Between Sunshine & Shadows

By Rune

It tickled me pink that she was so easily taken in.

I was surprised to be honest. She always seemed to be able to smell a rat at fifty paces; never thought I'd be able to fool her.

But I did. And it tastes so. Fucking. Sweet! Kinda like her, really. She was sweet. Sweet and ripe and vital.

I'd tried just about every other way. Every way of fighting her, plotting against her, mind-fucking and breaking her. Nothing worked. I'd fool myself that with the chip gone I'd have killed her easily long ago but I'm not sure about that now. In those days she had so much to lose. The Scoobies were always hanging around keeping her spirits up when things were shitty, watching her back and such. I reckon that without them she'd 'ave let Angelus chow on down on her when she brought 'im back.

But things changed. I got my chip; she got Mr fuckin' Idaho. Angel's gone; the Gangs all growed up and Rup's busy with his little Curiosity Shop. Then it was goodbye Joyce, bon voyage, and end of fucking story. That got her the most. Took some of the wind from her sails and that bloody smug smirk of her face. It broke that magic circle that seemed to be around her, the one made up of Mother and Scoobies and them giving her the focus to stay alive. I was sorry to see old Joyce bite it, she was okay. Good listener. Tough break.

Slayer should have listened to me more. Fuck, it wasn't as if I didn't WARN her was it? I told her 'never turn your back on me Slayer', didn't I? I told her that when I got this chip out they'd be finding her body for weeks. (Snigger) Well, we both know THAT'S not gonna happen any time soon... the thing with her body, I mean.

Then there was the whole 'Slayer' thing. She wanted to know how I killed them. She wanted me to tell her how not to be killed. Jesus fuckin' Christ, did that not strike her as paradoxical? A Slayer asking a Master Vampire how NOT to be killed by a Master Vampire. It was insulting, looking back on it. Insulting how she just bloody *presumed* that I'd wanna tell her anything; that I would want to save her sorry ass, even if it was for a few measly bucks. Vampires do have a fucking code, you know. We have honour and pride and we have hate.

*I* have hate, you bitch. For you and all your fucking kind.

But that's when I got the idea. Of how to kill her sorry ass.

Okay, maybe in the beginning I thought there was something there, something between us. A few horny dreams, me gettin' a bit obsessive. I know now what it was.

It was fear.

I was stuck, you see. Stuck in a nightmarish reality of imposed starvation.

It wasn't just the food. It's not just the blood. It's the hunt. It's the chase. It's the mind-numbing fear of the prey, the adrenalin chaser in the bloodstream when you're feeding and the heady scent of desperation and entrapment and no bloody hope. Even the shagging's no good; no good without the bite, the fangs sliding wetly and smoothly into soft flesh, the taste of the lust rushing through the veins and tainting the blood.

So. One minute I'm King of the fuckin' World and the next I can't feed or fuck or defend myself. I'm not even gonna touch on the ethics of those bastards that did it. Let's just say that Evil has more than one face and not all of them demon.

I was afraid. Who wouldn't be? My nature, my instincts were still intact but I'd been de-fanged, emasculated. I didn't have 'Mum', I didn't have the Scoobies, I had NO ONE. Just me. Kill or be killed except I couldn't, could I? It was fight or flight, but where the hell would I go? So I did what I'd done for Angelus for fucking decades. I bent over, I submitted. I put my fate in the hands of the Slayer, threw myself on her dubious mercy, demeaned myself, turned against my own kind and became a pariah because I didn't wanna be dust.

What, you think it was fucking fun? Believe me, the Slayer butt-fucked as roughly as Angelus in her own way, except she didn't have the courtesy to give me a reach-around. Well, not in the beginning anyway. It had become obvious to me that whether I liked it or not, the chip wasn't going anywhere in a hurry but if I didn't do something soon I was gonna be going somewhere - Hell. And an awful lot quicker than I'd hoped.

I did what I had to do. Doesn't mean I changed, doesn't mean I didn't wanna kill her as badly as I always had. But demons, smart demons, we adapt. Improvise and adapt. Sorta chameleon-like. When in Rome and all that shit. Dru used to love Rome...

Slayer chained me to the bathtub. Me. A Master bloody vampire. Chained to a fucking bathtub. Living with a librarian. Drinking pig's blood out of a novelty mug. Then, oh then things went totally tits up, they made me live in a basement with Xander 'I'm a fuckin' closet homo, donut eatin' demon phobic faggot' Harris. Who tied me to a bloody chair. He got a hard-on every time an' all. Thought I didn't notice the horny little poof. And yeah, of course I fucked him. 'Ad to do something to get out of that soddin' chair.

Life was a bowlful of shit.

Of course I never stopped trying to get rid of the chip or the Slayer. Just 'cause I couldn't do the job didn't mean I wouldn't cheer on some other bugger who thought he could. But there was no one or thing good enough. No matter what, the little bitch always came up smelling of roses and the opposition was left in a big puddle of goo, a pile of dust or simply just in bits. It was enough to make a hundred-year-old demon cry.

