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E-Mail: shananagin@gmail.com
IM: aboutblood
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Other Characters: Ed, Dipper, Georgia
Character Name: Spike
Series: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Timeline: Angel 5x22 "Not Fade Away"
Canon Resource Link: Spike at the Buffy wiki
Character History: William Pratt was a sad and pathetic human. He was a human who deeply loved his sick mother and wrote poetry and was mocked by his peers. He was in love with a girl named Cecily who didn't care about him at all. In 1880, when she finally rejected him so obviously that he couldn't deny her lack of feelings, he ran from a party and got himself murdered and turned into a vampire by Drusilla, the vampire he promptly fell in love with. But unlike most vampires, dying didn't make him lose his affection for his living family. On the contrary, he saw opportunity. He could save his mother and make her live forever with him. Unfortunately, it did not work out so well. She insulted him and mocked him and finally tried to have sex with him. He staked her, and never quite got over it, though he buried the memories deeply. Finally, though, the last tie to his life was cut and he was ready to move on with his death.
As far as he was concerned, dying was the best thing that could have happened to him. Instead of a soft poet that abhorred violence, he became a snarky, badass vampire that loved fighting and drinking and shagging and all the courser things in life. He started calling himself "Spike" and talking with a less refined accent intentionally to distance himself from who he had been.
He terrorized Europe with Drusilla, Angelus, and Darla. Angelus did not approve of how rash and careless Spike could be, or of how much he doted on Drusilla. They clashed a lot, but ultimately Spike looked up to Angelus a lot. Then, in 1898, Angelus was cursed with a soul. Darla kicked him out, though Spike and Drusilla didn't know why. This was also the year that Spike and Dracula first clashed, starting off a mostly one-sided rivalry that would span the next century.
In 1900, Spike killed his first Slayer. Xin Rong managed to slash his eyebrow with an enchanted sword, giving him his scar, but in the end, he won. He later described it as the best night of his life. He and Drusilla set off on their own after that, leaving Angelus to his tortured brooding and Darla to rejoin the Master.
Their lives were a non-stop party for a while. They traveled the world, killing whoever they felt like and taking what they wanted. Their travels took them from Germany in World War II where Spike got himself trapped on a submarine to the Woodstock festival and all sorts of other places in between. Life was good. Or, you know, evil. His most noteworthy experience of that century was in 1977, when Spike fought and killed the slayer Nikki Wood, leaving her son an orphan. She was more fun to fight than Xin Rong, and had a great coat. Spike took it from her after she died.
Eventually, Spike and Drusilla ended up in Prague, where Drusilla was tortured as an example to other vampires to warn them to stay away from the city. Spike freed her, but she remained weak and sick. They went to Sunnydale together. They'd heard there was a Hellmouth and a Slayer there, and Spike thought it might help make Drusilla well again. Spike quickly took over leadership of the vampires there by killing an important vampire called the Anointed One. He attempted to kill the Slayer, Buffy Summers, but she proved more difficult than the last two, or perhaps he was more cautious, since he had Drusilla depending on him. He also reunited with Angel, and he finally caught on about the whole soul thing. He captured Angel and used his blood to cure Drusilla, but during the fight, he was injured seriously enough that he was paralyzed from the waist down. Drusilla was strong again, though, so she pulled him free and took care of him.
Then Angel lost his soul after a moment of perfect happiness that followed his romantic first night with Buffy. For a while it was great. The three of them were a family again, though Darla wasn't around. But Drusilla had always liked Angel better, and Angel knew it too well. He constantly belittled Spike, making fun of him for the wheelchair and everything else he could think of. He flirted with Drusilla a lot and more, and she played along, which infuriated Spike. The two of them were also planning on destroying the world. Spike might be evil, but he likes the world. That and his jealousy fueled him to hide the fact that his legs had healed and turn to his nemesis: the Slayer herself.
Buffy Summers was, of course, skeptical when Spike initially suggested they work together to stop Angelus, but she didn't have enough options that she could turn him down. Spike kept Angel from killing Giles long enough for Buffy to gather her resources and come to their lair, then stepped up to give Buffy a fighting chance. He only was helpful for as long as it took to get Drusilla out of the fight, but it was enough to turn the tide. The world didn't end. Angel did get his soul back, though.
But things had changed, and Drusilla knew it, even if Spike didn't yet. He'd worked with the Slayer, and though he would laugh at the very idea, his future was set. He'd already started to fall in love with Buffy. It was enough that Drusilla took to finding pleasure from other men. When Spike saw her with a Chaos Demon, he had to put an end to it, but Drusilla wouldn't stay with just him. He returned to Sunnydale a drunken wretch. When he learned that Willow was becoming something of a witch, he kidnapped her and Xander and tried to force her to perform a love spell on Drusilla. She agreed in order to postpone her death, but said she'd need ingredients she didn't have with her. Spike had cocoa with Buffy's mom until Buffy and Angel showed up all ready to fight. He pointed out that they'd never find Willow and Xander if they killed him, so instead they followed him to get the ingredients for the love spell. They stopped to fight some vampires, and Spike regained his confidence in himself, sending Buffy and Angel off to find Willow and Xander and leaving Sunnydale to win Drusilla back.
