DR2: The Cross of Changes, book III

by Nick Midian

Broderick Egoyan has carefully chosen the right moment to strike, when friends are against friends and all trust seems about to vanish between Slayerettes and Archangels. It’s right when you think things couldn’t get worse that they get worse.

1. Part 1 of 10

DR2 - The Cross of Changes by Nick Midian, Book III, part 1 of 10
Written by Nick Midian

Content beta-reading and storyline suggestions by Duncan

English grammar, spelling, slang, Highlander continuity and general
corrections by Theo

French slang, content beta-reading and storyline suggestions by Mash

French slang by Alan


EMAIL: jcaballero@euskalnet.net

SPOILERS: For Buffy the Vampire Slayer: 3rd season, BUT no Xander/Willow
kissing and no Lover's Walk (welcome to the wonderful State of Denial,
Land of 'Shippiness). Hmmm, I've messed with the third season's timeline
to accommodate it to my necessities. Let's just say that 'Band Candy'
happened a lot later than it did, around the first days of February, OK?

For Highlander: None really, the characters of the TV series and films are
only tangentially mentioned. You just need to know the basics of
Highlander-style immortality, BUT I've always thought that whole
'Immortals have no parents and are found in a little basket' is a... um,
the Spanish word for it is 'chorrada', so let's just ignore it, OK?

KEYWORDS: Romance, Angst, Action-adventure, Violence, Alternate Universe,
Crossover.

RATING: PG-13 with some mild R parts for violence and sexual innuendo.

DISCLAIMER: This story has been written with no intention of profit,
merely for the pleasure of writing and sharing it.

The concept and characters of BTVS (Buffy, Angel, Cordelia, Xander,
Willow, Oz, Giles, Joyce, Spike, Drusilla, Snyder, Faith, Harmony, Lyle
Gorch, Quentin Travers and the rest) are intellectual and legal property
of Joss Whedon, Warner Brothers, Mutant Enemy, etc. Also, the concept of
Highlander and the characters mentioned here (Duncan MacLeod, Amanda
Darieux, Richie Ryan, Joe Dawson and the Society of Watchers) are the
property of Panzer-Davis and Rysher Entertainment.

Michael Deveraux, Rachel Curran, Crystal Parker, Kyle White Owl, Robert
Coltrane, Elvis the Dog, Broderick Egoyan, Damon Frost, Mr. Smith, the
World Committee for Civil Defense and the rest are my own creation.

All the songs and lyrics here are used without permission, they are
copyright of their respective rights owners.

AUTHOR'S NOTES: Please, understand that English is not my native language,
so any grammatical or spelling errors are my fault, not of any one of my
wonderful beta-readers. If you're thinking of sending any flames, please
be kind with me. I'm a grown man, but I still can cry like a child,
believe me.

SUMMARY: Broderick Egoyan has carefully chosen the right moment to strike,
when friends are against friends and all trust seems about to vanish
between Slayerettes and Archangels. It's right when you think things
couldn't get worse that they get worse.

And now, on with the show. Fasten your seat belts ladies and gentlemen,
because it's going to be a long, hard and jumpy ride...

~~~~~~

The cast for Book III

Nicholas Brendon as Xander Harris
Charisma Carpenter as Cordelia Chase

Sarah Michelle Gellar as Buffy Summers
David Boreanaz as Angel
Alyson Hannigan as Willow Rosenberg
Seth Green as Daniel 'Oz' Osborne
Anthony Stewart Head as Rupert Giles
Kristine Sutherland as Joyce Summers

Matthew Perry as Michael Deveraux
Paula Trickey as Rachel Curran
James Marsters as Spike
Nikki Cox as Crystal Parker
David James Elliott as Kyle White Owl
Elvis the Dog as Himself

Eliza Dushku as Faith Adams
Donald Sutherland as The Old Chess Player, Broderick Egoyan
Sebastian Spence as Damon Frost
Avery Brooks as Mr. Smith

Amy Chance as Aphrodesia
Persia White as Aura

Alan Rickman as Conrad Swann
Wesley Snipes as Talon Pantera
Dennis Rodman as Rush Pantera
Tom Berenger as Colonel Cabbot Ashe
Michael Ironside as The Sergeant
Benjamin Bratt as Santero
Trevor Goddar as Backlash
Dolph Lundgren as Havoc
Rob Rowland as Chopper
Jake Busey as Sniper
Shaquille O'Neal as Beast
Matthew Ferguson as Chip

Bill Paxton as Major Stephen Marsden, USAF
Tom Sizemore as Master Sergeant Ricky Perkins, USAF
John Leguizamo as Airman First Class Charlie Martinelli, USAF
Mario Lopez as Airman First Class Alonso 'Bear' Vasquez, USAF
Patrick Labyorteaux as Sergeant Edwin Walters, USAF

Richard Dean Anderson as Col. Jack O'Neill, USAF
Michael Shanks as Dr. Daniel Jackson
Amanda Tapping as Maj. Samantha Carter, USAF
Christopher Judge as Teal'c
Don S. Davis as Gen. George Hammond, USAF
Teryl Rothery as Dr. Janet Fraiser
Tom McBeath as Col. Harry Mayborne, USAF
Peter Deluise as Airman Shepard, USAF

with

Kevin Spacey as Robert Coltrane
Nicholas Lea as Jonah Whalls

and

Catherine Zeta-Jones as the Lady in Red


