Scaling Heaven! Part seven, and a visit, and general ramblyness...

[tabaqui]

Yes, actually updating! Sorry it took me so long - seems like the holidays just discombobulated me completely.

But i'm back! First things first, though. The Visit!

It was *so much fun*! sweptawaybayou got here first with ely_jan as the complexities (read: idiocies) of Missouri highway exchanges had baffled luvsbitch and mjsslave and they were a little...behind.

Ely! What a sweetheart! It was so grand to meet her, and to see Snow again - we sat and chatted and fussed over my silly cats for a while until the rest of the party arrived, and then we hoofed it up to the tattoo shop where the entire party got work done! A friend of Snow's - debvel - came down, too, and she and Ely both got their tattoo cherries...err...popped. Heh. pretties_4u is good at that.

So we ate, and visited, and giggled, and visited and talked about all *sorts* of unmannerly things. I think the Marines were a bit traumatized. Heeee!

Then back to our house and the most gods-awful, hilarious, slashy-freaky movie of all time. Voodoo Academy! *bows to Ely* Oh fuckin' my.

There was also birthday cake! With candles! And confetti poppers, whoo! And much fun was had.

The next day saw myself, Snow, Ely and Deb at Denny's having breakfast and more fun convo. (James had run off with Luvs to revisit his past at the Fort). Again, traumatization may have occurred, but these people need shaking up! Then we bought incense and had lovely bread that Snow had graciously brought down...all for *me! meeee!!* and then they had to go. *sniffle*

All in all, it was a lovely, lovely visit. Seeing Snow again was great, meeting Ely was divine! She and i, well... We were secretly plotting to force the party to screen *our favorite movie*. Heh. We share the same favorite movie!! Auntie Mame!
Wheeee!

I miss you guys already! It was so great, so fun. We must do it again.


In other news - i hate my state. Only two cities that of i know of are showing Brokeback Mountain, one is two hours from me and one is four. Fucking hell!

And - Supernatural has sucked me *in*. I saw my first ep this week and oh man, oh man, oh man. *Flails*. Yis. :)


Now, the story! So glad you all have waited and *read* this odd thing. I know it's not to the taste of a lot of you out there, but i really appreciate the support! *snuggles you all* Especially *snuggles* reremouse for her uber-support and de-erroring and just general chit-chat and help. Makes all this *so* much easier when i've got her to decompress all over!

Previous parts here.





Getting to where the home-world dogs and Angel and the Azk'k clan were going to rendezvous was a triple-skip that would take nearly a year in real-time. The only consolation was that the Outsider ships - seven altogether - and the home-worlders were in transit as well, so nothing would actually happen until they all surfaced out of skip-space around a dead planet too close to Earth for comfort. Somewhere on the side of space that Neverland was purported to be, but Nia just pursed her lips and didn't reply, so Spike didn't push.

He had his suspicions, though.

Then Rrahn and the Billy Bud got on the com with the last little bit of the plan and Spike shouted at them for all the time it took for three groups of Outsider ships to hit skip-speed and go. Rrahn wanted the Dru and the Bud and the other not-Outsider ships to synch - to go through the skip together. It was a thing the Outsiders did a lot, and something Spike had never done. It was bloody dangerous, especially when the ships were so mismatched. The Bud easily outstripped all of the ships for tonnage and engine power and Spike had visions of the Dru being pulled to pieces in skip-space, all of them lost to the particulate flow - dissolved into otherwhere like so much ash

In the end Rrahn got her way, but not until Nia had pulled Spike aside and said it would be okay - she and Xander had made some modifications. After that Spike got back into the argument with a will and eventually screwed another hundred-million out of Rrahn for wear, tear, and general pain and suffering. It didn't make him happy, though, and he pulled Xander off filter duty and into a hidey-hole and got intensely, furiously physical with him for about thirty minutes. That made him happy, and it made Xander happy and it eased the feeling of total helplessness that seemed to be overwhelming Spike whenever he stopped and really thought about what the fuck was going down.

