Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy.

Episode 4: The Mascot by Archivesgrrl/Jacque1in (cont'd)

****

The Sunnydale football player, ball clutched in his arms, fell into the end zone just as the horn signalled the end of the game. The Homecoming crowd went wild as the high school band burst into a rousing version of the fight song and the Sunnydale cheerleaders commenced a vigorous celebratory routine that involved a lot of high kicks and pom-pom shaking.

"See, now, why couldn’t they have won like that when we were in school?" Willow grumbled, picking at the remains of her popcorn. "It’s breaking tradition for the home team to win at Homecoming! You’re supposed to lose and then go comfort yourself by hanging around at the dance with your friends and making fun of the Homecoming Court while secretly admiring the dresses."

"Well, hey! We can still go scoff and admire! The school is allowing public access tonight to show off the new building," Buffy said, patting Willow’s arm comfortingly. "I think they hope the taxpayers will feel all nostalgic about high school and not mind how many millions of tax dollars it cost to rebuild the school."

"Some things never change," Willow sighed. "Let’s go check out the new building. After what happened to ours, I’m kind of curious to see if the architects made any interesting design changes. You know, like building it like a war zone bunker or something."

"Well, I did hear the motion-sensitive lights are pretty snazzy," Buffy said as the pair began to make their way down the bleachers. She paused partway down as she thought she felt her Slayer sense tingle, but then the sensation faded, and with a shrug, she followed Willow.

****

From his post beneath the bleachers, Spike listened to the reverberating tramp of feet overhead as he lit his cigarette. "Good, the sheep are off to the pen," he thought with satisfaction. "Should be show time pretty soon." His plan was to lurk about, make sure the prank came off as planned and that Dawn made a clean escape, then scamper off to the Bronze for a beer. But not until he was certain his Nibblet wasn’t going to get herself – or him – into any trouble, at least not any they couldn’t handle.

When the crowds had dispersed ten minutes and a leisurely smoke later, he started into the school building. An hour tops, he speculated, and he’d be free to rest easy and enjoy his weekend in peace. Perhaps he’d have a Guinness.

****

The dance was hot and crowded, but everyone seemed to be having a good time, including the few adult Sunnydale taxpayers who had been willing to brave the musical assault coming from within the gym rather than simply peeking in, covering their ears and scurrying away to look at the new library.

"Will, do you see Dawn anywhere?" Buffy shouted over the music. Willow shook her head and Buffy frowned. She wasn’t really checking up on her, but she had become a bit concerned that she still hadn’t seen her. Could Dawn have lied to her about going to Homecoming?

A familiar tingle began in her gut and Buffy began to search the darkened gym more methodically. When her eye finally caught a familiar glint of platinum hair in one corner, she touched Willow’s arm and shouted, "Be right back!" before starting towards her target.

Spike was lurking behind a table set with food and a punch bowl, helping himself to some sort of hors d’oeuvre. He was evidently preoccupied with selecting from the range of munchies because he failed to notice Buffy until she had nearly reached him. Even in the dark, she saw that he nearly choked on what he was chewing when he saw her, which seemed like suspicious behavior, even for Spike.

"First college parties, now high school ones. Are you trying to embrace your arrested development, Spike?" Buffy raised an eyebrow.

Spike cleared his throat nervously. "Uh, hello, Buffy. Thought you would be out doing patrolling or hanging out with the gang at the Bronze or something." He silently added, "And that Little Bit would have made sure of that before trying to pull a stunt under Big Sis’s nose. Going to have to have a talk with that girl about planning capers properly."

"Willow and I decided to relive our glory days for the night. You know: old school spirit, cheerleading, Homecoming-court viewing." Buffy paused. "Although, now that I mention it, none of those have particularly good associations for me." She grunted and looked at Spike. "What’s your excuse?"

"I was just –" He paused, trying to think of a plausible reason to be in the school besides his real purpose and found himself seizing on the first excuse that came to him. "I was just here to listen to the band," he finally said firmly. "Heard they were good."

