The Basement Bound Heart
The meeting was short, the cliff notes of a larger version. Glances were exchanged, mouths were opened and closed after further deliberation. Someone hefted a reference book. It only took a minute to identify the demon-M'Bava, as Spike smugly announced-and a few more to plot a game-plan.
Game-plan started with 's' ended in 'lay'. Buffy pulled an axe from her weapons chest, held it loosely at her side.
The lone hitch came a moment after the closing remarks. M'Bavas were invertebrate rabbits, practically harmless. More liable to run than fight. Spike insisted it wasn't anything a Slayer should squander time fretting over. Insisted they get to working on the apocalyptic bother while he took care of the nuisance.
This won him five looks raised by one snide remark, so he'd explained himself, albeit succinctly.
"Bugger all of you. 'm not completely without self-interest, here." He eyed Buffy, her mouth still quirking. "I'm just getting my vampire jollies. Remember? Vampires? Pro-violence, fiendish things?" Punctuated this with clawing gestures.
Round ended in another haul of bemused looks.
"So I've got a soul--I haven't gone soft, you know."
"Of course not. Being the vampire equivalent of a fluffy kitten doesn't have to mean you've gone soft." But Xander's voice was gentle, and it started something like affection in Spike's stilled heart. No, not affection. Out of the question, galaxies out of the question. Harris, awkward and pained, back tensed upright, his shoulders crooked in defeat. One hand rubbing at the small of his back, bandages there smelling of iron. Spike shook his head in annoyance, dug his hands into his pockets.
"Oh, come on people, do you want this bloody thing dead or what?"
They did. Post-meeting, it was decided--Spike would sniff out the demon's lair. Buffy would do the walk-and-patrol, with extra emphasis on patrolling. A migration of M'Bavas did merit fretting, but Sunnydale's recent storm of demonic shenanigans made it tricky to multi-task. Something in the air; the First, probably. Monsters acting like spooked puppies, on-the-rampage, toothing everything in sight. Pissing on the furniture.
"Buffy, we have our hands full." Giles put a palm up before she could speak. "I didn't fly out here to quibble about who gets to kill what. Spike can handle it. Well, provided there's the one M'Bava and, of course, that it's not reached the pullulative stage, because they're quite territorial, then."
"I do not quibble. And why is knowledge never reassuring?" Buffy forced a spattering of kisses on Dawn's twitching face before she turned back to Giles.
"Spike will probably be fine, it's the rest of Sunnydale that's in question."
"Alright, that's the last time I offer to help you lot."
What went unnoticed during the meeting was a small succession of motions: Xander touching Spike once, on the shoulder, hand warm and grateful; in response, Spike half-turning, eyes finding Xander's tuliped bruises, face relaxing. Smiling.
Spike didn't regret that moment, but it wasn't sitting well. Lump of hot coal, shifting and shaking in his belly. Like a bad batch of blood that turned to poisonous sludge only after you'd eaten. If he could sweat, he'd be doing a lot of it.
Thankfully, it wasn't hard to track the M'Bava. They left trace amounts of phosphorous everywhere their furry tails went. More than enough for a pissed-off vampire to follow like bread crumbs. Right up to its gingerbread house.
Though its house was neither gingerbread, nor a house. More of a dank complex. Skeletal remains of a clock-warehouse. And it wasn't just a vampire nosing the thing out.
"Growing up in the 'dale, I've realized that we have the nation's highest per capita of abandoned buildings-turned-lairs. Kind of a wordy distinction. Not the best for brochures." Xander swept the ground with his flashlight. Didn't need it though, with all the glowy smears.
"Yeah, a Hellmouth's not the smartest place to set up shop." He watched Harris stumble over a slide of rocks, stopped short of putting a hand out. Didn't care about helping the kid. He didn't. But if he let anything unpleasant happen to the silly thing, he'd never hear the end of it.
Xander kicked at an item that looked suspiciously like human bone. He was forcing his back upright, but his feet shuffled some tired tango, losing coordination with every step.
"I'm here because I was born here, Spike. What's your excuse?"
"Tell me again why I'm baby-sitting you?" This time, when Xander went, Spike didn't think, just moved; found his fists buried in t-shirt and jacket, the touch of cotton against his fingertips stinging like sunlight. He let go quickly, turned half-away and almost tripped over what was definitely a femur.
"Fuck, why are you here, Harris?" Frustration edged his voice, nettled the skin of his throat. Couldn't take this. Sad charade of a hunt, tensed with a knotted string-work of something hot and uncomfortable. Wasn't used to feeling affection, least not for this jumble of blood, skin, and insults. Last thing he needed. Xander wasn't therapy, wasn't the road to wellville. Wrong turn if Spike'd ever seen one.
