Title: A Gift Of Time
Author: JINX Buffywatcher
Feedback: Constructive comments always
welcome: jinxascendant@hotmail.com
Pairing: Spike/Angel
Rating: Strong R to soft NC-17
Spoilers: Scattered for the last season of
Buffy, chosen in particular and scattered for Angel’s fifth season but it
diverges into AU territory pretty quickly.
Warnings: The usual goodies for Slash,
violence, swearing and all that. Additionally a canon character death is
touched on and there’s some intermittent character bashing, particularly in the
stories later in the series. *This is NOT really a Scooby friendly
story!*
Disclaimer: Just borrowing them for a bit of
harmless fun. All characters, recognisable likenesses are retained by their owner
and accredited license holders.
Writer’s Notes: This story takes place in an AU
setting. Please excuse any minor discrepancies or artist license. As always
thanks are going out to GF, Myst, Salustra, Betsy, and Preety my most excellent
group of Beta/Editors.
Writer’s Credits: Special thanks to the transcript
gurus at Buffyworld.com for their
invaluable resources that allowed parts of this story to be blended with the
actual episode dialogue.
Writer Websites: JINXI’s Archive At Shadows In A
Mirror: JINX REALM
JINXI’s LiveJournal: http://www.livejournal.com/users/jinxwatcher
The
Crypt: http://home.att.net/~lubakmetyk/crypt.htm#buffywatcher
Distribution: If I’ve already been given
permission to archive my work please consider it yours if you want it. If I
haven’t and you would like to archive it please do, all I ask is that you email
me and tell me where it’s going so I can visit.
Writer’s Dedication: For Stony: Well when I was
pondering on a gift suitable for GF’s birthday it occurred to me that the only
suitable gift was something shiny and new so here you go Stony me Darlin, part
one of a two part shiny new tale. Happy Birthday *Hugs* JINXI
Summary: Months after the destruction of
Sunnydale, Spike mysteriously reappears in the offices of Wolfram & Hart
but the mystery of his resurrection is only one of the puzzles Angel must solve
before the gift of more time he’s received to make the wrong things right, runs
out and he loses the precious gift he’s only just reclaimed.
*Introspective or retrospective
comments, quotes, lyrics, or stanzas.*
Prologue
The house was quiet upon her return
and she knew that most of the Slayers must still be out on one of their
training exercises. Only Giles and
She listened to them as they told
her the truth of what Angel had brought to her; the means to win what had begun
to look like a futile war. Such a small thing to be so powerful….
“Buffy are you listening to us? I’m
not in the mood to be explaining this all over again.” Giles says in an
exasperated tone that he seems to have adopted permanently when speaking to
her.
“I heard you Giles.” Her gaze caught
on the insignificant bit of mineral and metal that could have fed them all for
years if it were sold. It was the means to save them, to save everything and
the only price; the life of the one that wore it would be forfeited. “I heard
you and hearing it more isn’t going to make hearing it the first time any less horrible
so please don’t repeat it.” She doesn’t look up at them, knowing she’d see a
look of compassion on
“From what we’ve discovered there
are only two choices. An ordinary human can’t channel the energy and we’ll need
you and Faith fighting. As you said, you sent Angel away so that he could set
up a second line of defence in case we fail and that only leaves Spike.” Giles
tries to make his voice sound sympathetic but underneath it all she can hear
the thread of self-righteous satisfaction. He’d already conspired to get rid of
Spike once, sacrifices have to be made in war or so he said. She defied him
then and sided with a Vampire, she’s not sure that he’s forgiven her for that yet.
“The bearer must be souled, other
than human, preferably willing to die for love, willing to die to save
everything and everyone.”
“Fitting since I am asking him to do
just that.”
“You can’t ask him Buffy! This is
too important to risk on his saying no and he might if he knew the cost it
would demand from him.” Giles says quickly. “He has to be willing to wear the
amulet or its magic will not accept him as we need it to do. He must be willing
to wear it and I really believe that if he knew it would kill him that he would
refuse it. It has to be Spike.” Giles eyes narrow. “Or Angel has to be brought
back and he wears it.” He hides a superior look as Buffy reflexively flinches
and closes in for the kill. “Is the life of one Vampire worth the world?”
“No it’s not.” He feels the heavy
weight of her gaze and he knows that she perceives that while his motives may
be altruistic the enjoyment in the knowledge that one of the two Vampires that
have challenged him will be no more. “But neither is the life of a Slayer… or a
Watcher.” He lets his eyes fall away. “I’ll do what I have to do to win this
war and pray that it doesn’t damn me in the process.” She sweeps up the amulet
and clenches it into a tight fist and takes a deep breath as she heads for the
basement stairs. She has a war to win and final night to say her goodbyes. She
may be sending him off to his death but until then she will give what meagre
comfort she can provide.
She walks down the steps and finds
the man she needs working out with the punching bag strung up from the ceiling.
He’s beautiful and never more so when he’s showing hints of the violent and
destructive grace that makes him one of the most feared and fearsome Vampires
in history.
"So...where is Mr. tall, dark,
and forehead?" He says at her approach.
Buffy rolls her eyes as she steps
off the stairs. "Let me guess. You can smell him."
Spike drops his eyes at the memory.
"Yeah, that and I also used my enhanced vampire eyeballs to watch you
kissing him."
Buffy looks slightly embarrassed. "It
was..." she pauses awkwardly for a moment."...A hello."
"Most people don't use their
tongues to say hello. Or I guess they do, but...." He says scoffing.
"There were no tongues."
Buffy denies vehemently. "Besides, he's gone."
"Oh, just popped by for a
quickie, then?"
Buffy walks a few feet away towards
the punching bag. "Good, good. I haven't had quite enough jealous vampire
crap for one night."
"He wears lifts, you
know." Spike says with a dismissive sniff.
Buffy looks at the punching bag that
sports a childish drawing clearly meant to be Angel and wants to laugh because
it really does sort of look like him most of the time but settles for rolling
her eyes.
"You know, one of these days
I'm just gonna put you 2 in a room and let you wrestle it out." She says exasperated.
Spike doesn't answer right away as
he's rifling through an empty cigarette package. "No problem at this
end." He throws the pack away in disgust and for a moment he wishes that
Angel was here. He's just not really sure if it would be because he feels like
a spot of violence or if he just needs to see his Sire.
Buffy's eyes widen with excitement
as a wicked thought occurs to her. "There could be oil of some kind
involved."
Spike shakes his head slightly as he
walks up to Buffy. "Where's the trinket?"
Buffy clenches her hand around the
amulet so tightly she can feel it starting to dig into her palm. "The
who-ket?" She holds the fate of the world in the palm of her hand...
literally... so why does she want to throw it away and lie to Spike and tell him
it's just a useless trinket and then send him far away?
Spike takes a step closer." The
pretty necklace your sweetie-bear gave you. The one with all
the power. I believe it's mine now."
Buffy finds herself wanting to deny
that it is. "How do you figure?"
Spike holds out his hand." Someone
with a soul, but more than human? Angel meant to wear it, that means I'm the
qualified party."
He knows that while a Slayer may be
more than human, the potentials will need Buffy and Faith and with his Sire
gone, the duty falls to him. If he can save Buffy by walking into Hell itself
than he will. He's just not sure at the moment if it's because he really loves
her or because Angel does. He did walk away and leave him with her without a
fight. Surely if she truly meant that much to him he would have stayed to fight
for her. After all fighting is what he was born... reborn to do.
"It's volatile. We don't
know...." Buffy can't help but to try and dissuade him. He was the only
one to stand beside her through everything, she knows that. Now what she is
going to have to do is going to haunt her but she knows that one life is not
worth the world. Not even the existence of this preciously rare being that
loves on a level Humans can only aspire to.
Spike tilts his head to the side and
looks at her. "You'll be needing someone strong to bear it, then. You
planning on giving it to Andrew?"
Buffy looks at the amulet and then
at Spike. "Angel said the amulet was meant to be worn by a champion."
She knows that the man standing before her as just as much right to that title
as Angel. Perhaps even more of one since he chose the path he is walking while
Angel began his as a curse. She is struck by that realization. She has always
judged Spike by holding him up against her idealized vision of Angel; when
maybe she should have been finding Angel lacking next to what *Spike* has
accomplished?
Spike looks down, disappointed and
hurt that Buffy thinks he is unworthy after everything he has done but Buffy
then walks forward and hands it to him.
Spike looks startled and then
touched as he closes his hand around the gaudy bit of shiny stuff in his palm.
"Been called a lot of things in my time...."
Buffy finds herself needing to be
close to him, to wrap herself up in him, claw her way inside and soak up the
essence of what he is. She looks at him coyly. "Faith still has my
room...."
Spike shoots her a slightly offended
look. "Well, you're not staying here. You can't buy me off with shiny
beads and sweet talk. You got Angel breath. I'm not gonna just let you whack me
back and forth like a rubber ball. I've got my pride, you know." His voice
trails off as the provocative thought that the taste of his Sire will still be
lingering in her mouth.
Buffy looks sad but resigned as she
starts to walk away towards the stairs. "I understand."
