Drowning

by
Rune

// denotes memories of Spike's words spoken to Xander.

It started with dreams of drowning.

Silent. Cold pressure exerting its authority on every square inch of me. Paralysing me, holding me helpless and vulnerable. Then. Waking with my mouth a soundless 'O', hands wanting to clutch sheets, but leaden with the weight of the nightmare. Drenched with sweat, pseudo seawater soaking the bed linen, fragrant with pheromones and fear and, somehow, arousal.

It lingered.

The dream.

Lingered, expanded to become a thing of dread and fear but somehow in the lingering it changed, twisted, morphed into a thing of dark beauty, desire, craving. I found myself starting to think of it as I edged towards sleep. Closing my eyes, imagining the pressure, the helplessness. The sensation of floating, disembodied in the cold, dark water yet alive with sensation, every nerve tingling with trepidation.

Then.

Swamped by a kind of frantic claustrophobia and a near certainty that this time when my lungs screamed for air and my body sucked it down my throat, that the water would no longer be pseudo but tangible and deadly. The very idea of such fragility, such complete submission, making me hard.

I didn't understand to begin with. Didn't know why my mind suddenly replaced Anya's warm, willing body with images of myself.

Me, myself, I.

---

When I lie in bed.

Naked.

I dream.

Eyes tight shut, hands busy on cock, panting, pulling, the dream coaxing the bloodrush to gather between my fingers in the soft hot flesh, making it steel. Images of me. Under the water. Alone yet not alone. Floating yet held under. Helpless yet aroused.

When Faith and I danced. When she took me, hurt me, loved me nearly to death - when she violated me, it became clearer. I lay on the bed. Naked. Eyes tight shut. Alone, but not alone. And she, holding me down because I was floating on sensation, on anticipation, on need. Holding me down while she gouged. Bit. Tore. Fucked. Not fucking me, fucking herself *on* me. She held me down and I was inanimate, a tool to impale herself on. To vomit out her pain and fear and hate on. And when it was done, she pissed on me. Marking me as her kill. Marking me so that no other would ever touch, ever want or ever love me if they caught her scent on me.

Anya smelt it. Recognised it for what it was. For what I was. Prey. Fair game. Broken, although not fully trained.

'No, not fully...' she said 'Because fully trained you would beg for it, not fear it.'

Being demonised before, she knew what I was, what I needed, teaching me how to beg to her liking. Teaching me how to fully submit. But her nature dictated that I suffer, as all men should. And so she would take me to the brink of understanding and when I was hovering on the verge of salvation, whilst I quivered, ready to lay myself totally on her altar, to give her my soul, my dignity, my self... She would smile.

"Sweet Xander."

No. Not sweet. Bad. Bad Xander.

"I do love you, Xander."

Hurt me. Devour me. Drown me, but don't love me. Love is sharing. Love relents. Please... Don't relent. I need...

"Make love to me, my sweet boy."

Oh no please, I need it *my* way, I need...

She would roll off me then. Lay on her back like a whore, legs akimbo, wetness leaving a thick, stickiness on my groin. Arms wide whilst she denied me what I need.

"Make love to me."

I needed to drown.

She would never let me.

And so I cut. I sliced. I burned my flesh. Bloodletting and the visual act of secretion giving a semblance of the pressure, the aloneness. The burning of the blade or flame a substitute for the fear. If I cut deeply enough, if I could stand the crackling and the stink of cooking flesh for long enough, I could close my eyes. Then, blinking away tears of pain, focus on the dull thud, thud, thud of my heart. Hear the echoing rush of blood pound in my ears. And I could almost be there. Underwater. Drowning.

It became an addiction. A need. An itch that had to be scratched. I tried to space out the days in between; contenting myself as best I could with the sting of reopening wounds and slowly tearing off scabs from the healing flesh, but it was cold comfort. A small relief.

That's how He discovered my secret.

One evening while Anya was with Giles discussing their mutual concern, whilst she got herself horny and wet with the smell of money and the beautifully balanced figures in her big black book, I embraced the blade.

