william the bloodyOne night in 19th century London, William was at a party. He was sitting alone in a corner, trying to write a poem about the beauteous Cecily Addams, whom he desperately loved from afar. When several party-goers publicly humiliated him by reading his half-finished work aloud, he fled only to come face to face with Cecily. Mortified, she asked him if his poems were about him. He admitted that regardless of their worth as poetry, he meant every syllable of them and loved her. However, this brave admission was met with disdain, and Cecily informed him that she never even thought of him, because he was beneath her. Crushed, William ran out of the party tearing his poems to confetti and drew the attention of a vampire called Drusilla. She followed him to a nearby livery stable where she told him how she saw him. She spoke of power and imagination, and seemed to finally see him—see him as no one else had ever seen him, and understand him the way no one else ever had. Mesmerised by her, he allowed her to kill him and was reborn as a vampire. Shedding his old persona of cultured, refined, and slightly poncy William, he took to affecting a working class accent and appearance and relished a good brawl. For all intents and purposes, William discovered his inner Football Thug, and the Spike we know and love was born. He clashed in those early days with his sire's sire, Angelus, but the "bat pack" remained a closely knit family until Angelus gained a soul at the turn of the century. Spike and Dru remained devoted to one another for over a century, when Drusilla was gravely wounded and weakened after they were attacked by a mob in Prague. Spike believed that the mystical energies from the Hellmouth would restore her, and so they set off for California in his black 1959 DeSoto. Upon his arrival in Sunnydale, Spike was sent by the Anointed One of the Order of Aurelius (of which his great-grandsire, Darla, was a member) to kill the Slayer. Having killed two slayers in his life, Spike was expecting to make short work of Buffy. However, from their first encounter, Spike knew there was something different about this Slayer. He video taped her, studied her fighting style, and came close to killing her several times before he was seriously wounded in the ceremony that restored Drusilla to health. Then Angelus came back. Suddenly, killing the Slayer was the last thing on Spike's mind. Instead, he allied himself with Buffy to stop Angelus from destroying the world. Mostly, he just wanted Dru back. But he's fond of this world—from Manchester United to "happy meals with legs" he likes things just fine they way they are, so when the battle was joined, he beat the crap out of Angelus with a poker, knocked Dru out and fled, leaving Buffy to deal with Angelus. However, his brief alliance with the Slayer seems to have had repercussions. Drusilla rejects Spike, saying that when she looked at him, all she can see the the Slayer. A heartbroken Spike returns to Sunnydale in a drunken stupor, trying to find a way to win Dru back. To this end, he kidnaps Willow and Xander, to force the young witch to do a love spell for him. Finding Buffy and Angel all cosy with one another again, he gives them a little lesson in love. "You're not friends. You'll never be friends. You'll be in love till it kills you both. You'll fight, you'll shag, you'll hate each other till it makes you quiver, but you'll never be friends. Love isn't brains, children, it's blood, it's blood screaming inside you to work its will. I may be love's bitch, but at least I'm man enough to admit it." He then tells the dynamic duo where to find Xander and Willow, and takes off to win Dru back. However, his bliss was short-lived. Drusilla leaves him once again (this time for a fungus demon) and he returns to Sunnydale to seek the Gem of Amarra. However, Buffy kicks his ass and sends the Gem to Angel in Los Angeles. He follows, but Angel kicks his ass and one of his minions steals the Gem, and Spike returns to Sunnydale bent on revenge, only to be captured by the Initiative—a covert government organisation with a base hidden beneath Sunnydale and a petting zoo full of nasties. As "Hostile 17", Spike had a behaviour modification chip implanted in his cerebral cortex that administers electrical shocks to the pain centres of his brain whenever he tries to hurt or kill a human being. Escaping the base, Spike allied himself with the Scoobies once again to help them discover the truth behind the Initiative. At first Spike is chained up in Giles' bathtub, and fed blood from a novelty mug. But as time goes on, he and Giles settle into an Odd Couple relationship, with Spike mixing his blood with Giles' Weetabix (an English breakfast cereal that most Americans have been blessedly spared) and watching Passions together during the lowest points of Giles' unemployed boredom. However, Spike was then shunted off to Xander's basement where he is once again tied up, and actually tried to commit suicide when he realised that he was no longer frightening in the least and he lost the core of who he was. However, the discovery that his implant allowed him to harm demons and vampires renewed his zest for life (and carnage) and he set off to make his mark in the world. Setting up house in an obscenely large crypt in one of Sunnydale's many cemeteries, Spike is at first annoyed that he is treated as a de-facto "Scooby" and goes out of his way to remind Buffy & Co that he is still the "Big Bad" despite the chip. He teams up with Adam, a cyborg with both human and demon parts, as a spy. However, at the 11th Hour he switches sides, perhaps realising that Adam will not keep his word and remove his cortical implant. While the Scooby Gang is sceptical, they grudgingly admit that he has his uses.
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just the facts(a work in progress)
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