Swapping the pieces around.
PG-13
All characters herein are the property of Joss Whedon (except the ones I made up, but even if he uses them, I'd be chuffed to bits) and are used here solely for the entertainment of others. No profit is intended.
Authors Note I have a set narrative in mind, but why don't you drop me a line telling me what you would like to see? Nothing smutty, mind, as FF.net is a squeaky clean place to be now. And I say yay! That means no more gratuitous snuff stories.
Ok, Spike Mentions Guy Fawkes in this chapter, so I should quickly explain who he is. He was a radical who tried to blow up the houses of parliament with the King of England inside. He failed and was burned at the stake. Guy Fawkes night is celebrated in the UK by the burning of effigies (called Guys) and the use of fireworks, every November the 5th.
This story takes place right at the end of 'Out of My Mind'. Buffy and friends have foiled an attempt by Spike to remove that pesky chip. Spike has just drunk the blood of a time demon, and travelled back to one year before (during the events of Wild at Heart). He's at the moment where the initiative captured him, and has just saved his past self from the soldiers.
+++ Spike smiled, despite the chronic migraine he was feeling. He'd just taken out the army boys that dragged him to get that chip stuck in his head. Now he was - or would be free.
"You got it mate." Spike said to his younger self "I'm you." He stood up and went into the younger vampires inside coat pocket, and pulled out his cigarettes. He opened the pack and studied the cigarette lighter.
"Old faithful" he said tossing it in his hand, before lighting one of his double's cigarettes. "Got this from World War I. well, you'd know that. but one of these buggers nicked it after they kidnapped me."
Spike then booted the still living guard in the gut, and felt a fresh dose of mind-numbing pain. He screamed and dropped the cigarette in the damp ground.
The pre-chip Spike retrieved his lighter and cigarettes from his double's grasp and put them back into his pocket.
"Listen mate" he began "Its only the fact that you are one hell of a looker, and that you saved me from the GI Joe appreciation society down there that I haven't killed you yet. And wasting one of my smokes just cancelled one of those reasons. So, you better tell me who you are, and why I'm meeting myself."
"Alright, alright, keep your knickers on mate." Said Spike. "Alright, I'm from about a year in the future. These boys? They work for a clandestine branch of the US Government that were charged with capturing and containing demonic lifeforms." "And at which point in the next year," began pre chip Spike "do I turn into Fox Bloody Mulder?"
"Oi! Do you want to know what happens to you or not?" grumbled the chipped Spike
"I'm all ears." Said the young one.
"In the original history." Spike began "these prats knocked me out and dragged me away. I came too in their underground lab. I managed to get out, and I decided to chow down on Red."
"The Slayer's mate?" asked 1999 Spike.
"Yeah. But I couldn't. perform." Said Spike nervously "It turns out that the initiative put a chip in my head. If I so much as point a gun at a human, I get intense neurological pain. The only way I could get my jollies, was fighting demons. At my worst point, I was staying in Xander Harris' wearing his bloody cast offs. Well it was either that or being chained in the bloody Watcher's bathtub, drinking pig's blood from a mug with a straw."
"But you knocked him out alright" said the younger Spike, gesturing to the fallen initiative soldier.
"Yeah, but right now I've got the kind of headache that would make you long nostalgically for the headache you had the morning after Woodstock."
"So." said Spike of the past "you paid the time demon a visit? Where the hell did you get three thousand dollars from?"
"Harm" said Spike the elder "But that doesn't matter. I'm guessing when you kill this fella all chance of the original history happening will be eliminated, and I'll cease to exist. Right, in a month or two, the new Big Bad will rear his head. His name's Adam."
"If his female lackey's called Eve, then I'm going home." Said Spike.
"No, and don't make me think of Adam shagging. He is an ugly bugger. Anyway, imagine a demon, Frankenstein's monster, and the terminator in one special bonus pack, and that's your bloke. He was hard, too bloody hard - I couldn't even kill the bloke. Of course, the slayer and her pals did, did some kind of spell that merged them all into one super being, they tore out his power core and smashed it. Now this is what you should do. Lay low. Keep out of the Slayer's way, and watch your back for GI Joe's mates. Adam will come to you, he'll probably be able to sense the fact that I was here. Tell him what I have told you. in exchange for one thing."
"What's that?" asked Spike of the past.
"He lets you at the Slayer."
