How the Light Gets In (15/16)
Jun. 12th, 2005 12:21 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowscastI've finished another chapter—and now I know that there's only one more after this one. I might return to this 'verse later, but this particular tale is drawing to a close.
Standard intro:
This is part of my Fragments series. It's a sequel to "Late Night Porn Store Blues," which is in turn a prequel to "Human Frailty."
Rating: R for the language at the moment. There might be some sexual content later, depending on how Spike and Xander behave. (What, you think I'd tell you ahead of time?)
Warnings: Spoilers for all of BtVS and AtS. The whole series was originally just an excuse to indulge my hurt/comfort kink. Somehow a plot crept in too (funny how that happens!) but expect lots of hurt/comfort still to come. My Spike's kinda broken, and my Xander's got problems of his own.
Previously in the Fragments 'verse: In "Late Night Porn Store Blues," Giles sent Xander from Rome to LA after hearing rumors of an undetected Slayer there. Xander found the girl, but it turned out to be Illyria, erstwhile god-king and currently roommate of Spike. Xander found Spike working in a porn store and suffering from a migraine, but it wasn't until Angel intervened that Xander realized Spike was now human. Spike was wounded superficially in a fight and also took an overdose of painkillers, so Xander took him to a hospital.
The next day in "How the Light Gets In," Giles asked Xander to recruit Spike for the new Council. Xander went and tried, and in the course of his interaction with Spike he found out that Cordelia was dead. Xander, in turn, informed Spike of Anya's death. The two of them got drunk and mourned together, and there may have been some drunken cuddles but they didn't talk about that in the morning. After sleeping the sleep of the drunk on Spike's couch, Xander had a morning cigarette in the kitchen and unfortunately triggered an apparent asthma attack in Spike. Note to Xander: don't smoke around Spike.
Meanwhile, Xander tried to recruit Illyria for the Council but it didn't seem to work. Then Xander decided to solve some of Spike's problems by getting him fake I.D. Something Giles said on the phone made Xander start to worry that Spike was suicidal, so he confronted him about it. They had dinner together, and Spike managed to convince Xander that he was too afraid of hell to kill himself.
The next day, they went to a gay bar together to buy a CD for Andrew (who is, by the way, gay). At first Spike danced with a stranger while Xander watched and Angel lurked outside and worried about Spike being up past his bedtime, but then Spike got laid in the bathroom and Angel and Xander had a nice conversation and finally Xander got to dance with Spike, and kiss him.
The next day Giles called up with a crisis: he needed Spike to translate an Ancient Greek text so they could stop someone from turning into stone. So Xander pulled Spike out of church, they got printouts of the text, and Spike slightly crashed Xander's rental car while driving to the UCLA library for a dictionary. Spike spent the day translating, and Xander spent the day dealing with crashed-car paperwork and resenting Spike. Then Spike's phone went dead so Xander had to go visit him in person to find out how the translating was going. He discovered that Spike wasn't in good shape; he was getting sick with a cold, and also hadn't eaten for a couple days. Xander went to get food. He came back with KFC, and he shared its greasy goodness with Spike while they chatted a bit. Then Xander slept in Spike's bed while Spike kept working. All that effort finally paid off; Spike found the right page and called Giles.
The following night, Xander showed up at the porn store during Spike's shift with subs to share. He hung around while Spike worked, and finally kissed him. Spike's reaction was unthrilled, and Xander worried he'd made a mistake. They talked in the back room for a while without mentioning the kiss, and Xander seemed to make some progress in convincing Spike to come to Rome. Then Angel came by and had an argument with Spike. He told Xander he was worried because Spike was sick; Xander told him to lay off, but then invited him to work for the Council. Finally Spike left Xander alone in the back room with a bottle of Wild Turkey and a bondage magazine. Xander drank the bourbon and read the magazine, and Spike had to drive him back to his hotel.
At the hotel, Xander drunkenly tried to come on to Spike, but Spike took advantage of Xander's inebriation in a different way: he asked him what his nightmares were about. Xander somehow found the courage to tell him about his terrible experience in the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Slayer he'd let die. Xander then had a cathartic emotional breakdown, and afterwards they talked more calmly, Spike advised telling Giles, and Illyria called to see where Spike was.
Spike stayed the night with Xander at the hotel. In the morning Spike was noticeably sicker than before. Xander left him to sleep in, then came back just in time to help him manage an asthma attack. After a phone call to Illyria, Spike agreed to go to the hospital. He was admitted after passing out in the emergency room. When Illyria and Xander were finally allowed to visit his room, they learned he had pneumonia. Xander suggested that Spike's health problems might stem from something going wrong when he turned human; Spike admitted the possibility and agreed to go to Rome and work for the Council in hopes that their doctors might be able to help him. Also, Xander and Illyria bought Spike a teddy bear.
Previous parts can be found here.
Chapter 15
"So what did Spike want to talk with you about?" Illyria asked as she fastened her seatbelt.
Remembering how Illyria had reacted last time he mentioned the going-to-Rome plan, Xander briefly considered being evasive. She was obviously really worried about Spike, though, so he decided to go with the truth. "We have this theory that something went wrong when he turned human, and that's why he keeps getting sick. If it's true, then maybe the Council can help him."
"So they're going to send a doctor over?"
"No, he's going to go to Italy. Once he's better, obviously." Xander glanced sideways—Illyria was frowning, but it wasn't a scary expression, just a thoughtful one.
"If he goes, I'll go too," she said.
