Fic: Dental Plan!
Oct. 9th, 2020 03:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beer_good_foamyContinuing to fill my ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
buffyversebingo card. I think I'll assign this one to "Skeletons in the closet".
Title: Dental Plan!
Author: Beer Good (beer_good_foamy)
Fandom: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, roughly between s4 and s5
Characters/Pairing: Buffy, Spike
Rating: PG13
Word count: ~1500
Summary: You know how all myths are true? Well, one legendary being is running around Sunnydale attacking vampires and leaving them... less than they were. You'd think this would be more helpful than it is. But Spike isn't too keen to be a part of it, and this town may not be big enough for two vampire hunters.
Dental Plan!
The vampire ran for his life, cursing his stupidity with every step. They'd warned him; "Are you out of your mind, Derek? Don't go to Sunnydale, dude, that's Slayer country. Hellmouth or no, it's just not worth it." But oh no, he had to "just, like, check it out", and now here he was, a perfectly innocent bloodsucking fiend running through the misty night from a girl who was effortlessly gaining on him with every step. Finding himself in a blind alley, he realised he had no choice but to fight. He turned, pulled himself up to his full height, and tried to look as menacing as he could. "Slayer."
The girl - blonde, pale, elfinly thin, and somehow completely unwinded after chasing him for so long, which somehow scared the unliving crap out of him - shook her head with a curious smile that made his legs feel very heavy. "Not exactly," she said in the softest voice he'd ever heard. Then she held out her hand and blew a fine powder in his face, and the world became full of stars for a few seconds before going completely dark.
When he woke up just before sunrise, he was in such a hurry to find shelter that it took him a while to realise that she'd somehow let him live (-ish), and what she'd taken from him in return.
* * *
I really should get a revolving door, Spike thought as Buffy kicked in the door to his crypt. They did the usual banter as he waited for her to get to the point, which admittedly took him a little by surprise. "Do you guys ever… well… molt?"
"Molt?"
"Or, well, teethe." Buffy actually looked embarrassed, the way you do when you bring up a theory you know sounds dumb but is the best one you have. "Giles is on vacation in England, and Willow said sharks lose teeth and regrow them on a monthly basis, and she thought maybe vampires - "
"What's this about, Slayer?"
"OK. Three nights in a row now I've slayed vampires who... didn't have any fangs."
"Huh." Spike grinned. "When I killed ordinary humans, they stuck a chip in my head."
That earned him a half-hearted punch in the nose. "Vampires. In vamp faces, hunting humans, dusting just fine, except carrying scalpels and straws because something had taken their fangs. So if you guys don't lose teeth naturally…"
"Of course we bloody don't!"
"...something is hunting vampires for their fangs."
Spike shrugged. "Well, sorry to disappoint, I don't know a thing. If you recall, yours truly is on a strict bloodbag diet these days. So if there's nothing else I can do for you - "
"Actually, there is."
* * *
"Look at me, here I am, just a mean old vampire looking for someone's blood to suck," Spike said out loud as he walked another lap around the graveyard. How the hell did William the Bloody come to this, he wondered, acting bait for some unknown beastie while the Slayer lay in ambush somewhere? OK, so maybe he was a little bit curious about what could be looking to make trophies of his teeth, but he was in no great hurry to be Fig. 1 in some future edition of Giles' daemonology books. "Look at these big shiny fangs I've got, sure would be a pity if someone were to sedate me and pull them out."
And then, coming out of the thick mist that hovered between the trees, he saw her. A tall, slim, very pale shape walking, almost floating, towards him. Her hair so blonde it was almost transparent, her grey eyes fixing his with a look that… that… he shook his head, suddenly full of cobwebs. "Uh… Slayer? You wanna help me out here?" The woman just kept closing on him, smiling in a way that was somehow both very reassuring and absolutely terrifying, her eyes shifting down towards his mouth. "Oi, luv, my eyes are up… here…" Again, he had to blink to clear his head of a sudden sleepiness. She held out her hand and pursed her lips to blow -
- and Buffy stepped out from the shadows, grabbed the woman's hand and twisted it behind her back. "Sorry, but as much as I'd love to see someone else knock him out for a change, I need some answers first. Starting with who, or what - "
The woman somehow slipped out of her grip. Buffy couldn't tell exactly how; she moved as if she wasn't quite solid, without hurry or force, just calmly turning out of Buffy's grip and facing her with the sort of look one gives a precocious infant. The woman cocked her head and seemed to search her memory for half a second, then opened her mouth to speak. "Buffy Summers. Five dollars and seventy-five cents."
