Spike read the letter for what had to be the several-hundredth time.

Today the reference to Walter Battin rattled him in a new way and, rather than feeling gutted about small gestures becoming big deals, he went through Xander’s possessions until he found the crucifix the medium had been given at Lestor.  Ignoring the pain in his fingertips as he removed it from its box, Spike pushed up his sleeve and with great deliberation pressed the cross to his inner arm, concentrating on the relief this deserved pain offered.  As he watched his flesh smoke and burn his mind flashed back to the early days of the soul, embracing a cross in a church, and how much Xander hated him back then.  Spike recalled that he couldn’t even be bothered to hate Xander back because the boy had been too insignificant.

Xander.  Insignificant.  How was that possible?

“Spike!” came from outside the room, the direction of the elevator.

“Oh…fuck.”

“Spike, there are lights flashing, if you set off the sprinkler system…”

Spike peeled the crucifix from his charred and clinging skin just as Angel barged into the room.  Latest complaint undermined by what he witnessed and the open sore left on Spike’s arm, his grandsire looked on in complete exasperation.

“Why?”

“Because,” Spike muttered, returning the cross to its box, and the box to exactly where Xander had placed it.

“That’s no answer.”

“It’s all you’re getting.”

Spike removed the unwashed t-shirt that lay on top of Xander’s possessions, unable to resist holding it to his face and inhaling.

“It’s all I’ve heard for three weeks and that’s not right.”  Angel spoke softly now, despite having tried every possible kind of approach and knowing not one worked better than any other.  “You need help.  Talk to somebody.  Better still, listen.”

“No.”

Angel took a step forward and Spike defensively put the t-shirt away.

“At least answer your phone.  People are trying to do what Xander asked them to and…”

“Go away, can’t you?  I’m not in the mood.”

“I understand if you can’t talk to me, but Willow is here, in the building, so is Giles.  Buffy and Dawn are in town.  Henry has called, Simone has called, Doug…”

“I can’t talk to them.”

“Xander wrote them: look after Spike.”

“I know,” Spike whispered, choking on the emotion that he couldn’t seem to release, however tortured he felt.

“And, Spike…”

“I know what you’re going to say.”

“Do you?  You know I’m going to tell you to change your damn clothes because, apart from stinking, you walking about covered in Xander’s blood is upsetting people?  If you know that why don’t you do it?”

“I don’t care if I upset people.”

“Xander would care.”

Spike was across the room in a flash, pinning Angel against the wall by his throat.

“Don’t you fucking dare!”

A gesture so futile it wasn’t even a distraction.  Defensively, Angel was doing less than nothing, he hadn’t even tensed against the attack.  Spike gradually released his hold, turning away, head hanging in misery.  With a resolved sigh Angel reached into his own back pocket and drew out one of life’s little necessities.

“We need to move on, Spike.”

“How can I when…”

“I’m not having this conversation again.”

“He died, you can’t just brush that aside.”

“That’s not what I’m suggesting.”

“Then what—”

Spike crumpled to the floor as Angel’s metal-clad knuckles thudded into the back of his head.

“What I’m suggesting…” Angel explained as he heaved Spike’s inert body over his shoulder, “…is a sharp dose of reality.”

…

Spike struggled to wake, then finally came to with an uncoordinated jolt, practically tumbling himself off the seat he was slumped in.  Gazing around, he was unimpressed to see Angel frowning at him, Zooza, wearing a slightly more sympathetic face, and one of their doctors, a granite-faced English woman with a buzz-cut, who went by the wholly incongruous name of Bunny.

Zooza stepped forward and squeezed Spike’s shoulder.

“How’s your head?”

Spike glared at Angel.

“Sore.”  A sudden memory of Zooza with a machete wedged in his skull struck Spike, and he realised he hadn’t even asked after the mage since they’d returned from the barn.  “How’s yours?”

“Fine, absolutely fine.  You know me: fast to heal.”

“Yeah.  Lucky you.  Right…”  Spike wobbled to his feet and in the direction of the door.  “If you’re not about to hose me down…”

“Spike!” Angel snapped; Zooza whacked his arm.

“Be nice.”

“Spike doesn’t respond to nice.”

“Spike, respond to nice,” Zooza tried ordering.

“Bollocks.”

“See?”

“Then what will you respond to?”  Zooza crossed to Spike and forcibly took his hand.  “What do you want?”

“What do I want?” Spike repeated incredulously.  “I should be dead.  I want what I was due.”

