Five Oldskool Spike/Buffy Romps
Oct. 29th, 2009 10:23 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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buffyversetop5These are five fics I associate with the time before I got my LJ in 2003, when the world of Spuffy fanfic was a very different place (or so it seems to me now). They've stuck with me to such an extent that it seems odd people haven't read them and they've probably influenced me more than I realise.
Black the Sun by Sangga
Black the Sun is the ur-rescue!fic in my head. Spike gets kidnapped by an ancient Egyptian priestess for ritual purposes and the gang have to go and rescue him. Buffy starts off not caring very much, but by the end... There isn't much more to it than that, but a mass of twists and turns along the way really make this fic. It's set in that nebulous time of S5-but-Glory's-not-really-an-issue, as things used to be before every episode made a crucial difference to the Spike-Buffy dynamic. A great action/adventure fic.
Definition of a Monster by GG Noel
If Black the Sun is my ur-rescue!fic, Definition of a Monster is my ur-time-travel-fic-post-1880-pre-series (all right, so that's a less catchy genre). Basically, it's a time-travel fic with just evil Spike and the fanged four, rather than William or younger Buffy, and it happens to be in World War II, with Nazi Slayers and Willow's grandparents. There's this bit with Spike and retro!Spike in Russia where they chat about Tolstoy, which is much more an action scene than deep angst, but it's completely wedged in my consciousness and probably will stay there forever. (GG Noel's other fic, Blood of the Heart has stuck with me in much the same way - it's a great resurrection tale with some magnificently hyperbolic descriptions of Buffy and Spike's fighting prowess.)
Dry Kind of Love by Tanith
The combination of this fic's title and its summary (You can run, but you can't hide. S/B Futurefic.) has haunted me ever since it appeared on ff.net. I still don't know why. The fic is much the same, ostensibly a story about future!Buffy and future!Spike's daughter coming to terms with her parents' past and her own nature, after Darla and Drusilla take it upon themselves to terrorise her, but weirdly much more haunting than the premise would make it seem. Offspring!fic isn't exactly my cup of tea, but this is completely its own animal, at least in my head.
The Island of Galleno by Isabelle
Isabelle still gets recced around quite a lot, but for some reason I never see people talking about this fic, which I remember because I read it almost in one go and it felt so long. Relatively speaking it isn't, really, but I got so immersed in it when I read it that coming out the other side was a very odd experience. The premise is that, just when Buffy and Spike actually get somewhere, Riley (in his fanon incarnation of some sort of bizarre deus ex machina) appears and steals Spike away to an Initiative camp, from where Spike spends literally years trying to get out and back to Buffy - only not really because his motives go through all these shifts and changes as the time passes. I think they have a son or something as well(?).
Spiegel im Spiegel by Fallowdoe
Frankly, I couldn't write this list without Fallowdoe's fic, in which The Gift has gone squiffy, Dawn has ended up as energy in this post-apocalyptic/fantasy-novel world and Spike and Buffy (and everybody else) are trying to make a go of it very much separated. Like all the fics on this list, I haven't actually read through Spiegel im Spiegel in a while, but it's always there in the back of my mind for the sheer power of the descriptions and imagery. It's an amazing fic. The sequel and the (permanent?) WIP of the third instalment are equally brilliant, but I don't know a link for them that isn't at Tea at the Ford, which is currently down.
Black the Sun by Sangga
Black the Sun is the ur-rescue!fic in my head. Spike gets kidnapped by an ancient Egyptian priestess for ritual purposes and the gang have to go and rescue him. Buffy starts off not caring very much, but by the end... There isn't much more to it than that, but a mass of twists and turns along the way really make this fic. It's set in that nebulous time of S5-but-Glory's-not-really-an-issue, as things used to be before every episode made a crucial difference to the Spike-Buffy dynamic. A great action/adventure fic.
Definition of a Monster by GG Noel
If Black the Sun is my ur-rescue!fic, Definition of a Monster is my ur-time-travel-fic-post-1880-pre-series (all right, so that's a less catchy genre). Basically, it's a time-travel fic with just evil Spike and the fanged four, rather than William or younger Buffy, and it happens to be in World War II, with Nazi Slayers and Willow's grandparents. There's this bit with Spike and retro!Spike in Russia where they chat about Tolstoy, which is much more an action scene than deep angst, but it's completely wedged in my consciousness and probably will stay there forever. (GG Noel's other fic, Blood of the Heart has stuck with me in much the same way - it's a great resurrection tale with some magnificently hyperbolic descriptions of Buffy and Spike's fighting prowess.)
Dry Kind of Love by Tanith
The combination of this fic's title and its summary (You can run, but you can't hide. S/B Futurefic.) has haunted me ever since it appeared on ff.net. I still don't know why. The fic is much the same, ostensibly a story about future!Buffy and future!Spike's daughter coming to terms with her parents' past and her own nature, after Darla and Drusilla take it upon themselves to terrorise her, but weirdly much more haunting than the premise would make it seem. Offspring!fic isn't exactly my cup of tea, but this is completely its own animal, at least in my head.
The Island of Galleno by Isabelle
Isabelle still gets recced around quite a lot, but for some reason I never see people talking about this fic, which I remember because I read it almost in one go and it felt so long. Relatively speaking it isn't, really, but I got so immersed in it when I read it that coming out the other side was a very odd experience. The premise is that, just when Buffy and Spike actually get somewhere, Riley (in his fanon incarnation of some sort of bizarre deus ex machina) appears and steals Spike away to an Initiative camp, from where Spike spends literally years trying to get out and back to Buffy - only not really because his motives go through all these shifts and changes as the time passes. I think they have a son or something as well(?).
Spiegel im Spiegel by Fallowdoe
Frankly, I couldn't write this list without Fallowdoe's fic, in which The Gift has gone squiffy, Dawn has ended up as energy in this post-apocalyptic/fantasy-novel world and Spike and Buffy (and everybody else) are trying to make a go of it very much separated. Like all the fics on this list, I haven't actually read through Spiegel im Spiegel in a while, but it's always there in the back of my mind for the sheer power of the descriptions and imagery. It's an amazing fic. The sequel and the (permanent?) WIP of the third instalment are equally brilliant, but I don't know a link for them that isn't at Tea at the Ford, which is currently down.