Buffy glanced over at the local band, a motley group of local college students playing a loud and enthusiastic but painfully out-of-tune cover of ‘Tainted Love.’ "Somehow, I never pictured you as a Soft Cell fan," Buffy said dryly. "Come on, Spike. It’s Friday night and even you could find something better to do than hang out with a bunch of teenagers listening to bad ‘80s music." Buffy crossed her arms and gave him a skeptical look.

"Oh, right." Spike took the offensive. "Sure you’re not looking for another high school to destroy? This would make, what, three?"

"Oh, please, I was kind of saving the world as we know it at the time –" Buffy began to point out, only to be cut off by shrill electronic feedback from a microphone. The band had wound up its number and the podium spotlight was now on Principal Gregory, the so-far-still-uneaten successor to Principal Snyder.

"Welcome, everyone, particularly our special open house guests, to the 2001 Sunnydale High School Homecoming dance! As you know, this is our first year in the new building…" Buffy tuned out Principal Gregory’s voice and turned back to Spike, who was taking advantage of the speech to slip some sort of pastry puff things into his duster pockets.

"Jeez, Spike, what is it with you and food, anyhow? You eat more than any vampire I’ve ever known." Buffy watched as Spike popped what looked like a miniature spring roll into his mouth.

"Mmmmph," Spike replied, before swallowing and then leaning over close to Buffy’s ear. "Simple, luv," he murmured. "I’m orally fixated." He straightened as he used the tip of his tongue to brush away a crumb on his lip and grinned sardonically.

Buffy felt a small tingle of something she preferred not to analyze as she watched his tongue brush across his lip, but quickly suppressed it. "God, Spike, sometimes you really are a pig," she snorted.

For some reason, her comment made him laugh out loud, causing a few heads to turn their way.

"Buffy, I still haven’t seen Dawn. Wow, look at that dress!" Willow appeared behind Buffy, eyeing a particularly backless and low-cut shift on a girl who looked at least as young as Dawn. "I don’t remember the dress code being that ... flimsy. Hi, Spike." Willow did a double take at Spike and then looked questioningly at Buffy.

"He’s checking out the band," Buffy said sarcastically. "And stuffing his face."

"Hey! It’s a public event, and I’m a resident of Sunnyhell, too, ya know." Spike craned his neck to see what was happening on the stage, which was now crowded with a handful of giggling girls in fancy dress and boys in tuxes. Principal Gregory’s voice boomed over the loudspeakers, announcing the members of this year’s Homecoming Court amidst applause and cheering. "So that’s the in-crowd, eh? Look a right bunch of prats." He grunted.

"Hey, I’ll have you know that I ran for Homecoming Queen one year," Buffy said, giving him a stern look.

"Oh? Did you win?" Spike raised an eyebrow.

"Uh – no --"

"Oooh, Slayer, so not quite as "in" as all that, then?" Spike smirked. "Just as well, pet, wouldn’t want you to be raising up Tidbit to think running with that lot was important. Better for her to be her own woman."

"And you’re what, Dr. Spike the adolescent psychology expert?" Buffy grumbled.

"Speaking of Dawn, where is she? We’ve been looking for her all night and haven’t seen her anywhere," Willow said, peering around into the crowd.

"I’m sure she’s around somewhere," Spike said nonchalantly. "Probably fixing her makeup in the loo with her mates or something."

"Probably has that Lyssa chick helping her apply it with a trowel." Buffy said, pursing her lips.

"Now, now, Buffy, we’ve had this talk before – " Spike began, only to be interrupted by sudden pandemonium near the stage. "Bloody hell, here we go," he muttered.

Around the stage, people were squealing and running. Buffy couldn’t see what started the ruckus at first, but then she spotted it: some distant cousin of the long-lamented Herbert, the last known Sunnydale Razorback mascot, was running frantically around on the gym floor, dashing between legs and under girls’ skirts. Only this pig looked much larger and considerably meaner – and seemed to be glowing a strange, phosphorescent green.

