Becky & Spike Forever

By Fojiao2

PART THREE: The First Peek

The next day, late in the afternoon, Spike was trying new software on his laptop when there was a knock at his door. He hadn't expected any visitors, and knew that Buffy would just come in. Feeling wary--it was still new to have a door that anyone knocked on--he approached the door and opened it.

"Dawn?!" he said.

The younger Summers girl was grinning at him from the hall. "Hey, Spike. Can I come in?"

"Uh . . . " He paused, then bowed and swept his arm toward the room. "Enter freely and of your own accord."

She giggled and entered, dropping her backpack by the coffeetable, and he smiled at her as she looked the room over. "So, big sis tell you where I was now?"

Dawn nodded, looking at his collection of CDs. "That and other things," she said, now purposefully trying to keep him from seeing the big smile she was hiding.

Spike started to close the door, then hesitated. He considered for a moment and left it open. William Bloody was trying to establish a normal human identity--being arrested on a morals charge because he had a 15-year-old girl in his room wouldn't help matters. Best that it look as innocent as possible. He turned to see that Dawn had pulled back his black curtains and was looking at the view from his windows, surrounding herself in sunlight. He couldn't approach her if he wanted to. "Uh, Little Bit? I'm over here."

"I know, I know. I just wanted to look the place over." She spun around to grin at him, then motioned toward the bed to her left. "Nice bed. Get a good workout on it?"

"Dawn!" Spike shouted, utterly shocked. "What the hell--?"

That's when Dawn ran across the room and leaped onto Spike, wrapping her arms around his neck. "Ohhh, Spike! Buffy told me everything! You're her boyfriend! It's, like, too good to be true!"

Spike disentangled the young girl from around his neck and became shy, not quite meeting her eyes. "Well, yeah, that's pretty much how I think about it. When did she tell you?"

Dawn threw herself down on his couch, stretching out lazily. "Not this morning, that's for sure, 'cause I had to get up and make my own lunch. Not that that's anything new. But she called the school and said she wanted to see me, so she took her lunch break when I got out and we talked." She sat up, staring intently at Spike, who'd taken a chair to meet her eye level. "Damn, Spike, how long has this been going on?"

He counted off on his fingers in a typical manner. "One, watch your damn language, Bit. Two, I'm not telling you anything until you tell me what Buffy said. You're not going to get anything from me that she doesn't want you to know."

Dawn smirked. "Yeah, you're too good for that old trick. She just told me that you've been seeing each other for a while, that that's part of the reason she hasn't been spending as much time with me. And she said that she couldn't let anyone else know because of how they'd react. Oh, and that Tara knows."

"Yeah, she's known for a while. Since before Buffy's birthday party. Even gave us an alibi so we could go on a date once."

"Hmm, I'll have to talk to her later. And Buffy told me to give you a message."

"Message? What?"

"I don't have this word-for-word, but it's like you really showed her something last night." Dawn couldn't help the smirk that came to her face, and Spike gave her an exasperated look bordering on real anger. "I mean, she said that you showed her last night that you were really serious. You impressed her. And she wanted to do something to show you that she was serious, too. So, voila," she finished, pointing to herself.

Spike took this silently. He leaned forward in his chair, with his elbows on his knees and his hands cupping his face, and stared into space. He let the silence stretch out until Dawn became uncomfortable. "Uh, Earth to Spike? Ya there?"

He suddenly snapped back to the reality of the room and Dawn. "Oh! Sorry, Dawn, I was just . . . daydreaming, I suppose. Have you ever wished for something so much that you've nearly died to have it? And prayed and cried and done all sorts of silly crap just to get you nearer to that place you've dreamed of? And then, out of the blue--the clouds part and you can actually see it. You're not there yet but you've been given the first real evidence that it'll happen. That's how I'm feeling."

"Wow," Dawn said. "Is that what Buffy meant when she told me about 'lecture mode?'"

Spike chuckled. "I guess so, Bit."

"You know, I've been rooting for you guys for so long. It's so great to know that you're together."

"Let's hope that it stays that way," he said. "With the way your sister blows hot and cold I never know just where I'm standing."

