Disclaimer: I don't own or profit from BtVS.
So many thanks to ObscureBookWyrm for looking this over.
Awakening
Chapter Four
Spike smoothed out the down sleeping bag on the natural shelf at the back of the cave he found near the glassy lake. Satisfied that the bedding was soft enough, he carefully lifted Buffy onto the makeshift bed.
The bandages wrapped around her torso had soaked though, inciting his bloodlust with every decadent whiff. Clamping down hard on his demon, he quickly changed the wrappings and zipped her into the bag before settling his duster over her. She no longer needed its warmth, but he found himself strangely reluctant to part her from it. It made him feel as if he was leaving a part of himself behind to protect her when he couldn't.
They were safe for the moment, but the aroma of slayer blood was certain to draw predators straight to them. The beast in particular.
Spike gathered up the bandages, and using his preternatural speed, he raced back to the wreckage. Choosing a new direction, he plunged into the twisting bracken, stopping only to smear Buffy's blood on exposed tree trunks and rotting logs.
Spike opened himself up to the night in a way he hadn't done in decades. Years of hunting in urban locales had made a lazy predator, and his instincts weren't as sharp as they should be.
In enclosed spaces sound ricocheted off every surface, but here in the wilderness it carried for miles, making it impossible to pinpoint the source. Human heartbeats were easily distinguishable from dogs, cats, and vermin; they overwhelmed everything else by sheer numbers alone. In the wilderness, heartbeats varied: the small, rapid patter of rodents rustling through the underbrush, the steady thud of mule deer bedded down in the briar, and the hungry stealthy beats of predators slinking through the woods.
Bats swooped in the air, close enough to his head that he ducked out of instinct. An owl screeched, followed by the screaming of a weasel. The sounds were all familiar to the predator who had hunted the night for over a hundred years, but somehow in this open space where humanity was only a nightmare at the edge of existence, Spike felt unsettled.
This wasn't his hunting ground. It belonged to another. A creature more beast than man, too intelligent to be truly considered an animal.
Spike followed his instincts to a sheer cliff edge, peering down at the black, jagged rocks hundreds of feet below. He wedged one of the bloody bandages between two small quartz-veined boulders before tossing the rest into the ravine.
On his way back, he chased down two rabbits. He wasn't hungry after his earlier meal, but he drained them anyway, before slinging their gutted and skinned carcasses over his shoulder.
At the lake he stopped to fill a canteen with fresh water. Across the black lake he could hear the tiny plops of trout leaping out of the water to gobble insects. At the sound of a larger splash, Spike turned his head, stilling as a shaggy black bear waded into the water not thirty feet away.
A soddin' bear.
Predator silent, Spike backed away from the water's edge, melding into the shadows at the tree line. Bloody hell, as soon as he was back amongst civilization, he'd head to the biggest metropolis he could find. New York or London, it didn't matter, as long as it was as far away from the wilderness as he could get.
The moon was hidden behind the black, looming mountains by the time he neared the cave. A twinge of anxiety made him uncomfortable. There wasn't a reason to feel any level of concern for his enemy. Just as there wasn't a reason to care for her wounds.
Regardless of those facts, he breathed a sigh of relief when he found her undisturbed and resting where he'd left her.
The scent of her delicious blood saturated the air, tempting him to forget about the uberbitch currently residing in the Slayer's skin and lose himself in the ecstasy of Buffy's taste. Something he couldn't rightly do without losing his testicles.
The uberbitch was another quandary all together. What was she? Why was she just now making her presence known? Had the Slayer always been the victim of a wicked personality disorder, and he'd just never witnessed it?
He dropped the rabbits in the corner, settling himself at the cave entrance to watch the shifting shadows beneath the pines.
Over the years, he'd heard rumors of what made a slayer, a nasty joke shared among the wicked of the underworld. The pure, pristine Slayer running on evil juice – no sugar and spice or anything nice, but foul and nasty, made of the very filth she professed to hate. It made the demons hate her even more for being a hypocrite.
But what Spike saw - what he thought he saw - it was as opposite of demonic as you could get. No demon there. It was power. Power beyond that of evil.
And that…just wasn't possible.
For Spike, power meant corruption - the filth polluting the stream, the poison beneath the purity. Whatever She was, it wasn't corruption. It was pure, uncut, unadulterated good. If anything, Buffy was the corruption. Humanity diluting the pure.
Spike didn't like that idea one bit. Buffy wasn't filth. She wasn't corruption. Her humanity made her strong, made her the best slayer he'd ever seen. It kept her alive. As far as the vampire was concerned, what kept you alive wasn't wrong. Wasn't evil. It was survival.
