Blondie Bear
Zydrate Addict
I wrote this story for my Medieval Dream Visions class (we were required to write our own dream vision, conforming, as much as possible, to the structure of the medieval ones) and it was suggested to me that it was good enough to post here, so here you go.
This takes place during "Seeing Red" when Spike wrestles with himself (with a little help from Clem, who does not make an appearance in this story) about his attempted rape of Buffy.
What Spike Has Become
"What have I done?"
Spike stood in the middle of his crypt, head down, his hands clenched at his sides. Images of Buffy lying on the floor, sobbing and pleading with him not to do this, please, lanced through his brain like lightning. He rubbed at his chest with a flat hand, vaguely surprised, behind the horror at what he had almost done, that it didn't hurt. He felt like his heart should hurt. But it couldn't. It wasn't even beating. For the first time in decades, he was aware of just how empty it felt to have a not-beating heart.
"What have I become?"
He leaned against a sarcophagus, his hands snaking into his hair, pulling at it as if to yank the memory of his latest inhuman act out of his mind by the roots. He bent double at the waist, feeling as though he should be hyperventilating, somewhat confused that he wasn't. The world wavered around him, and though he slumped to the floor, he believed himself still standing, leaning against the sarcophagus.
"You are a demon." The familiar voice came out of the shadows at the edges of the crypt. "I saw to that."
"Come out." Spike didn't have the emotional energy to get worked up at Drusilla's unwelcome presence. "Stop skulking."
Dru moved out of the dark, her slim body clad in a tight red sheath dress, her black hair cascading down her back and shoulders. "I rescued you from a life of mediocrity," she continued. "Don't you remember?"
"I remember." Spike refused to look at her.
"Then why are you so desperately seeking mediocrity again?" Dru circled him slowly, just out of arm's reach. "You could be a person stories are told about. You could kill the Slayer."
"I've already killed two," Spike muttered.
"But this one," Dru persisted. "This one is famous. Killing this one would make you famous. But instead you hover around her, try to care for her, desire her." Dru frowned. "You try to tell yourself you can be with her, that you can be human. But you can't."
"Maybe I can." Spike drew in deep breaths, biologically unnecessary but good for calming his thoughts. "Maybe there's a way. Angel. . . ."
"Angel," Dru interrupted sharply, "is alone. If you pursue his path, you will lose her anyway. Just like he did." She closed the distance between them and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Let me show you. Let me remind you what having a soul did for you." Without waiting for an answer, she covered his eyes with one hand.
When she pulled it away, he blinked in the sudden blaze of light from dozens of candles. He beheld a nineteenth-century drawing room, one side crowded with people, the other holding only two, one male, one female, sitting on a small couch.
"I don't need to see this," Spike muttered. "I remember it intimately."
"Then you remember how pathetic you were," Drusilla said as the young woman on the couch stood and delivered her last cutting remark to the young man. Spike closed his eyes against the memory of her cool scorn. "How this remark sent you sniveling into the streets. To me."
"Of course I remember," Spike snapped.
"I am the one who made a man out of you," Dru reminded him. She covered his eyes again, and when she took her hand away, they stood in a burnt-out factory. Spike watched himself stumble down the stairs, bottle in hand, drunkenly calling for Drusilla, who, of course, did not appear. "You have never been anything but pathetic when you don't have me."
"I've never been anything but a monster when I do," Spike replied. He watched his drunken past self stagger around the factory, sobbing.
"Without me, you'd still be a lonely, simpering poet with a fixation on his mother," Drusilla snapped.
Spike managed a snort and a half-laugh. "Without you, I'd be dead, love," he said. "And the better for it. At least I would have kept my self respect. I might have died alone, but I'd have died a man. I'd never have hurt . . . her."
Drusilla stamped her foot, and they reappeared in the dark crypt. "Fine," she snarled. "Be just as pathetic as you want. I wash my hands of you."
She disappeared, fading into the blackness that surrounded him. Spike relaxed muscles he hadn't realized were tense, relieved that she was gone.
His relief, however, was short lived. Moments after Dru left, heavy steps announced the arrival of a large demon. Spike glanced up, then sighed and rolled his eyes. Demonoid, anyway.
"What d'you want?" he muttered.
"I have been sent to show you exactly what you have become." Adam's deep voice rolled through the crypt. "You asked. I am here to show you the results of your life."
Spike managed a wheezing laugh. "So, we're playing "˜This Is Your Life,' are we? I don't remember signing up."
Adam tilted his head slightly the way he did when something a mortal said didn't quite make sense to his logic center. "You asked," he repeated.
