~*~

"Got him! This time it’s really specific, Buffy", Willow nearly shouted.

"Point me in the right direction. Any idea how he’s doing, or does that just say where he is?", asked Buffy. She was checking to be certain she was armed with everything necessary to stop humans just short of killing them. Her plan was still to get Spike out safely without taking a human life. Then again, self defense WAS self defense!

The small hut the locator spell had indicated held Spike’s essence was several feet from the motorpool garage. It had most likely been used as a storage shed of some sort at one time. It appeared to be abandoned and the earth around it was overgrown with weeds. There didn’t appear to be much activity near the motorpool. Any personnel that might be on duty must be in the garage itself. The weeds around the hut were trampled down leading to the door, however, showing recent movement in or out of the shed.

Buffy, along with Giles and Xander, prepared to enter the hut.

Angel was in the back of the van, out of the sunlight, preparing to help with Spike once they got him to the van.

Willow was in the driver’s seat and Tara was on the passenger side. They had driven as close as possible to the hut and Tara was chanting a spell to make the van blend in with the surrounding scenery.

The idea was to get in, get Spike and get on the road before any of the expected Council of Watchers operatives made an appearance. Giles would remain to meet the Council team and direct them to the underground bunker.

Before exiting the van, Giles hid the file with the damning information under the cushion of passenger seat. So far none of the group had even mentioned the file, having put it from their minds in the aftermath of the death of Sam Finn and the ongoing search for Spike.

Giles would deal with the ramifications of Spike’s chipless state at a later time. He greatly feared that if he brought it up now it would lead to chaos within the ranks of the Scoobies and they did not have time to spare for that now. The Council had deployed their first team from the Los Angeles area and they would be there all too soon. Time enough to argue when the Scooby crew got home. If Spike were in the same or worse condition he was in when they did the original spell, his chipless condition wouldn’t matter anyway.

Xander started to shove open the door to the hut only to have Buffy reach out and stop him. "Wait! Make sure to open it slowly. We don’t want the sunlight to hit him", she cautioned.

Spike had slid down the wall nearly a half-hour before he heard sounds outside of the door. He just couldn’t stay standing in his shadowed nook any longer. What little strength he had left was rapidly depleting. Spike had tucked his legs tightly into his chest to make himself as small a target as he could. Maybe if he could stay alert he could summon the energy to rise again when the sun continued its encroachment on his safety zone. He had to try. There was little more than an inch of space between the sun and himself at this point and he would need to press himself tightly to the wall to survive.

His talky friend was back again. Spike decided that he had snapped mentally at some point. He had lived with Dru long enough to recognize the signs. Next thing you know, he’d be naming rocks or some such. Spike hoped that the hallucinations were only a side effect from the blood loss and that if he survived, he wouldn’t be as loony as his former love forever.

"Spike, your Beatrice is coming, she is just outside the door".
Spike looked up towards the door and, just as the voice promised, there stood the vision of perfect womanhood. The sunlight hit her in a way that obscured her features, but the way her hair shone, like spun gold, and the light playing on her form made her appear to glow. Spike wondered if he was in the company of an angel or if he truly HAD lost his mind.

"Beatrice, Angel? Are you real or am I mad?" he asked the vision.

"Spike, it’s me, Buffy. Angel’s in the van. How’d you know he’s here? Who’s Beatrice? And you’d better have a good answer or I’ll be the one mad".

"Must be crazy, thought you said you’re Buffy. She’d never come for me. ‘M evil and disgustin’, wouldn’t put herself out for a thing like me. Soldier Boy’s right about that at least", Spike muttered.

Buffy grimaced at those words. She knew she had said them to Spike often enough but never really thought that he had taken them to heart. Then again, she had been denying his ability to have real emotions at the time too. Of the two of them, she had been the one unable to feel, he felt far too much. Buffy realized that she had a great deal to undo from the past few months before they could really move forward. At least she had found him in time to have that chance.

"Spike, don’t move! The sun’s too close to you. Stay where you are and we’ll come to you", Buffy said urgently. Spike had started to rise and his body had come far too close to the patch of sun for Buffy’s comfort.

The three rescuers moved quickly. Buffy and Giles went to free Spike from the chains that held him. Xander headed for the deadly window to use a tarp to cover the opening. They had brought it as a potential means of moving Spike if he were unconscious.

Spike was conscious but didn’t seem completely lucid. He looked from Giles to Buffy with his confusion clearly showing. Reality and fantasy seemed to have blended to the point where he wasn’t sure what was what any longer. What was clear was that the chains were off and the sunlight was blocked and he was not yet a big pile of dust.. His vocal, invisible companion seemed to have taken a hike, too. Maybe things were looking up.

