Chapters <<<< 7 8 9

Babylon

by
Tabaqui

Part Seven

On day twelve of their crystal-bought fortnight Spike came back from scavenging with a gash across his back, a full belly and a map. Ready to move on - get out of Boston and find some other place to be. Maybe go to New York and see if there was passage east - see if those junk-rigged ships he'd seen passing along the horizon went out to sea or only hugged the coast.

Xander, despite his claims, was better - better enough to be chafing at the confinement of the room. Spike had put the wards up anyway, because even this many years later he didn't exactly trust Harris not to do something...impulsive. Xander was reading, though, when Spike came in - wrapped up in blankets with the last of the nonpareils smudged on his chin and cheek.

Leave it to Harris to be able to keep down chocolate, Spike thought, but he had more - a dented steel thermos of hand-made hot chocolate, thick with nearly-cream. He'd traded a match-box with ten working watch-batteries inside for it. Xander looked up as he shut the door, lips curling in a sleepy smile, The Moonstone slipping out of his hand and sliding down the slope of his knees.

"Hey, Spike." Low and rough, whiskey-voice that, it seemed, would never recover. It stroked over Spike's senses like a warm and callused hand and Spike coaxed and teased for more, always.

"Like the book, then?" Spike asked, slipping his pack off and dropping it on the bed - going around to the side and sitting down. His hand went out to Xander's forehead - palm to warm skin, checking for fever. Automatic motion, one Xander didn't flinch from anymore. Xander's temperature seemed normal and Spike let his hand comb back through the silky hair, pausing for a moment to rub the fine strands at the nape of Xander's neck, his thumb stroking behind Xander's right ear. Routine now, these touches. Xander's eye blinked and then closed and Spike worked his fingers into the muscle at the top of Xander's spine, gently prodding. Xander sighed and let his knees fall, settling cross-legged, blanket edge unwrapping a bit from his shoulder.

"S'a good book," Xander mumbled, and Spike touched the leather-bound volume with his other hand, stroking its worn cover. Willkie Collins' epic tale of a stolen Indian diamond, and William had adored it. A rare books shop in Philadelphia had yielded several such volumes and Spike kept them in his pack despite the weight and bulk. Ties to a past long-gone that he...needed, somehow.

"Yeah, it is," Spike said - got up and got the thermos and poured out a cupful and brought it over - handed it to Xander with a small smile and Xander took it and sniffed and then grinned up at Spike, his whole face lightening - his eye sparkling. Flash of that boy that had shared his home - his friends - with Spike so many years before.

"Can't believe you found any," Xander said, taking a tentative sip.

"Any good?"

"Mmm...yeah. You have some too, Spike," Xander said and Spike lifted the cup from thin fingers and took a sip.

"Yeah, that's all right, then. Look here, Xander..." Spike handed the cup back - pulled his pack closer by one strap and fished the map out - spread it over the worn duvet between them. "Look - we're gonna leave in a day or so - go to New York and -"

"Locus Obiti," Xander said softly - sing-song voice that made the hairs stand up on Spike's neck. He looked up and Xander was gazing at the map, a dreamy expression on his face. Dreamy and gone, his hand lax on his thigh, the cup tipping in the other, chocolate slopping over the edge.

"Harris - Christ -!" Spike snatched the cup - recoiled when Xander leaned forward and reached out, tracing a damp finger over the map.

"Ha-de-ron-dah...there... there in mountains, there behind the veil, west, north, up, down... Passing...through."

"Passing through what?" Spike asked, staring at the map - at Xander's trembling finger that traced a path from the coast to the interior to - "Adirondacks, pet? What's there?"

"Ha-de-ron-dah...Locus Obiti...passing through..." Xander whispered. He sat utterly still for a moment and then he looked up at Spike, grey and shivering and with a sheen of sweat across his face. "What's that mean, Spike? What's - locus -?"

"Means...means place - destination. Obiti..." Spike shook his head. "I can't - remember. What - did you see something?" Spike asked - held out the still-steaming cup of chocolate and Xander took it in weak-fingered hands - carried it carefully to his mouth to sip slowly.

"I saw...a veil, a...a portal? A - hole, Spike. There's a hole, there. And something - on the other s-side."

"What, then?"

Xander shrugged - drank another and another tiny sips and sighed. "I don't know. Couldn't see that. We should g-go there," he said finally, and Spike lifted an eyebrow - looked at him. Xander shrugged again and drank his chocolate and Spike sat there, studying the map - looking out the balcony doors at the clouded, curdling sea.

"Reckon?" he asked finally, and Xander reached out and touched his cheek - cupped it, his fingers hot from the cup, smelling of chocolate and salt and Ivory soap.

"Yeah. Reckon. It's out. We should go s-soon." Spike closed his eyes and leaned into the touch and when Xander's arm started to tremble from the strain of being held up, Spike reached up and folded Xander's hand into his - rubbed his thumb over the too-prominent, scarred knuckles.

"You can't walk that far," he said, and Xander nodded.

"Doubt it."

"All right, then," Spike said, and got up - started laying out every item he had in his pack - from the cart. They'd need transportation - another sleeping bag - warmer clothes. He had work to do.

~*~*~*~*~

Later, when the sooty-grey sky had turned an ominous greenish-black and rain was slashing like buckshot against the hull of the ship they sat rib-deep in the tub, the small bathroom lit by a Coleman lantern that Spike had brought back the week before. The generators had been turned off, apparently, in the face of the storm. But not before Spike had drawn a bath.

Spike slowly ran soapy hands up and down Xander's back, tracing the lash-marks there. Silvery tracks like a pulled seam, skin slightly wrinkled, the scars themselves a little sunken, stark over sharp bones. "Those bastards beat you," Spike said, and Xander curled down into himself a little bit. Spike snarled silently. "Don't curl up like a damn snail in salt. Isn't your fault, what they did."

"Sure it is," Xander said, and Spike shook him - took one bowed shoulder in his hand and tugged Xander half around in the steaming water.

"How do you figure, then?"

"I fought 'em. All the time," Xander said - looked up at Spike for a moment and then dropped his gaze again, fingers twisting in his lap - water-drops and soap foam slipping down his chest. "Don't know why, r-really. Couldn't - get away from them and they were stronger than me... Should have just -"

"Just what? Gave up? You don't ever give up, Xander. S'why you'd make such a good vamp - tenacious, just like me."

"You mean obsessive-compulsive with a side of ADD," Xander mocked, but he smiled a little, and his shoulders came back up and Spike grinned.

"Turn 'round now, let me wash your hair. Growin' out nice, it is."

"Yeah. Haven't had it this long since... Well, they kept it buzzed to keep the - the wildlife to a minimum."

"Huh. Didn't work though, did it." Spike kneaded shampoo into Xander's hair, careful to keep it away from both eye and socket. Then Xander tipped his head back and Spike picked up his smallest cooking pot and poured water over Xander's head, sluicing the soap away until the dark strands lay sleek and clean, close to the skull. Xander sighed - eased back slowly until he was lying along Spike's chest. Buttocks to groin and his hands loosely on Spike's thighs - his head on Spike's shoulder. Spike just wrapped his arms around Xander's chest and rested there, cheek to the wet hair, listening to the strange, stumbling tattoo of Xander's heartbeat.

Not right, that. Seems to trip - almost stop. And it's too...liquid. To rushy Spike thought maybe a faulty valve - blood leaking back into the chamber it was supposed to be pumped out of. It would explain a lot - Xander's tiredness, his dizzy spells - the sometime pain he had in his chest. The wheeze and gurgle of lungs that never quite emptied of fluid, despite the pills Spike had given him. Xander was better, but he was right, too - he wasn't ever going to be well.