"Told you why I'm here." Xander was picking his flashlight up from where he'd dropped it.
"No, here, now. Tagging along. Not much you can do, shambling about like that." Could taste the hurt, a bitter affair, brackish like polluted oceans. "Go back, Xander."
"Lookee there, Mr. Sudden Change of Heart is still an asshole."
"Right, and I'm not the one leaking from a hole in my back, all left feet from painkillers. You wanna try walking straight, maybe you'll convince me you're not a liability."
"Spike, I thought--" apparently the kid didn't know what he thought. He shut his mouth quick, snap of an unfinished thought. Two bright spots high on his cheeks. Indignant was a flattering look on him.
"Leaving now?" Spike made for the dilapidated entrance of the warehouse. Didn't wait for Xander's answer, and told himself he didn't care. Because he didn't. Not a bit.
Phosphorus ribbons unspooled along the floor, almost prettily. Spike gave the abandoned building a once-over, took in the dead machinery, the Rubik's cubes of cardboard boxes, stacked to the ceiling, the rows of clocks dangling from metal arms. Whole place reeked of eerie, but he had a job to do. He was a pretty eerie thing himself, anyway. Walking, talking corpse. Cold where others were warm. Others. Others with shears of dark hair, darker eyes, bright if they looked at you just right.
Spike paused in his progress to kick at a tower of boxes. Sank his boot right through it, yanked it free before the shower of dusty cubes squashed him.
Sounded like the sky was caving in. The racket profaned the furtive silence, echoing and crashing around him. So, he'd given the M'Bava a heads-up. More fun that way.
The trail led him to another doorway, back in the recesses of the building. The air didn't move back there. Felt rotted and powerful. Spike stopped, mouth sticking. He considered letting Harris in on his whereabouts, maybe apologizing for earlier.
He shook the moment from his head, like shaking off rainwater. If Xander hadn't come running after the crash, then he'd probably gone back to his friends.
Spike aimed his flashlight at the door. Didn't really need it. He could do this blind. Maybe then he'd get a little respect. Definitely had a 'thanks' coming, especially from Harris. If the idiot hadn't gotten himself injured, there wouldn't have been this commotion. Least, not involving Spike. He had better things to do than worry about whether the kid was getting his spinal fluid put on tap by a monkey-demon.
Not that he'd ever worried.
Pushing open the door led to a set of stairs. Right. Downwards. At the bottom, he opened another door, slimed with substances he'd rather not know about.
The door clicked behind him when he went in. Didn't like the sound of it. Bravado dropped to his ankles like a forgotten pair of underwear. He tried the handle. Locked, of course. He pushed against it, expecting to feel it buckle, feel the hinges crumple. Didn't happen, of course.
Stuck in a basement. Couldn't escape the past, present or future. His life in basements. Fear tasted unfamiliar, but he knew it wasn't. Fuck, he'd seen his fill of basements. Didn't that count for something? So, this was karmic retribution; at least, something approximating it.
Spike slapped himself across the cheek, light but lingering. Just a basement, just another subterranean lair. Been in plenty of those in his unlife. No need for panic.
Squaring his jaw, he surveyed the part of the room he could see, throwing his light over the walls, the ceiling, the floor. Took in the mottled sprawl of runes and mystical mumbo. Drew the flashlight all the way around the black circle burned into the stone floor. Felt the air charge, like atmosphere before any big storm. From the wards he recognized, it looked like folks hadn't much cared about keeping things out. Looked more like they'd wanted to keep things in. Spike got the strong impression that something very bad had gone on there.
Figured. Haunted, abandoned building--just the thing he'd been lacking. Probably some secret cubby-hole for the First.
"Fucking figures." He sighed, patting himself down with a free hand. All the basements in Sunnydale. He gets two of its most haunted. "If this is someone's idea of a joke. Don't bother telling it again." He found his pack of smokes, shook one free. Only one left.
"I get out of here, someone's gonna hurt for this."
Dragging on the cigarette, he prowled the room, stood in the apse and peered at the altar. Looked like a satanist's science experiment. Stupid dark arts. Stupid underground lairs. He knocked the cups over, spilled pungent herbs and charcoal-dark ooze. Smelled faintly of blood. Probably a few years old. Did that mean someone had lost interest in their after-school activities, or they'd been lost in it? Overpowered in the middle of some inane ritual?
