My Dinners with William....
A little fun...Dinner and date scenes of BR and/or Buffy and/or her counterparts and William from various tales...
Sunnydalopolis...
At the I-87 restaurant...
Spike is decked out in tweed suit, shirt, and tie, and feeling quite
uncomfortable...it being the first time in a century...
It took less effort than he expected to convince Buffy Rebecca to do a dinner
with him, outside the Sunnydale limits, naturally. She was, she admitted,
"starving"...Starving, ah...Buffy would be starving after four days without a
real meal...so she is...I'm catching on, he thought...
Besides, she pointed out, he needed to brush up on his social skills before his
big interview tomorrow...
He is watching the VCR that Warren gave them when Buffy Rebecca insisted that
they make a replacement video for the one Buffy had thought she was making for
Riley... If they actually sent one, he might send one back to Buffy and... It
had taken her some practice but she had done a convincing job, he thought...at
least convincing enough for old war-boy...unless he somehow recognized the
crypt...
Warren had furnished some movies as well...mostly sci-fi, Spike noted...I
thought he said not to let Buffy Rebecca dwell on her origins too much...
Spike watches the ending of Warren's favorite, "The Bride of Frankenstein"...he
couldn't help feeling a little nostalgic during the bride's creation
sequence...
The Bride hisses like a cat...why, Buffy...there you are on the telly...Spike
tells the screen.
Suddenly he hears an excellent imitation of the hiss...Buffy Rebecca is looking
at him, ready to go...in a dress, looking...
She looks...well...she really looks... She hisses at him again...then "Spike,
are we going or not? I have to get back to patrol tonight you know..."
"Grr...she...hates me...like others." The Monster whines on the screen. You
and me both, pal...Spike thinks.
***
Dr. William Walthrop, tweedy British cybergenius and his lovelywife,...Rebecca?...well she's
using the name for her college work after all...,
out to dinner for the evening... We don't make a bad couple he thought,
looking at their reflection in the restaurant window. Tweedy but handsome...he
corrected. And she...looks... He's being a perfect gentleman, all the old
19th century charm lessons kicking in to lend a hand, he thinks... But maybe
he should make a slight gesture in the romantic department...nothing too
forward of course...just a little loving hand squeeze?....
"Spike.." She has folded her arms and is regarding him "This has been a nice
evening...Don't spoil it..."
She returns to her plate...
"Did you always eat like that?" he asks her. No wonder where the Slayer
strength came from.
She excuses herself and gets up...to what...he wonders? Ah, water and excess
biomass disposal...
it has to go somewhere...
He senses something...and looks at the other diners...Hmm...fatty, rich man and
young beauty...human...handsome dark fellow and shy young thing
looking...vampire... damn...Mate, rethink those dating services...middle-aged
couple...human...young woman, human, dining alone?...nope, there's her
date...vampire...great, just great...already two... If only Buffy Rebecca
doesn't look round on her way back... There she's coming now...
Too late...she's seen them too... Oh, well, there's goes a pleasant
evening...Maybe there's only two...She could take one and I the other...a ten
minute interruption at most. He realizes Buffy Rebecca has already turned back
towards the restrooms...the female is heading for the ladies' room and she sees
no reason to miss the opportunity. The male at the other table is getting up
as well...
She's not going to follow the other one to the mens' room, is she?...This is
a job for Dr. Walthrop...vampire slayer's date...Too late, she's already coming
out of the ladies room...There she goes...oh, no...Did anyone else see her go
in?...God, that girl works quickly... He thinks, admiringly.
Any more?...He wonders, looking around. It's like a regular
convention...Someone might have passed the word on to me...
What about that brunette in back?...she looks...familiar...oh God, no...
Harmony in the worst wig he's ever seen.Even Harmony wouldn't be stupid enough to... He
realizes Buffy Rebecca has
already returned to the table...
"Spike!?...Buffy!?.." She waves...
Dr. William Walthrop, eminent British cybernetist and third-rate poet, and his
lovely American wife, Rebecca, college student, experiencing an awkward social
moment on encountering an old girlfriend...
Go to story
***
Tales from the Greenwood Crypt...
Dinner and a tour of Mom's museum...
Mission: Improbable...
Spike had no idea I intended to hit Mom's office...Before Buf is well and does it herself...Or
Dawn does...But in our case, after normal museum hours...
There are pictures there...Mom kept a whole lifetime supply in her office...And I wanted some of them...
***
We ate at the fish place up the street...I think I recognized a couple of folks from the museum but
no one came over...Not a serious problem if they had in any case...
God, I love to eat...Thank God for Slayer metabolism in sis' case and robot metabolism in
mine...Else we'd be elephantine...The waiter's eyes bulged when I asked for seconds and a third to
take home...
Surprisingly Spike likes fish...I guess he'll be getting it twice come to think of it...
***
We slipped in just before the place closed...I avoided anyone whom I knew, then sweet-talked the
security guard until we could hide in the restrooms...I didn't want to be seen walking out with the
stuff...If word got out to Buffy, she'd be after us, sedated or not...And all I want are a few of the extras...
From the way Spike acted, you'd have thought we'd broken in to steal the crown jewels...I swear
he kept looking for lasers and booby traps the whole time...
It really was just a matter of forcing Mom's office door then her desk drawers without breaking anything...
Door I handed ok...The drawer I thought I'd have to break when my "cybergenius" came to the rescue...
He's learned a few criminal techniques since his unfortunate demise...
Mom even had the old ashtray Dawn made her...in third grade...
I only took that and the duplicate photos that I knew Buffy and Dawn had at home...
Then...a leetle trouble...
***
I only meant to hurry out...I opened the main door without thinking...
Broke the lock of course, and triggered the alarm...
Guess I don't know my own strength when I'm nervous...
We ran out like maniacs...Dodged around the corner and did our best to assume a mild-mannered
couple on the town expression as we strolled back...And saw the crowd...
What, a break-in?...At our beloved art museum?...Shocking...
Then I realized...I had dropped the box of stuff when we fled...
All that for nothing...And when it got out what had been found left behind...
Buffy would be on the street in ten minutes...
But Twerp just grinned and showed me the box...Caught it and carried it with him...
"Knew you'd want it, Buffy..." he smiled...
He has his uses...
Go to story
***
The Tie That Binds...
Dinner/dance tour and song at a London karoke bar...
"Heaven...I'm in Heaven..." the strains of the song played as William and Buffy Rebecca
Summers...Walthrop danced among the couples...
Willow watched from their table...They did make a beautiful couple...Maybe not the most
attractive or glamourous but...Definitely the most beautiful...
BR waved to her...
She felt a protective pang for them...So odd, feeling this way for two who would still be dancing
when she and Giles and Tara and even Buffy were long dust...And yet, both so fragile...
The embodiment of what Xander had been talking about in his wedding day speech...The tie that
binds us...The love emanating from the Slayers...Powerful enough to save even William the Bloody...
Perhaps even Drusilla...
And even me...
A wise man, my friend Xander Harris...she thought...
***
Willow had somehow not associated karoke bars with London and merrie ole England...But
somehow on their tour of famous ole pubs, Spike had managed to find one...
Not really all that difficult an achievement Willow was to learn...To her disillusionment...
Buffy Rebecca shyly but with the hubs' ardent encouragement was demonstrating the one area
where she most differed from her twin...
She could actually sing...Quite well...Willow had already known she could hum...But...
BR smiled at Spike and Willow from the stage...And nervously, at first, sang...To them...In a
rather jazzy style...
"When a girl's an empty kettle...Her heart may...be made of metal...Still it can be...torn apart..."
Willow grinned...
"Now I may be presumin'...But I think that I am human...If I truly have a heart..."
"I am tender...I am gentle...I can be...so sentimental...And I really feel the part..." She looked at
the beaming Spike...
"So I may be presumin'...But I believe we're human...If we only have a heart..."
"Picture me...On balcony...My beau comes from..below...Strange place to find...Romeo..."
Willow winked at Spike...
"I heard his...Beat...So sweet..."
"When he registered emotion...And pledged me his devotion...I gathered up my nerve..."
"And I likewise think he's human...Though you may think I'm presumin'...'Cause I know he has a
heart..."
That did it for Spike...Willow pressed his hand as he lost it...The audience applauded...
She came back to the table...Shyly...She was startled...She hadn't meant to make him...
He embraced her...
One month...One little month...
If I die this week, Willow thought...It will have been worth it...Just to see this...
Go to story
***
Adventure of the Freckled Man...
Dinner at the Inn...Scotland...
"Come on Spike..." she pulled him along...
"The inn is that way..." he pointed helplessly...
She glared at him...The louts catching her look...
Pretty little wife but I'd bet she makes him dance a tune...
"I want to see that factory...and the gate..."
They reached the gate of the Winset factory...Iron products, tools, nails...
A guard's booth was occupied...About four or five feet from the gate...
BR spoke briefly to the guard, then examined the ground by the gate...
The grass there was mashed down...Over a considered area...
A body-sized area...
She frowned...
Walthrop looked at her...What was she doing?...
"Dinner, sweetheart?..."
That usually got her...No matter how angry she might be with him...
BR loved to eat...
She nodded but...continued to observe the factory grounds as they walked back towards
their inn...
And the group of louts who had followed them over from the dead man's current resting
place...
***
Something strange was up she told him at dinner...
Nobody's blood just "disappears"...And that man had done more than stop at
the factory...He must have collapsed...possibly for a while...in that grassy field by the
gate...To get it so mashed down...
"And then there was the curious affair of the watchguard..." BR looked at Spike
rather archly...
"The guard? But he didn't see anything..."
BR grinned at him...
Oh...He got it...
If she starts saying "Elementary..." I'm going to smack her little robotic bottom,
whether she lays me up for a week or not...he thought...
***
***
In spite of his annoyance at BR's newfound determination to play detective...No doubt
once again interrupting their honeymooning...Walthrop was intrigued...A mystery...An
British (Scot/English border) country village mystery...Complete with castle, dim-witted
louts of villagers, insufferable, insular police...Where he, for once, was not the hideous
object of the hunt...But more important...
Something to get her mind off his little game at the sales meeting that morning...
***However she had not forgotten or forgiven that little stunt...
Making her the bionetics poster girl...
Letting those people think she was some poor disabled type...Suffering until the
"cybergeniuses" of W/S Bionetics had shown up on her doorstep...Or worse yet, the tragically
maimed wife, saved by the dedication of her loving
husband...All those long weary hours of work nobly spent in order to ....
Build himself a sexbot...
But he'd never said she'd been disabled...For any length of time...The good folks had
merely jumped to the conclusion...
And where would she be without bionetics, after all?...
"What would Warren say?..."
Probably that he was amazed things had gone so well...Spike noted happily...Warren, his
good buddy and partner who'd designed BR and her amazing artificial human brain for
him, had a fairly easygoing attitude on such things...
She frowned...Well...
"What would Giles say?..."
She had him there...But, when Giles saw the size of the contract...And realized what it would
mean for Buffy's and Dawn's future security...
And soon to wed Xander's and Anya's...Willow's and Tara's...Giles' and Basey's...Even a
certain little hard-pressed investigative firm in LA would benefit...
Hmmn...
Well...She was using bionetics...
But he might have told her what he had had in mind...Asked her about it...Given her a
chance to prepare...Asked her...Allowed her a chance to tone down the pathos...Asked her...
True it hardly compared to his past "escapades"...But still...
He was retreating back into the same territory as when he had selfishly copied Sis' mind
without her knowledge to create her, BR noted...
She was...Disappointed...
Not enough to cancel the contract of course...But...
Walthrop grabbed at the brief pause...
So...About these mysterious goings-on...What had she come up with?...
He had just had a brilliant insight himself...How about this?...
The strange dead man was not a man at all...
In fact...He paused...
"He was a robot, of course..." Buffy Rebecca noted, looking at him...
He'd taken this long to reach that conclusion?...
***
Oh...
"Well, you examined him of course..." Spike noted...
"Nothing about him except the missing blood to suggest him not being
human..." she told him...
He'd of had to be dissected in order to tell on exam...A good job, whoever had
made him...
Oh...Then...How'd she?...
"Just the logical conclusion...A demon, even a vamp demon, or any underworld
creature...would bleed...something..." she grinned...It was on the tip of her tongue
to say it, he knew...
Well, not a mummy...he told her smugly...That wouldn't bleed...Had she considered that?...
She folded her arms, looking at him...
"Spike...Did he look like a mummy?..."
Inspector Rigg interrupted them rather abruptly...The examination of the corpse had
turned up something rather...She required their attendance at police headquarters
in town...There were questions to be answered...
"We simply stopped to look at him..." Spike insisted... "I don't thinkwe could help you..."
"We'd be happy to come by..." BR noted sweetly...With a smile for her hubs...
The inspector noted grimly that Ms. Summers-Walthrop misunderstood...She was not
requesting their assistance...She wanted their presence at the station to answer
questions...Immediately...
"Did you disassemble that robot yet?..." Spike asked brightly...
The inspector looked at him rather suspiciously...How did he?...
"Elementary..." he smiled at BR...
Go to story
***
Dinner with Count Vitachi...Florence...
A young...butler?...Must be...In that white jacket...Dark, rather handsome...BR noted...Greeted
them at the Count's villa door...In Italian...
To which Walthrop responded pleasantly...Nodding to her...Not sure what else to do, she nodded
pleasantly back...Thank God someone in the family at least knows Italian...
The young man led them in through a hallway decked with fine paintings and sculpture to a huge
hall...Likewise filled with paintings and other works...Leaving them with a smile...
Hopeful...BR noted...At least Vitachi's got other interests...No single-minded fixation on us...
And he's quite a lot to lose, judging from this house...
***
The Count's wife, Chesra came forward from the depths of the hall and greeted them warmly...In
English, to Buffy Rebecca's relief...Young middle-age, about 10 years or so younger than her husband...
Their son Enri and daughter Elisa would join them in just a bit...
Better and better BR thought...A family...Social ties and obligations...
Difficult to butcher guests in the midst of a family dinner...
Although, of course, it depends on the family...
And this is after all the home city of the Medicis...And not far from the Borgias' home town...
She was pleased to note that "Dr." Walthrop was up to his Victorian gentleman's mark...Quiet
dignity, a little charmingly youthful enthusiasm in his appreciation of the artwork, a modicum of
hand-kissing and slight bows...Not over doing it, of course...English Victorian here...
Just perfect...His mum would be so proud...Buffy Rebecca thought...Proudly...
She tried to take her cue from him and Countess Vitachi...
But mainly went with that old exuberant all-American girl charm...
***
The dark, handsome butler returned...
"And here is our Enri..." Countess Vitachi smiled at him...
Enri?...The son?...Not a butler?...BR thought...But in that white jacket...And he hadn't acted liked
the son of a count...At least how she thought a son of a count would act...Shouldn't he have
kissed her hand or something?...Walthrop seemed unsurprised...
You might have told me, William...she thought...Of course if she had taken Italian back at
Sunnydale High...
***
Enri had brought out what was obviously a very old and very fine wine...
Fortunately Spike was one vampire who did drink...Wine...And appreciated this one...
The Count was slightly delayed...Cybernetics, the Countess sighed, smiling at "Dr." Walthrop, a
competitive and time-consuming field...
"Are you...In the field?..." Buffy Rebecca asked...
The Countess smiled at her...Yes, actually, she had some involvement in her husband's work...As
did their children...Enri, for example was quite skilled...
Enri smiled at his mother...And graciously dismissed her praise...Switching to very fluent English...
"But of course...It is my father who is the one true genius of our firm..." Enri noted...And smiled
at Walthrop...
"I cannot tell you, Dr. Walthrop, how anxious he has been to meet with you and your lovely
wife...He was so impressed by your presentation and of course the work your company has been
producing...As am I..."
"Dr." Walthrop graciously declined the praise, noting that Dr. Mears was in fact the true genius of
W/S Bionetics...Whatever small contributions he himself had made...
But he, like the Count, was fortunate in having a wife who shared in his work as a partner...
Well done, Walthrop...she thought...Just don't start showing off my arms and legs again...
She noticed Enri was looking at her...With professional interest?...
"Forgive me, Mrs Walthrop..." Well, at least he was frank about it... "I am aware that you possess
bionetic limbs...I hope I do not embarrass you when I say that one would never know from
observing you..."
Spike was complimenting the Countess on the magnificent art work in the hall...
BR nodded at Enri, smiling...No problem, we're all professionals here...
"We both appreciate the compliment...I'm sorry...Is it Count...Dr...?..."
"Enri is fine, although I do hold a doctorate...The title, however, remains in my father's capable
hands..."
"And William and Buffy are fine for us as well..." she told him...
Now if you could just get Dad to explain why he or someone he sent was shooting at us...
***
Elissa Vitachi was strikingly like her mother...Perhaps a bit shorter...
Likewise quite involved in the family business...And as interested as Enri in meeting the
distinguished Dr. Walthrop...
The Countess, however, thoughtfully turned the conversation to the Walthrop's honeymoon...
All were now sitting in a corner of the great hall...
Were they enjoying Florence?...
Indeed...BR told her...They'd been all over the city...
Walthrop, smiling, sat down beside her...Gave a hand squeeze...A-'Head's up'-squeeze...
What?...She wondered...So far, so good, right?...Did he sense something?...
"Malfunction...Now..." he whispered...And turned to Elissa to continue his conversation on their
plans for the cybernetics conference...
What?...Was he getting in over his head with the young lady cybernetist?...
***
Buffy Rebecca stands up suddenly...Her left leg wobbling...Her concerned husband rises as well...
A slight malfunction in her left bionetic limb...No real problem...
Minor social faux pax...
The Vitachis are a bit startled but of course...Understand...
Gallant lady...
"A slight adjustment should take care of this...Might we use the...facilities?..." Spike asked politely...
"Certainly, doctor...Perhaps, though, the workshop...?" the Countess asked, concernedly...
"No, no...Just takes a moment to make the adjustment..."
Buffy Rebecca beamed an innocent...Gallant smile at them...
"I'm so embarrassed...But William can take of this in a moment...If we may..."
"Certainly dear, certainly...Enri..." the Countess asked her son to guide the Walthrops...
***
In the privacy of a bathroom worthy of a Renaissance prince, the Walthrops looked at each other...
Bugged?...BR mouthed, not wanting Spike to give anything away too quickly...
He shrugged a 'Who Knows'...and came to her and whispered...
"Did you sense anything?..." he asked her...
Sense...No...Nothing...
You sense vampires?...Demons?...she asked...
No...he whispered...But something's wrong...We're sitting with three people...I'm not sensing any
other humans in the house...
So?...
So...Where are the servants?...And there's more...
Well, she reflected...Maybe with all this the Vitachis can't afford a staff...Maybe it's some kind of
modern aristocrat democracy thing...Ummn...Servants' night out?...So what more?...
"I don't think we're sitting with three people..." he whispered...
What?...You just said you didn't sense vamps or demons...You don't think they're human?...
Oh...You think...
"I sense maybe one human...Not three...Though I'm not sure which..."
"But you can't be sure regarding robots...I've fooled you...Even April fooled you...Not to mention..."
"I'm guessing, sure...But then I wasn't expecting April not to be human...She didn't register as
demon or vamp...But there was an emptiness in her...And in Buffy-April when she was up and
running...As for you, sweet...You are human..."
I'll bet you say to all the human-souled robots...She thought, pleased...
"So you think two are robots..."
"It's a possibility...Unless they're some kind of ghosts or something else I can't detect..."
Well...Vitachi is a cybernetist...
"We'd better get back..." she noted...
***
Enri tapped politely at the door...He hated to intrude but his mother feared perhaps the doctor
might need some assistance...If he needed any equipment?...
"All set..." Buffy Rebecca called cheerily as they emerged...
And accepted Enri's proffered arm...Looking inquisitively at Spike...
Well?...Him?...
They strolled casually back, Enri apologizing profusely for disturbing them...
Not at all, Walthrop told him...It was good to know experienced...human...help was at hand...
Ok...BR thought...
So...Here we are...In the home of a man...who may have tried to kill us...who has built himself a
wife and daughter...
So much for the social ties and obligations restraint...Excepting Enri, of course...
And pretty true to form for male robotmakers...
From her admittedly limited experience they tended to produce either females or copies of themselves...
***
Buffy Rebecca and Spike were spending a pleasant evening at the rather palatial Florentine home
of Count Dr. Salcome Vitachi...
With his "family"...Who, if Spike's unique sensitivities were correct, consisted of a human son
and a robot wife and daughter...
And excellent robots at that, BR had to admit...With mild disturbance...
They seemed so...Human...
Yet, Spike had said...They had the emptiness of an April...Whereas she, Buffy Rebecca...Had a
human, if artificial brain...And a soul...Proven after death no less...
The old nagging fear...Was she human, after all?...An independent human being?...Or...
She put the thought firmly aside...What more proof could you ask for than a soul's return after
death?...And there were more practical issues immediately at hand...
Like the possibility of imminent death for instance...
And the need to keep up her end of the conversation...With three very erudite, despite the
possible robotic nature of two, and sophisticated individuals...
After all, she did not want to come off as the dumb blonde Californian...Even the gallant...dumb
blonde Californian...
Even with robots...
***
Despite the possibility of great danger...The likelihood of imminent death and destruction...BR
couldn't keep down one perhaps mildly embarrassing thought as she continued to chat pleasantly
with Enri and the Countess...
What's for dinner?...
After all, she hadn't eaten since lunch eight hours ago...
And it sure would be nice to eat before any fighting and so forth began...
Especially considering what an aristocratic Italian family was likely to serve at table...
***
She felt a little...Hmmn...Should have eaten something...That wine was going right to her head...
Warren and his passion for accuracy...
Hmmn...Did Spike just say that wall hanging was a "beautiful shapestry..."?...she giggled, just a
little...
Why is he shandinng...standing up?...
Uh-oh...
The Vitachis were eyeing him...Rather coolly...He wobbled a bit...And called out to her...
"Buffy...We'd shetter be going...I think we've been shrug...drugged..."
Elissa grabbed him...With rather surprising speed...And held him...As he passed out
"It's slow-acting, Mrs. Walthrop..." Enri told her coldly... "But I assure you not fatal...He'll be
alright if you remain calm..."
She got up...Wobbling...Enri regarded her intently...Perhaps with a little surprise...Looking at the
Countess who moved on her...
He's suzzled...puzzled that it's works on me...He...Guessed about me...She struggled to think
clearly...And move on Enri...The one human in the bunch...
And passed out even before Chesra could reach her...
Hah...Shooled you there...Thought I shasn't shuman...she thought just as she went down...
"Shrug..my sis...drug me..." she mumbled, struggling vaguely to rise...