It didn't work. They got back together for a very short time before she left him again, this time for a fungus demon. Spike went back to Sunnydale searching for the legendary Ring of Amara, an item that would make him invincible. He found it, but Buffy kicked his ass anyway, took the ring, and sent it to Angel. Spike failed to take it back from Angel, and went back to Sunnydale.
Before he had a chance to start terrorizing Buffy, some secret government soldiers from the Initiative knocked him out and captured him. They put a chip in his head that rendered him incapable of attacking anything living. Again, he turned to his mortal enemy for help, offering information in exchange for them not staking him on sight. Still, he was depressed to the point that he attempted suicide. Finally, he discovered that although he was helpless against humans, he could fight demons all he wanted. He moved out and dedicated his life to making life hard for the Scoobies in non-violent ways and beating on demons when he was bored. Sometimes, though, he'd help them, either because Buffy hit him enough or because they offered him money.
Spike was not happy with this arrangement. Even if he could still hurt demons, he couldn't hunt and kill like he usually did. And the Slayer was everywhere, making his life harder no matter what he did. He couldn't stop thinking about her, even when she wasn't around. Eventually he realized to his horror that he was in love with her.
He started helping without expecting money in exchange. He comforted her when her mother was going to the hospital and took care of Dawn and Joyce when Buffy couldn't protect them. He also took to stealing pictures of her and bits of her clothing and standing around outside her house. Eventually, Buffy caught on. She was disgusted and went to tell him that no, nothing could ever happen with them. Unfortunately, Drusilla had just decided to take Spike back as well. She zapped Buffy with a cattle prod, knocking her unconscious. Then Spike knocked Drusilla unconscious and chained both of them up. He declared his love for Buffy and offered to stake Drusilla to prove it. She wasn't impressed, and he threatened to let Drusilla kill Buffy if she wouldn't give him even the slightest bit of hope something might happen. Buffy stood firm, Harmony showed up and shot Spike with an arrow, Drusilla broke free and tried to kill Buffy, Spike stopped her, and Buffy revoked Spike's invite to her house. As a vampire, he was powerless to enter without an invitation.
Spike was desperate. Buffy was even less interested in him than before, and now all her friends and family hated him. He commissioned Warren to build him a robot Buffy that would love him. Glory, the season's Big Bad, had sent minions to watch all of Buffy's acquaintances for hints to who or what the Key was. They saw Buffybot protecting Spike above all else, decided he was the key, and kidnapped him. Glory knew immediately that he was not, but realized he might know who was. She tortured him while Buffy and the other Scoobies headed towards them to kill Spike before he could tell, but Spike managed to escape. Buffy pretended to be the robot and learned that Spike hadn't told and would rather die than betray Buffy and Dawn, she kissed him and told him that what he'd done was real, and she wouldn't forget it.
After that, Spike started helping more. Glory found out that Dawn was the key, and Buffy reinivited Spike in. She also made him promise to protect Dawn no matter what. During the final battle, Spike tried to protect her, but a demon pushed him off a tower, and though Dawn made it out safely, Buffy sacrificed her life to save Dawn and the world.
Spike was devastated, but he stuck around to keep his promise to Buffy. He protected Dawn and Sunnydale instead of leaving. The Scoobies brought the Buffybot back into commission to fool demons into thinking the Slayer was still alive. Though the robot had originally been Spike's, he could hardly stand to look at it because it wasn't Buffy and just reminded him that she was gone.
Then Willow, Xander, Anya, and Tara brought Buffy back with a spell. She was not very happy to be back because, as she confided in Spike, she hadn't been in Hell like her friends had thought, she'd been in Heaven. They started almost being friends, but of course, Spike wanted more. He didn't really push her or tell her how much he felt until a demon turned Sunnydale into a musical and forced him to confess. After they'd beaten the bad guy and before the spell had worn off, the two of them kissed.
One kiss turned into two, and Spike wouldn't let Buffy forget it. He wanted her, and now it was clear she wanted him as well. She resisted until he learned that his chip didn't work on her. He claimed she came back wrong and they had a fight in an abandoned building that quickly turned into violent and passionate sex that destroyed the house.
Buffy continuously claimed that it wouldn't happen again, but she couldn't keep away. They started a secret affair that was emotionally damaging for both of them. He was in love with her, but she didn't feel the same way. She felt dirty and guilty about what the two of them did and refused to let them have anything more than sex. Eventually, she called it off because she realized she was using him and it was wrong. Though Spike couldn't see it, this was the most respect she'd shown him over the entire course of the affair. She was treating him as a human instead of an undead sex toy. But it meant not having sex, and without the soul, Spike couldn't see how that could possibly be better.
Spike kept trying to get Buffy to sleep with him again, but she stayed firm. He started drinking and commiserating with Anya, who was similarly heartbroken over her recent break-up with Xander. They ended up having sex in the Magic Box. Unfortunately, their friends managed to hack into the spy cameras the three wannabe supervillains had put in the store right at that moment. Xander rushed down to kill Spike and Buffy followed him to stop him. Spike told Xander and Anya that he and Buffy had been sleeping together.
Later, Dawn showed up at Spike's crypt and told him how much he had hurt Buffy. Spike took that to mean Buffy loved him, and he went to her house to try and patch things up between the two of them. She said no, but he wouldn't listen, and he tried to force her to have sex with him. She kicked him across the room, and he finally got the hint that this time, no really meant no. Horrified that he had tried to rape the woman he loved, he left Sunnydale and went to Africa to undergo the Demon Trials and get a soul. He wanted to no longer be the type of man that could do something so terrible to someone he cared about.
