Note: Thanks to my beta t_geyer for her unending patience, perseverance and support.

SECTION 5 - LIKE FATHER, LIKE SON

He raised his son in the English way
And he taught him respect, he taught him how to pray
He sent him off to boarding school
Where he learned how to live by someone else's rules...

... It must be something much deeper than fear or pain
Another child learns the pattern, he won't break the chain

Fear of God and the feel of the rod will raise a good boy
The fear of God and the feel of the rod will raise a good boy
The fear of God and the feel of the rod will raise the next boy


(Rick Springfield Album - Living in Oz)




Chapter 5.17
Sunday, June 16th, 2002


"You saved me, Spike. You. I-. You are a man... You're all the man I want." She let her hand drop from his hair, instead allowing sensitive fingertips to map the planes of his face. She used the tenderness of her touch to convey her message of love, a love that didn't discriminate between his normal human appearance and the coarser features of his demonic aspect. Her gentle hand traced the ridges over his golden eyes and then around the outer edge of his eye socket until she cupped his cheek in her palm, her fingertips resting on his beautifully prominent cheekbone. Even in his despair he pressed into her hand with all the sensuality of a giant cat, his subconscious refusing to allow him to set aside the affection between them. "You're not just a man, though. You're my man... and my demon and that doesn't make you any less, no matter what I said when I was channelling..." Buffy's voice trailed off, the cool flesh of her lover's hollowed cheek simply dissolving from beneath her fingers, fading into nothingness like some seventies sci-fi effect.

Frantically she tried to grab him before he could leave her, jerking awake to the sound of Spike's feral howl of grief and finding her hands pinned as if she had no more strength than a child.

"Buffy! Buffy... chill..."

Looking above her head, she traced upward from the arms that held her until she could identify Faith's deep brown eyes looking down into hers, the expression of sympathy still seeming incongruous to the blonde slayer.

Spike's snarling comment drew her attention before she could work out exactly what was happening. "Gonna have to shoot that thing pretty damn fast to get both of us before I rip your head clean off. I'd put it down now, watcher."

Buffy tensed again, finally becoming aware of the man who pointed a crossbow at her heart, Faith's grip turning her into an easy target.

"Wes? Why?" She looked puzzled and hurt in equal measure by Wes's hostility. It was this rather than Spike's threat, which given the vampire's mostly reclining position struck him as reminiscent of the bedroom scene in 'The Princess Bride', that made the watcher slowly lower the crossbow to the floor, trusting to his instincts when they told him she was no newly risen vampire.

"Now kick it over here," Spike ordered. "An' if it scratches the varnish then you can pay to have it sanded down an' redone."

He waited until the crossbow was safely within his reach before he turned his attention to Faith. "An' much as I like to see two women gettin' friendly, I don't think the missus is really in a hand-holdin' mood right about now."

"Take a chill pill, blondie," Faith answered as she loosened her grip since Buffy had stopped fighting against her. "All we were trying to do was check her pulse. Hardly my fault that B freaked out the minute I touched her."

"Take it from me, her pulse is just fine, kinda weak but steady as a metronome... or it was until you went and got her excited. An' that still doesn't explain why Bertie Wooster, there, was pointin' that thing at my mate."

"Testosterone much?" Buffy asked, somehow sounding fragile, impatient and teasing at the same time, Faith's response having provided her with the missing piece she needed to comprehend the situation. "Don't worry, Wes. I haven't joined the realms of the undead quite yet."

Spike's expression was one of utter incredulity as he gaped open-mouthed at the watcher. "You thought that I'd..."

"We were unable to rule out the possibility when there was so much blood around and when Buffy is seldom without a recent bite mark. I felt it appropriate to follow the course of prudence. I'd still be greatly reassured if Buffy would allow Faith to confirm what you said about her pulse. It's not that I don't trust your word," Wes said, doing his best to couch his words in a conciliatory tone. "It's simply that I know if there were to be one reason why you would lie, it would be if you perceived a threat to your mate."

Spike opened his mouth to protest, no doubt loudly and with many adjectives not found in your average Disney animation. An imploring look from Buffy was enough to temporarily still the invective before it left his mouth, and she extended her arm toward the other slayer, the effort inducing a barely visible tremor. At the sight, the vampire was quick to turn his attention to the watcher once more, his voice rough. "First aid kit's under the sink. Make yourself useful. I assume somewhere in all that watcher training they at least try to teach you how to stop your slayer bleeding to death... or are you just meant to shoot them to make sure they don't linger on their deathbed and keep you waiting for the next one to be called?"

"Spike! Wes had a perfect right to defend himself. Now, let it go," Buffy interjected, albeit weakly, smiling her thanks to Wes when he moved toward the kitchen.

"Feels okay to me. Leastways, there's something there to feel and bonus points for not being in a coma." Faith nodded towards Wes's house. "I'll go fetch Summers Junior. Maybe she can talk Fangboy into a better mood ...or gag him," she threw over her shoulder as she pulled open the front door.

