The Bronze
Spike had been in the Bronze while the Scoobies were there many times in the past. This was the first time he had actually been invited. It felt different somehow, sitting at the table without expecting one of them to tell him to get lost. Until, that is, Tara and Red got up to dance and the Bit found her friends and went to join them. That left him alone at the table with Buffy.
Never before had he been so tongue tied. He'd love the chance to talk to her about what all this champion stuff was supposed to entail, how she felt about it, but the music was too loud for serious conversations. However, it was just low enough that he felt he should try and fill the silence with small talk. The problem was the last time he'd had to engage in small talk was over a century ago; he had no clue whatsoever on how to begin.
He was on the verge of despair when he was rescued by the Bit. Or rather, the sight of the Bit dancing far too suggestively with some pimply faced youth.
He growled reflexively. "Who the bloody hell is that and why is she dancing like that with him?"
"That would probably be Mark, the kid from school she told me about yesterday. She said he may be showing up tonight and to try not to embarrass her if he did. As for the dancing, if you'll look around the room, you'll see it's pretty much the way everyone out there is doing it." She smiled at him. "What's the matter, the Big Bad worried about a teenage boy now?"
"I just think she's too young to be doing that with the likes of him."
"She's fifteen now. Much as I don't like it either, I don't think we have a chance in hell of stopping her. And if we can't stop her, I, at least, want to be watching what's going on. Hence the group night at the Bronze tonight."
He had to admit, she was watching them almost as closely as he was. And her idea had merit. The last time the Bit had been out on a "date" alone, her date had ended with her staking the bloke before the end of the night.
He scanned the rest of the dance floor, looking for potential threats. He didn't feel the signature of any other vampires in the club, but that didn't mean trouble couldn't come from other sources. As his eyes passed over the room, he noticed Red and Tara were not looking as happy as they had earlier. He couldn't make out the exact words between them, but he got enough to gather that Red was making another pitch to Tara about why he couldn't be trusted.
He sighed. He'dalready spent a long time trying to prove he was one of the team, that he could be trusted. Hell, he even had official approval from a higher power, and still it wasn't enough to convince some people. Red and Harris, in particular. He thought Giles might be coming around, slowly, and the new watcher seemed to be a bit of alright. But he was beginning to think the other two original members of the Scoobies were a lost cause when it came to giving him the benefit of the doubt.
The witches were leaving the dance floor now and walking back to the table. From the look on their faces, very little had been settled. He could sense a blow up in their near future. He just hoped it didn't end up making things harder on the Slayer.
Buffy didn't seem to notice the pending storm on her friends' faces. "All danced out?" She asked.
Willow replied, sullenly, "I guess so." Tara just looked away.
"Would you guys mind keeping an eye on Dawn while we go patrol? And taking her home, if we aren't back by eleven?" Buffy pressed on.
"Sure, Buffy, we can do that," Tara answered, shooting a meaningful look at Willow, who had been about to open her mouth.
"Sure," Willow echoed."Whatever you need."
Spike wanted to get away from the tension at the table and told Buffy, "I'll go let the Bit know the plan and meet you out front, Slayer." He walked off into the crowd toward Dawn before Buffy could answer.
He tapped Dawn's date on the shoulder and said, "Why don't you go get the girl a drink, she looks thirsty."
The boy seemed to want to argue until Dawn said, "Please, Mark? A Diet Coke? I'll meet you back at the table with Janice."
"You sure you're okay with him?" Mark looked suspiciously at Spike, who returned his stare blandly.
"Positive, I promise." Dawn smiled sweetly at her date before he shrugged and wandered off in the direction of the bar.
Spike watched him walk away, then turned to Dawn and said, "Big sis and I are heading out to patrol. You'll be okay here with your friends and the witches 'til it's time to go home?"
"Sure, no prob." She quickly changed the subject. "What do you think about Mark? Isn't he amazing? He's such a great dancer, too. I feel like a klutz next to him, but he's really nice about it when I step on his toes and everything…"
"Breathe, Bit." Spike interrupted. "Yeah, suppose he's alright. Least this one has a pulse. You be careful with him though. Teenage boys aren't exactly known for their self control. You remember what I told you to do if one of them gets fresh with you?"
"Yeah, yeah. Knees and thumbs. Groin and eyes. Trust me—gross—but I got it."
"Alright, then. Have fun and we'll see you back at the house."
"Bye, Spike," she called as she bounced her way back to the table where Mark was just joining Janice with their drinks.
Spike shook his head, turned and walked towards the exit. He wasn't paying close attention to where he was going and before he could step away, he ran into a couple standing in the middle of the aisle, talking.
"Ow!" The woman called out as she fell to the floor, her four-inch heels not helping her balance.
"Yo, asshole! Watch where you're walking!" Her date added as he bent down to help her up.
"Sorry," Spike said. Then gave them a second look and a discreet sniff. Humans, both of them. His mind went back to the kiss on the cheek Joyce had given him and the unusual feeling in his head at the time. His heart filled with trepidation. He made sure to 'bump' into another guy on his way out the door.
It was official. The chip was history.
Restfield Cemetery
Buffy thought Spike seemed unusually quiet on the walk to Restfield, the first cemetery on their docket for the night. But she was too caught up in her own thoughts at the time to ask him why he was so uncharacteristically moody.
Going over everything her mother and Spike had revealed about Angel left her deeply conflicted. She clearly remembered the overwhelming love and respect she had for Angel when he was still in Sunnydale, but the time apart, and her own growing up, had given her a sense of perspective on her feelings. She could now see his actions as they truly were: meant to seduce and manipulate the feelings of a naïve, teenage girl.
