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Cause and Effect	By : Kiristeen Category: > Spike(William)/Xander > Spike(William)/Xander Views: 2905 -:- 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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Chapter Five
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The Magic box was unusually quiet, everyone staring at each other and nothing. Ever since Buffy's death, with the blatant exception of when they were actively hunting or researching evil, no one had been themselves. Dawn curled her knees to her chest and wrapped her arms around her legs. Her head knew why Buffy had done it, had known all along. It was her heart that still screamed, 'Why?'. Why did she have to lose everyone she cared about? It just wasn't fair!

She flipped a page in the book she was attempting to read, not entirely sure she shouldn't start over. She couldn't concentrate. The words on the page came into focus and she managed to skim a few lines before her thoughts took over again.

So she was 'The Key'. So what? She was also a girl, and right now she was a girl who would give just about anything to talk to someone who not only really cared, but understood as well. Oh, 'the gang' cared. She knew that. It was obvious. It just wasn't the same as Mom, or Buffy, or even Spike. To these people she was just a responsibility. **No,** she told herself. That wasn't true. They were friends. They stood by her and helped her as best they could. She knew that. It just wasn't enough.

They all called her Dawn. It was such a silly thing, really. Dawn was her name, after all. But all the people she'd been something more to were gone. To Mom, she'd been a daughter, not just Dawn. To Buffy, she'd been a little 'pain in the behind' sister. To Spike, she'd been Lil' Bit or Niblet. She almost laughed. If she *really* thought about the nicknames, they were actually kind of gross -- considering the source -- but she liked them. They told her he cared. He cared enough to give her names he didn't call anyone else. They were hers and hers alone.

She turned another page.

She closed her eyes tightly against the tears she could feel filling her eyes. She didn't want to cry anymore, but more than that, she didn't want anyone else to *see* her cry. she'd had enough of being treated . . . fragile. She wasn't fragile. She just needed someone who saw her as someone special.

Sitting bolt upright determinedly, she dropped her feet to the floor with an overly loud thud, slamming the book shut at the same time. Everyone jumped and turned to face her. "Where's Spike?" she demanded, and even to her it sounded petulant. It wasn't the first time she'd asked. It was almost a ritual now -- a weekly ritual. The first time she'd asked, Spike had only been missing -- or conspicuously absent -- for two weeks. He'd been gone, now, for nearly two months.

She watched, as if as one, all their eyes widened in surprise at her demanding question **Right, as if they shouldn't expect it by no Th Then she watched one and all blink in seeming confusion. Right on cue, the next expression was *sympathy* . . . pity. Well . . . *damn it* she thought rebelliously. She didn't want pity. She wanted an answer to her question, and this time she was bloody well going to get one, or she'd do something about it herself. "Well?" she prompted.

"We don't know," Willow replied gently.

Xander stepped closer to her, kneeling down by her chair -- for all the world as if she were a little child that needed nothing more than comfort -- "I know you don't want to hear it, Dawn, but he *is* a vampire. Soul or no soul, he probably just took off."

"No!" Dawn shouted, angrily jumping to her feet. "Something is wrong," she went on determinedly. "He's in trouble. I just know it!" **He promised!**

"Dawn," Tara began quietly, and Dawn spun around to face her.

**Not you too,** she thought despairingly.

"S-Spike knows how to take care of himself. He's been doing it a very long time. I-if, and I'm not saying there was, but if th-ere was trouble, he probably went to ground to avoid it. He'll be back when it's safe."

Dawn closed her eyes against their words. They weren't what she wanted, no, needed to hear. They still weren't rallying behind her. They weren't volunteering to search for her friend. Tears seeped through her tightly clenched eyes.

**If Buffy had asked, they'd have been scrambling over themselves to help,** she thought rebelliously.

Suddenly snapping her eyes open, Dawn stared defiantly at everyone. "Are you listening to yourselves?" she asked snottily. "We're talking about *Spike* here, not Anya!"

"Dawn!" Xander gasped, and Dawn almost felt sorry for him. Anya's leaving had been hard on Xander, especially since he'd asked her to marry him before she'd taken off for parts unknown. Her anger, however, washed away any feelings of sympathy, of kinship.

"Fine!" she snapped. "If none of you will help me, then I'll look for him on my own!" Twirling around, she raced out of the Magic Box, firmly ignoring their pleas for her to wait.

However, one thing did trouble her, and that was the puzzling look in Xander's eyes just as she'd fled. Was he starting to believe her? Hope surged inside her, very briefly. Maybe, just maybe, she was finally getting through to one of them.

