shadowscast | Fic update: Before the Time of Dawn (7 of ?)

See, you can never trust me regarding chapter estimates. I said last time that I expected this to be the last chapter, and, well, it isn't! But the next one very well might be....

I haven't yet had the time to respond to all the comments left on the last chapter, but I want you to know that I deeply appreciate every single one and I hope to respond to them soon.

By the way, for those of you not following my RL journal, I had such a very exciting day that I'm going to mention it here too: I got a job! Next week I'm going to start teaching a business math course for the adult education department of a local Cegep (which is a sort of a junior college, I think, in American terms?). It's a five week contract, and being just one class (9 hours of classroom time per week) it will leave me lots of time to write. While also helping me pay my rent. Yay!

And now, on to the story:

Before the Time of Dawn (WIP: 7 of ?)
By:

shadowscast
Pairing: Spike/Xander
Rating: R for naughty language and implied sexual situations
Summary: Post-series Spike and Xander must travel six years back in time to prevent an apocalypse in the future.
Notes: This chapter is about 4200 words. Beta read by the lovely

flurblewig. Feedback and concrit welcome in comments or by email.

Click for:
Previous chapters in "Before the Time of Dawn"
Previous stories in the Fragments 'verse

Cross-posted to

spike_fics
Cross-posted to

bloodclaim

Chapter Seven

"Good luck," Xander whispered. "See you in the future."

Dawn gave him a quick hug. "Big party," she whispered one last time.

Spike gave her a wicked smile. "Go get'em, Magic Spice." Then his eyes widened in surprise when she threw her arms around him, too.

And then she was gone—running around the corner to the library, where the sounds of combat had ended abruptly less than a minute ago.

"Hope this works," Spike said.

"No kidding," Xander agreed. "Okay, where are the Sisters?"

They were in the student lounge. There were three of them huddled around the tipped-over vending machine, eating—"Oh god," Xander gulped.

"They do that the first time through?" Spike asked. He didn't look nearly as close to puking as Xander felt.

"Don't know. Don't care." Come to think of it, the next morning at school there'd been no sign of Bob's rotting corpse, and Xander had never thought to ask. "You talk to them. I'll wait here."

So Spike went over to try to convince the remains of the Sisterhood of Jhe that it would be a really good idea to go into hiding for six years, and Xander studied the student council bulletin board and carefully breathed through his mouth.

Huh, Dingoes Ate My Baby is playing at the Bronze Thursday night. Wow, that brings back memories. Behind him, the disturbing sounds of snapping bones and crunching gristle slowed down and then stopped.

"This is all that's left of you?" he heard Spike say—presumably for Xander's benefit, as the Sisterhood of Jhe didn't understand spoken language. "Only three? ... Sorry to hear it. Tell you what, though. We're here to help."

***

Dawn had done her job well; the school corridors were deserted as Spike led the way out into the night. The three last Sisters of Jhe followed him single-file, their claws clicking on the linoleum, and Xander brought up the rear.

When they got to the rental car, Spike handed Xander the keys. "You drive. I need my hands free."

"Where are we going, exactly?" The idea all along had been to get the Sisters out of harm's way, but their plan had been pretty fuzzy as to precisely where 'out of harm's way' would be.

Spike exchanged another flurry of gestures with the Sisters, then turned back to Xander. "The desert. They can find a cave, go into hibernation. They do it all the time between Hellmouth events."

"Great." Xander felt a profound sense of relief—things were finally falling into place. They were going to pull this off. He got into the car, then waited for the three Sisters to pile into the back seat. They elbowed each other uncomfortably, but managed to get the door shut. He decided not to bother getting Spike to tell them to fasten their seatbelts.

The drive out to the desert was largely uneventful, though each glance in the rear view mirror was fairly disturbing. Once the Sisters settled down for the ride, they started licking each others' battle wounds.

"They understand, right?" Xander said quietly as he took them through the low hills that bordered Sunnydale on the east. "About not messing up the timeline?"

