Title: Books, Bookings and Blondes
Author: SCWLC
Rating: Around PG-13, I think. Some innuendo and bad words.
Summary: This is my rewrite of S6 that turned into an AU immediate future fiction.
Pairings: Yes, I actually have something here other than B/A. It's Spike/Darla. Don't kill me.
Notes: Okay, first of all, to those who wanted to know from my last essay, I have a paper due in a week and a half on stained glass. Now you know. On this story, I would like to say that I made up the station in Indiana. I don't know if there is a KWBL out there, I just was making up the station. Second, I know I'm writing Spike a lot nicer than he is in reality but I wanted to have a happy story. So, to keep the angst to a minimum I wrote him as a really nice guy. Next, I was also making up the numbers for the money Buffy got paid for her story and books. I realise things are different in the real world, but I refuse to research a pastime to avoid insulting real authors.
Thanks to everyone for your feedback. You're the people who make failing Medieval Architecture worth it.
*********************
Prologue
Darla was feeling desperate. Her baby boy was going to die because she was a vampire and some stupid primal power was keeping them from giving her a caesarean. She looked around at Angel and his little band of friends as they stared back at her helplessly.
Suddenly Fred frowned slightly and asked Darla, "When you were tryin' to get the baby out before ... Y'know, when you found out that you couldn't hurt him, what exactly did you do?"
Darla glared at the girl and spat, "I was just trying to get him out! Okay!? I stabbed myself in the gut, I tried just cutting myself open, and nothing worked!" Despite the furious words the vampiress' face crumpled and she sobbed, "He's going to die-"
"Maybe not," said Fred.
Wesley looked at the young woman he had a crush on and asked, "Fred, there's no way Darla can manage a proper labour to give birth, and if we can't..." he trailed off, unsure of the way to express the grim notion.
Cordelia had no such compunction, "We can't cut her open Fred!" she said vehemently, "She said she tried it herself. I don't think we'll have any more luck."
"Maybe not if we try to do it the way she did." Fred had a sly look on her face, "But Darla said she never tried to actually do it to save the baby's life. Maybe if we do a proper C-section-"
Angel looked up with dawning hope, "The Powers are protecting the baby. If we go about this to save him rather than harm him, we might be able to save his life!"
At his words, the others perked up and began to sterilise the room, and put together the necessary implements to operate on Darla. Two hours later she and Angel were cooing at their son, and making all sorts of ridiculous facial expressions that new parents make at their children. Gunn had passed out in the grand tradition of the unprepared viewer of a live birth, while Wesley and Fred were looking inordinately pleased with themselves. Cordelia was being practical and shopping for necessities such as blankets, baby formula, baby clothes, and that necessity above all necessities, disposable diapers.
*************
Out in Sunnydale, a slayer struggled with her resurrection, bills, and confused feelings for a blonde vampire who seemed to be the only person around to realise that she was hanging by a thread.
*************
Part One
It was a lovely day in Sunnydale, the sun was shining, the trees were chirping as they fluttered from place to place, while the birds' feathers shivered in the slight breeze. It was also a typical day in Sunnydale.
Willow and Tara were involved in trying to correct the work of a warlock who's plan of world domination using an army of trees and shrubs had been seriously compromised by a starling fluttering into the middle of his spell. Now there were a couple of normally potted plants hopping around the magic shop leaving a trail of dirt, and Dawn was defending the rights of an adorable little geranium to exist as a motile creature. Xander and Anya were preoccupied with frantic attempts to capture the other plants before they covered everything with mud.
The only two people uninvolved with the plant crisis were Spike and Buffy. Spike, because he had more sense than to hang around a bunch of chirping bonsai trees, and Buffy because she was trying to find a way to pay for both the water and food, without going into debt. It was so riveting she didn't hear the chaos going on around her.
"Tara! You can't turn her back into a regular flower, she'll be so sad," Dawn held the trembling plant under the witch's nose, then pulled it against her chest and petted it, "Isn't she just the most adorable wittle planty, yes she is!" Dawn cooed to the cheeping geranium.
Okay, so Buffy wasn't completely unaware of her surroundings, ( "Xander! It's in the cash register! Don't let it damage the money!" cried Anya), but she was determined to find a solution to her fiscal problems, and that meant concentrating on monetary flow, not on the really big bush hopping up and down in front of the window that some nutcase had attached a leash and doggie sweater to.
At that moment, Buffy decided that perhaps it might be less . . . insane elsewhere. "Guys, I'm heading home so I can work on this money thing," she said.
"Are you sure -- Anya! Go left, there's a spider plant over your head! -- Are you sure you don't want to stay -- Bad bush! -- stay here?" Xander inquired.
Buffy smiled at the sight of the spider plant trying to fly out the window, and having all the success a wingless plant could have, and replied, "I think I'll probably get more done at home than here."
So she said her goodbyes and left. Walking down the street, Buffy could see all sorts of interesting things. The palm trees hopping up and down in a vain attempt to fly away, Mrs. O'Neal hollering as she chased her prized gardenias down past the hardware store, and several escaped emus from the local zoo standing stock still with glazed looks on their faces as worried zoo staff tried to get them to dislodge their feet from the dirt.
Buffy got home, just barely managing to avoid being crushed by a loudly chirping, hopping, out-of-control oak tree on the front lawn. "The bigger they are, the smaller they think they are," sighed Buffy as she entered the house.
At the slight scent of singed hair and leather the Slayer looked up to see Spike leaning against the wall in the living room. "What are you doing here?" she asked tiredly.
"The ivy on my crypt wall was startin' to act funny so I hightailed it out here. You don't have any plants in your house do you?" he responded.
Buffy chuckled slightly, saying, "No, although Dawn may soon be bringing home a cheeping geranium. I hope she takes better care of it than all the plants I've managed to kill."
"Well then until the plants get fixed can I sleep in your basement?" the expression on his face was so hangdog and desperate Buffy didn't have the heart to throw him out.
