Rating:PG-13
Disclaimer:Not smart enough, or enough money so it ain't mine. DAMN YOU WHEDON!
Summary: My first real sequel, all others have been fakes, kind of an AU of S7 so a bit more original than most.
There are moments when time seems to slow, when a second becomes a minute, a minute becomes an hour and so on. Watching someone die, your first kiss, taking the SAT's, time stretches. Making the happy memories even more wonderful, and the unhappy ones that much more painful.
At the moment, it's both.
It sounds far fetched for something like this to happen, but she's been standing in front of the basement door for what felt like fifteen minutes, but if she looked at the clock, it might have been one.
Buffy guessed the reason it happened was because of the hundred things you think about in the moment. The sheer information overload draws time to a crawl.
Staring at the door, it felt immense, holding something so frightening that the hand reaching to open it trembled slightly.
When her skin made contact with the cold metal of the doorknob her mind flashed back to the fight that had almost cost them both their lives. It was amazing how hard the punches were, how much they hurt. Buffy had managed, using all her skill, to avoid the uber-vamp from landing a hit for about fifty seconds, but when it did land it felt like someone had hit her with a sledge-hammer.
For the moment, between the backlash and the return punch, the slayer doubted.
She wouldn't be able to take a lot of hits like that.
Then Buffy was reminded of why she and Spike fought so well together.
In the few times, and man they were few and far between, they fought side by side, they were able to form almost a constant force, while she was down he was attacking, while he was down she was attacking, when they both were fighting, she didn't have to worry about him getting in her way.
Only because of the thing that made him such a pain in the ass when they were enemies, he had studied her moves so much that he knew what she was going to do next while staying out of the way and getting his own hits in.
This, through hell dimension and death, hadn't changed...much.
When Buffy ducked out of the second punch and turned to deliver her own, she found Spike, or at that moment what she thought was spike, engaging vampy in one hell of a fight.
Buffy didn't think "fight" was the right word for what she saw. He seemed to blur and disappear only to reappear somewhere else, landing blow after blow. Never really giving a clear view of him.
Unfortunately she couldn't stand there longer than a few seconds, cause for every five hits Slice-n-Dice landed, the uber vamp would throw one that sent him flying. The slayer had rushed in, pushing herself as hard as she could, using every combination she could think of. Mainly trying to duck any throw or kick it tried to land.
She was able to break its arm before it kicked her in the ribs, cracking two and sending her into a tree. It had taken a moment to shake the light bursting from behind her eyelids, but in true form she got back up and started at it again. They had fought like they always had, one down the other keeping it busy, sometimes fighting together. Slowly but surely they had worn it down. It almost seemed like they were going to win, until it landed a solid blow to her face and split the skin on her cheek.
Apparently while she was down Slice-n-dice had gotten it into his head to grab a sword and try to keep his namesake. That would have been fine, if the uber-vamp hadn't grabbed the sword right out of his hands. It then kicked him into a tree and skewered him by throwing the sword through his chest and into the tree. Sticking him like a shishcabob.
That left only her and mister I-can't-speak-cause-my-teeth-are-too-big.
The fight was quick and brutal, and for a moment it looked like Buffy was going to be done in after it split her lip with a vicious punch.
The ugly demon looming over her had suddenly screamed as Slice-n-dice ran it through the back, the end sticking through its chest. The problem was, unfortunately, vampires, not even this one, die from metal through the heart. Vampy turned sluggishly tossing the weary demon into a tombstone.
Seeing her chance Buffy lunged forward grasping the handle sticking out of it's back, and with her last bit of strength ripped it upward, cleaving the vamps upper body in two. It didn't dust, but it wasn't going anywhere.
She was eagerly on her way to passing out when she notice Sp...Slice-n-Dice wearily picking up the sword and finishing uber-vamp off.
Buffy had woken up slowly, and nearly puked whatever she had scrounged up for dinner.
The stench of burnt flesh was all around her, nearly suffocating her. Only when the slayer had cleared her head a bit more, she realized she was being carried. One arm cradling her back and another under her knees.
From what the slayer had figured out, they were moving steadily, not walking and not running. Buffy had wondered what the wet sticky substance was soaking into her clothes.
The horrible realization had almost made the small slayer scream and struggle to get out of his arms.
He was bleeding.
A lot.
From burns.
