Future Written in Blood ((Complete))

*****A/N: I’ve been having an air-head moment as opposed to a senior moment, I guess. Anyway, several people asked me to email them when there are updates, but that list has since been lost. If you do want me to add your name to my list, please let me know. I promise to keep up with it this time.

Thanks again go to Isis for her help. Thanks!!!!

Chapter 3 A Less Than Enthusiastic Hero

As the DeSoto roared down the highway, not for the first time Spike wished that the old legends of vampires being able to morph into bats and fly wherever the hell they wanted were true. ‘Would have been a damn sight faster than driving down these bleedin’ highways.’ Passing the “Welcome to Sunnydale” sign, Spike didn’t even spare a glance. Damn, damn, damn. His latest vision would make a vampire sweat, or at least, this vampire with his warped protective instincts towards a certain sassy slayer and her annoying friends.

Squinting through the small opening in the paint covering the windshield, it had been really hard to not break the speed limits from Las Vegas to Sunnydale, but Spike just didn’t fancy getting pulled over by a highway patrolman. Usually cops were fun to screw around with, but this trip was taking place during daylight hours. Made it a bit tricky to roll down the window to have a nice chat with the bobby. As a result, Spike restrained his foot from smashing the gas petal to the floor board, while again replaying the vision of the Slayer, Red and Harris over and over in his head. Each time he tried desperately to figure out the ending he never saw. He was sick about the loss of the witch. Mental images of Red lying in the grass with a werewolf gnawing on her neck and shoulder. Even the loss of Harris gave him a small twinge, but only a small one. It was thoughts of the Slayer, the silly chit, that made him more and more edgy during the long drive. She would be left to battle through jacked up werewolves. Normally not a particularly big deal for the highly capable slayer, but this was not going to be a normal circumstance. Try as he might, Spike had no idea how the Slayer would fare fighting over the corpses of her dearest mates.

From time to time throughout the long drive, Spike tried to focus his obsessive thoughts on a different topic, but only ended up cursing the slowly passing miles. Bugger it all, he had even run out of smokes 60 miles back. Silly pillocks, probably wouldn’t even appreciate his sacrifice just to save their puny, ungrateful arses.

Finally arriving at the proper cemetery, Spike drove his car as close as he could then covered the rest of the distance in a full out sprint. When he finally raced into the clearing, Buffy had just killed her second werewolf, and Willow and Xander were still fighting off another. Spike launched himself as the werewolf’s sharp claws swung at Willow. A flying tackle easily brought the surprised, but dangerous, little doggie down. Straddling the werewolf, Spike rained punches down as fast as possible while yelling over to Xander, “Harris, drop and cover!”

“Huh? What?”

“Incoming, you soddin nit-wit!”

Instinct developed from his very brief stint in the military (one Halloween night) kicked in and Xander dropped face first onto the grass just in time to duck a newcomer to their little werewolf party

The rest of the fight went quick with Buffy killing her opponent and going to help Willow and Xander with the one that had tried to attack Xander. Spike enthusiastically killed the one that would have killed the witch, and after noting that the slayer had the situation well in hand, he headed back to his car. Somewhere a pack of cigarettes had to be calling his name, and who was he to argue?

The Scoobies could hear the vampire cussing and grumbling while he headed away. Xander stood in the clearing, looking bewildered, “Color me confused. What was that?”

Willow punched Xander lightly in the shoulder, “Duh much, Xander? Werewolves.”

Rubbing his shoulder absently, Xander frowned at Willow, “No, I meant Dead Boy, Jr. He didn’t even stay for his usual gloat time or try to extract some payment.”

Buffy shook her head and laughed, never fully understanding the vampire herself. “He doesn’t really get money from us anymore. Just likes the fights, I think. But then when isn’t our resident master vampire strange? He’ll probably drive us crazy tomorrow night with a brag-a-thon.”

*****

As the Scoobies discussed him, Spike stomped the rest of the way back to retrieve his car, still with a splitting headache and thoroughly ticked that he had had to leave that posh suite at the Hard Rock Casino for this rotten cemetery. He sucked down a quick pint of blood while he drove back to his crypt and unceremoniously dove into his bed to sleep all the recent shenanigans off. He added a pillow over his head for good measure.

*******
The next afternoon, the sleeping vampire was woken up by someone knocking on the crypt’s door. Well, it certainly wasn’t the Slayer or Nibblet. Those two never stopped to knock. As he came up the ladder, Spike spotted Willow poking her head in the door she had now tentatively cracked open. He started to head back down, mentally cringing, ‘Please save me from another wanker coming to thank me.’ This was starting to give even this seasoned vampire the creeps. But on second thought, maybe it would be good to have one of the Scoobies beholden to him. Hell, now that he looked back on the past night’s timely rescue, they should all be thanking him.
He cli the the rest of the way up and nodded her way, “Red. What brings you calling?” As if he didn’t know. He smiled to himself as he fished around in his frig for breakfast.

Not too sure how to approach this, Willow plastered a bright smile on her face and took a hesitant step forward. “Spike, last night you were gone so fast. We didn’t get a chance to say thanks for the save.”

Spike gave a short bark of laughter. “We?”

Caught fibbing, exaggerating actually, Willow’s cheeks turned a light shade of red. Gathering her dwindling courage back together, Willow continued in her best perky voice, “Well, me actually. So…Thanks!”

Seemingly unphased, Spike continued to poke around the contents of his ice box. He finally pulled out a styrofoam container but froze, arm still upraised, after his first drink.

“Spike?” Willow walked a little closer, trying to get a better look at his face. She had never known him to stand so perfectly still. “Ground control calling Spike.” She waved a hand in front of his face with no response. He didn’t even blink. Do vampires blink? “Spike?”

