Buffy The Vampire Slayer Fan Fiction ❯ Fear Becomes You ❯ Something Like Understanding ( Chapter 8 )

Okay this is a bit shorter than the other ones, but I had to get it out of the way before anything else happened. Sorry it took so long. This chapter was really hard for some reason.

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Chapter #8: Something Like Understanding

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It didn't happen very often, but even Xander had times where he needed some time away from everyone to just sit and think. This just happened to be one of those times.

Back in the library, Buffy and Willow had tried their hardest to put the last few minutes, and Giles' revelation, behind them by making awkward conversation and turning back to their homework, ignoring Xander's strange silence as he stared at the table and struggled with his emotions, something which Xander was almost pathetically grateful about.

But when he found tears beginning to well up in his eyes, Xander had finally been forced to admit that he wasn't going to be winning the fight against his emotions any time soon and that he needed to get out of there before he broke down in public. So he had yelled to Giles that he was walking back to the house and rushed out of the library before Willow or Buffy could think to follow him.

And this led up to now, Xander sitting on the couch of Giles' living room, trying to control his sniffles as he escaped from reality into the TV screen.

He didn't get why he was being so pathetic about this whole thing, really. Sure, being a girl wasn't exactly what he would call of the good but still, a little thing like not being cured as quickly as expected shouldn't be sending him running for the tissues.

It had to be because of his new girl-ness. Girls were always crying and moody. It was the only logical explanation because Xander had never used to cry when he was a guy.

Especially not over something as little as this.

And why hadn't he cried when he'd first gotten the curse? Or when Giles had told him that the curse could last for months, and that his parents were going to think he was dead? Shouldn't those times have been a lot more cry-worthy?

And, plus, really. He was Xander. No, duh, there wasn't a cure. It had to be one of those major rules of the universe that nothing could ever go right for him. He should've been ready for something like this. For God's sake, he'd even been warned.

Fuck, he was such an idiot.

This last thought bringing on another wave of depression; Xander blinked back the tears desperately and swallowed hard. He was being such a wimp. He needed to stop that.

“Are y' actually crying?” Spike's voice asked suddenly, breaking through his concentration. Surprised, Xander jumped at the unexpected question and his head snapped to the side to find Spike just entering the front door. The move also revealing what were most likely blood-shot eyes, Spike grinned evilly and answered his own question, looking far too amused with the idea. “You are.”

“No'm not,” Xander denied, ducking his head in embarrassment and trying to hide any possible evidence. He thought about wiping his eyes with his sleeves but figured that would be too much of a give-away.

“No?” still amused, Spike walked closer and Xander clenched the material of his jeans as he prepared himself to be mocked. “Then wot's all this then?” Spike asked gently, “Did yer new dress get all dirty, luv?” as though he were talking to an especially cute 3yr old girl. You know, the one in pink frills having a tea-party with her dolls.

And Xander had the sudden horrific image of himself—in his real male-Xander body—wearing one of those exact same dresses. A soft pink with lace ruffles absolutely everywhere, it was stretched out of shape and coming up almost indecently high on his hairy man-legs, showing ruffled white girly panties whenever he moved. His cheeks covered with way too much blush, two ponytails, held by pink unicorn clips on the top of his head, stuck straight up in the air and his feet were encased in cute ruffled socks and shiny pink buckled shoes.

And that was his future?

“I'm not wearing a dress,” he managed to choke out past his horror. A little anger in there, which was good, but he still felt like he was about to start bawling any second now.

Sitting down next to him, Spike patted him on the knee consolingly. “That's alright, luv. We'll find y' one soon. Don't worry your pretty little head over it.”

“I don't want a dress, either, asshole,” Xander growled, angrily shoving Spike's hands off of him with a glare, standing up, and clenching his hands into tiny fists.

“No?” Spike asked, putting on the most irritating face of confusion, “But I thought all birds liked dresses.”

“I'm a guy.”

Leaning back in his seat, Spike looked Xander up and down meaningfully.

“I am,” Xander insisted.

“Whatever y' say, luv,” Spike smirked, clearly humoring him.

Seeing this, Xander made a sound of frustrated disgust, “God.” Turning away from Spike, he almost crossed his arms in irritation before remembering why he wasn't doing that anymore and got even more annoyed. “You wouldn't be so amused if you knew what Giles found.”

“Yeah?” Spike asked, obviously already getting bored with the conversation. He stole the remote and settled back in his seat to watch TV. “Wot's he say then?”

