Breathing By Rote, chapter 2

They chose an empty room in the basement that smelled suspiciously of human suffering, but the walls and floor were clean but for the stains so no one commented. Xander was fair bouncing in excitement, dressed in his old clothes, though Riley noted a suspicious folding in his back pocket that could have been a particular strip of leather. It was reassuring to see Spike back in his black duster, patting his various pockets as he nudged his lover into place near the center of the room.

For himself, Riley didn't know what he wanted. He had woken up in Spike's room alone, sore and with a confusing swelter of memories or dreams, a change of clothes laid out for him on a nearby chair. His own clothes had been shredded and his neck throbbed in time to the ache in his abraded wrists and mauled shoulder. There was semen leaking from his ass with a little blood, but he couldn't seem to panic. Angelus had fucked him, hard, and all he could feel was a pleasant, comforting warmth. What the hell was wrong with him? He blushed to remember he'd begged for it, screamed for it, and he wanted to feel dirty, used, but a foreign weight about his mind kept him from any negative contemplation. He was being controlled somehow, but as he stretched back on the rucked sheets he'd just smiled and sleepily contemplated the canopied ceiling until Spike wandered in to prod him up.

The vampire at his back was a heavy presence, hands guiding him down the stairs and into the room, the possessive touch never far from his person. The man made no bones about his interest, and the ex-Initiative agent had to repeatedly remind himself that the man sucking on his ear lobe was a cold blooded, undead killer, possessed of neither conscience nor heart. And his girlfriend was the Slayer, Angelus' nemesis.

It was hard to think, to remember all the horror stories he had been briefed on about the seductive creature holding him tight to its chest, and it was an it, he desperately reminded himself, he had to remember that. He was being lovingly fondled by a demon, one of the worst according the Buffy and Giles. Fingers carded his hair and he turned his head, catching Spike's smirking grin. With a renewed surge of anger he jerked himself free and escaped to the middle of the room.

Xander gripped his arm, his unspoken question of concern evident in his upturned face. Unwilling to admit how rattled he was, Riley clasped his shoulder in thanks, but just as silently refused the sympathy. This was all going to be over soon. Angelus was for all intents dead in the future. Once home he'd be able to forget all of this and that didn't cause him one ounce of pain. Or any pain that he acknowledged.

"Ready?" He asked, refusing to look as sire and childe embraced a few feet away, Spike's submissive attitude at odds with the abrasive vampire he had forced himself to tolerate. One of them was making a low growling noise, but it sounded more comforting than threatening, and he felt a sudden pang imagining what this was costing Spike. The future he was returning to would be absent the vampire who had created him, but not the body. He understood enough from his talks with Xander what an important figure a sire was in a childe's life. It would probably have hurt Spike less to see his sire dusted than twisted into that better-than-everybody Angel.

After a few minutes the vampires separated with a final caress of long fingers down a pale shallow cheek that turned into the touch. Riley turned away from the painful intimacy, trying to remember the last time anyone had touched him with such longing. He needed to concentrate, to remember the words Giles had written before him in clear script but refused to let him speak aloud.

"Let time return what was sent aside." At least that was what the words meant. The language he spoke in was guttural and hurt his over taxed throat. As he croaked the last word there was a drop of silence, then the familiar blue vortex opened before him. It swirled and raged within its contained space, making Riley think there should have been a wind to tear at his clothes, a thundering roar to deafen. There was not, however, and the lack made it all the more frightening. Its appearance wrenched something painfully inside him, but his stoic expression didn't change. Six steps at the most and he would be back home. Deep, even breaths and he straightened the shoulders that had subtly drooped.

"Oh yeah, that looks a little too familiar," Xander muttered, drawing Riley's attention. The teenager was in Angelus' arms, receiving a brief hug and kiss.

"Come on, pet," Spike called over his shoulder, brushing past Riley to step into the vortex. With a last glance at the master vampire Riley followed.

Xander faded into the blue light, the last to leave. The vortex lingered some minutes after they left, but Angelus could acknowledge no impulse to step into the unknown. He understood well enough this was his world and his future childe's visit, no matter how disturbing, could only help him keep this world his own. Forewarned and all that rot.

The vortex blinked out of a sudden and in the space it had filled Angelus found his William. The blond was curled upon himself, but at his touch started awake. His gold eyes were wide and frightened, tears coursing his pale cheeks as he clambered into his sire's lap.

"Will?"

"Sire, don't leave, please don't leave," William sobbed, clutching at the older vampire so tightly he tore the rich brocade of his evening coat. "That bitch, she made you leave, and you never come back, never. Please don't, don't go, don't become that thing, don't leave me and Dru!"

"Shhh, childe," Angelus shushed, realizing at last the pain he had seen in Spike's eyes whenever the boy had looked at him. Of why he had not turned Riley. "I will never leave you, my sweet Will."

Stepping out of her rented carriage the woman drew many an admiring eye on the street, dressed as was the fashion on the Continent and obviously of the ton. It was early evening, still a decent hour to call on acquaintances, and she ascended the stairs with the aid of her footman. The front lights were out, but as no one came to answer the sharp rapping, she realized the entire lavishly appointed house was dead quiet. Empty. Her footman knocked again and the woman realized they were beginning to draw curious attention.