"Fine." Spike pushed off the sarcophagus. "Let's get this over with."
Adam didn't cover Spike's eyes, but in a blink, they stood in a crowded club"”the Bronze. Spike watched himself stalk the dance floor, his eyes riveted to one of the many writhing forms.
"She was cute back then," he observed.
"This is when it began," Adam said. "This is when she began to affect you."
"Yeah, I'd worked that one out for myself," Spike replied. "So what?"
"After this, you were never the same." Adam stood perfectly still, but his eyes glittered as he stared at the past version of the Slayer.
"Yeah, she's good for that." Spike snorted. "I already know I'm in love with the Slayer. What's your point?"
"You asked what you have become. I am showing you how you became what you have become so you can decide for yourself."
"Why?"
Adam glanced at him, then turned back to the dance floor. "You are at a turning point. Or so I'm told. What you choose to do now will affect the rest of your days. And other people's, of course."
"Well. No pressure, then." Spike watched the Slayer rush out the door. "So this is where I started becoming what I've become." He gave Adam a sideways look. "Any idea what that is?"
Adam laughed, the expression twisting his inhuman face into something somehow less sinister. "I can only tell you what I am told. And that is not much."
"Okay. So I didn't start becoming this horrible thing who can try to . . . hurt someone I love when I was turned into a vampire." Spike snorted. "That seems odd, don't you think?"
Adam merely shrugged.
"Fine." Spike waved a hand at the dance floor, which was now empty of relevant people. "Show me the next thing, then."
The scene obediently dissolved and reformed into the same burnt-out factory scene Dru had already shown him.
"Yeah, I've seen it," Spike said.
"But you did not look," Adam replied. "The female was trying to show you the wrong thing."
Spike scoffed, but watched. This time, the scene didn't end with him sobbing over one of Dru's left-behind dolls. This time, they followed him back out of the factory, to the Magic Box, to the school to kidnap Xander and Willow, back to the factory, and finally to Buffy and Angel.
"This is the important part," Adam said. "You regained your equilibrium after fighting. You enjoy fighting. It's part of who you are."
"But violence isn't all I am," Spike said. "Though it should be, since I'm a vampire."
"That is the paradox, is it not? You are a vampire. Vampires, by definition, are violent. Evil. Uncaring. And yet you care."
"Not enough," Spike muttered. "If I cared enough, I've never have done that to her."
"That is for you to decide and ponder upon," Adam said. "I have only one more thing to show you, but it stands for much more that we do not have time to see."
The scene flashed again, and they were back in the Bronze. But this time, it was post-troll-attack. Injured people lay everywhere, the balcony was half collapsed, and other people were rushing about helping the injured. Including Spike. He watched himself make a young woman more comfortable by tucking a towel under her neck, but the past-Spike's attention wasn't on the young woman at his feet, but another young woman a few feet away. Spike snorted at his past self for thinking that any of this would help.
"It didn't work," he said. "She didn't notice."
"Not here," Adam said. "But she noticed later, didn't she? She left her little sister with you. She left her mother with you. And she has turned to you now."
"She's turned away from me now."
"Because she has realized who she is. If you wish to be comfortable in the world again, you must learn who you are."
Spike sighed. "I'm a vampire. By definition, I'm a bad man. What more do I need to learn?"
"That is up to you." Adam turned to look at him, and they returned to his crypt. "I have shown you all I can." Like Drusilla, he faded into the shadows.
Spike drummed his fingers on the sarcophagus. He had a feeling this wasn't the end of this; these things tended to happen in threes.
The next form to come out of the dark was slim and blonde.
"Buffy!" he gasped.
"As if!" The girl stomped the rest of the way into the limited light. "Please. I am so much prettier than her."
"Hello, Harmony." Spike sighed. "What are you doing here?"
"Same as everyone else." Harmony planted her hands on her hips, jutting one of them out. "You've been naughty, and I'm going to show you where you screwed up." She smiled brightly at him.
"Great. Where do we start?"
Harmony clapped her hands twice, ever the cheerleader, and they appeared in the lower level of the crypt. Buffy was chained to the wall nearby and Drusilla tied to a column.
"Right here!" Harmony glared at him. "This is where you screwed up!"
Spike gave Harmony a Look.
"Fine," she pouted. She clapped her hands again. This time, they stood outside the Bronze, watching Buffy and Spike kiss with a desperate passion, an invisible orchestra backing them.
"Please tell me I'm not in danger of bursting into song again," Spike said.
"Nah. We're outside the spell here," Harmony said.
"Okay. So what am I supposed to be seeing?"
