Author's note: This story and its contents are the property of Rebecca
Graves, and may not be reproduced or published without the written consent
of the author. (please! if you want to post this fic somewhere, email me at
dayetriper@sbcglobal.net and ask my permission first)
Disclaimer: The characters in this story are property of Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, 20th Century Fox, yadda yadda yadda... I only borrow, I promise I'll give them back when I'm done! :-)
Spoilers: See story description; through Season Six. Doesn't spoil any of Season 7 of Buffy, but may spoil this season of Angel (I'm kinda jumping ahead in the timeline in this chapter, since I'm totally and completely stumped as to what to do next - any suggestions PLEASE let me know!!!)
Author's Note: Hi there, faithful readers (if there are any of you). Just to let you know, I'm reposting these chapters, trying to fix the formatting a bit more to my satisfaction (not sure if it'll work or not, but it's worth a shot, I suppose). PLEASE read and review and let me know what you think!!! Thanks!
~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~
Author's Note: !!!WARNING!!!: This chapter is R-RATED for a reason, it contains flashbacks of Spike's attack on Buffy; if that makes you uncomfortable, I'm sorry, but you have been warned... Otherwise, please enjoy!
~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~
Willow slowly turned the key in the lock and pushed the door open. Miss Kitty flew past her into the house and up the stairs in silence. Willow turned and gently closed and locked the door behind her.
The living room was in shadow. She could barely make out Buffy's form on the couch, curled under a blanket. Willow tiptoed toward the stairs, trying not to awaken her.
"Will...?" the girl called quietly, not sounding at all as if she'd been sleeping. "It's late, are you ok? Did anything-"
"No, I'm fine. You didn't have to wait up for me," Willow replied, turning and entering the living room where Buffy was moving over on the couch to make room for her to sit. As she did, she reached into her pocket for the note, then paused.
Noticing her movements, Buffy searched her friend's eyes for a clue. After a moment's silence, she asked, "What is it?"
Willow looked up into the girl's blue eyes, wondering if this was such a good idea... "Well, I- I was patrolling in the cemetery, and I dusted this vamp-"
"You did?" Buffy seemed surprised; the redhead didn't look at all as if she'd been fighting. On the contrary, her cheeks seemed to glow with an inner warmth and her eyes glistened. She looked more like she'd just come from a midnight rendezvous with a lover than... Buffy stopped that thought in its tracks and switched topics in her mind. "How? I mean- I know you're perfectly capable of- But you don't look as if you've been fighting, no poof-dust; not a hair out of place..."
The talisman! Willow had almost forgotten in all the post-dusting excitement. "Well, actually, I found something of -" She paused, her eyes now moist with unshed tears. "Something that Tara left for me..." She reached into her pocket and extracted the necklace, holding it up between them, the metal glistening in the faint moonlight falling through the window.
"Is it... magickal?" Buffy asked hesitantly, already knowing the answer but feeling the need to ask anyway. She was still unsure of Willow's ability to reign in her magicks once unleashed, but she knew she should trust her friend.
"Yes, it's a talisman; it's pretty amazing." Willow paused for a moment; surely the Slayer would have enough inherent magickal ability to use the talisman even in this form; Willow had been thinking about it on the walk home and had realized that it hadn't really drained her powers very much, she'd just been able to channel more power through it than most would, and it had in fact left her feeling renewed, like a weight had been taken away that had been pressing down on her. Pent-up magickal power, just needing an avenue of release.
Her eyes returned to the Slayer's watchful ones. "Actually, do you want to see what it does?"
Buffy looked doubtful and a bit worried. "Do you think I could? I mean, I'm no witch; and would it be safe? I'm not sure-"
"Buffy," Willow whispered softly, silencing her, and slipped the chain around the Slayer's neck. "Trust me. Just close your eyes, and concentrate, and when you're ready, say 'Love, Light My Way'."
Buffy still looked dubious, but she closed her eyes and tried to focus her thoughts on the glass orb hanging between her breasts. The glass seemed to have warmed to her skin very quickly, it felt as if it were pulsing there, in rhythm with her heartbeat... she felt Willow take her hand and place it out in front of them, palm upturned.
