Title: Ride the Lightening

Author: Scorpio

Archive: The Nesting Place, The Den, CKoS, S/X WoF, BtVS, and anyone else just ask.

Fandom: BtVS

Pairing: Spike/Xander Willow/Tara

Rating: R (see warnings)

Disclaimer: Joss owns Sunnydale and all of it's residents... I intend no infringement nor do I make any money.

Spoilers: Post "The Replacement".

WARNING: Death Fic! If you don't want to see 'em buy the farm ::snicker:: than don't go any further. Obviously, there will be scenes of graphic violence in this.

Summary: Good deeds. Freak storms. Bad things happen.

by Scorpio

Spike looked around his crypt at all of the broken and jagged pieces of the mannequin dummy he'd found out at the dump. When he'd first seen it lying next to the discarded blonde wig he'd had the brilliant idea to take it home and destroy in effigy of Buffy Summers. Figured he could blow off a bit of steam and frustration at being chipped and helpless against humans.

He'd spent a good twenty-five minutes kicking and punching his Buffy-doll. Then he threw it's shattered pieces around until the largest remaining hunk of plastic was no bigger than the palm of his hand. Anger, hatred, frustration and humiliation had *poured* out of him. It had been...cathartic. He felt a *lot* better now.

Spike figured that this violent physical release was almost like a form of demonic therapy and it was *certainly* cheaper than paying some poofed up git in a stuffed shirt and silk tie to make him lie down on an uncomfortable couch and talk about his father. Besides, what head shrinker in the world would even *believe* the stories he could tell about Peaches anyway?

This little practice exercise in his endless plot to 'kill the Slayer' had been loads of fun and it could be expanded to include other favorite targets with just a little effort and time. With that thought in mind, Spike grabbed up his duster and strode out of his crypt into the night.

Time to go downtown and break into some department stores. There were sure to be plenty to mannequins that he could steal. He wanted to get a Riley the Commando Dork mannequin and a *new* Buffy the Bitchy Slayer mannequin. Perhaps even a Giles the Mid-life Crisis mannequin. He would get them and bring them back to the crypt where a good time could be had by all.

His nefarious plans for slaughtering helpless mannequins came to a skittering halt when he heard a loud metallic *bang* followed by the distinctive sounds of fighting coming from the next alley. Eyebrow quirked up in curiosity, Spike picked up his speed a bit and peered around the corner. And grinned.

The two witches were facing off against a small clutch of hungry fledglings. The oldest of the five vampires couldn't have been turned more than a handful of years ago and the youngest was probably only days old. Leaning up against the brick wall to watch the festivities, Spike was torn between cheering on the two mortal girls and cheering on the vampires.

Usually he would *always* be on the side of the demons in a human-demon conflict, but the witchy bints were two of the only four humans he could even stand to be around. The two birds were...*nice* to him. They went out of their way to try and make him feel...welcome. Xander was another. He was always willing to trade rude insults and even blackly morbid humor with him. Sometimes they were even friendly about it. And, of course, Anya. The only mortal who came close to understanding. She had her ability to rend humans lives apart stolen from her, just as he had. They...shared a bond of pain and loss in that way.

So it was, that he stood there and watched the witches dust two of the five fledglings, wondering how long it would take for them to finish off the rest and what he should say to them when they did. That's when it happened. The tallest of the vampires, a big snarling ex-wrestler from the looks of him, grabbed the blonde witch and literally threw her across the alley so hard that she bounced off the brick wall. Spike could hear the shattering of the bone in her arm and her sharp gasp of breath from thirty feet away.

"Tara! No!"

Willow gaped in horror at her girlfriend and that moments distraction was her downfall. With a lunge, the slim lanky fledgling in the dark green shirt grabbed her and pulled her in tight. Spike scowled and pushed off of the wall with a growl.

"Bloody Hell Red! I can't leave you two alone for a second and you're off and into trouble. Sometimes I wonder who's worse. You or Xander."

