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Chapter 19 – But Now You Never Show It To Me, Do You?

**********

Buffy awoke as Spike emerged from the bathroom, obviously having showered and partially redressed, he was rubbing a towel through his hair to dry it.

“Well, well, well, sleeping beauty seems to be awake,” Spike smiled.

“Yeah, sorry, didn’t mean to keep you all night,” Buffy sheepishly offered as she twisted the sheet around her.

“Not a problem. I managed to talk Dawn into watching Michael for the night, not without forking over some dosh, but it’s all good,” Spike grinned a moment before turning serious. “But, obviously I can’t stay forever. Come back home with me. Christmas is just around the corner. Always a big bash!” Spike finished with hesitant enthusiasm.

“I don’t think I…” Buffy started

“Christ, Buffy, I thought we did this last night?” Spike replied with frustration, throwing his hands in the air.

“No, last night you managed to screw up what I was trying to do!” Buffy retaliated.

“Damn it Buffy, I thought I got through to you last night,” Spike climbing up in volume and frustration.

“Oh you got through, all right. Way before I did, thank you very much,” Buffy barbed, not even sure herself where this was coming from. She just felt like everything and everyone was still trying to run her life to their own liking.

“WHAT?!” Spike shrieked, incredulous. “Where do you come off…”

“I didn’t, *that’s* the problem!”

Spike could only fish-mouth as he tried to form a response in his obvious cloud of confusion.

“You just had to take command, didn’t you?” Buffy started, her righteous anger, starting to fall away to confused tears. “I just wanted one moment! One damn moment that was mine, but you couldn’t…” Buffy trailed off as her words failed her.

A look of understanding passed over his face. It was all about the power, after all. She needed it; he’d had it. It appeared that he’d reached her, but only partially.

“No, I couldn’t,” He replied, suddenly seemingly a lot calmer, and sadder. “Not like that. If you would listen…”

“NO!” Buffy screamed. “I’m through listening to everyone. Do you hear me? Through letting everyone else demand! I’m through letting everyone control my life. I’m done, damn it!” Buffy screeched as she stomped into the bathroom and slammed the door shut, and clicked the lock closed.

**********

Where had it all gone so wrong? Spike thought he’d gotten through to her last night. Now he wasn’t so sure what he’d done was the right thing, no matter what his gut told him. Ok, so she did seem to understand it was all about control now. She’d looked to be about to listen to him, until he actually asked her to…

That thought stopped him, and he began to replay the entire morning in his head, until suddenly he had the answers he’d been looking for. Buffy’s shut down and revolt coincided with him taking control…

His train of thought was suddenly derailed as he heard the sound of breaking glass come from the bathroom…lots and lots of glass. In one step he was at the bathroom door. He tried the knob, calling to Buffy through the door, but it was locked. When he received no answer, he began beating in earnest on the door while yelling her name, but still to no avail. In sheer panic, as her last sentence also replayed in his head, he backed up a step and kicked in the door.

Much to his relief, he found Buffy sitting very calmly on the floor, not unconscious as he’d feared. Then he noticed the rather nasty looking shard of glass mirror clutched tightly in her hand. She was staring at it intently. He made a quick glance at the rest of her, but the only sign of injury he could find were minor scratches on the knuckles of the hand holding the glass.

Spike knelt down on the floor directly in front of her, but still got no indication that she even knew he was in the room. She seemed entranced with the glass in her hand.

“Buffy, love, I don’t know what you’re thinking, but please give me the glass,” Spike calmly requested, despite the raging hurricane of fear inside him.
Seconds stretched into minutes as they both sat there like that. Buffy calmly studying the shard, Spike tightly tensed in terror, ready to spring forward if necessary, but not wanting to galvanize her into action.

“I think I understand now,” Buffy finally stated, still focusing on the shard.

“Understand what, Buffy?” Spike asked.

For long moments she wouldn’t reply, just continued to study the sharp object that was inducing his terror. Seeing that this wasn’t going to be a quick confrontation, Spike slowly settled himself in front of her.

“Why,” She finally answered. “I don’t think I understood until now why I used to. Why it felt right.”

“Why you used to what?” Spike asked, leaning in to hear her answer.

“Control. It was something I could control.”

“Buffy, please let me help you. *What* was something you could control?”

“I don’t think anyone ever knew I did it. It wasn’t very often. Just when things were really bad, you know. Anything would work, but glass was so much… prettier,” Buffy smiled fondly.

Spike feared that he was beginning to understand her fragments, as Buffy began to shadow the glass over one palm.

