November 15th, 2008; Sunnydale, California

Willow’s face is pale as she pushes her chair back and stands. Oz’s hand is on her arm; he looks up at her, the picture of the caring boyfriend: “Willow, what’s wrong?”

The look she gives him is pure venom. “Let go of me,” she says, her voice steely.

Oz does not let go; he stands too. “Willow—"

And then her arm is by her side, as if he had never held it in the first place. Spike glances around the table to see if anyone else has noticed. Buffy is confused, but that is nothing new; Xander is worried; Anya is calculating. Perhaps Anya noticed Willow’s unnatural display of speed. Dawn looks as confused as Buffy does, and Giles looks hurt, maybe because Willow has not been very receptive to their eager attentions.

Cordelia and Gunn are stiffened, ready to stand and defend Willow; Wesley and Fred look nervous, as neither of them possesses much knowledge of the group’s history. Angel is growling and tense just as Spike is; only Faith, who sits between them with a hand on both their arms, keeps them from pouncing on Oz.

“Don’t touch me,” Willow says. She tosses a glance over her shoulder towards the bar. Lorne sits on a stool, nursing a margarita, still an unnatural shade of pastel green. He manages a weak smile in her direction, and his eyes dart nervously over the assembled group.

“I—I’ve got to go,” Willow mutters, and in a flash she is at the stairs, her coat in hand. Spike wrenches his arm from Faith’s steady grip and dashes after her quickly retreating figure.

She is waiting for him in the alley, but as he steps closer she holds up hand. “Stay there,” she begs, and the pure helplessness in her voice is enough to freeze him in his place.

“Willow,” Spike says softly. “What happened?”

She forces a giggle. It is tinny, unnatural, and it chills Spike to the bone. “I just wasn’t ready to see all of them yet,” Willow answers. There is truth in that, at least.

“No, not that,” Spike says. “The Host—what did he see, that made that all happen?”

Her heart rate picks up ever-so-slightly. It is barely noticeable, but Spike is nothing if not attentive. The girl had enough control, though, to hardly flinch.

“J-just a powerful reading, I guess,” Willow says, not meeting his eyes.

“Powerful, nothing,” Spike says, taking a step forward. Willow mimics him perfectly, backwards. “He doesn’t get visions, he just sees. What did he see, Willow?”

Willow takes another step back; Spike takes another step forward. He does not realize how he’s been stalking her until Willow’s back is pressed against the wall of the alley.

“It’s none of your business what he saw,” Willow snaps. Spike grins, relieved to see some emotion from her besides fear, and moves forward again, and this time Willow has nowhere to go. “Stop, Spike.”

Spike cocks his head to one side, bending a little to stare straight into her unwilling eyes. “Why did you leave, Willow?”

There is an unmistakable flash of fear in her eyes, and a muscle in her jaw twitches, but she doesn’t say anything.

“What did Oz do to you?”

Willow whimpers and her knees buckle. She leans against the wall as she slides to the ground.

Spike kneels before her and places a light hand on her shoulder. Her whole body stiffens. “What happened to you?”

She draws her knees up to her chest and hugs her arms around her body. “No,” she whispers.

Spike’s brow furrows, and a telltale note of worry creeps into his voice. “Willow—"

“I-I can’t,” she mumbles hoarsely. “I can’t tell you.”  She tilts her head up to look into his eyes. “You can hardly look at me now, Spike… you’ll be running to get away from me if you…”

“No!” Spike says loudly; Willow shrinks away from his outburst and he lowers his voice. “No, Willow. Nothing could make me leave you.”

The surprise in her eyes in honest enough, Spike reflects; how can he expect her to take his word for truth when she has no idea how he’s missed her? “Nothing,” he repeats earnestly.

Willow’s breath catches at the look in his eyes, and she very nearly tells him. “You wouldn’t believe me,” she finds herself saying. “You’d never—"

“I’d believe anything you say,” Spike swears.

Willow tucks a stray wisp of black hair behind her ears; her hair in itself is enough to remind her how much has gone wrong. “Spike…”

They stay there in silence for a long moment, Willow a shrinking form against the hard brick, Spike crouching beseechingly before her. And then the silence is broken, completely by accident.

“You are the most beautiful woman in the world.”

Spike doesn’t even realize he’s spoken until the words hang suspended in the air. He does not dare to look away from Willow’s piercing dark stare, and her response breaks his heart.

“When you say it, I almost believe it,” Willow says wonderingly, tears glinting behind her eyes.

Spike moves his hand from her shoulder to move his thumb along her cheekbone, and Willow almost imperceptibly leans into the gentle touch.

The door to Caritas is thrown open with a bang, and Faith runs out, her face tense. She freezes as she sees them: Willow backed against the wall, a single tear rolling down her cheek, an indecipherable look on her face, and Spike, looming above her.

A fierce loyalty to Willow has taken root somewhere deep within Faith’s soul, and it wrenches painfully at her as she sees her friend helpless. “Willow!”

Spike is pushed aside and Willow gathered into unthreatening arms. Willow clutches Faith like a lifeline, and Faith stands, pulling her friend with her. Spike unfolds his wiry frame as he stands as well.

All Faith can do is glare at him. “Look, Slayer, I didn’t do anything wrong!” he protests. Spike looks to Willow for help. “Tell her!”

“He didn’t,” Willow says in answer to Faith’s questioning look.

Faith looks doubtful, but shrugs. “Fine. But we’ve gotta get gone, Wills—Wolfboy’s coming to look for you.”

Willow breaks free of Faith’s embrace and nods, tense once again. “Fine.” She looks to Spike, suddenly unsure of herself. “See you later.” She takes Faith’s hand and turns, and Spike is left in the alley with only a short gust of wind to signal their departure.
 
