from taking care of the nobs. Now they're fucking gone, and good riddance."

"No swearing in front of Bonnie," Xander muttered.

Tara sighed and leaned close, brushing his sweaty curls off his forehead. "Bonnie's staying with Clem tonight, Xander. Clem had family visiting, and he wanted to show her off."

"She's not here?"

"No. She'll be back in the morning."

Xander didn't answer immediately. He turned his head and rested it against the wall. "Hopefully my head will fall off by morning," he finally whispered.

"Oh Xander."

"It should fall off. I killed someone."

Spike rolled his eyes. "You've killed lots of someones, pet. Can you even count the number of vampires you've staked?"

"Sixteen." Xander answered without a moment's hesitation, and Spike blinked, surprised that the boy would bother to keep track. It wasn't like he went around bragging about how many he'd dusted, so he wasn't keeping stats to brag about.

"Right then, just call this seventeen," Spike suggested. It wasn't like Warren had any more morals or any more right to live than any vampire Xander had staked. He was too weak to protect himself and too bloody immoral to claim the protection of Buffy and her white knights.

Xander was already shaking his head. "But he wasn't a vampire. He talked like one. Wanted to kill Buffy so he could prove he was some big badass, which is sounding like Spike."

"Oi!"

"He does have a point," Tara said softly, turning to give Spike an apologetic smile. Xander took the opportunity to move away from the wall and toward the second chair.

"Don't bloody start. I didn't have to prove anything, unlike that nancy-boy pillock."

Xander started laughing and then fell on his ass when he tried to sit in a chair and missed it altogether. Then he sat there looking vaguely confused, like he couldn't figure out why the chair hadn't just slid over to catch him. It was a good thing that the boy wasn't a drinker because he didn't hold his whiskey well at all.

After a few seconds, Spike realized that Xander was not going to get himself up off the floor and Tara was just looking from him to Xander and back, waiting on him to do something. With an aggravated sigh, Spike walked over and caught the boy under the arms, picking him up and tossing him onto the couch.

"Killed him," Xander keened softly, which was even more annoying than brooding.

"It's not like he had any choice. That wanker was getting more dangerous, and Xander knew it. We all knew it," Spike told Tara. He'd said the same to Xander often enough that he'd gone bloody blue in the face.

"He admitted to sending the reality demon?" Tara moved to the couch and sat next to Xander, her arm going around his shoulders.

"Yeah. Wanted it to change reality so Buffy wasn't the slayer. That way he could defeat her and have the added bonus of chaining her to his bed as the spoils of war." Spike growled at the thought of that pathetic worm ever touching Buffy. Even if it meant the chip fried his whole brain, Spike would have found a way to kill the wanker before that happened.

"And now... not so much." Xander hiccupped. "Know why? Cause he's dead. Like in doornail only more dead because a doornail never was alive, and so it can't really be dead, and Warren is. Really. Dead."

"Don't start in on that rot about killing humans being all that different from killing demons." Spike pointed his finger at Xander and wondered if there was any hard liquor in the house. He'd need some if Xander started in on that shite again. "You kill who you have to if you want to protect family. A vampire or Warren... if they threaten family, then they're choosing to get killed."

Xander let his head flop back onto the couch. "I'm listening to moral rules from the moralless one, Tara. You see why you have to break the tie?"

"What tie?" Tara stroked his leg like she might a dog she wanted to comfort.

"Bloody hell, the boy keeps coming up with theories, each one more barmy than the last. He's run through some rot about it only being okay to kill people who have killed and then he had some shite about saving two for every one you kill and then something about Darwin. The boy's a piss-poor philosopher when he's pissed drunk."

"Two for one," Xander mumbled, scratching his chest. "I saved Jonathan and Andrew. I sort of saved Andrew." Xander frowned. "Andrew's alive, but he would not be saying I saved him, so maybe I saved one and a half. Does that make it okay that I killed Warren?" Xander turned big puppy-eyes on Tara, and she had a look on her face like a deer about to get pulverized by the semitruck whose lights had caught it.

"I don't know, Xander," she finally answered.

"Bloody hell. You could reassure the git," Spike complained.

"Spike." Tara stopped and chewed on her lip. "I can't say something that isn't true. I just don't know right now, and Xander's not sober enough to have this conversation."

"He was even less fun having it when he was sober." Spike stood up and headed for the kitchen. He needed a bloody beer. On the couch, Xander was still trying to talk morality.

"I thought maybe the rule should be you only killed people who had killed first, because Warren killed that girl that he liked and he tried to kill Buffy and he... he did other stuff I'm not remembering right now."

"I know, Xander." Tara made a little crooning sound, and Spike opened his beer and leaned against the counter. Bloody souls weren't good for anything but mucking up the brain.

"But there's a flaw in that theory," Xander said, his voice a loud whisper.

"What's that?"

"I killed. I killed Warren, so does that make it right for someone to kill me?"

"No, Xander, it doesn't."

"Then maybe I wasn't right. Maybe I shouldn't have...." Xander's voice trailed off into a sob. Bloody hell. Spike had worked all night to get the git to the point where he wasn't brooding. He was coming up with daft rules about who could kill, and he was doing that in a bar full of demons who probably thought Xander was more than a little touched in the head, but he wasn't brooding. Five minutes at home, and now he was sobbing, the sound muffled as if by fabric. He was crying on Tara then.

Throwing the beer cap in the sink, Spike headed for the stairs. "You want help getting him downstairs?" Spike asked.

Tara shook her head. Xander was laying on the couch, his head in her lap and his arms around her waist as he sobbed. "We're okay here." She was still petting him, but Spike wasn't sure Xander even noticed. The man really was about as touched in the head as Dru.

"When he's listening to reason, you just remind him of one thing: If Warren's plan had worked, Buffy wouldn't be the slayer, Dawn would be chained to his bed, and I'd be dead. If Xander hadn't acted, that's the future Warren would have created sooner or later. He was too bloody obstinate to ever give up without some sort of victory to cling to." Spike was one hundred percent sure of that. Xander just kept sobbing, and Tara kept stroking his shoulder like some sort of stray, and Spike just rolled his eyes and headed down to his bedroom. Daft. They were all daft.

Nineteen

Then next night, Spike cut through the dungeon level rather than risk running into Xander and his brooding. It reminded him too much of Angel and his constant whining about how he wasn't human anymore. Git. Some days Spike wondered if it wouldn't be a mercy to just stake his overgelled sire.

Of course, if he did that, he'd never get to see Angel's face when the big poof found out that Spike had succeeded where he hadn't. Years ago he'd told those two that love was passion, it was blood and fire and passion, but Angel was such a dead fish that he couldn't match Buffy. Spike was a much better mate. And now that Warren was out of the picture, Spike could focus on the important battle: getting Buffy to stop deceiving herself and everyone else about their feelings. The woman was stubborn. Spike smiled because he was even more stubborn.

The house was dark when Spike strolled up the sidewalk. The door opened and Dawn came sailing out. "I'm off."

"Don't forget—"

"Got it!" Dawn cut her sister off and slammed the door mid-nag.

"Bit," Spike said as he looked at the bag thrown over her shoulder. "So, running away from home, then?"

Dawn laughed and came over to throw her arms around him. Spike hugged her back, feeling her heat and the steady thumping of her heart. The idea that Warren was getting stripped to the bone and eaten just made the feel of her arms around him even better. "I'm having a sleepover at Janice's," she said. She turned and waved at a car. Inside a middle aged woman with jowls waited, a girl about Dawn's age in the front seat waving back.

"You two planning on going out drinking or chasing boys?" Spike asked. Those might be normal enough pastimes for a girl Dawn's age, but if Dawn was planning to do either, Spike needed to make sure they got home safe.

Dawn rolled her eyes at him. "No. What I plan is a night of painting our toenails and watching chick flicks. Are you going to stalk us?"

"For chick flicks? Fuck no," Spike answered. From Dawn's expression, she was telling the truth, but it still bothered Spike a bit that Buffy hadn't warned him the Bit was going out. Sunnydale was a dangerous place, and he wasn't sure this Janice was a safe enough place for her. He dropped his cigarette to the ground and crushed it. "You have weapons?" he asked soft enough that no one could overhear.

"Two stakes and a knife. I'm okay, Spike. Geez, you're as big of a worrywart as Buffy."

"Oi!" Spike objected, but then Dawn went up on her toes and gave him a peck on the cheek, and he couldn't help but smile at her.

"See you tomorrow!" Dawn said before she ran for her friend's car. Spike watched as she got in and the car vanished. Spike would get Janice's address from Buffy and check the place out before he went home. Felt wrong, having family spread out so much, but that was humanity for you... downright illogical at times.

Spike headed up the steps and walked into Buffy's house without knocking. She was picking up a bowl from the coffee table, and she froze for a second, her whole body tight. Spike smiled. Already she was itching for a quick tumble; he could see it in the way her muscles tensed and her eyes dilated. She said all sort of things when the others were around, but her body would always yearn for him.

"Spike, what are you doing here?"

"Wot? I need an excuse to come visit?"

"Actually, yes. You do. Excuses would be good. You not coming over at all would be better."

Ignoring the insult, Spike walked over to the sofa and threw himself down on it, propping one boot on the table. Buffy hit his foot, and he smiled as he shifted it to the floor. Given a little prodding, Buffy did make a beautiful and vicious domme.

"Is there a reason for your visit?" Buffy put the bowl back on the coffee table, crossed her arms and glared down at him.

"Yep." Spike gave her his best smile, the one that always tempted the good little prey into his bed and made Angelus backhand him. "Wanted to give you a chance to enjoy my company." Buffy snorted. "That and I wanted to let you know Warren's gone. The wanker hired the demon who sent you 'round the twist, so Xander and I took care of him."

Buffy took a step back. "Took care of?"

Spike shrugged. It still irked him that he hadn't been able to take care of it himself, but he wasn't some insecure git who took other's credit. "Xander shot him, twice in the heart."

"Xander...." Buffy made a strange noise in the back of her throat and then she started shaking her head. "No, Xander wouldn't do that."

"Took him too long, but he finally got around to finishing the job." Spike stretched and watched Buffy through half-closed eyes, waiting for her move. Instead Buffy dropped down onto a chair.

"He... he killed Warren? Xander wouldn't do that. He isn't...." Her voice trailed off. Spike wasn't really surprised at the shock though. Hell, up until Xander pulled the trigger, Spike had been starting to wonder if the boy had any balls at all, despite Anya's colorful descriptions of him as being endowed like a Viking.

"When Warren didn't fall for any of the puppy boy's plans, Xander finally went over to deal with him directly."

"Plans?" Buffy glared at Spike.

"You know, talking Jonathan into going down to L.A."

"But...." Buffy was definitely off her game today. "He said he ran into Jonathan, that they just started to talk."

Spike frowned. What the bloody hell was Xander doing lying about what he'd done? The only time Spike had ever lied to Angelus was when he was about to sell him out to the slayer. "He said that?"

"Yeah. Spike, what is he not telling me?"

Spike sat up. Bloody right the slayer could trust him. "The boy and I snatched Jonathan up off the streets, and Xander talked some rot about comic books and right and wrong and then he talked Jonathan into going to stay with that nancy-boy watcher of Angel's."

Buffy smiled. "Okay, that sounds like Xander. Except for the snatching part, which sounds more like you, Spike."

"I helped," Spike agreed. "Bloody chip kept me from doing much but driving."

She nodded. "I bet you helped Xander with killing Warren, too, didn't you?"

"Helped him get the gun and drove him over. Then I was stuck outside listening to him try to talk Warren around to being a white hat. That one wasn't ever going to change, but Xander just kept trying to reason with him until the wanker finally threatened to rape Dawn. Apparently he thought his demon had done its work and you were helpless to protect any of us."

"So Xander killed him?" Buffy had a strange tone to her voice. Spike frowned and tried to figure out what she had running through her head.

"Shot him twice in the heart, but I arranged for some demons to come get the body, so the boy's in the clear." Spike sprawled, his arms stretched out on the back of the couch.

"You." Buffy stopped, her lips pressed tightly together, and Spike could feel a wisp of fear. Back in the day, that look meant Darla was about to take a whip to him until he couldn't stand on his own. "Get out." Buffy's voice was slow and measured.

"Wot?"

"I can't believe you. You backed Xander into a corner, and then you're going to come over here bragging about it?" Buffy was up on her feet, a finger pointed in his direction, and Spike sat up fast. "What? Isn't it enough that you corrupted me, but now you have to go ruining Xander's life?"

"I never—"

"Get out." Buffy's whole body was trembling, and Spike could smell the aggression and need rolling from her like a heavy fog.

"Going to play that game again, are we?" Spike stood up, bending his elbows as he prepared for the attack. Buffy did like her games, almost as much as she liked ripping through his back with her nails, leaving him bleeding and sore. Spike's cock was getting hard in anticipation.

"I told you, we're done."

"I heard that chorus before, luv." Spike pursed his lips and stalked closer, lured by the scent of Buffy's desire. She was breathing fast, and he could hear each heavy breath and her heart pounding.

"I mean it this time."

"No, luv, you don't," Spike said. "No need to keep lying to yourself?"

"Don't say that!" Buffy's fists came up, and her smell sharpened. Breathing in the scent of Buffy's desire, Spike smiled. "Just...." Buffy stepped back. "Okay, so I have some feelings."

"Some?"

"Okay, more than some. I have a lot of hard, sweaty feelings. But it's not love. Don't you see that?"

Spike moved forward again. "I see how much you want me."

"Do you see that I can't trust you?" Buffy's words cut through Spike, and he stopped. If this was some new game of hers, he didn't like it. Often as not she verbally and physically dominated him, but she'd never questioned his loyalty.

"You think I'd sell you out, side with some wanker like Warren who wanted to kill you?"

Buffy sighed. "No." Spike tried to not show the relief he felt at that, and Buffy kept on going. "But I can't trust you to understand what I'm feeling, what I need."

That made Spike laugh. "Trust is for old marrieds, Buffy. Great love is wild ... and passionate and dangerous. It burns and consumes." He stalked forward. "That's what you need. You need to let the fire take you until you don't have to think about anything but the passion." Spike had seen it a dozen times, the way Buffy's pain and loss would fall from her in the middle of their sex. She'd start full of conflicts and hurt, but he'd erase that... make her feel alive and whole and dominate.

"But until there's nothing left," she said softly. "Until there's nothing left of me... of the people I love. Love like that doesn't last, and how many people are going to be hurt?" That slight sour of pain was there in her scent, and Spike snorted at the wrongness of that. She just needed to slip back into their roles, and she could let that pain slide away.

"I know you feel the passion. You don't have to hide it anymore." Spike reached out, but Buffy yanked her hand away before Spike could catch it.

"Spike, please stop trying to make this work. It won't."

