Fic: Triangles Are Falling (Spike/Darla) NC-17
Title: Triangles Are Falling
Author: lillianmorgan
Setting: 1977, prior to events in Fool for Love, BtVS Season 5 and Lies My Parents Told Me, BtVS Season 7
Rating: NC-17
Pairing: Spike/Darla
Disclaimer: I do not own Joss' or ME's toys.
A/N: Written for the spike_fics Decades Challenge 1960-1997.
Many thanks go to yourlibrarian for the helpful beta job.
Originally posted 13th July, 2005.
Triangles Are Falling
New York, 1977
He wobbled down the street, merging with the mass of adolescents as they streamed out from CBGBs, weaving his way between paralytic punk and Bowery bum alike. He convinced himself it was the music that was giving him this high, and he waved a bottle of bourbon and shouted:
"I was saying let me out of here, before I was even born it's such a mgrpfm mpfrm mrpf." He never could get that part of the line right.
A couple of kids around him cheered and a girl, hair the colour of cotton candy, glided up to him and whispered, "I know where there's this great party." Her skirt line kissing her panties, her shredded black stockings complete with impenetrable black boots and her innocent eyes surrounded by blackest, deepest kohl that peered up at him intimately, persuaded him to play a bit with this one.
"Sure, luv," he said, purring the words into her ear, "where's it at then?"
She giggled overcome (why were they always this easy?) and called to her mate. Apparently they were all middle class kids slumming it downtown, so this party was going to cost them a meander uptown. Spike could hear his stomach already grumbling. Should have eaten before he left, but Drusilla’s habits, endlessly demanding that Spike recite to her William Blake’s “The Chimney Sweeper”, were putting him off his food.
"Loads of alcohol," one of the kids was saying.
"Yeah!"
Spike sighed. Well, he might be able to bring a few scraps home for Dru, make up for the row, though from the looks of them they were just that; the parasitic drug had eaten away at most of what made them succulent.
***
Richard Hell and the Voidoids were the shit. Or at least that's what Rachel said, only she didn't call herself Rachel anymore, she was Rat now. And I should be Polly Parrot. But I'm not sure if those names really worked.
We were walking out from CBGBs and Rat attached herself to the guy she'd met in the pit; they were sucking on each other like it was the end of the world. Or maybe they were just trying to keep upright. There was Jim, too, to my left but he was looking at something beyond me, so I followed his gaze, curious to see what excited him. Because it didn't seem to be me that did that; he only got excited by boys.
A real heavy punk was waving his arms around, singing and staggering about. He was just trying to draw attention to himself and I wondered why he did that. I'd never do that. I just wanted to meld in, not stand out. Hey! He crashed into us! And boy, now that I see him, boy was he hot! Black sleeveless tee with safety pins sewn in at haphazard angles and peroxide blonde hair sticking straight up to the sky. He must really know what it means to be a punk. He really knows.
I thought he winked at me, or maybe he winked at Jim I wasn't sure, but I felt Jim about to say something so instead I kinda grabbed him, to steady him, and told him, really unexpectedly, about the party we were headed to. Maybe it was because he had such nice arms; they were bigger than you’d expect, like he worked out or something because most of the boys around here were wafer thin and I started to imagine trying to get my fingers around them.
He answered me and I immediately forgot what he said but it made me giggle because his voice went all low and mellow, like chocolate, and he wasn't from New York, and it really hit me in the belly, well, below the belly, and made me go really tingly. Really tingly.
I didn't know what to do other than call to Rat and ask about the party. And as I did that, he wrapped his arm around me, like I was his possession, or his conquest, and that made Rat stop kissing and look at us. And I felt amazing. And the only thing I could think of was “wow.”
It was only til we came out of Hunter College station that I thought, "Why did he pick me?"
***
This party was, she decided, monumentally dull. She wandered away from the mix of humans and vampires that comprised the glitterati, and savoured the view of the Empire State Building before her. Eye-catching from both land and sea, a testament to human enterprise and progress - a feat of modern engineering that made things easier the longer one lived in this world. Something perhaps the Master understood but did not relish as much as she.
But he had given her a leave of absence on good behaviour and she had found the ways and means necessary to cross to New York, a city she might come to adore. It’s funny what time does to a place; when she was breathing and alive, this city wasn’t even a speck on someone’s imagination. And now, look at it. The lights buzzed and burned with power 24 hours a day and vampires could exist quite happily, never needing to hide - plenty of tasty treats happy to share indulgence, sympathy and some rich merlot. The city simply hummed with decadence and delights.
