He'd spent so long alone in dark places he hardly noticed the light dimming through the small basement window. He hardly noticed the quieting of sound from upstairs, as the army of girls one by one went to bed—hoping for any unlikely sleep they might garner before the end of the world tomorrow.

Spike held the amulet up in front of his pale face and played in his mind again and again the words she'd said...

Angel said a champion should wear it.

A champion.

…She'd called him a champion.

He twirled it in front of his eyes. He didn't know what it did, or how it would help. It looked like right shit, if truth be told. Sodding ugly thing, it was.

But he fucking loved it.

Because she gave it to him and called him a champion, so he loved it more than he had any right to love anything.

Buffy walked through the quieting house. Possible slayers tucked into every nook and cranny, trying to sleep. All trying to be so brave.

Being brave, she told herself.

These girls were so brave. They were brave because they were willing to fight, and probably die in the morning. All without special power or much training. All with only hope to empower them while they tried to save the world from whatever what coming for them from the Hellmouth. They were heroes as much as she was. The truth was her house was filled with heroes. Her life had always been filled with them…every room of her home and her life, filled with the most unlikely heroes.

She stepped over sleeping bundles, and thought of the man waiting in the basement.

He's one.

She found her way into the kitchen, and leaned against the island facing the basement door. People might not understand, but she realized she no longer cared.

He is in my heart…

She'd told Angel. And if she told Angel, then it was the damn truth no matter if it was understandable... So much about them had never been understandable. She shook her head and looked at the door harder, as if something might appear to her written in some ancient code and explain it all. But there it continued to stand; the thin boundary between this moment and the next…So much never made sense to the causal observer or to herself.

She sighed.

But he's in my heart.

She stepped to the door, and opened it.

He was up before he realized it, tucking the amulet into his jeans, listening…

He could hear her there in the kitchen. Or feel her. He could always feel her near. But for what felt like the longest time, she kept still. He wondered at her thoughts tonight… The burden on her must be so heavy, he thought to himself. He looked up at the ceiling, and rubbed his hands through his white hair, wondering if he should go up.

Did she need him?

He smirked to himself and shook his head.

"You've let it all go to your nutter head, champion", he muttered to himself in slight embarrassment. "A couple nights of cuddles, and you think she can't live without you."

He was about to turn back to the cot, when the door at the top of the steps opened. He watched her descend into the basement, and noticed the feeling in his chest as she came into the dim lamplight.

Love's bitch, all right. He looked at the floor, trying to compose himself.

"Hello."

"Hello," he answered. "Everyone good and tucked, then? No bed bugs or whatnot?"

"Not that I noticed. But ya never know, huh?"

He smirked. "Right. Creepy crawlers do happen around here…"

They stood there in silence. He shuffled, and she was so still.

"Right! So…Tomorrows the big day for the Big Bad," he offered.

"I thought you were the Big Bad." She said softly, but he could hear the smile in her voice.

"Ha. Not so much, I guess… Not these days…" He said. He lifted his eyes from the basement floor to look at her. She looked directly back, the way she did. She was the only one who ever did that, he realized. Looked him right in the eyes. He tilted his head and held her green gaze.

She was such a wonder…

In all his days he'd never seen anything like her. He opened his mouth to tell her so, but then shut it, looking back at the ground. He should just write her a sappy poem, he chided himself. Then she moved a step toward him, and he looked up again to see her lifting her shirt over her head. She dropped it to the floor. She stood in her black bra.

"Buffy," he breathed. He didn't move. He didn't think he could move… She took another step to him. Then another until she was standing so near. The smell of her filled him. He felt his breathing quicken- and then he thought, the First. It's the goddamn First trying to trick me!

"It's not her. It's not her…" He muttered. He stepped quickly back from the image of Buffy half nude before him-The image that ripped his heart. She stepped with him.

"Spike."

"You can't fool me," He told it, angry. He was so angry that it would jerk him around so!

"Spike." She reached out and grabbed his hand, startling him with her warmth. "It's me."

She laid it to rest on her chest, and he could feel her heartbeat under his fingertips. Her soft skin… He looked back into her eyes, so confused now.

"Buffy? What…what are you doing?"

She reached her hands under his black t-shirt, and slid it up his sides. Her fingers practically burnt his skin. He stopped her. Gently, holding her hands where they were.

"Buffy." His eyes searched hers. Then softly he asked, "What is this?"

She blinked at the slight break in his voice. She lifted a small hand to his face, and he unconsciously leaned into it, his icy eyes half closing.

"I'm here with you." She told him. He blinked open.

"You're here?" He repeated. She nodded… But then he reached for her hand on his cheek and he held in in front of him. He kissed it, sweetly. "I'm not asking for this, Buf—"

"No. I am." She told him, quietly. Steadily.

"…You are." As if he hadn't heard her right.

"I am."

Spike took a deep breath. If he weren't touching her, knowing she were corporal, he'd have thought he slipped back into psychosis. His fingers slid within hers, and he shook his head. Any other time, any other Spike, and she'd already be—what was it Anya said that time? Bent over and halfway to happy town. That was it.

But he wasn't the old Spike. The memories of them together both excited him, and made him ashamed. The idea of her regretting it, regretting him…not now. It was too much for his soul.

"Buffy, you know I want to give you anything you need—

"It's not like that." Her voice became both firm and kind. "I'm not using you. Not now, Spike."

"—I didn't say that! I just—I just meant that—tomorrow- I understand you must be worried—"

"Of course I'm worried. But…" It was her turn to look down. She leaned her forehead into his shoulder, and he couldn't help himself from pressing his nose into her hair-

God help me.

-Then she pulled back, and this time both her hands came to hold his face. She let out a breath he hadn't realized she was holding. "If we weren't facing what we're facing tomorrow…I'd still want this."

He was stunned.

"If you want this…" She added, quietly. Unsure, suddenly like a schoolgirl. More like the girl he'd first come to kill, than the woman he grew to love beyond reason.

Spike practically laughed.

"If I want this?" His mouth quirked, but then he saw she meant it, and she was waiting for his answer. He shook his head at her in disbelief. "Slayer, are you daft?" he asked gently, "Has it finally got you off your nut, all the stress of saving the world?"

He bent down and pressed his mouth against hers, ever so tenderly. More tenderly than they had ever kissed… And then he spoke against her lips, like a secret.

"As long as I walk the earth, you are all I'll ever want."

This time it was different than it had ever been.

This time there was no rush or hurry, no violence and no shame.

This time there was nothing either wanted to forget, except that daylight would come too soon and separate them.

But like the first time in the falling-down house, when she opened to him and he pushed into her softness, filling her… they both became still, and locked eyes again.

"Do you feel that?" Spike whispered, barely holding on. Desperately he begged of her, "Do you feel that, Slayer?"

"Yes." Buffy told him. "Yes, I feel it." She reached up to kiss him deeply.

"I always felt it…" She admitted when the kiss broke the kiss, and slowly he started to move within her, building the incredible fire between them. Everywhere their skin touched, fire. Her arms held him tightly, and his tangled in her golden hair. They move together like music and lyric.

Spike smiled against her neck, which he didn't want to bite. He kissed it instead. She moaned. He moved to her ear, and she heard his reply against her soft cheek.

"I knew it. I knew you did…"

-END