I'm sorry that if I'm taking forever on this story, it's just that I have been super busy with school and needing new ideas. But there are only a few more chapters left, so I'm starting to wrap it up. Sorry again, hang in there!! ^_^

Chapter 7

Family Reunion

Dawn stood up from the ground and wiped her face. "Guys, I think someone's here." She was looking in the direction of the bushes. "I think I heard something." She walked over peeked through where her sister watching, but she left before she was seen.

"M-maybe we should get going, wait until the others get back so we could tell them." Tara was trying to pick up her distraught girlfriend off of the ground, Dawn walked over to help.

"Where have you been luv'?" Spike turned off the television and stood up.

"Out."

"Where?"

"I went to see how they were taking the fact that I'm dead."

"Well you're not reall-."

"Look, I don't need you explanations right now." Spike nodded.

"Have you been thinking about what I told you? Our little plan?"

She looked up. "Yea."

"And…."

"Ya….I'll….I'll do it."

"That's my girl." He walked up to Buffy and kissed her, she kissed him back.

"I love y-."

She put a finger over his lips. "Shhhh…..don't talk, just kiss me."

He picked her up and brought her over to the bed. "Whatever you say luv'."

The walk home was quiet and somber, no one spoke the whole way. When they arrived they noticed that Giles' car was there. They went inside and Dawn started to head to her room.

"I need some time to myself." And she continued up the stairs.

"Maybe you sh-." Tara began but Willow cut her off.

"No-no. I have to talk to Giles and Xander."

"Okay then, I'll go with you."

"No, I actually need to do this one alone."

"Alright sweetie, I'll be upstairs with Dawn if you need me." Willow nodded.

She headed into the kitchen to where Xander was raiding the fridge again.

"Geez, someone needs to tell Buffy that it's time to go grocery shopping. There's nothing here." He stood and turned around noticing that Willow was standing there watching.

"Oh hey Will." He saw the look on her face. She was tired and worn out. The spell and the events from earlier had just drained her physically and emotionally.

"What's wrong?" he was starting to get kind of worried, he didn't have a good feeling about this.

"Uhh…. where's Giles?" she barely even had the energy to speak.

"In the living room. Why?"

"Then come with me, I've got some bad news." She turned and he followed.

Giles was sitting on the couch when Willow walked in. "Hello Willow. We got nothing, couldn't find her. What about you? Any news on Buffy?" she started to cry at the mention of her friend's name. He took off hi glasses and cleaned them on the end of his shirt.

"Will, what's wrong?" Xander put his arm around her trying to comfort her.

"You guys are going to need to sit down for this." A few moments of silence passed and she spoke again. "It's about….Buffy."

"You found her?" Xander was now sitting on the edge of the couch.

"No, and we never will." She looked down, tears falling to the floor as she silently mourned the loss of her friend.

"Willow….what are you trying to say?" he trying to make sense of the situation.

"Well I found this spell that could tell me if a person had been at a certain place and when I did the spell it said the she was…..was dead." She began to cry again.

"Oh god…Buffy." Giles was horrified at what he just heard.

"No." Xander had a look of horror on his face. "Do you know what could have happened? Who or what could have done this to her?" he stood up and began to pace back and forth thinking.

"Willow, are you sure that could be dead?" he was looking at her hoping for some kind of assurance.

"Yes."

Xander stopped pacing. "Spike!"

"What?" the other two said at the same time.

"The only possible person could be him! I mean come on, have any of you guys seen him lately?"

Willow rolled her eyes, she was getting a little tired of Xander always pointing this finger at Spike whenever something happened. Ya, he did have reasons to despise him, but that was a while ago and she was starting to think that he should move on. "Come on Xander, do you really think that Spike could've possibly done something to harm Buffy?"

He sighed loudly at that and he was growing impatient. "I'm sure you guys have heard of loving someone to death."

"Ya, but still, that doesn't mean anyth-."

"Look, don't believe me if you don't want to. I don't need you to believe me, I'm a big boy, but I have to go and sort some things out." He went over to the weapons chest and got an axe and a stake that he put in the back pocket of his pants. "Can never be too careful out there." As he headed towards the door to leave Willow grabbed him by the arm.

"Xander…."

"What now?" she didn't say anything.

"Exactly. Now let me go." He turned and left.

As soon as Xander left the house Willow looked back at Giles and asked, "Shouldn't we stop him?"

"Well….." Giles was kind of rooting for Xander but he knew how Willow felt about all of this and he wanted to respect her feeling. "Yes we should, before he gets himself hurt."

Willow let out a sigh of relief. "What are you waiting for? Let's get going!" They headed out the door in a hurry.

