I’m sorry that I haven’t replied to everyone’s comments. It’s been a busy week. Thank you for them and I promise to reply this time.
Chapter 5
*****Flash*****
It was dark. No light shone at all. Buffy could hear frantic breathing and frightened whimpers. She heard the sound of wood breaking. Then digging. Not the sound of a shovel entering the ground, the sound of hands ripping at the earth. She heard clods of dirt falling onto wood. Once she heard flesh tearing and a cry of pain. The sounds seemed to last for hours.
Suddenly there was moonlight shining on an open plot of ground filled with trash piles. Buffy saw beside her something she’d seen a thousand times in her life as a slayer. A fledgling was rising. A hand shot out and clawed for support on the smooth ground. Slowly, the fledge crawled from the coffin he’d been buried in. He’d been hidden here, not in a cemetery. Well, this was London. Watchers would be watching the normal burying grounds.
With a last push the exhausted, bleeding vampire fell out unto the ground, weeping, and gasping for air he didn’t need. William the Bloody had been reborn.
*****Flash*****
And they were back at his house? It was the same living room, unchanged from the night the doctor told William about his mother. Buffy knew that a lot of vampires went back for an easy first kill. It shouldn’t have surprised her. Angel’d done the same. It was just that she’d had higher hopes for Spike, having now seen him as William. But then if this was one of his bad memories, maybe he came to regret what happened tonight.
Spike and Dru were standing by the fire. He was covered in dirt and his clothes, the same ones he’d been wearing at the party, were shredded. Dru was looking at her childe with a puzzled expression. “You...you want to bring your mum wif us?”
Spike seemed surprised by the question. “Well, yeah. You'll like her.”
Dru gave him an affronted look. “To eat, you mean?”
Oh, Spike. Of all the foolish things to do. But he wouldn’t have known. Buffy’d seen people she knew that’d been turned. They were so happy to be vampires. Like dying solved all their problems. That must have been what it was like for Spike. No more whippings, no more people making fun of him, and no more worries about William’s mom. For once, he got to be the hero that saved the damsel.
William’s mother came into the room and saw Spike by the fireplace. “William?” She asked timidly.
Spike pulled Dru towards him nervously, looking every bit the guilty little boy. “Uh, mother.”
His mother was relieved to see him, but was irritated all the same. “Where have you been? I've been beside myself for days.”
Spike smiled happily. “You needn't have worried, mother. You'll never have to worry about anything again. Something has happened. I've changed.”
The poor woman looked at him in confusion. “I—I don't— Who’s this woman?” She gestured toward Drusilla.
“I'm the other that gave birth to your son.” Buffy shook her head. Dru and her psycho-babble. That almost made since, though.
The older woman’s mouth fell open in surprise. “I beg your pardon?”
Spike was delighted by Dru’s speech. Well, it matched his poetry. “It's true, mother. Drusilla—she...she has made me what I am. I am no longer bound to this mortal coil. I have become a creature of the night. A vampire.”
Oh, Buffy knew that expression. Universal mom disbelief. She got that one all the time. “Are you drunk?”
Spike looked at the ground, embarrassed. “A little bit.” His head shot up when his– William’s– mother coughed. “Think of it. No more sickness. No more dying. You'll never age another day. Let me do this for you.”
The lady tilted her head to the side in confusion. Buffy was startled by the gesture. That was something that Spike did to this day. “What are you talking about, a-and why are you acting so strangely?”
Spike stepped up to her, pulling her into a hug. “It's all right, mother. It's only me. We'll be together forever.”
“William...”
Spike shifted into game face. “It only hurts for a moment.” He leaned down and gently bit his mother’s neck.
The scene morphed like it had when William had dropped his chalkboard in the water at the school. That must mean that this was the aftermath of the turning. Buffy had an idea how it was going to play out, since she sincerely doubted that this woman was still out there somewhere. William’s devotion to her had carried over into Spike; he wouldn’t have left her alone somewhere. Spike was on the sofa in the living room, but stood up when music began to play. It wasn’t a song Buffy recognized, but it was pretty.
