I’m so happy for the free-for-all day! I haven’t had any time to really indulge in Seasonal Spuffy this round thanks to a great lack of time, but I did manage to get something written as a contribution. I skipped on the Fairy Tale theme, though.
Title: In Company of Linoleum
Summary: Just a pointless one-shot s4 fic of a still-held-captive-by-the-Scoobies!Spike.
A/N: It’s in annoying first-person POV. D’oh.
A/N the 2nd: Thank you to Deathisyourart for the look-over! *wraps a chain around you and keeps you 4evah connected to the ‘Verse*
It was downright humiliating.
It’s like: here’s a flimsy chair that even Harris could manage to break apart, here’s a set of ropes tied loose enough around you to be considered more an extension of wardrobe than an actual restraint, and here’s you… a once upon a depressingly short time ago Bad Ass master vampire, now at the mercy of the killer of your kind.
That’s willing mercy, by the way, because did I mention that I’d basically perched myself atop this twisted tale of idiocy?
Anyway.
Sitting comfortably on that shoddy, Xander-breakable chair with a section of rope lazily strewn across my lap, I’m feeling rather neglected. Slayer’s in the next room over, some disgusting attempt at pretending to play normal with her little band of loyal lackeys, while I’m locked in the small, stuffy bathroom without a decent source of entertainment. Eavesdropping aside. The Watcher left the half hour before, and aside from the one initial warning that consisted of the usual array of death threats and cold glares, I’ve been ignored and forgotten by the Slayer.
Best to rectify that.
“Slaaaayer,” I singsong, knowing the falsetto will reach those perky ears of hers.
Sure enough, just a few short seconds later, I can hear her grumble to her friends. Something about how she really, really hates her Watcher, and why oh why can’t she stake the bad, evil, ruggedly handsome vampire that’s managed to upset her every attempt at a professionally based dusting during their previous altercations.
Along those lines.
And, if I might add, coming out as a rather masculine growl. It’s not all that attractive.
“C’mon!” I yell after a couple more pointedly silent minutes, because, honestly, there’s only so much time I can spend in the company of linoleum without going bat shagging crazy. Like Dru, only with less appeal. “I know you hear me, Slayer, so quit your bloody blathering and get in here!”
She doesn’t disappoint. Not a breath of useless air later, that bathroom door is flying open. The Slayer can be so bloody dramatic sometimes. Heaven forbid she take the time to turn an actual doorknob without first having to kick her way through.
“Lookey there,” I drawl upon her arrival, giving her an unscripted once-over. “It’s the wind beneath my wings. Or,” I stop, mockingly reflective, “was it me that was the wind beneath your wings?”
“Spike,” she growls, a tight grip on that ever present anger that, in my personal and somewhat professional opinion, probably comes from a lack of a consistent and half-decent lay. “How about we skip this hourly thing you do in annoying me? Just this once?”
I offer up my most pleasant of smiles. No malice at all. Well, hardly. “How ’bout you untie me? Since we’re being so friendly?”
Never mind the fact that, if it came down to it, all I’d have to do is twist my left wrist, flex the right one, and the ropes would slide off my hands and down my body with no trouble at all.
“Untie you?” she blinks back. “Because I look like I’m in the mood to deal with your actual presence?”
If that’s not a cue for my leer, I don’t know what it is. “You didn’t seem to mind my actual presence last week. Matter of fact–”
“Okay!” she rushes to say, stomping her way over to me like a sullen child. “Point made. You’re just as annoying tied up. Got it.” And then, right in front of me, smelling like a bloody soap dish, she stops. Instead of proceeding with the loosening of ropes, she just starts to smile. “Unless…” And, fuck, I already hate that gleam in her eye. It’s twisted. It’s wrong. Nothing good can come of it. “How about I just gag you instead? I’m sure I can find something–” She does an abrupt about face, in the wrong damn direction of the ropes, and starts fumbling about in the Watcher’s cabinets.
“Stop,” I say, watching her in horror. “What’re you doing?”
“Ransacking!” is her cheerful reply as she rummages through various drawers.