They got Spike into the van with more speed than any of them suspected they could muster. Spike had yet to say anything sensible, just staring from Buffy to the Scoobies to Angel in amazement. He was 99% sure that he had fried and was in some hell dimension were he would seem to be saved by the most unlikely sources only to be tormented further for eternity.

Giles held back and said, "Go! I’ll meet you at Buffy’s when I finish with the Council here. I think I hear a helicopter now. Move out. The last thing they need to see is their Slayer in the company of two of the most well-known vampires in history", he pointed out. "We want them to close this operation down, not join it."

Spike knew he had to be in the midst of an ‘episode’. Dru had gone into fugue states enough times that he recognized the symptoms. He was seeing Buffy and her face showed all the concern and love he could have ever wanted from her. As unlikely as a Scooby rescue, featuring a willing Xander, was the presence of Angel. If Spike needed any further proof that he had gone mad, it was the inclusion of his sire in this hallucination.

He hadn’t been in Angel’s company since the Gem of Amarra incident. They had not exactly parted as bosom buddies, not that they ever had been before. For his mind to conjure up Angel in some rescue scenario was enough to make Spike let out a weak, burst of laughter. Pathetic that his subconscious was calling out to his sire like in the days when Angelus had abandoned his family at the turn of the last century. "First crazy like Dru, now the daddy issues, too", he thought to himself.

Spike had so little blood left in him that just staying semi-alert was a trial. Since his mind had decided to leave him in the lurch, Spike decided it best to simply shut down and fall into the arms of Morpheus. If he were very lucky the old god would give him pretty dreams of a caring Buffy and his body would somehow avoid the nearing sun. That, or he’d dust while unaware what was happening.

"Shit! God, he’s out like a light", Angel noted. "I guess it might be for the best from the looks of him, but it’ll be damned hard to feed him this way. He needs the blood, too. I really don’t want to find out what happens to a vampire when they lose it all".

Buffy sat for a moment holding Spike’s unmoving body in her arms like a live, modern Pieta. Tears coursed down her face as she looked over his condition. She realized that Spike was not yet aware that he was safe now. He had never expected her to come to his rescue, much less care about what had happened to him. She knew that fault lay at her door. She had taken his love and twisted it, and him, for months and finally walked off into the sunlight, where he couldn’t follow to plead his case. She had said so many hurtful things to him that the beating she had given him in that alley paled in comparison to the damage she had done to his self-image. Some things didn’t heal faster for vampires or slayers, hearts being one of them.
So Buffy did what she always did when confronting her feelings, she opted for action.

"I’m going to stay here with Giles to make sure we close ‘em down", Buffy decided. "Get Spike home and fed. I’ll be there as soon as possible. I think he’ll be out for quite a while. Tara, if you can come up with anything for the pain he must be in, please, just do it. Tell him … tell him …just make him comfortable and take care of him until I get home, okay?" Buffy jumped out of the back of the van and closed the back door.

The van sped off in the direction of Sunnydale as Giles and Buffy sprinted towards the helipad where the Council helicopter would soon land.

She and Giles easily subdued the two maintenance personnel in the garage area. The workers had not expected anyone to be in the area and were engaged in a card game. They hadn’t had a chance to call for help or set off any alarms.

Buffy opted to let Giles tell the Council team the story they had decided upon before leaving Sunnydale. The demon Doc was dead and would not contradict anything they chose to tell anyway.

The helicopters with the Council’s strike force began to descend. There were enough black-clad troopers to take on the facility and secure it until backup arrived, provided the element of surprise continued to work in their favor.

Emphasis was placed on the organization’s plan to study and eliminate the two existing slayers. Such tampering by an outside source was antithetical to the Council’s goals and mission. Indeed, the idea of any outside agency even being aware of the existence of a slayer went contrary to Council’s policies and history.

The stone faces of the Council team betrayed none of what they might be thinking about the group who had planned to capture the active Slayer with the intention of experimentation and elimination. All that mattered was that Mr. Travers and the Council had determined this to be a priority mission. They had their orders and were not waiting for the substantial backup that was on the way.

"Mr. Travers said that you would direct the operation until he arrives", the operative in charge told Giles. "He wants the whole thing closed off and those with Council ties to be held under lock and key. We are to segregate those not connected to the Council until he arrives and makes the necessary arrangements to have them permanently contained as well. By the time they get here, the Council should have all the intel done and know who is backing this operation."