"Why is this so nice?" Xander asked softly, his thumbs stroking gently on the insides of Spike's knees, and Spike shrugged - pulled Xander a fraction closer.

"Oh...suppose it's just...us knowing each other all these years. You can...trust me. You know?" Xander was silent for a moment and then he turned his head - twisted a bit to look up at Spike. Spike looked back, not daring to blink for fear he'd miss...something. Miss that - that light in Xander's eye - that crinkling of the skin as Xander smiled.

"Yeah, you're right. I guess - I can. I...do." Long silence, and Xander's breath warm against Spike's jaw - breath tea-sweet and chocolate rich. Spike tipped his head a little, half an inch closer and just wanting the warmth - wanting...

And then Xander's lips, light and soft on his and the weightless kiss seemed to last forever.

~*~*~*~*~

It took every bit of trade Spike had - and could scrounge - to get what he wanted. But it was worth it and he said goodbye to the bits and bobs of gold and semi-precious stones - and one diamond - without a quiver. A handful of still-viable electronics and the rifles and he was mobile again. He patted his sleek new acquisition and climbed aboard - drove with a sense of nostalgia through the streets and back to the Dens. He parked - gave the demon on duty a glare and a flask of moonshine to keep watch and bounded up the gangway to the room. Gather up the wards, gather up their gear - gather up Xander and get on the road.

Xander was waiting on the bed, leg bouncing in anticipation and nerves, pale face looking a little pinched under the dark knit cap he had on. He'd woken up fevered and the weather wasn't co-operating; it had turned chilly in the last twenty-four hours and Xander was moving stiffly. Sore he said. Aching in his joints. Spike had found him a fleece-lined coat and wool gloves - a scarf against the wind and Xander sat with his hand on the pile of things, shivering.

"You up for this, then?" Spike asked, tucking the wards away into their pouch - secreting that in his pack and making sure the pocket was closed tightly.

"Yeah, I - want to g-go. How are we gonna get there?"

"Oh, just you wait," Spike said, grinning - picking up his pack and Xander's - gathering up the bundles of the stove and the extra blankets. He hadn't wanted two packs, but in the end he just wasn't able to jettison his things - his books and a few keepsakes. Xander hadn't said anything but he'd nodded, smiling a little, when Spike had packed them back away. And he'd assured Spike he could carry a pack that consisted of little but sweaters, jeans and an all-weather sleeping-bag.

Xander tucked his scarf into the front of the sweater he was wearing - sweater, flannel, thermal undershirt and he was still cold, Spike could tell. Then he dragged the coat on - pulled on the gloves and Spike stretched the cuffs over the coat sleeves, to keep the wind from blowing right up. Spike did a last check of the room and then they walked out. Slow, for Xander's sake, but it still felt...special. Felt good.

Good to have some fuckin' purpose in my life. Even if it's a goose-chase. Spike wasn't sure they'd find anything in the hundreds of thousands of acres of wilderness where Xander had seen a 'veil' - but it beat dying of boredom. It beat...remembering.

The sky was low and dark that day - dry and silent lightning the color of snow flaring and snapping overhead and they stood at the head of the gangway for a moment, Xander taking in a few deep, slightly bubbly breaths - squinting at the lighting. He looked down and stomped his feet inside the hiking boots Spike had found - looked up again.

"Haven't walked around in...shoes in a long time. Probably get a blister."

"That's why we're gonna ride in style, Xander. Come and see." They walked slowly down - crossed the dock and Spike was grinning - anticipating. Xander didn't disappoint.

"Oh! Oh - wow. That's so cool! Th-that's really - Indiana Jones style, man! What kind is it?"

"Harley-Davidson WLA. Used 'em in the war. Scouts and couriers and such. Good overland, tough as nails. Had one in '44."

"Yeah? Where? What happened?" Xander was grinning back and Spike flipped open the panniers on either side of the rack and stowed their gear, being fussy and making sure it was all seated just so.

"In Belgium. Me an' Dru - we were havin' a Christmas in Antwerp and the bleedin' Krauts thought they'd do some fighting. Stole one of these and chased the moon, getting the fuck out of there before they burned us out. Went right through a line of Panzers..." Spike had to grin at the memory - at the wild night of cross-country travel on a stolen motorcycle, Dru perched behind him with a 9mm Luger, shooting at shadows as they'd jounced and slithered over the slush-covered ground. "Never let a crazy vamp have a pistol, Xander - always leads to tragedy. For somebody," Spike added - patted the cushion that was rigged on the old ammo box. "Climb on, then."

"I'll keep that in mind," Xander said, still grinning. He swung his leg over the bike carefully, unsteady, and Spike held his arm while he settled. Then he held the pack while Xander threaded his arms through and buckled it in front, struggling a little with gloves and the bulky coat. Then Spike got on himself, pack already in place - patted the gas tank in appreciation. Xander touched his arm.

"Where's your coat? Why don't you have your coat, Spike?" Xander said, his hand lightly on Spike's sweatered forearm.

"Lost it," he said shortly, putting his foot on the kick-start - half standing. "We should -"

"Spike. You need a coat," Xander said and Spike sagged - looked around at Xander and saw the serious look on his face - the determined frown. "You can't ride like this - you'll freeze."

"Don't really feel the cold -" Spike started, and Xander poked him.

"Yes you do. I know you d-do. Let's go get a coat. Can't have William the Bloody on a motorcycle in a sweater. That's lame." Spike opened his mouth to argue and just - stopped. If Xander wanted him to have a coat, then... He'd have a bloody coat.

"Whatever you say, pet," he grumbled, and Xander poked him again, grinning.

"That's what I like to hear. Let's get ramblin'."

~*~*~*~*~

I-90 wasn't very clear and they had to test the WLA's off-road ability often. It got colder as they headed inland and after about four hours it was obvious Xander couldn't go much longer. He was clinging to Spike's ribs, face pushed into the pack somewhere. Between bouts of coughing a steady whimpering sound creaked out of his throat. Spike was pretty sure he wasn't even aware of it.

They only made it as far as the exit to Springfield - not even a hundred miles. Too much back-tracking and long detours around dragon-blasted areas and cities that looked - or smelled - wrong. Demons not friendly to much of anything had moved in in force in several places and for once Spike wasn't looking for a fight.

Springfield was lit up with magic and bonfires and they found an abandoned house easily enough, Spike choosing one with three chimneys and solid brick walls that showed no signs of damage. Xander coughed, bent double and stumbling as they made their way up a cracked walk, hanging on to Spike's arm. The fireplace in the downstairs sitting room was choked with rubble and Spike hauled Xander upstairs, pushing him down onto a rumpled bed while he broke up furniture to start a fire. Xander's lips were blue - his face ashen and streaked with tear-tracks. And the choking cough seemed to go on and on, and Spike was getting worried.

"Gonna live, mate?" he asked, setting up the stove and getting water heating for tea - finding his 'wildlife' herbs and crushing them into a pot on the hearth in the hope that the astringent steam would help.

Xander dragged in a hard, ragged breath, eye wide and still spilling moisture. "Just - n-need to - catch my -- b-breath, I'll b-be - fine."