Just as Buffy would've...she passed out...
Good ole Dad...
***
"I suppose...They took your beeper away..." BR asked Walthrop who nodded...
Well, it least wasn't a walled-in room...And according to their watches, they'd only been out for
an hour or so...
She and he were chained to the floor of what appeared to be a basement room...Stone walls do a
prison make...She thought...
She could break chains like these...But they'd agreed they should wait a mo to find out if they
could learn anything...Let the Count or Enri come in...Make the usual pronouncement of
doom...And explain...Why...
Spike pointing out it usually worked that way...Even she...Buffy...Was fond of making her
"Here's the deal" speech before meeting out her Gift to enemies...
"You make it sound like I'm...We're...Like these people..." she noted, a little peeved...
Not at all, dearest...Just...
Of course from his pov...His former pov, she corrected...She had to admit...
Anyway the large metal door to the room did not look like it would open easily in any case...
So they waited...
Besides...Oz and the gang would be sure to get them out if this lasted much longer...
Still...The chains were chaffing her ankles...Not very gentlemanly of Enri, she noted...
Not to mention ruining a perfectly good pair of stockings...
And...
The least they could have done was to feed them first...
A blot on Florentine hospitality, that's for sure...
Go to story
***
How to Murder Your (Immortal) Wife...
Dinner party at the Walthrops'...
Step three in Dr. Walthrop's perfect murder plan...
Now the scene of the crime...
A party...
To be given at the Walthrop's....
Angel was confused...Remote controls...Drugs...Parties...Scenes of
crime?...What did all this have to do with the strip?...
An assassination plot, Spike explained...
A murder...
Hmmn...This didn't seem to fit in with Buffy's ideas for a more wholesome
strip...She might have a problem with this...
Trust me, old pal...Spike told him... She'll love it...
Hmmn...
***
A nervous Angel left him to set to work on the strip...
After promising to come to the party, planned for a week from today...And bring his
missus...Minus the dear niece and nephew...
He sure hoped Buffy would be ok with all this...
***
The first installments appeared Monday of the fatal week...
Buffy was puzzled...But as it seemed Spike had followed her ideas so far, and the strip had
become a major hit...She was willing to leave him to it...
Besides, if it were to be done in a wholesome manner...With Ms. Spike as the hero while dim-wit
Spike stumbled around...An assassination mystery might not be a bad idea...Although she sent
Angel over with more suggestions...
BR was even more puzzled...What was he up to?...
And what was this nonsense about parties?...She didn't have time to cook for and entertain a
bunch of...
No problem...He'd take care of everything...She'd just have to be there...
And why wasn't he telling her?...
All in good time...
***
"One...For each of them?..." Angel looked at Spike...
Who had handed him one of Ben's "goof-balls" for Buffy...
The Walthrops' party was in full swing...
"Just for the realism of the thing..." Spike noted...
"She'll be very pleased to have been a part of the whole thing when it's all over..." he told the
uncertain Angel...
I dunno know...Angel thought...On the other hand, a party with Buffy
unconscious...Any evening with Buffy unconscious...
He took the pill...
***
As always Warren's striving for realism in the creation of Buffy Rebecca had paid off...She
responded to Ben's little pill just as Buffy would and did...
Both were dancing on the Walthrops' tables...BR on the living room coffee
table...Buffy on the library table...
Spike stopped to check on dear Giles who'd been drinking quietly in the den with several others...
"Wonderful party, Spike..." he noted..."Buffy seems much happier tonight than I've seen her in a while..."
Hmm-hmmn Spike nodded...
"How's dear Basey doing?..."
"Oh...fine, fine..." Giles pulled at his drink... "You know Spike I've been married 97 years now,
thanks to the miracle of modern medicine...And don't regret a single day..."
Spike nodded...
"The single day I don't regret...Was when she went to visit her aunt...Back in 2025..."
***
BR had reached the high point of her dance...right up the wall...
Pow...
Spike watched her from a corner, a truly Spikish grin on his face...
And caught her as she went down...
Angel in his turn caught the staggering Buffy...
***
As they carried them to the bedroom, Angel was feeling just a touch of
deja-vu...Carrying Buffy's drugged body reminded him of several times when Angelis...
"What now..."
Spike indicated a space on the bed for Buffy and laid BR down gently...
He then pulled a full-sized female body out of the closet...A model from his company...
And wearing an old coat of BR's...
"We're off..."
Angel looked at the unconscious Buffies...
"They'll be fine..." Spike assured him...
Buffy is not going to like this...Angel thought...
***
They slipped out by the window, the guest bedroom being on the ground floor...
And, carrying the dressed model, headed for the construction site equipment...
***
Spike removed the remote control from his pocket and clicked it...
The crane, the glopida machine, and everything electrical in four blocks turned on...
Including...Ms. Summers-Walthrop...
***
Spike maneuvered the crane to them and placed the model in it...
"Realism, you know..." he told Angel...Clicking the crane over to the glopida machine...
"Good-bye, Mrs. Spike...Hello, Spike, Secret Agent of Darkness and Light..." he grinned...As the
body dropped into the goop of the glopida-glopida machine...
This was just for the strip, right?...Angel asked him...
It sure seemed like...Well...
A dry run?...
Well...Spike noted...Buffy is still out...In case you...
Ummn...
Of course not, Spike...Are you crazy?...
Just enhancing the experience...Consider it a tension-release...
***
Ms. Summers-Walthrop while pleased to find she and her sis had been removed from the party
after their rather bizarre behavior..Was a little put out to find Spike no where around...
She wandered into his studio...And found some of his latest sketches...
***
She was back on the bed when the ghoul boys returned from their hideous deed...
Apparently dead to the world...
As was her sis...
Angel waked his wife who confusedly staggered to the car with him...
She was definitely not going to be ok with this, he noted...Definitely...
What had he let that crazy maniac get him into?...
Oh, well...When BR learned what they'd been up to...
***
He took a worried call from Spike late the next day...
The Missus hadn't been home when he woke late...
He'd sent off the latest strips and still no BR...
Was she there by any chance?...
Nope...Sorry...
As Angel hung up, he couldn't help wondering...
Dry run?...
Go to story
***
Demon's Due...
Dinner at home...with Angelis-Buffy...
Buffy was clearly near the end of her rope...
And seeing no way out, was ready to accept the situation as it stood...
While Spike couldn't risk encouraging her with the news that Giles and Willow were on the
case...If that news could encourage anyone...He felt he could go ahead and urge her to fight on...
Angelis-Buffy would expect it anyway...
She mustn't take this lying down he told her...She must wait and keep her hope alive...
And by no means agree to anything more...
"Does it matter?...I'm trapped here..." she said despairingly...
Spike looked at her...
"If you allow this to continue Buffy, voluntarily...You become complicit in whatever it eventually
does..Your soul will merge with his consciousness...You become one...His new crimes,
yours..Eternally dammed...Together..."
"And that is probably what our dear Angelis is after...And his 'friends' at Wolfram-Hart..."
She bowed her head in thought...He was right, but what could they do...
He sensed the demon's return...She was a little miffed, having heard all...
Upsetting poor Buffy like that...New crimes?...Eternally damned?...Now if she were still the
nasty type and chose to point to some of Spike's recent misdemeanors...One might well wonder
which of them was the less worthy redemption candidate...But, as she had said...
Let time reveal her trustworthiness...
But for now...She was wondering if William might like to come to dinner tonight...After sunset
of course...She'd suggested it to Dawn at breakfast and Dawny loved the idea...
Nothing too elaborate...Just a nice, quiet family dinner to celebrate a rebirth...And the start of a
new relationship...
Did he like chicken?...
***
A quiet family dinner...At the Summers'
Dawn, Buffy...Angelis-possessed Buffy...and their new hero...
William the Bloody...
Who brought flowers...As befitting a former Victorian poet from the nineteenth century...
And who had politely dined on his "essential nutrient" before coming so that he could give full
attention to their cooking efforts...
And who assured Dawn that his praises were sincere...He could still appreciate good food, you
know...In spite of...
Buffy was shyly pleased to see that he liked it...She wasn't that experienced in the kitchen...
And told them she had feared she might have forgotten what little she knew during...Well...The
last couple of weeks...
A beautiful performance their guest noted...Worthy of the Angelis who had convinced a terrified,
but fatally compassionate Drusilla to let him enter her convent by sparing her mother, then
professing his desire for redemption and her sweet prayers...
Go to story
***
Fractured...
Movie night...
Well..." Giles smiled... "I think that Spike should take her out tomorrow evening..."
"What you say?..." Xander...Spike take her out?...The way she's been acting?...
"Giles?...Ummn..." Willow looked at him...
Spike grinned happily...Rupert, you are all right...
Buffy came over, bringing an exhausted Anya and Tara in tow...She'd been going a mile a minute
in her questions about the past three months...
She seemed quite pleased as well...She'd love to go out with Spike...But she frowned...Would she
have to kill him at the end of the evening?...
***
"Yes..." Giles concluded... "Spike should take her out tomorrow...For a pleasant dinner, perhaps a
movie...And bring her home...Unharmed...And untouched...By no later than eleven..."
"Him?..." Xander was choking on the words...
Willow on the other hand was beginning to see...
Buffy still wondered what would be the best way to end the evening...Release dear William with
the Gift...Or perhaps a leetle kiss?...She'd discuss it with Willow at the house tonight...
"Giles?..." Xander asked him...Choking on the words...
"Giles?...I'm not so sure about this..." Willow...
"Yes..." Giles went on, in a precise manner...
"You see...If we leave her alone...If she went out on her own...We'd soon have some human boy
to deal with, almost certainly, considering her present state...One whom we might have
hesitations about dealing with...Properly..."
"However...If our dear Spike should attempt to take any advantage of the situation..."
Ah...Xander was getting it now...
Giles concluded...
"We could deal with him...Without hesitation...Besides his chip prevents him from doing any
physical harm...And we won't leave them completely alone..."
They rejoined the others...
"Spike has a great idea..." Buffy told them happily... "He wants to take me out tomorrow night..."
Ummn...Yeah...We just told you that, sweetheart...They eyed each other...
Ummn...Great...Great idea...
Hmmn...Forgets things easily, eh?...Spike thought...Rather...Happily...
This sounds like it could be quite a date...
***
"Dawn?...How do I look?..." Buffy had come downstairs...In perhaps the strangest outfit Dawn
had ever seen her wearing...
And, Dawn admitted to herself...Sis has worn some pretty strange outfits...
"Buffy...It's five hours till Will comes for you...And I don't know if that...Is quite right for a restaurant..."
Oh...But...Wasn't it sexy?...
Well, yeah...In fact that was the problem...Not quite the thing to wear to a restaurant, really...Or a
movie...With families around...
But...She was sure the towel look had been in when she died...That girl they watched on TV...She
always had had plenty of skin exposed...
Dawn gently tried a new tack...She didn't want to hurt poor Buf's feelings...
"Buffy...You know we have to go slow with Spike...He's just getting used to associating with
humans again...On a non-food basis...You can't get him too excited..." she dropped to a
conspiratorial whisper...
"They'll be watching him...And if he behaves badly..." she drew a line across her throat...
Oh...Buffy was properly horrified...What had she been thinking?...Poor Spike...He'd be exploding
she told Dawn...
Oops...She put a hand to her mouth...I shouldn't say things like that to you...
No Problem, Dawn told her...We study this stuff in Biology and Health all the time now...
***
With help from Dawn, Buffy had chosen a nice, moderately conservative dress...And gotten her
hair into an agreeable state by the time a distinguished-looking blond young Englishman came to
call...With flowers no less...
Spike...In tweeds...
"Wow...Spike...You look great...How 'bout me?..." Buffy spun around...
Words couldn't describe he told her...But if they could...The words would be...Utterly...Just utterly...
She looked down at her feet and up at him, shyly...
Poets...Wasn't he one once?...Say the nicest things...she told him...
Dawn reminded him somewhat sternly that he was due back at eleven-thirty...Sharp...
He nodded...Buffy seemed a leetle...
Eleven-thirty?...So early?...Buffy, a peeved tone in her voice...
Sharp...Dawn said firmly...
It was plenty of time he assured her...
***
He scoped out the restaurant as they went in...No desire to have to do any Slaying just right now,
thank you...
So far so good...
Only one vampire that he could detect he told her in answer to her question...She had caught his
sweep of the place...
"Where?..." she asked...Looking round...Might be a nice way to release some of the tension...She
was so worried about making a mistake...
Here...He grinned at her...She laughed...
"So...Where are they?..." she asked...
He knew who they were...
"Willow and Tara just took the table over by the main front window...See..." he nodded just a bit
at them...
"Xander and Anya are at the table to the right in the rear...About three tables down...As for our
Bess...She's probably...Ah...My God..."
"What...Is the robot going crazy?..." Buffy looked apprehensively at him...
Hmmn...Pity Bess couldn't be doing that...Buf looks ready to take me on as her hero...
Well...Slow does it...
"No, no...It's just...She's with someone...I think you know him..."
Where?...Buffy asked him...
Front right table...Near the door...Don't look too closely, best not to let him see you if possible...
"Is it that bloody stupid twit?..." she asked...
Who?...
Angel...That bloody stupid twit...Leaving me all alone to fight Glory...Well...Not all alone...she
patted his hand...
She's angry at Angel?...At old Christ, Jr?...This is the first time I've heard her speak of him...Since...
Either the Powers That Be must have some dreadful punishment in store for me after this week,
he thought...Or I must have forgotten that I was a saint who saved millions in my human life...
"Is it Angel?...I can't see...Oh...I know him..." her eyes widened...
She nearly hopped out of her chair before he grabbed her...
"Parker...You...BADMAN!!!" she hollered in a voice that could be heard in the next three counties...
"My sister..." Bess told Parker pleasantly...
"Your sister...Buffy?..." Parker asked... "But I heard she was...Dead..."
"A very serious accident...She was nearly dead for three months...But she's almost all better now..."
Hmmn...Willow thought as she watched Spike gently calming Buffy...Maybe I should have been
more specific with Bess as to whose dinner proposals for tonight she should not accept when I
sent her to campus...
It seemed like a good idea at the time...Less noticeable than her sitting alone...Who'd have
guessed Parker would be slimy enough to date Buffy's twin sister?...
***
Buffy kept an occasional wary eye on the Badman Parker but had calmed and turned to
contemplate the menu...
"It's very expensive, Spike...Can you afford it?..." she asked...
"It's fine, Buffy...The Council's finally coughing up some dough for Slayers and their assistants,
thanks to Giles..." he smiled...
"You go ahead and order whatever you like...Two of them if you like..."
He heard from Dawn about Buffy's appetite...When at home...With her friends away...
The true source of Slayer strength he guessed...
The menu kept her mind mostly off the repulsive Parker...Although she noted she was concerned
for her "sister"...She hoped she wouldn't let him treat her bad...
Not a chance, Spike assured her...That slime won't get to first base with Bess...He grinned...
"In fact, lets hope he tries...She'll throw him though a glass window..."
"Like April did with you?..." Buffy laughed happily... "Oh, I hope so..."
Oh...She didn't mean that...Her eyes widened...Her "sister" wasn't...Dangerous... Like April?...
Miss Bess?...Oh no...Really...He was just trying to make her smile...Parker would be
fine...Although he'd never get halfway to first base...
Oh...Buffy thought a bit...She was a little glum...
"Are you...Ashamed of me?...I let Parker get past the first base with me..." she looked at her lap...
No...No...Not at all...He told her...Hey, look who you're talking to...
"I'm only sorry you feel badly about it, Buffy..." he assured her...
She smiled...He was very considerate, she told him...
***
She was pleased that he'd ordered something, she told him...She'd been a leetle afraid that her
memory was screwed up...She thought she remembered seeing him eating or drinking...Other
things before...Besides...But...
It just would have been too bad if he couldn't enjoy the meal as well...
"That's very considerate of you, Buffy..." he told her gallantly...
Willow noted that all seemed quite well...
She scanned the place...Xander and Anya were pretty much out in their own world...Parker was
obviously trying to score points with a very pleasant Bess...Who was dividing her attention rather
unevenly with most focused on Spike and Buffy...
Hopefully no vampires or demons...Neither Spike nor Buffy seemed to have sensed any as yet...
At least neither of them had gotten up on the excuse of a trip to the restroom in search of any...
***
Buffy ate enough for three strong men...But after all, three months in the grave...Spike noted...
However it did amaze him how she managed to stuff all that food into that slender body...And
manage to avoid bursting out of that dress...She must have stomach muscles like iron bands...he thought...
She looked a little embarrassed...Asking to see the dessert menu...
"I ate like a pig..." she apologized... "Hope you weren't disgusted with me?..."
Buffy...You ate very politely...And after three months...I would hope you'd eat a decent meal...he
told her...
She was much too sensitive these days...He noted...Poor Buffy...And really, considering how
much she ate...She did eat very delicately...
It's interesting though...She seems calmer...Maybe all she needed was some protein in the diet...
I should mention it to Giles tomorrow...A few good meals and she may be right as rain...
"So..." she looked at him as they waited for coffee... "We've both been dead...We should compare
notes..."
Hmmn...He nodded...Only thing is...He pointed out to her...My resurrection was demonic...I don't
really have any after-death experiences...
Unless you count my past career over the last century...
***
The words he dreamed of for months now came to her lips...
"Spike...Why don't we go over to your crypt?..."she smiled at him brightly...
Well...She probably just wants to overcome her fear of cemeteries...Maybe she just wanted to see
what he and Dawny had done with the place...
He noted that his crypt had indeed changed since Dawn and Bess had started a campaign to
humanize his living space...And now that her posters and photos graced the place...
Perhaps after the movie...If Willow and the others were willing to join them...he thought...
Buffy continued...She could forego the movie...And maybe they could...After the others were
settled in at the film...Slip off to the crypt alone?...
"We could have sex...Ok?..."
Not much room left for doubt there...
He didn't even mind the offer having come after Xander's...
Wow...
Whoa..Wait....
Ummn...This sounded like something that was sure to set Miss Bess and the others off...
Ummn...Buffy?...I'm on probation here, you know...Ummn...How to put this politely...
"You don't want to?..." she quickly moved from disappointment to despair...
"You don't want me anymore?...I'm a freak now...No one wants me..."
She looked sadly down at her hands...
"They're all saying...Look at the crazy dead freak...Who wants to have sex with her?..."
She looked back up at him, in tears...
"No one will love me now..."
Oh...
Spike was heartbroken, and rather shocked to find himself so...
My poor Buffy...
My God, I really do love her...He thought...I'm actually feeling for her without...Much of...An
ulterior motive...
Victorian to the rescue...
What's she upset about?...Willow wondered to Tara...Is he?...
He took her hand and patted it...Kissed her on the forehead...
Tara noted Spike's gallantry to Willow...I don't think he got her upset...In fact...
No, actually...He does seem to be dealing with it...Well...Ok...For now...Willow agreed...
***
"Buffy...I swear...If I thought for a moment we could actually get away with it...We would be out
there shagging like mad in a minute..." Spike gallantly told her...
Really?...She brightened...
"Absolutely...But we have to be careful...Or else Spikey never sees another sunset..."
He grinned... "More important...I never get another date with my Slayer..."
She was definitely picking up...
"And I have to take care of you, you know...I gave my word to the Nibs..."
She reflected...But he really would like to?...
Burning for it...He assured her...
Well...Maybe we should go slow...She agreed...
But really?...Well...Sorry to go on like that...She smiled sheepishly...
No problem, he grinned at her...A thought struck him...
"Did you ever imagine we'd end up like this?...Back in the old days?..." he smiled...
We had dinner together before, didn't we?...Oh no, we went out and had a drink...When I wanted
to know about those other Slayers...Yeah...That was it...Right?...
Yes...He nodded his head, we did...But not quite the same circumstances...
I wanted to have sex with you then too...Buffy told him...
Oh...He looked at her...Blinking...And tried to nod...Pleasantly...
How to respond to this bombshell?...
"I think I started thinking about you...A lot...After we nearly got married that time..." she told him...
Oh...He nodded...Pleasantly...
He had to admit that probably he too...He told her...At that time...
And gave Willow a friendly glance...
Thank God for dear Willow and her magical incompetence...
"Well...Since we are taking it slow...How about that movie, Slayer?..."
She brightened to glowing status...Spike was the only person since she'd revived who'd called her...Slayer...
"Lets go..."
Seeing her "sister" and her protege rising, Bess thanked Parker for a very pleasant evening...
As she had paid for the meal one could excuse her for not suggesting that he accompany her to
the movies...
Tara had to nudge Willow...Cool the withering gaze, sweetie...
"You have to admit...She's been having a good time...So far..."
Willow nodded...Lets hope blondie continues on the straight and narrow...
She rather enjoyed watching Parker's frustrated look from their table as Bess excused herself...
Though she didn't have the heart to disturb Anya and Xander...Still off on another world...
Time to call in to Giles...Phase one successfully completed...
***
As Spike had expected...The only problem was at the movies...A favorite killing field for
vampires...Dark, romantic, lots of necking...
But Buffy was actually very pleased to sense that there were several vamps lurking around...
And insisted they do what they could to stop them...Though she accepted that one must be
discrete and quiet in a movie theater...
However, she...Rather Loudly...Noted that many vampires showed no sense of courtesy...
Letting their dates pay and then killing them...Gross...
The Slayer would enjoy dealing with them...She bellowed...Pointing out to Spike that this oughta
clear the place...And since the film hadn't started...
An attendant came by...who reminded her that one should be quiet in a movie theater...Or else...
She would be quiet when the lights went down...She promised...
"Tell him, Spike...I'm just doing my Slayer's duty..." she asked him...
Fortunately the attendant knew the Summers...Oh...This was the dead Summers girl's sister,
right?...From Spain?...
"Si..." Buffy jumped into the role rather happily...
Spike noted a small number of patrons vamoosing...Casting rather anxious looks in their
direction,,,And he sensed the immediate vamp population declining...Rapidly...
"She...A little?...From all the mourning?..." the attendant asked Spike...As he got up to explain
poor Miss Summers' little problem...
He appreciated the attendant's perceptive skills...Spike told him...Yes, poor Miss Summers'
sister...A little shaken yet...From the recent shocks...
"I was dead as a doornail..." she informed the attendant happily...Oops...Spanish, right?...
Very tired...From the exhausting past weeks...Spike noted...
"Si..." She said solemnly...Smiling at the attendant...
"You're her sis' old boyfriend, aren't you?...I saw you with her once or twice..." the young man noted...
Great...A chatty lout of a movie attendant...Pity one of the departing vamps couldn't have taken
him out first...
Yeah...Buffy's old boyfriend...But of course a friend to the whole family...Spike noted...
