World's Edge

Part Two: The Massacre



Spike thought his strange relationship with Willow was at an end (no matter what Tara's annoying apparition said) now that she was back home with Buffy. The witch didn't call, didn't write, end of story. Meaning for the first time in months his un-life was free of her tear filled sniveling face. My immortality is looking up, he decided, tromping home one night through the wet grass of the cemetery. Now if Clem would only bugger off. It had been nice of the genial demon to look after the crypt while he was out of town, but Spike didn't fancy a roommate now that he was home.

Walking through the door he was stopped short by the sight of Willow comfortably lounging on the couch with Clem. The witch and the demon were grinning at one another and debating the relative merits of baked potato chips. It's like the bloody Hilton in here, Spike thought, frowning at them.

Seeing Spike, Willow nervously cleared her throat. With her black lacy dress and heavy eyeliner, she looked witchier now than she ever had while playing with dark magic. "So, you want to get a drink?" she asked hopefully.

Actually, he didn't. At all, he decided, glairing at the two of them. Clem smiled and waved a greeting, but Willow shrank back from the animosity in his expression. Spike felt a small thrill of delight when he realized he was frightening her, followed by a startling aftershock of guilt.

"A drink. Sure," he said. Bugger it all.

One sodding drink at the Bronze, that was all it took. Now Spike couldn't get the damn witch to go away. Like the clap, he thought callously.

"Tell me a story," Willow said one afternoon as they sat together on his couch looking at the blank TV.

Tilting his head Spike tried to think of something appropriate.

"One of the first kills Dru and I made together was a family, poor but clean, and young. Very tasty. I didn't know back then that not every kill was going to be as sweet. When we were done with dinner we strung them up with rope, the bodies, and had ourselves a little Punch and Judy show."

Spike only told Willow the light stories, the ones he thought she could handle. He didn't tell her about cutting up Cecily's pretty face and raping her with Angelus before drinking her dry. It was always Angelus, not Dru or Darla, who showed him the most brutal games. In return Willow had described her night of vengeance: how Warren's steaming stench heated the night air, the flush of satisfaction she felt sucking Rack's worthless life out of his body.

Leaning her head against Spike's shoulder, Willow was happy to listen to his wicked tales because if he were talking she wouldn't be thinking and remembering. Besides, the things Spike had done made killing Warren and Rack look like picking daises.



"Keep going," Willow mumbled into his shirt. Absently, Spike stroked her hair like he used to with Drusilla when she would get upset, which was often.

"Drusilla had a thing for babies, liked her prey small and juicy. I went for them a bit older, and strong. I wanted my victims to put up a good fight. Nobody took notice of me when I was alive; I was going to make bloody well sure I had everybody's attention now. Drove Angelus out of his mind I can tell you."

"Sometimes I wonder if Tara would ever have forgiven me," Willow said apropos of nothing.

Sitting there with his arm around Willow, hand resting on the crown of her head, Spike didn't respond. He was painfully aware that the smell of Willow's skin, the feeling of her warm, living body pressed against his, was turning him on. Natural enough urge, he reasoned, and he hadn't had a shag for ages. The last person he'd slept with was Buffy and that felt like it was in another life. In a way it was another life.

He wasn't Angel; having the soul didn't make him a bloody eunuch. Not that Willow would be into him anyway, lesbian and all that. Even if she was, Tara was already causing him enough grief in her unrest, and Buffy wouldn't like it. Of course Buffy wasn't going to like anything he did, but there was no point in going out of his way to piss her off. So no Willow, he told himself. Get over it. Be good. Being good was getting on his last nerve.

"Hey? Spike? Ground control to major Tom?" Willow was giving him her concerned look, eyes wide, and mouth small.

Her face was so open and vulnerable Spike wondered why Angelus had never gone after her; she was just his type. Too bad I wasn't here for the night of Evil Willow, Spike thought, would have been quite interesting to see that. It was impossible to believe all that had stood between them and the end of the world was Xander and the story of a broken yellow crayon. Only Willow could be moved by something so insipid.