He returned to Sunnydale, but getting a soul had taken a bigger toll than he'd expected. He moved into the basement of the newly built Sunnydale High and went crazy. When Buffy finally ran into him again, he was babbling things that didn't make sense and shrinking away from everything. He finally emerged to try and help Buffy with an evil that was coming. Anya, now a vengeance demon, could see the new soul, but Spike attacked her before she could tell, and Buffy broke up the fight. Spike attacked her instead, but they were interrupted by the demon they'd been after in the first place reappearing.
The demon was a man under one of Anya's vengeance curses, and she managed to reverse it just before Spike impaled him, causing them both to scream in pain, Spike from the chip and the man from being stabbed. Spike went insane and started muttering to himself. He ran into a church, and Buffy went after him. He let on that he had a new soul, but he went back to his basement. An ancient spirit known as the First Evil tormented him there with memories and the faces of dead people.
Eventually, Buffy got him to come out and move into Xander's spare bedroom. But people start turning up dead, and it's clear Spike's to blame. He denies it until he suddenly regains his memory. He moves into Buffy's basement and she chains him up. He tries to get her to stake him because he's done so much evil and thinks he'll do more, but she refuses, insisting she believes in him. The First Evil sent its servants, the Bringers, to attack the Summers household and kidnap Spike. The First chained him up over the Hellmouth's and bled him, opening the seal and letting out one of the Turok-Han. The First tried to turn Spike against Buffy, but he wouldn’t cooperate, insisting that Buffy would come for him. Eventually, she does. He started helping Buffy train the new potential Slayers and met Robin Wood, the son of the second Slayer he killed, though he didn't know it at first. Wood knew what Spike had done, though, and planned to get revenge.
They figured out the trigger that made Spike kill people was a certain song Spike's mother had sung to him back when he was human, but Giles and Wood still thought Spike could be dangerous. Giles distracted Buffy while Wood brought Spike to a warehouse filled with crosses and played the trigger song. Spike managed to fight through it in time to stop Wood from killing him. He didn't kill Wood, but he told Buffy that if he attacked again, he would.
The second Slayer, Faith, returned to Sunnydale and quickly won over the potential slayers by being more focused on having fun and less worried about working than Buffy was. Without exactly planning it, she wrested control away from Buffy, who left the house. Spike came back from a mission and found her gone. He punched Faith and left to find Buffy. He gave her a pep talk and explained all the wonderful things about her he loved, and she asked him to stay the night, just holding her. Spike later described it as the best night of his life.
Angel returned from LA, and Spike saw Buffy kiss him hello. He left in a jealous rage. She found him later and told him she'd made Angel go, and despite the kiss, she was choosing him as her champion. She gave him a necklace with a talisman intended to be worn by a champion with a soul that was more than human. Angel had meant to wear it, but Buffy gave it to Spike. They went to the final battle, Buffy shared her power with all the potentials, and Spike channeled the power of the sun through himself and the necklace, immediately dusting the vampires they were fighting and causing an earthquake. Buffy's forces started retreating, but Spike couldn't leave. Buffy tried to make him go, but he told her to go, let him stay through the end. Before he burned up, she told him she loved him, and he thanked her, but didn't believe him. Buffy ran to join the rest of the group while Spike combusted, taking all of Sunnydale with him.
His heroic death didn't last that long. Angel received a mysterious package that contained the necklace and with it, Spike. But Spike wasn't exactly his old self. He was incorporeal and bound to Los Angeles. He spent his days haunting Wolfram and Hart and worrying about fading away into Hell. Eventually, he started to master his ghost form and could touch things if he concentrated hard enough.
Then he received a package that was empty except for a bright flash of light. He thought it was nothing until he walked into a door, newly solid. That caused all sorts of problems, though, because of a prophecy. The Shanshu prophecy told of a vampire with a soul that would tip the scales to good or evil in a coming apocalypse and as a reward, would become human again. Everyone had assumed it was talking about Angel, but now that Spike had a soul and was a champion, it wasn't as clear. They followed a fake reading of the prophecy to a cave in Vegas where they fought to drink from the Cup of Torment. For the first time ever, Spike beat Angel in a fair fight. Since the prophecy had been fake, it didn't matter, but the battle had still gone to Spike. The Senior Partners managed to settle down the wonkiness, but it was still up in the air which souled vampire was in the prophecy.
Spike tried to go to Europe and find Buffy, but he chickened out because he didn't want his sacrifice to be meaningless. Then, a man who called himself Doyle approached him claiming to have visions that could lead Spike to be a champion of the people, much like Angel had been before Wolfram and Hart. Spike accepted and started to help people.
Eventually, it turned out that Doyle was actually Angel's old enemy Lindsey, and their alliance ended with the Senior Partners taking Lindsey into custody. Spike started working with Angel's team. The two of them were constantly at odds, though they fought well together, and Spike was going to leave until Fred's body was stolen by an Old One called Illyria. He and Angel teamed up to try and save Fred, but ultimately failed and Spike decided to stay around because he could tell something big was coming, and he wanted to help. He also started testing Illyria to see how expansive her powers were. They formed something sort of like a friendship, though she looked on him as more some sort of pet that she liked beating up.
