River Tam

There's a vampire exploding into dust around her, halo-ing her head in the street lamp, all poetic-like.

'Course the other five idiots kinda spoil the picture. Spike leans back against a handy wall and folds his arms to watch the show. It is a nice night for killing and he'd meant to take down this lot before he got his evening cuppa, but ladies first, like Darla always said.

Besides, this is his second Slayer-in-the-rough, not counting the one who took his hands off, and Beth didn't have her heart in the game; this one doesn't seem to have any such scruples, and Spike is dead curious to see how well she dances before he cuts in.

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How she dances: swiftly, and gracefully, and lethally.

There are faces morphing into monsters around her, humans who died but didn't lie down in their coffins even after the heart stopped and the soul fled, and they're snarling low and rabid.

River spins, grabs a collar and yanks -- the vampire's face contorts in surprise and anticipation as his fangs near her neck, and then in just plain surprise the instant before he vaporizes. River doesn't blink or hesitate at the ash; just darts forward, eyes narrowed with a clear deadly focus, and reverses her grip in time to stake the one making a grab for her from behind. She didn't even look at that one; she was too busy kicking another in the throat, hard enough to crunch cartilage.

No quarter given, and none asked.

No prisoners.

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Four of them are left, only three still upright; they're backing away, circling, the shock wearing off.

"Another goddamn Slayer," one of them spits.

"Yeah," breathes the first one to speak to her, his eyes alight. "Weird. She didn't smell like one. Still doesn't. 'Sup with that, gorgeous?"

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What makes Spike's flesh creep -- and impresses him most -- is the way her face doesn't change. Oh, a little squint, like maybe she wore glasses before the Slayer package kicked in, but otherwise floating serene above the carnage.

Yet another vamp drops in from a nearby fire escape. Not sporting, that. Spike sticks out a leisurely combat boot -- well, leisurely for a vampire -- to trip the bloke up and send him sprawling at her feet.

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River doesn't thank him.

She does dispatch the vampire promptly, though, so maybe that counts.

There's only one left to circle slowly with her, the one who keeps calling her gorgeous; his eyes gleam with interest, and with hunger.

Hers are cold.

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"You killed all my guys, gorgeous," he says, in a tone of mild good-humored reproach; he might be saying something like you stepped on my coat. "I mean, I can get more, but all of them? In like two minutes? Is harsh, that's all I'm sayin'."

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"I can see you," River murmurs, low and deadly.

And there -- a smile, faint and incongruously sweet.

"Stole the skin for a mask."

A sidestep, a double-feint, and then -- blindingly fast for human eyes, just about normal for a Slayer -- a strike.

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Her strike goes through empty air; he's two paces to the right, turning lightly on one foot and lashing out at her with the other.

The kick takes her solidly in the ribs, sends her staggering back.

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Spike catches her against his chest -- a classic hero move, if he were six inches taller and three stone heavier. As it is they both stumble back a step or two before preternatural strength wakes up and trumps physics. Then she kicks *Spike* in the chest, knocking him clear out of her way, and launches herself at Mr. One Adjective again.

This is getting boring -- the bloke, not the girl. She talks like Dru and fights like Buffy; Spike could be in a lot of trouble here, not even counting from the stake.

Then again, Spike likes trouble. He scrambles to his feet and throws a punch at the last vamp standing.

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The vampire staggers sideways, a snarl jarred out of him by the fist that just hit his jaw.

River's foot slams up towards his scraggly goatee.

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That one's a glancing blow, and it hits him on the shoulder rather than the face as he ducks away, retreating.

He's not smiling anymore, especially not as his glance settles for a moment on Spike.

"'Kay then," he says, and the smile starts to come back. "Catch you later, gorgeous."

And he sidesteps into a darkened doorway, and is gone.

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He's gone; River's eyes track him for only a moment before she rounds on Spike.

She doesn't attack, not yet, but there's a stake clenched tight in one hand and a wall to her back, and a taut and lethal wildness in her eyes, like a predator cornered.

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Spike should step back, show his throat, but be damned if he's gonna. His own fault for sitting out the first dance but his gums ache to sprout fangs; hell, his knuckles ache to split against someone's cheekbones. He's not gonna pick a fight with this bint just for the pure hell of it -- he doesn't know her that well yet -- but the just-a-harmless-puppy routine that Angel's so perfected isn't in him tonight.

He manages at least to keep the teeth back and let the fists go. "Hello, l-" love, he starts to say, then snarls -- his unknown rival has cornered the pet name market tonight. "You're new in town." It isn't quite a question.

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"You're not."

She hovers on the stretched-wire border between attack and flight, but if she flees it won't be for fear; there's nothing in her right now but the killer, and the frail and trembling jesses holding it back.

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"Not in any town on earth," he agrees with a razor-edged smile. It's hyperbole -- not like he spent his hundred odd years traveling round with an atlas and a number two sodding pencil -- but not by much. The edge, that's for himself. Mostly. Not her, anyway. A little for Angel, who even has to win at being older, more jaded and more tired.

"I'm Spike," he adds, belatedly. Not one of his better nights for repartee.

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"Bloody."

A beat; she flinches a little, free hand jerking slightly. Not the hand with the stake -- that one's steady. Like the proverbial rock.

"I," she says, and the killing edge has receded a little but the tension is if anything greater.

"There's masks, and -- you too. You too. There are teeth in the grass and under the walls and -- I need to find the door."

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When she says "bloody" Spike can't help but look at his hands. They're practically unmarked, this time out. He never says, never even thinks, clean.

Now Spike takes the step back because he remembers a voice like hers, remembers nonsense words that speak straight to some part of the brain that's older than logic or language.

The shiver under Spike's skin is revulsion and pity and nostalgia and arousal and more than a hint of fear. Once before he'd ripped out his heart and thrown it over the windmill for a girl who saw the hidden truth and missed the bloody great taxicab right in front of her. He doesn't want to want to do it again.

Unconsciously Spike's hand goes to his face. He doesn't think of his human visage as a mask, more like... an expression, like a grin or a frown. Real enough as far as it goes. Just not everything. But if there's one thing he knows, it's not to argue with the crazy girl when she's having a vision. Automatically he drops into his Dru-coaxing voice, soothing yet solemn. "Yes, pet," he says. "Me too. Now what does this door look like?"

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"Tell you what she sees--" River's voice is rising, spiralling upwards with anger and frustration and, now, something like fear -- but it's not of him. Not of what's in front of her.

"Twenty needles in her brain, wait while the crows are circling. I shoot," she says, voice trembling with too much stress and too little control, "with my mind. I have a mission and I will find it," and then the stake's jammed into the pocket of her long coat and she's running, running into the darkness with her tangled hair flying back from her white strained face.

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