Disclaimer: I don't own or profit from BtVS.
ObscureBookWrym is the best! She also doesn't know I dicked around with this after she gave it back. Shush, don't tell her!
Awakening
Chapter Three
Spike laid Buffy out in a shadowed corner and stepped away. Yanking her off the metal bar may have been a mistake. Blood rapidly poured out of the large, ragged hole, and Spike was hard-pressed to hope there was more left inside her.
He dropped his duster on the ground, tearing off his red button-up. He knelt beside her, balling up his shirt and pressing it against her wound. The shirt darkened, and the blood flow eased after a few minutes. He hoped it was from the pressure he was applying and not because she had simply run out of the precious essence.
The scent of her blood assaulted his senses. If he didn't get some distance from her soon he'd end up a spineless puppy when the uberbitch caught him feeding off her again. He backed away, his hand brushing against his leather duster. He picked it up, ready to shrug it on, when a violent shiver rattled the Slayer's small frame.
He looked at his duster, then back to her. He supposed the proper thing to do in this situation would be to cover her with his duster, but he really didn't want to get slayer blood on it. The stench could take years to get out.
She shuddered again, and Spike exhaled a deep, unneeded sigh. He draped his duster over her body, tucking it around her shoulders. If she lived she'd better be soddin' thankful or he'd rip the bitch's throat out. The only other woman besides Dru who came that close to his precious duster was the original owner. It took years to get her scent out, too.
The blood he licked off her face had already worked its magic on his body. His burns had lightened to a mild inflammation and his bones were mostly knitted together, but he was far from healed, and good blood was rapidly going to waste. Keeping one eye on the Slayer, he drained what was left in the corpses he could reach in the shadows.
One man still lived, his pulse weak and thready. With some proper first aid he might make it another day. Spike shrugged. The fresh blood washed out the dead taste in his mouth.
Along with keeping one eye on the slayer with a doozy of a personality disorder, he kept one ear open for the beast that caused all this chaos. He had awakened not long before the Slayer, so he never got a gander at what was in the cage behind them. But he'd heard it clear enough as it wreaked havoc, instigating a plane crash without even the smallest bit of fear of dying.
Nothing worse than a killing machine with an animal brain. Couldn't be reasoned with, couldn't be persuaded. All you could do was kill it or get out of its way. Its heady scent was a discomforting mix of wet wool, rotting vegetation, and animal musk that made Spike gag.
He followed its scent to the cockpit. The reinforced door separating the flight crew from the cargo hold was rent nearly in half, the heavy steel bearing deep, slashing scars. Spike shifted into vamp face, matching his claws to the marks. The width of his hand looked childlike compared to the spread marking the door. Whatever made the scars had paws the size of a werebear's.
He peeked behind the door. The cockpit was torn to shit. The flight crew shredded, the windscreen blown outward. Spike took a step forward, peering over the nose of the plane. No dead nasty, but the gap in the tree line suggested something large was flung out of the plane at maximum velocity. Hopefully, the creature had limped off to find a hole to die in.
Spike nudged the wreckage with the toe of his boot. He found the floor hatch and opened it up. The transponder was undamaged and transmitting. He locked it back up and walked out.
The sun sunk behind the mountains, leaving enough shadows for him to move without the worry of exposure. He ransacked the plane, finding two dozen parachutes, a fully fitted survival pack with a weatherproof sleeping bag, a collapsible cooking pot and soup mug, an empty hydration bladder, flint and striker, fish hooks and line, wire snares, and a compass which he shoved into the front pocket of his jeans. On the bodies of the soldiers he found more blades than he could shake a stick at, but all their rifles had been smashed to bits.
He fitted the sheaths of the two largest Bowies on his belt at the curve of his back, angling them downward so he could draw them in a single slashing motion that would gut his opponent from groin to gullet. He found several flashlights with batteries, ready-made meals, and a couple bottles of water.
"Gotta love soldier boys. Always prepared for the worst," Spike muttered.
He found a decent first aid kit under the remaining bench seat that hadn't been sucked out of the plane when the trees ripped the fuselage open, but didn't know what to do with most of it beyond using the gauze and tape. He knelt beside Buffy, carefully tearing away her shirt around her wounds, trying to leave her modesty as intact as possible. No way did he want to risk an uberbitch outbreak because her virtue was aflutter.
Replacing his wadded-up shirt with thick pads of gauze, he taped the front and back of her wound. When he turned her on her side he saw the slices along her back where the chain link had punctured her. Pink froth welled from a puncture just under the curve of her fourth rib.
He rocked back on his haunches. In the dim light he could see the bluish cast of her lips and the papery thinness of her eyelids. He dragged his long fingers through his hair, clenching them until he could feel the pull on his scalp. He didn't know what to do for her. As an expert at stealing life, he had no idea how to go about caring for it. He released his hair, rubbing the back of his hand roughly over his mouth, before cleaning the cuts on her back, packing the slice to her lung tightly and bandaging the rest.