To this day, I'm still not sure why she didn't just lose it and stake me. The times I betrayed her, the times I mind-fucked or just plain annoyed the hell out of her...

My theory stands.

At the end of the day Slayer knew I was the one. She knew I could kill her. With me gone, there was no one else around even close to being able to take her down. She needed me 'cause deep down inside she craved it. She craved that fangy, ugly death she'd been skipping around since the day she was Called. Why do you think she fucked Angelus? She loves to dance does Slayer. Dance with death.

I think... no, I *know* that's why she fucked me.

There was no love. Just a black, obsessive itch, an insane craving, an illogical, irrational urge to dance with the Devil. Down inside Slayer there was a power, a dark power. She could deny it all she wants but I've seen it, I've seen it in her eyes when she makes a kill. I've smelt her arousal and her heat and her craving when the killings done and all she wants to do is fuck. And she knows it, she saw it herself in Faith and it frightened her, scared the shit out of her. Oh denial, how do I love thee? Let me count the ways...

Besides. I'm her equal. Like onto like. Black on white. Dark on light. Life and death. And I'm the only thing left of Angelus that's tangible. The one part of him that she can reach out and touch.

And so she did. Eventually.

All her little creature comforts were disappearing one by one. Angel. Farm boy. Joyce. The close ties with Xander and Red were being nibbled away by their respective fuck-toys. Pretty soon, I was the only piece of the original puzzle left. Reality had kicked in, life WAS a bitch after all and Slayer was human. Lonely. Needy. Vulnerable.

The sweetest thing of all was that she came to me. The second sweetest thing was that she hated it. We did it right there in my crypt. Right there in the bed where I'd fucked Harmony. You could still smell her perfume off the sheets. I saw Slayer's nostrils twitch and the implications of what she was doing kicking home and her eyes filled with tears, hot and salty. I licked them away. Licked them away while I cooed and kissed and undressed her. Licked them from her face and moved down her neck, across her sternum where I stayed awhile, biting ice-cream pink nipples and gorging on her sighs and sobs.

When my tongue reached her navel she arched her body upwards and little hands fluttered and grasped the sheets, the ghost of Harmony forgotten and abandonment throwing her legs wide. Her face broke open like a rosebud in the sun as I tongued her cunt, clitoris hard as a marble and throbbing between my teeth and her juices soaking my face and dribbling down my chin and onto the sheets. I slipped a finger inside her, then two and she cried out then, hips jacking forward and urging the fingers to go deeper, the tongue to circle faster and harder.

Sliding up her body, oblivious to her whimpers of disappointment I moved between her legs and stared long and hard into her face. I wanted to watch. I wanted to see the look in her eyes when I rammed my cock into her, needed to see the desire but also the loathing, the self-hate, the dismay that I could smell from every pore of her body. Wanted to watch as she watched me fucking her, knowing I wasn't HIM.

And gods, she was so *tight*, just like I knew she would be. Tight and hot and wet, firm thighs gripping me and her little heels drumming on my ass as I slid in and out of her, slowly at first but then urged on by her moans and her bucking hips to go faster, harder. Her face shone with sweat and tears as she moaned and sobbed and cried out for more. There was no name called in the heat of passion, just a keening which grew louder and more desperate. When I gripped her thighs and pushed her ankles towards her ears, sliding in as deep as I could go and rotating my hips she screamed. Screamed like a banshee and nearly bucked me off of her, her cunt spasming around my cock so hard when she came that I nearly bit my own lip off.

I think I screamed myself then, her cunt muscles milking me in a vice-like grip as I thrusted and pumped my cold seed inside of her, feeling that rush of heat as she came and the pain as her nails dug scarlet trenches in my back.

We lay there for an age, her gasping for breath as she lay like a lifeless doll beneath me. No whispered endearments, no promises, no comfort. She stared impassively as I bit my own arm, the demon within me screaming for the kill, for the blood. I growled in frustration and rolled off her in search of some blood and I could hear her scrambling for her clothes and getting dressed.

So fucking much for the afterglow.

I'd like to say 'we' became a regular thing. Well, we did in a way. After a few kills and/or a particularly hard day Slayer came around in need of some absolution.

After all the fantasies I'd had, the whole thing was a bit of a letdown. Part of it had been me trying my luck to start with; the masochist inside of me enjoying the pain when she'd turned me down in the past. And the act itself was totally fucking joyless for us both. It was an expelling of surplus energy, an outlet for her bloodlust and misery and a cold and comfortless shag for me. I'm a cuddler, always have been, always will. Being a demon doesn't make me frigid, I'm a tactile vamp, me. It's one of my charms.

There was no romance, no sudden realisation of deep meaningful something - just shagging.

And I realised something else.

I still hated her.

An uneasy trust was formed; one-way I might add. I'm not stupid or naive enough to believe that a few shags constituted redemption from her stake, but SHE was. Maybe she got me all mixed up with my poof of a Sire, I dunno, but I could feel it. I could feel her relax more in my company, I could feel her dependence grow and so I fed it like a hungry pet, nurtured, soothed and stroked it into fullness all the while knowing that I would use it to kill her.

