Awards for The Writing on the Wall

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Author: Holly (holly.hangingavarice@gmail.com)
Rating: NC-17 (For language, violent imagery, disturbing content, and sexual situations)
Timeline: Post-The Gift, AU.
Summary: There was no body to bury. There was no funeral. There was nothing but the three rules and the knowledge that a thousand years of torment was nothing compared to a world without her in it. Spike embarks on a journey through the Gates of Hell to rescue the one he loves, but in order to save her, he must risk losing himself.

Disclaimer: The characters herein are the property of Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy. They are being used out of respect and affection, and not for the sake of profit. No copyright infringement is intended.

He remembered studying Greek as a boy. Memorizing the structure of an alphabet he didn’t understand, letters that didn’t resemble anything to which he was accustomed. Letters that, while uniformed, were otherwise indecipherable. Spike had never been good at Greek beyond a word here or there, and recognizing it when he saw it. Other languages had come more naturally. He’d learned Latin and its derivatives, the Germanic dialects and a slew of demon tongues. Greek, however, remained unreadable.

There was no such structure to the carvings in the walls. No symbol had a duplicate, no pattern emerged from the scribbles—but he knew they were words. Words that meant something, or had meant something, words etched over and over. Words in a language no one knew. Words she’d written. Words she’d put there. Her scent, her blood—he couldn’t breathe without being overwhelmed, couldn’t take a step without feeling her. These walls were her opus, and he didn’t know what she was trying to say.

The markings were hers and they were without logic.

Spike shuddered, taking a long step forward, his eyes fixed. “God,” he said again, raising a trembling hand to the rugged ridges of one of the carvings. Dried, aged blood was splattered across the plaster. How long ago had she done this? How much time had she spent creating a work of chaos?

Oh God.

“Buffy…”

Buffy made a small sound and padded forward. She had evidently worked out that the name was hers.

It was the thing she’d lost and didn’t know how to recover.

“What is this?” he asked, knowing he would receive no answer. “Why is this here?”

She licked her lips and shook her head. It was all she could do.

Spike sighed and turned his eyes back to the marks, a cold shiver sliding down his spine. “Well,” he said softly before clearing his throat, blinking and tossing her a glance. “I…you hungry, pet? Gonna start you up a fire, yeah? One roast pig coming up.”

If he didn't know better, he would swear she arched a brow at him the way she did so often when he wasn't telling her the full story. It was fleeting if there at all; the small, hopeful smile had returned by the time he turned to face her fully. And though it wasn't much, while it was most likely entirely in his imagination, it made his heart jump and his nerve-endings fire. He grinned without realizing it, ran a hand through his hair and fully turned his back on the wall. Little good it did. There was nowhere safe to look—nowhere to escape the writing. “Don't suppose you got a pack of matches, do you?” he asked, selecting a piece of jagged glass off the floor. He'd never done this before—gutted and cooked an animal. There had never been a need.

Well, here's hopin' I don't make her sick.

“A lighter’d work, too,” he said, though more to himself. “Think I had one in my jeans, but it probably rusted. An’ it’s clear across town. Not exactly sure if I could find the buildin’ I washed up in, anyway.” His eyes rested on the charred stretch of floor where she’d undoubtedly built her own fires. “How do you manage it, pet? Mind showin’ the new guy the ropes around here?”

Buffy stared at him a second longer before frowning and turning her attention to the dead warthog. She was still for a second, then her eyes brightened and she transformed into a whirl of motion, her quick hands seizing something off the ground, athletic legs carrying her rapidly into the back of the warehouse. It wasn’t a long wait; when she returned, she had a small torch fashioned from a piece of plywood and discarded paper, her expression hopeful and her eyes vibrant. She looked at him expectedly, a smile lifting her face when he grinned and nodded at her.

“Now, there’s a girl after my own heart,” he said, quickly compiling a pile of paper and wood. “How’d you manage that?”

She blinked and indicated the room into which she’d disappeared.

“Must have a stove or what all back there,” Spike mused. “Bloody handy.”

With the fire taken care of, he returned his attention to the pig, tightening his grip on his makeshift knife. The legs would be the best, he supposed, though there was undoubtedly salvageable meat in the abdomen and elsewhere. The first cut into the animal’s tough flesh sent a whiff of blood to his hungry taste-buds and the temptation to bite and drain the beast dry became damn near unbearable.

Was that how humans made their food? Didn’t they bleed animals out? He didn’t know.

“Fuck it,” he muttered to himself, slicing open the pig’s stomach and doing his best not to salivate when the blood’s scent intensified. He licked his fingers before examining the creature’s entrails. He supposed he couldn’t just leave animal guts rotting on the ground, and he didn’t reckon Hell cared a damn about sanitation issues. “Don’t know where you put these, love,” he drawled, wincing and lifting the pig’s intestines. Buffy just stood and shrugged as if to say, Your mess. You deal with it.

Spike grinned and glanced down, his eyes fixing on a cardboard box shoved in a far, seemingly forgotten corner. That would do. “Be a love, will you?” he asked, gesturing best he could. “Enough to stuff these down, yeah?”

Buffy’s eyes bounced between him and the corner for a few confused seconds before the request clicked. With a prompt nod, she hurried over to collect the box and scurried back just as quickly. And had he not paused to take a peek inside, he would have drenched the insides with entrails.

“Wait,” he said, nodding at the stack of aged, yellow papers stuffed within the box. They didn’t look to be anything remarkable, aside from the fact that there were many, all in her penmanship, and written in the same bizarre non-language as the carvings on the walls. While there was nothing to suggest the pages were worth keeping, the fact that they had once been important to her made them important to him. He wasn’t about to throw them away. Not now.

Spike glanced up and met her questioning eyes. “You know what those are, pet?”

Her brow furrowed, her nose wrinkling.

“You wrote them,” he urged unhelpfully. Then, almost sheepishly, he turned his head downward. “’Course you did. No one else here, right? But I’d know your writing anywhere. Stole enough of your notes an’ what all back in the day. Back before you jumped. Learned your handwriting backwards an’ forwards…even if it is bloody jibberish. You wrote it for a reason…can’t reckon why, but you did, din’t you? An’ we’ll save them.”

A long stillness settled between them—Buffy’s eyes darting from his face to the box and back again until she ostensibly concluded that removing the papers was what he expected. There were times, he noted, when she seemed to understand him, and up until this moment he’d hoped it meant she was remembering. But she wasn’t—she wasn’t remembering, merely reading his body language. It was too much to ask for so much progress so quickly.

Too much, and yet he wished for it anyway.

Buffy vigilantly lifted the scribbled, aged sheets, and frowned at them curiously. A few seconds passed before she looked up, eyes bouncing from the walls and the pages in her hand. Spike watched her carefully, waiting, hoping for a flicker of recognition. And though he truly hadn’t expected anything, he couldn’t prevent his insides from chilling when she betrayed none.

“It’s all right,” he muttered, at last dumping the entrails into the box. When he glanced up, her troubled eyes immediately fell away and in so doing took him with her. Spike sat up quickly. “Oh no, love, none of that. It’s all right. Don’t listen to me. I’m a bloody dolt.”

She worried her lower lip between her teeth.

“Now,” Spike said, leaning forward and wiping his hands on his jeans. He took the pages from her grasp and set them aside—better not to get them soiled here. There was no telling whether or not they were actually decipherable, but however the language read, it had been important enough to Buffy at one point to commit it to paper. There was all the time in the world to figure out what the words meant. “We’ll worry about that later, yeah?” he continued softly. “Let’s get you fed.”

The business of cleaning the warthog wasn’t as difficult as he’d anticipated. Buffy led him into the back of the warehouse where he discovered a small stove, and while it was broken and offered little aside from an open flame, that much was incredibly useful. Even more so was the sink he found by the back window. By looks alone, she hadn’t touched it in years; it took several attempts to get water to run; when it did, Buffy watched with such awe it made his insides crumble.

He didn’t think he wanted to know where she’d been getting her water.

“Let’s cook the leg tonight,” he said conversationally, eying the refrigerator pressed against the far wall. It didn’t work. That much was evident from the scent of aged rot occupying the air around it. “Meat’ll spoil, but something tells me there’s not a shortage of pig here, is there?”

Buffy just smiled at him, her eyes fixed on the warthog.

“Hope you’re hungry, pet,” he murmured.

The past few centuries had been nothing but cold; he had forgotten how quickly an open flame could warm the bones. Upon retreating to the main area of Buffy’s living space, Spike was greeted by an inferno fit for Hell, and though it became uncomfortable after a few minutes, he couldn’t deny the welcoming kiss of warmth.

The pig’s leg ended up resembling something he might have once seen on the telly, and judging by its smell and the way Buffy’s eyes sparkled, he’d done it justice. He sliced off a healthy portion with his shard of glass and handed it to her, wishing for plates but making do with assorted surfaces lying among the debris.

A quick glance outside confirmed evening had settled over Hell. Hell had a day and night. Strange how things like that had never occurred to him, yet seemed right in this setting. A setting ripped from the pages of Buffy’s imagination. As it was, the way the sky darkened and rolled into night was something he figured would always remember, even if they managed to make it back to Sunnydale some day. It was eerie in its similarities, yet different enough to make him painfully aware that home was far, far away.

Spike looked up and met Buffy’s eyes, unable to hide his grin at her food-stuffed cheeks. No. No, he was wrong. Home was wherever she was.

Home was right here.

“You must be bloody sick of pigs, eh, love?” he mused, poking at the fire with the stick he’d managed to procure, which festered but didn’t roar. It had started to die down an hour or so ago, and while he wasn’t worried about starting a new one, he wasn’t quite ready to relinquish the heat. “When we get back to Sunnyhell, the firs’ thing I’ll do is buy you a bloody funnel cake. Bet you can’t remember how sweets taste, can you?”

Buffy paused, grinned, and resumed tearing away at her slab of meat.

“Or one of those big greasy burgers from the place you like. The onion thing from the Bronze…God, I could stuff myself silly on that. They have those spicy chicken wings, too. Bloody brilliant.” Spike smiled wistfully. “All the things we’ll taste when we get back. I’ll take you wherever you like. We’ll see the whole world.”

She chewed, smiled, and swallowed. There was no doubt she was hanging on his every word, even if she hadn’t the foggiest idea what he was saying. And for that very reason, it was important he keep talking. His mind kept bouncing back and forth from one extreme to the other; one minute he thought her reactions were random, the next he was certain there was method behind what she did or what face she made. Her movements and responses were intelligent enough he hoped, he bloody prayed, that she was remembering at least some of who she was, even in the smallest measure.

“Wanna hear how I got here?” he asked, settling back. His stomach rumbled but he ignored it. Blood could wait until morning. As it was, he’d stolen enough sips from the pig to placate him for the evening. It wasn’t like not eating would kill him; if he could go three centuries without a drop, one night was a sodding cake walk. “It’s not a pretty story, but we got time to kill, yeah?”

Buffy licked her lips, finishing off the last bite of warthog before leaning back and crossing her legs.

“Willow, the redhead, the witch…she found this story about a demon king, or something or other. Gave me three rules to use to navigate Hell. You know the Hellmouth? You fought to keep it closed so long…turns out if you’re lookin’ for sub-ground real estate, all you gotta do is go into the rabbit hole.” Spike sighed and shook his head. “An’ I did. She got me the rules an’ I climbed down. Met with an enormous wanker by the name of Larry an’ made a deal to come an’ get you. There were these three trials, see, an’ I had to pass each without askin’ for rot. Or taking anything they offered me. Also couldn’t make any promises or…” He met her eyes and swallowed hard. “Forget my name.”

His breathing hitched and he held her gaze. She just smiled.

“Never told you, though, did they?” he whispered. “Couldn’t tell you. Sacrifice everythin’ you sacrifice, an’ this is how they reward you. You don’t belong here. Me? Yeah, I’ve earned it. I’m a vicious, bloody bastard an’ Hell is where I’m headed…even if I make it out of here, I’ll just be back one day, right? But you…this isn’t the way it’s supposed to be. This is the last place you’re supposed to be. A place like…” He broke off with a hard shiver. “An’ we’ll get you out. I don’t know how, but we will.”

It was an easy thing to say; putting it into action was something entirely separate. Larry had seized the only viable way out, melting it into the endless horizon of Buffy’s mindscape. There wasn’t a hidden escape hatch. This was a place people entered without any thought of leaving. No one walked away, and as he’d been warned, the security around a living slayer would be insurmountable.

He couldn’t give up, but there was little reason to hope, and as long as he had an eternity, nothing would stop him from searching for a way out.