Angel learned that Buffy was in Italy with the Immortal, a long time rival of his, and Spike tagged along to go rescue her. They didn't find her, but they learned that she was actually dating the Immortal, and though they still wanted to find her and win her back, they decided that they both had to try and let her go.
Angel started acting strangely, helping the enemies instead of trying to make things harder for them. They learned that he had joined a secret organization called the Circle of the Black Thorn. When they confronted, he explained that he was planning on taking them all out at once, but he needed their help, if they were up for it. It would be dangerous, and the consequences enormous, but for one moment, they would show the senior partners that they couldn't control everyone. Spike was the first to volunteer. Angel told them to take the day off as it could be their last. Spike went to a bar with an open mike and read his poetry to the crowd. His poetry was a hit, finally. Then they struck. Spike singlehandedly saved an infant and took out the Fell Brethren, then reconvened with their surviving party to face down the full power of Wolfram and Hart. The Senior Partners decided to toss the entire city into Hell, and that's where Spike comes into Wonderland.
Abilities/Special Powers: Spike has the usual vampire powers of super strength and speed, fast healing, particularly keen senses (especially smell and hearing) and immortality/eternal youth. He also has the ability to shift his features into a monstrous vampire face that includes fangs. His weaknesses include holy objects, sunlight, fire, and wooden stakes through the heart. Also decapitation, but that’s a weakness for most things. If he doesn’t drink blood, it won’t kill him, but it will weaken him and make him more violent and less in control. Eventually, he’d end up a living skeleton, but he has never starved himself long enough for something like that to happen. Drinking blood also helps him heal faster.
Third-Person Sample: Spike was burning up and laughing and laughing as the cave crashed around him. He was dying, he knew, but it was a good death. A heroic ending. He opened his eyes for a moment, wanting to see the destruction he was creating…
Well. This wasn’t the Hellmouth he was expecting. He was standing in a sunny garden that didn’t look at all like California. It didn’t look like any hell he’d heard of, either. Far too… pleasant-seeming, though that could certainly be an illusion. And there was something… off about the smell of the place. Something he couldn’t quite put his finger on…
Or maybe it was just the scent of burning flesh, since he was still on fire. It wasn’t the all-consuming flame that had caught his soul and channeled through the crystal to destroy everything. It was just the usual agony of being burned alive.
“Oh, bugger.” He took off at a dead sprint for a mansion he saw not too far away. It would be a bloody let-down to die now just moments after somehow escaping his heroic death. He wasn’t about to burn to death without taking out the legions of Hell with him. That’d just be anticlimatic.
New Sample 12/31/16: It's funny. The first thing Spike notices is the snow. It's not like it's never snowed in Los Angeles, but it's certainly rare. Of course, considering who he and the team were up against, he wouldn't be surprised if they weren't in Los Angeles anymore.
"Always thought Hell would be a bit hotter," he mutters, standing up. He always thought Hell would be a lot of things that didn't include a lovely snowy landscape with a mansion in the middle of it beckoning cheerily. At least there's no sun. For now, anyway, he doesn't know if Hell has regular days or what.
Well, there's nothing for it but to check out the Mansion. It's not like he feels the cold, but he's still glad for his long coat and big boots as he trudges through the snow. It makes him feel better, like a suit of armor protecting him from whatever's coming.
"All right," he says dramatically as he kicks open the door. "Who's head do I beat in first?"
As probably isn't surprising for the dead of the night, there is no one there to see his dramatic and heroic entrance. Spike glances around, then shoves his hands into his pockets and stalks towards the stairs. He'll find someone to menace.
First-Person Sample: [Spike looks far too at ease for someone who’s just been kidnapped. Also for someone who’s covered in fairly serious-looking burns. They sting like a bitch, but they’ll heal. He’s been burned before.]
What sort of fresh, likely literal hell have I landed myself in this time? [He shakes his head.] Funny, thought the same rules wouldn’t apply once I buggered off this mortal coil, but nothing much seems to have changed.
[He still burns in the sunlight. He’s still hungry for something a lot rarer than a hamburger. He’d be willing to bet anything he’d still be unhappy in the presence of a cross. He’s still a vampire.
He shrugs. He’s dead. Deader than usual. Might as well enjoy it before the burning for eternity begins.]
So. Where can a fellow get something to drink around here? [He grins, showing teeth. They’re blunt, for now, but he still looks all too predatory.] I’m partial to O positive. [His grin changes a bit. Friendly might not be the right word, but he doesn't look like he wants to eat the camera anymore.] I'd also settle for bourbon.
New Sample 12/31/16: [Canny viewers might recognize the room Spike's sitting in as the office of Angel's Investigation. Spike is, in fact, sitting on a desk, boots banging against the side as he smirks into the cameras.]
Hey, mates. Thought I ought to let you know that Angel's Investigation is under new management. [He jabs a thumb towards himself.] Sure, Angel's all right as a leader, but some people want a bit more brains and a bit less forehead, know what I mean?
[Has anyone agreed to this change in staff? Absolutely not. Is that going to stop Spike? Not for a second. It'll make Angel mad, and that'll be hilarious.]
So come on over for all your mystery solving needs. We take beer as payment. One thing's sure: with me in charge it'll be a lot more fun getting your mysteries solved. Cheers!
[He disconnects.]