She would have loved to share it with Angelus.
But those thoughts led inevitably to despair so she busied herself with other arrangements. The first thing she had done was acclimatize herself; buying just the right clothes and having her hair cut to a style that spoke of money and reputation. Having spent far too long underneath the earth with the Master and his other lackeys always gave her an overwhelming need to taste the divine, the sumptuous. It was the one-thing humans did very well; apart from bleeding prettily.
She had found herself a very rich but easily seduced man, who, more to the point, had a very nice apartment. So she began her new life; informing his neighbours that he was away on business, when instead she’d hired some lowly minion down on his luck to get rid of the body. He had tasted of wealth and power, like caviar, but was not as plump and juicy as those White Russians she’d had 70 years earlier.
Living with the Master, although the right and proper thing to do, made her realize how little she enjoyed life. Everything was browns and greys until the colour of the Mardi gras whisked her away for just a short time. Angelus had been an unpredictable festival - riotous, colourful, sensational, beastly, destructive - but in the span of her lifetime, he was simply another evanescent departure from her tenure to the Master.
And in those years she had had family. And now she simply had herself. And duty.
***
Bernard Crowley sipped at his champagne and stopped beside the hors d’oeuvres. He didn’t dare move, even if it meant mingling, because this was an opportune place to stand and just observe. He had done a lot of observing ever since his Slayer had given birth to her baby, so he was accustomed to it; the need to protect her had been inflamed by the mewling infant’s entrance into this world, and had remained strong as Crowley had watched him grow into a six year old boy already weary with life.
He had met, quite by chance, the apothecary owner who garnered him with invitations to these soirees; where all the new and improved demons came to see and be seen. Where he could observe from a safe distance all the new arrivals, the new harbingers of potential apocalypse, bent on destroying his Slayer, paradoxically challenging her to defend her life but also enable her destiny to protect the world.
He watched a blonde woman, wander away from the crowd, fingers pressed to the window, her beauty crystallized in her serene countenance, her intelligent eyes sweeping the party, summarizing its intent in one gaze.
He was so taken with her, he nearly missed the exuberant young man, whose leering and disdainful features, tugged the strings of his memories.
***
Spike licked the blood from his fangs and lips, realizing that all three of those kids hardly made one decent meal, but the supersonic enhancements in their blood - now coursing though his veins - gave him one incredible, indelible buzz. So much so that when he spotted the delectable blonde by the window, her reflectionless gaze pondering the skyline, he cozied right up behind her, bending and pressing his abdomen to her petite but perfectly rounded derriere and said, “Well, aren’t you a very tasty treat?”
Her hair flicked toward him, so much like a whip on skin, permanently marking memories of eighty years ago, and he came as close as a master vampire could to gasping.
“You don’t need to breathe, William. I don’t know why you persist with such a human endeavour. And, please, remove your hands from my waist. Now.”
Spike’s hands flew from her waist to his cigarettes, snuggled tightly into his jean pockets. “Nice ‘do,” he said nodding toward her hair and ignoring the party-goers flaps of frustration as smoke poured from his mouth.
“I believe it’s very de rigueur.”
“Sure, ‘tis if you’re one of those birds off the tele. The ones that ponce about in their shorts and high heels.”
Her hand slapped across his face, followed by a low giggle, a gesture so known, so ingrained in his memory that instead of wincing his head moved with her hand in a balletic arc. “Christ,” he whispered, feeling his crotch squeezed to the point of no return, and wishing these tight leather pants weren’t all the rage either.
“And what’s with this…mockery? This neon sign on top of your head, come to me my beauties, I wish to eat you,” she said, sweeping her hand over his face, wiping at his eyeshadow, “what are you attempting to be exactly, silly William?” To underline her disdain, she began to pat him on the head, only to remove her hand and screw up her nose at the amount of hair product her fingers encountered. As if they’d never been sullied with anything else before.
“Whatcha doing here in New York?”
“Trying out new things, dear boy.”
“Away from prying sires then?”
“And yours would be where exactly?”
“Drusilla doesn’t care for punk music. Besides, none of that’s as exciting as the prospects in front of me now, my darling, darling mistress.” He rocked back on the heels of his boots and smiled seductively, curling his tongue around his lips; a gesture he knew that she liked even if no excitement flashed in her eyes. Twenty years of living in that family taught him self-preservation, being quick witted at all times, how to guard a perimeter and which of his strengths he should play to and when. With Darla, it was always about the pretty.
“I believe you’re choosing your words to flatter me, but really, William, they hold no meaning. And I tire of this party. This isn’t what I want to do. I feel some other games need to be played, don’t you? Where are you staying?”
