"I'm not going!"
"All the Potentials are going, Ally." Giles insisted, from his place on the coffee table in the living room.
"Exactly. Potentials. I'm a Slayer. I'm all grown-up, and powerful, and… The bathroom's finally gonna be unoccupied for more than five minutes!" The brunette retorted, Buffy smirking from beside her.
"You've never had a Vision Quest. It could be helpful."
"I don't need it. Besides, I'm already met Rasta-mama Slayer." Ally nodded toward Buffy, who looked away, trying to look innocent.
"This trip is important for the girls to understand the source of their power, and to know how to use it right. Ally already does. Don't worry." Buffy supported her, smiling lightly at her sister.
"Yeah. I already do. Have a good trip. I'm gonna take a twenty minute long shower tonight, finally!" She jumped from her place on the couch and skipped toward the basement, leaving Watcher and Slayer alone.
She threw herself on the mattress beside Spike, stretching all her limbs out as she heard Giles say goodbye and the door close.
"Finally off to their fieldtrip?" Spike wondered, staring at the ceiling, then at her.
"Finally." She nodded, a wide smile on her face. "I can have a good long shower… and have breakfast in peace, not worrying if the Brits have eaten all the cereal."
"And no constant pitter patter of clomping teenage girly feet."
"No pitter patter." She agreed, rolling to the side and throwing an arm over him, only to have her skin clash against something metallic. "You're chained again?"
"This is better. Believe me, it's safer."
"OK. But you've been fine. In close contact with the girls."
"With you by my side, yeah. You won't let me hurt one of them. And that's the way it's gonna be until we're sure the First is done making me its bitch. Either we're together, or I'm on the leash."
"We just need to make sure the trigger's deactivated then. We've got a couple of days, lack of pitter-patter and all..."
"Ally Cat…" He started, but soon stopped.
She raised her head to look at him, wondering what he wanted. "What?"
"Ow."
She frowned. "Ow?"
"Ow ow ow!"
"What's wrong? Spike, what is going on?"
"The chip. God. Why would…? Aaahhh!"
For hours, his chip went off, only to stop hurting a moment later, and then start again. They never knew when it would give him another shock, or when he'd pop another blood vessel. The worst part was they had no idea what was causing it, or how to stop it.
Well, maybe those who had put the chip there could fix it. But Riley and Graham were in a mission, somewhere in… Asia? Last she'd heard of them, they'd be unreachable for a couple weeks.
Weeks they couldn't live like that.
She still gave the last contact number they'd given her a try. It was some kind of flower shop, a cover for their organization. Or so she thought. It wasn't very clear. Buffy voted for government conspiracy.
"Ally!" Someone screamed from the living room, apparently worried.
Ally looked back down at Spike, currently unshackled and sustaining a horrible headache, and he shook his head at her. "Go. I'll be right behind."
She ran upstairs, through the kitchen and into the living room, where Warren –or the First –had just been knocked down by Buffy. Wait, that was not right. The First was not corporeal. Then what…?
"Wait." Anya realized too, frowning at the man on the floor.
"But if he's the First..."
"I'm not the First." Warren insisted.
"You're not the First." Xander repeated.
Ally looked back to see Spike nearing her with a hand in his head, practically tumbling, and rushed to his side. He deflated when her arms came around him, like he'd been using all his strength to stay standing until then. "Hold on…" She whispered, blinking back the tears at his suffering. She felt impotent, but nobody else seemed to be paying attention as Warren revealed he was actually Willow, who had magically morphed into the deceased man.
"Are you sure?"
"There are other stories from kindergarten. Non yellow crayon stories in which you don't come out in such a good light. An incident involving Aquaman underoos, for example. You want me to start talking?" Willow/Warren threatened her oldest friend.
She ignored the situation in the living room as Spike crashed against her, slowly kneeling so he could sit on the floor. He grabbed her hand, squeezing until it became painful, probably unaware of the pressure he was applying.
"We'll deal. We'll get help." Buffy assured Willow, only to be rejected.
"No, I can handle this."
"On your own? Why?"
"I did it. I'll fix it. I don't want you seeing me this way anyway."
"It's kinda a little late for that."
"Seriously, I'm not posing any big threat to the world. Looks like you've got your hands full already." Willow finally looked at the couple on the floor, gesturing with her head.
Ally looked up at Buffy, trying not to let her own tears fall. "I need you to help me get him where he got his chip. We gotta do something."
Willow nodded at the couple, then at Buffy, trying to look as confident as possible. "I'll go, I'll handle it, I'll fix it, I'll be back before you even know I'm gone. Promise."
"Spike." Buffy neared the vampire on the floor, glancing at her sister constantly. Ally's eyes were focused on her boyfriend, defeated, trying to ease his pain with little to no success.
"The chip fired again."
Ally ran her fingers through his hair lightly, taking his hand in hers. "I kinda figured. Maybe they'll call back. Maybe they'll send help."
"Maybe we can't wait."
"Don't say that." Her voice trembled, and her sister realized they had to move fast.
They found the entrance to the old Initiative through a trap in the middle of nowhere, flashlights in hand. Ally had never been inside, so to find the place so dark and abandoned didn't match with the idea she had of Riley's working place. They walked through abandoned corridors, over fallen metal beams and corpses.
