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Chapter 6- Truth revealed

Spike hurriedly entered the Summers house. "Buffy?"

He started to go upstairs when he heard Dawn answer from the living room, sitting on the floor in the front of the couch, hugging a pillow amid the destruction from her earlier encounter.

"She's not here."

"Nibblet?" Spike narrowed his eyes, shocked by the destruction, and made his way to her, kneeling nearby. "You've a cut, what happened little bit?"

"I'm all right", Dawn assured him.

"That's up to me", Spike said, turning her face to inspect it.

"I saw mom", Dawn then informed him.

"What?"

"She was here, Spike. I saw her. She was here, and she spoke to me", Dawn insisted to him.

Spike started. "Look-"

"No, she was right here, and—and then she wasn't. She"

"It wasn't her, Dawn."

"What?"

"I saw someone too, who looked like someone I knew, but it wasn't her", Spike explained to the girl.

"I don't understand."

"It's the Big Bad, nibblet, the one we saw coming", Spike revealed to her.

"But, that's what she said. Mom, she said that things were coming, that things were on their way, and that she loves us. So, it had to be her, right? I mean, her warning was true", Dawn said, still trying to believe she had seen her mom.

Spike shook his head. "I don't know. I don't think we can trust our eyes at the moment, no matter how good they work."

Dawn was still in denial. "So maybe the evil thing messing with you was here too. Only maybe it was the thing trying to keep mom away. 'Cause she was trying to protect me. Maybe."

Peter swung back home and took off his mask. "May?"

"Peter", May turned to look at him, confused by why he looked so worried. "What's the matter?"

"Oh thank God", Peter hugged her, and while confused, she hugged him back too.

Willow closed the door and heard sobbing, and walked in to see Tara on her knees, crying, and immediately rushed to her, hugging her from behind. "What's the matter, baby?"

"That thing….it came to me…..as my mom…" Tara said with tears, as Willow hugged her and let her sob into her shoulder, realizing the thing that had come to her as Tara had also come to Tara in the form of her mom, and had clearly shaken her.

"Hey, its okay, I'm here", Willow assured, kissing Tara's forehead.

Spike closed the door to Dawn's room as Buffy ran up the stairs yelling. "Dawn? Dawn!"

"It's all right Buffy, she went off to sleep", Spike assured her.

Buffy immediately demanded. "What the hell happened? Downstairs looks like-"

"Yeah, hell happened, right? The Big Bad that wanted to devour wants to chomp now", Spike told her, shaking his head.

Buffy was horrified. "Oh, God. And it started with Dawn?"

"Both of us", Spike revealed. "This thing knows everything about us. It made me think I was talking to someone I knew. It came to me as Dru, said she would take me back, I refused."

In spite of the situation, Buffy was proud of Spike for that, and then Spike continued. "Dawn saw... your Mother."

Buffy's eyes were wide as Spike said. "Its trying to mess with us all."

"So, I met a therapist a while ago who'd been knocked out by his patient, and his patient had one hand, and he claimed the patient turned green and sprouted claws and a tail before he passed out", Buffy told Spike, who realized what she was talking about.

"You think this patient is that Lizard thing we've been seeing?" Spike asked and got a nod from her.

"And his name is Curt Connors, he is actually the science teacher in Dawnie's and Peter's high school", Buffy revealed, now surprising Spike.

"Bloody hell", Spike commented. "Things are falling into place now."

"Now we need to find out how Curt becomes this thing, and stop him", Buffy said firmly.

Later

"You called?" Peter asked, his arms folded as he sat in front of Buffy and Spike. "How's Dawn?"

"She's fine, that's not important right now", Spike told him.

"Well, whatever you saw, I saw it too, it came to me as Uncle Ben", Peter told the two of them. "Clearly, this thing is here for us."

"Willow saw it as Tara, Tara saw it as her mom", Buffy summed up, having talked to Willow on the phone. "But I need to talk to you about something else."

"What?"

"Curt Connors is the Lizard", Buffy said, and Peter looked incredulous.