"Open your eyes." Buffy obeyed. "Now, say the words..." Willow whispered.
"Love... light my way," the blonde whispered.
A faint golden glow began to light the room, hanging in the air almost like a fog. Slowly the wisps of energy began to float together into a small sphere, swirls of light spiralling around each other until they had formed a glowing ball of flame above Buffy's outstretched palm.
The Slayer gasped. "Willow... it's... it's amazing. Am I doing that? It's so beautiful..." In her excitement, her concentration slipped and the golden sphere's glow began to dim, fading until it had dissipated completely. Still, Buffy was in awe. To think that even she could do something like that...
"Isn't it wonderful? I'm going to make one for all of you, especially Dawn. She'll be able to wear it to the school, even to the Bronze, and everyone will think it's just a cool necklace, and that way she'll always be protected." A single tear spilled down her cheek, and she wiped it away, looking down into her lap. "It's what she would want. She loved Dawn so much, like a mother would... and now she can still protect her, even though she's..." Her voice faded off as more tears fell. She felt Buffy's warm hands wipe the tears from her cheeks, and she fell into her friend's arms.
Buffy held her for a moment, then pulled back and removed the chain from around her neck, placing it into Willow's hands and folding them closed around it. "It's been a long night for us both, how about we go to bed? We can tell Dawn the good news in the morning, ok?"
The good news... Willow's mind returned to the note as they reached the bottom of the stairs. "Buffy?"
"Yeah?"
Willow looked into her friend's eyes and her stomach turned. How could she possibly tell her what she thought might be happening..? "When I was patrolling, I was in the area of... well, I went by the crypt, and I found this." She spilled out the lie quickly as she removed the note from her pocket and held it out, her hand shaking.
Buffy reached for the paper and saw the "B" scrawled across the front. Her gut tightened as she unfolded the note...
"I'm sorry... William"
Her eyes shot back to Willow's. "You went to his crypt? Are you crazy?! What if he'd have been there?" What if he HAD been there? Her memory burned with the thought of their last encounter, and she longed for the feel of a stake in her palm so she could go hunting... but then her eyes returned to the paper, the flowing handwriting... How could he be sorry for what he'd done to her? Was he just using her own words against her? Did he think that he could just apologize and all would be forgiven, and she'd open her arms to him again? Her body felt numb with the shock of it all, it was just too much to process at once. She folded the note over twice, gripping it tightly in her fist.
Willow was still waiting for the rest of the reprimand, but saw that Buffy's mind was working furiously already, so she took the girl's empty hand and led her up the stairs. "It's all right, we can figure it out in the morning." She left unsaid that even if Spike had turned up on the front steps right now, he couldn't enter the house anyway.
"Yeah," Buffy replied, not really paying attention to her surroundings as she made her way down the hall. When they reached their doors, she squeezed Willow's hand tightly for a moment, then turned away. "Good night, Will..."
"Good night, Buffy," Willow replied softly as Buffy's bedroom door closed. Willow entered her own room and closed the door, making her way in the moonlight to the bed.
Why had she lied to Buffy? Why hadn't she told her that she'd spoken with Spike; hell, she hadn't even told the Slayer that he was back in town! For all she knew, he'd left the note for her before leaving. Willow frowned as she slipped out of her clothes, leaving them piled on the floor and crawling under the blankets.
On second thought, Buffy had been upset and distracted enough just by seeing the note, it was probably best that she'd left out the whole "Oh yeah, I talked to him, he's back in town by the way" part of the discussion. Still, the Slayer hadn't grabbed the nearest handy weapon and headed out the door, so Willow guessed that the note had done its part in buying time until she could figure out why exactly Spike had returned... and whether he'd changed as she suspected he had.
She resigned herself to visiting Giles first thing in the morning; at least she knew he would approach the situation logically and help her find a solution. Sighing, she rested her head on the pillow for a moment; then, frowning, reached over the edge of the bed to her discarded clothes and removed her half of the note from her pocket. Lying back down, she studied her name in the glow from the window for a moment, then placed the slip of paper under her pillow and lay back, staring up at the ceiling. She felt soft fur nuzzling against her collarbone and reached out with one hand, stroking Miss Kitty's head as she drifted to sleep...
