*****

There's a week where Xander mostly sleeps--bunks on Giles' couch, tries to eat what's put in front of him, throws it up, loses weight. He catologs the bruises, stripped throat, the bites and pulled muscles as they progress back to functionality. They talk a bit about what it was like when Angel tortured Giles. From which he learns nothing useful. The G-man's a stiff upper lip guy, Xander knew that already. And the air he's blowing about forgiveness, about it being something you do for your own sake, is pure unadulterated bullshit.

Never, never, never.

Then, returning to the day to day, to school and his friends. Awkward, pretense on all sides, no talking about It and everything is normal okay, just normal. Going to Willow's one night to study for a history exam, evening passed so quiet and diligent that he and Buffy both ace the test.

Week three--the conversations. All one on one, broken sentences which are the sutures they need to close the wounds. More for them than for him. Icky and unavoidable, a duty to be discharged, like getting your driver's license again after your wallet's stolen. Strangely little comfort even though he feels better afterward. Each of them gets a different snack pack of details. If they cry afterwards, compare notes, utter dark threats against the vampire--they don't do it where he can hear them. Which is explicitly what he wants.

At night, he imagines what they're saying, hears the conversations. It's bad enough.

Things he doesn't tell them: That Spike lost control, sure, but up until then it was more or less consensual. That some of it was good, good enough that the one time so far he's dreamed about It, he woke up with an erection.

That--in a way--he made Spike do it.

See, Xander's enchanted, irresistible to anyone--except, lamentably, Buffy. He only has to want someone and they're his. Think Willow. Cordelia. Anya. It's obvious in retrospect.

So if Xander's feeling like the 'he asked for it' posterboy, there's no way in Hellydale he'll tell his friends that. Self-respect is hard enough to come by these days.

Then things heat up and the Mayor goes down, and Xander's finally free to get the hell out of Dodge.

***

Before he does the bail, Xander gets into the boxes of books at Chez Giles, looks up the demon who enspelled him in the first place. Seeing him is what started this whole thing, seeing his Buffy- slain bod and remembering what the creature had said to him years before, during one of those run of the mill Sunnydale demon encounters.

"Anyone you want, baby, they'll love you right back."

The entry's easy enough to find, and Xander comes face to page with the leering, ill-dressed phantom of his past. Vorpazon, he was called, and he's the same class of critter as Anya. Where she existed to pay men back for infidelity, Vorpie specialized in giving people what they wanted� and making them sorry that they'd wished in the first place.

Which is interesting, in a way. It maybe explains why Buffy's immune to Xander's magically enhanced charms--she'd actually be good for him. He clings to that idea, because being irresistible hasn't panned out so far. Has anyone ever kissed him of their own free will? Loved him on his own merits, whatever they are? Uncomfortable thought.

So far the having regrets part of the spell is batting a thousand. Cordelia was a disaster, Willow barely less so. Anya's... well, she's Anya. Larry's in hospital, nursing some graduation-related fractures, plus a grudge over Xander's month of silence. As for Spike... Xander is still sleeping with a stake, nocturnal hard-ons or no. It's tucked in his shirt, goes everywhere with him.

The irresistible spell is one of Vorpazon's recurring favorites, so there's a lot of information to be had. One disturbing little factoid leaps out from the page. Once Xander turns someone on, it's out of his control.

This is why Willow's torch took so long to burn out. The spell doesn't have an off switch.

***

Kids his age look younger outside of Sunnydale--it's the first thing Xander notices as he gets away from the Hellmouth. There's an eerie lack of wariness even in the toughest of them. When he hits a burger shack, he's surprised to find the others avoiding him in a new way. Not the 'Dale's 'Xander you are a hopeless case' way; more of a 'watch out for that one' vibe.

Not that he's looking to bond with anyone.

He tours around. Checks out the wine country, lurks in the border towns of Northern Mexico. Runs into a bunch of jarheads one night and convinces them he's Army, on leave. Easy enough to do--Xander's got a veteran's face now. They all get puking drunk together, and he spends the night in their mobile barracks. One, a guy named Norton, swaps him an old-looking crucifix for one of the bottles of Holy water Xander has packed carefully into his bag. The guy has vamp scars and haunted eyes; after the transaction they avoid each other.

