Rated: NC-17 E-mail: astarte@uia.net Pairing: Buffy/Spike Summary: Spike and Buffy get dizzy. Disclaimer: The characters are the property of Joss Whedon, 20th Century Fox, and Mutant Enemy. No copyright infringement is intended, and no financial profit is anticipated. Warning: Violence, rough sex, explicit language, middling angst. Notes: Part 1 of this story takes place during the events of the episode "School Hard" (Season 2); Part 2 takes place during the events of "Smashed" and "Wrecked" (Season 6), so expect spoilers. There are also spoilers for "Fool for Love" (Season 5). Dialog that is enclosed within single quotes inside double quotes ("'like this'") is taken directly from the episodes. Many, many thanks and much gratitude and appreciation to avidrosette for her constructive and insightful beta-reading! Her comments and suggestions were right-on; any flaws in execution are, of course, my own. Dedication: This story is dedicated to Dragonsphoenix (sorry, it isn't Buffy/Angel, sweetie, but that just isn't my thang), who is brave, beautiful, kind beyond the call of duty, and a fellow U2 fan. Vertigo by atara Copyright (c) 2005 Hello, hello, I'm at a place called Vertigo It's everything I wish I didn't know But you give me something I can feel, feel --U2, "Vertigo," _How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb_ (Interscope Records, 2004) Part 1 With the practiced senses of a predator, he surveyed the swaying, writhing bodies, sweat glistening under the shifting colors of the lights. The colors were brighter for him than they would have been for most of the beings in the room, but that wasn't what interested him. He closed his eyes, better to absorb the only thing that mattered to him--the scent of blood. Blood with the faintest tang of extra flavor from poncy weak American beer. Blood oversweet from the endless sodas the younger ones drank while they waited to be old enough to drink the lousy beer. Menstrual blood captured in cotton. And sweat everywhere. Even the kids sitting at tables were sweating, laughing and talking on dates, pretending not to be nervous, while their odors gave them away. None of this interested him at the moment. It was a distraction. Then he got a waft of what he was searching for. A waft enough to give him a head rush from the memories. Slayer blood. His eyes followed his nose, and he saw a slight girl dancing with two friends, a boy and another girl; the girl whom he'd been seeking had hardly any skin on her bones, bare arms lifted above her head in a little-girl-lilac, incongruously revealing spaghetti strap top. The other girl had a strange aura about her, colors coruscating too quickly for his eyes to follow, but the flow was alternately warm and deadly. *Fuck,* he thought. *Witch. Have to keep an eye on her. And what kind of sodding slayer goes dancing?* The slayer's blonde hair bounced and swayed, and she smiled both at her friends and at the feeling of strength and flexibility that rippled through her body as she danced. He remembered the others. You bloody well didn't see them *dancing*. The Chinese girl was all control and training, endless training in martial arts, for what good it did her. When he had found her, she was already tired, missing her mother, heartsick from isolation. She was easy. The next one was full of fury, but also tired. Distracted and unable to keep all her focus on slaying. She had been tougher than the first, but ultimately easy too. And she had so considerately left him her black leather duster, the one he wore now as he contemplated his third slayer. What complete gits lived on this Hellmouth. Oblivious to danger, or ignoring it. And the slayer was *dancing*. She'd be easy, he thought to himself. Young and stupid. He'd been hoping for more of a challenge. Still, a slayer was a slayer, and killing her would make him the undisputed Master Vampire of the Hellmouth. Did it really matter that she looked as harmless as a kitten, he thought dismissively. Damn shaggable though. He licked his lips and noted reflexively the easily-inspired throb inside his jeans, as he mentally noted that he really wanted to *fuck* this slayer before he drained her blood or snapped her neck. He sadistically imagined the sight of her violated and broken body, as he had before assailing so many other particularly toothsome victims. But something, a predator's instinct maybe, made him take a harder look, and her aura, blurry until this moment, came into focus before his eyes, glowing silver with the slenderest ribbon of black at the center. This slayer was no kitten--more like a panther cub, playful and unaware of the darkness budding inside her, waiting to bloom, a darkness that would disturb but never shatter that brilliant silver light. Then his eyes popped open with shock. He was feeling something else--something entirely unlike the familiar combination of bloodthirstiness and lust--a sharp jolt, a traitorous feeling beneath his breast that somehow forced a long-repressed word into his mind: "effulgent." He realized that he was leaning against a wall; a dizziness had been creeping around his brain, and for a moment he closed his eyes, grateful for the wall's support. When he looked at the slayer again, the feeling hit him much harder-- like the floor falling out from under him, like he was falling and spinning all at once and where he landed would be hard . . . and sharp . . . and heartshatteringmadnessinducingconfusinghumiliatingglorious--with more pain than he could ever conceive and more ecstasy than he could ever imagine. *Get your fucking head together, you wanker!