The Time Machine...

 
 

PG

Not a BR verse story...

Summary: Desperate to win back his soul and hopefully, Buffy...Spike attempts to use Science to
regain his humanity...Courtesy one Warren Mears...Follows the action of "Gone"...
(Play the Stargate theme as you read the time travel parts...Hey, they're using it in the remake
of the HG Wells story...)

If playing the theme, let it load completely first... Play theme (Stargate SG-1)
Part I...

Willow felt uncomfortable as she stood at the entrance of Spike's crypt...On her diplomatic
mission...

One which...She increasingly suspected...Had more behind it than just trying to keep Spike
enlisted as a mercenary in the cause of good...

But...Buffy had asked, even to the point of near-pleading...And after recent events, how could she
refuse...

Still...She couldn't quite buy Buffy's tale of her spat with Spike...

That they'd argued, he again trying to get her to think of him as a potential feller...She, as always,
resolutely insisting that a friendship...Perhaps eventually, given his help over the past year, a
warm one...Was the most he could expect from her...

They'd fought like that before...And Spike was always there the next day, ready to start all over
again...

Until this one...

And Buffy had been acting strangely with regards to the Blonde One...Dawn had commented on
it, even to the point of mildly joking that maybe Buf was finding herself "attracted" to Spike...

To which Buf had responded with first a shocked and frozen look, then a rather overly forced
laugh...

Me?...Attracted to dead ole Spike?...

Hmmn...Willow Rosenberg's empathic skills might have faded a hair during her wild magics
days but she knew Buffy Summers...Even resurrected Buffy Summers...

And something was up...

***

Warren Mears faced deposition as Fearless Leader of the Masters of the Sunnydale Universe with
the same unflinching courage he'd always shown in his battles with the Slayer...

He whined...

It wasn't his fault, guys...he pleaded to his towel-robed judges, Andrew and Jonathan...

We could've beat Buffy if it hadn't been for that Willow...

"Man...We've heard it before..." Justice Andrew noted...

Yeah...Jonathan chimed in...

And you lied to us about the setting on the invisibility ray gun...It would have killed Buffy...

And there's no penalty harsh enough for one who would kill such a hot babe...he noted...

"You are no longer our Fearless Leader..." Justice Andrew passed sentence...

Well...Then who is gonna be leader?...Warren asked...

They looked at each other...Hmmn...Hadn't thought that far ahead, actually...

"We'll be like the Jedi..." Andrew noted...

A Council...No leader...

Yeah...Jonathan agreed...A Council...

Guys...Need I remind you what happened to the Jedi Council in the fight with Emperor
Palpatine?...Warren pointed out...

Hmmn...Point there...

Still they did come back...

"You, Warren, are deposed...The ban is on you..." Jonathan noted...

You will leave at once and not return to our Council for the next...

"Morons...This is my mom's basement...You get out!!" Warren cried...

And put Boba down, Jonathan...The Fett stays...he told him as the revered Judges headed out...

Hmmn...What'll we do now?...Andrew looked at Jonathan as they stood outside the Mears
home...

Well...We go on job interviews, get responsible jobs, and settle down in our own
places...Jonathan noted...

Or...We could move on to the Shrink ray...

They looked at each other...No doubts about it...

"Shrink Ray!!!" they cried...

Say...Andrew looked at Jonathan...

Are we like...Now on the light side of the Force...Standing ready to assist the Slayer should she
ever have need of our scientific genius?...

[Play theme...March of the new Jedi Council (Earth Division...(Raiders of the Lost Ark...)]

Absolutely...Jonathan noted...

Just as long as she doesn't find out about the Shrink Ray...

***
[Play Theme for Fearless Leader Warren (Everybody Wants to Rule the World...)]

Bastards...Wimps...Wusses...

Warren paced his mom's basement...

That Buffy...Did it to him again...

Thanks to her...His first and only, live, human girlfriend vamoosed...

And his brilliant schemes for ruling Sunnydale as Crime Lord had come to nought...

So far...

But now she knew who was behind the strange things that had been happening to her...And
would be ready...

Probably even watching him now...Her agents everywhere...Lurking...

As she trembled in her home, awaiting the next diabolical scheme of...

He looked at the blackboard...The noble achievements of the former Masters of the Sunnydale
Universe listed...Freeze ray, invisibility ray, robot girls, time-warping system...

And all his doing...His design...His genius...

He looked again...At the time-warping system schematics...

Hmmn...

Suppose...

Just suppose...

The past's mistakes could somehow be...Eliminated...

By going back and preventing them from happening...

After all, he'd already found a way to warp time...

***
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...

***

Ok...Test number three...Warren spoke into his tape recorder...

Tests one and two?...Well...There are no failures in Science...Only lessons learned...

He placed a comic book on the platform of his time-warp traveler...A square box-like device with
three Star Trek transporter discs (special purchase at the last Trek convention)...

Stepped back, pulled out his remote...And set the destination date...

One hour in the future...

Nothing happened...

Except...It seemed dark outside...

Of course, shorter days...He looked at the clock...Whoa...

"It can't be 5:30...It's 4:30..." he looked at the machine...

Oops...

Hmmn...Slight design problem...Easily rectified...

Just gotta make sure it's the traveler who's propelled about in time...Not the rest of the universe...

***

The Time Machine...Part II


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...

***
Ok...Test number ten...Warren noted on tape...

Tests four to nine?...

You don't wanna know...

A small action figure stood on one of the Time Machine's transport pads...

Boba...Heroic adventurer boldly traveling into the future...First...

Of course, if he was gonna send him into the past next...Wouldn't future Boba have already
appeared on one of the pads?...

Ow...Temporal paradoxes give me a headache...Warren thought...

Best to let the Universe handle such things on its own...

Just drop the bomb and let time sort out the bodies...

***

Although Willow's matchmaking had provided a truce, she had forgotten one thing...Until it was
too late...

Patrol...

Buffy was heading out happily...

Nice to see her so eager to kill again, Willow noted...

Wait a minute...She's not looking forward to killing vamps...

She's looking forward to her nightly stroll with...

Oh my God...

Xander told me he was worried about them...

And if they meet tonight...And start discussing what I told each of them...

I'm already in the doghouse with Buffy and Dawn enough as is...

"Buf?..." Willow asked brightly...

How's about some company?...

Ummn...Yeah...Ummn...Sure...Buffy looked at her...

Rats...she thought...Well, maybe I can talk with Spike later...

Gotta get things straight between us...

Just in case he took my invisible slut routine as the new state of things between us...

And of course...To thank him...He could've let me just go on...Er staying there and I might have
dissolved...
God...Thanking him for throwing me out...

"Can I go too?..." Dawn called over...

No...Buffy told her...Finish your homework and bed by ten...

Ten?!!...Dawn glared...

"Dawn...There'll be a new social worker coming...In two days...And we are not gonna screw it up
again...Understand?..."

If you die on Patrol that might "screw things up" you know...Dawn replied...

Hmmn...Willow thought...An out, possibly...

"Hey..." Willow noted, brightly... "Dawn may be right, Buf...It might be wise for you to scrub
Patrol for a few days..."

Wouldn't want to have to explain gaping wounds and hideous scars...

"Will...People out in the streets, vamps out in the streets..." Buffy looked at her...

Yeah...Guess so...

"We'll be back in a couple of hours, Dawn..." Buffy told her...

Ten thirty?...Dawn asked...

Ten-fifteen...

What?...No TV show ends at 10:15...she groused...

***
Boba...Forgive me...Warren moaned, looking at the badly aged action figure standing on the
platform...

Test ten...Results too hideous to bear...

Still Boba had traveled one hour into the future...

He'd just aged about 2000 years...

Well...Edison took years to get the light bulb right...

Back to it tomorrow...
***

The Time Machine...Part III


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...

***
Observation log:

Subject: Warren Mears

Location: His parents' basement

Purpose: Subject Mears a highly dangerous individual...Skilled in science, some knowledge of
magic...Rather lame with the ladies. Likely bent on revenge against those who thwarted him.
Poses a serious threat to Buffy Summers, world-saving Slayer. To be kept under observation
until all activities accounted for...

First night:

9pm...

Ummn..He's not doing anything...Andrew noted to Jonathan as they watched the Mears house
from the security of the new (Earth division) Jedi Council's van....

"So...Put it down..." Jonathan told him...

Subject inactive at present...Continuing to observe...

***
"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 ever
known..."

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 nodded...

***

"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 appointment
prominently 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...

***

"In the end, Will...Buffy has to handle this herself..." Xander noted as Willow got up to go...

And she will...Anya told her firmly...

Whatever the right decision is here...Buffy will make it in the end...

Willow nodded...But paused...

I...Just wish...I could help...

"You're doing that right now, Will..." Xander told her...By being here for her...And by keeping
off the magics thing...

"Actually...I meant...I wish I could help him..." Willow noted...

You gotta admit, Xander...Spike has been trying...There's gotta be something in there...

"I know...And I'm as sorry for him...For his human self, wherever it is...As I dare be..."

But my concern is with our Buf...And if I have to...I will do whatever it takes to keep her safe...

"Even if she hates me for it..." Xander noted...

Willow looked at him...Xander...?

I'll leave it to Buf for now, Will...he told her...But not forever...

Anya saw her out...

"He's a good man, there..." Willow noted...

And stared hard at her...

"I hope...You know..."

"How lucky I am?..." Anya finished...

Well...Yeah...Willow nodded...

And that I'm as ready to protect him as he is to protect Buffy...Or me...Willow regarded her
sternly...

"I know..." Anya nodded...

I won't ever let him down...

"Well...I believe you, Anya...If I didn't..." Willow paused...

"Could you...Help Spike?..." Anya asked...If you went back to the magics...?

I'm never going back...Willow told her...But...

I am gonna check every possible source of help or info I can...She looked down...

And if something or someone can help...I'll find it...And have Tara or someone with the ability to
handle things help him...

Only wish I had before...

"Well..." Anya patted her... "After all, it was a busy year..."

***
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...

***
The Time Machine...Part IV...

Test number eleven...The next morning...

Aged Boba stood ready...This time a note secured to his time-weathered right arm...

Instructions for future Warren...Who should be receiving his visitor in one hour...

Hopefully in one piece...

And a watch secured to his left...To confirm the passage was instantaneous...

***

Dawn went off to school that morning without a word of complaint or a single whine...

Such was the potency of Buffy's new glare...Which remained in place...

Willow thankfully had managed to slip in the night before after Buf had retired and leave for
college before she was up with Dawn...Fortunately this was the day she moved back in with her
parents...At least until she could regain her old dorm room...She left a friendly note, promising to
make proper goodbyes later...And headed out quietly...

But not before she spied Spike's open manuscript on the kitchen table...Half-read judging by
where it was open...

To the section dealing with the arrival of one William the Bloody in Sunnydale...With a footnote,
heavily underlined...

"The author, WSW, was killed on March 13, 1880 in London during a chance meeting with the
vampiress Drusilla...Tormented victim of Angelis... A scholarship student at Cambridge
University, he left behind a young sister and brother...His devoted mother having thankfully
passed on the year before. As to the cause of the events that have led him to his current state...He
can only hope that some vestige of his humanity is responsible. And that the faith his human
friends have displayed in him will someday be proven justified..."

Willow looked at it for a moment...And felt a tear running down her cheek...

Tissue?...Where does Buf keep...Well, one in the wastebasket looks barely used...

There was a torn piece of paper in the basket next to the tissue...She spied the word "Buffy..." on
half...And fished out the other...

And stared...Shocked...At...

"Buffy Walthrop...Buffy Anne Summers-Walthrop..."
***

Half an hour after Boba's voyage into the future had begun, Warren started across the lab and
tripped...Over the suddenly materialized form of the machine...And Boba...

With a new note attached...The watch reading only five minutes later than the original time he'd
set...

But...What was it doing in the middle of the lab?...

He scanned the note...

"Warren...Warren here...Send Boba back...I mean forward to me, idiot...Two hours from his
arrival...And, moron...Send him from exactly where he materialized...And let me know where
that was...I think there was a shift in position...May need to compensate for something in the
earth's rotation or whatever...Timewise all ok...

Yours,
Warren..."

He frowned...What a jerk...

And he might have given him the details of how he got back Boba back safely to the past...

Still...Gotta move on this...

He sent Boba two hours forward...With a new note...

"Hey, moron...Here he is...Leaving from the grid position indicated on the enclosed map...And
maybe the reason he moved is because you didn't bother to send me any data...Jackass...

Yours,

Warren..."
***
"So...There is no Buffy for William..." Spike muttered in the depths of his crypt...

Tearing up a photo of a smiling Buffy...

"What other pleasures can Sunnydale afford?..."

Hell, even Harmony's gone...Not, dear God, that I'd want her back for more than thirty minutes...

And even that would be pushing it...

"I'll make my heaven...In Buffy's reeking corpse...Well...Maybe not..."

The Nibs has had a rough year...Doesn't need me to make it worse...

Hmmn...Of course...Red is...Available...And she always was the sympathetic type...