 

April 21st, 2007; Sunnydale, California

The evening is cool and still, the house dark and empty. In a dank corner of the unusually clean basement, the manhole is pushed up and to the side and Spike draws himself up out of it.

When the manhole is securely back in place, Spike unbends his lanky frame from its tense crouch and stands. He makes his way to the stairs and swiftly climbs them; the basement door opens onto the kitchen, which is immaculate with polished chrome and shiny tiles.

Spike pauses by the doorway in the kitchen before he dares to venture further into the house; if he is caught, then this all has been pointless, and he’ll never know. And he will also quite possibly end up as filler in a DustBuster.

There are no telltale heartbeats, no creaking floorboards or warm breathing flesh. Oz has gone out. Spike exhales unnecessarily and steps out into the foyer, tense with anticipation. The stairs at the end of the hall are quickly ascended, the hallway on the second floor leads straight to Willow’s room. Spike tries to turn the knob and finds it locked. He has suspected something of the sort and produces from a pocket in his duster a long metal pin.

The door swings open silently, and Spike steps in.

“If I were leaving home,” Spike contemplates under his breath, “What would I bring with me?”

He pauses. “If I were *Willow* and I were leaving home, what would I bring?”

He turns around slowly, his black-clad figure oddly out of place in the softly toned bedroom. “Laptop,” he says contemplatively; “Knapsack, duffle; Clothes—denims, knickers, shirts—A spellbook, perhaps?”

Spike crosses the room and opens her closet doors. It is filled with clothing; he has never seen her closet before, but there doesn’t seem to be anything missing. However, if he knows the girls of the Scooby Gang—and he disgusts himself by admitting that yes, he knows them quite well, in fact, thank you very much—they all seem to accumulate gratuitous amounts of clothes, and it would be hard to judge how much is less than normal unless there was nothing there.

Spike growls in frustration and turns to close the closet door when a flash of something on the floor of the closet catches his eye. He bends, his duster spreading out on the floor behind him like some sort of perverse bird, and pushes away the dresses and skirts that hang to the floor away and pulls out his find: Willow’s laptop. It’s about a third of an inch thick and weighs almost nothing in his hands. It’s a chrome-plated Mac G8 Powerbook, the latest edition—Spike knows because Willow brought it to the Magic Box the day she got it, brimming with excitement. If there was anything in the world she loved more than that scumbag Wolfboy of hers, it had to be this laptop.

Something is wrong.

Spike stands swiftly, decisively, and then stoops again to replace the laptop carefully. He closes her closet door carefully, and her bedroom door too; no need to give the Wolf undue suspicions. All this is probably pointless, Spike reflects absently, as what he’s about to do will almost certainly be noticed.

He unlocks the door to the guest room—Oz’s room—and enters.

Spike nearly falls over with shock at the scents that bombard his senses.

Fear. Anger. Hatred. Blood. And something else—something that smells of death-but-not-death, something vaguely familiar if he could only define it…

He prowls the edges of the small room, sniffing almost delicately at the sickly-smelling air. The table in the center of the room will certainly have stronger smells, but Spike is too caught up in his fear for Willow to really want to investigate.

The dresser catches his eye, and Spike latches onto that as a thankful distraction. Before he goes over to the bloodstained table, he can search the dresser. He can search the dresser and gather his thoughts, and then he can think about that deadly-looking table.

Unfortunately, this plan is shot all to Hell when Spike opens the top drawer of the dresser first.

Spike chokes in shock. <The stuff in this drawer…> He pulls out a blood-encrusted knife, agonizingly dull, and holds it as if it’s a dead rat. He hasn’t seen torture implements this precise since his days with Angelus.

Spike gingerly lifts the knife to his nose and sniffs, though he knows what he will smell. The blood is undeniably Willow’s—sweet and spicy, run through with magic.

<What have you done to her, you psychotic puppy?> Spike rifles, panicked, through the stained, rusty, bloody contents of the drawer. They’re not limited to ‘professional’ objects—there’s wire, too, and bloody twine, and shards of what was most likely a wine glass, and a belt. Spike can just make out the L.L. Bean logo on the worn and dirty leather.

Spike doesn’t realize he’s crying until the tears cloud his eyes. He’d known Oz was… hurting her… but this…? He’s angry at himself, for being so bloody fucking soft, crying over a mortal, but so angry at the Wolf that he could rip him to shreds.

<Bloody bastard’s so fucking confident, he knows no one will suspect… Doesn’t even fucking clean the place…!>

Spike chokes again, a harsh, angry cough, and the sound brings him to his senses enough to glance at his watch and realize how late it’s gotten. The Wolf could be home anytime.

<Shit! >

Spike shoves the stuff back in the drawer and closes it roughly. If he’s lucky, the Wolf won’t notice the intrusion until Spike’s had a chance to tell somebody about what he’s found.

The door is closed quickly, the pin produced again from a duster pocket and fiddled with until the lock clicks; Spike runs like mad down the stairs and dives through the door to the basement and closes it behind him just as the front door opens.
 
 

July 3rd, 2008; Los Angeles, California

It is hot in Los Angeles, unusually hot for July. The air is heavy and damp enough that even the resident vampires are sweltering.

Muttering expletives at the weather, Spike sits in the shade in the back courtyard of the Hyperion, nursing a sweating glass of iced lemonade. Though he himself does not perspire, Spike can smell the sweat of Cordelia, Gunn, Fred and Wesley; they shower often, both to relieve themselves and to spare the acute senses of Spike and Angel, but in weather like this it is no use.

A heavy breeze passes through, bringing with it the smell of more lemonade, courtesy of Fred; Victoria’s Secret perfume and Tommy Hilfiger cologne from Cordelia and Gunn, respectively; ancient dust, stirred up from rotting books—Wesley; cinnamon and mothballs from Angel; and something else, something unfamiliar: mint?

