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Blood and Fire	By : addielogan Category: -Buffy the Vampire Slayer > Het - Male/Female > Buffy/Spike(William) > Buffy/Spike(William) Views: 8173 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Buffy the Vampire Slayer (BtVS), nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
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Buffy was relieved when they made it to Los
Angeles without incident. A small part of her worried that this meant they'd
blown all their luck, but as the drove into the city, she found that she was
more relieved than anything else. Furthermore, there'd been no sign of Angelus,
even when they'd been near Sunnydale. Spike had continued to drink bagged
blood, and Buffy had made an effort to keep from fighting with him. The trip
was tense enough without adding yet another blow up to it.
Spike allowed her to roll down her window
and look out as they drove down the L.A. streets, and Buffy watched as the
scenery of the city that she had lived in for most of her life moved past them.
It was all so familiar, yet she felt no connection to anything, no sense of
relief just from being home. Los Angeles wasn't home to her, despite the fact
she'd grown up there, and Buffy realized with sadness that she really didn't
have a place that she could truly call home.
She didn't remember a time even when she
had.
Howard had tried. He'd kept them in
California instead of moving them to England because he thought it would be
easier for her that way. But their apartment had never seemed like more than
borrowed space, had never had the sense of warmth to it that Buffy associated
with the idea of home. Howard had cared about her, she
was sure, and she had cared about him, too, but there was always a sense she
got from him that when it came right down to it, she was an obligation. He took
care of her not because he'd wanted to raise a daughter, but because as Joyce's
Watcher, he felt as if caring for her child after her death was his duty.
It was nothing Buffy had ever held against
him. He'd given her the things she needed and had never been cruel to her. He
was an older man, a well-established bachelor, and she couldn't blame him for
not being overly thrilled by the idea of having a small child to raise on his
own. She was simply grateful that he had.
"This was your old neighborhood, wasn't
it, pet?"
Buffy turned sharply towards Spike, startled
that he had spoken. He'd been surprisingly silent for most of their car trips.
"It is. You remember that?"
"I set myself up near the Slayer, so I
was staying around here, too," Spike replied. "So yeah, I remember
where it was. I thought it would probably be a good place to start
looking."
"They found her not far from our
apartment, I think," Buffy said.
"Good place to start then. We should
probably wait until tomorrow, though. There's not enough hours of dark left to
really get anything accomplished."
"Yeah, okay. We'll head out tomorrow
right after dusk."
Spike glanced at her for a second. "I'll
head out."
Buffy's back grew straight. "Look, I
know you have this whole caveman 'gotta protect my mate' thing going on, but
she was my mother, Spike. I'm not just going to sit around and twiddle
my thumbs while you search for her killer alone."
"And I'm not asking you to, Buffy. But
for what I have planned for tomorrow night, it'll be a lot easier to do without
a human tagging along, since that'll raise more than a few questions. So unless
you're keen on either me turning you or you blowing any chance I have of
getting someone to talk, I suggest you let me do this part on my own."
"I don't like either of those
options," Buffy said, her arms crossed in front of her.
"Somehow, I'm not surprised by
that." Spike sighed. "Look, pet, I don't like the idea of going out
and leaving you alone like this either. Probably not for the same reasons you
don't, but it's still not something I'm overly thrilled about. So believe me
when I say that I want you to stay behind because it's the best way to do what
I need to do to try to turn up some leads."
"And what if you do find a lead, huh?
Am I supposed to just sit around and wait some more while you follow it?"
Spike's jaw ticked. For most of the trip to
L.A., Buffy had been, well, pleasant and agreeable, surprisingly. He should've
known that wasn't going to last�
"It depends on what sort of lead it is.
I might have to be on my own for a while."
"Won't me being your mate keep other
demons from questioning why I'm with you?" Buffy asked.
"No," Spike answered.
"That'll just make them question it more. A vampire running around town
with a human mate is not exactly something you see every day. And there's
probably more than a few vampires who wouldn't talk to me at all if they saw I
had a human mate. For other vamps, it means I'm tainted."
"You're tainted? With what?"
"Humanity. Most vamps don't have much
of it, and they don't like the ones that do," Spike explained. "I've
dealt with it since I was turned, used to try to fight it by being the biggest
and the baddest. No one could call me out for still feeling something if they
were afraid of me. But claiming you has killed that for me, so I'm going to
have to get respect enough from my kind to get them talking to me with
reputation and intimidation alone. And you, hanging around me with your big
green eyes and beating pulse, wouldn't help much in that."
"Oh." Buffy frowned hard as she
thought about what Spike had just said. "I'm not understanding the whole
'tainted with humanity' issue," she told him after a few moments.