"Oooh! It must be a prank!" Willow squeaked. "What’s with the glowing? Is that luminescent paint?"

The pig suddenly stopped in the middle of the dance floor and stood, looking around as if searching for something or someone particular. Spying one of the girls on the stage, a slim blonde in a shimmering pink dress, it suddenly roared and stood up on its back legs. Buffy grimaced, thinking the motion looked rather creepy – but it was nothing compared to the abrupt transformation that followed in a rush of green energy. When the flash of light vanished, a man stood in the middle of the gymnasium, clad only in a bright red cloth wrapped around his waist, skin covered in a dense pattern of black tattoos, and dark hair shorn like bristles all over his head. It wasn’t until he turned to the crowd once more that people began to scream and run, as they saw his mottled pink snout and huge curved tusks jutting out of the skin.

"I guess not." Spike answered Willow’s question, staring numbly.

****

The creature opened its mouth and then roared before charging directly for the blonde girl, who began to scream shrilly and tried to run in her fashionably thick-soled sandals. Stumbling off the edge of the stage, the girl landed in a crumpled heap, the crown so recently placed on her head askew and the ribbon reading "Sophomore Princess" beginning to entangle her arms. The pig-man, his short, thick muscles pumping, swept her up with an indecipherable but triumphant shout and slung her over his shoulder. As the girl’s arms and legs flailed helplessly and she continued to shriek, he whirled, grunting, apparently looking for an escape.

"Caveman much?" Buffy snorted before taking off at a run towards the couple. With a groan, Spike followed.

The crowd was clearing in panic as the pig-man bolted for the door, bellowing, his captive in his arms. Attacking from the side, Buffy managed to jump up and cathch him in the ribs with a whirling kick, jarring the girl loose from his grasp. Growling, the pig-man turned to face this new and annoying obstacle while the girl, makeup beginning to smear around her eyes, tried to scramble away.

Dark eyes flashed green for a moment and the pig creature threw his arms up the air shouting in a language that Buffy didn’t understand. Instantly, a thick gray cloud appeared near the ceiling of the gymnasium, blocking out what little light there had been from the subdued party lighting, and a drenching downpour of ice cold rain began to fall. Buffy stopped, caught off guard by the unexpected shower, and behind her she could hear Spike begin to swear a steady stream of curses.

The pig creature shouted out another word in the unknown language and thrust his arm out towards Buffy. A brilliant flash of light combined with a concussive blow of what felt like a million volts of energy threw her several yards across the gymnasium, slamming her into the buffet table. She lay there for a moment dazed before raising her head dizzily and squinting through the indoor rain. The pig-man was trundling the girl up onto his shoulder again as wet and screaming people tried to run out of the room. The wires of the stage microphone system were sparking wildly as school officials and Homecoming Court members clambered over one another trying to escape the danger.

Off to one side, Willow, eyes even darker than the pig creature’s, threw up her hands and chanted something that made the pig creature suddenly stand frozen, unable to move, the girl dangling limply over his shoulder. The bizarre rain from overhead turned into drizzle and then stopped as the cloud evaporated.

"Buffy, are you okay?" Buffy could see Spike’s lips moving, but her ears were still ringing, muffling the sound. She vaguely noticed that something was very odd about Spike’s hair, but other more pressing matters demanded her attention as she struggled to her feet and ran back towards the pig creature, who still stood, battling fruitlessly against Willow’s magical bindings.

"Will, how long will that hold?" Buffy panted, her own voice sounding distant and watery.

"A few minutes at least. What IS that?" Willow looked anxious, despite her still ominously black eyes.

"Not any demon I recognize," Spike said, squinting at the tusks and running a hand through his hair. He paused for a moment and pulled at the blond locks as if trying to see them. "Damn!" he muttered. "I must have been standing too close to the Slayer." He brushed at his hair in annoyance.

