Spike had almost forgotten about her existence. Only the occasional twinge in his forearms reminded him of the girl from the missing year -- from the time that he and Buffy didn't talk about. By unspoken consensus, a veil of silence had been drawn over the period of time before the final battle.

Buffy had come to him as he lay there on the ground of the alley, broken and bleeding, and expressed absolutely no surprise at seeing him alive again. It was only a day later, as he lay healing in a nearby abandoned warehouse, that she told him that he was the only survivor of the battle. Angel was dead.

He got the full story out of Willow later -- the cryptic phone call from Lorne, the hurried gathering of the forces of the Watcher's Council, and their final arrival in L.A., almost too late to make a difference. They had just barely managed to beat back the armies of the Black Thorn, but not before Buffy had watched Angel take a lance to the heart and crumble to dust before her eyes.

Willow didn't supply any details, and Spike never asked. Buffy herself never spoke of Angel again after telling Spike the news. In turn, he found himself remarkably reticent about the events of the past year. It helped that Buffy almost never questioned him about them. She seemed content to have him near, and when she returned to Rome, he followed along -- mostly out of a sense of apathy than anything else. Without any real discussion, with very little fanfare, he found himself installed in her life, in her apartment, and in her bed.

And so they lived and trained and patrolled together, in something like contentment. Although he never brought it up, their final exchange before his death at the Hellmouth was a constant undercurrent to his thoughts.

I love you.

No, you don't. But thanks for saying it.

Part of him still longed to ask Buffy exactly what she had meant by those words, but another part -- the part that embraced the status quo with a quiet, almost-hidden despair -- insisted on silence. He almost thought that she had forgotten what she'd said to him, except that every night she fell asleep squeezing his hand in a grip almost powerful enough to crush his bones.

Several times a month, Buffy would disappear for a few hours at a time, and return smelling of the sterile, medicinal odors of a hospital. One evening, as she lay curled up against him in their bed, she hesitated a moment before finally speaking.

"Do you remember Dana? She's from L.A."

He glanced down at her, but she was studiously avoiding his gaze as she played with his fingers.

"The Slayer, yeah? The crazy one. You know she took my arms off, right?"

Buffy winced slightly. "Yeah, Andrew told me about that. Slayer strength plus psychotic girl isn't exactly a good mix. I can't believe I ever thought Faith was bad news."

He frowned, but she still wasn't looking at him. He was more than half tempted to drop the conversation, to slip into the easy, soporific silence that had been developing between them for months. A sudden frustration -- with Buffy, with himself, with the way he'd aided and abetted his own slide into passivity -- drove him to speak.

"It's not your fault. You know that, right?"

Buffy pulled away from him with a bitter laugh, and he let her go.

"Yeah," she spat out. "Because without me, she'd just be a normal crazy person. Now she has dreams she can't understand, memories that make no sense, and I can't even begin to explain everything to her."

"Wait." Spike sat up suddenly. "She's here in Rome?"

Buffy nodded. "The Council's been treating her here. She's...I don't think we're helping her."

"Maybe she can't be helped." Buffy turned a murderous glance on him, but he held steady. "You can't save everyone, and you've lost people before."

"Not like this," she said quietly. "This girl...I don't even know her, not really. She's been hurt so badly that I can't even begin to think about it, and half of what she says doesn't make any sense. But I can tell that she's hurting. These...Slayer memories, or whatever they are. I've never heard of anything like it. The doctors think that they're a form of waking dreams. I just want to make it easier on her. I have to try."

Spike nodded and tugged her close against him. "I know you don't want to hear this, but maybe the kindest thing...." Buffy threw an elbow into his ribs, pulling away from him again.

"Don't say it," she said fiercely. "I can help her. And maybe you can help her too."

Spike blinked at her. "Me?" he asked incredulously. "Yeah, because that went so well the last time I tried." He snorted. "The bird's off her nut, and there's no amount of talking that gets through to her. Especially not from the likes of me. It's not like she's got good memories of our time together, even when she knows I'm not someone else."

"Yeah, but she talks about you," Buffy persisted. "Or, well, she talks about vampires, something about heads and hearts, and she'll mention William the Bloody. I thought that, if she saw you, you might be able to get through to her somehow."