That said, Spike reached out and grabbed the vampire holding Willow by the arm that was wrapped around her waist. He was older, stronger and so very much more cruel than any fledgling ever had hope of becoming. So instead of just pulling the arm away from her body and letting go, he kept pulling until the limb was no longer attached to the body it belonged to. The vampire looked up at him in shock and then crumpled to the ground, howling mindlessly as his stolen blood poured out of his gaping wound.

He kicked out with his booted foot and felt it connect with one of the fledglings. It's head snapped back with a quick jerk, the snapping of bone loud in the small confines of the alley. Spike spun on his heal and used the bloody stump of an arm he was still holding as a bludgeon on the last vampire still standing. The fledgling went flying into the brick wall.

Spike dropped to one knee next to the vampire with the broken neck and made a fist. He pulled back and *slammed* it into the fledgling's chest with all his strength. The force of his punch allowed his fist to burst through pale skin, shattering bone and ripping muscle. Grinning with glee, Spike fished around inside of the shrieking vampire's chest cavity for a moment or two and then yanked his hand back out. He was holding the vampire's heart. A second later it exploded into dust and ash.

Standing up, Spike stalked over to the last of the fledglings. It was the one he had assumed was the oldest of the bunch. It looked up at him in fear and confusion.

"Wh...why? I don't get it. They're *human*! Why are you *helping* them?"

Spike grabbed the fledgling and flung him up against the wall. Then he braced him there with his forearm against the vampire's throat and offered up his most evil smile.

"Don't tell me you *didn't* know that these two bints are the strongest witches on the entire Hellmouth? I mean, only a bloody *idiot* would kill off the two best spell casters around when they could offer up protection in return for spells cast on demand."

The fledgling glanced passed Spike and watched Willow help Tara to stand back up. The blonde witch was cradling a badly fractured arm. Once she was back on her feet, they walked over to the two vampires. Silently, Willow handed Spike a wooden stake.

Spike took it in his free hand and glanced down at it, then flashed his wickedly charming smile at the now cringing and whimpering fledgling that was struggling futilely to escape his doom.

"Well...I guess that explains why *I'm* a Master Vampire and *you're* nothing but dust, don't it?"

And then he staked the fledgling.

Turning, Spike looked over at the two girls and glowered at them. Neither one backed down from his low snarls and they both offered up a weak smile at him, although Tara's smile was enhanced by her tears of pain.

"Where the bloody hell is the Slayer? And why are you two out and about at this time of night alone?"

Tara shifted her weight on her feet a bit and winced. Willow glanced over at her, compassion swimming in her eyes.

"Um...Spike? I have to get Tara to the hospital so that they can fix her arm. It looks pretty bad. Would you...um, walk us? In case we're attacked again? I'll tell you about everything on the way there. I promise. I think you'll like it. It's a pretty funny story and all...even Xander thinks so and he's the one...or rather he's the two of them, hims, Xanders...uh, that it happened to. I mean, it's fixed now, which explains where we were. Um...what we had been doing. Fixing it and putting Xander back together with himself, I mean. Before leaving to go home, that is."

Spike held up his hand to stop the flow of words.

"Red, Red...you're babbling again and you're not making any sense. Just...take a breath or something. I'll be happy to escort you ladies to the ER Just...tell what this is about two Xanders, bloody scary thought that is. Oh...and later on, you two can bake me more of those lovely sugar cookies. Deal?"

Willow smiled.

"Deal."

********

It didn't take Spike long to lose the witches in the hustle and bustle of the busy ER Tara was in too much pain to pay attention and all of Willow's energy was focused on her girlfriend. Normally, he wouldn't have bothered to escort them over so minor an injury, but he *did* have a good reason to be here. If it had been life threatening, then yeah, he wouldn't even have waited for them to ask, he'd have just grabbed the witch and ran here with her in his arms. But a broken arm? Naw, he merely used that as an excuse to be here at all. Now that he was, it was time to plunder the goodies.

Unconcerned and unhurried, he walked around the corner and down through several corridors. A bit of skulking until the coast was clear. A little quick jimmy with a lock-pick and *bingo*! The blood bank was his for the taking.

