No Hero

Author's Notes: Yeah, things are a bit different in my world. There was no wonkiness with Fred because I need her! Also, she's too adorable to kill.
I realize that I refer to Angel as Spike's sire. I'll explain it later.

Guardian Devil

“Angelus. Angel? Peaches!” For the third time in as many hours, Spike fought to rouse his sire into some semblance of alertness so the man could feed. He had never really liked him, that was true, but the sight of such an imposing man being reduced to nothingness brought a twinge of pity to even Spike’s heart.

Angel sat in perfect stillness and quiet, his hands clasped firmly together in his lap, his once-intelligent eyes blank and flat, unblinking. Even his characteristic way of breathing unnecessarily had ceased. For all intents and purposes, he was actually dead.

Things had all gone to Hell since Spike’s re-embodiment. Cordelia, Connor, Darla, Drusilla – he made a vague mental note to avoid people with C and D as their first initials – except Dawn, but then he would never see the Bit again. She, like Buffy, like all of the Scoobies, thought he was well and truly dead, and after seeing Buffy in Italy with the Wanker (or was that the Immortal?) he knew that he hadn’t a chance in the world with her. Of course, if Angel had shown his face, she would have climbed him like a tree.

Like a tree… Hadn’t she always smelled of nature? Spike shuddered inwardly when he realized that he could barely remember her scent. It had been something natural, he was certain of that, but he couldn’t pinpoint it. It had been far too long… He bitterly wondered if she ever thought of him the way he thought of her. Probably not. After all, her heart still belonged to the Poofter, didn’t it?

If Buffy could see what had become of her beloved Angel… The battle had been brutal, lives had been lost, and Angel, once fierce and strong, had been utterly destroyed. Physically, he was unscathed, but mentally, there was almost nothing left of him. It was enough to make Spike feel ill.

No one was entirely certain of what had happened to Angel. Gunn and Wesley had fallen, and Spike himself had been presumed dead for a brief moment, but then he had made his ‘miraculous’ recovery – he’d crawled out from under the body of a dragon. God only knew what had happened to the others, but the first thing he’d seen – other than the belly of the dragon – had been Angel staring blankly ahead, broadsword in hand, silent.

Fred attributed it to a severe case of post-traumatic stress disorder, and Spike, who knew a little more about medical procedures and the like than one would think, had to agree with her. There was no other explanation for it, unless said explanation was otherworldly, which there was no indication of. He preferred to believe that his sire was just mind-fucked.

“Buggering, sodding Hell, Angelus, snap the fuck out of it!” the blonde vampire shouted at the top of his considerable lungs. Again, there was no response, and he dragged a hand over his face and continued wearing a pattern in the rug with his pacing. After several moments of grumbling, pacing, cursing, and yet more pacing, Spike glanced at the brunette examining the machine that was monitoring Angel’s brainwaves – or lack thereof. “It’s no good, Fred.”

“What did you do the last time?” she inquired.

“Bloody Hell.” With a sigh of resignation, he bit into his own wrist, pried Angel’s jaws apart, and thrust the bleeding wound against his sire’s open mouth. Watching as a flicker of recognition returned to Angel’s mahogany eyes, he drew his wrist away. “Angelus?”

“It was so dark,” the brunette vampire whispered hoarsely. “And… and…”

“And?” Spike prompted.

“More darkness,” he said.

“Look, mate, I’m not one for this touchy-feely shit, but… Ah, Hell, we need you back. Think of all those people out there, walkin’ around like little Happy Meals with legs for Big Bads like me,” Spike taunted.

“You’re not a Big Bad,” Angel whispered. “You’re not bad at all.”

“Oy! You take that back, now!”

“Keep him talking,” Fred urged. It had been days since Spike had been able to provoke a verbal response from Angel, and the longer he remained coherent, the better chance he had at a full recovery.

“I’m trying…” He grabbed the mug of warm blood from Fred and took one of Angel’s hands, pressing the mug into it. “I’m not gonna feed you, peaches.”

Automatically, Angel lifted the mug to his lips and drank deeply. The unbuttoned sleeve of his shirt drifted down to settle in the crook of his arm, revealing a series of scars where an artificial limb had been attached to the remaining stump of his arm. With his advanced vampiric healing, the undead flesh had welcomed the creation of metal, wires, and synthetic skin as its own, and eventually, Spike knew, even the scars would fade.

“Peaches?” he repeated the nickname Angel hated most in an attempt to jar him back into reality.

Finishing the blood, Angel murmured, “I want to see her again.”

Spike didn’t have to ask which ‘her’ Angel had been referring to. “So do I, but… If you see ‘er now, you’ll give ‘er a bloody coronary. She’s only human even if she is the slayer.”

“Not human,” said Angel dreamily, reminding Spike far too much of Drusilla. “Above human.”

“How is she above human, Angel?” Fred asked, desperate to keep him talking as she watched in dismay when the monitor tracking his brainwaves slowed again.

“Dia duit,” the brunette vampire muttered in his native tongue. “Dia is Muire duit.” With those words, the line on the monitor flattened, and not for the first time, both Fred and Spike wondered how he could still be alive – or undead.

“What was that he said? Was that Gaelic?”

“God to you,” Spike translated, his ageless face somehow care-worn, older and world-weary. “God and Mary to you.”