TITLE: "Said she'd be back"
AUTHOR: Betty Woo (lwa@rocketmail.com)
RATING: PG, non-specific reference to violence & sex in some chapters
PAIRINGS: Buffy/Spike. Kinda.
SPOILERS: Starts at close of Episode 7.2, includes season 6 spoilers.
FEEDBACK: Better than chocolate!
DISCLAIMER: Mutant Enemy made this universe, I'm just taking a non-profit tour.
NOTES: I've decided to try something odd with this story, namely running it alongside the current season 7 episodes. Sort of like an "underplot" - things going on that they don't have time to show in a one-hour episode, although it's going to wind up AU once I get Jossed.
CHAPTER SEVEN - Saints and Martyrs
"Can we rest?"
Oh, God, the smell. The smell of his flesh, searing against the cross. It's why stakes had always been her weapon of choice against vamps. She couldn't handle the smell.
At first she doesn't budge, convinced it was a game, a trick of some kind. Yet another of Spike's nefarious plans to entangle the Slayer. The fear held her back.
Then she moved, running towards the cross, pulling him off and throwing him to the floor. She couldn't look at him, at what he's become, at what he's done for her. She's seen what crosses do to vampires, can't bring herself to face the molten blisters on his chest, his arms. His cheek. The burns weren't as bad as the look in his eyes.
"Are you crazy?" A broken record, all that their relationship had ever been. Tired and worn, trapped in a skipping groove until finally it came jarring loose.
She could hear him moving, crawling across the floor away from her. She's vaguely aware that she's still clutching the stake, aiming it towards him. "Thought we'd covered that one already, pet."
"I am not your pet." Cold fury in her voice, an anger swelling up inside, catching her by surprise. This man loves you so much he went to hell and back to reclaim his soul, and you're angry at him?
She was. Furious, in fact, a primal rage that sang through her veins. The same anger that had driven her to hit him time and again, a fury she couldn't name, couldn't even look at for fear it might blind her with what it revealed about herself.
"Right. Not my pet, not my anything." He had stopped moving now, staring off at the votive candles burning in the corner. "Still, my everything."
He was trying to keep his voice strong and even, she could tell. For all his efforts, he couldn't mask the pain. It was the still that broke her rage, a wall of half-whispered longing against which the waves of fury smashed and subsided. Without the anger, it was all too much again. She was vaguely aware of the tears on her cheeks, the clatter of the stake against the floor.
She walked towards him slowly, not wanting to frighten him. Already he seemed lost again, the fragile clarity he had struggled to retain during their conversation slipping out of his grasp. "Spike? Can you stand?"
He laughs, brittle and fractured. "Does it look like I can stand it? All those voices, all those..."
Crouching beside him, she waits, willing herself to patience. All she really wants to do is run away, bury herself deep down under her bedcovers and think about anything but the haunted way his eyes turn up to meet hers. But he needs her now, and she owes him this moment. After what he's gone through for her sake, she can't just run away from him now.
She owes him. And in that thought, she found the seed of her anger. Whatever he might think, she never asked for this. Never promised to love him, even with a soul. But he'd gone and done it anyway, broken himself apart to become the kind of man he thought she wanted. Taken her words and found a way to force her to care. How was this different from all the other times he'd offered his help, not because he wanted to do what was right, but just to get a little bit closer to her?
It was just like Spike, to do the right thing. But for all the wrong reasons.
"Can you stand up?"
In response, he struggled into a kneeling position, facing towards the back of the church. His eyes moved from her face up towards the cross. The flickering candlelight played on his cheekbones, his furrowed brow. Slowly, he planted one foot on the floor, pulling himself up with the help of a pew. Letting go, he swayed, finally losing his balance and gripping the wooden bar beside him for support.
"Standing. Solid through, yes."
She stood beside him, stepping in closer. Her senses hummed, standing this close to him, something between desire and fear. "Good. Go home."
His eyes, still fixed on the cross. She backed away, slowly, her eyes fixed on his narrow shoulders. She expected him to say something, whisper her name. She knew that she'd break at the sound of his voice, go running back and throw her arms around him. But he doesn't.
The church doors closed softly behind her. She made it half-way home before she started to cry again.
* * *
Anya stood off to the side, watching the paramedics load the injured human into the ambulance. Xander had wracked his brain for the last traces of field medical training from his military persona, managing to apply a compress to the wound that kept Ronnie from losing too much blood. Still, his collarbone had been shattered by the blow, and the medics were worried enough to be moving quickly, not asking too many questions. That was good. Anya didn't much feel like answering any more questions tonight. She had questions of her own that needed answering.
Xander thumped the back of the ambulance and watched it pull down the lane, red lights spinning, before looking back at her. "You okay?"