“Larry told me getting here was nothing,” Spike murmured soberly. “I didn’t think it was possible. After starving for so long, I just…getting to you was all I thought about. Getting out…I don’t know why I thought it’d be easy. Guess it was…as long as I got to you, the rest would be a cinch.” He reached forward without thinking, fingers threading through her hair. “I meant what I said, though,” he continued, thumb rubbing tender circles into her cheek. “Out there. I know I was angry, but…here? With you? There’s nothing better than this. Nothing…”

His voice trailed off, frozen with a horrible thought. It hit him from nowhere—a shot in the dark, blasting through the quiet and shattering the fortress he’d starting building around Buffy and himself. Something he should have already known. Something…

Oh my God.

He couldn’t be that stupid. He couldn’t be…

“Don’t make any promises,” he murmured. “Oh God.”

It was one thing while hanging in the cave—turning his face from the red-rimmed glasses Larry waved under his nose, repeating his name over and over to keep from losing himself completely, but there had never been any need to give anyone a promise. He kept his thoughts to himself, kept quiet, kept his mind focused on the tunnel through which he had to travel. And while he’d subconsciously banned the word from his vocabulary, he’d said a handful of things since arriving that could be construed as promises. Things he’d said without thinking, vows he’d made without hesitation—he’d condemned them with thoughtlessness. His promises…God…

“Goddammit!” Spike roared, tearing his hands away and leaping to his feet. He immediately broke into a furious pace, the worn, ragged floor groaning under his heavy strides. “Three hundred years. Three hundred fucking years! I din’t eat. Din’t move. Din’t ask for rot. Made bloody well sure I remembered my name. I made it—they told me they didn’t think I would, but I did. I made it. An’ the first thing I do when I get here…the first bloody thing I do is forget the sodding rules!” Another snarl ripped through his throat as his foot smashed into the box of warthog guts and sent it spiraling into a far corner. “I’m such a…Goddammit!”

The whimper that bubbled off Buffy’s lips was the only thing in the world that could have broken through the thick, angry cloud of self-loathing. Spike slowed his pace but didn’t break altogether, his head swinging southward, defeat crippling his shoulders. He couldn’t look at her. Not now. Not with what he’d done. Not when he knew he was the final nail in the bloody coffin—he’d condemned them to eternity here. In this hollow, hopeless place. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Not like this.

Not when his mind wracked with doubt. Not when he couldn’t think of anything but his shortcomings—his failures. How could he have come so far, sacrificed so much, only to let it go like this? Only to let it go now?

He’d allowed himself to believe it would be easy, and in doing so…

Spike shook his head hard, turning away to fix his eyes on the wall.

The wall on which Buffy had written, over and over again, in a place where she’d waited for centuries for rescue—a rescue which had only cemented her fate.

The air rustled as she climbed to her feet, and every inch of Spike’s body tensed. She would touch him, need him, and he couldn’t bear looking at her. He’d failed so miserably; he’d condemned her to an eternity of this. A thousand years down…but there would be no reprieve.

He’d made a promise and it had cost her everything.

Yet he couldn’t turn away, and he wouldn’t deny her. Thus, when her hand slipped over his shoulder, there was nothing but surrender. Spike’s body broke entirely, whirling around and seizing her in a fierce, desperate hug. Her heart thundered against his chest, her pulse raced in his ears, and he could do nothing but hold her. Give her all of himself—give what little he had to offer in lieu of what he’d taken.

“I’m sorry,” he gasped into her hair. Her arms tightened around him as though she understood, and even if it was cold comfort, he wouldn’t deny her a thing. “I’m so sorry. I just…I couldn’t keep it in. I needed you to know…an’ now…”

She offered a soothing hum, and he nearly fell apart all over again.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry…forgive me, Buffy, I couldn’t…I let it go.”

There was no reply, but for this, none was needed. All he needed was her arms.

And even though he had no right to hold her, no force in this or any other world could tear him away.

He moved slowly through the warehouse, eyes wandering to the walls every few seconds…unable to stop himself.

The carvings were hurried and desperate. She must have been so terrified—of what he didn’t know, and perhaps never would, but frenzied despair stretched through every mark. The picture his mind presented wasn’t any more forgiving; tears scalding down her cheeks, a piece of jagged glass grinding into her bloodied hands. Over and over, writing symbols that looked like nonsense. Writing something important in a language no one knew. Writing for someone. It was here for a reason.

Spike shivered and glanced down, wishing for a pack of smokes. He hadn’t had a good fag since the Hellmouth, and though the centuries had all but killed his need for nicotine, he could really use one now.

I promised.

It was so bloody unfair. She was dealt the punishment for his mistake.

“Be all my sins remember’d,” he recited softly, a harsh chuckle rumbling through his lips. “No worries there.”

When he turned, Buffy was climbing into the makeshift bed she’d built on the floor. Composed of clothing, stuffing from couches, and an assortment of other things, it gave Spike the odd sensation of being both homey and pitiful. She’d made this place hers, from the markings on the walls, to the camp stove on which she cooked her food, and the bed she’d pieced together…it wasn’t much, but it was hers. This place, these writings, this area…it was hers. More hers than any other corner of her Hell, because this was where she came when she slept. Where he would stay if she wanted him. If, after she remembered, she would have him for what he’d done.

The sentence he’d given her.

If she ever remembered.

Spike cleared his throat and shook the thought away, taking a step forward. “Tired, love?” he asked, voice strained. A sense of unwarranted calm had washed over them when the aftershock of his outburst finally wore away, and while he wanted nothing more than to scream until his throat gave way, he refused to scare her anymore. The fury would come later—right now, she needed the quiet.

“We had a long day, didn’t we?” he continued. “Started the day in a river. You tried to make me a bloody kabob. We hunted a pig, an’…” He broke off, jaw hardening. “Long day.”

Buffy blinked at him, then pointed at the bed.

“You want me with you?” he asked.

She moved forward and took his hands in hers, guiding him back until her heels brushed the edge of the nest. Then, with a tender smile, she guided him to his knees.

“I don’t deserve this,” Spike murmured. “You don’t know what I’ve done, sweetheart. I came here to get you out—”

Buffy shook her head and placed her finger across his lips, her eyes so soft and grateful he could barely stand it. And though he knew he shouldn’t, though he knew he’d lost his rights—if they’d ever existed in the first place—he couldn’t bring himself to move away. There was no sense in fighting tonight, or denying himself something he craved. He was exhausted, worn by the struggle and aching with the knowledge of what tomorrow would bring.

He hadn’t slept in three hundred years. Just once, just for one night, he wanted to rest. He wanted the solace of her arms, and with the day behind him, he could no longer fight what he needed so much.

Just tonight.

Please give me tonight.

Spike was admittedly a man of many mistakes, and when he made one, he felt it with every fiber of his being. However, awareness didn’t prevent him from repeating his missteps. He wasn’t one for regrets—the moment was what mattered, those in the past couldn’t be repeated, and it didn’t figure to dwell on them. His life was a living piece of art; some strokes less attractive than the rest, but ever evolving into something grander than himself. The past was gone and couldn’t be rebuilt. All he had was the moment in which he lived, and all the ones to follow.

This particular philosophy had served him well most of his life. Then he’d met Buffy, and with every botched decision, every step of the path not taken, regret drilled into his brain until he couldn’t think, much less sleep for wondering what could have been had he performed just a little better, just a little quicker. If he hadn’t been such an enormous lunk and fucked everything up with a simple vow.

A promise.

Buffy had changed everything.

And now here they were. Buffy so far removed from herself, sleeping soundly in his arms, warm and soft and alive, and trapped in Hell forever because Spike had made a promise.

A promise to get her out.

Spike sighed heavily, eyes tracing the contours of her perfect face. He’d waited so long to get here—to spend a night with Buffy in his arms. He’d waited so long, given so much, and within an hour of seeing her, of touching her, he’d broken what could not be broken.

He wasn’t one for regrets…except when it came to the things that mattered.

No lookin’ back, he thought, sighing heavily and rolling onto his back. Buffy fell with him, her cheek nestled against his chest, her soft breaths tickling him on every exhale. She would awaken soon enough…his sleeping angel, captured forever in a barren wasteland of misery and despair. Her eyes would shine when they found him. Her mouth would curve into a smile he didn’t deserve. Her hands would touch and he would tremble, and it would be like this forever because he couldn’t die and neither could she.

There was a kicker. Age couldn’t kill slayers. While he wasn’t terribly surprised, it was a pleasant thought. For as long as he was around, Buffy would be with him.

She would be in the world…somewhere.

“Guess we solved an age old question, din’t we?” Spike murmured, curled fingers exploring her cheek. “Knew time couldn’t do you in. You’re too much like us. You’re just like us…jus’ on the other side is all.”

He watched her a minute longer before sighing again and turning his eyes to the walls. The walls on which she’d written her story, even if the writing was twisted into hieroglyphics only Buffy—the Buffy he loved, the Buffy locked inside the girl in his arms—could decipher. Perhaps morning had brought on new realizations, or perhaps he was bargaining with himself for redemption, but even with his foul-up in the promises department, there were certain truths that sleeping had unlocked. Certain things he understood, or hoped he understood, where last night emotion had blocked rational thought from making a dent in the tidal wave of his self-loathing.

Promises.

He’d made promises…to Buffy, he couldn’t keep them contained. And yet nothing momentous had changed since the words had escaped him. Their exit had disappeared, yes, but nothing else. At the very least, he would have expected Larry to pop in, flash him a gotcha grin, and disappear in a villainous cloud of smoke. The fact that he hadn’t seen hair or hide of the ugly git since arriving was the only thing keeping Spike from unleashing his fury on himself.

Even if promises hadn’t played a role, he couldn’t fathom a scenario in which Larry let him walk out the way he came in. The brute’s own words had forewarned that exiting wouldn’t be nearly as simple as entering had been; the cavern would have disappeared with or without promises.

Spike had devoured blood that wasn’t offered, so much as there. He’d made promises to Buffy, who was in Hell but not a part of it. Willow hadn’t mentioned there being any loopholes, but right now, he had to believe they existed. He couldn’t allow everything to collapse now; Spike was many things, but quitter was certainly not on the list. No matter what, there were always ways. Bloody always. If not this, then something else, and he would find it.

Buffy would not spend an eternity in Hell. Promises made or not, Spike would find a way.

He would get her home.

The look in her eyes would remain with him forever. The flash of brilliance, the joy, the hope she exuded with a simple smile was enough to cripple giants. Perhaps the night had been unkind to her, but if she’d had nightmares, they hadn’t been violent. The only thing Spike knew was, from the way she looked at him, Buffy had very much expected to wake up alone.

“Fancy a shower, love?” he asked conversationally as she picked at leftover warthog meat. The blood he’d drained was cold and coagulated, but he forced it down nonetheless. His rumbling stomach would, at the very least, shut up for an hour or so, and there were more pressing concerns at the moment than his appetite. “Can’t be too sure of anything, but I think it might make you feel more like yourself.”

Buffy wiped her mouth and grinned at him. Absorbing every word even if she didn’t understand a thing she heard.

Christ.

“Not really a manual on this sort of thing,” Spike continued. “With amnesia victims…I’ve seen on the telly, anyway…they say familiar surroundings helps trigger the memory. Nothing familiar here, of course, ‘cept yours truly, but getting you cleaned up…might help a bit. What do you say?”

He could have told her anything he liked and received the same reaction. Right now, as she was, Buffy would follow him to the ends of the earth.

And he hated it.

“Finish up, pidge,” he said, nodding at the pig meat. “We’re goin’ for a walk.”

The streets were just as they’d left them. Endless, achingly empty, accented with whispers that followed them with every step. Buffy didn’t seem bothered by the whispers; of course, she’d grown accustomed to them over the centuries. They weren’t voices to her, and perhaps, eventually, they would fade into the horrid nothing that encompassed the nameless city. Spike didn’t know, and he didn’t want to be here long enough to find out.

And he wouldn’t. He wouldn’t. He would find a way home before the buildings became familiar or the streets etched paths into his brain. Before Hell became home for him—before this world became his world, as well. He would. He would find a way out, and he would guide Buffy back to where she belonged.

He had to try.

Spike didn’t know how long they had walked before he had to break the silence. She remained attentive at his side, fingers curled through his, her bright eyes meeting his every few seconds with a grin that shook his core. How long had he waited to be the reason for her smiles? How long…trailing her in the cemetery, diving into the midst of her scuffles to pretend he’d saved her life, sacrificing his body to the whims of an unstable god—so much, all to see her smile. And she had repaid him in kindness; she’d kissed his lips, granted her compassion, invited him into her home, entrusted her sister into his care, and allowed him closer than he had ever deserved.

That was the Buffy he knew; the one who had understood him in those last days, who had kept blood for him in her refrigerator, who had jumped to his defense when his presence was questioned by her friends. She might not have smiled at him, but she understood.

This Buffy was all smiles but she didn’t understand a word. And in turn, he had the one thing he wanted at the expense of what he loved most. Now, even with her smiles, with her hand in his and her body so willingly snuggled into his side, he wished for his Buffy back. He wanted her back so badly, if only to feel the sting of her fist smashing against his nose. For that smidgeon of normality that would give him the small victory that he’d at least dragged her out of the vast sea in which she’d lost herself.