And I have a feeling the "gay, now" thing is not cast in stone...

"Oh...Monstrous thought...And more to be avoided than the glare of twenty Buffies..."

Not that Red isn't a lamb...And quite attractive in her own way...Hope she realizes
that...Whatever gender she tries next...

After all, she's not a Slayer...Would be difficult for her to deal with me if the chip ever
failed...And cruel of me to try a rebound thing with her...When she's just starting to deal with
her broken heart...Even if I am a bit...With her performance last night...

"Love forswore me...In Drusilla's womb..."

No doubt Buf would say amen to that...But she cares...I know she cares...

And maybe my little remark about Angel and Darla was a tad...Insensitive...

But, hey...William the Bloody here...Not freaking Alan Alda...

"Don't come back unless you're human with a soul, she said..."

A tall order, that...But if there was any way...

"Why...I can smile...And murder whilst I smile..."

Really, I can...Or...I could...

"And cry content to that which grieves my heart..."

Well...Old Angelis is better at that...

"And set the twentieth century's greatest killers to school...Can I do all this and not get a
Buffy?"

If I were human...If I could be human again...Or at least...Oh, God, no...

Not the damned curse...

But if I love her...And I do...I know I do...There must be some of old Will left...Something...

And if I could prove it...Even strengthen it...

"I'll drown more sailors than the mermaids shall...Slay more gazers than the obelisk...Hmmn..."

Perhaps killing is not a proper objective here...

"Regain more soul than Angel has ever had..."

That's more like it...

"Can I do all this and not win my Buffy?...Tut...If she were on the moon...I'd reach and pluck her
down..."

Time to see a Wiccan about a soul, I'd say...
***

Hmmn...Warren...Now several hours into his tests...Had made a happy accidental discovery...

Centered around Heisenberg uncertainty...


The time machine moved in space as well as time...And...With some tinkering...That movement
could be controlled...

Teleportation...A side effect of time-warping travel...

Neat...He could not only travel back...He could avoid the long walk from his parents' basement
to, say, the site where April had first entered Sunnydale...Or where Buffy had first encountered
April...

Of course...Having discovered a practical method of teleportation...And it seemed there was no
limit to how far the machine could travel...At least on Earth...He could forego all revenge
plans...Become the world's richest man, earn every scientific award known...Be hailed by all as
humanity's greatest scientific genius...Even Buffy happy to tell of how she'd known him before
he became the famed Warren Mears...Hmmn...

Nah...Revenge was better...Besides after he'd dealt with Buffy and her friend Willow...Regained
Katrina...Or at least properly punished her for leaving him...And settled with his former
partners...He could go on to do all the other stuff...

Just a few more tests...Including some animals...And he'd be ready...
***
Although Buffy had told Dawn never to go to Spike's crypt alone again some time ago, Dawn
noted that she had not repeated the instruction recently...

Besides...If she brought Janice along...It would hardly be alone, right?...

And she had to know what had happened...

Besides...Buffy hadn't said anything about dinner with Spike tonight...And no one had asked him
what he'd like...

Janice stared at the graveyard gates...

"Your sister's boyfriend lives here?..."

Well...Yeah...He's...He's sort of a caretaker...

But...He's our friend...Not Buf's boyfriend...

God, I hope not...she thought...Although...It wouldn't be the worst thing I can think of...
Spike is preety sexy...And he has been so nice this year...Maybe the chip brought his soul back, at
least some...

God...Janice thought...It makes sense...Buffy is so weird after all...

No surprise at all that her boyfriend would live in a graveyard...
***
Observation log:

Day shift 1/10/02
Subject: Warren Mears
Location: Parents' basement

Subject Mears...Like a true whining lamester...Continues to hole up in his parents' basement.
No signs of activity except for some unusual electromagnetic readings...

"Holy crap!!!..." Jonathan cried...Looking out the window of the van with binoculars...

Warren's time machine...With Boba atop...Had just materialized outside the Mears home on the
lawn...

Warren himself emerging from the basement to check it out...He scanned the area intently...

Fortunately the new Jedi Council members had moved their van well up the street...And out of
sight...

After resetting the machine's controls, Warren went back inside...Thirty seconds later...The
machine disappeared...Boba with it...

Whoa...Andrew pulled away from the video screen to look at Jonathan...The thing
dematerialized...

And so did poor Boba...Who looks really bad, man...he noted sympathetically...

"More monkeying with invisibility, you think?..." he asked Jonathan...

Nah...Electromagnetic readings don't jibe...In fact...They're more like the signature of the time-
warper...

Hmmn...

As nerds...They possessed an innate ability to put themselves in Warren's shoes...

If they had been defeated by the Slayer...Rejected by their own...And...Possessed a time-warping
device...
And had a lot of equipment...And time on his hands...

"Time-travel?..." Andrew suggested...Jonathan nodded thoughtfully...

Only natural...

Hmmn...A diabolical fiend of Science, bent on altering History...Armed with highly dangerous
weapons...Like the freeze ray...

This is...Not a job for us...the Council members agreed...

"We better let Buffy or Spike know..." Andrew noted...Jonathan nodded...

A truly Yoda-like decision, my brother...The Council must only use its powers in defense...

Never take the offensive...
***
Nibs...? Spike looked at Dawn and her friend as they stood just inside his crypt...

He'd been waiting for the earliest moment to leave in search of Willow...To begin his quest...

"What the hell are you doing here, girl?...Don't you know it's almost dark?...When the beasties
begin to crawl out of..."

"Will?...My friend, Janice..." Dawn interrupted hastily...

Charmed...Now what are you doing here, Nibs?...

"Ummn...Well...You were supposed to be coming to dinner..." she noted...

And I just wanted to find out...What you might like?...

"Did your sis send you?...Does she even know you're here?..." he looked at her...

Ummn...Well...Buffy didn't exactly send me...But I'm sure she'd like to know...

"Doubt that, Nibs...Dinner was called...On account of Buffy-spat..."

Sounds like the boyfriend to me...Janice noted...

***
Nearly dark...No Dawn...

Great, thought Buffy...Social worker due tomorrow and I can't find my sister tonight...

Nice...Just what's needed...A phone call to the police and a city-wide manhunt...Oughta sit just
fine with the social worker...

Wait a minute...Oh, God...She didn't overhear Spike and me last night?...

She went over to his crypt...I know it...

Grreat...Well...

It's not like I'm going over to see him per se...Or like he's coming to see me...

Doesn't require me to fulfill my promise last night and stake him...Necessarily...

Should I bring dinner with me?...

Nah...That would be pushing it...

***
Nightfall...

A knock at the door of Warren's parents' basement...

He went over...Who is it?...

"I'm Angela...You Warren?...Roy sent me..."

Ah...The subject of test fifteen...A female vampiress...

From a den known to humans who liked to live beyond the wild to the hair's edge from suicidal
side...

He opened the door and greeted his guest...She scanned him and the basement...

Just another pudgy nerd living in his parents' basement, looking for a thrill...she noted with
relief...

A girl can't be too careful...Especially in Sunnydale...

"Cash up-front..." she noted...

Warren held up a thousand-dollar bill...Courtesy his brilliantly executed bank robbery...

She smiled...Then frowned a bit at him...

You havfta welcome me in, nerd...she thought...
"Ummn...Warren...May I come in?..." she asked politely...

By all means, please...Come in...

As she entered he hit her with the freeze ray...

Cold even for the undead...he giggled to her frozen body...

And sent her back about four hours...To a park outside Sunnydale...

In daylight...

With the machine programmed to return about thirty minutes after arrival...Without
her...Returning to the present at one minute after she was dispatched...And a video camera fixed
on its base...As well as a timer...

Poor kid...Warren noted, watching the video as the thawing Angela began moving only to burst
into flames in the afternoon sun...Well...

She's at peace now...

And test fifteen a triumphant success...

Now just a matter of picking the perfect time...And a good night's sleep...

***
After considerable debate...Necessary but consuming much precious time, new Jedi Council
members Andrew and Jonathan decided to try Spike rather than Buffy...

True, he was a vampire...However...From what they'd learned when he consulted them and from
observing Buffy...He was a vampire who could not kill humans...

And Buffy wasn't likely to have much trust in them...Plus she was probably still pissed about all
the stuff they'd pulled while seduced by the dark side of the Force...

Yeah...Best to start with Mr. Blond...

They reached the cemetery where Spike's crypt lay using their signal frequency detection
equipment to pinpoint Spike's chip's whereabouts...

***
Dawn felt terrible...Buffy nixed dinner?...

Seemed preety harsh...And she could guess that Will had been looking forward to it...

Of course he might have done something...Awful...To merit expulsion from Buffy's A list...

But still...

"Well...Nibs, that's about the size of it..." Spike told her...

And I have to be off...

"Where are you going?..." Dawn asked...Worriedly...

Not to Central America or some place like that she hoped...

"Actually...If you must know...I'm off to see dear old Red..."

Willow?...Dawn stared at him...

"You know me, Miss Nibs...Pick yourself up, brush yourself off...Start all over again..." he
grinned...

Willow?...But...

And think of the challenge...he noted slyly...

Let me escort you ladies to the front gate...

Place gets a leetle unsafe around this time...

"Creeps and weird types just seem to congregate here..." he smiled at Janice...Who smiled back...

Buffy is an idiot to let this guy get away...she thought...Of course, working in a graveyard isn't
exactly the greatest career possible...

But maybe it's just a temporary type thing...Just while he's in grad school or something...

***
Buffy arrived just as Spike was guiding the girls through the front gate...Nothing having popped
out at them thankfully...

"Dawn?!!..." she hollered...

Loud enough to wake the dead...At least those undead and still sleeping...

Dawn attempted an explanation...Spike attempted an explanation...Which Buffy brushed angrily
off...Threatening him with immediate...Er, looking at Janice...reporting to the police...Of his
attentions to young teenaged girls...
Now that was a trifle harsh...he noted...

"Well...Ms. Summers...Don't fret..." he told her coldly...

"You won't be bothered by my soulless likes again..."

And stalked off into the night...

Followed, at a respectful distance...By Andrew and Jonathan...

***

Dawn was pissed...And said so...After Janice had been safely deposited...

He hadn't done anything except see they made to the front gate alive...

And all she'd wanted to do was see if he'd like anything special for dinner...

And to see if dinner was still on...Which her sis...With extreme rudeness, Dawn noted...

Had canceled...Without so much as telling her...

It just...

"Enough!!..." Buffy glared at her sis...But Dawn saw the guilty look...

"Will is really hurt, Buffy..." she noted...

It's one thing to stake him for killing somebody...It's another thing to make him suffer cause you
don't want him around...

"That thing is a maniac!..." Buffy yelled... "Don't tell me how to treat him..."

Fine...Dawn sniffed...And remained silently disapproving as they rode home...

Until they reached their street...When she allowed as how Willow would probably make him feel
much better...

Willow had a little sympathy in her soul...A leetle compassion...

"Spike went over to Willow's?..."

Hmmn-hmmn...Dawn nodded slightly...

Why?...Why would he go to Willow's?...
"I don't know...Maybe when a guy is stood up and treated harshly...He turns to some nice kind
girl for a little..."

We better check this out...Buffy noted...Turning the car around...

Never can be sure what Spike is up to...
***

Spike frowned as the two nerds gave him their report...

Which they'd managed to blurt out before he could chase them off...

"So...Dr. Warrenstein has built himself a time machine..." he looked at them...

Of course, he noted...You boys are not high in our list of trustworthy sources...

Still...It sounds about what old War would be trying after that last fiasco...

"Why don't we do a little preemptive striking..." Spike noted...

With you gentlemen in close support, I'm sure victory will be ours...

They headed out...Spike admiring the van...Quite a nice little nerdmobile...

"Thanks..." Andrew nodded...

Please note the efficiency of our control room design...Modeled on the original Enterprise...

Hmmn...Spike thought as they rode along...Time-travel...

Interesting...
***
The deposed Fearless Leader was clearing up his work area and awaiting his mom's call to
supper...

When uninvited guests arrived...

Three of them...At the basement door...

"Guys...Spike...Nice to see you..."

Warren?...Spike looked at him...

"The boys here tell me...You've been making naughty-naughty with time machines and what-
not..."
Ummn...Time machines?....Warren repeated brightly....

Where is your little gadget?...And have you done anything...And I mean anything...With it yet?

Warren backed away...Spike donned his "work face"...

The former leader was prepared for this...Thanks to Spike's little chip maintenance call...When
he'd held on the chip's schematics...Just in case he ever had a return visit from his former
customer...

"Hold it right there, Spike..." Warren called...And pressed a button on his remote...

A sudden wave of pain caused the Blonde One to stagger...

"You've got his chip's signal frequency..." Jonathan glared at him...

Warren bowed slightly, grinning...Fearless Leader has still got it...

"Man...You're gonna hurt him..." Andrew moved to help the vampire who'd collapsed to the
floor in pain...

Warren removed his finger...Hey, might as well have an audience for my farewell...

