Title: Well of Realms Author: Nightmelody email: nightmelody@hotmail.com Season: post Chosen Summary: Yet another human-Spike- post Chosen fic. Pairing: S/B Rating: R Disclaimer: The Buffyverse belongs to Joss Whedon Chapter Six: Spike He recognized the street. It was in one of London's better residential areas, lit by gas street lamps. A horse drawn carriage clattered by. Dave looked at his attire. His swim trunks were gone. He was dressed in a suit of some type. Dress clothes, like a gentleman would wear to a dinner party, or to the theater. In the last century. I must have gone back in time. He walked down the street until he came to a large, gracious home, well lit. It was his mother's home! He recognized it! How could my mother have been alive a century ago? That doesn't make sense. None of it made any sense. He walked to the front door and let himself in. The house was quiet. He walked through the foyer, recognizing the furniture, the paintings on the walls. This was home! He found his mother in the drawing room, on her favorite sofa, doing embroidery. "William, you came!" "Mother?" "Of course my dear boy! Come, sit here next to me. Oh, I have been waiting for you for so long! I was worried you wouldn't make it!" She hugged him fiercely. "Mother, I don't understand what's happening, why I'm here. Something has happened to my memory-" "-Yes, yes, I know. You've had a time of it, haven't you? Oh, there were times when I was quite in despair over you. It put quite a damper on my heavenly reward, let me tell you! Your brother and sister both led such conventional lives-but you! With your vampire wickedness, and that horrible, insane girl, Istanbul one week, Paris the next, I couldn't keep up. Oh!" She wiped a tear from her eye. "Mother, mother, what are you talking about? Vampire wickedness?" "William, you've forgotten that? I thought you would at least remember that! Why, son, you were a vampire. For over a hundred years. And that's what made your saving the world so remarkable. A vampire saved the world!" She wiped a tear from her eye while William/Dave sat next to her, stunned. "My boy, the most remarkable vampire that ever lived! I am so proud of you. To close the Hellmouth and save the world!" His mother embraced him and he held her, but his mind was consumed with that word-Vampire. Vampire! How could he have forgotten! The memories flooded his mind-Dru, Angelus, the Big Bad. Spike. He felt dizzy. Spike. His mother saw his stunned expression and got up from the sofa, and poured him a glass of wine. "Now the dreams make sense. The old fashioned clothes. And the girl. We must have been enemies at first. I remember fighting..." All his memories had not returned "The girl...Buffy. The Slayer. Yes, you were enemies, and then allies, then more. Your relationship with her was complicated." She patted his arm. "It will come back to you soon." "Where is that girl, Buffy, now?" His mother frowned slightly. "I don't know. I can't see her. The Powers that Be haven't given me any information on her." "So she could be dead, in that earthquake?" "Earthquake!" Mother tittered. "Is that what you think happened? It was you, and the amulet. You closed the Hellmouth." "Hellmouth. Okay, now I remember that. But it's fuzzy." He had a vision of an underground cavern, and a bright burning light that emanated from him. From the amulet "Oh, son, it will all come back to you." She paused. "And I don't think that girl is dead. I think I would have heard. Even in this dimension, news like that travels. Slayers are like celebrities, here." Slayer. Vampire slayer. Yeah, it was all coming back to him. "So, what is the deal about this pool?" "Why, that is your reward! For saving the world. Well, and also because the Powers that be wanted to bring the Well of Realms back into existence." She picked up her sewing basket and began rummaging through it. "Now, this is important, William, so pay attention." Mother held up a hand sized piece of paper. "This scrap of parchment is part of a larger document, a prophetic work. It was protected by magic, so it could never be completely destroyed. However, the document was torn into pieces and scattered through out dimensions on this plane. Your task is to find all the pieces. The information will bring centuries of rest to your world." "What do you mean, rest?" He took the scrap and studied the unknown script. "The string of Apocalypses your world has experienced in this decade is out of balance. Really, every one knows an apocalypse is supposed to be a very rare thing. But not lately." Spike didn't know what she was talking about. Some big gap in his memory, he figured. "So, find the document. It might be a scroll, or perhaps a book. There's not enough here to tell." "But how can I find these pieces?" A rush of water engulfed him. It pulled at him, flipping and turning him like a piece of drift wood. Mother, the London drawing room-all were gone. "Follow the current." His mother's voice was distorted by the water. He glimpsed the piece of parchment rushing away from him, caught in a swift current, and he floundered after it. The pool was much deeper here, he couldn't see the floor, and the light at the surface seemed far away. And he needed air. The parchment was getting further away. Bloody hell. He surged after it, finally grasping it as his lungs ached and burned. He pushed to the surface. Kate and Emma were on the bank of the pool. Emma was crying. She looked just like Marie when she cried. And Kate was dripping wet. "Thank the Goddess!" Kate said, helping him out. "You've been gone- and I mean gone, because I searched the pool for you-for twenty minutes! What happened?" "London," he gasped, sucking in gulps of air and then coughing. Sometimes being human sucked He paused for a deep breath. " My name is Spike. I was a vampire for over a hundred years. And I closed the Hellmouth that was under Sunnydale with that necklace. My reward was to become the Guardian of the Well." Later that night, after a quick patrol of the local graveyard-no vampires, the two he and Emma met might have just been passing through- Spike pulled out his journal and made an entry. 'Today I found out how the Well works. I dived in and found myself in my mother's home in London. In the 1880's. My mother was there, looking better than I remembered--but now I realize that she was in her afterlife, not still living in 1880 London. So she wasn't sick anymore. My memories came back. It was a shock to remember that I had been a vampire. I can remember killing people. But it all seems far away, like looking through a filter. I remember the girl, Buffy. Mother said she would have heard if Buffy was dead, so I guess she's alive somewhere. Not in Sunnydale, though. I'm not going to try to find her. All of that-it was so intense, the joy , the grief. Anger, heartbreak. Love. I'm afraid that if I found her, life would be another roller coaster. I hope she's happy where ever she is. And if she's not--well, I never had the knack of making her happy, anyway. Maybe someone else can. That life-with her in Sunnydale-seems so far away from this life with Kate and Emma and Marie. That life was full of pain. Being here, it's like being part of a family. Nobody hates me for the things I did as a soulless undead thing. And I have a purpose, to find the document. It's not the big dream I once had, to be with her, to be her partner, her lover, but it is enough. I can find contentment, even happiness, with this new life. I hope she can find that, too.' He closed the journal and sat, staring at nothing. He could remember her touch, the softness of her hair, the passion of her kiss. He would never have that again, either. That's my penance, he thought. To live without her. For being a vampire, for killing all those people. I get the memories, and the knowledge of what might have been.