"Let yourself feel it." Spike whispered the words, his voice a plea. When he moved forward, she hesitated, and he slipped his hands around her waist, feeling all that strength below her skin. She was more demon than human some days, and he could see the wildness in her now.

"No."

"You love me." Spike leaned in to kiss her, waiting for her legs to wrap around him, taking him to the ground.

"No, stop it." She sounded cranky now, and Spike smiled and tried to grind his body against her. She just needed reminding of just what he could do for her.

"Admit it, luv. We're made for each other."

Buffy caught his arm and wrenched it so that muscle and tendon strained. Spike hissed through his teeth, his cock totally hard now. He grabbed her hair and tried to pull her close for a kiss. He loved that she would use his body any way she wanted, but he craved a kiss. She pushed at his shoulders, letting go of his arm, and Spike grappled for dominance. He'd never get it, but pushing Buffy to take control was the best part of the game.

"Ow, stop it." Buffy twisted and fabric ripped in Spike's hand. Well, that was one more shirt for the rubbish bin. He'd hear about that later, but not until Buffy was hot and sated, her limp body lying across his.

"What the hell do you—" Buffy's words were cut off as she hit the chair with the back of her leg and tumbled to the ground. Spike was on her in a second, pinning her to the ground and smelling the aggression like a perfume.

"Ow!" Buffy tried to crab walk out of the small space between the coffee table and chair, but Spike had her trapped.

"Let it go. Let yourself love me."

"Get off me!" Buffy brought up a knee that caught Spike just under the ribs, and he grunted in pain.

"Fuck yeah." His eyes went yellow and his whole body was tense, ready for a fight or a fuck. He hadn't felt this since Dru... or since Dru'd stopped having good days, anyway. After Prague, they'd never been the same. His vicious plum had seemed to barely notice him most of the time, but Buffy wasn't going to ignore him. She couldn't claim to be off talking to stars or dolls. When she needed him, he'd given up everything to be hers, and she was going to see just how much he loved her, no matter what he had to do. "You have more in you than that, luv," Spike crooned.

"No, stop it!"

"I know you feel our passion, our fire. When I'm inside you, that's when you come alive." Spike ran a tongue over her neck, feeling the heat and tasting the salt.

Buffy shoved him back and scrambled for the couch. Spike reached out, catching her foot, and she went down in an inglorious heap, her head hitting the coffee table with a loud crack. Spike flinched. If they broke that, he was never hearing the bloody end of it.

"Ow. no, Spike don't, please," Buffy cried out.

"I know how to make it all better. Going to make you feel good," Spike promised. He reached for her, and she made an awkward roll to the side to get out of his way, almost like she meant to lose the battle. That wasn't part of their normal game at all, but he'd done that for Dru often enough, taking the dominant role, playing at a relationship that didn't really exist between them. On the worst days, she'd call him daddy when she'd begged him to hurt her. Spike shoved that memory aside and focused on Buffy.

He focused a half-second too late. Buffy's punch caught him in the middle of the face and sent him sailing backwards. He hit the chair, tumbled over it, and crashed to the ground.

Spike bounced back up, confused and bleeding from the nose. That soddin' hurt.

"Stop!" Buffy said coldly. Her tone more than her word stopped him. Spike frowned at what he saw. Her body was defensive, but not coiled with power the way it usually was when they were together. Instead she almost looked like she was curling up inside herself, hugging her own body the way the puppy boy would. She held one side of her blouse up, the fabric ripped and a rug burn already showing through on the skin below.

"Buffy?" Spike cocked his head and sniffed the air. Her musk was there, dominating the space, but instead of being tinted with lust and power, there was a weariness in it, a pain that he'd never smelled before. Spike looked at her again, slowly realizing that this wasn't like every other time they'd been together. She wasn't fighting back. She wasn't digging her fingernails into his back and demanding that his body yield in ways a human couldn't survive.

"Ask me again why I could never love you," Buffy asked quietly.

Spike's blood turned to ice. He hadn't meant-- He never—Spike's thoughts chased through his head as he remembered every time they'd been together, every time he'd had to taunt her, encourage that demoness to slip out from under the weary and defeated woman Buffy had become.

"Buffy, my god, I didn't—" Spike stopped. He didn't mean to try and rape her. That was Angelus' game, and Spike generally preferred his partners willing. He wanted them reaching for him, not crawling to get away. He'd had enough of lovers who didn't actually want him. However, before he could explain any of that, Buffy cut him off.

"Because I stopped you," she snapped, and he had no comeback for that. "Which is something I should have done a long time ago."

"We're good together," Spike argued. Okay, he'd fucked this up, but there was room to recover.

"No, we aren't," Buffy said firmly. "You convinced Xander to kill someone. You convince me to—" She stopped.

"You loved every second," Spike snapped. He'd never made her do anything. Not until things had just gotten out of hand.

"I shouldn't have, Spike. That's my point. You need to leave, and you need to not come back." Buffy crossed her arms.

Spike wanted to argue, to slide up close to her and whisper in her ear. He wanted to feel her hands holding him down, fingers pressing deep into his flesh. However, some little part of his brain cautioned him that he was dangerously close to provoking the slayer in her. Spike backed up toward the door.

"Spike," Buffy said. Spike looked at her. "I mean it. Don't ever come back. I can't trust you, and I won't have you around Dawn."

Spike turned and strode out the door, his guts twisting so painfully that he actually touched his stomach to check for some sort of wound. Fuck. Fuck it all. It wasn't his fault. He just... he didn't understand how people worked. He didn't understand Xander or Tara or Buffy with her fucking rules that never made one bit of sense. Spike found himself running down the dark road without any destination in mind.

Twenty

Xander watched as Willow came in the room and shyly smiled at Tara. Tara ducked her head, but Xander was guessing that if he had sat on the other side, he would have seen she was smiling back. It felt weird; he'd killed Warren and life was just going on like normal. He felt like he should have some giant sign floating over his head that said, "Murderer here."

"Hey," Willow said, "so, big Scooby meeting? What's the sitch?"

Buffy shrugged and pulled her feet up under her. "Tara and Xander called this one."

"You two? Together?" Willow looked at them in confusion.

"Yep," Xander agreed. "Only not together, together. Just more like... um...."

"We decided that it's time for all our secrets to be on the table," Tara finished for him. Xander smiled at her.

"What she said," he agreed. He really didn't want to give up his secrets, but Tara was right that this thing with Warren was too big to hide. It wouldn’t be fair to leave Buffy thinking Warren was still out there, and he really didn't want to follow Willow down the path of repression and denial. That was just not a fun path.

"Okay." Willow sat down in the chair opposite Buffy. "Just to let you know, I haven't done any magic. None. I don't have secrets. Promise. So if this is an intervention, I am intervention unneeding. At least now, because it's not that I'm denying that I had a problem, only that it's no longer at intervention requiring levels."

"Willow," Xander said, but she just kept going.

"I mean, I'm getting more into the computer again, and I found this great group online, people who understand how hard it is to get through the day when there's this giant hole where the addiction used to be. And it's great to have people who understand, but they're addicts. Real addicts. Heroine and cocaine addicts, and let me say that it was not my life's goal to ever have anything in common with drug addicts, so I totally understand that I was out of control. Am out of control. Well, I'm sort of out of control, only I've been really good about controlling it. Promise." Willow had the sort of insecure, desperate expression that Xander remembered from high school. This was his non-addicted and babbly Willow... much better than the too-large and too-in-charge magically super-powered one. Maybe Tara saw that, too, because she leaned over to rest a hand against Willow's leg.

"Actually, I was hoping I could start." Xander said.

"Oh." Willow cringed.

"Xander?" Buffy asked. Xander looked over because Buffy had a strange tone in her voice.

"And hey, maybe after I start, we could all take turns baring our souls," Xander suggested with a plastic grin. He really wanted Buffy to come clean about the Spike-thing before either of them got hurt. He looked around at the whole room. Tara gave him a proud smile.

"Sounds fun," Willow said, her face scrunched in either disgust or dismay.

"Yea," Buffy agreed in a weak mockery of a cheer. She actually looked like she might be nauseous. Actually, now that he thought about it, Xander was coming mighty close to worshipping the porcelain god.

"Maybe I should start," Tara said quietly. Everyone looked relieved, and Xander was suddenly aware that he didn't know what was going on with Buffy and Willow any more than they knew what was going on with him. Oh, he already knew way too much about the Buffy and Spike show, but he didn't know why Buffy would turn to Spike. He didn't know why Willow's love of magic sparkles had turned into the addiction that threatened to destroy her. He didn't know his best friends anymore, and it hurt him.

Tara looked down at her lap. "I kn-kn-knew Willow was in trouble." Her voice trembled and Willow reached out for her hand before yanking her hand back before they made contact.

"Hey, you're not the one to blame for that."

"The addiction? No," Tara said firmly. "But I have my own sins." She took a deep breath and Willow laid her hand on top of the one Tara had placed on her knee. "I should have said something, but I thought I would lose you. So I d-didn't step in when I kn-knew there was a problem." The stuttering just about broke Xander's heart, and he wanted to just rush in and confess his own screw-ups to keep her from hurting herself. However Tara looked each of them in the eye and Xander couldn't interrupt her. "I should have put my foot down, but I covered when you forgot things, forgot people. I should have walked out before you became so addicted."

Willow's eyes were shiny, and her fingers curled around Tara's hand. "It wasn't your fault. I was out of control."

"And I let you get away with it," Tara said softly, her voice trembling with emotion. "I love you, but I can't be part of you destroying yourself or others." Tara took a deep breath. "If we try this again, I can't give you chance after chance, and I will use protective spells to keep you from putting a spell on me."

Willow flinched, but she nodded. "I can see why you need that. I don't like seeing it, but I can," she agreed. "But this isn't your fault."

"Not only mine." Tara looked around at the room. "We all should have stepped in sooner. We've all started keeping too many secrets."

Xander flinched, and he noticed that Buffy did, too. He wished there were an easy way to just blurt out that he knew about Spike and Buffy. That way he could save Buffy the awkward joy of trying to figure out how to say the words.

Tara turned toward him. "Xander?" She gave him an expectant look, and Xander's stomach churned.

"My turn? Hey, I heard there's a Bollywood marathon on television tonight." He smiled at his own joke, but no one smiled with him. Willow looked confused, and Buffy... she looked freaked out, actually. "Bollywood's not that bad," Xander muttered. "Okay, I've got some biggies."

"You can tell us anything," Willow said, looking even more confused.

"Theoretically, yes," Xander agreed. This was harder than he thought.

"Does this have anything to do with how upset you've been lately?" Buffy asked. She leaned forward and studied him until Xander actually squirmed uncomfortably.

"Funny you should ask." Xander cleared his throat and swallowed an inappropriate joke. "Okay, I've been really worried because the idiot trio was getting out of hand, and I think the whole humans-aren't-a-problem attitude is a little weird because humans kill more humans than demons ever could. And I really thing Warren was leading up to some serious killage."

"You do?" Willow wrinkled her nose. "But he's Warren."

"Which means we know he's a little psycho and Andrew is weirdly obsessed with him and willing to do pretty much anything. Sooner or later, they were going to give up shooting ray guns and time loop thingies and just use bullets."

"Were?" Buffy asked sharply, and Xander flinched. Yep, he'd put both feet in his mouth and now he had to tell them.

"Were," Xander agreed softly. "I asked Riley for help—"

"Riley? My Riley?" Buffy sat up and looked shocked. "Riley Finn?"

"Um, yes and not anymore and yes, in that order," Xander agreed. "You guys know that Jonathan headed down to LA, and I asked Riley to drop in on Andrew and Warrenand just poke around a little. Well, Riley's shaman had to do the anti-mojo mojo when Andrew panicked and started throwing magic around. Riley arrested him for assault with magic and attempted murder."

"Oh, goddess. Is Riley okay?" Willow asked. Buffy was just staring at him like Xander's head had turned blue and caught on fire, and this was going about as well as Xander had expected.

"Riley's fine. His shaman was expecting the dork to try something, but that means that Andrew is out of the way, but Andrew had already helped Warren hire the dimension demon thingy that put Buffy in that reality where she's in an insane asylum.

"And you decided to confront him on your own?" Buffy demanded. Before Xander could get offended at the suggestion he couldn't handle himself, Buffy had her hands held up. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean it like that. It just came out wrong."

"Xander wanted to protect you," Tara said softly, her voice offering Xander the support he needed.

"He was insane. Like Joker levels of nuts. He was making plans for who to rape first." Xander's guts churned at the memory. "I thought if it was just the two of us, he'd stop playing this weird game in his head where he had to beat us. I even offered to help him beat up some really scary bad guys. That always works when Spike is feeling useless." Xander sighed as he realized he was saying everything except what he wanted to say.

"Xander?" Willow had her head cocked as she looked at him.

"I shot him," Xander whispered.

Willow's mouth opened in a shocked "o," but Buffy just took a deep breath and leaned back in her chair. "Oh, Xander." Buffy sighed the words out, her voice utterly weary. "This is all my fault."

"Hey, I say we blame the nutcase who thought rape was the prize at the bottom of a Cracker Jack box," Xander said. "This wasn't your fault."

"This wasn't anyone's fault," Willow hurried to say as she looked from one of them to another with a shocked expression.

Buffy didn't answer, but from the way she was slumped in her chair, she wasn't actually hearing the part where it wasn't her fault. Xander traded a confused look with Tara. He had shot Warren. He'd held the gun when it had gone off. He'd seen Warren go down in a tangle of limbs, and he had chosen to go off and get shit-faced drunk... Harris-level drunk... while Spike cleaned up the mess. Buffy wasn't anywhere in that whole story. However, Xander could feel guilt stabbing at him because Buffy was clearly blaming herself.

"Okay, I'm not even seeing why this is your fault. Do you want to share with the rest of the class?" Xander asked.

Buffy's face twisted. "I brought Spike into the group. I.... He stayed because of what I was doing, and I know he pushed you to do that, Xander. I'm so sorry. I should have sent him away a long time ago, and instead I...."

"You what?" Willow asked Buffy. Xander found a soda stain on the carpet and focused on that for a second. Spike was sticking around for Buffy, and he had pushed Xander to kill Warren, so he could see why she was connecting those dots, but she wasn't being fair to herself.

"I chose to kill him," Xander said firmly without looking up from the stain. Spike wanted me to kill all three of them, and I don't mind telling you, he was pissed as hell that I gave Jonathan a pep talk and sent him wandering down to LA. Well, at least until he figured out that it got Jonathan out of the way and annoyed the crap out of Angel as a bonus. But still, if this were Spike's fault or your fault for keeping Spike here, all three of them would be dead. I decided to do something. I decided that they were dangerous, and I couldn't afford to take a risk with our lives." Xander looked up, but Buffy still had that guilty, sympathetic expression that meant she wasn't listening to any of it.

