Chapter Two: Rainbow in the Dark
Giles' bedroom door nearly crashes outwards as Buffy slams the door close behind her as she leaps onto the watcher's bed. She just barely remembers to reign in her strength. As it is the door frame cracks under the impact.
For a moment downstairs, when she had looked at Spike from out of her past, she wondered if she could love him. It had been a brief and flitting moment, there and gone just as fast. He was Spike, of that there was no doubt. He just wasn't her Spike. They didn't share the same history. Didn't have the same shared experiences. Hadn't suffered for each other, because of each other, at each other's hands the way she and her Spike had. While she had no doubt in her mind that she could make this Spike hers she would never be his. Not like she was his future incarnation's.
That was why she had run as hard as she could, as fast as she could, to get out from under his accusing eyes. The only problem being was that she couldn't out run herself. No matter how hard she had tried she would always be looking back at herself.
She hadn't even made it halfway up the stairs before her eyes had unleashed the flood of tears that were now streaming down her cheeks. It had been days since the last time she had broken down and that had been nothing compared to this. She had thought she had finally moved beyond this stage of her grief.
Then again her stages seemed to be moving in a circular pattern that she was having problems keeping track of. Acceptance, anger, and denial were playing a never ending game of musical chairs. Once she began to cope with one the music would start back up and around and around they would go until a different emotion wound up in the driver's chair and the cycle would start all over again.
She curls in on herself, drawing her knees upward as she pulls the pillow to her chest. Reaching into the left pocket of Spike's duster her hand pulls out a crumpled and tear stain sheet of old parchment. It was the kind of paper that was used over a hundred years ago. Her hands tremble like they always do whenever she holds this simple piece of paper. Ignoring the top of the page she instantly focuses in on the last few paragraphs at the bottom.
It has to be. I have to believe that if you had been free to chose you would have chosen me. But you weren't and you can't and I can't continue knowing that I'll never have all of you. That when we touch there's always a piece of you that'll never be mine.
Yet I can't leave you either. There is only one thing that I can do. I'll give to you a gift like the world has never seen. I give you the world free of the Hell Mouth. I give you a world rid of the First Evil. I give you a world in which you can set aside the title Slayer, Protector of the World and just be Buffy the woman I fell in love with.
This is my gift to you. The one and only thing that is truly worthy of you. Promise me that someday you'll find somebody that you can love with everything that you are. Somebody that'll love you the way you deserve.
My luv, always and Forever.
Her tears fall faster, harder as she reads and re-reads the letter. It wasn't that she needed to see the lines written on the page to know what the words were. She had it memorized from the first time her eyes scanned the page and realized what Spike had been planning on doing. Each time she reads the letter she felt her heart being torn apart anew, as if her very soul was being ripped asunder.
"It was you," she chokes out. "It was always you. Only you. You're the only one I ever wanted. Why couldn't you see that? Why wouldn't I let you see that?" She continues to cry as she buries her face into the sheet of paper just like she always did.
"I say we go upstairs and lynch her," Anya offers seriously as her and Willow continue to wrap Xander's bruised chest in gauss and bandages. For no reason any of them could fathom Spike had informed them that none of his ribs were broken a short time after Buffy had run out of the room.
Nobody believed Spike at first until the blonde vampire had pointed out he could care less if Harris lived or died. Then a thought had popped into his head as he remembered if Xander died then he would be able to get a drink of human blood instead of the pig swill he was forced to drink. Then he frowned remembering it was Harris he was talking about and he preferred drinking the pig slop. No one had found his joke on the subject very amusing.
"Yes," Giles mutters sarcastically. "Because a frontal assault worked so well on her last time why don't we go and launch another one?" The old watcher suggest bitterly. "Bloody inspirational," he mumbles loud enough for everyone to hear. He better then anyone here knew what the risks were of attacking a slayer head on, weather she was asleep or awake. Most of the time asleep was the worst of the options because they reacted to everything instinctively, without conscious thought.
"She needs to pay for how she hurt Xander," the ex-vengeance demon responds not willing to let the matter go.
"Long as he doesn't go antagonizing the chit. Whelp'll be fine in a few weeks," Spike says with a smile on his face thinking of the pain filled weeks Harris was in for.
Anya frowns at Spike, "but until then there will be no orgasms."
Spike smirks at her, "then maybe you should fine someone a bit more durable. Someone not prone to all these injuries, or at least someone who doesn't need oxygen to still be serviceable," he suggests playfully.
"Hey!" Xander squawks as he tries to sit up.
"Don't move," Anya says easily keeping Xander from doing more then getting his shoulders off the ground while her frown at Spike deepens. "Thank you for the offer Spike but I prefer that the men I sleep with don't look at me like I was the main course."
"But you would be my main course," Spike whispers seductively "Every single night I'd sample your exquisite..."
"Just why haven't we tied your British butt back up yet?" Buffy snarls at Spike cutting the platinum blonde vampire off before his attempts at seduction could degenerate any further.
Spike cocks his head over his shoulder before turning to face the slayer, "I believe she's about yea tall," he says holding his hand up to the top of Buffy's head. "Has a major attitude, and claims to come from the future," he says ticking reasons off his fingers. "And aside from you, prissy little chit that you are, I'm the only one capable of giving her a good go."