Angel reached for Spike.

“Angel, don’t you dare kill him!”

“Don’t tempt me.”

In a swift move, Angel grabbed Spike and heaved him against the wall that separated this room from the next, forcing his face against the observation window.  It took a while, but when Spike finally looked through the glass, it was all Angel could do to keep him on his feet.  Nudging Angel aside, Zooza took Spike from him, supporting the traumatized vampire in a much gentler hold.

“See?”

“I don’t…” Spike whispered.  “It can’t be…”

“Seeing, dear friend, is believing.  It can be.”

“No.”

“Yes.  See.  Believe.  At last believe, and you’ll heal too.”

“But…how?”

“Bunny,” Angel cued.

“Spike,” the doctor began.  “As I have tried to tell you on numerous occasions, after we operated, Xander was coherent enough to agree to this treatment, and subsequently we’ve kept him heavily sedated to allow his injuries to heal as quickly and least traumatically as possible.”

“He’s dead.”

“I think I would know if my patient were dead,” Bunny said crossly.

“Think of it as a nice, safe, healing coma,” Zooza suggested.

Spike looked to Angel.

“He’s dead.”

“Xander died, yes.  The appropriate medical intervention, whatever the hell it is that Zooza does, and…”  Angel gestured into the next room.

“And…  And…”  Spike peered at the familiar form in the next room, taking a moment to watch the chest rise and fall of its own volition, not a machine to be seen.  “And…  Nobody told me?”  Amazement predictably gave way to anger.  “Nobody told me!  You bastards!  You didn’t think to tell me!”

“Actually, I am gonna kill him,” Angel said quite reasonably to Zooza.

“Can I kill him after you?” Zooza replied in the same tone as Spike furiously shrugged him off.

“Be my guest.”

Bunny stepped between the various factions and fixed her beady stare on Spike.

“You were told.  Repeatedly.”

“I—”

“Spike, you were told.  Shock and denial are powerful reactions, and the combination…”  Spike was shaking his head incredulously and Bunny took a deep, highly irritated, breath.  “I am a consummate professional, not given to lying.  You, on the other hand, have suffered severe trauma and are not accountable, on this rare occasion, for your unreasonable behaviour.”  She pointed at the glass.  “The medication keeping Xander sedated will be wearing off today, and at some point he will wake up, quite naturally.  I hope for his sake that you manage to pull yourself together by then.  And, incidentally, if you ever call me a bastard again, I will remove your bowels with a meat hook.  Good day.”

The men watched Bunny leave.  Zooza patted his hand over his heart.

“How I adore that woman.”  He rushed to follow her.  “I’ll be back.  Or not.  Don’t wait up,” his voice disappeared down the corridor.

Spike once again turned to the wall, leaning on the glass with both hands and staring at the unbelievable sight of an apparently living Xander in the next room.  Angel joined him, and they remained in silence for ten minutes.

“He’s alive?”

“Yes.”

“He can’t be.  Angel…”

“Go see for yourself.”

“You think…  Should I go in there?” asked Spike warily.

“Yes, you should.  And you could have been here all along.”

“But…he died.”

“And he lived.”

“You told me?”

“We all told you.”

“I wouldn’t listen?  I don’t remember not listening.”

“As Bunny said, shock and denial…”

“Would that be enough?  Really enough?  When it’s something I’d want to hear?”

“I’ve said it before, Spike, and I have to say it again, preferably without you deliberately taking it the wrong way this time.  You need to get out of this business.  Every time we lose someone, we lose a little more of you too, and, however much you infuriate me, I don’t want to watch your sanity being gradually eroded.  For all your bravado, the person you are now isn’t cut out for this life.”

“I can’t stop what I do.  If I stop…  I can’t, it’s out of the question, too much suffering will have been for nothing.”

“Okay, then…  Be selective.  If you can’t, then let me be selective for you.”

“Wouldn’t work.”

“Something has to change.  You try your best to be blinkered over the people who work for us, but what happens if you see me dusted, or Zooza killed?”

Spike tired to stop the involuntary shudder.

“Couldn’t happen.”

“You can’t take that for granted.”  Spike drew breath to protest but, in the face of such undeniable truth, gave up on any futile argument and simply offered a shaky nod.  “Think about it.  Get some rest.  Spend some time with Xander and…”

“I don’t know if I can, if—”

“If?”

