AUTHOR:  AngelicVampyre

RATING:  Not sure yet.  At the moment anyone who watches the show can read this but it may go up as high as 18 (NC-17?) in later chapters.

DISCLAIMER:  Not mine; don’t sue.

DISTRIBUTION:  Ask and ye shall receive.

FEEDBACK:  I crave it!  It’s like cigarettes, ya know?  Just when I think I’ve quit…

SPOILERS:  Up to ‘Lover’s Walk’.

SUMMERY:  Buffy makes a great sacrifice and leaves something for her friends.

NOTES:
Everything happened exactly as it did on the show up to B2.

Buffy never hid Angel's return and the two of them are a couple but the clause is still in place.

Buffy never tried to pretend that she wasn't the Slayer when she ran away so 'Anne' never happened.  She came back to Sunnydale because of a demon (or any other reason you care to think up, it makes no difference to the story).

Buffy never went back to school.

Joyce never accepted who Buffy was and she isn't in this story.  Buffy now lives at Angel's apartment while he stays at the mansion.

The Willow/Xander kiss & subsequent break-ups happened but the Buffy/Angel break-up did not.

The words of the spell which look like random gibberish are actually written in genuine Klingon (I know, I need a life in the worst way), so if you want to translate it and then E-mail me to tell me all the mistakes that I've made, feel free.
 
 

Prologue

Buffy's eyes snapped open, abruptly ending her nightmare. Still shaking slightly from reaction to her dream she sat up and pushed her hair away from her face with both hands.  Since becoming the Slayer, nightmares had become commonplace for Buffy - so much so that they rarely affected her any more.  The dreams of the past month were different though; they stayed with her throughout the day.  Always in the back of her mind reminding her of the choice she would soon be forced to make.

Tonight was the night, she knew with a soul deep certainty that she couldn't deny.  Tonight she would have to choose and whatever she chose she would lose everything.  For a moment she regretted her estrangement from her mother, wishing that Joyce had been able to accept who and what she was but the thought was fleeting and her mind quickly filled with images of Angel.  Of all the things she regretted the one she felt most keenly was that she must leave him alone.

Sighing heavily, Buffy pushed the depressing thought aside and got out of bed.  Dressing quickly, she left the apartment, mentally running over a list of everything that she needed to do that day.  She had been preparing for this night ever since the dreams had started but there was still a lot she needed to finish before nightfall.
 
 

Part One

As she had expected, Giles was sitting at the table with a cup of tea in his hand and a book open in front of him.  He looked up as she came in.

“Buffy, you're early!  This is quite unprecedented.”

“You know me, Giles, always eager to train.”  Buffy responded facetiously and then added wickedly, “Do you want to practice with the quarterstaff?  We haven't done that in ages.”

Giles winced and said quickly, “No, no, I-I believe a-a more general workout will suffice for today.  We can train with the quarterstaff some other time.”

Buffy grinned impishly at him, but her grin faded as she remembered that there would be no 'other times'.  She looked away as her eyes clouded over and filled with tears.

“Buffy?”  Giles asked in concern, putting his hand on her shoulder in a reassuring gesture and gently guiding her to a chair.  “What is it?  What's wrong?”

Buffy quickly wiped the tears away and smiled reassuringly up at Giles.  “It's nothing, Giles, really.  I think I'm just tired.  I've had some trouble sleeping this week.”  She paused for a moment and then added, “Thank you.”

Giles looked at her, startled.  “For what?” he asked in confusion.

“Oh, everything...caring.”  Giles frowned as his concern deepened, but before he could question Buffy further Willow and Xander bounced into the room.

“Buffy, G-man, what's up?  Any new monsters or demons around?”

“Um, no, things seem to be unusually quiet at present.  And please don't call me that!”

“Sorry Xander, looks like you're going to have to go over your maths homework with me after all.” said Willow sympathetically.

“Yeah, there's never a monster around when you want one!” agreed Xander, glumly.  “And always one when you don't,” he added, glaring at Angel who had suddenly appeared in their midst.  “What do you want, dead-boy?”

Angel didn't seem to hear him; his attention was focused totally upon Buffy, who had risen to her feet when she saw him.  “Angel!” she gasped as he wrapped her in his arms, “What is it?  What's wrong?”

Angel shook his head against her neck and held her tighter than ever.  “I don't know, I've had this feeling all day that something terrible is going to happen and I just...needed to be with you.  I came as soon as the sun went down.”

Buffy returned Angel's hug and laid her head on his chest while she forced back the tears that suddenly flooded her eyes, then she raised her head to look into his and was immediately swallowed up by his adoring gaze.  As she sank into the chocolaty brown depths of his eyes, forgetting that they were not alone, she sighed, “I love you, Angel.  I always will.”

“I love you, Buffy.  Forever.”  For an endless moment they just stood and gazed at each other, untouching and yet, somehow, intimately connected.  Then Angel lowered his head to hers and their lips met in a gentle kiss.

As the kiss started to deepen the mood was broken by the sound of Xander clearing his throat.  “Sorry to interrupt,” she said sarcastically, “but aren't you two forgetting a little something - like the curse?”

Willow glared at him as Buffy and Angel pulled apart, but Buffy's voice was sad rather than angry as she replied, “Angel and I never forget the curse, Xander.  It haunts us in a way that I hope you will never understand, but we have to live with it.  We know that for us there will never be anything more than kissing but I'll be damned if I'll let that separate us any more than it has to.  We have to appreciate what we have and try not to let what can never be tear us apart.”  As Buffy finished speaking Angel smiled down at her and raised his right hand to gently run the back of his fingers over the smooth skin of her cheek, while Xander had the grace to look ever-so-slightly shamefaced about what he had said.

“Uh, Guys?” said Willow in a nervous voice, “What's happening?  Everything is...fading!”  At her words everyone looked around, sure enough, the library had acquired an insubstantial and ghostly appearance.

“Oh, dear,” said Giles worriedly, “we would appear to have been targeted by some sort of...”

~~~

“...Summoning spell,” he concluded as they appeared in what looked like a cross between a cave and an old church or temple.  “Does anyone have any idea where we might be?”

Angel shivered slightly and said grimly, “This is where Buffy faced the Master...and died!”  Remembering the pain he had felt when he though Buffy was dead he instinctively reached out for her, only to find that she wasn't there.  He looked around and then asked in a slightly panicked voice, “Where's Buffy?”  Everyone looked around but there was no sign of her.  They tried to search for her and discovered that they couldn't move more than two paces away in any direction before they ran into some sort of barrier, which was no less solid for being completely invisible.  Angel hurled himself against it in an attempt to force his way through but his efforts proved futile.  He prowled restlessly around their prison for over half an hour, testing every inch of the 'wall' looking for a weak spot that he could exploit, before he finally conceded defeat.

“So now what do we do?” asked Xander, sitting down on the rocky floor and leaning against the 'wall'.

“Well, er, there would seem to be very little we can do except wait,” said Giles.  “Since Buffy, as far as we know, has not been caught by the, the spell, we must hope that she can discover our whereabouts before...well...”

“Before whoever or whatever it was that brought us here, shows up.” finished Angel when Giles hesitated.

“And if Buffy was taken somewhere else by that spell?”  Xander demanded, “What then?  Are we just supposed to sit here?”

“Unless you have any better ideas, then it would seem so, yes.”  Giles answered mildly.

“Its okay, guys,” said Willow in what she hoped was a confident voice,  “Buffy will find us.  She always does.”

~~~

When the others disappeared, Buffy found herself standing alone in the library.  For a while she remained where she was, staring at the places where her friends had been only a few seconds before.  Although she had known it was coming, it had still been a shock to see them vanish like that.

She knew where they had gone; there was a powerful calling echoing in her head, compelling her to return to the place where she had died once before and, for a moment, a bitter smile touched her lips as she registered the irony inherent in the fact that she would have to make her choice in such an ill-omened place.

Shaking off thoughts of the Master, Buffy moved to the library door, pausing to look back at the place where she and her friends had spent so much time together over the last two years and say a final, silent goodbye to the old friend that the building had become, before she walked out and headed underground.

~~~

Nothing seemed to have changed since she had last been there, thought Buffy as she looked around the gloomy caves.  It was still as depressing as ever.

“Buffy!”  She swung round at the sound of Angel's voice and saw her friends gathered together at the far side of the cave.  She ran across to them and rested her hand on the barrier she knew would be there.

“Don't worry, I'm going to get you out of here.” she said confidently.  “Everything's okay.”

The complete certainty in her voice caught Angel's attention, “Buffy?” he questioned, his gaze sharpening on her face.   She looked at him calmly, without speaking, and suspicion transformed into certainty.  “You know what's going on, don't you?”

Giles, Willow and Xander looked at Angel, and then at Buffy, in stunned surprise but before she could reply there was a sound like thunder and a cloud of sulphurous yellow smoke formed in the centre of the cavern.

As the smoke cleared, a demon gradually came into view.  Its basic shape was human but that was where the resemblance ended.  It was covered in scales that were a nausea inducing shade of greenish yellow and only had one eye set high in its forehead.  A line of spikes ran from the top of its head and down its back where it branched off and ran down each leg to its ankles.  Its mouth was huge and slightly open, revealing an impressive array of pointed teeth, exactly like those of a shark.  When it spoke its voice was hoarse and yet managed to have the irritating quality of fingernails on a blackboard.

“Slayer, I am Y’el’ir.  Do you know why I have come?”

“I know.”  Buffy's voice was calm, though the others looked at her in astonishment.

“Do you understand the nature of the choice you must make?”  The demon's words were strangely formal and Buffy's response was equally so as she replied,  “I do.”

“Choice?  What choice?  Buffy, what's going on?”  Angel questioned urgently.

She didn't seem to hear him, her attention totally focused upon Y’el’ir as he asked, “How do you choose to make the sacrifice?”

Buffy drew in a deep breath and let it out in a shaky sigh, but her voice was still calm as she said,  “I choose to make the sacrifice for those I love.  Let Angel, Rupert Giles, Willow Rosenberg & Alexander Harris be free.  Let their designated fate be mine and all that would be done to them be instead done to me.  I make this choice in full awareness of its consequences to myself and accept that, once made, my decision cannot be altered.  Let those whose place I take go free and trouble them no more.  For the sake of these four I offer myself willingly as substitute.”

There was a stunned silence while the demon stared at her and then, as if unable to contain its curiosity, it dropped its formal attitude and asked, “Why?  You know what it is you face, why would you choose to endure this when you don't have to?”

Buffy glanced towards her friends, aware that they were calling to her but closing her ears to their cries.  The sight of them strengthened her resolve and she said with complete certainty, “It's because I know what I face that I'm doing this.  They've all suffered so much because of me, I love them more than anything and all I have ever brought them is pain.  I refuse to let them suffer any more, not when there's a way for me to prevent it.”

She paused and looked the demon up and down with contempt, adding, “But love is something that you could never even begin to understand.  Now, if we have to do this, could you please get on with it?”

“Right.”  Unbelievably, the demon looked sheepish (a truly scary expression on its monstrous face), then it resumed its formal mode of speech and asked, “Is this your final decision?  I caution you to think well before you speak, for I shall not ask again.”

Before she answered, Buffy turned back for one final sight of her friends.  She looked at them silently for what seemed like a long time, meeting the eyes of each in turn, hoping that they would read in her eyes all the things she couldn't say.  She met Angel's anguished gaze last and held it longest, continuing to look at him even as she addressed them all.  “Goodbye, my friends...never forget that I love you all.”  Then she broke the connection to Angel, gave a sad smile that encompassed them all, turned back to the demon and stated firmly, “It is.”

“Then so be it!”  Y’el’ir shouted and with another clap of thunder and cloud of smoke, both Buffy and the demon vanished.
 
 

Part Two

For a moment, Giles simply watched the vampire, and then he hesitantly approached and placed his hand on Angel's shoulder.  “There's nothing we can do here,” he said sensibly.  “We should return to the library and see what we can find about this demon and where it may have taken Buffy.  We must ascertain what the ‘choice' he referred to entailed and how Buffy knew of it in advance.”

Angel looked up at Giles, then past him to the worried faces of Willow and Xander.  Rising slowly to his feet, Angel nodded and led the way back to the surface.  The journey was completed in total silence, each member of the group lost in private thoughts of Buffy and where she could have gone.

~~~

As soon as they arrived back at the library Giles turned to the others and began issuing instructions.  “Willow, Xander, this may take a long time, I suggest that you call you parents and inform them that you shall not be home tonight.  As soon as you have done that then, Willow, I believe you should see what - if anything - you can find on that.” he indicated the computer.  “Xander, you look for anything about a choice, particularly in reference to the Slayer.  I shall look through the foreign language texts and Angel, you see what you can find about this demon, Y’el’ir.”

Everyone nodded and turned away to begin their assigned tasks: Willow and Xander to the phone, Giles to his office and Angel into the stacks.

Angel stood in front of the many rows of books about demons and gazed at them with unseeing eyes.  In his mind he saw a thousand different images of Buffy - laughing, fighting, teasing, crying, and, above all, gazing up at him with love in her eyes - and for the first time in almost two hundred and fifty years he prayed.  He prayed with all his unbeating heart and soul that Buffy would be alright, that just once the fates that had always treated her with such cruelty, would see fit to reward her goodness and bring her back safely.

Forcing his attention back to the task at hand, Angel reached for a large demonography, then froze before he could touch it when he noticed the box sitting on the shelf beneath it.  He read the inscription and then, with shaking hands, gently lifted it and carried it back towards the main part of the library, calling for Giles as he went.

“What is it, Angel?  Have you found something alread...” Giles trailed off in confusion as he noticed the box Angel was holding.  “What...?” he began only to be cut off as Angel explained abruptly, “I found it among the books on demons.  It's from Buffy.”

“Buffy!?” the exclamation came not only from Giles but also from Willow and Xander as they hurried over to find out what was going on.

“What's in it?” demanded Xander impatiently.

“I don't know.”  Angel replied and placed the box on the table so the others could read what she had written on its side in large, black letters.

“I'll call Oz and Cordelia,” said Willow at once.  Xander hesitated for a moment, staring at the box, then followed her over to the phone.

Giles just stood looking at the box, then he raised his head to look at Angel.  “She knew,” he said in a stunned voice.  “She knew this was going to happen, had time to prepare...and she didn't tell me...us.”

“I know.  I knew the moment I saw it.  What I don't know is why?  She must have known that I - that we - would have moved heaven and earth to prevent this.  Why didn't she warn me?”  There was naked pain in his voice as he finished speaking but there was no reply.  Only Buffy could have answered him and she wasn't there to do so.  All that any of them could do was wait and hope that the answers they so desperately needed would be found inside the box that she had left for them.

~~~

It took nearly an hour to get Oz and Cordelia to the library and fill them in on everything that had happened and with each passing minute the tension in the room increased, until it was like a living thing, writhing in the air around them.  At last they were ready and everyone gathered round the table as Angel slit the tape that held the box closed and lifted the flaps.

Inside were two envelopes and another box, one of the envelopes was unmarked and Angel reached for the other, which had 'READ THIS FIRST' written across the front.  For a while he just held it, turning it over in his hands and staring at it as though he was trying to read it through the envelope.  Then Xander shifted impatiently and Angel quickly ripped it open and unfolded the letter inside.  With a quick glance at the others, he began to read aloud:
 
 

 My friends,
  I guess you have already figured out that I knew this was coming and you're wondering why I didn't warn you.  The dreams started a month ago, kind of like the ones I had about the master but far less cryptic.  As far as I can tell, that’s because I have to choose and I have to understand the options.

 I know that I should have told you - tried to prepare you - but I knew that you would never accept that there was nothing you could do.  It was selfish of me but I wanted our last time together to be happy, not overshadowed by the knowledge that Y’el’ir was coming for me.

 I've left a package for each of you but before you open them, there is a spell I want you to perform.  You'll find the spell and everything you need for it, in the other envelope.  I know that I don't know anything about magic and you will all be wondering what the spell is for and where I could have got it.  I can't tell you.  If I do then it won't work.  All I can do is ask that you trust me and believe that I would never do anything that could cause you harm.  You will understand the spell's purpose as soon as you complete it and there is an explanation for the rest in an envelope marked 'ANSWERS' inside the second box.  I hope this will make it easier for you now that I am gone.

 There are so many things that I wish I had told you while I had the chance.  I have tried to make up for that in my messages to each of you but I know that it isn't the same.  Life is made up of moments that will never come again.  Make the most of your time together because there is nothing sadder than looking back with regret for what might have been.

 We have always had the unspoken knowledge that I would probably die young.  Please don't mourn for me too much.  I haven't missed out on anything that was really important.  I've known true love, true friendship and true happiness.  That's more than many people get out of 70 or 80 years.  Please remember the good times we had together and smile when you think of me.  If you do that then I will always be with you.

 Goodbye.
   Buffy

Angel's voice broke as he read her name and he closed his eyes and tried to hold back the pain of what had happened.  Tears pressed against his eyelids but he refused to let them fall - there was too much to be done for him to break down now.

When he had regained his composure he looked round at the others, Willow and Cordelia were both crying openly, Xander was trying unsuccessfully to hide the tears streaming down his face, even Oz's eyes were damp.  And Giles?  Giles was too British to cry but there was pain etched in his face and his eyes were glittering with the tears he refused to shed until he was alone.  Looking at him, Angel knew that his own face bore much the same expression - it was the look of a man who had lost everything.  Buffy was the sun around which both their worlds revolved and without her there was nothing but darkness.

At that moment Giles looked straight at him and their eyes met in a moment of complete understanding.  Daughter in all but name to one, true and eternal love to the other: She was all they had.  The others loved her - if she was forever lost to them then they would mourn her sincerely - but they had each other.  They would draw strength from that and move on.  For Giles and Angel moving on was not an option, they had nowhere to go and the grief would remain fresh for the rest of their lives.

~~~

Forcing his mind back to the matter at hand, Angel removed the second envelope from the box and held it in both hands, absently noticing from its weight and uneven balance that it contained more that just paper.  He stood silent until he was sure he had everyone's attention and then said simply, "Buffy wants us to trust her - no matter what this contains, I intend to do as she asks."

"As will I." said Giles at once and one by one, all the others agreed, although Xander looked unhappy about not knowing what he was agreeing to.

Drawing in a deep breath that he didn't need, Angel opened the envelope and carefully emptied its contents onto the table.  There was an ornate dagger, a small clumsily made cloth pouch which had been stitched closed and a two folded pieces of paper which Angel picked up and, after a moment's hesitation, handed to Giles.

Giles' hand shook as he unfolded the papers and his eyes blurred with tears as he looked at her large, curly handwriting.  Forcing the tears away he read what she had written and looked up to find that everyone was watching him expectantly. "The, the ritual seems quite simple," he stated "nothing more complicated than a blood circle seems to be involved."

"A what?" asked Xander nervously.

"A blood circle, it's when... Well, why don't I read what Buffy has written," Giles suggested, "it explains exactly what you will be required to do and it will save confusion later on." Without waiting for anyone to reply he began to read aloud:
 

"To perform the ritual:
Each person must make a shallow cut about 1-inch long at the base of each thumb. You must arrange the circle in this order: Angel, Xander, Cordelia, Willow, Oz, Giles. Place the bloody dagger in the centre of the circle.

 Each person must voluntarily press the cut on their left hand against the cut on the right hand of the person next to them so that the entire group forms an unbroken circle, bound together by blood.  Angel and Giles must hold the cloth pouch pressed between their palms so that it is soaked in their blood and then Giles must read the words of the spell aloud."

At his words everyone glared at him but, surprisingly, it was Cordelia who spoke first and her voice was thoughtful, "Buffy certainly wasn't crazy and she must have known how you'd react, so...this must have been really, really important to her."  She looked down at the smooth skin on her hands and shuddered at the thought of deliberately making cuts that might scar but then she raised her head again and said, "If it meant that much to her...I'll do it."

Angel looked at her with astonished respect and reflected on how much she had changed from the spoiled, self-centred bitch that she had been when he first met her.  Willow interrupted his thoughts, saying firmly, "Cordelia's right, Xander.  Can you really refuse to do this after everything Buffy's done for us?"

The unspoken thought that this might be Buffy's last request hovered in the air and after a moment Xander's shoulders sagged in defeat and he said, "Fine, fine, I'll do it.  Lets just get this over with before I change my mind!"  As he spoke he snatched up the dagger that Buffy had left them and stalked to the centre of the library where there was sufficient space for them to form the circle.  The others looked at each other and then followed him, Angel picking up the cloth pouch and Giles the paper on which was written the words to the spell.

As he took his place in the circle, Giles looked round in confusion, unsure how he was to read the spell when he couldn't hold it in either hand.  Then he realised that Buffy had planned for even this and deliberately written large enough for him to read it if he placed it on the ground in front of him.  He did so and straightened to find that Xander was still holding the dagger and looking extremely reluctant to use it.

Xander realised that everyone was watching him and decided that he was more afraid of looking like a coward than he was of the pain the knife might cause.  He quickly ran the sharp blade against his hand and was surprised and relieved to discover that it didn't hurt all that much, the blade was a sharp as a scalpel and he quickly did the same to his other hand.  Blood stained the handle of the knife and dripped down to land on the floor as he quickly passed the knife over to Cordelia saying softly as he did so; "The blade's so sharp that it really doesn't hurt much."

Cordelia gave him a grateful look and quickly cut her own palms not giving herself time to think about what she was doing, and so it went, round the circle no one looking happy about what they were doing but no one refusing to do it.  Angel was last and he cut his palms without hesitation and then stepped forward to place the dagger in the very centre of the circle.  When he resumed his place he looked at Giles and Xander and then raised his hands in a clear invitation to form the circle.  The hand Angel extended to Giles was angled upwards so that the pouch that rested over the cut on his thumb didn't slip to the floor.  Xander looked at the blood on his hands and froze but Giles looked at him and then pressed his left hand to Angel's right, covering the pouch and holding it in place, their blood quickly soaking the material.  At the same time Giles raised his other hand for Oz.  The circle formed quickly, in a kind of chain reaction, Oz, then Willow, then Cordelia. Xander pressed his hand to Cordelia's but he made no move to touch Angel.  Everyone was starting to think that he was going to refuse when he finally drew in a deep breath and placed his hand against Angel's, shuddering at the feel of his cold skin, sticky with his equally cold blood but he didn't have a chance to think about it for long.  As soon as the circle was completed a surge of power flowed through the group and they felt their hair stand on end.  Ignoring the eerie sensation as best he could, Giles looked down at the spell and said in a firm, clear voice:

"bang 'ej 'ut
cheghDaq net Sahvetlh Soh
naQDaq yab je porgh
ghoS maH qoy'
'elvam 'Iw gho voq
maH 'Ip pagh naDev neH SoH 'ej
meqma' pongmeHvam watlhlu'"

As Giles finished speaking each of them felt a wrench in their chest and balls of glowing light shot from them and intersected in the centre of the circle.  The lights joined and grew brighter, growing larger all the time. They closed their eyes and instinctively tried to cover them with their hands, to shield them from the light that was now a glowing column of fire that seemed as bright as the sun, but they discovered that they were unable to break the circle and could do nothing except turn their heads away.  The light grew until it filled the circle, blindingly bright but giving off no heat, and just when they thought that their eyes could take no more, it flashed impossibly brighter and vanished.  As the light faded, weakness overtook them and they all collapsed where they stood.
 
 

Part Three

The clumsy movement from the usually graceful vampire drew the others attention and they all looked over and saw what he was staring at.  Everyone froze and for what seemed like an eternity, nobody spoke.  It was Giles who broke the silence, struggling to his feet and saying in a broken whisper, “Jenny?”

Jenny Calendar looked back at him, her expression confused. “Rupert?  What's going on?”

Giles approached her slowly, raising his hand to touch her cheek, half afraid the it would pass right through her but her skin was warm and solid under his fingers and with a harsh sob that seemed to be torn from his chest, he pulled her into his arms.  “My God, Jenny!  Jenny!  I thought I'd never see you again!”  He held her tightly, as if he never intended to let go and Jenny's arms came up and she held him comfortingly.  Instinctively she lifted her face to his and their lips met in a kiss that healed all the pain that had come before.

