My name's Thomas Aquinas Ferro.  Yeah, I know.  Blame my mother for the name.  Ultra-Pope-lovin' crazy-assed bitch.  I was almost David Goliath Ferro - her favorite story - but my dad talked her out of it.  Thank god.  Right before he ran off.  At least I grew up with a mother and a father on my birth certificate - more than a lot of the kids in my neighborhood had.  And he sent stuff - money and stuff - at least four times a year.  So that was something.

Blame him for the Marines.  He sent me the little brochure when I was seventeen and graduating.  School was less boring than that gods-awful apartment we squatted in, and the cops were pretty hard-core in those days about truancy.  I didn't really wanna spend a lot of time in Juvie, so...  At least I got breakfast and lunch at school, which was unlikely to happen at home.

Anyway, my dad sent the Marine brochure, and wasn't it fancy and glossy and just so damn tempting.  So, I graduated and signed up and I was gone.  Boot camp and then four years here, there and everywhere.  Africa, Iran, the Balkans, fucking China and all those little islands above Australia.  All kinds of dirty little wars that just never seemed to end and we sure as hell did put our noses into 'em, as often as we could.  Won me a couple of medals, too.  Usual shit.  I got 'em around here somewhere.

Anyway, when I joined - July 3^rd, my actual birthday - was the year the Outsiders came.   2027.  Everything got crazy for a while.  Actual living, breathing, talking aliens; with space ships and drugs that could cure cancer and ways to make energy out of almost nothing...  That really fucked up the world view of a lot of people.  Made the fundamentalists go crazy.  Their particular rant couldn't grok non-human life and there were lots of calls for vengeance from the Lord and jihads and what-all.  Really rocked the 'one god, one species' boat, and hard.  Made worse by the revelation that the Outsiders don't believe in any god at all - no god, no goddess, no ancestors - nothing.  They're strictly in the now, and that made for some tense times, you better believe it.

But hell - they fixed our overpopulation problem by showing us how to colonize Mars and how to build stations and they built the Gate; got us a ticket straight into their space and their economy, which is now and always has been a war-powered machine that always needs just a little more.  So getting rich was easy, all of a sudden, and all they wanted were our hands and backs and minds, 'cause they were too busy killin' each other to bother with manual labor.  Oh, and Sol was the next point in a giant game of leap-frog and that particular jyiiy that had found us was looking to score big by having us on its side.  A jyiiy is the equivalent of 'family' or 'clan' to the Outsiders.  They don't actually have much in the way of either of those - it's more like a complex set of partners and CEO's and vice-presidents and shit.  Mother and son, father and daughter, wife and husband are all arbitrary terms - you exist for your jyiiy and it ceases to exist if you lose, and that's that.  Cutthroat doesn't begin to describe it. 

And the Outsiders - well, that's what they really were.  Home world was five thousand years of backstabbing and back-room deals and massacres and genocides and I guess it's only their super-fast birthrate that's kept them from wiping themselves out.  Older jyiiy were squeezing the younger ones out - keeping them from the territory and money and power they wanted but could never actually have by the way their rules worked.  So about twenty of the youngest jyiiy decided that space was the next best step.  Fuck a mountain or a city - they were gonna claim a planet.  A whole galaxy.  That got 'em ostracized and cast out of their whole society.  They really are Outsiders and they can't ever go back. 

But they made a new life and a new battleground out here in space and when my hitch was up I decided to throw my luck in with them.  They were hiring - ex-Marine, ex-Army, ex-anything - to fight and figure and organize all the stuff they didn't want to or traditionally couldn't take care of.   It sounded like a good gig to me - three times the pay and access to all that tech of theirs. 

What I didn't know and they didn't tell me was that a four-year hitch with them only counted the down-time - the real time - and skip time was all so much static.  So it turned out I was stuck for more like ten years than four and that really pissed me off.  Plus...  The Outsiders have got some damn nasty rituals they do when they win - or lose - and I got pretty sick of seeing kids killed and women and men raped and old people burned alive.  And all of it silent and...submissive.  Made me sick to my stomach. 

So I started drinkin' and then I started usin' - whatever came to hand.  So it was about...2035 or thereabouts - sometimes I forget - and I got into some trouble; got into some debt.  Well, the head of the jyiiy I was pledged to - bitch called I'kja - she fixed my debt.  Any debt an employee gets into and can't pay falls on the head of the jyiiy.  And she wasn't a big fan of me to begin with, what with me bein' drunk and generally disorderly most of the time - so she sold me off.  I got drunk, stumbled home, fell down, woke up two days later aboard the Tur-gah, which was a war-ship, something like a scout.  Little ship that spied and nosed around and generally acted like a rat in the corn-crib.  Not an Outsider ship but one of their hires, one of the other set of aliens.  Chaddock.   Outsiders and Chaddock both, they don't have a problem with slavery and so there I was, a slave.  And Chaddock are mean motherfuckers and that was...a bad time.

Then - the computer tells me 2040 but I was pretty lost at that point - somebody called a bounty on the Captain and we were free.  This vamp - Spike.   He came bustin' into the quarters, blood all down his side and this grin on his face like a fuckin' mad dog.  Asked me did I wanna live or go down fighting and I told him if that was the Captain's blood I wanted to live.  He tossed me a gun and told me come the fuck on and that was that.  Me and the pilot, we decided to throw our lot in with Spike, 'cause he'd collected the bounty along with the ship and it was his, now.  He got us fixed up, got the Chaddock toad-stink out of the ship and re-christened her the Drusilla.  And we never looked back.  

Spike - he's a mean fuck, and he's got a mouth that never shuts up and an ego like you wouldn't believe.  But he remembers - all kinds of shit, and he never once treated us like anything less than real live people.  I'd kill for him - fuck, I have killed for him.  I guess I'd die for him too, though.  Me and him, we got up to some crazy stuff, on and off.  But he's with somebody now - somebody from the old days, I guess.  Xander.  I guess I'd kill for him, too.  Bein' what I was - poor kid with no parents to speak of, and a Marine - family is the one thing you crave.  I've got that now - got my partner in slavery Nia, who pilots us safe and sound, got a Captain that might love us and a fix-it geek who says he does...and nothin' in the universe'd make me give it up.

Timeline

2005:  On assignment for the Council in Japan, Xander comforts a dying man after a devastating earthquake.  The man gives him a gift - a small figure of a three-legged toad - and then bops him on the head.  This is actually, as he finds out later, a good thing.

2026 - The Outsiders - a genuine alien race - make first contact with a clan of Yn'ng demons in Siberia and begin negotiating a trade: advanced tech, including faster than light tech, for magic.  The Yn'ng are ecstatic.  Demons all over earth begin to gather to get in on the deal.  Earth governments are not amused but eventually are forced to acknowledge demons, to make them citizens and to realize that demons will be the first to use the new tech.  The Outsiders introduce two other allied races - the Chaddock and something incomprehensible that humans dub 'Fairies'.

2028 - The Gate is built near Mars as a jumping-off point to Outsider space.   Demons begin to leave earth for space.  William the Bloody, also called Spike, leaves aboard the FTL ship Mercury.   He has hired on with the Outsiders as a bounty hunter.

2029 - The first all-human ship sets out from the Gate.  It is a ship of war and aboard are several thousand volunteer Marines.   A fourth race - shadowy, distant, and nearly a match for the Outsider's own ferocity - is the target and humanity learns that there are worse things out there than seven-foot talking dogs.   As a reward, the Outsiders help fund Fenris station, which is completed in 2037 and is the first human/demon owned and run station in space.

2040 - In lieu of his usual fee, Spike is offered a ship and becomes owner and Captain of the Tur-gah, an S-class Chaddock fighter/scout.  The enslaved crew is freed but chooses to remain aboard.  Spike re-christens the ship Drusilla and it is retro-fitted for himself and his human and Fairy crew. 

2054 - After a disastrous job, the Drusilla goes for repairs at the distant Whale Deep - a ship and scrap-yard on the very edge of Outsider space.  Spike and his crew meet up with an un-aged, still human Xander Harris.  Things...happen.  The Drusilla acquires her very own mechanic and computer geek.

2069 - A trade-war between two corporations becomes an actual war, complete with revolutionary slogans, blockades, and a competing 'People's Brigade'.  The Drusilla, of course, works all three sides but her crew also learns that once a white hat, always a white hat.  Fortunately, luck has them on the winning side.

Our story begins in 2099.

"Who, my friend, can scale the heaven?"
The Epic of Gilgamesh

Spike was dreaming.  He dreamed a lot but these were different dreams - skip dreams - and they always had an extra edge to them.   As the Drusilla moved faster-than-light - an electric-blue bubble in an ardent current - he dreamed of dragons, and angels.

"I kinda wanna slay the dragon," Angel says, leg braced back and sword raised, something like ecstasy and something like agony on his face.  And Spike lifts his own sword, wincing from the wounds that are bleeding him dry - watching the mob of monsters that is surging towards them like a wave of black oil.

"You're no saint, you ponce," he says, grinning, and Angel grins back and the dragon roars...

Two warriors facing what they thought would be their final battle.  Determined to win.  But, funny thing - it was Wes who'd saved the day on that one.  Wes who'd had some sort of plan in place, and deals struck, and who'd come back from the dead and opened a portal and the Wolfram and Hart immovable rock had been smashed to flinders by an irresistible force.   Wesley, who was dead these last fifty years - finally at peace.  *Do not go gently...* Spike thought, and dreamed on.

The bubble goes - traveling millions of light-years in the blink of an eye.  Ricocheting along the surface of real-time and real-space like a cosmic skipping-stone, heading unerringly for the well of gravity and energy that is a sun, a station - their destination.    Three weeks ago they'd left Dur'rhii Station - Outsider station - and were now bound for Fenris and the closest they'll ever get to Earth.  Earth...and Spike is dreaming again, of the first time he ever shook the dust of the mundane world off his boots and sailed the seas of faster-than.

Aboard the ship 'Mercury' and in his closet-like cabin Spike's got the screen on so he can see the Gate.  Earth is so far from anyplace anyone wants to go that there's a booster gate to kick ships out, 100-billion light years or more.  Straight to the heart of Outsider space and the center of all trade, all war - all life.  Suddenly all the old myths - vampires, werewolves! - are true and a lot of humanity is in a philosophical tail-spin.  Having actual aliens prove the myths true makes it that much worse.   Some of humanity has yet to recover, and space seems like the better option, just now.

The Gate is made of seven skip generators, tethered in a circle by Outsider know-how.   Spike watches as the ship joins the queue for the ride, moving slow.  In real-time it's the middle of October and Spike and the Mercury and everyone on board will arrive at Midway sometime in June.  But there's no 'June' at Midway since it's an Outsider station and it runs to Outsider cycles.  In skip-time, it'll feel like maybe he took an hour's nap.  Until he wakes up. 