"Any closer and I send Mr. Blond into convulsive shock..." he told them...

Andrew helped Spike to his feet...What'll we do?...Andrew hissed to Jonathan...Let him have his
rant...Jonathan told him...And move over to the workbench...

Spike looked at Warren...

"So...Nerdenstein...What the hell are you planning to do with the soapbox thing?..."

This...Warren noted proudly... "Soapbox thing"...Is a time machine...

Cool...Andrew noted to Jonathan...If it really works...Lame if it doesn't of course...Hmmn...

"Maybe we should reconsider the deposition..." he whispered...

Light side of the force...Jonathan reminded him...Remember...We use our genius for good now...

Right...Andrew sighed...But good is always so slow...

Wait a mo...Spike looked at the pudgy nerd...

"How can you go back and change the past without altering yourself?..."

Arrgh...Warren sighed...Not the damned paradox again...Look...I alter the past...The world
around me changes...But I'm still the Warren of the timeline where things went wrong...

"But then...There are two of you?..."

So?...

And what if the other Warren doesn't like your altered universe, builds a machine, and goes
back, and alters the past you altered...Three Warrens?...Spike puzzled...

And he'd actually discussed the original book with its author, Mr. Wells...At his club one night
in 1896...

Not in the timeline I altered...It would be another timeline where three, even an infinite number
of Warrens exist...Warren noted...

Hey...he looked at Spike's confused face...It's an infinite universe...With infinite potential
timelines...Anything's possible...And probably is...

Andrew and Jonathan nodded...The old temporal paradox in a nutshell...

Hmmn...A chance to alter the past...Handy thing to have around, Spike thought...

"Best not to think about the ramifications..." Warren noted...

And now...If you'll excuse me...Time to rewrite the history of the past year...he pressed the
remote...

Nothing happened...

Andrew and Jonathan grinned...Moving aside to reveal...A small transmitter taken from the
workbench equipment...

"Jamming signal?..." Warren frowned at them...

Jamming signal...they nodded...And that goes for the signal to our friend's chip...Andrew added...

The Jedi have overcome the evil Emperor...Jonathan noted...

Get off that thing...Spike told him...Or I will have to experience a mix of pain and pleasure
throwing you across the room...

Deposed Fearless Leader backed off...

"Now..." Spike looked at him...How does this thing work?...
***

No sign of Spike at Willow's Buffy noted...

He must have been pulling your leg, Dawn...she told her...

And lucky he didn't pull it off...she glared at her sis...

"But...If he's not here...?" Dawn frowned...

Spike is a big vamp, Dawny...He can take care of himself at night...Buffy told her...

"But...He was so hurt...What if?...If he decided...To do something?..."

Buffy looked at her...Spike?...

"Dawn, Spike is not the suicidal type...And vamps have a well-developed survival instinct...Even
when their love affairs go sour..."

He's a poet, isn't he?...Or Will was...Dawn noted...

"There's Willow..." Dawn noted...

Where's she going?...

Buffy looked at the hurrying Willow...

I think she's headed for Spike's...she said, half to herself...

Why would she be going to Spike's?

Well...

"Dawn, lets get you home..."

Quickly...she thought...
***

I'll need the right clothes, Spike thought...

Hmmn...Suitable for 1880...

Ah...Just the thing...He slipped down the ladder into the depths of his crypt and returned
with...His Randy suit...

Or whoever Randy, lame nerd that he was, had been...Stolen while trying to disguise himself
from the loan shark demon who'd hounded him a short time ago...Perfect cover for 1880...Hell, it
might do for 1780...

Hmmn...He looked at himself...If he had glasses...And he darkened his...Wore a wig, he corrected
to himself...Must never mess with the peroxide...

He'd almost be human William again...Bodes well, he thought..

Dru will never be able to tell us apart...

Until it's too late....

***

Willow, feeling terrible...All my fault, she chided herself...Was on her way to the crypt to begin
making amends...

Of course, if Buf had come straight out and told Spike herself that she wanted to make peace...

Buffy, after dropping Dawn at the house, followed at a distance, not letting Willow see
her...After seeing that look on poor Spike's face back at the crypt...

Well...She'd nerved herself up for this one...After all, it wasn't right to hurt the poor fellow...Just
because she was angry at herself for her lack of self-control and all around recent sluttiness...

Oh...God...He was so upset...So hopeless...What if?...Dawn was right?...

Spike?...Commit suicide?...Ridiculous...

Then again...If someone had told her a year ago that in a year she'd be on the verge herself...Not
to mention...Resurrected...And he was so hurt...

She picked up the pace to assault speed...

***

"So...Spike is really gonna try going back?..."

Andrew looked at Jonathan as they headed home in the "Council"'s van...

Looks like it...Jonathan noted...

And all for the love of Buffy Summers...Wow...

The love-lorn vampire and the Slayer who must kill him...Tragic, man...Andrew noted...

But what's he gonna do back there that'll change things?...Andrew asked...

Jonathan shrugged...He didn't confide in us, remember...Just got the operating instructions from
old Warren and headed off...

Hey...A thought suddenly struck Jonathan...Wait a minute...That rat...

Andrew looked at him...

"Warren...He didn't mention setting the machine to go back with Spike, did he?...Just told him
how to set the system to send him back?..."

If he goes back...Without the machine?....Andrew looked at his partner...

"We've got to warn him..." Jonathan noted...As Buffy's unseen but benevolent new protectors...

Jedi Council duty...

But...Where does he hang out?...Andrew wondered...

"Well...Unless Buffy lets him live in her basement...Gotta be in that graveyard somewhere..."
Jonathan noted...

We should be able to track him until he goes...

"On it, man..." Andrew headed for the van's transmitter and signal detection equipment...

Jedi nerds to the rescue...

***

Willow entered the crypt and stared at him...

Spike?...

He stood on the platform of the machine, decked out in Randy suit...A dark wig, glasses...

"What the hell are you doing?..." she asked...

He grinned... "Just tell Buffy...I'm still a fool for love..."

And vanished...Without the machine...

***

The Time Machine...Part V...

Buffy raced into the crypt...To find Willow staring at the time machine and the space where
Spike had been standing...

Followed closely by...the new Jedi Council (Earth division) members, Andrew and Jonathan...

Who were discussing one minor point...That had occurred to Andrew...

Spike had never asked Warren about how to get back...Even if Warren had instructed him on
how to keep the machine with him...He wouldn't have known...

"You don't think...He was planning to stay back there anyway?..." Andrew looked at his
partner...

Of course...He is a vampire...They live forever, right?...Unless somebody kills æem...

Maybe he thought it'd be fun to relive the last century...

Maybe he's just got a natural gift with machines...Like us...Jonathan noted...

***
"Will?...Where's Spike?..." Buffy looked at the shocked Willow...

He...He...He's...

Gone...

Rright...Buffy looked at her...

"Where?..."

Willow...? Where did he go?...

Willow pointed at the spot where William had stood...

"He was right there...And then..."

Buffy blinked...Willow?...You?...You didn't?

Willow came out of her trance...What?...

"God, no...Buffy?!...What are you thinking?...I'd never stake Spike..."
Unless, of course...

"William?!" Buffy screamed...

The new Jedi entered...

"Spike?..." Jonathan called...

There's a little thing you should know about the machine, man...

Buffy whirled on them...

You...

Slayer locked onto target...Andrew noted...

Willow caught the look...

"Buffy...I don't think they..."

"Did Spike already go?..." Jonathan looked at her...

***
The new Jedi Council explained the situation to the Slayer and her friend...

Back in time...To 1880...? Willow looked at them...

Gee...I would've thought he'd go back a couple of years, warn past Spike about the Initiative, and
give him how to do it instructions for killing the Slayer...Willow thought...

It must be love at that...she noted to herself, smiling a little...

Buffy had run over to the machine...Although Spike had taken the remote, it was useless without
the machine...

However...The destination date and positional map coordinates were entered on the machine's
front readout panel as well as stored in the remote...

March 13, 1880...4 am...

The morning of the day William Soames Walthrop had his little encounter with Destiny...In the
form of an insane vampiress...

Willow came over...

"Say...Isn't that the day?..."

He died...Buffy finished...

And she didn't need the nerds to translate the map coordinates to know where he'd arrived...

London...Probably as near as possible to where Darla's pride was hanging out...Darla,
Angelis...and Drusilla...

And where his counterpart, young William was blissfully unaware of the fate awaiting him...

He's gone back...To change things...Buffy noted...Staring at the machine...

"But...?" Willow looked around...

What's changed...Nothing...I mean...

"We haven't changed...Unless we're protected....Somehow?..." she looked at Andrew...Who
shook his head...

Only Spike's unaffected by any changes he made in the timeline...However...

It would be a new timeline...Jonathan finished...Not ours...

"Then...He went back...For nothing?..." Buffy looked at them...

Oh, no...Andrew noted...The world he's in now is changing...But that's the world he's in...

It may be very nice...Jonathan noted...

"But...You can't know...He has no way to get back..." Buffy looked at them and Willow...

Well...Buf...Willow thought...Maybe it's for the...

"He's trapped there..." Buffy noted...

Unless of course he comes walking back in the crypt door in a few minutes to tell us how his
repeated century went...she added...

And we may never meet again...she thought...In this world or that one...

"I've got to get him..." Buffy told Willow...Who looked at her...

What?!...

Wow...Andrew noted quietly to Jonathan...Shakespearian, man...

"Buffy?!...There is no way in hell you are going back to 1880 to "get" Spike!!!..." Willow told
her...

I just want to make sure he's not stuck there...Buffy replied...

"I'll set the machine to bring me a minute before he got there...He'll appear...We come back..."

It's easy, right guys?...She looked at the Council members...

Well...Jonathan pondered...There may be a little difficulty getting the exact time and even more
with the exact position...

Still...We probably could set you down fairly...

"Buffy?!!!..." Willow raged... "Are you out of your recently resurrected and half-melted mind?"

I have to go, Willow...she told her...

I have to...She looked at the crypt wall...

"He did this for me..."

Right...Willow noted...And now he's happy in another universe where maybe things are working
out better between the two of you...

But he's not with me...Buffy looked at her friend...Quietly...And steadily...

Oh, my God...Willow closed her eyes...Tears welling up...

Oh, the dear God of my fathers and mothers...

"I'm going..." Buffy said quietly...

Wow...Andrew looked at Jonathan...

This side of the Force has its moments...
***

The Time Machine...Part VI...

At Willow's insistence...Backed up by a threat to dig out her old magics skills...They waited for
thirty minutes...

In the faint hope that somehow William would have found his own way back...And the trip
would not be necessary...

At least he could've sent us a telegram...Willow noted...Like Doc Brown in "Back to the Future
II"...

Alternate timeline, Jonathan replied...It would've gone to alternate Buffy and Willow...

But...Willow pointed out...If we go back...Alter things?...

Do we have the right to take the chance?...What if we do something that alters history, gets
people killed?...she noted...

Hell...Just preventing Spike from stopping his own transformation'll kill close to 40,000
people...she did not say...

"The Powers That Be didn't worry when they allowed the monks to create Dawn..." Buffy noted
quietly...

And change our lives...Maybe even cause my mom's early death...

"Not that I...Or Mom...Would ever blame Dawn..." she hastily added...

They didn't lift a finger to save poor Will...or Dru...Even Darla and Liam for that matter...

I've played their game long enough...

If they have a problem with this...Tough s-t...

I'd like a chance to talk with them for a few minutes in any case...she noted...

Buffy Summers, resurrected Slayer vs the Powers That Be...I'd take odds on that...Willow
thought, grinning...

But...If she's going...I'm going...she thought...And said so...

"Will?...Only one of us has to go...It'll just take a minute..."

"If...Everything goes right..." Willow noted...

And if it doesn't...You may find yourself facing the Big Three...Alone...

Even if Spike can join you, it'd be tough odds...

"Besides..." Willow grinned... "In 1880 my no-magics pledge doesn't exist...And I've been
getting preety antsy..."

And...If you're right...If we just go back for one mo...Hey...I'm a history buff...she noted...

"Don't make me force you to tell me how wonderful it'll be to have me along..." Willow grinned
at her friend...

Mind-control spells always leave big headaches behind...For the practitioner as well as the
victim...

Actually...Buffy grinned...It will be wonderful to have you along, Will...

Pity we can't play dress up...Willow smiled...

Hopefully we won't have to...

Jonathan turned to his Jedi brother...

"The Slayer will need competent scientific assistance, my brother..." he noted...

Just in case that idiot Mears is as dumb as he looks...

He came over to the two ladies...Who smiled at each other...

We've got a mascot...Willow thought...

"Shall we go?..." Jonathan was properly solemn...

Buffy looked at Jonathan...And grinned...

"You know, Jonathan...If you keep this up..."

I might end up remembering you only as the sweet guy who gave me that nice "Class Protector"
umbrella...

***

Before departure, Buffy gave Andrew careful instructions...He was to contact Tara and Xander
immediately...Explain things...With her own handwritten note in support...

