Part 6

#

Faith was hanging out at the Bronze, just moving to the music and intimidating bartenders until they were willing to swear every oath imaginable that she was 21 or any other age she might want to be. It wasn't like there was anything else to do for her right now.

The vampire situation was lousy, definitely not enough of the bloodsuckers around to keep three super-powered thrill-seekers busy. Okay, she amended; Angel probably didn't qualify for the title 'thrill-seeker'. He always fought all business, no wasted move, ending things as quickly as possible. Faith liked to draw out her fights, at least those where she wasn't outnumbered ten to one, and she knew Buffy liked a little extra fighting as well.

Point of the matter was that there simply wasn't enough action for her satisfaction, so she had decided to hit the Bronze and burn off some energy. The rest of the gang wasn't here. Willow and Oz were busy with some kind of experiment or other, Cordelia and Xander were on some kind of fence-mending not-date, and Buffy and Angel were probably getting busy right now.

She refused to be depressed about being without a significant other of her own tonight. Well, she would probably be looking for some guy to get busy with before the night was through, but right now she just enjoyed moving to the music and drawing stares from all around.

Her guy-rate had gone down considerably since coming here, partially because of her ongoing preoccupation with the kind of relationship she had never had herself but was able to observe between Buffy and Angel. And partially because she didn't want to abuse Mrs. S' hospitality by bringing strangers into her home, but that was another matter entirely. Point was, she still had the urges, especially after patrol, but the 'get some, get gone' approach didn't really work for her anymore. Or at least not as good as it used to.

When the novelty of being ogled by high-school guys began to wear off Faith made her way off the dance floor and to the bar, yelling for another beer. This caused the guy sitting next to her to flinch away slightly.

"Cut out the yelling, will you?" He looked up. "And get me another beer, too, while you're at it!"

Faith stared at the Billy-Idol-wannabe and narrowed her eyes, catching some strange vibes from him. Then he hiccupped quite violently and almost fell off his stool. That, combined with the stench of alcohol that surrounded him like a cloud, managed to dispel all worries she might have had. She doubted any vampire or other demon would be stupid enough to get tanked in the Slayers' favourite hangout. Besides, she doubted vampires could get depressed. Except maybe Angel, but he was one of a kind.

"You know that the whole 'drown your hangover in alcohol' thing doesn't really work, right?" she asked him, sitting down on a stool of her own. The guy looked much too tanked to be of any use in the sack, but that didn't mean she couldn't have a little fun.

"Sod off," he mumbled. "What does a little thing like you know, anyway?"

Faith smiled broadly. This guy showed all the classic signs of someone in a deep bout of depression.

"So what happened, Billy Idol? Not selling your albums like you used to?"

He gave her a withering glare, muttering something under his breath she didn't quite catch. Something about stupid kids ripping off his style.

"Ah, I got it," Faith said triumphantly. "Girl trouble, right? Did your better half ditch you?"

"She didn't ditch me," he roared at her, almost losing his balance again. "I left her, okay? I told her I wouldn't put up with this shit anymore and ... why the hell am I talking to you anyway? Sod off, okay? I'm not in the mood!"

"Oh, you're in a mood all right," she grinned, giving him a little shove that sufficed to send him tumbling off his stool. A string of obscenities followed all the way down to the floor as Faith chucked back the last of her beer.

"That's it," he growled, trying to get to his feet again. "Only so much I'm gonna take from a bit like you!"

"You gonna kick my ass?" She gave him an encouraging smile.

"I'm going to spank you black and blue you little ..."

"Let's start with a round of pool and we'll see where the night takes us, okay?"

#

Half an hour later Faith was in a pretty good mood, one that was apparently not shared by the Billy Idol wannabe. If anything he was even more depressed than before. It might have something to do with the fact that his pool skills had left a lot to be desired and, apart from losing pretty much all the money he had left, he had also been stupid enough to put his nifty leather coat on the line. Faith was trying out her newly won piece of apparel and it fit quite nicely.

"Write this up as a productive evening."

"This is getting better and better," the bleached guy mumbled, looking really pissed at her but too tanked to do much about it.

"Shouldn't brag when you can't back it up!"

He stumbled to his feet. "Okay, that's it! Give me back my coat!"

"No go, Billy! You lost it fair and square!"

"That wasn't fair! I'd have kicked your little ass if I were sober."

"Then you shouldn't have played until then, Billy!"

"You're playin' with fire here, girl!"

She looked at the swaying guy and shook her head.

"You know, Billy? Whoever that bitch is you're mooning over, she's either laughing her ass off right now because you're drowning in the blues over her, or she has forgotten about you entirely. Shit happens! Get over it!"

With that Faith decided to call it a night. The guy had turned out to be a lot less fun than anticipated, but at least she had gotten a new coat out of it. Turning around, she didn't even notice that the Billy Idol wannabe tried to lung at her, only to lose his balance and crash into the pool table.

#

Spike grumbled quite explicitly about the parentage of certain women as he fought back to his feet, but by the time he managed the vertical the brunette bitch that had ripped off his coat was already gone.

"I don't believe this," he muttered to himself. Killed a Slayer to get the coat, lost it to a little girl because he was too tanked to shoot pool properly. Someone was having a lot of fun at his expense, that much was for sure.

Her parting words left him thinking, though, or the next-best thing his drunken state allowed him to achieve. He was behaving like a loser. Worse, he was behaving like a poof with a soul and too much time to brood. This was not going to go on.

Something had to be done. Drusilla was shagging it up with Chaos demons? Let her! He didn't need her. Only thing she had ever done was hold him back. He was Spike, damn it! William the friggin' Bloody! He had killed two Slayers with his bare hands (and lost his favourite trophy in a game of pool with a little girl, but that was beside the point).

No one would be laughing at him! Not him! Taking a deep and unnecessary breath he went through his mental list of things to do when he was in a bad mood. It was a really short list and most of the entries fell under one of two categories: Maiming and killing. Maiming wouldn't be enough right now, no sir! He really needed to kill someone right now. Preferably someone who really had it coming.

Okay! He didn't have a clue what had happened to the bloody Slayer and her idiot poof, but since the world was still here, odds were that the Slayer at least was still around. He'd find her! He'd kill her! He'd feel a lot better afterward. Then he'd find Dru, the Slayer's blood still on his fingers, and he'd spit on her while licking it off.

Sometime before that he'd really have to get his coat back. Preferably without getting Slayer blood on it.

Stumbling out of the Bronze, he tried to figure out a likely place for the Slayer to hang out right now. Probably patrolling, but there were so many cemeteries in this bloody burg that finding her there would be rather difficult. Much better idea to go to a place she would eventually turn up at and wait for her.

He smiled. Her mom's. The invitation she had given him when they had teamed up against the poof should still be in force. He doubted the bint had thought to revoke it. He'd go visit her mom, have a nice chat with her, and kill the Slayer once she got home. Yessir! He had a plan! A good plan! No little girl would call him a loser ever again.

Well, she hadn't technically called him a loser, but the message had been loud and clear. And no one called him a loser! And no one took his coat away from him! No one!

Swaying for a moment, he remembered where he wanted to go next and headed out.

TO BE CONTINUED