Crossed Lines

By Green

Rating: R mainly for language

Warnings: Some mild slash, angst. Spoilers for Buffy Season Five

Disclaimer: I am neither Joss Whedon nor Mutant Enemy, these characters are not mine and I make no money out of them

Feedback: PLEASE! Otherwise I'll never improve: green99bottles@aol.com or below

Notes: This is set somewhere between the end of Buffy Season Five and her resurrection. The relationship between Spike and Angel intrigues me, and I've finally done something about it (thank God for hitting you in your Chemistry test plot bunnies, eh?). I do not think the relationship is particularly slashy, but I think they must have been lovers at some point, as most of the vampire 'family' seems to have been. There is some debate over the true identity of Spike's sire. I'm choosing to assume it's Angel, but you could also say that a grandsire would have the same relationship I've suggested here.

Phew! Anyway, enjoy!

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Ring ring, ring ring, ri…

'Hello, Angel Investigations?'

'Um, Angel?'

'Yeah, who is this?'

'Spike'

'* Spike *! How did you get this number?'

Of course there is anger, the last time they met they were enemies in mortal combat, perhaps the status hasn't changed. But the anger is tired now, because it is edged with grief, because it is so tiring to be angry at everything when the entire world turns against you. Spike can easily understand, he can only hope Angel will too.

'Willow gave it to me. Look, Angel, this isn't my idea of happy-time either, but I had to speak to you and I'm guessing you'd also rather I didn't come to LA'

'Hell forbid. Does this have a point Spike? I'm kinda in the middle of a case here'

'Well gosh I'm * sorry * I had to invade the perfect soulful life you lead. Fact is, some of us are still creatures of the night as in a euphemism for child of Satan, and apparently even you being all ensouled isn't going to change that.'

'Meaning…?'

Still testy, because Spike has always had painful connotations for him, let alone now, with Buffy…Spike was there, he was there and Angel should have been. Spike was the one who fought to the last by her side, whom she could depend on to be there to the end, and even after everything, Angel always thought he would be the one to do that.

Cold hands grasp the other receiver even tighter, as Spike rallies himself to speak. He knows he has to say it, otherwise he'll feel even more stupid in the silence, and hanging up will just make him a look a coward.

'You, you're my Sire, man. You're supposed to bloody * help * me when I'm down. I'm not how I was and neither are you, but for some reason * I * still need this. I hurt like hell, the whole time, and I can't sleep, or drink, or fight for thinking about…everything. I can't carry on like this! You love this whole pain thing; you just bathe in it and hug all your sins to yourself like some protective blanket. I can't. I can't…'

That sounded a lot more like begging than he intended, and the catch in his voice has to go, because the last thing he wants is for Angel to have leverage against him, to be able to make some huge power trip deal out of refusing him. Not helping, just watching the suffering - that was always Angelus' thing.

Angel sits down in one of the easy chairs in the office, stunned. He hadn't expected anything so * real * from Spike of all people. And that tone, that tone of panic, of pain, he knows that because he remembers it from before, so many people looking torment in the face, wriggling away from its grasp without effect. Him looking on and laughing, and loving it. He knows Spike remembers that too. He knows that Spike doesn't expect him to help. He knows Spike is desperate. He knows that, as much as it may chafe, he can't turn Spike down.

Doesn't mean he can't hate every second.

'You think I'm not crazy right now Spike? You think I don't get the urge to just start killing people because I feel that, surely, sooner or later I'd find the one that hurt her? But life is still here, Spike. I have a job to do, from what I hear from Willow, so do you. Although maybe there's slightly less, how shall I put this…attraction, in it now?'

'I fight the good fight. I made a promise. Everything else is frankly none of your fucking business.'

He sounds tired too, the insults are deadpan. Tired of justifications, of lies, of truths. How much did he care for Buffy? Angel had always thought it was lust on Spike's part, but now he wonders, just slightly, because he knows full well that Spike has always loved deeply.

They were both freak vampires even before people messed with their heads - Angel for desiring the aesthetic pursuit of pain above feeding, for twisting people's psyche before their jugular - Spike for loving with devotion that seemed unhindered by his demon, for, even then, overcoming every selfish vamp urge for the one he adored.