“Scent’s stronger here,” Spike found himself saying. “Road looks a li’l familiar, too. Reckon this is the way I came.”

Buffy just looked at him.

“I fell into the river. Think I told you that.” He nodded at the road, his eyes fastening on a doorway that looked slightly more familiar than the others. Then again, that might have been his mind playing tricks on him. The buildings might as well melt into one—he couldn’t recall anything particularly distinguishable from the place at which he’d showered the day before, but for his own scent lingering in the air, he felt he was on the right course. “Yeah,” he murmured. “Think this is where I came. It’s not much, but I know there’s runnin’ water in there.” His brows perked upward and he shrugged. “Fancy that. Running water in Hell.”

There was no response. She just smiled her blank smile and watched him, feet following his lead when he turned to approach the building around which his scent was the strongest.

“Yeah,” he mused. The scene remained unchanged from the snapshot he’d memorized the day before. The scattering of boxes and trash, the turned over pieces of furniture, and the sense that the place belonged to someone…the sense that even in this wasteland, they might not be alone. “This is the place. Follow me, love.”

The words weren’t needed, but for the break they provided, he would keep speaking them. Buffy clasped his hand tightly, stepping over what he stepped over, twisting where he twisted, and even mimicking the small grunts he emitted when the floor groaned beneath his feet. The staircase was where he remembered, as was the bedroom to which it led. He found his discarded, blood-soaked jeans tossed into a corner and his tee draped over a gutted teddy bear. Everything looked untouched, unchanged, yet he still felt as though he was tainting a crime scene.

Strange. Things that wouldn’t merit a second thought back home weighed him down when he was in a foreign land.

“Shower’s this way,” Spike said, fingers tightening around hers as he led her through the far door. “Kinda funny when you think of it. Spent a bloody year trying to get you naked an’ now all I gotta do is turn on the faucet.”

There was no response. He turned to face her, feeling all at once timid and awkward. The words were easy enough to say—easy enough to talk about in passing while he was standing in the bathroom of a vacant warehouse with the woman he loved. And yes, he knew this was the best thing he could do for her, but there was a very large part of him only now emerging from its three hundred year hibernation. He’d always loved her—always, even when he hadn’t known it—but he hadn’t thought about caressing her bare flesh or kissing her sweet lips in longer than he cared to consider. Rotting from the inside out tended to kill one’s sex drive, even one as potent as his. Spike had only been a man remade for a day. His body remembered sex but he hadn’t felt it, touched it, or experienced it in so long he’d forgotten what lust felt like.

Oh, but he remembered wanting her. Wanting Buffy. He remembered standing outside her bedroom window, torturing himself with the echoes of her faked passion against Riley’s enthusiastic grunts, knowing full well it should be him sharing her bed. It should be him touching her, caressing her, unlocking her body’s secrets in ways no one had before attempted. Since she became a part of his life, Spike had been consumed with the want of Buffy. He’d yearned for her, craved her, and needed her so bloody badly he could hardly stand getting up each day for knowing it would get him no closer to what he desired.

But a bloke had to try, and he had. He’d tried, and he’d gotten closer than even he had thought possible. He’d gotten to her somehow, some way; he’d made her see that his love wasn’t the sick infatuation she’d labeled it. Through time and effort, he’d proved it was real. He’d proved himself to her and her friends. He’d made himself worthy, and in the end, she’d believed him. If nothing else, Spike knew that Buffy knew he loved her.

It was why she’d graced his lips with her kiss.

And that was all. A kiss. Buffy had left the world without feeling even a flicker of the inferno he felt for her. Three hundred years later—a millennia in her shoes—he stood in the bathroom of a warehouse in Hell. He’d brought her here to get her naked, and while he’d known to what lengths the suggestion could lead, he hadn’t thought about this—about being intimate with her—in so long. The days in the cave had been spent just wanting to see her face. He’d ached to touch her, yes, but his mind had long detoured from getting her warm and wiggling beneath him. He’d just wanted to touch her, to feel her skin under his fingertips.

It had been ages since he’d thought about sex. Now he was standing with Buffy—the woman he loved, the woman he craved—and for the first time in centuries, he remembered fully what it felt like to be a man. The spark, the craving, fired back through his veins with a triumphant roar, screaming it had never vanished, rather retreated until such a time when calling upon lust again made sense.

There hadn’t been reason to lust until now. His body was whole again, and he was with her.

He was with Buffy.

“Hey,” he said suddenly, desperate to get his thoughts away from her body, the body which would be naked under his hands in a few short seconds. Her body which he would not touch… No, good God, no, he wouldn’t take advantage of her like that. Not here.

And yet, for all his trying, his cock had stirred to life after lying dormant for centuries, and couldn’t be talked down. Spike inhaled sharply, tearing his eyes from hers the second they landed home. It was wrong—God, it was so wrong. Buffy didn’t remember him; she didn’t remember anything. She wasn’t even Buffy where it counted, but for fuck’s sake, it didn’t matter to his prick. His prick hadn’t been around a woman in ages, and with blood warming his veins, Buffy smiling those innocent smiles, he found himself crippled with lust so compelling it nearly drove him to his knees.

“‘m sorry,” Spike said suddenly. “I don’t…Buffy, I have no idea if you’ll remember this or anything, but I’m sorry for…” He glanced down at his irreverent cock, pressed firmly against the denim zipper. Swollen, aching…he couldn’t remember his last erection. “No. I’m not sorry for this. I love you—you an’ I both know it. And I haven’t had a stiffy since before I left to find you…so this? I can’t help this. I’m a guy, you’re a knockout, and since you’re…you…I can’t just switch this off. But I don’t want you thinking that what we’re doing in here is for this…for me, because it’s not. This is for you. I’m doing everything for you.”

Buffy just blinked at him.

“I know it doesn’t make any sense to you,” he continued, sighing and running a hand through his hair. “An’ I don’t know when you’re gonna be back…to yourself. I just needed to say it before I take your clothes away. It’s been a long time for me, pet…an’ you’re all I’ve wanted. This here is…you’re the flame an’ I’m the moth, if you catch my drift.” Spike looked at her a minute longer before breaking away, blinking hard and turning his eyes to the mirror. Again, his eyes clashed with his reflection, startling him for a second with the stark contrast in how he looked in actuality versus the memory he had of himself. His blond hair traded for brown locks, his extremely thin frame, the worn scars stretched across his skin—scars that would have already faded in a world with structure. Perhaps he would carry those scars forever.

“Oi,” Spike said, nodding at the mirror as he dragged his tee over his head. “Check it out.”

She turned in the direction indicated, a frown creasing her brow the second her eyes clashed with her reflection. She stared for a long minute, tilting her head, making faces at herself—a child discovering one of life’s simple pleasures for the first time. When she was through studying her mirror’s twin, she turned to Spike and waved a hand.

“What’s that?”

She pointed at the mirror.

Spike looked at her a minute longer before lifting his eyes to his reflection again, tilting his head and grinning when she grinned. It had likely been centuries since she’d wandered anywhere that she didn’t need to go—her days consisted of hunting, cooking, eating, and sleeping. Venturing into the city’s vacant buildings wasn’t a needed step…not after she discovered there was nothing to be taken from them. He hadn’t spotted any mirrors in the place she called home and figured it was safe to conclude she hadn’t seen herself in lifetimes.

“Remember this, pet,” he advised, nodding at his own reflection. “When we get home the mirror’ll look a li’l different. Vamps don’t reflect…not in our dimension, at least.” Spike sighed, his fingers curling around her forearm and gently coaxing her to face him. “Raise your arms for me,” he instructed gently, running his hands along her underarms until they were stretched above her head. He did his best not to tremble as he dragged the shredded clothing up and away from her body, and likewise tried not to swing his gaze downward and gawk at her exposed breasts like a prepubescent teen.

“This idea really seemed good on paper,” Spike muttered. He lowered his shaking hands to the torn slacks she had dragged around her waist, distracting himself briefly with idle speculation as to how she started dressing herself in the first place. Likely, once her name was forgotten, she observed she was already in clothing and retained that for the hunt. There was no way of knowing how long she’d been dressed like this—without others with whom to interact, growth and evolution was damn near impossible. She had the warthogs for food and the whispers for torment, but nothing tangible with which to relate.

No one to touch. No one to hold. Larry hadn’t visited her, hadn’t gifted her with a parade of spectral faces from her past. No, he’d simply left her to lose her mind in an unforgiving landscape…and she had. She’d wandered so long without anyone at her side that she’d lost what it meant to feel a caress from someone who loved her. It was why her eyes grew large every time his thumb danced across her hand—she didn’t know this. This—being touched like this—was the greatest thing she could remember.

Spike inhaled sharply as the fabric around her waist pooled at the floor, jaw clenched and eyes cast downward.

She wouldn’t want this.

No, she wouldn’t…not in the way he remembered. Yet even if Buffy snapped back to herself in a moment’s notice, too much had changed to believe her mentality toward him remained the same. She might never look at him the way he looked at her, but she wasn’t callous, and she was smart enough to reconcile what was happening and what he’d done to make it happen.

What he’d done to get here.

This wasn’t home.

Thus, with that in mind, he allowed himself to look. Allowed his eyes to trail upward, take in her bronzed flesh, linger on the thatch of dark curls between her legs before finding her breasts. And Christ, was she beautiful. Standing without any sense of self-awareness, her eyes confused but unembarrassed, her body his for the taking if he so chose.

This Buffy would allow him to touch her. To caress her. To make love to her. This Buffy would welcome him.

This Buffy wasn’t his. This Buffy was like his reflection—fleeting, a glimpse of something changed by circumstance, something alterable. This Buffy wasn’t the same girl who had jumped. Her skin was rougher, darker, her nails un-manicured, her legs unshaven. Her hair was a long, dark tangle—far from the sun-kissed shampoo-commercial blonde that had teased him with every toss. Her body was a map of cuts and scratches, some fresh and others aged. She was a vision in her own right…a reflection of herself warped by time. And while she was still the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen, her appearance alone stood as a stark reminder of what had happened over the past thousand years. How she’d lost herself—how she’d regressed.

Spike’s jaw hardened. He dragged his eyes away with borrowed strength, doing his best to ignore the painful swelling of his cock. Too long. Too long. He’d been without intimacy for too long—and Buffy was the one temptation to which he could never succumb.

Not like this. He was strong enough. He could resist.

“Dru was sick for a long time,” Spike found himself saying, his mind a haze and his mouth unsure of where this train of thought was headed. His eyes landed on a razor lying crooked on the edge of the sink, which he quickly placed on the top ledge of the shower door. Further investigation produced a pair of scissors on the floor and half a tube of toothpaste in the cabinet behind the mirror.

He grinned in spite of himself. Only Buffy could conceive a hell where the terror came in her surrounding’s normality.

“Don’t know if I ever told you what happened in Prague,” he continued, kicking off his shoes and quickly shedding his jeans down his legs. His cock sprang to attention without warning, jutted proudly outward for appraisal. Spike shook his head and tried to ignore it, moving instead toward the shower. “What happened doesn’t really matter,” he said. “But I took care of her for a long bloody time. Brushed her hair, dressed her, bathed her…nabbed her all the tasty townies she wanted. It’s been a while, yeah, but I figure there’s only so much…”

Buffy wasn’t listening; Buffy was staring intently at his cock.

Bollocks.

“Sweetheart—”

She frowned, confused, looked at herself and then at him again.

“Boys an’ girls are different,” he explained sheepishly, eyes darting away just as quickly. Foreign sparks of heat stretched his cheeks—he honestly hadn’t thought it possible for vampires to blush until that moment. Perhaps he’d never been well and truly embarrassed before, and considering his long career of being wrong off his ass, that was a true accomplishment. “I…urrr…well, we’re different. An’…I…let’s jus’ get in the shower, pet, yeah?”

Her frown didn’t dissolve. Of course it didn’t—he could explain the differences between men and women until the world collapsed in on itself and she wouldn’t have any idea what he was talking about. Better to turn his attention to what he’d come here to do before his cock started doing his thinking for him. “Buffy—”

It took feeling her fingertips against his prick before he realized she’d reached for him. Spike’s eyes went wide. His every nerve sparked to life. A strangled gasp scratched at his throat, and he had her wrist snatched before she could pursue her exploration. It was all he could to ignore the hard trembles tearing down his back. “No touching,” he managed between pants. “I can’t take it.”