Harmony stared at him blankly for a second, then bounced on her toes. "Oh, yeah!" She rolled her eyes up and continued as if reciting something carefully memorized. "This is the most recent turning point. This is where you began to try to change her instead of yourself." She grinned at him, terribly proud of herself.
"Right." Spike sighed. "What's next?"
Harmony pouted at him. "Are you that eager to get rid of me?"
"Entirely." Spike groped in his pockets for his cigarettes and lighter, but they weren't there. "Bugger."
"Okay, then." Harmony clapped her hands again, rather harder than necessary. They found themselves in an abandoned building, mostly collapsed. They looked down a hole in the floor to see Buffy and Spike writhing, mostly naked, on the floor below. Spike looked away, embarrassed for himself.
"Ew! Gross, Spike!" Harmony smacked him on the arm. "What are you doing, sleeping with the Slayer? That's just nasty!"
"Shut up, Harm. I'm sure she thinks the same about you. So what am I supposed to see here? Besides my own ass?"
"More of the same." Harmony shrugged. "There's one more. Do you want to see?"
"I suppose," Spike sighed.
This time, the glaring light of Buffy's bathroom met Spike's eyes. He lowered his head, already knowing what he would see. "I don't need to see this again," he said. "I've seen nothing but this since it happened."
Harmony, however, was watching anyway. "Wow. You're one messed up vampire, blondie bear."
"Get me out of here," Spike said.
"Fine." Harmony clapped again, not as vigorously, this time. She winced as her palms came together the second time. "That's all we've got for you. It's up to you, now." She gave him a spunky wave, blew him a kiss, and disappeared.
Spike's mind was clearer now, and he sat cross-legged on his sarcophagus. I want to be a good person, he thought. Theind of person who would nev. . . . His mind shied away from the images from earlier in the evening. But . . . how?
His own mention of Angel gave him the idea. He needed his soul. A person with a soul could be a good person, but without, was it even possible? Or would he just be acting, the way he had been for the past year?
But Dru said Buffy will leave me, he thought. Of course, what would that change? He didn't have her now. Maybe he could have her for a little while"”healthily, happily"”if he regained his soul.
That's that, then, he decided. He headed out of his crypt and settled onto his bike. He'd find someone, somewhere, who knew how he could get his soul back without the pesky perfect-happiness small print that Angel had pulled.
He paused at the top of the hill on his way out of town. "Get nice and comfy, Slayer," he said to the lights below with grim determination. "I'll be back. And when I am . . . it's all gonna change."
This takes place during "Seeing Red" when Spike wrestles with himself (with a little help from Clem, who does not make an appearance in this story) about his attempted rape of Buffy.
What Spike Has Become
"What have I done?"
Spike stood in the middle of his crypt, head down, his hands clenched at his sides. Images of Buffy lying on the floor, sobbing and pleading with him not to do this, please, lanced through his brain like lightning. He rubbed at his chest with a flat hand, vaguely surprised, behind the horror at what he had almost done, that it didn't hurt. He felt like his heart should hurt. But it couldn't. It wasn't even beating. For the first time in decades, he was aware of just how empty it felt to have a not-beating heart.
"What have I become?"
He leaned against a sarcophagus, his hands snaking into his hair, pulling at it as if to yank the memory of his latest inhuman act out of his mind by the roots. He bent double at the waist, feeling as though he should be hyperventilating, somewhat confused that he wasn't. The world wavered around him, and though he slumped to the floor, he believed himself still standing, leaning against the sarcophagus.
"You are a demon." The familiar voice came out of the shadows at the edges of the crypt. "I saw to that."
"Come out." Spike didn't have the emotional energy to get worked up at Drusilla's unwelcome presence. "Stop skulking."
Dru moved out of the dark, her slim body clad in a tight red sheath dress, her black hair cascading down her back and shoulders. "I rescued you from a life of mediocrity," she continued. "Don't you remember?"
"I remember." Spike refused to look at her.
"Then why are you so desperately seeking mediocrity again?" Dru circled him slowly, just out of arm's reach. "You could be a person stories are told about. You could kill the Slayer."
"I've already killed two," Spike muttered.
"But this one," Dru persisted. "This one is famous. Killing this one would make you famous. But instead you hover around her, try to care for her, desire her." Dru frowned. "You try to tell yourself you can be with her, that you can be human. But you can't."
"Maybe I can." Spike drew in deep breaths, biologically unnecessary but good for calming his thoughts. "Maybe there's a way. Angel. . . ."
"Angel," Dru interrupted sharply, "is alone. If you pursue his path, you will lose her anyway. Just like he did." She closed the distance between them and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Let me show you. Let me remind you what having a soul did for you." Without waiting for an answer, she covered his eyes with one hand.
