Subject: [SpikesSalvation] Phoenix Dreams- Chapter 30
Date: Sat, 1 Nov 2003 10:35:24 -0800 (PST)
From: Jerusha Hancock <enigmaticblue@yahoo.com>
Reply-To: SpikesSalvation@yahoogroups.com
To: SpikesSalvation@yahoogroups.com


Chapter 30


How long William knelt on the floor next to his son's ashes, he couldn't say. 
But it seemed like forever. All he could think of was that he had failed in the 
worst possible way. His chief duty had been to protect Ty, and he had failed 
miserably. Tears burned his throat, but they wouldn't come. He was frozen in a 
state of misery so deep that it didn't seem as though it would ever get better. 
He would welcome death.

That was how Buffy found him when Gunn led her into the main storage room. 
Wesley started in surprise when he saw her, but she shook her head at him, 
warning him not to make a sound. She laid a gentle hand on William's shoulder. 
"Look who I found."

He turned slowly, as though he had aged fifty years in as many minutes. And 
then he blinked. "Ty?" he whispered.

For his part, Ty didn't wait. "Daddy." The boy flung himself into William's 
arms, breaking him out of his stasis.

"Ty?" William pushed him away roughly and ran his hands down his son's body, 
checking for injuries at the same time he was checking to be sure he was real. 
"Oh, God, I thought I'd lost you." He grabbed him to his chest tightly, as 
though he would never let go. "Buffy?" That one word held a thousand questions.

"I was checking out some of the other storage rooms when I heard a noise coming 
from the air ducts," she explained. "I called out, and he popped out of one of 
the grates. We were on our way to meet you when we ran into Gunn, and he told 
us what had happened." Her eyes held nothing but compassion. "How's Emmie?"

"I—I don't know," he admitted, standing, Ty still in his arms. Ty didn't seem 
to have any problems with being held. "Wes, do you—"

"I just called Angel to let him know," Wesley replied, holding his cell phone 
away from his mouth. "He said Emmie's going to be fine. The knife missed all 
the major organs, and the Slayer healing is already kicking in."

"Good," William said, finally setting Ty down. "What happened?"

Ty's fear was rapidly diminishing as he realized that he was now safe and 
sound. His father's presence was all he needed to know that the bad men were 
gone and weren't coming back. As a result, he was bursting with excitement and 
news. "The bad men grabbed me at school, and I knew they weren't good, but I 
didn't say anything because I wasn't sure." Ty suddenly looked uncertain. "I'm 
sorry, Dad. 'Cause you said to listen to my gut, but—"

"It's fine," William said quickly, giving him a reassuring hug. "What happened 
next?"

"They tied me up and put me in the closet, and I was really scared. But then I 
'membered what Buffy said about you bein' a hero, and I thought about what 
Uncle Wes taught me, so I concentrated real hard and got out through the air 
ducts. And then I hid 'cause I knew you'd come." The last statement was made 
with such a complete and simple trust that William suddenly felt as though he 
would cry.

"Good thing Wesley taught you a bit, hey, Ty?" was all he managed past the lump 
in his throat. And then he released the boy long enough to give Wesley a hug.

"We should get both of you home," Buffy said, shooting a meaningful look at Wes 
and Gunn, who immediately took the hint.

Wesley nodded. "I think I'll go to the hospital and check on Emmie and Angel. 
From what he said, however, I imagine they'll let her go home tonight."

