Out of Joint -- Chapter 5 (Part 1)
Feb. 13th, 2005 09:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sharelleSince I received the call that there may be a decision regarding our school by tomorrow, I figured I'd better post this now. I'm not sure how ready it is, but if the news is bad, I may not have the ambition or the the inspiration to write anything for a while. If the news is good, however (*crosses fingers*), I should be able fix any roughness in this section and add to it fairly quickly.
I'd also hoped to have the story beta'ed beginning with this part, but, again, I was afraid that after tomorrow there might be a chance I wouldn't feel much like working on it. So here is what I have been working on -- the next section of Out of Joint for those of you who have been following it. (Though if the kindly soul who offered to possibly beta has the time and is feeling up to it, I'd still appreciate your thoughts and input. Editing in LJ is a simple thing. I can be reached at nlrummi (at) gmail (dot) com.)
Thank you all muchly for your patience. This scene is a bit rough (and includes what are probably more italics than I really need), but not too bad overall.
All previous parts are in my Memories, but as of this posting they don't seem to be working yet. The last chapter, at least, is here, in case anyone needs a refresher.
Disclaimer: Still not mine. None of it. Nope. Uh-uh.
Rating: PG-13 (for language and violence)
Setting: Picks up mid-"Destiny" and goes AU from there.
Feedback: Would seriously make my day. Seriously.
Out of Joint
by Sharelle
Chapter 5 – Ashes of Old Flames
Harmony loitered in the doorway of the med lab, the mug of blood in her hands significantly cooler than it had been when she’d first brought it over from the break room. She nibbled absently on the inside of her lower lip, trying to avoid smudging the mirror-like shine of her Sephora gloss, and stared at the vampire strapped to the gurney in the center of the room.
Angel had barked an over-the-shoulder order at her to bring some blood up here just as he and the rest of his boardroom posse had trooped past her desk, Chinese food in hand, and down the elevators. It had taken a few moments for Harmony to hop-to, however, as time was needed for the requisite ‘you’ve-gotta-be-kidding-me’ mouth gaping and the large ‘pleading-to-the-ceiling’ arm gestures before heading off to do as she was told in an ‘as-if-I-don’t-have-enough-to-do’ huff.
She had spent the next half hour moving slower than necessary, as though taking longer to fulfill Angel’s request would prove how busy she had indeed been. She lumbered through the staff room making disgusted faces at the various appliances located there, from the storage cooler where she found the blood to the microwave she used to warm it. Her face wrinkled with indignation as her mind held imaginary conversations with itself – sometimes a lecture on appreciation for one’s executive assistant with Angel, sometimes a dazzling soliloquy on why empowered females don’t need a man with Spike.
She came back to herself as the microwave started buzzing to signify the end of its cycle. Thinking about where she had to take it, Harmony’s lip curled over her teeth and she rolled her eyes as she removed the steaming mug from the rotating glass tray. Angel had once remarked that her face spent more time scrunched up while out of game face than any other vampire he had ever known. She couldn’t help it, though. This was annoying.
Holding the cup in her hands, Harmony noticed that it was much hotter than the preferred 98.6 degrees. She wasn’t sure if blood was actually supposed to steam like that. It was getting all crusty and bubbly around the edges, too. She hadn’t really paid attention to how long she had programmed the timer.
Well, she supposed, it’d serve him right if he did burn his mouth on it. After having to put up with his general moodiness and weird obsessions back while they were dating (not to mention getting the brush-off for the Slayer, of all people! The Slayer!), and then after what had happened in that office yesterday afternoon, it would definitely serve him right. Maybe he’d even get one of those little post-burn, dangly-skin things on the roof of his mouth. The kind that drove you nuts when you could never quite dislodge it with your tongue. And if Spike’s hands were strapped down like they said, he wouldn’t be able to use his fingers.
Hours of dangly-skin torture. That thought finally made Harmony smile.
But now that she was here, standing in the doorway of the med lab, unmoving, she found that her previous plan had been moot. There would be no mouth burning. The blood had cooled in her hands during her unplanned vigil as she stood there staring at Spike. She hadn’t expected to see him restrained like that. It must have been true. He really did go nuts.
“So are you gonna just stand there, or what?”
At the sound of his familiar drawl, Harmony squared her shoulders and hefted the mug directly in front of her like a chalice used for religious ceremony. She strode with quick wide steps into the room and around to the foot of the gurney so Spike couldn’t avoid looking directly at her. After all, she had reapplied her make-up and fixed her hair while in the break room. She’d even gone so far as to roll the waistband of her skirt over once, good for shortening it by at least a half-inch. It was times like this she missed mirrors the most – when in desperate need of a spot check. If she’d been at home she could have taken a quick Polaroid.
Carl, the Grl’lok demon from maintenance, who had been emptying the break room trash, had insisted she looked “A-Okay.” But after a few minutes of trying to chat with him, Harmony got the distinct impression that this was the only English Carl knew. She decided to take his word for it, though. She felt beautiful enough. And after the way Spike had treated her yesterday, he deserved to see what he had used, abused, and given up (again) in all her feminine glory.