 

---

 

It was quite some time later before everyone's wounds had been tended. Both blondes had taken their turn in the bathtub after Wes had proclaimed that it might be easier if he could actually see where the injuries were underneath all the blood. Faith and Dawn had helped Buffy, the teenager insisting that, real or not, she still had six years worth of memories of how to put her sister back together again. That left the watcher to tend to the vampire once the women had cleared the bathroom. Spike put up the obligatory token protest, but underneath he couldn't help but be grateful as the watcher slipped Spike's arm around his shoulder so that he could bear a portion of the vampire's weight as he helped him up the stairs.

Wes grimaced as the tepid water softened the dried blood to the extent that he could peel the vampire's clothes away revealing plum-dark bruises and ragged scars all over his body in addition to the deep wound in his stomach. "What the hell happened to you? You look like someone locked you in a cage with a pack of starving Rottweilers."

"Yeah? Don't feel all that different neither."

The watcher waited patiently as he sponged the blond's back before passing over the sponge to let Spike clean the more easily accessible areas on his own.

Eventually, Spike unwound enough to admit his uncertainty. "Haven't got a bloody clue, mate." He used his foot to hook around the chain and pull the plug, letting the sanguine water escape down the drain. Wes stepped up to the edge of the bath, passing him a towel that Spike wrapped around his hips and helping him out. "Got our bringer all trussed up but before we could get out we ran into three of them ubervamp bastards. Took one out with the little toy you gave us, then I got another but not before it gave me this..." The vampire suddenly found the vinyl flooring of intense interest. "Was wastin' time tryin' to pull m'self together when the last of them stuck Buffy in the gut with that damned axe. She went down an' after that I couldn't tell you how the hell she did it. Don't know how we got back here or where half these marks come from. Soon as she was hurt, I just checked out. Have to ask the slayer about what happened after that... but I'd leave it till Rupert's around. Don't want her to have to go through it half a dozen times."

"What matters is that you both made it out," Wes pointed out sympathetically.

Spike didn't voice his own reply to that. 'What matters is I let her down again.'

---

 

With Faith and Dawn fussing round her and Wes bandaging the worst of Spike's wounds, she'd been denied the comfort of his touch, and even when her eyes had met his across the room his gaze would flick away as if he couldn't bear for her to look at him. The journey back to the school was awkward. Spike insisted that Buffy take the front passenger seat while he curled under both a blanket and the rear window shelf of the hatchback. Logically, it made perfect sense but Buffy chafed at the distance it put between them. She could sense Spike distancing himself from her, and apart from tangled memories of an interrupted dream she hadn't had a chance to discuss it with him. The others in the car all reacted to the atmosphere between them, resulting in a nervous near silence except for Rogue's quiet whines. 'Stupid oversensitive vamp!'

What made it worse was that she knew that some time alone would be all she needed to reassure him and bring him back to her, but she also knew that they weren't going to get any peace until the full story of the night's events had been explained and dissected.

The front of the school building was in the shade when they got there, and Wes reversed up until his rear bumper almost touched the steps before he stopped. By unspoken consent no one offered to help either the injured slayer or her mate as they got out of the car, each masking their injuries to the best of their abilities, knowing that the potentials would take it as a major blow to morale if they realised just how badly they had been hurt. Spike still somehow managed to keep at least two people and a dog between himself and Buffy at all times, and the slayer's patience was suffering.

"Drawing room or upstairs?" Wes asked, unsure where they would want to convene.

"Upstairs?" Buffy suggested. "Less chance of uninvited guests? I can cope with Giles's latest flame... sort of, if I have to, but I really don't want to do this with your dad or Travers looking at us like a pair of chimps in a cage."

 

---

 

When the group began to settle into their positions Buffy decided that she wasn't going to let Spike lurk in a corner. Taking him by the hand she pulled him down next to her on the decrepit sofa and refused to relinquish her grip. She let their bond tell its own story, her love, pride and gratitude sweeping away the vampire's self-doubt or at least keeping it in abeyance for a time. Spike's eyes finally lifted to meet hers, allowing her to read the wonder that lingered there.

"Not that it isn't an improvement on Spike sulking, but impressionable teenage eyes here," Dawn teased immediately. "Do you have to do the freaky mind-meld stuff in public?"

"Was not sulking."

"Okay, no-o-o-ot sulking. Brooding, then?"

"Heyyy, take that back!"

"Were too!" Dawn giggled. "Brooding like a great big broody vamp... And our budget doesn't run to that much hair gel or the plastic surgery for the caveman forehead or, at least, if it does, it'd be so much cooler if you spent it on a motorcycle for me when I'm old enough."

Spike gave an amused snort, the last of his black mood dissipating. "'D barely trust you on a push bike, Bit, never mind let you loose in charge of a motorbike."