Spike sighed in defeat, dropping his head back on the pillow. "Yeah," he said dully. "Or she might just lose it altogether and decide to rid me of a few of my other bits and pieces." He shot a glance at Buffy. "What exactly are you trying to do here? That girl will never be normal."

"I..." She turned away, but not before Spike saw her eyes well up slightly. "I just want her to have some peace. What happened to her isn't fair."

"And if she can't?" Buffy shook her head, still not facing him, and her back stiffened. Spike sighed again.

"Right. Okay, I'll do it. Seems I've gotten some practice in dealing with insane Slayers over the years." He tried for a lighter tone, and was relieved when Buffy relaxed slightly. He was really ready to let the subject drop now -- it was a heavier conversation than they'd had in weeks -- but that same reawakened sense of frustration couldn't stop him from pushing.

"Slayer," he said softly, "who is it you're trying to save here?" He didn't say Angel's name, but he knew immediately that Buffy had understood his meaning. Throwing him a reproachful glance, she grabbed one of the pillows and stalked out of the bedroom, slamming the door behind her.

Spike squinted at the dingy building in front of him, a cigarette dangling from his lips. He was standing in one of the narrow alleys off the Via Giulia, near enough to the Campo de' Fiori that his sensitive hearing could still pick up the drunken laughter from the crowds at the outdoor bars. The alley was deserted -- not a big surprise, this close to midnight -- except for a nondescript man lounging almost too casually in the doorway of the building opposite. He seemed to be studying a crack in the plaster of the door frame, but Spike knew that he was being watched. The man had the smell of the Council, something that combined the officious air of the Initiative with the slightly stuffy odor that Giles had always seemed to carry about with him. Spike stepped up to the doorway, and the man straightened his shoulders and gave him an appraising glance.

"You're William the Bloody."

Spike rolled his eyes. Leave it to a Watcher to state the obvious, or to refuse to use any other name but that one. Buffy used to pointedly interrupt any of the Watchers with a blunt, "It's Spike now," but lately she'd stopped bothering. Giles was almost the only one who called him by his chosen name, and trying to correct a Watcher was more likely to lead to a blank stare than anything constructive.

"That's me. I've got an appointment."

The man nodded at him, glancing pointedly at the cigarette still between his lips. Spike heaved a put-upon sigh, taking one last drag before crushing it beneath the sole of his boot. It wasn't like the streets of Rome had a lack of cigarette butts embedded between the cobblestones. He followed the man inside, ducking through the narrow doorway and closing the door behind him.

The interior of the building was surprisingly modern, at odds with the shabby exterior. The tile floor was scrubbed clean and smelled strongly of antiseptic, and the walls had been freshly painted a stark, unforgiving white. The overhead lights were dimmed, illuminating the bank of monitors showing interior views of small rooms and shadowy figures, some lying on narrow beds and others pacing restlessly. Another Watcher behind a long desk gave Spike a look, then rose with a set of keys in his hand.

"Follow me," was all he said, and gestured to a flight of stairs.

"What, no fingerprinting?" Spike asked sarcastically. "No cavity search? Don't want to put out on the first date, is that it? I understand if you're not comfortable with that." The two Watchers merely stared at him, completely stone-faced, and Spike sighed. "Suppose you've had your sense of humor surgically removed like the rest of your lot. Fine, let's get this over with. I've got to get back. Got a Slayer to shag." He didn't know why he was pushing so hard for a reaction, but he supposed his suppressed frustration with the Council had something to do with it. He'd been playing nice for Buffy's sake for the past six months, and the temptation to lash out was almost overwhelming. He needn't have bothered. Apart from an eyelid twitch from one of the Watchers, neither of them blinked. Spike sighed again in defeat, following the man with the keys up the stairs.

He was led to a room at the end of a hallway on the highest floor. The door was bolted shut, with an extra padlock securing it. From the muffled thump the keys made as they rattled against it, Spike surmised that the painted wooden door surrounded a solid metal core. He shivered slightly.

"Ready?" the Watcher asked, raising his eyebrows. At Spike's nod, he swung the door open and stepped just inside, gesturing Spike to stand next to him.

Dana lay on a thin cot against the far wall, wide awake and staring at them with empty eyes. She was dressed in medical scrubs and her hair was neatly brushed and braided. Spike almost didn't recognize her without the smears of blood on her face. She stirred restlessly, and he heard the clank of the restraints wrapped around her wrists and ankles. The small window high above the bed was covered by a thick metal grille overlaying the glass, and in the bright moonlight Spike could see the spots where the metal had been welded to the wall. It looked like repairs had recently been made.

