No Hero

Author's Notes: The title of this chapter makes no sense, but I was listening to the song I've Seen it All while it was written, so...


If the Roof Doesn’t Fall

Buffy listened patiently as Spike explained all that had happened since his death, mixed emotions flickering in her expressive green eyes at each turn. She nearly became physically ill when she heard of the loss (and subsequent regain) of limb and almost-loss of unlife he had endured, all without her at his side.

She studied his hands with newfound interest, and she knew that she would never again be able to suppress her shudder when she heard the word reaper. Noting the storm of pain and rage in his eyes as he recounted everything he and Fred had tried, albeit unsuccessfully, to rouse Angel from his coma, she felt her respect for him double. It made sense to her now; Spike, in his own way, loved Angel. The blonde slayer stole a glance at the overflowing ashtray, watching Spike chain-smoke as he spoke. At length, he fell silent, and she brushed an errant curl away from his brow tenderly.

“So,” he said finally, breaking the silence, “that’s all you missed.”

“It’s a lot,” she replied.

“Well, yeah. Five years, that’s a long time.” Lighting yet another cigarette, the vampire met Buffy’s eyes bravely as he asked, “Why are you here with me an’ not Liam?”

“Do you remember what you said to me once, that you’re not known for being a thinker? You were right,” she retorted, her tone half-bitter and half-saddened. “I love you, you moron.”

“No, you don –” Spike never had the chance to finish his statement; instead, he found himself nursing a split lip, and when he dared look into the slayer’s eyes, they blazed with anger.

“Don’t you even dare,” she hissed. “I’ve been forgetting things about you, not Angel. You knew how hard it was for me to say the words, and you had the audacity to tell me what I was feeling? You had the nerve to fucking thank me?!”

“What were my soddin’ options?!” he shot back. “Should I have let you die with me?! You had to keep on living –”

“So one of us is living, I remember. It was my choice to make, Spike. You took the decision from me just like –”

“Slayer, don’t…” the blonde vampire warned, knowing what was to come.”

“Angel,” she finished defiantly, crossing her arms over her chest in a defensive manner. “You saved the world, Spike. Maybe I could have found a way to get you out of there, and maybe I would have died with you, but it was my choice. You were… you are so brave, but what you did… You should have trusted me.”

“It wasn’t about trust, pet. I trust you with everything in me.” His voice was softer then, more William than Spike, but his façade of macho bravado was firmly in place a moment later. “It was about takin’ a gamble. I don’t play that way, not with your life.”

Buffy’s eyes widened when she realized all that he implied with one single statement. As she had once refused to sacrifice Dawn to save the world, he would have refused to let her die, even if it meant that the First would win. It wasn’t the most rational decision, and it certainly wasn’t the right one, but it was a decision born of love – a decision which had required much forethought.

“See it now, pet?” the vampire asked cockily, but the arrogance wasn’t reflected in his eyes.

“You… you knew, didn’t you? You knew you weren’t going to walk away from that battle.” She held his gaze defiantly, seeking confirmation.

Scoffing, he replied, “Course I knew. You don’t get a honkin’ piece of jewelry and a nice, fancy honorary like ‘champion’ if you’re gonna walk outta there in one piece. That’s not the way it works.”

“Oh, God…” For a moment, the slayer’s golden skin took on a slightly green tint, and she touched her fingers to her lips as though that would prevent her from heaving. “Did you believe me?”

“Yes.”

A single word, no more than a whisper, and Buffy remembered the exact moment she had realized that she loved him. It had been that night, that horrid night when she had been tricked into believing she had killed Warren’s ex-girlfriend, when Spike had walked her home and ‘taken care’ of things. It had been then, when she had seen exactly how far he would go to protect her, even if it meant that she loathed him, that she had realized exactly what he meant to her.

“We always hurt the one we love, pet,” the vampire said, eerily accurate in his choice of reminders. “I’m sorry I had to hurt you then. I didn’t want that to be your last memory of me, but…”

“It was that night, when Warren…” she began cryptically. “I was… awful to you. I said and did things that I can never take back. I hated myself so much, hated being alive so much that all I wanted to do was hurt the way I was hurting. I thought it would make it better, distract me, maybe, or just make me into the monster I thought I was. You were right when you said I came back wrong –”

“Buffy, no, I didn’t –”

“Let me finish,” she said firmly. “I came back wrong because I came back ungrateful and cold. Instead of seeing that I was brought back for a good reason, because my friends love me and need me, all I saw was their selfishness. I was so happy where I was, and it was warm… Here, everything was so bright and cold. I thought that… if I couldn’t have the happiness I had wherever I was, that meant I didn’t deserve any happiness at all. I drove away the ones I loved the most, and… and I’m sorry.”

Releasing a pent up breath of air he didn’t need, Spike rested his forehead against his slayer’s, letting the words was over him. She truly meant it; she was sorry for hurting him in the past, she loved him. “I never minded, not really. Even if you were pummeling me into the dirt, I didn’t mind it, ‘cause at least you were touchin’ me. You were feelin’ something other than cold, even if it was anger.”

“That’s not making me feel any better,” she said lightly. “You never deserved to be treated that way… worse than an animal.”

“Can we forget about the past, just for tonight?” questioned the vampire, recalling the last time he had said something very similar, that last night in Buffy’s basement. “That was the best night of my life.”

“Mine, too,” she admitted. “And you died the next day.”

“Well, yeah. That other night was the second best night of my life, that was the first time you ever really let me hold you like that. It was bloody terrifying.”

“Again, you died not long after.”

“I remember, believe me,” he murmured, tucking a lock of her hair behind her ear for her.

“You escaped the oogey aftermath of me revealing my sensitive side,” the slayer teased.

Though he returned her grin, Spike’s eyes softened, and he said decisively, “I didn’t want to escape. We’d just gotten to the best part, luv. I would have waited for you as long as you needed me to.”

“I wanted to say it that night,” Buffy admitted. “It’s… that’s what I wanted to say afterward, and you wouldn’t let me.”

“Might’ve lost my nerve,” the vampire replied with feigned indifference. His pretense quickly broke, and he added, “I couldn’t go into battle hearin’ those words echoing in my brain, seein’ your eyes… Leavin’ you, knowin’ you’d hurt… it was the most painful thing I’ve ever done.”

“D-did it hurt when you…?” she asked, her voice almost inaudible even to his vampiric hearing. She shuddered inwardly as she remembered his initial cry of pain when the amulet activated, but then Spike, who had once whimpered and grunted over blows not even a human would have cried out from, had remained courageously silent.

“Well, yeah. I was on fire, pet, course it hurt,” he admitted, a glimmer of pride returning to his eyes. He had been burning from within, and yet he had only groaned in the beginning. He’d had to be audacious for his slayer, and in the end, he’d even laughed.

Tears in her eyes at the thought of how much he had suffered, mostly because of her choices, Buffy confessed, “I’m so tired…”

“Shall I take the comfy chair?” the vampire teased, already gathering her into his arms and carrying her to the bed.

The slayer didn’t respond until Spike had settled down on the bed and tucked her against his side securely; her head found the curve of his shoulder instinctively, and she marveled anew at how well she hit against the planes of his body. Finally, she answered, “I’ll be here when you wake up this time.”

“So will I,” Spike assured her. “So will I.”