"Yeah. Sound it, you do." Spike went into the bathroom that was attached to the room and found mostly clean, slightly mildewy towels under the sink. He brought one back and wet it with some of the warming water - carefully wiped Xander's face. "Get you warm, get you some tea - rest a bit, you'll be all right." Xander nodded - doubled over, holding his ribs and all but strangling on the cough and Spike helplessly rubbed his back - slipped the cap off and rubbed his hand through Xander's hair.

"Maybe one of those - inhaler things, yeah?" he said, and Xander blinked up at him, shrugging a little - catching Spike's hand and squeezing it in his.

"Don't - know. Never tried. M-maybe. But - l-later? Don't - l-leave," Xander said, his hand curling tighter into Spike's and Spike squeezed back - rubbed his thumb over the bones and tendons standing out on the back of Xander's hand.

"No, okay. Later. I'm gonna - make a pallet up, yeah? Right down by the fire. Bake that cough out of you."

"Yeah, okay," Xander rasped, and Spike rubbed his back one more time and then got up - went down the hall, searching. In a third bedroom there was a kid's bed - a narrow mattress that wouldn't take up every bit of floor space and he hauled it into the master bedroom - heaped duvet and blankets on it and then their sleeping bags - knelt down and helped Xander unlace his boots and get them off.

"Undo your coat, now - you're holding all the cold in." Xander's fingers struggled clumsily, even after he'd stripped the gloves off and Spike ended up doing it for him - got him settled on the pallet, the steaming pot of herbs near his head and the rest of their blankets draped over him. The fire was burning hot and fast and Spike went downstairs and gathered up what cut wood there was in the house - birch and pine, it seemed - and took it up. After Xander fell asleep, he'd get more - probably a whole stack in the back yard or something.

Xander was breathing in the steam and coughing a little less by the time the tea was ready and they both had a cup. But Xander wouldn't eat and he set his cup down and curled into an exhausted heap, fever-warm and shivering. Three aspirins in his belly and not much else and Spike didn't like it. But he didn't know what to do about it, either. He shed his own too-new leather coat and scooted in close - hugged Xander to him - stroked sweat-damp hair off Xander's forehead and, after a moment's hesitation, lightly kissed his temple.

"S'okay, you know," Xander murmured.

"What is?"

"That. You... I don't mind if you...kiss me. S'nice."

"Yeah?" Spike asked, but he was grinning and Xander twisted his head a little on the pillow, looking up at him.

"Yeah. Been - a long time and... And I -" He stopped abruptly, chewing his lip. Twining his fingers with Spike's and closing his eye briefly, as if sorting his thoughts. "I - never would have minded. Not after that...summer."

'Yeah?' seemed like a stupid thing to say again and Spike just lay there, silent. Remembering the long summer of Buffy's second death and how he and Xander had...called truce. Let go the old hates so they could concentrate on keeping what was left of their family...alive.

"You were supposed to kiss me again," Xander said, teasing edge to his voice but his grip tight and needing and Spike smiled - bent his head and kissed him again, mouth on mouth and just - lightly. Letting Xander breathe - letting him pull back when he wanted. Which he didn't seem to do, and they kissed slowly until Xander was half-asleep, his breathing slowing and his body going lax beside Spike's - shivers easing as the fever broke.

"You rest now," Spike whispered into his cheek - brushed his lips through Xander's hair and snuggled down behind him, pulling him close. Xander sighed and wormed backwards and was out not two minutes later and Spike lay blinking in the heat and dance of the fire, waiting. Letting Xander slip far, far under, stroking his hand up and down his arm - over his fingers. He'd do his hunting and foraging...later. There was no hurry.

~*~*~*~*~

They ended up staying four days in Springfield - the fever lingered and the cough worsened until Spike started seriously thinking about finding a healer of some kind. And Xander had a sort of...relapse. Asked brokenly for the shot, over and over, until Spike yelled at him - told him the bloody shite was down the drain and gone, no chance. It wasn't - not really. It was riding in cotton-wrapped splendor in a side-pocket of Spike's pack, just in case. But they weren't anywhere near 'just in case'. Not by a long shot.

Not unless you really are dying, Xander, and you're not - nowhere near dying. Just sick, is all - just got too cold. I'll get you better clothes - figure a way to keep you warm on the bike. You'll be fine. He found camping gear in a high-end shop - silk long-johns and space-age fiber sweaters - wool shirts. And the real prize, a box-full of some hunting gadget; little chemical packets that heated up after you flexed them - started some kind of reaction. Small enough to tuck into boots and gloves and pockets - radiate warmth for hours. Xander looked them over and nodded, wan smile on his stubbled face. Spike thought a beard would help keep him warm but Xander wanted it off - it itched, he complained. So Spike found a nice straight-razor in a pawn shop and carefully removed every bit of stubble - suffered with a smile Xander rubbing his cool, smooth cheek over Spike's.

"Isn't that - b-better?" he said, and Spike just kissed him, silent approval.

~*~*~*~*~

Their next stop was some little town near the border of New York and Massachusetts - the signs were all gone. But there was a clutch of Hnuk demons there and on the second day of raging fever and bloody phlegm Spike tracked them down and got one to come back to the community center he and Xander were squatting in. It had a fireplace as wide and tall as a truck and a generator in the basement and Spike had got the boiler working - got hot water, finally, and was giving Xander baths in between roastings.

The Hnuk took one look at Xander and went off on an herb-hunt, coming back an hour later with a bushel-basket of stuff. It diced and boiled and stewed in the kitchen and smeared a stinging, eye-watering poultice over Xander's chest and throat. The sludge-brown stuff was foul, but within ten minutes Xander's agonized, liquid breathing had eased and he fell asleep, sweating face bathed in fire-light, his clothing all stuck to him with sweat.

"Every day - three times a day. Heat, hot in the belly - no more of this." The Hnuk eyed the inhalers Spike had found with distaste and shoved them away - gave Spike a packet of dark-red leaves. "Make tea - as much as he'll take. Honey fine, sugar fine, no al-co-hol. His heart -" The hirsute, heavy-lidded Hnuk shook its head, clicking its tongue behind its teeth. "Heart not good."

"I know. Nothing to be done about that, then?"

"Tea will help - hawthorn, thistle, rosehip, tchka. You find me trade - find me good plant things - I give you enough for...six months." Spike couldn't go foraging for three more days but he ended up raiding a police warehouse two towns over for gro-lights, drip-irrigation supplies - somebody's marijuana-growing set up, it seemed. Plus a biscuit-tin full of seeds from a nursery that specialized in 'antique' plants. He was gone for almost twenty hours but it was worth it - the Hnuk were pleased and Xander... Xander just pulled him down onto the pallet and hugged him, sighing softly into Spike's neck and not letting go.

"Missed you too," Spike said.

They were there ten days all told, and then they were in New York and turning north - coasting along increasingly better roads toward the Adirondack Park and Xander's Locus Obiti. Spike had no idea what they would find - if they would find anything. But hope was a little coal in his chest, as warm and welcome as Xander's lips on the back of his neck - Xander's hand on his chest while they slept. Hope, anticipation....excitement. Things he hadn't felt in a long time, and Spike held Xander close in the rustling darkness of the tent, listening to an ash-fall slither over and down, over and down - rasping susurrus that went on and on. He slept deeply, his only dreams that of primal forest and clear, cold water - long march of dark evergreens upright and prickly against a snowy frieze of stone. Nothing of Gunn, or Illyria, or Angel. Nothing at all.

