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My Immortal 2. Chapter 5.
So, the Children of Earth chapter. Not surprisingly this is wall-to-wall angst, although it's all quite subdued. For those not familiar with Children of Earth, this is by far the best description I can think of:
'There are things worse than walls. Terrible... and beautiful. If we look at them for too long they will burn right through us. Truths we couldn't bear. Not every day.'
This chapter deals with the aftermath, looking at what happens when someone has been burned right through and there is nothing left.
Index post for the whole ‘verse here. And the first chapter of this sequel (with Important Notes) here.
Summary: The Immortal is Captain Jack Harkness. This is what happened next.
Setting: March 2010 (shortly before Jack went to see Gwen).
Spoilers: This chapter 'Children of Earth' & 'The House of the Dead'.
Rating: PG-13. (Some swearing.)
Genre: FitB, character study, BtVS/AtS/Doctor Who/Torchwood crossover.
Pairings/characters: Jack, Buffy/Spike.
Word count: 3000+ words.
Thank you's: To my wonderful beta![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
kathyh who really helped me get this into shape! (All mistakes mine.)
Disclaimer: Joss and RTD own these characters, I'm just playing with them.
Feedback: Yes please.
Chapter 5
Spike: Really, I'm all right. Think I still dream of a crypt for two with a white picket fence? My eyes are clear.
Buffy: Good. I'm glad. Thank you.
Spike: Never much cared for picket fences, anyway. Bloody dangerous.
~
Buffy: But I knew what was right. I don't have that anymore. I don't understand. I don't know how to live in this world, if these are the choices. If everything just gets stripped away. I don't see the point.
~
Jack: Still. I have lived so many lives. Time to find a new one.
London, March 2010
The white picket fence still made Buffy smile every time she saw it.
Back when they’d started looking for a house, the estate agent had asked them if there were any special requirements - shooting Spike (still rocking the punk look) a swift glance, obviously trying to intimate that he was a cool, with-it kinda guy.
Spike had sighed and patiently waited for Buffy to reel off her list of number of bedrooms and preferable locations that she’d worked out before they came - but instead she’d smiled, flushed with sudden inspiration, and said: “I’d like a white picket fence.”
There had been a pause, as the estate agent had tried to rally.
“Um, of course. That’s... a bit unusual. Might be difficult to find...”
“Well that’s why we’re here! I mean, it is your job, isn’t it?” she asked, and turned to Spike, whose face had gone very quiet.
“I know you think they’re dangerous, but if I have to live in this country, I’d like a small reminder of home, yeah?”
He’d nodded, eyes stunned and full of that overwhelmed gratitude that she never knew what to do with. The impossibleness of their life - the fact that they had it, and it was theirs and it was real was something she still didn’t know what to do with. But it made all the heartache - the pains and difficulties of the first couple of years’ worth of adjustments all worth it.
And now they had - on top of everything else - their own house with a white picket fence, like a symbol of their dreams coming true. Not that they didn’t fight so loud that the neighbours often wouldn’t meet their eyes... Or maybe that was because of... other loud noises, but English people were far too polite to ever say anything.
The day had been long, but satisfying, and Buffy was trying to work out what to make for dinner, but instead found herself staring out of the kitchen window, trying to make out the fence in the descending darkness. She really ought to have done some shopping on the way home from the university...
Spike had disappeared down the garden to his shed, another trend that was getting pretty ingrained. Human-Spike was... not that different from Vampire-Spike, but certain traits had emerged - or possibly re-emerged - that were still throwing her a little. Like the shed. And the need to go to the local pub to watch football matches - not to mention the giant wall chart in his shed to keep track of everything. She’d expected a weapons’ collection, not rants about Wayne Rooney.
The buzzing of the doorbell threw her out of her musings, and she walked to the front door, wondering if it was yet another parcel from Giles with something she needed to study.