He quickly located one of those plastic containers used for transport and lined it with dried ice. Then he just scooped in as many blood bags as he could fit in the thing. Once it was full up and locked, he began loading up the pockets of his duster until he literally couldn't carry anymore. Then, just for good luck, he quickly bit into and drained two in quick succession.

He peered around the door once he had listened at it and hadn't heard any heartbeats. The coast was clear. Picking up the cooler, he headed back down the corridor. It had been touch and go for a bit and he'd almost gotten caught, but he had ducked into a handy supply closet and waited it out. After another ten minutes of dodging orderlies and nurses, he was out into the night, his stolen human blood clutched tightly to his chest.

********

Spike *could* live on one bag of blood a day if he had to. Two was better and three was preferred. He had seven left. And after the bloody shit of a day he had, he was planning on gorging himself on them all.

*First* it had been the rain. A brief but intense shower had quickly turned all the patches of dirt into a thick syrupy mud. He had, literally, run into Anya and Xander as they were being chased by a nasty tempered Antoos Demon while leaving his crypt to go get some more mannequin dummies to replace the most recently destroyed ones. Xander's ill luck had knocked them both arse over end into a puddle of sticky mud, ruining his favorite pair of jeans. He didn't even have the chance to kill the stupid demon or tease the whelp about his latest misadventure when the two mortals had mumbled a quick apology for knocking him down and then took off with the demon in tow.

*Then* it had been the Slayer and her tame soldier-toy who had found him just as he was planning on breaking into the department store. They had insisted on escorting him back to his crypt instead of simply staking him. Shopping plans ruined and a few quickly healing bruises later, the two had finally left.

And now to top off his horribly shitty night, lightening had begun to crash around and that *always* screwed with the reception on his telly. All in all, Spike felt as if he *deserved* to indulge in some gluttony on his stores of human blood.

********

Spike *knew* better than to scavenge from the refrigerated section of blood marked untested. He bloody well *knew* better. Donated blood had to be tested before it could be used on humans for a variety of reasons. Spike, being dead didn't have to worry about any of the bloodborne diseases, but that didn't stop him from getting a good high from drugs. And at least two of those last blood bags had held large amounts of, most likely, heroin. Junkies did that from time to time. Sell their blood for money to get more drugs.

And right now, Spike was well and truly stoned. He hadn't been this lit since the alcohol fume fogged days right after Dru had left him.

Giggling at the lovely lightening storm crashing around him in the cemetery, he didn't rightly *care* that he was blitzed. He was enjoying himself for the first time in a long time. It was a magnificent storm, one that Dru would have loved and he wanted to witness every second of it.

At least, that was his last thought before a lightening bolt shot down out of the sky and hit him on the head. After that, he was only aware of intense white hot *pain*!

********

Agony.

Blinding mindbending pain.

Whimpering, Spike cracked open one eye and peered blearily around. The cemetery. *His* cemetery. Vaguely he noted that the sky was beginning to lighten to the east and working on some primitive instinctual self-preservation, he began to crawl through the mud and muck to his crypt, moaning in agony the entire way.

Finally, after what seemed to his muddled brain to be *hours* of unending torture, he slid inside dark cool marble walls and he huddled into a mewling ball of pain in the corner. Then, he slid into blessed unconsciousness.

********

It was dark and he was *starved*. He wasn't sure how long he had lingered in a healing trance, but the pain was almost gone and his scorched flesh had mostly healed. The sensation that registered the strongest was *hunger*. He needed blood, badly. It would finish the healing process and put a stop to the lingering soreness.

Spike stood up and changed out of his charred clothing and into something clean. He wasn't sure *how* he had survived the lightening strike, but he wasn't going to complain. He assumed that it was due to the massive amounts of blood that had been in his system combined with the rubber soles on the bottom of his totally ruined Doc Martins.

So, first food, then new boots.

Stumbling from his crypt, he turned to head in the general direction of Giles' house. He wasn't paying too much attention to his surroundings, walking the distance on autopilot instead, as he was too busy mulling over his near brush with permanent death. So, it was a bit of a surprise when he bumped into a young man walking down the street. Distracted and not really thinking about it, Spike lashed out at thehuman and shoved him down hard. Then, realizing what he'd done, he'd braced himself for the onslaught of agony from the thrice damned chip in his head.

