Modus VivendiBy Wiseacress
Chapter Eleven
He woke up with a body at his back and a cold tub of Thai soup in front of his face.
It was daytime—must be, there was a grey light seeping through the cracks in the curtains. He could see the loft in dim outline, the partition at the far end still shoved aside, the bathtub empty and silent. There were some carry bags on the kitchen counter, and a few forgotten cartons of Thai.
He was exhausted. He felt as if he were lying in a deep imprint in the mattress, his limbs pulled down by their own weight. Squashed like a bog man. He ached.
He shifted and realized that the boxers had dried and stuck to him. He had to reach down and pull them free, and he considered trying to get them off, but there was a body next to him. Spike’s body.
It was a pretty big bed, and Spike was mostly on the far side of it. His back was turned and he wasn’t moving. He wasn’t wearing a shirt. Or socks; his bare foot was cool against Xander’s calf. Xander couldn’t tell what else he wasn’t wearing.
And now he didn’t really want to get naked, even though the alternative was a pair of crusty boxers. His shirt had got lost somewhere between the couch and the bed. He stared at the back of the couch and thought about what he’d done on it the night before. He was insane. He was suicidal.
He was thirsty. He looked back at the tub of soup and considered it, then remembered how salty it was. He wanted a glass of water. His throat felt like he’d swallowed flour.
He turned onto his back and stared at the ceiling. Flaking grey paint, grey pipes criscrossing. Once upon a time, he’d lain on the cot and stared at the ceiling, thinking about Glen and the lawn mower blade. It felt like ages ago. His legs had been fucked for ages.
He wasn’t getting any better.
He had a sudden moment of panic. He wasn’t getting better, he felt worse now than he had that day—how long ago? He wasn’t bouncing back, he was going to get an infection and what the hell would that mean? He’d end at the knee. No, he was taking the red-and-yellows, he wouldn’t get infected. He just had to rest, take it easy and eat and sleep, and he’d be walking again soon. He’d be doing fucking steeplechase.
He should have stayed in the hospital.
He looked over at Spike’s naked back and tried to imagine where he’d be right now if he’d done the smart thing—stayed in the hospital, or called Buffy for help when he had the chance. He wouldn’t be here now, that was certain. He wouldn’t be on his back in bed with a dead man, wearing a pair of very used skivvies. LA extension of the Slayer posse, sure. This was Xander Harris, out on his own in the world. This was what it looked like.
He closed his eyes and tried not to hate himself.
Someone was shaking him and he woke up annoyed.
“Hey,” he said. “I’m trying to have a recovery, here.”
“We have to go now,” Buffy said. She was looking around in the darkness, and there was fear in her face.
“Sure,” he said. “But my legs are fucked.”
“I’ll carry you,” she said, and together they heaved him up out of the bed. She got an arm around his waist and started for the door.
It was dark, but he could see. The loft was quiet and empty, except that when they passed the couch he saw Spike sitting on it. He didn’t turn his head to watch them go by.
“What about Spike?” he asked. Buffy’s pace didn’t slow.
“He’ll come later,” she said, and Xander thought, Okay, later. He’s a vampire, he can take care of himself.
There was a brown dog sitting by the door as they went out. He let his fingers brush its head as they passed, and it watched them silently from the corners of its eyes.
“What about the dog?” he said, when they were halfway down the stairs. If the loft was going to go up in flames, he didn’t want to leave the dog behind.
“Spike will bring it,” Buffy whispered.
They reached the door to the garage and Buffy propped him up against the wall while she bent the handle off and pulled it open. He wondered how she’d come in.
“Which car are we taking?” he asked, and Buffy put her hand over his mouth. She smelled clean and sweet, like shampoo.
“Come on,” she mouthed, and grabbed him. They stumbled together around the doorframe and started running to the Nova. His keys were in his pocket, and he fished them out as they went, losing hold of them once but miraculously catching them again in mid-fall. Buffy yanked the Nova’s driver side door open, pushed him in, and slid over the hood to the passenger side. He had a moment to think, Nice move, and then she was in the car beside him, wide-eyed, clutching the dash.
“Go. Go!”
He yanked it into drive and tore a half-circle around to the garage door. It was opening already, slowly but surely, like an envelope of black. Night outside. He didn’t like the look of it.
“Buffy, what are we—”
“Just drive, Xander. Get us out of here.”
“But what—”
“Shut up. Just shut up and drive.”
He drove. They made it out just under the door, launched up the incline and landed in a trail of sparks. Like the streets of fucking San Francisco. He yanked the wheel left and they screamed through an empty lane and started laying tracks.
They flashed past empty nighttime parks and houses, dark windows and blinking red traffic lights. It was past midnight; the sidewalks of Sunnydale had been officially rolled up. They passed the old high school, still smoking, and one of the cemeteries. He’d almost died in that one. One step to the left—but he didn’t die, just got his first prescription for codeine.
