Title: Bonds
Author: Mina Clare and Lore
Spoilers: Up to Hells Bells, maybe some input from later eps
Rating: PG13 (so far)
Feedback: please, let us know your ideas, opinions (good or bad)
Summary: William's parents show up in Sunnydale
Category: Crossover (Buffy/Highlander)
Pairing: Buffy/Spike, Methos/Rose(OC)

Loud angry bellows swept through the skies as Igrajib of Banjor mourned his mate. For a thousand loves they'd clung to one another, creeping together for hunt and pleasure. They'd warmed one another in their victims entrails, gorging themselves on guts and blood and tears.

His mate had held his tendrils, feeding him in his weakness. She'd cleaned his scubs of sand and had protected and cared for their offspring. He remembered long mornings of bathing in the ocean, spurting water at his mate and wallowing in the moonlight.

And now ... now it was her carcass bleeding out in a muddy grave and Igrajib who mourned her passing, their broken bond.

Part One

Bonds, sometimes you can't help having them? A parent and child, friends, lovers... Bonds they just exist, they're real, ... and
they're vital. They can be fierce as iron, fragile like cord or deceptively frail like nylon. Bonds appear in all forms, all shapes.
Some old, some new...
Sometimes a bond forms quickly like a flash of lightening, on other it sets on like a tidal flow, slow and recurring, but in the end
unstoppable.

For centuries Rose had thought she knew the bond she had with the man sitting next to her. He'd been her teacher, her friend, her lover at times when both felt they needed one. Yet in all the time that she'd loved the man, she'd never expected that love to be returned in quite the same way.

"California," Methos muttered, shaking his head,
"You know" and he put all the proper emphasis on it, "how much I hate California. It's ... California!"

Rose groaned deeply, too tired to once again repeat the same argument they'd been having since they'd left London.
"It's just a pick up for the university Methos. It wasn't my decision where to pick it up *from*. It's not like 'I' ordered 'you'
to join me."
"But couldn't you make them mail it to you?"
He was practically whining by now.

"It's 400 years old. You can't expect them to send a four centuries old renaissance sketch by Fed ex." She tried to make her scowl as disapproving as possible, though she'd given up on expecting better from him centuries ago. "You, of all people, should know how unreliable the mail can be."
She reached onto the dashboard, glancing into her cigarette pack.
"Damn, I'm out. Do you mind if I stop to pick up a pack?"

Methos snorted and gave her a quick nod.

She parked the car.
"I'll nip into the convenience store. Why don't you go across the street and pick us up a couple of burgers from that Doublemeat
Palace? I'm hungry."
Methos gave her a weird look that seemed to ask her for her sanity.
"Please?"
He groaned and got out of the car.
"Don't forget your wallet!"
He turned around and barely managed to catch her throw.

"I don't know why I put up with you!" He yelled while crossing the street.

"I'm cute and I'm the only one to laugh at your jokes!"
Her yells ran after him as she marched up to the convenience store.
She went in, going up to the counter.
"Can I get a pack of cigarettes?"

"ID," the cashier said.

She rolled her eyes. "For the love of-- Fine." She started to dig in her purse. If not for the delay she probably wouldn't even have noticed him. He stood in the corner, grabbing a couple of beers. The man looked like a fugitive from the punkera, with his black leather clothes and his punkish bottleblond hair. She could almost imagine him on a videoclip as a Billy idol lookalike. Only years out of time.

"Hurry up Nibblet, I got things to do."

That voice.
"William?"

**** 1882 ****

Rose stood in front of the mirror, looking at the image reflected at them as she bound her son's tie. The boy was shuffling his feet, impatient to leave. She held in an urge to slap him on the fingers to get him to stand still and stop fidgeting, but restrained
herself and finished straightening his suit.

William was smiling, shy as always. Both excited and scared at the same time. He had a noteblock in one hand and a pen in the other. His glasses slid down his nose and she pushed them back up again.

"Don't you look dapper, tonight. You will be the toast of the town. In no way will Cecily be able to resist your charms."

William blushed somewhat, his hand moved up trying to get his hair looking straight again, it was a hopeless fight he was bound to loose as his pen brustled through his curls.
"Tonight will be the night mother. You will be the prettiest grandmother in London in no time."
He looked over the redheaded woman.
"How do you look so beautiful, mother?"

"Good genes," she replied, a bit smugly, "Now go. Please be home early. I will be up all night worrying if you are not home when I go to bed."

"Do not worry, Mother." William's lips barely brushed his mothers cheek. "I would never worry you."

**** Present ****

The punk turned around, staring at her, his eyes wide open in shock.
"Mother?"

What followed went so fast that one eyeblink could have made her miss it, his eyes changed color and ridges appeared on his
forehead. The moment was short and all to soon he looked human again.He grabbed the hand of a young girl who was standing a bit further, looking through some mags, and ran, pulling the kid along with him, making her drop her wallet and the necklace she'd been holding.

She noticed it though, backing off, up against the counter.
"William.... What happened?" She chased after him into the parking lot.
"WILLIAM!"

William and the girl got on a motorcycle, roaring off. Rose stood there, watching her son retreat. She lowered her head, feeling her heart sink. She raised her head when she felt the buzz.

Methos furrowed his brow, looking at his lover's confused expression.
"Rose? What's wrong?"

"William.... I just saw William," she rasped.

Methos gave her a wondering look as if he didn't really understand what the hell she was talking about.

"My son! William!" Rose exclaimed. "The one I adopted in 1860."