“The Chelsea Hotel-”
Darla sniggered. “Oh how the mighty have fallen!”
“Oi! I’ll have you know that many a distinguished guest graced the doors of that hotel. Janis Joplin, Tennessee Williams, Bob Dylan, famous, famous artists who’ve made an impact on-”
“Will you fetch my coat then? Perhaps we can catch a late film and then go hunting.”
Spike scampered away, like the good little puppy he knew he was, preparing himself for some hi-jinks only Darla was able to indulge him in.
***
Crowley watched the interchange; most unhappy that the miscreant, the young man who looked like a piece of forgotten rubbish on the floor, had waylaid the beautiful woman, who illuminated the room with her Botticellian features.
Even as they departed the room, Crowley began compiling a mental list of all the salient details about his appearance. It paid to be vigilant, even to the point of neurosis. Bright, spiky white hair; ripped black T-shirt, sawn-off at the shoulders to reveal skin so pale and crystalline he must have been undead; eyes covered with black Cleopatra-like paint, accenting eyes so blue and intense within. He might have been cold, though, without a jacket, were his body not warmed by the demon which it housed.
He would have to look up this fellow, search for descriptions in the Watchers’ records, and, if it came to it, alert Nikki. You couldn’t, after all, just let vampires get away with waltzing into parties and chatting up the most beautiful woman in the room.
***
As Darla watched from within the enormous, limousine-like passenger compartment of the Checker cab, Spike toyed with his food. He had grown tired of the cab driver’s sedate pace and hauled him outside for a bite to eat. The squirming, frightened, pleading, dying man had made an unsuccessful escape attempt into a side alley and Spike was now taking intermittent slurps from his neck.
“Are you bored, my sweet? The way you play says something’s amiss?”
Throwing the now drained body to the pavement, Spike turned to Darla. “Well, not amiss. But maybe…possibly…up…”
“If you come here then, darling boy, pay your dutiful respects and maybe I will feel inclined to help you fix that.” She dangled one leg exquisitely out of the cab, ankle swivelling her dainty shoe.
Spike moved toward her, taking her hand in his and licking each finger delicately and precisely. Her eyes flamed with need. She reached down and smiled her knowing, powerful smile.
“Poor boy.”
He lifted her up from her waist and spun her around, once, twice, three times before pinning her body between him and the brick wall which enclosed the alley.
“You want it, don’t you mistress? Down and dirty?” He slid his hands up her legs, meandering smoothly from her thighs to her hips and leaning in to lick the side of her neck.
“Good boy, keep talking and then you can remove my stockings and take me in your mouth.” Spike knelt before her, eagerly ripping clothes from her skin before sliding his hands up her legs to where he most wanted to be.
“You beautiful, powerful, wondrous mistress with a hidden treasure thirsty for my lips, demanding my attention, the ministrations of my tongue against the walls of your delectable, cherry-ripened-”
Darla stilled in her gasping. “Wait,” she instructed. “Wait. There’s something…”
“Will you be needing this body?”
It took Spike a muzzled few minutes to pry his mouth away from her delectable quim, hosted up as she was above him, cradled against the wall, before he realised a wary onlooker was addressing him, deep from within the bowels of the alley. His glowing eyes were the only thing that distinguished him, until he skirted the light of a street lamp and revealed a dishevelled walking carpet bag of a being, soiled and covered in sores, a dark legionnaires cap covered his hair, matted over a protuberous skull. A few further moments before Spike realised it was another vampire. Blood older, darker. But the state of him! What did these New York vamps feed on? Pitiful, was what it was. Pitiful.
The figure gestured to the cabbie’s discarded body. “Will you be needing this kill? Only, I see you’ve not finished it and if it’s all the same to you….”
Beneath his hands, Spike felt Darla begin to squirm at the disruption and, swearing coarsely under his breath, he roughly shoved her back against the wall, knowing he’d have to assert himself over her and whatever she was up to.
Forcing his arm over her chest in a position that provided the least amount of comfort, he continued to glare at Darla but called over his shoulder, “Alright, champ, if you don’t mind I’m about to get a bit wound up here. I’m here with my ladyfriend and we were right in the middle of-”
But Darla, oblivious to Spike and his intentions, even her need for a quick tongue fucking in a back alley, something she might have admitted at the point of a stake that Spike was very adept at (good teachers did abound), pushed off her dim-witted disciple. He skittered to the pavement, falling amidst the refuse of the city, in astonishment so complete that his customary mask of indifference barely held.
