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Drowning In You by BloodEnvy
 
27
 
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CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Buffy grinned as her stake sunk into the chest of her third vampire that night, pulling it back out as he dissolved into dust, a shocked expression on his face. She turned and smiled triumphantly at the peroxide blonde vampire behind her. Spike was standing back a few paces, a cigarette dangling loosely from his lips and his own stake in his hand.

“That’s three to one. I’m totally gonna win.”

Spike flashed a patented smirk, taking the cigarette out of his mouth to exhale a breath of smoke. “The night’s just begun, love. We haven’t even found the nest yet.”

Buffy rolled her eyes at him as he fell into step beside her. “Oh, please. Who’s the Slayer here?”

“Oh, you know I can take you, Slayer.” Spike’s voice carried a strange, husky tone she wasn’t used to, but he was looking away when she turned to quirk an eyebrow at him questioningly.

Deciding to ignore the feeling of weird, she twirled her stake idly between her fingers. “So how’d you find the nest, anyway?”

He exhaled again, and Buffy wrinkled her nose. Catching her expression, he dropped it, stubbing it out with his next step. Shrugging, he tucked his stake back into his duster pocket. “’Didn’t. I overheard a couple of vamps at Willie’s talking about it. Must be a larger nest too, if they’re taking on fledglings… most vamps don’t like to teach others unless they sired them.”

“Well, maybe their sire is part of the nest.” Buffy suggested casually.

“From what I hear, pet, you took care of their sire two weeks ago.” Spike grinned, “That’s where family ties usually end. I mean, Dru and me didn’t hang around with Darla once Angel got his soul back.”

“You didn’t stick around at all?”

“Dru went, I followed, you know?” Spike replied.

Buffy glanced at him. “You really… you really loved her, didn’t you?”

There was a heavy pause before Spike sighed, running a hand through his hair. “Yeah… yeah, I did.”

“Do you still?” Buffy asked hesitantly. “Love her, I mean.”

“No. No, not for a while,” Spike told her with the smallest of smiles. “Not for a long while.”

Buffy opened her mouth to speak, but shut it again as he touched a finger to his lips, pointing at the crypt nearest them. She nodded, stepping away from him to approach the door. She raised her stake cautiously and he followed suit, pulling his own out of his pocket. She paused.

“What do you reckon? Five or six?” she whispered. Personally, this was one of her favorite ways to hunt- two people blocking off an entrance and slaying vamps like fish in a barrel. She’d actually found this out while on patrol with Faith, but the nests hadn’t been as big back when Riley was still super-soldier, so she hadn’t had a chance to patrol this way in a while.

She guessed they were grouping like this again because of Glory- a fake name, or at least, not her real one, as Giles had discovered a few weeks ago when he’d tried to divine with that name to “check its authenticity”. The vamps were either grouping as protection against the Hell-bitch, or rallying to aid her.

Either way, it made patrol a lot quicker.

“Seven, I think.” Spike cocked his head in the direction of the door, inhaling through his nose. His brow wrinkled. “And there’s something else.”

“Something victim-y?” Buffy tightened her grip on her stake, eyeing the door. She wasn’t excited exactly, but her body was itching for the fight. But an innocent changed things— she’d have to be more careful so they wouldn’t get hurt.

“No… definitely demonic,” he answered, and she relaxed slightly. Easy as pie. “You ready?”

“Do you even have to ask?”

Spike grinned, giving her a wink as he turned and sent a heavy boot crashing into the crypt door, blasting it open. Eight faces turned towards the entrance as the two blondes filled the doorway, one less human than the others.

“Hey, you were right,” Buffy said. “Seven vamps, one ugly demon thing.”

“What can I say, pet?” Spike grinned. “Got a magic sniffer.”

The vampires were staring at them in shock, completely caught unawares by the sudden entrance of the two blondes. The demon-thing stood towards the back, and Buffy wrinkled her nose in distaste. It was short, dressed in a long brown robe of coarse wool- kind of like Friar Tuck in old Robin Hood movies- with greasy tendrils of hair hanging limply around its face. Its skin was off-colored, pockmarked, with a hooked nose and several warts. It was looking between the Slayer and Spike with a look somewhere between calculation and fear.

“Emphasis on the ugly, pet.” Spike said, his hand sliding under his coat to grip the stake tucked into his back pocket.

“And how.”

The demon raised a hand, gathering the attention of the startled vamps. Their gaze flicked towards it before fixing back on the two standing in the doorway. “Now is your time to prove your loyalty!” It announced loudly, raising its hands grandly. “Kill the Slayer in the name of the Sparkly-Incandescent one! Kill her for Glory!”

And then it ran.

There must have been a back entrance that Buffy hadn’t noticed, because the little goblin disappeared almost immediately, leaving the Slayer facing seven slightly confused and angry vampires. Buffy instinctively made a move to follow it, but was stopped by the collective growl of the vampires in front of her.

One vamp, a thirty-something year old female with a bad dye job and a Texan drawl, broke the silence with a scoff and a shrug. “Fuck that. I’m bagging me a Slayer for the fun of it.”

Buffy wrinkled her nose distastefully. “Rude, much?”

Dye job snarled at her in response, and Buffy was surprised when it was answered by a deep, guttural growl beside her. She glanced at the man next to her. He was staring at the angry vamp, something close to hate showing on his face. His eyes flashed yellow.

“You get the Slayer?” whined another, the acne scars on his face making her think he was younger than herself. “No fair.”

“Shut up, Mark.” She growled back, and Buffy figured she was probably the leader of the group, the others, while glaring hungrily at Buffy, seemed to be waiting for her go ahead. “I get the Slayer.” She shot Spike a sickening grin through her fangs. “You can have the traitor.”

“Hey!” Dye job’s head snapped back towards Buffy. “That’smy traitor!”

And with that, they flew into the fight.
 
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