“You weren’t there.  Back in Sunnydale.  You didn’t see Buffy when they yanked her out of heaven.  All she wanted was to be left in peace rather than brought back to a life she discovered she hated.  Xander was dead.  We’ve just done the same for him.”

“This is different.”

“You weren’t there.”

“Minutes rather than months.  And I was there when Buffy died and Xander brought her back after minutes rather than months.  She had no regrets, I promise you.”

“What if he hates me?”

“Then…he’ll tell you, and you’ll know.”

Spike fell silent, and Angel took that as his cue to leave.

Frightened to take his eyes from the still unreal vision of Xander, it took Spike a long time to get as far as the corridor.  A disturbed glance from one of the orderlies reminded him of the state he was in, and that motivated a move: he found himself a room where he could shower, borrowing a set of pale blue scrubs to replace the clothes that reeked of dirt and rotting blood.  He tried to flatten his wayward hair, but without gel it was impossible, and besides, if Xander woke up to see him like this…  The emotion that had remained bottled inside him for weeks welled and, once again, became painfully and debilitatingly trapped in his chest.  He’d have screamed it out if that were possible, but the only way to deal with this grief was for Xander not to be dead.

Xander…wasn’t dead.

Composing himself as best he could, Spike made his way to Xander’s room, needing several attempts before he could walk inside.  Needing a while longer to move to the bedside and take a good look at the bandaged and braced, but peacefully unconscious man who lay there, unknowingly the reason for Spike’s meltdown.  Spike cautiously touched the back of his fingers to Xander’s cheek, almost collapsing in relief when it was warm rather than freezing cold, as it had been in the barn.  He stroked the smooth skin, face and neck, every inch that wasn’t covered, and then he ran his fingers over the bandages too, a reminder that he had to find Bunny and familiarise himself with what damage Xander had sustained and the repercussions.  Any ongoing problems and he wanted to be the one to tell Xander.

His fingers drifted back to Xander’s cheek, and it was only then that Spike realised the obvious, that Xander had been shaved recently, and his urges became less desperate and more basic: he wanted to hurt, very seriously, whoever had dared touch this man so intimately.  A possessiveness that tilted toward murderous.  That felt so much better.

But first…  Spike leaned forward and pressed his ear to Xander’s chest, listening to the slow and strong, rhythmic drumming of Xander’s heart.  It couldn’t be real but it was real.

Xander died.

“I know.  I was there.”

Xander lived.

“I know.  I’m here.  He’s…”  Spike leant up and tapped Xander’s cheek.  “Xander, Love.  Time to tell your old mate whether or not he’s hallucinating.  Xander…”  A few more taps and Spike gave up: Xander waking up today didn’t mean sooner rather than later.  “Git,” Spike told him.  “Selfish git.”

He touched his lips to Xander’s in farewell, the lightest kiss, something to console him but not offend Xander too badly if there was any post-resurrection hatred to deal with.

It took a further ten minutes to get back into the corridor; Spike leaned against the wall with a sigh and reviewed what next.

Firstly, locate Bunny, get the lowdown on Xander’s condition.  He also needed to speak to Zooza.  Then…  Back here?  Or try a little resurrection of his own, revive the real Spike and fall back on the booze, brawl, fuck mentality of old.  The latter option, Spike told himself belligerently, and when he eventually returned he’d be ready for Xander being awake and dumping him with a hasty over when it’s over and a protracted glare that accused him of snatching away heaven.  Booze, brawl, fuck and Xander would be bound to know, would certainly dump him then, even if he’d had the kind of change of heart that was apparently only ever acceptable from a fickle bloody human.

Booze, brawl, fuck.  Yes.  Bottle of the best, and then maybe he’d kill someone just because he could, prove his strength in the wake of Angel’s molly-coddling.  And the fuck would be female, blonde, short, weak, scrawny, two eyes, and ugly, the total opposite of Xander.  Then maybe he’d kill her too, because he could, and because he wasn’t losing it, or going soft in his old age.  Booze, brawl, fuck and he’d jump at the next assignment, ready to prove he was able to do the worst of this job standing on his head, or, better still, standing on someone else’s.

Catching movement from the corner of his eye, Spike looked around to see the squat, streaky-mopped vision that was Dylan loping along the corridor toward him, twirling a set of car keys on his finger.

“Hey, Boss,” the young man cheerfully greeted him.  “Like the hair.”

“I could cripple you with one finger, Short-arse.  Don’t tempt me.”

“Now you’re getting me all excited,” Dylan grinned, tossing over the keys.  “New car, bay six, Big Daddy says don’t break it.”