Instead she opened the door to be faced with The Immortal. He was wrapped up in his greatcoat, belt tightened around his middle and every button done up. In one hand he held a briefcase and there was the merest hint of a composed, polite smile on his face.
“Buffy. May I come in?"
"Um... of course."
He waited until she'd moved out of the way before walking through the door, the deliberate distance somehow far more uncomfortable than his usual in-your-face-ness.
She showed him into the sitting room, not knowing what to say.
Where was the ubiquitous ‘Hello Princess!’? Where was his smile? Where his ready embrace and banter, with enough flirting to nearly make her blush? Not that she hadn’t seen him angry or tired, and even sometimes - very rarely - vulnerable, but there had always been an excess of emotion... Sometimes it was locked away, but it had always been obvious, at least to her.
(That’s what she got for having dated vampires - an overdeveloped ability to read suppressed emotions.)
“Have a seat?” she offered, and he bowed his head, before seating himself in an armchair. She had never seen him in an armchair before - he was a natural sofa-sprawler - and somehow the image of him sitting there, perfectly (unnaturally) quiet, literally buttoned up and with his briefcase gingerly balanced on his knees, reminded her of when she’d found crazy, newly-souled Spike in the basement of the rebuilt Sunnydale High, despite the vast differences in appearance and behaviour. She just knew that every sense inside her screamed that something was terribly, horribly wrong...
It had been almost half a year since the big explosion in Cardiff - the one that had clearly been designed to take out Torchwood - and the strange days following, with the children speaking in unison and no information available anywhere. Giles had tried talking to UNIT and been told that ‘Everything was being done’ - the brush-off so brusque that he was still offended.
Several weeks later Gwen had called, quietly letting Buffy know that Ianto had died and Jack ‘disappeared’. Except now he was here, in her living room, and she dearly wished Gwen had told her more, because this hollow, quiet shell wasn’t the man she had known.
“I’m sorry about Ianto,” she said softly, unable to find anything else to say, and he seemed to look at her properly for the first time.
“Thank you,” he said gravely, and her heart caught in her throat. She knew what it was to lose someone, knew that abyss of loneliness and pain far too well, and yet - and yet he was carrying burdens other than grief, she was sure of it. If grief - and the seeking of solace - had been at the heart of this, he would have told her, whether she was married or not, she was sure of it. No there was something else, something she couldn’t work out.
Oh god she was floundering and he was looking at her and she needed to say something...
“Is it OK if I go get Spike? Unless you want to speak to just me?”
“I was just about to suggest you fetch him.”
Relief sweeping through her, she swiftly made her way down the garden. She had always known how to deal with him, but now... Right now, she needed someone to hold her hand.
"Spike! We have a visitor!"
Spike’s brow drew together when she mentioned who their visitor was, but Buffy shook her head.
“Don’t do the jealous thing. Something... something’s happened to him. It’s... I don’t know. Just please, don’t be difficult!”
When they got back to the sitting room, The Immortal had pulled the coffee table closer, placing his briefcase on it, and was bringing out a folder.
He looked up as they entered, and his face was almost apologetic as he caught Spike’s eyes.
"Don't worry, I'm not staying long. Just... brought something for Buffy."
"Right," Spike said, unsure, but sat down on the sofa alongside her.
The Immortal looked through the papers in the folder and extracted several sheets.
"Buffy? I need you to sign here and here. Oh... and here."
He held the papers forward, along with a pen, and she took them automatically, then frowned.
"Wait... what is this?"
"My...” A brief hesitation. “The Immortal's estate. I'm giving it to you."
She stared for a long moment.
"...What?"
He studied her carefully, and then elaborated, slowly and precisely.
"My estate - I want you to have it. All of it. The house, the cars, the land, the money. It’s all yours. Just sign the papers. I’ve done all the legal work."
Buffy didn’t generally feel like a dumb blonde, but right now her hair colour seemed to have seeped into her head, killing all her brain cells.
"But... but why?"
A barely-there pause, but the distance in his eyes grew immeasurably.
"I'm leaving."
