Title:  Pillow Talk

Author:  Miss Murchison

Rating: NC-17

Disclaimer:  All characters are the property of Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, etc.  Only the lame plots and dialogue herein are mine.

Notes:  A Spuffy story that starts in early Season 6 before deviating from canon.   A slight change in circumstances, a different decision or two, and you wind up with very different results.

Thanks: To Keswindhover and revdorothyl for the beta.

The story begins here. A list of links to the individual chapters is here.

Chapter 27

Spike's eyes flicked to the right, but he didn't turn his head.  He was suddenly very still.  "The black one.  With the dent in the side."

"Yeah.  You dented it the other night with a kegged vamp.  I've got to hand that to you, Spike.  You don't even need a car to cause a fender-bender."

"Jealous?  Give yourself time.  The way you drive, you'll pass my crash record one day."  He drew in a deep breath.  "Humans.  Everything in that van is human.  Three of them.  Sure it's you they're after?  Wasn't the van outside the bar that night you got pissed?  And I was the one who damaged the paintwork."

"What, do you think it's all about your animal magnetism?  No, I've seen the van when you weren't around.  I'm pretty sure it was there when I got confused one day at UC Sunnydale, and I think it followed me home once.  And now we know it was the one parked in front of The Hill of Beans.  Before, I didn't think they were all the same van, but there it is again. I'm sure they're tracking me.  You're just—incidental."

"Incidental!  I am never just incidental."  He swung his axe thoughtfully, very carefully not looking away from her face.  "Initiative?"

She frowned.  "Could be, I suppose."

"Wouldn't mind taking even a metaphorical bite out of that lot."  He started to slip into game face.  "And since you're convinced it's your pretty arse they're tracking, you get to be bait, love."

She glared at him and raised her voice threateningly. "Oh, yeah?  And who put you in charge all of a sudden?"  She raised the axe too, for good measure.

He backed up a step.  "Sorry if I forgot that her royal Slayerness gets to make all the decisions around here!"

It was surprisingly satisfactory to really yell as loud as possible.  "I'm sick of people trying to make my decisions for me!"  For good measure, she gave him a shove with her free hand. 

He staggered back, catching his balance just before he fell.  "Bugger this!  Cope on your own then, bitch!"

She watched him stalk off, her expression stormy.  She didn't spare the van a glance until Spike had disappeared into the shadows, all dignity except for the plastic supermarket bag still dangling incongruously from one hand.  Then she shouldered her axe again and turned to march down the sidewalk, allowing her eyes to slide over the side of the van as if it were merely part of the scenery.  She hadn't taken fifty steps before its engine started up.   

Wow, they must really think I'm stupid.  She kept walking, swinging her axe jauntily as if she were just out for some casual slayage, ignoring the van as it cruised past her and turned left, in the direction of Revello Drive. 

She smiled grimly and turned right.  Less than a minute later, the van was back, stopping a half-block behind her. 

Okay, now I think they're really stupid. 

Out of the corner of her eye, Buffy noticed a dark shape making its way between two houses.  It scaled a fence and slipped into a back yard.  A moment later, there was a crash, as if a garbage can had been knocked over.   A dog started to bark.  Two others joined in the ruckus.  Something else fell over with a crash one house further on.  Those creeps in the van aren't the only ones who need a course in subtlety.  Wincing, she did an about-face and started walking toward the van.  The engine started again, stopped, then started.  She thought she saw the entire van sway a bit, as if the people inside were fighting over what to do next. 

She was halfway to her goal when her way was suddenly blocked by three monsters.  She took a step back, raising her axe and evaluating the latest threat.

They were sartorial menaces, for one thing.  They wore boots, dark pants, and shabby coats and vests.  She took inventory of the rest of their appearance.  Scaly, greenish skin.  Check.  Expressionless, flat faces.  Check.  Red eyes.  Check.  And, oh yeah, kind of unhorny horns that flopped around like pony tails.  Check.