"Are you listening to me?" Willow demanded.

"Yes, course I'm listening. I mean, no. I wandered off for a bit, but I'm back now." Spike grimaced at his own honesty. Bloody hell. She was turning him into a fucking prat.

"You're supposed to be the one person I can talk to," Willow complained.

Spike's brittle silences frightened her. They reminded Willow of how he was before the soul: distant and cruel. He looked that way now, and Willow nervously remembered how much he despised it when she complained about things in London.

Spike glared at the witch with something approaching hatred. He wasn't a confessional for Buffy or Willow to whisper their ugly secrets to and forget about them. You want me to play the hero, he accused Willow; you want me to fix your sad little life. Well too bad, Red. I'm not the bloke to absolve you of your sins.

"Go talk to your friends," Spike said shortly, annoyed that he cared whether she was happy or not. Didn't foresee that when he asked for the fucking soul, did he?

Spreading his fingers over her scull Spike turned her head like a dial until she was looking up at him. "You have to talk to them. Buffy learned that the hard way. You need to tell them what you're going through or this whole little co-dependent structure the three of you have will just collapse."

Willow's open face closed down like a window with the blinds drawn.

"They'll help you," Spike insisted.

Xander Harris and his crayon could help her better than he could. It was the truth and he hated it. Poor Spike, old and toothless and losing the girl to some puffy ponce who dressed like a bad acid trip.

Buffy watched this exchange from the door to the crypt. For a brief moment the sight of them together, Willow leaning with gross familiarity against the vampire's shoulder, made her chest constrict and she could not breath. They were so absorbed in one another they did not even hear her come in. Biting her lip Buffy tried to work out who she felt more betrayed by because, hello, cuddling with her attempted rapist? That was a major no no in the Best Friend Handbook. Then Spike smiled and all her ire rested on him. She hated it when he smiled like that. You're not a real boy, Buffy chastised him, stop looking like one. But he was telling Willow to talk to her and Xander, which almost smacked of selflessness. Not that it could be. Buffy was determined not to let Spike or his soul ruin her bad opinion of him.

"Ah-hem," Buffy cleared her throat loudly. Two heads swiveled towards her. Willow jumped away from Spike looking appropriately guilty. Well, good, Buffy thought.

"Excuse me, Watcher, don't you have someplace you need to be right now?" Buffy demanded. Spike squinted into the sun streaming through the door and then looked at the watch on Willow's wrist.

"Right," Spike said. "That thing with the Bit."

He hated walking around during the day. What if Tara took back her gift and he went poof with no warning? That would be a fucking waste. Was there a more pitiful way for a vampire to die than be killed by daylight? From the look on Buffy's face it was either sunlight or death by Slayer. Decisions, decisions.

Spike picked his sunglasses up off the sepulcher and sighed. "I guess I'll be going then."

"And buy a fucking clock already. Haven't you read the Watcher Diaries? You're now the poster boy for responsibility and timeliness," Buffy said. And Dawn gets all mopey when she thinks you've forgotten her. The Slayer turned towards her friend.

"Hey Will, you coming with?"

Willow perked up. "I'm coming."

Willow said it in the same tone she used in high school when she realized Buffy was choosing her over Cordelia. It's my fault, Buffy thought. I cut her out and now she doesn't even know I want to let her back in.

______________________________________________________________________

Dawn's head hit the mat with a tooth-numbing thump. The training room smelled worst from the floor: like feet and sweat and sawdust from the repairs Xander was doing to the Magic Box.

"Get up," Spike ordered.

Oh sure, Dawn thought. That was easy. At least it would have been if his arms weren't crossed over her throat.

"Chip?" she gasped, because that defiantly hurt.

"The chip won't activate unless I'm trying to bloody well hurt you. Now get up."

Dawn struggled uselessly against his weight. It was a horrible idea, she thought, training with Spike. Maybe he would kill her by accident and it would all be over soon.