God, he hated himself for the way she balked in shock. As though she’d done something wrong. As though there was anything wrong in touching him. She thought he was angry, and the knowledge positively unmade him. “Oh, sweetheart,” he murmured, raising a hand to her hair. “Don’t…it’s not you. You drive me crazy. So bloody crazy. You have no idea. Wanted you so bad before…before you…an’ I grew to love you after. Even after I woke up after that dream…I din’t know how much I loved you until…I just didn’t know. But now…I haven’t touched a woman in so bloody long…and now that I’m whole and with you…now…it’s you, pet. I’ve wanted you since the moment I first laid eyes on you. Outside the Bronze, remember? Wanted you since that moment, even if it took me ages to suss it out. But now, right now…I can’t…I love you more than I can…an’ I can’t have you touch me right now. Not when you don’t know what it means. What you mean to me.” There was a long pause. Spike held her eyes as long as he could before turning away and reaching for the shower nozzle. Focusing on this would do neither of them any good. He’d come here with a purpose, and the faster it was complete, the faster he could return to safe ground. “Enough of this,” he continued. “Let’s get clean.”

He felt her eyes burning through his skin with every move he made, and he had to force himself not to look at her again until twisting the shower handle. She jumped a bit when water sputtered and began to rain upon the ceramic, but she moved under the nozzle under his encouraging nod.

“Here,” Spike said, moving in beside her. “Jus’ hang tight, love…I’m gonna take care of everything.”

And he did. No matter how difficult it was, no matter that every touch of her skin made his erection stiffer and his heart ache for the ability to pound, he ran his fingers over her soft, wet skin with an ease his body envied. Dirt browned the water and raced down her legs, spiced with flakes of red here and there where wounds had scabbed over and chipped away. He soaped his hands and ran them down her arms, caressed her stomach, scrubbed her neck, washed her face, and grinned when she smiled and sighed beneath his touch.

“Showers,” he explained. “Bloody brilliant, eh, love?”

Buffy hummed her approval, stretching her arms above her head and inadvertently bumping her breasts against his chest, her hard nipples grazing his flesh. He nearly choked on a whimper. A beat—Spike swallowed hard, blinked, and moved away again, this time collecting the razor he’d placed on the shower’s edge. “Stand still for me, now,” he murmured, gathering the bar of soap and dropping to his knees. “This might sting.”

His hands weren’t going to be any help for the way he couldn’t stop shaking, and the last thing he wanted to do was knick her this first time. And yet, there was no way cleaning her up and making her as true a version of herself as she’d been before the jump could hurt matters any, therefore it was imperative he place his emotions on hold and gather control of his rampaging hormones long enough to make sure he didn’t do something stupid.

“Still,” Spike mused again, painting her legs with soap suds. “That’s my girl.”

He’d never been so careful with a blade in his life—large or small, sharp or dull. And Buffy didn’t budge. She just stood and watched, standing perfectly still under his hands as he shaved her legs clean. His eyes remained studiously on the track taken by his hands, painfully aware that her quim was just inches from his mouth. And Christ, did she smell divine. Warm, thick, feminine…and wet. Wet in ways he hadn’t smelled or dreamt in centuries. Wet with that perfect womanly honey he longed to drench over his fingers and paint over his tongue. He hadn’t done anything or touched her inappropriately…but she was wet.

Fuck.

Buffy was wet for him.

“Mmmm,” Spike murmured, his eyes rolling heavenward as the razor trekked up her thigh. “Buffy…”

She whimpered in response.

“Can’t make this easy, can you?” he replied. A few finishing strokes rendered her legs smooth as bloody silk, and he wasn’t done yet. He shifted behind her without a word, hoping she’d ignore the eager prod of his cock against her rear. “Raise your arms again for me, pet.”

There was no way she could follow that instruction without direction, which he provided the next second. Spike inhaled sharply, guiding her and doctoring her armpits with the razor before casting it aside completely. “Almost done,” he whispered, reaching for a bottle of unlabeled shampoo. It was the same he’d used the day before, and while it wasn’t his favorite, it worked better than nothing. There was no scent to it—nothing of the frilly girly aromas with which Buffy had so often taunted him back home. It was merely clean and there was nothing more he could ask in that regard. It was more than he could have hoped for in Hell.

With the larger tasks completed, Spike was left again desperate for mechanisms by which to keep his mind occupied. The situation was becoming real again—becoming something his starved body couldn’t ignore. Buffy’s warm flesh was pressed against his chest, his erection poking her backside, his fingers massaging her scalp. Every few seconds she would whimper her encouragement, fingers slipping over his thighs and gently scratching his skin. Showering was something so ordinary, so commonplace. Something he’d taken for granted back home—like so many other things. And with Buffy with him, touching him, moaning and teasing him with whiffs of her arousal, it was difficult to separate fantasy from reality.

So often over the past few years he’d lost himself in fantasy. Whether it be of the Buffy who had kept him company in the cave, or the dozens of different scenarios he’d entertained before the Tower, before Buffy had jumped. Things he hadn’t remembered—things he’d tried so hard to forget. A thousand different things performed a thousand different ways. He was only a man—a man with a warm, willing woman…a woman he loved, and she was whimpering under his touch.

He couldn’t touch her the way he wanted. He couldn’t feel her the way he wanted.

Buffy wasn’t really with him. Buffy was still trapped somewhere—hidden in a place he could not find. The girl in his arms was the one for whom he’d searched, but she’d buried herself so far inside her Id that identifying the real thing might take…well, he didn’t want to think about how long it would take.

But he couldn’t touch her. She could whimper and moan and…God…

Unthinking, Spike lowered his mouth to her throat, tongue tracing her perfect skin as his hands slipped up her abdomen. She was so warm. Buffy. She was so warm, so wet…and it had been so long…

Her breasts filled his hands, her nipples poking his palms. She whimpered and mewled and he sucked harder at her flesh. God, she felt so good.

Can’t…

“Buffy…”

Stop. Stop.

He didn’t want to stop. Neither did she. Every time he tried to drag his fingers away, she hissed in protest. The fog surrounding his brain was too thick—the line between right and wrong blurred. It had been so long. So long…

No.

“No.” Spike growled and tore himself away, releasing her harshly as his feet staggered back. “I’m sorry. Buffy—”

She whirled around, her eyes wide.

“Buffy—”

“Boofay,” she offered quickly. Helpfully. “Boofay.”

“Yes, sweetheart, I—”

“Boofay. Boofay.” She took his hand in hers and guided back to her breast, and only then did he understand. “Boofay,” she said again. “Boofay.”

She was trying to please him by speaking. She wanted…God…

“Buffy—”

“Boofay.”

“Don’t…I can’t.” Spike forced his eyes downward before he broke completely, hating the devastation wrought across her face. She hadn’t been touched in a millennium. Not by anyone—not tenderly, not like this. Where he hadn’t felt a sensual touch in generations, she’d forgotten pleasure altogether. She’d forgotten how it felt to be caressed and loved. She had nothing to measure it by…and he wanted to give it to her. God, how he wanted to give it to her. A moment of pure pleasure in a world that offered none. Cast aside protocol, ignore the boundaries of right and wrong, and give her something she couldn’t remember feeling.

She hadn’t been touched in so long…

Perhaps it wouldn’t be wrong if it was all for her. If it wasn’t for him. If he gave without taking…perhaps it wouldn’t be wrong.

“Guess I can’t go to Hell if I’m already here,” he mused, allowing his eyes to meet hers again.

She immediately seized the opportunity to try to impress him. “Boofay,” she insisted again, though her voice cracked. “Boofay.”

“Oh Buffy…”

“Boofay.”

It hit him like a silver bullet. This was Buffy begging him.

She was begging him.

“Boofay,” she said again, sniffing and blinking back tears. “Boofay, Boofay, Boofay—”

And that was it. Something snapped, and the decision was made for him. Spike stepped forward, murmuring softly and stealing a swift kiss off her lips. That would be all he took for himself. A kiss. And though brief, it left his mouth tingling and his body weak with need. The widening of her eyes confirmed he’d taken her by surprise, but before she could move in to explore his mouth again, he slipped his hand between her legs and nestled his fingers through her curls.

“It’s all right,” he whispered, kissing her brow. “Spike’s here. Spike’s got you.”

Her breath caught and she fell silent, her eyes drifting shut. And though he yearned to explore, he forced himself to remain quiet and motionless for a second—just a second. The vision she presented made his insides shiver. Needy, desperate…he’d never imagined Buffy desperate for anything. Never. She was so resolute, so steadfast, so ferociously independent, and that was why he loved her. Well, a why among thousands. She was strong and self-reliant, confident and snappy. She didn’t tremble or beg—he’d learned the hard way that she didn’t beg—and she never asked. She was a creature of doing. A woman after his own heart.

Solitude had broken her, and she’d been alone so long.

“Don’t hate me when you remember,” Spike pleaded softly, walking her back until she was pressed against the shower wall. His lips trailed across her face as his hand began a slow exploration of the wet, silky flesh between her legs. “I just wanna make it go away. Don’t hate me when you remember.”

He began softly, ever mindful that she could change her mind in a flash. Mindful that she could feel something she didn’t recognize, experience something she couldn’t identify, and shove him away before her body unleashed secrets she had no idea how to reconcile. But even as he pressed her further, wandering fingers slipping between her drenched labia to tenderly caress her molten flesh, she did nothing but shiver and moan. A long, uneasy breath hissed through his teeth, eyes glued to her face and soaking in every sigh. She whimpered so timidly, as though afraid of being heard.

“God, you’re beautiful,” Spike whispered, brushing a kiss across her cheek. His fingers wandered deeper, thumb finding her clitoris and relishing the harsh gasp that rode off her lips. He edged two fingers inside her tight opening, not venturing far but wanting to feel her. Needing to feel her—needing so much, but made whole with this alone. “Yeah, sweetheart. That’s it.”

Buffy’s eyes fluttered open and locked on his.

“Stay with me. That’s it, sweetheart, stay with me.”

There were a thousand things he wanted—a thousand things. His mind was on record, memorizing every expression she made, every gasp she gave him, every everything, because this was something he would never have again. Outside the wondrous fantasy she gave him—this moment of pureness and warmth in the midst of the nightmare she’d created around her. She gave him so much without even trying.

“So beautiful,” he whispered again, tenderly massaging her clit. She was so soft, so slippery. His fingers were drenched with her honey, and with every breath she whispered for more. More of the everything he wanted to give her.

She asked without knowing how, and there would never be enough. Not of this. He peppered kisses across her face and held her trembling body against his, wanting more, wanting this to last forever. Wanting so much of what he couldn’t ask. And when she trembled and came around him, squeezing his fingers and drowning him with her soft, sweet cries, he knew what he had.

What he’d had here. In this corner of Hell. He’d had something perfect.

He’d had perfect. This here…this was his perfect.

And it was all he could ever ask.

“Hold still.”

Buffy wiggled with a grimace.

“If you don’t hold still, it’s just gonna hurt more.”

More wiggling, this time accompanied by a scowl. She looked too cute to be threatening.

Spike paused and chuckled at that. If Buffy were actually with him, the thought alone would have cost a black eye. As it was, he could barely keep his chest from swelling every time his eyes caught hers in the mirror. She wore nothing but the green tee he’d had on the day before, which was at least a size too large…and while the clothes weren’t his, he’d claimed them, and seeing her in something he’d worn was dangerous. It stirred urges that hadn’t been stirred in years, marking her to the satisfaction of the inner primal male and proclaiming her as his.

It was only a shirt; the wiser option, as it was either this or naked. There was no way he was putting the clothes she’d worn back on her back…not when there was a healthy supply for the taking.

Spike held her eyes in the mirror, trying and failing to suppress a grin. “Never would’ve figured it,” he mused, jerking the brush’s bristles through another tangle. “Toughest bird I know, defeater of gods, an’ you’re afraid of a little hairbrush.”

She looked for a minute as though she resented the statement before her expression melted into a whimper, effectively killing his mirth. Her hair was in an unmanageable tangle, twisted and knotted through years of neglect; making every stroke was more painful than the last. And even though he was loath to cause her pain, he found this to be the most familiar, easiest task he’d undertaken in three centuries. Taking care of the woman he loved was something he knew. Something with which he was intimately familiar…and something told him that Buffy at her worst would still be buckets better than Dru at her best.

“Not sure what you do for fun around here,” he continued awkwardly. “’m willing to take suggestions.”

Buffy whimpered and tried to duck away, only to be caught in Spike’s arm.

“Ah, ah, ah,” he chastised. “Not so fast, love. Still got a few tangles.”

She mewled again before settling into a firm sulk. It didn’t do much good. Spike smiled and tightened his grip, though he couldn’t keep his heart from melting. There was no force more powerful than the Buffy pout. “I know it hurts, love,” he cooed encouragingly. “Just look at me. Watch me.”

Her gaze locked with his again in the mirror. There was such intelligence there—such fiery wit. Sparks of the real girl thrived well within her eyes, trapped behind a barrier she couldn’t lift. It was so strange having her with him and missing her at the same time. Buffy was still far away, locked inside herself, and the one-sided conversation he pursued with her reflection only strengthened the need to touch her again.