Eventually, Giles remembered that they had an audience and ended the kiss.  They smiled at each other and then a small frown creased Jenny forehead, “What happened, Rupert?  Why were you so upse...” she broke off as memory flashed in her eyes.  “Oh, God!  I'm dead!  This isn't possible!  I can't be here!  I can't... I can't...” Panic filled her voice and she tried to move out of Giles' embrace but he wouldn't let her go.

“No, Jenny, it's alright.” he told her soothingly. “You're not dead.  You were,” he admitted, “but Buffy found a spell to bring you back.”

“Buffy did?” she asked incredulously.  “She doesn't know any magic, how could she find a spell like this.  I've never heard of anyone successfully restoring life to the dead.”  She tried again to step away from Giles and this time he let her go, relieved that her panic seemed to have been replaced by curiosity.

For the first time, Jenny became aware that they had an audience and she blushed slightly at the way she had been behaving with Giles.   Four astonished faces gazed at her and then Willow threw herself into her arms and began to babble about how glad she was to see her and that she weren’t dead.  Oz, Cordelia and Xander told her the same thing but they didn't hug her.  When Willow eventually released her, a movement off to the left caught her attention and she looked over to find that Angel was standing in the shadows, watching the happy reunion.  She flinched, remembering the last time...remembering the feel of his hands on her throat a second before he snapped her neck.

Giles noticed her reaction and followed her gaze to Angel.  Cupping her shoulders with his hands he told her softly, “We found the curse you left, Jenny, Angel has his soul.”

She looked at him, seeking confirmation of his words in his eyes and then her common sense kicked in and she realised that no one would be so unconcerned about Angel's presence in the library if the demon were still in control.  Squaring her shoulders, she moved to stand in front of Angel.

He didn't speak; he just looked at her, his dark eyes so full of pain and remorse that the sight of them made her want to weep and instantly banished all fear of him.  Forcing back the tears that threatened she opened her mouth to speak and then closed it again, aware that nothing she said would convince him that he was not to blame for what had happened.  Instead, Jenny reached up and pulled Angel into a gentle hug.  He stiffened in astonishment but she refused to release him, urging his head down to her shoulder and stroking the thick softness of his hair as she murmured soft words of understanding and forgiveness.

Angel's eyes were wet when they finally separated and he said, brokenly, “I'm sorry, I'm so sorry for what I did.”

“I'm sorry too,” she told him, “You were my friend and I betrayed your trust.  I'd like to get that friendship back...do you think that we could start over?”

“I-I'd like that.”  Angel nodded, dazed by the fact that she didn't appear to hate him for what he'd done and feeling the burden of guilt lift just a little because of her forgiveness.  He wished that Buffy were there; the pain of what had happened to her was so overwhelming that he could feel little else.  He could see, looking at the others, that, in their joy over Ms. Calendar’s return, they had temporarily forgotten Buffy.

It was Jenny herself who reminded them when she looked around and asked curiously, “Where's Buffy?  I want to thank her and ask where she got that spell.”  Just that quickly, the joyful mood was broken, the harsh winds of reality blowing through the library and leaving everyone chilled.

“I...um...that is...” Giles stammered, “We...we... don't know.”

“You don't know?” Jenny repeated incredulously.  “Rupert, how can you not know where she is?  What's happened since I've been gone?”

“Well...er...that's a very long story.”

“So give me the digest version”

Giles sighed and then said, “Fine, but since even the digest version is a long story I suggest that we all sit down.”

~~~

Nearly two hours later, Jenny had been given a detailed account of the events of that evening as well as a brief outline of the nine months she had been gone and they were all standing nervously around the table, waiting to see what Buffy had left for them. Angel opened the box and laid its contents out on the table, handling everything as though it were made of the finest crystal and would shatter if he were the least bit rough with it.

When the box was empty, lying on the table were: two packages addressed to Angel and Giles, two cassettes one for Cordelia, one for Oz, two video tapes one for Giles and one Angel and seven letters one each for Xander, Willow, Jenny, Cordelia and Oz and two others, marked 'Answers' and 'Angel, Giles, Willow and Xander'. There was also a little note, which read:

I meant to leave a video for each of you, but I hit this
big, ugly vamp with my camcorder and it broke. Sorry.
All my love,
Buffy.

Their smiles soon faded and Giles hesitantly reached out for the envelope marked 'Answers'. He opened it carefully and withdrew a single sheet of paper. Realising that everyone was watching him with bated breath, he unfolded it and began to read aloud:
 

"I know that you must be wondering how I knew about this spell. So here is everything I know about it. Ever since the dreams began I have noticed that my powers were getting stronger and more varied. For the last month I have been able to leave my body at any time I wanted to (like Billy but I could do it whenever I chose). Several times you have talked to me in the library while I was at home and once I went on patrol without leaving my room.

I don't know if it has something to do with me being the Slayer or if it is normal when you're an asteroid body, but I have found that I can have very interesting conversations with the spirits of the dead. On one of my outings I ran into the spirit of a former slayer called Leila. We have been talking on a regular basis ever since and two weeks ago she took me to see a very nice Mage who calls himself Marellaan, who died in 1683, and I asked him if there was any way for me to bring back Ms. Calendar. He was very helpful and told me exactly what this spell can do and assured me that, if you have followed the instructions I left for you, she should be reading this with you right now. I hope so, anyway.

The whole spell is based on trust, you had to trust me without knowing what it would do, you had to stand next to and share blood with, the person you trust the least in the circle and work with them to achieve an unknown end. According to Marellaan it is trust that works the spell not blood, the blood is simply a way of testing that trust. I am afraid that this means that you can never use the spell again unless you can find another 6 people who don't know what it will do and are willing to trust you completely. That kind of trust is rare and I am truly lucky if I have been able to inspire it in you.

Buffy.

Giles took off his glasses and began to clean them absently saying as he did so, "This is quite unprecedented, I've never heard of a Slayer who could communicate with the dead... Although the prophetic dreams of the more powerful Slayers are well documented and Buffy was...is the strongest Slayer I know of."

"I don't think that comparing Buffy to other Slayers is going to help, Giles," said Angel wryly, pretending that he hadn't noticed Giles' slip. "After all, before her it was the chosen one now it's the chosen two...not to mention that she fell in love with me - a vampire. I don't think its possible to face her with a rule that she can't break one way or another."

"There is evidence to suggest that some kind of trigger is required to bring a Slayer up to her full potential," said Giles thoughtfully, "It's possible that the events of the past month have proved to be that trigger where Buffy is concerned. I believed that it was battle with the Master but I may have been mistaken. Buffy is already stronger than those Slayers that I know to have survived long enough to reach their full strength so if she is indeed only now reaching her prime, she shall undoubtedly be the strongest Slayer ever recorded by a quite astonishing margin.

You're quite right, Angel; there is no point in comparing Buffy to other Slayers because there has never been a Slayer like her before. She is utterly unique - one of a kind." He fell silent, reflecting on his good fortune in being assigned as Buffy's Watcher until a nudge from Jenny reminded him of their current situation.

"Um...what, what I suggest is this," he said slowly, "I, I imagine that everyone will wish to, to discover what Buffy has left for them in private... Ordinarily I would advise you all to go home but it is still imperative that we discover her whereabouts as quickly as possible, so instead I recommend that we each take it in turns to use my office while the rest of us research this demon. It's quiet and no one will disturb you - I have a somewhat dusty video and a cassette player in there, so that shouldn't be a problem."

Everyone agreed and Willow asked, "Who goes first?"

No one spoke. They were torn between the desire to know what Buffy had written and the equally strong desire to forget all about it because reading the letters seemed like an admission that she might not return.

Jenny was the first to move, picking up the envelope addressed to Angel, Giles, Willow & Xander and holding it out to Angel. "Why don't you start with this? You four were the ones the demon summoned - it might tell us something useful. If you think it'll help us you can tell the rest of us what it says when you're finished."

Everyone nodded and Angel hesitantly took the letter and walked slowly into Giles' office, with Giles himself right behind him. Willow and Xander exchanged nervous glances and then followed. The door closed behind them, leaving Oz, Cordelia and Jenny alone in the main library. They knew that they should be researching and could hear nothing of what was said but somehow none of them were able to turn away and they watched through the window while Angel carefully opened the letter.

~~~

Angel released a shaky and unneeded breath as he opened the envelope and carefully extracted a single sheet of paper. Giles, Willow and Xander all looked at him expectantly, fairly buzzing with nervous anticipation as he began to read aloud:

To Angel, Giles, Willow & Xander

Please don't blame yourselves for this; if it hadn't been you then it would have been others that I care about. I would still have been forced to make the choice. There was no other decision that I could make; I wouldn't have been able to live with myself if I had chosen to do other than what I did. My death was inevitable from the moment these events were set in motion.

You are the four people that I love most in the entire world - which is the reason you were taken. I don't regret that love and I hope that you don't either. Please remember that the only way this could have been prevented is if I cared for nothing and nobody and I truly believe that death would be preferable to such a barren existence.

Thank you all for giving my life meaning,

Buffy

Giles who summed up what they were all feeling when he said in a hoarse voice, "She knows us all so well, she knew how we would feel and just what to say to alleviate the guilt. How did she get to be so wise when she is still so young?"

Angel just shook his head, unable to reply but Willow said quietly, "Buffy listens. She doesn't seem to because she's always so active but she hears everything you say and most of the things you don't and because of that, I think she knows us better than we know ourselves.

Angel thought about what Willow had just said and suddenly realised that she was right: Buffy did listen. She always knew how to get him to talk and she could tell what his mood was almost as soon as she saw him. When he was brooding over the past, Buffy could make him laugh. Never in his life had he met someone who understood instinctively in the way she did and it wasn't just with him - it always her that the others turned to when they needed help or advice and she never let them down. In fact, in as long as he could remember, Buffy had never let anyone down - she always came through for people.

At that moment Angel stopped thinking of Buffy as a child. Always before he had believed that he had to be the one to make the decisions about their relationship because she was too young to know what she wanted but he suddenly realised that it wasn't true. Buffy possessed an emotional maturity that few people achieved, regardless of their age, and she saw things far more clearly than he had ever given her credit for.

Looking around at the others, Angel saw the same realisation on Giles' face and knew that if - that when - Buffy returned it would be as an equal.

Xander looked puzzled, knowing that something profound had happened because of the note but unsure what. Breaking the silence that had descended, he asked, "So do we show this to the others, or what?"

"Um…yes, yes I think so." Giles said, "It gives us a little more information to use in our search and as things stand at the moment we will need every clue we can find."
 

Part Four

Shaking off thoughts of what might have happened if Buffy had never come to Sunnydale, he focused on the letter.

Dear Oz, Please take care of Willow. I'm glad that you will be here to support her, I know that she is going to take what's happened to me hard and she will be so busy trying to help the others that she will hide her own feelings until they start to fester inside her. I don't know you as well as I would have liked but having seen how happy you make Willow, I am glad to count you as my friend. She is so special and I think that you are the first person to really see that. I know you love her and I also know how hurt you were by what happened with Xander. I hope the tape I've enclosed will help to make everything right again. You two need each other.
Goodbye,Buffy.

It was a recording of several conversations between Buffy and Willow during which Willow expressed all the pain and guilt she had been feeling since she kissed Xander. The whole tape was immensely emotional but one conversation in particular caught Oz's attention and made his eyes burn with unshed tears as it drove away his greatest fear - that it would happen again.

(Willow)"Buffy, I don't know what to do. I've spent so long wanting Xander to notice me and now he has and all I want is Oz to talk to me again. I thought I loved Xander but now it's like he's my brother or something and every time I see Oz my heart goes peculiar in a way it never did with Xander. What am I going to do if Oz never forgives me!?" (Willow bursts into tears)

Willow sat down at Giles' desk and looked at the envelope she held in her hands. A small part of her was bursting with curiosity about what Buffy had written but the longer she sat there, the more reluctant she became to find out. It was as if by reading the letter she was admitting that Buffy was gone and she wasn't ready to do that but neither could she put it down. So she just sat there, staring at her own name written in Buffy's big, curvy script. What finally prompted her to open it was the awareness that everyone was waiting for her - waiting for their turn to discover what had been left for them - and she suddenly understood why Angel had said he wanted to be last.

She picked up Giles' letter opener and slit open the envelope. Then, drawing a deep breath, she extracted the letter and began to read.

Dear Willow,

Ever since I moved to Sunnydale you have been my dearest friend. No matter what happened you were always there to provide me with support, understanding and almost limitless loyalty and patience. You were my defender when others criticised, my confidante when I was in pain and the voice of reason when one was needed. Most important of all you accepted Angel when he returned and I shall always love you for that. It was so hard for me and knowing that you were willing to support us was a great help.

I wish that I had told you all this before. You give so much and you ask for so little in return that I am ashamed to admit that I have sometimes taken you for granted. I am so glad that you have found Oz because I know that he will treat you as you deserve to be treated. It shows in his eyes that every time he looks at you he sees the most precious thing in the world and all he wants is for you to be happy.

Please take care of Angel, give him the same loyalty and support that you have always given me. He is going to be so lost now that I'm gone and he will try to withdraw into himself, believing that he isn't wanted around and blaming himself for everything. He carries such a heavy burden of undeserved guilt, please don't let him carry it alone and don't let him greet the sun because of me.

Be happy, Willow and remember that in being my friend you gave me a far greater gift than you will ever know.
Goodbye,

Buffy

She didn't know how long she cried but at some point she became aware that she was no longer alone. Oz had entered the office and was holding her in his arms, murmuring soothing nonsense into her hair as he rocked her gently back and forth. Her arms went round him and she cried on his shoulder for a while but his presence eased her pain and gradually the tears stopped.

Willow sniffled and looked at him, saying in a small voice, "I thought you were mad at me?"

"I was. Buffy set me straight, I mean, I'm still hurt by what happened and all… but I, I care about you and she made me see that you feel the same so...if you want...I'm willing to give it another try."

Oz sounded as cool as ever but there was a hopeful look in his eyes that warmed Willows heart and she wondered why she had ever been attracted to Xander as she looked into his eyes and cried happily, "Yes, oh yes, I want to - more than anything."

His arms tightened around her and their lips met in a gentle kiss that held both forgiveness and hope for the future.

When the kiss ended, Oz gently brushed Willow's hair away from her red, tearstained face and said quietly, "Come on, lets go figure out how to get Buffy back so that we can thank her."

She nodded and carefully tucked Buffy's letter back into its envelope before taking Oz's hand and walking out of the office.
 
 

Part Five

Dear Cordelia,

You and I have never really been that close, I guess in many ways you remind me of myself before I became the Slayer and that has always made me a little hard on you. I try not to remember what my life used to be like and I envy you for having a choice about your future.

Despite everything I consider you to be my friend and you have never let me down. You complain as automatically as Xander cracks jokes but you are always there, ready to help when you're needed and you have become a trusted and valued member of the group. I know that you sometimes feel like you're an outsider and don't truly belong, please remember that we are all your friends and we all care about you.

Forcing herself to focus through her tears, she resumed reading.

Which brings me to Xander, I know he was a jerk and I know how badly you were hurt by what he did - even though you try to hide it - but he really does love you and he's devastated by what happened. I know it will be hard for you to trust him again but love is too precious to throw away in anger. I have left you a tape, which I hope will help to improve the situation between the two of you.
Be happy,

Buffy.

(Xander) "I don't know what to do Buffy! Cordelia won't even talk to me."

(Buffy) "Can you blame her?"

(Xander) "No, not at all, but I miss her so much. I didn't realise just how much I love her until she was hurt. I was so scared she'd die and it put the whole thing with Willow into perspective."

(Buffy) "Put it into perspective how?"

(Xander) "I've known Will all my life, she's always been there for me and then she started dating Oz. I guess it suddenly occurred to me that she wasn't 'my' Willow any more. I felt like I was losing the past and I was trying to hold onto it in any way I could. But when I saw Cordy lying there, bleeding, I realised that I really didn't mind losing Willow to Oz, but I couldn't bear to lose Cordelia. I mean, I know that Willow will always be my friend but it used to be that whenever anything happened in my life, my first thought would be that I had to tell Willow. These days, my first thought is always of Cordy and it hurts so much not seeing her, not being with her… its like I have this constant ache in my chest and she's the only thing that can make it go away."

Xander was standing near the counter with a book in his hands and he looked at her in concern, his expression turning to stunned surprise as she threw herself into his arms and cried on his shoulder. After a moment's hesitation, his arms came up and held her tightly against him. Gradually, her tears lessened and she looked up into his worried eyes, she still didn't speak; she just closed her eyes and pressed her lips softly against his.

Everyone looked on and, for a moment, the atmosphere in the room lightened just a little. Willow and Oz smiled at each other, guessing that Buffy had done the same for Cordelia and Xander as she had for them.

Giles wrapped his arms round Jenny and she looked up over her shoulder and smiled at him, her eyes shinning with love.

Unnoticed by the others, Angel's dark eyes darkened even further in pain. Everything was the way Buffy had wanted it. Lately she had spent a lot of her time telling him how she wished that her friends could be happy together and trying to think of ways to get Willow, Oz, Xander and Cordelia back together. Now they were, her plans had paid off, she would have been so happy at the sight of them, Giles holding Jenny, Oz hugging Willow and Xander kissing Cordelia…none of them were alone any more - but she wasn't here to see it. Unable to watch any longer, he put down the book he had been reading and disappeared silently into the stacks in search of another. It wasn't that he begrudged the others their happiness; it was just that it seemed so deeply unfair that Buffy couldn't be happy too.

Xander entered the office and sat down at Giles’ desk.  He had been reluctant to leave Cordelia but she had urged him to find out what Buffy had written.  The effect of her letters on the others had been profound and he was almost afraid of what he might read while, at the same time, he was consumed with curiosity and the hope that her words to him would effect him as greatly as they had the others.  Drawing in a deep breath he ripped open the envelope and began to read.

  Dear Xander,

You have been my friend ever since I came here and I thank you for that.  You reminded me not to take my life too seriously and you always made me laugh when my responsibilities were weighing me down.  You accepted me, and the strangeness of my life and you have never hesitated when I have needed your support, even when I tried to push you away.  Many times you have put yourself in danger for no reason other than you thought that I needed your help.   You've been like a brother to me and I love you dearly for it.

There was only one thing that you refused to accept: Angel.  You may think that this is a strange time to bring it up, but I need you to understand.  I love Angel - nothing will ever change that.  He makes me complete in a way that nothing else ever can.  He's my light against the darkness and without him I have nothing to live for except my duty and that is a cold consolation at best.  I'm sorry if this hurts you (the last thing I want is to cause you, or any of the others, more pain) and I know that you and Giles and Willow and Oz and even Cordelia are all there for me but it isn't enough.  When Angel isn't with me there's this huge, gaping hole inside me where my heart and soul should be.  Even though we know that we can never truly be together, just seeing him or hearing his voice gives me peace and of all the things in my life, peace is the rarest and most treasured.

I know that you don't understand how I can still love Angel after everything that Angelus did.  The answer is very simple: They are not the same, any more that you and the hyena were the same.  Angelus was and is a monster, a demon that Angel has to live with every day and more than anything else I wish that there were a way for me to kill the demon and free Angel from his burden.  I hate Angelus, more for Angel's sake than because of anything he did to me.  Angel suffers so much because he blames himself for everything the demon did but it was not his fault, I wish that I could make him see things the way I do.

Angel is completely unconnected to the demon that shares his body; he is my soul mate, with all that that implies.  He has a good soul, a beautiful, tortured soul and that is what I love - his soul, not his body.  I love him no matter what he looks like.  When he vamps out I don't even notice any more, when I look at him all that I see is my Angel.

There is a reason why I've told you all this: I want you to give him a break, something you never did before.  All you've ever seen when you look at him is a vampire and a threat to your place in my life.  In your heart you have to know that he would never hurt you - he'd die first.  And as to being your rival, Angel would never try to force you out of my life because he loves me, he knows how much I treasure your friendship and, for my sake, he would gladly try to be your friend.

Angel will be desperately alone right now and it would probably take very little for you to drive him away.  Please, even if nothing I've just said has made any impression on you then, for my sake, give him a chance.  I am sure that when you get past your prejudice and his taciturnity you will be friends.  It might be an idea for you to let him read this if you decide to do as I ask, it will save you from having to make awkward explanations but of course that's up to you.

Take good care of Cordelia, she is far more sensitive than she acts and I know that she was deeply hurt by what happened between you and Willow.  I have left her something that I hope will improve the situation between the two of you but you will need to treat her gently for the next few weeks and prove to her that she can trust you.  I have no doubt that even after you make up she will take great pleasure in making you grovel for quite some time.

Be happy, Xander, remember the good times we had together and let the bad remain in the past where they belong.
Goodbye,

Buffy

Ever since they had met Buffy had always been there when he needed her but when she had needed his support he had refused to give it.  Indeed he had made her pain worse.  The memory of what he had done when Buffy had gone to face Angelus entered his mind and for the first time he bitterly regretted his actions.  He had betrayed her – and Willow and Angel and Oz and Giles and Cordelia and even himself.  At the time he had justified it by telling himself that if Buffy knew she might hesitate at a crucial moment and damn them all but now he admitted that his motives were far more ignoble.  He hadn’t wanted Angel back so he had manipulated Buffy, forcing her to kill the man she loved and wounding her more deeply than he had ever imagined.

There was nothing he could do to change the past but at that moment Xander resolved to do as she had asked, he would show Angel the letter and try to give up his vendetta and, when they found Buffy, he would confess what he had done.  He knew that she would probably hate him but she deserved to know.

He started to fold the letter and return it to it’s envelope when he noticed that there was a post script written on the back of the last sheet, it read:

P.S. No guilt Xander, I didn’t write this to make you regret the past, just to make you think about the future and realize that Angel is not an enemy.

I know what has gone before and what Willow did and didn’t say and it doesn’t matter anymore.  Let it go.

You are and will always be one of my dearest friends.

Be happy,
B.

