Ten Thousand
by wisteria

10. Prague



The K-Mart was gone.

Spike stood before its former home and mourned its passing. Bloody brilliant place, that had been. Imperial capitalist dogma planted smack in the middle of the former Communist Bloc. Every time he'd gone in, he would laugh at the irony.

Back then, he'd had a love-hate relationship with it. Loved that he could get all kinds of creature comforts there, like compact discs and socks that didn't itch, and the crowning glory had been the Little Caesar's pizza joint on the ground floor. Hated that all the good stuff was locked in plexiglass display cases. Made it nearly impossible to nick. The whole thing was so damned American too, that they couldn't trust the locals to be above-board and purchase things.

It'd been replaced by a British grocery chain store. The place looked quite posh inside, but the thrill was gone. Spike bowed his head in tribute, then walked down Národní toward the bridge. When he passed Café Mucha, he stopped and stared.

Sonia wasn't there anymore. She never would be again.




Every night, it's the same story. Drusilla sits on the bench opposite Café Mucha and watches the waitress flitting from table to table. She is stalking the young woman, as methodically as Dru can manage to do. Spike still doesn't know why the waitress was chosen, but then he doesn't know why his princess does half the things she does. Last night they'd found out that her name was Sonia, and tonight Dru claps her hands and sings, "Sonia! Sonia!" in a childish voice. She leans over and whispers in his ear, "Tonight we shall fly away home with the bird."

He hates the pedantry of this, but he understands why. For the past month, she's been harping about Angelus, saying that she's going to do something to make Daddy proud. Spike knows the story of how his princess was turned, how Angelus had methodically stalked her, killing her family and driving her mad. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. While Dru doesn't have a sincere bone in her body, Angelus still has a hold on her. Spike cringes every time she croons his name even though the poofter has been gone for nearly a century.

Drusilla sings her song, and Spike grits his teeth. Only another hour until closing time, and then they can bloody get on with the killing.





At least some things never changed. Spike approached the gate to the Charles Bridge, and a man caught his eye. He recognized the bloke. Still had the same shock of white hair curling over his face and the loud voice calling, "Toys for your children!"

Spike circled around the booth until the man's back was to him. Even in the darkness, the bright colors of the marionettes he sold were blinding. A young couple approached the kiosk. With a flick of his wrist, the man sent a doll dancing along the cobblestones, and the couple laughed. The doll was all strings and jerky movements, pulled every which way at the salesman's whim.

"I know the feeling," Spike muttered under his breath.

Though he seriously doubted the man recognized him, Spike kept to the shadows, squeezing through the narrow space between gate and souvenir stand. Then he was on the Charles Bridge.

He stopped to stare at the statues and the Vltava River below. The Prazsky Hrad loomed above the city, bathed in yellow light and the grandeur that only castles seemed to possess. It was nearly midnight, but the city was bathed in light that shimmered off the river and pulsed with life.

Spike loved Prague with a passion. He hated Drusilla for taking it away from him.




The tram rattles like old bones as it climbs the suburban hills. Sonia stands near the front, and Spike sits near the back. Drusilla leans into him, licking a line from his collar to his ear, but he can sense her eyes staring at Sonia the whole time. Even when she's tender, she is on the hunt.

He knows what she plans to do, and it annoys him even before it's begun. Spike would much rather just grab Sonia's arm, haul her off of the tram, and snap her neck. At least then they could be done with it and have some fun again. There were some seriously soused people at Café Mucha, and Spike knew that they'd be itching for a good fight right about now. But this is Drusilla's game, and she is his dark queen. He always joins in her blood games.

As the tram turns onto a bland boulevard, Sonia pulls the cord to signal a stop. "Time to go, love," he leans over to whisper in Dru's ear, but she's already stalking toward the exit. It shudders to a stop, and they step off with a handful of other people.

They follow Sonia as she goes down a street of hideous semi-detached houses, all stucco and post-Communist prefab. It's nearly midnight, but there are people out and about. This is one of his favorite things about Prague. People keep hours suited to him, as if they were all just waiting for the vamps to come out and play.

Drusilla begins to laugh, and he scans the street to see what has caught her fancy. Sonia is talking to a man outside what must be her home. The bloke is older, maybe her father.

Her voice jubilant and pure, Drusilla sings, "Spread your wings and fly, my sparrow!" She dances up the street.

At the sound of the vampire's voice, Sonia and her father turn and stare.




Capitalism had a firm grip on the city's pulse, draining the blood away as expertly as Spike could ever have done. He slowly walked across the wide expanse of bridge and counted no fewer than twenty vendors hawking anything that a tourist might fancy. They called out to him, though Spike knew he was just a symbol to them – a tourist with money in his pockets, easy to wheedle into buying things he didn't need.

