a/n **gasp** Another update? :-) Sure is. Hope you all enjoy.

Btw, oodles of squishes to Megan and Gail for their beta job.

hugs, sfg


Chapter 17 – Unchain me

Spike woke to complete darkness, a frantic call inside his mind stirring up confusion and panic, and a tingling at the base of his neck that also seemed to affect his stomach to a degree.

Danger! Danger! Danger!

It was a voiceless chant over and over in his brain yet he still understood.  He swatted at it like a fly only to find his hands pull up short.  Squirming around, he felt it – the confinement around him, hard and solid, boxing him in on all sides.

Oh, God, no!

His terror was doubled when the – demon?  Was that his demon?   It felt different, yet still familiar, somehow.  Whatever it was, it was thrashing in his brain, panicked at the thought of being chained.

Chained?

The thought brought back some sense and he gritted his teeth against the old terror he thought he’d gotten over. 

Instead of jerking his hands, he turned them, feeling his way along the – yes, the chains that bound his wrists.  Tightening his abdominals, he lifted his upper body, following the links and praying his head didn’t connect with anything.

It didn’t.

But his hand did find something.  A cool, hard, smooth surface that curved ‘round him.

Not a coffin then.  

He breathed a sigh of relief.  It was short lived, though, because the thundering in his mind, distracted by his terror, resumed its screeching.

Not alone! Not alone! Not alone! Danger! Danger! Danger!

He struggled to get his mind thinking through the noise, trying to remember how he came to be here but there was nothing.

“Oi, who’s there?”

What the hell?  I sound like a gir—

And all at once the memories poured in.  He’d helped the Slayer with her little ‘Slutty Faith in a Buffy Suit’ problem and gotten magically torn apart and then zapped for his efforts.

Shit!  

And if he wasn’t mistaken, he was now chained in the Watcher’s sodden tub.  Again. 

Fuck!

“SLAYER!”

His scream was rewarded with a sharp intake of breath to Spike’s left.  Now that he’d had a chance to get adjusted to the darkness, he realized it wasn’t really complete.  Light filtered under the gap of the door and while it was still dark, he could make out a darker shape in the far corner. 

Instinctively, he tried to tap into his heightened senses, forgetting, in his anger, the fact that he wasn’t in his own body.  For a split second, the room flashed brighter, the scents assaulted his nose, and his hearing was flooded with input. 

Then it was gone and all Spike was left with was a disgusting memory of the smell of Iowa ’s spunk and the fact that the only heartbeat in the vicinity came from his own breast.

On some level which he didn’t really consider, he recognized her.  Crouching in the corner.  In his body.  Unchained.

And he was right pissed. 

“Slayer—”

“I can hear your heart,” she interrupted, her voice low and...what?  Confused?  Uncertain?   Spike had never heard her sound like that and it was enough to have him falter, leaving her free to softly continue.  “It’s thundering away in there, I can hear it from all the way over here.  And I can see you, too.  Not just a shadow.  I can totally see you.”

Vulnerable.  She sounded vulnerable.

Well, so bloody what?! he yelled at himself.  You’re vulnerable, too, you stupid wanker.  She’s got you bloody well chained to a tub!  Again!

“Well, how nice for you,” he snapped and was rewarded with another hiss of breath.  Heightened hearing not all it’s cracked up to be, is it, bitch?   His voice rose with every word as his anger spilled out and filled the small space. “You can hear and see and, oh yeah, walk around untethered,” he shouted, grabbing the chains and shaking them so they clanged against the tub.

“Spike, please—” came her choked reply.

“Unchain me,” he demanded in a tight voice.

“No.”

Spike bellowed with rage, thrashing and kicking and swinging the chains with enough force to send chips of porcelain flying.  The noise, even to Spike’s muffled senses, was tremendous and, like a child throwing a temper tantrum, he was determined to keep it up until he got his own way.

He kept it up, even when Buffy rose, spun in a swirl of leather – After all these years, that coat was still the ultimate in cool – and stormed out the door.

Right until she returned and shot him.

tbc