Thank you all so very much for the awesome reviews! I promise that I will respond personally to all when I get a chance. Must write while the ink flows, so to speak.
Some feedback I received was that my chapters could be a little longer, so I am going to attempt it. Please let me know if I have got it right or not.
I am also shaking in my shoes that the best is behind me, but I am loving where this is going so far! So bear with me while I let this story use my fingers to write itself out. I have about 12k words written in a fever of inspiration last night, so I am switching between the overwhelming drive to get this story into words and rereading for pure enjoyment, then rereading for check for the awesome amount of mistakes one makes when writing like an insane person!
Anyway, enjoy! Hopefully.
And the bit I always forget - Nothing is mine except this story, and even that isn't mine but rather it is simply using me to get itself written. Non beta'ed.
A/N - I put this at the bottom so that people would see it. Some violent stuff coming up in future chapters that some might not agree the characters doing and totally what I would have done in their place. Nothing groiny (yet...), but some bloodshed, mild torture and death that might be upsetting, so please be warned.
Buffy reached out her hands to the violently thrashing vampire, but Faith smashed her hands away. Tears streaming down both their faces, Faith shook Buffy hard by her arms.
"Don't Buffy! You'll get trapped by the beam! Turn it off!" Another harsh shake and the words sunk past the panic in Buffy's mind. Together the women raced to the console, but once there, stood looking dumbly at all the switches and toggles.
"DO SOMETHING!" Buffy screamed!
Faith's hands shook wildly as they hovered over the panels, but she was too afraid to touch anything. A dark chuckle from the cage reminded them that they had the perfect instruction manual.
Spinning around Buffy was at the cage door in a split second.
"TELL ME HOW TO TURN IT OFF!" But the cage's occupant merely laughed.
"No, why should I?" Buffy glanced over her shoulder at the writhing vampire and back again at the caged man. Without another thought, she reached through the bars and grabbed his broken hand. At her rough handling, the man screamed and thrashed, but Buffy didn't waver. She yanked his arm out and with one smooth motion, unsheathed her dagger and sliced off all four fingers, blood spraying in an arc across the room.
"Because if you don't, I will cut off one part of your body at a time until you do or you die, whatever comes first." She slammed him up against the bars so that his ear was at her mouth and hissed. "And I will make sure that you live a loooong time as I do it!"
"YES YES! I'LL DO IT! PLEASE!" the man screamed as his lifeforce pumped out the remains of his fingers. Quickly Buffy unlocked the cage and threw the man towards the consol. With a shaking hand, the man fumbled with levers and there was sudden blessed silence. Buffy didn't even look at the man as she sped with slayer speed to the caged vampire. He lay still at the bottom of the cage, eyes closed. Buffy reached out a shaking hand and pressed it to a cold arm that hung from the cage. If Angel had been thin, then Spike was a skeleton. His bones seemed to be pressed against his skin, his face sunken and bruised. Cuts and gashes covered his entire body and burns were liberally spread between what little skin remained. Shirtless, his once lithe and sculptured body was a study in biology – bones and ligaments all that seemed to remain. His once black jeans were rags, barely holding on, the only thing that had seemed to survive were his boots, battered and scarred they seemed odd now on the tortured vampire. His hands were as if he had tried to claw his way through sheer rock – torn and bloody, claws even missing on a few of his fingers. His once slicked back bleach blond hair was matted and limp, stuck to his head in places by what looked like blood. His or the scaly pig thing Buffy didn't know and honestly didn't want to know. She choked back a sob, nearly gagging on the effort it took.
Faith appeared beside her.
"Buff, they're not dust! They're not dust so we know they are still here. We just gotta fix 'em yeah?" Faith tugged at Buffy's arm and turned her to face her. "Buff?" The blond slayer slowly focused on Faith and nodded. She glanced over and saw that Faith had relocked up the leader and thrown the unconscious one in an empty cage beside him. "Buff! Forget them for now. Let's go get Angel in here and figure out where to go from there, yeah? Buff?"
Buffy nodded silently and stiffened her shoulders.
She was the Slayer. She had done this before, with both of them. She knew the routine.
Between the two of them and some ingenuity, they managed to drag the snarling vampire out of the foul room and into the portal room. Pulling Spike's cage down, they settled the two vampires close to each other, but out of arms reach until they could figure out just how badly damaged the two men were. By then, both Faith and Buffy were completely exhausted. They stumbled into the other room and collapsed onto the pallets, too wiped out to even think of moving them to the portal room.
It was many hours later before either Slayer moved. Their exhaustion complete and their reserves drained.