Nothing.

No pain. No agony. Not a twitch from the nasty behavior modification microchip. It was silent and still inside of his brain. Spike gaped in shock. Could that stupid lightening bolt have short circuited the bloody thing?

A hard shove to his chest pulled him out of his thoughts.

"Hey ass-wipe! I'm talking to you! What? First you slam into people and then stare at them like a moron? You really are as dumb as you look, aren't you?"

Spike grinned. No time like the present to find out.

Instantly, he morphed into full gameface and pounced on the rude human. He grabbed the guy hard enough to leave bruises and the chip didn't send flares of pain through his skull. He yanked the bloke in close and sank his teeth into the soft warm flesh of his neck and the chip didn't send him crashing to his knees in agony. He sucked hard on the twin puncture wounds and listened to the man's heart speed up, then slow down and then finally falter and stop. And the bloody chip didn't even twitch.

Spike dropped the quickly cooling corpse and his feet and whooped in pure joy. He did a little jig around the body and giggled maniacally before throwing his head back and screaming at the top of his lungs.

"ALL BLOODY RIGHT! THE BIG BAD IS BACK!"

Then, being a thrifty sort of bloke, Spike bent down and pilfered the dead man's pockets for money. After all, he needed a new pair of Doc's...

********

For a full week Spike unlived the time of his unlife. It had been so bloody long since he could hunt, kill and maim. Right off at first, his victims were just any random person that he could, literally, get his hands onto. Just the joy of the kill, the scent and taste of living human blood was enough. He took the time to savor each whimper, each cringe of fear, each thundering heartbeat as his meal struggled and tried desperately to flee his hunger.

After a day or so, he changed his tactics a bit. He became more selective in his dinning choices. It wasn't that he was *paranoid*, or at least that's what he told himself. It was just that he was *certain* that Buffy would be able to *tell* that the bite marks on his victims were actually made by *him*. He didn't have any proof that she had memorized his bite mark so that she could recognize it on sight, but he couldn't stop that little voice in the back of his head.

Since he didn't want the Slayer to find out about his chip frying until it was far too late to do anything about it, he took up burying his victims. Not that he carried a shovel about town. No, he used his handy stolen shopping cart to haul the corpses to the local city dump and stuffed them under moldering piles of rubbish. At least that way he was sure no one would notice the stench after a few days when the bodies ripened.

After spending over a year and a half starved and on dead animal blood rations, Spike was slowly beginning to feel like his old self again. Strength and stamina filled him with boundless energy and he could feel his body regenerating a lot of the wear and tear it had suffered.

At sunset of the sixth night after he awoke and realized that the chip was fried the two witches stopped by his crypt looking for him. They both looked as if they had been crying recently and he could smell the fear, sorrow and anger rolling off of them. For a brief moment he had visions of slaughtering them where they stood and smearing their combined blood all over his naked flesh and then wanking off over their steaming corpses, but then his curiosity got the best of him.

"Fancy meeting you two here. Just couldn't stay away from me, could'ja? I can't help it I'm so bloody irresistible, you know, and I *should* charge you both a lot of doss for even a quick shag. However, since you're both personal friends of mine, I'll wave the normal fees and let you both ride me for free. What'cha say ducks?"

Tara simply stared up at him in fascinated horror and blinked rapidly, but Willow screwed up her face in disgust.

"Ewwwww! Um, no offense or anything."

Spike chuckled. He got such a kick out of winding up the redhead and then sitting back to watch her spin.

"None taken luv. But, uh...why *are* you here. This isn't either of your normal haunts."

A look of pain flashed through Willow's bright green eyes and they filled up with luminescent tears that clung precariously to her thick eyelashes. Spike was enthralled. The small girl never looked so beautiful as she did when she was suffering.

"Um...we need your help. It's...it's... Oh God. Spike, it's Anya. She was...k.killed last night. By a.an Antoos Demon."

