Note: Thanks to my beta t_geyer for her unending patience, perseverance and support.

SECTION 7 - LAKE OF FIRE

People cry, people moan.
Look for a dry place to call their home.
Try to find some place to rest their bones.
While the Angels and the Devils try to make THEM their own.

(Nirvana, Album - MTV Unplugged with thanks to Zanthinegirl for the suggestion)




Chapter 7.16
Thursday, July 18th, 2002


It was late evening when Spike joined Giles and Penny in the library.

"What's the news?" he asked the two watchers as he helped himself to a splash of the single malt that Giles kept on a tray to one side of the room before taking a seat on the end of Giles' desk with his feet on the chair intended for the occupant of the desk in front.

"I thought you would be the one to tell us," Giles responded dryly as he pushed back his chair to fetch a drink of his own, Penny also accepting his wordless offer.

The vampire shrugged. "Nothing coming through on vamp vision so far. Guess that means it wasn't some huge trap... but she hasn't rung neither, so seems like the mojo's taking a while. You get all the rest set up?"

Giles shrugged. "We eventually managed to convince Quentin, once he realised that his little apoplectic fit was getting him precisely nowhere, into letting us have enough people to pick up the minibuses... I wouldn't dare say anything about the whole potentials situation, especially not now that it's about to become more of a slayer situation, but it would make a refreshing change if a few more of them had valid driving licences. I'm fairly certain that Quentin thinks it's just a ploy to get transport for your wedding guests for nothing, though. I must admit to being tempted to volunteer to drive one of them myself."

"I'd do it... if I didn't have other things to do," Spike replied with a grin. "Should be a sight to see."

"Why's that?" Penny asked.

"Well, seein' as how you'll be on one of them buses, I guess you'll find out tomorrow, pet." The vamp tipped back his head and drained the last of the malt from his glass. "Right, then, figure it's time we hunted down the last of them bringers. They can't hide under the preacher man's petticoats no more an' we sure as hell don't want them interferin' in the morning."

"Shouldn't we wait for the change?"

"Well, that would depend on whether you want a bored vamp keepin' you company and drinking your single malt while he waits to find out if his future wife's gonna be alright."

"R-right," Giles rapidly acquiesced. "Penelope, if you would help out? Why don't we adjourn to the basement? I believe Anya made sure we had some reserves of the necessary components for the demon mapping spell."

---

 

When it appeared that the bringers had yet to abandon the vineyard, Spike rounded up a few volunteers who weren't due to be on duty at the seal overnight. Ha Nath and her friends went in by the front door. Spike led a mixed group of half a dozen watchers and potentials through Sunnydale's network of underground tunnels and made sure they were in position ready to block the bringers' escape route before the other demons moved in. The fight was messy, brutal and short. Spike seemed to snap any of the bringers who came into reach like so many bundles of dried twigs. He made sure, however, that no hint of it was allowed to reach Buffy and distract her from the ritual in which she was involved.

When the vineyard had been cleared out he called Giles and only when Spike was assured that there were no longer any harbingers within the limits of Sunnydale did he send the others home and make his way to the high school construction site. His group took the night time shifts as always. Tonight, the world was about to change for the girls in that group. They were tired, they were on edge, they were literally teetering on the brink of hell, they had to be worrying about what the night would bring and Tara's group would be missing their leader and the calming influence they were accustomed to her exerting. In short, they were vulnerable. He intended to be there for them, to talk them down if they needed it and to let them know that they weren't alone. The First wasn't going to play mind games with his people if he could help it.

---

 

Spike prowled from group to group, staying with each one for ten or fifteen minutes, taking the time to joke with them, to tease them that they had been chosen for the night time shift because Buffy's and Faith's groups were afraid of the dark. He laughed with them and cajoled them. He drew an occasional girl away from their fellows and told them how proud he was of them and how he would be right there with them when the battle began. He would tell them that he would do whatever he could to keep them safe, if the trouble started.

This time they didn't come in twos or threes. They didn't even come in dozens. It seemed like The First had saved up all its remaining human toys and was going to throw them at them all at once, so many that Spike could smell them on the night air long before he caught his first glimpse.

He pulled his people back from the site's perimeter and they obeyed instantly, though it was more from force of habit than because they understood the danger they were in. They took the partially built high school as their fortress, preparing to defend every hollow doorway and unglazed window, because Spike told them to. They fought down the heavy feelings in their guts that were only partially attributable to the anticipated fight.

"What're you even trying for, boy?" Angel asked him as the blond hit the speed dial button that would put him through to Penelope's cell. "Like you could run an army? No one will listen to you. You didn't earn their respect. You're just Buffy's wife."

Spike performed a spin-kick so graceful that, were it not for his habitual Doc Martens, it would have looked more like a ballet move than an attack. As he expected his foot passed straight through Angel's cranium without resistance. "An' you're sweet fuck all but smoke an' mirrors." Without even a pause he placed his cell against his ear and issued instructions. "Get Giles. Tell him to roust every bugger he can spare out of their pits, pass out the baseball bats an' get them down to the high school...pronto. They're going for the 'Hail Mary'." He snapped the phone shut so hard that something crunched and drew out a pick-axe handle from inside the folds of his duster.

They straggled out of alleyways or wandered across parkland in droves, shuffling toward something that ultimately would bring their own destruction.

A chorus of nervous whispers burbled in Spike's ears but didn't quite reach his brain, since the part of his brain that wasn't blocking his link with Buffy was busy checking out the tall, malnourished figure that moved directly toward him, cutting diagonally across the path of several of his companions to do so. His hair was a tangle of inch-long dreadlocks and his clothes were both filthy and in poor repair. His shirt was devoid of buttons and smeared with dark brown streaks, that could have been either dried blood or excrement. None of this separated him from the others within the crowd. It was the unadulterated hatred that made his eyes almost glow against his dark skin.

"So much for Xander sayin' that they evacuated all the hospital patients," the vampire muttered under his breath.