"Yeah and we all saw just how good of go that was," Buffy hisses incapable of stopping the jealous sounding words from jumping out of her mouth.
"Hey I was right there with you," Spike snarls back having missed the meaning of what Buffy had said.
"Yeah and a lot of help you were," Buffy shoots back at the bleach blonde vampire thankful that he was so dense he had misinterpreted the meaning behind her comment.
Spike whirls away, an action made less impressive seeming then it normally was by the lack of his black duster flaring around him as he moves. He takes two steps before turning back around to face Buffy, shoving his fingers at her he wishes he had a cigarette between them. Just for effect not because of the way the slayer's temper was getting him worked up again. "I didn't see you doing a hell of a lot better," he points out angrily.
Buffy takes a step forward feeling her heartbeat faster the closer she came to Spike. Weather that was because he was pissing her off with every word that came out of his mouth or because she was excited by the thought of another confrontation with him she didn't know and she really didn't care at the moment. "That's because you were lying around in a state of, I just got my ass handed to me, while I was doing all the real fighting," she nearly yells into his face.
"Guys," Willow says quietly into the momentary silence after Buffy's last word.
"What!" They both shout at the same time. Their heads turning almost in unison with each other as the turn to look at the shy red head who had interrupted them. Buffy moves first marching away from Spike back over to Giles so she can change his bandage again while Spike makes a bee line for the windowsill where he'd left the pack of cigarettes the other Buffy had given him. He really needed something to calm him down.
Willow blinks several times as she watches Buffy and Spike move away from each other. The two of them were acting even meaner to each other then they usually did. The words they were slinging about somehow seemed even more hurtful then normal. She shakes her head not wanting to think about the implications of what she was seeing. Things she might not have seen if future Buffy hadn't shown up flinging herself upon Spike like he was her heart. A heart that she had been missing for quite a long time.
"As entertaining as watching the two of you verbally spar with each other isn't," Giles scolds into the silence. Then grimaces as Buffy accidentally applies too much pressure as she finishes redressing the bandage on his wounded shoulder. Giles glances up at her and receives one of her patented innocent little girl smiles she was found of tossing around when she did something slightly wrong. "We still need to figure out what we are going to do about her. Something has obviously affected her in such a way that she might be unstable."
"What was your first clue that something wasn't right in the land of Buffydom?" Xander questions harshly, "the fact she was all over deadboy jr. or that she wailed on her nearest and dearest like we were a pack of vamps trolling for dinner?"
Buffy glances at Xander her soft, blue eyes meeting his bitter brown orbs. She can see years of repressed anger filling them and turns her head away from him to glance at Willow. The red head wasn't meeting her eyes. "Look she's been through something," she says into the silence Xander's hate filled comment caused. "Something traumatic, maybe even catastrophic. Something that none of us can possible understand."
"So what is it you propose we do?" Giles inquires once again placing his trust in Buffy. She had proved, on far too many occasions, that her instincts and intuition were perhaps the best guides in situations like this one.
"I don't know," she admits with a shrug.
"I say we summon Hallie and wish her the hell out of here," Anya proposes helpfully. "Perhaps we can get her a seat on the guided tour of hell. She could spend eternity visiting all the hotspo..."
"We aren't summoning another bloody demon," Giles rudely cuts into Anya's rant. "Having one on the premises unrestrained is quite enough. Now if you don't have something useful to offer to this conversation then I suggest you either vacate my flat immediately or shut the hell up until you do."
"Well, if you're going to..."
"Maybe we should try talking to her," Willow interrupts Anya. "I mean we know something happened to her, some event or tragic accident or some such thing and judging by the way she was acting towards us I'd say we were in part responsible for it."
"There's no way that we could do something that would make her act like that towards us yet leaves her craving bleach boy here," Xander breaks in. "I mean we're your best buds. The Scooby gang, the slayerettes, the guys that have been there since the beginning. That've help you through everything," he says through clenched teeth. "It's got to be a spell or something evil doing a Buffy impersonation because it wants to break us apart."
"Yeah, because evil the world over trembles in fear at the name Xander Harris," Spike scoffs from next to the window.
"Kicked your ass often enough," Xander growls.
"No," Spike replies through gritted teeth, smoke billows out of his nostrils as he points at Buffy. "She's kick my ass often enough. You've barely managed to maintain the role of comic relief," he smirks watching the young man struggle with his temper.
"Not surprising whose side you'd wind up on," Xander sneers reminding everyone of how close this other Buffy had been with Spike.
"This bickering isn't getting us anywhere," Giles interrupts the two of them before either can says something else. "Willow why don't you continue what you were saying before you were interrupted," he says with a pointed glare at both the vampire and the boy. "I think that you might have been on to something," the watcher admits remembering the way Buffy had looked at him with nearly pure rage burning in her eyes.
Why she hadn't killed him when she had hurled the crossbow bolt at him was still a mystery. She was more then capable of putting the bolt through his heart instead of leaving him with, what was nothing more then a rather painful flesh wound. In fact in the heat of battle her instincts would have been to go for the kill yet she had chosen to injure him instead. He suspected that there was something far more complicated at play here then any of them suspected.
"Well all I was really going to say is that one of us should, you know, try to get to know her," Willow runs down. "I know it's not really a plan, but it seems like the only thing we got going for us."