"Dawn! I said wait," Xander shouted, grabbing her arm and bringing her to an abrupt halt.

She felt the insane urge to stomp her feet and throw the mother of all tantrums -- like the ones she hadn't thrown since she was six. She'd only made it half a block before he'd caught up with her.

"What?" She demanded angrily.

"It's not safe to be out here by yourself at night, Dawn."

"I know that," she snapped, jerking a stake out of her back pocket. "I've got protection," she continued, pulling out the cross she wore around her neck as well.

Xander sighed, his shoulders hunching forward as he slipped his hands into his front pockets. "You really think--"

"How old were you?'

"Huh? How old was I, when?"

Dawn flourished the stake, using it to gesture around them. "When you started helping Buffy?" she demanded.

Xander blinked, then frowned. "Older than you."

"So not the point, Xander," she replied.

Xander shook his head, but one corner of his mouth quirked upward in an involuntary smile. "Yeah, I know. There's always someone who thinks you're too young."

Dawn's mouth dropped open. **How does *he* know that?**

Xander's grin became a real one. "I'm not ancient. I *do* remember being your age, ya know."

"Yeah," Dawn quipped, "back in the day."

Chuckling, Xander purposely hunched over further, as if he couldn't stand up straight. "Yeah," he said in a shaking voice, "Back when I was a young whipper snapper, they invented a new-fangled thing called TV, ever hear of it?"

Dawn laughed, bopping Xander on the shoulder.

"Ouch! You're supposed to use that on vamps, not Xanders."

"Sorry," Dawn winced, quickly tucking the stake back into her pocket, "forgot I was holding it."

An uneasy silence descended between them, Dawn shuffling uncomfortably.

"So, you really think Spike ran into trouble, and didn't just skip?"

Dawn's eyes narrowed. Was that *relief* she heard in his voice? **Nah, can't be.** "What do you think?" she asked, instead of answering.

Xander sighed, dropping his gaze from her, and mumbling something under his breath.

"What?"

He sighed again, this time sounding completely put-upon. "I said, I think you're right. I don't think Spike just took off either." He frowned then, snapped his eyes back up to meet her astonished gaze. "But if you ever, ever repeat that to Spike, that I think he's . . . he's . . . trustworthy, not only will I deny it *vehemently*--"

"Yeah, yeah," Dawn interrupted, wryly. "Heard this before--" Her eyes narrowed mischievously. "--every time Spike admits he likes one of us."

"What?" Xander exclaimed. "When?"

Dawn almost giggled. It felt good. "You should have seen him when I told him I felt safe with him," she said, her laughter growing. Then, miming the act of lighting a cigarette, she showed Xander Spike's outraged reaction to her confession.

" 'Take that back!' he shouted." Dawn laughed again, delighting in Xander's continued snickers.

"So," she asked, "what are we gonna do about finding him?"

*****

Spike rested as well as he was able, leaning back against the hard stone wall. The room he was in, tiny, and dark, was far different from the one with the table and the IV. He'd long since been removed from that one; however, he'd been unable to keep track of exactly how long ago that had been. Back when he'd still been there, he'd kept as careful track of time and the passage of days as he could -- his innate ability to sense the dawn helping immensely. Even if he hadn't been able to keep watch on the hours, at least he'd been able to count the days.

Unfortunately, he could find no rhythm or system they used for when they drugged him, or brought him blood, and he'd long since lost track of how many sunrises had come and gone. He'd been too often drugged, or simply left alone and without food until he was nearly incoherent with hunger and loneliness. The fact of the matter was, he'd lost track before they'd let him out of that accursed room, but until they'd removed him, he'd stubbornly clung to the idea that he did know.

He could vaguely remember what he'd thought then, what he'd expected to happen -- and he'd been right about some of it. Unfortunately, Doctor's methods had far exceeded even his rich imagination. He shivered briefly, memory flashes of some of the worst episodes forcing their way to the front of his thoughts. He laughed, the sound utterly devoid of any humor whatsoever, and tinged with just a touch of hysteria. That seemed to be happening more and more. By the time he'd left that room his convictions of remaining unbroken until he escaped were failing. Strangely enough, however, they'd never taken him back to that specific room again.

Oh, he'd been to others though. Each room had a purpose, and the walk to each one filled with vivid images of what, exactly, was going to happen when the door closed behind him. Until he'd found himself the Doctor's unwilling guest, he'd assumed unending pain, or perhaps prolonged starvation were the worst things he could suffer. He'd been wrong. Those things were too basic, too easy. It took a lot of pain before it actually began to really get to him, there'd been enough of that here -- it was getting to him alright. There'd been days upon days of pain, wounds had been inflicted that in his depleted state had taken so many days to stop hurting that he'd begun to suspect they never would.

