“What do we do now, Buffy?” Buffy couldn’t help smiling slightly at her Dawn’s naive question.

“We wait.” Buffy answered, drawing everyone’s attention to her.

“For what, Buffy?” Giles’ question was soft and gentle – too soft – as though he were waiting for the other shoe to drop. Buffy turned to the group for the first time then, her brow furrowed.

“For Spike. Who else?”

Everyone was shocked, and Giles and Dawn turned to look at each other, each painfully aware that, as Buffy’s family, it would be their responsibility to break the news to her. Luckily for them, Xander did it instead.

“Buffster, I don’t think that Spike is coming.” Xander’s broken voice came as a shock to everyone. Buffy looked confused for a moment, then rushed to Xander.

“Oh God, Xander, I’m so sorry about Anya.” Buffy’s arms encircled Xander in an attempt to comfort him. Xander leaned into her embrace for a moment before pulling partly away.

“I know, Buff. I’m sorry about Spike.”

At that, Buffy’s brow furrowed. “Sorry about what?”

Xander pulled completely out of her embrace and leaned down to put his hands on her shoulders. He bent down to eye level, as if speaking to a child. “I’m sorry about Spike’s death.” Xander wasn’t sure how Buffy would react, but her hysterical laughter was probably the last thing that he had expected.

“Spike’s not dead!” Buffy gasped between giggles. When she had calmed herself enough to stand up straight, Buffy began to wipe the tears out of her eyes. “I’m the one who dies in these things, not him. You’ll see: he’ll come hauling his sorry carcass up the side of the crater any minute now.”

“Buffy, we need to go.” Giles came to put a gentle hand on the Slayer’s shoulder.

“We can’t go. We need to wait for Spike.”

“Buffy, we have to get going; people are injured. We need to get them to a hospital.”

“And we will as soon as we get Spike.” Buffy’s tone bordered on childish.

“Buffy, we really don’t have time to do this,” said Giles, loosing his patience. "Spike’s not coming back. I’m sorry Buffy, but Spike is dea–" The palm of Buffy’s hand connected harshly with Giles’ cheek, cutting off his last word.

“Only in your dreams.” Buffy’s voice was shockingly dark, and Giles was forced to remember that their truce was born out of necessity. She was still angry about his attempt on Spike’s life. “Just because you want him dead doesn’t mean he is. He’s just taking his sweet time about resurfacing.” Buffy turned away from Giles and walked to the edge of the crater. “Hurry the *bloody hell* up Spike. We’re not gonna wait here all day.” Buffy’s shouts echoed for miles across the barren crater that had once been a town.

Giles exchanged worried looks with the young potentials–slayers now–Buffy’s friends, and her sister. Finally, he moved toward the edge of the crater where she stood tapping her foot expectantly. Mustering his strength and courage, Giles moved to scoop up the slayer. Buffy’s slap had been more surprising than painful, but the ensuing struggle left Giles bruised and out of breath. “We can’t wait here, Buffy. I know you don’t want to face it, but we really can’t afford to wait until you do. We have to go now.”

Buffy wriggled free, but lost her balance and tumbled over the edge of crater. She rolled for a few feet before she caught herself on the compact soil and sat looking dazed for a moment. “Fine then, go. Just leave some blankets, food and water. Oh, and blood. Actually, just dump Spike’s bag out of the bus with mine. I can wait, and you guys take off to the hospital.”

Giles and Dawn traded a look. None of them were strong enough to fight the slayer. The newly made slayers had the strength, but Buffy was light years away in skill and determination. “Alright then, Buffy. I’ll wait up here with you and everyone else can leave.”

Buffy smiled up at her younger sister. Finally, someone who understood. It was good that Dawn had finally forgiven Spike.

Dawn smiled back at her sister briefly then turned to Giles. “We’ll be ok. I can keep an eye on her. Leave us plenty of water, but it’s not that hot out here. I don’t think we need to worry about her overheating. Take the injured girls to the first hospital you find and then go down to LA and get Angel. Pray to God he can talk some sense into her.” Giles nodded, surprised by Dawn’s shockingly sensible solution.