Rising quickly to his feet he left the office to look for Angel.  He found him in the stacks, looking through a thick book.  Angel looked at him inquiringly but didn’t speak as Xander stood awkwardly in front of him, his eyes full of tears.  After a long silence he held out the letter and blurted quickly “I…I…Buffy suggest you should read this.  She’s right…everything she says is right and…and I’m sorry.  I’m so sorry I…” A sob choked his voice and he thrust the letter into Angel’s hand and walked quickly away, leaving the astonished vampire staring after him.

~~~

Some time later, Angel emerged from the stacks and walked over to where Xander was sitting with Cordelia.  His eyes glistened with tears as he returned the letter.  “Thank you.” He said huskily.

Xander shook his head as he took it, “No, thank you.  You made her happy – I never appreciated that before but I should have.  No one ever deserved happiness more.”

Angel nodded and, in a single moment of complete understanding and agreement, both were suddenly aware that they had taken the first step towards what could become a true and lasting friendship.
 
 

Part Six

Dear Ms Calendar,
I'm sorry for the way I treated you when I found out that you were here to watch Angel.  I know that you would have prevented what happened if you could have but at the time I needed someone to lash out at and you suffered because of that and because of Giles' loyalty to me.  I can never thank you enough for recreating the curse so that Angel could be restored to me. Even though we all treated you so badly you still tried to help.  I didn't know you that well but I am proud and grateful to be able to claim that you were my friend.

Please forgive Angel for what Angelus did - the memory of your death haunts him so much and he refuses to believe that it wasn't his fault.  I hope that if you tell him that you forgive him for what happened he might begin to forgive himself.

Take care of Giles for me.  Remind him that there is more to life than his books and make sure he has fun once in a while.  Please don't let him blame himself about what happened to me.  If you can make him happy then everything will have been worthwhile.

Goodbye,
         Buffy

P.S. I haven't been able to find anyone in the spirit world who knows how to break the clause in Angel's curse.  If there is any way that you could help then please, please try.  I would like to think of him being happy again someday even though I know that it can never be with me.

Giles slowly made his way into his office and sat down, holding the things Buffy had left him in his hands, never in the years since he had come to Sunnydale had he been so reluctant to be there.

He looked around at the books stacked on every available surface and had a sudden violent desire to sweep them all onto the floor.  What good were they?  He was Buffy’s Watcher, charged with keeping her safe and yet he had not even seen this coming.  His mind slipped back in time, remembering another occasion when Buffy had known she was going to die.

‘“Read me the signs!” Buffy hurled a book at him, “Tell me my fortune!” Another book flew at his head,  “You’re so useful sitting here with all of your books, you’re really a lot of help(!)”

“Giles I’m sixteen years old…I-I don’t wanna die.” ’

Well, now she was nearly eighteen years old and he was no more help now then he had been then; less, this time he hadn’t even known it was coming.  She had faced her fear alone and with dignity in order to spare her friends and he hadn’t seen it, no one, not even Angel, had.  When had she learned to hide her feelings so well?  When had she changed so much?  He’d known she was different, her eyes were old now; windows to a soul that had seen and endured too much – more than any one ever should – and knew that there was no rest in sight.  Even when she smiled the sadness in them lingered, only when she was with Angel did it ever disappear completely, that was the reason he had not fought harder against the vampire’s re-entry into their lives.

He had always known, ever since he was a small boy, that Slayers did not live very long.  He had known from the day he met her that Buffy would probably live a short life with a violent end and that every night she survived was a victory.  He had known that he would most likely outlive her.  Somehow though, knowing and believing were very different.  She was so full of life that it was almost impossible to think of her in the stillness of death, she had endured more, survived more, than any Slayer before her.  In over 10,000 years of history there was no one who could match her and in his heart he had begun to believe that she would defeat the odds.  After all, she had broken every other rule, why not this one?  Even now, he still had hope; an almost childlike faith that she would be all right, but he feared that watching what she had clearly intended to be her final goodbye would take that hope away.

With shaking hands, stood up, slipped the video into the player and picked up the control.  It took him a few minutes to figure out how to work it, then he pressed play and Buffy’s face appeared on the screen and her voice filled the small room.

“Hi, Giles.”
She said with her usual cheerful smile but it quickly faded and her voice became serious.
“This was not your fault.  I know you always feel like you should be able to protect me from all harm, even while as the Slayer you are always sending me out to fight a new monster.  I know that you will be taking this hard and I hope that Jenny will be able to comfort you.

Don’t mourn for me too much, I’ve had a lot more than most Slayers as you are well aware and I thank you for that. I know from what Kendra said when she first came here that you have broken a lot of rules for me.  My Watcher was never intended to also be my friend and I should never have had any kind of life outside being the Slayer.  You spared me that loneliness and in doing so, saved both my life and my sanity.  One way or another, I owe you everything.

  I’ve never told you how much you mean to me.  You’ve been so much more than my Watcher.  You are my mentor, my dear, dear friend and above all like a father to me, as long as you’re around it really doesn’t matter that my real father is never there for me.  I wish that just once I had embarrassed you terribly by giving you a hug and telling you how much I love you and how important the sense of stability you give to my life has been.

I hope…” Buffy stopped and glanced over her shoulder, then she looked back at the camera with a quick smile, saying “Excuse me a moment, I’ll be right back.”

“Sorry about that.”  She said and then added with another smile, “Now you can criticise my Slaying technique from the comfort of your own home.”  She frowned slightly and asked, “Where was I?  Oh, yeah, I really hope that the spell worked right, I don’t want to cause you any more pain by reminding you of the past if it didn’t.

I have to assume that everything went the way I planned because I can’t stand the thought of you being alone.  I know I have become the focal point of your life, I sometimes think that your duty and love for me is all that keeps you going and it’s not enough."

"Be happy with Jenny, Giles, and make the most of every moment you have together.  Don't let fear or embarrassment keep you from telling her how much you love her.

I hope that the two of you have a long and happy life together.  Even though you’re kinda old and there’s an ick factor, I like the thought of you living a life of contented domesticity and I know for sure that you’d make a superb father.”   She wrinkled her nose at her own words and said, “I’ve been spending way too much time with you, I’m starting to talk funny.”

Her slightly mischievous expression abruptly turned serious and her eyes were sad as she said, unconsciously leaning forwards slightly to emphasise the importance her words,

 “Please be a friend to Angel for me.  He, more than any of you, is going to be devastated by this.  Don't let him go back to being all alone, I think you'll find that you and he have a lot in common if you just give it a chance.  I know it’s hard for you to be around him after what Angelus did to you, but you know that he is not the same person.  Now that Jenny is back it should be easier for you to accept him as himself and not see Angelus every time you look at him.”

Buffy’s voice drew him from his thoughts and he returned his full attention to the TV screen.

Take care of yourself and smile when you think of all the trouble that I've caused you.  I know there must have been times when you wished I could be more like Kendra but you have to admit that life would have been far less interesting if I were.

I’ve left you my Slayer Diary; it contains, among other things, my thoughts about every battle that I’ve ever fought.  I hope that it will be of use to you, the council would benefit from a Slayer’s eye view, I think.”

Buffy gave one last sad smile “Goodbye,” she said softly, leaning forwards to touch the camera and then, abruptly, she was gone, the picture replaced by static.

Picking up the package he had placed on the desk he unwrapped it carefully to reveal two thick leather diaries with unusually sturdy locks on the front but as the keys had been tied to the lock of the first diary with cotton, opening them posed no problem.

He was a little reluctant to read them, knowing that when Buffy returned she would probably want them back and be embarrassed that he had read her private thoughts but more then that, now was not the time.  Reading about the past could wait, first they had to figure out where she had disappeared to and it was possible that she had left some clue behind.  Carefully detaching the keys he opened the first book and discovered that it was dated 1996 and the first entry chronicled her feelings upon being approached by her first Watcher, Merrick.  Despite his curiosity he closed it and unlocked the second, turning quickly to the last entries she had made.

Reading quickly he was disappointed to discover that she had written little that could be of any help to them.  She mentioned the dreams and the choice but only in the vaguest terms, choosing instead to write about her quest into the spirit world and her feelings about her approaching death.

She had written about her fear of what was to come and her grief that she must leave her loved ones but more, she had written of her relief, saying:

‘I have always known that I should die young and it is a relief to know that at least my death shall not be in vain.  I can think of no greater cause than to protect the life of the people that I love and there is comfort in the knowledge that their lives shall go on and they will get to experience all that my duty has denied me.
One of my greatest fears has been that I would die a meaningless death, unable to defeat an evil that threatens to destroy all that I care for and that I should leave my friends to face the darkness alone.

I know that a new darkness will come but so, in time, shall a new Slayer and until she does, the vampire numbers in Sunnydale are at an all time low as I have been searching out and destroying their nests.  Of late, many have fled for safety and those that remain keep a low profile, avoiding such places as the Bronze, where I am known to hang out.  Since Spike and Drucilla are gone they have no leader and they willingly take the path of least resistance.”

His brow furrowed and his concern deepened still further.  What could be so bad that she wouldn’t want them to know?  It wasn’t her death; she had been quite open about the fact that she believed she would die.  Something in her dreams had led Buffy to believe that it would be worse for them to know her fate then it would be for them to just accept that she was dead and live with the uncertainty of not knowing what had happened.

He shuddered as a sudden chill worked its way up his spine.  For a moment he considered telling the others what he believed he had learned but quickly decided against it.  He could not see how telling them would help and it would only serve to deepen their pain.  Quickly he placed the diaries in his desk with the video and left the office, determined to find something that would help her.
 
 

Part Seven

Drawing a deep, unneeded breath, he ran the tape.  The video whirred and then, suddenly, there she was.

She was sitting on the grassy slope of the hill overlooking Sunnydale.  It was their place; where they went to talk or make-out or just sit quietly, glad to be together.  It was infinitely familiar to him and yet everything was different.

The sun shone high up in the sky, lighting the world and revealing every colour imaginable.  The grass was so green and the sky so blue that it seemed almost too perfect to be real but Angel hardly noticed it.  His attention was riveted on Buffy.  The light struck her hair, making it shine as though it were trying to rival the sun, a golden halo, which framed the most beautiful face he had ever seen.  Her eyes sparkled, appearing more green than hazel and her cheeks were glowing, tinged pink by the warmth of the sun, and her lips curved in a gentle smile.

He gazed at her in awe and marvelled that this goddess who could have had any man she desired had seen something worthwhile in him. It seemed to him that her soul shone though, giving her a beauty that transcended earthly limits.  He might be called Angel but – to his mind at least – she truly was one.

Her lips moved and he was so enraptured by the sight of her that it took him a moment to realise that she was speaking.

“Hi, Angel.”  She said, her voice as soft and loving as her smile but with a note of sadness in it.

“You told me once that you wished you could see me in the sunlight.  I know that this isn't what you meant but it was that which gave me the idea of saying goodbye this way.  I know how hard this is for you and I'm sorry.  The last thing I ever wanted to do was cause you pain and it sometimes seems that I have done little else.  There is so much I want to say to you that I don't know where to begin.  You are everything to me, I don't think you have ever realised how much I love you or that you have been my reason for fighting, my reason to exist, day after day.  I have left you my diary in the hopes you will understand how I have felt since I met you.  It isn't the diary I once accused you of reading; I started a new one the night you told me about the curse and ever since then I have been writing you letters in it.  I guess I knew, even then, that I was never going to be able to get you out of my heart.

  Don't blame yourself for what's happened.  There was nothing you could have done to prevent it.  I made the only choice I could.  Please don't add me to the burden of guilt you already carry, I can't stand the idea of adding to your regrets.  You are a truly good person Angel; please believe that.  I love you.  Do you really think that I could love the monster that you believe yourself to be?  It is your soul that makes you who you are and it's your soul that I love.  For you to refuse to accept that is for you to dismiss my opinions as invalid and I don't think you can do that.  I know that a hundred years of guilt can't just be put aside but please try to accept that you had no control over the past.”

For the first time in a long time he deliberately thought about the time when the demon had been in control.  Always before he had looked at it through emotion, seeing nothing but the death and destruction he had caused.  Now, for the first time, he tried to see himself as Buffy did and as he did so he realised that the way he remembered the things he had done as Angelus was different from the way he remembered the things he had done as Angel.  The memory seemed to come from outside him; like a particularly vivid and horrific dream and it dawned on him that they were not his memories.  He knew everything that went on in the mind of the demon but the memories were not his.  Ever since his soul had been restored he had been aware of the demon in his head; screaming to get out, trying to influence him in any way it could, but the demon had no such memories.  His soul hadn’t been suppressed by the demon; it just hadn’t been there.

In his mind he felt the demon howl with rage as his self-hatred lessened.  There would, he knew, always be guilt and pain but for the first time in over 100 years it was tempered by the knowledge that there was nothing he could have done.  He should not have approached Darla in that long ago ally in Galway but he had known nothing of her world and he had paid a harsh penalty for his foolish youth and ignorance.

As he restarted the tape, he remembered how often Buffy had tried to tell him this but he had never accepted it; he’d been so sure that everything was his fault that he had never really listened – until now, when her absence forced him to consider her words in more depth than ever before.

   “Please take care of the others for me and let them be your friends.  Willow already is and if you give the others a chance I am quite sure you will find that you and Giles have a lot in common.  Even Xander isn't nearly as obnoxious as he seems to be when you are around, give him time to get over his prejudice and I believe that the two of you could be friends.”

Her absence was like a deep wound in his soul, which would never close until she was beside him once more.

   “I know it will be hard for you to be around them at first but please try.   I wish with all my heart that I could be with you but that just isn’t possible and I can't stand the thought of you being as alone as you were when we first met.  Don't give up on life just because of me, you may not be able to see me but you will never be alone.” Her eyes were shining with tears but her smile was infinitely tender as she said softly, “My heart belonged to you from the moment we first met and that hasn’t changed.  Wherever you are, whatever you’re doing, my heart will always be with you.

Farewell, my Love.  You really have been my Angel.”

“BUFFY!!!”

Sobs wracked his large frame as he buried his head in his hands and gave in to the grief he had been holding at bay ever since Buffy disappeared.  Consumed by his emotions he didn’t notice the small group of people who had gathered outside the office at his cry.

They stood awkwardly, wanting to ease his pain but knowing that nothing save the small blonde girl he loved could help him.  His tears shocked them for he had always kept his emotions hidden from everyone except Buffy and, feeling as though they were intruding on an intensely private moment by watching him, they turned away to resume their research.

Gradually the tears stopped and Angel rewound the tape and returned it to its box, before picking up the package that Buffy had left for him.  Carefully he unwrapped the diary, which, like the ones she had left Giles, was thick and leather bound with the key tied to the lock.

For a moment he just held it, running his fingers over the leather, thinking of all the times that Buffy must have held it and savouring the sense of connection to her it gave him, then he carefully detached the key and unlocked it, turning to the first page.

It began with the fantasies of a young girl, Lyrical descriptions of his face, his eyes and his body, all reminding him how great the age difference between them was.  But entwined with her thoughts on seeing him without his shirt were deeper thoughts, hinting at the love that was already growing between them.

When she wrote of his curse the worlds resonated with sympathy – no, more, empathy – her understanding of what it was to have a fate you did not choose, her knowledge of what it was to be alone even in a crowd.

She wrote of her desire to take away his guilt and pain and make him see himself through her eyes.  She wrote of how she missed him when they agreed to part and how she had longed for the safety of his arms even as she pushed him away after facing the Master.  She wrote of her joy as they grew closer and her insecurities and fear that he would find her too young and foolish or not of his time.  She wrote of her terror when she dreamed of his death, her rage and fear when he was captured and tortured by Spike and Drucilla, her joy when he returned from Hell, her guilt for sending him there and, at the end, her grief that she had to leave him.

Her every thought and feeling was laid bare before him in a chronicle of joy & sorrow, hope & despair, pain & ecstasy and, above all: Love.  A love that coloured her every thought and action – a love that survived no matter how it was tested.

The mute power of her words stunned him and he was amazed by the joy she found simply by being with him but it was what she had written during the time that Angelus reigned that effected him most.

My dearest Angel,
How is it possible to feel joy and such pain at the same time?

I miss you so and the demon in your body taunts me at every turn, gloating because I cannot kill him.  I know that you would want me to end it but I can’t, I don’t have that kind of strength.  If I accept that you are never coming back to me then I have nothing.  The hope of your return is all that keeps me alive as I face each day without you.  Your soul is so inextricably linked with mine that without you I am nothing but an empty shell.

You’re gone and it’s all my fault and yet somewhere deep within me is a spark of joy that I was able to make you happy.  I cling to that as I fight to stave off despair.  When Angelus taunts me that truth is like a beacon.  A reminder that your love for me was as strong and deep and true as mine is for you.

Willow urges me to date again; she doesn’t understand that there shall never be anyone else for me.  Despite its terrible consequences our single night together was as close to perfection as anything I have ever known or imagined and I shall cling to that memory for as long as I live…

I’m so sorry, I failed you, I failed everyone and now Giles is alone and Jenny is dead.  I hated her for not telling us who she was, for not warning us about what could happen even though deep inside I believed her when she told me that she hadn’t known.  I hated her even though I knew that you wouldn’t want me to and I let Giles turn away from her because of his loyalty to me – all because I needed someone other than myself to blame.

I should have protected her, I should have killed the demon and spared Giles this pain but the most awful thing is that, even now, I don’t know if I can.

…I miss you so.  Even with everything Angelus has done the worst thing about all this is that you aren’t here any more.  You were my light in the darkness, the only one who ever really understood.  You never judged or demanded and with you I could be myself.
You know what it is to have destiny thrust upon you, to have to live a life you never chose.  With you I didn’t always have to be strong, I knew that you would catch me if I fell, hold me if I cried and back me up if I needed it.  I have never felt as safe as I did when I was with you…

…Ms Calendar found the curse! I treated her so badly but she still tried to help.  She must have been working on it when she died.  We found the disk where it had fallen between the desk and the filing cabinet.  I told Willow that I didn’t know what I wanted to do but even before I saw the ring you gave me I knew that I lied.  I want you back.  More than anything on earth I want you back!  I know that it will be hard, you’ll be overwhelmed with guilt, the others won’t like it and we can never really be ‘together’ again and but I need you.  I don’t know how much longer I can bear living without you…

…It’s over.  I no longer have any choice.  To save the world I must fight and kill the demon that wears your face and in the process I shall destroy my own soul.  The demon must die, I can’t let myself think about what will happen should I fail to stop it and when he’s gone, taking all hope of my ever getting you back with him, I’ll end it all because without you I have nothing worth living for…

What have I done?  Your only crime was to love me and for that I condemned you.  I know now that I should have killed the demon long ago, that way you would at least have found peace in death, but that knowledge comes too late and now you suffer for my shortcomings.
Why does fate hate us so?  When you came back I felt, for a moment, such a surge of joy and gratitude that I could almost have flown.  You were with me and I was home, safe in your arms where I shall always belong.

How I wish that I had kept my eyes closed, how I wish I had not seen the demon move.  Could being in the demon dimension with you really be worse that life here without you?

The memory of your face in that moment haunts me.  I had betrayed you and you looked at me with such love and confusion in your eyes as you reached out to me.

I wish I had taken your hand when you reached out to me but I was frozen, transfixed by the sight of what I’d done.  Do you know why I did it?  Do you understand my betrayal?  Do you hate me?

…I ran but everywhere I go the pain of your loss is right there with me, too deep inside me to ever be left behind; every demon I slay seems to wear your face in the moment of its death.  I can’t take anymore; I certainly can’t go back to Sunnydale where every street is a memory of you.  I know that the others will worry but I can’t bring myself to care, I have nothing left to give them.
I haven’t cried for weeks, the pain is too deep for tears.  It fills me until there is no room for anything else leaving me a hollow shell of the person I once was.  Only in my dreams do I have even a spark of life and I exist for the rare occasions that I am able to sleep because those are the times that you are with me.  It’s a bittersweet torment because you hold me in your arms and promise that we will be together forever and then reality intrudes and I wake to find myself alone and it’s like losing you all over again.

I pray for death and yet feel that I don’t deserve the peace that it would bring while you still suffer.  I sit with a knife in my hand and stare at the blade for hours, thinking how easy it would be to end it.  A dozen times a day I bring it to my throat and each time I do, a memory intrudes; I see you offering your life for mine when we faced the Judge together, you thought that I was worth saving and I can’t forget that.  So I live, trying not to think how disappointed in me you would be if you could see me now, taking risks every day until the time comes that my ‘luck’ runs out and I can finally rest…

He had been thinking about leaving Sunnydale, getting away so that Buffy would have a chance to lead a normal life and it was only now that he realised how deeply he would have wounded her if he had acted on his thoughts.  She had lost him once and it had nearly broken her, to lose him a second time might be more than she could stand.  He had thought that what he could offer her wasn’t enough, that life in the shadows with a demon who couldn’t even make love to her would be cheating her.  Now he saw that, imperfect as what he offered was, he could give Buffy something that no one else could: he could make her happy.

“Oh, Buffy, come back to me,” he whispered to the silent pages, “I’ll never leave you I swear.”

Over two hours after he first entered the office Angel turned the final page of the diary.  The last entry was dated that morning and read simply:

I love you, Angel.  Nothing can change that – not even death.

The back of his neck prickled and his nostrils flared as he felt the sun begin to rise.  Reluctantly he got to his feet and drew the blinds before leaving the office; he knew that if the others had found something they would have told him by now so Buffy’s disappearance remained a mystery and he had to find her…he had to!
 
 

Part Eight

Hours passed, the school once again filled with the noisy chatter of students going about their lives, completely oblivious to the desperate search going on in the library.  Giles put out the ‘closed for filing’ sign to ensure that they were not disturbed, thinking as he did so of all the times he had used that as an excuse to keep the library free for Buffy’s training.  It always amazed him that no one ever questioned why such a relatively small library would require so many filing days.  He supposed that living on the Hellmouth made people suppress their natural curiosity, instinctively preferring to live each day in blissful ignorance and closing their eyes to anything that might disturb the status quo.

By unspoken agreement everyone had blown off school that day, determined not to stop until Buffy was found.  It was mid-afternoon when the first clue was finally found, almost twenty hours since Buffy had first disappeared.  Giles was reading the Codex, painstakingly translating the Latin in his head, exhaustion was lapping at the edges of his mind and he almost missed the little prophecy but the demon’s name leapt out of the page at him.

After carefully rereading the passage he called out to the others, “I may have something.”  Instantly they stopped what they were doing and gathered around him with hopeful expressions, “It’s not much,” he warned them, “but it’s the first reference to the demon and a choice that I’ve been able to find and it may...”

“Giles, just read it!” interrupted Jenny; “we can discuss it afterwards.”

“Oh…y-yes, of course,” he stammered and began to read aloud:

    “The Chosen, whose heart encompasses all, shall suffer
more than any who came before, yet she shall still love.
    To her, as to others before, shall be put the Choice
    She alone shall, for love, choose to endure the unendurable.
    For the sake of five she will sacrifice all.
    Upon returning, she shall have until the second sunrise to
prove her strength and worth.
    Should she emerge from the darkness within with heart
unchanged and mind unbroken, then shall she be reborn
as more than she once was, even as the demon Y’el’ir shall
perish.
    If she is lost, then shall her body perish and her soul be
condemned to bear witness as darkness covers the earth
for 10,000 years.
    Only when the light rules this world triumphant may she
ascend and find peace.”

“I’m afraid so, yes.”

“The numbers are wrong,” Willow pointed out, “so either the prophecy is inaccurate of it isn’t about Buffy at all.”

“Probably the latter, I’m afraid,” he admitted, “the Codex is renowned for its accuracy.”

“So what now?” asked Cordelia.

“We keep looking.  At least we know a little more, now.  We know that this has happened before and that it is possible for her to return….”

“We know that she’s suffering and we can’t help her.” Angel’s expression was haunted, his voice little more than a whisper as he pointed out the other thing that they had learned, the one that the others had been trying not to think about.

Silently they went back to their research, no one noticing the thoughtful frown on Jenny’s face as she went back to the computer and began following a new line of thought.

~~~

An hour and a half later she stared, almost in disbelief at her computer screen.  “Dear God!” she whispered as the enormity of what Buffy had done for her began to sink in.

“Giles!” she called out urgently.

“What is it, Jenny?  Have you found something?” he asked coming over, closely followed by the others.

“The prophecy was right – it was five.”

“I don’t understand.”

She indicated her glowing computer screen; “This is a translation of the spell Buffy used to bring me back.  It’s non-specific and very powerful.”

“Huh?” asked Xander blankly.

“It doesn’t just restore life to the dead.  It can summon anyone from anywhere and restore them to perfect health.”

Xander still looked confused but Willow said slowly, “So what you’re saying is that Buffy could have…”

“Used this spell to save herself?  Yes, that’s exactly what I’m saying.”  Jenny showed them a blood soaked piece of paper on which was written ‘Jenny Calendar (Janna)’.  “My name was inside the cloth bag you used in the ritual,” she explained.  “If she had written her own then it would have been her who appeared in the circle.”

“This is all my fault!” said Angel in a horrified whisper, “If I hadn’t…”

“If the demon hadn’t then Buffy would still be gone!” said Giles firmly; “There was nothing you could have done to prevent this.  She said in her letter that she went looking for a spell to get Jenny back!  If she had never died, then Buffy wouldn’t have been looking and the spell would never have been found.”

“Buffy chose to do this, Angel,” said Willow gently, “I don’t think she’s capable of thinking of herself when she has a chance to help someone she cares about.  She wouldn’t want you to feel guilty,” she looked at Giles and Jenny and, correctly interpreting their expressions added; “she wouldn’t want any of us to feel guilty.  She did this because she wanted the two of you to be happy.”

Angel nodded reluctantly, logically he knew that Giles and Willow were right but emotionally it was hard for him to accept.

“So now we know that this prophecy is about Buffy where does that leave us?” asked Cordelia after a moment’s silence.

“Hmm…I’m not entirely sure,” said Giles absently, “something about that prophecy is bothering me but I’m not sure why.”

“Do you think it’s important?” asked Angel.

“I don’t know…yes…I have this feeling that I’m overlooking something terribly important.

“All right, then, while you try and figure it out why don’t the rest of us take a look through the Watcher diaries, the prophecy suggests that this has happened before, maybe there’ll be something useful in one of them.”