Fuck if he cared. The cramped space was making his shoulder-blades itch. He walked back out into the larger room, decided a bit of exploration was in order. Maybe the bastards who'd fashioned the basement had given it fire-exits. Regulations to uphold and all.
He'd forgotten about the M'Bava, with the prospect of being locked in, until he heard the faintest glimmer of parchment against stone. Something crawling towards him.
Least it would pass the time.
Time did pass, though he didn't know how much. He sat, slumped against the wall, across from the basement entrance, soaking in the stew of gore. He didn't move, didn't breathe. Leaned his head back against the stone wall, let the last cigarette dangle from his lip, unlit. This would be the end of him. He would waste away here, starved and bored to tears. He'd already taken out a few Barrow demons, stumpy little fuckers, looked like the pill-bugs you found underneath a rock. But bursting with juicy flavor. Most of which had ended up sloshing down his shirt.
Hadn't run into the M'Bava, yet. If he went looking for it again, he'd lose his mind. Few circles around the entire underground region, and he'd realized some things. This place was in total violation of fire-safety rules, he didn't know how the M'Bava moved in and out, and he hated being trapped. Hated it with every anxious fiber, hated it so much he'd implode if he didn't sit still.
Lost in meditation, a sound from his left opened his eyes. Light blinded him, but he could make out a bright, heavenly apparition.
"Fuck, I wasn't serious, you know. About the end and everything. Don't want to go like this."
"Spike?"
Flashlight moved away. Left a retinal burn, made Spike see fireworks and after-images. He blinked until the world resolved itself.
"Harris? What took you so long?" He reached for his own flashlight, switched it on and aimed it at Xander. Didn't deny himself the matchstick-flare of warmth, the tectonic weight of gratefulness to see the boy.
"That's the problem with running off in a huff, dickhead. Didn't know where you went."
"Well." He was supposed to say something. On the tip of his tongue. Xander had beautiful eyes. "Right."
The kid took a few tentative steps into the room, his light careening around like a fly. The door was swinging shut behind him.
That was it.
"Fuck, hold the door!" Spike jerked forward on his hands and knees, slipping in puddles of Barrow-juice. He clambered to his feet and sprinted for the exit. Despite his enthusiasm and wild amounts of limb-flailing, he was too late. Mocking him, the door accelerated, swung shut with the steady clank of a steel trap. Steel jaws.
Now, he breathed. Panted through his nose, though it did nothing for him. Just assured him that he wasn't hallucinating this. He worked his mouth over a million buzzing angry words, lips curling from his teeth. Settled for a "fuck" and a few other R-rated things.
"You wanna fill me in, Spike? We can start from where you flip out about the door."
"That door," he chewed the word, "locks from the inside when it closes. And I can't force it open." He banged once, with his fist. "That fill enough for you?" Stared at the black wards of the door until he could see them with his eyes shut.
"Oh. Well, that sucks." There was the sound of someone sniffing the air. "Spike, please don't tell me that's you."
After the initial twinges of anger, the situation started looking up. At least, started looking like the opportunity for a good lay. To pass the time. Didn't mean much beyond that.
"So, the Slayer knows we're out here?" Spike scouted for a stack of dirty mattresses he'd seen earlier.
"Buffy does, yes. If we're not back by sunrise, I'd say they'll come looking."
"By sunrise? It's not sunrise, yet?"
"No, fangless, it's not. It's barely past midnight."
"Don't appreciate that tone, Harris." He found the mattresses. Started poking over them for the least soiled. "Feels like I've been down here for days is all."
"Why are there mattresses in the evil basement of a clock-factory?"
"Exactly." Spike pulled one out, brushed it off and laid it down flat. "Sit?"
The area they sat in glowed enough from M'Bava phosphorus that they decided to save the flashlights' batteries. Spike lounged back, admiring the crook of Xander's neck without guile. Mouth ached for something warm, familiar.
"Why did you volunteer for this, Spike?" The kid didn't look at him, but his heart was pitter-pattering, like rabbit-feet across wood. Nervousness rose from him in great, intoxicating lungfuls.
"Why'd you touch me?" He could match Xander's low voice, the confused sincerity.
"Touch you?" Realization flickered. "I. I don't know. Wanted to." Reverberations of the mattress as Xander shifted, tapping his foot.
"Why'd you want to?"
"Spike. What are you doing?"
"Having a conversation, I suppose. What about you?"
Didn't answer right away. Gnawing on something he didn't want to admit. Spike could wait; better than waiting in the lonely dark.
