"Me" – Yes, I suppose I do mean conscience.

Elie Norea - There will be NO Initiative in this story! I hate the Initiative, as well as the Watcher's Council. Why? I don't like humans coming in where they have no jurisdiction, and trying to boss the SLAYER, a mystical being that's been around since a long time ago, appointed by very powerful wise old men, around. Making one of my favorite scenes the one where the Council Building blows up! Boom!

Buffy awoke, yawning, in a bed that was not her own. It was a lot nicer than the bed her parents had bought her in eighth grade- fluffier, softer, warmer. She tried to flip over onto her back, but something held her down.

Her eyes flew open as she screamed, remembering where she was. In Spike's crypt, in Spike's bed, in Spike's handcuffs.

"Give a bloke some warnin' before you do that!" Spike shouted from somewhere. She scooted up on the bed, so she could sit with her hands held behind her. She looked around, not seeing Spike, but realizing that someone (who else would it be?) had tucked her under the covers during the course of her sleep.

She heard movement across the room, as he came down a ladder. She'd forgotten about the ladder last night- it meant they were underground. Underground in a cemetery, in a crypt whose previous occupants might or might not still be present. But indeed, he'd made her climb down it last night.

"Can-can you untie me? Or uncuff me, technically?" she asked. The metal was rubbing against the spots where the Vampires at the factory had secured her, and it stung a little. "I won't run."

"Why should I trust you?" he asked, smirking when she bit her lip in thought. He'd been planning to let her up anyway, and just lock the doors. But this was more fun.

"I'll give you my shoes so I can't run." He cracked up as he took the key out of his pocket, and leaned over her to unlock the cuffs.

"That's a very interesting solution. Kay, I'll take your shoes." She rolled her wrists as she stood up, and one at a time slipped out of her sequined flats. They weren't very practical, but they were the latest style. Pretty much ANYTHING with sequins was in style. She handed them to him, and he furrowed his brow as he visibly debated what to do with the shoes. Finally, he sighed, and tossed them into a corner.

"Uh, I can still get them."

"See, you're not supposed to tell me that. Then you can escape later on when I'm not looking."

"You're letting me escape?"

"No, I'm just telling you what NOT to do when you're captured by Vampires."

"Okay. Noted." He ran a fingers through his hair, and she noticed for the first time that it wasn't gelled back like she always saw it. It was beginning to curl on the ends, and it didn't look so shiny anymore. He also had taken off that horrid duster, and stood in front of her in black jeans and a Sex Pistols t-shirt. He looked relatively normal. He looked kinda hot.

She looked away quickly before he could catch her checking him out. First of all, he was evil. You couldn't go around, checking out evil. And second, she was with Riley. Riley was her guy, and he probably wouldn't appreciate her thinking fluffy thoughts about another guy. In fact, she thought, she shouldn't be thinking fluffy thoughts- Spike was OLD, and he had that whole bad-boy thing working for him. Some girls went for that, but she found herself drawn to the nice boys. Boys you could take home to Joyce. Boys that would treat you right.

"Do you want something to eat?" he asked her, breaking into her thoughts. He had moved across the room, and was looking at her from next to the ladder.

"You mean like bread and water?"

"Or ramen. I have lots of ramen. I like ramen."

"So you're willingly going to feed your hostage from your own food supply?"

"Is that wrong?"

"Yes that's wrong, because it's not like you're feeding me to keep me alive until you can work your diabolical plans on me! You're feeding me because you thought I might be hungry! You're a crappy captor!"

"Well, you're a crappy captive."

"I'm sorry, but I don't have much practice being held against my will."

"Yea, well, fine. I'm not feeding you. So there." They glared at each other. Her stomach rumbled.

"Ramen sounds good."

"Is beef okay?"

"Perfect."

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOX

They were sitting with a foot between them on Spike's couch, both watching Cops as they ate noodles from separate bowls. She was using a fork; he was using chopsticks.

