The Last Cut is the Deepest

Chapter Seven

"I dunno," Spike said to Buffy, "I feel like crap now, sure. But at least I can actually *taste* the brews and onion rings. And I figure, once I'm stronger, I can start training. No reason why 120 years of experience ought to go down the drain just because I don't have superpowers anymore."

"I don't see why not," she agreed without enthusiasm. "You know all the technical aspects of fighting. You just need to learn to use them with normal strength. Giles and Xander will help. We all will."

It was impossible for Spike - Now "William Haverton", according to his shiny new identity - to miss how present Buffy wasn't. The entire afternoon had gone like this... small talk punctuated by some awkward quiet, followed by a bit of staring into space, and then some unhappy silence for spice.

"Don't worry, Pet," he assured her. "Fuzzy-Wuzzy's got the attention span of a gnat on crystal meth. He'll get over it."

Her gaze remained locked on the vista of the sparkling LA skyline, but seemed farther away than that as she replied, "I don't know. We never really talked about..." she faced him once more. "You and me."

Spike snorted. "Yeah? Well, that makes three of us, then doesn't it? Not that it's any of his damn business anyway."

"It *is* his business, Spike. All of this is. He is right that we don't know why you're back, or who brought you." She added, more to herself than anything, "Or why now?"

The ex-vampire glowered at her. "What, you're the only one who gets to return from the dead more than once without a note from the Almighty?"

She gave him a look. "Don't be stupid. But... there were consequences to both times I came back. As... you probably remember."

He tensed, recalling that year he and Buffy spent as... what? Lovers? Not hardly. Fuck buddies? Didn't quite fit, so far as the `buddies' part went. Well, whatever it was, for all the rocking sex and entertaining head games, it had still been the pinnacle of suck, overall.

Look where it had ultimately got him. Soddin' human.

"Whatever. The fact is, consequences or not, I'm here, and all of us are just gonna have to deal with it."

"It's how we deal with it that I'm worried about," she replied with a sigh.

Spike was hesitant to come any closer to her - he'd been holding his own emotions over all of this at bay with what felt like a wall of Saran Wrap. But her obvious pain drew him as it always had, and he figured he owed her some small measure of comfort for sticking by him at the cost of her relationship with Meathead. He rose and came to sit beside her on the loveseat, glad for the first time that he could hardly smell anymore. Buffy's scent had driven him crazy since the first time he caught it, hunting her in the Bronze a million years ago, and that was one more thing he just wouldn't be able to deal with right now.

"I'll tell you what," he began, keeping his tone light. "When I'm a little less wobbly `round the edges, what's say I bugger out of the City of Angel, eh? Then all your problems would be solved."

Her head snapped up to stare at him. "And go where? Do what? You have no clue how to make it in the world as a human. Besides... if Angel and the Senior Partners want to find you, there's nowhere you can run. Their reach is pretty long. Like, interdimensional."

He shrugged. "I went up in flames last time, luv. There's not much I'm afraid of at this point."

"No. You need to stay here. At least until we find out what they have planned for you. I couldn't handle..." she glanced away, trailing off.

The softness, the disquiet in her voice crumbled his hard-built bravado. "You sure that's the only reason you want me to stay?"

It took her a moment to meet his gaze. "I owe you," she told him simply. "A lot."

He backed away. "Owe me? You... Have you gone completely box of rocks?"

"You were there for me when no one else was. You got a soul for me," she reminded him softly. "You died for me. So yes, I owe you."

Spike shoved himself off the couch and stomped across the living room, staring out the window for a few moments while he digested what she was saying... and found himself horrified. Ironic, considering that once, he would have cut off his... arm to hear her say those words.

He finally found the will to confront her. "I didn't die for you. I died because it was the right thing to do. And the rest? You don't owe me, because you never asked for any of it. In case *you've* forgotten, I spent the best part of five years trying to kill you and your mates. The only reason that changed is because I didn't have a *choice*! And at the *very* least, I'd damn well bet that trying to RAPE YOU pretty much erases any remaining debt, wouldn't you?"

"What did you just say?" came a dangerous hiss from the foyer.

Buffy whipped around to find Angel standing in the shadows of the entry hall, his face contorted with rage.

"A-Angel..." she stammered, and got up.