And for the first time since Xander had joined the crew, Spike wished he could grab Ferro out of the galley and do the same, because the big ex-Marine was looking damn jittery. Xander, however, slipped in before Spike could even formulate a plan - broke out the baklava again and got Ferro to sit down and just - touch. Shoulder, thigh, hands, forehead, and Xander saying something in a low voice that Spike decided not to overhear.

Instead, he went away up to the bridge to triple-check everything and irritate Nia into cursing him for three solid minutes in the lisping, lilting tongue of her home planet. For some reason, that always made him feel better.

H'ru was hunkered down in the office again, already behind the safety webbing and looking like a mound of buff-colored fuzz. Codes, Rrahn said he had. Codes to disarm the mines that would be defending the rendezvous - codes to get into the mothballed core of the station that floated there, construction put on hold when the home-worlders had suddenly appeared almost five years earlier. The negotiations and skirmishes had all come to nothing - had come to this - and Spike looked at the curled dog with loathing and a sick sort of rage.

*Been alive almost two hundred and fifty years. Seen so many fucking things. Amazing things - incredible things. Horrible things. Not gonna lie down and die for these dogs. Not gonna be ground under like I don't - like we don't - fucking matter. No bloody way.* All around them the Outsider ships were moving - going - streaming into skip-space like luminescent fish in a tar-black river. Flashes like contained supernovas as the generators finally geared high enough and time and matter shimmered aside. The idea was that the sudden influx of ships popping into real-time would mask the comparatively tiny group of Earth and Fenris ships. Would give them precious time unnoticed as they made their rescue attempt.

That was the idea, anyway. But Rrahn didn't actually know if the codes were for every mine - or if the ones for the station had been reset, or extra security added. Her contacts there were questionable - Chaddock, mostly - and her information dated. It was all one big fucking gamble and the only reason Spike had even given it serious thought was the sure knowledge that the home-worlders didn't give a fuck for any one of them - Outsiders included.

From her chair, Nia turned and looked at him, her pale, triangular face tense and frowning. "The Gur'y'a is going - she's the last group out. Rrahn says go."

"Fuck, yeah. Okay." Spike reached out and tapped a button - opened the com from his station over the whole ship. "Time to fly, pigeons. Batten down the hatches and get up here."

"Coming!" from Xander, somewhere in a Jeffries tube and:

"Aye, Cap'n!" from Ferro, crash of a locker and footsteps going hastily away. Spike sat down and belted in - watched the progress of Rrahn's group of ships - watched that tight blue-green cluster disappear like a match blown out. The other ships - two in white, two in red - were getting steadily nearer and their own position showed them almost overlapping.

"Billy Bud says to take the zenith position - they're going to set off flares and dump about five tons of scrap when we hit real space again."

"Should cover us," Spike muttered, checking readouts and levels - listening for the lift. A moment later it arrived and two sets of footsteps pounded down the short hall. Xander and then Ferro hit their chairs and belted in - powered up their boards and a tiny bit of tension went out of Spike's gut. "H'ru! When we're clear of skip-space we're gonna need those codes bloody fast - make sure you have 'em ready."

"I 'ould come up -"

"No. Don't need you on the bridge. Just the codes. We're in countdown. Five minutes."

"Yesss," H'ru said.

It might have been his imagination, but Spike thought the dog sounded sulky. There was a soft warning hoot as they settled into position for the skip - proximity alert that Nia quickly killed. The Rumplestiltskin was going to dock with them - hold them like a baby in a sling because when they surfaced from that last skip, they weren't going to brake. They were going to shoot at near-C velocity straight to the abandoned station, only braking at the last minute and the Dru's engines weren't strong enough to stop them in time. There was a reason ships came out of skip-space light-years away from their targets. The Rumplestiltskin, being a tug, could stop them almost on a dime but it was one more stress on the Dru that Spike didn't like to think about.

"Billy Bud is synching," Nia murmured, and another alert sounded, softer chime, and there was a shuddering thump all through the ship. "The Rumplestiltskin is docked."

"They've got you, Drusilla. See you on the other side," from the Bud, crackle of static and the com shut down.