Like hell I’m gonna be bound and gagged!
Her search ends up being fruitless, though. Turns out the Watcher isn’t as kinky as I thought–recreational set of chains on hand? Yes, as I can personally attest. Useful gag for extra efficiency? Not an inch of fabric to be found. Pity.
With a resigned sigh, the Slayer shuffles her way back over to me. And I greet her with what’s considerably my most charming smile, the one that’s been put to good use the past century over to lure in unsuspected victims.
“Let’s to it, then,” I tell her. “And careful, will you? Think my wrists are starting to chafe.”
She makes a face, this annoying little grimace–like I’ve just upset the worldly scales of right and wrong with my one harmless comment. God forbid. “First off,” she says, the Look of Disgust almost naturally being replaced by the Look of Business. Meaning the scowl is now there to greet me, accompanied by that pleasant, unfaltering frown of hers. “Don’t tell me what to do.” I have to try hard not to blurt out a retort at that. Like I’m one to take orders from Little Miss Not Quite A Cheerleader? But her eyes widen in this way that basically lets me know that, were I ever fancying seeing the dark of night again, I’d do best to shut my mouth. “Secondly,” she adds, upon my stubborn refusal to give her the perfect reason to keep me held captive. “Shut up.”
I blink. Veeeery, very slowly. Just when I think I couldn’t think any less of this girl, she goes and lets loose a gem like, ‘Shut up.’ It’s a hell of a comeback, wouldn’t you say? Chilled me to the very bone. No, wait. It was pathetic and embarrassing and–why does she even bother? You’ve got to know when to just accept your lack of quipping abilities and move the hell on.
Carefully, still eyeing me like any second I might violently lash out and attack (damn right! Because I’m still plenty dangerous!) she crouches down and starts to undo the ropes. It’s a bit distracting at first, because she doesn’t even bother to go behind me. No, the Slayer thought it more safe to stay in direct line of eyesight, settling for kneeling at my feet. Which, any other week when I hadn’t have earlier been subjected to being engaged to the sodding bint, I’d’ve enjoyed this position just fine. Probably would’ve even offered up a suggestive comment or four.
Now it’s flat out torture.
She’s leaning forward, her warm forearm brushing up against my leg, and all I can think about is last week with her sitting in my lap. These bloody images keep flashing through my head, quick and intangible, but I know, I know, what she feels like. Can remember. Remember it like it was just this afternoon.
It’s taking way too long, I decide. Can’t she just rip the ropes off with one of them handy surges of girl power and super strength? C’mon, I’ll stand up and they’ll fall down and it’ll all be done and over with–but then she has to go and make this little grunting noise, all throaty and annoyed, and if that’s not enough, she starts leaning further into my knee. And, alright, I’m not exactly proud of the fact that a little arm-to-knee brush-up is diverting the blood flow to more centrally located parts of my body, but… I can’t bloody help it! I’m a weak, pathetic man, alright? Been deprived of a woman’s touch for too long, Harmony discounted, and it’s only natural that in desperate situations, logic and clarity fly out the backseat window.
“Stupid… rope,” the Slayer grunts, fed up now. She starts to jerk her arm, making it brush again and again against the side of my leg.
“Slayer,” I growl, mostly because I’m dangerously close to feeling things I’m pretty damn sure no respectable vampire should be feeling, but also because I’m bordering on ripping her bloody head off if she doesn’t hurry it along. Paired up with that micro-what’s-it stored away in my noggin, ready to zap at will, it’s not as thrilling of a prospect as it once was.
There’s another twitch of her arm, her elbow hitting my shin, and then: sweet sweet release. The ropes loosen, effortlessly slide down my waist, and I’m bolting to my feet the next instant. The Slayer, being a natural predator and all, is on her feet just as quick. Which puts us nose to nose. Or, more, eye to chin… her being shorter and all. Either way, there’s not a lick of space between us.
She just narrows her eyes, taking a strong hold of my elbow. Before I can think to protest, she’s spinning me around and pushing me forward.
“Hey!” I shout, coherent thoughts once again taking shape.