"They're not invested in it like we are," Spike pointed out. "I did tell them our deal—that we're from the future, that we came back to stop them from being destroyed. They know there's not enough of them to do their job now—not enough to fight the beasties that come out of a Hellmouth when you vent it. I told them that if they wait six years, there'll be all sorts of super-powered girls ready to lend them a hand."

Forty-five minutes later, at the edge of the desert, Xander and Spike said good-bye to the Sisterhood of Jhe. The Sisters' pale blue-gray skin almost glowed in the light of the full moon as, one by one, they made the throat-slitting gesture and loped off into the harsh wilderness.

"That's it," Xander said, sagging against the car. "We're done. We can go back to the future."

Spike snorted. "Hold your horses, Marty McFly. Have to go back to Sunnydale first and check out."

"Well, yeah. Obviously. But the hard part's over, right?" He held up the car keys. "You wanna drive back?"

Spike shook his head and reached for the passenger-side door. "I'm all fagged out. Think I'll sleep on the way back."

Xander frowned, a bit worried. Spike loved driving, and what with having depth perception and all he was actually better at it than Xander. If he was begging off driving, he must be feeling pretty crappy. He'd been coughing on and off on the ride up, insisting the whole time he was 'fine.' Xander hoped he wasn't getting sick.

Of course, it was nearly two in the morning. Xander was tired himself, though he knew he was okay to drive. "No problem," he said. "Hop in."

At first Spike leaned back against the headrest with his eyes closed, but he was coughing too much to sleep. Xander didn't say anything; he was already getting them home as fast as he could, and there was nothing else he could do.

Spike gave up on trying to sleep. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees. His breath was sounding wheezy. He dug in his pocket and got out his inhaler and took another dose.

At that point, Xander had to say something. "Uh, Spike? Are you having another attack?"

Spike gave him a scathing look. "What's it ... look like?" he managed to say.

"Shit." Two in one night was seriously not of the good. It didn't seem like the inhaler was helping like it was supposed to.

Spike, meanwhile, was trying again.

"Aren't you supposed to wait longer than that between doses?" Xander asked.

Spike handed the inhaler to Xander. "Think it's ... empty."

Xander hefted it in one hand. It did seem a bit on the light side. "Fuck." He glanced at the dashboard—they were about thirty miles out from Sunnydale. Thirty miles of barren, cactus-covered hills. Not even a gas station, let alone an all-night pharmacy.

He drove as fast as he dared, faster by far than a one-eyed man had any business driving on winding unfamiliar roads at night. He hoped a cop would stop them—then he could turn over the driving to someone with depth perception, flashing lights and a siren. Then he could hold Spike's hand and rub his back and calm him down and ... okay, maybe it was Xander who needed the calming. Spike was perfectly calm, entirely focused on the fight to get air in and out of his resisting lungs. 'Not breathing doesn't scare me,' he'd told Xander once in the wake of an attack. 'Went more'n a week without breathing this one time.'

'Yeah, but that was back when you didn't need oxygen to live,' Xander had pointed out.

Spike had conceded the point with a shrug, and kissed Xander to shut him up and change the subject.

Now, in the car, Xander talked. He wasn't sure if Spike was really listening, but Xander needed to fill the air with sounds other than Spike's labored breaths.

"Never did catch sight of Cordelia," he said. "Probably for the best, but still, I would've liked to see her one last time. I never saw her again after the prom, you know. She moved out to LA and ended up working for Angel, which was completely weird but I guess you already knew about that. Willow went down there a couple times but I never did. And then Wesley ended up working with them too, how crazy was that? Try to imagine telling that to Angel at this point—that Cordy and Wesley are going to end up his intrepid team of adventurers. Or detectives, or whatever the hell it was they were supposed to be doing. Of course, I guess no one's even met Wesley yet."

