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Splinters by Lilachigh
chp 8 Guides
This is so far AU as to be in another dimension.
Funny what you remember when you’re double dead, Spike thought dreamily. Flames that tickle, light that burns into the heart of you, searching for a soul to set free.
Other things - Buffy’s fingers curling round his, the sheen on the Little Bit’s hair when she brushed it; the affection in Joyce’s eyes, Xander’s laugh, Giles turning into a demon, Andrew’s dog like devotion - further back, Dru and a hundred years of bloody mayhem, dangerous Darla, a brooding great Mick who wouldn’t now be needed to fight a second front and -
‘Why the sodding heck aren’t I in hell?’ Spike pulled himself out of his dreams. It was misty, he was walking but couldn’t see his feet, or his legs or anything come to that. He was drifting through a fog; damp like the ones in Victorian London he could just recall, but at least this one didn’t make you cough.
He’d been expecting hell to be, well, flames and brimstone and great pits, he supposed. He appreciated that his ideas were probably a bit story bookish, but he’d been educated as a staunch member of the Church of England until the day he’d met Dru. She and Liam had both been Catholic, of course, so their ideas of Hell were even more entrenched than his.
He wondered vaguely what religion Darla had been. Not a Quaker, that was for sure, although he remembered her feeding off a whole congregation of them once.
Anyway, no flames, not devils with pitchforks, just this bloody cold mist and, god it was boring! Had he died just to plod along like this for ever? Was this what Hell was.
‘I reckon I’d prefer the molten lava and endless torture. Least see a bit of action. Bloke could go barmy wading through this for ever.’
‘Honestly, Spike, do stop whinging. You’re not the only one who died today, you know. And some of us weren’t ready to go. ’
‘Anya?’
“Yes, of course it’s me. Who else sounds like me. If it’s my voice, it must be me. I mean, it isn’t going to be Jennifer Lopez or the President’s wife, or - ”
“I can’t see you. When did you - what happened - God, I’m sorry!’
“I went just before you made the Hellmouth explode. Swish, right through me with a long, pointy sword thing. I suppose, if I was being picky, I could say that it would have been extremely useful if you’d done your amulet trick ten minutes earlier, then I would be on the bus on the way to Cleveland with Xander, rather than here with you.”
“Sorry. Hard to please everyone all of the time.”
A long suffering sigh was his answer. “No need to be sarcastic, Spike. My dying can’t be helped, I suppose. I fought as well as I could. I hope Xander is upset and grieving, but I’m sure it won’t be for long. Did you see the way that little red-headed would be Slayer was looking at him, yesterday? I’m not quite sure why she couldn’t have died instead of me. ”
“Who else - oh god, did Buffy - ? Dawn ?’
“Oh, they’re fine. On the bus, too. Lots died, but they’ve gone ahead. I had to wait around for you, which, believe me Spike, isn’t how I’d planned on spending my first day dead.’
Spike felt he was reaching out a hand towards her, but there was nothing but mist. ‘Where are we going?’
‘Not far. You know what it’s like - you get the mystical instructions, the plan, the route, but never a proper explanation. I can’t even begin to reckon how much it all costs. The amount of administration involved is - ’
“Anya, my little vengeance demon, is this Hell?”
“What? No, of course it isn’t. Why should I be consigned to Hell? I’ve become a very useful member of the democratic consumer society. I know all the words of all the verses of the national anthem. And just because I decided to revert to being a demon for a while, there is no need for those in authority to be touchy. You probably deserve to be in Hell, Spike, but I suppose because you’ve just saved the world, etc. etc. you’ve been given a sort of time out.’
Spike growled. Bleeding bloody bollocks, she could talk the hind leg off a donkey. Didn’t know how Long John Xander had put up with it all these years. “Time out for what?’
There was no reply. ‘Anya. Anya! I’m sorry. Come back. Anya!’ He stood still and flailed around in the mist, but there was no one there. Just complete silence and a soft cloying whiteness that clung to a face he knew no longer existed.
