Title: First Breath
Author: Christine
Email: Xanderette43@hotmail.com
Distribution: My site, Lil’ Nibblin, Railroad Spikes and Runrises, Tremble, Original, Aurora Borealis... anywhere else, just let me know.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Spike, Dawn or any other Buffy character... Joss owns em.
Feedback: Pretty please with sugar on top?
Rating: PG-13.... will become R later on.
Couple: Spike/Dawn
Author's Notes: Post ‘The Gift’.... about 3 years from now.

Part Two


Dawn sat down next to Spike and lifted his head up off the ground and lightly stroked his cheek. She was afraid that he went into shock and wanted to keep him awake in case anything happened. The sun was rapidly approaching the horizon, and Dawn panicked before realizing that it no longer would harm Spike. She gently pulled his upper body into her lap and ran her hand through his bleached blonde hair. “Spike, Spike come on! Please, you’ve got to get up so I can get you inside to rest.” Her hands were shaking as she slowly stood up and tried pulling him to his feet, but he was too heavy for her, so she lifted his arms and slowly started walking the distance to his crypt, his feet dragging along the concrete.

When Dawn reached the door, she let go of Spike’s right arm to turn the doorknob. With the door opened, she lifted his body over the threshold and dragged it the rest of the way to his bed. She was just about to lift his legs onto the bed when Spike suddenly jumped up. He ran past her and curled up in the corner with his face in his hands. Dawn ran over to him and sat down next to him. “Spike what’s wrong?”

Spike looked up at her, his eyes welling up with unshed tears. His voice was barely audible. “I killed them, all of them...” A single tear escaped and fell onto his black jeans. “They’re all gone, I ripped their throats out, and I loved it.”

Dawn gently laid his head down to her lap and stroked his cheek. He held onto her other hand and gripped it tightly. “I remember them all... every single person I murdered. I always thought Angel was just a bloody loser the way he brooded all the time, but now I know why he’s like that... God I keep seeing them!”

He moved violently away from Dawn and leaned against the stone wall. Dawn remained silent, unsure of what to say. He continued on with his guilt-ridden memories.

“I remember my baby sister, Sarah... she always looked up to me, always thought highly of me when no one else did. She used to follow me around asking me to read my bloody awful poetry. She told me that she understood me, and that my poems were beautiful. She loved me unconditionally and I drained her dry without a drop of remorse.”

His face crumped and he let out an anguished sob. The tears flowed freely now, some drying on his distraught face, others staining his shirt. Dawn crawled over to him and put her arms around him, rocking his body back and forth in a soothing motion. “Shhhh, its ok, its ok, that’s all in the past now Spike, and you’re human now... everything is going to be all right, everything will be fine...”

He laid his head down on her shoulder and held on to her tightly. “Don’t leave me Dawn, please don’t leave me.”

Dawn’s eyes misted over as she listened to Spike cry. “I’m not going anywhere, Spike, I’m staying right here with you.”

She lightly rubbed his cheek in a circular pattern, trying to calm him down. His body slowly calmed down and his breathing became shallow. Dawn peered over his shoulder to look at his face and realized he was asleep. She leaned back against the wall and looked out the door to see the sun had risen and had illuminated the small, but well kept crypt.

She glanced down at Spike again and smiled faintly at the heartbeat that thumped loudly in the silence. She didn’t know how to deal with Spike’s newfound guilt, but she knew that there was a certain vampire who could help ease the pain. Dawn gave one last look at Spike’s sleeping form, and closed her own eyes as she drifted off to sleep.




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