lit_gal | The Cost of Butterfly Kisses

The Cost of Butterfly Kisses, Part 30
Fandom/Pairing: BtVS, Spike/Xander
Rated: ADULT

Summary: As the action of season 7 starts, the changes in the team start to really show. I may be offline for a while... this is my laptop I have hooked up, and I have a new computer to try and get running. Yeah, I don't know how much fun that is going to be, but at least I will leave you with a tied up Spike ;)

(Chapter One... ) ( Chapter Two... ) ( Chapter Three... ) ( Chapter Four... ) ( Chapter Five ) ( Chapter Six ) ( Chapter 7 ) ( Chapter 8 ) ( Chapter Nine ) ( Chapter Ten ) ( Chapter Eleven ) ( Chapter Twelve ) ( Chapter Thirteen ) ( Chapter 14 . ) ( Chapter 15 ) ( Chapter 16 ) ( Chapter 17 ) ( Chapter 18 ) ( Chapter 19 ) ( Chapter 20 ) ( Chapter 21 ) ( Chapter 22 ) ( Chapter 23 ) ( Chapter 24 ) ( Chapter 25 ) ( Chapter 26 ) ( Chapter 27 ) ( Chapter 28 ) ( Chapter 29 )

Chapter 30

Xander knelt behind a half-built wall and watched as Buffy leaped over a scaffold and darted through a maze of reinforcing braces. The Turok-Han followed her much more slowly, but Buffy couldn't run forever. Buffy reached the end of the construction scaffolding and darted forward, dropping down into what would be the basement of the new library if the town didn't get sucked into hell in the next few months.

"Now!" Xander called. Standing up, he opened fire with a fully automatic weapon. The weapon shook so hard that the vibrations made his whole body ache as the bullets poured out. These were armor piercing bullets, and they tore through metal struts and the Turok-Han’s hide, but that didn’t seem to slow him much. Six gunners were all firing, and the monster fell back and looked around.

They may not be the brightest monsters in the world, but Xander had to give them points for sheer determination. The beast swung his head toward the south. Xander grabbed his bullhorn. "Cease fire. South rim, run like hell!"

There was a scramble as girls got out of the way, and for a second, Xander wasn't sure if the Turok-Han was going to chase them or not. He stood, his whole body numb from the vibrations of the machine gun and his hand on the bullhorn as he waited to see if he was going to have to call Buffy for help.

"Hey, stupid. I'm down here!" Buffy called. The beast swung around, and Xander could see hundreds of red streaks across its chest, each no more than a small wound. He felt a little like a mosquito trying to bring down a bull elephant. Hopefully they could give it malaria.

"Fall back!" Xander called through the bullhorn to get the potentials to keep their heads down, and then he opened fire again. The bullet casings fell like rain, pinging against the metal scaffolding where Xander had set up. The monster spread his arms and roared, which actually made him a way better target. This one was not getting into Mensa.

Without warning, it leaped forward and disappeared into the basement excavation. Xander checked his ammo, put the safety on, and slung the weapon over his back as he watched the fight below. The potentials appeared at the edges of the building site on three of the sides. Willow was on the south side, Tara on the north, and Xander looked up to check on the four girls he had taken under his wing on the west.

Tara was chanting, and Xander could feel something warm the air as the whole scaffold to the north started to glow.

"Okay, it's just you and me now," Buffy promised the Turok-Han. "Or should that be you and I? I was too busy killing things like you to really pay attention in school." She kicked it, and it barely even took a step back. Xander tensed up and wished he was down there with her. But some fights he just couldn't fight. He didn't have the strength to go one on one with Neander-vamp, and he'd just get in the way.

Buffy's quips quickly faded as they fought viciously. It slammed Buffy into a wall, and Buffy swung a pick ax she had grabbed from the ground. She caught it a glancing blow on the shoulder.

"If the heart thing doesn't work, eyes and legs are good alternatives," Xander coached the would-be slayers near him. "Spike claims that genitals are a good third alternative, but personally, I get the ookies trying to stab a guy in the family jewels. But hey, feel free to try it out," Xander said. Buffy went flying across the basement and crashed into a pallet of building materials.

"Are they all that hard to kill?" One of them asked quietly.

"Not usually," Xander said. He was starting to get a little uncomfortable at the amount of times Buffy was getting knocked on her ass. They needed another fighter. They needed Spike.

