“Buffy! Let's go!”
 
“Mmmmph.” Buffy blinked her eyes sleepily, her mind slow to process the banging at the door. “Go 'way.”
 
“Come on!” the voice whined. “It's time to kick some baddie ass!”
 
Buffy threw a pillow at the door, but only succeeded in waking herself up completely. “Just got here. Don't wanna,” she muttered and snuggled back into Spike's arms.
 
He chuckled against her hair. “C'mon, pet. Lot's o' baddies out there, we could get in a rough and tumble…”
 
She smirked against his chest and shook her head.
 
“…Then we could take advantage of all that adrenaline, come back and have our own rough and tumble…”
 
She chuckled. “Oh, okay. As long as it's more with the 'tumble' and less with the 'rough'.”
 
“Pet?”
 
She looked up at him, her eyes serious. “I don't… Spike, I'm not willing to hurt you anymore, and I'm so, so sorry that I ever did. But I'm not gonna–”
 
“Luv. Stop.”
 
“No, I mean it. There's no way I can make any of it up to you–”
 
“And you don't need to.”
 
“But—”
 
“Buffy, there's nothing that you have to make up for, and even if there was, I don't want it. Anything that you did… God, pet, I either deserved it for what I was doing at the time, or I deserved it for what I had done. It's like karma, yeah?”
 
“No, it's really not.”
 
He smiled. “I love you. You love me. Nothing else matters.”
 
“But—”
 
“Fine. I forgive you. Do you forgive me?”
 
Her jaw fell open. “Forgive you? Huh?”
 
He slowly reiterated. “Do. You. Forgive. Me?”
 
“For what?”
 
Spike's eyes rolled and he began ticking off a list on his fingers. “For trying to kill you. For chaining you up. For pulling you down with me when you were already low. For… for trying to… for before I got my soul. God, luv, there's so much. I could go on for days.”
 
“Oh.”
 
“Yeah. Oh.”
 
She sniffed. “I guess I'm being silly.”
 
“Yeah.”
 
“Okay, I'm forgiven. You're forgiven. We're all with the forgiveness.” A half-smile graced her lips. “But, you know, we could try the chainy thing again.”
 
He laughed and kissed her soundly before hopping out of the bed and leaving her staring at his firm ass with a pout on her lips. “Come on, luv, I can hear bitty slayer out there pacing. She's probably trying to decide if she should risk coming in or not.”
 
Buffy harrumphed at him, but slid out of bed anyway, quickly throwing on her clothes as he did the same. She turned back to him before opening the door. “There's so much that we need to talk about still, but Spike, I just want you to know, I'm so glad. I'm glad that we're together. I love you.”
 
That hint of awe that always made her knees weak touched his eyes as he smirked. “Love you, too, Slayer. Will love you forever.
 
Vi was nearly dancing from foot to foot when Buffy finally threw the door open. “Finally! Let's go, already.”
 
Buffy grinned. “Right behind you.” She grabbed Spike's hand, and together, they left.
 
*~*~*
 
Spike laughed with sheer joy as he dodged an attempted blow from his opponent. A group of slayers fought to his right, and Buffy was at his back. They'd unearthed a motley nest of demons that had fled from the sudden appearance of what had seemed like hundreds of pissed off slayers.
 
Buffy was torn between the bliss of watching Spike fight, the comfort of once again having him at her side, and worry for the team of slayers fighting along with them. She kept an eye on Leanne, remembering Vi's earlier words about the brash young girl. Buffy grimaced at the younger slayer's form as Leanne squared up against a particularly ugly demon and was summarily knocked on her ass. Pissed, Leanne jumped up and swiped at the demon with her sword, grinning fiercely as its head flew to her right and its body flew to her left.
 
Buffy yelled furiously as she watched Leanne shove another slayer to the side so that she could begin hacking at her next victim. Spike had barely realized that something was amiss when he felt Buffy leaving his side at a sprint. He quickly dispatched his opponent before swinging around, his eyes widening in horror.
 
A Polgara demon was rushing toward Leanne, its skewer extended and ready to end the slayer's life. Leanne never saw him coming.
 
Buffy, however, did.
 
Time slowed to a crawl, and yet Spike couldn't make his body respond to his commands. The air around him congealed, and all he could do was watch as the Polgara's skewer entered Buffy's chest and reappeared out her back.
 
Her impaled body was lifted off of the ground as the Polgara shook her, then flung her off against a wall, where she fell to the ground with a sickening thump and a quiet grunt.
 
Spike didn't recognize the agonized scream that ripped from his throat, nor did he comprehend that the team of slayers rapidly finished off their opponents. All he could focus on was Buffy. Buffy, who was laying so very, very still, blood pooling over her shirt, flooding onto the ground. Rivers of blood. She was losing too much blood, even for a slayer.
 
Frantic hands covered the wound on her chest as Spike whispered to her. “Come on, love, my Slayer, my Buffy, come on. You can do this, you can fight it. Buffy, do you hear me? You have to fight, kitten. You have to. I can't live without you again, not when we just found each other, not now. Buffy, listen to me. I love you, and I won't soddin' let you bleed to death, but you've got to fight. Please, pet, please.”
 
He growled ferociously at Vi when the slayer approached and touched his arm. She jumped back in alarm, but somberly told him, “We've got to get her back. Help me bandage her, then you can carry her back. It's not far, but we need to stop the bleeding.”
 