DW username:
effulgentE-Mail: shananagin@gmail.com
IM: aboutblood
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Other Characters: Ed, Dipper, Georgia
Character Name: Spike
Series: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Timeline: Angel 5x22 "Not Fade Away"
Canon Resource Link: Spike at the Buffy wiki
Character History: William Pratt was a sad and pathetic human. He was a human who deeply loved his sick mother and wrote poetry and was mocked by his peers. He was in love with a girl named Cecily who didn't care about him at all. In 1880, when she finally rejected him so obviously that he couldn't deny her lack of feelings, he ran from a party and got himself murdered and turned into a vampire by Drusilla, the vampire he promptly fell in love with. But unlike most vampires, dying didn't make him lose his affection for his living family. On the contrary, he saw opportunity. He could save his mother and make her live forever with him. Unfortunately, it did not work out so well. She insulted him and mocked him and finally tried to have sex with him. He staked her, and never quite got over it, though he buried the memories deeply. Finally, though, the last tie to his life was cut and he was ready to move on with his death.
As far as he was concerned, dying was the best thing that could have happened to him. Instead of a soft poet that abhorred violence, he became a snarky, badass vampire that loved fighting and drinking and shagging and all the courser things in life. He started calling himself "Spike" and talking with a less refined accent intentionally to distance himself from who he had been.
He terrorized Europe with Drusilla, Angelus, and Darla. Angelus did not approve of how rash and careless Spike could be, or of how much he doted on Drusilla. They clashed a lot, but ultimately Spike looked up to Angelus a lot. Then, in 1898, Angelus was cursed with a soul. Darla kicked him out, though Spike and Drusilla didn't know why. This was also the year that Spike and Dracula first clashed, starting off a mostly one-sided rivalry that would span the next century.
In 1900, Spike killed his first Slayer. Xin Rong managed to slash his eyebrow with an enchanted sword, giving him his scar, but in the end, he won. He later described it as the best night of his life. He and Drusilla set off on their own after that, leaving Angelus to his tortured brooding and Darla to rejoin the Master.
Their lives were a non-stop party for a while. They traveled the world, killing whoever they felt like and taking what they wanted. Their travels took them from Germany in World War II where Spike got himself trapped on a submarine to the Woodstock festival and all sorts of other places in between. Life was good. Or, you know, evil. His most noteworthy experience of that century was in 1977, when Spike fought and killed the slayer Nikki Wood, leaving her son an orphan. She was more fun to fight than Xin Rong, and had a great coat. Spike took it from her after she died.
Eventually, Spike and Drusilla ended up in Prague, where Drusilla was tortured as an example to other vampires to warn them to stay away from the city. Spike freed her, but she remained weak and sick. They went to Sunnydale together. They'd heard there was a Hellmouth and a Slayer there, and Spike thought it might help make Drusilla well again. Spike quickly took over leadership of the vampires there by killing an important vampire called the Anointed One. He attempted to kill the Slayer, Buffy Summers, but she proved more difficult than the last two, or perhaps he was more cautious, since he had Drusilla depending on him. He also reunited with Angel, and he finally caught on about the whole soul thing. He captured Angel and used his blood to cure Drusilla, but during the fight, he was injured seriously enough that he was paralyzed from the waist down. Drusilla was strong again, though, so she pulled him free and took care of him.
Then Angel lost his soul after a moment of perfect happiness that followed his romantic first night with Buffy. For a while it was great. The three of them were a family again, though Darla wasn't around. But Drusilla had always liked Angel better, and Angel knew it too well. He constantly belittled Spike, making fun of him for the wheelchair and everything else he could think of. He flirted with Drusilla a lot and more, and she played along, which infuriated Spike. The two of them were also planning on destroying the world. Spike might be evil, but he likes the world. That and his jealousy fueled him to hide the fact that his legs had healed and turn to his nemesis: the Slayer herself.
Buffy Summers was, of course, skeptical when Spike initially suggested they work together to stop Angelus, but she didn't have enough options that she could turn him down. Spike kept Angel from killing Giles long enough for Buffy to gather her resources and come to their lair, then stepped up to give Buffy a fighting chance. He only was helpful for as long as it took to get Drusilla out of the fight, but it was enough to turn the tide. The world didn't end. Angel did get his soul back, though.
But things had changed, and Drusilla knew it, even if Spike didn't yet. He'd worked with the Slayer, and though he would laugh at the very idea, his future was set. He'd already started to fall in love with Buffy. It was enough that Drusilla took to finding pleasure from other men. When Spike saw her with a Chaos Demon, he had to put an end to it, but Drusilla wouldn't stay with just him. He returned to Sunnydale a drunken wretch. When he learned that Willow was becoming something of a witch, he kidnapped her and Xander and tried to force her to perform a love spell on Drusilla. She agreed in order to postpone her death, but said she'd need ingredients she didn't have with her. Spike had cocoa with Buffy's mom until Buffy and Angel showed up all ready to fight. He pointed out that they'd never find Willow and Xander if they killed him, so instead they followed him to get the ingredients for the love spell. They stopped to fight some vampires, and Spike regained his confidence in himself, sending Buffy and Angel off to find Willow and Xander and leaving Sunnydale to win Drusilla back.