"Not if Angel has his way," Gunn muttered, though not really loudly enough for 
anyone but Buffy to hear. She, too, had a suspicion that Angel wasn't going to 
let the young Slayer out of his sight for a while. "Yeah, there's some clean-up 
and debriefing to be done here. Why don't you get Ty home, Will? You look like 
you could use some sleep yourself."

~~~~~

Buffy was relieved when they got to William's apartment. They'd stopped for 
burgers on the way home, Ty insisting on a milkshake to top it off. Of course, 
his father was happy to provide it, and the Slayer had the feeling that Ty was 
going to be getting whatever his little heart desired for quite some time to 
come.

In the end, however, Ty was able to get through about half his meal before he 
started to doze off at the table, his head drooping precariously towards his 
food. Without a word, William stood and picked him up, setting off for his 
son's room. Buffy followed, equally silent, watching as the ex-vampire tenderly 
removed his shoes and socks, then his filthy t-shirt and jeans, replacing them 
with clean pajamas, and finally tucking him into bed. They stood that way for a 
long time, the man looking down at the child, she watching them both from the 
doorway with love on her face.

What she felt for this man was the same, and yet so different than what she had 
felt for Spike. In many ways, all the old remnants of animosity had been purged 
by the intervening years, leaving nothing but the love she had felt for the 
vampire. But William was human, and a father, and while he obviously felt 
something for her, it wasn't the burning passion Spike had displayed. This man 
had different priorities than the vampire had, and it felt right. Right, but 
different, since now it was she who was free from just about all other 
entanglements, and he who might hesitate because of other bonds that held him. 
One might say that she loved him more than he loved her at this point. Buffy 
could appreciate the irony.

And yet as he turned towards her, she could see raw need written deep in his 
eyes, and she held out her hand to him. Buffy led him to the couch in the 
living room, where he could finally collapse in a delayed reaction of fear and 
averted grief. "How?" he whispered. "I saw it. I saw him kill Ty, and he had 
turned him—" He choked on the rest of his words, and Buffy pulled him to her, 
so that his head lay on her shoulder, and she rocked him as she would a child.

"Shhh," she soothed. "It was an illusion, a glamor he used to make you think 
that. Race had probably planned to do exactly what he did, but because Ty 
managed to escape and hide, he couldn't and ran out of time."

"I failed him, Buffy. I was supposed to protect him." William was trembling 
with exhaustion and emotion, but still the tears wouldn't come. He was dry-eyed 
and aching with it.

Buffy remembered the night after she came back when he'd told her much the same 
thing. That he had failed her, and that every night, he saved her. She hadn't 
said anything at the time. It was one of her many regrets now, that she hadn't 
seen him for what he was then, in that moment. That she hadn't told him that 
no, he hadn't failed. That she hadn't held him then, or let him hold her.

"You didn't fail him," she corrected. "William, you provided him with the 
strength and the knowledge and the example he needed to get himself out of 
trouble. Any other kid would have probably panicked."

He shook his head, unwilling to accept her absolution. "Erin was wrong," he 
said hoarsely. "She thought I was the right one to raise him. She should have 
chosen someone else. If it wasn't for me, he wouldn't have been in that mess in 
the first place."

"And someone else wouldn't understand about the visions," Buffy said. "Look, 
Spike, I know you're upset and angry that someone was able to grab him. And I 
can't imagine what it must have been like to see him die, whether it actually 
happened or not, but you're the reason he's alive right now. You were the one 
that brought him to Angel and Wesley and the others. And what they taught him 
helped keep him alive too."

"Buffy—"

"No," she said, almost angrily, taking his face in her hands and forcing him to 
look her in the eye. "You are the right man for the job, Spike. You're his 
father. You're the person he trusts more than anyone else in the world. I think 
Erin was a very wise woman to know that you would love him so much you'd give 
your all for him, because you always have. I know this. I watched you do it. 
And I believe in you."

It was as if those words were a key to unlock a door long-shut. He shuddered as 
the memories began their assault on him, as he remembered his childhood in 
England, his mother, Cecily, her rejection, being turned. He remembered 
Drusilla and Angelus and Darla, cutting a swath of mayhem and blood across 
