To pay the price (3)
Fanfiction by dutchbuffy2305
Rating: R
Timeline: Season 7, AU, after Bring on the Night, spoilers up to that.
Summary: Spike and the other guys band together to solve the mystery. _____________________________________________________________________________.
Spike woke up on the couch, feeling groggy but exhilarated. That had been some dream. A bloke should always dream like that. He got up and was amazed at the amount of strength he seemed to have regained. He heard the other fellows talking in the kitchen and realized with a shock of apprehension that they might well have heard him dreaming. If he had actually made the sounds he remembered making in his dream…He'd better kip in the basement next time instead of just collapsing on the nearest flat surface.
He walked to the kitchen, intent upon the fridge, not looking at the others.
"Hey, Spike," he heard Xander say. "Awake at last. I'm guessing you had many, many interesting dreams?"
Spike turned slowly towards the others and saw Xander's smirk reflected on all their faces. He burned with the memory of blushing, and thanked God or whomever for not being able to any more.
"Is that right, mate? What were you doing then, standing over me listening to me dreaming?" he drawled, not returning the looks.
"Now why would I do that? You were just really really loud, man. I'm just glad the girls weren't around to hear you say those things."
Andrew sniggered.
"And can I just mention how deeply, deeply disturbing this was? And how disgusted I am? And how much I wish Buffy had just left you with the First?"
"I'm so glad to see you reassert your powers of independent thought, Harris. Pity that Buffy's opinions are already starting to lose weight, though. She's been gone, what, two days? Bit soon, eh?"
"Just – just stop dreaming of her, Spike. You have no right to dream of Buffy!"
Spike shrugged off his irritation. "'S not like I have control over my dreams, Harris. But I plan to sleep in the cellar next time, anyway, to spare your sensitive ears and impressionable minds."
"You do that, Spike. I'm just kind glad you don't have prophetic dreams like Buffy, coz that would be really creepy." Xander shook his head and chomped down on his breakfast donut.
Giles looked at him over his glasses. "Well, if Spike did happen to have a prophetic dream just now, we might get a clue on where Buffy and the others are."
Spike was heating up his blood and didn't answer. "Spike?"
"Transatlantic travel bollix up your mind, Rupert? We're not gonna discuss my dream. Period."
"But it was about Buffy, right?" Xander said.
"Well, yeah…" Spike rolled his eyes.
"Was there any indication of her location?" Giles persisted, still fiddling with his glasses.
Spike sighed deeply and wiped his mouth. Would the taste of pig's blood ever get any better? "I was in a cave, people, didn't go exploring, didn't meet any evil thingies."
"No, you just had sex with Buffy!" Xander said. "In the only place you could get it. In your dreams!"
"You know what, this conversation is starting to bore me. Let's talk about the progress you all have undoubtedly made while I was recuperating on the couch." Good. That made them uncomfortable again. No, not good. No progress meant no Buffy.
Spike sat down and leaned his forearms on the counter. "All right. What do we have so far? We know there is a demon, possibly an ex-god, who is interested in us. Us blokes. Rupert, are you saying you have found bugger all on this demon in the wonderful world of library books?"
"Um, basically, um, yes. Bugger all pretty much covers it." Giles put his glasses back on
"Nada. Zilch. Diddly," Xander elaborated.
"Zippety. No cigar. Squat. Zero…" Andrew enthusiastically started up a litany of nothings.
"Shut up!" Giles said. Andrew blanched and cowered.
Spike got up again and started to pace. Pacing always helped him think.
"Rupert, hear me out. A demon named Arty, maybe a former god; boyfriends usually end up in little pieces. That's what Clem said, right Harris? Ring a bell?"
"Yeah," Xander confirmed.
"You said Arky," Giles protested. "Arty is a completely different matter. Torn apart? By hounds, by any chance?"
"We're thinking the same thing, Rupert. Artemis. Never a very friendly goddess, especially not to people of the male persuasion."