"I believe we've met," said Buffy.  She swung her axe through the first one.  When it melted away as it fell to the ground, she administered the same treatment to the second one.  The third opened his mouth to reveal an oval rimmed by lots of sharp, jutting teeth and positioned itself between her and the van. 

Before it could attack, there was a screech of metal followed by the screech of human voices.  Buffy peered past the demon to see one of the rear doors of the van hanging half off its hinges.  Something that looked human tumbled out onto the asphalt, rose to a crouch, and staggered off into the shadows. 

"Sorry, I'm busy," she said to the third demon, shoving it aside as she ran forward.  It vanished before it hit the ground.

If the van had been rocking before, now it was shaking so wildly she wouldn't have been surprised if it tipped over.  When Buffy ran around the back and stared inside, there was a crazy game of tag going on in the very limited space.  She'd already figured out from the condition of the van's back door that Spike had made his entrance while she was distracted by the demons.  Now, he was circling a much smaller man, looking for a chance to grab him without doing any damage that could set off the chip.  A third figure was shrieking and climbing over what looked like some very expensive electronic equipment, knocking it to the floor as he scrambled through a blue beaded curtain and fell into the driver's compartment.

"Grab that one, Buffy!" yelled Spike, who was in game face and busy looking threatening.  She was about to run after the man escaping out the front of the van when she got a good look at Spike's prey.  "Jonathan?"

Jonathan turned to look at her, then back at Spike.  "Uh, oh," he said incongruously and dropped something on the floor.  Buffy reeled back as smoke enveloped the inside of the van, Jonathan leapt down, squealed, "My ankle!" and stared hobbling off.  Spike jumped out the back of the van and hesitated a few crucial seconds.  "All right, love?"

"I'm fine," lied Buffy, still choking.  "Go after them."  But as he started to obey, she lunged forward and grabbed him from behind, clinging to his waist.  "No!  I mean, stay here."

He stilled. "Okay, Slayer, enjoying the position here, but I thought the point of the exercise was to catch them."

"We don't have to.  I recognized one of them."

"That little wanker from your school, isn't it?  The one who buggered up reality a year or so ago?"

"Yeah.  It seems he's still not very good at the lesson-learning thing."  She released him.  "Great plan, by the way.  What was it?  Yank open a door and see what happens next?"

"I was thinking up something more elaborate when you turned around and started marching towards them.  What inspired that brilliant tactic?  They could have shot you, or tried to run you over, or done something else really dangerous.  Sheer luck they just called up demons."

"Spike, when I heard you sneaking around like a raccoon family reunion and waking up every dog in the neighborhood, I remembered just how stealth-impaired you are.  And just how much I didn't like the idea of you jumping three humans."

His eyes blazed and he started arguing again, but she cut him off impatiently.

"Come on, Spike.  All you had to do was blunder into one of them accidentally and you'd have been rolling around on the ground, stake-bait.  I couldn't risk them setting off your chip."

His jaw shut with a snap, and he was giving her one of those inscrutable stares he specialized in these days.

What's his issue now?   No time to worry about it now, since they'd become van thieves, or vanjackers, or something.  Someone was bound to call the police, and she wanted to find out who her stupid stalkers were before Sunnydale's Finest arrived.  Fortunately, the cops in this town had perfected a response time slow enough to ensure anything really scary had a chance to escape before they arrived.

Spike's retort was surprisingly subdued.  "You didn't want them to hurt me?"

"Duh."  Buffy pushed aside the blue beaded curtain that separated the driver's compartment from the back of the van and leaned over to check the glove compartment.   Her left hand hit the steering wheel, setting off the horn.  She jumped back. "That sounds familiar.”

“It’s the bloody theme from Star Wars, Buffy.  You may not have seen a lot of old movies, but—”

She glared at him. “I know that.  At least, I would have remembered in a second.  But I heard this horn when I was fighting the melty demons at the construction site.  The same melty demons that I just made melt outside.”  She went back to check the glove compartment.  It held only a futuristic-looking flashlight and some electronic thing with a label that said it was a GPS device.  "They certainly have a lot of equipment that beeps and buzzes."

