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Beer Foamy by Spikez_tart
 
Not The Way I Heard It
 
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Chapter 12 – Not the Way I Heard It


The Watcher’s Journal of Sir Arthur Gosnard-Tisklin.

Brontley, January 3, 1901, continued. Was it possible? Had the Slayer abandoned me to be killed by this hideous creature? Too weak to move from the spot where I had fallen, I said my final prayers as the vampire turned to finish me.

He leaned over me, leering with pleasure, and grasping me by my collar, raised me up from the ground to resume his interrupted meal, but before he could return his loathsome mouth to my wounded neck, he burst into flames and vanished in a whirlwind of dust.

From my vantage point on the ground, where the vampire dropped me when he disintegrated, I could see my Slayer holding the flattened remnants of a tin dark lantern. She had shattered the flaming oil lamp against the vampire’s back and given him his first taste of Hell.

Lady Victorine dropped to her knees and embraced me in a very forward manner.

“Sir Arthur, Sir Arthur. Don’t die. Don’t die,” she cried. She commenced sobbing in a manner that was certainly unbecoming to the fierce warrior she is meant to be, but quite comforting to me.


***

A few minutes after sunset, Spike emerged from the sewers, near the New Age Meditation and Happy Feelings Worship Center feeling happy, somewhat buzzed on alcohol and anticipating a visit with his mate as soon as his work was through. He was carrying a neatly wrapped bouquet of yellow daisies. To his surprise, the building was dark and quiet.

He kicked in the front door and shouted, “Where are you bastards? It’s dark. Time to get out there and feed.” Lazy blighters.

There was no answer, only the wind chimes tinkling in the breeze.

“What the hell?” He flicked his lighter and held it up. Nobody home. Where did they get off to? He shouldn’t have left them so long. Having sex with the Slayer had distracted him from his responsibilities. He checked the other rooms, but found nothing. “Damn, I’m going to have to chase every last one of the bleeders down again and beat the crap out of them. May have to dust a couple to set an example.”

“No dusting required,” Buffy said. She slipped out of the shadows and into the doorway behind him.

Spike jumped. “You scared the nightlights out of me! Don’t sneak up on me like that. I’ve half a mind to give you a good thrashing.”

Spike burned his hand with his overheated lighter, cursed and dropped it on the floor, leaving them in the dark. Leaving Buffy in the dark mostly, since he could see well enough. “And, what are you doing here? Did I summon you? Did you hear in your little Slayer pea brain ‘Slayer come see me, I want to bang your eyes crooked?’ No. No, you did not.” He hid the flowers behind his back, hoping she wouldn’t notice them.

Buffy laughed. She blinked to help her eyes adjust to the dark. Spike was cute when he was mad. And, he was holding some flowers, yellow daisies it looked like, behind his back. “Looking for someone, Spikey?”

“What? Oh, yeah. See there, you got me all distracted. You shouldn’t pester me while I’m working.” Spike paced around, making his leather coat flap. He forgot he was holding the bouquet of flowers and chopped the air with his hand.

“Working? Looked more like lurking to me.”

“Shows what you know. I’m the Master of Sunnydale now. I have duties, responsibilities, a mission. I’m checking on my minions.”

“Really? Where are they?”

Spike growled. How did she find him anyway? And, what was she doing here now? Bollocks! The claim. She’d followed him right here to his minions’ lair using the damn claim. Probably didn’t even know she was doing it either. And, where were his blasted minions? He’d stalk them down later. Right now, he didn’t want to appear peevish in front of the little woman.

“I sent them out to get their supper, if you must know. They’re wreaking bloody violence and pillaging all over Sunnydale, while you’re twiddling your thumbs following me about.”

Buffy smirked. She came up to him and put her arms around him. “Master,” she pouted, “I did something bad today. I killed all your minions. That’s okay, isn’t it?” She hadn’t killed all of them, but Spike could find that out on his own.

“You what! You’ve got your bloody cheek! I worked bloody hard to get those minions. Now, I’m going to have to start all over. Damn it all, Wifey, you’ve got no business interfering in my work.”

“Don’t worry about it, William. We’ll go shopping tonight and you can pick out some brand new minions for me to dust.” She touched the wrapper on the flowers. “Are these for me? Are we up to posies?”

“Well, yeah. They reminded me of you, all cheery sunshine and yellow.” He handed her the flowers and waited for her to make a smart ass remark.

She took the flowers and held them carefully. “Thank you. Nobody ever gave me flowers except when they were trying to kill me or weasel out of taking me to the Ice Capades.” She kissed his cheek, giggled and pushed a still arguing Spike out of the deserted building.

***

Sunday picked the strings of Bob Meat out of her teeth. Not that she’d got much Bob Meat, and even less Bob Blood. “You are such a selfish hog.”

