"Still Bound" chapter 15
This chapter: Battling the Suvolte Spawn (sounds like a band, doesn't it) and dealing with the fallout from Spike's ill-conceived money-making venture.
**********
In the moments she had to react before the first egg split open and spewed forth a scrabbling, scaly demon baby, Buffy realized she was unarmed but for a stake in the elastic waistband of her maternity pants. There was no way she could take on god knows how many little demonettes down here in the dark, enclosed basement of the crypt without a sword or ax. She quickly scrambled for the ladder and hauled herself up, cursing as one of her feet caught on a rung and she was forced to twist her foot out of her brand new loafer, abandoning it.
Achieving the upstairs, Buffy ran for the door, hoping to get out and slam it shut behind her. Perhaps the Suvolte spawn could be contained in the crypt if she could only block the door from the outside. Then she would have some time to consider her next move. Something to destroy them all in one blow like a hand grenade would be super. Too bad she hadn't raided the Initiative arsenal after the final battle down in the labs.
But already it was too late to escape the crypt. The small horde of hatchlings had followed right behind her and were ranging around the upper level of the crypt trying to flank her. In the come-and-go beam of the flashlight, Buffy could see them starting to surround her. The light also glinted on the sharp edge of Spike's best battle ax, which lay carelessly discarded in a corner. Buffy dove for the weapon, scraping her knees and distended belly as she skidded across the floor on all fours.
She grabbed the weapon and flipped around quickly, afraid that one of the cockroachlike monsters would attack from behind. A graceless arch upwards and Buffy regained her feet and began swinging the ax in a wide circle, driving off any of the creatures that might be encircling her in the dark.
In gaining a weapon, Buffy had lost her flashlight. It lay a few yards away, the beam of light illuminating only broken pottery in its path. However, weak moonlight marked the open door of the crypt, and in that light Buffy saw the silhouette of at least one Suvolte scurrying out. Damn! They were getting past her, escaping to wreak havoc all over Sunnydale.
Buffy tore out the door, determined to stop the swarming Suvolte from getting past the cemetery grounds. Out in the open, she could see her foe beginning to disperse in as many directions as there were hatchlings.
"One at a time, Buffy," she counseled herself and focused her attention on slicing the nearest baby demon. As the blade bisected it, a high-pitched squeal and scalding spurt of blood erupted from the hatchling. It flashed through Buffy's mind that she'd murdered some mother demon's infant before she spun on her heel and gave chase to the next foe.
Realizing it was too late to stop the first wave, Buffy turned back toward the crypt and began methodically chopping at each new Suvolte to emerge from the door. She was on her third when she caught a glimpse of a blond and black blur from the corner of her eye.
Spike was tearing after one of the escaping demons, hurdling tombstones which the creature was forced to scuttle around. Weaponless, he dove on top of the monster and began throttling it with his bare hands. Turning her attention back to her own fileting, Buffy was aware of a sharp crack and an aborted squeal and realized that Spike had broken his opponent's neck.
After Buffy's third kill, no more Suvolte emerged from the crypt. She slammed the door shut in case there were any late hatchers, then began running toward the only other demon in sight.
"Spike!" she yelled.
He leaped to his feet over the sprawled body of the Suvolte and turned toward her wearing his battle face. Buffy suddenly realized that she hadn't seen him yellow-eyed and grinning in murderous glee for a long time.
"Hey!" he called. "What are we killin' tonight?"
"You should know. They came out of Your Crypt!" Buffy bellowed as she reached him and smashed her fist into his joyful face.
"Fuck!" Spike howled as he grabbed his nose and blood gushed through his fingers. "What?"
"Suvolte, Spike! Or should I call you Doctor now?"
Spike's eyes above his hands told her everything she needed to know even before he began to speak. "I can explain. It's not like you...."
"Shut up," Buffy snapped through clenched teeth, shaking her head in denial.
"They weren't supposed to hatch so soon," he continued. "I thought the buyer would have them miles from here before...."
"But you knew they would hatch sometime, you idiot!" Buffy interrupted again. "You knew that somebody somewhere would get hurt." She held up a hand before he could start in with more explanations. "Never mind. We don't have time for an ethics lesson now. You head that way. I'll go north. I'll call the others on the cell and we'll cover Sunnydale in a grid until we get the rest of these things. I think there are about a half dozen still out there."
