Set during "The Replacement" Season 5 Ep 3, what if Spike had been hit by the magic Toth used to separate Xander instead!
The Scooby gang (minus Anya and Tara, plus Riley) is out walking through the city dump making light of the smells they were smelling when they hear a rustling.
"What are you doing here, Spike?" Riley asks, trying to sound menacing, raising the crossbow he's holding.
"Oh, there's a nice lady vampire who's set up a nice charming tea room, over the next pile of crap." His sarcasm was abhorrent, seeing the whole group of white hats.
Rolling his vampire eyes at Riley's crossbow aim, though witnessing him rummaging through trash was embarrassing in some sorta way. He was invigorated when he saw Buffy tense and reach up to Riley to turn the weapon away from him.
"What do you think I'm doing, I'm scavenging." He held up a glass lamp to prove it.
"Very pretty." Willow sounded almost encouraging and he shook off his shock, nodded in agreement, and tried to pack up and get away from them.
"Spike, um." Giles intoned, "We're looking for a demon, tall, robed... Skin sort of hanging off, deep voice."
"You mean a great tall robey thing like that one?" Spike pointed behind the Scoobies and they all turned in unison.
For a moment Buffy thought Spike was faking them out, but there the demon was, yelling "Slayer" and raising his rod to her. Buffy pushed Xander out of the way into a big pile of trash quickly and managed to duck the shot fired out of the wand thing the baddie held.
Spike had turned in on instinct towards the Slayer's spot and got hit directly with the green glowing light. Getting pushed to the ground with such force, the vampire was out cold.
Willow looked around, stunned how it all happened so fast, "He's gone."
Buffy frowned, glancing around, not a bad guy in sight. A slight pout graced her face, "Why would he just up and vanish, he finally found me, and the fight was just starting."
Giles had an answer for that, wiping his glasses, standing next to a stunned Riley, "I believe that magic was meant to disarm you, Buffy. Spike took the hit for you and now…"
Buffy, Willow, and Xander finally looked to the ground, "There's two Spike's."
"They look identical." Willow was amazed, squatting down, touching the duster on the one closest to her, "Down to the clothes!"
"This is so not good." Riley was appalled.
"Yeah, double the annoying." Buffy joked and saw one of the Spike's start moving. Willow stood up quickly, not wanting to be the closest human next to the waking vampire...vampires.
"Bloody…" The Spike closest to Buffy sat up slowly and rubbed his palm against his face.
"Uh, Spike," Buffy spoke and he looked up at her confused, "You feeling okay?"
He squinted at her, "The Slayer, is asking me if I'm okay?" He huffed and stood up, shaking his head, "Is it the end of the world or somethin'... again?"
Buffy just looked at him wide-eyed, smiling back at his kidding manner, he hadn't realized yet and her lips tucked in. He couldn't read her and now he noticed the rest of them looking at him too, her eyes looked back to the ground and he followed.
"What the bloody…"
"Bloody…"
The Scoobies looked at each other as the 'bloody's echoed. Second Spike was waking up and getting up off the ground. Everyone, besides Buffy, took a step back, two Spike's were kinda intimidating, they had no clue what to expect.
The first awakened Spike just looked at his other self, awed, shocked, and confused. The second Spike stood up and wiped off his hands together absently, scrutinizing his double as well.
They both tensed for a moment, when it looked like neither of them was going to fight the other, first Spike tilted his head and reached out to the other.
"Is this how you all see me? We look identical?" His voice was rough but wondrous.
The other Spike grinned in that joyous realization, his head tilting to mimic his twin, and then the first Spike grabbed him closer by the lapels of his matching duster.
Buffy looked back in awe to her friends who were just as shocked as her that the two Spike's were investigating each other.
"Better than a mirror ever was." The second Spike said, haven't seen his reflection in a hundred plus years, as his hands were tracing the first Spike's jaw with one hand and his eyebrow scar with the other.
Buffy flushed a bit, they were so up in each other's matching faces it looked like they might kiss.
"Oi, relax, ya poof!" First Spike ruffled second Spike's hair with his hand, messing up the slicked-back look with a smirk, like brothers.
Second Spike backed up, chuckling lightly, shaking his head, running his hand through his hair in an attempt to fix it but just caused more curls to fall outta place.
Buffy blinked, this interaction was so weird but endearing. Oh gosh, did she just think that? She blushed subconsciously.
"Well, at least we can tell them apart now." Xander chimed in, smiling slightly at his friends.
Second Spike with the messed up hair, regarded Xander first, Giles was still cleaning his glasses, looking to Willow, Riley hardly got a glance, leaving Buffy for last. Was she blushing? His head tilted with a smile.
He slid his arms out of his duster and folded it over his arm delicately like a waiter would a napkin. "Better?" he asked, mostly her.
She hoped her flushed cheeks would go down as she looked between both Spike's. First Spike looked very much as snarky and annoying as she knew him, maybe it was the slicked-back hair...
Second Spike looked softer somehow, curls, t-shirt, maybe his shoulders were a little more or less slouched? She couldn't tell exactly, but something about his demeanor was more… human to her Slayer senses.
"Are you both vampires?" Riley's cardboard voice broke Buffy's reverie staring at the two bleached blonde men.
"Good question." Giles had finally returned his glasses to his face.
The two Spike's looked to each other nodding and donning their game faces. To each other, they looked still the same but facing towards the Scoobies, Willow opened her mouth.
"The Spike who woke up first has so many more bumpies!"
"Sharper teeth too." Xander unconsciously shivered, first Spike definitely looked more like a demon than the second awake.
The Spike's looked back to each other, game faces showing their leering confusion at the situation.
"Seems like the spell separated them out into pieces of Spike and one got more demon than the other. We'll have to do research on the demon who did this. I suggest going back to the Magic Box." Giles started walking forward, Xander and Willow in toe.
