Addictive Personalities

Spike stalked back toward the apartment with long, angry strides. He was growling low in his throat, had been since leaving the place. He was pissed at the boy for being so careless, but he was even more upset with himself for caring. It wasn't about breaking the chip that time. He'd yelled because he'd been scared out of his wits when he saw his 'pet' walking in the dark with a blank look that might as well have been a neon 'Eat at Xanders' sign. His first thought hadn't been the loss of a food source or the chip's destruction, it had been the thought that Xander looked like he wanted to die. After he'd actually said it out loud, Spike had had to leave and leave fast before he killed the bastard!

Angelous had left, Dru had left, everyone left. He would not allow Xander to leave as well. The Ksani breed was his! He caught him fair and square and once he was broken and obedient, Spike planned on taking good care of him!

A commotion ahead caught his attention, that was when the smell hit him. Blood. Familiar blood. Xander's. He ran forward and pushed past the paramedics, to the gurney that held the pale, almost lifeless human. He clung to the cold shoulders without even thinking about what he was doing. "Xander! Bloody Hell!" He grabbed one of the white clad men, "What happened ta th' boy?!" The man didn't answer, and the other two loaded Xander into the ambulance, Spike climbed in after.

"Only family is. . ."

"I am his family!" The vampire spat, "Wot happened 'ere?!"

The man shut the door and they rolled into motion. Spike watched as needles and tubes were poked and taped about his pet's arms. "He tried to kill himself." The man sighed, "His wrists were slit up and across, this wasn't a cry for help it was a genuine attempt to die. He would have too, but his arms slid forward enough to block the drain when he passed out. The landlord was called because water was pooling in the hall. If the building didn't have the slant to it that let the water flow out, or if he'd had a carpet there. . ." The man shook his head, "As it is healmost drowned, I don't know how he managed not to. The water was over his head when we got there."

Spike stared at the peaceful face. The only reason the boy had lived was because a Ksani with a vampire owner didn't have to breath as much as a human. That was all that had saved him. Xander had actually tried . . . Spike knew he'd accused him of it, he knew that the boy even asked him to, but he hadn't thought that he was so serious. It had sounded like a split second decision. Said and forgotten! The whelp was too strong to break so soon, and so totally! Spike wanted a slave, not another Dru!

He sat back heavily, looking like a shocked and mourning friend to the paramedics, while his mind ran over the situation and where he'd miscalculated. He'd been sure that Xander would fight until Spike owned him completely and then he would give in and obey, that was the way humans were. He'd done it before, to see how long they lasted and this didn't. . . He sat up, eyes wide. This was too soon, the kid wasn't broken at all. He was playing the white knight! Spike had told him the chip was going to stop working, and Spike had never hidden the fact that when the chip was gone, the slayer and her tag alongs would die horribly. Because of the corner he'd backed the boy into, he couldn't warn his friends without saying why, and the watcher had been extremely harsh when he talked about the Ksani. Xander would have still sung, but he would expect Giles to need to kill him and he wouldn't want to make him do that. He couldn't stop Spike himself, because Xander, demon blood or not, wasn't a killer. He knew Spike, and so he couldn't kill him. The only option left would be to deny Spike his cum, which he couldn't do by force of will because of the addiction. //Well well well, my pet has a pair of brass ones, doesn't he.// He tried to kill himself to save his friends.

At the hospital, Spike managed to get Xander placed in a windowless room, and refused to leave while the doctors gave him transfusions and hooked him up to all manner of machines and bags of fluids and such. When they were asured that he would live, they let him rest, and Spike sat at his bedside quietly, contemplating the motionless face. "Good on you puppy." Hewhispered, "Took balls, what ya pulled." He traced the bandaged arms.

A light knock on the door brought Spike out of his musings and a white claddoctor strode in, "Mister Harris, Alexander is going to live, however there are some eventualities that I feel you need to prepare for, just in case." He mumbled, half listening to himself, as he studied the clipboard.

Spike desperately wanted to eat the inconsiderate git. He grinned at the thought of eating a human for bad bed side manners and stood. "So talk."

"He's lost a lot of blood, there is a real chance of brain damage. Also the psychological factors leading up to this and dealing with the inevitable reactions that people will have to the scars will take theraply, I have some pamphlets here that you should-"

The vampire had stopped listening after the first sentance, "Brain damage. Like what, headaches, dizzyness, paralasis, halucinations, or are you telling me he might be a vegetable?"

"There are cases of all of those results, frankly until he wakes up, our hands are tied. Another case is a change of personality, the trauma may have. . ."

