Chapter Thirteen: Et Tu, Damon?
Once night fell, Spike hit the streets. Though he knew he should have spent the afternoon planning out strategies with Vincent, like he had intended to, Spike had instead hidden himself away in his room. He had been too distraught to arouse any sort of interest in his clan or even in that night’s mission to reclaim the warehouse. He had just sat on the floor, leaning against the badly painted wall, staring into the dark empty room with a mind void of any real thought. He had sat there like a lump, hating himself, smoking his whole pack of cigarettes and finishing off every last drop of bourbon in his flask. A whole day wasted away in self-loathing. Now, he was outside, making his way down the deserted streets of Sunnydale, with the stars glittering above him. Spike couldn’t help but feel like they were mocking him with all their cheerful twinkling.
The vampire made his way down the street, his mood somber as he headed to the west side of town. He assumed Vincent and his gang were waiting for him; he never really did follow up on if Damon had delivered the message. At the moment, he didn’t really care. Spike just wanted to get there, deal with it, then go back to his room and wallow for as long as he possibly could.
It was his town; well half of it was anyway, so he didn’t mind leaving the house all on his own. Maybe he should be more vigilant, but again, he just didn’t care. Perhaps Spike was looking for a good brawl; he definitely needed to let off some steam. If someone or something was stupid enough to attack him, it was their funeral.
Drawing his black leather duster tighter around him, Spike tried to blend into the shadows. His thoughts weren’t so much focused on his surroundings as they were on a certain blond haired girl who he had terribly wronged. He still couldn’t believe what had happened that morning. How could he have said those things to her? Bowing his head in shame, he trudged along down the road. Gone was his usual confident swagger, replaced instead with a gloomy march, his entire being saturated with melancholy.
Spike quickened his pace. He just wanted this night to be over with.
Turning a corner, he took a few shortcuts through the backstreets, jumping over chain-linked fences and leaping from rooftops. He soon found himself near the border, snaking around the town’s many streets and their adjoining alleyways. Spike was making his way past one specific alley that looked no different from any of the others, when something he heard coming from within caught his attention. Veering off-track, Spike slowly crept toward the sound, peering over the edge of the wall to see what was hidden within the blackness of the alley.
Scanning for a few seconds, his vampire eyes finally focused on two struggling forms. He could hear cries of despair as the strong stench of blood and fear hit him like a ton of bricks. Spike also heard muffled threats and the sounds of flesh being slapped with an open hand. Someone was getting manhandled, he deduced.
Before he knew what he was doing, Spike was making his way into dark alley. He could see dark brown hair swaying frantically as a girl tried to pry herself out of some smelly bugger’s grip. She seemed desperate to get away but she wasn’t screaming for help. Made perfect sense, to Spike anyway. You start hollering for help, you’re more likely to attract some of the nasties that roam these parts than some Good Samaritan who’d be willing to risk his neck to save you.
Spike picked up on the scent of alcohol mixed in with the fear and blood. Usually he would relish in this kind of mayhem, the demon in him exhilarated by the potential hunt and violence. This time however, his mind could only focus on the little whimpers of fear that echoed throughout the cold dank alley. It was too familiar. Her cries were pounding into his head and he just wanted to make it stop.
Reaching out, Spike grabbed the sad excuse for a demon by the neck, easily flinging the lout off of the girl. He crashed into the opposite wall; the sound of his bones crunching reverberated through the suspenseful silence. Spike peeked down at the unconscious, and might he add, quite ripe smelling vamp. Hold on a sec? Spike was definitely off his game. Human. The asshole was human. The cornucopia of smells must have masked the guy’s true scent. For some reason in his mind, Spike could have sworn he had seen a defenseless blond girl getting attacked by a vampire. Wait. Blond? ‘Mind’s playin’ tricks on you again, mate. It’s not her. Totally different chit. Not to mention the fact that this one’s a brunette.’
Spike turned his head back to the fallen and beaten girl. Taking a whiff of the air, he confirmed that they were both human. What the hell were two humans doing in this part of town?
Glancing up at the wall he had thrown the thug against, Spike saw the neon glowing sign. It all started to make sense. The Lupanar. It was a clandestine brothel that catered to both humans and demons alike, and was one of Sunnydale’s best kept dirty secrets. The place was a landmark in the town’s demon underground, established long before Spike had ever set foot in Sunnydale. The Gyrnel demon that owned the place was generous enough to take in Spike’s vamps as clientele, so long as none of the girls ended up dead. That was pretty much how this place ran. For the right price, you could do whatever you wanted, just don’t kill or permanently scar the girls. But what wasn’t making much sense to Spike was that The Lupanar usually employed these giant meat-headed bouncers to keep a watchful eye over the merchandise and the assorted customers. All hell usually broke loose if anyone even tried to step out of line. How this pissant human had somehow managed to drag out a girl without anyone even noticing was beyond him. Spike shrugged at the mystery. Didn’t matter now. She was safe.