"Wait," Willow said, "Why would you say you were keeping Spike around?" She looked at Buffy, and Xander flashed to seventh grade when he and Jesse had tried to explain sex to her. She had that same expression now, like she didn't understand or believe anything anyone was saying. That was better than good-mood Willow throwing magic around, but Xander could feel sweat gathering along his spine just from the stress of dealing with all the dark, dusty little corners where they'd all hidden their secrets. Tara was studying the drapes and blushing.

"I've been sleeping with Spike," Buffy blurted out as fast as she could. Willow continued to stare at her like she couldn’t understand the words. "But it's over now. It's totally over." Buffy waved her hands in front of her like she was erasing a board. "In fact, I don't think Spike is going to be coming back any time soon."

"Um, Buff," Xander said, "I hate to say this, but he's totally, completely and obsessively in love with you. He's not just going to go away."

"You knew?" Buffy and Willow demanded at the exactly same time. Xander's brain advised him to run for his life because both girls were looking cranky, and he might have gone for it, only he couldn't outrun Buffy."

Xander shrugged. "Spike's been living with me in the new house, and he comes home with...." Xander stopped because he really didn't want to say that Buffy left bite marks and claw marks all over her lover. Xander was fairly sure that wasn't something she'd ever done with Angel or Riley, and from Buffy's sudden blush, he was right about that.

"Oh goddess, I don't want to know, do I?" Willow whispered to Tara, but then she cocked her head and really looked at Tara. "You knew, too!"

"I thought there was something wrong with me, that I came back with something missing because Spike could hurt me. I asked her to not tell you," Buffy hurried to explain. "You and Xander already had so much guilt going, and I didn't want to add to that."

"You're playing avoidy with the question about why Spike wouldn't come back," Xander said. "Oh God, you didn't dust him, did you?" Xander could feel the cold stab of panic at the thought. Yeah, Spike was a soulless monster, but he was their soulless monster, and he'd take Spike over a souled monster like Warren any day.

"What? No. I don't go around just—" Buffy made a face. "Okay, I do go around just staking people, but I didn't dust Spike. I told him that we were through, that he needed to not come back here again."

Xander snorted. "And you think that's going to work? This is Spike we're talking about. The man's obsessions make Imelda Marcos look like an amateur. I don't care what you said—" Xander stopped as Buffy's expression turned to pure anguish. "Buffy, what happened?" Xander asked. He scooted forward on the couch and hated that she was sitting on the other side of the coffee table. He remembered a day when they'd all lay on Buffy's bed and it seemed like nothing could come between them. Then they'd grown up.

"Nothing," Buffy said, her voice emotionless.

Willow leaned forward. "Hey, secrets bad. We're getting all our secrets out and we're forgiving each other and we're fixing whatever went all wrong here. You can tell us anything."

"It really is nothing," Buffy repeated.

Xander's heart sank as he thought about the marks and bruises and bites Spike would come home sporting. He'd come home one night limping so badly that Xander thought he'd gotten into a fight until he spotted Spike's self-satisfied grin and Bonnie had wrinkled up her nose because sex smelled funny.

"Did someone get hurt?" Xander asked. Willow frowned, but the instant blush on Buffy's face, Xander figured he'd guessed right. "Is Spike okay?" It would have to take a serious injury to slow him down, but if she'd hurt him that badly, he might need help.

"He's fine," Buffy said, emphasizing the "he" as she pulled the neck of her blouse to one side. She had a spectacular bruise in the shape of a hand.

Willow's eyes narrowed. "I'm going to turn him into a toad. A slimy, croaking, wart-making toad."

"Will, don't," Buffy quickly interrupted. "It.... He really thought I was still playing, but that's what I mean. I shouldn't have gotten involved with Spike because he doesn't have a soul and he can't know right and wrong, and he pushed you into killing Warren because it's what he wanted to do... to protect me," Buffy said with a sad look in Xander's direction.

Xander wondered if the girls were always going to assume he was just some follower. "Buffy, I told you. I made that choice."

"After he pushed you."

"He pushed me to kill Jonathan, too, and Jonathan is in LA following Angel around. I'm a little more worried about Spike hurting you like that. Were you fighting or...." Xander stopped because he really didn't want to think that Spike would force himself on Buffy. As much as the insane one loved Buffy, he wouldn't hurt her intentionally, but Buffy was right about the line between moral and immoral was a little fuzzy in Spike's head.

Buffy made a disgusted face. "Or," she admitted.

Xander dropped his head into his hands and rubbed his face. When had he gotten so used to expecting some sort of ethical code from Spike? Clearly, he had to rethink how far he trusted Buffy. If Spike would hurt Buffy under the right conditions, it pretty much meant he would hurt anyone. Not because he meant to, but just because he was a soulless demon.

"Hey, doesn't it feel better to have all the secrets out?" Willow asked, but the tone of her voice suggested that she was ready to dig a hole to hide in.

"I actually still have the big one," Xander admitted. He rubbed his hand over his face again.

"Bigger than killing Warren?" Buffy sounded worried, and Xander ordered himself to just blurt the truth out before Buffy and Willow could go jumping to conclusions.

Sitting up, he looked at the girls and he couldn't find a single word in his head. It was like he'd just lost his ability to use language.

"Xander," Tara prompted gently.

Closing his eyes, Xander took a deep breath and reminded himself that these were his best friends. And if nothing else, they didn't know where he lived, so Bonnie was safe. "Um, do you remember the hyena?"

"You still have a hyena?" Willow asked.

"No. No, the alpha bitch is well and truly gone," Xander reassured her. "I just... that night I did some things."

"Like eat Principal Flutie?" Buffy guessed.

"Like sleep with this really nice kwani demon. Half-kwani, actually." Xander blurted out. K'wani, Faith, and Anya—there was a pattern there. Xander waited for the accusations and blame, but Willow and Buffy both just looked at him like they couldn't figure out what he was trying to say.

"I'm sorry I hid it all these years, but at the time, I thought I could keep that part of myself separate from my life with you guys."

Buffy leaned forward. "Xander, no offense, but what you do with your sex life really is your business. The best part of you and Anya breaking up is that I don't get daily updates on your performance in bed because that was seriously creepy."

"I think I left the important part out." Xander licked his lips and fought down an urge to flee. "K'wani had a daughter. I have a daughter."

Now both girls looked dumbstruck. That was the reaction Xander had expected. "K'wani's family made her leave almost a year ago, and I've been raising her. I guess when I was young I was all caught up on the demon-equals-evil theory, only K'wani isn't evil, her mother is more normal levels of emotionally abusive evil, and Bonnie isn't evil at all."

"Bonnie?" Willow asked. "You have a daughter named Bonnie?" Buffy looked like she was having trouble getting her mouth to close.

"She's really beautiful. She has all these dark curls and bright green eyes." Xander skipped the part where she developed kwani cheek patches when she got upset. "I looked at this little baby, and when I was a kid, it seemed reasonable to hide her from you guys and especially from Giles."

"Giles? Why Giles?" Buffy asked.

"Um, because he was the baton twirler in the cheer squad of 'demons-equals-evil.' I didn't want him to tell the Watchers about my daughter."

"So you didn't tell us?" Willow had her hurt voice out now, and that voice was worse than her overly cheerful addicted voice. Whatever Willow said in her addict-voice was all about her addiction, but right now, Xander was hurting her and he knew it. Tara slipped an arm around Willow's shoulders.

"I'm sure he had a reason, but he was very young. We all did stupid things when we were young. I believed my family when they told me I was an evil demon," Tara pointed out in her gentle voice. Tara could get Willow to listen to things that Xander never could.

"I was embarrassed. I mean, how many safe sex talks did my dad make me sit thought, and then I not only slept with a demon, but I got her pregnant. And it wasn't like I had custody and you guys could come visit. K'wani's family barely let me visit," Xander explained.

"That's not right. You should have told us, and Buffy would have made them be nicer," Willow said firmly.

"Which would have led to Bonnie having dead family members, and I was trying to avoid that."

"You think I'd kill your daughter's family?" Buffy crossed her arms and glared at him.

"I think K'wani's family would have tried to kill a slayer that stepped foot on their family's property," Xander said. "I know you guys are upset, but even looking back, I'm not sure how I could have told you back then. And yeah, after we graduated, I probably should have told you, but once you keep a secret for too long, it's hard to figure out how to let it out." Xander stopped, and he noticed a heavy silence had fallen over the whole group. Willow was leaning into Tara and Buffy had curled up into a corner of her chair, and Xander picked at the lint on his jeans. Yep, fun times.

The silence ticked by, and Xander scrambled for words other than a joke. The air felt so tight that if he told a joke, something might snap and the universe end. It was like the three of them were on opposite points on a triangle and there was a big middle of awkward that kept growing between them. This wasn't supposed to happen, not to the three of them. Tara reached over and put her hand on his knee, smiling at him sadly.

"Buffy, are you okay?" Xander finally asked.

"What?"

"The Spike thing. Did he hurt you?"

Buffy shook her head. "I thought you'd be singing choruses of 'I told you so.'"

Xander shrugged. "He's a demon. He's a soulless demon who doesn't know right from wrong. He's also been living with me, so I think I lost track of that as much as you did."

"Were you and Spike...." Willow wiggled her fingers and made a squinchy face.

It took Xander a second to interpret that. "What? No. Absolutely no. Really no. He just moved in after he found out about Bonnie. There was blackmail, which should have been my first hint that he wasn't good... well, after the whole attempted murder and hitting me in the head with the microscope and hunting Buffy and siding with Adam. But somehow, I started to think of him as a friend and roommate instead of a blackmailing asshole." Xander looked at Buffy. "We were both kind of idiots."

She didn't disagree.

"We all had a really hard night," Tara said. "Maybe tomorrow we could have dinner together. A potluck?"

Willow sucked her lower lip into her mouth. She wanted Tara to stay the night; Xander could practically see it written across her face.

"I'll see you then?" Tara asked Willow. Willow's whole face collapsed, and Xander hurt for her. Willow put on her best good-little-soldier face and nodded.

"I'll walk you home." Xander stood up. He realized that Tara hadn't told the others that she was living with him now, but then maybe she wanted to wait on that secret. She loved Willow. Xander could see that on her face every time she looked at Willow, but she hadn't learned to trust her again.

"I could," Buffy looked up.

"Buff, I got it," Xander said. "Other than a few random vampires, the town's been pretty quiet." Xander didn't point out that their most dangerous enemies were dead. The image of Warren's shocked face flashed across his memory. Bile rose in his throat and he had to swallow it down.

Buffy nodded and Xander started toward the door at Tara's side.

"That wasn't too bad," Tara said once they were outside in the warm California night.

"The worst hasn't come," Xander said as he thought about Spike attacking Buffy. He didn't for a minute believe that Spike would intentionally hurt Buffy or Dawn or Bonnie; however, he couldn't keep sticking his head in the sand. Spike wasn't a good man. "Can you do a dis-invite spell for me?"

Tara looked at him with wide worried eyes, but she nodded.

Twenty-One

Fucking bitch. It wasn't his fault. She's the one who'd set the fucking rules, and then she'd had the nerve to tell him that he'd fucked up. Spike fell off the curb and landed on his hands and feet on the cold pavement. His skin itched as dawn approached. He'd have to get to shelter soon, but the house was hiding from him. Fucking house.

Spike pushed himself up to his feet and swayed.

He'd never tried to hurt her. Call him what you like—killer, sadist, rapist. He was all of them. Every last fucking one. But he'd cut off his own arm before he'd ever be disloyal. Angel had gone out of his way to stab him in the back at every turn, and Spike still hadn't returned that favor.

Oh, he'd tortured Angel a bit, found a creative use for hot pokers. But he hadn't actually damaged the vampire he'd called his sire for so many years. He hadn't killed that sharp-tongued bint the wanker liked. Spike stopped and swayed in the gray pre-dawn air. She'd liked Xander at one point. How the hell did someone go from Xander to Angel?

Xander didn't have most of Angel's better qualities—his strength, his knack for eviscerating his enemies, his love of fun. Well, those last two were more Angelus' specialties, but they were still there, buried under the soul. However, Xander had qualities Angel could never match. He was loyal and about as stubborn as Spike himself. Spike smiled at that. Puppy boy really was about as stubborn as a mule. And he might put out all the submissive signals, but when push came to shove, he had a real steel under there. He'd faced down Angelus in that hospital. Spike would pay good money for a spell that would let him go back in time to see that.

A tree root reached up to grab his boot, and Spike went flying, catching the tree in a hug to keep from hitting the ground. Fucking wankers were out to get him.

Spike wondered what Xander would be like as a vampire. Would he keep that loyalty? Would he still have that camouflage of helplessness that hid the weapon under it? Warren sure hadn't seen it coming. The wanker was 'round the twist, but he wasn't stupid, and Xander had walked in there and gotten right under the radar. As a vampire, that would be a powerful advantage.

Running his tongue along the inside of his lip, he imagined a vampire Xander as pushed off from the tree and squinted at the waving houses. Which was his? Fucking thing had moved. He wondered if a vampire Xander would walk up to prey with those big brown eyes of his, his mouth drawn up to an shy frown and his head ducked in submission. It was a pretty thought, especially when Spike imagined the demon then springing forward, all yellow eyes and teeth.

An image of Xander going after Buffy made Spike stop and snarl at the air. He'd never let the boy do that. Never. Buffy was just having a womanly fit of pique. She's calm down and....

Spike's brain couldn't supply an "and." Buffy had told him to leave lots of times, but she'd never smelled of such weariness, like she was so tired of having Spike around that it was wearing her down. She'd gone and turned on him.

If he could just figure out why, it wouldn't be so bad. Dru had left because he'd gone soft on the slayer. Even before he went and fell for her, he'd been drawn to her strength and her confidence. He'd believed she was going to defeat Angelus; he never would have sided with her otherwise. Wait. He'd sided with her. Did that mean he'd stabbed Angelus in the back? Spike rubbed his arm across his nose and tried to think, but the alcohol was making that hard. Angelus had turned on all of them, trying to end the world like some sort of feral dog that turned on its own. It wasn't Spike's fault.

What happened with Buffy... that wasn't his fault either. Spike patted down his pockets looking for a bottle. He needed to drink more if he wanted to make himself believe that. She was always the dominant. All he had to do was follow her fucking rules. Spike's foot went out from under him, and he sprawled on the lawn. It was comfortable. Lying his head down on the grass, he went to go to sleep.

"Spike?" A voice drifted in.

"I think he's drunk."

"He's way past drunk."

"Spike, the sun's going to come up."

"Can he even hear you?"

"Spike! Can you hear me?"

Spike raised a hand in a two-fingered salute.

"He hears me. I should go out there."

"I don't think that's a good idea."

"Funny enough, neither do I, but the alternative is letting him get dusted."

"Be careful."