"It’s a demi-god," said a new voice. Lyssa sounded shaken. She and Dawn had entered the gymnasium during the fray and stood nearby, faces wet with rain and pale in the flickering lighting.

"Dawn! Where have you been? Are you okay?" Buffy grabbed her sister by the arm and looked her over with concern. "Wait, what do you mean it’s a demi-god?" Buffy stared at Dawn and Lyssa.

"It’s Kamapua’a, the Hawaiian pig god," Dawn said.

"The water god who was in love with Pele, the volcano goddess?" asked Willow, her face brightening a bit. "Wow, he has a great myth!" As four faces turned to look at her, she added, blushing, "Well, it’s very romantic and passionate. Although kind of sad, since Pele rejects him brutally when he tells her he loves her and they fight and try to kill one another with storms and lava." Raising her eyebrows as if making a connection, she added, "I guess that explains the inside waterworks. He can make thunderstorms." Looking at Buffy’s hair she added, "And lightning," although Buffy failed to understand the implication.

Kamapua’a had stilled and now stood glaring at the group, the blonde now mercifully unconscious over his shoulder. Spike glanced overhead. "Uh, Buffy, Will, perhaps we can discuss Pig-boy’s romantic nature at some later point. Looks like it’s clouding up again. The binding spell must be weakening."

"Dawn, you’re eventually going to have to explain to me how you know that thing is a demi-god, but first things first. We need to get the girl away from him. Will, can we just take her out of harm’s way?" Buffy asked.

"No, the spell won’t allow us to break that barrier. He’ll have to give her up voluntarily," Willow said unhappily.

Buffy swore. "Okay, so any ideas why he grabbed her to start with? Maybe we can convince him to hand her over."

"He’s in love," Dawn muttered.

"What?" Buffy said as Spike and Willow raised their eyebrows.

"The girl is Kirstie Branson. He’s in love with her. I kind of put a love spell on – on him to make him want her," Dawn admitted. "But he was just supposed to chase her around the gym! And he was supposed to still be a pig!" she tried to explain as the three adults cast perturbed looks at her.

"Dawn, you were doing magic? Unsupervised?" Willow sounded appalled. "Don’t you know how dangerous that is?"

"It was just a little spell!" Dawn said, her brow wrinkled in worry.

"Let’s scold the Nibblet later," Spike said roughly. "I don’t fancy getting any more soaked than I already am." He gestured at the ceiling, where the clouds were growing darker and thicker. Kamapua’a was beginning to shift more, as if he could feel the bindings loosening, and he was beginning to rumble something in what the group now assumed was Hawaiian.

"Oh, great and it sounds like we have a language barrier, too. Unless you happen to speak Hawaiian as well as Fyarl?" Buffy looked at Spike hopefully.

"No such luck, pet, I don’t know much more than ‘Aloha,’’’ he replied.

"Ooh! I have a spell we can use for translating!" Willow said eagerly. "Maybe if we just ask him nicely, he’ll give her up!"

Willow chanted something quick and soft and made a motion with her hands and then suddenly the group could hear what the Hawaiian demi-god was saying in English. "Why do you insult me by offering me this maiden and then forbidding me to take her?" he roared. "How do mortals dare bind me in this manner after invoking me?" A flash of lightning suddenly flitted from one part of the dark cloud overhead to another and the air crackled. On the demi-god’s shoulder, Kirstie suddenly stirred, looked at her captor, and began to scream again. Kamapua’a glanced at the girl and, much to everyone’s surprise, began to speak to her coaxingly. "Hush, my beloved, I will soon have you away from all this. You will be my goddess and I will worship every inch of your golden sweetness." He nuzzled a tusk against her body gently and patted Kirstie’s satin-clad posterior comfortingly.

Kirstie squealed and began to sob again. "Help me! Please help me! He’s a pig!" She wailed and began to beat his bare and tattooed back. "You pig! Let me go! Let me go!" One kicking sandal nearly got Kamapua’a in what looked like a potential delicate area of his cloth-covered lower half, although it was hard to say with a pig-human hybrid.