"That has to hurt," one of the girls said as Buffy took another flying dive into construction equipment. Xander clutched the scaffold and honestly prayed. If this thing took Buffy, they were all in serious trouble. None of these girls was ready to pick up the fight, even with slayer strength, and the First was too powerful to fight without a slayer. Besides, Xander wasn't all that sure another girl would get called, and he was really, really sure Faith wasn't going to show up and just offer to help out.

The Turok-Han reached out to grab Buffy, and she caught an arrow still sticking out of its chest from an earlier fight. Yanking it out, she stabbed the creature in the eye.

"Go Buffy!" Xander whooped. Buffy flew into a series of punches and kicks that forced the creature back. It finally stumbled and fell on a pile of cinderblock, and Buffy wrapped a length of barbed wire around its neck. One good twist and Buffy was alone in the ring with a big cloud of dust. Coughing, she backed away from it.

"See? Dust. Just like the rest of 'em. I don't know what's coming next, but I do know it's gonna be just like this. Hard. Painful. But in the end we'll win. Here endeth the lesson." Buffy looked pretty damn proud of herself, which was fair. She'd just kicked primeval's ass, but the Biblical language might be a little over the top.

"Go team Buffy!" Xander called before he started climbing down the scaffolding. Buffy was limping as she headed for the ladder out of the basement, but she wasn't beat up as much as she had been the first time she'd danced with the big and ugly.

"Are you okay?" Willow asked as she rushed to Buffy's side.

"Way better than the other guy," Buffy said. "Really, I'm fine," she hurried to add when Willow's face twisted with worry. "I got a harder workout cheering," she said, only now she sounded like she was full of shit, probably because she was.

"So, time to head for home!" Xander said to all the little slayers. Giles had made it sound like the slayer line was in danger of dying out, but Xander was starting to feel like there were way too many would-be slayers. He wondered exactly how many girls had the potential slayerness before the first started killing them all.

"Did you see him turn to dust?"

"Buffy was amazing."

"Oh man, if I got hit that hard, I would have just stayed down."

The baby-slayers headed for the house, happily chattering away. The good part was that they were going to scare away any vampires way before seeing them. Xander's nerves couldn't take any more monster hunting tonight.

"Are you okay?" Tara asked Buffy softly.

"A little banged around," Buffy admitted. "A lot less banged up than I would have been without help, so thanks for the backup.

"Hey, that's what we're here for, upping the back," Xander said with a smile. "Actually, that doesn't make as much sense when I say it out loud."

"And I'm very happy to have you around, not making sense," Buffy said with a smile. In an instant, alpha demonish Buffy was gone and his friend was back.

"And I'm happy to make no sense for you, milady," Xander agreed. Willow slipped her hand in Tara's as the four of them walked behind the troop of girls. Everyone had pretty much invaded his house at this point, and he kept expecting to find Willow moved into Tara's room, but so far, Tara had not been inviting, and Willow wasn't pushing. Xander could feel hope growing as he watched just how much their relationship had changed—he actually believed Willow wouldn't go all manipu-fun this time around.

"So, is it just me, or could we really use another front-line fighter?" Xander asked.

"Spike." Buffy said it without any emotion. Willow and Tara stayed quiet on the matter.

"We can't keep him chained up forever. We tried that once. It didn't work."

"It has been a while since he went all grrrrr on us," Willow said. "Which does not mean he can't start doing the grrrr the second the chains are off."

"I kind of need him to go all grrr, just on the bad guys," Buffy said. "I mean, I took the Turok-Han, but if that's the henchman, the big boss is going to be ass-kicking hard to kill."

"Can you kill evil?" Xander asked. The girls all looked at him like he'd just opened all the presents two days before Christmas. "Right. Of course we can. We can do anything," Xander quickly added loud enough that a couple of the baby-slayers at the back turned around to see what he was talking about.

"Tootin' right," Willow said firmly. She seemed to think for a while. "We could do some sort of monitoring spell."

"For evil? Wow, that's going to light up the town," Xander said.

"For Spike, to monitor Spike," Willow said with a dramatic roll of her eyes. Xander grinned because this was starting to feel just so damn normal. There wasn't a baddie in the world they couldn't take down when they were together.

"Something to let us know if he tapped his demonic energy," Tara agreed with a thoughtful tone. "Or maybe we could monitor him for music, watch for the signs that he was hearing music."

"You can do that?" Xander asked.

Tara gave him a knowing smile. "I can do a lot of things."

"That's actually a little scary," Xander said.

"It should be." Tara smiled at him and then started walking faster so that her and Willow headed for the pack of baby-slayers.

"Tara really can be scary," Buffy said softly.