That was as far as Red got into her story. The tears spilled over her lashes and she began to sob brokenly. Tara pulled her close and wrapped an arm around her and rubbed soothing circles over the small of her back.

For his part, Spike felt as if he'd been sucker punched in the gut. Anya had been one of the four people on the entire bloody planet that he considered to be a friend. They had often sat around together drinking down a few pints and reminiscing about the "good old days" of blood, mayhem and gratuitous slaughter. And now some stupid demon had come into his town and killed off his friend. Didn't the idiot know that the only one allowed to kill his friends was him? William the Bloody himself, no one else.

"How?"

Tara swallowed hard and peered up at him through her soft blonde bangs.

"S.s.she said it kn.new her f.f.from her d.demon days. She c.cursed it's u.uncle."

Spike's blue eyes narrowed dangerously and a low pitched growling noise began to rumble from his chest.

"So, it was revenge, was it?"

The blonde nodded and the redhead began to try to pull herself together, but she wasn't doing a very good job of it. It was obvious that this was tearing her apart.

"Spike you've *got* to help. Xander's getting ready to go out and hunt this thing alone."

That shocked Spike to his core. *He* didn't like the Slayer, but she had never sent her chums off into danger without going along.

"Alone? Why isn't the Slayer going with him? I mean, I can understand why the whelp would want to go off and kill it, but why doesn't her Buffness want a piece of it's hide?"

To his surprise, Willow began to cry again.

"Buffy's with Joyce. She collapsed at an art show in LA yesterday afternoon and they rushed her to the hospital. It's something in her brain. Giles drove both Buffy and Dawn to the city to be with her. Joyce is being operated on right now and I can't find Riley anywhere. Tara and I are willing to go with him and help with magic, but we're gonna need another fighter because I don't think Xander's really thinking all to clearly right now. I'm afraid he's going to get himself killed and..."

Spike held up one hand palm out and interrupted her.

"Right. Slow down a bit. Okay, just...let me grab my duster and we'll go find the whelp."

Willow practically swooned with relief.

"Thank you Spike."

*********

Spike blinked rapidly and swayed on his feet as he tried to reign in his bloodlust. It was never easy to do around injured and bleeding humans, especially when he was all riled up from a good bit of violence, but over a year with the chip zapping his brain had taught him lots of discipline. It helped it he focused on his surroundings instead of the humans themselves.

There were bits and pieces of gray mottled Antoos Demon flesh laying about. Whole limbs had shorn off and many of the corpses had deep gouges made by Spike's own claws. Antoos Demons didn't have regular blood that pumped through the heart, but a deep yellowish bile that circulated through their livers. The acidic stench almost overpowered the other smells contained in the small lair.

Ash and soot coated almost everything from the various fires, many of which were still cheerfully burning here and there. Thick clouds of smoke that stunk of burnt flesh, melted plastic and charred wood billowed around on the fitful breezes. Flickering red and orange light from the remaining fires cast an eerie glow that shimmered and shifted with the deepening shadows. All and all the place looked like a cozy little corner of hell.

Glancing around at the carnage that surrounded him once more, Spike had to admit that the witches had been right. Xander *hadn't* been thinking too clearly. The majority of the damage he was looking at had been caused by the young human and in a moment of sheer brutal honestly, Spike was forced to admit that he was impressed.

Xander had shown up with a small axe, a few knifes and a duffle bag filled with shrapnel pipe-bombs and small explosives. Then, with a grim expression on his face and with dead emotionless eyes, he had led them to the entire Antoos Clan's lair. And more than a dozen Antoos Demons.

Only four had managed to escape the massacre. Including the one that had killed Anya.

Tara had managed to get knocked unconscious early in the fight since her broken arm slowed down her spell casting and prevented her from fighting well. Towards the end, Willow had taken a good drumming as well, but she had managed to hang in there. Xander had gotten his left leg broken. Badly broken. And yet he had braced himself up against a wall continued to swing his axe at anything that came close to him in between his throwing homemade explosives about the place.

