Unacceptable Losses

Xander fumbled with the shower nozzle as he adjusted the temperature, warm but not too hot against his tender back. He shoved his face under the spray and let the emotions stirred by the session come flooding to the surface. Shaking, he flicked the clasp on the stainless steel cock ring that had kept him from cumming under the lash. Grief, pain, guilt, arousal, all roared through him as he yanked at his rigid cock, pulling himself to an immediate orgasm that broke the remaining barriers holding back the feelings. He slid to the cool tile floor of the shower and let the water beat way his cum and tears.

After several minutes, he gathered himself and stood shakily. He felt wrung out, relieved of some of the tension that seemed a constant these days. Grabbing the hotel-sized bar of soap provided by the club, he scrubbed himself clean. Flashes from the session skittered through his mind, and he began to gather them together to lock them carefully away in the box marked ‘must repress’.

The lash snapping down on his back as he saw Buffy’s neck snap to the side. The paddle smacking his buttocks as he heard his own burbling growl around fangs slipping into her dead flesh. He allowed himself to remember these images only as the implements of punishment struck his skin. The blows never reached the core of his betrayal, but he kept returning for the pain that allowed him to face the grief, always seeking the possibility of a forgiveness that eluded him.

As he finished showering and dried off, he considered stopping at the bar for a drink before heading back to the Hyperion. He held out little hope for returning ahead of the vamp slaying set, but he recognized that the longer he was gone, the worse the lectures he would have to face. Sighing, he grabbed his duffel and went back to the reception desk to request a cab. No longer driven by the desperate need to get out, he confronted the reality that Spike would have his balls for disobeying, and he began to formulate a plausible excuse for his whereabouts while he waited for the taxi that would deliver him to the vampire.

******************

At the Hyperion, Dawn and Faith gave Spike a wide berth as he paced the lobby alternately growling and smoking. Vamp dust still clung to his boots and duster, and his shirt sported spatters of blood from the battle. Everyone else had dispersed for showers as soon as they got back. Despite their insistence that Xander wouldn’t have run, that he must have just taken advantage of the evening out, Spike couldn’t relax. Harris was his responsibility, like it or not, and he had instructed the man to stay put.

Bloody Hell. No wonder Dawn needed help. If a Master Vampire couldn’t compel the git to obey and take care of himself, then what must she have dealt with over the last year? Spike’s calls with her during that time had been filled with attempts to comfort and bolster one another up as he tried to keep Angel from giving up champion status altogether and going back to feeding on rats and she tried to fill the void left by Buffy’s death while at the same time keeping Xander from managing to off himself in skirmishes with the demon of the week. Apparently his sense of self-preservation, always coming in second to his loyalty and concern for friends, had taken a further tumble down his list of priorities, and Xander came close to getting killed so often that Giles and Willow refused to let him patrol at all in the last few months. Dawn feared that he wanted to be killed ever since Buffy died.

Spike shook his head. Daft bugger. Yeah, he’s to blame, but at the same time, from what Dawn said, he was under that Rayne bloke’s spell. Spike couldn’t help but sympathize as he recalled his own manipulation at the hands of the First. Willow found out about the spell on Xander, but not in time to prevent the tragedy. Spike had only sketchy details about what had happened, but apparently Xander killed Buffy when Rayne had turned him temporarily into a vampire. No one else had been present when it happened. Dawn and Giles found him huddled in a corner of a training room with her body lying broken and bloodied on the floor. All he would say was “I killed her.” Even without the details, Spike could imagine the battle: Xander in full vamp form and Buffy holding back, trying not to hurt a friend whom she knew wasn’t really undead. But that shouldn’t have been enough for Xander to beat her. Buffy fought against the best of his kind and walked away. Something else had to be at work, and Spike knew he needed to find out what if he was to be the help that Dawn needed him to be.

The scrape of the front doors opening snapped Spike from his contemplation. In a blur of motion, Spike had Xander backed up against the doors. Game-face to the fore, Spike catalogued the man, taking in the squeaky-cleanness and fear-tripping heart beat.

“Where the fuck have you been?”

“Out.” The slight shake in his voice undercut Xander’s defiant gaze. The tremor in his voice disgusted him. Hell, he was a grown man, not some teenager who got caught sneaking in late.

Spike glared back. He growled as he shifted his hold on the larger man and without ceremony flung him over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry, ignoring the gasp from Dawn and the snicker that could only be Faith. They had accepted that this was no longer their battle, besides the nest of vamps seemed like a cake-walk when compared to the conflict going on between Xander and Spike at the moment.

“What the fuck?” Xander scrambled to hold onto his bag as the world tilted upside down. “Put me down you bleached menace!”

Taking the stairs two at a time, Spike stalked down the hall to Xander’s room and kicked the door open.

“Hey!”

Grimly silent, he deposited the squirming human gracelessly on the bed and slammed the door closed. Xander winced as he righted himself, but at the look on Spike’s face, he figured that standing back up was not the most prudent approach. He watched warily as the vampire stalked closer.