~~~~~~

BOOK III: Game of Survival


If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a
hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory
gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor
yourself, you will succumb in every battle...

--"The Art of War", Sun Tzu

~~~~~~

CHAPTER EIGHT: First strike
Sunnydale, California. December 4, 2002. 12:23 p.m.


Tied to the tracks and the train's just coming
Strapped to the wing with the engine running
You say that this wasn't in your plans
And don't mess around with the demolition man

Tied to a chair, the bomb is ticking
This situation was not of your picking
You say that this wasn't in your plans
And don't mess around with the demolition man

I'm a walking nightmare, I'm an arsenal of doom
I kill conversations as I walk into the room
I'm a three line whip
I'm the sort of thing they ban
I'm a walking disaster
I'm the demolition man

"Demolition Man", Sting



Cordelia was dreaming.

That in itself wasn't anything really worth mentioning. Or, the truth be
told, it wouldn't have been if she didn't know that it wasn't a regular
dream or even a nightmare – but more like a memory, that she had forgotten
long ago.

And there was where the problem resided, because she was completely sure
that, if indeed it was a memory, it belonged to a person that wasn't her.

She had heard that dreams are always in black and white, but this one
seemed to have been filmed in a sort of bright Technicolor. As if it had
been hand-painted by an Italian painter from the Renaissance with living
reds, blues and ochres, as if the sun was a big globe of yellow paint
hanging in the sky over an endless blue ocean.

She was dressed completely in white, a long, simple and gauzy dress
without sleeves that seemed to shine with an inner glow under the bright
sun. It stood out against her tanned skin and long, dark mane of hair,
that fell freely over her smooth and bare shoulder and back.

She had to grab her long skirt with her hands and hold it up, so it
wouldn't touch the sand or be drenched by the water of the sea. Salt water
came to her with every wave that crashed softly against the shore,
caressing her naked feet with a chill that was cold and wonderful at the
same time.

The beach where she was seemed to be long enough to reach the very line of
the horizon. As her bare feet walked over the thin hot sand, bringing her
closer and closer to her loved one, Cordelia knew that if she followed the
shore-line for a long enough time, she would walk off the edge of Earth.

She'd reach that point where land, sea and heavens became one.

Somewhere beyond the clouds and the rain, the harsh light of day and the
cold darkness of the night, where there was no more worries and no more
pains. Where time meant nothing, and she would just be able to spend the
rest of the eternity in total and absolute peace.

And the only thing that stood between herself and that tantalizing
oblivion was the figure of her loved one, waiting for her not far away
from where she was. His haunted brown eyes were lost in the vastness of
the blue sea, as the gentle breeze caressed his dark hair and white
clothes like a lover, make them flow softly.

He was wearing a pair of simple cotton pants and a shirt with its long
sleeves rolled up to his elbows, both pieces of cloth pure white as the
driven snow. So much in fact, that it made the rest of him look even
darker than what he already was.

His hair was black as a raven's wing and fell in soft locks to the very
end of his rear neckline, as if he hadn't cut it in a couple of months,
letting it grow freely. His dark eyes, brown like warm chocolate, seemed
as bottomless and old as the ocean itself.

And, like it, they held all the secrets, all the promises and all the
wonders of a future full of possibilities and hopes.

He turned his head to look at her and, when he spotted her figure and she
smiled brightly at him, he returned it with the same warmth and deep,
almost overwhelming, love they shared.

The young man climbed down off the small heap of rocks he had been
standing on, and began to walk towards her, their eyes locked onto each
other as they made themselves their mutual points of destination.

The gentle caress of the wind, the alluring sound of the sea, the warm
sensation of the wet sand beneath her feet filled the world. They were the
only two habitants of that unreal world of their own, and it was their
love what made it spin around, what kept the sun rising up every morning
and the moon lighting the sky every night.

They had each other, so they had everything.

She felt her heart beating inside her chest to strongly that she feared it
would burst, as they got closer and closer to each other until there was
only an arm's length of distance between them.

As if by common agreement, they stopped and looked at each other, not
uttering a word. They didn't need them; they were unnecessary between
