The witch and the vampire shambled down the dark suburban street, silent, heads down, eyes on the ground, side-by-side but separate. 

        Willow stole a sideways glance at her companion.  Spike’s face was averted, making it difficult to read his expression in the uncertain and shifting light from the street lamps.  “This is where I’m supposed to say something brilliant that will make him feel better,” she thought. 

Willow pushed her own feelings of grief into the back of her mind.  She had not for a moment confused the First with her lost lover, but the profanation of Tara’s image had scraped raw every healing scar on her heart.  It would be some time before it was safe to contemplate that wound again.

        They continued on in silence for a few more blocks.  Suddenly, a lighter flared, and Willow saw Spike draw a cigarette to his lips.  His hands were shaking, but she thought he looked marginally less haunted than he had at the high school.  “My cue to speak,” she thought again.  She searched her mind for the right words and settled for the obvious.

        “You didn’t mean to do it.”

        “But I bloody well enjoyed it.”  He tossed the first cigarette aside, fumbled in his pocket, and pulled out another.  “What does that say about my efforts to put my evil past behind me?”

        She winced.  “When I killed, I enjoyed it and I meant to do it.  You can’t say that.  Not since you got your soul.”  She forced a relentlessly cheerful note into the ghoulish speech.  “So I think that among the soul-having contestants, I’ve got you beat in the evil department.  Hands down.”

        Spike turned to stare at her, at first incredulously, then admiringly, “You know, Red-” he started to say in something close to his normal voice.  Then he stopped, turning to look down the street.

        His ears had caught the sound a fraction of a second before hers.   Willow stared in horror as the flames corresponding to the explosion shot up into the air.  The fire was--

        “No!” she screamed.  “Not Buffy’s house!”  She turned to him, begging for reassurance.

        But Spike was already gone.

        “He should be okay.”

The ambulance driver turned away, and Buffy nodded, feeling a wave of guilty relief.   The guilt came from the realization that she was happiest not because Principal Wood would survive, but because she would not have to tell Spike the man was dead or permanently injured.  She glanced at the body on the stretcher.  He, at least, was now on the list of non-combatants.  He might yet be grateful to have been removed from the fight this early in the battle.

        “The police should be here soon,” the driver went on, but he was interrupted by one of the EMTs, who had been speaking into a two-way radio.

        “No,” said the EMT.  “The cops won’t have time to investigate this for a while.  They said to just take names and let the witnesses go.  And we need to get this guy to the hospital right away and get our asses over to Revello Drive.”

        “Revello Drive?” demanded Buffy.  “What’s happening on Revello Drive?”

        “Huge fire,” the woman responded tersely.  “Sounds like a house went up in a matter of seconds.  Lots of injured.  At least one dead so far.  ”

        “What’s happening?  Where is everyone?”  Breathless with anxiety, Buffy ran up to Willow.  She could hear Dawn panting a few paces behind her.

        Willow looked down the long hospital corridor.  “I’m still not sure.  They keep promising that a doctor will come out and talk to me, but there were so many hurt, I don’t know when anyone will be able to talk.  I tried to grab someone a few minutes ago, but they didn’t know anything other than that most of the girls were in the burn unit.”  She took a deep breath.  “And they confirmed what I already knew.  Vi is dead.”

        “We went to the house,” said Buffy.  “What used to be the house.  They told me one girl was dead.  And--what about Giles and Anya and Xander?  Andrew too?”

        “Anya and Giles are being treated for smoke inhalation.  They were the best off, I think.  Xander wasn’t there.   He was home working on some contracts for his job tonight.  I don’t think Andrew was there either.  If he was, Spike and the firemen couldn’t find him.”

        “Spike?” asked Dawn.

        “He got them out,” said Willow.  “Giles and Anya and the others.  No one else could have done it.  The firemen would have been too late, and no one else could get in because of the smoke.  But he did it, on account of the whole not needing to breathe thing.”