He wakes the next morning, feeling good, no destination fixed in his mind. South through Mexico, or up and then east into the U.S.? No reason to decide today, not when the Marines have offered to drive him along the Rio Grande to the next border town.

He's fishing in his pack for some gum and barely notices the sign at the edge of town. Perros Muerto, it says. Dead Father? He didn't take Spanish, isn't sure, doesn't care. It's a border town like all the others�some tourist flash, a lot of poverty, more soldiers than should, strictly speaking, be necessary. It has a shrine to Mary whose statue allegedly bled once. He visits the place, bums a new bottle of Holy water off the priest, buys the postcards.

Then, because it has been a week, he finds a phone booth, makes the promised call. Willow seven days ago, unsatisfactory convo, as if she was distracted. Wouldn't admit Oz was there. Buffy isn't home so he tries Giles.

"Hello?"

"You found a job yet, Tweedman?"

"Xander." He can hear the smile spreading as Giles relaxes, realizes it's not bad news. How often does the man get calls which are about chatting, rather than monsters or death? Not often, Xander's thinking. "How are you?"

"Paying for some beer-related sins and turning brown in the sun." He recounts the last four or five days, leaves out the part about the trauma case Marine and anything else which might sound remotely sinister. Though he's not sure he has much perspective on that. Manages to make a highly amusing out of a story about hitching a ride with a would-be heavy metal folk diva. He does most of the talking, because he has come to appreciate how good a listener Giles is, and he knows the others will want the gossip. And if there's bad going on in Sunnydale this summer, there's nothing he can do from here, and he doesn't want to know.

If there is, Giles doesn't offer any highlights. But about the time Xander's nearly out of change he lets his voice drop into the serious, and asks: "How are you, Xander? Really?"

"Good," he says. "Getting out by myself was the right instinct."

"Nightmares? Panic attacks? Are you eating?"

"Gee, Dad, can I send you a nutritionist's report? I'm fine, Giles. On my honor as a faux Army guy."

"I'm glad to hear it. And you'll call one of us next week?"

"I'll call," he promises, sighing. They slip back into meaningless pleasantries for the minute before he hangs up.

***

He's learned how to find the real bars amid the tourismo, and night finds him sitting in what passes for the Muerto hotspot, improbably called Pufino, nursing a beer and scrawling Virgin Mary postcards to the usual list. He's worked the hitchhiking story into a 3 x 3 written format and spent some time scrutinizing his map, wondering where to go next. Still no decision, still not important. He's loving the journey, couldn't care less about the destination.

When the Mexican soldiers start coming in from the night shift he decides it's time to clear out, slips into humid night. He can hear the Rio Grande talking to itself on the side of town; chickens clucking in a truck near the border. Low conversations in Spanish filter out of the houses and into the dark.

He doesn't hear anyone behind him, even though he listens. He always listens now. Long, thin fingers clamp around his throat and a hand wrenches his arm back in a painful arc. Xander goes from zero to terror in less than a second but doesn't quite lose it. He has the stake tucked in his shirt, another in his boot. He promises himself he'll wait for the right moment. If it comes.

"He isn't thinking about me anymore," someone drips the words slowly into his ear, one by one, like treacle. A feral voice. A female voice. A jealous voice.

Drusilla.

The postcards fall out of his hand, fluttering against each other as they fall, like a one-winged dove.

***

Dru's got a home at the bottom of a mineshaft, a dark cylindrical pit maybe fifty feet in diameter. Gas lanterns give the place a smoky glow and it's--oddly enough--fully furnished. One wall houses an ancient four poster bed, another corner has a dining table and two chairs. A dead bird lies in a cage, rotting atop tiny avian skeletons, and an inactive refrigerator yawns beside it. Empty bookshelves form truncated walls, making a maze out of open space.

"Can you smell the people who died here, pet?" Setting him on the floor from a fireman's carry, she gives him an impossibly sweet smile.