He walked over to his favorite statue. Cast in concrete blackened by smog, a man in long robes stood in a classic pose. One hand rested over his heart, and the other held a book. Though he hated that part of his life when he was human, even now Spike was drawn to the familiar pose. He didn't miss being a laughingstock with his head in the clouds, but he did miss the strange alchemy of learning, of reading classical texts and filling his head with their images.

Even before he felt the finger on his shoulder, Spike sensed someone approaching. He whipped around and saw a woman smiling up at him. A Polaroid camera hung from her neck, and in broken English, she asked, "Do you like a photograph? Only fifteen Koruna."

He stared at her, but she was too quick for him. A bright flash of light, then he heard the mechanical whir of the photo being processed. She smiled as she flicked the photo to develop it, and Spike wanted to walk away with a curse and a "go to hell."

But as she held out the photo to him, he glanced down at it and saw the faintest outline of his body. It was hard to make out, but it was there. It'd been ages since he had a photo of himself. Wild curiosity pulled him back from the desire to walk away.

He shoved his hand in his pocket and pulled out a few Euros. Not her currency, but he doubted she'd mind.

Lamps bathed the bridge in near-daylight. Entranced, he stared at himself in the photograph as he slowly walked across.




Excitement sparks from Drusilla's body as she approaches Sonia and her father. Spike walks a few steps behind her, and her energy fills him and whets his appetite. Never been one for the old fashioned stalk, but this is starting to become fun.

"Who are you?" the father calls out in Czech.

It's one of the few languages both he and Drusilla speak. She murmurs, "I am your black angel," in Czech. Then she says in English, "Do you feel it, my William? Angel is here! I can sense him."

He mutters, "No, he isn't, pet," but she doesn't hear him. She's playing her game.

His princess is smooth and cunning. One long arm reaches toward them, and her black-tipped nails trace swirls in the air. Her intensity can overpower even the most staid human, and Spike knows its power. It has consumed him for the past century, and tonight it consumes the father and daughter who are her target.

She sways side-to-side in her perfect dance, and the two Czechs join the minuet. Spike wants to go up and finish the job; he can already taste their blood on his tongue. But this is Drusilla's game to play, and he gives her the kill. They will revel in the spoils together.

The sound of one neck cracking and then another echoes down the street. Before the bodies can begin to fall, he catches the father and Drusilla cradles Sonia. She shifts into game face and sinks her teeth into the young woman's neck..

"I thought you were going to drive them mad," he asks her before taking his own bite.

With a bloody smile, she looks up at him. Her eyes glitter and oh, he loves her so. "I didn't want to wait anymore." She leans down and licks a line from Sonia's ear to her collar, just like she had done to him in the tram. When she leans over to kiss Spike, her mouth suddenly moves from his lips to his ear. "Now my birdie is flying for me."




When he reached the other side of the bridge, he saw the old outdoor café along the riverbank where he and Drusilla would go after a good kill, their stomachs full of blood that sang inside them. He didn't want to go there again, didn't want to sit there and remember how they would look at the other patrons and guess how their blood would taste.

He stood at the railing under the lamplight and stared at it. Tourists and locals filled the tables. That was always part of its charm. It felt real, instead of quaintness manufactured in the name of attracting visitors. Even though he didn't want the memories, he was drawn to the café all the same.

So he walked down the long staircase to the riverbank and found an unoccupied table. The waitress approached him for his order, and Spike froze.

Not Sonia. Couldn't be her. She was dead. He had painted hearts and stars on Drusilla's cheeks with her blood.

Spike blinked, When he looked up again, he saw that it wasn't her. Just another young woman who had the same bright eyes and suspicious set to her chin. In a voice that surprised him with its calm, he ordered a peach vodka. The stuff was dreadful, but he'd mixed it with the blood into a sweet cocktail seven years ago. For him, it tasted of Prague.

Voices buzzed around him, but he tuned them out. The light there was dimmer, more atmospheric, creating a deliberate sense of romance that kept people coming back.

But his eyes were better than humans', and he could see clearly. He placed the photograph on the table and pressed his palms on either side of it.

Spike stared at the image of his face. The flash had cast him in a strange light, making the planes of his face look dark and sinister. His black clothes swallowed the light until he looked like a disembodied head hovering next to the book that the statue held.

The image churned in his gut. In the photograph, he saw evil.

He wondered if this was how Buffy saw him.




