it's like a buddy movie (only without the buddy part)
Chapter Fourteen: Fifty Eggos in Various Stages of Thaw
Spike pulled the sleeping bag over his head and rushed from car to porch as quickly as he could manage in his condition, banging on the front door when he reached it. “Gettin’ a bit crispy out here!” he called loudly. “Willow, you wanna open this bloody…”
His voice trailed off when Xander shoved him aside gently and tried the handle. The door swung open freely.
“Oh. Right, well, I was about to try that, but I figured --”
“Uh huh. Sure.”
“What? We told the girls to lock themselves up, didn’t we? No reason to believe otherwise.” Once the door was safely closed behind them, Spike shrugged off the sleeping bag and collapsed tiredly in the nearest chair.
“Okay, hang on, I’m gonna find Wil and give a quick ‘I have this horrible flu thing’ call in to work,” Xander said.
“Wouldn’t that be a LIE, Harris? Lying’s WRONG, you know.” Spike tried to offer up a snarky grin, but he found he was too exhausted to muster it properly. He let his head fall back and slouched lower in the chair, putting his feet up on the coffee table.
“So I should be making with the truth? ‘Sorry, boss, I can’t make it in today. I have to go chop the head off a demon that bears a striking resemblance to Bullwinkle. Oh, and I’m doing said demon decapitation with my pal the neutered vampire.’ Yeah. That’d go over real well.” Xander shook his head and bounded up the stairs.
“Not your pal!” Spike called after him. He grumbled to himself and looked around for the TV remote.
He didn’t find it, though. Something else caught his attention. A small noise, rustle of skirts, and a strange mix of scents: floral perfume and burning ozone.
Do not make eye contact, he willed himself. Perhaps it’ll just go away on its own.
But it didn’t. Light, staccato footsteps on the parquet floor slowed halfway into the living room.
“Hi!” came a merry voice.
Oh, balls.
Spike cleared his throat, but still didn’t look up. “Er, right. Hi yourself. You’ve not seen the control for the telly, have you?”
In his peripheral vision, Spike could see a blur of hair whipping around. “Nope! Sorry. But I can turn it on for you if you’d like.”
And then there she was, clear as day, standing right in front of the television, crouching down to press the “on” button.
“No, that’s… don’t bother,” Spike said quietly.
“Okay!” She straightened up again and plopped herself on the sofa. “Did you kill things last night?” she asked, blinking at him with huge, innocent green eyes. “You should’ve brought me with you. I can kill lots of things, you know.”
He cringed. “Yeah, and you’re right good at it, too.”
Where are the others already? Spike wondered, his agitation growing by the second. He turned around and glared up at the staircase. Come on, you nits! Don’t leave me here with –
“Spike? Is something wrong?”
He couldn’t help it. Spike looked right at the ‘bot, and for a second, everything seemed as it should be. Except that this couldn’t really be Buffy, not if she was smiling happily at him, looking hopeful and pleased with herself.
Oh, God, if it only COULD really be her…
Suddenly, feet pounded down the stairs, and Spike sighed with relief. “Took you lot long enough,” he muttered, gesturing vaguely at the sofa. “Havin’ a conversation with this one isn’t so much fun.”
The ‘bot grinned up at Willow and Xander. “I made breakfast!” she announced.
Xander squirmed nervously. “Yikes, okay, last time you did that I had to break out the fire extinguisher. Spike, fill Willow in. I’m gonna make sure the curtains aren’t burning up or something.”
“Can’t you take her with you?” Spike asked, but Xander had already disappeared into the next room. “Bugger.”
“What’s going on?” Willow asked. “I thought we told you guys there wasn’t anything to worry about. No badness to be found.” She sat down next to the ‘bot, who smiled at her in something like daughterly awe.
“Thank you for my new battery. I’m feeling full of extra pep today.”
Willow rolled her eyes. “Yes, that’s… that’s GOOD, um, Buffy…”
Spike made a low, menacing growl.
“’Bot,” Willow quickly added. “BuffyBot.” She peeked at Spike, who was becoming more and more visibly uncomfortable. “Yeah, uh, why don’t you go up to my room and… and read or something,” she suggested.
The ‘bot sprang to her feet. “I can finish the book I found under your bed. It was very interesting and had pictures.” She scampered upstairs.