Part Eight

It took them almost two weeks to reach Saranac Lake. The tea the Hnuk had made seemed to be working - seemed to be doing something, but Spike wasn't taking chances and anyway - there was no hurry. It was amazingly pleasant to ride along at slow speeds, watching the mountains unfold and rise up all around them. The woods were mix of dense evergreens and sugar maples, the still-vivid crowns winding through the dull, dark green of the pines like threads of ruby and antique gold. The towns got further between - the demons and hybrids thinned out and it was...quiet. Normally that would have put Spike right over the edge but somehow, it didn't. The demon who'd traded the bike had done something to the motor and Spike didn't have to forage for gas too often. He'd traded his bottle of whiskey for that little bit of magic but so far all the stations they'd come across had still had petrol in the big underground tanks. He didn't begrudge the whiskey, though - he just didn't take some risks, anymore.

They would ride for three or four hours and then stop. Find a house or a hotel and camp for the night. They even slept in the tent a couple of nights but it was cold and damp and Spike didn't like how it made Xander's chest sound. So it was beds and fireplaces and sometimes, if there were demons, hot water and hot food that Spike would sniff and taste and dither over until Xander would remind him he wasn't actually all human anymore, so hand over the damn stew, Spike. Xander never got sick but Spike couldn't keep himself from checking, every time.

Here where the land was mostly untouched and the towns simply deserted rather than destroyed the pickings were easy. In the back of a pawn shop Spike found a rifle that slotted nicely into the scabbard on the WLA, with a box of hollow-point ammo besides. Most of the hybrids could be killed by a well-placed round, and he wanted something Xander could use, if he had to. Spike also got them all new clothes at least twice - nobody had working washing machines and he'd be buggered if he'd try and wash jeans by hand. Xander just dressed his freshly-bathed self in layers and layers, snuggling down in a cocoon of blankets by the fire Spike had made, reading 'The Scarlet Pimpernel' now - reading aloud to Spike who fed the fire and lay with his hand on Xander's thigh, letting the rough, low voice lull him into a half-doze; scent of woodsmoke and chocolate and salt, honey-sweet tea on his lips from Xander's mouth.

'Chauvelin, who, as he told Marguerite once, had seen a trick or two in his day, had never dreamed of this one. With one ear fixed on those fast-approaching footsteps, one eye turned to that door where Desgas and his men would presently appear, lulled into false security by the impudent Englishman's airy manner, he never even remotely guessed the trick which was being played upon him.
He took a pinch of snuff.
Only he, who has ever by accident sniffed vigorously a dose of pepper, can have the faintest conception of the hopeless condition in which such a sniff would reduce any human being.'

~*~*~*~*~

Xander stopped reading, his voice choking off and Spike twisted around to look up at him, wondering what, exactly, the odd snuffling noises were. Xander was giggling.

"He g-gave him snuff?" Xander wheezed. "That's the b-big plan? Chauvelin's gonna sneeze himself to d-death?"

"You ever done snuff, then? It's wicked if you get a nose-full of what he did."

"But - b-but -" Xander let the book droop down out of his hands. He was laughing out loud now, his eye leaking tears and his breath getting wheezy - his whole body shaking and Spike couldn't help grinning at him - squeezing his thigh and poking him in the belly when he started to double over.

"Not that funny -"

"It is! It is, i-it - Oh god." Xander squirmed lower in the bundle of blankets, pulling Spike up closer, his breath hitching in little snorts and huffs as he tried to control himself. "Okay, maybe it isn't but...it just ss-struck me... Snuff." Spike propped himself on his elbow over Xander and Xander grinned happily up at him, his chipped tooth and thin face making him so damn boyish - so innocent in the soft, amber light of the fire. Even the empty socket seemed nothing more than shadow - a trick of the light - and Spike had to lean down and kiss him.

Xander tasted of honey and salt and the complicated green flavors of the heart-tea - underlying tang of not-human that was like tin and licorice. But all of it warm - all of it opening eagerly to him as Xander kissed back, his hand curling loosely into Spike's hair and his leg shifting over, thigh to thigh under the blankets. Long, slow kissing that made Spike feel - breathless. Made him inch his hand up under Xander's layers and stroke the finely-textured skin of his back. Scars over muscle felt like coarse silk under his fingers and Xander sighed into his mouth - pulled Spike over a little closer and did his own slow exploration of backbone and ribcage and sternum, making Spike laugh.

"You think there's gonna be a test later, pet?" he asked, and Xander pulled his hair a little, laughing back.

"No, you jerk. I just want to...know you. Want to know everything. All the stuff I didn't b-bother with, before."

"Yeah?" Spike asked, and Xander's smile faded, then - went to something solemn and intense and young, again. So very, very vulnerable and open and Spike felt that look like a fist to his gut.

"Yeah," Xander said finally, fingertip skipping up and down Spike's ribs, his eyebrows drawn down and his eye veiled behind lashes and lid. Looking like he wanted to say more but just not quite able. Spike tipped Xander's chin up and studied the dark, defiant eye that gazed back at him and then he just leaned in and went back to kissing. But they both knew something was different, after that.

~*~*~*~*~

They sheltered from an ash-fall about ten miles from Saranac Lake - the town there the closest they could get on the bike to where Xander said they had to go. Spike was fretting about that - fretting about Xander having to hike miles and miles through forest, on trails meant for experienced hikers or at least people with properly working hearts. Xander ignored him - took out the book and started looking for their page, nibbling a piece of dried meat that was possibly demon, possibly dog. The demon selling it had been suspiciously unclear and Spike wondered if it was family, which would account for the absurdly low trade-price. But it tasted salty and savory and good, and Xander seemed to like it so Spike wasn't going to quibble. The ash made him restless, though - that and the hike ahead and he couldn't settle enough to listen. After a while Xander shut the book and reached out - touched his arm.

"Tell me what happened? With Angel and - the others? It felt sad and...angry. You were angry."

"I was out of my mind, pet," Spike said softly - carried Xander's hand to his lips and then folded it into his own. He lay on his back and told the story, his voice tremoring and breaking from time to time, but steady enough. When he was done Xander tugged until he turned over - let himself be pulled and pushed until he was lying with his head on Xander's chest, the rushy start-stop of Xander's heart right under his ear. He lay there for a long time, thinking he might cry but in the end Xander's hand, sweeping over and over his hair lulled him to sleep and when he woke up, the ache had passed.

~*~*~*~*~

Breaking down the tent, Spike's anxiety returned but it wasn't about Xander, this time. It was about where they were and he moved fast, rolling and packing and getting things settled - not liking the feeling of the place. The air was damp and the ash clung to everything and made Xander cough. The clouds were high and moving fast - deep, pearly grey lit with intermittent, silent lighting. A strange day - the sun was up there somewhere - and the skin on the back of Spike's neck prickled. Crows were circling and cawing away to the east and then a covey of morning doves started up out of the tall birch opposite, whirring away with small peeps of alarm. There was a deep, breathy, growling sort of noise from - somewhere. A guttural huuh huuh that reminded Spike uneasily of a lion, beating the bush for prey.

"Xander - get on the bike," Spike said. Deliberately kept his voice low. Jerked the buckle down tight on the off-side pannier and put his hand out, steadying Xander as he straddled the bike. "Keep hold of my pack for now, all right? I just want to -"

Something moved - something struck, fast as a snake but infinitely larger and Spike felt himself hit tarmac and then ground, rolling hard, cloud of ash kicking up and covering them. Something all angles and bone and coarse fur - all snarling, fang-filled mouth tearing at him and he jammed his leather-clad arm into its jaws and pushed - heard something crack, loud as fucking canon and Xander yelled and then Spike was free, crashing hard into a tree-trunk and scrambling to his feet, ash gritty between his teeth.

