Chapter Text
Vienna, the world without shrimp 1963
A woman cowered in the corner of the room. Her eyes closed and her body folded in on itself like a pretzel. She was still alive, but barely, fear was gripping her. Her heart was thumping so fast she couldn't hear each individual beat, in her ears, it sounded like a continuous humming inside her chest. Around her were the bodies. She'd let them down, she was supposed to protect them. She kept telling herself this was all her fault, that if she hadn't let him in, this wouldn't have happened.
Spike was knelt by the doorway, by then he was sporting his bleached look and a black turtleneck. The girl in his arms lay dying, the wounds in her neck were pouring blood onto the floor, and his knees. His teeth were stained red and dripping a mix of blood and spit. He didn't laugh, or smile, or try to enjoy this destruction. He just bathed in it, and sat with his killings, a stone cold look on his face. He could see the woman on the other side of the room, the children dead on the floor between them. She was cowering and crying and sniffling with noise because she was too scared to hide it anymore. He decided he'd end it all for her, Angelus would let her suffer, but he didn't care for cruelty, he was only here for blood.
The door behind him slammed when a band of merry men holding stakes and axes entered the periphery. Roger Wyndam-Pryce was wearing undercover gear and a headtorch. His group were following closely behind. Roger was a young man, a new wife at home, and enough training that he thought this raid was going to be easy. He found the vampire crouched in the doorway, holding one of the victims like she was his own daughter. He felt sick at the sight of it, covered in her blood and just staring out at the carnage. So, this was the famous William the Bloody? He asked himself, before the vampire dropped the girl and whipped around to face him. His fangs were still bared, and now he was smiling. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and attacked, pushing Roger backwards into the doorframe and knocking him out.
The the horde descended. With their leader struck down, their only orders were to attack and stake on sight. One of them launched forward, aiming to take out one of Spike's legs so he would be disarmed on the floor. But he missed and Spike managed to grab him. He lifted the small man up and threw him across the room, vampire strength coming in handy. The man's skull was crushed against the wall. This room used to be for the children to play in, in the light pink and blue wallpaper could be seen plastered to the walls. The trim decorated now, with an array of balloons, baby animals, and blood. Spike turned back to the Watcher's Council team and plunged his teeth into the exposed neck of another man. This bought the others time to crowd around him and bare their weapons. They'd been trained to abandon injured or dead team members if it was hindering the mission. They watched the vampire drain the life of their teammate before poking their stakes into Spike's chest.
Roger's head ached like he'd been hit by a wrecking ball. He held his forehead as he stood up, realising that there were more bodies on the floor now than there had been when they'd arrived. They'd lost Marshall and Hendricks, their corpses abandoned on the floor besides the children. He was lucky to still be standing, he thought, then turned his attention back to the vampire. Spike had managed to throw another man out of the circle and make a gap for himself in the weaponry. Roger watched from the back of the room, where the woman was shivering, undeterred by the disturbance of the group, as his team cowered and Spike made a break for it at the back of the orphanage. He was furious they'd let him get away, he'd wanted the glory of finally dusting the vampire known as William the Bloody. Now, he was gone. His team had let him get away.
Then he noticed the woman beside him, still alive but barely. She was moments off dying from fright. So he lifted her beneath her legs and carried her past her young wards. His shoes were covered in blood that he trod into the grass. The woman was mumbling something, he didn't speak good German, but enough to know that she was asking for God to spare her. "It's quite alright," he reassured, "you're safe now." Then he found another room to put her in and left her, calling the police and then telling his team to dispatch. This had been a failure of human error. He'd trusted his team to come together but they'd all tried to attack separately, allowing two of their team members to perish. He was enraged but refrained from shouting at them until they were back on English soil. He'd get a dressing down from the inner council itself when he got back, he could see sir's face already in his mind. The thin line of his mustache turned up at the edges. His eyebrows raised.
The Viennese police found the woman alone in the office of the orphanage, still shaking and crying. The news of the orphanage's demise was all over the newspapers' front pages the next day, despite how much the council had tried to defer it. Roger was suspended from missions for a month because of his failure to properly report the attack and stake the vampire responsible. The Watcher's Council were very much watching William the Bloody, but it would be several decades before the two men came face to face again.