Chains of Darkness   Chapter 6   -  

Author:  Crunchberry –  mildly tormented b/s shipper who also likes Angelus (except he is being quite awful these past weeks in TV land – naughty boy – he should be spanked!  Who wants to line up to spank Angelus?)   No, Spike, give the good readers a chance first!  You can spank me instead….

A/N – sorry about the delays – real life tends to get in the way but I do know where this story is going – and like to write the next chapter before posting the previous ones so I can tweek em.  Feedback lets me know there are people actually reading this and it is worth my time to continue.  Thanks!

Vampirekiss – thanks for the heads up on my boo boo – its now fixed!

Disclaimer:  Hmm, Angelus does play a bit too rough for me.  Why is it that his soulless vampire so much worse than Spike soulless?  Ah the eternal question.  I believe it is because of their roots….   Hair gel does something worse than bleach to the brain cells…   Oh – I mean family roots.  Sorry, my bad.    Oh – disclaimer – I am off topic – sorry Joss.  Just borrowing for a lil while so I can do what I think should be done to YOUR characters.

Looking thru the small circle in the painted windshield, he searched for the correct street sign.  Following the directions the realtor had told him over the phone he drove another mile and then looked for the green mailbox on the side of the road..  There is was, perfect!  Just like the ad in the paper said.  For Rent, 4 bedroom colonial, secluded, furnished, animals welcome.  Maybe it was the animals welcome part that got to him, did the realtor even realize that she was talking Sunnydale here?  Snickering to himself he drove down the driveway into a heavily wooded lot.  Patting the key in his pocket, he realized how lucky he was to live in Sunnydale, where unconventional business arrangements like renting a house without meeting the owners or realtor were almost a norm.  There were so many vacancies in this town that realtors were more than happy to be as accommodating as possible.

The driveway curved up into the woods and then next to the house.  Gives the house lots of shade, very convenient that he thought.   Parking the DeSoto under the carport located on the side, he hopped out and quickly went over to the back door.  Could of just broke in and set up house without doing it the legal way, but he didn't want any of Sunnydale's finest showing up and then the possibility of the Watcher finding out where his soon to be missing Slayer was.  The way the agent sounded, he had the house for a year at least.  Owners fled town, too many beasties scared em.  Though the official story was they were taking a long vacation in sunny Florida. 

Going in the back door he noticed that at 4 in the afternoon the sunlight hardly entered the house due to the canopy of trees.  Perfect.  Away from my soddin sire and cozy enough for my plans regarding the Slayer.

Whistling thru his teeth, he took a tour of his new home.  I'll start with the kitchen first…

****

"Oh you have got to be kidding!"  Xander exclaimed.  "We have to GLUE all these bones together?  Do I even remotely look like I still enjoy erector sets?"

Giggling, Willow hit him playfully on the arm.  "The question you should be asking is if you remotely look like a medical student – we have to label all the bones too!"  Looking at the 253 bones spread on the tabletop, Willow wondered if she would get ANY help from her team members.  "Look, all we have to do is everyone take a section of the cat and figure out what bones you need, if we all work together, we should get this done fairly quickly."

"Oh, this is just gross.  I didn't mind the frog or worm dissections, but a poor lil kitty cat?"  Buffy wrinkled her nose in disgust and really hoped that Willow would help her on her section of the cat.  She was beginning to get a humdinger of a headache and putting together a cat skeleton was on the bottom of her priority list.

"At least the teacher put us in groups of four, it could be worse."  Glancing up at Cordelia as he said this, he smiled and hoped she would smile back. 

"Yeah, we could have been wondering where she got 24 dead cats instead of just six dead ones.  And this is just for this class."  Flipping her hair back she glanced over the class to see if anyone was really noticing where she was sitting and with whom.

Picking up the cats skull, Xander swiveled it back and forth on top of the table to make it look like it was talking.

"Before I only cared if I was fed

But that was before I lost my head!

Oh no – I must be really dead!

Skull bones the kitty said!"

"Xander!  That is SICK.   Don't play with the kitty's head! And what type of a stupid name is that? I am going to call my section of bones 'cuddles'.  That's a nice kitty name!"  Willow grabbed the skull out of Xanders hands and put it over by what she thought were the neck bones.

Cordelia just rolled her eyes at the trio even though she secretly thought Xander was hysterical at times. 

