Collide

By: enigmaticblue

Rating: PG-15

Disclaimer: The standard "I don't own; please don't sue."

Archive: Anywhere that already has my stuff; anywhere else just ask.

Summary: What if that house-demolishing in Smashed was a metaphor with a different meaning than the writers gave it? What if that night marked a release of a different sort? Goes seriously AU immediately after Smashed, and makes reference to my short story, "The Promise I'm Keeping," written for summer_of_spike.

Chapter 19: Leap of Faith

"I lost it all/You got it back/Believed in me/When I gave up on myself again/A sudden rain/ Revealed your face/I knew right then/No matter where I go I'd have/Your hand to hold...I was/A tender reed/Bent in the wind/And then the storm had passed/And you helped me stand upright again/So here we are/Nothing to lose/So take my hand/We'll jump right in/The water's warm/It's time to swim..." ~Plumb, "Sink n' Swim"

Buffy took the plastic bag filled with magic supplies from Tara. "So we know how this is going to work?"

Tara had taken a trip to the Magic Box for the necessary supplies, after teaching Buffy the correct pronunciation for the Latin in the ritual. Buffy had spent the last couple of hours memorizing the words. It would have been easier if the whole thing had been in English, but that wasn't possible. Apparently, there were segments that simply weren't as potent if spoken in English. In order to break Willow's spell, the magic was going to have to be pretty powerful.

Tara nodded. "When you lift the curse, it will probably spring back on the caster."

The Slayer raised an eyebrow. "Probably?"

She sighed. "It's hard to say. It depends on how Willow set up the spell. Sometimes curses are tied to the person who made them in the first place. Sometimes they're not. If they are, then the witch will know if the curse has been broken."

"What if it doesn't work that way?" Buffy asked.

Tara looked grim. "Then Giles and I take her by surprise and cast the other spell anyway."

"The one that Dawn wants to help you with," Buffy stated. She frowned. "I don't want her involved in this, Tara. She's—"

"It's not dangerous," Tara assured her. "I wouldn't have even suggested that Dawn help if it was. I also don't think that Willow would deliberately hurt her, and..."

When the other woman trailed off, Buffy nodded. "You think that how Dawn looks at Willow will have more of an effect on her than anyone else's opinion."

"Dawn hasn't done anything to hurt Willow," Tara pointed out. When Buffy looked like she was about to protest, Tara raised her hand to forestall the argument. "That's the way Willow will see it. I think it has a better chance of working than if one of us was the focus."

"You think this will really bring her to her senses?" Buffy asked. "I mean, it just seems like this isn't really Willow, you know?"

"I think she needs to realize what kind of damage she's doing," Tara said. "And I think this might be the only way to accomplish that."

Buffy nodded slowly. "Okay. Dawn can help. I know you and Giles will take care of her. How will you know when we've completed the ritual?"

Tara smiled ruefully. "I'll know. I should be able to feel it since I'm looking for it. If I can't sense it, hopefully we'll get the timing right."

"Okay. I guess I'll get this set up, then."

Tara put a hand on Buffy's arm, watching her closely. "Buffy, are you sure about this? The ritual calls for..."

"I know." Buffy shrugged. "It's weird, and unexpected, and Spike's still a pain in the ass, but he's my pain in the ass." Her face softened. "I wouldn't have made it through the last couple of months without him."

Tara impulsively gave Buffy a hug. "If it makes you feel any better, I like Spike."

Buffy returned her embrace, thankful that at least one person in her life didn't think she was making some huge mistake. One person besides Dawn, anyway, who was completely biased in Spike's favor. "Thank you. That does make me feel better."

"Do you know what you're going to do?" Tara asked, referring to the gesture of trust that the ritual called for.

