A/N Many thanks to mahaliem for kindly beta reading this for me.
Coming Back To Haunt Me
Chapter One
As Buffy’s face scraped against the rough stone of the tomb, she had time for just one thought before the darkness took her. “Next time Spike looks depressed, I should just punch him and go home.”
It had been such a simple errand; go to Spike’s crypt and ask him for help with an upcoming fight. When she got there, pushing open the door rather than kicking it, in a rare moment of consideration, she found him pacing the floor, a bottle in his hand. His face was hollowed and sharp, almost skeletal in the flickering light of a dozen candles, and the air was heavy, as though a storm was about to break.
“What do you want, Slayer?” His voice had a harsh edge to it, cloaking a weariness that made his words drag. His tone caused a shiver that prickled the back of her neck and she chose her words with more care than usual.
“Giles heard about a nest of Bregnath demons outside town. They’ll go into their killing stage very soon. I can’t take them on alone and I wondered if you wanted to come with. You know; hack and slash, have some fun.”
He nodded but she got the feeling that he wasn’t listening and that piqued her. Since when did she not get his full attention?
“Sorry, did I fade out there?” she asked, letting sarcasm drip from her voice like honeyed acid as she abandoned caution in favour of goading.
His eyes were grey in the soft light, as grey as a sky heavy with rain and his pale hair was like silvery wood ash, feathered over his head in soft curls instead of sleeked back as it normally was. With the colour leached from him, he seemed ghostlike and insubstantial. His eyes were flickering restlessly and when he finally looked in her direction she had the feeling that he was looking through her, not at her, still searching the room for something.
“I’ll help you,” he said abruptly. “When? Can’t do it tonight.
“That’s not a problem. Giles and Willow found a spell, some potion we can soak our weapons in overnight. Those demons have skin like armour plating. This should let the knives slide right in. So while they marinade, we wait.”
“Tomorrow, then,” he said. “I’ll call by the shop at sunset. Now push off, there’s a good girl.”
Buffy stood still as one of the foundations of her world began to crumble. Spike was telling her to go? No, it just didn’t work like that. He stuck close, stalked her and bothered her. That was normal. He didn’t try to get rid of her, especially when he could have got in a few good digs about a Slayer who needed help fighting. She felt cheated out of an argument she hadn’t known she was anticipating. Who said he could change the rules?
“What’s the deal with you?” she demanded. “You’re like –” Her brain cast about for inspiration and the dull greyness in front of her combined with a childhood memory to produce the perfect analogy. “Eeyore. But with fangs.”
His face darkened. “Oh, for God’s sake! Save it and get out. I’ve said I’ll help you, so why are you still here? Oh, wait. I know. You haven’t hit me. So get on with it.”
He slammed the bottle down on the table and took two strides towards her, thrusting his face at her, waiting for a blow. She stepped back and he followed her, his eyes impatient and angry. Buffy raised a hand and then let it drop. “This is too weird, even for you,” she said. “Spike, are you in trouble?”
She had a full hand of grudges against Spike but mixed in with the distaste, distrust and derision that he evoked in her was an element of possessiveness. He had declared himself in love with her. She didn’t want that love and her rejection of it had been as comprehensive as she could make it, but still...if anyone were to make Spike unhappy, it was going to be her.
Her mild sympathy seemed to disconcert him and he floundered for a moment before shaking his head. “I’m fine.” He saw her eyebrows rise at this blatant lie and gave in. “I’m not fine. I’m waiting for something bad to happen but it’ll be over soon. There’s nothing you can do, so for the last time, will you go away.” He paused, and added quietly, “Please.”
“You have never, ever said ‘please’ to me,” Buffy said flatly, arms folded across her chest. “Whatever it is that’s bugging you, I want to know. Now.”
“You don’t give a rat’s arse if I’m feeling miserable. You’re just nosy.”
Feeling slightly guilty, Buffy backed down. “Maybe you’re right,” she said softly. “Forget it, then. But, Spike? Snap out of it before tomorrow. I don’t want you fighting by me with an attitude like this. It could get you killed.”
“Like you’d care,” he said, a sneer twisting his lips.
She considered this for a moment and then turned away. “No, I wouldn’t.” She took a step and said without looking back, “Dawn might miss you though.”
“Slayer –” His voice was defeated and she smiled fleetingly. “Oh, fine, I’ll tell you.”
Giving him a perky grin, she walked back to him. “Spill it, then and don’t expect me to provide a shoulder to cry on. And I’m fresh out of Kleenex too.”
He went to sit on the tomb in the centre of the room, giving her a sardonic smile in reply to her needling. Buffy leaned against the rough stone, looking up at him curiously.
“You know what today is?” he asked, continuing before she had chance to chime in with the details. “It’s the anniversary of my first kill.” Buffy’s lip curled at this admission and she wondered if she should have just left Spike to wallow in what she assumed was nostalgia for the good old days. “Dru had turned me, I’d pulled my way out of my grave and I was hungry. You can’t imagine how that felt.”
“I’d rather not,” she interrupted. “If this is going to get gruesome, I’m off.”
Ignoring her words, he carried on, choosing his words carefully, savouring them. “Hungry for something I’d died tasting. Blood. If I ran my tongue over my teeth, I could still taste Dru’s blood in my mouth, a hundred different flavours from a hundred severed lives. I could almost hear their voices.”
“You are seriously disturbing me, you know,” Buffy said, watching his eyes grow distant as the memories dragged him back.
