Part 1

\\ It’s calling to me, why won’t it stop…Bad enough that there are all these voices, faces, things, I’ve murdered, tortured, killed all in the name of fun, but the blood, it won’t stop calling to me. I have to go. I have to find him. He has to stop this bloody calling. I’m going insane, mad as a hatter and the March Hare, Dru would be so proud of me. Wonder if I’m as mad as she is, or was she the sane one and the rest of us are mad and just can’t see it.

Maybe I’ll ask Giles when I get back to Sunnydale. Yes that will be fun, “Hello Watcher, just a quick question, are we all mad and the mad sane?” that would go down well…Wonder what Buffy would think to that. Oh god, Buffy. What have I done, she’ll never forgive me, I didn’t mean it, it wasn’t me it was…What was it if it wasn’t me?

Angel always speaks as if Angelus is another being not him at all, but that makes no sense. He’s wrong, it’s him and it isn’t him. He’s always here inside calling. God I’m so confused, it hurts to think.

Must stop thinking; just stop. Yes that’s what I will do, just stop.

Stop and be the dead thing, the monster that I am…

Can’t stop…every time I stop his blood calls me louder and louder. Argh, have to find him my Sire, my god, my all. Have to keep moving. \\

*

Somewhere near LA

On the side of the road, near the edge of a cliff, in the middle of the night a young man steps out of a car, “Thanks,” he says to the driver as the car speeds away. He turns and looks at the sea searching. Slowly the man descends the cliff face, stops at the seas edge; takes a deep breath “What the hell have you gone and done this time Peaches,” with that the man walks into the sea.

 

*

A few hours later, two men stager out on to the same beach and collapse on the sand, the smaller of the two leans over the larger one and asks, “Where are you living now?”

“The Hyperion Hotel,” the darker mans answers before passing out.

The young man gets up and walks away, he comes back a while later and waits. Another car pulls up on the cliff above and a small young lady with long dark hair gets out followed by a tall black man.

“Angel?” the tall black man says as they draw nearer.

“Who are you? And what have you done to Angel?” says the little lady to the stranger.

“Who am I? That’s a good question, for I don’t rightly know? Am I real? Am I flesh? The blood won’t stop calling. Why won’t it stop?”

They look at him in confusion.

“I have had many names Will, William The Bloody, Willie, Spike, Boy; Little One. But who am I? I have no clue, I really don’t know. Who are you?” he asks.

“You’re a vampire, Fred stay back,” the tall black man pulling Fred behind him and taking a stake from his pocket.

“Yes, I am a vampire. You have no need to fear me. I can’t bite and even if I could I wouldn’t.” Spike slowly stands.

“What did you do to Angel?” Fred asks again.

“Nothing. I did nothing, I found him. He’s been calling for so long. Thought I was mad. Well, madder than I already am that is,” he chuckles.

“Spike, you said your name was Spike,” the black man said.

Spike could see the cogs turning in the man’s brain.

“Yes.”

“You work with Buffy and the Scooby’s in Sunnydale, I remember Wes talking about you. Angel is your Grandsire.”

“No, I am his Sire.” Came a weak voice from the ground. Fred rushed to Angel’s side.

“Angel, are you alright, you look bad and I mean really bad. What happened? Where have you been? We have been so worried about you. Where is Cordy? Have you seen Conner?”

“Fred stop, Gunn, Spike is safe, get me home,” with that the older vampire passed out again.

“Okay then, let’s get him home.” Gunn walked towards Angel but as soon as he touched him, Spike growled and went into gameface.

“No one touches him.” With that Spike bent down and picked up his Sire and started to make his way up the cliff to the car above.

“Thought Angel said he wasn’t dangerous?” Said Gunn while shaking his head Fred just stood up and followed Spike.

*

Back at the hotel, Spike carried Angel up stairs while the others saw to getting blood warmed. Spike laid Angel down on the floor and began removing what was left of Angel’s cloths, all the while muttering to himself. When Angel was naked, he went to the bathroom and ran a bath, returned, scooped up a still unconscious Angel and gently lowered him into the bath. Spike carefully washed away the sand and grime and cleaned the cuts as best he could, muttering away to himself all the while. When Angel was as clean as he was ever going to be; Spike empted the bath and carried him to bed and placed him under the covers. Just then Fred and Gunn came rushing in with two big jugs of blood. Not sure what to do and not wanting a repeat of what happened on the beach, they just stood there waiting.

