Title: Daddy (Part One - Book Four - The Evil Within)

Author: Nimue

Rating: PG -13

Pairing Buffy/Spike. Most major characters included.

Feedback: Yes, please

Disclaimer: All characters belong to Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, UPN, Fox... Just Borrowing. (with, of course, the exception of Emma, who belongs to Buffy and Spike)

Summary: First chapter of the Fourth Book. Book One - Twist. Book Two - A New Life. Book Three - The Peacemaker Prophesy. If you haven't read them, you might get lost. In Book Four, Spike and Buffy are charged with protecting their daughter from being harmed by one among them. But who? When? The new threat is something that they never expected nor are they ready to do what they may have to do to defend Emma.



Daddy



"Daddy! Daddy! Daddy! Daddy! Daddddeeeeeeeee!" A chirping, little voice sang from the room next door. Spike opened one eye, staring at the red glow of the alarm clock. Four thirty-two AM. They had been in bed for exactly three hours and asleep for precisely twenty-seven minutes.

"Daddy! Daddy! Daddddeeee!" The voice came again like a wave crashing into his skull. Spike groaned. Buffy chuckled.

"Oh, so you're awake?" Spike murmured, nudging her calf with his bare foot.

"Umhum," Buffy sighed, smiling and stretching like a cat.

"So why don't you go fetch Emma and bring her in with us?" Spike grumbled.

"Because she's not calling me," Buffy answered, smiling. The two-year-old had a pretty good vocabulary, which did indeed include 'mummy', but she tailored her words and her pitch for her intended target. This was most definitely a Spike mission.

"She's just calling, Pet. Doesn't matter who..." Spike mumbled, pulling the pillow over his ears. Buffy tugged the cushion from his head as another chorus of "Daddy!" rang from the baby's room.

"*I'm* not the one who spent three hours teaching her to say it," Buffy

retorted. "So, go, Big Bad Daddy." She chuckled evilly, planting her foot just above his perfect backside and scooting him out of the bed.

"Alright, girl," he growled at his beloved, one foot hitting the floor.

"Daddy! Daddy! Daddy! *Help! *"

It was barely a split second between the time Spike's other foot hit the

floor until he had the sheet wrapped around his waist and was in Emma's

doorway. Buffy was behind in a flash, the comforter tucked around her chest like a towel. Emma stood in the crib, hanging onto the railing and giggling madly. Three of the fairies still stood sentry over the tow headed two-year-old, but other than a horrible case of insomnia, she looked right as rain.

"Emma?" Spike asked, stepping tentatively toward the crib, one eyebrow

raised as he approached.

"Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!" The baby sang, holding her arms out. Spike lifted her up, pulling the little girl against him. Buffy walked over next to them, trying not to trip over the trailing end of a queen-sized comforter.

"Emma, you alright?" Spike said, brushing white blonde ringlets gently off her pretty face.

"Emma," the girl repeated, smiling. "Daddy."

Buffy inspected her, furrowing her brow. "Seems OK," Buffy said, shrugging at Spike. "Emma, baby, where did you learn 'help'?"

"Help! Help! Help!" She chirped like a baby sparrow, then burst into

giggles.

"Where'd you learn that one, Mite?" Spike asked. Neither of them was ever sure how much she understood. She was two and timeless. A toddler and a Prophesy. Never could tell.

"Dawnie!" The little girl giggled as Dawn appeared in the doorway.

"Nib-bit". Buffy caught her daughter's giggles and Spike smirked at the lot of them. The little girl was like a parrot. Have to watch what I say in the room next door, Spike thought.

"Dawn?" Buffy said, turning towards her sister and trying to maintain some composure. Dawn rubbed her eyes, yawning.

"What's going on? Em OK?"

"Did you happen to teach her how to say 'help'?" Buffy asked.

"Thought it was a good word to know around here," Dawn answered. "Better than 'Nib-bit'."

"Wait a bloody minute," Spike huffed. "You always..."

"*She* doesn't need to call me that," Dawn snapped.

"Enough!" Buffy interrupted, still chuckling and refereeing another round of Family Feud, Slayer style. "Dawn, not sure she's understanding the *when* here..."