The warning comes over the PA - they're about to skip out - and Spike's fingers are tight, tight, tight on the edges of his coat as he watches the screen that's above his head.  He's flat on his back in the bunk, the Gate looming closer.   St. Elmo's fire surrounds them as the gate fires - actinic lightning that meets and expands into a writhing ball of energy.  A sort of bone-deep hum vibrates through everything and time seems to slow to nothing at all...and suddenly they go.  A kick like a mule and a few seconds of free-fall and then they're in faster-than.  For a moment Spike can see every molecule that makes up his body - every atom of the ship - and it's all streaming around him like a river - a ribbon of fire and ice and light.  And he's flying and falling and laughing.  And then he's dreaming - dreaming of Dru and the first time they made love - and then he's jolting back down, down, down, into slow-space again and the ribbons of time and matter furl themselves away like a cosmic umbrella.  The PA is telling them not to move until they get the all-clear and his mouth is dry and he's thin, so thin from the longest skip in space.  It takes him four days to get back to full strength again, drinking the 'approved' synthetic blood that most vamps live on.   Taking down a drunken stationer or two as well, because you can't beat it straight from the source. 

And he only goes through the Gate two more times in the next fifteen years because Earth isn't part of the plan much anymore, and the Dru is all the home he really needs.

Fenris Station was an old station - the first demons and humans had ever built, completed seven years after first contact.  It was out in the Canis Major constellation - Earths closest galaxy.  A system choc-a-bloc with debris rich in minerals, ores, and heavy metals - hazardous to fly through, but profitable to mine.  The station's age showed in the old-fashioned metal decking that rang under Spike's boots as he strode along the Concourse, heading for the Segue bar and his client.  Fenris' age also showed in the pockets of weather that tended to generate themselves far up in the soot-blackened supports and cross-beams of the overhead.  With a huff of annoyance Spike sidestepped a puddle and the drizzle that was making it.  It was coming down from the tangle of unshielded conduits and pipes that carried water, atmosphere and heat to the stem, where the ships were docked.  Fenris was like a huge metallic flower, with the ships docking all up and down the 'stem', and the living and working and everything else going on in the various levels of the 'petals'.  The center of it all was Engineering and the Outsider power-source that kept it all going. 

Spike had only been in there once - something like thirty years ago when Fenris was in danger of being blown up and Xander had talked him into joining the guerillas and liberating the station.  You could still see the fire-damage from that time - scorch-marks along the metal and plastic infrastructure that aren't worth the effort of a clean up.  They're a reminder, those marks.  'War was here, and could be again.  Never forget.'   Even gifted with tech beyond imagining, humans had still found it necessary to kill each other over those oldest of all prizes - gold, water and flesh.  Outsiders had watched with a detached, amused eye.  They had fought more wars than humanity ever had and most of them with their own kind, and the little scuffle over trade routes and mining rights had interested them not at all.  They had their own interminable battles to fight - their own labyrinthine politics to thread.

It made for wild times and outrageous profit if you got involved in an Outsider fight - if you picked the winning jyiiy - the winning house.   If you didn't - you lost your head right along with the boss.  Spike had so far always picked the winning side, even if he sometimes picked after the fighting was over.   An Outsider jyiiy was very much like a corporation, if corporations condoned torture and rape.  'Family' didn't actually translate all that well into the Outsider language, much less 'friend', 'compassion' or 'mercy'.  It was pure chance that a sort of cosmic game of leap-frog had led Outsiders to human space, and all of humanity had come this close to being the next handy gene-pool for supplying Outsiders with slaves.  Demons - and demon magic - had proved too fascinating and luckily Outsiders had met a magical human or two, as well.  Something that had caused them to lump humans in with demons, much to the horror of some overly zealous humans.  The smart ones - once they'd learned a little history - had happily gone along with it.

Spike growled as some station trash - drunks, junkies or unemployable-due-to-criminal-history types - swarmed him at the lift station, selling trinkets and lottery tickets and drugs.  He vamped, snarling and most of them scattered.  The couple that were too fucked up - or too desperate - to back off got the back of his hand.

"Undead freak!" one muttered, limping away and Spike hissed in dissatisfaction.  He didn't like the stink of them.

"Fuck off, little snack-pak, I'm feelin' peckish."  The human glared at him but scurried faster.  Most vamps lived on the synthetic blood vat-grown to specification and dispensed at every restaurant, bar, and hotel on-station.  It was tasty and it kept you healthy but no vamp ever gave up the hunt entirely and everyone knew it.    The Outsiders just shrugged that off - they were predators themselves - and no Station had yet done anything too extreme to try and keep vamps from feeding.  Of course, the smart ones kept it under the radar.  The dumb ones - got dusted.  Spike had had a hand in that from time to time.  No sense in making things hard when they didn't have to be.  The Outsiders knew a thing or two about genocide.

The lift took him up three levels and he got out and stalked on, the vast hollow of the Concourse ringing and singing all around him.  A six-story jump from the top level and the whole thing a dizzying, neon-lit canyon that sold every vice and every virtue a skip-drunk spacer could want.  There were mostly humans and Earth demons at Fenris, but Spike stepped aside for a clutch of Outsiders.  Anywhere between seven and eight feet tall, they most closely resembled dogs who had learned to walk on their hind legs.  But an Outsider skull had a set of jaws that opened much too widely for comfort and were studded with a double row of razoring teeth.  Large, bat-like ears heard too many secrets and the brain behind the wide-set eyes processed endlessly for advantage - conquest.  Outsiders fought and Outsiders won, and it was only their intense need to win against each other that had kept Earth from becoming one more burnt-out cinder in their path.   So busy fighting that they didn't have the time or inclination for manufacture, agriculture - research.  The devoured, like upright piranha.  If you were smart - and didn't mind stepping aside - you could live like kings off the chum in their wake.  Humanity and demon-kind - stepped aside. 

The com-set in Spike's ear ticked with static and then the Drusilla's pilot came online, her voice a faint whisper in Spike's sensitive ear. 

"Fenris Traffic Control just posted the 'Billy Bud' inbound for dock," Nia informed him.  

 Spike sighed.  The Drusilla had a feud with the Billy Bud.  Chiefly, with their bigoted, brainless Captain but it all filtered down.  "One thing at a time, please.  Bounty first, opinionated gobshites next."  He didn't actually open his mouth to talk - the throat-mic array stuck more-or-less invisibly under his chin and on either side of his Adam's apple picked up sub-vocal speech.  Good for loud bars and back-stabbing.

"Just wanted to let you know."   Nia sounded sulky. 

Spike sighed again.  "And I'm glad you did.  Going into the bar now."

"Confirmed," she said, and then static as she shut down.  Nia disapproved of the way Spike was handling the feud.  She wanted bloody mayhem on the docks rather than the covert sort of guerilla approach Spike was taking.   Ferro - his ship's gun and weapon's master - approved of bloody mayhem too.   Xander didn't particularly approve of bloody mayhem, but fighting made Spike horny and horny made Xander happy, so...there might be approval in there somewhere, except mayhem wasn't going to happen.  Neither Nia nor Ferro nor Xander would have to pay the fines if they took out the entire complement of the Billy Bud while docked at Fenris.   Spike would.  He was the Captain, and that made him responsible.  *Responsible.  Christ.  Been running from that for over two hundred years!*   And destroying the Billy Bud might get them all banned from Fenris, which was - unacceptable.  Spike settled his Captain's jacket across his shoulders, pushed the door to the Segue open and stepped inside.

"Fuckin' Billy Bud.  Why'd those assholes haf'ta be here now?"  Ferro scowled at the vid-screen in front of him, watching the course that the station was plotting for Billy Bud.  "Don't tell me they're gonna dock 'em on our level.  Nia, tell me they're not that fuckin' stupid!"  Ferro glared over the top of his station at the back of the pilot's head.  She waved a slim, palely bluish hand over her shoulder, ignoring him.  Intent on the final moments of the water-swap from their tanks to the stations, and gleaning the stations data-feed for anything useful.   Ferro slumped back in his seat and contemplated arming the Drusilla but station - and more importantly, Spike - would skin him alive if he powered up right there at dock.  At Fenris, which was aggressively neutral at the best of times and suicidally tolerant at the worst. 

"Thank you, Fenris, there's our credit number," Nia murmured, and Ferro watched the camera view that showed the line of dock-monkeys leaving the Drusilla, empty loaders trundling in their wake.   Re-stocking essential items, a priority in the first few hours at dock.  Later would come the real shopping, when they searched out the Earth delicacies that Fenris always had.  And maybe found a Billy Bud crewman or two to...annoy.

Fenris-station didn't approve of feuds, grudges or private little wars.  That just made it harder to carry out each skirmish.  Ferro stretched, grabbed his coffee and went down to his 'office'.  Basically, it was the armory with a hanging chair and a stash of porn for the player; a place Nia avoided and Xander sometimes hung out.  Spike bought the porn and inspected the weapons, and long before Xander had come along they'd made use of the hanging chair quite a few times.  Now it generally just saw Ferro and a random selection of off-world beauties.  And a lot of gun oil, one way or another.

Ferro crawled up into the hanging chair and stared in dissatisfaction at the weapon-covered walls.  Fenris did not allow knives, free-projectile guns or energy weapons of any sort.   They'd learned their lesson well during the war years and were as aggressive about their weapon's policy as they were about their neutrality.  But that didn't mean Spike didn't have that old-fashioned straight razor on him, and probably a taser, too.  Didn't mean that when Ferro went on-station later he wouldn't be carrying a little shock-knife of his own, a Chaddock stinger that felt like acid over your nerves and left neatly cauterized slashes inches deep.   Fenris didn't acknowledge the need for those weapons any more than they did the inherent idiocy of having warring Outsider jyiiy docking on the same level, much less the same station, but Fenris seemed to have gotten away with it for years.  Didn't mean either Ferro or Spike would stop carrying hidden weapons any time soon.

There was a loud crashing noise from the corridor and then cursing and Ferro got up and sauntered to the doorway.  Xander was standing there in that raggedy-assed coverall he wore when he was working, wrestling with an access cover.   Getting ready to do some maintenance or some precise and finicky thing to the ship's engines that would make her .38 percent faster or some such.  Xander was their fix-it guy - computer guy - the guy that kept the Dru purring along like a big, happy cat.   Kept Spike purring along, better than Ferro ever had.

"What'cha doin'?" Ferro asked, calculated drawl and Xander shot him an evil look and then yelped as the cover slipped and the unfinished edge gashed his palm.

"Fuckin' help me or fuck off," Xander growled and Ferro grinned and went over - helped him wrestle the stubborn cover out of its grooves and onto the floor.  Xander clipped a safety line to the recessed ring in the wall - clipped the other end to the cover and kicked at it with his boot.

"Stupid damn thing." 

"The Billy Bud's out there.  Fuckers are dockin' 'em right on our level."

"Christ."  Xander raised his hand to his mouth - bad habit he'd never broken - and Ferro snatched at his wrist. 

"Go get this fixed right," he snapped, turning Xander's hand and examining the gash.  It was bleeding nicely, two-inch cut right across the meat at the base of his thumb. 

"Later.  I wanna get this filter in before we go -"

"We're gonna be here three days, Xander."  Ferro pulled an old square of pale red cloth - a bandana once upon a time - out of his pocket and made to wrap it around Xander's hand.  Xander recoiled.

"You are not putting that filthy rag around my hand!" 

"It's not filthy!"  Ferro examined the cloth.  Well, it was a little...stiffish.  "Cleaner then in there," he added, jerking his head in the direction of what Xander obscurely called the 'Jeffries tubes'.  One of the many crawl-spaces that riddled the Drusilla and provided access to her inner workings.  And the hidey-holes where they'd smuggled everything from drugs to escaping slaves to - on one never-to-be-forgotten run - fish.  Bags and bags of bright-finned guppies for the core-crawlers out on Charybidis.   The things Spike hit on...