An uncomfortable silence fell between them. Dawn knew exactly what he was talking about. She loved her sister dearly, and saw her as her own personal hero. But she was also a victim of Buffy's fickle nature. Buffy could be abjectly humble one moment, letting her guilt about her actions bring her to her knees. But then her Slayer nature would kick in, the force that knew no retreat, and she could just as quickly attack the sister she'd just apologized to, or just as suddenly treat Dawn with the same unconscious indifference that she'd felt so guilty about. In her memories she knew that Buffy had not always been like this--only since she became the Slayer had she become so conflicted about life, so confused as a person. And the two people who loved her most now sat, just feeling the weight of their love on their shoulders.

"So, I hear you're an author now," Dawn said, breaking the silence.

"I was always an author, Little Bit," Spike answered. "Now I'm merely published."

"Whatever. So what's the book about? Buffy said you were pretty vague about it."

Spike gave her a deep considering look. "I wonder if you can keep a secret, Dawn."

"Of course I can!"

"No, I mean a big secret. As big as a certain vampire helping you retrieve a Ghora demon egg for a certain resurrection spell. Something you can't tell or it could end in me being staked."

Dawn was suddenly very solemn. They never talked about that night, even over the long summer of Buffy's death. Dawn, of course, never told Buffy that Spike had helped her, knowing that it would just get him staked or, at the very least, beaten down so hard he'd never go near Dawn again. But the secret was doubly hard on her because she never told Spike the consequences of the spell, never told him that she had in fact done it and it had worked, but that she'd cancelled it. When he saw her the next day, anxious to know if Joyce was back among the living, she only said that it fizzled out because she couldn't really do magic well enough. He'd complained about taking a lick from the Ghora to help her, but said that maybe in the end it was best that she not get involved in magic.

To bring that up again here, now, told her that the secret was very large and dangerous. And she truly hesitated before answering, thinking about consequences and how much extra stress she could really take on besides working under Anya to pay off what she'd stolen. But Spike was her best male friend, almost her brother--there was no way he'd put her under some danger. So the danger must be all on his end; and that she could handle. She met his eyes and said, "Okay. I swear not to tell anyone."

He nodded once at the statement and crossed the room to his refrigerator. There was a small flash of blue when he opened it, then Dawn recognized his normal packets of pig's blood. She briefly wondered if, now that he was rich, he could afford human blood. And what that would mean.

"This won't involve blood, will it?" Dawn asked.

"No. I just hid it in here because I knew no one would go poking around my bloodpacks." When Spike turned around he held a glossy-covered paperback in his hand, the predominant colors a dark gray and blood red. "This is my book, Nibblet. Early author's copy. I wanted you to see it before anyone else and tell me your thoughts. It won't come out for another month, so I had plenty of time to bring it over. But seeing as you're here . . ." He returned to his chair and passed it to her.

The cover was dominated by half a girl's face that ran the length of the spine side. She was a pretty blonde with sea-green eyes and looked innocent and determined at the same time. The small picture to the right of the face showed the same blonde girl in a black tanktop and red pants, clutching a stake in one hand while she kicked a fanged man in the chest. They were in a cemetery, and there were three other vampires (obviously) menacing her. The blurb at the top said in large letters: BECKY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER. In somewhat smaller letters just under that was the subtitle: BOOK ONE: Welcome To The Hellpit. In letters even smaller, at the bottom right of the cover, it said WILLIAM T. BLOODY.

Dawn looked up at him in pure shock. "Oh. My. God," she said. "You wrote a book about Buffy? You didn't write a book about Buffy! You wrote about Buffy?"

Spike nodded. "I started it last summer. At first it was . . . an homage. Because it seemed like the world had forgotten about her and didn't appreciate what she'd gone through. When she came back, though, it seemed like a good way to make a buck. And I think it's still good that the world knows what the Slayer goes through to keep it all running."

"But-- but-- She'll kill you!" Dawn shouted.

"Will you at least look at it before deciding I should die?"

"It won't be my decision," she grumbled, looking at the fat paperback in her hands. She took a peek at the last page number--400 pages, a good size--but was afraid to really open it. "You probably make Angel look like a dork! And Xander--Oh man, what did you do to Xander in here?"

There was only so much even a calmer Spike could take. He growled at her and gave her a flash of yellow in his eyes. "What does it bloody well take for you Summers girls to get an ounce of TRUST?" he said, punctuating the last word with a fist hitting the table. "Will you bloody well read part of it before sentencing me?!"