I took Captain Cardboard's place at her side while she patrolled. She felt safer, more secure with me 'cause as I said I'm her equal. She didn't have to worry so much about some vamp getting in a lucky shot or feel guilty 'cause she was putting my 'life' in danger. The guilt factor was waaaaay reduced. Frankly, Slayer couldn't have given a shit if I'd 'ave gotten dusted or not. She'd have missed my cock, though.

We existed in limbo; me not quite a vampire, her caught between the sunshine and shadows. Hunting and killing and shaggin'. Misery feeding misery, cold comfort binding us. It had to end eventually.

By the time it did, she wanted it anyhow.

Ever heard of Pontius Pilate? That's me, baby. I didn't kill her myself, didn't need to wash hands that were guilt free and waxy-white clean. I just stood back and watched while some other something did.

There was no Timetable of Doom, no alert, no 'heads-up Spike, today's the day the Slayer kicks'. It just... happened. And I let it.

We were patrolling as usual, walking along in silence, me sniffing the air for the scent. It came out of nowhere; we hadn't a bloody chance. Well, she hadn't. The Mag'rosh are big buggers, preternaturally strong and as evil and vicious as they come. It must have been waiting for us, I dunno; Slayer's hated almost as much as I am and seeing us together like the Fabulous Twosome of Impending Demon Death really pissed the demon community off. Suffice to say there's a sizeable bounty on both our heads.

The Mag'rosh went straight to her. Separate the weakest from the strong and take it down, a wonderful piece of demon logic. She may have been a Slayer but I'm a demon and a hell of a bit harder to kill, not as easy to break or smash to a bloody pulp.

The whole thing panned out like one of those badly lit budget movies with a really crap slow-motion effect tagged in. It went straight for her throat with one of it's big paws or claws or whatever the bloody hell it's got for hands, and her little arms were dwarfed by it's biceps as she frantically grabbed it's arms and tried to prise herself free. It was never gonna happen, I knew it, the Mag'rosh knew it and Slayer knew it.

It was at this point that William the Bloody would come out to play and rescue the fair damsel from the nasty beastie, then help her kick it's ass to fucking Texas and back.

But not today.

She wasn't strictly speaking the fair damsel. A hot looking Slayer, yeah, but never a damsel. There would be no Black Knight to the rescue.

Her hair shone like melted butter in the moonlight and her face had this eerie kind of glow but it was her eyes... Her head swung in my direction and she screamed my name. Just once. Our eyes met and I could see the fear as it battled for supremacy in those hazel depths with something else, something that I recognised.

Resignation.

Okay, I'd already decided in those fleeting seconds that I was gonna let her die, but it was all there in those windows to her soul.

For a moment time stood still, our eyes locked and my senses were drowned with her, the smell of her fear and the pleading in her eyes. For a tiny splinter of a second I reconsidered, muscles already coiling beneath my flesh ready to spring on the beast and kill it but then she spoke, softly and calmly.

"Let me go." The ghost of a whisper suspended on her last breath.

In the vacuum of my pause, the Mag'rosh broke her neck.

You know what's odd? I felt her go. Felt something small and slightly warm slip from within my body, from my own essence and I felt the chill inside me deepen.

The Mag'rosh dropped her to the cold earth and turned to me, it's red eyes blasting me with baleful pleas to 'Come on, you just fucking try it, vampire!' I couldn't move even if I wanted to. Then it walked towards me and past me, knocking me to the ground with a humongous shoulder as it did, hissing hatefully 'Maybe there's hope for you yet Spike.'

There was a rumble of thunder from a dark and ominous sky and the rain exploded from the clouds in a fury not seen for years in Sunnyhell. Were the heavens mourning the Slayer's passing I wonder? Huh! You'd easily know I used to be a fucking poet.

Without thinking I scooped up her rapidly cooling body and headed for the shelter of the crypt. I don't why I brought her here, it just seemed... I dunno, like bringing her home.

They never found her body. The Scoobies, they never found it, never knew. There were no ballads written about the Slayer's Last Battle. The very next night I hunted down the Mag'rosh and killed it and any other demon that had an inkling of the truth. If there were others left who knew they were too frightened to tell.

The story goes that Buffy just upped and left. So much pressure and unhappiness after Joyce's death and the loss of the vampire in Angel's clothing she'd never ceased to love. Rupert knew she was dead, though. He felt it long before the new Slayer came to town. He's only ever asked me once if I knew what had befallen her.

What, do you think I'd tell him the truth? I looked him straight in the eye and lied. I'm good at that.

Her body? It's here, in my crypt.

Well, most of it. I kept her head, a souvenir you might say.

What I can tell you is that the Slayer still exists. Well for as long as I do, she does.

She's with me, in me, a part of me.

She belongs to me.

I ate her, you see.

Like I told you in the beginning she tasted sweet. Sweet and ripe and vital. Because in the end I'm a demon. I might have to lie back and be shafted once in a while, but that doesn't change my nature, doesn't change what I am.

I'M A VAMPIRE. IT'S WHAT I DO.

And no one would understand that more than she would.

After all, we had danced.

~Fin~