"Leaving? How leaving - Gwen said you’d gone away. But you’re here now... Are you going abroad or-"
"No," he cut her off. "I mean, I'm leaving the planet."
The words refused to make sense for a few moments. OK, so everyone knew that aliens were real, and she'd known for more than a year that he was a time traveller, but 'leaving the planet' were still words that were absurd.
Seeing the look on her face he shrugged slightly.
“There are a few other people I need to see first. But then... then I’m gone.”
"But why?" she pressed on, shaking her head. What wasn’t he telling her?
He was silent for a long time, and an emotion of some kind almost broke through, but not enough to tell her anything except that whatever had happened had been bad on an unprecedented scale. He was so old, what could possibly have done this to him? She remembered trying to get him to tell her about Baxter, and he’d been a stony wall, angry to be quizzed. But now...
He shook his head imperceptibly and lowered his eyes.
"I... I can't tell you."
Spike, who had barely moved until now, finally spoke up, voice calm but with an underlying horror, and Buffy (despite everything) was glad that she wasn’t alone in almost freaking out.
"What. Did. You. Do?"
He looked up then, the last pale rays of sunlight cutting through the gloom, picking out a few strands of grey in his hair and caressing his cheek - and he was as beautiful and unknowable as the portrait on his wall.
"I saved the world," he said, voice perfectly blank, and suddenly all Buffy could hear in her head was Willow's voice, from so many years ago now...
‘There was just... nothing. It was like he was dead.’
She'd never feared him, not even close, but now she instinctively reached out and grasped Spike's hand. If The Immortal noticed, he didn’t let on, just looked at her, eyes now imploring.
“Buffy please. There - there is no one else. If-”
He caught himself, but she immediately jumped at the chance.
“If what?”
A bitter smile, swiftly curbed, and then he looked down, his voice low and suddenly rough.
“If things had gone to plan I wouldn’t even be here, arguing with you. You would simply have received a letter from my solicitor informing you that you were the main beneficiary of my will.”
She blinked.
“But... You can’t die. I don’t understand.”
He shook his head, speaking more to himself than her, she realised.
“I had it all worked out. A night of magic and death. Ironic, considering how I always hated magic, that that’s what I turned to. Desperate times, I guess. But Ianto-”
He broke off, swallowing hard, and for a moment Buffy thought the facade might finally crack. But then he pulled himself together again, looking up and meeting her eyes.
“You know it’s funny Buffy, how we tend to fall for the same type. My plan was simple - I was going to destroy the rift, and in the process seal myself away in the void. Eternal oblivion...”
The longing in his voice made her shiver, because she remembered that feeling. Knew what it was like to run towards death in order to find peace away from the impossible realities of life. Which choices had he been faced with to leave him in such a state?
But before she could find the right words, he continued, the strangest mixture of pain and pride on his face.
“Except the magic brought Ianto back, body and soul. I’d hoped to see him again - an echo, a ghostly memory, so I could say a final goodbye - but it was him. And he decided to save me, taking my place. He didn’t remember-”
Catching himself abruptly, The Immortal smiled stiffly.
“So - no need to worry about Cardiff anymore. No more rift. No more odd statistics. No more aliens running riot. Buffy, please just sign the papers.”
There was urgency in his voice, and she could tell that just being there was painful for him. She sighed.
"OK... but what will I do with..."
She flickered through the papers, gasping as she saw a figure, and Spike’s jaw dropped.
"...that... much... money..."
He shrugged. "Whatever you want.”
She shook her head.
“But really...”
There was silence for a moment, then he spoke, voice distant, as if he was quoting something he’d heard a long time ago.
“The human infant mortality rate is 29,158 deaths per day. Every three seconds a child dies. The human response is to accept, and adapt.”
Looking up there was something... something old and dead in his eyes.
“You could try to change that.”
She swallowed, abruptly reminded of her little sister, tied up and ready to be sacrificed, and how hollow life had seemed when everything kept being taken away... Trying to clear her thoughts she attempted an answer.