Xander turned and glared accusingly at the bastard. “He found out what your rock-thing did to us.”

“Yeah?” Spike asked again, not really paying attention as he flipped through the channels, “Wot's that?”

“Turns us into our deepest fears, apparently,” Xander said irritably, annoyed that Spike was ignoring him. This was important here. Didn't he even care?

The rapid channel flipping paused on a Febreeze commercial and Spike turned to Xander. “Yer joking,” he said, voice flat and disbelieving.

“I'm told it's supposed to all be pretty painful, actually,” Xander told him, “Very big on the crazy making.”

“Right,” Spike scoffed and turned back to the TV, “`Cos breathing is obviously such excruciating torture.”

Xander shot Spike an annoyed glance at that. “Buffy thinks you have a soul.”

Spike tensed noticeably in his seat. “A soul?” he asked, deceptively casual. He flipped to a different channel.

“Yep” Xander smirked at his discomfort.

Spike shot him a suspicious glance. “An' yer tellin' me this because . . . ?”

“Well, a soul would be pretty painful, don't you think?” Xander asked innocently, loving that he was finally getting a response, “Emotionally at least.”

Not able to dispute this, Spike clenched his jaw, eyes locked on the TV screen, “An' th' Slayer thinks I've got me a bleedin' soul `cos o' this?”

“Well that, and `cuz of the whole human-thing. Even human serial killers have souls.” Xander shrugged then paused and tilted his head to consider this, “At least, we think they do.”

“Right,” Spike said, “An' th' cure?”

“None”

Spike turned to him in unmasked surprise. “Wot?”

“There isn't one,” Xander said, some of his sadistic delight vanishing as he remembered, and he frowned. “Apparently most of the people that were cursed before never had the resources to find one and those that did could never find one that worked quickly enough.”

“Quickly enough?”

“Uh, yeah . . .” Xander hesitated, giving Spike a quick look, “As in before they went insane or killed themselves.”

Spike just stared at him, taking a moment to digest this pretty nasty bit of info and then looked at Xander with a strange expression. “An' yer okay with this?” he asked incredulously.

“Okay with this?” Xander echoed, drawing back to return Spike's look of incredulity. “Of course I'm not okay with this.”

“Well, y' seem rather happy for a person not okay with this.”

“That's just me being sadistic and enjoying your pain,” Xander said defensively, “Of course I'm upset. I've just been turned into a fucking girl, remember? A girl. I have breasts,” gesturing angrily at the things in question, “Actual breasts! Xanders don't have breasts.”

And what did Spike do at this announcement? Did he drop to the floor and apologize for everything he'd said? No. The bastard merely smirked and lowered his eyes to Xander's chest, then followed this up by actually saying, “Good thing y' ve never had a cock then, eh? Bet y'd miss that something awful.”

The bastard

Xander stared at Spike in shock, unable to believe that he now had some guy blatantly checking out him out. “Ar- Are - Are you really . . . ? I mean, you can't . . . you can't . . .” Xander didn't know quite what to say to something like this, finally snapping, “My face is up here, asshole,” both indignant and completely horrified, Xander moved one arm to block the other's view, raising the other hand to point in the direction of his face.

Spike didn't bother looking up.

“Yeah,” Spike said, tilting his head to better take in the much more attractive curves that had just appeared, “but this show's more interesting.”

Xander figured that for his own mental health he should just ignore that, bringing his other arm down to join its partner in blocking Spike's view, and continued, “And I did have a cock, okay? Just felt a little weird to scream my deep grief over its loss in the middle of the street,” Spike still staring blatantly at his chest area, Xander shifted on his feet uncomfortably, “Besides, that's really not the point. The point is that this whole thing is starting to sound pretty damn permanent.”

His show gone, and with it any distraction from what he was hearing, Spike frowned, finally looking up at Xander's red face, “An' he's sure about this?”

“Yeah,” Xander nodded tersely, “he's sure. Apparently the book was pretty clear on this one thing.”

Spike was thankfully silent as he digested this new info, allowing Xander time to get his own emotions back in check.

Because for this to be permanent? Xander swallowed roughly as another picture popped into his head, this one of male-him in a lacy wedding dress complete with veil and mysterious groom in a black tuxedo at his side.

“God,” Xander choked out, horrified. And that was his future?

“No,” Spike finally said, abruptly getting to his feet to pace, shaking his head in denial. “Can't be right.”