A sickening sense of intuition flickered along Spike's insides. The Slayer - Buffy - wasn't merely enhanced with power stolen long ago before memory. The uberbitch was Buffy, the very essence of her. The inner core. Walled off and separate, guarded by barriers, but still there. Still powering the ship. Like the warp core on the bleedin' USS Enterprise.
Buffy coughed. The harsh, wet sound loud in the absolute stillness of the predawn. Spike picked up the canteen, unscrewing the cap as he approached. Her eyes opened, unfocused until they snapped to him.
"Spike?" Her breathless voice wavered.
"Yeah, Slayer."
"You killed me?"
It pained him when his lip curled into a small smile. For being his absolute worst enemy, she was bloody adorable sometimes. "Not yet, luv. Seems you're too stubborn to go softly into that good night."
"My mom always said I could out-stubborn a mule." She fell back with a stifled scream when she tried to lever herself up onto her elbows. A fresh waft of blood hit Spike, tantalizing his demon.
"Don't move," he ordered tersely, moving closer in case she disobeyed. Her whimpered response ended in a cough.
"Water?"
She nodded, too weak to take the canteen. He cupped the back of her head, feeling the oily sweat at the nape of her neck, and lifted her as minimally as possible. She drank greedily, her bruised eyes trained curiously on his impassive face. When she'd had her fill, he laid her back, settling his duster around her shoulders.
"Where are we?"
"In a cave."
Her pale face crumpled. "Did you kidnap me?"
"What's the last thing you remember, Slayer?"
Her eyes drifted to the side in thought. He was fascinated by the play of her small, white teeth rubbing over her bottom lip. She'd make a magnificent vampire - fierce and passionate - she'd be a creature grounded in the moment, unlike his fey princess who swayed to music only she heard, always leaving him out of the dance.
"I was at a party with Parker."
"He stank of vulnerability and many other women."
She frowned at him. "We fought."
"Anything else?"
"We were…on a plane?"
Spike nodded. "Some soldier boys got the drop on us."
"There were soldiers?"
"Yep. They strung us up good and proper."
Her face paled as they spoke, the hair around her temples darkening with perspiration. Her shallow breathing took on weight, rattling in her chest.
"You should rest, luv."
"We crashed," she said suddenly, almost fiercely. Her green eyes locked onto him. "Why am I still alive, Spike?"
"Like I said, you won't go quietly, tough, stubborn bint."
Her eyes hardened to sharp-cut emeralds. "Why haven't you killed me?"
"Well, that's gratitude for you. I patch you up. Get you all cozy and—"
"So that's it? You're hiding me from rescuers so you can torture me before you kill me?"
"Hadn't occurred to me, but if that's what gets you off, then let it be said I know how to oblige a lady." Spike rocked back on his heels with a leer, his thumbs hooked into his belt.
"I do not get off—"
"Liar," he cut her off, his tone slick with menace and a dirty kind of knowing. "You're Angelus' girl after all, and he likes a whole lot of pain with his pleasure. Or maybe not. He did say you weren't worth a second go."
She lunged at him, only to spasm in pain. Her mouth wrenched open into a silent scream, the long lines of her throat convulsing.
He hurried to her side, uncapping the canteen.
"Drink," he urged when her fit passed. She accepted his help reluctantly. Some water dribbled around the lip of the bottle, sliding down her throat. When she was done, her body went slack with exhaustion.
"Get some rest, Slayer. We'll pick this up when you're better. It's no fun when you can't be your normal bitchy self."
Something shifted in her eyes, and he fought the urge to slink away and hide in the darkest shadow he could find.
"Spike, if you're not going to hurt me, then why'd you bring us to this cave?"
He debated telling her about the beast in the woods, but one look at her pale, sweaty face dissuaded him. Unnerved by his response to her, nearly overpowered by her scent, he resumed his crouch by the narrowed entrance of the cave. His restless gaze flittered from the shadows to the pale outline of the mountains. Sunrise would soon be upon them and they'd be trapped. If the beast sought them out, they'd have to make their stand in the cave, and their refuge may very well become their crypt.
"Those soldier boys were up to no good. They weren't squirin' us on a dream vacation, Slayer. I thought it best not to be around when they came a-callin'."
"But we need them, don't we?"
"Not disagreein'. We're in the arse-crack of nowhere. They'll probably come by 'copter and hopefully it'll be after dark afore they leave."
"And if it is?"
He knew the grin he gave her was pure wickedness by the way she shifted nervously under the weight of his duster.
"Then I'll commandeer their transport."
"You can fly a helicopter?"
"I've had a few lessons over the years."
"A few?"
He shifted sheepishly. "Dru kept eatin' the instructors, but I'm sure something stuck."
"I'm reassured," she responded dryly.
"Well, I can always leave you here to die." He expected a witty retort, but when he turned to look she had sunken into unconsciousness.