Chapter 6: Bloody Details

Cassie awoke in a hospital, blurrily looking up into the smiling face of an intern. In the background, the stern voice of a doctor lectured on the dangers of hanging around old buildings in Sunnydale.

"You have gas pipes all over the place, running thither, running hither. You have no idea of how dangerous those old places are."

"You're absolutely right, doctor," Willow's voice said. "We'll be more careful."

"I work on construction, doc, so I'll be sure to give them the rest of the full nine yards later on, 'kay?"

Yeah, that was Xander.

"Can't leave y' alone fer two minutes in California, can I, Cassie?" came the sound of a soothing brogue. 

The intern pulled away, leaving the image of a smirking Irishman of her acquaintance. 

"Doyle?" she asked. She was amazed at how croaking her voice sounded. 

"Y' gotta stop smokin', love," he told her. "It'll be the death of you."

"Secondhand," she croaked, attempting to cough away the impediment. "Why?"

He sat down on the edge of her bed and smiled. "Why am I here? Silly question. When Marco was hurt, the college called yer parents in New York, and your father called LA, raving and threatening me to come here immediately to see what was the matter."

"Cordelia?"

"Nah, she had to stay in LA, lest she get a migraine o' mine and need t' report in. Angel too. They've got on odd bunch of people there, I must say. Wesley's a…dork, and—"

"Tell me something that has changed," came the calm voice of Rupert Giles from behind him.

Doyle looked up, introduced himself, and Giles smiled at Cassie, then turned to the outside. It was an ER.

Buffy glided alongside Cassie's gurney. "Hey, nice of you to join us. We thought you were cooked for a moment there."

"What?"

Buffy explained what had happened up to the time Marco had hit her. "When I woke up soon after, Marco, well, walked through the fire… or he may have jumped. I'm not quite sure. I was a little out of it by then."

"Dead?"

"Vamp, yes. Brother, no such luck. He's got some nasty burns, and he's going to have a bad headache when he leaves, but he'll be staying overnight for now. You get to come home with me."

"Yippee." She managed to dredge up a weak smile.

Marco had a vision of Buffy, and then of Buffy leaving. And it wasn't a vision, he knew. He had woken up three times, and she had explained it all to him. He had asked her for some queer items, especially this late in the game, but she agreed anyway: some personal items back from the hospital staff, and to ask the priest to come down from his appointed rounds.

After that was done, and he fell asleep again, Buffy watched him. Aside from looking as though he'd been savagely beaten, he seemed rather peaceful. Almost as though he was where she'd been. Despite all she'd seen of him, he looked cute, almost cuddly, almost angelic…

And that was a bad word to use. Between guys with wings and tall dark and brooding…

Buffy closed her eyes tightly. She couldn't lose control again. She'd allowed herself once, and that was self-indulgence as far as she was concerned. She had to get out for a few minutes. He'd be fine without her, if only for a little while.

Marco's eyes opened before the door did. He slowly reached above him and grabbed the headboard, pulling himself up. To his right, there was a janitorial cart with a bucket precariously balanced on the edge, and a mop leaning on it. 

Marco closed his eyes for a moment and let the scent waft into his nostrils. The annoyance smiled. "Hello, Nuala, I'm so glad you could come and visit me."

The huge vampire stood at the foot of his bed, her face properly morphed, ready to kill.

Cassie, Willow, and Tara managed to get Spike back to his crypt, Cassie's headband wound around his neck as a bandage.

Cassie had needed to calm down a bit after the hospital. Buffy had continually assured her that her brother would be all right, and that Spike had needed her help. She had mindlessly begun to babble to a suddenly mute vampire until he had pressed a hand to her mouth, his eyes telling her it would be okay.

And it will be, she thought. After all, Marco's got a Slayer looking after him.

Now the two Wiccas and one New Yorker discussed how best to care for him.

"If his windpipe's closed off, double or nothing he can't feed properly," Willow observed.

"M-Maybe we could do it intravenously?" Tara suggested. "A tube running from a blood bag into his esophagus?"

Cassie saw Spike's eyes widen almost comically, frowning a negative. "Oh, please," she giggled. "Do not tell me the Big Bad is afraid of needles."

He grabbed up the notebook and pen he'd been given earlier and scribbled angrily, almost tossing it at Cassie, who read: I'm not a bloody invalid!

"Well, you're wrong about the 'bloody' part, pal," she shot back. She gently touched the cloth covering his torn throat. "And at least you're in better shape than Marco. He's been in and out of consciousness since Buffy got him to the hospital." Before she realized it, Cassie was fighting off tears again. Marco was as tough as they came, she knew this; but it still pained her that he got hurt.

