Special Purpose Vehicle
Based on casting spoilers for ATS Season 5, and following on from the finales of ATS S4 and BTVS S7.
Rating: PG13 now, rising to NC 17.
In the beginning there was light, glorious white light, untouched by the powers that pass through it, and dwell within for a season, before passing again leaving only the light. The light touches everywhere with equal indifference. It is everywhere. It illuminates the darkness, but cares nothing that it does. It is. It exists. That's enough. It's existed from the beginning, and will exist until the end. Nothing touches it, but it touches everything and everyone, and cares for nothing and no-one. So when golden fire erupts in the midst of that pure white space, then collapses in on itself, leaving behind the figure of a man lightly coated in fine-grained ash, there's nothing but silence.
He feels numb. Where there was ecstatic pain there's nothing. Well, there's something. It's curiously neutral, but it's solid under him. He can't process it yet. He can't process anything. It's all been too much, too much agony, too much joy - too much transcendence. Even an immortal vampire isn't meant to touch what he has, let alone be consumed by it. But he's always been the one to be consumed by his passions. He just never expected quite so literal an experience.
He knows he died. He felt the flames, and become one with them and the glorious golden light of love. He truly knew extinction. That moment's seared into him forever. He's been into the valley of death twice after all; he's an expert at knowing whether he died or not. He did, again.
And he's back.
He shouldn't be. He's fried enough vampires over the years to know that vampires don't come back from ash. He knew he wasn't coming back this time. He didn't know anything the first time he died, but that was an everyday thing according to the supernatural rules and regulations that govern this world. That light, that fire; nothing about that was mundane, he knows that.
There should probably be something in his memories that tell him why he's here, something full of clouds and loved ones, or cloven-footed nasties. There should be a mission, a great task only fit for a great Champion that has transcended the limitations of his existence. He should have a list of 'do's' and 'don'ts' inscribed all nice like on a golden tablet, or at very least etched irrevocably into his consciousness. He should at least remember what happened between that final bursting of fire out of his skin and becoming aware on this solid surface.
He can't. There's nothing but a fuzzy hole in his memory. If he had the energy he'd feel robbed, but he's drained, utterly and totally drained. A millennia or two's worth of a good kip might just give him the energy to move, or to get angry at that loss, but at the moment he doubts it.
He thinks he's doing a pretty good job to be this coherent. He's seen enough daytime telly pop psychology to know he is. He knows he probably in shock, and will melt into a puddle of angst and confusion later. But right now, he's numb. He'd laugh at the idea of anyone who went through that blaze feeling frozen, but at the moment he is, and he can't move any part of his body. He's trying to open his eyelids, but he'd have better luck trying to bench press a small elephant with them.
He tries to listen, but it feels like his ears are still burnt away, and all he can hear is nothingness. He moves further inside to find the fire that's animated him for so long; both fires in fact.
He stretches out his awareness for the demon that moves under his skin. It's kept Old Father Time from taking him years ago. It also whipped the love that he's warmed himself with into a destructive fury, until he tamed it for his own sake and that of the woman he loves. No - loved. Something's wrong. He can't feel the demon. That's wrong. It's suffused every molecule of his being for more than a century, driving long dead organs to function in what might be a mockery of life - it's certainly felt like that sometimes in the last year or so - but which kept him going. And now he's looking, he can feel the absence of the demon. There's nothing flexing beneath the man, nothing to keep him alive, yet he's here.
That makes no sense. He can't think about that mystery now. He's not together enough right now to solve anything more complicated than two plus two. Basic facts of the universe - that he can do. Americans make crap tea, Man U rule - Arsenal suck. Angel is a self-righteous pillock with stupid hair. And Spike loves Buffy.
Except now he's looking for that love and he can't find it. The steady furnace of love for Buffy had kept him going through Hell-God torture, rejection, being used as a toy and self-flagellation instrument before being thrown in the trash - however much he knows he deserved it. The warmth of loving her had animated him as surely as his demon - before and after his own wildfire love and lack of self control blew away what little he'd been allowed to keep. The very thing that drove him across the world to seek out a legend and do the impossible - gone as if it had never been.
He remembers it. He knows all of it: every punch, every kiss, every broken nose, the mind blowing pleasure, the ecstasy and the agony. He remembers his madness, more rejection, use, that thing with his own face, and hers, more torture, and then rescue, comfort, and finally being allowed to help, to at last be allowed to touch and be touched, to connect - and finally those words. It's there. He can see and recognise all of it. But the feeling, the love, it's all gone, and he's lost. Where his heart is, where she is - no, was - there's nothing. She's gone; burnt away in the crucible he's passed through.