“Mother?”
She walked in holding a music box. She certainly looked better than she had before. Less ill. She smiled at Spike. “Hello, William.”
“Look at you.” His smile was radiant. So full of joy at seeing this woman happy and well. So proud because he was the one that did it. There wasn’t much of the Spike Buffy knew in that smile. Maybe at this point he was still William. Just with fangs. There was no sarcasm. No hate. Just sincere…love? Could vampires love without a soul? Angel hadn’t.
She nodded. “Mm, yes. All better.”
William still looked like he loved his mother. “You're glowing.”
“Am I? Well, I suppose I have you to thank for that, don't I?” She set the music box on a table. “How ever will I repay you?”
Five of the memories she’d seen so far were about people William loved. Judging by them, everything in William’s human life had been about love, even his poetry. Maybe love was so important to him that he kept imagining he loved his mother after he died. “Seeing you like this is payment enough.”
His mother smiled. “Oh, William, you're so... tender.” She patted his face. Buffy thought, in looking at her, that she seemed colder than she had been while alive.
William was still smiling. “Well, this is as it should be, mother. You and I together. All of London laid out before us.”
“Ah, yes. Us.” Buffy could hear underlying contempt in that voice that seemed to escape William. He might be fooling himself into thinking that he still loved her, but she had stopped loving him. He just didn’t know it yet.
He smiled happily beside his dear restored mom. “First, we'll feast. Then the night is yours. Theater, perhaps. Dancing? Tell me,” he patted her lightly on the shoulder, “what's your pleasure?”
She turned to look at him with a cold, cold smile. “Pleasure? To take my leave of you, of course. “The lark hath spake from twixt its wee beak?” You honestly thought I could bear an eternity listening to that twaddle? I feel extraordinary. It's as though I've been given new eyes. I see everything. Understand... everything,” she finished with a frown at William.
Buffy knew that had to have been more of William’s poetry. She must have encouraged him about it when she was alive, the way parents did when their kids handed them drawings that could have been of houses or pink elephants. He was finally beginning to realize that something was wrong here. “Mother...”
William’s mother was beginning to creep Buffy out. She was still smiling. “I hate to be cruel— No, I don't. I used to hate to be cruel in life. Now, I find it rather freeing. Nothing less will pry your greedy little fingers off my apron strings, will it?”
William was hurt and becoming upset. It was a low blow, that after all the people he’d lost, his own mother was rejecting him. Because he really seemed to believe that he was talking to his mother, not a demon. “Stop. Please.”
She slinked closer to him. “Ever since the day you first slithered from me like a parasite...”
“What're you s - ”
“Had I known better, I could have spared myself a lifetime of tedium and just—dashed your brains out when I first saw you.” She whirled, turning her back on the confused fledgling. “God, I prayed you'd find a woman to release me, but you scarcely showed an interest. Who could compare to your doddering housebound mum? A captive audience for your witless prattle.”
Buffy watched the emotions crossing William’s face. Concern, fear, confusion. Some anger, but he stifled it. Respectfully, he murmured, “Whatever I was, that's not who I am anymore.”
She laughed. “Darling, it's who you'll always be. A limp, sentimental fool. You want to run, don't you? Scamper off and cry to your new little trollop. Do you think you'll be able to love her? Think you'll be able to touch her without feeling me?”
Whoa. Okay, seriously freaking here. “All you ever wanted was to be back inside.” She caressed his face in a way more than motherly way. “You finally got your wish, didn't you? Sank your teeth into me. An eternal kiss.”
William stumbled back, appalled. Buffy knew he had no such ideas; even as a freshly turned vampire he was curiously innocent. “No. I only wanted to make you well.”
“You wanted your hands on me. Perhaps you'd like a chance to finish off what you started.”
William pushed her back as she advanced on him. Buffy could see that he was trying desperately to understand why this wasn’t his mother anymore. “I love you. I did. Not like this.”
She nodded. “Just like this. This is what you always wanted. Who's my dark little prince?” She tried to kiss him!