He is still giving it all up for Buffy…Angel doesn't want to think about it.

'So what am I supposed to do then Spike? Is there some sire101 lesson I missed out on that tells me how to reboot you?'

'I told you I don't know!'

The tears are audible, waiting in the throat in a painful slice of grief, frustration, anger and that overwhelming all-powerful tiredness with it all

'I told you I don't know! I just needed to speak to you, it was an instinct. Believe me it sickens me as much as you to say this, but I * need * you Angel. You're my sire, I'm bonded to you beyond everything else, and I need your help. My instincts don't know you're above all that now, I can still feel the bond, pulling me along, keeping me alive, or should that be dead? I dream it, when I drink I feel it as some kind of muscle memory, all of me remembers how it felt to have…Look…it's my demon, alright, it misses yours, because they're part of each other, and they aren't meant to be separated like this.'

'Wow'

'What? What is it?'

'Nothing, just…memories. Spike, listen, I'm sorry but I can't help you. I keep as far away from my demon as possible, I don't want to go back towards it; I've been far too close recently. You're just feeling like you've lost everything right now, this thing will pass'

He hates himself as he says it, because he should help, that's what he does. But Spike is asking too much, he's asking to turn back the clock, even if he doesn't realise it himself. He wants what Angel has almost half wanted recently, to be free again, free to do whatever he likes and not feel it. And Angel knows that both of them right now would settle for simply not feeling.

'Angel?'

'Yes?'

'Do you remember Austria?'

'…'

How could he forget? Good beer, few tourists (it was, after all, 1880), large rural populace of free meals. He'd bathed in blood that summer, and had a surfeit of victim to carry out his 'experiments' on. It makes him shudder in self-hatred.

But that's not what Spike wants him to remember. Spike wants him to remember the days, not the nights, the days spent sleeping in barns, inns and hotels, sleeping curled around each other. Him sketching Spike lying back naked and proud on the beds, Spike washing his hair for him, licking the blood from the corners of his mouth. The way they moved as one being and loved and killed together every day. The smooth and rough and ice-cold and heat and vicious, violent tenderness of that summer in Austria.

Because that's the sire and the childe. That's Angel and Spike, Darla and Angel, Drusilla and Darla, Angel and Drusilla, The Master and Darla, Angel and Penn, and back and back to that first demon that spawned another and saw that it's creation was good, gazing upon it in love. That essential, necessary link is what Spike can feel pulling now, and of course he needs his sire at a time like this. But at one end the rope's come untied, because Angel can't do that anymore. He can't be there, because only Angelus can, and Angelus is dead, at least (touching wood) for now.

Dead. Like Buffy. Like the Slayer who entranced two vampires and then left them for another world they will never see except through the shimmering heat of the brimstone.

'Yeah, I remember Austria'

'Well, look, I only bring it up to illustrate a point. That was all a long time ago. But, that's what I mean. That * thing *, that knowledge of what to do. I want that back.'

'Spike, your sire is gone. I'm not him.'

'Yes! You are, and don't bloody try and deny it. I * know * you, Angel, I know you because you are my sire, and no amount of good deeds can cancel out creating me so forget it!'

'Spike, it's gone. We can't have that again, however much we might…It's just not possible'

Impossible to truly separate a sire and his childe, they know that too.

'First Drusilla left. Then Buffy left, now you saw you've always been gone. Great. You know, this chip and all the emotional crap that goes with it has taught me one thing…I've seen death from the other side now, first Mrs Summers, then Buffy. And I've discovered it * fucking * * hurts *. I want to be human, so I can die and give all this pain to someone else to bear, but heck, you'll be dancing on my grave, and who else even knows my real name?'

'Look…Spike, I'm sorry'

'How could you leave her? How could you have her and leave her?'

'I can't give her back to you Spike, even if I thought you deserved her. I can't be there for you and neither can she. Death sucks, welcome to my world.'

'…Yes, well, anyway…………. This call is probably costing them a fortune, so I guess I should go now.'

'Maybe, yeah. Like I say I have a case to read up on, so yeah, I should probably go too'

'Well, bye'

'Goodbye Spike'

I hate you. I need you. I need your hate.

'My Sire'

'My Childe'

The words hang empty in the dialling tone…