"Okay, but if I catch you telling Dawn any more stories about the days of blood guts and gore, you're out in the street. Got it?" Spike just nodded and hurried down the stairs, leaving Buffy to work on her bills in peace. Accompanied by the crashing sounds of potted plants leaping to their doom.
She sat down at the table and started into her budget to find things she could cut so they would still have electricity as well as the enormous luxury of food. Shuffling the bills between those that needed to be paid immediately, those that could wait, and the other expenses she garnered like the fact that she needed some new cords for her crossbow, and Dawn had a science fair coming up which usually required obscene amounts of money spent on pipe cleaners.
Buffy had just finished working the budget out to her satisfaction, albeit not Dawn's, when she noticed it. It being the magazine with a huge cover ad in yellow, black, red, and green. It practically vibrated on the cover advertising a chance to be a published author and win $1,500. Naturally the money caught Buffy's eye and she flipped through the magazine until she found the details of the contest. All one had to do to enter was write a science fiction or fantasy story, fill out the form and mail the package in. First prize was a huge wad of cash and being published, second and third were smaller wads of cash and being published.
Dawn and the others came home then. "Buffy! What do you think of Gerry as a name for my plant?" Dawn demanded, "Tara says she knows how to exclude her from the reversal spell."
"You mean aside from the fact that I'll be thinking of that Spice girl every time we talk about it?" Buffy replied.
Xander and Anya had followed Buffy's younger sister in and were carrying bags of takeout Chinese food. "Hey everybody! We come bearing tribute!" called Xander.
"Did you bring blood?" Spike demanded, "If I'm not allowed to sleep, which is my right as a nocturnal creature, you could at least get me some food too." He came tramping irritably up the stairs.
Anya looked over at Buffy, "You know, although Spike is hot I don't see why you don't kill him." At that Spike looked quite baffled as to whether he ought to be affronted or complimented. "You are the Slayer, why don't you kill him?"
"More to the point, why is he here?" asked Xander.
"The ivy was freaking him out." Buffy responded shortly. "I haven't killed Spike because killing something helpless is wrong."
Dawn marched up to the vampire in question and linked her arm with his, saying, "Well, I like him, and I think we still have some blood in the fridge," she directed the latter comment to Spike, and the two proceeded to the kitchen. They were followed by the three young adults who sat down to a nice family dinner of takeout. Through the whole conversation they had covering Dawn's grades which were slowly on the rise again, Xander and Anya's wedding, and Spike's insistence at trying chicken fried rice in his blood which even grossed Dawn out, Buffy couldn't get her mind off of the $1,500.
So after dinner she hurried upstairs, took out one of her old diaries and sat down at the computer. Five hours after writing, *Kitty had just spent what was arguably the most boring day of her life in school and now stood on the front steps waiting for Andrew to join her so she could make the quarterback beg to take her to the dance.* Buffy had finished writing about the day she was called.
She slipped it into the envelope with the entry form, and ducked briefly outside and down the block where people were busy rerooting their trees to drop it into the mailbox. After all, what did she have to lose?
***************************
Spike's evening was not nearly as calm. After sunset he left the Summers' residence and hit Willy's bar. There he heard a rumour so bizarre he had to go to LA to find out specifically what events had (clearly) gotten mangled in the telling. He illegally parked his Cadillac in front of the hotel where Angel had set up his office and waltzed in to find out what exactly the poufter had been doing this time.
Amazingly, the demon who knew a guy hadn't gotten things totally wrong. His grandsire stood in the atrium cooing at a small smelly bundle in his arms. "Oooo, isn't he just a wet wittle baby aren't you Connor?"
Spike shook himself as he lurked in the doorway. The sight of Angelus the Scourge of Europe baby talking was enough to give him chills. Of course, at least the baby wasn't Angel's. Vampires were sterile and Angel couldn't have adopted the tyke. He'd probably taken on some chick with a baby as a case.
"Daddy's gonna have to change your diaper," said Angel speaking in the variable tones of a new parent. He also had just shattered Spike's little happy illusion. God! What the hell was going on in this heathenish hole?
Then Darla come in and destroyed the last of Spike's composure. She baby talked to the brat as well, and started feeding him, "Oh Connor, you're gonna be a big strong boy just like your daddy, and Mommy and Daddy love you very much! Yes we do!"
"WHAT THE BLOODY HELL IS GOING ON IN HERE!?!?" Spike was too stunned to be cautious. This broke all the bounds and rules of logic, nature, and the supernatural. This set the baby off crying, and Angel stepped forward as though to protect the baby from Spike.
"Spike," he said, his voice menacing.
"Angel," was his reply. This was followed immediately thereafter with, "Since when are you and Darla so snuggly? Also, please tell me the demon was wrong and the baby is adopted or something." Spike pleaded with his grandsire not to tell him the truth.
Instead of answering any questions at all Angel growled and demanded, "Which demon told you this?"
He shrugged, "Belviac out at Willy's. Said you got Darla preggers, and the two of you were plannin' on keepin' the tyke." The curiosity got the better of him, "So what is he? I mean the child of a couple of vampires has got to be something."
"He's human. Completely human." Darla had faded into the background as the two talked. Having ascertained that Angel did not consider Spike a threat, she now stepped forward carrying her son and showing him to the chipped vampire.
Spike's eyes widened, "So, Angel here I get bein' all lovey and crap. What about you? You don't have a soul the last time I checked."
She shrugged, "Somehow, being pregnant with Connor, I got sort of infected by his soul. I do have one."
Then Spike did something that took the other two aback. He laughed. Just breaking down into complete hysterics, the bleach blonde vampire staggered, howling with laughter, over to a chair and just flopped down. Angel and Darla looked at Spike both wearing expressions that clearly said, *I just knew he was unstable, must be all that time with Drusilla.* "Uh, Spike," Angel said hesitantly. Darla was already edging away with the baby in case Spike lost it and tried to attack them. "Spike," he said a little more firmly, "What is so funny?"