Spike almost sighed, but managed to hold it
in. And why didn't that surprise him one bit? "Vampires, like humans, are
all different. The Watchers' Council likes to tell its girls that we're all the
same animal, just wearing human skin now. Like the person inside dies
completely and the demon is all that goes on. But if that really were the case,
then why would a vampire retain all the memories from being human? Seems to me
that if we were just demons, those wouldn't exactly stick around. Not a lot of use for memories of a human life if you're about
nothing but blood lust."
"So you're telling me you're the exact
same guy you were when you were human, just with fangs now?"
Buffy was surprised when Spike responded to
her question with a laugh. "Hardly. It's been over a century for me,
Buffy. Of course I've changed in that period of time. And yeah, becoming a
vampire does change you, too. You loose your soul, that's true. You're not
worrying about what's right and wrong anymore because it doesn't matter.
Vampires live outside of society, so social morals�not an issue. But the core
of who you are, that doesn't change. If you can love
deeply in life, then you can still love deeply in death." Spike turned
towards Buffy for a moment as he spoke the last bit, letting her know in no
uncertain terms what he meant.
Buffy chose not to respond directly to that.
Instead, she asked, "Then why is retaining humanity seen as a taint to
vampires? I mean, if what you're saying is true, then shouldn't most vampires
still have this?"
Spike laughed again. "Wow, you have
quite a high opinion of the human race, pet. You think all of you are kind and
full of love, deep down inside? Please. Most of you want to kill each other off
with souls. At least vampires have the need for blood as an
excuse."
"That isn't true," Buffy snapped.
"Most people don't want to kill each other."
"Ever been stuck in traffic?"
"You're just all�jaded and evil,"
Buffy said, throwing her hands up in frustration.
"Humans are just as capable of real
evil as any demon. Trust me. I've seen enough of it in my time."
"I'm not saying humans are perfect, and
I'm not saying they don't do bad things. But we're not like demons," Buffy
argued.
"You just keep telling yourself if it
makes you feel better. But I've seen a lot in my time, Buffy, and I've learned
a thing or two about the human psyche. Most of them are just waiting for an
opportunity to let their inner darkness loose. They're one slip of conscience
away from a killing spree. I bet if just about any human had the chance to kill
at least someone without ever getting punished for it, they would."
"No. Some would, but not all of
us."
"Didn't say all. Said most."
Buffy shook her head emphatically. "You
just think that because of what you are. But it isn't true. Vampires are the
way they are because they're demons, not because they've lost their conscience
and now they can be all kill-happy just like they've always wanted to be."
"You know what the first act of a
vampire often is? They go kill the people they most wanted to kill in life.
Hell, Angelus murdered his entire village. Conscience gone, rules of
society gone�you're free to act out on all those base impulses you've had to
keep locked up for years."
"Then what was your first act as a
vampire?"
Suddenly, Spike's entire demeanor changed.
He withdrew from her, his body going rigid. "That's none of your concern."
Buffy almost pushed it, almost demanded he
answer her question. But then she caught something rolling off of him in waves
through the claim. Pain. Whatever had happened, it had left a deep
emotional scar on him, one that Buffy was afraid to pick. Instead, she turned
back towards the window, hoping Spike would just let this conversation drop.
He did.

***
*** ***
Buffy rarely dreamt about her mother, but
that night she did. She supposed it had been the combined effect of returning
to Los Angeles and renewing her efforts to find Joyce's killer that had brought
the dreams into her mind.
At first, they'd been good. Happy memories
of her mother's smile, of how it felt when she held her. Warm, foggy memories
of the last time in her life when Buffy had thought she was safe and loved.
But then it had changed, the images playing
in her mind's eye suddenly dark and bloodied. When she awoke, her throat was
raw from screaming, her eyes hot with tears, and Spike had pulled her up and
gathered her in his arms, trying to soothe the terrors that were plaguing her
in her sleep.
She came fully awake, but she didn't say
anything, nor did she try to lie back down. Instead, she cried against him,
allowing his arms to be a haven.
When her tears finally slowed, and she
looked up at him, Spike wiped her face with his thumb. "What was it,
princess?"
"I dreamt about my mom," she told
him. "I don't remember it very well, just that it�wasn't good at the
end."
"Do you dream about her a lot?"
Buffy shook her head. "I used to. Well,
it comes in spurts, I guess. Sometimes I'll have several dreams about her, and
then sometimes I won't for months." Her eyes went away from his face
again. "I don't mind when they're good dreams. It's almost like getting to
see her again for a little bit."
Spike guided them back down to the bed,
Buffy's head resting at the crook of his neck as he stroked her hair
soothingly. "We'll find who did it, kitten. I won't let you down on
this."
