Elie Norea – That is quite possibly the sweetest thing anyone has ever said to me. However, I'm convinced it's not true. I order you immediately to make your way to my profile, and my favorite stories, and read His Childe, by Kallysten. And as to the time period: It takes place during Buffy's senior year, but since none of the slayish stuff ever happened, 3rd season isn't entirely accurate. I also have the sinking suspicion the allusions to the real events on the show might not be following a strict timeline either. So it's just around 3rd season if you must have a definite time to aid you in your reading.

Ilea Dreike – Seeing how I let you peek, the least you could do is review ;-)

Spike awoke in a chair at the factory, feeling like his brain was orbiting his skull. Thoughts whirled by, but before he could catch any of them, they were gone.

"Bugger."

"Spike?" he faintly heard Dorian's voice from beside him. Or behind him. It was a little hard to tell.

"Head's all loopy."

"Giles injected you with something." When he heard the word 'Giles', his cold blood burned.

"Loopy head. 's what I got."

"Yea, we were gonna let you sleep that off." Flashes of what had happened in the library flooded back to him as he finally began to place Dorian's voice. The Vamp was apparently standing a few feet in front of him, peering anxiously into Spike's face.

He opened his eyes slowly, but the room around him was spinning, and it made him even dizzier than he currently was. Groaning, he shut them again.

When the grogginess had begun to subside, his subconscious mind began to kick itself. It was telling him to get up.

"Can't make me," he said aloud, taunting his own brain. The minion appointed to watch over him, having begun to doze, jerked awake. "No, I don't think I will. Thank you for offering, though."

'Holy shit, Spike's gone crazy.' Terrified, the young Vampire ran to the door.

"Dorian! It's Spike!" The elder came running, followed by a small pack of curious Vamps.

"Alright, fine. I'll do it." Spike's piercing blue eyes flew open as Dorian bent over him. "Oi! Back off, bollock-brain!"

"Sorry, Spike. Just wanted to see if you were gonna join us again." Spike growled. The world looked a lot clearer after waking up a second time.

"Did none of you idiots grab the bloody book?" The crowd around him shifted nervously, and he groaned as he stood up slowly. He was still a dizzy, but he had a hunch it was nothing a little snack, followed by a few hours of Soap Net, wouldn't cure. "Incompetent buncha wankers. That's what you lot are."

"Won't happen again, Spike."

"It bloody well not." He took a few steps forward, immensely satisfied when he didn't topple over. "Right then. You all stay here, hunt in shifts, don't stake nobody, the usual. I'm goin' back to my crypt to recover; tomorrow, we're back to focusing on Giles." He turned to go, but Dorian cleared his throat superiorly.

"Questions from the audience?" Spike asked, raising an eyebrow.

"What do you want to do with the girl?"

"What girl?" As soon as he said it, her scent hit him. Anne. Here, in the factory. He took in a deep unnecessary breath, trying to hone in on her. She was on the lower level, terrified, and basically unharmed. Just as he'd requested.

When passing by the cafeteria before the library incident, he had given the order that the blonde girl was not to be touched. He himself had called dibs, knowing Anne's ownership would never be challenged that way. But at the time, he'd pushed the incident out of his mind, vowing to deal with her after Giles was a pile of bloody body parts. His motives behind the order had been selfish, as he was entitled to give as a Vampire Master. She was a rather interesting human, one he didn't want his employees drooling on. But whether he'd actually intended to take her himself, or harbored the wish to obey her request never to bite her…he didn't know.

"How sweet of you, Dorian. I think I'll go gather up my toy, and be on my merry way." He patted Dorian's head with a gesture that could have been either affectionate, or patronizing. He loved the fact that his second-in-command would spend hours trying to discern between them after he made his exit.

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOX

She was tied to a metal pole protruding from the concrete floor. His pigshit minions had secured her with twine, not rope, and her mouth was full of a gag made from an old, dirty t-shirt. She had lowered herself to the floor, where her head leaned on her knees. A former accountant watched over her from a stool several feet away, and he stood up when Spike's presence became apparent. Anne didn't move, though he could see her eyelashes fluttering.

"Fought like an animal when Dorian hauled her in. She had a cross that we already dumped, and a stake." He picked the crude wooden object up from a nearby overturned bin, and held it out to Spike, point first. When he realized that he was pointing a stake at his leader, however, the panic caused him to fumble with and drop the weapon.