"Us!" came the reply, "Darla, favoured childe of the Master and the Scourge of Europe have souls, and I've got this bleedin' chip in my head that keeps me from killin' humans. Think we should start a club?"
Darla giggled slightly as she realised that Spike was not only not planning on hurting her son, he was not able to hurt the boy. Then began to really laugh as the meaning of his words reached her. Angel just looked flummoxed. "I really don't see what the two of you find so funny."
"Don't you get it?" Darla handed their son over to him, "Us! Three of the most feared vampires in history, and we've all become unable to kill. We're practically the good guys." She looked over at Angel with a raised eyebrow and said, "You especially."
Angel just shook his head and carried his son away from the two lunatics who spent so long talking that night that Spike was trapped there for the day and wound up staying to help Angel and Darla fight off a batch of marauding Fyarl demons hired to kidnap Connor.
As Spike prepared to leave at sunset that evening Darla approached him, carrying Connor, "So you're leaving?" she asked.
"Yeah. Got myself a nice little crypt in Sunnyhell. 'Side's the Slayer's sister'll want to hear some more blood and guts stories when Buffy's not lookin'." Spike smiled at Darla and thought about how sweet she was when she wasn't saying he was an incompetent.
She smiled back saying, "I was just thinking. You're welcome back any time. It's nice having someone who understands aside from Angel around." Darla considered what a nice guy Spike was, and really had always been. At least from a vampire perspective anyway. And it was nice talking to someone who got what being a vampire was about without either the gloom and doom of Angel, or the 'treacherous bitch' talks she got from most other vampires these days.
"Bye Darla," he said.
"Goodbye." As Spike drove off in the glow of the streetlights Darla looked down at her son. "My boy," she said softly, reliving the moment she'd realised she would get to see her son grow up, "What do you think of Spike?"
**********************
Weeks had passed and Buffy had, for the most part, forgotten about her entry to the contest. After all, there were more important things to deal with, like explaining to Anya that no one was going to be wearing larvae to her wedding, and getting the social services people to realise that sometimes you have a bad day.
So, it was a pleasant surprise after Buffy had discovered that she needed $500 for various bills and down payments that month, she was almost out of free cash for food, and Dawn had spent her lunch money for the month on new earrings, that she had won the contest. A copy of the magazine and a $1,500 cheque were in her mailbox along with the rest of the mail.
Buffy ignored everything and rushed off to the bank to deposit the cheque so that she could pay off all of her bills at one go while she had the money, and to take some of the rest of the cash to pay for all her groceries for the week, and a chocolate cake to celebrate.
When she got home, she finished sorting out the mail and carried hers up to her room, and sat down to make dinner for all. She was somewhat hurt when no one noticed the miraculous appearance of luxuries on the table, and instead focussed on Dawn's day with her cheeping plant.
". . . So anyways, Leslie said that she had seen something like this on a special on the Amazon rainforest, and Mrs. Jensen totally wanted to take her petals. Anyway, I was like, 'No!' I mean God! Doesn't she have any feelings for other living creatures?" Dawn would have continued with her saga of the plant when Willow interrupted desperate to have Buffy's opinion.
"Do you think that maybe if I had little wormy designs put on the bridesmaid dresses Anya might actually let us wear clothes instead of larvae?"
Buffy was about to answer when a huge red thing covered in slime burst through the door with Spike in hot pursuit. As they fought it off Buffy thought, *There goes the rest of my cheque,* and winced as the carpet got ripped and covered in slime, thus ensuring the need for a new carpet.
The demon took off out the back door and Buffy was forced to go after it and Spike. "What does it want?" she asked as she caught up with her sometime patrolling partner.
"Near as I can tell, it's been eatin' the guys down at the Mason's lodge." Spike said as they followed the thing down Sunnydale's side streets. "I think that dip of a conjuror what works for the medieval society hired him to take 'em out."
Buffy rolled her eyes. The feud between the two was ongoing and even Sunnydale's more oblivious citizenry had noticed and been irritated by the two. The medievalists insisted that the Masons were moronic for believing the Mason tradition went as far back as it did, and the Masons were insulted by the lack of belief from the medievalists. Both sides had connections to the occult and about a quarter of the demons raised in Sunnydale could be attributed to the overactive stupidity of both groups.
The demon had actually been raised by neither, but by a beginning warlock who had been manipulated by a mischief demon that saw the opportunity to institute widespread chaos. By the time the mess was cleared up it was one in the morning and Buffy showered and crawled into bed without going through the rest of her mail figuring it would still be there in the morning, and she was too tired to go into it then.
So it wasn't until the next morning that Buffy got to see her short story in print, and read the other letter that had come accompanying the magazine. She read the letter twice before the meaning sank in. Then she read it once more to be certain it wasn't a dream.
Dear Miss Summers,
We here at Mitchell Publishing have read your story and wish to place it in an anthology of fantasy fiction. The story will be published only with your permission and a percentage of the profits would be sent to you for your work.
This is not, however, the primary reason we have contacted you. After reading your story we wish to know whether you would be interested in writing a full length novel about your "Kitty" character. We believe that, should you agree, the novel would be quite profitable.
There would be a certain amount sent in advance of $500.00, and a payment of $2,000.00 on the completion of the work. You would also receive 8% of the profits from the sales of the book.
If you wish to accept these terms, please respond within the month by sending a letter to the enclosed address. Should you accept, you will be sent the contact to sign, and as soon as it is received your cheque will be in the mail. We will expect to see the novel completed within the year.
Sincerely,
Jeffrey P. Turner
"Well," said Buffy, "Who am I to look a gift horse in the mouth?"
**********************
Angel crept quietly into the atrium of the hotel, grateful that Spike and Darla weren't around. He was getting tired of seeing the vampire who claimed to live in Sunnydale constantly underfoot in his hotel in LA. The fact that he and Darla were well nigh inseparable just made the whole situation even more irritating. In fact, the only good thing about Spike's presence was that it kept Cordelia from flirting with him, and the others from implying that the two had some sort of mystical bond.