He was babbling, he knew. When you've got to fill thirty miles with impromptu monologue and you're trying not to talk about the only thing you're thinking about, which is whether your lover will die before you can get him to the hospital, babble just kind of happens.

Spike didn't seem to get any better, but he didn't get any worse either. Hunched over, hands clawed on his knees, forcing the air in and out. Thirty miles of breathing.

They made it.

Half-helping, half-carrying Spike, Xander pushed open the familiar door of the Sunnydale ER and staggered inside, looking for the first nurse or doctor or orderly or anyone who could help.

He was looking for someone in scrubs, of course. Which maybe explained why the group of people walking down the hall towards him didn't register at all until they stopped abruptly a few feet away and Angel said, "Spike."

The bottom fell out of Xander's stomach. He froze—a deer in the headlights, a statue in the Louvre, a snowman in fucking Antarctica.

Angel. Faith. Willow. Giles. Buffy with her arm in a sling. All of them in a cluster, blocking the hall, looking at Spike now with varying expressions of startlement, anger and dismay.

"Peaches," Spike said, pulling himself up straight and half-pushing Xander out of the way and acting like he was going to fucking bluff his way out of this.

Angel glowered, taking a half step forwards and nudging Buffy behind him. "You should've stayed gone, Spike."

"Spike?" Faith repeated. "You know this guy?"

"AKA William the Bloody," Buffy supplied, sounding severely unimpressed.

Faith blinked. "He's a vamp? Huh."

"An old friend," Buffy said dryly.

Faith raised her eyebrows. "Don't tell me it's another one we can't dust," she said with a significant glance at Angel.

Buffy narrowed her eyes. "Oh, this one we can dust."

"No!" Xander yelped. Thus drawing everyone's attention to him.

"Xander!" Willow gasped. "What happened to your eye?"

"What happened to your hair?" Buffy added.

"I'm not Xander," he said quickly, panicked. "I'm his cousin. Rigby. From Tulsa."

"No you're not," Willow said. "I've met Rigby."

"Spike," Angel said, "I don't know what you're up to, but you're going to let Xander go."

Spike, meanwhile, in his effort to hide his asthma attack, was barely even breathing. His lips were tinged with blue and he was swaying on his feet. "Out of the way," he managed to say, "or I ... kill the ... boy."

"You're not even holding on to him," Giles pointed out with a hint of exasperation.

Spike looked like he was trying to reply, but he couldn't. His knees buckled and Xander lunged forward to catch him.

"Xander?" Willow said in a small voice.

Xander was supporting almost all of Spike's weight. With his head tucked against Xander's chest, Spike struggled to breathe.

"He needs a doctor," Xander said. "Now."

"It's a trick—" Angel started.

Xander cut him off with a fierce look. "I'll explain everything, just let us through!"

Giles stepped forward, frowning intently. "Willow, this is not Xander. The resemblance is striking, but look closely—this is not your friend."

"Yes I am! I am Xander!" He turned to Willow, desperate in his appeal. "Will, you're my best friend. Make them listen. Spike can't breathe."

"Uh, guys?" Willow said to the rest of her group. "Maybe we should..."

"He's human." Angel had moved in closer; now he was looking down at Spike with a mixture of confusion and horror. "His heart is beating." He started to reach out to touch Spike, but stopped himself. "It's beating much too fast."

Xander glared at Angel. "Get out of the way." A vampire, two Slayers, a witch and a Watcher. The adrenaline surging through Xander's veins said he could fight them all if they didn't stand aside.

"Angel," Buffy said quietly from the back, "bring Spike into the ER."

So in the end it was Angel who carried Spike, barely conscious, into the Sunnydale hospital's emergency room. Xander hovered at his side, way past worrying about the timeline now, waving over the nearest nurse and explaining in quick, short phrases the empty inhaler, the thirty mile drive. Faith and Buffy lingered at the edge of the room, conspicuously guarding the exit. Giles and Willow stayed closer, watching and listening.