"Died as in recently?" Usually, his voice rises when he's scared. Now it stays even, deep. Almost indifferent.

"In the mine," she says. "Miners, like my daddy."

"Ah," he says, rattled. "Mining's dangerous. Big rocks and all. Explosives, cave-ins, deep holes..."

"Angel killed him. I see it sometimes, in my head. Bashed his 'ead in with a big lump of coal, just outside our flat. Angel, playing games." Her eyes narrow, become bright and demonic. Ridges grow in her forehead. "You hate Angel, don't you?"

No point in lying; Xander makes his jaw do the up and down thing. Yes oh yes oh yes. "With a--"

"Spike's coming," she whispers then. It echoes off the stone walls. Spike, spike, spike... Xander goes icy cold and forces himself, again, not to go for the stake. "Soon, pet. We'll play then, won't we? Promise we'll play." With her accent, play sounds too much like die.

"Play," he repeats dully, and then she's freeclimbing out of the cavern, sliding up the rock wall like a spider, and he's alone at the bottom, in the maze.

Trapped.

*****
Part 2:

There's no point in hiding--Spike will smell him. But Spike is saner than Dru, might think to check Xander for weapons.

"Or he might just rip my shirt off, like last time..."

Don't think that. The stake from his boot goes into a crevice in the wall near the bed. The one he keeps tucked into his shirt--hard to let go of that one, he hasn't done so in a month, it actually smells of him�gets tucked between the couch cushions. The Holy water's unmarked, and it occurs to him he might need it to survive. Dru's obviously bad at caring for her pets. He hides the four bottles like Easter eggs, leaves the crucifix tucked into the pocket of his jeans. His food rations and half-empty canteen he leaves on top of his backpack.

Then he tries climbing out, discovers he's good for about fifteen feet of vertical before his arms give out. Falling, he scrapes his elbow, a prosaic wound--he's almost happy to get a lick in on himself that doesn't involve sex, violence, or most especially the undead. And, weirdly, the pain clears his head. He sees that if he pushes the fridge against the wall of the cavern, gets a chair up on top of it, then he'll only have to climb maybe six or eight more feet to reach the lip of the pit.

Doable, he decides, but then he hears steps up above. Familiar steps.

Spike.

Escape will have to wait. It's gibber with terror time.

Clutching the cross, Xander backs up against the cavern wall. Inhale, exhale. Stay calm. Okay, seem to stay calm. No vomming. The gas light makes Spike look huge as he beetles down the wall. It's the same route Dru took. This must be one of their boltholes--they have the handholds memorized. He scrabbles at the wall intently from ten feet up, then drops to the floor, turning in mid-air so they're facing when he lands.

"Well," he says, setting down a satchel that clunks metallically. "If it isn't the little homewrecker."

Xander doesn't answer, just breathes down the panic. It's like there's something crystalline growing inside him, spreading from his navel, turning his insides into quartz or salt. v "Nothing to say, lover?" Spike springs across the space between them, catches Xander's arm and licks the scraped elbow, around and around, almost sensual. Then he twists, grabs Xander's head with both hands and kisses him passionately. The strange dead-on-live flesh electricity sparks between them.

A flicker of response, of arousal, drives him over the edge. He shoves the crucifix against Spike's chest, fingers tangled in the chain�a precaution to make sure Spike can't yank it away. The vampire growls, lurches back.

"Don't touch me." Each word needs its own lungful of breath.

"No?" A smirk. "Little late now to play hard to get, Xander."

He turns his back, opens his bag and disappears behind the shelves, making a lot of metal crunching noise in the general vicinity of the four-poster bed and its gauzy curtains. Xander stays where he is. Finishing, Spike returns to the bag, takes out a flat of beer and stows it in the dead fridge. "Want one? Might help you relax."

He shakes his head, unbelieving. Spike's clueless, clearly has no idea he all but carved Xander a new digestive tract. Sees himself as the injured party, even. Xander doesn't know whether to laugh or cry.

Preparations complete, the vamp cruises closer. He catches Xander's crucifix hand, sweeping it up and away and pins it against the wall as he snuggles in. Xander gets the shudders and the beginnings of a hard-on.

