By Melissa Anderson
E-mail: missya@jps.net
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Buffy/Spike
Improv 26: Darkfic
Disclaimer: These characters are not mine, they belong to people much
richer and more powerful than me.
Spoilers: "The Gift"
Archive: Sure, just let me know where I can visit it.
Author's Notes: Alternate Universe. In my little world "The Gift"
ended with Dawn's death, not Buffy's.
Thanks to Robert Smith and "39" for the inspiration.
I stare at the gash she's made in her wrist. Her own pearly whites
tore the skin open. Just a tiny tear really. Not big enough to bleed
out. She won't die from the wound, if that's what she's after. No
quick death for her. Torture, torment, these are what she wants. What
she believes she deserves.
She offers me her weeping wrist.
"Here Spike, drink."
Welcome to hell.
Her voice is an autumn leaf, dry and crumbling. "It won't hurt me."
So therefore it won't hurt me? Is that the implication? She's bloody
well wrong there. Since Dawn's death everything hurts.
"No." The calmness of my voice surprises me. The demon roars and
rattles the bars of his cage, but doesn't emerge. My restraint is
really quite impressive if I do say so. The warm, earthy tang of
Slayer's blood assaults my nostrils. Fuck all, I'm starved.
"You're starving, Spike."
"I'm all right." I lie.
"You're lying. You haven't left this house in… how many days has it
been?"
"I'm fine, Buffy." But a little taste would be so fucking nice.
Looking down at the wan moon of her face, glowing even in the dimness
of her living room, I want to cry again. I haven't shed this many
tears since I was turned. Bleeding poof.
We've been holed up here in her house, her mother's house, for four
days. It seems like a lot longer. Only four days since the end of the
world as we know it was averted. Only four days since she let her
sister die. Only four days since she locked herself up in this empty
house and cut herself off from the world. She's sent everyone away;
Willow, Xander, Giles. Everyone except me.
Two fat drops of her blood have circled around her wrist and drop,
slow and thick like molasses, onto the carpet.
Spun gold between my fingers, blanketing the midnight of my clothes.
She's been laying here on the sofa, her head in my lap, all morning,
silent since my failed attempt to get her to eat some soup last
night. She's still stubborn as a mule, and no amount of pleading,
bribery, or threats could get her to do what she doesn't want to.
She sits up beside me. The dead gaze she fixes on me reminds me how
much she's lost. Not only her mum and her sis, but herself. Her eyes
are lost and empty now. A stranger's eyes. I miss the slayer. I miss
the fire. This sad, stranger sitting mutely beside me wears Buffy's
skin, but there is nothing left of her fight, her passion.
The fire is almost out and there's nothing left to burn.
Of course, I wish things had gone differently. I promised to protect
the nibblet with my life, and, well… I'm still here and she's not, so
you can see how well that all worked out.
This has been one too many sacrifices for the slayer. She is just a
girl after all. Not a super-hero, not a god. And now, I might never
again see the rage gleam in her eyes, the glare, like finely polished
pewter, when she's pummeling the bloody hell out of some poor git,
usually me. If I'm lucky me. That's the Buffy I miss most.
Does she see my sadness mirrored back to her? My hunger? Holding her
head up is suddenly too much for her. She lays her head on my
shoulder and exhales a heavy sigh.
"Don't you die on me too, Spike." So much misery in that small voice.
I used to love misery.
I refrain from stating the obvious, about already being dead and all.
Instead, I sit with her in silence. I am going to have to go out and
get some blood, and soon, but I can't bring myself to leave her
alone. I could call Red about making a delivery. Of all the Scoobies,
she'd be the least likely to give me shit over being here. No. I
don't want anyone here, not even Willow. Maybe Buffy will come out
with me. I can hold out 'til dusk. It would do her good to get out of
this house, take in a little night air. Oh, who am I kidding, she's
not up to going anywhere yet.
The gash in her wrist is clotting. The streaks of blood that circle
around and end abruptly where the drops fell, are drying into rusty-
brown stripes.
Like a dream of a Buffy I never imagined would ever exist, she
reaches up and caresses the side of my face. Like the Buffy from my
deepest fantasy made manifest, her hand cups my cheek and rests
there, tenderly, gently. I close my eyes and accept the comfort her
touch brings. I'd like to believe this to be a gesture of genuine
affection, but I know better.
Like tiny spiders, her fingers crawl up into my hair. The wound is
moving closer and closer to my mouth. She's pressing the closing cut
against my lips now. Exactly who is the demon here?
Liquid fire on my tongue as it laps flat against the healing cut. A
rush of warmth and power surges through my cold body with this tiny
taste of Slayer blood, a promise of the bigger and better still to
come, if I just latch on and go for the ride. Slayer blood, nothing
like it in this or any other world. Vampire ambrosia.
Me, I'm Mr. Passive. Not moving in for the kill, not pushing her away
in righteous indignation, merely resting my face against her wrist as
she holds it there. She holds it there. She is in the driver's seat.
Kind of like turning the asylum keys over to the crazies. And what
exactly is the correct etiquette for a vampire in this situation? Hmm?
Feed. Kill.
Oh yeah, that's it… but I can't, and it's not just the possible pain
from the chip that stops me.
Her finger and thumb are twisting a stray lock of hair at my temple.
I'm breathing in the scent of her blood, her flesh, her tears, the
loss and despair she wears like expensive perfume, it's all melded
together with my own scent. I'm all over her, all over this house,
and I have to admit, I love it. I am her companion, in this her
darkest hour. I am her protector. I am her savior.
Buffy never would have allowed any of this, but this shadow image,
this haunt of the old Buffy is willing to turn her back on what she
knows is right, for what? My welfare? I'm not that big a fool. This
dark descent has nothing to do with me, this is all about her and her
failure.
So, now what?
If I do this, if I let her do this, will she snap out of it? Will she
snap my neck? Will the fire come back to her eyes? It's not that I've
got a death wish or anything, but me a pile of dust on the blood
stained wall-to-wall would be a fair trade for having the old Buffy
back. Or, will this extinguish the last bit of fire inside her?
Why the fuck do I care?
I grab her hand a little too roughly. Twist her arm with a little too
much force. Pull her body into my lap. Willing. Voluntary. Weird. I
was never one for the groupies.
A bit of probing with the tip of my tongue is all it takes to open
the healing wound.
Oh dear god.
I'm a fool. This fire could never be out. This girl is fire.
Molten lava coats my tongue and throat. The pain as the first trickle
of her blood hits my gut has nothing to do with the chip in my head.
No, this ache is ancient. The hunger for the live, pumping blood of a
human, the need that is everything to my kind.
If I didn't already know I was this girl's bitch, the liquid fire
that is her blood brands her mark on me from the inside. No teeth. No
pain, not from the chip anyway. I suck harder. Her heart pounds
faster. From lullaby to hardcore punk in a manner of seconds, pumping
into my mouth so much faster now. Splashing against the back of my
throat and into the pit of my stomach.
That first kiss of Slayer blood has mutated from pain to pleasure. An
incredible pleasure I haven't felt since my last kill. No, this is
much better than some nameless human in a darkened alley, this is a
Slayer, and at the same time, it is so much more than that. She is
more than that. Better than any of the other Slayers I've tasted.
Stronger. Sweeter. Mine.
I may wear her brand, I may be her slave, but she's mine now too.
The End.
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