The lipstick-pink Ford pulled away from the kerb and onto the rain-drenched streets. D'Hoffryn, a slim bluish-skinned demon with a wispy beard that was tied into a facial ponytail several inches below his chin and several rather large horns that curved up and out from the side of his head, watched it leave from the shelter of the doorway. His expression, now that the torrential downpour would prevent the car's driver from seeing it, was thunderous.

"You know," whined Hallie, in an aggrieved tone that really didn't seem appropriate to her grotesquely veined visage. "She'd probably have been worse than useless if she had come back. That human had her head so screwed up that she was actually believing all that love crap. She-"

"Enough!" D'Hoffryn cut across his minion. "Now is not the time for petty jealousies. Anyanka was the best and most creative of my girls, otherwise I would never have offered her the chance to return to Arashmahar."

"Yuh, right! And look how that turned out. You make a big exception and ask her back and she turned you down."

"She has not yet turned me down. I will let her have a few more hours to think things over. Then, I'll give her one more chance. In the meantime, I think that you should remain here. Either she will say yes and return to Arashmahar, in which case those she has known here will be of no consequence to her, or their unhappiness will be the reward for her scorn. Remind her of what a vengeance demon can do."

It had been days. Long tedious days and morose drink-fuelled nights since he had seen her. Part of him was afraid that when they met again he'd find that she would be hanging on the arm of some Harris cousin. Even in that hideous dress, with a swathe of pointless yellow nylon pinned to the back of her head, she'd been beautiful, and weddings were notorious for making people feel romantic enough, or desperate enough, to give things a try with people they'd normally never look at, and Buffy would have been tipsy by the time they finished the toasts. You would have thought that slayer constitution might have boosted her alcohol tolerance, but no. Two glasses of champagne and she'd probably been doin' her slinky dances right there in the middle of the dance floor. Two minutes of that and she'd have had half the blokes in the room after her. So, no, he didn't want to see her. Didn't want to smell some other man's scent all over her. And yet, there she was, heading in the direction of his crypt...

He shifted the grocery sack in his arms until he could use one hand to pull his cigarette packet from his coat. He used his lips to pull one from the pack, put the pack back into his coat and then took the cigarette in his free hand. The familiar routine gave him time to compose himself before he called out to her retreating back. "You lookin' for me?"

Without even pausing in her stride Buffy's half-bored, half-irritated tones echoed back to him. "Really not."

Spike dumped his groceries on the nearby bench and watched as she took another couple of paces before she turned at the distinctive click his Zippo made as he opened it, her eyes on the tree line behind him.

"I wouldn't hang around outside if I were you. It's probably better if you don't run into Xander on your own right about now." As if to emphasise the part about 'on his own', she turned again and began to walk briskly away.

"S'that so?," the vampire drawled. He lit his cigarette and sat down on the bench next to his groceries. "An' why would that be?"

"He thinks you stole his car." Buffy turned again and gave a slight shrug. "I... Look, with everything that's happened..."

"I wouldn't touch his pretty pink poncemobile with a ten-foot pole an' you know it."

"Yeah, I do," the slayer conceded. "Now, if it was a black corvette or something, then, I'd believe him."

Spike drew deeply on his cigarette. "What d'you mean 'with everything that's happened', anyway? Other than someone havin' the piss poor taste to nick the git's car, that is. There some sort of bust up at the wedding? Families tear the place apart?"

"You didn't hear?" Buffy asked, closing the distance between them. "I mean, yeah, there was some fighting, but... Xander left. The wedding didn't happen."

Spike exhaled a column of smoke in something that almost resembled a sigh. "Well... Gotta say... I didn't see that coming."

Buffy slumped onto the end of the bench as she began the tale. "It was awful. Anya was devastated."

Before Spike could help himself the words were out of his mouth. "Is that right?" 'How is it,' he wondered, 'that she can see it when it's other people an' she can look at me an' think my heart's made of stone?'

"No one's seen her since. No phone calls, no emails, nothing. Xander says that her suitcase is gone. He's been trying to find her. He thinks maybe they can still get back together but—"

"An' Einstein couldn't put—"

"Spike!" Xander's voice, laden with malice, interrupted their conversation. The blondes looked up as Willow and Xander strode toward them, each of the newcomers carrying stakes, Xander appearing more than ready to use his. "I shoulda known you'd be tagging along."

"Yeah, like I always carry a week's supply of blood an' smokes when I'm lookin' for a spot of violence."

Buffy got to her feet, positioning herself between the two men. With a conciliatory tone she addressed Willow and Xander. "Hey, guys. I, uh... I found Spike and I thought I should ask him about your car and maybe check out what kind of dangerous contraband he had."