Yes, mint and furniture polish, with a slight scent of meticulously groomed animals; a hint of fear and of organic shampoo and ammonia… nail polish. Spike half-shrugs: it must be a customer. He’s far too hot to move. Better to let Fred deal with it.

But the smells come closer to him, and now he smells leather and foreign sweat, and he hears footsteps of feet clad in slides. They keep coming: someone to see him? Spike turns half-heartedly, twisting around on the cool cement. Faith stands in the doorway, smelling strongly of mint, her hair just washed and falling in still-wet curls around her shoulders, her fingernails newly manicured with a sparkling black coat; and her feet, in their Birkenstocks, shift uneasily.

Spike nods to her and considers taking out his cigarettes.

“Hey, Junior,” she greets him, and moves out into the back courtyard. She’s dressed neatly today, unusually squeaky-clean for a girl as flamboyant as she is. Faith smiles hesitantly and bends long tanned legs to lower herself to the ground beside Spike. “Hot, huh?”

“Yeah,” Spike says. He lifts his glass of lemonade. “Want?”

“You’re unusually monosyllabic,” Faith notes, taking the glass. She tosses her head slightly to move her hair and sips slightly at the cool drink. “Thanks.”

“You look preppy,” Spike says, ignoring her comment. “Any reason?”

Faith swallows and puts the lemonade down. “Yeah, actually.” She casts a sly glance towards him under her long thick lashes. “I was wondering if you’d help me out.”

Spike’s interest is piqued: is the redeemed bad girl going to fall off the wagon? “Yeah? What’d you want?”

Faith sighs and picks at her cuticles. “I found an apartment to move to, like me and Angel agreed.”

<Damn.> “Yeah? Good for you, then.”

“But…”

There’s always a ‘but’. Spike smiles slightly. “But…?”

“Well, the apartment comes with a roommate. And she’s great—real nice, responsible, doesn’t mind about the whole parole thing—but, uh, she’s vampire-aware, doesn’t like them much.”

Spike can’t see where this is going. He looks to Faith, who is now chipping the polish off of her newly styled nails. He’s never seen her look so neatly tailored before—the black leather is traded for denim shorts of a modest length and a thin long-sleeved white cotton peasant shirt. She’s got a new anklet on, some kind of colored thread, tightly knotted. She’s never worn jewelry before, except the silver ring on her pinky that she never seems to remove. It’s a gift from Angel.

“So?” Spike prompts unsubtly.

“The point is, you and Angel can’t come meet her or see the apartment. She’s speciesist.”

Spike doesn’t much care—if this roommate is as responsible as Faith says she is, Faith would be fine. “I still don’t see…”

“Angel’s gonna want to approve the apartment! And he can’t, because she won’t let a vampire in.”

Ah. It’s a conflict of trust. Spike shrugs. “I don’t see what you want me to do, ducks. Sorry.”

“Can you talk to Angel for me? Gunn told me Angel moved back here and everything ‘cause of you…”

Spike is shaking his head before Faith can finish. “No way.” Spike picks up the still-sweating lemonade glass and stands. “Sorry, again.”

Faith’s brow is furrowed, her expression bewildered. “But—Why not?” She stands, too, her hands on her flat hips. “He *listens* to you!”

Spike shakes his head again and heads into the Hyperion. “One, that’s not true,” he says. And then: “Second, if I do this for you,” he finds himself explaining, “You’ll keep depending on me to help you out; and the Pouf won’t believe you without a representative.”

Faith’s expression is defiant, even though a trickle of sweat has cut through her light eye shadow. “But…”

“Look,” Spike says, “If you think he’ll say no, don’t ask. Just tell. Tell him you need to be trusted, that you’ll check in with him every night before patrol—something like that. He’ll probably pout, but it’s not his decision, and if you don’t let him argue, he’ll eventually have to give in. He doesn’t distrust you so much that he’d kidnap you in the middle of the night.”

Faith looks thoughtful. “Hmm.”

“Yeah, ‘hmm.’” Spike rolls his eyes and digs in his back pocket for a cigarette. “Want?” He holds the Marlboros out to her generously. She makes a face and he shrugs. <Whatever tickles your fancy.> “Well. Good luck, then.” He heads into the hotel, leaving Faith standing contemplatively in the back courtyard.

The air conditioner is broken, so the inside of the hotel, despite all of the standing fans whirring furiously in every bit of empty floor, is nearly as hot as the outside. Spike goes to the kitchen to exchange his lemonade—now watery with melted ice—for a nearly frozen Guinness and then mounts the stairs to the second floor just as Faith reenters the lobby.

She catches his eye and he smiles. “Don’t forget to write!” he calls, mockingly, and she scowls good-naturedly and flashes her middle finger at him.

Spike expected no less; his smile doesn’t waver as he returns the favor and continues up the stairs to his suite.

Once he’s entered and kicked off his boots, Spike turns each of the six fans in his room to face the bed and switches them on. He regrets doing this—it means that he can’t hear the confrontation between Faith and Angel—but it’s too hot for anything else, and Spike would bet any one of these fans on the fact that once Faith leaves triumphantly—and she will—Angel will come upstairs and rant.

Spike smiles confidently and waits.
 
 

April 21st, 2007; Sunnydale, California

It is a fidgety and nervous Spike who pushes the sewer entry of Angel’s new place of residence open and clambers clumsily into the basement. Spike’s hands are shaking slightly, and there is a treacherous sore redness to his eyes that alludes to the times in his journey through the tunnels below Sunnydale where he had to stop and wipe the eyes that wouldn’t stop crying.