"Now that's an exciting prospect. Well, I'll kill this arse, and we'll have you on your way." Said past-Spike
"Wait!" pleaded his future self.
"Unless you've got the results of every horse race for the next year in your pocket, I really don't give a monkey's."
"I just have a favour to ask - call it pay back for travelling in time and saving your arse. After you kill the slayer, I want you to sire her. Make her one of us. She'd go mad at the idea. See how she likes having to rely on the creatures she loathes."
"Well, I don't do revenge for other people." Said Spike the younger with a stern face. "On the other hand, it wouldn't be revenge, because you wouldn't exist anymore, and in my heart of hearts, I gotta admit - siring a Slayer sounds like a bloody marvellous lark. I'm in."
They shook hands firmly, and unchipped Spike walked to the wounded Soldier. He grasped his head in his arms, and twisted his neck in two.
"That should do it." Said Spike looking down at his handy work. "So, when do you shove off?"
He looked around - the older man was gone. Spike grinned. He had a second chance to be the Big Bad - and he would exploit it to its fullest potential.
+++ March 2000
Spike sat in his Crypt watching yet another soap. It was a tough life. The initiative was all over town, he'd had some close shaves with them whilst Feeding, but he usually kept an eye open for them at all times. That and the Slayer. She was still blissfully unawares that he'd even come back to town. Which was very handy. The last think he wanted was the Slayer hunting him down before this Adam chap his future self harped on about could wipe out the Slayerettes, and hand him the Slayer on a platter.
His crypt door opened - for a split second, he thought his messiah had come, but that was instantly disproven, when he detected a very familiar scent.
"Ello Dru. its been a while."
He turned from the TV and saw Drusilla in all her glory. She moved as ever in long graceful exaggerated strides.
"My Spike" she said. She leaned over sat on the arm of his chair and put her arms around his neck. Spike wanted nothing to melt into her embrace, and go on a bloody rampage with her. But something stopped him. He turned the embrace, and forced her onto the chair, whilst he shot up.
"What's wrong, has your slime demon dumped you? Good for him I say."
"Shhhhhhhh" said Drusilla getting up and wrapping her arms around his neck again. "The stars told me you had been cheating - you've taken back some moves in the game. You know what happens in the next act. Cheat. Cheat. Cheat. Cheat."
"So, your foresight told you this eh? Alright, yeah, I admit it. I came back and told myself what's gonna happen. But what's it got to do with you?"
"I'm sorry." said Drusilla "I knew that I'd doused your fire by lighting another. You laid down with the enemy because you were jealous of the king."
Spike had been away from Dru for nearly two years, so it took him a while to get used to her way of speaking again. "You mean, you feel guilty because my love for you outweighed my evil nature? Well aren't we the selfless little Vampire?"
Drusilla just rested her head on his shoulder. Spike felt his body tingle as dreams of this day had plagued his mind. He wanted to share everything. But he was still sceptical.
"Alright, why did you come back, if I had been spoilt so badly?" asked Spike
Drusilla lifted her head and looked up "You are waiting for the next move, the next player in the tale. The rose and the thistle bound together by the sword. And inside you Spike, the fire burns again. You are going to cause pain, and misery, and sadness. And you want do drive the girl who separated us mad! I see the fire burning. It's very pretty! Can I stay and watch the fire please Spike? Can I please?"
Spike lifted Dru's arms from around his body and put them at her side. His face shifted as the ravenous demon at his core came to the fore.
"Love" said Spike "Guy Fawkes Night has nothing on what I have in mind."
Spike drew her to him and kissed her passionately, savouring the contact he had so dreamed of for so long.
+++ May 2000
Spike and Dru pursued their quarry down the alley. A young girl. Enough for one, but if they shared her, they would need to find another to feed from to satisfy their hunger.
But there would always be more.
The woman found that the alley was a dead end, and she looked desperately for a way out She tried to climb a fire escape, but Drusilla grabbed her ankle, and with no effort at all tossed her backwards. Spike could hear her heart now. It was like a natural accompaniment to her moans.
"Please, don't do this." She pleaded.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
"I have money. lots of money."
ThudThudThud.
"Oh money you say?" said Spike. "Well I guess that changes everything."
"It does?" she said calming a little
Thud. Thud. Thud.
"Oh yeah." Spike said. "We'll nick your purse after bleeding you like a pig!"