"Sorry," Dawn conceded. "I meant well."

"I know," Buffy said, the giggles bubbling back to the surface for both her and the toddler. "Kinda funny...now."

"Scared me half to death!" Spike exclaimed melodramatically.

"You *are* half dead," Dawn baited, grinning.

"I should throttle you," Spike growled back. "Insult my parental skills and your pet name all in the course of a minute..."

"I *love* Niblet," Dawn sighed. "And maybe the whole 'help' thing was a

little not thought out."

"Right then," Spike agreed, trying to hide his own amusement.

"Can we go back to bed now?" Dawn was yawning almost continuously and her face was red from rubbing.

"You can. We have hyper baby to deal with," Buffy answered, stroking Emma's bare leg.

"Have fun. You know...school.. or I would help."

"Yeah, yeah," Buffy said. Emma reached forward from her perch in Spike's arms, grabbing hold of Buffy's hair and tugging.

"Ow!" The older Summers girl whined, nearly losing her grip on the

comforter.

"Eww. Are you guys naked?" Dawn whined.

"Out!" Spike ordered. Dawn giggled, bolting from the doorway.

"Shift work?" Buffy asked, looking up at Spike.

"Right," he answered. "But can we take her in with us? If we have to be sleep deprived, can we at least do it in our own bed?"

"I guess," Buffy sighed. "But no falling asleep and we are both going to have to think about the pajamas thing."

"Right."

*****

"Pulling an all-nighter?" Tara asked, rubbing her eyes and making her way into the dining room of the flat that she and Willow now shared. Willow was bent over the table, five empty diet coke cans lined in front of her like a tin wall.

"Have a big test tomorrow," Willow answered, yawning, her eyes drooping.

The caffeine had only served to give her the jitters. Her mind had fallen asleep about three hours prior.

"Usually you're much more... not last minute," Tara said, sitting down in a chair across from her, taking Willow's hands in hers.

"Been... distracted.. lately," Willow stuttered, yawning again.

"Med school?" Tara asked, looking at all of the MCAT manuals laying around the table, tucked under copies of Gray's Anatomy and Comparative Vertebrate Biology. "You know there's no rush. It'll still be there in the fall. No one will fault you if you don't get in on winter admissions," she continued, smiling serenely.

"I know," Willow replied softly. "But it's about time one of us could patch up all the ouchies. I can't do anything... magical... anymore to help."

"You help."

"Not enough."

Tara giggled. Willow looked at her curiously a moment, but was infected by the smile. "Wonder if UC Sunnydale's Med School offers Vampire Physiology."

"I think it's in the catalog, right after Demon Dentistry 101," Willow

joked. As soon as the giggles faded, that all too common uncomfortable

silence settled over them.

"There's more on your mind, isn't there?" Tara asked, cocking her head to the side and staring at her love. Willow looked at her with resignation.

"I know it sounds stupid... But I feel like something's ... wrong,"

"It's not stupid, baby," Tara said, brushing her red hair from her cheeks. "Do you know what?"

"No," Willow answered, her voice lowering in frustration. "Just feels... out of balance. Almost like everything is *too* good. So it can't be..."

"Real?"

"Real." Willow echoed.

"Is it...us?" Tara could no longer look at her. It had been a hard road getting back here. The thought that it was all for nothing was too hard. Instead, she stared at her clasped hands.

"No! No!" Willow answered, shock in her voice. "You're... perfect. I

just... I don't want to ever find out what it's like to lose you again. Not any of you. But especially not you."

"Is that what you think is going to happen?" Tara's eyes twinkled in the dim lamplight. Those eyes always mesmerized Willow.

"I don't know. I hope not. But I don't know," Willow answered, sullenly. She sighed, stretching, realizing that one more minute of anatomy might induce catatonia. "Go to bed?"

"Thought you'd never ask."

*****

"Anya, it's four am. What's with the vacuuming?" Xander huffed from

between two pillows.

"It is four thirty two and I can't sleep," she yelped over the roar of the Hoover.

"I have to get up in a hour and go to the site anyway. Can you hold off on the heavy cleaning just that long?"

