souled2
Souled To Be, Or
Not To Be Me
Part 2
by Phoenixstitch / Vickey
Brickle-Macky
All disclaimers in Part 1.
Part 2
Spike walked
through the workout room to get to the back door so he could step out,
and get a smoke. As he went through the entryway to the back Buffy, and
Dawn entered the shop. All Buffy saw was a fleeing black clad figure, and
his trademark white hair. She started to yell something at him, but decided
against it. Since Anya didn´t seem too concerned about Spike being
there, since she had noticed him wandering through too, and she had gone
back to what she was doing, it was apparent that Anya was aware of him,
and was okay with it, and Buffy guessed everyone else was okay with his
being there as well. But it was daytime so—why--why was here?
While Dawn
put her book bag down by her usual chair, and sat down, Buffy went over
to the counter to talk to Anya. "Hi, where is everyone? And why is Spike
here?" Buffy asked bluntly.
"Giles, Willow
and Tara are upstairs doing a spell for Spike. He asked them to do it,"
Anya told her just as bluntly. "He made Xander leave," she added with a
pout.
"Spike made
Xander leave? How? Why?" Buffy asking getting angry.
"Because he
didn´t want to hang around, and see Spike get a soul, so he left.
He thought it was a bad idea," the ex-demon grumble, looking through a
supply catalog.
Buffy was stunned—a
soul? Spike came here asking Willow to do the soul restoring spell on him?
Now what the hell was the peroxide pest up to? Just because they had had
an argument about souls last night after the fight, and he had told her
the only way she would believe that he was sincere was to get one—never
in a million years had she believed he would actually 'want´ to do
it. She was totally stunned by this. "He asked Willow to do the spell,
and she agreed?" Buffy managed to ask.
"Yeah, that´s
what she, and Giles are doing right now. They´ve been up there a
while so they ought to be done soon."
"Then why did
I see Spike go out the back then? Doesn´t he kind need to be there
for this thing?" Buffy asked confused.
"No, he can
if he wants, but the spell will work if he´s close around. Angel
wasn´t in the same room when Willow did the spell on him, was he?"
she asked.
"No, no he
wasn´t," Buffy agreed, the painful memories of that time coming back
of when he got his soul back, and she had to send him to Hell to close
the gate of the demon dimension.
"If he left,
he probably wanted to be alone. It´s going to be a painful experience
for him, and probably he doesn´t want anyone to see how bad it is,"
Anya suggested, feeling a twinge of pity for the vampire.
"Yeah, maybe,
but this is Spike we´re talking about. I still think he´s up
to something," she said, still not believing the vampire was sincere. Going
back over to the table where Dawn had been listening to every word, Buffy
told her. "Stay put. I´m going to see what Spike is really up to.
I´ll be back in a couple of minutes," she told her sister.
"Maybe he´s
not up to anything. You always 'think´ he is—jeeze, Buffy, give the
guy a break. He´s not always up to bad stuff you know," Dawn told
her defending her friend.
"Dawn, you
just don´t understand!" Buffy said angrily, frustrated that the girl
couldn´t see how dangerous the vampire really was, and not wanting
to get into another fight with her sister as that´s all they ever
seemed to do any more since their mother´s death. Then she turned
on her heels, and headed for the back room before she could say another
thing.
Dawn just watched
her go, and shook her head sadly at her retreating back, "No, Buffy, it´s
you that doesn´t understand," and went back to working on her homework
assignments.
In the deep
shady area under the outer back stairs to Giles apartment above the shop
Spike had sat down carefully on the gravel covered ground. His side still
hurt from that bite he had taken defending Dawn from the Ghora demon when
they went to steal those eggs for her spell. He wondered how that had went
since he hadn´t seen her since then. At least the damn bite marks
had stopped oozing, and finally looked like they might heal up in a day
or so. It had made it hard as hell to fight those damn knights last night.
Luckily, Buffy hadn´t noticed he was favoring his side. He really
didn´t want to explain his part in the kid´s adventure, and
since the Slayer hadn´t coming storming in to stake him recently
then Lil´ Bit must have kept her mouth shut about it all.
He rummaged through
the pockets of his trench coat, and finally found his smokes and lighter.
He was trying to quit smoking. but he was wound up tight, and needed one
to cut the edge off as he waited to see what was going to happen if anything
from the soddin´ spell. He was sitting there peacefully smoking his
cigarette when he could feel the spell began kicking in. It doubled him
over from the sheer pain of all his senses being assaulted at once. It
was like being hit by a freight train running full steam through his head,
and body as the full force of the spell hit him in waves and waves of blinding
pain. It was ten times, many times worse than he had expected it to be.
