| TITLE-----The Dragon (part 2) AUTHOR-----Puca Dentata [email protected] DISTRIBUTE-----http://www.scary-septic-cat.com/pennydreadful/ and the lists. You want it, email me. Or send one of those pigeons with the note on the leg. That would be cool. DOES IT HAVE A PLOT?----- Dawn and Spike need to find a way to deal. They start to hunt down the dragon that was released by the portal. SPOILERS-----Season 5 IMPROV-----reckless -- false -- pallor -- spice LEGAL-----It is against the law for a monster to enter the corporate limits of Urbana, Illinois. Compared to that, what's a little harmless fanfic? In otherwords, please don't sue. NOTES-----Thanks to Kita for pushing me to write. She gives great beta-head. Thanks to Joss for providing such alluring enigmas such as the Dragon. Thanks to whomever asked for a Dawn and Spike "on the road" fic on the lists. *********** (-----day 5-----) Dawn walks into the hotel room a little after sunset to tell Spike the good news. There's a lead, a real lead, and they can get the hell outta Needles *now*. The last five days have consisted of take-out pizza and HBO movies and swimming in the indoor pool. All in all not bad, exactly, but not helpful. Dawn seriously doubts she'll find the dragon on the way down to the sauna. Dawn walks into the hotel room and promptly forgets the words she was about to cry out in her eagerness to leave. Spike's sprawled in a chair, as usual, but he's watching...he's watching *naked* people on the TV. Dawn catches Spike looking at her, making her realize she was staring at the TV, where two women are engaged in...ummm... Dawn has a sudden mental image of Willow and Tara, and she all but sprints into the bathroom, shouting out, "Turn that *off* Spike! Now!" She can hear the dark chuckle as she slams the bathroom door. "Can I come out now?" She pushes her ear up against the cheap wood of the door and listens for telltale moaning and huffing. Nothing. Cautiously, she eases her way out of the bathroom. TV's off, but Spike is laughing at her. Oh, great. Dawn wonders, for a brief moment, about bringing Buffy's name into this. Seeing how fast Spike's laughter would disappear. 'Cause Buffy would not have approved of *this*. Not at all. She stalks over to the bed and plops down. "Disgusting, Spike. And where did you get the money, huh?" "I put it on the debit card." "Spike!" Dawn is up, hands pressed against her face. They'll find us, she thinks. They'll trace the number. She'll be thwarted because...because Spike needed to watch some icky porn on the "Spice Channel," or whatever it was. Spike stares at her coolly, arms crossed over his chest. "Yes, Dawn?" His patient tone makes her want to scream at him, claw at his face, even. "They'll find us, you idiot! We were only gonna use cash!" "If they wanted us, they would have us by now." "Oh, yeah?!" "Yeah. Trust me, love. We'd be back in Sunnydale--you in bedroom lockdown, me in an urn--if they were pissed. Let it go." Dawn knows he's right, but still... She reaches over and snatches the remote away from the bedside table. "That stuff is...gross." "Wait a couple of years. I'll be curious as to what you think then." "Whatever." "So why did you come in here in a rush? Dragon news?" "Oh. Yeah." Dawn sits up, visibly perking. "In Gallup, New Mexico. There have been weird sightings over the past week. The *past week*, Spike! That means the dragon is still there, or in the area! And it's only 400 miles!" "Well, let's get the fuck outta here then, shall we? The view from the window's getting old." ********** There are landscapes where the sky is just an abstract idea and space shapes itself into a tangible being, using the stars as cohorts. You can see the sky above yourself, sure, but it's a thin veil. And if you squint just so, it ceases to keep space from nudging down on you. Makes a person feel small. Makes the stars seem almost dangerous. Makes a person think about *things* to escape the baleful gaze of those stars, whether one wants to think or not. Spike had tried, but it wasn't working. Why had he allowed Dawn to pick this wayward RV retreat as the home base? Her being able to see a few bunnyrabbits and hearing coyotes wasn't worth his present state of mind. If only, if only. If only he had kept the doc guy from Dawn. If only he had had the foresight to realize there was something wrong with the old fart. If only his ass could sprout wings and he could fly to Mars, eh? Spike shifts on the hood of the car, trying to keep from sliding off. The car makes random noises, cooling off as the night air begins to sweep away the dry heat from the landscape. Dawn comes into view, back from a walk. She crawls up onto the hood next to Spike, staring up at the sky. In the distance, Spike can hear the sound of vehicles on the freeway. Other than that, they are isolated. Only a couple other vehicles in the RV Park tonight, and the owners are tucked away inside asleep like good boys and girls. "Spike?" Dreamy and distant, Dawn still looks up at the stars. "Mmm-hmmm?" He lights a smoke, the ember shielding him from having to look at the stars. He doesn't feel brave enough, tonight. "What's going to happen to me?" The stars