Chapter Twelve
An hour after the incident in the alley, with Buffy's unknown daughter, and after running a quick, but thorough, patrol through all the usual haunts, and taking out seventeen vampires and two other demons, both types that Anya gladly pointed out, total, everybody headed back to the magic shop to explain everything to Spike.
The silence that had reigned for most of the evening was only battled by the opening door and the shuffling of everybody to the back table, and then the door being slammed shut by a very annoyed Spike, who had been pestering like the king of the terrible twos all night for the explanation he was about to get. Once everybody was sitting, excluding the vampire and Archangel, Spike pestered once again.
"All right, for the last time, what is the blumin' secret that is Buffy and this winged bloke here?" he shouted, annoyed beyond anything describable.
"Spike, sit down," Buffy quietly ordered of her son. The chipped vampire took but one look at the blond, red clad goddess, and immediately, and quietly, did as told.
"Spike," Buffy began, only to have Willow take the reigns before she could get another word out.
"Spike, we're gods. I know how that sounds and everything, considering that we just killed a demon god two weeks ago, but we're, we all are good gods. You know from Heaven." Willow babbled.
"What Willow's trying to say," Xander took up, "is that we all went to visit Buffy this, well that is Buffy's grave, this morning and say our little…uh, things. Anyway, Tara saw Buffy there, and when me, Will, and Dawn were about to get in the car, we turn and see Tara, with Buffy walking beside her. Anyway, about three seconds after Buffy gets to us, there's this massive flash of light and this…this HUGE noise that makes me deaf for like…a minute, and then…"
"By the way, that's when I came on the scene," Joshua interrupted.
Xander, having lost his flow of thought, stutters, after throwing Joshua an annoyed look, and fails to resume. Buffy takes up the slack. "Anyway, Spike, as unbelievable as it may sound, we really are all gods. About two thousand or so years ago, the gods of our home Realm, which is called Anton,…"
"Anton?" Spike interrupts, unbelief lining his tone. "Who the bloody hell named the place Anton?" Spike unconsciously takes out a cigarette and a lighter. Buffy waves a hand and the cigarette is replaced by a red heart-shaped lollipop, and the lighter is just gone. Shocked, Spike doesn't even stutter, and then looks accusingly at the former Slayer. The look she returns, not only tames him, but causes him to pout a little and put the lollipop in his mouth grumpily. Buffy smiles brightly.
"Actually, the humans of our Realm named it such, as well as all the lands, features, formations, and to some degree, even some of us." Joshua answered Spikes question.
"Really? Wow." Willow exclaims. The two gods just smile.
"Anyway," Buffy continues, getting everybody's attention back on her. "About two thousand years ago, we had to leave our Realm, and so we were allowed to come to Earth. Once here, we had to stay here until we were called back home. So, we came up with a plan to…incarnate ourselves, our bodies and spirits into normal humans. At least that was the plan. Most of us, at some point or another ended up having some kind of special power, or gift, or trait, or maybe even mission as humans that made us…more than just normal mortals."
"For example, in my first life here on Earth, I was born into the life of a princess, unfortunately, it was this princesses sacred duty to fight and destroy a type of demon known as 'Shadow Spirits.' Good news is, I, or she, or…whatever, defeated all of the 'Shadow Spirits' and trapped them for the rest of eternity in something that they could never get out of. Which is why, thank the Heavens, the Slayers, and nobody else has had to deal with them for over a thousand years. See what I mean?" Buffy finished her part.
"OK, kinda, yeah," Spike started. "But what I don't get is how I, and the rest of these…us, fit into all of this."
"You're out brothers, sister, and cousins." Joshua stated matter-of-factly.
"What?" Spike asked, totally confused.
"Spike," Willow grabbed his attention, "Buffy's my sister. My godhood sister. Alexan, um Xander's our brother, and Giles is our cousin." She elaborated.
"Uh huh," Spike had a glazed 'not quite here' look in his blue eyes. "So, you're my sister, and…" Spike tried.
