SpikePuppet 2/?
Spike tensed, bracing himself. Buffy would come running and open his box, and then... actually, he wasn't sure what would happen then. He hadn't thought that far ahead. He'd only thought about how he'd found the perfect opportunity to sneak in a clandestine visit to Buffy. He hadn't really considered her potential reactions to finding a Spike puppet on her doorstep. Would she laugh, cry, throw him in the fire? Seeing that it was Buffy, any or all of the above were possibilities.
It was too late to try to escape even if he wanted to. Footsteps moved down the stairs and stopped near the box. "Aren't you supposed to be doing your homework, Dawn?" Buffy's voice said.
"I had to answer the door," Dawn retorted. "Look at this big package you got."
Spike tensed again, waiting for Buffy to rip off the tape and discover him. Instead there was a pause.
"I wonder who it's from. I don't see a return label, and it looks like a child printed our address."
Spike winced; he'd had to clutch the pen with both of his awkward new hands to get that job done. Being a puppet was a lot harder than he'd counted on.
"Let's see what it is," Dawn urged.
"All right." Buffy sounded amused as she began to unwrap the tape from around the box.
'Don't blink when she looks at you,' Spike told himself, before remembering that, being a puppet, he couldn't blink. Good thing, too. If Buffy knew he'd returned to (un)life and hadn't told her, she'd be bound to pick the option of tossing him in the fire and stoking it. He forced himself to relax until he was lying limply at the bottom of the box, face down. He heard the last of the tape being ripped away and then the box flaps lifted above him.
For a moment there was silence. Then came a puzzled, "What is it?"
Spike scowled. That wasn't exactly one of the reactions he had envisioned.
When he felt hands reaching into the box and grasping him, he schooled his features back into an expression of neutrality. Buffy tugged him out by his duster and flipped him over to see his face.
Somehow Spike kept himself from moving, even as he saw Buffy and Dawn for the first time since the previous May. Dawn's hair was several shades darker and she looked like she'd grown another couple of inches. Buffy was a bit more tanned and a little thinner (not enough to indicate that she'd been pining away, though), but her hair remained long (Spike was pleased to see that she hadn't gone back to an unflattering short cut).
"It's..." Buffy breathed.
"It looks like Spike," Dawn inserted. "Look, you can tell by the hair.The eyes are off, though. Spike's were a lot beadier."
"Wow." Buffy slowly examined the puppet, smoothing her fingers over the shrunken duster and the felt body.
Spike repressed a shudder of pleasure and continued to gaze blankly, though it was hard when he saw the tears glistening in Buffy's eyes.
Making matters more difficult, Dawn began to prod at his face. "Hey, he even has the scar." Then came a ripping noise Spike was sure could not signify anything good, and as he continued to stare ahead, he saw Dawn dangling his scarred eyebrow in front of Buffy. "It's detachable, see? Isn't that adorable?" She replaced the eyebrow and went back to exploring. "You can take his nose off, too. And his ears." She proceeded to do each of those things, replacing the pieces at her leisure. Next, her fingers dug around the puppet's eyes, trying to pry them up. Spike felt a growl rising in his chest. He loved Dawn, he really did, but she could be incredibly annoying at times.
Luckily, Buffy came to his rescue, pulling him out of her sister's clutches. "Don't damage him. Someone went to a lot of trouble to get him made." Then a pertinent thought seemed to strike her. "But who did it?"
"No return address," Dawn reminded her, indicating the box.
"Also no postmark," Buffy noted. "Who delivered him?"
Dawn shrugged. "I don't know. Some guy. He brought the box to the door, gave it to me, and left. I didn't even get a look at his truck or whatever."
Buffy peered inside the box. "No note in there. That's weird."
"Maybe it's inside the puppet," Dawn suggested. "You know, tucked inside the duster or something."
Spike forced himself to remain still as Buffy's fingers undressed him in her search for a nonexistent note. Duster, shirt, pants... She stopped abruptly. "I think the question has now become, who would send me an anatomically correct Spike puppet?"
"I wonder if that comes off too?" Dawn piped up.
"Dawn, don't molest the puppet!" Buffy slapped her sister's hand away and restored Spike's clothing, much to his relief. "Well, I think we can be pretty damn sure Xander had nothing to do with this. Or Giles."
"Probably not Willow or Kennedy either," Dawn added. "'Cause they know how you felt about Spike."
Spike's ears pricked up (figuratively). How, exactly, had Buffy felt about him? He willed Dawn to elaborate.
Naturally, she didn't. "I know who it was--Faith!" she yelped. "This is the sort of thing she would do, right?"
"Faith?" Buffy considered. "I don't know. Maybe. More likely her than the others, I guess. Next time we hear from her I'll have to ask." She looked at the puppet again. "I have to say, he's very cute."
Cute? Spike bristled inwardly. He wasn't cute. He was fierce and imposing and sinisterly handsome, not cute.
"So cute, in fact, that he gets to sleep in my bed tonight," Buffy went on.
Spike quickly decided that he didn't mind being called cute after all.
TBC
Next time: Spike snoops in Buffy's room; bedtime arrives.