are suddenly better to look at than Dawn's face, no matter that the stars don't care a rat's ass about what's being said. Spike gives up. Looks up. Feels the loneliness envelop him snuggly. "You're going to live," he says. Dawn says nothing, so Spike continues. "You'll grow up, become a woman. Have a job. Have a love. Have some kids. Knowing the entire time that you know secrets that few do. Guess in the end, that's not so bad." Comfort wasn't his best social talent. "And then I'll die, right?" Dawn leans back against the car hood, stretching her legs out. "I guess so. That's how it goes." He's becoming more uncomfortable with this conversation than he wants to admit. "I'm "born," I live, I die. Great story." There's self-loathing in that soft voice, and Spike wishes he could make it stop. It's not helping the guilt he's feeling, not at all. He tried, Dammit. He tried his best to make things work out and do right by Buffy. It's not his fault, so why does he feel this *shitty*? "Except you, Spike. You're not part of the story. You'll still be here when no one knows there was ever a person named Dawn Summers. Or Buffy Summers. We get the ending; you don't." Spike rubs a fist against tired, sore eyes. Wishes he could rub the soreness away from his brain in the same manner. "If you say so, Dawn. But everybody has an ending. Sooner or later." "You think that if people could see our story, they'd think it great and wonderful and romantic? You know, fighting the good fight? Knowing things that most people can't dream of being true?" Dawn sits up, giving Spike her undivided attention finally. Spike wishes she would just stop. But when she looks at him with her Summers' eyes, so like her sister's, he can't help it. It just comes tumbling out. It's...nice...to have someone that listens. Acknowledgement that you exist. "Maybe. Probably. But you know what? They don't know shit. Being part of something, like this, isn't all it's cracked up to be. Knowledge doesn't equal happiness. I sometimes think it's a tradeoff. And you can't even decide if you *want* the tradeoff before it happens." "The grass is always greener? And, like, if it *was* a story, they'd know more than we do. They'd know all the angles and all the thoughts of the characters, us." "Yeah, I 'spose your right, pet. We'd put a bloody disclaimer on the first page, how's that?" Dawn wrinkles her nose and snorts, saying, "What?" "Reader! Please. This is not a fairy tale. Don't think for one minute that the supple lips of the Narrator would wish to turn the frog into a beautiful prince or princess that lives happily ever after!" "Who would be the narrator?" "Dunno. Giles, maybe. He's got that air 'bout him." says Spike, losing interest in the topic. Dawn leans back once again, seemingly appeased by what Spike has said. What part though? Spike, himself, didn't find any comfort in anything that had just been discussed. It left him colder, if anything. But then, he wasn't a young mortal girl, was he? Thank god. Maybe. Maybe, deep down, he'd rather be anything than what he had become. Damn stars. ********* (-----day 6-----) "See? Five sightings in seven days. Scorch marks. Cattle missing. Funny "dinosaur" footprints." "Yeah? So where's the dragon? We've looked at all the places where the shit has happened. What does it tell us? That dragons from other dimensions like hamburger well-done? Wonderful." Dawn sighs, watching Spike saunter off towards the shadows. Off to find some sort of food, she guesses. She walks back towards the cafe, frustrated, barely noticing the glances of locals. With Spike's duster and bleached hair, and her Donna Karen sweater and expensive Nikes, they buck the standards of normality here. She's noticed that people here have a jaded look to them, like they've seen and done it all. Why? They haven't, have they? Most of them have probably been born and raised here in Gallup. Spike said it was a look adopted for the tourists, but Dawn has caught that look on people when they don't know she's watching. Can a life become so ordinary that you become jaded? She always thought it had to be the other way around. Dawn scoots into her booth, picking up the menu and quickly scanning for chicken strips. She gets them nearly every time because it's a proven fact that *no one* can make truly inedible chicken strips. How can she tell Spike that she...just knows...the dragon is near? That it is still in Gallup? It could be wishful thinking on her part, sure. But it's not. And doesn't it make sense in a way? The dragon came from her energy being released. The dragon was--born, into this world at least--from her power. Makes sense that she feels like if she knew just the right thoughts to think, just the right way to concentrate, she'd know where the dragon was holed up. An alien creature released here; her sister taken away almost as tribute. She hears the whispering in her mind, saying, You get a dragon, Dawn, but *we* get your sister. Didn't you once say you'd rather have a horse than a big sister? Well, we did one better! Enjoy! Find the dragon and destroy the dragon, thinks Dawn, as she smiles at the waitress setting her meal down in front of her. ***** |