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Author's Chapter Notes:
Please review. I added some backstory for Spike that is important to my next story
The smell of Buffy's blood roused him. At first it was comforting to him because it meant she was near. It was comforting until it overwhelmed him. The scent was too strong. There was just too much blood. Something had to be terribly wrong. It took a few seconds for Spike to remember where he was and what had just happened. The floor beneath where he had fallen was saturated with her scent, with her blood.

When that reality seeped into his conscious mind, his weakened limbs gained the strength they needed to propel his body back, in disgust, from the horrible sight in front of him. The shock of what he'd been through suddenly meant nothing to him. Nothing mattered to him but Buffy. The sight of her gave him inner strength he didn't know he possessed.

Buffy was suspended from a chain rigging in the ceiling. Her wrists were bound over her head, in manacles. Her body seemed to float and sway with her slightest movement. The weak attempts she was making to free herself only caused the weight and momentum of her body to spin her in slow, dizzying circles, adding to the disorientations that he knew she was experiencing. A feeling she was unable to stop because her feet were at least six inches off of the factory floor.

That was when he noticed Angel, seemingly frozen in place in front of her line of sight. Her head was hanging down and Spike could tell that she had lost consciousness, whether from shock or blood loss he didn't know, nor did he care. The only thing that his whole universe consisted of was the ever-fading whisper of her heartbeat.

Somehow he made his limbs move even though the clothes he wore were sodden and heavy with her blood.

"If you're not going to help her, Angelus, get out of the way!" he seethed as he tossed Angel aside and reached up to try and wrench the chain that held her, from the ceiling. He tried to position himself so that his body would absorb her fall and any jarring he would cause her. "Sorry Love. Let's try and get you out of here, all right?" he said gently as he pulled on the chain.

The rigging crumbled under his force and he gently held Buffy as he guided her body to the ground. Spike held her loosely in his arms, grasping her under her knees before she touched the floor because he didn't want her to have to awaken in a pool of her own blood.

He looked at the corner in which he'd tossed Angel, who was still staring dumbfounded, at him as he struggled to free Buffy. "Give me your coat," he said.

"What?"

"I said, give me your coat! Do you want Buffy to go out of here exposed to the elements! Now, hand it over."

Angel handed his coat over. And as Spike tenderly held Buffy in his arms, he wrapped her up in it. "There you go Love. This should help keep you warm."

Looking back over his shoulder at Angel he said, "Tell the others that I'm taking her to hospital. County General is closest. Tell them to meet us there."

Disregarding his own comfort, Spike carried her out of the factory as quickly as he could, the obstacles of the twists and turns, and the added weight of the satchel of weapons he carried forgotten in his urgency to get her to safety.

Once he was out in the open night air, he set her down on a little patch of grass near the building's entrance.

He looked her over with a concerned eye. Her injuries were too numerous to count. She had to get to hospital fast, but hospital would do her no good at all if she died before he could get her there. More than half of her blood volume was lost. The first thing he had to do was try to replace her lost fluids somehow.

As he reached into his satchel for the vile of holy water he carried, he thanked his father for insisting that he attend medical college for two years. The only reason he hadn't returned for his last year of schooling was that his father had died six months prior to when fate stepped in and he met with Lady Death, and he'd had to return home to care for his ailing mother. The medical knowledge he retained had made him a very effective killer.

And now he was finally using that knowledge for its intended purpose. With trembling fingers, he uncorked the small vile as he supported her head, "Here Love, drink this. It isn't much, but it will help until we get you to hospital."

Buffy's head weakly swayed from side to side, avoiding the water that he was trying to give her, "Love it's all I can give you right now. I'd take the manacles off, but I think your wrists are broken," his face was getting damp and his vision of her was a blur of red. There was so much blood, "And I don't want to hurt you anymore. Please take just a sip, Love. Then we'll be off, with eagle's wings, to hospital. Please?"

He strained to hear her delirious reply, "No..promised."

Spike could have howled with joy. His hold on her tightened a little, "Promises are good, Love, except in this case. You need it."

"Trick. Don't hurt me," her body was too dehydrated for the luxury of tears. Spike knew that if she weren't a Slayer, she would have been dead hours ago.

"I won't hurt you, Love. Not if I can do anything to avoid it. Please, just one little sip?" Spike ignored the natural instincts against self-injury, and placed the tip of the index finger of one hand at the mouth of the vile and tipped it over. The water stung his skin, but he paid it no attention. Buffy was more important to him than his own comfort. He brushed his fingertip against her dry lips, "Here, this should help," he nodded in encouragement as her tongue licked away the water droplets, "That's it. Bottoms up."