The father is in the way, so Spike tosses him to the ground. Sonia's body is wedged between them, her head poking into his stomach. He wants to grab her head and crush her skull, to feel the rush of power as his hands destroy bone and scalp. When he looks down at her neck, he sees a long stream of blood pouring from her nearly-empty body. One arm holds Drusilla close, and his other hand dips down to Sonia's neck and bathes his fingers in red.

He brings his hand up to his princess's face and coronates her with a star drawn on her forehead. His love, his queen.

A loud sound snaps his head back. He jerks around and sees three men advancing on them. One carries a battery torch. Another has a gun.

The second shot hits Spike in the arm. Only a flesh wound, and instead of hurting him, it thrills him. Even in the darkness, he can see the fury on their faces. They scream at him in Czech, their voices too hoarse and loud for him to make out the words.

He thinks this night couldn't possibly get any better. Now he gets to do his own dance.

Drusilla coos and giggles as she does a waltz around Sonia's body, which is now in a heap on the ground. Spike swaggers forward, his tongue testing his fangs and his fists curled to strike.

Then a woman joins the men, and she begins to scream words in a language he does not know. Bitter chants and hands raised to the heavens.

Spike feels the air shifting around them. The woman's eyes glow, and for a second he thinks she might be a vampire too. But when her hand cuts a swath through the air, he knows what is happening.

Panicked, he looks back at Drusilla. Her whole body is glowing too, and her face freezes in a scream. She crumbles to the ground next to Sonia.

Turning his back on the growing crowd of humans, he chants, "Princess! Oh, hell. No!" Everything is so bright, so chaotic, and for a second he thinks she has been dusted. But when he touches her, she's still solid. She quivers under his hand.

The dance is over.

He pulls her limp body up from the ground and tightens his arms around her. The screaming in his mind deafens the shouts of the mob. With Drusilla's unconscious body in his arms, he runs away.


All Spike tasted was the vodka, and its sugary peach tang made him wince. It was far better with the blood mixer, but he'd forgotten to bring the flask with him tonight. Screwing up his face, he downed the small glass with one flick of his wrist, then he slammed it back on the table. The photograph shivered with the impact.

He looked around at the others in the café, and he wondered if any of them had known Sonia. He and Dru had literally painted the town red back then. The collateral damage had probably spread wide. Even in the midst of this strange new melancholia, the idea of playing "Six Degrees of Spike and Drusilla" brought a half-smile to his face.

The waitress came by and asked if he wanted another peach vodka. With a wince, he ran his tongue over his teeth and still tasted the sickly sweetness. "Coca-Cola, thanks," he muttered, and she disappeared.

He stared at the photograph.

It reminded him of the old sepia photos he'd took with Drusilla all those years ago. The sky was black, but the castle loomed yellow in the background, and his own face was cast in yellow-white light. He looked like a ghost, all startled eyes and half-open mouth. Spike picked it up and examined his eyes, trying to see the soul in them.

This was the new him, worn down by the chip and experience, with a hidden soul lurking behind those eyes. This was what Buffy saw when she looked at him, though minus the soul. It was what she would see when he returned to Sunnydale. No wonder she couldn't trust, couldn't love him.

The waitress returned with the Coke, and he pulled out some money for her. She disappeared, and he sipped the drink slowly as he took the pulse of the café.

A man approached the next table, asking the couple if they wanted a photograph. Must be the new tourist trap here. They waved him away, and the man scanned the crowd for more takers.

Spike waved him over. "How much for the camera and film?"

The cameraman stared at him. He was young, and the crease of his brow as he processed the question looked strange on his smooth face. Then he said, "Not for sale."

For the first time since he'd arrived in Prague that morning and cloistered himself in a hotel to sleep the day away, he was seized by an irrational craving. Staring the bloke straight in the eyes, he offered the man the equivalent of a hundred bucks in Czech Korunas.

That did the trick. The battered Polaroid and four packets of film were out of his bag and on the café table before Spike finished counting out the money. Spike handed it over and the man vanished, probably hoping to get away before Spike second-guessed the deal.

Dropping the film in his backpack, Spike got up and started walking through the Mala Strana, through cobblestoned alleyways and medieval buildings. This was what he loved most about Prague – the feeling that he'd stepped into a fairy tale. Seven years ago, he'd felt himself the wicked snake-charmer, hellbent on tasting the blood of the villagers. Now he wondered if he was the snake.

As he slowly walked up the hills, he practiced his smile. He wanted to go to the castle and take a photograph, and another across the river in front of the Art Nouveau panels of the cafes there. Maybe yet another in front of Café Mucha. He would smile in each one of them, and create images of someone that Buffy could trust and love.

The city pulsed around him, and turned his back to the taste of its blood.




END, Chapter Ten

wisteria@smyrnacable.net