Author: Azure K Mello
Rating- R for swearing
Warning- angst abounds
Description: Spike went to Angel for help... and Angel did? But wouldn't that make Spike evil?
Disclaimer- clearly I own nothing. The sentence: now let me go. is stolen directly from I Only Have Eyes for you. You could say but it's only four words it can't be stolen, which is legally true but I just have this vision of the woman teacher saying it to the janitor.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I woke up laying on my side,
looking down at my feet, and with the top of my head pressing against something
hard. The something hard was vibrating with soft rumbles. My sire's purring
comforted me slightly and I relaxed into his hold. Keeping my eyes shut
did not fool him and he said softly, "Are you hungry?"
I sighed heavily. "We're
pretending to be asleep, Angel. Don't ask silly questions, just pretend
to be asleep with me," I said, sounding petulant and childish, I'm sure.
He laughed his soft warm
laugh and kissed the top of my head as he pulled me closer to him. With
our chests flush against each other, I suddenly realized why I was so fascinated
with his purring: my chest wasn't moving. I pulled him closer to me as
I vamped out. I was only slightly aware that I was hyperventilating as
I started to cry. Angel said nothing but caressed my back in small soothing
circles. "Thank-you... Sire," I said in a whisper that only vampiric hearing
would detect.
My sire hushed me and twisted
a lock of my hair around his finger. "Are you hungry?" he asked again.
Smirking, I said, "We're
supposed to be pretending to be asleep."
I could feel his grin against
my shoulder. "I'll give you asleep."
Suddenly he started to torture
me in the way only my sire could. Curse the god that made me ticklish.
Screaming only encouraged the bastard. Perpetrating the only offence that
would get him to stop, I bit him, earning me a clout around the ear. And
he screamed "Fuck me in the eye." Followed by some rather colourful Gaelic
expressions.
Unwittingly I had vamped
during his barrage and, upon biting, I had bit clean though his skin and
into a nerve. I licked the wound and whispered, "See what happens when
you're cruel to poor little animals?"
He laughed and kissed me
full on the lips. "But you're my poor little animal," he said.
I looked into his eyes and
sobered. "I am yours. You know that right? I've always been yours and nothing
I tried to do changed that. It didn't matter that Dru made me; you were
always my Sire. You were and always will be my be all and end all." I sat
up and tried to pull away to run from his reply, which would undoubtedly
break me. I should have just been happy my anal retentive sire was letting
me lay on his bed while covered in dirt, sweat, and blood. My sire loved
Buffy, he loved Drusilla and Penn, he loved Darla, but he never loved me.
He had taken care of me because my own sire was incapable, but I had never
been his childe in his mind. He grabbed my wrist and I was too fucking
weak to get away.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
He sat there with his back
to me, his body rising and falling with the power of unneeded yet hitched
breath. My poor lost childe was sitting there dejected, his shoulders slumped.
"Why do you always run?" I asked, with an edge compelling my childe to
reply.
"Why do you ask questions
to which you already know the answer?" he said softly. He looked back at
me with so much hurt and pain in his eyes. "I run because I fear what's
coming next. And it's probably the one smart thing I ever do. Now let me
go."
"Spike," I said, softly
pulling him back to bed. "Honey, I love you too. Now stop spazzing."
"Thank-you, for saying it.
It's kind of you," he said, and I started to respond but he cut me off.
"It doesn't matter that it's not true... you don't have to, I understand."
"I do!" I said, slightly
angry that he didn't accept it. "How could I not?" A brief flash of concealed
pain flashed across his face. "Just say it, Will. What's the matter? Why
don't you believe me?"
"I believe that you like
me very much. That you love me in the un-conditional soft love of a parent.
But you don't love me the way I love you, the way I want you to love me.
I love you. I love your stupid poncy hair, I loved you when you took me
in, when you thrashed me, when you sang to me in Gallic when I was sick.
I love that this scar was your doing," he said, touching his eyebrow. "I
love that there is one under your armpit that's mine.
"I get the shivers watching
your compassion to people: the same shivers I got from your ceaseless and
imaginative violence. I feel like the world is sitting in my stomach when
you talk to me. Touching you is like fire. I could die when you laugh.
I want to spend my life with you. Fuck a happiness curse: just standing
next to you gives me my moment of pure happiness. Don't tell me you feel
that way."
"Spike, I love you. I don't
know how I can say that to make you believe it. You are now and have always
been my childe. I love you so much it hurts," I said, shaking my head slowly,
disgusted that I couldn't prove it to him.
"Ok," he said, sounding
dejected. " Would you let go of me?"
"You don't believe me,"
I said, feeling suddenly so tired of the runaround we gave each other.
" You never came for me,"
he said softly, not looking at me.
"What?"