Darla took a step forward into the alley, then held herself back, unsure, waiting, sniffing and sensing the night around her.
"Angelus?" her impassioned, reverential whisper stilled all motion.
The figure, having loomed over the body, straightened himself from the waist, but remained in the shadows. The pregnant moment paused and stretched into more as the three vampires, as if caught in stasis, contemplated each other.
And then he began laughing. Long, loud, booming chortles racking his body, shaking and quavering their way from his chest and stomach into the midnight atmosphere.
"Oh Darla," began Angel, "with the boy. As if..." But the coughing and spluttering from his continued mirth attack swallowed any further words into his body. He stumbled further into the alley, almost drunk on the comedy. "Now don’t either of you come looking to me for completion when the other isn’t enough. The two of you, together, just sickens me. Disgusting."
Darla drew herself up, then as if unable to contemplate anything else but the anger, the indignity of Angelus’ rebuke swarming around her, she slapped Spike. “Stay away now, boy.” If she had been wearing the same outfit when William had first been brought home to her, then she would have gathered up her skirts and given the exit of a lifetime. As it was, these modern fashions clung and slithered down her frame, exposing something she knew would draw Angelus in. The power of her body. All thoughts of Spike disintegrated into the night air, but of course the boy would never be sufficiently chastised.
“But mistress,” said Spike, running, panting, after her. “I want to finish you. Please. Let me do that.” Then petulantly, pouting, “Besides, he left you. But I never did that.”
And then as if wishing to be free of all distractions, she turned on Spike, “Run along Spike, run home to Drusilla. You know your place. That’s where you deserve to be. Completing her. Not me. You’re not good enough. You should know only Angelus and the Master have that privilege. I don’t know what possessed you to even try. Go on, get on home.”
And for good measure she tweaked one of his safety pins between her thumb and forefinger and pitched him a few feet away from her.
His back against the wall, Spike watched as Darla walked away, listening for the telltale sound of screeching rats, and repeated her prayer of worship. “Angelus, Angelus are you still there?” She continued deeper into the alley, never pausing, never casting a final look over her shoulder at him.
Spike kicked at a beer can on the pavement, livid at his sire’s command to stay. Then he drew his hands into fists as he heard her seducing whimper roll out from the alley. “I never left you!” he screamed to the air above him, “I never bloody left you. Not like you bleeding lot did. Just for sport, just for fun. Let’s kick good old William when he’s down, have some fun with the little puppy, see what next trick he can do.”
He turned, furious with himself, furious with them, their silence and indifference extending into a chasm around him. “Well, maybe I don’t want you then. Maybe you’re not good enough for me. I killed myself a bloody Slayer, what have you lot done other than desert your family, leave them to fend for themselves? You bloody created me, then left me to finish myself.”
Picking up a burst of speed, he ran away from the alley, out into the city, out into where the light buzzed a thousand nights long. He kicked at a rubbish bin along the way, then picked it up and threw it through the nearest available window, revelling in the sound the window made as it shattered into pieces. As he stood contemplating whether to set the place into a bonfire of explosion, he vented, “Bloody Angelus always turning up when you least expect him! Bloody Dru, giving me grief over my hair! Bloody heat of this bloody summer!”
Turning away from the shop, he observed the expanse of park before him. It really had to rain.
And there must be some way for a young, daring vampire to be a part of it, make a mark, dance the dance of the wicked and sexy, gamble the boundary between glory and death. Darla and her bloody power games, controlling everyone around her like she was the invulnerable Queen of Spades, the death card, remiss in everything, feelings, emotions. Drusilla had always called him her knave, and maybe that’s what he was. A dark entity, brave, inspired, creative and destructive. New York held something for him; a tale yet to be written, an adventure yet to enjoy then flee from in exponential glee, some right royal fucking and quite a bit of bloodsport. Going to see a few punk bands was all well and good, but that was for the here and now, Spike decided that the bigger picture needed a bit of attention. All was left open to him; Darla and Angelus could go fuck themselves for all he cared, even right at this moment of his insane joy.
And then, as if someone in Heaven or Hell, had been listening to him, the skies opened to deposit their contents upon the city. In a few short minutes, Spike was drenched; trudging toward the park, rain sluicing off his bare arms, making his eyeliner run into stripes. "Bloody hell," he thought, as he crunched into himself, "need to get myself a coat first, before all those adventures I’ve been dreaming about."
Finis
A/N The song Spike attempts to sing at the beginning is Richard Hell and the Voidoids’ "Blank Generation", from which the title is also taken.
The poem Drusilla is so keen on can be found here.