"It is a good plan," Buffy replies giving her friend her support since she really didn't want to go head to head with herself again anytime soon. She had the feeling that her older self had been holding back during their first go round and if antagonized she may not feel the need for that kind of restraint again. "Which one of us did you have in mind?"
"I think we can safely cross Xander off the list," Willow says slowly. "It's nothing personal. Its just with some of the things you'd say I think you'd come back from a talk missing vital parts of your anatomy."
"Then I say he should be the first to go," Spike remarks to Harris with a broad smirk.
"Good thing the choice isn't up to you," Buffy replies snidely as she suppresses the smile that threatens to crack her face. Pushing down the warm feeling Spike causes her she begins mentally repeating her mantra on the vileness that is Spike.
"And it can't be you," Willow informs the blonde vampire.
Spike snorts, "what makes you think I'd care what you did with the chit?" Spike questions, "aside from finally getting the stick up her ass amputated she still seems to be as much of a royal pain as miss priss here."
Buffy turns to glare at Spike as Willow continues speaking. The young witch having developed the skill of talking no matter what anybody was doing around her. "You seem to cause her as much pain as seeing Giles enrages her..."
"Just tell me again why I haven't staked your ass yet?"
"...And Anya's as bad as Xander right now. Maybe if she got over the fact of future Buffy hurting Xander..."
"Cause you still need me to figure out what commando boys are up to," Spike gloats.
"...And Buffy seems almost as pissed off at herself as she does Giles and she seems to be redirecting that anger at you, so that leaves you out as well..."
"Oh I think we could do pretty well on our own," Buffy challenges him.
Spike smirks lightly, "right. Because you've done such a bloody good job of it so far?"
"Do you think you're up to that kind of confrontation? She didn't seem none to pleased with you if I recall," Giles inquires politely not wanting to bruise the young girls delicate feelings.
"I wasn't thinking of me," Willow admits.
"If I didn't have to spend so much time watching your dead ass then I probably would have found them by now."
"But you're the only person left," Anya points out slightly confused by the red heads logic.
Willow shakes her head, "not according to Buffy..."
"You wouldn't even know the bleeding wankers existed if it wasn't for me," Spike growls as the Buffy glares at him.
"She mentioned a girl that I met at a Wicca meeting a few months ago."
"This Tara?" Giles quizzes remembering the name from future Buffy's previous assertions. "Are you sure about this?"
"And yet we'd still know more about them then you've been able tell us so far."
"Not really," Willow concedes, "but Buffy did say that the two of us were best friends in the future. Plus when she talked about her she seemed as if she was happy, or at least not so sad."
Giles nods his head in acquisition to her judgement, "if you think it will help us sort out this problem then by all means proceed. Just be cautious, we don't know what the circumstances were that brought this girl to us," he sternly advises the young girl.
"...And you wouldn't have found out about them until one of their little groups caught sight of you cracking demon skulls..."
Willow gives him a warm smile, "don't worry Giles. She's a friend, just one we haven't met yet."
"...Doing things no human can do. Then they would've had themselves one little brassed off slayer locked up in their little sci-fi fields doing to you..." He cuts himself off with a snarl as he curses himself. What the hell should he care if the slayer and all her little pals got stuck in one of those damn cells. Let them experience what he gone through and see how they all liked it. "I need a bloody fucking drink," he growls storming into Giles kitchen.
Buffy watches Spike rush out of the room shocked. He was truly concerned about what happened to her. Maybe not in a wishing her happiness and a long life kind of concern but he didn't want her to go through whatever had happened to him. That was what he had been going to say before he stopped himself. She was sure of it.
Then again the entire thing could have been a ploy to make her think he had some kind of feelings for her. It was simply another way to keep her off balance. To lure her in before springing a trap where he could sink his fangs into her. Satisfied that she had worked out his convoluted plot Buffy once again begins her mantra: Spike is evil. Spike is a soulless disgusting thing. Spike is a heartless creature with no feelings. Spike would gladly kill you and all of your friends.
Continuing her turn all the way around so that she's facing Willow and Giles she questions, "so who're we sending in?"
Dawn's eyes snap open with the suddenness of a flash flood. She bolts upright, tossing the piece of paper that had been in front of her face to the side, as she peers into the darkness of the unfamiliar surroundings. Only she was able to make out more details of the bedrooms furnishings then she should have been able to considering the time of night, the sealed door, the shuttered blinds, and drawn curtains.
Everything felt wrong. She felt wrong. Her body ached in spots she had never thought could ache. Everything was too sharp. Color's were too bright, as they stabbed into her eyes, leaving her with a sense of vertigo. Odor's were to strong, their mingled scents making her nauseous. There was a constant buzz in her ears that sounded like nest of wasp were buzzing around inside her skull. An intense tingle centered at the base of her spine and would occasionally become stronger or weaker for no reason what-so-ever. Several minutes pass at a snails pace as she slowly brings her rampant senses back under semblance of control.
As her heart slowed from the marathon pace it had been on she began to realize the room wasn't as unfamiliar as she had originally thought. In fact she could remember spending several nights in a row sleeping in this room. The first few nights after Buffy sacrificed herself she couldn't bring herself to spend the nights at her house. A house that now wasn't only devoid of her mother's loving presence, but also of her sister's over protectiveness. Giles had been kind enough to allow her the use of his bed for a few nights until she could come to terms with what she had lost.