these two, as their eyes were able to speak their shared feelings better
than any words, written or spoken by man or god, would ever do.

Love, devotion, feeling, emotion...

He smiled that way that was his and his alone, and around them the day
seemed a thousand times brighter with that simple gesture, as he reached
out with his hand to cup her flawless cheek.

He caressed her tanned skin with his thumb so softly, that it felt like a
feather's touch to her, but that was enough to awaken a blaze inside her
that was hot, primal and almost consuming.

And she would love to be consumed in the fire, that was Xander Harris.

Letting out a moan that was pure pleasure, she closed her eyes and reveled
in the warm contact of his skin against hers as he delicately traced the
contours of her beautiful face with his fingertips as if he was trying to
memorize them forever.

She wanted more, more of his touch, more of him, all of him. All his love,
all his darkness, all he was able to give her. Instinctively, she knew it
would never be enough; no matter how much she would get, no matter how
much time she would spend trying to get it, Xander would never satiate
her.

Oh, but it would be so wonderful to spend the rest of her life trying...

Cordelia opened her hazel eyes and looked straight at him, returning his
smile with the same intensity, almost feeling his love for her coming in
physical waves. Perfect, the time, the place, everything was perfect.

Until she looked down, and saw the red rose on his chest.

It was like a flower right over his heart, slowly growing as if it was
blossoming under the action of the bright sun's rays. It was blood. His
blood.

Horrified, she lifted her eyes to look at his face as the red spot kept on
growing and growing without stop, feeling the touch of his hand turning
suddenly cold on her skin.

She saw a single lonely tear rolling down his perfect cheek as the sadness
in his eyes engulfed her into a cold embrace, that froze her heart and
soul into a block of ice.

He wasn't scared, not even frightened; his expression was sad, almost
resigned, as if he had known all along that this was the fate God had
reserved for him.

His wonderful, sensual and beautiful lips moved without actually
pronouncing the words. 'I will love you forever.'

The blood, impossibly red and dark, drenched the front of his white shirt,
covering and plastering it to his chest. And then, without warning, the
garment began to be pulled away from his body, as if something pointy was
pushing the shirt from the inside. A nauseating sound of ripping flesh and
broken muscles filled the salty air.

Xander closed his eyes and clenched his teeth in a tight grimace that was
pure suffering, until the pain seemed to become unbearable and he finally
began to scream; so loud and strong, that his voice could have made the
stars themselves fall from the sky.

Cordelia screamed along with him, unable to move as if she was as frozen
as her heart was, unable to do anything more than to stare in horror.

She stared as the bloody tent on his chest grew to the maximum extension
of his shirt; and the blood began to flow freely from his mouth and nose,
coming out like a fountain and raining down on the warm sand like red
tears.

His scream was turned into a gurgle as the blood overflowed his mouth and
covered his face like a red mascara, and the edged point of a spear came
out from his chest with a sound of crushed bones, ripping through his
shirt.

In a reflex movement, Xander grasped the handle of the spear as it
appeared from his chest, struggling with it; but his eyes never left
Cordelia's as he looked at her, letting the handle go to reach out for her
with his left hand. As if even at that moment, she was the only thing that
mattered to him in the whole world.

Calling his name, she tried to reach him, to take his hand in hers, but it
was as if he was being dragged away from her, farther and farther into the
void and the bottomless oblivion of the horizon.

For a second, she looked over his shoulder and saw her figure behind him –
nothing more than a dark silhouette with two golden blazes where eyes
should be, and a voice that was full of venom and hate.

Like the mouth of a cobra. 'If he can't be mine, he won't be yours.'

Their fingers touched for a second, a final caress as his hand slipped out
of hers. A final push and Xander's blood matted her face as he began to be
dragged away from her, out of her reach, away from her touch, out into the
darkness and the cold of the night behind him. His lips were moving,
saying the words once and once again.

'I will love you forever. Forever. Forever... '

And then, he was simply no more. And she was alone on that endless beach.
And she was cold again. And empty again. And dead again.

And the sand was cold beneath her feet, and the clouds covered the sun,
turning the sky gray. The thunder roared, the lightning crashed, and the
ocean rose and fell with a great rage.

And she was alone.

Forever.