In under a minute Spike was on a bed getting oxygen. A doctor was listening to his breathing, frowning, calling for a nebulizer and listing off drugs that sounded vaguely familiar to Xander. She had Spike's t-shirt bunched up to expose his chest for her stethoscope, which gave Xander and Angel a good view of the ugly greenish bruises from the fight with the fledge Friday night.

The doctor was a tall woman with salt-and-pepper hair held back in a low bun. Xander thought he recognized her; maybe she'd treated him for concussion once or twice. "Is he going to be okay?" he asked as soon as she tucked the stethoscope back in her pocket.

"And you are ...?" she prompted.

"His partner." Xander reached for Spike's hand and held it, both for comfort and to let the woman know he didn't mean his racquetball partner. Beside him, Angel shifted uncomfortably.

The doctor nodded. "He should improve rapidly once we administer medication." She motioned Xander a little distance away from Spike. "He'll definitely need to stay overnight for observation. He won't be able to speak for a while, so can you give me an idea of his medical history?"

"His asthma's usually not bad unless he's sick. He's, uh, had pneumonia," Xander counted quickly in his head, "four times in the past year." He knew he should probably tell her about all the drugs Spike was on, but he couldn't remember their names.

She made a note on her clipboard. "What's his HIV status?"

"Negative." Xander didn't even blink; he'd got used to that question in Rome.

"You didn't give a name or MediCal number on admission," she observed. "It would be very helpful if I could get his previous hospital records."

"He's not American," Xander said. "He doesn't live here. Doesn't have a MediCal card." He knew she couldn't refuse him treatment as long as it was an emergency.

"You want to tell me about the bruises?" she said.

Xander hoped she didn't think he'd beaten Spike up. That would be messy. "He was mugged Friday night near Peaceful Acres," Xander said. "Big guy with a messed-up face. He barely managed to get away." It was a Sunnydale kind of story; he hoped the doctor would subconsciously recognize the type of attack and decide not to question him further.

Angel, who obviously knew exactly what Xander was talking about—he could see the healing bite mark on Spike's neck, anyway—crossed his arms and scowled. No way to guess what he was thinking.

"What about the scars?" the doctor said.

"Oh. Uh..." Xander was thrown by the question. He didn't really even think about the scars anymore, he was so used to seeing them on Spike's bare skin every night. His left forearm had a dusky rose four-inch line where the junky had sliced him that night at the porn store. Then there were the dozens of thin scars on his other arm and his chest, pale pink now and fading towards white, more visible than usual in the hospital's harsh bright light. Any time Xander had tried to ask about them, Spike had given him a different vague story and changed the subject. Xander knew better than to press when Spike didn't want to talk about something.

"They look self-inflicted," the doctor said impatiently. "Is he under psychiatric care?"

"What? No!" he said emphatically. "He was robbed at work last year, the guy cut him." Inside, he was shaken. Shit, that's why he wouldn't tell me. It had never occurred to him that Spike had cut himself, but as soon as the doctor suggested it he was sure it was true.

"All right." The doctor sounded like it didn't matter one way or the other to her. She made another note on the clipboard.

At that point a nurse finally arrived with the nebulizer, and Xander backed off to let them set it up. Still thinking about what the doctor had said, he decided that once they were safe back home he was going to ask Spike about it, up front.

Angel grabbed his arm. "Now you're going to talk," he said very quietly.

He let Angel lead him over to the side of the room, where Giles and Willow had settled on hard plastic chairs. He didn't like getting farther from Spike, but he knew he had to deal with this. Faith and Buffy, seeing the movement, came over to join them.

"It's time to tell us the truth," Angel said. "Who are you? And who is that over there?"

Xander sighed. "I'm Xander. That's Spike. Only ... we're from the future."

"That's impossible," Angel said flatly.

"Giles?" Xander turned to him. "Help me out here. You're the one who sent us back here in the first place."