Xander nodded. "I figured you would. That's no problem. I can get you travel documents—"
"Oh, there's no need for that." Illyria flashed him a wry smile. "As far as the government's concerned, Fred Burkle never died. I still have her I.D. and passport and everything."
"Right. Okay." Xander wasn't sure what to say to that. It was a little freaky to dwell on the fact that he was sitting next to the corpse of a murdered woman. "When you're like this—I mean, when you're not, um, blue—are you basically being her?"
"I have access to all her memories. I can reproduce her mannerisms exactly. Even her own parents didn't notice a difference."
"You met her parents?" Okay, that was creepy.
Illyria shrugged absently. "They came by not long after I took over the shell. Wesley was appalled, but he didn't tell me to stop it. They still think she's alive."
"Does it bother Spike when you look and talk like her? I mean, I've noticed you usually change when he's around."
She gave a curt nod. "It bothers him. You missed the turn."
"Oh. Shit."
The rest of the way to Spike and Illyria's place, Xander just concentrated on driving.
***
The battery in Xander's cell phone had just enough charge left in it for him to find out he had four messages, but it died when he tried to find out what they were.
"The charger's back at the hotel," he said. "You'll be okay here, right?"
She rolled her eyes. "I'm immortal and I have superpowers. I think I can handle an afternoon on my own, thanks."
Xander hadn't exactly been concerned about her physically...in fact, he wasn't so much concerned about her as about what she might do to anyone who crossed her path. Plus, Spike had said to watch out for her.
Still, though, she seemed fine.
Back at the hotel, there were three messages and a package waiting for him at the desk. The messages were all from Giles and they all said "Ring me as soon as you get this." The package was from the fake Roman address the Council sometimes used. He opened the package in the elevator on the way up. It had Spike's new I.D. So, that was useful at least.
He called Rome right away even though it was one in the morning there. Giles answered, sounding tense. He didn't even ask Xander why he hadn't been answering his phone all day—he jumped straight to business. "There's a situation in South Africa."
Xander felt his hand clenching tight around the phone; he sat down on the bed and made a conscious effort to relax his grip. "Shit. Giles. I told you I am not going back—"
"I know," Giles cut him off. "But this is South Africa, not the Congo. It's an entirely different situation, a crisis of supernatural rather than human origin. We had a distress call from Thandiwe."
Thandiwe was a Slayer—one of those who'd chosen not to join the Council, or even to travel to Rome. She was one of the youngest Slayers Xander had found, only twelve when Willow cast the spell. He'd explained the situation to her and her parents—in English, yay British imperialism—and her parents had decided that she was too young to go to Rome for training. She had a bright, crooked smile and she loved playing soccer. "What happened?" Xander asked, filled with sudden dread.
"The town was attacked by vampires. From what she said, there were at least thirty of them—more than we've known to ally together since the Master tried to open the Sunnydale Hellmouth. They drove all the humans down into the mine."
"Jesus. That's—thousands of people."
"Indeed. And Thandiwe is planning to rescue them."
Xander closed his eye—his one eye—and rubbed his temple. "Okay, but what does this have to do with me? That's a job for Slayers. My suggestion would be lots of Slayers, but hey, you're the boss man..."
"Rona's group boarded a flight to Johannesburg two hours ago," Giles said. "But you're the only one who knows Thandiwe—the only one of us she knows..."
"I can't."
"Xander, this may be the best way to get past the difficulties arising from your last visit to Africa."
That was bullshit, and Xander knew it—stiff-upper-lip Watcherly bullshit. But anyway, it wasn't the point. The thought of going back to Africa didn't make him start shaking and flashing on gunpowder and blood, not now. He knew he wasn't what you'd call 'over it,' but spilling his secret to Spike had made a difference...and this was all very significant in a personal growth kind of way but still not the point. "I can't leave LA, Giles. Spike's sick."
"Pardon?"
"He's got pneumonia, it's pretty serious. I just got back from the hospital."
"Oh." Giles was clearly thrown for a loop. "Oh dear. When did he become ill?"
"It happened pretty fast. I mean, he was sick on Sunday when he was working on that translation with you, but it was just, like, a cold. Yesterday at the store he seemed better, but Angel was worried about him...which reminds me, I recruited Angel for the Council."
"Excuse me?"
"And Spike's agreed to it, too, by the way, and if you order now we'll throw in a primordial god-king for the low, low price of absolutely nothing."
"Perhaps you had better back up a bit, Xander, and explain what you've been up to for the past couple days." Giles sounded kind of irritated, but Xander wasn't sure if that was because of him recruiting Angel and Illyria along with Spike or just because he wasn't already hopping on a plane to Johannesburg.
So he gave Giles the Reader's Digest version of the past couple days, skipping the parts about bourbon and kissing and blood-soaked secrets. He told him the things he'd learned—how Angel was spending his nights brooding in a derelict hotel and seemed like he was ready to start fighting for the good guys again, and how Spike had been getting sick ever since he turned human.
"That is troubling," Giles admitted when Xander got to the part where Spike confessed his fear that he'd come back wrong. "I wonder...could it be something as simple as his immune system being out of date? I think you were quite right in your recommendation; he'll be better off here. But in any case, now that he's getting medical care he doesn't need you. Thandiwe does."
"Giles, this is America and he doesn't have insurance. They're going to discharge him as soon as they possibly can, and I'm not leaving him with just Illyria to take care of him. She didn't notice when he didn't fucking eat for two days."
"What about Angel? You mentioned that he seemed quite concerned for Spike's welfare."
"Not possible. Spike won't invite him in."
