druffine | 3 Inches

Hey everybody!
Here is a new part of 3 Inches. I try to update again tomorrow but I am not sure if I will manage to. If you don't see an update tomorrow, I promise it will come on Wednesday. Hugs to everybody and thanks for all the wonderful comments.

button by

vampirellabites
*hugs and cuddles you*

beta'ed by

joolzmp7 and

mygothangel
thanks to both of you, hugs!

previous parts

Part 11

Xander, Tara and Willow hide in the shadows of the small alley. The boy balances the 3-Inch-vampire on his hand so Spike can watch them all and participate in the conversation. To any passer-by it may look as if Xander sells drugs to some innocent girls, but they’re in Sunnydale – nobody cares what happens in the shadows.

“I…, we want to say, we’re sorry for what happened to you, Spike.” Tara tells the vampire directly. Finally, someone who doesn’t ignore him.
“’s not your fault, Glinda.” Willow tries to make herself even smaller.
“We want to help you.” Tara goes on, without reaction to Spike’s comment.
“Really? Help me, fix this?” Spike asks sceptically. It’s not easy to accept help from the person that actually got you in trouble.
“Yes, yes, Spike. It’s not right you’re like this and maybe we can undo it again and…” Willow babbles. She is near tears.
“Well, Red, it’s gotta be the least you can do, hasn’t it?”
“Spike, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to… I mean I only wanted to save you. I did not want to do this to you, but at least I saved you… somehow.”
“At least you’ve stopped bloody lying, witch.” Spike spits, without accepting her apology.

While Spike and Willow talk, Xander watches Tara closely. She doesn’t seem surprised at all that Willow did change Spike’s size. Xander wanders if Willow told her or if Tara figured it out by herself. Does shy, nice Tara tolerate a blatantly lying girlfriend?
“Willow and I are going to do some research and find out how to undo this spell. Since it’s done out of good thought, we should be able to find a solution quickly.” Tara, unusually, takes the leading part in the conversation. “Please come by our dorm room tomorrow after sunset. Maybe we’ll have some results by then. At least, we’ll have a lot of guilt-cookies, won’t we, Willow?” Tara finishes boldly and Willow takes in an appalled breath. Xander adores Tara’s courage; maybe they all underestimate the silent witch.
“Thank you, Glinda.” Spike says smiling in relief that someone is going to help him.
“Yeah, thank you, Tara. Good night you two. We’ll see each other tomorrow.” With that, Xander and Spike are on their way home. The witches disappear back into the Magic Box.

Xander and Spike’s walk back to the new apartment passes almost in a comfortable silence – well, it would if Xander didn’t chuckle to himself a few times until Spike couldn’t take it anymore.
“What’s so damn funny, git?”
Still laughing slightly, Xander answers: “Nothing.”
“Yeah, sure. For nothing, you’re giggling far too much!”
“I am not giggling! Girls giggle, I don’t giggle.” Xander bursts out between fits of laughter.
“Come on, just tell. Make fun of good old Spike.”
“I’m not making fun of you.” Xander says honestly, even if it’s hard to believe with that fat grin on his face. Spike raises an annoyed eyebrow. “It’s just; I never thought I’d ever carry you home!”
“So you imagined me carrying you home?” Spike turns Xander’s words around.
“Yes, I mean, no. Why should I. Well, maybe, it could be..., should I ever be injured in a fight on patrol and should I be in such a bad condition that I can’t walk on my own, maybe you…” Xander drifts off, face bright red and laughter swapped with embarrasement.
“You’ve got some fantasies in that head of yours!” Spike snickers, trying to play it down, even if there is some hope building in the possibility that Xander might be interested in him as a bit more than friends.
“It’s not a fantasy. Not that kind of fantasy. Nothing in a dreamy way of fantasy kind of thing!” Xander tries to explain helplessly. “Just thought that maybe some night, some fight, I might not be able to walk home on my own and who’d help me then. I just couldn’t imagine Buffy carrying me. Or Willow. Or Giles. So that left you.”
“Yeah, sure.” Spike shrugs, not quite believing Xander’s babbled explanation. Silence stretches out and Spike wonders how little trust Xander has in his so called friends and father figure.

“So, would you?”
“Would I what?”
“Carry me home? If I was injured or passed out?”
Spike takes a moment to think about that. He feels that Xander needs a no-nonsense answer to that question. It’s one of those moments that define a relationship.
“Guess so.” Spike finally says and means it. He always was too loyal, even to people who never deserved his loyalty.
Xander lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. “That’s good. Good to know.”

The rest of the way home passes in the same comfortable silence in which it began. The whelp’s warm hand feels good around Spike. The slow pace and the rhythmical swing of Xander’s body are calming the vampire down in a way he can’t remember feeling before. He can’t remember having felt this safe before.