Spike growled when human hands pulled at him. He forced his eyes open and saw Xander's face an inch from his. "Oh, it's you."

"Hello to you, too. Did you drink a distillery?"

"Fucked up."

"Yep, you really, really are," Xander agreed. "Come on, one foot in front of another, Spike. You know how it works." Xander had his arm around Spike's waist and he was trying to walk him toward the driveway. Spike kept trying to get his foot in front of Xander's so he could get to the porch, and their legs were tangling in the middle.

"As amusing as this is," Xander said, "the sun is coming up, and we need to get all the good little vampires into the shade before they turn into piles of dust."

"House is that way, Harris."

"We aren't going to the house, Spike."

"Then sod off." Spike shoved Xander back, and he landed on his butt. The chip didn't even spark. Maybe something was finally going his way. He staggered up the steps, ignoring Xander's shouts and the look of panic on Tara's face. Whatever was going on, he'd fix it after a good day's sleep. He hit the entry and bounced off, an invisible barrier blocking him out of his own home. Snarling, Spike shoved against it, only to have it hold.

"Spike, you need to get inside." Tara wrung her hands.

"Then invite me in," Spike said. He stood up as straight as he could and tried to not sway. Tara looked past Spike, and Spike turned around to see Xander just getting up from the lawn. "Hurry up and invite me in, ya nob."

Xander sighed. "Spike, I can't."

"Sure you can. Not hard. Even you can manage it."

Xander climbed up onto the porch like an old man. Spike squinted, trying to see if he was hurt, but he just moved like he was old and tired. "Spike, I'm really sorry, but I can't invite you in. Now let's get you somewhere sunproof.

"It's my fucking house." Spike turned and tried just ignoring the barrier. It repelled him strongly enough to send him crashing into the porch post, and Spike snarled in full game face.

"Invite me back in or you'll be sorry." Spike pointed a finger at Xander. After the words were out, it occurred to him that he'd just made the most pathetic threat in history, but he was too soddin' drunk to get more creative in his intimidation.

"I am sorry, Spike. I actually got weirdly used to having you around, but after what happened with Buffy, I just can't have you in the house with Bonnie."

Spike frowned, trying to understand what Xander was saying. "I never hurt the poppet. Never would."

"And you'd never hurt Buffy," Xander said. Spike opened his mouth to protest, but Xander cut him off... cheeky sod. "I know you would never intentionally hurt Buffy, just like I know you would never intentionally hurt Bonnie, but I forgot that you're a vampire, Spike. You aren't a soul-having demon like Clem—you can't even understand why we're so upset."

"Sure I can. Buffy's brassed off because I broke the rules," Spike defended himself. "That's doesn't have anything to do with you, mate."

"It has everything to do with me, Spike. I don't expect you to understand that, but I'm not going to let you into the house, and time is running out. We need to get to the van."

Spike lurched forward and caught Xander by the shirt. Tara cried out, but Spike ignored her as he used his weight to push himself and Xander off the porch. Xander lost his footing on the side of the walk and they both went down in the grass. Xander grunted as they hit, and the chip sparked, helping to sober Spike up a bit as well as giving him a bloody headache.

"This is my house, mate. Now you let me in or you're going to find out what kind of enemy I make." Spike nearly whispered the words. There was something particularly terrifying about making prey strain to hear the threats.

"I really hope you don't become enemies, Spike, but I have to protect my daughter. If you can hurt Buffy, you can hurt her."

"I didn't hurt the slayer. She's just playing another of her games. She'll be back to wanting me." Spike put on his cockiest grin even though his gut was telling him he'd ruined something there.

"No, she won't. And I don't expect you to understand that."

Spike pushed himself up and looked down as Xander all sprawled in the grass. If it weren't for the chip, he could eviscerate the boy in two seconds. A quick twist of the knife, and his guts would spill out like an over-filled grain back. The chip sparked again, and Spike snarled and fell back. "I'm not stupid," Spike snapped. "Don't go telling me that I can't be expected to understand. You lot are the dumbest bunch I've come across. It's downright embarrassing that so many of my plans have been ruined by bumbling morons."

"It's not about being stupid. It's about not having a soul and not understanding what morals are. You can care about individual people, but you can't understand us... you can't be part of us. Spike, I'm not saying you're stupid or that you were trying to hurt Buffy. I'm just saying that vampires and people aren't meant to live this close together and we're going to keep hurting each other if we do, and I can't let my daughter be in the middle of that." Xander looked over his shoulder. "Spike, please, the sun is coming up. You have to get into the van. Please." Xander was pleading now, and Spike liked the sound of that, but he wanted his house. He wanted his bed and his telly. He wanted to play with the poppet and go over to see Buffy when the sun set—fighting or shagging, he wasn't particular. He wanted to check on the Bit and make sure she wasn't sneaking around with boys. They were his clan. He'd bloody lost everything except them, and he wasn't going to give them up.

Spike sat heavily on the lawn, his Doc Martin propped up on the sidewalk.

"It's my house," Spike said as firmly as he could. The world was bobbing and weaving a bit, yet.

"Xander, the sun's coming up," Tara called out, desperation in her voice. If they wanted to play chicken, he would, but he wasn't giving up on what was his.

"Spike stop being so stubborn," Xander said. He got to his feet, and Tara came padding out in her nightgown, holding out a dark blanket. "Come on." Xander took the blanket and held it out as an offering. Spike could feel the sun skittering across his skin like spiders, but there was time for him to get in the house if they would only invite him.

"No." Spike crossed his arm.

"You'll thank me when you've sobered up," Tara said.

Spike turned and frowned at her. "What's that supposed to mean?" Tara threw up her arm and dust flew into the air and then Spike's world went dark.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Xander headed into the living room and moved the chip bowl.

"It'll be fine," Tara said.

"Daddy's scared," Bonnie whispered to Tara, but her childish voice carried into the living room.

"He's nervous," Tara corrected her.

"Spike would make him happy again. Spike's good at happy annoying." Bonnie had taken up complimenting Spike ever since he'd disappeared, absconding with Xander's van in the process.

"He was good at annoying, anyway," Xander agreed. Bonnie looked through the arch, her forehead wrinkled in a miniature frown. Oddly, Xander missed Spike, too. He missed him and worried about him. With the chip, he couldn't defend himself, but Spike was 120 years old. He could take care of himself. Usually. Xander was trying hard to not think about the spectacular examples of just how self-destructive the vampire could be. "He'll come back when he wants to." Xander moved over to Bonnie and took her hand, walking her to the kitchen table. Bonnie sat in one of the chairs, and Xander sat next to her. Holding her hand, he looked at her for a second. When he'd told Spike that he couldn't come in any more, he had no idea that Bonnie would give him more of a guilt trip than Spike ever had. One glorious guilt-inspiring pout and Spike was gone—although Xander figured if he ever told Spike that he'd looked like a pouting child sitting in the grass, the vampire would find a way to pull Xander's spine out, chip or no chip. Then, hauling Spike's drunk, confused ass to the van had inspired more guilt than Xander had ever expected.

However, all of Spike's guilt-inspiring drama paled in comparison to Bonnie's big-eyed and silent stare. "Honey, Spike had to go away."

"Because you made him," Bonnie said sadly, but she managed to sound resigned rather than angry. The problem was, she was never angry, not even when she talked about her grandmother's hatefulness. So the resignation in her voice now just made Xander feel like more of a shit.

"I just told him he couldn't stay in the house with us. He could have stayed in the tunnels under the house. There are four rooms down there." Xander didn't mention that they were dungeons. Spike had stayed in worse, though.

"The why isn't he here?" Bonnie asked with a tremble in her voice.

Xander looked at Tara helplessly, but she simply shrugged. "Oh, honey," Xander said, "I really don't know."

Bonnie chewed on her lower lip. "Did he find a better clan?"

Xander's heart tightened when he was the rejection and resignation in her eyes. "No, he didn't, Bonnie." Xander pulled his daughter close and hugged her. "He just couldn't stay when things changed, but he still thought we were the best clan around." Xander figured he was stretching the truth on that one, but he was putting it down to parental prerogative.

"So, he doesn't like the rules?"

"Yep," Xander agreed.

"Can we change them back?" Bonnie pushed herself back away from his hug and smiled up hopefully.

Xander had always hated it when his parents dismissed him with a 'you're too young to understand' argument. However, he was so very tempted right now. How was he supposed to explain souls and rape and the idea of a moral compass, or, in Spike's case, a missing moral compass. He took a deep breath and blurted out the truth. "I can't let them." Xander braced for the disappointment and betrayal on Bonnie's face. Instead, he saw only confusion. "Honey...." Xander groaned. Where was the demon attack when you needed it?

"Spike's not coming back," Bonnie whispered.

"We can't know that," Xander answered, and after years of wanting Spike to go to hell, he was a little surprised to find he really did miss fangless. Spike had been an important part of their lives... not always a particularly good part, but an important part. It was like missing your first car—the one that took every dime of your money for gas and oil and still broke down on you. Yeah, the car was just bad news, but you liked it anyway. And Xander was not even going to think about what a shit that made him because Spike had hurt Buffy. He'd actually hurt Buffy, and Xander still couldn't seem to stop himself from feeling some sort of sympathy there. After all, he'd been the one at home when Spike had come home with marks and a ridiculous grin that meant he totally didn't understand what Buffy was doing.

"He won't. He won't come home." Bonnie pulled her hands out of Xander's grip. "It's okay, Daddy." She gave a weak smile.

"No, it's not." Xander sighed. Sometimes being a father just sucked. "He hurt us. It's not okay, and some days I want to track him down and drag him back here while insulting his intelligence. "

"Can we?" Bonnie's eyes brightened.

"Spike wouldn't appreciate it." Xander looked at his daughter's hopeful expression. "But who knows—if he's not back in a year, maybe we can. You could do a tracking spell, couldn't you?" Xander turned to Tara.

She smiled at them. "It wouldn't be easy with a vampire. Most tracking spells use life force, but I bet Bonnie and I could go through the books and find the right spell." Tara's words made Bonnie bounce on her chair.

She turned to Xander. "You can make him be okay with being dragged home, Daddy," Bonnie said with confidence. "You can make the slayer lady be nice to him."

Xander leaned back in his chair and exchanged a look with Tara before he focused on Bonnie again. "I can't make Buffy do much of anything."

Bonnie didn't look as happy at that.

"Do you want to help me pick pizza toppings?" Tara asked. Bonnie's face lit up and she slid off her chair to head over to where Tara was holding out the toppings menu. Xander flinched because Bonnie did pick some revolting combination. Funny, Xander remembered the day when he ate anything on a pizza, but these days, pineapple and asparagus should not ever touch the same pizza. Actually, asparagus just shouldn't touch pizza at all.

Bonnie studied the menu intensely, and Xander went back to pacing. The two halves of his life were about to collide, and he was on the verge of developing an ulcer. The doorbell rang, and Xander jumped-his heart pounding painfully. Okay, he could do this. Xander headed for the door and plastered a smile on his face before opening the door. "Hey!" He greeted Buffy and Willow who stood on his porch with overly wide smiles.

"Hey," Willow echoed.

"Way to be responsible home-owning man," Buffy said.

"I thought I'd grow up. It seemed better than the alternative." Xander had meant that as a joke, but Buffy and Willow just stared blankly at him. Clearly he'd missed the funny.

"Willow," Tara whispered from behind Xander. Xander could hear the hunger and fear in her voice, and Willow ducked her head.

"Hey," Willow answered, sounding as unsure as the ninth grade girl who had blushed every time Jesse said 'sex.' When Xander stepped back to let them in, Willow drifted toward Tara. "I tried calling to see if you needed a ride over." Tara ducked her head, but she didn't volunteer the fact that she was living with Xander. "Oh," Willow said in surprise. Bonnie appeared from behind Tara's legs. "Hi there." Willow gave Bonnie a bright smile. Instead of smiling back, Bonnie looked over at Xander, her cheeks darkening.

"Honey, this is Willow," Xander said. He walked over to the couch, sat down, and held out his hand. Bonnie darted to his side and stood with both hands clinging to his arm. "Willow, this is Bonnie."

"Hi," Willow said again.

"Please to meet you," Bonnie offered, her childlike voice very formal. Willow's smile faded a little, and for a second, Xander thought she was going to correct Bonnie's grammar. She didn't.

"And this is Buffy," Xander said.

"Hey." Buffy kept her greeting pretty casual and dropped into a chair. "You look like Xander."

"You're the slayer," Bonnie announced. That seemed to catch Buffy off guard.

"Where's Dawn?" Xander asked quickly.

Buffy turned to look toward the door and frowned. "I don't know. She just needed to grab something out of the trunk, but she was right behind us." She got up and headed for the door. She was almost there when Dawn came charging through the still open door.

"Hi! Oh my God, Xander, you should have told me that you had a really cute boy living next door."

"I do?" Xander sat up and tried to figure out which house Dawn might be talking about, because this might be really, really bad.

"Yeah. The house next door with the blond boy. He's so sweet. He offered me a piece of gum."

Xander cringed. Oh yes, this was going to be bad.

"And what's this boy's name?" Buffy asked suspiciously. After Dawn had accidentally dated the vampire, Buffy had gotten a little paranoid, and Xander just didn't have the heart to point out that Dawn hadn't dated half the psychopaths the rest of them had.

Dawn shrugged. "I don't know. I was busy looking into his blue eyes. So, you must be Xander's daughter. I would kill for those curls. I used to have a crush on Xander so bad, and I swear it's the way his curls look when he needs a haircut and then he gets them messed up. I'm Dawn." Dawn introduced herself to Bonnie and then turned back to Buffy, seemingly without noticing that Bonnie was clinging to her father's arm more than ever. "And you can just stop being so overprotective," Dawn told Buffy.

"I'm your sister. It's protective, not over-protective."

"Are you going to kill Halvard?" Bonnie asked, her eyes focused on Buffy. For a second, the entire room seemed to freeze. Willow and Tara were standing in the arch to the kitchen, Buffy was standing near the chair she'd claimed, and Dawn was next to her, and they were all looking at Bonnie.

"Um, I wasn't planning on it," Buffy said with a confused look at Xander. "I don't kill people."

Bonnie cocked her head to the side, and Xander had that feeling like when you see your soda going over, and you know you're about to get ice cold Coke all down your shirt and in your lap and you just can't do anything to stop it.

"You're the slayer, and they kill people like us."

And yes, that would be the soda hitting. "Honey," Xander said in the awkward silence that followed, "Buffy focuses on bad vampires and people who try to end the world."

"So, she wouldn't kill Halvard?" Bonnie turned to look at him.

"Of course she wouldn't," Xander said, and he was praying for two things. One, that he was right, and two, that Bonnie would just change the topic.