When she pulled it away, he blinked in the sudden blaze of light from dozens of candles. He beheld a nineteenth-century drawing room, one side crowded with people, the other holding only two, one male, one female, sitting on a small couch.
"I don't need to see this," Spike muttered. "I remember it intimately."
"Then you remember how pathetic you were," Drusilla said as the young woman on the couch stood and delivered her last cutting remark to the young man. Spike closed his eyes against the memory of her cool scorn. "How this remark sent you sniveling into the streets. To me."
"Of course I remember," Spike snapped.
"I am the one who made a man out of you," Dru reminded him. She covered his eyes again, and when she took her hand away, they stood in a burnt-out factory. Spike watched himself stumble down the stairs, bottle in hand, drunkenly calling for Drusilla, who, of course, did not appear. "You have never been anything but pathetic when you don't have me."
"I've never been anything but a monster when I do," Spike replied. He watched his drunken past self stagger around the factory, sobbing.
"Without me, you'd still be a lonely, simpering poet with a fixation on his mother," Drusilla snapped.
Spike managed a snort and a half-laugh. "Without you, I'd be dead, love," he said. "And the better for it. At least I would have kept my self respect. I might have died alone, but I'd have died a man. I'd never have hurt . . . her."
Drusilla stamped her foot, and they reappeared in the dark crypt. "Fine," she snarled. "Be just as pathetic as you want. I wash my hands of you."
She disappeared, fading into the blackness that surrounded him. Spike relaxed muscles he hadn't realized were tense, relieved that she was gone.
His relief, however, was short lived. Moments after Dru left, heavy steps announced the arrival of a large demon. Spike glanced up, then sighed and rolled his eyes. Demonoid, anyway.
"What d'you want?" he muttered.
"I have been sent to show you exactly what you have become." Adam's deep voice rolled through the crypt. "You asked. I am here to show you the results of your life."
Spike managed a wheezing laugh. "So, we're playing "˜This Is Your Life,' are we? I don't remember signing up."
Adam tilted his head slightly the way he did when something a mortal said didn't quite make sense to his logic center. "You asked," he repeated.
"Fine." Spike pushed off the sarcophagus. "Let's get this over with."
Adam didn't cover Spike's eyes, but in a blink, they stood in a crowded club"”the Bronze. Spike watched himself stalk the dance floor, his eyes riveted to one of the many writhing forms.
"She was cute back then," he observed.
"This is when it began," Adam said. "This is when she began to affect you."
"Yeah, I'd worked that one out for myself," Spike replied. "So what?"
"After this, you were never the same." Adam stood perfectly still, but his eyes glittered as he stared at the past version of the Slayer.
"Yeah, she's good for that." Spike snorted. "I already know I'm in love with the Slayer. What's your point?"
"You asked what you have become. I am showing you how you became what you have become so you can decide for yourself."
"Why?"
Adam glanced at him, then turned back to the dance floor. "You are at a turning point. Or so I'm told. What you choose to do now will affect the rest of your days. And other people's, of course."
"Well. No pressure, then." Spike watched the Slayer rush out the door. "So this is where I started becoming what I've become." He gave Adam a sideways look. "Any idea what that is?"
Adam laughed, the expression twisting his inhuman face into something somehow less sinister. "I can only tell you what I am told. And that is not much."
"Okay. So I didn't start becoming this horrible thing who can try to . . . hurt someone I love when I was turned into a vampire." Spike snorted. "That seems odd, don't you think?"
Adam merely shrugged.
"Fine." Spike waved a hand at the dance floor, which was now empty of relevant people. "Show me the next thing, then."
The scene obediently dissolved and reformed into the same burnt-out factory scene Dru had already shown him.
"Yeah, I've seen it," Spike said.
"But you did not look," Adam replied. "The female was trying to show you the wrong thing."
Spike scoffed, but watched. This time, the scene didn't end with him sobbing over one of Dru's left-behind dolls. This time, they followed him back out of the factory, to the Magic Box, to the school to kidnap Xander and Willow, back to the factory, and finally to Buffy and Angel.
"This is the important part," Adam said. "You regained your equilibrium after fighting. You enjoy fighting. It's part of who you are."
"But violence isn't all I am," Spike said. "Though it should be, since I'm a vampire."
"That is the paradox, is it not? You are a vampire. Vampires, by definition, are violent. Evil. Uncaring. And yet you care."
"Not enough," Spike muttered. "If I cared enough, I've never have done that to her."
"That is for you to decide and ponder upon," Adam said. "I have only one more thing to show you, but it stands for much more that we do not have time to see."