Touch her…

Spike’s jaw tightened and he shook his head, turning his eyes to the ground. No. No. What had happened in the shower could not happen again. No matter how wonderful it had been, how glorious it had been. How his mind couldn’t help but drag him back to those few blissful seconds where he’d shown her a world beyond misery. How he’d felt her gasp and pant, how he’d felt her strangle and drench his fingers with her rich, tantalizing honey. It was over, behind them, and it didn’t do any good to dwell on what he couldn’t have.

Not until she was with him. Really with him.

“I miss you,” Spike murmured softly, nuzzling her hair. “Wherever you are. God, I miss you so much.”

Buffy blinked and quirked her head. It wasn’t much, but it was enough to stir him back to himself. In an easy second, he’d plastered on a smile, as the brush in his grip unraveled another tangle.

“No worries, kitten,” he assured. “It’s all right.”

One thing at a time. Right now, his attention remained with her hair. Next, it would be with catching the night’s meal. Buffy would emerge when she emerged; wishing did little more than make the girl who needed him feel inadequate, and he couldn’t bear making her more self-conscious than she was for the simple crime of having lost herself after a thousand years of silence.

None of this was her fault.

None of it.

Spike sighed, his eyes dropping to the edge of the sink where he’d placed the scissors. “Fancy a haircut?” he asked.

Buffy’s nose wrinkled.

“Bloody miracle you’re not Rapunzel,” he commented, running his fingers through her freshly-combed hair. “Don’t worry, pet. I love your hair. Jus’ gonna take off a few inches, is all.”

A foot or so was more like it, but words made little difference. Spike inhaled sharply, draping her hair between the blade wedges and keeping careful watch of her face the second he snipped her length away. Hair was important to women—even the batty ones like Dru—and though it had been lifetimes since he found himself in the position to intimately care for anyone, his hands didn’t shake, his mind didn’t set traps for him, and he didn’t second guess himself. He knew Buffy. He knew every tendril, had a mental snapshot of the way her golden locks framed her face, how her hair bounced in the middle of a fight. He knew every inch of her so well.

His hand didn’t quiver. Didn’t hesitate.

He couldn’t doubt when he knew her better than he knew himself.

“There,” he murmured, brushing wisps off her shoulders. Her hair hit her where it had when she jumped, best to his memory. It wasn’t the best style she’d ever sported, but already she looked better than she had the day before. She looked more like herself. “Pretty as a picture.” He paused when her eyes met his, her hands exploring the job he’d done. “Know it’s not what you’re used to, but I’m no bloody stylist.”

Buffy’s fingers curled in her hair, her eyes shining at him.

“Come on,” he said, ushering her toward the adjoining bedroom. “Let’s see if we can find somethin' other than my shirt for you to wear.”

Spike reckoned in all his life he’d never worked so quickly to put clothes on a woman after taking them off. Given what had occurred in the shower, he didn’t trust himself to keep her in any state of undress too long. His senses were too keen, his body starved for touch—starved for her—and parading her around in all her glory was essentially waving a willing meal before a ravenous man. In a flash, he had her covered in an oversized long-sleeved navy cotton shirt and a pair of black leggings which, much to his dismay, did little to sate his voracious appetite. If anything, a wet-haired, wide-eyed Buffy, still flush from her orgasm and dressed in men’s clothing was more lethally tempting than anything for which he could have prepared himself.

There was no preparing for this. For the wonderful torment of having her so close, so willing, yet so completely off limits.

Better to get his mind on a different track altogether. Spike whistled a long sigh and shook his head. There was nothing more he figured on doing here—the prime objectives conquered. Buffy looked brilliant and smelled divine, and while she was still far from the picture in his memory, she was closer than even he could have hoped.

“No frilly scents,” he observed. “You weren’t one to over-pamper, but I know you fancied lavender. Used to spray it on before every patrol.”

Buffy smiled, entertaining herself with her oversized sleeves.

“Time to head back, then.” Spike moved forward and took her by the arm. “See if we can find another roast for tonight.”

She nodded as though she understood and placed herself faithfully at his side, mimicking the steps he took and the curves his body made as she had when they first arrived. The empty streets appeared a shade darker, marking the maturation of the day as the perimeters of the dimension spun toward nightfall. He hadn’t planned on spending the entire day at the warehouse, but somewhere between shaving Buffy’s legs and cutting her hair, he’d lost track of the hours.

Somewhere between…

God, he’d really fucked himself over. Convincing himself he was acting on her behalf, telling himself it was what she deserved—something she needed after lifetimes without anyone to touch. Something that wasn’t at all for him.

Only of course it was. It was entirely for him. The way she smelled. The way she sighed. The way she whimpered and arched against him, her soft, silky pussy around his fingers, drenching him with liquid desire. Things he’d only imagined before—forbidden fantasies that had driven him mad in life and death. In a blink, every pang, every twist, every jerk his battered heart had ever endured, his overactive mind had ever suffered, blasted through the walls solitude had built. His sex-drive revived, his body pumped with harsh waves of crippling lust…and he’d allowed himself a touch.

He’d allowed those fantasies to take shape. He knew things now—things he could only before imagine. True, he’d always known how she smelled when she was hot; he’d sniffed her enough when they first met. From the beginning, in good ole Sunnydale High that night they first came together in battle. She’d been so warm, so fiery—her body spiced with arousal and adrenalin. She couldn’t hide from him then—not as she learned to in the years that followed. She’d been so young, virginal, unschooled in ways girls didn’t appreciate until after adulthood had seized them fully. And while, yes, she had grown up much sooner than any teenager ever should, she’d possessed such precious innocence when they first crossed paths—innocence that couldn’t be described. Innocence that once lost was lost forever. And in the early days, she’d let him know in a thousand ways how easily it would have been to take the forbidden. How he could have claimed her without any struggle at all. She might have loved Angel, but her teenage hormones left her a time-bomb that would have gone off for anyone who gave it attention. He'd enjoyed fusing and defusing her, especially knowing he could have ignited her fuse any way he pleased. She might have hated him then, but her mind was still open, curious, aroused by danger and anyone’s to conquer. She would have let him have a taste if he’d pursued it.

The fantasies had started back when she barely qualified as a pedophile’s wet-dream, and time had only strengthened his hunger. The more he knew her, the more he wanted to know her. Her beauty and allure increased with each day, flavored her life with experiences that had made her into the woman with whom he’d fallen in love. Her soft girlish skin had smoothed into a woman’s curves and the punches and kicks they’d traded were exchanged for verbal skirmishes, not to mention more pops in the nose than he cared to relive. She’d grown up before his eyes, and while he’d always been obsessed with her, while he might have loved her since the beginning, there was no match for the woman she’d become. The woman he’d braved Hell to find.

The woman he’d had only vivid fantasies to call upon, until he let his dick convince his brain that touching her when she couldn’t know what it meant was the right thing to do. The thing she needed when she couldn’t known right now what she truly needed. When she didn’t know him beyond the understanding that his presence meant she was no longer alone. He’d always had her scent in his nostrils and her taste in his mouth, and he’d known how her skin felt beneath his fingertips from the few times she’d allowed him to touch her. He’d had those things before to bolster the fantasies. And now…

Now…

Now he had everything in his imagination filled in for him. Her moans. Her sighs. Her gasps. Her honey. Her warmth.

He had everything.

Christ, he shouldn’t have touched her. He shouldn’t have allowed those fantasies to know reality.

She’d unwittingly given him the most perfect moment of his life, and he could never touch it again. Not like this. Not when the part of Buffy he wanted the most was lost among the inner debris.

And that’s the rub. Spike glanced up, absorbing her sweet face, her innocent eyes…those eyes that would follow him anywhere.

The part of her he wanted was gone, and he wouldn’t be satisfied with anything else. And he sure as fuck wouldn’t take advantage of her. Another time, another life, other circumstances…he’d been a soulless prick and proud of it, but the ground on which he now trod was paved far off the beaten track of anything he’d ever ventured. This was different. He was different. And he loved her too much to make it about him, and today, try as he might to convince himself otherwise, had been about him. Whatever he did, however he touched her, whatever boundaries he broke were so broken because he wanted them gone. It wasn’t because she needed it…no matter how hard he tried to convince himself otherwise.

He’d find her. Somehow, some way, he would pull her from the shadows in which she’d buried herself. He’d find her.

He had all the time in the world.

Spike couldn’t begin to imagine how bloody sick Buffy must be of pork. Day in and day out, for a thousand years, experiencing nothing but the mundane taste of roasted pig. She’d likely never again ask to carve the Christmas ham once he had her home.

“About had your fill, love?” he asked, wiping her mouth with the corner of his shirt. For something she ate every day, she gobbled it up with all the enthusiasm of a woman who didn’t know from where her next meal was coming. She’d exhibited surprise when he began the hunt for another animal, which led him to believe she didn’t eat every day and likewise went a long way in explaining why she was so thin. Buffy always had been a tiny slip of a thing—more so toward the end than ever—but she was similarly a girl who liked a good meal. She never starved herself for the sake of vanity; Lord knows she didn’t need to for all the exercise she got both in training and on the hunt. However, after having lost herself and all semblance of what it was to be human, the routine of eating had likely slipped into something she only did when hunger pains mounted toward starvation.

No way to evolve without others. She’d been alone, and stripped of the ability to grow.

“Ready for a bit of kip, then?” Spike questioned, nodding at the makeshift bed. “Figure today was all right, wasn’t it?”

A soft smile tickled her lips, her eyes brightening. And though it was fleeting, he couldn’t help but feel that she understood him.

“Nothing too exciting, of course,” he continued, doing his best to keep images of her hot body pressed against him, her pussy strangling his fingers, at bay. The last thing he needed was another stiffy, especially when his body was still tense from the stolen moments they had enjoyed earlier. Anything more and he’d have to sneak off for a wank, and given that it had been three centuries since the last time he’d pleasured himself, he wasn’t sure that was the best of ideas. Not at the moment, anyway. Not when Buffy could stumble upon him; not when he didn’t know how long it would take to relieve this bloody edge…

Nothing too exciting. Who the fuck was he trying to fool?

“I’ll have to go to the river tomorrow,” he said. “Get somethin’ to eat.”

Again, Buffy looked as though she understood. She even nodded.

Spike paused, his heart about leaping into his throat. While it didn’t do well to get his hopes up, he couldn’t help but wonder for one glorious second if it was possible. If he’d done more good by her than even he could have anticipated…if a sensation had triggered a memory…if she was fighting through the forest that was her mind to a place where things made sense again.

Could she…

He held her gaze and swallowed hard. Such intelligence. Such strength. All locked behind those emerald eyes.

Best not to get his hopes up.

Spike inhaled sharply and nodded at the bed. “Hop in, pidge.”

Buffy just looked at him.

He sighed. So much for wishful thinking. “Here,” he said, stepping forward and taking her arm. “Let’s just—”

She stopped, shaking her head and hardening her stance.

Spike frowned. “What’s wrong?”

No response, of course, but he didn’t expect one. There was nothing until she shook his hand off her arm and seized his wrist, and by the time he realized she was guiding it to her pussy, it was too late. Her warmth was pressed against him, tickling his nose with a fresh wave of potent slayer arousal and dulling the sensors that guided him through moral gray areas. All at once the insipid line between what was right and what felt right melted into nothing.

Be strong.

Hard bloody words to live by when she looked at him like that.

“Buffy—”

She offered a fast, enthusiastic nod, sounds that could have been words scratching at her throat.

Oh Christ.

“No,” Spike said harshly, fervently. “I can’t. We can’t. It’s—”

The fire in her eyes dimmed.

“It’s not you, kitten,” he swore. “I want this more than you can bloody well imagine. I jus’ can’t take it, all right? What happened in the shower was a one-time thing. A mistake. A…”

If he didn’t know better, he would have sworn she flinched. Perhaps mistake was a universal term, understood only by women in whatever language it was uttered. He didn’t know; all he knew was his heart wilted when she blinked back tears. In an instant his world unraveled. The vows he’d made to himself folded in favor of the same rationalization that had possessed him before. The logic he’d used to pacify the conscience he shouldn’t command; to justify touching her the way he had. Senses dulled and reality faded. Buffy was pressed against him, her watery eyes shining up at him, a wordless plea riding her muted lips for something she didn’t know how to express.

It’s not her, his mind warned. It’s not her…

And it wasn’t. He knew it—for fuck’s sake, he’d repeated it mercilessly to himself to keep this from happening again. But when he met her eyes, Buffy was all he saw. The Buffy he knew; the Buffy he loved. There were no lines, no boundaries, no clearly marked sign labeling a wrong turn. Buffy might not be behind the wheel, but the girl in his arms was Buffy where it mattered most.

He’d told himself no. He’d sworn a bloody oath.

But she hadn’t been touched in so long…

How could he deny her the one thing she’d asked of him?

