Chapter 49 – Home
Take me somewhere we
can be alone
Make me somewhere I
can call a home
Cause lately I’ve been
losing my own
Zero 7
Dancing Queen was blaring in static rhythm over the cheap hotel radio. Raven didn’t care. She loved the song. Her hips were moving along to the beat as she applied her makeup. She glanced in the mirror, smiling because Connor was watching her with eyes filled with love. And other things. She giggled, double-checked her mascara, before hurrying back to the bed.
“I missed you,” Connor said, pulling her close to his naked body. “You were too far away.” He kissed her forehead. “Don’t leave again.”
“I won’t.”
Raven stretched out beside him. She wished they could play all day, but knew they couldn’t. They had to get back to the Hyperion to check on the aftermath of the night before. They also had to get back to Sunnydale some time, and figure out where they were going to go now. There was no way she wanted to keep living with her parents. She just wasn’t sure Connor wanted the same thing.
“What are the plans?” Connor asked, startling her. It took her a couple of seconds to realize that he meant for the day, and not their future. He hadn’t changed. Like his father, he was a man of few words when it came to the future. Raven sighed. It would all work out. He’d taken her to bed, so she knew that he was fully committed to her. She just needed to be patient and trust him.
“I guess breakfast,” Raven answered, twisting so she could look at him. “Then head over to the school, check in with everyone and my parents, and then back home.”
“Okay,” he said, still not taking the hint.
Raven let it go. It was one thing she’d learned in their relationship, and that was not to push Connor. When he was ready, he’d either say or do something, and not a moment before.
“Do you think everyone is all right after what happened?” Connor asked.
“I don’t know,” Raven replied. “They were pretty hyped up last night, and then everything exploded. Damn, the First was right there in the hotel. God only knows what other trouble he’s caused. There are so many dead slayers for him to imitate, not to mention everyday people that we wouldn’t even suspect.”
“Yeah, he is everywhere. I just hope everybody can hang on until we can discover what his plan is this time around, and once we know what they are we’ll be able to work together to defeat him.”
“You…solitary man?” Raven teased. “Hope everyone can work together?”
“It seems what he wants,” Connor continued. “To divide us, so it would seem logical that the way to defeat him would be to work together.”
“Yes, Mr. Spock.”
Suddenly she was flat on her back with Connor looming over her. She giggled again. He pinned her hands over her head.
“You are a brat,” he declared. “One of these days, girl…”
Raven wrapped her leg around his waist. “What are you going to do? You going to spank me?” She used her lower body to flip them so that she was straddling him. He didn’t fight her when she pinned his hands. “You know you love me being a brat.” Without losing eye contact, she kissed his chest.
“I just love you,” Connor whispered.
“I know you do,” Raven said, sitting up. Her hands rested on her thighs. She tilted her head, and smiled, “Yeah, I do.”
“Sounds like a revelation.” He interlocked his hands under his head. “Did you doubt me?”
“For awhile.”
“And now?”
“No doubts…not about us anyway…you know being together.” She stared at some spot on the wall behind him.
Connor sighed, grasping her hands. “Don’t worry. We’ll get it all worked out. I promise. Don’t rush it.”
“It’s what you said before.” She turned her gaze back to him. He’d been right. So why was she allowing any doubts to interfere at this point? “I guess I want it all now.”
“So, do I,” Connor said, with a wink. “I think right now we need to concentrate on defeating the First, keeping everyone together and then we can decide what we’ll do from here.”
She wanted to ask how he could be so patient, but she already knew. It was survival instincts culled from his childhood. Sometimes it grated on her nerves, because she wanted to know the ending already. She wanted him to say that he wanted to live with her, that one day he planned to marry her, but he wouldn’t. Not until this crisis was over with, and they weren’t even sure what the threat was yet.
Crawling off him and the bed, Raven started to pick her clothes up from the floor. If the battle was going to come first then they may as well get to it. She sighed as she pulled her jeans on. Connor didn’t come to her, didn’t say anything comforting. He just followed her lead and started to dress. The conversation was over.
~~~~~~~~
“Would you care for some more tea?” Wesley asked, looking over his shoulder.
“Um…excuse me?” Giles replied, startled from the text he was trying to decipher. He glanced up at his fellow watcher who was waving the teapot at him. “Oh, uh, no, no, I’m fine,” he continued, and then sighed. “I feel like we’re going in bloody circles on this prophecy. Just when I think we’ve made some sense of it…it becomes more convoluted.”
“What do we have so far?” Wesley asked, taking a seat across from Giles at the conference table. Spread out between them were their notes, Tanja dream details, and texts covering everything from the beginning of the world to the end.
“It just shouldn’t be this hard,” Giles grumbled, spreading papers around trying to find the sheet with the words they’d translated so far. “Ah, here it is. Two winged creatures born of hope, one shall fly and one shall burn with righteousness, thrice tempted…”
“Wait a minute,” Wesley interrupted. “The thrice tempted part…could that be
referring to Spike? I mean there was
Donna, then that girl in
“Yes, it would,” Giles said, scribbling down some notes furiously. He didn’t want to take the chance of losing any insight they may gain. “I still don’t get the two winged creatures though. Birds? Demons of some sort? Dragons perhaps?”