"Tara?..." Willow asked...

If we get stuck...Buffy looked at her...

Willow nodded...
Besides...If Warren makes trouble, Tara can deal with him in ways Xander and Andrew
can't...Willow nodded...

"Jonathan?..." Buffy looked at him...

Are you absolutely sure you want to do this?...You don't have to...

"You saved my life a lot, Buffy..." he told her...

And...I guess...I did let you down...Some...

No problem...she told him...Sunnydale can get boring at times...

"I can understand you wanting to liven things up a little...And no one was hurt, thank
goodness..."

"I want to...And you may need me..." he noted...

Ok...She smiled at him...

"But as to practical matters...You are sure this thing can handle three of us?..."she asked him...

Are you kidding?...Mears wouldn't have gotten close to the thing unless it could carry a dozen
people safely...he grinned...

They rechecked the controls and the three of them got on the platform...

Andrew solemnly made the Vulcan sign...

"Live long...And prosper...My friends..." he noted...

Jonathan attempted to return the sign...

Always had a problem with that thing...he noted to Willow...

As they vanished...

***
The Time Machine...Part VII


Hmmn...Willow thought, looking around the alley yard they'd materialized in...

1880 stinks...Literally...

Horse smells...Unpleasant ones, with the accompaniment of human waste, rotting garbage, and a
number of stinks she couldn't identify...

***
They'd arrived about 125 seconds before Spike's materialization should've occurred...Jonathan
told them...After they'd dragged the machine as close as possible to a flickering gaslight so he
could read the instruments in the dark...

A leetle off the one minute mark...But given the 121 year trip and the fact that Mears was too
cheap to buy new processors...Not bad...

Only problem was...It was now ten minutes since the Blonde One should've made his
appearance...

Of course...Jonathan noted brightly...Spike's arrival time could have deviated just like
ours...Maybe a little more...

They looked around...Hmmn, Willow thought...There's an awful lot of wooden trash in this
alley...

And Spike would've materialized a bit more than one foot off the ground...Not having the
machine under him and all...In the dark...If he actually arrived before us...And fell...

Oh...not that Willow thought...She looked at her friend who was also looking round...Clearly
Buffy was thinking the same thought...

Just like the Powers That Be to have pulled something like that...

Jonathan looked at them...Geesch guys...Sorry...

Not every first journey into the unknown ends in...he thought...

Oh...Wait a mo...

Lemme check the positional data...Jonathan told them...

Maybe there was a variance there too...

***
Welcome home...Spike thought to himself...As he donned "work face" to frighten off the petty
thief trying to paw through the pockets of the young man he'd found unconscious on the dark
street...

Strange clothing that, the thief paused to consider as he fled in panic from the mad ghoul he'd
seen...Pity I couldn't have got it off 'im...
Spike pulled himself to his feet and stared around the street...

William S. Walthrop back in...He grinned... "His" city...Well...

Unlike a certain LA type he could mention...A rather busted LA type he noted happily...Walthrop
could share the great City of London with all...

My God...He thought...I did it...The first successful journey back more than 100 years through
time...

Mr. Wells would be so pleased...In about 13 years or so when he writes the book...

That's one small...Well, one rather long step considering the fall he'd taken...One giant leap for...

Hmmn...Wonder if making a heroic contribution to scientific progress counts as points toward
ones redemption...

So...He frowned...I see the machine didn't come with me...

No doubt old Mearsy is laughing up his sleeve at that one...However, the only real problem there
for me is...If Willow tells Buffy what I've done...And they have the machine...

But, then, fortunately...Willow has no idea what I've done...Just that I disappeared in front of
her...

Poor Red...A shock that...

Besides...Buffy would probably...Will probably...Say "good riddance"...

Hmmn...Looks like I arrived about when I wanted...Well before dawn...

Pity I don't know where the old gang is right now...I could end this all very quickly...

Not to mention quite a few bonus redemption points...Well, later...

For now...Where the hell did I stay when I came to London this week?...

My God...Amelia...Phil...I could...

No...Don't think a quick visit from their dear brother in my current state would contribute much
to their future peace of mind...

Maybe a quick letter...? No...If everything works out...They won't be needing any info on my
tragic disappearance...

I won't have disappeared...My counterpart, anyway...

Would be nice to stop by Mum's grave though...If I succeed that'll be the first thing I do...

Nice to be able to tell her I finally made some good...And that I met a very nice girl...

Whom, unlike poor old Dru...I'd have been very pleased to have her meet...

After all...I'll have a lot of time on my hands...

Now, to the task at hand...Crocker Street, perhaps?...

No, that was 1878...Christmas week...

***

Hah...Jonathan grinned at Buffy who turned at his sound...

The machine has a possible variance in position of 1000 yards at this distance in time...

Mears and his crappy Celeron processors...Jonathan snorted...

"Meaning?...Spike could be a thousand yards away?..." Buffy looked at him...

Exactly...Jonathan nodded...But...We have the chip's signal frequency...Give me a mo and I can
adjust my remote to detect it...

"You have a remote for Warren's machine too?..." Willow asked him...

It's for the old time warper...And some of our other stuff...he noted...All three of us had them...

We were a partnership once...Before the dark side got to Mears...he sighed...

And smiled at Willow...Who could empathize...Having flirted with the dark side herself...

"But I guess...It was an evil partnership...So just as well..." he noted...

She nodded and grinned...

Thank you for coming Jonathan...Buffy told him solemnly...

"We're gonna need some clothes..." Willow noted...

Unless we can pass ourselves off as some kinda acting troupe or something...

And I don't think what we're wearing passes for the demure young lady of 1880, she pointed out
to Buffy...

Neat...She thought...I was hoping we'd have to play 1880 dress up...

Just as long as I don't have to wear a corset...
***
Warren Mears had not been idle in the time since Spike and his former partners had taken his
time machine and left the former lair of the Masters of the Sunnydale Universe aka Warren's
parents' basement...

He'd whined and fretted...Loudly...For the best part of an hour...

However...He could savor the fact that he had so cleverly avoided informing Spike of the need to
set the machine to travel with him...

Although even that was partly mitigated by his remembrance that Spike had not seemed
especially interested in the return procedure...And his realization that an Immortal vampire
probably didn't have much cause for concern on that score anyway...

In fact...He'd been a leetle nervous...What if Spike simply endured the 121 years and was now on
his way over...With a minor complaint as to customer service...

But then, temporal paradox...And who the hell cared if an alternate Warren was getting his throat
ripped out right now...

Anyway...Back to the issue at hand...Regaining his machine...And...Revenge...

After all...He knew where to go...

He'd been to Spike's crypt...To deliver that work of art, tragically mishandled...The Buffy-bot...

The...Original Buffy-bot...He corrected...

And...He had...As Dr. Smith once said on "Lost in Space" in a similar situation...

A proxy...

"Come...Here..." he called...

Yes, Warren?...the repaired and enhanced Buffy-bot smiled, stepping forward..

"Do you have any orders?..." she beamed...

Lucky for me Spike brought what was left of the original back in October...

Expecting a free repair...And claiming she "broke down"...

A crime the crappy way he kept up the maintenance on a work of art like that...

"Yes, Buffy...er bot..." he grinned...

I do...

***


The Time Machine...Part VIII

Hmmn...Willow frowned as they continued cautiously moving down 1880s London’s dark streets...Following the directional signal put out by Spike’s chip...Buffy carrying the time machine by her side, a bit awkwardly...Jonathan watching the blinking light of his remote...

No clothes hanging out, waiting to be grabbed...

Geesh...In all the time travel movies and TV shows, there’s always clothes hanging, waiting to be taken...

Courtesy no dryers...

Of course it is only 4:45am...Still...Don’t people here trust each other enough to leave clothes out to dry at night?...

So much for my grandad and all his talk about how safe people used to feel in his and his dad’s day...Willow noted to herself...

They passed a grim-looking woman...Neither old nor young...Cheaply dressed but in colors that were a leetle...Hmmn...Prostitute?...Willow wondered...Or, maybe...She looked at Buf who shook her head...Nope, prostitute...

The woman ignored them expect to glance at Jonathan...And turn away...Clearly unimpressed by what she took to be a clod-hopping provincial...

Some Australian oaf, judging by the clothes...the woman thought...Maybe an Etalian...

Definitely not a fellow with the l’argent to persuade her to make his dreams come true...

Hey...Willow thought...Seeing the disdainful look on the woman’s face...

Nobody disses our nerd mascot...And went over to Jonathan, putting an arm round his side...

:”How’s it going cutie?...” she asked the startled Jonathan, loud enough for the woman to hear...As they continued down the street, Buffy moving ahead...

Buffy paused and looked back at her friends...Letting them catch up...

“He’s still moving...And fast...” Jonathan told her...

Hmmn...And daylight coming...

“He’ll have to put in for the day, soon...” Buffy noted...

And we can’t wander the streets dressed like this, with the machine...

“Think your lady friend back there might point us to a place where we could stop a minute and get our bearings?...And some reasonable daytime clothes?...” she asked Willow...

I’ve got some cash on me...

My “lady friend”?...Willow bristled a little...

You know...The “gay, now” thing doesn’t mean I go for every...she thought...

“I think she’d want 1880s cash...” Jonathan noted...

***

Hmmn...Spike thought...Forster Arms, that’s it...

Old Henry’s digs...He used to let me use them once in a while when I came to London...

God, good old Henry...Haven’t thought of him in years...Fortunately...Considering what a good friend he was...

Regular Harris, that fellow...With a bit more culture, of course...

After all...We were Cambridge men...

However...He noted the first blush of dawn tickling the clouds...

Hmmn...”the first blush of dawn tickling the...” Nice that...

My poetic sensibility seems to be returning...Wonder if it’s the effect of time-travel...

Or...love...

Practical matters though, Walthrop...Be quite a waste to burn up before I get anything accomplished after all this trouble...

He set about looking for a suitable shelter...After all, now that he’d remembered Forster Arms he knew the route Will would be taking to the Herricks’ party...As well as the route he’d be taking after he left...

Two sterling opportunities...He’d pull this off...

And with luck...Maybe even alternate 2002 Buffy would appreciate his efforts...If they ever met...

But then, that wasn’t the chief goal here...

He was setting his sights on Eternity...Where alternate timelines wouldn’t matter...

But souls would...

***

William Soames Walthrop, human, unaware of the doom awaiting him, slept on in his rooms...

Dreaming of the coming night’s encounter with Cicely Addams, the woman he had worshiped from afar for months...Wealthy, beautiful, cultured Cicely...

Who’d smiled at him one night when his dear friend Henry had introduced him round...Giving his friend Walthrop, a poor but determined Cambridge scholarship student a glimpse of London high society...

Cicely...Who since he’d made the sole object of his poetic labors...Despite his current state of poverty which might well have daunted a more practical sort of man...

He was sure he would, in time, achieve whatever position and wealth would be required...A mere side benefit in his struggle to create a new beauty with his writing and bring it to the world...

A side blessing that would allow him to do his proper duty towards his dear little sister Amelia and young brother Phil...He was after all, their support and hope now that sweet dear Mum had succumbed to consumption and years of endless slaving in service to provide her oldest and all her children with the chances she’d never had...

Besides...Cicely was not the type to be concerned with such trivial matters as wealth or position, he was sure...
Only beauty...

His sheath of poems waiting on top of the tall bureau near the bed...True, some negative comments had been made...One oaf going so far as to holler out that his poetry was the most bloody awful stuff he’d ever ...But only Cicely’s opinion mattered...

And beauty finds beauty...

***
The remaining new Jedi Councilor had performed his duty and placed calls to Tara and Xander immediately...Both of whom as he’d expected and been warned by Buffy...Did not believe a word he said...

But all that mattered was that they were coming over...To check things out...

Andrew frowned as he watched Spike’s TV...Crappy job of stealing cable, man...

Got get the guy set up with a decent dish system...

A leetle gift from the Jedi to a tragically condemned...

Geesch...He looked where the machine had been...

They’re taking their time about the return... I expected some deviation in return time and all but...

He looked at the screen... Malcolm McDowell as HG Wells was preparing to make his journey into the future...In pursuit of David Warner as an evil mad surgeon aka Jack the Ripper...

Well, natch...He found the one time travel movie playing tonight...And close to the right time period, too...

A leetle silly though...All this stuff about “time-spheres”...But the machine looked neat, anyway...

He looked again at the empty spot...Gee...What to do if they don’t return?...

Well...Maybe that “Tara” could help...Buffy seemed to think she could if they got into any trouble...

A true Jedi embraces patience, he reminded himself...Returning to the screen...

Which was more blurry than ever...Bummer...Oh well...

Consider it Jedi training, dude...A lesson in patience and fortitude...

Sorely needed after their late flirtation with the dark side...
***

Near Spike’s crypt, Warren had paused...With Buffy-bot II...Who waited patiently with him...

He continued to adjust the signal on his transmitter...He’d hoped to simply command the machine to teleport to his position and make a quick exit...But it had become clear almost immediately that the machine was in use...