"Not like that," Spike said, annoyance creeping into his tone. "You can't try and use brute force with somebody stronger than you are. You're not the Slayer. You don't get to fight like your sister. Use your hips. Use gravity. Make my weight work against me."

Dawn strained and twisted her hips, throwing him to the side and breaking his stranglehold with her arms. Good girl, Spike thought. But by now she shouldn't have to think about a move like that. It should be instinct. Before he was on his feet she rolled out of his reach and popped up into fighting stance, or what she thought was fighting stance.

"Better," Spike admitted grudgingly. "But in the real world I'd have killed you by that point. Ready to try it again?"

"I think that's enough for today," Buffy said from her perch on the pommel horse. Her textbook, the one she had supposedly been trying to study from, lay open across her lap.

In her mind it had made sense, at the time, to let Spike train Dawn as long as she was present. Watching him throw her sister to the floor countless times Buffy wondered if she was right. No, nothing about this was right. Buffy told herself she felt safer if she could chaperone their training sessions. It gave her a chance to work out how much faith she had in the soul, to see if Spike was really new and improved. Willow said yes, but her opinion carried less weight now that she had tried to suck them all into hell.

Dawn, feeling huffy and bruised, didn't object to her training session being cut short. She had thought learning to fight would be fun, like that first night in the cemetery when Spike had corrected her form with authoritative, steady hands and demonstrated punches in the air. When he touched her she had felt a tingling mixture of fear and, well, tingling. More of that wouldn't be bad. Instead training was a whole lot of pain, and bruises, and soreness. And Buffy seemed to have about zero sympathy for how hard she was trying.

"I'll go help Anya in the store," Dawn said grudgingly.

Yep, four months and still her debt to society was not paid off. Buffy didn't say anything. The Slayer was staring hard at Spike who looked down at the floor. So the eternal fight fought on, Dawn thought. Whatever.

"Do you want to take a shot?" Spike asked, because Buffy looked like she did.

Shrugging, she closed her book. "I could go a round."

Spike let the Slayer strike first. It seemed polite. Buffy slammed her fist into his face with compunction for manors. So she was angry with him then, Spike decided, because that sodding hurt. He was surprised she hadn't beaten the crap out of him sooner as punishment for assaulting her. Being a Slayer, she had the divine right of retribution on her side. There was nothing he could do to stop her from turning him into little dusty bits.

Still, he could make her work for it, Spike resolved, easily blocking her next two punches. Buffy looked surprised. Did she think he was just going to take whatever she dished out? You're getting complacent with me, love, he chastised. Do you think the next portent will just sit there and let you do the samba on its ass? Suddenly Spike spun and kicked hard enough to propel the Slayer across the room.

Bruised and pissed, Buffy picked herself up off the floor. She hadn't really thought he would hit her, not hard. Her mind flitted back to the alley the night Katrina died when he let her use him as her own private punching bag. Don't I have more of a right to that now? Buffy was pretty sure she did.

"Come on, Slayer. You can do better than that," Spike admonished, not even having the good grace to look winded from their little tussle.

"You have no idea what I can do," Buffy snapped. When had she begun this tradition of pointless repartee with her opponents, and why couldn't she stop?

With mercurial speed Buffy was off the floor and on him. Fighting in a flurry of elbows and fists, they spun and parried their way around the room. This was the dance, Spike thought, settling easily into the familiar rhythm of the Slayer's anger. Too easily. Try harder, Buffy. The next Big Bad will rip out your throat if you can't even take me. Maybe she still trusted him too much? Not bloody likely.

Enough of this, Spike decided. He spun and ducked out of her reach.

"You're predictable when you're angry," he told her in the scornful tone he knew she hated. Irritated, she lunged. He sidestepped. "Think, Slayer. You have to be smarter, not just stronger."

"Save the Watcher crap. It doesn't impress me," Buffy retorted, moving in slower this time, hands low. As they circled she watched his muscles move beneath the tight black shirt, trying to anticipate which way he would go.

You wouldn't have beaten the Host without me, Spike thought. I bloody well saved your life, and your miserable bratty friends.

