Disclaimer: Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy and WB own all things Buffy.

Spoilers: Buffy through Chosen and Angel through Just Rewards.

A/N: This story has nothing to do with season five of Angel beyond the first two episodes.

True Nature

Chapter 2

Spike strode down the hall toward Wesley's office. He wouldn't have believed it when he first found himself here, but he and the other Englishman had bonded. His first thought when he'd met the man was 'Nancy-boy.'

But, Wesley had proven himself not only a strong demon fighter, but also a good friend. And they had discovered that they had a great many things in common.

******************

Spike paced around the lab as Wesley and Fred ran yet another round of tests on the amulet.

Fred kept watching Spike and sighing. But, Spike continued his relentless pacing, whether he didn't hear her, or simply wasn't concerned, Wesley didn't know. However, both the pacing and the constant sighs were getting on his nerves.

"Spike, why don't you go watch television? I believe it's nearly time for Passions."

Spike paused and looked at Wesley, then glanced at the clock. Whether by accident or design, Wesley was correct, Passions was about to start. Spike turned and walked out of the lab, missing the grateful look that Fred directed at Wesley.

He retreated to the small suite of rooms that Wesley had managed to convince Angel to give Spike. Spike knew that Wesley had convinced Peaches that he would be easier to get rid of when he got on their nerves if he had a nice place to crash, especially if it had a state-of-the-art telly.

So, Angel had given in. And now Spike had a nice little suite of rooms, a flat screen telly with a satellite feed so that he could get not just movies and local shows, but also Man U's matches (once the season started) and dog races and a lovely little sound system with surround sound and a 5-disc CD player. He was in bloody heaven. Of course, he had to get someone else to turn the bloody machines on, and that someone was usually...

"Hey, Blondie Bear. Ready for Passions?"

Spike groaned as he turned to face Harmony. "How many times have I asked you not to call me that?"

Harmony rolled her eyes as she turned on the television. "Fine, fine. Grump. There. Your show is on, I guess I'll just be going. Unless you want me to stay, you know, to talk, or something..." She looked at him hopefully.

"No. Thanks." He said curtly. She pouted, but left with no further protest.

He flopped onto the sofa and soon lost himself in the lives of the inhabitants of Harmony. 'Harmony'. And if that wasn't a disturbing irony, he didn't know what was.

Just as Passions was ending, the door opened and Wesley strolled in. "Well, you seem calmer, now. Not so much like a caged lion."

Spike rolled his eyes. "Lions, leopards....What is it with you lot comparing me to big cats?"

Wesley looked at him in confusion, but continued. "We still have not determined how you are linked to the amulet, or why it was sent to Angel. But, we are still working on it."

He gave Spike a very pointed look. "However, you pacing about in the lab while we work is not helping matters at all. I know that you are frustrated but..."

Spike cut him off with a growl. "Frustrated hardly covers it, mate. What was it you said? 'No control over his fate, not able to touch anything, affect anything. Unable to fight.' Too right. Haven't felt this bloody helpless since I was stuck in a sodding wheelchair. Had bloody Angel around for that barrel of laughs, too."

Wesley sighed. "Look, I understand how you feel."

At Spike's pointed look, he continued. "All right, so I've never been a ghost. But, I understand about feeling helpless. I've been stuck in a bloody wheelchair myself, so I know what you're talking about."

Spike looked at him in surprise. "What? Just because I don't sit around brooding and scowling all the time, or pacing about, snapping at everyone you think I haven't had a few hard knocks myself? You and Angel aren't the only ones around here who've had a rough time of it. So, stop acting like a prat."

Spike sat back against the sofa and folded his arms across his chest. "Fine." He snapped as he rolled his eyes.

Wesley snorted as he attempted to conceal his laughter.

"What?" Spike snapped.

"Are you channeling Buffy, or her teenage sister, right now? Or perhaps one of the other girls who was living at their house during the past year?"

"What are you on about..." Spike looked down at himself and realized how he was sitting, then thought about what he had just said, and the tone of voice, along with the eye roll...

"Great, only thing missing is the ear piercing 'Get out! Get out! Get out!'" He muttered.

Wesley chuckled and sat down on the couch as Spike sent him a deadly glare.

"Oh, yes, that's quite frightening, Spike."

Spike gave up trying to intimidate Wesley. "So, how'd you end up in a wheelchair, mate?"

"Shot by a zombie police officer. You?"

"Buffy dropped a pipe organ on me."

"Well, that would do it."

"Yeah."

"So, what's on now?"