"You're helping me. That's more than
anyone else has ever done." Buffy took a few slow, deep breaths, trying to
still the last of her tears. "I told Howard before he died that I wanted
to find who had killed my mother and get revenge, but he wouldn't even let me
talk about it. He said that was part of the past, and I needed to move on, that
that's the way my mother would want it, but I couldn't. I can't move on with
anything until I put that part of my past to rest. It's always been something
that's weighed on me. When I was four years old, my mother left and never came
home, and I want to know why."
Despite her best efforts to stop them, Buffy
felt tears coming to her eyes again, and she wrapped her arms tighter around
Spike. "She used to promise me every night before she'd go out that she'd
come home to me, that she'd be there in the morning to take care of me. I
didn't understand it as much when I was little, didn't know fully what she was
going out to do, but I knew it was serious, and I also knew that she meant it
when she said she'd come home. She told me that the last night, too. I need to
know what she faced that was so horrible she couldn't keep her promise to me
anymore."
"Joyce was a good fighter. One of the
best I'd ever seen," Spike told her. "I'd faced off against two
Slayers before her, but she was the only one that ever fought like she really
had something in this world she wanted to hold on to. She didn't take stupid
chances, didn't let herself slip. She meant to keep her promise, Buffy. I know
she did."
"She still seemed that way, even the
last night?" Buffy asked.
Spike nodded. "Yeah."
"Tell me. What was that fight like?
What happened?"
"There was this demon bloke, went by
the name of Ashmalare. He had some great evil plan to bring about the end of
the world, like the crazy ones tend to do, and this one involved the sacrifice
of a vampire gifted with second sight. Well, his psychic vamp of choice turned
out to be Drusilla, and he snagged her one night when we were out on a hunt. He
overpowered me then, and I knew I couldn't take him on my own. Normally, I
probably would've tried anyway, but I didn't want to take any chances where Dru
was concerned, so I decided I'd get some help. It seemed to me that if
Ashmalare had set up shop in L.A. that he had to be on Joyce's radar, too, so I
went to her. Convinced her we'd have a better chance of killing the blighter if
we went after him together."
"She just agreed?" Buffy asked.
"Weren't you two like mortal enemies?"
"Yeah, we were, but our battles tended
to end in a stalemate, and I think Joyce was ready to get rid of me. She
couldn't ever seem to kill me, but I was a threat as long as I was around. So
she made me agree to skip town and never come back after we finished off
Ashmalare."
"And that's what you did?"
"I did," Spike replied. "This
is the first time I've been in Los Angeles since that night. We stopped the
world from ending, and Joyce was bloody amazing. All I did was offer a little
distraction and take out some minions to cover her back, but she took Ashmalare
head on, like a woman who knew she was going to win. And she did.
Chopped him up into tiny pieces."
�"Then you took Drusilla and left?"
"Yes. She was more out of it than
usual, and I carried her to the car. Gave Joyce a nod to say good-bye, and that
was it. I drove off and didn't look back."
"Do you think maybe Ashmalare wasn't
dead?" Buffy asked. "Or maybe he still had some minions around that
could've killed her?"
"I doubt Joyce would've been taken down
by a minion, but it's possible. And I don't know about Ashmalare. He looked
pretty dead, and it's hard to heal from being chunks, but there are certain
kinds of demons that can. I don't know what kind he was beyond ugly
nutjob." Spike cleared his throat. "Why exactly did you think it was
me? Was it only because you'd seen me with her that night?"
"That's what the official Watchers'
Council report said," Buffy replied. "I found a copy after Howard
died, in his personal papers. It didn't go into detail, just gave the date and
place of death and under cause it had William the Bloody, vampire. There was a
small blurb about her being found with vampire marks on her neck and her blood
drained, and that you were the vampire she fought that night."
"Watchers didn't get their facts
straight then," Spike said. "But that's understandable since she
didn't have her Watcher with her that night. Hard to make a full report when
you don't see what happened."
"Yeah. Howard must've told them it was
you because you'd been at our apartment."
"It's a logical conclusion," Spike
conceded. "I would've thought the same thing, in his position."
Buffy nodded, then yawned. It was
information overload, too much when her mind wasn't awake enough to process it
all. All the pieces weren't seeming to fit together,
and she wasn't in the right state to start trying to make them fit. "I'm too tired to work on theories right now.
Tomorrow?"
Spike knew her well enough by now to know
when she'd shut down. "Of course, pet." He kissed the top of her
head. "Good night, Buffy. Love you."
Buffy snuggled against him, even as she
ignored his declaration of love as she'd taken to doing recently. It was easier
for her that way. "Good night."

***
*** ***
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