About twenty feet away was a hybrid, snarling as it clawed at the leaf-mold; struggling to right itself as well, blood pouring down its arm. Spike, ears ringing, threw a wild glance at Xander who was lying on his back beside the motorcycle, the rifle clutched across his chest and a stunned look on his face - one foot hooked on a pannier.

Oh, fuck, did it hit Xander too? Fuck, fuck, got to get the fucking gun - Xander wasn't making any move to get up and Spike dove across the space between them, snatching the rifle and chambering another round - taking aim before the hybrid was able to do more than howl. He pulled the trigger - cocked - pulled again and the hybrid went down, gurgling. The 45-70 round left an exit wound the size of a dinner plate and Spike had hit it mid-trunk with both shots. Half its spine was gone - lungs and heart pulverized - and it crumpled into a heap of bony limbs and brindled fur, fanged snout gaping open as the wide, black eyes slowly glazed and went dead. Blood pooled beneath it, black and silvery-grey as the ash mingled with it.

"Xander? You all right?" Spike dropped to his knees beside Xander, hardly daring to touch him until the man moved on his own. Xander lay there blinking up at the sky, his mouth twisted into a grimace of pain.

"Ff-fuck, that's got a wu-wicked fucking - kick," Xander muttered. He made an abortive attempt to get up and Spike leaned the rifle against the bike - carefully hauled Xander upright. Xander yelped and put his hand gingerly to his right shoulder. "That's gonna leave a m-mark," he said, and Spike snorted softly.

"Scared me, pet. Didn't know if it got you or not. Just the shoulder, then?"

"Yeah, just the shoulder, turned into mincemeat. No w-worries."

Spike couldn't resist a quick kiss to Xander's forehead and then he was standing up - lifting Xander with him and picking up the rifle again. Just in case. Brushing at Xander's coat and hair, cursing at the mess.

"Is that - it?" Xander asked, and his voice sounded - odd. Sounded off and Spike looked at him sharply.

"Yeah, that's it. What's wrong?"

"N-nothing. I mean... That's -" Xander's voice trailed off into a ragged intake of breath, his eye fixed on the hybrid. Spike laid his palm against Xander's cheek and stroked the jut of bone there lightly with his thumb.

"What is it, Xander? Have you seen that kind before? Do they hunt in pairs or - packs?"

Xander blinked - started to lift his hand and then winced. He held his right arm close to his body with his left and stared for another moment at the hybrid lying crumpled on the tarmac. It had been tall and lanky, darkly pelted and maned. Long, clawed hands, clawed feet and a blunt snout that was reminiscent of a hyena. Human enough that it was obviously female but the legs bent backwards at the knee, like a dog's.

"N-no, they don't - hunt in pairs or packs. Th-they - hunt alone. Always - alone..." Xander's voice trailed off to silence and Spike felt a twist of unease in his belly and let his hand drop away from Xander's cheek. Something - familiar about that.

"Listen, pet, you need to tell me what's going on, you hear? Makin' me nervous, now."

"Oh." Xander sniffed - looked away from Spike, rubbing his hurt arm slowly. "When it happened - when the change happened... That's what - the Slayers turned into, Spike. That was - that was a Slayer."

"Slayer? Christ." Spike tugged Xander gently closer - hugged him - and Xander hugged back, pushing his face into the collar of Spike's coat and just breathing, for a long moment. Then he stepped back - wiped at his eye.

"Spike? Can I - borrow your knife?" Spike nodded silently, slipping the short-bladed one from the sheath at his waist and handing it over. Xander took it - took a deep breath. Walked stiffly over to the - body - and knelt down. A moment later he was coming back, and Spike watched him tuck the long lock of dark, brindled hair into his pocket without comment.

They rode in silence, Xander's hand on Spike's hip, and settled into a resort cabin for the next three days while Xander's badly bruised and strained shoulder healed. Then they shouldered their packs and a cache of tinned food - said a fond farewell to the motorcycle - and walked into the forest.

~*~*~*~*~

Walking was easy - worrying about Xander was exhausting and they made the journey in fits and starts, resting often despite Xander's protests. Spike kept alert, the rifle in his hands just in case. The woods were quiet, though. The dim light filtered down all dapple and shadow, dimmer yet under the close-knit pines and the air was thick with the astringent smell of them - with the thick scents of leaf-mould and mushrooms, rotting wood and water. Rills and creeks, ponds and springs at every turn and Xander scooped up a handful from a tiny waterfall, drinking and then smiling - amazed that it tasted so good and was so cold. Spike had some himself and it was sharp and clean on his tongue. Xander said it made the tea taste better and drank an extra cup.

But halfway through stirring in the honey - while he was re-winding his scarf - adjusting his gloves... He'd get that look in his eyes. Dazed and strange. Turning a little, this way and that way, whispering.

"North, up, sideways...through the looking glass...broken glass...broken record, there's a skip..." Rasping whisper and a little shudder and Spike touched his cheek - made sure he was awake - was there, before they went on.

Picking their way around the skeleton of a huge, fallen maple Xander slipped and scuffed his hand - stood sucking the red, scraped skin of the heel for a moment while Spike dug around for a length of clean gauze and some A&D that he'd picked up in the Lake town.

"I was born with a caul, you know?"

"You were?" Spike looked at Xander for a moment - held out his hand and Xander put his hand in Spike's, fingers open, palm up. Tiny beads of blood welled along the scuff. "Had a cousin that was," Spike said. Cousin Jules, who had died at the age of eight. He remembered the caul - a thin membrane stretched over the face of some newborns, reckoned to be - good luck. The midwife had taken it - sold it, or so William's mother had said, with a sniff and a moue of disgust.

"Yeah?" Xander flinched a little from the cold ointment - smiled at Spike's cluck of amusement. "My granny - my mom's grandma - she saved it. Buried it. Said it meant I was special - meant I would do...great things." Spike wound the gauze around and around - tied it neatly and tucked the ointment away - ran his fingers over Xander's palm and wrist, just - touching.

"Guess she was right," Spike said finally, and Xander shook his head - laughed softly.

"I don't think being the 'last pure-blooded human' is special, Spike."

"They used a caul to tell the future, pet. For divination. Guess that's special. I think - it's special."

Xander's fingers curled into his - held fast - and Xander hitched his pack up a little higher. "I think... I think I was already part demon before the changes happened. I think - that was my...m-mark -"

"Of what - Cain? What are you hinting at, pet? Not gonna tell me you're evil or some such, are you?"

"No, no... I meant... What I was, in Sunnydale... I think the caul meant I'd be that. Different. Not - right."

"Bollocks, Xander," Spike growled, squeezing his hand - glaring at him. "Nothing wrong with you that isn't wrong with the whole bloody planet. We're all changed."

Xander sighed, his shoulders sagging. "I know. It's not... It's just, I'm...afraid," he whispered. "What if where I'm taking us is - l-like Cleveland? Or - what if it kills us?"

"What if it takes us to the Land of Milk and Honey? It doesn't make any sense to fret about it, Xander. We'll know when we get there. For the record -" Spike tugged Xander closer - leaned his forehead into Xander's and trailed his fingers gently over Xander's cheek. "For the record, I trust you. I think it's going to be grand."

"Liar," Xander said softly, but he tipped his head a little and got a kiss - started back up the slope they were trying to climb, a small smile lingering on his mouth. Spike took a deep breath - lit a horded cigarette, the familiar action and taste calming him a little. He'd found a Latin dictionary in the last town and looked up Xander's 'veil'. 'Locus' he already knew - a place, a designation. 'Obiti', though, had two meanings. Going, which would make this portal simply a place to step from here to there. But also...destruction - death.