It wasn't until the snarls and screams sounded that they awoke, Stumbling out into the portal room and wiping the crust from their eyes, they saw that they obviously hadn't moved the cages 'quite' far enough. Angel had managed to reach out and drag the leader's cage flush against his and was thrashing, trying to reach the terrified man crouching in the far corner of his cage, scrambling to avoid the rabid vampire. Buffy stood watching, unmoved by the terror of the man, but after a few minutes of listening to him plead for help, she decided to move his cage away. If only because they needed him to work the machine.
Angel screamed in rage as his prey was moved and Buffy shivered at the pure animalistic visage on his once beloved face. Spike was still a silent slumped pile on the bottom of his own cage, showing no sign of movement in the hours the two slayers had been asleep. Faith merely stood watching in horror as her mentor and friend thrashed and raged against his cage bars.
Buffy straightened her shoulders and opened their meagre resources. There was only a little bit of food remaining and their last bottle of refilled water. Sharing out the meal between the two of them and ignoring the pleas of the two caged men, they ate quickly and silently, a backdrop of now quiet growls coming from Angel as he sulked in the bottom of his cage.
It was only once they finished and their pack put to one side that the two women finally spoke.
Quietly Faith spoke as though anything louder than a whisper would make the situation worse.
"Buffy, what the fuck are we to do now? I mean look at them... they obviously need more blood than we have got here, hell they need more blood than a blood bank could supply! We can't let them out like that. I remember Angel that time at the Manse..." her voice trailed off uncertain.
After a few moments, Buffy nodded.
"First of all, we get these guys to tell us how to work the machine. Then we get back to the Camp and get some warriors here to clean up. We can't leave those poor creatures in those cages and I can't let them free..." Her heart shuddered at the decisions she had to make. 'Hopefully Ollordna knows something that can help. But I can promise you something, I'm not leaving them here. I don't care how long it takes..." Her voice trailed off as well.
Neither woman could stay still, so they got to cleaning up the portal room, dragging corpses to the windows in the far room and tossing them out. They found the stash of food in the living area and after a few taste tests and no ill effects, decided to risk it rather than starve themselves.
Angel continued to alternate between raging against his bars and sulking on the floor. When he started whimpering, Buffy knew she had to do something. Starvation in vampires was not nice and these two were definitely starving. But a search showed no signs of any more pig creatures and a quick interrogation of their 'guests' revealed that they were fetched from another dimension, so that vetoed that idea. Faith came up with a solution. Without a word, she stepped up to the cage with the other man and yanked his arm out similar to Buffy yesterday.
With a cup on the floor, she stretched out his arm and flicked it with her dagger. Realising what she was doing the man struggled violently, but was no match for slayer strength and determination. Buffy looked on impassively. They needed the blood. Fact was fact.
When the cup was only half full, Faith wrapped a rag around the man's arm and let him scramble back into the relative safety of his cage. Carrying the cup of life-giving blood she came close to Angel's cage, but as the vampire thrashed and carried on, was unable to get close enough to give him the cup without him knocking it over or grabbing her. Buffy came up with an idea and snatched up a water bladder. Quickly draining the water out, she motioned to Faith who poured the now cooling blood into the leather bag. Stopping it well, she tossed it to the slavering vampire who snatched it out of the air, and with one bite, sucked the bag dry in seconds. When it no longer drained any blood, he threw it aside in a rage.
"Well, it worked at least" Faith shrugged at Buffy. The smell of the blood had apparently roused Spike who was lying on the bottom of his cage, blinking yellow eyes blearily in the bright light of the portal room. Buffy could see him try to get up but it was obvious that he lacked the strength to even lift his head. Muscles twitched and tensed but all he seemed able to do was roll his head to the side as he looked towards the snarling form of his Sire. Even though he had apparently drained the man thrown against his cage the previous day, it didn't show at all. That scared Buffy more than anything. If he was so far gone yesterday that a full body of blood got him this far, it meant that she had nearly lost him. Again.
Her heart stuttered at the thought and she dropped to her knees, hands clutching her aching breast as she sobbed deeply.
Faith crouched down and wrapped her arms around her sobbing sister slayer. She may not know exactly why Buffy was crying as though her heart had just broken, but she wasn't stupid, she had a very good idea thank you very much.
After a while, Faith could make out words in the heartrending sobs.
"I can't...c-c-can't lose him again... not again..never again...nnooooo" Faith sat down, pulling Buffy close and merely rocked the broken girl. It was a while before Buffy's sobs quietened and in the following silence, they could hear an almost silent croon. Almost felt rather than heard, was a low crooning sound. Looking up Buffy's eyes crashed with yellow eyes. Spike still lay on the bottom of his cage, but he was looking at the two women clutching each other on the floor. A soothing croon could be heard and with a shock, Buffy realised it was coming from him! Scrambling to her feet, she stumbled to the side of his cage, but as her hands touched the bars, the croon switched to a snarl and with extreme effort, the wounded vampire shrank from her hands.