He wasn't listening anymore, but staring at the boy ensconed in white sheets. A vegetable could still be useful, as long as the body could react and be made to take in fluids, paralasis might be a problem, but it was likely that in most of those cases, Spike could still use the Ksani. He refused to listen to the part of him that was screaming that Xander had to be alright, and needed to still be Xander. He ignored the part that told him that he needed Xander to be whole. All he wanted was to get rid of the bloody chip and he could still do that. He wasn't crying for the brave boy who'd fought so well against him. The doctor had left the room, Xander's eyes were closed, there was no one there to see it, and so he wasn't crying.

Locking the door, he pulled back the sheet and began pulling on the boy's member, it reacted as always and he fed in silence, tasting the salt of his tears with Xander's cum. A small jolt of electricity pulsed in his head once, and then suddenly, nothing. He blicked and rubbed the back of his skull where the shock had come from, focused on extremely detailed thoughts of killing, torchering and maiming humans, or draining them dry and showering himself in their blood. Nothing. Not a spark.

He'd finally gotten strong enough, the chip was useless.

He'd thought that he'd be happier about it.
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The Scoobies showed up that morning, as soon as Spike had thought to give them a call. He was playing the dutiful boyfriend, sitting at his lover's bedside and holding his hand and what not, but an odd look from the blond witch told him that he wasn't quite fooling everyone. He stood, muttering something about giving the scoobies some time with their unconcious donut boy (not in those words of course) and walked into the hallway, musing over what could have gotten Glinda the good witch so testy about him. He'd thought he pulled it off rather well considering the mess his head was in at the moment.

He leaned against the wall and cocked his head, listening to the inane pattle from inside the room. The chip was fried, he'd won. He could walk into that room and slaughter each and every one of those pesky little happymeals before they would realized that he could hurt them again. He could finish the boy off too, make an end to all of the madness that was living with Xander Harris. So why didn't he? He didn't need them anymore, he was his own vamp again. He was William the Bloody! He could be master of the Hellmouth in less than a day, he could claim his third slayer, he could send the Watcher's head to his counsel and he could watch the little witches burn. He could just leave the boy alive and let time and the addiction tear him down to nothing. He could be the Big Bad again. //I am the Big Bad again.//

"Spike."

He turned to look at the pallid watcher who'd emerged from the room of tittering females. "Rupert."

"What happened?" The man was close to falling apart or going Ripper and Spike couldn't tell which. "He wasn't honestly happy, I'll admit I overlooked that, but he wasn't suicidal. He had a good job which he enjoyed, and although his family is no means ideal, he had all of us, he had you."

"Don't know, I wasn't home."

"Obviously."

Spike nearly lost his calm at the idea of Rupert Giles beleiving that he, William the Bloody, would have stopped the white hat from hurting himself.

"I spoke to Xander yesterday afternoon." The watcher went on, "I will admit I told him to leave you. I don't like the idea of one of my children in the danger emotionally and physically that you will put him in. He has always seen more than any of us, he sees the world in a way I could never hope to, even though he hides it with laughter. I don't want him to lose that wonderful gift, but with you. . . he seams to have lost himself."

"Boy's first 's bound ta tie him in knots f'r a while, yeah?"

"Well of course, however he doesn't act like. . . he isn't. . . How can I put this?"

Spike waited.

"When I spoke to him I told him that you would never love him."

"Oi!"

"No, listen. He said he knows you don't love him, and he won't have a happily ever after with you, he can't. But he felt like you were friends before, and he cares about you, and I have never heard Xander speak like. . . like he had given up. Like love was painful. Even at his worst he has always had faith in the future, but when we talked. . . he sounded resigned. I don't think. . . I don't know what to think anymore, to be quite honest."

//Love.// Spike turned back to staring at the wall ahead of him and lit up a cigarette, reguardless of the no smoking signs posted all over the hall. "You 'n me both Rupes." He admitted and exhaled.
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To my readers,
I would like to appologize to everyone for this coming so late, and for the long waits between each update of all of my stories and of my website. You see, I am working on my third novel and trying to find a publisher for the first (I have put it off for far too long) and so I haven't had much time between that and my two other jobs. I cannot promise to be more timely about updating, but I do promise to finish each story and to bring more as well, it will just take a while longer than most. Thank you all for staying with me through this hard time and for continuing to read my story however frusterating it may be to wait between chapters. Please enjoy and review and thank you again. Knowing you are reading is what has kept me writing fanfiction for so long.
May you walk the blessed ground,
Raihne