Sometimes, he thinks that someone like him doesn't deserve a family. When he was human, he had his mother, father, and sweet little Kathy. He hated his father, tolerated his mother, and adored Kathy. But the second he became a vampire, he killed them all.

Later, Darla, Drusilla, and eventually Spike become his family, if you could call if that. Filled with pain and sex and passion, it was definitely vampire like. All that ended when he was cursed.

That brought him to L.A. For a time, he felt like he truly belonged here with Cordy, Wes, Gunn, Fred, and Lorne. They made him believe that he could be happy, that he wasn't the monster that he'd spent so many years being anymore, that they could bring down all the evil in the world, that he would get the girl at the end, that one day he could be human again. Sometimes, he wishes he can go back to thinking that and he becomes envious of his past self. When Connor was stolen by Wesley, when Cordelia died and Connor betrayed him, his illusion shattered.

He had spent the entire time at Wolfram and Hart distancing himself from everyone so that the blows would sting a little less when they came. He knew that the big fight, bigger than anything he'd ever faced before, was coming. He knew that not everyone would survive bringing down their assigned people, and if they did, they certainly wouldn't survive this battle. Two vampires, Illyria, and an injured man against hundreds. It's almost laughable.

Time to get to work.

He knows he is going to go down fighting. It seems fitting, somehow.