This Temptous Rage 7/14 Series Incomplete
By Denna at dennaseer@hotmail.com
Rated NC-17 for rape, torture and language
Keywords: Buffy and Spike.what else could there be?
Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters. They belong to Joss Whedon
and Mutant Enemy. I am not making a profit off of this.
Spoilers: "The Wish" except Willow, Xander and Buffy weren't killed
Summary: The days pass by at HQ and Spike is running out of time

Chapter 7

July 7th, 1999 1:23 AM

Despite the late hour, there were people in the corridors, all high on
adrenaline after the fight. Giles entered the recreation room, the voice
coming out loud and heated. The air was thick and hazy with cigarette smoke
and there were twenty or so people there, half of his team, crowded around
the radio. He knew they would be listening.

They moved when he came in, their eyes intent, and Giles nodded to them
briefly.

"They blame us for this thing with the minefield," someone said.

Even though Giles was ready for these words, they still hit hard. He did
his best to sound calm and confident, and was satisfied with the result.

"You know they would. They're desperate for a scapegoat and we're just too
convenient a target."

"They can't even count their own men. They don't even know how many we
took, if any!"

"The hell we're going to give the slut back. Piece by piece, maybe."

Giles listened to them, smiling faintly. It was good like they were like
this, sure and enthusiastic. They couldn't afford to think about failure,
not if they wanted to keep on fighting.

Giles had come here more to find Oz than to check on his people's morals,
but he was not there unsurprisingly. Oz never liked crowds, preferring to be
alone. It was strange how even though the boy had everyone's respect, he
hardly had any friends.

That'll change Oz, Giles promised silently. After everything is over, I'll
take care of that. You'll have friends; you'll have life. Everything that a
boy your age should have.

"Sir." someone hailed him. "Do you think the Council will get in contact
with us?"

So far the contacts from the Watcher's Council were sheer ultimatums. Giles
smiled, touching the man's shoulder.

"What you think yourself, Jackson? It's a long way till then, but one day
it will happen."

A few more men entered the room loudly, discussing something excitedly.
There was a strange smell clinging to their bodies, the one that Giles
refused to admit feeling, even though it made his stomach lurch
involuntarily. He saw them notice him and stop, their eyes feverishly bright
but their voices dying away. He moved to the door, caught one of the
newcomers by the sleeve, and asked in a low voice:

"Have you seen Oz?"

He wanted the man to say no for some reason, maybe because he knew what the
answer would be.

"Yeah." There was a broad, nearly delirious smile on the man's face. "He's
with the vampire. I tell you, sir, it was a good idea to take her. Let one
of those bitches get a taste of their own medicine."

Giles jerked his hand back abruptly, letting the man go. It was what he'd
expected, wasn't it? He knew Oz, after all. But he also hoped Oz had enough
presence of mind to.not do anything too bad.

He rushed down the steps to the basement, the sound of his boots on the
steps loud and hasty, half in warning to those down there. Don't let them
get caught do anything that would make him angry. Only Oz was never afraid
of him.

The basement premises were chillier than the upper ones but also stuffier;
the ventilation in the building didn't work so well. And sand was
everywhere, covering the floor and crackling under his feet as he walked
along the corridor.

They didn't take his approach as warning and in the end it was even worse
than he expected. The smell assaulted his senses as he walked in, unbearable
in the tiny room. The men didn't seem to notice it however, which Giles
could explain, carried away as they were. Oz was perched on the side of the
table, his hands buried in the wide sleeves of his jacket. He must've been
the only one who had heard Giles approaching, and didn't react to it letting
the others know.

As if Giles could expect anything else from him.

He stopped at the doorway, glaring at the men. They noticed him finally,
one of them backing away from the vampire hastily. For the other it took him
a bit more time because he needed to disengage himself, and then rearrange
his clothes.

"Dammit.sir."

Idiots. Stupid idiots. Giles felt anger seize him at the sordidness of the
situation and at his obligation to deal with it. He leaned against the
doorjamb, feeling how the dank air of the room was suffocating him. Couldn't
they spare him from looking at their brutal entertainment?

"Sorry, sir.didn't see you." the men said breathlessly, zipping up their
pants.

"You may go." He prided himself on his level voice. They walked past him
out of the room and Giles felt this smell again, coming from them.
Arousal.blood and sweat. Was he too clean to understand it, as Oz always
scolded him, and too far from understanding to approve it?

