Chapter Six – The Time Agency
Earth was abuzz with news. The Time Agency was building an embassy on Earth, and you could become a Time Agent yourself, if you were lucky enough!
Time Travel. For the first time, Spike had hope. He knew a bit about time travel – one of his lovers had been a scientist. Well, when he said lovers…
He hadn't loved anyone since Buffy. He would sleep with people but after a while, he would leave.
Because they were just going to die, and leave him.
But he learned – he could essentially go back to Buffy. Since he had no idea what happened during his 'Blackout', as he started calling it, he could go back and interfere. If he knew what happened, then it became a fixed point. But he didn't know anything. And even if he met himself then (which he didn't think he would, but who knows) it would be okay because he wouldn't remember any of it.
He made his way to Cardiff, and signed up.
And….
They didn't let him in.
He demanded again and again to be let in. He snuck on the grounds. He tried to steal a vortex manipulator. He applied continuously as different people for over two hundred years.
He tried everything he could think of, every single possibility. But nothing happened. And one day, after another failed attempt, when he grabbed his liquor and his wallet, and waited outside, he didn't come back in. He waited on the Agency's lawn, and climbed a large, ancient tree on its ground. He found himself talking to the tree as he climbed.
"Yeah, yeah," Spike grumbled. "I get it. You're old. You know what? So m' I." He climbed onto the highest branches, and found himself looking over the rolling hills of Scotland.
As he sat there, drinking and talking to himself (and the tree) he thought of Buffy. He stared at her picture. She wouldn't want him to go. And maybe if he waited another century or two, Time Travel would be more available.
But even as he thought it, he knew that it was a lie, and that he wasn't even trying.
He drowned himself in more alcohol. Maybe when he was dead, he'd see Buffy again.
But he knew that was a lie, too.
This was his last night on Earth.
And then he'd be gone. And that was okay.
