Grosse Pointe Buff

Disclaimer: Spike, Buffy and all the other members of the Sunnydale crowd belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Fox, and so on, and so on. Grosse Point Blank was written by Tom Jankiewicz, D V deVincentis, S K Boatman & the vastly talented John Cusack. It is of course owned by Hollywood pictures and Caravan Pictures and not me. I’m ripping them both off for no profit whatsoever, other than the happies I may get when and if you lovely people review.

Dedication: For NeverMindDaria, Rosie, Zzickle, Ava, RetroSkater, Belladonna and even fastpilot who should stop reading now because we are talking total AU, no slayer, no supernatural anything. She definitely isn’t going to be a wimpy girly girl, but no supernatural ability, no duty, no watcher. Zzickle - yep, whole movie in a loose sort of way, plus flash backs to high school. Retroskater – yes to Giles, yes to Xander and as to the other, read on. And to Bella… soon.  

Everything he needed for the Sunnydale trip was waiting and ready. His clothes were packed, his weapons cleaned and packed neatly away in their cases. His tickets and ID were safely stowed away in his pocket book. He had everything from toothpaste to a travel hair-dryer. He was just checking his hair one last time in the mirror when he heard the double beep that announced he had e-mail.

He rattled the mouse until the monitor came out of standby mode, reading aloud the words that appeared in blue on the screen. "‘Services no longer required for California venture.’ What? ‘Alternate vendor to service contract at original cost.’ What alternate vendor?" Comprehension rapidly dawned on Angelus. "Spike. Ingrate, arrogant son of a bitch! Swiped the damn job out from under me. I was that guy’s fuckin’ Yoda. Let’s see if he’s so happy when he comes home and Miss Kitty’s nailed to his front door, or maybe just her head in his bed? Maybe sever his spinal chord, kinda appropriate, a knife in the back for the little back-stabber? See how he fancies life in a wheelchair, huh?"

As he spoke to himself he typed a response to the electronic message. "Preparations have begun in good faith. Expenses have been incurred." He hit the ‘enter’ key and waited for a response.

"Connection is terminated. Status idle," replied the text across the screen.

"Right, you think you’re so smart. How much do you think you’re going to have to pay once Spikey boy is out of commission?" Angelus picked up the phone and hit a series of buttons from memory.

A bright young female voice came on the line. "Agent Walsh’s office. How may I connect your call?"

"Hi." Angelus was suddenly all charm. "Can you put me through to extension 17 please?"

"Graham," answered the voice on the other end.

"Hi, I’ve got a line on that hostile you were looking for. Flying into Sunnydale tomorrow. He’s scheduled to hit a star federal witness before he can testify on Monday morning. Now, if you guys keep an eye on him, as soon as he does his job, you can do yours…"

Angelus hung up the phone with a feeling of satisfaction. Spike gets the witness. The spooks get Spike. Before the client can find out the target’s gone, we get in touch to let them know Spike’s dead, renegotiate the fee and get money for nothing.

~+~

Spike drove yet another black Lincoln along the freeway from the airport toward what had once been his hometown. Instead of the black suit, he wore a rather more casual outfit. His jeans were black and so tight that if someone were to look closely enough they could probably tell you the dates on the coins in his back pocket. He wore an open-necked deep blue shirt that brought out the colour in his eyes, or it would have done if they hadn’t been obscured by the mirror-finish shades he wore. His black leather duster draped around his frame like the old friend it was. A cigarette burned down in his hand as it tapped against the steering wheel. As he drove through the outskirts of town, craning forward in his seat to take in sights at once familiar and unknown, he switched off the punk CD he had been listening to, choosing to sample the local radio network. The song Pretty in Pink took him straight back to junior high and the first time he saw her.

Several hundred yards behind him, two men were bickering with each other as their station wagon followed along behind him. Both men looked as if they would have been at home on a college football team about a decade previously. Graham’s hair was that shade that was too light to really be brown and too brown to be blonde. Like Angelus’ it was gelled to stick straight up at the front, but thanks to slightly more taste it was only about half the length. He had the kind of open face and straightforward attitude that led most people to trust him instinctively.

His partner appeared more openly intimidating, looking less at home in his regulation blazer and slacks. Forrest carried with him an air of hostility, as if all mankind was his enemy until proven otherwise. Like many African Americans he shaved his head totally bald, but it was the fact that he seldom smiled that really gave the impression of austerity.