"Look, just go and spray some damn nu-skin or something on it, okay?  I don't wanna hear the bitchin' and moanin' that'll happen when Spike gets back on board and smells your blood everywhere."  Ferro snatched the plastic storage-box of filters that Xander was proposing to replace and sauntered off with them.  "You come show me you fixed it up and I'll give these back," he said smugly, knowing that invoking Spike's name would get it done like nothing else would.  Xander could be a stubborn son of a bitch.

"Ferro, you fuck!" Xander yelled, but he stomped off towards the infirmary and Ferro grinned - shoved the filters into his office and locked the door.  He had a funny feeling about this deal and he wanted to be back topside, monitoring what was going on at the meeting.   Spike's contact was a Chaddock and he didn't trust the slimy bastards.

The Segue was a bar and restaurant.  It was expensive, quiet and not quite dim enough, all of which made Spike nervous.   Not a place Spike wanted to make deals in, or settle bounties in - not a place he wanted to be in.   At least in his Captain's jacket and the trousers with the pale charcoal stripe down the leg he looked like a legitimate trader and not what he really was.  Fenris was tolerant, but individual businesses could still bar him if they thought he'd bring trouble - and lose them money.  He didn't fit here and he was pretty sure the Chaddock he was meeting had done it on purpose.  Hoping to throw him off or maybe to get him thrown out.  The demon stirred inside, anger building, but Spike did his best to ignore it.

He took a deep breath as he walked in, scenting the air.  Humans, Outsiders, Chaddock.  A vamp or two and maybe a Fairy.  Real wood and stone in the construction, real whiskey and gin in the glasses and Spike felt the demon pushing again.  Wanting to make a little noise.  He saw his contact right off - smiled tightly at the hostess who approached with small sneer and a lifted eyebrow, pale blonde hair done up in a twist and the latest in Outsider jewelry draping her throat.

"Can I help you?" she asked, giving Spike a raking once-over and he drew himself up straight and dug out a hand-rolled smoke - put it between his lips and felt for his lighter.  She glared. 

"I see my party, love - care to bring me a whiskey?"

"I'll have your server come over," the woman said frostily.  "Smoking is allowed only at the bar."  

Spike shrugged.  "I'll be done in a minute, ducks, no worries."   The hostess turned on her heel and stalked away.  Spike strode to the table where his contact waited in solitary splendor.  A Chaddock, second of the third alien species humanity had been introduced to.  Chaddock and Outsiders had had an understanding for about two hundred years before Outsiders had found Earth space, and where Outsiders fought, Chaddock did business.  Nobody beat Chaddock for thinking up inventive new weapons, poisons and fiddly little gizmos that could run entire households or map the brain-waves of a slug.  The myriad diseases, psychosis and abilities of humanity and demon-kind were a giant puzzle of fascinating problems that Chaddock scientists were unraveling with gusto.   

Spike sat down, legs sprawled and the smoke clenched between his teeth.  He flicked his lighter open and sparked his cigarette - blew out a plume of smoke over the Chaddock's head.  *Better to hang for a sheep than a lamb.  Damn Jack, anyway.*   Jack - Fat Jack - glared disapprovingly, bulging eyes and neck-less, squat torso radiating irritation

"Do you have no manners?"

"Not really.  Do you have any sense?" 

Fat Jack drew himself up, bristling - swelling like the toad his race resembled.  "I am meeting some colleagues of mine.  We are discussing a way-station between Farpoint and Uckt.   My egg-set will run it."  Fat Jack smoothed the front of his pea-soup-green suit - laced stubby, webbed fingers together and leaned back in his chair.  "It is a great opportunity."

"Yeah, so's this - do it right and I won't gut you."   Fat Jack smelled faintly but distinctly of stagnant water and dead vegetation - a thick scent that was suddenly spiked with ammonia as he registered Spike's threat and his heart started to beat faster.  Spike lifted his chin as the server hurried over, folded length of linen over his arm and an old-fashioned pad and pen in his hands.  "Whiskey, neat, double.  And whatever Fat Jack here is having."  The Chaddock's slitted nostrils flared a bit at the nick-name but he nodded shortly and held up a glass of something palely green.  The server darted off with a breathed Yes, sir.  Spike smoked, watching Jack calm himself by distraction - fiddling with the napkin and utensils and his glass.

"I should have known better than to think you would be civil.  I suppose we should get this over before my real meeting starts."

"Shouldn't have picked such a bloody inappropriate place, Jack, and you know it," Spike muttered, digging into his inner breast pocket.   Not enough shadows, not enough noise and this was looking worse and worse.  The table of Outsiders near the door suddenly broke into barking, staccato laughter and Jack jumped, marbled-yellow eyes darting to them and away.  *Oh bloody hell.  Jack, you miserable toad.  Knew you'd try something...*    Spike pulled a small, wrapped box out of his pocket and then fumbled it, dropping it to the thick carpet and bending down, out of Fat Jack's line of sight.  "Nia, find a schematic for this place - tell me there's another way out besides the front door.  Dog trouble."  Throat movement was minimal with a sub-vocal mic but he wasn't taking any chances.

"On it," Nia said, and Spike sat slowly back up - put the box on the table and slid it forward several inches. 

"There's your prize, Fat Jack."

"Ah, yes."  Jack reached into his own jacket - froze for a moment when Spike tensed and then continued his movement, going slow.  "What, you are nervous?  Do you think I would - would 'try something', as you say?"

"I think you'd sell the eggs of your ancestors if the price was right," Spike said, and the dull yellow-brown of Fat Jack's face flushed to an equally dull umber.

"You dare," he hissed, and Spike leaned forward over the table, his hand coming down on the box and his other reaching to pat Fat Jack's jowly cheek.  The Chaddock flinched from the smoldering cigarette between Spike's fingers, his breathing becoming a little labored.

"I more than dare.  Give me the fee, right now."  Spike watched as Jack fumbled in his pocket and then drew out a magnetic card.  Electronic bank check - drawn on the Fenris main branch and cashable anywhere on the station - on any station within a skip-length away.  *Bloody thing had better have my money on it.* 

"I have never been so insulted.  This is the last time my House does business with you or any vampire!" Jack wheezed, and Spike plucked the card from his fingers - shoved the box across the table.

"Probably a wise move on your part.   Us vamps, we're an untrustworthy lot."  Spike shoved the card into the little reader he carried - watched as the fee amount popped up on the display.  *At least he didn't try to short me.  Bloody toad.*

"I see how your mind operates.  You do not even trust the one who employs you!"  Jack looked outraged at the presence of the reader, but Spike hadn't gotten to where he was by blindly trusting the other criminals.   

"The ones who employee me are usually the worst of the lot," Spike mumbled.  He hit the sequence that transferred the money - shoved card and reader into his pocket and dropped the butt of his smoke into Jack's mostly-gone drink.  Behind the Chaddock's head he saw their server come out of the bar with a tray and then stop - turn around sharply and disappear.  *Wait for it...*

"Hello, Sss'ike."  A bony hand - like an articulated steel vise - closed on Spike's shoulder.  "Sso 'ood to ssee 'oo."   

Spike looked up, into whiteless eyes set aslant in the narrow, dog-like face.  At an expanse of gleaming ivory teeth and enough muscle to punch a hole straight through four inches of plex.   Or a vamp's heart.  "Y'yis.  Likewise, I'm sure.  But I've got appointments to keep -"   He pushed up and the Outsider's hand easily slammed him back down.

"No' any moore, Sss'ike."

Xander stomped down the corridor, opposite hand fisted around his cut one, cursing.  Mostly cursing Ferro.  His smugness, his greater height - his rightness, because Spike would bitch if the Dru smelled of Eau de Xander-blood.  *Stupid vampires and their stupid super-senses and their stupid ideas about humans,* Xander thought.  But he was kind of grinning too, because there was nothing in the fucking universe sexier than a possessive Spike who had decided a naked body-check was in order.  At least, nothing sexier to Xander.   *My possessive vampire.* 

Xander bumped the door-switch on the wall with his elbow and stepped into the infirmary.   It was about the size of a medium walk-in closet, big enough for two narrow bunks and a wall-locker of supplies, plus a ceiling-mounted diagnostic unit that they'd 'acquired' five jobs ago.   Xander stuck his hand under the bell cover of the 'sonic and watched as the inaudible waves of sound vibrated the blood off his hand.  A tiny pump suctioned it away, straight into a flash-incinerator.  The 'sonic kind of tickled.   

He poked around in the cabinet until he found the aerosol can of nu-skin and sprayed a layer over the cut, pressing the edges of the wound together for a few seconds while the chemical dried.  A little blood seeped out, making the patch a spotty kind of pink.  It was dry, sealed, and the nu-skin would kill any bugs he might have picked up.  Good enough.   Xander wanted to get the filters done.  Fenris had some very...novel places of entertainment and he intended to drag Spike to at least three.  Maybe four.  This job promised to be particularly lucrative and they all needed a break.

*A little break with my honey and no fucking jobs, no toads, no dogs.  No shooting and no fighting and no damn deals.   We are job free for a month at least, after this.  Skip over to Rennick Station and get the damn enviro computer fixed so we don't wake up to another tropical fucking rain storm.  Maybe go planet-side, do some swimming.*  Rennick orbited an Earth-like planet whose sun was almost permanently hidden behind dense clouds - a bit of a vampire resort and it had coastline, with a warm, saline sea.  Xander missed swimming.  The wave-pools at Midway just weren't the same.

And they smelled like wet dog.

Xander tidied up and left the infirmary - stopped in the galley for a soda, snugging the spill-proof lid on tight.  One incident with a high-vee turn and an uncapped drink had been plenty, thank you.  Ferro still ribbed him about it.  He'd been new, then.  Well, newer.  He wasn't quite so new now.

*Almost fifty years...*   Xander touched the tags that hung around his neck - reminder and promise.  He took a drink of his soda and strolled down the corridor and around, heading for Ferro's office.  It was locked.  *Fucker.  Is he...taking a break?*   Xander grinned to himself.  Interrupting Ferro in the middle of a 'break' would be perfect compensation for locking up his filters.  Xander started to tap in the master override code.   Ferro seemed to forget that Xander was the geek on this ship.

"Xander, get up here!"  Ferro, yelling over the com and right after there was -

"Fuck, fuck, fuckfuckfuck!"   Nia cursing when she almost never did and Xander ran - slammed his palm down on the lift switch and winced as the cut throbbed. 

"What the fuck's going on?"

"Fuckin' toad fuck -" Nia and Ferro both losing what coherency they usually had and Xander squeezed through the too-slow lift doors - punched for the bridge, bouncing on his toes - palm flat to the cool plastic and adrenalin making his heart thump almost painfully in his chest. 

*Damnit, damnit - knew this job was gonna be bad!  Fucking with things we shouldn't - steal a m'ryi - sure, why not?  It's only the closest thing to a fuckin' religious relic any dog's got!*   The doors slid open and Xander almost fell out of the lift - did a little hop to save himself and staggered past Spike's chair to Ferro.

"Tell me what the fuck is -"

"Somebody fired - somebody had a gun, gotta get the Cap'n out of that damn bar -!"

"Fucking Fat Jack double-crossed him -!" Nia and Ferro at the same time, Nia's hands flying over her boards, using whatever Fairy magic she had to get whatever she needed for Spike.

