Post Seeing Red - Return from Africa

[fangfan.livejournal.com]

Hi!  I'm new to this com and to Live Journal, so please forgive me if I do anything too stupid.  :)

Several months ago, I was up really late one night surfing Spuffy sites when I came across a really neat, well-written fic.  As I was only half awake and not thinking too clearly, I neglected to bookmark the fic.  *Sigh*  I can't remember if the fic was a WIP or if I simply got too sleepy to continue reading all of it.  I evidently thought I would remember the title and site.  (Yeah, right - that was gonna happen.)

The story was set post Seeing Red.  Spike has gone to Africa and completed the trials, but instead of simply getting his soul back, he is also made human again.  Spike is less than thrilled with the gift of humanity.  In addition to the guilt he is feeling from the soul over all of his past sins and especially over his "attempted rape" of Buffy, he is now convinced that as a mere human, he is too weak to be of any real help to Buffy.  Of course, being Spike, he absolutely wallows in his feelings of guilt and inadequacy and blames himself for what he perceives as his failure.

After wandering across Africa and Europe, he eventually winds up in England on Giles' doorstep. It seems that he turns to Giles simply because he can't think of anyplace else to go.  Intrigued by Spike's transformation (in full research mode) and somewhat exasperated by the former vampire's attitude, Giles takes him and tries to help.  Spike's been neglecting himself and isn't in great shape.  He's also less than cooperative and not the easiest person to have as a guest in one's home.  

After living with Giles for a while, his health gets better, and Giles begins to see clues (faster than normal reflexes, accelerated healing, etc.) that lead him to believe that Spike is more than human.  Giles also believes that a great evil is coming, and he wants Spike to return to Sunnydale to help Buffy.  By this time, Giles has filled Spike in on the latest happening in Sunnydale which leads to more guilt on Spike's part.  Spike doesn't want to go back.  He feels totally unworthy of Buffy and is afraid to face her again.  He's also in denial that he is anything other than merely human and doesn't think he can help anyone.  He's pretty much throwing a pity party for himself.

This is pretty much where the story leaves off.  I know it's rather vague.  The only scene from the fic that i remember clearly at all is one in which Giles gets up early one more moring to find Spike sitting alone, feeling sorry for himself.  He's sulky and pouting just a little.  Spike no longer dyes his hair, it's longer and definitely curly.  Looking at him, Giles thinks to himself that he's glad he nagged Spike into cutting his hair some, but he thinks that even with the haircut, with his blue eyes, high cheek bones, curly hair and pouting mouth, Spike looks like a fallen angel.  Of course, Giles is annoyed with himself for even thinking that Spike looks anything at all like one of the heavenly hosts.  :)

Wish I could remember more.  I hope that someone out there can come up with an author and title.  I would love to finish reading this fic.  That is, if it's not in WIP limbo.  Thanks in advance for any help. 

Comments

[ruuger]

That sounds really familiar. Could it be Measure of Man by Gwyneth Rhys?

(btw, there's something wrong with the code in your entry because the font is so big that I can't properly read it on my friendslist)

[fangfan.livejournal.com]

Thanks for replying to my post so quickly. I'm gonns check out the story you mentioned to see if it's the right one. As for the large font - my bad. I have vision problems so I typed my post using the larger font, thinking I could change it later, but so far that hasn't worked. As I said I'm kinda new to this. *Sigh* If anyone can help me fix the look of my post, I'd really appreciate it.

Thanks,
fangfan

[ruuger]

No problem. You can edit the post by clicking on the button on the top of your post. Just remove any < font > tags that you might have there and leave just the text and that should fix the problem.

[fangfan.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately, measure of a man isn't the fic i'm looking for here, but it's seems like an excellent fic. I've read enough to know that I want to keep on reading more, so that's good. Always happy to find a good fic to read. :) Meanwhile, maybe someone will come up with another suggestion. I've tried various ways of changing the size of the test in my original post, but nothing seems to work. *Sigh*. At least now I know not to click on medium where it says size the next time I want to post something here. Anyway, I've learned something new, so it's not all bad.

[copykween.livejournal.com]

I was also going to comment on the bold coding, but someone beat me to it. :)

Also: For some reason you've set this post to have screened comments. I've unscreened these two replies, but please edit you post so that any other replies are able to be viewed by everyone. Also keep this in mind for future posts.

Thanks,
CK

[fangfan.livejournal.com]

Thanks, copykween, for letting me know about my error. I think I've fixed it. As I've mentioned before I'm new to this site. And I guess it's kinda obvious that I'm not exactly a computer genius. I'm always open to any helpful suggestions. :)

fangfan

[copykween.livejournal.com]

No problem. :)

[just-sue.livejournal.com]

This is ringing bells with me - not that I can remember the name right now! LOL

But the one that's bugging me had Willow in it too, so it could just be something vaguely familiar. If I think of it I'll pop back and let you know.

[(Anonymous)]

Man, that is familiar. The first thing I did was go to check Three Lions by Lesley but that apparently isn't it. (It includes willow and wesley) I will be watching these posts closely. good luck

[scarlett2u.livejournal.com]

Any chance it's The Return by anon462?

http://dark-solace.org/elysian/viewstory.php?sid=173&warning=NC-17

[(Anonymous)]

Hey, I'm pretty sure the fic you're looking for is "Journey to Destiny" by PSUbrat.
You can find it here: http://lubakmetyk.infinology.net/others/psubrat/journeypro.htm

[fangfan.livejournal.com]

Hi, y'all! Thanks to everyone who's tried to help me locate this fic. So far none of the fics mentioned on this thread have been the one I've been trying to find. But even though I haven't found the story that I've been looking for, thanks to you all I've found several other fics that sound very interesting. I'm gonna put the titles on my list of fics to be read. It's always good to have something to fall back on to read on a rainy day.

Meanwhile I have thought of one other small detail that might help someone to come up with this fic. I seem to remember that Giles has to constantly remind Spike to eat. It seems that in addition to just not being used to being human, Spike is also seriously depressed and just doesn't take very good care of himself.

I hope I'm not getting details from two different fics confused here. That's kind of easy to do when you've read a lot of stories. Sometimes the plots sorta get mixed up. (Or maybe that's just a problem for me) :(