Buffy nodded, her eyes deathly serious. "Yeah, but I have no idea if Spike will cooperate."

~~~~~

Anya looked up when the bell over the door jangled, frowning when she saw Xander. "What do you want, Xander? I'm in the middle of making orders."

He hesitated. "Can I talk to you?"

She put her pen down. "Talk."

"I'm sorry," Xander began awkwardly. "When I—I was stupid."

"I'm not going to argue with you."

He winced. "Thanks. It's just that I think we're moving too fast. I wanted to slow things down." Xander met her eyes. "I love you, Anya. I don't want to break up with you."

"I didn't want to break up with you either," she replied. "Xander, you put your friends before me most of the time."

"They're my friends, An," Xander replied. "They do important work."

"And your girlfriend isn't just as important?" she asked. "I don't want you to marry me if you're just doing it because you want to keep me around."

Xander ran a hand through his hair. "I want to keep you around, but it's more than that," he said with a sheepish look. "It's just that I don't want to hurt you."

"But you did hurt me," Anya replied. "You don't want to be with me."

"I do!" he protested. "It's just—forever is a long time."

Anya nodded. "You're right, it is." She took a deep breath. "I'm not going to wait around for you to make up your mind, Xander. If you don't want forever with me, then I think we should end this now."

This was it, Xander realized. This was where he had to make a decision. Anya wasn't going to let him off the hook. There wasn't going to be any more waiting. Xander could either put aside his fears and go ahead with their relationship, or he could walk away.

He just wished he knew the right thing to do.

~~~~~

Willow had no idea what had happened. Her plan had been perfect. Once Spike was out of the way, Buffy would come back to her friends. Except that apparently Spike was still alive—or undead—and now Tara was helping him.

Tara's words haunted her. What if she had been right? Willow had just wanted to fix things. Buffy was dead; she would bring her back to life. Tara was angry with her; Willow would make her forget their fight. Both Buffy and Tara were upset and angry; Willow would make it better.

That's all she'd wanted really.

Now, however, Willow didn't know what to do to make things right. She couldn't remove the curse; she hadn't lied to Tara about that. Willow was fairly sure that the curse couldn't be lifted unless she died or Spike did. Apologizing to Buffy wouldn't change things either, and besides, Willow really didn't want to.

She'd simply been doing what she thought was best. Since when were you supposed to get into trouble for good intentions? If Buffy had just talked to her, instead of going to Spike, everything would have been okay. They could have worked something out. Willow could have fixed it, but instead everything went so horribly wrong.