Just three of them stayed now, he, Oz and the vampire. Oz shifted lightly
on the table, his thin figure seeming to consist just of hard angles and
lines. His eyes met Giles, unrepentant.

"You're crazy, aren't you?" He couldn't help saying that. Oz looked like he
expected Giles to lecture him, and what else could Giles do, anyway? "You
know we wanted her to testify. No one will believe she'll the truth and do
it willingly after what you've done. She's of no use to us anymore!"

"Vampires heal fast." Oz's mouth curved shortly, and then the boy jumped
down from the table, walking up to the prisoner. "But that's not the point.
She's of no use to us anyway."

The vampire's body was limp, suspended on her arms wrenched behind her
back, the flow of her hair brushing her bruised shoulders as her head
sagged. Her jacket was gone and her shirt was shredded, half deliberately,
half because of the beating, Giles realized. But her pants were lowered on
purpose, no doubt of that, downed to her chained ankles.

"No one will believe her all the same," Oz said, wrapping the vampire's red
hair around his palm and yanking the woman's head back.

The vampire must've been exhausted, barely conscious as she submitted to
Oz's gesture without struggle. Her blood-smeared face, raised to Giles, was
blank. Her eyelids fluttered over eyes full of pain and shock in black
pupils and green irises. For a moment, he suddenly recognized those eyes.
Maybe from a couple years ago.she appeared young, she could have been a
student that was killed during the first battle. When he was still a
Watcher.

"Society sucks, huh? The people are too damn scared of the vampires to even
see that truth anymore." Oz said, letting her hair go.

"It's all right," Giles found himself saying, denying that the note of
irony in Oz's voice hurt him, as if it was Giles who'd chosen to take this
particular vampire with them and was his fault. "We still have other means
to prove our case, other evidence."

Oz's light eyes looked at him with that strange expression that both
maddened him and put him in awe. As if between the two it was Giles who was
young and immature, and Oz who was adult and knowledgeable.

"What I want to say, Giles, is that you don't have to worry your little
British head about damage control. The vampire is worthless and she'd never
know much anyway. She was rather a dummy there.honorable Willow
Rosenburg.she told us everything she knew. It wasn't difficult to make her
talk. But we can't use her to testify so I don't see a reason why our people
shouldn't have some fun."

Why shouldn't they? Giles wondered about it. He hated vampires, and wanted
to see as many of them dead as possible. But of course there was that
vampire Spike. Saving the Slayer of all people, carrying a deadly vaccine
for another vampire, risking his life for another? And besides, he didn't
want it like this. To one of his captives. By his people. It was what
defined them as human, wasn't it? Kept them from crossing that line of
inhumanity he thought so much about.

But maybe it was just theorizing. Maybe he didn't understand. His people's
anger demanded more than just staking a few vampires during the attack. His
people wanted something more tangible, like the impact of their fist against
a pale, cold body, like hearing their enemy's voice crying out in pain,
begging them for mercy. Like this smell of blood that made Giles really sick
but probably excited others even more.

"You can stop worrying and drink yourself to sleep now, Giles," Oz added
coldly, defiantly. Giles didn't react to the insult. It was too deliberate
and he had more important things to say.

"You offered them all to participate in it, didn't you?"

Oz's face was tranquil, his figure so narrow and brittle as he stood there
with his arms wrapped around himself. The chained vampire's head dropped
again. Blood and other disgusting fluids kept rolling down over the
vampire's thighs and Giles looked away. The sight was too much for him.

"Only those who wanted to," Oz answered brightly. "Unsurprisingly, there
were quite a lot of them. But you didn't give an order forbidding it, did
you Ripper?"

It was true. He didn't.

"I thought it went without saying that you wouldn't.wouldn't abuse and rape
a prisoner."

That was the wrong thing to say, he knew it, and the payback was swift.
Oz's face changed, his lips spread into a bitterly sweet smile, his voice
sounding just too kind.

"Oh really? And I thought, on the contrary, it went without saying that a
prisoner always gets raped and abused. Stupid me! I must've misunderstood
something.in my time."

"Don't fool around, Oz!"

Giles bit his tongue to keep his voice from breaking, saying the words
through clenched teeth. Oz's light hazel eyes in the meager light of the
basement seethed with pain and anger.

"Fool around? I don't think there's anything to be called 'fooling around'
here! Besides, we didn't hurt her too much, did we? Vampires can bear more
than humans, it's well known. Twenty men are around something a human can
bear.even a boy."

