16


Angelus was waiting for them.

"I'm surprised the star crossed lovers haven't jumped a train by now."

"Tell us about what has happened." Buffy said in a deadly voice, "When you talked to dark Willow, you knew her. You also killed Drusilla. Tell me why."

"Was he the best you had ever had? I talked to Mr. Farmer for a little bit. He seems more like a missionary guy than fucking against the bars of a vampire's cage." Angelus snickered until Buffy slammed the remote control against the bars. The vampire in the cage gave an unperceivable twitch.

"I have nothing to loose. I hate myself and cannot become anymore self-depreciating than this moment. My friends cannot look at me. And I am sleeping with a fucking monster." She leaned in closer, "Do you really think anyone's going to care if I press this button? They will throw parties in the street, after what I did today."

Angelus chuckled.

"You can't get any lower, wait until you find out."

"Tell me what is going on."

"I was bored of this world anyways. These cages are too well paid for." He sighed and looked at his nails. "You don't remember any of this because you aren't really here. This world is an illusion and someone who isn't a natural blond created it."

"You may not remember, but you did." Angelus laughed at Spike and Buffy's guilty expression, "Everything comes back to Sunnyhell. Go to the post office and meet Angel."

"Is this a joke?"

"Nope, I swear on my... unlife, that you will find your answers in the back room of the post office. You had better hurry up. The next train leaves in five minutes."

They ran out of the tent.

"Time to go home." Angelus whispered and looked towards the direction of Darla's tent, " Baby, it was fun while it lasted."


********


The two sat in silence on the train to Sunnydale. They had to slip into maze of cargo because there were police looking up and down for a blond haired blue eyed man who wore a torn shirt, bruises, and who may perhaps be a vampire but no additional information would be confirmed until a later time. All they knew was that these police weren't shooting with their guns. They carried crosses, stakes, and holy water.

Buffy and Spike weren't scared of the big men on the train. They were deathly frightened of what would happen if they found out that this wasn't some sort of nightmare. What if this was their life? Their choices? What if they were wrong? And the person who they least wanted to spend time with was sitting next to her, in a corner, with nowhere to go.

Buffy began to laugh.

"Something got your fancy, Slayer?" Spike grumbled, "I really don't see anything amusing besides boxes."

She couldn't stop. The pain was starting to kick in and she didn't know where she put her pills. Buffy the Vampire Slayer was having an illicit love affair with a vampire causing her friends to hate and despise her. When she tried to get away, she turned into a weak venerable baby who couldn't push a spider away. But instead, he had convinced her to run away with him and the last person in the world she wanted to be with was only two inches away. The only saving grace was that they were on their way to Carson City, to find a man, who the most evil of all vampires recommended. And this Angel guy was supposed to cure everything.

Ironic and funny.

It was hysterical because her life had become a piece of shit. When she got on the train, she could literally see her life flash before her eyes. She was dying inside because she entrusted a vampire over her family. Over the closest thing she had ever had to a father. Over her friends...

She used Spike's penis!

"Shhhh!" Spike whispered, "Someone's coming!"

But Buffy couldn't stop. The vampire stared at the Slayer with a look of pure astonishment.

"What the hell is wrong with you?"

"I can't.... stop..." She gasped. The blond clapped both of her hands over her mouth in effort. But her convulsions still came. Snorts were bouncing off the boxes and down the hallway...

"You are going to get us killed!"

"... sorry..." Buffy gasped. Tears were rolling down her eyes and her sides were burning with pain. She rolled from side to side in her small confining place in order to stop, but it only caused one of the overhead boxes to topple over in front of them. The box fell with a loud crash and the top flaps fell open to spill Styrofoam popcorn all over the floor. Two vases tinkered and crashed as they hit the ground.

Buffy snorted and Spike swore.

The vampire pinned Buffy to the back wall and forced her to look towards him. Her eyes darted back and forth as she felt suffocated by the monster. Her body tried to push him away, but he wouldn't budge. He took the blows without a word until she stopped. Buffy had heard footsteps.

The car door opened with a loud whoosh and two men stepped inside the luggage cabin.

"See anything?"

"Damn it, a box fell over." The second man whistled. "Jeee-sus, what a mess."

"I hope nothing broke." The man said, taking two steps forward. A crunch of broken glass responded to his foot step. "Shit."