"Why don't we summon her?" Andrew asked.
Spike looked at Giles. "Could he? She is only patron to female virgins, right?"
"Hey!" Andrew protested. "Who says I'm a virgin!"
Spike looked at him askance. "Let me put it this way. Did you ever have sex with a woman?"
"None of your business," Andrew answered sullenly.
"From what I remember a bloke had better stay away from our ex-goddess, unless it's about hunting."
"We're hunting our girls?" Xander suggested.
"More literal," Giles elaborated. "Game. Boars."
"Huh. But does she have, like, power over women?"
Giles pursed his lips. "Not literally. But if a virgin girl asked her help, she might intercede in worldly events on her behalf."
"So? Is there a virgin taking revenge on us? And who are we talking about? Dawn? One of the little wannabes?" Xander asked.
Spike shrugged. "Giles?"
Giles got up, already mentally rifling through his books. "These are the beginnings of a lead. I'll do some research on summoning our former Goddess or asking for intercession." He left the kitchen.
"Okay. Giles is happy. What are we gonna do?"
"Help him? Wash up?" Spike suggested, and left in his turn for the quiet of his basement.
He was making up his cot with the underside of the soiled sheets, not willing to ask Xander for clean ones, when his door opened and he saw Giles coming down.
"We need to have a little chat, Spike."
The tone of his voice told Spike pretty much what kind of chat it was going to be. He resigned himself to it and sat down on the cot.
"Well? Don't hold back on my account, Rupert. Let 'er rip, then."
Giles coughed and seemed to have trouble finding the right beginning.
"Spike, about the soul. I mean to say, I know why you went to get it. Buffy told me something about your relationship, and Xander filled in some of the details…"
"Yeah right, Xander Harris, the completely unbiased observer who was there every minute Buffy and me ever spent together?"
"Let me finish, Spike. I know Xander pretty well, and I think I can assess the weight of his judgment. If you truly love Buffy, and want what's best for her, I think you should leave Sunnydale and never return. However worthy your deeds and intentions have been lately, and I say this with some doubt, I don't think you could ever be called good for her. Surely you realize that now, with the soul to guide you? Promise me you will leave as soon as you're fully recovered. Buffy may think she needs your strength, but there is always an alternative."
Spike was silent for a while. "Rupert, you know I respect you. Well, maybe you don't. But you're talking a load of rubbish right now. You're not her father, we're not in some Victorian farce, where the undesirable suitor can be made to leave with threats or promises of cash. I'm not saying I'll hang around for ever, but it's up to Buffy. If she wants me to stay, I will, if she wants me to leave, leave is what I'll do. But to have the gall to think you know what's best for her? I think she'd be mightily pissed off if she knew that."
Giles transformed into Ripper right in front of Spike. He grabbed Spike by the collar of his shirt and with clenched teeth said: "You'll do as I say, you young punk, or I'll find a stake with your name on it."
Spike looked back with a calm certainty he hadn't known he possessed. "You do that, Rupert. You try that. I don't answer to anyone but Buffy."
Giles tried to stare him down, and Spike remembered an occasion very much like this one, when he'd felt powerless because of the chip, and Giles had easily succeeded in forcing him to back down and running him out of the magic shop. Not that he had power now, but it didn't matter who was boss, Giles or him. Buffy would make the decision.
Giles backed down slowly, still staring hard at him.
"So," he said at last, trying to mask his unease with a cough. "Better get Buffy back soon. Try to talk some sense into her." He started to walk towards the stairs.
"You know I would never willingly hurt her or Dawn, don't you?" Spike asked, troubled by Giles' hostility.
Giles turned his head to look at him. "I do believe that is your intention. I'm just not too sure how well you are going to stand up to that. A soul in not exactly a guarantee for good behavior, you know. And my chief concern is Buffy. I don't want to see her hurt again, in whatever way."
"No parent can protect his child completely against hurt, Rupert."
"But she's been hurt so often before. Could she take staking you if it was necessary? I want her not to have to make that decision."