Buffy quickly realised that he was too badly entrenched in his wild demon side, but she knew, just for a moment, that he knew she was there. Whether it was him or the demon, she didn't know and honestly didn't care!
Beside her, Angel went wild! Slamming himself against the bars, his arms stretching to reach Buffy, the rage a veritable wave pouring off him.
"Buffy, come away from Spike, quickly" Faith hissed. Retreating from Spike's side and returning to Faiths, Buffy was stunned to see Angel calm down. Angel looked towards the supine figure of Spike and growled. Buffy would have sworn on Giles's book collection that the growl sounded like a question.
And when Faith agreed, Buffy realised she had spoken out loud. Quietly so as not to interrupt, they watched as Angel pressed himself against the bars of his cage and growled at Spike. The growls continued, soft and querying until Spike pulled himself up enough to look in the direction of his Sire and growled softy back. Satisfied at the response, Angel settled back down, his glare now settled firmly on the two slayers.
"Well, that answers that question Buff. I don't think they will be a problem with each other."
Buffy was stunned. She knew that vampire 'families' were different than minions, but to see it with her own eyes, and especially being THESE two, was incredible!
But after a few moments, she remembered what they had been trying to do as Angel resumed his rumbling whimpers and snarls. How was she to get them fed? She could bleed the two men easily, that wasn't a problem, but she knew that it wouldn't be nearly enough.
Coming to a decision, she turned to Faith and outlined her idea. Faith agreed and volunteered to head back to the camp earlier than planned. The sooner she left, the sooner she would return.
Before she left to return to the camp, they bled both the men. They had given the men a choice. Volunteer the blood, or have it taken via vamp extraction. As they stated, they only needed one alive to work the machine. The other man had thrust his arm out quickly, but the leader had sat there, falsely smug in thinking that he was more important than his man. Buffy took great pleasure in draining him as far as she could. As soon as he started swaying, she tied off the rag and thrust him back into his cage. The other, she only took another half cup.
Finding another leather bladder, they split the blood between the two bags and tossed them into the vampire's cages. Angel again snatched his out of the air, draining it in seconds and tossing it aside, where as Spike didn't even look at it as it smacked into his arm.
Buffy whimpered. 'Come on Spike, COME ON!'
But the bleached vampire didn't even blink. Hoping to rouse a reaction from Angel again and by extension Spike, Buffy approached the cage and tentatively reached through the bars to touch Spikes boot. At the hissed "BUFFY!" she flinched back and glared over her shoulder at Faith. Turning back, she found herself face to face with vampire visage. Throwing herself backwards out of reach, she watched as Spike merely lay back down again, ignoring the bladder of cooling blood at his side.
She looked despairingly at faith who merely shrugged.
"Fucked if I know B" was Faiths only response.
Turning back to Spike and ignoring the spitting Angel, she reached through and grabbed the bladder of blood. Spike still didn't move. Buffy waved the bladder near his face, but still no response. Buffy was terrified. It was almost like that time when the First was playing with Spike's sanity and he had opted to die by starvation. It took a long time and vampires went completely batshit crazy Spike had told her once, but it was possible apparently.
Buffy came to a fast conclusion. Tossing the bladder to Angel, who again snatched and drained, Buffy looked at Faith and motioned her over.
"Be ready to yank" was all she said the other slayer. Before Faith could understand that cryptic comment, Buffy had slashed her wrist and let the blood drip right on Spike's face.
The affect was instantaneous! A mere flash of white skin and yellow eyes and Spike was latched onto the Slayer's wrist, sucking great draughts of exquisite slayer blood. Angel was going insane at the smell, his thrashing causing his cage to literally rock from side to side. Spike wrapped his arms around Buffy's trying to prevent the heavy nectar form being stolen away. All too soon, Buffy nodded to Faith and Faith placed a foot against the cage and together they yanked!
Spike was left behind in his cage as Buffy's arm was wrenched away. This time, he followed Angel's example and thrashed weakly at his bars, trying to get closer to the blood that smelted so incredible.
Buffy and Faith were forced to retreat to the living area to allow the vampires time to calm down.
Buffy expected Faith to launch into her, but other than a quirked eyebrow and a clean strip of cloth torn from Faith's shirt, that was that.
"Faith?" Buffy couldn't understand the no condemnation.
"B?"
"Nothing?"
Faith sighed and turned to Buffy. "Look Buffy, I am not Giles, Willow or Zander. I'm not gonna say shit against you helping Spike. He's one of the good guys and frankly, after the way we all treated him, we owe him a lot more than a few pints of the red stuff." And with that, she checked the now quiet vamps and left the living area, leaving a stunned Buffy behind.