"What are you talking about?" Peter asked, shaking his head in disbelief. "That's ridiculous."

"Look, I found a knocked out therapist who used to be my classmate, he said the patient who knocked him out had one hand, and before passing out he saw him turn green, and sprout claws and a tail", Buffy revealed to Peter, who now looked shocked. "It's Curt. Plus I saw him in the basement behaving weirdly. Maybe the thing I thought was drugs is actually a formula that turns him into-"

"Cheap Godzilla", Spike finished with a smirk and shrug.

"You really think its him?" Peter asked.

"Well, there is no other candidate here", Buffy pointed out. "I want you to talk to him, find out what you can."

"What, me? No, but-"

"Please, its important", Buffy begged, and Peter realized there was no other option.

"Fine."

Later

Peter knocked on Curt's door and he opened it, looking a bit dishevelled. "Oh! Peter, hey, what are you doing here?"

"Uh, Professor, I wanted to talk to you about your resea-"

"Look, I'd love to, but I'm going out right now, you can come tomorrow, okay?" Curt said as he closed his door and locked it up before walking off, as Peter watched him with narrowed eyes, deciding to follow him to find out more.

At the promenade, there were a lot of people bustling about at night, with a musician playing a harmonica in the corner, as Curt passed him, he played the 'Mr. Sandman' song.

Curt started humming along as Peter, a few paces behind but unseen to him, followed, though the crowd got too dense and Curt was getting quite difficult to follow.

Peter then pushed through the crowd and arrived where he had thought Curt would be, but he was gone from there now.

Curt had followed a woman into an alley, and turned to his right to see Peter looking at him. "Do it, you know you want to. You know I want you to."

Curt groaned as he started changing, and the woman turned, her eyes widening as she let out a scream of terror.

He pounced upon her, and in a few seconds, it was over, as he then turned to look at Peter, covered in blood, and actually shuddered, feeling fear even in this form.

He ran off as Peter smiled and morphed into Spike. "Then tell him his lonesome nights are….over."

Later

"Well, I did fight 2 people who looked like human-sized lizards, so perhaps Curt bit them, and his behavior did seem suspicious", Peter told the rest as Willow was on the computer with Tara behind her, and Buffy, Spike, Dawn, Xander and Anya stood together as well.

"But other things we were told then were not true", Dawn said, her arms folded.

"Yeah, that's right", Tara agreed with a nod, since her mother would never say things like that to her, and no one with common sense would agree with whatever that thing had said.

"Whatever it is, we need hard facts though", Buffy pointed out, turning to Peter. "And you lost him."

"Hey I wasn't Spider-Man at the moment, and if he did transform, he ended up in a sewer or something", Peter defended himself, raising his hands.

"Maybe all of us should try it next time, discreetly that is, I can sniff him around", Spike said with a shrug.

"Sounds good to me, he needs more than one person after him from different angles", Xander agreed there.

"So, you are not finding anything about lizard people, are you? Not in abundance or anything?" Anya asked.

"Maybe we should look for something else", Tara suggested.

Willow typed and noted. "Well, there are missing people, eight maybe, no, ten of them, no bodies, they're missing."

"You think the professor has something to do with this?" Spike asked.

"I am not sure of anything right now", Peter said with a sigh. "But it could be him, if he is the Lizard."

"He is the only one who knows", Buffy pointed out, all of them deciding to look into it again.

Next night

Curt was out again, looking really sick, as if he was going to explode any moment, and Peter dressed up as Spider-Man was following him discreetly, with Buffy and Spike doing the same from other vantage points.

His head suddenly jerked up, as if he was remembering something, and he immediately made his way away into another direction, the three of them following him as well.

Curt eventually made his way down into a basement, followed by Spider-Man, Buffy and Spike, and Buffy called out. "Professor."

He turned to look at her as his eyes widened in horror. "No! No! Why are you here?! Get out!"

"We know what you are", Spike said as he walked forwards. "Best to just spill it all out right now."

