A/N These in betweener stories take place after an episode (eg. Prophecy Girl) or during an episode (eg. Flooded). It helps to have a good working knowledge of the series, or, at the least, these particular episodes. Also, I know it might annoy some people, but I wrote in Spike's accent because I love apostrophes. This is a habit you can blame Gambit of the X-Men for ;) I don't own any of these characters, etc. Please don't sue; I am poor. I suggest adjusting the formatting to Verdana, standard size or one larger.

*

The Porch Sessions

Prophecy Girl

A mangled but still shiny car pulled up in front of a house on the dimly lit Revello Drive at a quarter to two. A honey-haired girl in a white dress stepped out, followed by a red head and a dark haired boy who both hugged her in turn. They laughed about something, and the later two got back into the car and drove away as the first girl walked slowly up to her front door.

"Well, well. What do we have here?" whispered a voice from across the street, behind the privet. "All alone, with nobody to hear her scream." A sinister smile gleamed in the moonlight, and the squeak of leather broke the silence.

The girl spun on the spot, and her observer stepped back into the shadows, curious.

A blur came from her left, and the man in the shadows recognized it as a vampire-- But not before the girl did. In a whirl of white fabric, the girl high-kicked her attacker in the face, sending him sailing half-way across the lawn. T he man in the shadow's jaw dropped and he looked annoyed but impressed.

"You gotta be kidding..." he muttered to no one in particular.

The fight continued, but it was short-lived. Another set of heavy kicks the vampire's face and gut followed. As he lay moaning on the grass, struggling to sit up, the girl ran and jumped very high towards the pine tree on the edge of the property. She returned to the vampire's side with a weighty branch she'd broken off, and staked him directly in the heart with what appeared to the man in the shadows as a practiced move.

The cloud of dust disappeared and the girl tossed the branch to the side, brushed off her dress, and made her way up the porch steps as though she did this every night.

Her one man audience looked resigned, but optimistic. "Well, three is a lucky number," he conceded. "Maybe this was a good night after all." With that, he shoved his hands in his pockets and walked off, in search of better hunting grounds.