Spike stands in the dusty basement for a long moment, trying to compose himself, before heading up the stairs into the kitchen. Hoping that the Slayer isn’t home—because if she is, who will believe him?—Spike leans on the counter and shouts a “Halloo?” to the house.

There is a vague shout in response, and soon enough Angel’s heavy footsteps can be heard on the stairs, and then Spike’s former grandsire is in the kitchen doorway. He doesn’t look particularly thrilled to see Spike, but then, that’s not surprising.

They try to stare each other down for a long moment before Spike abruptly decides the posturing isn’t worth the time it’ll take away from finding Willow. “I need your help,” he says frankly.

Angel has the grace to look caught off-guard. “What?”

“I… Uh…”

Is there a graceful way to say that he just broke into Willow’s home and went rooting through her things? No; but it doesn’t matter. What he found there matters.

“Oz hurt Willow, you know,” Spike says. “A lot.”

Angel shakes his head. “That was years ago, Spike,” Angel informs him.

“No, I don’t mean when he left,” Spike says impatiently. “I mean now. Before Willow disappeared. The wolf *hurt* her.”

Angel raises his eyebrows dubiously. “Hurt her.” He sits at one of the stools by the island in the middle of the kitchen. “What do you mean?”

The grand Pouf’s going to grant him an audience, at least. Spike sighs. “I could tell she was losing blood every night,” he begins, “sometimes a lot of it.” Spike gives Angel a look, daring him to contradict. “And she was very weak… Pale. Tell me you noticed.”

Angel frowns. He *had* noticed, then. Spike takes mental note of this.

“And I could smell that Oz was sleeping around,” Spike continues bluntly. “I’m sure Willow knew, but you saw her fawning over him.” He stares at Angel. “Willow wasn’t much like that before, was she? Terrified of every little shadow, totally submissive to everyone, clutching the wolf like a lifeline? I was there, before *he* came back. You know what she was like. Vibrant girl, all extroverted, yeah?”

Spike starts pacing, aware that Angel is watching his every move. He doesn’t know where to go from here- how can he make the jump, logically and in terms that even the idiot can get, from where he’s started to the fact that it is Oz’s fault Willow withdrew, that it is Oz’s fault she left, that it is Oz’s work that coats that horrible little room in Willow’s house?

Perhaps direct is the best approach.

Spike turns to look Angel in the eye. “Come with me, to Willow’s house,” he says. “You’ll only believe me when you see it—”

Angel’s cro-magnon brow is furrowed, his dark eyes worried. “I still don’t understand,” he says. Spike restrains a growl of frustration.

“I don’t know what you want me to see,” Angel says, “but it can wait until we discuss this with the whole gang, or at least until Oz gets home.”

Spike was banking on *not* telling the whole gang or waiting until Oz gets home. The latter is unavoidable, as Spike had just managed on diving out of sight as the wolf had come in; but perhaps, maybe, Oz hadn’t noticed an intruder’s scent. If Spike can just get Angel to come *look*--he can’t deny the blood, the sweat, the pain, the acrid scent of fear. Even a human would have to recognize the sickly-sweet smell of death in Oz’s little torture chamber.

Especially a human like Angel.

“*Please*,” Spike begs. He’s ready to get on his knees, now, to plead for Angel’s cooperation. “Come with me, just look there.”

Angel’s getting ready to refuse, Spike can see: getting completely ready to dismiss him.

So Spike gets on his knees and clasps his hands, a mockery of prayer. “Please. Please.” He’ll have to do something drastic, swear on something believable: anything so that Angel will agree. “In the name of—of the bond, that we used to have, grandsire and childe.” Spike gestures, indicating an invisible line connecting their hearts. “I’ll do anything, but you have to come.”

If Angel won’t come, there isn’t anyone who’ll believe him. Xander mistrusts Spike too greatly, and Anya will side with Xander. Buffy will side with Oz, and Giles will side with Buffy, and Angel will be there to egg them on. Dawn might believe him, but she doesn’t have any influence in the group, yet; or not enough. She’s too young and inexperienced compared to the rest of them.

Angel’s looking pensive, something not unusual on his square features. “Spike, I get that you’re worried about Willow. We all are. But you can’t just—”

“Yes I *can* bloody ‘just’!” Spike yells. “You say you care, but if you did you’d be coming with me!” Spike stands, unable to contain his frustrations. “Think about how much anger and violence the wolf’s got to have tied up inside! You used to know what it was like, demon and soul raging at each other all the time! He tells everyone it’s fine that he keeps the werewolf in at full moon, but it can’t be. He *hurts* her!” Spike’s voice is growing hoarse from his shouting. “He *hurts* her, it’s an outlet for him, and she could be dead and you’re just sitting there!”

“I can’t believe that Oz would hurt Willow,” Angel says stubbornly, but he looks more like he’s willing to be convinced.

“This isn’t Oz,” Spike says certainly, and something shifts.

Angel moves slightly on the stool. There is a long pause, and then: “All right. We can go, if you do this quickly.”

Spike is frozen in place. He’s won?

Angel takes a breath. “Don’t make me regret this, boy,” he says, and Spike swears he can hear the menace of Angelus in that statement, though the bastard is long gone.

“I trust these people, and it has taken fire and brimstone for them to trust me,” Angel continues. “I’m taking a lot on faith here.”

“I know,” Spike says solemnly, and then adds, sincerely, “Thank you.”
 
 

July 5th, 2007; Los Angeles, California

Vaughn has known Charlie Gunn for years, since they were *this* high. They cut school together, dodged the cops out looking for kids playing hooky; they tried a cigarette together from Vaughn’s aunt’s stash, the secret one hidden in her desk drawer; together they collapsed on the rough carpet of her bedroom, coughing, and neither Vaughn nor Charlie ever smoked again.