It was actually Dawn that had opened her eyes. Not intentionally, but as Buffy considered her sister's exuberance for her date tonight, she realized Dawn was nearly the same age she'd been when Angel had supposedly fallen in love with her. The comparison was eye opening. The thought of an older man, let alone a 200 plus year old vampire, professing feelings for her baby sister made her sick to her stomach. She didn't want to think of the word pedophile in relation to Angel, but it was hard not to make that connection.
She knew now that her own feelings were far from the everlasting, soulmate, true love she had thought they were at the time. But, what did that leave? Spike was right when he told them they'd never be friends. Her thoughts were muddled and she was more than ready to 'Gone With the Wind' them for the time being.
She focused her attention on Spike and realized he was just as deep in his own thoughts.
"What's going on in that head of yours, Spike? You've been awfully quiet tonight," she asked.
"Got to tell you something and I'm not sure how you're going to react. But it's not something I can keep to myself. Not if I want all of you to be able to trust me."
"O-Kay…" she said. "Is it something bad?"
"Guess that depends on your point of view," he said, chagrined. "I want you to know, it doesn't make a difference. I'm not going to do anything about it. I only found out earlier tonight by accident. I didn't go looking for it."
"Whoa! Wait! Let's start with whatever it is you're talking about."
"When we were at the Bronze tonight, I bumped into a couple different people," he started.
"And…" Buffy didn't see where this was going.
"And… Normally, those bumps would've caused my chip to fire. This time, I got nothing. I even deliberately bumped into this third bloke on the way out the door and zilch. When your mother gave me that kiss on the cheek the other night I felt something weird go on in my noggin. I think she might have removed or disabled the chip somehow."
He looked earnestly at her. "You need to know that this makes no difference to me. I'm not about to go out snacking on the populace or anything else that I would have done a couple of years ago. I've changed. I know it's hard to believe and I don't expect you and the rest of your lot to believe that, but I have. I wanna be a better man. I wanna justify the faith your mom and the Powers that like to bugger you have shown in me. So…I figured I needed to tell you right away. Let you decide whether you need to stake me or not."
He had drifted off toward the end of his speech, and now Buffy saw him just standing there with his head down—like a prisoner waiting for his execution. She couldn't deny that the thought that he was now chipless gave her pause. She thought back on all the damage and mayhem he had caused pre-chip, but realized it was never quite as bad as they had made it out to be. Yes, he had tried to kill her—multiple times—but, in all fairness, she was trying to kill him too. He kidnapped Willow and Xander—but never actually hurt them, and eventually even led her and Angel to them. The thing that bothered her most wasn't the lame schemes he came up with, it was the nightly feeding and killing. So that's what she addressed with him.
"So…no more chip, huh?" She looked at him thoughtfully. "Every time I've asked for your promise in the past, you've kept it. So, I want you to think really carefully right now and not make one you won't be able to keep. Can you really, truly promise me you won't feed on or hurt humans now that you don't have the chip?"
Spike took her request seriously and didn't automatically blurt out a 'yes, of course'. "Feeding, yes, no problem. I've gone this long on the pig, continuing with it isn't a problem when you know how to spice it up. Hurting humans…I just can't make a blanket promise like that. If it's a matter of protecting you, or Bit, or even someone else, I may have to hurt someone. Who knows, I may get a vision from Anya showing humans attacking an innocent. I'd have to act in that case. I can promise not to hurt anyone for anything other than self defense or defense of another. Can you live with that?"
"I think that's fair. I can't exactly ask you to live up to a standard I'm not willing to myself. And those nerds the other night pushed me to my limit!" She smiled and bumped shoulders with him. "How about we move on? I don't see any fledglings rising or vamps attacking here tonight."
"Sounds good to me." After a minute, he asked slyly, "So where does Bit's new beau fall on the hurting humans scale?"
Buffy laughed and punched him in the arm. "Right now, he's off limits. But ask me again when he breaks her heart, and I might change my mind."
Spike chuckled and fell into step beside her, neither of them noticing the shadow that had just started carefully stalking them from a distance.
Crawford Street Mansion
Angel threw a candle from an end table against the wall in a fit of rage. Nothing had gone the way he intended it to that night. First, he had to deal with Giles and that psychotic girlfriend of Xander's treating him like he was the crazy one.
By the time Giles had bothered to direct him to the Bronze, when he'd gotten there, they had already left. Luckily their scent was still strong enough to follow, so he had finally caught up with them at Restfield, only to see them practically walking hand in hand. They were smiling little smiles at each other and when they finally did find a fledgling to dust, they moved like they'd been fighting together for years.
Angel could tell he wouldn't be able to convince Buffy Spike was the threat and take him out while they were together. He'd have to wait for a time when he could get Spike alone. He'd planned to follow him back to whatever underground lair he'd been crashing in, but then the two of them walked back to Revello and Spike never came back out. Angel had waited until almost sunrise with no sign of his quarry. He'd eventually made his way back to Crawford with minutes to spare. The only good thing was that, after all the lights had gone out, he'd climbed the tree outside Buffy's bedroom window. Wherever Spike was sleeping, it wasn't with her. Yet. He'd been able to watch her sleep again, like the old days, for nearly an hour before he had to leave.
As he sat with a glass of whiskey going over the night's events, he realized a more detailed plan would be needed if he wanted to break the hold Spike had over Buffy and most of the other Scoobies.
For now, though, he needed to rest. Tomorrow he would begin putting his plans into motion.