Chapter Fourteen

And they envy him the sunshine
And they pity him the chill
And they're sad to do their living for some other kind of thrill

There was still a light on at the back of the Magic Box, presumably Anya and more last minute preparations. So Buffy took a few moments of peace and quiet, sitting on the steps outside.

Patrolling with Spike had left the Slayer shaken. She tried hard to pretend it was an old fear, a hangover from old Spike. Patrolling with Spike had always left her shaken. From the early days of feeling she had a predator at her back through the complete metamorphis to predator-she-was-kind-of-sleeping-with, even the idea of Spike was outright stressful. His obsession with her could seem so terrifying at times that Buffy had never let herself dissect it properly, scared of what it was he saw in her that attracted him so.

So yeah, spending three hours in his stimulating company had been kind of a trial last year. Fighting, working up adrenalin, knowing she should be disgusted by his very existence but all the time confronted with the eye-pleasing reminder of just how good he was at making the world fade away. And sometimes the shaken feeling he left was physical, on the nights she gave in to those animal urges. On the nights she was strong, went home and tried to play the good sister and happy friend, the shakage was emotional. Temptation so strong that it frightened the Slayer - and if there was something wrong with her that made her catnip to Spike then how much more must be wrong since she came back from the dead and found that attraction returned. Gradually coaxed out with clever dead fingers and entirely unnatural sex.

Whichever way the night was going to end up, patrolling with Spike, since that fateful kiss, left Buffy full of self-doubt and self-hatred and generally, thoroughly, shaken. Because she wanted him and the oblivion he offered.

This new kind of shaken wasn't the same thing at all, no matter how she tried to convince herself. Buffy'd noticed, academically of course, that he was still totally jump-worthy. Even without the duster and the come-get-me body language that went with the look, those finely chiselled cheekbones framed with an effeminate new hair-do, there was no denying the hotness that was Spike. But nowadays Buffy could notice the jump-worthy and not want to jump. Or need to castigate herself for the dirty impure thoughts.

Contrary to what old Spike might have said of her, Buffy wasn't a complete nymphomaniac - it wasn't the high she had craved, just the escape from life. Sometimes her weakness was even more prosaic; it was simply easier to say yes than no. This year's Buffy had left behind the darkness she'd brought back from heaven and time and distance meant she could see her affair with Spike for the crutch it had been. Something she'd maybe needed at the time but certainly not something she was still tempted by.

So this was definitely a different kind of shaken.

And it wasn't the chip's lack of reaction to her either. That much Buffy had expected and that 'research' mostly just confirmation for the Slayer. She'd already added up the coincidences and anomalies in her own mind, and while her mathematics were more instinctual than logical, such were Buffy's usual thought processes and she was sure, with Anya's confirmation of Spike's real identity, that Spike's idea of the chip had to be nothing more than a construct.

That was the big stuff Buffy ought to be worrying about, if only she could get his tender smile out of her head.

Her Spike never smiled. He smirked and grinned and pouted and curled his tongue but genuine expressions of simple happiness, not so much. Chinks in the big bad image, Buffy assumed, to be surprised out of him by unexpected resurrections or in moments of weakness. Lucky for her, it turned out. Not that her Spike hadn't had a few very effective expressions in his arsenal - there was no-one who could let their eyes roam downwards in more suggestive a fashion or make a grown Slayer blush with a twitch of his eyebrow - but he'd never made her feel such affection. If she ever slipped in an affectionate direction, her Spike could be relied upon for a crude comment that would shatter the mood.

New Spike had a way of smiling at her like he just... liked her. In a way it made Buffy feel like an imposter. She was under no illusion that she'd ever really been a friend to the vampire, even when he'd been a friend to her. However much her Spike might have professed to love her, he couldn't have liked her, not after the way she'd treated him, but this softer Spike smiled at her with an affection she couldn't help but return.

And affection was a dangerous thing. Scarier even than the passionate attachment her Spike would have preferred, more of a weakness than falling in love. Falling in love, after all, went virtually hand in hand with doing crazy things and who had control over who they fell for? If Buffy thought she was falling in love with Spike she might have found her feelings easier to excuse. But Buffy had outgrown falling in love - been there, done that, got the bloodstained T-shirt and was too wise to go there again. Wouldn't now give her heart without her head unreservedly seconding the proposition and Buffy's head laughed at the idea of Spike as suitable heart-giving material. Even if she could ever fall for his not inconsiderable charms, duty came before love, she'd learnt that much from Angel.

Affection was more insidious, harder to lock out and deny, and Buffy was uncomfortably aware that it had led her away from her duty tonight. At the very least, affected her decision-making. Letting Spike go home alone was hardly cautious, but she'd been so eager to be out of his company to clear her head that she'd acted like a person rather than a Slayer. She didn't even know for sure his chip still worked at all, if he took it into his head to hit someone and it didn't work, anyone he killed would be on her conscience - because of all that affection. But that's how it was if you made friends with evil things. Friends meant ties and loyalties which would inevitably be split in possibly world-ending scenarios.