Spike looked at her, not liking the way her eyes were shining. He took up the pen and wrote another message: Go. The loverwiccas can take on from here.

She read the words through the blurring tears and glanced at him. "You sure?"

He nodded ever so slightly, making a shooing motion with one hand.

Willow smiled. "We'll take care of him, Cassie. Go see Marco."

Cassie grinned. "Thanks." To Spike: "I'll be back later." She turned to leave, then paused and turned back. She pressed a light kiss to his cheek, whispering in his ear, "Thank you." Then she was out like a shot.

Marco looked at Nuala for the first time, studying her.  Her primary biting teeth had yet to grow back, but the rest of them were sharp enough for the task.  Despite her face belonging to the most gruesome creature in existence, her body was quite attractive, and made him wonder what the rest of her face had been like before the vampy look.

"You know, I'm disappointed that no one checked for remains," Marco stated.

Nuala shrugged. "They found a sharpened cross and assumed I was dust."

"Buffy's going to figure it out, you know. You don't incinerate a vampire and have nothing remain."

"And she'll think this through in time for her to save you?"

He thought a moment. "Probably not. But, truthfully, I'm surprised. I mean, doesn't anyone read Jeffery Deaver?  It could be one of his books."

"True…like The Devil's Teardrop."

Marco's eyes lit up. "You've read that! Thank you!"

She looked confused. "Fer what?"

"For being the only literate vampire I've ever met."

Marco jerked his foot to one side, and the bucket leapt off the cart, drawn by the string around his ankle. The contents slashed up and down Nuala's leg. The vampire screamed and leapt backwards, into the wall. He reached behind the headboard.

"You bast—"

Nuala was cut off by the foot-long throwing knife entering her chest and pinning her to the wall. The vampire reached for it, ready to break off the handle and slide off, when a slight tingling at her neck made her body go numb. Out of the corner of her eye, the small, wooden throwing knife protruded from the side of her neck. 

Marco slowly made his way out of the bed, walking on the dry side of the floor. He sat down on the edge of his bed and said, "So, is there anything you want to say before you die?"

"I don't want to die…"

He nodded thoughtfully. "Reasonable request. After all, after the people you've killed, you won't exactly be going to a highly pleasant resort… we don't know how long this will last, it hasn't exactly been done before, so you might want to say a few prayers, assuming you remember any."

Her eyes filled with sadness. "I…I…"

Marco sighed, trying to remember what language they would have prayed in, in the 1200s. Latin, perhaps, and the closest derivative he knew was Italian. 

"Padre Nostro…" he prompted, starting with the Our Father. She took up the prayer in time with Marco, and they prayed together, him leading her along. As it progressed, Nuala's face changed, turning human once more.

He decided that she was as beautiful as her vampire face was ugly. Her green eyes sparkled with moistness, making them gleam with light. She had wonderful cheekbones. He felt inclined to kiss her. As it was, he merely smiled at her. He bent over, slowly, dipped his fingers into the holy water on the floor, and picked up the string of piano wire he had hidden in the bucket. He looped the wire over her head as she finished the prayer.

Nuala giggled, almost girlishly. "That won't work on me, you loveable idiot!" she said, as though she were teasing him. "Vampires don't have to breathe!"

He nodded. "Humor me…and just one more prayer."

She began it again as he drew his damp thumb over her head, one line vertical, the other horizontal, in the shape of a cross. Though the flesh sizzled, Nuala's eyes only glowed brighter as the prayer went smoothly, rapidly. 

Marco gently kissed her on the forehead. 

"Amen," she finished.

Marco pulled tightly on the garrote. The piano wire cut through her throat, the holy water burning through all resistance, and the wire biting into the cartilage of her neck. With one burst of strength, the wire snapped into a straight line. 

"Oh," she said innocently.  "I see."

Nuala became a pile of dust on the floor.

Marco fell back on the bed, exhausted.

Not much later, Doyle walked into the room, looking for Marco. He found him spread out on the bed, tired as all heck. He shrugged and scanned the room for a chair. He glanced down at the floor.

"What in God's name—can't anyone walk through a hospital without sliding on the damn floor?!"

Doyle braced himself against the wall, and sidestepped along the edge of the floor, where it was driest, continuing to look down. He stopped when he ran into the handle of the foot-long knife still protruding from the wall. He glanced at it, then looked back down at the floor, where a stake and a garrote lay on top of a pile of ash and two business cards.