And she didn't think she could do anything about it.

~~~~~

Spike watched Buffy suspiciously as she set out the various spell ingredients on her dresser, close to hand. "You haven't told me why Tara isn't doing this."

"That's because she doesn't have to," Buffy replied. "It's also because once we break the curse on you, Giles and Tara are going to go after Willow immediately, so she can't do it."

"You're not tellin' me everything."

"No, I'm not."

Her honesty surprised him. "Buffy—"

"The spell has to be done by someone who loves the victim."

Spike stared at her. "Then it's not going to work."

"Why is that?"

"You don't love me," Spike said. "You—" He stopped, staring at her in wonder as Buffy used the ritual preparations to cover her confusion. "Buffy?"

She ignored him in favor of lighting the candles at the four points of the compass on the floor. "Step into the circle, Spike."

"But you—"

"When this is over we can talk about how I feel," she said. "For right now, I want to get this done." Buffy saw the hurt on his face, and she sighed. "Spike, please. I promise we will talk about this, in great depth and in as much detail as you like. When I feel like I have more than a minute to breathe. We're kind of on a schedule here."

He stepped into the circle. Spike wanted this curse gone as much as Buffy did—more than Buffy did. He also really wanted to know what else this little magic trick was going to reveal. "So what do you have to do?"

"Say a prayer, chant a chant, make a big trust-like gesture, and boom. The curse should be lifted."

"Should be?"

"Anya said she's seen it work once before, but it turned out badly. I'm hoping we're the success story," Buffy admitted. "You ready for this?"

Spike nodded, listening as she began to chant in English, and then in Latin. His Latin was definitely rusty, but he understood the rest of it just fine. The trouble came in with the Latin, which was a plea for charity—and something else. Spike couldn't quite figure it out. He knew that Buffy loved her friends, loved her Watcher, loved Dawn. For all he knew, she could love him too, but not in the way he wanted.

How did you define love? More importantly, how did Buffy?

She'd loved Dawn enough to die for her. Spike wondered if she loved him enough to stay with him. He tended not to have great luck in that area.

The Latin ended and the English began again, a statement of complete trust to demonstrate the fact that he was worthy of being saved.

Spike was beginning to feel an odd tingling sensation, as though he was warming from the inside out. It should have been impossible because he was a vampire, and vampires didn't feel heat or cold, at least not under normal circumstances. This was anything but normal, though.

"Buffy?"

She kept going, stubbornly working through the Latin. It was just the same phrase over and over again, and Spike wondered when she'd learned to say it properly.

Spike was beginning to get warmer, and he wondered if his skin would feel hot to the touch. It felt like some great pressure was building, and he could see the flames of the candles rise and the sand marking the edges of the circle begin to glow.

Now Buffy was asking somebody or other to regard her offering with favor, and Spike started getting really uncomfortable. What the hell kind of offering was she going to make? He didn't want her to make a sacrifice. That wasn't what it was supposed to be about. Spike had been trying to make Buffy's life easier, not harder.

Buffy finished the chant with the same Latin she'd been using. Spike had heard it so many times at this point that he knew it by heart. She was asking a favor, that the curse over him be broken. They were simple words.

As was her gesture as finished the last round of chanting.

Spike watched in disbelief as Buffy pushed her hair over one shoulder, leaving the left side of her neck bare. "What are you doing?"

"It's my big gesture," she replied. "Bite me, Spike."

Spike stood frozen. He couldn't believe this was even happening. That Buffy would offer herself up to him willingly—if she came to regret it later, though... "I can't, Buffy. You don't want this."

"Actually, I do." Buffy's mouth was a straight line. "And don't tell me what I do or don't want. I'm old enough to know my own mind."

"I can't," Spike replied, knowing that he sounded like an utter git. "You'll hate me for it."

Buffy took a small step closer to him. "No, I really won't."

"Why not?" Spike demanded. "What's so important about me, Buffy? Why put your neck on the line for this?"

"Because I love you, you idiot," she said, sounding a little irritated by the whole thing. Buffy stepped even closer, invading his space. "And because I trust you. With everything. This is just the icing on the cake."

Spike couldn't have said no to her even if he wanted to, and he really didn't want to. It had been years since he'd drunk from a living human, and Slayer's blood was like a Siren's call. Spike wondered if Buffy had realized that she was the only person he could have fed from, and he hadn't done so. If that alone hadn't told Buffy everything she needed to know about his feelings, there were no words that Spike could have used to convince her.

He wondered if she'd even thought about it. Spike wondered if Buffy even knew what she was doing.

It was more than just placing her life in his hands. It meant that she was breaking down every barrier that stood between them, offering him everything she had.

His face shifted, and Buffy smiled at him, touching his cheek. "Go on, Spike. Break the spell."

Spike felt as though he was burning up from the inside out. He was on fire. The candles were still flaming, the light from the circle covering them with a blaze of glory. Buffy's face was glowing; she looked like an angel. It seemed impossible that he should even be able to touch her, monster that he was.

But he would take it because she offered.

Spike heard her cry of pain when he bit down, and he would have withdrawn, but Buffy's hands came up, her fingers gripping the short hair at the back of his head. "I'm okay," she whispered in his ear.

He kept drinking, feeling the heat explode through him in a moment of ecstasy so profound he couldn't even comprehend what had just happened. It was that night in the abandoned house all over again, only better.

It was everything he'd ever wanted, ever longed for. It was perfect.

Spike pulled back, even though Buffy's hands maintained their tight grip on his head and neck. "Gotta stop now, luv," he said quietly, his face shifting again. The room was now shrouded in darkness, the candles having gone out and the pale sand demarcating the circle glowing only faintly in the moonlight. "You okay?"

"More than okay." Buffy kissed him hungrily. It wasn't that she'd gotten off on him biting her, precisely. It wasn't quite like the excitement that came after a good fight either. She'd felt perfectly safe in his arms, even with his teeth buried in her neck.

It had been the look of wonder on Spike's face, the absolute awe that her words had kindled. It was feeling, if only for a moment, that she belonged exactly where she was.

And it was the fact that even if she was safe with Spike, Buffy was walking on the edge by having a vampire biting her. The adrenaline was coursing through her, as much from the bite as from Spike's expression of adoration. She'd put that there.

Her hands were frantic on his clothing. She wanted him now.

Spike's hands were equally insistent. "Buffy...say it again."

"I love you," she said, her hands on his belt buckle.

Spike's hands were actually warm on her skin, the remnants of the spell causing an artificial heat.

There was a kind of rough tenderness in their lovemaking, a raw need that went beyond words. It was hungry and desperate and nearly overwhelming. Buffy understood what Spike meant when he said he was drowning in her, because the feeling was mutual.

And it felt so right.

~~~~~

"How are you going to know when Buffy does the ritual?" Dawn asked. She was standing with Giles and Tara on the UC Sunnydale campus, near Willow's dorm room.