“Get a move on, Spike.”
Bitch. I offer up a glare, one that holds all sorts of promises that’ll eventually be fulfilled once I’m chip free, before whirling on my own two feet and sauntering on out of there of my own free will. I only get so far before I remember that it’s play time for the Slayerettes, as I’m hit with their sudden presence. There the others are, just around the corner. Red, who I’m still pissed at for making me a victim of her spell, by the way, is sitting comfy in the arm chair with a bowl of popcorn in her lap. And there’s Harris, too–the git whose very existence makes Harmony’s look downright applaudable.
Just my luck, Xander notices my entrance and decides to greet me with a comment. “Well, now,” he says, mock-cheerfully. “If it isn’t Spike, the fangless wonder.”
“And if it isn’t Sunnydale’s designated loser,” I retort with much more disdain, “the poxy git. How goes the delivery service? Tips still keeping you afloat?”
The Slayer’s hand is suddenly at my back, all at once an immediate distraction. I can feel each and every warm digit pressing down, making my shirt slide across and against my skin, but it’s far from pleasant. It burns like holy water.
“Move it,” she barks, giving me yet another hard push.
“Shove off,” I growl, and sidestep out of her directed path to maneuver myself into the kitchen, going for that tool box of an appliance that the Watcher calls his fridge. Inside there’s a few packets of blood with my proverbial name written on them. Not exactly fine dining, admittedly, but it keeps the stomach from making gurgly noises.
The Slayer shrugs and heads towards her friends while I grab myself one of them novelty mugs the Watcher has strictly forbade me to use, fill it to the rim with blood, and place it in the center of the microwave. I figure about 30 seconds will do, so I set it for that and focus elsewhere. I don’t want to pay any attention to the Slayer, certain as hell couldn’t care less about her friends, but I find myself drawn to their conversation anyway.
“So you’re going?” Willow’s asking, beaming brightly. She’s at the edge of her chair, bubbling with over-charged excitement.
Interesting.
“Of course she’s going,” Harris cuts in knowingly. He glances towards the Slayer, suddenly unsure. “Right, Buff?”
The Slayer, now seated at the end of the couch next to Xander, glances back and forth between her friends. Then, ever with the dramatics, she plops back against the cushion with a heavily put-on sigh. “I don’t know.”
“Buffy!” Willow’s at the Slayer’s side in an instant, which only further piques my interest. But then the microwave beeps from behind, reminding me of lunch, so, and after only a slight hesitation, I go back to fetch it. Don’t waste any time in getting back to my claimed spot to watch the events unfold before me though, mug in hand. I sip ever-so-quietly while the Slayer pours her wretched little heart out.
“I should, shouldn’t I?” she says, looking… nervous? Or worried? Royally constipated? “I mean, it’s like, ‘Here, Buffy. Here’s your clean slate. Have some chalk and get to writing!’ But I don’t know what to do! How do you recover from that?”
What in the great hell is ‘that’? If she’s gonna be having some heart-felt conversation here, the least she can do is be more specific.
“I think you’re tragically underestimating the Power of Buffy,” Harris offers, smiling stupidly. Wanker.
“The Power of Buffy is stuck on pause,” the Slayer pouts. “And–and jammed in the VCR, and all the little tape inside is coming out and–”
“And I think you just danced your way right into a metaphor that you never quite had me with.”
Curioser and curioser.
I down the atrocity that the mortals dare assume serves as a well-balanced meal, not even bothering to rinse my cup out. The Watcher deserves a nice ring of blood coated at the bottom of his precious mug for all the torment I’ve been put through. The bloody bastard never even lets me catch my soaps! How am I supposed to keep up with Passions if I can’t turn on the sodding telly?! For all I know, poor Timmy’s been held at the bottom of that well for weeks, and–
Oh, right. The Slayer and her problems.
