This is the last chapter. I think it's pretty obvious from the plotline itself, but here it is. It wasn't always number one on my to-do list, but writing this story was a reward unto itself, and the reviews from you wonderful, wonderful people were the icing on the cake. I'd like to know what you thought of this story, overall, or just this chapter. Some people may not like this chapter, but I felt it fitting. Call it an angsty ending, or call it happily-ever-after, I hope you enjoyed reading the story that I so enjoyed writing. Thank you for your time.

Spike lunged at Angelus' throat, but was batted away by a bloody fist. Spike grinned, though it connected steadily with his forehead. He had been the one to rip the skin of Peaches' knuckles not five minutes ago.

Their fight was progressing slightly in Spike's favor. This seemed to shock Angelus, but he didn't let it affect his movements, only his expression. Both had multiple bruises, cuts, gashes and bites all over their body. Neither had been armed when they'd first come up, but broken furniture littering the space had provided makeshift stakes for both. The space they lunged in was not the outdoor roof, but a dark, empty floor with odds and ends dating back to the earliest days of the building, all dirty and dusty. The only light came from grimed-over windows, not enough to burn the Vampires, and a door much like a basement-to-outside door that, after climbing a few concrete steps, led up to the outside roof. The beams of sunrise slipping through those cracks were quite evident in the dark room, like golden laser beams, and the two had to be careful to avoid them. So far, Spike had singed his thigh on one, so it became an even more complex dance. But what a dance it was!

Angelus swung his stake, but Spike dodged, brushed past his side, and kicked him backwards to the floor. Turning and holding his stake over Angelus, the older Master had already rolled away, and was nearly behind Spike. A quick jump on an unsteady crate remedied that, and he jumped at Angelus, kicking him in the face, his stake hitting the Poofter in the shoulder.

He was winning, when he felt the presence. No, turn around! Run away! he cried silently, but it was too late. The elevator around the corner opened, and at any second Buffy would come into view. Angelus sensed it too, and darted towards the new arrival.

"No!" ripped from his throat, aloud this time. He managed to slip past Angelus and stand in front of Buffy, who had a giant smile on her face as she took him in.

"Spike!" she nearly cooed, not getting that this was NOT the time.

"I admit, Spike, I have no idea what's going on here. I normally pride myself on knowing and seeing all, but this time, this girl, this behavior, I am completely thrown. I can't figure out why you're living with a human, why you've bitten her but not turned her, or why you're protecting her now..." his voice faded off as he blinked a few times. "Or maybe I can. Don't tell me...William the Bloody has fallen for a human!" Spike growled, Buffy glared from behind him, putting her hands on her hips, and Angelus roared with laughter. "Oh, Dru and Darla are going to shriek like hyenas when they hear about this! Spike...and a human girl! I always knew you were unconventional, but this takes the cake, boy!" He continued to laugh, and Spike readied himself for a quick attack. But as suddenly as it had started, it stopped, and Peaches positioned himself to lunge.

To their left, a door opened, and the exhausted Protector stumbled out of it, holding a cross in front of him. Spike looked at him, and it was all the distraction Angelus needed. He leaped, pushed Spike aside. Spike stumbled. It was enough for Angelus' move to succeed. His hands latched onto Buffy's neck, and a sickening snap could be heard by all in the room. She crumbled to the floor as Spike screamed, not in rage, not in attack, not words of any kind, but just a scream of disbelief and immediate pain that he knew already would never leave. He threw himself at Angelus, no longer playing both the offensive and defensive. He didn't care about himself beyond staying around long enough to shove a splinter through the Devil's heart, harder and harder he struck, tears he didn't know he could still create causing him to miss ever few blows, but overall striking Angelus again and again.

"I was planning to draw her death out, but when I realized what a fool you actually were, to have developed genuine feelings for her, I figured it would be more fun this way. It was." All of Angelus' words were said between dodging and striking, a causal smirk on his face, as he tried to hide the effort avoiding Spike really took. He found himself pushed backwards to the floor, both of his hands crushed by Spike's boots, the blood from Spike's nose he had brought forth by punching him squarely dripping down into his eyes, a chair leg inches from his heart. For the first time in his unlife, Angelus feared for it.

"Well, boy, it appears you win. What do you want? LA? Drusilla? Anything? It's yours. You've bested me. You are Aurelius now." Spike growled.

"No."

"Well, you can't kill me, obviously. I've offered you everything you've ever wanted. I know how to tempt you Spike. Power. Power, you'll have if you let me up now." He smirked, more genuine this time. Spike would always be Spike, just the runt of the litter who wanted to be boss. There was no need to worry about him going crazy and actually staking Angelus. But for some reason, he wasn't being called off.