"Bullshit," Graham gently responded to Forrest’s claim. "You always have to know them all."

"I was on a job in Lisbon, ‘bout two years ago and I saw him," his partner insisted.

"No, man" Graham shook his head, splitting his attention between the argument, the road and Spike’s vehicle. "You didn’t. You know what, he hasn’t been in Portugal since ’86. If you read the file you’d know that." He temporarily freed a hand from the wheel to peel back the cover on the unopened file resting in Forrest’s lap. "Why don’t you read the file?" he replied somehow still managing to sound cool and even-tempered.

"Bonn, then. I spoke to him in Bonn. Angelus was there. He introduced us." Forrest refused to be outdone.

"Whatever. How about since you two are such bosom buddies, I’ll just take the weekend off and you can kill him?"

Spike hummed along, thinking back to the fall of ’86 and his first day as part of the American education system, and the temporarily welcoming sight of the diminutive blonde in the tiny mini-skirt sitting on the wall by the school’s main entrance. When the DJ came on at the end of the track, his jaw dropped and he reached to turn up the volume.

"Okay, guys. That was The Psychedelic Furs from the days when the brat pack were making movies that didn’t go straight to video, and we all thought Andrew McCarthy was going to be the next Steve McQueen. And that goes out to the returning veterans of Sunnydale High class of ’90. Here on WFSC, we’re going to be celebrating with you guys by making a return to the eighties. All day, every day from now till Monday morning each and every track’ll be from the years 1980 through to 1990…"

Spike made his way toward the centre of town, pulling his car into the parking bay at the front of the unit that housed the town’s local radio station. The DJ sat in her booth looking out on Sunnydale’s main thoroughfare as the Lincoln slid to a halt before her. Spike turned sideways in his seat, using his right hand to obscure the lower half of his face, the mirrored shades hiding his eyes as he watched the girl who haunted his dreams, seeing her in the flesh for the first time in a decade.

"…And we’re continuing with Bon Jovi, going back to the days when his hair looked like he had it done at the local poodle parlour with Wanted Dead or Alive." Her words slowed as she reached the end of her intro, something causing the hairs on the back of her neck to tingle almost like an early warning system as she tried to make out the partially silhouetted figure through the windows of the town car. She couldn’t see his eyes. His sculpted cheekbones and full lips were hidden behind his hand. The white-blonde hair, shorter but the same shade it had been ten years ago, the way he held his cigarette, his posture and the dark clothing were still enough for her to be sure. It was him.

"Welcome back, Dalesmen," she said in a sultry tone that sent shivers down his spine, before she had time to reconsider her reaction to him.

Shoving the car into drive, he pulled back out into the midmorning traffic. Spike exhaled a huge breath that he hadn’t been aware of holding. ‘Damned if she didn’t look every bit as good now as she had ten years ago. And damned if he didn’t have a soddin’ hard on. Three bleedin’ words and she had him again already.’ His route home took him past the high school and he pulled up at the front of the building, deciding to stretch his legs and have a look at the old place. He was surprised to see a familiar figure heading toward the main entrance.

He called out to her without thinking, surprised and pleased that she was still there. "Miss Calendar! Oi! Miss!"

The elegant, yet casually dressed woman turned, her arms full of papers. "William? William Blank?"

Spike lit a cigarette and pulled off his sunglasses as he closed the distance between them. At about ten years his senior his former teacher still had the same svelte figure and huge thick-lashed eyes that had featured in many a teenage fantasy when he’d studied there. Only an occasional sign of grey at the roots of her dark lustrous hair and a couple of extra laugh lines marked the decade that had passed.

"William Blank. Your disappearing act was up there with the Lindbergh baby. The teachers all had a pool on where you’d end up. Princeton? Harvard? North Western? Oxford? Cambridge? …And you just went …nowhere? Disappeared without a trace."

"Yeah, well, I decided to go for a career with on the job training. Skip the whole college thing. You’re looking good. Probably still have a flock of sixteen year old boys hanging round the computer room pretending to work on their projects."

"Thanks," she gave a short laugh. "I think. You’re not so bad yourself in a sort of Goth way. Is that the same coat you had when you were here?"

Spike shrugged and gave a disarming smile. "Ain’t broke, don’t fix it." The ringing of a bell signalled a rush of activity.