Buffy knew what he was thinking, and expected him to say it, to gloat that she needed him. When he didn't she was surprised. Maybe the soul gave him tact? It certainly didn't make him any less rash.

As she expected him to, Spike broke the circling first, aiming a high kick at her head. She ducked, slamming her elbow into his gut. That should hurt him. He backed off a little, but not as much as she expected, and grabbed her by the throat. Hadn't anticipated that, had she?

"Try harder, or you're dead," Spike growled, morphing into vamp face. Snarling he lunged at her neck.

Shit! Buffy thought. Was he was really going to bite her? Falling backwards, she used his momentum to throw him over her head. Somewhere behind her there was a crash. Grabbing for one of the stakes littering the training room, Buffy rolled over into a crouched position and slammed Spike back to the floor as he tried to get to his feet, the stake ready to plunge into his chest.

"Better," Spike said grudgingly, his words thick around his heavy fangs, "but we should have been here a lot sooner.

She could not tell if she meant this fight in particular, or them in general. You should have killed me sooner. Buffy thought that was what he meant. Spike's blue eyes were filled with an expression she could only identify as anticipation. Breaking off from his gaze she appraised the tip of the stake poised over his heart. Did Spike really want her to kill him?

"Maybe we should train Dawn on distance weapons: throwing knives, crossbows. It might keep her safer, out of the main action of the fight. What do you think?" Buffy asked. Oh good, I've regained my title as the queen of the non sequitur.

"Sure," Spike said, shaking off the manifestation of his demon. "Whatever you want."

______________________________________________________________________

Anya watched Xander work. Xander hammered. Willow, dressed for a funeral, clickity clacked away on her laptop, Dawn re-priced the inventory and Anya watched them all. There were no customers. This is your fault, Anya thought looking at Willow. Then she decided to say it out loud.

"This is your fault, you and your bitchy magic. If you hadn't broken my store people would still be coming and paying money and my bank statement would have more zeros at the bottom," she complained.

Willow looked up from her computer, startled.

"Ahn, that's not fair," Xander said, putting down his hammer and stepping between them ready to do, well something. It was hard to be Action Guy when there was no clear path of action.

"No. I think Anya gets to weigh in on this," Willow said. "I mean you spent a thousand years torturing and punishing people you didn't even know, right? Of course I'm so painfully interested in your feelings about how I killed the man who murdered my girlfriend. Isn't that vengeance? Shouldn't you be all happy about that? Or are you just pissed I impinged on your job description?"

Sometimes, Willow thought, I have no idea what is going to come out of my mouth. I just open it and rivers flow out of nowhere.

"Oh god, Will," Xander said. He could feel Action Man melt away. He had no idea how to deal with this strange new Willow.

Anya sliced a hand through the air to demonstrate her impatience.

"I don't care about the little man you killed, or the warlock. There were two, right? I'm talking about me! You - you threw me against walls and twisted my mind before hitting me over the head some more. Then you were in London and everything was fine, except that the insurance won't cover the damage to the shop because we don't have a policy that covers vindictive, narcissistic witches. You practically killed Giles and now you're going to bankrupt him. And now you came back and I have to look at you all the time!"

There was more to say, but Anya was out of breath.

Willow looked like she was going to snap something witty and defiant. Her mouth was hard and set in a way that connoted scornful anger. Then her whole face crumpled and Xander felt oddly elated. Good, she felt bad. All this weird time hanging out with Spike wasn't turning her into some coldhearted monster.

"I'm sorry I destroyed the shop," Willow sniffled. "And I am sorry I hurt you." But how many of your victims did you apologize to, Willow wanted to know. Besides, Anya was a vengeance demon. It wasn't like she could have done any permanent damage.

Anya quirked an eyebrow. "I do not find myself moved by your apology."

Standing between them Xander realized a decision had to be made. He could go to Anya and try and talk her down some, or he could go to Willow who looked both angry and mortified behind her computer. It wasn't really much of a choice. He slid into the chair next to his best friend.