"Now then. We have a few minutes. Tell Daddy all your troubles." Kiss behind the back of the ear.

"Didn't you tell me to stay away from you, Spike?"

Neck kisses. Oh, shit. And Spike has to feed to get hard. "Got a new plan for the Dru thing. You figure prominently. Least you can do, I figure."

"That does it." He punches the vampire hard, enough to knock his lips away, not enough to free up the cross hand.

"What? I said her name while we were fucking?" Spike's face changes to vampire hardness. "I forgot to call? Your football player dumped you? How is it, Xander, that you get off treating me like the asshole?"

He turns his face to the wall.

"I *know* you put a hex on me. Got myself checked out. You bloody got a nerve, man. You love spelled me."

"You were going to kill my friend. What was I supposed to do?" His breath comes back on him from the rock, warming his face.

"All right, point taken, fair e-bloody-nuff." Spike writhes against him. "But you bought what you got, Xander."

His free hand presses Xander's traitorous groin, still lamentably, noticeably swelling. He starts in with his lips again, pushes up Xander's shirt, lays kisses in a track from his throat to his nipples. Xander's inner slut is responding--against his will?--to Spike's gentle chemistry. Thing inside soften up. By the time he's down near Xander's navel, the hard-on is full, massive, twanging to Xander's still terrified heartbeat.

"Talk, Xander." The vampire's unzipping him now, pulling down jeans, finding the singing length with his hand. He releases Xander's pinned hand, lets it fall limply. Regarding him intently, the vampire then bends to lick the head of Xander's cock, just like the elbow, sensual swirls with a rough tongue. Electric fingers close around his scrotum--squeeze, release, squeeze. It's good.

It was good last time... for about a minute.

"Talk, Xander."

The blond head bobs down, taking in more of him. Pleasure eats at the fear and he feels like he's betraying himself. Tell him, then. His cock sizzles, roasts. Lips close around it like a vise and only what's left of his pride keeps him from moaning. "You went rabid on me," he says quietly. "You did the snarling hungry vampire thing, remember?"

Spike doesn't answer, just tightens, sucks harder. More difficult not to moan this time.

"I trusted you--well, in a sort of maybe the bloodsucking fiend is kind of tame way."

Spike chuckles at this, shows he's appreciating the joke. I'm gonna hate myself when I come in his mouth, Xander thinks. Because it's not if, it's when. He's enjoying this. He's hot and light and the only reason he hasn't come yet is he's talking about the scariest night of his life. Furious And aroused at once, he claps the crucifix to the back of Spike's neck, feels the flesh burn. Spike keeps sucking.

"Trusted you, Spike, stupid me."

"That hurts, love."

"This? Not a tenth of what I owe you. Not a hundredth. *You forgot I was there.*" Smoke coils under his hand, burned fish and cloves, and he throws it away. "And yeah, Spike, you did call her name."

It's like a weight comes off him then, a thousand pounds of pointless falling away. Vampire fingers trace heat around his cock, lips blur back and forth and he's arching his back, hating himself as anticipated but not as much as he maybe should, and orgasm rolls through him with the crushing weight of falling boulders. He's thrusting into Spike's mouth, no moans barred now, indifferent even to Dru, returning down the rock face with rage in her eyes. He's coming, coming, impaling Spike's face as he's done, more than once now, in his dreams. Sensation peaks, fades, and Dru's almost down in the pit and whatever comes next, he's definitely not ready.

He notes, distantly, that she's losing her balance, before he even realizes Spike is away from him, gone. Dru wobbles on the hand-hold Spike was messing with. She shimmies, falls off, lands on her back, face up.

And Spike's ready. Punch, punch, and she's too stunned to fight as he drags her to the bed.

Xander recognizes the metal noise now. It's chains. He fumbles his jeans shut, shivering. Saying his piece helped a little. Being let go would help more. But Spike's got plans, or so he said.

The lousy thing about fear is you never seem to run out.

"Spike." Dru's voice is equal parts hatred and longing. The bastard must have chained her to the four poster. Now he's helping himself to a beer from the fridge.