"Oh, God. They just left them." Buffy voiced, her low voice extremely clear in the silent facility.
Spike's flashlight found even more corpses; demons, soldiers, doctors. He didn't focus on them long, just kept on walking beside his fiancée. "They just sealed the place off. Left everything as it was."
"I'm thinking brief stay." Buffy proposed as they arrived to a more open space, full of spider webs and even more smelly bodies.
"Yeah, you're not wrong." Spike agreed wholeheartedly, taking Ally's hand in his free one. He directed his flashlight to their right, revealing a metal door with a little crystal window. He seemed to recognize the area. "I think I can get us to the med lab, find the drug."
He opened the door and let the girls go inside, following them closely. It was a much wider space, which proved to be more dangerous as they started hearing sounds behind them. Everyone turned, keeping together so that they had they backs covered, and tried to find the source of the groaning sound with their flashlights.
When nothing happened in a little while, they kept walking, although much closer this time, until another similar sound broke the silence.
"You hear that?" Spike questioned, keeping Ally behind his back.
The brunette moved the flashlight around the room, not seeing anything that would indicate life. "Yep."
"Think something survived?"
"Sounds like." Buffy replied, her arm tightly attached to Ally's.
"You see where?" The vampire, the one who was supposed to have the advantage in the dark, asked them.
"No, it sounded like it was coming from over there." The senior Slayer replied. "Whatever it is, it's not…"
Something moved near them, making them all turn their lights in the same direction. At seeing nothing, they kept walking, tension building among them. Ally took the lead, knowing she had the best chance at surviving an attack. Spike stuck close to her, her sister right behind.
Then, out of nowhere, the brunette glimpsed something, only a split second before a figure bounced on her and dragged her away from the group, her flashlight falling to the floor with a clank.
"Ally!"
The vampire didn't need a flashlight to find his girl. He followed the electric pulling that connected them, soon finding the demon attacking the girl on the floor. He punched it, only for the chip to misfire a moment later.
"Not now..."
The demon, at seeing a more vulnerable victim, left the girl it was fighting and lunged against the vampire writhing on the floor.
"Spike!" Ally screamed as her sister reached her side, helping her up.
Their opponent grabbed the vampire's leg and started dragging him off the room. Both girls stood up and followed after them, picking up the fallen torch on the way.
"Spike?" They called out, almost simultaneously.
The creature suddenly appeared before them, grabbing Buffy and throwing her over a low wall before the brunette had her hand at the back of its head and pushes it against the wall, crushing it several times before she was hit on the side by its arm. She was thrown back and tripped over a stick on the floor, which she soon picked up to find it was actually a shovel. When the demon charged against her again, her sister jumped back over the wall and landed on its back, holding him in a headlock while Ally buried the shovel in its stomach.
The demon growled, a strangled sound joining the sound of metal through flesh, before falling to the ground. Buffy let go of it and stood back up, picking up her flashlight as Ally ran across the room, following the pull to Spike. Buffy ran behind her sister to the fallen vampire, lying on the ground, almost immobile.
"Hey. Are you still with us?" The blonde questioned, kneeling beside the man as Ally held his hand.
The vampire glanced between both girls, his sight barely focused and his voice barely a whisper. "Yeah."
"That guy was…" Ally started, only to be interrupted by all the lights in the room switching on, lighting the whole facility. They looked up to find lines of soldiers pointing their weapons at them. "just the beginning."
"What's happening?" Spike wondered, turning his head lightly to take in the numbers of commandos over their heads.
"Miss Summers." A military man –curiously not pointing at them with a rifle –called out. "Agent Finn reported that you tried to contact him earlier today." The man waved at his men to lower their weapons, a couple of them coming down a set of stairs to the level the girls and vampire were on. "He indicated you might be needing our assistance. We're to provide you anything you need to help assface here." At the raised eyebrows from all three components of their little group, he pursed his lips. "Those were his exact words, ma'am."
"Finn's or Miller's?" Ally sighed knowingly.
"Both seemed to coincide on that point."
A few soldiers approached them and looked at the vampire before looking at the girls, as if asking for permission. Ally nodded at them, squeezing Spike's hand before taking Buffy's arm and standing up to let the soldiers lift Spike to a stretcher. The girls followed them as they took the bleach blond to an examination room, a few doctors entering with them.
"Med team tells me they took a look at the chip. You were right. It's degraded. Leave it as it is much longer, it'll be fatal to him." The lead commando approached the girls as they stood watch on the edge of the examination room, Spike asleep on the stretcher after the doctors had been with him.
Buffy squeezed Ally's hand, knowing the girl was a wreck right then. "OK. So, how long t…"
The man didn't let her finish. "Now."
"Right, of course. Um, what do we do next?" The senior Slayer inquired, feeling her sister's hand tighten in hers.
"Agent Finn said it was your call, ma'am." The man looked straight at Ally.
Ally blinked, sharing a quick look with her sister. "My call?"
"All decisions regarding Hostile 17 are to be left in your hands. This chip...we can either repair it... or remove it."
"Remove it." The brunette responded without a moment's hesitation.