Spike dashes around to cut her off
knowing that he can't let her go. His Sire is beyond his reach but this small
slight bit of a girl they both shared for a time, she is here.
"Clearly you don't, 'cause the
whole 'having my pride' thing was just a smokescreen."
Buffy sighs with relief. She really
needs to spend this time with Spike. He deserves to have his last night pass in
peace and love. "Oh, thank God."
Spike looks surprisingly shy and
vulnerable for a moment. "I don't know what I would have done if you'd
have gone up those stairs." If she had left so too would his last
connection to his Sire, a thought that he finds impossible to bear.
She lounges in his arms as he
sleeps, his arm draped over her as though to keep her close. They are still
fully clothed; this night isn't about sex or desire but about love. She fondles
his hand, marvelling over how such a deadly and powerful man could have skin so
soft. He sighs softly in his sleep and rolls over, removing his arm from her,
and she takes the opportunity to sit up. She stands and paces around the
basement restlessly until she finds herself before the small window, with its
tattered bit of fabric hanging limply from one corner. She looks out the
window, staring at the night sky and its full moon hanging like a pale phantom
when First appears in the guise of the now slain Caleb.
"Pretty, ain't it?" The
First says with a slight smirk.
Buffy spares him barely a glance.
She knows 'him' for what he truly is now. "You're not him."
"No, you killed him right and
proper. Terrible loss. This man was my good right arm. 'Course, it don't pain
me too much. Don't need an arm. Got an army."
Buffy scoffs at the high handed
comment. "An army of vampires. However will I fight...?"
"Every day our numbers swell.
But then you do have an army of your own. Some thirty-odd pimply-faced girls,
don't know the pointy end of a stake." The First feigns a second of
concern before the smirk returns. "Maybe I should call this off."
It's clear that it means only to try and taunt and upset her.
Buffy says drolly. "Have you
ever considered a cool name? I mean, since you're incorporeal and basically
powerless. How about 'The Taunter?' Strikes fear in the heart...." She
comments snidely.
"I *will* overrun this Earth.
And when my army outnumbers the humans on this Earth, the scales will tip and I
will be made flesh."
"Talk on. I'm not afraid of
you." Buffy realizes that she isn't in that moment, that at some point her
fear has turned into hope. She glances at the cot and the sleeping form of the
one man that has never let her down. *He* will bring them a victory as he has
every time before when his strength was added to her own.
The form of Caleb rolls his eyes.
"Then why aren't you asleep in your dead lover's arms?" It looks over
at Spike and its eyes narrow briefly before returning to her. "'Cause he can't help you. Nor Faith,
nor your friends, certainly not your wanna-slay brigade. None of those girlies
will ever know real power unless you're dead. You know the drill." It
grins and morphs into a twin of her form. "Into every generation, a slayer
is born. One girl in all the world. She alone will have the strength and skill
to— There's that word again. What you are. How you'll die. Alone. Where's your
snappy comeback?"
Buffy almost laughs and for a moment
she considers doing just that to watch the foul spirit before her frown in
confusion. "You're right."
The First looks somewhat
disappointed. "Hmm. Not your best."
Spike suddenly jerks in his sleep
and cries out. "I'm drowning in footwear!" He sits up with a start as
Buffy turns to look at him and The First disappears. What a weird dream."
He says disconcerted looking around in confusion and notices Buffy standing in
the middle of the room. "Buffy? Is something wrong?"
Buffy looks at him and almost
smiles. "No. Yeah. I just realized something. Something that really never
occurred to me before. We're gonna win."
Spike looks startled and she wants
to run back to his arms. She knows that he will walk where Angels fear to tread
and all for love. If anything could defeat hatred and corruption than it is the
purity of this Demon's heart and his love for her. She turns to look up the
stairs. It's time to win this war.
Hours Later: Inside the Hellmouth
Buffy and Spike are the only ones
left in the Hellmouth as the others flee for safety. She stares at the sight
before her. Spike is still glowing from the amulet, sending rays of light out
into the Hellmouth slowly destroying it from inside the belly of The Beast.
Buffy stands in front of him, staring, still holding her scythe and she is
transfixed. There is a light in his eyes that she has never seen, knowledge and
a resignation mixed with an agony that brings tears to her eyes. Giles didn't
tell her that his death would be one of slow inches rather than the quick death
that this warrior deserves for his service to all that will walk upon the
planet he is perishing to save.
Spike looks at her and says quietly.
"Go on, then."
She looks into his eyes and she can
see the courage and love running through his deceptively slender form. He is
truly the strongest man that she has ever known. She wants to drop her eyes
with a pained cry as she reads something else in his eyes. Somehow he... knows.
The awful knowledge that she has willingly chosen him to make this sacrifice
glares at her from his beautiful glowing eyes but there is no censure for her
there, even now.
She wants to clutch at him and take
his hand and run for safety. "No. No, you've done enough. You could still...."
Spike looks at her sadly, neither of
them believes that. "No, you've beat them back. It's for me to do the
cleanup." The walls are crumbling around them as she stares at him.
Faith calls out to Buffy from the
crumbling remains of the stairs. "Buffy, come on!"
Spike looks at her sadly.
"Gotta move, lamb. I think it's fair to say school's out for bloody
summer."
Buffy wants to scream at him to come
with her, it doesn't have to be this way! "Spike!"
She starts to reach out to grab him
and force him up the stairs.
Spike wills for her to go. His
instincts and the whispers of the power running through him have made their
will clear and what he began he is going to finish. He'll never stop until
every one of them is dead or dying.
"I mean it! I gotta do this!" He holds out his hand to stop
her from forcing him to leave.
Buffy laces her fingers through
Spike's, and they burst into flame together and she gasps as she shares the
power of his soul and the love that fuels the amulet's powerful magics even as
she wants to weep at the agony it is inflicting on him. Damn Giles for not
telling her!
Buffy tenderly looks into his eyes
and says softly. "I love you."
Spike looks at her with a sad
expression and a deep realization of the truth in his eyes.
"No, you don't. But thanks for
saying it. There is another earthquake and it forces Buffy to let go of his
hand. "Now go!" He cries, urging her to listen and Buffy runs up the
stairs. He looks around at the destruction he has wrought. "I wanna see
how it ends."
Buffy runs through the hallway,
still carrying the scythe, trying to avoid the debris that has fallen to the
floor as well as what's still falling as the ground continues to shake apart
under Spike's amulet-fuelled wrath. A tremendous pile of debris has the door is
blocked, so she sprints desperately for the staircase and heads upstairs.
Spike stands in the crumbling
Hellmouth as the sunlight pours down on him from above and channels through him
and into the amulet. He can't help but grin from ear to ear and laughing in
ecstasy as he burns up from within in the sunlight's embrace. He dusts
slowly... first his skin singes, then his muscles, then his bones as the Hellmouth crumbles in around him on his
final lingering thought of "Angelus." Then he's gone, carried away by
the light's embrace.
Miles beyond the destruction
Buffy stands looking at what was
once a town and is now little more than a lunar landscape of devastation as one
by one those that are able to walk to join her.
Giles looks down at what was once a
street and stares at the utter annihilation. “I don't understand. Who did this?”
“Spike.” Buffy walks closer to the
crater that was once her home and smiles faintly as the much abused ‘Welcome to Sunnydale’ sign still stands,
perched precariously right on the edge. As she watches the sign teeters a
little before falling backwards into the pit that used to be its city. She
smiles knowing that Spike would have found the sight inordinately amusing. She
knew that they would win, that he would win. He doesn’t… didn’t… know any other
way to be. He was a champion.
“Buffy, what are we going to do
now?” Dawn asks quietly as she grieves silently for lost friends.
“I need to go see Angel. I have to
tell him… about Spike. After that, I don’t know but *he’s* given us all the
time in the world to figure it out.” Buffy turns away after a long last look at
the monument to one man’s love and sacrifice and heads back towards the bus.
There’s the business of living to get on with.
Chapter One: Wolfram & Hart
They all troop after Angel as he enters his new office. Their first
official week in the Grand Central Station of evil has been less than
spectacular.
"Is this gonna be our lives now? Fighting our own employees, our
own clients? Are we really gonna do any good?" Fred says somewhat
disheartened as she follows them into Angel's office.
"Yes, we are. We're gonna change things. We came to Wolfram and
Hart because it's a powerful weapon, and we'll figure out how to wield
it." Angel rubs his chin as he ponders just how the hell they're supposed
to actually *do* anything good. Do the ends justify the means it takes to get
there?
"Or kill ourselves with it." Wesley makes that sound like it's
far more likely to happen.
Fred throws up her arms in a parody of a cheer. "Yay, team."
Her voice flat and toneless, sounding almost like an emotionless automaton.
"No, sooner or later they'll tip their hand, and we'll find out why
they really brought us here." He sees an unmarked envelope addressed
directly to him with no return address on his desk and out of curiosity picks
it up. His brow furrows slightly as he hears something shift inside the thin
paper conveyance. "Meanwhile, we do the work...our way, one thing at a
time." He tips the envelope and his ears twitch at the soft sound of metal
links clinking together as he rips open one end and tips it back towards his
open hand. "We deal...."
