[Reviews - 126]
-
Table of Contents [Report This]
Microsoft Word Chapter or Story | ePub eBook Chapter or Story | Printer Chapter or Story

Has been viewed 3648 times

- Text Size +




Author's Chapter Notes:
hope you all enjoy..for shadow, katkin, jade and Pandora who keep me on the chat box far longer than i should be:)
Spike could hear the comments through the closed door, but he ignored them all, they weren’t worth the effort. Buffy was in front of him, real, not part of some dream he was having, and that’s where his heart and mind wanted to be, with her.

William the Bloody felt scared: if his heart could beat it would be crashing through his chest. Spike slipped off his black duster and put it on the chair, taking his time as he looked around the room, taking in every detail, allowing himself the minutes he needed to come to terms with what he’d been asked, no told, to do.

He saw the emptiness of Buffy’s life reflected in the room. There were no pictures displayed, no personal touches; her hair brush was a cheap and simple one, one that simply got the job done, the cleansing products were also cheap ones. No smell of vanilla or jasmine perfumed the room, there weren’t even any candles; if it wasn’t for the blond on the bed, Spike would never have known whose room it was. Then Spike saw the pig, Mr Gordo, sitting on the dresser, his seam still leaking stuffing and he looked forlorn, as though he knew that his beloved mistress was dead. Spike tried to hear any sound of life from Buffy but there was none. He took a deep breath in: there was no scent of death. She was there, he could smell that wonderful Buffy scent, but it had faded, days old.

Spike made his way over to the bed, noting the bottle of whisky, the fags, the leather pillow. His heart felt like a hand was gripping it, squeezing it hard, and he felt like crying. The fact that the greatest slayer ever had been reduced to this pitiful woman was a crime against all humanity. It hadn’t taken some nasty’s one good day, it had taken the unending grind of her so-called friend’s good intentions.

He picked up the pig and started stroking it, remembering the times when she’d thrown it at him. She’d had far more serious weapons at her disposal but when she was really mad at him it was the pig. This fraying, disintegrating, pig. Spike strode over to the door and snatched it open; he’d do something about that to start with.

‘Giles!’ he yelled through the open doorway. The watcher was heading down the corridor away from the room when he heard the shout. Giles hurried back towards the yelling vampire, still clutching the crossbow as though it were a talisman. Dawn put her head out from her own room, where she’d decided to hide, wondering what all the noise was about now; she had caught the look on Spike’s face earlier and knew it meant trouble for someone, and she was staying well out of the way. Giles met Spike in the corridor; he was stroking the decrepit pig from Buffy’s childhood.

‘You get this fixed,’ The Vampire with the gleaming yellow eyes told him. ‘How could you? You were supposed to be her friends: you stripped her of everything she valued. I just wish you could feel the pain you inflicted on her for a week. Then you’d know what it felt like.’

‘Wish granted,’ a disembodied voice said and Joyce appeared from a bright light.

‘Joyce: you’re a vengeance demon?’ Spike was suddenly worried; if she was a demon she could well have lied about Buffy not being in heaven. He was glad he hadn’t started trying to help Buffy yet. Not until he knew the truth; but she didn’t smell like a demon. He didn’t get any tinglies like he had from Anya.

Joyce smiled gently: she always had liked the blond vampire, he was such a nice boy. Funny how Spike, at over 140 years of existence, could seem younger than Giles who wasn’t yet sixty. She hadn’t forgiven the watcher his behaviour since Sunnydale. He had been the worst of his kind, at least Quentin Travers had been a known enemy, but Giles’ insidious hatred had coloured everything he had done, trying to manipulate her daughter as though she was some sort of puppet. Joyce didn’t need to be a demon to want justice or vengeance.

‘I’m no demon William, and D’hoffran prefers justice demon I believe, but I am worse than anything Hell could throw at you: an irate mother. “Vengeance is mine sayeth the Lord”, and he empowers his angels to enact righteous vengeance. I will reflect back the hatred and loathing Buffy has felt on those that inflicted it; if they inflicted nothing, then they will feel nothing, if their hearts and motives were pure then all they will feel is a slight regret where their conscience will prick them; but if they were manipulative and sought to control her, then they will feel that control reflected back on them… every unkind word, thought and deed shall be shown them all.’ Joyce’s voice sounded echoey, as though she was pronouncing judgement on someone.