"Enough!" She caught the man's cane, crushing the hard wood between her dainty fingers. "He is obviously not at home!" The house was empty, abandoned, and as she accepted her man's arm to help her back down the stairs Darla wondered where her childe and his worthless brood had gotten to. Angelus should have been here, waiting for his sire. She had plans, plans to tie her childe to her forever, to at last break his willfulness and end the pitiful existence of those freaks he dared to dedicate his attention to. Angelus should have at last been hers again, and he would be, she assured herself. Once she found him, he would be.

oOo

1985. Iowa.

Maria Finn brought her six year old son to the town's clinic at just after one in the morning. She had left her six other children at home under the care of the eldest with dire threats hanging over her head if another of her siblings 'tripped' down the stairs. A nurse came and took Riley away without her really noticing. Her nerves were strung too tight to be up this late and she slumped in the hard plastic chair, eyes glazing over watching the news program playing on the wall mounted television.

The nurse led Riley to a white room with an examine table she easily lifted the small boy on to. Tow headed with large tear shined hazel eyes Riley was a darling angel the middle aged nurse clucked over, gently helping him work his broken arm out of his hand-me down play worn pajama top. The doctor chose that moment to walk in and he smiled at the trembling boy.

"Well, then, look who's come for a visit!" His brown eyes focused on Riley's discolored and swelling arm. "What have you been at, young man?"

Riley sniffled angrily. "Hullo, Dr. Carey. Ian shoved me down the stairs! He said I couldn't make his Transformer work, but Mom said he had to share! He's mean!" The little blond wailed the last part, not at all afraid of the big doctor or of telling him of his evil older brother.

"Hmm, doesn't he sound like a little demon," and deserving of punishment for hurting my cherub, Angelus silently added. He smiled at the little boy before speaking to the nurse. "Alice, could you call Sheriff McReedy? Mrs. Finn looked out on her feet in the waiting area. See if he can have one of his boys swing by in an hour to drive them home."

"Of course, doctor," Alice nodded, obviously agreeing with him. Setting Riley's shirt at the end of the table she bustled out, not at all concerned to leave them alone. Dr. Carey had been tending to the bumps and bruises of the Finn children since shortly after their fifth one here was born. Angelus turned back to his waiting boy.

"And I hope Ian also has a broken arm?" he grinned, letting Riley know he was joking.

"Nooo." The large eyes watched him gently touch the broken limb. "I kicked him though, right in the jewels, like I saw Moira do to Patty McDougal, and he screamed like a little girl and Mom said he didn't get to come to the clinic. Are you going to stick me with a needle? I don't want a needle. And look," the little boy straightened up, taking a couple of deep breaths, "I didn't lose my breath at all."

"Good, good. And no needle if you're willing to drink some medicine?" His little childe carefully considered before reluctantly nodding. Angelus smiled and tucked a few errant blond curls behind his small ears. "Good boy. Such bravery will deserve a lolly."

Turning to the counter Angelus poured out a mild sedative painkiller into a small cup, Riley unable to see around the wall of his back. Required to disappear from history, or at least the Watchers' radar, the quickly bored demon had turned to medicine to entertain himself. Such a promising field of study, with all its shiny and sharp explorations into human anatomy. Angelus had proven gifted, though he disfavored the sterility of the universities. Battlefields were rife with screaming and misery, however, and Americans were a brutal lot, uncaring if their doctors tried out new surgeries on enemy prisoners. It had truly been a calling for him, so much so he'd almost missed the decade he'd estimated his boy's birth in.

Once he was born he contacted William. He had thought to wait till Riley arrived in Sunnydale to begin his conquest, but William had suggested differently. His boy was stubborn. If he could bond the child to him now, claiming him later would be easier. The decision then was simply how to craft his person, showing his skill as a powerful master vampire in aging his appearance until he was a handsome older doctor, perfectly respectable to be tending to small children. The head of his Order could do as much, though Angelus hadn't the faintest why the old geezer wanted to look like a desiccated corpse. It amused him that his own sire, centuries older than him, could not master the skill. Just one more weakness among her many.

Holding his hand over the cup he sliced open his middle finger with a swipe of a nail right where the digit met the palm. His blood would help heal the broken bone quicker and for a child as small as his boy he'd be drowsy for the next day or so from the vampiric infusion, easily explained away with the painkillers he'd prescribe. Without any claiming marks he needed to regularly douse the boy to maintain his tenuous influence. Since his first check up at six months Angelus had been feeding him small rations of his blood, allowing the master vampire to influence his dreams and speak to him in his head at times. It was not an uncommon game for vampires though usually they fed the children nightmares until their fragile minds snapped.

His cherub had no intimacy with nightmares.

"Drink up!" Dr. Carey grinned, flourishing a lollipop in the boy's favorite green color in his other hand.

Though Dr. Carey had given his Mom pills for his arm, the pain still followed Riley into sleep. He was sandwiched between his two older sisters in their double sized pink bed to keep him from rolling around. At his whimper of distress eight year old Elaine put an arm over his stomach without waking, kissing the top of his head and mumbling.

/Shhh, childe, no hurts here./ Riley gasped as the red laced darkness about him melted away into the bright lights of a circus. He was standing in front of a large red and yellow striped tent that filled his vision. Other children were walking past him through the entrance, laughing and calling for him to come along. Old fashioned music like his grandma listened to was playing and he didn't think when he reached for the hand of the boy standing next to him. Liam his mind whispered and the taller boy smiled.

"Come on, we don't want to miss the elephants," Liam cried, tugging Riley after him under the big top. Happily, Riley went, knowing nothing bad could happen when Liam was with him. Liam was perfect. He was everything.

TBC.