AN: New chapter!! This time both the title and the quote at the beginning are by Marilyn Manson. Why, you say? Because I just bought the tickets to Marilyn Manson's first concert ever here in Tenerife and I'm just sooooo exited.

Thanks to Slaymesoftly for betaing this, and to everyone who left a review. Thank you so much!

CHAPTER 6: "I Don't Like The Drugs (But The Drugs Like Me)"

Norm life baby "I'm just a sample of a soul made to look just like a human being."

~I Don't Like The Drugs (But The Drugs Like Me), Marilyn Manson~

Insistent knocking on her bedroom door jarred her from a dreamless sleep. Groaning, Buffy turned and covered her head with the pillow, determined to block the sounds that were trying to wake her up from the first full-night sleep she'd had in weeks. The knocking wasn't going anywhere though, and soon her mother's worried filled words reached her ears.

"Buffy, honey, are you OK? It's past noon already and you're still in bed. Are you feeling under the weather?"

With another groan, she dragged herself from bed and went to open the door to an anxious mother.

"I'm fine, mom, really. Just feeling tired I guess."

Joyce frowned and looked more worried for the minute. "Are you saying something's making you weak? Like when Mr. Giles set you up for that barbaric ritual when you turned 18?"

Buffy sighed, her mother could be such a nag sometimes, "No, mom. No ritual and, definitely, no watcher betrayal. It's just usual tiredness."

Joyce fixed her daughter with her patented ‘I'm the mom and I know better' stare. "Well, that's the thing. Buffy, you never get tired, or at least not so much that you have to sleep until noon. Now, are you going to tell me what's making the Slayer so weak?"

Um, a vampire munching at my neck, maybe?

Well, but that wasn't so bad, was it?

She huffed at her traitorous mind yet again making her consider things she didn't want to think about. If she was being honest, she could tell that the bite wasn't so serious; after all, Spike only took a few mouthfuls and anyway, the mark would be healed by tomorrow. The comatose sleeping was probably because of the emotional turmoil of last night and her own concern over the uncertainty of Dawn's situation. The fact that Spike was a feral vampire now was the cherry on top of her worry-sundae.

Should she keep Spike's situation a secret, then? That didn't seem like a good idea; after all, sooner or later everyone was going to find out about the feral vampire chained to a wall inside the mansion, and if she had kept it from them, they would think she was protecting another vampire yet again. And she wasn't, was she?

Oh, shit. Of course she was.

Buffy looked at her mother standing by the door, tapping a foot impatiently and decided to confide in, at least, one person.

"OK, let's go downstairs and I'll try to explain, all right?"

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Half an hour later, the two eldest Summers women sat at the kitchen counter, a cup of hot cocoa in front of each of them.

"So, let me see if I got it right; Spike was strangely calm when you had just essentially broken his heart, then he disappeared for a few weeks, and now he's back but in some kind of feral state, badly beaten and he doesn't recognize you. Right?"

Buffy nodded, staring at her steaming chocolate. "And he bit me, so his chip's not working."

Joyce looked pensive, "I see... well that explains a lot of things." She rose from the stool and went to wash the cup in the sink.

The Slayer just frowned, staring at her mother. "Huh? No, that doesn't explain anything.
No explanations, that's the problem...umm what do you mean?"

Joyce sighed and sat again in front of her daughter. "Well, you see, after Spike and you had that ‘talk' he came here and we chatted," she ignored Buffy's outraged ‘mom!' and continued with her tale, "and he told me everything that happened at the crypt and that he had a plan of sorts. He said he was going to make you ‘see how much he changed' or something along those lines, and that he needed to go for a while but that he would come back. So I'm thinking that he somehow got rid of his chip, something went wrong and that's why he's out of it right now." Joyce finished, clearly proud of herself. "That doesn't explain why he isn't feeding, though."

Buffy shook her head. "I don't think that's it. Maybe he did try to have his chip removed, but something else must have happened. A surgery gone wrong wouldn't make a vampire revert to a feral state; at least, I don't think so. I should ask Giles, I guess." She paused at that. "Only I shouldn't because he would, you know, stake him."

