Banner by Selene
Banner
by Selene
Chapter 27: It's All in the Preparation
Spike tenderly kissed the blood off of Buffy’s
mouth before extracting him arms from around her body. Almost methodically, he
rearranged her limbs so that she looked like she was just resting. Then, he
climbed off the bed away from Buffy’s lifeless body. He walked two steps
before he lost it. Blinding rage consumed him and he lashed out at the inanimate
objects in the room. Nothing was safe from his path of destruction. Lamps,
chairs – they all went flying as his grief tore through him. Tears fell
steadily from his yellow eyes. He cursed the fates, God, everyone, for making
him do this.
The bedroom door flew open as Spike continued his rampage. Angel could
understand how Spike felt. He had stood outside her door, keeping everyone away,
and listened as Buffy’s heart slowed and then finally stopped. But, he
couldn’t let Spike beat himself up over this. This stuff was beyond him,
beyond all of them. It had been preordained, and Spike was just a pawn in
Fate’s machinations. It was time to remind Spike of that.
Angel grabbed Spike from behind before he could pull out the drawers to the
dresser and fling them about. His fury was so great Spike just shrugged him off.
“Spike!” Angel hollered, once more grabbing him, trying to get him to calm
down. “Spike! Stop it!”
“Ow!” he yelled as Spike elbowed him in the stomach attempting to break
Angel’s hold on him. But, he didn’t let go. Angel could tell the exact
moment when the rage wore off and the anguish began. Shudders racked the younger
vampire, and Spike cried. Sinking to the floor as his legs gave out, he gave in
to the grief he was feeling. Angel slipped down beside him and in a show of
utmost compassion, pulled the younger vampire into his embrace and provided
protection and comfort while he cried.
Angel didn’t say anything, just allowed Spike to grieve. Besides, there
wasn’t much he could say right now. Spike was doing what Angel was unable to
do. So, he let Spike cry for both of them.
Moments later, a blinding white light invaded the room and enveloped Buffy.
Angel just stared in awe. For a second, Angel thought that he could make out the
image of Cordy. But, then, the light got even brighter around Buffy and Angel
had to shield his eyes against the glow.
“Spike. Look.” Spike was still crying, but not as hard as before. Angel
tried to get his attention.
“William. Look at Buffy. She’s glowing.” Slowly, Spike lifted his off of
Angel’s shoulder. He glanced at the bed and sucked in an unnecessary breath.
Buffy was glowing. Just like an angel. He wiped his tears to clear his blurry
vision. Realizing where he was, he scrambled out of Angel’s embrace and stood
up.
His slayer was glowing! Glowing! What the hell – or should he say heaven –
was going on?
Angel got up off the floor and came to stand beside Spike saying, “You did
that, William. You are what’s keeping Buffy’s soul grounded here. So,
don’t be sorry. Don’t hate yourself. True, she may be different. But,
without you she would have died taking all the others with her. Never forget
that.”
Silently, he left the room, leaving Spike alone with Buffy. He needed to tell
Giles what was going on.
~*~*~*~*~
Spike hadn’t moved from where he stood gazing at his slayer when there was a
knock at the door sometime later. After a pause, the door opened to admit Giles.
He peeked around the corner of the open door then paused at the sight before
him. As if in a trance, he came in and absentmindedly shut the door behind him.
“It’s true,” he whispered mostly to himself. Buffy lay in the bed and
appeared to be sleeping peacefully. But, she was just glowing. There really was
no other way to describe it. In all his years as a watcher, in all the texts
he’d read, Giles had never come across anything that described what he was
seeing. It was as if her soul was a blinding burst of light, refusing to leave
her. This was a monumental event that would need to be documented, so that
Watcher’s for years to come might now what his slayer had done – for all of
them.
Shaking himself from his revere, Spike turned towards the watcher.
“I need to leave her for a bit. There are things I need to do, to prepare.”
He didn’t go any further. He wasn’t about to tell the watcher of his plans.
Didn’t want to hear his protests. And he would too. But, if Spike was doing
this, he was going to do it right. He grabbed a clean shirt out of a drawer
that, thankfully, was still attached to the dresser. He dressed quickly, told
Giles to watch out for Buffy, then left the room. He didn’t know how much time
he had before Buffy woke up. Normally, he would have a few days. But, well, his
slayer never did anything the normal way.