"Interesting," Giles said, sounding exasperated. "Why not?"
"I never asked. I assumed it was something to do with Angel being an asshole."
It wasn't like Giles was going to contradict him on that one. Xander thought he heard a muffled snort of laughter.
"The point is, Spike hasn't got anyone else. I can't leave him."
"Spike must be greatly changed," Giles mused. "It's quite unprecedented to hear you advocating for him."
"Uh, yeah," Xander agreed. Really, he wasn't sure Spike had changed much at all...but something sure had.
Giles really doesn't need to know about the kissing.
Giles didn't seem to notice the lack of conviction in Xander's reply. "I think we can solve this problem," he said. "For one thing, now that Spike's agreed to work with us, the Council will cover his medical expenses."
"Okay, that'll help. But he still shouldn't be on his own—"
"Quite right. I'll send Willow and Kennedy to stay with him until he's ready to make the journey to Rome."
Xander's resistance to the plan made it easy to see its logical flaws. "Don't you think Willow would be more useful than me for fighting thirty vampires? I mean, she could take them all out with a box of office supplies."
"Willow isn't available for the mission," Giles said, suddenly evasive.
"But she's available to come to LA?"
Giles cleared his throat. "She won't be able to do magic for the next several months."
"What?" A whole new texture of worry rippled through Xander's stomach. "What happened?"
"Oh, no, it's—it's nothing to worry about," Giles assured him. "You had really better ask her yourself." Xander's fear abated at his tone; he sounded bemused more than anything. "So that's settled then?"
Xander knuckled his forehead and let himself dwell for a moment on how much it sucked that he had to choose between being there for Spike and helping to save thousands of people. Couldn't the fucking universe get things lined up better, give him one crisis at a time? "Yeah," he said, pushing the words out despite himself, "I guess that'll work."
***
The elevator door was closing to take Xander up to Spike's floor when someone's fingers intervened. Xander hit 'open door'—and regretted it as soon as he saw who it was.
"Angel."
"Xander?" Angel hesitated, looking disconcerted, but when the doors started closing again he quickly stepped inside.
"How did you find out he was here?"
"Illyria." Angel glared at Xander, but kept well to his own side of the elevator. "I told you this would happen."
The fact that Angel was right did absolutely nothing to make Xander like him more. "You really have no conception of how much you're not wanted here, do you?"
Angel rubbed his thumb over the knuckles of his other hand. "Are you planning to try to keep me away from Spike?"
Xander considered it. He was still considering it when the elevator dinged open—but really, short of making a scene that would get them both kicked out, what could he do?
It was dinner time in the ward. The middle bed in Spike's room now held a twenty-something guy who was spooning up his jello while talking in rapid Spanish with a pretty, dark-haired girl. The old guy in the last bed was slowly working on his vegetables, keeping his gaze on the room's muted TV. As for Spike, he seemed to be asleep; his tray of food sat untouched off to the side. The teddy bear was still tucked into the crook of his arm.
Xander wasn't sure it was a good idea to wake him up, but he had to talk to him. Giles had booked Xander on a midnight flight to Johannesburg; he'd be heading straight to the airport from the hospital. Xander had talked to Willow and cleared the plan with her, so all that was left was to make sure Spike didn't go all wiggy at the idea...
God, I can't believe Willow's pregnant.
Angel, meanwhile, was frozen in the doorway. Knowing from first-hand experience that invitations weren't an issue for vampires visiting hospital rooms, Xander left him to get over it.
"Hi Spike," he said quietly, sitting in the chair at the side of the bed. "You awake?" Spike didn't respond, so Xander gently squeezed his hand. He opened his eyes just as Angel finally came into the room. There wasn't another chair, so Angel was left looming over the bed.
Spike glanced up at Angel, then at Xander. "Should've told me there was going to be a party, I would've got beer," he joked weakly. As he spoke, he threaded his fingers through Xander's.
Xander's heart sped up when he realized what Spike was doing. We're holding hands. In front of Angel.
Angel either didn't notice or pretended not to. "Illyria told me you're going to Rome," he said. "She thinks the Council's doctors are going to help you."
Spike gave a slight shrug. "That's the general idea."
"I've agreed to work for the Council too," Angel said.
Spike's eyes went wide at that, and he turned to Xander for confirmation.
Xander suddenly realized that Spike might be upset that he'd recruited Angel, too. Shit. "I figured, why should we hog all the fun?" he said, squeezing Spike's hand conspiratorially. "There's been a posse of slime demons terrorizing Ecuador all month. I bet Angel could handle them."
Spike grinned, and Angel looked vaguely uncomfortable and possibly pissed off, so that was all right.
"I talked to Giles," Xander added. "He's going to put everything in motion. Oh, and—" with his free hand he pulled Spike's new passport and green card out of his pocket, "—you're all set up now for international travel."
Spike let go of Xander's hand to take the documents. Opening up the passport, he raised his eyebrow. "He named me Will Smith?"
Xander hadn't looked carefully at the name Giles had chosen; now he stifled a snort of laughter. "Hey, at least he didn't go with Spike Jonze."
Angel looked perplexed. "Smith is a very common surname, isn't it? I don't see the problem."
"There's no problem," Xander said with a shrug. "It is a common name—there's probably like a hundred William Smiths in LA." He started humming the 'Fresh Prince of Bel-Air' theme under his breath until Spike glared at him.
"Look, you'd better hang on to these things 'till I get out of here," Spike said, holding out the documents to Xander again. "Got no bloody privacy in this place."
