Out of the Frying Pan, Into the Fire

Chp.8

Father Figure Turned Doctor?

Information is in the first chapter

Looking up from her hands, which she had stared at after that little impromptu kiss with Spike, Buffy hears the voice of the only other English man she knows. The one man that in Sunnydale she considered a father, the only man that was a father to her.

"You must be Miss Summers, or Buffy." He says. Leaving his resting place on the door facing and making his way over to the two couples in the alcove. "And from the story you've just told, I assume you already have a good idea who I am." He now stands mere inches from her, and crosses his arms over his chest.

Looking up at the doctor, a smile blooms on Buffy's face, when she sees a smile in his eyes. The smile there seems to be one of approval, even if the man doesn't know who she is.. It's just as Giles as the Giles in her delusions had been.

She gently untangles herself from Spike's arms, gets up from the couch, and makes her way over to the man not standing more than two feet from her. The smile on her face brightening with the few steps she has to take.

Before the man knows what's happening, Buffy is throwing herself at him, and hugging him into unconsciousness. He looks over to the others for help out of the chokehold she has on his abdomen. Imploring with his eyes, he looks to Spike.

"Sorry mate, she's got an affinity for doin' that. Nearly bloody choked me to death, last night."

Letting her strangle hold on the doctor go, she turns to Spike and gazes at him with an annoyed look, then a evil smile spreads across her face, "excuse me?" She plants her hands stubbornly on her hips. " I wasn't the only one choking the life out of another. Plus, I thought I'd never see your not so bleached ass again. I thought that was enough incentive to hug you. You weren't exactly complaining. Actually you seemed as if you had been enjoying it." She states flatly, gives him a small smirk, and a slightly teasing look, before turning back to the rest of the people in the alcove with them.

Turning her gaze from Willow and Tara, she looks Giles over with a scrutinizing, and appraising eye, and has to hold in a laugh of mirth, as she takes in his dress.

'Still the same old Giles' runs through her mind. From his sparkling blue eyes, right down to the tweed jacket and Nike Airs adorning his feet? Giles never wore Nike's, and especially not with a suit jacket, and sweater.

As Buffy scrutinizes him, Giles takes his glasses of for another impromptu cleaning with the handkerchief he pulls from a back pocket.

"Running shoes with tweed? Can you say tacky? Do you take your fashion advice from the eighties or something, because this is just screaming 'Miami Vice'?" She retorts, smile in place, and starts to giggle uncontrollably.

Frustrated by the tiny blondes inquiry. "Well, uh yes, well." The English man stutters in frustration. He wasn't expecting the tiny slip of a girl to comment on how he chose to dress. It was comfortable.

Hearing Spike chuckle behind her, she turns to him. "Well it is." She gives him an irritated glare,.

"Yes, Luv." He says in a calm voice. "It is to you, but it could be the norm in this place, maybe everyone is stuck in the eighties here." He explains. "You have to remember that we're not in a 'delusion'." He rolls his eyes at that, not really believing himself as he says it. "Anymore, Buff." He finishes with a slight little smirk, and a cock of his head.

"I know all of this, Spikey. I do remember waking up here, but it's just so Huey Lewis." She smiles, showing him her teeth, "Oh and about that eighties thing, it seems that in those 'delusions'. She emphasizes the last word. "Someone else was stuck in the eighties, right along with poor, poor Giles here."

He gives her a condescending look, and leans defeated back into the couch.

"What you thought I was just gonna let that lie there and rot."

He glares back at her, but can't keep the smile from forming as he remembers the night she got drunk with him.

Giles clears his throat, getting everyone's attention. "Yes well not that my fashion sense isn't interesting, and we've now discussed it extensively. Pointing out all of my no-nos. Can we please get to something that's much less important?" His voice dripping with sarcasm, so much so that there's a puddle forming at his feet.
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Turning from Giles, Buffy walks back over to the couch, and plops down beside Spike, nearly landing in his lap, as she tries to get as close as possible to him, without actually sitting on him.

Spike slides his arm back around her shoulders, as she looks back up to Giles. "Okay, question away. Even though I don't know why you'd ask, since I've already told you guys everything." She rolls her eyes, but waits for the questions to start flying at her.

Spikes arm tightens around her, as he feels her tense up at the prospect of an inquisition.

"Well." He swipes his glasses off of his face, and gives them another shining. "I was hoping that you'd speak to me privately." He says as he rubs the glasses furiously.

"What so you can analyze me?" She asks with irritation.

"I wouldn't analyze you, per se, but I would like to talk to you about all of this."

"You know that in the you're the same Giles, in or out of the coma?" Buffy states, looking at the others sitting around her, they all have varying degrees of amusement written on their faces.

"You do know that your doctor will prolly want to speak to yours truly, eventually, too, Pet." Spike smiles, hangs his head, and shakes it slightly.