"Just so", Giles agreed. "It would appear that only these two individuals are above ground and we were able to prevent them from making any report below. We should be able to effect a surprise raid on the facility itself. I’m thinking we should approach in such a way that they won’t be able to tell just how small a force they are dealing with. Of course, it is to be hoped that we’ll have sufficient backup in short order".

They laid out their plans and divided the troops into two groups, one to be led by Buffy and the other by Giles. They planed to enter the facility from two directions and meet in the lab area, roughly in the middle.

The raid went perfectly. The element of surprise carried the day for the group and, as promised, a large contingent of Council warriors arrived just as the defenders began to realize the numbers they faced were smaller than they had first thought.

The U.S. Government had sent representatives from some unnamed agency to deal with the former military personnel that had attached themselves to the unauthorized operation. A representative apologized profusely to Buffy, explaining that the government had indeed shut down the Initiative. Any involvement by anyone still in the employ of the government was going to result in serious disciplinary action, including imprisonment.

Travers had arranged with unnamed sources to take any personnel not covered by U.S. government or Council authority into custody. "No ask, no tell" was the order of the day.

Mostly, everyone just wanted it all to go away.

Buffy was grateful to the Council, but still not willing to let Travers have all the say in the plans. "Look, I’m the Slayer. I know which demons are dangerous and which ones are simply ugly. It’s my job to slay them if they need slaying. I say that I get to go cell to cell and decide. There are a couple that are harmless in there. I’m not going to be just like these people here and kill them just because they exist. If we’re supposed to be the good guys, we need to act like it."

As Buffy was checking the prisoners and pulling out the handful of harmless demons, she saw Riley being led to the section where the former military personnel were being held. He was awaiting his turn for questioning about his military status.

She stopped the soldier detaining Finn and asked to speak to him for a moment. "Riley, I don’t even know where to start. Let’s just say that I know the whole story, the way you set Spike up. I can see from his condition--and yes, he is still alive--what you’ve done since then. I never thought you would be the monster, Riley. I just don’t understand. If it wasn’t about us, why did it still bother you that we broke up? You had Sam, why not let me get on with my life too?"

"Sam isn’t my wife", Riley admitted. "She’s an old friend and Maggie Walsh’s daughter. Buffy I need for you to know that I would never have let them kill you. I was planning to stop them from that part of the operation. I’m sorry you got hurt, Buffy. I am glad that I helped bring you to your senses where Spike is concerned, though. I can’t regret that what we did made you wake up and dump him. He’s not good enough for you. He’s a thing, Buffy, and you deserve a man. Maybe I’m not that man, but he’s out there and now you can find him. I’m just sorry I didn’t finish Spike off before you got here".


Buffy hit him then. As Riley fell into a metal table, his leg incision opened up where he’d had surgery the day before. Sparks arced from the wires in his leg and everyone seemed to be looking at him at once. Riley looked shocked himself to discover his leg was anything but the normal tissues and bone of a human. "My God, what the hell did you do to me?", he yelled at the medical staff in the makeshift stockade.

Giles turned from his discussion with Travers to ask one of the medical staff, "What kind of prosthesis have you put on Riley Finn? That looks far beyond the normal technology used today."

Riley was struggling to break free of his captors. He seemed determined to get to the medical team who were nervously watching him. "Buffy, help me! What am I? What did these bastards do to me?, he demanded.

Travers became quite interested at this point and whispered an order to the head of the government contingent. Riley was led off to the group under custody of the Council. "Not to worry, Rupert, we’ll have a little look at him back in London", Travers promised. "I believe we have the files from the medical experiments and our own group can determine just what modifications may have had made to this young man. Perhaps some good can come of this fiasco in the end."

Buffy began to feel some pangs of sympathy for the clearly frightened soldier. Then Spike’s face and his condition when they’d found him came clear in her mind and all sympathy dried up. She didn’t want to have a scene with her ex-boyfriend, especially in front of the Council. The last thing she wanted was Spike to be mentioned in their presence.

Buffy pulled Giles to one side, her face showing panic for the first time since they had found Spike. "Giles, they’ve got the files! They’ll know Spike was here. What do we do?"

"Don’t worry, Buffy. I took that particular file. It is in the van, well on its way to Sunnydale as we speak", he reassured her.
The debriefing took much longer than Buffy was comfortable taking. She was itching to get home and make sure Spike was going to be okay. Giles was starting to unnerve her with the looks he sent her way when he didn’t realize she was looking. Something was up with him and Buffy didn’t want to ask until they were alone.