"Not if we see you first," Xander whispered and Spike snorted softly, glancing swiftly over into Xander's laughing face. The skip-generator was humming - thrumming - sending its subsonic roar all through them and Spike flexed his fingers and vamped for a moment, taking in a lungful of air. Sweat and gun oil and peanut butter, the lemon-flower scent of Nia, fainter smells of cleaning fluid and soap and coffee. No fear, not yet. Not ever, if Spike could help it. He let the demon go - looked at the numbers flicking past on his screen.

*One minute. Christ.* "Why, now, blow wind, swell billow and swim bark! The storm is up, and all is on the hazard!"

"Time," Nia said. The Dru - all the ships - skipped out.




Skip-space has no time. Or, rather, it has all time, and existing in it is like picking over a buffet of a thousand dishes. Choose a memory - a moment - and live it for the next millennium or twenty seconds. In skip-space, it's all the same.

Ferro's fingers twitch faintly, faintly - his heart beats so slowly he may as well be dead. But his mind works. His mind - remembers. Dry-pepper air with a pall of greasy smoke and the sharp, thick smell of aviation fuel. Ferro sits on the deck of the helicopter, his feet dangling out the open door, his hands resting comfortably on his rifle. Beside him is Mitchell, the 'copter's gunner. He's leaning casually on the stock of his .50 cal, shouting something over the ratcheting roar of the propeller blades. The head-sets Ferro and his platoon wear don't quite mesh with the 'copter's so there's all kinds of noise and Ferro is mostly tuning Mitchell out - swinging his feet and bobbing his head to the music somebody's got playing on all-cast. It's CCR and Mitchell's telling Ferro about how his granddaddy fought in some war - Japan or Vietnam or fuckin' Malaysia, Mitchell doesn't seem too clear - and how Credence was the best music to shoot the enemy to. Or fuck hookers to, maybe - Mitchell's gone off on some rant that Ferro totally zones on and the 'copter banks hard, coming around westerly and for a moment Ferro sees all the other 'copters with their graffiti and their tinted black plastic bubbles over the cockpits - hybrid dragonflies swarming through the salmon-pink dawn.

As he watches the ground rush closer - as he shouts to his men to get off their asses and get ready to hit the drop zone hard - there's a streak of phosphorus light from the wind-cut gullies below and the 'copter at ten o'clock explodes into curling, red-orange fire - expanding cloud of shrapnel and burning fuel and vaporized Marines.

Ferro's 'copter is streaking toward the DZ like a bat after a bug and Mitchell is sweeping the .50 cal back and forth in arcs, sending a cascade of glittering casings fountaining out into the air, bright as beetles. Metallic taste of blood in the back of Ferro's throat and the sting of a burning-hot casing hitting the back of his hand. Chinese dust in his mouth, the chattering din of automatic weapons' fire and John Fogerty crooning in his ear.

'Well, I'm here to tell you now each and ev'ry mother's son...You better learn it fast; you better learn it young...'cause someday never comes...'



The Dru skimmed real-time, the bubble flickering and fading. Nia hit a series of keys, inputting code for the next skip, coordinates and countdown. Spike watched her through half-shut eyes - stretched his fingers and licked dry lips and tried to sit up, but inertia held him nearly motionless. Stringing the skips together like this was pushing their physical limits hard. No time to eat between skips - barely enough time to set up the new coordinates. Nia lurched up from her chair - staggered against the hard tilt of the deck and leaned against Spike's side, her hand cupping his jaw. She was warmer than a human - fever-hot even in skip-space. And being a fairy, somehow able to withstand multiple skips easier than they could.

"Get - belted. Nia, don't -"

Nia's fingers slipped down Spike's shoulder to his forearm - to the blood-pack and tubing taped to the side of his chair - the needle sunk into his arm. "Just checking on the I.V, Cap'n'," she murmured, her voice dopplering and fading and breaking into rasping white-noise like a dying radio transmission and Spike let his eyes close - let the noise stutter into his head, filling it up. A chime rang for hours-minutes-seconds and the Dru shook loose of time and space and skipped again, chain lightning flicker silent in the void.