She thought about D'Hoffryn, about Halfrek's warning. About her job and her life and her lack of friends. About waking up every morning alone in her bed. No, definitely not okay. "I'm fine."
"Again, you did the right thing." He had that smile on his face, that quirky half-smile he used whenever he wanted to hide his nervousness.
"Could we not talk about that anymore?"
"Fine." He shrugged, putting his hands in his pockets. "Can I walk you home?"
Because Sunnydale is a big, bad scary place full of nasty demons. Because she was just a frail little girl who needed protection. "Fine. But don't get any ideas."
They walked along the quiet sidewalks in silence, trying not to notice the places where the pavement was broken and jagged. She liked the silence. It let her focus on what was important, running over in mind again and again the memory of him walking away from her at the church, the way everyone just stared and stepped away when they realized that he'd left her.
"So. What was up with Spike, anyway?"
"Like you care."
"Well, he hit you. I don't really like seeing that." He paused, a slight smile crossing his face. "Although I did enjoy the part where you threatened to kick his ass."
"I can, you know. Kick his ass."
"And if you're planning to in the future, please invite me. I'll bring popcorn."
So you can't stick around for our wedding, but a slugfest you'll attend. And my priorities are whacked because I care about a dead puppy? 'He's changed."
"So you said back at the Bronze. What was all that about, anyway?"
"Spike," she hesitated. It'd be easy enough to tell him. Heck, she'd enjoy it, watching his narrow worldview crack with the news. "It's not my place to say."
"Right. Looked like the same old Spike to me."
She remembered the glow, that faint smell that even the fresh peroxide couldn't drown out. It was impossible, yet somehow he'd managed it. "Why do you hate him so much?"
"Gee, let's think. Aside from trying to kill me and most of my friends repeatedly, you mean?" His voice was laced with sarcasm and anger, remembering old wounds.
"Which is different from the times that Buffy tried to kill you, or Willow tried to destroy the world, or..."
"Don't bring her into this!"
"Of course not. Because this is different."
"Yes. It is different. It's Spike."
She stopped, waiting for him to turn around and stare back at her. "You know, Xander, sooner or later that excuse just stops working."
Anya crossed the street and didn't look back, walking as fast as she could in her high heels. There's really no need to hurry, though. The silence told her that she's not being followed.
* * *
Stowing her brown jacket in the overhead bin, the slight redhead took a quick look around the Concorde. She'd been on one before, on her way over to England, although she didn't remember much from that trip. Just the long, dull silence of being trapped in her seat, a silent Giles beside her. Her head had still been too jumbled to say much, still reeling from the magicks and the violence. Giles had done nothing to break the silence between them, not until days later. Looking back, she realized he was probably in too much pain, even with all the drugs they'd given him at the hospital, to bother with conversation anyway. Even doped up, she has still been aware of his watchful gaze, alert to any little trick she put try to pull.
She'd been too tired for such things. Maybe they'd kill her when she arrived in England. She didn't much care anymore.
They'd left the day before the funeral. She knew it was happening, through her haze, but no one told her the specifics. She wanted to ask if they could delay, just for one more day, but the look on Giles's face when he told her to pack her bags made it impossible.
Willow pressed her forehead against the cool glass of the plane's window and stared out into the darkness. London was lit up all around the airport, and the glow from the Heathrow buildings twinkled across her field of vision. All she wanted to see was the darkness.
She could ask Buffy about the funeral. Provided Buffy ever spoke to her again. Willow wouldn't blame her if she didn't. She couldn't blame anyone but herself.
Poseys. She'd wanted someone to put poseys on the grave for her. They'd been one of her favorites. By the time she found the voice to ask, the funeral was already over.
Fidgeting with the seat buckles, she strapped herself in for the long flight ahead. Seven hours to New York, more to L.A. and then on to Sunnydale. Plenty of time to worry about all the fears she'd voiced to Giles, and the one she hadn't.
Going home. Giles was right about one thing. She wasn't sure that she'd really be going home this time. Home was where your friends were, the people who loved you and cared about you. Maybe that didn't exist anymore.
But Giles had missed the bigger picture. She pressed her head against the glass again, trying to push down the tears. Home was where she was loved, which meant she had no home any more. Rather, that her home was six feet under, a frail wooden box too small to contain the vibrant spirit that once sang through the discarded jewel within.
It had been easy to tell herself that she was healing, in the unfamiliar rooms of the coven's school. Nothing there was soaked through with memories of her girl. Hiding a shy smile at the Bronze. Brushing her teeth at the bathroom sink in Buffy's house. Tucking her silken hair behind one ear as she curled up in bed beside her. Every inch of Sunnydale resonated with her, with them.
How was she supposed to face all those places again, all alone? Her friend's hatred, the evil spreading from the hellmouth, even hell itself was nothing compared to facing the truth that everything was still there, however much it had changed since she'd left.