“Buffy broke the last one,” Spike griped, but Dylan’s attention had already wandered to the occupant of room three.

“He’s cute,” Dylan observed, nose pressed to the window.  Spike refused to be drawn.  “He with you?”  Spike silently studied the car keys.  “’Cause if he isn’t, I’ll…”

“Touch him and you’re dead,” Spike said under his breath.

Dylan’s attention switched to Spike, and his large grey eyes were brimming with humour.

“You are so sexy when you’re homicidal.”

“Do me a favour, Pet?  Sod off before I’m obliged to break your legs.”

“Hey, at last!  The Spike we know and are terrified to love.  Welcome back.”

“Been that far out of it, have I?”

The nonchalance was betrayed by the anxious look Spike shot Dylan.

“Kinda.  Like when Hennessy died and then some.  Major then some.”

“Did they tell me about Xander?”

“Sure they told you, we all tried.  You just weren’t…here.  They said you were out of it before you’d even left the scene.  They said you gave up.  I don’t wanna believe that.”  With an abrupt change in mood and a friendly smile, Dylan took a step closer and squeezed Spike’s forearm.  “Glad you’re okay now, Boss.”

A horrible thought occurred to Spike.

“Who isn’t?”

“None of the immediate crew were hurt badly,” Dylan reassured.  “But a couple of the guys we brought in were seriously injured.  And…um…Paolo Roski died.”

“Paolo?”  A well-known face flashed through Spike’s mind: scarred brows, bent nose, cauliflower ears and broken teeth.  An absolute thug with the sweetest nature and sunniest disposition.  “He lived with his mum, didn’t he?  He was all she had.”

“Yeah.  Big Daddy and the Zooz went to see her.  It was…difficult, I’m told.”

“Paolo died?”

Dylan squeezed Spike’s arm again, gave him a sad nod, and wandered off.

So much for the booze, brawl and fuck scenario.  Sliding too easily into a daze of remembrances and losses, and unable to find the will to move, Spike was still propped against the wall when Bunny came looking for him some time later.

“Spike.  We need to talk.”

“Yes.  I suppose we do.”

“God, you look like crap.  If I fill you with blood and coffee, think you can hold it together for this conversation?”

“Maybe.  Dyl told me about Paolo.”

“Very sad,” Bunny agreed without any hint of sympathy, seizing Spike’s elbow and frogmarching him in the direction of her office.  “But life goes on.  Sick as you are of hearing that.”

“You don’t really give a monkey’s, do you.  Ever.”

“Surely you recognise professional detachment?”

“And beyond that…?”

Bunny considered.

“I don’t really give a monkey’s.”

Bunny pushed Spike into the guest chair by her desk and brought him a flask of blood which he rapidly gulped down, realising this was the first thing he’d consumed since before the barn.  He felt his energy returning and some of the depression lifting, perfect timing if he found any reason to break Bunny’s figurative balls over Xander’s treatment.  More blood, and an ultra-strong coffee blend for that extra lift, and he and Bunny faced one another across her desk.

“Tell me about Xander.  Put heavy emphasis on the life goes on.”

“Certainly.”  Spreading open Xander’s case notes, Bunny gave Spike her renowned velociraptor smile.  “Xander, yes.  Xander has proved…fascinating.”

“Fascinating?  Is that good, or…?”

The velociraptor smile widened.

…

“I know where the tree’ll be,” Spike told Xander as he wandered the room.  “I had a think and, near where I grew up, there’s this public green – bit of grass, few trees, shrubs, puddle that we affectionately called a pond – and I used to go there when it was sunny, sit and compose my sadly lacking little verses lauding Mother Nature’s finer gifts.  Francis actually used to refer to it as ‘William’s Patch’, so…obvious really.  I’d be happy to show you.  The Patch, our house, the street where Francis and his folks lived.  Assuming the houses haven’t been demolished.  Assuming the green wasn’t built on.  If they bulldozed my tree I think you’ll let me terrorise someone, so that should be fun.”

Spike fell still, stared at Xander, willing him to wake.  Nope.  He wandered.