"Uh… what?"
"You got a quarter each for the first nineteen, but a dollar for the last one. Standard rate in your family. Like everyone, you assumed it was your father who left them under your pillow." She leaned in closer and looked at Buffy's mouth. "Full set of 32, well done. Impressive in your job."
Buffy stared up at the strange face (what was so strange about it, anyway? Was the smile just a little too wide, the ears a little too pointy, the eyes just… just…) She blinked, shook her head, and raised her knife in a just-conspicuous-enough manner. "OK, enough of this. Who are you?"
The woman smiled even wider, showing a row of impossibly straight teeth. "You know who I am."
Buffy realised that she did, somehow, but saying it out loud would just be… silly. "Say I do… what are you doing here?"
"Simple," the tooth fairy said. "Human milk teeth are a good business, but you get tired of hiding in kids' closets waiting for them to fall asleep after a few hundred years. Hellmouth-flavoured vampire fangs are a lot rarer, especially since they turn to dust if you're not careful during the… extraction process. You wouldn't believe the price they fetch in Faerie."
"Wait, so you're running around de-fanging murderous vampires… for profit?"
"Well, that has been the arrangement for some time, you know. I pay you, then I sell them on. Did you think I collected children's teeth like some serial killer? ...But yeah, also morals, obviously," she added in a not too convincing tone when the moonlight glinted off Buffy's blade. "Darn those evil vampires. But just because it's a calling doesn't mean you can't get paid too. Now if you'll excuse me..." She turned her attention to Spike again, as a pair of pliers appeared in her hand.
Spike tried to back away. "Hey, Slayer, we had a deal!"
"I guess we did," Buffy groaned. "Sorry, can't let you have him. As much fun as it would be."
The tooth fairy was starting to look frustrated. "Are you afraid I won't pay you? You'll get a lot more than the farthings you got for your milk teeth, William Pratt." She held out a $50 bill.
"No," Buffy said, "that's… Pratt? Pratt?... Nevermind. You don't get to show up in my town, leaving vamps toothless but just as hungry and violent, and letting me clean up the mess. Spike here is already neutered - "
"Hey!"
" - but your victims aren't. Plus, I really don't need any more moral ambiguity here. Do whatever you want, but if you do it here, a lot of little kids are going to wake up with nothing under their pillows. Get it?"
The tooth fairy gave Buffy the sort of look ancient beings tend to reserve for moments when they decide to simply outlive the problem. "Ugh, fine. I'll stay out of Sunnydale."
"So… you're not going to pull my teeth, then?" Spike asked.
"Not for the next…" The tooth fairy gave Buffy an appraising look, "...huh. Just don't think I'm forgetting this debt."
"Because in that case…" Spike took an apprehensive step up to her and whispered something in her pointy ear.
She nodded, surprised. "It very well might. Thank you, William. Slayer," she turned to Buffy and curtseyed in an impossibly graceful way. And then, somehow, she turned around and… left; one second she was there, the next she was gone into the receding early-morning mist.
"O… kay. So I guess she's real too." Buffy looked at Spike. "What was that whispering about?"
Spike shrugged. "Just called in an old demon favour to keep her off my back, is all. Now, unless there are any other body parts of mine you'd like to gamble with, I suppose we're done for the night?"
"...You're a pig, Spike."
"Yeah, but a pig who gets to keep his tusks. Later, Slayer."
* * *
Leaving Sunnydale behind was a setback, the tooth fairy admitted to herself as she stepped into the veils of mist and travelled through the layers of night in a direction that would give Euclid nightmares. Those vampire teeth had fetched a pretty penny and Sunnydale had seemed like a perfect cash spider. (You don't want me to explain that term, so common in Faerie, in any detail.) But the bleached and undead body of William Pratt had indeed had a point; the fangs of an ensouled vampire - with or without hair gel - would probably be worth at least 100 pairs of ordinary ones, she figured as she stepped out into Los Angeles.
buffyversebingo card. I think I'll assign this one to "Skeletons in the closet". Title: Dental Plan!