“Promise me one thing,” Spike whispered, brushing his lips across her cheek. “When you remember me, remember this, you’ll also remember I tried.” A long breath shuddered through his body, hands gently guiding her back until her ankles brushed the bed. This time when she stiffened in protest, he shook his head, nuzzling her throat and rubbing soothing circles into her shoulders as he guided her to the ground. “It’s all right. I’m here. I’ll take care of you.”

He would never understand how he could burn so brightly under her smile without dusting, especially now when his hands shook and his knees knocked and he did his best not to fumble like a schoolboy. She was so beautiful. So open and trusting, warmth beyond anything he’d ever tasted burning her eyes. And for an instant, he found himself back in his crypt, lost in her eyes as they met each other with understanding. He’d always been there for her. Even when they were enemies, he’d waved a white flag and taken a stance at her side, no matter how rigidly his demon protested. Even when his bones were at the mercy of an irate hell-god, he held his head high and asked for more. Even when he had no reason to keep fighting, his fists remained raised and ready to strike. No matter the cause, he’d always been there. Always.

He wouldn’t stop now. Not when she needed him the most.

“It’s all right,” Spike said again, cursing the hands that trembled as he fisted the hem of her over-sized shirt and drew it over her head. Her nipples puckered the second they kissed air, dragging his eyes downward and making his mouth water. Strange that she didn’t blush or turn away; Buffy might have been a woman of the world, but she was always so conscious of herself, of the way she looked to those around her, both internally and externally. He’d never imagined her baring herself with such unaccustomed openness, and though he wished he could believe this was something she gave to him and him alone, the truth wasn’t nearly as flattering. He could be anyone so long as he was with her right now. So long as he saved her from silence.

Buffy inhaled sharply when he cupped a breast, eyes falling shut and her head rolling back. And Spike was doomed to follow; his mouth falling to her throat. “You’re perfect,” he murmured, stretching out beside her. “So perfect.”

“Ahhh…”

“Always were to me, love. The perfect enemy. The perfect slayer. The perfect woman. Perfect for me.” He sighed, hands dropping to her leggings. “Bloody well perfect for me. Lift your hips.” Spike tugged on her hemline to indicate intent, and she obeyed without hesitation. God, it shouldn’t be so easy. Not with Buffy. Nothing ever was. But just like that she was naked and beneath him, her body open and inviting. And completely his.

Wrong.

“Mmm…” Her hips rolled upward in offering, betraying womanly expertise which should have been lost to her. “Uhhh…”

Spike smiled softly and kissed her cheek, hand abandoning her breasts and tracing down her abdomen. “So lovely,” he murmured, unable to keep his head from dipping so his tongue could curl around one of her nipples. God, she tasted sweeter than he could have imagined. Every nerve in his body quivered. “It’s all right. Jus’ let me…”

The river that drenched his fingers when he slid his hand between her legs was enough to render his balls a cold, hard blue, and he couldn’t, with a good conscience, touch himself…not while he was doing this. As long as he kept his pleasure separate from hers, there was some leeway with his conscience. Blur that line and everything was lost. Not that she made it easy. God, no. One touch, one simple caress, and her hot nectar flowed over his fingers, tightened his every cell and compounded the need for release. It had been so long. “Oh, Buffy,” he murmured, gently caressing her labia before parting her completely. “So warm. So fucking warm…let me…”

“Ahhh…”

“That’s it, darling,” he said encouragingly, unable to keep from licking her nipple again. “Jus’ let it go.”

He teased her gently for a few mindless seconds, penetrating her opening with a few shallow thrusts before turning his attention completely to her clitoris. Weeks could be spent enjoying Buffy’s body, exploring everything he’d only dreamt about for so long—he could stay here happily and never tire. But this wasn’t about him, and he couldn’t fool himself. She would cling and gasp, hold onto him as he introduced her to levels of pleasure her mind had forgotten, but it wasn’t about him. It could never be about him. He had to keep his distance, keep his involvement minimal. He had to make sure she understood what it meant when she returned to him.

He had to make sure Buffy knew he’d done this for her.

“I love you,” Spike murmured, drawing lazy circles around her clit. “I love you, Buffy. You hear me?”

She gasped and scratched at him, and he pressed harder.

“I love you. Remember that.”

Perhaps it was too much to ask, but he didn’t care. It was something that needed asking. Something he had to say.

He had to get the words between them so she knew. So when the day came that she opened her eyes and saw him, she would recognize what had passed.

If there was one thing he would take for himself, this was it.

He needed her to know it was about her—and always had been.

When he stared, he could almost see her. Jagged glass in hand, her skin bloodied, tears scalding down her cheeks as she carved into the walls. More than just a snapshot in his head or an image that plagued him long after day had rolled into night, it was as though the shadows themselves came to life. As though Buffy assumed form outside her body, captured in a loop and cursed to repeat her actions over and over again until consciousness and flesh were reunited.

Spike sighed heavily. The scribbling blurred into nothing the longer he stared.

“What are you trying to tell me, pet?” he murmured, gently brushing hair away from Buffy’s eyes. She had fallen asleep in ten minutes, which he found amusing even if he wasn’t surprised. After centuries without human contact, two orgasms in one day would do a lot to tire anyone out…even someone with the strength and durability of a slayer.

The quiet was nice. Holding Buffy to his chest, listening to the steady rhythm of her heart beating against him, her soft breaths rolling over his skin…drinking in all the things he’d yearned for, and hoping with everything he was that she would be herself when her eyes opened again. It wouldn’t happen; it was too soon and he hadn’t done nearly enough to rescue her from her private prison. But for the moment, at least, he could pretend. Pretend she was sleeping off hours of rampant love-making, where her eyes were locked with his, where she knew who he was, and where she held him to her breasts as she whispered how much she loved him.

It was the fantasy. A fantasy he’d entertained longer than he remembered. A fantasy that rendered the image he’d constructed for himself nothing but a fancy costume.

Spike smiled, shaking his head. Another random bolt of normalcy, just when he didn’t think he would feel remotely normal again. They always struck when he was least expecting it. He didn’t figure he’d cared a damn about his reputation in…well, centuries. Loving the Slayer had made every other thing he’d ever considered important obsolete in comparison.

A long, tired sigh fell off his weary shoulders.

There was a long road ahead. A long, lonely road. The loneliest of all roads. The road he traveled with the woman he loved, but still remained alone. Buffy wasn’t with him. Buffy was still far away.

He still had to find her.

Something hard punched his shoulder, thrusting him out of a dreamless sleep. It took a few bleary-eyed moments to recall where he was, but by the time memory had caught up with consciousness, his eyes were consumed with Buffy’s terror-stricken face.

“What?” he demanded, bolting up. “Buffy, pet, what—”

The second he spoke, her face fell in warm relief. It wasn’t until she patted him, until he noticed where her hand rested, that realization dawned.

And fuck, did it dawn.

“Oh, Buffy,” Spike murmured, tension dropping from his shoulders. “You won’t feel anything there. It doesn’t beat. It’ll never beat…but I’m here, see?” He took her free hand and pressed it against his cheek, his thumb rubbing circles into her skin. “I’m jus’ fine. It’s just this…vamps don’t have heartbeats. When the demon takes us, it takes everything. Pulse, heart, soul and all.”

His words had lost her interest; Buffy’s concern faded entirely in favor of fascination. Her hand remained against his chest, fingers flexing curiously, her brow furrowed as though she thought she could find a beat if she looked hard enough. Whatever futile explanation waited poised on his lips fell away completely in favor of adoration—the same fuzzy feeling that had warmed his long-dead insides over the past couple days as he walked alongside her in her journey of self-discovery. She was learning everything over again, and he got to learn it with her.

“Think that’s something, do you?” he asked, capturing her chin and directing her gaze upward. “Watch this.”

And, without ceremony, he allowed his fangs to descend.

The reaction wasn’t entirely what he expected. Buffy roared a gasp, her eyes widening with terrified alarm before evolving into something else entirely. Something foreign. Something he’d never before experienced. The sort look he’d seen on old-timers’ faces as they reflected on the good ole days with a haze only nostalgia could provide; like looking through a catalogue for a forgotten novel where the plot was crystal clear but the title was long forgotten. Buffy remembered the song but not the lyrics; she stared through eyes that recognized without knowing how or why. It was humbling and uncomfortable all at once; there was no way to react to an emotion he’d never confronted. She stared and stared, peeling away layers he hadn’t known existed until there was nothing to do but look away.

Her hand stopped him and every molecule in his body froze.

“Buffy…”

Her trembling fingers explored his ridges, her lips forming words her voice couldn’t find. And he was helpless to do anything but watch.

She knew this but she didn’t know how. She knew him. She knew…

“You remembering, kitten?” Spike whispered, closing a hand around her wrist. He’d forgotten how his voice thickened when maneuvering through fangs. “Any of this trigger anything?”

She must have understood that particular question, for immediately her face fell away in shame.

“Oh, sweetheart, don’t—” He sighed and shook his head, the bones in his face falling back to his human mask. “It’s not your fault. Don’t ever think I’m upset with you for not knowing, yeah? There’s no reason you should remember anything just yet. Figure I’m lucky jus’ to have you like this. For as long as I begged the sodding Powers to let me make it this far, I’m just thankful to have you with me.”

There was a look in her eyes that made him believe she comprehended more than she realized, for when she nodded, it was in understanding rather than reaction. He didn’t know how he knew but he didn’t question it. Just as he wouldn’t question the soft smile that stretched her mouth or the sudden spark of inspiration that brightened her face. Before he could blink, Buffy was on her feet and pulling him along with her.

“Where—”

She shook her head, pressed a finger to her coy, grinning lips and motioned for him to follow her.

And Spike, ever her slave, was helpless to do anything but obey.

It took realizing that his eyes were fixated on her bronzed, luscious ass to grasp that she had stepped outside without wearing a stitch of clothing. In a blink, Spike stripped off the shirt he’d slept in and drape it over her head before her bouncing breasts gave his cock ideas it didn’t need.

“You’re gonna drive me outta my mind,” he told her. “Can’t be good. Can’t be wicked. Can’t be a bloody saint for you, sweetheart. It’s been three hundred years, an’ you know how I feel.”

His words were wasted; as she had the day before, Buffy was entertaining herself with his oversized sleeves.

“At least you did,” Spike continued. “You knew how I felt before you went in. Don’t expect you to remember it, but the way you looked on those stairs. You understood me, even if you didn’t want to. You believed me in the end.”

Buffy stifled a laugh. A thread along the hem had come loose and was dancing a ticklish path across her thigh.

“Well,” he said with finality, kissing her cheek. No sense trying to get her to see what he couldn’t explain. He was her caregiver, and he’d be happy for it. No matter how difficult it became, or how often she flaunted her body in front of him. The night before had given him perspective, and there were certain things he would no longer fight. Buffy needed touch, and he was going to give it to her whenever she asked…but only if she asked. He wouldn’t deny her what she needed, nor would he take for himself. It was the only way to placate the conscience that shouldn’t exist and give the warring devils in his head something over which to agree.

For now, he had his definitions in line. Touching Buffy was all right just so long as she wanted it. Just so long as she initiated it. Touching Buffy because he wanted it was out of the question. At least for now. Until she remembered.

If she remembered.

“You’re beautiful,” he whispered, kissing her cheek. She tasted so sweet. “Beautiful.”

Buffy flushed against his skin, pulling back to gift him with a bright smile. Every nerve in his body warmed.

“What’s this you wanted to show me, then?” Spike asked, voice strained. It was better to keep his mind on the task at hand.

And again, as though she understood, Buffy immediately ceased playing with the sleeves and turned on her heel to continue on her way, her steps full of spring and her ass just barely visible with every bounce.

Spike groaned inwardly. Sometimes not seeing forbidden fruit was the greater of two evils. It allowed one’s imagination to run rampant. And fuck, wasn’t life a bloody hoot? He remembered Drusilla dancing naked under the stars in a town full of churchgoers and it not bothering him a lick. Give him Buffy in a deserted town that her own fears had concocted, and suddenly he was opposed to indecent exposure.

Well, that wasn’t quite right, but it was close enough. He didn’t much care if Buffy flashed her goodies all over the place, just so long as she knew what she was doing…and what it was doing to him. In this state she hadn’t a sodding clue; even if she did, she was still much too childlike to mean anything more than purely instinctive sexual curiosity. It was the reason she’d looked at him quizzically but hadn’t fought when he pulled his shirt over her body, the same reason she smiled when he’d kissed her cheek. She knew they were something to each other without knowing what, or even understanding how such relationships worked.

A bloody delight, she was. In whatever incarnation, Buffy was his sunshine.

It didn’t occur to him that he knew the path they traveled until the smell was thick and heavy in the air, and even then it took seeing the crimson waves for the significance of her offering to settle in. Where she’d brought him. Where she’d known to bring him without knowing anything at all.