She was in a bad mood. By the time Bob the Warlock had gotten through bringing her back from the dead and Rosamund had killed him and they’d had a big fight over who was going to get the biggest share of Bob blood, the sun had come up and they’d been stuck in Bob’s house all day.

Mrs. Warlock showed up around noon, but ran off when a ravenous Sunday answered the front door in vamp face. The bitch left the door open and they’d had to close the door with a mop handle to keep from getting torched. They’d revenged themselves on Widow Warlock’s clothes closet.

After rejecting and ripping up every item in Mrs. Warlock’s closet, except for a pair of red high heels of indeterminate manufacture, Rosamund pulled Bob’s flannel shirt off his corpse. “Put this on. You can’t run around Sunnydale naked.”

“Why not? And, hey, hungry here? Been dead for two months? Hungry as a fledge? I could eat a Senior Citizen.” Sunday put on the flannel shirt and curled her lip. She’d looked less Fashion Challenged when she was dust.

“Tough. I ate Bob. So, bite me.”

Rosamund opened the cabinet where Bob had stored the Mason jar with her money in it. She dropped the jar into the sink to smash it, then sprayed the baggie with water to rinse off the holy water. She touched the bag with the tip of her finger, burnt herself, cursed, then used a pair of Mrs. Warlock’s new OXO salad tongs to extract the money.

“Hey, give me some of that,” Sunday said.

“Fuck no. Steal your own. Sun’s down. Let’s get out of here. I’m still hungry. Warlocks – no one can eat just one.”

Sunday followed Rosamund out of the house. “Bitch, that’s my line.”

“Don’t follow so close. I don’t want anyone to think I’m related to you. You look like a skank in that outfit.”

“You should have brought me some of your own damn clothes before you raised me, shithead.”

“As if. Is there any decent shopping in this stink hole town?”

“Let’s go to the mall. We can grab a bite at the Food Court, then shop while they drop.”

“No way. I saw the mall on my way into town. It’s a dump. Let’s go to that Goth shop I saw when I was stealing all that overpriced warlock junk to revive you.”

They jumped into the stolen Miata and headed to the main shopping area.

Sunday touched the cross burn on her cheek where Bob’s cross scorched her when she was attacking him. The cross burned her fingers, too, when she’d ripped the chain from Bob’s neck. Since when did a warlock get off wearing a cross? “Shit. That hurts. I told you not to fuck with Bob because Bob’s a warlock, but Nooooo. I’m going to eat Bob and get my money back. Slut.”

Rosamund floored the accelerator on the Miata and roared through two red lights. She made a sharp, right turn onto Center Street, barely missing a traffic island before ramming a row of parked cars, setting off alarms and leaving a trail of flying bumpers behind her.

“You’re an ingrate, sister dear. Watch this.” She selected a juicy target – a brand new silver Lexus with a moon roof. She clipped the front end of the Lexus. The car’s air bag exploded and it shrieked its alarm, blew its horn and flashed its lights. She shifted into third gear and circled around the block to get up speed.

“Quit fucking around, Rosie. I’m hungry,” Sunday whined.

“Why oh why oh why did I bring you back to unlife, you major skag? I was happy. I killed the owner of a Manhattan apartment with rent control. I was enjoying an all expenses trip to Mexico on the owner’s major credit cards. I had all the cute girls I could drink. Fab clothes, fab shoes, fab girls and what happens? My cunt sister says to herself – Gee, I have nothing better to do. Let me fight the Slayer and see where that gets me.”

“Screw you, bitch. I nearly had her. Little whore threw a stake at me from fifty yards.”

“Not the way I heard it. I heard that she took out all your minions and she kicked your ass for stealing her stuff.”

Rosamund revved the engine and drove straight for the glass entrance of Hank’s Hardware. She crashed the Miata through the windows, spraying glass and metal in every direction as humans ran and dived for cover to avoid being hit. Not satisfied with that destruction, she backed up the car and bounced it off an exceptionally ugly statue of former Mayor Wilkins. “Oh, Sun, look at the little humans. They’re afraid of the Big Bad Car.”

Sunday snickered. “Maybe they should be afraid of something else.” Sunday kicked her car door loose with her feet. She was wearing Bob’s boots. They were gross – shitkicker brown with red and green plaid laces to match his red and green plaid flannel shirt that she was also wearing. She should have grabbed some of Mrs. Warlock’s clothes before Rosamund barbequed them on Mrs. Warlock’s Jenn Aire stove. She needed new clothes yesterday, but first she had to make up for lost time.

