Disclaimer: Characters of Buffy and Spike belong to Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy and 'Grr Arg', not me. No profit being made.
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Part One
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Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows.
-Shakespeare, The Tempest
* * *
Somewhere in LA:
Night insects gathered dizzily around the flickering porchlight of the old tenement. On the sidewalk beyond, a morass of humanity seethed, busy people with busy lives, passing quickly through this part of the city, driven by necessity, buzzing as erratically and aimlessly as the insects. None of them had any time for monsters that lived in the dark-such things they'd left behind with childhood, along with most essential truths of the world. Had any of them had the time or inclination to look for such things, demons could be found within the very building they passed each day, on the way to work. Monsters though, are the stuff of fairytales, and so the tenement was still safely housing the pair that had been living there for the past week.
The apartment was small, but relatively well-appointed, the stark, almost gothic splendour of its wrought-iron gables and heavy beams giving it an air of debauched dignity. At the time, it had suited Spike and Druscilla just fine, not a place to call home, but comfortable enough; with its enormous, heavy velveteen drapes blocking out every hint of daylight.
Yes, it had been a welcome haven after their mad dash across the countryside, fleeing Sunnydale in the discomfort of the blacked out car. Arriving at last at this small outpost of antiquity sandwiched between low-cost slum dwellings in the heart of the city.
Tonight though; as the people outside went about their mortal business, and the other elderly tenants slumbered oblivious of their deadly neighbours; all was not well.
* * *
Miss Edith was not happy. She spoke to Druscilla, constantly berating her, singing the songs she'd read in Acathla's stone, over and over. Sighing airlessly, Dru sat up, moving to the edge of the bed. Sleeping was useless, the whispers intruded, and sometimes they would not be Miss Edith at all. Sometimes she thought they were her Angel, and he was hurting. He wanted her with him.
Idly stroking Miss Edith's silky matted hair, Dru's gaze wandered blankly about the small room, voices fading to quiet humming in the base of her skull. All the walls were dark, but she could feel the sun pressing in against the curtains outside, it shrieked at her, or perhaps that was Angel again.
Her eyes flicked down to the other side of the bed. Her Spike lay there, deep asleep still. He couldn't hear her Angel calling her, or the truths Miss Edith had told her about what had happened back in Sunnyhell. She woudn't talk to him since then, and that made him burn inside. She could see it, had seen it also when she was still with her Angel; like a furnace through his eyes, under his skin.
She snarled quietly to herself. Miss Edith had told her Spike lied to her, that Spike had helped the Slayer send her Angel away. She hadn't believed it at first, until she'd spoken to the moon, on their first night here. It's pale cold light reminded her of his skin, and she'd sung it a song, telling it how much she missed her Angel. Spike had been mad, but through his anger she could read the truth- it glowed in the lights of his eyes.
So now, she waited; Angel's voice, inexplicably high and sweet, playing in her head; waiting for him to tell her how to join him.
* * *
Spike groaned as awareness slowly returned, attempting to figure out where he was. It was late, the air biting at him with the chill of night; hunger gnawed ceaselessly at his stomach, and his eyes were full of sharp burning pain.
Hesitantly, he touched a hand to his cheek, fingering wetness there. Everything was dark- were his eyes closed? Memory seemed blessedly insulated, full of vague warm nothingness. The moment he realised relief at this lack of recall, he also felt an intense sense of foreboding over whatever it was he couldn't remember. Snarling in frustration at the distraction the pain was causing in his thought processes, he sniffed the liquid on his fingertips,
Ignoring the intense pain the movement caused in his darkened vision, he attempted to lever himself up off the floor. In a sitting position, he cautiously extended a hand in front of him.
Dropping his arm back down, he patted the floor around him, stopping short as he brushed against something long and silky. Winding the strands around his palm he pulled the object towards him. Traced its cool porcelain contours with a finger.
< a doll, one of... Dru's... ? >
The grim wave of sickening knowledge crashed over him, finally breaking, memory returning with it. Trapping him in the darkness behind his eyes, the empty blackness now filled with vivid images...
He'd awoken, aware of the emptiness beside him where she had lain. Across the room, the bathroom door stood slightly ajar, and he rose, wearily padding across to it.
