NOVEMBER 15, 2028

Homer’s words rang in Joni’s head for days. She tried to put them out of her mind and do her job. But with the kinds of things she knew about, being one of the few Slayers left in the world, and knowing what she knew of both of her parents, the words held a certain ring of truth.

Her parents were never the type to just accept things. They had their own view of the world and how it should be. Yes, there were things that couldn’t be changed. But there were things that could be changed.

All the Slayers could have died. Her mother could have died. She could have died. But, she didn’t. She was still alive, and the Slayers still existed. Mom was still here, although Joni knew that sometimes she wished she wasn’t. She knew that sometimes her Mom wished she could follow her Daddy to wherever it was he had gone.

Joni thought about what the last few months with her Daddy were like. They were awful. He was seldom conscious. And when he was, moments of clarity were few and far between.

But, sometimes he would say things that, at the time, sounded like the ramblings of a fevered mind. Now though, Joni wasn’t so sure.

Even her Mom had trouble making sense of all the things he said. And he said a lot of things, before he couldn’t anymore.
*********************

SEPTEMBER 13, 2027-

Buffy woke to a darkened house. She looked at the bedside clock; it told her it was three in the morning. Of course it would be quiet. She really hadn’t meant to fall asleep, but she was so tired.

For an instant, Buffy’s heart seized. She looked over at the place where he had been, and it was empty. She stared at the spot where he should have been, and wanted to blink the image away. She was tired, but that was no excuse. She shouldn’t have fallen asleep. She shouldn’t have let him down.

Panic surged through her. Then came the terror. The most unreasonable, unrelenting terror she’d ever felt ripped through her. She had to find a place to hide. “Get low,” it told her, “Be small, then it won’t find you.” She’d felt this before, somewhere in her brain she knew that this was a part of the sickness she’d gone through, and that now it was passed. For her, the time to fear the unknown was passed and was replaced by the gaping fear that her present had become. Spike was in the worst fight he’d ever been in. His brain didn’t enter into this. She welcomed the fear. It meant that he wasn’t dust.

He was going by instinct. And now, so was she. Her instincts told her she’d find him where he thought he’d be safe. For him, safety meant darkness. That meant the basement. So, down she went.

She saw it all unraveling in front of her, and she’d done nothing to help him. Buffy cursed herself for being so blind.

Buffy had never known it was this bad before. No. That was wrong. She had known it. Knew it was happening. She just hadn’t wanted to believe it was happening. Not to him. Not like this.

She saw it all in slow motion. The walking stick she had passed off as nostalgia. As a bit of whimsy, and he didn’t tell her otherwise. He just smirked at her and winked. It was the same with the eyeglasses, the ones he shouldn’t have needed, that sat perched on the end of his nose.

She’d seen it. But she’d run from it. She ran from it. And now, as she stared into the darkened basement, it was all catching up with her.

She had to choke back a sob at the shock he presented, as his white skin glowed against the dark.

Buffy remembered the heat. The virus closed off all sensation but one. Slowly, the burning of the nerve fibers was all that was felt. It was all the virus allowed. That made movement, eventually, impossible. The virus slowly and mercilessly robbed its victim of any refuge from the pain. It robbed its victims of the ability to cry out for comfort. It isolated them from any solace that could be had from contact. First through pain, then by cutting off all other outside stimuli, painful or otherwise, due to blindness and deafness.

It was a horrible way to die.

Right now, Spike was being engulfed in a fire that consumed everything, yet touched nothing. Buffy knew that pain. And his was a thousand times that.

When the pain had started for Buffy, her first instinct had been to rend herself free of her clothing in an effort to cool her emblazoned nerve endings. Joni had been small then, so in order to keep little eyes from seeing what they should not, Spike would spend hours, perhaps days, just holding her. He used his body’s unnatural coolness to calm her, and keep her safe.

Buffy had no such mercy to give him. So here he was, lying nude on the concrete floor of the basement, unmoving.

She rushed over to him, and he stared at her with pain-blinded eyes, “Help,” he panted, “Angel…he has…to help. Joni…too small…can’t save…Buffy…Angel can…but…won’t.”

Buffy didn’t want to see what the virus was doing to him. She didn’t even understand how he was able to talk. She had been saved. The Slayers still were, thanks to him. A part of him knew that, she felt sure. The vaccine he’d developed could not be synthesized. Each time a Slayer was stricken, it meant that Spike had to expose himself to the virus again and again. He knew that eventually even his body would become saturated with it, to the point where his body could not repair itself. But, he didn’t care.

Time disorientation was a symptom of the virus. Buffy knew he had no idea where he was, or when. She closed her eyes and tried to draw in a calming breath, “No Love,” she said, “that was years ago,” she swallowed the lump in her throat, and cooed, “You saved us. You saved me.”

His eyes fluttered shut, “B…uffy? Saved you…did?”

“Yes,” she told him reverently, “you did.”

“Now…promised…me…not…you.”

Buffy bit her lip in worry. The disorientation really had him in its grip, “What did you promise?”

“I die,” he rasped out, “Not you.”

“When did you promise this?”

“Before,” he whispered, “And…after. I love you…love…always,” with that, his body gave out, and he fell into unconsciousness.

*************************************
OCTOBER 29, 2005-ROME

Giles wasn’t sure Spike had been sober when he spoke to him on the telephone. He’d even asked him about his apparent state of inebriation. That was the only reason that Giles could justify what he was asking the Council to undertake. The Council had a new relationship with the Slayers in the field, that was true, but for Spike to ask for this, especially after what had happened to him under the auspices of Wolfram and Hart, he had to be impaired in some way.

“You want me to do what?”

There was a sigh, “Told you, Rupert. The figures you sent me, they smack of an evil beyond what Angelus, or I, is capable of. This smells of the Senior Partners. Wolfram and Hart still has an office there in Rome?”

“Yes.”

“Good. See if you can gain access to their Conduit.”

“Their what?”

“Conduit. A magical, mystical know- it-all that keeps the keys to all the other dimensions; it knows all there is to know. See what it can tell you.”

“And how do you propose we gain access to this, ‘Conduit?’ Do you think they will just open the doors and let us walk right in?”

Giles could hear the mischievous grin, and the glint in his eye, “No,” Spike said, “But I happen to know someone with a skeleton key.”

“And what do we inquire after?”

“That’s simple, Rupert. Angelus, and his dealings with the firm.”
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