Spike nodded and wiped his still trickling nose on his wrist. Buffy handed him his axe. "You'll need a weapon. I'll stop by the Magic Box for another."
He silently took the axe and started off to search the area she'd assigned him.
As she watched his retreating back, Buffy took a deep, centering breath, patting her baby-bulge reassuringly.
"Sorry about all the action, tadpole," she said. "Sacred duty, yadda, yadda." Little Jack kicked back at her comforting hand, then for good measure, gave her a sharp kick in the bladder. Buffy was forced to squat in the shadow of the crypt to relieve herself before heading off at a dead run toward town.
***********
"I'm a survivor. I'll never give up. I'll never stop. I'm gonna work harder," Dawn warbled along with Beyonce who was blasting her mantra directly through the headphones into Dawn's brain. Flipping her long brown hair and swiveling her hips, Dawn danced around the kitchen while her mac 'n' cheese microwaved.
She looked in her text book, which was spread on the counter, for the next question.
"'Tis a far better thing I do than I have ever done before..." she read aloud. "Who is Simon Carstairs?" She shouted, Jeopardy style.
The phone rang and Dawn slipped off her headphones to answer it.
"Hey, Janice! Whassup?" She listened for several minutes, nodding and uh- huh-ing at the appropriate times. "So what did you say?" she asked, and listened some more as she pulled her late night snack out of the microwave and peeled back the cellophane.
"He's a jerk. Don't let him get to you," she advised her friend. Dawn stirred a fork around in the dish to let out steam. "No. No. I can't. Buffy'll find out. She could be home any time. I shouldn't even be on the phone, you know."
She listened some more. "No. Don't do that! Look...." Dawn glanced at the clock and at the darkened windows. "It's really late. You shouldn't.... All right.... Yes. I'll come." She sighed. "Just sit tight. I'll be right over." Another pause. "I mean it, Janice. Don't do anything stupid! I'm coming."
Dawn hung up the phone with another long-suffering sigh and tossed her fork down on the counter.
"Buffy is so gonna kill me if she comes home," she muttered as she quickly scribbled a note and tossed on a jacket. She checked her inside pocket for her stake, which was right where it ought to be.
Dawn was out the door and halfway down the block when the Suvolte spawn attacked. A sharp pain tore down her back from shoulder blade to hip when the creature leaped on her, shredding her coat and skin with a razor sharp claw. Dawn screamed and whirled around, but the monster clung to her, biting down on her shoulder with its razor like teeth.
Acting on instinct, Dawn ran to the nearest tree and began trying to scrape the thing from her back. Screaming non-stop, she reached into her jacket, pulled out the stake and began driving it over her shoulder into the Suvolte's head. It released its Rottweiler jaws long enough to let out a screech of its own, then dug into her flesh even harder. She could hear it scissor through tissue and bone.
Dawn gasped at the increased pain. Her heart jack-hammered in her chest and adrenaline coursing through her veins gave her Matrix-like power. She pulled her stake from the top of the Suvolte's head with a slurping sound and drove it in again with all her strength. She must have hit whatever passed for a brain in this primitive demon, because it let out a final scream and released its hold, falling off her back and hitting the ground with a thud.
Dawn fell to her knees beside it, blubbering and gasping for air. Her hand went to her shoulder and came away sticky and red. Her gaze shifted from the Suvolte, still spasming in its death throes by her side, to her blood covered hand. The world began to darken around the edges and a loud buzzing filled her ears.
"This can't be good," she murmured, staring at her hand as she slid the rest of the way to the ground. Her last conscious thought was of how much she hated Janice Pendleton.
**********
Dawn drifted into awareness of someone shaking her roughly and talking much too loud. It was very irritating. She was so cold and thought she could get warm if he would just let her sleep.
"...fuck's sake! Christ, Little Bit, please wake up!"
There was so much pain. She wondered if her arm was broken. Then the annoying person was wrapping something around her shoulder and pulling it way too tight. She tugged feebly at the material.
"Good, you're awake! Let it be, Niblet. Have to keep the pressure on ... hit an artery"
"Spike?" she managed to whisper.
"Yeah. I'm here now. Gotta lift you up, take you to hospital."