Buffy settled back in her seat and pulled anxiously at her seat belt. He glanced over at her. He’d forgotten how tiny she was.
“Buff, what’s going on?”
She looked out the window and shook her head.
“Come on, since when do you cut a loyal Scooby out of the loop?”
She looked at him sadly. “You’re not a Scooby, Xander. Not anymore.”
He stared at her for a minute, to see whether she was serious. He was stung, but at the same time he knew it was a bullshit accusation. “Don’t go Dynasty on me, Buffy. I’m still a Scooby and you know it.”
“If you say so,” she said, and looked away.
He started to speak, then stopped. The Scooby thing hurt, but not because he thought she was right. It was just that she thought it. She was serious—she didn’t think of him as part of the group anymore.
“I’m not going to convince you, am I?” he asked, looking back to the road.
She didn’t say anything, and after a minute he said, “If I’m not a Scooby, why’d you come and get me?”
“We still need you,” she said softly.
“What for?”
“You know where Spike is.”
It was true, he reflected—he’d been in the loft, he could probably find it again. But if they’d just brought Spike with them in the first place, they wouldn’t have to find it again.
“You’re slipping,” he said with a smile. “He was just here, you could have talked to him yourself.”
“He’s coming later, I told you. He has to wait for the plug uglies.”
“The—” He looked at her. “The uglies? They’re coming to the loft?”
She nodded.
“Buffy, they’re human.”
She looked at him, puzzled. “Yuh-huh,” she said.
His hands were starting to sweat on the wheel. “They’re human, Spike can’t hurt them. The chip, remember?”
She frowned, then figured it out and shrugged. “Well, he’ll just have to do his best.”
“His—” He yanked the wheel and the car came to the curb. “Buffy, they’ll kill him.”
She started to shrug again, then froze. She looked past his shoulder, out into the empty street. Her eyes went wide and she drew in a breath.
“Stay here.” She was out the passenger side door before he could say anything, and so instead he looked around to see what she’d been looking at. At first he saw nothing. Then there was some movement in the alley beside the Bronze, and someone walked out.
Bony Nose.
He was wearing a T-shirt and jeans, and he was smiling. Buffy looked both ways before she crossed the street toward him.
Xander fought to roll the window down, to call out to her—Get back in the car! Come on, Buffy, move! But she’d already got too close, she was saying something, and Bony Nose laughed and reached out and casually smacked her across the face.
Xander got the door open and ran three steps before his legs disappeared and he piled into the asphalt. He was shirtless, shoeless in the middle of the street, his legs a ruined mess of bloody bandages and dirt.
“Buffy!” he yelled, and they were both looking at him. Bony Nose waved, and Buffy frowned and kicked him in the stomach. He took a step back, staggered a little, then reached into the back of his jeans.
“Gun!” Xander screamed, and Buffy turned to look at him in confusion, and Bony Nose pulled the pistol out of his jeans and blew the top off Buffy’s head.
She stood for a moment, still confused, then fell.
Xander stared at the black pool spreading around her.
Bony Nose looked at him and smiled. He started to walk over.
Xander didn’t move. Buffy was still lying there in the growing pool. Her hair was getting wet. She was going to hate that.
He started pulling himself forward, thinking he could lift her head up out of the pool, and when he looked up Bony Nose was standing over him. There was a bright star over his left shoulder.
“Hi,” he said. “You know what this is about by now, right?”
Xander looked away and tried to go around Bony’s legs. He heard Bony sigh and felt the gentle blunt pressure of the gun behind his ear.
“Tell Spike it’s about the dog,” Bony said quietly, and Xander thought, Spike, who the hell is Spike? He heard a quiet metallic click and closed his eyes for the bloom.
A hand was on his shoulder, and he was sitting up. He couldn’t move his legs and he started to panic.
“Jesus—”
“It’s all right—”
He was caught in the sheets, that was all. He yanked them away and kicked his legs free. His hand hurt. Great. New pain.
He’d dreamed about Bony Nose, and Buffy, and getting the hell out. It hadn't been pleasant, he knew that much. He was cold and sweating. Jesus, he needed a bath.
Spike’s hand was still on his shoulder and he looked around. Spike was standing beside the bed, wearing a pair of faded jeans without a shirt, his hair messy with sleep. His face was tight and watchful, and there was a red mark on his shoulder.
It was strange to see Spike; it gave him a sickly, uncertain feeling in his gut. After a moment he realized it was because he hadn't looked Spike in the face since…last night. Whatever it had been.
“You all right?” Spike took his hand away, and Xander tried to sit up straight.
“Fine,” he said. He was like one of those barkless dogs.
