Spoilers: Set right approximately right now in the series so all around spoilers for this season and others past may crop up.

Disclaimer: I think it's quite obvious i don't own them or i would have all you rabid fans, much like me, beating down my door to smother me with gifts and adoration. You can do that anyway if you want, but you can't get Spike. I'm keeping him chained to my bathtub and he's all mine! Ya hear me, ALL MINE!

Feedback/Reviews: Who needs reasons when ya've got heroin?

Rating: PG-13

Summary: Buffy and Spike are gonna get together. Ya know they are. And if not, well then, they will here. ;>

Author's note: Please please please review if you read this at all! Man I was looking over this story and I realized Spike and Buffy haven't been in the same room together in a looong time. I couldn't remember how the spell in Becoming went so I had to start from scratch so to speak. I hope I didn't do a crappy job. :P





Anya blinked. "They're all at the mansion," she blurted.

Spike growled and slammed his fist into the wall, making Anya and Dawn jump. "Bloody mansion! Of course!" Spike roared as he stalked back in forth, running a hand through his hair. "I'll tear him limb from limb if he lays a bleedin finger on her!" he declared before spinning around and striding out the door.

"But...!" Anya called after him. "Angel and Cordelia," she explained to the empty place where Spike had been. She turned to Dawn with a pout.

Dawn's eyes were wide and excited, "Can we go to the mansion, now?"

Anya glanced over her shoulder. "It would be exciting. I'm sure Spike's misconception will be quite funny or at least entertaining. But we're supposed to wait here for Xander. He said he had an important errand to run but that he would bring Chinese food back with him," Anya smiled and nodded vigorously at the proffered appeasement of take-out.

"C'mon, Anya. It'll be SO exciting. Don't you want to know what happens?" Dawn pleaded.

"I suppose we could leave a note. And Cordelia did leave one of those constraints for children so you can carry them like a Munga demon," Anya wavered.

"Huh?" Dawn asked with scrunched nose.

"Munga demon," Anya said matter-of-factly, as if everyone knew what that was. "They carry their young in frontal pouches for many years," she elaborated at Dawn's still confused expression.

"Riiight. Well, then it's all settled," Dawn said with a happy smile. Anya grinned back, glad that she would get to see all the fun between Buffy, Spike, and Angel. Anya paused. *Now there's a thought. Replace Buffy with me, and Angel with Xander,* Anya thought dreamily, her head tilting as she stood motionless and stared unseeing at the wall. Dawn came back into the room, shrugging into her coat, and halted. "Anya. Earth to Anya. What are you doing?"

Anya jumped and smoothed her hair, "What? Hmm? Oh nothing. Let's go. Do you think it would be tactless to bring popcorn?"

Dawn paused for one moment as she looked at Anya appraisingly. "That never stopped ya before."

Anya made to go for the kitchen to make popcorn then stopped. "No, we can't. Buffy said you're grounded and Xander said to wait here."

They both plopped back on the couch dejectedly. "Didn't know Xander was the boss of you," Dawn mumbled sourly.

"Hey!" Anya exclaimed indignantly. "Xander is not the boss of me. And to prove it I'm ordering a pizza right now. Chinese take-out be damned!"





The roar of the motorcycle between his thighs fed Spike's anger as he sped to Angel's mansion. He grit his teeth. They just had to pick the seat of so many humiliations and indignities to cuckhold him. He could just imagine the conversation:

"Oh, lover, I'll be so glad when we're together again!"
"Yes, Buffy, I've been brooding silently all these years just to have you back in my arms again."
"Now we can forget all the ways our lives have changed and everything will be like it was!"
"Oh how I've missed the brooding! And you of course, my darling. Plus it will be so nice to put Spike in his place."
"Where should we do it that has the most painful memories for him?"
"Well we can't fly to Brazil overnight so I guess it'll have to be the mansion."

Then the chit would just fall into the poof's arms and forget all about him. Well, he wasn't about to let that happen. He gunned the engine for an extra ounce of speed and turned left, gravel spinning out behind him.





Willow was already set up in the hall with Buffy and Tara completeing the circle around her ingredients laid out with painstaking care, when Cordelia rushed out in a drooping blanket that barely covered her flushed, sweating body. "Hurry! Do it now!" Cordelia shouted as she stood in the doorway and peeped through the opening anxiously.

The orb lay in an urn with runes scratched into its surface. A burning root lay in a similar jar before Willow while a vial of blood sat before Buffy and Tara held a bowl of crystal clear water. Willow nodded to Buffy as she began a soft chant in latin. Buffy reached out and tipped the vial over the orb as Willow switched to English seamlessly.

"Steeped in pain
Forged in death
Evil shall we replace
as with heart's life blood we erase."


Next Willow wafted the smoke across the urn.

"Your soul we summon
From the dark place lost
With heaven's root we call
love, lust and all"


Tara needed no guidance and reached out with a steady hand to pour the water in a crystal stream onto the orb's bloodied surface.

"We wash away what was
and your soul flows onto you
bound even as passions soar
bound to you evermore."


She finished in three short strings of Latin and the orb flashed for a moment. The thrashing roars had quieted and Cordelia edged the door wider. "How will we know if it worked?"

"We'll know," Buffy said quietly. She hadn't realized how much this would effect her. The spell had been so powerful, she'd felt the pull of magic as she'd sat in the circle with the two witches. And it hadn't escaped her notice that she was heart's blood. She stood up slowly and moved to Cordelia's side. They shared a steadying look and moved in twin steps across the room, Cordy's sheet dragging behind her on the stones like a royal train.

Angel lay motionless in the bed and Cordy felt suddenly very aware that her man was displayed to all the world in his naked glory. She grabbed the comforter bunched at the foot of the bed and tucked it around him lovingly. "Angel?" she asked with her heart in her throat.

Buffy stood stiffly beside the bed, her hands clenched as she studied the lines of his face. He opened his eyes and soft tears were puddled there. "Cordy?....Buffy?" he asked dazedly.

"It's him," Cordy and Buffy said in unison.

Willow couldn't help but gloat from the doorway as she smiled proudly, "Did you have any doubt?"

Tara was remarkably free of blushes as she said in a very business-like tone. "We should be sure, though."

Cordy looked puzzled for a moment. "You mean again?"

"Yup," Tara answered.

Cordelia stood up and said, "Ok, but we're gonna need some privacy, guys." As the door clicked shut, leaving them alone, Cordelia bent to grab the little key resting atop their pile of clothes.

"No," Angel said raggedly. "We have to be completely sure first."

Cordy smiled and let her blanket drop to the floor. "Now I know for sure you're Angel." She slid beneath the comforter. "But, I want you to hold me." The little key turned in the lock and freed his arm. He wrapped it around her and she snuggled into his chest.





Spike threw open the door and shouted "Buffy!" as he prowled across the main room to the stairs, taking them two at a time. "Buffy!" he called again as he cleared the landing. Buffy spun around at the sound of his voice, her heart pounding in her chest. She stopped still at the murderous look on his face.

"I won't let you do this!" he said through gritted teeth.

"It's already done," Buffy blurted automatically.

Spike's eyes widened with hurt and he looked as if she'd just staked him in the chest. He wavered for a moment then just turned and left. Everything in him shut down for a moment and he just had to get away. Couldn't look at her. Couldn't listen to her leave him.

Buffy raced after him and called, "Spike! Wait!" But by the time she'd cleared the stairs she heard his motorcyle already squealing away.

TBC

Continue...