In the hall Giles felt sick, his heart breaking as he started to see and relive everything he had put Buffy through. He wanted to pretend he had acted in her best interests but he knew it wasn’t true, and he couldn’t hide from the truth in his own mind or in his own heart. He saw his cruelty to Buffy when she was five months pregnant, begging him to find someone else to take out the nest of vampires that had set itself up near a convent school, giving Rosa the evening off so she could go on a date with her boyfriend because she had been working hard all month; Buffy had worked for years without a break and he hadn’t thought anything of it. He could feel the bone weary tiredness creeping into every limb, his joints aching from the effort put in just to keep going. He could feel Buffy’s love and need to protect the life growing within her, and his contempt for it. Tears rolled down his face as he felt her pain at the realisation that no-one really cared for her, him, her… Buffy; they loved having the slayer around, but not her, they wanted her obedient and pliable, just a machine to do what she was told.

He felt her pain when she was attacked and the agony of the blow that sent her child into the next life. He felt every sting, punch and cut, and how the knife tore at her skin. The loneliness of waking up in the hospital, with strangers telling her that the mugging she had suffered had cost her daughter her life. He felt his heart break as he saw how she cradled the tiny child for the hour they let her, before taking little Anne away to be buried, buried without Buffy’s knowledge, in a unknown graveyard, unnamed and unwanted by any but the mother who was bleeding heavily in the hospital, taken away by the orders of her so called friends.

He felt her devastation at being abandoned by him when Joyce died; he should have stayed with her, cared for her, but he had run as far away as possible. He had even suggested that they kill Dawn to stop Glory, how stupid could he be… and to throw her out of her own home, to support Faith as leader in the battle with the First… Giles started to crawl away on his hands and knees, he just wanted to hide his shame in his private space where no one could see him cry. The thought of that room being violated by another made him throw up on the carpet as he crawled his way along the corridor.

Giles was made to see how his actions in Sunnydale, setting Spike up to be killed by Robin, had nearly cost Buffy her greatest ally; if he had succeeded the planet would have been overrun by the forces of evil. As it was they were losing the battle now.
Giles tried to shift the blame, but he couldn’t; he knew in his heart of hearts all this really was his fault. His last thoughts before the horror in front of his eyes overwhelmed him was that he hoped Willow would see this for what it truly was and he begged that he would be allowed to apologise to Buffy. With his last thought a prayer to Buffy he collapsed on the floor in front of his shut door and continued to live out the horror he’d made of his surrogate daughter’s life.


Willow began to shake, falling forward onto the table in front of her, the books scattering everywhere: flashing in front of her eyes was every cruel and vindictive thoughtless action she had ever done, from forget spells, to her wish in Sunnydale for Spike and Buffy to be married, and to her appalling behaviour since. She screamed hoarsely as every word and deed was shown to her, but Willow wasn’t going to take this: she was the strongest witch there had ever been - in her own mind at least. She watched with contempt as the powers showed her the pain she had caused Buffy, and felt nothing. Merrick couldn’t quite believe it: she was shaking off the pain Buffy had felt, she wouldn’t or couldn’t learn. He appeared in front of the red headed witch and looked her in the eye. There was no remorse in her heart or in her mind; she was right and nothing else mattered. There was nothing they could do for the witch, but Buffy loved her, and they wouldn’t hurt Buffy.

‘Child, you are beyond help in this life, but I am not going to send you to hell, though I am severely tempted. Your problems stem from the love you never had as a child: you never learned to love or to empathise with anyone, so we will return you to that state. You will become a child again, a baby in a womb somewhere…’ and Willow vanished in a light, as though she had never existed.

Joyce looked at the pig still in Spike’s hand.

‘Be whole,’ she whispered and with a gentle wave of her hand, the pig’s seam restitched itself and the photograph of Spike materialised in his hand.

‘Give this back to her, Spike,’ she said quietly, then looked to the room containing her other daughter. Joyce took a deep breath and pointedly looked into the room where Buffy lay asleep on the bed.

She turned back to Spike. ‘You go back to your lady; I’ll deal with these people, and I will leave them alive, don’t worry,’ she added with a grin that reminded Spike of a cat with a mouse.

‘Now, Dawn,’ he heard as he turned his attention to the petite blond on the bed.





You must login (register) to review.