Everything but Tara.
AUTHOR: Betty Woo (lwa@rocketmail.com)
RATING: PG, non-specific reference to violence & sex in some chapters
PAIRINGS: Buffy/Spike. Kinda.
SPOILERS: Starts at close of Episode 7.2, includes season 6 spoilers.
FEEDBACK: Better than chocolate!
DISCLAIMER: Mutant Enemy made this universe, I'm just taking a non-profit tour.
NOTES: I've decided to try something odd with this story, namely running it alongside the current season 7 episodes. Sort of like an "underplot" - things going on that they don't have time to show in a one-hour episode, although it's going to wind up AU once I get Jossed.
CHAPTER SEVEN - Saints and Martyrs
"Can we rest?"
Oh, God, the smell. The smell of his flesh, searing against the cross. It's why stakes had always been her weapon of choice against vamps. She couldn't handle the smell.
At first she doesn't budge, convinced it was a game, a trick of some kind. Yet another of Spike's nefarious plans to entangle the Slayer. The fear held her back.
Then she moved, running towards the cross, pulling him off and throwing him to the floor. She couldn't look at him, at what he's become, at what he's done for her. She's seen what crosses do to vampires, can't bring herself to face the molten blisters on his chest, his arms. His cheek. The burns weren't as bad as the look in his eyes.
"Are you crazy?" A broken record, all that their relationship had ever been. Tired and worn, trapped in a skipping groove until finally it came jarring loose.
She could hear him moving, crawling across the floor away from her. She's vaguely aware that she's still clutching the stake, aiming it towards him. "Thought we'd covered that one already, pet."
"I am not your pet." Cold fury in her voice, an anger swelling up inside, catching her by surprise. This man loves you so much he went to hell and back to reclaim his soul, and you're angry at him?
She was. Furious, in fact, a primal rage that sang through her veins. The same anger that had driven her to hit him time and again, a fury she couldn't name, couldn't even look at for fear it might blind her with what it revealed about herself.
"Right. Not my pet, not my anything." He had stopped moving now, staring off at the votive candles burning in the corner. "Still, my everything."
He was trying to keep his voice strong and even, she could tell. For all his efforts, he couldn't mask the pain. It was the still that broke her rage, a wall of half-whispered longing against which the waves of fury smashed and subsided. Without the anger, it was all too much again. She was vaguely aware of the tears on her cheeks, the clatter of the stake against the floor.
She walked towards him slowly, not wanting to frighten him. Already he seemed lost again, the fragile clarity he had struggled to retain during their conversation slipping out of his grasp. "Spike? Can you stand?"
He laughs, brittle and fractured. "Does it look like I can stand it? All those voices, all those..."
Crouching beside him, she waits, willing herself to patience. All she really wants to do is run away, bury herself deep down under her bedcovers and think about anything but the haunted way his eyes turn up to meet hers. But he needs her now, and she owes him this moment. After what he's gone through for her sake, she can't just run away from him now.
She owes him. And in that thought, she found the seed of her anger. Whatever he might think, she never asked for this. Never promised to love him, even with a soul. But he'd gone and done it anyway, broken himself apart to become the kind of man he thought she wanted. Taken her words and found a way to force her to care. How was this different from all the other times he'd offered his help, not because he wanted to do what was right, but just to get a little bit closer to her?
It was just like Spike, to do the right thing. But for all the wrong reasons.
"Can you stand up?"
In response, he struggled into a kneeling position, facing towards the back of the church. His eyes moved from her face up towards the cross. The flickering candlelight played on his cheekbones, his furrowed brow. Slowly, he planted one foot on the floor, pulling himself up with the help of a pew. Letting go, he swayed, finally losing his balance and gripping the wooden bar beside him for support.
"Standing. Solid through, yes."
She stood beside him, stepping in closer. Her senses hummed, standing this close to him, something between desire and fear. "Good. Go home."
His eyes, still fixed on the cross. She backed away, slowly, her eyes fixed on his narrow shoulders. She expected him to say something, whisper her name. She knew that she'd break at the sound of his voice, go running back and throw her arms around him. But he doesn't.
The church doors closed softly behind her. She made it half-way home before she started to cry again.
* * *
Anya stood off to the side, watching the paramedics load the injured human into the ambulance. Xander had wracked his brain for the last traces of field medical training from his military persona, managing to apply a compress to the wound that kept Ronnie from losing too much blood. Still, his collarbone had been shattered by the blow, and the medics were worried enough to be moving quickly, not asking too many questions. That was good. Anya didn't much feel like answering any more questions tonight. She had questions of her own that needed answering.
Xander thumped the back of the ambulance and watched it pull down the lane, red lights spinning, before looking back at her. "You okay?"
She thought about D'Hoffryn, about Halfrek's warning. About her job and her life and her lack of friends. About waking up every morning alone in her bed. No, definitely not okay. "I'm fine."