                                                                        ****

"Yo! Spikey!   Where are you William?"    Looking around the basement floor of the factory, Angelus finally spotted some minions.  "Hey – Where did Spike go?  Anyone see him?"

"Uh, no – we thought he was with you and Dru.  There was so much noise coming out of your room, figured it had to be the three of you." the burly vampire named Zack said.  He wasn't the brightest of the bunch, but he knew enough to keep on Angelus's good side, even if it meant kissing some vampire butt.  He knew Spike had left, but decided to let some other minion make the mistake in telling Angelus that he had slipped out when they were supposed to keep an eye on him.

Running up the stairs, Angelus went to the fire exit door and peered outside.  It was still sunny enough for him to get incinerated if he ventured outside but a glance over toward the garage with the door opened confirmed what he thought.  Guess Spikey boy took the DeSoto for a spin.  Seems like he took his wheelchair too seeing it not around anywhere.  Guess he isn't totally healed yet then.  Grinning maliciously, he went back downstairs thinking of visiting his favorite Slayer tonight and what he was going to do about Spike.

Couple hours later found the sunlight fading and Dru getting restless about going out to feed.  She carried that stupid doll around and kept singing about the stars, twirling around in her skirts.  How Spike managed to put up with her for all these years and not go as batty as her was beyond his comprehension. 

"All right Dru, maybe we will run into your boyfriend.  I think he has been keeping some secrets from us."  Tugging her hand impatiently, Angelus took her out to the alleyway and started off for town.  First some food, then some fun.  Tonight should I visit Buffy or one of her friends?  Choices Choices…Mental anguish?  Physical Torture?  Prolong the inevitable cause Buffy – your mine and nobody else's sweetheart. 

Buffy was at the dining room table, picking at her chicken divan casserole that her mother had made.  Usually she loved this dish, but she thought she was coming down with the flu.  Usually Slayers never got sick, but she had started feeling worse and worse as the night progressed and it was the only explanation that she could find.  Her headache was not going away and her stomach just couldn't seem to handle any food right now.

"Aren't you hungry Buffy?" Joyce asked as she cleared her plate from the table.

"Not really mom, I think I am going to skip my study session with Willow tonight and hit the bed early.  Didn't sleep too well last night."

Getting up and slowly going upstairs, Buffy entered the bathroom and decided to take a warm bath.  Getting undressed, she looked at her scars in the mirror.  They were definitely fainter than this morning.  By tomorrow they might be totally disappeared.  She was feeling more lightheaded even when she immersed herself into the warm bath.  Closing her eyes, she tried to put all her thoughts away and concentrate on getting rid of this headache.

After her bath, she laid down on her bed and pulled up the coverlets over her naked body.  She didn't feel like putting on her pajamas.  Her skin felt almost hot and it wasn't from the bath.  She felt like tiny ants were crawling under her skin and she kept squirming against her sheets to alleviate the feeling. 

Outside her window, unbeknownst to the girl in bed was a sleek predator perched on the branch of the large oak tree.  Peering intently into the room, he wondered what would happen if he just knocked on the window.  It's too soon, he thought,  she would probably stake my ass.  Soon my sweet Slayer, soon. Shimming down the tree, his thoughts kept going back to the Slayer as she squirmed naked under the sheets.    And I actually wanted to kill her before, had no idea of the fun I was gonna have. 

Whistling under his breath, he decided to head to Willy's for a beer and some pool.

The whistling noise echoed in the dark recesses of the foundry.

Two sixth grade boys were crawling in through the gap in the locked gate.  One boy, larger and more confident, went first and held open the chain link for the smaller boy.  Eric, the smaller one of the two, looked nervous and kept glancing around like they were going to get caught at any moment.  Scrambling up they sprinted around two older smaller buildings and then Steve, the larger boy, pointed to the back part of the foundry where a number of broken window panes could be seen.  "We can enter there, nobody will see us that way."

"I don't think this is such a good idea anymore Steve.  We could get into a lot of trouble!" 

"C'mon Eric, only a wuss would chicken out now!    You want to be part of the gang, then you have to go thru the initiation!" Steve quickly crawled over the window panes, dirt getting caked into his jeans from where he rubbed against the molding.

Not wanting to appear a chicken, Eric followed Steve into the foundry.  He really wanted to be accepted by Steve and his friends and it was just an old foundry he kept telling himself.  What's the worst that could happen he kept asking himself as he followed Steve into the darkness.

TBC:   Feedback always welcome.  Lets me know that people are reading it and actually want to read more.