...her last conscious thoughts were of soft black leather and the coppery smell of blood...
~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~
As he moved through the shadows, Spike's thoughts wandered. He pulled a drag from the clove cigarette, licked the sweet spice from his lips and smiled at the taste. It seemed to conjure up some distant memory from the depths of his mind, something that remained obscured when he tried to focus on it. Sighing a cloud of swirling smoke, he slid the lighter back into his tight hip pocket. Damn, should have never traded away that coat, feel right naked without it... have to do something about that... Gazing down at his chest, he realized that he'd never buttoned his shirt before leaving his crypt. Well, that'd explain the whole 'naked' feeling, you dolt... Touching an index finger to the three small scratches near his left nipple, he grinned. That's what you get for carrying a frightened cat with no shirt on, lucky she didn't cut the damn thing off when she jumped out of your arms! Chuckling, he held the cigarette between his lips as he worked the buttons into their respective holes. There, much better....
Walking again, he smiled to himself at the memory of Willow's face as she'd read his note; the utter surprise and fear he'd glimpsed. It'd been a long time since anyone had feared him... well, maybe not...
Cursing himself, he pushed the dark memory further back into his mind, or tried to. Her pleading, her weak struggling, the tears coursing down her cheeks... he'd been so angry at her, her refusal to admit to her friends that she'd been seeking his solace for months, and he'd attempted to drown his sorrows in bourbon, blood, and violence; nothing had eased the burning pain within him.
So finally, in a drunken blood-fueled rage, he'd decided to confront her. When he saw her there, his anger had melted away. She was hurt, tired, exhausted... he could comfort her, make her forget her aches... but she pushed him away, snarling at him. He loved her, just wanted to hold her, ease her pain! Gods, she made his blood boil with passion, didn't she see? Couldn't she understand? She cried out and pushed him away, falling to the floor in agony. He tried to help her, but she fought him, refusing his every advance. His rage returned, with more fury than ever. Had she no heart? Couldn't she see that though he was dead inside, she had made him feel more alive than ever before, and now she was killing him, sucking away every bit of life he'd felt with her! Oh, to feel her above him, the fragile human body that held the unbreakable essence of the Slayer, being able to hold such life in his hands, feel it coursing through him without even tasting the sweet nectar of her veins, to feel himself surrounded by the fire within her, warming his body and his cold dead heart... and now she couldn't even stand to be touched by him! And now he was atop her, in control for once, and all she could do was struggle and sob; he would make her understand, make her know what it felt like to suffer as he did, make her feel the pain that burned inside him!
"Stop... Spike, please.... no... please, stop...." she sobbed, her weak arms fluttering against his chest as he thrust into her again and again, but his vision was clouded in red, burning anger and passion and fury... Strangely, he realized now that the thought of killing her, simply tearing her throat and drinking her life, had never occurred to him; no, he had wanted her to suffer as he suffered; death would have been a blessing, a gift... he wanted her to... god, he just wanted her... wanted her to give herself over to him, fully and completely... the one thing that she would never do.
Only when her legs flew up and kicked him across the room did he realize what he'd done... Time seemed to slow as she sobbed, pulling her robe around her, sitting up and curling into a ball; dear God, what had she made him do? No, that wasn't right... he could see now, she had fought him with every ounce of strength she possessed, she didn't want him anymore, it was well and truly over... what had he done?
"Buffy.... I...." he whispered, starting toward her.
She cowered against the wall, her eyes glistening with tears. "You see now why I could never love you...?" she murmured, turning from him.
He reached to touch her shoulder, and she jerked away violently, the spark returning to her eyes for a split second. "Don't - EVER - touch me again, Spike. Ever. Or I will kill you."
"It's over."
Spike started as he realized that he'd walked halfway across town in a daze of remembrance. He found himself in an alley behind a shop on Main Street, the butt of a dead cigarette still clutched between his fingers. Shaking his head, he tossed it aside, and looked around. Hmm, what luck...
Wrenching the knob on the door open, he stepped into the back of the clothing shop, listening for an alarm. "Nice security system you've got here," he chuckled to himself, "surprised the door wasn't unlocked..."