Harmony held her chin up slightly as she glared down her nose at Spike. She wore her hostility like one of those cute little coats her vampire body no longer needed, but that her mall-girl sensibility wouldn’t let her live without. She tilted her head expectantly, glaring at the other vampire through contentious narrow eyes as though waiting for him to provide some explanation owed to her.
Spike did nothing but glare back, looking as though he was quite unsure as to why he was getting the evil-eye.
Finally his irritated gaze traveled from her face to the cup in her hands. “That for me?” he asked. “'Cause Doctor Fred said I’d be gettin’ some.”
Harmony straightened in a huff, transferring the mug to one hand while the other moved up to gesture erratically beside her shoulder, fingers spread wide, grasping at shreds of patience. The blood in the mug sloshed up to the rim, nearly spilling onto the floor. She shook her head and put on her own version of game face, one she had perfected long before ever becoming a vampire – the valley girl grimace.
“Oh, my God,” she groaned, her dander up. “Is that all you think about, Spike? Like you didn’t ‘get’ enough yesterday!” Then she looked at the mug in her hand and quieted grumblingly. “Oh.”
Harmony pulled herself up again and she tried for a more businesslike air. “Yes, this is yours. I was told to bring it in to you.”
Spike shifted a bit under his restraints, his gaze going from her eyes to the mug and back again. “Well, let’s have it, then.”
Harmony’s jaw slackened and hitched a bit, her face washing over with a look of extreme irritation and offense. She crossed her arms, bringing the hand that held the mug to rest against the opposite forearm. Oh no, uh-uh. He was not going to dismiss her like that.
“I would think you’d have something to say for yourself, first,” she chastised, the sterile linoleum floor of the med lab echoing with the click of her toe as she tapped her strappy sandal-clad foot impatiently.
Spike squinted at her. “What?”
“You know what,” Harmony went off, depositing the mug on the instrument tray beside Spike’s gurney and turning her back to him with a deliberate toss of her hair. “And I don’t care what they’re saying about you. Nuts or not, you don’t get to get away with what happened yesterday.” She turned dramatically back to face him. “We’re having this out right now.”
Spike’s face seemed fixed in a permanent scrunch. “Are you completely—?”
“I should have known, you know,” she huffed, her hands fluctuating between invoking the ceiling and planting themselves on her hips as she paced in front of him. “You only ever came around when you wanted something. Who even knows why I thought this time might be different. But it always ends up being about you, doesn’t it? Well, I don’t have to take that, you know.”
Harmony hadn’t seemed to notice that Spike wasn’t listening. He strained against his bonds, his lips stretching toward the rim of the mug of blood that was only a few inches beyond his reach.
“They have a word now for what you are, Spike – All the magazines call men like you a ‘DESS.’ A 'Dependent, Exploitative Self-Server.'” She counted off the words on her fingertips. “That’s you. Cosmo had a whole article on it last month. I practically memorized it . . . .”
Spike growled as the rim of the mug slipped out from beneath the tug of his upper lip.
“‘. . . Although highly DESS-irable, you’re nothing but a pack of DESS-ensitive males who prey on beautiful women, use them, and then DESS-ert them,’” she quoted. “Just DESS-picable, if you ask me . . . .”
Spike rolled his eyes as he made another failed attempt to reach for the mug. He glanced up at her sideways, a frustrated but predatory grin on his face. “Sorry, pet, was that 'desert them' or 'dessert them'? Big difference, you know.”
“ . . . and it’s not like I can’t recognize the signs. I took the quiz on ‘Women Who are DESS-perate.’ That is so not me! I promised myself it would take more than a great six-pack and a set of mile-high cheekbones. . . .”
Spike tried to nudge the handle of the mug with his nose to no avail. He only succeeded at inching it farther away. “Couldn’t have brought a bloke a straw,” he grumbled.
“And to think I felt sorry for you while you had that little . . . condition,” Harmony continued obliviously, complete with air-quotes. “But you know, that’s my problem. I care too much. I always have . . . .”
Spike jerked against his bonds, trying to joggle the gurney closer to the tray.
“But I just wanted us to be clear that that’s not happening again. Not ever. Not with sweet-talk and not with begging. You gave up this good thing for the last time.” To punctuate her words Harmony spun back to meet his gaze, her eyes determined as her arms swept outward to plant firmly and dramatically upon her hips . . . catching the instrument tray against the side of her hand and sending the mug of blood crashing to the floor, crimson liquid exploding across the linoleum and a nearby stainless steal cabinet. “Oops.”
“Oh, bloody hell!” Spike snarled.
Harmony moaned low in her throat as she stooped down slowly, disbelievingly, to the shattered pieces of cream-colored ceramic. Blood and bits of pottery were strewn like the gore of a miniature murder scene. “Ohhhh, no,” she murmured, “he’s gonna be so upset.”
