"Don' like the look of him," Jayne growled.

"He's a paying fella who keeps himself to himself," said Mal. "S'long as he keeps doing that – specially the paying part – I ain't holding nothing against him."

The object of their conversation could hear every word, and Spike was unsurprised at their uneasiness. People always had doubts about him; even in this time when vampires had passed from stories, to legends, to nothing, some residual fear lingered in their makeup. But he ignored them, and continued to do nothing, lurking in his cabin. The other voices of the Serenity crew floated through to him, picked up by his vampire senses; pretty Kaylee and absolutely stunning Inara discussing their destination, Athena – Simon swearing softly as he looked for something in the medical bay – and River's voice, suddenly all too clear, saying:

"You hide a lot."

He turned around to see her standing in the doorway, staring idly at the ceiling.

"'m not hiding, but. 'm just not out there with the others." Spike waved his hand to invite her in. She drifted forwards and twirled as she gained enough room to manoeuvre, a cloud of brown hair flying out around her. River unnerved him more than he cared to admit. In too many ways, she reminded him of Drusilla.

"Missing the raven," she crooned, stopping beside him and looking down into his eyes. "Dark raven, shadow still hanging over you."

Spike's head shot up in alarm. "How d'you know that?"

"I see things," she said idly. "I think I'm kind of broken."

"You an' me both, kid." Spike heaved a sigh and leant back against the wall. To his surprise, River sat down beside him and wiggled into his side.

"All gone now," she said softly. "The raven… the dove too."

Spike sprang up and stood before her, glaring down. "And what exactly do you mean by that?" The veiled reference to Buffy – it had to be Buffy – had him burning more than he knew. More than he had for hundreds of years. He'd buried away thoughts of her, hidden them from himself for centuries, and then to have them brought out so abruptly, so without ceremony, by some girl who had no idea of what she'd meant to him –

"I do know, Spike," said River. "I can see it in your head. She sings even when you don't think she does, she's always there."

He was unable to speak for a long minute. All he could think about was Buffy; all the memories he'd locked away to tightly flooding out and drowning him. And God, he didn't want to be saved. He just wanted to see her, have her back; just pretend even for an instant she was in the room with him.

Buffy…

"Stop it," he finally croaked. "I don't know what you are, or what you're doin', but stop."

"I can't stop," she breathed. "I can't help it. It's what I am. It's what I was made. Just like you were."

"Like I was…"

"Made. Sired. A vampire."

The universe froze, and shuddered, and breathed again to hear that long-forgotten word spoken. Everything of the demon word, everything they'd meant, everything they'd done, had been lost.

Until River.

Until maddening, crazy, tiny little River just looked at him and opened up volumes of memories and knowledge held only by Spike.

"I've always known," she said conversationally, as though discussing the weather, and not rewiring the entire universe. "I've always been able to hear the different voices. The cold ones. The stone ones. The dead ones."

"That suits me fairly well, I must say," he muttered, staring at his hands for lack of anything else to do. Everything had completely flipped around and recreated itself, and he was still stuck on Buffy. His dove, as River had put it when she tore everything down so innocently. "So what's that make you, then?"

"I think I'm an eagle," she said. "I'm vicious and hurtful and I hunt, because it's my nature. Because I was made that way. Because I have to."

"Join the club, kid," Spike mumbled, dropping to the floor in front of her, still seated on the bed.

"Okay," she said.

"What? Kid, that's a figure of-"

"I'm not your dove, Spike, and I never will be. Nobody ever will be what she was. I'm not even your raven. But I want to make it better. I want to help you."

Help… God, he hadn't even known he'd needed help until River said he did. Hadn't known how broken he already was before River broke him some more, ripping open old wounds to make them heal properly. Bringing her – bringing Buffy – out into the open so casually, like it was nothing.

And, Spike supposed, it should be.

Hell, the girl had died centuries ago, and she'd never come back to him the way he'd hoped (but never really believed) she would. She'd never affirmed her love for him after that night in the cave, his soul pouring out of him, dying to save the world. Dying to save her.

She was gone now. Gone. Really and truly, in the most permanent sense of the word, gone. Dead. Deceased. Passed on. A normal death for the least normal girl the world had ever seen. But she'd never passed on for him. She'd always followed him, everywhere he went, in everything he did; she was always there. She never gave up, never quit, never went away. She was still real to him.

But she shouldn't be. Buffy was dead. It was time to accept that and let her be dead. And while the mere notion had him wanting to scream and tear the thought right out of his traitorous skull, he had to admit it was what he needed. What she needed. She'd earned her peace and more besides, and Spike had too.

It was easy, in the end, after countless years hanging on to her memory, to let her go. To stop carrying her around like some monument to his screwed-up relationship with her. To simply pause, and let her drift off into wherever it was painful memories went when they weren't painful anymore. To get over her. He wasn't forgetting her; the memories weren't all flying out of his head with nothing left behind. He was lowering the barriers he'd constructed around them, letting them finally be free. Letting them fit themselves into a normal niche, just another part of his life. An important part, a life-changing part, but not one he would be constantly hung up over. Buffy wasn't locked away anymore. She was, finally, at peace.

Spike jerked up and looked around, half-surprised to find himself still in the tiny cabin on Serenity. He'd been so lost in the memories of Buffy – and the releasing of the memories of Buffy – that he hadn't known where he was. River was looking up at him like he was the crazy one, and not her.

"That was a very weird thing, that you did there," she told him, sounding like a parent to a child. "And brave. That's nice."

"Yeah, thanks a bunch, kid." He paused, and decided she deserved more sincerity than that. "No, really. Whatever you did, what you said before… it helped. Really." A smile crooked his lips as he used her metaphor. "The dove's out of her cage."

River smiled and stood up, twirling around the cabin again. "I didn't do anything, Spike. It was all you. It all came from you. I was never here," she added, before drifting away through the still-open door. Spike shook his head as she passed from his sight. That was one crazy girl, he had to admit. But she'd helped him, just as she'd promised to. She'd fixed him in places he didn't even know needed fixing. She'd helped him get over Buffy.

Now that just didn't sound right. Oh yeah, I met this girl and got over my old ex… Did not fly with him. But Buffy could rest now. Whatever else happened, Buffy could rest.

And so could he.