"Why did you volunteer, Spike? Was it really for a spot of the old ultra-violence?"
"I don't sound like that, and not entirely."
"You want to inspire trust, you're gonna have to give honest answers."
"Honest?" Spike scoffed, looking out over the basement. "Don't think you want honest, Harris."
Silence rose in a wall, then crumbled down again.
"You--you're not. I don't like you, Spike." Bramble-tangle of thoughts, colliding on their way out the door.
"No?"
"No." Quick as a bird, Xander glanced at him, then away at the floor. Too late. Spike had seen.
"Feels like you do, pet." He slid a few inches over on the mattress. Didn't know what Buffy and the others were up to, didn't much care. Guided by something larger and more unwieldy than rationality.
"No. No. See, there's that thing where you're a vampire."
"Didn't bother Buffy."
"Don't want to hear about that--and you're evil."
"Reformed."
"You slept with Anya."
Ah, that was the kicker.
"Yeah, I did." He said it softly, words just a whisper on the air. Watched the twitch of Xander's eyebrows, how they knit together, spaced apart. Bright, bright eyes.
"Personal space, Spike." Gestured vaguely at the now lessened gap between them. Mouth parted enough to see a world of pink and wet, breaths coming faster, noisily.
"Thing about Anya is," he didn't take his eyes from Xander's, "she smelled an awful lot like you, pet."
Xander's throat clicked and he shivered once. Hotter than desert sands, could feel it rising from him. Spike tilted his head, watched Xander squirm. Snuck a hand onto the warm thigh.
"Fuck, Spike, I'm not--" Xander shivered, pushed at Spike's hand. His head shook from side to side, but Spike only had to smell him to know. Couldn't say how long he'd been needing this heat, this human heat. Like a knot, pulled free after days of picking at it. Clear, singing moment of satisfaction. The rest came easy.
He grabbed Xander's wrist, pulled him forward. There was a small noise, of protest, but Xander's mouth met his, hungry, confused. Spike leaned back and Xander followed, heart beating wildly. Scent came off him in waves. Smelled like he wanted to touched, whether he knew it or not. Spike couldn't deny him that. Wouldn't be fair.
Basements unhinged him. He tried to look around, but the room was as tall as a cathedral, one of the dizzying ones. Things spun and swam, only made sense when he looked down at Xander.
He pushed the soft thing backwards, onto his back, propped up on his elbows, legs bent and splayed open. Bandages on his back already forgotten. Shameless boy, ready to pop. The runes thrummed and sang around them, reflected in Xander's saucer-eyes.
Spike drank him in, Xander blushing and moving imperceptibly, hips searching the air. Wonderful sight, skin glowing yellow, the gold of a fancy mosaic. Spike kneeled between Xander's open legs, watching the entire intimate process. Things growing and shaping, hands scuffing at the mattress, knees wanting to close, but twitching apart instead.
Mouth parted, pink tongue slipping out to slick the lips. Hot breath coming in shallow pants, unnoticed noises wriggling in the back of his throat. Sweat dampened his forehead, sticking his hair in tousled clumps, making him look sweeter, like he'd already been fucked.
"This why you came back, Harris? Hoping for a little bit of kiss-and-make-up?"
Xander flinched, looked away. Confusion cut into the desperate fervor for sex, and he suddenly looked close to tears.
So, Spike dropped down onto him, hands pinning resistant limbs to the ground. He forced a kiss on the slippery mouth.
"Spike--I don't--"
Easy to silence him.
Greedy, he was greedy. So be it. Want itched behind his eyes, all over his skin, and he couldn't stand it any longer. Wanted Xander's warmth, wanted to lose himself in equatorial cracks. That a suicide wish? Just self-indulgence?
Hands pulled at his shirt, still caked with gore, tugged and prodded until Spike made it disappear. Sailed back in for another kiss, burned against his mouth.
"Touch me." Xander closed his legs around Spike's waist, shameless, his confusion gone. Didn't make any sense, none of it did.
The zipper was loud in the stillness, almost as loud as their flutters of noise, their caught-strangled whimpers, their oiled sounds of wetness and motion.
Xander's cock felt right and heavy in Spike's fist. Fingers already knowing the map of veins, the pull of taut skin. Watched the face beneath him, unwravelling, lost in another world. Pupils wide, dilated until there was only black. He kissed at Xander, who kissed back, nipping at Spike's lips until blood was imminent. Steam-roller of need ground him flat and helpless. He grabbed one of Xander's scrabbling hands and guided it between them. To his own cock, thick and twitchy in his jeans. Least bit of pressure, then more. Xander's eyes widened, looked down at Spike's belly. His hand fumbled, but he eventually manuevered the zipper. Handled Spike recklessly, but cautiously, if that made any sense.
