Buffy the Vampire Slayer Preferences + imagines/one shots

Spike - Dust 🔥

requested by ChattyCathy23 <3

Spike stumbles through the cemetery, tripping over his own feet in his drunken state. An empty bottle in one hand, a lit cigarette in the other, he mutters darkly to himself. He's upset. About what, I do not know.

He sits outside his crypt, leaning back against the door. It would be so easy to slip inside, sink into his comfy bed and sleep the night away, but it's just so far. The ground isn't cushy, but he's endured worse, so he closes his eyes. 

He lets sleep take him. The bottle in his hand falls but doesn't smash, and the cigarette extinguishes as light rains starts to fall.  

It's not enough to stir the intoxicated, sleeping vampire. He lays there as still as death, as pale as snow - completely unaware of the rapidly approaching morning.

The sun peaks over the horizon, cascading rays onto Spike's sleeping face. Birds sing, celebrating the new day, and insects chirp and hum lowly in the shrubbery. He looks beautiful in the light - all golden hair and defined cheekbones. 

Beautiful for a beautiful moment, before flames burst on his porcelain skin and eat into the flesh until, in a matter of mere seconds, he's a pile of dust. 

His mouth barely had the time to contort into a pained, aghast scream. 

I bolt upright, sweating and panting like an animal. 

I put a hand on my heaving chest, trying my hardest to take in a full breath. I'm in my bedroom. It was a nightmare. It's okay. 

But it felt so real. The background noise of crickets, the smell of midnight rain, the look of horror twisting Spike's features as he burned to a gruesome second death.

Fuck.

I force my breaths to slow, in and out, in and out. 

It felt so real, that's what worries me. Usually my dreams contain the most bizarre things and they're often harmless. Showing up to school naked. Starring in a Shakespeare play I never rehearsed for. Working at The Magic Box but all the customers were babies in self-driving prams and Giles was Big Bird from Sesame Street (that was an interesting one). None of them felt as realistic as the one I just had. 

The thought that it could have actually happened creeps into my head. By instinct, I want to push it away and roll my eyes for being so stupid but as the possibility takes form, it becomes more feasible. Buffy's had prophetic dreams in the past and stranger things have happened in this town. Surely, I'm just overreacting because I saw one of the people I love most in the world literally burst into flames but... could I walk over to Sunnydale Cemetery and find a pile of dust on his doorstep?

A glance over to my alarm clock tells me that it's almost 5 AM. I swing my feet out of bed and let out a sigh, listening to the pitter-patter of rain outside my window. My skin crawls when I realise that it's dawn and it's raining - just like in my dream. 

I'm 90% sure I'm being ridiculous, but the other 10% makes me throw on a jacket and slip into my running shoes. My heart pounds in my chest like a drum although I'm only walking, so at some point I think fuck it and start to jog. Then run. 

The gates of the cemetery are locked this early in the morning. I look up at the looming metal structure in front of me and it takes me about three seconds to decide I'm going to climb over it. To my surprise, I manage it with minimal injury (I hit my funny bone) and hurry up to the crypt.

As I approach it from behind, part of me doesn't want to look at the door, in fear of what I'll see. 

If he's dead, I'm going to kill him.