"And?" Xander demanded as Spike tossed his cigarette and ground it viciously under his boot.

The vampire rose to his feet, his disgust at Buffy's lies and Xander's suspicions, plain for all to read on his face. "Tell you what, slayer. Let me get out of your way." He grabbed the top of the grocery bag and swung it into the crook of his other arm. "I'll stop bothering you."

"He didn't take your car, Xan," Buffy reassured him.

"He seems in a mighty big hurry to run away for someone who doesn't have anything to hide," Xander insisted.

"You know, I guess you know all about that, don't you?" Spike sneered as he made his way toward the brunette, that cocky swagger to his hips that was a precursor to violence or sex. "The King of the Big Exit. Heard it brought the house down."

Like the bully he could be, Xander crumpled under Spike's attack, the words obviously hitting home. "I don't need this crap from you."

"Right, let's not listen to Spike." The vampire's eyes turned away from his opponent to meet with Buffy's, the slayer hurriedly dropping her gaze to her feet. "Might get a bit of truth on you."

Spike shifted even closer, the height difference becoming more apparent as Spike had to tilt his head backward to look the carpenter in the eye.

Willow darted to get between them, trying to separate the two. "Okay, okay. Heh. Calm now. Let's, uh, turn around and release this very manly thing the other way."

"I forgot," sneered Xander in a tone that clearly indicated that he hadn't. "Willie Wannabite can't hurt me. Dumb to pick a fight, I guess."

"More than happy to beat you right through the pain, you pathetic poof," Spike replied, tossing his grocery bag off to one side and drawing back his fist.

Xander's punch to his face hit home just as the chip kicked in, the combined effect driving him down to the ground, though Xander's blow hadn't even drawn blood.

"Guys, don't," Buffy's plea was weak, but it drew Spike's gaze to where she sat on the bench once more, her head hanging forward as if its weight were too much for her neck to support.

The vampire sprang back to his feet, his annoyance at Buffy forgotten. "Buffy, are you okay?"

"What is this?" she asked, raising her head, her eyes seeming to focus on midair.

While Spike's attention was on her, Xander caught him with a sucker punch that sent him tumbling backward, squashing the grocery bag as he did so. Then, as the vampire picked himself up off the ground the two Scoobies rushed over to the slayer as if she had always been their main priority.

"Buffy? Are you okay?" the witch queried.

"What happened?" Xander followed up.

Buffy lifted her head only to flinch back away from the pair.

Spike crept quietly to Buffy's side, positioning himself in front of Willow and crooning softly to the distressed slayer. "It's okay, Buffy. Buffy, it's okay." Slowly Buffy raised her head to watch him through her hair in a way that was far more reminiscent of the good witch's early days in Sunnydale than of Spike's fearless slayer. "Look, pet. Look, Willow's here."

"Buffy?" the witch asked as the slayer looked at her with a puzzled expression.

Puzzlement became outright shock and the blonde peered at her friends in wonder. "Mom? Dad?"

Spike's gaze met those of the others. "She's not lucid. You've got to keep talking to her. Try to ground her."

Xander's first words, however seemed to drive her to tears, burying her head in her hands. Xander and Willow each grasped an arm, pulling her hands away from her head.

"Oh... no!" Buffy cried, but slowly she lifted her head and looked around once more only this time she looked at the trees and the grave markers and at Willow and Xander instead of at phantoms only she could see.

"Here," suggested Spike. "Let's get her back to my crypt."

Xander turned a disdainful stare on the vampire. "Spike, just go, okay? She's our friend. We'll take care of her." Standing one on either side of her the two Scoobies each wrapped an arm around her, supporting her between them. "When we want a toothless vampire, which is never, we'll call you."

Spike's lip curled into a silent growl as he watched them lead her away. "Put a little ice on the back of her neck," he bellowed after them. He picked up the bag of groceries and began walking off in the direction he'd been going before Buffy had made her appearance. "She likes that," he muttered to himself.

He made it halfway to his crypt before the bottom of the paper sack gave way, spilling plastic bags of blood, some more full than others, and crushed cigarette cartons all over the grass. Spike looked at the mess which had cost him the last of the money he'd made hustling college students at pool. He half-heartedly pulled his bloody shirt away from his torso, feeling it peel damply from his skin. The thought of making his way back across town to the vacant house he was currently making use of when he needed a shower didn't appeal in the slightest.

