Musical Wars
Chapter 10

The humans wandered back through the white hall, and Spike pushed himself up from the floor, consciously putting on a mask of obsequiousness just like he wore a human face over his demon. Ducking his head submissively, he hunched his shoulders to make himself even smaller. As much as he hated playing the weak fool, the act had helped him survive Darla, and he wasn't letting any soddin' humans turn him to dust now. His demon growled, but the idea of getting out of the cage and eating the wankers gave Spike the strength to play his game.

"I didn't do anything," Spike whined as the humans went by. They ignored him.

"The treatments clearly aren't working. The tolerance increases each time, and the side effects..." the older doctor pled, his hand hovering over the younger doc's arm as though he wanted to grab it.

"And what other choice do we have? Once addicted, nothing but blood works."

"We should at least--"

"Shhh," the younger doc desperately hushed as a soldier stormed in through a door at the far end of the corridor.

"Dr. Engelman!" soldier boy snapped, his body screaming with a need to hit something, and for the first time, Spike truly considered the tall human. Boy had some aggression issues, which might be useful.

"Captain Riley, you are not needed here. Dr. Cruz, collect a quarter pint from number four. That should cure Graham."

"Cure?!' Riley's voice lowered to an outraged growl. "This doesn't feel like a cure. My men are getting sick more--"

"And this gives you the strength to--"

"It's unnatural!" Riley bellowed, and Dr. Engelman snapped his mouth closed, his body flinching back from the anger. Oh yeah, now this was more like it. Spike waited for the fists to start, but soldier boy just stood with his hands closed into tight fists that trembled with rage. The sounds of the other doc collecting blood faded into silence.

"Captain, we are all doing our best. You have your orders, and we have ours," Dr. Engelman said softly, his body still tense as though he would take off running any second. And Spike figured the git might have to make a run for it considering Riley's barely controlled fury. This one would make a lovely vampire... all rage and violence once he'd lost the conscience that kept his fists at his side.

"Won't work. Drinking the blood... it'll just make ya rot from the inside," Spike tried again, keeping his voice soft and subservient. In the next cell, Gary made a strange noise, and Spike willed the fledge to just keep his gob shut. He hated having the other vamps see him act like a weak, sniveling git, but he figured he could dust them once he got out of this soddin' madhouse.

"Shut up," Dr. Engelman ordered. Spike forced himself to flinch back from the voice just when he wanted to lunge forward and snap the moron's neck.

"It'll just hurt more. Humans can't digest it."

"My orders are clear, but you have to know this isn't working," Riley stepped closer to Dr. Engelman.

"It is working. The body just needs to adjust. The results have shown great promise."

Spike interrupted again, fighting to keep from growling his annoyance at being ignored. He couldn't very well put his plan in action if they didn't bloody listen to him. "I'm old enough ta know things. Know how the blood works. Know how to help your friend."

Spike watched as Riley's eyes jerked to him immediately.

"What?" Riley demanded as he stepped up to the glass. The way he moved reminded Spike of Angel... the way he used his large body to command attention. Even more than before, Spike felt a burning need to throw himself at the boy and prove his strength by draining the body and leaving it lying in an awkward pile of skewed arms and legs. Instead, he reminded himself that strength came in more than one form as he forced himself backwards away from the glass as he indulged in a bit of fantasy with all the humans mangled at his feet.

"The more ya give 'em, the more the pain's just going to come back. I'll trade information for my freedom, or maybe some nice fresh blood," Spike tried again, whining like the worst of the court fledges. Oh yeah, he would bloody kill every last wanker who saw him acting like some half-arsed minion.

"Don't listen--" Dr. Engelman started saying, but Riley cut him off.

"Your experiments are just making my men more and more sick."

"If ya keep drinking blood, the pain'll just get worse. I'm older. I know things." Spike did his best to imitate the irritating fledge Dru had turned in the twenties. Git had made it two whole weeks before Spike had torn off his head.