"It is not impossible," Giles admitted. "However it is highly inadvisable, and I cannot conceive of any circumstances under which I would have committed to such a course of action."

"That's not the impossible part." Angel glared, folding his arms over his chest. "The impossible part is Spike somehow turning human."

"Well obviously it isn't impossible," Xander snapped. "Because there he is."

"Listen, Giles," Faith edged in over Angel and Xander's back-and-forth, "I've seen these guys around. They're staying at the same motel as me, two doors down."

"Really." Giles looked thoughtful. "Faith, Buffy, why don't you go and see if you can find anything in their room that could shed light on their true identities or their purpose here."

"Giles," Xander said quickly, "think about it. We're from the future. Do you want to risk messing up the timeline?"

"As far as I am concerned," Giles said, "the future hasn't happened yet. Buffy, Faith—go."

"Oh god." Xander sank onto the vacant chair beside Willow. His legs felt like wet noodles. Overcooked ones, even. "We are so fucked."

"Xander!" Willow said, sounding shocked. "Language!"

"Will," Xander started wearily, and then didn't know where to go with it. I'm twenty-four years old. I've seen more death than you can imagine, some of it caused by me, some of it caused by you. I'm having hot gay sex with the guy who waved a broken bottle in your face two months ago, or at least I would be if he weren't in the middle of almost dying. I've blown up my high school, I've watched my hometown crumble into a giant crater, I've walked into villages where the flies are so thick on the hacked-up remains of what used to be people that you can't even tell they used to be people. I say 'fuck' now, Will. "Sorry," he said out loud. "It's been a rough night."

"Tell me about it," Willow sighed, slouching lower in her chair. "You can't even imagine what kind of night we've been having."

"I'm from the future," he reminded her. "I know you just fought that monster from the Hellmouth."

"Oh," her eyes widened. "I suppose you do."

"Perhaps you could tell us," Giles said in his polite talking-to-a-maybe-enemy voice, "what you have been up to tonight."

Xander shook his head. "I can't tell you things. We shouldn't be talking at all. This is all horribly, terribly bad."

"You can hardly endanger your timeline by telling us about things that have already happened, can you?" Giles said.

Xander closed his eye, rubbed his temples against the dull headache that was building there. He tried to think about what Giles had told him in Rome about timelines. It had pretty much boiled down to all change is bad. Unless caused by Dawn, in which case it didn't count. But Dawn wasn't here to save him now. "We were saving the world," he said. "What else would we be doing here?"

Angel snorted derisively. "You and Spike were saving the world?"

"He's good now," Xander said. Weary, wary—he didn't really expect them to believe him.

"He threatened to kill you," Angel reminded him. "Just now. In the hallway."

Xander rolled his eye. "That was a bluff. He just wanted to get past you."

"If he's human," Willow said, "he has a soul, right?"

"Yeah," Xander said, "of course." Silently he marveled at how naïve they'd all been back in high school, thinking of souls as an on/off switch for evil. Faith was going to shake that belief pretty soon. Spike was going to gray things up a whole lot more in the coming years. But not if I screw it all up, first.

"Giles," Angel said, "we can't trust him."

"Spike?" Giles looked up over the tops of his glasses. "I most certainly don't trust him, though it seems rather a moot point at the moment, given his condition."

"No. Xander. This Xander. He's ... with Spike."

"Well, yes." Giles looked at Angel as though he were stupid. "He did just say that."

"No, I mean, he's..." Angel cleared his throat and looked pained. "with Spike."

Giles blinked and suddenly his glasses were in his hands, getting a vigorous polish. "I see."

"I don't," Willow said, sounding slightly cranky.

"Spike's my boyfriend," Xander said, because the euphemisms were pissing him off.

Her eyes went wide. "Oh." She looked at Xander. "But you aren't—are you?"

"I'm bi," he said. "I didn't come out until long after—" after you, he nearly said. He acknowledged to himself that exhaustion and worry about Spike were leaving him very prone to saying stupid things. "—after high school," he managed after the awkward pause.

