Title: Dear Boy

Writer: Azure K Mello

Part: (5/?)

Rest can be found here:

Thanks for all the feedback!!

Challenge/plot bunny by Angela (who makes me keep writing this, no really she stands there with a whip in one hand and chocolate in the other), who wanted chipped Spike interacting with human Darla and for Angel to swoop in playing our golden boy's brooding night!

Not Beta-ed

Setting: After Angel's Untouched and set during Buffy's Crush which has been moved up in the time line as Dru went straight to Sunnydale and was never in LA.

Rated R

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*Three Days Ago*

She knocked on the crypt door and waited. She took one last drag of her cigarette before stamping on it with the heel of her boot. If she was stuck in a human body she was going to take full advantage of her properly working lungs. As the door sung open she caught sight of her pathetic grandchilde. He was thin and pale, pale even for him. He stood carefully out of the rays of the sun and looked at her with confusion evident in his eyes. For a moment she considered simply grabbing his arm and dragging him into the light. But that would have been too simple, no fun at all.

"Aren't you going to invite me in, William?"

"You're human, ma'am, you don't need an invite." The title rolled off his tongue before he could think. The name had been beaten into his mind.

"It's still polite, *childe*."

"Darla, won't you come in?"

"No," she said with a sneer. "What's this I hear about you helping the slayer?"

"It's not like that, ma'am, I'll kill her the minute I can it's just. . ."

"I heard about your emasculation." She reached out to touch his face, "Poor childe."

He leaned into her touch and closed his eyes. Yet he didn't flinch when she scraped her nails down his face and drew blood. He had known that it would happen. He was tactile not an idiot. And he craved her touch, his blood screamed out to be touched by family. He blinked back tears, now was not the time to think of Angelus.

"Why hasn't he come for you?" asked Darla and Spike wondered if he had been muttering.

"He doesn't know."

"Why?" she asked and wrenched his face up to look at her as he answered.

"I don't want him to know."

"Why?" she asked feeling exacerbated.

"Because," he said softly. He couldn't lie to the woman, even after all this time he feared her. He couldn't lie and say something false, she would see through it and he would be punished, "I'm not his responsibility any more. And if I don't call he doesn't know and therefore doesn't come to save me. Whereas if he did know and *still* didn't come to save me then I would be. . ."

"Why would he not save you?" she asked in a deceptively gentle tone that Spike knew all too well.

"Because I'm a monster," his voice slipped into a cultured tone and he was pulled back in time to when he was a fledge and so eager to please the woman. "And he never loved me anyway. We both know you were the only person he loved. And I would rather believe that he would save me than know in actuality that he doesn't."

"Don't lie, boy!" he looked at her fully in the face for the first time and she saw the honesty there. William still believed what he had been told! The innocence and trust in her eyes made her stomach contract and she nearly vomited just thinking of it. "He loved you!"

A scared look finally hit his face when Spike realized why she was there, "Please, Darla, I've done nothing to harm you!"

"You took my childe!"

"I didn't! I wouldn't dare, you're my sire!" the title was a blanket term for anyone above him whom he feared and respected. Spike was no fool. Even he, the big bad, knew that Darla would cream him. A vampire Darla would wipe the floor with him and this Darla. . . he couldn't touch a human. "Drusilla!" he said clutching at straws, "Drusilla is here! She could turn you! And then you could lay into me like in the good days! I miss those days, miss being your boy."

"You were never my boy!" she screamed as she brought an open hand down on his face. The force and speed caused her nails to rip yet more of his flesh. And he knew he was well and truly screwed. "And I do intend to have the halfwit change me but not until after I've had my fun with you!"

"But if you do it like this," said Spike as another blow sent him down to his knees, "You're simply winning by default. Wouldn't it be more rewarding to be a vamp and be secure in the knowledge that I'm not fighting back because I fear *you*? Not some chip?"

"Winning is winning! Vampires don't play by rules of valor and I haven't yet gotten used to this human life so I shall beat you whichever way I see fit." She kicked him hard in the gut and as he sprawled out over the floor she said, "It's almost like killing a puppy. . . which I haven't had the chance to do recently. Feel free to scream. I always kinda liked it."