"Hey," he said gently, taking her hand.

"I know I did horrible things, Xander," Willow said softly. "I know I can't ever make up for them, but I can't go through each day apologizing to everyone each minute either."

"Why not?" Anya demanded from behind the counter. "I think that's a good idea." Her anger was sharpened by the fact Xander took Willow's side over hers. Of course he would. Humans always stuck together. Not that she should care. And if he wanted to accuse her of summoning great swarms of blue wasps to exact vengeance on the men of Sunnydale, well Anya was determined not to care about that either.

______________________________________________________________________

Willow cleared her throat. Right. "Hi everyone," she said.

Dearly beloved, we are gathered her today - no, wait, that was the wrong speech. Willow had gathered everybody together at the Bronze because it was neutral territory. Well, really it was because she asked Spike to come and couldn't justify inviting him back to Buffy's house. Hi? Buffy? Can we just invite the evil demon who tried to rape you back into the house? Not really a conversation she wanted to have. Buffy seemed to be okay with her talking to Spike, even with Spike training Dawn, but Willow wasn't going to push it.

The club was practically empty at six o'clock on a Thursday. With most of the lights still on, Willow was conscious of what a dump their old hangout really was. Through the grate of the catwalk she could see the stain from every drink spilled since the dawn of time, and each squished piece of gum spat onto the floor. Highly un-pretty.

"So," Willow said, nervously fingering the sleeve of her dark shirt. "This is the point where I start talking."

She shot a glance at Spike who raised his dark eyebrows in boredom. No, Willow thought. I don't know why I wanted you here either.

"The thing is, I, uh, did some things that weren't so great to you guys - like kind of tearing down the Magic Box for one." Anya nodded emphatically. "Which is the thing I'm the least concerned with because it can be fixed. Right? It can be fixed?" Willow turned to Xander who nodded. Anya's satisfied expression darkened.

"Oh. Good. Which brings us to the non-destructive more, uh, personal type of apology thing. I said some really crappy things, especially to you, Dawn."

The girl perked up at the sound of her name, suddenly interested.

"I really don't want you to turn back into green goo. I mean, I'm not sure if I even could have, but it was a really shitty thing to say."

"It was the magic, Willow. It's not your fault," Xander said. He was so sweet, always taking her side like that, Willow thought. She hated having to flood light into Xander's blind spots.

"Well, no. It was me. The magic made me strong, but it didn't make me mean or stupid. I lost control. Loosing Tara hurt me and I wanted everybody else to hurt too. I had a really bad day and almost killed everybody, Xander. There's really no great excuse for that. I can't go back and fix it, especially not now that the magic's gone, which given how my major spells go is probably a good thing."

Willow could see her friends wanted her to say it was a great thing, the best thing, but she wasn't up for any massive lying yet.

"I just want to tell you all how sorry I am for everything. You're all my friends and I love you and I hope you can forgive me someday. And I'm really sorry I called you Super Bitch," Willow said to Buffy who nodded seriously.

"From this point on you should leave the quipping to me," Buffy agreed, smiling gently.

In Buffy's mind there was a difference between forgiving the things Willow had done and forgiving Willow herself. It was the same line she had walked with Angel. Back in the land of moral ambiguity, she thought, how nice to be home.

"I forgive you," Dawn said, sliding her arms around Willow's neck. "As long as you're not going to go away again."

"Nope. I think I'm pretty much stuck here." Willow smiled sadly at Dawn's too obvious insecurity. It reminded her of herself.

"Well I don't forgive you," Anya said. "I mean is that all it takes to get redemption these days? Are we forgiving Spike now?" she demanded with a wave of her hand at the offensive vampire.

"No," Xander said turning around in his chair and staring at Spike. "He gets forgiven never. What the hell are you doing here anyway?"

I'm being bored to tears listening to you wankers talk about your feelings, Spike thought. He congratulated himself on his tact for not saying this. Instead he leaned nonchalantly against the rail of the catwalk and shrugged, lacking an honest answer either for Harris or himself.