"The protocols have resulted in higher performance levels across the board, Captain Finn. Our experiments represent the best chance to develop a defense against the hostiles," the doctor insisted as he ignored Spike all together. Spike added the man to the torture before killing list.

"You are not Dr. Walsh. Your experiments have resulted in more men being in the infirmary than available for patrol." The boy was so angry that his body had gone stiff and still so that he looked like a cardboard cutout of a soldier.

"These are temporary setbacks."

"Been around a long time. I've never heard of a human surviving after drinking too much of that. Now lots of humans pay for a little extra," Spike whispered to the soldier, making up the plan as he went. Angelus never had liked his lack of planning, but then Angelus had never tried to deal with humans as nutter as these lack-brains. Fact was that a few mages used vampire blood in some spells and potions, but only idiots would drink the shite straight, at least not without trying to turn someone.

Captain Cardboard glanced at him again.

"I tell you, and you'll do right by me, yes?" Spike whispered as he glanced toward the doctor as though afraid. "You'll remember if I help ya?"

Spike could see the doubt in Riley's eyes. Before knowing Xander, Spike would have tried to bribe the boy with promises of power, but now he slid forward and made another offer. "Can cure your friend. It's an old trick. Works every time. It's a good way ta give human helpers a little extra protection, extra healing."

"What is it?" Riley asked, ignoring both Dr.Engelman's frown and the second doctor who now stood next to him, a bag of blood in hand.

"You'll do right by me?" Spike forced his shoulders to slump. "Yeah?"

Riley just crossed his arms and stared through the glass. Spike barely caught a growl from erupting.

"It's blood, but the body can't digest it. A little vampire blood over a cut... just enough ta let blood and blood mingle." Spike stilled. It all depended on them falling for that little piece of half-truth. Well, than and them using his blood for the little experiment.

"That's unacceptable. It could result in turning or some sort of half-vampire," Dr. Engelman immediately dismissed it.

Spike shook his head. "Have to drain someone ta turn 'em. But blood touching blood will give ya a bit of a boost. If I'm lying, I'm still here, chained ta the wall. Wouldn't do that."

"And if you're lying, I'll make it a personal goal to make you beg for death," Riley snarled as he slapped a bare palm against the glass wall. Spike flinched back, cowering in the corner even as he promised to bathe in their bloody entrails as soon as he got out.

"There's no way--"

"Do it." Riley said quietly.

"What?" Dr. Engelman was still shaking his head as he looked at Riley in shock.

"I'm not going to stand by while Graham and Forest and the others on your 'program' slowly die from this."

"Graham is far too weak for us to experiment. As soon as he has another dose of blood, he'll recover and we might consider some laboratory tests on his blood's reaction to direct contact with hostile blood."

"He doesn't have time." Riley turned his back and strode down the hall with sharp footsteps that echoed off the walls. For a moment, Spike thought he'd lost, but then the glass slid open. He watched as Riley returned, stepping into his cell and standing at the edge. Part of Spike wanted to throw everything into ripping the chain loose, but for once in his life, he needed to just follow through on a plan.

Riley held a thick knife out. "Give me your arm," he ordered.

Spike inched forward, shaking his head. "I'll heal too fast. You need to cut yourself first ta make sure the blood's still flowing," he said. For a second, Riley looked at him with cold eyes, and then he pulled the sharp edge against his forearm, opening a shallow cut across arm.

"Just remember, if you're lying, I will make you suffer like no creature on earth ever has," he warned as he pointed the tip of the knife in Spike's direction. Silently, Spike held out his arm. Riley grabbed his wrist and made a quick deep cut into the flesh. As Riley held his own wound under Spike's bleeding cut, Spike could feel his demon swell. For a second, he felt like a rubber band being slowly stretched, and then something snapped.

The world turned reddish as Spike flashed into game face. Riley stared back, seemingly unaffected, but Spike could hear his heart race. Spike could also smell the clear scent of demon now drifting under the soap and gunpowder odor of Riley. Now Spike just needed to figure out a way to use his newly made pet.