"Uh, no can do." Xander winced inwardly, hating what he had to say. "I'm leaving, Spike. Tonight." He reached for Spike's hand again, explaining quickly before the surprised look in Spike's eyes could turn into anything worse. "When I talked to Giles he told me about this huge crisis in South Africa. A bunch of vampires have taken over a gold mine and taken thousands of prisoners, and there's a local Slayer but I'm the only one who knows her."
"Oh," Spike said. "Well, I suppose you'd better go save the world, then."
"I'll look after Spike," Angel promised quickly.
Spike bristled at that. "No you won't, you bloody poof."
"No, he won't," Xander agreed emphatically, daring Angel with a glance to make a thing of this. "Willow and Kennedy are going to come stay with you when you get out of the hospital, until you're ready to go to Rome."
"I don't need anyone looking after me," Spike muttered, glaring at both of them in turn. "And it'd be nice to be bloody well consulted about these things."
Xander didn't bother arguing the point with Spike; he figured that with Angel listening in there was no way Spike would admit to needing anyone to take care of him. Instead, he just squeezed Spike's hand and apologized. "Sorry. Everything's happening really fast, there wasn't time to talk to you first."
Spike seemed to accept that. "Be nice to see Red again," he acknowledged, and stifled a cough.
The Willow solution seemed to satisfy Angel, too; at least he wasn't arguing. "I'll give your ID to Illyria," he offered, getting back to the original topic. "It'll be safe in your apartment."
"All right." To Xander's surprise, Spike handed over the documents.
Just as Angel was tucking the fake ID into his pocket, a nurse came into the room. Angel stood aside so she could check Spike's readouts and his IV. She frowned at the untouched meal tray. "No appetite, Ian? You really should try to eat."
"I will, luv," Spike promised. "Just been busy talking with my friends here." The nurse moved on, and Xander pulled the table with the meal tray on it into position so Spike could reach it. Spike grimaced at the food—limp grilled chicken, mushy peas and carrots and red jello. "'m really not hungry," he muttered.
Xander found himself exchanging a worried look with Angel; he broke eye contact before Spike could catch them. "Just try some of the jello," he suggested, "even a hospital kitchen can't screw that up."
So Xander and Angel ended up making small talk of the who's-where-doing-what-now variety while Spike ate. Xander shared the bombshell that Willow had dropped on the phone, and found them a lot less surprised than he had been.
"Who's the daddy, then?" Spike asked around a mouthful of jello.
"She didn't say. She's still with Kennedy, so...yeah, I have no idea."
"It's not mystical, is it?" Angel asked, looking suddenly worried.
"Probably just one of them turkey baster deals," Spike suggested, looking cheerful at the confused and grossed out looks that he elicited from Angel and Xander respectively.
Having eaten the jello and a couple bites of the chicken, Spike laid down his plastic fork and knife and closed his eyes.
"Spike? Are you all right?" Angel asked before Xander could.
"Just fagged out is all."
"I'll fix the bed," Xander said. They'd raised it to its maximum angle so that Spike would have support for sitting up while he ate; now Xander lowered it to the position it had been in when they came in. "Maybe we should go, so you can sleep."
"Angel, you'll get that stuff to Illyria, right?" Spike said. "I want a word with Harris before he goes."
"Right." Angel hesitated, then turned to go. "I'll be back tomorrow."
"I know you will."
When the door closed behind Angel, Xander shook his head. "I don't get you and him."
Spike gave a faint smile. "S'pose it's complicated. Family always is, innit?"
"Do you still think of him as family?"
"Don't know what we are, exactly. That'd be one of the complicated bits." Spike looked at Xander uncertainly. "Xander? What are we?"
Hell if I know. Xander rubbed the back of his neck and focused for a moment on the teddy bear. "Damn, Spike, you gotta warn a guy before you ask a question like that." He waited for Spike to say something, to help him out, but Spike just waited. "I'm not sure if we're anything, yet."
"Oh." Fuck—Spike sounded hurt. "Well, I just wanted to know," he said, and the hurt Xander had heard in the first syllable was gone now, covered up with as much flippancy as Spike could muster when he was this close to passing out. "Good luck in Africa and all."
"I said that wrong." Xander reached for Spike's hand. "I mean, we're something, we're old comrades-in-arms, we're friends...if we hadn't both been really fucked up I think we would've had sex by now."
The flow of Spanish conversation from the next bed faltered for a moment, and Xander belatedly realized he should probably lower his voice.
"Thought you wanted to shag me because you were fucked up," Spike said, but he let Xander hold his hand.
It wasn't something he could flat-out deny. "This is confusing as hell, okay? I didn't expect to ever like you, but now I do, and it completely sucks that you're sick and that I have to leave, but...I'll see you in Rome, right?"
"I like you too, Xander," Spike said, hardly above a whisper. "When do you have to leave for the airport?"
Xander glanced at his watch. International flight, leaving at midnight... "About an hour."
"Stay here till then?"
"Sure." Xander squeezed Spike's hand, feeling almost giddy just because Spike wanted him to stay. "I'd like that."
Spike fell asleep quickly after that, his right arm wrapped around the teddy bear and his left hand in Xander's. Xander sat there, watching him breathe. He wondered whether they'd be able to pick up from here when they saw each other again, or would it be all weird. He wondered how he'd stopped himself from realizing in Sunnydale how beautiful Spike was. He wondered what the hell Spike saw in him, why he let Xander in while chasing Angel away.