*Which, now that I think of it, is a good reason to keep him around.* The other issue was a little more distressing. Darla and Spike had never gotten along. She had always thought him to be a complete sap and something of an imbecile as well. Spike had only respected her because he knew that Angelus would turn him into a bloody pulp if he ever tried anything on Darla. So this sudden friendship had Angel baffled.
Darla had actually let Spike hold their baby the other day. Spike had been holding Connor making Angel completely petrified for his son. Darla had smacked Angel, reminding him that Spike could not hurt the baby deliberately and that he had vampiric speed, reflexes and balance. He was unlikely to drop the boy by accident. That had not comforted Angel in the slightest.
Nor had her sighed comment that Spike was so good with the baby, and Connor really loved him helped at all. "He's a vicious killer!" he had responded.
"He's sweet." Darla's reply was firm.
Spike had chosen that moment to enter the conversation, "Oh! Anything but sweet luv," he said in mock hurt, "No man wants to be told he's sweet. That means you don't think of us as material for a beau." He had grinned at Darla who fluttered her eyelashes coquettishly at him.
"Who said I was looking for a beau?" she'd purred. Angel could have sworn the two had been flirting. It was ridiculous of course. Spike wasn't Darla's type, and neither was Darla Spike's.
In any event, Angel had the hotel to himself for the time being, and he was going to play with Connor and enjoy the time alone with his son. His human employees had gone out to catch a movie, Lorne was busy rebuilding Caritas, and Darla and Spike had left earlier saying something about checking out the sewer routes between the hotel and places Angel might wish to get to during the day.
They had been rather unspecific about their destinations, but Angel had merely let them go off. He had learned long ago better than to try to convince Darla not to do something.
He had just settled down with Connor when he heard giggling coming from Wesley's office. He went to investigate and saw something that threw him. Spike and Darla were kissing. Not just any kisses either. The hot openmouthed kind that usually went somewhere, and as Angel watched, Spike took off his everpresent duster and spread it on the floor. He and Darla sank down to the floor, and Angel scurried off before his son was introduced to an activity that was rated a little too high for his tender years.
After all, it wasn't like he and Darla were involved. They were just raising Connor together because he needed two parents. Also, as the only two ensouled vampires in the world they shared the bond of being the only people who understood what that really meant. So he didn't have a problem if she decided to have hot monkey sex with someone who wasn't him.
It was just that it was Spike! Spike was the guy she had called a blithering idiot the day she first met him, and she hadn't changed her opinion. Well, not until now anyhow. He now also had to admit that they must have been flirting that day, as much as the notion galled him.
*Ah well. She's an adult and is entitled to make her own choices.*
But still... Spike!
**********************
When Spike got over to Buffy's that evening he found the floor littered with diaries in Buffy's handwriting. Buffy herself was sitting in the living room with a laptop computer and a pile of paper which she shuffled through rapidly, cursing with a vocabulary to make a longshoreman proud.
"Hello Slayer," Spike decided to ignore the mess in favour of giving his message to Buffy, "I just dropped by to tell you I've found myself a girlfriend and I'm not attracted to you like that anymore."
She looked up at him, frowned, and said, "So you came here to tell me that you're not attracted to me?"
He suddenly realised how he had sounded and said hurriedly, "I didn't mean I don't like you anymore Slayer, and you are an attractive woman, but I've found myself a girlfriend and I thought you would want to know I won't be chasin' after you any more."
Buffy smiled in response to his hasty backtracking saying, "I'm glad you're going to stop trying to get me to go out with you." She sighed and turned back to the books she was writing. On the whole it was going well, but Buffy wanted to have some scenes about the bad guys planning and stuff. She wasn't a villain and she'd never plotted the downfall of a slayer.
"What are you writin' pet?" Spike asked curiously.
Buffy looked over at him and sighed again. "Nothing important Spike," she replied, "If you want to talk to Dawn she's upstairs."
Spike turned to leave, but was stopped by Buffy's question, "Spike, do you know anything about Lothos?"
He blinked at her, puzzled, then hesitantly responded, "Ummm, you killed him, right?"
"Yeah," she smiled, "But I was curious what you know. Y'know, like stuff I wouldn't. Bad guy in his lair kinda stuff."
The vampire shrugged and began to move off when he lunged at her and snatched the laptop off her lap and started to read, "'So Kaspar told his minions to find the Huntress and bring her to him. "Tonight, you will be mine, Kitty," he said.' What the hell is this?" He read a little more even as he played keep-away with Buffy, "This is like an autobiography or something!"
Buffy gave up and flopped onto the sofa, "I had this amazing piece of luck and somehow I got a book deal," her face was chagrined, "I thought this would be easy 'cause all I have to do is write my memoirs with the names changed. All of a sudden I realised I have to write the bad guys too."
Sudden enlightenment crossed Spike's face, "So you were tryin' to pump me for information on what goes on in a master vampire's lair."
"Yeah."
He grinned at her, "Of course I'll help. Just give me some credit in the writin' and a cut of the profits and I'll tell you everything I know."
"Well then, I'll work out the details of the money with you when I find out how much I get, but you'll get at least $50, okay?" Buffy was handed back her laptop and they settled in to write a real sounding Lothos.
Spike, it turned out had actually spent some time with him back in the day, and had even gotten an up close chance to observe how the vampire ran his little HQ. "Formality was a big thing. There were rituals for everything. Feeding, bathing, talking. It was like a bleedin' Japanese court."
"So, I have to have a lot of doing obeisance then, and a lot of that hack formal language stuff?" Buffy looked at the vampire who, it turned out, had a real gift for writing prose. When Buffy had complemented his writing style he had been surprised and had admitted to the ridicule of his poetry that had driven him into Drusilla's clutches.
Buffy just rolled her eyes saying, "Just because you can't write poetry doesn't mean you can't write. I knew this guy once, couldn't sing at all, but he wrote the most amazing music."
Spike looked at her hopefully, "You really think I'm good at this?"
"Totally."