As soon as the pain from one session was almost completely healed, and he began to hope for at least one day completely free of pain, or barring that, even one hour free of it, his torturer would come back and the whole thing would begin again. In his more lucid moments, he had to acknowledge that it was ingenious. It was worthy of Angelus' more ambitious tortures.

And hunger! He'd been hungry for so long now that he didn't remember what it was like not to feel the hollow, ravenous, bone-deep ache that followed him even into sleep, affecting his dreams as much as it affected every waking moment.

He dreamed of bathing in a lake of blood. Rich, warm, human blood. When he dreamed, he could smell it. He could feel it, the thick, cloying, rich red liquid oozed over him as he swam through it. He breathed in its iron scent with every breath he took. He just couldn't drink it. Each time he tried, the moment the first blessed drop hit his tongue, agonizing pain lanced through him -- like a lightening bolt spitting him from the sky, effectively jolting him back to wakefulness.

He could survive all of that. He knew deep down inside his very being that he could. That alone wouldn't be enough to break him, no matter how long it continued. He steadfastly ignored the tiny little voice that told him he was deluding himself. He was a master vampire, pain and hunger were *not* enough to break him.

Hell, even the rapes he could handle. They pissed him off. They made him want to tear the offenders apart piece by piece -- starting with the cocks they were all so bloody proud of. Those, he'd make them eat! No, that wouldn't break him. He'd survived rape before, and when he got out of here -- yes *when* -- this probably wouldn't be the last time he survived it.

What *was* getting to him, however, were the constant surprises. He was used to being in control. He was a master vampire and even when he wasn't in complete control of the situation around him, when someone else held all the strings, he was used to being in control of himself. He was used to knowing exactly what was going on around him, of knowing who was coming long before they got close en to to interact with him. Here, these *humans* had figured out a way to mask themselves. He couldn't smell them coming. He couldn't hear them coming -- not their heart beats, not their footsteps, and, blinded three quarters of the time with a blindfold that kept him from seeing anything at all, he was constantly being startled when any single one of them approached him.

Some of them had even gotten so good they could silence the rustle of their clothing. Those two he didn't know were there until they touched him. It was . . . unnerving, and Spike wasn't so sure that given too much more it it wouldn't drive him completely insane. He'd been there once before -- just after he'd gotten his soul -- and he really didn't relish the idea of going back to the land of la-la again.

A polite cough from across the room caught his attention, and Spike couldn't stop the smallest pleasurable leap of feeling deep in his chest, nor could he prevent the sense of excitement that curled and tightened his gut. The only person who warned of his approach was Doctor -- and Doctor was the only one who brought blood. He brought it every time he came.

Spike's mouth began to water in anticipation, intense hunger shooting through him the instant the scent of blood hit his nostrils. He fought it all down. He wasn't stupid. He knew what was happening, and he hated it. He horded his hatred of this man, the man carrying blood to him. He gathered every shred of rage he held inside him, focusing it directly on this human who held all the controls in his life. He needed it to fight the conditioning. Still, despite the hate, despite all his efforts, he relished Doctor's approach.

He hated the man, Doctor, who brought him blood everyday -- not enough mind you, but blood all the same. Once or twice it had even been human. This man who had never personally hurt him, had never even been present when he'd been tortured or raped. Oh, he recognized exactly what was going on. It was a classic, if exotic, variation on good cop, bad cop. In his mind he knew this man, and only this man, was responsible for every pain, every degradation, every single humiliation he'd suffered in this place. The problem was, his heart was beginning to sidestep the logic, the facts.

To his heart, this wasn't who hurt him. This was someone who cared what happened to him. This was the man who made sure he didn't starve to death. No one else cared. As far as they were concerned one captive would be as good as another, he was sure.

**No!** Spike screamed silently. **Hate, hate, hate. He's the reason I'm here.**

"Hello, Vampire," Doctor greeted him jovially. "I've brought you a treat."

**My name is *SPIKE* you son of a bitch!** Spike thought vindictively, only barely preventing himself from saying it out loud. He needed the blood Doctor held in order to survive this ordeal.

The sound of ceramic being set gently against stone teased his hearing and Spike closed his eyes.

"I've turned the lights down for you, Vampire," Doctor offered gently as Spike felt the human's hands behind his head, removing his blindfold. "It's dim enough that I can barely see you," he teased quietly as he pulled away, his fingers brushing against the sides of Spike's face.