He's lost. He's beaten the First, got more than his pound of flesh for the cuts it had made in his, even if he can never bring back those he killed while he was under it's thrall. But in winning, he's lost everything that's kept him going for years. It's just gone. He can't find either fire, and now he really is panicking. With his last reserves of rational thought he desperately reaches for an explanation, anything to cling to in all this loss.
The amulet - the bloody cleansing, purifying, bubble scrubbing amulet, it's scrubbed her right out of his heart. She's gone; the love consumed along with him. The pictures of her, of them, are crystal clear, but now they're a black and white silent flick, when before they were glorious Technicolor, and he feels nothing. Love fuelled the cleansing fire; perfect sacrificial love sparked the transcendent light, and burned him through. He's been consumed in the fire of love through the amulet, and it's re-forged him, leaving him Damascus steel sharp and shiny, with his love for Buffy left behind with the slag of his old body.
Cosmic irony's played with its favourite Spike toy again. You can't tell from the still, pale, naked form lying so silently amidst the white, but inside he's screaming.
***
Mission accomplished: Angel Investigations taken whole by Wolfram and Hart. Lilah's done it. The contracts are signed. They'd already verbally agreed - those in a state to - even before Angel signed them over. Legally and mystically binding in any dimension. She should feel happy. She should at least get some ice chips when she goes back - she's in the good books. But she gets one last bonus before she's sent away; Angel - all naked, shanshued, vulnerable, owned body and oh so special soul by them, and laid out at her feet.
She deserves it, after all. Lilah Morgan and Wolfram and Hart have saved the world; provided the means, and sent the patsy off to do it. She can't help but snort at the irony. She can't help but delight that Wes still has a world. She also can't help the traitor tear trying to force its way out at his doomed attempt to free her, and that she's got to leave him. But Lilah Morgan does not cry. She may get nail marks in her palms to ensure that, but The Bitch isn't going back to Hell with tear marks marring her mascara. Besides, she's a shanshued naked vampire to gloat over first.
The elevator fades into the White Room. At first she can barely distinguish the pale flesh against the pure white, but as she gets closer she realises she was looking for dark hair and what she's got, on his head anyway, is peroxide white. There's only a fine layer of dust trapped in that hair to distinguish it from the surrounding blinding whiteness. As she watches the last of a fine layer of dust drifts off his motionless body into the light dimensional breeze, and disappears as if it had never been. The body it reveals is slimmer and somewhat shorter than the one it was supposed to be, but it's a fine one: tightly muscled, satin skin marred only by a scar shadowing one eyebrow.
She takes a good long look. Lilah Morgan might be dead but she's still got eyes. She might have those annoying feelings for Wes, but she still deserves to look. Hey, she's Evil, it's not only allowed, it's expected - by some people anyway. But Lilah knows that they've got a situation, in fact she's got a situation, and she's looking at him. Her fine mind might be only currently flimsily connected to her body, but it still over-rides any distractions from lower down. Her brain's busy calculating angles and arguments while her eyes enjoy the view.
She's working out her fifth plea on how to get out of this one, when Gunn arrives in the room and stands on the other side of the still motionless body. She gulps almost imperceptibly, and awaits the verdict. She doesn't have to wait long. She's almost grateful.
Gunn's eyes look straight into her bought and paid for soul. "It's the wrong vampire."
"Mr Suvarta?" It feels strange to hear those chillingly charming tones from Gunn's lips rather than the creepy kid, but Lilah is nothing if not adaptable.
"You were meant to give the amulet to the contracted vampire with a soul."
"I did. Signed, sealed, and delivered."
"The amulet would enable the shanshu of the contracted vampire and ensure he and his powers would be under our control afterwards. It was a one time only deal. The amulet was used up with the vampire and cannot be replaced." The voice is a stiletto swathed in silk. "Our agenda remains on track: the Sunnydale Hellmouth is sealed, we remain on schedule and budget for our Apocalypse, the First has been put back in its place in the current balance with us and the Powers, ready for our move in the game - now, what's wrong with this scenario? Oh yes, the shanshued souled vampire. It's the wrong one! Fix that, Lilah, by any and all means necessary. You're on permanent secondment to this division until then. He will sign a contract. You know the consequences if he doesn't, to this firm and to you. I know you won't let us down, will you, Lilah?
She can almost feel the knife entering her over and over again. Once was enough. Besides, hell or this, with all that this dimension contains - it's not exactly a hard choice, so she inclines her head slightly and says, "No, Sir. Consider it done."