Gazing through the racks of coats, he sighed. It wouldn't be the same, no matter what he chose. That coat had been a trophy, like the scar above his left eye, won in battle against the Slayer. It was irreplacable... but still, it was his style, he had to have something... he stopped at a shorter, shiny black leather jacket with straight sleeves, no cuffs, and a small collar... "Nah, looks like something the poof would wear, not my style.." he chuckled.
On and on he searched through every rack, clothes littered the floor in disarray, and still he hadn't found a thing that would suit him. Moving to the last rack, he sighed; then something caught his eye.
It wasn't like his old leather duster, that was for sure, but still, it had a look about it that attracted him, so he wrestled it from its hanger and pulled it on. It was a soft wool blend, very finely woven, and not black, but a dark charcoal grey. Its weight settled nicely onto his frame, and he moved about in it a bit, throwing punches and such, just to be sure it wouldn't rip to shreds if it saw any action. It was made tougher than it looked, and was cut in the same way as the duster had been, long and billowing about his calves as he walked, and tapering in a bit at the waist, a look he hadn't worn in maybe a hundred years or more. Yeah, I could definitely get used to this, he thought, looking down at himself, picturing what he might look like through someone else's eyes, clad in black jeans, a dark blue buttoned shirt and the charcoal duster... nice, very nice, he thought, running a hand through his hair, and grimacing at the sand that showered from his fingers. OK, I still need work, but not so bad...
Lighting up another cigarette, he closed the shop door behind him and started down the alleyway, but soon stopped again. Sighing, he turned back. He reentered the store, reached into his pocket, dropped a handful of crumbled bills onto the counter. "Good god, what a right poof I am. Next thing you know I'll be helping old ladies cross the street and saving damsels in distress... bloody hell.." he muttered as he made his exit again and strode off into the night, not noticing the dark figure lurking in the shadows, chuckling to itself at his behavior.
"Now who's the poof, William...?" Angelus growled, and tore anew into the throat of the shopkeeper, whose last breath left him with a whimper as his body fell to the ground.
~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~
TBC - Please review and let me know what you think, suggestions are welcome! (Especially since I've been stuck completely and totally with this story since this past summer and am just now writing again! PLEASE let me know what you think should have next!) Thanks for reading!
Disclaimer: The characters in this story are property of Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, 20th Century Fox, yadda yadda yadda... I only borrow, I promise I'll give them back when I'm done! :-)
Spoilers: See story description; through Season Six. Doesn't spoil any of Season 7 of Buffy, but may spoil this season of Angel (I'm kinda jumping ahead in the timeline in this chapter, since I'm totally and completely stumped as to what to do next - any suggestions PLEASE let me know!!!)
Author's Note: Hi there, faithful readers (if there are any of you). Just to let you know, I'm reposting these chapters, trying to fix the formatting a bit more to my satisfaction (not sure if it'll work or not, but it's worth a shot, I suppose). PLEASE read and review and let me know what you think!!! Thanks!
~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~
Author's Note: !!!WARNING!!!: This chapter is R-RATED for a reason, it contains flashbacks of Spike's attack on Buffy; if that makes you uncomfortable, I'm sorry, but you have been warned... Otherwise, please enjoy!
~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~
Willow slowly turned the key in the lock and pushed the door open. Miss Kitty flew past her into the house and up the stairs in silence. Willow turned and gently closed and locked the door behind her.
The living room was in shadow. She could barely make out Buffy's form on the couch, curled under a blanket. Willow tiptoed toward the stairs, trying not to awaken her.
"Will...?" the girl called quietly, not sounding at all as if she'd been sleeping. "It's late, are you ok? Did anything-"
"No, I'm fine. You didn't have to wait up for me," Willow replied, turning and entering the living room where Buffy was moving over on the couch to make room for her to sit. As she did, she reached into her pocket for the note, then paused.
Noticing her movements, Buffy searched her friend's eyes for a clue. After a moment's silence, she asked, "What is it?"