She'd said nothing as he pushed the door open, turning to look at him with an expression of perfect clarity; and, for the first time he could remember, something resembling sanity. For an instant the entire room was visible in eerie detail, the sharp black lines of the gables, shadows casting bars across her flesh as she pulled aside the last barrier to the sun. She'd smiled then, eyes reproving him as her beauty lit up with the brilliant intensity of daylight. The brightness touching her skin for the first time in 200 years, lips mouthing something as she turned towards the sunbeam : "Angel... ?"
Her hand raised, holding the heavily woven stay that controlled the movement of the curtains; their thick rich velvet incongrous with the well worn furnishings of the rest of the small apartment.
Him, standing in that doorway as time seemed to stop; his mind registering every tiny detail of the scene before them, yet seemingly unable to process them, unable to believe this could happen.
And he hadn't saved her. Even as he watched her pull back her arm, sharply jerk open the curtain ties,
"No... "
He managed to croak out weakly in that split second, unable to move, knowing it was too late to rescue her, seeing in his minds eye the motes of ash glittering, floating in the autumn sunlight. Seeing himself diving into the room, perishing with his black goddess. Yet that was not what he did. These thoughts ran end over end through his brain, and in that second she was gone, expression full of slight bemusement.
His sight exploded in nuclear whiteness; the scene burned into his mind, as if with a flash-bulb from some ancient camera; his body reflexively slammed the door, collapsing in the blessed darkness on the other side, the after-image of Druscilla's death still branded on the inside of his eyelids.
Blood streaked Spike's cheeks, as he was pulled back yet again to that moment; all his resourcefulness, all his toughness and savagery, his ruthless practicality had fled. The pain in his eyes, the bite of the hunger; were nothing to him now compared with the tight agony in his chest as he realized she was gone.
With no one there to see him, he curled around the doll still clutched in his hand, it's china skull broken by the strength of his grip, shards drawing blood from gashes he could not feel.
* * *
Tonight, Buffy leaned against the graffitti darkened wall of the rear of a nightclub; praying she'd run into some guy dumb enough to mistake her for a streetwalker, or better still, a vampire she could happily pound to a pulp. The granite of the wall digging into her cheek, was just enough to remind her that she was still alive. In moments of stillness such as this, unwanted thoughts leapt through her head at a dizzying pace; she needed cartharsis, needed a good fight to blank out the thinking.
Buffy rarely slept anymore, and the lack had etched dusky shadows on the pale skin under her eyes. She had given up sleeping, as an activity that was not only non-productive, and sometimes dangerous, but also intensely painful. When she slept, she lost control of the pain, as visions of demons, swords and loved ones plagued her. Instead, she walked the streets of the city, supremely secure in the fact that none of LA's everyday monsters could compete with the undead ones she was trained to handle. She'd been in the city for a little under a week, spending her first night in a youth hostel, before that had become too dangerous. Aside from the fact that everything about her clothes and manner screamed 'runaway!' she preferred to stay on her feet, active.
Initially she'd come here fully intending to stay with her father, but somehow, during the bus trip from Sunnydale; the events of the past night had started to truly sink in. She'd realized then that there was no way she could face anyone she knew, or loved. That would make her into the girl who had fallen in love with Angel, and at the moment she couldn't bear being that person anymore.
Most nights, if she was lucky; she'd run into a hood dumb enough to tackle her, the adrenaline of beating him to a pulp, and the pain if he managed to score a hit on her; making thought impossible. Secretly she wondered how long she could keep this state of sleeplessness up for. She posessed Slayer stamina, sure, but now and then she'd caught herself dozing, and that was not a good survival bet to be taking, out in the open in a city rife with monsters; both human and undead. More disturbing was the fact that she hadn't yet done anything about it, and the half-formed thought hit her that perhaps she had a death-wish. She flicked it away dismissively, ignoring the niggle in the back of her mind that embraced the idea of a dreamless sleep.
The pain still lurked there, raw inside her, an open wound. She had found she could manage it better if she didn't constantly prick it. Still, it was there, and every vamp she'd staked since coming here had suffered before dying. Perhaps if she passed a bit of it along it would lessen, but everytime she shoved a stake into a heart; in her minds eye it was transformed to steel, and his face floated before her closed eyes, full of shocked suprise. Always when she opened them again, half expecting to see the portal, his blood, once more; there was only a rapidly dwindling pile of ashes, scattered by the wind.
So, for now she leaned against the cold concrete, determinedly thinking of nothing, coldly scanning the empty street, looking for physical pain to drive the greater hurt away.
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