“We’ll send him as soon as we can. Do you have your cell phone?” Dawn nodded an affirmative, and Giles gave her a brief hug before motioning everyone back onto the bus.

~*~
Come up to meet you, tell you I’m sorry
You don’t know how lovely you are
~*~

Dawn sighed and started to slide carefully down the side of the crater, dragging the three duffle bags down with her.

“Hi, Dawnie,” Buffy called her greeting out softly, not turning to see her.

“Hey, Buffy. How are you?”

“Impatient.” Dawn chuckled at her sister’s response.

“You love him, don’t you?” Dawn’s question was quiet, hesitant, unsure if Buffy would want to discuss her relationship with Spike.

“More than words can describe.” Buffy confessed. “I told him, but I’m not sure he believed me.” Buffy paused, her eyes downcast. “That’s ok. I’ll never give him reason to doubt me again.”

Dawn was silent for a long time after that. Finally, gathering her courage, she decided to ask. “I don’t understand how you can after what he tried to do to you.”

“What he tried to do?” Buffy seemed genuinely confused.

“He tried to… rape you.”

Buffy sighed and folded her hands behind her head. She leaned back against the side of the crater and looked up into the cloudless sky.

“You can’t understand everything that we did to each other, but trust me, of the two of us, Spike committed far fewer, and less serious crimes.”

“It’s not a score board! How could you possibly love him when you know he can’t be trusted? Why didn’t you get rid of him? He betrayed your trust!” Dawn’s voice broke. She quieted for a moment, before adding softly, “He betrayed my trust.” Buffy turned toward her sister, a gentle understanding in her eyes.

“What do you mean, your trust? Spike would never hurt you.”

“But I trusted him not to hurt you! I trusted him to fix you.” Dawn was in tears by now.

“He tried, Dawnie. I wouldn’t let him.”

Dawn considered her next words for a long time.

“I read somewhere that most rape victims blame—“

“I’m not a rape victim Dawnie; you have got to stop saying that. Normal circumstances don’t apply. I’m stronger than he is. I could push him off whenever I wanted.” Buffy paused. “I don’t think Spike was trying to force me into having sex with him that night. He wanted to make me listen to him, and the only time I ever listened to him anymore was when we were having sex. It was a necessary measure, but not the end goal. Spike was trying everything he knew to keep me from self-destructing. You can’t hold it against him. I don’t.”

Dawn was quiet for a long time after that. Finally, she murmured, “I wish I had understood sooner. I wish I could have talked to him about it.”

“As soon as he gets his lazy ass out of that wreckage, you can.” Dawn didn’t respond. She simply stared towards the lowering sun.

~*~
I had to find you, tell you I need you
Tell you I set you apart
~*~

“When did you know that you were in love with him?” They were the first words Dawn had spoken in half an hour.

“You want to know the truth?” Dawn nodded. “You remember when we were running from Glory and the knights found us? Remember how that one stabbed through the top of the RV and would have killed me except for Spike?” Dawn nodded again.

“Spike caught the sword. I remember you stared at him for a moment, and then he said—“

“‘Now might be a good time for something heroic.’” Buffy imitated his accent. “I fell in love with him in that moment. It’s the reason that I was staring. It just suddenly occurred to me that I was in love. It was this amazing feeling, unlike anything I’ve ever felt before.”

“What about Angel and Riley?” Buffy sighed, collecting her thoughts.

“I never really loved Riley; I liked him. I liked what he stood for—a nice normal relationship for a nice normal girl—but I never loved him. With Angel, it was like I waited to fall in love with him. The whole ordeal had this fairytale quality where I found my true love, and when we were done battling the monsters, we’d live happily ever after. So, after I met him, I rode out the drama and waited to feel that gushy love feeling. With Spike, it was totally unexpected, and instead of squishy love, it hit me kinda like a train, you know?”

“So you convinced yourself to love Angel? You never really loved him?” Buffy looked thoughtful.