~~~~~~



Cordelia opened her eyes, feeling the unstoppable need to scream, but her
empty lungs were only able to let out a moan that was half a whine, half
the sound of her heart breaking in two.

She remained quiet, unable to move, hanging on to the cushions of the
couch she was lying on for dear life, feeling the whole world endlessly
spinning around her.

Her heart was racing inside her chest and her whole body was shaken by
sensations that she wasn't able to understand, not to mention explain. It
felt as if she had a river of molten lava running through her veins, and
she had to make a serious effort to control her own body and gain back
some resemblance of stability before even thinking of getting up from the
couch.

As she fought to gain control, the young brunette felt some movement
beside her and the warmth of a large body coming near her. Cordelia turned
her head and almost jumped on the spot with surprise, as she found Elvis'
furry head at barely a couple of inches from her own, practically
breathing on her nose.

The large German shepherd whined softly and leaned closer to her,
tentatively sniffing at her, as if to get himself an idea of what was
going on with the young human female. "Elvis, what...?"

The dog seemed unsettled and whined again, raising his front right paw to
place it on the couch near her and, not able to hide a smile, Cordelia
scratched him between the ears, getting a new whine, this time of delight,
from the large animal.

Elvis propped himself up on the couch and began to playfully lick her all
over her face with his fat and spongy tongue, tickling her.

"Oh God, Elvis, no!" she exclaimed, giggling. "You have doggie breath!"

Elvis barked and got down from the couch, beginning to run in circles as
if he was chasing his own tail and barking like mad. Wiping her face with
the sleeve of her sweater, Cordelia couldn't help but to laugh at the
dog's antics and, after trapping an errant lock of dark hair behind her
ear, took his face between her slender hands, scratching his sides and
almost making him purr.

"Thank you very much, furface," she said, planting a big kiss on his
forehead.

If dogs could grin, Elvis was doing it right then, obviously delighted at
having improved the young woman's mood. Jumping on the couch, he lay down
with his head on the woman's lap, allowing her to pet him.

Cordelia took a deep breath and tried to catch the last strands of her
dream, or more accurately her nightmare; which, like rivulets of fog, were
quickly vanishing from her brain as if it had never existed.

As she scratched Elvis' head with her right hand and absent-mindedly
turned her new silver ring around the ring-finger of her left one, she was
only able to catch some disconnected feelings of fear and pain.

Of loneliness and deep, overwhelming sorrow, as if her most precious
possession had been ripped out from her chest.

As if she had lost everything that made life worth living.

Shaking her head, Cordelia suddenly remembered what had been happening
when she lost consciousness and shooed the dog away, so she could get up
from the couch and go back to the lab and the discussion between her
friends. Xander needed her help and she was going to give it to him,
whether he wanted it or not.

After stopping for a few seconds to recuperate from a small attack of
sea-sickness when she got up too quickly, Cordelia walked to the adjacent
lab and waited at the door for a moment, looking at the interior without
being detected.

Xander was sitting by the main computer, which was being operated by Kyle
and both Angel and Buffy were leaning close to the machine. The tension
was palpable in the air, thick enough to be cut with a knife; and the
young brunette stood by the door, passing unnoticed and listening
carefully to their conversation, knowing they would speak more freely if
they thought she wasn't present.

She felt something wet touching the back of her knee and turned around to
see Elvis, who sat down on his hind legs and looked at her in silence,
slightly tilting his head to one side as if asking what was going on.

She just brought her right index to his lips, and signaled him to keep
silent and quiet. The dog just lay down on the floor, leaned his head
between his front paws and observed the scene with his human friend.

When the first pictures appeared on the computer's screen, Xander cleared
his throat and began to speak, trying to sound calm and professional; but,
although he achieved some success in giving his tone a good dose of
coolness, he couldn't lie to himself. He was on the verge of a nervous
breakdown.

The first photo was a known one, Myriam Archer as the police had found
her, on the roof of the Kobayashi Tower-1. She was lying in a pool of her
own blood, her stare dead and empty, lost into the void.

The second photo was also one of her, but it was so different that it was
almost impossible to tell that both images belonged to the same person. It
was a typical picture taken during a high school prom night.

Myriam, no more than eighteen years old, dressed in a outrageous pink
dress, smiling and hanging from the arm of a lanky young man with a severe
acne problem dressed in an obviously rented tux, with an electric blue bow
and cummerbund. The image of a typical American teenager.