That was where she was now, Giles' old bedroom back in his Sunnydale apartment. Which begged the question how. She began racking her brain, trying to piece together what had happened. The last thing she remembered before waking up in Giles' bed was running her hands over Spike's taut body, kissing him, groping, rubbing her body into his. The intense heat that had been...
Her mind freezes as her face goes scarlet. That was a dream. A very intense, very tangible dream that left her on the edge of a bliss she didn't think was possible to achieve. She had been Buffy, a very sore Buffy, but still Buffy. She was in the past shortly after the Initiative had put the chip in his head. She had been making out with Spike, kissing, groping, and just doing things to him that she didn't even know could be done. She had found that aspect of the dream strange since the last time she had seen Spike he had tried to kill her, or so she thought at the time. Her last encounter with Buffy had been even less pleasant.
The make-out session had been interrupted by the fight. A fight were she fought like Buffy as she fought Buffy, Spike, and everyone else. Of course she had won. She was Buffy after all and this was her dream. After the fight had come the interrogation of her by the gang. She could remember wanting to kill Giles, wanting to hurt Xander, Willow, everybody that had hurt her in the past, not her, but everyone that had hurt Buffy in the past. To just lash out at everything around her. She remembers keeping up a running argument with herself listing all the reasons she couldn't just unleash her anger at these people who had never done her any harm.
Numbly, she was coming to the realization that it hadn't been a dream. That somehow she was inside Buffy's head. The head of a person she hated, the person who had just up and abandoned her, a person that hated her nearly as much as she hated her.
Somebody had merged their minds into Buffy's body and transported them back into nineteen ninety-nine, maybe early two thousand. Somebody that obviously hated the two of them nearly as much as they hated each other. Either that or it was someone that found the situation extremely amusing and was right now laughing his or her ass off watching events unfold.
Somehow it had been her that had kept Buffy from killing everyone downstairs. That she was somehow able to influence Buffy's actions, that she might have a slight amount of control. Then she looks down at Buffy's blood covered hands. The torn and tattered clothing soaked in Buffy's blood. Spike's duster that Buffy hadn't bothered taking off before she had sobbed herself to sleep.
A smile creeps its way across her lips as she realizes she had more then just an infinitesimal amount of control over Buffy's actions. Right now she was Buffy. While Buffy was sleeping she had control of her body. That she could do whatever she wanted and nobody would be able to stop her. Just to prove a point she lifts Buffy's arm up in front of her then she puts it back down. Then she drums her fingertips on her thigh as she lightly taps her foot on the floor. She can't stop the smile that spreads across her face. For a girl who, until a few years ago, had been nothing more then a big glowing ball of green energy she could think of far worse fates then being trapped in her sister's skull. As long as she got to come out every now and then to play she could deal with sharing her sister's body.
Standing up she feels her stomach growl as it tightens into a painful knot. She feels as if she hasn't eaten in several days and wonders just how long it has been since Buffy's last decent meal. Standing up Dawn walks over to the mirror and gasps seeing the condition Buffy's body is in. She had seen Buffy thin before, the past two years she had eaten like a bird, but what she saw in front of her made thin Buffy seem obese. Her sister's body looked skeletal.
Her eyes were sunken deep, her cheeks were cavernous hollows. Her collar bones were practically sticking out through the flesh that remained. Looking down at her hands she realizes she can see the thin bones just underneath the skin's surface. She was almost afraid to take off the duster and blouse she was wearing, but she needed to see everything. What she saw wasn't a very pretty sight. She had seen skeletons with more flesh covering their ribs then she had right now. Buffy had never been endowed with large breast but at least people knew she had breast. Now her chest had more in common with a little boy's then a twenty-two year old woman.
Grabbing the brush of Giles' dresser she goes to work on her hair. There was no way she was going to let anyone see her looking like this, even if it was Buffy's body they were seeing. It takes her nearly ten minutes to brush all the snarls out of her hair, but there's nothing she can do at present to get rid of the frizzy split ends. Absently she wonders just what Buffy had been doing before getting sucked into the pass, she knew it had to involve her older sister sticking her finger into an electrical outlet, but other then that she didn't know what she possibly could have been doing.
As she went through Giles' wardrobe looking for something to wear she tried delving into Buffy's memories to find out what she had been doing. Each time she kept running into a brick wall that wouldn't give no matter how hard she pushed. Not that she was pushing too hard right now. For all she knew her trying to get in might be something that would wake up Buffy and waking Buffy up right now was something she wanted to avoid.
After putting on one of Giles' white t-shirts she slips on a thick green sweatshirt before sliding Spike's duster back on. She didn't know if the gang had seen how thin Buffy was, or if they had even paid attention to it, but if they hadn't she wanted to keep it that way. Give herself a little time and she would get some meat back on Buffy's skeletal frame even if it killed her.
Mentally preparing herself for the performance of a lifetime she quietly pulls open the door to Giles' bedroom. Squinting her eyes as she tries to adjust to the brightness of the light in the hall Dawn stops before she steps out into the hallway. Standing just inside the bedroom door she picks up the conversation from downstairs. Her light frown deepens slightly as she comes to realization that Buffy had probably been able to hear just about every conversation that went on around her. She wonders just how many times her sister heard somebody insult her and never do anything because if she was a normal girl she never would have been able to hear the comment in the first place.