The vacuum clicked off. The room was still dark. Anya had reasoned that she didn't want to disturb Xander with her insomnia, so better to leave the lights out. The vacuum? Well, that came after he didn't bother to wake up and realize that she was sleepless and scared. Scared. No clue why. But scared all the same.

"Thanks," Xander grunted, pulling the covers over his head.

"Xander?" Anya asked, jutting one leg out and crossing her arms.

"Wh...at?" he whined, tossing the covers back down.

"Xander? Do you love me?" Her voice was flat, toneless. But her eyes

crackled with emotion. Fear. Need. Desire. Xander paused a second,

spending the time it took to focus his sleepy eyes on her and not just blurt out the first thought that crept into his head.

"Of course I do," he answered, reaching his hand out to her. She grabbed hold as if clinging to a life preserver.

"Are you just saying that because of some upcoming world ending scenario?" she asked, kneeling on the bed next to him.

"No," he answered, looking at her curiously. "I'm saying it because I do. And nothing bad is going to happen." Anya shot a glance at him, reminding him of where they lived, who they associated with. "Well, nothing world ending," he corrected.

"How can you be so sure?" Anya asked, shifting nervously onto her heels. She felt worn down by unknown demons haunting her sleep.

"I can't," Xander answered. "Not really with the whole seeing the future show. But I know we've been through almost everything and made it. And I know I love you."

"Good," Anya answered, stretching out next to him, her right arm and leg

draped over his body. "You can go to bed now."

*****

Giles stood quietly in the entryway of Quentin's den. The house wasn't so much of a home but a museum. It felt barren. Musty. Devoid of life and human emotion. Staying here was almost insufferable after his recent life in Sunnydale. Constantly, it amazed Giles what Buffy had managed to do on her own. What Spike had managed to do. A sort of paternal pride flushed his cheeks when he thought of them. They had created, from the most unnatural circumstance, a life that was more normal, more pleasant, than any Giles had experienced in his days. Out of ashes, they had built a palace and ruled it wisely.

Simply put, he missed being part of that life.

Still, aligning himself with Quentin, at least for the time being, was what he needed to do to protect the very life that he had grown to love. There was no doubt that the Slayer and the Vampire could handle the demons of the Hellmouth, but this greater threat, the one that would kill their child, the one that stood before him, chatting on the telephone as if he were actually a feeling human being, would take every last one of them to defeat. It was not Quentin's, Draconius's, strength that concerned Giles, rather his complete lack of humanity. This man would turn a child inside out and wear her heart as a pendant for a moment of glory or power. That sort of evil was something of which Buffy could not conceive. And Spike, if he ever had the capacity to understand it, could no longer fathom its toll. His heart had grown too large to understand such atrocities.

"Rupert," Quentin said, setting the phone back in the cradle with a soft

click. "You said you had news of the Prophesy. I'm all ears. Sit," he

continued, gesturing at two over-stuffed chairs.

Giles had been working double time translating the text using Quentin's

information and reporting back to him, then using Spike's matrix and storing the information privately. He sent the true translation in coded bits to the one Watcher he had grown to trust. At least in matters pertaining to Quentin Travers.

"Yes," Giles responded, sitting down and unfolding a leather pouch full of musty papers. He pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose as he

shuffled through the pile.

"What did you discover?" Quentin asked, smiling a dry, cracked, smile. One devoid of any discernable emotion.

"It seems that the demon threat you had suspected should arise in the nights immediately preceding the Blood Moon. I believe that falls near Halloween."

"Odd time for demonic activity," Quentin replied, his hand placed pensively on his chin. Obviously a practiced maneuver, Giles thought.

"As well I thought," Giles continued. "From the description, the attack will arise in the form of a cross dimensional demon. However, the demon seems more interested in the One than the Peacemaker."

"What sort of demon?"

"Something along the lines of a Tarwali," Giles answered, showing a sketch to Quentin. "Venomous, however, the venom is not deadly. Creates a state of suspended animation."

"That seems a bit of a waste," Quentin replied, tapping his manicured

fingers on the arm of the chair. "Theories?"