He hisses and jerks his hand away as something hot scorches his hand and
he watches as an amulet falls to the floor at his feet, a horrifyingly familiar
amulet. "...With whatever comes next." He says distractedly.
He backs up hurried as the power of the amulet immediately explodes into
action. A black whirlwind shot through with fiery embers explodes and erupts
from the amulet. It is like watching the remains of a fire pit caught up in a
tornado. The papers on Angel's desk begin to stir in the maelstrom as they are
all driven into taking several steps back. Angel sucks in an unnecessary breath
as something deep inside him clutches his dead heart and almost squeezes it
back into life. Deep inside the cage of his mind Angelus stirs with a welcoming
howl that for a moment almost shocks him into losing control but he hangs on at
the last moment to keep Angelus back.
The ashen whirlwind starts to glow with flecks of orange as something
begins to materialize inside it particle by particle. A male's skeletal form
slowly emerges from the storm of fiery ash and then it gradually fills out
until it's complete.
The wind fades and a man is standing there, screaming and grunting, in
the middle of the office, right where the amulet fell. He doubles over in pain,
panting in the after-effects of his screaming re-entry into the world.
Wesley stares in disbelief at the familiar form that has so recently
made its show stopping appearance. "Spike?" He says softly.
Angel begins to growl angrily. "Spike." Can't the damn powers
that be leave him alone?! The battle was over for him and they've dragged him
back screaming into the world. Angel mourns even as his heart sings as he
watches Spike gather his ever-present Duster around his slender form and sink
to his knees quaking violently.
Suddenly Angelus wrenches his way free long enough to send them hurtling
towards kneeling form of the traumatized vampire, their arms outstretched to
sweep him up. Angel tumbles over the coffee table behind Spike to land in a
less than graceful sprawl across the couch, half on it and half over the back.
He stares in shock and horror at Spike as the slender feline-like Vampire turns
to look over his shoulder at him with an almost peaceful look on his face. The
blank expression on his face betrays no surprise at the revelation of his
state. He watches as his friends slowly work up their courage to approach the
tragic figure and hands reach out and pass harmlessly through him as though he
was nothing more than smoke and mirrors in some magician’s stage show. Deep in
his mind Angelus roars his fury and pain to the Heavens and its cruel fates
that have visited such a horror on his Grand-childe.
“How fascinating this is.” Wesley says quietly as he waves his hand
freely in and out of Spike’s ghostly form.
“A complete corporeal inversion, you just never see this in a sentient
and aware entity.” Fred says intrigued.
“He’s not a science experiment or a sideshow attraction, he’s a
Vampire.” Angel growls quietly as he rights himself off his ungainly sprawl on
the couch and rises to his feet.
Gunn wraps and arm around Fred and pulls her back some distance. “This
is the Spike you were telling me about?” He says surprised. Somehow he thought
he would be bigger.
“Who’s a Vampire? What did you tell Charles about him? Who’s Spike?”
Fred rifles off in machine gun fashion as she stares intently at the kneeling
man. He’s really quite amazingly handsome, almost beautiful with a cat-like
grace that somehow only serves to make him seem more menacing. Well as menacing
as a splendidly powerful man curled up like a shaking kitten can be at the
moment.
Lorne takes a step closer and lifts his arm and stretches his arm out
but he’s careful not to get too close or intrude on the space being inhabited
by the quietly shivering form huddled into the roomy coat he’s wearing. “Take
it easy, no one is going to hurt you.” Lorne says calmly looking at Spike sadly.
“I don’t think anyone *can* hurt you any more than you have been already.”
“Speak for yourself music man.” Gunn says with a sneer as he glances at
the notoriously deadly Vampire.
“His name is William the Bloody. He’s a Vampire, one of the worst in recorded
history. He was second only to….” Wesley clears his throat and states. His eyes
are locked on the Vampire and he marvels that of all the things that have been
written about him, why it has never been mentioned that he is… perfect. He
possesses the symmetry and chiselled flawlessness that is all but unknown in
the males of any species. The books recount many reports of Angelus’ inhuman
charms but there are few if any references to William’s looks. He finds that
astounding for the feline-like creature before him is… perfect.
Angel scowls at Gunn as he slowly approaches Spike. He is taken aback by
the stillness and quiet demeanour of the blond. Spike is like the ocean, never
still, always moved by tides and eddies even if they can be felt more than seen;
he is never still, never quiet. “Lorne, can you get anything off him?” He asks
quietly as he reaches Spike’s side without incident and kneels down beside him.
There is no spark of awareness that even betrays that Spike is aware he is
there or cares if he is and that he finds unacceptable.
“You know it doesn’t really work that way Angelcakes. All I get is a
general feeling of detachment and pain. I’m not sure he’s even aware that we
are in here with him… or rather that he is here with us.” Lorne says sadly.
“Can you sense him Angel?” Wesley asks interested.
“Sort of, it’s more like I can feel the sense that he is near by or as
if he was here but left again and I came in afterwards. It’s more of an
impression than an actual sense of him. My De… Angelus can sense him, I’m
positive of it.” He admits finally, lifting his hand and letting it hover just
short of touching the tousled platinum curls, as though he were stroking his
hair.
“So your connection wouldn’t be strong enough to reach him through the blood
bond?” Wesley says regretfully. “It would be unwise to release Angelus to
attempt it I would think.”
“He is my Grand-childe not my Childe and it has been years since I last
fed on him; our blood bond is almost non-existent. Drusilla is his Sire perhaps
if we can find her she can reach….” He is startled as Spike slowly turns his
head to look over his shoulder at him, a glimmer of true awareness entering his
vacant eyes for the first time since his appearance.
“Drusilla has flown as a butterfly from its cocoon. Ashes to ashes and
dust to dust.” He says quietly. “She has not come to see me in many and many a
day.” His voice sounds strange, as though he were talking to himself rather
than to them but the nonsense collection of words sounds like something Drusilla
would say. “Her Sweet has turned bitter and she comes no more to whisper me to
sleep.”
“What are you saying Spike? Has something happened to Drusilla? Can you
sense her?” Spike only repeats his words from before.
“You had him for a moment I think Angelcakes. I still think that somehow
we don’t seem real to him. It’s like he’s watching all of this happening to
someone else but he answered you when you said Drusilla’s name so part of him
is aware of us but unable to reach out somehow.” Lorne says shaking his head.
“It’s like he’s in shock… or waking up after a very long sleep. You have to
find a way to ground him in the here and now Angelkins, force him to accept we
are reality.” Lorne advises.
“Spike, talk to me.” Angel says gruffly but there is no reaction. “Spike,
don’t ignore me!” He growls angrily and while he can see his muscles rippling
tensely beneath his clothing Spike doesn’t acknowledge him. Angel swallows his
anger and channels it, touching the core of the power that marks him as the elder
of the Aurelius line. “William, you will attend me *now*.” His voice is softly
quiet but run through with an implacable steel backbone that transforms it into
something so much more than six simple words. Wesley unconsciously shivers and
backs up as that tone of voice and the thread of command in it; that was pure
Angelus.
Spike slowly turns to face him and their eyes meet and lock for the
first time. “Angelus?” He says quietly but then tilts his head and his brow
wrinkles as his eyes narrow briefly. “No… Angel.” He says definitively.
“Yes, Wil…Spike… its Angel. Can you tell us what’s happened to you?”
“I… I died… again.” He says slowly and simply as though he was talking
to a moron who could grasp only the most basic of concepts. “Lovely trinket you
gave to the Slayer, Mate, it really lit up my life.” Spike says in a soft growl
showing a hint of his former fire but it is quickly banked as he looks around
at all of the people staring at him.
“She made it Spike, most of them did.” Angel says softly, knowing that
he’ll want to know about Buffy and surprised that he hasn’t already asked.
Spike has always been borderline obsessively possessive of those he considers
‘his’ and though he died… again… he doubts that will ever change.
He’s surprised to see no reaction from Spike to his announcement. “Where
am I? Is this still the Hellmouth?”
“No we’re in LA now.” Lorne says helpfully. “But a lot of people make
the same mistake.” Spike only shrugs eloquently.
“Angel we should take him to the lab and run some tests. See if we can
discover what’s going on.” Fred says shifting her weight nervously as Spike’s
gaze falls on her.
“Spike go with her. If we can find out how you got this way then maybe
we can help you.” Angel says quietly finally letting his hand drop away.
Spike’s eyes swing back to him. “Why would you want to? You never have
before.” He says simply.
“Go with her William and do what she tells you to do and no back talk
Childe.” The quiet tone and steely will are back and just as effective as Spike
struggles to his feet somewhat weakly but follows the shy young woman from the
room. Gunn motions to Lorne and they trail after the pair, leaving Wes and
Angel alone.
Wes leans over and carefully picks up the amulet and Angel quickly
snatches it from him and places it on the desk. He doesn’t know why he panicked
but seeing the amulet in any hand but his own made him suddenly frantic. “Be
careful with that Wes, we don’t know what it will do to a human.” He says
quickly to cover up his seemingly rude grabbing.