"He's making time preety quick..." Buffy put in helpfully...Smiling at her beau... "I was
barely...Ummn...Sis was barely cold..." She was so clearly pleased at her skill in assisting with
the deception...Spike didn't have the heart to shush her...
She'll be just fine...Spike promised...Really...
Bess and the others were taking their seats...At strategic locations...
Whoops...So...Had he known the Summers a long time?...Spike asked the young lout...Moving
him away from view of Bess...
"He used to be our paperboy..." Buffy noted... Oops...
"Ummn...Sis' paperboy...Mom said he stole stuff off our porch..." she became indignant at the thought...
No one steals from the Slayer's family...
"You give that stuff back!!!..." she yelled at him... "Or Spike will tear your throat out!!!"...
She'll be just fine...Spike assured the boy, leading him away from Buffy and keeping Bess out of
his field of vision...By the way, was he by any chance a student of Psychology?...That remarkable
perceptive ability of his...
The flattered lout admitted to several Psych courses at UCal Sunnydale...
Willow and Tara looked at Buffy who remained glaring at the attendant...As Spike slipped him
twenty and again assured him that Ms. Summers would be fine...
Xander, brilliantly catching on to the situation, walked to where Bess sat and blocked her from
view...Asking her how her "date" had gone...
Very pleasantly she told him, thanking him for his interest...Buffy seemed very happy, wouldn't
he say?...
The lights mercifully dimmed...
Xander looked at Spike...Who nodded a grateful thanks...Both headed back to their seats...
"You'd tear his throat if it weren't for the chip, wouldn't you, Spike?..." Buffy asked, whispering
as he retook his seat beside her...
Absolutely...he assured her...
She beamed, taking his hand...
But...Oh...Those vampires?...Shouldn't they?...
Bess...Or she...Would catch 'em later...Spike assured her...For tonight, it's Slayer vacation...
Besides...They were so scared leaving they'll probably give up humans for a month...
He was so sweet...She grinned happily...
***
Spike seemed actually glad to accept his suggestion that they all have a last coffee together
Xander noted as they headed out of the movie house...
Buffy had never had a better time...Ever...At least that she remembered...She told Willow and
Tara happily...At the coffee house...
But...She knew she'd acted a little...Was Spike embarrassed by her?...She asked them...
Not at all...they told her...
Oh...Then...Why didn't he want to have sex with her?...When she asked earlier?...
Ummn...
"He's just being polite..." Tara reassured her... "It's a little too soon, you know..."
Oh...Oh!...I didn't mean to tell you that...
"Don't kill him, please..." she asked anxiously... "He was very nice..."
No, no...We were there...He behaved himself very well...Tara assured the nervous Buffy...
Amazingly well...Considering Buffy's little rendezvous proposal...Willow thought...
He was clearly very concerned about her...Tara went on...Considerate...
And wants to see another sunset...Willow thought grimly...
Still...One must give Blondie his due...She'd had a great time...With no visible scars...
"Good job, there, Spike..." Willow whispered to him at the first chance...And sternly looking at him...
"I expect you to keep it up..."
***
Buffy hated to see the evening end...But, Spike pointed out...He had some Patrol to do with Bess...And...
Eyeing the others...
They'd see each other again...
"Tomorrow night?..." she asked happily...
Well...He looked at the others who looked at each other...
No?...She looked sad...And progressively sadder as he hesitated...
Of course tomorrow night, Willow told her...
He'd come over the house, they'd watch TV or something...
Great...Buffy told them...She and Dawny would make...Things...
Xander eyed Willow...Who shrugged...Do you want to tell her no?...
At least we'll all be there again...Anya noted to him...
"Enjoy it while you can, Spike..." Willow told him in a grim whisper...
Tara couldn't help patting his hand...Someone should show him a little appreciation for a job well
done...Compliment him on his excellent restraint...Must have been difficult...
Why was Tara patting her date's hand?...Buffy asked...Rather annoyed...
Go to story
***
Dinner Party for Angel...
Anya looked at Giles as he hung up...
"What about...Spike?..."
Well...Best to leave that to Buffy...For now, Angel's presence might even be helpful...he told
her...Another beloved friend to help jog Buffy's mind back to normal...
And, if he should be a bit...Surprised...To find that she and Spike were now hitting it off so well...
Well, we all know Angel's noble and self-sacrificing nature would lead him to make Buffy's
well-being his primary focus...
"You still really hate Angel, don't you?..." Anya asked him...
***
Buffy now happily began putting out some plates and things for the evening...Spike helping with
a smile...It had been a while since he had the chance to help set up for a dinner party, he noted...
Dawn mentioned to Spike that they would be having some special guests...Angel, Wesley, and
Cordy were on their way...
Buffy frowned...She didn't want to see that bloody stupid twit...she told them...
"Buffy...He's coming all the way from LA...Most of the way in daylight...Just to see you..."
"I don't want to see him...He left me all alone here to die...And I know what he did with
Darla...Wesley told Giles...And all those other girls in LA...Always talking about them...His
Kate...Oooh...So brave..." she mimicked... "And his Annie...And all of them..."
"I bet he had sex with all of 'em..."
"Besides..." she smiled at Spike...
"William is my boyfriend now..."
She turned huffily and went to the kitchen to get more plates...Dawn rolled her eyes, looking at
Spike...Will you talk to her...Please?...
She went in after her...
Spike looked after the two girls...
Thank You, God...he thought...I just want You to know...This squares us for my unjust damnation...
***
Still, for Dawny's sake...Who was clearly anxious that the evening pass off well...Spike
reluctantly pointed out to Buffy that she should try to be polite to Angel...As a guest...
Her mother would be hurt if she didn't behave as a proper hostess...
And after all the fellow had shown up after Joyce died...Remember?...
Well...Buffy frowned...If he thought Mom would want her to be nice...She'd try...
And Angel had saved her a number of times before...she admitted...
But...She asked...He did want to be her boyfriend, right?...
More than he wanted eternal life, redemption, anything...Spike assured her...
More than...Dawn looked at him...Enough already...Well...He was truly very pleased that she
wanted him for a dating companion...
Of course they'd have to see how things went once she was all better...
Dawn had an inspired idea...
They needed a few things from the store...Spike had his car outside...Would he mind taking Buffy?...
"Yeah!...Lets go!..." Buffy raced for her coat...
I'm trusting you on this, Will...Dawn told him, taking him aside...
Don't make me regret it...And don't make me have Giles send Bess out after you two...
Less than an hour and back in one piece...he promised...
"Can I drive?..." Buffy asked as they went out...
Ummn...Well...Dawn shook her head furiously...It's a hard car to drive, dear heart...Spike began...
***
Willow looked at Dawn...Dawn looked a trifle sheepish...
But it had only been twenty minutes...
"You think it was a bad idea?..." she asked for the third time since Willow had arrived to help
them set up...And learned Dawn had sent Buffy and Spike out shopping...Together...Alone...
"Dawn, I sometimes think letting William the Bloody live a day past the moment we first met
him was a bad idea...Still...Spike has been trying..."
Astonishingly Willow had to admit to herself...It wasn't Spike she was worried about...
"He won't let her drive, you think?..." Dawn asked...
"Spike?...Let someone drive his car?...Nah..." Willow told her...
God...I hope not...she thought...
***
Forty minutes...
Willow patted Dawn reassuringly...Xander had seen them at the store...No problem...
They'd set back to work on setting up...
Giles called...The LA team had arrived and if all right they'd all head over in a few minutes...
Could Angel possibly speak to Buffy now?...
Ummn...
***
A robbery...Spike thought...
Of all the things we have run into in our times together...A simple, stupid...Robbery...
The nervous gunmen were still waving their pistols about...Demanding the clientele keep to the
floor...Or else...
Buffy looked at Spike...We have to get home...Dawn will be upset...Which means Giles will be
upset...Which means Bess...
Oh-oh...Which means I lose my latest boyfriend...
"William...Can you charge 'em?...You're resistant to bullets...Right?..." she asked in a whisper...
"DOWN!!!" screamed one of the nervous gunmen...Pointed at her...
She dropped her head to the floor...
Well...Sort of resistant...It still hurts...A lot...he told her...
But more important they'd probably shoot you and every human in here before I could reach
them...he noted to her...
"You always think of me..." she smiled at him...
But he was in danger...If Dawn got upset and called Giles...
And it was all her fault...Oh...
"QUIET!!!" One of the gunmen screamed at her...Waving his pistol in her direction...
Hmmn...Thought Spike...I don't think all of our friends here are quite...Human...
"Hey..." Buffy hollered at the gunman... "My boyfriend and I have to go home!..."
He looked at her...
"You and your boyfriend have to go...Home?..." he smiled... "Lady, I'll send you both
home...Right now..."
She looked at him curiously...She's sensed it too, Spike noted...
"You...You're a vampire?...Why are you holding up a store?..." she asked, genuinely curious...
They didn't seem to be taking any of the hostages for a quick snack...
The vamp blinked at her...His mates, human, Spike now noted...Looked at him and then her...
"She crazy?..." he grinned at Spike...Who smiled feebly, shrugging...
"Nutcase..." he looked at his pals...Apparently he preferred to keep his unique qualities under
wraps...Spike noted...
"I am the Slayer..." she told him firmly...
"I kill vampires..." she explained...Just in case he was new to Sunnydale, she told Spike...
***
Sixty minutes...Time's about up...Dawn thought...
He said...Less than an hour...
She looked at Willow...Willow looked at her...
Tara, Xander, and Anya looked at them and each other...
"I could go over to the market...See what's keeping them..." Xander offered...
Buffy might just be having trouble picking out desserts...Or maybe there's a long, long line...
It happens...he assured Dawn...
No reason to think Spike decided to risk taking Buffy up on her sex offers...
If they're not at the market...Willow thought...And not walking through that door before Xander
gets back here...
But for Dawn's sake she agreed with Xander...He was sure to find them mired in a make-out...er
check-out line...
***
Fortunately, Spike noted, the one vampire in the group of robbers holding up the supermarket he
and Buffy had chosen, seemed as unwilling as they for "trouble"...
He seemed in fact to be anxious that his human partners not learn what he was...And tried to
brush off Buffy's questions of why a vampire was robbing a store...And not killing the customers
and employees held at gunpoint...
Although her declaration of her Slayer identity had clearly made him more nervous than ever he
continued to try to laugh off her statements...A real nutcase, he informed his pals...
And came over to her and Spike, grinning...
She was genuinely curious...
"You don't what your friends to know you're a vampire?..." she said in a conspiratorial whisper...
"I won't tell again if you let me and my boyfriend leave now..." she told him...
He really was afraid of being found out, Spike realized...
"Look...Slayer...Just can it will you?...I'm not harming anyone...I just need some cash..."
He paused, and earnestly pleaded...To both of them...
"I'm using it for blood...I'm no hunter...Just sit tight a little longer and I see
you...Everybody...Gets out ok...Ok?..." he looked at them...He put his hands out pleading for
calm...Looking back to his friends now engaged in breaking open the closed cash registers...
"Well..." Buffy thought it over...If he really wasn't a bad vampire...Oh!...Spike...
She explained that her sister would be very angry with William if they didn't get home soon...And
he was a vampire too...They were brothers, sort of...And he had to help him...
Plus she would remember him if he was nice...And check before she'd Slayed next time they
met...Long as he was not bad...She'd leave him be...
Hmmn...Not every day the Slayer offers you a safe pass...
"Is she ok?..." he asked Spike..."She seems a little...And I heard the Slayer was dead..."
"The rumors of my death are..." Buffy got confused midquote... "I'm not dead...Now..." she concluded...
"You'd be wise to accept Ms. Summers' offer, lad..." Spike told him... "Not many vamps get on
her good side, I can tell you..."
"Just you Will..." she told him happily... "And maybe you...If you're very nice..." she told the vamp...
Hopefully she's not planning to put him on the sex or marriage list, Spike thought...
"Are you sure she's ok?..." the vamp asked...Looking back at his mates...
She was dead three months...Spike explained...It takes a toll...Temporarily of course, he nodded
to Buffy...Now almost all well...
She smiled...He was always so eager to spare her feelings...So sweet...
"I was dead as a doornail..." she told the vamp...
Say...Did he remember what it was like when he died?...They should compare notes...
***
Xander reached the market lot about five minutes later...
Just as Angel and co reached the Summers'...With Giles and Bess...
***
The vamp was apologetic...He didn't have any after-death experiences...You see...
"Spike didn't either..." Buffy told him kindly... "That's ok..."
He had to swing back in to look over other hostages, the vamp told them...Just cool it a bit and
he'd be back...
The rest of the gang was now engaged in trying to open the office safe...Without much success...
Except for the several including their vamp who were nervously looking over the hostages at
different spots...
Watching the group struggling in the office, Spike noted that they might well be here a while...
Buffy was nervous again...Dawn and Giles will be so pissed...If they don't have Bess
stakeWilliam...At the very least we'll never get another date...
She noticed the vamp returning...
Having a moment, the vamp was curious...Why was the Slayer hanging out with the famed
William the Bloody...
Buffy was pleased...The famed...Her boyfriend...
And thought quick...
"We're having a meeting...For a peace treaty..." she told the vamp solemnly... "William is
representing all the good vamps who want to make peace..." She smiled at the vamp... "Like you..."
Oh...The vamp was interested...
Buffy?...Spike looked at her...
Hmmn-hmmn...And free blood for all the vamps who come in on the deal...she told him...
Really...Free blood?...The vamp was very interested...
Maybe I could slip you two out the door when the others are counting the cash out...he noted...
Nobody'd miss two less customers...
"By the way, I'm Leroy..." he smiled...
Leroy...She'd remember him...Very pleasantly...Buffy told him...If...
He moved to check on progress...Just sit tight and he'd be back...he told them...
Nice going, dear...Spike noted, smiling...She grinned back...Raising her eyebrows...
Not too bad for the crazy dead girl?...she whispered...
She noted Xander causally strolling into the store...Oh!...
That's my friend...she called to the returning Leroy...
"Xander...Hi!!!" she waved...
Buffy?...Spike?...What's?...He looked at them on the floor...And the other hostages, looking at
him, frightened...And saw the gunmen in the rear...
They saw him as well...
And were not in a mood to receive additional guests...
***
Leroy now faced a moral dilemma...
Much as he liked the idea of a free and steady blood supply...Without the bother of a hunt or the
need for a sustained cash flow...
His human mates were not likely to accept his switching sides with good-natured tolerance...
On the other hand...What were a few bullets compared to a safe pass from the Slayer herself?...
And it wasn't like the guys were old friends or anything...Just causal acquaintances...
"Down, pal!..." he called to Xander and turning back round opened fire on his former
associates...Who'd come running out of the office with similar intent towards the unwanted intruder...
"Yeah!!!" Buffy cried... Hopping up as Spike desperately grabbed at her...He followed as she
charged in the direction of the now panicking gunmen...Who fired wildly as they fled toward the back...
Xander...Though still a bit puzzled...Joined the pursuit a moment later...Calling to Buffy to watch
out...And Spike to watch...Her...
Fortunately two of the three front fast-moving targets now presented had a high lead tolerance...
And the third was the fastest moving of the three...
She was upon one of the fleeing robbers before the rest reached the rear doors...And raced for
their cars...
She clubbed the startled fellow one...Good...
Down for the count with one blow...
She was grinning in triumph as Spike and Leroy reached her...
He might only be a human...But...
The Slayer is back...
"She really is the Slayer..." Leroy noted to Spike...Who nodded...
Made the right call on that one, mate...Spike told the vamp...
"She definitely is the Slayer..." Grinning back at her...
"What the hell is going on?..." Xander called, coming up...
Peace negotiations...Buffy solemnly informed him...Smiling at Leroy...
***
Well...Dawn noted grimly...Listening to their explanation...
Long line...Very long line...
As long Xander vouches for you...
It was a madhouse there, Xander informed her...
Smiling at Buffy...And Spike...
Hmmn...Thought Willow...Well, best not to press it right now I guess...
"Hi, Wesley...Cordy!..." Buffy hugged them...
"Hello...Angel..." she said...Politely...Offering a hand...
Angel looked at the others...What's?...Did I do something?...
He glared suspiciously at Spike...Who stood watching with a Cheshire cat grin...
Remarkably similar to one Giles was wearing...
Even Willow was not all that sorry to see his discomfort...
Where the hell had he been during the fight with Glory, anyway?.
***
Buffy maintained a polite and composed pose with her dinner guest, Angel...For the best part of
ten minutes...
Who...While naturally pleased to find her alive and more or less functional...Was rather
distressed to find a less than joyous welcome from her...
What'd I do?...He looked pleadingly at the others...
Cordelia and Wesley surprised as he...Buffy?...
Even Spike felt a modicum of sympathy...
Oddly however...The other Sunnydalers...Did not seem...All that...
"Please sit down...Dawn and I are very glad to have you all here..." Buffy told the
group...Formally...But looking to Giles...Willow...Spike...Xander...Anya...In
turn...Anxiously...For a little encouragement...
First dinner party in months, after all...
Am I doing ok?...They each smiled and gave a nod or a wink...Just fine, Buf...
She looked at Dawn...
"That's the way to do it, right?..." she whispered...Loud enough to be heard...
Absolutely...Dawn whispered back...Don't sweat it...
What's with her?...Cordelia hissed to Willow...Who shrugged...
She has been dead three months, you know...
They all sat down...Spike taking his seat next to Giles and Bess...Dawn diplomatically grabbed
the other seat between Wesley and Spike...Hinting with a wave to a disappointed Buffy to sit near
the LAers...
The special guests...Oh, right...
"Sorry, Spike...I have to entertain our guests..." she called over to him...
He nodded...Absolutely...
The LAers looked at each other...
Buffy took a seat with her guests...But distinctly away from Angel...And crossing her legs
demurely began a pleasant conversation with Wesley...
Had he killed many things since they last met?...she asked...
Ummn...Well...
Wesley looked nervously at his Boss...Who glared back at him...And stepped over...
Buffy not deigning to notice him...
"Buffy?...Could we talk?...Go outside for a moment, maybe?..." Angel asked her...
"Ummn...Angel..." Dawn said, looking over... "I think it's best if you guys stay indoors..."
"I don't want to go outside with you, Angel..." Buffy told him regally, turning back to
Wesley...And frowning at Dawn...
"But I could...If I wanted to..." she brightened...And turned to Spike...Who was pumping Giles
for info on the medical evaluation performed on Buffy that morning...Pleased to hear that his
diagnosis might have been on target...
"Spike!...Lets go out again..."
"NO!!!"...Dawn...
Ummn...Buffy...It's not polite for us to leave your guests...Spike noted to her...
She nodded...He was right, of course...And apologized frostily to Angel...Who'd glared Wes out
of his seat...She was sorry if she'd said or done anything to offend him...But he had to
understand...She...Had recently been in a terrible battle with a terrible, powerful enemy...
He picked up a bit...An opening...
"Yes, Buffy...Giles has been telling me how great you were fight..."
She cut him off...All alone she told the room at large...Alone...She looked at him...Well, except
for her good friends...And dear William...
Yes, I know, Buffy, and I...Angel tried desperately...
William?...he thought...As she interrupted his effort...
All alone...She went on...Except for my loyal friends...Especially Willow and William...Fighting
a terrible, powerful enemy...A goddess no less...she noted, nodding...
Well, Buffy...Cordelia tried to put a word for the Boss...Angel was...
And she'd been dead as a result...Of being...Almost all alone in a terrible, deadly fight...Dead...As
a doornail...So...Buffy hoped he...And the others...Would understand...
Death...She concluded...Makes one distant...When one has fought...All alone...
She looked...Narrowly...Back at a startled Angel...
Almost...Except for one's friends, of course...
Plus...Buffy couldn't resist breaking her aloof pose and grinning happily at her beau...She had a
new boyfriend now...
So Angel would just have to under...
He exploded...This was too much...
"What?...Spike is your...Boyfriend?!!...Buffy?...What the hell?..." he glared at Giles who returned
a noncommital look...Before returning to his Cheshire cat grin...
Wesley and Cordelia were equally shocked...Buffy?...And Spike?...
Willow gave Spike a rather Puckish look...
Enjoy yourself, Blondie...While you can...
Actually...
They're being a little rough on old Christ, Jr. he was thinking...In spite of the pleasure of watching
Angel squirm...
Tara, sympathetically tried to move the conversation along...And provide Angel an escape hatch...
"Angel, I understand you guys were trapped in another dimension?..."
He got hold of himself and calmed...Yes, he nodded...
Place called Pylea...By way of a dimensional...
"Portal!?...Portal?!..." Buffy jumped up... "You were in a portal?...And you didn't even stop to
pick me up?..."
It wasn't the same portal, Buffy...Spike told her gently...
And you were dead...
Angel looked at them...I don't believe this...
"What did you do to her?!!..." he yelled at Spike...
"DON'T YELL AT MY BOYFRIEND!!!!" Buffy hollered at him...Poise forgotten...
"Buffy...Stop shouting...Sit down..." Dawn told her...
Spike tried to calm her...Angel was just concerned...
But she had crossed a barrier...And intended to have her say, now...
She glared back at Angel...Fire in her eyes...
"You had...Sex...with..." she paused...Ummn...Oh yeah... "Darla!..."
Well...Angel looked nervously at the others...Willow?...Help me out here?...
"It was only to help her, Buffy...I knew it wouldn't bring me...Happiness..."
"Just doin' your duty, huh?..." Buffy looked at him, swaying hips as she spoke for
emphasis...Eyes narrowing...
He looked at the other Sunnydalers for help...Spike...Giles...Xander, even...Seemed to
be...Enjoying this...
Yeah it probably wasn't all that happy for him...Xander noted quietly to Anya...Very helpful for
Darla, though...I'm sure...
Even I find that one hard to stomach, Willow noted...
Giles kept his noncommital look...
Bess smiled pleasantly...
Though he could see Buffy was not herself...Angel was moving...Rapidly...Towards a little...Annoyance...
After all, Buffy had jumped into the sack with ole Riley fast enough...he couldn't help noting...
The Sunnydalers looked at him, a little...Jumped into?...Closing ranks...
However...Dawn tried to help...
"Buffy...Angel couldn't help not being here..." she paused... "When you needed him so badly...He
was...Probably very busy..."
Cordelia was getting a bit...Who do these Sunnydalers think they are?...
"Angel was saving our lives...He had no idea that..."
"He knew Glory was after me...He was here before...Why didn't he stay?...He always leaves..."
Buffy noted...Glaring at the now very annoyed Angel...
"Spike never leaves..." Proudly beaming...