It didn't work. They got back together for a very short time before she left him again, this time for a fungus demon. Spike went back to Sunnydale searching for the legendary Ring of Amara, an item that would make him invincible. He found it, but Buffy kicked his ass anyway, took the ring, and sent it to Angel. Spike failed to take it back from Angel, and went back to Sunnydale.
Before he had a chance to start terrorizing Buffy, some secret government soldiers from the Initiative knocked him out and captured him. They put a chip in his head that rendered him incapable of attacking anything living. Again, he turned to his mortal enemy for help, offering information in exchange for them not staking him on sight. Still, he was depressed to the point that he attempted suicide. Finally, he discovered that although he was helpless against humans, he could fight demons all he wanted. He moved out and dedicated his life to making life hard for the Scoobies in non-violent ways and beating on demons when he was bored. Sometimes, though, he'd help them, either because Buffy hit him enough or because they offered him money.
Spike was not happy with this arrangement. Even if he could still hurt demons, he couldn't hunt and kill like he usually did. And the Slayer was everywhere, making his life harder no matter what he did. He couldn't stop thinking about her, even when she wasn't around. Eventually he realized to his horror that he was in love with her.
He started helping without expecting money in exchange. He comforted her when her mother was going to the hospital and took care of Dawn and Joyce when Buffy couldn't protect them. He also took to stealing pictures of her and bits of her clothing and standing around outside her house. Eventually, Buffy caught on. She was disgusted and went to tell him that no, nothing could ever happen with them. Unfortunately, Drusilla had just decided to take Spike back as well. She zapped Buffy with a cattle prod, knocking her unconscious. Then Spike knocked Drusilla unconscious and chained both of them up. He declared his love for Buffy and offered to stake Drusilla to prove it. She wasn't impressed, and he threatened to let Drusilla kill Buffy if she wouldn't give him even the slightest bit of hope something might happen. Buffy stood firm, Harmony showed up and shot Spike with an arrow, Drusilla broke free and tried to kill Buffy, Spike stopped her, and Buffy revoked Spike's invite to her house. As a vampire, he was powerless to enter without an invitation.
Spike was desperate. Buffy was even less interested in him than before, and now all her friends and family hated him. He commissioned Warren to build him a robot Buffy that would love him. Glory, the season's Big Bad, had sent minions to watch all of Buffy's acquaintances for hints to who or what the Key was. They saw Buffybot protecting Spike above all else, decided he was the key, and kidnapped him. Glory knew immediately that he was not, but realized he might know who was. She tortured him while Buffy and the other Scoobies headed towards them to kill Spike before he could tell, but Spike managed to escape. Buffy pretended to be the robot and learned that Spike hadn't told and would rather die than betray Buffy and Dawn, she kissed him and told him that what he'd done was real, and she wouldn't forget it.
After that, Spike started helping more. Glory found out that Dawn was the key, and Buffy reinivited Spike in. She also made him promise to protect Dawn no matter what. During the final battle, Spike tried to protect her, but a demon pushed him off a tower, and though Dawn made it out safely, Buffy sacrificed her life to save Dawn and the world.
Spike was devastated, but he stuck around to keep his promise to Buffy. He protected Dawn and Sunnydale instead of leaving. The Scoobies brought the Buffybot back into commission to fool demons into thinking the Slayer was still alive. Though the robot had originally been Spike's, he could hardly stand to look at it because it wasn't Buffy and just reminded him that she was gone.
Then Willow, Xander, Anya, and Tara brought Buffy back with a spell. She was not very happy to be back because, as she confided in Spike, she hadn't been in Hell like her friends had thought, she'd been in Heaven. They started almost being friends, but of course, Spike wanted more. He didn't really push her or tell her how much he felt until a demon turned Sunnydale into a musical and forced him to confess. After they'd beaten the bad guy and before the spell had worn off, the two of them kissed.
One kiss turned into two, and Spike wouldn't let Buffy forget it. He wanted her, and now it was clear she wanted him as well. She resisted until he learned that his chip didn't work on her. He claimed she came back wrong and they had a fight in an abandoned building that quickly turned into violent and passionate sex that destroyed the house.
Buffy continuously claimed that it wouldn't happen again, but she couldn't keep away. They started a secret affair that was emotionally damaging for both of them. He was in love with her, but she didn't feel the same way. She felt dirty and guilty about what the two of them did and refused to let them have anything more than sex. Eventually, she called it off because she realized she was using him and it was wrong. Though Spike couldn't see it, this was the most respect she'd shown him over the entire course of the affair. She was treating him as a human instead of an undead sex toy. But it meant not having sex, and without the soul, Spike couldn't see how that could possibly be better.
Spike kept trying to get Buffy to sleep with him again, but she stayed firm. He started drinking and commiserating with Anya, who was similarly heartbroken over her recent break-up with Xander. They ended up having sex in the Magic Box. Unfortunately, their friends managed to hack into the spy cameras the three wannabe supervillains had put in the store right at that moment. Xander rushed down to kill Spike and Buffy followed him to stop him. Spike told Xander and Anya that he and Buffy had been sleeping together.
Later, Dawn showed up at Spike's crypt and told him how much he had hurt Buffy. Spike took that to mean Buffy loved him, and he went to her house to try and patch things up between the two of them. She said no, but he wouldn't listen, and he tried to force her to have sex with him. She kicked him across the room, and he finally got the hint that this time, no really meant no. Horrified that he had tried to rape the woman he loved, he left Sunnydale and went to Africa to undergo the Demon Trials and get a soul. He wanted to no longer be the type of man that could do something so terrible to someone he cared about.
