Chapter 6:

To an outsider it did look like Angel was feeling better after a night of slaying vicious demons. He got reminded of the old times, when the four of them, him, Spike, Darla and Drusilla would go out and paint the town red. Literally.

Of course that involved taking innocent lives and although Angel shuddered and felt ashamed for the things he'd done, he couldn't stop the warm feeling, the adrenaline rush while hunting that showed him that his monster was still enjoying the bloodshed. No matter if it was the blood of his kind now.

Spike had fun, too, but after a few nights of patrolling with him, Angel realized that it wasn't the same for him. Whenever he was talking about the old times, Spike was clearly uneasy thinking back. There was no pleasure whatsoever when he remembered. Just the pain. The screams of the innocent that he had killed.

Angel heard those cries, too, but when he was fighting, when he allowed a small part of the monster to come out and play, the voices got quieter. When Spike was fighting the voices got louder. Being around his family was the only thing that calmed the monster into submission.

Angel was thinking a lot about those things during the day. He preferred to stay inside the basement, listening to the life upstairs. Listening to the trampling of little feet, the voices of Buffy and Spike, talking with each other and talking to their son.

He was thinking about what Will had said to him.

When Buffy was at her daytime job and Will at school, Spike sometimes came down to sit with him when he wasn't sleeping himself. He knew that Angel was listening to them anyway. They talked about what Spike would normally do at this time of day. Before he was trapped by the light.

And Spike always smiled, remembering his mortal life fondly. When he wasn't writing, he would have gone to his own daytime job, consulting for a special branch of the San Francisco police that dealt with the now publicly known supernatural. Then he would pick up Will from school and they would spent the afternoon together until Buffy came home. Apparently, Dawn was doing the pick-up now since she was home with her own small child anyway.

Angel was still baffled by the fact that Buffy's little sister was a mother now, too. It should only feel like a blink to him, an immortal vampire, but those ten years truly were a lifetime. So much had changed.

So where did he fit?

In the evenings he was having dinner with the little family. Only Buffy and Will were eating, but Spike always put some food on his plate, too, pretending to enjoy it. For Will, he assumed, so Angel did the same. Smiling and munching on stuff that tasted like cardboard and ashes.

He was looking at Spike, but he seemed to be much better at pretending. Angel hasn't eaten in so damn long, he has forgotten what food was supposed to taste like.

The vampire was feeling an emptiness within him that he hasn't ever felt before. When he got turned, Angel had enjoyed the immense power he was given and even when he got his soul, there at least was the pain that he had to live with. But now there was only a void. An empty space where feelings were supposed to be.

And all just because he was watching a life that could've been his, if only things were a little different. In all his time, it had never felt so inadequate, so unsatisfying and unreal to be a vampire.

He watched Spike again. If Angel was feeling like that... it must be hell for him. Because Spike got a taste. His memories of life were fresh again. He got to be alive for a whole decade only to get ripped out of it once more. No longer able to stand in the sun, but remembering clearly how it felt on his skin. And yet Spike was smiling. Smiling like Angel did, too. Pretending.

But Will knew he was sad.

After another week of this charade, Angel stopped Spike when he wanted to leave the basement in the early morning hours after patrolling. "Hey, do you think you could, uhm… make sure that Will isn't in tonight when I come upstairs?" Spike threw him a questioning look so he continued, "I don't know, does he do sleepovers or things like that?"

"Uh, sure. Could ask Dawn and Xander to watch him… or maybe one of his friends from school." Spike considered, pushing his brows together and making wrinkles appear. "Why?"

"I just… wanted to talk to you guys about something and I'm not sure it would be such a good idea to risk Will overhearing something."

"Right." pondered Spike, still trying to figure out what Angel meant by this. "I'll talk to Buffy."

"Thanks."

Spike nodded, walking up the stairs. Then he stopped and turned again. "You know, if you're planning on leaving tonight, I'm sure Will would want to say goodbye. I think he likes you now." he grinned, attempting to put humor in Angel's obviously heavy mood. But the older vampire only stared at him blankly, mind clearly miles away.

Then Angel came back. "I'm not leaving immediately. There's still time for him to say goodbye."

"Alright." Spike said thoughtfully. "If you say so."

A few hours later, when night fell over their half of the world once more, Angel, Spike and Buffy met around the dining table. Will was with the younger Summers sister and Buffy sat in between the two vampires she both loved. But not both quite in the same way.

Her fingers played around the neck of a wine glass that she was only drinking to stand out less between the red liquid of blood on the table.

"So… what do you wanted to talk to us about?" asked Buffy, obviously nervous about the ominous feel to the meeting. She quickly glanced at Spike. When she was scared he was always her source of calmness and this time was no different. His sharp features were revealing nothing, but she knew however upsetting the news would be, she could rely on him to balance her emotions.