“I... Are you sure... your house... you said it was your only refuge...”
He laughed then, a strangely harsh and bitter sound. She’d never thought that he could laugh like that.
“Last place I will ever go. Don’t get me wrong, I love Italy and Italians. Too much for my own good, really. Or too much for their own good, I should say.”
He smiled, bitterly.
“No, that place has served its purpose. If The Immortal can’t die, he should at least disappear. Never was good for much anyway.”
Spike, thankfully, kept quiet, and gently she reached out, laid her hand on top of his.
“He was good for me.”
The darkness left his eyes as he slowly shook his head.
“It was the other way around Buffy. And this is why you deserve it. You know, I was planning on buying you lots of presents when your kids come along - I guess you’ll have to buy them yourself now.”
“If we have children,” she admonished, trying for a little levity, and for the first time a shadow of a genuine smile lit up his face.
"You will," he stated, unequivocally, and then continued, looking from her to Spike and back again.
“Three thousand years from now your descendants will walk the stars, beautiful and deadly, and quite, quite irresistible. A touch sociopathic, it’s true, but he came through in the end.”
He tilted his head.
“Yeah, he did you proud... Buffy - sign the papers.”
She wanted to shake him, hit him, force an emotion forward, make him talk. What was he, who was he, how did he know the things he knew, what had he done?
Instead she signed her name.
He swiftly sorted out which papers she had to keep and which he would take back to the lawyers, and then, as he was about to close the briefcase, hesitated.
Extracting a blank sheet of paper, he swiftly wrote on it, then handed it over.
“Here. This is the address of Martha Jones. If you ever have any problems with aliens, give her a call. And feel free to tell her... anything and everything, I trust her to the end of the world and beyond. Literally.”
A soft smile touched his mouth.
“You’ll like her. She saved the world once, all by herself. And her husband is pretty special too.”
Then he closed the briefcase and stood up, handing Buffy the paper, and she looked up at him, bewildered.
“You’re leaving already? Don’t you want... some tea or... something?”
He shook his head lightly.
“No, I’m... I need to go.”
Abruptly making for the door, he didn’t stop until he was outside on the step, and Buffy felt the far too familiar deja vu of ‘He’s leaving!’
How many men had walked out of her life, by now? And she knew that really, he was nothing like Angel or Giles, since he was certainly not leaving ‘for her own good’, but still... They always walked away.
“Will I see you again?” she asked as he turned, feeling like the greatest cliché in the book, but well, clichés were clichés for a reason...
“I don’t know,” he said simply. “Probably not. Which reminds me... Could you do me a favour?”
She nodded.
“Of course.”
“Please destroy my portrait. It’s the only thing that carries my image and I... don’t want it. Better if I am a faceless legend. Thank you.”
“Immortal...” she began, then faltered, their first meeting suddenly coming back to her, here at the end.
‘You look like you could do with a friend,’ he’d said, so certain of his own charms, reeling her in with laughing blue eyes, dimples and mystery.
It wasn’t supposed to end like this. Her Immortal - her bright, vivacious, Prince Charming should never be... this. Except he was.
“Goodbye,” he said, shaking Spike’s hand, and Spike replied “All the best,” and somehow the world didn’t end. And then...
He held out his hand towards her, but she shook her head wordlessly and stepped forward, wrapping her arms around him. And finally, finally, he let go, pulling her so close that anyone who wasn’t a Slayer would have been crushed.
“Goodbye Buffy,” he whispered into her hair, and the catch in his voice was somehow worse anything else. “I... I wish I could have loved you.”
He pulled back, and for just a moment she could see right through him, the way she had sometimes been able to back then, and the naked pain and longing on his face - so desperate she felt as if it was scalding her - explained better than anything he’d said why he was leaving.
But then the mask came back down, and with a gentle nod he turned and walked away without another word.