“I loved Angel, but it was a very immature love. We brought out the high school Romeo-and-Juliet qualities in each other that made us need to end the world to prove our love. With Spike, just looking in his eyes proved that he loved me, and that was enough. I just wish I had told him sooner. I almost did, you know. We went back to the house to get weapons, before we came to save you from Glory. We were talking and he said something about knowing I’d never love him, but how I treated him like a man and how that was enough. I told him that not all of us were going to survive and that I wanted him to protect you. I wish now that I had told him how I felt. Maybe I would have avoided messing things up so badly when I got back.”

“So, the only reason Spike stayed with me was because you asked him to? He didn’t care about me?” Dawn was hurt by the revelation.

“No, the only reason I asked him to was because I knew he loved you.”

“Oh.” Dawn wasn’t sure what to say to that. She had spent the last year so determined to hate the man she had once thought of as a brother. Now, it seemed that all those feelings had been wasted, and she wished again that she could have had some time to talk to Spike about what had happened.

~*~
Tell me your secrets, and ask me your questions
Oh lets go back to the start
~*~

“Buffy, you know how you always went to Spike whenever you needed a reality check?” Dawn had broken the stillness of the early evening again. The stars were slowly starting to twinkle above the sisters.

Buffy nodded, “I could always count on him to call me on my bullshit. He always dealt with things the way they were.”

“Right. Well, if Spike were here—“

“Dawnie, don’t start with that. When he gets here.”

“Buffy, we’ve been here all evening. I don’t think Spike is coming up. I think he would want you to face that reality.” Dawn took Buffy’s hand in her own. “You know Spike. If there was any way on earth that he could get here, you know he would, but I don’t think he can. Buffy, I think he’s gone. I think you know that, in your heart and in your head. Buffy, Spike is dead.”

Buffy simply stared at her sister. “Dawn, he can’t be. He promised he would never leave. He never breaks his promises. I can still feel him all over; he can’t be dead.”

“Buffy—“

“No! Spike is fine. Be patient.”

~*~
Running in circles, coming up tails
Heads on a silence apart
~*~

A motor sounded in the distance, drawing closer and closer. Eventually, headlights cast an eerie glow over the side of the crater. The motor stopped and a car door slammed. The sound of footsteps. Finally, a voice: “Buffy? Dawn?” Dawn breathed a sigh of relief; her last few attempts at conversation had led to little more than non-committal grunts.

“Down here,” the teen called over the edge of the crater.

“Angel?” Buffy’s voice startled her sister. Angel’s form appeared over the edge of the crater before he slid the little way down the edge, landing next to the sisters. “Oh, good! You can get Spike to come out. You’re in his family. He has to listen to you, right?” The hope in Buffy’s voice was heartbreaking.

“It’s not likely, Buffy. He never listened to me before. I doubt he’ll be any more compliant now that he’s dust.” Buffy looked up at him, confused.

“What the hell are you talking about? Why does everyone keep saying that? Spike is fine, he’s just slow, maybe he’s hurt! Oh God I should go help him!” Buffy started to move towards the center of the crater. A strong hand around her upper arm stopped her.

“Come on, Buffy, you and I both know that’s not the case. I felt it. You felt it, too, the moment it happened.” Buffy looked into his eyes and shook her head slowly, as though she were a small child. “You felt it in your heart, Buffy. Spike is gone. He’s not coming back; you and I both know that.” Buffy continued to shake her head, her mouth silently forming one word over and over: no. “Buffy, I know how you feel. It’s always hard to lose a comrade, especially one you care about—“

“No!” This time it had been vocal. “You don’t understand, Angel. I love him. I’m in love with him—Spike. I love Spike. He can’t be gone. He promised he wouldn’t leave. He was the one that I could love who wouldn’t leave. He can’t leave me!” Angel visibly recoiled from her, and Buffy became aware of her audience. “God, I’m so sorry. I never meant to lie to you, Angel, but I couldn’t bare to hurt you. I thought it wouldn’t matter.” Tears were coasting shiny trails down Buffy’s cheeks by now. “I thought I’d die in this fight, and after everything we shared, I didn’t want you to remember me hurting you. I just couldn’t do it. I thought it wouldn’t matter.”