"It is enormous and quite strong. His venom glands are numerous and near impossible to avoid. The suspended animation would have the added effect of being able to inactivate one of the halves of the One without transferring its essence into the other." The worry consumed Giles as he spoke. Although he knew the translation was false, he assumed Quentin would do something to distract Buffy and Spike from the threat. This, if anything, fit the bill.

"Quite a vile creature," Quentin commented, handing the sketch back to

Giles. Lenora did well in conjuring it, he thought.

"Terribly," Giles answered. "However, it is odd that this particular demon would enter this dimension in the first place. Their taste for humans, and for human culture, is minimal and they are purportedly quite intelligent."

For enough money or power, anything would be palatable, Quentin thought.

"I'm not sure," he responded. "I'm afraid I know little of them. But as you are so gifted in this area, oblige me and see what else you can

discover."

The wild goose chase continues, Giles thought. He nodded back at Quentin in response, sick to his stomach at the concept of amusing the creature before him in any manner.

"You *will* update me with any new information, will you not, Rupert?"

"Of course," Giles responded, standing. "Should we warn Buffy?"

"Absolutely. I'll send word straight away," Quentin responded with his

cracked grin. Again, Giles' stomach flipped just looking at him.

"Good, well, I'll be off," Giles replied quietly. "Please give Buffy my

regards." He knew Quentin had no intention of warning Buffy of anything. He could only hope that the dossier he had sent with both the true translation as well as the cover would make it to them in time.

Quentin studied his protégé for a moment, reading the concern in his eyes. The fear. "I'm sure she's fine, Rupert," he commented, still studying the ally he knew was his foe. For now, he thought to himself.

To be contd.

Title: The Dog (Part Two - The Evil Within)
Author: Nimue
Rating: PG -13
Pairing Buffy/Spike. Most major characters included.
Feedback: Yes, please
Disclaimer: All characters belong to Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, UPN, Fox... Just Borrowing. (with, of course, the exception of Emma, who belongs to Buffy and Spike)
Summary: Buffy trains for an unknown threat. Spike arrives and takes her mind off of her worries, but when they rejoin the gang, they realize that the concern is not Buffy's alone.


The Dog


Buffy pounded the punching bag in the training room of the Magic Box.
Something seemed off. Even if the little episode with Emma was a complete mistake, a Dawn induced misunderstanding, the timing was eerie. A little itch in the back of Buffy's mind was driving her mad for days. Sort of like the dreams she used to have, but without the aid of visuals.

Emma sat quietly in her playpen, seemingly conversing with her bunny and a small stuffed St. Bernard that Spike had brought back from somewhere for her. She loved anything he gave her. She loved him. Buffy knew that sooner or later she'd have to face facts. Emma was a serious daddy's girl. And Buffy would have to share Spike. Not something she had every really thought of before. In the past, that would have been a blessing. At this point, the thought kind of hurt.

Still, Emma was everything. So pretty and light and calm and sweet.
Really, the perfect baby. And she loves me too, Buffy thought, as she
tossed punches half heartedly at the leather bag, watching her daughter play out of the corner of her eye. I lucked out, she added mentally, as the little girl chattered at her pets in a made-up language. Or maybe it was a real language that Buffy just couldn't understand. Never could tell.

Maybe it was time to get her a real pet.

The strangest leaps of thought coursed through her head as she hit the bag. Punch after punch, breath after breath. All the while, the nagging seed of something yet to come burned in her mind. Something. Punch. Something. Punch.

Always something.

The door to the training room opened, allowing a hazy light to filter in
from the main room of the shop. Spike stepped through the door, setting two bags down on the bench. Slowly, he sauntered over to Buffy, his walk spelling out his motive. She watched that walk. The way his legs moved, his hips swaying with purpose, his arms swinging all too casually by his sides. Just the walk was sometimes enough to set off the little hum in her body that made her remember how this all started.

"Having a good spot of afternoon violence, Pet?" Spike asked, stopping just to the side of the bag.

"Training," she panted, going back to punching the bag. Emma had swung her head around and was watching them silently, grinning her sweetest smile.

"And is the bag a worthy opponent?" he taunted, placing one strong hand on the other side of the leather and stopping its momentum. The rain of jabs ended.

"Could be better."

