The phone rang four times before the familiar deep voice could be heard across the wire.
"Hello?" A slightly annoyed and obviously awakened Angel mumbled.
"Things aren't working here," Spike began without preamble. "He's not adjusting at all. What the fuck am I supposed to do?"
The dark-haired vampire was instantly more alert. "Tell me exactly what happened," he demanded quickly.
"Nothing. Everything. He attacked that demon bint he was seeing before. Didn't kill her, though. Didn't even hurt her. I got here in time to stop him from ripping her throat out, but not before he could scare her half to death. He's out of control. His soul's not powerful enough to stop the demon from doing just about anything it wants, and because of the soul his demon won't submit completely to me, either. It's the first time I let him out of the bloody apartment and this happens. I knew he wasn't ready. I don't know what to do next." With each word, the agitated blond's voice became calmer and more controlled. Finding Anya and Xander like that had shocked and alarmed the younger man. He had up until that point believed that he could trust Xander, at least around the brunette's friends. Now it was clear that Xander couldn't be trusted at all.
There was silence on the other end of the line as Angel took a minute to digest this. "Where is he now?" he asked eventually.
"In the other room.
"Keep an eye on him. Make sure he stays with you at all times. I'll be there as soon as I can, but there's only an hour until dawn now, so I can't leave here until tonight. Be careful until then, okay?"
"You know, Angelus, I have made other childer before. I think I know how -"
"But how many of them had souls, Spike?" Angel interrupted. "Xander is different. His demon took control and almost killed someone that his soul cares about. He's going to be feeling incredibly guilty right now, and if you don't handle this just right there's no telling what he might try to do to himself as penance. Just...be careful."
"You said that already. Look, we'll both be all right when you haul your fat arse up here. Don't worry about us." With that, the blond abruptly hung up the phone and stalked into the living room to check on Xander. Despite what he had said to the older vampire he was becoming deeply concerned by his Sire's reminder that Xander's soul might react badly to what was, really, a small incident. Spike remembered that in his first month as a vampire at least a hundred people had met spectacularly brutal ends at his hands. One near-kill was nothing in comparison. Of course, the soul might not see it that way.
Muttering under his breath about the inherent unnaturalness of a vampire with a soul, the blue-eyed demon stopped short when he realized that the living room was empty. Not only that, but the entire apartment was empty. Xander was gone.
*********
Because Spike had not actually been the vampire that sired Xander, there was no strong psychic connection between them. Neither could sense when the other was near. Spike was especially cursing this turn of events as he raced out of the apartment building, trying frantically to recall any and every place that the fledgling vampire might have gone. Usually he would assume the whelp would want to be with his friends, but after what had just happened that had to be the last place Xander would go. His mind came up blank when he tried to consider other possibilities. Even the Bronze was closed at that late hour. Xander had only had a ten or fifteen minute start on him, but the fact that there was less than an hour until dawn meant that the blond didn't have time for guessing games. He had to find the brunette, and fast.
Eighteen minutes later Spike was pounding on the same dorm room door that he had been outside two weeks earlier, the night this had all began.
This time it was a sleepy looking Tara who answered his knock, her eyes widening in alarm as soon as she saw Spike's own worried expression. She opened the door all the way and invited the vampire in without even thinking about it. Willow was sitting up in bed, blinking as the light from the hallway blinded her.
"Spike, what's wrong?" Tara asked behind him, her quiet voice revealing her unspoken fear.
"It's Xander. He's missing. I need to know where he'd go."
"What happened?" Willow finally managed.
Spike's impatience began to get the better of him as he glared at the two young women. "I don't have time to sit here and tell the whole bloody story. There was ...an incident. He didn't actually hurt anyone but he almost did, and now me and the great poof are worried he might offer himself up as some kind of eternal atonement. Some kind of martyr for the Whitehats and all, self-sacrifice above all else. Where would he go?"
Willow contemplated this question for half a minute before her eyes lit up. "The roof. Did you check the roof?"
Spike just stared at her, confused. "The roof of what?"
"Of his apartment building. Xander once spent an entire afternoon trying to break the lock on the door that led up there. He wanted to do it in a way that no one would notice, so that he could go and sit out there whenever he wanted to be by himself. That's where he is."
She said it with such certainty that Spike didn't even bother asking her to name any other places. He simply turned on his heel and rushed back in the direction he had just come from.
All of his spidey senses were tingling by the time the tall building finally came into view. It was very close to dawn now, time for good vampires to be curling up in bed. Instead, Spike ran up the nine flights of stairs as quickly as possible, that much closer to the coming sun.
As predicted, Xander sat alone on the flat cement surface, facing the east with a blank expression on his face. He didn't turn around until the blond was halfway across the distance that separated them, but one look at his vacant expression made Spike stop where he was.
"What do you want, Spike?" the brunette asked in a flat, dead tone which was nothing like the Xander that Spike had known.
The older man was uncertain how to best handle the situation. In the end, he resorted to the bullying attitude which he had always worn around Xander before they had first gone to bed together. "It's almost dawn you stupid git. We need to get inside. Now."
In response, the slayerette simply turned back around and studied the sky in front him, ignoring his adopted Sire.
Spike hesitantly began walking forward again, uncertain of what Xander's reaction might be. This caution proved to be the best course of action as the dark-eyed man soon whirled around, pulling a wooden stake from his pocket and brandishing it at the blond.
"Don't try to stop me, Spike. I know what I have to do. I'm a danger to every human in Sunnydale. It's either this or sitting around, waiting for the demon to kill someone so that Buffy has to come and stake me." The young man took an unneeded breath, then looked squarely at Spike. "You'd better get inside, though. Not much use in us *both* becoming piles of dust."
Behind him, the first rays of the sun were just beginning to peek over the horizon.
Without even thinking about what he was doing, the older vampire swiftly darted forward, grabbing the taller man around the waist in a quasi-tackle before the brunette realized what was happening. The force of the blow tumbled both men over the edge of the roof and sent them hurtling toward the street, nine floors below and safely shadowed from the harmful dawn.
Xander landed first with a sickening CRUNCH on the pavement, Spike's grip on his torso never loosening, even as the blond vampire landed directly on top of him. After a minute, the Englishman slowly got to his feet, gathering the unconscious and broken childe in his arms. Eventually he was able to carry the still form back into the lobby of the apartment building.