Willow looked up into the girl's blue eyes, wondering if this was such a good idea... "Well, I- I was patrolling in the cemetery, and I dusted this vamp-"
"You did?" Buffy seemed surprised; the redhead didn't look at all as if she'd been fighting. On the contrary, her cheeks seemed to glow with an inner warmth and her eyes glistened. She looked more like she'd just come from a midnight rendezvous with a lover than... Buffy stopped that thought in its tracks and switched topics in her mind. "How? I mean- I know you're perfectly capable of- But you don't look as if you've been fighting, no poof-dust; not a hair out of place..."
The talisman! Willow had almost forgotten in all the post-dusting excitement. "Well, actually, I found something of -" She paused, her eyes now moist with unshed tears. "Something that Tara left for me..." She reached into her pocket and extracted the necklace, holding it up between them, the metal glistening in the faint moonlight falling through the window.
"Is it... magickal?" Buffy asked hesitantly, already knowing the answer but feeling the need to ask anyway. She was still unsure of Willow's ability to reign in her magicks once unleashed, but she knew she should trust her friend.
"Yes, it's a talisman; it's pretty amazing." Willow paused for a moment; surely the Slayer would have enough inherent magickal ability to use the talisman even in this form; Willow had been thinking about it on the walk home and had realized that it hadn't really drained her powers very much, she'd just been able to channel more power through it than most would, and it had in fact left her feeling renewed, like a weight had been taken away that had been pressing down on her. Pent-up magickal power, just needing an avenue of release.
Her eyes returned to the Slayer's watchful ones. "Actually, do you want to see what it does?"
Buffy looked doubtful and a bit worried. "Do you think I could? I mean, I'm no witch; and would it be safe? I'm not sure-"
"Buffy," Willow whispered softly, silencing her, and slipped the chain around the Slayer's neck. "Trust me. Just close your eyes, and concentrate, and when you're ready, say 'Love, Light My Way'."
Buffy still looked dubious, but she closed her eyes and tried to focus her thoughts on the glass orb hanging between her breasts. The glass seemed to have warmed to her skin very quickly, it felt as if it were pulsing there, in rhythm with her heartbeat... she felt Willow take her hand and place it out in front of them, palm upturned.
"Open your eyes." Buffy obeyed. "Now, say the words..." Willow whispered.
"Love... light my way," the blonde whispered.
A faint golden glow began to light the room, hanging in the air almost like a fog. Slowly the wisps of energy began to float together into a small sphere, swirls of light spiralling around each other until they had formed a glowing ball of flame above Buffy's outstretched palm.
The Slayer gasped. "Willow... it's... it's amazing. Am I doing that? It's so beautiful..." In her excitement, her concentration slipped and the golden sphere's glow began to dim, fading until it had dissipated completely. Still, Buffy was in awe. To think that even she could do something like that...
"Isn't it wonderful? I'm going to make one for all of you, especially Dawn. She'll be able to wear it to the school, even to the Bronze, and everyone will think it's just a cool necklace, and that way she'll always be protected." A single tear spilled down her cheek, and she wiped it away, looking down into her lap. "It's what she would want. She loved Dawn so much, like a mother would... and now she can still protect her, even though she's..." Her voice faded off as more tears fell. She felt Buffy's warm hands wipe the tears from her cheeks, and she fell into her friend's arms.
Buffy held her for a moment, then pulled back and removed the chain from around her neck, placing it into Willow's hands and folding them closed around it. "It's been a long night for us both, how about we go to bed? We can tell Dawn the good news in the morning, ok?"
The good news... Willow's mind returned to the note as they reached the bottom of the stairs. "Buffy?"
"Yeah?"
Willow looked into her friend's eyes and her stomach turned. How could she possibly tell her what she thought might be happening..? "When I was patrolling, I was in the area of... well, I went by the crypt, and I found this." She spilled out the lie quickly as she removed the note from her pocket and held it out, her hand shaking.
Buffy reached for the paper and saw the "B" scrawled across the front. Her gut tightened as she unfolded the note...
"I'm sorry... William"
Her eyes shot back to Willow's. "You went to his crypt? Are you crazy?! What if he'd have been there?" What if he HAD been there? Her memory burned with the thought of their last encounter, and she longed for the feel of a stake in her palm so she could go hunting... but then her eyes returned to the paper, the flowing handwriting... How could he be sorry for what he'd done to her? Was he just using her own words against her? Did he think that he could just apologize and all would be forgiven, and she'd open her arms to him again? Her body felt numb with the shock of it all, it was just too much to process at once. She folded the note over twice, gripping it tightly in her fist.