For a minute he panicked. He was totally and utterly alone. The guy who liked people, his happy meals on legs, loved the buzz, the excitement of things going on all the time was now alone.
This was his punishment, of course. No hell, no flames, just being alone with no sound, no voices, no one in the entire world but him for ever....
OK. He shuddered and stopped flailing. He’d never grovelled to anyone either in his first life or his second. And he certainly wasn’t going to now. He would walk on. If this was his Hell, then so be it. At least the world was safe. And his girl would live a different life, a good life. He loved her so much and had given her what no one else could.
“They know that.” A gentle voice, like honey running across soft white bread. A voice he hadn’t heard for a long time, but one he always remembered with warm affection.
“Tara?”
“Spike.”
‘I don’t understand.”
‘They know that, too. Anya has brought you as far as she can. I have to take you a little further.’
“Are you OK? We all miss you. What happened - I was away at the time. Don’t know if you know. I’d have gutted Warren and strangled him with his own entrails if I’d been in Sunnydale. Although Red did well in the end, although I suppose it wasn’t right for her to try and end the world as well.”
He thought he could hear Tara giggle, but decided it must be a ringing in his ears from the explosion at the Hellmouth.
“I think you’re supposed to be thinking good thoughts, Spike, not taking about entrails and strangling.’
“Oh, sorry! But hey, vampire here, can’t think that a few good thoughts now are going to outweigh a lifetime of murder and mayhem.”
“You were in Africa getting your soul when I died, weren’t you?”
“Oh, you do know about that, then?”
“Why did you think you needed one, Spike?” Tara’s voice was as gentle as ever but, he realised, the stammer had gone.
“Well - always a nice thing to have, luv. And Peaches has one, so why shouldn’t I?’
“Warren had a soul.”
Spike batted again at the mist. If only he could see her face. If only he could see something instead of sodding white cotton wool!
“Are you saying it was all a waste of time? That it doesn’t matter if you have one or not.”
“No, Spike. I just feel that a soul gives you a conscience, but you had one of those before. And you didn’t go and fight for one just because of Angel . Let’s face, it, no one is that petty and over eight years old.”
Spike raised a scarred eyebrow in her general direction, glad suddenly that she couldn’t see him. Tara’s belief in the general goodness of the world was always alarming. Even getting shot didn’t seem to have dented that at all.
That was weird in itself. Did that mean that when you died, you just went on the same person as you were before, making the same judgments and the same mistakes about people.
Bloody hell, did that mean he was going to have to meet all the people he’d killed over all these years and have some sort of long, meaningful conversations with them?
‘It’ll be a sodding great queue if I do,” he muttered.
Spike knew quite well why he’d gone seeking his soul. The reason was a small, slim, brave woman back in Sunnydale. His grandsire thought he’d done it just so he could go on having sex with her. Spike knew he was wrong. He’d done it out of love.
“So - you were sent to meet me?” he asked now into the mist. “Why you, pet, if you don’t mind me knowing?”
“You need a guide. I thought a friend would make the journey less - painful.”
‘Well, you’re certainly less annoying than Miss Vengeance Demon,”’ he said dryly.
“How long is the journey? Where are we going?”
“Time doesn’t have much meaning here, Spike. I look down at Willow and feel it is only yesterday we were together, but she has moved on now. And I’m sort of glad.”
“Only sort of?”
“I’m not an angel, Spike. I want her to be happy, but I don’t like - ’
‘Kennedy?”
“She’s very brave.”
Spike yawned. He felt he’d been walking for hours and no offence meant, but the whys and wherefores of lesbian lovers weren’t at the foremost of his thoughts at this precise moment.
“So, I’m going to a meeting,” he broke in at last as Tara was listing all the things about Kennedy that made her right for the witch.
“Two people need to see you, urgently - before - before - ”
Spike groaned. “Before I go down to Hell, is that it? Okay, bring them on.”
And he clenched fists he couldn’t see and felt his face change as his fangs lengthened. Whatever was about to happen, he’d go down fighting to the very end.
to be continued
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