OBSERVATIONS: Epilogue
by Maz
Please read the Notes
 

Spike sat slumped in his chair, eyes locked on the bed across the room where Xander's body lay. They'd had six years. Six wonderful years. The San Francisco warehouse apartment had been their home and their base of operations. In spite of their best, or worst, intentions it had proved impossible to give up the good fight entirely. Leaving Sunnydale hadn’t meant leaving the nasties behind and there was no one else in this city, with its tolerance for alternative lifestyles, who recognised the point at which lifestyle ceased and demonic exploitation began. So they'd found themselves stepping into the breach. 'We two. We happy two. We pair of buggered,' Spike thought with a snort.

He hunched forward, pulling his coat tighter around his body, searching for the warmth it couldn't give him, and glanced around at the familiar furnishings of their home. From here they'd travelled and Spike had shown Xander so many other worlds and watched him glow with the excitement of discovery. From here they'd gone out hunting the things that needed hunting. From here they'd ruled the city's underworld. But they always came back. Here was safe and warm and... theirs.

He'd worried from the start, worried that one day Xander would be taken from him either to final death, or worse - replaced by a demon, leaving him with a simulacrum of his boy, never the reality. He'd started researching the question as soon as his fears clarified. It took three years but even when he found it – the spell that would allow Xander to keep his soul – still he'd hesitated. He spent another year checking all the related references, telling himself that he was just making sure that this most important of spells was foolproof and watertight. Then he told Xander.

Now he waited. Waited to find out if he was a fool. Waited to die himself in the flood of failure, or soar with his love into the darkness of success. As soon as Spike explained his research Xander had been there offering his neck and Spike realised how frightened Xander had also been all these years - of growing old. That Spike would leave him when he was stiff and grey. That he would die and leave Spike behind.

He felt the sun rise and move across the sky and still he watched. He felt it set and the night come alive outside the shuttered windows. He kept his vigil. After two days dead Xander would rise at sunset. He would be strong, a true childe, and he would have his soul. He would have a demon too and Spike didn't know what that would mean. He'd be the first vampire ever to wake up with both demon and soul in place.

Much as he hated to admit it, Spike knew that for him, just as for Angel, the soul was such a strong moderator of his behaviour because of the things he'd done in his years without it. He'd spent a hundred years as a soulless, conscienceless demon inflicting mayhem with impunity. It was the shocking return of conscience after all that time that had allowed, demanded even, that he mend his ways. There was no chance he'd ever turn into a broody supplicant for forgiveness like Angel, but then he had never, even as a human, placed much store on the concept of guilt. And while Angel had his Catholic upbringing, Spike had Xander. Xander always brought him up short, if he ever started to agonise over his past. Xander was his voice of reason, his true conscience, his lode stone and compass. Xander would surely be able to resist the lure of evil? Spike needed to believe that. But he also feared. Although the demon was a simple beast, it was sneaky. Spike worried, as he watched, about the insidious power of the demon to corrupt. About the naivety of a soul that had nothing to react against. Humans who had souls and no demons were so easily corrupted and committed the most terrible of crimes. Would Xander's soul be able to withstand the inch by inch seduction of the demon? Would Xander remain Xander once the demon found its home in him? 

Spike had voiced these worries to Xander when he told him about the spell. He remembered the dawning fear in Xander's eyes as he absorbed this new idea. But then he'd shaken himself and taken Spike's face in both hands. Staring deeply into his eyes he'd said, "I trust you."

At first Spike didn’t understand what Xander meant, even after six years of sharing every thought the boy had. But Xander explained, "I trust you to make sure my soul is not corrupted. You have been my Master and my love for six years. I know how to do what you tell me to do. I'm used to it. It's what I do. It's who I am. I trust you to keep me safe." He smiled that blinding, happy grin that lit his face and always brought joy to Spike's dead heart. "Anyway," he added. "I've given you my blood and drunk yours for years. I think I already have a bit of your demon in me. But I'm still me." The smile had turned serious then and Xander's voice dropped, taking on tones of reassurance and trust. "And even if I don't. Even if what you fear is true, I trust you to help me. To keep the soul in command and teach the demon to obey. You'll make me behave. I trust you."

But Spike hadn't wanted to lose his warm lover - still he'd refused. Until now. Such a simple thing. A car in a hurry, a red light ignored, a pedestrian mowed down by a hit and run driver. Spike had crouched over Xander in the empty street and known that the time for hesitation was gone. So he had bitten and he'd drunk and he'd fed his dying lover his own heart's blood. Then he'd carried him home. And now he waited and watched the body on the bed. Waited for the sun to set.