Watching the evening darkness swallow him up, all Buffy could think of was the warmth and beauty of Rome, and wondered how they had come to this, as she felt their fairy tale turn to dust.
TBC.
'There are things worse than walls. Terrible... and beautiful. If we look at them for too long they will burn right through us. Truths we couldn't bear. Not every day.'
This chapter deals with the aftermath, looking at what happens when someone has been burned right through and there is nothing left.
Index post for the whole ‘verse here. And the first chapter of this sequel (with Important Notes) here.
Summary: The Immortal is Captain Jack Harkness. This is what happened next.
Setting: March 2010 (shortly before Jack went to see Gwen).
Spoilers: This chapter 'Children of Earth' & 'The House of the Dead'.
Rating: PG-13. (Some swearing.)
Genre: FitB, character study, BtVS/AtS/Doctor Who/Torchwood crossover.
Pairings/characters: Jack, Buffy/Spike.
Word count: 3000+ words.
Thank you's: To my wonderful beta
kathyh who really helped me get this into shape! (All mistakes mine.)Disclaimer: Joss and RTD own these characters, I'm just playing with them.
Feedback: Yes please.
Chapter 5
Spike: Really, I'm all right. Think I still dream of a crypt for two with a white picket fence? My eyes are clear.
Buffy: Good. I'm glad. Thank you.
Spike: Never much cared for picket fences, anyway. Bloody dangerous.
~
Buffy: But I knew what was right. I don't have that anymore. I don't understand. I don't know how to live in this world, if these are the choices. If everything just gets stripped away. I don't see the point.
~
Jack: Still. I have lived so many lives. Time to find a new one.
London, March 2010
The white picket fence still made Buffy smile every time she saw it.
Back when they’d started looking for a house, the estate agent had asked them if there were any special requirements - shooting Spike (still rocking the punk look) a swift glance, obviously trying to intimate that he was a cool, with-it kinda guy.
Spike had sighed and patiently waited for Buffy to reel off her list of number of bedrooms and preferable locations that she’d worked out before they came - but instead she’d smiled, flushed with sudden inspiration, and said: “I’d like a white picket fence.”
There had been a pause, as the estate agent had tried to rally.
“Um, of course. That’s... a bit unusual. Might be difficult to find...”
“Well that’s why we’re here! I mean, it is your job, isn’t it?” she asked, and turned to Spike, whose face had gone very quiet.
“I know you think they’re dangerous, but if I have to live in this country, I’d like a small reminder of home, yeah?”
He’d nodded, eyes stunned and full of that overwhelmed gratitude that she never knew what to do with. The impossibleness of their life - the fact that they had it, and it was theirs and it was real was something she still didn’t know what to do with. But it made all the heartache - the pains and difficulties of the first couple of years’ worth of adjustments all worth it.
And now they had - on top of everything else - their own house with a white picket fence, like a symbol of their dreams coming true. Not that they didn’t fight so loud that the neighbours often wouldn’t meet their eyes... Or maybe that was because of... other loud noises, but English people were far too polite to ever say anything.
The day had been long, but satisfying, and Buffy was trying to work out what to make for dinner, but instead found herself staring out of the kitchen window, trying to make out the fence in the descending darkness. She really ought to have done some shopping on the way home from the university...
Spike had disappeared down the garden to his shed, another trend that was getting pretty ingrained. Human-Spike was... not that different from Vampire-Spike, but certain traits had emerged - or possibly re-emerged - that were still throwing her a little. Like the shed. And the need to go to the local pub to watch football matches - not to mention the giant wall chart in his shed to keep track of everything. She’d expected a weapons’ collection, not rants about Wayne Rooney.
The buzzing of the doorbell threw her out of her musings, and she walked to the front door, wondering if it was yet another parcel from Giles with something she needed to study.
Instead she opened the door to be faced with The Immortal. He was wrapped up in his greatcoat, belt tightened around his middle and every button done up. In one hand he held a briefcase and there was the merest hint of a composed, polite smile on his face.