Giles thought briefly of his oath as a Watcher never to allow anyone access to the diaries and gave a mental shrug. “That’s a excellent idea, Angel, though I’m afraid that you will have to take the earlier diaries yourself.  They are written almost exclusively in Latin and you are the only one, beside myself, who can read it with any degree of fluency.  They’re copies of course, the originals are locked in the vault of the council’s headquarters in London, but they were still made nearly 800 years ago.”  He reached into his pocket and took out a small bunch of keys, handing it to the vampire and saying as he did so, “The diaries are all in my office, you’ll find the oldest of them in the locked cabinets, the rest are just on the shelves.”  He looked over at the others and added, “They’re all organised according by date, don’t worry about any that were written within the last two-hundred years or so, I’m very familiar with their contents and I’m quite sure that I would have remembered any references to something like this.”

They nodded and all six of them disappeared into his office.  Giles sat down at the table and opened Codex, staring at the prophecy he was unable to shake the feeling that there was something terribly important right under his nose and he was unable to see it.

~~~

Hours passed and one by one exhaustion claimed them and they fell asleep where they sat, their heads pillowed upon the books they had so recently been reading.

Only Angel remained wakeful and the only sound that could be heard in the still library was the turning of the pages as he read.  Every time he found a reference to a making ‘the choice’ he put it aside to show the others and it wasn’t long before he began to notice a pattern but there was nothing that could tell them where Buffy had gone and he let the others sleep.  There would be time enough for them to read it later and they had more chance of helping if their minds weren’t clouded with fatigue.

Everyone slept deeply, the stress of the past day had taken its toll and it was six hours before the first of them stirred. Surprisingly, Cordelia was the first to wake, dragged out of a sound sleep by a sharp pain in her neck as her body protested to the strange position in which she was lying.  Groggily she raised her head and was surprised to find that she was in the library and not at home in bed.  Then her gaze fell upon Angel and the events of the previous day returned to her in a rush.

“Have you found anything?” she asked hopefully, he voice still husky with sleep.

He looked up in surprise, startled by the sound of her voice after it had been quiet for so long and the moment she saw his face, Cordelia knew that he had not.

He looked terrible.  Pale even for him, his face had the greyish cast of exhaustion and his expression was so anguished that tears came to her eyes at the sight of it.

“Not really,” he confirmed, waving a hand towards three books he had left open on the desk, his voice as ravaged as his face, “they mention the Choice but there’s nothing useful in them.”

The sound of their voices, quiet though they were, disturbed the others and before long everyone, with the exception of Giles who was out in the main part of the library, was awake.  They gathered around and Jenny picked up the only one of the books that was written in English, and then hesitated, “Someone should wake Rupert,” she said, “No matter how trivial this may be, he’d want to know.”

“I’ll go,” Oz volunteered and slipped out of the room.

Only a few moments later he was back with a somewhat rumpled Giles in tow.  Jenny smiled lovingly at him as Oz returned to Willow’s side and then, as everyone but Angel gazed at her expectantly, she looked down at the book in her hands,  “It’s a transcript of a letter written by a Slayer before her death…before her suicide.  It’s dated 1221.” she told them, and began to read aloud, her words halting as she translated the ancient English in her head,

I have condemned all that I hold dear because I could not face the nightmare that awaited me.  Here at least my death shall be swift and mercifully painless, would that I could say the same of theirs.
It was my duty to protect them and I failed.  It was my duty to sacrifice myself to save them and I could not.  Their only crime was to be loved by me but a harsher punishment there has never been.

I pray that the next Slayer to face the Choice will prove stronger than I.
May God forgive me for my sins,

            Isobel.

Giles broke the silence that descended upon the library at Angel’s words, forcing his mind to focus on the task at hand, “You say it’s only the strongest Slayers?”

“Yes, it seems to be, I thought that you might be able to narrow down which diaries would be worth looking at.”

He nodded and went to the bookcase containing the more recent diaries and began rapidly going through them, opening the covers to see which Watcher had written them.  Most he put back but a few he passed to Jenny who stacked them on the desk.  Without a word everyone else reached for a book and sat down to read each hoping that this would be the one that held the answers they needed.

Giles sorted through almost two-thousand years worth of diaries before he stopped and admitted, “I’m…far less familiar with the earliest Watcher diaries, I’m afraid that I can’t be sure of the strength of the Slayers prior to Aylinn in 74AD.”

Xander stared at him and asked in amazement, “How do you remember all this?  There have been hundreds of Slayers since then.”

“1,949, not counting Buffy,” Giles informed him.  “It was part of my training, Xander,” he explained, “I spent years learning about the great Slayers and their Watchers and I had to memorise the names of the Slayers, just as you learn the names of your Presidents in History.”

Willow stared at him in horror, “But that’s more than one a year!”

He nodded sadly, “Slayers do not live long, most die within a year of being called although, of course, there are exceptions, like Buffy.  But then there are…bad times, which keep the numbers high.”

“I don’t understand.”

Giles looked apologetically at Angel, knowing that he was about to remind him of things that were best forgotten “The worse year on record was 1813 when nine Slayers were called.”

Cordelia looked confused, “But a Slayer is only called when the one before her…Oh.”

“What…what happened in 1813?” asked Willow, not at all sure that she wanted to know.

Giles hesitated and before he could speak Angel said harshly, “I did!”

~~~

Angel’s mind drifted back to the summer of 1813; all Europe had been at war fighting either for or against Napoleon and the resultant chaos meant that there were easy pickings to be had for vampires.

She had attacked him when he was feeding and he had only narrowly avoided getting a stake though his back.  Sensing her presence behind him, he had turned at the last moment, receiving nothing more serious than a graze on his arm.  Angered, he had attacked and within a few moments she lay dead at his feet, her body drained of blood.  He had never known her name.

Despite his relative youth, she hadn’t been the first Slayer he had killed, there had been two others before her, the first in 1773 just twenty years after he was turned, but she was the first he had drained.  She had been strong, though inexperienced, and the challenge presented by her kind, combined with the power in her blood had called to him like a drug and he had begun to hunt for more.

Each month, for six months, a new Slayer fell at his hands, then, just before New Year, he had grown bored and moved on to find new amusements.  In the years that followed he had killed other Slayers as he came across them but he had never repeated the slaughter of that year.

Willow’s voice dragged his thoughts back to the present, “Y-you killed them all?”

“Seven of them.”

“Seven Slayers…you killed seven Slayers in one year?” she gasped sitting down abruptly, her face pale.

“Were they…?” Xander began and then hesitated, but Angel guessed what he was about to ask.

“Were they the only ones?”

Xander nodded.

“No.”

“How…how many were there?”

There was a morbid fascination in this discussion and everyone except Giles held their breath, waiting for Angel’s reply.

“Thirteen.” Thirteen, he thought with bitter regret, Spike had killed two and was regarded with fear and a touch of awe because of it but he, he was a legend; The Scourge of Europe, Angel of Death and many other names that reflected his ‘achievement’.  The Master had killed more, many more, but he had been thousands of years older than Angel and since his death there were no vampires living who had killed even close to half as many.

 The number got Giles’ attention, “Really?  Angelus is only recorded as having killed nine.”

“You knew?” asked Jenny in surprise, “Did…Buffy?”

Angel nodded, “Giles told her but she already knew.”

“She asked me not to tell any of you,” Giles explained, “After…after Angelus returned.  She didn’t want you to worry any more than were already.”

Angel looked at them in confusion, he had thought that they would hate him for this but none of them seemed to care that the killer they were discussing was standing in the room with them.  Giles noticed his expression and said, “We all know that you and the demon aren’t the same, Angel, why should we blame you because some of his victims were Slayers?”

Angel made a choked sound in his throat and whispered, “That’s what Buffy said!”

“She’s right, you know, no one but you has any doubt about it.”

“Angel…you said that Buffy knew before Giles told her?” Cordelia said curiously, “How?  Did…did you tell her?”

“We talked about it a little but she knew from her dreams.”

“Her dreams?”

“Every Slayer dreams of the lives of the ones who have come before, what they did – how they died.  Buffy knows more than she will ever tell you.  No Slayer has ever survived more than five years after being called and she knows that as well.”  At the back of his mind, Angel knew that he would regret telling them this, regret causing them more pain but he was too tired and too grief-stricken to censure his words.

Giles looked stunned, “She knew?  I’d never considered that aspect of Slayer dreams.  I tried so hard to keep it from her, to give her the hope of a future and all this time she’s known that there wouldn’t be one.”

“Why didn’t she say something?” asked Willow in a small voice, “All the time we’ve spent discussing our futures and college...  It must have hurt her so much!  Why didn’t she stop us?”

“What could she have said?” Cordelia asked bluntly, “Please could you not talk about this because I’ll be dead before it happens?  Buffy would never do something like that and you know it.”

“Cordelia’s right, Buffy didn’t want to spoil things for you, she didn’t want to take away the hope and excitement you were all feeling and…” Angel hesitated, “…she didn’t want you to treat her any different.  She was afraid that you’d all start acting like she was already dying.”

“We wouldn’t!” Willow began to protest indignantly but Angel silenced her with a look,

“Wouldn’t you?  Can you honestly say that it wouldn’t have changed things?  That you wouldn’t have clung to her even while you tried to ‘act cheerful’?”

He looked round at them and, unable to meet his eyes, they all looked down and shuffled their feet uncomfortably, knowing that what he said was true.

Having made his point he didn’t press it, instead he turned to Giles and said, “I take it you didn’t figure out what was bothering you about the prophecy?”

Giles shook his head and an expression of frustration crossed his face, “I’ve cross checked it against every other book of prophecy I have but I still can’t put my finger on what’s wrong with it!”

Angel handed him a diary, “Take a break and maybe it’ll come to you,” he said, before turning back to the bookcase and reaching for one of the earliest diaries.

Following his lead everyone sat down to read and silence reigned once more
 
 

Part Nine

The others had all bowed to the inevitable and periodically left to get some sleep, only to return the moment they awoke but their efforts to get him to do the same had proved futile.  Exhaustion tugged at him, his vampyric stamina was almost gone and he knew that he would not be able to keep this pace up much longer but he couldn’t bear the thought of stopping when he knew that, wherever she was, Buffy desperately needed his help.

Forcing his eyes to focus he began to read, the Latin translation almost second nature by this point.  At first he simply scanned the pages, searching for anything that might be relevant, but gradually his attention was caught by the words before him, the description of a Slayer who had more in common with his beloved Buffy than any he had ever heard of.

She had lived nearly 4000 years ago and, though the Watchers had raised her, she had somehow retained her sense of individuality.  To her Watcher’s dismay, she had made friends and even fallen in love.  Over time her friends had come to know her secret and support her in her battle.  Despite the opposition of the Watcher’s Council she had been planning her wedding when disaster struck in a manner she could never have imagined.

Egypt – 2006BC

Observing his weakness the demons formed a great alliance and planned to use him to destroy Leila and safeguard against another who might match her strength.  They summoned forth the great demon Y’el’ir, the Betrayer and brought the Watcher before him and offered him a trade.

The cowardly Watcher, too fearful to deny him, agreed to the bargain and the deal was struck but the Slayer’s life was not his to give and the moment he agreed there was a blinding flash and the Slayer stood before them.

The demon offered her a Choice: Either the four people for whom she cared most would each spend a hundred years in the demon dimension, unable to die until the day that they were returned to Earth, or she must serve their sentences for them and endure four hundred years of torment without even the hope of death to sustain her.

The demon gave her one month to decide and sent dreams each time she slept to ensure that she understood exactly the nature of the choice she had to make.  Her terrified Watcher told her what he had done in the hope that it would make her hate him, for if she cared nothing for him then he would be in no danger.  But he had been like a father to her and, despite her bitter anger, she loved him still.  When the month ended, on the very day of her wedding, Y’el’ir summoned her loved one’s to him with a spell and a call sounded in Leila’s head, drawing her to his lair.

Unable to resist, she followed and the demon challenged her to make the Choice.  With a despairing heart and a bitter sense of shame, she chose the sacrifice of those she loved.  Tears streamed from her closed eyes as she spoke, unable to look at the ones she condemned.

Y’el’ir checked to confirm her decision but the gloating note in his voice told her that it knew she wouldn’t change her mind.  The last sound she heard as the demon disappeared with the people she loved was her Watcher screaming for mercy.

As the demons had anticipated, Leila’s spirit was broken and guilt over what she had done gnawed away at her soul.  Ten days after they disappeared, the bodies of her loved ones returned to earth.  Though they were twisted and scarred beyond all possible recognition she knew instantly who they were.

She carefully arranged their burial and then went to her Watcher’s house and wrote the whole story down in his diary, knowing that someone from the Watcher’s council would come for it.  As soon as she was finished, Leila took a knife from the desk and calmly cut her own throat.

Southern California – 1998AD

They all gathered around him asking questions, their faces hopeful and he raised his head to look at them.  The sight of his grief-ravaged expression silenced them, telling them more clearly than words ever could that the news was not good.

“My God, what is it?” asked Xander in a hushed voice.

Further speech was beyond him and Angel shook his head, thrusting the diary into Giles’ hands as he got to his feet and backed away, disappearing into the stacks as the memory of his own time in hell overwhelmed him.

On his return he had pushed the memories so far into the recesses of his mind that they seldom emerged except in his nightmares.  Buffy had known and for a long time she had stayed with him all through the day, watching over him as he slept, protecting him from the darkness.  Her presence had rebuilt his sense of security and self until he was able to fight off the terror of the nightmares when they came and even sleep without dreaming of anything but her.  As his sleep grew more peaceful she had allowed her vigil to lapse for fear of the temptation they represented to each other but until her disappearance she had never let a day go by without coming to check that he was all right, never waking him if his sleep was peaceful but always leaving something to let him know that she had been there.

He lacked the comfort of ignorance that the others possessed and his mind painted vivid pictures of the unimaginable horrors that Buffy was now enduring.  As bad as the others thoughts might be when they learned where she was, he knew beyond doubt that they would be nothing compared with the reality of Hell.

His large frame began to shake uncontrollably and he slid down against the bookcase he was standing next to until he sat huddled in a ball at it’s base, clutching his head in his hands as he tried to drive the nightmare images away.  He could hear her screaming his name, begging him to help her and he could do nothing.  She was out of reach.

~~~

Six pairs of eyes watched as Angel disappeared into the stacks before turning anxiously to the diary that Giles held clutched in both hands.  It held the answers that they had been searching for but after seeing Angel’s reaction none of them were sure that they wanted to know what it said.

It was with great reluctance and shaking hands that Giles turned to the last entry in the ancient book and began to read aloud, translating the Latin for the others as he did so.

Before long his voice trailed off and his face paled as he scanned the text in silence.  By the time he reached the end he could hardly see the page, his vision clouded by the tears that streamed down his face as he cursed fluently in every language he knew, his voice filled with impotent rage and anguish.

“Giles?” asked Willow shakily, shocked by both the language he was using and the sight of the Watcher crying.

He didn’t appear to hear her and Jenny went to his side and gently touched his shoulder, “Rupert?”

Her action seemed to get his attention for he fell silent, looking at her with pain-filled eyes for a moment before dropping the diary, heedless for once of any damage he might do to it, and pulling her into his arms.

They stood like that for a long time but at last Jenny reluctantly pulled away and said gently, “Rupert…please, we have to know what’s going on…what it is that’s upset you and Angel so much.  Could you finish reading the diary for us?”

Giles flinched but accepted the book that Xander had retrieved from the floor and was holding out towards him.

His voice broken and filled with tears he began to read once more.

~~~

Absolute silence reigned in the library; the footsteps of a spider would have seemed loud in the stillness.  It had been hours since Giles read the diary and the desperate and hysterical tears and denials had long since ended.  Angel had still not returned but the others sat round the table, three couples clinging to one another’s hands, inactive for the first time since the nightmare had begun.  All around them were the books that they had used to try and determine Buffy’s fate and more than one of them looked at them with loathing, stricken by the horror of what they had learned and their utter inability to do anything about it.

A slight sound, so quiet he ordinarily would never have heard it, made Oz turn in his seat.  The others turned to see what had caught his attention and a collective gasp left their throats at what they saw.

Angel stood at the entrance to the stacks.  Pale, even for him, his face was gaunt and haggard and, for the first time since they had known him, Angel looked old.  Every one of his 243 years showed in his grief-stricken eyes and his broad shoulders slumped beneath a weight greater than even he could bear.  The tears he had cried showed in the faint streaks of pink that stained his face, his hair was mussed from running his hands through it and his clothes were dishevelled and dusty.  When he spoke his voice was hardly recognisable, so different was it from his usual smooth rumble but he made no reference to Buffy.

“You should go home – get some rest,” he told them hoarsely, “You’re all exhausted and there’s nothing more you can do here for the moment.”

“That’s it?” asked Willow incredulously, “You’re just going t-to give up?  She’s gone and we should all just move on with our lives as if nothing had happened?”  The moment she spoke Willow regretted the angry words but it was too late to call them back.  Her heart twisted at the anguish that flashed in his eyes and, even without the dirty looks the others were giving her, she had never felt more ashamed of herself than she did at that moment.

He didn’t reproach her, which somehow made it far worse than if he had when he said quietly, his ravaged voice cracking on Buffy’s name,  “Buffy…asked me to take care of all of you.  She wouldn’t want you to drive yourselves into the ground over this and…we have time.  Her only hope lies in the prophecy now.  We can’t bring her back; even if we could find a way to open a portal to the demon dimensions there’s no way that we could go in and rescue her without getting trapped ourselves.  That means that we have 37 days to find a way to help her.”

“I-I’m sorry, Angel,” Willow stammered, her voice thick with tears and her cheeks burning with shame, “I shouldn’t have said that to you.”

Angel nodded in understanding but didn’t speak, his eyes haunted as he contemplated a life without his love.  For a hundred years he had lived with despair as his constant companion but now, thinking of returning to that darkness after knowing her light for too-brief a time, he knew that, despite her desire for him to live on, he couldn’t do it.  No matter what he did, he couldn’t fulfil her wishes because without her he could not live, he could only exist; an empty shell with no hope of ever being filled.  Better oblivion than such a travesty of life.

Forcing himself to remember that the others were still watching him, he told them, “Go home; get some sleep and go to school tomorrow.  We can meet back here tomorrow night to decide what we’re going to do next.”

“School?” asked Xander in confusion, “Isn’t tomorrow Sunday?”

“Monday,” Oz informed him, “Today was Sunday.”

Xander hung his head and groaned but it was a half-hearted effort as were the smiles in response to his performance.

Despite the fact they were almost dropping where they stood with exhaustion it was only reluctantly that the group moved towards the exit, leaving Angel standing alone in the middle of the room.

As they reached the door Giles looked back and said sympathetically, “You need to rest too, Angel.  Have you slept at all since it happened?”  He didn’t respond but the answer was clear in the harsh lines etched in his face and Giles nodded, “I bet you haven’t fed either, have you?  Angel, you can’t go on this way; you’ll be no help to Buffy if you collapse.”

Aware that Giles was right, Angel inclined his head in reluctant agreement and said quietly, “If you need me, I’ll be at the apartment, I just have to grab a few things from home.”

Giles nodded but made no move to leave, nor did any of the others in the doorway and after a moment Angel realised that they were waiting for him, making sure that he did, indeed go home and rest.  Touched, and unable to explain that he feared the memories he couldn’t fight in sleep, he walked to the door with Giles following on his heels.  The group walked together to the front of the school where the three couples walked hand in hand towards their vehicles while Angel turned and walked alone into the night.
 
 

Part Ten

The angry snarl of the demon shattered the illusion and he opened his eyes with a heavy sigh and retrieved a packet of blood from his bag.  At the sight of it his stomach growled and his face changed as the demon came to the fore and his fangs sank into it ravenously.  Seconds later it was empty but the hunger remained, and he reached for another bag even as the demon whispered seductively about the possibility of finding warm, living blood.  Ignoring it as he had done for a hundred years, Angel drained the second bag and then hung his remaining supply in the fridge, next to the single bag that Buffy always kept there for when he came over.  He touched the cold, smooth plastic gently with his finger, aware that it was just one more symbol of the love and acceptance that she had always given to him.

When he had first returned he had been too weak to feed unaided so, several times a day, she had brought him mugs of warmed blood, holding them steady while he drank.  At the time he had been too out of it to protest but when he had finally realised what it was that she was doing, he had been overcome by self-loathing and tried to stop her by refusing to feed in front of her.  She had refused to allow it, insisting that he never needed to be ashamed of anything when he was with her and that she loved him unconditionally.

At first he had been reluctant and uncomfortable but she had been so matter-of-fact about everything that he had gradually come to accept that she had been telling nothing less than the truth when she told him that it made no difference to her.

It had become a minor ritual for them to curl up together at the end of every patrol, either on the couch here at the apartment or in front of the fire in the mansion, she with a mug of hot chocolate and he with his blood, and just talk about anything that came to mind, content simply to be together.  The possibility that they might never do so again burned inside him like acid and with a muffled curse he closed the fridge and turned away.

Despite his exhaustion, sleep was an impossibility and he paced restlessly, stopping often to run his fingers almost reverently over the things that Buffy had left behind.  The apartment represented the dichotomy of her nature in a way that her bedroom at home never had: a crossbow lay next to a fashion magazine, in the jewellery box on the desk an assortment of crosses and bottles of holy water mingled with more mundane fashion accessories, a stake lay on her bedside table while a small toy pig rested on the pillow nearby.  He had spent a lot of time here with Buffy since his return but he had never thought beyond the fact that it suited her, it was only now, with the silence ringing in his ears, that he realised why.  The unique combination of warrior and child that was Buffy was perfectly reflected here, an outward representation of the internal balance she was forced to maintain, somehow keeping her innocence despite the darkness she faced every day.

A glint of sliver on the wall above her bed caught his eye and he stepped forwards to have a closer look.  The cross he had given her the first time they met hung on a hook.  She seldom wore it when they were together, not since she had noticed a burn it had given him but he knew that she always wore it on the rare nights that she patrolled alone and she had once told him that she always kept it nearby, an extension of his love to guard her dreams.

Ignoring the discomfort of having a holy object so close to him, Angel reached out and lifted the cross from the wall, touching only its chain.  He sat on the edge of the bed, looking at it.  Buffy had always kept his gifts close to her and, though they were pitifully few and inadequate compared with all she had given him, they had seemed to delight her.  The ring he had given her for her seventeenth birthday never left her finger, its position as permanent as that of the matching one adorning his hand, and, when the nights turned colder, more often than not, when they patrolled she would wear the jacket he had given her so long ago, ‘her safety blanket’ she had once called it laughingly.

That jacket was gone now; she had been wearing it when she disappeared, though the weather had been mild.  He hadn’t thought to question it at the time as he was so used to seeing it but now he realised that what she had said had been no more or less than the truth, she always wore the jacket when she was afraid or facing a challenge she didn’t know if she would be able to overcome and there could be none greater than the choice that she had made.

Unable to face the thoughts brought on by inactivity, Angel tucked the cross into his pocket – almost unaware of the pain as it burned his fingers – shot to his feet and hurried out of the apartment.

For hours he prowled the night, searching for unwary vampires on whom he could take out some fraction of the anguished rage in his heart but, as Buffy had promised, there were few to be found, most having fled to easier hunting grounds.  Only the very young had been foolish enough to remain in Sunnydale with their leaders gone and the Slayer on the rampage and most of those had already been slain.