"I suggest you stay on this side of the room," the Watcher said, not taking his eyes off of Dana. "For your own safety, of course."

Spike eyed the Watcher. "Right. Look, are all those chains really necessary?"

The Watcher gave him a surprised look. "You've seen what she's capable of." He raised his eyes, and Spike followed his gaze to the small camera set high in the corner of the ceiling. "We'll be watching you."

"Of course you will," Spike said under his breath as the Watcher slipped outside, shutting and locking the door behind him. He turned to find Dana lying still on the bed, staring at him again. After a moment her nostrils flared and she gave a small smile.

"William the Bloody." Her voice was just as he'd remembered it, fierce and surprisingly deep for such a young girl. She frowned slightly, studying him carefully. "No," she said flatly. "You're not the one."

"Which one is that, pet?" His fingers itched for a cigarette to hold, and he wished there was a chair he could sit on. Not that he particularly wanted to rest, far from it, but he was restless enough that in another moment he would start pacing. He didn't want to admit to any weakness in front of this girl.

"I took his hands," she said. "He can't hurt me anymore." She frowned again, twisting up her mouth. "But you didn't. The monster is dead."

"That's right," Spike said cautiously. "What was his name, Walter? That bit was real, and he's dead. No worries there."

"You're the vampire."

"Yeah," Spike said again, relieved that he seemed to be getting somewhere, and then unnerved by her feral grin.

"Head and heart," she said, with that strange smile that didn't reach her eyes. "Keep cutting till you see dust."

"Right," Spike said, throwing his head back in frustration. "Look, I don't think this is working. Yeah, I'm a vampire. But I'm one of the good guys now, remember?"

"The vampire with a soul." At his nod, she raised her eyes to the ceiling. "Cursed vampire. Poor soul. Get it with hate, lose it with love. And then the monster comes out."

Spike felt a chill run up his spine. Cursed? "I think you've got the wrong vampire. Look, I'm not Angel. You can get that through your head right now."

Dana looked confused, then angry. "You killed them," she snarled. "The Slayers were strong, but you killed them."

"Yes," he breathed, unable to look away from her eyes. He almost missed the brief spark that arose there.

"Are you here to kill me?" Her voice contained a desperate hope that almost drove him to his knees with pity. He'd seen that look in a Slayer's eyes before, that same death wish. He had reveled in it, until that horrible year when he'd seen that same dead look in Buffy's eyes. He hadn't been able to help her then; what in the hell made him think he'd do any good here now? But he found himself unable to walk away.

"No," he said firmly. "No one's dying here. Not you, and not me either. Let's be clear on that."

"You kill the Slayers," she insisted. "Kill them, and love them. Bring them into the darkness."

"No," Spike said again, his voice shaking slightly. He didn't know exactly how much she knew about his history, how much Buffy had told her and how much of it was the bizarre Slayer memory she seemed to have. He had no idea how this worked. He'd expected to be good at this, what with all of his practice with Drusilla, but this girl couldn't be coddled or distracted. She was staring at him with that same creepy intensity she'd had since he'd first entered the room. This wasn't going to work. Whatever Buffy had expected, he couldn't do it. He turned to the camera and gave it a small wave.

"Why are you here, vampire?" Dana asked. Spike slumped slightly, resting his shoulders against the door.

"I don't know," he whispered honestly. Dana had turned her head away from him, staring out the window at the full moon.

"Kill the monster, heart and head," she singsonged. She looked back at him, and her eyes were remarkably clear and lucid. "The monsters kill the innocents. The Slayers kill the monsters. You're my Slayer."

"You're not a monster," Spike said. His voice was shaking worse than ever, and he didn't think he was able to inject the right note of confidence into it. He knew she couldn't be fooled by false reassurances. She had killed, and he honestly wasn't sure how much of it she even remembered. He didn't know how much of her memories were even her own. He had a sudden flashback to his experiences with the First Evil, tortured by his new soul and unsure of what was real anymore. The only thing he'd been sure of was that he was a monster.

And yet Buffy had believed in him.