“Buffy. May I come in?"
"Um... of course."
He waited until she'd moved out of the way before walking through the door, the deliberate distance somehow far more uncomfortable than his usual in-your-face-ness.
She showed him into the sitting room, not knowing what to say.
Where was the ubiquitous ‘Hello Princess!’? Where was his smile? Where his ready embrace and banter, with enough flirting to nearly make her blush? Not that she hadn’t seen him angry or tired, and even sometimes - very rarely - vulnerable, but there had always been an excess of emotion... Sometimes it was locked away, but it had always been obvious, at least to her.
(That’s what she got for having dated vampires - an overdeveloped ability to read suppressed emotions.)
“Have a seat?” she offered, and he bowed his head, before seating himself in an armchair. She had never seen him in an armchair before - he was a natural sofa-sprawler - and somehow the image of him sitting there, perfectly (unnaturally) quiet, literally buttoned up and with his briefcase gingerly balanced on his knees, reminded her of when she’d found crazy, newly-souled Spike in the basement of the rebuilt Sunnydale High, despite the vast differences in appearance and behaviour. She just knew that every sense inside her screamed that something was terribly, horribly wrong...
It had been almost half a year since the big explosion in Cardiff - the one that had clearly been designed to take out Torchwood - and the strange days following, with the children speaking in unison and no information available anywhere. Giles had tried talking to UNIT and been told that ‘Everything was being done’ - the brush-off so brusque that he was still offended.
Several weeks later Gwen had called, quietly letting Buffy know that Ianto had died and Jack ‘disappeared’. Except now he was here, in her living room, and she dearly wished Gwen had told her more, because this hollow, quiet shell wasn’t the man she had known.
“I’m sorry about Ianto,” she said softly, unable to find anything else to say, and he seemed to look at her properly for the first time.
“Thank you,” he said gravely, and her heart caught in her throat. She knew what it was to lose someone, knew that abyss of loneliness and pain far too well, and yet - and yet he was carrying burdens other than grief, she was sure of it. If grief - and the seeking of solace - had been at the heart of this, he would have told her, whether she was married or not, she was sure of it. No there was something else, something she couldn’t work out.
Oh god she was floundering and he was looking at her and she needed to say something...
“Is it OK if I go get Spike? Unless you want to speak to just me?”
“I was just about to suggest you fetch him.”
Relief sweeping through her, she swiftly made her way down the garden. She had always known how to deal with him, but now... Right now, she needed someone to hold her hand.
"Spike! We have a visitor!"
Spike’s brow drew together when she mentioned who their visitor was, but Buffy shook her head.
“Don’t do the jealous thing. Something... something’s happened to him. It’s... I don’t know. Just please, don’t be difficult!”
When they got back to the sitting room, The Immortal had pulled the coffee table closer, placing his briefcase on it, and was bringing out a folder.
He looked up as they entered, and his face was almost apologetic as he caught Spike’s eyes.
"Don't worry, I'm not staying long. Just... brought something for Buffy."
"Right," Spike said, unsure, but sat down on the sofa alongside her.
The Immortal looked through the papers in the folder and extracted several sheets.
"Buffy? I need you to sign here and here. Oh... and here."
He held the papers forward, along with a pen, and she took them automatically, then frowned.
"Wait... what is this?"
"My...” A brief hesitation. “The Immortal's estate. I'm giving it to you."
She stared for a long moment.
"...What?"
He studied her carefully, and then elaborated, slowly and precisely.
"My estate - I want you to have it. All of it. The house, the cars, the land, the money. It’s all yours. Just sign the papers. I’ve done all the legal work."
Buffy didn’t generally feel like a dumb blonde, but right now her hair colour seemed to have seeped into her head, killing all her brain cells.
"But... but why?"
A barely-there pause, but the distance in his eyes grew immeasurably.
"I'm leaving."
"Leaving? How leaving - Gwen said you’d gone away. But you’re here now... Are you going abroad or-"
"No," he cut her off. "I mean, I'm leaving the planet."