She picked up one of the larger pieces which bore evidence that the former owner of the mug was the “World’s #1 Boss!” She cradled the unfortunate shard as though the blood spilled upon the floor had been its own. “It was his favorite,” she moaned. “I gave it to him on Employer Appreciation Day.”
Harmony suddenly seemed to remember that she wasn’t alone in the room, and that her current actions were probably doing little to reinforce her speech of empowerment from a few minutes ago. Her eyes slid up to where Spike lay upon the gurney, regarding her with a raised eyebrow, and she slowly rose to her feet, still cupping the chunk of ceramic.
“Not to belittle the occasion of the novelty mug’s passing, pet -- or yours for that matter if its owner is who I think it is -- and of course my subsequent hunger as a result,” he said sardonically, “but might I ask a question now?”
Harmony shrugged, defeated.
“Who the hell are you?”
Harmony looked shocked. She had heard bits and pieces of Angel’s conversation with his inner circle as she had come to and from the office and the boardroom earlier, running minor errands they had requested. They hadn’t paid her much attention, and probably assumed she had done the same, but she had heard something . . . something about Spike not remembering things . . . but she hadn’t thought . . . .
Spike not knowing her? What’s the big idea?!
She opened her mouth a few times before she could force a sound out. “What the hell are you talking about Spike?” she finally said, becoming more obstinate as she spoke. “Duh, first off, I’m a vampire just like you.”
Spike tilted his head and stared at her with exasperation. “That much I can tell, pet. You’re a real Malibu-Bloodsucking-Barbie. But who the sodding hell are you and what do you want from me?”
Again, Harmony was floored. “Spike,” she said, suddenly a bit meeker, “you can’t seriously not know. I mean, I’m your . . . you were my . . . .”
Spike laughed at that point. Not a nice laugh either. In fact, it had a pretty nasty sound. “Oh, yeah,” he breathed out through the forced amusement. “Look, even though Angelus and his lot must be having a grand old time trying to play pinball with my brain, there are a few things I do know for fact. I’ve only ever sired one person in my entire existence and that one . . .” His eyes darkened and bore into hers. “. . . had been a very large mistake. So this little claim you’re making . . .” His gaze swept over her body and he sneered. “. . . would mean I’m 0 for 2, wouldn’t it?”
Harmony’s lip curled as her arms swung forcefully up to land on her hips. “Oh, my god, Spike, you really did lose it, didn’t you?” she asked in what seemed like mock sympathy. “You’re not my sire, you big dork . . . .”
“Bloody damn right, I’m not. Last thing I’d want is a living doll collection. Got enough of those sodding things around, what with Dru—”
“You were my boyfriend.”
Spike froze mid-sentence, glaring at her incredulously for a long moment. “What?”
Harmony's hands were flailing again. “Like I would have ever slept with my sire! Yecch! I mean he was just . . . yecch!”
“You are completely sack o’ hammers, you know that?”
“Hey, pal, at least I’m not the one doing a timeshare in Amnesia-Land and the State of Denial. There was a time we really had something, ‘til you went and ruined it by—”
“Not bloody likely, Barbie.”
“It’s Harmony,” she corrected bitingly.
Spike struggled to sit up as far as the straps would allow. He squared his shoulders and fixed Harmony to the spot with a hateful stare, amber flashes leaking like venom through his darkened blue eyes. “I don’t know what Angelus has done,” he grated in a low and dangerous voice. “If this is some kind of spell I will find out what’s behind it, but make no mistake, you little two-bit tart, we’re forever, Drusilla and me. You can relay that message to your ‘#1 Boss’.” He jerked his head to indicate the chip of mug still cradled in her hand. “Right before he removes your pretty little entrails for smashing his crockery.”
Harmony, however, was not intimidated. Just annoyed. Drusilla? He remembered Drusilla and he didn’t remember her? As if! She scoffed sharply at the back of her throat. “Forever? Shyeah, right. Like I’ve never heard that line before! Unfortunately Dork-silla’s concept of ‘forever’ has the life-span of the time it takes to rebound from you, to a Chaos Demon, back to you, to a Fungus Demon, to . . . was there a Crustaceous Demon in there somewhere?”
Spike’s eyes flashed with warning. “Don’t you dare, you little—”
“And then there’s you!” Harmony plowed onward, anything but dissuaded. “You wanna talk ‘forever’? First, it was you and Dorkus, then when I came along it was: 'Oh, all about you, baby!'” she said, dropping her voice into an over-exaggerated baritone. “And don’t even get me started on your weird freakish obsession that came afterward!”
“You bite your lying tongue, bitch!” he snarled
“Been there, done that,” Harmony countered. “Had you do it for me, Spikey” she added suggestively after a beat.
Spike settled his shoulders back against the gurney, his nostrils flaring and his jaw clenching to the point where it throbbed. He kept his head up, face and eyes trained to the obstinate expression of the woman before him. “You listen, Melody . . . .”