Suddenly his face contorted to what looked to be predominantly anger with a touch of fear. When she reached out and touched his arm, Spike jerked back and finally focused his eyes on her. “Red. I think I’m gonna puke.”

Willow took a hasty step backwards. “Big eeewww on vampire vomit. Icky, it would be blood, wouldn’t it?”

Spike looked dazed for a moment. “Uh?...yeah, most likely.”

“Why don’t you try sitting down instead. Let’s skip the whole spewing part.” Willow waved a hand towards Spike’s chair.

Spike made it to his chair. Willow knelt down next to him watching with concern as the vampire held his head between his hands, shaking it from side to side.

“Oh, God, Dawn is in danger or is going to be. Whichever. I’m not too fond of these visions anymore.”

“Spike? What about Dawnie? Tell me about the vision.”

Not meeting her eyes, Spike groaned. “You’ll never believe me. Hell, I barely believe me.”

“Already think you’re pretty strange. See, no problem there. So, why don’t you tell me what you saw anyway.”

“Well, it seems, Red, that I have been having a spot of second sight lately. But first let me rewind and replay just a bit.”

Amazed, Willow listened to the tale of Spike’s last couple of days. Saving Carol there in Sunnydale, the poker game, the trip to Las Vegas and the winnings, then the vision that told him that Willow and Xander would not survive the werewolf attack, and his subsequent return to Sunnyhell. Spike made it through to the saving Willow and Xander part before stopping to look at Willow. “Well?”

Willow was unsure what to think, “Uh…Wow?”

“That’s all you can say? I think the fact that I can see into the bloody future should rank up the scale a tad more than a pansy little ‘wow,’ don’t you?”

“Oh….Super!?”

“Arrrggg. At least tell me this. Do you believe me?”

“Well…”making her “sorry” face.

“Bloody hell. Ok, tell me this. Why would I leave a posh suite, free mind you, in Vegas, and travel through daylight hours to get back to Sunnyhell of all places? It certainly wasn’t for the warm fuzzies and support I get here from you blokes.” Frustrated, Spike was up, pacing across the room and then back, “How did I even know that you, the whelp, and the Slayer would be fighting werewolves? How did I know to save you first. For that matter, how would I even know which cemetery to go to? I’m a vampire, not a card carrying member of the psychic network.”

“You had your palm read? Tarrot cards maybe?”

Spike ran over to his duffle bag, opening it wide, showing her all the money inside. “How would I have gotten all of this? Nearly two mil in there, pet.”

“I don’t know. Uh, maybe I don’t want to know.”” Willow thought about it for a moment and started to frown. “Ok, say I do believe you. Were you having a vision in front of the refrig? I think I saw that in the original Ghostbusters movie. You know where Sigourney Weaver opened the frig and sees a weird temple looking thingy with animals that look all grrrrh.”

“Yes, it was a vision but no bloody Ghostbusters.” Now exasperated, Spike paced back to stand in front of her. “I saw the Nibblet, and she was in danger.”

“Dawnie, right?”

“Y Di Didn’t we already do this part?” Spike ran his hand through his now curly hair while he paced again. “So just pretend with me for a sec. Just pretend that you do believe me and help me work through this.”

“I thought you just saw it all visiony like.”

“I did but I need to figure out the when, where, how and most importantly, who I need to kill to stop this.” Spike looked Willow square in the eyes. “Red, it looked like she was being kidnapped.”

“Ok, I am great at the helping part. Tell me what you saw.”

“Actually, I saw three, separate flashes this time. Disconcerting, it was. In the first, the platelet was definitely at the Bronze dancing with some pimple-faced git.”

“When!” Willow interrupted. “Got it. Buffy promised Dawn that if she passed her English test, that we would celebrate Friday night at the Bronze. What else did you see?”

“The platelet was in the alley behind the Bronze with the same git. He was trying to kiss her. Remind me to have a little chat with the fellow when this is all over.”

“Will do, big bro to Little Bit.”

“Anyway, I saw some thug-type knock the little pillock out and take Bite Size.”

“Did you recognize anyone besides Dawn?”

“Must have been from out of town – didn’t recognize a one.”

“Check. What was the last part you saw?”

“Two blokes, that will also be minus their heads when I find them, were holding the Nibblet between them. Bit was putting up quite a fight. Her lip was split open, and she had a bruise on her cheek. There was a third bloke giving her the once over,iousiously in charge.”

“So where were they? Maybe since it’s only Monday, and we’ve got until Friday, we can go over there and take care of them before they ever even try to grab Dawnie.”

“Good idea, Red. One teeny problem, though.”

“What?”

“I don’t have the foggiest where the hell they were!”

“Ok, ok. Sit down again, close your eyed ged get a mental of the place they are…err…will be holding Dawn. What details do you see?”

After much work and helpful questioning by Willow, Spike was able to guess at three possible locations, which he wrote down for her. Spike made Willow promise to wait until Thursday morning to tell Buffy if he had not taken care of the situation already.

“One last thing, Red. You are good at computers and numbers, right? Can you also cook some books for me?”

“Depends.”

Zipping the duffle bag back up, Spike handed it to Willow. “Take half this money and beef up the Summers’ bank account. Use hacker liberties and make up some cover story for the girls. Distant relative kicked his heels up and left them some money. Anything. I don’t care what but no sign that it is from me. A slayer and a key should have some security in life. Hide the rest for an emergency.”

“Like now?”

“Good point. Use it all if you need to.”

“You mean if you don’t come back.”


TBC


Reviews are very appreciated. Madrog@ev1.net