From the ache in his chest, he could almost believe that his heart was beating again. He needed to say something, but his tongue felt like it was stuck to the roof of his mouth. Dana was looking at him with curiosity and...pity?

"Shhh," she breathed. "It doesn't hurt if you hold still."

That was it. He had to get out of there. Spike heard the keys rattling in the door behind him. With an undignified sound that was far too close to a whimper for his liking, he threw the door open and barreled outside. He heard a grunt as he knocked the breath out of the Watcher standing outside, but he didn't pause in his mad rush down the stairs. He ran out into the cool night air, leaving the sterile building behind him.

Spike didn't plan on ever going back to the hospital.

He finally made his way back to their apartment and collapsed into bed, reeking of alcohol from a quick stop at one of the dingier bars. When Buffy tentatively asked him how it went, he shrugged and turned over without answering. Even though he couldn't see her, he was able to feel her hand hovering over his back from the heat she gave off. She pulled away without touching him, throwing herself into bed next to him with a muttered, "Fine." He felt an uncomfortable mix of guilt, weariness and irritation, but he simply didn't have the mental energy for any type of conversation.

After his initial dismissal, Buffy never asked him again.

Although he did his best not to think about Dana in the days that followed, something about her bothered him. He'd had more than his fair share of dealing with the less than sane, and prophetic statements and sudden odd insights were nothing new to him. But there was something different about this girl that made the skin on the back of his neck crawl. The Slayer thing, he supposed. He knew that Buffy had occasionally had prophetic dreams, but she'd never given any indication that she experienced any kind of direct memories of the lives of previous Slayers. This girl was something different altogether, some unholy combination of Dru's psychic madness and Buffy's strength and focus. It was absolutely eerie, and he couldn't stop thinking about her.

Despite his conscious decision to stay away, Spike found himself pacing restlessly at the entrance to the alley almost two weeks later. The moon hadn't yet risen, and the ambient light from the nearby Via Giulia was barely enough to illuminate the shabby exterior of the hospital halfway down the narrow street. He approached the building reluctantly, drawn by that fascination he hadn't been able to fully articulate to himself.

The same Watcher was leaning in the doorway, and if he was surprised to see Spike again gave no sign. He merely straightened up, looked Spike over coolly, and gestured him inside. Grabbing a set of keys from the man behind the front desk, he started up the staircase nearest the front entrance. When Spike didn't immediately follow, he turned back and raised an eyebrow.

"So, you were expecting me?" The attempt at casual bravado fell flat. The sterile smell was tickling at the back of Spike's nose, making him twitchy.

"She said you were coming," the Watcher answered calmly.

Spike frowned. "I didn't tell Buffy I'd be here."

The Watcher gave a twisted smile and let his eyes flicker upward briefly. "Not her," he said cryptically, then turned his back and made his way up the stairs. Spike followed, suppressing the shiver that ran through him.

Dana was lying on her cot in the darkened room, almost in the same position Spike had last seen her in. The restraints around her wrists and ankles clinked as she shifted slightly, turning to face him.

"William the Bloody," she said in that curiously deep voice, fixing him with her dark eyes. "It's okay," she whispered, as if confiding a secret. "We're all monsters here."

"That we are, pet." He noticed that someone had left a small metal folding chair in the room, and he dragged it over to the door and sat in it, leaning back against the wall. Dana seemed to relax slightly when he sat down.

"Are you here to kill me?"

Spike slammed his eyes shut. "No," he said, trying for patience. "Look, I told you, no one's getting killed around here."

She looked confused, and the sudden lost look in her eyes made her seem ten years younger. "Why are you here?"

The unanswerable question. Guilt? Pity? Curiosity? He still didn't know how these Slayer memories of hers worked, and he suspected the Council didn't either. There was a part of him that desperately wanted to find out whether any of her perceptions of him were based only on the memories of the Slayers that he'd killed. "Why don't you tell me?" he asked. The chair bit into his back uncomfortably, but he refused to move. "Would you like me to leave?" he asked quietly when she didn't answer.

"No," Dana said, her face crumpling slightly. "Stay here, and help me be quiet."

His stomach clenched, but he nodded and tried to smile. Dana finally turned her eyes away to stare out of the window, and they sat there in silence until she fell asleep.