Then the time was up and Xander had to leave. He slipped his hand out of Spike's as gently as possible. He hesitated, then kissed him lightly on the forehead. Spike didn't stir. "Bye," Xander whispered, not expecting to be heard. "See you soon."
Standard intro:
This is part of my Fragments series. It's a sequel to "Late Night Porn Store Blues," which is in turn a prequel to "Human Frailty."
Rating: R for the language at the moment. There might be some sexual content later, depending on how Spike and Xander behave. (What, you think I'd tell you ahead of time?)
Warnings: Spoilers for all of BtVS and AtS. The whole series was originally just an excuse to indulge my hurt/comfort kink. Somehow a plot crept in too (funny how that happens!) but expect lots of hurt/comfort still to come. My Spike's kinda broken, and my Xander's got problems of his own.
Previously in the Fragments 'verse: In "Late Night Porn Store Blues," Giles sent Xander from Rome to LA after hearing rumors of an undetected Slayer there. Xander found the girl, but it turned out to be Illyria, erstwhile god-king and currently roommate of Spike. Xander found Spike working in a porn store and suffering from a migraine, but it wasn't until Angel intervened that Xander realized Spike was now human. Spike was wounded superficially in a fight and also took an overdose of painkillers, so Xander took him to a hospital.
The next day in "How the Light Gets In," Giles asked Xander to recruit Spike for the new Council. Xander went and tried, and in the course of his interaction with Spike he found out that Cordelia was dead. Xander, in turn, informed Spike of Anya's death. The two of them got drunk and mourned together, and there may have been some drunken cuddles but they didn't talk about that in the morning. After sleeping the sleep of the drunk on Spike's couch, Xander had a morning cigarette in the kitchen and unfortunately triggered an apparent asthma attack in Spike. Note to Xander: don't smoke around Spike.
Meanwhile, Xander tried to recruit Illyria for the Council but it didn't seem to work. Then Xander decided to solve some of Spike's problems by getting him fake I.D. Something Giles said on the phone made Xander start to worry that Spike was suicidal, so he confronted him about it. They had dinner together, and Spike managed to convince Xander that he was too afraid of hell to kill himself.
The next day, they went to a gay bar together to buy a CD for Andrew (who is, by the way, gay). At first Spike danced with a stranger while Xander watched and Angel lurked outside and worried about Spike being up past his bedtime, but then Spike got laid in the bathroom and Angel and Xander had a nice conversation and finally Xander got to dance with Spike, and kiss him.
The next day Giles called up with a crisis: he needed Spike to translate an Ancient Greek text so they could stop someone from turning into stone. So Xander pulled Spike out of church, they got printouts of the text, and Spike slightly crashed Xander's rental car while driving to the UCLA library for a dictionary. Spike spent the day translating, and Xander spent the day dealing with crashed-car paperwork and resenting Spike. Then Spike's phone went dead so Xander had to go visit him in person to find out how the translating was going. He discovered that Spike wasn't in good shape; he was getting sick with a cold, and also hadn't eaten for a couple days. Xander went to get food. He came back with KFC, and he shared its greasy goodness with Spike while they chatted a bit. Then Xander slept in Spike's bed while Spike kept working. All that effort finally paid off; Spike found the right page and called Giles.
The following night, Xander showed up at the porn store during Spike's shift with subs to share. He hung around while Spike worked, and finally kissed him. Spike's reaction was unthrilled, and Xander worried he'd made a mistake. They talked in the back room for a while without mentioning the kiss, and Xander seemed to make some progress in convincing Spike to come to Rome. Then Angel came by and had an argument with Spike. He told Xander he was worried because Spike was sick; Xander told him to lay off, but then invited him to work for the Council. Finally Spike left Xander alone in the back room with a bottle of Wild Turkey and a bondage magazine. Xander drank the bourbon and read the magazine, and Spike had to drive him back to his hotel.
At the hotel, Xander drunkenly tried to come on to Spike, but Spike took advantage of Xander's inebriation in a different way: he asked him what his nightmares were about. Xander somehow found the courage to tell him about his terrible experience in the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Slayer he'd let die. Xander then had a cathartic emotional breakdown, and afterwards they talked more calmly, Spike advised telling Giles, and Illyria called to see where Spike was.
Spike stayed the night with Xander at the hotel. In the morning Spike was noticeably sicker than before. Xander left him to sleep in, then came back just in time to help him manage an asthma attack. After a phone call to Illyria, Spike agreed to go to the hospital. He was admitted after passing out in the emergency room. When Illyria and Xander were finally allowed to visit his room, they learned he had pneumonia. Xander suggested that Spike's health problems might stem from something going wrong when he turned human; Spike admitted the possibility and agreed to go to Rome and work for the Council in hopes that their doctors might be able to help him. Also, Xander and Illyria bought Spike a teddy bear.
Previous parts can be found here.
"So what did Spike want to talk with you about?" Illyria asked as she fastened her seatbelt.
Remembering how Illyria had reacted last time he mentioned the going-to-Rome plan, Xander briefly considered being evasive. She was obviously really worried about Spike, though, so he decided to go with the truth. "We have this theory that something went wrong when he turned human, and that's why he keeps getting sick. If it's true, then maybe the Council can help him."
"So they're going to send a doctor over?"
"No, he's going to go to Italy. Once he's better, obviously." Xander glanced sideways—Illyria was frowning, but it wasn't a scary expression, just a thoughtful one.
"If he goes, I'll go too," she said.
Xander nodded. "I figured you would. That's no problem. I can get you travel documents—"
"Oh, there's no need for that." Illyria flashed him a wry smile. "As far as the government's concerned, Fred Burkle never died. I still have her I.D. and passport and everything."
