DISCLAIMER: Nobody belongs to me, unfortunately. They belong to Joss & Mutant Enemy, and a few other people I don’t know.
RATING: NC-17 – eventually
SPOILERS: Everything up to Five by Five & WTWTA, things change a bit after that. Special referenced to Doomed.
CATEGORY: Willow/Spike/Angel
SUMMARY: Spike’s in bad shape, Angel comes to help.
DISTRIBUTION: Of Sire & Childe, BBA, Fire & Ice Fic, anyone else, ask, and you shall receive
AUTHOR'S NOTES: Okay this is my first W/S/A, so bear with me.
DEDICATION: Kaitelynn; Inell, who inspires me.
**********
~Part: 1~
Willow glanced at her watch for the third time in under an hour. Where was she? They were running out of time. Just as she was about to pick up the phone, the door to the mansion burst open. Anya walked in with a small box.
"Sorry I’m late. That greasy bartender guy tried to stiff me." She looked at Willow’s worried expression and turned her eyes towards the door. "How is he?"
Willow shook her head as she grabbed her bag. Not good. He still won’t eat." She took the box from Anya’s arms. "Did you get the good stuff?"
Anya nodded. "Yeah, but he won’t be around to appreciated it soon."
"Anya!" Willow admonished.
"What? It’s true." She looked at the clock, "You’d better go."
"Yeah. Thanks for watching him. I couldn’t bare it if anything happened to him."
Anya waved her away. "Go."
Willow hugged her friend. "Oh, yeah, Xander’s called twice. He thinks I know where you went."
Anya snorted as she walked back through the hall into the room. She stood in the doorway and frowned.
"You should eat." She told him.
Babysitting duty, Luv? I thought we were past that."
*****
As willow drove silently, she thought about the events of the past several months. It didn’t seem like so long ago that Oz had left her, and she had been heartbroken. A mess. But then Spike came back. He had a way of cheering her up. But now it was him who had needed the cheering up. Only it wasn’t working. When she and Xander had stopped him from staking himself several months’ back, she had tried to convince him that things weren’t so bad. He hadn’t been too receptive then either. But then he found out he could still hurt demons, and everything seemed to be fine, for awhile.
But lately, he just seemed to be getting worse. He hated not being able to kill. And with the exception of Anya and Willow, he detested the Scooby gang. He had been attacked on a few occasions by other demons. This last time was the worst. He was nearly killed. And now, he refused to feed. He didn’t want to heal himself. It had been several days since he ate, and he was getting weaker. She and Anya had had to drag him to the Mansion, just so they could keep an eye on him.
The others, Buffy, Xander, Giles, they didn’t care. They didn’t know him. Didn’t understand him. She was going to the only person she thought would. But she was uncertain. As far as she knew, the two hadn’t spoken since the incident with the Ring of Ammara. S he her self hadn’t spoke with Angel since Thanksgiving. S he didn’t know if he would help.
A part of her believed he would, after everything she had heard about their past. But another part of her wondered why angel, if he really still cared for Spike hadn’t come to Sunnydale sooner. To make sure he was all right. That part of her feared Angel would decline her plea.
****
Willow pulled off of the freeway and drove to Angel’s office. She followed the directions she had lifted from Buffy’s address book carefully. She pulled into the parking garage and parked.
As she rode up to the office, she braced herself for the rejection she might be facing. As she got off of the elevator, She took a look around. The office seemed to be empty. Just as she was going to turn around, she heard one of the office doors open. She looked up to find Faith walking out.
"Red." She nodded briefly as she walked past Willow and into the staircase.
Willow shook her head and wondered briefly why she didn’t take the elevator. She had heard Faith was in LA. Buffy had been highly irritated that Angel was trying to help the rogue Slayer. Willow hoped that he was getting through to her.
"Willow?" Angel asked as he stepped into the main office.
"Hi, Angel. How are you?" She asked, trying to delay the inevitable.
"Good. You?" He asked awkwardly. He didn’t know why she had come, although he was pleasantly surprised to see her. He had forgotten how much he had missed her until that moment.
"Is something wrong?" He asked.
