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[sired1880spike]

A night to end all nights, it had been; I'd nearly killed Dawn, and then I'd really killed her, turning her blood to ice and making her like me. I could still smell the petrol, the taste of smoke on the wind as the Summers house burned. I glanced over at the passenger seat where Dawn sprawled, feet up against the dashboard, all coltish limbs and

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[lockless_key]

I'd only be lying if I said that the past few days have been the best days of my life 'cause I'm not alive anymore. What Spike and I had done... what I had done... it's something else. I used to dream about life after graduation, when I could take my diploma and just leave, go to a place where I've never been before and start all over. Have a new life. Become someone else.

Then Spike came back and everything changed.

Although I did become someone else, it wasn't quite what I had in mind. But it's so much better. Spike and I are more evenly matched now, and he doesn't have to hold back anymore, with me. While the games we'd play were interesting because of that edge of danger, my human fragility, now there's something else to it, something more heady and real

[sired1880spike]

Yeah, Dawn knew how to get around me. Mainly by getting on top of me, or underneath me. In this case, she'd straddled me, pulling my fly down and pushing me inside her before whispering "let's go to LA."

In the heat of the moment I'd agreed, o'course, and then afterwards had retracted my agreement. But Dawn persuaded me in the end. Think she's figured out I'm a bit of a soft touch, when it comes down to it.

We're driving along a dark highway, music blaring, and the signs for LA are flashing by more and more frequently now.

"Let's go see granddaddy."

"He's your great-grandpa," I point out. "How d'you feel about havin' Angel in the family?" I feel a strange squeeze of jealousy. I remember walking into a room and seeing Angel with another dark haired girl. Dru with her legs spread underneath him. I put a possessive arm around Dawn. "Not goin' to fall for the dark 'n forehead routine like your big sis, are you?"

[lockless_key]

"He's your great-grandpa."

I wave the correction away. "Whatever." That's besides the point, isn't it? The point is that I'm dead and joined the line of Aurelius, the bloodline that's produced some of the most fearsome vampires in the world. Or something. That's what Giles always said. I guess I've got quite the reputation to live up to.

Won't be hard.

"Not goin' to fall for the dark 'n forehead routine like your big sis, are you?"

It's just so damn cute that Spike's all jealous and worried! He slips his arm around me and I slide closer to him in the seat, wrapping my arms around his shoulders and kissing him chastely on the cheek.

"C'mon, have I done anything like she did? I won't if you don't want me to." I rest my cheek on his shoulder, 'cause there's something comforting about having him nearby. "But wouldn't it be hilarious to watch him squirm?"

[sired1880spike]

I like the way Dawn understands what I need, even if I can tell from her expression that she finds my jealousy amusing. She slides along the seat, pressing her thigh next to mine, and I breathe in the smell of her skin. Her head on my shoulder is a comforting weight.

"But wouldn't it be hilarious to watch him squirm?"

"Hey, wait a minute," I say indignantly, pushing her off my shoulder and prodding her, none too gently, in the side. "There will be no attempts to seduce Angel. Got that? Don't want bloody Angelus comin' back, for one thing," I say darkly. I've got too many memories of Angelus taking things I want. Far too many. "Be as nasty to him as you like. Just don't be too nice, yeah?"

I glance at the latest road sign. We're approaching LA.

"So where does the pillock hang his hat these days, d'you know?" I ask. "An' do you want to go an' find him right now, or d'you want to kill something first?"

[aknightforhire]

It's hard work. Running and jumping off of buildings and trudging through sludge and being hit and hitting things -- life fighting vampires is a full-body exercise routine nearly all the time, and sometimes all I want to do is curl up in a bathtub with a good book and a bottle of wine.