“Why *do* you want to help Spike?” Wes asks candidly. “He was right in
wondering as your relationship has been less than cordial as I am given to
understand.”
“He’s my Grand-childe Wes.” He says exasperated.
“As I recall you set your last relatives on *fire* and roast them like
marshmallows and you *staked* the one before that.” Wes points out, crossing
his arms over his chest and looking implacable.
“He has a soul Wes.” Wes jumps in shock at that revelation. “And
whatever happened to him, it happened because of this damn thing that *I* gave
to Buffy.” Angel growls flicking the amulet with his fingertips until it rocks
on the desk wildly. “If I hadn’t let Buffy talk me into leaving… hell she
didn’t even talk me into leaving, I just waddled off like a tame puppy when she
told me to. If I had stayed what happened to him would have happened to me,
maybe it was *supposed* to be me.” He says brusquely.
“Well that does explain some things I suppose. What do you think all
that cryptic stuff about Drusilla meant?” Wes asks curiously.
“I haven’t been able to sense Drusilla since I tried to roast her like a
marshmallow as you put it. I’m pretty sure trying to kill your Childer
adversely affects the Sire/Childe bond.” Angel says wryly.
“I’ll go lend a hand in the lab, maybe what happened is mystical and I
can be of some help.” Wesley decides and turns to leave the room as Angel falls
heavily into his chair. His eyes fall on the amulet and lock on it and he
stares at it hard for several moments as though willing it to tell its story.
After a minute of stubborn silence he snarls and leaps out of his chair and
opens the wall safe that he had reset so that only he knows the combination. He
sweeps up the amulet and carefully places it inside and closes the heavy
fireproof door. As soon as the lock is scrambled he lets out a relieved breath,
feeling better now that it is locked safely away in a place only he has access
too. He draws a deep breath and leaves his office for Fred’s lab.
Chapter Two
The late hour blessedly has the lab section fairly deserted and they can
carry out their tests in relative quiet.
Spike looks at the tiny pixie holding up something that looks like a
supermarket price scanner. "So what are you then? Scanner girl?"
"I'm Fred, Winifred Burkle. I head up Wolfram & Hart's Science
Department." She says shyly, trying to repress an insane urge to giggle
and blush under the beautiful man's gaze.
Spike furrows his brow and tries to remember some things that he's
heard. "Wolfram & Hart. I've heard of that but I thought it was a law
firm."
"It is, among other things." Fred says with a smile, watching
her scanner.
"Also heard they represent the worst evil in the universe."
Spike says eyes widening in surprise as he remembers that little fact from the
tales he's heard.
"It did, among other things, but now I'm in charge." Angel
says strangely managing to be proud and ashamed at the same time.
Spike shows a hint of his old grin and spirit. "Are you now?"
"Weird. I'm getting electromagnetic readings consistent with
spiritual entities, but there's no ectoplasmic matrix." Fred picks up a
folder and reviews the contents.
"Ok for those of us with IQ's that aren't in the billions what does
that mean?" Gunn asks with a confused expression on his face.
Fred looks at him kindly. "Ectoplasm's what makes ghosts visible to
the human eye. If he's a ghost, technically we shouldn't be able to see
him." She makes a notation in the folder before clicking the pen closed
and placing it back in her pocket. "And I'm detecting brainwave
activity."
"On Spike?" Angel chuckles, seeing an opportunity to tease him
back for his less than stellar belief that he can run this monster of building.
"That *is* weird." He shoots Spike a slight grin hoping he'll realize
he's not trying to start a fight. His reaction though will be a mystery as he
suddenly winks out of existence.
He is back within moments but Angel will never forget the feeling
ripping through his chest as he watched Spike vanish, wondering if it would be
the last time he’d ever see him. He has so much he wants to say but he keeps
getting swept up in their old rivalry and allows the distraction. There has to
be a way to help him, there has to be. If anyone can find it than it’s the
people in this room now. He has faith in them.
Chapter Three
It seems faith isn’t as easy to keep as once it was as week after week
passed with no resolution to Spike’s problem. With every week that trickled by
he became even more the ghost than he was and he was already doing a pretty
good impression of one. Angel knew that something significant had happened to
Spike at some point, either during the fight that took his life or wherever he
went to once it was gone. The being before him was new though he could see
hints of William and Spike peeking from the patchwork of this new amalgamation.
If he hadn’t have already known how much Spike had changed, he may have been
surprised by how much he had grown and matured during their century apart.
When a rogue Necromancer threatened to end his existence it was a clever
plan by Spike that routed Hainsley’s machinations and put an end to the threat.
Then the vile perversion that was Matthias Pavayne began to pursue Spike with
the intention of consigning him to Hell and thereby escaping that fate for
himself. When it came down to a choice between his freedom from his ghostly
state and Fred’s life the choice was accomplished with the eloquent response of
a left hook that threw the foul spirit into the field meant for him. When the
malignant spirit arrived he was there waiting for him. No one tries to send an
Aurelian to Hell, especially not one of his family members and gets away with
it. He made sure that Pavayne would have an eternity to regret his decision,
consigned to a fate not unlike that Spike is enduring but just so much worse
really.
Then came the day that he found out that miracles could be found in the
strangest places, including plain brown paper wrapped boxes full of nothing but
blinding flashes of light. He was in his office when the sound of something
heavy hitting his door and causing it to rattle brought him hurrying around his
desk to throw it open it and stare at Spike laid out at his feet like some
pagan sacrifice. They stared at each other neither speaking as their senses were
flooded with each other’s presence and he knew then that however it had
happened, Spike was back.
Neither however could seem to unlock their muscles to move and could
only stand… or lay… as they were with their eyes locked on each other. It
wasn’t until he saw the pink garbed tornado that was Harmony bearing down on
them with a happy squeal that he noticed the crowd starting to gather and the
hands starting to reach out to touch Spike that he snapped out of it.
“Don’t touch him!” He snarls darting forward to crouch protectively over
the supine younger Vampire and growling menacingly until the crowd hurriedly
backs up. Angel shoves the mug in his hand towards Harmony who squeaks like a
mouse as some of it splashes over onto her skirt. He could care less however as
he tenderly sweeps Spike up and carries him into his office as though he were
made of fragile glass. “Harmony, bring me two carafes of blood, *now*.” He
calls back as he slams his office door shut with a jerk of his elbow.
He crosses the office to set his too light Grand-childe on the couch
before he attacks his clothing until all he is left with within mere seconds
are the low slung jeans that cling to him like skin. A low rumbling growl of
warning and a snarl has Spike answering with a soft purring whimper and relaxing under his
Grand-sire’s close perusal.
Angel purrs softly, the sight, feel, scent, and taste of Spike’s skin
filling him as the Childe of his Childe lies beneath his questing hands and
senses. He instinctively examines his Grand-childe and offers him his
reassurance in the traditional Vampire sense. The door opens and he turns to
look over his shoulder with a snarl as Harmony hurries in juggling a tray. She
cries out sharply at the sight of the clearly predatory looking Master Vampire
perched over Spike but immediately cuts it off and drops her eyes as Angel
growls.
“Put the tray down and get out. *No one* comes in here Harmony, get
security up here to guard the door. I don’t care what you have to do but clear
the calendar for the rest of today and tomorrow.” Angel snarls and Harmony
opens and closes her mouth several times before she can force the words out to
reply.
“I’m sorry, Angel….” Angel growls softly. “…I mean Sir….” The growl
gains in volume and Harmony stammers. “…Elder, I meant to say Elder, Sir I
swear it. You have many important meetings tomorrow and one tonight. You’ve
been preparing for a week and you said it was urgent that you…”
“Have Wes and Gunn handle it Harmony! There is nothing… *no one* that is
as important as Spike right now. I don’t care what you have to do but handle
it, understand?!” Angel snarls, curling his top lip back to reveal that his
fangs have dropped in a not so subtle threat gesture.
“Yes, Sir, elder, Sir.” She squeaks all but running to the coffee table
and dropping the tray before scurrying out of the door and slamming it behind
her with the sound of the dominate Vampire’s growls chasing at her heels.
Angel chuckles huskily as he turns back to his Grand-childe and nuzzles
Spike’s chin with his cheek. He makes a soft wordless murmur of comfort deep in
his throat and chest until he can feel the answering vocalizations and caresses
from Spike as his Demon responds to the Elder of its bloodline.
Satisfied that his ordeal hasn’t irrevocably injured his Grand-childe
Angel settles onto the couch, wedging his back into a corner and opens his
arms. Spike hesitates for only a moment before slowly inching his way towards
the offered comfort. The process is painfully slow but inexorable.
As soon as he is close enough, Angel reaches out and gathers him into
his arms and pulls him closer so that he is resting across his lap with his
head resting against his chest. He smiles as he sees Spike glancing at his
duster and after a minute or two of indecision his hand flashes out until its
dark folds are settled over him cocooning him in its comforting embrace. He
tucks it around the young one with a gentle smile. It is indeed gentle for deep
inside him the unrestrained fury that is Angelus has become a purring kitten,
reaching out to soothe and succour one of his youngest Childer.