How long’s it been? Long enough; long enough that Vaughn has some cheap Polaroids of himself and Charlie and Alonna, long before the vamps got her. Vaughn was among the few who never turned against Charlie Gunn when he went to work for that vampire, and among the even smaller group who still watched Charlie’s back after he picked up that Chase girl.

They—Vaughn and Charlie—don’t see each other too often because of their jobs. Both of ‘em fighting evil, it takes up a lot of time. But Vaughn has time for a beer or two with his oldest friend on evenings when the supernatural lies low; and once in a while Vaughn will drop in for dinner with Charlie and Cordy, who’s not so bad once you get to know her, and the kids, who call him Unca Vah.

Once in a while Charlie and Vaughn exchange favors, nothing too big: you don’t want to push it. But it was okay when Charlie called him up and asked if Vaughn would just take an afternoon, get the scoop on some chick used to work for the vampire.

So Vaughn gets in his truck, just like Charlie’s except without the huge stakes strapped in front, and drives down West Hollywood to a little shop with a handmade sign, and this is what happens to him:

The bell rings as he pushes the door open, sounding a low, melancholy note. The girl whose picture he has looks up from where she’s indicating something on a shelf to another customer and mouths “Just a second!” to him. He nods and looks around, hands on his hips under his denim jacket.

The shop is larger than it looks from outside, much larger. There’s a wide space in the center before the counter, with comfortable-looking chairs; behind the chairs are neatly arranged display shelves, and against the walls are cabinets. It takes Vaughn a moment to realize that there is glass in front of the items on the shelves in the cabinets, because the glass is polished until it’s nearly invisible.

All sorts of things are in the display cases—multi-faceted bottles full of colored sand or suspicious-looking liquids; uneven folded bits of cloth; carefully blown glass spheres; bunches of feathers tied together with lace or twine or thread; little china bowls with lumps of gold; broken crystal of all different colors; smooth rocks with pulsing lights inside; candles of all shapes, sizes, colors and scents. On the shelves is a huge selection of hemp and wool, chenille and cotton, dyed in every possible color, and generous piles of neatly folded clothes: linen, cotton, wool, silk, velvet, cashmere. A rack of knitting needles is placed discreetly to the side, and an extra bookshelf nudged into a corner holds various soaps, washes, and gels.

Another girl—woman—sits behind the counter, next to the cash register, which is old-fashioned and heavy-looking. She has long, thick hair that Vaughn thinks is black. It is tied back in a loose half-ponytail, and several small braids fall amidst the smooth mass of hair, run through with gold thread. She sits in front of a small wooden belt-loom, and her slender hands move delicately across it. Something about her suggests that she is going unbearably slowly, but that’s impossible; if anything, her concentrated weaving is unusually fast. Heavy dark lashes frame her eyes, hiding them from view, but suddenly she is looking up, looking directly at Vaughn, and he realizes he’s been staring. He nods to her and just before he turns his attention elsewhere, she shifts and the sunlight streaming through the front windows falls on her hair.

Her hair isn’t black, it’s a dark, shiny red. Dark like blood.

The girl Vaughn’s here to check up on steps up to him, dusting her hands on her jeans. She’s dressed strangely for the heat outside: long pants, neatly creased, and a shirt with sleeves that are a little too long, falling to her knuckles. She’s cute though, with her chocolate-colored hair in careless wide ringlets lying on her shoulders, and a quirky smile. She fiddles with the clumsily knotted hemp necklace she wears, and Vaughn sees that her fingernails are black and sparkly.

Her lips curve upward. “Can I help you?”

“Yeah,” Vaughn says. “I need a cleansing spell for ridding a place of negative energy.” This is his alibi that Gunn’s girl made up for him. She said that cleansing spells were all-purpose, so they might use the stuff he’d buy sometime, and also they were relatively inexpensive. She’d given him fifteen dollars, clapped him on the shoulder, smiled, and said she expected change.

The girl nods. “That’s pretty simple. I’m new, though, and not so much the magic girl, so I think Wi—” She pauses. “—Salix might be able to help you better.” She gestures towards the blood-red girl behind the counter, and then looks embarrassed. “Sorry! I’m Faith.” She holds out a strong-looking hand for Vaughn to shake. He takes it and is proven right: her grip is firm and confident. “I’m supposed to introduce myself right away,” Faith explains, “But like I said, new.”

Vaughn chuckles. “’S all good.” He goes to the counter, and the blood-red girl looks up. Her eyes are shadowed and serious, but a small welcoming smile touches her mouth, and it’s something of a relief to know that she can smile at all. She, too, is dressed warmly, in a bell-sleeved linen shirt and layered linen skirts. “Cleansing spell,” she says, and slides a notepad towards her from the other end of the counter. “White linen packet, small,” she mutters, writing this down in a tiny, neat script. “Sage, two pinches, dried, not fresh; lavender scent, a couple of drops; six bits of melted silver; one spray of lilac flowers.”

She looks up at Vaughn and winks. “I like my spells to smell nice, but I guarantee that there’s nothing in here that’s unnecessary.”

Vaughn shakes his head, smiling. “I know next to nothing about spells. You could put dragon scales in there and I’d believe you.”

She frowns. “No, dragon scales are used for way more complicated stuff. Not for beginners.” Then she shakes her head a little. “Sorry,” she says apologetically, “I’ve been meaning to develop a sense of humor, but it just hasn’t worked.” Vaughn laughs. She looks a little sheepish, and then adds, “It’s hot out, and you’ve got that big jacket on—do you want some iced tea?” Off Vaughn’s pause and doubtful glance she says, “Oh, it’s a courtesy; it doesn’t cost anything extra.”