She managed to get away to a small office and call home to check on Spike. "So he’s still out? I would have thought he’d start to come around by now. At least you’ve gotten some blood into him. That vampire healing should start to kick in soon. Angel, you’ve got the best chance of knowing what to do for him. Please stay until he’s on the mend, okay? Right now we could use Xander coming back to pick us up. So far they’ve been so busy asking questions about this operation that they haven’t wondered how Giles and I got here. I figure Xander can pretend that he’s been waiting for us in the woods or something".

~~

The ride back to Sunnydale was tense. Buffy waited for Giles to spill whatever was so obviously on his mind while Giles appeared to be wishing himself on the other side of the world.

"Okay, I’m thinkin’ you two have some issues you’re dancing around and I’m gonna be the lucky guy in the middle here", said Xander. "You want me to pull over and take a little walk while you two go at it? I mean, not really in the mood to play quick-witted umpire here, it’s been a busy day and I’d like to just go home, kick back and enjoy what’s left of the weekend", he continued.

"Anything Giles has to say to me he can say in front of you, Xander. So, Giles, is this going to be a lecture on how Spike is a vampire and only good in the role of bad boyfriend? Cause, I’m thinking Riley gets the gold star for that job", Buffy said.

"I had a look at the files, Buffy. There are some factors that we hadn’t counted on, I fear. Your plans might change once you know what their doctors did during the medical procedures", Giles began.

"Good Godfrey Cambridge! Don’t tell us they really did neuter Spike this time!", exclaimed Xander in horror.

Buffy paled at the thought of what sorts of experiments might have taken place on the vampire she she loved. "Giles, what are you talking about? Be real specific, too, ‘cause I want this all talked out before we get home. I don’t want Spike waking up to hear some argument between us about him".

"It’s the chip, Buffy. They removed the chip. Spike is now the same feral vampire he was when he first came to town. There is nothing to prevent his carrying out the many threats he has made over the years. Once he is strong enough, he’ll be up, feeding and killing just like any other vampire. It would be merciful to simply stake him as soon as we arrive. He will likely still be unconscious and won’t feel a thing. Best get it over as soon as possible", Giles advised.

Buffy looked at Giles as if he had grown an extra head. Xander pulled the car to the side of the road and stared at the Watcher in horror.

"So you think we should just stake him?!", Buffy demanded.

"You say he has to die because of what he IS, not for what he’s done. He hasn’t done anything wrong in a long, long time, Giles. He HAS done a lot of good. Maybe he won’t go back to the way he was. Did you ever think of that? He hasn’t even threatened any of us in ages. He’s changed, Giles, really changed", Buffy said.

"Buffy, I hate to bring up old stuff, but remember Miss Calendar and Willow’s fish? Remember the factory? I know you hated having to send Angel to hell, but you ...", Xander started.

"Xander, stay out of this. Angel and Spike are two different people. I mean, can you imagine what Angelus would have done if they had put a chip in him? I don’t think he would have ever joined up with us or let Glory torture him or take care of Dawn when I died or any of the things Spike has chosen to do. He’d have been having his meals delivered and working on ways to torture all of us. Spike isn’t Angelus. I don’t get nervous whenever you go to the zoo, do I, Hyena Boy? And I don’t keep Giles away from all things chocolate", Buffy pointed out. "You have to judge Spike by how he is now, not what he’s been or what Angel was."

"Look, Giles, Spike won’t hurt me. I don’t think he’d hurt any of us. I also don’t think he’d risk losing me just for a quick meal. He really does love me. I told you about all that went down after I came back from the dead. I clearly told you that the chip didn’t work on me", she reminded him.

"Whoa, horsies!" Xander cried in horror. "What’s this about Spikey’s chip not being plugged in all this time? You mean he could’ve ripped out all our throats while we were patrolling or watching TV?"

"No, Xander, it only stopped working on me. I’m the only one he could have killed any time he wanted to. And he COULD have, Giles! He could have killed me or turned me anytime. I wasn’t in any mood to fight him. I think I might have welcomed it. He never tried. He never even threatened to do any of that. All he did was take whatever I dished out. He didn’t even fight back when I beat him unconscious in the alley the week before my birthday. He didn’t do it because he loves me. And he won’t do it to anyone else now for the same reason. He’s changed", Buffy said.

"Buffy, he is a vampire. They kill. It is his nature. He has been unnaturally restrained all this time, that is all. He may well love you, or think he does, but he does not love the rest of humanity except as a buffet", Giles said quietly. "He has no soul, no moral guide. He sees people as lunch, not companions. He has constantly complained about the taste of pigs’ blood. Now he can have what he craves. What makes you think he won’t be out hunting as soon as he realizes he can do so?", Giles asked.

"Because he’s Spike", Buffy said in answer.