From her office, Lilah watched the fire rain come down outside. She wrung her hands nervously, then rubbed her upper arms as if shivering.
Wesley was sitting on his couch working on papers, when there was a knock at the door. He stood and answered it. When he opened the door, Lilah had a worried look on her face that faded when she saw him. She let out a big sigh of relief and leaned against the door jamb.
"Okay." She smiled. "I was just checking."
"I'm alive."
Lilah walked in. "Not by much from the looks of it." She hugged him. "I left you a couple hundred messages last night. Don't feel obligated to return any of them."
"Then you're alright." He shut the door.
"Fine. Slept at Wolfram and Hart. FYI, safest place to be in case of an apocalypse. You on the other hand— Hmm. I bet I could make you feel better." She leaned in to kiss him, but he turned and walked away. "You know, it's weird. Rain of fire, whole city burning—why do I feel a chill?"
"I can't do this anymore."
She smiled, walking over to him. "Yeah, yeah, I've heard that a million times, cowboy. We both know how this song ends." Right close to him she sweetly said, "You, me, broken furniture..."
"It's over, Lilah."
She blinked, stepping back. "You're serious."
He turned and walked away. "After what I saw last night, I believe a day of reckoning has arrived."
With a flippant tone, "And you just reckon you'll toss in with the good guys?" She crossed her arms.
Wesley faced her. "I'm choosing a side."
"And the girl of your dreams just happens to be on it." She cocked her head. "Hmm. What are the odds?"
"This isn't about Fred. Or anyone else, for that matter. It's about right and wrong."
"And you have such a clear grip on those concepts."
"I've made mistakes."
Her voice was low and earnest, "You're making a big one now." She softened, walked to him, and put her arms around his neck. "I could wear the glasses again."
"Don't embarrass yourself."
Lilah pulled away.
"There is a line, Lilah. Black and white, good and evil."
"Funny thing about black and white—" She walked away. "You mix it together and you get gray." She faced him. "And it doesn't matter how much white you try and put back in, you're never gonna get anything but gray. And I don't see your Texas-gal-pal wearing that color. Come to think of it, she prefers black." She walked out of the apartment.
Lilah had fled the conference room and, though badly wounded, sneaked down the hallway. Holding one hand to her wound, she steadied herself against the wall with the other as she walked. She looked around and saw the Beast following her, so she quickened the pace. As she walked past office after office, she moaned in pain. She gasps with fright as someone grabbed her and pulled her into one of the offices, helped her to a desk where she could sit, and closed the door. It was Wesley. "Uh, oh, I don't understand." She fell forward, weak.
Wesley caught Lilah and held her up. "Stay with me, Lilah."
"Why are you here?"
"I have a man on the inside." Sounds of metal clanging could be heard outside. "What's that?"
Lilah's head fell back. "Oh, it's the fat lady singing."
He shook her gently. "Lilah."
"The building automatically shuts down under full scale attack."
He bent to inspect her wound. "When you say 'shuts down...'"
Through the office's windows, metal shutters closed over the outside of the building.
"Windows, doors, air vents. Nobody gets in or out. Oh..."
The Beast knocked down the door to the office Wesley and Lilah are in. Wesley picked up Lilah and carried her out of the room in his arms.
Carrying Lilah in his arms, Wesley hustled down the hallway, careful not to trip on the bodies of slaughtered Wolfram & Hart workers.
"Stay with me. Come on, Lilah, there must be a way out for someone like you. Think. A back door, something."
The Beast was following them down the hallway.
"Around the corner, a supply closet."
Wes put her down on her feet.
"Why are you stopping for?"
Wesley grabbed a grenade from his bag.
" You gotta be kidding me."
He pulled the pin, and threw the grenade down the hallway toward the Beast, where it exploded.
"Will it kill him?"
He put Lilah's arm over his shoulder to help her walk. "No, it might distract him for a moment."
Lilah stopped when she saw Gavin's body on the floor. "Gavin. Poor bastard."
Wesley looked around. "Lilah?"
"It's in here." She pointed.
Wesley and Lilah went into the closet and shut the door behind them.
Lilah rifled through the rolls of toilet paper. "Come on, where is it?"
"Are you sure this is the right closet?"
"Yes. Third floor and lobby."
Wesley helped her look for the exit.
Lilah finds the lever. "Okay, here it is."
The lever opened the door to a chute. When the Beast ripped off the door to the closet, the room was empty. He walked away groaning.
Lilah and Wesley slid down the chute and landed in a sewer.
Lilah moaned and coughed as she landed. They sit up. "Now what?"