"Right. Okay." Xander wasn't sure what to say to that. It was a little freaky to dwell on the fact that he was sitting next to the corpse of a murdered woman. "When you're like this—I mean, when you're not, um, blue—are you basically being her?"
"I have access to all her memories. I can reproduce her mannerisms exactly. Even her own parents didn't notice a difference."
"You met her parents?" Okay, that was creepy.
Illyria shrugged absently. "They came by not long after I took over the shell. Wesley was appalled, but he didn't tell me to stop it. They still think she's alive."
"Does it bother Spike when you look and talk like her? I mean, I've noticed you usually change when he's around."
She gave a curt nod. "It bothers him. You missed the turn."
"Oh. Shit."
The rest of the way to Spike and Illyria's place, Xander just concentrated on driving.
The battery in Xander's cell phone had just enough charge left in it for him to find out he had four messages, but it died when he tried to find out what they were.
"The charger's back at the hotel," he said. "You'll be okay here, right?"
She rolled her eyes. "I'm immortal and I have superpowers. I think I can handle an afternoon on my own, thanks."
Xander hadn't exactly been concerned about her physically...in fact, he wasn't so much concerned about her as about what she might do to anyone who crossed her path. Plus, Spike had said to watch out for her.
Still, though, she seemed fine.
Back at the hotel, there were three messages and a package waiting for him at the desk. The messages were all from Giles and they all said "Ring me as soon as you get this." The package was from the fake Roman address the Council sometimes used. He opened the package in the elevator on the way up. It had Spike's new I.D. So, that was useful at least.
He called Rome right away even though it was one in the morning there. Giles answered, sounding tense. He didn't even ask Xander why he hadn't been answering his phone all day—he jumped straight to business. "There's a situation in South Africa."
Xander felt his hand clenching tight around the phone; he sat down on the bed and made a conscious effort to relax his grip. "Shit. Giles. I told you I am not going back—"
"I know," Giles cut him off. "But this is South Africa, not the Congo. It's an entirely different situation, a crisis of supernatural rather than human origin. We had a distress call from Thandiwe."
Thandiwe was a Slayer—one of those who'd chosen not to join the Council, or even to travel to Rome. She was one of the youngest Slayers Xander had found, only twelve when Willow cast the spell. He'd explained the situation to her and her parents—in English, yay British imperialism—and her parents had decided that she was too young to go to Rome for training. She had a bright, crooked smile and she loved playing soccer. "What happened?" Xander asked, filled with sudden dread.
"The town was attacked by vampires. From what she said, there were at least thirty of them—more than we've known to ally together since the Master tried to open the Sunnydale Hellmouth. They drove all the humans down into the mine."
"Jesus. That's—thousands of people."
"Indeed. And Thandiwe is planning to rescue them."
Xander closed his eye—his one eye—and rubbed his temple. "Okay, but what does this have to do with me? That's a job for Slayers. My suggestion would be lots of Slayers, but hey, you're the boss man..."
"Rona's group boarded a flight to Johannesburg two hours ago," Giles said. "But you're the only one who knows Thandiwe—the only one of us she knows..."
"I can't."
"Xander, this may be the best way to get past the difficulties arising from your last visit to Africa."
That was bullshit, and Xander knew it—stiff-upper-lip Watcherly bullshit. But anyway, it wasn't the point. The thought of going back to Africa didn't make him start shaking and flashing on gunpowder and blood, not now. He knew he wasn't what you'd call 'over it,' but spilling his secret to Spike had made a difference...and this was all very significant in a personal growth kind of way but still not the point. "I can't leave LA, Giles. Spike's sick."
"Pardon?"
"He's got pneumonia, it's pretty serious. I just got back from the hospital."
"Oh." Giles was clearly thrown for a loop. "Oh dear. When did he become ill?"
"It happened pretty fast. I mean, he was sick on Sunday when he was working on that translation with you, but it was just, like, a cold. Yesterday at the store he seemed better, but Angel was worried about him...which reminds me, I recruited Angel for the Council."
"Excuse me?"
"And Spike's agreed to it, too, by the way, and if you order now we'll throw in a primordial god-king for the low, low price of absolutely nothing."
"Perhaps you had better back up a bit, Xander, and explain what you've been up to for the past couple days." Giles sounded kind of irritated, but Xander wasn't sure if that was because of him recruiting Angel and Illyria along with Spike or just because he wasn't already hopping on a plane to Johannesburg.
So he gave Giles the Reader's Digest version of the past couple days, skipping the parts about bourbon and kissing and blood-soaked secrets. He told him the things he'd learned—how Angel was spending his nights brooding in a derelict hotel and seemed like he was ready to start fighting for the good guys again, and how Spike had been getting sick ever since he turned human.
"That is troubling," Giles admitted when Xander got to the part where Spike confessed his fear that he'd come back wrong. "I wonder...could it be something as simple as his immune system being out of date? I think you were quite right in your recommendation; he'll be better off here. But in any case, now that he's getting medical care he doesn't need you. Thandiwe does."
"Giles, this is America and he doesn't have insurance. They're going to discharge him as soon as they possibly can, and I'm not leaving him with just Illyria to take care of him. She didn't notice when he didn't fucking eat for two days."
"What about Angel? You mentioned that he seemed quite concerned for Spike's welfare."
"Not possible. Spike won't invite him in."
"Interesting," Giles said, sounding exasperated. "Why not?"
"I never asked. I assumed it was something to do with Angel being an asshole."