Spike didn't trust to luck - didn't trust to fate or destiny, only to his instincts and his desires. But here - at what seemed the heart of an untouched, primal world... He had no compass - nothing telling him yes or no. And his only desire was Xander. Was that connection of history and blood and pain - love and happiness that they shared. He hoped - for something 'grand'. For his sake, and for Xander's as well.

~*~*~*~*~

They came to the portal on their fifth day in the forest. Xander was looking pale, that day - feeling the cold. The temperature seemed to have dropped several more degrees and he was shivering in his layers. Breathing too hard and not catching his breath, his heart laboring. Spike was ready to call a halt - set up camp and rest for a day or so but Xander just shook his head, standing with his hand on the peeling parchment bark of a birch-tree, his teeth chattering together while he tried to talk.

"It's close. Spike, it's r-really close. Feels like - feels like a-ants on me or - s-ssstatic electri-city. Just - want to get there, Spike. Just - get there." Edge to his voice, something close to panic and Spike couldn't tell if it was because they were so close to the portal or because Spike wanted to stop.

"Just sit for a minute or two, Xander, you're all in..."

"Please? Spike? Please just - help me -" Stopping, then, was the panic and Spike cursed as Xander swayed a step and then another away from the tree, clutching reflexively at Spike's arm as his legs wobbled.

"Fuck. Xander -" Wide, wide eye - sheen of moisture and Xander's hand trembling, clutching tight enough to make the leather of Spike's coat creak. "God damnit. Fine. We'll go. But if you fall down you're staying down and I bloody well won't be talked around. Got it?"

"Yu - yu -" Labored breath in - out - and Xander clenched his teeth and nodded, abandoning his attempt at speech. Gestured with his head upslope, where Spike could see glimpses of dark rock between the tree-limbs.

"Right. Hold on, now." Arm around Xander's waist and they walked, boots slipping on the dead leaves and old pine-needles, the sound of running water getting louder. A sort of roaring, and Spike saw white water foaming and falling and realized they were coming up on a waterfall. His skin felt - itchy. His ears buzzed and he imagined this was what Xander had been talking about. Shivery pulse of wrongness that was the magic that made the portal or that held it open - who knew? The blood in his belly - deer that he'd hunted and drained a few hours before - seemed to curdle and for a moment he just wanted to turn back. Find what was left of civilization and just...live. With Xander.

He doesn't want that, though. He wants this. Whatever this is. God...

Xander's breathing was harsher now - a tearing gasp that hurt to hear and he sagged in Spike's arms - shook his head when Spike stopped. "No, no, no - no ss-stopping, we go, Spike!"

"Xander -" Frustration and anger and panic - visions of Xander's heart just stopping - pushed past all limits and failing at the critical moment. But Xander gulped and breathed and coughed. Breathed deeper, eye closed and sweat standing out on his lip - on his forehead.

"It's closing. T-tomorrow, today - ss-oon. Has to be now Spike. Come across, come across, come across..." Shake of his head and a dazed look up and around and Spike snarled, flashing into the demon-face. Xander laughed - coughed hard. "You ss-scared?"

"Fuck you! Scared your fucking heart's gonna stop, you git." Xander's mouth was still curled in amusement and he leaned in close to Spike and kissed him, hard. Not minding the fangs and he drew back with a bead of dark blood on his lip and a look that was full of affection and - happiness.

"Git, yourself. N-not gonna stop. Just get me th-there!"

"Fine. Bastard. I'll get you there." They staggered onward, upward - came out of the trees to a sandy margin and a small pool that churned and foamed under the hammer of falling water. Forty or more feet high, a waterfall as wide as two men fell in a champagne-torrent down black, slick rock. And at the base - behind the boiling cloud of mist and spume was - light. Shiver-flicker-flash, coldly white, bright enough to make rainbows dance in the humid air.

"There. God, th-there. C'mon, Spike let's - let's go." Xander's gaze was riveted on the portal and Spike hesitated, searching. The sides of the pool by the fall were sheer - there was no way Xander could get past them.

"How do we get there? You're not climbing that. And that pool could be - twenty feet deep. No way you can swim it."

"No, not deep, it's - it's okay"

"Xander, you can't know -" Spike growled and Xander swung around to face him, his hand coming up and grabbing the back of Spike's neck, wool glove prickly and damp.

"I can. I do. It's shallow. We just - walk. T-t-trust me, Spike. Okay?" Tug at his neck - tip of Xander's chin and they kissed again. Xander tasted like sorrel and honey and saltine crackers and Spike suddenly pulled him into a hard, hard embrace, burying his face in Xander's neck.

"You hold on to me and don't let go, you hear? Don't even think about it," Spike said, his voice gone husky and Xander tugged at the messy braid of his hair - hugged him back.

"Promise. I promise."

~*~*~*~*~

The water was cold - bone-freezing cold that crept up to mid-thigh and Xander was wheezing - breathing in sharp, tight pants that hurt to hear. Spike grimly held him, arms around his waist; plowing through the water and slipping on the worn rocks underfoot. They paused for a long moment at the foot of the fall and then plunged ahead, gasping and ducking on reflex when they passed under the sheet of glass-clear water that flowed past the portal. It pounded down on them and Xander flailed and lost his footing, kicking out and tangling his feet with Spike's. They both went down, the water sluicing in past Spike's coat collar, icy wash of it down his back. Spike struggled upright and found Xander's pack - yanked him up by it and shoved him forward.

Xander was reeling - coughing - and Spike scrambled and slithered and splashed, heading for the lip of stone that rose out of the water - heading for the portal that shimmered at the back of the tiny alcove that the fall had hid. Like a TV turned to static; it buzzed and sizzled and made Spike's head hurt and he stumbled up against Xander who was clutching the stone edge, coughing so hard he was gagging.

"Fuck - fuck - grab hold, damnit, Xander - pull!" Spike got his shoulder into Xander's flank and heaved and Xander scrabbled at slick, wet rock, half out of the water and his face a ghastly blue-grey. Spike clambered after, hindered by the sodden weight of the pack - the blankets - the awkward bundle of the stove that Xander had talked him into keeping, just in case. His jeans clung, making it hard to bend his knees and he finally flopped down next to Xander, pulling the shaking body half over onto him. Holding him close. The energy from the portal washed over them, sickly whine in Spike's ears and his skin all but crawling off his bones. It was horrible.

"Bloody fucking hell - you all right? Xander - you okay?"

"Ju-ju-jesus Christ it's c-c-c-"

"Yeah, I know. I know." No way to light a fire here - no room to change and he doubted the clothes had survived their dunking and they had to get out of here - he had to get Xander warm and dry. "Gotta get the fuck out of here."

"Go th-through, Sss-pike, we gotta -" Xander was grimacing; teeth clenched shut and his hands clutching fiercely at Spike's coat, his whole body spasaming with chills.

"You're gonna get pneumonia for fuck's sake," Spike snapped - pushed Xander over and levered himself to his feet, hauling Xander with him. The overhang was too low for them to stand straight and they both crouched there for a moment, Xander wiping his gloved hands back over his head, wiping water off his face, his lips a pale blue.

"N-now or n-n-never," he said, gaze wide and glassy. Staring at the portal and Spike looked out - past the falls - at the wavering scene of furling clouds and upright pines - green and grey and autumn-gold, water like crystal. Then he grabbed Xander and pushed, launching them both through the air - into the portal.


