Chapter 6
Between the length of three heartbeats, the whole world can change.
Spike had told her that once, and something about the tone of his voice and the hard blue glint in his eye, had made it seem less of a platitude. One dark night when she'd thought it might be fun prying him open a little, staring at the mess of his insides instead of her own for a change, she'd asked him to tell her a story. His story. The one about how he came to be what he was and this time she wanted the real one, not the one he put on for the cheap seats.
He hadn't given it up easily. Knew damn well that that would be something sharp and handy for her to use on him, slit him wide open when he least expected it but, with the right kind of hook - baited with just the right worm - she'd felt him bite hard. He wanted to tell her, part of him needed to, and as the truth spilt out of him, wet scarlet on black London cobbles, she'd felt an answering need. A need to know exactly how it felt to die that way.
Between the length of three heartbeats, his whole world changed. Light had shifted into dark, like a figure stepping quietly into shadow. His human heart; filled with weak love and dull verses about songbirds and lace, slowed and then ceased, and in that second he became something else. Something other than human. Something terrible.
That the passage was painful was only fitting because, within those first two agonised heartbeats, his soul was taken from him. He'd felt it go, he'd told her, slipping away to be carried like a fine handkerchief on the wind. And it hadn't felt bad exactly, just funny, kind of like he was emptied out inside, a hollow thing opened up to the wind, making a sound like a bottle or a kiddy's whistle. His blood ceased it's pumping, his brain ceased it's quiet workings and, in the space of his last heartbeat - the silence was truly deafening.
"And then what?"
"And then I died."
"You remember dying?"
"'Course," he'd squinted at her, half serious, half mocking, "Don't you?"
The candlelight had made a jack-o-lantern of his face, his cheekbones casting angled shadows upwards. She remembered his eyes though, still and clear, holding her gaze as he'd pulled her hair back from her face, touched his lips slowly to her throat.
"Three heartbeats, Slayer. That's all it would take. Your world can change forever."
And now, frozen in sunlight, crouching over Spike's body, Buffy felt herself silently counting them.
"I am sorry. I should have called you."
Carlo's voice was soft and perfectly moderated, but at the sound of it her hand tightened so painfully on her knife, she heard her knuckles crack. Keeping her eyes riveted on his face, she drew herself upright.
"What are you doing here?"
The Immortal's dark hair shaded his expression from her and he moved sideways out of the light.
"Not quite the welcome I was expecting."
"Really?" Her voice sounded strained even to her own ears, but she struggled to control it, to hide the fact that she was silently shaking from head to toe. "Just exactly what was it you were expecting? And while we're at it – why not tell me how the hell you managed to find me."
The tone of the words surprised even her, but she left them where they stood. Reaching down she took hold of Spike's wrists and, without changing her expression, she pulled him quickly backwards into shadow, ripped off her jacket and covered him with it. Tendrils of smoke were already starting to curl from the exposed skin of his chest and seeing them, she felt a surge of anger overcome her fear.
This was not her dream. In that, she had been a powerless corpse, helpless to defend herself against his attack, but here and now...
"Buffy..."
Frowning, Carlo stepped towards her and, with a smooth sidestep, she blocked him, the knife held low and purposeful at her hip. Staring into his face, she thought she saw the slightest shift of surprise.
"OK, you need to back the hell away from me right now."
The Immortal's head tilted slightly to one side, a small frown creasing his perfect brow. Dropping his hands to his sides, he stepped back a pace.
"Buffy, why are you this way with me? You hold a knife as if you could harm me. You talk as if I am your enemy. What can I do?"
Something about the timbre of his voice was affecting her and, shaking her head furiously, she shifted the blade to her other hand, narrowed her eyes. If he was trying to get into her mind he was going to have a hell of a fight on his hands.