~*~
Nobody said it was easy
Oh it’s such a shame for us to part
~*~

Angel had never wanted to hurt Buffy so badly in his souled existence. She had lied to him, moved on; she loved someone else. Not just anyone else, but Spike. Angel wanted to howl and scream, to hit her, to throw her to the ground and take her—by force if necessary—anything to make her his again. Still, this was Buffy, the love of his life. He could never hurt her like that. Instead, forcing his demon down, he took Buffy into his arms and murmured four words into her hair. “It’s alright. I understand.”

~*~
Nobody said it was easy
No one ever said that it would be this hard
~*~

At those words, Buffy began to cry in earnest. She struggled against Angel’s grip, freeing herself to turn and face the crater. Buffy had intended to run toward the center of the crater, but as soon as she freed herself, she found that she lacked the strength to stand. She collapsed to her knees and a sob tore from her throat. Suddenly, she understood the feeling that was gnawing at her heart, the emptiness. ‘God, please no. I could have done without anyone else, but not without him. Please take me. Take the girls. Please just give him back.’ With a sudden certainty, Buffy knew Spike was dead. “Spike, no, Spike.”

Buffy continued to sob her mantra, her body shaking with the force of her sorrow. Buffy felt Dawn’s arms around her, trying to comfort her, but suddenly, all Buffy could feel was the pain that engulfed every fiber of her being.

“Please, I need you, Spike.”

~*~
Oh take me back to the start
~*~

It took several hours before Buffy sobbed herself to sleep. Once she tired herself, Angel picked her up and took great care to carry her back up the side of the crater and into the backseat of the car. Dawn followed silently, grabbing the bags of supplies and climbing into the passenger seat next to him. Without a word, Angel started the car and began the drive back toward the lights of civilization.

~*~
I was just guessing at numbers and figures
Pulling your puzzles apart
~*~

Buffy felt a man’s eyes on her as she danced at the Bronze. Even at the tender age of 16, she had found it intoxicating to be able to captivate a stranger’s attention so completely. Her body had understood what her mind had yet to grip—he wanted her. What was more, she wanted him. That night, even after his promise to kill her come Saturday, her dreams had been filled with sharp cheek bones, blue eyes, bleach blond hair and a man named Spike. They were filled with sex. She had loved Angel, of course, but even then her body and the demon whose strength she possessed wanted Spike.

~*~
Questions of science, science and progress
Do not speak as loud as my heart
~*~

Buffy remembered her shock when Xander and Giles had spoken for her when she said that she loved everyone on the night that they took on Glory. Of course, they would have assumed that she did not love Spike. Still, it irritated her that they would just assume. It did not make sense. She was the Slayer, and she would not fall into that dangerous game again. She refused to love another natural enemy, but that didn’t stop her heart from leaping every time she looked at him. Even with the impending apocalypse and her worry for her sister’s safety, Spike made Buffy feel. He made her feel loved, safe and supported. And she loved him for that.

~*~
Tell me you love me, come back and haunt me
Oh and I rush to the start
~*~

He was drunk again. It was as though she could smell the alcohol coming off of him as he knelt beside the little head stone. He was crying again. He cried about failing her, about loving her. He cried that he saved her every night. He cried that Niblit missed her, he was weak when Dawn needed him to be strong. He cried because he knew she was happy, and he was furious that the very knowledge of her happiness was not sufficient to keep him happy. He cried because he was selfish for wanting her back, because he knew he could not have her back. And she felt his pain, even through the layers of heaven. Even in her perpetual dream-like state, she wanted more than anything to hold him, to dry his tears, kiss them away, and tell him that she would never leave again. She was at peace in her own heaven; yet, she wanted to heal his heart.

In the middle of Restfield cemetery, Spike looked around as he caught Buffy’s scent on the wind.

~*~
Running in circles, chasing our tails
Coming back as we are
~*~

Her fist connected with his skull. Buffy could not understand what was wrong with her. She had set out to become his friend, to learn to love slowly with him at her side, and somehow it had all gotten muddled. The passion that she felt for him when she kissed him those two times was unlike anything she had felt since returning. Buffy was ashamed of herself. The need to love had become overshadowed by the need to feel. The loving girl that she had once been had been replaced by this freakishly strong bully who used people. She was making her whole life into some sort of freak show, and she couldn’t stop.