But after sixth months as CEO of the Los Angeles Branch of Wolfram and Hart, a little demon fighting feels like a trip to the spa. Or, well, what I imagine a trip to the spa would be like, having never been there myself, although I was subjected to a number of long lectures on the subjects of spas while Cordellia was still ali--

-- Was still awake.The trenchcoat and baggy sweater feel old friends now, after ... well, yeah. You know. And there's something freeing about not parting the damn ed hair. I may just ... skip that, from now on. Wesley says I look a bit like a late-forties aging punkster still trying to be 'cool

[lockless_key]

I laugh as Spike pokes me in the side. It doesn't hurt. "Calm down," I murmur, sliding my arms around his shoulders again, lips moving against the line of his jaw. "I was teasing. It'd just be funny is all." From what I remember of Angel, he was a little bit awkward - uncomfortable with too many people around, and desperately in love with my sister. It wouldn't take much to make him wig. Probably the very sight of us...

"Dunno," I said with a half-shrug, kissing him on the cheek again, then trailing light kisses down his throat, stopping just before the collar of his shirt. "Pull over."

I wait until he does. I can see the high-rises of downtown LA in the distance, but we're in a shadier part of town. Doesn't bother me. There's nothing here that can hurt me now. As he parks the car, I get out, tired of being surrounded by that much metal, feeling the evening air on my skin. It's not quite completely dark, that odd space between twilight and nighttime. I lean against the car and think, feel, listen.

"Can you hear him?"

[sired1880spike]

Dawn asks me to pull over and I obey, cos I like it when she tells me what to do, sometimes. She can be a bossy little thing, given how submissive she likes to play it in the sack.

We step out of the car, and I watch the way Dawn takes in the night. It reminds me of when I was first turned. The way everything felt different. More alive, which was sort of ironic.

"Can you hear him?"

"I'm not a bleedin' bat, love," I grumble, but I stand still, opening my ears and nose, taking in the sounds and smells of the city.

"He's been here before, I reckon," I say. "C'mon. We'll walk a bit." I put two cigarettes in my mouth, light them and pass one to Dawn. "Let's find the poof."

[aknightforhire]

I snarled and grabbed vampire number two by the front of his t-shirt, spinning him around and slamming him into the brick wall of the alleyway. He snarled back at me, and we glared at each other, teeth to teeth for a second, until he crumpled away into dust and ash, floating on the wind

[lockless_key]

"You're a vampire bat," I laugh, taking the cigarette from Spike and threading my arm through his. I could feel the nicotine going to my lungs from the first drag, but so what? It won't kill me now. And I love how much more aware I am of my body and what happens to do. Makes sex that much more... well, y'know.

We walk for a while, and I can hear the tiniest noises around us, and all the while, I'm keeping an eye out for Angel. The dark hair, the sweep of trench coat that I monk-remember. There's a feeling. I know Spike must feel it too, since he's higher up in the line. It's weak and vague but it's there.

I tug on Spike's arm and we follow it.

I can hear the fight from far away, miles, it seems. And the humans in the area don't notice a thing. Not that they'd care. LA is a whole other world. I might like it here. I squeeze Spike's arm and grin in the dark. I feel like having fun tonight.

I whisper, "This is gonna be fun."

[sired1880spike]

Dawn hangs on my arm. Smoke rises from her lips in the still night, curling blue into the dark heat of a summer midnight.

"This is gonna be fun," whispers Dawn, squeezing my arm, and I smile down at her, unable to resist smiling back at her glee, though I'm not altogether convinced visiting the poof is the best of ideas.

I can sense him long before I see him. S'pose cos he's family in a way, much as I don't want to think he is.

We lurk in the shadows of a building. Angel's doing his usual saving-the-day poncy bollocks. Gives some pretty girl help but doesn't even try to cop a feel, or flirt with her. What is the point of heroism if he has to be so po-faced about it?

"...you can come out. I know you're there. ...your hair smells."

I roll my eyes and drop my half smoked cigarette to the ground. Then, gesturing at Dawn to stay behind for a moment, I step out. I know she'll make a grand entrance at just the right moment.

"Angel," I say. "Fancy seein' you here."

[aknightforhire]

Seeing him come around the corner put a knot in my gut. It wasn't that I needed the visual confirmation, but ... seeing him, being near him... it always twisted me inside. Spike was a visual reminder of everything I was, everything I used to be, and everything I might be again, someday. It pulled at me, twisting inside and ...