"No, no I haven't made myself clear," Willow corrected. "Buffy is the princess of the gods, because she was the first daughter born in Anton. Joshua is her older brother, and Alexander, um Xander, uh…"
"It's OK Will. I might as well get used to it again. I just never liked to be called Alexander because that's what Mom always called me when I was in trouble." Alexander pardoned for her.
"Oh, OK. Well, after Alexander, as I understand how it goes, Buffy was born. And then a whole bunch of other people, and I'm like the youngest daughter or something. And Ripper, that's Giles' god name, was born from our uncle I think. Anyway, you, uh, you're one of us, but you didn't have the same parents, uh…"
Willow glanced at Buffy, who nodded, smiling ever so slightly, and held Dawn's hand a little tighter. (Oops, forgot something.) Buffy was sitting in the same chair that she had been sitting in all day, with Dawn on her immediate right. Past Dawn was Willow, who was on the left of Anya and Xander, the brown haired ex-demon choosing once more to use her lover/fiancée as a sitting tool. On the other side of the table was Spike, and Giles on the side between him and Buffy. Joshua was leaning against a bookshelf not far from the table between Spike and Xander in position.
"Uh, Spike, your parents…um, your, well, your real, godhood parents. What I'm trying to say, um…is, uh…" Willow tried again.
"For cryin' out loud Red! Just spit it out!" Spike shouted, startling the young wiccan.
"Buffy's your mother." Willow speed-spat.
The shocked look on Spike's face was worth every Kodak moment since the invention of. Joshua grinned, but managed to contain himself, while the erstwhile mother snickered a little from her sudden giggle-fit.
"It's not funny," Spike deadpanned to the ex-Slayer.
Just managing to hold back her laughter, Buffy responded, "No, no it's not. But your face is!" and then she, Dawn, and Willow to the degree of smiling widely, broke out in laughter and giggles.
"It's not funny!" Spike repeated, louder, slightly angry. But the laughter didn't stop, and soon even the enraged vampire found himself turning a slight grin at the situation. "Well, OK, maybe, a little funny. But that's all!" And then he chuckled at himself.
"The point is Spike," Joshua interrupted, killing the laughing mood, "I'm here to bring all of you back. All of you."
"That means that each of the gods have to be re-awakened, and once that is done, we head back home. Fortunately, we have all the time that we'll need to find everybody, and remind them of who they are." Willow elaborated.
"So, if that's the case, how come the rest of you aren't already 'gods'? Or are you and your just pretending to be normal for little ole me sake?" Spike asked suspiciously.
"No Spike, we're still… uh, we're still mortal." Willow answered. "We can only do the re-awakenings one at a time, and because we're living on top of the Hellmouth, only one a day. Buffy, after reappearing, regained her memory and full powers just this morning, so Giles is going to be tomorrow." She further explained.
"Oh," was the only response a very overwhelmed Spike could give.
"Spike, honey," everybody started at the love goddesses use of the affectionate term, she ignored it. "I know how this might sound and everything, but it is very real. I have seven children total, to answer Anya's earlier question. Three boys and four daughters. You are my second born Spike. You are also the God of Balance and Forces of Change. We…we have to re-awaken all the gods in, in a specific order. I, since I reattained my powers and not my memory, was first, and therefore Ripper has to be next, and then Tara, the Goddess of Peace and Purity. After Tara, Alexander will most likely be the next to gain his powers, and then I have to go and find the other gods that are not here."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Joshua shouted. "Who said you would be going? I already found Oz, and he's on his way here now. As for when the time comes, I'll go and find the others. But I repeat, what made you think that you would be the one to go and give everyone back their powers?"
Buffy just smirked gaily at her older brother and stroked Dawn's arm a little before answering. "Because I'm the princess. That and I was the first awoken, and have spent the past two thousand years on the planet, same as everybody else. You haven't. And despite your superior tracking skills, I could probably find everybody a whole lot quicker than even you could. Now, I'd let you come along, but I will be the one to go and find the Charmed Ones."
