Chapter 15: Demons and Visions

Morning had become one of Buffy's favorite times of the day. Dawn was at school. Willow and Tara had left a few minutes ago, off to their classes. It was just her. Well, her and her cup of coffee. Three weeks had passed since she had walked through the portal to return home.

Buffy thought back to that day, as she absently stirred her drink. Arriving back in Sunnydale, Buffy had gone first to the Magic Box, shocking the pants off of Anya and Xander. Or at least Xander's pants were off, and Anya was just put out at the interruption.

Eventually, Xander had hugged her until she couldn't breathe, while Anya phoned Giles, letting him know that he, Dawn, Willow and Tara could finally return to Sunnydale.

When the Scoobies all met at Revello Drive that night, Buffy told her story. She detailed Spike's help but edited out the extracurricular activity between them.

Giles was the first to speak after the fantastic tale. "So, Buffy, if I understand you correctly, this Sebastian is going to inform his buyer that there no longer is a Key? No longer a Key up for sale?"

Before Buffy could answer, Anya "umphed." Knowing better, no one took her interruption for a loud exhale.

Xander swiveled in his seat to look at his girlfriend. "An, hon, do you need some share time with the group?"

"No."

Giles rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Anya, do you know something about this Sebastian?"

"Yes," she answered looking like a petulant child. "But I have no desire to get on his bad side, or any other side of his. He's nice enough, but he would do anything for the right price. You have to admire that in a man, but it doesn't make you want to trust him."

From that point on in the conversation, the Q and A deteriorated into more of a heated debate. Xander had been convinced that Spike had "taken her out." Willow was calmer, saying that it made sense that her locator spell didn't work if Buffy and Spike had been in a different dimension. And Giles worried, not wanting to trust Sebastian's word that the Key, namely Dawn, was now safe.

Dawn had been very quiet during the discussion, but finally spoke up. "So, Buffy, you're here, but where's Spike?"

Buffy had dreaded the question but had braced herself, knowing it would come. "He's not coming back, Dawnie. He decided to stay in one of the other dimensions."

With that answer, Buffy locked the memories away, and her life went back to normal, as normal as a slayer's life could be living on the Hellmouth.

*****

As Buffy stared off in space, the back door opened and in walked Willow, jarring Buffy out of her memories. "Hey, Buff. What's up?" Startled, Buffy nearly spit out her coffee. As it was, she had to carefully swallow. "Hi, Wills, what are you doing home at this time of day?"

"Oh, not much. Thought I would skip class today."

Luckily, Buffy had not taken another sip or she would have spit the coffee out for sure. "Willow, I would have never thought."

"Gotcha," Willow said with a mischievous grin. "Way cool. *And* I got a smile."

Buffy smiled a moment more. "So do I need to call the attendance Nazis, or what?"

"No, the professor was sick, so no class. Yay for a day off."

"A Willow running free. Scary."

"So speaking of smiles."

"We weren't anymore."

Undaunted, Willow pushed on. "We don't see your smiles anymore."

"Yes, you do. See, look." Buffy gave her brightest smile but ended up looking more like she was in a teeth whitening commercial.

"Wigging here. Ok, recap time. Week one, when you got back, we saw 'Robot Buffy.' Very distracted and just going through the motions of life. The second week we saw 'Grrh Buffy.' You were very angry, but I'm not too sure what happened that week because I was hiding, along with everyone else. The third week was 'What Is Wrong With Me Buffy,' which came with the ever popular questions: 'Am I pretty? Am I appealing? Do men like me?' All of which translated into the real Buffy question. 'Why doesn't he love me?' And now we come to my self-imposed homework assignment. 'Find out who *he* is'."

Buffy thought long and hard about giving an ambiguous answer, but the truth was pushing and shoving to come out. Maybe she did need someone in which she could confide, and who better than Willow? "Bull's-eye, Wills. Are you sure your assignment wasn't target practice?"'

Ignoring Buffy's attempt at diverting the topic of conversation, Willow kept prodding, "And?"

"I did fall in love with someone while I was gone."