Miss Calendar looked up in the direction of the school building. "They’re playing my song. So, where you off to now?"

"I’m just on my way home."

"Oh, oh. Really? Well, I must be going. Young minds to fill." The teacher seemed discomfited and backed toward the building as she spoke.

The sound of a nearby window being thrown open temporarily distracted Spike’s attention and the woman slipped away unobserved. A malproportioned head with ears more suited to a chimpanzee emerged from the open window. "Blank! Don’t think, just because you’ve graduated, you can smoke on school grounds! There are laws now about smoking in public places in California." Spike rolled his eyes as he walked back to his car ignoring Snyder’s voice in the background. He briefly contemplated doing a service to the current attendees of the school by eliminating the homuncule, but remembered his shrink’s advice and merely gave him a two fingered salute instead, not even deigning to turn round and look at him.

Spike pulled the car over in front of the Mueller’s house and got out. He got out of the car and engaged the central locking. As he walked around the front of the car and looked up to check for traffic before crossing the street his automatic pilot mechanism suddenly went haywire. He looked back at the Mueller’s. ‘Yep. That was the house he’d seen for four years whenever he looked out of his bedroom window. There was the window it had cost him a month’s allowance to replace after he broke it playing baseball. So, okay, why was there a parking lot where his dad’s carefully tended lawn used to be and why was there a bloody supermarket where his mum lived.’

He headed for the across the car park at a jog making his way directly to the counter. There was no-one else other than the cashier in the store. Judging by the binder full of notes that was open by the cash desk, he was a student working to pay his tuition fees. He cast a nervous glance in Spike’s direction as the blonde strode purposefully toward him.

"H-hi. C-can I h-help you?" The guy was short, so short that his uniform looked way too long on him as if they hadn’t had a size small enough, or they had just given him the one that belonged to the last guy to quit irrespective of their relative stature. Everything about him just screamed ‘victim’. Normally, Spike would feel sorry for the guy. Today he was just someone he needed to get information from.

"You better hope so," Spike answered, pausing only to read the unfortunate employee’s nametag. "Jonathon. What’re you doin’ here?"

"Ehm, it’s my job?"

"No, dimwit," Spike almost snarled. "What’re you doin’ here?"

"Em, I d-don’t—"

"Never mind. Do you have a supervisor or a manager here?" Spike shot rapid-fire questions at the younger man, not giving him time to think between attacks.

"N-not today…" Jonathon stammered out his response.

"But you do have one. Where does he live?"

"Hey. I can’t tell you that."

"Where do you live?"

"I-I…"

"I-I used to— Bollocks it. No point feedin’ you yer arse in a sling for what’s bugger ‘all to do with you. How long have you worked here?" Jonathon’s mouth opened and closed as he tried to prepare an answer for the hyperactive Englishman.

"Em, a couple of months—"

"And yer boss. How long’s he been here?"

"I d-don’t."

"Right. Fine. Doesn’t matter. ‘S done, ‘s done." Spike strode off toward the back of the store, pausing half way down the aisle to pull his cell phone from his pocket.

The teller watched warily as he moved off, wondering if he should hit the panic button. The guy was obviously either on drugs or in need of some.

Half way across the continent an answer-phone kicked in. "You have reached the office of Dr Willow Rosenberg. There is no-one available to take your call at the moment but if you leave a message the doctor will get back to you as soon as possible."

Spike didn’t even wait for the beep. "Red! I know you’re the-ere. Pick up." The psychiatrist paused with her hand inches from the phone when she heard Spike’s voice, letting him rant on. "My mum’s house is gone. I pulled up and instead of our house, there’s a soddin’ K-Mart. They say you can never go home again, Doc… but I guess you can shop there."

The redhead waited till the line went dead and then blew a raspberry at the phone. "Just because I have to talk to you in person doesn’t mean I have to pick up when you’re in California." She gave a self-satisfied nod, proud of not giving in to him and went back to reading her trade journal.

Spike looked up as he finished the call, straight into Forrest’s eyes as the government agents observed his movements from their car, but as soon as they knew they’d been spotted he put his foot down driving away.

Spike made his way outside, watching the station wagon disappear round the corner before hitting speed-dial.

"Cordy? … Bollocks to the contract. The clients could flippin’ do a Morris dance naked in Times Square and I wouldn’t bloody care. Find my mum. Do whatever you have to do, but find my mum."

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