No doubt someone had gone in search of Spike...

Change of strategy...He couldn’t control where the time machine would reappear under the circumstances...But he could affect whether it returned...And when

He now aimed at delaying the machine’s return...If its users were trying to return...

He had no intention of preventing the return of the machine permanently...But he saw no reason why he shouldn’t delay its and its users’ return until he’d had a chance to prepare a proper welcome...

After all, no way was he gonna go out and try to build another one...Geesh...
***
“Xander?...” Tara spoke into her cell phone... “Did you just...?”

Nerd call?...Yeah, Xander replied...

“You think it’s legit?...I can’t get hold of Willow and I was afraid to call Buffy’s with Dawn there...” she hesitated...

Legit?...Xander paused...

That Buffy and Willow have gone back to 1880 to fetch Spike who’s on some fool’s errand...Maybe involving his murder and transformation?...

Sounds pretty far-fetched...Tara noted...

Well...Xander replied...This is Sunnydale...And our evil nerds are not your average all talk, no superweapons, evil nerds...

Something’s definitely up...Probably involving an ambush...

I suppose we should be grateful the nerds want to include us...he pointed out...

“Should we go over or no?...” she asked...

I’m worried about Willow...But I don’t want to make things worse if somethings going on...
“You mean as in?...We become the nerds’ Buffy-Willow bait?...” he replied...Anya shaking her head and waving her hands...

Well...Been there, done that..he sighed...But...Buffy can usually deal when that happens...

And if by any chance what’s his name is telling the truth... he paused...Looking sheepishly at Anya...

Well...At least lets not make it too easy for them...he went on...Lets meet at the cemetery gate and go in together...

“And, Tara?...Remember...The no-magics pledge doesn’t apply to you...”

“Be there in fifteen...” he hung up...

Honey, by any chance?..You weren’t in London in 1880?..he asked Anya...

Hmmn...Nope, sorry...

“Paris was as close as I got that year...” she told him...

Say?...Anya looked at him...

“Any one else going to Spike’s?...Besides you and Tara?...” she asked brightly...

After all, unlike Willow, Tara had never...In her presence, anyway...Specifically cast her sexual orientation in stone...

Not that Anya placed complete faith in Willow’s “gay, now” either...

She’d met too many demons as Anyanka who changed their orientation...As well as their form...On a daily basis...

***

Hmmn...Warren thought, rising from the transmitter...That should do it...

The machine would be prevented from rematerializing until he shut down the jamming signal...

Now...Perhaps a quick test of the upgraded Botty Mark II before showtime...

He had her smash a gravestone to bits...Perfect...

He’d aimed for strength trebling Buffy’s in case they met again...And it sure looked like he’d got it...
Now...As to her improved personality...

Just in case she was called on for a little acting to fool her friends...

“Buffy...” Warren called...She came over...

Please engage Buffy personality program...he commanded...

She struck a typically Buffy pose...

“Warren...What are you doing here?...” she asked...A slight glare...

Very nice...he told her...

Now...

How do you feel about...Spike...And Angel?...

“I don’t know about Spike...” she sighed sadly... “I know he’s been trying to help me and I want to encourage any humanity left in him...”

But he is a killer...She looked down...

Well, former killer...

“But I’m trying to do what I can for him...”

Warren grinned...Very empathic, Buffy...Just great...

“And as for that bloody stupid twit...” A rather different note of emotion crept into the bot’s voice...

If he’s gonna leave me for doing...” she paused, blinking a bit...Warren hadn’t had much data regarding Buffy’s old vamp boyfriend... “Whatever he does in LA...”

He can just stay there...she concluded...A rather Buffy look of anger on her face...

Warren congratulated himself...A real improvement with the psych profile programming...

With a leetle more data, she could pass for Buffy full-time...Even with her friends...

Which had been his intention...Had his Crime Lord schemes worked out...

After all, Sunnydale would still need a Slayer after Buffy had been dealt with...And one who would be able to obtain him info about her friends and any unique abilities or knowledge they had...While remaining compliantly obedient to Sunnydale’s new ruler...Would have worked out quite nicely...

Of course he’d in large part simply built on Willow’s improvements over the summer in the bot’s personality profiles...

After all...He was not one to spend time reprogramming the bot from scratch...Just one to build on Willow’s enhancements and take sole credit for the result...
***

The Time Machine....Part IX...

Part IX...

From her corner, the prostitute was occasionally glancing down the street at them, Willow noted...

Beginning to wonder about us she realized...

Hmmn...When did the Ripper make his appearance?...Willow wondered...

Now there’s an explanation of the mystery for you...Not some member of the royal family or the Queen’s favorite surgeon...Two oddly dressed young women and their small, equally strange-looking male companion...

Actually...If Jonathan were taller...Say...Angelis’ height...

Hmmn...Maybe not such an odd explanation at that considering Darla’s pride is in town...

“Lets talk to her...” Buffy suggested...

Maybe we have something she’d want besides cash...

At least she might be able to give us some info...

“I dunno Buffy...She doesn’t look like the info-giving type...” Willow noted...

Maybe you could persuade her to be...Buffy looked at her friend with a faint smile...

Me?...Now just a minute, Buf...Oh...Willow thought...

“You want me to magics her?...As in mind-control?...” Willow looked at Buffy...

You can do that?...Jonathan was suitably impressed...

Well...Yeah...Willow nodded, a hair proudly...
Well...I think I could...

At least...Maybe...Persuade her to like us enough to help us...

“But you said...” she turned to Buffy... “No more magics...Under any...”

That was 2002, this is 1880 Buffy noted...

Different times, different measures...

Especially when the...man?...Well, the one...You love is in danger...Willow finished to herself...

“We can’t wait to find clothes and figure out where we can stow the machine...” Buffy went on...

“Will, either you persuade her gently...Or I persuade her...My way...”

Willow looked at her friend...Whose expression was a curious mix of embarrassment and pleading...

Well...Been there myself, she thought...Smiling at Buffy...

Spike’s still moving...But in a circling pattern, Jonathan responded to Buffy’s questioning look...

Can’t quite pin him down...But he’s within a two mile radius of us...

“You’re probably right...He’s looking to find a place to hole up...” Jonathan noted...

Willow sighed, looking down the street...

“I’ll see what I can do...”
***

Warren and Buffy-bot Mark II were concealed near Spike’s crypt...

Hmmn...According to his calculations the machine should now be blocked from returning until he deactivated the jamming signal...

And Botty had determined that she could only make out one person in the crypt at present...Based on microwave and thermal scans...

Sounds good...Time to move into position to “welcome” our friends back...He started to get up...

“Someone’s coming Warren...” Buffy-bot II told him...Pointing in the direction of the cemetery gates...

Whoops...Company...

He could see two figures cautiously approaching the crypt from the direction the bot had pointed ...
“Are those vampires?...” he hissed to the bot...Who tensed visibly at the word “vampires”...

A true Slayer...He noted proudly...My little girl...

She scanned them carefully and smiled...

No, Warren...Their body temperatures are those of normal humans...

She peered into the dark...

“Actually it’s my friends, Xander...Who is like a big brother to me but with whom I’ve never had a sexual relationship...And Tara...My best friend Willow’s gay companion with whom I am working on developing a friendship for Willow’s sake...” she noted happily...

Should we go say hi?..she asked...

Just a mo...I mean, wait until I give an order he told her...Noting that she had immediately begun counting down one minute...

Still a bit of April in her...he sighed...Though she is a big improvement...

Hmmn...If I could get my hands on Buffy for say...Two or three hours...It’d be interesting to try that neural transfer system I was dreaming up the other day...Copy her whole brain into an artificial one...

Properly adjusted to have her regard me as the one true God...And the only person in the world she’d wish to boink, of course...

Oh well, another time....

They watched Xander and Tara cautiously enter the crypt...

Warren pondered...

Question now was...Should he tip his hand and have Buffy-bot II blindly storm in and secure Spike’s digs?...Or take the subtle approach...Infiltration using her upgraded personality...Feeling the enemy out and holding off until the last possible...

But if Buffy was one of the travelers using the machine?...

Well...Nothing’s to say she couldn’t have come back...Seeking help...A deviation in the machine’s positional systems causing her to materialize away from the crypt...

A first-rate test of the bot’s abilities...In Buffy behavior and as spy...

Just requires a deft touch with the robo-instructions...

“Buffy?...” he looked at the beaming bot...

Yes, Warren...she smiled at him...

“How’d you like to spend a little time with your friends in there?...”

***

“Me digs...Blessed Lady...” Moira Fitzgibbons, Irish-born, London streetwalker ushered the three time travelers into her abode...Looking worshipfully at Willow...Who looked rather guiltily at Buffy and Jonathan...

Didn’t expect the spell to have this much oomph...I was just aiming at her seeing me as someone she would like, trust, and respect a little...

Anyone else live here?...Buffy asked her...

Moira regarded her coolly...What kind of a question was that?...She was a respectable woman when not out earning her own...Still the strange looking girl was a follower of the Lady...

Who might be wondering herself, Moira realized, suddenly ashamed...She turned to Willow...Falling to her knees and clutching at Willow’s hand...

“Blessed Mother of God I swear!...I keep a decent home and follow the ways of Mary Magdalene only to earn me bread!...”

Buffy and Jonathan looked at Willow...

Hmmn...Willow thought...So I’m the Virgin Mary...

Well, Mrs. Christ was Jewish, after all...

“It’s alright Moira...” she smiled on the poor woman...

I know you’re a good woman...Basically...

“That’s why you’re going to help us now...” Willow told her...

***
Spike had found shelter in the basement of a large old warehouse...

Hmmn...He sniffed...

Blood...And vampires...Though no one he could identify...

Apparently the place appealed to his kind in general terms...Well...Might be useful to introduce himself round...Maybe get a lead on where the dear grandparents and poor old Dru were at the moment...

He began walking towards the scent in the dark basement...

Hmmn...No gaslight...Too dangerous in a warehouse I guess...

Pity electric lights wouldn’t be installed on a regular basis for a while yet...
***

On the bed of their hotel room, Drusilla was trembling...Practically in a fit, Darla noted...

Moronic little fool...Mad as a hatter...

What Angelis had ever seen in her...

“Leave...” Dru grabbed at her “grandmother’s” sleeve, shaking in hysteria...

“Leave...Leave...Leave...We have to leave!...” she stopped shaking and calmed a bit...

Naturally Angelis had wandered off at the beginning of Dru’s fit...Responsible, caring father that he was...

Why do you want to leave here, Dru?..Darla asked her coldly...

Mad as she was...Her visions and hysteria sometimes had a kernel of useful information...

Dru was calming...Back to normal...Or what passed for normal with her...

She looked at Darla...Leave?...The lovely city?...With all these lovely, tasty, frightened little people?...

And the new one she sensed she’d be encountering soon...

“Don’t want to go...Grandmother...” Dru took on a pleading tone...

You just said... “We have to leave”...Darla noted...

Why?...

Sadly, alternate timeline visions tend not to make it to the long-term memory...

Dru had no idea what Grandmother was talking about...Very confused she was...

Not an unusual state for Dru...

With a sigh, Darla gave it up...

And began to get themselves settled for the day...

Pity she hadn’t grabbed a last bit of someone before beginning to bed down...

Not likely selfish Angelis would bother to bring anything back for them...
***

“Tucker’s brother...” Andrew introduced himself to Xander and Tara who’d cautiously entered Spike’s crypt...After they’d clearly not had any idea who “Andrew” was...

“Where are Buffy and Willow?...” Xander glared at him...

Well...Andrew pointed at the spot where the machine had been...If they get the positional coordinates exactly right...

“Oughta rematerialize about there...Unless the machine deviates a bit...” he noted...

Xander frowned...He’d had quite enough of nerdspeak...And of this ridiculous time-travel blather...

Like Buffy would go back for Spike’s sake...Why she’d have to be...

In love...he thought, gulping...

Oh, no...

Tara tried the gentle approach...The little guy seemed sincere...

“How long have they been gone?...” she asked...

About an hour now, Andrew noted...He was getting a hair worried...

Their return by all rights should have been almost instantaneous...

“Guys?!..” Buffy called from just inside the door of the crypt...
She came in, looking a bit rumpled and disoriented...

“Xander...Tara...Thank God, you guys are here...” she staggered a bit...

Problems in 1880...she noted...Had to come back...Guess the machine plopped me down a bit off the mark on return...

The others are ok, she explained hurriedly...Just...Captured...

“Where’s the machine?...” Tara asked her...Helping her to a chair...

She shook her head...Had to leave it there...So the others could get back if they could get free...

Hmmn...Andrew looked at Buffy...

That wasn’t what she was wearing when she left...

And it doesn’t look like the fashion for 1880...

“You came back here?...” Xander looked at her...

Not like Buffy to leave when her friends are in danger...Especially when she has a time machine/teleporter to get her back before a trap was sprung...Say just outside where the trap was set...

Had to, Xander...Buffy looked at him...No choice...

Hmmn...Possible...