Speaking of which, Spike peered down only to see a mass of long curly chestnut hair and quivering skinny limbs. She was still crying. He didn’t understand why. No bug ugly was gonna touch her now. Shrugging again, Spike started to walk away. He felt the girl tug on his leg, refusing to let go. Getting a little bored with the whole situation, he looked back down at her, ready to tell the girl to buck up and bugger off. He stopped himself when he saw her huge glistening green eyes.
“Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. God, thank you so much,” the girl incoherently rambled, as she continued to kneel by his feet.
Well this was different. Spike wasn’t used to girls praising him. They usually scurried away from him, screaming at the top of their lungs. They didn’t look up at him like he was their bloody Lord and Savior. Spike stepped away from her, needing to distance himself from the unfamiliar feeling of accomplishment that was suddenly weighing down on his chest. God, why did the girl suddenly look so much like Buffy?
“No problem, pet. Just go on and get your precious self back inside,” Spike said, surprised at how soothing his voice was.
The girl vigorously nodded, sniffling and wiping away her tears. She stood up and made her way to the brothel’s back door, the sign’s buzzing fluorescent glow lighting up the small steps that lead up to the rear entrance. Opening the door, she turned back to Spike with a smile that seemed so out of place against her swollen and bleeding face. “If only we had more guys like you around here,” she commented as she slipped into the building.
Spike wondered if he had fallen into some alternate dimension. When did he start saving damsels in distress? What had possessed him to get involved? What the hell was happening to him? If any of his vamps found out what he had just done, he wouldn’t only lose all his creditability as their leader but he’d be the utter laughing stock of the entire clan. He could just hear the nickname now: William the White Hat. Why couldn’t he have just walked away?
‘You bloody well know why, you ponce!’ he internally reprimanded. An image of those sparkling green eyes flew into his head. The sounds of crying filled his ears. Buffy. It was always because of Buffy. The thought of her in this exact same alley, getting pawed at by some drunken oaf made Spike want to retch. Is that what she had looked like when his minions had caught her? So helpless and scared?
Spike stepped out of the alleyway and back onto the empty street. With his hands tucked into the pockets of his duster, he continued on. He wasn’t too far from the warehouse. Just a few more blocks really. The vampire stopped for a second and pulled out his pack of cigarettes. Empty. Great. He was dying for a fag to smoke out his jitters. Taking in a deep breathe, he took a moment to sit down on a wooden crate that was by the wall of some factory. Glancing around, he realized he was suddenly in the town’s industrial district.
Spike didn’t know what to feel. He should be disgusted with himself. Honestly, who’d ever heard of a vampire helping the helpless? Spike ran his hands over his face. But he wasn’t disgusted. If anything, he felt good knowing Buffy would be proud of him. In theory, she would have been proud. Now, he wasn’t so sure. The last words he had spoken to her had cemented his fate. She was never going to be proud of him and she was certainly never going to forgive him if he went back to her with blood on his hands. He could picture Buffy in his thoughts, the look of pure and unadulterated revulsion on her face. The whole argument replayed in his head. Spike never wanted to see her like that again. He didn’t want to be the cause of her pain anymore. He just wanted things to go back to the way they were before. Before he had opened his gob and destroyed the only bit of happiness left in their mostly miserable lives.
That was it. Spike decided. To hell with the consequences. He wasn’t going to go through with the counter-attack. He’d still go to warehouse but he was going to call the whole thing off. Make up some excuse, like Damon had fabricated the whole thing to try to create a new riff between the leader and his clan. Yeah, that was believable, right? Spike would order everyone off on their merry way and make his own way back home. He would go straight to Buff’s room where, after explaining to her that he had cancelled the raid, he would crawl on his hands and knees and beg for her forgiveness. Spike knew he didn’t deserve it, but he prayed to whichever god it was that was messing with his life to get her to just listen to him.
“Better get going,” Spike thought out loud, feeling as though a weight had been lifted. Sliding off of the crate, he headed to the warehouse, his eyes being able to make out the silhouette of the condemned building against the backdrop of the night sky. Spike consciously rearranged his posture. ‘Can’t have any one suspectin’ the Big Bad’s gone soft,’ he reflected.