“Harmony!”
“Whatever. When I find Drusilla—”
“Give that a rest, already, will you, Spike?” Harmony droned. “Drusilla hasn’t been around for years. You actually expect me to believe that sooo much has changed since yesterday that you suddenly want Dorkus back again? Please. Even with all that bleeding-eye garbage I could still tell you were thinking about Buffy while you and I were—”
“Fuck, not you too!” Spike’s head crashed backward upon the gurney with a growl.
“Hey, I’m not the one who ruined a good thing over the Slayer, pal,” Harmony retorted. “You wanna talk about ‘yecch’! That was ‘yecch’!”
“First off,” Spike raised his head again, his eyes sparking in violent frustration, “I do not have a thing for the bloody Slayer. I’ve been fucking trying to kill the bitch!”
“That’s not the song you were singing before,” Harmony muttered, looking suddenly wounded and not meeting his gaze.
“Oh, yeah, ‘cause we’re just a match made in the Second Circle of Hell!”
“Come off it, Spike,” Harmony countered, turning to him again. Her voice sounded weary and her eyes glistened with what looked suspiciously like tears. “You’ve been obsessed with her for, like, over three years now. Maybe more, for all I know.”
Spike looked aghast. “Okay, now I know you’re daft as a melon. I haven’t even been in Sunnydale for five months, let alone three sodding years!”
Harmony shook her head, brandishing her composure again. “Yeah, and that’s another thing,” she said. “We’re not in Sunnydale, genius. This is L.A.”
Spike gave her an incredulous look.
Harmony shrugged offhandedly. “Sunnydale’s gone. You, like, destroyed the whole town months ago when you died.”
Spike rolled his eyes and settled his head back again. “Well, at least something good came of . . . . Wait– ” He raised his head again. “– when I what?”
Harmony opened her mouth to speak again when another voice sounded from the doorway at the other end of the med lab. “That’s enough, Harmony.”
Both vampires turned toward the room's entrance. Angel stood flanked by several people, only one of which Spike recognized. His question for Harmony was abandoned for the moment, albeit reluctantly, as he forced up a smirk at Fred. “Well, welcome back, Doc,” he sneered. “And you’ve brought the big man himself. Was wondering when the spineless bastard was gonna stop sending members of his new harem to talk to me and show his Cro-Magnon self.”
“Spike,” Angel acknowledged coolly.
“Cheers, mate,” Spike returned, with a cheerfulness that belied his underlying hostility. He gave Angel a sideways look, up and down. "Nice suit. You just give all sorts of new meaning to the term 'highbrow' now, don't you?"
Before taking her leave of Spike, Harmony turned back to him. “Oh, and F.Y.I., Blondie Bear, ‘harem’ is so passé. Some of us prefer the term ‘executive assistant’ now.”
She stepped quickly away from him and toward the doorway, knowing that Angel’s manner required a hasty exit on her part. Her delicate heels clicked a sharp staccato across the linoleum as she stepped toward her boss, the large chunk of what used to be Angel’s mug in her hand and a mournfully apologetic look on her face. “I’m so sorry, Boss,” she murmured. “It was totally an accident, but I promise I’ll get you a new one.”
Angel rolled his eyes, but did his best to keep a placating tone. “It’s all right, Harm. Just . . .” He waved his hand in a backward motion by his shoulder. “. . . get another one down here.”
“Gotcha.” She hurriedly made to step around him.
“Oh, and, Harmony?”
She turned.
“Until we’ve had a chance to really figure out what’s happened around here since yesterday, it might be best if you don’t interact too much with Spike,” Angel said matter-of-factly.
Harmony’s heart sank as though she had been reprimanded. She shrugged and tried for an ‘I’m-just-trying-to-help’ expression. “I was just trying to get him to remember stuff,” she offered obligingly.
Angel turned his back to her and faced the vampire on the gurney again. “We don’t think it’s his memory that’s the problem, Harm.”
The group of individuals in the doorway fully entered the room and collected at the foot of the table where Spike was strapped down, leering at them with hostile amusement. He raised a scarred eyebrow as he regarded them. “Didn’t know you’d been out making some new minions for yourself, Angelus,” he sneered. “Though I must say, some of them are a might cuter than others.” His gaze distributed itself between the woman he knew as Fred, and a large green demon in a garishly metallic purple suit to Angel’s right.
Angel and the skinny ponce to his left exchanged a brief haunted look at the mention of the name ‘Angelus.’
“Right,” Spike announced, his bravado unshaken, in spite of the fact that he was the one tied down. “You’re gonna tell me where Drusilla is and what the bloody hell is going on around here.”
Angel’s expression was stone-hard as he stared down at Spike. “We need to test a theory, first,” he said.
“And what’s that supposed to mean?” Spike spat.