“That’s the thing,” the bitch in question grumbles, and with it, I feel a stab of annoyance. Here I am, planning evil, evil things for all she knows, and I’m not even a second thought! Nothing! She’s too caught up in her ‘normal girl’ problems to even remember the vampire diabolically lurking about–or, okay, so currently I’m peeking my head out of that small opening that cuts between the kitchen and the Watcher’s living room… but I could be lurking! The Slayer slumps down in her seat even further, still complaining, “There was never any ‘have’ to begin with,” she whines. “Not really. There were beginning stages of ‘have’, but they’ve pretty much been ruined by–” She cuts off her own words, sitting up suddenly. Then she’s on her feet the next second, whirling around, and I have to push back pretty damn quick to avoid getting caught with my ear against the wall. “Spike!”
Balls.
Best to play this casual, lest she feels like locking me in the bathroom again. Not that I’d let her. Despite that, I saunter my way into the living room, making sure to look as annoyed and inconvenienced as possible. “What?”
“What were you doing?” she demands, slinking up close, making herself right cozy in my personal space.
“Baking you a cake. What else in this sodding cubbyhole?” Off her continued look of blankness (and, honestly, her nose doesn’t look any less deformed from this close angle) I roll my eyes and clarify, “I was heating up blood. Satisfied?”
She starts to frown, which either means she’s annoyed or… well, no, it mostly just means she’s annoyed. “Does Giles usually let you use his stuff?”
“No, usually we dine out. It’s real fancy. Rupes in his evening wear–”
“Stop,” she says, a hand held up in my face to, I don’t know, further cease the flow of words. Annoyingly bossy, this bint is. With a disgusted wave, the hand falls back to her side, and she shrugs daintily. “Fine, so you’ve developed a sense of maturity beyond that of a three year old. Spike can cook his own food!” she mock-gasps. “Color me impressed.”
I just smirk. “If I knew you were that easy…”
And now there’s that predictable crease of her brow, followed with the thin line of her lips as my comment starts to connect in her itty bitty brain. “Don’t even,” she warns through a clenched jaw. “I’m nauseous enough just having to look at you.”
“Oh, you’re the nauseous one?” I shoot back, feeling oddly insulted. “Have a look in the mirror lately? ‘Cause it’s not pages of poetry you’re inspiring from within, that’s for bloody sure.”
She starts to seethe, which makes this scenario slightly more tolerable. At least from my perspective. “Get out of my sight, Spike.”
“Says the warden to her captive,” I mock, reminding her for the umpteenth time that I’m here against my will.
All of a sudden, Willow jumps to her feet, joining the Slayer at her side in a vain attempt at peace-making. She’s like an overly-excited, bouncy little dog. “Okay!” she says, way too cheerfully. “Calm time! Let’s everyone just take a deep breath and–and relax and try not to kill each other!”
The Slayer, instead of backing down, takes a step forward. The inch between us gets sliced down to little more than a hairline, making her clog and consume each and every one of my senses. “Captive?” she bites out. “You came to us, Spike, not the other way around.”
“Yeah, white flag all but waved and raised!” I argue back. “Cut me a sliver of slack here, Slayer.”
“Slack?” There’s an impressive amount of incredulity behind her words. “You want slack? Pulse check, Spike: you’re a vampire! You don’t get slack. You get stakes. Want one of those? ‘Cause I can give you one of those.”
I resist the urge to roll my eyes. If redundancy could kill, I’d be dust a dozen times over. As it is I’m merely bored with her continuing predictability. “Yeah, yeah,” I wave her threat off, a slight, unimpressed shrug tossed in for emphasis. “I’ve heard that one before. Matter of fact, I’ve heard ’em all before. Guess that means you’re slipping, doesn’t it?”
“Go to hell,” is her harsh reply, cold and, just beneath the surface and heavy weight of her anger, a touch of actual hurt.
“Already on a direct flight,” I smirk. Then, because I just can’t help it, I lean in and lower my voice. Personal attacks are always a highlight of our conversation. “Guess which one of your sweetie bears is joining me in the cockpit?”
Before the Slayer’s face can crumple into a pile of girly mess, all sad and pathetic about having dated a bad, mean, evil vampire that broke her heart when she shagged the soul and moral goodness right out of him, Harris cuts in. “Okay,” he says, mostly as a casual observer and with a distant sort of awe, “this conversation has turned disturbing on so, so many levels.”