She felt him match action to word as her body was pressed against rock and raised by iron bands.
"No," she gasped. "Buffy...."
"Shh. Just you concentrate on breathing and staying alive."
Her eyes fluttered open and Spike's blurry face was looming over her. She felt the jarring thud of his footsteps as he strode along carrying her like a broken doll.
"She'll ... kill ... me," she finished her thought.
"No. No, she won't, precious," he soothed. "Just rest now. You've lost a lot of blood."
As her eyes drifted closed again and her consciousness began to spin out into the cosmos, Dawn thought she heard him add, "...kills anyone, it'll be me."
*************
When Buffy finally walked out of the hospital door it was well past sunrise, but Spike was lurking in the shadow of the western face of the building. He stepped toward her.
"Is she...?"
"She'll live." Buffy stood, facing away from him, staring at the parking lot.
Spike relaxed palpably. He nodded and leaned back against the wall. "After I found you, I took a sweep around town. Killed another Suvolte. With yours and the one Harris got, I think that's all now."
"Good," she said vacantly.
"Buffy," his voice lowered as he importuned her. "I'm sorry. Never meant for...."
"It doesn't matter," she interrupted sharply. "It doesn't matter what you mean, just what you do."
Spike leaned toward her. His eyes searched her blank face, but it gave no clue as to her level of pissed off.
"I'll change," he entreated. "Just tell me what to do and I'll do it ... or not do it."
She finally looked at him, head moving slowly as though she were half asleep. "I can't be your conscience, Spike. I can't always be there to say 'Don't kill Ben' or 'Don't steal from that convenience store.' If you don't know on your own what's right and wrong . then I can't have you here. Not around my family. Not around my town." Unspoken but hanging in the air between them was the knowledge that by all rights she should be staking his undead ass about now.
"Buffy...." he whispered, reaching to touch her arm.
"I want you to leave," she said, eyes returning to studying the cars in the parking lot, the early morning sun glinting off their shiny windows.
"I forgot what you are,' she continued quietly, as though thinking aloud. "Not a man but a monster. That's all you can be."
'I'll try harder. Give me a chance,' he wanted to beg, to fall to his knees and grovel at her feet, but the implacable tone of her voice froze the words in his mouth.
Buffy moved from the shadow of the building then paused. "Better get inside somewhere, Spike, before you fry." And with that goodbye, she walked away.
***********
The horizon was still pink when Spike threw the last of his meager belongings in the DeSoto and slid behind the wheel. He gunned the motor and peeled out just for the sheer joy of making noise.
In the two minutes it took him to reach the city limits sign on the hillside above town, the sky had completely blackened to night. Spike pulled off the road, got out and leaned on the front of the car like some oversized hood ornament. He looked up at the stars coming to life in the sky and at the matching twinkles of man-made light in the town below.
Blowing smoke from his nostrils, he flicked ash impatiently from the tip of his cigarette before tossing the whole butt down into the grass. He watched the ember glow then the dry grass begin to ignite and curl into flame. After a moment or two of watching the fire spread and grow, he stomped it out with a vicious grind of his boot.
"I CAN change," he growled as he stomped. "I'll show her how much I can change."
A brief memory of Angelus' torment immediately after the soul curse flashed through his mind, but he instantly dismissed it. 'Won't be like that,' he thought. 'I'll be me, only better. She's halfway to loving me already. This'll finish it off. If it's just a little soul that stands between us, I can take care of that.'
Then, feeling more hopeful than he had in weeks, Spike got back in the car and started off on his grand quest.
To be continued....
Whew! I made it through a lot of action, the hardest thing of all to write. It took me a long time to come up with something comparable to the attempted rape, something that would be an obvious catalyst for Spike's change but not involve a personal assault on anyone. I think unleashing Suvolte demons on Sunnydale and causing injury to Dawn works great! Because it's basically a stupid accident due to poor planning, we find ourselves able to forgive morally-challenged Spike. But on the other hand, it's a huge enough error to make even Spike understand that he needs an inner compass for right and wrong that he just doesn't have without a soul. Sorry to all those who prefer soul-less Spike winning Buffy. I used to be part of your camp, but I've switched sides. Besides, I love the drama of Spike dealing with the guilt caused by the addition of a soul.