So Dawn opened the book. There was a brief prologue about who the Slayer was, how she came from a millennia-old tradition older than civilization, and how it was her job alone to kill the vampires and demons that plagued the world. Dawn had known this for years, of course, but it was the first time she'd ever seen it in print. And knowing that books just like this were going to appear all over the country--the whole concept scared her. Fearing the worst, she flipped a few pages into Chapter 1 and read:

Merely a sophomore in high school, Becky had little idea what she wanted in life. All she was sure of was what she didn't want: vampires. The whole world of darkness, in fact. She knew very well that the sunshine world that most people took for granted was just a surface gloss on the stronger, more dangerous reality that had entered her life only a year before. But just because she knew it was there didn't mean that she had to give it her attention. And she definitely didn't have to be the Slayer. Let someone else take the reins, stalk through cemeteries at night, and guarantee themselves a shorter lifespan. Becky was going to break free and have a life, have a husband, children, the house in the suburbs with the white picket fence: the whole deal. And ironically, it was her strength as the Slayer that fueled her ambition to get this.

Dawn looked up at Spike after reading this. It was the kind of thing Buffy had said for years, but she wondered how he knew how Buffy felt on her first day at Sunnydale High. She flipped forward in the book and started reading another passage.

They sat on one of the stone benches in the school's open courtyard. Rowan turned to Becky and said, "I don't know why you'd want to spend time with me. I warn you now, your popularity quotient is going to plummet just being seen with me."

"It's a risk I'm willing to take," Becky said, putting a reassuring hand on Rowan's shoulder. A year before she might have asked herself why she would dare lose any popularity, especially in a brand new school. But she'd fought more than a few battles and killed personal demons as well as the literal ones. The 'defend the defenseless' part of her heritage cried out to this pretty redhead, and she refused to give up on her. "Besides, who wouldn't want to be your friend? You have a lot going for you! You're smart, pretty, funny. And I can tell right away that you have a good heart."
Rowan blushed and ducked her head. "I've just never really been Confidence Girl."

"Rowan," Becky said, and the redhead looked up to see a firm, frowning, determined expression on Becky's face. "This is my resolve face," Becky said.
"I use it in battle . . . uh, when battling with my fears, y'know." She put her fingers on her temples and then moved them to the same spots on Rowan's face. "I do hereby give it to you."

Rowan was floored by the symbolic gesture. "I can have your resolve face?" she squeaked. "But you're such a strong person. I couldn't handle it."
Becky took her hands. "Of course you can. You have that strength in you, if you'd just use it."

"Hey hey, a tender moment!" some guy called. Both girls looked up to a grinning, open, honest face.

"Pax!" Rowan squealed, and pulled him closer to them. "Becky, this is Paxton Morris, my best friend since kindergarten."

"Everyone calls me Pax," he said lightly. "And didn't I meet you in the hallway?"

"Uh, yeah. I guess," Becky said, suddenly shy. He was a cute enough guy, but she wasn't sure how close he and Rowan were and wasn't about to make any move without better information.

"Pax means 'peace' in Latin," Rowan said.

"I was wondering when you'd get around to that," said another guy, joining the threesome.

"Jimmy!" Rowan said, shooting off the bench and hugging him. "I haven't seen you all day."

The new young man smilingly disengaged himself from his friend and threw a playful fist at Pax's shoulder. "Funny, I've been seeing Pax here all day long. Guess we two don't rate the accelerated courses you're taking."

"Aww, don't think like that!" the redhead told him, taking her seat by Becky again.

Becky was amazed and delighted to see how Rowan lit up when the two boys came. The shell that so far had hidden her heart was completely removed around them, and the Slayer felt herself warming to this bright, sparkling personality that was Rowan even more. Look what can happen when you treat people with decency, she thought. The two young men now stood before the girls like knights-in-waiting. "I'm Jimmy, by the way," the brunette boy said, introducing himself to Becky. "We've known each other forever, and I'm the Aramis part of this little Three Musketeers company."

"So I'm Porthos?" Rowan said, the only one among the four to have actually read the book. "Thanks a lot!"

"I'm Becky Winters," the blonde said to Jimmy, getting some clearer signals from Rowan about his availability.

Pax cleared his throat, looking into Becky's eyes. "Uh, as I said. You bumped into me in the hallway. And I believe you dropped your, uh, pointy wood." He held one of Becky's hand-carved stakes out to her.

She flushed in embarrassment and grabbed the stake, fumbling to get it back into her purse.

Jimmy leaned in close to Pax's ear and whispered, "Dude, I saw you in the hallway. She wasn't the one with wood, y'know?"