“And slightly uncivilized,” Willow agrees.
My eyes are still locked with the Slayer’s, and hers are just as locked with mine. Neither of us willing to back down, not when everything’s turned so wicked and fun.
There’s a heavy beat that passes, and then the Slayer starts to smile, that crazed, twisted smile complete with the you are about to get royally fucked over twinkle in her eyes. “Xander,” she calls out, pleasant as can be, “grab some rope.”
Oh, hell no.
“I think it’s time we put Spikey back in his cage,” she continues, still staring at no one but me.
“I’d like to see you try,” I tell her, lowly, deadly serious. There’s no way I’m going to be put through this humiliation on a daily basis just because the Slayer’s a dictating, sadistic, uptight bitch with a God complex that’d impress even the more fascist of historical nut jobs. It’s time to knock the princess off her pedestal.
“Believe me, Spike, I am so far from being in the mood to deal with you, it’s not even funny.”
“Tell you what, then. How about I just let myself out–”
“Don’t even think about it,” she warns, taking a step forward as I take one back.
“Can’t bear to part? Is that it? Don’t worry,” I mock, lowering my voice so just she can hear. “I’ll make it a habit to visit.”
“Get in the bathroom,” she orders with scary calmness, her jaw clenched tight enough that I can see the thin, wiry muscles of her throat and neck leading a double trail downwards to the cross of her collarbone.
I leer at that spot, that point just above her revealed cleavage, and then ever-so-slowly lift my gaze upwards until I’m staring directly into her two beady eyes. Ohh, and she looks pissed. I can’t help but smirk, my tongue poking at the back of my teeth playfully. “Is that a direct order?”
She fumes, grabs a hold of my shirt sleeve, and immediately starts to drag me towards her holding cell of choice. Her friends scatter out of the way, useless idiots that they are, so that she has a clearer path.
“Hey!” I shout in outrage, immediately trying to twist free. “Let go, you bitch!”
“Not a chance.”
I splutter on. “I came to you all in peace–”
She whirls around to glare at me, still holding tight and still moving forward. “You came to us in desperation!”
“Yeah, still, but I was peaceful about it.”
“You threatened to eat Xander!”
“How was I to know he’d make a full recovery?! I thought I’d do everyone a favor and put him out of his misery–”
“Ugh!” she disgustedly huffs, or more sort of growls, and sharply tugs again on my arm.
“Bloody hell,” I yell, forced along after her. “You can’t keep me locked away like some house-trained pet vampire–”
“Wanna bet?”
“It’s unconstitutional!”
“Like you care?” she shoots back. “Hello, British accent ringing any bells?”
I don’t get a word in, not with the distraction of being shoved through a doorway and pushed onto that bloody chair, the one Harris could rip apart if you gave him enough time and a dose of testosterone. I almost start to smirk in triumph when I see her reach for the previously discarded ropes, knowing that they won’t keep me bound for long, when Xander comes following in after us with something much stronger.
“Check it out,” he says to me. “Chains, courtesy of a’one Jacob Marley. Your day just went from bad to worse, didn’t it?”
I could rip the boy’s head off. I could work through the chip and rip the boy’s head off, one vertebrae at a time.
The Slayer takes the chains from Xander with a pleased smile and starts to wind them around me. I just glare, breathing heavily in and out through my nose. Hot red anger plays behind my eyes every time I blink, but I don’t stop staring at her. Not when she bends across me to pull the chains tighter, her warm breath in my ear and against my neck, and not when she stops to loom above me, one knee touching mine.
She nods her head and wipes her hands, a self-congratulatory pat on the back. And then, with another satisfied nod, she bounces around and all but skips out, Xander barking at her heels to follow. The door gets pulled shut behind them with a resonating click, and I’m left to my own devices. I start to tug. Pull. Yank with all my strength, and the chains move not one blessed inch.
I slump back in defeat, boredom already creeping in. At least there’s the linoleum.
Originally posted at http://seasonal-spuffy.livejournal.com/122244.html
