Once Sam had cleaned up and changed into jeans and a t-shirt, he spent the rest of the day in The Magic Box, learning as much as he could about vampires and demons, both from Giles and from the extensive collection of books in the store. Meanwhile, Giles busied himself with trying to figure out what had happened to 'Buffy' to make her lose her memory and her powers. Sam knew it was a pointless exercise, but at least it meant they could sit at the same table, pouring over books.
As the day went on, the rest of the 'Scoobies' started trickling in to help out with the research on the latest apocalypse, and every single one of them commented on Sam's sudden fascination with books. Apparently Buffy wasn't known for her studiousness. But their teasing was light-hearted and it was clear that this was a very tight knit group. Sam supposed it was only natural that they'd become close—he'd seen the same kind of fellowship with soldiers. People who fight alongside each other learn a deeper kind of trust than most people will ever know. Still…an ex-demon, an accident-prone construction worker, a slayer, a watcher, a teenaged bundle of energy, and two lesbian witches made for a very odd ensemble.
With all the camaraderie and activity going on around him, Sam wasn't surprised at how quickly he felt at home with these people. For once he didn't feel like an outsider—the whole group had rallied around him to help him out. Sure they thought he was Buffy, but Sam figured that he and Buffy had a great deal in common. They were both chosen by fate, or time, or the powers-that-be to make the world a better place to live in. It was a heavy burden, but it was one neither of them had to face alone. Buffy had her support, Sam had his—and they were all working together on this one. It made facing impending doom far less horrifying than it should have been. Truth be told, Sam was more anxious about the butterflies he got in his stomach whenever Giles came near him than he was about the fate of the World.
At six o'clock, Anya summarily kicked everyone out of the store so she could close shop for the night. Sam gathered up Buffy's gym bag and joined Tara, Willow and Giles outside. Xander had already taken Dawn home and was on babysitting duty for the night (a loose term, which Xander interpreted as pizza and movie night).
"Do you want us to come along on patrol tonight?" asked Willow. Sam did want them to come along, not only as backup, but also to act as chaperones. The thought of being alone with Giles for so long made his palms sweat and his heart race. Buffy's emotions were unnerving him to say the least. But he also couldn't rule out the possibility that the reason he was there wasto make sure Willow and Tara went home and studied so they could pass their exams.
"That's okay—you guys go home. Giles and I can handle patrol," said Sam.
"Don't worry, Willow, I'll take very good care of her," said Giles in a way that got all the butterflies in Sam's stomach fluttering at once.
"Well, if you're sure…" said Willow uncertainly.
"They're sure," said Tara, coaxing her girlfriend away from them. As Sam watched the girls walk arm in arm down the street, the full realisation of what 'going on patrol' meant, struck him. Tonight he was going to deliberately hunt down more creatures like the one that had tossed him around like a rag doll. Even with Giles at his side, he was starting to think Al had been right—maybe being Buffy was going to be the death of him.
"Shall I pick you up around eight o'clock?" asked Giles. But Sam's mind was far away, contemplating demons and vampires and his chances of survival. Giles laid his hand on Sam's shoulder and gave it a squeeze. "Buffy, are you alright?"
Sam unconsciously leaned into the touch, feeling a deep, thrilling shiver run through his entire body at the contact. He looked at Giles, and his feelings must have been plain, because Giles sputtered and backed away like a shy, lovesick teenager. And that's when Sam knew, without a doubt, what he was there to do.
Sam stood in front of Buffy's bedroom mirror, checking out his latest choice in outfits. It was the fourth one he'd tried on, but it just didn't seem right. The clam diggers were okay, but the white blouse was too frilly, too busy...and way too conservative. He needed something special—tonight he had to make an impression. Hell, he'd even gone so far as to voluntarily apply makeup!
Sam rummaged through Buffy's closet again and found a low-cut, clingy yellow top that looked like it might fit the bill. And just as he'd stripped out of the white blouse he heard the Imaging Chamber door open. Sam turned around and prepared himself for the usual depravity to ensue, but Al didn't even seem to notice that his friend was half naked.
"Oh, Sam—this is not good!" said Al, pacing furiously, his brow furrowed deeply as he bashed the squealing hand link.
"Al, what is it?"
"What is it? It's the end of the World, is what it is!" Al exclaimed, his hands gesturing madly in his panic.
"Calm down," said Sam as he pulled on the yellow top. "Tell me what happened."
"Ziggy's losin' it, Sam! The whole compound is locked down in a state of emergency. So far the Project's been unaffected, but we don't know how long it'll stay that way."
"Unaffected by what?" asked Sam.