Methos gave her an odd look.
"So you just saw a geriatric of over a 140 years old? Sure Rose,... He ...It was probably just someone who looked like him. Or ... hell, he could have been a descendant for all you know."

"He called me mother!" She was shaking violently, sinking to the concrete.
"He died.... The police told me he died. Pickpockets....."
She ran her fingers through her hair. "It was him. He recognized me.
He wasn't immortal..... I would have never let them bury him if he were."
Methos didn't know anything to do, but just hold on to her, to listen to her.
"Someone dug up his grave," she whispered, gripping Methos tightly. "Someone dug him up, stole his body."

"Vampire." Methos whispered.

Rose wasn't even sure she'd heard him correctly.
"There's no such thing," she whispered back.

"Oh, yes... Immortals exists, but vampires, how could they be real?"
Methos shook his head.
"You would think after a thousand years, that you'd know better Rosa."

"He's a vampire?" She gasped in pained shock. "That face... That demonic face. He changed when he looked at me."

"Be glad he's gone Rose. Vampires they're ... they're evil."

"No," she said firmly, "Not my William. He was *good*. He was... He was... He was a good boy, a good son!"
She was fighting tears. "Do they really murder for food? Drink the blood of mortals?"

"Worse. They don't need to kill Rose. But they do anyway... for the chaos, the destruction..."
It seemed there was a bitter sadness in his words.
"Whatever looked at you from out of his body. That wasn't William.
It was just a demon wearing his face."

Rose got to her feet, wiping the tears from her eyes. She grit her teeth, turning to Methos. He could tell the look in her eyes. She was on the hunt. "Tell me... Does beheading really work?"

*********

"Spike!"
Dawn pulled away from the vampire who was dragging her into her house.
"Why did we have to run out of there? I was going to buy something!"
She tried to bring a pout in her voice. She pouted a bit at those words.The cornershop over at Marston was after all one of the few shops in town that hadn't banned her for shoplifting yet. Now they still might, she couldn't help but staring at the lipstick she was holding. One she most definitely had planned to pay for.

"Stay out of it, Nibblet!" Spike snarled. He usually wasn't this harsh with her.

"Who was that?" She asked. "That woman."

"A demon. Can't be anything else. Damn demon, daring to take her face. Can't be ... has to be a demon, has to be..."
He kept on rambling, moving back and forth.

"Who was it? An old girlfriend?" Dawn gave a nervous smile.

Spike didn't answer.

"Spike... You're scaring me...." Dawn said.

A car skidded to a halt in front of the Summers' home. The woman in from the convenience store came out, brandishing a sword. "You should be more careful with your wallet, little girl," she snarled at Dawn before she turned to Spike. "William."

Dawn trembled as she felt Spike's grip on her hand loosen as he froze in some kind of shock. Thank god that it only lasted for a moment before he planted himself in between Dawn and the strange
woman.
"Dawn, run!" He pushed her away.

"I have no interest in her, unless you've turned her into your kind...." The woman snarled.
"How could you let this happen, William?!?!"

"BUFFY!" Dawn yelled as she saw her sister walking up the street. "HELP!"

Buffy rolled her eyes, running towards Spike. She picked up the redhead, throwing her aside.
"Who do you owe money to this time, Spike?"

"Look here Slayer..."

The attacker got up off the pavement, picking up her sword.
"This is a matter between me and William," she hissed.

"Slayer?" A man came out of the car. He rushed out, grabbing Rose. "She'll take care of this, Rose."

The woman with the sword tried to surge forward. Buffy pulled out a stake, throwing it into her heart. She didn't turn to dust, as Buffy expected. She made a strange gasp and started to die in her companion's arms.
"Nobody stakes my ... vampire."
Buffy's hand went to her mouth before she could stop herself.
Dawn just stared at the man who was holding on to the woman's dead body.

"What did you do that for? She wasn't..."
He seemed to stare up in shock as Buffy went up to Spike, standing in between the strangers and the vampire.
The dark haired man who had run from the car got up pulled the stake from the redhead's heart and approached Buffy.
"Why aren't you killing him?" He asked. "He's a vampire, you're the Vampire Slayer! Put two and two together!"
He didn't even seem at all concerned with the fact his companion was now dead.

Buffy pushed Spike to the door and got in a fighting stance.
"Spike get inside."

"Not on your life Slayer."
Spike pushed passed Buffy, vamping out. He grabbed the dark haired man.
"I don't know who you are and why you look like my father....."

"Father?" Dawn couldn't help but mirror Buffy's confusion.

"But I never had a chance to get even with him for deserting us either..."

Buffy and Dawn looked even more shocked when the redhead gasped for air and got up.
"William Adam Marlowe, put him down NOW!"
Especially when Spike actually obeyed the order and looked at the woman in shock.
"You're a vampire," She said calmly, still holding the sword tightly in her hands.

"Yep that's the bollocks"

"You're an evil, soulless killer.

"Well that's half the fun of it."
He sneered at the woman.

"Yeah right."
Dawn couldn't help herself.
"Spike's about as evil as a kitten up a tree."

"Am not."

"Are too."

"I am sooo evil..."

"What?" The sword dropped slightly. She turned to her companion.
"You told me vampires were evil! I'm not going to kill him unless he's evil!"

"Vampires are evil!" The dark haired man snarled. "I don't know what his problem is if he isn't!"

Dawn could feel Buffy's frown on her and the others. If her sisters eyebrows could go any higher they'd be on top of her head.

The strangers began arguing about the evil of vampires. The woman ended it by yelling,
"I am not going to kill my son unless he really is a soulless, evil murderer!"

"Son?"