"Got nothing to do with honour, mate," Spike shrugged, preparing to continue the fight, "s'just I'm selfish, see. It's gonna be a pleasure."

Spike threw himself at his enemy, raining blows relentlessly upon the Lothgar demon. Nykos was certainly durable, taking the repeated punishment and still coming back for more. It felt good to let go, Spike mused, to let slip the rage and frustration that had been pent-up inside him since the whole business with Laibach began.

From the corner of his eyes he could see the grinning idiot faces of the Order of Aurelius, amused by the savage violence. Spike imagined they would be quite perturbed to learn that most of the rage he vented on the demon was not for the Lothgar, but for the ancient deity they held in such high regard and who held his precious lover as ransom for his servitude. Just the thought of it fuelled his rage to near madness. He kept imagining that the Lothgar was Laibach.

He twisted into a high kick that took the demon in the centre of its chest and knocked Nykos backward. It stumbled, half falling upon the queen-sized bed.

Drusilla had been lost in a sleep impossibly deep, but when the Lothgar crashed down beside her, she woke at last. Her raven hair spilled in a veil across her porcelain features and her eyes were wide with the innocence of the mad.

"Spike?" she called sleepily, gazing about, a tiny smile flickering at the edges of her mouth. "Is there a party? Why didn't you wake me?" She rubbed sleep from her eyes with a fist.

"Stay right where you are, poodle," Spike said as he cautiously moved toward the bed. "Daddy's just finishing up some business."