Curt grabbed his head. "I remember…..I remember…..I'm trying to…"

"Professor, calm down", Peter said, raising his hands in a placating gesture.

Another Peter was there, visible only to Curt, and he was pacing in the background as he then hummed the Mr. Sandman tune, and then he started singing it. "Mr. Sandman, bring me a dream. Make him the cutest that I've ever seen. Give him the word that I'm not a rover. Then tell him that his lonesome nights are over."

Curt was now distracted, mesmerized by the song as Buffy asked. "What is it Professor? What are you trying to remember?"

And then Curt, in front of their very eyes, transformed into the Lizard, and lunged at Buffy who cartwheeled back to avoid, and then he tried to slice with his claws which she barely avoided as Spike took Vamp face and rammed into Curt, staggering him a little, and gave him a combo of two punches and a kick twice.

Before Curt could react, Peter swung at him, kicking his face and sending him falling back. He then pinned himself on top of the Lizard, using webbing to try to shut its mouth. "Professor, I know you're in there, you don't want to do this."

The Lizard pushed him off as Buffy gave it a spin kick, sending it staggering back, and then she leapt into the air and kicked it back again.

"This is fun", the other Peter commented with a chuckle.

And then, other humans, now deformed to look like human-sized Lizards, rose out of the floor of the basement, coming at Peter, Spike and Buffy.

Peter webbed one up and pulled it towards himself, leaping and kicking it out, while Spike gave another one two punches, taking it down, and Buffy spin kicked another hard on the face, putting it down too.

More came as they continued fighting them, with Peter webbing one's face and pulling towards his knee, then kneeing it out, and Spike blocked one's blow and decked its gut and abdomen before flipping it to his other side, and Buffy gave her opponent a left hook, a right hook, and then an uppercut, sending it down as well.

Lizard was watching, staggering around while holding its head, in an internal struggle as the other Peter ordered. "Do it, kill them all, you know you want to, you're just an animal, do it."

The Lizard walked towards them, as Peter webbed another and hurled it towards the wall with his web-line, taking it out, and Spike swept the next one's feet from under it, making it fall down, and stomped on its face, with Buffy leaping and kicking her opponent hard on the face, sending it down to the ground too.

Lizard suddenly recoiled, falling into a cubbyhole at the back end of the basement, and transformed back into Curt, his clothes now in tatters, and he looked horrified at what he had done.

"I win, you lose, they know what you did, time to take responsibility for it, doctor", the other Peter told Curt, who was simply watching with wide eyes.

Peter leapt up and firing a web, hung one upside down, as Spike blocked another's punch and elbowed its arm, and then its face, knocking it out, and Buffy grabbed another one's hands, putting them down, and head-butted it hard, dazing it and sending it back before flipping in the air and kicking its face, taking it down as well.

This was the last one, and then they turned to Curt, who was cowering and shivering in the cubbyhole.

Peter walked to him, Buffy and Spike behind him, as he begged. "Do it, please just do it, end it all. He said you'd do it."

"Who said?" Buffy asked.

"Peter, it was Peter, I saw it, Peter was here the whole time, talking and singing", he started sobbing. "It sang to me."

Peter was shocked and asked. "What are you on about? I don't see anyone else here."

"I don't think he saw Peter, mate", Spike told Peter, realizing what was going on.

"There's something down here", Buffy said in realization herself.

"I can feel them, I can hear them all!" Curt cried.

"This thing is playing with all of us, Professor", Peter assured him.

"What is it? Why is it doing this to me?" Curt inquired, still horrified.

"Will you all help me?" Curt inquired.

Peter made a decision, and took off his mask, revealing his face to Curt, whose eyes were wide again. "P…..Peter?"

"Yes Professor, its me", Peter said, kneeling down to him. "And we will help you."

The other Peter sighed and sneered from the stairs, then walked away.

Later, at the house, Curt was sitting in a chair, wrapped in a blanket while the others talked in an adjacent room.

Peter, Buffy, Willow, Spike, Tara, Dawn, Xander and Anya were all there. Curt was listening to them.