"Oh, oh. A long distance romance. Was he tall, dark, and from another dimension?"

"Unfortunately, no, he's blonde, pale, and mouthy. But, yes, he is in another dimension." The tears that had been threatening to fall started rolling down Buffy's cheeks.

"I'm sorry. I'm insensitive girl today." Willow moved closer to her friend, so she could wrap her arms around Buffy. "I bet he misses you, just as much as you miss him."

"No, that's just it. He left me. I thought he was coming back here with me, but then he asked me if it was worth it. I froze, Willow. I couldn't answer him."

"Worth what?"

"Losing you, Xander, Giles, all my friends because of him. I didn't think any of you would accept him. But now I don't have to make the choice between you or him, do I?"

Willow thought a moment, thinking carefully about what she was going to say to make her friend feel better. "Buffy, when Tara and I first got together, I was Scaredy Cat Willow about what you guys would say about us. But I shouldn't have been worry girl because everything worked out. The only time I felt bad was when Spike tried to cause trouble for Adam. Remember he... what? What'd I say?"

Buffy had been gazing down into her cup while Willow talked, but at the mention of the vampire's name, her head shot up. She looked at Willow long enough to watch Willow's expression go from "huh?" to "uh oh!" Buffy quickly looked back down, but she had already seen the big round-eyed, open mouth surprise on her friend's face.

Buffy's thoughts started to race. Bag. Cat. Out. In a big way. Now how did she catch the slippery feline? God, Spike was right. She had not wanted to tell her friends. Maybe it wasn't a cat. Maybe it was a chicken that got out of the bag and was now loose. Well, now was honesty time or choke on feathers.

*****

Spike was pacing, but not his normal pacing due to excess energy. His current pacing was not because he had minded leaving Leilor and her father during dinner. Hell, he had been antsy before the meal had even started. The problem was that Spike had assumed he was no longer having visions of the future. Nonetheless, they were back. The first one came as they were sitting down for dinner, resulting in the vampire almost missing his friggin' chair. He had almost tumbled on his arse, and for what? To briefly see some soddin' demon. At first he thought it was a flashback or some such nonsense. The vision had been much shorter than the previous ones, and no telling how many hallucinogens he had literally sucked down with his "meals" over the last hundred years, especially from the 60's on. He was due a flashback or ten.

But then Spike had a second flash of the future. Two demons this time. They had looked familiar in a butt ugly sort of way, but Spike knew he had never fought, let alone seen their kind before. Sort of scaly, bug-eyed, and a Mohawk type appendage sticking out of its head. 'Oh balls,' he thought he had left the visions behind in Sunnyhell.

Just the thought of that town brought an abrupt halt to his pacing. Hells' bloody bells, the vision hadn't been from the dimension he currently resided but from Sunnydale. Since the first vision had been short, Spike hadn't noticed the lack of snow. Now, though, Spike would bet his last dollar, if he had a dollar, that he had recognized the tombstone behind the second demon.

Unfortunately, along with thoughts of Sunnydale also came thoughts of the slayer. For the last 3 weeks, he had been working hard to put Buffy out of his mind and any other part of his anatomy that wanted her, he thought with a glance down his body.

Unexpectedly, Spike had another vision. This time he briefly saw the slayer with the demons. When it was over, he found himself lying on the floor with one leg hanging over an ottoman. 'Ok, visions and pacing do not go together. Ought to warn a bloke when they're coming, anyhow. And how was he to forget the slayer when she was spoiling his visions now?'

Resigning himself to the floor, Spike replayed the latest vision in his head. The same two demons had been fighting the slayer. No big.

Then instead of ceiling, he was looking at Sunnydale again, but not the replay. This time the scene had drastically changed. The slayer was on the ground with one demon was standing over her, holding a sizeable tree branch as a club, and the other demon was sitting on top of Buffy.

Short and to the point again, Spike thought as the vision ended. Still not that bad of a situation, he thought, but then Spike realized that the slayer had not been fighting back. She had been lying there limp with the demon on top of her, his hands at her throat. He had to get back to Sunnydale. Bleedin' hell, those demons had to die. If anyone got to throttle the slayer, it would be him.