Dropping to a ready crouch again, she felt around on the floor for her phone, checked to see the signal was strong and then hit the speed dial button. Flashing up on the screen, her home number connected and started to ring. Carlo's frown had dissolved into the mildest of puzzled smiles, but the sight of him silhouetted against the daylight was still enough to keep every muscle in her body tensed like a spring.
The phone clicked into their voice-mail and Buffy cursed softly at her sister's ability to sleep through anything.
"Dawn, it's me...you need to get some blood, as much as you can. Ring Andrew, he'll know someone. And we'll need bandages..."
Stepping into her space, Carlo reached for her hand so quickly that she barely had time to bring the knife up under his chin, before he'd knocked it roughly from her. Balling her fists, Buffy pulled back, her eyes flashing.
"You have exactly ten seconds to tell me what you're doing here. Do you hear me?"
The shake was barely audible, but she knew he heard it. Shutting him out of her head only hid so much.
"Why are you afraid of me?"
Sliding off her, his eyes dropped to scan Spike's body curiously and, for the first time he seemed to realise that her stance, although outwardly combative, was also protective.
"What is this creature to you?"
"Answer my question."
The air between them crackled and then, at the corner of her vision, Buffy saw a movement. Square-shouldered and solid, Antonio - Carlo's personal assistant and driver – had silently stepped into view above them. Outlined against the blue morning sky, he addressed his employer quietly in Italian and, nodding a reply, The Immortal turned back to her. Spreading his hands wide, he shrugged.
"Buffy. I do not understand your question. I am here because I was told to come. Dawn telephoned me and I..."
"Dawn."
The mention of her sister's name grounded her, the last of the trembling in her belly dropping away to be replaced by a strange distant calm. Dawn had called Carlo. Probably out of anger at being left behind. Maybe just out of concern. Dawn had called Carlo because she hadn't known. How could she, when Buffy had been very careful not to share the most disturbing detail of her dream with her baby sister.
"She told me that your vampire friend was hurt, that he would need blood and medical care." Shaking his head slightly, he reached behind him to lift something from the floor. "I have a vehicle waiting outside the gates, with blood, some medical supplies. The sun has risen already, but he will be safe inside this."
For a moment she stared in confusion at the object he held out to her. Reaching almost to the floor, the heavy length of black vinyl seemed to exude a faint familiar odour, but it wasn't until Carlo reached down to unzip it that she fully understood what it was.
"You want me to put him in a body bag?"
"It will protect him from the sun."
"No! I...no!!"
Speechless, Buffy's eyes widened in horror. Nothing that had happened so far today made any sense. Instinct was telling her that nothing was as it seemed, that there was still danger here – for both her and Spike – and that, right now, she needed to get him as far from this place as was humanly possible. But logic. Logic was telling her that time was definitely not on their side.
Reaching for the vampire's hand, she slid her fingers through his, pressing their palms together. He was unconscious again, his head falling loosely to one side, but the idea that he might come to zipped inside that...thing was just too horrible to contemplate. Pausing for a second, she stared at his face before folding his scarred arms carefully up underneath her jacket. When she turned to look at her boyfriend again, his expression was unreadable.
"I'll carry him"
"At least let me..."
"I said I'll carry him."
Trying to control the emotion in her voice, she reached around on the floor for her dropped knife. Carlo's feet, encased in pristine cream leather, shifted as he bent down to pick it up. The hilt was sticky and, averting her eyes as she took it from him, she wiped it clean on her sleeve before returning it to her waistband.
"You gave him your blood?"
His control was precise, but she still sensed something running underneath the surface. Jealousy. Maybe curiosity. Or something else. Something darker.
"He was dying."
"He is a vampire Buffy. He is already dead."
"You know what I mean."
Sliding her arms carefully under Spike's neck and knees she braced herself for the noise she knew would undo her; the sound of shattered bone grating again bone, but still wasn't prepared for what she felt when she straightened up with him. His body weighed no more than a child's.
It'll be alright. Hang on just a little longer okay. I know you didn't mean what you said before.
"You did not answer my question."