Giles felt a splitting headache. How unfalteringly Oz could aim for his
soft spots. How well he knew where Giles' weak areas were.a hint or reminder
to spur his memory, to make pain flood his being. Giles wondered if
reminding him hurt Oz just as much it hurt him. Probably it did. Only the
boy never showed his pain.

"But if you feel so sorry for her." There was a deceptive mildness in Oz's
voice, mildness that Giles didn't believe but couldn't avoid being affected
by, ".if you think she should suffer for her and what her race did.well,
since we don't need her for testifying anyway, I don't see any problem with
releasing her. Release her, Rupert. Show the humanity you like to talk about
so much."

Oh God.there had been times when talking about humanity and the future were
not such a travesty to Oz. There had been times when they could talk.

Oz's glimmering eyes didn't leave him, a little half-smile tugging at the
corners of his mouth. Under this stare Giles reached for his stake. He knew
what Oz meant under release. He never misunderstood him. There was no other
way to let the vampire go. The handle lay in his hand almost smoothly and
habitually. He stepped towards the vampire and reached for her hair.

The long strands were soft and smooth, silky despite the sand in them.
Giles pulled on them, making the vampire raise her head. The bloodied face,
so unbearingly human, was tilted up to him now, her green eyes staring up at
him.

Willow Rosenburg. He suddenly knew who she was. She had gone to the high
school in Sunnydale at the beginning. She had spent most of her time in the
library studying and reading. She was shy so they didn't talk much. He never
got to know her. But he got to acknowledging her presence, helping her with
books and calling her by name. Oh God.At the Harvest she had been at the
Bronze. The poor girl; she had had no chance.

Giles raised the stake.

"Willow Rosenburg." The dark eyelashes fluttered as her eyes widened,
locked on the stake. Giles pressed the point to Willow's chest. The vampire
shivered minutely, letting Giles feel how she tried to withdraw
involuntarily. "You're to be executed for your crimes."

The words came out almost softly, and indeed he didn't need to raise his
voice, so close they stood. The vampire's eyes looked in his, blinking. The
girl didn't say a word, didn't ask what right Giles had to judge and execute
her.

Maybe she understood that killing her now would spare her from everything
that could've waited for her in here, Giles thought. From Oz's frenzied
revenge, from other's anger. For a moment Giles took his gaze away from the
vampire's face and glanced at the boy. Oz's face was an expressionless mask,
his long slanted eyes focused on Giles, unblinking. And even though his lips
didn't move, Giles felt as if he could hear Oz's hard voice in his mind:

#Release her. Yeah right, spare her. Give her an easy death.what had never
been given to me#

The right to judge and execute.did Giles really have it? The revenge is
mine.Oz could judge, others who suffered from vampires could judge. But him,
Giles?

He felt familiar despair flood him. The stake was pressed to Willow's
chest, her head immobile in Giles' grip and he could count the seconds
passing by his own heartbeats, by the blink of the vampire's green eyes. He
knew already he wouldn't kill her.

Giles hit with the handle. The sound of the vampire's broken jaw was
sickening, the impact reverberating through Giles' wrist. As the vampire's
head fell back, a trickle of red blood sliding from the corner of her mouth
under the scarlet net of hair, Giles stepped away and tucked the stake back.

He was at a loss for words for a few moments, not knowing how to explain
the cruelty or weakness of his decision, but as it turned out, words were
not necessary. Oz's eyes glowed, staring at him warmly, almost gently.

"Well done, Ripper."

Giles wanted to argue, to say that his choice didn't imply that Oz and the
others were allowed to continue their practices now, but it did imply and he
knew it, so he spared his breath.

Lightly and gracefully, Oz moved towards him with his shoulder almost
touching Giles'. The boy raised his eyes to his and smiled.

Before Oz could say anything, he walked out of the room, sand screeching
under his boots, with just one glance back. Oz had turned back into the
room, gathering some things off the table. The vampire's head was lowered,
her cropped hair obscuring her face again, as red blood soaked into the
ground below her feet.

~

Time was running away like sand through his fingers and all he could do was
just watch it desperately. But even despair lost its edge with the weakening
of his body. Nearly two weeks of fever had worn him out. Spike had never
felt so feeble and vulnerable before.