"Let the games begin," he says cheerily.

*****
Part 3:

"So," Spike says. He's been through the cave, sniffed out all the Holy water and the stake by the bed. Searched Xander's pack just in case. "Let me see if I've got this right. You fucked me over, point to me--but for altruistic reasons--so, point to you. I fucked you over because you're so bloody shagadelic."

Xander winces--he hated that movie.

"I fucked you over--point to you. And you got it worse than me, for a bonus point. Your three to my one--ergo, I am the asshole."

"That about covers it." He's tempted to giggle. Spike's being charming. Charming him.

It's driving Dru crazy. She can hear them, probably smell them too -- smell Xander on Spike's breath--but she can't see. She's set up a steady, nerve-grinding growl. "Spiiiike," she croons. "Spike, come to bed."

"I'm busy, love."

"I'll kill you, Spike."

"All in good time, pet."

"Well, I'm glad we had this talk," Xander says, in a faux cheerful voice. "The caring and sharing have just choked me up, really. I have a train to catch, though..."

"I'll give you a ride, all right." Spike has drained the beer, opens two more and takes one to Xander. That scent of cloves tickles his nose.

"I'm not bending over for you." The words come out hard, and he's afraid Spike will shrug them off. He's strong enough to do what he wants; they both know it. "You'll have to kill me first."

"S'all right," Spike agrees thoughtfully. "I bet Dru would love to hear you fucking me. She always liked to think I'd look good spitted on bloody Angelus."

"You?" There's something about Spike that screams top. "I don't know." Still, it'd be safer, and his cock likes the idea, jumps in his pants. He frowns at it sternly. Shouldn't you be tired?

Nope, answer the teenaged hormones. Do him.

"Spike, come to bed." A little more desperation from the Dru. Spike grins.

"That's a yes vote. What do you say, Xander?"

"I say no."

A hint of danger in the pale eyes. "Wrong answer."

"I say... maybe."

A hint of a grin. Dru gets to thrashing with her chains, loud enough to induce a cave in.

"Xander..."

"I say, what else do you have in that bag you brought down here?" Xander tips back the beer, walks to the bag. It's heavy leather, tan, has that nice dead cow smell. He crouches, keeping eye contact with the vampire, feels Dru's eyes devouring him as he walks into her line of sight. He reaches inside. His hand touches a set of cuffs, soft leather on the inside, iron on the outside. A tiny lock and key are still attached to them with plastic pricing material. Hmmm.

"I don't think..."

"Quiet, Spike. We're humoring Dru, remember?"

The vampire can't help but grin.

"Anyway, you're down a couple points. If we're gonna play points for pain, you better at least try to win." Sliding his hand past the cuffs he finds a whip--yuck, no thank you--then lube, and finally a metal case. He pulls it out. Dru's grinning at him madly, licking her lips and struggling against the chains. We should really be playing who's the sicko, he thinks, but he files that thought under Much, Much, Later.

Opening the case, he finds a set of scalpels. That's got potential. Taking the cuffs, he walks back to the couch. "Lose the jacket, big guy, and come here."

Is this part of the anyone he wants spell? Spike, miraculously, does it. Stands there, smelling suddenly peppery, as Xander locks his hands into the shackles. He takes off Spike's belt and cuts a new hole in it, earning a raised eyebrow from the vampire, and wraps it around his torso, lung- crushingly tight, high up under his arms. Cold white skin bulges under the belt as he finds a way to hooks the shackles to the buckle so that Spike's hands are above, back, over. Fingertips brushing against his shoulderblades, Spike's arms are strung taut like bowstrings.

Then Xander pushes him lightly toward the couch, no strength versus strength contest, no point to that. The vampire sits willingly. Xander unzips Spike's pants, finds the flaccid drop of his cock with his eyes. "You got a glass in here, Dru?"

"Tea things," she says, sing-song. "Tea's in the cupboard, cupboard's in the corner. Hurt him. Hurt him, Xander." That Drusilla giggle, like a chuckle from the grave. Yuck-o-rama.