He slides his arm beneath the coat to trace over the marble hard
contours of a truly impressive chest, his palm tingling as it rides over the
rock hard abs that ripple beneath his touch as Spike presses up against the
caress. He lets his hand rest comfortably low on Spike’s stomach, his ring and
little finger resting beneath the waistband of the low riding black jeans, the
backs caressed lightly by the denim as he rubs his hand lightly over that
washboard belly.
“You’re too thin.” He says quietly. He reaches out and manages to snag
one of the carafes of heated blood that Harmony brought for them with a couple
of mugs and pours a generous amount into one of the ceramic mugs.
He turns the mug to pick it up by the handle and freezes as he can make
out the words staring at him from the mug. ‘Angels
do it with their halos on’. He hesitates for a moment and then slowly turns
the other mug around and his mouth drops open. It’s unmistakably a hand drawn
image of Spike, from the ubiquitous black duster to the platinum pale hair and
there is even a small grey railroad spike in his tiny hand but it’s the words
that have him reeling. ‘Getting Spike’d makes
my day’. The choked snicker he can feel beneath his spread hand tells him
that Spike’s seen the mugs colourful decorations.
“I swear I don’t know why I keep her around sometimes.” He mutters as he
picks up the mug he filled. A slender long-fingered hand reaches out for the
mug only to fall away as it is deftly wielded beyond his grip. Surprised
glacial blue eyes follow the mug to another set of lips and watch incredulously
as it is gleefully consumed, refilled, consumed and repeated for yet a third
time.
After the fourth time gentle hands urge him to move onto his side and
stunned eyes watch the fluttering of those same powerful hands slowly slipping
off first the tailored silk jacket and then the dark grey silk shirt and the
soft cotton undershirt below that until a truly impressive chest is bared to
his gaze. A swiftly brutal flash of a deadly talon and a slowly weeping wound
is slashed open across a nipple and thick scarlet rivulets begin to leak out
seductively.
“Come, Precious, you must feed and my blood will be better than this
animal swill these damned souls have consigned us to.” The voice is the same
but the whiskey smooth brogue, that silky soft accent that infuses the words is
music that he has not heard in over a century. It is the sound of beginnings,
of family, and of home, it is….
“Ang… Angelus…?” He shudders under the possessive hand that slides
through his hair to cup the back of his head and gently force his mouth down to
the seeping wound.
“Yes Precious.” The whiskey brogue dances over the endearment. “The soul
isn’t an utter Bastard, well alright my Lad he *is* but I have promised to
behave.” Spike almost laughs at the sound of revulsion in his Grand-sire’s
voice; he knows that behaving himself is not really something Angelus has that
much experience with. “As long as I don’t feed off of Humans or play with his
treasured lackeys he will allow me my time with you. It’s worth it to be out of
the cage even if it’s only now and then.”
Spike nurses quietly at the wound and marvels at the changes he senses
but yet cannot bring himself to trust, not after all that has happened. He
shudders as powerful arms close around him and lock him against one of the few
bodies that has ever made him feel delicate and protected. One hand kneads
through his hair as the other explores his body with a thoroughness that a
doctor would be proud of.
“You are stronger my Lad, I can feel it coursing through you and lurking
just beneath the surface waiting to explode. You are far too thin, the poor
quality of the animal blood you have been forced to exist upon no doubt. You
will feed from me at least twice a day from now until I tell you to stop, do
you understand?”
Spike licks the wound until it closes and leans back to nod his head
silently. He stiffens marginally and quakes with faint shivers as a hand cups
his face to stroke a thumb along a cheekbone. When no pain chases the caress
across his cheek he slowly relaxes and allows it to continue.
“There was a time when my touch would make you quake for a different
reason Childe. I am sorr… in Sunnydale; I was insane you know that it wasn’t
truly me and I… regret what happened there. I was out of my mind but the
madness was so complete I lost my true self beneath its weight. Just for the
record, the whole sending the world into Hell thing? Not one of the best ideas
I ever came up with.”
Spike smiles faintly as the tenderly caressing hand gently urges his
head down to rest on the cushion of the firm chest beneath him as a hand
strokes his back in small circles and rubs.
“That our bloodline should come to this… it is unfathomable to me.” Angelus
says sadly. “Darla slain by our own hand, the betrayal of the Sire. The soul
stood by and let a Human destroy our Penn and set our Dark Princess on fire
with her newly fledged former Grand-sire. Your mutilation at the hands of
disgusting Humans and being left alone to cope with no assistance from Sires or
bloodline both was intolerable. I could
not sway the soul; he saw only that one of the evils we had created at least
would do no harm to his treasured humans. Betrayals upon betrayals and The Lore
abandoned. A Childe that has so lost his way that he would seek a soul so that
*Humans* would accept him, left to fight and perish alone. You shall not be
alone any longer. You and Drusilla… you are the last of my legacy and I must
protect you. The soul will allow this at last, you have shown him the truth
that my presence could not get him to accept. A soul doesn’t make you good any
more than the lack of one makes someone evil; it is a choice like any other.
The soul just makes some decisions easier to live with.”
“Sire… there is something that I have to tell you but I don’t know how
to….” Spike’s quiet voice finally breaks his silence after nearly an hour.
“My silver-tongued poet who can talk the moon from the sky to shine in
his hair, the mouth that launched a thousands battles, the lips that could
reduce a vicar’s daughter into a wanton harlot? You my Precious Lad are struck
silent? How very extraordinary that is.” An amused voice rumbles above him.
“Sire….” Spike slowly lifts his head to meet those whiskey chocolate
brown eyes that narrow with worry at the sight of unshed tears in his youngest
Childe’s eyes. He pushes off his welcoming perch and falls to his knees beside
the sofa and looks up sadly and clears his throat gruff with tears and tries
again. “Sire of my Sire, the wellspring from which I sprang and to which I must
always return….”
Angelus stiffens and starts shaking his head as the horrible words
assault his ears. “No William, *NO*!
Tell me it cannot be that she….”
“Your Childe, Drusilla the Seer, has returned to the spring, let all
Aurelius mourn. I am Childe no longer for my sire no longer walks amongst us. I
am Spike, William the Bloody, Aurelius Master, out of Drusilla the Seer, she
who was out of Angelus, the Scourge of
There are twin cries as ivory fangs slipping like needles into a vein
under the equally pale skin. Angel and Angelus both rejoice in the taste of
Spike’s blood. It is vanilla and whiskey with the sharp bite of cinnamon and it
is heat and power; far more power than a Vampire of his age, even one as strong
as he is. It is intoxicating and beguiling and they never want to stop feeding.
It’s more than blood; it is life and no where does life cling more tightly to
Spike than in the uncommon power of his blood.
Blood; it sustains them, it is more than the food that they must
consume, it is the air that they breathe and the energy that animates them.
Taken from a living source, there isn’t anything quite like it nor are any two
sources the same. It is all about the blood, everything a person is, has done,
or will ever be is in their blood. Take the blood from another Vampire and you
take their strength as you take their existence. The blood of a Sire or
Childer, that is in another class of experience and where the oldest Orders
draw their true power from. Drinking from one’s Sire regularly creates a
powerful Childe and the closer to the head of the Order your Sire should be the
more power contained in their blood. A little strengthens and fortifies as it
heals damage… but a lot, taken regularly… that creates a Vampire with the
strength often only seen in the old ones. It is however a double-edged sword
for the more blood a Sire and Childe exchange, the tighter the bonds that hold
them together grow. True it keeps a potentially powerful Childe in line but it
chains their Sire to the same degree as the need to be close grows in direct
proportion to how much and how often their blood is exchanged.
Spike quakes faintly and the arms around him instinctively tighten and
cradle him as the latent link that has fallen quiescent in their years
estranged from each other is ripped open and renewed.
“We are truly the last then and the Order shall pass with us. The soul
will never make another and his control has grown, I do not think that I will
ever be free as once I was. And you my Precious have never sired a Childe nor
do I suspect you ever will.”
“I remember my promise Sire. I have never broken the faith.” Spike
swears quietly and Angelus smiles gently as he knew that without being told.
Despite being a Demon, William has always kept his bargains and agreements,
bolstered by his own strange sense of honour. Once his word is given it truly
becomes his bond.
“Tell me again? I want to hear the words again.” Angelus says eagerly.
“I will have no home where you are not welcome. I shall not walk where
your feet cannot follow. I will have no God before you and no God after you. I
am blood of your blood now and eternal bound. I will place none above you, not
Master, Sire, nor Childe, as you have made me so I will always be, bound in the
blood of the first Aurelius from your veins to mine, as you will then let it be
so.” Spike intones solemnly remembering the vow Angelus asked of him long ago,
word for word and with them comes the peace of belonging.
“You have kept your word for all these many years despite your
estrangement from The Soul?”
“I cannot and will not lie to you Sire. There were times that I did long
for a Childe of my own, someone to see in me what I saw in you all those years
ago, one who would look at me as I looked upon you then. You were my sun and my
daylight, everything that I wanted but that I could no longer have.”