Christ…

“Buffy…”

She just smiled at him expectantly, rocking slightly on her heels.

Perhaps it was innate. Perhaps there were certain things one simply knew. It had been a long time since Spike gave a fig about philosophy—the study itself was more a William thing, though try as he might to bury the shadows of his human past, a few things from the finer world had trailed him unhappily in the years that followed his death. He remembered a theory that people were born with infinite knowledge, locked away in the mysterious unused portion of the brain. There wasn’t such a thing as the unknown—knowledge just had to be relearned.

Whether or not there was truth to philosophy, he didn’t know. Philosophy was funny that way. One bloke spurs out a theory and another contradicts it with something that sounds just as probable if padded with the right wording. However, in watching Buffy, it seemed there almost had to be some truth to the belief. To the notion that she already knew everything she had forgotten. There was no other way she could have known to bring him here. No other way the notion would have crept into her head. As a slayer, identifying vampires would be second nature, especially when flashed a pair of fangs. Perhaps seeing Spike’s incisors had triggered something she couldn’t yet reconcile with her reality—he didn’t know. All he knew was Buffy had led him directly to the place his demon had been craving.

The river. The long, delicious, deep red river. The scent alone made his stomach ache and his fangs tingle. Spike stared at the rolling waves of red for a long, frozen moment before turning to meet Buffy’s achingly hopeful eyes.

God, and then he understood. This was her present to him, her gratitude in the form of something for which he could never ask and wouldn’t take with her at his side…unless it was like this. Unless she was with him and comprehended what he needed. And she did. In ways he couldn’t grasp, Buffy knew exactly what he needed, and this was her offering. Something she wanted him to have in return for all he had given her. Something she wanted to give him.

The uncarved block. She understood because she knew what she was doing, she knew what he was, even if her advanced thought hadn’t developed. She knew him well enough to know what he needed.

She knew he was a vampire and she didn’t care. At least for the moment, she didn’t care.

“Thank you,” Spike said, smiling. “Jus’ what the doctor ordered, pet. Another day an’ I would’ve eaten my own bloody arm.”

The way her face brightened could have warmed the earth.

He’d forgotten this feeling.

When he’d fallen from the cavern, the blood he’d consumed had been for survival above all else. It had been delicious—Christ, the most delicious thing he’d ever tasted, but even with only two days between him and that momentous plunge, the event stood in his memory as one of redefinition rather than satisfaction. His previously dead limbs surging with life his body had forgotten, thriving on energy that would have killed him had he been anything less than what he was. It hadn’t been about the pleasure of eating; it had been about living.

It wasn’t that way now. Warthog blood had sustained him, but the blood in the river was human. Human blood to complete Buffy’s nightmare. Her curse was his salvation, and though he hated what it had done to her, at the moment, he couldn’t be more thankful. He felt pumped and alive in ways beyond his experience. It was a gunshot through the dark, the way it all came flooding back. Restless energy. Strength beyond imagine. The need for sport. The need for fun. The need for violence. God, he hadn’t had a good brawl in ages. His limbs hadn’t had the strength to lift, much less throw in for a tumble. He needed it now like he never had before. Never. Not even after being handicapped by a government chip.

He remembered the chip. The chip had harnessed him, chained him, put a muzzle over his fangs and kept him leashed. Discovering demons were fair game had been a saving grace. He’d spiraled into a rediscovered life; he’d been reborn.

Whatever he felt now was beyond rebirth, and God, he wanted to share it. Share it the only way he knew how.

Share it in a way that would make them both feel like themselves.

“Oi,” Spike said suddenly. “Slayer.”

It was the blood rush; it had to be the blood rush, though he could honestly say it seemed like a good idea at the time. Buffy had been quiet since leaving the river, though there was no mistaking the way her eyes widened or her pulse quickened the second his words hit the air. She almost had time to block the mad punch he sent flying toward her face…almost, but not quite. The familiar smack of flesh striking flesh filled the horrified silence between them, accented with a surprised grunt and completed with Buffy’s abrupt collapse. The rush faded just as quickly, reality returning with an ugly sneer. Spike’s eyes went wide and every molecule in his body froze.

Well, almost every molecule. The nerves attached to his legs knew exactly what to do.

“Oh God,” he muttered, falling to his knees at her side. “Oh God…Buffy! Buffy, Christ, pet, I’m so sorry. I wasn’t thinking. I didn’t…it’s the blood, yeah? Made my brain short-circuit. I didn’t think, I’m so sor—”

Buffy’s head flipped up and he found himself capsized under a stare icy enough to freeze the ground beneath his feet.

“S-slayer?”

Her fist smashed into his cheekbone, and the next thing he knew, he was airborne and barreling into the brick wall of a vacant warehouse. The world changed again in an explosion of pain; pain in a category all on its own; pain he hadn’t felt in generations. Pain that rocketed through every corner of his body.

It was fantastic.

“Fuck yeah!” Spike growled, rolling onto his feet. “That’s the ticket, there, Slayer. Give it to me.”

She seemed willing to oblige. Her eyes were bright with fire, her chest heaving breaths too large for her small body, but there was resilience in her form he’d nearly forgotten. For the first time in a long time, the girl was gone. All was left was the warrior.

Glorious.

“You remember this, don’t you?” he demanded, fists flying upward. “The dance? Feels right. Familiar. Haven’t had a good thrash in ages, I’d wager. No willing partner. No vamps to slay. Jus’ bloody pigs, and fuck knows they don’t put up a fight. You know this, love. Now give it to me. Give it to me!”

The lady needed no encouragement. Each move she made was a piece of living art. She bent. She twirled. She kicked. She threw punches. She poured herself into every twist, and for a brilliant moment, he saw her as she always had been. It was as though nothing had changed. They were back in Sunnydale, battling on the streets, in the cemetery, duking it out over who-knows-what. Trading blows, catching each other’s tosses with the ease of old friends who knew every word in a well-rehearsed quarrel.

Buffy knew this as well as she knew anything. She was, at her root element, the Slayer.

His slayer.

“Can’t remember the last time we had it out like this, can you?” Spike demanded, jumping eagerly from one place to the other. “Maybe that time over the gem, yeah? Right before those bloody soldier boys shoved that piece of tin up my noggin.” He ducked a swing to the head and countered with a fierce blow to her gut. Her wheeze of pain barely registered. “Think that was what I missed most about bein’ strapped in. Made a good play of it bein’ for the sport, but dancing with you, pet? Taking that away was the kicker. God, how I’ve missed this.”

Buffy growled and seized him by the collar.

“That’s it!” Spike encouraged, even as the ground beneath his feet vanished. “Now give us a good throw, eh?”

She shrugged and the next thing he knew, his body had shattered hard against an exterior wall. Pain resurged, but without the thrill of novelty it had provided mere seconds ago. This was, too, a feeling he remembered—one of sore muscles meeting with angry fists behind a force that didn’t know the meaning of fatigue.

It hurt like a bitch, but the hurt was welcome.

“Always with the walls,” he moaned, his head rolling upward. “That move was a favorite of yours.”

She offered another shrug, this one reading: You asked for it, buddy.

That was a point he had to concede.

All right, Spike. The fire in her eyes was too vivid to be from exercise alone, and it wasn’t hard to see why. He’d attacked her without provocation, and though she might know more than she understood, she had no context in which to place a fight. This whole excursion was likely a path in the wrong direction, but then there was no telling if she was truly brassed off or just playing with him. No way to know whether or not she understood the first punch hadn’t been malicious. And while he knew he should stop, the larger part of him didn’t want to over-think it. This was the first thing in years that had felt even somewhat normal. More than an instant or a surge—he felt like himself in ways he hadn’t in lifetimes. If the price was calming the beast later, so be it. It was worth it.

It took a few seconds for the world to stop spinning. “Fuck me, but you haven’t lost your touch, have you?” Spike drawled, slowly climbing to his feet. “Like old times, eh, love? But then you haven’t gone for the nose yet.”

Her eyes flickered. It was brief but very present, and though it faded before he had time to evaluate it, he knew it had to mean something.

“Or yapped my ears off with your li’l quips,” Spike prodded. “Given me one of your brilliantly empty threats. ‘If you’re lying, I’ll stake you good and proper,’ that sort of rubbish. Might as well tell you now, you never had me worried. Figured I’d let you think I was on your leash, just to be friendly-like, but yeah, I always knew the truth. Had too much of a soft-spot for your Spike, didn’t you? At least I was good enough to be used as your punching bag whenever muck-for-brains was too sore to don the padding. Then again,” he added with a grin, “I always liked it when you hit me.”

Right on cue, Buffy raised her fist, but Spike was there to catch her this time. “Ah, ah, ah,” he murmured, hand closing around her wrist. “Think that’s enough for today. Didn’t mean to get all…just brought back some fond memories, is all. Wouldn’t wanna waste all this strength on taking you out, now would I?”

There was a pause. Her eyes remained slanted and her expression dubious for a long, lingering minute, and then she seemed to understand.

“There, now, love,” he murmured, thumb softly caressing her inner wrist. “Wasn’t that fun?”

Another long beat passed between them. She gave him no ground.

And he knew her better than that. Spike’s eyes narrowed. “Buffy…”

Yes. That was it. There was no hiding from him now. Her façade of anger melted without struggle. She knew something had changed—they both did—even if what remained ambiguous. He’d unlocked a part of her they’d both nearly forgotten, a part essential to who she was.

A part without which she could not find herself.

Buffy knew it. She had to know it. For in seconds, the frown was gone completely, a warm smile in its place.

He should have figured she’d take to sparring like a duck to water, though with every swing of her fists, she unlocked a slew of memories and rekindled old stings his skin had somehow retained over three hundred years. Her mean right-hook, for example. Every time her knuckles smashed into his cheek, his bones would whimper and his joints would whine, and he’d have to remind himself why doing this was a good thing.

It didn’t take much coaxing. Seeing her in action was all he needed.

“That’s it!” he yelled, ducking a wild punch aimed at his jaw. “Just like old times, eh, Slayer?”

Buffy grunted and kicked his legs out from under him.

Spike barked a laugh, grinning up at her shining eyes. “Oooh, yeah,” he purred. “You always liked it rough.”

She rumbled another indignant huff, this one patently female. It was another in a long line of indicators that she was beginning to remember.

He flipped himself upright in an instant. “You missed this, didn’t you?” he drawled, ducking another errant swing and repaying her with one of his own. He wouldn’t pretend to not take pleasure in her surprised grunt, just as he wouldn’t deny extending a hand to help her onto her feet. Her resentful glare earned an amused chuckle. “Pretend all you like, sweetheart, I know you better than that. Missed the dance, you did. Slayers need it jus’ as bad as vamps.” He pointed at her. “Don’t think I didn’t know about your nightly sprints through Sunnyhell that last year. Soldier boy din’t cut it, and you needed a slay to work out the kinks.”

Buffy’s eyes flashed brilliantly and she swung at him again, landing a punch to his jaw that sent him soaring through the air and into the harsh, unforgiving side of a brick building. Still, Spike barely felt a thing. He rebounded with a gleeful leap, grinning ear-to-ear and motioning her forward.

“What’s the hurt, love?” he demanded jovially. “Something I said?”

Bloody right it was. This was familiar. This was something she understood, even if she didn’t know it.

And he was going to milk it for all it was worth.

The Slayer heaved another brutal swing; Spike caught this one in midair and used the leverage to deliver a kick to her lower back. Buffy panted and fell backward before nailing him with another cold glare. At last, he relented, shrugging. “Gotta take advantage of it while I can,” he said, shrugging. “You’ll be mopping the ground with my ass before too long.”

Buffy’s brows flickered upward and she ran at him again, leaping upward and smashing her foot against his face before he could blink. The ground beneath his feet vanished just as quickly, and in a flurry he was falling, crashing onto his back with a very smug slayer straddling his waist. It took a few seconds before the stars dancing around his head faded, even longer until darkness melted to light and he took in her smiling face. Her smile alone was worth the pain.

It was worth anything.

Beautiful.

“Yeah,” Spike hissed, though with a grin. “Something like that.”

There was nothing he could have done or said to make her look more superior in that instant, and again he found himself flashed back. This felt right. Buffy kicking his ass. Buffy looking particularly pleased with herself. Buffy smirking at him in victory.

Oh yeah.

He saw his hand migrate upward before he realized he meant to brush her hair from her eyes. “I love you,” he murmured. The words felt familiar, too. Felt right. Felt more like a declaration than a reassurance. He’d loved her both blindly and with his eyes wide open. And though that was one thing he’d never forgotten, it still jolted him to remember how he’d made it this far.

A tender look fell over her features, the fire fading. It happened quickly but there was no mistaking the change, shining through in recognition without source or guidance. They remained that way for a long minute, Buffy just staring at him, trying to place her forgotten memories before softness melted into confusion. Her brow furrowed. She looked so close, then—within reach of an objective she couldn’t identify. And it was all Spike could do to keep his big yap shut.