He returned to Sunnydale, but getting a soul had taken a bigger toll than he'd expected. He moved into the basement of the newly built Sunnydale High and went crazy. When Buffy finally ran into him again, he was babbling things that didn't make sense and shrinking away from everything. He finally emerged to try and help Buffy with an evil that was coming. Anya, now a vengeance demon, could see the new soul, but Spike attacked her before she could tell, and Buffy broke up the fight. Spike attacked her instead, but they were interrupted by the demon they'd been after in the first place reappearing.
The demon was a man under one of Anya's vengeance curses, and she managed to reverse it just before Spike impaled him, causing them both to scream in pain, Spike from the chip and the man from being stabbed. Spike went insane and started muttering to himself. He ran into a church, and Buffy went after him. He let on that he had a new soul, but he went back to his basement. An ancient spirit known as the First Evil tormented him there with memories and the faces of dead people.
Eventually, Buffy got him to come out and move into Xander's spare bedroom. But people start turning up dead, and it's clear Spike's to blame. He denies it until he suddenly regains his memory. He moves into Buffy's basement and she chains him up. He tries to get her to stake him because he's done so much evil and thinks he'll do more, but she refuses, insisting she believes in him. The First Evil sent its servants, the Bringers, to attack the Summers household and kidnap Spike. The First chained him up over the Hellmouth's and bled him, opening the seal and letting out one of the Turok-Han. The First tried to turn Spike against Buffy, but he wouldn’t cooperate, insisting that Buffy would come for him. Eventually, she does. He started helping Buffy train the new potential Slayers and met Robin Wood, the son of the second Slayer he killed, though he didn't know it at first. Wood knew what Spike had done, though, and planned to get revenge.
They figured out the trigger that made Spike kill people was a certain song Spike's mother had sung to him back when he was human, but Giles and Wood still thought Spike could be dangerous. Giles distracted Buffy while Wood brought Spike to a warehouse filled with crosses and played the trigger song. Spike managed to fight through it in time to stop Wood from killing him. He didn't kill Wood, but he told Buffy that if he attacked again, he would.
The second Slayer, Faith, returned to Sunnydale and quickly won over the potential slayers by being more focused on having fun and less worried about working than Buffy was. Without exactly planning it, she wrested control away from Buffy, who left the house. Spike came back from a mission and found her gone. He punched Faith and left to find Buffy. He gave her a pep talk and explained all the wonderful things about her he loved, and she asked him to stay the night, just holding her. Spike later described it as the best night of his life.
Angel returned from LA, and Spike saw Buffy kiss him hello. He left in a jealous rage. She found him later and told him she'd made Angel go, and despite the kiss, she was choosing him as her champion. She gave him a necklace with a talisman intended to be worn by a champion with a soul that was more than human. Angel had meant to wear it, but Buffy gave it to Spike. They went to the final battle, Buffy shared her power with all the potentials, and Spike channeled the power of the sun through himself and the necklace, immediately dusting the vampires they were fighting and causing an earthquake. Buffy's forces started retreating, but Spike couldn't leave. Buffy tried to make him go, but he told her to go, let him stay through the end. Before he burned up, she told him she loved him, and he thanked her, but didn't believe him. Buffy ran to join the rest of the group while Spike combusted, taking all of Sunnydale with him.
His heroic death didn't last that long. Angel received a mysterious package that contained the necklace and with it, Spike. But Spike wasn't exactly his old self. He was incorporeal and bound to Los Angeles. He spent his days haunting Wolfram and Hart and worrying about fading away into Hell. Eventually, he started to master his ghost form and could touch things if he concentrated hard enough.
Then he received a package that was empty except for a bright flash of light. He thought it was nothing until he walked into a door, newly solid. That caused all sorts of problems, though, because of a prophecy. The Shanshu prophecy told of a vampire with a soul that would tip the scales to good or evil in a coming apocalypse and as a reward, would become human again. Everyone had assumed it was talking about Angel, but now that Spike had a soul and was a champion, it wasn't as clear. They followed a fake reading of the prophecy to a cave in Vegas where they fought to drink from the Cup of Torment. For the first time ever, Spike beat Angel in a fair fight. Since the prophecy had been fake, it didn't matter, but the battle had still gone to Spike. The Senior Partners managed to settle down the wonkiness, but it was still up in the air which souled vampire was in the prophecy.
Spike tried to go to Europe and find Buffy, but he chickened out because he didn't want his sacrifice to be meaningless. Then, a man who called himself Doyle approached him claiming to have visions that could lead Spike to be a champion of the people, much like Angel had been before Wolfram and Hart. Spike accepted and started to help people.
Eventually, it turned out that Doyle was actually Angel's old enemy Lindsey, and their alliance ended with the Senior Partners taking Lindsey into custody. Spike started working with Angel's team. The two of them were constantly at odds, though they fought well together, and Spike was going to leave until Fred's body was stolen by an Old One called Illyria. He and Angel teamed up to try and save Fred, but ultimately failed and Spike decided to stay around because he could tell something big was coming, and he wanted to help. He also started testing Illyria to see how expansive her powers were. They formed something sort of like a friendship, though she looked on him as more some sort of pet that she liked beating up.