Spike stepped back and watched him, and Xander began to feel embarrassed.
“Was I—I was loud?”
Spike shrugged.
“Sorry.” He fiddled with the sheets and shook his hand absently.
“Hurts?”
He looked up and saw that Spike was watching him test his hand. He nodded.
“You took a lovely swing just before you woke up,” Spike said matter-of-factly.
Xander didn’t get it for a minute, and then he did. He looked at the red mark on Spike’s shoulder.
“I hit you?”
Spike shrugged again.
“Sorry.”
Spike watched him for another moment, then turned away and picked up a glass from the bedside table. “Pills time.”
Xander took the pills and drank the water. When he gave the glass back, Spike took it to the sink and drew him another.
“What was it about?” he asked as he walked back.
Xander paused, then said, “I don’t remember.” He didn’t remember most of it, and he didn’t want to talk about the rest.
Spike stood holding the water, looking at him. After a minute he absently lifted the glass and took a sip.
“Hey.”
“You said something about the plug uglies.”
“Yeah.”
“Reliving the glory?”
He laughed shortly, bitterly. “Yeah, kind of.” His throat caught and he started to cough. It tore at his stomach and his shoulder.
Spike waited for it to finish, then handed him the water. It was cold and sweet and delicious, and after he’d bolted it he hiccupped.
“Thanks.”
“What else?”
He looked up in confusion, then realized Spike was still talking about the dream.
“I don’t know,” he said with annoyance. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“It could be important.”
“Who are you, C.G. Jung? It’s a fucking dream.”
“What else do you remember?”
He had a sudden, blinding urge to turn and whip the glass against the wall. He saw it happen in living color, but he didn’t do it.
“I don’t want to remember it, Spike.” He spoke slowly, trying to control his voice. He wanted to scream.
“I’m telling you to.”
“Fuck you.” It snarled out before he could even think, and it wasn’t so much the words as the tone. All of a sudden he wanted to kill Spike, and it was right there in his voice.
There was a brief silence, and Xander stared at the grubby edges of the bandage on his knee. It occurred to him that one of two things could happen. If the chip wasn’t working, Spike could punch him in the side of the head, or just lean over and take his throat out.
If it was working, he could walk away. He could dump the pills down the sink, Xander realized. He could stop bringing Thai soup and glasses of water. It would be easy. He wouldn’t have to risk the chip, and he could hurt Xander as much as he wanted.
Really hurt him.
Xander swallowed and took a deep breath, and found himself hoping to be punched.
But Spike didn’t punch him, and he didn’t walk away. He just stood there.
“I’m asking you to,” he said, and his voice was cool and careful.
For a moment Xander was struck by the strangeness of it, and then he realized that he’d better answer. Spike was asking nicely. He’d asked nicely three times already.
“It’s just rehashing,” he said, staring down at the glass in his hand. “Bony Nose shows up and floats the message again.”
“The message.”
“Yeah, you know, like before. When they were all, this is a message for Spike, and then with the whaling-on. I thought you got that.”
“I got that.”
“That’s it.”
“He leathers you?”
“What?”
“Beats you up?”
“Yeah.” He thought about the cold pressure behind his ear and swallowed. Spike’s eyes narrowed.
“Something else?”
“No, just—yeah, I think he had a gun.” The understatement was staggering.
“He shoots you?”
“Yeah.”
“How many times?”
He paused. “Just the once. That’s all it usually takes, I think.”
“No, git—how many times have you dreamed it?”
The days were a blur. “I don’t know…twice, maybe.”
Spike stared at him, frowning.
“You wouldn’t wake up,” he said after a minute. “I couldn’t wake you up just now.”
Xander smiled uneasily. “I’m a heavy sleeper.”
“I shouted in your ear.”
Xander shrugged. He didn’t want to think about the dreams anymore. He had a rotten feeling, like a black mold trail down the back of his throat. A black pool had been spreading around Buffy’s head, in the middle of the empty street.
He shook his head and tried to think a happy thought. Thai soup. That was of the good.
“Anyone else?” Spike asked.
“Anyone else what?”
“In the dream.”
He sighed and touched his neck gently. The bite throbbed.
“Spike, I don’t want to talk about it any more. Please.” It came out small and humble and thin. He was starting to feel tired again. He could lie back down in the sheets and fall asleep right now.
Except he didn’t want to have that dream.
He’d been sagging, and he sat up a little straighter and forced his eyes to focus.
Spike was still standing there, watching him. After a moment he put out one hand and ran it through Xander’s hair, at the back of his neck.
Xander jerked uncomfortably and didn’t look at Spike. Spike let his fingers stay a minute, then took them away.
“Hungry?” he asked.
Xander nodded, looking at his legs.
“Head before or after?” Spike asked, and Xander sighed and lifted his arm. Spike caught him up and they started across the floor.