“Yeah?” Xander asked, coming out of his horrified daze and turning somewhat hopeful eyes on him, “Why not?”

“Well, it's obvious, innit?” Spike said, “You, I can see,” a quick look of disgust shot his way, “Makes perfect sense you'd be afraid o' a weak `lil girl. But me?” he gestured to himself arrogantly, “Humans are hardly sumthin out of my nightmares. Yer nuthin but food.”

Xander was unimpressed by this deduction, “And there you go.”

Spike looked at him, obviously wondering what that meant. “Yeah?”

“Well, a powerful bad-ass vamp like yourself wouldn't want to be food, would he? I happen to know for a fact that you don't,” Xander said, his voice honey sweet. “Hiding out at your enemy's house to keep away from the big, bad, scary monsters.”

Spike's eyes narrowed and Xander could see him clenching his fists as he grit out, “I am not afraid.”

“Funny,” Xander replied, tilting his head to the side, “All signs seem to be pointing differently.”

And, finding nothing immediate to say to this, Spike defensively turned the conversation back to mocking Xander. “An' turnin' inta a bloody bird is right brave o' you, yeah?”

Xander's amusement vanished. “Alright, look,” he said, walking over to Spike aggressively, jabbing a finger in his direction. “I've never claimed to be Mr. Bravery, okay? I'm the breakable human guy in the group, remember?”

Moving closer, Spike sneered down at him, deliberately showing the difference in heights. “Not so much the guy anymore, eh, pet?

Xander tilted his head up and sneered right back at him. “Not so much the demon anymore, eh, soul-boy?”

Spike's smirk vanished. “I don't have a soul.”

“And you're pretty insistent about that, aren't you?” Xander demanded, prodding his chest with a finger, “Do I detect a little fear in there?”

“Course not,” Spike muttered, brushing aside Xander's finger, and apparently deciding that now would be the perfect time for a good smoke. Stepping away from him—Yeah, you run. You run like the sissy boy you are, Xander thought victoriously—Spike scrimmaged around in his duster for a cigarette, finding one, and lit up. Then blew a lungful of smoke into Xander's face.

Coughing and waving the smoke out of his face, Xander glared at him. “You're not supposed to smoke in here.”

Spike ignored him, “Wot if I don't fear not being cured?”

“Then you would have been turned into something you did fear not being cured from,” Xander answered, somehow easily following the rapid change of subject, “Were you not listening?”

“But wot if I jus' stop fearing it?”

And here Xander paused.

Huh. He hadn't thought of that.

Xander frowned, somewhat irritated that Spike of all people had asked a good question. Why hadn't he thought of that? “I dunno. Maybe. I didn't ask.”

“Right . . .” Spike trailed off, bringing his cigarette back to his lips.

There was a moment of silence, Spike lost in whatever passed as thought for him and Xander scowling at him, looking for any reason to be even angrier. Finding one, Xander accused, “This is all your fault, you know.”

“Yeah?” Spike blew out a lungful of smoke and gave him a sideways glance. “I forced y' t' look at th' thing, did I?”

“Well, no,” Xander allowed resentfully, only getting angrier at Spike for being right, “But if you'd never tried to use it on Buffy, then I wouldn't have even been able to look at it,” glaring at the bastard, sure in his point.

“An' if I'd never used it on th' Slayer then I'd never `ave been able to, either,” Spike replied, obviously thinking Xander an idiot.

“Well . . .” shifting on his feet, “yeah,” Xander finally muttered, noticeably uncomfortable with admitting this, “But since it was your stupid idea in the first place, you actually deserve it.”

Spike raised a brow at him. “An' you don't?”

“I don't.”

“Then tell me, pet, jus' how did y' get cursed?” Spike asked, “I don' think I ever quite got that bit.”

Xander winced at the reminder of his own stupidity, but remained stubborn. “It was when I tried to pick you up and take you back to Giles',” he lied.

“Of course,” Spike drawled, smirking knowingly as he let himself drop back into his own chair.

“It's true,” Xander insisted.

“An' I believe you,” Spike said, putting on his most sincere expression.

Obviously he didn't really, but Xander had no real response to that. He almost crossed his arms to pout, remembering at the last second not to, and finally said, “I'm gonna tell Giles you smoked in here.”

Spike snorted. “Oh, nice,” he said, settling back in his chair with obvious amusement, “Very mature. Y' gonna stick out yer tongue at me next?”

Xander tried to look at him threateningly, “I just might.”