Shaking his head at the absurdity of it all, he looked up to the sky. ‘Buffy, what have you done to me?’
Swaggering towards the front entrance, he perked up his senses to pick up on Vincent or his vamps. Strangely, he couldn’t sense any of them. Instead, he caught wind of another vampire. One who just that morning had refused to go anywhere near the warehouse.
“Damon? What the hell are you doing here?” Spike wondered, as he walked toward the dark vampire.
Damon, whose presence was illuminated by a nearby functioning lampost, was lounging about on the front stone steps of the warehouse’s main entrance. Jumping to his feet and with a spring in his step, he made his way closer to Spike. “Surprised to see me?” he asked with a sinister-looking grin on his face.
“Yeah…What happened to not wanting to clean up my mess?” Spike asked, eyeing Damon as he edged closer to him.
“Change of heart I guess,” Damon casually stated. His superficial tone set off silent alarms in the back of Spike’s head.
“‘S that right?” Spike asked, taking a few hesitant steps toward Damon.
“Uh huh,” Damon casually replied, stopping a few feet from Spike.
“Where’s Vincent?” Spike inquired, glancing around.
“He’s not coming,” Damon answered, smiling widely at Spike’s malcontent reaction.
“Why the hell not?” Spike vehemently asked, his jaw clenching at Damon’s clear display of disobedience.
“I didn’t tell him to meet us here,” the dark vampire responded, carelessly examining his hand as Spike fumed at him just a few paces away.
Spike angrily stepped toward Damon, pointing his finger at him. “I’ve just had about enough of you, you pillock! The raid is officially off. You better hope Natasha held onto that whip she likes so much. If not, she’ll have to find a new one. And you know how much fun she gets outta breakin’ ‘em in,” Spike sneered threateningly, watching Damon recoil a little.
Damon shook off the threat, regaining his composure and resuming the menacing smirk he usually sported. He suddenly started to laugh. Spike watched, completely baffled; Damon’s impudence was completely inexplicable and absolutely inexcusable. Nevertheless, the black haired vampire continued to chuckle, clearly mocking Spike. “You’re so sure of yourself, aren’t you?” he asked, his voice still light and giddy.
“What the fuck are you blathering on about?” Spike was used to Damon’s rebellious ways, but this was beyond rebellion, this was pure insubordination.
“Well, you seem to think that I would actually waste my time and play messenger boy for you. Why should I go trouble Vincent when this catastrophe is all your fault?” Damon wondered, his tone steady and fearless.
“Because I bloody well ordered you to!” Spike roared, his voice breaking through the night’s silence.
Damon laughed again. “Oh Spike. See that’s what you’re not getting. Why should I follow your orders?” he asked, reclining on the lamp post he was standing by.
“You have some nerve. You follow my orders ‘cos ‘m your fucking leader!” Spike gritted out, livid with the vampire he had once considered worthy enough to be one of his seconds-in-command.
Damon’s strolled over to Spike, his mood more calm and serious, the laughter still there but only in his grey eyes. Standing face to face with his leader and spotting the ice cold fury in Spike’s azure glare, Damon smirked. “Not for long.”
Spike didn’t fully understand the meaning of Damon’s statement. Glancing away as Damon took a step back, Spike’s mind grappled with what he had just heard. Looking back up and seeing Damon’s smug face, Spike suddenly knew something was very wrong. Before he could reply, the net dropped.
Thrashing wildly, his gaze never left Damon’s as at least ten humans ambushed him. He knocked two to the ground, but the rest kept a strong hold on the net. Roaring like a rabid animal, Spike struggled against those who were trying to restrain him.
“DAMON!” Spike screamed as the treacherous vampire arrogantly smiled, menacingly waving goodbye as he slowly faded away into the shadows.
Spike kept on fighting. He could feel himself getting brutally hit; fists, kicks, blunt objects. It didn’t deter him though. All he could think of was Buffy. He wasn’t going to be there, which meant that she was going to be auctioned off to the highest bidder. Damon had betrayed him and was no doubt heading to the house. He was going to go after Buffy and Spike wasn’t going to be there to protect her.
A jolt of electricity shot right through him. His body tensed as he rigidly collapsed to the ground. He groaned loudly from the pain but it hadn’t been enough to knock him out. Gazing up through the holes of the net, he saw the face of a man he’d thought he’d never see again. The word ‘Watcher’ crossed his mind as another jolt sent him into a dark oblivion.
TBC