This chapter: Battling the Suvolte Spawn (sounds like a band, doesn't it) and dealing with the fallout from Spike's ill-conceived money-making venture.
**********
In the moments she had to react before the first egg split open and spewed forth a scrabbling, scaly demon baby, Buffy realized she was unarmed but for a stake in the elastic waistband of her maternity pants. There was no way she could take on god knows how many little demonettes down here in the dark, enclosed basement of the crypt without a sword or ax. She quickly scrambled for the ladder and hauled herself up, cursing as one of her feet caught on a rung and she was forced to twist her foot out of her brand new loafer, abandoning it.
Achieving the upstairs, Buffy ran for the door, hoping to get out and slam it shut behind her. Perhaps the Suvolte spawn could be contained in the crypt if she could only block the door from the outside. Then she would have some time to consider her next move. Something to destroy them all in one blow like a hand grenade would be super. Too bad she hadn't raided the Initiative arsenal after the final battle down in the labs.
But already it was too late to escape the crypt. The small horde of hatchlings had followed right behind her and were ranging around the upper level of the crypt trying to flank her. In the come-and-go beam of the flashlight, Buffy could see them starting to surround her. The light also glinted on the sharp edge of Spike's best battle ax, which lay carelessly discarded in a corner. Buffy dove for the weapon, scraping her knees and distended belly as she skidded across the floor on all fours.
She grabbed the weapon and flipped around quickly, afraid that one of the cockroachlike monsters would attack from behind. A graceless arch upwards and Buffy regained her feet and began swinging the ax in a wide circle, driving off any of the creatures that might be encircling her in the dark.
In gaining a weapon, Buffy had lost her flashlight. It lay a few yards away, the beam of light illuminating only broken pottery in its path. However, weak moonlight marked the open door of the crypt, and in that light Buffy saw the silhouette of at least one Suvolte scurrying out. Damn! They were getting past her, escaping to wreak havoc all over Sunnydale.
Buffy tore out the door, determined to stop the swarming Suvolte from getting past the cemetery grounds. Out in the open, she could see her foe beginning to disperse in as many directions as there were hatchlings.
"One at a time, Buffy," she counseled herself and focused her attention on slicing the nearest baby demon. As the blade bisected it, a high-pitched squeal and scalding spurt of blood erupted from the hatchling. It flashed through Buffy's mind that she'd murdered some mother demon's infant before she spun on her heel and gave chase to the next foe.
Realizing it was too late to stop the first wave, Buffy turned back toward the crypt and began methodically chopping at each new Suvolte to emerge from the door. She was on her third when she caught a glimpse of a blond and black blur from the corner of her eye.
Spike was tearing after one of the escaping demons, hurdling tombstones which the creature was forced to scuttle around. Weaponless, he dove on top of the monster and began throttling it with his bare hands. Turning her attention back to her own fileting, Buffy was aware of a sharp crack and an aborted squeal and realized that Spike had broken his opponent's neck.
After Buffy's third kill, no more Suvolte emerged from the crypt. She slammed the door shut in case there were any late hatchers, then began running toward the only other demon in sight.
"Spike!" she yelled.
He leaped to his feet over the sprawled body of the Suvolte and turned toward her wearing his battle face. Buffy suddenly realized that she hadn't seen him yellow-eyed and grinning in murderous glee for a long time.
"Hey!" he called. "What are we killin' tonight?"
"You should know. They came out of Your Crypt!" Buffy bellowed as she reached him and smashed her fist into his joyful face.
"Fuck!" Spike howled as he grabbed his nose and blood gushed through his fingers. "What?"
"Suvolte, Spike! Or should I call you Doctor now?"
Spike's eyes above his hands told her everything she needed to know even before he began to speak. "I can explain. It's not like you...."
"Shut up," Buffy snapped through clenched teeth, shaking her head in denial.
"They weren't supposed to hatch so soon," he continued. "I thought the buyer would have them miles from here before...."
"But you knew they would hatch sometime, you idiot!" Buffy interrupted again. "You knew that somebody somewhere would get hurt." She held up a hand before he could start in with more explanations. "Never mind. We don't have time for an ethics lesson now. You head that way. I'll go north. I'll call the others on the cell and we'll cover Sunnydale in a grid until we get the rest of these things. I think there are about a half dozen still out there."