But this really is the yuck portion of the evening. If he can pull through this, he just might get away. Alive and comparatively unmolested.

He finds a cup, opens the scalpels, sits on Spike's knees so that the vampire's already arched back is forced further into the couch. "Don't say a word," he says, trying for the Deep Throat voice. "You made me eat that goddam chaise." Spike's mouth, half open, shuts with a click.

Xander balances the teacup between his knee and the inside of his elbow, makes the cut. Blood runs silently--the smell brings out Spike's demonic face and Drusilla starts mad-thrashing again. Kabang, kabang, kabang.

"That's enough," Spike hisses, when the cup's half full. Xander takes his word for it, wedges a rag into the elbow and clamps down. Taking the cup, he holds it to Spike's lips. There's a moment when he looks like he's thinking of refusing it--then instinct overcomes him and he drinks. His cock rises out of the vee of his unzippered pants and he starts to growl.

"Play nice." He tosses the cup over a shelf, hears it whick through the four-poster curtains. There's a grinding of metal. No way to say if it landed close enough for Dru to lap out the dregs.

He didn't see Spike's cock last time. He'd already been unnerved, had squeezed his eyes shut. Inside him, tearing, it had been twice as long as Xander's whole body. Today it's real and grabbable and manageable, still a blunt instrument but perhaps not entirely terrifying. It's got some horrible scars. Bitemarks. Xander rides it up and down with his hand a few times, and then- -as Spike looks to be losing control--hhhe lets go. Takes a moment where they both come down a little before Xander bends to remove the vampire's pants. He uses the second scalpel to cut off Spike's shirt.

Then--gentle urging with the hands again, no pretense at force�helping with balance more than anything else--he gets Spike flipped over.

Now Xander really wants this. He could move on to the escape, but he knows he's going to take it all the way first, and damn the risk. He peels, lubes, kneels with the knife hand on Spike's ribcage and the spare on his own cock, stroking the slicked wetness of himself, harder, harder. Spike's groaning, hard, attempting to hump the edge of the couch.

"I wish I had your sense of smell," he murmurs, teasing Spike's bud with the tip of himself.

The vampire groans. "Yours for a sip, love."

"You'd lose your hard-on."

Spike shakes his head. "Doesn't work that way. I'm good till I pop now. But you're not going to--"

Xander has to grit his teeth, but he makes himself do it. Cuts him.

Vampire blood spills over the cushions from a gash along the shoulderblade, just under Spike's pinioned hands. The vampire jerks, cursing, but Xander's thought this through and he moves fast. He thrusts himself inside Spike, briefly surprised at how tight it feels, how it actually hurts--but he doesn't let that stop him from clamping his lube-wet hand over the vampire's erection. As if his life depended on it. The twinned pleasures quash Spike's resistance. He relaxes against the couch, bleeding, as Xander slides in--good, so good!--and squeezes him. The four-poster bed is earthquaking.

"You better have tied her down good," he hisses in Spike's ear.

"She won't break free," the vampire groans. His blood's still soaking into the cushion as Xander pumps--slow and steady, in out, in out. Encased in electric Spikeflesh, a sensation unlike anything he's ever known. Beneath, Spike has picked up the beat, bumping to the rhythm as Xander lays it out, groaning as Xander had groaned, before things careened out of control. And for awhile he loses himself to it--fucking Spike, teasing Spike, enjoying this one-time-only sensation of being on top of a goddam vampire. Inside him. Heady shit. He has to think of some seriously unpleasant things--luckily there's no shortage in his hard drive--to keep himself from blowing his wad too soon.

Because the blood loss is making Spike weaker, as he planned. And he doesn't want to fuck this up.

Choosing your moment. It's an art.

"Remember what you said, Spike?" he says at last. He's getting close now, time to cash in, see if he's really gonna get out of this with his skin. It's hard to manage coherence. "Fear's sexy?"

"Yeah, ducks." Spike, under him, is unafraid. He thinks Xander's talking about the brief moment of what the fuck when Xander slashed him.