"Darla's sire is long dead, and I outclaimed her. Now you've outclaimed me. You're a Line Master, William." Spike continued to stare. Finally, he spoke.

"Did you even know her name?" he asked, hoarsely. Both Giles and Angelus stared at him, Angelus from his vulnerable position, Giles from the teenage girl's body that he cradled, weeping quietly at his failure. He stared at her glassy eyes, still teary from just a few minutes ago. Angelus was silent to his question. "Her name is Buffy. Say it. Say Buffy."

"...Buffy," Angelus muttered, still confused as to Spike's behavior.

"Say it louder!"

"Buffy."

"Louder!"

"Buffy!"

"LOUDER!"

"BUFFY!" Angelus screamed, not liking the look in Spike's eyes.

"I hope that name rings in your ears all the way to Hell!" The chair leg descended the few inches necessary to pierce Angelus' heart, and Spike stood on a pile of dust. Kicking it off his shoes, he turned to Buffy's body. His eyes traveled painfully over her from head to toe, before he approached the Protector holding her.

"Back!" Giles gasped, holding up his cross again. Spike sat down beside them.

"Rupert, that tiny thing doesn't scare me." He stroked Buffy's blonde head, remembering having had to wait an extra ten minutes for her to blow dry it earlier that night, before they could go out on the town. What fun they'd had, just the two of them surrounded by a faceless crowd, dancing together like they'd never get the chance to dance again. And they wouldn't now, he realized. Bowing his head, he closed his eyes, and silently sent a prayer up to the heaven that had rejected him.

'Yea, I know I'm not your favorite bloke, but she just was with me. She's a good one, you know that. She belongs up there. She really does. She deserves wings and a halo and a harp and whatever else you have, just please don't send her where there are any more of my kind.' He took a deep, unnecessary breath, wanting to stay and look at her fallen form forever, but simultaneously wanting to put as much distance between her corpse and him as possible. Giles had lowered the cross, and was now staring at him in disbelief.

"It isn't possible," he heard the Protector mumble. Spike raised his eyes to him.

"I'm sorry, Rupert. I tried." And failed, he added silently to himself. He was a failure. Nothing had ever been so important to him as making sure that Buffy was safe, and he'd failed at that task. He wasn't fit for anything else. He didn't want anything else. Bending down and brushing his lips against her forehead, he stood up and walked through the sunbeams, smoke drifting lazily off him where they struck.

Rupert Giles had studied Vampire behavior for over half of his life. He had read every book he could find, had observed those Vampires under his watch, had trusted that he and his fellow Protectors completely understood who Vampires were and what it was that made them tick. But as he saw the blonde Vampire who had plagued him for so long open the doors to the illuminated roof, the golden sunrise bathing him for a minute in glowing light, before 126 years were reduced to ashes floating leisurely to the floor, he realized how little he had actually ever known about their species.

RIPRIPRIPRIPRIPRIPRIPRIPRIPRIPRIPRIPRIPRIPRIPRIPRIPRIP

Buffy didn't have any tell-tale marks of death on her, apart from a very loose neck, so it had been easy to carry her like he would carry a drunken girl. He'd gotten her back to the Council building, and had thrown out all the details he cared to at Wesley, trusting him to make the Protector report while he got Buffy back to Sunnydale. Wesley hadn't quite understood his hurried words. Murder-murder-suicide? Two Vampires slain, Giles not having played a part in either of them? Interspecies love? Wesley tentatively wrote the report, but decided not to send it to London until he had a discussion with a more coherent Rupert Giles.

With Buffy's body reclining in the backseat, a blanket over her to give the appearance of sleeping in case other drivers wondered why the man in glasses had a lifeless girl in his car, Giles sped back to Sunnydale. Back to Joyce. How would he ever explain this to her? He couldn't tell his girlfriend who it was that had really killed Buffy. He didn't think he could face Joyce at all. But he'd have to be there for her when they 'discovered' the body in the lake Giles knew he had to leave her in, as he couldn't just carry a dead girl to the police. She'd died a normal enough death, and though the coroners would have a hard time explaining the pre-mortem bite marks that hadn't been the cause of her heath, he thought that this could work. Just another Sunnydale murder. Another he'd failed to prevent, though this time he was far too emotionally attached to sigh and go about his business. First Kendra, now Buffy. He needed to stop getting involved with girls. It only led to him having to cover up their murders. He needed to get away again, as he'd done with Kendra. He sighed as he reached the Sunnydale city limits. He'd stay a little while for Joyce, but then see if the council could transfer him some place else. Some place where little girls with big eyes and a talent for slaying creatures of the night were in short supply.

