Title: Name of Hero
Spoilers: Post 'Not Fade Away'
Characters: Giles, Spike
Summary: Giles and Spike met in an airport.
AN: Written for Limerickgirl and Betaed by Gutterface

Name of Hero

The two men stared at each other through the crowd. Disbelief painted on one face, burden on the other, and shared grief shinning through their eyes. Giles stood still, comprehension refusing to come as he watched the duster clad vampire make his way through the din. Giles opened his mouth, searching for the right word, but none would come. Spike stood, jaw tense, as if trying to hold back a flood of emotions, his hands in his pockets, clutching uselessly to the soft leather. Neither said anything, words not needed to carry the message.

"How?" Giles voiced finally.

"Wolfram and Hart. He put a good fight, wailed the tar out of some dragon demon." Spike smiled sadly, remembering the days before. He didn't know why he was saved, why he made it when the others failed. He knew he shouldn't look a gift horse in the mouth but it wasn't right. He wasn't more righteous than them, surely Wesley was smarter, Fred more kind, and Buffy...

Giles felt pity he had never known as he watched the emotions play over Spike's features, he looked like a lost little boy. And the watcher wished more than any thing he could play Peter Pan and could be the leader but he knew that was no longer his role. "It's tonight."

Spike nodded, thinking of the ruckus his sudden appearance would cause. Bit would either hug him or threaten to stake him, probably both. And the boy and Red? Who knew? Maybe he would be welcomed back with open arms or maybe he would join Angel wherever his dusty demise had taken him. He tried not to think of the task in front of him, one that he thought he would never have to endure again, even though he knew better. Of course it would happen, it had too, he just didn't think it would be so soon.

A questioned weighed on the Watcher's mind, one that he knew he had no real right to ask... "Why didn't you come for her? After Sunnydale you must have known what you're ...err... demise would mean to her? How she would welcome you back?"

The vampire's eyes held Giles' look and for the first time the he saw wisdom of the centuries embedded in them. He had never thought of Spike as wise before, always had treated him like one of the children. In part because of his appearance and in part because of how he acted, but tonight he watched as Spike aged before him and suddenly Giles felt that he was not an intelligent man after all. "Thought that would have been obvious, Rupes." He paused for a moment. "She was happy, right?"

"Yes." Giles said simply and Spike knew it was the truth.

Spike bobbed his head, examining his black boots. "So big battle? Lotsa nasty big demons? Saving some poor chit who couldn't run properly in her shoes?"

Giles stood silent, examining the vampire, calculating how much he could bear on his already weighted shoulders. Knowing that Spike could not understand a warrior dying from her own betraying body, that cancer was not a foe he would be able to vanquish to avenge her. "She died a hero's death."

It was the truth, for Giles had never seen someone fight so bravely and finally with a diagnosis that there was no real hope, her courage shown through as she checked herself out of the hospital, a grim look of determination in her eyes to still live her life. He was truly proud of the world she had carved out for herself, settling on Rome, a place of magic she had told him, never telling anyone save himself, letting Dawn be happy and carefree. Yes, she died a hero's death.

Giles gestured towards the doors and Spike followed him like an obedient puppy. The Watcher didn't know what possessed him but with his fingers busily cleaning his glasses he offered up a small parcel of comfort. "Which means we are short one hero." Spike raised an eyebrow, questioning. "It's up to you of course." Giles spoke, placing his glasses back on the bridge of his nose. "But she always thought you were one."

Spike swallowed tears that pricked his eyes; he didn't care about being a hero. He just cared that she thought of him as one.

The End