People talk about time stopping or slowing down when they come across something completely unexpected, they speak romantically about feeling their heartbeat pulse through their body or being unable to catch their breath, they talk about that one perfect moment where everything pauses around them and they are able to let realization just flow into them.
Buffy didn’t have that luxury.
So when she saw Spike--William the freaking Bloody--standing before her in all his not dead glory she did pause, yes, with mouth hanging open and eyes wide like some Japanese comic book character Andrew loved to rave so much about--but she was immediately bashed in the head with the back of a battle axe afterwards.
So much for the dramatic reunion.
The good thing, was that Spike was just as fast as he ever was, and the demon barely had time to see her hit the ground before he’d ripped the axe from the demon’s hands and, with a vicious snarl, cut it’s head clean off. Then he reached down a hand to help her up and they were able to fight the rest of the demon horde together, moves and tactics in sync, as if it hadn’t been nearly two years since they’d last fought together. The bad thing was that the only word’s they were able to exchange were things like, “over here,” “catch,” “duck!” and “behind you.”
When they were finished, and all the demons were dead, and Buffy was bent over trying to catch her breath, hands on her knees and seriously envying the fact that he didn’t need to breathe, she looked up at him and gasped, “You’re alive.”
He shoved his hands in his coat pockets and didn’t quite look at her. “Yeah.”
The jacket looked new, she thought distractedly, mind still not caught up on the idea that he was here and he was alive.
Or at least, undead.
“How?” she choked out.
He shifted restlessly from side to side. The street lamp made his bleached hair gleam and lit up one cheekbone, deepening the shadows around his mouth and eyes. “Kind of a long story,” he told her. “Got trapped in that soddin’ amulet and then brought back, but I couldn’t touch anything. Was like a ghost there for a while.”
Buffy opened and closed her mouth, still staring at him, and was just working on getting the phrase, “How long?” out of her mouth when she heard something and was reminded--once again--that neither time nor demons stopped for Buffy Summers’ love life.
“Come on,” she said, straightening up and peering past the neat row of little houses to the English country side behind them. “More are coming.”
He too was looking at the darkened hills at the edge of town, head cocked slightly, vampiric hearing picking up on what Buffy could only barely catch. “A lot more.” He turned back to her. “Which way?”
She tilted her head in one direction and started running, not trusting herself to speak. It was all too familiar, fighting with him, running with him, and she didn’t have the time right now to deal with it all.
“What are these things?” he asked her as they were running. Uphill. It was always uphill. One thing she really hated about England, Buffy thought, was that it was so hilly.
“Demons from some hell dimension,” she gasped. “Can’t remember the name. Started with an X.” She glanced behind her. Nothing. So they weren’t following yet. That was good.
“Xanophryn?”
“I don’t think so.” She focused on breathing. They had to get to other side of town and it was uphill all the way.
“Xzytiphlix?”
“No.”
“Xuscheion?”
“Spike, I don’t know!” God. Back from the dead not even half an hour and already she wanted to kill him.
They reached the Slayer Headquarters, which was a two story house just on the outside of town--close enough that they could easily protect the people there but still far enough away that nobody noticed the Slayer training sessions they held outside in what supposed to be some kind of grazing field. Luckily, they didn’t have any sheep to worry about.
Just demons, vampires and the like.
Buffy headed straight for the front door, wasting no time in muttering a quick “Come in, Spike,” before walking to the bottom of the stairs and calling out in a sharp voice, “Giles! We’ve got in-coming!”
Willow walked out from the kitchen, balancing a stack of books that nearly reached to her chin. Dawn, who was right behind her, had even more books in her arms. “Hey, Buffy. You slay the demons?”
Buffy looked at her, expression tense. She was in full Slayer Mode, so she didn’t even notice the odd looks Spike was giving her. “Yeah. But there’s more heading our way, so I need you to finish that spell. The sooner we can send these things back to their dimension the better.”
Willow nodded. “I’m on it.” She caught Dawn’s eye and they both headed for the living room, barely glancing at Spike as they walked by.
“Come on,” she said to him. “There’s more weapons in the basement.”