It wasn't like Giles was going to contradict him on that one. Xander thought he heard a muffled snort of laughter.
"The point is, Spike hasn't got anyone else. I can't leave him."
"Spike must be greatly changed," Giles mused. "It's quite unprecedented to hear you advocating for him."
"Uh, yeah," Xander agreed. Really, he wasn't sure Spike had changed much at all...but something sure had.
Giles really doesn't need to know about the kissing.
Giles didn't seem to notice the lack of conviction in Xander's reply. "I think we can solve this problem," he said. "For one thing, now that Spike's agreed to work with us, the Council will cover his medical expenses."
"Okay, that'll help. But he still shouldn't be on his own—"
"Quite right. I'll send Willow and Kennedy to stay with him until he's ready to make the journey to Rome."
Xander's resistance to the plan made it easy to see its logical flaws. "Don't you think Willow would be more useful than me for fighting thirty vampires? I mean, she could take them all out with a box of office supplies."
"Willow isn't available for the mission," Giles said, suddenly evasive.
"But she's available to come to LA?"
Giles cleared his throat. "She won't be able to do magic for the next several months."
"What?" A whole new texture of worry rippled through Xander's stomach. "What happened?"
"Oh, no, it's—it's nothing to worry about," Giles assured him. "You had really better ask her yourself." Xander's fear abated at his tone; he sounded bemused more than anything. "So that's settled then?"
Xander knuckled his forehead and let himself dwell for a moment on how much it sucked that he had to choose between being there for Spike and helping to save thousands of people. Couldn't the fucking universe get things lined up better, give him one crisis at a time? "Yeah," he said, pushing the words out despite himself, "I guess that'll work."
The elevator door was closing to take Xander up to Spike's floor when someone's fingers intervened. Xander hit 'open door'—and regretted it as soon as he saw who it was.
"Angel."
"Xander?" Angel hesitated, looking disconcerted, but when the doors started closing again he quickly stepped inside.
"How did you find out he was here?"
"Illyria." Angel glared at Xander, but kept well to his own side of the elevator. "I told you this would happen."
The fact that Angel was right did absolutely nothing to make Xander like him more. "You really have no conception of how much you're not wanted here, do you?"
Angel rubbed his thumb over the knuckles of his other hand. "Are you planning to try to keep me away from Spike?"
Xander considered it. He was still considering it when the elevator dinged open—but really, short of making a scene that would get them both kicked out, what could he do?
It was dinner time in the ward. The middle bed in Spike's room now held a twenty-something guy who was spooning up his jello while talking in rapid Spanish with a pretty, dark-haired girl. The old guy in the last bed was slowly working on his vegetables, keeping his gaze on the room's muted TV. As for Spike, he seemed to be asleep; his tray of food sat untouched off to the side. The teddy bear was still tucked into the crook of his arm.
Xander wasn't sure it was a good idea to wake him up, but he had to talk to him. Giles had booked Xander on a midnight flight to Johannesburg; he'd be heading straight to the airport from the hospital. Xander had talked to Willow and cleared the plan with her, so all that was left was to make sure Spike didn't go all wiggy at the idea...
God, I can't believe Willow's pregnant.
Angel, meanwhile, was frozen in the doorway. Knowing from first-hand experience that invitations weren't an issue for vampires visiting hospital rooms, Xander left him to get over it.
"Hi Spike," he said quietly, sitting in the chair at the side of the bed. "You awake?" Spike didn't respond, so Xander gently squeezed his hand. He opened his eyes just as Angel finally came into the room. There wasn't another chair, so Angel was left looming over the bed.
Spike glanced up at Angel, then at Xander. "Should've told me there was going to be a party, I would've got beer," he joked weakly. As he spoke, he threaded his fingers through Xander's.
Xander's heart sped up when he realized what Spike was doing. We're holding hands. In front of Angel.
Angel either didn't notice or pretended not to. "Illyria told me you're going to Rome," he said. "She thinks the Council's doctors are going to help you."
Spike gave a slight shrug. "That's the general idea."
"I've agreed to work for the Council too," Angel said.
Spike's eyes went wide at that, and he turned to Xander for confirmation.
Xander suddenly realized that Spike might be upset that he'd recruited Angel, too. Shit. "I figured, why should we hog all the fun?" he said, squeezing Spike's hand conspiratorially. "There's been a posse of slime demons terrorizing Ecuador all month. I bet Angel could handle them."
Spike grinned, and Angel looked vaguely uncomfortable and possibly pissed off, so that was all right.
"I talked to Giles," Xander added. "He's going to put everything in motion. Oh, and—" with his free hand he pulled Spike's new passport and green card out of his pocket, "—you're all set up now for international travel."
Spike let go of Xander's hand to take the documents. Opening up the passport, he raised his eyebrow. "He named me Will Smith?"
Xander hadn't looked carefully at the name Giles had chosen; now he stifled a snort of laughter. "Hey, at least he didn't go with Spike Jonze."
Angel looked perplexed. "Smith is a very common surname, isn't it? I don't see the problem."
"There's no problem," Xander said with a shrug. "It is a common name—there's probably like a hundred William Smiths in LA." He started humming the 'Fresh Prince of Bel-Air' theme under his breath until Spike glared at him.
"Look, you'd better hang on to these things 'till I get out of here," Spike said, holding out the documents to Xander again. "Got no bloody privacy in this place."
