PAIRINGS: SPIKE/WILLOW/ANGEL IN VARIOUS COMBINATIONS
RATING: NC-17
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There were things Willow should've been thinking about, zipping down old Route 66 in Xander's brand new, shiny white sports utility vehicle. First on the list- the fact that it was her hands on the wheel, not Xander's. Xander wasn't in the passenger seat either, or dozing in the back, or even splayed out on top like an oversized hood ornament. Xander was nowhere to be seen and, as far as Willow knew, would never be inside his beloved automobile again.
Did they have SUVs in hell? Willow didn't know, but she'd have been inclined to think yes, if she'd been thinking about it at all. Which she wasn't.
She should've been thinking about Buffy. Buffy and her heroic, pointless death. Dawn. Giles. Her mother. Everyone who wasn't a monster. Wasn't like her. She should've been thinking about them.
She should've been thinking about the final battle, going over it in her mind, trying to figure out where things went so terribly wrong and what she could possibly hope to do to fix it. She should've been asking herself just where the heck she thought she was going and what she was going to do when she got there and whether her two passengers were an asset or a danger. But she wasn't.
Her only thought, the only sentence she could string together in her mind with any sort of coherence was, "Why isn't it day yet?"
It wasn't right.
The terrible things had happened at night. They'd stumbled into the truck and sped away from the horrible scene at night. She remembered looking at the clock when they first started driving and it had read, very clearly, 2:17. Which had to be AM, because it was dark and hell on Earth had just been unleashed and all her friends were dead, and those things just didn't happen at two o'clock in the afternoon.
Now the clock read 10:37, which also had to be AM, because there was no way they'd been on the road for thirty-two hours. She was absolutely certain of that much.
So where was the sun?
She asked the question aloud, and was shocked at how weak and small her voice sounded. Her only response was the low, steady moan coming from the back seat where Spike lay in a huddled mess, bleeding from his face and hands.
Well, she supposed he didn't care much about the sun anyway.
She glanced briefly to her right, hoping for some kind of reaction from her other companion, but of course that was stupid. He wasn't exactly Mister Fun in the Sun himself. Still, he had to find it somewhat alarming. Didn't he?
"Angel, where's the sun?" she asked again, this time with an air of desperation.
His forehead was pressed against the passenger side window, and he'd been bashing his skull against the glass periodically as they drove. It was disconcerting, to say the least.
"It's gone," he said flatly.
Gone? She didn't understand gone. How could it be gone? It was a giant, flaming ball in the sky, bigger than the Earth. Bigger than anything. How do you just lose something like that? It wasn't possible.
"What do you mean? How-how can that possibly be? It's the sun!"
Almost panicked now, because it didn't make any sense. How could Xander's SUV still be here when the sun wasn't? How could there be shoes on her feet and gas in the tank and a horrible, stupid, awful country music tape playing on endless loop if there was no freaking, goddamn sun in the sky anymore?
Willow started to cry and Angel suggested, gently, that it ought to be his turn to drive now.
She let him take over and, eventually, cried herself to sleep in the passenger seat.
When she woke up the clock said 2:46, which had to be PM. She certainly hadn't been asleep for sixteen hours. She wished it would get closer to night. Then the dark wouldn't seem so strange. She could pretend that this was normal, that they were on a road trip, maybe to Las Vegas or some other fun place. She could pretend that Angel had lost his soul, and Spike had never gotten his, and the two of them kidnapped her and decided to take her to Vegas for a wild weekend of bloodletting and torture. Because even that would be preferable to...this.
Angel had turned off the stereo at some point, and she missed the sound. It was too quiet in the truck now. Even Spike wasn't making his wretched noises anymore. She glanced back briefly and saw that he, too, had somehow managed to fall asleep.
She tried to think of something to say to Angel, but found she no longer possessed the energy for even that simple task. Instead, she pressed her cheek against the headrest and stared out the window, hoping to see...something. Anything at all.
