Hey guys, sorry it took so damn long for me to get this out... but guess what? You get three new chapters all at once! I tried to upload these first two last week at my cousins house, but duh! I forgot the floppy with them on. ::slaps forehead::


Angel carried Spike through into his own room and laid him on the bed. He then left and went back downstairs where Cordelia, Fred, and Wesley had been discussing Spike. They all looked up as he came in.

"Any idea's on what's causing it?"

Fred glanced at Wesley. "Well.... I've been lookin' into some stuff with Wesley, and we found somethin' about when someone's emotions are powerful enough, they can shut down their bodies. One thing at a time, and it would usually start with the eyes. I'm not saying that's what's happened to Spike... but someone touched by unnatural forces would be far more likely to experience it."

"And since Spike's a vampire, it puts him into that class," Wesley finished.

"Or it could just be a spell," Cordelia put in lightly.

"Or it could just be a spell," Wesley repeated with a sigh. "We don't know. There's no evidence to support the first theory, but it was just something Fred found in a book so we thought we'd mention it."

Angel nodded slowly. "Ok, well, you look into this mind thing then Fred, and Wes, you check out the spell idea." He turned back to Fred with a frown. "What do you mean by if someone's emotions are powerful enough?"

"Well, if a person – or a vampire – was angry or upset or depressed enough, they could feel so twisted up inside that it would start to shut down their body. It's a really interesting theory actually, it dates back to animal instinct, if they're so badly messed up that it's going to affect their lives, the body takes its own action."

"You don't think Spike feels like that do you?" Angel asked seriously.

Fred laughed lightly. "Nah, I don't think so. But there might be some way in which it affected him, if it was channelled into a spell or somethin'." She shrugged.

As they all drifted back to their various researches, Angel felt rather like a spare part. There was nothing for him to do; Fred and Wesley had the only books likely to have any helpful information in, and Cordelia had the computer. Not that Angel could've worked the computer properly even if he had the opportunity.

And so, Angel felt himself drawn once more back up to the sleeping vampire. He sat on the bed and watched Spike sleeping for a while, before realising what he was doing was slightly morbid, and went back to his own room where he could sit and sketch in private.

Unconsciously, he found himself drawing a lifelike black and white charcoal sketch of Spike. But his died white hair was gone, and was replaced instead with gentle curls which, had they been in colour, would have been golden. William. Angel looked at what he'd drawn in surprise. A sleeping William lay peacefully, his long eyelashes dark against his cheek. Strange, the things that art could bring out of a person.

A faint change in the scent of the air told him that Spike was awake, and jerked him out of his thoughts. He silently left his room, and closed the door to Spike's behind him. Then he waited for Spike to sense him.

Spike was curled into a ball, his eyes shut tightly, muttering to himself slightly. He didn't show any sign of knowing Angel's presence, and Angel decided he'd have to speak.

"Spike?"

Spike jumped visibly and looked in the direction of the voice. He hadn't detected Angel's scent on the air and it worried him, because the Sire smell was the strongest in the world to a vampire. To not smell your Sire – well, you'd have to be... senseless.

"Sire?" his unseeing eyes opened, and Angel was there, sitting beside him, holding his shoulder loosely. Spike swallowed hard and raised a hand to his Sire's face blindly. "Are you – is it you?"

Angel took his Childe's small hand in his own. "Yes, of course it's me. Can't you sense it?"

Spike shook his head. "No... Angelus – I think I'm losing my sense of smell too," he whispered quietly, worried.

"Don't worry, Cordy, Wesley and Fred are looking into it downstairs. You'll be ok soon."

"Really?"

Angel hated the was Spike's voice sounded. It was weak and, well, it was a fledgling voice. And Spike was not a fledgling, Angel told himself. Not anymore.

"Really. Just keep talking. You can still hear me can't you? We'll just keep talking," Angel soothed.

Spike relaxed slightly, feeling a lot calmer now Angel was holding his hand and touching him. "Talk about what?"

"Anything. Try... happy memories, anything that makes you remember something happy."