They arrive at the apartment shortly after 9 pm. Even if it’s still early in Scoobie time, Xander claims to be very tired. After some face stuffing at the fridge and some blood letting for Spike, Xander sets Spike down inside the doll house. The youth steps out of most of his clothes, then gets into bed. Spike shrugs out of the duster and shirt and pulls off his boots. He’s restless and misses the warmth Xander’s hand had provided him shortly before.

Finally, he decides to be bold.
“Xander?”
“Wow – was that my name you said?”
“Git!”
“Guess you want something?”
“Yes.”
“So?” Xander sits up in the bed to have a better view of the little, only half unclothed vampire.
“I just - it’s silly – to hell – what’s sillier than a shrunken vampire in a doll house?”
“A shrunken vampire in yellow…”
“Shut up, git! Can I sleep there?”
“Where?” Xander looks around himself, searching for the place Spike refers to. “Here?” He gestures to the bed, stunned.
“Yes. I mean, on your hand?”
“You want to sleep on my hand?”
“It’s warm. Electric blanket, remember?”
“But, but – it’s dangerous!”
Spike looks at Xander uncomprehendingly. “Dangerous? Dangerous how?”
“I could, I mean, I could – don’t get angry – squash you!”
Spike thinks for a second. “You wouldn’t.”
“You can’t know that! Once I had this dream where I fell off a building and I needed to hold on with all my strength to not fall off and I’d squash you if the dream repeats itself and…”
“You won’t have that dream again. Not tonight at least. You won’t squash me.” Spike answers, his voice reassuring and full of patience. He wants to sleep warm!
“How can you be so sure?”
“I just am. Now let me – take me over there.” Spike smiles over the perfect double meaning of the sentence and hates being small with renewed energy.
“Okay, I’ll do it – at your own risk! It’s your life, unlife you’re putting into my hand – and wow, that’s some trust you have in me!” Xander finishes and stares in wonder at Spike. “You trust me!”

Spike rolls his eyes. “Get over it. It’s not as if I have a choice.”
“But you do have a choice. You could stay in the house.” Xander doesn’t let it drop so easily and Spike grits his teeth. He hates to be seen through so easily. Xander is stunned. The fact that Spike, of all people – hated enemy and long-time idol – does trust him is just too cool.
“Can I go to bed, I mean to hand now?”
“Sure, just…”
“What now?” Spike asks, annoyed.
“Just, say it.”
“What?”
“That you trust me. I want to hear it.”
“No.”
“Please.”
“No.”
“Puppy-eyes-please?” Xander says and makes the puppy eyes at Spike who melts inwardly.
“Damn you, Harris. Yeah, I do trust you, Xander!” Spike says through gritted teeth.
Xander watches the vampire for a moment intently, then with his most earnest voice he says: “I feel honoured, Spike.”
“Bloody hell, boy!” Spike explodes, unable to handle this situation. Xander pulls back abruptly and turns his eyes down. His fingers play with the blanket unsteadily.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to…”
“Xander, look at me. I was just surprised, okay?” Spike says, calmingly. The big brown almost-manga eyes of the boy look back at the vampire. “It’s just – nobody ever trusted me or said he trusted me.”

If there ever is a moment where the Powers That Be should revoke spells spontaneously – this would be the moment. Spike begs them, from all his heart and non-existent soul, but it doesn’t change anything. He so wants to pull the boy into his arms and make the hurt and doubts go away, but at his size it’s absolutely impossible to do that. All that is left to Spike are words: “Xander, I wasn’t mocking you. I was really surprised. You did so much, you still do so much for me. Without you I’d be in real trouble, if not already dust. I thank you for all that and I trust you with my unlife. I didn’t know it means so much to you.”

Spike pauses and thinks for a moment about people he trusted before. He trusted Cecily not to laugh and she did. He trusted Dru to show him another life and she killed him. He trusted Angelus to care for him and he left. He trusted Dru to be his forever and she disappeared. There was not one person, that didn’t disappoint him. “There is no one else on this planet I trust but you, Xander.” Spike says sincerely, more to himself than to the whelp.

Without another word, Xander holds out his hand to the vampire whose shoulders are hunched, hands put deeply into the pockets of his jeans. “Thank you.” Spike says louder, looking forward to the delicious warm sleeping place the whelp offers him. “No, Spike, thank you.”

Xander lies down on his side and puts his hand down near his head on the pillow. After Spike himself lies down, Xander pulls up the blanket. The youth drags up one edge of it to cover Spike, too. They’re only a few Inches from each other, face to face and Spike wishes, for the thousandth time these past few days, to be normal sized again. Mind you, if he’d been normal sized, chances are he wouldn’t have been here in bed with Xander at all. Still he feels good where he is and he plans on staying there quite a while longer – especially when he is back to his original size again. He’s got way more than 3 Inches to give to Xander.

It doesn’t take long until both of them are fast asleep, Xander’s fingers curled tenderly around Spike’s fragile body.

3 Inches - Part 11

no subject