“What can we do?...” Tara asked her...Without the machine...

“Warren...He must know how to build another one...” Buffy pointed out...

We’d better get over to his place...Make him build us a second one...

Ok...Xander thought...Looking at Andrew who stared back at him...Darting his eyes around...

Something’s up here...Xander realized...

“Why don’t we wait a bit...” Tara suggested...

“We can’t leave them stranded...” Buffy told them, agitated...

Well...Tara patted her hand...Maybe I could do something...

Just give me a mo...

“We should go...Warren might be building another machine right now...” Buffy looked at her...

“I think Tara’s right, Buf...” Xander told her, coming over...

Lets see what she can do...

And if not...I’m sure Andrew...And Jonathan, when he gets back from the store...Can help us reconstruct the machine...

“Ok, Xander...” Buffy smiled wanly at him...

“Andrew?...” Tara asked... “Could you get her some water or something?...I think Spike keeps some in the fridge against the wall there...”

Andrew grinned at Xander as he walked over to the fridge...Neat play, man...

“What do you think you can do, Tara?...” Buffy looked at her...

Oh...Maybe a variation on the locator spell can trace them back...Reach them somehow...Tara noted...

Oh...Buffy smiled...A spell...Right...

“Xander?..” Tara asked... “Would you help me find the magics books we have Spike keep in the lower cavern?...”

Xander looked at her...Books?...

Oh...So, she’s caught on too...

“Right with you...”

So...Buffy...Andrew came over...Bringing some water...

“How’s 1880...”

***

The Time Machine...Part X

In Spike’s crypt, awaiting the anxiously hoped-for return of the time-travelers, Xander and Tara had descended to the lower depths, ostensibly to obtain magics material...

Buffy, apparently back from 1880 to seek help, was arousing their suspicions...

“She didn’t know Jonathan was with them...And Andrew didn’t seem to think she was quite right...” Xander quietly told Tara...

Unless nerd boy was trying to make a pass at me back there, he noted...

Tara nodded...She’d sensed something wrong as well...

“Her aura’s blank...It’s not Buffy...More like...” Tara began...

Botty?...Xander looked at her...Tara nodded...

He shook his head a bit...Warren’s outdone himself...Quite an improvement over April...Even over the last time the bot was functional...

“Why do you think she’s here?...” Tara looked at him...

I’d say Mears wants his time machine back...Xander replied...Hmmn...

“Andrew said they should’ve returned by now...You don’t think...?” he looked at Tara...

Botty did seem to want us out pretty quick...Tara noted...

“I think we’d better find out what old Warren is up to...” Xander frowned...
***

“So?...” Buffy looked at Jonathan...As they sat in what passed for the “parlor” of Moira Fitzgibbons, 1880 London streetwalker...He was checking his remote...

Spike’s definitely slowed down...About two miles away, north by northwest...he told her...

“Could we teleport to him...Using the machine?...” she asked him...

Hmmn...Given the deviation factor and the lack of firm positional coordinates he wouldn’t recommend it for a trip like that...They could end up anywhere within the deviation radius...In broad daylight...And still rather far away...

Miss Fitzgibbons watched them respectfully, her attention focused on her Blessed Virgin...
Not for her to question the doings of the angels and the Mother of God...

Odd, though...She’d never heard of the Blessed Mary having red hair...Still, all the statues had her hair covered...

“Willow?...” Buffy turned to her...
A locator spell...Or something?....

Willow shook her head...

“I haven’t got anything of Spike’s to work with...Should have thought of it when we left but there wasn’t time...”

Hmmn...Something of Spike’s?...Buffy thought...No...I don’t think I want to go that way...

Willow’s already guessed enough about the state of affairs between me and Blondie...No need to mention that I’m in possession of some of his bodily fluids...

“Well, we’ll just have to go on doing it the hard way...” she sighed...

At least we have a good idea of where he is for the moment...And he’ll have to stay there for the day...she noted...

Willow nodded and turned to her new friend and devout follower...

“Moira?...Can you get us some clothes?...Keep our box...Of, er...Sacred artifacts...Safe here?...”

And...If you could lend us just a leetle money...

***
Angelis returned to the hotel room where Darla and Dru waited just before dawn, March 13^th, 1880...Bearing nothing, as Darla expected...

“Has our insane nun settled down?...” he asked Darla...Who frowned at him...

Your “daughter” is fine...she told him...

“What was it she was going on about there?...” Just a hair of nervousness in his voice, Darla realized...

Just like dear Angelis to panic at the slightest thought of impending danger...she thought...

She raised her head and looked at him...Pity he has to be so good-looking...What a delight it’d be to hand him over to a peasants’ lynch mob...

“She doesn’t remember herself...Probably nothing...”

Well, then...He smiled at Darla...

“We may as well get comfortable...” Putting his booted legs up on a footstool...

Clearly expecting his mate to remove them...

She glared at him...But...It was 1880...He was a powerful vampire...And she was a traditional kind of girl...

And...When all was said and done...A devoted mother...

She pulled them off, cursing him under her breath...However, as she didn’t have to breathe he noted her reaction...Enjoying it immensely...

“Having a little trouble with my boots, dear one?...” he leered at her...

Pity Dru didn’t sense old long-dead Holtz or someone like that, Darla noted to herself...The terrified look on Angelis’ face would be worth even our destruction...

***
Not a particularly friendly group...Spike thought...As he began his third fight to the death with one of the nest’s best...A large, hulking brute of a fellow...Must’ve been a longshoreman or something like that in life, he noted, remembering the huge fellows he’d used to watch working on the Thames...

But then, as he now recalled...Dodging the brute’s lumbering thrust of a long wooden pole...It had been the same after his initial transformation...Difficult to break into any of the established prides...And adding British reserve on top of normal vamp demon territoriality...

Well...He had no more time to waste on this...He pulled another Buffy move and jumping up, grabbed and rammed the pole into the astonished lug’s chest, dusting him...The others, now at last beginning to see the light of reason, backed off from him in shock...

At last, peace...He watched the vamps retreat into their resting places...

Summers would be so proud...Her moves were really giving him an edge against these fellows...
Not that his newly transformed self hadn’t acquitted himself well in similar battles in this era...

Well, if all went well...He’d have a lot of interesting bits about this trip to tell her soul in the afterlife...
***

Great...And to think it was my idea to tell Spike to try and get the botty repaired if possible...Xander noted to himself with a sigh...

Take some pressure off our newly resurrected Slayer...Well, seemed like a good idea at the time...

He and Tara had returned from the crypt’s depths to find a hapless Andrew firmly in the bot’s grip...
Warren having thoughtfully provided her with amplified hearing, she’d overheard them talking in the lower crypt...

And switched to Warren’s “Plan B” instructions...In a remarkable display of her superior computing performance...

“Please stay where you are, guys...I don’t want to hurt anyone human...Slayers should only kill vampires and demons, you know...” the bot told them pleasantly...

Warren should be here in just a minute...He’s been monitoring me...

“Tara?...” Xander hissed...

“Sorry...I try to stay away from any stuff that hurts people...” Tara sheepishly noted...

Admirable...But just right now...

“Buffy?...” Tara tried a little psychology... “Why do you want to help Warren?...He’s evil...He wants to hurt people...And you’re the Slayer...”

Hmmn...Well...the bot looked at her...

“I’m Warren’s Buffy copy, Tara...As you know...I heard you and Xander talking downstairs..” Buffy-bot II smiled at her friend...

I follow his instructions...

“But you’re programmed to be Buffy...” Tara noted... “And Buffy fights evil...”

Hmmn...Well...the bot pondered a mo...Andrew struggling helplessly in her firm but gentle grip...

That’s beyond the scope of my programming, Tara...she told her pleasantly...I have to follow Warren’s instructions...

“But I will fight evil when Warren is finished...” she concluded happily...

Speak of the nerd...Xander thought as Warren entered, lugging the freeze ray...Puffing a bit...

Never know when a leetle back-up might be needed...

“Warren...I’m sorry my friends failed to accept me as Buffy...” the bot told him...

Should I let Andrew go now?...she asked...

***
Nothing of Moira’s being of suitable size, the time travelers were awaiting her return from Jack the RagMan’s...Where she was sure she could find something for each of them...

Willow, feeling a tad guilty, made sure the woman kept a strict accounting of everything she was spending on them...Poor lady has to earn it the hard way, she thought...

Jonathan was reasonably sure of Spike’s location now...He seemed to be staying within a few hundred feet of a central spot 2.2 miles away...Still doing a lot of moving up until the last ten minutes or so, he noted...But all in the same local area...

“He must have found some place to hang out until dark...” Buffy looked round the room...Clearly in pacing mode...Which she began in the limited open space the small room had to offer...

“Maybe we should just go now...?” she stopped, looking at Willow...

Ummn...Dunno know, Buf...In these clothes...

“Moira said she’d be back in a couple of hours at most...That’s plenty of time...” Willow noted...

If he stays where he is...Buffy fretted...

“He can’t wander around in daylight, Buf...” Willow pointed out...

Yeah...But sewers, that sort of thing...Buffy noted...

“Spike?...Risk that hair of his in a sewer?...” Willow smiled at her friend who grinned back...

He’ll stay put...And if he doesn’t...We’ll go right after him...she concluded...

Buffy nodded...And finally sat down...

Jonathan kept an eye on the remote while looking curiously at Miss Fitzgibbons’ photographs, hung about the room...

“Will?...” Buffy looked at her hands as she sat...

Haven’t had time to say...Thanks...she grinned...

“Don’t mention it...” Willow grinned back...

How often do I get a chance to see Victorian London?...

“I guess...” Buffy paused, a little hesitant to begin... “You’d like to know...Why?...”

Willow’s turn to look at her hands...
“You’re in love with him, aren’t you?...”

“I don’t know...” Buffy shook her head slightly... “I know it’d be crazy if I am...”

But I can’t just let him go...

Willow sighed...Patting Buffy’s hand...

“Well...Guess we’ll have to sort it all out later...When we get him home...Anyway...” she smiled at Buffy... “He must love you...In some way...To have done this...”

And at least he seems to want to stick around...Unlike some of your previous beaus...

She looked at where Jonathan was peeking at photos...

Hmmn...Family and “friends”?...Wonder if poor Moira has any steady customers we’d know from history?...The current Prince of Wales was supposed to be a pretty randy fellow...

Well, some things are best remaining unknown...Willow noted to herself...

***

Warren had ordered Buffy-bot II to retain her grip on Andrew...

“Just what is it you want, Warren?...” Xander glared at the pudgy nerd...Now engaged in snickering at his former partner’s predicament...

Thank God I was never desperate enough for friendship to try and hang out with this creep...Xander thought...

Course he did manage to have two human male friends...And a girlfriend for a little while...But hey...I have a fiancee...A former demon...And my friends...Who are girls...

With whom I rarely if ever stood a chance...

And my single current male acquaintance...A former killer vampire...

God, I’m pathetic...he sighed...

Oh, well...More important matters at hand...

“You’re keeping the others from returning, aren’t you?...” he frowned at Warren...

“You’ve gotta let them come back, Warren...” Tara told him...

Hey...Warren looked at them...I didn’t tell them to use my machine...

“Lets keep it straight here...It was my property that was stolen...And I want it back...”

So...He pointed the freeze ray at them...

“We do this my way...”

***
The Time Machine...Part XI...

March 13^th, 1880...8am...William Soames Walthrop, human, Cambridge scholarship student, poet and would be Creator of Beauty, had awakened in his friend Henry Foxcraft’s generously lent digs at Forster Arms...

And was dutifully writing in his daily diary...Before composing his first poem of the day, to be followed by a long letter to his dear young sis and brother...Now living with relatives since their mother’s early death from consumption the year previous...

A glorious March morn, he noted, looking out the window...A pleasant day free from his heavy student workload which he planned to use to advantage to clean up odds and ends of things necessarily put off during the past exam sessions...And to complete his cycle of poems revolving around one Miss Cicely Addams...

With luck a large part would be ready for presentation quite soon, though he had no intention of trying it out at the large party to be given at Henry’s cousins, the Herricks that evening...

Not after that first disastrous reception of his poetry in public...

However...If Miss Addams should spy him, poor but earnest young Will Walthrop, scribbling away during a break in the party...And sweetly request of him that he reveal what was so occupying his mind even at such a delightful event...How could he refuse reading a small snatch of his work?...

Of course...Dear old Hal had been guarded in his enthusiasm for Walthrop’s latest before he’d left on his urgent visit to his ailing mother...Even to suggesting he not bring it to the world’s attention for a short time just yet...Polish it up a bit, that sort of thing, he’d suggested...

Well...He’d need something to keep him busy, knowing so few people personally among Henry’s friends and relations...So, he’d take it along, not pressing it on anyone yet having it handy...Yes...

He’d let fate take a hand tonight...And with luck...

***
A rap at the hotel room door...Angelis tensed, rising from his bed in the darkened room...
Darla sat bolt upright, looking at him...He waved a hand...

