Sunnydale, 2018

"Oh Spike, it's beautiful."

Spike dropped into a defensive crouch as he turned, then relaxed when he saw who was behind him.

"It's a great bloody hole in the ground, Dru," he said, turning his back to her. Moonlight shadowed his face. "What are you doing here?"

"I heard she died," Drusilla said, drifting closer to murmur her words in Spike's ear.

"Come to gloat?" Spike asked bitterly. "Twenty-two years as the Slayer, faces down vampires and demons and the end of the world, and then one day some vampire has one good day, and it's all over. Can't say I didn't warn her."

"Slayers die, Spike. They're made of human weaknesses."

"And human strengths!"

"She could have lived to be ninety-four and died of old age...or violence." Drusilla mimed a blow to Spike's face and smiled a reminiscent smile. "She'd still be dead. Dead as a butterfly that someone forgot to water."

"Go away, Dru," Spike said, waving the bottle in his hand at her. "Before you make me angry. I could kill you, you know."

"Don't you love me, Spike?"

"With all my heart," Spike said, his words accelerating toward rage. "Go away."

"You loved her with all your soul," Drusilla whispered, stepping back.

"Yes, I did." He bit the words off.

Wordless, Drusilla retreated as if pushed, then drifted along the edge of the crater, the great gaping hole in the ground where Sunnydale had once been. No longer a raw rip in the ground, erosion had softened it and plants had overgrown it, making the crater appear to be a natural part of the landscape. The only exception was the exact place Spike had chosen as his lookout point; the ground was rocky at the edge of a cliff falling fifty feet straight down. Dru flitted from rock to rock at the very edge of the cliff.

"Oh, come back, Dru," Spike shouted after the third time she just barely avoiding falling in. Drusilla skipped back and leaned against Spike. He sighed and put his arm around her and took a swig from his bottle. Then another. They looked at the crater in silence for a while.

"Your grave is burgeoning with life," she said.

"Now there's some kind of irony," Spike said. "She had a grave down there, and she didn't stay in it either."

"Don't be sad, Spike. She's in a better place."

Spike threw Drusilla to the ground. "You don't know anything, you soulless bitch," he shouted.

"Ooooooo," Drusilla said, more pleased than otherwise. She looked up appealingly. "Hurt me again, Spike."

Spike kicked at the ground near her and then threw his bottle as hard as he could. It arced across the sky and shattered somewhere in the leafy greenness. He fell to his knees and bowed his head. Sobs shook his shoulders. Tears spotted the dusty ground in front of him.

An elegant finger caught one tear in mid-air. Drusilla brought her finger to her lips and her tongue flicked out, engulfing the tear. She repeated the gesture patiently, over and over again, until she'd captured twenty or thirty tears and Spike quit crying.

"It tastes like lemonade," she said. "Salty lemonade. Bad lemonade."

"Shut up, Dru," Spike said dully.

"Human weaknesses," Drusilla observed. "You're full of prickles. You're full of light. You have a rose bush growing inside of you and someone cut off all blossoms and now it's just thorns. They're cutting your soul."

"They're cutting my heart, Dru. That's where love lives, in the heart, and mine's bleeding."

Drusilla looked at his chest.

"No, you can't drink from my heart, it's a bloody metaphor. I'm leaving. She's not here, I don't feel any closer to her," Spike said. "You can do whatever you want, just quit looking into me. I'm not bleeding for your amusement."

"I'm coming with you," Drusilla said.

"The hell you are."

"Poor Spike. You're weak, I'll take care of you. I've always taken care of you when you need me. You can't stop me now."

"Try to follow and you'll find out just how weak I am," Spike said dangerously.

"I'll kill your enemies. I'll never be naughty."

"Won't work, Dru." He started walking toward a black car in the weeds.

Drusilla paced after him. "There's blood on the ashes. You taste like blood. And the Slayer's dead. I've been very patient, Spike."

"I'm different now. I have a soul."

"I have a rosebush growing in me too, and you're cutting off all the blossoms. You're raking the thorns across my heart."

Spike stopped walking. His face when he turned was tender. Almost weak. "It won't work, Dru," he said gently. "I tried, I know."

"You're hurting me, Spike," Drusilla said, leaning in close to him. "Hurt me more. Give me prickles. I want to be full of prickles, I want to be full of light."

Spike's jaw dropped.

"Tell me how you got your soul."