~o0o~

Spike paced uncomfortably as he waited for something to happen. A third doctor had come and taken blood from Gary, but nothing else had happened since Riley left with the two doctors nattering on about isolation and tests. The only thing he hated more than playing the moron was being bloody bored.

Spike reached the glass wall and the end of the chain again, and gave it one more yank just for good measure.

"Won't break," Gary offered.

"Shut the fuck up," Spike snapped back. Gary made another of his strange little noises and then fell silent as Spike paced the four steps to the back wall. Fuck the "make a pet" plan, he just should have tried to snap the soddin' chain when the wall was open. Besides, making a pet obey required a serious beating or sex. He doubted he'd have a chance to try either.

The image of Xander flashed across Spike's memory. Boy had followed without either. Of course, boy hadn't really been a pet. Spike shoved a rising nest of fear aside. He couldn't afford to think of his childe right now because if he did, he'd be lost. He remembered seeing Dru across the river, her clothes ripped by the sticks and pitchforks of the mob. A hundred voices had fused into one scream for her blood. Dru had snapped at one with her fangs, and then she had tilted her head in confusion, probably hearing some voice in her head.

Spike had finally waded into the dark, polluted water of the Vltava. His clothes sucked up the water and dragged at him, but he couldn't even think straight enough to shed them. Instead he plowed through the murky water as he struggled to reach her side, even if it had been just to turn to dust by her side. Instead, he hadn't even made it half way before he'd seen her shimmer into dust and then vanish in the light of the full moon. Spike had just stopped swimming, the current pulling him miles down river before he'd finally crawled out onto the rocky shore.

He'd been careless, leaving victims who could identify them. Of course, now he knew that Cassidy had turned the crowd on them, but he remembered the ash taste of guilt in his mouth. He tasted that again as he thought of his own arrogance at ignoring the shuffling sound of human footsteps in the dark. He'd dismissed these wankers, and now his childe was out there, on the Hellmouth, alone.

Spike's mind shifted to nightmare images of Xander broken or chained to the Anointed One's throne. Forcing those thoughts aside, Spike paced harder. No time for turning into a nancy-boy brooder like Peaches.

Spike yanked at the chain again. Stupid, nancy-boy plan. Angelus loved the complex plans with the thousand things that could, and usually did, go wrong. Spike was more the hands on sort, and he cursed himself for not just going for the ripping the chain free and smashing heads into walls plan. 'Course, the chain didn't seem to rip free all that easily.

The door whispered open at the far end of the corridor, and Spike froze. Even before the figure appeared, he could feel the slight twitches and pulls at his demon. Riley-pet then. Spike watched as the soldier came in and silently walked toward Spike's enclosure.

Spike leaned against the wall and considered soldier-boy. Without turning the human's emotions back on himself through fear or lust, he couldn't really control him properly, but obviously he could influence him. This time, when Riley came to the glass, he looked more confused than confrontational.

"Your friend okay, then?" Spike asked. Riley started nodding immediately, and then he stopped and shook his head like a dog coming out of the water.

"He's better. They used a small transfusion of five's blood." Spike glanced toward the wall where Gary and Antonio had their cells. Antonio might not be able to fully use the bond, he sounded a bit young yet, but if he understood what Spike had done, he might be able to influence the git through their connection.

"Why?" Riley sounded confused. Spike cocked his head as he wondered what the demon whispered into Riley's mind. Bloody stupid volunteering himself like that, but then, lately Spike had some experience with that kind of stupidity. If the boy was anything like his own childe, maybe soldier-boy felt something even stronger than lust or fear.

"Not all demons are out ta end the world, mate," Spike offered. With the demon in Riley, he wouldn't play weak any more, but he couldn't make the human feel threatened. For this to work, soldier-boy needed to take the demon's thoughts for his own. Otherwise, the wanker would just fight tooth and nail ta get free. Spike shrugged. "Take me, I like the world right where it is."

"You're evil," Riley shook his head.

"Maybe. Had a friend once told me that I'm no more evil than a leopard. Just want to go about my business."