“What it means, Sweet Cheeks,” said the green demon as he stepped forward, “is first we need to know for sure that you are who we think you are. And for that-,” He smirked. “- you’re going to have to sing me a little song.”
* * *
To be continued . . .
I'd also hoped to have the story beta'ed beginning with this part, but, again, I was afraid that after tomorrow there might be a chance I wouldn't feel much like working on it. So here is what I have been working on -- the next section of Out of Joint for those of you who have been following it. (Though if the kindly soul who offered to possibly beta has the time and is feeling up to it, I'd still appreciate your thoughts and input. Editing in LJ is a simple thing. I can be reached at nlrummi (at) gmail (dot) com.)
Thank you all muchly for your patience. This scene is a bit rough (and includes what are probably more italics than I really need), but not too bad overall.
All previous parts are in my Memories, but as of this posting they don't seem to be working yet. The last chapter, at least, is here, in case anyone needs a refresher.
Disclaimer: Still not mine. None of it. Nope. Uh-uh.
Rating: PG-13 (for language and violence)
Setting: Picks up mid-"Destiny" and goes AU from there.
Feedback: Would seriously make my day. Seriously.
by Sharelle
Chapter 5 – Ashes of Old Flames
Harmony loitered in the doorway of the med lab, the mug of blood in her hands significantly cooler than it had been when she’d first brought it over from the break room. She nibbled absently on the inside of her lower lip, trying to avoid smudging the mirror-like shine of her Sephora gloss, and stared at the vampire strapped to the gurney in the center of the room.
Angel had barked an over-the-shoulder order at her to bring some blood up here just as he and the rest of his boardroom posse had trooped past her desk, Chinese food in hand, and down the elevators. It had taken a few moments for Harmony to hop-to, however, as time was needed for the requisite ‘you’ve-gotta-be-kidding-me’ mouth gaping and the large ‘pleading-to-the-ceiling’ arm gestures before heading off to do as she was told in an ‘as-if-I-don’t-have-enough-to-do’ huff.
She had spent the next half hour moving slower than necessary, as though taking longer to fulfill Angel’s request would prove how busy she had indeed been. She lumbered through the staff room making disgusted faces at the various appliances located there, from the storage cooler where she found the blood to the microwave she used to warm it. Her face wrinkled with indignation as her mind held imaginary conversations with itself – sometimes a lecture on appreciation for one’s executive assistant with Angel, sometimes a dazzling soliloquy on why empowered females don’t need a man with Spike.
She came back to herself as the microwave started buzzing to signify the end of its cycle. Thinking about where she had to take it, Harmony’s lip curled over her teeth and she rolled her eyes as she removed the steaming mug from the rotating glass tray. Angel had once remarked that her face spent more time scrunched up while out of game face than any other vampire he had ever known. She couldn’t help it, though. This was annoying.
Holding the cup in her hands, Harmony noticed that it was much hotter than the preferred 98.6 degrees. She wasn’t sure if blood was actually supposed to steam like that. It was getting all crusty and bubbly around the edges, too. She hadn’t really paid attention to how long she had programmed the timer.
Well, she supposed, it’d serve him right if he did burn his mouth on it. After having to put up with his general moodiness and weird obsessions back while they were dating (not to mention getting the brush-off for the Slayer, of all people! The Slayer!), and then after what had happened in that office yesterday afternoon, it would definitely serve him right. Maybe he’d even get one of those little post-burn, dangly-skin things on the roof of his mouth. The kind that drove you nuts when you could never quite dislodge it with your tongue. And if Spike’s hands were strapped down like they said, he wouldn’t be able to use his fingers.
Hours of dangly-skin torture. That thought finally made Harmony smile.
But now that she was here, standing in the doorway of the med lab, unmoving, she found that her previous plan had been moot. There would be no mouth burning. The blood had cooled in her hands during her unplanned vigil as she stood there staring at Spike. She hadn’t expected to see him restrained like that. It must have been true. He really did go nuts.
“So are you gonna just stand there, or what?”
At the sound of his familiar drawl, Harmony squared her shoulders and hefted the mug directly in front of her like a chalice used for religious ceremony. She strode with quick wide steps into the room and around to the foot of the gurney so Spike couldn’t avoid looking directly at her. After all, she had reapplied her make-up and fixed her hair while in the break room. She’d even gone so far as to roll the waistband of her skirt over once, good for shortening it by at least a half-inch. It was times like this she missed mirrors the most – when in desperate need of a spot check. If she’d been at home she could have taken a quick Polaroid.
Carl, the Grl’lok demon from maintenance, who had been emptying the break room trash, had insisted she looked “A-Okay.” But after a few minutes of trying to chat with him, Harmony got the distinct impression that this was the only English Carl knew. She decided to take his word for it, though. She felt beautiful enough. And after the way Spike had treated her yesterday, he deserved to see what he had used, abused, and given up (again) in all her feminine glory.