Pax pushed his friend away, smiling, and turned his attention back to Becky. "So why--?" he began.

"Oh. My. God," said Regan Chambers, approaching them out of nowhere. "Becky, what the hell are you doing HERE? Are you trying to commit social suicide?" Her eyes slid sideways to look down on the redhead. "Ooh. Rowan Cohen, not worth knowin'," she rhymed.

Rowan was immediately hurt at the familiar line and looked to Becky, whose eyes sparkled with hostility toward the interloper. But she knew that it was her place to fight this battle, not Becky's. Rowan mentally slipped on her resolve face and turned to Regan with anger for the first time in her life. "You've been saying that since the fifth grade," Rowan said. "Isn't it time for some new material?"

"Yeah," Pax fairly growled at Regan through clenched teeth. "Don't you have a little girl to terrorize on a yellow brick road? I'm sure the flying monkeys miss you."

"Regan," Jimmy said, pushing Pax out of the way and already stumbling over his own feet at the sight of this girl. "You don't have to listen to this stuff. Why don't I escort you to your locker?"

The beautiful girl snorted. "Right. As if I'd let you breathe my air," she said. "Becky, I was going to invite you to go with us to The Forge tonight, but if you're gonna spend your free time hanging with these losers then I don't see why I bothered."

"Free time?" Rowan said. "We were just getting ready to go to class."

"Duh!" Regan said. "We've all been let out because of the dead kid they just found in the locker room."

Alarmed, Becky leaned toward Rowan and said, "Gotta go. See ya later. How about at The Forge?" Rowan quickly nodded her head, and Becky was off to investigate the death in the school.

"Ah, the first corpse of Autumn," she heard Jimmy quip as she left them. "Sure sign that school really has started again."

Dawn giggled. "What, what?" Spike said, very much the nervous author.

"That 'first corpse of Autumn' thing," she said. "They still say that at my school."

"Ah, I see," Spike said. If it were possible for him to sweat he would have filled a bucket by now. As it was he was dangerously close to letting his demon free for a bit. Sitting here while his work was read was really the most nerve-wracking thing he'd done since being tortured by Glory. Note to self, he thought. Next time give the book over and run.

Dawn closed the book on her finger. "This is really good, you know. It's so . . . them! It's like you were standing behind them when they first met. How'd you do it?"

"Well, I hear stories, Bit. I listen. You'd be surprised how many points of view I get from all sorts of people telling the same tale. The stuff that Giles and the Scoobies and the Slayer haven't told me, I heard from Angelus when I was stuck in that wheelchair. He loved to blab the secrets of the Summers household. And of course, Dru told me things that nobody else could know, seeing as she could dip into minds." Not to mention that he had thoroughly read Buffy's diary back in the days when his obsession with her first started. But it was best not to tell Dawn that. He'd even had conversations with Harris' parents when they'd come down to do laundry and he was staying in their basement. He'd charmed the mom and gotten the dad drunk straight off. It had given him a much clearer understanding of Xander--but it was best that NO ONE knew that.

Dawn looked back at the book, then at him. "That Regan girl is Cordelia, right? Why'd you call her Regan?"

"Well, Lear only had three daughters. What'd you want me to call her, Goneril?"

"Ew, no!"

"Well then."

Dawn shook her head. "It looks like you're making them look okay."

"Keep reading. You'll see that I don't do any of 'em real harm."

Nodding, Dawn opened the book up again near the middle.

The strange man was out by the tree again, the one that looked up on Becky's window. Hope wondered if "Slayer senses" could detect creepy stalker guys. But then those senses were things Becky was just starting to learn how to use, or so Jeeves said. She was a lot better at punching than sensing. Of course, she always had been.

It was time to be a hero like big sis. Sure, it was dark, and she knew for a fact that there were scary things that moved around in the nights in Sunnyvale. But Becky couldn't be everywhere--somehow, sometime, she'd have to learn to stand up for herself. So far she'd only dared to step onto the back porch in the evenings, but now she felt strong enough to venture further. She took one tentative step off the wooden step, letting her bare foot touch the cool grass, then brought the other foot down to match it. She still held the banister, though.

Hope released the banister and took three courageous steps toward the tree before the tall dark shape turned to her and said, "Hello."

She squealed and scrambled back to the safety of the porch. She hoped her mom didn't hear her, and even more strongly hoped that Becky didn't hear. She sat on the porch and hugged the banister, staring hard at the man in the shadows.