Spike did his best to maintain an innocent but concerned...And friendly...look...Avoiding a direct
glance at the now hotly glaring Angel...
Buffy...Wesley put in, a trifle indignant...You know Angel can't stay with you...There's
Angelis...And the Prophecy says...
Prophecy...Smaphecy...she sniffed...I don't pay attention to dumb ole Prophecy...The Master...He
tried to fool us with that...
She looked proudly at Xander and her good, loyal friends...
"Xander was too smart to be fooled by that kind of stuff...What if he'd left me dead?...Went off
and said 'Ooh...The Prophecy...The Prophecy...'...#&$@!!!...It's stupid..."
Buffy...Dawn hissed...Guests...What would Mom say?...
Got to watch my language around her these days...Willow thought...
You could've stayed and watched over me...Buffy glared at Angel...At least when Glory came here...
We wouldn't of had to have sex...she told him...
He was struggling to keep his composure...Clearly Buffy was...But even so...
Giles had meanwhile lost a little of his composure...He felt a bit uncomfortable to be reminded
that he'd been ready to accept her loss back there with the Master...If only for an instant...
Spike stayed...She told the hapless Angel...Even when Dru came and tried to get him to go
way...She looked proudly at her beau...Do you know what he said?...
He said...No way...I'm staying with Buffy...She nodded her head emphatically...
She dropped to a proud, confidential whisper...
"He even offered to croak her to prove he loved me..."
Had her in chains...Knife right by the throat...She smiled happily, picturing the moment...
Angel was staring at her...He looked at Giles...Willow...
What the hell is wrong with you people?!...
His gaze locked back on to Spike...You...
Spike returned his stare...Innocently...
Buffy remembered she was mad at Angel...Eyes narrowing again...
"You didn't even try hard to kill Darla..."
He might have hung around a bit longer after Mrs. Summers died, Tara couldn't help noting to herself...
Bunch of inflated egomaniacs...Wesley thought...
A little reputation, a few minor successes, and they think they can sit in judgement of the rest of
us and...
Of course...He couldn't help noting to himself...If it had been my true love...
Oddly enough, outside his LA staff, it remained only Spike who seemed to feel a bit of pity for
poor Angel...In the midst of enjoying the experience...
He'd been on the receiving end of Buffy's glare often enough...
"Buffy's been a little...High-strung...Angel...I hope you understand..." he told him...Pleasantly...
No need for a scene, mate...
Angel looked at him...Understand?...Why, you...Little blond maniac...
He started over...
Buffy was watching...A shy, sly grin on her face...
Her boyfriends were gonna fight over her...
Neat...
Dawn looked nervously at Willow and Bess...They're not gonna fight are they?...Now?...
In the house?...
"Spike is quite right, Angel..." Giles told him quietly, stepping quickly over to him... "Buffy is
just a little agitated these days...We must make allowances...You understand..."
Bess watched pleasantly...Ready to step in as required...
Angel calmed again...And grimly retook his seat...
He understood...Of course...Glaring again at Spike...
"He looked like Angelis just then, didn't he?..." Buffy noted to Willow...
Actually...Willow thought...
Buffy looked at Giles...Spike...Her mood changing abruptly...Oh?...Had she embarrassed them?...
Not at all...Spike gently smiled at her...Just explaining things to Angel and the others...
"I didn't mean to hurt your feelings, Angel..." Buffy told him, looking back at him...Haughty pose
forgotten with the grievance...She remembered how he'd saved her lots of times...She was
just...What Giles and Spike said...
She was sad now...She'd done it again...Stupid, crazy, dead Buffy...Does it again, she noted...Despairingly...
Mom would be so...
No, no...William told her, heading over to her...Patting her hand...It's just...A period of
readjustment...Angel understands...Right?...
He nodded at a startled Angel...Startled as much by the way the other Sunnydalers looked to
Spike...William?...William?!...To take Buffy in hand...
He recovered and assured Buffy he did understand...No problem at all...
The LA team looked in wonder at William the Bloody comforting a now deeply embarrassed Buffy...
Who apologized again for losing it...She'd been dead as a doornail...Ask Spike or Giles...
She held out a hand to Angel...Who finally got his hug...Though still nothing like the hug she
also gave to her latest...
Who was always...So sweet...She noted to the room...
Giles mercifully brought this part of the evening to a close...Suggesting politely that Buffy
needed her rest...
***
He laid out what he'd learned after Buffy reluctantly went up to bed...Having given Angel a last
friendly if rather dutiful hug...While reminding William that she was still his girlfriend...With a
rather bone-crushing hug...
"Careful on Patrol, Spike...Bess!...Watch out for him..." she called to the robot...Who nodded pleasantly...
Dawn once again having refused her request that Spike not be forced to go back to
that...Place...Again...
Poor Spike...She groused...I bet Angel doesn't have to...
Spike looked away from a renewed Angel glare...Ummn...You've gotta understand, old pal...
He'd be fine in his crypt...As always...Spike assured her...
Well...They were all friends again...Buffy noted...So...She'd leave it up to Spike on the living
arrangements...For now...
Oh!...She reminded Spike to tell Bess about Leroy...The good vampire...Not to be staked...If he
remained good...
He'd describe him to her in detail...Spike promised her...Maybe they'd meet tonight...He'd give
him her best...If he was still a good vamp...
Good night, everybody...she called...Heading up...
"She wants Spike to live in their basement?..." Angel asked Willow...Wonderingly...
Go to story
***
Qualities of Mercy...
Another dinner tour of Joyce's museum...
He reached the Summers'...
And entered, privileged guest that he was...
No sign of Dawn...
In the living room Buffy was listening to a tape through headphones...
She pulled the earphones down to her neck...
"Right on time, Will..." she told him...
She removed the phones and stood up, zipping up a duffel bag without looking at him...
He caught just a snatch as she reached to shut off the tape...Springstein...
She tossed a small bag at him which he caught neatly...A blood bag...
Buffy motioned for him to sit a moment...
"Go ahead...It's alright...I'm sure you haven't fed in a while...And I'd rather you did it here..."
She sat down on the edge of the couch...
Ummn...Buffy...
Prefer not to stain your rug...
She passed him a plate which sat on the coffee table...
He began drinking as discretely as he could...
There's this couple I know...she began...Not looking at him...
Friends of my Mom's...
The lady...was in a terrible incident...Got pushed in front of a subway train..
By some deranged guy...
Lost her legs, nearly bled to death...
Poor kid suffered brain damage, scarred and disfigured for life...
Took years to learn to speak and read again and all that...Her whole life changed in a second...
Not by her fault in any way...
She gets confused, even bizarre sometimes...Most of her friends, except my Mom and a couple
others ...Abandoned her...Too difficult to deal with...
Has even gotten violent at times...she noted...Though thank God for medication...
A real pain in the butt at times...As she herself told me...Buffy grinned at him...
Her husband met and fell in love with her after all that happened...In spite of the way she acts...Sometimes...
Spike looked at her...
She continued...
He found a way to see her best and deal with the rest...
And she tries to give him her best...But it's an effort...And she fails sometimes...
But he deals...Or did, last time Mom and I saw them...
"Love, I guess..." she finished...
Looking at him carefully...
Come with me, Buffy told him...
He followed her...
***
The Sunnydale Art Museum...Joyce's workplace...
The place was open a bit late tonight...They just made it...
He looked at her...
"Bathroom..." she pointed...
Until they close...
***
About half an hour later he emerged, looking round carefully...
She was standing, looking at a painting...Rather intensely...
Hmmn...Always suspected it...he thought...Grinning at her...
Buffy Summers, closet art lover...
After all, Joyce...
She saw him and led him to the area Joyce had set up...Her last work...
They looked at the arrangements...Rather avant-garde stuff...
"I've...Been here before, Buffy..." he told her...
She looked at him in surprise...
Not with ill intent, he noted carefully...
"I just thought...It would help me understand you and Joyce...Better..."
She nodded...
And pulled out a blanket from her duffel bag which she laid down...
He looked around a bit...Ummn...Security may not care for this...
"What are you doing?..."she asked him...Grinning at his nervous face...
No lasers, no security grid...she noted...They can't even afford cameras here...
The one guard's sleeping in his booth outside the building...
Oh...Hmmn...
Americans...No value put on anything meaningful...he thought...
She waved at him to sit down with her...
***
She pulled out a tape player...
More...U2?...he asked...Trying to find words...
She started the tape softly playing...Springstein..."Secret Garden"...
You got it wrong the other night, Spike...she told him...
He stared at her...
"With that minion thing of Sweet's...You said...One day he'd be a real boy..."
But you're the one who wants to be a real boy...Pinocchio...she smiled...
And I guess...That makes me the Blue Fairy...
She looked carefully at him...
"You rejected the other one last night...A pure demon...A monster...Wouldn't do that..."
"Are you William?..." she asked...
Buffy...I...Don't...he looked at her...
"I don't know anymore..."
"Can you be William for me?..." she asked...
You can't trust in me, he told her...Tears in his eyes...
"I can deal with Spike...If he ever tries to come between us...But..." she hesitated...
"Can..you..be..William?..." she looked at him, pleading...
As long as I live?...she stared at him...
The image of Drusilla flashed in his mind...Asking him...
Can it be so simple?...Is this...Redemption?...he wondered...
No...he realized...Not simple...
The hardest thing in the world...And everyday...Until she...Until they both...Died...
He would have to fight...
Oh, God...he begged, silently...looking at her open-hearted face ...Pleading but...
Somehow...Sure...
Of him?...
Take pity on me, God...On her...Tell me what to do...
Don't let me hurt her...Ever...
She looked at him...Waiting...
Yes...he gasped...
She nodded and kissed him gently...
This is the real place to feel Mom's spirit...she noted...
Not that damned grave...
She took his hand...He looked at her...
She called out softly into the room...
"Mom...This is William...?..." she looked at him...Well?...
Oh...
"William...Soames Walthrop.." he told her...
Mom...This is William Soames Walthrop...A good man...
I love him...
He looked at her...He couldn't help...Trembling...Couldn't stop...
Don't be afraid, Will...she told him...Touching his cheek...
"'Cause I'm not..." she embraced him...
***
He was crying...
Will...Will...she murmured...Crying herself...as she stroked his hair...
"I never thought...After all this time...That anyone would ever hear me...That anything...So
beautiful could still come to me..." he suddenly gasped...through choking tears...
Go to story Alternate Earth, outside the Mears lair... Nemesis Buffy waited in the bushes near the front door of the ruined-looking old house in which, she hoped...Dear ole "Dad"
was hiding... Though her instincts were to waste no time and charge whatever he had waiting for her...She was aware that subtler methods
were called for in this instance...And therefore had agreed to her William's plan...But...Waiting was such a drag... And she was nervous for William...Warren always a trick or three up his sleeve...He'd even eluded the Council at times...And if
she was to survive...William must survive as well... But he wouldn't, couldn't fail her...Not her William...He'd die first, she knew... She counted on it... But, God...Wish he'd get on with it and summon her...She was not made for waiting... And was rather anxious to see Warren's face when she came waltzin' back in his door... *** Nemesis Buffy pondered...Surely something must be going wrong...It was taking too long for Will's summons by concealed
beeper... Still, if she smashed the door down and rushed in...Dear ole "Dad" might slip through their fingers...If he hadn't already...No,
William had been right...Subtle...Subtil... Bastard Warren...He deliber...Deliberally...Damn...He did this to me on purpose...His little everlasting joke on Buffy
Summers... As if her brain-dead "sisters" weren't enough...But then he'd never got over her exposing his little side traffic in sex clones to his
girl Katrina, especially his own little April, back in the before time... Kat's image of noble young Dr. Mears, benefactor of Humanity via his cloning research, had taken quite a fall that day...A
pleasant memory still, his humiliated face... Not perhaps as good as his terrified face...Or at least his clone's terrified face, if Will had been right about the Mears who'd been
running the main lab's daily operations then...When she'd trashed the place and killed every Hunter she could get her hands
on...The developing ones as well as the fully adult... That was quite a face he'd worn that day... Well, anyway...Being cautious...Was called for here...For William's sake as well as her own... But she had considered this...And she had a fall-back plan... She wasn't stupid after all...Just trouble with big words...Sometimes...Mearsy's little "dumb blonde" joke... All she had to do was make a little of the right kind of noise...And see who came to investigate... And with luck... "Hey!!!!!....Warren Mears!!!!!..." she screamed... Ok, maybe it wasn't all that cautious a plan... Rushing steps...Crap...Sounds wrong... Ah...The door opened slowly...Come to Mama... Another Katrina, in maid's outfit...Not quite what she'd hoped for...But... "Hi..." she sprang up...And jerking the clone into the bushes, snapped her neck in a second... Hmmn...Well...No surveillance camera that she could see...Or hear...And her hearing was pretty good at catching security
systems like that, thanks to Warren's genetic manipulations...Plus with her speed, a camera would have to work hard to catch
her... Though Warren might have allowed for that... Well, a risk had to be taken...And she wanted more company...One of her sisters in fact...If she could just get to see her alone a
moment...After all, her wig had been chosen by dear ole Willie to match her sisters' darker hair color... And she'd impersonated Hunters before... Just had to look dumb and docile and do everything the guy in charge said...Until the right moment... Hmmn...Someone else coming to the door...I hear the footsteps... I know those footsteps...Beautiful...And just one... Thank...you...sister...She rose up stealthily...Just as the Hunter reached the door... Warren should work on his security...Nemesis shook her head...But, guess he hadn't really had much time to prepare the place... Hope Will isn't dead...Or whatever...Yet...I need him...she thought as she undressed her dead "sister"... It was good it had worked out this way, actually...She'd have to deal with any Hunters Warren had kept round for his own use,
sooner or later...Now one less for poor Will to see her with...He hated to see her deal with her "sisters"...Especially the ones
entrusted to his care...Like those waiting at Mears Corporation...Sweet, really... But then, he always was a sweet man...Even sweeter than poor Willie... So nice to have him back with me...she beamed...Dragging the dead Hunter over to where the dead Katrina lay in the bushes... A vague fear crossed her mind...What if?...Nah, Warren wouldn't dare...William is fine...He'll be fine... After all, except for the problem with the rest of the guys, things had been working out kinda nice since her rebirth...At least
since she'd escaped the Corporation... She pulled the wig on...And slipping through the open doorway, checked herself in a hall mirror...Pasting a benign and placid
look on her face...Content to be spending her life in the guardianship of Humanity...and, for this particular brace of prototype
Hunters...protection of dear ole Warren... And God knew what else...Though she could imagine what dear ole "dad" did with his Hunters... She looked at the cell phone the Hunter had carried, punched the redial, and waited... "Buffy H-5?..." a voice asked...A Katrina, she recognized... "Hi...I'm at the front door...No problems...Coming back in..." she brightly spoke into the phone... "Password?..." Ummn...She looked down the hall to the door sealing off the rest of the place...Probably a stout one, despite its ordinary
look...And she could now hear the sounds of a number of people, including one of her "sisters" behind it... "Password...?" the Katrina repeated... "Obi-wan...?" she tried...Well, that was the old password... Fast moving steps behind the door...Shit, must be a silent alarm...Great...All this acting effort and I still hafta do the charge
thing...She tensed... Hey...I smell something...Crap... So Warren did have something up his sleeve...Gas...Well...No use standing around to see if it works... She raced down the hall, feeling a little wobbly at the end...Must to be pretty strong stuff to affect her...Sarin nerve gas at the
very least...And smashed into the door...Stumbling through... Hmmn...I was sure there were more back here...They must've run...she thought as a Katrina and a Hunter opened gunfire on
her... Ow!...A couple of bullets struck home in her legs...But her enhanced Slayer physiology allowed for instant tissue
regeneration...And the clones had clearly been instructed not to aim for vital areas... Not that she'd allow them a vital target... "Hi..." she shook the Hunter...Who struggled in her grip...The Katrina was already down... "Where's Warren...?" she asked, a friendly tone... The Hunters were, after all, a bit on the dim side...Sometimes a direct question...Oops...Something dropped from the Hunter's
belt...Hmmn...A grenade, pin still in... Dear ole Dad...He obviously still wanted her alive, if possible...But best not to take chances on kamikaze orders...And this one
didn't seem willing...Or perhaps, capable...of answering her question... Hmmn...She turned the now dead clones over...Nothing on them so far as security badges or instructions... Poor sister...she stared at the Hunter Buffy a second... Better off dead of course but still... "Sorry I won't have time to help you all...Sister...Maybe someday I'll be back..." she whispered to the dead clone, scooping the
grenade, and beginning to search the rooms beyond hurriedly... *** Alternate Earth, deep within the Mears lair... "Are the doors all sealed?..." an anxious Mears...Clone?...was asking the Hunter who'd accompanied the Katrina carrying
William...William now laid on a low bench with the Katrina sitting next to him... She passed on his question into her cell phone to the clones further back...Yeah, she nodded to him... "But the Nemesis is through the first door...The gas did not stop her..." "Didn't think it would..." he noted...A trifle proudly...His little Nemesis... William stirred and sat up, blinking... "Hey, Will..." the Hunter beamed, pleased... Sorry...she bit her lip at him...Then resumed watching the door to the long tunnel chamber they'd entered... "Hardly the way to engender trust, Mearsy..." Will looked up at Warren...? Yeah, same scent, clone...As he came over... "You lied to me about Nemesis, Walthrop..." the clone Mears replied... But, hey...I and my original figured you would...he smiled... "You'll be pleased to hear your girl is on her way...Already through the front door, dispatched several of my guards..." He grinned... "You're a lucky bastard, Walthrop...My Nemy doesn't give her heart to many..." Her body...Well, different story... "She needs me..." William replied... "I don't have any illusions about that..." "Oh..." clone Mears shook his head... "I don't believe that...But then I'm a romantic...And a sucker for a story of true love..." He looked over at the Hunter...Still carefully watching the door, evaluating best defense positions... "And this one is such a romantic tale...Right, Buffy?..." he called over to the Hunter, who looked back... "I'm sorry Warren..." the Hunter stared at him... "I'm not able to make the kind of emotional response I think you want..." Pity...clone Warren shrugged...The Hunter quickly eyed William... "Are you feeling better, Will?..." she asked... "Yes, Buffy...Thanks..." she smiled and returned to her observation... He looked at clone Mears... "So...Shall we dispense with the little games and get down to business?...Before Nemesis reaches us...And your throat..." *** Alternate Earth, deep within Mears' lair... A terrible thing...Not to be welcome in your own "father-creator"'s home...Nemesis Buffy thought as she cautiously searched
through rooms on in the multi-chambered lower levels far below the rather decrepit old house Warren Mears had taken as a
front for his refuge...From her as much as from the Watchers and their Hunter Buffies... No one in sight or hearing since the group she'd killed just off the hallway...And both her sight and hearing were rather
extraordinary, even given her Slayer nature. She was a bit nervous now...What if Warren had already found a way back into the Mears Corporation labs and fled Earth for
his alternate world?...Killed Will and left her to face Willow and the Council all alone... Would be just like the schmuck to pull something like that...She picked up the pace, smashing quickly through several secured
doors into a series of rooms. Nothing... She paused and tried to calm herself...Concentrating on extending her enhanced senses as Giles had used to instruct her in the
before time...Before he and the others had let her down so badly... Giles...she sighed...It would have been so nice to see him again...All she'd had was that brief moment in the lab three months
ago...Then he'd vamoosed without so much as a good-bye for his "daughter" and protege...Not even coming when she'd called
him in London after her escape...Ready to forgive and forget, maybe...If he'd help her destroy those awful things he and the
others had let Warren create. Well, ok...Maybe it woulda been hard to let him off scot-free...But if he'd helped her, she'd've remembered only the good times
when he was gone...And she'd've sent him off with a beautiful memory...But he'd sided with the rest...Against her... All of them had let her down...Betrayed her...And now wanted her dead...All but William... But hey, natch...She'd known William would stand by her, even if her acts might horrify his hard-rewon soul, poor sweet
thing...Their existences were intertwined...Her past self had loved and tried to save him back in 1880, her soul'd searched for
him for a century and won rebirth for his sake, as Buffy she'd spared him when he was in Spike's grip, murderously evil and
unable to control himself. So now...It was simply his turn...Even if she did feel her actions to date since her rebirth in Mears' lab were justifiable and
perfectly understandable... It's what good spouses do...Stand by each other in times of trouble. But, if he were gone...? She shook her head to drive the fear away...There were other Earths and other Williams if Warren was right...She'd find
another, if she had to...And another place, a better place...Where she could be the Buffy she had once been...Loved by her
friends...Safeguarding the world... She just had to get to Mears and make him take her there...Before the raging Willow caught up with her with all the strength
magic could give her... And with luck, after forcing her bastard of a creator to reverse whatever he'd done to her that had caused her friends here to
reject her...That had caused her to take such a different attitude towards what she once considered evil in general and the
sanctity of human life in particular than she remembered she'd once held... Not that she'd come to enjoy inflicting suffering...She hated to see her friends in pain...She simply found it easier now to accept
that view of existence centered around one's self and one's needs that those creatures she'd fought in the past had embraced...And
since that seemed to place her in the camp of Evil now with the gang, so be it... But maybe she'd simply become more practical...Following what she now saw as her senseless leap into Death to stop Glory's