“You know,” he started as they made their way down the stairs, “Glastonbury was the last place I thought I’d find you. Last I heard you were in Rome.”
She nodded, “I was there.” she told him without looking at him. He suddenly seemed too close in the confines of the stairwell, his presence too much for her too ignore. “But I got called here because of all the demon activity. Apparently that thing on the hill, The Tower--”
“Tor,” he corrected her.
“Yeah, that. Well, it’s like an inverted hellmouth or something. All the demons flock to it because it’s supposed to be where this world and the spirit world meet or where the King of Dead lives or maybe the King of the Faeries. I don’t know, you’ll have to ask Willow.”
“Yeah, about that. Why di--”
She cut him off. “The battle axes are over there,” she gestured to one side of the basement. “I’m gonna take a look at the swords.” She headed in the opposite direction, still talking. “Willow said she needed some kind of special sword to finish the spell. My scythe won’t work. It has something to do with the type of magic the warlock or wizard that brought these demons over used.” She sorted through her--pretty massive--collection of swords, studying the blade of each one. “Giles said we had one. I just have to look for a certain symbol--”
“Buffy,” he interrupted her, “what is that doing here?”
“Aha! Found it!” She held up the sword in triumph and turned around, grinning. “What is what doing h--” She stopped, grin falling away and cheeks flushing when she saw what Spike was looking at.
Spike was staring at himself.
Or at least, a robot version of himself.
“Um, well,” she stammered. “You see…”
He turned around, hands once again shoved in the pockets of his jacket, but this time he looked right at her, smirk twisting his lips. “Oh, I get it. You’re all high and mighty when I did it, but when it comes to you it’s alright. After all, its not like I would mind, right? I’m dead. ‘Course,” he raised his eyebrows at her, “I don’t know if I should be happy that you missed me that much, or upset that I was that replaceable.”
Buffy glared at him. “Oh, like you’re one to talk! Couldn’t have me so you go and have Warren make you a sex robot to be your personal slave Buffy. That’s so disg--”
He tisked at her. “Now now, luv. I wouldn’t throw stones. Not when you’ve done the same thing.” He was still smirking at her, and the look in his eyes could only be described as gleeful.
Buffy clenched the sword in her fist. He was enjoying this, the jerk. Never had she wanted to punch him so much. “It wasn’t like that,” she said through clenched teeth.
“Oh? Then tell me, Buffy, what was it like? ‘Cause from where I’m standing that’s exactly what it looks like.”
“It was your fault!” she snapped, starting to pace back and forth. “If you hadn’t fought with me so much and just let me do my job rather than use to me to get your violence kick in, then word wouldn’t have traveled that the Slayer always fought with William the Bloody at her side.” She turned on him suddenly, brandishing the sword at him. “They wouldn’t take me seriously! Everyone I fought thought I was weaker simply because you weren’t there.”
Spike’s brow furrowed. “But you aren’t weaker. You’re the Slayer. You’ve never needed me to help with a simple fight.”
She scoffed. “Of course I’m not weaker!”
“Then why --?”
“Dawn had the idea that it would be a good distraction. You know, for the Slayerettes. Send it out to fight first, and while it got pummeled the girls could take them out. All the while I sort of stand watch and make sure nothing goes wrong.”
“Why wasn’t it out there with you tonight? With that many demons it might’ve been useful.”
Buffy reached for the robot, tugging up the black t-shirt to reveal a deep jagged hole, wires and bits of metal falling out of it.
Spike grimaced. “Gee. So much for respecting the dead, huh?”
She dropped the shirt and looked away.
“So,” he said in the suddenly tense silence. “You sayin’ that you had my body right here ready to be taken advantage of and you never did? You weren’t even tempted?”
“No,” Buffy muttered. “I could barely stand to look at it.”
There was another moment of silence and then Spike spoke, voice much softer. “Yeah. I know what that’s like.”
She finally looked at him again, and he wasn’t smirking now, but gazing at her with a soft, earnest expression, eyes twitching back and forth as they took in her face. “I guess you do,” she whispered, and her breath caught in her throat as it all suddenly hit home.