"I didn't mean to frighten you," he said. "I mean you no harm." She heard a strong Latino accent in his words. Duh, Hopie, welcome to Southern
California, she thought. Or should he call you Esperanza?

"Could I--?" He seemed hesitant, then stepped out of the shadows and into the yellow light cast by the streetlights. He was very tall and dressed all in black. His black hair was sculpted and immaculate, and he had a neatly-trimmed goatee that fit the long lines of his face perfectly. "Could I join you over there? Con permisso?"

"You can't come onto our porch," the defiant little girl said.

"Wouldn't dream of it," the man said with a winning smile. He stepped closer to the porch and looked down at Hope. Only if she stood on the porch's railing would she be able to look him in the eye. From this distance, and in the porch's light, she could see that he was incredibly handsome. His olive complexion perfectly suited the dark colors he wore, and his chocolate-brown eyes sparkled with intellect and wit.

"I really do not mean you any harm," he said. "I'm only here to make sure that the Slayer is safe."

Hope's eyes widened. "You know Becky's the Slayer?" she asked.

He nodded. "I'm a friend of Becky's," he answered. "My name is Deo."

"Day-o," Hope pronounced. "Are you her boyfriend?"

She caught a flash of panic and hope that crossed his face before he resumed the good humor he'd worn before. "No, no, nothing like that. It's just that your sister has a lot of enemies. And she can't be everywhere at once. So I'm sort-of guarding her back, making sure that she's safe while she sleeps. And hopefully protecting her family while she's patroling."

"I'm ten," Hope said. "I don't need protecting, even on the Heckpit. I can take care of myself."

Deo hunched down until their eyes were level. "And I'm twenty times your age. But even I need friends to help me, to guard my back. No one should go through this world alone, especially not in a place like the Hellpit."

"I thought you were Becky's friend."

"I could be yours, too. That is, if you don't have too many already."

She smiled at that. "Silly. Who can have too many friends?"

He smiled back at her under the buzzing porch light. "A philosophy I agree with completely."

Dawn quietly closed the book. Spike's head shot up, his eyes wide. "What? What is it?"

Dawn looked up, once again very solemn. "I just read the scene where I first met Angel, out on the porch."

Spike nodded. "Yes. And?"

"And I wasn't really there," she said. "That didn't happen. I still haven't ACTUALLY met Angel, I just have memories of us. He'd left and the Initiative had already been destroyed and you had that chip in your head, all before I even appeared. But you put me in there anyway."

Spike was suddenly cast out of his nervousness by Dawn's attitude. He leaned forward and put a hand on her knee. "Of course I did, Bit. This whole book is built from memories. If they're not real then that doesn't make them any less powerful. In our private history--the personal story that's running through our heads--you are very much a part of all those events. And you bring an extra measure of happiness to what happened, even when times were at their worst. It would have been criminal to leave you out."

Dawn was silent for a good two minutes before she choked out, "Thank you."

"No problem." He let the silence stretch and then said, "Mind you, you won't do much in the books 'til you're much older. Except be kidnapped, and rescued by yours truly." She looked up again with a bit more humor.

She even chuckled. "I'd forgotten that I used to call it the Heckmouth."

"Cutest thing I ever heard."

"And Jeeves?" she said. "If Buffy doesn't kill you, Giles will do it for that."

"Nonsense. He's a P.G. Wodehouse fan, he'll get the joke."

"So Angel is Latino?" she said with a smirk.

He smirked back at her. "Spanish, actually. 'The Second Torquemada.' I'm still enough of an Englishman to know that I can't write an Irish accent and I won't even try."

"And what's up with naming me Hope?"

"Four letters. Easy to turn it into 'Esperanza,' a nickname that Deo will have for you. Plus, it's just as precious and twee as 'Dawn.'"

She stuck her tongue out at him. "So if Angel without his soul is Angelus, what's Deo?"

Spike took the book from her, flipped through it expertly to a certain section, and pointed with this thumb to a page just past the middle. "Here, read this. It's where the reader discovers that Deo's a vampire."

Darcy lingered behind Deo's back, letting her hand dance along his shoulders, knowing the effect she was having on him and knowing even more just how much he hated each delicious contact she made with his skin. "What would she say, your little cheerleader heroine?" she purred into his ear. "What would she say if she knew the truth?"