The interface was sticky - hot - and it pulled them in and then repelled them with a bone-jarring push that sent them flying - falling - spinning off into a grey-static nothingness. Spike clamped his hands down hard, holding onto Xander but he couldn't feel anything. Everything was numb - everything was roaring and he shouted, twisting.

Then there was a thump - a trembling surface that caught and stretched and finally broke, spilling Spike down onto something springy and damp - fragrant. Spike rolled, the pack and bundles banging into his sides and finally catching him on something and he lay there, panting - blinking into a spangled darkness that gradually resolved into... Tree branches. Stars. A warm, steady breeze that smelled of salt and grass and green leaves - smelled of earth and somewhere, blackberries. Crickets, the rushy hiss of the surf, the low call of a territorial owl.

And a muffled thud-shush - faltering heartbeat that he knew so, so well. He grabbed branches and a long vine of creeper - pulled himself upright, the branch that had tangled with his pack parting with a sharp crack. Wetness down his face and he smelled blood - shook it off with a snap of his head, impatient.

"Xander? Pet - where are you?" He staggered through brambles that caught at coat and pack and his hands, the sweet, thick fragrance of blackberries rising up heady and warm as he crushed them under foot. Something pale flashed, away to his left and he stumbled faster - barely avoided a tussocky lump of grass and fell to his knees beside... "Xan - hey, Xander - you awake? Xander?" He ran his hands over the crumpled figure, not daring to move him until he moved on his own. Snarling, unconsciously reverting to the demon in his distress.

The heart sound went on, stuttery and wrong but still going - sharp, wheezing breaths that caught and then evened out and Xander stirred - reached out for Spike.

"Spike? Can't - see you -"

"Here, I'm right here, Xander, right here." Spike grabbed the questing hand - held tight, his other hand scrabbling in the unfamiliar coat, searching. Finally he found his Zippo - flicked it open and lit it. Xander's face in the wavering, golden light was pale and scratched - smudged with dirt - tracked with tears. His pack was askew and his coat torn - dirty.

"Oh - god! Spike-" And then he was yanking Spike down, arms going around in an awkward embrace, mouth seeking Spike's and Spike fumbled the Zippo shut and just held on, kissing back, the both of them shaking into half-hysterical laughter.

"That was fucking - awful, god - Xander, you okay? Can you stand up? We have to get you warm, pet."

"I th-think - think I can, just -" Momentary confusion in the dark, Xander uncertain where to put his feet and Spike got up and lifted him - held him close. Xander's hands curled tight into his back and they stood there a moment. "You smell like blackberries," Xander said finally, his voice muffled. "And you're bleeding."

"So're you. Can you walk? Let's - let's get out from the trees, see if there's any - anything."

"Yeah, okay." Xander held on as Spike guided them twenty yards or so through bracken and trees, toward the sound of the sea. They broke free and staggered down a sudden slope onto a rocky beach, the waves crashing and curling over, phosphor glow and white foam. Starshine lending a faint glow to everything.

Far, far down the strand - glimpsed through tree-limbs and tall grass - Spike could see light reflected on the water, blue and red and gold. Jewelry strands of diamond-white and movement - cars. Faintly, the sound of traffic came to him, carried on the breeze.

"Look there, Xander. Looks like - something."

"Yeah. Something good. Hot b-bath," Xander said, swaying a little, his arm tight around Spike's waist.

"Yeah? You think so?" Spike asked, pushing his hand through Xander's hair - plucking out a leaf and a tattered bit of bark.

"Know so, Spike. Special, remember? It's - something. Not home. But - look." Xander gazed at him, smiling that smile - innocent and so, so young and Spike had to grin back - had to laugh again, softly.

"Yeah, special. I remember. Let's go, then. Sun'll be up in an hour or so."

"Will it? Wow. It's been...a long time." They started walking, picking their way over rocks, following the gentle curve of the shore. Somewhere far above a plane moved, blinking lights and the distant roar of the engines. Spike tracked its progress for a moment, blinking at what might be tears. They weren't home - never would be again. But Xander was there, and that was...enough.

Epilogue

A cool breeze was coming in the window, rain-washed and thick with the scents of wet earth and roses, rusting iron and woodsmoke. The curtains belled and sank, belled and sank and Spike stood in their folds, looking out. Watching the sky slowly darken. Straight overhead it was navy velvet with a liberal decoration of rhinestone stars. But further down it shaded to raspberry and lemon, watercolor-green and peach. Sherbet colors with lacings of plum-dark clouds. Spike rolled a cigarette and smoked, the damp breeze cool on his naked skin. Lamplight - low and amber and dancing - lit the dim cave of the room behind him.

Somewhere to the west a train whistle sounded, high and lonely as a coyote's howl and there was a small sound behind Spike - a soft, querulous noise. Spike turned, looking. Xander was sprawled over the bed, face half-buried in the pillow, washed-soft sheet of bleached linen tangled around his legs and draped over his back. Spike watched the steady rise and fall of his ribs for a moment and then turned back to the window, satisfied that Xander was still asleep.

They were leaving in a few hours - taking a midnight train down out of the mountains to the coast. This place was...good. But not right - not what they wanted. For one thing, Spike was slowly going crazy without his music and Xander was starting to mourn the loss of junk food. Not that Spike let him have much, but still...

Spike smiled to himself, pulling in a lungful of dense, sweet tobacco smoke with satisfaction. This, he would miss. He was already stockpiling the stuff - tanned leather pouches stuffed full, stored in biscuit and tea tins against future need. The tins all packed tightly into the bottom of their trunk, which hid backpacks and torches, books never written and the XPods - what Xander called the almost-the-same music players they had acquired. Things that took too much time to explain. They were getting good at camouflage. And they were getting smarter. Avoiding some things - ignoring others. Paying attention. Paring their mistakes down to a minimum.

They'd made a big mistake, the first time around - the first world. A bad one. They'd gone in search of - themselves. In search of former lives and former homes and former things. In search of the past. It hadn't been a good idea. They'd found heartbreak; too many dead, the living bitter and closed off - nothing quite the same. Everything turned just five degrees off and it had been - utterly miserable. Spike had spread out a map of the country on the table at a 24-hour diner and Xander had looked and found another portal in down-town Detroit and they'd gone; raided a Food 4 Less and stolen a Mercedes and three nights later in the middle of Greektown they'd stepped through into somewhere else. Now, eleven months and nine portals later they were moving on again.

Spike finished his smoke and pinched it out - tossed the butt out the window. There was still a little packing to do and he moved quietly around the room, laying books and odds and ends into the brass-bound trunk, covering what didn't fit, here, and making sure they had enough clothes to last a trip of several days. They were leaving Ni'iihi' - Denver in their world - and traveling to Jijiyama - Seattle. Train service was good but there were always delays - weather or animals or a running tribal feud spilling across the neutral lines of the Nippon-Castile Railroad. They bought first-class tickets and looked forward to traveling in style no matter what.

Spike picked up an object from the little dressing table. It was a strange thing - a rough-coated tube that at first glance had seemed to be a branch of dark coral. But the broken end showed smooth, glossy black - like obsidian. Xander had picked it up in the sandy earth near the second world's portal and decided to keep it. It was glass made from a lightning strike, and Xander had decided it meant good luck, so they'd kept it. It was the only good thing that had come of that world.