“Beautiful, and delicate, and perfect for little tiny…”

“Buffy,” Spike began as tears began to well in his eyes. “It's Michael’s first Christmas, please don't make it be the one when his mum…” Spike couldn’t finish his sentence.

“Christmas? I’m telling you my inner secrets, and you’re worried about Christmas?” Buffy’s brow marred in confusion, but she still hadn’t looked at Spike.

“It’s a useless holiday, anyway. I don’t think God likes me anyway,” Buffy supplied, very nonchalant.

“Buffy,” Spike began, but was suddenly cut off as Buffy looked up at the ceiling.

“Why? What the hell did I ever do to deserve this?” She screamed at the ceiling. “You’ve taken everything and everyone from me!” She continued at the top of her lungs. “You’ve taken my mother, my childhood, my innocence, my body, and even my Angel! Everything! For what?! What did I do to deserve this?!?”

Buffy was now sobbing uncontrollably, and her hand was dripping in rivers where she’d clutched the glass too firmly in her rage. Seeing his opportunity, Spike gently pulled her onto his lap, and carefully took the glass from her hand. She continued sobbing as he grabbed a nearby dishtowel and wrapped it around her hand tightly.

“You’re wrong, love” Spike softly replied. “He didn’t take everything. You still have a sis, and a son who need you very much. You have a man who considers you to be his daughter and is nearly beside himself worryin' over you. You've got friends still trying to find you. And you have a man who can’t imagine life without you, because he’s been hopelessly in love with you since the day he saw you.”

He allowed her to continue in her grief. He didn’t know how long they sat there like that. But as it started to slow down, he finally dared to ask her the question that weighed most heavily upon his mind.

“Buffy, I’m going to ask you a question, and I need you to be honest with me, ok?” Spike asked. His only reply was a slight hesitant nod. “If I hadn’t been here, would you…would you have…” God, he couldn't even finish the thought, but he had too, "would you have…killed…"

Buffy looked up in clear confusion. “You thought I was going to…”

“Buffy, I was terrified you would be dead when I came through that door. Or, worse, when I was sitting in front of you…”

“Too easy,” Buffy answered in a quiet voice. “I always thought that was the easy way out. That if I’d just wait, just a little longer, things had to get better. I never really considered dying. I wanted to live first.”

“Then what…” Spike started to ask, when the answer dawned on him. He’d read about it in a book after Buffy’s attack, trying to find an answer that would allow him to help her. “Cutting,” He answered his own question, as he leaned his head back against the wall and closed his eyes. He was silently answered with a nod. “When?”

“Hear and there," Buffy shrugged. "About a dozen times since I was about 12, I guess.”

“And just now,” Spike added.

“No,” Buffy responded immediately, causing Spike to frown down at her. “I, I wanted to…but then you of all people had to pop in my head. And suddenly I understood. But, god,” Buffy began crying again, “God, how I wanted to," She wept, “ Why me, Spike?”

“Don’t rightly know. But I do know this; there are people that need you. Hell, *I* need you. Who else am I gonna find to be such a pain in my arse? Xander?”

Not hearing a reply more than an indiscriminate mumbled, sort of, nearly giggle, Spike glanced down again, only to note that his captive audience, was apparently falling asleep. He quickly checked her pulse, though in his head, he knew she’d not lost enough blood from her hand to knock her out, and he found it firm and steady.

He shifted his companion gently so he could carry her into the bedroom. He settled her into the bed and then slid in next to her, and pulled her close to him. He wouldn’t allow himself the luxury of sleep, but he could still offer her comfort. He had a feeling that with the demon’s she was fighting, she’d need him close by when the dreams came. Because they would; they always did.

**********

“I don’t like this…” Angel opined, slowly entering the Bronze behind her.

“Don’t like what?” Buffy turned and asked.

“There’s the bait,” Angel observed, “Where’s the hook?”

Suddenly the female vamp attacked as Buffy’s back was turned, but was easily beaten down by the stronger slayer.

“You’re right, why would they send just one?” Buffy wondered aloud, as her thoughts settled back onto her friends she’d so coldly shut out.

Back in the library….

“I still think we should have gone with her,” Willow argued.

“If Buffy’s about to lose it, I think we should be trying to reach minimum safe distance,” Xander argued, his anger still fresh as he thought of the sensual teasing Buffy had issued at his and Angel’s expense.

“Xander you know it’s a trap!” Willow reiterated, worried that no one was going to listen to her any more.

“Ah, ah, ah!” Giles interrupted the argument with his discovery. “Uhm…The Latin is translated from the Sumerian, and rather badly. ‘Closest to the master’ actually translates as ‘nearest’…physically,” He explained, then continued reading the translation, “ ‘The person or persons who were with him when he’…It is a trap. It just isn’t for her…” Giles said, noting the cadre of vampires surrounding them. They valiantly fought, but in the end, they'd all been taken.