portal from destroying the world...And the suffering she'd been put through...Jerked out of a Heaven or Limbo she now but
vaguely remembered...Coming to a kind of horrifying fractured consciousness (or at least an awareness, one could hardly call
the poor half-brained sisters...Conscious...) in the enslaved Hunters, then ripped out yet again to come to rest at last in her new
home... And that wasn't even getting into what she'd come to remember of her existence as Cicely Addams in 1880 both before and after
her death two years ago...Loving and losing William, learning of the betrayal and scheming that had caused her to send him to
his horrible Undeath...Dying in childbirth only months later after fruitless attempts to find and save him or destroy the thing he
had become. Go though all that and your attitude is bound to focus a bit more on looking out for number one...and perhaps, number one's
significant other. Though of course...There were things about her new self that did vaguely disturb her...In addition to Mears' little practical jokes
with her occasional inability to vocally handle big words and other little "California blonde" quirks...In part, regarding
killing...Humans...Especially males...Somehow her enhanced sexuality seemed bound up with it...In a way she didn't think had
been quite true of her old self...Though one had to confess, even then she'd always gotten a strange charge, rather more like
Faith's than she'd then cared to admit, out of her kills, that was probably part sexual in nature. And then the other thing...The thing that had led to the rage that made her destroy the lab and what Hunters she could and flee
before she'd planned to...If it hadn't been for that...Lack...She might have been able to control herself a little longer and stick to
plan, maybe even have avoided the confrontation that ended in Tara's and Anya's deaths...Really an imbecile mistake on Mears'
part. Everyone needs to be able to cry... Without it, all she had was rage...At least until William had let her know he was still hers...Would stand by her...Loved her
still... Stupid, stupid "father-creator"... Humanity saving "Biogenius"...What the hell had he been thinking...? Not to let her cry... No doubt the moron had screwed a few things up in her neurogenetics...Maybe deliberately... Well, minor things...Didn't really affect her essential Buffiness...And she'd have Warren do something about it, if he could, once
she'd forced him to take her and Will to the other place...If he couldn't...She'd simply work round it once she was good ole Buffy
again, back on the side of Light and with her friends...Maybe alternate Willow could help her once they got to know each other
well enough... Speaking of Willow...She checked the charms on her necklace and bracelets...All still cool to the touch...Willow wasn't in the
vicinity yet...Probably still in London, maybe planning with Giles if he'd managed to calm her down...Poor kid...She could
understand her rage of course... If roles had been reversed and Will had been killed by Willow instead of Tara by herself...Well, maybe she'd have a little less
rage and a leetle more deliberation in her revenge, but she'd still seek an even more terrible vengeance than she was already bent
on...Unlike poor sweet Xander, she warmed at thinking of him...Xander...Who couldn't bring himself to hate her, whom she
knew wanted to take her alive, help her if he could even now...She rather hoped she wouldn't meet up with him. Hey...There's a good ole selfless Buffy attitude...she noted...See, she told herself... Nice as it might have been to finally show him that she'd had sexual feelings for him, even in the before time...And She'd've sent
him to his Anya with her complete forgiveness...Well... Several of the charms faintly jingled as she felt them. Thank God for the anti-magics charms Warren had carefully been amassing, several of which he'd given to her just before her
escape...Believing that she was serious about her offer to assist him in his own little flight to freedom...The rest of which she'd
taken as she'd smashed through the Mears Corp, leaving dear ole 'dad' to choke on her dust in his corporate prison and killing
every "sister" she'd encountered at whatever stage of development she'd found them. Without 'em, with all her tremendous, enhanced strength and speed, she'd have no chance against her wiccan friend or the more
magically-gifted members of the Council. A sound from deep within behind the far door...She raced over, throwing it open...And listened...Yeah...Someone back down
that way... It had to be Warren, still on this Earth...And Will had to be with him, alive and waiting for her to join him...It had to be... There had to be some limits to God's savage cruelty. *** *** Alternate Earth, Mears' lair... "Hey, Warren..." Nemesis Buffy nodded at the Mears clone with William in the room where she'd cornered them...Two Hunters
and several Katrinas around him, all heavily armed, tensed and awaited orders. He put up a brief hand... "Will..." she beamed at the sitting William, a Katrina and a Hunter on either side, who smiled at her but gave her a
careful...Watch it, girl...look. "I was getting so worried...You didn't check in..." she turned to Mears' clone with a glare... "You better not have hurt him, Warren...Especially if you not the Warren I need..." The other clones moved to battle posture...Nemesis tensed as well...The Mears clone gave them a quick command to stand
down a bit... "Lets not make this reunion a fight, Nemesis..." he smiled at her... "Will and I have just been doing a little business..." "Buffy...Call me Buffy..." she insisted... "I am Buffy..." "Buffy then..." he nodded, spreading his hands... "You two and I...Or my original, if you prefer...Have a common problem and a common goal...And each of us holds a piece of
the solution..." He sat down and waved her to a seat...Across from where William and his guards sat... So...? she looked at Mears from her seat.... "My original has the transfer coordinates and can set up and run the system in a couple of hours...William controls the Hunters
at my corporation...You can deal with anything else the Council and your friends throw at us..." "Ok..." she nodded...And smiled a gentle smile at the clone... "Where is your original...?" "Safe until our negotiations are settled, Summers..." he smiled back at her... "He doesn't especially like torture, you know..." "And just in case you're thinking of it...I don't know where he is right now...Just that he's monitoring us and will let me know
what he decides..." "Let me sit by Will..." she insisted... Hmmn...Not right now...the clone shook his head... "Safer if William remains in our hands for the moment...And my prototype Hunters I should mention, don't have the Council's
imbedded directives...So they could hurt him...Even before you could kill them..." She eyed the two Hunters...Dumb clucks...Prototypes is right...Musta been practically from the first batch...At least the
dopey-looking one on the right. And yet...They could cry...All of 'em...She'd seen them cry...That day in the lab when she'd realized she couldn't...Not even for
Mom...She'd made them cry... "You could hurt our Will, girls...?" she asked... "Only to protect Dr. Mears, Buffy N-1..." one replied... "Preservation of the creator is necessary to protect Humanity..." "Hafta..." the one on the other side, nodded in agreement...She looked a bit wanly at Will... "Don't want to hurt Will...Unless
hafta..." Thanks, dear heart...Will patted the Hunter's hand... "One of your first tries, Warren...?" Nemesis Buffy looked at him briefly...And then coldly at the smarter of the two... "Call me Buffy, sis...No designation...I am Buffy..." the Hunter glanced at Warren who nodded. "Sorry, Buffy..." the Hunter replied... "But..." the other interrupted...A curiously puzzled look on her face... "You're bad...You're dangerous...You hurt people and us...You are Buffy, too?..." Out of the mouths of babes...William thought...But then, some of the early Hunters had shown surprising bursts of independent
thinking before Mears and the dear Council had gotten the "bugs" worked out... Much to his surprise...And the Mears clone's...Nemesis not only took the question in stride...She seemed, after a little initial
shock at a Hunter's direct question, to be pleased at her "sister's" initiative. "I'm not bad, sis...I just gotta protect myself...And William...People just gotta learn to let me be..." Sometimes you hafta do bad things to be free...And to punish the people who hurt you...she kindly explained. The Hunter stared...The other shook her head... "Bad is bad...You caused harm, Buffy...You hurt people...You must not be allowed to hurt anyone else..." Nemesis glared at her...Warren eyed them both...Ladies...he began... "Save the philosophical debate for later...We have business to settle..." "Tell her to turn off the self-righ...self-righty...(self-righteous, Buffy...William helped out...Thanks, she hastily beamed)...spiel,
Warren...I've heard it..." Nemesis frowned... "I won't hear it played back from one of your personal sluts..." And you might remember that I don't really need you, clone...she eyed him coldly...The left Hunter tensed, as did the right...But
the right showed some agitation... "Please stop using such harsh tones, Buffy..." the left Hunter sternly told her... "We will have to assume you mean to do
harm...And you're upsetting Buffy H-2..." "Please..." Buffy H-2 nodded...Looking anxiously at Will and her Hunter sister, then Mears... "Sorry..." Nemesis smiled at her... "Don't be scared...We're just talking...Will and I are going to help Warren and his original...I
won't hurt him, I promise..." The Hunter visibly calmed... "She reminds me of Dawn..." Nemesis grinned at Will... "Remember when she was little...The time Spike came to fight me and
she found us outside...And started crying cause you...he...threatened to rip my throat out...?...And then you...Sorry..." she looked
at his pensive face... "He...But it was you doing it, trying to reach us, I'm sure...Stopped and told her you were just kidding...It
was a game we played..." And then she smiled and asked if you were my new boyfriend...? "And I...Spike...Whatever I was then...Said no, just a friend...But I would be very lucky to have Buffy as my girl..." Will eyed
her gently. And then he left...Buffy H-2 suddenly spoke up...They stared at her... Yeah...Nemesis nodded at her...Then he left...Very good remembering, Buffy... "I guess that musta been a phony memory..." Nemesis sighed to Will... "For both of us...And Dawn...Still, it was nice...You
seemed so kind, so human...I almost liked you for a moment then..." "What else do you remember, Buffy...?" she turned back to the Hunter...Who looked at her... "We shouldn't try remembering...It's distracting...Wrong..." the other Hunter interrupted... "I'm not talking to you, sis..." Nemesis glared again at her...Then smiled a little coolly at Will... "Funny, huh...They all seem a little different...Kinda nice, really...Gives them a little something of their own...For example, this
one's really getting on my nerves..." "She can't help it, Buffy..." Will replied... "You know that..." Guys...? the Warren clone shook his head... We got things to settle and do...Now... Nemesis put a hand up...Sorry... "I'm not mad at her...Really...It's just..." she smiled at clone Warren... "I listen to her and I wish your real self were here right now..." Tell me...she settled back in her seat... "What's in this for you, clone...? I know it's silly to care what you think about all this, but I'm curious...You've got Warren's
nature, as many brains, and you're certainly braver than he ever was...You must know we may kill you before we're done,
especially if your original tries to cross us...As he probably will, if he goes true to form...Why go to so much risk for your
original, that jackass...?" Will smiled at her reprovingly...Buffy...Almost forgetting for a moment...Then a tear formed...Which he quickly wiped... "Best not to upset our fair ladies, Buffy..." he nodded at the left Hunter who had tensed again...As the right Hunter now did, a
bit more slowly...The Katrinas watching as well... The Mears clone seemed unfazed by her question, however, and again signaled the Hunters and the other guards to stand down
a bit... "I do what's necessary to protect the Mears line, Buffy...My original is the essential irreplaceable element in our line...Protecting
him is protecting me..." And as to that...Can I tell him that we have a deal?...Or do we fight it out, now...? "Will...?" she eyed William... "Can we trust him?..." Certainly not...Will smiled back...But...Not much alternative... "I agree..." she grinned. "Ok, clone...Tell your daddy we have a deal...We'll arrange for him to get to the lab, he takes us to new Earth with him...He
might need our protection, anyhow..." "And you agree not to act against him on new Earth?..." the clone eyed her... "On your mother's soul?..." You...Bastard...she stood up...Then stopped as the Hunters rose and the Katrinas came over... "Sorry girls, no problem..." she smiled a bit and sat back down... "Know me pretty well...Don't you Warren...?" she coldly glared at him... "Ok...On my mother's soul...I won't hurt your original...Hell, I might need the sob for medical help or science advice when we
get there...Besides...I'll be Buffy again there..." And Buffy Summers doesn't kill defenseless human beings...Even evil ones...she smiled at William... I will...I will be Buffy again...And loved...she thought. *** From "Anne..." Anne and Spike do a Bronze date... The Bronze...7:56... "Hold up just a mo..." Spike put up a hand as he halted, just in sight of the table where Anne sat, glancing round...Angel and Les
halting as well...The three other vamps moving on... "This'll do fine..." he waved his two companions to a seat at the table they'd
stopped by...Well hidden from Anne's, yet with a reasonable view of her... "So tell me...Soul-boy...What's living with a dead Slayer like?..." he hissed...Turning in his chair to smile at Angel... "Darla was quite
jealous about your playmate...And Les here and the rest of our Anointed One's merry band have been keepin' a watch on you
two..." he turned back and looked at her... "Thought she was a blonde..." he paused...Staring... "I've told you, William...She's too tough for me to..." Angel began...Spike cutting him off with a sharp wave of the hand... I...he began, his voice suddenly shaky as he stared at the nervous-looking brunette, who looked at her watch, then round the room
again...Then finally...Straight in their direction...With an alert expression, as if despite their concealment in the shadows and, in
Spike's case, partially behind a pillar, she'd locked on to them...Angel stared at him...Spike?... "Where...?" Spike
whispered...Blinking suddenly...His hand going, involuntarily to his pocket... His three goons now coming up on Anne's table...Reasonably good-looking in human face, they smiled at her...She ignored them
and looked through the gaps between them in Spike's direction... "Hey pretty lady..." one called to her...His most winning smile... Her intense stare ignored him still...Though she waved a hand where she sat as if brushing off a fly... Spike now eyeing her with an equal intensity...Angel saw his hand lifting something from the right pocket of his duster...What
looked like a small black velvet bag...Which the hand felt gently, almost caressing... That bag...He'd seen it only once before...When...?...Yes...Dru had been trying to snatch it while Spike slept...He'd caught her and
the row'd been so loud, Darla had sent him in to silence the two idiots before they woke the hotel up... And every now and then...Dru'd continued to demand it...Or order it thrown away...Despite Spike's anger at its very mention by
her...And his steadfast refusal to let her or a vaguely curious Darla have a look... Something precious in that bag...That William had never let anyone see, not even Dru, though somehow...Dru'd sensed danger in
it... That bag which Spike now had opened with the hand holding it...From which he pulled...Something oval...Almost like... "Lady...We hear you're one tough Slayer..." the middle of Spike's three vamp thugs leered...But a slight annoyed tone in his
voice...She wasn't showing them the slightest interest, just staring through them as if they didn't exist... "Go away, I'm busy..." she said in a flat tone, not taunting or even annoyed... Spike rose, the miniature which Angel could see clearly now clasped in his hand...The portrait of a young woman, brunette...In
nineteenth century dress... The look on his face anything but a look of triumph or even anticipation of a good night's fight...It was almost a look of...Angel
stared as Spike moved towards Anne's table, still trying to conceal himself, while looking at the miniature, then towards
Anne...Angel rose as well and followed...Les just behind him... Anne now rose...She'd seen him, Angel realized... "Get out of my way..." she quietly told the three... Spike halted again, pulling back to the nearby wall...He looked at Angel now beside him, a strange expression on his face...The
miniature in the hand by his side... "She..." he paused... "She reminds me..." he caught himself...But to Angel's surprise showed him
the miniature with a questioning look... "Does she...Look?...A little I mean..." "Friend of yours...?" Angel eyed the portrait...Which Spike hastily returned now to his pocket, clearly trying to take himself in
hand... "Forget it, nothing..." he harshly whispered... "We wanna see what you..." the vamp on the left of the three began...As Anne eyed him coldly... The three vamps went dust to a move so fast that Angel watching couldn't quite believe they'd ever been there...She whirled round
as she heard the sound of clapping...William?... She stared at him...He grinned as he stepped from the wall, Angel waiting behind with Les, who now waved in two more vamps
who quickly moved in beside Spike..."Nice bit of workmanship, Slayer...Glad to see that Death hasn't taken that ole Slayer edge
off..." I'd hate to let it get round I took my third Slayer with her edge off... "William..." she breathed...Blinking at him... "...The Bloody, yes ma'am...At your service...Though sadly only for this evening...And actually that's just a courtesy thing, in case
you Americans don't get it instinctively...I am going to destroy you, miss..." You and that awful coat...he frowned at the coat... "I'd heard Miss Summers was a rather tasty morsel who dressed to
kill...Literally...Miss...uh...?" he politely waited... Miss...Despite my coat, every bit as hot as I look, babe...she grinned... "Anne Summers...Rather unique vampire Slayer" she
smiled... "Formerly Buffy Summers, human but in her own way likewise unique vampire Slayer...Hiya..." Watching his face carefully...As she
began moving slowly but steadily to his left...Clearly looking to slip round him and in-between him and the vamp 'support force'
behind him... "Thanks for showin' on time...I appreciate that in my gentlemen callers..." Though...She pouted at the two vamps on
his sides... "I'd hoped for a more intimate meeting..." Later...Maybe...he smiled back... "Sorry if you were countin' on adding me to your Slayer scoreboard..." she gave an winsome look...While moving a bit to his side...
"Afraid ole Nastie beat ya to it..." "So I've heard..." he slid carefully sideways to counter her moves... "But I suspect..." she halted and grinned... "Whether or not lil' Colin sent you, you weren't that displeased to know that I chose
rebellion over dutiful 'daughterhood'...and sent the bastard back to Hell forever..." "I'm not one to shed tears over self-appointed 'Masters'..." he nodded... "We'll get on well then..Maybe...." she smiled benignly... Maybe he nodded... "Though I like a little style in my girls and Death appears not to have become milady's fashion sense...And?..." he eyed her hair, she
instinctively patting the wig to check while frowning at his last... "Funny...I was told you were a blonde...Slayer..." "The Slayer was a blonde...I'm her demon...I like change...So kill me..." she shrugged...In a bit, pet, patience...he shrugged back... "How bout you, Spike?..." she eyed him...Up...And down... "You amenable to...Change...?" "Or does dear mummy mean all the world to you and you just can't let her Psychoness down?..." Nasty, Miss Anne...he raised a forefinger at her... "First lesson..." he made a vicious, quick swipe at her, tossing her back into the
wall across from them... "We never insult my Dru..." Uhnnn...She rose, swinging round to face him... "Careful...You'll get us bounced...More important, you'll muss me...And you don't wanna be round me if you muss me..." Anne
sighed, eyeing him as she reached a hand up...Phew, wig intact and holding...He smiled at her wig securing gesture, then was
startled to find himself flying towards the ceiling...While his remaining two vamp aides went dust with brief strangled cries... Angel eyed the human bouncer now moving up...Who'd stopped to stare at the dust cloud... "I'd leave them be and call the cops,
friend..." he suggested kindly...The bouncer nodded... "Sir..." she grinned at Spike as his gravity defiance ended and he hit the floor hard... "You should have made your introduction a bit
more formally..." And a Brit ought to know better than to manhandle a lady before her consent is given... He blinked at her...Hadn't even seen her move...He looked where his late, lamented aides were floating to earth or drifting with the
air flow...Then pulled himself together and rose as she watched him...Damn, she is good...he repressed a grin... "Girl...I am your personal Death, personified in rather hot and nifty unliving flesh..." "Sweetie..." she smiled gently... "You're late, I be rotting in my grave a week now...And as that's the case..." Why not let my personal...'Death'...Take a holiday...For tonight...? a tight, seductive grin... "Tempting..." he nodded, pressing in close... "But, sad to say for you...I'm a family man..." "You always were, William..." she nodded back...He looked at her a long moment...As they slowly and warily stepped round each
other... "You study up on me in your last days or something?...Only natural, given my rep...Wait a mo..." Your human name was...Buffy? "Yeah...I know...I'm tryin' to Unlive it down..." she sighed... "And you're...Anne, now?..." "In the smoldering flesh...Well..." she eyed her long, rather conservative, dress coat... "Smoldering within, ya gotta imagine it...As a
former poet I'm sure you..." "Anne...Buffy...Cicely?...You?..." They continued to step round, almost in dance pattern, he noted to himself, unable to resist a
genuine smile at the thought... "That's my net moniker, yeah, and hey thanks for answering my email personally...It was a real thrill..." she cooed... "How'd you know I was a poet?...The ruddy Council been following my tale of tragic woe and utterly delightful mass murder that
closely?..." "Absolutely, Mr. Walthrop...You oughta know better than anyone that you rate on the list of Watchers' Council headaches..." she
smiled...He as well, another genuine one, in spite of himself... "Nice to have devoted fans willing to paw through the archives to reconstruct my past..." "Hey, after Mr. Nast, you were gonna be my...Well, dead girl's...Focus..." she eyed him with a solemn look... Really?...his almost boyish beam brought a quick return smile, an unmistakably genuine one, which startled him almost as much as
the tears he saw in her eyes... "Your Council oughta get its priorities straight...I'm no threat to human civilization...I like Humanity...In general, and raw with a nice
bottle of suds..." "A menace like Spike...Please, the Council had you down as my next Big Bad...But hey, I'm takin' a more independent route
now..." You alright?...he asked at the tears...His sudden concern bizarrely sincere... "Fine, fine..." she blinked the tears back, still holding a defensive stance as they moved round each other... "Had a bad human
memory going...You remind me of an ole boyfriend..." He paused...Staring at her...A startled look which he desperately tried to wipe away... "Lucky fellow...Permanently dead I hope?..." "Dead...But not forgotten..." "Best to let all that go, girl...I can tell you from experience..." "Have you?..." she eyed him... "Let it all go...?" Everything I could shake off from the past...he nodded... "But I didn't come to give you counseling regarding your new Unlife..." "I thought you came to negotiate for the Annoying One..." she carefully matched his slow pace as they circled round each other...