*Gun?  Jesus - Christ, who the hell is crazy enough -*     "Where the hell is Spike?  What -"

"I'm on it, Xander -" Nia snapped, then made a small noise of triumph when a schematic flashed up on her board.   Station blueprints that nobody was supposed to see. 

*Wonder if what she does is real magic or just...  Keep meaning to ask and then when I remember to ask I forget to ask, wonder if that's magic too...*   Xander felt sweat, cold and crawly, going down his spine and he ruthlessly cut off the inner babble that still tended to swamp him in times of stress.  At least he was mostly out of the habit of the babble actually coming out of his mouth.

"God damn dogs," Ferro growled, and Xander looked at the ready-lights coming up on his board and felt his stomach roll.   They gleamed, muted red and orange, off Ferro's dark skin - smears of crimson down Ferro's scarred cheeks that was too much like blood.  The rest of the bridge was in twilight, lit only by small overhead spots.  Xander jerked away from Ferro's chair and fell into his own - auxiliary pilot boards - with a thud.

"Getting it, getting it -" Nia muttered, scrolling faster than a human could see and Xander powered up his station - shoved the soda into a clamp he'd jerry-rigged on the side of the chair.  He fumbled the headset off its hook and onto his head, vague noises coming over the link from Spike and then Station buzzing in his other ear and he flinched.

"All ships, be advised we have lock-down proceeding, level three.  Repeat, all ships, lock-down on level three, do not attempt to access level three.  All personnel report to your ship or station."  The advisory cycled again - repeated in Outsider and Chaddock and the pidgin that a lot of the less social Fairy used.  Xander acknowledged, short and to the point, not wanting to draw any more attention than he had to.  He flicked through a series of views from the ship's cameras: the Drusilla's outer hatch, the foot of the ramp leading up to it and a panning view of the section of dock just beyond the ramp.  So far the only activity seemed to be a trio of dock-workers shoulder-deep in an electrical panel and an amorous couple leaning body-to-body against a pillar-like conduit.  The alert was station-wide but they were keeping it confined to the Concourse so far.  "Nothing's stirring." 

"Got it!" Nia crowed.   Xander switched the station-feed off for a minute so he could concentrate on Spike.  "Cap'n - Two o'clock of the main door is hall, kitchen, storage - access to Maintenance three meters left, access to ventilation two meters and up."

"Right.  Just gotta - fuckin' dogs and their fuckin' - Jesus!  Almost - there -"

"I'm goin' live in three minutes, Nia," Ferro warned, fingers hovering, and Nia rolled her eyes at him - wide and pale and flaring with an unsettling sort of reddish gleam in the blue-white glow of her boards. 

"No!"  Xander tore his gaze away from Nia and glared at the other man, shutting his com off altogether so he wouldn't distract Spike.   "Ferro - you gotta wait.  If you power up, Station'll be all over us - Spike'll never get through!"  

"If I don't, whatever ship those fuckin' dogs are off could get up behind us and take out our skip array!  We'll be fuckin' chaff."

"Just let Nia work her magic, man.  Just - wait."  Ferro snarled but his hand didn't move and Xander switched back to station-com, hearing questions and answers flying - hearing one Chaddock ship threatening undock and at least three Outsider crew getting damn close to opening fire.   Chaddock ran - Outsiders fought.  On the whole, Xander preferred the Chaddock way.  Fairies - tended to just fade into the woodwork.  "Fucking Christ - it's going all to hell out there - who fired?"

"Somebody did - not the Cap'n.  Dog, I think -"   Nia's gaze went unfocused and Xander switched back to her channel.    

"I'm in the pipe, Nia - ventilation.  Christ, it's filthy."

Nia pressed the audio bud deeper into one tall, pointed ear, eyes narrowing in concentration.  "Five meters, there should be a hatch - type in....zero zero niner fiver tree..."

"Right.  Where...?"  Spike's voice, slightly flat and slightly muffled, effect of the sub-vocal mic.

"It's a service trunk.  Go right - twenty meters...right again...ten...got another hatch?"

"Yeah - it's open - fuckin' hell!"

"What is it?" Xander hissed, and Nia waved her hand.

"It's cold storage for customs perishables - see the exit?"

"Pressure door - got a code?"

"No, a card - let me..."  Nia's fingers danced over the keys, codes and access keys a blur on her screen.

"That's got it - I'm out.  Fuckin' brilliant, you are.   Power up - we are leaving."

"Hundred and seven meters hard left, Cap'n, we'll keep the light on."  Nia grinned over at Xander and then Ferro with her sharp, white teeth.  "Get those babies live, Tommy-boy,"

"Don't call me Tommy-boy, you fuckin' Fairy," Ferro muttered, but he was grinning too and Xander flopped back in his chair, a hand to his heart as if he could stop the too-fast pounding that was making him a little dizzy. 

"You, Nia?  Are a fuckin' genius!"

"Belt in, dumbass, we're gonna leave scorch-marks."

"Fuck yes," Xander said - wrestled the tangle of webbing straps up and over his shoulders and around his hips, snapping the tongues into the central buckle with sharp little snicks while Ferro did the same.  Nia was never in her chair without the belts. 

Xander switched back to the station channel, clearing his throat and taking a quick slurp of soda so his voice wouldn't crack.  "Fenris Station, advise we're prepping for immediate undock.  Ship personnel emergency.  Ten minutes and counting, on my mark."   Xander winced at the bark of irritation in Station's reply - the central communications hub was being bombarded with multiple undock advisories on top of the ongoing emergency on level three and they weren't happy.   Apparently, Outsiders bringing out guns had caused a general panic and several groups of station personnel had started firing back - as had the crew of another Outsider ship.   The original Outsiders were now barricaded in the Segue while Fenris militia tried to enforce a cease-fire to get them out. 

Xander keyed up a screenfull of status reports showing system after system on the Drusilla going live, including Ferro's guns.  There was a sudden, bone-deep hum - subsonic and almost painful.  It was the skip-field generators coming online and Xander grinned.  That ghost hum was the heartbeat of the ship - the pulse that meant safe and mobile and home and Xander took a long, wavery breath.   *I'm gonna kick your ass when you get up here, Spike.  Fucker.* 

"And there's the Cap'n," Nia said - choked off her next words and hissed something in her own language.

"What?  Oh shit."  Xander watched with a sense of sick helplessness as the image of Spike - standing in the Drusilla's main hatchway - was joined by three tall Outsiders.

Spike yanked his jacket off - flung it across the small room that served as their in-dock 'office'.   Customs, vendors and clients never saw more of the Dru than this.  It was what used to be a holding cell directly off the main access hatch and they hadn't done much to it beyond getting out the stains and adding a narrow desk bolted to the floor and a chair in a locking track.  Chaddock, like Outsiders, were slavers.  The walls were still studded with recessed rings - handy for chaining up purchases.  The trio of Outsiders looked around them with something like disdain and Spike changed, too angry to maintain his more polite human mask.

"What the fuck are you doing, coming here?  We had a deal."

The central Outsider - distinguished by a thick ruff of brindled hair around her neck and shoulders - lifted her head, long tongue licking out for a moment.  Rather like a snake, scenting the air.  "Deal hass changed, Sss'ike," she snapped and Spike snarled.

"I've got your seal in blood says otherwise, Rrahn."

"Do you have the m'ryi?" 

Spike resisted the urge to launch himself at Rrahn.  Outsiders were too strong - too bloodthirsty - and they were on his ship.  Which meant his crew were in danger every minute they stayed.    "Don't even think of coming down here.  Any of you."  The sub-vocal mic was still patched in and he hoped to the bloody gods his crew would listen to him.  "Of course I have it.  That was the deal.  And the other part of the deal was we were to meet at coordinates specified -"

"That 'oint hass 'ecome...inhoss'itable.  Sso now we meet herrre."  The growl in Rrahn's voice was unmistakable and Spike growled back but he was already reaching for the com-panel on the wall.

"Get the box out of the safe, put it in the chute.  No one comes down."  He shut the link before anyone could answer and they waited, the Outsiders shifting uneasily in the small room.  It smelled of disinfectant and old blood and his crew - and now the rank, sharp musk of Outsiders - and Spike knew the light was too bright and the air too warm for them.  Outsiders came from somewhere cold - somewhere dim - and their bulky, coarse-furred bodies preferred a heavier gravity.  One of the reasons they were so strong, in the human zones.  Spike watched long-fingered, clawed hands flex and curl. 

*They're nervous.  Bloody fucking hell.  Move it, Xander - get it done.*

"It's in."  Nia's voice, a ghost of a whisper in his ear. "We're still in prep - three minutes to undock."  Spike acknowledged her with a subsonic growl.  A moment later the spreading membrane of the Outsider's bat-like ears twitched and swiveled as they all clearly heard the box hissing through the chute.  Little delivery tube system that the Chaddock - who were not always easily mobile - tended to have in their ships.   Spike made a small motion with his head - slight tilt of his body and the Outsiders filed out of the office.  Spike strode past them - slid the chute-cover up and removed the small steel box that rested on the bottom of the shaft.  He pressed his thumb to the underside - print-lock - and it opened silently, revealing another box made of a dark, non-reflective alloy peculiar to Outsiders.

"Like the deal said.  Your m'ryi."  Spike held the boxes out and Rrahn came forward - lifted the smaller one carefully out and pressed her claws in a complicated pattern on the seemingly blank surface of the lid.  The alloy shimmered to transparency and Rrahn gazed downward for a moment.  Another touch with a claw and the box was once again an opaque block and she turned and handed it to the right-hand, shorter guard that flanked her.

"I am 'mm'ressed, Sss'ike."

"And I'm bloody pissed, Rrahn.  Just pay me the fee and be on your way, yeah?  I'm in countdown to undock."

"Yess, sso am I.   Here iss a new 'oint.  'Ou will receive the fee there."  Rrahn was holding out a slip of paper and for a moment Spike just stared at her, fury growing.  He took on long step forward, his hand coming up and back - the antique straight-razor glinting in his fist.  When the roar bellowed up out of his throat he heard a squeak of pain from Nia, who'd just had her ear-drums blasted.  But he didn't care.  His fist came down, straight for Rrahn's sensitive snout.

The taller guard's hand stopped his cold, nearly snapping his wrist and he stood there, breathing in and out in sharp pants.   Rrahn stared back, lips lifted away from her mouthful of fangs in a deadly display.  "H'ru will accom'any 'ou to be shhure that 'ou arrive on time.   If 'ou do not arrrive...'ou're bounty iss sset at fifteen million."  Rrahn reached out and tucked the paper into Spike's shirt-pocket, her bony fingers hot through the thin fabric.  She growled something in the Outsider tongue and H'ru let go of Spike - stepped back.   Rrahn made a short sort of bow in Spike's direction and then she and her remaining guard stalked out.  

Behind him, Spike heard the lift doors shush open and he spun around as H'ru's hand went to his belt - to a weapon.  "Stand fucking down you fucking dog," Spike snapped.  H'ru growled but he subsided and Spike glared at the lift - at Xander - who was trying to look as if he'd only come down accidentally.

"Guess we'll need that extra safety web rigged then?" he asked, all eager helpfulness and Spike wanted to strangle him.  Instead he took a long, hard breath - folded the razor and tucked it away.

