Chapter
6.05
Wednesday, May 15th, 2002
Buffy was off the bike in a second, not even
bothering to remove her helmet. She unravelled the bundle of leather
to find the purse at its centre.
"It's hers."
Spike could almost visibly see Buffy raising
the same mental walls as that day with Glory at the gas station
replayed in both their minds.
He flung himself off the bike. Striding over
to where she stood and gripping her by the shoulders, he shook
her as hard as he could.
"Don't you dare even think of hiding
away in that head of yours, Slayer. This isn't your fault,
and that there puddle isn't her blood, but if you quit
now and something does happen to her you'll never know
if you could have stopped it."
"You know?" Buffy looked to
the vampire for confirmation.
"Of course, I bloody know. Bit's made from
you. Her blood sings, and this... it's like the difference between
Barry Manilow and a two hundred strong Welsh voice choir singing
Bach. It isn't hers. It could be the boy's. It could be one of
theirs, but there isn't one drop of it hers. Now, are you with
me?"
"I'm with you. So, what now? The hospital
or here?"
"Here and then the hospital. If she made
it there, she'll be gettin' looked after. If she's inside and
someone's after her, she could still be in trouble." He pulled
Buffy's phone from his pocket, passing it to her. "If you
get Red and Wes to go straight to the hospital when he's dropped
off Tara with Harris and the missus, then maybe we'll find out
all the sooner."
The pair combed the club from balcony to backstage
and everywhere in between. Spike's keen eyesight spotted Brandon's
helmet and the one sitting next to it in the cloakroom, but he
chose not to worry Buffy further. They were just about to head
out, when they heard back from Wesley.
"Buffy?"
"Yeah, Wes. What's the sitch?"
"It's not good, I'm afraid. Brandon was
brought in a little while ago by his father, but Dawn wasn't with
them."
"Well, what did he say? What happened?"
"He's not saying much of anything from what
I gather. We haven't managed to get near him. He's in ICU and
there's a policeman outside the room in case he comes 'round long
enough to make a statement. Buffy, I get the impression they're
not really expecting him to pull through. Willow's going to try
what she called an old Jedi mind trick to see if she can get in,
but she wants to recover a bit from helping with the barrier spells
around The Magic Box and Lily's apartment first."
"Shoot. I guess they're playing for keeps.
Is there anything Willow can do?"
"She won't know until she actually sees
what's wrong. I think the reason she wants to recoup some of her
power is more to do with what she anticipates she might have to
do once we get in, than actually getting in."
"Well, unless Tara can come up with a location,
it's the best we've got. See ya in ten." Buffy ended the
call and turned to Spike.
"I'm guessing you heard most of both sides
of that."
"Enough to know I don't have to string the
boy up for not taking proper care of her. Let's go."
"Hey, honey, I'm home," Sam called
out as she made her way through the back door of the clapboard
house. Riley stretched and rose from his position at the rather
grubby window and went to meet her.
"Hey you." He stooped to give her a
kiss. "Not that I'm complaining but I didn't expect to see
you tonight. I thought you were going to be busy over on the other
side of town."
"We were. It's done. Henriksen and Ogilvy
are taking care of the clean-up now. I take it your vampire isn't
co-operating."
Riley shook his head and wandered back toward
the window he'd been watching from earlier. It wasn't really good
luck that the house opposite 1630 Revello was empty. In fact,
indirectly it was actually Spike's fault. The house had remained
unsold since the death of the previous owner, last time someone
had used it to spy on the Summers household. "No sirree.
I don't know who this new guy is, but he seems to be running a
motorbike taxi service. First, he brings Dawn home, then Willow,
and then they left again about five, ten minutes later. And between
visits Dawn heads out with some other biker.
The guys at Spike's old crypt have seen zip,
so they're not there and they're not patrolling. All the guys've
got is some decomposing sub-T in the basement, and even for Spike
that's pretty crappy housekeeping.
As for the apartment he's supposed to be subletting
from Anya, we checked out her lease and got the address, but no
one's been there all day. We've got men there just in case, but..."
He shrugged.
"You think he's on to you? Skipped town?"
Sam asked.
"No. He's too arrogant for that. If he's
really managed to convince Buffy and the others that she's in
love with him, he'd more likely come looking for me than the other
way around. He'd be in my face about it."
"Doesn't he know you're a happily married
man?" Sam asked in what seemed to be a teasing voice. In
reality, although she had little or no affection for the man she'd
married, she'd heard more than she wanted to know about the slayer
and her penchant for vampire lovers, repeated far more often than
necessary, in her time with him.
"A monster like him wouldn't even understand
the concept."
"Okay. Enjoy your stakeout. I'm just going
to take a walk, check on the others, and then I'm going to head
back to Lowell for a nice, hot, soapy bubble-bath. If you get
finished quick enough, you could always join me." She gave
Riley a long deep kiss and a wicked smile before she left, not
in anticipation of conjugal passion, as Riley thought, but at
the idea of leaving him aroused and frustrated. "Tell Graham
and the other guys upstairs I said hello."
"I don't see why we have to all be here.