"Disappointing to find it was just another setup...I had hopes for you William..." "Diplomacy bores me...I get impatient, like to settle matters quickly...Though I wasn't expecting we'd take you down just yet...And
something tells me you were expecting a little rumpus...You were, weren't you, miss?...Hell, if you've studied me..." Sure...she nodded... "Say..." she grinned... "If we're gonna keep this up..." she indicating their track across the floor... "We may as
well dance for real and keep the mortals quiet...Whatdaya say?..." ...Why not?...he shrugged... "Prefer it if you'd lose the coat, though..." "Not just yet..." she replied...To his surprise holding out her arms...He took her hand
tentatively... "Don't think they play slow dances in this place, pet..." "First lesson, allowing that the other thing was just my response to yours?...I dance to my own beat, William..." she swung him
round in a slow glide...He released her suddenly...Pulling away... "What?..." she stared... "Surely you can give the condemned girl a last dance?..." "I..." he stammered...The memories crowding in for a second...There was something just too...Familiar... "Lets finish this later, Slayerette...I only wanted to see you in action, find out if you were worth my time...Have a pisser of a good
time here tonight cause the next we meet I will..." "Don't go...Not so soon...Please..." the sincerity in her voice stunned him...What's wrong with you, lady?...he frowned at her... "I see...You're laughing at me...Fair enough, acts speak louder...And I will act...Soon..." "Fine, fine...But finish the dance, William...You always finished the dance, even when you couldn't bear the partner...I liked that
about you..." The Council keeps real good records...she hastily told his puzzled face... "Later...Before I dust you..." he stepped back... "You could read me some of your poetry?..." she quickly thought up the one guaranteed to hold him... "You must have some new
stuff since I last...Since the Council last...Collected your work..." "The Watchers' Council?...Collected my work?..." the boyish look returned...Well...He got hold of himself... "You wouldn't like my stuff, girl..." he eyed her coolly...Oh, no?...She grinned... "My soul is wrapped in harsh repose, midnight descends in raven-colored clothes, but soft...behold! A sunlight beam cutting a swath of glimmering gleam. My heart expands, 'tis grown a bulge in it, inspired by your beauty..." She paused... Effulgent...he finished, staring at her...As Les and Angel exchanged looks... "Do they know each other?..." Les hissed... "Nice to have your early work appreciated, isn't it?..." Anne smiled... *** *** The Bronze, 8:20 pm... The little party at Anne's end of the club had not gone completely unnoticed by the group near the front entrance...Xander, Willow,
Tara, the false "Joyce", Mrs. Post, and Wesley Wyndham-Price...the false "Xander" and "Willow" still out on the dance
floor...Apparently having a rather annoyingly...At least to their true counterparts...Good time... Xander looked over to the dark rear of the club where a slight ruckus had attracted one of the club bouncer's attentions...That
Angel over there by the wall?...Ummn...He blinked as what had vaguely appeared to be two large guys disappeared in puffs of dust
and pulled gently at Willow's sleeve...Wil?...Ummn... She turned to him...Huh?... "Lets hit the floor a mo?..." Us?...Willow stared at him... Well, we have been getting extra close these past few...she couldn't help a beam...Hmmn...Xander had his new
'serious-as-in-Buffy's-dead, etc, etc' face on... "I don't think that's wise, Mr. Harris..." Wesley cut in, a bit solemnly... "Your counterparts might be noticed if you start dancing as
well..." Here?...At the Bronze, where most people don't even notice a major vamp feast?...Or two big vamps suddenly dusting?...Xander
did not say...Frowning at bit at the Brit, a rather poor younger imitation of Giles...Though not unhappy that his speaking up had
distracted Mrs. Post and "Joyce" from watching the floor...Tara eyeing him as well... "We'll be careful..." Willow replied, giving Wesley her sternest look...We know what we're doin' pal... "Come on, Xander..." she
rose... "So..." she eyed him as they reached the floor...That way...he hissed, leading her away from the direction of Anne and her callers... "I just spotted Angel...And Anne...At least I think saw her dust a couple vamps..." "What?...Shouldn't we tell..." Willow began... "I dunno..." he hesitated, stepping round, still moving away from Anne's area...Noting
the others at table watching him and Willow...Excepting Tara, who was looking in the opposite direction...And then back at him,
catching his eye... I dunno what we should do...he repeated...Willow staring at him... "Xander...We've got to destroy her...These..." she searched for a word... " 'people'...May be our only chance..." I know, I know...he sighed, moving round... "But to just hand her over to them...And we promised her a chance to find him,
Willow..." "She's a murderer, Xander...We don't owe her a thing..." He looked over her head...And caught distant sight of the young-looking, slight blonde man in long duster...Now talking to... Anne...In the wig Willow had bought her just that afternoon...Not bad, actually...Though that long coat?... She was reaching her arms out, the blonde man reluctantly taking them in his... William the Bloody...He had no doubts about it... William the Bloody...Dancing...With Anne the insane demonic vampire-Vampire Slayer... And slow dancing at that...No, he'd just pulled back...Funny, he didn't look like...Well, yeah, with that hair and coat he did look
like a psycho killer...But just now, pulling from her...He looked like a man who'd just seen... The ghost of his dead wife...? Willow now moved, noting his stare and saw for herself...The others at the table starting to turn... Oh...!!...Tara cried out as she knocked over her drink which moved rapidly towards Mrs. Post...Who, startled, moved, distracting
the others... Willow and Xander likewise turning at the sound...Then back to see that Anne and William had vanished... As had Angel, Xander
noted... And, as neither they nor the group at table noticed, as had their doubles on the floor... *** "Are you that anxious to return to Hell, girl?..." Spike eyed Anne as she smiled at him in the alleyway where they'd just emerged
from the Bronze's rear exit...Too crowded for me in there she'd noted... "I've given you an extra day or two to get your things in
order and you seem determined to reject my little act of courtesy..." "Just didn't want this evening to end so soon, Mr. Walthrop..." she grinned... "Livin' with ole Angel there..." she nodded at Angel
who'd likewise with Lester followed them out... "Is just too unbearably dull, ya know?..." I can imagine...he nodded...Still...Lets call it a night, girl... "Not even a poem...For your soon-to-be victim?..." she asked, batting eyes... "Your Council learned my name...?" he stared at her... Yeah...she nodded hastily... "Course they're hardly 'my' Council now...Though we have an uneasy alliance for the moment..." Yeah?... "Say that does intrigue me?...Why?..." he looked at her...She looking at Angel for a second then back to him... Hmmn?...she stared... "Why are you still workin' for them?...Doin' you lil' Slayer thing?...You're free now, right?..." Spike looked
her up and down, waiting... "Part of our great circle of Unlife and all that?..." Angel moved off quietly...Things to do, places to see...he noted to Les...Let me know what happens...he headed off...Les nodding
rather pleasantly... Kinda wish I could be takin' off myself...he sighed to himself...But evil Duty calls... "I'm used to it, I guess...And I still kinda like my little friends and all...Maybe the fact is I just don't like competition from other
demons..." she shrugged, grinning again... "Hey, you're not exactly plotting world conquest for lil' Colin, yourself I see..." Where'd poof soul-boy go off to?...he stared at Les...Who shrugged...He had things to do, he said... "Eh, he's a mite chicken...Too attached to that soul and the living now..." Anne sneered... "He's not up for fights these days..." Pity...He was quite a lad in his day...Spike noted...A tad wistful... "We had some decent sport in our salad days..." "I'll bet..." she nodded...A brief look away... "Look, girl...Kinky as it might be to have an ex-Slayer vamp hangin' round me...Especially one as capable as you...It's a bit much
even for my taste to have my victim knowin' yet wantin' to party with me first...Lets keep the lines drawn clearly...You wanna play
Slayer, fine...I kill Slayers...Fine..." "I could take a night off..." she smiled...He not able to resist a smile back...Then a slight blink... Cicely?...He shrugged it off...Coincidence, nothing more... "Les...We'd best go find out where soul-boy has run off to..." he turned back to Anne... "Less he's gone to fetch your back-up?..." "Me?..." she grinned... "I work alone...My counterpart had a few idiot humans and your ole pal there as pets, mostly gettin' in her
way...But I..." You live with Angelus, girl...Spike eyed her sternly... "He's been assigned...By my former Watcher...To stick by me...I get a kick out of tormenting him...And he lets me stay for
free...Not even sex, if you can believe it..." she shook her head... "Not the Angelus I knew..." Spike sighed...But smiled yet again in spite of himself... "We have to go, miss...I promise you we will meet again..." he nodded... If you have to...she gave a pout... "I gotta do my rounds soon anyway...But you know where I'll be tonight...And where I live..." Don't be a stranger, William...she smiled at him... "Just make sure you let me know it's you before you do the ambush thing, ok?...I
couldn't bear it if I accidently let you have it..." "Very funny, Slayer..." he frowned... "Just let me know where you want your ashes scattered..." "My old house..." she caught him by surprise as he started to turn away... "You know...Next to Henry's...The large brownstone...I think it's a law firm now..." He stared at her... "In London, Will...You remember..." she nodded... And vanished before he could reply...But he felt the faint kiss on his cheek long
after... "She's fast..." Lester noted... In more ways than one...He politely did not say... ***
***
The Time Machine...
Buffy breaks a dinner date...
Willow knocked and entered the crypt...Spike was sitting on his slab...
A look of disappointment on his face...
"Oh..." he turned away, back to the telly...
"It's you, Red..."
Well...Pull up a chair and set yourself...
Got the magics jitters, eh?...Well, ole Spikey got just the cure...
He held up a bottle of whiskey...
William the Bloody turns on the charm for his houseguest...
"Ummn...No thanks..." Willow looked at him...
So...He returned to watching the telly...
What's up?...
Hmmn...Making me work for this, Willow noted...
Definitely something is up here...
"Spike...Buffy asked me to come and..."
Oh...Buffy "asked" you, eh...he grinned...
She didn't...By any chance...Plead, beg, and whimper?...He looked at her a mo, then back to the
telly...
"She said you two had a fight..."
That's right...Spike nodded...And did she say what it was about?...
I'm getting the strangest feeling about this...Willow thought...
Somehow I feel like I've done this...For Xander...Before...
"Ummn...She wasn't specific...Just that you had a fight and she'd like you to know..."
Spike blinked...
"She's apologized?..." A radiant, almost boyish, expression of joy came over his face...
Willow couldn't look at that face and go on...
She wussed...
Absolutely...she told him...Buffy realizes it was her fault...Because of her upset condition what
with recent events and all...She knows she should try to be more considerate of your feelings...
And she apologizes...Sincerely...
What the hell...Once you've crossed a line you might as well go all the way...Willow thought...
She couldn't help...Looking at the happy Spike...Also wishing...She'd done more to help him this
past year...
But heck, it was a busy year...He never asked for help in regaining Humanity or gaining
Redemption...And look at the problems my messing with magics big time has caused...
Still...Wish I'd tried something...
Maybe I could do some research...Talk to Giles...
No magics of course...
And now the freaky part...
"Spike...Ummn...Buffy was wondering...If you forgive her, of course..."
Spike stared at Willow...
"Would you like to come over for dinner...Say tomorrow night?..."
After sunset of course...
***So...Buffy looked at the returned Willow out of the corner of her eye...
"What'd he say?..."
A hair eager...Willow noted...
Say?...
Spike?...
"Will?...What did he say?...Is he willing to stop acting childishly?..."
He knows I'm...Er, we're...All he's got...Friendwise...
Willow looked at Buffy's eager face...
No doubt about it...I have done this for Xander and Anya before...Willow thought...
"Absolutely..." she smiled at Buffy...
He knows he was acting like a fool and hopes you'll forgive him...And is very grateful for the
dinner invite...
Well...Buffy smiled...Great...
Thanks, Will...she patted her friend's arm...
Oh...she looked at Willow...
"You didn't use anything...To persuade him?..." Buffy stared at her friend...
Buffy?!...Willow was shocked...Shocked...
But hey, she really hadn't used magics to persuade William to come to terms...
Just good ole white lies...
***
Willow was hopeful...A half-hour into Patrol, only one staked vamp and no Spike...
And Buf seems ready to call it a night early she noted, thankfully...
Something stumbled over garbage cans at the end of the dark alley they were about to check out...
Buffy had Mr. Pointy at the ready...
"Ladies..." Spike called pleasantly from the cans as he picked himself up...
Obviously he'd been running to catch up, trying to swing round in front of them...
Buffy frowned...But Willow caught the faint smile that immediately disappeared from her
friend's face.
Oh...No...
"Yes, Spike?..." Buffy called to him...
Looking for something to decorate your crypt?...
"Actually, Slayer..." he came strolling up... "I wanted to give you this..."
Buffy looked at the box...Blinking...
Oh...God...He's not bringing me presents now, is he?...
In front of Willow?...
Oh...It's not some of my underwear?...Please God, no...I know I left something behind the other
night...she thought...
Willow blinked at the box...Holy...
He's bringing her presents now?...
"You can open it you know...It's not a beating heart from my latest victim or something like
that..." he grinned at her and Willow...
***
"A Short and Concise Account of the battles of Buffy Summers...Greatest Slayer of All Time..."
Buffy read from the cover of the manuscript Spike had given her...
Willow looked...
"By William...Soames Walthrop..."
Buffy blinked...Willow blinked...
Spike looked at them...
He shrugged...
"Well...Hell, Slayer...I knew you'd never get around to chronicling your adventures..."
And I do occasionally have a little time on my hands...
Willow read a few pages...And looked at Spike...
"How did you?...Spike, you weren't here when a lot of this stuff happened..."
"It is accurate, isn't it?..." he asked...Looking genuinely concerned...
Giles told me a few things when I told him I wanted to write a little memorial after...er...Last
summer...And the rest I got from some of the survivors...
Even old Angel gave me some info when I called him...
"You called Angel about this?..." Willow looked at him...
William...Soames...Walthrop...Buffy was still thinking...William Soames Walthrop...
Oh God...I never even...
"So...Mr. Walthrop, I presume..." Willow grinned at Spike...Who gave a slight bow...
At last we're properly introduced, she smiled...And looked at Buffy...
William Soames Walthrop...Buffy thought...
Buf...? Willow looked at her...Say something...she thought...
"Well...William...It's very nice...And accurate, so far as I can tell..." Willow told him...
It's great, isn't Buf...She nudged a little...
Ummn...Yeah...Great...Ummn...
"Thanks..." Buffy looked at him...
"There's a dedication...Page three..." he noted...
Willow looked...
"To Buffy Anne Summers...My greatest foe and dear friend...William..."
"And to Joyce Summers...Apart from my mother, the sweetest human being I have everknown..."
Oh...Gee...Willow thought...His mother...Oh...
Buffy was in rapid blink mode...
"Ummn...It's very nice...William...Thank you..."
So...He looked at them...
"Patrol going well...All quiet on the Sunnydale front?..."
Hmmn-hmmn...Buffy nodded...Holding the manuscript...
Just fine...Ummn...She looked at him...
"It's really nice, William...Really...I'm just a wee floored, you know..."
Well...Nothing really...he smiled...Kept me busy...
Of course it's not quite finished but...
"Greatest?...Of All Time?..." she smiled at him...
Never heard tell of a greater...he noted...
Why do I have this feeling I should leave now?...Willow thought...Watching them look at each
other...
William?...she thought...Did she just call him William?...
"Besides..." Spike went on...Walking along with them... "After that gracious invitation, I had to
do something to express my thanks...Even though it's not finished..."
And hopefully never will be...he added...At least in terms of a final battle...
Oh...Buffy blinked...
And you were so nice about apologizing...Spike continued...About the fight we had...He looked
at Willow...Buffy freezing a bit...A slight glare coming on...
About my pestering you and all...he hastily added...
Oh...Buffy's glare disappeared...A unmistakable beam of gratitude in her eyes...
Which Willow caught...Oh, no!...She thought...
She didn't...She couldn't have...Buffy?...You idiot?!...
She did...Willow realized...And also realized...
Oops...The apology thing...
Busted...
Wait...Buffy thought...My apologizing?...I apologized to him?...
The beam was extinguished...
Uh-oh...Willow caught that as well...
"Willow?!!"...Buffy turned to her...
Willow put her most sheepish and blank expression on...
"Did you tell Spike I was apologizing for last night?!..."
Spike looked at Willow as well...
Red...?
Ummn...
Somehow this always worked out so well with Xander and Anya...Willow thought...
***
"You told me..." Spike told Willow quietly... "That Buffy apologized for last night...And that she
was...Sorry...For hurting my feelings..."
What?!!...Buffy glared at Willow...
Whoa...Willow thought...She's found a whole new glare intensity...
"So..." Spike looked at Buffy... "You didn't apologize...And you're not sorry..."
"You threw me out!..." Buffy choked...Gasping as she looked at Willow...
Who maintained an utterly clueless stare...
Nothing...She thought...I heard...Nothing...
***
"Hey..." Dawn came out of her room...
How did...
And caught the glare on Buffy's face...A whole new level of glare...
Must be the maturity her death and resurrection has brought her, Dawn noted...
"What are you doing up?!..." Buffy asked her...
It's only 10:05...Dawn noted...You said...
Go to bed!!...
Something in her sister's face persuaded Dawn to go...Quickly and quietly...
***
A few pebbles struck Buffy's window...She looked a moment...
No...I am not going to the window...
More pebbles...
Of course...she noted...He did come to me...
A rock smashed the window...
She ran downstairs to the front door...
"Dammit, Spike!!...What the hell do you think you're doing?!!!..." she screamed at him as he
stood on the lawn...
Dawn watched from her window...Spike catching sight, motioned to Buffy...
Nibblet...he mouthed...
"Come on in..." she grumbled...
***
It wasn't my fault...Willow noted to a sympathetic Xander...
She having come over bearing...Cookies...
A belated extra engagement gift...she lamely told him and Anya...
"They have no right to be mad at me...I didn't want to be their note-bearer..."
Oh...Anya looked at her...So they're at the note-passing stage now?...
That's so swe...Xander glared at her...So incautious and dangerous on Buffy's part...she
finished...
"You know, Willow..." Anya told her pleasantly... "You're very lucky...In my old human days, a
note-bearer who failed in his...or her...mission was usually buried alive..."
"Xander...I think...Things have reached a dangerous point between them...And I don't mean the
usual...They go out and try to kill each other..point.." Willow told him...
I know, I know...Xander muttered...
I think...I actually think...They've...
"Done it?..." Anya filled in helpfully...
I know, I know...Xander looked at Willow...
You...Know?...
"She was at Spike's the other day...When she was invisible..."
What?!!...Why didn't you?...
I didn't realize it until after I left...he noted...
Spike was acting strange...And something was in bed with him...
Bed?...With him?...Willow looked at him...
Chewing on his ear while I talked to him...Xander shook his head...
I probably knew right away...The shock must've blocked my mind...he noted...
"Course after I realized...I hoped it was just that her brain had melted a little from that invisibility
ray..."
What should we do?...Willow asked him...
"What can we do?..." Xander frowned...
But...A killer...well, hopefully former killer...demon and a human...How could that possibly...?
Xander and Anya looked at her...Oddly, the exact same expression on each face...
My...They are growing into each other...Willow noted...
"I suppose...If Spike had become human again...It would be completely different..."
Willow hastily added...
Absolutely...Xander and Anya noted...
***
"Look...Buffy...We have to sort this out..." Spike told her...As he stood in the Summers'
kitchen...
Things can't just go on like this...We care for each other...You can't deny...
"I...Care for you?...You?!...You're a demon, a monster!!..." she raged...
And I did not apologize...she noted firmly...
"All right then...Why did you come to..." he stopped and lowered his voice...Mustn't forget the
Nibs...
Why did you come to my place yesterday?...he whispered...
"Insanity...My molecules were breaking down...My brain was probably half-melted..." she
noted...
You came to me...You wanted to be with me...He noted...
You want to be with me...
"I felt sorry for you..." she looked at him...
You're damned...Forever...And you did help me last year...And you were very good about taking
care of Dawn...
So...I tried to be nice...When my inhibitions were down...
Obviously...Big mistake...she concluded...
"You did invite me to dinner...Willow didn't make that up..." he noted...
I wanted to be nice...Encourage your better side...
Not that you have one, of course...
"I love you, Buffy...That has to mean something..." he pointed out...
You want me...Dead...And transformed...That's all it means...
"That's all it will ever mean..." she looked at the kitchen wall...Social worker's
appointmentprominently posted...
"I'm sorry, Spike...But you're not human...And no amount of pledging your undying undead
devotion will make you human..."
You've killed...What?...365 days a year times...Say 100 years...At at least one kill per day...
"Anya's record must stretch over 10 times as long...You people don't seem to have much trouble
with her..." he pointed out...
Anya is human...Anyanka the demon is gone...Buffy replied firmly...
Don't see her shedding many tears of remorse over the dead...he continued...
"Enough..." Buffy stopped him...
Besides...he went on over her protests...If I were regaining Humanity...If my demon were under
control, even...Gone...How could you hold me...human Will, that is...Responsible?...
"Of course I suppose you...The Greatest Slayer of All Time...Would never allow your demon to
take control and conduct mass slaughters...Not with your noble self-control..."
But considering you've let Angel off...
"Angel has a soul..." she began...
Angel is Angelis...One hundred and eighty degree turn in motivations...That's all...he noted...
Now he wants to save the world and all the little humans in it...Instead of killing them and
sending the world to Hell...
"He wants Redemption..." she started again...
Noble of him...Spike noted...But why?...What has his human soul done that it needs to be
redeemed?...It was Angelis who was the mad killer after all...Wasn't it?...
Unless...Perhaps...Old Liam took more pleasure in his part in Angelis than Angel would like to
admit?...Or, maybe...
Saving the world appeals more to his ego than being with the woman he... "Loves"...
"He's been ready to die for me..." Buffy interrupted...
"And I'm ready to live for you...And with you..." Spike told her...
Now...When you need me...Not in some far-off hoped for future...Not the afterlife...
After all...Where the hell was he when you faced Glory?...And when you came back...Did he stay
in Sunnydale to look after the resurrected "love of his existence"?...
Did he even ask you if things were ok at home when you went to see him?...
"No..." she sobbed suddenly... "He...He..."
He and Darla had a child together...she blurted...
It was Spike's turn to blink...Rapidly...
Grandad...And Grandma...?
"Darla...She's the love of his existence...Her soul, anyway...Though he won't admit it even to
himself..."
I was just a...Substitute...A blonde substitute...she sobbed...
***
***
Spike was at a loss for words...For once...
Grandad and Grandma...Parents?...Good God...
And Grandma staked herself for love of her kid?...
Well...Underneath the sarcasm, sadism, and brutal killings, he'd always thought there was
something real there...he noted...
Unfortunately, aloud...
Buffy went to her new glare level...
"You...Soulless!....Get out of my house!!...Get out of my life!!!...Don't ever come back!!!..."
She shoved him out of the kitchen, across the living room to the front door...
"Out!!!!" she screamed at him...
Ever?...he smiled at her...
I have all eternity you know...he noted...
"If you ever come back...You'd better be human with a soul...Cause I am gonna shove a stake
through anything else..."
And I might not be too particular about checking out your humanity...
She slammed the door...
"This mean dinner's off?..." he asked through the door...
Go to story
***
Romance Palace...
Cicely and Will go boating...1880 style.
"Haven't you ever been in a boat, Mr. Walthrop?..." Cicely asked...
Smiling at the little man...As he struggled with the oars...
A day out in the Lake District, courtesy dear Henry and his generous offer of his little cottage and boat...
Ummn...Walthrop shrugged...Trying to seem casual about it...Casual as one could with one oar
floating off into the center of the lake while the other seemed likely to pull him in...
Why the hell she'd asked him to come out here...He'd never know...She must enjoy the spectacle of
him constantly being humiliated, trying to cope with a world he'd never experienced outside of his
beloved books...
Well, there goes the other oar...
And he'd given up critical exams time for this...Not to mention precious dabs of his funds in
traveling here...Money much better spent on his books or better still sent to his sister and brother,
Amelia and Philip...
Still, she'd promised to "fire his poetical imagination" with new sights...Actually she'd teased that
she would do what she could to fire anything that might possibly be there...
Dim coals, judging by what she'd read of his work...
Well, to be fair, a remark she instantly withdrawn and profusely apologized for after seeing his
crestfallen face...
Rather remarkable, her consideration for his feelings just then...Considering her usual haughty prig
manner...
She'd almost seemed...To care...
But then, she simply wanted to please ole Henry...And demonstrate her capacity for compassion to
the lower orders...
Who knew, maybe she was in love with ole cousin Henry...? Unable to act on it, perhaps, but
desperate to please him...
The boat was drifting out into the center of the lake...At least in pursuit of one oar, he noted, if rather
slowly...
Oddly enough she didn't seem much distressed by the situation...Lost out on the lake with her
cousin's ragamuffin charity case "friend"... The "dangerous radical" William Soames Walthrop...A
joking sobriquet she'd placed on him at dinner the other night...Which her father had taken quite
serious umbrage at...Glaring at the "radical" Henry had smuggled into his home all the rest of the
evening...
Well, he supposed if she was so determined to take it calmly, the least he could do was demonstrate
similar fortitude...
"Don't be distressed..." she told him...Kindly, he noted with surprise...
William...she paused...
He stared at her...
"We can just drift a bit...We'll catch up to one of the oars soon enough..."
Tell me about your family...William...she eyed him...
"Henry says...He told me...Your mother died last year..."
Tuberculosis...he nodded...
And years of slaving like a dog...With beatings from the masters to boot...