Their bare chests were together, Xander’s arm around Spike’s neck and Spike’s arm around Xander’s waist. Spike’s skin was cool and smooth, and Xander was horribly aware of how battered and thin his own body was. He was still in the tragic boxer shorts, and he smelled like sex and sweat and days in bed.
“I need a bath,” he said aloud, to take away from the awful intimacy of being carried like this, half-naked and stumbling.
“Sure,” Spike said. He kicked the bathroom door open and hauled Xander to the urinals.
Xander waited for him to let go and leave, but he didn’t.
“Spike—”
“Oh my sweet aunt—”
“Spike, let me—”
“You have got to be joking.”
“I’m not joking. Get out.”
He didn’t turn his head, but in his peripheral vision he saw Spike turn and stare at him. Their faces were inches apart.
“Do you have any recollection,” Spike asked, “of how you spent last night?”
Xander ground his teeth and blushed. It was unbearable. He tried to yank his arm free and got nowhere.
“Spike, please get out.”
“I’ve seen it already, wanker.”
“I—” He stopped, took a deep breath, and squared his shoulders. “I know. But this is—it’s different.”
“Yeah, I think I fucking know that.”
He tried to pull away again, and again it was useless. Like trying to pull his own arm off by tugging on his hand.
“Spike, I don’t think I even can, with you standing there.”
“Give it a go.”
“Spike.”
“Jesus Christ, you’re a nance.” He sighed and ducked out from under Xander’s arm. “Piss in peace, little princess.”
“Thank you.”
Spike went out and he pissed, flushed, and turned to look at himself in the mirror. He couldn’t make the trek across to the sinks this time; he knew he’d fold if he tried. He was having trouble just hanging onto the wall. But he could still see what he looked like.
It was worse than he’d imagined. He looked gaunt and grey-white, with dark pain circles under his eyes, a three-day beard, and the black stitches still holding his face together. His shoulder was an impressive mess, like a smeared palette, and the stomach bruises were going green and yellow. He looked heavily fucked up.
He was heavily fucked up.
The bite on his neck was purple and bruised—two puncture wounds the size of pencil heads, scabbing over with black. He raised his hand and touched it gently. He’d seen wounds like that lots of times. Mostly on dead people.
Spike came in and caught him looking. For a moment their eyes met, and Spike’s face was hard to read. He looked at Xander’s throat, and his eyes weren’t remorseful or sympathetic. If anything, he looked hungry.
Xander dropped his hand and looked away, and Spike came over and picked him up. “Food,” he said, and Xander almost laughed at the double entendre. He was feeling a little giddy.
Spike had put a T-shirt on, which made touching less personal and easier to bear. Xander’s feet barely grazed the floor on the way out to the couch.
There were a few cartons of last night’s Thai food open on the table, and a fork was plunged into one of them. Xander smiled.
“Props for the food styling.”
Spike ignored him, lowered him onto the couch, and handed him the carton with the fork. He started eating. Pad thai. Room temperature. He’d never tasted anything better.
He tried to go slowly, but still his stomach gave up after just a few minutes, and he had to put the carton down. The rest sat mocking him silently.
“Just you wait,” he said quietly. “Your time will come, you little fuck.”
Spike had turned the water on in the bath and disappeared into the bathroom. He came out with a towel, which he dropped it on the floor beside the tub on his way back to the partition. When he came out he had a pair of green boxers and a white shirt over his arm. He dropped them on the towel and walked over to Xander.
“Come on,” he said, putting out his hand. Xander grabbed it and they made for the bath.
When they got there he hesitated, wondering how this was going to work. Spike didn’t give him a chance to express a preference. He leaned over, hooked his thumb into the waist of Xander’s boxers, and yanked them down. They ripped in the process, and he kicked them under the tub.
“Grab on,” he said, and just scooped Xander up, the way he’d done that first day, as if he were no more than a child. A second later Xander was in the bath, in warm water up to his navel.
“Jesus Christ, Spike—” He pulled his knees up to his chest, partly to keep the bandage out of the water, and partly for modesty. Spike looked at the bandage and frowned. It was getting pretty mangy.
“Have to change that later.”
“Later, sure.” He wasn’t looking forward to it. He held his knees and waited for Spike to leave. Spike stayed crouched beside the tub, looking at him without moving. The light was dim—it was always dim in the loft—but still Xander felt ridiculously exposed. It wasn’t as bad as in the bathroom, but it wasn’t the comfort of total darkness, either. He watched Spike’s eyes move over his body, and couldn’t tell what he was thinking.
Maybe he was thinking Xander had looked better last night.
Maybe he was thinking he’d been pretty damn drunk.
