Chapter One Hundred and Forty Eight

History

San Francisco, the world without shrimp - March 2007

Spike stared down at his hands, his black nail polish was a week old and chipping at the edges. He sucked through through his teeth, the sun was rising and he was out of cigarettes. Everything was not how he planned it. He was mad, fists banging against the wall mad. Until there was blood cracking on his knuckles and a rippling purple bruise ripe on the back of his hand. "Bitches!" He cried, collapsing onto the floor, his head pounding, his hand aching. Nothing worked.

About an hour later he was wishing Buffy or Dawn or anyone else was there to hold him. Buffy. When he thought about it made him feel better. If only a little. He held his head in his hands, and he saw her face. Her pale skin and sunken eyes and dark hair across her shoulders. Drusilla's whiny voice haunted him. He had to find her, whatever they had was long gone now. He had to find her and kill her and then it would be over.

He got up and stormed out of the crypt. His duster swaying behind him violently.

When Spike slammed his bloody fist down on the bar top at the bartender shivered a little. The demon at the end of the bar shook, before running out of the building. Spike snarled and bared his fangs, the rest of the vampires and demons and witches and small fearful humans who were down for a good time, fled the scene. It was just him and the bartender now. The quivering guy with the rag and tha glass between his palms. "Wha-wha-whad-do-ya want Spike?" He said, looking at his feet.

"What I want! Is to not feel this anymore." He pointed to his head and then grabbed the bartender by his collar. "Do you understand? The pain in my head. It's not going away. Tell me how to find her!"

"Erm, excuse me, Mr Spike." The bartender chirped, Spike was gripping harder and harder on his collar, his throat started to close, the air becoming precious. "Who. Is. She?" He squeaked.

"Drusilla." Spike replied, "vampire, vixen, woman who is driving me mad. I want her finished. But I have to find her. Where is she?" He let the bartender's collar go lax a little, he took a big gulp of air and started spluttering. He was a demon, this bartender. A guy Spike often got his more mind-draining beverages from. Things that made him forget when the guilt crept up on him. Things to forget what he'd done, now that it was all running around inside his head again.

"Okay, alright. I'll find your girl, I promise. But it's gonna cost ya." He was pushing his luck, but what else was it worth. What else did he have to lose? Most likely if he survived this someone else would come along and beat him up next month. At least Spike gave a good pay out whenever he wanted something. Spike rummaged in his pockets and pulled out a few fifties, slamming them on the counter top beside the bartender's hand.

"Find her." He said before turning on his heels and lighting a cigarette. The smoke rippled in the air around his head and made his bombshell hair a little brighter.

"She's on the west side of town." The bartender let out, his eyes opening suddenly as he recoiled from his vision. He could sense people, detect them using his mind, if he had a strong enough connection. And well, Spike and Drusilla had spent enough time with each other over the last century to qualify, apparently.

Spike looked up from the newspaper he was scouring through, "she's here?"

"Yeah, she's staying in an abandoned building off Clayton Street." Then he stopped, turned to the vampire and said, "can I have my money now?"

Spike stood up abruptly, his limbs like rubber and shrugged, "it's yours mate." Then he stalked out of the bar and headed for Clayton Street. He wondered how she'd done this? Why? Dru was almost-sane at the best of times, there probably wasn't a logical explanation. Maybe a wacky plan to win him back. But what was the point? Surely she knew he was a slave to the slayer? That was never going to change. He loved her. He loved her more than he'd loved anyone, even Dru. He'd won his soul back for her. Surely Drusilla knew there was no going back from that.

"Grandmother why?!" Drusilla cried, collapsing onto her heels. She stared up at the version of Darla her crazy mind had created. She was dressed in red, a dark bloodied dress she'd torn from a girl not unlike herself. "No! I want this! I need this! I have to have it!" She rocked back and forth on her knees, not looking at the bleak walls around her. She closed her eyes and bowed her head to the floor. She didn't want to see. She didn't want to argue. She wanted to do the ritual, make him hers again. She wanted her grandmother to be proud.

Darla said some inaudible words, unreal words, words that would make no sense had they been spoken aloud. Drusilla wailed into the floor, her knuckles dragging over the concrete. She whined like a small child, her head telling her she couldn't do it today, it wouldn't let her. It was turning her over in circles, pain and pain and more pain just for fun. She licked her lips, nibbling just until she drew blood. A quick snack. She thought all was lost, time for a snooze, or a dance? She couldn't tell.

The doors slammed open. "DRUSILLA!" Spike screamed. "I'M GONNA BLOODY KILL YOU!"

*Flashback* Prague, the world without shrimp - 1997

"Dru!" Spike called down the alley, he was lost and alone and slapping his head against the wall because they'd taken her and he didn't know what he was going to do to get her back. "I can't do this without you Dru! Why'd you have to go and get taken?!" He hit the brickwork with his fist and strode off into the dark. A rat following him just to find a meal.

He found her a few hours later, weak and alone. Dumped outside a warehouse, they must've thought she wasn't worth killing, too insane, an example to other vampires. Spike found her captor lurking, counting money, his leather jacket rubbing against an old table. He stormed over to him, twisting his head so far round it was barely still attached. This man had taken Drusilla. He wasn't worthy of being drained. Spike just wanted him gone from this Earth. He picked up Drusilla like a bride and stowed her away on a boat to America. They were going to the Hellmouth. They were going to find the slayer. They were going to get Dru's strength back. Or at least, that's what Spike told himself as he kissed her forehead and swayed her and told her "everything would be alright, pet."