"Her name was Myriam Archer," Xander said with expressionless tone,
"believe it or not she was born in Topeka, Kansas, last Sunday made it
twenty-five years ago. Her parents were Steve and Marcia Archer."

He continued, "He had a small dealership in automotive parts, and she
worked as a volunteer in one of the municipal libraries. Both of them
passed away a couple of years ago, in a car accident. No foul play
involved, they just crashed into a drunk driver."

"Your usual Mom and Pop from good ol' America, huh?" Angel snorted with a
sarcasm that surprised Buffy.

Xander shook his head slowly. "There was nothing usual about them, they
were both adepts of the Brotherhood of Ezrain. Like the rest of the
members of the sect, they lived normal lives on the outside – jobs,
relationships, hobby-clubs, PTA reunions... nothing that would attract
attention to them. They were postmen, teachers, policemen, doctors... you
wouldn't be able to tell what they were, if one of them passed you by in
the middle of the street."

"I hate it when that happens," Kyle grunted, with a shake of his head.
"There should be a law making people like that wear black robes or
something all the time, it would be a lot easier to identify them."

Ignoring him, Xander resumed his narration, looking at the blonde Slayer
as if she was the only one apart from him present at the moment. "You
already know what was the basis of the Brotherhood, to bring Ezrain back
to this plane of existence and all that crap. There was a prophecy..."

"There's always a prophecy," the tall Texan commented, in a low but
singsong tone.

"...saying that, exactly twenty-five years before the moment in which
Ezrain would rise, a child would be born from two faithful adepts,
carrying its mark on her skin, and that child would be the one whose form
the Unholy would take. The Chosen One."

Kyle snorted once more, shaking his head in amusement and turning towards
Buffy. "Have you noticed how popular that term is? I mean, how many
'Chosen Ones' must be out there? Hey Buffy, I bet that you could form a
club or something like that, have an annual convention, Chosen-con or..."
he finally noticed the stares directed at him, and shut his mouth, turning
back to the computer.

Tiredly massaging the bridge of his nose, Xander let out a long sigh.
"Anyway, when Myriam was born, they found the mark on her body and from
then on her whole life was... predestined, I guess you could say. She
would raise Ezrain and give her body to her, blah, blah, blah, you know,
the usual crap."

Buffy shook her head sadly, looking at the photo on the screen. "It's
incredible what some people are able to do. Her own parents poured all
that bullshit into her brain since she was a baby – how wasn't she going
to believe that was what she had to do?"

She felt sad for her, knowing what it was to have the weight of a
non-asked fate on her shoulders. Then she looked straight at Xander, not
able to hide an accusatory spark in her eyes. "This is what I was talking
about, she was also a victim. She needed help, not to be executed like an
animal."

Wounded by the sting of that words, Xander got up from the table, making a
deep effort not to shout at her. Leaning his hands on his waist, taking a
long breath to calm himself, the young vampire looked down at her with a
serious expression on his handsome face.

"There's where we differ, Buffy. Because when I saw her for the first
time, she had the edge of a sacrificial dagger at the throat of a
nine-year-old kid, ready to rip it open. She didn't look to me like a
victim then, not at all."

Buffy flinched under the intensity of Xander's voice and strong stare.
But, as strongly as the young vampire seemed to believe in his reasons, so
did she in hers. "OK, I'll grant you that she had to be stopped and that
she deserved a punishment for what she had done and intended to do. But do
you think that they deserved to be massacred like that? Don't you think
that the death penalty was taking things a little too far?"

In the shadows by the lab's entrance, Cordelia looked at Xander, holding
her breath, waiting for him to answer.

But the young vampire said nothing. He just closed his haunted dark eyes
and, for a second so short that it passed unnoticed for all of them but
the woman that loved him the most, grimaced in pain, as if his whole world
was crashing down into pieces all over him.

"Kyle," he said without turning around, with a voice that was like the
ghost of his usual one, "please, load the data of what the Brotherhood did
to kidnap those kids."

The tall Texan gave him a worried look, noticing the quick downturn of his
mood. But he limited himself to nodding and doing as ordered, letting the
fingers of his left hand fly over the computer's keyboard as with the
right one he skillfully used the mouse.

"Do you want a quick review?" he asked. At Xander's soft and wordless nod,
the images and the data on the different screens quickly changed to show
new ones, among them a detailed map of the city of Los Angeles.

Kyle sighed and zoomed in until a precise street was focused, using
practically all of the screen. Then a blinking red spot appeared on the
image, and this one began to change to turn into a detailed
three-dimension display of the zone.