"...Concerns me is the fact that your chip didn't activate when you attacked her," Giles' dry voice ponders from down below. "Are you positive it functions the same way in response to every creature you attack?"
"Sorry," Spike replies as he shifts his stance, "guess I should've told every one the soddin thing doesn't work on time travelling bitches from the future. Bloody stupid of me," he says sarcastically. A second later he continues, his rough accent conveying his annoyance. "Its not like I attacked every single bloke I came across. Unlike some poofters I could mention, I happen to like my noggin pain free."
"Maybe whoever put it in your head wanted something they could control. Some kind of shock troops," Willow suggest. "Think about it. Vampires, super strong, super fast, excellent senses, wouldn't show up on heat sensors. They look human, but you can shoot them all you want and it isn't going to slow them down, unless you hit a kneecap or something. But their not really the type you want to turn your back on. At least not if you're human. So create a chip that produces a concentrated neurological pain when they attack human beings, get yourself a whole bunch of vampires, and suddenly you have yourself unkillable shock troops."
"It sounds like we finally might have some kind of idea about what this organization is after in Sunnydale," Giles agrees.
"Nice theory, except for the fact that I can't even think about hitting a human without it buzzing around my head," Spike growls.
"Who said they were going to be sending you against humans," Anya interjects. "I'm sure there are a lot of demons out there that you would have been sent up against. Though your survival rate would dip accordingly. Either that or there's an off switch," she points out helpfully.
"That's it!" Xander shouts from below as Dawn inches her way down the stairs taking all the time she needs to allow her senses plenty of time to adjust to all the new stimuli presented to them.
"What's it?" Willow asks almost sounding afraid of what the answer might be.
"That proves that the other Buffy is a demon," Xander explains jovially.
"I'm not quite sure I follow your thought process honey," Anya replies.
Dawn follows his thinking though. If Spike's chip didn't work on demons and Spike could hit future Buffy then that must mean she's a demon. "I believe I do," Giles says into the silence. "You believe because Spike's chip may only function on humans that the Buffy upstairs may not be human."
"Right," Xander almost shouts again. "I mean it only makes sense. Why else would she be macking on Spike and beating on us if she was what she claimed? Buffy from the future."
"Maybe because out of all the men she knows in the future I'm the only one man enough for her," Spike suggest cockily. "What with the likes of poofter's such as yourselves for her to chose from could it be any wonder that she'd pick me?"
"So she's with you simply because there's no one else?" Buffy inquires far too politely.
"I can't help it if you surround yourself with nothing but nancy boy's," Spike responds in a voice coated with far too much sugar for Dawn's liking. "That you wouldn't be up to the challenge of having to handle a real man," he says a moment before the sound of his zippo popping open reaches her.
"As soon as one shows up we'll find out wont we?" There was a moment of silence down below before Buffy speaks again. "As far as her being some kind of demon, I don't think so. She didn't feel demony to me, she just seemed really pissed off."
"I happen to concur," Giles replies, "but we can't ignore the possibility that Xander may be right, no matter how unlikely."
"I know," Buffy responds.
"Not to change the subject," Spike cuts in, "but my nails really need a new coat of polish. One of you's wouldn't happen to have something that matches up with pitch black?"
"I don't wear anything that dark. It clashes with my complexion," Anya replies apologetically.
"Oz left some of his behind," Willow adds. "I don't think any of its black, but you could take a look. See if there's anything there you like," she offers.
"I don't want to take something if your..."
"Your not. I mean yeah it reminds me of Oz and all and at first I wouldn't let you use any of it because it belong to Oz, but its only nail polish. It's not like Oz is stuck inside one of the bottles and it is nail polish so it should get used and if there's a color there that you like then you should use it," Willow says in a rush.
"That's awful kind of you red," Spike replies softly.
"Have you thought about using something other then black?" Buffy questions actually sounding nice to Spike for a change. "I got this blue that would go perfectly with your eyes," she suggest sounding hopeful.
"I don't know," Spike hedges. "Black just screams Big Bad."
"Trust me, it's not the nail polish that screams big bad."
"I don't believe this," Xander growls. "You have the nerve to call us poofter's... Whats a poofter anyway?"
"A homosexual," Giles answers.
"A homose..." Xander gasps. "You call us faggots while you sit around discussing nail care with a bunch of girls," he demands angrily.
"Just because your not secure in your masculinity doesn't mean I'm not," Spike goads Xander.
"Hey I'm very secure in my masculinity," Xander objects.
"Now if you just keep telling yourself that, then maybe someday you'll even believe it," Spike responds sarcastically.
Dawn decides that now would probably be a good time to make her presence known. It would at least keep Spike and Xander from verbally sparing with each other. She had already been creeping down the stairs during the entire conversation so now all she had to do was step out and let everybody see her.
