Mixed Signals
By: PhoenixJustice
Disclaimer: Buffy the Vampire Slayer is property of Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, etc. I only own this story and make no profit from this.
Warning: Rated M for sexual content, language, etc.
Pairing: Spike/Buffy Summers (main), Willow/Tara, etc.
Setting: Bargaining pt 2/Afterlife, with spoilers up to Season 11 of Buffy, Season 11 of Angel and anything inbetween.
Summary: Two people who were never supposed to meet. She had seen everything, up to the Dragon that destroyed everything she loved. He had only the lasting memory of her words of love before he burned to cinders. Could they bridge the gap between them?
A/N: Flashbacks in italics.
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Chapter Six - Identities
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Her first thought is that he had gotten hurt somehow, but she sees no wounds on him or sees any sign that he had taken any kind of injury. She grabs at him, using her strength to lift him up effortlessly, holding him close to her while she takes him into the back, sitting him carefully into one of the chairs on the left side of the room. She barely takes notice of Giles still somewhere behind her, with footsteps approaching quickly as well.
"Spike?" She says to his still form. To see a Spike that wasn't so animated as he usually was (when he was asleep excepted), disturbed her. He was, despite being a vampire, more full of life than pretty much anyone she had ever known.
"Woah, what happened?" Xander asks somewhere behind her. "We under attack?"
"Is everything okay?" Willow asks.
"Is Spike okay?" Anya asks. There's a pause. "What? Not everyone hates him like the rest of you do."
"I don't know." Buffy says, biting her lip in worry. What could have caused him to collapse? He was a Master level vampire. Not much would take him down so quickly.
"What about-"
"Maybe we should-"
"Guys, I really don't think we should-"
"Buffy, dear, just let him-"
"Shut up." She says without thinking. She turns to see them looking at her with astonishment. She smiles a bit guiltily. "Sorry, just...a lot of voices all at once wasn't helping me think. I-"
She hears a faint groan next to her and glances back at Spike for a moment before looking at the others, making her decision then. "I think he's stirring now. If I need you guys, I'll yell for you, okay?"
Xander looked displeased at that, it being about Spike she was sure, but Willow gives him a look, after seeing Buffy was giving the Determined Eyes, and they all, even Giles, eventually file out.
She turns back to look at Spike, still kneeling in front of his chair, when he finally opens his eyes. Her breath is taken from her as she looks into his devastatingly blue eyes. He looks at her almost solemnly for a moment, before his hand moves to touch some of her hair. She freezes and he does too, frozen in place, him looking unsure at her now.
"Spike." She whispers.
He seems like he wants to say something, but as if he is frozen in place, he doesn't say anything.
"Are you okay? Are you...you collapsed. Are you okay?" She repeats.
He shakes his head, looking at her as if he had never seen anything before, so astonished he looked as he looks deeply into her eyes.
"Spike, please, you're really worrying me here, okay? I'm not used to a quiet Spike." She jokes.
His throat works hard for a moment and he shakes his head. Finally, after what seemed like forever, he speaks.
"Do you...know anything about a Dragon? Or a madwoman named Wise?"
She stiffens in shock.
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"You...how do you know those things?" She asks hoarsely.
He had put the thought out there, but hadn't expected anything but for her to look at him in confusion. Instead she looks like she's just seen a ghost. She couldn't. It wasn't possible. She had been resurrected by her Scooby friends. She had been in a Better Place. There was no way she should have known about-
"She thought she was a witch, just because she had stolen all that power." Buffy whispers, eyes looking large and almost innocent in her face.
His eyes widen.
"Well," He says, finding the words hard to get out. Not the content, but just because of the shock he was in. He wanted to see what else she might say. It seemed all but a given, but still...he couldn't comprehend it. There was no way. "What about when everyone lost their memories?"
She snorts. "Because of Willow, you mean. I called myself Joan, of all things. I was all with the martyrdom complex even then. And you were Randy."
He starts. "What?"
She raises a brow at him. "Randy Giles." She giggles.
He groans. "Of course you'd remember that the most."
She bats at his leg a bit. "Well, what about the time the Buffybot was around-"
"So we're just going through the lists of my screwups now, are we?"
"If you want!" She exclaims brightly.
She looks at him with a smile and such a warm look that he can't help but laugh. A deep belly laugh like he hadn't had in a very long time.
It really sinks in then, just like that.
"It's really you then." He says.
She sobers back up just as quickly, but the smile doesn't leave her face. Instead in deepens into something deeper, more personal, more intimate. She holds his face in her hands, smiling all the while, even when the tears start to fall down her face.
"I missed you."
"I missed you too." He says, ignoring the tears on his own face now. He pulls her up from the floor, putting her in his lap, leaving them face to face. His eyes close as he kisses one of her hands. "I love you, Buffy."
"William." He opens his eyes to look at her, stunned as at the sheer amount of feeling in her eyes. "I love you too."
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"So...what do we do then? How did you get back here, Slayer?" He asks her.
She looks up at him. She had been in his embrace for minutes now. Precious minutes that she had never thought she'd get again. Not with the Spike she had known. But miraculously, surprisingly...he was here, with her. There was no doubt of that. The how of it, the why's...
"I don't know." She responds honestly. "You were there in that moment, with the Dragon-" His arms tighten around her. "I don't know how I got here. I just woke up in my coffin."
She could all but hear his frown. "That you had to go through that again-"
She shakes her head. "That doesn't matter now. It's past. So you don't know either then?"
"No. Just came to here, as the chaos was going on all around me with the biker demon's. Just in the dark about that as you, I guess. I figured..."
He pauses so long it causes her to look up.
"Figured what?"
"You'd have gone on back to Heaven. I was always prepared for that. Well," he amends. "Not ready, but I knew it'd happen. To have you for as long as I could on this Earth was all I could have ever hoped for-"
"I wouldn't have gone." She murmurs, head moving to rest against him now.
"What?"
"I wouldn't have left you. If, for whatever reason, despite your Champion status, you didn't go to Heaven or any heavenly plane after death, then I would have followed after you."
She relishes his arms around her then, feeling the presence of him in a way that nothing else could comfort her or make her feel better.
"Buffy." He says, voice choked.
"William." She says, moving her head against him now.
"I don't deserve you." He whispers.
"I could say the same." She looks back up at him. "You've put up with a lot of my...less than desirable traits too, you know."
He looks like he's going to say something then-and she can guess the direction of what-but he instead shakes his head.
"Looks like we're in the same boat then." He finally says.
She nods.
"So...where do we go from here?"
"Why are we back here?"
For both those questions, she had no answers.
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I hope you enjoyed this!
Let me know what you thought!
-PhoenixJustice