As Kirstie continued to shout and kick, Kamapua’a flung his head back and roared toward the gym rafters, where the ceiling-bound cloud began to flicker with more electrical charges and a light sprinkle of rain began to fall. Shaking Kirstie, he bellowed, "Why must they always say that?" He roared again.

"What’s he griping about?" Buffy asked in bewilderment.

"Uh, I think he’s upset because Kirstie called him a pig," Willow answered. She continued, lowering her voice confidentially, "The love of his life, the goddess Pele called him a pig when she rejected him. It’s gotta be kind of a sore point." Willow looked at the railing demi-god almost pityingly.

Spike snorted. "Hey, mate! You have my sympathies there," he shouted to the demi-god.

Buffy rolled her eyes. "Okay, what about lifting the love spell? Maybe he’ll let her go if he doesn’t feel that love any more."

"Just let her keep calling him a pig. That might take care of the feelings without any mojo," Spike grunted.

"I think I could do a reversal spell," Willow said cautiously. "Dawn, tell me exactly what you said when you worked the magic."

Dawn and Lyssa filled in the witch in on the details of the love spell and Willow, after thinking for a moment, took their hands while she recited an antidote to the love spell as Kirstie continued to kick and squeal. The demi-god’s upper body was moving much more freely now, although his legs still seemed to be mired in whatever invisible molasses Willow’s magic had sunk him into. As Willow spoke, a bluish aura began to swirl around the pig god and his captive, until it suddenly whirled right into the area of what should have been Kamapua’a’s heart if he had been human. He straightened suddenly, looking down at the blonde still sobbing and writhing on his shoulder, and then suddenly flung her away from him.

"Begone from me, you pale and insipid creature!" Kamapua’a proclaimed with disgust. "You are nothing compared to my beloved Pele, she of the dark hair and the molten fire."

Kirstie tumbled to the floor of the gym, scrambled to her feet and ran out of the room, which was now empty.

Kamapua’a growled. "And when I am free, I shall be avenged on you, humans, for this humiliation. It does not befit a great warrior such as myself to have such paltry tricks played on him by children."

"Hey, who are you calling a child?" snarled Spike. "I’ll have you know I’m nearly– "

Spike’s comment was cut short as a lightning bolt flashed from the ceiling to the electrical equipment on the stage and Kamapua’a finally broke free of Willow’s waning magical bonds. With a tremendous bellow, the pig god launched himself at Buffy, trying to gore her with his tusks. With an equally full-throated roar, Spike threw himself into the battle as Willow pushed Dawn and Lyssa to a safer area and a torrent of rain began to pour down.

Slipping and sliding on the wet gymnasium floor, Buffy and Spike worked in sync, throwing punches and kicks, both staying as physically close to Kamapua’a as possible on the assumption that he would not dare direct a lightning strike too close to himself. Buffy managed to grab a metal hors d’oeuvre tray at one point, snapped it brutally in half, and was about to use it to decapitate the pig god when Willow squealed.

"No! Buffy, don’t kill him! You’ll kill the pig and it’s an innocent creature!"

The momentary distraction was enough for Kamapua’a to take the upper hand. Knocking Spike away on the slippery floor just in time for a lightning bolt to zap the vampire and knock him unconscious, Kamapua’a launched himself at Buffy and wrestled her to the ground. Buffy found herself pinned against the sodden floor, water streaming into her face and eyes from above, and bits and pieces of debris sticking her in the back.