Spike, still muttering to himself walked up to them took one of the jugs and started to drain it.

“Hey, what do you think you are doing? That’s for Angel.” Gunn asked, making a lunge for the jug.

Spike took a step backwards, looked at them lowered the jug and in a calm voice said, “I know, but pigs blood ain’t going to do shit for him, he needs something stronger. He hasn’t fed for over a month, it would be like giving a starving person a sweet, it will do nothing for him. He needs strong blood and there ain’t much that is as
strong as Childe’s blood, other that Sires blood. So unless Darla is about somewhere; keep out of the way let me feed so I can feed him.”

With that, Spike took the second jug and half drained it, turned to the bed, sat down next to Angel’s head lifted it and placed it on his throat.

“Come on love you got to try, not like you’re going get another chance.” Angel remained unresponsive so Spike lifted his wrist to his mouth slipped into gameface and bit down hard and held his wrist to Angel’s mouth. Still nothing happened, then Angel started to suckle, slowly at first then the pull of blood became stronger.

Spike lent over to the bedside table and drained the rest of the jug.

All the while the two humans just stood and stared at this strange vampire. Who was once again muttering to himself?

Fred gathered up the two empty jugs and went back to the kitchen to fill them again. She returned placed both jugs on the bedside table in easy reach of Spike, turned grabbed Gunn’s arm and pulled him from the room.

“We can’t just leave Angel with him, he’s mad,” Gunn protested.

“Yes we can and yes we should, Angel said he was safe and from what I know about Sire and Childer, Spike will not hurt Angel.”

 

*

The next morning, Fred knocked on Angel’s bedroom door. When she heard no response she walked in, Angel was asleep in bed, but she couldn’t find Spike. Fred walked up to the bed, “Angel,” she said in a quiet voice. Angel stirred and woke.

“Hey, you how you feeling?” Fred asks.

“I’m good, could do with something to eat mind.”

“I’m on it.” Fred goes to the kitchen and prepares some blood.

“Here you go,” she hands him the jug while sitting on the edge of the bed.

“What happened? How did you find me?” Angel asks slowly, drinking the blood.

“We didn’t. Gunn got a strange phone call, asking if we had lost an Angel, Gunn said we had and the man on the other end said he had found an Angel in the sea and would we like him back. Well obviously we said yes so we followed the directions and found you on the beach with another vampire, Spike I think his name is, not to sure really he was a bit mad, in the insane rambling kind of way and wasn’t making much sense.”

“Fred, slow down take a breath. Spike’s not insane, Drusilla is the insane one in the family.”

“No, Spike is insane…” Angel looked at her as if she was the insane one.

“Where is Spike now?” Angel sighed feeling very tired and wanting to sort this mess out.

“I don’t know. He was here last night. We left him feeding you and……”

“He fed me?” Angel roars.

“Yes. Is that a bad thing, cause he said…”

“No, I’m just surprised that’s all, Spike and I have a complicated relationship and I just never thought he would feed me. So where is he?”

“I have no idea. He was here last night, but when I came in this morning, he was gone. I can go look if you want.”

“Please,” Fred left and Angel started to think. Okay brood.

# My Boy fed me. I can still taste him; he’s in me, with me, around me. Oh it’s been to long, far too long. I missed him so much more than I care to admit. Why did he come? Maybe he’s playing a game with us. What does all this mean and why does Fred think my Boy is mad, he was the sanest of us all. He was the one who stopped us when things got to mad, like when I tried to unleash hell he helped stop it. Then I was the insane one. What on earth is going on? Where is my Boy? #

 

Angel’s brooding session was interrupted when both Fred and Gunn walked in.

“I’m sorry Angel, we can’t find him he’s not in the hotel. We searched everywhere.”

Angel closed his eyes and listened to his blood, trying to feel where Spike was, the blood pulled in the direction of Sunnydale.

“He’s gone,” Angel said sadly. “Now why do you think Spike is insane?”

They both came further in to the room, Fred once again sitting on the bed while Gunn stood arms crossed.

“The whole time he was here, he kept muttering. Most of it made no sense and trying to get him to tell us his name was very confusing,” Gunn replied.

“What was he muttering about?”

“How he got the spark. How it burned and all sorts, he wasn’t making much sense at all.” Fred said apologetically.

“We leave for Sunnydale as soon as it’s dark.” Both Fred and Gunn started to object, but as soon as they saw Angel’s face gave up.