She'd have to talk as well. That part might be a problem. She didn't actually talk a lot like Buffy, but then again they didn't know what Buffy from the future talked like either. Summoning up her courage she takes that final step into everybody's view. They were all looking at her. It felt like they were all looking at her. Most of them actually had their back's to her: Giles in his chair, Buffy standing at his shoulder, Xander and Anya on the demolished couch. Her eyes refused to look at Spike standing at the windowsill, but somehow she still knew where he was without having to look at him. In fact the only one that could see her was Willow, who was sitting in Giles' other, not so comfy, chair. But it felt like they could all see her, like they could all tell it was her and not Buffy in control of the body.
She takes a deep breath, slows her speeding heart and gives Willow her biggest smile, "hey guys," she blurts loudly into their conversation. Everybody that wasn't facing her spins around so that they are. "I'm really sorry about before, the things I said. Beating the crap out of you guys. I wasn't feeling at all like myself, must of been something to do with temporal jet lag. I mean if you think crossing the international date line plays havoc with your body just imagine losing three plus years. I mean heck I feel like a completely different person now."
"Buffy?" Giles questions as the real Buffy steps in front of her friends in order to protect them in case her older self begins channeling Spike's anger instead of Willow's babble.
"Yep, that's me. Buffy the one and only," Dawn glances at the real Buffy, "one of two Buffy's present in the whole wide world. But I'm the twenty-two year old alcohol drinking Buffy who doesn't turn into a cave person," Dawn continues as she picks up the bottle of scotch and fills the large shot glass. She wishes she had been paying more attention to how much liquor Buffy had poured into the glass, but she had thought everything going on around her had been nothing more then a dream.
Buffy glowers at herself. She might seem less angry, but there was something even more off about her now then there had been. Everybody notices the changes in the Buffy standing before them. How it seemed like a completely different person then the one they had just meant a quarter of an hour ago.
"I know you guys are a little freaked about the whole thing," Dawn continues as puts the bottle of scotch down. "And quite frankly so ain't I, but I can assure you I am the real Buffy from two thousand and three. Spike's chip doesn't work on demons but before you jump to the wrong conclusion just let me state that I'm not some type of demon doppelganger, evil clone, or anything else like that. I died for a few months, Willow resurrected, as in a not flesh eating zombie kind of way, me and ever since then Spike's chip doesn't go off when he punches me," she says in a rush.
Everyone looks at her in shock, but nobody more so then Willow. The fact that Buffy had died wasn't that big of a surprise. She was the slayer after all and eventually ever slayer does dies. But the fact that Willow had brought her back from the dead. It was a feat that Willow knew she wasn't even close to being able to perform at her current level of knowledge and power. She wasn't even able to turn Amy back to girl, yet in the future she was going to be able to raise the dead.
Lifting the shot glass to her lips she tilts her head back and downs the liquor in one gulp. It feels as if her inside have suddenly burst into flames as the liquid burns its way down her throat. "Holy!" She chokes crushing the glass in her hand as her left hand bangs into the countertop.
Giles gapes as not only does Buffy palm slap send a crack spiderwebbing its way through out his counter top, but because his counter visibly sunk half a foot into his floor. "The way your going Slayer I don't think Watcher here is going to have a roof over his head 'fore much longer," Spike comments with a wide smirk lighting his face.
Dawn looks at Spike, the person she had been avoiding looking at, and her face goes beat red as she remembers the feel of his skin under her hands, the feel of his penis through his jeans. How just being pressed against him had set her entire bo... "I gotta go," she says suddenly running towards the door.
She had moved so fast that the only people who had been able to follow her had been Buffy and Spike. All the rest of the group had seen was a streaking blur that went from the kitchen to the front door and stopped there.
Turning the knob she jerks the door open ripping it off it's hinges. Dawn looks at it for a brief moment in shock before finally placing it against the wall, "Xander can fix that," she mutters confidently. Looking back over her shoulder she tells the assembled group, "I gonna go patrol. Stop that evil from running amok in the world. Make it a safer place for Christmas, and puppies, and bad poets everywhere," before she dashes off into the night.
Willow blinks as she looks around, "did anybody else find that kind of..."
"Odd?"
"Bizarre?"
"Strange?"
"Weird?"
Come from four different mouths at the same time. "Yeah," she agrees.
Spike shakes his head wondering if that was somehow another jab at the man he had been a hundred and twenty years ago. Grabbing his coat, along with Xander's flannel shirt Spike heads to the door, "where do you think you going?" Buffy asks not sounding angry just wanting to know.
"Somebody's got to make sure she doesn't do something evil," Spike grins mischievously for a moment before he to bolts out the front door.
"You're just going to let him?" Xander squawks.
Buffy shrugs lightly, "he's got the chip in his head. It's not like he can hurt anyone," she points out not sure why she wasn't worried about Spike being out on his own.
She was there inside her house moving around. With Buffy's exceptional hearing Dawn was able to listen to every little sound that Joyce made while she gets ready for bed. Occasionally Joyce would pass in front of the window Dawn peered through. Unlike herself or Buffy, both of whom are well short of five and a half feet and thin as a rail, the matriarch of the Summers women is a tall, regal woman.
It was tearing Dawn apart standing outside, what will one day be her home, watching her mother go about her nightly routine. Right now she was getting ready to watch the nightly news. Something she did every night with a cup of her special cocoa. What made it her special blend of hot cocoa was the little shot of peppermint schnapps she adds to it.