Buffy entered the library to find it in shambles. A fight had obviously occurred there. A movement caught her eye near the upturned table and she assisted a bloody and beaten Xander to his feet. “Xander! What happened?”

“Vampires…the one’s you could handle yourself,” he mocked.

“Where are the others?”

“I don’t’ know,” Xander spat out at her. “I don’t know what your problem is, what your issues are, but as of now I officially don’t care. If you’d have worked with us for five seconds, you could have stopped this.”

“Ok, we just have to think,” Buffy said. She turned away from him. His words having shaken her greatly, but she didn’t want to deal with that just now. There were more pressing issues. “Where would they take them?”

“If they hurt Willow, I’ll kill you,” Xander seethed.

“Why did they take them and not you?” Buffy asked.

“Giles said the ritual,” He began. “They needed people who were close to the master…physically close, when he uh,”

“The one’s who were with the master when he died,” Buffy surmised.

“Giles, Willow, Cordelia,” Xander ticked off the names.

“Ms. Calendar,” Buffy finished the list.

“Odds are, they’ve got a complete set by now,” Xander sarcastically supplied.

“We need to find out where,” Buffy replied, mind already settling back to the bait she’d earlier encountered.

With Angel and Xander looking on, Buffy interrogated the vamp using a darkness inside her that she didn’t even know she possessed. Faced with certain torture, the vampire had easily given them the needed information and met her own swift ending. Buffy hardly even offered another thought to the vamp as her, Angel, and Xander made their way to the industrial area.

As the trio stealthily entered the abandoned factory, they were met with the macabre site of their friends hanging upside down and unconscious over the bones of The Master. The one who killed her. The one whom she’d thought she’d defeated.

“What’re you gonna do?” Xander whispered, as Buffy quickly assessed the situation.

Grim determination suffused Buffy with the strength she only now realized she’d been missing. “I’m gonna kill them all.”

The fight ensued. Throughout, Buffy felt her purpose filling her, giving her the strength and determination she needed to fulfill her chosen duties. As she fought the gathered vampires, she heard Angel and Xander rescuing the others but were quickly set upon by a few of the vampires that had split off.

Angel quickly shifted into his vampire face and began fighting as Xander cradled Willow, who had yet to wake up. As Buffy continued to fight, she took note of Angel’s own fight and in one of those moments when time seems to stretch into eternity Angel ceased to be the one fighting, his form fading into that of another…Spike. It was Spike now, who was watching her back and helping her to win the battle she was waging.

“Where’s Buffy?” Giles asked as he dazedly sat up.

“She’s working out her issues,” Xander replied as he noted Buffy continue to pound the vampires around her. With use of her quick wit, Buffy broke off a ceremonial torch and used it to stake one vamp while the flame dusted the last remaining vampire, causing the heavy sledgehammer he’d been wielding to fall to the floor with a dull thud. The fight was finally over.

“It’s over,” Willow quietly observed.

“No it’s not,” Xander astutely noted, as Buffy remained frozen…looking on at the remains of the thing that had defeated her.

The thing that had defeated her. The thing that she had almost let defeat her again. And with sudden clarity, Buffy realized what had almost happened. She'd abandoned everyone and everything, and rather than saving them, she’d nearly been the cause of their demise. All because she’d never really faced her issues. She’d simply pushed them to the side. She’d moved around, but never moved on.

Buffy picked up the dropped sledgehammer and began to beat the master’s bones to dust as everyone watched. Finally letting out all the fear, the anger, and the despair with each blow she landed.

Realizing what was happening, Spike slowly stepped up behind Buffy as she began to dissolve into tears. She turned into the offered arms and Spike pulled her into an embrace of true comfort as she finally began to come to terms with all that’d happened.

**********

Spike was still holding her, watching her face as she slept. He knew she must be dreaming, he’d watched her a few times before. As he watched and waited for the scream he was sure was coming, he consciously drew her closer to him as he tried to comfort her. He knew he couldn’t fight her demons for her. He could only be there to patch her up when she finished the battle.

But instead of the startling scream of awakening that he’d grown accustomed to before she’d left, she awoke slowly, barely blinking her eyes open before shutting them tightly as she began to shake. A few seconds later, Spike recognized the shaking as it became accompanied by the wetness of her tears. He did the only thing he knew to do. He pulled her closer and held her tightly as she finally turned loose all the things she’d been holding onto.

Tbc…





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