Drusilla felt the world shifting around her. The pixies were dancing in circles, cheering and laughing as Daddy bled. She snarled at them. Her lovely William was breathing, his heart beating, his blood alive. Watching him move, she snarled. He could not kill her daddy. She moved toward him keeping his gaze locked to hers.

"Be in me," she said softly, her voice pitched low and gentle as she approached her creation. He stilled, his pupils dilated. She heard him snarl even as reality shifted.

She looked at William and smiled as the dancers swirled around the ballroom between them. His hair was golden in the amber glow of the room. He was lovely and lethal and hers.

Spike shrugged against the restrictions of his Victorian evening wear. These damn joy rides of Dru's came with all the inconveniences. He looked at the swirling dancers. The waltz, how very risqué.

There was no sense of the real world, she'd dragged him pretty damn deep this time. raising a defiant brow, he scanned the crowd of overdressed idiots. This had been a particularly bloody evening. Their first joint hunt as equals. There was a time he might have enjoyed the stroll down memory lane. He took a deep breath.

"Let me go, Dru." His anger was palpable. She shivered as he strode through the dancing couples, making no effort to avoid them. "I will hurt you."

"Pretty please." She clapped her hands twice and touched her chin with her fingertips. Her William knew how she liked to hurt. She spun around in a delirious circle.

His hand grabbed her shoulder and wrenched her body around to face him. She smiled, looking up at him, relishing his displeasure. She let the world around them melt. She shivered in anticipation as they stood on a cobblestone street.

"I'm not impressed with your parlor tricks, Dru." He thrust her from him and spun about. She pouted and strolled about, trailing her fingers through her long hair.

"This is our place, my William. It always will be. You learned to live here." She looked at him coyly.

He looked at the mews and took a deep breath of the polluted air. She'd captured the moment so perfectly. There had been a time he had enjoyed these tours. He examined his surroundings and shrugged. It was just a place now. The damp cobblestones shining in the moonlight, the bite of the cold air on his skin and in his lungs, it was all as it had been, but this time there was no surge of fond memories.

"I died here, and didn't have the sense to stay in the ground." His eyes flashed as they changed from blue to green veined amber.

"You are not dead, my boy." She slid towards him her innocent eyes fastened on him. "You are naughty for playing with Daddy's toys, but you are not dead."

Suddenly, a grey, dingy little whole of an apartment swirled up and enclosed them. Drusilla giggled and patted his arm as she forced him to witness his mate's first time. It was too delicious to watch the pain cross his brow.

"She belongs to Daddy." Drusilla whispered, her breath cold on his skin. She bit his earlobe. "You are a very naughty puppy."

Rage boiled through him and he expanded his senses, forcing their surroundings to his will. He couldn't break free, but he could make her suffer. He smiled as the familiar walls of his bedroom formed around them. He looked to the bed and found Buffy smiling as she read a book, a lock of hair twisted around her finger. His mark rode her neck. Their mingled scents filled the air. He could feel Drusilla trying to fight him, trying to change the image, but he could feel Buffy now. Drusilla's thrall was weakening. His mate was fighting for their lives, and he was trapped in his own damn mind.

Drusilla grabbed at the image of Buffy on the bed before him, but her hand passed through the image of his love. He smiled as she snarled and turned toward him.

"You can't touch her. Hell, you can't even hold a candle to her." He laughed and forced them back to the ballroom. He leaned against the wall across from Drusilla and winked at her. No reason to let a good thing go to waste.

Blood dripped from Druilla's nose. She wiped at it and stared as it glistened in the ballroom's flickering lights. Her William had grown strong. She shuddered in delight and licked the blood from her hand with a casual swipe of her tongue. He had shed the repressive clothing and slouched against the wall in jeans and a black sweater. He looked to the large doors and she watched as he moved not toward her to continue the battle, but toward the cursed slayer that was destroying her family.

Spike smiled as the image of his love, smiled at him. He touched her gently, reverently. It was enough to hold her and touch her even if this Buffy was only a construct of his mind. He spun them onto the floor and she grabbed him with a breathy laugh. It was a perfect moment. He would have to find place to take his love dancing when this battle was Behind them. She would enjoy the change from their usual haunts. He hummed along with the waltz keeping this Buffy with him as Drusilla tried to change the world around him.

He waltzed his love across darkened cobblestones, the factory, the mansion, and a probably a thousand other places as Drusilla tried to break him. Her green eyes never wavered from his. Wars raged around them. Nazis threatened him. The mob in Prague attacked. Scents of blood filled the air, screams sounded all around, but he looked in his mate's eyes and let the distraction float away.

He was with Buffy, his body bound to hers, his demon safe in her thrall.

"Be in me, be in me." Drusilla's voice sounded so far away.

"Stay with me." Buffy said softly, the voice filling the room despite her unmoving lips. "Come back to me."

Everything dissolved and he fell back into reality. He felt the earth beneath him and Buffy's arms around him as she propped him up. He forced his eyes open, fighting the nausea that hit as he tried to prepare for the next attack.

Sophie was crouched before him, snarling. A bloody sword blade flashed as she shifted her stance. Where had that come from? He looked around for Penn, but he was nowhere to be seen. Had the bastard run away?

Drusilla dragged Angel away by his one good arm. He looked like a great hulking doll as she yanked him up over the wall. He could see the other, torn almost completely from the hulking bastard's body dragging in the dirt. There was a nasty gash along Angelus' thigh. He could see the femur glazed with blood, the skin and muscle hanging down obscenely and dragging in the dirt. Why weren't the girls finishing the bastard off?

He felt Buffy pressing his skin together, and dropped his eyes to his chest. His rib cage was exposed. Well, bollocks, when had that happened?

"I'm not dust, Love." He stopped her frantic hands. "I'll be fine."

He groaned as she shifted. Her fear was sharp in his nostrils. Buffy was cradling him, a bloody gash on her forehead. He reached a shaking hand up to her face and wiped at the blood before it could run into her eyes. She stroked his face, her eyes fixed on the retreating vampires.

He knew she was holding it together with nothing but sheer will. Her body was shaking beneath him. They needed to get home, but they had to heal him up a bit first. Leaving a bloody trail would not be good idea. His blood didn't reliably dust anymore.

"We need to find some temporary shelter." Sophie said as she turned and took in his condition. "He needs to heal before we can head should and we should check our own wounds as well."

Buffy shook her head at Sophie and let her tears fall. Spike smiled as she bent forward and allowed him to lick the precious water from her skin. The strange tingle on his tongue was welcome as he felt his body heal in a burst of searing heat. Buffy ran her hand along his smooth skin with a smile.

"We need to move. Dru and Angelus might be down for the count, but they could send minions." Buffy smiled and pushed Spike up to asitting position. "I'm just not up for a rousting game of whack a vamp at the moment."