"Yeah, well if it did. Wasn't my fault. I wasn't the one who packed it."

"But we saw it. We're supposed to report it."

"Nope. I ain't doin' the paperwork tonight. I'll let the conductor do it. He doesn't have a wife and kid to get home to. I ain't seen my girls in two days."

They started to walk away.

"What box? I didn't see no box?" The man said as he opened the door. "Sorry Mr. Conductorman, I didn't see nobody."

"Shut up, you idiot."

The door closed again with an identical whooshing sound.

Neither stowaway moved.

Spike turned his head to look at Buffy. Her eyes were looking directly at his until he met her gaze. Then she turned her look downward.

"Are you going to laugh?"

She glared at his forehead.

Spike took his hand off her mouth and leaned back until he rested on the balls of his feet. Buffy scooted as far back against the wall as she possibly could and looked away.

"Are you alright?"

"No."

Spike sighed.

"Buffy..." She jerked at his use of her name. Spike opened his mouth to apologize but Buffy jumped in first.

"Don't call me anything! Just... don't use my name."

"Right. Slayer." He took a deep breath, "If it helps any, I know what you are going through."

"Really." Sarcasm dripping from her voice, "What does Mr. Vampire know about my pain?"

"I... I've seen that look before. In other girls." The vampire tried. "The laughing, the inability to touch, you haven't looked at me once. I know that you are in a cycle of self-loathing. It's the worst sort of revelation that there is. But Slayer... you can get through this. You're not a girl."

Buffy whipped her head to look at him. Her jaw was locked and her eyes were blazing. Her lips pursed to scream at him. This was what he wanted, some normal angry emotion. But then her eyes widened in realization and her face contorted in horror.

"Other girls?" She gasped, looking at her feet. "You have seen it? You mean you CAUSED it!"

"I never—"

"What did you do to them?" Buffy pushed him back from his kneeling position to sprawling flat on the floor. "What the hell did you do to them to make them act like this?"

It was Spike who looked away.

"If you don't tell me, I will jump this train right now and... and..." Her face darkened, "Tell me."

"Drusilla." Spike said shortly. "Angelus found a girl who supposedly had visions. He wanted to make her just like he made Drusilla, so he tortured her, killed her family in front of her. Only this girl didn't have any visions. So she died."

"And Drusilla?"

"She is the end product of being tortured by Angelus. She was writing symphonies before she was turned."

"Who else?" She asked darkly. Spike shook his head.

"Then whenever we raped someone and left them to live, sometimes they would act like you're acting right now." He paused then looked up at her face with furrowed eyebrows, "But there is a difference. You consented. I didn't do anything you weren't already begging for."

"You're right. I did ask for it and I should have expected the bite." Buffy said quietly, "But if the effect is the same, what difference does it make?"

"It's a hell of a difference!" Spike insisted, "I've done evil and I knew it. It felt good and right and natural. But what we did earlier... it didn't feel natural." Buffy gave him a look.

"So you drag me all the way out here to tell me how bad I was?"

"No!" Spike retracted, "Not to say the sex wasn't bloody fantastic."

"Well, what DO you mean?"

Spike sputtered.

"That's what I thought." Buffy said moodily.

"You know, you can be a real bitch sometimes!" Spike shouted, "I'm trying to tell you that you can get out of your conceited, egotistical, self-loathing frame of mind and you are getting all uppity when I mention how the sex was different. You and I BOTH know it was different. That's why you're all huffy right now! If I was human, we would be snuggling together then you would tell the witch how kinky it was to do it in a cage. But I'm not. I'm a bloody Vampire. Get over it!"

"You know nothing—"

"I know you weren't victimized." Spike growled, "So quit with the melodrama."

Buffy was silent for minutes before she spoke again. Spike had settled back into his original seat beside her scrunched up against the wall, hidden by other boxes. The Styrofoam popcorns still fluttered around the floor.

"I don't care what you think." Buffy finally said, "But I want you to know that it's not the sex that hurts... or the bite. It's everyone's reaction. It's my decisions. It's how I'll never be able to go back. I know I won't look at you or let you touch me. And that's because I can't get past the idea that I've done something horribly wrong."

"And you're a bitch." Spike mumbled.

"Don't touch me."