"Amazing what "gentlemen" can get away with when the woman beaten almost to death by her
employer is a poor servant..." he noted...
God save the Queen, our just legal system, and our noble Parliament...
"Henry is hoping to better things like that..." she noted...
When he gets to Parliament...
I wish there were more like him...William noted simply...
"I've always said it...He is a good man...And my friend..."
Who owes you a great deal, William...she looked at him...
"He needed a bit of help...I was glad to oblige..."
"He would have failed and been sent down...If you hadn't taken him in hand..."
"I rather enjoyed helping a toff..." William said curtly...
Nice to have one indebted to one...Can come in handy...
"Are you always so ready to snap at anyone who shows you a little kindness...?" she glared...
"I'm sorry...I didn't mean that..."
As I didn't mean to hurt you the other day...she noted...
I thought you could take criticism...You certainly claim to be able to...
"I never claimed to be a great poet, Miss Addams...I just...Try to write..."
You need more...Experience...William...
"I've had years of it, Miss Addams...Assisting my mother and her fellows in service, working in
factories, working anywhere I could make a few shillings...Trying to keep a roof over my brother
and sister's heads...Bury my mother in some dignity..."
He eyed her...
You can't know the "experience" I've had...And frankly, I'm glad for you, you haven't...
It was clouding up and getting gusty...
"I may have had more "experience" than you can imagine, William..."
He stared at her...
"My name, by the way, is Cicely...Please use it...I don't like calling you by your first if you refuse to
use mine..." she smiled wanly at him...
She looks tired...He noted...As if she's been working at the books or something...All night...
"Perhaps we'd best try heading in..." he looked at her...
Wouldn't want to compromise your reputation any further...
"I can bear a little "compromising"..." she smiled...Stared at him...
Was she...Nervous?...
And looked away...
"Henry thinks you have a great future..." she began...
Henry...Is a very kind friend...
"But when you get your degree..."
I will be a poor man with a degree from Cambridge, two others to feed...And...
A very bad poet...
"Your story the other night was very good..." she paused... "You have promise..."
A tale to friends about my working days...A hair better than my poems...
As your friend Henderson pointed out...When he gave me my new nickname...
"Bloody Aw..."
"Henderson is an ass!..." she eyed him fiercely...
You wrong me to call him my friend...
He stared at her...So angry...So suddenly...
Like a summer storm...
For...Him?...
"Are you going to let a fool like him tell you to stop...?" she went on...
Is that what your mother killed herself for...So you could give up at the first hint of criticism?...
"I have to think practically...Mouths to feed, remember?..."
"Don't belittle my opinions, Will...iam...Just because I don't know hunger and cold right now
doesn't mean I don't understand..."practicalities"..." she told him crossly... "I'm not a little fool, you
know..."
Just because you must think of the practical doesn't mean...The romantic in you has to die...she
muttered...Looking out toward shore...
Odd...? He could almost...Think she was talking about...herself...
The romantic mustn't die, Will...she looked back at him...Life's not worth living without it...
Wind was really picking up now...Boat rocking...
"Are you all right?..." she looked at him...
Just...he paused...
A trifle...Giddy...
A swell caught them neatly, lifting the boat, turning it over...
"William!..." she cried, grabbing for him...With simply amazing speed...
But a hair too slow...They went in separately...
He bobbed up...Much to his own surprise...
She wasn't there...He looked round in terror...
"Cicely!!..." he screamed...
"Cicely!!!"
He pushed himself back down...And found her just under the upturned boat, stunned by striking the
side...
Grabbing her, he desperately dived back under, while trying to cover her mouth and nose from the
water...And popped up with her on the other side...She coughing and choking as he propped her up
against the upturned boat...
Go to "Romance Palace..."
Your Email Always Alerts You Before It Deletes...
Two dinners at Buffy and Angel's home...
Business was booming for old Angel Investigations...Largest firm in Sunnydale...
And largest employer...
It was no time at all before one of Angel's underworld operatives had let him know his
"grandson" was back in town...
I got a surprisingly friendly note at my crypt that afternoon...Asking to meet me...
A drink at Willie's...
***
Angel came in a half-hour later...Sorry, I'm late, busy times...
"So..." he grinned... "I hear you've been pretty William these past years, Mr. Walthrop..."
Been keeping tabs on me, eh granddad...? I looked at him noncommitally...
"William the Bloody rates, wouldn't you say?..." he smiled...
Besides Buffy...And Dawn...Were concerned about you after you left...
He hesitated...
"They told me all about that summer...And the year after..."
I'm proud of you, Will...
Lucky me...I looked at him...
"Thank Uncle Sam and modern electronics..."
"That's not what Buffy says..." he noted, looking at me...
Oh...
"What does Buffy say?... "
That William has been trying...he looked at me...
That she's sure there's something human in there...
He paused...
"You know about the spell...That freed me from Angelis...?"
I heard...Talk of the underworld for all of fifteen minutes...
He grinned...Same old Spike...
"It could be done...On you..." he looked at me...
What?...I paused, trying to catch myself...
"What...Lose that razor edge ole Spike gives me?..."
"I'm serious, Will..." Angel hesitated...
Willie came up, all smiles...
I looked at the beer...Unpronounceable import...
"Getting dangerously trendy there, mate..." I grinned at him...
What next, ferns and a string quartet?...Willie winked and moved off...
I turned back to Angel...
"You don't owe me anything, young Christ..." I smiled at him...
Buffy would like it...So would Dawn...he paused...
"And frankly I could use the extra help in my business..."
Well..If it's a job you're offering...That's different...I smiled at him..
"A little demon-killing for cash would be right up my alley..."
In fact, I paused...That's why I came back...Thought I could wangle a few bucks from you on a
job or two...
Little short on dough just right now...
Angel pulled out a wallet, and plunked down a thousand...
"You're hired as of tomorrow..." he grinned...
But...I hope you'll think about the spell...
Well...I looked at him...Maybe I'll think it over, I told him...
"And how's about coming by the house?...It's early...Buffy was hoping you'd come to dinner..."
You never did see the boy...he smiled...
And Dawn wants to see you too...
***
Buffy wants to see me...The words kept pulsing in my mind...
She wants to see me...But no...She's got her Angel, her happy life...
She wants to rub my face in it...That's what she wants...
And, maybe...Make sure I'm not here to ruin things for her...
Well...There's nothing so enjoyable as making one's old beloved twist slowly in the wind...
"Dinner?...Well, my social calendar does have an opening..."
And I'd like to see Ms. Nibs again...I nodded...
"Great..." my new boss beamed...
But, listening from the bar, ole Willie eyed me...
Carefully...
***
"Dru is my major focus right now..." Angel explained as we drove over to the old house...
I want to help her as quickly as possible...
Might have done a better job last time you had her...I didn't say...
"I owe her that much..." Angel noted...
That goes without saying...I did not say...Nodding as we drove...
"But that means a return to LA...Full time for a while..." he paused...
Which is why...I really need your help, William...
"We've had good success here at the source...I don't want to lose the momentum..."
Had no idea this was a football game, granddad...I thought...
***
I tried to psych myself for seeing her again...
No good of course...
"Buffy didn't want to leave the old house..." Angel explained...
Maybe after Dawny finishes high school we'll get another place...Or maybe when...he paused...
Waving at Dawn as she came out...
Running up to us...
"Hey Spike!..." she called...
"Hey...Little miss-can't-pick-up-a-pen-to-write-her-old-babysitter..." I fake groused back...
She looked at her feet...
"I didn't mean to take so long writing back, Will..."
No problem, Nibs...I grinned...
"Really...I...Just things were so..."
She stood in the door, looking out at us...
I let Dawn prattle on...Trying to apologize for being a teenager...
Watching her, while trying to keep my eyes on the Nibs...
Angel waved to her...
"Got him, Buf..."
She smiled faintly...And I knew...
Without a word...I knew...
Odd...The first thought that popped up...
Poor old Angel...
***
Connor properly presented, a handsome little prince, that...We sat down to dinner...
Dawn flooding me with attention, desperate to make amends...
Buffy quietly watching me...
Only animated when Angel brought up the spell again...
"You should consider it Will..." she told me...
You have a right to be...Free...She looked at me...
"Please...Think about it..."
Angel, clueless...Smiled at her...
"We'll persuade him..." he told her...
I nodded...Well...
"If it can be done...And the chip wouldn't interfere..."
I'll think about it...
"The chip?..." Buffy looked at Angel...
"We'd check everything out first..." he assured her...
Of course...he paused, returning to me...It can't be done successfully on every vampire...
"Else I'd be long out of a job..." he noted, grinning...
Many vamps have merged soul and demon...Given in to evil...And nothing can be done for them...
"The way that creep Mears would if he were ever a vamp..." Dawn noted...
And Dru?...I looked at him...
Her soul is pure...Angel noted sadly...Trapped in limbo...But...
"I don't know what the effects of what I...What Angelis...Did to her...Before..."
"She'll be grateful if you free her, honey..." Buffy told him...
Whatever state her soul is in...
I nodded...
"Still..." he sighed... "If I could try to give her the life she lost...Here..."
At least see if that's what she wants...Let her choose...
"Angel has trouble seeing things in Slayer black and white..." Buffy smiled...
Demon or vamp...Slay...Human...Don't slay...
"It's not that easy these days, Buf..." Angel noted...
Yeah...she agreed...
And looked at me...
***
Angel was off to read his nightly story to Connor...Dawn attending...
Then bring me home to the old crypt...
To be replaced by a decent basement apartment asap he insisted...
I went to assist in the kitchen, carrying plates like a good guest trained in Victorian era manners...
"So..." Buffy eyed me...
Nice kid, Connor...I looked at her...
My heart pounding a 100 miles a minute...
"You'll try the spell?..." she hesitated...
For you?...I paused...Yes...
"For yourself, Will..." she quickly dodged...
"Your 'grandfather'..." she grinned... "Is quite concerned with you..."
And his wife...? I looked at her...
Cares...she nodded...
Always will...she looked away...
"Buffy...If things could be...Different...If..."
"It's too late, Will..." she looked at me...Then at her hands...
Too late...
"I should have tried to help you back then..." she kept looking at her hands...
I didn't have the courage...Or the faith in you...
And now...
"Angel is a good man..." she looked at me...
But...I returned...
She put up her hands...
I took one...She didn't resist...For a mo...I held it in mine...
Then she pushed me away...Staring at me...
"Why did you have to come back?..." she whispered...
Trembling now...I could see...
"He's never loved me..." she shook her head...
"When he first saw me, he saw the woman he'd been seeking all these years..."
"Darla..."
Hey, I was blonde...And fighting the good fight...
"So I filled in fairly well..."
I reached but she backed off...
"Then...Leave him..." I hissed... "I'll try the bloody spell...We'll go away...""I can't..." she stared
at me...
Dawn...And...
"I couldn't bear trying to start all over again...With nothing..."
I stared at her...
"I've been dead...And I've been poor...And I'm tired, William..."
I can't start from the bottom...Again...
I'm a coward, Will...Fundamentally...she looked at me...
Maybe it's Death...Maybe, apart from the Slayer side...I always was...
I was afraid to try loving you then...I'm afraid to lose what I have now...
She put up her hands...
"I'm sorry..."
***
Of course, I should have left...Spit in her face, and left...Then and there...Humanity spell or no...
But...I rode home with Angel...Listened to his campaign plan for "Operation Dru"...Made my
little suggestions...And promised to be in promptly at the office at ten...Courtesy a shielded car to
be sent for me...
And I showed up promptly at ten at Angel Investigations, Sunnydale the next morning...
***
Dru regained consciousness, after a fashion, while I was there...At her bedside...
Looking at us with no recognition...Mumbling vaguely...
Demon-free...But as lost as ever...
Angelis had done a through job before killing her, I noted to Giles...
Who watched her with me, sadly...
"Is there...Anything...We can do...?" I asked him...
The dutiful Victorian son, that's me...
"I hate to see her go on like this..." I told him...
He shrugged...Perhaps in time...She'd make progress...
And learn what a first-rate homicidal maniac she'd become over the past century...
I looked at him...
"Angel made me promise to try the spell..." he noted... "And I did..."
But I suspected this would be the result...
He sighed...And gently kissed the trembling Dru's shaking hand...
Well...
"As I said...One never knows how these things will unfold..."
I sat by her bedside, holding her trembling hand as she fought with the terrors dear Angelis had
created for her...
My poor innocent Dru...
But a profound sense of relief coursed through me...
***
A similar sense had eased Buffy's torments...Angel had regained consciousness...
But had little or no memory of what had happened that night...Even in a vampire, a fractured skill
is a fractured skull...
However he was relieved to learn "Operation Dru" had been a success...At least from his pov...
And he wanted Dru to come "home"...Intact...To Sunnydale...Where she could be cared for
properly by a new and loving family...
I suspected Giles did not approve of keeping her in her present state but he deferred to
Angel...Who insisted on her preservation...
Dru might, with good care, one day recover, after all...he argued...
It was his...Duty...To care for her until then...
Father Angel, knowing what's best...Extending his kindly paternal mantle over us all...
Buffy and I naturally took over full Patrol duty for Sunnydale while Angel convalesced...
For us, at least...That week...Free of the burden of fear that had weighed on us since that
night...Was the happiest, most carefree time we've ever had...
Buffy agreeing that we'd been insane to try that way...We'd find another way in time...Breaking
the Dawn stranglehold and making a decent life for ourselves...Keeping the pain for all, even
him...To the minimum...
Until then...She was content...
And I...Could deal...
***
But...At the beginning of the following week, as an invited dinner guest, I came in on a little
family spat...Buffy and the nearly fully recovered Angel alone in the house...
He wanted Dru home...In Sunnydale...
Here..
Dru had a soul again alright but...Needed constant care...And who better to provide it then her
"father" of sorts...
He couldn't abandon the poor thing...To some institution where she'd be alone and little doubt,
exposed to sunlight the first day...
Buffy had different ideas...Well suspecting just who the burden of dear little Dru's care would be
falling on...
.
They were not at their best as happy couple when I came in...Perhaps abusing my status as
welcome guest by not knocking loudly enough on my entry...
But after all, I wasn't alone...Tara had come as well...So it wasn't eavesdropping...
Not really...
Buffy was shrieking at Angel...
"You're not bringing her here!!!"...
"Buffy..." Angel was cold...And firm... "Dru is my responsibility...That makes her your
responsibility, too..."
She trembled with rage...But got hold of herself as Tara and I came in...
"Hi...Guys..." she tried to smile at us...Coming out to greet us in the living room
This isn't settled, Angel...she told him as he went upstairs...
Tara looked at me...I at her...
Well...Buffy again tried to smile at us, waving us to a seat on the sofa...
"You two seem to be spending a fair amount of time together..."
***
He came down, smiling as always...And we sat down to dinner...
Tara and I carefully avoiding the subject of Dru as we ate...
"Nibs out for the evening?..." I asked...
At Janice's...Buffy informed me...
"Not that I approve of her..." she glared at Angel...
Dawny needs friends her own age, Buffy...Angel calmly replied...
"You have no right to go back on things I've told her to do...Or not to do..." she told him coldly...
Even if you have had me legally declared a feeble-minded child...Like...
"That's enough, Buffy..." Angel told her quietly...
Dru doesn't deserve to be talked about that way...
But I do?...she stared at him...Quiet rage...
"If you act like a child...Yes..." he stared back...
Dru can't help herself...You can...
You said you'd get the decree on me reversed, she told him...
"When I feel you're ready..." he told her coldly...
"I am not spending my life treated like a child and caring for your past mistakes on hand and
foot!!...." she told him...
He got up, excusing himself...
"Buffy..." He eyed her... "Is upset..."
I'm sure she'll be better in a bit...I'm sorry...
"It's been nice...I'll leave you to have a little chat time with her...See you tomorrow at the office..."
She glared at him...As he left...To go upstairs...
Story time for the little prince Connor...And even a furious Angel is a dutiful Angel...
Be interesting to hear tonight's story I couldn't resist whispering to Tara...Who slyly grinned
back at me...Then remembered to frown at my bad behavior...
Tara made her excuses and left shortly after...Wordlessly hoping I'd say something to her...Calm
her down...
I waited...
"So..." Buffy looked at me, off-hand...Bitterly...
"So...That's my life...From now on..."
Caring for his crazy, dead "daughter"...
For the rest of my life...
She slammed a hand on the kitchen wall...
I stared silently...
Tough for me, eh...she nodded at me...
You can walk now...Buffy's life is...Settled...
I kept staring...
"You do have a stake here, William..." she glared at me suddenly...
"I'm pregnant..." she eyed me...
And it's not Angel's...Though I was ready to tell him so...Until...
I stared at her...Until she decided she needed me to help her out of her little nursing care job...
She shrugged...
"I suppose you don't believe me..."
I got up...Glaring back...
"I believe you...And I believe you wouldn't have told me unless you needed me..."
That was always your way, Buffy...No sacrifice is too much for those who serve the Slayer...
In any capacity...
"Anya's the only one who ever saw though your act..."
'Oh my dear little friends, I wouldn't put your worthless lives at risk for the world, but my
precious ass is at risk and I need something to throw at my latest enemy...' I sneered...
So...She stared back at me...
"I get my chance to break with Dawn at last..."
Your way...she reminded me...
What we hoped for...
But...Now...
"Now...He'll never let me go..."
And...She looked at me...
"He knows...About what really happened in LA..."
I stared at her...She nodded...
He remembers...But...He's...Forgiven me...
It's his nature...She noted...
I went to her...Realizing...
"That's why...I was going to say..." she looked at me...
That the baby was his...
Otherwise...
"He'd kill me..." I finished looking at her...
Or his people would...
Spike...she corrected...He'd never kill William, only Spike...
You'd just be the innocent bystander he'd had to take out at the same time...
Clearly the spell having failed...You...Spike...Having led me on to these awful acts...
she noted...
As for me...Crazy Buffy...In my current certified unbalanced state...
I'd be forgiven...Again...
To continue my happy life with the one I love...Forever...
"I didn't understand, Buffy..." I told her...
She nodded, tears in her eyes...
I'm not afraid of him...I went on...She put a hand over my mouth...
"I am..." she whispered...
"I said I wouldn't fail you, William...Not again..."
And I won't lose you...Whatever price I have to pay...
"You asked me..." I hesitated...
If I loved you...If I would prove it...
She stared at me...
"I'm ready to prove it..." I looked at her...
***
Go to story
Drusilla...
Cicely the Vampire Slaying Housewife...
Several days later found a worried Cicely in the small house Walthrop had rented for them, facing
the greatest challenge of her career...As she stared at the book of recipes she'd found in her new
kitchen...
How to cook a full meal without a small army of servants...
With her mother gone, Slaying, and her father requiring her services to manage their home and
servants, while assisting him as secretary and hostess for his parties, her direct kitchen skills had
been even more limited than most upper class young women...Though she had tried to learn a bit in
the past few weeks, with her marriage imminent, and had successfully mastered the art of making
William's favorite dessert, fairy cake...A great deal still eluded her...
Will, having anticipated her inexperience...And rather experienced in the kitchen, of necessity, had
kindly attempted to assist her, to her embarrassment...
But naturally she couldn't allow him to think her some useless fool...And while it'd been nice to
have his help on the first simple meals...Just warming things brought from the local grocer's and
baker's...She had insisted on taking things in her own capable hands for the first fully home-
prepared meal while he and a nearly recovered Henry were at their classes...
"Now...Sir...Here is the arrangement I propose..." she addressed her standard Slayer speech to the
object of her intent...A large chicken, recently deceased...
"You shall be rubbed and stuffed and cook quietly on your back in that oven..." she pointed to the
large, kerosene-fueled oven...
Along with your companions...she noted several potatoes...Onions...And a small heap of string
beans...
"While I review my choice of options for entry into the special classes..." she eyed a listing of classes
for which non-matriculated students were offered admittance...
Of course, William's uncertainty had been something of a goad...
"Perhaps...You should consider hiring a girl today instead of later...Someone to help..." he'd
suggested before leaving...
Help?...she'd eyed her husband...
This wasn't like the laundry...Where she'd gratefully accepted his assistance...He again being
experienced of necessity...And their budget not allowing for experimentation with his few decent
school clothes...
Or the cleaning...Where, reminding her of the miserable life of drudgery he'd seen his mother
endure, he'd insisted that it was his job as well as hers...And that if he were willing to defer to her
experience in this...Slaying, she called it?...Surely she could accept that in his dreary former careers
in various factories of his home town of Brusset he'd acquired far more direct experience in heavy
cleaning than she...
How difficult could it be?...The Greatest Slayer of All Time versus a plucked chicken...And its
vegetable allies....
As light a task as a piece of the fairy cake she'd be making for dessert, she'd noted...Sending him off
with a fervent kiss for him and a hug for Henry, with a promise of a fine dinner to mark his recovery
and return to his own lodgings...
Might do well to eat a good lunch...Henry'd quietly noted to Walthrop as they'd made their way
onto the campus...
He'd been the pleasantly smiling recipient of most of Cicely's recent efforts back in London...
***
It was not the fire, started when she set her burning chicken on the small kitchen table...Nor the
strangely lumpen potatoes which refused to mash smoothly...Nor the gravy tasting much like wall
plaster...Nor the dress, ruined when the heated iron she'd left on it burned through when she ran to
put out the chicken in the kitchen...Nor the vanished time she'd planned to employ in cleaning the
house, what little left over from her kitchen efforts being lost in trying to figure out how to
permanently remove the dirt which her sweeping efforts seemed only to succeed in moving from one
spot to another...That left Cicely reduced to tears...
No, the Slayer was not to be discouraged by a few minor disasters...And most could be retrieved
with a desperate plea to one of the neighbor wives...
It was her visitor...The forthright Miss Rosenberg, out from London, having used the resources of
the Council to track her down...
Not too difficult a task, Willow'd admitted...William and Henry being enrolled students...And the
Walthrop's habitation being duly registered...
A flustered, smoke-begrimed Mrs. Walthrop having done her best to try to properly greet her
unwelcome visitor...Bearing equally unwelcome news...
Both the Council and her group having failed to find any new trace of the Angelis pride, she'd come
in part to plea with the Slayer...
And in part, to warn her...
Drusilla, according to information gleaned from psychic members of the Council...And confirmed,
Willow noted, by the Slayer's own vision sensations...Reported to the Chairman by her own cousin,
Mr. Foxcroft, before he'd left the Council's care...Had a common interest with Mrs. Walthrop...
In a certain young, newly married poet...
***
Go to story
"Buffy...Nemeses...er Nemesis..."
Soames (alternate William) and Nemy's cocktail parties with (alternate) Willie the Snitch and (clone) Warren...