Something happened that hadn't occurred in over a century. Spike silently prayed. Once he had prayed for his sire's safety when Angelus was called into Darla's quarters. When his god had come out beaten beyond recognition William vowed he would never pray again. Yet now here he was begging an absent god to watch him and protect him. He doubted anyone was listening but it occupied his mind and stopped him from screaming aloud. He wouldn't give the bitch that satisfaction.

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*Tonight*

Angel got scared the minute he saw that the door was a jar. It had taken him twenty minutes to find out where Spike lived. Willy wasn't talking. So Angel did what should have been the unthinkable, he beat up Giles. The man wouldn't tell Angel where his own fucking childe was! He had once sworn that he would do nothing to harm the man. After all Angel had killed his girlfriend and tortured him. In Angel's mind that equaled an instant get out of jail free card. But this went beyond the protection that guilt afforded Giles. The watcher said that Spike wouldn't want Angel to know. Angel's fist informed the fool that he didn't really care what William wanted right now.

He paused and swallowed hard. He didn't want to go into the crypt. He could smell the blood from where he was standing two hundred yards away. Why was his boy in a crypt to begin with? Did he honestly think Angel wouldn't help him? Angel knew he had been a real dick to the lad, but deep down he always thought that Spike knew how he felt. This "refection" was just an excuse to stall. Slowly he approached the door.

Though it was open he still knocked. "Will?" he called.

"Bog off!" The reply was weak, as though ripped from a ruined throat. What scared the dark vampire most was its lack of animosity. There was no power behind the statement. Will always had a biting tone, even after Darla ripped his tongue out once.

"May I come in?" asked Angel patiently.

"No." He ignored the statement and walked in anyway, "Bloody hell, what is wrong with people? You and she both do exactly what I say not to."

Angel sighed, "Darla," it wasn't a question. He couldn't see the boy but the voice was close. He rounded the stone coffin in the center of the room and stopped in his tracks.

"Darla," agreed Spike not meeting his sire's eyes. "Shut your mouth, flies well get in."

"Oh my god." The blood puddle went a good four feet out from what at first glance was a mangled corpse.

"It's not that bad."

"Oh my god." Angel couldn't figure out why Spike wasn't shutting his eyes. His boy always shut his eyes when he didn't want to hear what was going on, Angel, Angelus, always thought it was endearing for it's total lack of logic. And when he realized the reason for William's wide eyes he felt himself retch. He made it outside before he threw up. Spike had not eyelids. Spike. Had. No. Eyelids. Darla hadn't wanted him to be able to block out what was happening so she had taken his only form of security away.

Silently watching his sire Spike saw the fear, and the anger, and the love held in those brown orbs. Confusion and odd pleasure swam over his broken body, "Sire?" he asked slowly with shaking hope. And then it occurred to him, he had passed out and this was his body's way of coping, He saw the question in Angel's eyes, "She said she wouldn't kill me. She said my pet slayer would have to put me out of my misery. But you're here now." If it was to be his last fantasy he was bloody well going to enjoy it, "Angelus, I need blood."

Instantly, without saying a word, Angel had his open wrist at Spike's mouth. He pulled the boy up a little trying to ensure that Spike didn't chock, he made soft hushing sounds as his other hand traversed the young vamp's body looking for injuries. "She's an idiot, always under estimated you, you'll be fine." He went to hold Spike's hand but realized all his fingers had been cut off just below his first knuckle. The bone had been sawed through. Spike was missing his left ear and clumps of hair missing. His face was puffed up nearly beyond recognition. The burns on his flesh smelled of cooked meat. He had been laying there for days it seemed. There were stops where she had cut away flesh right down to the bone and removed whole chunks of the tissue. Angel knew that he would have to look through Spike's rooms below, all those parts were hidden somewhere as a nice surprise. He looked back into Spike's face and smiled bravely hoping the screaming hysterics were only inside his own head. "It'll all grow back. Right as rain you'll be."

"Angel?" asked Spike after a few minutes more when he knew that Angel would pass out if he drank anymore of his blood. He knew that the old vampire would not push him away, would not deny him what he needed to heal, Angelus never denied his childer anything so long as Darla wasn't there to witness.

"Yes?" said Angel softly.

"For a minute I thought you were him. But you're crying. And I can taste the soul."

Angel looked away ashamed and disgusted and waited for Spike to send him away. "The minute I found out where she was going, where you were, I had to come. I'm sorry."

"Thank you," said Will. He leaned up slightly as if to say something in Angel's ear. And then. . . he passed out.