Disclaimer: Joss said we could, right?

Author’s note: Beta’d by the great and wonderful BTL.
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Chapter 43: Back Together Again

From that day forward Buffy tried to get more involved in the do gooding. She actually started to learn a few of the potential’s names too. Kennedy kept a wide berth around Buffy, rightly so. But Kennedy couldn’t do what she really wanted: leave, and pound the shit out of Buffy, not necessarily in that order. If she left the safety of Liz’s house the Bringers would get her. If she tried to take on Buffy, well, that wouldn’t really work with the demon strength and all.

Robin hadn’t been around in a few days either, which was fine with Buffy too.

Until the night he showed up after patrol and stopped her outside the house, a determined look on his face. Buffy looked with longing at the house, and it’s supposed sanctuary as Robin blocked her path.

“I know who you are,” he stated bluntly.

“Oh really?” asked Buffy trying to appear unconcerned. “Who am I?”

“You’re her.”

“Very articulate. Did they teach you that in principal’s school?” she said impolitely.

“When I was four...you granted my wish,” he continued on, as if he hadn’t heard her at all. “I’ve been researching this vengeance demon thing, since Kennedy let it slip. I want a wish.”

Buffy shook her head. “No.”

“What do you mean no? You’re a vengeance demon, you grant wishes. I want a wish. I wish that William the Bloody and Erixel the vengeance demon had never existed,” he said petulantly.

“No,” she said firmly, before walking into the house, leaving him on the lawn.

She didn’t get far before he grabbed her arm and pulled her back to face him.
“I wish it!” he shouted, drawing the attention of the Scoobies and assorted potentials in the house.

“Too bad!” she shouted back, wrenching her arm away from him. “You got your wish. I’m not in the habit of giving second wishes to my clients, unless they deserve it.”

“I don’t deserve it? You killed my mother!”

“Correction, Spike killed your mother. I just gave him the opportunity. Your wish has been granted. Trouble me no more,” she said, concluding the discussion in her most vengeance demon like voice and walking into the house, an irate Robin following after her.

Buffy stepped over the threshold trying to block out Robin’s furious rant behind her and into Anya’s personal space, who had been hovering near the door like so many of the potentials. Dawn and Andrew were trying to get a better look at what was happening out on the front lawn. Suddenly a thought occurred to her. Buffy knelt down in front of her boss and gazed at the ground.

“Blessèd be the name of Anyanka. I come in supplication. I bend as the reed in the flow of the rippling wave of vengeance. I come in the name of vengeance to call upon its mistress. Blessèd be the name of Anyanka, the name whispered in the name of revenge, vendetta, justice, retribution, vengeance.”

Anya giggled. “Ooh! Wish denied, but really, nice touch,” laughed Anya.

“Anya! You haven’t even heard what I wish!” Buffy whined, standing up again.

“But I can tell. Of course now everyone knows...I’d been so good keeping it a secret,” added Anya with a pout.

“Secret?” piped up Xander.

“Secret?” added Willow. “That she’s the mistress of Arashamahar and the boss of all vengeance demons? I knew that.”

“No secret here, either,” added Liz, coming around the corner from the dining room.

“Dawn!” whined Anya, turning towards the teen.

“What? It kinda just slipped out!” she excused herself.

“It slipped out?” said Anya indignantly her hands on her hips.

“You have to admit Anya that any secret about you slipping out is kinda ironic. You can’t keep a secret...” started Liz.

“That’s not true!” Anya protested. “Xander and I were engaged for months before we ever told anyone!” Anya popped out of the room in a puff of smoke.

“She’s a demon too?” asked Robin confused.

“That’s right vengeance boy,” said Xander inhospitably.

Buffy peered at Xander curiously.

“And you can just keep your demon killing paws off of her,” he said somewhat manically before tramping off into the kitchen.

The assembled potentials and Scoobies looked after him as he left.

“Xander has Anya issues,” muttered Dawn knowingly.
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But Robin didn’t leave it there, no matter what delusion Buffy thought Liz was under, who proclaimed that nothing else would happen. Buffy knew something was up. Robin was dangerous and no one was going to admit it.

Except Spike. Lovely vampire that he was, always on her side of things.

“It’s like living with Angelus again,” he muttered, holding her close as they lay on their cot, just waiting for life on the ground floor to resume normality the next evening. “Always looking over your bloody shoulder! Not knowing when you’re gonna get tied up.”

“I could tie you up and get it over with, but then I might not want to let you go...” she purred.

Spike smirked.

“Please?” Spike said seductively.

With a smile Buffy rolled on top of her lover and pinned back his arms. She was leaning down to plan a kiss on his lips, but was interrupted by the opening of the basement door.

“Buffy?” came Liz’s voice, standing at the top of the stairs, daring not to come down any further.

With a roll of her eyes, Buffy leapt off the bed and scurried towards her discarded clothes. She really didn’t need Liz seeing her in the all together. Finally decently clothed Buffy scuttled back over the cot and bounded towards the stairs.

“Yes?” asked Buffy innocently.

“Robin let me know about a nest of vamps, near the caves. You wanna come with? Maybe...maybe we can talk?” asked Liz, hesitantly.