"I thought maybe because he was a krakonos that the slayer would just kill him because he wasn't human. Grandmother always said that slayers came from human magic where humanity was trying to push the native people of Earth off into other dimensions, and that they didn't care if people were good or bad, only if they were human or demon."

Xander's stomach developed three ulcers, but Bonnie just looked over at Buffy. "But my grandmother was wrong about a lot of things. She said Daddy was a worthless pile of meat."

"She did?" Buffy sounded almost winded.

"So, he's a demon?" Dawn asked. "He's so cute."

"He can do this thing where he grows wings and he makes shadow puppets real good," Bonnie added with a smile.

"He's actually a really good kid," Xander said with a weak smile. Right now, an attacking horde would earn his eternal gratitude if it would only pick his house.

"Krakonos are peaceful," Tara offered. "They can call up fogs or snows to protect their secrets, and legend says they're keepers of medicine and magic that they share only with people who have a pure heart."

"Cool." Dawn sat on the opposite end of the couch from Xander. "But knowing Sister Worrywart over here, she won't let me date a demon."

"I never said that." Buffy's gaze flicked over toward Bonnie who was watching with wide eyes. What had made Xander think for even one second that this was a good idea?

"So I can date him?" Dawn sat up and gave Buffy a smile that was either excited or manipulative... Xander couldn't figure it out.

"Hey, you have a spell oven," Willow said in an overly bright tone of voice. She practically fled into the kitchen, and Tara followed her. Xander might have gotten cranky with Willow, but she was living with Buffy and Dawn, so he supposed she had a right to avoid one more sibling fight.

"I didn't say you can date him. I don't even know him."

"But you don't want me dating him?"

"I didn't say that." Buffy threw her hands up and turned on Xander. "Did I say that?"

"She did too, didn't she?" Dawn demanded. Xander stared at them both with his mouth open. Okay, this would be why Willow had fled.

"So, the pizza should be here soon. Any oddities in the toppings are not my fault. So, the school is well on its way to being a school again instead of a pile of rocks. And can I say that it's a little weird to get paid to build something when I was the one who blew it up in the first place? Have to love those soldier memories."

"That is too cool," Dawn said, following him onto the new topic. "I wish I could tell everyone that my family blew up the school. Actually, you'd think they'd know since you weren't exactly secretive, but people really are blind when it comes to mayors turning into giant snakes." Dawn leaned in toward Bonnie. "Has Xander told you that story?"

Bonnie nodded. "Daddy and the slayer blew him up."

"Yep, they did." Dawn smiled. "So, do you have your own room? When I was your age, Mom made me and Buffy share, and I don't think I ever recovered from the trama."

"You didn't recover?" Buffy demanded, her voice incredulous.

Bonnie looked at Xander with wide eyes and shadowed cheeks, and he knew exactly what she was thinking. "It's okay," he told her. "They aren't like most company. They're more like clan, so you can show them downstairs. In fact, it might be a good idea if Dawn knew where the entrance to tunnels were, just in case." Xander felt a twinge when he realized that they'd have to go into Spike's room to see that.

Bonnie smiled and turned to Dawn. "I'll show you." She finally let go of Xander's arm and headed for the stairs.

"Cool." Dawn turned to Buffy and gave her a not-nice smile. "Don't go killing anyone when I'm gone, oh great slayer of native people of Earth."

Buffy stiffened, but before she could say anything back, Bonnie and Dawn were through the door to the basement levels. Sagging back into the chair, Buffy closed her eyes. "I swear, I'm going to kill her and hide the body. Some days she's great, but other days, she's this giant pain in my ass. I think it's pretty clear which one she's being today."

It was oddly comforting that Xander's demon daughter didn't even cause a big enough ripple in the water for Buffy to make a comment.

"You're trying to be mom and sister. It's easier when you only have to be the parent," Xander said.

Buffy opened her eyes. "Huh. Xander Harris, father extraordinaire. That's a little bit cool. Or a lot." She smiled at him. "So, how's the father thing going for you, and where did you get this house because I'm feeling whole lots of materialistic jealousy here."

Xander looked around at the intricate carvings on the exposed beams and the hand plastering work with niches built into the thick walls. The floors had some sort of hard wood with a waving grain that made Xander suspect it might be from some demon dimension because it wasn't in any of his woodworking books. "It is nice, huh?"

"Only totally awesome. I'd get up to see what made Willow so excited about your kitchen, but Dawn has sapped all energy from me, so I'm here until someone feeds me pizza," Buffy said as she spread out her arms so they'd dangle over the sides of the chair. "How'd you find this place?"

"It's a funny story," Xander said as he thought back over the past year. " You know about the night with the hyena, but I guess the story of this house started about a year ago." Xander leaned back on the couch and thought back to how much life had changed in the last year, and how much his view of the world had changed, too. "It started with Spike and a little blackmail, but I guess that's not surprising considering this is Spike we're talking about..."

Chapter 23

"Xander, we've got a problem!" Buffy called as she ran out of the bathroom with the new gaping hole in the floor in the newly reconstructed Sunnydale High School, right on the grounds of the old Sunnydale High School, which seemed slightly stupid. However, Xander had only been hired to build the place, or parts of the place anyway. No one had asked his opinion about putting hormonal teenagers on top of a Hellmouth. He had been considering public high school when Bonnie got older, but hell and the Hellmouth would both freeze over before that happened, now.

"Um, yeah. I am so glad I was not in charge of the subflooring because the boss is not going to like the new expressway to the basement," Xander said. "And can I just say that zombies are so very overdone. I mean, maybe I'm getting old and jaded, but these guys were not up to Jack O'Toole standards. Sure they had the whole living dead-rotting flesh thing going for them, but Jack had a slimy charm that sucked you in before he gutted you with his giant knife. These guys? No style."

"Not that." Buffy punched him in arm a little harder than she should have. Xander winced and rubbed the newly forming bruise.

"If you're talking about your ability to humiliate Dawn, I am staying out of that. Forever. And ever."

"What did I do?" Buffy crossed her arms, but after a half second of indignation, she sighed. "Okay, so I might have humiliated her. I am a mother-figure now, you know. I mean, you've humiliated Bonnie lots of times, right?" Buffy looked at him with hope.

Xander thought about that. Bonnie'd been raised by a demon grandmother to respect strength and power. "Probably," he admitted with a sigh. "She just hides it way better."

"Dawn is not really much for hiding the humiliation. She's more about magnifying it until she can get a new CD out of the guilt she inspires. However, our problem is in the basement."

"Shit. The pipes aren't leaking, are they?" Xander had been in charge of overseeing that the plumbers and the framers hadn't killed each other or ripped each other's work out. Buffy gave him a truly terrifying glare.

"Spike's down there," she said.

Xander's mouth fell open. Spike? His Spike? The giant idiotic Spike who had vanished and left Bonnie picking at her food and throwing the world's quietest temper tantrums?

"Yeah, I was about that shocked," Buffy said. "But Xander, something is seriously not right with him. He's acting like he's been hanging out with Dru too much... either that or he's gotten into serious glue sniffing."

Xander frowned. "Spike?" Spike was a lot of things, but he wasn't generally nuts—not in the traditionally crazy ways, anyway. A vampire falling in love with a slayer did ping the crazy-meter.

"Unless it's a shape-changer...." Buffy stopped. "Wait. It could be a shape changer. We've seen weirder."

"And we've seen weirder than a crazy Spike," Xander said, heading for the door to the basement as he pulled out his construction keys.

"Can I help you?" A black man in a suit came walking down the hall, and Xander held up his work badge without giving the guy time to see it.

"You have a clear violation of section 1632 of California Code of Regulations for building which requires you to provide temporary railings and toeboards or covers where there is danger of people or materials falling through floor. You'd better get in that bathroom before the inspector comes," Xander said without pausing.

"He's right. I think. There is a big hole in the floor, although I'm not sure on the code stuff," Buffy was saying, but Xander had the door to the basement open and was half-way down the stairs before she caught up. "He's the principal," Buffy explained. Xander got to the bottom and looked around. This was not the basement he'd help build. This place looked like it had been built in the 1920s, and welcome to the Hellmouth. Buffy moved in front of him, still talking. "He wants to hire me for something that sounds a lot like a counselor, only without the college degree requirements." She headed into the maze.

"That's great, Buffy." And it was. Xander hated how money had been such a problem, and he could only sneak so much money into the house before she started noticing.

"I hope so. Being back here is bringing up some therapy-inducing moments. I wonder if the health insurance covers therapy?" Buffy sounded vague and distracted. Normally she could find her way anywhere once she'd been there once. Either she had a really good sense of direction or it was a slayer thing. Either way, Xander was getting that cold fingers-up-your-back feeling about this place. Eventually Buffy came to a door and pushed it open slightly, her body tense and poised for a fight.

"Stop. Please, mum! Begging now! Make it stop! Oh, God!" The voice that cried out was Spike, but not like Xander had ever heard him. He gave a pained cry, and a shiver went through Xander's whole body. Buffy turned to look at him with concern. Even though part of Xander wanted to run away and not see the creature making such pathetic sounds, Xander inched forward and looked into the dark.

Spike's curls were loose instead of slicked back, and his black shirt hung open showing cuts and gashes all over his chest as he sat on the dirt floor. "Holy shit," Xander breathed. Spike looked up at him, his eyes wild.

"It's coming. Big and ugly. Coming. Can feel it."

"Oh great," Xander sigh.

"Did I mention he's crazy?" Buffy said quietly.

Spike made a sound that might have been a shaky sob or the world's saddest laugh. "Bug-shaggin' crazy. Crazier. Shagging bugs is nicer than the whispers in my head," he offered. Xander and Buffy traded worried looks.

"Hey, I know a nice quiet dungeon cellar with hot and cold running water and a telly," Xander offered cheerfully. He felt like crap for not offering to take Spike back to the house, because the vamp was clearly injured, but he couldn't risk Bonnie getting hurt. If Spike showed up for a while and then vanished again, Xander didn't even want to think how Bonnie would react.

"From beneath it devours," Spike said, his voice a terrified whisper.

"Okay, this is getting creep-tastic," Xander said.

Spike pointed at an empty corner of the room. "No! Not my fault, you silly bint. You went to the beach." He brought his hands up around his head. "Stop it. Can't hear you." He turned to face the wall and Xander looked at Buffy helplessly. There was crazy and then there was bug-shagging crazy, as Spike liked to call it, and he was definitely that last one.

"Xander, can you get him to come with us?"

"You have the slayer strength."

"You have the construction clothes," Buffy countered. "Hey! Do not give me that look. I am out of money. Out. If I rip something, I can't replace it, and I do not think the principal is going to appreciate me coming to school naked."

Xander sighed and eyed Spike, wondering if the vamp was going to fight. "That would be one way to get boys to come to school," he told Buffy, already moving in on Spike. If the idiot tried to get away, Xander would never be able to hold him, but right now he looked more like a scared kid than a master vampire.

"Nope." Spike shook his head. "No, won't work. Need to find a costume, hide it. Hide it." Spike looked around the room wildly, clearly avoiding Buffy as he searched the corners for something.

"What do you need?" Xander crouched down and pretended he was talking to Bonnie. Of course, Bonnie was never this crazy.

"You'll see. No more mind." Spike looked up at Xander and then Buffy. "Am I flesh? Feed on flesh. My flesh. Not a spark. Solid. Protect the boy. Service the girl." Spike reached for his pants.

"Whoa, hey, let's not get all wild with the servicing." Xander could hear his voice rise to an unmanly squeak, but desperate times called for desperate measures. "How about we stick to protecting the boy?" he asked.

Spike looked at him for a long time before his gaze slipped up to Buffy. "Girl doesn't want to be serviced. Because there's no spark. Ain't we in a soddin' engine?"His voice broke, and Xander had to close his eyes. This wasn't the strong creature who had survived Angelus' torture and Dru's insanity and the Initiative's chip. This was a man who was broken.

"Spike." Buffy stopped.

"Pain and hunger," Spike whispered. "Whispers from beneath."

"Hey, you know what they say," Xander said, forcing himself to fake a cheerfulness he couldn't feel. "Your pain and your hunger, they're driving you home. Not quite as good as the music of pain, but Desperado will do in a pinch."

Spike pulled back, his head cocked to the side. "Home? No home, just whispers, reminding me of who I was. Who I am."

Buffy crouched down so that she and Xander had Spike pinned in the corner. "Who are you? Tell me what happened, Spike." Her eyes were shining, and Xander could hear the emotion in her voice even if he didn't quite understand it. He didn't understand her feelings or their relationship, but there was something still there. Squatting on the floor between them, he could feel the passions that still connected them.

"I tried to find it." Spike sounded so sad.

"And you couldn't?" Xander guessed. Spike looked at him with eyes filled with agony. His hand came up into a claw and he tore at his open gashes, blood flowing. Xander threw himself forward and grabbed Spike's hand. "Stop. Just stop." They wrestled, and Xander found himself on his back, Spike pinning him down, and Buffy on top of Spike, holding Spike's wrists.

"No hurting yourself," Buffy was saying over and over. Xander silently gasped, the weight on his chest making every breath an effort.

"Protect the boy," Spike whispered. Without warning, he threw himself backwards. He drove Buffy across the room and slammed her into the wall before leaping away, his eyes wide with shock. "Right. Wrong. All wrong. Wrong maneuver. Wrong spark. Wrong, wrong. God, please help me." Spike looked at Buffy and then at Xander. "Help me."

Xander got up onto his knees. "I will," he promised. "I will help you, Spike. You have to tell me what's going on." Spike darted toward him so fast that Xander didn't have time to brace himself before Spike hit him.

"I get it. The joke's on me. Lots of laughs." Spike sobbed. "Yeah. Hey, bring the wife and kiddies. Come see the show 'cause it's going to be a circus. This is warm-up act, luv. The real headliner's coming, and when that band hits the stage, all of thiswill come tumbling in death and screaming, horror and bloodshed. From beneath you, it devours. From beneath..." Spike's arms went around Xander's waist and he laid his head on Xander's thigh. Xander stroked Spike's curls the way he might soothe Bonnie when she woke up in the middle of the night with a nightmare.

"You had that dream about something from beneath killing girls. I'm thinking the Hellmouth is feeling frisky," Xander said to Buffy. She was already chewing her lip, so he was guessing she'd come to that conclusion on her own.

She made a face. "I was just getting used to not having a big-bad to worry about. I mean, we've been decidedly low on Hellmouthy goodness since the mayor."

"Is something in the Hellmouth making Spike extra special crazy? Maybe we should all get out of here before we start hearing voices."

"I dreamed of killing you. All of you. Blood like water running over the earth," Spike whispered, his voice nearly lost as he pressed himself to Xander like a burrowing child.

"Hey, you're a vampire. You're supposed to have they freakishly bloody dreams," Xander offered. Yep, he was a little weirded out about hearing that the vampire who was hugging him had dreamed of killing him, but luckily the Initiative made a damn good chip. God bless American ingenuity.

