taxonomites | 016: Beating to a Funeral Song [Accidental Visual / Location: Hyperion Hotel]

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016: Beating to a Funeral Song [Accidental Visual / Location: Hyperion Hotel]

She could feel her heart beating.

The blood pulsed through her veins to a rhythm that, once upon a time, Drusilla would have danced along to. But she wasn't dancing today. Because it was her heart. A heart that had been silenced for centuries.

Her eyes snapped open.

No. Not her eyes. She'd fallen asleep as a vampire, safe in the forest and with Miss Edith in her arms. She'd woken up as a human. And not just any human. Somehow, she'd slipped into the skin of the Vision Girl.

For a long time, there was nothing but silence. It shattered with a scream and, for an even longer amount of time, Drusilla didn't realise that it was coming from her lips.

She screamed and she screamed and then, because there was nothing else she could do, she laughed.

The Vision Girl's heart kept on beating.

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Spike had gone back to staring in the mirror and futzing with his hair. "That's odd," he says absently, "You sound like..."

He stops and turns back to the tablet fully. "Drusilla." He knew the mannerisms and way of talking well enough. Of course, if he was wrong, Cordelia would be rather annoyed.

"Clever boy," Drusilla crooned, chuckling warmly in the back of her new throat. She liked playing pretend, but she knew who she was speaking to now. She'd lost count of the number of times she'd seen him wake up. It was a new body, yes, but they way he moved hadn't changed. "Is that Spike?"

He nods, giving her a playful smirk that's all Spike and looks bizarre on Wesley's face.

"I have my moments. Guess this isn't just us, huh?"

"I like surprises," she murmured, giving him a proper smile - a Drusilla smile - in return. It was a terrible body for Spike to be trapped in, so weak and so human, but he'd take it in his stride. Her boy was good at that. "It might be exciting."

Spike shrugged, looking Drusilla up and down. Now that he realized who it really was, he could see all sorts of little tells in how Cordelia held herself and spoke, things that were so distinctly Drusilla he was surprised he hadn't noticed sooner. But he didn't know Cordelia well enough that he would notice unless something was very off about her.

"I've imagined becoming human again before," he told her. "But I'd really assumed I'd keep my own body if it happened."

"No one would want to be a stuffy old Watcher," she remarked. And he was old. Old before his time and weighed down by the knowledge drawn from the books he'd read. "Is he in you?"

"Wes is all right. If I became Giles, there might be some screaming." Spike liked Wesley a lot better than he liked Giles. And he'd far rather be stuck in Wesley's body. "No idea. I..." he frowned. "Probably." Naked. Curled around a naked Buffy, the way Spike had been last night.

Ripping off his own head was both inadvisable and probably impossible, considering human level strength. But he was pretty sure Wesley wouldn't take advantage of her, and it wasn't Wesley's fault, so that was all right.

"Make sure he looks after you," she said, waving a warning finger at the camera. She'd hate it if her boy's - she still thought of him as hers, even if he was from the wrong world and the wrong time - body was damaged by a careless human.

Spike shrugs. "I'll be all right. So long as he doesn't go tripping onto inconvenient branches, or play with fire, I'll heal from anything he does." It was more what Wesley might do to other people that worried him, but he doubted Drusilla would sympathize.

"That wasn't what I meant," she said. Fortunately for Drusilla, the concept of caring about Spike - even this Spike - wasn't new. She didn't have to attribute it to Cordelia's soul. "I was thinking about when his tummy starts to rumble."

"Oh, that." Spike frowned. Wesley would have to drink blood, and for him, that wasn't as usual a thing as it was for Spike. "Well, I've got stuff in the fridge. I'll keep an eye on him, make sure he feeds regularly and doesn't kill anyone."

"All that sorrow," she said, very softly, imagining the mess that Wesley could potentially make. It thrilled her, but not as much as it should have. "All that mess. The city would burn with it."

And Wesley would burn with it, sacrificing himself to heal wounds he hadn't intended to cause.

"Cordelia won't be able to hunt," she added, suddenly. Because it mattered. Because she couldn't make a mess and blame it on Drusilla. "She'll still have the wires in her head."

Spike shook his head. "I won't let him," he repeated. "Worst comes to worst, I can probably take him." Not that Wesley could take Spike normally, but Spike was nothing if not cocky.

As for Drusilla, Spike nodded. "She'll be glad of that when she's over. She's not a killer."

At the comment, Drusilla simply nodded. Spike's spirit was strong enough to give a human body extra strength and she had every faith in him.

"I know," she said, resting a hand on Cordelia's chest. Feeling the heart beat that unsettled her most of all. "She's all light."

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016: Beating to a Funeral Song [Accidental Visual / Location: Hyperion Hotel]

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