"She won't find out," Deo growled back, looking straight forward, careful to avoid her gaze. He was stronger than he'd been in a long time, stronger than even she knew. But only two years before he'd been feeding off rats in alleys and looking for the quickest, cheapest way to die, while she had spent the last century practicing the arts of seduction.

"You haven't even kissed her yet, have you?" Darcy asked. "My my, the first time she touches those cold lips, she's bound to know."

"I have plenty of blood," he responded. "I keep myself warm."

"I'll tell her myself," she said brightly.

"And I'll stake you," Deo promised. "Count on it."

"Stake your own sire?" Her laughter was sparkling. "Having a soul has perverted you in practically every way, Diablo, but even you haven't sunk
that far. Your precious 'nobility' wouldn't permit such an affront."

"I'm not Diablo!" he shouted, standing and shrugging her hand off his shoulder. His human visage slipped off like a loose glove, revealing the demon within. He glared at her through yellow eyes and bared his fangs. "I left that behind long ago! I'm Deo now, with a soul and a purpose! And if you harm that mission you'll be just another pile of dust that I'll step over!"

There wasn't a hint of fear in Darcy's eyes. "Tell it to someone who gives a damn," she growled, letting her own demonic features slide into place.
"Fact is, your little Slayer is going down. The Harvest will happen. The Master will rise. And YOU'RE the one who'll wind up dusty if you get in our way."

Dawn was laughing enough to hold her stomach. "Diablo!" she squealed when she could speak again. "Oh, that's just perfect!"

Spike didn't look happy. "I wasn't trying to insult him, I swear," he said. "I just needed some name that would fit with 'Angel' without actually saying 'Angel.'"

"Well, I think it's fine. Gah, Spike, you're really being a lot more fair than I thought you'd be. Wait, wait, let me read the end," she said, opening it to the last page.

In the silent aftermath they all stood looking around the now-empty Forge, appreciating that they had won but also knowing what they had lost. In one corner stood the ashes of Jimmy, who Pax himself had been forced to kill. He'd kept Jeeves' words in his mind as he held the stake to what had once been his best friend: "You're not looking at your friend; you're looking at the thing that killed him." He had to hold onto these words, keep repeating them in his head, or he felt he just might go crazy. God, his life had been one twisted roller coaster since school started, since the day he met Becky Winters. Barely two months from that day and everything he ever knew had changed. He met a girl who was different like him, who was special and beautiful and seemed to really care for him. Then she turned out to be some long-dead Incan mummy who sucked the life out of his classmates and almost did the same to him. And now he'd killed his friend Jimmy, the guy who was going to be best man at his wedding some day, the guy who'd sit with him on the couch and watch football on Sunday afternoons when they both had kids running around and wives to keep them away from the remote control. The guy who was supposed to be around forever. But forever didn't mean much these days, did it?

Deo looked at a similar pile of ashes. Darcy, his sire, the woman who'd taken a drunken rent-boy from the streets of Madrid and turned him into the Scourge of Europe, the Second Torquemada. He could find much to blame her for, and it would be tempting to lay the burden of his many sins at her feet and find some joy in his soul. But that was just a foolish fantasy, an easy escape. She'd only given him the power to change lives, and while he regretted what he'd done with that power for more than a century, he had to appreciate that now he still had the ability to right those wrongs, to make the world a better place. She'd given him all of that, the bad and the good, the disease and the promise. What tortured him most was that his greatest regret about her death was that she was no longer here to tell him where The Master was hiding.

Becky sat exhaustedly on the stage. Killing Luke had been easy compared to the dozens of other vampires she'd had to kill just to get to him. And like Pax, one phrase kept repeating through her head. It was something her first Watcher, Merrick, had told her on that day more than a year in the past, that day when she found out that she was the Slayer and killed her first vampire. "You see what power you have? You see what you can do?" But she hadn't really seen it then, and after burning down the gym of her old school she still didn't accept the consequences of who she was. But her two months on the Hellpit had finally taught her to accept it. She was the Slayer. It wasn't a temporary gig, it wasn't something she could quit because she didn't like it, and there would always be a need for her power to put down Evil and save the world. Because now she'd done it--literally saved the world and stopped The Master from turning Sunnyvale into a vampire feeding park. It felt good. And speaking of that--

"Deo," she said, reaching out her hand to him. The dark vampire shook himself free of his brooding and looked up at her, smiling when their eyes locked. He stepped over to Becky and took her hand, then cupped her face with his other hand and kissed her, long and deep.