So close. So close.

She knows who she is.

“Buffy?” he whispered, then winced.

Don’t push. Don’t push. Let her come to you.

Whatever end she was approaching vanished on the breath of a hoarse, pained cry. Her features contorted in agony, her hands fisting clumps of her hair. It happened too quickly for him to grab her, and in an instant, Buffy had tumbled onto her side.

“Buffy!” he gasped, rolling onto his knees and grabbing her shoulders. “What is it?”

She whimpered and shook her head.

“Buffy…”

This scene was too familiar for comfort. In a flash he saw himself, centuries younger, standing at Drusilla’s side; a stolen moment in which she was calm, if not lucid, one second and writhing in pain the next, her brain crushed with visions of things she only partly understood and only rarely conveyed. Oh yes, Spike knew this well…only he’d never known it with Buffy.

He had no idea what was happening to her, and that terrified him.

“It’s okay,” he whispered hurriedly, barely hearing himself. “It’s okay.”

It was over as quickly as it began, leaving eerie silence in its wake. The violent jerks fell to a confused calm; Buffy blinked at him blearily, as though refocusing his shape through blurs. She sat idle for several long seconds, then, as though nothing at all had happened, frowned, shook her head, and climbed back to her feet.

Every nerve in his body was on edge. “Buffy…”

Her frown deepened and she shook her head again, waving at him dismissively. And that was all there was to it. He could stop and stare and demand answers all he liked, but he wasn’t going to receive any, and Buffy couldn’t give them even if she wanted. So he had to stand aside and let her pass, not knowing what exactly had just happened or why. He played the silent role, and fuck if everyone didn’t know how much that wasn’t his strong-suit.

He needed to communicate with her beyond smiles and frowns, nods and shakes of the head.

He needed words.

But words he couldn’t have.

Spike sighed heavily and cast a hand through his hair. “No,” he said shortly, when she raised her fists again. “That’s enough for today.”

Buffy looked at him quizzically but relaxed her stance without quarrel.

There were things she understood.

Spike walked her back to the warehouse that she’d made her home before returning solo to the streets. She hadn’t wanted him to leave, and he hadn’t particularly wanted to leave her, but he likewise knew how he responded when in a slayer’s proximity after downing a bellyful of human blood. And he was hungry again—hungry for something that couldn’t be sated with the blood of a two-day dead boar, especially after tasting the good stuff.

Vampires hungered for blood, sex, and violence. He was satisfying as many of those hungers as possible. Blood from the river, violence in the half-hearted spars in which he’d engaged Buffy—which was honestly more for her benefit than his—and sex…well…

She’s yours.

Spike’s jaw hardened, watching drops of red run between the cracks separating his fingers before his hands dipped into the river for another serving. Wrong. She wasn’t his. Not like this…not in any state.

He was here to help her. If she needed intimacy, he would grant it…but he wouldn’t take.

Even if it broke every natural code in his body, he wouldn’t take.

“Not like you’re not used to blue-balls, Spike,” he mused before tossing back a mouthful. Fuck. Had human blood always tasted this good? He couldn’t remember. He’d been muzzled back then, reliant on animals and whatever else he could finagle from resident demons around town. On occasion, Willy would get in the real good stuff, but the bartender always knew how to price his merchandise, thus Spike rarely got a sample. Likewise, Harmony had snagged a few bags off hospital delivery trucks from time to time but, more often than not, he’d relied on what was bagged and sold in butcher shops, and the butcher’s he’d met hadn’t specialized in human.

If he and Buffy ever got back to Sunnydale, he supposed he’d have to wean himself off the good stuff. The Slayer wouldn’t take kindly to him munching on the townspeople.

Spike licked his lips, dipping his hands back into the river for another helping. The chip hadn’t fired once. Not bloody once. It was something he hadn’t noticed right off, but it was hard to ignore after Buffy’s painful reminder. She’d never been the one clutching her head and screaming—that had always been his role. And though his memory was fuzzy, it was loads better now than it had been when he first stepped into her strange, terrible world. He remembered the chip very well—too well—and he needed no reminders of how it worked.

Humans get hurt by Spike’s hand, and Spike gets a migraine.

In the grand scheme of things, he supposed the chip didn’t matter one way or another. Not to him, at least. He’d lived by the chip’s rule before and he would again, if it was what Buffy wanted. Time in Hell might change her perception, but he couldn't see her taking a liking to the thought of him running around unleashed. There were always alternatives, though, and Spike was accustomed to jumping through her hoops. He knew he could school himself. He knew the difference between right and wrong—her right and wrong—and he would be whatever she needed him to be. Chip or no chip.

Spike sighed and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, rising to full height. “Reckon the sodding chip fell right outta my skull,” he murmured before wincing at the thought.

It seemed possible, given the shape he’d been in. His body depleted, his muscles black and rotting…perhaps his bones themselves had been weathered, grown thin in areas to allow a synthetic thing to simply fall away. Or maybe it had happened before then—before the three hundred years of imprisonment. After all, he had dived willingly into a pool of holy water. There was no telling how much of him had melted away before he’d regenerated.

He might have been without the chip since the first trial without knowing it.

At the moment, though, he supposed it didn’t matter. Buffy didn’t know anything about the chip, and it was something he couldn’t convey intelligibly. He’d worry about it when the time came. For now, there was nothing to do but turn on his heel and set off for their home. Their temporary home. The place where she lived.

“Right,” Spike muttered dryly, kicking at the gravel. “The place she’s lived a thousand bloody years. Don’t get more temporary than that.”

Everything in her world was harsh. The red lake. The orange sky. The burnt, crimson ground. She’d done a number on herself without even trying.

And she was waiting for him.

Spike sighed again and fixed his eyes on the buildings ahead. She hadn’t asked him to touch her since the night they showered together, and when he took her back to the building tomorrow to wash up again, he suspected she would want a repeat performance. He wanted one, too. He wanted one so badly. All he needed was an excuse. One tiny little indication that she craved his hands on her, and he was bloody done for. The way her body pulsed around his fingers, the way her pussy clenched and pulled him in…he was a goner. He wanted to feel her, taste her, memorize her every little whimper to play over and over on his inner soundtrack.

He needed closeness. He needed release.

He needed her.

I need a bloody wank.

A soft snicker wheezed through his lips. It was a simple solution with little payoff, save the obvious. While touching himself would take off the edge, it would similarly do little to relieve the burn he felt. Still, some help was better than none; he’d just have to find a free moment in which to rediscover his body. Not that Spike had forgotten how the piping worked; rather he’d only recently begun to think of himself as a sexual being again. He remembered ecstasy but nothing specific. Pleasure was a foreign entity, and he wanted to relearn it.

It wouldn’t be easy. Not with Buffy stapled to his side. He supposed he could sneak off into an abandoned warehouse and have a go at it, but he didn’t want to leave her longer than needed. Blood was essential; masturbation was not. He’d find time.

Though sooner was definitely preferable to later, before he busted a nut.

Spike stopped short of the doorway before she could sense him. The sight had taken him by surprise; he’d never seen her study the marks on the walls before. Ever since inviting him into her home, she’d been rather indifferent to his fear and curiosity, which he supposed was fair. After all, she had put them there and lived with them for God-knows-how-long. It was no small wonder she didn’t find them remarkable.

Only, for whatever reason, she did now. Buffy was staring at the walls, her expression troubled and her arms crossed. It was a look he knew well. He’d watched her mull things over more times than he could count, trying to unravel the unknown and form hypotheses only she could piece together. She’d managed to work up some truly brilliant plans when she wore that look, and though everything was different now, Spike was struck again with the feeling that, somehow, nothing had changed.

The notion was ridiculous and romantic, and he knew better than to be fooled by a look he recognized.

For her part, she didn’t give any indication she knew he was near. Her attention was totally claimed. Buffy licked her lips and shifted closer to the walls, her eyes following the years-old cuts her hands had made. She remained like that for some time, startling him when she moved, when she raised a hand to trace her work.

He was mesmerized. He wanted to go to her, to experience whatever she was experiencing at her side, but he couldn't budge. He couldn't tear himself away. Not when she moved like a ghost—like something out of both their imaginations. There was no hesitation as she explored; her finger never halted, never broke contact. She knew the marks well. Her strokes were fluid and confident, even if she didn’t rush herself. She traced one senseless symbol and followed it with another, her frown deepening and her eyes boring hard in concentration.

This was the brink of an epiphany. There was no mistaking it. No way could it be anything else. The look on her face was unquestionable…she just hadn't made it to the point of realization. To the place she was fast approaching.

She remembers.

Fuck, he couldn’t help himself—he was too excited to try. “You know what it means?” he demanded, surprising her enough to make her jump…

And that was it. The spell was over, snapped in half and cast aside. He’d scared her out of her concentration, stealing a gasp off her lips and chasing away the determination in her eyes until there was nothing but uncertainty. And that was gone just as rapidly. He saw it coming before she did.

Spike’s face fell as his stomach dropped.

Wait…

“Buffy!”

He was at her side before she fell, catching her swiftly as the first wave came crashing down. Her hands flew to her head, harsh whimpers tearing through her lips. It came at her again and again—pain from nowhere, pain he couldn’t see and didn’t know how to stop. Forget what he’d thought before—this was nothing like Drusilla’s visions. At least then he’d had an idea of what to do. Hold her, demand what she'd seen and try to find a way to appease the vision…or stop it, whichever Dru thought was better. Visions were bloody easy; whatever this was, whatever Buffy saw, provided no trail to follow. She hadn't the words to tell him what was wrong, and he had no sodding clue how to help.

All he could do was hold her.

“It’s all right,” he murmured into her hair, hating himself.

She mewled pitifully and buried her face in his shoulder. Her body tensed and shuddered.

And he’d never felt more helpless in his life.

Spike shivered, sliding his arms under her legs and hoisting her off her feet. “It’s all right,” he said again, even though he knew it wasn’t. “I’ve got you, kitten.”

Her breaths rocked against his shoulder, ricocheting hard through her body. And every whisper twisted his heart. God, he hated this. He had no sodding clue what it was, but he hated it. There was no feeling worse in the world than not knowing how to relieve the pain of the one loved most. Holding her provided empty comfort—whatever she saw, whatever she had seen, remained with her long after the pain faded into memory. He had nothing to offer. No reassurances to whisper into her hair. This was something else—a whole new element introduced into a world where nothing had a simple explanation.

Spike carried her over to the place where they slept, sinking to his knees. “I don’t know,” he whispered, rocking her gently. It was the best he could offer. The truth often was. “I don’t know. I’m so sorry, Buffy, I just don’t know.”

She sniffled but didn’t look up. And they remained that way long after the tremors subsided and the agonized whimpers faded into silence. She clung to him as she had the first night, as she had when she worried he would disappear.

“I’m here. It’s all right. Spike’s got you.”

Buffy trembled, her nails digging into his arms. Nothing could pry her face away from his shoulder. She was rigid in his hold.

The world around her was blacker than darkness. She was safer with her eyes closed.

A dream. This has to be a dream.

Nothing else made sense. Buffy was in his arms. She’d fallen asleep just minutes after the pain subsided. This was fact. Buffy was in his arms. She was not standing at the walls. She was not.

This has to be a bloody dream.

Yet he felt wide awake.

She was carving. Her back was to him, blood streaming down her arm from where the glass dug into her palm, but she was definitely there. More than a shadow or a whisper of something in his head, Buffy was grunting and gutting word after word. They were words he ought to know but couldn’t decipher. Words that meant something to her. Words he needed to read. Words he couldn't see.

She's not there.

Glass dug into plaster. He smelled the dust. Smelled her blood. The air was thick with her tears. It was too real to be a dream.

But it had to be a dream. It had to be.

Maybe my mind’s going. Surprised I managed this long. How long did I last?

Buffy sniffed and shifted against his chest. Buffy scratched and dug against the wall.

A dream.

He’d never experienced a dream that felt this real.

Hours could have passed and he wouldn't notice. He watched her work. Watched her move, watched her carve words that had no meaning. He couldn't tear his eyes away. Spike remained in shadows, holding a sleeping Buffy to his chest as a phantom with her face added to the horror of her opus.

He had no idea how much time passed before the writing stopped. When she was finished, Buffy turned to stare at him, and only then did he understand. How was another matter; she was trying to show him something. The girl in his arms and the girl standing before him were the same. They existed together. He didn't know how—he just knew. She was trying to show him something.

She was showing him the walls. She was showing him what was written. Somehow she was showing him.

It came down to one word. She'd bled to write one word. And as Buffy's phantom faded into darkness, the lines of her scribbles began to bend. The unintelligible writing took form, stretched beyond the mechanics of reality, twisted, turned, and became something else.

Every fiber in Spike's body numbed.

The word on the wall was a name.

The name on the wall was his.

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