Author: Beer Good (
beer_good_foamy)Fandom: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, roughly between s4 and s5
Characters/Pairing: Buffy, Spike
Rating: PG13
Word count: ~1500
Summary: You know how all myths are true? Well, one legendary being is running around Sunnydale attacking vampires and leaving them... less than they were. You'd think this would be more helpful than it is. But Spike isn't too keen to be a part of it, and this town may not be big enough for two vampire hunters.
Dental Plan!
The vampire ran for his life, cursing his stupidity with every step. They'd warned him; "Are you out of your mind, Derek? Don't go to Sunnydale, dude, that's Slayer country. Hellmouth or no, it's just not worth it." But oh no, he had to "just, like, check it out", and now here he was, a perfectly innocent bloodsucking fiend running through the misty night from a girl who was effortlessly gaining on him with every step. Finding himself in a blind alley, he realised he had no choice but to fight. He turned, pulled himself up to his full height, and tried to look as menacing as he could. "Slayer."
The girl - blonde, pale, elfinly thin, and somehow completely unwinded after chasing him for so long, which somehow scared the unliving crap out of him - shook her head with a curious smile that made his legs feel very heavy. "Not exactly," she said in the softest voice he'd ever heard. Then she held out her hand and blew a fine powder in his face, and the world became full of stars for a few seconds before going completely dark.
When he woke up just before sunrise, he was in such a hurry to find shelter that it took him a while to realise that she'd somehow let him live (-ish), and what she'd taken from him in return.
I really should get a revolving door, Spike thought as Buffy kicked in the door to his crypt. They did the usual banter as he waited for her to get to the point, which admittedly took him a little by surprise. "Do you guys ever… well… molt?"
"Molt?"
"Or, well, teethe." Buffy actually looked embarrassed, the way you do when you bring up a theory you know sounds dumb but is the best one you have. "Giles is on vacation in England, and Willow said sharks lose teeth and regrow them on a monthly basis, and she thought maybe vampires - "
"What's this about, Slayer?"
"OK. Three nights in a row now I've slayed vampires who... didn't have any fangs."
"Huh." Spike grinned. "When I killed ordinary humans, they stuck a chip in my head."
That earned him a half-hearted punch in the nose. "Vampires. In vamp faces, hunting humans, dusting just fine, except carrying scalpels and straws because something had taken their fangs. So if you guys don't lose teeth naturally…"
"Of course we bloody don't!"
"...something is hunting vampires for their fangs."
Spike shrugged. "Well, sorry to disappoint, I don't know a thing. If you recall, yours truly is on a strict bloodbag diet these days. So if there's nothing else I can do for you - "
"Actually, there is."
"Look at me, here I am, just a mean old vampire looking for someone's blood to suck," Spike said out loud as he walked another lap around the graveyard. How the hell did William the Bloody come to this, he wondered, acting bait for some unknown beastie while the Slayer lay in ambush somewhere? OK, so maybe he was a little bit curious about what could be looking to make trophies of his teeth, but he was in no great hurry to be Fig. 1 in some future edition of Giles' daemonology books. "Look at these big shiny fangs I've got, sure would be a pity if someone were to sedate me and pull them out."
And then, coming out of the thick mist that hovered between the trees, he saw her. A tall, slim, very pale shape walking, almost floating, towards him. Her hair so blonde it was almost transparent, her grey eyes fixing his with a look that… that… he shook his head, suddenly full of cobwebs. "Uh… Slayer? You wanna help me out here?" The woman just kept closing on him, smiling in a way that was somehow both very reassuring and absolutely terrifying, her eyes shifting down towards his mouth. "Oi, luv, my eyes are up… here…" Again, he had to blink to clear his head of a sudden sleepiness. She held out her hand and pursed her lips to blow -
- and Buffy stepped out from the shadows, grabbed the woman's hand and twisted it behind her back. "Sorry, but as much as I'd love to see someone else knock him out for a change, I need some answers first. Starting with who, or what - "
The woman somehow slipped out of her grip. Buffy couldn't tell exactly how; she moved as if she wasn't quite solid, without hurry or force, just calmly turning out of Buffy's grip and facing her with the sort of look one gives a precocious infant. The woman cocked her head and seemed to search her memory for half a second, then opened her mouth to speak. "Buffy Summers. Five dollars and seventy-five cents."