"Uh-huh," Xander agreed. "Hopefully she'll let a little of that scary out if Willow starts going all—"

"Seriously, Xander, let it go," Buffy said.

"Right. See me let go?" Xander mimicked dropping something. "Hey, you do the Dawn-frustration, I do the rehashing the past."

"Less rehashing, more moving on."

"Got it," Xander agreed. She was right that Willow had been on the straight and narrow for a while. "So, you agree that we need Spike?"

Buffy sighed and for some time they walked in silence. More and more of the houses were showing signs of being abandoned. A lot of Xander's neighbors had a little demon blood, and more than one had whispered to him that the whole demon community had been warned—pick a side because the end was coming. "Giles is going to be majorly unhappy."

"You mean the guy who left us alone to handle things? The one who tried to claim he was doing it for our own good?"

Buffy frowned at him. "You're getting cranky in your old age."

"I always was. One word: Angel."

"Point taken." Buffy sighed as they walked down the dark street. The first of the baby-slayers hit the house and went pouring in, the house seeming to shimmer for a moment as they passed through the protective barrier. So far, either Tara's spell or the protective runes or the house ghost had kept the First out, but Xander suspected they weren't going to be that lucky forever. "So, we cut Spike loose, but only for short periods of time when we're with him. We can't risk having him go out on another killing spree."

"I think he'd appreciate any time out of that chair. He's been growling at potentials just to keep them from torturing him with teenage angst."

"Is that why they all came running down the stairs screaming the other day?"

"Yep," Xander agreed. "And personally, I’m kind of right there with Spike. If I hear one more story about the house in the Hamptons, you're going to be short one baby-slayer."

"That one is a little annoying, isn't she?"

"Hey, if Spike tries to eat her, I'm not even going to stop him," Xander said.

Buffy shoulder bumped him hard enough to push him off the sidewalk. "Well, you unlock Spike, and I'll tell Giles."

"Have fun with that," Xander said. Buffy didn't answer, but when they hit the front door, Buffy headed back toward the bedroom Giles was using. Xander was betting that Giles would claim any other bedroom right now because the family ghost was not an easy roomie, but Tara, Willow, Buffy, and Dawn had the four first basement bedrooms and Xander and Bonnie had moved into Spike's room just off the emergency exit. Well, that and it was the only room with a private bathroom. None of the potentials had figured that out yet. They all shared the two huge dorm-style rooms and single bathroom that had once housed the clan children.

Xander smiled at Spike who was still chained to his chair. "So, it sounds like you lot did well," Spike said. His face was tight, and if Xander had to guess, he would guess that Spike hated getting sidelined during the fighting.

"Yep." Xander walked to the weapons chest and put his machine gun inside. "So, where are the potentials?" Usually after going out, they demolished the kitchen.

"Willow chased the kiddies downstairs; she made it seem like something was going on." Spike was watching carefully while Xander fished the key out of the weapon's cabinet.

"Yep, you're getting sprung," Xander told Spike.

"In the history of bad ideas, this stands out as an exemplary example of poor judgment," Giles said as he came out of the back bedroom with Buffy right behind him. Ignoring him, Xander unlocked the chains that held Spike.

"Well, yeah, but we need more firepower, and Spike is very fiery."

"Poor word choice there, considering I'm a vampire," Spike said. "And as much as I truly loathe agreeing with Rupert, I'm not sure this is a good idea, pet."

Buffy shook her head. "Hey, you've been sane for a week now. Besides, you're not getting out of fighting that easily," she teased. Willow and Tara are going to use the spell to tell us if someone is sending you a music o'gram in your head, but I need a good fighter at my side."

"And as one of the not-good fighters, I second Buffy," Xander added. He'd hated watching Buffy get the snot knocked out of her, even if it had given him a chance to use some of his newly-purchased toys. If he was going to be honest with himself, it had pretty much terrified him how much it took to kill the vamp that time forgot. Luckily, he wasn't feeling like being honest with himself, so he just shoved all those feelings to one side.

"The potentials aren't helping?" Spike asked.

"They're doing their best," Buffy said. Xander was pretty sure that meant they were about as effective as a horsefly going after a buffalo. "When Giles rewrites the Council books, he can say that a good beheading works for a Turok-Han. It just helps to have a few hundred bullets in the thing to slow it down first."

"I find a few hundred bullets helps with almost anything," Xander agreed. "Well, anything that actually has a butt to kick. I'm getting annoyed with the First's whole non-corporeal gig."

"We'll find a way to stop it," Willow said with her best resolve face.

