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You Have to Love Her by Sandy
 
Chapter 11
 
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As it turned out, Buffy's date had been pleasant but uneventful. She hadn't learned anything really new about Riley and hadn't gotten asked back to Lowell House that evening. Buffy hoped that it wasn't because she was a little distracted. It had been three days since she and Spike had last been together and all Buffy could think about was Spike and their nest.

Next time she had a date with Riley, Buffy told Spike, she thought it might be wise if they made love first so that she could think of something else besides how horny she was for Spike.

Spike had laughed and said that if they made love before she went on a date with Riley, then all she would think about was how good it had been. Buffy had smiled, kissed him and told him he was probably right. Spike felt just fine.

***

Time passed as time will. Willow researched, Buffy dated Riley but found out no useful information from him, and she and Spike patrolled and made love.

On the nights that Buffy had a date with Riley, Spike would do a quick patrol on his own, always being on guard for the commandos, and then worked on fixing up the crypt. He spliced into the conduit and ran electrical cords to the upstairs of the crypt. One night Buffy arrived to find a small TV and refrigerator in place. She didn't ask where they came from. Spike seemed to have adapted to not being able to hunt and she was so happy she could keep him around that she tried to not let a little petty theft bother her. Plus she knew that a lot of the stuff now decorating the crypt had been scavenged and repaired. She was rather proud of him. The place was really starting to look...well, cozy.

***

Buffy never realized that as she was observing Riley and trying to gain information about the goings on at Lowell House, she in turn was being observed. And those observing her had much better luck than she had been having.

When Maggie Walsh was given the report, she found herself fascinated. Complete medical reports from infancy until the present time were included. To all intents and purposes, Buffy Summers was a completely normal girl. Her latest physical exam showed everything to fall within normal ranges. None of her blood work showed anything out of the ordinary. Heart, lungs and blood pressure were all listed as strong, clear and normal. Even her gynecological exams came back normal.

But Buffy Summers was most definitely *not* normal. Maggie picked up the remote control once again and watched the videotape of Ms. Summers and Hostile 17 in action. They worked in concert, both preternaturally fast and strong. Miss Summers was shown staking vampires and fighting demons, sometimes slicing off their heads with a sword; sometimes using her bare hands to break their necks. And almost every night she and her vampire lover retreated to a crypt where they engaged in the vilest of illicit relations. This disgusted Maggie Walsh who was a purest. She would have ordered that Riley stay away from the contamination that was this girl, but it allowed her to study Buffy even closer so she permitted the relationship. Fortunately, the little slut did not seem interested in pursuing a sexual relationship with Riley. This Maggie would never have allowed.

***

Sometimes when Buffy was out with Riley, Spike would map out the miles and miles of tunnels that led from the crypt. He found to his delight that they extended out to almost every part of Sunnydale. From underground he could reach Giles', Xander's, almost any downtown store (from which he occasionally liberated items) and most importantly Buffy's home on Revello Drive.

One night a little more than a week before Thanksgiving, Spike made a discovery. One of the tunnels ran near Lowell House, and more importantly, there was a passage that didn't seem to lead anywhere. After more closely examining the walls, he found a small panel. Opening it up, he discovered a touchpad. He was pretty sure that he had finally discovered a way back into the facility.

***

It was 2 am, and Spike, Buffy, Willow and Xander stood before the mysterious panel. Willow carefully removed the cover and looked at the wires and modules. Taking a cable out of her bag, she hooked it up to the panel, turned on her computer, whispered an incantation and started to process information. Fifteen minutes later, a small door in the wall popped open.

Taking a deep breath, Buffy cautiously opened the door and peered in. It appeared to open into a maintenance crawlspace. Silently she crawled forward, followed by Willow and Xander. Spike brought up the rear. As she carefully made her way, she stopped periodically to peer through grates that opened off the tunnel. For the most part, they seemed to be offices and storage rooms, but after what seemed like miles, she stopped with a quickly suppressed gasp. Willow and Xander pushed forward to see what it was. Buffy moved out of the way and caught Spike's eye. Whatever it was, he knew it had unnerved his Slayer.

Giving Xander a bit of a shove, he finally forced his way forward enough to look out. A room of immense proportions filled the area. Soldiers and men in lab coats moved purposefully about, even at this late hour.

Buffy continued to crawl down the tunnel, but Spike could feel the tension radiating from her. If his bearings were right, they would soon be near where he had escaped. Sure enough, Buffy again halted suddenly, gazing down with a dark frown. This time, Willow and Xander quickly moved out of Spike's way.

And there it was. The facility from which he had escaped. The walls were lined with bright white rooms occupied by almost every species of demon known to Sunnydale. Some paced and roared, some sat and stared, some lay curled in upon themselves as if they had lost all hope.

Buffy wasn't sure why the sight disturbed her so. Maybe it was because of what she had told Joyce so many weeks ago. She killed demons, but capturing them, caging them, experimenting on them? This bothered her.

So far, they had not come upon any more doorways. Nothing except the ventilation grates led into the rooms below. This wouldn't really be a problem though. They could simply enter one of the unoccupied offices; that is once they were certain that they wouldn't set off a security system.

Motioning everyone to retreat the way they had come, Buffy and the others left it for that night.

***

They woke Giles up out of a sound sleep to inform him of their findings.

"We can probably get into that place pretty easily from that crawlspace," Buffy was informing Giles. "The only problem is, a place like that is probably wired up with a high-tech security system."

"Yes," Giles said. "We need to find a way to neutralize it."

Willow had been quiet for most of the discussion, but she suddenly exclaimed, "Miss Calendar!"

Giles paled slightly and said, "Wha..what? What about Jenny?"

Willow immediately looked contrite saying, "I'm sorry, Giles. What I meant was, Miss Calendar was a techo-pagen. I think I still have the names and e-mail addresses of her coven at home. If I can contact some of them, they may be able to provide me with a techno- incantation that we can use on the security system. It's worth a try anyway."

Giles had recovered from unexpectedly hearing Jenny's name and nodded his head saying, "Yes, good thinking Willow. They very well may have a solution to this problem. You also might see if they have any ideas how one could, ah, hack into this organization's computer system. We would certainly find out more information that way than skulking around down there."

Spike had looked questioning at Buffy upon noting Giles' reaction to Jenny Calendar's name, but Buffy had just shaken her head. She would fill him in later in private. Now she said, "Okay, that sounds like a good plan Willow. See if you can get any help from them right away. Thanksgiving is next Thursday and Riley told me that most of the guys at Lowell House will be heading home for the holiday. If what we suspect is true and they're all affiliated with the commandos, then that means that many less soldiers we have to worry about."

Since nothing else could be done that night, the group broke up with Xander driving the girls back to their dorm and Giles heading back to bed.

Spike wouldn't let Buffy know for the world, but the idea of going back into that place terrified him. But there was no way on earth he was going to allow her to go in there without him. He could still help her even if he couldn't fight humans.
 
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