Willow was still waiting for the rest of the reprimand, but saw that Buffy's mind was working furiously already, so she took the girl's empty hand and led her up the stairs. "It's all right, we can figure it out in the morning." She left unsaid that even if Spike had turned up on the front steps right now, he couldn't enter the house anyway.
"Yeah," Buffy replied, not really paying attention to her surroundings as she made her way down the hall. When they reached their doors, she squeezed Willow's hand tightly for a moment, then turned away. "Good night, Will..."
"Good night, Buffy," Willow replied softly as Buffy's bedroom door closed. Willow entered her own room and closed the door, making her way in the moonlight to the bed.
Why had she lied to Buffy? Why hadn't she told her that she'd spoken with Spike; hell, she hadn't even told the Slayer that he was back in town! For all she knew, he'd left the note for her before leaving. Willow frowned as she slipped out of her clothes, leaving them piled on the floor and crawling under the blankets.
On second thought, Buffy had been upset and distracted enough just by seeing the note, it was probably best that she'd left out the whole "Oh yeah, I talked to him, he's back in town by the way" part of the discussion. Still, the Slayer hadn't grabbed the nearest handy weapon and headed out the door, so Willow guessed that the note had done its part in buying time until she could figure out why exactly Spike had returned... and whether he'd changed as she suspected he had.
She resigned herself to visiting Giles first thing in the morning; at least she knew he would approach the situation logically and help her find a solution. Sighing, she rested her head on the pillow for a moment; then, frowning, reached over the edge of the bed to her discarded clothes and removed her half of the note from her pocket. Lying back down, she studied her name in the glow from the window for a moment, then placed the slip of paper under her pillow and lay back, staring up at the ceiling. She felt soft fur nuzzling against her collarbone and reached out with one hand, stroking Miss Kitty's head as she drifted to sleep...
...her last conscious thoughts were of soft black leather and the coppery smell of blood...
~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~
As he moved through the shadows, Spike's thoughts wandered. He pulled a drag from the clove cigarette, licked the sweet spice from his lips and smiled at the taste. It seemed to conjure up some distant memory from the depths of his mind, something that remained obscured when he tried to focus on it. Sighing a cloud of swirling smoke, he slid the lighter back into his tight hip pocket. Damn, should have never traded away that coat, feel right naked without it... have to do something about that... Gazing down at his chest, he realized that he'd never buttoned his shirt before leaving his crypt. Well, that'd explain the whole 'naked' feeling, you dolt... Touching an index finger to the three small scratches near his left nipple, he grinned. That's what you get for carrying a frightened cat with no shirt on, lucky she didn't cut the damn thing off when she jumped out of your arms! Chuckling, he held the cigarette between his lips as he worked the buttons into their respective holes. There, much better....
Walking again, he smiled to himself at the memory of Willow's face as she'd read his note; the utter surprise and fear he'd glimpsed. It'd been a long time since anyone had feared him... well, maybe not...
Cursing himself, he pushed the dark memory further back into his mind, or tried to. Her pleading, her weak struggling, the tears coursing down her cheeks... he'd been so angry at her, her refusal to admit to her friends that she'd been seeking his solace for months, and he'd attempted to drown his sorrows in bourbon, blood, and violence; nothing had eased the burning pain within him.
So finally, in a drunken blood-fueled rage, he'd decided to confront her. When he saw her there, his anger had melted away. She was hurt, tired, exhausted... he could comfort her, make her forget her aches... but she pushed him away, snarling at him. He loved her, just wanted to hold her, ease her pain! Gods, she made his blood boil with passion, didn't she see? Couldn't she understand? She cried out and pushed him away, falling to the floor in agony. He tried to help her, but she fought him, refusing his every advance. His rage returned, with more fury than ever. Had she no heart? Couldn't she see that though he was dead inside, she had made him feel more alive than ever before, and now she was killing him, sucking away every bit of life he'd felt with her! Oh, to feel her above him, the fragile human body that held the unbreakable essence of the Slayer, being able to hold such life in his hands, feel it coursing through him without even tasting the sweet nectar of her veins, to feel himself surrounded by the fire within her, warming his body and his cold dead heart... and now she couldn't even stand to be touched by him! And now he was atop her, in control for once, and all she could do was struggle and sob; he would make her understand, make her know what it felt like to suffer as he did, make her feel the pain that burned inside him!
