Chapter 1.09
Sunday, May 12th, 2002

Spike twisted his body and turned his head so he could see under his arm. The approaching footfalls caused a surge of adrenaline through his system even after more than a century. However, it was no longer a thrill of pleasure that flooded his being at Drusilla's approach, but a useless fight or flight impulse.

Some time earlier Lorne had finally succumbed to a bone-deep weariness and curled up on the room's only bed. For a short time, he had managed to keep up his end of the conversation from a horizontal position, but slumber had eventually claimed him, much against his will.

The door to the room opened, and the battle of wills began.

"Hello, precious." Spike started off the conversation with a note of false gaiety. "You know, pet, you could have skipped all the crossbows and chains. If you wanted to get the chip out, all you had to do was hand me an appointment card."

Drusilla swayed her way over to a hi-fi in one corner of the room, ignoring Spike for the moment. She selected a CD and turned it on, cranking up the volume so that Lorne was startled from his sleep.

"Now, pet," Spike chided. "You've gone and woken our guest, and I don't think German industrial's his cup of tea."

Dru's head swivelled toward Spike as if she were noticing him for the first time. "You didn't tell me we had guests."

"I thought you would find him difficult to miss, considering the suit. I'm afraid to do the proper formal introductions I would need to be rather more mobile." Spike raised an eyebrow and a manacled wrist in a hopeful manner.

Dru merely tutted softly and then clapped her hands together twice. It seemed that this was some pre-arranged signal, for half a dozen burly guard types came into the room. Four of the men took up positions near the room's four corners, training their crossbows on him, while the remaining two undid the chains that bound him.

As they did so, another figure appeared in the doorway. As if Spike's thoughts of escape were written clearly across his face, the newcomer cautioned him. "I wouldn't. This time they're not aiming low. You can't keep Dru happy if you're dust."

"I've got news for you, mate. You can't keep Dru happy. She's off her rocker, and it don't matter what the hell you do for her, she'll find something to cry over. Won't you, love?"

As if on cue, Dru began to make the humming sound that preceded an all out tantrum. She stamped her heels, even as the two guards jerked the chains attached to his wrists, pulling him into a roughly cruciform pose, and then dragging him to one end of the four-poster bed.

While this was going on, Lorne pulled himself into a sitting position on the bed. He gave the man in the doorway a cool glance.

"Well, now I know where to send the thank you note for the helicopter ride. I'd like to say it's good to see you again, Lindsey, but we both know that I'd be lying."

"Gee, you save a guy's life, and that's all the thanks you get."

"Well, hey, just drop me off in LA and let me know your address here, and I'll make sure you get a fruit basket," Lorne replied in his bitchiest voice.

"I'd be careful what you say. You used to manage impartial, but if you can't manage to stay civil, I'm sure that Dru wouldn't mind having both you boys to play with," Lindsey suggested.

"Oh yes!" Dru's moaning stopped, her face visibly brightening. "Mummy would like that very much." She clapped her hands in excitement, as the two guards attached Spike's chains to the top of the bed frame. The chains were fixed so that if he stood, he could drop his arms to a horizontal position, but in order to rest his legs by sitting on or even leaning against the framework at the bottom of the bed, his arms would almost be pulled from their sockets.

"But only if he's rude, Dru."

Spike snorted. "God forbid that anybody should forget the proper torture etiquette."

"Down, Spike. Bad dog," Dru scolded.

"Yeah, or you'll do what, pet? Torture me more?" Spike drawled.

"That's about the size of it," Lindsey responded for her. "But don't let it stop you."

Dru opened up a wooden chest that sat off to one side and pulled out what looked like a normal spray bottle for watering plants. It was a normal spray bottle for watering plants. Spike's problem was that he would bet it was full of holy water, and he suspected that he was about to become a plant substitute.

"Does that mean we have to listen to more of this music?" Lorne asked.

