the end of Buffy?
See, though, I don’t think that the Demon was trying to do him any favors. As you said, the first thing he does is berate Spike for not being evil anymore. For letting the chip in his head make him go soft. Spike is trying to put up a front of bad-assitude, but it’s obvious to the demon that he’s let himself go.
See, Spike doesn’t (or didn’t) have a soul, and is incapable of really being in love with Buffy. He’s able to fool himself into thinking that a relationship of mutual exploitation *is* love, but the fact is that he’s been impotent as a vamp for so long that he’s lost the taste for the hunt, and has channeled his unspent energies into an obsession. So when Buffy comes back subtly altered, and Spike finds that he *can* physically approach her, this obsession is coupled with compensating for his impotence as a vampire with sex. While he may have been *acting* more human, he’s been forced into it and has been conditioned to act in a way that’s acceptable. It’s obvious, though, that his feelings for Buffy aren’t love — if they were, he never would have attempted to rape her. It’s at that point that it becomes clear that this isn’t love, it’s not caring, this is merely obsession and desire masquerading as love. We can’t fool ourselves into thinking that Spike’s just a heartbroken guy anymore, he’s a soulless monster that attempted to hurt the person he professed to love.
Now, the demon he’s made a bargain with has seen this. It knows that Spike has let himself go ga-ga over Buffy. It also knows that if he passes the tests, that his request must be fulfilled. Because the demon isn’t really impressed with Spike and his attitude or the way he’s let himself go soft, it does fulfill his request. But it does it in a way that isn’t going to help Spike at all. He follows Spike’s wish to the letter, and makes him as he was before. Spike will realize what a completely horrible b@stard he’s been. He’s going to actually be able to be in love with Buffy, and know that because of what he’s done, he can’t have her. This isn’t going to be a good deal for Spike. This isn’t what he wants at all.
And this could, after all, make him even more dangerous. As Warren and Willow have shown, you can have a soul — be entirely human, in fact — and still be as evil as they come.
–Aleck