"They needed innocent blood for the ritual, the prophecy was very clear
about that," Xander said suddenly, his eyes fixed on the screen as if he
was hypnotized by the blinking red spot, his voice low and haunted.

He continued slowly, "But think about it, who's really innocent in this
world today? The answer is probably only the children, and not even all of
them."

"You sound pretty cynical about that," Angel softly told him, speaking for
the first time. Nevertheless, his tone was a worried one – Xander
understood that even when he would always back Buffy up, he also cared
about him, even in a moment like this. "Don't tell me that you've lost all
hope for the humans, Xander."

It didn't pass unnoticed to Buffy the way Angel said the word 'humans', as
if he had wanted to state clearly that he wasn't one of them and neither
was Harris. She wondered where that left her.

Xander looked at his blood-brother sideways and shook his head, managing a
tight smile for the older vampire's benefit. "If I thought that, I'd just
take Cordy and spend the rest of my life on a Caribbean island or
something. Do nothing more than sun-bathe and drink piña-coladas, instead
of staying here and peeling my ass off in this damn war."

He shook his head once more, this time pointedly looking at Buffy. "No, I
want to believe that there's still some good people out there for whom the
fight is worth the pain, and that's what I want to get to."

He made a soft signal to Kyle and the images changed once more, to show
pictures of a tattered yellow school-bus. Some of its windows were
shattered, and some close-ups showed the telltale bullet holes in its
frame.

"The bus of the Woodrow Wilson elementary school at Burbank," Xander
resumed his narration, "On Labor Day last week it was on its route after
classes, to safely drop the school kids off in front of their homes. That
was when they had to stop, because of a broken-down car in the middle of
the street."

"An ambush," Buffy guessed.

The young vampire just nodded affirmatively. "The moment the bus stopped,
five men dressed in those black robes Kyle was talking about and carrying
automatic weapons emerged from the adjacent alleys, and surrounded it. Two
of them forced the door open, and entered the bus. The driver, a man
called Carlos Gutierrez, do we have any pictures of him?"

At Kyle's soft nod and as he made a photo of the bus driver appear, a
smiling, bald and slightly over-weight Hispanic man, Xander continued. "As
I was saying, he stood up and tried to face them. The acolytes shot him
sixteen times in the face and chest, and then threw his body out of the
vehicle. He was married and had two children, aged 12 and 14."

"God..." Buffy whispered, passing a hand over her face.

"Apart from the driver," Xander continued, swallowing down a thick knot
that had formed in his throat, "there were twenty-two children on that
bus, all of them between 7 and 12 years old. And one other adult, a
teacher who was in charge of taking care of them. Her name was Sarah
Fisher."

Buffy didn't miss the way in which Xander had said was and, when her photo
appeared on the screen right by the driver's one, the blonde Slayer began
to see things a little from Xander's point of view. She had been a very
beautiful woman.

"Did they also kill her?" Angel asked with a soft voice.

Xander shook his head slowly. "Not immediately, she wasn't that lucky."

Buffy looked at him in startled surprise, but the young vampire only gave
her a cold, almost dead stare. "They tortured and raped her, before they
did that," he said simply.

"Do you really want to keep going with this?" Kyle asked the Slayer with
worry, seeing that her face had turned suddenly pale.

"I-I... I don't know..." Buffy whispered weakly, fighting to hold back the
tears. "I'm beginning to see where you're coming from, Xander. And I
understand what you probably felt that night, God knows how many times
I've felt that way myself," she took a deep breath, sniffing and wiping
the corners of her eyes.

"But still, that's not the way. We're supposed to be better than those
people – we're supposed to be the heroes, the good guys. If we fall into
that sort of behavior and just act as our impulses tell us to act, if we
cross the line that separates us and act like them... then tell me,
Xander, what's the difference between us and them?"

He shrugged slowly, with a sad look. "Maybe we're not better than them."

"We are, Xander," she insisted with all her heart. "We have to be."

Xander closed his eyes tightly shut, and for a second it seemed he was
going to explode. "You don't get it, don't you?" he growled, almost
painfully. "Sometimes we can't be, that's the problem. I would love to be
a white knight in shining armor, traveling the world, rescuing damsels in
distress and forgiving, even redeeming the bad guys."

He continued, "But this is the real world, Buffy. And if there's one thing
I've learnt in the last few years, it's that I can't save everybody. I
have to make choices, and my choice that night was to help those children
and avenge those people. They were the victims, Buffy, they were the ones
who deserved our help. And as sure as Hell is burning beneath me, that's
what they got from us."