"I question the wisdom of freeing Spike," Giles said. Xander tried to not smirk when everyone just ignored him. Spike was family. Embarrassing family, but family.

Giles sighed. "I just don't understand why this thing is attacking now." Giles set his glasses on top of the two books that had dominated the kitchen table for days now. They were the only two books that Giles had rescued from the Council, which meant they were the only documents anyone knew of that referenced the First, and so far, they'd been pretty much "omnipotent" this and "omniscient" that. Not cheerful reading.

Xander took the last chain off, and Spike stood up and stretched his head first one way and then the other. Even standing in the middle of a house full of potential slayers, he still looked like the predator in the middle of a whole lot of sheep. Spike stopped and turned to look down at Xander with a raised eyebrow. Clearing his throat, Xander stood up. "So, nearly-fearless leader, what's next?" he asked Buffy.

"I wish I knew," Buffy said. "Any luck, Giles?"

"None," Giles said. He stared down at the books and papers.

"Any chance that Rack was telling the truth?" Buffy asked.

Giles sighed. "I fail to see any reason why we should believe a notorious warlock who has made a regular practice out of draining others of their powers."

"We're all going to die," Rona whispered from the door to the basement where she stood staring at them. At least Xander was pretty sure it was Rona. The number of potentials that the coven of English witches and the last few Watchers had sent them was getting a little ridiculous. Xander was about to start calling them things like "black chick who keeps giving Spike a weird look" and "creepy pushy brunette who spends too much time randomly mentioning rich parents" and "lame girl who always writes in her notebook." At least then he could keep track of them. Rona came up into the room and three more faces appeared in the door. Xander glanced over to see if Willow or Buffy were going to chase her back downstairs, but neither reacted, although Buffy had that tightness to her body that meant alpha demonish Buffy was about to make another appearance.

"Yes, we're all going to die," Buffy snapped. Xander was starting to think that slayers were like vampires—if you got too many of them in one place, they started turning on each other and playing alpha games. But as long as the slayers didn't resort to cannibalism, he wasn't getting in the middle. Buffy started pacing.

"But you knew that already. 'Cause that's the cool reward for being human. Big dessert at the end of the meal. Don't kid yourselves, you guys. This whole thing is all about death." She stopped and pointed at the girl who was probably Rona. "You think you're different because you might be the next slayer? Death is what a slayer breathes, what a slayer dreams about when she sleeps. Death is what a slayer lives. My death could make you the next slayer. You could be standing here on the mouth of hell with it threatening to swallow you. But that's the slayer's job, to make sure that the hellmouth chokes on her bones. We're not ready? They're not ready. They think we're gonna wait for the end to come, like we always do. I'm done waiting. They want an apocalypse? Oh, we'll give 'em one."

Buffy's face was hard.

"Um, Buff?" Xander asked. She turned at looked at him, and for a second, Xander could swear he was looking into the eyes of a demon. "Way to be a little creepily over the top. Before going for death and breathing death and choking the hellmouth with bones, maybe we could... oh... look for a solution that doesn't include death."

Buffy sighed, but her expression was still hard. They really did need to keep a certain distance between slayers, Xander thought to himself, but suggesting that these girls were turning more and more demonic they more time they spent with each other was a sure way to get his ass kicked.

"No reason for Rack to lie," Spike said. "He's bloody moved on to another dimension, so he doesn't have to worry about some demon from below eating this world whole."

Giles put on his best constipated expression. "And he has no a reason to help us, either. I don't see any reason for believing—"

"Except that part came true," Spike interrupted.

"It did?" Xander frowned. "Was I out of the room when we had apocalyptic signs?"

Spike shrugged. "Rack said there were two doors open—that good had committed an act so evil they'd opened a door here. But he also said that evil had committed an act so good that the other side had started their own plans for ending the world."

"Other side? There's another side?" Note-taking girl asked, pulling out her notebook. Xander rolled his eyes.

"The Powers," Willow said. She pulled out a chair across from Giles and sat down. "They're Powers of good and light, but if they end the world, we're all still kinda dead."

"Which I'm saying is not good," Xander said.

"Depends on which way you're headed after dying, pet. I figure the Powers just want a nice gentle way to kill humanity and send them on to the path of light, but light isn't the first stop for a vampire." Spike's gaze slid off to the side, and Xander didn't know what to say. Spike was still totally convinced that he was damned, and Xander wasn't sure about things like eternity. He just knew Spike deserved another chance. "However, when Rack said that, I figured the poof wouldn't let us trump him. If we had us an apocalypse going, he was probably in the middle of the other one."