That evening, a writing partnership was born.
Author: SCWLC
Rating: Around PG-13, I think. Some innuendo and bad words.
Summary: This is my rewrite of S6 that turned into an AU immediate future fiction.
Pairings: Yes, I actually have something here other than B/A. It's Spike/Darla. Don't kill me.
Notes: Okay, first of all, to those who wanted to know from my last essay, I have a paper due in a week and a half on stained glass. Now you know. On this story, I would like to say that I made up the station in Indiana. I don't know if there is a KWBL out there, I just was making up the station. Second, I know I'm writing Spike a lot nicer than he is in reality but I wanted to have a happy story. So, to keep the angst to a minimum I wrote him as a really nice guy. Next, I was also making up the numbers for the money Buffy got paid for her story and books. I realise things are different in the real world, but I refuse to research a pastime to avoid insulting real authors.
Thanks to everyone for your feedback. You're the people who make failing Medieval Architecture worth it.
*********************
Prologue
Darla was feeling desperate. Her baby boy was going to die because she was a vampire and some stupid primal power was keeping them from giving her a caesarean. She looked around at Angel and his little band of friends as they stared back at her helplessly.
Suddenly Fred frowned slightly and asked Darla, "When you were tryin' to get the baby out before ... Y'know, when you found out that you couldn't hurt him, what exactly did you do?"
Darla glared at the girl and spat, "I was just trying to get him out! Okay!? I stabbed myself in the gut, I tried just cutting myself open, and nothing worked!" Despite the furious words the vampiress' face crumpled and she sobbed, "He's going to die-"
"Maybe not," said Fred.
Wesley looked at the young woman he had a crush on and asked, "Fred, there's no way Darla can manage a proper labour to give birth, and if we can't..." he trailed off, unsure of the way to express the grim notion.
Cordelia had no such compunction, "We can't cut her open Fred!" she said vehemently, "She said she tried it herself. I don't think we'll have any more luck."
"Maybe not if we try to do it the way she did." Fred had a sly look on her face, "But Darla said she never tried to actually do it to save the baby's life. Maybe if we do a proper C-section-"
Angel looked up with dawning hope, "The Powers are protecting the baby. If we go about this to save him rather than harm him, we might be able to save his life!"
At his words, the others perked up and began to sterilise the room, and put together the necessary implements to operate on Darla. Two hours later she and Angel were cooing at their son, and making all sorts of ridiculous facial expressions that new parents make at their children. Gunn had passed out in the grand tradition of the unprepared viewer of a live birth, while Wesley and Fred were looking inordinately pleased with themselves. Cordelia was being practical and shopping for necessities such as blankets, baby formula, baby clothes, and that necessity above all necessities, disposable diapers.
*************
Out in Sunnydale, a slayer struggled with her resurrection, bills, and confused feelings for a blonde vampire who seemed to be the only person around to realise that she was hanging by a thread.
*************
Part One
It was a lovely day in Sunnydale, the sun was shining, the trees were chirping as they fluttered from place to place, while the birds' feathers shivered in the slight breeze. It was also a typical day in Sunnydale.
Willow and Tara were involved in trying to correct the work of a warlock who's plan of world domination using an army of trees and shrubs had been seriously compromised by a starling fluttering into the middle of his spell. Now there were a couple of normally potted plants hopping around the magic shop leaving a trail of dirt, and Dawn was defending the rights of an adorable little geranium to exist as a motile creature. Xander and Anya were preoccupied with frantic attempts to capture the other plants before they covered everything with mud.
The only two people uninvolved with the plant crisis were Spike and Buffy. Spike, because he had more sense than to hang around a bunch of chirping bonsai trees, and Buffy because she was trying to find a way to pay for both the water and food, without going into debt. It was so riveting she didn't hear the chaos going on around her.
"Tara! You can't turn her back into a regular flower, she'll be so sad," Dawn held the trembling plant under the witch's nose, then pulled it against her chest and petted it, "Isn't she just the most adorable wittle planty, yes she is!" Dawn cooed to the cheeping geranium.
Okay, so Buffy wasn't completely unaware of her surroundings, ( "Xander! It's in the cash register! Don't let it damage the money!" cried Anya), but she was determined to find a solution to her fiscal problems, and that meant concentrating on monetary flow, not on the really big bush hopping up and down in front of the window that some nutcase had attached a leash and doggie sweater to.
At that moment, Buffy decided that perhaps it might be less . . . insane elsewhere. "Guys, I'm heading home so I can work on this money thing," she said.
"Are you sure -- Anya! Go left, there's a spider plant over your head! -- Are you sure you don't want to stay -- Bad bush! -- stay here?" Xander inquired.
Buffy smiled at the sight of the spider plant trying to fly out the window, and having all the success a wingless plant could have, and replied, "I think I'll probably get more done at home than here."
So she said her goodbyes and left. Walking down the street, Buffy could see all sorts of interesting things. The palm trees hopping up and down in a vain attempt to fly away, Mrs. O'Neal hollering as she chased her prized gardenias down past the hardware store, and several escaped emus from the local zoo standing stock still with glazed looks on their faces as worried zoo staff tried to get them to dislodge their feet from the dirt.
Buffy got home, just barely managing to avoid being crushed by a loudly chirping, hopping, out-of-control oak tree on the front lawn. "The bigger they are, the smaller they think they are," sighed Buffy as she entered the house.
At the slight scent of singed hair and leather the Slayer looked up to see Spike leaning against the wall in the living room. "What are you doing here?" she asked tiredly.
"The ivy on my crypt wall was startin' to act funny so I hightailed it out here. You don't have any plants in your house do you?" he responded.
Buffy chuckled slightly, saying, "No, although Dawn may soon be bringing home a cheeping geranium. I hope she takes better care of it than all the plants I've managed to kill."
"Well then until the plants get fixed can I sleep in your basement?" the expression on his face was so hangdog and desperate Buffy didn't have the heart to throw him out.