He bent down and picked up the cards.  One was for a law firm named Wolfram and Hart.

The other was for Angel Investigations.

One was the employer.

The other would have been the next target.

Cassie found Doyle in her brother's hospital room, sitting beside the bed. One pair of blue eyes looked up to meet another. She smiled and waved from the hallway, then beckoned him outside so they could talk without disturbing Marco.

The Irishman caught her in a gentle hug. "Good t' see y' back on yer feet, Cassie."

"Thanks, and I'm glad I didn't have to wait too long to see you again." She pulled back to look at him. "Can we talk a minute?"

Doyle saw the seriousness in her eyes, and knew something was wrong. Despite growing up in Brooklyn, she'd always kept a small part of her youth, her "fine sense of the silly", which showed in her eyes. Suddenly, the half-demon saw something of an accelerated, involuntary maturity there. It was almost as if her inner child had dived under its bed after seeing a monster coming from the closet. He nodded at her request and guided her to a set of chairs in the hall just outside Marco's room.

"Doyle, you got to know Marco pretty well when you were living with us, right?" she asked tentatively.

"Well, I like t' think I did."

"Did you"—she shook her head and began again—"Have you ever seen anything dark in his eyes? Ever seen him act as though—he didn't have a soul?"

"I always thought he was a potentially scary bugger, but no, not really a vampire."

"Vampire's not what I'm aiming for." Cassie struggled for words for a moment. "Have you ever—see any sign of life or compassion just drain from his eyes? Seen a lack of remorse or conscience?"

"No' really." He furrowed his dark brows at her. "Cassie, where're y' goin' wi' this?"

"I saw something in his eyes earlier, Doyle. Like all of a sudden, there's a completely different personality wearing the face of someone I thought I knew." She paused. "He killed a demon virtually by himself and he didn't see fit to tell me. I had to find out from…someone else." She had remembered at the last minute to tread lightly around the topic of Spike, tiptoeing around a story she'd heard about a vampire ring of invincibility and a torture session. "Doyle, please tell me I'm imagining it. I'll believe you."

He sighed, his eyes sad. "I wish I could, Cassie. But for some reason, Marc wants t' protect y' from what he is, what he became somewhere along the line. He doesn't want y' t' worry."

"I'm not really as worried as I was before he came out here for classes." She swallowed. "I guess—I should let his decision stand. He's good here. He has friends. I just hope I can live with him and with what I know."

The half-conscious Marco tried not to laugh.

When Cassie would depart for home days later, she would only smile at her brother, believing that he knew nothing of what she suspected.  Even though he knew that what she suspected was dead wrong.

A day later, Cassie knocked on the crypt door, poking her head in. "Hello?" she called. "Spike?"

She noted the armchair positioned in front of the television. Where did he get the power for that anyway? she wondered. She walked around until she came upon the opening in the floor, complete with ladder leading down to the lower level.

"Spike?" she tried again. This time, she saw a paper airplane sail across the space of the opening. Grinning, she climbed down, adjusting the bag on her shoulder. When her feet touched the stone floor, she turned to see him sitting up on his mattress. Several canary-yellow bruises marred his pale face, red marks were on either side his healing nose, and a thick white bandage circled his neck.

He offered a smile and a hand raised in greeting.

"Hi. Were you sleeping?" she asked as she came closer.

"Until five minutes ago I was," he replied in a whisper. His throat had not yet healed enough for him to speak louder. "What're ya doin', traipsin' 'bout the markers this time o' day?"

She took the chair in the center of the room and scooted closer. "It so happens that I brought you a care package." With a small flourish, she took three thermoses from the bag. "So, what's your pleasure? Beef, pork, or O-positive?"

Spike glanced at the containers and gave her a confused look.

"I heard you've been 'bagging it' lately, so I thought it might be a good idea to bring you some. Buffy and the others were nice enough to tell me which places actually sold the stuff."

His eyes widened. "Y' didn't go t' Willy's, did ya?"

Cassie snorted. "Please, like I would. I'd feel safer at Caritas in LA. At least there the Host can back up the 'no violence' policy." She shook her head, smiling slightly at his concern. "No, they pointed me toward a few butcher shops and a private clinic." She poured the rich blood from one container into the cup and offered it to him. "I tried getting it to ninety-eight-point-six, but it came out more" she shrugged "well, feverish."