"All the comforts of home.  Even Mr. Coffee."  He picked up the pot and shook it.  "The least they could have done is left us some java."  He abandoned the coffeemaker and leaned over one of the monitors that had survived his entrance.  "They must have been seriously over-caffeinated to be playing this many computer games at once."  He poked at some keys.  "Whoa!"

Buffy crawled back into the rear of the van to look at the monitor.  "Ewww!  Spike, that's disgusting!  I—" She peered more closely at the screen.  "I didn't even know you could do that."

"Well, I could as a matter of fact, if you'd show a bit of interest."  He was reaching for a chair, apparently planning to settle down and spend the rest of the evening watching dirty movies.

She slapped him on the side of the head before clapping one hand over his eyes and banging on the keyboard with the fingers of her other hand.  "I don't think I should let you watch this sort of thing.  It's got to be bad for—  Damn!"

"Why, what are they up to now?"  He pushed her hand away, leaning forward eagerly, but when he saw what was on the monitor, his jaw tightened.  "Bloody hell!"

Buffy grabbed the mouse and flicked through the images she'd just accessed.  Not porn this time.  Something much worse.  They were all clips of her.  Buffy walking down the street at night, Buffy fighting demons, Buffy at UC Sunnydale looking like a crazy person, Buffy working at the Magic Box and The Hill of Beans, Buffy talking to Dawn on her front porch.  No, not my little sister too!

"The bastards." 

She looked at Spike.  All humor was gone from his face and his fists were clenched. "I'm going to find a way to kill them. No one gets away with stalking my girls!"

"What, no one except you? And I'll handle this, Spike."

"You'll let me help."

"Okay, deep breaths."  Buffy forced the hot rage to stop roiling her stomach.  She pushed it all into her head, where it settled down as cold anger.  "We're checking this whole van out.  I want to know what else they've been doing.  And then I figure out what we do to them."

She looked around.  "Because the rest of this stuff?  It's between weird and pathetic." She noticed a big red button marked “destruct” next to the monitor.  "Look at this.  It’s like something out of a Saturday morning cartoon."

“That would account for none of the demons in town knowing anything about this lot.  I forgot to check with the Joker or Catwoman.”  Spike was peering up at the roof.  "That thing pops up.  Some kind of surveillance device, I think.  One of those wonky little periscopes with the metal butterfly wings.  Didn't those government types use something like that to track down E.T.?"

"Not really remembering that movie all that well."  Buffy picked up a comic book.  "I think I was about seven the last time I saw it."  She turned to see Spike staring at the clocks hanging on the panel behind the driver’s seat.  “Why would they care what time it was in Tokyo?” 

He shook his head.  His anger seemed to have faded too.  Or maybe it was just under control, like hers.  Spike has control?  Well, yeah, sometimes.  “Maybe the wankers want to know when the next episode of Sailor Moon airs.” 

"What?”

"Never mind."  He added, "Dawn would understand."

"Dawn is nearly as insane as you are.  Are you sure they were all guys?  I mean, I can't think of any woman over the age of twelve who would put a place like this together, but—"

He looked over his shoulder at her before going back to his investigation of the van.  "Yeah.  Not just because of the porn, I could sense it."

She picked up what she thought at first was just a skateboard.  "This is some kind of motorized scooter.  What could they use that for?"

"Probably liked pretending they were Marty from Back to the Future.  I'm surprised they didn't try using it to escape."

"Spike, is there any movie that you haven't seen?"  Buffy opened a small drawer and stared at the contents.

"Yeah.  Ishtar.  Heeded the warnings for once.  Mind, I'm considering skipping Glitter too, even when it hits cable."

"Look at this!  These guys were the evil lint people!"

