Title: Jaded
Authour: Sing to Angels
Disclaimer: I don't own A:ts, Grr Argh, JossGod, or anything really except a few knives, a crappy pastry bag, and a toque which has seen better days.
Authour's notes: This is the companion story to 'Cynical'. I recieved so many reviews for it. People actually wrote me EMAILS! Yeah, pretty amazing I know. *snerk* I really hope that this one lives up to 'Cynical'. So please make sure to tell me ok? :)
Distribution: FF.net, my site, and any list sites. All others please ask.
R

I am dying.

There is no use denying it because I know it to be true. My time is up, I've helped the hopeless, fought the wicked, failed in protecting the one pure thing in my world. No chance to make it up now though. If I want someone to blame, it would have to be me. Of course, I'm not the one who yielded the knife. No, not the one who sliced through my voice box and the major artery in my neck. I'm merely the one who is bleeding.

And really, what do I have to go back too? My adopted family have surely turned from me by now. My family, my friends. Cordelia's gone. Angel would have killed me after what I had done; I'm only glad Justine beat him to the punch. She was more merciful than his wrath to be sure. Quick and clean, to the point. Not personal, simply business. Gunn, the betrayer. Sweet little Fred; that whoring b#tch who lead us both after the secret under her skirts. No, stop it. Stop it, I said. Fred is not a b#tch. She is only a woman, like the rest of them. Bloody hell, I thought I was over that. Really, I shouldn't listen to him, he tells me such horrible things.

From this vantage point the sky looks like a dome above the planed surface of the Earth. No wonder the ancients thought the world was flat. I feel as if I am trapped in a bubble, like that children's game. I can't remember the name of it, and I won't waste my last thoughts trying either. But the moon is so beautiful. Full and round like a face. The grass, however, is sharp. The blades are rough, smelling of sevendust and pesticides. They are snagging my skin with tiny little teeth. Makes me think of Faith actually. Now there's a b#tch if ever there were.

But, lord she was a pretty thing. And so cunning with her mantrap, too. I still remember the moonlight flashing in her eyes as she pounced on me, cutting my skin to ribbons while impaling herself again and again. That was the sweetest torture Ive ever known. I couldn't have been more excited if I had had five Slayers surrounding me that night. But it was only her. One magnificent, glorious, sensual Slayer who liked to stab shallowly into my shoulder blade as she neared her release. It was one hell of a turn on.

Oh I know. I've been in America long enough to pick up on the psychobabble these people banter about as casually as one discusses the weather. So my father mentally abused me; I'm horribly scarred for life. It is the same story with every person on this planet. A psychologist would most likely say that I had confused love and anger somewhere along the way; pleasure and pain. Stupid pillocks, what do they know?

A dirty word, a bad girl; it all gave me a tingle just by thinking about it. Makes the blood pump faster through my heart and out into the air, compels me to shiver with the cold creeping into my veins. I used to sneak off to the blue-collar pubs when I was a young lad. It was so delicious to mingle and wallow in the grubby atmosphere. Just for a moment, then once again to my strict and proper regime. F#ck that, I say.

Faith was right, you know. I did desire her. From the first moment I looked into her eyes. She was like a little girl, lost in a world she knew far too much about. The underbelly, the corruption; they were all she knew really. And I, on the other hand, knew nothing. Naive, stupid, proud. I guess I still am arrogant after all.

We make a fine pair now. I have sunk so low that even she would turn away in disgust. I could have changed that, saved her. And God how she wanted to be saved! I could see it every time those bittersweet eyes glanced in my direction. So confused. Like me. We could have held each other up in a world that wanted nothing to do with either of us. Instead, I sang a little song and we both got screwed. She is a piece of shit, that much is true. But I guess that the conceit faded along with my blood and I see that I am too.

Dogged and ragged, hungry for something I can never have. I never could find. Just a little taste of love to sweeten the cold and bitter dish I have been served my whole life. I can feel that bond with her. Sometimes I think it is something I imagined to ease the ache of loneliness. However, I know it is real. She is thinking of me now, hurting and weakened by my pain. I could have saved her. She could have saved me. But that is in another world, some other dimension maybe. Happy endings aren't real anyway. This isn't Cinderella. No pumpkin coach to take us off into the sunset.

I should have danced. I should have twirled. I should have sung so long and so loud that ears bled and car windows shattered five kilometres away. I forgot, it is miles here. Stupid, backward Americans. I should have found some ladies of the night to ease my aching groin. I should have done foolish things, caught venereal diseases and engaged in pub brawls. I shouldn't have been so consistently upper crust and damn unflappable. I should have rammed Faith into a wall the moment I met her, as I had wanted to do. I should have killed Fred with that axe and not regretted a thing. Angelus could have been dust except for my incompetent feelings of friendship towards the demon with Angel's face. Too many should haves for me to count. Just a wasted life full of blundering good intentions that never panned out in the end. Faith wanted the light, but I...well I have always yearned for the darkness if you couldn't tell.

This is the end. All of my little friends will wind up as the Power's pets, while I shall be the dog sleeping on the doorstop in the rain. I can hear Faith chanting my name along with foolish encouragements to never give in to the icy claws that grip me now. And Fred is hovering over me, blurry to be sure, but there all the same. What use is it, really? I had best take my medicine like a good boy. Depths of Hades, here I come.