"Spike," I turned squarely to face him and pulled the wooden stake back out of my coat pocket, fingering it and glaring at the bleached wonder. "Thought I made it clear you weren't ever to come here again. What happenned? Dru dump you again? You get lonely?"

[lockless_key]

Laughing softly as Angel calls out to Spike, I lean against the wall and finish off my cigarette, listening to them banter. It's kind of funny, seeing them get all growly and snipe at each other. But if Angel makes one wrong move, I swear, there's gonna be hell to pay. Nobody messes with us.

I mean, Angelus would've been more fun.

I drop the cigarette to the ground and grind it out with my shoe. I'm dressed simply today, in dark jeans and a plain black tshirt that sets off the color of my skin - or lack thereof, I guess. Angel pulls out a stake. I guess it's my turn to make a move.

Stepping out of the shadows, I toss my hair back and wrap my arms around Spike's shoulders from behind, watching Angel over his shoulder. "Lonely?" I say softly, and laugh. "Hardly." If Angel's any smart at all, he'll notice that I'm not exactly the same girl as I used to be all those years ago. In more ways than one.

[sired1880spike]

Angel pulls out a stake and I have to laugh, seeing him threaten me with that thing. Like he could bloody take me. I feel untouchable.

Dawn steps out from behind me. I can hear her grinding her cigarette beneath her shoe. As she wraps her cool arms around me, I can smell the smoke clinging to her. The press of her body against my back is enough to get me hard, and I'm tempted to throw her down and screw her right here in front of Angel, shag the hell out of her, because it'll hurt him. Because she's all that's left of Buffy, his true-sodding-love, and I've killed her and made her mine. Seems fair, given how much he's taken from me.

"Lonely? Hardly."

Dawn's voice is Dawn's girl voice, but now with something harder behind it, and I grin at Angel's dumbfounded face.

"Upgraded," I say, smiling. "Now I'm nobody's whipping boy."

[aknightforhire]

You know, it's amazing how little a man can change, even with over a hundred years to his name. Willie, William the Bloody, 'Spike' (what a juvenile moniker. He may just as well have named himself Package or Stacked or anything else that shouted 'compensating for something else!') -- whatever he called himself, he was still the same young little 'Willie' that Darla brought home, still warm, still squishy inside, still yearning for someone else's attention and adulation. Someone else's approval. I ... I've started.. to tune out, a little. It's always the same thing from him, over and over, the same arguments, the same ploys, the same gags, and really, it's so juvenile, so beneath ...

I snorted, looked to the left with a smirk, and fingered the stake in my hand. I wanted to wipe that smug look off his face, I wanted to hurt him. It was... so... It was instinct.

"Spike--"

And that's when ~she~ came around the corner, and my world ~stopped.~

[lockless_key]

Spreading my fingers posessively over Spike's chest, I laugh into his shoulder, looking over it as reactions flicker over Angel's face. I'd almost liked him, back in Sunnydale, until he'd turned all evil and terrorized Buffy's friends and then took off. He never gave me the time of day, even though I was just a kid then... even though they were only monk-memories. I don't think it would've gone any different if they were real.

He's not very good at hiding his emotions, that much's for sure.

Slowly unwrapping my arms from Spike's shoulders, I slip my thumbs into the back pockets of my jeans and step around him, pausing for a moment to look at Angel appraisingly. Then, before he knows it, I'm next to him and the stake is in my hand. He's older than me, and stronger, but I surprised him. He wasn't expecting it and I got the better of him. Don't think it'll happen again, but oh, well, it was fun.

"Don't think you'll be needing that," I say, twirling the stake between my fingers. "What? Cat got your tongue?"

[sired1880spike]

I grin as Dawn manages to magic the stake out of Angel's hands. She moves like smoke, and he looks like the big dumb ox he is. Stupid prick, thinking I can't surprise him any more. Oh, I think I've still got a trick or two up my sleeve.

"What? Cat got your tongue?"

"Angel's never been much of a conversationalist, pet," I observe. "Unless it's to give a lecture. So, Grandpa," I said, smiling at him, "are you going to lecture us for being very bad children this year?"