Placing the now very clean glasses back on his nose, Giles clears his throat again. "You're correct in your assumption, Spike. Dr. Wood and I spoke this morning, and we found it beneficial that we talk to you and Miss Summers, privately.

Letting Spikes arm fall, loosely to the couch, Buffy stands back up.

Smiling at the fire he sees in Buffy's stance, "Uh, oh, Mate. Watch out." Spike says as his arm makes its way back up to the back of the seat.

She takes a deep breath, and angrily steps toward the other man, "I already told you everything." She straightens to her full height, trying to be intimidating. "There's nothing else to tell." Her rigid body becomes slack, and she hangs her head. " I don't want to go over this again, it's hard and hurtful." She relents.

"Yes, yes. I understand, but Miss Summers, there may be. . ." He's interrupted, by Buffy's quiet voice.

"You couldn't possibly understand. You didn't have to watch your mother, and not one but two of your loves die. I did, I can't do it. The only person in this god-forsaken world that does understand is Spike. He was there. You weren't." Her voice raises an octave at every word spoken until she's nearly screaming. Her hair flies around her as she makes her way back over to the couch, and sits down this time on Spikes lap. He wraps his arms around her, for the comfort she seeks.

Taking the scene in, and pulling in a deep, breath. "As I was saying. There may be some details, I'd like to clarify, and have an explanation on."

"Okay, I get that, but why do we need to talk to you, privately?" Her voice is quiet, again, almost a whisper.

Feeling as if he should be holding the girl instead of trying to get information that she didn't want to give him, the girl just seemed so despondent, and he wishes that he could console her like his patient seemed to be doing a good job of. "Some people might embellish, to make themselves seem better than they actually are. Speaking to each of you privately will give us more of an incite to your personalities. Spike and yourself may have been having the same delusions, but there might be slight deviations in your stories. That way we can have the whole picture as to what actually happened in them."

"Yeah." She replies, her voice still quiet, but now they don't have to strain to hear her. " I understand that." Her gaze falls on the man holding her to his lap. "As a warning, Spike does like to embellish, a lot." She smiles still looking in Spikes eyes.

He knows by the look she gives him that she's teasing. "Hey, now! Missy. I do not embellish." He smiles back, with a playful glint in his eye. "I just try and make the story more interesting." Straitening his posture, he lets out a breath into her face.

"Hence the word embellishment, there Spike."

Making an audible "Humph." Spike loses his so-called intimidating posture and slouches back down into the cushions of the couch.

"I'm sure if you can figure out the fact from fiction." Buffy glares at Spike, indicating that his story would probably have some fiction in it. " That our stories will pretty much be the same." Looking over to Giles, she finishes the explanation. Her mood had changed quickly from enraged to amusement in a matter of seconds.

"I see." Giles says smirking and the perky, little blonde, sitting in the lap of the man across from him. "If you would like to wait until a later time, I would gladly have Willow set up an appointment for you." He looks over to Willow, who had been silent this whole time, in askance.

Dropping the now mangled piece of hair she was playing with, Willow stands, and rushes over to her desk. Flipping through the appointment book laid out, over it. "The earliest opening you have is, Friday at 4:00p.m. Doctor." She says, as she looks back up at Giles.


Shrugging her shoulders. "I guess that's okay, but I'm telling you right now, nothing will change between now and then." Buffy tells him, gazing intently as he looks back over to her.

"No, I don't suppose it will, but the point of it is that I would like some clarification, and you two are the only ones that can give it. I say that Dr. Wood, will have the same point of view, so I'd be thinking it over." Giles states plainly, no inflection, nothing in his voice at all, to make them think he may be joking about it.

Taking in all of what he'd said, Buffy straightens as much as she can in Spikes lap, and flips a strand of her behind her. "Friday it is then." She then looks over to the red head at the desk. "Four o'clock, right?" She asks, bluntly, not giving her any choice but to answer.

"Y-yeah," Is the only thing uttered from the red heads lips, as she picks up a pencil, and writes the patients name in the book. She'd gotten a little nervous there for a bit, she'd read the file on Buffy, and knows that the girl could turn violent. She'd thought that Giles was gonna be on the recieving end of one of those violent outburst when he'd just kept pushing. It had been touch and go there for a moment. Tara's poor hair now bore the brunt of her nervousness.at the situation.

Turning back to Spike, and slowly sliding off of his lap, she stands. She leans back down and grabs his hand pulling him up beside her.

Spike looks at everyone else. "Right then." He nods his head. "I recon we're off."

Gently tugging on his arm. "That we are, Spikey." Buffy says, leading Spike to the door, and out into the hall.

(Wow, that was long, and involved. Giles says way to many really long words, but I think I got his character right, at least I hope he sounds like the season two Giles, which is what I was going for.)