tamingthemuse | Prompt 165 - Crushed - Lost in the Darkness (1/1)

Title: Lost in the Darkness
Fandom: BtVS
Pairing/Characters: Spike, and his musings
Rating: PG
Warnings: NoneCharacter death(s)
Disclaimer: Nothing is mine, except the words that Joss inspires in me. Thanks Joss.
Summary: At the end of Angel, Spike comes to in the alley and tries to make sense of his fate.
Prompt #165: Crushed
Word Count: 1064

Presently unbeta'd so please forgive any errors; if you point them out I'll fix them. Thank you.

LOST IN THE DARKNESS

It was dark and it was wet and he was hurting. Physically, it wasn't anything that wouldn't heal eventually. Emotionally? That was a whole other matter. It was like there'd been a shift in time, so he was here but not here, and everything felt black and white and lacking substance. He groaned as he tried to sit up and found that he couldn't move, his legs pinned beneath a heavy weight that on closer inspection turned out to be a dragon's wing.

Everything came back to him in a rush; the battle, the hordes of demons and dark forces massing against the band of hapless heroes outnumbered thousands to one but still standing firm. The rush of adrenaline that accompanied their valiant fight. The losses. Oh god, the losses.

Spike pushed himself to sit up, gritting his teeth against the pain that ripped through his body. His shoulder was dislocated, his flesh bloodied yet no longer seeping fluid, his store of borrowed blood long since ebbed away. The alley was uncannily quiet even though there was movement here and there across the bloody pavement, most probably death throes if they were lucky. Heaps of rags turned out to be bodies, those demons that didn't melt away when deceased lying in final repose, waiting to be removed with the rest of the rubbish.

Spike tried to push the putrid flesh from his legs, managing only to pin himself further with the lack of two working hands. He looked about, wondering if help would come – and the twist in his gut made him howl. Where would help come from now that Angel...

He realised that he'd no idea how long it had been since Angel had...

Angel.

That bastard.

Why did he always have to be the hero? Why couldn't he let somebody else grab the glory every now and then? All it took was unbeatable odds and Spike shouldering forward to fight the dragon – a bloody DRAGON for fuck's sake! - and Angel was rushing headlong into the fray, sword in hand and knocking him out of the way. Before Spike could react, Angel was on the dragon's back and hacking away at the mottled flesh beneath him.

Spike had cursed and demanded that Angel let him fight the beastie, but to no avail, and soon there was no time as he had his hands full with a veritable cornucopia of evil of all shapes and sizes and colours, all intent on parting his body from his limbs and his head. Then it was all slashing and parrying, kicking and biting, no time to think about what was going on above his head and to his side and his back. He thought he'd seen Blue tearing demons in half, but she was a blur of mayhem and he may have been mistaken, and Gunn had been around here somewhere, he'd heard him, just before he blacked out.

And Angel...

Again, his thoughts turned back to the vampire who had been more of a sire to him than the one who made him. Finding him was an irresistible pull that gave Spike the strength to slide from beneath the dead weight of the dragon's wing and lurch unsteadily to his feet. The world swayed around him and he swallowed down nausea, his head bowed until it passed.

When he finally felt able to look up he saw the scene of devastation properly for the first time. The sky was still heavy with ash, and lightning flashed sporadically outlining the dead and the wreckage in stark relief. The rain that continued to fall was washing blood in scarlet rivulets around the bodies to pool here and there. The scent of blood was overwhelming and in his delicate state, Spike was finding it difficult to control his game face, even though the smell was making him gag with its connotations.

He managed to acknowledge the irony of a vampire surrounded by blood enough to feed him for weeks being sick to his stomach at the thought of eating. Angel would find that amusing.

Angel. Even though Spike's mind was drifting, registering the horror around him and trying to process what it all meant, Angel kept creeping in there and stopping him dead like a slap to the face. He had to find out what had happened to him, good or bad.

Heading deeper into the alley, Spike limped among the bodies, casting them barely a glance in his search for his sire. Having a goal allowed him to forget his own condition. He didn't have to face the future while he was searching, and that was good.

When he'd made two circuits of the alley with no results, he resorted to yelling Angel's name to the heavens, his voice hoarse. Nothing. No answer.

Spike sunk to the floor, sweeping away a pile of burnt bones as he hunched over gripping his knees with his good hand as his dislocated shoulder hung useless. He wanted to cry, his eyes stinging yet without the moisture needed for tears as his body was shutting down due to lack of blood. His mind was racing; surely he would have felt the disconnection if Angel was dusted, wouldn't he? Wasn't that how it worked? Maybe Drusilla should have been clearer with the vampire 101. That thought drew a chuckle, as if Drusilla even knew what day it was most of the time, never mind be able to teach him vampire lore. Angel would know, and he would...

Angel.

As Spike sat motionless, just another corpse amongst corpses, for the first time since being turned he felt an overwhelming sense of loneliness. He had nobody. No Dru with her daft ideas and dollies. No Dawn with her teenage moods and little-girl smiles. No Joyce with her lovely cuppas and motherly hugs when nobody was looking. No Buffy, and god that hurt but he'd gotten used to that and was being all noble and doing it for her own good. And no Angel.

He had to face it; Angel was gone. Angel, the one that had always been there in the background to come back to whenever Dru ditched him or whenever he needed a fight or - and he'd admit this now - a fuck, was gone.

And he was crushed with the realisation of loss and paralysed with fear at what would happen now.