“So we went hunting. Didn’t take long to find someone. London was busy in the evenings and this was perfect timing. The respectable people were all at home and the streets were full of the lost, the lonely, the ones who wouldn’t be missed. We do care about that, you know. Mobs aren’t a pretty sight. Dru spotted a mark and went into her act, distracting her, pulling her away from the crowd, luring her somewhere quiet.
“And there I was. Waiting like a good dog, my tongue hanging out. I could smell it all on her, the worry, the fear, the curiosity. I wanted to taste it too.”
“Enough!” said Buffy, her voice tight. She knew what was coming; she’d seen the whole play and what happened after the curtain call too many times to hope for a happy ending.
“It’s never enough, pet,” said Spike. “I’m sorry; I quite thought you were keen to hear this story? My apologies for boring you.”
Buffy turned and started to walk to the door.
“Lady’s impatient?” he asked, his voice silky and low. “And I can see she’s not the only one.”
Buffy paused, frowning. “What do you –?”
“Shush. Mustn’t speak out of turn. Where was I?”
“Half way past insanity,” Buffy muttered peevishly, her hand fingering the stake in her pocket as she debated leaving.
“Well, I killed her. There; quick enough for you? It’s not a surprise ending, I’ll give you that, but it was a revelation to me. Should I tell you that I loved her even as I drained her? Would you believe that in those few moments, I knew her as no one else ever had or ever would? I wonder.”
“Spike, is there a point to this, or I swear I’ll put us both out of our misery and stake you.”
He raised his eyebrows and gestured at the shadows behind her. “Ask her that. Maybe she’ll tell you. She’s never told me.”
Buffy felt every hair on the back of her neck stand up. It wasn’t a cliché, she thought with a detached part of her mind, a part that wasn’t screaming silently in atavistic terror. It really does stand on end.
It was the Slayer who spun, stake at the ready, to face the threat that she knew, beyond all hope, was standing behind her. It was Buffy whose face crumpled with pity as she saw what that threat was.
A young woman, pale and pretty, formed from candlelight and darkness, her neck bearing the marks of the vampire, her hands full of the flowers she had been selling, limp and decayed. Buffy knew the smell of dead flowers, breathed it in as she patrolled the graveyards of Sunnydale. It washed over her now and she gagged, feeling her throat close up with sudden nausea.
“’Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds,’” Spike quoted unexpectedly. “But I think you were selling bunches of violets, weren’t you, sweetheart?”
Buffy turned away from the pitiful ghost and looked at Spike with such a depth of hatred in her eyes that he flinched. “Why is she here?”
His lips thinned. “Ask her.”
“I’m asking you, not Eliza Doolittle, and I want an answer.”
He rolled his eyes and said impatiently, “She’s a bloody ghost, Slayer. She’s haunting me. Should have thought that was obvious. She was twenty whatever when I killed her and in the spirit of dramatic irony, every twenty odd years, she gets to come and make my life miserable for the night. Her name’s Marie by the way.” He got down from the tomb and walked to the table, picking up the whisky bottle again and taking a long drink before returning to his perch.
The ghost was drifting towards them, slowly, remorselessly, and Buffy found herself edging away towards the door. To her dismay, she found that it was locked. After tugging at it in vain, she went back to stand by Spike. This night just couldn’t get weirder. She was going to Spike for comfort as the lesser of two evils. His hand dropped to her shoulder and squeezed it. He seemed resigned to whatever was going to happen, as if he knew that there was nowhere to hide.
“It’s all right, Slayer. When she takes me, try and sneak out. The door should unlock then.”
She twisted her head to look up at him, shrugging off his hand. “Takes you where?”
“She takes me back to that night to live it over. Just my mind goes, I think. Can’t be sure; I’ve never had company before.”
Buffy frowned. “I can see how that would bother Angel,” she said, “and I suppose it’s going to be a taste of what you can’t have now you’ve got the chip, but other than that, what’s the big deal?”
Spike smiled slowly. “Didn’t say I got to see it through my eyes, did I?”
Buffy worked this out and then said bluntly, “Well, if you get to feel what she did, serves you right. But you’re still evil, right? Still no conscience, no regret, so what’s the point of it all?”
“Maybe there doesn’t need to be a point,” he said. “You seem to think she’s still the innocent victim. Look at her again; is that someone you’d want to meet in a dark alley?”
Buffy turned and cried out, the sound torn from her throat. The ghost was inches away, peering curiously at her. Spike’s arm wrapped around her, pulling her up beside him, holding her protectively. The ghost’s eyes widened at this and a malevolent look contorted her features, stripping away the superficial prettiness. Buffy had seen demons with more humanity in their eyes.
“She wants revenge,” she whispered. The ghost didn’t answer but her eyes seemed to widen with agreement as she reached out for Buffy. Spike cried out and lunged in front of the Slayer, trying to shield her.
Marie laid her hand against his face and his body jerked once before slumping down on the stone tomb, his eyes wide and empty.
“What have you done to him?” Buffy said, anger lending her strength. “Why do you keep on doing this; what, four, five times has it been? Move on! I know what he did was terrible but he can’t do it anymore, I promise. I can see how tormenting him seems right but it isn’t. Not really.”
The sight of Spike’s body, still twitching slightly, had made her allegiance shift. Spike was a killer but this staged, scheduled punishment revolted her.
“How long will this take?” she demanded. The ghost regarded her silently. Buffy swallowed. “What will it take for you to stop this?”
Marie’s lips peeled back in a hideous grin, exposing rotting teeth. Before Buffy could scramble away, the ghost’s hand whipped out and brushed her cheek with a touch that stung like nettles. Buffy fell forward, grazing her face on the stone of the tomb. Her arm came to rest across Spike’s back and the darkness engulfed her.
TBC