The scene flashed again, and they were back in the Bronze. But this time, it was post-troll-attack. Injured people lay everywhere, the balcony was half collapsed, and other people were rushing about helping the injured. Including Spike. He watched himself make a young woman more comfortable by tucking a towel under her neck, but the past-Spike's attention wasn't on the young woman at his feet, but another young woman a few feet away. Spike snorted at his past self for thinking that any of this would help.
"It didn't work," he said. "She didn't notice."
"Not here," Adam said. "But she noticed later, didn't she? She left her little sister with you. She left her mother with you. And she has turned to you now."
"She's turned away from me now."
"Because she has realized who she is. If you wish to be comfortable in the world again, you must learn who you are."
Spike sighed. "I'm a vampire. By definition, I'm a bad man. What more do I need to learn?"
"That is up to you." Adam turned to look at him, and they returned to his crypt. "I have shown you all I can." Like Drusilla, he faded into the shadows.
Spike drummed his fingers on the sarcophagus. He had a feeling this wasn't the end of this; these things tended to happen in threes.
The next form to come out of the dark was slim and blonde.
"Buffy!" he gasped.
"As if!" The girl stomped the rest of the way into the limited light. "Please. I am so much prettier than her."
"Hello, Harmony." Spike sighed. "What are you doing here?"
"Same as everyone else." Harmony planted her hands on her hips, jutting one of them out. "You've been naughty, and I'm going to show you where you screwed up." She smiled brightly at him.
"Great. Where do we start?"
Harmony clapped her hands twice, ever the cheerleader, and they appeared in the lower level of the crypt. Buffy was chained to the wall nearby and Drusilla tied to a column.
"Right here!" Harmony glared at him. "This is where you screwed up!"
Spike gave Harmony a Look.
"Fine," she pouted. She clapped her hands again. This time, they stood outside the Bronze, watching Buffy and Spike kiss with a desperate passion, an invisible orchestra backing them.
"Please tell me I'm not in danger of bursting into song again," Spike said.
"Nah. We're outside the spell here," Harmony said.
"Okay. So what am I supposed to be seeing?"
Harmony stared at him blankly for a second, then bounced on her toes. "Oh, yeah!" She rolled her eyes up and continued as if reciting something carefully memorized. "This is the most recent turning point. This is where you began to try to change her instead of yourself." She grinned at him, terribly proud of herself.
"Right." Spike sighed. "What's next?"
Harmony pouted at him. "Are you that eager to get rid of me?"
"Entirely." Spike groped in his pockets for his cigarettes and lighter, but they weren't there. "Bugger."
"Okay, then." Harmony clapped her hands again, rather harder than necessary. They found themselves in an abandoned building, mostly collapsed. They looked down a hole in the floor to see Buffy and Spike writhing, mostly naked, on the floor below. Spike looked away, embarrassed for himself.
"Ew! Gross, Spike!" Harmony smacked him on the arm. "What are you doing, sleeping with the Slayer? That's just nasty!"
"Shut up, Harm. I'm sure she thinks the same about you. So what am I supposed to see here? Besides my own ass?"
"More of the same." Harmony shrugged. "There's one more. Do you want to see?"
"I suppose," Spike sighed.
This time, the glaring light of Buffy's bathroom met Spike's eyes. He lowered his head, already knowing what he would see. "I don't need to see this again," he said. "I've seen nothing but this since it happened."
Harmony, however, was watching anyway. "Wow. You're one messed up vampire, blondie bear."
"Get me out of here," Spike said.
"Fine." Harmony clapped again, not as vigorously, this time. She winced as her palms came together the second time. "That's all we've got for you. It's up to you, now." She gave him a spunky wave, blew him a kiss, and disappeared.
Spike's mind was clearer now, and he sat cross-legged on his sarcophagus. I want to be a good person, he thought. Theind of person who would nev. . . . His mind shied away from the images from earlier in the evening. But . . . how?
His own mention of Angel gave him the idea. He needed his soul. A person with a soul could be a good person, but without, was it even possible? Or would he just be acting, the way he had been for the past year?
But Dru said Buffy will leave me, he thought. Of course, what would that change? He didn't have her now. Maybe he could have her for a little while"”healthily, happily"”if he regained his soul.
That's that, then, he decided. He headed out of his crypt and settled onto his bike. He'd find someone, somewhere, who knew how he could get his soul back without the pesky perfect-happiness small print that Angel had pulled.
He paused at the top of the hill on his way out of town. "Get nice and comfy, Slayer," he said to the lights below with grim determination. "I'll be back. And when I am . . . it's all gonna change."