“You speak in the past tense Childe? Do you not look at me now and see
in me what you saw then? Am I truly so very different with a soul then?”
“Am I now as I was then?” Spike asks quietly, on a stifled moan as a
talent tongue sweeps across his skin as Angelus feeds slowly, keeping their
rapport open and throbbing between them.
“No you were truly the Childe that I named you then. You are a Master
now, I can feel the strength in you, taste it on your skin, and smell it
radiating from your pores. You are stronger than your years, much stronger than
you should be. Tell me what happened to you Childe. I know that you have been
keeping something from the Soul. I want to know what that is and you *will*
tell me.”
“After… in the Hellmouth when I was…. I died… again.” Spike stutters
faintly. “It was so lonely… there….”
“Do you know where you were? You… you weren’t in Hell?”
“I was nowhere. Everywhere was just… nothing at all. I was all that
there was and it felt like I was all that there had ever been as I floated on
the maelstrom at the center of it all. Then one day I wasn’t alone anymore and
Drusilla was with me. I knew then that she was gone too. She said that she was
lonely without us and she decided to take a walk and try to find us again. It
was sunny at the time.” Spike says sadly. “She would come to see me now and
then. She said that ‘they’ told her that she could so that the waiting would be
a little easier to bear but then one day she just never came back. When I was
finally released… I felt for her presence and that was when I knew it had
really happened, that she was really gone. I knew that it had all really
happened and that I was returning to a world that had treated me less than
kindly and that I would be alone.”
“But you weren’t alone I… he… *we* were here for you, many years too
late but here at last.” Angelus says quietly. “You could have gone to the
Slayer William or one of those infants she persists in coddling and calling her
friends as much as that pains me to say. I’m sure that they would have been
glad to know that you were alright… why didn’t you ever ask the Soul to help
you? Not that he offered anal retentive bastard that he can be but I think he
would have listened and helped if he could have.”
“I’m sure that they would have been overjoyed to find out I was back.
You never know when you’ll need a sacrificial lamb again, especially one that
will walk *itself* to the slaughterhouse.” Spike says bitterly.
“What the Hell does that mean?!” Angelus exclaims with a growl but he
calms as he feels his only remaining Childe trembling in his arms at the tone.
He forces his locked muscles to relax and resumes rubbing Spike’s back and
cleaning up the traces of his feeding with a greedy tongue. Under his
ministration’s calming effects his Childe is once more quiescent against him.
“You may speak freely to me Childe, the Soul slumbers within and only my ears
are awake to hear your tale. Trust the Sire if you cannot find it in you to
trust the Soul.”
Spike leans back to stare deep into the soft whiskey brown and gold
flecked eyes. After a minute he slowly nods and settles back down against
Angelus’ chest and lets his eyes slip shut as he remembers things he’d rather
have forgotten. There have been many times since his return that he has wanted
to reach out and talk to Angel, the Soul as Angelus calls him now, but he knew
that he could not. “It means that she gave me that little bauble to wear for
the big fight *knowing* what it would do to me if I wore it. When I wore it… it
whispered to me all its secrets and her lies. I could have refused it then but
I didn’t I accepted the price and world was saved, you and Dru were safe. She
knew what the amulet would do to the one that wore it before she gave it to me,
gave it to me and didn’t tell me what it would do to me.”
Angelus swears violently and jerks his Childe to him tightly. “The Soul
brought it to her and they did not know what it would do. Wesley tried to
discover its secrets but could find barely anything, I swear this to you Childe
on *my* honour. The Soul would not have left if he had known, he may have been
a disaster as a Sire without my influence but he would not have let a Childe be
sacrificed in that manner.”
“I know that Sire and I think she did too. Giles told her that it must
be either you or I and she could not bear that you should… so she chose me to
be the sacrifice the power demanded. The sad thing is as I had a lot of time to
think on things. If she had told me I would still have borne the price if it
had meant that you would be safe. After all I had done, what I had already
sacrificed, they couldn’t trust me.”
“Time… how long were you gone my Precious Boy? Only months passed here
but it was longer for you. I sense this in you and I can taste it in your blood
and sense it in the air all around you.” Angelus strokes his boy’s cheek and he
drops his eyes.
“I do not know how long exactly Sire. I stopped counting after the first
three centuries passed and time meant little in… that place.” Spike admits on a
choked gasp as tears threaten.
Angelus throws his head back and roars his fury to the Heavens as his
Boy weeps with his face hidden against his chest ashamed to look at him as he
displays such weakness before his Sire. “Oh my Precious Moonlight Lad, that you
should be consigned to such a fate it saddens me deeply. Give to me your agony
Childe, let me make the burden light and be comforted that it shall not happen
again. I will make peace with the Soul if it means that I may look after you.
You are the last and the greatest of my legacy and I will have you survive and
thrive. He must not deny me this, he will *not* deny me this.” Angelus promises
as he tightens his arms around his Boy and holds him tightly as over a century
of pain pours down his chest in a waterfall of tears.
It is over an hour later that the sobbing becomes sighing and eventually
silence as Spike slumbers in the wake of his emotional exhaustion. He is not
awake to see or feel the subtle changes that wash over his Sire as the Soul
awakens and Angelus once more slumbers quietly within him, purring in
contentment at his time with his Precious Boy. He sleeps peacefully as Angel
looks down upon him and only tightens his arms and carefully picks up the
sleeping boy and carries him tenderly to his private elevator and up to his
penthouse. Spike belongs to him as much as he does to Angelus, if not more so
for the weight of their souls and he has a Boy that needs to be taken care of.
Chapter Four
Spike awakens to the rising moon’s siren song. Despite these months
living by all hours thanks to the necro-tempered glass that sheathes the whole
building, night is still the time that calls to his Demon above all others. He
lifts his head sleepily and blinks flutters his eyelashes until the sleep
clears from his eyes and he stares. He
has seen few sights that could equal the sight of the full moon outside the
penthouse windows; that looks so close that it seems he could reach out and
touch it if he desired; to equal the sight of the man sleeping beside him.
He reaches up slowly and traces a fingertip along the curve of his jaw
so lightly that even his sensitive skin can barely perceive the contact. He
knows somehow that the face under his fingertip is no longer that of his Sire
but that of the sleeping Soul. They are resting face to face and Angel’s arms
rest around him lightly and every now and then his hand moves rubbing his back
lightly. He wonders who brought him up here and put him to bed and more
importantly still, who it was that got into bed with him. Some indefinable
instinct tells him that it was Angel and still he marvels to find himself here
naked in Angel’s bed. He would not have expected such kindness from Angel as he
has never before bothered to well bother before now. He wonders if an old trick
still works on his Sire’s souled version and he carefully reaches out and
lightly skims his hand Angel’s side, so lightly that he disturbs only the tiny
almost invisible hairs on his smooth skin. He smiles as Angel sighs and rolls
away from him, protecting his vulnerable ticklish side without really awakening
and allowing him the space to move silently from the bed.
He pauses beside the bed and watches Angel carefully, nodding in
satisfaction as he doesn’t appear to be awakening in his absence. As much as he
was allowed… made to really… feed earlier has likely placed Angel’s body in a
partial healing sleep. Spike lifts his hand to ghost his fingertips over the
freshly renewed claim mark on his neck. He knows that what little blood his
Sire reclaimed is no where near the volume that he surrendered to him and briefly
considers heating some blood and waking him to feed. Seeing how peacefully he’s
sleeping however he decides to let the restorative sleep accomplish its
purpose. He needs to think some things through and being this close to his
Sire, Souled or not, has always short-circuited his brain so he decides to take
a walk. He looks around for his clothes but he spots only his jacket folded
neatly over the back of a chair. Shrugging with unconcern at his nudity he
slips into the coat and quietly out of the penthouse apartment and up to the
roof.
Winter has taken its inevitable hold on the city and the usually lovely
The peace and beauty of this rooftop retreat soon soothes his worries
away despite the cold. Like the rest of the monstrosity of a building, every
available space has its function and the roof is no exception. A large atrium
encloses a large portion of the roof beneath the protection of reinforced
plastic polymer necro-tempered glass. Beneath its protection rests a lovely
rooftop pool and spa facility to rival that of any posh resort. Open
twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, and three hundred and sixty-five
days a year, it is a haven of relaxation that is staffed by six Humans during
the day and three Demon attendants by night. Many of the executives take advantage
of the facility. While it is rare to see many of the lower level employees up
on the top floors of the building; some who are brave enough to make the upward
journey; take advantage of the convenient luxury as well. He suspects that Angel and his friends likely
don’t even know that its up here any more than they know about the fully
equipped gym on the third floor, the fully functional restaurant on the seventh
or the always busy brothel on the tenth. Wolfram & Hart never met a buck
that they didn’t like and they’ve found many a myriad of ways to earn it. There
wasn’t much to do when he was the ghost in the machinery as they say, other
than walk around this monstrosity of a building and he dares say that he knows
more about what it harbours than Angel and his cronies do.