Vaughn nods. A cold drink would be nice. The blood-red girl bends and reaches under the counter; as she bends away from her belt loom, Vaughn takes a closer look at what she’s making. The belt is about an inch and a half wide, made of tightly and neatly woven intricate patterns of black and red wool. At intervals a silver or gold bead is knotted subtly in. The belt looks to be a little less than half finished, but Vaughn can tell it’ll be great once it’s done.

The blood-red girl straightens, bringing with her a brightly polished cut-crystal jug of mint iced tea and a ceramic mug. She pours quickly and slides the mug across the counter towards Vaughn, who takes the drink eagerly.

When he’s done, she takes the mug back and tears the list out of the notepad, handing it to Vaughn. “Here. Faith should be able to put this together for you; if you need anything, just ask.” She turns back to her belt loom, squinting at it.

Vaughn shrugs and swivels. Faith is kneeling over by the door. Vaughn saunters over, scanning the list that the blood-red girl has given him, and is about to speak when he sees that Faith is stroking the head of a rabbit.

She looks up and ducks her head again to indicate the rabbit: “This is Timpani. He’s Wil—Salix’s.”

The rabbit is unusually large, with thick purple-silver velvety fur and wary eyes that remind Vaughn eerily of the blood-red girl. He can easily believe this rabbit belongs to her.

Vaughn nods. “Cool.” He pauses, and then holds out the little list the blood-red girl gave to him. “Um…”

Faith jumps to her feet. “Of course.” She takes the list and scans it. “I think I know where everything is,” she says softly, and then smiles. “This’ll be quick. Make yourself comfortable.”

“Great,” Vaughn says, and Faith moves off among the display cases. Vaughn turns to look slowly around the shop again, and freezes when he sees the blood-red girl sipping at a clean mug of iced tea, the belt loom moved to the side and her beautifully finished belt draped elegantly across the counter.
 
 

April 21st, 2007; Sunnydale, California

Spike stands like a naughty child in front of the assembled Scooby Gang, hands thrust deep into the cluttered pockets of his duster, jaw clenched, trying to endure his chastisement without going mad.

“But I don’t understand,” Oz is saying helplessly. “Why would he think that I would ever do anything to hurt Willow?” His voice escalates annoyingly towards the end of the sentence. Spike has to resist rolling his eyes at the melodramatics.

“Hey, hey, are we forgetting something?” Xander interrupts. “Spike’s *evil*. The evil undead. Does he really need a reason to—”

“—Oh, please!” Spike really does roll his eyes now as he cuts in. “Must I remind you, Chubs, of the countless times I’ve saved your worthless behind on patrols? I’ve fought beside you stupid White Hats for seven years. If I were plotting to sabotage you once and for all, do you really think this is how I’d do it?”

“I don’t know, Spike,” Buffy says caustically. “Why don’t you tell us?”

Seven pairs of self-righteous eyes are all trained on him accusingly. Spike can’t believe this. “Come *on*!” he groans. “Willow’s been missing a day and you pathetic lot haven’t done anything to look for her! If I’m so evil, how come I’m the only one who cares?”

“That’s not true, Spike,” Xander hisses, spitting Spike’s name out like it’s something disgusting. “We all care about Willow. We’ve been out searching all night, but there’s no trail.”

“I’m telling you, it’s *him*!” Spike yells, pointing at Oz. “If you’re so bloody concerned and you’ve been out all bloody night like you say, then how come you’re here now, looking like you’ve had a good healthy beauty sleep? How come you’re not crying, huh, Xander?”

Xander flinches slightly, though it might simply be in surprise at Spike’s use of his name.

“That’s quite enough,” Giles protests sternly, but Spike ignores him.

“How come you don’t have bags under your eyes? How come you don’t look scared sick as to where Willow might be? How come you aren’t wondering why a girl as straightforward and constant as Willow is just up and left in the middle of the bloody night?” Spike’s voice is going hoarse.

He straightens and looks around at the blank faces of the White Hats until his gaze levels with Oz. The wolf doesn’t back down but stares straight at Spike, some kind of alpha-male posturing thing. Oz’s throat ripples in a silent growl, but it’s not so much a warning as a triumph. Spike sees Oz’s upper lip twitch slightly in what might be a smile, and then he has an inkling of what’s going on.

Oz has them all wrapped around his little finger. Spike doesn’t know what could be causing it—a control spell? A wish? Some demon the wolf has bent to his will?—It doesn’t matter.

They won’t help Spike, ever, at all, because they’re blinded by something intangible and because Spike has no evidence. Willow’s laptop has disappeared from the floor of her closet as if it were never there, and Oz’s little torture chamber is clean—the table moved away, the top drawer of the dresser filled with clothes, a neatly-made cot rolled into the corner of the room. The whole place stinks of Lysol.

It had so nearly worked. Angel had come willingly enough, had believed Spike to the point of trekking back through the sewers to Willow and Oz’s, had crept up the stairs and obligingly waited while Spike picked the locks anew; but he’d quickly become skeptical as Spike became more and more bewildered and angry, and Angel had refused to admit that he could at least smell the crisp lemony scent of cleaning fluid permeating the shirts hastily shoved into the top dresser drawer.

The group is stony-faced, staring resolutely at Spike, and then Buffy speaks. “Get out,” she says coldly, evenly, and then as Spike hesitates she yells, “Out!”

A muscle twitches in Spike’s jaw. “All right, then,” he says. “I’ll get out.” He walks stiffly to the door to the Magic Box’s basement, and pauses with his hand on the doorknob. “But remember this: I’m your enemy. I’m evil, just like your macho man there loves to point out. I was never friends with Willow, I never knew her well; but while you’re sitting here feeling self-righteous, I’m out there looking for her. And I’m going to find her. And I will never, *ever* let you take her back again.” He lets a significant silence fall as he glared at Oz, and then he turns his attention to one man in particular.