“Spike—” It was ridiculous, he hadn't even had a chance to think about last night, to figure out what he’d done and agreed to, and what might be likely to happen again, and he was nervous and uncomfortable as hell. But at the same time it was painful to think that Spike might find him ugly.
“Yeah?”
“Listen, I—” He stopped. He looked down at his bruised, mottled body and couldn’t think of what to say. He cleared his throat and waited for something brilliant to occur to him.
It didn’t happen. Instead, Spike reached into the tub and put his hand on Xander’s bare shoulder, then ran it up his neck and tugged the hair at the base of his skull. Xander opened his mouth again, then closed it. He was hot all over—partly shame, partly instant lust. Spike leaned toward him and he leaned sideways, met him halfway and kissed him.
It was sweet and cool, and Spike tasted like himself, and the taste was enough to bring back the night before in a blinding rush. Xander opened his mouth and let Spike kiss him, and this time it wasn’t a feeling of delight and abandonment so much as a knife of need. He didn’t smile. He brought his hand up and yanked Spike in hard, pushed his tongue into Spike’s mouth, and groaned.
For an instant Spike kissed him back just as hard. The hand in his hair twisted deliciously, the knuckles against his skull—and then it stopped. Spike pulled away and Xander was left with nothing, trying to put his face back together.
“What—?” It took a second for it to sink in, and then it crashed over him all at once. Spike had just turned him down. He clenched his teeth and tried to smile.
“None of that,” Spike said. He was kneeling a couple of feet away from the tub, too far to reach. Because Xander was acting like a desperate girl, and Spike didn’t want to get grabbed again.
“Yeah, sorry,” Xander said, looking down. Under the water, the bruises on his belly were obscene. Like mildew.
He’d just made a grab for Spike. When, exactly, had he taken leave of his senses? He was insane.
He was ugly.
And insane.
“Soap’s in the dish.”
“Right. Thanks.”
Spike’s hand was in his hair again, and he flinched away. Pity touch. “I’m fine, I’ll…I’ll burble when I’m done.”
“Look at me, you tosser.”
He looked. Spike was staring at him levelly. “It’s not you,” he said. “I shouldn’t have started it.”
“Yeah, I get it.” He looked away and Spike gave a harassed sigh.
“You stupid shit, did you look at yourself?”
“Yeah.” He glanced down at his arms, the bruises scattered over them, and smiled painfully. “Kind of modernist abstract, is what I’m thinking. And did I mention that I get it?”
Spike rolled his eyes. “Not because of how you look, twit. Because you’re half-dead already, and I’m assuming you don’t want to go the other half here and now.”
Xander looked at him. “Are you expressing concern for my wellbeing?” he asked after a moment.
Spike scowled and leaned away. “Take your fucking bath,” he said, and stood up.
Xander watched him walk away, the humiliation fading and giving way to a shaky, uncertain happiness. He was alone with a hard-on for a dead guy, but he’d seen the front of Spike’s jeans, and it was oddly reassuring that the dead guy had a hard-on too. He sank down into the water and smiled at the ceiling.
Spike watched soccer, and Xander took his bath. He washed everything, drained the tub and filled it again, then fell asleep in the clean hot water. When he woke up it was lukewarm and his skin was pink and wrinkled. He pulled the plug and reached over the edge for the towel and his clothes.
When he was dry and half-dressed, Spike wandered over and hauled him back to the bed. He thought about protesting, then thought, fuck it. The bed was big and soft and cool. His head hurt. He sat on the edge of the mattress and looked at his feet while Spike brought the pad thai over.
“You ever watch the news?”
Spike shrugged and walked away to the kitchen.
“Because, you know, you could learn something.”
“Like what?” Spike was rummaging in a cupboard, and Xander sat with a forkful of pad thai in his hand, watching Spike’s back. The knots of his spine showed through his T-shirt, and the muscles in his neck showed when he lifted his arm. Xander had never really noticed that before. His heart tripped, and he felt a good warm ache start up between his legs.
Spike pulled a roll of tape out of the cupboard and turned to look at him. His expression was amused. Xander looked away, feeling his face go red.
“Like…I don’t know, consumer reports. Community events. Something that isn’t soccer.” He put the fork in his mouth and chewed, but he couldn’t taste. He’d just ogled Spike. And Spike knew it.
“Football.” Spike turned back to the cupboard, but Xander could hear the smile in his voice. Bastard was smirking.
“Whatever,” he said quietly, keeping his eyes on the television. He couldn’t see it very well from here, but that didn’t matter. He wasn’t thinking about soccer anyway. He was thinking, damn him, about Spike’s back, and the line of muscle that went down his neck into the collar of his shirt. There was still a building warmth in his belly and groin, even though his stomach was tight with embarrassment.
Spike started towards him and he dropped his eyes to the carton in his hand. He wasn’t hungry anymore; the cold food disgusted him. He put it on the bedside table and wiped his hands on his shorts.