Radio fading in and out - hiss and pop of static and distance. Frost on the windscreen and every blade of grass - every leaf - standing up sharp and silver in the salt-white light of the moon. The rumble of the engine goes right up Spike's spine and into his chest - false heartbeat under Dru's ear, the mink of her hat tickling his chin.

"It's like a fairy world, Spike. It's like the moon."

"Is it, pet? D'you think the moon's cold as this?"

Dru snuggles closer, her hand slipping into his pocket. "I think the moon's all lovely and warm, like an eiderdown. You can just lie back and sink down and down..."

"Be there soon, Dru. I can see the lights from here."

Dru sniffs a little - reaches out and touches the feathers of ice that are growing on the windscreen. The heater died twenty miles back. "Jack be nimble, Jack be quick... Will there be dancing, Spike?"

"Sure to be. Dancing and parties and scores of people for you to talk to." They've been in America too long, and it's all gone to hell. Four years since the Crash and nothing's getting better. Everything's drab - nearly everybody's poor and it's bloody boring. They'll be in Latrobe in fifteen minutes - on the train out of Pennsylvania in under an hour. Then New York - the Chelsea Pier - and their state room on the Britannica. And across the sea to London - back to some sort of civilized living.

Dru settles closer still and Spike hugs his arm around her, leaning to kiss her temple. The radio clicks and crackles and then suddenly comes clear for a moment and Spike smiles.

"Hear that, Dru-love? That's all about you."

'Did you ever see a dream dancing? Well, I did! Did you ever see a dream romancing? Well, I did! Did you ever find heaven right in your arms, saying I love you, I do? Well, the dream that was walkin' and the dream that was talkin' and the heaven in my arms was you...'



The Dru shuddered, her frame straining as the synched ships did a hard, banking course-change and geared up for the last skip. The groaning shriek made Xander shiver - made him lift his head and look across the bridge to Spike's chair - to Ferro's. Nia's was empty and for a moment he felt panic, slow and distant in his altered state. But then she lurched into view by his shoulder and did something - switched the tube on the IV to a new bag and patted his wrist. Xander flexed his arm against the sting of the needle and tried to smile at her but she was already gone, belting in - tapping something into her computer and then - everything dissolved into light and chattering sound and Xander closed his eyes and dissolved, too.


The first time Xander realizes that he's not going to die is when he's pushed out of a moving car somewhere in Utah. He's said the wrong thing to the wrong guy at the wrong time, and there goes his genuine Urkuth crystals of something or other. Something the Council wanted and he'd trotted off to fetch it like a good dog and now here he is, lying in the gravel and weeds of a Utah highway verge, bleeding and sore and fucking pissed off, but not dead. And really, a bullet to the sternum should generally do it but as Xander watches it seems to screw itself out of his chest. It hurts about as much coming out as it did going in.

It plinks to the asphalt and rolls a few inches and Xander picks it up - stares at it, and then at the not-hole in his chest. It's beyond belief that what just happened, happened and Xander lies there in the heat and dust and smell of hot tar and asphalt for a long time. Long enough to feel the tight itch of sunburn across his forehead and nose - to really feel all the cuts and scrapes and bruises he got when he hit the ground rolling. He can hear a toad somewhere, creaking and croaking to itself - an incongruous sound out here in the desert. After a while, when all the little hurts don't go away too, he figures the healing thing must only be for life-threatening stuff and he staggers up and shoves the bullet into his pocket with the little carved-jade toad he always carries for luck. He wanders down the road, his lips cracked and one shoe missing and his head pounding like a big, hollow drum. His shirt is soaked in blood and he's pretty sure nobody'll stop for a serial killer so he takes it off and tucks it into the waist of his jeans.

Eventually, a rattletrap pick-up stops aways along the road and waits for him and Xander climbs into a cab that smells of hay and sweat and horses and Skoal. The cowboy behind the wheel - Preston - thinks he needs a hospital. Xander thinks he needs a drink. As it turns out, Preston's brother sides with Xander and Xander discovers that skinny Utah cowboys can just about drink their own weight in whiskey.

He shows the brothers the bullet that he thought had shattered his heart. He shows them the pinkish scar that itches just a little, and the shirt that's stiff and shiny with dried blood.