Now it was all over and Willow was doing her best to wake up Tara. With a sigh, he made his way over to the young man slumped over by the far wall. The boy looked up at him with a consuming fury and hatred in his eyes.

"He got away."

Spike's heart went out to the boy. He could very easily sympathize with the need to rend your enemies flesh into quivering hunks and it always hurt when you were denied that pleasure.

"I know pet, I know."

Xander made a quick exasperated gesture at his fractured leg. His face was a mask of self-loathing.

"And the only fucking thing this means is that I can't go back out after that murdering beast now."

"Yeah. I know. Come on. Let's get you and the Beige One to the hospital."

The boy snorted in frustrated anger, but he didn't argue. In fact, that was the last thing he said for the rest of the night.

*********

Spike paced impatiently back and forth in his crypt willing the sun to bloody well hurry up and go the hell down. He had woken up from his sleep only a short time ago and it already felt as if it had been ages. He was far too excited to have any patience at all and the delay was chaffing at him.

Sometime during his daytime sleep, his brain had given him an idea. A naughty idea. An evil idea. A bloody wonderful idea. And so he paced and he plotted, going over the details in his mind again and again and again as he waited.

Finally the sun went down and Spike immediately threw open his door and raced across town until he reached Xander's apartment building. He dashed inside the public hallway and ignored the elevator in favor of the emergency stairs. Racking his brain to try and remember which floor the whelp lived on, he finally guessed at "level 3" and pushed open the firedoor. He jogged down the hallway until he reached the right door and then knocked loudly.

"Who is it?"

"It's Spike. Let me in."

There was a brief pause and Spike would have held his breath if he had needed to breathe.

"Come in Spike."

An evil grin spreading across his face, Spike turned the doorknob and walked over the threshold. Careful to shut the door behind him, Spike sauntered casually across the living room to where the whelp was lounging on the couch. The boy had his left leg stuck in a white plaster cast that went almost to the top of his thigh. His foot was propped up on a pile of pillows on the coffee table and only his toes stuck out the top.

For a brief moment, Spike was tempted to torment those toes. To lick them and bite them and just generally torture them while the whelp tried to beat him back with only one good leg. However, he used the discipline the chip had forced on him to force that urge down. He'd just have to remember that idea for another time. He had a *plan* that needed to be put in motion tonight and that was more important that toe sucking.

"What do you want Spike? I mean, as much as I'd love to go out and hunt up some more Antoos demons with you, I'm sorta stuck here and I can't see as how I'd be much fun for you."

"No worries about that mate. Just a quick visit to see how you are, maybe sign your cast, snicker at you hobbling about. Besides, I promised the witches that I'd pop in and check up on you, didn't I? The blonde one is still a bit sore, so they'll pop in and check on you tomorrow instead."

Spike grinned and began to take off his duster and took a brief moment to really look at the boy. His face was pale and there were dark circles under his eyes. Probably from lack of sleep or from seriously hideous nightmares. Not that either of those things bothered Spike, it was more the little brown pill bottle that was sitting on the coffee table next to a half filled glass of water that worried him.

Xander scowled at him as he flung his duster over the back of the couch.

"I don't need a baby-sitter you know."

Spike chuckled.

"Doesn't matter if you need one or not, pet. Red promised me an extra batch of sugar cookies to dunk in my blood if I stopped by."

Xander's scowl deepened but he didn't argue. It was pointless, the boy could never say no to Willow.

Careful not to jiggle the boy and get him all suspicious or upset, Spike sat down on the couch next to him. He then leaned forward and snagged the bottle off of the table. Glancing down at the label he realized that he didn't recognize the name.

"What's this? Painkillers?"

All he got as an answer was a grunt and a nod. For a second, Spike glared at him and a nasty retort stood on the tip of his tongue. Then, suddenly, he changed his mind and his tactics.

"Fine, grumpy-boy. Gonna cheer you up whether you want it or not. Got a story to tell and I think you'll like it."

Xander just sighed and shook his head, but he didn't turn his head towards Spike. He just stared at the television with dark empty eyes that made the vampire wonder just what it was he was really seeing.