That distracted him from trying to focus a huge pair of binoculars at her chest. "Okay," he said in a tone that said it wasn't.  "Is that anything like Soylent Green?"

She glared at him. “Didn't I tell you about the evil lint?”

“Now you mention it, I think it came up around the time you were finishing off my whisky.  Can’t say as I took in the details.  Or even the main points.” 

“You mean you thought I was just drunk. But I didn't imagine it.  Look at these things!  That’s the evil lint.”

“Not doubting you, love.”  He peered over her shoulder.  "Look more like those computer chips Willow used to fix the Bot, though."

"Exactly!"

"Okay," he said again, in a tone that meant, "Girl's gone over the edge at last."

Buffy saw the tip of something lying under a zebra-striped throw.  She pulled out a long, white object.  "Ick.  I wonder what's missing this?  I hope it was foe, not friend."

Spike stopped trying to get an image back on the screen and reached out to touch the bone. "Whatever it is, it's been missing that piece a long time.  All dried out, but--there's energy in it.  And those symbols on it aren't bedtime stories."

"Great."  Buffy made a face.  "How do we find out what it is?  Because I want to know about everything these guys were doing.  Except the porn."

"One of the witches might know.  Or Rupert.  Best if we put it somewhere safe until we get it checked out."

She tapped her chin with one finger and stared at the roof of the van.  "Let's see, a safe place in Sunnydale—"

He was grinning at her.  "I'll hide it in the tunnels, until we can find out if it's dangerous or just the intercostal clavicle of a brontosaurus."

"Speaking of which, that lizard's innards—"

"One of those back gardens had a compost heap."

"Okay."  Do demon lizards even turn into compost? She shook the thought away and looked around the van.  "Anything else here we're smart enough to figure out?"

He shook his head.  "Not unless you think action figures and comic books are part of their evil plan."

"How lame are these guys?" Buffy reached up and yanked at a console board.  It came off with a satisfying screech.  All the lights on the equipment went out and the one remaining monitor gave a sad little beep as it died.  "Losers or not, I don't want them scavenging anything from here that they can use to spy on me." 

Instead of complaining at the loss of porn, Spike looked approving.  "Doing a bit of van—?"  He stopped, smiling and expectant.

He's going to let me say it. That's kind of sweet.  "Yep.  We're going to vandalize this thing."  Buffy picked up her axe.  "How bad do you think we can trash it before someone calls the cops?" She swung her weapon up and watched the expanded roof of the van crack from the rear almost all the way to the windshield.  The periscope-surveillance-thingie groaned, then heaved up and out, leaving a hole large enough for stargazing. "Look, I made them a moon roof." 

His eyes were gleaming with pleasure now, even more than when he'd spotted the porn.  "Slayer, are you really asking me to help you destroy private property?"

"Consider it an early birthday present."  Hmm, I wonder when his birthday is? With luck, today, and I won't have to figure out what to get the vampire who has nothing when it rolls around.

Less than five minutes later, Spike stopped in the act of shredding a zebra-striped pillow and snarled. "It's the coppers!  Time to blow this joint, toots." 

A fraction of a second later, Buffy heard the sirens too.  She stomped on an action figure, grinding plastic shards of something in tights into a pile of shredded comic books.  Then she snatched up her axe and the bone they'd found before jumping out the back of the van, which was now a mess of smashed equipment and shattered windows.  It was listing to one side, the end of one once-gleaming black bumper resting on the asphalt.  She evened up the slope a bit by taking a sideways swipe at a tire with her axe, as Spike made his exit by swinging out a side door, yanking it halfway off the hinges when he dropped to the ground.  They both hit the road, or at least the bike path that veered off toward Restfield Cemetery, a location not even a Sunnydale cop was stupid enough to enter, no matter how hot the pursuit or how mundane the criminal being pursued. 

And mundane we're not, although that was pretty childish of me.  And I don't care.  That was much better than one of my birthdays. 

Of course, that's not saying much. 

Please send feedback to: missmurchison@mchsi.com