Very slowly, very carefully, Spike opened his eyes. It wasn't that he doubted Doctor's words about the light. No, it was the fact that even the smallest amount of light hurt now. He'd spent far too long in complete and utter darkness.

Without another word, Doctor lifted the mug from the floor, and with every seeming indication of gentile caring, held it and the straw steady while Spike forced himself to drink slowly. Never once removing his eyes from Doctor's, Spike glared malevolently at the human until the very last drop of blood was gone. He fed the hatred, and the rage, all the while he partook of Doctor's offering.
It was with a sinking sensation deep in his gut, however, that Spike came to the sudden realization that it was getting much harder to maintain his hatred. Just as it was getting more difficult to remember with any clarity what his life had been before this place. He didn't know how they were doing it, but that last bit scared him as much as anything else that had happened here. They were un-making him. He knew it, he just couldn't seem to stop it. Nothing he did, nothing he thought made any difference at all.

**NO!**

"Get out!" Spike screamed.

Doctor reared back, Surprise at Spike's angry outburst written across his face.

Spike narrowed his eyes, kicking his feet feebly toward the hated -- yes, hated -- enemy. "Get out! Get out! Get out!"

Doctor rose slowly, and with a deep sigh, his eyes reflecting hurt, he shook his head. "I'm sorry you feel that way, Vampire," he said softly, and left the room, never looking back.

Spike fought a sudden desire to apologize, to say anything to bring Doctor back. He reared back, hitting his head against the wall as a sharp, brief stab of guilt hit him squarely in the chest. He shook his head, completely ignoring the pain in his skull. **Guilt?** he thought, ruthlessly stamping out the horrid feeling, knowing it for the damnation it was. He was a vampire! He didn't *feel* guilt.

//Not even souled vampires?//

"No," Spike murmured, he couldn't afford that crippling feeling right now, soul or no soul. It was sorely misplaced here.

*****

"Well, that didn't go so well. I thought you said he was getting close."

Doctor Weisenburg turned and faced his inquisitor. "Actually, it's an excellent sign."

Laughter greeted his proclamation. "How do you figure that? He ordered you out, virtually screaming hatred at you."

"Well, brother dear, that was the reaction of someone panicking."

"Oh, really?"

"Yes, really," Weisenburg replied dryly. "He just realized he's losing the battle."

Watching as his brother raised a doubting eyebrow, Weisenburg turned to face the computer monitor. "The problem all along has been, just as our research indicated, he spent literal decades learning at the feet of a master torturer. He's known from the very beginning what was happening to him and what was going to happen. That's what's taken so long. That knowledge has given him an edge with which to resist our efforts.

"It *has* effected him, however, he's just masking it, out of misplaced pride and pure unadulterated stubborness. I give it less than month before he falls."

His brother chuckled. "How much would you care to wager on that?"

Weisenburg turned. "You think I'm wrong, John?"

"Oh, yes. I think you're wrong. I think it'll take longer."

"How much longer?"

"I give it almost two months."

Weisenburg frowned. "You really think it'll take that long -- with what we're putting him through?"

John nodded. "Yes, I do. That vamp in there," he said pointing toward the monitor, "is no stranger to suffering. It's given him a stubborn streak a mile wide. He'll resist until there's nothing left inside him to resist with."

"You're on!" Weisenburg said, smiling. He turned back to the monitor, glaring at rec recalcitrant vampire. It was time to turn up the heat. He was not going to lose this wager to John. This was *his* bailiwick. He knew what he was talking about. Vampire, Childe of the hated Angelus, would fold inside a month. He was going to pull out all the stops to make sure of it.

First off, Vampire must be punished for his outburst. Just because he understood why it happened, and rejoiced for the sign that it was, didn't mean he was going to let it pass uned. ed. "Marcus!"

He didn't turn as the big, burly man stalked into the room. "He's yours today."

"Good," Marcus replied, and even Weisenburg shivered. He didn't like Marcus, but the man was very useful in this endeavor. The man had his own axe to grind against vampires, and, he suspected, against this particular vampire. He didn't know what it was, he'd never asked. He didn't really need to know. The man got the job done, that was all he cared about.

He watched as Marcus flipped the lights in the Vampire's cell to full brightness, giving no warning whatsoever. He knew, that if Vampire's blindfold had been on, he wouldn't have given even that much warning. The first Vampire would have been aware of Marcus' presence would have been the first deceptively gentle caress across the cold flesh of his face.

TBC
Kiristeen
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Kiristeen@kiristeen.com
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Cause and Effect