"Shall we?" he asked, sliding off the short leather jacket he'd worn out and about, leaving him in a pair of blue jeans and a green button down. Colour definitely suited him.

"Think you can take me?" Buffy said, grinning evilly and planting her feet, her taped hands coming up to her face.

"You don't have a chance," he answered, matching her stance. Emma giggled. To her, this was play. Nothing about their dance was frightening. In Emma's brief experience in this world, this was like puppies scrapping in the yard.

Buffy threw a nasty left hook that nearly caught Spike in the jaw, his head reeling back, his eyes filling with glee. This girl is perfect, he thought, deflecting her next blow and tossing a spin kick at her hip. She jumped out of the way, launching a barrage of quick jabs. She likes to fight, she likes to shag, she's smarter than a whip and she's a great mum. Can't do much better than that, he thought as he caught her wrist and spun her until her back was pressed against his chest.

"Think I've caught you, Love," Spike purred in her ear. She sunk an elbow into his stomach and spun away, letting out a little victory giggle.

"Not on your life," she answered, hopping onto the pommel horse, crouching on its canvas surface. He came at her, her hands grabbing for her ankles. Buffy planted her hands on his shoulders and flipped herself over him. Spike spun, raising an eyebrow.

"Practicing?" he asked, launching into the air and spinning, catching her shoulder and pushing her to the side. She grunted, returning an equally perfect airborne kick.

"Practice makes perfect," she answered, ducking from a right hook and
tossing a left almost simultaneously. Spike avoided the punch and back
flipped over the mats to the wall.

"Looks like you've done your homework too," Buffy quipped.

"You know how I so love research," he answered, as she darted at him
throwing a high kick that would have landed on his shoulder had he not
grabbed her ankle and used her momentum to toss her on the mats. Before she could position her legs to launch him across the room, he dropped down on her, kneeling with a leg on either side of her hips, pinning her hands behind her head.

"You understand that I could toss you to the other wall with the flick of the hips, " Buffy taunted, bucking underneath him.

"I am sure you can find better uses for your hips," Spike purred, leaning down, his face as close to hers as it could be without touching her skin. Buffy felt her blood ignite, flooding her veins. It was passion, she thought. He fights with it. He loves with it. That is why it feels the same.

The thought was shattered as his lips brushed against hers like butterfly wings. Her eyes drifted shut and her mind was about as useful as her shaking legs. His tongue traced the outline of her lips and she could feel her heart race at twice the speed at which it had pounded during their sparring. He had passion for both, and he did both better than any man or monster she knew, but this was his element. Making her body sing.

Buffy nipped his lip as he settled against her, her mouth hungrily searching for his. Slowly, dreamily, he pulled away. "Ah, ah," he whispered, nodding to the other side of the room, hidden from view because of the mats piled behind them. "Don't think she needs to know bout the birds and bees quite yet, Love." Buffy shook her head to clear it and glanced over the pile behind her. Emma had gone back to occupying herself with the bunny and St. Bernard. Buffy's head fell back to the padding in frustration.

Spike leaned down and kissed her softly again. "I'll make it up to you
later," he whispered, his mouth brushing hers as he spoke. She nodded,
wanting to argue, but knowing that there wasn't anything to argue about.

"Promise?" she whispered breathlessly.

"Have I ever let you down?" he asked, brushing her hair from her face.

"No," she answered smiling up at him. That smile, he thought, that silly, innocent grin of hers had roughly the same effect on him that his kisses had on her. He sat up quickly, rocking back on his heels. She propped herself on her elbows, noticing the reaction. "Did I do something... wrong?" She asked, evilly, grabbing a belt loop on the front of his jeans and twisting it back and forth, her hands brushing against denim. She smiled that schoolgirl smile again, and he felt himself gasping for air. "Funny how power can just... shift," she whispered, still staring at him with her sparkling green eyes.

"Buffy, I..." he muttered. "We... Emma."

"I know," Buffy answered, her eyes, her slowly twirling hand, turning his brain into oatmeal. "It'll have to wait," she whispered, her coral lips pouting into a slow rolling grin.

The door to the training room opened slowly. Buffy's hand dropped casually to the mat. Spike's head turned so fast Buffy thought it might spin off.