"Okay, but if I catch you telling Dawn any more stories about the days of blood guts and gore, you're out in the street. Got it?" Spike just nodded and hurried down the stairs, leaving Buffy to work on her bills in peace. Accompanied by the crashing sounds of potted plants leaping to their doom.
She sat down at the table and started into her budget to find things she could cut so they would still have electricity as well as the enormous luxury of food. Shuffling the bills between those that needed to be paid immediately, those that could wait, and the other expenses she garnered like the fact that she needed some new cords for her crossbow, and Dawn had a science fair coming up which usually required obscene amounts of money spent on pipe cleaners.
Buffy had just finished working the budget out to her satisfaction, albeit not Dawn's, when she noticed it. It being the magazine with a huge cover ad in yellow, black, red, and green. It practically vibrated on the cover advertising a chance to be a published author and win $1,500. Naturally the money caught Buffy's eye and she flipped through the magazine until she found the details of the contest. All one had to do to enter was write a science fiction or fantasy story, fill out the form and mail the package in. First prize was a huge wad of cash and being published, second and third were smaller wads of cash and being published.
Dawn and the others came home then. "Buffy! What do you think of Gerry as a name for my plant?" Dawn demanded, "Tara says she knows how to exclude her from the reversal spell."
"You mean aside from the fact that I'll be thinking of that Spice girl every time we talk about it?" Buffy replied.
Xander and Anya had followed Buffy's younger sister in and were carrying bags of takeout Chinese food. "Hey everybody! We come bearing tribute!" called Xander.
"Did you bring blood?" Spike demanded, "If I'm not allowed to sleep, which is my right as a nocturnal creature, you could at least get me some food too." He came tramping irritably up the stairs.
Anya looked over at Buffy, "You know, although Spike is hot I don't see why you don't kill him." At that Spike looked quite baffled as to whether he ought to be affronted or complimented. "You are the Slayer, why don't you kill him?"
"More to the point, why is he here?" asked Xander.
"The ivy was freaking him out." Buffy responded shortly. "I haven't killed Spike because killing something helpless is wrong."
Dawn marched up to the vampire in question and linked her arm with his, saying, "Well, I like him, and I think we still have some blood in the fridge," she directed the latter comment to Spike, and the two proceeded to the kitchen. They were followed by the three young adults who sat down to a nice family dinner of takeout. Through the whole conversation they had covering Dawn's grades which were slowly on the rise again, Xander and Anya's wedding, and Spike's insistence at trying chicken fried rice in his blood which even grossed Dawn out, Buffy couldn't get her mind off of the $1,500.
So after dinner she hurried upstairs, took out one of her old diaries and sat down at the computer. Five hours after writing, *Kitty had just spent what was arguably the most boring day of her life in school and now stood on the front steps waiting for Andrew to join her so she could make the quarterback beg to take her to the dance.* Buffy had finished writing about the day she was called.
She slipped it into the envelope with the entry form, and ducked briefly outside and down the block where people were busy rerooting their trees to drop it into the mailbox. After all, what did she have to lose?
***************************
Spike's evening was not nearly as calm. After sunset he left the Summers' residence and hit Willy's bar. There he heard a rumour so bizarre he had to go to LA to find out specifically what events had (clearly) gotten mangled in the telling. He illegally parked his Cadillac in front of the hotel where Angel had set up his office and waltzed in to find out what exactly the poufter had been doing this time.
Amazingly, the demon who knew a guy hadn't gotten things totally wrong. His grandsire stood in the atrium cooing at a small smelly bundle in his arms. "Oooo, isn't he just a wet wittle baby aren't you Connor?"
Spike shook himself as he lurked in the doorway. The sight of Angelus the Scourge of Europe baby talking was enough to give him chills. Of course, at least the baby wasn't Angel's. Vampires were sterile and Angel couldn't have adopted the tyke. He'd probably taken on some chick with a baby as a case.
"Daddy's gonna have to change your diaper," said Angel speaking in the variable tones of a new parent. He also had just shattered Spike's little happy illusion. God! What the hell was going on in this heathenish hole?
Then Darla come in and destroyed the last of Spike's composure. She baby talked to the brat as well, and started feeding him, "Oh Connor, you're gonna be a big strong boy just like your daddy, and Mommy and Daddy love you very much! Yes we do!"
"WHAT THE BLOODY HELL IS GOING ON IN HERE!?!?" Spike was too stunned to be cautious. This broke all the bounds and rules of logic, nature, and the supernatural. This set the baby off crying, and Angel stepped forward as though to protect the baby from Spike.
"Spike," he said, his voice menacing.
"Angel," was his reply. This was followed immediately thereafter with, "Since when are you and Darla so snuggly? Also, please tell me the demon was wrong and the baby is adopted or something." Spike pleaded with his grandsire not to tell him the truth.
Instead of answering any questions at all Angel growled and demanded, "Which demon told you this?"
He shrugged, "Belviac out at Willy's. Said you got Darla preggers, and the two of you were plannin' on keepin' the tyke." The curiosity got the better of him, "So what is he? I mean the child of a couple of vampires has got to be something."
"He's human. Completely human." Darla had faded into the background as the two talked. Having ascertained that Angel did not consider Spike a threat, she now stepped forward carrying her son and showing him to the chipped vampire.
Spike's eyes widened, "So, Angel here I get bein' all lovey and crap. What about you? You don't have a soul the last time I checked."
She shrugged, "Somehow, being pregnant with Connor, I got sort of infected by his soul. I do have one."
Then Spike did something that took the other two aback. He laughed. Just breaking down into complete hysterics, the bleach blonde vampire staggered, howling with laughter, over to a chair and just flopped down. Angel and Darla looked at Spike both wearing expressions that clearly said, *I just knew he was unstable, must be all that time with Drusilla.* "Uh, Spike," Angel said hesitantly. Darla was already edging away with the baby in case Spike lost it and tried to attack them. "Spike," he said a little more firmly, "What is so funny?"