"That's it, pet. Just like that." He kissed Xander, licked inside his mouth, along the ridge of teeth, tasted his gums, his cheeks, his tongue. Could've eaten him like that.
The air shimmered, crackled. Couldn't tell if the glow was from the phosphorus or the runes. Didn't much matter. If this was what the enchantments did, he couldn't say he disagreed.
Xander's fingers were blunt, but nimble. Swiped the head of Spike's leaky cock, already dripping onto Xander's own belly. Sex was a messy puddle, lot of juices and squirming. He watched the hand jacking him, sliding just right with the foreskin. Polishing him, shining him up and down. And slipping between his legs, squeezing his balls lightly, but so sudden that Spike winced. Bucked against Xander awkwardly, mouth crashing into teeth and lips. He pulled back and sat on his heels.
Let Xander follow, sitting up on an elbow, face flushed like he'd been burned. Watched his hand on Spike's cock, pulling and sliding. Looked up into Spike's eyes, and stuck there. Moment lasted until his arm gave out and his body rippled like a collapsing bridge. Noisiest part, this last bit. Xander bit at his lip, groans echoing around them, pinging along the stone walls. Spike watched him come, wanted to remember it forever, etched into cellular memory. Pretty sight, eyelashes fluttering, pulse jumping in his neck.
Xander's hand jerked back to life, fucked at Spike's cock until he came, growling from somewhere in his throat.
Vertigo moments of euphoria, followed-up with slow, tired blinking. Creak of stirring muscles. Spike remembered Xander's injury and began moving off of him.
"Spike?"
"Know what you're going to say. Just don't worry about it."
"No, it's not that." Xander looked quite alert. Pointed a finger behind Spike's shoulder. "It's that."
The M'Bava took an unprecedented amount of time to die. Not that Spike minded. He thought about the kid's face while he grappled with the demon. Thought about the M'Bava's proboscis and about Xander's spine and everything went red. Hadn't killed something with his bare hands in a while. Felt more alive than a vampire had a right to, ripping at the hairy demon's appendages.
So, the Shakespearean death scene more than made up for following it into a trap.
That, and the sex.
"Jesus Christ, Spike. You should maybe work out your aggression more regularly. Punching bags are good for that, I've heard." Xander threw him his shirt.
"Can think of better things."
"Funny."
"You alright with all of this?" He turned away, slid the crusted shirt over his head. Waited for whatever Xander had to say.
"Surprisingly, yeah. Though it might have something to do with the being trapped in an evil basement and holy shit, Spike. We're fucking idiots."
"Speak for yourself."
"Right, because I tracked that thing in here, but didn't wonder about how it comes and goes."
"I wondered about that." He squinted at the darkness around them. "Still wondering."
"Maybe we should look around for its doggy-door, huh?"
"I already checked. Didn't find anything."
Xander absently wiped at the wet spots on his jeans.
"Well, maybe you should check again."
"Maybe you should check. Perfectly fine right here." He settled back down on the mattress, stretched his legs out with a kingly smile.
"I should check." Xander watched him, eyes darkening. The runes were dropping down into the air, flickering and dancing. Maybe Spike was losing his mind. He blinked them away, but kept Xander.
"Going? Or coming?"
Xander sank down onto the mattress, crawled over to Spike on hands-and-knees.
"Can't believe you made that joke."
"Thought it was appropriate, given the circumstances."
"When we're out of here, I'm not owning up to this, Spike. I claim otherworldly interference." Xander nuzzled at the hollow of Spike's shoulder-bones, dripping little kisses along the skin.
"Not so far off, I think." He didn't care about the kid. Felt no qualms either way. "If we ever get out."
"Right. If we ever get out."
"This is an evil place, you know."
"I know. Evil place."
"Someone got sucked up by their mojo here."
"Gotcha, Spike. Right there with you." Didn't feel like it. Felt like the kid was a few steps ahead. He arched his back, moving himself inside Xander's tight mouth.
"Fuck, should I thank you or the otherworldly interefence for this?" Didn't mind the lack of an answer.
They would get out. Eventually. The Watcher would huff-and-puff about this place, and Buffy would give it a spring-cleaning. Had to investigate all loose ends with the First around.
And Harris would deny it all, chalk it up to possession. Spike would find himself in the cold, again, and the world would keep spinning, right on schedule.