Family and friends mourned the loss of the girl they loved. For Giles, it was more personal. He'd been training her. Theoretically, just for self-defense, but always in the back of his mind, as he watched her corner him with a blunt stake, had been the thought of more. He didn't want her to become a Protector. It was too dangerous. But at the same time, he'd always known that if she did...he'd be proud. Really proud. And though the Council didn't even know of her existence, she had died at the hands of one of the creatures she'd slain in a graveyard one night. That made her a Protector in his eyes, and when he made his trip to London to explain the strange report Wesley Wyndam-Pryce had finally sent in, with his own comments questioning Rupert Giles' mental health scribbled in the margins, he would make sure she went down in the book of fallen Protectors.

Buffy had avidly kept a diary when she was younger, but when she was older, the habit had been reduced to merely gluing important items into the book. Awards, pictures, little white slips of paper with fortunes written on them, notes, and such. She'd written nothing about her Vampish activities. She'd written nothing about the kidnapping. The only thing in the book that was supposed to bear her soul that actually reflected the life few had known she led was a photocopied picture of a mean-looking man with white-blonde hair. The man she'd ran away with, everyone assumed. The man who had killed her through blunt trauma to her cute, little, birdlike-neck. There was a warrant out for the strange man's arrest, though he would never be found. All that was left of him Giles had gathered up in LA and taken back with him. When he came to visit Buffy's fresh grave one night, instead of leaving flowers like all her other well-meaning mourners had (her grave was the most floral in the cemetery, as far as he could tell), he sprinkled dusty ashes over the ground, over the tomb stone, over every surface nearby.

He still didn't know why it had happened. Why an innocent human girl and a ferocious Vampire Master had cosmically been thrown together, with the results buried in front of him. He had never heard of it happening before. He doubted it would happen again. But the incident refused to sit with him as 'senseless' or 'random.' It had to have a purpose. Maybe he was just telling himself that to ease the pain of Buffy's tragic death, but he couldn't believe that such an unprecedented thing could happen for no reason at all. He would never know the reason. But he was almost positive that there was one.

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOX

It was very bright. Annoyingly bright. Too bright. He clearly couldn't be out in the sun, for obvious reasons, but when had he stumbled into the million-watt bulbed room? Groaning, he opened his eyes. The light was coming in through the lids anyway, so he might as well find out where he was, maybe try to shut those damn lights off and go back to sleep. Then he realized he wasn't tired. Nor was he hungry, or hurt, or sad, or happy, or anxious. He was just there. And he didn't really care where 'there' was. He looked around at his surroundings. As he'd suspected, they were bright.

He tried to stand up, but it seemed he was already standing. Shrugging, he took a step forward. No floor to speak of, only bright, but he moved. He padded leisurely around wherever he was, before noticing that someone had been walking beside him for quite a while. It was a girl with darker skin, a long braid, and a kind, but firm smile.

"Hello there," he greeted he pleasantly. He knew he'd never seen her before, but felt like he knew of her somehow.

"'lo, Spike. How are you doin'?" she asked.

"I'm quite fine, thanks for asking. Where am I, Miss?" She grinned.

"Someplace dat you dought you'd nev'r be." His eyes widened.

"Don't tell me! Why, I think I'm in heaven!" She giggled, clearly loving this part of her job.

"Dat you are, man. It's nice to fin'lly see you. We've been waiting a very long dime."

"How in the world did I get up here?" The girl pointed towards a patch of bright that had pictures on it. Bright pictures. He saw himself opening the doors to the roof, and watched his last moments with interest. "How about that."

"Spike, you are an odd one. We'd always knew dere was something diff'rent about you. And you proved us ride. You are nod like odher vampires. You did nod deserve dat life. No one does. My body died at de stake, but my soul was here. As was yours...would you like to meed him?" Spike raised his eyes at the man approaching. It was him, only with moppy brown hair, and a less bold gait than the one he now had.

"Spike," his self greeted him.

"Hello William," he answered, the bitterness he normally felt when he thought of his past self not present.

"Will'am has been here for a long time, but we did'nt dink you would do what you did. You rose above the bondar'ies of vampire. Your soul has been liv'ng here, but da two of you gets a reward. You get to make up Will'am's lost years. Where Spike walked, Will'am will now do it."

"I don't quite get it, I'm sorry." William now took over explaining.

"When someone is turned, their body walks the earth, while their soul goes to heaven. When the body dies, it goes to Hell. Except in our case, the only of its kind. There can't be the both of us Williams, the bloody awful poet, and the bloody vampire, walking around here. It defies the rules, and the rules just aren't defied. You won entrance to here with your love, bravo, but we cannot stay, so we shall go back to earth to live out the rest of what should have been both of our days as one. And when we die, the one that is the both of us shall come here." Spike blinked at the two in front of him.