He clutched the sides of his head, and gritted his teeth fighting to stay
conscious, and endure this. The pain was worse than what the chip did to
him if he tried to hit a human. He was totally regretting getting his soul
back now as the pain increased, and flashes of memory, and hundreds of
faces swarmed before his mind's eye, and assaulted him-- filling his ears
with their screams of terror, and pain as they died by his hands. He realized
he was seeing all of the people he had killed as a vampire, and reliving
each of their deaths exactly as they had happened, and how—none of it was
a pretty sight. The realization of what he had done hit him, and he started
gagging, and throwing up.
No wonder Buffy
and her friends had rejected him—he had been an unspeakable monster, and
did deserve to be staked for his crimes. He wondered now if there was any
hope at all to make right all the wrongs he had done. How could he expect
them to forgive him if he couldn´t forgive himself. He did not deserve
to live, let alone even hope to win Buffy´s love. At least now he
knew the truth, and could see himself the way they saw him. The pain continued
and he was suddenly seized with convulsions, and he felt his dead insides
shift, and change, like some sort of weird transformations were happening
to his body too. He threw up all the blood he had in his stomach until
it was all gone, and he finally subsided now to dry heaves. When he could
move with a shaky hand he wiped the vile tasting mess off of his mouth
with the back of it noting that his skin felt warm, and slightly feverish.
'What the bloody hell?´ he asked himself in pure shock as suspicions
of what was really happening to him became apparent to him. He didn't want
to believe it--could believe it as if what he suspected was going on was
too unbelievable for him to accept.
'The witch
didn´t? She couldn´t have?´ He asked himself as he checked
himself for a pulse, and found one—weak and thready, but steadily growing
in intensity. He then realized he was gasping for breath, and was taking
large lungfuls in to his newly useable lungs. He was breathing—he really
was breathing—what the bloody hell? Scared now, he put a shaking hand to
his normally silent chest, and found a beating heart there. "Oh sweet,
Mother of God!" he swore out loud alarmed, and terrified now. "I´m
bloody human again now on top of everything!"
He was panicking
now. 'What the hell had the witch done to him? How had she done this? This
wasn´t possible? Was it?´ he asked himself his mind racing
as he pushed himself up from the ground and stood up on shaky legs to try
the ultimate test. Cautiously, he stepped forward from his sheltered area
into a bright patch of sunlight, and carefully put his hand out into it
waiting for it to burn, and hurt like hell— but nothing happened! After
a minute or two, after his hand didn´t start smoking, he edged closer
into the bright light letting the golden sunlight fully surround him, bathe
him in its warmth and light. He stood there completely amazed, and a slow
smile crept across his chiseled features as he accepted that the sun was
no longer a danger to him. He held out both arms, turning around, and round
in a circle, his trench coat swinging around his lean jean clad legs as
he looked up in joyous wonder into the perfect cerulean blue of the sky
for the first time in over a century. The former vampire happily laughed
out loud at the sheer joy of being alive again, and able to enjoy such
a simple thing as a bright sunny day.
It was to the
unexpected, and unnerving sight of Spike standing, laughing loudly as he
swung his arms wide, and danced in the sunlight unharmed in the middle
of the alley that Buffy walked out of the back door on. She really hadn´t
been playing too much attention to much of anything when she opened the
door, and stepped outside. She was only intent on finding him, and giving
him a piece of her mind. She had only taken two steps when she saw him
dancing in the sunlight unharmed, and not smoking with his back towards
her. In complete shock she backed up against the closed door, and stared
at him with wide, frightened eyes trying to understand, and fully comprehend
what she was seeing.
"NO! I´m
not seeing this—I´m not!" she swore to herself. "It can´t be!
No way in hell!" she tried to make herself disbelieve what her eyes were
showing her as she shook her head violently trying to deny it all.
Spike became
aware of her, and spun around a bright smile plastered on his face enjoying
the shock on hers. "Hi, luv, notice anything different about me?" he grinned,
trying to keep down his giggles.
"Spike! You—you´re
standing in the sun –and it isn´t burning you—HOW?" she demanded,
afraid to move.
"I dunno, luv,
ask your friends. All I wanted was my bleedin´ soul back, and I got
this…but I bloody well am not complaining. It´s a friggin´
miracle—that´s what! Ain´t it wonderful?" he asked, still letting
the sun drench him in it´s light.
"Yeah, it's
real great," she said trying to enthusiastic, but she was still in shock,
her mind just beginning to process the implications of this. Tentatively,
she finally pushed away from the door, and went over to him her hazel eyes
still wide, and staring at him. "You´re really alive? Human again?"
she gulped nervously as she stood next to him, and touched his face feeling
the sun warmed, normal, feeling flesh, and then she grabbed his arm, and
felt the now steady pulse on his wrist under her fingers. She dropped his
hand like she had been burnt, and stepped back shaking her head.