"Everything I did while
you were Angelus, I did for you. The slayers. Fuck man, I killed children
to prove myself. You didn't even seem to notice. Everything I've ever done
since you left, I did so you would come back. I took care of Dru so that
you didn't have to feel guilty about abandoning your 'poor crazy daughter'.
I let you alone hoping you just wanted space. I stopped you from destroying
the world to make you proud, so that you wouldn't regret it later. I tortured
you for some stupid accessory; I thought you'd realize I was acting up
so you would notice me. I fought with Buffy because you couldn't. I tried
to be with her so you would get jealous and come back."
"Jealous of you?" I asked,
trying to understand.
He rolled his eyes. "No,
you stupid dolt, jealous of her. That she could touch what was yours. I
got so angry... you just didn't care. I tried to rape her: anything so
you would take note. I felt badly -- I love Buffy as a brother loves his
sister and our entire stint together was painful and rash. I went home
and spoke to my friend Clem; I couldn't figure out what was left to do.
I kept asking him: 'What have I done, what haven't I done, why didn't I
do it?' What could I do to get through to you? What haven't I done?" he
asked, laughing, and then he continued on. "So I went out and got myself
a fucking soul, can you imagine? I had all these wonderful visions of you
swooping in, coat billowing, and welcoming me into the society of the ensouled
like a sire. I thought you would take care of me. As it was, I ended up
mad in the school basement, being coerced into killing dozens if not hundreds
by the First Evil. You never came. So I thought, hey, if at first you don't
succeed -- right? So I went back to Buffy hoping for the double whammy:
don't touch my childe, moreover my SOULMATE. So what happens next? I see
you two macking it in a crypt while the First whispers sweet nothings in
my ear that she's a skanky bitch and that you never loved me. So I did
the last desperate thing I could: I died fighting the good fight, eager
that maybe you would mourn me. You didn't even know I was dead. Don't tell
me you love me with an all-consuming love. And don't pity me. I'm not fragile...
I'm just naive."
"I didn't know, baby."
"Bull!" he screamed. "It's
called the Sire/Childe bond and it's real."
"I severed it years ago,"
I said, softly feeling guiltier than I ever had: no, I haven't killed somebody;
I just broke my little boy.
"Because you didn't want
to be connected to someone so weak? You didn't give a damn about what I
was thinking and feeling?" he said, his words filled with cold resigned
malice.
"Because I couldn't bear
not being the center of your every waking thought, your dreams... I wasn't
at the root of every emotion and I couldn't stomach it. I didn't think
you wanted me 'all ensouled' as you put it. I couldn't bear to hear you
and feel you if I couldn't be with you. So I cut it. I didn't know where
you were since I last saw you. And then Buffy tells me that you're together
and that you have a soul and that you make her happy. And it killed me.
But what's that old expression? If you love something, let it go. And I
had hurt you both so many times that I left. I think she thought I was
proud of you, for fighting the good fight, for getting a soul. I wasn't
proud. I couldn't be proud of you for those things when I'm so proud of
you just for being you. You can't do anything to make me more proud of
you than I already am. I wanted to die that night when I went home -- I
hadn't even gotten to see you. But I thought you were hers, that you had
no interest in seeing me. I left and I cried all the way back here. Fuck,
I bleed for you, the way you bled for everything. You always knew what
you wanted. You're amazing. You're beautiful." I realized I was crying,
and laughed. "You're fucking effulgent. I love you. Remember that time
Darla beat me 'til I couldn't walk?" I asked. Spike nodded. "It was because
she wasn't the object of my adoration and she damn well knew it."
"Adoration? Now there's
an archaic word," he said flippantly as he looked back at me with tears
pouring down his face.
I pulled him to me and bit
into his neck without saying a word. I focused on all the emotion I had
suppressed in order to break the bond. I poured everything I was feeling
out metaphorically through my teeth. I heard him gasp and I knew his side
of he bond was back up. He was seeing inside my head. I released him and
licked the wound until it healed. I pulled back to face him. "Now it's
your turn."
"What do I have to do?"
he asked, sounding for all the world like a nervous virgin.
"Just bite me. You never
broke our link," I said. I felt his cold breath on my neck and then he
was inside me. My boy was finally home. I focused again on censored memories
and what it felt like to lose him for all those years. And suddenly I could
feel him. I made soft hushing noises as he broke the physical contact.
"Oh, GOD! Angel, I.. I..
I don't know what to say. I..." he said, in a stunned fashion that made
me smile. I wondered when Spike was last fazed.
"You're starving." I said
with authority. "And you're tired. Go to sleep and I'll get you something
to eat. Kay?" I asked as I sat back up. But instantly I was pulled back
down. I saw the look of quiet desperation in Spike's eyes and I kissed
him fiercely. He clung to me like a lipid to a stone. My childe had always
been tactile. "I love you," I said again as I watched him drift into sleep.