Chapter Three

One hour, and another gravely wounded slayer later, Buffy reluctantly allowed the girls to retreat outside where they could better fight the vamps foolish enough to follow them there. They’d found the third impatient slayer just inside the door, her throat torn out and her body drained. After moving her body outside, the still vengeance-seeking slayers had stormed into the big all-purpose room, only to find themselves battling not just vampires, but booby traps and barricades of overturned furniture. They spent much of their time ducking additional furniture as the stronger vampires turned chairs and tables into weapons.

While the girls did manage to stake and behead a large number of minions, they had not been able to advance very far into the building without risking more losses. When Bobbi went down under the force of several vampires, the others had fought their way to her and pulled her bite riddled body away just in time. Buffy’s shout of “Outside, now!” sent them retreating to the relative safety of the open street. Even without the protection of the rapidly disappearing sun, the slayers were better able to use their skills when they didn’t have to worry about lack of space and booby traps.

Buffy scanned the street anxiously, not having seen Spike since he’d identified the turned slayer and -- with a joy in the battle that she hadn’t seen in him since he’d returned with his soul -- had called her out to take him on. The last time she’d seen them, Spike had thrown the turned slayer through one of the few windows not boarded up and had jumped through it after her.

Leaving the remaining slayers to clean up the minions willing to venture out into the street, Buffy began a worried search for the only vampire who mattered to her. She was seconds away from fighting her way back into the nest, when she felt the familiar signature and followed it to the alley behind the shelter. Both Spike and the vampire he was fighting – a powerful-looking girl that Buffy assumed was Dora – were bloodied and battered. They faced each other, chests heaving with unneeded breaths, the joy of battle clear on both their faces. Buffy hefted her stake, preparing to end the fight, when the alley began to fill with more vampires that seemed to be coming from nowhere.

“Spike! Come on! You can try again later. We need to--” She was interrupted by a hard kick to her back that sent her stumbling forward, stake dropping to the dirty floor of the alley. Sensing the movement behind her, she dropped and rolled, coming to her feet in time to block the intended blow from a grinning vampire clad in old fatigues. Back to back, she and Spike faced Dora and a small group of vampires, all wearing old uniforms indicating one branch of the military or another. Unlike the weaker minions that had overwhelmed the other slayers with sheer numbers, these vamps were obviously experienced and hardened fighters. And, based on the force of the blow she’d taken, Buffy could guess that they’d been filling up on slayer blood.

“So this is William the Bloody,” Dora sniffed. “You’re not all that. It’s a shame Chanterelle wants you alive; I’d love to be the slayer that dusted the Slayer of Slayers.”

“Sorry to disappoint, pet, but you’re not a slayer anymore. You’re just another vampire. As soon as the vamp that killed you had his one good day, you became another statistic.”

“That’s a little sexist, don’t you think, Spike?” The voice, so familiar and yet so different in tone came from some distance behind the ring of vampires surrounding Spike and Buffy. Anne/Chanterelle stepped closer, taking care to remain safely behind her bodyguards, but close enough for Spike to see her. “It wasn’t a man who turned her…it was me. I killed a slayer. Just like you have.”

“I should have thrown her out the window when I had the chance,” Buffy muttered, moving in a small circle, automatically responding to shifts in Spike’s position.

“Right there with you, love. Right now, though, what say we regroup and think about interesting ways to kill her somewhere a bit less crowded?”

“Edinburgh?” Buffy asked, referring to a similar situation in which they’d been surrounded by very angry Ch’lack demons.

“That’s the plan. On three…”

The listening vampires smiled to themselves, confident that whatever the two heroes had planned, they were more than ready for it. As Spike intoned, “One…” they tensed, preparing themselves to pounce before he could get to “three”. Which he’d had no intention of doing. At “one” he leapt almost straight up, his legs lashing out to smash two faces before gravity brought him down on the outside of the circle. At the same time, Buffy had thrown herself directly into Dora’s knees, smiling at her pained shriek. Buffy rolled past the temporarily crippled vampire, grabbing her abandoned stake as she did so. She came up outside the circle and drove her stake through the back of the nearest camo-clad minion. Not pausing to try to inflict more damage, she joined Spike in a break for the alley’s entrance, running until they were safely away from the building and within sight of the other slayers.

“Let’s go,” she said tersely, checking quickly that all the remaining slayers were able to walk under their own power.

“What about…”

“Everybody who isn’t vamp food or a too cocky vamp is right here. We’re going back to regroup.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

After dropping off Bobbi to join Janie in the hospital’s ER, the battered and bruised slayers returned to the residence. By the time they got there the Watcher/Housekeeper had already left to wait for the injured girls to be released into her care, but a note directed them to a casserole in the oven and cold drinks in the lounge refrigerator.


Shaking her head at them, Buffy headed for the suite that she and Spike had been given.

“I’m going to shower first…” She cast a critical eye at Spike and added, “But you need to eat.” She went to the cooler they’d brought with them and took out a bag of pig blood. “Here, drink this, and then after I eat…”

“I’m fine, Buffy,” he said, cutting her off before she could finish her thought.

“You’re not fine. You’re beat up, bloody and you’re going to be fighting a turned slayer who’s been snacking on slayer blood. I’m not sending you back there without evening the odds. This is not negotiable.” Her lip came out in stubborn pout, and she put her hands on her hips for emphasis.

“We’ll talk about it later,” he mumbled, tearing open the bag and guzzling the chilled blood. Buffy watched him from the corner of her eye, his lack of complaint about the temperature of the blood saying everything she needed to know about how badly his body needed replenishment.

“Damn right we will,” she vowed silently as she went into the bathroom and turned the water on. “Stupid, stubborn vampire.”

She knew that Spike’s reluctance to drink from her was a direct result of how close he’d come to draining her so many months ago. But she also knew that the chances of his losing control like that, or of her own unwillingness to stop him, were very slim if not non-existent. Something about the stony expression on his face when she emerged from the bathroom told her the resulting argument might not be something she wanted to have within earshot of younger slayers. With a sigh, she dressed, tossed him another bag of blood, and went downstairs to see if there was going to be any dinner left for her.

As the other slayers finished their meals and left to go shower and compare wounds, Buffy began to mull over her possible options. She was still thinking when Spike, looking better but still battered, walked past her to sit on the back porch and smoke. She watched him play with his lighter, finally bringing the flame to the tip of his cigarette and pulling the hot smoke into his lungs. The snick of the lighter snapping closed accompanied a broad smile that spread across her face.

When Spike came back inside, eyeing her suspiciously when she smiled at him, she stood up and took his hand.

“Time for bed. We have to get an early start tomorrow." She pulled him upstairs, helped him out of his clothes and pushed him towards the bed. “Just lie down and rest,” she said cheerfully. “I’ll be there as soon as I brush my teeth.”

Still watching her through narrowed eyes, he said, “Not going to drink from you, Slayer. Another packet of grade A Hampshire hog and a good night’s sleep, I’ll be back to normal.”

“Wasn’t going to ask you to,” she said cheerfully. “I’ve got a new plan.”

“Which is?”

“Oh, just something I remembered from high school.”

“You’re going to blow up the nest?” His eyes lit up with a male’s interest in making things go boom that didn’t seem to fade no matter how old or what species the male happened to be.

“Wrong high school, Spike. This was before your time. I’ll tell you about it tomorrow. Let’s get to sleep now, ‘k?”

Ignoring his frustrated growl, she slid between the sheets and curled into side, smiling when, in spite of his obvious annoyance, his arms automatically went around her. She snuggled into him and nuzzled his chest until the soft growling turned to contented purring and she felt his arms relax as he fell into a healing sleep.