“I think there’s a good caber toss on ESPN,” he said, staring at his feet and hoping he didn’t have a hard-on.
Spike dropped some stuff on the bed next to him, and Xander looked at it. Gauze, tape, scissors. Oh, fuck.
He looked up and tried to smile. Funny, he didn’t feel turned on anymore.
Spike crouched down in front of him and picked up the scissors. Xander swallowed and looked at the television.
“Man, that’s a big field,” he said softly. He felt Spike cut the tape and start unwinding the bandage. It pulled unpleasantly, and he tensed and held onto the edge of the mattress.
The bandage came free and made a thump when Spike dropped it. There was a slight yeasty smell. Xander looked down.
The wound under his kneecap was pink and raw and shiny with pus. The bruises had started to fade down from black to purple, and the swelling had lessened. It still looked like a dead man’s leg.
He noticed with detached interest that they’d shaved his knee, and the hair was just starting to grow back.
“Huh.” He was still gripping the mattress tightly, and he forced himself to let go. “That’s, uh… Is it supposed to look like that?”
Spike looked up with pursed lips. “They did a decent job,” he said, and Xander wondered whether he meant the uglies or the doctors. “You’re lucky, really.”
“And I feel lucky.”
Spike reached for the gauze and opened the bottle of alcohol. They were getting some serious use out of that stuff. “You’re lucky you had it stitched up right. Miracles of modern medicine.”
“You wanted to dump me in the back and let me walk it off, remember?.”
Spike shrugged and put the alcohol-soaked gauze over his knee. It was cold, and Xander flinched.
“You’re lucky I didn’t,” Spike said. It wasn’t a threat, just an observation. It struck Xander that certain facts of human frailty didn’t get through to Spike.
“I’m lucky Liv was here,” he said pointedly, and Spike nodded without rancor.
“She’s sensible,” he said. He moved the gauze and Xander’s knee flared. He jumped, but Spike didn’t seem to notice. He was holding the gauze with one hand, sorting through the pile of stuff with the other. “I did a bloke like this one time,” he said, and paused for a moment, frowning. “Eighteen— Oh fuck, eighteen eighty-three, eighty-four. He said something to Dru and I walked out with him, put his head in a rain barrel and did a dead good job on his knees. They were on backwards by the time I was done.” He smiled and pulled the roll of tape out of the pile.
Xander sat frozen, clinging to the mattress again.
“Didn’t kill him,” Spike went on, turning the roll of tape around and squinting to find the end. “That’s the thing—no Demerol back then. No real antibiotics. We took a little trip somewhere, maybe it was Bath, or Brighton. Looked him up when we got back, just to see.”
He found the end and picked it free with his fingernail, then tossed the tape aside and lifted the gauze off Xander’s knee.
“This’ll be fine,” he said. “Looks rough, but it’s coming along.”
He wiped the incision and dropped the gauze on top of the old bandage, then found a fresh pad and put some antiseptic on it.
“Hold that,” he said. Xander let go of the mattress and held the pad numbly against his knee while Spike found a wide roll of gauze and started wrapping him up again.
The television announcer said something in an excited voice, and the crowd cheered. They both looked over at the screen.
“Brilliant shot,” Spike said as they watched the replay.
“What happened to the guy?” Xander asked. He felt cold and shocked and distant.
“What?”
“The guy. Was he okay?”
Spike looked at him with confusion and annoyance, then remembered and shook his head. “Oh, fuck no. They had to cut his legs off, if you were poor they did it with a hacksaw in those days. He didn’t last halfway.”
Xander nodded silently, and watched Spike wrap the gauze neatly and firmly around his knee until the worst of the bruising was hidden.
“Thank you,” he said formally, after Spike had taped it up.
Spike looked at him. “You all right?” he asked.
“Fine,” Xander said. He lay down and closed his eyes, and after a minute he heard Spike gather up the pile of stuff and take it back to the kitchen.
The crowd was shouting something in unison, a huge dull unintelligible chant. Like Romans baying for blood, he thought. In the end, that was what everyone wanted—someone else’s blood.
He turned inside himself and found a doorway into sleep. Opened it and slipped through with relief.
When he woke up the loft was dark except for the bedside lamp. There was a glass of water beneath it, and the pills. For a moment he was disoriented, thinking he was back on the cot—hadn't he woken up like this before, everything dark except the pills in a circle of light?
His knees and shoulder were throbbing. He propped himself up and took the pills. There was no grey light showing through the curtains, so he assumed it was night again.
When had his life shrunk down to this?
Spike wasn’t in the bed, and Xander had the feeling he wasn’t in the loft at all. The silence was total.