Because that world - had been dead. No life, no light, nothing but cold wind and black dirt and they'd hiked for two weeks, Xander living on their rapidly diminishing supplies of tinned food, Spike living on him. Stumbling through the third portal half dead, stumbling through grey streets and blasted houses. Fourth World War? Fifth? What was left of the population - grey zombies that matched their grey world - didn't even know. Endless war and draconian rationing made it almost impossible to scrounge what they needed and Xander had left that world as bad as he'd been back on their Earth, all his gains lost and the fever back. The fourth and fifth worlds had been - wrong. Off. No demons in one and it had made them both feel ill - unreal.

"Feel...thin. Like butter scraped over too much bread." That quote had made Xander shiver - and demand they find a copy of The Lord of the Rings before they'd left. Spike said it wasn't quite right and Xander had got more copies in the next worlds to compare - something that looked to becoming a hobby.

Or is that obsession? Spike thought, grinning. Something had stopped the sixth world somewhere in the Stone Age; they'd walked vast stretches of glacier-carved plains, dodging tarns and fissures - Homo erectus stalking them through the cold mist. The portal had been a mile off the coast of what had been Florida and Xander had almost drowned, getting to it. The next world had been very home-like - except for the people like little Stepford clones and the churches like grains of sand. Uncomfortable and increasingly creeped out, they'd been glad to get out of there. Even the demons had been...strange. That world's copy of the book had been found in an 'underground' bookstore - banned for fifty years or more.

World eight had been - nightmare. Soldiers everywhere, half the population in 're-education camps' and Xander had been forced to shoot someone. He still had dreams about it - cold sweat nightmares that left him hollow-eyed and silent all the next day. They'd had to go underground to find that world's portal - down deep under a mountain in Colorado. Buried missile silos or maybe bunkers for a war that had already happened. Skeletons down there, and the trapped and choking stink of long-hidden death.

This world - the ninth - was peaceful. They'd passed themselves off as cousins, the older escorting the younger to the mountains for the 'cure'. TB - or something like - had caused sanatoriums to be built all over the Shining Mountains and Xander needed rest, good food and peace. Lazy days spent in the library had told them that the Black Death had lingered far into the nineteenth century here, winnowing the European population decade by decade. Columbus had never crossed the sea - there had been no need and no ships. Japan had colonized the west coast - allied themselves with the tribes there and kept the migrating hordes of Central America from taking over. They'd moved slowly east until they'd been stopped at the Great Divide by the impenetrable wall of the Apache, Navajo and Shoshone tribes. Portugal and Spain had eventually found the eastern shore and colonized as well, but they hadn't pushed much past the Allegheny Mountains or the Catskills and the tribes - who'd adopted something of the Samurai tactics as well as gunpowder long before the first ships had anchored - possessed most of the interior and lived side-by-side with the Japanese colonists, moving slowly forward into a much more peaceful Industrial Age.

Steam engine trains and some cars, repeating rifles and the telegraph - they were stuck in the Old West and Spike wanted out. Xander had been ecstatic for the first few weeks while they'd rested and learned. But he was tired of it now, too - restless, and ready to move on. There was something to the cure - something in the thin, clean air. An Arapahoe medicine woman had looked over the heart-tea and made up her own version and it seemed to work as well - maybe even work better - and Xander had gained some weight and lost the dreadful grey pallor that had followed them through eight worlds. He'd even sat out in the sun, acquiring a wash of pale gold on his skin and deep claret lights in his earth-brown hair. There were quantities of the new heart-tea in the trunk as well, and a pouch-full of raw gold nuggets that Spike had lifted from a few meals. Ni'iihi' was in gold-rush territory. Spike patted the little pouch full of knobbly insurance and shifted a thick sweater over. Some things were universal.

Spike folded a last shirt and laid it in the trunk - closed the lid and locked it, then padded over to the bed, settling onto the mattress and propping a pillow between his back and the iron bedstead. He reached out and stroked his hand lightly, slowly down Xander's back. Xander shivered - twisted around a little and flung an arm over Spike's thighs - pushed his forehead into Spike's hip.

"Is it time to go?" he mumbled, eye still shut and his hair - grown to his shoulders now - tangled across his face.

"Not quite. Couple more hours, yet. Didn't mean to wake you, pet."

"'S okay. I don't mind." Xander sighed and inched closer - let his fingers curl over Spike's hip. Warm brush of lips on skin. "Gonna take me forever to get dressed, anyway," he grumbled, and Spike grinned down at him, stroking Xander's hair out of his face - tracing the dark curve of his eyebrow.

"I'll tie your tie for you, if you like."

"You better." Xander sighed and hitched himself around, pillowing his head on Spike's thigh now and getting his other arm behind, hands clasping together over Spike's hip. Rolling his eye to look up at Spike. "Stupid way to travel."

"Nothing wrong with a little style, Xander," Spike chided, but he was grinning and Xander was. Travel here was an event, and it called for polished boots and waistcoats, silk ties and velvet-collared jackets and hats. Rather like his days as a human, but Spike's jacket was plum brocade and the waistcoat embroidered with silver thread, while Xander had rich browns and golds. Spike's 'new' coat had fit in well enough that it was hanging still on the coat-rack but Xander had had to buy a greatcoat. Spike knew he secretly loved the great, caped thing. Xander had wanted to get spurs, too, but since neither of them rode Spike had talked him out of spurs and into a lovely pocket-watch. Picking out the watch-chain and decorative seals had taken half the day, and Spike...hadn't laughed so much in ages.

"Style," Xander scoffed, but he was smiling now and Spike ran his fingers through Xander's hair, working gently at knots and tangles while Xander stared off into the distance, his own hand stroking along Spike's flank.

"Do you think...we'll want to stay?" he asked finally, and Spike shrugged, working at a particularly stubborn knot. "Ow."

"Sorry, pet. I dunno. Guess we'll just have to wait and see."

"Yeah." Xander sat up suddenly, sitting cross legged with his knees propped on Spike's thigh. "Are you - it's okay that we're traveling, right? I mean...if you want to stay someplace, Spike, you have to say so." Xander reached out and pushed a lock of hair behind Spike's ear - let his thumb rub gently over Spike's cheekbone. "I don't feel like stopping. Not - yet."

Spike leaned into Xander's warm hand, smiling. "I don't mind. We'll stop when we find a place that's - right. There's no hurry."

"No hurry," Xander repeated, with that so-young smile and Spike leaned forward and kissed him, his hand loosely circling Xander's bicep. Covering the vertical slash of black that ran down the center of it. Ashes, from the lock of Slayer hair that Xander had gathered just before they'd left their world forever. Memorial in skin and he and Xander were all that was left. Forgotten history imprinted on their DNA now - carved into their flesh forever.

When they found a world that was comfortable - that didn't jar them with some small difference or strange scent...that didn't make them wake in a cold sweat, or cry in the bath, they would stop. When they found a place that didn't remind them of home at all. Then they would lie down, one dawn, and Spike would cure Xander's heart for good and all - kill to cure. Spike had offered and Xander had agreed, sideways nod and a lingering kiss - whisper that he never wanted to be alone again. And they didn't know, really, if Xander would be able to see, once he was turned. So it would be their way of saying - they had come home.

Xander pulled Spike a little closer, a hand dropping down to rest heavy and possessive on Spike's belly. "Guess we've got time then, if you'll do my tie."

"I will, love," Spike said, "Any time."

Ni'iihi' is an Arapaho word meaning 'in a good way'.
Jijiyama is Japanese and means Old Man or Grandfather Mountain.
The book quoted is J.R.R. Tolkien's 'The Lord of the Rings

The End

Back

Index

Feed the Author