Surely, Jenny and Dr. Wilkinson tried to do their best, but little depended
on them. The only one who could change something for Spike was Giles but day
after day passed with him saying the same thing. It wasn't safe to leave
their HQ yet, they had to wait. He knew Giles didn't lie, the man knew how
important the vaccine was, said he would do everything for it to be
delivered as long as it could be brought into allies' hands. Spike believed
him. It was just fate that turned this way. Damn bloody luck.

Spike knew Buffy had recorded her testimony and it was sent to whomever
Giles sent his messages, The Council, the government, the Mafia, who knew?
He never knew what Buffy had said there. On that morning, the girl had been
so nervous she couldn't even put the buttonholes through the buttons of her
shirt.

"You want me to go with you, pet?" Spike asked, almost unexpectedly for
himself. There was no reason why Buffy would want him there, and nothing
threatened the girl.and when did he become Buffy's self-appointed guardian
anyway?

Buffy made a small gasp, looking at Spike with this weird expression of
mixed guilt and hope in her incredibly expressive eyes, then shook her head.

"It's 'kay. I'd better do it.on my own."

Spike just nodded. He really didn't want to be there. For some reason the
thought of Buffy's childish voice recounting everything that had been done
to her made him feel ill. Of course, the past was there.wasn't going to go
anywhere.

Spike didn't know how many others among Giles' people had heard Buffy's
statement, and talked to Giles as soon as he could.

"Order your people to stay away from her, mate. I don't want any of your
loony fanatics try to.force her. No one can touch her, unless she wants to,
all right?"

"I'll spread the word," Giles answered seriously. "She is safe with my men.
They'd never do her any harm."

Spike had wanted to ask about Willow then and to find out what had happened
to the vampire, but he never managed to make himself say her name. He never,
never wanted to hear about Willow Rosenburg again. He never even wanted to
think about her ever again.

He and Buffy were given a place at the infirmary, those two beds where they
had spent the first night. The big room was generally empty too, so they had
it all to themselves. And while Buffy used to wander around the building,
Spike seldom walked out, mainly because he wasn't so sure of his strength
anymore. It'd happened once that his legs gave up somewhere on the way and
on of Giles' men had to carry him back to the bed. Spike didn't want it to
happen again.

His world seemed diminished this way, to faintly waving nets all around him,
to Jenny and Giles' visits, and to Buffy's presence that Spike didn't know
if he wanted or needed. To himself, Spike explained it with Buffy's own
words she remembered from their time in prison. When Buffy had said she had
wanted to be near to Spike because it was for such a short time, because
soon Spike would be gone from her.

Maybe, it was just that. He would be gone soon. Whether he would leave to
deliver the vaccine, or whether it'd be departure to death, it was just a
matter of days either way. Soon they'd part and Spike would never see her
again. He wondered if the aching feeling he had when he thought about it was
regret. Regret of not seeing again the pale tender face, its features so
fragile and its mournful eyes so much older than she. Of not hearing that
lilting voice asking another one of those annoying questions.

"Why did you get up? Didn't Jenny tell you stay in bed? Now you're going to
fall!"

Or.

"You want some cake? It's soft."

"I can chew, you bint. I can't swallow," Spike answered angrily.

There was always some kind of cake or cookies Buffy was gnawing at. The cook
apparently had a soft spot for her. Maybe a lot of insurrectionists did.
Maybe she reminded them of their sisters or brothers. Or girlfriends. She
was, after all, quite an attractive young woman. And he realized he had
begun to notice that more and more often as the days passed.

A part of Spike's mind was glad to know that Buffy was safe and well liked
here. But part of him tinged with a confused emotion he couldn't find a name
for until one day he realized it was jealousy. It was unfamiliar and absurd.
What kind of jealousy could he feel about the girl who was nothing to him,
about his sworn enemy and maybe even a light snack? He had other things to
worry about, much more important things than whom Buffy's body and mind
might belong.

But nights were the most difficult times to direct his thoughts the right
way. And it was at night when in fever Drusilla's face appeared in front of
him and Spike felt more guilty and desperate that he hadn't done anything
yet, that there was a chance he wouldn't be able to do anything.

Spike had already decided that if he couldn't deliver the vaccine and
failed, he wouldn't have it removed to stay alive, as Jenny offered him to
do. He didn't need to exist like that, in shame and failure. It nearly
enraged Jenny.

"What did I say? A fanatic!"

"You're not even supposed to know about this," Spike said weakly. "And I'm
bloody well sure the Captain didn't let you in on the news."