The skies were still dark in the early afternoon because of the continuing rain,
and it allowed Spike to leave without having to worry about his sun
“condition.” He had snagged Niblet’s keys to make it easier and quicker
for him to take care of what he needed to do. His first stop was a candle shop
where he loaded up on dozens of candles in varying size, shape, color and smell.
Buffy’s rebirth would be nothing if not special. Then, he scoped out a local
hospital. He refused to allow Buffy’s first meal to be pig’s blood. He was
determined make her as strong as possible, and if that meant human blood, so be
it. And, it wasn’t like he was going to kill humans for her to obtain it. He
was just going to nick it from the donor storage facility.
Leaving the car parked at an unused side exit, he walked around to the front and
slipped inside. His duster billowed behind him as he moved quickly down the
hall, water droplets leaving a trail behind him. Rather than head towards the ER
department, figuring that that blood storage area would be constantly busy, he
took the elevator to where surgeries were performed. Except for the odd
emergency surgery, most were conducted by appointment. Traffic there shouldn’t
be as bad. Luck was on his side, and he didn’t encounter anyone in the hall.
Slipping inside the lab, he made his way towards the wall freezer that held all
the donated blood.
‘Jackpot!’ he thought as he opened the door. The freezer was packed
with blood; it must have been just recently stocked. He grabbed a box from under
a counter and started dumping bags of blood inside. He was careful to grab the
more dated blood, leaving the newer stuff behind. When the box was full, he
closed in then shut the cooler door. Picking up the box of blood, he swiftly
made his way to the stairs, figuring people would be less likely to notice him.
Down several flights and he was soon wending his way to the side exit where he
had parked Dawn’s car.
He opened the front passenger-side door and set the box inside. Quickly, he
crossed back to the driver’s side and slid inside. The rain was coming down in
buckets and his hair was plastered to his head, water running unheeded down his
face. His duster had protected his clothes from most of the deluge, but he could
feel the front of his shirt plastered to his skin. He would have grabbed a
couple of bags of blood for the drive home, it seemed like it had been forever
since he ate. But, the thought of slush blood had him crinkling his nose in
distaste. He could wait a few minutes until he was home and able to heat some up
in the microwave.
~*~*~*~*~
When Spike arrived back at the house, the rain was still pouring as hard as
ever. I guess Mother Nature was just as pissed as he was at the slayer’s
death. Ignoring the rain, he grabbed the five huge bags full of candles in one
hand and the box of blood in the other and made his way inside. He dropped the
bags in the foyer and took the box of blood into the kitchen.
Spike opened two bags of blood and dumped them into a huge mug and stuck it in
the microwave. The remaining bags, about 40 of them, were placed in the freezer.
He planned on gorging himself, and Buffy, on the human blood the first few days
of her un-life. And just let someone try and stop him. The buzzer sounded and he
pulled the mug out and gulped down the contents.
Ahhh. Human blood. He had almost forgotten what it tasted like; he’d been
swilling the animal stuff for so long. He was just licking his lips when his
Grand-Sire walked into the kitchen.
“Change of diet?” Angel asked, an underlying menace in his tone. He could
smell the human blood on Spike.
Spike returned the glare. Without a word, he opened the freezer door revealing
the bags of blood.
“I’m gonna do this, I’m gonna do it right,” Spike argued. “No Childe
of mine is going to awaken to pig’s blood. So, I paid the hospital a little
visit. Hell, I even took the older stuff.” He crossed his arms over his chest,
waiting for the battle ahead.
Angel surprised him. “Just checking to make sure it wasn’t bodies you were
stacking up, Childe.” Spike was at a loss. Had Angel stepped out of brooding
mode to attempt a funny? He decided to tease him a bit. After all, it was what
he did.
“And if I had?” he replied, trademark smirk firmly in place as he cocked his
scared eyebrow. Angel moved forward to grab Spike and shake some sense in to
him. He wasn’t even halfway to him when Spike started grinning like an idiot.
“Gotcha, Peaches!”
Angel turned and started out of the kitchen mumbling under his breathe about
insolent childer needing some discipline and not showing the proper respect.
Spike chuckled and followed after him, his mood temporarily lightened.