Spike nodded and wiped his still trickling nose on his wrist. Buffy handed him his axe. "You'll need a weapon. I'll stop by the Magic Box for another."
He silently took the axe and started off to search the area she'd assigned him.
As she watched his retreating back, Buffy took a deep, centering breath, patting her baby-bulge reassuringly.
"Sorry about all the action, tadpole," she said. "Sacred duty, yadda, yadda." Little Jack kicked back at her comforting hand, then for good measure, gave her a sharp kick in the bladder. Buffy was forced to squat in the shadow of the crypt to relieve herself before heading off at a dead run toward town.
***********
"I'm a survivor. I'll never give up. I'll never stop. I'm gonna work harder," Dawn warbled along with Beyonce who was blasting her mantra directly through the headphones into Dawn's brain. Flipping her long brown hair and swiveling her hips, Dawn danced around the kitchen while her mac 'n' cheese microwaved.
She looked in her text book, which was spread on the counter, for the next question.
"'Tis a far better thing I do than I have ever done before..." she read aloud. "Who is Simon Carstairs?" She shouted, Jeopardy style.
The phone rang and Dawn slipped off her headphones to answer it.
"Hey, Janice! Whassup?" She listened for several minutes, nodding and uh- huh-ing at the appropriate times. "So what did you say?" she asked, and listened some more as she pulled her late night snack out of the microwave and peeled back the cellophane.
"He's a jerk. Don't let him get to you," she advised her friend. Dawn stirred a fork around in the dish to let out steam. "No. No. I can't. Buffy'll find out. She could be home any time. I shouldn't even be on the phone, you know."
She listened some more. "No. Don't do that! Look...." Dawn glanced at the clock and at the darkened windows. "It's really late. You shouldn't.... All right.... Yes. I'll come." She sighed. "Just sit tight. I'll be right over." Another pause. "I mean it, Janice. Don't do anything stupid! I'm coming."
Dawn hung up the phone with another long-suffering sigh and tossed her fork down on the counter.
"Buffy is so gonna kill me if she comes home," she muttered as she quickly scribbled a note and tossed on a jacket. She checked her inside pocket for her stake, which was right where it ought to be.
Dawn was out the door and halfway down the block when the Suvolte spawn attacked. A sharp pain tore down her back from shoulder blade to hip when the creature leaped on her, shredding her coat and skin with a razor sharp claw. Dawn screamed and whirled around, but the monster clung to her, biting down on her shoulder with its razor like teeth.
Acting on instinct, Dawn ran to the nearest tree and began trying to scrape the thing from her back. Screaming non-stop, she reached into her jacket, pulled out the stake and began driving it over her shoulder into the Suvolte's head. It released its Rottweiler jaws long enough to let out a screech of its own, then dug into her flesh even harder. She could hear it scissor through tissue and bone.
Dawn gasped at the increased pain. Her heart jack-hammered in her chest and adrenaline coursing through her veins gave her Matrix-like power. She pulled her stake from the top of the Suvolte's head with a slurping sound and drove it in again with all her strength. She must have hit whatever passed for a brain in this primitive demon, because it let out a final scream and released its hold, falling off her back and hitting the ground with a thud.
Dawn fell to her knees beside it, blubbering and gasping for air. Her hand went to her shoulder and came away sticky and red. Her gaze shifted from the Suvolte, still spasming in its death throes by her side, to her blood covered hand. The world began to darken around the edges and a loud buzzing filled her ears.
"This can't be good," she murmured, staring at her hand as she slid the rest of the way to the ground. Her last conscious thought was of how much she hated Janice Pendleton.
**********
Dawn drifted into awareness of someone shaking her roughly and talking much too loud. It was very irritating. She was so cold and thought she could get warm if he would just let her sleep.
"...fuck's sake! Christ, Little Bit, please wake up!"
There was so much pain. She wondered if her arm was broken. Then the annoying person was wrapping something around her shoulder and pulling it way too tight. She tugged feebly at the material.
"Good, you're awake! Let it be, Niblet. Have to keep the pressure on ... hit an artery"
"Spike?" she managed to whisper.
"Yeah. I'm here now. Gotta lift you up, take you to hospital."