"I think they were dreams." Spike sounded confused, and Xander stroked his hair while Buffy brushed herself off and came over to crouch down near them. "So weak," Spike whispered. "Did you make me weak, thinking of you? Thinking of home, of buckets of salt over the ending, of waking up without family? Angel—he should've warned me. He makes a good show of forgetting." Spike reached up and rubbed chest wounds which were still seeping blood. It was soaking Xander's jeans, which probably made him smell a little like a human sacrifice. Given his history, he really wanted to get away from the Hellmouth before someone tried feeding him to some creature. However, Spike was clinging to him so tightly that Xander wasn't sure he could get up. "It's here, in me, all the time. The spark. I wanted to give you what you deserve, and I got it. They put the spark in me and now all it does is burn."

"Way to go with the crazy," Xander muttered.

"Oh, Spike." Buffy looked ready to cry at any time, and Xander made a face at her, silently asking her to explain to the rest of the class because she was clearly understanding something Xander didn't.

Buffy reached out and touched Spike's arm. He pulled back, letting go of Xander and throwing himself across the room to lean against the wall with the sort of casual disregard Xander had seen a million times. In the blink of an eye, he looked like Spike again, but it was like the universe had shifted two inches to the right and Spike hadn't moved with the rest of them. He was out of sync.

"Your soul," Buffy sighed.

"What?" Xander looked at her with a frown; however, Spike gave an amused chuckle. "Bit worse for lack of use, but yeah."

Xander stared at Spike as the truth finally hit him. Spike had his soul. For a long time, Xander could only blink up as Spike leaned against the wall with the sort of easy cool he always seemed to possess, but his eyes darted around the room like a wild animals.

"You got your soul back. How?" Buffy took one step toward him and stopped when Spike made a small mewling noise. For a second, his body crouched and hunched in either fear or maybe disgust, and then Xander blinked, and Spike was back to his old self.

"It's what you wanted, right? What all of you wanted? Kept telling me I couldn't understand. Didn't have a soul." Spike pressed his fingers to his head and made a low moan of pain. "And now, everybody's in here. Whispers and shouts and curses. Everything I did and everyone I killed and it... the thing beneath... beneath us all.... It's all here. It's all telling me to go to hell." He gave an inhuman little cry. Xander got to his feet and might have rushed forward to comfort Spike except that this looked like the Spike of the past—the one who would have gutted Xander before accepting comfort.

"Why? Why would you do that?" Buffy asked.

Xander closed his eyes and fought against his own tears. How many times had he called Angel an unnatural monster? And now he'd help drive Spike to find his own soul. He'd known how deeply Spike loved—true, it was a twisted, dysfunctional, demonic sort of love, but Spike committed himself to people without conditions. He'd chosen his family, and his family had told him he wasn't worthy because he didn't have a soul... because he couldn't understand. They were no better than Angelus torturing young Spike to turn him into a better companion.

But looking back, Xander wasn't sure what else he could have done. The moment Spike tried to rape Buffy, he'd proven that he could hurt someone even as he loved them in his twisted way. They couldn't have that sort of time bomb around Bonnie or Dawn.

Spike's eyes seemed to glaze over for a minute. "She shall look on him with forgiveness, and everybody will forgive and love. He will be loved." He slowly stared up at the ceiling. "Can we rest now? Do I have to keep fighting?"

Xander looked over, and Buffy was crying. He walked over to Spike and pulled him into a hug. "You can stop fighting," Xander said. At first Spike stood awkwardly in his arms, and Xander started to get that feeling like you might have toilet paper hanging from your pants. Maybe he was wrong about what Spike needed. Just about the time Xander was about to back away, Spike's arms wrapped around him, clinging tightly to Xander.

Spike whispered so softly that Xander could barely hear him even though Spike's breath brushed against his skin. "Your prison is walking through this world all alone." It was the line from Desperado, and Xander figured it was probably Spike's worst fear. It was Xander's.

Xander tightened his arms around Spike and just held on. He didn't know what to say or how to make this right. Everyone had done what they had to, and everyone had suffered. Xander felt a hand press against his back as Buffy moved closer to support him, but she couldn't bring herself to comfort Spike. Xander couldn't blame her when Spike had tried to rape her. She shouldn't have to deal with that. But if Spike had his soul, everything was different now. Maybe he was still going to be a cold-blooded demon. Maybe he was going to be more human. Maybe he was going to be something in between. Well, if everything blew up, Xander could just have Tara do the de-invite spell again.

"Let's go home," Xander told Spike.

Chapter 24

Xander looked at Spike who was now sprawled out in a chair like nothing had changed and he was still the big bad, only now he was the souled big bad, and Xander was shocked at how much that bothered him. He thought he’d hated the vampire. Oh, he'd gotten used to him, but a week ago, Xander would have said that he still hated Spike. The idiot had blackmailed him and threatened him and hit him on the head with a microscope in an attempted to get back his psychotic girlfriend, but the idea of him turning into some brooding Angel-clone was pretty much nauseating.

"Do vampires sleep?" Dawn asked. She was sitting on a kitchen chair Xander had pulled into the living room, and she had her arms crossed in a good imitation of a pissed off slayer.

Spike looked over with an expression of confusion. "Yeah."

"I know you're stronger than me, but if you ever hurt my sister again, I’ll find you when you’re asleep and stake you," Dawn threatened.

"Dawn!" Buffy had been withdrawn and silent up to this point, but that pulled her out of her funk. "Let’s avoid death threats."

Sighing, Xander just patted Bonnie on the back. She was clinging to him. When Spike had first come home, she’d thrown herself at him with such joy that the trembling Spike who was clearly hallucinating had vanished and he turned into the demon she knew. He’d swung her up and for one brilliant second, things felt normal. Then Buffy had followed, and Spike had accidentally brushed against her as he spun with Bonnie in his arms.

The moment that happened, Xander could see Buffy recoil, the fear and desperation etched on her face. If she’d been planning on telling the rest of them that the attack hadn’t been any big deal, she’d lost her chance. In one second, all of them realized just how much Spike had frightened her. Even Spike. He’d put Bonnie down and retreated to his chair. Even now, his body language was big bad, but he was silent, his eyes focused on the knee of his jeans.

"He tried to rape you."

"Ixnay on the ape-ray," Xander said desperately as he felt a need to put his hands over Bonnie’s ears.

"But if he wasn’t strong enough to win, does that still count?" Bonnie asked. The whole room fell silent. Tara and Willow hovered in the arch to the kitchen, Dawn’s back went even stiffer, and Buffy, who was sitting on the couch with Xander, turned ghost-white.

"Honey, it does count," Xander said softly. "It’s not okay to hurt people or even try to hurt people."

"Unless you’re Spike and then you get a free pass," Dawn muttered. Bonnie’s cheeks darkened in distress, and Xander could understand why. Dawn was the closest she’d ever had to a friend her own age, and Dawn had always been a big Spike fan, but now Dawn was pissed. Dawn was rightfully pissed because attempted rape wasn't like putting your elbows on the table at dinner, and Bonnie was having to choose between her friend and her family. Xander held her tighter.

Xander wanted to just sit in a corner and maybe throw a few jokes around, but Bonnie was looking at him with bright green eyes that reflected nearly as much pain and confusion as Spike’s blue ones. "He made a mistake, and part of that was the fact that he didn’t have a soul or a sense of right and wrong. He had more of a sense of strong and weak, and the strong-versus-weak thinking is not exactly moral." Xander struggled to find the right words to make his daughter understand this. "I mean, using that rule we’re all screwed because no matter how big we are, there will always be something bigger out there. But part of that was the whole not having a soul, and hey, he fixed that."

"What does that mean exactly—that Spike is all soul-having?" Dawn demanded. When she got going, she really was about as stubborn as Buffy.

Willow gave Dawn and Buffy matching sympathetic looks. "Now he has a soul, so he’s more like—" Halfway through that thought, Spike turned to give her a yellow-eyed glare that made Xander wonder just how well pinned on his soul might be. She fell silent.

"Not anything like the poof," Spike snapped. Clearly there was still a whole lot of big bad in there. "I should just bugger off." Spike sat up, his posture oddly formal, and Xander could feel Bonnie's fingers digging into his arms.

"Hey, no one is looking for any buggering." Xander blushed as his brain processed that statement about one second slower than his mouth. Spike actually managed to smirk.

"Why were you in the school?" Tara asked softly. When the rest of them flailed like emotionally headless chickens, they could count on Tara to keep her cool.

Spike shrugged. "Something called me. Kept saying that it was coming from below--that I belonged in hell, but since I wasn't coming down, hell was rising up to meet me."

"Well, that's sounding un-cheerful. I thought we had that fight and won it." Xander didn't specifically mention Glorificus' hell-dimension door, not when Buffy was looking so breakable.

"Things are strange in the magical world, too," Tara said. She glanced over at Willow. "Rack is gathering magical powers faster than ever, and it feels like magic is tipping somehow." Willow's eyes slid down to the ground.

"Which I would feel if I hadn't done so much tipping myself," Willow whispered.

Buffy sat up a little straighter on the couch. "Hey, we are not keeping score here. We've all done some pretty stupid things in this last year." When Buffy's eyes found him, Xander flashed on an image of Warren sprawled in an obscene pool of blood. She would probably always think he'd been stupid and just following Spike, but Xander believed in his heart that he'd done what had to be done. Period. However, he'd always regret doing it, anyway. Yeah, if they kept score, Xander figured all of them would have some pretty sad numbers right now. "But if something's coming, then we do what we've always done--we pull together." Buffy had on her firm voice, the one that just dared anyone to disagree with her.

"I feel a need to say 'amen' which is weird with the whole Jewish/wiccan thing," Willow said. She was still timid and quiet, but Xander could feel the clinging wisps of their friendship pulling at him.

"Hey, we've kicked hell's a--" Xander coughed, "tush. We've kicked hell's tush lots of time, as long as two counts as lots. But hey, that's two more times than anyone else has managed, as far as I know. So, what's the plan?"

"We could see what Rack knows," Tara offered. "I don't think Willow or I should go, though. There's a new darkness in that part of town, so he might be killing witches or maybe even stripping their powers." Tara made a face.

"Um, you're making it sound like stripping powers is worse than killing. Personally, I'm way more okay with being powerless, but then I have a lot of experience with powerlessness," Xander said with a goofy grin that got a matching smile out of Willow.

Buffy was still looking like a glass version of herself—pale and on the verge of shattering into a million little pieces. It was weird to think that Spike had managed to do so much damage accidentally when he'd spent years intentionally trying to hurt her without making a dent in her defense. Of course, the problem was that she had let him in. She'd trusted him. As much as Xander had railed and complained and privately thought Buffy was losing her mind, he'd never been blind enough to miss the fact that something in her had pretty much trusted Spike since she'd let him out of Giles' bathtub. Now that Xander had spent time around Bonnie and Spike, he suspected that something deep down in Buffy was just a little demonic—enough that she'd expected to be able to control Spike by proving her dominance over him. It was like Bonnie expecting Spike to come back because he was the strong one in the house so of course he couldn’t leave. That wasn't the way it worked in with demonic logic. The dominant one took control and told other people what to do, at least until the dominant one got tossed on his ass. Spike and Buffy had discovered that pretty much on the same night.

"Xander?" Willow sounded concerned and Xander blinked at her.

"Huh?"

"You're being all weirdly spacey," Willow said. Xander blinked as he realized that people were looking at him. Clearly he'd missed part of the conversation.

"Um, could we back up to where I was saying that dead is worse than powerless?"

Spike snorted, and Xander found himself oddly reassured by the fact that Spike still thought he was an idiot.

Tara studied Xander for a second, and Xander squirmed a bit. "I said that if Rack rips the magic out of a natural witch, someone born with powers, it might rip the soul out too."

Xander's mouth fell open. "I vote no to any and all soul-ripping. I mean, body ripping is bad, but it does not seem fair for someone to go ripping your soul."

"My grandmother saw a lot," Tara said softly and slowly. She was feeling her way around the words, and Xander waited for her to figure out how to say what she was trying to. "She said some demons and warlocks could..." she stopped and swallowed. The something shifted and she straightened up, her determination shining out of her. "She said they could trap the soul. She said the women of my family were cursed because the demon that had stolen my great-great-great-great-grandfather's soul had raped the wife and left a changling child. She said we were the children of that evil—that the demon's blood travelled through the female line and that as long as one drop of the demon's blood walked the earth, the soul of our ancestor was held prisoner inside the demon's heart."

"But that doesn't make sense," Buffy said. Xander was glad he wasn't the only one a little confused. "If your grandmother thought her blood was keeping someone's soul trapped, why would she have children?" Buffy asked. "No children, no demon blood left."

Tara gave a small shrug. "She did what her husband told her. The women of my line had an obligation to have female children who could carry the demon's power. The men wanted... they wanted us to track down other witches with the blood of the demon and kill them. It was our obligation to destroy all the other descendants and then when the line was down to one, she would have to destroy herself to free the ancestor's soul." Tara's voice had lost all emotion, but Xander could feel enough disgust for both of them.

"Your family are complete and utter tit-heads, pet," Spike offered. "How old were you when they started in with that rot?"

Tara shrugged. "From as early as I can remember. But my grandmother used to slip me books, make me translate Latin spells and magic history, and the books said that soul-trapping was a skill of the old gods and the most powerful chaos mages and practitioners of nigromancy and ya sang. Those types of magic users usually sacrifice the ability to have children because they redirect their life-giving forces into prolonging their own lives."

"So they lied. Big surprise." Buffy frowned. "I wish I'd hit your father really, really hard when he was in town."

Tara shrugged like it didn't matter, but Xander noticed that everyone else in the room looked more than a little bothered, including Spike. The last time Tara's family had come up, Spike had congratulated them on being manipulative bastards. Then again, he'd fried his own brain by hitting Tara just to prove to her that she was human. Xander wished he could fit Spike neatly into one box so that he could stop giving himself a headache by trying to figure the vamp out. And now with the soul, Spike was even harder to understand.

"But if Rack is practicing nigromancy or ya sang, he might catch my soul or Willow's. Our soul would be trapped inside him until he died. It would become part of him, like... like a battery in a toy."

"Ick," Bonnie said. Xander flinched as he realized that his daughter was hearing all this. Her cheeks were dark and she was clearly upset, but she still looked calmly around the room with bright eyes.

"Seconding that," Buffy said with a disgusted expression of her own. "So, you two will be staying as far away from him as possible. I'll go and find out what he knows about hell rising." Buffy stood up.

"You can't go alone," Dawn blurted about a second before Xander said the same thing.

"I'll go with," Spike offered as he stood. Buffy flinched back, her foot catching the leg of the coffee table and kicking it hard enough to made Bonnie's pile of books tumble to the floor.