Standing to the side, Rowan watched her with clear envy. She'd found love this year, too, just like Pax. So what if Malcolm had been just an Internet crush--the things he'd written and the way he made her feel were real, and that was enough for her. Okay, so he'd turned out to actually be a demon named Moloch and tried to kill her friends as well as take over the world. No one was perfect. Even if the whole experience had crashed and burned, she still treasured the memory of being cared for and having someone tell her she was special and loved. Though she still held out hope that someday Pax would see what he had standing right in front of him.

At that moment, however, Pax was looking at Jeeves. A vampire had knocked the Watcher unconscious early in the battle, but now Jenny Kalendros had finally shaken him awake. They were both so relieved to see that they'd survived that they began kissing feverishly, and were still doing so by the bar. Pax stepped over to Rowan and elbowed her, catching her attention. He pointed to Jeeves and visibly shuddered.
Rowan looked, nodded sadly, and then pointed to Becky, who by now was into some serious tongue wrestling with Deo. Pax looked and felt nauseous. Sickening, he thought. Just sickening. What the hell does she see in that guy, anyway? Give me 200+ years and I could look just as tall and handsome.

"Well, I guess they're all getting their happy endings," Rowan said. "Except you and me, of course. We're doomed to be alone."

"Isn't that kinda how we thought we'd be even before the vampires entered our lives?" Pax asked.

"Yeah, but at least we had each other."

Pax reached out and hugged his friend to him. "We still do," he said, trying desperately to keep tears out of his voice.

"I miss Jimmy already," she said into his chest.

"Me too." They then fell into an easy silence, just holding each other and rocking, two old friends with no one else to hold. Pax, his head on top of

Rowan's, looked from Jeeves and Jenny at one end of the club to Becky and Deo at the other end. "I guess you're right," he said. "Those two couples are destined to be together forever."

"Ooh, what a tease!" Dawn shouted. "You know damn well that they're both going to be heartbroken!"

"It's what makes for good storytelling," Spike argued. "Why do you think I'm so addicted to Passions? They do stuff like that all the time. Besides, they're all going to be fine until the fourth book. I'm thinking of the big picture here--I have a whole series to write, Bit. And you also know too well that Pax and Rowan aren't really 'doomed to be alone,' don't you?"

"Yeah, I guess so," said Dawn. "But I thought The Harvest happened on Buffy's first week at school."

"So I messed with time a little; it's no big deal. Xander and Willow also didn't find love before The Harvest, I'll tell you that, but it worked for the story. I needed a big crisis to end this book, just like The Master rising and killing Becky will be the denouement for the second one. Look on the back, it says it there."

She turned the book over to see the short synopsis of the story on the back cover and found a bright splash of color around the words: "Look for BOOK TWO: The Master Shall Rise, coming in Christmas 2002." "Hey," she said, "the next book's coming out awful soon."

"The publishers don't think so," he said. "The first one'll come out on Glory Day, and they think it'll be snapped up. Then when the second one comes out they re-issue the first and really clean up on Christmas sales. Or something. I'm not really sure how it works, and I don't much care as long as I get paid."

"Glory Day? When's that?"

"Y'know, in a month. When--" He stopped, suddenly realizing who he was talking to.

Dawn's eyes widened as she realized. "Oh my God, you're right. It'll be exactly a year to the day that Buffy died."

"Wrong!" he said, pointing his index finger. "It's the day Glory died. That's how I'll remember it, anyway. And I hope to hell that none of you will be thinking of an anniversary surrounding Buffy's death."

"Of-- of course not. We just--" Dawn stopped and gulped. "To be honest, none of us have been thinking about it. We've just had so much else going on, y'know."

"Well I think about it," Spike growled. "I've counted every bloody day that she's been back with us--that's 334--and I mark each one as a blessing. Maybe you lot have forgotten what we went through without her but I bloody well haven't."

Wanting desperately to change the subject, Dawn held up the book. "Spike, you have to let me take this. I'll die if I don't read it!"

He still didn't look happy, but his mood lessened as Dawn turned her puppy dog eyes on him at full power. "Please please please please please," she begged.

He had to smirk at her. "Okay, Bit. But make sure you hide it as well as you hid your ill-gotten gains, 'kay?"

The teenager stood up and put the book into her backpack, already exasperated. "Gah, that was, like, months ago! Don't you people ever forget a mistake?" she whined, walking out the door.

 

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