They'd driven through some towns before. There had been buildings, shops and homes and office complexes, but they'd all been dark and unwelcoming. Still standing, which she supposed was some sort of triumph, but no people anywhere to be seen. There had been no people at all since they'd left the place that used to be Sunnydale.
"You slept," Angel noted, and though he spoke quietly, the sound of his voice startled her. She twitched a little, then nodded. "That's good," he said. She didn't find it good or bad. Just the result of complete bodily exhaustion.
She continued to stare blankly, uneventfully out the window for another hour or so. Then she saw the lights.
"Angel, look!" she pointed excitedly into the distance. It was a city. With lights! Or, okay, probably just a town. There weren't *that* many lights, but there were some. There were some.
"I know. I see."
Spike roused in the back, and popped his head between the seats. "What's the hubbub?" he asked, but without much interest.
"There are lights!"
"Oh." Spike slumped back into his seat dejectedly. Willow couldn't understand the lack of excitement on the part of her companions. Where there were lights, there was electricity. And where there was electricity there were people. Right?
Well, there was electricity at any rate, and that meant they were getting further away from it. Maybe the further they got, the more normal things would become. Maybe eventually they'd drive back to the real world, and leave the nightmare behind.
She wanted to press on Angel's foot with her mind, force him to go faster, but that would've been wrong.
There was so much she wanted to do that would've been wrong. It was best if she didn't think of it at all.
And anyway, soon enough they were driving into the light, down what looked to be a main street in a very, very small town. Town might have even been too generous. It was a village. There was a five and dime store, a pizza place, a few antique shops, and at the corner, near a stop light that turned red when they hit it, a 7-11.
"Go in there," Willow said, and Angel turned into the parking lot dutifully.
The air was chilly when she stepped out of the car, and she tightened her arms around her self. There were crickets. She heard crickets. And there was gas. The tank had to be almost empty by now. She knew she could propel the car forward using her own energy, but she hoped it wouldn't come to that.
She found her credit card right where she'd left it- in her wallet which sat, undisturbed, inside her jacket pocket. It seemed strange, that she still had a wallet, but it was a blessing. She slid the card into the automatic pump and rejoiced when it worked.
Angel was walking around the parking lot. He seemed to be sniffing the air. Spike hadn't even bothered to get out. She tried not to let it phase her. Once the tank was full, she scrambled inside the store, desperate for human contact.
The door was unlocked, but the place was empty. Utterly and completely empty. No customers. No one behind the counter. Not a single, solitary soul. She wanted to cry all over again.
Instead she grabbed one of the red, plastic baskets piled near the door and began wandering the aisles, stuffing random items inside. Candy bars, those would be tasty, and give her energy. A box of Fruit Loops. That would work for breakfast. Some tampons, just in case. Toilet paper. 'Cause that was a handy thing to have no matter what. Donuts. Donuts were good. Bananas. They had bananas at 7-11. Who knew. Pain killers. Band-Aids and antiseptic and some gauze to wrap over Spike's bloody hand. A few bottles of water. A pre-made ham and cheese sandwich. Soon the basket was too heavy to carry and she put it down on the check-out counter ceremonially.
"Hello! Can I get some service here, please?" she demanded into the dead, artificially cool air. Why did they have the freaking air conditioning on, anyway? It was cold outside.
She felt Angel's hands on her shoulders. "There's no one here, Willow. We should go."
But she didn't want to go. She wanted service. She wanted to be checked out, like a normal person at the normal 7-11. She didn't want to steal. To loot. She wasn't a looter. So Angel stepped behind the counter and began bagging her items.
It was a bizarre ritual. She knew this. But somehow, it was comforting. She gave him some money from her wallet, and he pretended to put it in the register.
"Oh, and...some cigarettes. For Spike," she said. "He'll want those. Um...Camels?"
Angel nodded and pulled a few packs down from the overhead compartment. He put them in her bag and smiled.
"Have a nice day," he said, and she realized, dimly and in the very back of her mind, that she was having a nervous breakdown.