He lay for a long time staring at nothing. Vaguely, he was aware that the pain was easing down into a low grouse, and that he was getting sleepy again. He could spend his life like this, just sleeping and taking pills and sleeping again. He felt like he’d already spent his life like this.
He thought about his apartment, the roaches and the smell and the empty refrigerator. It seemed unreal—was it even still his anymore? He didn’t know the date; he might have missed rent by now. His stuff could be out on the curb. He thought of Willow and Tara’s curtain abandoned in the gutter, and felt a wrench of sadness.
The job was gone by now, for sure. He hadn't called Jeff to let him know what was going on—and what was he going to say, anyway? I got beat up, I’m not at home, I’m not sure where I am, actually. Some other guy was hauling beams in his place.
No job, maybe no apartment. Troubling thoughts, but somehow he didn’t feel troubled. He felt low and calm and warm. Because—why? Because there was nothing he could do. He was in the hands of a dead man, a murderer, a vampire who’d bitten him once already. And the thing was, he was mostly okay with that.
He thought about the guy whose legs Spike had broken. It couldn’t have been a quick death. It must have been long and slow and terrible.
Before the chip went in, Spike had done that to hundreds of people—given them long, slow, terrible deaths. Or just ripped their throats out, if he was hungry and they were handy. If the chip hadn't gone in, he probably would have killed Xander by now. He’d had a few tries at all of them, back in the day.
He knew it was true—it was just flat and plain and true, like Spike saying he was lucky without any hint of threat—but it was still hard to believe. He closed his eyes and thought about how Spike’s mouth had tasted, how he’d run his hand through Xander’s hair and kissed his jaw. That was—weird. He felt flushed, and suddenly the bedside lamp seemed too bright in his face. He reached out and clicked it off.
Was he losing his mind? He was content to lie here, fall back to sleep and wait for Spike to reappear. He’d reviewed the ruins of his life and found it didn’t really bother him. What he wanted wasn’t in that crappy little apartment anyway. What he wanted was to wake up and see Spike’s back, be able to reach over and touch it.
He was losing his mind.
He tucked his hand between his knees and fell asleep without a qualm.
He woke up and saw Spike’s back, and life seemed pretty okay.
Spike was sitting on the edge of the bed taking his boots off. There was faint grey light in the curtain cracks—barely morning.
Xander reached out and touched Spike’s back, felt the points of his spine through his shirt.
“Hey,” he said.
Spike didn’t say anything. Xander’s finger came away dark and wet.
“What—” he said, and Spike turned halfway. His face was torn. There was blood on his forehead and in his hair.
Xander’s heart leapt and he jerked upright. Spike’s shirt was soaked in blood. There was blood on the sheets where he’d put his hands.
“What’s going on?” Xander whispered.
Spike turned away. Slowly, he ran his hand through his hair. Two of his fingers were broken.
“Oh fuck,” Xander said.
Spike made a small noise, and his shoulders started to shake.
“Spike—” Xander started, then stopped. Was Spike crying? The thought transfixed him and he couldn’t move. Spike wiped his face and flicked blood onto the floor. He was crying. Spike was crying.
Xander thought he should put his hand out, touch Spike’s shoulder, say something—but he was frozen, and all he wanted to do was get away. He felt sick and terrified and betrayed. Spike didn’t cry. Of everyone he knew, Spike didn’t cry.
“It’s okay,” Xander said woodenly, without emotion. The words came out as though someone else had spoken them. He was holding his knees to his chest, staring at the bloody prints on the sheets. Spike looked at his hands and tried to straighten one of the snapped fingers.
“Don’t do that—” Xander whispered.
A brown dog came out of the darkness and sat between Spike’s legs. He stroked its head with shaking hands, leaving black streaks of blood in its coat. It licked his palm. Its eyes were dark and sad. It laid its head on his knee and he leaned slowly down and buried his face in its neck.
The dog filled Xander with dread.
He’d seen the dog before. Its eyes were familiar, and when it turned its gaze on him over Spike’s shoulder, he flinched. The hair on the back of his neck stood up
The dog was something terrible. It made something terrible happen.
“Spike—” He reached out to take his arm and pull him away, but there was a bang down in the garage and they all looked at the door. It was standing open. There was a moment of pure silence while they all sat frozen, staring at the darkness beyond.
Footsteps started up the stairs.
Xander grabbed Spike’s shoulder and pulled, and at the same moment the dog spun and ran out of the loft, through the open door. Its footsteps went down the stairs at a run, then stopped. There was silence.
“Spike,” Xander whispered. “Spike, come on. We have to get out of here.”
Blood was running from Spike’s nose, and from the corners of his mouth. He fell back onto the bed and looked up at Xander dazedly.
“Wha—?”