Spike stood tall and silent as his grandsire stalked toward him with death in his dark eyes. Not his fault the two of them lived in a damn soap opera... just his tough luck.

"I ASKED YOU WHAT THE HELL YOU JUST SAID!!!" the vampire roared.

"You heard what I said. Buffy didn't love me, so I got it into my head to force her to," he confessed, fully prepared to die for that alone.

Angel turned in nightmarish slow motion to face a stunned Buffy. "Is this true?"

She stared at him, aghast. "It's... it's not what you..."

"IS. IT. *TRUE*?!"

"I just said it was," Spike cut in, taking the steps back down into the living room.

"He didn't, though," Buffy insisted, "I stopped him."

"You..." Angel sputtered, "YOU STOPPED HIM??? He ATTACKED you, and because you happened to be stronger than he is, that makes it all right?"

"No, but..."
"Hey"Hey! Your problem's with me, Angelus, not her!"

Angel spun at the sound of his voice, and before anyone could react, he'd grabbed Spike by the throat and thrown him clear across the room. He crashed into the far wall, but never made it to the floor, as Angel was instantly upon him once more, in vamp face, pounding the peroxide blond into a bloody pulp.

Buffy sprinted to them and grabbed Angel by the back of the coat, but in the clutches of a berserker demon rage, she couldn't pull him off.

"STOP IT! YOU'RE KILLING HIM!" she screamed.

Angel shoved her away without pause and slammed Spike's head three times into the wall, leaving a dent in the wallpapered sheetrock. "I'LL KILL YOU!" He rammed him into the hole once more. "I'LL RIP YOU TO FUCKING SHREDS!!!"

"Yeah! Do it!" Spike shrieked through the blood in his mouth, hoping death would come a little more quickly, this time... and with less fire. Also that he wouldn't end up suffering the way he'd seen Angelus make so many of his victims suffer - like maybe getting skinned alive or having his wank chopped off and fed to him. "Go ahead! Snap my neck! Rip my head off!"

Another heave, and he was flying through the glass door in the entertainment center on the other side of the room. But before Angel could resume his attempt to beat the bastard to death, Buffy tackled him from behind, sending him slamming face down into the floor. Seeing nothing but his desperate need to kill, Angel automatically flipped over and drew back for a punch.

She dropped down onto his chest and pinned both his arms with her knees.

"STOP THIS! STOP! ANGEL! STOP!" she shouted at him, then her voice broke. "Please don't do this. Please..."

Angel morphed back to his human visage as her tears brought him slowly back to reality. He blinked at her, still half-blinded by the violence exploding in his blood. Afraid he might lose it and try to hit her, he pushed her off, and got to his feet, but didn't move either toward her or the still form crumpled on the floor nearby. Buffy hurried over to check Spike's pulse.

"He's not dead. His heart's still beating," Angel snarled. "Which it shouldn't be."

Buffy nailed him with a withering glare. "Just call the nurse."

He crossed his arms over his chest, but didn't move.

"Fine. I'll do it then," she snapped, and grabbed the phone.

~

While Buffy and the nurse tended to Spike in the bedroom (God, he could hardly think those three words together...) Angel called into the office.

"Mr. Angel's office. Michael speaking."

"Michael. I need you to go down to the archives and get everything we have on Spike," he commanded. "And I mean everything."

"But Sir, I can just call down..." his assistant began to remind him.

"No. Go down yourself. I don't want anything to `accidentally' be omitted. I want the entire file. Bring it to the apartment yourself. Don't use a courier."

"Of course, Sir. Right away."

He hung up and sank onto the couch just as the doorbell rang. For a moment, he was confused - even Michael wasn't that fast. He got up and took a glance at the security console in the foyer.

"Oh, great. Just what I needed," he grumbled, but opened the door.

Xander stepped inside, agape in the same fashion that he had been since he set foot in the building. "Man, this place is..." He got a good look at Angel, and his expression changed from awe to something closer to the neighborhood of stark terror. "You're... covered in blood. Hey! I thought making with the horizontal wasn't a danger thing anymore!"

Angel spun away from him and headed back to his brooding, ignoring the boy's implication. "Spike had a little accident," he explained, and collapsed back onto the couch, "With my fists."