“If I have to lock you in this room, I will. If I have to tie you to a chair, I will. If I have to break both of your bloody legs, I will.”

Xander swallowed heavily. Lectures bypassed, straight on to threats. He had forgotten how terrifying the vampire could be. Fear warred with anger, however, and Xander recognized that he hadn’t had the time that he needed to finish pulling himself back together following the session at Chambre de Sade. As a rule, he took several hours alone after a session to sort himself out. Time constraints had prevented that tonight, and he clenched his fists, willing himself to be silent and controlled despite the rage and pain rolling through him.

Spike imagined he could see Xander shaking on the waves of emotion that crashed off him. Despite his silence and rigid stillness, fear, anger, and pain, pain, pain seemed to flood from the man. The demon in Spike wanted to revel in that emotion, push it over the edge into violence, but he allowed the soul to reign in that impulse. He settled his features back into his human guise as he considered his next move.

“Why does it matter to you where I go?” Xander spoke low, his face averted.

“Matters to me ‘cause it matters to the ‘Bit.”

“It shouldn’t.”

“Wanna clear that up for me, pet?”

“Shit, Spike, I’m five years older than she is, responsible adult here.” Xander struggled to keep from standing and pacing. “Why the fuck does it matter if I go out by myself? I’m legal for everything except running for government office, and you can believe me when I promise that I’m not looking to do that, promises of easy interns bearing cigars aside. Why can’t they just leave me the fuck alone?” He snapped his mouth shut, willing himself to calm down.

Spike grabbed Xander’s shoulders and brought his face close.

“If you’re not half as stupid as I’ve always taken you for, you know the answer to that question.” The vampire let go and stood back a pace. “Question I want answered is why you put them in this place where they can’t leave you alone.”

“Right. Great. It’s my fault they’ve got you breathing down my neck twenty-four seven.” He finally stood, shoving the vampire back. “I didn’t ask for this. I’m doing what she told me. I’m in fucking LA, living with vampires who hate me, being a constant reminder to Buffy’s sister, ex-lovers, and whatever the hell Faith is, that Buffy is dead. She’s dead, and I killed her. I can’t fix that, Spike.” He turned from raging and towering over the vampire to wrap his arms tight around himself as though to keep from flying apart utterly.

“Tell me how to fix it. I’m trying, but I don’t know what to do.” His voice broke in misery this time. “I don’t know what to do, and they won’t let me leave.”

Spike stuck his hands in his duster pockets and regarded the shivering figure. “They love you.” He registered the shudder that ran through Xander at that declaration, as though his whole body protested. “And they wanna help you. If you let ‘em.”

The vampire circled around until he stood before Xander, taking in the abject misery on his face, eye clenched shut and a single tear tracing a path down the tanned cheek. His fingers itched to reach out and touch the man, but he resisted, not wanting to chance shattering him.

“Xander. Xander, look at me.” The brown eye swam with tears. “They don’t know how to help you. You don’t seem to know how to either, so I’m gonna ask you to let me try.” He gazed steadily into that pain-soaked face and willed Xander to agree.

Xander searched Spike’s eyes for a sign of mockery. Even the unbridled anger that had surfaced when he first returned to the hotel appeared to have faded. He found only a calm acceptance in the steady blue gaze. But he couldn’t bring himself to speak.

“You killed a slayer, Xan.” Spike pressed, not enjoying the man’s flinch, but recognizing that the source of the struggle lay with Buffy. “Been there, done that, bought the soddin’ t-shirt.”

“I’m not like you.” Xander spat out. “Not evil.”

“You killed a Slayer.” Spike shrugged calmly. “Can’t say that goes over well on the white-hat resume.”

“Get out.” His breathing turned harsh as Spike chipped away at that repression box he struggled so hard to keep closed in the back of his mind.

Spike nodded with a forced amicability, recognizing that his comments cut deep into the wound. However, gone untreated, the wound had become septic, and it would take a great deal of cutting to root out the infection if they hoped to save the man.

The compassion in Spike’s gaze, the lack of condemnation, tipped Xander from defense to offense, and he stalked past the vampire to yank open the door to the room.

“Get the fuck out of my room, and stay the fuck out of my life.” Tremors wracked his voice as he fought with himself, drawn by the promise that Spike understood the pain and could help. Images of white bones on red petals flashed across his mind, and he clamped down hard on the hope that had barely begun to blossom. He didn’t deserve help, and he was certain that Spike knew that as well, despite his offer.

“Get out, or I’ll add dusting a champion to my resume as well.”

Spike strode insolently to the door. He stood in the doorway and looked back, “None of us deserve forgiveness, pet. That’s why it’s a gift.” He continued to stand in the hall after Xander slammed the door. From inside the room, muffled sobs worked their way to the vampire’s ears. He forced himself to listen, and in the ragged sounds recognized a depth of guilt and despair the like of which had led him to regain his soul and then to want to burn it back out. Touching his fingers to the door, he renewed his promise to Dawn to take care of Xander, to keep him from destroying himself as well as Buffy.