A thought struck her as she looked at the familiarity he was showing her. Spike didn't know what to do with her. He wasn't the one who had taken her, that had been an uglier, burlier Vampire, named Dorian according to what Spike had said before he untied her. She was now in his custody, though, and it didn't appear he'd ever meant for that to happen.

"Hey, Spike?" she asked. She was still afraid, but talking to him had proved not to be a problem.

"Yes kitten?"

"Why did you take me out of the factory?" He shrugged.

"Don't know. Wasn't thinkin' about it at the time."

"So you really have no idea what to do with me?" He growled.

"I'm the Big Bad! I'm gonna chop you to messes little girl, THAT'S what I'm going to do with you!" He hoisted noodle above his head with the chopsticks, slowly lowering the whole length of it into his mouth. "Not a bloody clue."

They continued eating and watching. Spike laughed as one of the criminals swung a bat at a cop, and Buffy silently cheered as the man was apprehended.

"I thought you lived at the factory," she said a few minutes later.

"Not much for company, luv."

"So you live here all by yourself, and commute?"

"Yes."

"Because?"

"Have you ever shared your bathroom with twenty immature, unwashed Vampires?" She wrinkled her nose.

"'Nuff said." He put his empty bowl down on the floor in front of him, and took a cigarette from his pocket. After lighting it and exhaling a plume of smoke, he took the remote from the couch arm, and turned the TV off. Buffy looked over at him with a noodle hanging from her mouth.

"What's your name?"

"Buffy," she replied before thinking. It came back to her then that she'd told him her name was Anne, and she'd planned on sticking to it ever after being captured.

"Buffy?" he asked. "Is that even a name?"

"Yes, it's a name!" she replied indignantly. "And it's better than Spike."

"Spike's a nickname. I put a railroad spike through the head of one of my critics." She squashed the feeling in the pit of her stomach away by refusing to focus on the 'through his head' part of the sentence.

"What's your real name, then?"

"William the Bloody."

"So William then. That's a nice name."

"William the Bloody."

"The Bloody is not part of you name. It is a title, one that angry villagers added on later, probably."

"If you can be Buffy, I can be The Bloody."

"No, Buffy is my name. It's on my birth certificate. The Bloody is NOT part of your name."

"We didn't do birth certificates in my day, so I can add whatever I want to my name."

"How old are you anyway?" He puffed himself out proudly.

"126."

"Wow. You could like be…my great-great grandpa."

"What are you, sixteen?"

"I'm seventeen."

"Not much difference."

"There is too."

"No there's not."

"You're really gonna fight me on this, aren't you?"

"Yes."

"Fine. There are worlds of difference between sixteen and seventeen." He took another puff as Buffy checked off her victory in her head. He turned towards her again.

"I'm going to contact the Protector. Tell him I have his Buffy, and where to meet me for further information." She gasped.

"No! I will not be part of you plan to kill Giles! He's a nice man!" He smirked.

"Vampire, luv. It's my nature."

"I won't go along with whatever you have in mind."

"Hey, you're a prisoner, remember? Not your place to say yes or no."

"Oh yea." She ate another noodle. Spike was being so nice to her, it was periodically slipping her mind.

"I'll be goin' back to the factory in a few hours. I'll lock you in, but you may wander if you wish. Don't hurt yourself." She nodded. "What are you to the Protector, anyway?"

"What does that mean?"

"Rupert's a lonely old bloke. Him hangin' round with a seventeen-year-old blonde is a little suspicious. Is he your 'grownup friend' or something?"

"Ew! No! He's the librarian at my school!"

"Why were you in the library the day I came for the manuscript?"

"I was serving detention."

"Why were you helping him snoop around for my factory?"

"Because I drove you there. Oh, we found it, by the way. He knows where your Vamps are hiding." Spike grimaced.

"Ah. Forgot. Well, I should go now in that case. Help yourself to what little food I have, watch TV, read some books. I'll be back later."