Shouldn't we be out looking for Dawn if she's missing?" Xander
asked from his seat at the research table.
"Because the more we split up the more vulnerable
we are, honey." Anya replied as she checked the shelves,
in preparation for making up a purchase order for one of her suppliers.
"Well, couldn't we have been just as not
vulnerable at our place, with the food and the beer and the Seven
of Nine special on cable?"
"But here we have weapons, and spell components
and sewer access. And if anything gets broken, Giles owns a share
and has to help replace it, rather than it all belonging to us."
"Okay, I get the rest, but surely sewer
access is of the bad. We don't want a whole bunch of special ops
commando guys swarming under our nice comfy barrier."
"It's okay, Xander," Tara assured him.
"Willow and I left kind of a trapdoor in the basement, but
you have to know the password to use it, so we can get out, and
if there's trouble at their place Clem and his family can come
in, or Willow, Wes, Buffy and Spike, but that's it. And we can
find Dawn quicker by doing a locator spell, which I'll be doing
shortly, by the way, than by wandering the streets."
"Not to mention it's far less dangerous,"
Anya added.
"Hey." Willow's mouth twisted up slightly
to match her very subdued welcome.
"Hey, Will." Buffy and the redhead
met in a hug of mutual consolation. Across their heads, Spike's
eyes met Wesley's before, with identical minuscule shakes of their
heads, they dismissed any idea of following suit, and Spike walked
around the two women to greet the former watcher.
"Any fresh news?" asked the vampire.
"Not so far."
"Let's go," Willow instructed. "And
Spike, when we get there, let me do the talking; just stay quiet."
"What? I never said a bloody word."
"Just keep it that way," the redhead
instructed.
"Won't it be harder for you to get us all
in the room than if you were going on your own?" Buffy asked.
"A bit," Willow admitted. "But
if we all get in and I can do anything to help heal him, then
I can draw energy from you and Wes to do it while Spike stands
guard." Spike and Wes seemed to take this at face value,
but Buffy was puzzled.
"Wouldn't you be able to draw more energy
from Spike than from Wes, what with the supernaturally strong
gig and all?"
Spike shook his head, intervening before Willow's
embarrassment would allow her to do it.
"Evil, dead things and healing mojo don't
exactly go tiptoeing through the tulips hand in hand, pet. There's
plenty energy, but it's all the wrong sort. Red's got the right
of it. I'll keep an eye on the door."
As they neared the room with the police officer
sitting on a chair outside it, Willow seemed to gain a marvellous
focus, her entire being concentrated on the task in hand.
"Good evening, officer. Excuse us, my students
and I need to go through to visit Mr Michaels."
"Your students?"
"Yes, medical students. We don't get many
wounds like this, and it's important that their training covers
as wide a cross-section as possible."
"If you say so, doctor."
The officer moved his chair aside and allowed
the group to enter the room. As soon as they were inside Willow
breathed a sigh of relief and dropped the blinds so that no one
could see in from the corridor outside. She moved to the chart
that hung from the foot of the bed, trying to make sense of the
notes there but having difficulty due to the hurried handwriting
and technical terms.
After about twenty seconds, Spike impatiently
snatched the clipboard from her hands. Scanning down the pages
he summarised his findings.
"He's been shot."
"Well, I worked that out."
"It's lodged too close to the heart, and
he's too weak from blood-loss for them to risk operating, but
in the meantime one of his lungs is filling up with blood. According
to this it's just a matter of time before something gives. Add
a bump on the head, probably from when he fell, and the fact he
already had God knows what in his system before that, so they've
got to be pretty careful about what drugs they might give him
and he's in a fine mess."
"Pretty good for a layman," came the
voice from behind them. "Almost exactly how they explained
it to me, in fact. Now, perhaps you'll tell me what you're doing
in my son's room and how you got past the police guard out there."
Buffy shot an irritated glance at her fiancé.
"You couldn't watch the door like you were meant to? Em,
Mr Michaels, I'm Buffy—"
"I know who you are, Miss Summers, Miss
Rosenberg, Spike ...or do you prefer Hostile 17? The question I
asked is what you're doing here. My son is dying. Isn't that enough
for you people?"
"If you know who we are, then, you know
that we're responsible for Dawn." Somehow, even though Spike
was a good six inches shorter than the other man, the cold inhuman
anger in his eyes made the difference seem irrelevant as he closed
the gap between them with slow, measured strides. "Now, maybe
your son is beyond help and maybe he isn't, but Dawn is missing
and your son might be able to tell us where we can find her. Even
if that wasn't the case, if you really knew these people
you would know that they would do what they could to help your
son. We would do it because he earned our loyalty when he stood
by Dawn. They would do it simply because it's the right thing
to do. Hell, we'd even do it because if Dawn found out we lost
her bloody date for that damn formal none of our lives would be
worth living.
Medical science doesn't hold out much hope for
your boy. I guess it's up to you whether we see if good old-fashioned
mysticism can do any better, but if that were my boy lying in
that bed, I'd be grovelling at Red's feet 'round about now, rather
than trying to piss her off.
Now, I think you owe the ladies an apology."
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