"It's a fuck-in'...m'rr-acle," Preston says, his eyes glassy and his voice thick with whiskey and awe.

"It's got-damn creepy," Preston's brother mutters, leaning in close to study the scar - to press his fingers lightly to Xander's chest and feel for himself the solid bone and un-torn muscle.

"It's that weird g-guy I mmet in...over...thataway," Xander says, gesturing toward what he thinks is west.

"Wonder f' you got any other ss...special powers," Preston's brother says, hazel eyes hot and direct and locked on Xander's mouth. Apparently, Xander does. The power to make cowboys sing in the middle of a blow-job.

Or maybe that's just Preston's brother's particular kink, who knows?

The bubble goes, and Xander hums in his skip-sleep. Spike's never figured out why this song makes Xander horny.

'We're goin' to the city - to the city fair...If you go to the city then you will find me there...And we'll go honky tonkin', honky tonkin'...Honky tonkin', honey baby...we'll go honky tonkin' 'round this town...'





Coming out of skip-space was like opening a door in a silent hallway and finding chaos behind it. Finding Hell. Proximity and collision alerts were beeping madly - ratcheting up to a deafening klaxon as they went unnoticed in the scramble. Other alerts kept coming - one that warned them they're not braking, one that warned them there's no traffic control here and another that's something internal. A line or a leak or a fucking filter, Spike couldn't tell anymore and he shoved himself upright - scrabbled at the needle in his arm and yanked it free.

"Nia! Report."

"Billy Bud just dumped enough scrap to power a small planet, Cap'n! They -" Nia pressed the earpiece closer and then nodded, hitting keys. "We're out of the sync with the Billy Bud, us and Rumplestiltskin. Inbound for the station now."

"Got a visual," Ferro said, rough croak of a voice and Spike focused blearily on his screen - saw the hazy mass of Outsider ships off to one side - the bee-swarm of chaff the Bud had dispersed. And the solid core of white that was the station, coming up way, way, way too fucking fast.

"Christ," Xander whispered - coughed hard, and Spike looked over at him. He looked like shit and it must have showed, because Xander just closed his eyes for a second. "Feel like shit, too," Xander said, wincing as he pulled the needle out of his arm.

"Feel like shit that's been trampled on," Ferro grated.

Spike pulled a hypo out of the skip-packs that Nia had taped to their boards. Adrenaline, plasma for Spike, some drug of Nia's - a cocktail, basically, to get them up and moving. Spike took the cap off the short needle and pushed it, hard, into the side of his neck. A moment later it hit, and almost took the top of his head with it. "Bloody fucking hell, Nia!"

"It's what you needed," Nia said, looking too innocent.

Spike shook himself like a dog - pushed himself up and out of his chair and looked back at Xander who was just shoving his own hypo back into the pack and sealing it up.

Xander's eyes went wide. "Oh - my - god -"

"Like a fucking -"

"Freight train. Damn! Needed some of these in my soldiering days!" Ferro was up, too - lunatic grin and a bounce on his toes and Xander laughed.

"Need some of this just for the fun of it. Whoo!"

"Settle down, for fuck's sake!" Spike opened the com - hit a key and watched the screen shift from the rapidly approaching station to the office. H'ru was standing right there, looking like he'd had his own pick-me-up. Ears and ruff of fur standing up, his eyes wide and diamond-bright. "Got those codes, H'ru? Now's the time. I'm opening your board up."

"Got - I got -"

"Mines, Cap'n! Send those codes now!" Nia shouted and another, seldom-heard klaxon went off, sharp buzz that made Spike's ears hurt. On the screen H'ru was typing madly, claws clicking on the keys, a little holo of numbers and letters - dog-alphabet - hovering by his head. There was a rattling scrape as some of the scrap the Bud had dumped swept over the Dru's hull, and Spike winced.

"Ssent, ssent - more?"

"Jesus, somebody triggered some," Ferro said, putting up a shot of white fire blossoming along the edges of the Outsider wedge.

"Got no time - Xander, Ferro, let's go - Nia -"

"Got it, Cap'n, I got it, we'll do the codes, we'll get us through, go!"