"Buffy?" Dawn asked.

"Yeah," Buffy chirped, never taking her eyes off Spike.

"What are you doing?"

"We were training and we..." Spike muttered, the blood not flowing properly into his brain in order to produce coherent sentences.

"And I fell," Buffy saved. "You got a lot of homework?"

"Yeah," Dawn said. "Came to ask if it was OK if I skipped training today."

"Yeah. Yeah, Niblet," Spike muttered, trying to tear his gaze away from
Buffy and not managing to cast more than a split second glance at her.

"Do you think you could keep an eye on Emma while you study? Spike and I need to run a few errands," Buffy asked, watching the little glimmer of joy and impending relief take over his blue eyes.

"Sure. You going to get a puppy? You promised we could get one after
school started."

"We'll see," Buffy answered. "Maybe we'll consider the dog while we're
out," she said, grinning from the corner of her mouth and winking at Spike.

"Time to go, Pet," Spike nearly choked, un-tucking his button down and
hopping up, nearly dragging Buffy to her feet.

"How long will you be?" Dawn asked as they passed by her.

"Well come back at dinner time," Buffy said. "Bring you some good wholesome study food."

Spike stopped long enough to lean down and kiss Emma's forehead and bolted out the door, Buffy trailing behind.

*****

They barely made it to the street before Spike ducked into an alley, pulling her with him. She felt the cold brick against her back, then promptly forgot about it as his lips clashed against hers. She sank bonelessly into the wall.

"That was... not fair... in there..." he whispered between bruising kisses.

"All's fair in love and war," Buffy answered, pulling away enough to look up at him with eyes drunk with desire.

"Which is it then, Pet?" he asked, his mouth against her neck, his human teeth nipping a little path down her jugular.

"Tough call," she answered, her hands sliding under his shirt. He shuddered as her warm fingers slid up his abs and made slow, lazy circles on his chest.

"Yours to make," he commented, his fingers pulling the strap of her tank top to the side and kissing across her collarbone. She purred, her body beginning to move on autopilot.

"Crypt. Now. Decision. Later," she gasped, pushing him away and darting down the alley, Spike at her heels.

*****

"What time is it?" Buffy asked, rolling onto her side. It looked as if a cyclone had hit the upper level of the crypt. Their little home away from home. Spike lifted an almost boneless arm and grabbed her watch from the floor a few feet away, turning it in his palm and bringing it to his face as if it took all the effort in the world to move.

"Six twenty," he answered, letting his hand fall down across his bare
stomach.

"Where does time go?" Buffy asked, whimpering at some unknown muscle strain as she tried to prop herself on her elbow.

"Not sure, Love. But as long as it's well spent," Spike answered, pulling her down so her head rested on his shoulder.

"Was that love or war?" Buffy asked, chuckling, her fingers tracing a nip mark she'd left on his shoulder.

" I think we compromised and met somewhere in between," Spike responded, his aching body never so happy to be completely sore.

"We need to get back," she whispered, reluctantly. "Dawn's going to be
upset that we didn't get her a dog."

Spike thought about Buffy's remark in the training room. Then about the
last several hours. Then about the inappropriateness of commenting further. "Taken care of, Love," Spike said quietly.

"What?" Buffy asked, propping herself up to look down on his face.

"Those bags I brought into the training room?"

"You had a dog in a paper bag? Buffy asked, squinching her nose.

"No," he answered, drawing out the word. "Dog food. Bowls. All that
sodding nonsense. I made a few calls. Found one that would be good around the tot. Be here tomorrow."

"You did?" Her eyes blinked with a mixture of surprise and contentment.

"Where did you think I was all morning?" Spike asked.

"I don't know. Some manly Vampire mission," Buffy answered, chuckling at herself.

"Oh, quite," Spike said, lowering his voice an octave. "Grocery store.
Bank. Phone calls. Pet store. That shop you always stop and stare at the windows..."

"You went there? Why?"

"To stare in the windows," he said, raising an eyebrow.

"Did you buy me prezzies?" she giggled, bouncing next to him and
inadvertently rubbing against him in all the wrong and far too right ways. He put a hand on her shoulder to stop her from starting this whole afternoon over again.