"Charmed Ones?" Willow asked, the name striking a chord of memory in her mind.
"Cordelia's three daughters. Actually, to us, they're called the Empowered Ones. Together they control the forces of Space, Time, and Destiny in our Realm, and therefore are the most powerful, second only to our parents and our Special Guardian, of all the gods. Here, they have similar powers, but are witches and are called the Charmed Ones. The most…"
"The most powerful witches in all the world." Willow finished for the goddess. Then she did a double take. "Wait, the Special Guardian is more powerful than the Charmed Ones!!? I'm more powerful than the three most powerful witches on the planet? You're kidding right?"
"What's she talking about, Mom?" Spike teased the blonde. Buffy smirked at him and answered Willow.
"Well, not yet. You have a lot to, well relearn. But by the time that you regain your powers and knowledge, then yeah, you'll be more powerful than the Empowered Ones. And for a very good reason too Willow. You remember what I told you about the Special Guardians?" Buffy asked.
Willow nodded solemnly, still somewhat overwhelmed that she had done, and would hopefully do again, some of the things that Buffy had described about the powers and responsibilities of the Special Guardians of the Realms of Heaven. A Special Guardian was a member of the Realm that had access to the powers of Heaven itself, only after tapping into every other power of the Realm she therein existed in. Almost all of the Special Guardians were she, and were often very young. At least in appearance. Willow, having been born a god, was stuck in the body of an eighteen year old, the body that she had lost her virginity in. That's what it meant to come of age, Buffy had explained. Buffy still looked like the fifteen year old that had first been called, despite everything that had happened.
The responsibilities of the Special Guardians was to protect the Realm from just about everything that the gods did not either control, or had the power to stop themselves. The Guardian was also meant to protect the gods themselves from any thing that might possibly threaten them. From an arrogant mortal who tried to steal their power, or because they didn't like what one god had done, tried to find a way of killing them all. Or even on the off chance that some unknown evil had entered their Realm, and it was her job to fight it off. To put it basically, she was the bodyguard of the gods. Now she knew why her past life incarnation had been a paranoid freak on the verge of a mental breakdown, the job had gotten to her.
Seeing that Willow knew what was being asked of her, Joshua intervened, noting the time. "OK, I think that that should do it for a night," he said cheerily. "How about we all head on home and get some rest, and then we'll meet back here, say what? Eight o'clock in the morning?" Seeing no disagreement, "Well, OK. Spike, if you pretty much understand everything, then I guess that we're done here and we'll see you here in the morning?"
Spike snorted at the thought of walking through either the sewers, or the very bright sunlight just to come and watch Rubes, or was it Ripper? Become a god. Seeing his reaction, Buffy gave him a look, and he immediately began to sheepishly examine the floorboards. Buffy grimaced slightly, as though coming to a weighty decision, and then let go of Dawn's hand, surprising the young teen, and then stood up and walked over to Spike.
"Spike, stand up." Buffy ordered. The others wondered what was going on.
"I know what this has done for you, and I know how you feel about it, but I also know that knowing what you now know, you'll use this gift wisely. Do you understand me?" Buffy stared straight up into the blond vampire's eyes.
Somewhat wary because of her words, Spike considered them. Thinking that he understood, he slowly nodded his head. Smiling briefly, Buffy also nodded and put her hands to Spike's shoulders. "This might hurt a little. I'm not really sure though, I've never done it before." She warned him. Fear suddenly crept in with that wariness.
Taking a deep breath, the Princess goddess moved her hands from Spike's shoulders to either side of his head, just above his ears. A look of intense concentration etched in the shorter woman's face, everyone looked on in wonder and amazement as an aura of pinkish red surrounded both the vampire and the goddess.