Riley shivered, either in response to Spike's voice or his own demon's whispers. Xander had said he felt the demon as if it were some dark part of himself, so Spike just needed to make sure Captain Cardboard kept thinkin' that.

"Seems like experimenting on you lot is more evil that eating a few hairy-arsed idiots. Aren't they supposed to be on your side?"

Spike watched Riley's eyes narrow as he fought some internal battle.

"Hostiles threaten the country," he finally said.

"Bloody boring threatening a country, I'm more hands on," Spike joked. Riley's body tense, and Spike could feel the connection between them go taut as Riley obviously struggled. "'Sides, I don't really fight on the side of chaos anymore," Spike shifted his argument slightly. "Have a mate, a human friend, wouldn't want to make him all cranky."

"You...?" Riley was back to looking confused. If not for the cage and chain, Spike might have found the whole thing amusing. "You have a human friend?" Riley finished.

"Yeah. You lot tossed him in the van with me, but then ya tossed him out somewhere."

"The boy with dark hair."

"Yeah," Spike agreed.

"He's your friend?"

"Yeah, mate, he is. And he's a right white hat, savin' damsels in distress and all."

Now Riley shook his head as he obviously struggled with that idea. "No. You eat people. This town, it's being overrun with demons. They kill."

Again, Spike could feel his control slipping away as the soldier reasserted himself.

"Bloody right," he agreed, and Riley actually leaned forward, his hand slapping the glass, as though Spike's agreement had thrown him off balance both physically and mentally. "Powerful little git called The Anointed One is brewin' up some serious shite with a pack of demons that shouldn't even be in the same dimension together, much less a room. He's got Vahrall comin' in, and they're ending the world sorts, them. Now I don't really want the world endin', and I know my mate would be right put out seeing as how he's human. Problem is, these gits in green interrupted me before I could get any details."

Spike willed Riley to believe him. 'Course it was only half true, but if the boy's streak of protectiveness ran as deep as it seemed to, Spike might just be able to keep this plan from going tits up.

For the second time, Riley shook his head like a dog, as if he could physically rattle his thoughts back in order.

"No. It's not possible." Riley argued, but his words came out strained and soft.

"Oi, not lying. Tell ya what, I'll give you a bit of proof." Spike waited until Riley looked up at him. "But you have to make a promise."

"I'm not promising a hostile anything," Riley immediately answered, his voice stronger than before.

"Promise that if my Xander's at this place I tell you, that you won't bring these wankers down on him. You already saw he's human, and if I'm turning ta dust in this place, I at least want to know he's safe. Promise me you won't let Dr. Frankenstein touch him." Spike leaned forward, putting his palm on the glass. If he gave Riley the warehouse, he wouldn't have a bolt hole, and he might be putting Xander in danger, but he couldn't leave his childe alone, and it was the best proof Spike had.

"Xander? If he's human..." Riley's voice trailed off, and Spike could practically read the soldier's thoughts. Graham and his crew were human, yet the scientists had made guinea pigs of them.

"Promise me, and I'll take your word for it," Spike pressed. Riley paused and then nodded sharply, his mind clearly made up.

"He's safe. I won't give his name to anyone."

"Right, two-story warehouse at the northwest corner of Mill and 3rd. If I were evil, or if I were even cranky, I'd drain Xander for making me listen to his soddin' country music collection, but you'll see. The bloody music, and if the universe likes me just one little bit, Xander are both safe as houses. Not all vampires treat humans like walking happy meals. And I'm not out ta end the world, or even willing to sit back and let someone else end it, now am I?"

"Mill and 3rd." Riley repeated slowly. Spike could feel him balanced on the edge of believing and giving in to the demon voice.

"You go and see. Xander and me, we live together without me seein' him as a meal. And then we need ta figure out what to do about a runt of a Hellmouth Master who seems ta be trying to open a portal to hell right in the middle of California, yeah?"

Spike thought he might have pushed too far from the way Riley went still, his whole body pausing unnaturally with one hand half raised. It was as though the boy had been caught in time, and then, after three heartbeats, he finished his gesture and nodded.

"I'll start with the warehouse."

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