She screamed, and as Spike moved in for the final kill, a fist burst through the wall behind her, and a skewer went straight through her spine killing her instantly.
"I dunno who you are, mate." Said Spike angrily "But you just killed lunch. Now you're gonna pay!"
Drusilla grabbed Spike's arm and put his her fingers to his lips.
"It's the Rose, the thistle, and the sword - they're here at last!"
Spike grinned. The figure that she claimed was Adam retracted the skewer that killed the woman. It then ripped apart the wall until it had made a hole big enough for it to get through. Spike thought his future self was right - Adam was an ugly sod.
"Adam I presume" said Spike.
"How do you know my name?" barked Adam, his voice seemed to have an intense anger inside it. "Just lets say the ghost of Christmas future told me. The name's Spike."
"I know your plan." Said Adam matter of factly. "That sentence helped me. You see, I have been troubled by you, ever since I was awoken. I felt vaguely that there was something wrong with reality. I traced the problem to its source, and I found the problem in the Hostile ID files of the Initiative. I'll assume you know who they are."
"Go on." Said Spike.
"You see, Spike, the problem could be pinpointed to Hostile 17. Sometimes I see a Pogara demon, and sometimes, I see, you."
Spike lit a cigarette, and played it cool.
"Probably dodgey software mate, maybe you need to update your Windows."
The cyborg delivered a forearm to Spike, and he was sent flying across the alley. It then trudged up to him and yanked him up by the throat.
"Do not mock me, Vampire. The reference to the ghost of Christmas Future, is from Dickens' 'A Christmas Carol'. The particular ghost shared knowledge with Scrooge, knowledge of what was to come. Now I realise that your future self bent the laws of time. You are a contradiction to what should be. I should destroy you."
"That would be a bad idea mate." Said Spike. "You're life is on the line here. You will be defeated soon, and I know how, and by who. Let me help, and I'll spill the beans.
The cyber-demon gave a yell, and choke-slammed Spike onto the ground.
"Very well, Vampire, we shall work as one. Now share your details!"
+++ Apologies, this was a bit of a talky chapter, but the next one will be more action orientated - check out the next exiting instalment when its published. In the mean time, feel free to R and R!
All characters herein are the property of Joss Whedon (except the ones I made up, but even if he uses them, I'd be chuffed to bits) and are used here solely for the entertainment of others. No profit is intended.
Authors Note I have a set narrative in mind, but why don't you drop me a line telling me what you would like to see? Nothing smutty, mind, as FF.net is a squeaky clean place to be now. And I say yay! That means no more gratuitous snuff stories.
Ok, Spike Mentions Guy Fawkes in this chapter, so I should quickly explain who he is. He was a radical who tried to blow up the houses of parliament with the King of England inside. He failed and was burned at the stake. Guy Fawkes night is celebrated in the UK by the burning of effigies (called Guys) and the use of fireworks, every November the 5th.
This story takes place right at the end of 'Out of My Mind'. Buffy and friends have foiled an attempt by Spike to remove that pesky chip. Spike has just drunk the blood of a time demon, and travelled back to one year before (during the events of Wild at Heart). He's at the moment where the initiative captured him, and has just saved his past self from the soldiers.
+++ Spike smiled, despite the chronic migraine he was feeling. He'd just taken out the army boys that dragged him to get that chip stuck in his head. Now he was - or would be free.
"You got it mate." Spike said to his younger self "I'm you." He stood up and went into the younger vampires inside coat pocket, and pulled out his cigarettes. He opened the pack and studied the cigarette lighter.
"Old faithful" he said tossing it in his hand, before lighting one of his double's cigarettes. "Got this from World War I. well, you'd know that. but one of these buggers nicked it after they kidnapped me."
Spike then booted the still living guard in the gut, and felt a fresh dose of mind-numbing pain. He screamed and dropped the cigarette in the damp ground.
The pre-chip Spike retrieved his lighter and cigarettes from his double's grasp and put them back into his pocket.
"Listen mate" he began "Its only the fact that you are one hell of a looker, and that you saved me from the GI Joe appreciation society down there that I haven't killed you yet. And wasting one of my smokes just cancelled one of those reasons. So, you better tell me who you are, and why I'm meeting myself."