"I'm sure you'll learn to appreciate it before she's done," Lindsey added as he signalled the guards to leave the room and followed them out, with just a few final words for his sire. "Dru, remember. Don't take off all the skin at once. You've got days to amuse yourself. You know if you have to resort to broken bones, you'll only have to push him round in a wheelchair again when we're finished."

"I'll remember, Lonesome. Are you going to fetch Daddy tonight?"

"We'll see, sweetness. We'll see."

"Take care, my turtle dove."

Dru wandered back to where Spike was chained up. She put down the spray momentarily and used both hands to rip open the front of Spike's shirt.

Spike smirked in response. "You really didn't want to do that, Dru. The slayer's gonna be right pissed off at somebody else ripping off the shirt she bought me. Reckons that's her job, she does."

"The nasty girl won't find my Spike. Not until he's ready."

"He's ready now, pet."

Dru picked up the spray bottle and matched the hissing noise it made with one of her own. "Tsss. Nasty white-hat. Hissing like a snake." Dru formed her free hand into a swaying snake's head, bringing it up until it snapped at Spike's face. All the time, that first squirt of water burned into the side of Spike's neck. It was such a fine mist that, as yet, his skin had not discoloured, but it stung worse than one of Buffy's spin kicks.

Spike gave Dru a big grin. "Pet. I really hope you've got some jasmine that needs watering, 'cause if lover boy told you that was holy water, he was lyin'."

Dru squirted the spray three times at close range, so that this time instead of a light mist a trail of water ran down his neck and pooled briefly at his collar bone before leaving a pink trail down his alabaster chest. Dru, however, was too busy watching Spike's laughing face to notice.

"Say, pet. How about you fetch some toothpaste and a toothbrush, and I can use that stuff to rinse?" Spike suggested.

"N-n-n-nno." Dru dissolved into despair. She squirted once more, this time onto her own hand, yelping and dropping the bottle when the mist burned her pale skin.

"What? Did it burn? Maybe it's just me? Maybe shaggin' the slayer's made me go all human again."

"Nasty doggy. We shan't play nice any more." Dru picked up the bottle again and stormed from the room.

"Did you really have to piss her off like that?" Lorne asked the vampire.

"And how else am I goin' to do it when I'm chained up like this? Speaking of which, I don't suppose there's any chance of you being able to get these off at all?

"Locks and chains, no. Not my scene."

"So, where do you stand, Lorne. Who was the greatest? Elvis or the Beatles?" Spike swiftly changed the subject as he heard Dru coming back toward the room.

Dru walked into the room, dragging a young girl about Dawn's age behind her. The girl looked like her clothes could use a good wash. Her mousy hair hung limply round an emaciated face that reminded Spike far too much of how the slayer had looked for the last couple of months. There was no way to know for sure, but Spike could read the signs. The kid had been living on the streets. No one would miss her, and if they did, the police would pay no attention until there was a body.

Behind her Scheherazade came through and set up a video camera on a tripod so that it was focused on Spike from in front and off to one side.

"Nasty Spike shall pay for hurting mommy. We'll make the nasty girl think my lovely boy is home, and then he'll have nowhere else to go." Dru muttered as she dragged the girl over in front of Spike.

"Really, pet. If you're planning on getting into the porn market, you really shouldn't put the only woman in the room that actually has a pair of tits behind the camera. It's mostly guys that hire these things, and they like to see something a bit bigger than a double A cup. I never said anything before, 'cause I never wanted to hurt your feelin's, and I know it's not your fault that the Poof turned you before you hit puberty b-" Spike's words were cut off as Dru's palm impacted full force with his face.

He ran his tongue along his teeth and spat a gobbet of blood onto the room's ice-blue carpet. "Does it hurt to know that all the time he was shaggin' you, he was imaginin' you were some fifteen year old boy? That he was wishing you had a dick he could wank off while he took you up the arse."