Only when the suns light touched the eastern horizon did Angel return to the apartment, where he finally succumbed to the exhaustion that dogged his every step and slept.

~~~

His dreams were far from peaceful, filled with horror and torment, and only a couple of hours later he jerked upright, screaming Buffy’s name.  It was still early, not even mid-day but further sleep was out of the question.  After pacing the confines of the apartment for less than ten minutes he felt that he had to either do something or go mad and explode.

Getting around was not a problem, for he had chosen the apartment largely because of its easy access to the sewers and long practice had taught him how to avoid the sun without letting it stop him.  Dropping down into the extensive network of tunnels that ran beneath Sunnydale, he stood for a moment, irresolute, before turning in the direction of the High School – and the library.

As he lifted himself up into the stacks, a sound drew him towards the central part of the library.  The blinds were raised so he could not move beyond the shelter of the bookcases but it didn’t matter because from his position he was able to see the entire room.  A view that included Giles, sitting at the table, surrounded by books, muttering to himself as he frowned in concentration over a small, leather bound volume.  He looked marginally more rested than he had the night before but it was clear from the number of books piled on the table around him that he had been there for some time.

For a moment Angel considered leaving him in ignorance of his presence but it was clear he was still searching for information that might help Buffy and the need to know what, if anything, he had found and to avoid covering the same ground twice prompted him to speak.

“Giles.”

His voice was low and quiet but considering the reaction it elicited from the Watcher he might as well have shouted.  Giles yelped; dropping the book he was holding as he jerked backwards in surprise.  The sudden movement proved to be too much for his chair, which tottered precariously before depositing him unceremoniously on the ground.

From his position on the floor, the Watcher turned his head to look at him.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.” Angel said apologetically.  Under other circumstances he might have been amused by the Watcher’s predicament but the thought of how much Buffy would have enjoyed it, had she been there, was enough to effectively kill any humour.

“That’s quite alright, Angel, but if you could please try to remember to make some noise when you arrive?”  As he spoke, Giles pushed himself to his feet and crossed to the windows to close the blinds.

The moment it was safe for him to do so, Angel emerged from the stacks and walked to the place where Giles had been sitting, where he lifted the chair upright and stooped to retrieve the book that he had dropped, glancing at its title as he did so.

“The Codex?” he asked questioningly, “Do you still think that you’re over-looking something important in the prophecy?”

Giles sighed and rubbed his eyes, dropping into one of the other chairs around the table, “There’s something about it that just seems…wrong.  I’ve been looking at it for hours and I have the feeling I’m missing something terribly obvious but I have no idea what it is!”

Angel nodded, accepting the other man’s instincts.  Looking down at the book in his hands he opened it slowly, flipping through the pages until he came to the one on which the prophecy was written.  At that moment, a bell rang throughout the School, signalling the break for lunch but he ignored it, his attention focused upon the text before him.

He read it through carefully, the translation second nature after the long hours spent among the Watcher diaries, and when he had finished a slight frown tugged at his eyebrows.  Returning to the beginning he read it through a second time.

“Should she emerge,” he muttered, “If she is lost...” he looked across the table; “Giles…” he began, and then broke off as the library doors were pushed open and the Scooby Gang entered the room.

“Angel!” Exclaimed Cordelia in surprise, “How did you get here?”

“Sewers tunnels,” he explained briefly, his attention still on the book before him.  A faint sound from the stacks reached his ears and he looked up sharply, getting to his feet, his posture guarded.  Following his lead, the others also turned to look at the stacks.  Then Jenny emerged holding a box of donuts and there was a collective sigh of relief as everyone relaxed once more.

“Hi, Guys,” she said, “Angel, how did you…?”

“Sewers,” said Willow, Xander, Cordelia and Giles together.

“Oh.  So I take it you haven’t found anything while I was gone?”

Giles shook his head sadly but Angel hesitated and then said slowly, “Maybe…”

Everyone looked at him hopefully and he said cautiously, “I don’t know if it’s important but…  Giles, when Buffy had to face the Master, you told me that the Codex was immutable, that everything in it always came to pass?”

“That’s right,” agreed Giles, his expression confused

“If that’s the case, why does this prophecy list two different possible outcomes?”

“My God!  That’s it!  That’s why I thought there was something wrong!” he exclaimed, then his excitement faded and he said in confusion, “It still doesn’t make sense though!”

Seeing the mystified expressions on the other’s faces, he explained, “The Codex deals in absolutes, throughout the last two-thousand years, everything written in it has gradually come to pass, and yet, in this one prophecy there are two possible outcomes.”

“So?  How does that help us?” Xander asked.

“I…I don’t know, but it’s important, I’m sure of it!”  He removed his glasses and began to clean them absently as he paced up and down the library, unable to keep still as he voiced his thoughts.  “It has to be significant, to the best of my knowledge there is only one other occasion on which the Codex is…less than…certain…” his speech slowed as an amazing thought nudged at his consciousness, “…and…and that’s…when…it…” The idea crystallised in his mind and he stopped, “Good Lord!”  For an instant he stood motionless in the centre of the library, then he suddenly dashed into his office and began rummaging through the books he had stored there.

The other’s exchanged glances and followed him, watching from the doorway as he searched for they knew not what.

“When it what, Giles?” Angel asked urgently, “What is it that you’ve thought of?”

Giles made a sound of triumph as he found the book he had been looking for and began flipping through its pages.  “Just wait,” he instructed them without looking up from what he was doing, “I have to be sure I’m remembering this right, I need to check…”

He fell silent and the others watched impatiently as he read.  It was nearly half an hour before he looked up, his eyes wide and containing an expression of awe.

“Well?” demanded Xander when he didn’t speak.

“I…” he began, his voice barely audible.  Clearing he throat he said more loudly, “I-it may be that-that Buffy is destined to become the Eternal Slayer.”

Everyone except Angel looked at him blankly.

“The who?” Xander asked.

“She’s supposed to be greatest of all the Warriors for the side of Light.” Angel said hoarsely, “It’s said that she will come during the light’s darkest hour and fight on throughout eternity until the darkness is finally defeated forever.  I thought she was a myth.”

“No, there are mentions of her in most of the great books of prophecy but after she is called they all become very vague and uncertain.”

“A vague prophecy,” quipped Xander, “who would have thought it?”

“The prophecies surrounding the Eternal Slayer make the ones we’ve dealt with in the past look like instruction manuals.” Giles informed him, “She stands outside prophecy and as such becomes the ‘wild card’ of any situation, the best that prophecy can ever do after the time of her calling is predict what will happen if she doesn’t intervene.

If I’m right, there is a chance for Buffy to become the Eternal Slayer – that does not mean that she will.”

“So how much do we know, then?” Willow asked, “What do the prophecies say?”

“Um…well, as Angel said, several prophecies state that, when the light begins to lose its battle against the darkness, an Eternal Slayer will be called.  Born mortal, she shall be tested severely and, if she is not found wanting, she shall become more than what she is.”

“So, you’re saying that Buffy might be supposed to live forever?” questioned Cordelia.

“Yes.  There has been some debate amongst the members of the Watcher’s Council about when the Eternal Slayer might be called.  Evil has been increasing; the Slayers have barely been able to keep the worst of it in check and the cost of doing so has been high.  Buffy is the longest-lived Slayer for more than 300 years.  Indeed, many council members have used her success as proof that the time of the Eternal Slayer is not yet upon us.”

He glanced down at the book in his hands and added, “According to prophecy, if she survives the calling, she shall be both blessed and cursed; forced to watch as all she knows grows old and dies while she remains young and possessed of great magic and the knowledge of the ages.”

He paused to read further down the page before him, then his eyes lifted and locked with Angel’s as he said slowly, “She shall be sustained throughout her unending battle by a fallen Angel, redeemed in love, who shall be her strength and guidance as he fights by her side for eternity – two halves of a single whole, so closely bonded that nothing, not even death, can ever separate them.”

“You see, Angel,” Willow said into the silence that followed, “You and Buffy were meant to be together; if you were mortal then she would eventually have been forced to watch you die…and that would have killed her!”

I don’t understand this,” said Xander suddenly, “if Buffy stands outside of prophecy, how do they know all of this, and how was it possible for the Codex to predict that she would die if she went to face the Master?”

“Because she isn’t the Eternal Slayer yet,” Giles explained, “Until she passes the test then she is simply the Slayer, and bound by the same rules as everyone else.  It’s possible for prophecy to know when the time of the Eternal Slayer will come, and who it is that she will be because that’s already fixed – if it isn’t Buffy then it won’t be anyone – but there is no way for it to tell if she will pass the test or fail.”

“Buffy had to die,” Angel said suddenly, “Kendra needed to be called before this happened or the Slayer line could have been ended forever.”

“Of course!” Exclaimed Giles excitedly, “One Slayer dies and the next is called – but if Buffy passes the test then she will never die!  The Eternal Slayer was never intended to replace the Slayers, only to do the things that they cannot.  Buffy’s ‘death’ ensured that the line will continue regardless of the outcome of this situation; in a way, Buffy hasn’t truly been the slayer for over a year and a half – that role fell first to Kendra and now to whoever it is that has been called in her place!”

“So Buffy’ll be, like, ‘Super Slayer’ and take care of the really big problems while the regular Slayer deals with your everyday vamps and demons?” clarified Xander.

“In a manner of speaking…yes,” admitted Giles.

“Cool!”

“Only if she passes the test,” Jenny reminded them, picking up the translation of the Prophecy that Giles had written out for the non-Latin-speaking majority of the group and reading it aloud to refresh the memories of the four teenagers.
 

    “The Chosen, whose heart encompasses all, shall suffer
more than any who came before, yet she shall still love.
    To her, as to others before, shall be put the Choice
    She alone shall, for love, choose to endure the unendurable.
    For the sake of five she will sacrifice all.
    Upon returning, she shall have until the second sunrise to
prove her strength and worth.
    Should she emerge from the darkness within with heart
unchanged and mind unbroken, then shall she be reborn
as more than she once was, even as the demon Y’el’ir shall
perish.
    If she is lost, then shall her body perish and her soul be
condemned to bear witness as darkness covers the earth
for 10,000 years.
    Only when the Light rules this world triumphant may she
finally ascend and find peace.”

Part Eleven

The others gathered around her to look at the paper she held – all except Giles, who by this time knew it by heart, and Angel, who still held the original in his hands.

“The first couple of lines have to be about everything that’s happened during the past year,” said Willow after a moment, “It tore her apart inside but she never let it make her bitter, never let herself give in to hatred.”

Everyone nodded and for a moment there was silence as they reflected upon the awesome inner strength of their friend.

“So what’s the deal with this whole 10,000 years of darkness thing?” asked Oz when the moment had passed; “Is the Hellmouth going to open or something?”  The words, ‘if Buffy dies’, reverberated in the air, almost deafening despite being silent.

Giles removed his glasses and began to clean them nervously, “No…no, I don’t believe so,” he said, “at least, not immediately.  According to all the lore, the Eternal Slayer is supposed to come when the side of Light begins to lose the battle against the Darkness.  She is, if you like, Light’s last throw of the dice.”

“So, you’re saying that that’ll be it?” questioned Xander incredulously, “They’ll just throw in the towel and concede the game?”

“Oh no,” Giles said hastily, “merely this round.  The balance of power has rested with our side ever since the demons were first pushed from this dimension; since then the Slayers have always managed to hold back the tide but now that might change.”

“Great(!)” said Cordelia sarcastically, “Do you think they could put a little more pressure on Buffy?  It’s not like she had enough already!  I mean…who are these ‘higher powers’ anyway?  And why don’t they get up off their cosmic asses and do something for themselves instead of expecting us to do it all!”

“Because if the forces behind the two sides were to confront one another directly, the entire universe would be destroyed.”  Angel told her, almost absently, without looking up from the prophecy and therefore not noticing the way that everyone went pale at his words.

“Why?” asked Willow, her voice a barely audible squeak.

“Because they cancel each other out; were they to meet then the result would be, not destruction, but oblivion, a vast emptiness where nothing at all exists.  The game is designed to keep that from ever happening.”

“Okay, maybe not such a great idea after all,” Xander admitted, “but its still unfair and what’s the whole ‘soul condemned not to find peace ‘til light wins if she fails’ thing about?  ‘Cos that’s just harsh!”

Angel finally looked up at that and his eyes were infinitely sad as he said, “It isn’t just if she fails, Xander,” The others looked at him, confused, but before anyone could ask he explained, “The Eternal Slayer is destined to fight until Darkness is defeated, there is no peace, only unending, eternal battles as the people she loves grow old and die around her.”  He gave a twisted travesty of a smile and added bitterly, “It seems that no matter what she does, Buffy will never find peace even though no one has ever deserved it more!  And I agree,” he said with sudden violence, “its not fair – its sick!”

His anger echoed in his voice and showed in the hint of yellow that glowed in his eyes in the instant before he turned away, moving several paces away from the others as he struggled to control the powerful emotions that surged and boiled within him.

The others didn’t speak, respecting his need for privacy and knowing that theirs were not the voices that he needed to hear.  Not wanting to cause him more pain but needing to understand, Willow turned to Giles and said quietly, “If the two sides can never meet, there can never be a real victory for either, so how is it possible for light to triumph?”

“There are other worlds, Willow, other dimensions, other realities, the war never ends but individual battles do, Earth is just one battleground and, one day, one side will concede it to the other and move on to the next – just as Light conceded the demon dimensions long ago and Darkness gave up on the higher realms.”  He paused for a moment and then added, “Or so we think, from what a small number of prophets have told us.  We can never be sure; the sheer scale of this is too big for us to even begin to comprehend, we’d be driven to madness if we were able to see even a fraction of it.”

“So how did these prophets manage?” questioned Cordelia, “How come they could do it?”

“They couldn’t…every last one of them was quite insane.”

“So…you’re saying we’re banking everything on the ramblings of a lunatic?” Xander clarified, “Well, that’s comforting, I thought that we might be in trouble(!)”

“None of this helps!” Exclaimed Willow in frustration, “We understand everything about that blasted prophecy except the lines that explain what Buffy needs to do to come back to us – how can we find a way to help her if we don’t know what she has to do!?”

~~~

“I know what she has to do.”

Angel’s quiet words electrified the group and they all swung in his direction, only to find that he still stood with his back to them.

“You do?” questioned Jenny quietly, “Angel, if you understand this, I think you’d better explain it to the rest of us.”

Angel inclined his head in reluctant agreement and, without turning to face them, said simply, “Buffy has to come back more-or-less the same person she was when she was taken – she has to have been strong enough not to give in to the relief offered by madness or hatred.  She’s there because she loved us…that has to have remained true despite all that she’s suffered.”  His eyes, unseen by the others, were distant, unfocused, filled with memories of his own painful climb out of the abyss, as he added, “The darkness within is her own mind; if anything of her has survived, it will be because she’s retreated so far within herself that nothing can touch her…and we’ll have only two days to bring her back!”

The despair in his voice sent chills down the spines of all those who heard him and, in an attempt to brighten the mood, Willow said in a small voice, “You came back – Buffy will too!”

Everyone nodded in agreement and the atmosphere brightened a fraction.  Then Angel slowly turned to face them, and his expression was enough to send their spirits plummeting once more.

“Yes,” he agreed, regretting the fact that he had to hurt them but knowing that they had to understand the sheer magnitude of the task before them if they were to have any chance of success, “I came back…and it was almost three weeks before I even recognised Buffy!”  He looked at the six people in front of him and asked, “None of you saw me after I first came back, did you?”  It had been a rhetorical question, he already knew that Buffy had kept them away until he was more-or-less back to his old self, but they all shook their heads anyway.

“I couldn’t think, couldn’t remember, I was an animal, running purely on instinct – and even that was more the demon than me.  I had to be chained to the wall and at first I lashed out at Buffy every time she came near but she wouldn’t leave me.  She spent days sitting with me, talking to me for hours on end, just letting me get used to her voice and presence the way you would any wary animal.  I’d retreated into my own mind: it was only after I escaped from the mansion and found…found my mate in danger and reacted instinctively to protect her that something inside me was able to accept that she was real and respond to her.”

Everyone had tears in their eyes when he finished speaking, his words having reminded them once again of the absolute devotion that lay between the Slayer and her vampire love.

“So what you’re saying is that it took a long time and a powerful trigger to get through to you?”  Giles asked, dejectedly.

Angel nodded, “The first few days I would have killed her if I could have and never even realised what I’d done.”

“Yes but…but you were there for far longer than Buffy will have been,” argued Willow, “so maybe she won’t be so badly effected.”

“I really wish that I could believe that, Willow,” Angel told her sadly, “but I had an…advantage, if you want to call it that, that she doesn’t and I think that you’re forgetting just how many years we’re talking about here.  After a while, time ceases to matter and we have to hope that Buffy’s found a haven in her mind, if she hasn’t, she’ll be quite mad by now.”

“What do you mean, ‘you had an advantage’” asked Cordelia, “What advantage?”

“I had the demon.”

“That’s an advantage?  I thought you hated it?”

“I do, but it was still…company – something to remind me of who and what I was.  Even when my mind finally shut down, there was still an, an awareness between us that kept a tiny part of me anchored to the world outside.  I think that’s the only reason I wasn’t completely catatonic when I finally got back.”

“And that’s how you think Buffy will be?” questioned Jenny.

“Yes.”

Depression hovered over them like a cloud, threatening to engulf them.  With a great effort of will, Giles squared his shoulders and said firmly, “Well, if just being with her and talking to her isn’t going to be enough, we’re just going to have to find something that will.”

Just then, the bell rang for a second time, calling people back to their lessons.  Willow, Xander, Cordelia and Oz hesitated, looking at Giles.

“Go,” he instructed, “You can come back after school finishes.  We have 36 days before Buffy’s return, we will find a way to help her through this; the alternative is…unacceptable!”

A renewed sense of determination filled the group and, as the four teenagers reluctantly left the library, Giles, Jenny and Angel hit the books once more.
 
 

Part Twelve

Time after time an apparently hopeful line of inquiry proved to be a dead end, leaving them nothing but sheer will power with which to stave off despair.  Exhaustion tugged at them all, they left periodically to rest but the moment they awoke they returned to the library.

The teenagers had started taking catnaps in their classes, to the immense annoyance of their teachers, and even Willow’s grades had plummeted.  Compared with the safe return of her dearest friend the lessons that had always been so important to her were suddenly insignificant and uninteresting and it was a relief when the Christmas vacation arrived and they no longer had to divide their time between classes and the library.  Giles was seldom found anywhere else, arriving early and often working ‘til long after midnight until Jenny forced him to leave, although she herself was little better, spending long hours at the computer every day.

Of all of them, though, Angel was, unsurprisingly, the one who pushed himself the hardest.  He spent days on end in the library, only leaving when the others saw that exhaustion and hunger had him threatening to drop where he stood and forced him to go home and rest.  Even then, he often patrolled the streets and graveyards in an attempt to put off his return to the empty apartment for as long as possible.  And when he finally did sleep, it was never for long and often found him waking abruptly less rested than he had been when he lay down.

~~~

Almost three weeks after Buffy disappeared, Xander looked up from the book that he was reading and exclaimed, “I think I’ve found something!”

The others put down their books and gathered round him hopefully as he pointed to the page in front of him, “Look, this spell is to force someone’s memories to the surface!  If we used it on Buffy then perhaps…”

“Perhaps it would be enough to bring her back to us,” Giles concluded, “Well done, Xander, this might well be what we…”

“NO!”  Angel interrupted, “We can’t!”

Surprised by the outburst, everyone turned to look at him, “I don’t understand,” Giles admitted, “Why can’t we?”

Rather than answer directly, Angel turned to Xander and asked, “Did you notice what that spell is intended for?”

“Uh…no…but what difference does it make as long as it can do what we want it for.”

“What we want it for doesn’t matter, Xander, what matters is what it does!”  Seeing that the others still didn’t understand he explained, “That spell...its a form of torture!  It's not even intended for interrogation!  When the book says that it forces memories to the surface, that’s exactly what it means…what we’re talking about here is mental rape and it will bring back everything that’s ever happened to her as though she was living it a second time, only this time there would be no way for her to shield herself, nowhere in her mind that she could retreat to!”

The horrified expressions on the others faces told him that they understood and he fell silent.

“Dear God!” said Giles shakily, “If we had used this and made her relive everything she’s been through…it would have broken her completely.”

“But…but how can you be so sure that that’s what it does?” asked Willow, desperately clinging to the tiny shred of hope offered by the spell, “maybe its just…badly worded, maybe….”

“Willow,” Angel interrupted gently, holding her eyes with his, “I know.”

She looked down, unable to face the pained knowledge in his eyes, and said in a very small voice, “Oh.”

“Maybe we’ve been going about this the wrong way,” said Jenny, thoughtfully.

“How do you mean?” asked Cordelia.

“We’ve been trying to find a spell that will make Buffy respond to the world around her – to bring her to us – but forcing her out of her sanctuary is bound to be traumatic however we do it…so maybe we should be looking for a way to go to her.”  She looked across at Angel, “You and Buffy have always had a strong connection to one another, maybe we can use that to somehow…link your mind to hers.  Then you can guide her back to us.”

The others reacted enthusiastically to the idea but Angel went rigid, every muscle tensing like those of a predator sensing its prey, as Jenny’s words plucked at an almost forgotten chord in his mind and his thoughts turned inward as he painstakingly searched his memory, trying to confirm what he thought he knew.  It took him less than a minute to reassure himself that he was not mistaken and once he was certain he moved quickly towards the library exit, snatching up his duster from where he had left it on the back of a chair as he passed and shrugging into it without slowing down.

“Angel?” Giles’ voice stopped him before he reached the doors, “Where are you going?”

He had been so focused upon what he needed to do that he had completely forgotten that the others were there.  Slowly he turned back to them, reluctant to waste any time now that he had finally found a positive course of action that he could follow to help Buffy, but aware that they deserved some kind of explanation.

“I think I might know where to find what we need,” he told them, “if we’re looking for spells of the mind or spirit, we need to look in the Book of Athene.”

Giles inhaled sharply, “I thought that the Book of Athene was destroyed over 3000 years ago!  Are you saying that you know where it is?”

Angel nodded slowly, “I think so, at least, I did.  I’ll be back before the time runs out.”

“We’ll come with you,” volunteered Xander at once and the others nodded in agreement.

“Not a chance,” Angel told them firmly, “You’d be killed…humans wouldn’t stand a chance where I’m going!”  He saw the protest forming on their faces and added, “Besides, you have to stay here and keep looking, if I’m wrong or anything happens to me…” he didn’t finish but everyone understood and one by one they nodded unhappily.

“But where are you going?” asked Willow.

“New York.” He said simply as he started towards the doors once more, “I need to talk to a friend!”

“Angel!” called Giles a moment before he reached them, he glanced back questioningly, “Be careful, my friend” the Watcher told him soberly, “Not just for your sake but Buffy’s as well…I don’t think we’ll have any chance of recovering her if you’re dead.”

Angel nodded his understanding and then he was gone, the slight swinging of the doors the only sign of his passing.

The others watched it in silence for a moment, and then Xander asked, “What’s the Book of Athene?”

“Athene was the Ancient Greek Goddess of Wisdom,” Giles explained, “It’s said that she gave a book containing spells of great power to the first of her High Priestess’s.  The book was handed to each successive High Priestess with the sacred charge never to allow it to fall into the wrong hands…until now I’ve always believed that if it ever existed at all it must have been destroyed sometime during the Dark Ages.”

“How does he know where to get this stuff?” asked Cordelia, rhetorically, “Angel got the Codex for you as well, didn’t he, I wonder what else he has stashed away.  Does he run a second-hand book shop on the side or something?”

No one answered her but Willow giggled and a fragile feeling of hope seemed to shimmer in the air around them as they exchanged tentative smiles before returning to the search.  As Giles reached for the book that he had left open on the counter, his gaze fell upon the calendar beside it: it was Christmas Day.

~~~

The library seemed emptier, somehow, without Angel, which was strange since he seldom made a sound even when he was there.  It was only once he was gone that they realized how much a part of the group he had become.  Over the past few weeks his status among them had quietly changed from that of an outsider who was connected only to Buffy, to that of a full member and trusted friend.  The number of books that they were able to get through each day had dropped by almost a third, proof, if proof were needed, of how much Angel had contributed and how tirelessly he had worked.

They had become accustomed to seeing him the moment they arrived in the library, always the first to arrive and the last to leave, and his absence left a hole in the group that was hard to ignore.  It wasn’t a vast gaping emptiness like the one that had been left by Buffy, but it was there and, as they did with Buffy, they prayed each night for his safe return.
 
 

Part Thirteen

School started again but apart from the time that the four teenagers spent in class, they still spent every waking moment in the library, ostensibly looking for an answer but it was driven more by a need to be among other people who understood, rather than the belief that they could help her.  As Giles had told Angel before he left for New York, without him there was nothing Buffy loved enough to induce her to endure the suffering she would have to face to return.

None of them doubted that she loved them, she had proved it many times, but she didn’t need them and, when it came right down to it, they didn’t need her either, not the way she and Angel needed each other.  If Buffy died then they would always mourn her but their lives would, ultimately, continue and there would be another Slayer to take up her duties on the Hellmouth.  The world would keep turning, as it always did, for everyone except Angel.  For him, the world would stop, the bond between them so strong that life without her would be the worst torment imaginable – a pain too deep to endure.