"Alright, alright, keep your knickers on mate." Said Spike. "Alright, I'm from about a year in the future. These boys? They work for a clandestine branch of the US Government that were charged with capturing and containing demonic lifeforms." "And at which point in the next year," began pre chip Spike "do I turn into Fox Bloody Mulder?"
"Oi! Do you want to know what happens to you or not?" grumbled the chipped Spike
"I'm all ears." Said the young one.
"In the original history." Spike began "these prats knocked me out and dragged me away. I came too in their underground lab. I managed to get out, and I decided to chow down on Red."
"The Slayer's mate?" asked 1999 Spike.
"Yeah. But I couldn't. perform." Said Spike nervously "It turns out that the initiative put a chip in my head. If I so much as point a gun at a human, I get intense neurological pain. The only way I could get my jollies, was fighting demons. At my worst point, I was staying in Xander Harris' wearing his bloody cast offs. Well it was either that or being chained in the bloody Watcher's bathtub, drinking pig's blood from a mug with a straw."
"But you knocked him out alright" said the younger Spike, gesturing to the fallen initiative soldier.
"Yeah, but right now I've got the kind of headache that would make you long nostalgically for the headache you had the morning after Woodstock."
"So." said Spike of the past "you paid the time demon a visit? Where the hell did you get three thousand dollars from?"
"Harm" said Spike the elder "But that doesn't matter. I'm guessing when you kill this fella all chance of the original history happening will be eliminated, and I'll cease to exist. Right, in a month or two, the new Big Bad will rear his head. His name's Adam."
"If his female lackey's called Eve, then I'm going home." Said Spike.
"No, and don't make me think of Adam shagging. He is an ugly bugger. Anyway, imagine a demon, Frankenstein's monster, and the terminator in one special bonus pack, and that's your bloke. He was hard, too bloody hard - I couldn't even kill the bloke. Of course, the slayer and her pals did, did some kind of spell that merged them all into one super being, they tore out his power core and smashed it. Now this is what you should do. Lay low. Keep out of the Slayer's way, and watch your back for GI Joe's mates. Adam will come to you, he'll probably be able to sense the fact that I was here. Tell him what I have told you. in exchange for one thing."
"What's that?" asked Spike of the past.
"He lets you at the Slayer."
"Now that's an exciting prospect. Well, I'll kill this arse, and we'll have you on your way." Said past-Spike
"Wait!" pleaded his future self.
"Unless you've got the results of every horse race for the next year in your pocket, I really don't give a monkey's."
"I just have a favour to ask - call it pay back for travelling in time and saving your arse. After you kill the slayer, I want you to sire her. Make her one of us. She'd go mad at the idea. See how she likes having to rely on the creatures she loathes."
"Well, I don't do revenge for other people." Said Spike the younger with a stern face. "On the other hand, it wouldn't be revenge, because you wouldn't exist anymore, and in my heart of hearts, I gotta admit - siring a Slayer sounds like a bloody marvellous lark. I'm in."
They shook hands firmly, and unchipped Spike walked to the wounded Soldier. He grasped his head in his arms, and twisted his neck in two.
"That should do it." Said Spike looking down at his handy work. "So, when do you shove off?"
He looked around - the older man was gone. Spike grinned. He had a second chance to be the Big Bad - and he would exploit it to its fullest potential.
+++ March 2000
Spike sat in his Crypt watching yet another soap. It was a tough life. The initiative was all over town, he'd had some close shaves with them whilst Feeding, but he usually kept an eye open for them at all times. That and the Slayer. She was still blissfully unawares that he'd even come back to town. Which was very handy. The last think he wanted was the Slayer hunting him down before this Adam chap his future self harped on about could wipe out the Slayerettes, and hand him the Slayer on a platter.
His crypt door opened - for a split second, he thought his messiah had come, but that was instantly disproven, when he detected a very familiar scent.
"Ello Dru. its been a while."
He turned from the TV and saw Drusilla in all her glory. She moved as ever in long graceful exaggerated strides.
"My Spike" she said. She leaned over sat on the arm of his chair and put her arms around his neck. Spike wanted nothing to melt into her embrace, and go on a bloody rampage with her. But something stopped him. He turned the embrace, and forced her onto the chair, whilst he shot up.
"What's wrong, has your slime demon dumped you? Good for him I say."
"Shhhhhhhh" said Drusilla getting up and wrapping her arms around his neck again. "The stars told me you had been cheating - you've taken back some moves in the game. You know what happens in the next act. Cheat. Cheat. Cheat. Cheat."