Xander had taken off running and was already halfway there. "If that son of a bitch did anything to Buffy…"he thought to himself, but before he knew it he was already standing in front of Spike's crypt, he was ready to kick some ass. He brought his leg up to kick down the door, but before he had to chance to do so Spike opened the door and kept behind it in order to stay out of the sun's harsh light.

"Knew you were coming. What the hell do you want Xander? Oh and look at that! The little scooby has brought himself a toy!" he was pointing to the axe he was holding in his hand. "If you came here to try and kill me, I'm going to save you some time and energy by telling you to just go back home. You're wasting your time boy."

"Shut up Spike."

"Ooooo, someone's a lil feisty today."

"Look Spike," he was looking at him with disgust written all over his face. "as you know Buffy's missing and according to a certain spell, she's dead."

Spike pretended to act surprised but he wasn't fooling anyone.

"Cut the crap Spike. See, the thing is I don't believe this spell. I know she's fine and I know you kno-."

"Whoa, someone's in denial."

"Do you love her?"

"Get out Harris."

"Do you?"

"Get out!" he swung and hit Xander, he then fell backwards screaming in pain. Xander had ended up on the other side of the room.

"You stay the hell away from me. I may have this bloody chip in my head but that isn't going to prevent me from slitting your throat." Xander slowly stood up rubbing his chin.

"Ya know, I'm pretty surprised. For someone that loves Buffy so much, I don't see you doing anything to help find her. Actually, it kinda seems as if you're hiding."

"Don't worry bout me, I've been doing enough."

"Really now?"

"Ya. And I know exactly where she is. But see, we aren't sharing information here so you could just-." And before he knew it, Xander had pinned him up against the wall pushing the handle of the axe against his throat.

"Where the hell is she?" spike began to laugh.

"You can't find someone if they don't want to be found." He threw Xander off of him. "She knows that you're looking for her and that's exactly why you haven't found her. She doesn't want to be around you guys anymore. She's sick of you guys always getting in her way and crowding her. She just wants to be left alone. She's tired of always protecting you guys. You don't help, you only make things worse. So don't expect her to be coming home anytime soon."

"You're a liar!"

"No. I'm speaking the truth. She told me so herself. She'd rather be with me then with you. Funny isn't it?"

"Son of a-." he punched Spike but it didn't affect him.

He vamped out and lunged at Xander, but stumbled backwards with the pain that overcame him. Xander took advantage of this and got on top of him. He took the stake out of his back pocket and went to plunge in into his chest when someone grabbed his wrist.

"Get off of him." He recognized the familiar voice. He turned around.

"Buffy?" she picked him up and threw him against the wall.

"You heard him. Get out!"

"They said you w-were dead." He was surprised at the way Buffy was treating him.

"Get out!" he was at a loss for words. Something had changed about her, he just didn't know what it was.

He walked toward the door and as he opened it he looked back and saw Buffy with Spike, something twinged in his heart and he left.

"I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"Everything."

"No need to apologize luv'." He hugged her and they kissed. That always made her feel better.

As Xander walked through the graveyard he bumped into Willow and Giles. She noticed that he was in a fight.

"Xander are you ok?"

"Ya, I'm fine." He pushed her hand away, he was still kind of upset with her.

"Did you….."Giles asked.

"No, he's till alive. If that's even the right word for it."

"Damn." He thought to himself.

"And so is Buffy." They looked at him.

"W-What? But the spell." Willow was confused and happy at the same time.

"Spike had said something about not being able to find someone if they don't want to be found."

Giles was contemplating the thought. "That's why the spell she was dead, she didn't want to be found."

"Why wouldn't she want to be found?"

"I don't know," he lied "but something's wrong with the way she was acting. She seems to have changed somehow."

"What do you mean?" Giles asked,

"I don't know, but something wonky is going on and I don't have a good feeling about this." He turned to look back at Spike's crypt.

Giles decided that he should change the subject. "Okay, well I think it's time that we should head back to the house. We need to tell Dawn."

Then it hit Willow. "Oh my god, Dawn did see Buffy that night." She didn't say anything and continued walking.

(back at the crypt)

Spike rolled off of Buffy. They just finished a session of passionate sex which they have been doing a lot of lately.

"Mmmm…that was nice."

"Ya, you really know how to give it to a man." She smiled.

"Thanks." He leaned over and kissed her.

"Wanna go again?"

"No no, that's enough for one evening." She pouted. "There is something that I have wanted to tell you ever since that stupid ponce came earlier."

"And that would be?"

"It's time."

"For what?"

"To kill them."