"Oh," Willow said again, obviously working hard to assimilate the surprising information. "Well ... good for you!" She gave him a brave attempt at a smile.

"And now I'm going to go sit by my lover and hold his hand," he said, standing up, daring Angel or Giles to stop him.

They didn't stop him, but this time it was Giles who followed him to the bed. Xander didn't make an issue of it.

Spike opened his eyes when Xander's hand closed over his. "Sorry, luv," he whispered, the sound muffled by the oxygen mask he was wearing.

"Don't be stupid," Xander told him gently, "it's not your fault. Anyway, everything's going to be fine. Just rest, okay?"

Spike closed his eyes again.

"If you are Xander Harris," Giles said, "then you must understand why I cannot trust you without knowing far more than you've told me."

He understood. Hell, he'd been the victim of a fake 'Xander-from-the-future' prank himself one time—though of course Giles didn't know about that, the aborted wedding was years and years away. Still, as a Watcher he'd certainly know about the potential for that kind of deception.

As for how to convince Giles now that he and Spike were the good guys, Xander had no fucking clue.

"We weren't supposed to meet you." Xander's gaze rested on Spike while he talked. His chest was moving up and down evenly now. "I forgot that Buffy broke her arm that night—this night." Behind the plastic distortion of the oxygen mask, Spike's lips were a healthy shade of pink. "All you have to do is let us go. We'll leave town right away. We aren't any threat to you."

Giles had his hands folded neatly on his lap. He was watching Spike, too. "You realize I have nothing but your word for that, and your association with Spike tends to strain my trust."

"He's human, Giles. You've got to see how that changes things, right? Like Angel getting a soul, only more so. And he's sick. If you don't believe me about anything else, you must believe that I want to get him home as soon as possible."

"I'm feeling much better now, actually," Spike said without opening his eyes.

"Spike?" Xander said, his voice going involuntarily high as his combined relief and frustration mixed into an absurd urge to giggle, "that was not helpful."

Someone tapped his shoulder from behind. He looked around, craning his neck because the person was on his blind side. It was Willow, standing there with two styrofoam cups of coffee from the hospital canteen. She handed one to Xander and one to Giles.

"It seems like we're going to be here for a while," she explained. "So I thought—wouldn't this be more fun if we all were buzzing on caffeine?"

"Oh god," Xander said, almost reverently. "Will, you so completely rock." He stood up and gave her a one-armed hug, careful not to slosh the coffee.

It wasn't just the coffee. It was the fact that she'd brought him a cup, while everyone else was busy trying to decide if he was evil.

She hugged him back tightly, and stepped back with a tentative smile. "Xander? You probably don't remember, but earlier tonight I told you I loved you. I do. That's not ever going to change."

"I know." For some reason his mind flashed on Kingman's Bluff. Willow at her darkest moment, ready to commit murder-suicide with the whole entire world ... stopping only because she couldn't do it if it meant killing him first. The Willow standing in front of him was years away from that, but it was coming. "I love you too," he said. "I always will."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

altyronsmaker.livejournal.com

I still love this story. Poor Spike with his sick little self. *sniff*
And the gang, headed up by Angel being all mistrustful. In character, but still, it's stupid. Silly scoobs, that is XANDER!!

But it was this exchange that just nailed how much and why I love this story:
She hugged him back tightly, and stepped back with a tentative smile. "Xander? You probably don't remember, but earlier tonight I told you I loved you. I do. That's not ever going to change."

"I know." For some reason his mind flashed on Kingman's Bluff. Willow at her darkest moment, ready to commit murder-suicide with the whole entire world ... stopping only because she couldn't do it if it meant killing him first. The Willow standing in front of him was years away from that, but it was coming. "I love you too," he said. "I always will."

It brought tears to my eyes. Oh man. I miss my shows!

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Fic update: Before the Time of Dawn (7 of ?)

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