Author's Note: Mazza, thanks so much for the lovely review! After careful thought, I removed it, however, because you quoted my punch line and some people look at reviews first to decide whether they want to read a story. Even though that makes my 'struggling new writer trying to establish herself' statistics look worse, for me writing is about readers' pleasure in the story rather than a popularity contest, and not spoiling the surprise is more important. But you said such nice things, I hope you don't mind but I've edited out the quote and reprinted what you wrote here. Thanks again!
Mazza's Review: you really do have a feel for the way the characters sound, this was how Spike would think and feel, another perfect piece of writing and that last line was a killer. Great writing, I hope you share any more you have with us soon.
Vamps weren't that much different from humans. Humans consumed life to live. Just because meat and fish came neatly packaged at the supermarket didn't make the killing of life to keep life going any less real.
And sodding vegetarians didn't get off that easily either. Greens and beans were hacked out of the ground and sacrificed in a pot for humans to consume. Hell, lettuce was eaten still alive. And where roots were yanked out, entire ecosystems collapsed and died. From beneath you they devour. No different than a vampire drinking blood. That's just the dark truth about life. Any life. Or unlife.
The difference was he had killed people. Oh, he wasn't buggered about the humans he'd killed before he'd got a soul. The blood-sucking was survival, the cruelty was undead instinct. Finely honed courtesy of Angelus, the git.
His previously under-used conscience tortured him about it every waking moment and most sleeping ones. It had gone on without a break so long there were whole seconds where it almost felt like white noise. Almost.
No, what made it really bad was the ten people he'd killed since getting his soul back. Buffy was trying to give him a free pass on it, said it wasn't his fault on account of his being under the First's control. Bollocks to that.
If a human accidentally killed someone, it was called manslaughter and he could expect life in prison. But what did "life" mean for a vampire? What did ten lifetimes mean for someone who's immortal? Even though he was a bit slow in school, he got the hang of his ten times table—just add a zero—but what do you do with the zero in
10 x forever = ?
And he had a pretty good idea no government would commit to paying for all eternity for his three squares, a nice weight room, and a movie every third Sunday.
Other options were thin on the ground. His crime of sucking the life out of ten humans would get laughed out of vamp court, if such a thing existed. 'Course, there wasn't anything depraved enough to justify setting up law courts in the vampire world . . . except perhaps falling in love with a Slayer.
No, Buffy was going to give him a free pass, and it chafed that he had no way to pay his debt to society. He was never going to be good enough for her. It looked like his only chance at penance was a permanent state of service to humans, his debt never paid. At best, he was doomed never to be more than her pal, and maybe her wingman, his only future on the edge of her circle watching her build a life with someone else.
Bugger it, it wasn't enough. It wasn't nearly enough.
He thought about the coming battle with the First's über-vampire army. Maybe there was a way to pay his debt to society through saving the world. But it had to be something he did on his own. Even if it was something small, it had to be something significant that was all his, otherwise all the cumbaya-yas of a group effort would bleed the penance out of it. But opportunities like that didn't just fall into your lap. He wished they did.
"Wish granted."