Angel’s presence had given them hope; deep inside all of them dwelled the belief that Buffy would willingly do the impossible if it meant that there was the slightest chance of sparing him pain.  It was that belief that had sustained them since the whole ordeal began and as it faded, they found themselves grasping at air, trying to anchor themselves to ideas as insubstantial as a summer breeze.

Almost without realising it they had begun to speak as though it were already too late to save her, their voices hushed and respectful like those of people gathered around a deathbed, waiting for confirmation of what they already knew to be inevitable.

~~~~~

Twenty days after Angel’s departure – thirty-eight since Buffy disappeared – they were sitting around the table in the library.  It had been weeks since any of them had had enough sleep and even Cordelia was starting to look haggard but none of them felt any desire to go home and rest.  For the first time in weeks, all the books around them were closed, the hum of the computer silenced.  The calendar lay in the centre of the table, the black circle around January 15th seeming to mock their efforts, taunting them with the fact that they had only two days left, but it was not that which had brought them to a halt.

It had been Cordelia who had noticed it, and when she mentioned it to the others they had all wondered how it was possible that they could have overlooked it for so long, though they were sure that Angel had been aware of it from the start.  For thirty-eight days they had been marking off the passage of time on the calendar, watching the days slip through their fingers like water through a sieve, but not one of them had allowed themselves to consciously register the significance of the date.

Buffy would be returned on the 15th and, as things currently stood, it seemed inevitable that she would die two days later on January 17th – her 18th birthday.  It seemed like the ultimate cruel trick of a fate that had been having fun at her expense from the moment she had first been called, destined to be forever different from those around her.

Logically they knew that it was really a very insignificant detail, but coupled with everything else that had happened, particularly the events of her previous birthday, it just seemed like the last straw.  Proof that the universe really did have it in for Buffy Summers.

“I don’t understand why,” said Willow plaintively, “It can’t just be a coincidence, can it?”

“I don’t know why, Willow,” Giles said quietly, “I agree that it seems unlikely that, with all the possible days of the year it should happen to fall randomly on that one but I can’t begin to speculate on the reason for it.”

“It’s symbolic,” said a hoarse voice from behind them, “Birth and death or birth and rebirth, either way it has symmetry.”
 
 

Everyone whirled to face the speaker, hope surging within them once more even as they tried to brace themselves for disappointment in case their ears were playing tricks on them.  But no, they had not mistaken the voice, for there, leaning against a bookcase at the entrance to the stacks, a large, ornate book in his arms, was Angel.

He looked like death warmed over; his clothes were ragged and dirty, his skin an unhealthy shade of grey and pulled tautly over the bones of his face in silent testimony to the weight he had lost but to those watching he seemed like the most wonderful sight they had ever seen.

They gathered around him but before any of them could give voice to the delighted welcome in their hearts, he said, thrusting the unexpectedly heavy book into Giles’ hands, “Here…you have to find the spell, there’s not much time left!”

Angel’s voice died away on the last word as, his task finished, he finally allowed his body to succumb to the strain of everything it had endured and, pushed far beyond even his limits, he collapsed.

Everyone but Giles - who still held the book - leapt to catch him, but their reactions were too slow for any of them to reach him before he hit the ground.

There was a dark red stain on the bookcase where Angel’s back had rested, a silent testament to all that he had endured to retrieve the book that Giles now held.  After staring at it for a moment, the Watcher pulled his scattered thoughts together and began to issue instructions.

After depositing the book on the library table, he bent down to grasp Angel’s shoulders and said, “Xander, Oz, help me get him into the office.”

In the end it took all six of them to move Angel’s large frame the short distance from the stacks to the couch in Giles’ office and they were out of breath when they got him there.  Despite the amount of weight that the vampire had obviously lost, what remained was pure muscle and he was far from light.

When they finally set him down, Giles, Jenny, Cordelia & Willow – all of whom had been supporting his torso – found that their clothes, particularly their sleeves, were stained with partially dried blood – just as the bookcase had been and they carefully turned him over to examine the extent of his injuries.  Giles took one look at the shredded remains of Angel’s duster, the grey pallor of his skin and the deep wounds in his back and immediately sent Cordelia to find bandages and Xander and Oz to the butchers to bring back as much blood as they could carry before cutting the remainder of his coat and shirt off him and carefully picking out the bits of fabric that had become embedded in the wound.  As he began to work, grateful that Angel was unable to feel the pain of what he was doing, Giles found to his horror that, as well as cloth, there were splinters of wood lodged in the wounds – a fact which told him that, instead of the blades that he had imagined, Angel had come within centimetres of getting a stake through his heart!

It was a long, unpleasant process, and by the time he was finished Angel’s torso was swathed in white gauze and Xander and Oz had returned with the requested blood.  It was a measure of their concern for their friend that, when Giles asked them to decant some of it into a mug, the unpleasant nature of what they were doing barely registered.

Giles took the mug from them and moved back to Angel’s side, he was wondering how he was going to get the blood down the unconscious vampire when Angel solved the problem for him.  The heavy, metallic scent of blood reached the ravenous demon within him even in his unconscious state and his eyes snapped open, glowing yellow as his face transformed into the harsh ridges that revealed his true nature to the world.

He didn’t seem to notice the people around him; his attention was riveted on the thick, red liquid that filled the mug Giles had placed on the table by his side.  As he snatched it up and began to drink, the other’s looked at one another and quietly left the office to give him some privacy.

It disturbed them to see him that way; it was a reminder that the demon who had rejoiced in tormenting them, and whom they all hated, would always dwell within their friend, trapped but always there.

Only Buffy had ever been completely at ease with the duality of Angel’s nature, able to view the occasional lapse of control with equanimity.  For the others it had been a part of what had made them so hesitant about accepting him and was now something that had to be tolerated, a bad habit, like occasionally drinking too much and becoming obnoxious, that they had to put up with because they considered his presence the rest of the time to be worth the effort.

~~~~~

It was over half-an-hour before Angel emerged from the office and during that time he had found and drunk most of the rest of the blood that they had provided for him.

His face had resumed its usual handsome visage and, in the brief time since he had fed, the sickly grey pallor had faded from his skin and his angular form seemed to have filled out a little, making him appear less skeletal than he had before, though his eyes were still shadowed with exhaustion and he swayed where he stood.

Despite his obvious weakness, his mind was clear and his attention was riveted to the book that lay on the table in front of a totally absorbed Giles.  He had done little beyond register its extraordinary weight when Angel had handed it to him but once he was sure that he had done all he could for his friend, it had called to him like a siren’s song, beguiling him, primarily with the possibility of a way to help Buffy but the chance to study such a remarkable text had possessed a lure of its own.

It had taken little more than a cursory inspection to reveal the reason it had been so heavy, instead of paper or parchment, the book was made of some sort of metal, the likes of which Giles had never before encountered.  The cover gleamed dully under the electric lights and was highlighted by an inlayed design of what appeared to be silver.  Each page was made of what appeared to be the same metal as the cover, but was as thin and flexible as paper.  The text gleamed silver on the dark pages but it lay seamlessly on the pages as though it had always been there, a part of the darker metal surrounding it, and Giles touched it almost reverently, running his fingers over it in search of some kind of imperfection that would suggest it had been forged by human hands, but there was none.

“Giles,”

The sound of someone calling his name penetrated his absorption and he reluctantly lifted his head, but his irritation dropped away when he saw who it was.  “Angel!” he exclaimed, “How are you feeling?”

 “Forget about me.  How long was I out?  Have you found anything?”

“Not long,” Giles replied, “I’ve only just started translating it.”

Angel staggered and nearly fell as he moved towards him, catching himself just in time and waving away Xander when he tried to support him.

“Angel, you need to rest!”  Willow told him anxiously, and the others nodded in agreement.

“Later,” he said hoarsely.

“When?” asked Xander bluntly, “You’re practically out on your feet!  We have less than two days left and Buffy is going to need you to be at full strength!”

“Xander’s right,” Giles told him, “You’ve done your part for now, you should rest while you can.  I’ll keep translating this and I promise that I’ll call you the moment I find anything.”

Angel held his eyes for a long moment and then nodded reluctantly, accepting that in his present state he would be little more than a hindrance.  For the first time since the crisis began there was nothing for him to do and the absence of a goal left him feeling dazed.

Recognising instinctively that he had pushed himself almost beyond rational thought, Cordelia put a gentle hand on his arm and guided him towards the door saying as she did so, “Come on, I’ll drive you to the apartment.”

As docile as a lamb, Angel followed.
 
 

Part Fourteen

She stood looking down at him for a moment, her expression compassionate, before moving to the cupboard to find a blanket.  As she spread it over him, Cordelia studied Angel; she had never seen him look so vulnerable, his face lined with grief and pain even in his sleep.  What had happened to Buffy was tearing him apart, and she had no doubt that, if they should fail to save her, he would follow her into death rather that remain in a world without her in it.  She could barely imagine a love like that; a love that would have each give anything, without a single thought for cost or consequence, for the other; a love that made life worth living.  Xander cared for her, she knew that, and she cared for Xander, but what lay between them was as far from what Buffy and Angel shared as a single candle flame was from the sun itself and she both envied and pitied them for what they had.  Envied because, from the light that shone in their eyes when they were together, it was a joy beyond words and pitied because, when they were forced apart, it became an agony beyond endurance.  With a silent prayer that the two of them would be together again soon, she placed the key on the bedside table and left the apartment to drive back to the library.

~~~

During the hours that followed a hush seemed to fall over Sunnydale and for Buffy’s friends there was a feeling that the world was holding its breath, waiting to see what would happen next.  Until Giles completed the translation, they could do nothing more and, after being told to stop hovering over his shoulder, they left the library to rest, with instructions not to return until they were summoned.

When they awoke, almost twelve hours later, it was as though they had suddenly been cast adrift.  Their lives had revolved around the library for so long that it seemed strange not to head straight there, hours before school started.  The day passed in a daze, their lessons seemed unreal and, at lunchtime, the bright sunshine outside was like a dream compared with the reality of the shade inside the library.

The school day ended without news from Giles and, after a brief stop at the library to see if there was anything that they could do and to make sure that Giles had the number for Cordelia’s mobile so he could contact them if anything came up, they left the building.  Having nothing to do seemed even more unnatural in the evening than it had during the day and none of them were sure what they should do.  All the things that had previously filled their days seemed unappealing to them now; going to the Bronze when there was so much about to happen was out of the question – they needed to help but there was nothing that they could do.

After wandering aimlessly for a while they found themselves back where they had started – in front of the school.  For a while they simply stood and looked at it, but night was falling fast and the streets of Sunnydale were far from safe after dark.  There was little danger from vampires – Buffy had decimated their numbers and they had yet to recover – but vampires were only one of the many things that were drawn to the town by the power of the Hellmouth beneath it.

Xander was the first to move, heading, not away from the school, but towards it but it was only a second before the others followed.  Not wanting to disturb Giles concentration, they stayed away from the library and instead settled down to wait in an empty classroom just down the hall, where they talked for hours about everything that had happened since Buffy had entered their lives and how much she had given them simply by being herself.

Giles worked steadily, so aware of the minutes passing that he paid little attention to spells that would, under other circumstances, have had him overflowing with excitement.  With each new spell he came to, he prayed silently that this would be the one for which he was searching, the one that would give them at least a chance to bring Buffy back.  The translation was painfully slow, the Greek so archaic that even he had trouble reading it, and the spells had no titles; the only way to discover their purpose was to read through the text until he was sure that it was not the one he sought and then move on to do the same thing with the next, and the next and the next…

Hours passed, and exhaustion tugged at him but he ignored it, driven by a desperate combination of hope and fear and the knowledge that giving in to his need for sleep could cost Buffy everything.  Jenny provided him with a steady supply of coffee, which he either drank without noticing or left to go cold and once or twice she insisted that he stop what he was doing long enough to eat something, though he couldn’t have said what it was that he had eaten.

If he had had the energy he would have cursed the fates that had placed them in this desperate situation but it took everything that he had just to focus his eyes on the pages before him.  In twenty-six hours he had read less than a third of the book that Angel had entrusted to him and he was sorely afraid that, if, indeed, it contained a spell that could help them, it would be in its last pages where he would not find it in time for it to do them any good.  Less than twenty hours remained before Buffy returned and after that there were only two days for them to reach her; at his current speed, he would finish the book just in time to watch her die.

Forcing himself to concentrate, he reached for his long-forgotten coffee and took a sip, hoping that the caffeine would help him stay awake as he continued the painstaking process of translating page before him, running one finger of his other hand across the page in harmony with his eyes in order to keep his place when fatigue made his vision blur.

He was about to take a second sip when he froze, wondering if his mind was playing tricks on him or if he had just read what he thought he had.  Quickly his eyes jumped back up the page and he read again the words that had caught his attention, taking great care with his translation so that he could be sure there was no mistake.  There was not.

“My God!” he exclaimed, startling Jenny since they were the first words he had spoken since he had told the teenagers to leave, “I've found it!”

In his excitement he completely forgot about the cup he still held in his hand and it slid from his fingers, depositing liberal quantities of cold coffee in his lap before shattering as it hit the floor.  Giles barely noticed, as, his exhaustion forgotten, he held up his hand to Jenny for silence while he finished translating the spell before him, carefully writing down the details they would need in the notebook that lay beside him.

She watched him for a moment, smiling with relief at his obvious enthusiasm, and then quietly left the room to tell the waiting teenagers that the long wait was nearly over – there was finally something they could do.

~~~
 

The sound of the phone ringing echoed around the apartment and pulled Angel from a deep sleep.  Despite that, there was no chance for it to ring a second time before he snatched it up and put it to his ear.  There was no grogginess, no instance of wondering where he was; he went from sleeping to fully alert in seconds.

“Did you find it?” he asked urgently, without waiting to learn the identity of the caller.  The possibility that it could be someone other than Giles or one of the other members of the gang never even crossed his mind.

“Yes.”

“I’ll be right there.”

He hung up before Giles could say another word and, after changing quickly out of his shredded clothes, left the apartment at a dead run, arriving at the school less than ten minutes later.

~~~

When Angel burst through the library doors, the six people seated around the table turned to look at him in surprise – it was the first time since they had known him that any of them had ever heard him arrive.

“You’re looking much better,” Cordelia told him with a smile as he took his seat at the table, “How do you feel?”

It was true; the difference that a little blood and twenty-six hours sleep had made to his appearance was remarkable.  The grey cast had left his pale skin and the exhausted glaze was gone from his dark eyes.  Lines of strain still marked his face and he was not yet up to full strength but, even in such a short time, he had gained back some of the weight that he had lost and no one looking at him would have been able to guess at the extent of the already healing injuries hidden beneath his black duster.

“I’m fine.” Angel said dismissively, then asked, after a vaguely apologetic look at Cordelia for being so short with her when she was merely expressing concern for his well-being, “Giles, what have you got.”

Giles, whose euphoria had faded slightly upon reading the details of the spell, got to his feet.  “As you believed, there is a spell which should make it possible for you to communicate directly with Buffy within the confines of her mind.  Assuming that she has not completely severed every connection between her body and her spirit, the spell should guide you through her mind to-to her centre…her soul.  If we are too late and Buffy has cut herself off, then the spell will do nothing and she will be lost forever."

He was silent for a moment, allowing the bitter implications of his words to sink in, before continuing,  "Once you have entered her mind, there will be obstacles, which must be overcome if you are to succeed.  The spell will keep you from losing your way but it cannot help you to overcome the defences behind which she hides; you must find your own way through them.”

“Can we do it?” Angel asked, “Do we have what we need to set this up?”

The Watcher nodded, “The spell itself is relatively simple, any elements we don’t already have should be easily obtained at the magic shop.” He paused and then said worriedly, “Angel…this could prove to be very dangerous; once begun there will be no way back.  The spell can get you into Buffy’s mind but only she can get you out again.  If you should fail to reach her…your soul will be dragged down along with hers when she dies.  You’ll be trapped forever in what could prove to be a very unpleasant place.”

“I understand.”

“Do you?”

Angel nodded, “I’ll be with Buffy…that’s all that matters.  Better trapped with her forever than alone for eternity.”

“Angel…  After everything she’s been through the Buffy we knew might gone forever, can you really contemplate spending eternity with the tortured remains of what was once the woman you loved?”

“Yes!”  He answered fervently, without the slightest hesitation, “The soul doesn’t die, Giles, not completely.  Given enough time I might be able to reach her.  And even if I can’t…better to suffer with her than alone; I can endure anything except being without her!”

The look in Angel’s eyes kept Giles from arguing.  He had known all along what Angel would do but he had still felt obliged to make sure that he was fully aware of the risk involved.

“All right,” he agreed, “but there are…problems associated with having you as the seeker.  Your soul will enter the landscape of Buffy’s mind.  In a human, that would cause a coma-like state in the body of the seeker, but in your case…”

 “The demon,” Angel said, understanding at once, “If my soul isn’t present then the demon will have control.”

At the thought of facing Angelus again – this time without the protection of the Slayer – fear clutched at the hearts of everyone in the room.  Jenny, in particular, was as white as a sheet at the idea of coming face to face with her killer.

Of all of them, Angel was the most horrified by the idea of letting Angelus loose once more; of knowingly setting him free from the restraints his soul placed on him; of exposing his friends to such danger when there would be no one to help them; of the possibility that those friends would die screaming at his own hands.

He shuddered and closed his eyes, fighting back visions of what would happen to them if the demon roamed free, “I won’t let it happen again!” he swore hoarsely, unaware that he spoke his thoughts out loud, “This time it will be different!”

His eyes flashed open and he looked around the table, “I’ll help you cage him,” he told them, his voice ragged, “show you what you need to keep him at bay.  I won’t let him hurt any of you again!”

Angel didn’t even notice that he had begun to think, and speak, of himself and his demon as two separate entities.  The seed that Buffy had planted with her insistence that he was more than he believed, and nourished by forcing his mind to confront the fact his soul had not be present to stop the demon, had grown, so gradually that he had not even noticed; sending down roots deep into his soul until even his heart had been forced to accept that she had spoken the truth.

“We know you won’t, Angel,” Xander told him, responding to the unconsciously pleading note that had entered his voice, “we trust you; just tell us what we can do to help.”

Angel blinked in surprise, still unaccustomed to anyone other than Buffy – particularly Xander – being willing to put their faith in him, “Thank you,” he said hoarsely, “if one of you could get as much holy water as possible, I’d be grateful; I can take care of everything else but I’d rather not have to get that myself.”

“All right,” said Giles, “We’ll do as much as we can now and then I think that we should all try and get some sleep, once Buffy returns we’ll have very little opportunity since Angelus will require careful watching and its essential that three of us are awake to tend the flame at all times; once the spell has begun, if it should go out, or be tended incorrectly, Angel will be without guidance; its light will create the path that he must follow.”

Everyone nodded in understanding and agreement, their expressions sombre as they considered how much would be riding on the burning of a single flame.

“I’ll get the holy water,” volunteered Xander.

“I’ll drive you,” offered Cordelia at once, “we’ll be able to carry more if we use the car and we can go to several churches instead of just one.”

Willow glanced at Oz and then said, “If you give us a list of what we’ll need for the spell, Oz and I will go to the magic shop for you, Giles.”

Giles handed her a sheet of paper on which were listed the elements of the spell and the amount required, “Some of these things will be quite expensive,” he warned her, “particularly in these kinds of quantities, you’ll need money.”
He was reaching for his wallet as he spoke but Angel beat him to it, handing her substantial number of hundred dollar bills.
Everyone looked from the money to Angel in surprise and Xander whistled quietly but no one commented and Willow took it from him without question; with Buffy’s imminent return at the forefront of their minds, there was no room in anyone’s head for trivialities.

~~~

It was after one o’clock when Angel finally left the library; he had sent the others home hours before with instructions to eat and rest and not return until ten the next morning at the earliest so that they would be as fit as possible for the coming ordeal.  Left to his own devices, Angel worked to create a cage that would hold him, no matter what the demon tried, once his soul left his body.  The book-cage was the obvious solution; it had been reinforced in order to make it strong enough to hold Oz when the moon was full but, looking at it, Angel knew that it would not be enough to hold him.  He could see places in its structure that had gradually succumbed to the monthly violence inflicted upon it, weaknesses that his demon could easily exploit.  Unlike the werewolf, the cage now needed to contain a being that could reason and it was not up to the task.

Had there been time, he would have replaced it completely – despite the problem Giles would have had explaining to the school-board why it was that they the library needed a book-cage strong enough to hold an enraged elephant – but time was a luxury that they did not have and he was forced to improvise.

Even when he had finally done all that he could, he still did not go home and rest, instead he patrolled the streets and sewers of Sunnydale, killing the few vampires that he came across and walking endlessly until the first light of dawn crept across the horizon.  As he walked, he cursed himself silently for having succumbed to the need to feed and sleep, it would have been better for all of them if the demon had been too tired and weak to cause trouble, but he had not known what the spell would entail and hindsight did no good at all.  Deep in the sewers, he could not see the lightening sky, but instincts honed by over 200 years of fear warned him as clearly as the changing sky would have done and he turned and made his way back in the direction of the library, where he rechecked the preparations he had made and paced restlessly around the room.

~~~

At exactly ten o’clock Giles, Jenny, Cordelia, Xander, Oz and Willow arrived back at the library.  Rather than go back to their respective homes alone, they had all gone back to Giles’ house, recognising that they were more likely to relax in each other’s company than they would be with nothing but four walls and their own thoughts.  Even so, the sleep that they needed proved elusive; their nerves were taut with an uncomfortable combination of anticipation and fear of what the next day would bring and none of them were able to unwind enough to sleep, and the awareness that if they were to succeed it was imperative that they rest, did nothing to relieve their frustration.

Finally, in desperation, Jenny cast a simple spell that temporarily released them from the tension that had been tying them all in knots.  Immediately, peace began to enfold them and, in a matter of minutes, everyone was asleep.  Once the initial barrier had been overcome, their bodies, still exhausted from the strain of the past 39 days, took over and none of them stirred until Giles’ alarm clock echoed through the house at eight-thirty the next morning.
 

~~~
 

As they entered the library, all six of them stopped in the doorway in surprise at the scene before them.  The relatively tidy library that they had left the night before had been transformed.  There were weapons of every shape and size propped up against the counter: swords and axes, crossbows and quarterstaffs, mace and daggers, stakes and crosses.

The weapons cabinet in the book-cage where the weapons were usually stored stood open – and empty.  Inside the cage, two sets of manacles lay on the floor inside a circle of crosses – just large enough for someone to lie down in if they curled up – had been carefully arranged, and there were more crosses fixed to the bars of the cage with string.

As well as the crosses, several large containers had been rigged high up on the outside of the cage, which, on closer inspection, proved to be filled with holy water.  There were several tiny punctures in each of the containers, each carefully covered with sticky-tape.  The removal of the tape would result in a slow but steady trickle of water running down the mesh of the cage, covering the most vulnerable areas.

In preparation for when the water in the containers ran out, several more stood nearby, ready to take their place.  Away from the cage lay six crosses, six, fully loaded, crossbows – four of which Giles had never seen before but immediately recognised as being both older and better than his own – and six large, powerful water pistols, which they assumed – correctly – to be filled with holy water.

The scene was nothing less than a vampire’s nightmare, and they cringed in sympathy for what it must have cost Angel to make the preparations that he had.  A pair of black leather gloves lay on the floor near the cage, evidence that he had had at least that much protection, but there was no doubt in anyone’s mind that what he had done had caused him considerable pain.

With the exception of the day that the Hellmouth had opened, the room had never born less resemblance to a High School Library – or a library of any other sort – and more then one of them spared a grateful thought for the spell that they had cast to keep people away while they were researching.  It had been less than two weeks after Buffy’s disappearance; despite the late hour they had been hard at work when Principal Snyder had burst in, demanding that they leave and henceforth the library remain closed after school hours.  Doing as he wanted was out of the question, but with the threat of Giles’ dismissal hanging over them, they could not openly defy him either.