"Again, you did the right thing." He had that smile on his face, that quirky half-smile he used whenever he wanted to hide his nervousness.
"Could we not talk about that anymore?"
"Fine." He shrugged, putting his hands in his pockets. "Can I walk you home?"
Because Sunnydale is a big, bad scary place full of nasty demons. Because she was just a frail little girl who needed protection. "Fine. But don't get any ideas."
They walked along the quiet sidewalks in silence, trying not to notice the places where the pavement was broken and jagged. She liked the silence. It let her focus on what was important, running over in mind again and again the memory of him walking away from her at the church, the way everyone just stared and stepped away when they realized that he'd left her.
"So. What was up with Spike, anyway?"
"Like you care."
"Well, he hit you. I don't really like seeing that." He paused, a slight smile crossing his face. "Although I did enjoy the part where you threatened to kick his ass."
"I can, you know. Kick his ass."
"And if you're planning to in the future, please invite me. I'll bring popcorn."
So you can't stick around for our wedding, but a slugfest you'll attend. And my priorities are whacked because I care about a dead puppy? 'He's changed."
"So you said back at the Bronze. What was all that about, anyway?"
"Spike," she hesitated. It'd be easy enough to tell him. Heck, she'd enjoy it, watching his narrow worldview crack with the news. "It's not my place to say."
"Right. Looked like the same old Spike to me."
She remembered the glow, that faint smell that even the fresh peroxide couldn't drown out. It was impossible, yet somehow he'd managed it. "Why do you hate him so much?"
"Gee, let's think. Aside from trying to kill me and most of my friends repeatedly, you mean?" His voice was laced with sarcasm and anger, remembering old wounds.
"Which is different from the times that Buffy tried to kill you, or Willow tried to destroy the world, or..."
"Don't bring her into this!"
"Of course not. Because this is different."
"Yes. It is different. It's Spike."
She stopped, waiting for him to turn around and stare back at her. "You know, Xander, sooner or later that excuse just stops working."
Anya crossed the street and didn't look back, walking as fast as she could in her high heels. There's really no need to hurry, though. The silence told her that she's not being followed.
* * *
Stowing her brown jacket in the overhead bin, the slight redhead took a quick look around the Concorde. She'd been on one before, on her way over to England, although she didn't remember much from that trip. Just the long, dull silence of being trapped in her seat, a silent Giles beside her. Her head had still been too jumbled to say much, still reeling from the magicks and the violence. Giles had done nothing to break the silence between them, not until days later. Looking back, she realized he was probably in too much pain, even with all the drugs they'd given him at the hospital, to bother with conversation anyway. Even doped up, she has still been aware of his watchful gaze, alert to any little trick she put try to pull.
She'd been too tired for such things. Maybe they'd kill her when she arrived in England. She didn't much care anymore.
They'd left the day before the funeral. She knew it was happening, through her haze, but no one told her the specifics. She wanted to ask if they could delay, just for one more day, but the look on Giles's face when he told her to pack her bags made it impossible.
Willow pressed her forehead against the cool glass of the plane's window and stared out into the darkness. London was lit up all around the airport, and the glow from the Heathrow buildings twinkled across her field of vision. All she wanted to see was the darkness.
She could ask Buffy about the funeral. Provided Buffy ever spoke to her again. Willow wouldn't blame her if she didn't. She couldn't blame anyone but herself.
Poseys. She'd wanted someone to put poseys on the grave for her. They'd been one of her favorites. By the time she found the voice to ask, the funeral was already over.
Fidgeting with the seat buckles, she strapped herself in for the long flight ahead. Seven hours to New York, more to L.A. and then on to Sunnydale. Plenty of time to worry about all the fears she'd voiced to Giles, and the one she hadn't.
Going home. Giles was right about one thing. She wasn't sure that she'd really be going home this time. Home was where your friends were, the people who loved you and cared about you. Maybe that didn't exist anymore.
But Giles had missed the bigger picture. She pressed her head against the glass again, trying to push down the tears. Home was where she was loved, which meant she had no home any more. Rather, that her home was six feet under, a frail wooden box too small to contain the vibrant spirit that once sang through the discarded jewel within.
It had been easy to tell herself that she was healing, in the unfamiliar rooms of the coven's school. Nothing there was soaked through with memories of her girl. Hiding a shy smile at the Bronze. Brushing her teeth at the bathroom sink in Buffy's house. Tucking her silken hair behind one ear as she curled up in bed beside her. Every inch of Sunnydale resonated with her, with them.
How was she supposed to face all those places again, all alone? Her friend's hatred, the evil spreading from the hellmouth, even hell itself was nothing compared to facing the truth that everything was still there, however much it had changed since she'd left.
Everything but Tara.