"I'm not sure if I have any of those," Spike said quietly. "My whole life has been one big piece of shit after another."

Angel frowned, feeling suddenly guilty for his own part in that. "But there's got to be something. Maybe even when you were human? Or with Dru?"

Spike shook his head. "My life as a human... well that was just crap. You know what it was like, you've lived there. And with Drusilla, sometimes it might have seemed perfect, but it was all false. She was mad, she never really cared about me at all." He paused. "Why am I telling you this? You know it all, you were there." Again, he paused, and then said a little quieter. "I guess... I remember one time. A happy memory. Some northern vamp tried it on with Drusilla. She came home screaming. Me and you, we went and ripped his entrails out. I..." Spike smiled slightly with the memory. "I hung his intestines round my neck like a scarf and wore them all the way home. It made you laugh so much that Darla had to go and visit a friend for the night."

Angel smiled. "I remember that too."

"I don't think you yelled at me or hit me once that night."

"No... I clipped your ear for being cheeky when we got back home though."

Spike laughed hollowly. "Yeah, but that didn't count cuz it didn't even hurt and you were laughing at the time." Both of them silently remembered the night with sad smiles, and then Spike rested his head against Angel. "Why can't we have that anymore?"

"Cos you're a pain in the ass?" Angel suggested lightly, but Spike didn't smile.

"I dunno... it seems all we do now is fight. Course, most of what we did before was you beating me up, but there were some good shags in there too, and..." Spike trailed off.

Angel clenched his jaw and tried desperately not to remember his time as Angelus. He was constantly fighting that part of his personality, and to have Spike remind him of it was just too much.

"I used to hate you so much. You made me feel stupid and worthless everyday, but it was only after you'd gone that I realised how much I needed that. Only then, I started to hate you more because you left me and Drusilla on our own. I thought maybe, if you came back, everything would be better." Spike fought the tears threatening to choke him and then continued bitterly. "But that wasn't the case as I found out in old Sunnydale. God, I hate you so damn much but I'm so pathetic that I can't stop needing you." He sat up and whacked the bed angrily with his fist.

"Spike," Angel started to say, his heart almost breaking with everything his Childe had just told him. "I can't do that anymore, we can't have what we once had, you know that. And it's not just me, it's you too. You're so much stronger now, if we tried to live together without Fred or Cordy, we'd end up driving each other insane. Look, we're even doing it now!"

"And whose fault is that?!" Spike yelled, getting angrier which just frustrated him even more because he couldn't see anything to glare at. "You're the one who had to get a stupid soul!"

"You think I asked for this?" Angel asked incredulously.

"Well if someone asked you if you wanted it taken away now, you wouldn't say yes would you?"

Angel paused, unsure what to say. Finally he admitted quietly, "Angelus would."

Spike let out a huge exasperated sigh and leant backwards against the bed's headboard, burying his face in his hands. "Why do you do that?" he asked, a little calmer. "Why do you act like Angel and Angelus are two different people?"

"Because they are," Angel replied simply, scooting up to sit beside him.

"But they're not! You are Angelus! You just took the 'us' off the end!" He shook his head faintly. "Why can't you see that?"

Angel thought about it. The reason he separated Angel from Angelus was because he didn't want to be like Angelus. But Angelus wasn't all bad, was he? All that stuff the Watchers wrote about him, they didn't know anything. Angelus cared about his Childer, in a manic, possessive, violent sort of way, and so did Angel. True, Angel didn't beat Spike to a bloody pulp all the time, and if he did it was for different reasons, but the underlying care was still there. Maybe Spike was right. After all, Spike could see things that other people couldn't, there were a million examples of that.

Angel hit his head against the wall. All the thinking was hurting his brain.

Spike jumped at the noise and his head jerked up like a frightened mouse. "What was that?"

"Me," Angel groaned, massaging his head with one hand. "Spike... I'm sorry. I... just don't like being reminded of who I am."

Spike grinned to himself. "I feel it my duty as a Childe to do things you don't like."

Angel almost smiled as he cuffed Spike lightly round the head.