Willow looked pained. “The book under my… OH! Oh, dear. That’s not the sort of… I – I meant for her to read, you know, books on magic or demons or…”
Spike raised an eyebrow. “What’s this amazing tome you got stashed beneath the mattress, Red?”
Willow pursed her lips. “None of your business, that’s what it is.”
“Bet your ladylove likes it right good, though, eh?”
Willow shook her index finger at him. “Not talking about things like that! I’m here to be filled in. So, start filling.”
“Take away all my fun,” Spike groused. “Yeah, well, seems our boy’s got some sort of spell goin’ on over himself that cloaks him from others. ‘S why you and yours couldn’t see him last night. Harris and I witnessed the ritual, hence it appears we’re immune.”
Xander rushed back into the room then, slightly out of breath. Willow met his anxious gaze.
“Fire?” she asked worriedly.
“No fire,” Xander reported. “But there are approximately fifty Eggos on the counter in various stages of thaw.”
“Ew,” Willow blanched. “Maybe I need to reprogram her so she doesn’t --”
“Focus, people!” Spike demanded. “I was just gettin’ to the good part, too.”
“Sorry, sorry, yes. Cloaking spell,” Willow said.
Xander flopped down on the sofa. “Any idea how we can undo the spellness so we can catch this guy? Or what about putting some kind of mystical tracer dealie on him?”
Willow frowned. “I really don’t see the point. There’s no demon.”
Xander blinked. “Spike, did you not tell her YET AGAIN that there is, in fact, a demon?”
“I did.”
“Crap,” Xander muttered. “Wil, there is TOO a demon. You guys just can’t…” He paused. “Wait. It’s not just that you can’t see it, you can’t even process its existence, can you?”
“What, like it’s gettin’ eaten right out of their heads even as we tell ‘em about it, that it?” Spike asked. He leaned forward and looked closely at Willow. “Wil? What’d I just yammer on about?”
Willow looked from Xander to Spike. “The BuffyBot made a bunch of waffles,” she said.
“Yeah, we got that part,” Xander said patiently. “What about the rest of it?”
“You...” she gestured at Xander weakly. “You want me to… put a tracer on something.”
Spike touched his left index finger to his nose and pointed at Willow. “Right, yes, and? Put a tracer on what?”
Willow looked pensive. “Some… guy?” she offered lamely.
Xander groaned and smacked his forehead. “This is getting us nowhere.”
“Should we even bother tryin’ to ring Rupert?” Spike asked.
“At this point? I don’t know. Although if we can be vague enough about what we need, maybe he could give us more books.”
“No. Ain’t doin’ another lick of research on this,” Spike said. “Had my fill.”
“Me, too, but what else can we do?” Xander asked.
The front door opened, and Dawn entered, looking wan and exhausted.
“Hey, Dawnie!” Willow chirped. “How was the inventory?”
“We’re not done.” Dawn’s voice was a monotone. “There’s more FUN,” she said, punctuating the word with air quotes, “awaiting me this afternoon. I’ve only been let out on furlough long enough to feed.”
“There’s apparently a hundred thousand waffles in there,” Spike said, jerking his thumb toward the kitchen.
“Huh? Why so many?”
“Don’t ask,” everyone else replied in unison.
Dawn paused a moment. “Uh, okayyyy. Hey, whatever. Waffles.” She looked at the guys, who both wore expressions of utter gloom and annoyance. “Why the long faces?” she asked. “Is it ‘cause your little car chase was a stupid idea? We told you, there’s nothing out there.”
Xander made a noise eerily akin to a possum attempting to loose itself from a steel trap.
“You really shouldn’t worry us when there’s nothing to, you know, worry about,” Willow pointed out. “What if you keep doing this, and then something REALLY bad comes around?”
“It’ll be like you’re the boys who cried demon,” Dawn added, smiling at her own cleverness.
Willow giggled.
Spike straightened up in his chair. “Hang on. What’d you just say?”
“The boys who cried demon?” Dawn repeated.
“So you recall that we told you there WAS a demon,” Spike pressed.
Xander brightened. “Whoa, hang on, this could be a good sign!”
“Spot on!” Spike agreed. “Fissures in the cloaking whatsit are startin’ to crack, they are, and --”
“What?” Dawn interrupted. “There’s a demon?”
“Oh, bloody hell.”
Xander groaned. “My thoughts exactly.”