"Yes, actually. I need your help." He looked at him hopefully.
"Is it Buffy?" He asked wearily. He would help her if necessary, but after their last encounter, he wasn’t looking forward to seeing her again.
Willow shook her head. "No. It’s Spike."
Angel looked at her askance. "Spike?" He asked. "What…" Before he could finish his question, willow interrupted.
"Why haven’t you come to see him?" She asked accusingly.
"What?" Angel was confused. What did his wayward have to do with Spike, and why would he go and see him?
"It’s been several months Angel. Bad months. Very bad months. I understand that you have… issues. He’s told me about your past, but…"
"Whoa!" Angel interrupted. "Maybe you should start from the beginning."
He ushered her into his office and offered her a chair. She declined, preferring to pace instead.
"His been in town eight months. Eight months since those bastards put that nasty implant in his head." She looked up at angel. "You know he tried to stake himself a couple of months ago?" She looked down at her fingers, "And now, he won’t eat. He’s dying a slow death, and you" She pointed a finger at him, "Can’t even bring yourself to see him, or even call!" She snapped.
Angel sat there stunned. He didn’t even know Spike was back in Sunnydale, much less anything else Willow was talking about.
"Willow, I have no idea what you’re talking about. I didn’t even know Spike was in town." He told her as his mind ran over everything she had said.
"Did you say implant?"
***
~Part: 2~
Willow stared at Angel, the anger draining from her face as his words sunk in. "You didn't know?" Her voice was a disbelieving whisper.
"Oh, Angel. I'm sorry." She hugged him tightly, letting a trickle of tears slide down her cheeks.
"Shh." Angel whispered soothingly as he ran his fingers through her hair. "Tell me what's happened."
Willow pulled herself away from angel's comforting arms and wiped her face. Shortly after that business with the Ring." She looked up into the vampire's eyes. "The Ring of Amarra"
Angel nodded. His face was expressionless, but Willow could see traces of a deeper pain. She wasn't sure if it was from the memory of the torture he had endured at Spike's hands or something else entirely.
"He came back to Sunnydale, and was captured by the Initiative. They're this secret government agency which capture and experiment on demons."
"Experiment?" Angel asked, not liking where this conversation was going. "What kind of experiments?"
"No one knows for sure. They put some kind of implant in spike. Something to keep him from harming humans. If he tried to hut someone, or even things about it, he gets a sudden and intense pain."
"And this… Initiative, they just set him loose, knowing he couldn't possibly survive that way?" Angel's voice had taken on a hard edge to it.
"Not exactly. They never intended to let him loose. But spike is not the average bear, so to speak." She smiled slightly. "He escaped."
Angel nodded, smiling slightly. His favorite childe was nothing if not inventive. "You said he tried to stake himself?" Angel barely repressed a shudder at the thought of Spike being dust.
"A couple of months ago. We got there in time."
"We?" Angel asked, curious as to who would save Spike's life. Willow's actions didn't surprise him. She was that kind of person, but everyone else? They were more likely to do it for him.
"Xander." When Angel quirked an eyebrow at her, she elaborated. "Well, okay maybe he just happened to be there at the time." She smiled slightly, remembering how excited Spike had gotten when he discovered that he could kill demons. "That night, we found out it was only humans he could harm. He could still kill demons. He was very excited about it." She giggled.
Angel smiled as he watched the smile play across Willow's features as she remembered. He hated to interrupt the memory, but he needed to know the rest.
"What happened, Willow?"
Willow looked up at him, forgetting for a moment what she had been telling him. "He's in bad shape. Angel. He'd an outcast among his own kind. Your kind. He's helped us, on occasion, and for that he's attacked, nearly killed." She sighed and finally took the offered chair. "He's dying angel. I don' know what to do." Willow wrapped her arms tightly around her body as she let the tears fall.
Angel walked to her and embraced her in a comforting hug. "It's okay. He'll be alright."
Willow sobbed into his chest. "No, he won't." Her words were muffled.
"He heels quickly. He'll be good as new in…"
"No!" Willow shook violently as the sobs racked her body. "Not if he doesn't feed."
****
"Spike, you're an idiot."