Spike looked up from the horrific sight of torn flesh under his frantic fingers and straight into Illyria’s eyes. He didn’t know where she had come from, but he was startled to see her staring at Buffy’s still form. She blinked placidly at him. “She is The One.” When he shot her a bewildered look tinged with hysteria, she spoke again. “I will help you return.” He nodded numbly, sweeping Buffy into his arms. He didn't notice the blurred journey back to the hotel, and before he knew it, new hands, hands that were clean and unblemished by demon gore were helping him move her to a small hospital bed. A low growl continually rumbled low in his throat as someone slipped a needle into Buffy's arm and an IV was started.
 
A sob stuck in his throat as he took in her pale face. With trembling fingers, he brushed hair, sticky with blood, away from her forehead before he closed his eyes and prayed to whatever deity that would listen that she would be okay.
 
*~*~*
 
Angel paced back and forth within the confines of his office, muttering to himself and occasionally stopping to anxiously peek through the blinds at the makeshift hospital in the hotel lobby, and at the few Slayers that had stayed behind rather than patrol.
 
“Okay,” he cleared his throat. “Buffy… Buffy, I just want you to know that despite everything, your attempts to move on, sharing your cookies with someone else, Spike, I'm willing to forgive you and take you back.”
 
He stopped moving and ran his fingers through his hair, shaking his head. Okay, he thought, maybe something not so angry. Blowing out a breath, he started again. “I love you. I always have, and I always will. You are the most important person in the world to me. As soon as you're ready, I'll break up with my girlfriend and we can finally be together.”
 
A frustrated sigh escaped his lips. “I love you. Yeah, okay, that's good, but maybe I shouldn't say anything about Nina. Just… let her think that it was all smoke.” He nodded to himself and started pacing again.
 
“Buffy, I love you. Always have, always will, blah, blah, blah… A lot more than anyone else could, that's for sure. I mean, you think Spike could love you more than I could? Ha! That's just crazy! Evil, soulless, Spike? Okay, well not so much soulless anymore, but he certainly has less soul than I do! And—and I've had mine for so much longer! That counts for more, right? He's just trying to impress you with the whole soul thing, and I'm… not. It was… forced… on me.” He growled. “Yeah, okay, so that's not the best way to impress her.
 
“Okay. Here's the thing, Buffy. I wasn't entirely, shall we say, accurate, when I told you that we—that is, Spike and I—had moved on. You see, we're ready to move on, we just haven't exactly started yet. But believe me,” he rushed on, “he's a lot farther than I am. I mean, sure, I do have a girlfriend already, or at least I do if she'll even still talk to me, but Spike moved on with Harmony. Harmony!” He paused, thinking. “Oh, wait. I wasn't going to mention Nina…”
 
Angel grumbled in frustration and slumped into his chair. At least he was only in the 'practice phase,' because this was not going well. At all. He had no idea what to even say to Buffy, or how to say it. He didn't know how she'd react to anything anymore. He didn't know her, and he was pretty sure that she didn't know him so much anymore, either. And he didn't know what to do about it.
 
When he was perfectly honest with himself, he wasn't even sure that he really wanted to do anything about it. He wasn't sure that they fit together anymore.
 
There. That was the crux of it. He loved her. Of course he loved her, but he wasn't sure that he was in love with her anymore—how could he be, when they hadn't even seen each other for more than a few stolen moments over the last five or so years? They’d been apart for longer than they’d been together. She'd changed.
 
The Buffy he'd fallen in love for was innocent, and had known nothing of all the gray areas of life. That Buffy would never have slept with Spike, or—and even still, it put a foul taste in the back of his throat to even contemplate it—the Immortal. That Buffy would have done her duty, would have slain both of her most recent lovers before they'd even gotten a chance to spoil her purity with their sins.
 
Yes, Buffy had changed. But then, so had he. He'd made choices that he wouldn't have contemplated in the past. Sighing, Angel finally realized that he had two paths. When she came back from her patrol, he could tell her everything… He could tell her that Spike still lived and breathed for her, that Illyria wasn't Spike's lover, and that she had his blessing if Spike was who she truly wanted. Hell, he could even refrain from telling her how grudgingly that blessing was being given.
 
Or, he could pursue Buffy himself. He could woo her again, relearn all of her facets. Maybe give her a refined book of poetry—maybe Byron. She had liked that sort of thing in the past, hadn’t she? Surely it would work again—still. He could lavish her with gifts, maybe even let her take an extended vacation. There were plenty of Slayers, and he could take a break in the fight now that he had defeated the Circle of the Black Thorn. He could finally give her the bit of normality that she still so clearly wanted, but was now afraid of. She would appreciate all that he was doing for her, and give up on the idea of his idiot grandchilde.
 
After pondering (not brooding) for some time, he came to a decision.  Now, he just had to keep his resolve until she came back. Surely not much longer now.
 
*~*~*
 
The lobby erupted into chaos. Their leader was down, appeared to be dead, or nearly so, and the newer slayers shook at the sight of pale skin and the gaping wound in the middle of her chest. A brave girl pulled Buffy out of Spike's arms, ignoring the snarl of outrage, and began prepping an IV. Another whispered to her companion, expressing her disbelief that Buffy would survive, while yet another asked why Buffy wasn't being taken to a real hospital in a carrying voice.
 
Nobody noticed the appearance of Angel, who, stricken, fell to his knees at the sight of the Slayer. Tears washed his cheeks as he struggled and failed to hear her heart over the din of the scrambling slayers, and he never registered that Spike had carried the girl in.
 
Positive that hope was lost, the grieving vampire turned and blindly made his way back to his office, berating himself for his part in keeping Buffy from happiness. He was sure that his betrayal played a major role in her death—she’d been distracted, depressed, and doubtlessly careless in her belief that she had lost the love of not just one, but both of the vampires in her life. He pulled the door behind him and prepared himself for a particularly long session of brooding.
 
TBC