"Xander..." Buffy said, beginning to get a little frightened at Xander's
growing outburst.

Nevertheless, Xander didn't even hear her. "There is a line, Buff, but it
doesn't separate the good guys from the bad guys – it separates those who
are ready to sacrifice everything for what they believe in, from those who
aren't! I believe in defending those who can't defend themselves and
punishing those who deserve it, and I'm willing to do whatever is
necessary in order to do so. Now, tell me Buffy, can you say the same?"

"Damn it, Xander!" Buffy exclaimed. "Do you hear yourself? You're talking
like a goddamned fanatic! What those people did was horrible, but what you
did to them wasn't any better!"

"Why, Buffy? You kill vampires every day, you stab them with stakes, you
behead them, you set them on fire – what's the difference between what you
do, and what I did?"

"You know there's a difference..." she said with a sullen voice.

Xander practically snorted at hearing this. "Really? What – that they
haven't got souls? What's worse, Buffy, a vampire that kills because
that's what its nature makes it do – or a human that does it, just because
it's convenient to his interests? Who deserves to be sent to Hell more,
Slayer?"

At the poison in Xander's voice, Buffy remained speechless for a brief
moment. Then, slowly, she shook her head.

"I don't believe you," she whispered, her voice ragged from the tears, "I
listen to you and I hear your words, Xander, but I don't believe them. And
I think that not even you believe them. Do you? Or are they just what you
tell yourself, so you can sleep at night?"

"I sleep perfectly well at night," he lied, looking into her eyes, "thank
you very much."

Near them, both Angel and Kyle watched the exchange between the two old
friends with dread and worry, each one because of their own reasons.

Angel because he knew and cared for both of them, and it broke his undead
heart to see them like this.

Kyle because he knew the reasons behind Xander's actions, the
responsibilities he had accepted and how much they had cost him.

Buffy shook her head one last time with sadness, and turned around to walk
away. "If that's all that you have to tell me..."

"One last thing," the Slayer stopped dead in her tracks and turned around,
facing him again. Xander looked at her, hard and resolute. "I don't like
killing people, Buffy, you have to believe that. And I don't like what I
sometimes have to do, but I do it. Given the same situation as last
Sunday, I would make the same choices, no matter what nightmares they make
me have."

He paused. "You may not like it, Buffy, but it's a war out there. And in a
war, either you kill or you die. We both know what death is, and frankly,
I didn't like it at all."

The blonde Slayer nodded slowly. "Do you know something? When you came
back and got together with Cordy and all that, I was as happy as I've
never been before, because I thought that you were alive and with us
again."

"And now?" Xander asked, leaning his hands on his waist.

"I was wrong," Buffy said sadly, soft, shiny tears rolling down her smooth
cheeks. "As much as I hate to tell you this, you have to realize it, or
you won't be able to come out of that dark hole you're in. You're still
dead inside, Xander, and now it seems that death is all that you know and
all you can dish out."

It felt as if she had staked him, right there. As Buffy turned around once
more and began to walk out of the lab, not waiting to see if Angel
followed her or not, Xander remained quiet and silent, looking at her back
as she walked out of the room, carrying a little piece of him with her.

When the Slayer exited the lab, she practically stumbled upon Cordelia –
who was almost invisible between the shadows of the door, as if her dark
hair and tanned skin turned her into a perfect inhabitant of the night.

"How dare you..." she whispered with incredulity, looking at Buffy and
shaking her head as if she couldn't believe what she had just said.

The Slayer just looked at her, in silence.

"I thought he was your friend," Cordy said.

"I said it precisely because he's my friend," Buffy told her calmly, but
with a sad expression. "He can't keep going on like this, or it'll destroy
him in the end." =And you too,= she thought without actually voicing it.

Cordelia had to make a real effort not to shout at her, but she managed to
keep her voice low and controlled. "And you think that is gonna help him?
Do you believe those people deserve your help or compassion, more than
what Xander does?"

The Slayer looked at her through half-closed eyes, as if she was examining
her taller friend and seeing something in her for the first time. "You're
too close to him to see what's happening to him, Cordy, and I think that
you want so much to be with him that you're overlooking his faults."

"Oh," Cordelia hissed with sarcasm, "and this is the pot calling the
kettle black."

Buffy just rolled her eyes. "OK, I guess this is not the best time to talk
about this. I'll see you later."

"Yeah, Buffy, later," she said to her back, practically spitting the
words.