Buffy looked at herself, and gathered as much power as she knew how to, to prepare for what she was planning on doing. Then, following the strand of power that linked all gods to their children, Buffy looked at Spike before her. She focused on the body section of his power and soon found herself looking at everything any doctor could possibly ever learn about vampires, as well as an X-ray picture that clearly showed where the government chip was. Drawing upon the power that she had gathered, as well as a good portion of her reserves, Buffy reached out with her power and began to extract the chip from her son's head.
The first thing she tried to do, obviously, was to just yank it out, but she immediately felt the pain that such a maneuver had caused Spike. Everybody was more than a little surprised when Spike suddenly cried out in pain and tried to either jump away from his "mother" or to fall to the floor in writhing pain. He did neither, just standing there, surrounded by Buffy's aura, with her hands on his head, squinting his eyes in intense pain. Buffy, as soon as she realized what she had done, soothed the sparking nerves and tried as best she knew how to numb the rest of Spike's brain. She tried to think of a way to remove the chip that wouldn't rip off her son's head in the process. Then she thought of it.
Applying power to the spell was the easy part, focusing it around the chip rather than into it so that it wouldn't spread to Spike's body was the hard part. It took about twenty, thirty seconds for the spell to be cast, and then just like that, the chip was invisible and therefore slightly out of phase with the matter and reality around it. Using another somewhat simple, yet rarely used spell, Buffy levitated the invisible chip through the necessary pathways and crevices of Spike's head, and then just like that, the chip was out and in her hand. And all Spike had left was a numbing headache… and the power to hurt humans once again.
Withdrawing from Spike, Buffy removed the spell from the chip and fully disconnected herself from the de-chipped vampire. The glow faded, and the two stepped back from each other, Spike rubbing his forehead slightly in diminishing pain, and Buffy, ex-Slayer, Love goddess, fainted on the spot. Joshua, Spike, and Alexander were the first ones to her, all getting there at the exact same moment, everyone shouting, "BUFFY!!"
Some time later, with everybody, including the afflicted, blaming Spike for Buffy's fainting spell, Buffy came around, though she looked horribly weakened. "Unnhhh…" she moaned from her resting position on the table. Everybody immediately surrounded her on all sides and at the same time asked out loud, "Buffy, are you all right?"
When Buffy opened her eyes and looked around, she closed them again and put her right hand over them and chuckled weakly. "This is getting to be a reeaaaal bad habit," she mumbled.
"Buffy, are you all right? You fainted." Willow repeated.
Trying to sit up, the blonde love goddess, felt every ache that she had ever received, whether that be as Goddess Buffy, or Slayer Buffy, or some other incarnation. She moaned slightly and laid back down. "I'm fine," she said with more strength and confidence than she had at that moment. Willow, Xander and Dawn all smiled. She was going to be all right, even if she wasn't for the moment.
"How do you feel?" the little wicca asked, keeping her voice calm and soothing.
"I ache. Ache covers me. If I were to be dead, which is somewhat an ironic thing to say, I would have died every death a human could die, many times many times over." Buffy answered.
"OK, besides ache, what else do you feel? Is the hurt focused on any one part, or is it like a fever kinda ache?" Willow questioned.
Buffy was silent for a moment, her right arm covering her eyes. Finally she answered her youngest sister in an even weaker voice. "I'm tired," she whispered. Willow thought about this for about three whole seconds before shooting out her next question. "When was the last time you ate Buffy?" This question somewhat shocked the others, Spike the most who thought gods didn't need to eat.
Buffy was silent once again, until, "Lunch. With you. The nine hamburgers, two pizzas, and seventeen cakes. Sorry about wasting your money like that Will. Again." Buffy apologized.
Willow waved it off with her hand and dismissed the apology. "I told you, don't worry about it. Right now, we just have to get some energy into you. According to what you told me today at lunch, the more powerful spell that you do, the more energy that it requires from you, and thus the pig fest today at school."
"Hey," Buffy exclaimed, feeling insulted. "Sorry," Willow apologized, not sounding apologetic in the least. "But after all the spells that you've been casting since lunch, along with the fight with Joshua, along with all the vampires you alone dusted, along with whatever you did for Spike, you're completely drained. And I don't think materializing a dozen pizzas is going to help you all that much. And Mario's must be closed by now, so what do we do? We have to get some food into her." Willow looked to the others.