Already halfway to the door, Buffy stopped and held her breath. Carlo's shadow reached long and sinuous across the container's floor towards her and, turning her head sideways, she looked back at him.
"Which one?"
"What is he to you? This vampire."
"He's a friend."
With a low groan, Spike's head rolled back loosely against her shoulder, and she hesitated a moment before adding,
"Someone...I loved."
A long silence stretched between them and, within the high walls of it, Buffy felt her stomach clench. Outlined by the rising sun behind him, The Immortal's silhouette was a black hole into which all light seemed to have fallen. Then a hand reaching out from his side sent cold fish darting into her stomach, ice shooting down her spine.
"I can't let you go, dear heart. I need you."
Reaching calmly into his pocket for his mobile phone, Carlo slid it into glowing life. His voice, soft and perfectly distinct, was the calm, detached counterpoint to her crazy, racing heart.
"Vittorio. Be ready. We're on out way."
It was a mercifully short journey.
Hunkered down over Spike's body in the back of the private ambulance, she barely raised her eyes more than once from his face, aware of the curious gaze she could feel resting on them both. After helping her inside, Carlo had taken a seat next to the silent driver and then calmly turned around to observe.
Not that they made a particularly pretty tableau. Essentially force-feeding the vampire from the blood packs he had provided, the expression on Buffy's face was less one of tenderness than ruthless determination as Spike, sliding in and out of consciousness, thrashed weakly about on the gurney beneath her hands. The tube she'd fed down his throat had made speech impossible and, when he tried a couple of times, half choking on blood and saliva, she had to forcibly restrain him from pulling the damn thing out. His eyes, fiery gold with huge dark pupils, opened wide into her own before sliding closed again. The intensity of pain in them was terrible and, breathing hard, she'd laid a palm gently against his cheek, before reaching behind her for another fresh blood-pack. Finding one in Carlo's outstretched hand, she hesitated a moment before taking it.
"He has...a strong will."
It was the first time he'd spoken since they'd left the storage container and pursing her lips, Buffy remained silent whilst she fumbled awkwardly with the seal of the blood-bag. Reaching to help her, Carlo's hand paused for a second to touch the back of hers before deftly attaching the new pack to the tube. His eyes searched for her, but she turned away, busied herself with a bandage.
"Is it much further?"
"No. Five, perhaps ten minutes."
"He needs more blood than we have here."
"There is more where we are going."
"Where is it we're going - exactly?"
"A safe place. Where your friend can recover in peace."
Reaching for her hand again, he paused a moment before enclosing her fingers in his.
"Baffy, there is no need to be afraid. Your friend has been through much, but he will survive."
The emotions she'd experienced back in the container were still echoing inside her, and Carlo's continuing proximity was doing nothing to help. The memory of his smiling face looking down on them haunted her and his explanation for his sudden appearance, that he'd simply tracked her from her abandoned car, seemed just a little too convenient to be the whole truth. The Immortal had many talents, many super-human abilities she didn't know about, but his skill at providing smooth rational explanations was one she was already very familiar with. He was a businessman after all - apparently a very successful one - and on several occasions she'd been witness to one of his famously satisfying explanations.
What The Immortal chose not to reveal, no one would ever suspect him of, and that was the part that now began to unnerve her. She'd always believed that being the object of Carlo's affections protected her from his dark side, that his affection for her meant that he hid nothing, but what if, in fact, the opposite were true? That proximity had merely blinded her to the glaringly obvious fact that he was exactly what Giles had first asserted him to be.
Beside her on the gurney, she watched the vampire's throat convulse, drawing the life-giving liquid down into his body almost against his own will. It was human blood, she could tell from the colour, the rich oxide smell of it, but for some reason the part of her that should have cared about that was silent. Spike was still alive, she had found him in time and he was alive and, for the time being, that was all that really mattered to her. Who or what her boyfriend really was, those were questions that, for now, would just have to wait to be answered.