But Xander throws the scalpel away, digs deep between the couch cushions, comes up with the stake and presses it hard against the back of Spike's chest. Above the heart. Spike stiffens, tries to lift himself off the blood soaked couch, can't get leverage. Falling back, he smears his face in his own blood.

"Do you have any fucking idea how many points behind you are?" He's ramming Spike now, hard as he can but not hard enough to hurt him, Spike's still a fucking demon and the only chance Xander has of getting any of his own back is to scare him green, if it's possible. "Maybe we need to press on to a deeper goddam insight about fear and sex."

And the emotional intensity of the moment brings it all back, he's remembering now, how black and horrible the world was when Spike lost it, and he knows nothing he does now is going to come close to evening it up. Memories hold off the orgasm, he thrusts again and again and again. Even Spike's growing panic, the breathless "Xander, Xander, Xander," the eerily satisfying cry to Dru for help she can't give. Hearing her scream in genuine panic now. He could push the stake home and the debt might blank out then, but he's...

Not a monster.

He's shitheel enough to leave the stake where it is, keep the threat intact. He's bastard enough to clamp down on the base of Spike's cock before the demon can come, giving him pain instead of pleasurable release. He's selfish enough to make it last as long as he can, Spike's ass is a very nice place to be, after all, and he's never doing this vampire-thing again. But he can't kill him.

And then, magically, a payoff he didn't expect, just as he cheats Spike of his orgasm and begins to boil over himself. The vampire's face softens out of demon mode and his eyes are blank, staring. And he whispers something, so softly Xander can't hear it. But he can read the lips all right.

I'm sorry.

Which damn near drives him to the edge of tears and the weird part is they're happy tears, and then he's caught in this long, endless orgasm, getting his own back, slaying a vampire with some good old fashioned heartbreak. He has a white-hot realization that every time he's come with someone, it has been better than the last time, and this one is a full-on nuke. His blood boils down from the opened wound on his elbow, splashing Spike's back and mixing with the darker fluid spilled into the couch. Twitching, he puts the stake partway into Spike's back, but the vampire doesn't flinch, just keeps mumbling soundlessly. Sorry, sorry, sorry. Maybe he's apologizing to Dru now. Odds are he owes her one, too.

And finally Xander's done, finished, gloriously renewed. Standing up as Spike lolls, drained and ravished, on the couch. Tossing the stake away. Watching coldly as the vampire struggles to get it together enough speak.

"You gonna leave me with the blue balls, man?"

"That's Dru's problem." Xander kisses him on the cheek, strokes the blond hair, and then covers the vampire's body with the discarded leather jacket. The scalpel slash has already stopped bleeding--Spike's in no danger, as long as he feeds soon.

Feeds. He shakes off the thought. Maybe he *should* kill them, but right now he figures Angel's responsible for everyone the two of them kill. He's done with guilt, done with pain, done with remorse.

Headed back to the road.

He strains to get the fridge against the wall, sets a chair up on top of it, shifts the kitchen table up so he can get onto the fridge itself. Sorts through the things in his backpack, has a snack to raise his blood sugar, takes the time to bandage his arm. He eyes his old friend the stake, decides it isn't going back into his shirt. Besides, it's all bloody.

He does take the crucifix, though, as a memento.

Then he climbs. Table to fridgetop to chair, and then freeclimbing up the side of the rock wall. It's harder than it should be, what with the blood loss and the exhaustion. Plus sex makes his knees wobbly. But he makes it. Pulls himself up and flops like an ungainly kid rolling out of a swimming pool.

"Hey Spike," he calls down into the cavern.

"Yeah?"

"You know how, in horror movies, they always give you one last scare?"

That long laugh. "You're going to scare me? From up there? I've seen your kit, Xander. There's no grenade in that bag."

He looks into the vampire's eyes. "I walk away now, you starve."

Then, when comprehension dawns and the nervous look takes over the milk white features, he tosses down the keys to Dru's shackles. They arc in the gaslight, silver and beautiful, a perfect throw. Spike opens his mouth and they drop onto his tongue. It'll take them awhile, but they'll get loose.

Xander grins. "Don't forget to write," he says, and then he walks out of the mine, heading for the sun.

Finis