Happy 25th round!
Title: Ka-bump!
Author Relurker
Setting: post series
Rating: G
Hi guys! This is my first time here as a writer, so I’m thrilled and a little anxious.
My very short entry is just a moment of Buffy & Spike’s continuing adventures, somewhen after series.
Ka-bump!
By Relurker
Bump!
Another pothole in the bloody road. Spike swore under his breath. The endless movement had been bad enough while on the freeway, but this was getting painful. The noise alone was torture enough. He tried to find a better arrangement: after all, he’d been in smaller coffins. He shifted and turned… his boots caught on the snow chains box, his head hit the wheel compartment. Bloody hell! A coffin would have been far superior. One could always stretch one’s legs in one of those. By the weak light of his batman penlight keyholder-a gag gift-he’d explored the boot: snow chains, miniature car tool pouch, reflecting triangle and vest, all the legal accoutrements, and not a clue as to why the whole thing smelled so foul. Only reading material was the car manual, that’d lost its riveting quality somewhere about the maintenance of spark plugs. It was like reading a badly written story that you’ve already lived through a hundred times. Also, the penlight battery was starting to fail.
The car braked abruptly. Then started, stopped, started and stopped again before getting on something metallic: clang, clang, ka-clang. The boot was totally blacked out, not a chance of any sunlight in it, but Spike could feel the sun shining implacably on the outside, slowly warming the vehicle to the point of discomfort, while the ferry was crossing to the other bank. So what if he didn’t need to breath, he was suffocating all the same. He must have fallen asleep or lost consciousness-NOT fainted- then for a while, until another series of undeciferable clatters and thumps woke him, and the car was on a bumpy road again.
Clunk, whirrr-clunk, whirrr-clunk, whirrr-clunk-clunk-bump-clunk. That would have been an overpass, and after that there was a series of hard turns left and right, that jarred him to and fro, interspersed with sudden brakings and accelerations. He could just about make out other drivers yelling and honking over the loud engine noise. Would this trice damned, hellish trip never end? A vampire couldn’t possibly stand much more than this, his forbearance had reached a breaking point. Spike roared. He hit the partition with both fists and kicked uselessly at the carpeted metal. The only result was more rattle and shake, but then the car slowed, moved downward on smoother ground, turned around a few times squeaking loudly and finally-FINALLY!-stopped. In the blessed silence he heard the driver walk around the car and knock lightly on the trunk: “You all right in there? It’s okay to come out, now, we’re underground. If you’ve dented the rental they’ll put it on my credit card bill, you know?”
Spike opened the lid mechanism from the inside and peeked out sheepishly, disheveled and kind of chalky looking. “Sorry, love. In case, I’ll cover it. Don’t think I did anythin’ bad though, this car’s build like a tank.” Fresh and pretty as a picture as usual, Buffy gave him a hand out, a frown line forming between her eyebrows because he did look unsteady, with slighly panicky wild eyes. Out of the trunk and on his feet again in the cool of the underground garage, he felt his temper rising once more. “Of all the barmy, senseless ideas for traveling, this moving around inside the boot takes the bloody cake! I won’t do the back trip in there, you hear me?”
Buffy smiled sweetly at him, made air quotes and parroted with her horrible sounding English accent: "Three hours? Not a bloody problem, is it? Buffy can drive the rental, I'll sleep it off in the boot. We'll be there by tonight, slay, come back before dawn…"
Spike gritted his teeth and narrowed his eyes: "You know, slayer, bitching is just about as attractive as saying I told you so"
"Rats. Let's try it another way," she said in her normal, slightly teasing voice. "How about, before leaving I reserved us a cottage with a northern exposure and ocean view for tonight and tomorrow, and extended the lease on the car till the next day?"
Spike did a double take, gulped, and a slow, real smile lightened up his face.
He jumped to retrieve the weapons bag from the back seat. “What are we waiting for, then? The sooner we finish with the slaying, the sooner we can check on that ‘ocean view!’”
Before leaving the garage for their monster hunt, Spike paused to kick the wheel of the rental car, affectionately. “We’ll wait after next sundown to go back and I’ll do the driving, see if we can make it in less than two hours”.
He checked her from the corner of his eye, and…score!-this time, it was Buffy’s turn to look a bit panicky.
_______
Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters and settings are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. No money is being made from this work. No copyright infringement is intended.