Spike fought against tears of weakness and doubt. "I'd sooner walk into the sun or stake myself than let her go through that!"
"I hope so. Otherwise I intend to see to it," Giles said, his voice no longer sounding threatening, but no less determined for that.
Damn Giles for bursting his little dream-fueled balloon of happiness. Spike heard Giles tread slowly and heavily up the stairs and close the door. He fell back on the cot and put his arm over his eyes, trying to find his focus of ten minutes ago. Self-doubt and self-hatred were not opportune feelings now. He had to concentrate on finding Buffy, and keeping the others on track. He tried to remember who'd taken charge last time Buffy had been out of the picture. Willow, mostly. It was still odd that Giles let him take the driver's seat, even more so after this lecture. Maybe he was getting old. Maybe he never had been the leader type, just the loyal follower and protective father figure. Before falling into sleep once again, Spike thought he'd do his utmost to live up to Buffy's expectations.
*******
"Buffy?"
"Here…"
They kissed feverishly, as if they'd been apart much longer than a few hours, as if he wasn't just dreaming this. She pressed herself against him urgently and slipped her hot hands down his jeans to grip his ass cheeks.
"Buffy, wait…"
She drew back reluctantly, unwilling to relinquish the contact, he thought. "What?"
"Buffy, you would send me away if you didn't want me, wouldn't you?"
"How can you even ask? How can you think that I would do that? I want you here, with me. I want to make love to you right now!" She pushed him down on his knees on the patch of sand, where his duster was still lying.
"No, love, I mean…Giles thinks I'm bad for you. That I should leave you for your own good…"
His head struck the sand with a thud. She straddled him and pinned his arms, her expression thunderous and fierce. "Don't you dare. Don't you dare leave me. Promise me you won't."
He saw the tears in her eyes and said thickly: "Never leave you. Only if you send me away."
She relaxed and collapsed on his chest. "Just hold me, Spike. Don't wanna think of hard stuff right now, just wanna feel."
Spike passed up the obvious opportunity and held her tightly. Ruefully he said; "I'm a drip, to choose to dream this instead of a nice shag. Rather talk to you than shag you, innit weird?"
He inhaled the smell of her hair, no longer obscured by shampoo or conditioner or whatever goop girls put in it. He remembered that when he was a young man, he would try to get a whiff of the delicious scent that was said to rise from a girl's parting, the neat white stripe that bisected their shapely heads.
"Must be love," she said, her voice muffled by the cloth of his tee pressing against her mouth.
"Yeah. Most likely is, sweetheart. Come here, baby, gonna ravish you now."
He was taking his time unbuttoning her shirt, kissing the tops of her breast and her stomach, when they heard Willow's voice.
"Buffy? Are you there?" She sounded anxious.
"What the…?" Spike groaned and cast his eyes to heaven. "Why? Why dream of Willow? Is this my bloody conscience torturing me?"
A bedraggled auburn head was stuck around a stalagmite and retreated again hastily. "Spike. Oh." Willow's voice said. "I didn't know you were here, too. That's weird. But - good. You can be our link to the outside world."
Spike rolled off Buffy, onto his back, leaning on his elbows. "How would me dreaming of shagging Buffy – and not getting there, mind you, because of your unwanted presence – help a dream person communicate?"
Willow appeared from behind her rock and sat down next to them, politely averting her eyes from Buffy, who was doing up the last buttons of her shirt. "But we're not dreaming, Spike. I noticed Buffy had gone into some kind of trance, and I decided to follow her."
Spike tried to clear his head by shaking it. "Are you saying this is real? That Buffy and I met on some dream plane?"
Willow made a face that said, 'Something like that, but it's too complicated to explain it properly to you.'
"So, everything we say and do on this plane is like me saying it to a real person? Buffy will remember meeting me here?"
"Huh-huh." nodded Willow, looking uncomfortably at Buffy. "Sure she will. That's what so convenient about it. We can talk this way, even if we don't know where we are and how we got here."
