“You know something?” Dawn frowned down at Andrew as the training room door closed behind a tearful April. “You’ve scared the life out of that kid! Poor April!”
“She hit me!” Andrew whimpered.
“You told her to!” Dawn knelt down and pressed the bloodstained cloth firmly to his bleeding nose. “Jeez, Andrew! She’s half your height and she can’t weigh above a hundred pound soaking wet! What happened to the ‘black tiger’ thing?”
“Ouch!” Andrew winced. “I wasn’t ready! I hadn’t focussed my chi!”
“Then there’s obviously some strange, inscrutable, Oriental meaning to ‘OK, sock it to me, sister’ that we mere mortals don’t understand.” Dawn gave an exasperated sigh and lifted the cloth. “Look, it’s already stopped bleeding, and Spike said it isn’t broken…”
“He was very gentle with my nose.” He gave Dawn an accusing look.
Dawn snorted. “He’s got more patience than I have.”
Andrew lowered his voice and gave Dawn a conspiratorial look. “I mean, really… you know… what with the blood and all…”
Dawn gave him a disbelieving look. “You think your nose blood might have unleashed some sort of unbridled bloodlust? Eeww, Andrew!”
“I have good blood! And, you know, it’s not like he hasn’t bitten me before.” Andrew put a hand to his neck.
“Well, yeah, but he had to be out of his skull under the influence of the First Evil’s mind-control badness to do it.” She peered at him suspiciously. “Do you want him to bite you? Because that’s just weird.”
“I didn’t say that!” Andrew looked away quickly. “Do you think I’ll have a scar?” He peered at himself in the training room mirror and put a tentative finger to the bridge of his nose.
“Oh, sure, a real big one. Frankenstein-esque.” Dawn folded her arms.
“You think?” Andrew looked worried.
“No.” Dawn gave him her well-practised ‘duh’ look.
“I wouldn’t mind a small scar.” Andrew ran a finger over his left eyebrow. “A little scar can be kind of sexy…”
“You won’t have a scar. You’re barely gonna have a bruise if Spike hurries up with that ice.” Dawn glanced at the clock on the wall. “Wonder where he’s gotten to?”
“I could go look.” Andrew offered.
“Nope. You stay here and try not to bleed on the upholstery. Don’t want you scaring any watchers.” Dawn hurried over to the door. “If you feel faint, put your head between your knees, or raise your feet above your head…or whatever.” She glanced back at him as she closed the door behind her and heaved a long-suffering sigh.
“Ah, Dawn.” She turned to see Giles coming along the corridor toward her.
“Giles! Did you bring the ice?”
“Ice?” Giles frowned in puzzlement. “Why should I bring ice?”
“For Andrew’s nose?”
“Andrew’s…?” Giles looked even more bemused. “I’m sorry, but I don’t seem to have the vaguest idea what you are talking about.” He shook his head. “Dawn, I… ah… fear we may have a problem.”
“What’s that?” Dawn pointed at the book in Giles hand.
“Our problem.” Giles held the thesis out to Dawn. “Buffy found it while she was unpacking.”
Dawn flicked quickly through the pages. She closed her eyes briefly then looked at Giles. “Buffy saw this?”
“Saw it, read it and reacted to it.” Giles sighed. “Not well, I have to say.”
“I’ll bet she didn’t. What did she say?”
“Ah… quite a bit about his slayer-killing history, rather a lot on my stupidity for letting him get close to you - ending on, I seem to recall, ‘Get rid of him. Before I do.’”
Dawn groaned. “Giles, this has to stop - now. It’s getting out of hand. We have to tell Buffy.”
“No. We must wait. Willow is doing all she can to… to try and find a safe way out of this. I really think that if… if we try and tell Buffy what has happened without any sort of solution in place, it will do her serious harm.” Giles sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Dawn, Willow will be back very soon. Please. Say nothing. Just until Willow is ready.”
“Have you any idea what you’re asking?”
“Please. It’s in Buffy’s best interests.”
“And Spike’s?”
“Spike’s?” Giles frowned. “Ah. We should warn him to keep him out of Buffy’s way, at least until…”
“Where is he?” Dawn cut him off impatiently.
“He isn’t with you?”
“He went to find you – to tell you about Andrew and find some ice and…oh. Oh, God.” Dawn moaned. “What if he heard you? Heard you and Buffy?”
“I… ah… I didn’t see him. He may have…” Giles shrugged helplessly.
Dawn bit her lip. “OK. Look – you find Buffy, make sure she’s OK, and I’ll go after Spike. It’s not completely dark yet, so he can’t have gone far. Perhaps if he got a taxi the guy at the desk saw him. All else fails, I’ll start back at home.” She looked at Giles unhappily. “What a mess.” She turned to go. “I just hope you’re right about all of this.”