He started coming weekly after that, and then every other day, staying for an hour or two at a time. For the most part, he simply sat and listened. Sometimes she was more lucid, sometimes less, but Spike couldn't shake the suspicion that the unthinkable was happening: he was actually helping her. She seemed calmer after he'd been there, and she stopped asking if he was there to kill her. The Watchers eventually removed her wrist restraints, although her ankles were still bound to the cot. Spike was becoming used to the rare times when her eyes would cloud over and she would address him as Nikki, or as the Chinese Slayer he had killed.

The absolute worst moments were when her voice became Buffy's. Spike would listen with a combination of horror and hopeful desperation to every tiny glimpse that reflected Buffy, especially her feelings about him -- her hatred, her fear, and finally her trust. In his growing obsession, he barely noticed himself drifting farther away from Buffy herself.

One evening, Spike arrived to find Dana unbound and sitting up on her cot, head down and staring at the hands cupped loosely in her lap. The Watcher who had brought him up gave him a smirk and a muttered, "Good luck," before locking him in with her. Spike thrust his hands into his pockets and leaned back against the door.

"So, look at you," he mused. "All up and about, like a good little Slayer."

Dana looked up at him, and there was a manic spark in her eyes that he hadn't seen since L.A. "Spike," she said. "William the Bloody."

"Yeah," he said cautiously. "Thought we'd established that."

"Monster with a soul." She wrinkled her brow and looked up at him. "Do I have a soul?"

Spike frowned and took a step forward. "Human, yeah? Soul's part of the package."

Dana stood and began to pace in front of her cot, looking remarkably steady for someone who had been prostrate for so long. "You belong in the darkness with me," she insisted, holding his gaze. Spike stood completely still as she walked around him, rubbing her shoulder against his body. As she came around to face him, she took his hands in hers. Her fingers were warm and slightly calloused, and she looked down at his hands with a frown. "You can't hurt me anymore," she said softly. Holding him tightly, she raised her head and tilted it, baring her neck to him.

"Heart and head," she whispered. "Have to get home." Closing her eyes, she pressed herself against him.

Spike froze and swallowed hard. He could feel the warmth of Dana's trembling body, and smell the blood flowing just below the surface of her neck. "No," he said harshly, his voice shaking, but Dana merely tightened her fingers around his and raised her mouth to his ear.

"One. Good. Day," she breathed.

Spike jerked away, pushing her to the floor.

"No," he insisted again, running his hands through his hair in distress. He stole a look at the security camera in the corner. "Right, I want out of here, now," he said loudly.

Dana growled and rolled gracefully to her feet with a confused frown. Stepping over to her cot, she flung the thin pillow aside and revealed a stake. She snatched it up and spun around to face Spike, weaving on her toes.

What the fuck? "Now, pet, you don't want to be using that," he soothed. Where did that come from? Where the bloody hell are those Watchers? "Why don't you put that down, and we can...oof!"

He dropped heavily to the floor as Dana leaped on top of him. While she was trying to gain her balance, he caught hold of her waist and flipped her off him. He barely had time to get to his feet before she was on him again.

Spike couldn't believe how strong she still was. She fought him like a berserker, while he did his best to pull his punches as he attempted to disarm her. Within minutes, she had him flat on his back again and was straddling his waist. She panted in triumph and squirmed on top of him. He groaned at her movements, and couldn't help hardening against her. He almost closed his eyes in disgust at himself. Dana grabbed his wrists, the stake biting into his arm as she held him. She lowered her mouth to his ear, pressing her throat against his jaw.

"Have to go home," she whispered again. "Help me." She rocked against him, and Spike closed his eyes at the overwhelming rush of pity. He felt a sudden intense longing for Buffy, and a wild sorrow at the thought that he might already have lost her. Help me. He tried to pull away, but Dana held him tightly.

"Can't do that," he murmured brokenly. "Can't help you that way. This isn't what you want, pet."

She pulled away from him, and he opened his eyes to see the death wish in her face that he'd seen from too many Slayers already, that mixture of hopelessness and utter fatigue that he used to think was so beautiful. Now, it just filled him with sympathy. Dana's face twisted in fury.

"Ask me again why I could never love you," she hissed. Quick as an eel, she raised the stake and brought it swiftly down. As it pierced the skin over his heart, he felt only a dull ache of loss and regret for chances missed.

Buffy...


 

Continued in Part Two