* he thought, shaking his head, and the vertigo dissipated as he reminded himself of his plans and ambitions here in Sunnydale, plans which required that he take this slayer *out*. All business now, he walked over to the table where she had been sitting, glanced with disinterest at her schoolbooks, circled the dancing trio from a safe distance, and ordered the waiting minion to go get himself something to eat. After a sufficient time had passed he called loudly for a phone, announcing that there was a big guy outside trying to bite someone. Predictably the slayer took off. He followed slowly, forcing himself to remain cool. To remember he was *cool*. The coolest. The baddest. He watched her stake his minion, who hadn't known he was on a suicide mission, and clapped his hands slowly, sarcastically, each clap resounding in the alley behind the club. He let her know he would kill her, his voice menacing, confident, but another voice buzzed inside his head like a mosquito, a taunting voice, saying, *You'll never kill *her*, bloody William. Never. Nevernevernevernevernevernevernevernever . . . * He forced himself to walk away as if he owned the world, but the dizziness had overtaken him again, and when he was safely away in a nearby alley, he threw up. Part 2 She was fighting him, furiously, somehow having crashed through the walls of an abandoned house. Fighting! It felt so familiar--hadn't they been fighting like this for years? But of course not--he shouldn't have been able to hit her. Not. At. All. But here his fist connected with her ribs, and there he flipped her across the room. He had to be, God forbid, right; she had to have come back *wrong*. Pummeling Spike, she felt a surge of rage at Willow--who should have fucking known how difficult resurrection spells are. Particularly when you don't know if the person has any desire to be resurrected. Again, she found his fist smashing her cheek or sinking into her gut. She had taunted him, "'Poor Spikey. Can't be a human. Can't be a vampire. Where do *you* belong?'" But now she might be as much of a *freak* as *he* was. She rushed him, the familiarity of fighting him and the *wrongness* of him being able to fight her chasing each other around her head. She was dizzy, bewildered, . . . and more. Angry and strong and alive and . . . god, like she was burning up. *Stop thinking!* she ordered herself as she shoved Spike against a wall. She was ready to beat him black and blue, break bones, leave him a crawling wreck who would never bother her again . . . and she grabbed his head and began kissing him as fiercely as she had fought him. Then she pushed him again, shoving him across the room and up against a wooden pillar, and she jumped up lightly, wrapped her legs around his waist and reached down to unzip his pants, while, obviously not objecting, Spike yanked down her panties and lifted her onto him. Oh god *yes*! She'd been burning inside--it was excruciating--and the coolness of his cock impaling her felt like . . . nothing she could describe. Perfect. His tongue was down her throat, and her hands were all over him, feeling cool flesh under his shirt as she slid her hands under it; she wanted to lick him everywhere and quench this burning thirst. She wanted him to fuck her harder. As if reading her mind, he turned her around, pressed her against the pillar, and she reached up and grabbed at the top of it, all her weight on Spike. He slammed her into the wood with every thrust, and all that mattered was his pounding cock, because she wanted to COME. And come again. And again. God, how could she ever be satisfied? Good thing he was a vamp, she thought for a wry moment. Wanted? Wait. Wanted? When had she last *wanted*? Anything. At all. Before she died, of course. And maybe she wasn't really alive--and that's why he could hit her. She felt the bruises blooming on her skin from their fight and sought his own with her fingers, pressing on them while she bit his lower lip and rode him. And then her head was buzzing with dizziness, he was letting her fall--god, where? How long? How far? How deep? Her head spun with vertigo--she didn't know up or down, just that she would fall forever. But. He hadn't let go. His arms were tight around her, and they had fallen