I didn't have to be too careful. I'm a clumsy guy, so they keep telling me, I cut myself a lot.

'Doing stupid, manly things' Anya would smirk.

The other's, they would smile along. Yeah. I'm Donut Guy. Monkey Boy. Redundant Scooby. Clumsy Xander. She knew though. She had balanced the tightness of her leash on my needs as carefully as the finances for the Magic Shop, and was aware her boy would need another outlet, because she never let me...

// Drown? //

Never gave me what I need.

I made the incision on the inside of my elbow, the soft part that's laced with cerulean veins, that sings softly to me to *cut*. I pressed the blade against flesh, shivering with the frigidness of the steel and the abject craving to somehow stand toe to toe with death, to toy with my own mortality, to play Truth or Dare. The song in my head became a thundering roar and bright pinpricks of light fractured behind my tightly shut eyes and I was there...

// Drowning? Oh pet, drowning is not for you, better to dance... //

I was submerged, engulfed.

// Dance with me //

Disembodied.

// Let me help you scream //

:: :: :: ::

To this day, I don't know where he came from. They'd told me he was gone. The chip was burnt out, dead...

// I don't want to hurt you, baby //

... And He was free.

Buffy had allowed him to leave - payment in kind for his help with Dawn. She harboured a strange reluctance to dust him. I wondered idly if she'd fucked him.

// Doesn't mean I won't //

And I missed Him. He frightened me. Fascinated me. Aroused some ebony ravenous hunger I didn't even know I had curled inside my belly.

And he made me think about drowning.

Sometimes in my fantasy I imagined him in the water with me - his lean body straddling mine, blue eyes flashing to yellow as his demon face came to the fore. Weighing me down. Drowning me.

Those were the best fantasies of all.

So that night when I heard his low, resonant voice intone my name again and again... When I opened my eyes finally and saw him standing there, a blur of black leather and white hair, he was so real that I thought I'd pushed past my previous limits. Pushed myself that little bit further than I ever had before, cut that little bit deeper than I'd meant. I thought that this time I really might die. And it thrilled the hell out of me. I came. Hard. Hips jacking, warm semen soaking my pants. Then I just sat there, realisation that he wasn't a mirage swamping me.

He stared at me for what seemed eons. Blue, unreadable eyes flickered over my body to the knife in my hand, the incision, and the blood. The damp patch on my pants. Then they locked onto mine.

"Well. I can see the Slayer is paying her usual amount of attention to your sad and sorry state, pet."

He held out a pale hand.

"Let's get you on your feet. And you might wanna get out of those pants. Don't want you sticking to the floor, now do we? Oh yeah. And I'll have a look at that arm, if you don't mind."

"Oh I get it. After a free meal Spike? I thought we were all done with you actually having to *ask* for blood, what with your little Tonka toy being broken and all that."

He looked at me wolfishly and licked his lips. "Never let it be said that I'd turn down such a fine meal, but there are other things I'd rather be doing with you, boy."

He pulled me to my feet then, and as soon as I was steady he gently took my arm, fingers probing the wound. I winced and he shot me a look.

"Seems to me you were enjoying the pain just a little while ago. What's the matter? Lost your bottle? Did a little blood freak you out enough to stop you being so fucking stupid in the future? Now that could only be a good thing. It's not safe for..."

His eyebrows knotted and curious fingers found another recent scar a little higher on my arm. The fingers scuttled like spiders underneath my t-shirt and suddenly he tore it from my body with a snarl, eyes darting, fingers moving over the map of wounds and burns on my torso and upper body. Leaning forward he inhaled sharply and I could see his nostrils flare and his eyes half close as he analysed my scent. Eyes snapped open again and he pulled back, his gaze direct, questioning.

"No one?"

In the absence of anything to say, I shrugged.

"All of this was you? Tell me why."

"I don't think that's any of your goddam business. And since when did you suddenly give a fuck?"

He inclined his head slightly, still gazing deeply into my eyes. Those blue orbs narrowed a little and his glance flickered to the floor briefly before searching out my eyes again.