She felt him match action to word as her body was pressed against rock and raised by iron bands.
"No," she gasped. "Buffy...."
"Shh. Just you concentrate on breathing and staying alive."
Her eyes fluttered open and Spike's blurry face was looming over her. She felt the jarring thud of his footsteps as he strode along carrying her like a broken doll.
"She'll ... kill ... me," she finished her thought.
"No. No, she won't, precious," he soothed. "Just rest now. You've lost a lot of blood."
As her eyes drifted closed again and her consciousness began to spin out into the cosmos, Dawn thought she heard him add, "...kills anyone, it'll be me."
*************
When Buffy finally walked out of the hospital door it was well past sunrise, but Spike was lurking in the shadow of the western face of the building. He stepped toward her.
"Is she...?"
"She'll live." Buffy stood, facing away from him, staring at the parking lot.
Spike relaxed palpably. He nodded and leaned back against the wall. "After I found you, I took a sweep around town. Killed another Suvolte. With yours and the one Harris got, I think that's all now."
"Good," she said vacantly.
"Buffy," his voice lowered as he importuned her. "I'm sorry. Never meant for...."
"It doesn't matter," she interrupted sharply. "It doesn't matter what you mean, just what you do."
Spike leaned toward her. His eyes searched her blank face, but it gave no clue as to her level of pissed off.
"I'll change," he entreated. "Just tell me what to do and I'll do it ... or not do it."
She finally looked at him, head moving slowly as though she were half asleep. "I can't be your conscience, Spike. I can't always be there to say 'Don't kill Ben' or 'Don't steal from that convenience store.' If you don't know on your own what's right and wrong . then I can't have you here. Not around my family. Not around my town." Unspoken but hanging in the air between them was the knowledge that by all rights she should be staking his undead ass about now.
"Buffy...." he whispered, reaching to touch her arm.
"I want you to leave," she said, eyes returning to studying the cars in the parking lot, the early morning sun glinting off their shiny windows.
"I forgot what you are,' she continued quietly, as though thinking aloud. "Not a man but a monster. That's all you can be."
'I'll try harder. Give me a chance,' he wanted to beg, to fall to his knees and grovel at her feet, but the implacable tone of her voice froze the words in his mouth.
Buffy moved from the shadow of the building then paused. "Better get inside somewhere, Spike, before you fry." And with that goodbye, she walked away.
***********
The horizon was still pink when Spike threw the last of his meager belongings in the DeSoto and slid behind the wheel. He gunned the motor and peeled out just for the sheer joy of making noise.
In the two minutes it took him to reach the city limits sign on the hillside above town, the sky had completely blackened to night. Spike pulled off the road, got out and leaned on the front of the car like some oversized hood ornament. He looked up at the stars coming to life in the sky and at the matching twinkles of man-made light in the town below.
Blowing smoke from his nostrils, he flicked ash impatiently from the tip of his cigarette before tossing the whole butt down into the grass. He watched the ember glow then the dry grass begin to ignite and curl into flame. After a moment or two of watching the fire spread and grow, he stomped it out with a vicious grind of his boot.
"I CAN change," he growled as he stomped. "I'll show her how much I can change."
A brief memory of Angelus' torment immediately after the soul curse flashed through his mind, but he instantly dismissed it. 'Won't be like that,' he thought. 'I'll be me, only better. She's halfway to loving me already. This'll finish it off. If it's just a little soul that stands between us, I can take care of that.'
Then, feeling more hopeful than he had in weeks, Spike got back in the car and started off on his grand quest.
To be continued....
Whew! I made it through a lot of action, the hardest thing of all to write. It took me a long time to come up with something comparable to the attempted rape, something that would be an obvious catalyst for Spike's change but not involve a personal assault on anyone. I think unleashing Suvolte demons on Sunnydale and causing injury to Dawn works great! Because it's basically a stupid accident due to poor planning, we find ourselves able to forgive morally-challenged Spike. But on the other hand, it's a huge enough error to make even Spike understand that he needs an inner compass for right and wrong that he just doesn't have without a soul. Sorry to all those who prefer soul-less Spike winning Buffy. I used to be part of your camp, but I've switched sides. Besides, I love the drama of Spike dealing with the guilt caused by the addition of a soul.