"For Acathla's sake, give it to me before we're both dust." It was in his hands, and he turned it over, looking for any markings. It didn't have any; just a whittled piece of wood. But the fact that the Protector had her armed meant that Anne was indeed a player in this game.

"You probably could have taken Dorian. Don't know how much Giles has taught you, but if he didn't take this from you the second he got his hands on your bendable little body, you would have had the element of surprise." He crouched down in front of her, but she didn't move. Oh, she started to shake, but she didn't move. "I'll be taking this. Puttin' it in a special place." Still nothing.

Singing a Misfits song to himself, Spike untied her. There were small scratches in the places the twine had bitten her, but nothing a handful of band aids couldn't fix. He threw her over his shoulder as she started to squirm. Without blinking, he turned sharply so her head bashed the pole, and she fell silent.

"I'm out. Happy hunting," he said to the former accountant as he made his way to the back loading dock. He climbed onto his motorcycle, settling Anne in front of him so that her unconscious form leaned back into him. It didn't look as suspicious as a biker with a young girl slung over his shoulder, and it was easier. All pluses.

As the wind stung his somewhat blurry eyes, the warm dead-weight in his arms shifted. Damn. She wasn't supposed to wake up yet. Apparently he hadn't hit her head as hard as planned.

"Hmm?" she murmured, the noise falling on his ears like a dove settling into its nest.

"Bad Spike!" he scolded himself aloud. He'd promised himself no more poetry many years ago, and rarely slipped up. But when he did, it was often times such as this; when he wasn't feeling quite top notch.

"Spike?" she questioned quietly, her eyes fluttering open, and her left hand feeling around. It found his legs, and she jumped. Only a quick show of skill by Spike kept her from sending them both into the highway divider. "Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God." The scent of her fear was tantalizing, making him question again what he was going to do with her. Keep up his bargain? Bite her quickly? Have a little fun with her first? "Someone help me, please!" Her plea wasn't very loud, but he clamped a hand over her mouth anyway.

"Shush. In my day, women were to be seen and not heard." Her eyes flashed definitely for a moment before being flooded with terror once more, and he chuckled. "Luckily for you, I don't believe in that rot. Known some ladies that were true fighters. Got a lotta respect for them, even if I don't particularly like them." Darla. What a bitch. But she could take a whole mob, laughing as she scratched and nibbled.

Buffy wracked her brain as he stopped talking to her and concentrated on steering. It was good- the motorcycle was wobbling a little too much for her taste anyway. She took a deep breath through her nose, trying to calm herself. Not allowing herself the luxury of panic, she assessed her situation.

She was going to die. That was the result of her assessment. She was alone, on an almost-empty highway with an evil Vampire, heading God knows where, at a completely indecent hour. Deciding that she might have a better chance to escape if she could work on her plan in advance, she tapped him on the thigh.

"Yes, sweet bottom?"

"Where are you taking me?" she asked as he removed the hand.

"My place." The way he said it, so nonchalantly, made her feel like it was Riley. 'Let's go to my place.' It wasn't right for her sweet, human boyfriend, and this THING to share lingo. Shouldn't a Vampire call it something cooler, like a lair, anyway?

"When are you going to kill me?" He shrugged; she felt it against her shoulders. She was trapped between his arm, his hand, and his chest. It hit her just then that this would have been a very intimate position with any other guy. And how weird it would be with any other guy- Riley was her man. Riley was her first real boyfriend, her only real boyfriend. She'd given her self to him, ALL of herself. And she knew that (in the event Spike didn't have her on the menu in the near future) she'd be with Riley for a very long time, if not forever.

"Have you forgotten about our little bargain?"

"No, I just assumed you had." He nodded thoughtfully.

"I'm undecided. I always am- there's so many options when you don't have a conscious to get in the way."

"Can I say something?" As had happened during her previous encounter with Spike, the more scared she got, the more casually she was able to talk to him. That couldn't be right. She should get her head examined. Assuming, you know, that it stayed attached to her body.

"If you must."

"If you decide, for some reason, not to kill me, could you do it before Wednesday? Because that's when I have this huge math test, and I can't make it up. Living with that over my head won't be fun."

"So you choose death instead?"

"N-no. I just meant that if you're not feeling very kill-y, what harm would it do to let me go a few days early?" Behind her, he was smirking. He liked her- he liked her logic, he liked her way of speaking, he liked her courage. Another verse began to take shape in his mind…she who stared down the lion yet had more reserves from which to draw- BAD SPIKE.