Many thanks to lmbossy for the banner.
Author: lillianmorgan
Setting: 1977, prior to events in Fool for Love, BtVS Season 5 and Lies My Parents Told Me, BtVS Season 7
Rating: NC-17
Pairing: Spike/Darla
Disclaimer: I do not own Joss' or ME's toys.
A/N: Written for the spike_fics Decades Challenge 1960-1997.
Many thanks go to yourlibrarian for the helpful beta job.
Originally posted 13th July, 2005.
Triangles Are Falling
New York, 1977
He wobbled down the street, merging with the mass of adolescents as they streamed out from CBGBs, weaving his way between paralytic punk and Bowery bum alike. He convinced himself it was the music that was giving him this high, and he waved a bottle of bourbon and shouted:
"I was saying let me out of here, before I was even born it's such a mgrpfm mpfrm mrpf." He never could get that part of the line right.
A couple of kids around him cheered and a girl, hair the colour of cotton candy, glided up to him and whispered, "I know where there's this great party." Her skirt line kissing her panties, her shredded black stockings complete with impenetrable black boots and her innocent eyes surrounded by blackest, deepest kohl that peered up at him intimately, persuaded him to play a bit with this one.
"Sure, luv," he said, purring the words into her ear, "where's it at then?"
She giggled overcome (why were they always this easy?) and called to her mate. Apparently they were all middle class kids slumming it downtown, so this party was going to cost them a meander uptown. Spike could hear his stomach already grumbling. Should have eaten before he left, but Drusilla’s habits, endlessly demanding that Spike recite to her William Blake’s “The Chimney Sweeper”, were putting him off his food.
"Loads of alcohol," one of the kids was saying.
"Yeah!"
Spike sighed. Well, he might be able to bring a few scraps home for Dru, make up for the row, though from the looks of them they were just that; the parasitic drug had eaten away at most of what made them succulent.
***
Richard Hell and the Voidoids were the shit. Or at least that's what Rachel said, only she didn't call herself Rachel anymore, she was Rat now. And I should be Polly Parrot. But I'm not sure if those names really worked.
We were walking out from CBGBs and Rat attached herself to the guy she'd met in the pit; they were sucking on each other like it was the end of the world. Or maybe they were just trying to keep upright. There was Jim, too, to my left but he was looking at something beyond me, so I followed his gaze, curious to see what excited him. Because it didn't seem to be me that did that; he only got excited by boys.
A real heavy punk was waving his arms around, singing and staggering about. He was just trying to draw attention to himself and I wondered why he did that. I'd never do that. I just wanted to meld in, not stand out. Hey! He crashed into us! And boy, now that I see him, boy was he hot! Black sleeveless tee with safety pins sewn in at haphazard angles and peroxide blonde hair sticking straight up to the sky. He must really know what it means to be a punk. He really knows.
I thought he winked at me, or maybe he winked at Jim I wasn't sure, but I felt Jim about to say something so instead I kinda grabbed him, to steady him, and told him, really unexpectedly, about the party we were headed to. Maybe it was because he had such nice arms; they were bigger than you’d expect, like he worked out or something because most of the boys around here were wafer thin and I started to imagine trying to get my fingers around them.
He answered me and I immediately forgot what he said but it made me giggle because his voice went all low and mellow, like chocolate, and he wasn't from New York, and it really hit me in the belly, well, below the belly, and made me go really tingly. Really tingly.
I didn't know what to do other than call to Rat and ask about the party. And as I did that, he wrapped his arm around me, like I was his possession, or his conquest, and that made Rat stop kissing and look at us. And I felt amazing. And the only thing I could think of was “wow.”
It was only til we came out of Hunter College station that I thought, "Why did he pick me?"
***
This party was, she decided, monumentally dull. She wandered away from the mix of humans and vampires that comprised the glitterati, and savoured the view of the Empire State Building before her. Eye-catching from both land and sea, a testament to human enterprise and progress - a feat of modern engineering that made things easier the longer one lived in this world. Something perhaps the Master understood but did not relish as much as she.
But he had given her a leave of absence on good behaviour and she had found the ways and means necessary to cross to New York, a city she might come to adore. It’s funny what time does to a place; when she was breathing and alive, this city wasn’t even a speck on someone’s imagination. And now, look at it. The lights buzzed and burned with power 24 hours a day and vampires could exist quite happily, never needing to hide - plenty of tasty treats happy to share indulgence, sympathy and some rich merlot. The city simply hummed with decadence and delights.
She would have loved to share it with Angelus.