“Let’s go to the Fish Tank and get a drink. I’m thirsty.” Bob hadn’t had nearly enough blood for two vampires to share and Rosamund, the hog, had already eaten. Sunday smelled fresh blood on her sister’s breath the moment she’d come back to consciousness in Bob’s kitchen.

“Let’s go to that Goth clothing store so I don’t have to be caught dead with a fashion-impaired reject like you.”

Sunday sighed. “I wouldn’t be so thirsty if you hadn’t guzzled so much of Bob.”

Rosamund pulled her vamp face on a couple of little boys who were throwing pebbles at some pigeons that were roosting on the Mayor’s statue. The boys screamed and ran away. “Consider it the vig on the two grand you owe me for reviving your pitiful excuse of an unlife. We have to shop first. You can’t kill anyone looking like that.”

***

Buffy stepped around Mayor Wilkins’ statue and around the crumpled remains of a black Miata, her fuchsia, pointy-toe, lace-up ankle boots crunching on a thick layer of glass. For once, a problem that didn’t require Slayer aptitude.

Spike tagged after her, sniffing the air. Huh, Rosamund was here, and Sunday, too. He’d heard that Buffy slayed Sunday a few weeks ago, but he was certain she was here now. The Twinks smelled alike – Chanel No. 5 and cemetery dirt. Well, no worries. He’d take care of both of them for Bob. He lit up a cigarette and put his arm around Buffy’s waist.

“Taking you shopping is a bad idea,” Buffy said. “I don’t know what I was thinking. It’s almost as bad as you being my husband or whatever the hell you are.” She sniffed her daisies.

“I’m your mate, luv. The wild animal waiting to drag you back to his lair and ravage you into matey oblivion.” He pulled her closer and copped a feel.

Buffy forced herself to shrug off Spike’s arm. “I knew it. I knew you had a lair.”

Spiked grabbed her hand and dragged her toward the XXXtra Spicy Video and Adult Toys Store. “Let’s go in here.”

She jerked her hand away. It was getting harder and harder to pull herself out of Spike’s grasp. Holding his hand, cuddling in his arms, just walking along next to him felt beyond comfortable, it felt – right. She couldn’t allow that to happen. She couldn’t allow herself to get in any deeper with Spike, which is exactly what would happen if she allowed him free rein to touch her and pet her. Except when they were having sex, of course.

“No sex toys and no dirty movies. We’re not shopping for you. You’re only here so I can keep an eye on you. I have to buy some leather pants to fight in. Do you think it’s too much of a cliché for a Slayer to wear black leather?”

Spike grinned. “Depends on how tight those pants are.”

Buffy headed for Demonia, the Goth clothing shop.

***

Sunday held up a pair of leather pants. “Do you think it’s too much of a cliché for a vampire to wear black leather?”

Rosamund held up a red leather dress that was cut to the navel. “Doesn’t matter in your case. You always look like a skag.”

“What about this?” Sunday showed Rosamund a purple leather mini-skirt with torn black lace sewn into the seams.

Rosamund scoffed. “Gee, that will look great on those fat hips of yours. Mooooo.”

“Screw you,” Sunday said. She grabbed a stack of skirts, bustiers and pants in black and shades of red and violet and tossed them on the counter where a pudgy teenaged girl with dyed black hair and charcoal stripes of eyeliner around her eyes, was fussing with the cash register.

The girl, who called herself Arachnida, which was way cooler than her older sister’s name, Tarantula, and also cooler than her own real name which was Jennifer, picked at the silver ring in her belly button. The piercing was red and slightly infected. She’d taken a job at the store three weeks ago. She figured it would be a good place to pick up guys that her mother wouldn’t approve of. “Will that be cash or charge?”

Sunday rippled into her vamp face. “That will be free.”

Arachnida screamed and ran to the back door.

Sunday leaped over the counter and tackled the girl. She choked the thrashing girl, snarled and lowered her fangs.

Rosamund came out of the dressing room wearing a tangerine-leather corset and a pair of burgundy knee pants. “Don’t kill her yet, moron. She has to take off the security tags.”

Sunday edged the trembling girl closer to the counter and shoved her next to the security removal device. Tears streamed down Arachnida’s face and she whimpered in terror. Her mascara ran down her face in black streaks.

Sunday massaged the girl’s shoulders, then her flabby breasts. “Don’t cry, baby. I’m not going to bite you. Well, I am going to bite you. But, in case I decide to turn you into a vampire, you might want to know that Maybelline makes some very good waterproof mascara in Devil Black.”

Arachnida cried and fumbled with the clothing, removing the security tags. When the she reached the last pair of pants, she threw them in Sunday’s face and tried to run. Rosamund caught her and shoved her back to Sunday. The twin vampires shoved the sobbing clerk back and forth between them.

The girl screamed.
 
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