Drusilla, exhausted and full of laudanum courtesy a grandmother tired of her recurrent fits, slept on...Dead...Literally...To the world...

“Who’s there?...” Angelis called...

“Morey...Sir...” Came the reply...

Angelis and his mate relaxed...Morey...The half demon contact who’d promised to introduce them to the locals...All anxious to meet the famed Angelis...And his women...

Angelis went to the door and cautiously allowed the demon, in appearance a slightly deformed old man, into the room...

Well...Darla regarded the little demon coldly...

Miss...Morey bowed slightly, glancing over at Dru on her bed...

He turned to Angelis...Who glared at him...

“Why have you disturbed us at this hour, Morey?...” he came over to him...

The mighty Angelis does not appreciate the disrespect of a daylight awakening...

Unless of course some emergent danger is involved...

Darla caught that slight hint of fear in Angelis’ face...And rolled her eyes a bit...

My heroic boy...

“You asked to be immediately informed if any newcomers of strength came to town, sir...” Morey
noted...

Short of funds in a market where competition for wealthy humans was intense, Angelis and co hoped to take a purse or two in fights with any interested vamp parties...However the locals were well aware of his reputation and were not taking his challenge...

None cared to be staked in the back by Darla or Dru while trying to deal with their lord in front...

However all were quite willing and eager to see the great Angelis against some reasonably strong...
And naive newcomer...Who’d managed to endure the challenges of the locals...
***

“You can’t do this, Warren...Changing history to suit yourself...” Tara looked at him...

He blinked at her...Gee...Just what is Spike doing right now?...Besides...

“I won’t be changing anything here...Just a potential timeline...Which already may exist and probably does...” he noted...

In which my existence is rather...A neat one...he giggled...

Ok...Xander looked at him...As Mears kept the freeze ray pointed at them and the bot continued to restrain Andrew...

“Just let them come back in one piece...Then take your damned machine and get out of here...”

Warren glared at him...

Hmmn...he looked at them...I think I remember saying... “We’ll do this my way...”

And “my way” begins with you saying...The Magic Word...

Oh, come on...Xander thought, rolling his eyes...What a geek...

“Oh, no...” the bot interjected helpfully... “Warren, it’s Tara who can do spells, not Xander...She just told me...”

Ummn...Spells?...Warren hesitated...Raising the freeze ray...

“A word from her, Mears, and you’re rat-boy...” Xander told him, thinking fast...Tara looked at him...

Though she much prefers to avoid violence...Xander hastily added...

Tara nodded...Much...

“Well...” Warren nodded slowly... “Then I guess...” he sighed...And jerked up the freeze ray... “It’s time for a cold one...” Aiming hastily he fired at her...

Rats, missed...Damn...Whoa, bad choice of word there...Warren thought, feeling himself...

Phew...

Hey...You can’t do spells worth a damn...he sneered at Tara...And aimed again...

The freeze ray clicked and sputtered...

Tara grinned...

“Maybe I can’t hurt people...But nothing says I can’t screw up a ray gun or two...”

“Buffy!!!” Warren hollered...Fuming...

Yes, Warren?...Buffy-bot II came over, dragging Andrew gently...

“Take Andrew over there...” he pointed at the others... “Let go of him...And then go knock them all unconscious...Especially the witch...”

However...There seemed to be a leetle conflict for the bot...She led Andrew over, released him, and halted...

Warren rolled his hands... Get a move on, girl...he told her...

Buffy-bot II shook her head...

“No...Warren...I am sorry but I can not obey that order...I can not hurt Xander who is like a brother to me although we have never had a sexual relationship...Or Tara who is my best friend Willow’s gay companion and with whom I am working to develop a friendship...”

Does she have to tell everybody?...Xander wondered...

Gee...Tara thought...I thought we already were friends...

“What’s going on?...” Xander hissed to her...

Must be some safety program Willow buried in the programming for the original bot...In case Spike ever tried anything funny before we got to trusting him last summer...she whispered back...

We “got to trusting Spike” last summer?...Xander wondered...

I wouldn’t be trusting him if he were here right now...

“Can you do something with her...?” Xander hissed to her...

Ummn...Actually...Xander...Tara looked at him...

“I didn’t screw up Warren’s ray gun...Just thought it would scare him if I said that I did...”

It must’ve malfunctioned...she sheepishly noted...

Fearless Leader was enraged...Defied by his own bot?!...

“I order you to knock them unconscious!!!...Hell, I order you to kill them!!!”

She looked at him, smiling...

I am sorry Warren but I cannot...

“Damnit...Come on over here and lets have a look at you...” he commanded...

“Ummn...I am sorry Warren but I cannot...You threatened Xander who is like a brother to me although we have never had a sexual relationship...and...Tara who is my best friend Willow’s gay companion and with whom I am working to develop a friendship...Therefore...

I cannot allow you to readjust my programming...”

Xander grinned...

“So...Buffy-bot...How’s about putting old Warren under restraint, him being such a dangerous type and all...”

Warren looked at the bot nervously...Who shook her head...

“I am sorry Xander...I cannot obey any orders except from Warren...Nor can I allow you or Tara or Andrew to harm him...”

Hmmn...Stand-off...

Andrew tried his hand...

Logic to the fore...

“Ummn...Botty?...” the robot turned and smiled at him...

“Hello, Andrew...”

You know...If you keep us from helping our friends...You’re really...Hurting us...
he noted...

Oh...she looked at Xander and Tara...

Warren frowned, narrowing his gaze...So...My former comrade wants to play the logic game, eh...Well...

“Buffy?...” Warren called...

Who is Andrew?...

Andrew is your friend and partner, Warren...Which means he is one of the coolest dudes in Sunnydale...she replied...

Really?..Andrew grinned...

Warren glared...

“That was from when we were all still partners, Andrew...”

Before you guys sold me out...

You mean before you turned to the dark side...Andrew noted firmly...

“You, moron!...We all worked together on our plans...Till you guys wussed...”

Buffy?...Warren turned to the bot...

Warren?...she smiled pleasantly...

Ok...You can’t harm Xander and Tara, right?

That is right, Warren...

And you can’t obey Xander and stop me, right?

That is right, Warren...

But...You could harm Andrew, right?...

Yes, Warren...I can harm Andrew...she nodded pleasantly...

Andrew gulped...Oops...

Flaw in my logic there...
***
Ok...Willow looked at the clothes Miss Fitzgibbons had purchased...Or stolen... For them...

A leetle...Well, at least the corsets looked clean enough...And they could go on wearing their own 2002 undies...

Buffy and Jonathan fingered the clothes gingerly...Are we supposed to actually wear this stuff?...

Looks like it was stuff rejected from Goodwill, then thrown under a truck...

Moira was a shade crestfallen seeing Willow’s hesitation...Had she failed her Lady?...

Willow hastened to reassure her...Everything was fine...She was just...Sad...Saddened by the current unhappy state of the world and the poor folks in it...

You know, like the expressions on all my statues...she told her...

Right, guys?...She nudged Jonathan and looked at Buffy...They nodded in agreement...

“You did just fine, Moira...” Willow assured her...

They dressed rather slowly...Tolerable fits at least...

Hey...Jonathan pointed at the old photos...We fit in just fine now...

“We even look black and white and gray...”

***
Well...Spike thought...This should do just fine...

He sat himself down by a large pillar of the warehouse basement...Well...

At least eight hours to go before dusk...And my appointment with my destiny...

What to do?...Hmmn...How’s about a poem, he thought...

Something to present to Buffy’s soul in the afterlife...Or if I get very lucky...To alternate 2002 Buffy in 121 years...

I’ll certainly have plenty of time for revisions...

***
A small...hmmn, Spike looked him over...vamp?...Nope...demon...Came over cautiously...

Doffing his hat as a token of respect for the valor-proven newcomer...

“Sir...?” he respectfully addressed Spike who looked up at him...

“May I present myself?...I am Morey...I handle things for those of us in the lower world of London who need daytime contacts...”

Spike nodded...Always nice to have daylight-capable associates, he noted...

“You’re new here, aren’t you?...Sir...” Morey asked...

You might say that...Spike nodded...

“And quite capable...If I may say so...Based on your performance back there...” Morey pointed toward the main space of the warehouse...

“I was wondering...Sir...If you perhaps might be on the lookout to make a small piece of change?...To cover your expenses while in town...” he looked at Spike’s rather odd Randy suit...

“London...She’s a mighty expensive place...Sir...” Morey noted...

“Fight promoter, are we?...” Spike grinned at him...

Well, sir...Our brethren have so little to amuse themselves with in the daylight hours...One feels for them as can’t see the light of day in safety...Morey solemnly replied...

“Afraid I’m not up to any more fights today, lad...” Spike told him...Another time, perhaps...

“Ah..A shame, sir...Mr. Angelis...He’ll be so disappointed...Have you hear tell of ‘im perhaps?...And the purse, a fine...”

“Angelis?...The Angelis?...” Spike looked at the little demon...

Indeed sir, the famed Angelis himself...In town for a limited engagement...With ‘is lovely ladies...
Under the care and management of yours truly...Morey bowed slightly...

Sometimes the Powers that Be curse you for no Godly reason...And sometimes they send you a Buffy Summers...Spike thought...Or an opportunity like this...

“I think I might be willing to reconsider your proposal, lad...” he smiled at Morey...
***

The Time Machine...Part XII

March 13^th, 1880...A little after 11 am, London...Buffy, Willow, and Jonathan...In more or less suitable attire had left the time machine in the charge of Willow’s devout Miss Fitzgibbons who had sworn on her soul to keep it safely hidden and were now following the directional signal Jonathan was receiving from Spike’s chip...

About two miles away from where he was preparing for a bit of rough-housing with none other than Angelis...

The crowded streets of London, 1880 made 2002 LA look like a picnic Willow noted...People on
foot everywhere, street trams, cabs, horses, animals of all descriptions...Even the rare demon,
attempting to pass as human...

Jonathan desperately tried to watch the remote’s signal while keeping it hidden from view...
While Buffy stayed by him, watching for any signs of unusual curiosity or worse from passersby as they strolled...

Difficult to keep together even at a slow pace, Buffy noted...

She eyed the cabs passing by...Pity poor Moira had been so broke...But the poor woman had practically broken the bank to get them the rather awful clothes they were wearing...If she’d even been able to afford paying for them...

Hmmn...At the rate they were going...If they weren’t soon hopelessly separated and lost, they’d still take most of the day to cover the two miles to where Spike was...

Willow had nixed any idea of a transport spell...Very dangerous, even more than using the machine for short-range travel...They might end up in another continent...Literally inside that other continent...

Well...The thing with poor Moira had worked fairly well...Maybe it could be done again...With some cabby or some wealthy businessman...

Hmmn...Need a leetle time to recover from that last one, Buf...Willow told her after Buffy moved back to her friend and mentioned the idea...

Besides we’d need some privacy as well...Can’t do something like that in the middle of the street...

***

Morey happily reported to Angelis at his hotel room that Mr...er...Spike...Was willing and eager to accept a challenge...

A likely lad, Morey noted...Small and slight but powerful...And very experienced, judging by his performance...

Hmmn...Experienced?...Powerful?...Angelis was somewhat...Thoughtful...

“Sounds challenging, my love...” Darla smiled at him sweetly...

Tell Mr....Spike...The mighty Angelis is pleased to accept his challenge, Darla told Morey...

And will meet him tonight...

“Only daylight hours, miss...” Morey sternly informed her...

Our clientele have too much to do in the night hours to waste precious night for entertainment...
Outside the hunt, of course...

Of course, Darla smiled at the half-demon...
And will meet him...Shortly...

“I’ll be awaiting you in the hallway in one hour...” Morey bowed and putting his bowler back on head, left...

Angelis stared at Darla...

“You’re rather quick to decide who and when I’m to fight...” he grimly noted...

A good provider like you, dearest?...I knew you’d be pleased at the chance...

Spike?...Angelis looked at her...

“My love...Would I ever allow you to come to harm?...” she smiled at him...

***

“Guys?...” Buffy looked at her friends rather sheepishly...

“Did I mention how grateful I was to both of you for coming along to help me?...”

Willow felt the cold water seeping up her skirt, soaking her feet...Not to even begin to mention...The stench...

Jonathan desperately tried to plug his nose...And studiously avoid looking at the rat-sized shapes scurrying around...Everywhere...

Welcome to 1880 London’s amazing sewer system...Wonder of the industrialized world...

And fastest means of transport through London on foot...With connections in many large buildings, almost certainly including the one Spike must be holed up in...

Hmmn...Willow thought...Trying that “persuasion” spell on some cabman is sounding better by the minute...Even if it puts me in a coma with my ears bleeding...

Buffy beamed the faint light of Jonathan’s little pocket tool on the path ahead...Handy-in-all one flashlight, screwdriver, can opener, wrench, pliers, solder tool, stun gun...and heavy-duty calculator...

No true nerd is without one...
***
In the warehouse basement, never suspecting that he was now only separated by about one and a half miles from his own true, Spike awaited his leetle “family reunion”...