Harmony held her chin up slightly as she glared down her nose at Spike. She wore her hostility like one of those cute little coats her vampire body no longer needed, but that her mall-girl sensibility wouldn’t let her live without. She tilted her head expectantly, glaring at the other vampire through contentious narrow eyes as though waiting for him to provide some explanation owed to her.
Spike did nothing but glare back, looking as though he was quite unsure as to why he was getting the evil-eye.
Finally his irritated gaze traveled from her face to the cup in her hands. “That for me?” he asked. “'Cause Doctor Fred said I’d be gettin’ some.”
Harmony straightened in a huff, transferring the mug to one hand while the other moved up to gesture erratically beside her shoulder, fingers spread wide, grasping at shreds of patience. The blood in the mug sloshed up to the rim, nearly spilling onto the floor. She shook her head and put on her own version of game face, one she had perfected long before ever becoming a vampire – the valley girl grimace.
“Oh, my God,” she groaned, her dander up. “Is that all you think about, Spike? Like you didn’t ‘get’ enough yesterday!” Then she looked at the mug in her hand and quieted grumblingly. “Oh.”
Harmony pulled herself up again and she tried for a more businesslike air. “Yes, this is yours. I was told to bring it in to you.”
Spike shifted a bit under his restraints, his gaze going from her eyes to the mug and back again. “Well, let’s have it, then.”
Harmony’s jaw slackened and hitched a bit, her face washing over with a look of extreme irritation and offense. She crossed her arms, bringing the hand that held the mug to rest against the opposite forearm. Oh no, uh-uh. He was not going to dismiss her like that.
“I would think you’d have something to say for yourself, first,” she chastised, the sterile linoleum floor of the med lab echoing with the click of her toe as she tapped her strappy sandal-clad foot impatiently.
Spike squinted at her. “What?”
“You know what,” Harmony went off, depositing the mug on the instrument tray beside Spike’s gurney and turning her back to him with a deliberate toss of her hair. “And I don’t care what they’re saying about you. Nuts or not, you don’t get to get away with what happened yesterday.” She turned dramatically back to face him. “We’re having this out right now.”
Spike’s face seemed fixed in a permanent scrunch. “Are you completely—?”
“I should have known, you know,” she huffed, her hands fluctuating between invoking the ceiling and planting themselves on her hips as she paced in front of him. “You only ever came around when you wanted something. Who even knows why I thought this time might be different. But it always ends up being about you, doesn’t it? Well, I don’t have to take that, you know.”
Harmony hadn’t seemed to notice that Spike wasn’t listening. He strained against his bonds, his lips stretching toward the rim of the mug of blood that was only a few inches beyond his reach.
“They have a word now for what you are, Spike – All the magazines call men like you a ‘DESS.’ A 'Dependent, Exploitative Self-Server.'” She counted off the words on her fingertips. “That’s you. Cosmo had a whole article on it last month. I practically memorized it . . . .”
Spike growled as the rim of the mug slipped out from beneath the tug of his upper lip.
“‘. . . Although highly DESS-irable, you’re nothing but a pack of DESS-ensitive males who prey on beautiful women, use them, and then DESS-ert them,’” she quoted. “Just DESS-picable, if you ask me . . . .”
Spike rolled his eyes as he made another failed attempt to reach for the mug. He glanced up at her sideways, a frustrated but predatory grin on his face. “Sorry, pet, was that 'desert them' or 'dessert them'? Big difference, you know.”
“ . . . and it’s not like I can’t recognize the signs. I took the quiz on ‘Women Who are DESS-perate.’ That is so not me! I promised myself it would take more than a great six-pack and a set of mile-high cheekbones. . . .”
Spike tried to nudge the handle of the mug with his nose to no avail. He only succeeded at inching it farther away. “Couldn’t have brought a bloke a straw,” he grumbled.
“And to think I felt sorry for you while you had that little . . . condition,” Harmony continued obliviously, complete with air-quotes. “But you know, that’s my problem. I care too much. I always have . . . .”
Spike jerked against his bonds, trying to joggle the gurney closer to the tray.
“But I just wanted us to be clear that that’s not happening again. Not ever. Not with sweet-talk and not with begging. You gave up this good thing for the last time.” To punctuate her words Harmony spun back to meet his gaze, her eyes determined as her arms swept outward to plant firmly and dramatically upon her hips . . . catching the instrument tray against the side of her hand and sending the mug of blood crashing to the floor, crimson liquid exploding across the linoleum and a nearby stainless steal cabinet. “Oops.”
“Oh, bloody hell!” Spike snarled.
Harmony moaned low in her throat as she stooped down slowly, disbelievingly, to the shattered pieces of cream-colored ceramic. Blood and bits of pottery were strewn like the gore of a miniature murder scene. “Ohhhh, no,” she murmured, “he’s gonna be so upset.”
She picked up one of the larger pieces which bore evidence that the former owner of the mug was the “World’s #1 Boss!” She cradled the unfortunate shard as though the blood spilled upon the floor had been its own. “It was his favorite,” she moaned. “I gave it to him on Employer Appreciation Day.”