He slipped another cigarette from the pack in his pocket as he tried to figure out, what, if anything, was worth saving from the mess on the ground. By reflex, his Zippo made its way into his hand, opened and he flipped the wheel. The flint threw sparks, but no flame emerged. Spike closed the lighter, shook it and tried again getting the same result. He was out of fuel. He returned it to his duster and his gaze fell to the box of matches that lay on its side on the ground amongst his other purchases. The outer part of the box had unravelled, the small wooden sticks lying in a mixture of blood and groundwater from the recent rains. Disturbing the pile as little as possible, he extracted what he hoped was a dry match and looked around for somewhere to strike it. The nearby headstones were damp, and in desperation he folded back the fly on his jeans and ran the head of the match over his zip. A few little pink specks clung to the first few teeth and then the whole head dropped off, leaving him holding the world's smallest stake.

Spike tossed the match away in disgust, the twisted remains of his useless cigarette soon following after, and he lashed out at the pile of debris on the ground with his foot. If he couldn't watch over Buffy, or smoke, or even eat, then that only left one possible avenue of entertainment for the night. It was time he killed something. The vampire took off at a run into the night.

Hallie watched as Spike vented his frustrations on a newly risen fledgling. He toyed with it, as if to let it think it might have a chance of escaping. However, as he had failed to show any such mercy to the night's earlier conquests, she doubted that this one would be more fortunate. It was difficult to pick out the remnants of the gentle William in the man before her, but though he might be more confident, more aggressive and indubitably more attractive, it seemed that William still carried with him a deep well of pain; pain that could be turned to Hallie's advantage.

The young vampire tried to cut and run, but Spike hauled him backward by the scruff of his neck.

"Didn't your mum ever tell you it's not polite to go walkin' all over people's graves?" Spike asked.

"Huh?" Considering that up until two seconds ago Spike had been kicking his ass all over this section of the cemetery, the fledgling had a right to look confused. His face still wore the same expression in the millisecond before it crumbled into dust and settled to the ground several feet away from where Spike had grabbed him.

The blonde looked at the lightening sky, judging that he had another half an hour before he would need to make a dash for cover. He made his way to a nearby tree and slid to the ground, resting his back against its trunk. Hallie could see that Spike's lips were moving, though he spoke too softly for her to hear. She teleported closer.

"Not gonna have some stupid fledge set foot on your restin' place," she overheard the vampire say. "'Course, you prob'bly wouldn't exactly thank me for the favour, these days. Not like we parted on the best of terms, what with the disinvite an' everythin'... An' I know, well, what with how I screwed up everythin' with your eldest, an' her bein' president of the 'I despise Spike' campaign, reckon you'd come after me with a fire axe again, an' this time you'd do more than dent m'noggin. Ah mean, if worshippin' from afar was enough to make you lock me out of your house then... well... takin' her to bed... or, well, everywhere but... s'not exactly gonna make for jokes an' cocoa. An' you know what? I'd still give me right arm to have you back.

Buffy's not the only one as isn't copin'. They lost you an' then the watcher up an' left, an' every single one of them's gone to hell in a hand basket since. Bit's been shopliftin' left an' right. Even took a pile of stuff from the magic shop. Whether that's 'cause she reckoned the watcher an' the demon bint would be less likely to call the cops on her or whether she didn't care that the folks as she was rippin' off are meant to be her mates, or maybe that was the whole point..." Spike shrugged. "Harris dumped Anya at the altar. An' God only knows that the bint was about the only thing he had goin' for him. Red got too big for her boots, muckin' with the sort of magic she'd no right touchin', an' scarin' off her little brown mouse.

They need you, Joyce. You were the only parent worth a lick that they had between the lot of them. I wish you could be here to talk to them an' help them all get their heads screwed on straight 'cause I sure as hell ain't cuttin' it."

Hallie held her breath and considered. She could bring Joyce back as a ghost. That would still meet the terms of Spike's wish. She'd be able to talk, though, somehow, Hallie had her doubts about how comforting her incorporeal presence would be. That thing with the fire axe was too tempting, though. Being able to talk coherently enough to offer advice ruled out the possibility of raising her as a zombie. That left one option. The original body would be too decayed, and she'd have to create a magical construct, much like the slayer's pseudo-sister, to house Joyce's soul, but it was do-able and it circumvented most of the problems with a traditional resurrection. She'd even throw in the axe for free.

Stepping out of the shadows, she waited for the vampire to notice her. When his monologue trailed off, she could see him mentally retracing his steps. "Wish granted!" she announced. In the instant before she teleported away, her giggles filled the air as she caught Spike checking his right sleeve, just in case she had taken him at his word about giving his right arm.