Spike was alive. It shouldn’t be possible. He burned up in the Hellmouth; she saw the sun start to destroy his body, outran the giant cave in that should have fallen on only dust, and yet here he was, staring at her with that expression and time wasn’t standing still for her but speeding up, whirling around her until she was dizzy and she felt like she couldn’t breathe, or maybe she was breathing too much and--
“Spike,” she gasped out, dropping the sword and feeling like she, too, would drop any minute, except he was suddenly there, hands on her arms holding her up.
“Shh…” he whispered, pulling her forward to lean against his chest. “It’s alright now, Buffy. It’s alright.” He wrapped his arms around her and pressed his lips into her hair, murmuring to her in a soft soothing voice that reminded her of years ago, when she was still struggling with being dragged out of heaven and he would hold her just like this on days that it became too much. And even though they’d never speak of it afterwards, and she knew that those muttered phrases didn’t make it alright, she’d still lean against him and pretend for a while that it was okay to do so.
Now, she gave a sort of half sob, half giggle, because this time, it was he who came back from the dead, and shouldn’t it be her turn to give comfort?
“Shh…” he said again and Buffy let herself be soothed.
After a while, the world stopped spinning and her breathing was coming slow and even. It was also, she noticed, in tandem with his.
“Bit of a shock, isn’t it?” His voice was still soft, but laced with a sort of amused irony that reminded her that he’d gone through this before.
“Yeah.”
They were quiet again. Buffy listened to their synchronized breaths and focused on the feel of him against her, firm and cool and real and so different from the bot, whose skin (on the few times she forced herself close enough to feel it) was warm from the whirring of the machines inside it. Things weren’t suddenly fixed simply because he was here: they had two years of separation to deal with, and a boatload of issues that made Buffy dizzy even to think about working through, but right now he was here, with her, and she could focus on that.
At least until it came time to fight.
Spike suddenly chuckled and Buffy pulled away, looking at him curiously.
“It’s the Spikebot,” he explained. “It explains why Willow and Dawn had no reaction when they saw me.”
She blinked. “I didn’t even think about that.”
“Yeah. You had too much on your mind. But it’s kind of a blow to a man’s ego, realizing you’re so insignificant that people don’t even have a reaction when you come back from the dead.”
She laughed, taking a step back. “Yeah, I guess it would be.”
He didn’t let her pull completely away, grabbing a hold of her hands as she stepped back. “But you knew it was me, didn’t you?” He leaned forward, eyes once again locked on her face, head cocked slightly to the side.
Buffy's gut clenched at the sight. “As soon as I saw you.”
“How?” he asked, and as his eyes searched hers she was reminded of another conversation that took place over five thousand miles away in a dark kitchen, also before a battle.
“What does that mean?”
“Does it have to mean anything?”
“How did you know it was me and not the bot when I came to your crypt?” she asked, and hoped he didn’t see it as another deflection, because, really, there was no answer--she just knew, would have known even without the tingles she got on the back of her neck whenever vampires were near.
But Spike stopped breathing for a moment and his eyes widened before a look of absolute awe like the which she hadn’t seen since the day she came back from the dead overcame his features and she knew, even before he clutched her hands tighter in his, that he took the statement for what it was supposed to mean. “Buffy,” it came out in a hoarse whisper and she leaned closer to hear him. “Are you sayi--”
“Buffy!”
They jerked apart, heads swiveling to the stairs. “We’ve got demons!” Dawn’s voice called down. There was a small pause and then, “Really ugly ones! Bring the big weapons!”
They stared silently at each other for a moment, before Buffy’s lips curled into a wry smile and she bent down to pick up the sword. “Looks like it’s time to fight,” she said. She gestured to the weapon’s chest. “You heard her. Get the big weapons. Now that you’re alive you can at least be useful.”
Spike’s lips twitched. “Right.”
She grabbed two more swords and started up the stairs, already preparing herself mentally for the fight. Spike was right behind her.
Time didn’t stop for Buffy Summers. But right now, with Spike following close behind, battle axes in hand, she was alright with that.
Author's Chapter Notes:
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters used in this story. I am not making money. Do not sue.