"So you'll study your pretty little arse off Tuesday night?"

"Oh, no, I'll look at my friend's notes. She takes really good notes."

"Tisk-tisk. That's not very scholarly."

"I'm not very scholarly."

"Shame."

"Well, you don't exactly scream 'bookworm' yourself." Ah, how wrong she was. She whose scent tingled the senses, making any sensible man's very self shrivel once removed from its tangible elusiveness.

It was definitely time for a nap.

He dragged the bike back to its hiding spot, all the while keeping a hand wrapped around Anne's wrist. He led her inside as he debated what to do with her. She wasn't confined to the crypt in a few hours like he was, and there were definitely some weapons strewn around that he didn't want to risk her playing with while he slept. Wooden ones, in particular. Whether or not she had the stones, figuratively speaking, to kill him was yet to be discovered. For now, he wanted rest, and she needed to be secured.

He dug a pair of handcuffs out of a box, and her eyes widened when she saw their glint in the candlelight.

"I'm gonna cuff you to the bed with all my possessions out of your reach. I will then go to sleep. You can't hurt me, so I'd appreciate it if you would refrain from attacking me with your bare hands, because I need the shut eye. You can sleep too, if you want. I haven't decided how I'm going to deal with you yet, so I won't kill you for a few hours." She said nothing as he backed her against the bed, and pushed her down. She went limp as he locked her down, and he jumped over her body, landing on her other side. "Sweet dreams, Anne." He then remembered that wasn't her real name. He'd ask her when he awoke.

Buffy lay silently, finding that the only comfortable position she could achieve with the handcuffs was to lie on her side, facing Spike. She'd watched Riley sleep once, though it was on the couch, and during a movie. She wasn't actually allowed to spend the night at his house yet. It would have provoked some not-fun questions from Joyce. Speaking of Joyce, she'd be pissed when Buffy didn't come home. She'd think she was at the Bronze, or with Riley. Buffy cringed as she thought about her mother's anger, and then became sad when she realized that Joyce would soon realize Buffy wasn't slinking around with her friends. She'd be crushed.

Time to focus on something else, she told herself. Something other than the pain her mother would endure if she lost her only child. So instead, she focused on Spike. He was different from Riley (apart from the obvious 'dead' and 'alive' thing) in that he didn't breathe. Well, that did kinda fit under the 'dead' category, but still. She'd watched Riley's chest move up and down for twenty minutes, letting the sounds of his lungs wash over her. Spike didn't breathe. His eyelids didn't flicker. He didn't twitch. She was, in all effects, lying next to a corpse. But, as did all corpses, he looked peaceful. Like he was beyond all earthly problems. Like nothing could touch him anymore.

She reached out and felt the tip of his nose with her fingertip, just to make sure the skin planned on staying there. She felt like he was in danger of decaying right before her eyes, his soul passing on as his body crumbled. And about that whole soul thing, how was it possible to not have one? A soul was a person, it was who they were. If they didn't have a soul, what prompted the bones and organs to do their thing? Shouldn't they be a vegetable?

What could be in Spike? Memories, apparently. That was obvious from the whole 'my mom was a great lady' thing. And emotions- he'd loved Drusilla. And a demon, according to Giles. So if a soul had just served as a conscious for Spike, there was apparently not as much to a soul as people hyped it up. But if it was just a conscious, then there must still be some of the human he had been many years ago left inside him. Feelings, and weaknesses.

It must have been all the deep thinking she was doing, but she came to a conclusion about her situation then. Spike would more than likely kill her if he wanted to, and not kill her if he didn't want to. No amount of good behavior or brownnosing could change that. So she resolved to make the most of her position, and unravel the mystery that was becoming more and more mysterious to her; who was Spike? It couldn't hurt, and she was fascinated with this creature that could kill without blinking and die without dying.

When Spike awoke a few hours later, she had curled up as far away from him as she could get; but she was sleeping. She had either been exhausted enough to fall asleep in the presence of a bad guy, or she was braver than he'd initially thought.

His lips curved into a smile. Who the hell was this little girl? She was terrified of him, but she still treated him like an equal. She talked to him. She didn't act like he was beneath her, or better than her.

His brain would have composed a verse concluding in the word 'enigma' at that moment, had he not stopped himself in time.