Angel learned that Buffy was in Italy with the Immortal, a long time rival of his, and Spike tagged along to go rescue her. They didn't find her, but they learned that she was actually dating the Immortal, and though they still wanted to find her and win her back, they decided that they both had to try and let her go.
Angel started acting strangely, helping the enemies instead of trying to make things harder for them. They learned that he had joined a secret organization called the Circle of the Black Thorn. When they confronted, he explained that he was planning on taking them all out at once, but he needed their help, if they were up for it. It would be dangerous, and the consequences enormous, but for one moment, they would show the senior partners that they couldn't control everyone. Spike was the first to volunteer. Angel told them to take the day off as it could be their last. Spike went to a bar with an open mike and read his poetry to the crowd. His poetry was a hit, finally. Then they struck. Spike singlehandedly saved an infant and took out the Fell Brethren, then reconvened with their surviving party to face down the full power of Wolfram and Hart. The Senior Partners decided to toss the entire city into Hell, and that's where Spike comes into Wonderland.
Abilities/Special Powers: Spike has the usual vampire powers of super strength and speed, fast healing, particularly keen senses (especially smell and hearing) and immortality/eternal youth. He also has the ability to shift his features into a monstrous vampire face that includes fangs. His weaknesses include holy objects, sunlight, fire, and wooden stakes through the heart. Also decapitation, but that’s a weakness for most things. If he doesn’t drink blood, it won’t kill him, but it will weaken him and make him more violent and less in control. Eventually, he’d end up a living skeleton, but he has never starved himself long enough for something like that to happen. Drinking blood also helps him heal faster.
Third-Person Sample: Spike was burning up and laughing and laughing as the cave crashed around him. He was dying, he knew, but it was a good death. A heroic ending. He opened his eyes for a moment, wanting to see the destruction he was creating…
Well. This wasn’t the Hellmouth he was expecting. He was standing in a sunny garden that didn’t look at all like California. It didn’t look like any hell he’d heard of, either. Far too… pleasant-seeming, though that could certainly be an illusion. And there was something… off about the smell of the place. Something he couldn’t quite put his finger on…
Or maybe it was just the scent of burning flesh, since he was still on fire. It wasn’t the all-consuming flame that had caught his soul and channeled through the crystal to destroy everything. It was just the usual agony of being burned alive.
“Oh, bugger.” He took off at a dead sprint for a mansion he saw not too far away. It would be a bloody let-down to die now just moments after somehow escaping his heroic death. He wasn’t about to burn to death without taking out the legions of Hell with him. That’d just be anticlimatic.
New Sample 12/31/16: It's funny. The first thing Spike notices is the snow. It's not like it's never snowed in Los Angeles, but it's certainly rare. Of course, considering who he and the team were up against, he wouldn't be surprised if they weren't in Los Angeles anymore.
"Always thought Hell would be a bit hotter," he mutters, standing up. He always thought Hell would be a lot of things that didn't include a lovely snowy landscape with a mansion in the middle of it beckoning cheerily. At least there's no sun. For now, anyway, he doesn't know if Hell has regular days or what.
Well, there's nothing for it but to check out the Mansion. It's not like he feels the cold, but he's still glad for his long coat and big boots as he trudges through the snow. It makes him feel better, like a suit of armor protecting him from whatever's coming.
"All right," he says dramatically as he kicks open the door. "Who's head do I beat in first?"
As probably isn't surprising for the dead of the night, there is no one there to see his dramatic and heroic entrance. Spike glances around, then shoves his hands into his pockets and stalks towards the stairs. He'll find someone to menace.
First-Person Sample: [Spike looks far too at ease for someone who’s just been kidnapped. Also for someone who’s covered in fairly serious-looking burns. They sting like a bitch, but they’ll heal. He’s been burned before.]
What sort of fresh, likely literal hell have I landed myself in this time? [He shakes his head.] Funny, thought the same rules wouldn’t apply once I buggered off this mortal coil, but nothing much seems to have changed.
[He still burns in the sunlight. He’s still hungry for something a lot rarer than a hamburger. He’d be willing to bet anything he’d still be unhappy in the presence of a cross. He’s still a vampire.
He shrugs. He’s dead. Deader than usual. Might as well enjoy it before the burning for eternity begins.]
So. Where can a fellow get something to drink around here? [He grins, showing teeth. They’re blunt, for now, but he still looks all too predatory.] I’m partial to O positive. [His grin changes a bit. Friendly might not be the right word, but he doesn't look like he wants to eat the camera anymore.] I'd also settle for bourbon.
New Sample 12/31/16: [Canny viewers might recognize the room Spike's sitting in as the office of Angel's Investigation. Spike is, in fact, sitting on a desk, boots banging against the side as he smirks into the cameras.]
Hey, mates. Thought I ought to let you know that Angel's Investigation is under new management. [He jabs a thumb towards himself.] Sure, Angel's all right as a leader, but some people want a bit more brains and a bit less forehead, know what I mean?
[Has anyone agreed to this change in staff? Absolutely not. Is that going to stop Spike? Not for a second. It'll make Angel mad, and that'll be hilarious.]
So come on over for all your mystery solving needs. We take beer as payment. One thing's sure: with me in charge it'll be a lot more fun getting your mysteries solved. Cheers!
[He disconnects.]