“It’s been a funny old day,” he sighed.  “If I’d stopped beating myself up long enough to think about it I’d’ve known, wouldn’t I?  Who on Earth – or otherwise – can kill off Xander Harris?  Seen better attempts than Escolet’s if I’m honest.  Didn’t have a lot of style, did he, Love?”  Spike threw a wry smile at Xander’s snoozing form.  “Love.”  He shook his head and moved on.  “Bad case of what you fear consuming you, I s’pose.  Zooza’s said that to me…oh, about…several hundred times over the past few years.  Don’t let your fear consume you, he says.  First time he said it I thought he was calling me a coward so I punched him out, but it made me think.  Think, but not take it to heart, obviously, otherwise I’d’ve been in a fit state to listen when they told me you’d been revived.”  Moving to the bed, Spike laid his hand over Xander’s and started to squeeze, quickly snatching his hand back as he tried to figure out which of Xander’s palms and fingers had the scars from clutching the dagger’s blade.  Left.  Yes.  Left, not right.  He squeezed Xander’s hand – the right.  “Heard your heart stop.  Felt you leave me.  Xander, I—”

A caught breath, another squeeze, no reaction, and Spike once again paced.

“You should be dead.  You should be dead, but Zooza…  He has this ability to jumpstart a heart and hold it in rhythm until the purveyors of modern medicine deign to shift their collective arses and take over.  He can’t cure a body, but he can keep it hanging on.  I’ve seen him do it before, but never with a human, and it never occurred to me he’d manage it this time.  I was…consumed by fear.  He can be a right bloody know-all.”  Spike leaned on the frame at the foot of the bed; for a moment, it seemed to be all that was keeping him upright.  “For all our wittering on the subject, this is whatever it takes, isn’t it?  Whatever it takes to get you better.  Get you back.  Not sure you could walk past a magnet factory without kicking yourself to death now, but…  Wonder if you’ll be the same Xander.  No-one knows what Escolet did to you.  Beyond the obvious.  Think he quite fancied me for a moment back there in the barn, maybe that’ll…  Or maybe not.  I know you think it’s irrational, when I’m honest about how much I want you, and I agree with you, one-hundred percent.  Completely irrational.  Completely.  We’re right about that but…I can’t find it in me to care.”

Spike leant forward and prodded the lump in the bed covers that was Xander’s foot.  And again.  Prod, prod, prod.  Nothing.

“No dreams, at least.  I can see you’re at peace.  Still think you might hate me for letting them drag you out of heaven, and I don’t care what Angel says, he doesn’t know you.”  Spike’s voice dropped to a gruff whisper.  “He doesn’t know you once stepped in front of a car to get away from this life.  Hope it was once.  Course it was just the once, what’d be the point in you telling me you tried to kill yourself, but then lying about how often you tried?”  Spike cleared his throat and prodded the foot again.  He affectionately rubbed it.  “Who knew?  All of them, or any of them?  Bet Medusa knew.  I know the type.  Oh, yeah, she’d have it out of you.  I’m not criticising that, can’t afford to, can I?  Not while I’m avoiding Dawn, ‘cause she’d have every detail of our trip out of me in about ten minutes.”

No answer to that, naturally, but Xander did shift his head slightly before getting right back to some more heavy-duty sleeping.  Spike crossed to the cabinet beside the bed.  On it sat the tiny stereo.

“Would music work, you think?”  He began flicking through the tracks.  “Need something with a bit of punch to start your engine.  Christ, you have some shit on here, you should be ashamed of yourself.  What’s this?  ‘Folder two.’  Missed that before.  Maybe there’s some—  Neil Young?  You have Neil Young?  No wonder you felt you had to hide it.”  He went back to flicking, shaking his head.  “Neil Young.  Next it’ll be—  No, not even going to joke about it.”  Spike paused in his search, shuddered, and very deliberately deleted the Traveling Wilburys.  “Should’ve let you die, Petal, it would have been an act of mercy.”

More flicking and Spike stopped abruptly as a song title and memory collided.  He went back to searching, but…

“‘Every breath you take’,” he unconsciously sung under his breath.
“‘Every move you make.
Every bond you break,
Every step you take,
I’ll be watching—’”

Xander stirred.  Spike froze.  Waiting.  Xander gave a contented sigh and slept on.  Spike grumbled to himself as he tossed the stereo back onto the cabinet and returned to prowling, suddenly breaking into song.

“‘A wandering minstrel I,
A thing of shreds and patches,
Of ballads, songs and snatches,
And dreamy lullaby.’”  He scowled at Xander.  “I remember that from before I was turned, and it’s still better than Neil Young.  And it’s also still pertinent, you in your perpetual dreamy lullaby.  Bet you’re pretending.  Bet you’ve been awake for hours.”

Prowl.  Glances.