"Ooh! And I missed it?" Xander lamented, "I've got to work on my city driving. What happened?"

Angel watched as Buffy's friend tossed his jacket on the nearest chair, helped himself to a soda from the bar's mini-fridge, and plopped down in the recliner. "Make yourself at home," he offered dryly.

"Thanks. So, did you kill him? Because that would save everybody a *lot* of trouble."

"I tried," the vampire informed him.

"Let me guess. Buffy wasn't cool with the idea?"

Angel shook his head.

"Yeah, that's sort of what I figured. She's always been big on the Spike-defense."

Angel sat up and nailed him with an accusing look. "Did you know what he did to her?"

Xander instinctively backed away from the demon's anger, immediately understanding his reference. "Uh...yeah. I sort of found her afterward."

The elder man grimaced. "Then why in the Hell is he still solid? You let him get away with trying to... to... rape her?" He forced the word out.

"Hey, pal! It wasn't my *choice*! There was other stuff going on at the time, and he split town right after! The next time he showed up, he was You Redux, and dusting was off the menu!"

"Because of Buffy," Angel completed his unspoken thought wearily. "That's the worst part about all of this. She thinks so little of herself that she let him get away with..." He scrubbed his hands over his face. "The whole thing makes me sick."

"Welcome to my world," Xander replied, popping open his soda and taking a long slug. It was nice not to be the focus of Angel's enmity for a change. "I was head guy in the `Stake the Bastard' Brigade, but I got outvoted. I can't believe she didn't tell you any of this."

"We don't talk about Spike," he confessed, "It's an unwritten rule I'm starting to regret."

"Well, fear not, my undead friend. The cavalry will be here tout de suite. We'll figure out what's going on, and then we can kick the bleached-blond-pain-in-our-asses to the nearest handy-dandy curb."

Angel's gaze hung on the dark hallway leading to the bedroom. "I have a feeling it's not going to be that simple."

~

If Spike had looked bad when he first came back, he looked ten times worse now. His face - and most of the rest of him - was a swollen mass of bruises and ccuts that rivaled the results of his run-in with Glory four years ago.

Buffy sat on the edge of the bed as Hello Nurse left.

"I'm sorry," she apologized softly, "He had no right."

Spike peered at her through the one eye that wasn't puffed completely shut. "He had every right. I would have done the same. Or worse. Problem, is, he wasted time with punching when he should have been snapping or ripping. I tried to tell him, but..."

"I can take care of myself," she reminded him. "And whether or not there's any grudge-holding should be up to me, no one else. Even Angel. No... especially Angel. He hasn't been part of my life in so long, I don't know where he gets off...""

Spike sat up, interrupting her rant before it really began. "He gets off because he loves you, and it rips him up inside to think of you getting hurt. Seems pretty clear to me. Not everyone forgives as easily as you do, you know."

"Spike..." she said, catching something in his inflection, "You don't blame yourself for that, do you?"

"Well, yeah," he snorted. "I know, you're going to give me the old `soul/no soul' lecture. But save it. It doesn't matter what I was then versus what I am now. It's all the same in my head. I just feel worse about it with a soul, that's all." Softening, he reached out and took her hand. "I never did tell you I was sorry. I know it's lame, but I should have said it anyway."

"Don't. It doesn't matter, now." She'd been through this before, with Angel. When he came back from Hell broken with guilt over the things he'd done when he was soulless. She never blamed either of them for the crimes perpetrated by their bodies when the demon was in full control. "It's of the past."

"Tell that to your pet Hellhound out there."

A ruckus echoed from the living room, heralded by familiar voices.

"Sounds like the gang's all here," Spike declared with a note of sarcasm, letting her go and easing himself stiffly from the bed. "Must be time for the Scooby Meeting. Can't wait to catch up with old mates."

She watched him painstakingly make his way out of the room, and worried that for some strange reason, seeing him in that condition because of what he tried to do to her gave her a twisted sense of closure.

Buffy never blamed ensouled Spike - consciously, at least - for attacking her, but Angel's action in her defense, however heinous, healed something far less rational inside of her. Something whose voice she'd never let speak before, in all the years since it happened.

And Buffy had to wonder: if that was true, what else hadn't she been hearing while she was sealed up in her denial bubble?

~