He tried to
keep neutral about it, but he laughed any way at her discomfort. "Seems
so—pulse, and heartbeat—I think I got the whole works, but I think I didn´t
lose the other either. I can still hear things, feel stuff like I did before
so I´m not sure either what all is the same, and different yet,"
he said trying to sort out all the new body impressions with the old ones
the pain of his transformation vanishing..
"And did you
get your soul back?" she asked nervously looking up at him, her eyes searching
his, not knowing what she was expecting to see in the blue depths of his
eyes. Something, maybe, that would give her a clue between his old self,
and this new one like she had seen between Angel and Angelus, instead she
saw almost no change.
He looked at
her thoughtfully knowing what she was asking, but he couldn´t lie
to her so he told her truthfully, "I think so. I can feel some difference,
but I´m not going to go all super depressive, and guilt laden like
my bleedin´ sire. I´m very aware of what I´ve done, and
to who, and how all these years, I always was. I never stopped seeing their
faces, Slayer. They were always with me, and I knew what I had done, I
just couldn´t stop myself, and after awhile I just didn´t give
a damn. That´s what you never understood. I always had the choice
to do, or not do evil, or good. It was survival, luv, pure, and simple
in a world I had to exist in because I had no bleedin´ choice about
it. Just like you have no bleedin´ choice in what you have to do
being the Slayer and all," Spike told her seeing that the realization of
his words was sinking in to her as well as the disgust and fear.
"You knew all
this time what you were doing, and you did it anyway?" she asked appalled.
He struggled,
"yeah, I did what I did because it was what I was supposed to do. I was
a bloody vampire, and your precious Angelus and that bitch Darla demanded
that I act like one, or else. Then there was the damned blood lust pushing
it, and the demon wouldn´t let me ignore what I was supposed to do
either. It was a no win situation. But part of me always knew what was
happening, and hated it, but got over ridden by the other. The only difference
I can feel now is that the demon part is suppressed more than it was, and
the other parts of me that it was keeping down are bit more accessible
now," he added.
"So you are
still you? You´re not some other you like Angel was—is from Angelus?"
she asked confused. Angel and Angelus were in her mind like day and night
in no way similar to either one because of Angel having a soul. If Spike
was telling her the truth then what did that mean about Angel really and
how much of what he had told her had been the truth--the real truth? She
didn't want to think about that at all.
He grinned,
"yeah, that´s what I´ve been trying to tell you all along.
I never lost my bloody soul, it just went into deep sleep coming awake
every once in a while when it was needed like stopping the world from going
to Hell, until I got that soddin´ chip. What you´ve been dealing
with since that happened has been just me, the real me, soul, and all trying
to readjust to life without the demon in control, with the real me coming
out more and more. Think about if you had been used to living a certain
way for years, and suddenly you couldn´t, and then you had to act,
and think in a completely different way that was totally opposite of all
you knew, wouldn´t you have a bit of trouble adjusting, especially
with no soddin´ help or guidance to do the right things in this new
situation? Then every time you tried to do the right thing you got shot
down, or your actions misunderstood-- wouldn´t you get just a tad
frustrated?" he asked, trying to get the point across.
Guilt crossed
Buffy´s face as his words did sink in as well as new understanding
crept in of how the last, almost two years, had been for him by her and
her friends. "Ohh," was all she could manage to say. And look down at the
gravel underneath her tennis shoes.
"Luv, you didn´t
understand. You didn´t want to understand—none of you, because it
wasn´t anything in your Watcher´s books, and none of you couldn´t
believe that a demon would tell you the bloody truth," he also rubbed in
enjoying her discomfort.
"So why the
spell?" she asked, needing to know.
"To prove to
you some things just like I told you last night. I told you I´m in
this all the way with you on fighting this Glory chick, and keeping the
Nibblet safe, but you wouldn´t bloody believe me because I didn´t
have a soddin´ soul. Now I got one—you going to believe me now? And
believe me that I do really care about you?" he asked with a smirk, crossing
his arms, and looking down at her seriously.
"I dunno, I
don´t know what to think right now. Especially, since it sounds like
you did this all for me," she said slowly, still having a hard time with
that because that would have to mean she had to accept that he was sincere
about being in love with her, and she was not so in the mood to deal with
that can of worms full on right now. "Spike,… I…. This is just too much…I
just can´t deal…," she said with a groan, and then she spun around,
and ran back in side before he could stop her.
"Buffy! Come
back we have to talk—we need to talk," he called after her, shaking his
head in dismay as he watched her flee from him--again. He sighed bitterly,
disappointed at her reactions, and then he followed her back in to face
the reactions of the rest of the Scoobies.
End Part 2
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Vickey
Brickle-Macky @ vbmacky1@yahoo.com