And it would be so easy to smile back. Buffy might have admitted, under torture, that she had a far softer spot for the vampire than she'd ever have let him see. It was easy to hide that spot when Spike made a hobby out of pissing her off, she was damned if he'd break through her defences now by inexplicably forgetting what a jerk he could be.

With a start, Buffy realised she'd been sitting outside the Magic Box long enough to carve a doodle into the pavement with the now-blunt point of her stake. Eventually though, she had to go in. There were many good reasons for a serious chat with Giles, most of them not Spike. That would just be the hardest part.

********

When Giles' ancient red telephone rang, there was a good deal of excavating necessary before he could answer it. The Watchers Council, he was certain, was keeping something very important from him so instead of staying in London to research, he'd 'borrowed' any books he thought might be pertinent and brought them back to his flat, where he could research undisturbed and unobserved.

There was a downside. He'd pilfered enough books to fill his rusty old car and slow it to a crawl on the journey home and now his cramped flat, already largely library, was filled to bursting with old books and the dust they'd collected over the years. In fact, so extreme was the overpopulation of books that Giles was starting to think fondly of Willow's computer, no bigger than a weighty magazine but able to access more information than contained in the Bodlian. Willow herself had caught the coach to Heathrow a couple of hours ago and was already sorely missed; Giles was only one person and he'd be dead of old age before he could read every printed word his living room now contained. The witch had a naturally tidy way of working that, after years of researching together, gelled well with Giles' own methods.

But after the girl had exhausted every internet lead she'd managed to dig up, Giles could no longer justify keeping his assistant. Two months in the coven and another reacclimatizing herself to life in Giles' flat but Willow had yet to take the biggest steps in her personal journey to recovery, and he thought she was ready. Ready and maybe needed. Her research skills might be invaluable to Giles but Buffy, alone at the front line, would soon need her more if Giles' worries proved justified.

And if he hadn't already decided it was time to send Willow back home, news of Spike's return would have tipped the balance. Giles might have laughed when he heard about Buffy's liaison with the vampire - the way she'd confessed as if it were the end of the world, in the midst of a genuine apocalypse, had seemed humorous at the time - but since then, from Dawn and Xander, he'd heard details considerably more disturbing. Much as he might trust Buffy when it came to protecting humanity, she didn't seem to be able to protect herself with the same ruthlessness, but even Giles had been surprised to hear she'd been letting the vampire stay in her home. His first instinct had been to leap on a plane but with six potential Slayers already confirmed dead, he was forced to focus on the greater threat and the greater good. Sending Willow was the next best thing; she could at least cure whatever ailed the vampire and send him on his merry way, seeing as no-one but Giles seemed inclined to stake the bastard.

When he finally found his telephone, under the table and obscured by the probably-not-relevant pile of books, it was Buffy on the other end apologising for waking him up. This, Giles had learnt, she did as a precaution every time she phoned, the girl being completely incapable of mastering time zones. She gave him a short and, Giles suspected, selective recap of everything that had been going on in Sunnydale since Dawn's reappearance and adroitly shifted the conversation to Willow before Giles could put forth his own opinions on the subject of Spike. In return he told her about the Council's new enemy, what little they knew with no survivors to tell tales, and the slow and stubborn reaction of the Council.

And then, because he couldn't help it, he gave her the lecture. All the ways in which Spike was bad and bad for Buffy in particular, and all the horrible things that could happen if she let her guard down. His Slayer listened politely, or quietly at least, but when she finally spoke it was in her 'humouring Giles' voice and he knew he'd had no impact.

"Look, Giles, I really will-"

Over the fuzz of the transatlantic call Giles heard the familiar tingle of the Magic Box bell and the almost as familiar crash as someone or something flung the door open with more force than strictly necessary. And almost as if he'd caused it, with his warnings to his charge, he heard Dawn's voice announce: "Buffy! It's Spike! He's gone evil again!"

There were indistinct noises of movement and less piercing voices that Giles couldn't make out, and for a few seconds he thought Buffy must have put down the phone, her voice more distant as she soothed her sister. The teen was almost incoherent with rage or fear but her stuttering accusations were clear enough to Giles that he wished he could spend the time flying back to Sunnydale to make sure the Spike situation was dealt with thoroughly. Moments later the Slayer's voice was back on the line.

"I've got to go, Giles. I'll call you tomorrow when Willow gets here."

"Buffy, did I hear-"

"I'll call you tomorrow, Giles," Buffy repeated grimly, and then there was just the hum of the dial tone.