"Well, you're the only one who can pick up the remote and check the other channels, now aren't you?"

"Excellent point."

*******************

Spike sat on the couch in Wesley's office in stunned silence, tears in his eyes. Wes had just finished reading Giles' book to him, cover to cover. He couldn't believe the Watcher, of all people had written such an evenhanded account.

And the information Giles had about his and Buffy's private moments; the good, the bad, and the just plain ugly, could have come from only one source: Buffy, herself. He couldn't even begin to imagine how painful that must have been for her.

Wesley sat on the edge of his desk, just watching, as he allowed Spike to digest what he had just heard. He had questions, but he held back. He had realized while reading it that Spike had never told the others about the trials that he'd endured to regain his soul. They were not covered in the book. But, Spike had told Wesley. Right here, in this very office.

**************

"So, how did you get your soul? Did you have someone curse you, like Angel?"

"Hell no. I fought for it, earned it."

"Earned it? How?"

"Heard about a demon in a cave in Africa. Grants wishes to those he deems worthy. So, I went to see him, told him what I wanted, proved myself worthy, and got my soul back."

"Yes, but how did you prove yourself worthy?"

"He had these trials for me to endure, tests. I had to fight a man, a very large man, with fists of fire. When I finally defeated him, I moved onto fighting demons of various species. Then, for the final bit of fun, I got to be covered in scarabs."

"Dear Lord. How did you survive all of that?"

"Had to. Had to prove myself worthy so I could get what I asked for. I had to get my soul so I could give Buffy what she deserved. So I could go back and help her and make sure that I never hurt her again."

Wesley shook his head. He had heard Angel's story often enough, cursed with a soul to suffer eternal torment as punishment for killing the favorite daughter of the gypsy tribe that had cursed him.

He also knew Angel's feelings on the subject. He'd spent a hundred years trying to come to terms with infinite remorse. While Spike spent three weeks moaning in a basement and then he was fine. Angel failed to see any fairness in the situation.

Yet, after hearing Spike's story, Wesley was inclined to feel that Angel's opinion on fairness was somewhat biased. First, he didn't seem to have all of the information, nor did he seem to want it. Second, Angelus was cursed with the soul as a punishment. It was forced upon an unwilling recipient, so of course there would be a great deal of difficulty adjusting.

For Spike, the soul was a reward for someone who had proven himself a worthy of receiving the soul he genuinely wanted. He may have had some difficulty adjusting in the beginning, but since his soul was a reward, instead of a punishment, it simply stood to reason that he would not experience the same level of pain and suffering that Angel had. He had endured a great deal of pain and suffering merely to acquire the soul in the first place.

*************************

Wesley realized as he watched Spike react to the book that he thought he knew why he'd never told Buffy or Rupert about the trials. He knew enough about Spike's reputation to know that he was a well-known braggart. Yet, he had only seen bits of that side of him since he'd been here, and usually only around Angel. Angel always seemed to bring out the worst in Spike. Yet, he had probably downplayed the trials he'd endured to acquire his soul, most likely to take the focus off of the quest itself, and keep it on the result of that quest: the soul.

He thought about the vampire he'd learned about through research and heard about from Angel, as well as Buffy and Rupert. Then compared those stories with the ghost in front of him, and the knowledge that he'd been Buffy's ally, by her side during the last apocalypse, and had sacrificed himself to save the world, and he wondered if the soul hadn't given him something else, as well. He seemed so different from the vampire he'd learned about. Despite his frequent pacing, he was less frenetic than the vampire in the research he'd done. He was also calmer, more mature (most of the time), less impulsive, and less temperamental.

Wesley shook his head as he thought about the strange twist his life had taken. Only a few short years before he had been a Watcher, steeped in the lore, absolutely positive that all vampires were soulless creatures, incapable of love, guilt, remorse, or any other human emotion. Demons, in general, were evil creatures to be destroyed. Yet, here he sat, surrounded by demons, many of whom he counted among his friends, including the vampire in front of him who, without a soul, had loved so deeply and felt such strong guilt and remorse, that he had voluntarily sought the return of his soul. While upstairs, his grandsire, the original vampire with a soul, chose to help the helpless in LA. And both of them were in love with a vampire Slayer.

"So..." He let the word hang in the air. Spike looked up at him. "So...what?"

"Well, we know where Rupert is. And, apparently Buffy is with him. So...do you still wish to see her, speak to her?"

Spike's jaw dropped. He hadn't really considered that. He'd been so focused on his shock at the Watcher's fair account and his sympathetic pain for Buffy that he hadn't thought about what it meant that Wesley was in possession of the book.