Europe, killing his first Slayer in China and his second in New York, and all 
the years in between. He remembered Sunnydale, and Buffy, and trying to kill 
her and failing miserably, only to wind up in a wheelchair before helping to 
save the world.

He remembered coming back time and again, only to wind up with a chip in his 
head. And he remembered Adam and Glory. He remembered his love and his promise, 
and his passion for Buffy swept through him again as it had on that morning 
he'd had his (first) dream of her and realized what he felt. He remembered the 
agony of her death and the joy of her return, and he remembered their 
friendship and the sex and the casual brutality that they'd shared.

And he remembered the final night in her bathroom, and going to Africa, and 
getting his soul. Memories of that last year, of which he'd never seemed to 
remember dreaming flooded him so that he almost thought he was going insane 
again. He had been insane, and then a pawn, and then an ally, and then a friend 
in a dizzying succession, so that at the end he had doubted her words.

Most of all, he remembered the cave, and the great beams of light that exploded 
from his soul, and he had been cleansed. He had been light, and the beauty of 
it eclipsed the pain of the burning and then he had been—

There. No time, no sense of need or urgency anymore. There had been nothing but 
a feeling of fulfillment, of being finished. Of having done everything that he 
was meant to do. In fact, he simply was.

And it was really rather nice.

Until the voice—

William.

?

William. You are needed.

?!

Will you go?

The William-who-was considered the request, trying to remember what might be so 
urgent as to call him from this place. He was finished, he had—he had saved the 
girl. Had saved the world, not to put too fine a point on it. Finally he came 
up with the only possibile reason he might be tempted to return.

Buffy?

There was some amusement in the answer he got.

No. A boy.

He saw him. A laughing boy with dark hair and blue eyes.

Our tool needs a guardian. Will you go?

He paused. To go back meant to be unfinished, to hurt, to grieve, to be guilty. 
Even here, he remembered that there had been shame and rejection and 
embarrassment. Not even Buffy could call him back to that. Except, to be needed 
and not go denied some vital part of him. Something that still existed inside 
of the essence of himself.

You are forgiven, William.

There was an infinite amount of compassion and love in that voice. Love so deep 
that there was no end to it, and it swallowed up his fear.

I will go.

And then, as an afterthought.

Buffy?

In time. But for now, go absolved, cleansed, whole. Go, loved.

And then he had been on a street in October, in ragged clothes with no memory 
of who he was or how he had gotten there, except that he was William, and Spike 
was dead, and he had to save the girl. The girl who was about to get eaten by 
monsters.

He remembered.

"Spike!" Buffy's frantic voice cut through the haze of memories. "William! Are 
you okay?"

He blinked several times and looked at her, realizing with a sense of awe how 
much he loved her. "Buffy?"

"Thank God," she murmured. "I thought I'd lost you there for a second. You 
stopped breathing, and I couldn't figure out what had happened."

He didn't reply to her words, merely put a hand up to her cheek and stared into 
her eyes. "Buffy."

It was something in his tone that stopped her, something in his eyes that 
hadn't been there before. "Spike?" she whispered, hope evident in her tone, in 
every line of her posture. "You remember?"

"Everything," he replied. "I remember everything." A look of astonishment 
crossed his face. "I was—Chosen, Buffy. For Ty. That's why I came back, for 
him. And I was forgiven." The overwhelming knowledge of it all, the sense of 
all the holes being filled came crashing down on him, and he finally wept. The 
man who had been Spike and William and was now something in between wept with 
joy and sorrow combined, not even realizing that the woman who held him was 
crying as well.

"I love you," he said, when he pulled back, looking into her eyes that now 
returned the same love he felt. "I love you so much."

"I love you." Buffy ran a hand over his face, his hair, his neck, remembering 
every curve and plane, reveling in the sheer beauty of it all. And then she 
smiled. "But I swear, if you ever, ever die on me again, I will so kick your 
ass."

And William laughed, then proceeded to show her just how alive he really was.

"But we have this treasure in clay jars, so that it may be made clear that this 
extraordinary power belongs to God and not to us. We are afflicted in every 
way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted but not 
forsaken; struck down but not destroyed." 2 Cor 4:7-9

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