"Guess we will."

In the lift Spike pushed Xander back into the wall - slammed his hands down on either side of Xander's head, trapping him there.  Spike's face inches from Xander's - gold shimmer in his eyes and a rumbling growl down in his chest.   His hair was tangled and tufted and soap-bubble-sheen over white, with some sort of ventilation-shaft lint or something stuck in it.  Xander clenched his fists to keep himself from reaching up and plucking the lint out.  *They need to clean the damn vents.  Fuck.  Ferro took my god-damn filters.*   There was a smudge of black on Spike's jaw and more fuzz on his trousers and boots and Xander knew it had pissed Spike off to deal with Outsiders in that state. 

"I told you to stay topside."

"Too fuckin' bad," Xander snapped - pushed Spike back hard.  Spike barely rocked on his feet.

"It was a fuckin' order!"  Spike's fist hit the lift wall right next to Xander's ear and Xander jerked - glared.  "I don't want any of you down there!"

"I don't want you down there!  Or that fucking dog!"  The doors slid open and Xander pushed past Spike - stomped to his chair and flung himself down, his hands shaking a little as he pulled the belts up over his shoulders.  Spike didn't come out of the lift for a minute and Xander busied himself scrolling through his screens - getting the headset on and listening to station chatter with half an ear.  Trying not to give in and turn around - trying not to look at Spike.  *Owe me an explanation, Spike.  Owe all of us.  A fucking deal with Rrahn?  What fucking deal?*   He heard Spike's boots on the deck - heard the chair sigh as Spike sat down.  Opposite him, Ferro lifted his head and looked back at Spike - glanced over at Xander and made a sort of 'What the fuck?' face.  Xander made a 'No fucking idea!' face back.  Ferro snorted softly and turned back to his boards.

Xander put his com on ship-wide so the Outsider down in the office could brace himself.  As much as he hated the thought of a dog as a passenger, he didn't want him splattering his brains on their decking.  "Undock in five, four, three, two, one - and - we're free.  Thank you, Fenris Station - we've got them on our screens." 

The Drusilla went momentarily weightless as they undocked.  One hard kick from the trim-jets to get them free of the clamp and then slow reorientation under the jets alone.  The giddy flyingfalling of it swamped Xander for a few seconds, like it always did.  He swallowed spit and soda-dregs and watched a Chaddock ship - the Tchis, according to station - undock right behind them, yellow oblong on their short-range radar.

"Got another ship," he murmured and Nia hissed an affirmative, intent on ship's controls.

"What's our heading, Cap'n?  Rennick?" Nia asked, and Xander finally looked over at Spike, who was looking at his boards with a murderous expression.

"No.  Something new," Spike said.  Xander watched him pull a slip of crumpled paper out of his pocket and tap a string of numbers into the computer.  They echoed to all the other boards and Xander stared down at them, biting his lip.

"I don't know this, Cap'n," Nia said finally and Xander looked over at Spike again - watched him run his hand back through his hair, habit he'd fallen into.  The ventilation lint drifted to the floor.

"It's an Outsider point."  Spike's voice was tense - his face expressionless.   "Just - get it in nav-comp, Nia, and tell station - get us our outbound track.  Ferro, get us set up for the skip.  I'll tell you what's going on during power-up." 

"Aye," Nia said, and sent the request after a split-second hesitation.

"Spike, what in the hell -"

"Just do it, Ferro!"   They waited tensely while station processed their new heading and assigned them a lane.  Spike stood abruptly - held grimly to the edge of his console for a moment as Nia swung the Dru on course, hard nudges with the trim-jets.  Aligning them to the lane that would keep them from colliding with other outgoing and incoming ships.  "I gotta get cleaned up," Spike muttered and stalked off the bridge into the lift.   The doors worked and then he was gone and Xander sat frozen for one long minute, until Nia sat back in her chair with a small sound of satisfaction.

"That it, Nia?"

"That's it.  You go on, then."  Nia looked over her shoulder at him, narrow pixie-face and corona of wispy honey-gold hair under-lit by her boards.  Wide, tilted eyes full of concern.

"Yeah, go.  I'll unlock the bath for the dog - see if he needs anything," Ferro said.   "From my station," he added, as Xander opened his mouth to say something.

"Fuck.  Okay."  Xander undid the safety belts and stood up - put his boards on stand-by.  "Where are we going anyway?"

"I'm not sure.  It's - two degrees off Midway and toward the zenith...  Outsider space for sure but -"  Nia shook her head.  "I just don't know."  Xander exchanged a glance with Ferro, feeling a twist of unease in his gut.   Nia always knew.  Fairies always did, it was part of their magic or...whatever.  Ferro jerked his head back in the direction of the lift and Xander nodded and went after Spike.

"That is going to be some fuckin' fireworks," Ferro said, watching Xander go into the lift and stab for the next level down, mouth set and grim.

"Cap'n is acting like an ass," Nia grumbled.  She stood up and stretched, five-foot nothing in a form-fitting coverall.  Body of a ten-year-old boy and bare feet and hands a little too long to be normal.  No wings, but her kind didn't need 'em.  They had their peculiar and very secret magic.  Or super-duper-tech brains, or something.  Ferro didn't know, and didn't care.  It all came down to the Dru flying as if she had the brain - never missing a mark, never losing a degree of course or a c of power.  

"Hey, Nia..."  Ferro put his boards on stand-by - joined Nia by the forward port, the only actual view the Dru had of space that wasn't from a camera.   Spike had put it in, saying something about listening to the stars.  Sometimes Spike was a little freaky.  "What'd you...?  I mean, do you really not know where we're goin'?"

Nia turned her gaze from the port - turned it up to Ferro and made a face, irritation and worry.   "I think I do.  I...feel like I should know.  Perhaps when we get there.  It is..."  Nia considered, looking out the port again - flicker of pale light over her face as the running lights of some tug or tender found her narrow cheekbones and thin, blue-lipped mouth.  "I think this is only a - way point.  I'll see better when we skip."

"Yeah."  Ferro ran his hands back over the half-inch mat of dense curls he'd cropped his hair to, rolling his shoulders and listening to the left one crackle.  Left-over from his Marine days when he'd popped it out of place twice in one month.   "Gonna get the dog settled, gonna get something goin' in the galley.  You wanna get the packs up here?"

"Sure.  I can do that," Nia murmured, distracted-sounding and walked aft, heading for the storage locker that was at the far back corner of the bridge.  It was filled with cases of vitamin-rich drinks laced with electrolytes and bars dense with fat and protein and carbs.  Solid hit of nutrients to combat the leeching effect of skip-space.   Pretty much all he and Nia had ever had to eat, when they'd been slaves on the ship.  Except the Chaddock pilot had bought the cheapest, that tasted like chalk and chemicals. 

Spike always sprang for the best - real chocolate and butter and nuts, real fruit.   Fuck, Spike bought 'em actual tree-grown, hand picked shit sometimes, if they were anywhere near a planet that had hydro-gardens.  Grapes like drops of purple-blue glass and apples pink-green-white that tasted like sex.  And actual slabs of blood-red animal meat, although Nia wouldn't touch that.  Ferro grinned to himself and moved back to his board - reached out and hit a couple of buttons and then opened a link to the office and the Outsider.  Camera-link, so he could be sure the dog wasn't up to tricks.   His loyalty to Spike didn't come from tree-grown oranges - it came from something much deeper, but the deal - the dogs - still had Ferro feeling a bit - twitchy.  *Better have a good deal for us, Spike, 'cause we were never gonna do business with Rrahn again.*

The Outsider seemed to be asleep, or just trancing.  Curled into the air-mattress they'd inflated, the safety webbing like a cobweb over him, secured to the various rings in the walls.  Every time he saw that room, it made Ferro smile 'cause Spike had staked the Chaddock Captain out in it and run his intestines through the rings like half-assed knitting until the fat toad bastard had given him what he wanted.   

*Dog needs a fucking collar and chain,* Ferro thought, and hit the audio.  "Hey - dog!  That access at the back is unlocked - bath in there if you get sick or need water.  Don't have any dog food on board so you'll have to go hungry for now.  Too bad your buddy didn't leave you anything."  The Outsider stirred - lifted his head, ears flaring wide and lips curling up a little, showing fangs.

"I have...sssufficient," it said, stumbling a little over the words.  A hand reached out and patted a medium-sized belt-pack that was tucked into the corner.

"Better not be anything illegal in there.  We'll put it out the air-lock and you with it.  We're on approach to skip out - 'bout half an hour and we'll do the count.  'Til then, stay quiet."  The Outsider nodded and lay back down and Ferro stabbed the 'off' button, frowning.  He'd kind of hoped for it to have started something so he could go down and shoot it.  *Be a total accident, too.*

"I'm done here - you done?" Nia asked, and Ferro glanced around at the skip-packs clipped into the webbing on the sides of the consoles - the four ruby-dark bags of blood for Spike. 

"Yeah - done.  Let's go see what's in the freezer.  Can't believe we didn't get to go shopping this trip!  Wanted some more of that cake, man."

"You and cake," Nia giggled.  Ferro headed for the lift and Nia jumped up on his back, thin arms curling around his shoulders.  "Piggy-ride!"

"I'm not a fuckin' pig, you gnome!"

"I'm not a gnome!"

"Smell like a gnome -"

The one advantage to the Dru being Chaddock-built was that Chaddock were big.  So individual quarters were much roomier than on a human-built ship, and the showers were twice the size, with multiple heads.  Chaddock liked water.  The hydro system on the ship was top-notch, too - hot water in an instant, and for as long as you cared to have it.  

At the moment though, Spike was oblivious to it all.  He stood in the pounding spray of six heads, eyes closed and fists on the wall - head down.  Furious and a little nervous, because Rrahn might be double-crossing him...and because he had to explain himself now to Xander and the rest.  He'd wanted to wait until their very healthy fee was banked and theirs before confessing his little...deal.  Now -

*Now I've gotta justify it to three people who're pissed off and scared.  Fucking dog - what in bloody hell is she playing at, changing the deal?  Have her guts for garters, if she tries anything more.*   There was a small noise behind him - slight waft of cooler air and Spike turned around, arms crossed over his chest.  Frowning at Xander, who was scowling back, shutting the shower cabinet door.

"Care to tell me what the fuck that was all about?"

"Xander -" Spike sighed, and Xander took a step and shoved - knocked Spike back and pinned him, blinking water from his eyes. 

"Don't, Spike.  Don't fucking go there!  I can't believe you made some kind of - of - secret deal with Rrahn!  Jesus!"

"Xander -"

"And, what - she's not keeping her end up?  She did some kind of fucked up double-cross or -"

"Xander!"   Spike changed when he yelled - half growled the name and Xander stopped short and stared at him.  "She's not double-crossing us, she's - it's bloody complicated!"

"Then use small words," Xander snapped.  But he was pressing the bar on the soap dispenser - moving gel-slick hands over Spike's shoulders and chest and Spike slumped back against the wall.

"Fuck, love - I'm sorry."

"Yeah, yeah, sorry," Xander muttered - pushed at Spike until he turned around.  Spike put his arm up on the wall of the cabinet and leaned his forehead on his wrist - sighed again when Xander's strong, warm fingers dug into his neck, easing tense muscles.  "You could've been shot, Spike."