"Whe..hm.." He cleared his throat, which suddenly had a lump in it. "Where is she?"

"Cleveland."

"Cleveland?"

"Yes. It seems there's another Hellmouth there and they've opened a Slayer training facility."

"What?!" Spike jumped up and began to pace around Wesley's office. "What in the bloody hell is she doing on top of another bloody Hellmouth? She was supposed to be free. Have the chance to live like a normal person, let the others take over. But, oh no, she's on another Hellmouth, still the Slayer, probably still patrolling. And, you know what...Yes. I wanna talk to her. Ring her up right now. I want her arse on a plane to LA right this bloody minute. Because I want to know why she's on a sodding Hellmouth instead of on a nice, sunny beach drinking Mai Tais and Pina Coladas, or some shady campus filled with brainless frat boys trippin' over themselves tryin' to impress her because they think she's the most beautiful girl they've ever seen."

He spun around and stalked over to her photograph. His features softened as he gazed at her face. "I want to know why she's not living the life she deserves."

Wesley watched Spike with an expression of amused awe. He never ceased to be amazed by the differences in the two vampires who loved the Slayer. Angel tended to brood and fret and make decisions for Buffy that he felt were best for her. While Spike ranted and raved, and, Wesley suspected, argued with her until he was blue in the face (metaphorically speaking), but in the end let her make her own decisions.

Part of it was simply the difference in the two men. Angel tended to make decisions for everyone. Wesley still remembered being fired by Angel, and when Angel had donated all of Cordelia's clothes to a shelter for runaways. And he felt a niggling sense of something in the back of his mind, as if there were something he was forgetting, another time that Angel had made a decision, taken something away, for everyone's own good. And it was a trait that Wesley found himself imitating from time to time. A trait that his own father had.

But, being around Spike helped him remember that not everyone appreciated having Papa Bear make all of their decisions for them. Most adults liked to be able to make their own choices. And that was what Spike allowed Buffy to do. He apparently told her his opinion, often quite vehemently, but he would never take her choices, her decisions, out of her hands. He had attempted to do that one time, and he would never, ever do it again.

But, Wesley also suspected it had alot to do with the fact that they had fallen in love with slightly different people. Angel had fallen in love with teenage Buffy. She was still a child when they had met. Young, immature, inexperienced, innocent, looking for a knight in shining armor. And Wesley was fairly certain that Angel still saw Buffy as that innocent girl he'd fallen in love with.

Spike, on the other hand, had fallen in love with a more mature, worldly young woman. She had been more experienced, had known pain and heartbreak. She'd been made stronger and hardened by what she had experienced. And that was the woman Spike fell in love with.

Spike turned to look at Wesley. "What are you smirking at, you git?"

"Nothing. Blondie Bear." He chuckled as Spike growled and shifted into game face. "Yes, that's quite frightening, Spike. Or, it would be if I didn't know that your fangs are just as non-corporeal as the rest of you. Or...what is your term...'go through-able'?" Wesley chuckled. "Even if I wasn't aware of your relationship with Buffy, hearing you use that term would have been proof that you spent a great deal more time with her than I had been led to believe."

Spike smiled as he thought about the odd words that Buffy and her chums used. It was true that they butchered the English language, but he would give anything to hear some of those "Buffyisms", as he had affectionately termed them, right about now.

Wesley walked out of the office still chuckling as Spike followed. They headed down to the garage and climbed into Wesley's car. Wes started the engine and pulled out of the garage.

"Where are we going?" Spike asked, as he gazed out the heavily tinted window.

"My place. I didn't want to call from there. Who knows who might be listening? I've got the number right.." Wes patted the inside pocket of his jacket. "No." He checked the other pocket, then another, and another. "Bloody...I left it on the desk."

He pulled into a gas station and turned the car around. He pulled the car back into traffic and headed back toward the law firm.

When they arrived back in Wesley's office, they found a very angry Angel ransacking the office.

"Angel, what are you doing?!"

Angel spun around at the sound of Wesley's voice. He stalked forward and grabbed Wesley by his collar, yanking him into the office and pinning him to the desk. "Where is it?"

"What?" Wesley struggled to remove Angel's hands from his collar.

"Let go of him, Peaches." Spike growled from behind them.

"Shut up, Spike. This is your fault." He kept his eyes on Wesley. "The amulet. Where is it?"

"Why do you want the amulet?" Wes asked him warily.

"I'm going to destroy it. I'm going to smash it and send him back where he belongs."

TBC