together. There was a floor, and she decided it didn't matter where they had fallen. He was under her, and she was still riding him, getting closer, her head thrown back as his hands dug bruises into her breasts, and her nails spasmodically scratched bloody lines in his chest as she got closer. THERE! Buffy wailed in release then fell forward onto Spike's chest, pushing him down with her hands. He complied and stayed still, only his hips still rocking under her until she felt him come, shivering a little at the coldness of his semen inside her. They rested. Briefly. He took her from behind, giving her a sharp smack on the ass when he was done. She shoved him off of her, and they wrestled, biting, scratching, pinching, even tickling, using every dirty trick to get the upper hand and the other one on the bottom. She hit him in the mouth, pushed him to the floor and bit into the bruise, smiling to herself as he howled and she tasted his blood. He knelt on top of her with her hands trapped behind her back and tormented her nipples with both hands, twisting and pinching. She freed a hand and slapped him, and he grabbed the hand and sucked each finger after the other, slowly, languorously, until her patience could stand it no longer, and she pushed him off so he was sitting on the floor, and she lowered herself onto him, their legs around each other, and they fucked each other slowly and kissed, and she had a flash of an unfamiliar feeling, until she remembered the word for it was "safe." Another rest. Also brief. "Suck me," he ordered, and she did, feeling like a whore and getting turned on by the feeling. She swallowed, thirstily, wondering why she had always found it distasteful. And when she was satisfied, she demanded, "Lick me," in as imperious a tone. And, oh god, did he. He took his time. He explored. He teased her clit with the very tip of his tongue until she was pounding on the floor with her fists, then plunged it inside her cunt, fucking her slowly, circling the entrance, darting out to play with her lips, and she pounded the floor more furiously. "Spike!" she yelled. "Make me come or I'll fucking stake you. NOW!" He lifted his head, quirked an eyebrow, and said, "I always aim to satisfy a lady." Then he sucked at her clit, tonguing it hard, and her back arched higher and higher, and she howled, a sound so primal that if she'd actually been conscious of it, she would have terrified herself. But all she was aware of were the contractions that rocked her violently, and then more slowly, and then more slowly as she felt the bliss of utter release and drifted into the best sleep she'd had since before she died. * * * She woke up, disoriented, covered with nothing but Spike's duster. Spike's duster!!!! "'Oh. My. God.'" she murmured, busying herself with finding her clothes. She insisted that it was all a mistake, and she had to get home, and she had left Dawn alone, and found herself in his arms again, her mouth on his, his hand on her breast. But then he opened his mouth and said *those* words, words that instantly called to mind Angelus saying that she obviously didn't know very much about men, and she had to get out of there, and she had to hurt him if the soulless thing *had* anything in him that could be hurt, and every word out of his mouth after that only made her feel more nauseous and filthy and diseased. She was desperate to get home, desperate to scrub the sticky blend of semen and her own juices from between her legs--repeatedly. And then she remembered his kisses, commanding, *de*manding, cooling her mouth and reaching for her throat and his kisses, surrendering, desiring, inviting *her* to use his mouth as she liked. She *could* go back for a *short* time--she was so late going home already. She imagined the thing he *hadn't* done that night, his fangs sinking into a hidden place, like her breast, while his cock pounded her into oblivion. She had to reach out and steady herself on the closest building as, without warning, a sudden orgasm pulsed violently inside her. Shit. What was she thinking of? He was a thing, a dead thing, and an asshole to boot, mocking her, "'I knew the only thing better than killing a slayer would be f-'" before she had hit him to shut him up. Dangling her panties in her face, "'You gonna want these too?'" Saying things that exploded in her brain, rocking all she believed: "'I may be dirt, but you're the one who likes to roll in it, Slayer.'" Her head began to feel like it was collapsing on the inside. At least she'd gotten him where it *had* to hurt, spitting it at him like a curse: "'You're just . . . you're just *convenient*.'" Buffy tried to walk faster; she had to get home, she had to get away from the voices in her head, from the feelings in her body, from the desire and the disgust. She tried to hurry, but the dizziness had overtaken her again, and when she was safely away in a nearby alley, she threw up. The End.