"Now you disappear. You get patched up and leave town." He stood, bringing her to her feet.
"Turn tail and run?"
"That thing won't quit 'til everyone at Wolfram and Hart is dead. Go underground, change your name." He turned, walking away. "Don't make its job easy."
Lilah called after him. "Wesley..."
Wesley stopped and turned to face her. Lilah had a worried look on her face. She started to say something, but stopped and sighed before finally speaking, but not telling him what she wanted to say.
Wesley continued his pursuit of Lilah through the sewer system. Lilah jumped out from a hiding spot and tried to hit Wesley, but she was still weak, and he caught her arm easily.
She walked away from him, holding her side. "You're a son of a bitch, you know that?" She sat next to a wall, looking at her bleeding stomach wound.
"When I said 'go underground,' I didn't think you'd— Is that where the Beast—?"
"I can't make it stop."
"I could take a look a it."
"Uh, I'm fine."
"I had to make him believe I was desperate."
"Not much of a stretch, really, is it? And you always wanted Angelus."
"No, Wolfram and Hart did, but it doesn't matter anymore. I just—I just want my life back. All my pretty things. I'm selfish that way. That's why we wouldn't have worked out."
He replied in a soft voice, "There are many reasons we wouldn't have worked out, Lilah."
She looked away.
"You're too scared to believe in anything because you're too scared to hope. You won't even open your eyes to the possibility," said Cordelia.
Lilah giggled, facing her. "You don't get it, do you, twinkie? I'm what I believe in. And you think I got this far by sticking my head in the sand? The Beast that eviscerated me has a boss, and that boss is going to end life as we know it, and nobody is coming to save us! Not Angel, not the Powers that Be, and not the forty-damn-second cavalry!"
Cordelia's head snapped back.
"So if anybody has scales on the rise—"
White-eyed Cordelia looked at Lilah.
"It's you."
Lilah ran away as fast as her wounded body would take her, but someone grabbed her by the throat from one of the rooms, and pushed her into the doorjamb. It was Cordelia.
"He's gonna kill us."
"I know." She stabbed Lilah in the neck with the knife from the Beast's offering.
Lilah collapsed, falling to the ground.
"Why do you think I let him out? You stupid bitch."
Wesley and Gunn were walking the hallways looking for Lilah.
"Lilah!" Wesley called
Wesley and Gunn stopped in their tracks when they come upon the hallway where Angelus was. He was standing, holding Lilah's body in his arms, feeding from her neck wound.
Angelus looked up. "Oh, geez, fellas—this isn't what it looks like." He laughed nervously.
Gunn hurled the battle-axe at Angelus, but missed.
"A little too tart for me, anyway. You know what I mean, Wes?" He dropped Lilah's body. "Catch ya later."
Angelus ran away from Gunn and Wes down the hallway and out the window. Gunn tried to catch Angelus. Wesley stared at Lilah's body and her bloody neck wound.
"Where's Angelus?" Cordelia asked.
"Gone. He killed Lilah."
Everyone turned to Gunn, shocked.
Cordelia, Lorne, and Fred lookd on nervously as Wesley and Gunn wrapped Lilah's dead body in plastic sheeting. Connor looked anxiously out the window. After a moment, he broke the somber silence by banging his hands on the window sill emphatically and turning toward the others.
"What are we waiting for? Why aren't we going after him?"
Wesley was staring at Lilah, his voice deadpanned, "No need. He'll be back."
"How do you know?" Fred asked.
"We're the ones he wants to hurt. The people closest to Angel," Cordelia answered.
"I say we dust him before he gets the chance," Connor stated.
Wesley was still staring at Lilah. "That's just the kind of reckless thinking that allowed Angelus to double back on us, giving him the chance to—" He softens his voice. "From now on, we all stay close."
"And do what?" Fred asked. " If Angelus is coming back for us, we can't just be waiting for him to drop by. We need to do something. Board up the windows, make it safe somehow." She looked at the others. "Don't you think?"
"Won't make a difference. If he wants in, nothing's gonna stop him," Gunn replied.
"We have to destroy her," Connor said.
"What?" Wesley asked.
"The body. She could have been turned."
"Sired, you mean?" Gunn asked. "No, there wasn't enough time."
"You don't know that."
"The hell I don't. It happened to—"
Wesley stood. "No, he's right. We can't take any chances." He grabbed a battle-axe off of the wall. "I'll take care of it."
Wesley lifted the battle-axe. "I'm sorry, Lilah." He swung the axe, swiftly decapitating her. He pulled the axe back up, blood staining its edge. He grimaced, a pained expression on his face.