"Sorry. Buffy, I'm sorry," Spike said, backing away.

"No, it's me. I—I just—" She stopped. Xander could fill in the rest. She was just scared. She was just freaked out being in the same room with the vampire who had tried to rape her after she had put her trust in him. Actually, Spike was looking freaked out, too.

"Bloody hell. This can't work. I should just leave town."

"It will," Buffy blurted out quickly, and now she looked desperate. "It already is. Hey, you've been out of the basement for less than an hour and you've already given up talking to invisible people. Give us some time and we can get back where we were."

Spike just stared at her.

"Well, maybe not exactly where we were," Buffy said with a pained frown. Yeah, she was still hurting him about as much as he was hurting her.

"Buff, no offense, but you tend to inspire either running and flailing or the firing of big magical balls of flame," Xander said. "Maybe Spike and I should try talking to Rack."

"You?" Maybe Buffy didn't mean to be insulting, but Xander had to clench his teeth to keep from saying something pretty unkind. Bonnie's darkened cheeks puffed up like little balloons so that Xander could see K'wani's face in their daughter.

"Boy is good at playing helpless and putting people off their defenses. You go in there, and you and Rack are going to end up trying to kill each other. You don't get much information out of a dead body, luv." Spike had been sounding like his old, confident self until the 'luv' slipped out. He visibly flinched.

"That might be the best way to get information. Rack wouldn't hurt Xander. He doesn't have magic and hurting him would make us come after him," Tara said. "But he m-might take you hostage," she added after a heartbeat.

"Great. I get to be bait. There's nothing like feeling like my life has purpose." Xander patted Bonnie on the back and started urging her to move the couch seat. She was getting so big that his legs went to sleep when she sat in his lap too much, and he could feel the pins and needles start when she shifted.

"You don't have to," Buffy said.

"Hey, I don't have to do a lot of stupid things that I do anyway," Xander pointed out. "Besides, Spike still doesn't know how to work the washing machine without shrinking all his clothes, so he'll bring me back safe and sound."

"Bloody right. Houseboys are expensive to replace," Spike said before he headed for the door with long strides.

"See? I feel safer already," Xander joked as he followed him before the girls could launch any sort of counter-attack on his manly ego and ability to not get killed. Hopefully Dawn would distract Buffy with the verbal attack Xander could see just below the surface. Buffy had jerked Dawn around about as much as Spike. Socializing with demons was bad when Dawn wanted to do it, but at the same time she was busy explaining why Dawn shouldn't date Halvard, she'd been sleeping with Spike. Yep. If they were keeping score, they'd all fail at life. "Be good for Tara," Xander said to Bonnie before he closed the door after him.

Xander stood looking at the door. Shit. In all his planning to escape the house, he'd forgotten that he'd be alone with Spike. He wasn't prepared to deal with this new vampire when he couldn't figure out what he thought about the old version.

Sighing, Xander realized he had to face Spike eventually. He plastered a smile on his face and turned around. Spike was standing by the front gate smoking as he scanned he quiet street.

"Are we going to go after Rack, or do you want a chance to take a shot at me?"

"Me?" Xander asked. Spike turned his head just enough to give Xander a cold look. "I was just making sure you weren't talking to any more of your invisible friends." Xander started toward Spike. "I had an invisible friend when I was four. He talked me into eating a mud pie. Looking back, I'm pretty sure I just thought it looked like chocolate."

Spike's eyebrow twitched.

"So... Rack? I don't actually know where he lives, so I'm really hoping you do. If we have to go back in there with the girls, our egos will take more damage."

"I know where he is," Spike said. He gave Xander a long look and then dropped the cigarette to the sidewalk before grinding it under his heel. The turned and headed down the sidewalk. Xander realized that Spike's coat was gone. He'd been a lot more dramatic with it, but maybe he was tired of the 'batman with the cape' look he had going when he walked fast in that coat.

"So, any chance we're going to be taking the van to the other side of town? You know, the van that disappeared when you did?" Xander asked. "Wait. You didn't trade my van for a soul did you?"

Spike stopped and spun around to glare at Xander.

"Not that you could because your soul is worth way more than a van," Xander quickly added. Shit. He really was an idiot.

Spike turned back toward the north and started walking again. This was going to be long night.

"Did the van even survive?" Xander asked.

"If it didn't? Spike didn't seem too concerned. Xander sighed, but hey, before Spike was ripping through his money, Anya was doing the same thing. They walked in silence for a time, neat little houses giving way to small apartment buildings and stores. "Right then, if you're planning on saying something, just say it."

"What am I planning to say?" Xander asked. Spike stopped again, this time staring at Xander until Xander started to squirm. "What?"

"I figured you'd be the one voting to stake me."

"Me? Why me?"

Spike's eyebrows went up. "Some days I think you got dropped on your head as a tyke."

"Considering my mother's parenting skills, that's possible." Xander gave a goofy grin and just waited for Spike to say something that actually made sense.

The silence continued as Spike just stared at him, but Xander was a whole lot better at outwaiting people than he had been as a teenager. Sure, he still wanted to make an inappropriate joke about his mother versus Spike's crazy sire, but he had grown up enough to keep his mouth shut. Usually. Sometimes.

"Bloody hell. I really thought you'd be saying I couldn't be trusted around the women and children."

"Okay, the women in my life are scarier than me. I don't worry too much about them, although I tend to worry a lot about their budgeting and plumbing skills. As far as the children, the only one I know is Bonnie, and she pretty much adores you."

"More than Dawn," Spike said, pressing his lips together unhappily.

"There is the whole attempted rape thing. It tends to make sisters cranky."

Spike gave him a cold glare. "I wasn't trying to hurt her. You, though.... you, I'll hurt."

"First, thank god for the chip because I do know that. Second, I know you weren't trying to hurt Buffy. Okay, I will never again admit this, but I remember what it felt like when I had the hyena--Buffy was so strong, and I just wanted to either dominate her or let her dominate me, but I wanted to be in the same pack with her, and I didn't care if I hurt Buffy the girl because I wanted to be close to Buffy the slayer." Xander grimaced. "Okay, I think I just heard hell freeze over because sympathizing with you over our mutual habit of trying to rape my best friend... this is officially the weirdest conversation I've ever had."

"You? You tried to soddin' rape Buffy?" Spike's mouth was practically hanging open.

Xander shrugged and started down the sidewalk. Hopefully, if he picked the wrong direction, Spike would stop him. "I told you about K'wani."

"Trust me, that wasn’t rape, mate. Hell, the bird still smelled of soddin’ lust even when I met her four years after the fact. When Anya called you a Viking, she couldn’t have been too far off the mark." Spike gave Xander a look that was just plain creepy. It was an odd cross between admiration and curiosity, and Xander’s arm hair stood up on end.

"Way to be creepy guy," Xander complained. "But I wasn’t talking about K’wani. I was talking about when the hyena took over. I actually missed out on eating Principal Flutie because I was busy trying to rape Buffy. She kicked my ass, but I tried. And I am going to deny ever having this conversation, but maybe looking at Bonnie every day and thinking about K’wani has made me realize something." Xander looked over, but Spike was walking beside him without comment. If this had been soulless Spike, he would have made any number of comments by now. This patience was actually as creepy as Spike’s weird looks. Xander chewed on his lower lip for a second as he tried to figure out how to say this. If Spike would just interrupt him, he could change the subject and forget the whole mess, but Xander figured Spike had earned some honesty. "What Warren did…" Xander stopped. Now Spike was looking at him, but he was still staying weirdly quiet. Maybe he was listening to the voices in his head. Xander verbally plowed ahead. "Warren wanted power. He was a sad little man who raped someone because he wanted to feel unpathetic for one moment."

"Soddin’ right," Spike agreed. Xander expected Spike to go off on the righteousness of killing people who threatened the family, but Spike just sniffed and went back to silently studying the street they were walking. Maybe Xander should have brought Bonnie. His daughter had the good or bad habit of showing brutal honesty She must have gotten that from her mother because Xander was more the sort to avoid the uncomfortable parts. Like now. He’d pay good money for a vampire attack to just avoid this conversation he’d started. He was clearly an idiot.

"When I attacked Buffy and K’wani, I wasn’t trying to be unpathetic, although looking back, it was slightly pathetic, but I mostly just wanted the fight. I wanted to dominate them or for them to dominate me, and I was totally okay with either one. It was more about finding pack. So, I’m not saying that vampire are anything like primals--"

"They are," Spike cut him off. Xander looked over, searching for some sort of emotion, but Spike was watching the street with the same predatory gaze he always seemed to have when they were hunting. Xander nodded and just walked through the pools of yellow light at Spike’s side. If vampires were like primals, Xander knew why Spike had done it. It was wrong. Flat out it was wrong. And Xander didn’t regret throwing Spike out of the house. Without a soul, Spike wasn’t going to understand the danger he was putting people in, and Xander knew that because he’d been a danger to everyone when he had the primal in him. And Xander knew he never would have been able to talk Spike or Buffy out of boffing until they wrecked each other’s lives. Nope, the whole ugly mess had been totally out of his control. But if vampires were like primals, Xander could feel a little sympathy for a subordinate pack member who found himself without a pack to run with.

They’d walked in silence for a good mile, the sounds of distant traffic and chirping bugs filling the night, before Spike spoke. "So, you’re not planning on staking me the minute I have my back turned?" he asked.

"Nope," Xander said, "just as long as you promise to not turn into Angel. Seriously, one good brood or speech on redemption and spiritual torture or snowstorm and I’m reserving my right to dust you."

Spike snorted. "Like I’d turn into that nancy-boy wanker. If I start whining about redemption, I’d want someone to put me out of my soddin’ misery."

"Exactly. It would be a mercy killing. I know I’d way rather be dead than turn into Angel."

"I’ll make sure to drain ya and leave your rotting corpse in some nice quiet place if you ever start abusing the leather and hair gel," Spike offered with an expression that came close to a smile. Maybe things were going to be okay. All they had to deal with was something evil rising from below, and face it—they were all way better at fighting demons than confronting personal issues.

Part 25

Xander looked around the empty room. It looked like a waiting room at the world's tackiest dentist, but there wasn't anything particularly magical about it. He might have thought they were at the wrong place, only Spike was doing his wired and twitchy thing. One of these days Xander was going to have the guts to tell Spike that he looked like a hunting dog stalking around the room, but today was not that day.

Spike kicked open a door to an inner room, his arms bent as though prepared for an attack, but as far as Xander could see, there was only a whole lot of grandmotherish furniture. Why was evil always so tacky?

Spike stalked into the room, and Xander followed, watching Spike for signs that it was time to run like hell.

"I guess we missed him."

"Not bloody likely," Spike muttered. He had his head tilted to the side, and Xander could feel goose pimples go up his arm. "Something's here." Spike walked along the wall, his hands ghosting over the walls as he searched for something. Either that or he was trying to freak Xander out, and if it was that last bit, it was working. Xander was suitably freaked.

"Maybe we should ask someone else about the thing from below," Xander suggested.

Spike snorted, but he didn't even bother to answer.

"And I guess I'll stand here and try to look threatening in case someone sneaks up on us."

Spike looked over his shoulder. Yeah, Xander figured those were two things he would never have to do around Spike: watch their backs and look threatening. Spike did both. When Xander gave Spike a goofy grin, Spike rolled his eyes and went back to feeling his way around the room. At least Spike was acting more like Spike now. A hallucinating, guilt-ridden Spike was just wrong... wrong like pink frogs or vegetables on pizza.

"Got it," Spike said.

"What? Our missing wizard?"

"Warlock, ya idiot," Spike corrected him.

"I dare you to call him a wizard to his face," Xander said as he walked around to the side so he could see better. Spike's hands looked like... well, they didn't look like anything because Spike's arms ended at about the wrist. "Okay, that looks painful."

"It's an open portal," Spike said.

"That's better than you just randomly losing your hands," Xander said. "So, our missing warlock skipped town?"

"Or dimension," Spike answered. Xander didn't have a joke for that. Leaving the dimension seemed a little extreme, even for someone trying to avoid Buffy. Usually people just left California.

"Should I call Tara?" Xander reached for his cell phone, and Spike paused long enough to make it clear he was thinking they might need backup. As far as Xander was concerned, if Spike even considered back-up, Xander pretty much thought it was mandatory. Spike might act all surprised that Xander hadn't gotten eaten yet, but Xander was attributing his survival to the fact that he knew when to go running and/or screaming like a six-year-old girl. A six year old human girl.

"Stay here and keep the phone ready. If this portal starts to close, get her over here," Spike finally said.

"Um, how am I supposed to know if it's closing?"

Spike pulled his hands out of the portal and turned around to give Xander a look that made it clear Spike was questioning Xander's intelligence.

"Hey, the only portal I ever saw was Glorificus'," Xander pointed out in his own defense.

Spike took a second to keep giving Xander that same exasperated expression. "Exactly, pet. When portals open or close, they make an awful lot of noise. So if you have a soddin' thunderstorm in the room, the portal's probably trying to close. Get Glinda on the phone."

"Oh. Got it," Xander agreed. When Spike kept looking at him, Xander crossed his arms. "I have it. Storm. Call Tara. I'm not so much of an idiot that I can screw that one up."

"Never said you were, mate. I just don't fancy getting stuck in some other dimension."

Xander frowned. "Spike, you know I want you back, right? I mean, I would never intentionally lose you in another dimension. Not unless you were with Angel and even then, I'd be torn." Xander held his hands up as if he were weighing two things. "Getting rid of Angel—good. Losing you—bad. Honestly, if Angel were going with you, your odds would be fifty-fifty, but since you're going in there alone, I'm going to cover you."

Spike rolled his eyes, but he also smile. "Loon," he muttered and then he dove into the open portal before Xander could even make all his arguments about how maybe they should call Buffy for help on the backup side of things.

Spike came out in the sort of over-decorated castle that Dracula might prefer. Outside the arched windows, a purple and black sky was lit with flashes of lightning that flashed every second or so. They definitely weren't on Earth.

A small sound caught Spike's attention and he grabbed a chair and twirled around, ready to swing it like a bat. Considering that it was just about as ornate as a throne and a good two-hundred pounds, Spike figured it could do quite a bit of damage. Rack stood there, his normal clothes replaced with a long green robe.

"Don't try it, vampire," Rack said, and Spike could feel the magic swirling around him.

"I don't particularly want to, but I'll have answers or we'll find out which of us is stronger," Spike said as he tightened his grip on the chair. Rack would have trouble constructing a spell and ducking at the same time. He'd fought magic users before, and he had no illusion about how much danger he was in, but Spike hadn't lost a fight with one yet.

"Well, well," Rack took a step backwards and dropped his hands to his sides. Spike could feel the ambient magic settle like dust released from a whirlwind. "The vampire has a soul."