Running out of his room to find someone who could open a portal, a small part of him hoped he didn't have another vision because the way things were currently going, he would run smack into a wall.

*****

The portal deposited Spike close to the spot that he recognized from his vision. Shifting into game face, Spike took off in a full sprint and quickly made it to the area of the graveyard that the fight would occur. His golden eyes didn't see the slayer , but then locked on the two demons. So they were in the right place, but the slayer wasn't yet. Good, he could kill these two horror show rejects before Buffy even got there. He took the closest one down with a flying tackle. He stayed on top, straddled him and pulled back his arm, already picturing how he was going to smash in the tosser's face.

Then suddenly Spike couldn't bring his arm forward. He tried a couple more times, but it was like his arm was being held in an invisible vice. When he stopped struggling, he realized that the demon was mumbling. Mumbling? A mumbling demon? Spike looked down in time to see the demon reach up and pull off his own head, and then Spike was looking down into Xander's face. "Whelp? What the fuck?"

Xander tossed the mask aside. "Oh, no. Don't even use the 'F' word while straddling me."

Before he could reply, Spike recognized Willow's voice briefly to the right just as his arm was set free again. Glancing over, he saw the two witches standing close to a mausoleum. No wonder he couldn't see them as he came in. Then, to make the whole situation worse, they waved of all things.

"Geez, Spike, glad you tackled Xander instead of knocking me flat."

Spike's head jerked around at Dawn's voice. But instead of the Nibblet's form, he was looking at the second demon, standing in front of him, holding its head under its arm, and other hand on its hip. On top of the demon's body was Dawn's smiling face.

"What the fu..." Before he could repeat his earlier question, Dawn raised an eyebrow, stopping Spike mid-cuss.

Below him, Xander was trying to push the vampire off. "Willow better have kept some of that money you won, blood breath, because you're so going to pay for any wreckage to this costume."

Spike smiled down at Xander making sure to show his fangs to their best advantage. "Now, the Bit I'm fond of, but you, whelp, are another matter altogether."

"Xander, maybe you should not add anymore fuel to the fire so Spike will let you up with minimal amount of.uh.contact?"

Spike whipped his head around to left to see the Slayer sitting on top of a tombstone, swinging her feet and smiling at him. Why the nervy bint!

Slayer and vampire stared at one another, but their facial expressions were vastly different. Buffy's smile was as bright as a shiny day, and Spike's frown was no doubt a dark, stormy night. No telling how long they would have stayed in a glare contest had it not been for an insistent tapping on Spike's shoulder. He looked up into Anya's face.

"Spike, let Xander up. You are sitting on his important parts, and I was planning on using them later." Anya was proud of herself for remembering to edit her language in front of Dawn.

Even without saying penis, everyone could tell when Spike figured out what exactly Anya meant by important parts. The blond vampire scrambled to his feet with such a horrified expression on his face that all the onlookers started laughing. All except for the man with the important parts, and the vamp that had been sitting on them.

Buffy was impressed. Anya got Spike off of Xander faster than she ever could have, but now she needed some alone time with Spike.

However, before she could speak, Dawn interrupted. "Ok, guys, I think Buffy and Spike need some alone time."

For once appreciative of Dawn's matchmaking, Buffy smiled her thanks to her departing friends.

As they passed by the vampire, Willow handed Spike a black t-shirt with a thanks. Inspecting the shirt, Spike recognized it as one of his own.

Xander's voice floated back as the group walked away. "I hate this costume. I feel like the Monster from the Black Lagoon."

"You're right, Xander. You make a much better Tarzan."

"An... Can we just get out of here?"

*****

Audience gone, Spike held the t-shirt up to Buffy with a questioning look on his face.

Buffy shrugged, "They said they needed something of yours for their magic to find you. I started to bring your TV... Ok, stop growling. Note to self: No sense of humor."

"My sense of humor is top notch, Slayer, but not when I have been bamboozled."

"What oozle?"