He shoved her away and she hit the ground. “No!” He screamed, looking around like he wanted a way to escape what was happening to him.
His mother got to her feet and grabbed a cane. She swung it at William. “Get out. Get out!” William wrestled the cane away from her, breaking it in the process. Suddenly she transformed to vampire face. “There, there, precious. It will only hurt for a moment.”
Buffy saw in his face the exact moment that William realized what he had to do. It was his final act of…love. “I'm sorry.” He shoved the broken cane handle through his mother’s heart, and her game face disappeared. She looked like his mother again, smiling for a fraction of a second before she crumpled to dust.
William fell to the ground before the pile that had been his mother. Tears leaked out of his eyes, and Buffy heard the occasional sniffle. He drew his legs up to his body and began to sob, as he had for his sister.
Buffy watched him as he grieved. This went beyond acting the part of loving son. William really had loved his mother, even after he lost his soul. It shocked her that that was possible. She’d always figured that Spike was just obsessed with Dru, not in love with her, but now she wasn’t so sure. He’d stuck with her even when she cheated on him. What other reason could he have, besides love? But Angel hadn’t loved her. Not when he lost his soul. Did that mean he didn’t love her as much as she thought he had? William’s mother had certainly loved him in life. But as a vampire she didn’t. Maybe William’s mother and Angelus had stronger demons than Spike did.
That didn’t make sense though. Buffy’d fought both Angel and Spike when they let their demons out. Spike had come far closer to beating her in combat than Angelus. Maybe it wasn’t about the demon. She’d been thinking earlier that these memories of Spike’s were about human things. Maybe there was more humanity left in him than she realized, and less in Angelus.
_______________________________________________________________________
Giles stood to one side of the crypt, watching its other occupants. Willow and Tara were sitting side by side on Spike’s sofa, staring at some sort of cooking show. Spike himself was as inert as he had been when they arrived. And Buffy hadn’t twitched since entering Spike’s mind over an hour ago. His eyes focused on her more often than not, since he didn’t see the joy in watching someone on the telly cook a horrible American version of Shepherd’s Pie.
Her breathing was steady. When he was certain that the young witches weren’t aware of his actions, he would take her pulse. It was more rapid at some moments than others, which he found curious. Apparently whatever Spike was experiencing was having a profound affect on Buffy.
That was a bothersome thought. It was bad enough having to send her on missions where she could be killed by demons, turned, or critically injured. He’d lost more sleep than he would have believed possible over nightmares in which he sent his slayer out to her death. But having her stuck inside the mind of this vampire was worse yet.
There were too many things that could go wrong. Astral projection was a risky affair. If the person projecting was drawn too far out of herself she might lose the ability to return to her body. She’d die, without ever having the chance to defend herself. And what was she seeing in there? Torture, turnings, images more disturbing still? If she brought Spike back out, what kind of emotional damage would she have suffered? Giles would rather have lost an ally and let Buffy keep her peace of mind.
Spike was a boon to them, of course. He was annoying, caustic, disrespectful, and had atrocious taste in television programming, but he had saved Buffy’s life many times. For that, Giles couldn’t say that he regretted Spike assimilating himself into their lives. But he wasn’t worth sacrificing Buffy.
The crypt door swung open suddenly, and Xander popped inside. “Hey, so what’s the 411 with Fangless? Anya said something about him being a tomato.”
Giles sighed. “She means that he is in some form of vegetative state.”
Xander snorted. “So he sprouted roots?”
An unexpected voice answered him from the recesses of the crypt. “No. It’s her what’s growing roots in my boy’s head. Twisting ‘em together.”
In a single fluid motion Giles grabbed his crossbow, swung it in the direction of the voice, and flipped on his hand torch. He searched the dark for the source of the words. A shadowy figure stepped slowly forward. A woman, tall and pale, with dark hair. One he recognized from years past, when he was tied to a chair. “Drusilla.”
She smiled.
*****
Thanks for reading! Thanks Linda!
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