******
Spike came slowly down the cellar steps and glanced over at her. There was no emotion in his eyes, just a cold calmness that scared her.
“Dawnie.” He put the black leather sports bag he was carrying down next to the bed. “How’s it goin’?”
“Spike… what are you doing?” Dawn watched with a puzzled frown as he began to pack his few possessions into the bag.
“What I should have done years ago.” He picked up one of Giles’ books, looked at it, shrugged and threw it into the bag. “Getting the hell away from this mess.”
“You’re running away?”
“Nope, I’m walking away. Whole different vibe.” He rummaged in the bag and pulled out a pile of notes. He added his poker winnings from beside the bed and stuffed the resulting roll back into the bag. “Tell Giles I borrowed his secret stash of cash. Really think he should find somewhere better for his savings than under the mattress.” He spoke calmly, reasonably. “And a couple of his less offensive shirts. And the odd priceless artifact – they’re only gathering dust.” He zipped up the bag and patted it. “Oh, and his bag.” He stood up and slung the bag over his shoulder. “Second thoughts, tell him I nicked ‘em. He sure as hell isn’t gettin’ them back. What?” He shrugged at Dawn’s stunned expression. “You’re shocked and disappointed? Evil, remember?”
“No, I’m not…” Dawn gave a despairing shake of her head. “Spike, she didn’t mean it.”
“Oh, she meant it.” Spike gave a brittle laugh. “And you know? She’s right. All that…“he gestured at the thesis in Dawn’s hands, “everything I did, it’s still here, inside of me. It’s still part of me. I can bury it deep and try to pretend it doesn’t matter, but it’s not going away.”
“It’s not all of you! You’ve changed…”
“Have I?” He gave her a hard look, and then turned away. “Yeah, maybe. But I’m not sure I know what I’ve changed into. Maybe it’s time I sorted that out.” He gave a weary sigh. “I’m tired, nibblet. Buffy and me…” he shook his head “it feels like we just stagger along on from one crisis to the next. Only so much a bloke can take, even a stupid, pig-headed one like me. Giles is right - she’s better off out of this. I’m beginnin’ to think I am, too.”
“You don’t mean that. You wouldn’t just give up.” Dawn’s voice caught as she struggled against her tears. “You love Buffy!”
He winced at her words, the muscles of his jaw tensing as he bit back his pain. “Not givin’ up. Just… moving on.” He made his way to the door to the yard resolutely.
“We’ll tell her! We’ll tell her what happened and… and it’ll all be OK.”
He stopped, back to her. “No, it won’t. Even if there wasn't a risk... What she said, it’s how she feels now – really feels, deep down. You wanna say, ‘hey you know your whole life as a slayer you think you’ve believed vampires are the evil undead? Well, you don’t remember, but you're in love with one. And we’re not talking about the great poof.’” He glanced back at her with a wry smile. “You think?”
“We could tell her about your soul.”
He pressed his lips together and shrugged. “The soul’s only part of the package. Besides, she’ll want to know where it came from and…” He closed his eyes. Not going through all that again. “No. And I don’t want you rockin’ the boat, OK? Promise?”
“Spike…”
“I mean it, nibblet.”
“What if she remembers?” Dawn called after him desperately. “What if she needs you?”
“Tired of living on ‘what if’s’. Gonna go find me some certainties.”
“You’ll come back? Spike… you will come back?” She gave up fighting and let the tears come.
“Oh, you know me. Bad penny.” He stopped by the door, hesitated and then put down the bag. He turned and crossed the room to her quickly, hugging her to him fiercely. He kissed the top of her head, feeling the smoothness of her hair beneath his lips, breathing the warm, clean smell of her. Hell, leaving her was almost as bad… “You take care of yourself, huh?” he said, his voice rough with emotion.
She could hear the hurt, clear and sharp in his voice. She held him tightly, her face pressed into his shoulder arms around his waist. “Don’t go.” she whispered. “Please?”
He detached himself from her firmly. “Goodbye, Dawn.” He touched her cheek gently, walked to the door and picked up his bag. This time there was no hesitation. He went out into the gathering shadows of the evening and he didn’t look back.
******
Buffy walked. Blindly, with no destination in mind, she threaded her way through unknown streets busy with homeward-bound commuters. The space of Hyde Park opened around her, the fading colours of autumn dulled by light filtered through heavy grey skies, the grass wet beneath her feet – all unnoticed. She walked on, head down, hands thrust deeply into her pockets, past the flat, steel-smooth Serpentine and out of the park again, finding a crossing for the busy road automatically, barely aware of her surroundings.
