Life

Author: Mkatsi

Rating: PG

Pairings: Semi Spike/Xander friendship or slash depending on your reading.

Feedback: Yes Please!

Disclaimer: The boy's aint mine.

Distribution: Please ask and let me know where it's going.

Written: 5 years ago

Summary: Xander comes home to find Spike acting strangely, set in season 7 when Crazy Spike! Is living in Xander's spare room.

Darkness filled the apartment, when Xander came through the door he had expected to find Spike gone and was planning on giving him an ear-full and a flipping piece of his mind for leaving the door unlocked. Again. But as he swung the door to and dropped his unused keys on the counter, he noticed the soft glow from the TV. He frowned. 'Odd' he thought. It wasn't very often that Spike sat in the dark to watch TV, even if he could see easily through the gloom, most of the time the vamp would watch TV with the lights on and the sound turned way up just to annoy Xander and waste his electricity. "Hey deadboy what y'watching that's so good that you need to…." But Xander trailed off as he passed into the living area, he had been curiously looking towards the TV when he entered and to find it glaring only black and white snow across the screen, in the darkness was just weird and eerie, and made you see patterns in the light. The dark haired man turned his head until he located Spike in the gloom, figuring he would be drunk and had zonked out before the end of a tape and left it running, but no, the vamp was staring right at the screen, seemingly watching the fuzz with intent, not only that but with fear and anguish and confusion.

"oookayy…?"

Xander projected into the darkness, he quickly opened a curtain to let the street light in and switched off the TV then turned to face Spike. The vampire hadn't seemed to realise he was there at all. 'Getting scared now' thought Xander as he crouched in front of the bleached blonde. "Hey Spike" He said calmly "Spike, come on, you have to snap out of this, hey are you asleep, is this some kind of vampire sleep with the eyes open type thing cos I gotta tell you, a) its kinda creepy y'know and uh b) you're nocturnal so if you just-" but the boy was cut off and startled by the quiet confession of his flatmate. "Not 'sleep, can't sleep, bad. Bad. Bad. Too much, too much night, it's all night….." then his voice dropped lower an almost indeterminate whisper that seemed more to himself than to Xander "cant sleep"

"fuck"

Xander felt he managed to sum up the feeling of the whole situation quite well.

Unfortunately Spike, did not.

The vampire flinched violently and backed himself further into the corner.

"Spike what…?" but Xander was at a loss as to what to say.

The vampire looked up at Xander, his blue eyes piercing in the shadows

"Oh, oh right then, right then, I know, pound of flesh to pay the debt, s'ok, I don't need it, all useless anyway"

Suddenly it was just as it had been when the Vampire had moved in just after the restoration of his soul, when he was being haunted every waking moment by ghosts of the first and his sleep was plagued with nightmares, and nothing he had said had made sense at the time, yet looking back with everything Xander knew now, every word had been coherent and relevant. He really didn't know what to do, or more importantly why Spike had reverted to this weak non-senseical mess, but he had to do something, especially when the vampire was still staring at him as if waiting for something. Finally Spike snapped and spoke irritatidly at Xander

"Well, go on then take it"

"Uh take what Spike"

"the flesh, the flesh I owe, you said, so take it"

"Spike I-"

"Take me"

"WHAT? NO!"

Xander internally swore, can't say anything in front of the crazy vamp that isn't literal, should have remembered that one, but for now he had to focus on the vampire he had scared with his disgusted outburst

"No, Spike." He spoke softly

"No. Look I didn't actually mean fuck, I just meant- er, never mind ok, just come on, we have to make you better ok, can you tell me anything? What happened?"

The vampire held his eyes for a moment but let them drop and shook his head forlornly. Xander sighed and stood to move towards the phone, it was going to be a long night.