The outer ring of the building is an excellent small scale
representation of a manicured park, complete with old fashioned street lights
and large sturdy iron and cedar benches and carefully tended expanses of sunken
beds of lawn and other growing things. It’s really a marvel of modern
engineering. A fair sized area remains concreted and glows faintly in the
moonlight from the embedded fibre optic cables that line the helipad. A small
but well equipped outbuilding that services the helipad is tucked neatly out of
the way in the distant corner of the building. Several smaller buildings here
or there serve their purposes also unobtrusively. It’s a bit like a man-made
oasis, a bit unnatural but no less beautiful or functional for its artificial
origins.
Spike strolls to his favourite spot in the North-West corner and hops up
on the low dividing wall with the ease and grace of jungle cat. The gently
sloping roofline of a storage shed merges into the concrete of the retaining
wall and forms a natural recliner that boasts the best view in the building… if
one isn’t overly squeamish about heights that is. Spike stretches out along the
wall and leans back crossing his bare feet at the ankle as he digs into a
pocket and pulls out his cigarettes and lighter.
He is smoking and looking out over the city when the tiny scrape of a
sole reaches his ears heralding the soft footfalls of someone approaching and
he turns to look and is rather surprised to see a somewhat sheepish looking
Wesley. In deference to the chilly weather he is turned out in heavy woollen slacks,
a thick coat and a fuzzy knitted cap but still the bite of winter is there in
his rosy cheeks and the puff of breath that betrays the warmth of his living
form.
“I hope that I’m not disturbing you. I didn’t know that anyone else
liked to come up here too….” Wesley glances at his watch. “…Especially not at
two in the morning.” Wesley adds with a small smile. “I heard about the
mysterious package from Harmony, who’s probably managed to tell the whole
building by now, that certainly was mysterious but good luck however it
happened.”
“The more the merrier, pet.” Spike says softly as he exhales a billowy
cloud of clove scented smoke. He lifts his leg to brace his foot and shift his weight
slightly to the side so that he can look at Wesley without straining, resting
his arm on his raised knee. He doesn’t notice the leather of his jacket falling
away to display much of his clearly bare form to the suddenly dry-mouthed
ex-Watcher.
“Aren’t you a little… cold?” Wesley asks with a cough trying not to
stare but failing abominably.
Spike follows the line of his gaze and chuckles huskily; his jacket is
still covering the best parts while displaying a good portion of the rest of
him. “One benefit to being a Vampire I suppose; you don’t really notice the
temperature much and cold isn’t as much of a problem as the heat as there’s no
combustion issues.” He replies with a shrug.
“Really that’s fascinating the Diaries don’t really contain much about
the physical aspects of being a Vampire.” Wesley says trying to sound
nonchalant.
Spike has to stifle a chuckle as
he’s forced to wonder if Wesley realizes he’s bouncing up and down on the balls
of his feet like a kid trying to jump up and look in a candy store window. “If
you want to ask the questions, I’ll tell you if I know the answers.” He offers
chuckling quietly at Wesley’s frantic nods and thinks privately that he looks a
little like the bobble-head ornament that used to grace the dash of his DeSoto.
“Why don’t we start with the temperature tolerance?” Wesley says
excitably. Spike laughs as Wesley climbs up on his perch forcing him to move
his legs and change position to make room for him.
“I’m not sure what the exact temperatures are mate but I can tell you
some things. As far as low temperatures, we’re pretty tolerant but there are
some environments that still prove hostile. While I doubt freezing solid would
kill us it would certainly render us immobile and should that continue we’d
either starve, being unable to move or we’d enter a hibernation of sorts. As
for high temperatures those are more dangerous for us but only once the
temperature is high enough that combustion becomes a factor. Don’t get me wrong
though mate, Vampires and Humans are alike in some ways so while we may be able
to survive a wider range of cold and to a degree heat, we are still only
*comfortable* within a more Human tolerant range so we tend to congregate in
temperate areas.” Spike replies, sounding like he’s giving a lecture.
“Additionally we tend to stay in areas frequented by our pre… source of food.”
“You almost said prey didn’t you?” Wes asks having caught the quick
replacement phrase.
Spike nods a little self-consciously. “Yes I almost did but I don’t see
Humans that way anymore but to almost any other Vampire that would be what you
are. They’d show as much concern for you as they would you would for a
hamburger you’d eaten.”
“Well that’s a bit simplistic isn’t it really? Hamburgers don’t feel
pain or have families.” Wes argues.
“Why don’t you talk to a cow then get back to me on that?” Spike snaps
with a slight flash of his fang as his temper flares for a moment. “Humanity
can be such arrogant wankers! You think that all that matters is your own
species. You rape and pillage and decimate whole species in your
short-sightedness and not even just to feed yourselves but because they’re in
your way. And before you start arguing that none of those species are sentient,
don’t even bother, Humanity doesn’t even understand their *own* sentience much less
that of any other species. I’ve argued this around in circles with Giles for
hours and it’s always the same, animals aren’t like people….” Spike lifts his
hand and makes a duck bill motion with his hand opening and closing it and
mimicking Giles yammering on and on as he sometimes does and it startles a
laugh out of Wesley.
“Giles doesn’t speak for everyone Spike but he sure likes to try
sometimes.” The pair shares a quiet laugh. “How did you do that? Before I mean,
you flashed your fangs but the rest of you didn’t change at all. Can you
control the change to that degree?” Wes asks fascinated.
“I’m a Master Vampire pet.” Spike says with a chuckle but his eyes widen
as he realizes Wes isn’t joking with him. “You mean to tell me that the almighty
Council of Wankers doesn’t even know that much about vampire physiology?”
“Well it seems not.” Wesley says somewhat embarrassed.
“Well then… mind I am telling *you* these things Wesley will you? I’d
just as soon not give the rest of the Vampire community any *more* reason to
think I’d be better off dead. I’m telling you because you seem like a decent
bloke and Angel trusts you so I will too until you give me a reason not to. I
don’t mind telling you more about us but your ears only eh Mate? A Master
Vampire gains a certain level of control over their Demon that the passage of time
adds to. I can drop my fangs without the rest of my face changing and sometimes
my eyes will shift though that’s rather unconscious on my part so far. Angel though,
he can control the change almost completely and at will to a much larger
degree.”
“Is that because he’s older?” Wesley asks.
“Partially yes but it’s also because the soul affords him more of a rein
on the Demon part of him as well. He’s had more practice at keeping his Demon
side in check.” Spike replies.
“Is that also a factor in your control?” Wesley asks intensely curious
about this strange Vampire who seems more human than most of the people he
knows.
“William has always had an unusual control over his Demon and he is much
too young for most of the control and abilities he exhibits.” A softly smoky
accented voice drifts out of the darkness as Angel just suddenly seems to
materialize out of the darkness itself. It’s obvious that he’s not long out of
bed, his hair is sleep tousled and he’s wearing only dark grey silk sleep
bottoms and a matching short robe that hangs open loosely and his feet are
bare.
Wesley starts in surprise and a grinning Spike claps a hand on his
shoulder before he can tumble off the retaining wall with an exasperated shake
of his head. “Be careful there Wes, there is definitely no in flight movie or
the nifty free peanut if you take that one way flight.” Spike says with a
grimace as he glances over his shoulder and at the fog shrouded ground far too
distant below them.
Angel has the grace to shoot Wes an apologetic glance as he nimbly jumps
up to settle beside Spike on the retaining wall, his hand falling naturally on
his thigh and curving around the sleekly muscled expanse.
Wesley quickly jerks his eyes away as he swallows heavily at the
blatantly possessive caress and the ease with which Spike accepted it. While
Spike is much more accepting of physical contact he’s noticed, Angel is almost
obsessive about his personal physical space and clearly doesn’t appreciate the
unconscious social trespasses that most of them simply accept. The sole
exception seems to be Spike he realizes. Angel is always getting into his
personal space and allows Spike to enter his, something he hadn’t consciously
noticed until he was thinking about it just now.
“William has always been a rather… unusual Vampire. He’s always had much
more control over his Demon than even most Elders exhibit.” Angel completes his
thought from earlier, his voice soften by a gentle but pronounced Irish brogue.
“I say I didn’t notice your accent before, why it’s lovely.” Wes says
surprised and looking a little enchanted as Angel chuckles, hearing genuine
laughter from his taciturn friend is a treat. His eyes widen a bit as Angel wraps
an arm around Spike’s back and pulls him into an easy embrace as his hand curves
familiarly over his hip. At that moment he’s left to wonder just where the
clearly less than attired younger Vampire had been before he came up to the
roof.
“Wesley Wyndom-Price, I’d like to present to you Liam Kiley Quinlan or
Angelus if you prefer” Spike says formally. “Before you panic, Angel is still
in there and he’s still souled.” He adds hurriedly.
“The Soul allows me time with my Childe. He has never truly been a Sire
having pushed all nearly all of the memories we share of it away and he would
not listen to my counsel until I made certain concessions. I am no threat to
you or your friends, or to any innocent. That is the price of my occasional
freedom so that I may look after my Boy.”
“So you share a body but you aren’t Angel?” Wes says sounding
incredulous. “Forgive me but from all that I have read, you were a monster, why
would you suddenly change?”