"And you believe him?" Anya asked after it was all done.

Buffy told her. "You didn't see him down there. He really didn't know what he'd done. It wasn't in his control."

Xander said sarcastically. "Oh, an out of control serial killer. You're right, that is a great houseguest."

"Well, you had one for a houseguest, remember?" Spike asked with a smirk as Xander groaned, remembering.

Dawn asked. "Wait, is he—is he staying here?"

Buffy sighed. "I don't know. But I'm not letting him out of my sight, that's for sure."

"I do want to help him, but keeping him here, is that a good idea?" Peter asked. "I mean, he isn't in control, you know?"

"Yeah Buffy, he has been killing, it wasn't in his control yes, but if he transforms, he's dangerous", Willow agreed with Peter there.

"Or is there some other reason too, outside of just helping him?" Tara inquired, as Buffy looked at them all.

She finally revealed her other reason. "I'm not keeping him around just to help him. I think there was something there, talking to him, making him do things."

"Yeah, it came to me too, not very pleasant", Spike said before turning to Dawn. "Nibblet would know."

"Yeah", Dawn nodded with a sigh.

"Yes, it does know how to get under your skin", Peter agreed with them.

"So it is clearly affecting Curt and compromising his better judgment", Tara noted sadly, hoping they could help him somehow.

"So we need to find out more about it", Willow realized.

Buffy continued. "And its been screwing with Curt big time."

Xander then asked. "So, you want him around because...?"

"Look, there's something evil working us, and if we are ever gonna have a chance to fight it, we need to learn everything we can about it. This thing has been closer to Curt than any of us", Buffy explained her reasoning.

"Don't like it but that does make sense", Peter agreed with Buffy about that.

Willow realized. "And if you want to understand it..."

"I'm gonna have to get close to Curt", Buffy finished for them all.

"Nah, it's too dangerous", Xander warned her.

Buffy knew, but nothing else could be done. "I don't have a choice. Whatever this thing is, from beneath us, it's bad, and it's only getting worse."

"Yeah, this is all that can be done now", Peter said with a sigh.

Giles had come to England itself to get Travers to give him more information, but had failed so far, so he decided to ask a friend of his who was a higher-up, and he entered the flat, looking around.

He saw a young woman lying dead on the floor.

"Oh, dear God! Robson, are you here? Robson!"

Giles got up and started looking for Robson, who he found near a chair in the next room. Giles went to his side.

"You too?" He took off his glasses and started to cry. "Dear God, I thought you—"

Robson's eyes flashed open. "Gather them. It's started."

"It's all right. I understand. I'll take care of it-"

One of the robed men snuck up behind Giles wielding a battle-axe. He swung it at Giles.

New York

Jemma Simmons was in the kitchen, having put the pizza in the microwave, and turned around, when suddenly there was a robed man in front of her.

He was about to swing a knife but Jemma reacted in time, kicking him away, and then two more came from the side. She punched one off but the other one kicked her down.

Then the one from before raised a dagger.

Suddenly, he convulsed and fell down, unconscious, revealing Leopold Fitz who had his ICER aimed at the other. "Get away from her."

He fired again as they ran off and rolled away to dodge and ran off, disappearing from the site.

Fitz ran to Simmons. "Jemma! Jemma! You okay?"

He helped her up and she nodded. "Yeah, I'm fine."

"Who are these?" Fitz wondered.

"No idea, let's go to the Avengers Tower and find out", Simmons suggested, and they agreed, deciding to take him there for interrogation.

And now the Agents of SHIELD are roped in too, though I'll only be involving FitzSimmons, Bobbi Morse and Lance Hunter in the main plot, since I don't want too many characters around.

Decided to have Giles go back to England since that's the only way he can return with Potentials of his own.

Now all know Curt is Lizard and is manipulated by the First. As for why I used the 'Mr. Sandman' song, well, if used in the right context, that song can be really creepy, like when it was used for Cell in DBZ: Abridged.

Hope all enjoyed and see you all next time with another chapter.