Giles gave an impatient sigh. "Yes, quite, now perhaps we can have some sort of explanation as to what actually happened last night and why the two of you look to have gone several rounds with Lennox Lewis, not to mention what that report about an explosion on this morning's news was all about."

As his gaze came to rest on Buffy she shook her head emphatically before the motion obviously had an adverse effect. "So-o-o not me. Just because a girl burns down a building or three and blows up a school, why does every explosion have to be her fault?"

"Perhaps if you start at the beginning..." the elder of her watchers prompted.

"'Kay, watcher," Spike took up the tale. "We found the back way in. Got as far as a nice little armoury complete with a nice big box of explosives before we met any resistance. Killed a bunch of bringers, trussed one up ready to bring back an' that's when them Turok Han showed up. One of them seemed to think I'd be more attractive if my innards were outards. Another one stuck the nice sharp pointy end of that axe of mine through the slayer's guts, seein' as I was considerate enough to leave it around for him. Guess I passed out then. End of story."

Giles' lips pursed, and he turned to his slayer. "Would you care to fill in the blanks?"

Buffy shrugged. "Like he said. We got the first one with the garrotte. Spike staked the second one, 'cept he had to get the vampy guy on the floor and stomp on the stake to do it and he was already hurt by then... When I went down, I mean from the shock. I got back up but... that's when it all sort of changed." Buffy cast a nervous glance in Spike's direction. "We just... I mean last night when we were getting ready for a fight it was like we could hear what the other one was thinking... even if we weren't touching, not just like knowing what we were going to do in the fight but I could hear everything, clear as if he said it... like an adrenaline thing."

She looked at Spike again, as if he might have the words she needed to explain. "When I got hurt... Spike didn't pass out. I guess he doesn't remember, but he kinda went all Forbidden Planet on me... I mean I could still feel him, and it wasn't Spike but it was. I mean it wasn't the guy who's sitting here now but maybe it was a part of him."

"Forbidden Planet?" Giles asked.

"Monsters from the id, Rupert. In the film they get out of control an' damn near kill everyone."

"You mean the demon took over?" The watcher looked from Spike back to Buffy.

"I'm not sure it's as simple as that but sorta... or the local bar owners are up to their old tricks, except not with the stoop and the cave painting and the drop in IQ."

Spike ducked his head, looking through his lashes into Buffy's eyes. "'M sorry, pet. You shouldn't have to see that, let alone have it..."

Buffy's fingers came up to rest on his lips, cutting him off. "I saw him and I felt him and he was primitive but he was fierce and beautiful and he loved me and he wanted to protect me. I never doubted for one second that I was safe with him because he was part of you." Cupping his chin with her fingertips, she leaned in and pressed a light kiss on his lips. "Without you I don't know if I'd have managed to kill the third guy, and when bad guy number four turned up you more or less tore him apart... fists and fangs... Okay, so number five kamikaze-ed in the end and took our prisoner with him, but you got us both home safe."

"I thought you'd dragged me back while I was sleeping the sleep of the knocked unconscious."

Buffy rubbed at the egg shaped bruise on the back of her head. "Actually, I think that would have been more me."

"And the explosion?" Wes asked.

"Guess vamp guy number five realised that he wasn't going to walk out of the room," Buffy answered brightly. "Spike and him were fighting, and I was trying to help, only they were rolling around so much that there wasn't much I could do in case I hit Spike, and it wasn't like I couldn't tell that Spike was winning. Then, they ended up next to the box with the explosives and Turkish Han managed to kick Spike off. Next thing I know, it's snapped the lock and before it can even get the lid open Spike's picked me up and he's running for the exit. We were nearly clear before the blast caught us, but that's when I hit my head, so that's about all she wrote."

"Even with Spike's speed, it seems hard to believe that you'd be able to outrun an explosion," Wes offered. "Especially with his injuries."

"I think maybe there was some sort of delay, but that could be the concussion talking. It was one of those slo-mo, total clarity sort of moments."

"Whatever way you look at it, they weren't just storing that stuff down there," Spike grumbled. "That box was left there for us to find and they were lookin' for curiosity to kill something a bit bigger than the cat."

 

---

 

The meeting had wound to a close before too long, more because it was obvious that both Spike and Buffy were in need of further rest than because the group had come to any sort of resolution regarding how to deal with the situation. Wes was contemplating his chances of it being quiet enough to catch up on the sleep he'd missed when his cell phone rang.

"Querido?"

Wes smiled. "I'm willing to answer to that. Now, what's wrong?"

"There has to be something wrong?"

"It's still an hour or two before Oz was meant to meet you to help you and the others move in, so let's say I have a hunch."

"Okay, I need you to come with me to LA. I need to pick someone up from the airport, and I think after what happened last night it might be wise for you to bring a gun."

"The person you're meeting shouldn't be in any danger, Marie. Not unless they were a watcher or a potential."

"She was a watcher." Several seconds passed while Wes tried to make sense of this news before Marie continued with a touch of nervousness in her voice. "I believe you call her mother."