"Why do you think I'm here, Xander? To kill you? Is that what you think? William the Bloody, returning to the place that has witnessed spectacular kickings of his ass to extract revenge?"

I thought for a second. Then.

"No. I don't know why you came back. But somehow I get the feeling that if you wanted to take me down you would've at least started to torture me by now."

He laughed then, a quick, sharp bark. "How do you know I haven't started?"

He moved closer to me, his body seeming to glide. At that very second I wanted him more than I'd ever wanted anything in my life. He was a thing of such startling beauty; ice-white skin, blue eyes indigo with desire and he moved like water - fluid, silent. I wanted to drown in him. I was ready to give myself totally to him, and I'm pretty sure he knew that because his eyes darkened just a little more and the pale pink tip of a tongue snaked out to moisten his sensuous lips.

"I could show you things you've never even dreamt of, Xander. I could give you such exquisite pain that you'd willingly die for me if I asked you to. When you looked at me before tonight, what did you see? An enemy, someone to be hated and feared. A pathetic excuse for a demon; someone to be laughed at, scorned, mocked. Take a long hard look at me now, boy. This is the real deal, the un-chipped, killing machine that is me. Are you afraid, Xander? You should be. Now take a long hard look inside yourself. I'm a creature of the darkness, an evil monstrous thing, but you see something of yourself in me, don't you. There's a monster inside you Xander. A monster that I can set free. Let me release it, let me help you escape. Let me help you scream. I can give you all of those nasty little things that you've yearned for. I can give you love so fucking black you'd be lost inside it forever. I. Would. Swallow. You. Whole."

His face was so close that his lips brushed mine with every word that he spoke, and every time they did it was like being struck by lightening. My head was full of his words, full of white noise and the pounding of my heart, and my whole body was buzzing with the power of those words, and the sheer power of *him*. He was a black hole. And I was being sucked inside. I closed my eyes and in my mind I floated underneath the glassy surface of the water, the glassy surface of *him*, my arms and legs spread, held captive by the sheer weight of his will. Then, I just... gave myself to him.

And in the ghost of my whisper... "Yes. Devour me."

I heard him chuckle darkly a split second before his tongue was coaxing open my lips and he was kissing me hard, almost frantically.

He pulled away and his eyes seemed to search out my soul.

"You're mine now, boy. You're mine to do with as I will. You'll love only me, obey only me. I'm your God, Xander. I'm your fucking reason to live and if I wish it, your reason to die. Get on your knees. Get on your knees and worship your master."

One hand grabbed my hair and forced me to my knees, the other opened the zip of his trousers and freed the throbbing hardness within. He pulled my face towards him, snarling.

"Suck it, boy. That's right.... Ohhhhh yeah.... Suck it hard."

He thrust his hips forward and fucked my mouth, his hardness an unfamiliar intrusion in my throat and I retched. Cold hands gripped my head and he thrust even harder as I tried desperately to relax my throat enough to take him. The pain blossomed like a flower opening in the sunshine and I had this sudden premonition that I would never see the sun again. But I didn't care - I gave myself up to the pain and the blackness and felt myself sinking into the depths of him, into the depths of drowning, and I couldn't help but moan; my own cock hardening and twitching beneath my sweatpants.

A harsh laugh and he pulled himself from me, then leisurely pulled off his boots and trousers. I knelt at his feet watching him, and the loss of him was like emerging from the water, unfulfilled. I felt frantic, desperate... I wanted to kiss his feet and beg like a dog. With a knowing chuckle he pulled me up and, half naked, he manoeuvred me backwards towards the bed, prowling after me like some ravenous beast with golden, feral eyes and fangs sliding from his gums.

"Strip."

Trembling, I took off my clothes and stood before him, before my God, naked. A virgin to be sacrificed on his alter of pain and blood, ready to be reborn in his image. But then, I was no stranger to either, really. That the offering was impure didn't seem to displease him. A long, pale tongue snaked from beneath deadly fangs to lick his lips and he practically drooled. He removed the rest of his clothing and one hand trailed lazily from his nipple to his groin and he stroked himself slowly as he watched me strip.