But those thoughts led inevitably to despair so she busied herself with other arrangements. The first thing she had done was acclimatize herself; buying just the right clothes and having her hair cut to a style that spoke of money and reputation. Having spent far too long underneath the earth with the Master and his other lackeys always gave her an overwhelming need to taste the divine, the sumptuous. It was the one-thing humans did very well; apart from bleeding prettily.
She had found herself a very rich but easily seduced man, who, more to the point, had a very nice apartment. So she began her new life; informing his neighbours that he was away on business, when instead she’d hired some lowly minion down on his luck to get rid of the body. He had tasted of wealth and power, like caviar, but was not as plump and juicy as those White Russians she’d had 70 years earlier.
Living with the Master, although the right and proper thing to do, made her realize how little she enjoyed life. Everything was browns and greys until the colour of the Mardi gras whisked her away for just a short time. Angelus had been an unpredictable festival - riotous, colourful, sensational, beastly, destructive - but in the span of her lifetime, he was simply another evanescent departure from her tenure to the Master.
And in those years she had had family. And now she simply had herself. And duty.
***
Bernard Crowley sipped at his champagne and stopped beside the hors d’oeuvres. He didn’t dare move, even if it meant mingling, because this was an opportune place to stand and just observe. He had done a lot of observing ever since his Slayer had given birth to her baby, so he was accustomed to it; the need to protect her had been inflamed by the mewling infant’s entrance into this world, and had remained strong as Crowley had watched him grow into a six year old boy already weary with life.
He had met, quite by chance, the apothecary owner who garnered him with invitations to these soirees; where all the new and improved demons came to see and be seen. Where he could observe from a safe distance all the new arrivals, the new harbingers of potential apocalypse, bent on destroying his Slayer, paradoxically challenging her to defend her life but also enable her destiny to protect the world.
He watched a blonde woman, wander away from the crowd, fingers pressed to the window, her beauty crystallized in her serene countenance, her intelligent eyes sweeping the party, summarizing its intent in one gaze.
He was so taken with her, he nearly missed the exuberant young man, whose leering and disdainful features, tugged the strings of his memories.
***
Spike licked the blood from his fangs and lips, realizing that all three of those kids hardly made one decent meal, but the supersonic enhancements in their blood - now coursing though his veins - gave him one incredible, indelible buzz. So much so that when he spotted the delectable blonde by the window, her reflectionless gaze pondering the skyline, he cozied right up behind her, bending and pressing his abdomen to her petite but perfectly rounded derriere and said, “Well, aren’t you a very tasty treat?”
Her hair flicked toward him, so much like a whip on skin, permanently marking memories of eighty years ago, and he came as close as a master vampire could to gasping.
“You don’t need to breathe, William. I don’t know why you persist with such a human endeavour. And, please, remove your hands from my waist. Now.”
Spike’s hands flew from her waist to his cigarettes, snuggled tightly into his jean pockets. “Nice ‘do,” he said nodding toward her hair and ignoring the party-goers flaps of frustration as smoke poured from his mouth.
“I believe it’s very de rigueur.”
“Sure, ‘tis if you’re one of those birds off the tele. The ones that ponce about in their shorts and high heels.”
Her hand slapped across his face, followed by a low giggle, a gesture so known, so ingrained in his memory that instead of wincing his head moved with her hand in a balletic arc. “Christ,” he whispered, feeling his crotch squeezed to the point of no return, and wishing these tight leather pants weren’t all the rage either.
“And what’s with this…mockery? This neon sign on top of your head, come to me my beauties, I wish to eat you,” she said, sweeping her hand over his face, wiping at his eyeshadow, “what are you attempting to be exactly, silly William?” To underline her disdain, she began to pat him on the head, only to remove her hand and screw up her nose at the amount of hair product her fingers encountered. As if they’d never been sullied with anything else before.
“Whatcha doing here in New York?”
“Trying out new things, dear boy.”
“Away from prying sires then?”
“And yours would be where exactly?”
“Drusilla doesn’t care for punk music. Besides, none of that’s as exciting as the prospects in front of me now, my darling, darling mistress.” He rocked back on the heels of his boots and smiled seductively, curling his tongue around his lips; a gesture he knew that she liked even if no excitement flashed in her eyes. Twenty years of living in that family taught him self-preservation, being quick witted at all times, how to guard a perimeter and which of his strengths he should play to and when. With Darla, it was always about the pretty.
“I believe you’re choosing your words to flatter me, but really, William, they hold no meaning. And I tire of this party. This isn’t what I want to do. I feel some other games need to be played, don’t you? Where are you staying?”