“Or maybe angels?”
“Or angels?” Giles laughed, leaning back in his chair. “That would certainly be something original in our battles.”
“Don’t forget Spike’s lady in white? The one who offered him the choice of remaining a human or becoming a hybrid. Wasn’t she an angel? At least that’s the way he refers to her presence.”
“So, is she coming back to help us out? Or is she someone we need to protect? We’ll have to ask him more detailed questions about her when he comes in this morning.”
“Excellent idea,” Wesley said, reaching for one of the books. “Now the last part of the prophecy…the part about the sacrifices and penance? Is it referring to particular people or to all of us in general?”
“I don’t know,” Giles sighed. “It doesn’t refer to any bloody battle, or soldiers, but just individuals.” He pulled his glasses off, and threw them on the table. “Maybe we’re just not supposed to get it.”
It was something that kept replaying in his mind. The world’s fate always seemed to boil down to one person’s choice to lay down their life for everyone else. The faith of one that changed the way the world turned and it seemed to be this way again. Or rather, several people if he was making any sense of the prophecy. It was just frustrating not to know who they were, what they were supposed to do and why. There were few people he would not only put his own life but that of family’s fate in their care. He just hoped in the end he had a chance to offer his input, but who really wanted an old man’s opinion.
“Maybe I can decipher it at Wolfram & Hart,” Wesley offered. “The explanation might be in their records. Maybe if I…”
Giles laughed. “I appreciate the offer, Wesley, but to consult an evil reference material to research something holy just doesn’t seem to bode well for the getting the right answers.”
“Well, what the hell else are we supposed to do?” Wesley asked, standing up. “This whole thing is ridiculous. We’re totally useless.”
“In the end, Watcher’s usually are,” Giles said. “We stand by helpless while our chosen one fights and inevitably dies.”
“You’ve never stood by and let Buffy fight alone. Why now?”
“Because I can’t very well do anything else,” Giles yelled, standing up so abruptly that his chair rolled back. “Tell me, Wes, what are we supposed to do? This whole damn thing is falling apart while you and I are trying to solve a riddle that doesn’t make any sense. It just seems we would be better off dealing with the things that we can, and leave this particular problem to higher beings.”
It was over for him. There were almost two hundred girls in this institution they called a school. After the events of the night before it was clear they were falling apart in loneliness, mistrust, and confusion. Them he could deal with, and knew that his experience would help. For the first time in his life, he knew his mind wasn’t going to change a damn thing. His heart could, and he was going to use it. He walked away from the months of research he’d been working on to head back out amongst the living.
The lobby was busy with the slayers congregating before classes, and training. He smiled at them, stopped to say hello to a few who smiled back. They were his charges, and it was time he started to act like their headmaster and friend.
~~~~~~~
Buffy stretched her arms over her head before reaching over
to find Spike. He wasn’t there. Reluctantly, she opened her eyes to scan the
room for him. It was then that she heard
the shower running. Thoughts of
continuing their night of passion made her leave the warm cocoon of the bed and
head for the bathroom. She turned the
light on, and was surprised to find it was almost
“We’re fine, Mum,” he sent to her with his mind. “We’re playing in the family room.”
“Love you, baby,” she sent back then felt him close the wall between them.
With them safe, she could indulge in a few more minutes with
Spike before facing the day. Grabbing
some clean clothes, she headed for the bathroom.
”Spike, it’s me,” Buffy called, closing the door behind her. “May I join you?”
Pulling the shower curtain back, Spike peeked out at her. “Morning, love.” The wicked gleam in his eyes was enough for Buffy to hurriedly pull her pajamas off. He reached his hand out to help her into the tub, his arms wrapping around her to bring her under the warm spray with him. “Glad you decided to wake up. I was feeling a bit lonely.”
“Were you?” She wrapped her arms around his neck, her fingers threaded through his curls. “I was kind of lonely myself when I woke up all alone. You left,” she pouted.
“Sorry, pet,” Spike replied, planting kisses from her cheek down to her neck. He nipped her ear lobe. “And I’m afraid I’m going to have to do it again.”
“What do you mean?” Buffy asked. She put her hands on his chest, praying it wasn’t what she thought. It was supposed to be over. Her husband wasn’t supposed to be leaving them again. “Where are you going?”
Spike cupped her face, and rubbed his nose against
hers. “Stop, baby, it’s only for today. Okay?
Jake needs a favor, something picked up in
“Promise?”
“Yeah, I promise.”
Buffy smiled.
“Do you have any idea of how much I love you?”
“Yeah,” Spike said, running his hands down her slick body. “I love you, too.”
Everything was going to be all right. Spike always kept his promises.
to be continued…