Spike turned around slightly to look at Anya. Her face was completely serious. He shrugged and turned back around.
"You're letting them win. That's not smart. That's not very demon of you." She said the last part hoping to get a reaction out of him. It did, but not the one she was hoping for.
Spike snorted. "That's sort of the point, isn't it Luv? I'm nothing anymore. Not a person, not a vampire, I'm not even a pouf."
Anya handed the vampire the glass of blood she had prepared for him. S he even heated it up to body temperature. "Drink."
He stared at her for a long moment. Anya had this hard look in her eyes, something he had only ever seen there once or twice before. It was reminiscent of what she must have been like in her demon days. He took the glass and stared at the thick red substance for a long time, as if he was deciding on something.
"Drink."
Spike lifted the glass up, inhaling longingly, as if trying to memorize the smell. Something unusual caught him attention. He turned around to face the ex-demon and raised an eyebrow.
"Human? Red went all out."
"She loves you." Anya told him simply.
"She shouldn't." Spike spoke with a note of sadness, which was not lost on the former vengeance demon. "She should hate me. Hate what I am, what I have become." He hurled the glass across the room, shattering it. He watched as the blood slid down the wall, painting a picture of death along the dark paint.
A knocking on the front door interrupted anything either was about to say. Anya left silently, leaving Spike to his solitude once again.
*****
Xander hung up the phone with a frustrated sigh. He had called everywhere. Spoken to everyone Anya knew, not a lot of people really. He didn't know where she could be. She hadn't returned any of his calls in over three days. No one had seen her. Buffy had told him to let her cool off a bit, giver her some time. But he couldn't. He needed to make her understand. He loved her. She wasn't who she used to be. She wasn't a demon, not anymore. Coddling willow's pet project would change that.
Angry, and exhausted, he picked up the phone and started dialing again. He would just have to call everyone again.
*****
Buffy walked through the darkened streets one last time, before she was to meet up with Riley. She turned down Crawford Street and stopped. It ad been a long time since she'd been her. Too long, not long enough. The place still held so many memories. Memories she'd rather forget. Memories that needed to stay forgotten.
She looked up at the towering mansion, and noticed something she hadn't when she first turned down the street. A few of the lights seemed to be on. She took a step closer, trying to peer in one of the windows near the garden. She couldn't see anyone, but that didn't mean no one was there. It was a big place. She briefly wondered if Angel was back in town, but then shook the idea off, thinking it ridiculous. If angel were in town, he would come to see her, or called her at the very least.
Buffy approached the door cautiously. She knocked on the heavy door, drawing out her stake, just in case. When the door was opened, Buffy stood, in shock.
"Anya?" She looked at the former demon, her face a mask of confusion. She tried to peer around her, to see further into the mansion.
"Buffy. What do you want?" Anya's done was bored, which for Anya was not unusual.
"What are you doing here?" Buffy asked as she put her stake away.
"I live here… sort of. What's your excuse?" Anya raised her eyebrows.
"Excuse me? No one lives here, not anymore. It's been abandoned since Angel left." She stared questioningly at the other girl.
"Not abandoned, just unused. Now it isn't." When it was clear Buffy wasn't going move, Anya rolled her eyes and started to close the door.
"Wait." Buffy stuck her foot out before the door completely closed. "Xander's worried about you. You should call him."
Anya opened the door slightly and glared at the Slayer. "There's nothing to say. To either of you." Anya closed the door firmly, forcing Buffy to move her foot back onto the porch.
When the door was closed, she locked it and walked back to Spike's room. She stood in the doorway and watched. Spike was slumped against on of the walls, staring blanking ahead of him, at the blood he had splattered. He was paler than usual. His blue eyes had lost some of their brilliance. He clothes, torn, and clotted with his own blood. The wound on his arm, still oozing slight amounts of the liquid. The gash across his face had stopped bleeding, but was refusing to heal. It just sat there, opened, taunting her. Telling her that they had lost, and it had won.
She sighed. It was going to be a long night. She hoped that Willow was fairing better than she was. If Willow didn't return with Angel soon, there would be nothing left to save.
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