Everybody, including Spike and Dawn, looked to Joshua, who just shrugged and sighed slightly. Then he held out his left hand, and in it materialized a gold goblet with a strange glowing orange fluid in it. He stepped closer to Buffy, and signaled to Alexander, who was on Buffy's other side, and together they lifted her into a sitting position. Buffy opened her eyes and stared at the liquid concoction in front of her. "What is it?" she asked weakly. "Something that you need," Joshua stated.
Slowly, Buffy took the goblet in her hands, Joshua still steadying it, and she took a long drink from the goblet. And then immediately gagged on it, but still swallowed it. "Aggghhhhh! cough cough, what, cough cough cough, what is that stuff?!!!" she shouted, pushing it away from her.
"What do you think it is?" Joshua asked sarcastically, knowing that she really did know what it was that he had materialized.
She looked at him disbelievingly, and then with disgust. "It isn't." she stated. "It is," he returned. She turned on the gold cup with a look of such utter disgust and revulsion, it's amazing it didn't melt under her gaze. With a sneer worthy of a super villain, Buffy noted the orange concoction as, "Ambrosia. Greek ambrosia." And then turning on her eldest brother, "It's slime."
"It helped you gain a little bit of your strength back. And even I have to admit, it ain't the greatest, but it is as the saying goes, 'the food of the gods.'" He replied with a weak grin.
"Then you drink it," she says, disgusted. He looks at the orange drink in his hand and sneers a little himself. Turning back to his sister, "Well, then what would you rather have?"
"I don't know. Maybe can you come up with something a little more…well, modern?" she asks. Joshua thinks for a second, and then an idea lights his face, and with a flash of gold light, the lumpy orange fluid in the gold cup is replaced with an equally strange orange liquid in the gold goblet. Handing it back to her, she repeats her first question, "What is . . . ?" She stops when she smells the light soda in the cup. Taking it with surprising strength, even for a former Slayer, she puts it to her mouth and begins to down the drink almost unhealthily quickly.
Surprised, most in the room turn to Joshua, while the other half continues to watch Buffy down the drink. "So, what is it?" Willow asks Buffy's unfinished question, half looking at the Archangel, half looking at the gulping Buffy.
"Gatorade," Joshua states quite simply. At everyone's raised eyebrows, he responds, "Hey, she asked for something modern."
"I never knew Buff liked Gatorade so much," Alexander comments as they all stare at the still swallowing goddess.
Some moments later, "Shouldn't she be done by now?" Anya asks.
"Oh, I, uh, I cast a spell on the goblet," Joshua explains. "It'll never be empty. It continuously refills. Apparently, even if somebody is still drinking from it…" he trails off as they continue to watch the blonde gulp down the orange liquid.
Several moments after that, "Um, how long does the spell last?" Dawn asked. "Till I…vanish…the cup…" Joshua answered, distracted.
"Can you do that with her still drinking?" Dawn pestered.
"No, I have to be holding the cup to…whoa!" Joshua exclaimed as he watched Buffy lean her head back further to get even more of the regenerating drink into her body. Everybody stared in total amazement and total disbelief as they watched their friend and sister/cousin/mother take an impossible amount of the drink into her all at once. Finally Willow had to know.
"Um, Joshua, is…is this…safe?" she stuttered out.
"Huh? What? Oh. Well, yeah, I mean, I guess. I know that I've never…tried…to…" he trailed off in his answer as he continued to watch Buffy's throat, it moving up and down at an incredible rate. "I'm sure she's fine. Just really, really, really…really thirsty." He finished.
Several moments after that, spent in silence, Spike asked something that they hadn't worried about until now, "Doesn't she need to breath or something? We don't want her drowning again."