The words refused to make sense for a few moments. OK, so everyone knew that aliens were real, and she'd known for more than a year that he was a time traveller, but 'leaving the planet' were still words that were absurd.
Seeing the look on her face he shrugged slightly.
“There are a few other people I need to see first. But then... then I’m gone.”
"But why?" she pressed on, shaking her head. What wasn’t he telling her?
He was silent for a long time, and an emotion of some kind almost broke through, but not enough to tell her anything except that whatever had happened had been bad on an unprecedented scale. He was so old, what could possibly have done this to him? She remembered trying to get him to tell her about Baxter, and he’d been a stony wall, angry to be quizzed. But now...
He shook his head imperceptibly and lowered his eyes.
"I... I can't tell you."
Spike, who had barely moved until now, finally spoke up, voice calm but with an underlying horror, and Buffy (despite everything) was glad that she wasn’t alone in almost freaking out.
"What. Did. You. Do?"
He looked up then, the last pale rays of sunlight cutting through the gloom, picking out a few strands of grey in his hair and caressing his cheek - and he was as beautiful and unknowable as the portrait on his wall.
"I saved the world," he said, voice perfectly blank, and suddenly all Buffy could hear in her head was Willow's voice, from so many years ago now...
‘There was just... nothing. It was like he was dead.’
She'd never feared him, not even close, but now she instinctively reached out and grasped Spike's hand. If The Immortal noticed, he didn’t let on, just looked at her, eyes now imploring.
“Buffy please. There - there is no one else. If-”
He caught himself, but she immediately jumped at the chance.
“If what?”
A bitter smile, swiftly curbed, and then he looked down, his voice low and suddenly rough.
“If things had gone to plan I wouldn’t even be here, arguing with you. You would simply have received a letter from my solicitor informing you that you were the main beneficiary of my will.”
She blinked.
“But... You can’t die. I don’t understand.”
He shook his head, speaking more to himself than her, she realised.
“I had it all worked out. A night of magic and death. Ironic, considering how I always hated magic, that that’s what I turned to. Desperate times, I guess. But Ianto-”
He broke off, swallowing hard, and for a moment Buffy thought the facade might finally crack. But then he pulled himself together again, looking up and meeting her eyes.
“You know it’s funny Buffy, how we tend to fall for the same type. My plan was simple - I was going to destroy the rift, and in the process seal myself away in the void. Eternal oblivion...”
The longing in his voice made her shiver, because she remembered that feeling. Knew what it was like to run towards death in order to find peace away from the impossible realities of life. Which choices had he been faced with to leave him in such a state?
But before she could find the right words, he continued, the strangest mixture of pain and pride on his face.
“Except the magic brought Ianto back, body and soul. I’d hoped to see him again - an echo, a ghostly memory, so I could say a final goodbye - but it was him. And he decided to save me, taking my place. He didn’t remember-”
Catching himself abruptly, The Immortal smiled stiffly.
“So - no need to worry about Cardiff anymore. No more rift. No more odd statistics. No more aliens running riot. Buffy, please just sign the papers.”
There was urgency in his voice, and she could tell that just being there was painful for him. She sighed.
"OK... but what will I do with..."
She flickered through the papers, gasping as she saw a figure, and Spike’s jaw dropped.
"...that... much... money..."
He shrugged. "Whatever you want.”
She shook her head.
“But really...”
There was silence for a moment, then he spoke, voice distant, as if he was quoting something he’d heard a long time ago.
“The human infant mortality rate is 29,158 deaths per day. Every three seconds a child dies. The human response is to accept, and adapt.”
Looking up there was something... something old and dead in his eyes.
“You could try to change that.”
She swallowed, abruptly reminded of her little sister, tied up and ready to be sacrificed, and how hollow life had seemed when everything kept being taken away... Trying to clear her thoughts she attempted an answer.
“I... Are you sure... your house... you said it was your only refuge...”