This time instead of slapping him, Dru pulled the girl to her feet and with one swift twist she snapped her neck, before either Lorne or Spike could even protest.

Lifting the body, she pressed it to Spike's chest. Morphing into demon form, she began to suck the warm delicious aromatic blood from one side of the girl's neck.

Spike knew what was expected of him. Many times in their long association, he and Dru had shared a victim, trapping him or her between their bodies in a macabre three-way embrace whilst they drained the life from the victim's body. Part of him, a large part, wanted nothing more than to return to that life, but the better part, the part that Buffy had managed to drag kicking and screaming into the metaphorical, if not literal, light of day, knew the price was too high to pay.

Pulling sharply on his chains, he used them to pull himself up and pivoted his hips swinging his leg into the side of Dru's head. She staggered slightly, and dropped the body, even as Scheherezade abandoned the camera and came to her aid, giving her a helping hand to get back upright.

Dru gave Spike an accusing stare. "You aren't playing the game by the rules."

"I never did, poodle. It's just that you used to be on the same side. As I recall, it was you who decided to terminate the arrangement," Spike reminded her, his voice almost gentle.

"You don't want to try that again," Sheherazade told Spike as she led Dru over to the bed, Lorne shifting to an armchair in order to maintain his distance.

"And if I think I do?" the blond asked.

"Then we keep bringing them in and snapping their necks until you pretend to play nice. Who knows? Maybe once you get a taste you'll remember what you're missing?" she taunted.

"Won't work. You want to make me responsible for a bunch of kids you brought up here to be your all you can eat buffet. You can't blackmail me by saying you're going to kill a bunch of people that you're going to kill anyway. Do I look stupid?"

"Actually, you look good enough to eat... or at least lick, but that's a conversation for when you're back to your evil self. He's got a point, though," his hostess drawled, looking over toward Dru. "Tell you what, we'll bring them up here, and they can stink up your little suite here with their sweaty unwashed bodies, and that way you can see that nobody's snacking on your little pets. At least, not till you're yourself again."

"You seem to think that it's a foregone conclusion." Spike gave a dry laugh. "Didn't anybody tell you I've got a tendency to buck the odds."

Scheherazade walked over to the door and called down the corridor to an unseen accomplice. "Bring the rest of the kids. They're moving in with Goldilocks."

Within minutes, half a dozen teenagers were herded into the room.

Scheherezade walked over to Spike and cupped his cheek in her palm. "There they are, Uncle Spikey. Your new pets. Now it's time for you to perform, or Grandma will start snapping their fragile little necks."

The vampiress turned to resume her position behind the camera. "Come on, Grandma, time for you to play with your little blond Ken doll."

"Goody." Dru wiped genteelly at a couple of blood dribbles. "Will my William be a good dolly now? He must mind his manners if he is to come to tea."

"I'll put on your little show, princess, but if you don't stick to your side of the agreement, when these chains come off, you'll wish you'd staked me."

Dru smiled at him in a way that would once have set his libido racing. She picked up the girl's body, holding it once more between herself and Spike. The blond let his demon come to the fore and ripped into the girl's neck, knowing that if his captors failed to get the shots they wanted, then they would use it as an excuse to claim another victim. He raised his head, his lips reddened with innocent human blood. His eyes met Lorne's across the room. The green demon rocked the youngest of the hostages in his arm, humming a comforting tune as the group watched Dru and Spike drain their friend's corpse. Before he could turn to see the looks of fear and disgust the other prisoners were giving him, Dru claimed his bloodstained lips with her own. Spike had no choice but to acquiesce to her demands.

Monday, May 13th, 2002

The staff of Angel Investigations, past and present, and the Sunnydale contingent all returned together to the Hyperion, having stayed overnight at the same motel. Buffy had covered the bill from the money Spike had given her for the wedding. The way she looked at it, if they didn't all stay alive and get Spike back, she wouldn't have to worry about the wedding.

When they reached the Hyperion they found a package waiting for them.