"So, your foresight told you this eh? Alright, yeah, I admit it. I came back and told myself what's gonna happen. But what's it got to do with you?"
"I'm sorry." said Drusilla "I knew that I'd doused your fire by lighting another. You laid down with the enemy because you were jealous of the king."
Spike had been away from Dru for nearly two years, so it took him a while to get used to her way of speaking again. "You mean, you feel guilty because my love for you outweighed my evil nature? Well aren't we the selfless little Vampire?"
Drusilla just rested her head on his shoulder. Spike felt his body tingle as dreams of this day had plagued his mind. He wanted to share everything. But he was still sceptical.
"Alright, why did you come back, if I had been spoilt so badly?" asked Spike
Drusilla lifted her head and looked up "You are waiting for the next move, the next player in the tale. The rose and the thistle bound together by the sword. And inside you Spike, the fire burns again. You are going to cause pain, and misery, and sadness. And you want do drive the girl who separated us mad! I see the fire burning. It's very pretty! Can I stay and watch the fire please Spike? Can I please?"
Spike lifted Dru's arms from around his body and put them at her side. His face shifted as the ravenous demon at his core came to the fore.
"Love" said Spike "Guy Fawkes Night has nothing on what I have in mind."
Spike drew her to him and kissed her passionately, savouring the contact he had so dreamed of for so long.
+++ May 2000
Spike and Dru pursued their quarry down the alley. A young girl. Enough for one, but if they shared her, they would need to find another to feed from to satisfy their hunger.
But there would always be more.
The woman found that the alley was a dead end, and she looked desperately for a way out She tried to climb a fire escape, but Drusilla grabbed her ankle, and with no effort at all tossed her backwards. Spike could hear her heart now. It was like a natural accompaniment to her moans.
"Please, don't do this." She pleaded.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
"I have money. lots of money."
ThudThudThud.
"Oh money you say?" said Spike. "Well I guess that changes everything."
"It does?" she said calming a little
Thud. Thud. Thud.
"Oh yeah." Spike said. "We'll nick your purse after bleeding you like a pig!"
She screamed, and as Spike moved in for the final kill, a fist burst through the wall behind her, and a skewer went straight through her spine killing her instantly.
"I dunno who you are, mate." Said Spike angrily "But you just killed lunch. Now you're gonna pay!"
Drusilla grabbed Spike's arm and put his her fingers to his lips.
"It's the Rose, the thistle, and the sword - they're here at last!"
Spike grinned. The figure that she claimed was Adam retracted the skewer that killed the woman. It then ripped apart the wall until it had made a hole big enough for it to get through. Spike thought his future self was right - Adam was an ugly sod.
"Adam I presume" said Spike.
"How do you know my name?" barked Adam, his voice seemed to have an intense anger inside it. "Just lets say the ghost of Christmas future told me. The name's Spike."
"I know your plan." Said Adam matter of factly. "That sentence helped me. You see, I have been troubled by you, ever since I was awoken. I felt vaguely that there was something wrong with reality. I traced the problem to its source, and I found the problem in the Hostile ID files of the Initiative. I'll assume you know who they are."
"Go on." Said Spike.
"You see, Spike, the problem could be pinpointed to Hostile 17. Sometimes I see a Pogara demon, and sometimes, I see, you."
Spike lit a cigarette, and played it cool.
"Probably dodgey software mate, maybe you need to update your Windows."
The cyborg delivered a forearm to Spike, and he was sent flying across the alley. It then trudged up to him and yanked him up by the throat.
"Do not mock me, Vampire. The reference to the ghost of Christmas Future, is from Dickens' 'A Christmas Carol'. The particular ghost shared knowledge with Scrooge, knowledge of what was to come. Now I realise that your future self bent the laws of time. You are a contradiction to what should be. I should destroy you."
"That would be a bad idea mate." Said Spike. "You're life is on the line here. You will be defeated soon, and I know how, and by who. Let me help, and I'll spill the beans.
The cyber-demon gave a yell, and choke-slammed Spike onto the ground.
"Very well, Vampire, we shall work as one. Now share your details!"
+++ Apologies, this was a bit of a talky chapter, but the next one will be more action orientated - check out the next exiting instalment when its published. In the mean time, feel free to R and R!