Well, Jenny obviously knew everything now, and Buffy knew as well. Spike
just declined every attempt the girl made to talk about it. He didn't need
Buffy to feel sorry for him. He didn't deserve pity if he was to fail.and
he'd have his award when he returned to his normal life. Without Drusilla.
Without Buffy.

At night Spike lay listening to the jingle of springs in Buffy's bed as the
girl tossed and turned unceasingly. For someone so light, Buffy certainly
made an awful lot of noise in her sleep. As if fighting someone.so close yet
not close enough.

The truth was sometimes Spike missed the necessity of their forced intimacy,
like in the prison cell, when they went asleep with their limbs entwined and
feeling her breath on his skin. It wasn't cold at the infirmary, so there
was no reason for them to get close. There was just Buffy's usual
forwardness as she sometimes flopped onto Spike's bed. Or a reached hand in
the darkness catching his hand as Buffy babbled sleepily of some places she
had seen and things she had done.

And when one morning Spike found Buffy sleeping in his bed, curled on the
blanket, he tried not to think about the joy that fluttered inside him. He
turned, spooning against the girl, and pretended to sleep.

~

July 14th, 8:42 PM

"It's going to storm tonight," Jenny said as she dropped two respiratory
masks on their beds. "Put them on when it starts."

"Of all places to concoct your heroic plans, why the bloody Sahara?" Spike
raised his eyes from a boring doctor's book. Whether he was going to die in
a few days or not, he didn't think he had to waste his time and not learn
something useful.

"Because it's too damn miserable to invade," Jenny shrugged. "See all this
sand on the floor? When the Mother of all Sandstorms comes, it'll all fly up
and get in the air. You'll cough it out later with pieces of your lungs.
Whether you breathe or not."

Jenny was exaggerating, as usual.

"If you get scared, just head on by to my office," she winked before
leaving.

"Scared?" Buffy drawled. "She should know we've been through worse things
than a little sandstorm."

Her small tongue was tucked between her teeth as she colored her drawing.
Someone had given Buffy a pad of paper and fountain pens a couple days ago.
Now she almost was always drawing. Unfamiliar landscapes with strange,
mournful animals on them, animals with nearly human eyes. Horses, deer,
predators, joined in some strange dance of courting and hunting. Buffy's
drawings surprised Spike, now with their style that was neat but naïve, but
with the feeling of maturity that came from them, absence of explicit
violence mixed with constant threat.

"Don't you draw people?" Spike had asked her once.

"I don't draw people," the girl shook her fair head. She didn't draw wolves
as well, Spike thought and he had bit his tongue so as not to say something
tactless.

"I made something for you." Buffy had suddenly sat on her heels; with the
solid agility that only a Slayer could possess. Even though I doubt she even
took that into account. A piece of ripped paper was pressed to her chest. "I
mean if you want it, of course."

"For me, pet?"

"Yeah. I drew if for you. But if you don't want it, it's okay." The girl's
voice was getting agitated, that little defense she had gotten used to
placing in her voice. Maybe, she didn't even get it from the prison. Maybe
she got it from years and years of fighting demons alone and never showing
herself to anyone. No wonder she denied her birthright. It didn't take a
genius to get that she would never accept Slayer duty again.

"Sure I want it, love."

"Okay then." The tension was gone from Buffy's voice. She folded the paper
and handed it to Spike. "No, don't look yet. It's." she said with an effort
and Spike looked at her in surprise. Buffy had never tried to explain her
drawings before. "Its of you."

She suddenly blushed, biting her lip savagely, his expression becoming one
of such misery and loneliness. Spike felt a pang of regret for the
disappearance of Buffy's open nature. It felt as if the girl were building a
barrier around herself.

And at the next moment the first crash of thunder came.

The lights above their heads flickered and dimmed visibly, but even like
that they could see the little grains of sand from the floor rise slowly and
hang about the air in spirals. Spike could see the fair hairs on Buffy's
arms rise with electricity.

"Don't breathe!" In a moment Buffy was over him, placing the mask over
Spike's nose and mouth. Satisfied, she put on her own mask, looking over at
Spike with mysterious, glimmering eyes over the edge of the respirator. The
sand was swaying in the air slowly, gathering in long strip like strange,
airy cobras dancing on their tails.

"Cool." Buffy's voice was muffled but still understandable.

It was pretty cool; he had to admit to himself. Spike nodded quietly. Jenny
had said nothing about covering their eyes; maybe because she didn't need to
bother with it herself but it was mostly likely that looking wouldn't be
healthy either. Spike started to feel his eyes sting. And then, in one more
rumble of thunder, the room was thrown into dark as the lights went out.