"Remember that bad lightening storm a few days back? Well, I was feeling a bit of all right. Managed to snag me a few bags of blood from the blood bank and some of them hadn't been screened and marked yet. Lucked out and got me some that was drugged with narcotics."

Spike glanced over at Xander again. The boy still wasn't looking at him, but his eyes had lost that blank look so Spike knew he was listening to his story.

"Stoned, I went outside to watch the free lightshow. Reminded me of Dru. She always loved a big storm. Anyway, I'm standing out in the pouring rain like some stupid git when this massive bolt of lightening shoots out of the sky and slammed into my head. Knocked me clean off my feet, it did."

Xander snorted.

"No way, fangless. A lightening bolt would have fried you into dust."

Spike chuckled.

"Funny you should mention that. See, that's the irony. It didn't fry *me*. It fried the soddin' chip in my head."

*That* announcement got a reaction from the boy, but Spike had to give credit where credit was due, it *wasn't* the one he expected. He had been expecting panic and fear and a mad scramble of the crippled boy as he tried to get away. Instead he got glared at and taunted with a scathing tone that just rang with an unspoken challenge.

"Oh? Then tell me, O Bitey One, why am I still alive? Did you forget how to kill humans already? Please...enlighten me."

Spike chuckled even as his gameface came forward turning his eyes from blue to gold. Still, Xander didn't flinch away, nor did he smell of fear. The boy had knackers, that was for sure.

Then Spike lunged, grabbing Xander on the shoulder with one hand while the other clutched at his head, tipping it back to expose the pale flesh of his throat. Leaning down, he nuzzled his face against the boy's skin inhaling deeply. He could smell the blood thrumming through the veins just beyond his lips and his hunger rose up to almost intolerable heights. And the steady rhythm of Xander's heartbeat never wavered. He suddenly understood just how badly Anya's death had injured the boy.

"Do it. If the chip is toast, then just do it Spike."

He struck with unerring aim, his fangs slicing into skin and muscle and vein. Deep rich thick hot coppery essence of life spilled over his lips to splash onto his tongue and against the back of his throat. Beautiful, so wonderful. Spike moaned against Xander's torn flesh and drew in another mouthful to greedily swallow down. He was only vaguely aware that his cock had grown painfully hard in his jeans from the taste and all he wanted was more and more and more...

*******

Spike paced back and forth across the living room as he waited for his childe to rise. He had already hung dark heavy blankets over the windows in case he awoke before the sun actually set, but he doubted that Xander would. Most newborn fledges didn't rise until an hour or so after dark.

Wanting to be prepared, Spike had went out last night after killing the boy and had picked up a pretty young woman at a local bar. She was now laying curled in a corner of Xander's bedroom, tied up with lots of rope and with a thick sock stuffed in her mouth as a gag. Spike figured that she would make a good first meal for his childe.

And then, without the need to worry about broken legs and bruised muscles, he and Xander could go out and finish off the four Antoos Demons. When that was done? Who knew...maybe they would stay here and maybe they would head off to parts unknown. That was a detail that they could work out later.

Pulling another cigarette out of his quickly emptying pack, Spike lit up as he felt the sun set beyond the horizon. A sizzle of excitement worked it's way through him. This was it. The sooner Xander rose, the stronger he'd be. The longer it took, the weaker he'd be. With weak minions, it might even take two full nights before they rose, but with the boy he'd done everything he could to ensure that Xander would be a true childe. A *strong* childe.

He paced and smoked for another five minutes, ten tops, when he heard it. A slight shifting of material as an arm twitched. Grinning maniacally, Spike made his way over to the bedroom and walked over to the bed. Sitting down next to the still corpse he waited. A finger twitched. A leg shifted. The jaw clenched once, twice. Then the eyelids sprung open.

Deep golden orbs stared up at him as sleek beautiful ridges shifted into place. Slowly, Spike reached out with one hand and traced a single finger along one eyeridge. A low rumbling purr echoed throughout the room and a husky voice murmured one word.

"Sire."

END
Ride the Lightening