"You know you're a horrible captor?" she scolded him as he grabbed his duster from a nearby chair, and shrugged into it.

"Would you like me to tie you up?" She shut her mouth. "Good girl. Don't even bother trying to escape, there's no point." He turned to go, but thought again. Coming back to her, he reached out and touched her chin with his long, cold fingers. She froze as he knelt on the couch in front of her, and slowly leaned in. His lips touched hers seconds before she screamed at the look in his eyes, and he coaxed her mouth open with his tongue. Then Buffy was gone.

Funny. She'd always thought Riley was a good kisser. He was the only boy not in her grade she'd ever kissed, and she judged accordingly. As Spike turned the kiss into a thousand little licks and nips, she decided she was going to have to reevaluate.

He pulled back with a smirk, watching her chest heave up and down and her face turn red.

"I'm considering keeping you around. Even the Big Bad gets lonely." He turned and left, making sure the doors wouldn't open to her.

She sat on the couch, immobile, for ten minutes after his departure. THAT had been unexpected. What did it mean? What did he mean when he was considering keeping her around? She shuddered from the memory as much as from the wave of fear that washed over her.

Standing up, she began to walk around with the intent of calming herself. She found downstairs, in the corner, a waist-high bookshelf. She sat Indian-style on the floor and looked through it. He had, it seemed, several volumes of poetry. Everything from Emily Dickinson to Shel Silverstein. She smiled at the fact that 'William the Bloody' owned "A Light in the Attic," and skimmed more titles. A lot of older books, some classics, some newer thrillers. He seemed to be quite the Anne Rice fan. But he liked Bram Stoker too.

She picked up "Carmilla," a rather thin, dusty novel. Of course, out of all the books she could have picked, it was a Vampire novel. She found it funny that he had quite the collection of Vampire novels, though she assumed they were more like satires for him. Being an actual Vampire, there were bound to be discrepancies and mistakes in the books that he would find amusing.

She set down to reading it, trying not to think about Giles. She prayed he didn't fall for whatever Spike was plotting. But at the same time, she hoped Giles didn't stake Spike. And not just because she'd eventually stave to death in here alone, but because she wasn't done unraveling his mysteries.

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOX

Giles paced back and forth. The FBI would be at the school in the morning, looking for traces of Buffy. At first, Snyder had assumed that she'd run out, but Joyce Summers had reported soon that Buffy was missing. And Giles knew that their nocturnal guests were to blame.

He took a drink of brandy from the glass sitting on his kitchen table. This was his fault. He'd gotten her involved, and now she was probably dead. It was Kendra all over again- he'd seen a girl with some potential, talked her parents into letting her come with him, and trained her. She'd been bitten. She'd been turned. She'd come after him and his fellow Protectors, and it had been the council's decision to take her out. He'd been disgusted with them at the time, and asked to take a Hellmouth position soon after that. By now he'd had enough time to think on the matter, and had come to the conclusion that there was nothing else the council could have done without putting innocent lives at risk. He had accepted it.

But if he met bumpy Buffy one of these days, he might not be able to accept it again.

The phone rang, and he picked it up absentmindedly.

"D'you know that the friendly operators will give you any number, but no address? You'd be dead by now if they were more cooperative." He felt like he was having a heart attack. Spike.

"I know you have her, you bastard."

"Buffy? Yes, she's with us. And I'm wondering how far you'd go to get her back." He choked. No…not an ultimatum.

"You just made your staking twice as painful, Spike. I'll dowse it in Holy Water."

"Won't say, eh? Well, you're working late tomorrow night. We'll be there around nine-ish to talk terms."

"You're a bastard, Spike."

"You're making me blush, Rupert. Be there." He hung up as Giles refilled his glass from the bottle a few feet away. He wasn't sure he could handle this, but he had to. He had to save Buffy, at whatever cost to him.