When I was done he approached the bed and flung me upon it onto my back. He then produced black leather laces, it seemed from nowhere, and bound my wrists tightly to the bedpost. Oh gods, I nearly came there and then, and my whimpers must have alerted him because his face, now fully game, contorted in rage and he gripped my cock hard enough to make me cry out in pain and stopped me from ejaculating. With the other hand he backhanded me hard across the face and I tasted blood in my mouth.

"Not until I say so, bitch. You come only when I say you can. You move only when I say you can. You touch me only when I say you can. Tell me if you understand this boy, because I won't be telling you again. Next time, I hurt you. Badly."

I nodded - abject fear and extreme arousal jostling for dominance inside me. For a second he *became* Angelus, and the years of cruelty and harsh tutoring from his Sire showed in Spike's every word and movement. I could nearly pretend that *I* was William and Spike was his Sire, the blonde acting just as Angelus had decades before when he turned and broke William. The notion was horrifying, yet beyond erotic.

I was panting now, terrified that when he removed his hand I would come all over him, and that he would hurt me. Terrified also that he wouldn't. His golden eyes locked onto mine and he slowly removed his hand, only to slide it under my thigh and behind my knee as he straddled my body. Then he lifted my leg around his impossibly small waist and leaned on his elbow as his other hand found it's way between my legs and his fingers probed the rosebud opening there. Pain flared as his fingers scissored inside me and I groaned in agony, but that became an explosion of sensation as the cool digits brushed the secret hidden inside me and I heard myself babbling, begging him for more, and more and more.

Fingers plunged harder now, slick with my blood, and I was floating on a wave of pain and pleasure. He straddled me, smirking like some evil imp.

"You like that Xander? You want more?"

Squeal of pain/pleasure as a third finger joined it's twins and I could feel myself sinking into that blissful state, his voice, my voice and the pounding of my heart the only things I could hear. My breath was coming in short, sharp gasps and his name fell from my lips like a litany.

"Spike... Oh yeah... Oh Spike..."

"Tell me. Tell me what you need. Pray to me, Xander. Pray to me for what you need. Beg me for what you need."

"Oh God... Please... "

"Pray to ME you bitch!"

A fourth finger ripped it's way inside me and I was floating.

Underneath.

Submerged.

Begging.

"Spike... Please... Fuck me. Fuck me. Oh please master, I'm begging you to fuck me..."

There was a wet pop as his fingers were wrenched from me, only to be replaced by something that felt impossibly huge and impossibly cold. He entered me slowly, his cock burning like fire and ice as it squeezed past the neck of muscle at my entrance and then slid totally inside with a sick-making flare of pain. I retched and he laughed loudly, pulling back until his cock was almost free of me, then plunging in again, this time nudging that something inside me that made me want to die with pleasure.

But it wasn't enough. It wasn't enough; I needed something more than I could even comprehend. I begged him, pleaded with him although I didn't know exactly what it was I was pleading for.

But he did. He knew what I needed, like he had always known.

It was why he'd come back.

"Now, bitch? You want it now? You fucking want it?"

And I screamed. I screamed and pleaded and wept as he fucked me hard, my cock straining for the darkness he had promised me. He was close to the edge himself now, panting, snarling; every plead from my lips a prayer only for him, worship only for him.

At last, his hand gripped my throat and he squeezed, tighter and tighter. Squeezing the breath from me, the life out of me and I was...

// Dance with me //

... Drowning.

//... Better to dance... //

Finally drowning.

// Let me help you scream //

And it occurred to me then, through the pain, the pleasure, the darkness...

It occurred to me that we hadn't decided. Hadn't chosen.

The safety word.

There was no safety word.

But then, he had known that all along.

That was why he'd come back.

Because he knew that for me, there would never be a safety word.

And as I came and came and came, I felt the sting of his fangs at my throat as he, my God, took my soul from me; felt the slow, exquisite suction, felt my life slip away.

At the end, I tasted the coppery darkness from his veins that was his unholy Communion wine. I drank it in obedience to him, in preparation for my second coming and an eternity of drowning.

The darkness closed in around me.

And he swallowed me whole.

The End