"That wasn't Rrahn, that was Y'yis.  He's always got a digit in some pie or other, and Fat Jack's always selling."

"Rrahn took the m'ryi - was it her jyiiy's?"  Xander leaned into Spike hard, thumbs sinking in deep under his shoulder blades and Spike groaned aloud - pushed back and felt Xander's thigh brush his.

"No... long story, Xan, why don't we just - forget about all that for a minute."  Spike turned - pulled Xander close by one soapy arm, wrapping it around his own waist and pressing their bodies tight, ribs to knees.   "Hard evening, love."  Spike trailed a hand down Xander's back - let the other trace a random pattern over Xander's chest - over the three parallel scars there.

"Yeah.  And you made it a lot harder, showing up here with Outsiders on your tail."  Xander glared at him but his hips were doing a slow, subtle roll, pressing hardness to slippery hardness.  "You're trying to distract me with sex, Spike."

"Mmm.  Course I am, Xan.  You're so bloody hot - can't keep my hands off you."  Spike ducked his head a little, smiling up at Xander through water-heavy lashes - ventured in close for an open-mouthed kiss, his hand creeping from the small of Xander's back to his arse - squeezing the dense muscle there. 

Xander snorted softly - snaked his head to the side and nipped strongly at Spike's neck.  Spike jumped - and so did his hips.  "Yeah, right."  Xander let his tongue glide over the place he'd just bit - heaved a sigh of long-suffering that made Spike grin.   "I'm such a fuckin' slut."

"Thank Christ," Spike breathed as Xander slid down.

When they got down to the galley, Ferro was getting something - maybe lasagna - out of the cooker and Nia was making one of her nasty Fairy things in the blender.  Juice and weird powders and what Xander always said were beetle eyes.  Nia just grinned at him and made little cricket noises and Xander pretended to gag into his supper.

Tonight though, there was no teasing and no smiles.  Ferro looked up and scowled when they came in - Nia punched blender buttons a bit harder than necessary, and Spike mentally groaned.  *Ah, Jesus, nothing worse than a crew with the sulks.*

"Smells good," Xander said, getting plates out of the cabinet and Spike slumped down in his chair, watching Ferro dish up - yes, lasagna - for himself and Xander and Nia.  Watching him hesitate and then slop some onto a plate for Spike.  Xander got a panful of cheese-and-garlic toast out of the top part of the cooker and they all shuffled to their seats and ate in total silence for about one minute.

*C'mon and ask, for fuck's sake!  Just ask, I'll tell you...didn't mean to keep it a secret for this long...  Ask, ask...Ferro, c'mon -*

"Why're you dealing with Rrahn, Spike?"   Ferro, like Spike figured.   Spike ate a forkful of his lasagna and wiped his mouth - pushed his plate away and leaned his elbows up on the table.

"The fee'll keep us for a year, Ferro."

"She left that -   There's a dog on the ship, Spike."

"Yeah, I know." 

Ferro prodded at his food - picked up his toast and looked at it and put it back down.   "You know you can't trust her, Spike! I mean - Jesus Christ!  She's the reason we were all almost sold to the toads!"

Nia slurped her drink, looking narrow-eyed at him.  "I know.   I know, Ferro!   It's - she told me this m'ryi was gonna be - available.  Told me Y'yis was gonna be trying to collect it when he wasn't supposed to touch it."

"So it was a set-up to take Y'yis down," Xander said, and Spike sighed and leaned back in his chair.

"Yeah.  Y'yis and Fat Jack.  Rrahn took that m'ryi a year ago - took that jyiiy out.  Y'yis and his house were supposed to be allying with them but when they got the chance - they took it off Rrahn.  We stole it from them - Y'yis had Fat Jack put out a bounty - Rrahn got 'em all.  The toads are supposed to know better than to fence a m'ryi.

"Okay - okay, I - kinda get that.  I mean - Y'yis needs to be made into fuckin' giblets -"

"When did we steal it?" Xander asked, interrupting Ferro and scowling at Spike and Spike got up and got a beer from the cabinet - opened it and drank half in one gulp.

"When we boosted that shipment out of Farpoint.  Those - artifacts?  All that - was what was left of Han-y'ri jyiiy.  Y'yis had it re-routed - that's how Rrahn knew."

Ferro made a noise very much like a growl and Spike's demon hissed in approval.  "That bitch - we couldn’t fence half that stuff!  Jyiiy artifacts - no wonder nobody'd touch 'em!"

"Yeah - made her add a couple million to the fee for that."

"Right, okay - so - couple million?"  Spike nodded.  Ferro looked over at Nia, who shrugged.  "Fuck.  What the fuck do we do next?"  Ferro forked up the last of his lasagna - looked at Spike's mostly untouched plate and grabbed it.  Nia took a nibble of her own portion and looked thoughtful.

"I think we're gonna see a hole or two in the Outsider's ranks real soon," Spike said.   "I think Rrahn's trying to collect as many m'ryi as she can - I think she's making herself a fucking army."

"Army."  Ferro stabbed at his food - dropped his fork with a clatter and picked up his toast - shredded it as he sat there, his leg bouncing, bouncing, bouncing in the grip of nerves.  "So, what, she's plannin' on recruiting us?  Makin' us part of her little war?" 

"Not in this fucking lifetime," Xander muttered, and Spike privately agreed.  If one jyiiy - one House - took out another, all the ranking members were killed as well as any blood-kin, servants - hell, they killed the sodding pets.  What was left was folded into the victor's household, seamless and without debt.  The loser's name was struck from all records and all memory and the m'ryi - the history of a House - became the possession of the winner.   All the victories - all the triumphs - became the new House's history.   It was as if the defeated jyiiy had never existed.    Of course, eventually a jyiiy got too big and a branch would split off - a new house form.  Like cells dividing.  But the loyalty one might expect didn't last past the inception.  What Rrahn was doing was dangerous.  

"I dunno what she's doing for sure.  She's - planning something big.  And she's nervous.  And anything that makes an Outsider nervous...  I want a cushion.  I want - backup in case everything goes to shite and we're stuck out here with the kind of war that pushed these jyiiy into our space in the first place."

"Yeah, I get that," Ferro said quietly.  "Well fuck."  He picked up his glass - milk, it looked like - and drained it.  "I hope you've got some kind of plan, Spike.  For when Rrahn turns on us like a rabid fucking dog.  Or when her flunky down there does."

"She's too caught up all her fuckin' - drama," Spike said, waving his hand vaguely.  He felt in his pocket for his smokes - pulled one out and lit it and watched his crew.  Ferro was finishing off the last of his food with rapid jabs, acting as if the noodles, cheese and sauce had personally insulted him.  Nia was taking tiny bites, looking as if she wasn't enjoying it - too much salt for her, probably.  Washing it down with whatever she'd concocted in the blender and even from across the table it smelled foul to Spike.  Xander was eating in that head-down, elbows out way he'd acquired out at Whale Deep when his money was scarce and protection scarcer and Spike nudged him under the table - watched him look around and straighten up and slow down a little.

"I can probably get us out of this.  Rrahn wants us to do another job for her - maybe more, but - I can get us out.  If that's what we decide."  He looked at his crew, who were looking at each other, silent communication.  *Good crew.  Best fucking crew there is and Rrahn be damned if she thinks I'm going to risk them for some half-cocked scheme...  Don't care how good the money is.  But oh...fuck - money is so good -*   Something - some current - seemed to go through them all and Nia shrugged again - got up to rinse the dregs of her Fairy-drink out of her cup.  Ferro grabbed her plate, too, and Xander got up to scoop another big spoonful out of the pan. 

"So - you think she's gonna want us to get another m'ryi?  Are we gonna be part of taking out a House?"  Xander didn't look at Spike - concentrated on getting another piece of toast.  Surreptitiously rubbed the back of his hand over his chest.   Spike pushed away from the table and crossed to him - wrapped his arms around Xander's biceps and chest from behind, hugging him close.

"I dunno, love.  Won't let you get hurt, no matter what.  Promise."

"Yeah."  Xander turned his head a little, looking at Spike, and Spike had to kiss the curve where jaw met skull.  Mouthed the warm skin gently for just a moment.  "I'm in, then."

"I'm almost in.  What's the fee, and what's my cut?"  Ferro brought over the scraped-clean plates from the table and dumped them in the washer - turned on the faucet and got some soap on his hands.

"Fee's - six hundred million.  Your cut's one quarter, just like always."  Spike felt Xander go stiff with shock in his arms - watched Nia turn slowly to look at Ferro and watched Ferro soap his hands over and over, staring at him.

"W-well - okay, then.  I'm in.  We're in."

"Good gods yes," Nia muttered, and Spike felt that little coil of tension - that had rode tight and aching in his belly for the last hour - finally unwind.

"This ship and this crew take priority - first sign of it all going south, we're out, right?"

"Right," Xander said, and Spike let him loose - watched him go back over to the table and sit down, plate and fork in hand.  "We can get a whole new OS for Dru.  Computer like that one we saw on Dur'rhii -"

"Get rid of that damn pulse-gun before it blows us all to bits - get something with more kick to it - less plasma-bleed."  Ferro practically bounced to the table, flopping down next to Xander to talk upgrades.  Nia put her cup in the washer and then leaned on the sink, looking at Spike.

"You really good with this?" Spike asked, and Nia held out her hand.  Spike sighed and held out his own, letting Nia take his and hold it for a moment between her palms.  Heat - stillness - the scent of beebalm and new-cut grass and Nia was blinking - looking at him with a strange expression. 

"Oh, I'm fine.  It'll - work.  Somebody to see you, though."

"See me?"

"Somebody...old."  Nia shrugged - grinned up at him and let his hand slip away.  Spike shivered.  "I'm going to check our position - thirteen minutes until we skip out."

"Yeah, okay," Spike said, and watched her walk away.  The heat - lingered.

The Drusilla skipped out, leaving a vague shimmer and a sudden emptiness on any nearby radar.  Inside, her crew lay in tilted chairs, securely belted in.  Dreaming.  Skip-dreams, that took you backward and forward and downward and upward and sideward, maybe.  Xander - dreamed.

"Holy mother of moley, this ship is..."

"Piece of junk," the vamp says, and Xander shakes his head.

"Nah - not junk, just - Christ.  Took some hard hits."  Xander ducks under the skip-field array, his fingers gliding lightly on scorched and dented metal.  Fingering actual holes, although only one had punched through the triple layer of steel and plex and fire-tempered porcelain.   Whale Deep is the only shipyard in the 'verse that can dry-dock, up to a point.  The S-class Chaddock ship - shaped like a spindle with the bubble of the bridge forward and the inverted parasol of the array aft - fits with about ten meters to spare, cradled in a suspension harness because this kind of ship - scout, infiltrator, assassin - was never meant to land anywhere.  Xander marks points of repair on his slate - stands for a long, long minute under the port hatch, where the ship's name and code is painted.  The Drusilla...and he shivers.

A hand grabs the back of his neck - the chain and tag he wears, twisting it so he has to cough. 

"Not getting' paid to stand and stare, Harris.  Get your ass in gear."

"Yeah, I'm doin' it," Xander mutters and the vamp stalks away.  Xander rubs his neck, fighting the urge to slip the piece of whittled press-wood out of his pocket and stake the bastard.  But - he can't.  Indentured - in debt - fucked.  And he has work to do.