It was perfect...With any luck, all the eggs in one basket...Angelis, Darla, and most important, dear old Dru...

Stake the old family circle...And soulful city here I come...Or, at least, my counterpart, good old Will...

And think of the redemption points to be earned...Why, I’d be on the plus side of the balance sheet in one fell swoop...

Of course...The little matter of actually defeating the world’s three most powerful vampires...Who had even managed to survive encounters with the Greatest Slayer of All Time...

Dracula, for all his flash, rating a poor fifth, of course...As for the Master, please...The administrative type...Never surprised Spike a bit that Buffy had taken Heinrich almost the moment he’d resurfaced...

But he had 121 years of fighting experience, a through knowledge of all of Angelis and co’s little tricks, plus incomparable training at the hands of Buffy Summers, some of it even voluntary...

Right on his side...Amazing as that fact might seem...

And, most important, no matter what the outcome...He really couldn’t lose...In terms of his overall goal...

Even the Powers That Be would cut his soul a break fighting in a cause like this...
***

“Time...My love...” Darla noted...

He looked over at Dru...Sighing...

Still sleeping off Darla’s laudanum...

Pity...

Pity...The moronic little clairvoyant couldn’t be up and about to help him survive this grim battle...

Well...If he was destroyed, he’d have the satisfaction of knowing that Dru would probably not survive a single day alone...

The hallway being windowless...They exited down the back, bowing courteously to another young couple...

Lunch?...Angelis suggested hopefully...

Never helps to fight on a full stomach, Darla noted...
Hmmn...Spike?...Angelis thought...Sounds familiar somehow...

Experienced...Powerful...Spike...

Great, just great...The thanks I get for acceding to my girls’ desire to see London again...
***

“I think...” Buffy paused, waving the time-travelers to a halt...

I think I sense vampires...Dead ahead...

A lot of them...she noted...

She turned to Jonathan...

“Is that the way we’re going?...”

He nodded, looking at the remote...

Well...Willow pointed out...Stands to reason he’d be hanging out in a vamp den...

All alone in a big city and all...

Buffy looked at the others...Hmmn...

“Maybe you guys oughta hang back here a bit...”

Willow frowned...Jonathan shook his head...

“Here for the full monty, Buf...” Willow told her...

‘Sides...We’d probably be safer with you in there...Than waiting in the dark down here...

“I’ll keep a watch on our Jonathan...” she smiled at him...
***
After politely greeting them on the stairway Morey led Angelis and Darla to the hotel basement entrance...Leading to the sewer system connection running to the warehouse where Spike and the members of the local nest waited...

Mind those slick steps, Miss...Morey noted to Darla courteously...

Catching her deftly as she slipped...Damn these sewers, she thought...Why do these things always have to be in daytime?...

Angelis naturally pressing on, utterly heedless of her...
Hmmn...Spike?...Darla wondered...Looking after her mate...Who had paused to wait for them...

Not, of course, out of courtesy...He had no intention of entering the fight arena alone...

Spike...Darla thought...Nice name...Wonder what he looks like?...

I might possibly be in the market for a new companion for all Eternity...
***

The Time Machine...Part XIII

March 13^th, 1880, now just before 12:30 pm...

London, near the Thames...

Buffy, Willow, and Jonathan had reached the sewer tunnel connection leading into the warehouse building where Spike was preparing for his match...Against Angelis...which of course meant Darla and Dru as well, who as he knew would never allow a little thing like fair play to stand in the way of protecting their male...

Buffy was pulling at her corset bindings...Damn moronic century...What kind of idiots would wear these damn things on a regular basis?...

Still, to be honest, probably not as hard as actually keeping the weight off, 2002-style...she thought...

They halted near a grilled opening...A bolted inspection door up ahead...

Fortunately it seemed this particular sewer tunnel was not the sewer route of choice into the building for most underworld types...

Listening, Willow could hear the sounds of cheering from a short distance away...Shrill cries somehow almost, but not quite...human...

Buffy was right, she realized...A lot of vamps in there...

A lot...

Willow looked back at Jonathan who rechecked his remote, shrugged, and nodded...He’s in there...

Grreat...

***
Numerous large candles and torches lit the large area in the center of the warehouse basement now marked off by Morey the demon promoter and his associates...The crowd, a motley collection of underworld London, anxious for the fight to begin...Quieted and pulled back along the lines, allowing the contenders to get into position...

Damn...thought Spike, seeing Angelis with Darla...And no Dru...

Gramps, great-grandma, but no mum...Vampiral sense, he mentally added...

No offense to real Mum intended...

This puts a stick in the wheel, that’s for sure...he realized...

He had to know where Dru was...And where she would be for the next ten or so hours...

Else he’d be limited to his original two shots at intercepting his counterpart...Before and after the Herricks’ party...And after would be cutting it dangerously close...

Well...Still the leetle business of surviving his now rather pointless match with the Brooding one to deal with...Who actually seemed in quite the non-brooding mood as he strode into the fight area...Waving to the crowd, evenly divided between cheering fans and hissing enemies...Casting long and admiring glances at the various females in the crowd...Which were eagerly returned...

Darla plainly put out by his behavior...

Poor old great-grandma...Grandsire was always quite a project for her...Spike thought...


And yet...If what Buffy had told him back in 2002 was really true...

Well, he was hardly one fit to question the concept of finding your true love in the oddest places...
***

Morey spoke...Addressing the eager crowd...Ready and waiting for bloodsport...

Not to mention standing by to lick up any random spills of blood during the sport...

“Mesdames and Monsieurs....Ladies and gentlemen...In my ‘umble capacity as your ‘ost...May I present our two gallant contenders...”

The famed Angelis...Legend of our world for the past century and more...

“And our new and challenging friend...Mr...”

Spike signed to him, causing the promoter to pause...Spike staring over at old Angelis...Who was doing his best to show an utter lack of fear...

And gave no sign of recognition...Nor did Darla, though she was scanning Spike with considerable interest...

Well...Spike thought...Sad as it is not to be known by one’s own “family”...

No need to do things without a little style...

Morey came over and he spoke a word to him...

Backing off, eh...Angelis wondered...Hopefully...

The little fellow looked tough...Experienced...And eyed him without the slightest hesitation...

Unheard of...

After all, the mighty Angelis...Famed and feared throughout the underworld...

Nothing beats good publicity...

However, in this case it seemed his formidable reputation alone would not be enough...

Morey returned to the center of the fight area...And waved a hand at Spike...

“William...The Bloody!...Ladies and gentlemen!”

A cheer surged across the room...

Sure-fire crowd-pleaser, that name, Morey noted...

Angelis blinked... “William the Bloody?!”...

That sounded even worse than “Spike”...Formidable as that had sounded...

What the hell had Darla gotten him into?...

Pity...Darla thought, looking at the mysterious “William the Bloody”...

Just a bit too short for me...

***
In 2002 Sunnydale, at Spike’s crypt, Warren had found the logical solution in his confrontation with Xander, Tara, and Andrew...

If Buffy-bot II could not harm Xander or Tara due to previous buried instructions left in the old Buffy-bot programs...She had no such restrictions on dealing with former fellow Master of the Sunnydale Universe, Andrew... Now foolishly having chosen the light side of the Force...

Faced with the prospect of seeing a new friend...Well, acquaintance...Well, he had been trying to help the time traveling Buffy and Willow, hurt...Xander and Tara reluctantly gave in and allowed the bot to tie them up...

The deposed Fearless Leader considered his options while savoring his triumph...

If he deactivated the jamming signal, it was likely the time travelers would return, giving him a chance to recover his stolen time machine and proceed to create a Warren-friendly alternate timeline beginning back before Buffy’s first encounter with his original bot, April...

However...He might face serious odds...The freeze ray was out of commission, possibly thanks to the witch’s...He glared at Tara...Manipulations...Even his strength-enhanced Buffy-bot Mark II might have trouble fighting Buffy, Spike, and the others, if they all came back together...

And the damned bot might not even be willing to fight Willow and Spike...or Buffy...Thanks to Willow’s buried safety programs...

What to do?...What...to do?...

Well...He did have hostages now...
***

Get on with it, you...Vain-glorious, stupid...Cowardly...Darla thought, looking at Angelis...Who was preening himself in the center of the fight area under the studious gaze of several dozen attentive females...

And, as Darla knew all too well, desperately playing out his entrance...Trying to avoid that moment of truth...While also trying to feel out his opponent...Who seemed uninterested in anything but the fight...

***

Utterly unaware that he was enjoying what were likely if not certain to be the last few hours of his life, young William Soames Walthrop had paused from his dutiful brother letter-writing to savor the surprisinglywarm March sun...

Without realizing it, his letter to his younger sister Amelia, describing some of the places and people he’d met while on his current holiday in London, was turning into an epic prose poem on the virtues of his beloved Miss Addams...

He’d merely intended to present his friend Henry’s distant cousin as a model of the best in English gentlewomen...Completely different from the sort of disdainful and ridiculously insular upper class types who’d dominated the meager social and cultural life of his and Amelia’s home-town, Brusset...

A young and lovely woman of exquisite sensibility and taste...Who understood and appreciated Inner Beauty...Possessing it herself...

But...Practical matters were pressing...He had just enough funds saved, he happily informed his sister in his letter, to cover Amelia’s desire to attend the local school, a private academy for young ladies, in the town where she and brother Phil resided with their uncle’s family, for the rest of this year...Her first step in avoiding the grim fate that had consigned her mother and namesake to a lifetime of servitude and an early death...

Money...Which unless the course of history were changed...Would shortly be spent by his beloved siblings in a desperate and hopeless effort to find him after his tragic disappearance...
***

The spell she had just tried wouldn’t exactly make the vamps filling the nest down the hallway mistake them for comrades, Willow explained to Buffy and Jonathan as they proceeded cautiously forward through the grilled opening which Buffy had pried open...It would only mask their human scents...And hopefully Buffy’s Slayer scent...

A variation on a spell for covering up bo when one has no time for showering after exercise...

Still, vamps in a packed place like this would naturally assume any newcomers not plainly human by scent were their own kind...Or at least demons...

They’d take it for granted that even humans would surely not be foolish enough to wander into their midst...

She hoped...

“Well...If it doesn’t work...We’ll deal...” Buffy patted her on the shoulder as they continued...

Jonathan politely pointed out the stun gun feature on the all-purpose flashlight-12 in 1 tool set he given to Buffy to light their way...

He’d finally gotten the necessity of having protection when strolling about Sunnydale at night, he told her, grinning...After about the...Third?...Or fourth?...Time you saved my life...

Nice, she noted...But she preferred good ole Mr. Pointy, putting her hand in a concealed pocket of her skirt to pat the stake...She returned the gadget to Jonathan, lighting no longer a problem...

They could hear distinct voices up ahead now...

“Did some of them just call?... “Angelis”...?” Willow looked at Buffy...

Who looked back at her...And listened carefully...

Whoa...

“I think they did...” Buffy replied...

“Who’s “Angelis”?...” Jonathan asked...

***
Hmmn...Morey frowned at Angelis...Still making his grand procession of the fight area...

Taking his time about it, I see...

Fortunately young William seemed eager for the battle...

Darla caught sight of a newcomer at the edge of the far end of the crowd...Staring at her, for some reason...

Slight young blonde...Not much to her...Probably a run of the mill "lady vamp of the evening” judging from her cheap clothes...

With a diminutive red-haired young female trailing just behind...And what appeared to be their mate...Rather a poor excuse, that one...just behind the red one...

But the blonde female continued to watch her...With a rather angry glare...

Hmmn...Is she the one from St. Petersburg, 1797?...Whose mate I killed?...No...

No one Darla could place....Yet she certainly seemed to have a strong enough dislike of her to merit a clear memory...Strange...

After all...Darla thought...With the occasional rare exception...Everybody likes me...
***

“Darla...” Buffy hissed to Willow...Glaring across the crowd which blocked their view of the fight area...

Keep back, both of you...she whispered to her friends...

They stood at the edge of a large crowd, mostly vamps...More vamps than Willow at least had ever seen concentrated in one place before...

Must easily be a couple hundred of them, she realized...

“Where’s Will?...” Buffy asked Jonathan quietly...
He studied the remote and nodded in the direction of the massed crowd...A few of whom in the rear were beginning to take note of the newcomers...

However, a major fight being about to start, the usual territorial clashes were suspended...

Buffy began moving cautiously through the crowd of vampires and demons...One fellow resenting being touched as she tried to slip past, grabbed at her to throw her back...

Mr. Pointy fell from her skirt...With a clatter that caused the entire room to go dead silent...

And every face in the immediate vicinity...Including those of her friends...To turn in her direction...

Looking at her...And the wooden stake on the floor beside her...

What the hell is up back there?...Spike wondered, looking back where the crowd was turning...

Angelis, seeing an opening while his would be opponent was distracted, smiled his trademark smile and moved in for a quick kill...

After all...Who was gonna fuss about his lack of gentlemanly sportsmanship in this crowd?...
***
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