Spike looked at Buffy, who was very red and biting her lip. She refused to meet his eyes and concentrated on doing her shirt up. Willow glanced at Spike in confusion. Spike was too busy masking the hurt he felt to help her out.
"Spike, tell me about your side. What do you know?"
"We think you were kidnapped by a former goddess named Artemis. We don't know why, we don't know what she wants. She seemed to be interested in us men."
With a gesture, Willow made a fire appear on the cave floor, looking very real, crackling merrily. It gave off actual warmth and smelled of apple wood. They arranged themselves around it, stretching their hands to the low flames. Buffy sat turned away from Spike. It hurt.
"Huh. Interested in men? Why did she kidnap us, then? Buffy, did you tell Spike about Dawn, and the other girls?"
Spike tensed. "What about Dawn? Is she alright?"
Willow frowned. "I guess. But she and three of the other girls are in some kind of trance. The rest are just normal and bored out of their skulls, and stinky like us."
Spike looked thoughtful for a moment. "Could be that Artemis, being a kind of patroness to virgins, treats them differently?"
Willow cleared her throat. "Spike, do you have any idea if we're still in Sunnydale somewhere?"
Spike shrugged. "We couldn't find you. Demon grapevine only mentions us. Maybe you're not even in this dimension?"
Willow frowned and twirled a lock of her stringy-looking hair. "Tell Giles to do a locator spell on us. I know there is one in the Grimoire Grys, that's the big red leather book under my pillow. Tell him to use that. I need to know where we are if I want to use magic to get us out."
"Couldn't you just use this dream-talking thingy to talk to Giles directly, Willow? This seems like taking the long way around?"
Willow sighed and fiddled with a stick of wood that wasn't burning properly. "I tried to do a locator spell earlier, but the magic just bounced back off the walls in our cave. You could try telling Giles, but I have no idea how you and Spike managed to meet on a dream plane without even realizing it, let alone that I could instruct Giles on how to find it. Gonna get out of here, now, back to check on the girls."
Willow took a deep breath and closed her eyes. Buffy said in a low voice" How do I get out of here, Willow?"
"Just close your eyes and will yourself to wake up while counting to ten, that always works for me."
"Willow, wait!" Spike said urgently. "How about food and water? You'll die if you don't have water?"
Willow opened her eyes with a snap. "Wow. How could we not think of that? I haven't been hungry or thirsty at all. How long have we been away?"
"Days. At least two nights. Can't really be sure, I've been sleeping a lot, still injured, you know. Too much time not to notice hunger or thirst, I'd think."
"Weird. Different dimension? Um, leaving now!" She waved a little wave at them and disappeared. Trying to be tactful, Spike assumed.
Buffy turned a troubled face to Spike, looking as if she was going to say something. After several false starts, she did.
"Spike. I'm sorry. I thought I was dreaming. I didn't mean, you know, to do that again. Go there with you."
"Why dream of it, then?" he said evenly. "Isn't that a place where your deepest desires live, where you think of what you would do without normal rules and limitations?"
Buffy bit her lip. "What you want isn't always the right thing."
"What about sleeping with me in the basement? Still want me, then?"
"Now you're gonna question that?"
Spike was silent.
"Okay. I do want you. You knew that already. I just…"
She sat there on her knees, looking miserable and guilty, and Spike didn't have the heart to push her.
"Off you go then," he said resignedly. "We'll just pretend it didn't happen."
For a moment she looked him full in the face, eyes brimming with some emotion, but then she closed her eyes, moved her lips a little and disappeared.
Spike felt an urge to stare at the place Buffy had been sitting, but forced himself to look at the orange flames. So, nothing had really changed, not like he thought it had. Buffy still couldn't bear to own up to her best friend what she really wanted. He'd thought the sleeping together in the basement had been a beginning. But knowing now that he'd met the real Buffy, in what he thought was a dream, showed him it had just been another false start.
TBC