"You bloody well know what I mean." He threw the t-shirt her way and started pacing. "So the visions were sent by Red and Glenda?" Not thinking it was safe to talk at that point, Buffy just nodded. After all, he was still in game face.

"You weren't in any real danger. So I was the subject of another of Red's spells. The same witch that most of her spells are associated with the word, 'oops'? Thank God Glenda helped her. And you put them up to this?" Spike was shouting by the time he asked the last question.

Buffy hadn't thought he would be this mad. "Well.I didn't think you would come back if I just asked. Besides I thought that if you did come back when you thought I was in trouble, there may be hope for us."

"So you played me?"

"Not like I could call you on the phone." Buffy snapped back, but then kicked herself for not remaining as calm as she wanted.

Spike threw up his arms in exasperation. "I've been tricked by Scoobies. It's humiliating and demoralizing for a bloke."

Buffy smiled, trying to entice Spike closer to her. "Come here and let's see if I can stroke your ego."

"Stroke?" No way the vampire was passing up such an opening at a sexual innuendo. Spike took a couple of steps toward Buffy, then stopped and forced himself to turn away. "No way, Slayer. I am brassed off and not likely to get over it so soon."

Buffy watched him pace around another tree. Her heart had leapt when he had started toward her but was now sinking again. She knew Spike was pissed in a big way, but at least he wasn't leaving.

Spike glanced over at the slayer. "You told your friends about us? Not just the fighting, but the shagging, also?"

"Dense much? You saw them here helping me... uh... contact you, didn't you?" Now Buffy was getting frustrated.

"Rolling your eyes at me isn't helping, missy."

Buffy sighed. She hadn't even realized she had rolled her eyes. "My bad. All shagging has been revealed. Well, not the places or positions. Just that we shagged and much enjoyment was had."

"So what am I doing back here, Slayer?"

"I wanted to thank you for paying the bills."

"That's well and good, pet, but I'm not buying that one. Pitch another."

Time for the direct approach. Hopping off the tombstone, Buffy intercepted Spike on his next pass by her perch. "I missed you."

"What?" That had shocked Spick down to his boots.

"I. Missed. You." Buffy hadn't realized how good admitting that to Spike would feel. The second time had felt even better.

Spike, however, was still cautious. His hopes had soared at her words, but he need to know how far the slayer was willing to go. "I'm not going to sneak around."

"No sneekage, hard head. If you want, though, we can go now and kiss in Giles' living room, kitchen, stairs..."

"Bath tub?"

Buffy smiled, but Spike still had a frown. Standing up on her tip toes, she kissed him on the mouth. "Sure, but no chains."

That got a smile from Spike as his human face melted back into view. "Oh, luv, you say that now." Gathering Buffy up in his arms, he leaned down, lips meeting lips.

Eventually, Buffy leaned back and tried to catch her breath. "Want us to send you back now?"

"Guess not. At least here a bloke can get a spot of violence." Spike leaned down to kiss her again, but she broke away.

"So what happened with Leilor?" Buffy couldn't bring herself to meet his eyes when she asked the question.

Spike grinned. Was the slayer turning a little green from jealousy? "We shagged... oomph. Hey, watch the ribs, Slayer. No, I just couldn't bring myself to touch her. Not that she didn't offer, but I had this other bint stuck in my head. Short, blonde, stubborn, doesn't know a good thing when she sees it."

"I see it now, Spike. I see you now." Leaning up, Buffy kissed her vampire lover again.

Thanks so much for reading this story. I realize that a few issues are still up in the air. Do the Scoobies know about the chip being out? Did Sebastian tell the truth or is he going to sell the key again? What happened to Clara? And what if Angel is added to the mix? So I am going to either write an epilogue or sequel. The problem is that I haven't decided yet which to do. So if you have an opinion, let me know. I could really use some feedback.

On a different note, I have a new story that is coming out soon. Please look for With a Little Help. It is a combination of humor and Spuffy.

Thanks to Isis for being the beta for this story and thanks to t_geyer for the wonderful suggestions and feedback.

MadRog