Their solution had been a spell that ‘encouraged’ people to disregard the existence of the library.  It wasn’t exactly that people forgot about it, just that anyone without an extremely powerful need to be there would find themselves wanting to go somewhere else when they approached it.

It had worked better than they had hoped, and since that day there had been no visitors to the library.  On the rare occasions that he considered it at all, Giles felt mildly guilty about making so many textbooks unavailable to the people who would need them but that was outweighed by the relief of being able to get on with things without any fear of interruptions.

But it wasn’t the ordered chaos that the library had become that stopped them in their tracks when the first pushed open the doors; it was Angel himself who held them spellbound.

He was training.  He stood in the centre of the room, wielding an axe with deadly skill, ducking and weaving gracefully, his long coat swirling out around him as he blocked blows from an enemy that existed only in his mind.

Though he was aware of their presence, he didn’t even pause in what he was doing, continuing his workout until he finally rolled forwards, coming up on one knee to hurl the axe at the wooden dummy he had set up twenty-five feet away.  The blade bit deep into the wood where, had the fight been real, his opponent’s head would have been, splitting it neatly in two and stayed there, quivering.  Only then did he turn to face the others.

They were staring at him open-mouthed, they had known he was dangerous, known that he was a skilled fighter but this was the first time that any of them had ever really had an opportunity to study him in action.  Though he and Buffy frequently trained and patrolled together they always worked alone and it was only now that the others began to appreciate just how formidable he really was and for the first time they truly understood how it was that Angelus had come to be responsible for the death of so many Slayers.

They had watched Buffy train often enough to have acquired some understanding of the kind of strength and skill that it took to do what he just had – particularly since the axe he had swung so casually in one hand was one that Xander could only just lift with both of his.  Always before they had imagined that his fighting ability and strength placed him somewhere between their own, negligible abilities and Buffy – able to aid her in a fight but in no way her equal – and it came as a shock for them to realise that he and the Slayer were closely matched.  Buffy’s strength was greater that his, but Angel’s greater size and long experience worked in his favour, giving him a reach and tactical understanding that she did not possess.

Unbeknown to the others, over the course of the two years that they had known each other, they had discovered that their fighting styles complemented each other perfectly, and that that, combined with their knowledge of one another, melded them into an unsurpassable fighting team – or the most deadly opponents they would ever face.

When Angel had lost his soul, everyone had assumed that it was only her love for him that had made it so difficult for Buffy to fight him, none of them had realised that, combined with her reluctance to harm him had been a very real fear that she would not be able to defeat him if she had to, or how close she had come to dying when she faced him over Acathla.  Not even the Master had had his skill; it had been his mental powers that made him so dangerous – and made easy prey of every Slayer he had encountered – without them he had been no more fearsome than any other vampire that had lived long enough to learn caution.

Buffy had known but to the others it was a revelation and, as he came towards them, reality seemed to shift minutely around them as the man they had come to know merged with the deadly fighter they had just seen, leaving them with one more piece of the puzzle that was Buffy and Angel – they were true equals.
 
 

Part Fifteen

As the time for Buffy’s return drew nearer, fear built silently within each of them; fear that they would fail, fear that the changes in Buffy would be too great; fear that even if they succeeded, their friend would be gone forever.  They prepared for the coming ritual with great care, taking far longer than they needed to setting up in an attempt to keep busy.  Giles drilled them all repeatedly in everything they needed to know to perform the spell successfully and the tension in the air grew thicker with every second that passed.

Only Angel was calm; he knew, better than anyone, what Hell could have done to her, but he also knew that he would never rest until he reached her.  No matter what happened he would be with her again.  His greatest fear was having to exist without her and, no matter what happened, he knew that they would be together.  For him, the worst was nearly over.
For the others it had yet to begin.

~~~

The seconds ticked past with agonising slowness; everything that could be done in advance had been done – the elements of the spell were carefully arranged on the library floor and the book-cage was as vampire-proof as Angel could make it – and they had given up all pretence of doing anything except watching the slow progression of the hands around the face of the clock.

Darkness had begun to cloak the world outside the library, the shadows deepening, the sky a breathtaking display of colour as, for a moment, the last, slanting rays of the sun turned everything they touched, no matter how ugly, into a thing of beauty.  It was as though the sun wished to cram everything that was good about the day into the last few minutes before it gave way to night, something for the world to remember it by until it rose again the next day.

But the group in the library neither saw nor cared; the coming of darkness meant only that the time was almost at hand.

They had all been silent for so long that it was almost a shock when Willow asked anxiously, “What if we’re wrong about this, Giles, what if she doesn’t come to us?”

“Then we search the Master’s cave,” responded Angel before Giles had a chance to reply, “and if she isn’t there then we split up and search Sunnydale until we find her.”

Willow looked at him in silence for a few seconds and then nodded, she had known the answer before he spoke but she had wanted to be told that there was a better way.  No one said what they were all thinking – that if they had to search the town for Buffy, then it was likely that they would fail; there was little enough time for Angel to do what he had to as it was.

The problem was that they had almost no idea of what would happen when Buffy returned.  The only information that they had been able to find was in Leila’s original account.  In it she stated that her loved ones had appeared before her, when their sentence had ended and they could only hope that the same would be true of Buffy but they were far from certain. She had been taken in place of four, not one; there was nothing to guarantee that they would be together and it seemed impossible that she could be returned to them all – or so they hoped.  The possibility that they might each receive a piece of her had made them very determined not to be separated.  But if she could not be returned to them all, would she be returned to any of them?  Would she appear in the cavern from which she had vanished or somewhere else entirely?

They simply did not know and in the end they had decided to wait in the library and pray that, just once, luck would be with them.  They had toyed with the idea of someone remaining in the Master’s lair to keep watch, but only Angel could travel the tunnels in safety and if he, Giles, Willow and Xander remained in the library, Cordelia, Oz and Jenny would be easy prey for anything that discovered them.  And even if they had no trouble, there would be no way for the three of them to carry Buffy all the way back to the library, so nothing would be gained by their presence.

~~~

For almost half an hour after the sun set, nothing happened and as the seconds ticked by a new fear began to grow within them – the fear that they had been wrong, that the prophecy had been wrong and even the small chance on which they had pinned their hopes was a lie.

Angel shifted restlessly, he had a better sense of time than the others, a better memory of precisely when Buffy had vanished and everything inside him was screaming that the time for her return had arrived – but there was no sign of her.  He forced himself to remain where he was until he was sure that the time had passed and then he headed for the library door, saying as he did so, ‘I’ll check the cavern, wait here.’

Just as he reached the door, there was a sound like thunder and the room shook violently, dislodging books from their shelves and sending the tumbling to the floor.  The familiar cloud of sulphurous yellow smoke formed directly in front of Angel, whose actions had placed him on the opposite side of the room from the others.

The smoke lingered for a moment billowing thickly about the room before clearing enough to reveal to Angel what it was that lay huddled on the floor at his feet.

He dropped to his knees beside what remained of the woman he loved, swallowing the anguished scream that rose within him at the sight of her and tears poured unchecked down his cheeks.  She was scarcely recognisable as human, let alone as Buffy.

The others stepped closer as the smoke cleared enough for them to make out the two forms by the door.  At first they moved quickly, their faces relieved, but as they drew nearer their steps slowed as horror and disbelief froze them where they stood.  Nausea rose within them as the smell of burnt flesh reached their nostrils, making them long for the return of the sulphur, which had hidden it from them.

And then the smoke was gone and what it had concealed was now plainly visible to them all as they got their first clear look at what had been returned in place of the bright, loving girl who had been taken.

After a single, all encompassing glance, Giles, Jenny, Cordelia, Oz, Willow and Xander turned away as one, overcome by the overwhelming urge to be sick as they fought not to pass out.  Angel had tried to warn them but it had done no good; nothing could have prepared them for the reality of what lay before them.

Angel didn’t even notice their distress, he was aware of nothing except Buffy.  Her entire left side was brutally burned; her matchstick thin arm charred and blistered; her hand so twisted and distorted that it seemed more like a claw.  In contrast, her right side appeared to be untouched by fire.  Deep cuts and claw marks criss-crossed her flesh, until little skin remained and she shone with the gleaming scarlet paint of her own blood, which continued to pulse from her body with every beat of her heart.  In only the few minutes she had been there, a small pool had already formed beneath her and was spreading slowly across the floor.

The spell that had kept her alive for four-hundred years was still working but it was obvious that once its ‘protection’ failed, she would be dead within seconds.

The hazel eyes, staring vacantly from her ruined face were the only part of her that seemed to have escaped damage but the light that had always shone behind them was gone and, even though he had expected it, the emptiness that had taken its place horrified Angel more than the physical damage to her body.

He reached out towards her, his hand stopping just short of making contact with her ravaged flesh.  For an instant he hesitated, afraid of causing her more pain, before realising that the pain must already be so overwhelming that it could make no difference even if she had been aware of his presence – which she was not.

He gathered her up into his arms, uncaring of the blood that instantly saturated his clothes, and her name was torn from the very depths of his being as he cradled her against him, rocking her like a child as his eyes searched hers in the vain hope of finding some evidence that the connection that had always stretched between them like a live wire remained unbroken but there was nothing.
He had known how it would be, he remembered his own mindless return from Hell and had woken screaming every night since he had learned where she had been taken, but he was still unprepared for the anguish of seeing her like this.

The others approached slowly, their faces pale.  Despite all that they had witnessed since meeting Buffy, they had remained innocent in many ways and the sight before them was a nightmare they had never even imagined.

Despite everything Angel had told them of Hell, they had expected her to return at least looking almost the same as she had when she was taken – as they believed he had.  Instead they were confronted by…this.

“That can’t be Buffy!’  Denied Xander, knowing in his heart that it was but refusing to accept it, “It can’t!”

No one answered him, but the sound of his voice reminded Angel of the fact that he and Buffy were not alone, which, in turn, reminded him of what they had to do.  Slowly, he got to his feet, and carried her to the centre of the room and placed her gently in the circle that Giles had drawn.

“Giles,” he said quietly, forcing himself to look away from her and concentrate on what had to be done.

The watcher didn’t reply; his gaze was locked almost hypnotically on Buffy’s still form and he was unaware of anything else.

“GILES!”

Giles – and everyone else – started violently and tore their eyes away from Buffy to look at Angel.

“The spell?” he prompted, “We don’t have much time and we can’t afford to waste any of it.”

For a moment, the watcher just stared at him blankly, his mind still frozen with shock, and then understanding stirred, jolting him into action.  He nodded jerkily and, his movements unnaturally stiff and his voice hoarse with grief and shock, began trying to organize the others and get them to remember their carefully planned roles in what lay ahead.

~~~

It had taken nearly an hour for everyone to pull themselves together enough to perform the spell and Angel was practically snarling with impatience by the time they were ready.

Recognising that there was nothing he could do to help them, he had spent the time with Buffy but her vacant stare had only increased his desire to perform the spell and see the true face of his love one more instead of the empty shell that he held in his arms.

When the other were finally calm enough to perform the spell without mistakes, Angel kissed Buffy’s ruined face tenderly and said quietly, “I’ll be with you soon, Beloved.”

As he got to his feet he was aware of the moist stickiness of her blood on his face, the powerful taste of it on his lips and he started to wipe it away, only to stop dead at the sight of his bloodstained hands.  The symbolism made him shudder and, as so often before, guilt surged within him.  But before he would be washed away by it, the memory of everything Buffy had written in her diary rose up before him like a shield and the guilt ebbed away once more.

Stunned by what had just happened, Angel forced himself to focus upon the task at hand, storing the incident in his mind to be looked at once Buffy was safe and whole once more.  It had, however, made him aware of something that he needed to do before the spell was performed and, with the words, “I’ll be right back,” drifting behind him, he suddenly bolted from the room.

The remaining six stared at one another in shock, unable to believe that anything could have been important enough to Angel for him to leave at such a moment.  For several minutes they simply stood there, too stunned to react, then Giles took a single, hesitant step in the direction Angel had gone.  Before he could do more, the library doors swung open and Angel rushed through.

He was soaked; water beaded his skin in crystalline droplets and ran in silver streams from his hair to trickle down his face and bare chest before soaking into the already sodden waistband of his pants.

“I’m sorry,” he said in answer the astonished looks the others were giving him, “I…the demon…the blood…  I-I couldn’t let him…”

He trailed off, but he had said enough and the others shuddered with revulsion at the though of what the demon might have done had he returned to find himself literally covered with Buffy’s blood, and gratitude filled them that, thanks to Angel’s foresight, they would never have to find out first-hand.

He walked to the book-cage and was about to enter it when a sudden thought made him stop and turn back to face the others.

“If I should fail…” he said quietly, “…if I can’t guide her back…  I want you to promise me that you won’t try to recall my soul.  There’s no guarantee that you could, but I don’t even want you to try.  Just kill the demon and have done.”

As one, the others opened their mouths to protest, but the look in his dark eyes stopped them cold, “There’s no place for me on this earth without her,” he said hoarsely, “Nothing but emptiness and pain.”  His voice broke and he finished pleadingly, “Please…let me be with her!”

For a moment he allowed everything that he felt to show in his face and they caught their breaths at the depth of the agony they saw in Angel’s expression.  Giles looked round at the others and, seeing the pained agreement in their eyes, nodded reluctantly.

“You have our word, Angel.  We won’t try to bring you back.”  Giles assured him, turning to face him once more.

“Thank you,” he said, the words quiet but heartfelt, ‘…my friends.”

~~~

Without another word, Angel walked into the cage, wincing as he stepped inside the circle of crosses and sat down on the floor.  He locked one of the two sets of manacles around his ankles, then fastened one side of the other set around his left wrist, passed the other end around the chain of the other set and handed it to Giles so he could shackle his right wrist, rendering him virtually immobile.

“Nothing you see in Buffy’s mind can harm you unless you allow it to do so,” Giles told him softly as he crouched beside him, “Your own fear will be your greatest enemy.  It will seem like you're walking through a physical world, because your mind will translate the things that you see into those things to which it can relate but it will not be real - any pain you may feel or any danger, can only threaten you if you give it the substance with which to do so!  You can banish it in an instant in you try but you can’t destroy it.  What you’ll see will be representations of Buffy’s thoughts and feelings and you cannot fight her demons for her, however much you wish you could. Focus on your goal; focus on reaching Buffy and persuading her to return.”

Angel nodded to show he understood and the watcher patted him awkwardly on the shoulder before solemnly handing him a large white feather that had been shed from the wing of a snowy owl and exiting the cage, locking the door behind him.

The others stood watching him through the wire mesh and, looking up, he said urgently, “When I’m gone…make sure you have someone watching him at all times and do whatever you have to in order to keep him in line.  Remember what he’ll do if he gets the chance and use the water pistols at the slightest hint he’s planning something.  If I make it back, I’d much rather find myself drenched with holy water than any of you dead or injured.

If the cage doesn’t hold…use the crossbows and shoot to kill.  And don’t open the door until you have proof that I’m am who I claim to be, wait for a sign from Buffy,” he paused, unable to think of any other instructions, and finally concluded simply, ‘Be careful.”

“We will,” Cordelia promised, and the others all nodded in agreement.

“You do the same,” added Xander.

“Good luck, Angel,” said Willow, “bring her back to us.”

Giles, Jenny and Oz all murmured something similar and then they all moved to take up their places for the spell.

Once everyone was in place, Jenny lit a candle and touched another feather, almost identical to the one held by Angel, to the flame.  When the feather was burning she used it to light the ritual flame, which had to burn continually until the spell was concluded.  Once it was lit, and the oddly fragrant smoke was curling through the room, mingling with the acrid odour of burnt feather, Jenny began to chant.  Her voice led the others and soon five voices were rising in harmony with hers.  Their words were unrecognisable, but as they continued, the air seemed to thicken and become heavy with power in a manner similar to that of an incipient thunderstorm.  Great forces, mysterious and uncontrollable, filled the room, waiting to be unleashed.

The chant grew louder and louder, echoing around the room with a resonance their voices did not usually possess.  For long minutes the voices filled the room, then Angel’s voice rose above those of the others as he laid his request before the goddess.
 

“Goddess of Wisdom, grant this plea.
Soul to soul I seek her,
Soul to soul I greet her,
In her united,
Through her released,
While the flame burns,
Light my way,
In thy name, Great Athene,
Let it be so.”
 

As he finished speaking, Angel raised his hands as far as the chain would allow, the feather resting on his open palms and hunching his back so that his lips were almost touching it, he forced his lungs to work and blew upon it gently.  The feather rose from his hands as though carried by a strong wind, rather than an almost imperceptible breath of air.  It sailed across the room, never veering from its course, angling through the mesh of the cage as though it were not there.  For an instant, the feather hovered above the sacred flame then it drifted down to land it the very centre of the fire.

At the same moment, the chanting reached its climax and something passed from Angel and into Buffy, so swiftly that it was almost impossible to detect, but in its wake, trailed a thread of golden light, no thicker than a cobweb; then the chanters fell silent and he slumped to the side as his body went limp.

As the first surge of energy from the spell ebbed away, leaving only a faint suggestion of its power to linger in the air like static electricity, Jenny, Cordelia and Giles murmured the words that would, temporarily, release them from the circle and their duties as guardians of the flame and turned to look anxiously at Angel.  The other three remained where they were, their eyes riveted on the flame.

For a time he lay still, then he stirred and rolled onto his back before rocking up into a sitting position using the strength of his back and stomach muscles, the shinning thread still connecting him and Buffy together.  For a moment he just looked at them, then his gaze settled on Jenny and his lips twisted in a cruel smile as he said sardonically, “Hello Jenny, you’re looking...livelier than you did the last time I saw you!”

Satisfaction gleamed in his eyes as his words hit home, making Jenny flinch and move closer to Giles, who had immediately snatched up one of the water-pistols, instinctively seeking comfort and protection from her enemy.

Angelus had returned!
 
 

Part Sixteen

The darkness surrounded him, so complete that even with his enhanced vision he could not penetrate it.  All around him he could hear the harsh, rasping sound of breathing, the clack of large claws and the slither of leathery skin on rock.  In the distance, a sudden scream of anguish split the air, going on and on until it faded into a despairing wail, which was lost beneath inhuman howls of sadistic pleasure.

A light flared before him, momentarily dazzling him with its unexpected brightness.  Squinting, he looked around him and, the moment his vision cleared, he would have given anything to have remained safely in the darkness.

He stood in the very centre of his own worst nightmares.  The brutal landscape of the demon dimension surrounded him, its denizens drawing closer as they noticed the newcomer in their midst.  Terror squeezed Angel’s soul and a whimper lodged in his throat as he struggled to hang on the knowledge that he was not where he appeared to be.  The knowledge that he was not in Hell but the landscape of Buffy’s psyche and that he was quite safe.

Squeezing his eyes tightly shut, he clutched his head in his hands and held Buffy’s memory before him like a talisman as he fought to control his panic.

Angel had no idea how long he remained that way but eventually he was able to force himself to straighten and cautiously opened his eyes, taking great care as he did so to keep his gaze firmly focused upon his own feet so as to avoid looking at his surroundings.  Gradually, the urge to panic receded slightly and, though it continued to hover close by his side, ready to pounce at the first opportunity, there was no longer such an imminent danger that he would break and run.  As a measure of his control returned, rather than blindly staring at his feet, he noticed that the ground beneath them seemed different from that of the surrounding landscape.

Slowly, warily, he raised his head and immediately realised that he was standing on a narrow path that shone with a pure, white light and stretched out before him a far as the eye could see, rising up the slope of a small hill and then disappearing over the other side.  Turning to look behind him, Angel saw that the path ended abruptly less than a foot from where he stood.

“There will be no way back…  The spell will guide you…” Giles’ words suddenly echoed within Angel’s mind and he turned to look at the path that he had to follow.  Even knowing that it would ultimately lead him to his goal, it still took every ounce of courage that he possessed for him to take the first step forwards.

The moment he had done so, he stopped, glancing around nervously, his eyes darting in all directions.  A scream lodged in his throat as he saw the demons that were advancing on every side and he clung to the fact that there were none on the path ahead of him.  Shaking with fear, he took another step, then another, expecting capture at every moment. As his steps quickened, he kept his eyes fixed on the path in front of him, refusing to acknowledge the terrors that surrounded him on every side.

At first, the path represented nothing more than a possible route to safety but, gradually, its true significance penetrated the fog of terror that surrounded him and his fear was forgotten as it dawned on him that, after so many weeks of separation and helplessness, he was almost within reach of Buffy.  Even before the thought was fully formed, he began to run, his feet moving so fast that it was almost as though he had taken flight.  So intent was he on his goal that he didn’t even notice when the demons he had so feared, faded away into the distance, their power over him shattered by his sudden indifference.

As he ran, Angel thought about the only possible explanation for his surroundings.  His heart wept over what Buffy must have suffered to turn the landscape of her mind into a reflection of Hell and he sent up a fervent prayer to the higher powers that, somewhere deep inside her, there remained some small spark of the radiance that had always lit her from within and warmed his battered soul whenever he was near her.

~~~

When he reached the top of the hill, Angel stopped abruptly.  Before him, the path gave way to a deep ravine, as unlike the gentle slope up which he had travelled as it was possible to be.  Looking down, he saw that the glowing white line of the path continued straight down, clearly visible against the dark, forbidding face of the cliff.

Far below stood an immense, windowless fortress that seemed to be made out of darkness itself.  Despair and pain radiated from it so strongly that Angel almost staggered under their weight, barely catching himself in time to keep from tumbling headfirst over the edge.

It crouched like a giant spider at the bottom of the ravine, almost covering the valley floor and towering many hundreds of stories above it.  Like a malevolent black hole, it seemed to drain the light and colour from everything around it, making even the bleak landscape through which he had just passed a relief to the eye.

~~~~

The climb down was treacherous; there was little by way of hand and foot holds, merely small, razor sharp protrusions and occasional tiny crevices, which shredded his hands as he clung desperately to the cliff face, making them slick with blood and hampering him still further.  His progress was painfully slow and anxiety gnawed at him ceaselessly as he struggled to increase his speed without losing his grip.

More than once he considered simply letting go and allowing gravity to carry him to the bottom but the state of his hands was enough to convince him that, were he to do so, then his own conviction in the reality of the fall would cripple him.  It had been easy to accept that nothing he saw would be real when he had been listening to Giles in the library; it was nearly impossible when presented with the overwhelming reality of it.

He had descended less than two hundred feet when a new problem presented itself.  The cliff below him suddenly became as smooth as glass forcing Angel to risk leaving the path in order to find an alternate route.  Fear clutched at him as he cautiously edged to his left, reaching for an outcropping of rock that lay beyond its boundaries.  Giles had not told him what would happen if he left the path before he reached Buffy and the possibility that, by doing so, he would lose his only way of finding her struck terror into the very depth of his being.

The relief that he felt when he realised that the path still glowed beneath his hands was indescribable.  Obviously it didn’t matter what he did, the spell would continue to guide him from wherever he might be for as long as the candle still burned within the library.  His progress improved after that, once he realised that there was nothing chaining him to that particular part of the cliff, he began to search for an easier route.

Not that any part of the climb could ever have been described as easy.  More than once, apparently safe rocks crumbled beneath him, leaving him hanging by his fingertips as he searched for another way to distribute his weight.