They walked silently to the truck, and Willow sat in the back seat next to Spike. She asked if she could see his hand, and he held it out to her. She began fussing over his wounds, cleaning and dressing them with the supplies she'd gotten. And as she did this, she made the mistake of looking into his eyes.
It was like gazing into the abyss. So much loss and sorrow and humiliation and rage. She could've drowned from it if she lingered too long, so she averted her eyes quickly and told Angel to start driving again.
"There weren't any people, were there?" Spike asked when they started back on the road. It wasn't really a question, though. He knew the answer already.
"Maybe in the next town," she said, but something in her heart told her no. There wouldn't be any people in the next town, or the town after that either.
After she'd finished cleaning and dressing most of Spike's visible wounds, Angel told her she should eat something. The thought made her stomach turn.
"Not really hungry."
"Eat anyway," he said, in a tone that brokered no argument. She tried a banana first, and found that she was, in fact, thoroughly starved. She devoured it quickly, then moved on to the ham and cheese sandwich, which was finished in four large bites. She didn't taste any of it.
The memory of her last meal flickered briefly- turkey burgers with Buffy and Dawn, sitting around the table, talking about school. Dawn was learning chemistry. She liked it, and discussed the subject excitedly with Willow, while Buffy tried to feign interest.
Willow didn't know how long ago that was. At least a couple of days. Before she felt it beginning. Before Angel and his friends got there. Before any of them had even realized how little time they might have left.
She started peeling another banana, but Angel glanced back and shook his head. "No more. You'll just throw it up."
He was right, of course, so she put it aside and drank some water instead.
She wondered how long it had been since Spike and Angel had eaten, and what they were planning on doing about that. There hadn't been any blood packets for sale at the 7-11, after all.
She fingered her neck absently, thinking of the Donner Party, and commenced staring out the window.
They drove on in silence for awhile, until Willow noticed that Angel had changed their path. He'd taken them off the old highway, and they were traveling an even more desolate route. A rural back road, weaving through intermittent open fields and dense blocks of trees.
"Where are we going, Angel? she asked, hoping he might actually know- might have some sort of plan.
Angel started to speak, but Willow didn't hear his answer because Spike interjected loudly with, "We're off to see the Wizard, of course. Try to get the key. Could've told them it was broken. Should've seen it coming. Try to save the girl, but the girl doesn't want to be saved. No one wants to listen."
"Spike...?" Willow leaned closer to him, concerned. She hadn't heard him talking like this in months. She thought he was past it. But, she supposed, if anything could test the precarious sanity of a newly-souled vampire, this would be it. She wasn't exactly the poster girl for mental health at the moment, either.
"Spike, are you okay?" She touched his shoulder, attempting to soothe, but it seemed to have the opposite effect. He jerked away violently and raised his voice to an almost hysterical pitch.
"No! No touching! No magic, bad girl, broken doll, shouldn't break what you can't fix. Should've know. You should know."
Then he was bashing his skull against the door, like Angel had but harder, with obvious intent to harm.
"Spike, no!" She reached for him again, and he shoved at her arms, using just enough force to deflect her. The wound on the side of his head was opening again from the impact. She could see the blood dribbling down onto his chin. "Spike, stop!"
She didn't know how to stop him, though. Not without magic. She didn't know what to do.
Then the car was swerving off the road, coming to a screeching halt. Angel threw the gear shift into park and came around to her door. He opened it, and asked her if she could drive. Willow nodded, anxious to hand the situation over to someone else. Someone who might know what to do.
She walked around the car, taking deep breaths to calm herself, then sat in the driver's seat, but didn't move the car until she saw Angel pinning Spike's arms to his sides, temporarily immobilizing him. He was still rambling incoherently and alarmingly, but at least he wasn't hurting himself anymore.
She felt uncomfortable, driving around with him like this, but it seemed somehow imperative that they keep moving.
"Spike, you need to stop," Angel said, in the same tone he'd used to get her to eat. Not to the same effect, though. She could hear and sense Spike struggling to get out of Angel's grasp.
"Could've stopped it," he was saying. "Couldn't stop it, make it stop, ruined it all, broke the sky. I'm a bad man. Bad man."
