They walked over to Willow's house hand-in-hand, stopping occasionally to kiss. As it turned out Spike had a present for Buffy too and she was wearing it now; a delicate gold chain bearing a small filigreed heart. It was the most beautiful necklace Buffy had ever seen.

"I didn't steal it," Spike hastened to assure her as she gazed at it in wonder. At her questioning look he continued, "You know all that stuff that I scavenged and fixed up? Well I sold most of it and made enough money to buy that." Buffy smiled at him in pleased surprised.

"Knew you wouldn't want anything stolen. Besides, wouldn't be right would it?"

Buffy leaned forward and pressed a soft, tender kiss to his mouth. Then turning around she asked, "Would you fasten it for me?" Spike took the necklace from her fingers, draped it around her neck and then dropped a kiss on her shoulder. "I give you my heart, Buffy," he murmured into her hair.

Never had Buffy resented her duties as Slayer as much as she did tonight. She wanted nothing more than to join with this man in slow languorous lovemaking all night long. But she did have duties and so after exchanging another kiss, they rose from the couch and went to fetch Willow.

She was waiting for them on her darkened front porch and saw their entwined hands as they walked down the street towards her. Willow's worry for her friend increased as she sensed an even closer bond from just a few hours ago. She wasn't sure what had happened, but it was clear that Buffy's emotions were even more firmly entrenched than ever.

Nervously stepping forward, she joined them. She looked pointedly at their clasped hands, but they ignored her. Turning around they walked back to Spike's crypt, going over the night's plans in low voices. All the time, Spike and Buffy remained handfast.

***

They had studied the diagram of the facility's layout and knew that the area of Room 314 was beyond the room where they had entered previously. They would enter a room as close to the area as they could and then make their way to the laboratory since there didn't seem to be any direct route from the crawlspace.

Finding an office that they figured was as close as they could get, Willow performed her silencing spell. Pain shot through Spike's head again as the spell took hold, and as before it was quickly gone. He'd really like to know what the hell it was about that spell that was setting the pain off.

Exactly as before they entered the room, but this time instead of staying where they were they moved out into the facility. Spike led the way, vampire senses extended to their fullest.

Following the blueprint Willow had provided, they moved cautiously through the halls of the facility, ducking back out of sight whenever Spike detected approaching footsteps. Buffy thanked The Powers That Be any number of times for enhanced vampire hearing as they evaded the few doctors, technicians, and soldiers that remained on duty.
Even with a skeleton staff, there were enough people around that the going was nerve-racking.

After what seemed an eternity, they finally found the room for which they searched, Room 314. Willow took over now. Using a dummy keycard attached to her laptop she chanted an incantation, typed a few symbols on her keyboard and grinned in triumph as the door slid open. With a small sigh of relief vampire and slayer entered the room followed closely by the witch.

They had no sooner entered than the door slid shut behind them followed by an ominous click. The room which had been totally dark lit up with bright overhead lights and the door on the opposite wall opened. Maggie Walsh, wearing a long white lab coat, stood there accompanied by a squad of soldiers that immediately surrounded them.

***

"Welcome, Miss Summers. I'm glad you accepted the invitation I extended to you by way of Agent Finn. I hope you found your way here without too much difficulty," the Psychology Professor commented. "I did everything in my power to facilitate your entry."

Buffy felt a rush of anger such as she had never known burn through her. A set-up! She and Spike, all of them, had been set up. She could only be grateful that she had insisted that Giles and Xander not accompany them tonight. However her relief was short-lived as the door behind her whooshed open again and a second squad of soldiers entered.

And right in the middle of them where Giles and Xander.

They looked as if they had been manhandled, the worst being Xander who sported a rapidly swelling black eye. Buffy was furious, and even more so when she saw who entered last.

"You bastard!" Buffy hissed.

Riley Finn looked momentarily uncomfortable, but then put on his good soldier's face. He was doing his duty, nothing more. He was sorry these civilians had interfered in something they didn't understand. And now they would suffer the consequences.

"Ah good, everyone's here now," Maggie said. Moving back a bit, she made a welcoming gesture with her hand. "Please Miss Summers, all of you; you wanted to see what we did here. Allow me to give you the Grand Tour." Gun barrels prodding them in the back, the group moved forward and into the next room.

What Buffy saw there made her sick.