"Uhm, no. Gods don't need to breath. But we do, and it really doesn't matter. But none of us ever, shall we say constantly eat. Then we might actually begin to look fat. Plus, gods can't drown. Unless they're mortal, which Buffy isn't at the moment, and therefore there's really not much danger of that Spike." Joshua allayed.
Another period of silence, and Buffy's gulps suddenly became quite audible. "You think she's getting full yet?" Willow asked. Alexander smiled and replied, "Naw. Don't you remember when she was just a Slayer. She was a bottomless pit then. Now that she's an exhausted goddess, she's a black hole." Xander joked.
Nearly a whole minute of silence later, "Uhm, OK, how long has she been at this now?" Alexander asks, growing a tad concerned, though for other reasons than Buffy's stomach issues.
Anya looked at her watch and raised her eyebrows in slight surprise. "For over three minutes now," she answers her lover's question.
"Only three minutes!!" Alexander exclaims. "It feels like she's been at this for a half an hour." Everybody stops at those words, and the future god of Justice puts into words everyone's thoughts right then. "You don't think that she's actually going to be at this for a whole half an hour, do you?" he asks each in turn.
"Well, she bloody well not try," Giles comments angrily. "I've got a big day tomorrow, and I don't plan on being as tired as she is now. So if she doesn't stop this in the next five minutes, I'm going home to bed."
"Now you're starting to sound like Ripper," Joshua dryly comments to the older gentleman.
"Well, yes. Ever since I've come to terms about it, I've been, how shall I put this, letting go a little more." Giles explains, blushing slightly as he does so. Joshua just bats an eyebrow.
After another whole minute, with Buffy still the center of attention, even Willow is bored.
"Buffy, if you don't get your face out of that drink right now, I promise you, I'm going to spill it all over your blouse," Joshua warned her. She had no response except to gulp just a little louder.
"Geez Slayer," Spike exclaimed, "You sound like me and Dru at Christmas!"
The blonde goddesses only response to that was to quiet down a little, but she still kept drinking. "Buffy, I'm getting bored. And a promise is a promise, especially one made by an Archangel." Joshua warned once again, for the last time.
Apparently taking it seriously, Buffy finally, (HEAVY emphasis on FINALLY), tipped her head back forward and swallowed a final time. "Ohhhhh! I so needed that!" she gasped as she handed the full goblet back to Joshua. As soon as it left her hand, she materialized a tray chock full of a mountain of chocolate. Her other hand immediately began to shovel them all, one at a time, into her temporarily vacated mouth.
"Hungry?" Joshua asked, amused as he vanished the goblet.
"Mmmm," the goddess groaned between bites. "Oh yes! You would not believe how much energy that last spell took. I mean, I was going to eat as soon as," pause for another chocolate and heavy chewing, "as soon as I, ummm, I made sure that Dawn got home safe. Then we had our little talk with Spike, and I saw an opportunity to not only prove what we told him was true, but to kind of test his loyalty, and give him something he's been wanting for months." Buffy spoke around the chocolate in her mouth, swallowing after the word "true".
In less than a minute, half the tray was gone, and the other girls not eating in the room, mouth's were watering. Only one had the decency to ask. "Um, Buffy, I don't suppose that I, or maybe we could…" Willow trailed off as Buffy switched hands so that the other girls could help her devour the tray of candy. Immediately three greedy hands were helping the first to remove the brown lumps of sweetness. In unison, all three groaned as the milkiness of it melted in their orifices. Buffy smiled in a strangely mischievous way as she watched her sisters, and sister in law to be, ate the very chocolate that she had willed into existence. Not a minute later, the tray was completely empty.
"Now if you're finished eating, for the moment, Slayer," Spike said, contempt and annoyance lining the word, "Maybe you wouldn't mind explainin' what it was exactly that you did to me."
Replenishing the tray of chocolate, this time with pink icing cupcakes, with a flash of red and pink light, Buffy grabbed the one on top and sat the tray down, peeling the cupcake just before answering Spike's question. "I removed the chip," she said as though commenting about a bug.