"Spike?" Drusilla whimpered. "Where are we?" She whispered close to his chest, his hand in her hair, a cut on her forehead crusty with dried blood.

"We're doing fine, pet. We're just gonna take a little boat ride. You like boats, nice little pretty boats all in a row." He was paraphrasing. But it did the trick, Dru just moaned quietly and laid back against him.

San Francisco, the world without shrimp - March 2007

Drusilla had been so confident, so damning the last time Spike saw her. She was squatting on the floor, her head bent over, and cackling. She was giggling a high pitched squeak at him, her lungs overexpanding so she sounded breathy and wrong. Spike stood in front of her unamused but frozen. How was he supposed to react to this? She looked like she had after Prague, weak and broken. Like he could kill her with one fell swoop. Easy as pie.

But he couldn't. Not now, not after seeing this. Something inside of him broke down. He'd been so angry, but seeing her made it all disappear. She was cuckoo-bananas, Buffy would say. And Buffy wouldn't kill her either. So he backed down. He left his cool where he couldn't lose it and slouched against the wall and waited for her to stop. Then they could have a little talk.

The next thing he knew he was tied to a pole.

He'd only closed his eyes for a second, just a second and then her hands were on him. Tying him to post, his wrists bound in rope so tight he could feel it constricting. Some kind of magic, Spike knew. He hated magic. All it did was cover up the things you were trying to hide. Willow used it for good, but sometimes it backfired. Jenny used it for bad and she didn't get very far either. Buffy was too good. Spike opened his eyes slowly, his eye ached like someone had taken a very large hammer to it. Then he saw the bloody thing on the floor which just confirmed it. Drusilla was nowhere to be seen, and frankly this was not how he'd anticipated this moment going. He thought it was going to be swift and easy, in and out.

He tried the ropes again, yelling profanities when it only hurt him further. He was spitting blood onto the floor when Drusilla reentered the room. She sidled up to him like she didn't need to walk. Like she was floating on water. She held a cold blade to his throat, slicing the finer layers of his skin and drawing a slick line of blood. "I don't want to do this, Spike. Grandmother told me not to," she said.

Spike shook his head, "Darla? Dru, love. She's long gone. Where's your head?" He recoiled at calling her love. There was nothing but selfish greed.

"No she's in 'ere." Dru replied, pointing at her head, pressing the dagger a little further into his throat.

"Do you mind?" Spike looked down, his eyes flicking.

"No, sorry. It's what she orders."

"What is going on? Finally decided to get rid of me?"

"I don't want to do this, Spike. Keep talking and you'll make me." Dru stared at him with darkness in her eyes. The kind of craziness you could see, the kind that made your insides turn. "I want you to stay very still." She continued, one hand on his chest, the other on the blade. Spike began to cry out, like she was forcing her fist into her chest.

"What the...?" He yelled out, "DRU!" He lifted his knee slowly, and moved his hands so he was in a better position to defend himself.

"Have to get it out. That's what grandmother said, what she told me. Have to take it away. Make you bad again. Make you my big bad." Drusilla kept on pushing, further and further until Spike was sure there wasn't anywhere left to go. He was bound at the wrists but his legs were free, so he brought his knee up sharply between her legs and she doubled over. "No you don't. Spike?" She looked up at him pitifully, "no you can't." But he didn't have a stake, only the blade Dru had dropped into the movement. He tugged, looking down at his chest, but he could no longer tell she'd been inside him, there was no blood, no hole, no marks. He leaned down and pulled the dagger towards him with the edge of his foot, lifting it high enough so he could grab it with his hand and thus free himself.

He started slicing, forcing the fraying fibres of the rope apart. Despite the enchantments, it seemed to be coming undone. Zero points to magic, one point to Spike. He lunged forward, bending over Drusilla and taking the dagger into his palm. The silver was warm. What'd Dru done to it? She was room temperature, she couldn't make it warm with just her palm. He laughed cruelly, something was different now. Something dark had crept in with Dru's hand, something uncontrollable and evil. But it wasn't a disease, it was something worse. Something breaking him from the inside. He held his head for a moment, a thick pounding ensuing whilst he handled the dagger. Drusilla was still cowering on the floor, weeping from the kick, the plan didn't matter now. It didn't matter that she'd botched it up, he'd betrayed her. At least in her mind. He'd kicked her, that wasn't love. That was disgust, hate. She couldn't handle Spike not loving her anymore, it simply broke her.

But Spike didn't care anymore. She'd been driving him mad for months, those dreams his every waking nightmare. She'd been torturing him. That wasn't fair. He pressed the knife to her chest, it wouldn't kill her but it would hurt like hell. He pushed it further, cruelly, like she had. Torturing for a moment before stabbing it violently into her chest until it clicked against bone. Her sternum providing armour, but it cracked slowly. Spike pulled his hand away, his throat ached, but he ignored it. Only slurping a little of the blood from his fingers. He stepped over Dru's wailing body and strolled out of the warehouse. He left her there. The dagger in her chest, blood dripping onto the floor. Hands splayed out like she was spent, but really she was tired, too sad to get up.

Spike crashed through the doors. The sickening hole in his chest screaming. He felt his soul tearing itself apart, the pieces splitting onto sides and two armies preparing for war. He smiled for the first time in months, guilt leaving him, joy creeping back in. He wanted a body, somebody to drink from. He found he didn't care what Buffy thought. Didn't even care that they were fighting. He was ready for a kill, and yelling, "I'm back baby," into the night.