But she hadn't said anything, just let him carry her home. Didn't look at his face, exhausted and fighting the bile in her throat from the smell around her, Buffy only stared at the fingers curling around her leg. She just watched in fascination as the charred flaking skin slowly healed right before her eyes.
Repairing then scarring over.
He must have known she was awake cause as soon as they reached the back door he set her down on her feet, making her walk in. She had turned to thank him, but he had already made a dash into the basement, black ashes floating to the ground. Her first instinct was to go after him but a combination of aches and pains slowing her down, along with one of the potentials spotting her and yelling for others put an abrupt end to the idea.
What proceeded was a blur of faces and hands. For a moment she thought she had seen Willow's face, guilt ridden, but it could have been a dream because she soon passed out, feeling a bit disoriented from the pounding in her head and the flurry of motion around her.
Of course she woke up annoyed, it was the third time in one day that she had to get up from having a knock to the head.
Buffy after looking around, realized that everyone had crashed, sleeping anywhere and everywhere. Some of them had barely had made it under there respective covers before passing out. Looking at them all, the slayer yearned for the days before death, none of them had that look yet, the weariness that she could see in all her friends. The weariness that only death brings when you see it once to many times.
Her thoughts were interrupted when she noticed that old overwhelmed feeling she got when he was around. It almost hurt at the beginning, but she had gotten used to it and pushed it in the back of her mind. He was still there, in the house, probably hadn't left. Not surprising considering.
The fear had started when she walked into the kitchen, and grew as the slayer reached the basement door.
Now she stood there, for what seemed like hours, looking at the doorknob, willing her hand to twist it. She wanted to, she's wanted to talk to him since the fight in cemetery a month ago. With what was said and done, things needed to mend, and not that then something new had to be built, something good, something to make up for everything in the past.
Ever since those words had been spoken she had spent the time not thinking about it, making it his fault, pulling up every defense, every brush off. It worked too. For one month it worked. Every time she was able to brush it off and not think about it, her skin felt tight, uncomfortable.
Like the things that weren't being dealt with was building underneath, crowding her insides. Making her want to do something to relieve the pressure, make her forget. All this all too reminiscent of last year.
So Buffy stood, a desperate want to do something to make things right, making her hand itch for the doorknob, and the gut wrenching fear of what might happen, holding her back.
One thought makes her hand grip the doorknob.
All the reasoning for this, the making things better, making up for last year, trying to build something good.
It was all crap.
She wanted to know why. Why he doesn't want her to say the words that are just on the edge of her lips. With that in her mind she turned the doorknob, opened, and walked in.
Of course the first thing she does is bang her knee against the stair railing.
Silently cursing she looked around and didn't see much. It made her wonder cause the basement usually wasn't that dark, the moon was shining through the windows, shining on the floor, but everything around it was almost pitch black. When she reached the bottom of the stair she looked around, trying to find him, the slight smell of ash telling her he was still here. Her eyes moved until they caught a still form that she didn't recognize being there before.
"What do you want?"
The voice that had been continually creeping her out since she first met this Spike was harsh, ragged, and slightly gargled. Buffy of course reacted only to the harsh, with her own instinct.
"Oh nothing much, wondering how long it's gonna take to get the smell of charred demon out of here."
She felt the insides of her stomach shrink a size at the words, but in true form it didn't reach her face. Not even when she heard him chuckle.
"You know I almost get tired of knowing you so well. Come in here wanting answers, and you do the best you can to make sure you get none."
"That's assuming you'd give me an answer in the first place. I mean, what's with you and the cryptic mumbo jumbo. I remember you'd just say what you wanted, what you meant. But now I bet if I asked you give me a long spiel about me being unable to understand and that the future is at stake so you can't tell me."
He was silent for a moment. Then, as if labored, got up from where he was sitting in the shadows across the way. Seeing his advancement and possible fight she crossed her arms and tilted her head in the most defiant way she could. The slayer could almost see his smile at her actions.
"Did you ever figure that maybe your just not supposed to know? Or better, maybe I just don't want to tell you. What gives you the right to know about any of my reasons..."
Buffy was incredulous and immediately interrupted.
"How about three years ago I helped your sorry ass, instead of staking it like I had the right to do. How about letting you live, even after you went out of your way to prove you were dangerous. Whether intentional or not I gave you a chance to be something better. You owe me an explanation, at least an answer."
He seemed to turn a little, as if he didn't like the issue.
"And the question would be?"