        Buffy was looking around.  “Where is he?”

        Willow pointed down the corridor, and the sisters stared at the lonely figure slumped in a chair at the far end.  “He just bundled himself in a coat and is kind of hiding out.  He’s hurt, but he can’t let them see him, because they’d try to treat the burns and they’d figure out he’s not human.”  There was guilt and frustration in her voice.  “I wanted to help, but he said he’d be okay.  I found him some bandages.”

        Buffy started down the hall towards Spike, but at that moment a nurse stuck her head out of a room and said, “Miss Rosenberg?  One of the doctors may have a few minutes to talk to you, if you can go back into the waiting room.”  Her voice became more stern.  “Where we already asked you to stay.”  She threw a cursory glance at Dawn and Buffy before disappearing again.

        Buffy hesitated, staring down the corridor at Spike but desperately needing news of her friends. 

        “I’ll make sure Spike’s okay,” said Dawn suddenly.  “You go talk to the doctor.”

        Buffy was about to object, but she took a deep breath and accepted the impossibility of dealing with all her obligations at once.  “Okay.  Thanks.”

        Dawn walked halfway down the hall towards the desolate figure slumped in the hard, plastic chair.  Then she stopped, close enough now to see the burn on the side of his face and the way his hands were shoved inside his coat, apparently to hide his injuries.  She turned abruptly and went down a side corridor.

        Buffy paced the waiting room impatiently, wondering if she should burst into Giles’ room and make sure he was being treated properly and not being tortured by some doctor under the control of the First.  And Anya.  If there was torture going on, she supposed she should rescue Anya too.

        The Slayer shook her head, as if that would help sort out her thoughts.  Willow seemed to think the doctors were taking proper care of the injured.  Buffy shouldn’t go wild and assume the worst, unless—

She looked up at her friend, struck by a terrible idea.

        Before she could act on it, a phone rang, and Willow was fumbling in her pocket for the device.  “Too bad I couldn’t reach my cell when your Principal had us tied up, huh?  I probably shouldn’t answer this, because, you know—hospital—” the witch said as she read the caller’s number.  Her face was suddenly paler than usual, and she rushed to answer.  “Yes, yes.  Why, what’s happened?” 

        Buffy’s eyes were intent on Willow’s face.  She didn’t ask whether it was bad news; that much was obvious.  “Has someone else been hurt?” she said. 

        “Ow!”  Dawn blew on slightly scalded fingers.

        She didn’t look at Spike as she dropped into the chair next to him.  She frowned ferociously, juggling the plastic bag in her hands as she tried to keep the Styrofoam cup she had balanced between her knees from toppling to the floor.

        “I hope I didn’t heat this up too much.”  Dawn managed to tear the bag open at last.  She steadied the cup with one hand as she poured the bag’s contents inside.

       Spike stared at the thick, viscous liquid.  “That’s human blood,” he said.

       “Well, duh,” she replied.  “This isn’t Vinnie the Vet’s Animal Hospital, you know.”  She thrust the cup towards him.

        He pulled back.  “No,” he said hoarsely.

        “Drink it.”  Her voice was impatient and imperious.  “I haven’t seen you this much in need of feeding since Buffy dragged you back from being tortured by the First.  And no whining.  It’s not like anyone died for this.  It was donated.”

        He shook his head.  “Whoever this belonged to donated it to help some poor, sick bastard.  Do you think they’d be doing cartwheels if they knew it was going to a bloodsucker?”

        “I don’t know.”  Her voice became harsher.  “We’ll just have to tell them it went to a guy who got hurt pulling a bunch of people out of a burning building.  How do you think they’ll feel about that?  Besides, human blood will heal those burns faster than a pig’s would.” 

        He took the cup at last.  “When did you become such an expert on first aid for the undead?”