She tried to walk the confusion away, to tie down the disorder of thoughts racing frantically around her head. But still his image filled her mind and the memory of the breathless seconds in the basement burned inside her. And still the cold, dizzying pain of what she’d read, the hard anger of a betrayal she knew she had no right to feel, but that she’d clutched to her like a shield, ached. Vampire. Evil undead. Killer. Worse – killer of slayers; how dangerous did that make him? She’d dropped her guard. She’d taken him as he appeared and forgotten what he was – she’d forgotten what she was. And it had happened so quickly, so easily. Why? Why had he touched her so deeply? She’d behaved like a hormonal teenager – blinded by her physical attraction to him. And that’s all it was – physical. Nothing more. Her steps faltered. She knew that wasn’t true. Over the past few days she’d felt she’d known him, been stunned by how well he’d seemed to know her; and the small quiet voice at the core of her being said ‘And now he’s in your heart...’
“No.” She stopped suddenly, passers-by throwing her wary looks as they moved to avoid her. She looked around, confused by the noise of heavy traffic that seemed to suddenly impinge on her senses. Half-familiar buildings stretched around her, and ahead of her an elegant fountain played in a tree-edged square. Sloane Square. She was almost home – not altogether sure how she’d got here, but here she was. She took a deep breath and walked on.
******
Dawn was sitting curled up on Spike’s bed, the thesis clutched in her hands. She looked up at Buffy as she came down the stairs. “He’s not here.” She said flatly.
“Oh.” Buffy gestured to the thesis. “You’ve seen that?”
Dawn shrugged. “Didn’t need to. Knew it all already. Though I have to say it’s a bit over the top. Certainly not A+ material.”
“You knew about this?”
“Yes. I knew.”
“How?”
“I told you, I met him in Rome, and after I got to know him I… I researched, OK?”
“And you didn’t think this mattered?”
“No. I didn’t.” Dawn looked at Buffy. “This Spike in here,” she held up the thesis “this isn’t the Spike I know. I know what he was. Difference is I can see what he is. You could too, if you just let yourself.”
“What?” Buffy folded her arms across her chest and frowned at Dawn.
“You’re saying he’s beyond redemption? You’ve seen him, Buffy - Jeez, you’ve been virtually inseparable for the past week! This,” she waved the thesis, “you’re reading about someone who doesn’t exist anymore.”
“He’s a vampire… a monster.”
“Angel is a vampire.”
“He has a soul.”
“He has…” Dawn stopped herself and gave a growl of exasperation. “The whole soul thing? That’s too easy. It’s always been your excuse and…” She stopped herself and started again. “So what? Do I have a soul? I mean, I’m just a ball of green energy - hardly came into this life in the normal way. And if I haven’t got a soul? Am I a monster?”
“No! Of course not. That’s not…”
“And what you remember about me from before, it’s not real. Who knows what whatever I am used to get up to. You judge me on what you see, on what I am to you now. Why can’t you ever judge him the same way? Why can’t he be allowed to be a better man? What does a stupid soul matter?” Tears of anger and frustration started in Dawn’s eyes.
“Dawnie…”
But Dawn wasn’t to be stopped. “Willow had a soul. She killed people. She damn near killed us all. But she’s not beyond redemption? Can we say ‘double standards’?” Dawn stood up and thrust the thesis into Buffy’s hands. “No.” She gestured as Buffy opened her mouth to speak. “Don’t. I can’t do this now.” She pushed past her sister and made for the stairs. Half way up she stopped and turned back. “You know, I’ve been wondering. Is this really all about Spike? Or is this about you?”
Buffy watched her leave then looked down at the thesis. She stared at it blindly for a long while, then carefully smoothed the cover on Spike’s bed and laid it neatly on his pillow. Then she wrapped her arms around herself, closed her eyes briefly and turned away.
******
They’d warned her he was back, naturally - Wolfram and Hart kept a close eye on this renegade vampire - and they’d warned her that something was clearly not right with him. But even so, she wasn’t prepared for the rawness of what she saw in his eyes, the fragility of the hold he was keeping on himself.
He stood in her office doorway and leaned against the frame, arms folded, trying for the Big Bad smirk and failing miserably.
“So.” Ilona sighed. “It didn’t work out, huh? You and your Booffy?”
“That obvious?” He shrugged. “Fool to think it ever would.”
“Ah, l’amore, huh? I think she makes a fool of us all.” She stood up with a sigh and went over to him. She reached up to take his face in her hands and kissed him gently on either side of his mouth. “So.” She rested her hands on his chest and looked up at him, head tilted. “You want to talk, maybe?”
Spike rested his hands on her waist. “I want a drink.”
She gave a throaty chuckle. “Naturally!”
“And a bed.”
“Si, my bed is your bed.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Oh, yeah?”
“The penthouse…” She gave him a slow smile.
“Ah.” He gave her a rueful smile. “Pity.” The smile faded. “And then, I want to talk - about that job offer.”
Ilona gave him a concerned frown. “I think maybe we start with the drink,” she said thoughtfully.
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