"Good idea, get outta the stinky," Willow commented on having been in the junkyard longer than she'd like. The Spike's shook off their game faces and started after as well, interested in their split, pretty lamps forgotten.
"No! This is so not good! How do we know which one got the chip?!" Riley clearly didn't want to just tag along, and the group who started to follow Giles stopped and turned to the commando.
Buffy's brow furrowed, shouldn't she be the one concerned? But she hadn't thought or found two Spike's any more worrisome than usual.
"Well, we can answer it easily." First Spike lunged towards Riley with vengeance and quickly punched him in the face. Both men yelled, Riley from his now bleeding nose and first Spike from the firing of the chip.
Second Spike grinned in leisure at his double and appreciatively at the bleeding Captain Cardboard, but turned to Buffy solemnly, "I'd rather not deal with the headache if there's a chip in me too. Do you mind?" he held his hand out to her.
Buffy looked on questioningly, she didn't want Riley getting punched again for the sake of the experiment. But she was unsure of touching one of these Spikes, what if they were the bad guy… like. For real robey magic bad guy… not Spike?
Since Spike didn't really give her that vibe anymore, ohhh her thoughts right now. She chastised herself and held out the hand that wasn't holding her giant ax to him tentatively. He couldn't possibly do anything to just her hand and hello, ax.
Everyone watched on as second Spike held her hand in his, a moment, so gentle, so calm, then all of a sudden the grip increased as he tried to crush her fingers.
His eyes squeezed shut at the jolt of pain triggered in his brain and released fast, petting over her unhurt fingers delicately, before dropping his hand from her warm one entirely.
"Well soldier boy, looks like we are both good and chipped," he answered with a sneer.
"Complete duplicates," Riley mumbled, swiping at his hurt nose. Not really happy about the information but at least both Spike's couldn't hurt humans, especially now they could ultimately do more damage as a team rather than single.
The group started walking towards the Magic Box again, "Not complete dupes though, I mean the demon bits at least looked different." Willow rationalized.
"Huh, yeah, more bumpies always means more vampire to me. Like older, you know?" Buffy's head tilted as she thought and looked at the two Spike's, who walked side by side, a few paces behind her.
"At what age do you guys go all bumpy and fruit punch mouthy like the Master?"
At once both Spike's seemed amused at the Slayer's question, and her blush resumed. First Spike smirked and chuckled, second Spike grinned at her, but after a beat, they looked at each other a little concerned. The group was rounding on the Magic Box in a moment.
"The Master was 600 or something." First Spike said to his double.
"He was Darla's sire even…" Second Spike blinked, "She still looked decently human into her what, 350th year?"
First Spike shrugged he didn't think much care about the lineage, rather live in the moment, but he couldn't deny what she insinuated, "You might be onto something, pet."
"Maybe all vamps go full game face, like the Master, at some point, but most of us don't make it that long," Second Spike smiled, cheekily, "Probably cause of Slayers like you," he winked, holding the door open for her at the Magic box.
Buffy blinked and found herself sincerely smiling back. Something was definitely more human or... congenial about curly-haired Spike. At least in comparison to the first awakened Spike, she thought, as she gladly entered the store in front of him and the other.
Anya was there. Her arm in a sling from the vamp attack last week. Stupid Dawn, running out of the house like that, Buffy lost the smile from her face, still feeling bad Anya felt that pain.
Anya's eyes widened at the two Spike's and Xander filled her in. "Yep, two Captain Peroxides for the price of one! Same magical dude, that Giles fought off earlier, did it."
"Feels like too much handsomeness for one space." She responded casually. Xander took in a shocked breath, feeling a tad jealous at his girlfriend's comment.
The Spike's both smirked at the ex-demoness, the first awake raised his eyebrow at her seductively. She smiled flirtily in return, though grabbing Xander closer to her, with her free arm, showing the vamps she was happily taken. Xander breathed out a smile into her neck.
"Let's look into this demon who caused this." Giles rationalized, cutting off the sexual tension easily, handing books to everyone as they congregated around the table.
"Why?" First Spike huffed, backing away, "Let's just get out and find the ponce."
Buffy smiled at his reaction, it was hers too, but she downplayed her excitement when Willow spoke up.
"Well, we did try that." Willow pouted, "And that's why there's two of you now. But he's after Buffy!"
First Spike growled a little and glared but no one seemed to mind, the Scoobies all took their usual positions. Second Spike picked up a book from the table and tried to hand it to him, "We know what he looks like, won't be difficult."
Second Spike dared to whisper to his double after the Scoobies looked away, "We'll protect Buffy with our lives."
The first Spike nodded at him in abject agreement, the second was pleased his twin felt the same. The hints of how he cared for Buffy haven't been that clear yet, but there it was, for nearly two years, steadily growing in his, now their, heart.
His voice still kept low, "If they find a way to merge us... and it's not a detriment to be apart, why become one again?"
The first awakened Spike looked enthralled with his double for a moment. There was always a minute chance this second Spike was the demon who had split them apart, to begin with, though their exchanges felt like they were equals.
He knew deep down this second was him, his part, his brother, twin. A different part of him but still him. They looked at each other with knowing agreement, two vamps were better than one and they had the stiff faces to ensure it.
First Spike flipped open the book, both of them glancing at Buffy who half-heartedly turned a page in her own book, at a glance, not considering them in the slightest.
Although Buffy was hardly reading the pages in front of her, she was distinctly aware of the two vampires. Who were now shifting apart from each other, across the expanse of the Magic Box, till she remained at the table almost exactly midway between them. Her blush began to rise up in thought.
To be continued!
Ah, I had a dream of two Spikes and couldn't wait to get it down on "paper"
Let me know what you think!