"Uh, no can do." Xander winced inwardly, hating what he had to say. "I'm leaving, Spike. Tonight." He reached for Spike's hand again, explaining quickly before the surprised look in Spike's eyes could turn into anything worse. "When I talked to Giles he told me about this huge crisis in South Africa. A bunch of vampires have taken over a gold mine and taken thousands of prisoners, and there's a local Slayer but I'm the only one who knows her."
"Oh," Spike said. "Well, I suppose you'd better go save the world, then."
"I'll look after Spike," Angel promised quickly.
Spike bristled at that. "No you won't, you bloody poof."
"No, he won't," Xander agreed emphatically, daring Angel with a glance to make a thing of this. "Willow and Kennedy are going to come stay with you when you get out of the hospital, until you're ready to go to Rome."
"I don't need anyone looking after me," Spike muttered, glaring at both of them in turn. "And it'd be nice to be bloody well consulted about these things."
Xander didn't bother arguing the point with Spike; he figured that with Angel listening in there was no way Spike would admit to needing anyone to take care of him. Instead, he just squeezed Spike's hand and apologized. "Sorry. Everything's happening really fast, there wasn't time to talk to you first."
Spike seemed to accept that. "Be nice to see Red again," he acknowledged, and stifled a cough.
The Willow solution seemed to satisfy Angel, too; at least he wasn't arguing. "I'll give your ID to Illyria," he offered, getting back to the original topic. "It'll be safe in your apartment."
"All right." To Xander's surprise, Spike handed over the documents.
Just as Angel was tucking the fake ID into his pocket, a nurse came into the room. Angel stood aside so she could check Spike's readouts and his IV. She frowned at the untouched meal tray. "No appetite, Ian? You really should try to eat."
"I will, luv," Spike promised. "Just been busy talking with my friends here." The nurse moved on, and Xander pulled the table with the meal tray on it into position so Spike could reach it. Spike grimaced at the food—limp grilled chicken, mushy peas and carrots and red jello. "'m really not hungry," he muttered.
Xander found himself exchanging a worried look with Angel; he broke eye contact before Spike could catch them. "Just try some of the jello," he suggested, "even a hospital kitchen can't screw that up."
So Xander and Angel ended up making small talk of the who's-where-doing-what-now variety while Spike ate. Xander shared the bombshell that Willow had dropped on the phone, and found them a lot less surprised than he had been.
"Who's the daddy, then?" Spike asked around a mouthful of jello.
"She didn't say. She's still with Kennedy, so...yeah, I have no idea."
"It's not mystical, is it?" Angel asked, looking suddenly worried.
"Probably just one of them turkey baster deals," Spike suggested, looking cheerful at the confused and grossed out looks that he elicited from Angel and Xander respectively.
Having eaten the jello and a couple bites of the chicken, Spike laid down his plastic fork and knife and closed his eyes.
"Spike? Are you all right?" Angel asked before Xander could.
"Just fagged out is all."
"I'll fix the bed," Xander said. They'd raised it to its maximum angle so that Spike would have support for sitting up while he ate; now Xander lowered it to the position it had been in when they came in. "Maybe we should go, so you can sleep."
"Angel, you'll get that stuff to Illyria, right?" Spike said. "I want a word with Harris before he goes."
"Right." Angel hesitated, then turned to go. "I'll be back tomorrow."
"I know you will."
When the door closed behind Angel, Xander shook his head. "I don't get you and him."
Spike gave a faint smile. "S'pose it's complicated. Family always is, innit?"
"Do you still think of him as family?"
"Don't know what we are, exactly. That'd be one of the complicated bits." Spike looked at Xander uncertainly. "Xander? What are we?"
Hell if I know. Xander rubbed the back of his neck and focused for a moment on the teddy bear. "Damn, Spike, you gotta warn a guy before you ask a question like that." He waited for Spike to say something, to help him out, but Spike just waited. "I'm not sure if we're anything, yet."
"Oh." Fuck—Spike sounded hurt. "Well, I just wanted to know," he said, and the hurt Xander had heard in the first syllable was gone now, covered up with as much flippancy as Spike could muster when he was this close to passing out. "Good luck in Africa and all."
"I said that wrong." Xander reached for Spike's hand. "I mean, we're something, we're old comrades-in-arms, we're friends...if we hadn't both been really fucked up I think we would've had sex by now."
The flow of Spanish conversation from the next bed faltered for a moment, and Xander belatedly realized he should probably lower his voice.
"Thought you wanted to shag me because you were fucked up," Spike said, but he let Xander hold his hand.
It wasn't something he could flat-out deny. "This is confusing as hell, okay? I didn't expect to ever like you, but now I do, and it completely sucks that you're sick and that I have to leave, but...I'll see you in Rome, right?"
"I like you too, Xander," Spike said, hardly above a whisper. "When do you have to leave for the airport?"
Xander glanced at his watch. International flight, leaving at midnight... "About an hour."
"Stay here till then?"
"Sure." Xander squeezed Spike's hand, feeling almost giddy just because Spike wanted him to stay. "I'd like that."
Spike fell asleep quickly after that, his right arm wrapped around the teddy bear and his left hand in Xander's. Xander sat there, watching him breathe. He wondered whether they'd be able to pick up from here when they saw each other again, or would it be all weird. He wondered how he'd stopped himself from realizing in Sunnydale how beautiful Spike was. He wondered what the hell Spike saw in him, why he let Xander in while chasing Angel away.
Then the time was up and Xander had to leave. He slipped his hand out of Spike's as gently as possible. He hesitated, then kissed him lightly on the forehead. Spike didn't stir. "Bye," Xander whispered, not expecting to be heard. "See you soon."