Harmony suddenly seemed to remember that she wasn’t alone in the room, and that her current actions were probably doing little to reinforce her speech of empowerment from a few minutes ago. Her eyes slid up to where Spike lay upon the gurney, regarding her with a raised eyebrow, and she slowly rose to her feet, still cupping the chunk of ceramic.
“Not to belittle the occasion of the novelty mug’s passing, pet -- or yours for that matter if its owner is who I think it is -- and of course my subsequent hunger as a result,” he said sardonically, “but might I ask a question now?”
Harmony shrugged, defeated.
“Who the hell are you?”
Harmony looked shocked. She had heard bits and pieces of Angel’s conversation with his inner circle as she had come to and from the office and the boardroom earlier, running minor errands they had requested. They hadn’t paid her much attention, and probably assumed she had done the same, but she had heard something . . . something about Spike not remembering things . . . but she hadn’t thought . . . .
Spike not knowing her? What’s the big idea?!
She opened her mouth a few times before she could force a sound out. “What the hell are you talking about Spike?” she finally said, becoming more obstinate as she spoke. “Duh, first off, I’m a vampire just like you.”
Spike tilted his head and stared at her with exasperation. “That much I can tell, pet. You’re a real Malibu-Bloodsucking-Barbie. But who the sodding hell are you and what do you want from me?”
Again, Harmony was floored. “Spike,” she said, suddenly a bit meeker, “you can’t seriously not know. I mean, I’m your . . . you were my . . . .”
Spike laughed at that point. Not a nice laugh either. In fact, it had a pretty nasty sound. “Oh, yeah,” he breathed out through the forced amusement. “Look, even though Angelus and his lot must be having a grand old time trying to play pinball with my brain, there are a few things I do know for fact. I’ve only ever sired one person in my entire existence and that one . . .” His eyes darkened and bore into hers. “. . . had been a very large mistake. So this little claim you’re making . . .” His gaze swept over her body and he sneered. “. . . would mean I’m 0 for 2, wouldn’t it?”
Harmony’s lip curled as her arms swung forcefully up to land on her hips. “Oh, my god, Spike, you really did lose it, didn’t you?” she asked in what seemed like mock sympathy. “You’re not my sire, you big dork . . . .”
“Bloody damn right, I’m not. Last thing I’d want is a living doll collection. Got enough of those sodding things around, what with Dru—”
“You were my boyfriend.”
Spike froze mid-sentence, glaring at her incredulously for a long moment. “What?”
Harmony's hands were flailing again. “Like I would have ever slept with my sire! Yecch! I mean he was just . . . yecch!”
“You are completely sack o’ hammers, you know that?”
“Hey, pal, at least I’m not the one doing a timeshare in Amnesia-Land and the State of Denial. There was a time we really had something, ‘til you went and ruined it by—”
“Not bloody likely, Barbie.”
“It’s Harmony,” she corrected bitingly.
Spike struggled to sit up as far as the straps would allow. He squared his shoulders and fixed Harmony to the spot with a hateful stare, amber flashes leaking like venom through his darkened blue eyes. “I don’t know what Angelus has done,” he grated in a low and dangerous voice. “If this is some kind of spell I will find out what’s behind it, but make no mistake, you little two-bit tart, we’re forever, Drusilla and me. You can relay that message to your ‘#1 Boss’.” He jerked his head to indicate the chip of mug still cradled in her hand. “Right before he removes your pretty little entrails for smashing his crockery.”
Harmony, however, was not intimidated. Just annoyed. Drusilla? He remembered Drusilla and he didn’t remember her? As if! She scoffed sharply at the back of her throat. “Forever? Shyeah, right. Like I’ve never heard that line before! Unfortunately Dork-silla’s concept of ‘forever’ has the life-span of the time it takes to rebound from you, to a Chaos Demon, back to you, to a Fungus Demon, to . . . was there a Crustaceous Demon in there somewhere?”
Spike’s eyes flashed with warning. “Don’t you dare, you little—”
“And then there’s you!” Harmony plowed onward, anything but dissuaded. “You wanna talk ‘forever’? First, it was you and Dorkus, then when I came along it was: 'Oh, all about you, baby!'” she said, dropping her voice into an over-exaggerated baritone. “And don’t even get me started on your weird freakish obsession that came afterward!”
“You bite your lying tongue, bitch!” he snarled
“Been there, done that,” Harmony countered. “Had you do it for me, Spikey” she added suggestively after a beat.
Spike settled his shoulders back against the gurney, his nostrils flaring and his jaw clenching to the point where it throbbed. He kept his head up, face and eyes trained to the obstinate expression of the woman before him. “You listen, Melody . . . .”
“Harmony!”