“Grandsire,” Spike says formally to Angel, and then gives up the good manners. “You made a bloody awful vampire, but you make a worse human. You know I’m right, and you hate it, because you like your sunlight and your crosses and your vulnerability. But I swear I never thought I’d see any vampire, even if he’s Shanshu’d like you’ve gone and done, believe a *Slayer* before his own childe.”

Spike grimaces and opens the basement door. “Good riddance to the lot of you.”
 
 

August 11th, 2008; Los Angeles, California

“So!” Angel says cheerfully. “What have we got?” This question is directed towards Wesley, who is bent intently over an antiquated demon encyclopedia.

“Ahem,” Wesley begins, pushing his glasses up his nose. It’s a very Giles-like gesture. Spike rolls his eyes.

“So far?” Wesley says. Uncertainty taints his voice. “Er… Whirling Dirvesh, Whurlegyg, Tombelweid, Sugarplum Fairy, Tasmanian Cyclone Demon, and Spinning-Top.”

Spike and Gunn exchange glances from the corners of their eyes and begin to crack up.

“Whirling Dervish—!” Spike hoots.

“Tumbleweed…” Gunn gasps.

“Spinning-Top?” Spike adds incredulously.

Gunn is laughing so hard that he can barely manage to echo “Sugarplum Fairy!” before he doubles over.

“Whirligig,” Spike groans.

“ ‘Tasmanian Cyclone Demon,’ my ass! That’s the Tasmanian Devil!” Gunn hollers. “Don’t knock Taz!”

Wesley sits up straight and glares at them sternly over the tops of his glasses. “I assure you, Gunn,” he says, “That ‘Taz,’ as you so flippantly call it, is a force to be reckoned with—”

“Taz is a *cartoon*!” Gunn retorts. “Come on, Wes. It ain’t that serious. Look at the list you just read.”

Wesley sputters but does as he is told, and his mouth curves reluctantly upward. “Yes,” he says. “I do see how this could be seen to be amusing…”

Angel sighs loudly. “It’s not funny, guys,” he says stubbornly. “This is important—nobody knows what this thing is, and I’m worried about Faith.” This last part is said in a lower tone, just in case she happens to walk in at that time and hear this affront to her powers of self-defense.

“She’s managed to avoid every other big bad that’s graced the streets of L.A. for a month,” Gunn points out nonchalantly. “No big. She’ll be fine.”

“But…” Angel runs a hand through his haphazardly spiked hair. “This isn’t anything anyone’s ever heard of—it moves too quickly to be seen! It’s powerful, and it’s been staking vampires left and right and I don’t know whether it’s on our side or not! I don’t want Faith getting stuck in a fight with something she can’t handle.”

“I don’t know what to tell you, Angel,” Wesley says apologetically.

Gunn shrugs. “Sorry, man. And I gotta go pick up Peanut Butter and Jelly from preschool—catch you later.”

Angel nods tiredly. “Go ahead, Gunn. And say hi to Cordy and the kids for me.”

Gunn smiles. “Yeah. Good luck,” he says, and Wesley, Spike and Angel shrug in thanks.

*   *   *

“What’s up, guys?” Faith bounces into the lobby enthusiastically at 7:30 PM, the time she and Angel have agreed upon for her to check in.

She doesn’t see the bustle of Angel Investigations that she usually encounters during her visits to the hotel. Instead, the lobby is dimly lit, the main light coming from the glow of the computers that Spike, Wesley and Angel each squint at.

Angel looks up. “Oh, hi, Faith.” He peers at the computer for a moment, and then back at Faith. “Just a second.”

Faith skips down the steps. “Whatcha doin’?” She walks around to look over the men’s shoulders at the computer screens. Spike’s gives her pause. “What’s this?”

“Gunn just sent me an email saying that he got word from some of his boys,” Spike says. “A big vampire territorial thing is going down night after tomorrow.”

“Where?” Angel asks, and gets up, pushing his chair back. Faith twirls a damp curl around and finger and frowns a little.

“I can probably take care of it, guys,” she offers, and is unprepared for Angel’s outburst.

“No!” he says, and crosses his arms in that particularly stubborn way of his. “I think you should back off from patrol, actually,” he adds.

“What?” Faith is incredulous. What on earth is he smoking? “Have you gone nuts?”

“There’s something very dangerous out there, Faith,” Angel informs her as though she’s five. “We can’t figure out what it is, but we’ve been getting different reports on it all day and it’s sounding worse and worse.”

Faith rolled her eyes. “Look, I appreciate your concern, Angel, but hey: I’m a Slayer. And people *always* exaggerate. There was this little demon once, size of a puffball, people called it ten feet high.”

“Faith…” Angel sighs, and then picks up some sheaves of paper and hands them to her. “This is what we’ve got so far.”

Faith sighs dubiously but scans the papers. “ ‘Whurlegyg’?” she says, chuckling, but stops at Angel’s hurt glance. “Sorry.”

Angel goes back to his computer as Faith sits, cross-legged, on the floor to read. Finally she says, “So… There’s this unidentified thing out there that stakes vampires.”

“Right,” Angel says, reading over Spike’s shoulder again. “Would you print that out?” he asks Spike.

“… And it’s really fast,” Faith continues.

“So fast you can’t anticipate its moves,” Angel confirms nervously.

“So it’s, like, a blur,” Faith says. She gets a nod from Angel. “Okay…” she says, and has to refrain from chuckling. “It’s alone?” she asks. “Or does it have friends?”

“There are actually reports of other things like it,” Wesley pipes up. “A great deal smaller than this thing, strangely. But they move just as quickly.”

“How many?” Faith asks, sure she knows, now.