"I suppose," he said, leaning up to kiss her, "you'll just have to wait and see."

"Are they at the Magic Box?" she said, hopping up and beginning to collect clothes, tossing his at him and putting hers back on as she found them.

"That all you're interested in, Pet?" he asked sitting up, still naked on the cold floor. He knew the answer, but asked anyway. She stopped, looking at him, wearing only her workout pants, her arms crossed over her chest.

"You know better," she answered, walking back over to him and sitting down on his lap. Her arms wrapped around his neck softly. "You should, at least."

"I do," he answered. " I love you, Buffy."

"Always?"

"Every day."

*****

It was seven fifteen when they strolled back into the Magic Box. It seemed that everyone had ended up there. Xander and Anya sat on stools by the counter, chatting about something very secretively. Seemed to do that a lot now a days. Willow's head was buried in her laptop, sitting next to Dawn at the table. Tara had a book open in front of her and Emma on her lap, letting the baby read it to her in a sing songy voice as if each page had only three to five words on it.

"If I'd a known, I woulda brought more to eat," Buffy said, walking to the table and handing Dawn a sub and a bottle of juice.

"Tuna?" Dawn asked.

"Yep."

"Yay!" the girl answered, ripping open the paper. Spike and Buffy sat
down, tearing into their own food as if they had not eaten in nearly a
century.

"How's the studying?" Buffy asked, downing a carton of milk and opening the next one. Spike watched her, awed at how someone so tiny could put away that much food in such a short time.

"Not bad. Paper due day after tomorrow."

"On?" Spike asked.

"19th century lit," she answered. Buffy chuckled and Spike kicked her under the table, knowing what went through her mind.

"Lived that, Niblet. Want me to give it a read before you turn it in?"

"Yeah," she answered. "Should be done with it by morning."

"Right then," Spike said. "Leave it on the counter and I'll look it over."

"Tutor now too?" Buffy asked, grinning.

"Yeah, Spike. Wanna take an anatomy test for me Monday?" Willow joked.

"You could write my abnormal psych dissertation," Tara contributed, smiling softly.

"Feeling ganged up on yet?" Buffy asked, as Spike sunk back into the chair.

"I'm being used for my brain. Now that's a new sensation," Spike shot back. Buffy glanced at him, a little shocked, then watched a smile break on his face. "The answer is no. One high school literature paper does not a patsy make."

"So, what's the plan for tonight?" Xander asked, coming over to the table.

"Patrol," Buffy answered, breaking open a bag of chips.

"Any big bad nasties we should be looking out for?" Willow asked. "I mean other than the blood flow to the spleen?"

"Dunno," Buffy said.

"What do you mean, Pet?" Spike said, leaning his elbows on the table and studying her face.

"I have this weird feeling."

"Been going on for about a week?" Spike asked, watching her face. He could feel that little nagging seed of doubt in his own mind as well.

"Yeah," Buffy answered. "Like something's out there. Or something's coming or.. something."

"Do you know what?" Tara asked, looking at Willow.

"No idea," Buffy answered.

"Something does feel... odd," Anya added. "Couldn't sleep last night. Woke up at four thirty and felt like there was something wrong."

"Weird," Willow commented, "Me too."

"That's when Emma woke up," Buffy said, looking over at her daughter who was decidedly droopy after being fed strained carrots and oatmeal by her aunt Tara.

"And when she screamed for help," Spike said quietly. "Niblet, did you
teach her that yesterday?"

"Nope," Dawn said, polishing off her sandwich. "Like a week or two ago."

Spike looked over at Emma, watching her pretty blue eyes blink more slowly by the minute. "Think we'll keep her with us tonight."

"Yeah," Buffy agreed. "We need to take her home. Anyone up for babysitting while we patrol?"

"Why don't we just move the whole study shindig to Casa de Summers, " Xander commented. Buffy looked at Spike, then up at Xander. "Or whatever it is now."

"Just don't leave her alone, alright?" Spike asked, picking the little girl up from Tara's lap and cradling her against his chest.

"Sure, Spike," Tara answered. "Never alone."

To be contd.

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