"You the guy gonna fix her up?"  New voice - different voice - and Xander looks over and then up, seeing a tall black man standing by the door.  Left leg in an inflated cast - body held stiff, bandages showing at his collar.  Finger-long dreads hanging down and scars on his cheeks - raised tribal markings that look old and well-worn.  Handsome man with a gun and a knife and a Chaddock stinger at hip and waist and thigh - man with a scowl on his face and Xander's fingers clutch the slate a little tighter.

"Yeah, I - uh - I'm your guy.  Don't worry, I'll - she'll be good as new."

"Better be, or I'll...  Bloody hell.   Harris?"  And that's when Xander discovers that the Drusilla is Spike's ship.  William the Bloody, Captain, and it's been 51 years since Spike died on the Hellmouth and Xander watched Buffy grieve him.  And get over him.

"Yeah.  Me.  You - you're dead, Spike."

"I get that a lot," Spike says, and then he's walking forward and pounding Xander on the back, grinning, and the scary man with the scars is laughing and Xander feels...at home. 

On the bridge Xander's eyes move, back and forth, back and forth as the Dru skips, light-years unraveling ahead and behind - the fabric of time and the ship and the crew skeining through space.  And the dream shifts - flows - becomes something else.

"Xander!  Xander, answer me!  Bloody dogs said he was this way -"   Spike's voice - Nia's  - calling him and Xander twists in the rubble and stiffening bodies of the dead.  He's bleeding - he can feel it, cold in the air from a ventilation fan - but he's numb and he doesn't know where he's bleeding from and he's - scared.  

They'd been asked to ferry in an Outside matriarch to Llact, a joint Chaddock-Outsider station.   Some sort of negotiations - some new trade route or a change of CEO's - it was hard to say, with the dogs.   What they'd actually skipped into was two jyiiy destroying a third, down to the last new-born pup and little, jeweled lizards in gold-wire cages.   An entire level of the station gutted - the patriarch and all the blood-kin dying slow deaths.  Their passenger had wanted a tour - Xander had lasted five minutes and then couldn't go on.   Lagging behind the rest, he'd taken a cat-sized Outsider pup into his arms.  It was blood-covered, keening - torn and pitiful.  Trying to save it was taboo.   One of the Outsider's who'd been on the attacking side had simply turned and slashed him across the chest, claws digging deep. Leaving him there among the corpses.

"Sss..."  He can't even talk - can't move - and the little Outsider pup cries and cries and cries until he wants to scream...but Spike is there, Nia is, and he's crying, he can feel it.  Crying and trying to hold onto Spike and the pup is crying and then there's a crunch and it's not, and Spike's face is grim. 

"Get a damn EM unit down here," Spike snarls, and Xander's hand clutches weakly at Spike's.  They're both slippery with blood and Xander's fingers slide off.

"This terminal's fucked.  Just a moment -" Nia says.  Her long fingers weave wires together and suddenly power surges along blackened strands and she's talking to the station - talking to Ferro and Spike is holding him tight, tight.

"Fairy magic," Xander says, voice tight with pain.  "I don't like this dream."  His chest is burning - his lungs feel full of water and his heart is beating so, so slow.

"Dream something else," Nia says, and Xander turns - fish in a fluorescent sea - and dives into some other where.

The Dru shimmered into real-space like a faulty hologram - shiver-flicker-flash and then she was there, the skip array throwing off the last of the energy like a swarm of pale bees.  In his chair Ferro stirred - pushed himself upright and groaned softly.  Opposite him he could see Xander doing the same and behind them both was Spike, swearing softly.  Nia already had her chair upright - had a pouch of drink open and in her hand.  Her other hand was skimming over her boards and Ferro groped for the chair control - winced as he was powered upward and his innards all settled decidedly down.  

Leaving skip-space was like the morning after a really good wake.  Ferro felt along the edge of his console and found a drink-pouch - pulled the straw out - hard little pop that broke the seal - and drank.  Not too fast, or it would come right back up.  He felt - desiccated.   Xander looked like shit - hollow cheeks and sunken eyes, skin tinged with a sort of greyish green.  *Long fuckin' skip, Christ, that was...too fuckin' long...need to eat...* 

Ferro took a last suck of the drink and shoved the empty pouch back into the webbing - fumbled for a bar and tore at the wrapping.  He could hear Spike moving and he twisted slowly around.  "Jesus fucking hell, Spike, you look -"

"Look like Nosferatu," Xander mumbled, and Spike scowled, death's-head with dandelion hair.

"Ah, man, don't do that!  That's even worse!"  Ferro took a bite of food - chewed with a jaw that felt like it had rusted shut.

"Nia, how long -?" Spike grated, sinking his fangs into a bag of blood.  Ferro shivered and looked away.  The vamp-face was even worse, thin as Spike was.

"It's....  Ship says - almost four months."  Nia slurped the last of her drink and shoved the trash away - swung her chair around, unbuckling.  She'd been awake - aware - probably a good fifteen minutes or more than they had.  Fairies recovered faster from a skip - didn't lose so much to the down-time.  "There's a marker out there, and what might be Rrahn's ship - I can't tell, we're too far out."  She stood up - grabbed at her seat-back for a moment and then walked mostly-steadily off the bridge and toward the head.   "Right back," she muttered and Ferro suddenly had to get up, too.  Xander was unbuckling and Ferro yanked at the belts, the last one catching.

"Dibs, man, dibs -" he said, and the buckle and tongue parted with a grinding noise.

"Damnit, Ferro -"   Xander wobbled to his feet and then put his hand to his mouth, looking more green than grey.

"Oh, fuck - yeah, okay, you next," Ferro said, grabbing another drink and opening it.  Pissing could wait - he was not gonna suffer through Xander losing his lunch on the bridge.

"Gonna get air-sick bags, swear to fucking god," Spike muttered, licking a smear of blood off his lip - reverting to his human face and looking a little better already.

"It's the damn - drink," Xander muttered, groping for another one.  "Can't stand that fucking orange."

"Sorry," Nia said, staggering past him and falling into her seat.  Her wispy shock of hair was dark gold, slicked back with a handful of water and a few trickles ran down her cheeks.  "Thought I gave you the cherry."

"Gave me both," Xander said, and lurched off the bridge.  Ferro concentrated on his boards, making sure all systems were up and running.  There was a warning on one ventilator shaft and he winced.   *Fuck - wonder if this is where we're gonna be or - are we skipping again?  Probably have time to fix that...*   Spike slurped his blood and Nia made a disgusted noise and Spike laughed, tired-sounding.  But it was laughter and Ferro felt his stomach unknot just a bit.  Back to a little bit of normal.

"Guess I should'a let you do those filters after all," he said, when Xander came back to his chair.  "Got a warning on number five."

"See?  See?  'Get a bandage, Xander!  Spike'll be mad, Xander!'"  Xander dropped into his chair and groaned and Spike stirred, making a questioning sort of noise.

"Why'd you need a bandage?"

"Just cut my hand.  He didn't even notice!  Ferro stole my filters and now we're all gonna get particulate pneumonia and die 'cause a little blood makes him squeamish."

"It does not!"

"Children, hush," Nia said, and they all looked at her.  She was staring at her boards with a sort of sick look and Ferro felt the drink in his belly curdle.  

"Report, Nia," Spike snapped, and Nia did something on her keyboard that made a screen on Ferro's boards go live.  Echoed to all the boards and Ferro heard Xander take a hard breath - heard Spike start to swear, low and angry and not English.

*We are so, so fucked.*   Ferro stared at the screen - at the haze of blue-green oblongs and dots that surrounded a central, dark mass.  The skip-point and all around were ships - maybe hundreds.  And all Outsiders.

"Ferro - get going if you're gonna go.  Things are gonna get rough," Spike said, and Ferro had to agree.

The closer they got to the mass of ships, the more - daunting it was.  *Right.  Daunting.  Not flat-out fucking terrifying.  Which it is.  Daunting.*   Spike sat in his chair, watching his crew do the little things you had to do, coming out of skip-space.  Eat, use the head - take lightning-fast showers and get into clean clothes, because all that dead skin that built up started to itch.  Spike didn't have that problem but he wasn't going to do any potential meetings - or potential fights - in the washed-soft fatigues and raveling sweater he'd put on for the ride.

*Need to look like a bloody pirate captain.*   "Arrrgh," he muttered to himself and Xander - coming back from getting a 'real' drink - stopped and looked at him.

"Gonna go get your eye patch and parrot?" Xander said, and Spike grinned at him.

"And my fucking cutlass and pistols.  Bastards aren't gonna board, that much I can guarantee you."

"Aye, aye, Cap'n."  Xander grinned back, making a sloppy salute with his left hand, since he had a soda in his right.    He looked down at his own jump-gear, which was basically sweats and a t-shirt topped by a very old, carefully preserved flannel shirt.  Some things never changed.  "Guess I'd better go put on some battle gear, too."

"Might be a good idea.  Nobody's gonna be intimidated by that juice stain."

"That's grease.  And I thought I got that out."  Xander wandered off, muttering, plucking at the weird-colored stain on his shirt.

Spike watched him go - raised an eyebrow at Ferro who was coming back to his boards, showered and in his own version of 'battle gear'.    Surplus Marine fatigues - the grey-black-white of 'urban' camouflage - and black-market battle armor that was supposed to be for Outsiders only.   It was oddly insectoid for a mammalian species and Spike had always found it a bit - weird.  But it was rated for the kind of weapons an Outsider ship might hold for its crew and that was all that mattered.  Ferro had his Marine jump-boots on, too - glassine and some sort of epoxy in layers, with steel toes and soles.  Tougher than Spike's old tanker boots but not, in his opinion, as aesthetic. 

"So, anything?" Ferro asked, settling into his chair and snapping on the belts - cycling through his screens with a flurry of key-strokes.

"Just an approach-vector, like we're at some bloody station.  Saw a few other ships out there.  Couple Chaddock and at least one Earth ship.  Nobody's talking, though."

"Huh."  Ferro checked his boards again - looked at the warning that always came up when the ship's gun was charged.  A leak, somewhere - nothing bad yet.  But the little warning was always there. 

Spike watched Nia doing something at her boards - logging every move of every particle out there, probably.  Watching that mass of ships with more than just the Dru's sensors.     She sensed his gaze - she pretty much always did - and glanced back over her shoulder, shaking her head.  Nothing new.  Spike sighed and shifted a little - reached for his own boards and brought up the camera and com in the office.  Time to check on the passenger.

"H'ru.  This is the captain.  You alive?"   The camera showed the air mattress with the safety webbing unhooked and draped aside.   A little pile of trash - some sort of post-skip food wrappers - was in the middle of the mattress.  The Outsider was just emerging from the little cabinet of a bathroom, water darkening his dun-colored fur and glittering on his shoulders. 

"I am - a-live."  H'ru didn't seem to have much in the way of English - or anything much to say either, and Spike's finger hovered over the cut-off.

"We're coming up on a bunch of ships - Outsider ships.  Have you back to the doghouse in no time, I'm sure."

"What do 'oo mean, 'dog'ouse'?"

"Never mind.  Just - straighten up down there, I don't want a mess."

"Yess," H'ru said, and Spike cut off the com - leaned back in his seat.  It annoyed him to have that dog aboard.  Rrahn's dog.   He wanted it off his ship, and the sooner the better.

"Guess the dog made it," Ferro muttered, and Spike sighed.