Joyce looked horrified. "Oh Buffy, but Mr. Giles wouldn't do that, would he?" At her daughter's expression, she backpedalled. "Well, you can't let him do that."

The slayer looked at her mother and tried to ease her fears. "Don't worry, mom. I won't
let him kill a defenseless creature."

Instead of being appeased, Joyce looked annoyed. "I don't expect you to spare his life because he is defenseless! I expect you to do it because he is a nice young man and-"

Buffy rolled her eyes. "You do know there's at least three things wrong in that sentence, right?"

Joyce just narrowed her eyes and continued, "... a nice young man and I raised you better
that that, didn't I?"

Buffy was opening her mouth to answer, when she was interrupted by her sister running down the stairs until she was standing next to the door, denim jacket already on.

"So, are we going or what?" the teen asked, arms crossed and hip cocked to the side.

Buffy frowned, while Joyce just smiled knowingly. "Going where, Dawn?"

The Key smiled and said perkily, "To the butcher to get some blood and then to see Spike, of course."

Joyce laughed at her younger daughter's antics. "You were eavesdropping again, weren't you?"

"Yep."

Buffy sighed and looked annoyed at her mother and sister."I can see there's nothing I can say to make you stay here, so we're going-" Dawn let out a piercing squeal, the kind only teenagers can manage, "but you're both staying in the car until I'm sure Spike's restrained. He's still a very dangerous, unchipped, feral vampire, you know."

Dawn muttered something along the lines of "yeah, whatever" and went outside. Buffy turned to face her mother, a puzzled expression on her face. "Mom, if you knew all this time that Spike was out of town for a while, why did you make me look for him?"

Joyce looked at the Slayer, smiling wickedly. "Well, young lady, it was your fault he left in the first place." And with that, she went to get the car, leaving a fuming slayer behind.

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As soon as she entered the room carrying several packets of blood, the vampire's head whipped around, and he started to softly growl at her.

Uh, I should have known he would be pissed after being left here chained.

She walked across the room until she was near him, but still out of reach, and sat on the
floor. Spike sniffed and seemed to recognize her scent, for his growls stopped and he went back to whimpering.

I wonder if he's already healing and he recognizes my scent from before or just from last night. And the whole vampire sniffing thing, ewwww.

She held a blood bag out until he snatched it, looking suspicious.

"It's pig's blood, you big baby. Come on. You need it to heal."

He sniffed at the blood -again with the disgusting sniffing thing- and, making a disgusted face, threw it against the opposite wall, where it splattered, blood dripping down the wall.

"Great, look what you did. Do you think pig's blood is free or something? I had to pay for it, you know." Buffy paused when she noticed the vampire staring hungrily at her neck.

"No way, buster. This neck is completely off limits! It's pig's blood for you."

She didn't realize how fast he could move, even being so weak, so she found herself pressed to the floor, with a vampire drinking happily from her neck. Again.

She rolled her eyes, this was getting old really fast. And wait, there was a vampire at
her neck ¿how wrong was that?

Her body tensed, preparing to throw him off when Spike retracted his fangs and licked
the wound closed. Pushing at his shoulders, the Slayer managed to turn him onto his back and, straddling his waist, whipped out a stake from her back pocket.

"That's it! I should just stake you and get over it. You can't keep using me as a pincushion
and as soon as everything is back to normal-"

"Buffy, is everything alright?" Her mother's worried voice sounded from the doorway, where
she was standing next to Dawn and staring at the visible bite mark on Buffy's neck.

Buffy scrambled back to her feet and walked to her mother. "Mom, what are you doing here? I told you to wait in the car! Anyway, I'm fine, but I wouldn't say no to some OJ. Let's go back home, OK?"

Both women were oblivious to the teenager now sitting close to the whimpering vampire. Too close. When she reached a hand to touch his face, a growl erupted from his throat, making Buffy and Joyce turn back to watch horrified what was happening inside the room.

"Dawn, don't!"

 

TBC...

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End Notes:  Ohhh cliffhanger! Aren't I evil? Please, leave a review!!