Spike hit her and suddenly feeling anything that intense was all she could think about. The emotions she felt for him were suddenly overshadowed by her need to feel explosive feelings that his lips and fists had created. She pushed him against the wall of the abandoned house and struck. His lips were on hers for the third time, and all she could think about was wanting more. She wanted him—she would take, and she would have.

~*~
Nobody said it was easy
Oh its such a shame for us to part
~*~

Buffy could smell his flesh burning. His soul. Didn’t he understand that it had been her’s that need fixing? His soul. She hadn’t wanted him to change. She had needed time to heal when she couldn’t hurt him. She wasn’t angry about what happened in the bathroom; she recognized that it was a fraction of what she had done to him. His soul. Would she have another Angel on her hands now? She didn’t want someone who would baby her and put her on a pedestal. She wanted Spike. With a cry, she ran towards the cross and pulled him from it. She tried to embrace him, but he shoved her away with a shocking amount of force and ran past her. She called to him, but somehow she knew he was gone. Buffy rose to her feet and walked numbly home.

~*~
Nobody said it was easy
~*~

This was different, a change from the flashes of memories that had been flying before her eyes. It was quiet. There was no burning, no fighting. The two of them simply stood in the center of the hellmouth that no longer existed. Buffy felt tears coming to her eyes, and without warning, she threw herself into Spike’s embrace. ‘I love you!’ He caught her—he always did—and whispered soothingly as he held her, running his fingers through her silken hair.

“It’s alright, pet. I know.” It had taken Buffy moments to determine what Spike was murmuring into her ear. It was then that she realized she was repeating her mantra out loud. He knew. Spike always knew what she was feeling. He knew that she loved him. She clung harder.

“Buffy, pet, it’s time.” Spike’s words echoed with a terrifying finality through the empty cave.

“I can’t do this without you, Spike. You promised you would never leave me. You promised!” Spike pushed her back gently, just far enough to look into her eyes.

“You can do this without me, but you know you’ll never have to.” Spike kissed the tears that fell down her cheeks. “You know that I’ll always be near you. Can’t touch you anymore, but I’ll be watching out for you. You’ll do just fine. It’ll hurt, but you will be just fine. With time you will move on, and you’ll flourish. Do that for me, ok Slayer?” Buffy nodded weakly into his chest.

“I love you, Spike.”

“I know, pet, I love you too. My beautiful girl, my beautiful Buffy.”

~*~
No one ever said it would be so hard
~*~

Buffy awoke with a start. She took in her surroundings: expensive and unknown. Her best guess was that Angel had brought her somewhere. She went to the window and gazed up at the full moon. A single tear traced its way down her cheek. “Goodbye, Spike.”

~*~
I’m going back to the start
~*~

The occupants of the room jumped as the door opened.

“Buffy, you’re awake. Sit down. We were just discussing where to go from here. Angel has been kind enough to put us up for a little while, but it’s time that we moved on.” Giles was speaking to her. Buffy looked around: Giles, Angel, Xander, Dawn, Willow, Faith and Andrew. They were sitting around making decisions rather than having them made by some council. It was kind of nice.

“Yeah, that’s a good plan. Let’s get out of the country. I don’t even care where; I just want to see the world.” Buffy’s answer was clearly shocking to everyone. Giles had suggested that they treat her as normally as possible until they understood where she was mentally, but clearly they had not expected her to be alright.

“Quite right, we’ll have to stop by Scotland first; I do believe that the council keeps a good deal of its money tied up in property holdings over there. I’ll make arrangements. Willow, why don’t we start booking plane tickets? Everyone else, go report to the other girls.” Everyone rose and began to file out of the room. Dawn hugged her sister on her way out the door. Buffy smiled and hugged her back. Only Angel remained behind. Buffy moved over to the window and opened it, staring at the moon and breathing in the night air.

“How are you doing, Buffy?” The question came with a tentative hand placed on her shoulder. Buffy breathed deeply, the scent of leather, tobacco and whiskey in the air.

“It still hurts, but I’m going to be just fine.”


A million thanks to Immortal Beloved who was kind enough to make this into something readable.