"Doesn't mean I won't pull your soddin' intestines out through your nose," Spike threatened. He was surprised when the chip didn't even give a chirp. Spike smirked. "Especially seeing as how you're not all human."

Rack shrugged. "I have a few extra pieces spliced on. They give me an... edge," Rack said with a certain level of smugness. Spike figured that meant he had some hidden fighting skill. He fucking hated magic-users. "So, what answers were you looking for?"

Spike took a matching step backwards and lowered the chair to the ground, signaling that he wasn't any more interested in fighting than Rack. "Something's rising on the Hellmouth."

Rack laughed, the sound like a hyena's cackle. "Something is," he agreed. "Something that will play with you like a child's toy, vampire."

"Necromancer?" Spike didn't like the thought of one of those bastards in Sunnydale. The magic-users could control the dead, and vampires were like marionettes in their hands. Spike snarled at the thought.

Rack smiled and shook his head. "Worse. Far worse."

Xander whirled around when soft footsteps told him he wasn't alone. He brought his knife up, but when he recognized the woman, he let his knife drop to his side. "K'wani?" Xander's heart tightened as he gazed at the mother of his daughter. She stood in the doorway between the room and the waiting area Spike and Xander had passed through. She was beautiful, just as beautiful as the night Xander had met her with long, black hair and dark eyes. True, she didn't look human, but Xander never let that stop him from crushing on B'Elanna Torres or the Borg Queen.

"Xander."

"Hey." Xander stopped, not sure what to say now. "Spike told me you had to leave, and I'm sorry."

"You didn't stop my mother from taking me away."She didn't exactly sound like she blamed him, but that was a strange thing to say. Xander had never been able to say more than two words to K'wani's mother before the woman had either walked away or shoved Xander down on the ground and then walked away. K'wani looked around the room. "You're with Spike."

"I'm playing backup boy," Xander agreed. "Bonnie's doing really well. Hey, if you want to stay with us that would be great. Spike would love to tell your mother to go jump off a cliff." Spike wouldn't use those words, but he'd get the idea across to the old bat.

K'wani's eyes found him, her long, dark hair flying in a wind that didn't exist. Okay, that was weird. "I should have been able to raise my baby."

Xander's eyes widened. "I know that," he said softly.

"You weren't even there for the first five years of her life. She's my baby... my blood. I chose you because you were so strong, but you never chose us. You had Bonnie by accident. You hid her."

Xander knew that K'wani had a right to say every single thing, but that didn't make it hurt any less. Yes, he'd made more mistakes as a father than he could count. However, he loved Bonnie. He frowned in confusion as she turned on him. "I've told my friends about her now," he said. "They all love her, and she's safe."

"Until you decide that someone else is more important than your family." K'wani looked uncharacteristically angry. "You're not good father material. The primal had strength going for him, but you have nothing."

Bile crawled up Xander's throat as he realized that there was only one good reason for her to come back to Sunnydale. "What are you doing here?" Xander asked. If she said she'd come to take Bonnie back, Xander wasn't sure what he'd do. He couldn't give up his daughter—share her, yes. However, he couldn't hand her to her mother and just let K'wani take her back to whatever demonic world she lived in.

"I came to see you," K'wani said, her tone making it clear she thought that was a stupid question. "When I first met you, I thought you were so strong."

"That was the hyena," Xander said. He tried hard to be an ethical man, a dependable one, but he didn't have illusions about being strong. Hell, about a year earlier, Spike had made a damn good point about the fact that Xander should be dead.

K'wani wrinkled her nose as she looked at him with unvarnished disgust. "I chose you to father my daughter. You. She's lost her entire heritage and culture because you're such a loser that it taints her."

Xander could feel his face warm with humiliation. It was all true, but it wasn't something he really wanted to think about. "I do my best to take care of her. I don't tell her she's worthless, unlike your mother," Xander argued.

"My mother was trying to make her stronger. You're just making her weak. And when you get tired of her, she's going to be more alone than ever."

"I would never—"

"You mean you would never walk away from blood relatives without ever visiting? You're so overwhelmingly loyal that you'd commit yourself to family?" K'wani demanded. Xander opened his mouth to say exactly that, but she interrupted him. "How are your parents?" she asked with a honeyed tone.

For a minute, Xander froze, his mouth open. Then he started to shake his head. "It's not the same."

"Really? My daughter is better off with me. I never abandoned her because it was more convenient for me. I never turned against my own blood." K'wani stepped toward Xander, and he backed up, panic making all his thoughts blur together.

Spike narrowed his eyes as he studied the warlock. "I can hear it telling me that my place is in hell; I can feel the pull." Running his tongue along the inside of his lower lip, he shrugged as if those things didn't bother him. "But it doesn't have any power over me."

"It will," Rack said. "I left Earth because the darkness that's rising is going to swallow everyone. Oh, some people think it will devour only the good, but evil that omnipotent will consume the entire dimension."

"Then help us stop it," Spike suggested.

Rack laughed. "Not a chance. It's whispering into the ears of a hundred souls, and one of them will open that seal. I don't plan to be anywhere near Earth when that happens.

"The seal?" Spike felt a crawling fear as he remembered sitting in the room in the basement of the school. He kept getting images of his victims, buried alive and calling for him. He'd wanted to claw through the dirt until he found them, but he'd wanted to run away just as much. Instead of doing either, he'd sat huddled in the corner tearing at his own flesh as he'd tried to rip the soul out. Considering the amount of misery he'd seen come out of wishes, he was a bloody moron for trying a wish on himself.

"The hellmouth taint still clings to your aura, vampire. You know where it is."

Spike didn't bother answering that. "Who's under it?" Spike knew of a half-dozen old ones that might be lurking under that seal, other gods like Glorificus that had been pushed out of this world when humans discovered magic.

"Not who... what," Rack said. "Muslims call it Iblis, a being created out of smokeless fire. Zoroastrianism called it Angra Mainyu, the destructive spirit. The Sumerians said it was the birthwater of Saghulhaza, the upholder of evil. You're not talking about some demon that you can fight. You're looking at the rise of the source of evil—the first evil." Spike could feel a cold chill through his body, and he gave himself some time to think by pulling out a cigarette.

"Sounds more like mythology than reality." Spike put the cigarette to his lips and lit it, feeling the warm smoke fill him with the illusion of body heat. Outside, thunder rumbled as a particularly large bolt of lightning flashed through the sky.

"Vampires are both," Rack pointed out. "I've been feeling this for the last five years, preparing to run just as soon as I had spliced enough powers onto my own to survive in a demon dimension in the proper style. So, this is home now. You can fight for Earth if you want, but you'll lose."

Spike blew out a long plume of smoke. "I've heard that before. I'm still here."

"Yes, but this is different. Earth is built on some peculiar magical rules. Only evil can open the door for ultimate good to win the battle, and only good can open the door for evil."

"So some git who means well is going to open the hellmouth?" Spike didn't like the sound of that, especially since he knew one or two gits who were pure good intentions and just stupid enough to do it.

Xander shook his head as he struggled for the right words to convince K'wani that he loved their daughter too much to ever leave her. "I'd never turn on Bonnie. Never."

"You turned on me." K'wani's gaze dared him to contradict her.

"I never did. I sent you money, offered to support you, tried to convince you to get your own apartment."

"You left me alone with a weak daughter and a mother who hated the sight of me," K'wani disagreed. "You abandoned me, and I'm taking our daughter before you can destroy her the way you've destroyed me."

"I never hurt you, never intentionally hurt you," he edited himself. "I was young, and I'll do anything to fix the mistakes I've made. Bonnie needs both of us," Xander said, desperate to make her understand how much he wanted to keep his daughter. Grabbing Bonnie and running for the hills was sounding better and better.

"Bonnie doesn't need a rapist as a father. You tried to rape your friend. You did rape me."

Xander could feel his legs tremble as he shook his head. "No, I never—"

"I wanted to have sex with a strong man, a man who would give my daughter the power to survive in this world, and I got you." K'wani tilted her head to the side. "Don't you remember that night? Don't you remember how you found me on the street and threw me down on the damp grass? Don't you remember our legs tangling as I struggled to get out from under you?" K'wani's grin twisted into a dark snarl of fury. "Unless you want me to take back the daughter that you stole from me after raping me, you'd better run, little rabbit."

Xander looked at K'wani, fear twisting through his guts until he couldn't breathe, but if he ran, he was leaving Spike without backup. Yeah, he was pathetic backup, but some help was better than none. He couldn't do that, but he couldn't lose his daughter. The world narrowed until Xander felt like he was watching K'wani down the length of a straw; her face all he could see.

"No," he said. "I'm not running. Bonnie is my family, so are Spike and Buffy and Tara and Willow. If you want to fight for her, I'll fight," Xander warned. His whole body felt like it was vibrating; it was like if he didn't throw a punch he was going to collapse in fear.

Suddenly K'wani started laughing. "And here I thought the sad little boy would run for the hills. Well, I have to get one wrong every century or so."

"Who are you?" Xander demanded. "Where's K'wani?"

"K'wani? She died because she let a pathetic thing like you touch her. Demons aren't terribly forgiving. We'll see each other soon," K'wani gave a malicious smile and then it was like she was turning inside out, her mouth opening so the blackness inside poured out and she vanished into a black blob that made the hair on Xander's arms stand up.

Rack shook his head. "Too late, vampire. The seal is nothing. Anyone can open that, and my guess is someone will soon enough. The First is whispering schemes into a hundred ears, and someone will listen. However, the door... the door that good intentions have left the locked door standing wide open and unguarded."

"How do we close it?" Spike dropped his cigarette and stepped on it.

"It's not that easy." Rack looked amused.

"Unless you want to me ta rip out your beating heart—"

Rack held up his hands. "Peace, vampire. I don't have a fight with you. I just don't think you can close that door. Goodness opened the door by committing an evil act. Closing it requires an evil to commit an act so merciful and good that the scales balance."

Spike gritted his teeth. "We'll bloody find a way," he said firmly.

"Even if you do, you're still going to lose Earth to the last battle," Rack said. "Earth magic has always existed in contrasts—good against evil, black against white, earth against air, fire against water. The first evil opened a door in Sunnydale, but the first good has found an opening too. After a little manipulation from the first good, evil opened a door through an act of self-sacrifice and love. The other side is working through prophesy and warriors to end the eternal struggle. The ending might be different, but the battle will still rip your reality to pieces. You should just find yourself a younger world to move to. For a certain fee, I could even help you settle here."Rack spread his arms to show that his castle was available as sanctuary if the price was right.

"Sod off," Spike said. He turned to go back through the portal, Rack's laughter following him. He pushed through the magic, his skin burning with cold as he stepped back into the dark room he'd left. Xander sat on the floor, his back pressed back against the wall and his eyes swollen. He still clutched his knife, but his body was visibly trembling.

"Pet?" Spike flashed into gameface and looked around, expecting to find the boy had been forced to kill something—the only time Spike had seen him this panicked, he'd just killed Warren.

Xander looked up, his breath coming in little gasps. "She's dead."

Spike blinked. "Who?" Xander didn't immediately answer, and Spike strode across the room and knelt in front of him. Catching Xander by the shoulders, he demanded, "Who's dead?"

Xander looked up at him with wild eyes. "K'wani. K'wani's dead."

Cocking his head to the side, Spike studied the boy. He smelled of misery, so he clearly believed what he said.

"Something was here," Xander whispered. He raised his hand to wipe his hand over his eyes; the smell of salt filled the room. "It said she was dead... she died because of me."

"Bloody hell, you can't tell me you're going to believe the first big nasty that tells you a tale."Spike sank back on his heels. Part of Spike considered that pretty damn stupid, but he knew enough about K'wani and her family to suspect it was true. If no one wanted her, she would have been a liability in a family where the matriarch cared more about power than anything else. Spike had suspected that from the first time K'wani had said she had to leave, but the boy did tend to assume the best of things. "Evil lies, pet," Spike pointed out."You can't just believe it." He wasn't sure how he was supposed to offer comfort.

Xander shook his head. "It wouldn't make sense to lie. We could check. Tara could do a spell, but I never asked her to. I never asked her to look for K'wani."

"If she's made a new life—"

"She hasn't. She would have come back to see Bonnie. I just—" Xander sucked in a breath and tears fell freely now. "I didn't want to admit it, but the monster took her form, made her say she blamed me... threatened to take Bonnie away."

Spike could feel his fangs itch at the idea of someone stealing his family. "Over my dusted body, pet," Spike promised. Shifting around, he sat next to Xander on the floor. He could understand the fear and pain of losing family—Spike had felt it more than once. Xander wiped his hand across his eyes again.

"Bloody hell, pet. I was there when she visited Bonnie that last time. She knew there was a chance her mother would throw her to the wolves, and she walked into that trap to keep her daughter safe. If she gave her life for the poppet, then you should bloody well respect her strength, not cry over her."Xander's breathing just grew more ragged. The discomfort in Spike's chest grew, and he realized that he felt bad for the boy. As illogical as Xander's grief was, it pulled at some emotion in Spike that hadn't existed before the soul.

The only person Spike had ever tried to comfort had been Drusilla, so he wrapped his arm around Xander's shoulder and pulled the boy close enough that Spike could hold Xander's cheek to his chest and start the wordless crooning that had always silenced Drusilla's screams. Xander, however, grew louder. For long seconds, Xander struggled to free himself, but Spike remembered that behavior from Drusilla, too—the desperate desire to not take the comfort she needed. Spike just held Xander close until sobs tore the cries from Xander and his arms wrapped around Spike's waist. Spike kept crooning as the boy finally faced a dark truth he'd ignored for far too long. Spike figured Bonnie had already come to terms with her mother's death, but clearly Xander needed time to grieve.

"Jasmine, hurry up," Amy called. She could see her mother smiling at her, even if she would only talk when Jasmine wasn't around. The younger witch kept Amy's mother from returning to this world. A small part of Amy regretted that Jasmine had to die, but she'd lost so much time with her mother. Her mother was right; Amy had wasted so much of her own youth. But now she and her mother were both going to enjoy power and eternal life: it was only right for two such powerful witches.

Amy's mother gave her the sort of smile Amy had always yearned for. Her mother loved her. Jasmine's life was such a small price to pay.

"Are you sure about this?" Jasmine looked around the basement.

"Absolutely," Amy said.

Chapter 26

After he hung up the phone, Xander groaned as he looked at the clock. Five a.m. His alarm would be going off in fifteen minutes anyway. Swinging his legs over the side of his bed, he rested his head in his hands and wondered how much longer he could keep doing this. Fighting evil had been a lot easier when he’d been a couple of years younger. Between trying to spend time with Bonnie and working and answering Buffy’s five a.m. calls, he felt like shit. But she had to be feeling worse. In three hours, she had to be at school dealing with all hormonal teenagers. You couldn’t pay Xander enoug