Large cylindrical devices lined the walls of a huge room, 30 at least. Inside them, preserved in some kind of fluid, were...things. Demons, but not as God or whatever had made them. Heads were attached to bodies not their own, mismatched arms and legs, hand and feet. Buffy felt as if she were on the set of every bad horror movie ever made.

Professor Walsh saw the looks of sick revulsion on their faces, even, she noted with interest, the vampire, and smiled. "You are seeing here ladies and gentlemen...and thing," she addressed the last to Spike, "the beginnings of the army of the future. Soon we will have no need to send young men such as you see here into battle to spill their blood needlessly. We will send these creatures to wage our wars."

She stopped in front of a door at the end of the room. Placing a hand on it in an almost loving touch, she turned back to her audience. "Inside this room is Adam. In him we have merged the strongest attributes of various demons into one great being. A virtually unstoppable soldier. He is almost ready to be born.

"With an army of such as you see here we will no longer have to fear invasion or terrorist activities."

Buffy looked at Maggie Walsh with a look of contempt. "So this is all altruistic, huh? No plans for conquest or anything. National defense only, right?"

"I'm only making the soldiers, not dispatching them. That is up to the military. What they do with them doesn't concern me; I'm a scientist. Once I have achieved this goal, I am guaranteed unlimited funding to continue my experiments. This research facility will be the first of many."

"This isn't a research facility," Buffy snapped. "It's Frankenstein's Castle without the rustic charm. God, you're not even a Mad Scientist. You're a caricature of a Mad Scientist, and this is a travesty."

Professor Walsh glared at Buffy. "I should have known that you wouldn't see the beauty in my children. Few do. Luckily for me, your approval isn't necessary. And you, my dear, will make an interesting addition to my research; to all appearances a normal girl but with superhuman abilities of strength, speed and healing. It will be interesting to see just how extensive your healing abilities are."

Buffy felt a chill go all through her and was vaguely aware of loud protests being shouted by Giles, Xander and Willow. A low growl emitted from Spike's chest. She missed entirely the look of shock on Riley's face.

"You're friends however are of no interest to me," Maggie continued. "They, unfortunately, will have a tragic car accident in which all are killed. I, of course, will attend Ms. Rosenberg's funeral and extend condolences on behalf of the entire faculty of the University.

"And as for your lover," Maggie moved over to stand before Spike, "well he'll be taken to one of our labs where the chip we implanted in him will receive its final programming. He escaped before we had the chance to complete it, you see."

Buffy took a step towards Maggie, but stopped as several guns pointed at her. "A chip?" she asked. "Is that what you did to him? Put a computer chip in his head?"

"Yes, Miss Summers. Quite an interesting piece of technology. Dr. Morrison's project actually," she added, indicating the timid little man who had originally had the misfortune to inform Dr. Walsh of Spike's escape. "Once we have completed the programming, his training will commence. Once that's concluded, he will be turned over to an agency with which we have close working ties. Vampires make excellent assassins you see."

Spike merely looked at the woman with disdain in his eyes. "Bugger off, bitch. I won't be one of your trained puppies."

"You think not?" was Maggie's amused reply. "But you don't understand the beauty of how the chip works. You see, it works on the pleasure/pain principle. If you disobey us, you receive pain...a great deal of pain. However, if you obey us, you receive pleasure as your reward. And from the number of times you've been between Miss Summers' thighs, I think we can safely assume that you are very fond of pleasure."

Buffy heard a gasp from Riley. She blushed slightly but then ignored him. She didn't care if he now knew that she had just been using him. She was more concerned with what Walsh was saying about Spike. "He can't hurt anyone," Buffy insisted. "Don't you know how your own chip works?"

"His chip right now is in default mode. It processes human DNA received through touch and smell and fires whenever he tries to harm any human being. The final level of programming we give the chip allows us to override the programming for a particular DNA sequence that we download into it.

"It's quite an ingenious program. Dr. Morrison should receive a Nobel Prize for it. Unfortunately our research is classified.

"But to continue, once the vampire assassin has received its programming, it is sent to eliminate the target. If it succeeds, it is rewarded. If it fails, it is terminated. And since vampires turn to dust upon termination, there are no bodies left behind. A win/win proposition.

"So you see Ms. Summers, what you have been interfering with is a government sanctioned research facility. And now you and your lover will be used to aid our work."

Turning to Riley, Maggie ordered, "Take these three away and arrange their "accident". Then return here. We have work to do." Without further comment, she left the room.