He grinned at how considerate she was being and slowly sipped it down. Thankfully, his throat had not been so damaged he couldn't swallow. He savored the taste, the warmth as it slid down into his belly. "Perfect," he rasped. "Thanks."

"You're welcome." She rooted around a moment until she extracted the protein bar for herself and tore into it.

Spike took the thermos of pig's blood and poured out another cupful. "How're y' holdin' up, pet?"

She swallowed the mouthful of Cookie Dough flavor. "I'm okay. I only lost consciousness for a few seconds. Marco got the worst of it."

"How is the little bugger? Pretend I care."

"He's good. The hospital released him a few hours ago." She couldn't help but let out a little chuckle. "He doesn't like it that a vampire took him out by luck."

He shook his peroxided head. "He's the one who's damned lucky she didn't cave his skull in 'r burn 'im." He paused, thinking it wasn't a good idea to ask what he wanted to know. But he was never one for reining in his curiosity. "And Buffy?"

Cassie nodded. "She's okay. Think she's still a little shaky, having to deal with a vampire of that kind of power after being yanked away from heaven."

Spike nearly choked on a mouthful of blood. "You know?!" he exploded as loud as he could in his condition (which wasn't very). "Did she tell you?"

She was startled at the force of his reaction. "She didn't tell me, but she obviously told you."

"How?" he asked. "How could y' know without her tellin' you?"

"It may sound hokey, but I know because I'm Catholic." At his confused look, she elaborated. "She didn't commit suicide when she jumped. She jumped to save lives. St. Vincent de Paul said, 'To love another person is to see the face of God.' To her, God looked like Dawn, Willow, Xander… even you."

He snorted. "Yeah, right, she died t' save a soulless monster."

"But she treats you like a man. She treats you as she can only treat someone she cares for."

Spike looked at her thoughtfully, not daring to hope that Buffy could love him someday, maybe. She would probably say, "Been there, done that, different vampire." He decided to change the subject. "What was that ya said t' Nuala? 'Pog mo thoin'?

Cassie blushed a deep pink. "It's the only Gaelic I knew that she would understand. It means 'Kiss my—'" she cut herself off by clearing her throat.

Spike grinned. "Why, Cassie, such language.  I'm proud of you."

Marco watched Cassie leave Spike's crypt, watching from behind a tomb.  He nodded sharply, then winced at the sharper pain in his head.  Sure she had gone from eyeshot, the younger Cattalano staggered toward the crypt. 

Spike, who for the second time that day had tried to get some rest—he had lied to Cassie…she had woken him up—looked up and tried not to strain his throat but groaned.

"Stay there… I won't take too long," Marco said softly, trying not to give himself a headache. He righted a chair and straddled it, facing Spike with the chair back between them. "I just want to ask for a favor."

Spike raised a brow.

Marco chuckled. "I know, after all the hell you've been through lately, who am I to ask, right? In fact, have you been through…less pleasant episodes aside from the crud you've been inflicted with?"

Spike had to shake his head. The torture session with Glory had been… mercifully long ago.

"In any event, I want you to look out for Willow and Buffy when I'm gone."

"Expectin' to die?" Spike whispered.

Marco shook his head. "Enough wishful thinking. No, I'm sorry to say; but I'll be returning to New York at the end of the semester. After the little problems we've been seeing with Willow, and the fact of Buffy's…resurrection leaving her a little out of it, both of them need a keen eye on them. Now, I've seen the looks you've been giving Willow, they're almost as bad as mine. As for Buffy…you'll at least be looking at her body if nothing else. Not that I blame you too much, but for God's sake man, try to be subtler. Agreed?"

Spike wondered what his response should be. He'd been planning on doing that anyway, Marco or no Marco, but should he give the annoyance the satisfaction?

Marco held up a hand. "Just think about it. You don't have to say a darned thing. It's just that…Willow's scaring me, and I can't do a darned thing about it. Her abuse of power is…more than anyone should be allowed to tolerate. I don't know what you'd call raising the dead, but I call it an abuse of power. So I do the only thing I can…I go."

Marco nodded, checking his internal checklist… that was all he had to say. He stood and walked to the crypt door.

"Why…?"

Cattalano turned. "Why what?"

"Could've killed me. Why not?"

Marco thought. He could have killed Spike? When? …Oh, yeah, the crossbow thing with Nuala. "Because I couldn't get away with it. At that range, no one would have believed that I had accidentally shot you in the heart. After all, I never miss."  He shrugged.  "Besides, you followed my ground rules: you didn't eat my sister, you didn't let her get hurt, and so, you get to live…or un-live, as the case may be."