“It’s hard to tell, due to their enormous speed,” Wesley says, managing to convey a great deal of fear and respect for these things as he mentions them. “Some have reported sixty, at least, and others just one; but a demon acquaintance with particularly sharp eyesight claims there were three smaller ones and just the one larger.”

“Oh,” Faith says, and appreciates the dim lighting of the hotel that does its best to conceal her smile.

“So,” Angel says distractedly. “Can you put off patrols? Spike and I can take over for you.”

“Like Hell we will,” Spike mutters, but Faith knows he will probably acquiesce later.

“I’m not promising anything, Angel,” Faith says, “But I’ll see what I can do.” She gets up to hand the papers back to Angel, and leans inconspicuously on the printer. “How’s your day been?” she asks, shifting slightly. “Like this since morning?”

“Pretty much,” Spike groans, rolling his neck.

“I’ve found another reference to our mysterious speed demon!” Wesley cries, and as Angel and Spike both divert their attention to his computer, Faith nicks the printouts on the upcoming vampiric activity from the printer’s bin.

“So…” Faith says, folding the papers quickly and stuffing them into the woven shoulder-bag Willow gave her, “Is that all for tonight?”

Angel nods absently, and Faith sighs. “Okay,” she says, keeping her hand on her purse. “G’ night.”

There are vague grunts in response from all of the men. Faith smiles faintly, again, and leaves.

*   *   *

Angel doesn’t realize the printouts are gone until the night after tomorrow, and then he doesn’t think much of it until he realizes that nobody from the office has taken them.

Spike doesn’t have the printouts; Wes doesn’t have them; Gunn doesn’t need them; Fred and Cordelia don’t know they exist. The twins, Paul and Thea (or Peanut Butter and Jelly, as they prefer to be called), haven’t been at the office in over a week, so they couldn’t have taken them for any of their games of pretend.

The only other person who could have them is Faith.

It’s not that Angel particularly needs those printouts; to get them again all he needs to do is get Spike to log into his account and re-print them. But the only reason Faith would have taken them is for her own purposes, and Faith’s only purpose having to do with those printouts is patrol.

Damn it.

“Shit!” Angel exclaims, and runs to load up on weapons.

Spike saunters disinterestedly into the lobby with a glass of Fred’s lemonade. “What’s the matter?”

“Faith’s gone to try and massacre that territorial dispute tonight,” Angel says, frustrated. He can’t find his favorite sword, the one with the pink hippo sticker that PB&J stuck on it. “Where’s my hippo sword?”

“Are you joking? The girl’s going to get herself killed!”

Angel pauses to favor Spike with his best disdainful look. “I know. Where’s my *sword*?”

“Probably up in your room.” Spike grins. “I thought I told you to put your sharp, pointy weapons away after you play with them?”

“Spike, shut up,” Angel says, dropping Gunn’s homemade battleaxe and bolting up the stairs. “Get ready, would you?” he yells.

Spike sighs but starts strapping on wristblades.

He’s practicing the wrist-flick that looses the blades when Angel stomps down the stairs again, waving the sword. It’d look menacing enough, Spike thinks, if there weren’t a pink hippo sticker on the hilt.

“Ready?” Angel asks tensely.

“Let’s go,” Spike replies.

On the ride over to midtown, Angel says, “What if the Speed Demon shows up?”

“Unlikely, isn’t it?” Spike says. “That this thing shows up when we’re there?”

“*Un*likely?” Angel snorts. “Please.”

They park and get out, pausing for a moment in the night to listen and smell for a battle. The sounds and scents come to them soon enough, a couple of twisting alleys down. Angel breaks into a panicked run. Spike rolls his eyes but follows, flexing his wrists under his sleeves.

There is a crowd of vampires in a relatively small dead end—twenty or thirty at least—all snarling viciously, and of course, Faith is fighting gleefully in the middle of them. Spike is surprised that she’s held her own this long before there’s a peculiar whirring sound and something so fast it’s a blur whizzes by his head.

“Shit!” Spike yells to Angel. “Back down, the Speed Demon’s here!”

Angel shakes his head and is about to dive into the fray, but Spike grabs his arm. “It’ll kill you,” he informs his grandsire, pulling him back, “And you can’t help the Slayer if you’re a smelly pile of dust.”

Angel grits his teeth and is about to yell a reply when something blurry shoots over *his* head and he ducks. “Christ!” he yells, and presses himself against the wall.

“Exactly,” Spike agrees.

They are forced to watch the fight, unable to participate. Fortunately, the Speed Demon and its three mini demons seem to be fighting the vampires and not Faith, but it’s clear that Angel is doubtful as to how long it’ll stay that way.

As the vampire population quickly diminishes to fifteen, and then ten, and then three, the demon whooshes by with enough force to create a sizable breeze, and Spike freezes.

What is that smell? It comes from the demon, and it’s something familiar and sweet, but alien at the same time. Faith stakes another vampire and the demons dispose of the last two, and then all at once the four blurs are closing in on Faith in spirals.

Angel lets out a hoarse shout as he leaps to his feet and hefts his sword; Faith screams a high-pitched protest, but her exact words are lost in the buzzing from the demons and it’s unclear what she’s saying no to; and as Angel swoops in, swinging his heavy sharp blade with a flash of pink hippo and a sudden spurt of blood, Spike scrambles to stand and stop him, because at last he’s recognized that smell.

“Damn it!” Faith yells, and pushes a bewildered Angel away. Spike runs into the cleared space and is splattered with bright blood as the largest demon’s blurry spirals grow slower and slower. The three smaller ones drop just before their master does; and finally, lying stretched on the ground, pressing her hands to the blood pumping from her abdomen, surrounded by three bristling animals and a further bristling Faith—changed, skinnier, with inexplicably black hair—is Willow.

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