"The apocalypse!" Al shouted, then he rubbed his forehead at the pain his shouting had caused him. "Whatever you're doing back here, it's brought about the end of the World!"
Sam started pacing. "Then tell me what's changed so I can fix it."
"How about your dying, for a start? Along with every human, plant and animal in the entire western hemisphere,' Al said, gesturing profusely as the hand link wailed.
"That's not what happens," said Sam.
"'Course it is," said Al. "I'm in a position to know!"
"But in my dream, Spike and I survived the apocalypse," Sam murmured.
"Wait a minute here, Sam. You knew the apocalypse was coming…and you didn't tell me?"
"It was a dream, Al! I didn't think it was really going to happen."
"Well it did," said Al. "And you gotta stop it from happening, Sam. This is the big one."
"Al, I can't stop the apocalypse! I'm not the slayer."
"You are today," said Al.
Sam's face lit up suddenly and he stopped pacing. "That's it, Al—if I do what I've been sent here to do, then I'll leap and Buffy can return in time to stop the apocalypse."
"Yeah, but Sam, you're forgetting that if your leap was hijacked, then you were sent here to get killed."
"Humour me," said Sam. "I think I know what I'm here to do—just tell Ziggy to forget about the apocalypse for a minute and treat this like any other leap."
"Forget the apocalypse? That's easy for you to say, Sam—you're not here!"
"Just…do it, okay?"
Al griped some more under his breath, but he did as he was asked and punched the request into the hand link. The colourful little cubes lit up like a Christmas tree and it chirped at him in response.
"It's no good," said Al. "Ziggy says you're not far enough into the past to get an accurate, long term reading."
"Well something must have happened to bring me here…apart from your Devil theory," he added, cutting off his friend before he could say it. "Were there any major changes in the lives of Buffy or her friends in the near future?"
"I wouldn't rule out that Devil theory so quickly," said Al. "Ziggy's still convinced that it's the most likely scenario." Sam merely raised an eyebrow at him in reply, and Al gave in. "Fine. I'll ask her." He jabbed his finger at the hand link, punching in a new request, and then he waited impatiently for an answer. "Okay, here we go. Ziggy says the only big change to occur in the very near future was that Giles is going to move back to England on October 26."
"That gives me a few days. If I can stop Giles from leaving, I'll leap out of here." Sam was grinning—it fit in perfectly with his theory of what he was there to do.
"Who're you talking to?" came a voice from behind him. Sam spun around to see Buffy's sister standing in the doorway, her arms crossed. She was staring at him like he'd grown a third arm.
"I, uh…I was just…"
"You're such a geek," said Dawn. "And what's with the hot date shirt? I thought you were going on patrol with Giles."
"Yeah, Sam, why are you all dolled up? And—ooh! Glossy pink lipstick!"
"I am going on patrol," said Sam to both of them. "Is it a crime to look good while I'm doing it?"
"It should be," said Al, his concern over the planet's doom momentarily shelved as his libido finally kicked in.
"Whatever," said Dawn. "I just came to tell you Giles is here, and he's ready when you are."
"Okay. Tell him I'll be down in a minute," said Sam, and Dawn disappeared in a whirl of shiny brown hair.
"Sweet kid," said Al.
"Not bad, for a green ball of energy," said Sam. "Look—I gotta go on patrol…"
"You want me to stick close and keep an eye out for you?"
"No—Giles and I have it covered. Why don't you head back and try and keep everyone calm? If everything goes right tonight, you won't have to worry about the end of the World."
"What's going on in that enormous brain of yours, kid? You're not thinking of doing what I think you're thinking of doing…are you?"
"Care to translate that?" asked Sam with a twist of a smile.
"You're not planning on…with Giles…are you?"
"She's in love with him, Al, I can feel it. A part of her didn't leap, and I've been having these feelings…"
"Nuh-uh, Sam. Don't be telling me that—I don't wanna hear it."
"And I'm almost a hundred percent sure he feels the same way about Buffy, only he hasn't been able to tell her," said Sam.
"I'm telling you Sam, I don't want to hear it. You are not here to get Buffy and Giles together, so drop it." Al was pacing now, and he seemed almost as upset about Sam's admission as he had been about the apocalypse.
"Look, I know how you feel about this sort of thing, but I will do whatever it takes to save the World. So unless you'd rather see the powers of hell unleashed on Earth, I suggest you run my theory by Ziggy and see if I'm right."
Al practically scowled at his best friend and stabbed the hand link with his finger. The Imaging Chamber door whooshed open, and without another word Al stepped through it.