Tara looked at her watch. "Buffy was going to start around nine. We guessed that it would probably take about fifteen minutes to finish the spell."

Giles raised an eyebrow. "I thought you said you'd be able to sense when it was broken."

"I should be able to," Tara replied. "The timing is just so we have something else to go by in case it doesn't work."

"What if nothing happens when Buffy does the ritual?" Dawn asked. "Are you and Giles going to be able to take her?"

"I'm hoping that we'll catch her by surprise," Giles admitted. "If Willow is unprepared, she cannot be on the defensive."

Dawn raised her eyebrows. "That's not making me feel any better."

"It wasn't meant to," Giles replied, sounding a little snappish.

Tara straightened. "It's done."

"You felt it?" Giles asked, following her as she headed towards the front doors of the residence hall.

Tara just nodded, heading down the hall towards the corner room. She waved Giles and Dawn to stay back where Willow wouldn't be able to see them when she opened the door. Steadying herself, Tara knocked. She didn't want to do this. It felt like a betrayal, to be trying to catch her ex-girlfriend unaware. In some ways, it felt as though they were doing exactly what they had accused Willow of.

Tara just wished she could find a different way.

Willow opened the door, looking pale and ill. "Tara? What—do you know what happened?"

Tara nodded. "Buffy broke your curse, Willow." She didn't know what she was hoping for. Maybe if Willow had seemed relieved, or if she'd expressed any remorse for doing the curse in the first place. Instead, anger flashed across the redhead's face—anger and hurt pride.

"Buffy did it?" Willow asked in disbelief. "Buffy doesn't know anything about magic. I made that curse so it couldn't be broken!"

Tara set her jaw and raised a hand. "Necto."

Willow stared at her in surprise as the binding spell took affect. "What? What do you think you're doing? You can't hold me! Is this about the curse? Spike is a vampire! He's not a person! He's nothing!"

"Necto." Giles' voice took on a deeper tone as he reinforced the binding spell, coming into the room, Dawn at his heels. "Shut the door, Dawn."

Dawn did as she was told, leaning against the closed door and staring at Willow with a cold expression. "How does it feel, Willow?"

"Dawnie, what are you doing?" Willow asked. "I don't know what they told you, but it isn't true."

"You know what's true?" Dawn asked. "What's true is that you took me to Rack's, and if you hadn't, he never would have known about me. What's true is that he decided he would kidnap me because you put that spell on Spike, and Rack didn't think Spike would be around to protect me. You're the reason that bastard took what he did from me."

Willow shook her head, her eyes wide. "Dawn, you have to know that I would never hurt you. I never did anything to hurt you! You know that!" She was so focused on Dawn and her accusations that Willow didn't notice that Tara and Giles were beginning to chant quietly from either side of her.

"Now, Dawn," Tara commanded.

Dawn reached out and grabbed Willow's hand. "No, Willow, you have to know exactly how we feel about you."

Willow was suddenly inundated with Dawn's feelings of rage and helplessness, her feelings of betrayal. It was Willow who had hurt Buffy so badly, Willow who had gone after Spike just when they were starting to feel like a family again, Willow who had put her in danger.

Dawn hated this person that Willow had become, the woman who had replaced the girl she had hero-worshipped.

Willow was sobbing by the time Dawn let go of her hand, but they weren't done with her yet. Tara was next, and the sense of utter disappointment and complete loss of trust nearly did her in. She was begging them to stop in a broken voice when Tara released her. Giles just shook his head when Tara and Dawn looked at him to see if he would finish the spell.

"That's enough," he said quietly.

Tara nodded, speaking the words to end the spell and release the binding. Willow collapsed on the floor, still weeping, the emotional onslaught having broken through her denial. Tara watched her weep and couldn't help but feel compassion for her. At the same time, she couldn't go to her. Not anymore. Not now.

"Why don't you take Dawn home?" Giles suggested. "I'll take care of Willow."

"Okay," Tara said. "Dawnie?"

"Yeah, let's go," Dawn said, heading out the door. "Only, maybe we'd better stop somewhere in between first." She didn't want to be around Willow. In fact, right now Dawn thought she'd be just as happy if she never had to see her again.

Tara frowned. "Sure, if you want to, but why?"

Dawn smirked. "Knowing my sister and Spike, they're going to need some privacy for a while."