"For a human woman, you have a lot of fire!" Kamapua’a rumbled, his tusks brushing against her cheeks as he bent in close. Buffy could see that the dark eyes staring out above the snout were really rather pretty, which was disconcerting. She could see the arcs of lightning flashing behind the pig god’s head and feel that the damp red cloth he wore was soaked through and providing an inadequate barrier between their bodies. "You have the passion of my beloved Pele," he said approvingly. The tusks nuzzled against her provocatively and Buffy realized with a sense of horror that the piggy little mouth was heading towards her own lips. She was just trying to decide if she dared open her mouth to scream or whether that would be considered an open invitation for demi-god tongue action when Kamapua’a’s weight was suddenly lightened and she found a normal-sized pig resting on her chest, trembling and snuffling rather anxiously. At the moment Kamapua’a vanished, the storm clouds hovering near the ceiling and pelting the gym with rain disappeared. Buffy pushed the pig off of her and sat up, disoriented.

"Not that I wanted to have porcine lip contact, but what happened?" she asked, looking around.

"We sent him back into the obsidian from whence we think he came," announced Willow proudly, holding up a slim and shiny black rock. "Dawn was carrying it around in her pocket and I figured out a way to stuff him back in. Although, Dawnie, didn’t anyone ever tell you these things are bad luck? I’ll have to make sure Anya sends it back to the islands pronto."

Dawn ignored Willow and knelt down beside Spike, who was sitting up groggily, holding his head and using curse words that none of the young women in the room had ever heard. "Spike, are you okay?" Dawn asked anxiously.

"Yeah," he groaned, wincing. "I think so. Although I imagine my hair is rivaling the Slayer’s in the bride of Frankenstein department."

"What? What’s wrong with my hair?" Buffy felt her head, where her hair was sticking up in tufts after the lightning strike she had taken early on. "I was fighting with electroshock hair and no one mentioned it?"

"Didn’t seem to make much difference to Kamapua’a," observed Willow. "He still looked like he wanted to put the moves on you."

Spike frowned. "What’d I miss while I was knocked out?"

"I’m all fiery," Buffy muttered. "What is it with men who groove on my beating them up?"

"Well – " Spike began.

"Don’t even go there, Spike." Buffy shot him a warning look. "God, you can be such a pi— a jerk."

She turned to Dawn, who was hovering as if waiting for an axe to fall. "Dawn, now that the immediate crisis is over, what the hell were you thinking?"

"It was just supposed to be a joke, Buffy, that’s all," Dawn began defensively. "No one was supposed to get really hurt or anything." Dawn looked apologetically at Spike, who was still wincing and rubbing his head. "The spell just went kind of wonky. Maybe if you let me actually learn how to use magic properly, it wouldn’t have happened." Dawn raised her chin defiantly.

"What, so you can destroy the whole school next time instead of just the gym?" Buffy snapped.

"Following in big sister’s footsteps," Dawn snapped.

Willow interceded quickly, seeing the pained look on Buffy’s face. "Buffy, she has a point. About the magic training, not the school-destroying," she added hastily. "If she’s determined to try to use magic, she’s better off properly instructed." Buffy glared back at her friend. "Well, of course, unless you don’t want her using any magic..." Willow backpedaled.

"Will’s right, Buffy," Spike interjected. "If Little Bit is going to want to do magic, she’s going to do it whether you want her to or not. Better to have the Wiccas take her under their wing than let her be playing at being teen witch without any idea what she’s doing." He missed Lyssa’s hot blush at his words.

"Hello, still here," Dawn said, waving her hand. "Would you mind not discussing me like I’m invisible?"

Buffy looked at everyone and sighed. "Okay, we’ll talk about it, later. But for now, let’s just go home. I think I’ve had enough high school déjà vu for the evening." Buffy held out a strand of her hair and examined it with a grimace.

"Lyssa! Are you guys alright?" Mark appeared behind his sister and pulled her into a quick hug. "I heard the commotion but couldn’t find you outside. What happened?"

Spike frowned at the new arrival, taking in his bleached hair and black clothes.

"Just another Sunnydale High School Homecoming," Buffy said drily, looking around at the smoldering and water-soaked gym.

"Yup. This is pretty much the way I remember high school," Willow said nostalgically.

****

It wasn’t until Dawn had stalked off into the house on Revello, put out at being grounded by Buffy for the next two weeks, that it came out.