"Lurking doesn't really suit you Slayer," Spike comments as he steps up next to her. He had been watching her for some time now. Watching the tears that slowly slide down her cheeks while she watches her mother. He was fairly certain he knew why she was crying, why this would have been the first place she had gone to once she left the watchers flat. "I don't think your mum would mind if you drop in for a visit," he suggest. A second later a slight smirk quirks the coner of his mouth, "even if it did take you three years to get here."
Dawn shakes her head, "she wouldn't even know me," comes her stinging reply. It was true. At this time Joyce Summers only had one daughter, Buffy. To her Dawn doesn't even exists. She wouldn't exists for another nine months. She could walk in there right now tell Joyce the entire story, or what she knew of it and whatever emotional response her mother had it would be for Buffy.
Turning on her heel Dawn looks at Spike, and again she can feel Buffy's body respond to the vampire standing next to her. Intense desires that were slowly driving her insane as she fought with them for control. True she had always had a crush on Spike, had always wanted to ravish him until he turned into a mindless puddle at her feet, but she wanted it to be her feet. "Feel up to killing some of your old buddies?" She asks Spike instead of doing what she really wants to do to him right at this moment.
In the back of her head she can feel Buffy stirring, imperceptibly, before settling back down. She wonders if Buffy is aware of what she's doing right now like she was aware of what Buffy was doing. Or if Buffy was simply dreaming, and if it was a dream what was she dreaming about. Then she remembers what Buffy had done to Spike earlier and the satiated way Buffy had almost felt as she neared the surface and her face reaches a deep crimson color before she can turn away from Spike.
Spike's smirk falters for a moment as he watches the Slayer's blue eyes cloud with lust for an instant as she flushes with desire as she gazes at him. She ducks her head either out of shyness or shame, though after what she did earlier either emotion doesn't really seem appropriate for her. "Sure pet," Spike answers and can't help but smile as her still red face brightens even further at his response. "Been awhile since I've had a good spot of violence to liven up my day. What with thinking I couldn't hurt anything. Tell you something luv, me..." Points to himself then at Buffy, "... You working together. We could own this burg. Take out those pansy ass, nancy boys put this chip..."
"Spike I'm not helping you become the new master of Sunnydale," Dawn interrupts him.
"Oh," Spike replies slightly disappointed.
Dawn sighs, "I just want to go out and kill something. I am the slayer after all and it's my job to make sure all the evil demons know I'm in town doing my part..."
"If you want to kill something fine, I'm all up for that. Just save the watcher spiel for people who actual believe it," Spike grumbles softly.
"Right," Dawn agrees. "No stuffy watcher speak. Got it," she continues as she looks at Spike, "so what do you want to talk about?" She finally brings herself to ask the blonde vampire.
"Well..."
"Watch!" Spike begins to shout from his perch atop one of Sunnydale's many crypts, but stops himself. "Never mind," he finishes in a barely audible sigh as the slayer had spun around backfisting the vampire that he had thought had the drop on her. The vampire in question had sailed backwards at speeds Spike had thought were unattainable without being in the cockpit of a stealth fighter. His head had made contact with the tree with an audible thud before slowly falling away. Spike was impressed, the vampire's face had left a noticeable impression in the tree.
Spike turns his attention back to the fight at hand. Not that he would ever actually call it a fight. It ranked more on the level of a serious thrashing. The Slayer against five, now four vampires. The skill the slayer had displayed earlier at the Watcher's flat had disappeared only to be replaced by raw power. Her strength was phenomenal, her speed unprecedented, and she took shots that he thought would have leveled her without so much as batting an eyelash.
It was like she was testing herself, finding out what she could do, what she was capable of, and having the time of her life doing it. He had never seen any creature look so alive before in his life. Now if he could only get his Slayer to cut loose like this, to admit to herself that this was what she enjoyed...
His mind cuts off as he realizes what he was thinking. Growling low in his throat he rises back to his full height. Plucking his cigarettes and lighter out of his pocket he quickly lights one and inhales deeply.
There was no way he had just thought of the Slayer as his. This one or the other. They were slayers, he was a vampire and just because circumstances forced them into this uneasy truce, alliance, or whatever it wanted to called, it didn't mean he was going to become attached to either of them. He was simply helping them out because he could still have fun and fight and kill things with this damn chip in his head.
"Do you see that?" Forrest questions his two companions as they watch the fight from the safety of scrubs some hundred meters away.
"Definitely hostile seventeen," Riley answers. "Plus it looks like his friend that helped him escape from Stevenson Hall has shown herself again," he adds concentrating on the blonde girl decimating the vampires she was engaged with. There was something familiar about the girl that tugged at the back of his mind. It was like he should know her, or he did know her.
"No time like the present to get him back," Forrest responds. "while we're at it we can bag his little playmate as well."
"That's a negative," Riley orders. Forrest glares at his superior, "look at her," Riley commands. "A pack of vamps that would take us half a dozen squads to take down and she's ripping through them like they were children. I can see how she was able to manhandle us before."
"That's what we have these for," Forest responds padding his tazer.
"And what happens if it doesn't work on her. You wanna face that with your bare hands?" He demands in a fierce whisper.
"I'm not afraid of her," he blusters.
"Neither am I," Riley responds angrily at the implication behind his friends comment. "I'm not an idiot either," he shoots back. "We watch them, follow them, and pick our spot to bag them."