"Us!" came the reply, "Darla, favoured childe of the Master and the Scourge of Europe have souls, and I've got this bleedin' chip in my head that keeps me from killin' humans. Think we should start a club?"
Darla giggled slightly as she realised that Spike was not only not planning on hurting her son, he was not able to hurt the boy. Then began to really laugh as the meaning of his words reached her. Angel just looked flummoxed. "I really don't see what the two of you find so funny."
"Don't you get it?" Darla handed their son over to him, "Us! Three of the most feared vampires in history, and we've all become unable to kill. We're practically the good guys." She looked over at Angel with a raised eyebrow and said, "You especially."
Angel just shook his head and carried his son away from the two lunatics who spent so long talking that night that Spike was trapped there for the day and wound up staying to help Angel and Darla fight off a batch of marauding Fyarl demons hired to kidnap Connor.
As Spike prepared to leave at sunset that evening Darla approached him, carrying Connor, "So you're leaving?" she asked.
"Yeah. Got myself a nice little crypt in Sunnyhell. 'Side's the Slayer's sister'll want to hear some more blood and guts stories when Buffy's not lookin'." Spike smiled at Darla and thought about how sweet she was when she wasn't saying he was an incompetent.
She smiled back saying, "I was just thinking. You're welcome back any time. It's nice having someone who understands aside from Angel around." Darla considered what a nice guy Spike was, and really had always been. At least from a vampire perspective anyway. And it was nice talking to someone who got what being a vampire was about without either the gloom and doom of Angel, or the 'treacherous bitch' talks she got from most other vampires these days.
"Bye Darla," he said.
"Goodbye." As Spike drove off in the glow of the streetlights Darla looked down at her son. "My boy," she said softly, reliving the moment she'd realised she would get to see her son grow up, "What do you think of Spike?"
**********************
Weeks had passed and Buffy had, for the most part, forgotten about her entry to the contest. After all, there were more important things to deal with, like explaining to Anya that no one was going to be wearing larvae to her wedding, and getting the social services people to realise that sometimes you have a bad day.
So, it was a pleasant surprise after Buffy had discovered that she needed $500 for various bills and down payments that month, she was almost out of free cash for food, and Dawn had spent her lunch money for the month on new earrings, that she had won the contest. A copy of the magazine and a $1,500 cheque were in her mailbox along with the rest of the mail.
Buffy ignored everything and rushed off to the bank to deposit the cheque so that she could pay off all of her bills at one go while she had the money, and to take some of the rest of the cash to pay for all her groceries for the week, and a chocolate cake to celebrate.
When she got home, she finished sorting out the mail and carried hers up to her room, and sat down to make dinner for all. She was somewhat hurt when no one noticed the miraculous appearance of luxuries on the table, and instead focussed on Dawn's day with her cheeping plant.
". . . So anyways, Leslie said that she had seen something like this on a special on the Amazon rainforest, and Mrs. Jensen totally wanted to take her petals. Anyway, I was like, 'No!' I mean God! Doesn't she have any feelings for other living creatures?" Dawn would have continued with her saga of the plant when Willow interrupted desperate to have Buffy's opinion.
"Do you think that maybe if I had little wormy designs put on the bridesmaid dresses Anya might actually let us wear clothes instead of larvae?"
Buffy was about to answer when a huge red thing covered in slime burst through the door with Spike in hot pursuit. As they fought it off Buffy thought, *There goes the rest of my cheque,* and winced as the carpet got ripped and covered in slime, thus ensuring the need for a new carpet.
The demon took off out the back door and Buffy was forced to go after it and Spike. "What does it want?" she asked as she caught up with her sometime patrolling partner.
"Near as I can tell, it's been eatin' the guys down at the Mason's lodge." Spike said as they followed the thing down Sunnydale's side streets. "I think that dip of a conjuror what works for the medieval society hired him to take 'em out."
Buffy rolled her eyes. The feud between the two was ongoing and even Sunnydale's more oblivious citizenry had noticed and been irritated by the two. The medievalists insisted that the Masons were moronic for believing the Mason tradition went as far back as it did, and the Masons were insulted by the lack of belief from the medievalists. Both sides had connections to the occult and about a quarter of the demons raised in Sunnydale could be attributed to the overactive stupidity of both groups.
The demon had actually been raised by neither, but by a beginning warlock who had been manipulated by a mischief demon that saw the opportunity to institute widespread chaos. By the time the mess was cleared up it was one in the morning and Buffy showered and crawled into bed without going through the rest of her mail figuring it would still be there in the morning, and she was too tired to go into it then.
So it wasn't until the next morning that Buffy got to see her short story in print, and read the other letter that had come accompanying the magazine. She read the letter twice before the meaning sank in. Then she read it once more to be certain it wasn't a dream.
Dear Miss Summers,
We here at Mitchell Publishing have read your story and wish to place it in an anthology of fantasy fiction. The story will be published only with your permission and a percentage of the profits would be sent to you for your work.
This is not, however, the primary reason we have contacted you. After reading your story we wish to know whether you would be interested in writing a full length novel about your "Kitty" character. We believe that, should you agree, the novel would be quite profitable.
There would be a certain amount sent in advance of $500.00, and a payment of $2,000.00 on the completion of the work. You would also receive 8% of the profits from the sales of the book.
If you wish to accept these terms, please respond within the month by sending a letter to the enclosed address. Should you accept, you will be sent the contact to sign, and as soon as it is received your cheque will be in the mail. We will expect to see the novel completed within the year.
Sincerely,
Jeffrey P. Turner
"Well," said Buffy, "Who am I to look a gift horse in the mouth?"
**********************
Angel crept quietly into the atrium of the hotel, grateful that Spike and Darla weren't around. He was getting tired of seeing the vampire who claimed to live in Sunnydale constantly underfoot in his hotel in LA. The fact that he and Darla were well nigh inseparable just made the whole situation even more irritating. In fact, the only good thing about Spike's presence was that it kept Cordelia from flirting with him, and the others from implying that the two had some sort of mystical bond.