The reaction, delayed by overwhelming shock, was instantaneous and spread throughout all mortals present, also including the affected vampire. "What!!??!" everybody shouted at the eating young woman. She shrugged, and swallowed the bit of pastry in her mouth and repeated, "I removed the Initiative chip."
Spike just blinked in total confusion and disbelief. Willow and Anya had distracted looks on their faces, but you could still see the initial look of surprise on their faces. Giles actually looked angry, while Alexander mirrored Spike in his confusion and disbelief. Joshua really didn't care, he was still amazed at the feat Buffy had completed with the goblet. Buffy, choosing to ignore everybody's reactions, finished her treat.
"What do you mean, you removed his chip?" Xander shouted at his sister/best friend.
Buffy, calmly evaporating the wrapping in her hand, ignored him until done with that, and then still calm, turned to him and gave him the "death by the Slayer's eyes" glare. He, as well as Spike and Giles behind him visibly paled and got a hunted scared look in their eyes. Reacting on instinct, Spike exclaimed at the young man in front of him, "Don't yell at her you fool! She's a god for cryin' out loud!" Then, going with the same instinct, he slapped the zeppo on the back of the head. It took about a second for Xander to react, crying out in the pain of the attack, but it took about another minute for Spike, and everybody else to react to something else.
Seeing the young dark haired man cry out in pain was worth it, more than worth it for the ego-abused vampire, especially since after he didn't feel any paralyzing mind-wrenching shock of pain shoot through his head after he did it. Once the realization of that fact shot through him, he was shocked, but not by pain, by an over-compelling sense to laugh in pure joy. And so he did.
Everybody turned to look at him like he was insane, as he laughed like one, and then the realization came to them as well. She had really done it. She had removed the one thing that guaranteed them protection from a creature that was invited into every one of their homes and had at one point tried to kill each and every one of them. Now they were at his mercy. The next thing that Spike did was not, to say the least, unexpected, but was surprising nevertheless.
He hit Xander again, in the exact same spot. Xander, hurting from the shear force of the blow cried out again. Spike only grinned as the same bubbling joy resulted within him. When Xander stood straight again, Spike, grinning like the insane Cheshire cat, flat out decked him with a punch that might have broken something. Luckily for Xander, Joshua was the one to help him up.
But before the young god-to-be could get steady on his feet, Spike attacked him again and this time didn't let up as he pummeled and kicked Xander as the boy curled up in pain on the floor. "Hey!" Anya voiced protest as she finished her third cupcake from the tray. The three young women were almost finished with the refilled food tray, the most already consumed by Buffy, with a close second of Willow. "Just don't kill him Spike. I'm marrying him in like three weeks." The ex-demon spoke around the food in her mouth.
Spike just laughed at the absolute joy of what he was doing. Finally, after feeling something solidly break after one of Spike's kicks, Xander called out rather weakly, "Buffy, ya wanna put a leash on him or some-tin…?"
Before Spike could throw the next punch, in an annoyed and authoritative voice, Buffy called out, "Spike." The bleach blond vampire looked up at his blond mother, a smile plastered to his pale face. Buffy shot him the same look that had gotten Xander in so much trouble, and his face fell, and he slowly backed away, his arms up in surrender. When he looked back to Xander, who was being healed and helped up by Joshua the Archangel, a wide grin easily worked its way back onto his mouth. A slight clearing of a throat from Buffy immediately removed it.
"Sorry," he muttered.
"Now you have to let Xander hit you," Buffy told him. All the men in the room looked up at her at that statement.
"What?" Alexander, Spike, and even Joshua asked as one.
"It's the rules. Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth, punch for a punch, kick for a kick." Buffy explained, as she took the last cupcake, which was followed by whines from the girls until she refilled the tray, this time with heart shaped cherry filled doughnuts. All three squealed in excitement. Joshua squinted his eyes in suspicion.