He laughed then, a strangely harsh and bitter sound. She’d never thought that he could laugh like that.
“Last place I will ever go. Don’t get me wrong, I love Italy and Italians. Too much for my own good, really. Or too much for their own good, I should say.”
He smiled, bitterly.
“No, that place has served its purpose. If The Immortal can’t die, he should at least disappear. Never was good for much anyway.”
Spike, thankfully, kept quiet, and gently she reached out, laid her hand on top of his.
“He was good for me.”
The darkness left his eyes as he slowly shook his head.
“It was the other way around Buffy. And this is why you deserve it. You know, I was planning on buying you lots of presents when your kids come along - I guess you’ll have to buy them yourself now.”
“If we have children,” she admonished, trying for a little levity, and for the first time a shadow of a genuine smile lit up his face.
"You will," he stated, unequivocally, and then continued, looking from her to Spike and back again.
“Three thousand years from now your descendants will walk the stars, beautiful and deadly, and quite, quite irresistible. A touch sociopathic, it’s true, but he came through in the end.”
He tilted his head.
“Yeah, he did you proud... Buffy - sign the papers.”
She wanted to shake him, hit him, force an emotion forward, make him talk. What was he, who was he, how did he know the things he knew, what had he done?
Instead she signed her name.
He swiftly sorted out which papers she had to keep and which he would take back to the lawyers, and then, as he was about to close the briefcase, hesitated.
Extracting a blank sheet of paper, he swiftly wrote on it, then handed it over.
“Here. This is the address of Martha Jones. If you ever have any problems with aliens, give her a call. And feel free to tell her... anything and everything, I trust her to the end of the world and beyond. Literally.”
A soft smile touched his mouth.
“You’ll like her. She saved the world once, all by herself. And her husband is pretty special too.”
Then he closed the briefcase and stood up, handing Buffy the paper, and she looked up at him, bewildered.
“You’re leaving already? Don’t you want... some tea or... something?”
He shook his head lightly.
“No, I’m... I need to go.”
Abruptly making for the door, he didn’t stop until he was outside on the step, and Buffy felt the far too familiar deja vu of ‘He’s leaving!’
How many men had walked out of her life, by now? And she knew that really, he was nothing like Angel or Giles, since he was certainly not leaving ‘for her own good’, but still... They always walked away.
“Will I see you again?” she asked as he turned, feeling like the greatest cliché in the book, but well, clichés were clichés for a reason...
“I don’t know,” he said simply. “Probably not. Which reminds me... Could you do me a favour?”
She nodded.
“Of course.”
“Please destroy my portrait. It’s the only thing that carries my image and I... don’t want it. Better if I am a faceless legend. Thank you.”
“Immortal...” she began, then faltered, their first meeting suddenly coming back to her, here at the end.
‘You look like you could do with a friend,’ he’d said, so certain of his own charms, reeling her in with laughing blue eyes, dimples and mystery.
It wasn’t supposed to end like this. Her Immortal - her bright, vivacious, Prince Charming should never be... this. Except he was.
“Goodbye,” he said, shaking Spike’s hand, and Spike replied “All the best,” and somehow the world didn’t end. And then...
He held out his hand towards her, but she shook her head wordlessly and stepped forward, wrapping her arms around him. And finally, finally, he let go, pulling her so close that anyone who wasn’t a Slayer would have been crushed.
“Goodbye Buffy,” he whispered into her hair, and the catch in his voice was somehow worse anything else. “I... I wish I could have loved you.”
He pulled back, and for just a moment she could see right through him, the way she had sometimes been able to back then, and the naked pain and longing on his face - so desperate she felt as if it was scalding her - explained better than anything he’d said why he was leaving.
But then the mask came back down, and with a gentle nod he turned and walked away without another word.
Watching the evening darkness swallow him up, all Buffy could think of was the warmth and beauty of Rome, and wondered how they had come to this, as she felt their fairy tale turn to dust.
TBC.