Warnings: Fantasy violence; implied sexuality; harsh language; elements of dubious consent.
Queen C of the Damned
Part I: It Was a Thing
As a lot of things do, it all started at a club in L.A.
Spike had dragged his arse out of South America after Dru left him again, and he had some vague plan in his alcohol pickled mind about torturing and killing old Angelus to prove once and for all that he was twice the vamp Dru's sodding Daddy was. Word was that the Magnificent Poof had opened up some kind of kitten rescuing service in the City of Lost Angels, so here was Spike, drunk off his nut and trying to find a lost Angel of his own.
He was going to get a plan together and conduct a proper hunt for his soulful excuse for a grandsire any night now, really. He was just taking his time about things. Taking in the sights of the city. Relaxing a bit. He'd driven nonstop from Brazil, after all. He'd earned a bit of a rest.
Spike snorted into his drink. He'd never been one for denying the truth, not to himself at least. He was sitting here in this bar, three sheets to the wind, because he couldn't stand to be sober yet without feeling like he'd taken a holy water coated stake to the gut, and he knew he couldn't beat Angel in his current state. The fight would be close even when he was stone cold sober.
Hell, maybe he'd just go after Peaches anyway and let himself be staked. Suicide by poofter.
The idea of such a grand gesture, a statement of what his unlife was like without his Dark Plum appealed to him even as he was repulsed by his own… patheticness. Pathetocity?
Bloody hell, he was drunk.
He decided he needed to get laid.
Even through everything, he'd stayed true to Dru. He'd not strayed once, not when she was lost in her visions and forgot about him, not when she was messing about with Angelus, not when she'd left him.
He was loyal.
He was hers.
Well, it was time that stopped. He'd show her. She'd realize that he wasn't going to wait around for her this time.
And he'd show himself. He could live without Dru. It was time he got some of his own back. Time he had someone who was just as devoted to him as Dru was to the memory of Angelus.
He knocked back the rest of his drink, warming to the idea. He'd make himself a childe. He'd never had one before, what with having Dru to take care of. He'd never needed one before.
In over a hundred years, he'd never been this lonely.
He got up, swaying only slightly, and made his way to the dance floor, surveying the crowd. He wasn't going to be idiotic and turn the first bint who caught his eye, of course, but now that he had a plan he was impatient to get on with it. He eyed the women dancing speculatively, mentally cataloging what traits he wanted his childe to have.
Sane went at the top of the list. After a hundred years of interpreting messages from stars and dolls, sane would be a welcome change.
Young. Young enough that he'd be able to mold her, break her, make her devoted to him. But not too young. Able to carry on a conversation about more than boy bands and lip gloss.
He was debating whether he'd like to stick with brunettes or go for a blonde, just to have someone who looked as different from Dru as possible, when he saw her.
She was wearing a little red dress, the skirt flaring around her thighs as she moved sensuously to the beat. Her lips, painted a red to match the dress, were parted in a smirk, her dark eyes hooded in a come hither expression. She had long legs, an hourglass figure, and porcelain skin most women would kill for, contrasted beautifully with her long dark hair, artistically styled to look like she'd just been well shagged and was raring to go again.
Spike wanted her. And he decided he'd take her. Tonight. Never mind not turning the first bint to catch his eye, he wasn't in the habit of denying himself things he wanted.
His leather coat swirling around him, Spike moved into the crowd, making his way toward the sultry beauty. He lost sight of her once, when she was swallowed up in a knot of men all vying for her attention, but found her again leading a muscle bound moron toward the parking lot. Spike frowned, but only briefly. He'd eat the sod before the human had a chance to touch Spike's new princess.
It was sweet of her really, bringing him dinner.
Hugging to the shadows, Spike followed them, the perfume of the man's arousal making Spike sneer to himself, clenching his teeth to hold back a growl. He waited until the daft bugger had Spike's sweet childe-to-be backed up against a car, hands sliding over her dress, and then he let out a roar and struck.
He'd just sunk his fangs into the sweet spot when something smacked him in the back of the head hard enough to make his ears ring.
Spike looked up to see his beautiful princess glaring down at him, her eyes turning a fierce gold as a vampire's game face came forward. "Hey buddy," she spat at him, lisping a little around her fangs, "get your own!"
She brandished a red clutch purse at him, presumably what she'd used to box his ears. What did she keep in that thing, bricks?
Immensely put out to find that the woman he'd wanted for his childe had already been sired by someone else, and angry with himself for being so careless as to not notice, Spike threw the man at her feet. "Fine. There you go, you crazy bint."
At the sound of his voice, the dark haired vampiress tilted her head, her red lips parting and a pink tongue darting out to wet them. "Spike?" she questioned.
Spike blinked, then smiled a charming smile. Maybe he couldn't have her for his childe, but he might get a shag out of this yet. Just something to get Dru out of his system. "We know each other, luv?"
"Well, yeah," the brunette answered. "I was human. You were in Sunnydale. You kidnapped my boyfriend. It was a whole thing."