“The Chelsea Hotel-”
Darla sniggered. “Oh how the mighty have fallen!”
“Oi! I’ll have you know that many a distinguished guest graced the doors of that hotel. Janis Joplin, Tennessee Williams, Bob Dylan, famous, famous artists who’ve made an impact on-”
“Will you fetch my coat then? Perhaps we can catch a late film and then go hunting.”
Spike scampered away, like the good little puppy he knew he was, preparing himself for some hi-jinks only Darla was able to indulge him in.
***
Crowley watched the interchange; most unhappy that the miscreant, the young man who looked like a piece of forgotten rubbish on the floor, had waylaid the beautiful woman, who illuminated the room with her Botticellian features.
Even as they departed the room, Crowley began compiling a mental list of all the salient details about his appearance. It paid to be vigilant, even to the point of neurosis. Bright, spiky white hair; ripped black T-shirt, sawn-off at the shoulders to reveal skin so pale and crystalline he must have been undead; eyes covered with black Cleopatra-like paint, accenting eyes so blue and intense within. He might have been cold, though, without a jacket, were his body not warmed by the demon which it housed.
He would have to look up this fellow, search for descriptions in the Watchers’ records, and, if it came to it, alert Nikki. You couldn’t, after all, just let vampires get away with waltzing into parties and chatting up the most beautiful woman in the room.
***
As Darla watched from within the enormous, limousine-like passenger compartment of the Checker cab, Spike toyed with his food. He had grown tired of the cab driver’s sedate pace and hauled him outside for a bite to eat. The squirming, frightened, pleading, dying man had made an unsuccessful escape attempt into a side alley and Spike was now taking intermittent slurps from his neck.
“Are you bored, my sweet? The way you play says something’s amiss?”
Throwing the now drained body to the pavement, Spike turned to Darla. “Well, not amiss. But maybe…possibly…up…”
“If you come here then, darling boy, pay your dutiful respects and maybe I will feel inclined to help you fix that.” She dangled one leg exquisitely out of the cab, ankle swivelling her dainty shoe.
Spike moved toward her, taking her hand in his and licking each finger delicately and precisely. Her eyes flamed with need. She reached down and smiled her knowing, powerful smile.
“Poor boy.”
He lifted her up from her waist and spun her around, once, twice, three times before pinning her body between him and the brick wall which enclosed the alley.
“You want it, don’t you mistress? Down and dirty?” He slid his hands up her legs, meandering smoothly from her thighs to her hips and leaning in to lick the side of her neck.
“Good boy, keep talking and then you can remove my stockings and take me in your mouth.” Spike knelt before her, eagerly ripping clothes from her skin before sliding his hands up her legs to where he most wanted to be.
“You beautiful, powerful, wondrous mistress with a hidden treasure thirsty for my lips, demanding my attention, the ministrations of my tongue against the walls of your delectable, cherry-ripened-”
Darla stilled in her gasping. “Wait,” she instructed. “Wait. There’s something…”
“Will you be needing this body?”
It took Spike a muzzled few minutes to pry his mouth away from her delectable quim, hosted up as she was above him, cradled against the wall, before he realised a wary onlooker was addressing him, deep from within the bowels of the alley. His glowing eyes were the only thing that distinguished him, until he skirted the light of a street lamp and revealed a dishevelled walking carpet bag of a being, soiled and covered in sores, a dark legionnaires cap covered his hair, matted over a protuberous skull. A few further moments before Spike realised it was another vampire. Blood older, darker. But the state of him! What did these New York vamps feed on? Pitiful, was what it was. Pitiful.
The figure gestured to the cabbie’s discarded body. “Will you be needing this kill? Only, I see you’ve not finished it and if it’s all the same to you….”
Beneath his hands, Spike felt Darla begin to squirm at the disruption and, swearing coarsely under his breath, he roughly shoved her back against the wall, knowing he’d have to assert himself over her and whatever she was up to.
Forcing his arm over her chest in a position that provided the least amount of comfort, he continued to glare at Darla but called over his shoulder, “Alright, champ, if you don’t mind I’m about to get a bit wound up here. I’m here with my ladyfriend and we were right in the middle of-”
But Darla, oblivious to Spike and his intentions, even her need for a quick tongue fucking in a back alley, something she might have admitted at the point of a stake that Spike was very adept at (good teachers did abound), pushed off her dim-witted disciple. He skittered to the pavement, falling amidst the refuse of the city, in astonishment so complete that his customary mask of indifference barely held.
Darla took a step forward into the alley, then held herself back, unsure, waiting, sniffing and sensing the night around her.