"Actually, it's Alexander's rules. For any god that hurts another, retribution must be paid in total equality. Actually Spike, when the rule was made, you actually helped him with it. So unless you want to wait for Xander to become Alexander the God of Justice before he pays you back for that, then let him hit you just as hard."
The two then looked to the Archangel, to see if he could provide any translation, and he glanced strangely at his sister, who kept a straight face, while scarfing it. Then he turned to the other two men and answered them. "Well, she's right about the rules, but I really don't think that, as, well…Earthlings, that Alexander and Spike need to be following something that hasn't even been done for over two thousand years!"
Before Buffy could respond, he continued. "Another thing is, Spike has to be sorry for what he did, and fully willing to take whatever punishment that Alexander deems fit. Since there was no lasting harm, thanks to me by the way, I really don't think that there should be anymore, except to maybe put the chip back in…"
"NO!" Spike shouted. Then he fell on his knees, begging, before Xander, Alexander, his uncle. "Xander…Alexander…whoever! Please, I'll do anything, take anything, kill anything, NOT kill everything, but please, please, PLEASE, don't put that chip back in my head! I'll do anything! Anything, you hear me! ANYTHING! Just keep it away from me!"
Feeling an untimely bout of pity and compassion for the vampire that had somehow over the past few months become his reluctant friend, he lifted Spike forcefully from the floor by his lapels and looked the bleach blonde man in the eye. "Spike…I forgive you." Was all he said. And then he walked over to Anya, who was busy trying to devour two doughnuts in her one mouth, grabbed her by the arm and led her willingly, but whimpering over her lost doughnuts, out the shop and presumably home and to bed.
In the wake of their departure, they left quite a stunned audience, except for maybe the women who were eating a refilled tray of heart shaped raspberry cookies. "What…what did he mean by that?" Spike asked, feeling like he had missed something important.
"He forgave you," Buffy answered.
"For hitting him?" Spike felt lost.
"For everything," she replied, before grabbing another cookie.
"What do you mean…" Spike looked at the Archangel, who only gave him a soulful eye, and then at the door that Alexander had just left through. He looked back at Buffy, and back at Joshua, and went back and forth between them for a moment before finishing, "…everything?" Landing a lasting gaze at the visitor from the heavens.
Joshua nodded, but he did not smile.
Spike didn't know what to think. Nobody had ever forgiven him before. Well, maybe Buffy, but that was just for the things he had done to her, and usually just the one or two recent things. Never had anybody, in his whole un-life, ever…forgiven him…for……everything. He needed to think about this. "I gotta think about this…" he trailed as he turned to the back and started to make his way out. He was halted by a question from Ripper, er…uh, Giles.
"Spike, I do trust it that you will be here tomorrow morning?" the younger, yet older looking Brit asked. Spike stopped, and without turning around, simply nodded his head, and then disappeared from the shop for the night.
"Come on you two," Buffy vanished the tray, eliciting groans from the two girls she'd been feeding. "Time to go home." Buffy led them by the arm until they stood before her eldest brother. "I don't suppose you mind giving us all a lift, huh Joshua?" Buffy asked, the cutest little girl smile in her eyes. Joshua chuckled and hugged his shorter sister good night, before sending her off with her two sisters back to the Summer's house for sleep.
"What do you think it was that she was feeding them?" Giles asked out of the blue.
"For Anya? Not that hard to guess. For Willow and Dawn, I can only guess." Joshua replied.
"Well?"
"An Aphrodisiac mixed with a mild to heavy sedative."
A.N. Well,
I hope you liked this. Tell me if it
was good, bad, needs work, or just respond to my challenge for help. Since I want to get a good portion of the sequel
written before I post it, it's going to be a few weeks before I can post
it. But I'm working on other stories
that I hope you'll enjoy as much, if not more, than what I have got here. By the way, if anybody wants my e-mail, all
they have to do is write a Review asking for me to release it, and I'll do
it. I'm starting to love your
input. And even if its to say that my
writing sucks, I think I'd still want to hear it. Have a good one!