"But...what if I don't want to go back to earth? It's not as bright as here, especially not without..." His words trailed off. The woman and William exchanged glances.

"Ah, she. She is around here somewhere...for now." Spike's heart lurched.

"No, she deserves to be here, let her stay!" The woman's eyes twinkled. For the first time, Spike realized that none of them were clothed, but it didn't seem to matter. No one was checking anyone out. It was comfortable, lacking lust, just pleasant.

"She loved dat who dey told her nod to love. She too gets a reward, says de Powers dat Be. She geds you, for a few dozen more years. She will be back, as will you. But earthly love and earthly relations are nod importand here. If you'd dink about id, you would realize. You two can have thad for a liddle while longer. Be happy, Will'am/Spike."

"Wait, I didn't get your name," he called to her, who was suddenly very far away. William beside him was looking around at the world which was becoming far less bright.

"My name is Kendra. Id was nice do fin'lly meed you!"

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOX

William stormed outside. How dare Cecily reject his loving words, when the intent behind them was the most real thing the spoiled little girl had eve heard! How dare they laugh at the words which flowed directly from his heart to his pen! How dare strangers be in his way when he was so clearly upset!

He turned around the view the three strangers who had just been in his path. He'd never seen them before, and was not all that interested in them, but a tiny voice inside his head said they were not going to turn around. Not that he had thought that would, but it was almost like watching a play he'd read, only upon seeing it the actors began a different scene than the one he had been unknowingly expecting.

He shook his head. He was being silly. He continued to tear up the paper in his hand, flinging scraps onto the ground, not caring if a Police saw him. He shrank to a dark alley and began to pace, wondering how to win Cecily's heart. He knew she'd just rejected him, but the thought of having no one to compose poetry to stung his artistic soul. Perhaps, he mused, that was the main motivation behind his love for her. She wasn't very nice, like the few people he chose to surround himself with. She was, of course, the most beautiful girl he'd ever seen, but he'd read that beauty was only skin deep. Perhaps it was true. Maybe he only did love her because she was beautiful, and inspired him to write beautiful poetry.

Still, the ache in his heart would not go away. He had never been so openly insulted. 'You're beneath me...' her words floated back to him. Angry, he kicked at the ground.

"Are you alright?" a musical voice came from behind him. He turned to see a blonde girl, dressed in a fancy gown, a fan held loosely in a tiny, pale hand, standing there, gazing at him.

"I wish to be alone, Madame," he grumbled. She took a step forward anyway, hesitantly.

"Was that your poem they were reading inside?" He looked at her, not wanting someone else to reject his work.

"Why do you ask?"

"It was very beautiful. My father is a poet. He would love it. I do too." William stared at the young beauty coming closer still. He'd never seen hair so golden, or skin so clear, or eyes so green!

"Th-thank you. I'm William. William Dasher."

"Elizabeth Winters," she said with an angelic smile, placing her little hand out for him to shake. "I saw you run out of the party, and felt awful. People are such uneducated fools these days. The wouldn't know beauty if it bit them in the rump." He raised his eyebrows at her cocky attitude.

"Most of my peers around here have been expertly schooled. You'd be hard pressed to find a BETTER educated group of young people."

"Educated in what? Nothing that matters, clearly." He gaped at her for a minute, and then smiled.

"You're witty."

"And beautiful," she said, somewhat bored now. "They always tell me I'm witty and beautiful. Second one cancels out the first, I suppose, making me bearable. So tell me I'm beautiful."

"Not beautiful...effulgent," he said quietly. She fit the word so much better than Cecily. She smiled.

"Would you like to go back to the party, William? I hope you can read me some more of your lovely poems."

"Most of them are at home," he said sheepishly. She took his arm bossily, like a girl used to getting what she wanted.

"Fine. To the party tonight, and to your home tomorrow so I can hear more of your lovely words."

"You-you really think my words are lovely?"

"Of course I do, but what matters is if you think they are." He waited a beat, and then replied.

"I know they are a bit rough, but they are jems none the less." She smiled again. Oh, what poetry he could compose to that smile alone! He smiled warmly back at her.

"Oh, your smile lights up your face! It's gleaming, William. You don't look like you smile much. You should. It's so perfectly handsome." He blushed and she laughed easily. "I can tell that you and I are going to be very good friends."

They re-entered the party, and many heads turned to see the blubbering fool walk in arm-and-arm with the enticing new girl. Her family had moved to the town only a few days ago, and most of the young men were trying to win her favor.

"It appears Elizabeth has fallen victim to William," one of the young men said to a companion. Shaking their heads, they moved to another group of people to mock the girl's poor taste.

Elizabeth and William. Buffy and Spike. Whatever. Whenever. However. Forever.

The End