"Angelus?" her impassioned, reverential whisper stilled all motion.
The figure, having loomed over the body, straightened himself from the waist, but remained in the shadows. The pregnant moment paused and stretched into more as the three vampires, as if caught in stasis, contemplated each other.
And then he began laughing. Long, loud, booming chortles racking his body, shaking and quavering their way from his chest and stomach into the midnight atmosphere.
"Oh Darla," began Angel, "with the boy. As if..." But the coughing and spluttering from his continued mirth attack swallowed any further words into his body. He stumbled further into the alley, almost drunk on the comedy. "Now don’t either of you come looking to me for completion when the other isn’t enough. The two of you, together, just sickens me. Disgusting."
Darla drew herself up, then as if unable to contemplate anything else but the anger, the indignity of Angelus’ rebuke swarming around her, she slapped Spike. “Stay away now, boy.” If she had been wearing the same outfit when William had first been brought home to her, then she would have gathered up her skirts and given the exit of a lifetime. As it was, these modern fashions clung and slithered down her frame, exposing something she knew would draw Angelus in. The power of her body. All thoughts of Spike disintegrated into the night air, but of course the boy would never be sufficiently chastised.
“But mistress,” said Spike, running, panting, after her. “I want to finish you. Please. Let me do that.” Then petulantly, pouting, “Besides, he left you. But I never did that.”
And then as if wishing to be free of all distractions, she turned on Spike, “Run along Spike, run home to Drusilla. You know your place. That’s where you deserve to be. Completing her. Not me. You’re not good enough. You should know only Angelus and the Master have that privilege. I don’t know what possessed you to even try. Go on, get on home.”
And for good measure she tweaked one of his safety pins between her thumb and forefinger and pitched him a few feet away from her.
His back against the wall, Spike watched as Darla walked away, listening for the telltale sound of screeching rats, and repeated her prayer of worship. “Angelus, Angelus are you still there?” She continued deeper into the alley, never pausing, never casting a final look over her shoulder at him.
Spike kicked at a beer can on the pavement, livid at his sire’s command to stay. Then he drew his hands into fists as he heard her seducing whimper roll out from the alley. “I never left you!” he screamed to the air above him, “I never bloody left you. Not like you bleeding lot did. Just for sport, just for fun. Let’s kick good old William when he’s down, have some fun with the little puppy, see what next trick he can do.”
He turned, furious with himself, furious with them, their silence and indifference extending into a chasm around him. “Well, maybe I don’t want you then. Maybe you’re not good enough for me. I killed myself a bloody Slayer, what have you lot done other than desert your family, leave them to fend for themselves? You bloody created me, then left me to finish myself.”
Picking up a burst of speed, he ran away from the alley, out into the city, out into where the light buzzed a thousand nights long. He kicked at a rubbish bin along the way, then picked it up and threw it through the nearest available window, revelling in the sound the window made as it shattered into pieces. As he stood contemplating whether to set the place into a bonfire of explosion, he vented, “Bloody Angelus always turning up when you least expect him! Bloody Dru, giving me grief over my hair! Bloody heat of this bloody summer!”
Turning away from the shop, he observed the expanse of park before him. It really had to rain.
And there must be some way for a young, daring vampire to be a part of it, make a mark, dance the dance of the wicked and sexy, gamble the boundary between glory and death. Darla and her bloody power games, controlling everyone around her like she was the invulnerable Queen of Spades, the death card, remiss in everything, feelings, emotions. Drusilla had always called him her knave, and maybe that’s what he was. A dark entity, brave, inspired, creative and destructive. New York held something for him; a tale yet to be written, an adventure yet to enjoy then flee from in exponential glee, some right royal fucking and quite a bit of bloodsport. Going to see a few punk bands was all well and good, but that was for the here and now, Spike decided that the bigger picture needed a bit of attention. All was left open to him; Darla and Angelus could go fuck themselves for all he cared, even right at this moment of his insane joy.
And then, as if someone in Heaven or Hell, had been listening to him, the skies opened to deposit their contents upon the city. In a few short minutes, Spike was drenched; trudging toward the park, rain sluicing off his bare arms, making his eyeliner run into stripes. "Bloody hell," he thought, as he crunched into himself, "need to get myself a coat first, before all those adventures I’ve been dreaming about."
Finis
A/N The song Spike attempts to sing at the beginning is Richard Hell and the Voidoids’ "Blank Generation", from which the title is also taken.
The poem Drusilla is so keen on can be found here.
Many thanks to lmbossy for the banner.