They usually didn't leave the lights on in the infirmary at night, but
there usually was light coming in from the next room and Spike knew Buffy
somehow liked it. She probably had been used to sleeping with as little
light as possible in the prison. Now the darkness was complete, apparently
the light in the whole building was gone.

Crashing thunder gave way to silence, and Spike strained his eyes to at
least see something. He vaguely could see Buffy's figure near him. But even
with his honed night vision could he barely see anything. The rumble came
again, this time closer, and Spike felt sand lash against his cheek.

"Buff?"

"Uh huh?"

The voice was breathless and came not quite from where Spike expected it.
It strangely disturbed him, not to be sure where Buffy was. As if there was
something important in knowing it, as if the girl was threatened somehow and
he could protect her. He reached his hand forward blindly, and met a small
cold palm in the air. He clasped Buffy's fingers and pulled slightly.

"Come here, pet."

The girl moved immediately and eagerly, Spike's bed sagging under their
joint weight. A moment later Buffy's thin, bony shoulder pressed to his. For
a moment, the unexplainable pleasure of this touch was so strong that Spike
felt overwhelmed and uncaring of anything else but the warmth spreading
inside him. Buffy fidgeted and settled more comfortably.

"Close your eyes," Spike said.

"Why?" Buffy's voice was small and mesmerized.

"I dunno. It'll hurt your eyes."

"How do you know?"

"Bleedin' common sense, chit."

"You.you don't have #bleedin'# common sense, Spike," Buffy giggled
suddenly. It was a nervous giggle, not an easy one. Spike caught himself
being concerned for the girl again.

"What's all this about, then?" He made his voice sound carefully level.

"It's a fact. Everyone says it. Jenny says it."

"Jenny is a stupid bint. So, you listen to her?"

"Why not?" The laughter was gone abruptly, as it always did with Buffy and
exchanged with seriousness. Suddenly Spike knew what Buffy would say next
and didn't want to hear it. "Spike."

"This is one crazed sandstorm. You'd think they would have this place well
kept up to this sort of thing."

"Spike." The insistence in Buffy's voice was so strong, and so akin to a
Slayer's, the Spike stopped. "You don't need to die, you know. Even if
there's no way out of here by then."

"Sod off."

"There has to be another way."

"Sod off!"

He couldn't bear it anymore. In his anxiety to keep Buffy silent he reached
blindly, finding Buffy's face and feeling her smooth cheek and sandy gauze
of the mask. He felt Buffy back away from him slightly.

"What are you doing?"

"Checking to see if you actually listened to me and kept your eyes closed."

"You." The little frown between Buffy's eyebrows fluttered against his
fingers. "Why do I have to listen to you? Did #you# close your eyes?"

A narrow sand-covered palm groped his face and Spike pushed it away.

"You stubborn bint," Spike muttered.

"Not any more stubborn than you."

"No."

"Yes."

"No!"

It was ridiculous. In a moment it got even more ridiculous. Buffy pushed
him suddenly, turning him down on the bed. Spike wrestled blindly, not
knowing what he was trying to achieve. To push the girl away or pull her
closer. Buffy was over him, pressing him down to the bed. Spike didn't know
if he could wrestle her away even if he wanted to. Buffy's body was along
his, just thin clothes separating them. Spike could feel every bone and
muscle in her thin form and how Buffy's chest fluttered against his. He
writhed, catching Buffy's wrists and holding them. Their faces nearly
touched, mask against mask, but even through them Spike fancied he could
feel Buffy's breath.

It felt so good. So good that Spike's head felt light and swimming as Buffy
leaned over him, silent in the dark.

What are you doing to me, he wanted to ask. What am I doing to myself? But
he couldn't. His thoughts lost their coherence; his body lost its strength.

"Spike!" Suddenly Buffy's hands slipped out of his slackened grip and
touched his face insistently and carefully. "Spike, are you okay?"

Yes, he tried to say but only shivered violently. Buffy was off of him at
once, the girl's arms hugging him, raising him into a sitting position.

"Spike, do you feel all right?" The girl's voice was plaintive and begging.
"I didn't hurt you, did I?"

"No, you dumb bint," he said finally, leaning against Buffy's shoulder and
deciding that he shouldn't open his eyes anymore. He would just sit like
this and wait for the storm to pass.

Than that gave way to darkness.