"Stop... Spike, please.... no... please, stop...." she sobbed, her weak arms fluttering against his chest as he thrust into her again and again, but his vision was clouded in red, burning anger and passion and fury... Strangely, he realized now that the thought of killing her, simply tearing her throat and drinking her life, had never occurred to him; no, he had wanted her to suffer as he suffered; death would have been a blessing, a gift... he wanted her to... god, he just wanted her... wanted her to give herself over to him, fully and completely... the one thing that she would never do.
Only when her legs flew up and kicked him across the room did he realize what he'd done... Time seemed to slow as she sobbed, pulling her robe around her, sitting up and curling into a ball; dear God, what had she made him do? No, that wasn't right... he could see now, she had fought him with every ounce of strength she possessed, she didn't want him anymore, it was well and truly over... what had he done?
"Buffy.... I...." he whispered, starting toward her.
She cowered against the wall, her eyes glistening with tears. "You see now why I could never love you...?" she murmured, turning from him.
He reached to touch her shoulder, and she jerked away violently, the spark returning to her eyes for a split second. "Don't - EVER - touch me again, Spike. Ever. Or I will kill you."
"It's over."
Spike started as he realized that he'd walked halfway across town in a daze of remembrance. He found himself in an alley behind a shop on Main Street, the butt of a dead cigarette still clutched between his fingers. Shaking his head, he tossed it aside, and looked around. Hmm, what luck...
Wrenching the knob on the door open, he stepped into the back of the clothing shop, listening for an alarm. "Nice security system you've got here," he chuckled to himself, "surprised the door wasn't unlocked..."
Gazing through the racks of coats, he sighed. It wouldn't be the same, no matter what he chose. That coat had been a trophy, like the scar above his left eye, won in battle against the Slayer. It was irreplacable... but still, it was his style, he had to have something... he stopped at a shorter, shiny black leather jacket with straight sleeves, no cuffs, and a small collar... "Nah, looks like something the poof would wear, not my style.." he chuckled.
On and on he searched through every rack, clothes littered the floor in disarray, and still he hadn't found a thing that would suit him. Moving to the last rack, he sighed; then something caught his eye.
It wasn't like his old leather duster, that was for sure, but still, it had a look about it that attracted him, so he wrestled it from its hanger and pulled it on. It was a soft wool blend, very finely woven, and not black, but a dark charcoal grey. Its weight settled nicely onto his frame, and he moved about in it a bit, throwing punches and such, just to be sure it wouldn't rip to shreds if it saw any action. It was made tougher than it looked, and was cut in the same way as the duster had been, long and billowing about his calves as he walked, and tapering in a bit at the waist, a look he hadn't worn in maybe a hundred years or more. Yeah, I could definitely get used to this, he thought, looking down at himself, picturing what he might look like through someone else's eyes, clad in black jeans, a dark blue buttoned shirt and the charcoal duster... nice, very nice, he thought, running a hand through his hair, and grimacing at the sand that showered from his fingers. OK, I still need work, but not so bad...
Lighting up another cigarette, he closed the shop door behind him and started down the alleyway, but soon stopped again. Sighing, he turned back. He reentered the store, reached into his pocket, dropped a handful of crumbled bills onto the counter. "Good god, what a right poof I am. Next thing you know I'll be helping old ladies cross the street and saving damsels in distress... bloody hell.." he muttered as he made his exit again and strode off into the night, not noticing the dark figure lurking in the shadows, chuckling to itself at his behavior.
"Now who's the poof, William...?" Angelus growled, and tore anew into the throat of the shopkeeper, whose last breath left him with a whimper as his body fell to the ground.
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TBC - Please review and let me know what you think, suggestions are welcome! (Especially since I've been stuck completely and totally with this story since this past summer and am just now writing again! PLEASE let me know what you think should have next!) Thanks for reading!