“We have to get out,” Xander whispered. “Come on, now.” He yanked Spike’s shoulder, but he couldn’t move him. “Spike, get up. We have to—”
Spike raised a hand weakly to his face and started to sit up, then fell back. The sheets under him were red and wet.
“Spike—” Xander pulled at his shoulders, got him halfway up and realized there was no way. His own legs were fucked, there was no way he could take Spike’s weight. “Spike, you have to get up. Get up, we have to go right now.”
Spike looked up at him with blood-filmed eyes. Christ, there was blood in his eyes. Xander wiped them with the sheet and Spike gave him a cockeyed smile.
“Come on,” Xander said. He used both hands to pull Spike upright, and his right shoulder screamed. He ignored it. “Is there another way out?”
Spike’s head lolled and he blinked. “Back,” he said loosely.
“Okay,” Xander said. “We’re going out the back.” He grabbed Spike’s arm and slung it around his neck, held onto Spike’s wrist with his right hand even though the pain in his shoulder sent stars across his vision. He wrapped his left arm around Spike’s waist and got ready to either lift or fall on his face.
The dog screamed.
It gave one sharp, piercing yelp, almost like a child’s, then went silent. Xander froze.
The door was still wide open. He was such an idiot, such a fucking idiot. He should have closed it—he could have made it there in time if he’d gone right away. Maybe he could still do it. If he went right now.
Everything seemed to happen very slowly.
He let go of Spike and pushed off the bed, wavered for a second on senseless legs, then half-fell forward and started for the door. The footsteps were coming up the stairs again. Too close, they were too close, and he was too slow. He wasn’t going to make it.
He stumbled forward with Spike’s blood on his arms and face, hardly feeling the pain in his legs, thinking idiot, fucking idiot—and he was almost there, a foot away from the open door, and Bony Nose came around the doorjamb and smiled in his face.
He reared back in terror and fell. Bony Nose stared down at him. His expression was amused and repulsed.
“Sweet mother Mary,” Bony said, leaning against the doorframe. “You are one slow study, my friend.”
This was it, this was what the dog brought. Xander pulled himself backward across the floor, unable to look away from Bony Nose’s hands. They would go behind him, disappear and then come back, and when they came back they’d be full of death.
Fucking idiot.
He should have closed the door when he had the chance.
“Where you going, little guy?” Bony’s hands went back, and Xander closed his eyes for a second. He felt his shoulder touch Spike’s leg.
“Spike—”
Spike gave a low growl, and Xander looked up to see him sitting up, facing Bony Nose in full game face. He was wearing a mask of gore, and his eyes were bright and fierce and full of hatred. His lips skinned back, and dark blood ran down his chin. One of his fangs was broken.
“Spike, no—” He turned back just in time to see Bony Nose sneer and point the gun at Spike’s head.
“Smile,” he said, and pulled the trigger.
The sound was like ice on a lake, cracking.
Spike flipped back onto the bed. His foot kicked Xander’s elbow, then lay still.
“Okay,” Bony Nose said. He walked forward and crouched in front of Xander. “This is getting pretty old for both of us. There’s a message you need to deliver. You need to tell him something.”
Xander stared at the gun in Bony Nose’s hand. He could smell cordite. That was what a gun smelled like, after it had been fired.
Fingers snapped an inch from his eyes. “Come on,” Bony Nose said. “Don’t crap out on me now.”
Blood was soaking down the sheet on either side of Xander. It was cool against his back.
“What’s the message?” Bony Nose asked, as if quizzing a child.
Xander stared at the gun. After a moment he realized he was supposed to answer, and shook his head.
“I don’t know,” he whispered.
“You do know,” Bony Nose said. “You know.” He waited, and Xander didn’t say anything. Bony Nose sighed. “Do I have to give it to you again?”
He nodded dumbly, just because it was a question.
Bony Nose shifted, let the gun dangle, and shook his head. “I don’t know, I think you’re going to blow a gasket pretty soon.”
Xander shook his head, because it seemed required.
Bony Nose took a deep breath, then put a palm against his chest and pushed him back against the bed. Xander’s head came up and he found Bony Nose staring into his face, his eyes clear and piercing.
“Okay,” Bony Nose said. “Here it is, one last time. See if you can make it stick.”
He lifted the gun and pressed the muzzle to Xander’s forehead. Xander closed his eyes. He felt a tear go down his cheek, and bit his tongue.
“Tell Spike it’s about the dog,” Bony Nose said. “The dog, Xander. He can’t keep a dog in this city, it’s not allowed. Can you remember to tell him that?”
Xander opened his eyes and looked at Bony Nose with confusion. It made no sense.
“It’s not his dog,” he said, and Bony Nose smiled.
“Sure it is,” he said. “Now let’s see if we can do this right, okay?”
Xander caught the movement in Bony’s forearm and shut his eyes tight, tight, for the thunderclap.
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