"Uh… what?"
"You got a quarter each for the first nineteen, but a dollar for the last one. Standard rate in your family. Like everyone, you assumed it was your father who left them under your pillow." She leaned in closer and looked at Buffy's mouth. "Full set of 32, well done. Impressive in your job."
Buffy stared up at the strange face (what was so strange about it, anyway? Was the smile just a little too wide, the ears a little too pointy, the eyes just… just…) She blinked, shook her head, and raised her knife in a just-conspicuous-enough manner. "OK, enough of this. Who are you?"
The woman smiled even wider, showing a row of impossibly straight teeth. "You know who I am."
Buffy realised that she did, somehow, but saying it out loud would just be… silly. "Say I do… what are you doing here?"
"Simple," the tooth fairy said. "Human milk teeth are a good business, but you get tired of hiding in kids' closets waiting for them to fall asleep after a few hundred years. Hellmouth-flavoured vampire fangs are a lot rarer, especially since they turn to dust if you're not careful during the… extraction process. You wouldn't believe the price they fetch in Faerie."
"Wait, so you're running around de-fanging murderous vampires… for profit?"
"Well, that has been the arrangement for some time, you know. I pay you, then I sell them on. Did you think I collected children's teeth like some serial killer? ...But yeah, also morals, obviously," she added in a not too convincing tone when the moonlight glinted off Buffy's blade. "Darn those evil vampires. But just because it's a calling doesn't mean you can't get paid too. Now if you'll excuse me..." She turned her attention to Spike again, as a pair of pliers appeared in her hand.
Spike tried to back away. "Hey, Slayer, we had a deal!"
"I guess we did," Buffy groaned. "Sorry, can't let you have him. As much fun as it would be."
The tooth fairy was starting to look frustrated. "Are you afraid I won't pay you? You'll get a lot more than the farthings you got for your milk teeth, William Pratt." She held out a $50 bill.
"No," Buffy said, "that's… Pratt? Pratt?... Nevermind. You don't get to show up in my town, leaving vamps toothless but just as hungry and violent, and letting me clean up the mess. Spike here is already neutered - "
"Hey!"
" - but your victims aren't. Plus, I really don't need any more moral ambiguity here. Do whatever you want, but if you do it here, a lot of little kids are going to wake up with nothing under their pillows. Get it?"
The tooth fairy gave Buffy the sort of look ancient beings tend to reserve for moments when they decide to simply outlive the problem. "Ugh, fine. I'll stay out of Sunnydale."
"So… you're not going to pull my teeth, then?" Spike asked.
"Not for the next…" The tooth fairy gave Buffy an appraising look, "...huh. Just don't think I'm forgetting this debt."
"Because in that case…" Spike took an apprehensive step up to her and whispered something in her pointy ear.
She nodded, surprised. "It very well might. Thank you, William. Slayer," she turned to Buffy and curtseyed in an impossibly graceful way. And then, somehow, she turned around and… left; one second she was there, the next she was gone into the receding early-morning mist.
"O… kay. So I guess she's real too." Buffy looked at Spike. "What was that whispering about?"
Spike shrugged. "Just called in an old demon favour to keep her off my back, is all. Now, unless there are any other body parts of mine you'd like to gamble with, I suppose we're done for the night?"
"...You're a pig, Spike."
"Yeah, but a pig who gets to keep his tusks. Later, Slayer."
Leaving Sunnydale behind was a setback, the tooth fairy admitted to herself as she stepped into the veils of mist and travelled through the layers of night in a direction that would give Euclid nightmares. Those vampire teeth had fetched a pretty penny and Sunnydale had seemed like a perfect cash spider. (You don't want me to explain that term, so common in Faerie, in any detail.) But the bleached and undead body of William Pratt had indeed had a point; the fangs of an ensouled vampire - with or without hair gel - would probably be worth at least 100 pairs of ordinary ones, she figured as she stepped out into Los Angeles.
no subject
Date: 2020-10-10 09:02 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-10-10 03:32 pm (UTC)Really, fairies should be scary, period.
And yeah, I'm half-tempted to make this a recurring series of the tooth fairy showing up at different points in the characters' journey, so now I kind of regret setting this fic this late in the series. But yeah, Spike kind of deserves to have this boomerang back on him - I'm sure Angel can handle it, but still.