Despite the danger, Angel moved with reckless speed, too aware of every second that passed to be cautious.  He had no way of knowing how much time had passed since he had arrived, no way of knowing if his current perception of time was accurate, but if it was, then hours had passed and he was not even close to reaching his goal.  The cliff he clung to was simply the first of what could be many challenges and even as he fought to conquer it, he was constantly aware of the oppressive presence of what he had yet to face  – the menacing black shape that towered behind him, waiting patiently for its chance to swallow him whole.

~~~

At long last, Angel arrived at the bottom of the cliff.  He stood in a narrow corridor, walled on one side by the cliff down which he had just descended and on the other, by the building into which he must travel.  Looking up, only a tiny sliver of the sky was visible, and no light penetrated the depths in which he stood.  Only the path that guided him made it possible for him to see at all, its light was not bright, more like a pure white florescence but the glow emanating from it was enough for his preternaturally acute eyes to make out the details of his surroundings.

The surface of the building was so dark that looking at it was like falling endlessly into nothingness. Angel had the feeling that, if he were to touch it, he would be sucked in: buried so deeply that all that he was would cease to exist.  The longer he looked at it, the greater its power seemed to become.  The despair he had been fighting since he first saw it – in truth, since Buffy disappeared – gradually wormed its way into his soul, freezing his will to go on.  The thought that he was already too late, that Buffy was already beyond saving whispered insidiously through him, making him long for the oblivion he sensed within the strange dark walls.

With an almost physical wrench, he forced himself to look away, focusing his eyes on the path beneath his feet, just as he had done when panic threatened.  Forcing himself to remember what he had told Giles; that, even if he failed to bring her back in time, he would, one day, find a way to reach Buffy.

Instantly, the crushing weight of despair lifted slightly – still present but no longer all consuming – and he realised that at some point he had fallen to his knees, one hand reaching out like a supplicant, his fingertips only millimetres from the wall.  Horrified, he snatched his hand back as though it had been burned, recognising instinctively how close he had come to falling into a fatal trap from which he would never have emerged.

For a moment, he knelt where he was, staring unseeingly at his own hand.  Then he blinked and, as the world came back into focus, he suddenly noticed that the injuries he had sustained during his descent were gone.  In his battle against despair, all though of physical pain had vanished from his mind and, in forgetting, he had reshaped his own reality.

The smooth, unblemished skin of his palms was a salutary reminder that, in this place, the greatest danger he faced was himself.  Slowly, Angel got to his feet and turned to face the gaping maw of the building.  The light of the path was only visible for a few feet before it turned a corner and vanished abruptly, leaving no hint as to what lay ahead.

Drawing a deep, unneeded breath and squaring his shoulders in an effort to prepare for whatever lay ahead, Angel entered Buffy’s despair.

As he crossed the threshold, a violent shudder wracked his body and bitter cold enveloped him, carried by the slight breeze that blew from within.  The air whispered around him, filled with voices whose words were too faint for him to distinguish but whose grief was clear.  Setting his feet resolutely on the path before him, Angel forged deeper into the unknown.

~~~

Within seconds of entering the fortress, Angel was utterly lost, even if he had wished to go back there would have been no way for him to do so.  Once he had rounded the first corner, the darkness had given way to a flickering red glow, like the last light of a dying fire, though it had no visible source.  All around him lay a labyrinth of passageways, twisting and turning like great stone serpents, so numerous and intertwined that without the path to guide him, he would have been lost forever within the darkness.

A sudden scream split the air ahead of him and, instinctively, he began to run even as he recognised that the voice he had heard was not Buffy’s.  As he rounded the corner ahead of him he stopped dead at the sight before him.  A teenage boy he had never seen before lay sprawled across the path before him, his neck bearing the unmistakeable marks of a vampire’s fangs.  As the spark of life faded, the boy’s eyes turned towards Angel and anger flashed within them.

With his final laboured breath, he gasped accusingly, “This…is your fault…  You…should have…been…here...” Then his eyes rolled back in his head and he lay still.

Angel frowned, not understanding how the boy came to be there, or how he could be held accountable for what had happened.  A sudden movement in the passage beyond the boy’s body caught his attention and he looked up to find that a strange vampire was laughing at him.  The vampire was obviously young, as he had not yet learned how to feed without getting the blood of his victim on his clothes.

“You think you can stop us, Slayer?” he asked tauntingly, “Your fight is hopeless.”

Then he was gone, fading away into the darkness like mist, leaving Angel standing alone with only the boy’s body and his own confusion for company.

As if the first scream had been a signal, more echoed through the air, coming from every direction, their sound distorted by the passage walls.  And through it all the whisper of the walls continued, a counterpoint of loss to accompany the unearthly chorus of terror and pain.

When the anguished wail of a child echoed from one of the passages to Angel’s left, it was all that he could do not to leave the path to follow it to its source.  Trying to close his mind to what he heard, he stepped over the body and continued along the path.

The scene repeated itself many times over the hours that followed.  A scream would sound just ahead of him and he would arrive just in time to watch the victim die.  Men, women and children, so many that he lost count, all dying with words of accusation on their lips and a look of anger and betrayal in their eyes.  And each time, the demon(s) or vampire(s) that had been responsible for their death would taunt him with the futility of trying to stand against them.

No.  Not him.  Every word that was spoken was intended for Buffy not him, he was merely a spectator, a silent witness to Buffy’s pain as it gradually dawned on him that every one of the victims was someone whom Buffy had been unable to save since she had been called as the Slayer.

The realisation nearly broke Angel’s heart.  She had done so much good…saved so many lives and yet it was what she perceived to have been her failures that still lived on within her.  Each death inflicting a fresh wound on her vulnerable and loving heart, the faces of countless strangers branded forever upon her soul.

And he had not known.  Though he had known she grieved for each life that was lost, that she had never been able to view death as a part of her job the way most Slayers did, he had never imagined the sheer weight of the burden that she carried so uncomplainingly.

It was no wonder that she had always understood him so well.  Even in this they were alike.  He had always believe that Buffy did not, could not, understand what it was to bear the responsibility for so many deaths but he had been wrong and that understanding made him want to weep.

The prophecy which had led him here had been more accurate than he had known; Buffy’s heart did indeed encompass all and she suffered intensely because of it.

Angel was suddenly filled with shame over his own selfishness.  Where he had withdrawn, thinking only of himself as he brooded over the past, Buffy had reached out, keeping her own pain hidden in an effort to give strength and support to him and the others whenever they needed it.
 
 

Part Seventeen

Then, suddenly, he turned a corner, as he had done so many times before, and found something new.  A demon stood before him, so large that the ceiling had to arch upwards to accommodate its height, but there was no victim.  And the demon was like nothing that had been seen on Earth since before the first Slayer, when demons had ruled supreme.

Angel shuddered at the sight of it, for this was a denizen of the demon dimensions and he had seen its like before.

“YOU HOPE STOP US, SLAYER?” It rasped derisively through a mouth that had never been intended to speak English as moved towards Angel, talons extended, “DO YOU PLAN TO DEAFEN US WITH YOUR SCREAMS?  YOU ARE PATHETIC!  WEAK!  NOT WORTHY OF OUR CONCERN.”

Fear was forgotten as fury surged through Angel like a flood, washing away everything in the need to revenge himself upon the creature that had harmed his love.  But even as he tensed to spring, the demon turned its back on him and faded away into the darkness, leaving him with nothing on which to vent his rage.

With an unearthly howl, he whirled and slammed his fist into the passage wall with all his strength, not even aware of the pain.  He wanted to kill, even though the demon was no longer with him, he wanted to utterly destroy the demon he had seen.  The urge for violence didn’t trouble him; didn’t, as it once would have, make him wonder just how much of the evil he had committed had come from him and not his demon.  There were some things that were worth killing for, worth any price at all, and Buffy was his.  There was nothing he would not do for her.

Just the thought of her was enough to give him the strength to regain control.  Hatred still seethed within him but he was able to ignore it in order to continue his mission, able to remember once more that what he had seen had been a memory.  And there was no way to kill a memory.

Still shaking from the force of his emotions, he set off along the path once more.

~~~

When the scream sounded ahead of him, it was almost a relief, a return to the familiar scenes of the previous hours instead of further details of what Buffy had endured.  But when it came into view, he realised that he had been wrong.  This was not the same.

All of the other victims had been strangers, death their only connection with Buffy.  Even when Angel had been with Buffy when she had found them, only the faces of the children had lingered in his mind but this face was familiar.

Jesse.  Willow and Xander’s friend.

As though thinking their names had conjured them up, Willow and Xander appeared before him, their eyes fixed on the lifeless body of the boy they had grown up with.  Dropping to their knees, they gathered him up, holding him tightly as they wept.  Then, suddenly, they looked up and, despite everything that had come before; Angel was taken aback by the hatred in their eyes.

“This is your fault!” Xander spat bitterly.

“You should have saved him!” added Willow, “If you’d been a better Slayer then you would have!”

He wanted to argue, wanted to hear them admit that Buffy had done everything she could to save their friend, more than most would have expected, but they were not real.  The real Willow and Xander had long since accepted that, in the war Buffy fought every night, there would, inevitably, be casualties.  For all her strength, she was only one person and they, along with everyone else who knew of her duty, were awed by how much she was able to accomplish.

But there was no way to convince these apparitions of that, any more than he could punish the demons.  Only Buffy could do that…and she was not here.  She was not fighting any more.  Her demons ran free within her while she retreated from an agony that was too great for her to face alone.

Angel could only pray that his presence by her side would be enough to spur her into battle once more but, the more he saw of her pain, the more he doubted that his love would be sufficient to balance the scales.

It was deeply disturbing to have to walk past Willow and Xander without acknowledging their presence, to listen to them curse their dearest friend for her failure to do the impossible.  Unlike the demons in the earlier scenes he had witnessed, they did not fade away once they had said their piece but continued to hurl their venomous accusations until their voices faded into the distance, drowned out by the mournful whispering of the walls; the tragic chorus was a welcome relief in comparison.

The relief did not last.  Around the next corner waited Merrick, Buffy’s first watcher, his final words accusing Buffy of being responsible for his death because she had refused to listen to him.  After Merrick came the Master, reminding her of her cowardice in the face of death, reminding her that people had died because fear had kept her from facing him.

More demons followed; all huge and powerful, all obviously memories of Buffy’s experience in the demon dimension and all taunting her with her inability to stand against them – taunting her with her weakness in the face of pain.

Angel wanted to shut them out, wanted to pass them by without hearing their words but he could not run fast enough to outdistance them.  Time seemed to slow as he passed each one, forcing him to listen, fuelling the hatred that knotted inside him, burning his mind with the memories of his own experiences, with the knowledge of exactly what she had endured.

Each scene he came to was worse than the one before, each memory crueller, more brutal than the last.  Tears flowed unchecked down Angel’s cheeks and anguish tore at him as, with each step he took he prayed that this would be the last, that he had reached the end of the labyrinth.

Finally, when he almost given up hope, he turned a corner and found himself confronted by another familiar face.  A face that he had seen only once and yet which had been branded forever on his memory.

Y’elir; the demon that had been responsible for the nightmare of Buffy’s ordeal, stood before him.  At the sight of him, Angel felt a rush of hatred stronger than anything he had ever known, deeper and more consuming than he had dreamed possible.  Even his feelings for the demon he had carried within him for so long were overshadowed by it.

But strong as it was, there was another feeling within him that was stronger still.  At the sight of the demon, hope flared within him, for Y’elir was the one who had been charged with the task of destroying Buffy, surely he must be the last, the worst, of her memories.

Hatred was thrust aside, a distraction he could not allow as he hurried onwards, refusing to let himself to be diverted from his goal by Y’elir’s words.  Words that seared his mind, adding a still greater weight to the reckoning that Angel silently vowed he would one day bring about.  No matter how long it took, he would find a way to avenge what Buffy had been forced to endure.

 “SO THIS IS THE MIGHTY SLAYER; HOPE OF HUMANITY!  A SNIVELING WEAKLING, BROKEN TO MY WILL WHO BEGS FOR MERCY ON MY COMMAND!  YOU ARE NOTHING; MY PUPPET, TO DO WITH AS I PLEASE.”

The urge to strike was strong, his protective instincts outraged beyond all measure by the picture the demons words painted, making it hard to remember that what he saw was not real.  He held Buffy’s image before him like a beacon, narrowing his focus until there was nothing but her, nothing but his conviction that this was the end of the labyrinth and he was almost within his reach.  For what could possibly be worse than the memory of Hell?

~~~

As he turned the corner ahead of him, Angel suddenly realised his mistake.  Even now, after all she had endured, Buffy’s greatest pain was reserved, not for herself, but for others.

He had hoped to see a door, an archway, something that would lead him out of the labyrinth and into Buffy sanctuary.  Instead, he faced a group of familiar faces that struck him to the very depths of his soul.  His steps slowed involuntarily as pain roared through him, its force sufficient to bring him to his knees.

Unlike the other scenes he had witnessed during his painful voyage through Buffy’s soul, what he saw now was not a single event.  It was a summary, a mixture of what was and what could have been.  Before him lay the results of his own fall from grace.

A weeping Giles, seemingly shrunken and frighteningly diminished with grief, crouched over the lifeless body of Jenny Calendar, then his eyes lifted, revealing the hatred that burned within as he spat furiously, “You could have prevented this.  You caused this with your weakness!”

Theresa, Buffy’s friend, whom he had made a vampire for no reason other than to cause her pain, lay stretched out in her coffin.  Kendra lay dying almost at his feet, cursing Buffy for not having been there when she was needed, bitterly reproaching her for her ignorance and stupidity in having allowed herself to be drawn away.

Xander and Willow lay like broken dolls, the light fading from their eyes even as they added their voices to the chorus of blame.

And, in the very centre of it all, stood Angelus.  For the first time, Angel was face to face with the darkness that had dwelled within him for so long and yet, as always, he could not touch it.  Could not defeat it; for it was real only to Buffy.  His nemesis was now also hers.

He was laughing, revelling in the carnage about him, his fangs still stained with blood.  One by one, the others fell silent, their eyes filled with the emptiness that comes with death, until only the soft sound of Giles’ sobs could be heard.  Even the ever present whispering of the walls had stopped.

Then, with a roar of rage, Giles lunged at the demon, seeking to destroy the one who had shattered his world.  But he was outmatched and, almost casually, Angelus swatted him away sending him flying back against the wall, before sliding down to the floor, his neck lolling at a sickeningly unnatural angle.

For a moment the laughter of the demon was the only sound, then it stopped, leaving only the silence of the grave.  Angelus looked around at the carnage he had wrought and then gave a mocking bow, “Thank you for setting me free,” he said with a smirk.  Then, indicating the bodies that lay around him with his hand, he added, “I couldn’t have done any of this without you.”

~~~

Frozen with horror, Angel stared at the scene before him.  Even after reading her diaries, he had had no idea of the depth of the suffering that he had caused her.  The realisation that, to her, the pain of what he had done had been more agonising, more soul destroying, than all the torments of Hell threatened to shatter him.

He knew from his own experiences that any emotional weakness would have been mercilessly exploited while she was Hell, keeping the wounds open and bleeding for as long as possible, but the very fact that, after so long, events which took place in Sunnydale were still so all-consuming was a staggering reflection of just how much damage he had done to her.

It was also a reflection of just how much she cared.

That thought provided the impetus Angel needed to bring him to his feet.  If the love she felt had been burned away by what she had endured then her memories could no longer have had the power to wound her so greatly.  What he saw was not even what had happened, it was what could have been and yet Buffy bore the pain of it as though it were true.  Her friends lived but still she grieved for them and held herself responsible for their destruction…for the innocence that they had lost since meeting her.

All of Angel’s deepest fears were suddenly gone.  Somewhere, deep within herself, Buffy had remained unchanged.  Her loving heart still open and true despite the savage scars that had been left upon it by life.  All he had to do was reach her.

Slowly, his movements jerky, and unnatural, he began to move.  Trying not to look at the carnage around him, he walked slowly forwards but the bodies of his friends blocked his way and he was forced to step over them as though they were nothing more than so much rubbish littering his path.

As he walked, Angelus matched his pace, walking down the passageway at Angel’s side, little more than an arms length away, in a grotesque parody of companionship.  When Cordelia’s limp form blocked his path, the demon kicked it carelessly out of the way without so much as a glance, forcing Angel to jump hastily forwards to avoid stepping on her.

 “Its ironic, you know,” Angelus said after a moment, “You betrayed everyone you cared about – and all for me.”  He began to chuckle, “You couldn’t kill me; you were too weak to do what you had to so instead you betrayed your friends and, most of all, you betrayed your boyfriend.  You knew how he felt, you knew he would have begged you to kill me.”  He shook his head in mocking reproof, “You wouldn’t even fulfil his last request; you wouldn’t let his soul rest in peace!”

“You couldn’t kill me,” he repeated as they turned the corner, then he pointed to what lay before them and added, “but you did so much worse to him!”

Slowly, already knowing what he would see, Angel turned to look in the direction Angelus had indicated.  Before him lay the doorway he had been seeking for so long, a small arched recess set into the wall at the end of the corridor and sealed with a solid-looking metal door – the door that would lead him to Buffy.

And in front of it, almost blocking it from view; was Buffy’s greatest nightmare.

Acathla…and Angel himself.
 
 

Part Eighteen

For a moment, he stared at himself in fascination.  This was what Buffy saw when she looked at him.  He had come to believe much of what Buffy had said about the distinction between himself and Angelus, trusting her to see what he could not, but now, for the first time, he could literally see it for himself.  Only seconds before he had stared into the eyes of the beast; seen the evil within looking back at him, the utter darkness of a creature empty of anything but the desire to destroy.

Now he gazed into his own eyes and, though he knew that the demon was still there, he could see no sign of it.  The darkness was gone, replaced by deep emotion.  Grief, confusion, relief…love; all were easily ready in his eyes but there was no hatred, no savagery only deep sorrow – the memory of things that could never be forgotten.

They were the eyes of a man, not a monster.

At that moment, the last of Angel’s doubts fell away and he finally accepted what Buffy had been trying to tell him all along – he was not the demon.  Though it was a part of him, he was more than just the darkness.  With that realisation came the first glimmer of hope that, one day, he might prove worthy of the love Buffy had given him so freely.

The scene was frozen, unable to play out because, in this case, there was no villain to jeer and taunt, Buffy herself was the protagonist and she had locked herself away from the pain.  Only if and when she emerged would the events continue until they reached their inevitable conclusion, only to begin again leaving Buffy locked forever in the moment of her greatest pain.

From his perspective, what he saw did not even begin to compare with some of the horrors he had already witnessed on his journey, even with the added knowledge of what he had later endured.  But to Buffy, it was a nightmare beyond description from which she might never awaken were she to venture outside the walls of her sanctuary.

~~~

Only then did the reality of what he had come to do sink in.  He had been so determined to get her back that he had not allowed himself to consider what it was that he would be bringing her back to.  Everything that he had witnessed during his journey still lived for her; every experience was still real…and more.  He had heard only the words, seen only part of the nightmare – for Buffy herself had not been present.  How much more still remained unknown to him?  How much more should she be forced to endure?

If Buffy had found peace, even if it was in oblivion, who was he to take it from her?  She had fought so hard for so long and suffered so much, what gave him the right to say that she should go back?  And how could he persuade her when he wasn’t sure himself that it would be right?

He knew that the others, waiting for them back in the library, would be horrified by the idea that perhaps Buffy should remain where she was, but they had no idea of what it was they would be bringing her back to endure.  Angel knew only too well – he had lived though it himself and wouldn’t wish the experience upon his worst enemy…let alone the woman he loved.

Ultimately, though, it didn’t matter.  The choice must be hers…and whatever she decided, he would stay with her and do everything he could to help her deal with everything that she had endured, everything he could to bring her happiness and peace.

There was no way for him to know how much damage had been done to her before she’d managed to escape to this place; his only hope lay in the knowledge that she was far stronger than he had ever been – and that she loved him still.  There could be no other possible explanation for what he saw before him, only the very deepest love would still feel such pain after so long.

~~~

Angel skirted the tableau of himself and Acathla and approached the door; his whole body shaking slightly with a potent mixture of exhilaration and terror as he reached towards it, only to stop, stunned, at the realisation that there was no handle, no key or even any evidence of a lock.

He knew, deep within himself, that Buffy was on the other side of the door – and there was no way for him to reach her.

“NO!”

With a cry of anguished rage, Angel threw himself at the solid metal barrier, beating his fists against it in a futile effort to force his way through.  The scarred and dented metal bore mute witness to the fact that he was not the first to try; the talons of the things that dwelled within the darkest reaches of Buffy’s mind had left their mark but her sanctuary remained secure.  And, as it had kept out all the things that would destroy her, it now kept her sealed away from the one who loved her the most.

~~~

At length, Angel’s attack ended.  Sobbing her name, he pressed his hands flat against the door, willing her to sense his presence and come to him, though he knew that such a hope was futile.  As the bitter reality of his defeat – so close to his goal – sank in, his strength drained away and he sank to his knees, resting his forehead against the cold metal, knowing that it was as close as he would ever get to Buffy.

As his palms slid down the smooth surface of the door he felt a strange irregularity against the index finger of his right hand.  For a while he dismissed it, too lost in despair to care and assuming that it was merely part of the scarring that covered most of the doors surface, but it seemed too small, too intricate and, somehow, too familiar to have been caused by the slashing of some great beast’s talons and, at last, he raised his head to investigate.

For a moment, he could see nothing more than a slight indentation in the door’s surface but then, as he peered closer, he was able to distinguish the impression of a familiar image – a heart held within two hands and topped by a crown.

Angel drew in a harsh, unneeded breath and his gaze dropped from the door to the Claddagh ring that adorned his hand, the counterpart of the ring he had given to Buffy as a symbol of their love, which neither one of them ever removed.

Hope stirred within him as he looked at it.  Was this the key?  All along they had assumed that love was the only thing that could reach Buffy, what could make more sense then the symbol of that love being the only way to open the door?

~~~

With a silent prayer, Angel closed his fist and touched his ring to the impression.  The two fit together perfectly and, the moment they connected, a warm golden light spilled from the lock and enveloped him.  Wrapped in the cocoon of light, he felt himself drawn through the door as though it had suddenly become as insubstantial as mist.

As he reached the other side, Angel swayed dizzily and looked down, only to jerk his head up again in fear as he realised that the path he had followed for so long was gone.

Then the last of the light faded and he found himself standing alone…in his apartment in Sunnydale.  For a moment, he looked around in confusion, unsure if what he saw was real or just another aspect of Buffy’s mind.  But if he had returned to his own body then he would have been locked in the book-cage in the library – and Giles and Jenny had been very definite about the fact that there would be no way for him to return without Buffy’s help.

Satisfied that he was still in Buffy’s mind, Angel looked around again and this time recognised the subtle differences.  There was no evidence of Buffy’s having lived here; the apartment was as it had been while it had still been his home…before he had lost his soul.

With that realisation came others: the sound of rain falling heavily outside, the faint perfume of Buffy’s skin, made stronger by passion, the soft sigh of her breathing in the next room.  He was already moving when recognition dawned…this was the night of Buffy’s 17th birthday, the night that he had lost his soul – the night that he and Buffy had made love for the first and last time.

Angel stopped in the bedroom doorway, hardly able to believe that he had found her at last; his heart so full of love for her that he feared it might burst.  She lay in the bed with her eyes close; her nudity covered only by a sheet and, by her side, holding her tightly against him, was the memory of himself.

As Angel watched, he bent his head and pressed an infinitely tender kiss to her slightly parted lips, whispering softly “I love you”.  Buffy’s eyes opened a fraction and she smiled sleepily up into his eyes “I love you, too” she murmured.

Angel’s heart squeezed at the sight of them; he had never forgotten that moment, the pure love that had shone from her eyes like a heavenly light that had warmed and not burned him.  It was strange, watching them like this.  He couldn’t be jealous, because he was the one that Buffy loved so much, but he did envy him the innocence that had been lost so soon after – the ability to touch without fear.

But thoughts of the past could not hold his attention for more than an instant, and Angel stepped forwards eagerly into the room, saying reverently as he did so, “Buffy…”

~~~

TBC...

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AngelicVampyre
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To lose your soul once might be considered a misfortune,
To lose it twice looks like carelessness.
 

Angelus about the Judge:  "Gee, maybe he's broken(!)"
--'Innocence'

Wesley:  Stay calm, Mr. Giles. We have to stay calm.
Giles:  Well, thank God you're here. I was planning to panic.
--'Bad Girls'

Tina:  You've been to Missoula?
Angel: "During the Depression...er...my depression.  I-I was depressed there."
--'City of...'

Angel: "Why would a woman I've never met even talk to me?"
Doyle:  *laughs* Have you looked in the mirror lately? (hesitates) er, I guess you really havent, no."
--'City of...'

Buffy:  Angel, when I look into the future...all I see is you.  All I want is you!
Angel:  I know the feeling.
--'Bad Eggs'

Angelus:  Yeah, baby...I'm back
--'Innocence'

Spike:  I've known you for two minutes, and I can't stand you. I don't
really feature you livin' forever. (to Drusilla) Can I eat him now, love?
--'Lie to Me'