Satisfied that it was the best he could do, and that her slayer healing would have to do the rest, he resituated her and tucked his duster around her once again. He shoved the first aid kit and the survival pack under the bench seat and jumped out of the wreck onto the half-frozen ground. He inhaled deeply, his lungs filling with the odors of death, fuel, and juniper. Slithering insidiously beneath it all was the musky hint of unhallowed earth and wet wool.
He methodically scouted the perimeter, enlarging his sweep with every pass when he found no evidence of the beast. A mile from the wreckage he found a small glacial lake, the surface so smooth it reflected the moon with the purity of polished silver. To the east was a crevice cut into the mountain, large enough for him to stand and deep enough to keep him from the sun.
The valley was high in the mountain peaks, red fir and Ponderosa pine soared overhead leaving only coarse, hardy vegetation covering the black soil exposed to the sun. Beneath the branches of the evergreens, the frozen ground crunched as he wound his way through the thick, snarling huckleberry oak. The pristine landscape showed no signs that humans had ever passed through its sublimity. Its desolation was perfection, its utter absence of humanity terrifying.
Spike needed to get the fuck out.
He examined the shivery needle of the compass, aligning his body so he faced a westerly direction. He wasn't sure where he was, but he knew if he traveled due west he'd eventually run into coastline, and more than likely civilization well before then. He'd have to travel at night, keeping to the trees, and be on the constant look out for bolt holes as the sunrise neared. That rot about vampires going to ground was just that-rot. Sure he could bury himself in a hole, after taking hours to dig one. Then take hours to dig himself out. He'd dug himself out of his grave once before and he had no desire to repeat the experience again. Ever.
So, yeah, he could make a run for it. Take his chances that he'd find a new place to hole up every day. Or he could wait it out. The soldier boys would be showing up soon to check on their men and clean up the mess. If they lingered after dark, he'd have himself a nice meal and transport out.
Besides, the Slayer wasn't up to traveling and he refused to think about why that even mattered.
As he approached the crash the reek of the beast saturated his senses. Spike's nerve endings went on point as he scanned the clearing for any sign of the creature. The beast had come and gone, but he hadn't left empty handed. The bodies littering the clearing were missing.
Trepidation locked his heart in his throat as he approached the wreck. Blood streaked the plate metal floor-slick, slimy trails leading out of the fuselage.
Spike leapt inside. The knives he'd collected into a pile were gone. The flashlights were smashed, the parachutes shredded. He kicked it all aside, making his way to the corner where he'd left Buffy. His duster was a shadow darker than the rest. He slowly dragged it away.
The breath locked behind his breastbone left his body in a thin hiss. Buffy laid motionless underneath the shroud of leather. Her face pale, her bloodless lips parted as she took small, shallow breaths.
"Right then. Time for new digs."
The survival pack was still tucked next to the first aid kit under the seat. He slung it over his shoulders and took up the kit. He squatted down next to Buffy, wondering how he was going to lift her without hurting her and still hold onto the kit. He settled for wrapping the duster around her body and picking her up bridal style.
The ionized rush of power crackled over his skin, forcing his gameface forward with a sick crunch of cartilage.
Strong fingers wrapped around his throat, and he was one wrong twitch from losing his gift of eloquent speech. He stilled. For the first time in his unlife he was the prey and not the predator. His yellowed eyes dropped to meet ethereal ones glaring up from Buffy's heart-shaped face.
"Your actions confuse us, vampire." The seraph-like voice crashed over him with the muted force of raging thunder.
His legs wobbled and weakened. He fumbled to his knees, the girl still held protectively to his chest even while being possessed by the unspeakable.
"What are your intentions for this vessel?" The intensity of the voice lessened, and Spike gasped in relief. Anger seethed in his core and a muscle in the hollow of his cheek jumped with the sheer force of will needed to contain his rage.
"My intentions are to get the bloody hell out of here before that beastie comes strolling back. 'Less you think you can take it on-then, be my guest."
Her steely fingers tightened around his throat.
"Sarcasm does not amuse us."
"Well, bitchiness doesn't amuse me."
Her fingers dug painfully into his larynx. The only thing he valued more than his ability to talk was the ability to pleasure his woman. He'd rather not lose either.
"Your intentions, vampire."
"Look, you overpowered bitch. I'm not goin' to hurt Buffy." He tried to jerk away, but she held him firmly. "You, on the other hand…" he muttered.
The being wearing Buffy watched him curiously. "Why?"
Spike refused to meet her eerie gaze. He was still on his knees, still cradling her to his chest. The moon was sinking and somewhere in the wilderness was a beast that might not be as blindly dumb as he'd thought.
"Don't ask why, 'cause I don't know myself," he confessed. "Just can't leave her like this. Can't leave her as meat for the beast."
The being peered at him intently. Gradually the crushing pressure pressing on him from all sides receded. His head cleared, his ribs expanded, the small hairs along his spine and arms laid down. He stared hard at the frail, unconscious girl in his arms. Her pale, bloodless skin glowed with faint residual light that dimmed with every passing second.
Spike gave serious consideration to the origin of the Slayer and what it meant that he was still alive.