Buffy shrugged her shoulders. “Ok,” she said half heartedly. She turned back and looked at Spike with a disappointed frown before making her way over to him to give him a kiss and promising to make it up to him later.

She really didn’t want to leave Spike, but somewhere deep inside her, the part trying to change for the betterment of the Christmas, puppies, saving the world, and making her family happy, she consented.
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Buffy and Liz walked silently through the woods towards the caves.

“So what did you want to talk about?” Buffy asked, breaking the silence between them for the first time since they left the house.

Liz looked away uncomfortably.

“Oh come on, you really don’t need my help to take out a nest of vamps, you could take all those potentials out to dust the baddies. It must be big important if you wanted to get me alone to talk,” continued Buffy.

“I...I wanted to talk, about me, you, life in general and...Spike,” stammered Liz, kicking at a clump of grass.

“Ah ha!” exclaimed the vengeance demon.

“I mean, I know that...God, I’m saying this all wrong.”

“You haven’t said anything yet,” Buffy laughed.

“Gah. Ok, Spike, you...I get that, long unrequited love, from what Dawn tells me. I didn’t read the rest of the diary. Dawn seems more perceptive than me, that’s not new. And it’s icky! I wanted him. Spike! The vampire I loathed for years. And he’s my grandfather, so many times removed.”

“Yep, it’s a special kind of grossness,” Buffy agreed with a nod, trying very hard to keep the smirk off her face that would anger her granddaughter.

“You know maybe that’s why I was denying it for so long. I’m sick, messed up in the head. I’m not saying that it was more than when I came back from the dead, but still messed up.”

“Wait,” cautioned Buffy, holding out her hand to stop her granddaughter from her rant and from walking on. “Stop right there. You didn’t know, he didn’t know. How could he? We didn’t know where they went, Henry and Isabella, your grandfather and great aunt.”

“LA, they went to LA,” muttered Liz.

Buffy nodded her head. She’d long figured it out. Liz and Dawn had ties to LA.

“I...” Liz trailed off, letting out a big sigh before continuing, “I also wanted to say, I’m sorry. That I didn’t believe you. That it took me so long. You have to admit, a vengeance demon turning up and saying that she’s my so many times removed grandmother is a little far fetched. Even for a Slayer who lives on the Hellmouth.”

“Is it so ridiculous?” asked Buffy just a little hurt.

“Maybe not,” admitted Liz and the two shared a smile.

They walked on for a bit, closer to the caves before the silence was again interrupted.

“So, you and Spike?” said Liz curiously. “That’s going well?”

“Yes,” said Buffy with a small smile. “Why do you ask?”

“It’s nothing...”

“No, it’s not nothing,” pressed Buffy. “You asked for a reason.”

“Ok, so maybe, in some sick way...You and Spike, and I’m so over him, cause with the ick, but you guys are the only fully functioning romantic relationship around, you know. That sounds dumb. Ignore me...”

“No,” interrupted Buffy. “I understand, and it’s not dumb.”

“Anya and Xander are kaput, Willow’s macking on the potential form hell...”

“Oooh ya,” added Buffy.

“Until Anya and Xander went kaplewy at the altar, I thought that maybe I wasn’t the grimm reaper of relationships.”

“You aren’t the grimm reaper of relationships,” disagreed Buffy. “That’s a terrible thing to think. One day you’ll find someone for you, and he’ll be wonderful and you’ll want to fight for him.”

“I thought Angel...”

“Ok, I have to stop you right there. Angelus is no one’s. I don’t care what you think about the soul. He’s vile, terrible and he killed my family. Your family. He’s not to be trusted.”

“You aren’t the first person to tell me that,” continued Liz.

“I won’t be the last either, you know. But somehow, it’s my right...being the grandmotherly person in this situation.”

“The demon’s funny.”

“It’s a gift, what can I say? So where is this nest?” asked Buffy.

“It should be just ahead,” explained Liz.

“Good, cause all this tramping around in the wet grass is ruining my... SPIKE!”

Liz turned and looked at Buffy, who was clutching at her head. “What’s wrong?”

“Someone’s hurting Spike. And he’s not fighting back! Fight back you moron! He’s only a human!” Buffy yelled into the air, and was about to teleport to his location when Liz reached out and grabbed her arm.

“Spike can’t hurt humans...his chip.”

“He doesn’t have a chip anymore!” declared Buffy. “He hasn’t had it for months! I never told him!” Buffy threw off Liz’s grip and teleported to Spike’s location.

The room was covered in crosses. And Spike lay against one wall, his face bloodied as if just waiting for his end, from an attacker that was nowhere in sight.

Buffy stormed across the floor and towards her lover and mate.

“Why didn’t you fight back?” she asked, crouching down to look him in the already swollen eyes.

“He’s human pet. Done him wrong enough in his life,” he said slowly. “Chip.”

Buffy stood up nodding her head. She knew at once who had attacked her mate. “Wood,” she growled. “Spike, I don’t care if you slaughtered his entire family! I won’t let you get dusted by a mere man! Fight back!”

Spike sniffed as if gathering his strength and attempted to stand. At once the only door to the shed opened revealing Robin Wood, a sneer on his face.

“Oh good, back together again,” said the principal glaring at the two demons.
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tbc...