Angel took his time, but eventually he was speaking. His eyes not meeting anyone's gaze, but trained at the bottom of his glass. "I… I have been thinking… a lot," he started slowly. "About the time I've lost and… what I have missed while I was out…"

He fell silent and, unable to stand the tensed mood any longer, Buffy impatiently tried to cut to the chase. "You're wondering where to go from here?"

Angel looked up at her, holding her gaze for a bit longer than what felt comfortable. "Yes… and no." he said. "I'm wondering if there is anywhere for me to go from here."

Buffy furrowed her brows. A glance at Spike unexpectedly told her that he wasn't as puzzled by Angel's words as she was. "What do you mean? Of course, there is. You could stay with us, fight evil in San Francisco. Or you could go back to L.A. or wherever you want, really, get your old team back together."

"And then what?" Angel wanted to know. The lack of emotions in his voice disturbed Buffy.

"Well," she snorted humorlessly. "How the hell should I know? I can't predict your future."

"I think I'm beginning to see it pretty clearly." said Angel. "I could find my team, maybe I could even convince them to fight with me again. We could stop our fair share of evil, help making the world a slightly saver place and eventually, when they die or when they quit before they die, I could find a new team and do it all over again." He paused, letting his words sink in. Buffy stared at him, open-mouthed. "Or… I could help you… right now."

"Wh-What do you mean?" stuttered Buffy. "How would you help?"

"With a sacrifice."

Out of the corner of her eye, Buffy saw Spike move. He hung his head down, breathing for a beat and then looking up again. "You don't have to do this, mate."

"I think you know that I have to." Angel replied.

"No, w-wait a second, wait, a bloody, second," spluttered Buffy, getting agitated for not following the sense of the conversation. "What do you mean? What sacrifice?"

"I mean that I'm the reason this stopped." Angel gestured around. "Your normal life."

His reasoning slowly began to seep into Buffy's brain, but she cut those thoughts off before they could take root. "No!" she stated forcefully. "No, it hasn't. We still have a life. We're still together and we don't care in what way." With fearfully widened green eyes, Buffy looked at Spike. "Tell him!" she demanded.

"It's true, you know." Spike said dutifully and calm to Angel. "We don't care how. And we always knew it wouldn't last forever. This miracle that made me human. I'm just glad I got those ten years. That's more than any of our kind could ever dream of."

"Yes, but you could have more." argued Angel.

"I don't need it." Spike shot back quickly. "We don't need it."

"Maybe not yet. Maybe not even for a long while." Angel said, only talking to Spike now. "But eventually you'll have to watch your own son outgrow you. You'll have to watch them both grow old and die-"

"I'll go with them. That's already settled." Spike cut in because he couldn't bear to hear those words out loud.

"You could grow old with them!" Angel continued passionately over Spike's mumbling. "How can you possibly pass on that possibility and be fine with it?"

Spike looked up, glaring at him. "Because I don't want to murder you!" he said sharply.

"You won't have to. I'll go freely."

"NO, you won't!" Buffy exclaimed, bursting into the conversation again while shooting straight up from her chair, glaring daggers at Angel.

"Buffy, it's okay." Angel tried to tell her calmly, standing up, too, and reaching for her hand. She flinched back. "I've lived for more than 200 years. It has to be over some time. And I rather die for a good cause than by accident in a stupid fight with another demon."

"How can this be a good cause?" shouted Buffy. "I could never be happy again, knowing what you did for us! I couldn't live with the guilt!"

"I can't live on with the guilt of knowing that I've taken away a boy's father."

"Will still has a father!" argued Buffy heatedly, tears beginning to roll down her cheeks. "Spike still loves him. He always will and he'll always protect him. What more do we need?!"

"A father who won't burst into flames when he's playing in the sun with his son." Angel answered matter-of-factly, reminding everyone of what Will had said on Angel's first night with them. "Someone who can pick him up from school in the middle of the day. Someone who won't miss a single thing that boy does, because he sleeps during the day."

A shocked, final silence spread its tentacles from the center of the dining table to the darker edges of the living room. Buffy's mouth hung open, ready to argue, ready to scream, but Angel's face remained unworried and unchanged and Buffy couldn't think of anything to say without repeating herself.

Sharply, she turned towards Spike, lashing out with words. "Did you talk with him about this stuff? Did you cry to him about the things you can't do anymore, because you told me you were fine!"

"I…" Spike swallowed to wet his dry throat as Buffy's angry, desperate glare hit him. "I didn't- Not like that-" he tried to explain, but she cut him off.

"I thought you put his mind off of those thoughts! Were you lying about that to me, too? Did you want this to happen?"

"No!" Spike spoke up fiercely and hurt. "You bloody know I don't. You know!"

"It's not Spike's fault, Buffy." Angel tried to interfere. "If anything I just learned from him what's the right thing to do." He snorted dryly. "And I always thought he was the one who could learn from me. The reason he always followed me around and hung on every word. But he's much wiser than I gave him credit for. I may have excelled in teaching hate, but he understood love."

Angel looked at the couple and they stared back at him before looking at each other silently.