        “That summer Buffy was dead.  The summer you took care of me.  Some babysitter you were.  You were always dragging your sorry ass in with some wound or burn or something.  I think you must have been set on fire more often than any living vampire.”  He still wasn’t drinking, and she went on ruthlessly.  “I stole that for you, you know.  And I broke all kinds of rules by going into a doctor’s lounge to microwave it.  If I can regress into juvenile delinquency to do all that, the least you can do is drink the results of my misdemeanors.”  She waited a few more seconds before breaking out the biggest gun in her artillery.  “Please,” she said.  “For me.”

       Dawn waited until the cup had been drained and tossed aside before she spoke again, this time in a small, quiet voice.  “I’m sorry I took your chip out of commission without asking.”

       The surprise in his face was a blow.  He shouldn’t look so astonished that someone felt the need to apologize to him. 

“Don’t worry, pet.  I would have let you if you asked, if you’d explained.”

        She winced.   “Then I should have asked you.  I shouldn’t have used you—”  She stopped, took a deep breath, and went on.  “Willow explained to me that she and Buffy had talked about taking the chip out.  That’s why Willow made the orb.  But then they realized you wanted the chip, that it made you feel more secure.  At least for now, while you deal with the soul and what the First did to you.  I did understand that it would be harder for you without it.  But I wanted Buffy safe, so I destroyed it anyway.” 

        He started to reply, but she threw up her hand.  “Don’t, Spike.  I know you’d do anything for Buffy.  That just makes it worse.  Because the whole truth is that what I did—and the way I did it—it wasn’t just to save Buffy.  It was because I was still so mad at you I wanted to hurt you.  Sometimes, I’ve wanted to kill you, even.”  Her eyes were wide, intent and full of pain.

        “I earned that hatred, Bit.  You’ve got a right to feel it.” 

        The self-loathing she saw on his face tore at her heart, and the next words tumbled out.  “I didn’t want to kill you because I hated you.  I’ve wanted to kill you because I kept remembering all the stuff you did for me, and I couldn’t make myself really hate you.  Even when you—”

“I know what I did,” he said bleakly.

“Do you?  Because, you know, what you did to Buffy, that’s between her and you.  And you made up for it by getting the soul and everything.  But, what really still hurts—”  She looked away, acutely aware how petty this would sound, but unable to refrain from saying it at last.  “You stopped coming around.  You stopped talking to me.”

“I—”  He seemed at a loss.  “Didn’t want to stop seeing you, Bit.  But your sister didn’t approve.  Afraid you’d notice what we were up to.  She had this idea that shagging the evil undead was setting a bad example.  Besides, I didn’t think you’d notice I was gone.  You didn’t need me any more.  You had Buffy back.  Ow—!” 

        Dawn stared in horror at the hand she had used to slap his arm.  “Oh, I’m sorry!  Did I hit one of your burns?  I didn’t mean to hurt you.”  Hurt you worse than I have already.  “But you deserved it, you stupid vampire.”  All the exasperation and guilt she felt poured out in an incoherent jumble of words.  “If having you couldn’t make up for losing Buffy, what made you think that getting Buffy back would make up for losing you?”

        He didn’t respond, but one look at his face made her sigh with relief.  She felt tension that had been building for more than a year pour off her shoulders and fall away.  It had been that easy. 

       She moved towards him again, this time to hug instead of hitting him, but remembering too late that his recent injuries would make her embrace as hurtful as a blow.  She pulled back at his gasp of pain and embarrassment.  Even the need to apologize once again couldn’t dim her conviction that everything was all right between them now.

       This sudden and unexpected sensation of peace lasted for perhaps thirty seconds.  Then she saw Spike’s expression change as she looked over her shoulder.  Her head whipped around as Buffy came toward them.

       “What’s wrong?” Dawn demanded, jumping up out of her chair.  She realized that the question was ludicrous, given the events of the day.  “I mean, what’s happened now?”

       Buffy’s face was a mask of stoic grief. “Faith’s dead,” she said.

Chapter Ten