“Whatever. When I find Drusilla—”
“Give that a rest, already, will you, Spike?” Harmony droned. “Drusilla hasn’t been around for years. You actually expect me to believe that sooo much has changed since yesterday that you suddenly want Dorkus back again? Please. Even with all that bleeding-eye garbage I could still tell you were thinking about Buffy while you and I were—”
“Fuck, not you too!” Spike’s head crashed backward upon the gurney with a growl.
“Hey, I’m not the one who ruined a good thing over the Slayer, pal,” Harmony retorted. “You wanna talk about ‘yecch’! That was ‘yecch’!”
“First off,” Spike raised his head again, his eyes sparking in violent frustration, “I do not have a thing for the bloody Slayer. I’ve been fucking trying to kill the bitch!”
“That’s not the song you were singing before,” Harmony muttered, looking suddenly wounded and not meeting his gaze.
“Oh, yeah, ‘cause we’re just a match made in the Second Circle of Hell!”
“Come off it, Spike,” Harmony countered, turning to him again. Her voice sounded weary and her eyes glistened with what looked suspiciously like tears. “You’ve been obsessed with her for, like, over three years now. Maybe more, for all I know.”
Spike looked aghast. “Okay, now I know you’re daft as a melon. I haven’t even been in Sunnydale for five months, let alone three sodding years!”
Harmony shook her head, brandishing her composure again. “Yeah, and that’s another thing,” she said. “We’re not in Sunnydale, genius. This is L.A.”
Spike gave her an incredulous look.
Harmony shrugged offhandedly. “Sunnydale’s gone. You, like, destroyed the whole town months ago when you died.”
Spike rolled his eyes and settled his head back again. “Well, at least something good came of . . . . Wait– ” He raised his head again. “– when I what?”
Harmony opened her mouth to speak again when another voice sounded from the doorway at the other end of the med lab. “That’s enough, Harmony.”
Both vampires turned toward the room's entrance. Angel stood flanked by several people, only one of which Spike recognized. His question for Harmony was abandoned for the moment, albeit reluctantly, as he forced up a smirk at Fred. “Well, welcome back, Doc,” he sneered. “And you’ve brought the big man himself. Was wondering when the spineless bastard was gonna stop sending members of his new harem to talk to me and show his Cro-Magnon self.”
“Spike,” Angel acknowledged coolly.
“Cheers, mate,” Spike returned, with a cheerfulness that belied his underlying hostility. He gave Angel a sideways look, up and down. "Nice suit. You just give all sorts of new meaning to the term 'highbrow' now, don't you?"
Before taking her leave of Spike, Harmony turned back to him. “Oh, and F.Y.I., Blondie Bear, ‘harem’ is so passé. Some of us prefer the term ‘executive assistant’ now.”
She stepped quickly away from him and toward the doorway, knowing that Angel’s manner required a hasty exit on her part. Her delicate heels clicked a sharp staccato across the linoleum as she stepped toward her boss, the large chunk of what used to be Angel’s mug in her hand and a mournfully apologetic look on her face. “I’m so sorry, Boss,” she murmured. “It was totally an accident, but I promise I’ll get you a new one.”
Angel rolled his eyes, but did his best to keep a placating tone. “It’s all right, Harm. Just . . .” He waved his hand in a backward motion by his shoulder. “. . . get another one down here.”
“Gotcha.” She hurriedly made to step around him.
“Oh, and, Harmony?”
She turned.
“Until we’ve had a chance to really figure out what’s happened around here since yesterday, it might be best if you don’t interact too much with Spike,” Angel said matter-of-factly.
Harmony’s heart sank as though she had been reprimanded. She shrugged and tried for an ‘I’m-just-trying-to-help’ expression. “I was just trying to get him to remember stuff,” she offered obligingly.
Angel turned his back to her and faced the vampire on the gurney again. “We don’t think it’s his memory that’s the problem, Harm.”
The group of individuals in the doorway fully entered the room and collected at the foot of the table where Spike was strapped down, leering at them with hostile amusement. He raised a scarred eyebrow as he regarded them. “Didn’t know you’d been out making some new minions for yourself, Angelus,” he sneered. “Though I must say, some of them are a might cuter than others.” His gaze distributed itself between the woman he knew as Fred, and a large green demon in a garishly metallic purple suit to Angel’s right.
Angel and the skinny ponce to his left exchanged a brief haunted look at the mention of the name ‘Angelus.’
“Right,” Spike announced, his bravado unshaken, in spite of the fact that he was the one tied down. “You’re gonna tell me where Drusilla is and what the bloody hell is going on around here.”
Angel’s expression was stone-hard as he stared down at Spike. “We need to test a theory, first,” he said.
“And what’s that supposed to mean?” Spike spat.
“What it means, Sweet Cheeks,” said the green demon as he stepped forward, “is first we need to know for sure that you are who we think you are. And for that-,” He smirked. “- you’re going to have to sing me a little song.”
To be continued . . .
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Date: 2005-02-17 03:52 pm (UTC)Thank you, and I hope you continue to enjoy the story when I have more posted! *G*