The spongy soft ground in the cemetery muffled the sound of Sam's footsteps as he crept from grave to grave. And if his footsteps were muffled then so were those of anyone else who might there—including the vampires. Sam was starting to jump at every tiny sound, certain that someone was following him.
They were on their sixth cemetery of the evening. Knowing what he did about the Hellmouth, Sam wasn't at all surprised that a town as small as Sunnydale had so many cemeteries, but what did surprise him was that the people of Sunnydale didn't seem to think it was odd.
They were almost done their patrol for the night and so far there'd been no action—not with the vampires, and definitely not with Giles. Sam was worried that their earlier encounter had given Giles cold feet. He was pretty sure the reason he'd originally left for England was because he didn't want Buffy to discover his feelings for her. If Sam was going to set things right, then he couldn't afford to scare Giles off so early in the game. The other man had avoided all of Sam's attempts at conversation, claiming they needed to stay focused. Plus, he'd kept himself at a safe distance, keeping within visual range, but far enough away to avoid contact. Right now he was 'scouting ahead', but Sam knew it was classic avoidance.
Sam was running out of alone time with Giles and was starting to think he should just throw caution to the wind and confront him, when he heard the distinctive sound of a twig snapping behind him. Sam twisted around in time to see a spark of flame light up a face he recognised all too well. Spike peered at him through the smoke of his freshly lit cigarette, and Sam's blood ran cold. He was exactly like he remembered from the dream, right down to the scar that sliced through one of his eyebrows.
Sam stood frozen to the spot, too frightened to even call out for help. It was too soon—was this the end? Had he been wrong about the apocalypse?
"You had to go and bring the chaperone, didn't you?" said the blond vampire. "You afraid to be left alone with me now? Afraid you might give in to temptation again?"
"Spike."
"Like you were expecting someone else. We've got unfinished business, you an' me."
"Oh? And what business might that be?" asked Sam cautiously.
"Oh please, Buffy—let's not pretend it didn't happen. That game's getting old."
Beyond his fear, Sam was aware that he was feeling something else. It was twisted and warped, but he was sure he felt an attraction…only it was an attraction offset by equal parts revulsion and confusion.
"Now come here and give us a kiss," said Spike, and he grabbed Sam by the wrist and yanked him closer.
"Never," Sam said through clenched teeth, and with his free hand he reached behind his back to grab hold of the stake in his back pocket. But he wasn't fast enough—as the wooden weapon arced towards Spike's chest, the vampire snatched it out of his hand and snapped it in two.
"Now that wasn't very nice, was it?" said Spike, his eyes twinkling with mischief. "Feeling a bit playful, are we?"
"Let go of me," Sam said with as much menace as he could muster. He was trying desperately to break free of Spike's grasp and he was failing miserably.
Spike cocked his head at him and he dropped the macho bad-boy routine. "Buffy, are you alright? Something's wrong—you're not sick, are you?"
Sam was taken aback by Spike's sudden about face. Whatever else was going on between Buffy and Spike, it was clear that he really cared about her…at least in his own demonic way. Sam was debating what he should do, when the sparkly blue lights of a leap suddenly surrounded him. He was confused—he hadn't done anything yet, so why was he leaping? Then he realized that he wasn't the one who'd leapt.
As the blue lights faded, Sam found that Spike had gone, and in his place was a stranger—a tall, red-haired man with a neck thicker than his head. His eyes were beady and the colour of amber, and they squinted at him curiously.
"Well, shi-i-i-t! If Lothos ain't got the best damn timin' ever!" the man exclaimed, revealing a thick, Southern drawl. "He done dropped you right in my lap an' saved me a whole lotta walkin'. Dr. Sam Beckett, right?"
Sam felt a stab of fear—Al was right, there were other forces at work here. He remembered the name Lothos. It was a hybrid computer, like Ziggy, only it was used towards very different ends. And if this guy was working with Lothos, then he had to be stopped. The only thing working in Sam's favour right now was that he was now dealing with a human instead of a vampire.
Or at least that's what he thought until the man transformed in front of him, sprouting fangs, eyes turning red, forehead bulging. Sam redoubled his efforts to break free, but the vampire's grasp on his wrist tightened until he could feel his bones grinding together.
The vampire laughed and shoved Sam hard to the ground. "What's the matter? Cat got your tongue, Sam?"
Sam blinked up at the vampire with growing dread. With the contact between them broken, the aura surrounding the vampire was restored, and he looked and sounded exactly like Spike—his nightmare was coming true.
Sam tried to get to his feet, but a big, steel-toed boot slammed into the side of his head, knocking him flat on his back. Darkness pressed in on him, and as he began to lose consciousness he could only pray that the shout he'd formed in his mind had made it past his lips.