"I want to do this." he promised unshaken. "It's the right time and the right thing to do. Please… let me do this. Let me give you back your normal life."

Buffy stared at Angel through burning, watery eyes. She looked at Spike, so high-strung with emotions but he desperately tried to hide them for her sake. So she could let loose. Buffy's heart was beating violently in her chest, feeling like it was too narrow to contain it. Too overwhelmed to deal with it all, she turned and ran. The force with which she slammed the bedroom door shut sent shock-waves of vibration through the silent house and splintered the frame.

Spike moved to follow her, but Angel stopped him. "Give her a moment. It's… it's harder for her to understand. She hasn't lived as long as we have."

Worried, Spike kept his eyes trained down the hallway where Buffy disappeared, then, clenching his jaw he turned back to Angel. "Oh, believe me, she understands just fine. She was kind of undead once and had to find the will to live on."

"Still." claimed Angel. "It's different. Did you ever think of giving up living as a vampire?"

Spike scoffed. "Hell, yeah. Many times. Before I had my soul and I thought I truly loved her, but she didn't want me. Or when they put that sodding chip in my brain. I was bloody useless then."

"Ever had those thoughts when you had your soul?"

Spike looked away and nodded curtly. "Asked Buffy to end me." he murmured. "Couldn't stand the voices in my head. Didn't want to hurt anyone anymore. But she believed in me. She told me to fight." He looked up at Angel. "You don't have to do this, either. You're just feeling down because you watched us play happy family."

Angel shook his head softly. "That's not why I want to do it. Remember after your recorporealization when you told me I have to stop doing good to appeal to the powers that be and start doing it just for the sake of it?"

"Yeah?"

"Well, it took a while until I understood what the difference is, but I have tried, before the coma. I tried to listen to you even though it was hard not to think of a personal gain somewhere deep within. But this… now… it just feels right. Feels like I have to do it. Like I'm destined to do it, you know?"

Slowly, Spike nodded. "That's what I felt at the Hellmouth Battle in old Sunnydale." He stopped, all of a sudden, pushing his brows together. "Hm." he murmured, cocking his head as he was suddenly swept up by an idea.

"What?" asked Angel.

Spike blinked and looked at him again. "I just thought… maybe there's a way to make things a little easier on Buffy."

Curiously, Angel raised his brows and Spike started to explain.

Afterwards, Spike eventually sneaked up to the bedroom door, listening for sounds inside. Buffy was quiet, but he could hear the unsteady breathing of one that hasn't quite calmed from crying yet. "Buffy?" he asked, knocking gently at the door and causing it to swing open. The lock wasn't closing properly anymore since Buffy slammed it shut. "Can I come in, luv?"

She had pressed a pillow against her chest, laying with his back turned towards the door. Now that she heard him enter Buffy quickly sat up and glared at him out of wet eyes. "You're done talking now, are you? About the vampire stuff that I'm too young to understand. I hope you told him that his plan is insane and overdramatic and I won't let it happen. Did you tell him?"

"Oi, first you have to calm down, pet." he said gently, sitting at the end of the bed and reaching for her. But she slipped away.

"Don't patronize me!" she hissed, wiping an angry tear from her eye. "I swear, if you encouraged him-"

"Buffy." Spike exclaimed firmly to stop her railing and she stared at him, ready to break out in tears once more. But then she looked away, forcefully trying to pull herself together. "Look at me," he asked her softly and waited until she did so. "I know you're angry. And hurt. I understand why you're lashing out, but," he quickly continued before she could interrupt him. "Remember that day when we flew to Los Angeles to help Angel and I was worried that this connection between him and me would eventually stand between us… and you told me it wouldn't. You said you'll love me. Always."

Buffy kept quiet, sullenly grinding her teeth. Spike reached for her hand again and she let him hold on to her this time. He locked eyes with her, his blue gaze burning earnestly.

"I would never hurt you. I know how much he still means to you and I promise that I never encouraged him in any way. This was his decision alone. I didn't know that he was seriously thinking about ending it. I swear." He squeezed her hand. "Buffy, you know this, right? I wouldn't hurt you. I wouldn't." Spike pledged again.

Buffy's lip wobbled, but refusing to breakdown once more she threw her body forward instead and into Spike's arms. He caught her and she cuddled close, burying her head against his chest. "I know, Spike. I do. I'm just…" she clenched her hand around his shirt. "I can't live with this. I can't. Knowing what he'd do for us. Please, you have to stop him."

"I'm afraid he made up his mind, pet." said Spike, stroking over her hair and kissing it softly. "He said it's his destiny. He wants to do good."

"Ugh, he and his bloody destiny. It's stupid. He's stupid."

"I know, that's what I always told you."

"Stop it." she grunted, but with no real venom in it.

"Sorry." he murmured, kissing her head again. "Now, listen, I did have a talk with him. I couldn't convince him to reconsider, but I've had an idea…"

Only one more chapter to go! Please review! :)