"God I'm stuff," Dawn mumbles pleasantly satiated as she pushes away the remains of the third large pizza she's eaten in the past hour. For the first time since waking up in Buffy's body she didn't feel the gnawing ache in her gut telling her to eat. It had only taken her three large pizzas, two orders of fried mozzarella sticks, a large order of potato skins, and three extra large cokes to get her that way. She could almost feel Buffy's body converting the enormous meal to muscle and flesh that Buffy's diet had stripped it of.
"If you say so," Spike mumbles blowing smoke out of his mouth and nose.
"Trust me, I've never felt this full in my entire life. If I had gills I'd be stuffed to them," she finishes with a smile. "Or possible overstuffed. Stuffed to the point stuff would be..."
"Got the point Pet," Spike responds with a slight smile. Realizing what he's doing he scowls at her, blaming her for the turmoil he's feeling. "No need for you to go and kill it like you did everything else tonight."
Dawn frowns at Spike's comment, "did I do something to piss you off?" She inquires, worried that Spike may not like her.
Spike can see the tears that start to form in Buffy's eyes and curses himself for the fool he is. He shouldn't care that he hurt the Slayer's delicate feelings but he can't help that he does. "Course not," he replies. "Just knowing those twits that put this sodding chip in my head are still out there, walking, talking, breathing, and the like and I can't do a bloody thing to them because of it. Makes me a bit irritable is all," he says taking another drag off his cigarette before crushing the spent stub out in the discarded food. "Nothing you need worry your pretty little head over. Least not until I get this piece of U. S. plastic and wire out of my head, then me and you'll be having ourselves a reckoning."
Dawn smiles at Spike's boisterous talk. He was just like the Spike she remembers before his and Buffy's turbulent affair, all bragging and boastful about what he was going to do, or what he had done. This was the Spike she had developed a crush on when she was just a little fourteen year old girl. She didn't know how Buffy had been able to resist him for as long as she had, especially not with the way her body was reacting around him. It was taking every once of control she had not to throw herself at him and ravish him the way Buffy had earlier.
Going through her pockets she searches for the money she was sure Buffy was carrying. After all what kind of idiot went around time travelling without carrying at least a little bit of cash on her. Obviously she had her answer. Buffy.
"Problem Pet?"
Dawn nods her head, "little one. Seems like I didn't really think through this whole travel to the past."
"No cash?"
"I got pocket lint if that counts?" Dawn comments with a little shrug, "I don't suppose you'd go all vamp face on the clerk would you. Kinda scare him into giving us the meal for free," Dawn suggest with a hopeful little smile.
Spike blinks at the Slayer, at the suggestion that had just popped out of her mouth. It was something he never thought he'd hear come out of the Slayer's mouth. He wondered what could have happened to her in three years that would even allow her to think of doing something like what she had just suggested. Suddenly he comes back to the moment as she sits there staring at him with those pleading eyes of hers. "Bloody hell," he mutters sliding out of his chair.
Striding across black and white checkered floor to the cash register with all the swagger of a hundred and twenty year old master vampire. The clerk looks up as Spike approaches, black coat swishing around his legs. Suddenly Spike vamps out, then with a loud roar, he lunges menacingly at the young pimply face boy. The boy steps back, smelling slightly of fear but not anywhere near what Spike was used to.
"That'll be sixty-seven ninety-one," the boy says practically unfazed by Spike's appearance in front of him.
"What?" Spike gapes at him, "don't you know who I am?"
"Spike, right?" The cashier asks, "we heard the slayer had taken in a vamp with a..." He spends a moment searching for the right word, "...Performance problem but nobody knew it was you."
"Does everybody know everything in this bloody town?"
"Well I did graduate with Buffy last year, so there was that whole Mayor turning into a giant snake thing, but yeah pretty much," the kid replies to Spike. "Now will that be cash, check, or charge?"
"I'm not paying for a meal I didn't even eat."
"Well seeing how Buffy's already skipped out you don't really have a choice now do you?"
"What?" Spike gapes again as he spins towards the table him and the Slayer had been sitting at. Just like the kid had said she was long gone. "Bugger this," he mumbles walking away from the teenager.
"Hey you can't just leave without paying!" He shouts at Spike.
"Somebody's going to pay all right," Spike mumbles as he pulls open the glass door. "Bloody little chit thinks she can stiff me with the bill does she? Bint's got another thing coming."
________________________________________________________________________
Rainbow in the Dark - Dio
When there's lightning - it always bring me down
Cause it's free and I see that it's me
Who's lost and never found
I cry for magic - I feel it dancing in the light
But it was cold - I lost my hold
To the shadows of the night
There's no sign of the morning coming
You've been left on your own
Like a Rainbow in the Dark
Do your demons - do they ever let you go
When you've tried - do they hide -deep inside
Is it someone that you know
You're just a picture - just an image caught in time
We're a lie - you and I
We're words without a rhyme
There's no sign of the morning coming
You've been left on your own
Like a Rainbow in the Dark
When there's lightning - it always brings me down
Cause it's free and I see that it's me
Who's lost and never found
Fell the magic -fell it dancing in the air
But it's fear - and you'll hear
It calling you beware
There's no sign of the morning coming
There's no sight of the day
You've been left on your own
Like a Rainbow in the Dark