"Is he?" Buffy demanded, worry carving lines on her face. Spike flinched. Yeah, the last thing Spike needed was a reminder that he was still number two in her books.

"Yeah," Spike said. "Darla got knocked up."

"Vampire Darla?" Willow asked. "She's dead—dusty dead, not the walking around getting pregnant sort, not that vampires get pregnant a whole lot."

Spike walked the room, stretching out his arms. "And she got brought back as a human to try and trick the moron into sleeping with her and losing his soul."

"Wait, there's another vampire with a soul?" Notebook girl started flipping through her pages. Xander felt like reassuring her that Angel wasn't on the test.

"Angel would never risk—"

"Oh he did," Spike cut Buffy off. "He buggered her, but it turns out that sleeping with Darla is just as much fun now as it always was. Bint always was a terror in bed. Angelus broke Drusilla before turning her just so he wouldn't have another ball-buster in the clan. However, Darla got pregnant and then managed to keep the baby after getting turned."

"Oh good Lord," Giles breathed. "A vampire has no life force, there's no possible way for that to happen."

"She did it anyway," Spike said. "And when the pregnancy went wrong, Darla staked herself, dusted herself to set the child free. Evil committed the ultimate act of good."

"Which opened an apocalypsy door?" Xander demanded. "There's unfair and then there's whole huge levels of unfair. There should be a one-apocalypse-at-a-time rule." Xander threw himself down in the chair Spike had just left and rubbed his hand across his face. Buffy wasn't the only one coming close to going completely nuts.

"Please tell me that Angel got the door closed," Xander begged.

"Jonathan isn't sure," Spike said, and Xander twisted around to glare at him.

"I told you to tell me that it's all okay."

Spike gave him a long look. "Sorry, pet. It turns out that the tyke is the door, and Angel isn't about to let anyone touch Conner. The good side is that Jonathan and Wesley have already untangled a half-dozen plots against the boy, and Angel's so brassed off at the Powers he's refusing to be a champion for anything other than his family, and he's sworn to raise his son as far from any fight as he can get him."

"So, the door's open," Xander summarized.

"Yeah," Spike agreed.

"Great," Giles added.

"So, if we win we're still going to die?" Redheaded girl asked from the stairs.

"But it'll be a happy-happy sort of dead," Xander said, twirling his finger in the air like he was spinning one of those party favors. "I swear, if we stop evil here, and Angel loses his apocalypse, I'm going down there and kicking his ass so hard his teeth are going to rattle."

Spike raised an eyebrow.

"Okay, I'm not," Xander admitted, "but I'm driving Spike down there and watching as he kicks Angel's ass."

"Bloody right," Spike agreed. He twitched, his whole body jerking, and two of the potentials just about jumped out of their skins.

"Muscle cramp," Spike said with a grim smile. Xander looked over, and Willow and Buffy and Giles were all looking as confused as he felt. Spike did not do muscle cramps. Vampires in general were not big with muscle cramps.

Buffy gave Spike a concerned look for a second before getting back to business. "I could ask around Willy's... see if anyone has any information."

Willow scrunched up her face. "I don't know, Buffy. It's just that Rack said that good did something evil, and I'm thinking that you aren't going to find too many forces of good in Willy's place."

"The Initiative," Buffy blurted out.

"I doubt that," Giles said. "While they were certainly attempting to do good, or rather the soldiers were, I doubt the Initiative itself could be considered a force of good."

"More a force of the twisted good intentions," Willow agreed.

"You lot can argue this out. Let me know when evil needs its arse kicked," Spike turned to head for the basement, and the potentials scattered. Rona darted toward Giles' room and the others disappeared downstairs.

"Spike," Buffy said, her voice having just an edge of panic. Yeah, a potentially psychotic Spike plus a whole lot of teenagers could be monumentally bad.

"I'll go with him," Xander offered. Buffy gave him a disbelieving look, and Xander shrugged. "Hey, if he goes all psychotic, I'm more skilled than anyone at running, flailing and screaming. Trust me, you'll know in seconds." Before Buffy could answer, Xander headed for the door. If she really hated the idea of him playing guard, she'd say something, but she didn't and Xander heard Spike's heavy boots behind him on the stairs. They'd hit the lower level where a long hall divided the two dorm rooms before it occurred to Xander that Spike didn't know they were sharing a room now. All Spike's punk music CDs had been neatly stacked up and put next to Xander's music of pain. Oh well, if Spike was going to kill him for touching his stuff, it was too late for Xander to do anything about it now.