"I don’t understand why she did it," Buffy said to Spike, who was leaning against the front porch columns, running his fingers idly through his wild and frizzy hair. "What would possess her to do such a moronic thing? A prank? A magical prank?" Buffy shook her head.

Spike sighed. "She’s feeling out of the loop, I think. Usual teen alienation compounded by the whole mystical Key thing, to say nothing of losing her Mum and sis for a big part of the year. Hanging out with the Scoobies this summer – well, it had its uses, I can’t deny it, but I suspect she felt more like a mascot than a real member of your little group. Scrappy to your Scooby, if you know what I mean."

Buffy digested this silently, but then nodded in understanding.

"I think she just wanted to fit in with somebody, somewhere." He shrugged. "Lyssa and her mates fit the bill." He grunted. "Speaking of which, I wonder where those two halfwit boys were during the escapades. Probably bolted as soon as they saw real trouble was afoot. They didn’t look the courageous sort." He snorted.

"Boys? What boys?" Buffy sounded confused and Spike froze. "Spike, what do you know about this?"

"Uh – " That lightning bolt must have scrambled his brains a bit, Spike thought. Usually he could think up a lie and think it up quick like the Grinch, but he was drawing a blank.

"Spike, you knew she was going to do this?" Buffy’s voice sounded ominous.

"Oh, bloody hell," he muttered, feeling for a cigarette in his pocket. He was obviously going to need a smoke for what was coming.

"I thought she’d be better off with me looking out for her," he said, lighting his cigarette and blowing the smoke out in a harsh puff of air. "She told me what she was up to and I thought she’d be better off with a bit of adult supervision."

"You let my sister invoke a horny demi-god into a pig and destroy the new school gymnasium?" Buffy hissed in disbelief.

"Hey, now! She never mentioned the whole mojo thing to me! All she told me was that they were snatching the pig and turning it loose at the dance. That’s all, I swear!"

"Oh, so you just aided and abetted her in breaking and entering?" Buffy exhaled in frustrated disgust.

"No, I just drove the bloody getaway car," Spike grumbled.

"You WHAT?" Buffy howled. "Spike, are you out of your mind? This is serious! You helped her commit a criminal act. Multiple criminal acts, if you throw in the destruction of property and potentially life-threatening danger we were all in tonight. What the hell were you thinking?"

"I was trying to protect Little Bit," he shouted back, growing angry himself. "For God’s sake, Buffy, she’s fifteen bloody years old. She is going to do as she pleases whatever you or I tell her. At least she isn’t shutting me out yet, so I still have a chance to make sure she doesn’t do anything permanently harmful to herself."

"Letting her do whatever stupid thing she wants to do is NOT protecting her, Spike!" Buffy snapped furiously. "You should have – have stopped her somehow!"

"Oh, bugger it," Spike snarled, flipping his half-smoked cigarette into the bushes. "You just don’t get it. You cannot control another person’s choices, Buffy! You can only do your best to stand by in case they make bad ones and then help them out."

"Oh, like you helped out Dawn with this one?" Buffy said coldly. "That kind of help is something she doesn’t need."

"Fine," Spike spit out. "Then you can just lock her up in her room like bleeding Rapunzel and pretend to be surprised when you find she’s escaped and you don’t know where the hell she’s run off to." He stomped off the porch. "I’m going home. Tell Little Bit goodnight for me."

"Whatever." Buffy turned away and slammed the front door behind her as she went in.

From the window above the front porch, Dawn watched Spike stride angrily into the night, and heard the front door slam and let out the breath she’d been holding as she’d listen to her sister and the vampire argue. Picking up her hairbrush and moving to her vanity, she began to work out the intricate knots in her hair. Taking in her pale, makeup-smeared and still damp reflection, she stared at herself for a long time before abruptly whipping the brush viciously at the mirror, where it clattered harmlessly but noisily. "You’re more of a freak than ever," she hissed at herself.

School on Monday was going to be a bitch.

End Episode Four