She gritted her teeth at the obvious stall. But through her frustration she pulled up her courage to ask the one question that had been bothering her for the longest time.
"Why won't you let me say...it?"
She could tell he was looking at her, couldn't see it but she knew. She knew he was powerful, and unpredictable. Any movement she tried to anticipate and find a way to counter.
"Because I am Spike, but I'm not. I know you don't understand..."
Anger had been going through her all during this conversation, now it was straining to the point of making her snap.
"Your right, I don't get it. So why don't you explain it."
The words caused him to visibly stiffen. Slowly, ever so slowly he started to walk forward. The air seemed to change; it got stuffier, making it a little harder to breath. He seemed to move more deliberately, as if his very steps were being planned as they went.
Her hackles were rising, getting more and more anxious around him. Buffy knew he was remembering something. Something she did long ago.
Sometimes she hated people who remembered everything.
"Considering the last time the words "why don't you explain it" were said, I wouldn't ask me that. Unfortunately, knowing you, hints won't be enough."
Buffy's eyes widened slightly when the memory hit.
The dark alley where she just wanted to disappear and never return, if not death, then a cell where everyone could forget about her. But that damn stubborn vampire wouldn't let her, kept trying. Making her want to try for the tiniest second.
She had reacted, and reacted...badly.
She immediately uncrossed her arms and backed away as he advanced. But he stopped, he stopped when his body entered the shaft of light.
She immediately went stiff and rigid. Trying desperately to keep it together
So...
So many...
"I've had every piece destroyed when I was being tortured. Every piece of flesh, every bone, all of it melted, broken, torn out, cut, consumed and boiled off. And that was just the physical part of it. I've been literally driven out of my mind more times than I can remember. So when I was summoned back, you'll excuse me if I didn't really remember who the hell you all were, or even what I was. I didn't forget. I just didn't have the memories anymore."
He probably saw she was crumbling and moved back into the darkness.
"So when I got here I had to search, and find memories, figure it all out. I got the complete listing in here now. But that doesn't change the fact, everything I know now, everything I remember about who I was, is second hand. None of it is me. So I'm Spike, but I'm not."
As he talked a haze slowly fell on her, something that made her focus just on keeping herself from bursting out. The combination of the state of his body, and what he was saying, made it a losing battle. From what she could see he wasn't done with this, but god she wished he was.
"I was able to keep a few with me, nothing much, whispers of memory, didn't even know what they were, but I kept them because it was all I had. Three, three memories out of a hundred an twenty years of life and death, all I had were three crumbs."
He paused a moment, probably could tell she was on the brink. Doing the only decent thing he turned and sat back down in the shadows. A sad chuckle pushing him to sit back against the floor.
"You know what was my favorite till recently. One that kept me getting back up after all that. Didn't know it then but it was just a smile, one of your smiles. Small little one, nothing much, but for some reason it felt like it had the world in it, all the joy, all the pain everything. It was only later I learned it was when Angel said he loved you."
Buffy closed her eyes at that.
"Isn't that just a kick in the balls. Memory that was my will to go one for so long turns out to be the one thing that crushed me in the beginning. You've never worn that smile again. Believe me I know. At the time I was jealous, hated you for something I hadn't seen. At the same time I envied him, knowing his past, and getting something so precious. Still do. And I hate him with a depth you will never understand. That smile was for him, and just for him. So don't go telling me you love me, cause I'm not him, and the words would seem a bit hollow."
The finality of it just clicked in her. It wasn't painful but she realized there was nothing she could say, no words for her to even start. Finding nothing in herself after that long speech Buffy simply turned, and walked away, albeit a bit unsteadily, almost as if she was deciding whether or not to run. But halfway up the stairs she paused.
Maybe she could offer this crumb of comfort. Trusting herself to speak only once before the slayer could scramble away.
"What are the others."
She didn't look at him, but she could feel the slight smile in his voice and from it a spark deep inside her.
"My mums hair and Dru's eyes."
With that Buffy quietly closed the door.
I spent the longest god damn time on this chapter. I wanted to make sure it was true to the character that Joss gives us while adapting it to the new one I'mm giving you. I hope it it's up to snuff.
But ya know what, I won't know will I. You'll all read this, you'll all either like this or not, and I won't have a god damn clue what's good and what's bad. I won't know what to continue with or what to scrap. You know why...CAUSE NONE OF YOU REVIEW!
Oh p.s. thanks to the few that did.