"Dammit, William, knock it off!" Angel was yelling now, shaking him. "You're not a bad man! You couldn't stop it. Nobody could. It's not your fault she died!"
And at this, Spike started sputtering, choking on broken sobs, and Willow had to bite the inside of her cheek to keep from crying too. There was just something so...final in the way he said that. Something that put it firmly in the tragic, but unalterable past. Died. She had died. Wasn't coming back this time. None of them were.
She heard more rustling- the sounds of another struggle, perhaps- and glanced in the rearview mirror to see what was going on. She almost screamed when there was nothing looking back at her (she really was losing her mind), but then she remembered.
She took a small driving risk- no cars on the road anyway- and peered over her shoulder. Spike was bent at the waist, clutching the front of Angel's shirt, crying silently into his chest, and Angel had one arm around his back, one hand opening and closing over patches of his tangled hair. He was murmuring soft words into Spike's ear, so quiet that Willow couldn't hear them.
She let her gaze linger for a moment, in something resembling wonder, then turned her attention back to the stupid, empty road.
There were a few moments of blessed peace and quiet, and Willow let herself relax and settle back into the groove of driving. It was better when she was driving, she found. It was something to concentrate on. A task. Tasks were good.
It was going to be okay. Angel had everything under control. He was calming Spike, and he knew where they were going. He'd been ready to tell her, but they got interrupted was all. She just had to keep going, following the path he'd been taking them on. Just keep going straight and they'd get somewhere good. Angel knew.
"No, no more. Hole. Hole's coming with fire. Fire to devour us all."
So much for peace and quiet. Willow sighed and glanced into the backseat again. Spike seemed relatively sedate- he looked almost restful against Angel- but he was back to the babble.
"Spike, there's no fire anymore," she tried, as gently as possible. She didn't want to yell, or upset him further. She just wanted him to stop acting so freaky. It was making things worse.
"Stop. No more. Hole. Hole with fire."
She shrugged and gave Angel an imploring look before turning back to the road.
Then he started in on it too. "Willow, there's...there is a hole." Then, more frantic, "Stop the car, Willow! Stop the fucking car! There's a hole in the road!"
She pressed down on the brakes with a startled shriek, and finally saw what they were talking about. It was huge, went all the way across the road and into the surrounding woods and Willow couldn't figure out how she'd managed to miss it. There were flames flicking up from beneath, and horrible noises that they could hear through the closed windows. Another hole to hell. And there were only a scant two or three feet between the front wheels of the truck and the outer rim of the rapidly crumbling pavement.
She felt herself, her brain in particular, shutting down in a blind panic. They were going to fall. The road was going to give out from under them and they were going to fall and die. Or worse.
Angel was talking again, but she couldn't make the words out, couldn't take her eyes off the flames.
Reverse, reverse, she had to put the car into reverse. Just drive them back and away and onto another road. But as she started to move the car backwards, she heard Angel very clearly saying "No, no don't move," and he was right because the road was crumbling faster now and one of the front wheels was dipping precariously downwards.
"Oh, God," she whimpered. "What do I do? What do I do?" and she tried really hard to listen to him this time.
"We have to get out. We have to get out of the car," Angel said. Calm. So calm. Thank God he was there. Of course. Get out of the car. "You should climb back here," he told her. "Carefully."
She hauled herself into the back seat, as gently as she could manage, shaking all the way, and Angel opened his door and let her out first. She felt the road rumbling under her feet and knew they didn't have much time.
Angel came out next and told her to run, but she couldn't run until she saw Spike get out. He was just sitting there, looking like he couldn't care less.
"Spike, come on!" she called desperately. He gave her a blank expression, then shrugged and crawled across the back seat and out the door.
And then they did run, into the trees and as far away as they could get until the ground stopped moving under them and the stench and din of hell had vanished almost completely from their senses. It wasn't until they stopped running that Willow noticed how horribly cold it was, how very deep into the woods they seemed to be, and how terribly she already missed Xander's beautiful white sports utility vehicle.