*Which, now that I think of it, is a good reason to keep him around.* The other issue was a little more distressing. Darla and Spike had never gotten along. She had always thought him to be a complete sap and something of an imbecile as well. Spike had only respected her because he knew that Angelus would turn him into a bloody pulp if he ever tried anything on Darla. So this sudden friendship had Angel baffled.
Darla had actually let Spike hold their baby the other day. Spike had been holding Connor making Angel completely petrified for his son. Darla had smacked Angel, reminding him that Spike could not hurt the baby deliberately and that he had vampiric speed, reflexes and balance. He was unlikely to drop the boy by accident. That had not comforted Angel in the slightest.
Nor had her sighed comment that Spike was so good with the baby, and Connor really loved him helped at all. "He's a vicious killer!" he had responded.
"He's sweet." Darla's reply was firm.
Spike had chosen that moment to enter the conversation, "Oh! Anything but sweet luv," he said in mock hurt, "No man wants to be told he's sweet. That means you don't think of us as material for a beau." He had grinned at Darla who fluttered her eyelashes coquettishly at him.
"Who said I was looking for a beau?" she'd purred. Angel could have sworn the two had been flirting. It was ridiculous of course. Spike wasn't Darla's type, and neither was Darla Spike's.
In any event, Angel had the hotel to himself for the time being, and he was going to play with Connor and enjoy the time alone with his son. His human employees had gone out to catch a movie, Lorne was busy rebuilding Caritas, and Darla and Spike had left earlier saying something about checking out the sewer routes between the hotel and places Angel might wish to get to during the day.
They had been rather unspecific about their destinations, but Angel had merely let them go off. He had learned long ago better than to try to convince Darla not to do something.
He had just settled down with Connor when he heard giggling coming from Wesley's office. He went to investigate and saw something that threw him. Spike and Darla were kissing. Not just any kisses either. The hot openmouthed kind that usually went somewhere, and as Angel watched, Spike took off his everpresent duster and spread it on the floor. He and Darla sank down to the floor, and Angel scurried off before his son was introduced to an activity that was rated a little too high for his tender years.
After all, it wasn't like he and Darla were involved. They were just raising Connor together because he needed two parents. Also, as the only two ensouled vampires in the world they shared the bond of being the only people who understood what that really meant. So he didn't have a problem if she decided to have hot monkey sex with someone who wasn't him.
It was just that it was Spike! Spike was the guy she had called a blithering idiot the day she first met him, and she hadn't changed her opinion. Well, not until now anyhow. He now also had to admit that they must have been flirting that day, as much as the notion galled him.
*Ah well. She's an adult and is entitled to make her own choices.*
But still... Spike!
**********************
When Spike got over to Buffy's that evening he found the floor littered with diaries in Buffy's handwriting. Buffy herself was sitting in the living room with a laptop computer and a pile of paper which she shuffled through rapidly, cursing with a vocabulary to make a longshoreman proud.
"Hello Slayer," Spike decided to ignore the mess in favour of giving his message to Buffy, "I just dropped by to tell you I've found myself a girlfriend and I'm not attracted to you like that anymore."
She looked up at him, frowned, and said, "So you came here to tell me that you're not attracted to me?"
He suddenly realised how he had sounded and said hurriedly, "I didn't mean I don't like you anymore Slayer, and you are an attractive woman, but I've found myself a girlfriend and I thought you would want to know I won't be chasin' after you any more."
Buffy smiled in response to his hasty backtracking saying, "I'm glad you're going to stop trying to get me to go out with you." She sighed and turned back to the books she was writing. On the whole it was going well, but Buffy wanted to have some scenes about the bad guys planning and stuff. She wasn't a villain and she'd never plotted the downfall of a slayer.
"What are you writin' pet?" Spike asked curiously.
Buffy looked over at him and sighed again. "Nothing important Spike," she replied, "If you want to talk to Dawn she's upstairs."
Spike turned to leave, but was stopped by Buffy's question, "Spike, do you know anything about Lothos?"
He blinked at her, puzzled, then hesitantly responded, "Ummm, you killed him, right?"
"Yeah," she smiled, "But I was curious what you know. Y'know, like stuff I wouldn't. Bad guy in his lair kinda stuff."
The vampire shrugged and began to move off when he lunged at her and snatched the laptop off her lap and started to read, "'So Kaspar told his minions to find the Huntress and bring her to him. "Tonight, you will be mine, Kitty," he said.' What the hell is this?" He read a little more even as he played keep-away with Buffy, "This is like an autobiography or something!"
Buffy gave up and flopped onto the sofa, "I had this amazing piece of luck and somehow I got a book deal," her face was chagrined, "I thought this would be easy 'cause all I have to do is write my memoirs with the names changed. All of a sudden I realised I have to write the bad guys too."
Sudden enlightenment crossed Spike's face, "So you were tryin' to pump me for information on what goes on in a master vampire's lair."
"Yeah."
He grinned at her, "Of course I'll help. Just give me some credit in the writin' and a cut of the profits and I'll tell you everything I know."
"Well then, I'll work out the details of the money with you when I find out how much I get, but you'll get at least $50, okay?" Buffy was handed back her laptop and they settled in to write a real sounding Lothos.
Spike, it turned out had actually spent some time with him back in the day, and had even gotten an up close chance to observe how the vampire ran his little HQ. "Formality was a big thing. There were rituals for everything. Feeding, bathing, talking. It was like a bleedin' Japanese court."
"So, I have to have a lot of doing obeisance then, and a lot of that hack formal language stuff?" Buffy looked at the vampire who, it turned out, had a real gift for writing prose. When Buffy had complemented his writing style he had been surprised and had admitted to the ridicule of his poetry that had driven him into Drusilla's clutches.
Buffy just rolled her eyes saying, "Just because you can't write poetry doesn't mean you can't write. I knew this guy once, couldn't sing at all, but he wrote the most amazing music."
Spike looked at her hopefully, "You really think I'm good at this?"
"Totally."
That evening, a writing partnership was born.