Buffy's eyes fluttered open. Spike knew from the look of terror that floated across her gaze that Drusilla had indeed invaded a place in her mind that had been safe for her once. He silently cursed Dru as he tried to comfort Buffy, "It's all right, Love," he smoothed her hair, "don't worry. Everything's going to be fine."

Spike shed the small cache of weaponry he had slung over his shoulder, leaving it on the grass as he rose from his knees, held her close to his chest, and ran with her toward the hospital.
*****************

Dawn was frantic with worry. She hadn't wanted to leave Spike's apartment for fear that he wouldn't come back. At least, she reasoned, if she stayed someplace that she knew Spike would go, eventually he'd have to be there. He would know to come back. If he didn't know where she was, how would he know to come back?

Willow had to remind her that Spike would probably stop by the Hotel too. So being here, instead of there, would be okay.

But that was hours ago. And he still hadn't been seen or heard from. The fact that there was no news only made her more afraid. She had good reason to be, she'd lived on a Hellmouth for most of her life. She knew all the things other people thought were just the stuff of nightmares were very, very real.

She also knew that if Buffy were hurt, Spike might not be able to get past that. She was afraid that he might just wait for the morning, and she would never see him again.

"Dawn, I'm sure Spike is fine," Xander was saying, "I mean, the guy was a walking charcoal briquette. What could be worse than that?"

The pain that was showing on her face made Xander wish the earth would open up and send him to his own private circle of Hell, "Okay. Not helping. Sorry, Dawn, sometimes my mouth outruns my brain, and then my brain has to smack my mouth around a little for getting away from it. But, I'm sure we'll hear something soon," Xander hugged Dawn, "Spike wouldn't let you worry long. We'll know something soon."

Just then, there was a knock at the door. Dawn startled at the sound but rushed to open it as her heart suddenly took residence in her throat.

When she saw Angel, standing in the doorway instead of the vampire she had hoped for, she lunged for him. The surprise of her attack caught Angel unawares and he collided with the wall across the hall with an amazing force and speed.

Dawn was hurling accusations, and fists at him, "You son of a bitch! You killed him! I told him not to go. I begged him! But he wouldn't listen to me," if she had been a little older, the punches she landed would not only be bruising, but bone crunching as well, "Did you kill Buffy too? Did you? You tell me what you did to her, you evil, sadistic bastard!"

Angel waited for fatigue to slow down the blows that were raining on his head and face before he none too gently pushed Dawn off of him. He lay there, in disbelief, as the Scoobies had done nothing to stop the tiny torrent of fists and allegations.

"When I left, they both were alive," Angel muttered, "Buffy was barely holding on. She'd lost a lot of blood. If I hadn't been there, she would have died."

Dawn's eyes blazed in fire, her fists were clenched, "Where is Spike?"

"He took her to County General. He's there with her now. He wants you all to meet him there."
*****************************

He must have looked like an axe murderer coming into the emergency room of the hospital covered in Buffy's blood.

"Nurse, you have to help me," he said as he rushed up to the triage nurse, "I found this woman wondering in the old warehouse district. She said she'd been kidnapped. Then she passed out, and I brought her here," it was at that point that all rational thought flew away, "You have to help," he begged, "I think she's been raped."

The nurse proceeded in a calm orderly fashion, having been witness to all manor of injury in her years of working as a nurse. She motioned for a gurney, "Do you know this woman?"

"Only by acquaintance," he lied, as he placed Buffy gently on the stretcher, "I think her name is Buffy Summers."

"Any known allergies, Mister...?"

"Dustin. William Dustin. And no. No allergies. Please take care of her."

"We will. I'm going to have another nurse look at you," she said as she hurried behind a restricted area with Buffy, "You stay there. The nurse will be right out. Sit down. You look like you might be going into shock."

That was hours ago. Or, it could have been merely moments. Everything that had happened since he'd awakened in a pool of her blood was just a nightmarish blur. The few precious moments of consciousness Buffy had had while on her way here were filled with desperate pleas for him not to hurt her.

The things Drusilla could have done to her made him physically ill to even imagine.

Drusilla. Oh, God. Drusilla was gone. His Dark Princess, the one he'd loved for so long that it had almost been as natural to love her as breathing had once been, was gone. She was nothing more now then a handful of dust.

Ashes to ashes; dust to dust. For dust thou art, unto dust thou shall return.

And now, because of her, Buffy might be so traumatized that she never may be truly his again. Buffy may turn out to be another of Angelus's victims. Another of his artistic creations, beautifully, brilliantly mad.

As he sat in the small hospital chapel, soaked through to the skin in Buffy's blood because he hadn't allowed that poor little candy striper to get within a kilometer of him, he plotted his revenge.

Angelus would pay for taking his soul, his Buffy, away from him.
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