“Wil is the last of my Bloodline and caged as I am by the Soul, there
will be no others. Do you have any conception of what that means to an elder
Vampire Human?” Angelus replies with subtle menace.
“The last, that’s not possible what about Drusilla? If something had
happened to her Angel would have known surely?” Wes says heatedly.
“When he… we… were souled Angel would not allow himself the comfort of his
Childer. The blood bonds had grown weak, I could barely feel William until he
was *in* the room with us. If he had been farther away I too would have been as
oblivious as the Soul as to his return. Blood bonds between Sire and Childe are
strong and never more so than between an Elder and his bloodline Childer but
even the strongest of bonds cannot survive untended. He… we… let our Childer go
and here you see the result, Watcher. One by one my Childer have fallen, one by
one and we did *nothing* for them. We slew our Sire over a *Slayer’s* love and
we stood by as our Penn was slain by a *Human* girl not a quarter of his great
age and power. We turned a blind eye to the suffering visited on our youngest
and most precious of all again at the hands of *Humans*.” Angelus nuzzles
William’s cheek with his own, making a soft sound of apology deep in his throat
and smiles as a deep purring trill from his Childe answers him back.”
Wesley is taken aback by his bitter tone and the pain that rings clearly
in his powerful voice as Angelus continues his declaration of pain. “We did
nothing when the *same* Slayer that brought us low repeated her machinations on
our Precious. We left him with no foundation, no where to belong and that
killed him as surely as that atrocious bauble the idiot of a little girl gave
him to wear. We were *right there* Watcher, in the same town with the only one
of our Childer to ever follow in our footsteps and we left him there. True we
did not know that he would not live to see another night but we did fail him
all the same, as his elder and as his Sire. I stood by and let my Childe suicide
in grief over our lost Boy.” Angelus turns his head and presses a kiss to Spike’s
temple as Spike trembles faintly. “In the end my poor broken Princess was more
of a Sire than I was.”
“I don’t think that Dru was thinking when she did what she did, Sire.”
Spike tries to console his Sire.
“I think perhaps if the Soul had stopped
thinking rather than just acting than we would not be the last of a once mighty
Order. We have stood since before the
“There is no other of your Order left?” Wesley asks surprised by that
revelation.
“Perhaps some minions, the occasional functionary here or there, but no
true Childer or Masters aside from Spike and myself.” Angelus says sadly.
“Cannot a minion sire a Childe?” Wesley asks somewhat confused as the
Watchers Diaries are pretty specific that such a thing is possible. “Does Angel
know about Dru?”
Spike looks at Angelus in silent inquiry and he nods solemnly. “He knows
about Drusilla. I didn’t think it was
right that he should not know that she was gone. He may be a leashed puppy with
that soul but he was as much her Sire as I, in theory at least.” Angelus says
somewhat disgusted by the feeling of mercy that made him share that much of his
conversation with Spike with his souled half.
“He knows Dru is gone.” Spike replies in a sad tone, grateful as Angelus
brings his hand up to stroke his hair briefly. He didn’t miss Angelus’ careful
inflection on Dru’s name and he understands that Angelus was telling him that while
he shared Dru’s fate with the part of him that is Angel he chose not to reveal
the truth of what Buffy had done. He leans against his Sire’s petting hand and
nuzzles it in silence response nodding in a motion too imperceptive for Wesley
to see, knowing that his Sire will feel it. The subtle flexing of his hand
tells him that the message has been perceived and understood.
“A minion has not the power to create so much as a single Childe. All a
minion can create is another minion and like poor sweet Harmony they will never
be anything more than that for they have not the strength to become Master
Vampires. No we are the last and I will not lose him to the unconcern and enmity
that claimed the rest. If I must accept the leash of the Soul than so will it
be, I will bear it and more. As for you my Little One the hour grows late and
you still have much healing to do. Back to bed with you and….” Spike starts to
shake his head but finds his chin caught by his Sire’s large but tender hand. “There
will be no argument on this William. You are still weak and you must rest and
feed if you are to recover so it is off to bed with you until I say otherwise
young one.” Angelus says with a faint growl in his voice. “You may attend the party
you were telling the Soul about tomorrow if you do as I wish now, William. Sire
knows best my lad.” He bops Spike lightly on the nose with his fingertip before
drawing in his legs and hopping off the retaining wall with a snap and lifting
his Childe down tenderly. “No say good night to Wesley and let us be off to bed
my Lad.”
“Good night Wesley. Its late mate you should be home sleeping you know.
All work and no play makes for a… Giles you know!” Spike says with a wickedly
dangerous grin and a saucy wink as Wesley is startled into laughter at the
thought of turning into a Giles. Angelus smiles in good humour at his Boy’s
teasing jests and wraps his arm around his shoulders pulling him tightly to his
side in a possessively close embrace.
“Why you are certainly correct, I would hate to turn into a Giles to be
sure.” Wesley says with a wry grin. “Perhaps I should be off to bed as well to
prevent such a dire occurrence.”
“Good on you pet; one Giles in the world is more than enough!” Spike
says with a snicker but he quiets as his Sire silences him with the expedient
gesture of placing a single finger across his lips with a small shake of his
head.
It is clear that Angelus intends that none of the Soul’s companions
should know of his animosity towards the man that now heads the rebuilt
Watchers Council. While their power is but a fraction of what it once was he
will not take a chance that Wesley may have any lingering loyalties to them;
not until his Childe is once more at full strength and their own relationship
is on a solid foundation at least. With their blood bond once more renewed and
pulsing with life the message passes swiftly and silently between them and
Spike slips an arm around his waist and squeezes lightly. Angelus smiles, his
Boy has received and understood his concerns.
“Are you doing anything at six Wes?” Spike
asks cuddling against Angelus as the trio heads for the stairway access.
Wes looks surprised at the question and shakes his head after he thinks
over his schedule for a moment. “No I believe my last appointment of the day is
at half passed four. Why?”
“There’s this keen bloke down in accounting, transferred over from the
“I think I met him in the lunch room the other day seemed like a nice
man. Stony I think his name was.” Wes says, his brow furrowed in thought.
Spike smiles happily. “Yes that’s the bloke. It’s his birthday tomorrow
and there’s going to be a bit of a roustabout in the restaurant down on the seventh
floor. I’m betting he’d love to hear a few more voices that remind him of home.
I found this great little shop tucked away down by the warehouse district that
sells all the things I couldn’t find here. Angel took me over there the other
night and I made up this great care package of some old favourites. We can tell
him it’s from all of us. Come on it’ll be fun! Please? We can all go together
and have a little fun to break up the doom and gloom around here.” Spike asks
with a shy smile and fluttering of his thick lashes that leaves Wesley feeling
faint.
Angelus smirks and buries his face against Spike’s hair to stifle his
chuckle. Wesley’s a dead man no one can pass up one of Spike’s little boy grins
when he backs it up with those unholy eyelashes of his.
Spike’s shy smile turns into a lascivious grin as he runs his tongue
slowly along his lower lip and looks up beneath his lashes at Angelus. “Are you
sure you won’t need just a wee bit of convincing there oh peach of my soul?” He
shrugs his shoulders as though flexing his muscles and flashes the pair with a
glimpse of alabaster skin framed by supple black leather before another
rotation of his shoulders covers up the view again.
Spike chuckles and pulls away from Angelus as the larger man makes a low
sound of pain that sounds like he’s taken a shot to his diaphragm. He walks a
few feet away and plants his foot and pivots to face them, blocking their path
as a leisurely crossing of his arms stops his duster’s backwards slide off as
the sleeves catch on his elbows.
He looks like a wicked wet dream standing there clothed only in
moonlight, black leather and thoroughly bad intentions. “So what do you say?
Come and be my little party favours at Stony’s party? Please? I’d owe you a
favour… a big favour.”
Angelus and Wesley freeze and stare at him with matched expressions of
awed wonder.
“You’ve no need to be using those looks on me
Laddy o’ mine. We’ll go if ye do as I asked ye and rest and heal til then imp. You
may as well give in to my Boy Watcher. He always finds a way to be getting his
way in these things.” Angelus says with a grin.
Wesley swallows heavily through a suddenly dry throat and can only bring
himself to nod mindlessly. At that moment Spike could have asked him for his
soul and he’s not sure he would have been able to say no… or want to.
Spike smiles and drops his arms letting the coat slide off his arms only
to be caught with his fingertips and flipped over his shoulder as he pivots
from the hip so they don’t get anything but a glimpse of what the leather
concealed as he stalks away with every muscle moving fluidly.
Angelus grins. “Damn I love that wicked Boy.” He darts forward and
sweeps Spike up against his chest and the pair is gone on a cloud of laughter
and kisses as Wesley watches them disappear into the stairwell.
“I think I do too.” He says softly as he gathers his coat around him and
heads for the stairs and home.
TBC
In Part Two and the conclusion: Spike’s resurrection is only the tip of
the iceberg as the mystery of his return deepens amid strange happenings at
Wolfram & Hart and an unexpected call leads to an unpleasant reunion for
the newly reunited Sire and Childe.