Wesley picked up a book from the floor and brought it to his desk. Illyria paced in the background.
"Odd."
Wesley wrote at his desk.
"It doesn't exist until it cracks apart." She paced with her hand out in front of her like she was trying to touch something.
"What's that?"
"Time."
"You don't look altogether well."
Illyria dropped her hand, standing tall. "Your opinion of me weighs less than sunlight." Illyria suddenly doubled over in pain, knocking over a glass of water from the edge of Wesley's desk onto the floor.
Suddenly, Wesley was enveloped by a portal, and he immediately grew faint from dizziness. He hit the sofa of his apartment and groaned. He sat up, rubbing his head. "Ow…" He blinked, taking a moment to recollect himself. How did that happen? One moment he had been idly conversing with Illyria, the next he found himself in his apartment.
There was a knock at the door. He stood and hesitated before walking over to it, answering it. When he opened the door, a very much alive Lilah stood before him with a worried look on her face that faded when she saw him. She let out a big sigh of relief and leaned against the door jamb.
"Okay." She smiled. "I was just checking."
Wesley blinked. Was this some kind of sick, demented, twisted joke? "You're alive…"
"Slept at Wolfram and Hart. FYI, safest place to be in case of an apocalypse." She walked in and hugged him. "I left you a couple hundred messages last night. Don't feel obligated to return any of them."
Wesley shut the door. He rummaged around for a calendar or a newspaper.
Lilah tilted her head, watching him.
Wesley found that days newspaper. It was dated November 18th, 2002. He widened his eyes. The day after the Rain of Fire. Again. He looked over to Lilah. The day he broke it off. The day of the Beast's attack on Wolfram & Hart. The critical day that resulted in her death.
"Okay, the staring thing? Starting to get creepy."
Wesley turned his gaze elsewhere. "You'll believe in pretty much anything, right?"
"It rained fire last night, what do you think?"
He looked to her again. "What about time travel?"
Lilah raised her eyebrows. "Okay, if you're about to tell me you're from the future, I have to sit down." She walked over to the sofa and sat down.
Wesley blinked. The power of woman's intuition. He took a seat next to her and sighed. "Well, that saves me the trouble of trying to phrase it."
Lilah's eyes widened a bit. "This is new…"
Wesley looked at her again, flashbacks roaring through his mind. "I am going against all logical code, here, but it's important that you don't go to Wolfram & Hart today."
Lilah decided that he wasn't acting too different from usual, so he couldn't have come from that far ahead. He looked the same, too. "What happens if I do?"
"The Beast will attack and kill everyone at Wolfram & Hart today, or turn them into some sort of zombie. But you don't. Your death is December 16th of this year."
Lilah's lower lip quivered uncharacteristically. "But…" She closed her eyes, down casting her head. "Wesley, I'm pregnant."
Wesley's eyes widened in shock. Realization struck. That was what she had been going to tell him down in the sewers, before she changed her mind. "Lilah…" He murmured, compassionately wrapping an arm around her. "That's not how it has to be. Just don't go to work. Stay here."
Lilah looked at him in shock. "I really must die, you've never been this nice to me."
"Fred dies. I've had time to get over her." He lowers his voice to a murmur. "But I still have the signed dollar. I couldn't get over you." He leaned in and pressed his lips to hers in a soft and tender kiss.
She returned the kiss, wrapping her arms around him. After a few moments, she pulled away. "You bastard," she murmured. "I'm gonna cry now."
He smiled softly, pulling her into his lap. "Don't worry, I won't tell anyone." He stroked her hair.
Dropping her head to rest against his shoulder, she sobbed quietly. "I love you." It was so quiet, it could barely be heard.
Lips close to her ear, he whispered, "I love you, too."
December 16th, 2002 rolled around. Lilah was still alive, just over two months pregnant, and happily jobless. The Beast had destroyed Wolfram & Hart in its entirety back on that one day in November. Wesley cut contact from everyone involved with Angels Investigations, who couldn't believe he'd abandoned them for the enemy. There was a sparkly diamond ring on Lilah's finger. They were engaged. They were happy.
That night as they laid together in bed, Lilah asked a question. "Doesn't it ever bother you, from time to time? That you've lost all your friends, and everything from the other reality? That you're not in the black vs. white, good vs. evil game?"
"Cordelia and Fred died. Angel, Gunn, and Lorne lost their respect in me. I had no one." He kissed her forehead. "And a very smart woman once told me, that once black and white have been mixed, no matter how much white or black gets put back in, it's always gonna be gray. Though there is one thing, one day that I miss."
"What's that?"
"The day Angel was turned into a puppet."