In an alternate existence...On Alternate Earth...
[Suggested theme... "Heart of Glass"]
A smoke-filled, noisy watering hole...In a blighted world barely beginning to recover from constant,
devastating demon raids...Ready to eagerly accept anything...And any group...Offering salvation...
A salvation which had been granted...At a price...
"Once had love and it was a gas...Soon turned out...Had a heart of glass..." The Blondie song warbled
over the sounds of the crowded room...Sung by a small young dark-haired woman on the tiny postage stamp
of a stage in back as she danced in rather scanty costume...Dozens of patrons clutching drinks paying
scant attention to her but for the few close males eyeing her short, but attractive form with commendable
attention...A form that to a few non-human patrons scattered round seemed disturbingly familiar...
In the back of the bar...The owner, a short, nervous though rather prosperous-looking, little man, his
eyes dashing over the crowd like a ferrit's...Looking for any potential...Oh, Christ...No...
Now in the center of the room, eye'd briefly by a number of females...Not all human...A brown-haired,
bespectacled, bemused-looking young man...In a long black coat rather at odds with his shy, slightly
embarrassed expression...Rather out of sorts in this crowd and place, obviously...Searched the room until
he saw...
The singer paused, staring back at him...Then at Willie, her boss...A look of terror flashing on her face
for just a moment...Then back to him...
William...she breathed across the room to him...
Her eyes pleaded...
He stared back at her...As she nervously returned to her song and her bump-and-grind dance...
"Seemed like the real thing...Only to find..." she continued...
"William Walthrop...Bloody Awful Will...Our own human-souled vampire vampire Slayer..."
the bar owner called cheerily, as he hastened over...One hand extended for a friendly shake, the other
waving to call a waitress and drinks...
"Willie..." William nodded at the little man...Clearly aware that he'd spotted his target...Desperate to
keep potential trouble to a minimum...
Though having a Nemesis series...the One of the series...Working in his bar was hardly a way to avoid
potential trouble...
The singer had returned to her performance, picking up the pace perhaps...Eyeing him with the same pleading
look from time to time as he accepted Willie the Snitch's hospitality...
Willie waved him to a booth...One allowing a good view of the stage he noted with a smile...
"Quite a girl we just got in...You hear about her?" he smiled...
A knock-off of course...But one of the best...
C'mon, William...he leaned in with a confidential air...
"Wouldn't you rather see one Hunter out free in the world?...Than slaving for the Council?...She's an
altered early test model, can still think a little for herself..."
"I don't keep her with me..." he tried...
"She's a Nemesis series, Willie..." William sighed at him as he cradled his ale...
The One...he added...
Willie stared at him...No point in trying to cover...
"She's all that's left of your Buffy, William..."
The one who really is Buffy...
"It's a crime what the Mears Corporation and that Council did to her...To the others..." Willie shook his
head...
They couldn't let Buffy rest in peace...
"They use her to keep Humanity safe..." William noted...
My Buffy would've wanted that...
"Buffy Summers would want a hundred of her brain-dead clones wandering around, doing whatever the Watchers'
Council tells em to do...?" Willie glared...
And would you like to hear what some of those oh-so-high-and-mightily respectables have their Buffies do?...
"No..." William shook his head...
I would not...And I already have heard...
"They're slaves, Spike...Except for the One...And she's..."
William rose suddenly...
"Never call me that!...I am not Spike...He is in Hell!!...Again...Forever..."
"That's for sure..." Willie sneered up at him...
Spike would've killed Mears and the whole Council for what they did to her...
"William?..." a voice tensely whispered next to them...Both men jumping slightly...
The singer had finished and come over...With such haste and so quietly neither had had a hint of her
approach...
"It's ok Willie...I can deal..." she glanced at her boss hastily...
Jesus, girl...I been trying to buy you run time...What are you trying to do?...Willie stared at her...As
she nervously, eagerly stared at Walthrop...
"I've missed you, William..." she shyly told him...Sitting next to Willie on his side of the booth...
Willie rolling his eyes...
"Look...William..." he began, in a tense whisper...
"I...can...handle this..." she interrupted him in an annoyed tone, putting a hand on his shoulder...And
snapping his neck with the subtlest of quick moves...Her hand now keeping his dead body propped up..
Jesus...William stared...
"I told him I could deal..." she noted in a harsh whisper, a little sullenly...
***
"Buffy..." William stared at her as her free hand moved swiftly over dead Willie, going through his
pockets...While the other held him in place...
Not that anyone here was likely to notice...Or care...
"He hid you...Saved your life...At no small risk..."
He loved you...
"Yeah, so...?" she shrugged...
"He wanted an invite into me, so he protected me...Why should I let it bother me?..."
After all, she smiled at him...All the more bizarre for being a thoroughly sincere little Buffy smile,
he knew...
"There's only one guy for me...William..."
Unless you turn on me like my friends did...she glared at him...
"They didn't turn on you...They don't even know you, darling..." he sighed...
"They want me dead..."
"They know what the Mears Corporation created in you..."
"Why only me?..." she pouted "There's dozens of my sisters around now..."
"They're mindless servants of the Council...You can think for yourself...And Warren took a lot of pleasure
in making sure the best of his clones...The Nemesis series...Got Buffy's...
he paused...
"Worst side...?" she eyed him...Triumphantly pulling out a stuffed wallet...And a slip of paper...Ah, the
mother lode...
"Cash...And the address..." she waved the paper...
"I'll say a prayer for him...My sweet boss, Willie..." she got up hastily...Pushing Willie to a relatively
stable position...
Lets go...she eyed Walthrop...
"Willow and the others will be coming...Sooner or later they'll trace you even if they can't track me..."
And we can't have them finding their Hellmouth Watcher so initim...she struggled...
Intimate with you?...William offered helpfully...
Yeah...Thank you...she nodded...A rather surprising gently grateful smile...
"Besides...I know you don't want me to meet up with my Dawny again..." she beamed beatifically...Touching
his coat... "Or the others..." she eyed him with an innocently soulful Buffy stare...
"And we have a man to see...Honey..." she started off for the entrance...
Would she say a prayer for him one day?...William wondered...Following her into the smoke-filled room...
None of the patrons...Of any species...Paying attention as Willie's corpse fell over in the booth...
***
He stepped out to the
street to hail a cab...
She froze a bit...Having followed him out to the street...
"You're going back...? After...?" she looked at him...The cab pulling over...
"Only if things aren't settled tonight, pet...If we need more time, I'll have to go back...To keep the
others from guessing..."
"You won't leave me...William...?" half-question, half-demand he realized...
And very likely his existence hanging in the balance...he also suspected...
"You won't leave me..." she repeated, a confident assertion...Sealed with a gentle kiss...
"You know I can't Buffy..." he replied...Opening the cab door for her...
"Say...?" she grinned, stepping in...My English gentleman, she smiled at the cabbie, indicating William...
"You didn't say how you liked my show?...Or my costume...?" she now pulled her dark wig off to reveal
Buffy in all her blondness...
The wig was a nice touch...he smiled...
"That bad...?" she pouted...
"7717 Orchard Drive, Crestwood..." he told the cabbie...
Bad neighborhood...And kinda far...The cabbie frowned back...
"You won't have to wait...And we'll make it worth your while..." William handed over $100...
"Please...?" she smiled at the cabbie... "We're going to tell my dad about us tonight..." she hugged
Will a moment...
"William will pay more...And I'll give you a kiss..." she grinned...
For being such a sweet guy...
The cabbie grinned back and nodded, unknowingly saving his life...Ok...They sped off...
Willie said I was great...A natural...she noted to William in a slightly hurt tone...
***
"You sure this is the place...?" William looked at the gloomy old house...Huge but sadly rundown...
At least on the outside...
She nodded...But looked uncertain herself...
Not exactly the sort of lair one of Earth's great corporate leaders would be expected to take...
Yet rather fitting for one in hiding from the world's secret elite of protectors...Especially one like
the nerdish, rather morbid Dr. Warren Mears...
And the name he'd given as owner...JL Sebastian...
Please...No wonder a reader of men like Willie had found him so quickly...Just search all real estate
holdings using every famous sci-fi name reference...And given his replicant Buffies...The choice of sci-fi
reference was easily narrowed to one film...
At least he'd had enough sense not to use "Tyrell"...
"Careful, William..." she kissed him quickly...He stood in front of the door, waiting to press the bell...
Nemesis Buffy moved to wait in bushes near the door...They'd agreed Mears might be a tad less reluctant to
see the representative of the Watchers' Council than his own dear "daughter"...
***
Yes...?
Both recognized the young maid who appeared at the door...Natural enough, Mears had had a dozen copies of
the Katrina who'd left him years ago working as devoted secretaries and middle-management types throughout
the Mears Corporation...Sentimental type that he was...
This one however seemed one of the less bright models...Though strong enough, William carefully noted...He
flashed an id...
"William Walthrop...Of the Royal Council of Librarians and Library Scientists...I'm here to see Mr. Sebastian...
On urgent business..."
"Mr. Sebastian is not at home...And sees no one..." she started to close the door...He held it open with one hand...
Concealing as best he could the rather heavy strain...She was a strong one, for a mere enhanced normal human...
But he tried to seem unbothered...
After all, his own true was watching...At least...All that was left of her...
"I said it was Council business, Miss...And urgent..." he smiled at her...As she struggled to close the
door...And reached for something...A button, he saw through the crack between the half-open front door and frame...
Alarm, no doubt...She managed to press it...
"Mr....Sebastian...Is...Not...At...Home..." the Katrina clone still struggled grimly to close the door...
He shoved it open in a burst...The maid fell back...
"He'll want to see me...In fact, this involves his own safety..." William kindly told her...As she tensed
and took a fighting crouch...A door opened down the hall...
"Who are...? William?..." A dark brown-haired Buffy stared at him from the open door...
An unregistered Hunter, he realized immediately...
Not surprising Mears would have found some way to elude the Council's surveillance and keep one or two for
his own protection...
Just lucky he hadn't...Hopefully...Managed to do the same with the Nemesis series...
Though even for the power-mad Mears, one Nemesis should have been enough...At least after she'd so effectively
proven his success in restoring so much of Buffy's independent mind and memory, nearly leveling his corporate lab
in the process...
"William?..." the Hunter eyed him...The Katrina clone remaining in defensive posture...
"Yes, Buffy...It's me..." he nodded...
"I'm here to see Mr. Sebastian...For the Watchers Council..."
"Mr. Sebastian is not available...Why did you force your way in, William?" the Hunter had assumed a defensive posture...
"I must see him, Buffy...This is a Council directive..." he eyed her carefully...
She remained in defensive mode...Hmmn...Best to feign surprise at her lack of cooperation...
"Don't you follow Council directives, Buffy...?"
Certainly...William...
She hesitated...Mears had clearly given her orders to disguise her renegade status...
She must be one of the prototypes...Before the Council took over as silent partner in his company...Surely Mears would've
enhanced her well beyond a standard Hunter's mental capacity if he'd taken the risk of altering a recent Hunter's
neurogenetic profile with the Council observers on his back night and day ...
He'd barely gotten away with the creation of Nemesis at that...No, he wouldn't have risked it for a mere Hunter...
Nemesis...she must be getting antsy with a Hunter so near...The rage building...He could almost feel it...
Perhaps the most truly Buffy thing about her...The furious rage and sense of violation and betrayal she felt in the
presence of her "sisters"...
Still, she was a practical lass and survival-oriented...He had to trust she'd stick to the script and hold herself in
check a bit longer...
The Hunter had thought the matter over...Or at least as much as she could still "think"...
"I will pass on your message to Mr. Sebastian...If he wishes to speak to you and the Council...He will contact you..."
She gave him a bright-eyed Buffy smile...But remained waiting...
He eyed her a bit more sternly...
"That's how you answer a Council directive, Buffy?...As your Watcher, I am ordering you to take me to Mr. Sebastian..."
She stared...Evaluating the possible combat scenarios, he guessed...
And...As your William...I'm hoping you'll comply...he finished, more kindly...
"It's all right, Buffy..." a voice called from down the hall...A tall, rather handsome middle-aged Dr. Warren Mears now
emerged from the far end door...And strode down to them...
The Hunter relaxed a hair...But maintained position...Watching William carefully...As did also the Katrina maid,
now standing in defensive mode as well...
"Mr. Walthrop..." Warren grinned...
"Mears...Or should I say, Mr. Sebastian...?" William took him in coolly...
Same ole Warren...With yet a few more improvements...
"You've been experimenting with enhancing yourself again, haven't you Mears...? You know the Council will be displeased..."
But not Nemesis, he thought...If you have managed to improve yourself...Mentally...Her prayers...And mine...Might still
be answered...
"Improving oneself's is what life's all about, Spike..." Warren waved him to an open doorway... A comfortable,
even luxurious living room beyond...The clones followed...
"The name is Walthrop, Mears..." William paused in the doorway...Fixing Mears with a hard look...
"Sorry...No offense, intended...William...Have a seat..." Mears indicated a loveseat across from the sofa where
he sat with the Hunter by his side...The Katrina clone moving to stand beside the sofa...
So...he grinned...
"You and the Council...Or was it ole Willow, perhaps?...Finally tracked me down..."
He cocked his head at the Hunter now shyly smiling at William as she sat beside Warren...Doubtless ready to die
for the boss at a moment's notice, William thought...
"You've guessed she's outside the loop of your little harem, I'm sure..." Mears grinned...
"A prototype...? From the first attempts...?" William looked at her...
Bingo...Give the Unman a kiss, Buffy...he smiled at the Hunter...
She rose, smiling...
William...
He put a hand to ward her off instinctively...But got hold of himself and explained kindly to her that
he'd like to wait on the kiss, thanks...
Mears watched, beaming...She turned to him...A rather crestfallen look...
"Later is fine, Buffy...Sit down..." he told her...
"The Council won't be pleased to hear you've kept this one...And, frankly...If you don't hand her over to us...
I'll be very happy to see her destroyed..." William grimly told Mears...
"Spike..." Mears grinned... "You'll hurt her feelings..."
Bad enough turning down a kiss from your girl...
"Enough, Mears..." William raised a hand...
The two clones eyed him carefully...Ready to spring...He paused and carefully lowered his hands...
My girls are overly cautious...Warren noted...
"Even with an ole buddy like you...Sp...William...But...That's love..."
"Well...What can I do for you...Now that you've found me?"
William smiled...
"Before I go any further...I want to speak to the real Warren...Not a clone like you..."
***
Alternate Earth...Mears lair...
Warren beamed at William...So...
"You think I'm a clone?..." he smiled...
The two protecting clones, the Katrina and the Hunter Buffy, staring...But remaining focused on William...
"I've no doubt about it...I've met you before...At the Corporation, posing as the real Mears there too..."
"Your original should never have tried to improve his body odor...I never forget a scent..." William smiled
back at Mears... "His...or yours..."
And I expected it...Mears would never risk confronting me directly...
He looked around as Mears frowned at him...
"So...Where is ole Warren?...Or do I have to summon a half-dozen Hunters to tear the place apart just to
help him out...?"
***
Hunter Buffy had sensed danger in William's threatening words...And was on her feet in a second...The
Katrina moving up in support...
"William...Please stop...Or I will have to restrain you..."
"Right...Sorry..."He raised a hand...
"I never want to hurt you, girl...Believe me..."
"I can't let you hurt Dr. Mears, William..."
"This..." he pointed at a glaring Mears on the couch... "Is not Dr. Mears...It's a clone...Like you..."
"Do you have any idea what they...Mears and the Council..." he paused...
"What...We've...Done to you, Buffy...?"
Hunter Buffy eyed William...
"I'm sorry William...I am not capable of the kind of emotional responses I think you're seeking...
My function is to honor my original's memory by defeating evil and keeping Humanity safe...And protecting
the father-creator, Dr. Mears...That leaves me content...
But I am sorry if I'm causing you pain...
"I know, dear heart... he sighed... But I'm trying to help your Dr. Mears, not hurt him..."
"Then...Please don't use such threatening terms, William..." she replied, still watching carefully...
"Impasse...Mr. Walthrop..." Mears grinned...
"But...I concede...Excellent observational skills...I am a clone of Dr. Mears...One of his best..."
So...Now that some of my cards are on the table...How about some of yours?...
"For example...Where is my Nemesis...? Did she come with you?..." he smiled at Walthrop...
"And just how do you want to "help" my original?"
***
Alternate Earth...Mears lair...
"Well...?" clone Warren sat, arms folded on his sofa, watching William on the opposite loveseat carefully...
"How can you... Help...My original?...And where is my Nemesis?..."
"How would I know where she is?...But let me ask...You're that anxious to have her rip your head off?..."
William smiled... "You must know after what happened back at Mears, Inc how she feels about Daddy Warren..."
Hunter Buffy tensed a bit...
"The Nemesis isn't here, Buffy.." William quickly looked at her...
So far as I am aware...
"She didn't kill me...She could have..." clone Warren noted...
"She had to leave in a hurry...Besides she was still hoping to get something out of your original...Why
do you think she was so patient that last week of testing after she finished her education cycle...
Playing Daddy's grateful little girl?..." Will paused...
"She still is seeking something from him, you know...Which is why her attempts to re-enter the Corporation
this past month were so stealthy...She could've just smashed in and killed you, even with the Hunter guards..."
he smiled...
"Your "dad" outdid himself with this one..."
"What does she want?..."
"Ask her, I don't know...Probably info on how to remove any lingering traces of your original's handiwork..."
"Then she'll kill you...Him, I mean..." William smiled...
"But maybe she'll give you both kisses for being so nice and remember you fondly everafterwards..."
"I think...As does my original...That you know where she is, William..."
"After all..." clone Mears smiled...
"She's your wife...Your lost love of a century...Even as my Nemy you can't help loving her...Wanting to
save her..."
"And she remembers it all...Thanks to me...My original..."
"She is Cicely again...All due to our work..."
"Yes...I have to remember to..." William eyed the Hunter... "Thank...Your original properly for bringing
my Cicely back as well in her..."
"I...We're...Not to blame for the games of the Powers That Be, Walthrop...They let her be reincarnated...
And die before she fully realized who you and she were..."
He leaned back against the cushions...A very good job, William had to admit...All of Mears' arrogant smirk,
everything...Only the utter cowardice removed...The real smoking gun as to the clone's true nature...
He requested the Katrina clone fetch drinks..."Scotch still yours...?" he eyed William who nodded...
"And maybe...A little something special?...You're looking a trifle pale...?"
"I have my own, thanks...Fresh from the butcher..." Will patted a side pocket...
The clone nodded and settled back...Relaxing a bit...
"Where is she, William?...Maybe I...Or he...Can give her what she wants...Still..."
"After all...You know I don't really give a damn what the Council wants..." he smiled...
"Can't help you there, Mearsy..." William folded his arms... "But...Maybe it isn't improvement...Or repair
she's after..."
Oh...?
"Maybe...It's Gateway..."
"Gateway...?" the clone couldn't help a blink...He is a great job, Will noted...
Maybe even a little too good...Mears let a little unwanted knowledge slip in...
"What's Gateway...?"
"The Council observers aren't all fools, Mears...You think your other projects went unnoticed?..."
"Never heard of it...But then, maybe my original didn't need me to know...What is it?..."
William smiled...The clone knew something...It wasn't a mistake to have come...
"An escape for our boy Warren...Who's been getting antsy under the Council's benevolent thumb all this time..."
"Oh...? It's true my original wasnt impressed with your efforts to protect him and the Corporation from
Nemesis...But why should he want to escape being head of the most important company on Earth?...All the
riches and power a man could want?...Not to mention..." he smiled benevolently at the Hunter...
"Our Warren doesn't like playing second fiddle...And he knows the Council will only allow him so much
freedom...They took his Hunters away and micro-managed his work...Even your girls here...And you...Are violations
of their agreement with him..." Will paused to take his drink from the Katrina...
"And how could he have created more like Nemesis with the new regime the Council was going to impose on him
after she popped up...? No...No...Our Warren likes to play on his own...He wants out...Which is probably
a wise move as the Council must inevitably choose to terminate him in time after what happened with Nemesis..."
"And just where would my original escape to?...The Council with your friends at their side...And the
Hunters...Have the run of the world...He's lucky to keep in the shadows from them...And Nemesis...now..."
"Another Earth...Which must appeal to a sci-fi nerd like Warren...To arrive somewhere where no one is
prepared for him...Where he can rule unchecked...And yet, all his old enemies are around, just clueless..."
The clone regarded him...Impassive...
"What good would running to some other world do?...Where things might be even worse than here?..."
William chuckled a little... "Mears?...Take a chance like that?...Hardly...No, he's been at this for a
couple of years now...Ever since the Council muscled in on his little operation...He's been looking for
just the right world...A nice little Earth where things have been going well and there are no Hunters or
Nemys looking for him...And no other power-mad opponents, including alternate Warrens, living to challenge
him..."
"Sad that he had to abandon the project and flee the Corporation just when he'd almost succeeded..."
"But then, he pushed Nemesis along to completion just because he hoped to take her with him...Pity he
underestimated my Buffy's spirit...Even reawakened in a thing like Nemesis she was too much for him..."
The clone remained impassive to the end...Then laughed a little...
"Pretty far-fetched, William...Is there any more?..."
"Just that the Council is studying the Gateway components they found...Theyre still intact at the main
lab...If someone with clearance could get your original back into the Corporation...The system could be
up and running in a few hours..."
He sighed...
"Sure would beat hiding out here for what little time Mearsy can hope to elude us...And even if the
Council and Willow could reconstruct the system...Unlikely if it were destroyed in the escape...It would
likely take centuries to find the right alternate Earth without Mears' coordinates..."
"And..." the clone smiled... "If my original wanted to use this "system"...You really think he couldn't
evade your Council security...?"
Not with six Hunters patrolling Mears Corp. he couldn't...William replied...
"But their Watcher could get him in..."
Hmmn...clone Warren nodded, thoughtful...
"Buffy..." he gave a sharp look at the Hunter...Who with a rush, leaped at William and knocked him
unconscious...
"Sorry...William..." she hesitated, looking at his prone form...
"I didn't want to hurt you..."
"He'll be all right?..." she looked at clone Warren who nodded...
"He'll be fine, Buffy...I promised you he wouldn't be hurt seriously...And he won't..."
"I can stay with him...? Make sure... I mustn't let Evil be done... And he is William..."
Yes...You can...This is just for my protection...he waved to the Katrina...
"Take him...Buffy has to remain on alert..." she picked Walthrop up and waited...
This way...The clone activated a hidden door in the side wall...And went through...Katrina with William
and an anxious-looking Hunter Buffy following...
***
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