"Watch your back!" Spike shouted, and they ran for the lift, all three of them bouncing, jittering - grinning in a way that was reminiscent of strychnine. "Kick these bloody dogs back home and get the fuck out of here. We're gonna have so much fucking money - won't have to work for years."

"Buy us a little beach," Xander said - grabbed Spike's head and kissed him so hard Spike tasted blood.

"Buy some'a those suits got the sighting aaall integrated - right in the helmet," Ferro said, looking as dreamy as a weasel on speed.

"Fuck, yeah." Xander gave Spike a look and Spike raised an eyebrow - leaned forward, dragging Xander by an arm around his neck and pinning Ferro to the wall with his free hand.

"For luck," Spike said, and kissed Ferro.

"Always knew you were the girl," Xander snickered and then the lift-door opened and they tumbled out - grabbed their suits and got them on, slapping down the seals and snugging the bindings tight, each one checking the other, fast and silent.

"We're braking - in count. Hold on down there!" There was a bench and emergency webbing right beside the lock and they flung themselves down - strapped in and held on and when gravity slammed them down Spike laughed breathlessly. The ship wallowed, gravity fluttering, and then the entire structure shuddered violently as the Rumplestiltskin let go and pushed them into place to dock with the station. There was a shriek of scraping metal and then a thump that threw them against the webbing and Xander was cursing, tangled up and half off the bench.

"Fuckers had better not put one scratch on her!"

"We're docked, Rumplestiltskin has the tube in place, go!"

"Where's Rrahn? What're they doing?" Spike asked, jerking hard on the webbing and getting it off Xander who bounced to his feet, gathering his duffle of tools out of a locker and taking the rifle Ferro handed over.

"They're - six light years off station nadir. Engaging... The home-worlders are putting up a fight - there's two ships docked at the station itself, we're on the opposite side of them. Cap'n -"

"Nia - lock her up tight. Ferro - shoot anything that moves." Ferro grinned - slung a rifle over his shoulder and shoved a pistol into a holster. Jammed a handful of grenades - that looked like cherry-sized ball bearings - into a pocket.

"Be safe, esutla," Nia said, and there was a moment's silence. Spike was shoving his own chosen ordinance into any pocket that would hold it when the lift door opened and H'ru walked out, clad in what looked like salvaged armor from a junkyard. Its ready-lights twinkled fitfully - half the systems were compromised and his helmet didn't have a visor.

Xander snorted laughter, shaking his head. "Fuck, he's like - the Little Orphan Annie of the Outsiders."

"Cap'n - tubes in place. The dog's got to come. He can't do the codes from here."

"Bloody hell!" Spike stared at the dog for one moment and H'ru stared back, gaze hard and steady. Spike grabbed his own rifle from Ferro's hand and gestured with the barrel. "Right, then - you go first, mate. Get us in."

"Yess," H'ru said. He touched the panel that opened the lock and looked over at his shoulder at them - grinned in doggish delight and then turned and plunged into the shuddering emergency tube, yipping.

"He seems happy," Ferro said, clicking his visor shut, his voice coming through crackled with static on the mic.

"He's fuckin' nuts," Xander muttered, getting his own visor into place, his face pale and ghostly in the helmet lights.

"Shoot anything that moves," Ferro said. "Right Cap'n? 'Cept Angel."

"Nah." Spike slapped his own visor down - chinned the com on inside the helmet. "You can shoot him too, if you want. Can't kill him, anyway."

"Fuck. Another non-living motherfucker?" Ferro nudged his helmet lights on and strode into the tube, grabbing the first handhold and shooting forward.

"Yup. Another one. It really pisses him off if you fuck with his hair." Xander followed Ferro - grabbed and pushed and flew up into blackness, toward the little lights on Ferro's suit - H'ru's armor. Spike closed the lock and followed, his body singing with the drugs - with the fierce glee of a fight. Demon-faced, grinning - ready to go, ready to fight. Ready to win. And rescuing Angel in the bargain was just the cherry on top.

"C'mon, my loves - let's go make a little noise."


Part eight.