"Yeah.  Course he bloody did.  Damn dogs."  Spike stood up and stretched, popping every vertebra in his back.  "I'm gonna go suit up.  You okay?"

"Yeah, I got it," Ferro said and Spike nodded and walked aft, tapping the lift button.    Riding it down, walking out and walking down the hall, hearing music that gradually became clearer as he got closer to their quarters.  Xander was there in the shower, singing along to something - bouncy. 

*Jesus.  Thought I'd gotten rid of that particular disc...*   It was old stuff - Earth stuff - and it made Spike smile even though the music itself was far, far too peppy for his tastes.  It was the soundtrack of freedom, after all - Xander's freedom.

'No dangerous animals can play in my yard...No giant monsters can climb this tree...I should have known that a person like you...Could never be the person I need...No dangerous animals can play in my yard...'

Xander is lying on his back on the Whale Deep equivalent of a creeper, only instead of wheels to slide him under a vehicle it has a little suspension module that is currently floating him up under part of the skip-array.   Xander has dark goggles on and a welding torch is spitting sparks over him as he seals a patch onto the Dru's flank.  His dark hair is held back in a worn bandanna and the dull-brown coveralls he has on are unzipped and pulled down, the arms tied around his waist.  Spike pauses for a moment to admire the view - grimaces at the loud, tinny music that's piping from a player duct-taped to the floater.

'No poisonous snakes can swim in my tub...Only friendly dinosaurs can read my books...I should have guessed that a woman like you...Would be impressed with a guy like that...No dangerous animals can play in my yard...'

"What in bloody hell is that noise?" Spike shouts and Xander yelps and almost drops the welder - flails behind his head and smacks the 'off' button on the player.  He hauls the goggles up off his face, his wide, dark eyes glaring at Spike.

"Jesus, Spike!  Scare the fuck out of a guy - I could've set myself on fire!"

"Shouldn't be in here deaf like that, anyway - s'dangerous," Spike says - walks over to the floater and pulls it down to eye-level.  Xander is slick with sweat and smells of grease and metal - of burning and rock-sugar candy and Spike wonders if he just kissed him, if he'd get a welder in the face.  He has no idea where the sudden heat - the sudden want - comes from, but in his nearly quarter-century in space - and almost two hundred years of living - Spike's learned to just go with his instincts.

"It's not dangerous," Xander says, but his voice is a little breathless and instead of recoiling he leans up on his elbow, putting himself marginally closer to Spike.  There's a smudge of grease on his cheek and nose - another on his chest near his nipple and Spike's eyes track to it.  That's when he sees the chain and tag around Xander's neck.  Like a dog-tag but...different.  Indentured servant tag, which puts him about a notch lower than the dog and Spike suddenly has a very bad feeling.

"So - she 'bout ready to fly?"

"Um - huh?  Oh, yeah.  She is.  Damn, Spike -"   Xander grins up at the arching, dull-pewter mass of the Dru above him - at the span of the skip-array that looks like crystal and bone and cobwebs, even powered down and cold.  "She's a fucking beautiful ship."

"That she is," Spike says - reaches out and caresses the cold curve of his lady-love.  So many similarities between his new Dru and the old.  He likes to think of her between the stars, bathed in their light with no atmosphere or static to come between them.  His hand drifts down and lands on Xander's ankle, feeling heat through the cheap shank of the boots he's wearing and Xander grins.  Spike's pretty sure that fifty years have taught Xander to follow his instincts, too.

"You know, my bunk's right over there," Xander says.   It's like a bucket of icy water.

"He makes you sleep here?" Spike growls, and Xander loses his grin - loses the easy posture and hunches - jerks his foot away and sits up, not looking at Spike.

"It's cheaper than any of the places around.  He only charges -"

"Charges?!"

"It's in the rules, Spike!  He can - can charge for whatever he wants to charge for."

"Bloody hell - how in fuck did you get into this mess, Xander?"  Spike reaches out and plucks the tag up, holding it.  Oblong of steel with Xander's name and ident number - his debt and his...owner.  All there for anybody to look at, any time they want.  "How'd this happen?"

"It's none of your business," Xander mumbles.  He twitches away - slaps at the floater's controls and sends it up, high on the side of the Dru.  He sparks the welder to life and settles his goggles - flicks on the player, good and loud. 

'I know I'm going to the place I like best...The place I know most...Where there are people who know me, people I know...And people who care about the one I care...'

Spike watches him, unaware that he's growling - that his demon is to the fore, glaring with golden eyes.

"This is not fucking acceptable," Spike shouts, and watches Xander start to weld a new patch, mouth set grimly - ignoring him.

Three days later the Dru is spaceworthy again and Spike comes in to pay his bill.  He brings along Ferro and a clerk from station control.  There's an accusation about the bill being padded - there are words, shouts and a fight, and then Desmond - Xander's debt-holder - is dust on the dry-dock floor and Spike's signing papers.  Putting his bloody thumb-print on a sheaf of legal documents that says he owns this dry-dock now.  Owns everything in it and Xander too.  Before midnight they've found a renter and they're gone, skipping out to Fenris and Xander's settling himself into his quarters.  It takes them five months - real-time months - to get back to that moment in the dock, when Spike was drowning in Xander's heat and Xander wanted Spike in his bunk.  Spike's happy to wait.

Spike slipped into their quarters and stripped out of his skip clothes, shoving them into the laundry.  Steam and music and Xander's voice - a little hoarse and a little off-key - wafted out of the bath.

'Bakelite, satellite, say goodnight...Cosmonaut, astronaut, honey well all right...All the stars that we could see...In the kissing galaxy...Just might be on your color TV...  Rocket fuel, after school...Zoom, Zoom...Telescope, wish and hope...Now give us room...  K-I-S-S-I-N-G in the back of a big black Mercury -'

"Swear I'm gonna space that damn disc," Spike said, slipping into the cabinet and Xander yelped, jerking around and getting foam in his eyes from the shampoo horns that were sticking up all over his head.

"Spike!"

"S'dangerous to be deaf like that," Spike said, wiping shampoo off Xander's mouth and kissing him.

"Not supposed to be in danger here - ow - fuck -"   Xander stuck his head under the spray, rinsing off soap and Spike pushed the water-black, shoulder-length hair out of Xander's face - kissed him again and got a spluttery kiss in return.  "Anything new?"

"Nah.  Nia's all eyes and ears but they're just...sitting out there."  Spike made himself comfortable, leaning into Xander and Xander slung an arm around Spike's waist, blinking.   "Couple other ships coming in - looks like we're about the last."

"Huh."  Xander rubbed his eyes - watched Spike get a palmful of soap and start to soap himself up.  "The dog make it all right?"

"Right as rain."

"What doest that mean?  I mean - does that mean rain is the 'right' way for weather to be and not-rain is wrong?  Or does it mean -"

"Means he lived, you git."    Xander put his hands on the wall on either side of Spike and leaned in close - dropped a fast kiss on Spike's mouth and pushed away.

"Think there's time for me to replace that filter?"

"I - dunno.  Just leave it.  I don't you want you in there with a bunch of tools if we have to move."

"Okay then.  But just remember one thing."   Xander ducked out of the cabinet and got under the dryer, rubbing lotion into his skin as the warm, forced air blew his hair around his face.

"What's that?"

"If we get pneumonia and die it's all Ferro's fault." 

Spike rolled his eyes - shook water out of his hair like a dog and palmed the switch, shutting the water off.  "If you all get pneumonia and die, I'll be sure to do something nasty to Ferro's corpse, okay?"

"Sounds good."  Xander finger-combed his hair, grinning cheerfully, and looked at himself in the mirror.  "Okay then.  Battle gear. Do you think the 'U2 - Last Legs' tour shirt or 'Demons do it in the dark'?"

"How 'bout that retro-Hawaiian thing Ferro got you for your birthday last year?    They'll be dazed and confused and we can steal all their spoons."

"I don't think Outsides have spoons, Spike." 

Spike stared at Xander's 'I'm so serious it hurts' expression.  "And I don't think U2's gonna make 'em run for cover.  Unless you're gonna stay on board I think you might wanna go for the very expensive body armor I got you."

"Nothin' says 'Happy Birthday, I love you,' like body armor," Xander muttered, walking out into the main room and leaving the dryer on for Spike.

"Better than a sucking chest wound!" Spike yelled after him.

"That's supposed to be 'better than a sharp stick in the eye!" Xander yelled back, and Spike kicked the heat on the dryer up, grinning.

"Cap'n, the Rumplestiltskin is hailing us."

"The - what?"  Spike stopped moving, the whiskey bottle halfway to his lips.  Beside him, Xander choked slightly on his mouthful of tomato soup and Spike patted his back absently.

"Rumplestiltskin.  It's a tug.  Sort of.  It's going to help us dock."

"Dock at what?  Nia -"

"There's a sort of - living space out here, Cap'n.  Five or six transports from the war years, looks like they've got 'em all - welded together.  Enough mass to make a skip point."

Xander tossed his spoon in the washer and tipped his bowl up, drinking fast, and Spike did the same, gulping three big mouthfuls of good Irish whiskey.  He capped the bottle and put it away - strode toward the galley door and the lift while Xander shoved the bowl after the spoon and did a fast check of the counters, making sure nothing was lying loose.

"Why the fuck," Spike said, holding the lift door for Xander, "are we docking at anything?"

"Let me put them through, Cap'n?  Their captain's getting a little...impatient."

"Yeah, put 'em through.  Xander - move it!"

"Coming, coming -"   Xander darted through the doors with a capped mug and an apple.  "They say eating an apple is just like brushing your teeth."

"If your toothbrush leaves bits of red skin behind."  The com popped softly and Xander subsided. 

"Drusilla?  This is the Rumplestiltskin - Captain Havisham."

"This is Spike - what's the situation, Captain?  We're docking?"

"You are.  But the docking facilities are - primitive.  We're going to have to guide you in.  It's a flex-tube and universal lock."

"For fuck's sake."  The lift stopped and Spike and Xander got out, heading for the bridge, Xander cursing softly under his breath.  Universal docking locks were for emergencies - something a rescue ship could, in theory, use on any ship to get endangered crew or passengers off.  In practice they were finicky and difficult to use and more often than not breached halfway through the procedure.  It was going to be suits and extreme caution on this one.  Ferro glanced up as they sat down, scowling, and Spike raised his hands in a 'what can I do?' gesture.  Ferro snorted and shook his head.

"Your pilot's got the course that'll bring you through to us - once we're in range we'll guide you in.  We advise pressure-suits, Drusilla."

"Bloody hell, so do we!  All right, Captain - ETA is -"   Nia held up four fingers.  "- four minutes.  Don't scratch the chrome."

"The - chrome?  Uh - sure.  Four minutes, Drusilla.  Out."   The Rumplestiltskin went offline and Spike slumped back in his chair.

"Bet you the whole fuckin' crew's younger than I was when I died," Spike muttered.  "Ferro, better get below and prep three suits."

"Aye, Cap'n," Ferro said, unclipping and getting up, heading below fast.  Four minutes wasn't much time. 

"Has Rrahn hailed us, Nia?"

"The Gur'y'a says Rrahn is in conference and will meet us on the - thing.  And that we're to bring H'ru with us."

"Wonder if he has a suit in that little pack of his?" Xander said.  "Spike -