Not able to look at the Slayer without feeling the need to chase her and
kick her ass, Cordelia turned around and walked into the lab. She quickly
sent a look of warning to Kyle and Angel and, after exchanging a
meaningful look, the two men stood up in silence and went out, leaving her
and Xander alone.

The young vampire was looking at the floor, still immobile on the spot
where Buffy had left him, as if he was a human-shaped statue completely
dressed in black. But, by the shaking of his closed fists, she was able to
feel the anger growing inside him like a tidal wave, coming out of his
body almost physical waves.

She walked close to him and tried to hug and offer him her comfort, but
Xander quickly recoiled away from her reach, never raising his eyes to
look straight at her. "No, don't touch me..."

"But Xander..." she pledged at him as the young vampire began to pace back
and front, trying to keep his rage in check. It was as if he wouldn't even
acknowledge that she was present.

"Buffy... Summers..." he growled incoherently, his voice rising and rising
in anger. "Miss 'Oh-I'm-holier-than-thou'... who the hell does she think
she is to say... Shit!!" he finally exploded, kicking one of the chairs
and sending it flying like a projectile against the nearest counter.

It crashed, and reduced the different vials and flasks there into a
useless pile of broken glassware. "Damn her!!"

"Xander!" Cordelia called him, scared by his outburst and covering her
ears. "What do you think you're doing?"

"Letting off some steam," he growled, resuming his nervous pace. "Trying
to calm down, before I make an irreparable mistake like following her and
pounding some sense into that stubborn head or hers..."

"Are you really hearing yourself?" she asked in awe. "You're acting like a
maniac."

He just snorted, and gave her a sideways look. "Well, maybe I like being a
maniac. Maybe I am a maniac." He sighed, passing a hand through his
longish hair.

"Shit. Shit. Shit!!" he kicked again the same fallen chair. And again. And
again, until it was nothing more than a shapeless bundle of twisted
metallic bars and plastic.

Cordelia was scared. She wasn't being able to recognize the man she loved
in that furious tornado that was in front of her, and she didn't know how
to reach out for him.

"Xander," she called him once more, hoping that the softness in her voice
was enough to calm him, even if it was just a little. "Xander, I know that
some of the things Buffy said sounded harsh, but you have to calm down."

Xander stopped his attack on the helpless chair and leaned back against
the counter, breathing heavily, like an enraged bull, and covering his
contorted face with his hands. He felt possessed; he was furious, sad and
scared at the same time.

He wasn't sure who was more right, Buffy or himself; and, what was worse,
he wasn't sure anymore if it really mattered at all.

"Xander, look at me, please. Look at me, baby," Cordelia kept on saying,
getting closer to him very slowly and speaking in a hushed and calming
tone, like one would do with a dangerous animal. Xander finally let his
hands slip away from his face, and looked at her.

Blood-red tears blurred his warm brown eyes, and they seemed so haunted
and lost that their mere sight broke her heart in two. Slow and silently,
she walked to him and enveloped him into her arms, letting his head rest
on her shoulder.

"It's not fair," he whispered so low, that she wasn't sure that he had
actually pronounced the words.

"I know, but you have to understand her too – she's your friend, she just
wants what's best for you." Cordelia surprised even herself with her
words, because she was angry with Buffy too, but the truth was that she
was plain tired from suffering and seeing her friends suffering too.

She just didn't want to lose any of them again.

Nevertheless, the young vampire didn't seem to understand this and he just
took his face away from the crook of her neck, looking at her with wide
open and wounded eyes. "You're agreeing with her?"

Cordelia sighed, closing her hazel eyes and shaking her head. "No...
yes... I mean..."

She sighed once more, and took a deep breath as she searched for the right
words. "Look, you know I'll support you always, and Buffy's sense of
timing sucks; she chose the worst moment to talk about this, with Faith in
town playing mind-games and all, but I have to admit that some of the
things she said... well, they kinda made sense to me."

Xander shook his head and got out from her arms, turning his back on her.
"Do you think that I'm nothing more than a cold-blooded murderer, too?"

"No, and I don't believe that Buffy thinks that of you either," she said
with resolve but without following him, knowing it was the time to give
him some space. "And, if those bastards did all I've heard you say they
did, you won't hear any complaints about their deaths from me."

She continued, "In my opinion, they just got what they deserved. But Buffy
was right about one thing, Xander. I don't think that you believe in your
own reasons – you say you do what you have to do, but you still blame
yourself for it. That's why Buffy's words've had such a strong effect on
you."

Without turning around to look at her, he shook his head slowly. "You
can't understand it, Cordelia. You weren't there, or in any of the places
I've been these last few years. You can't understand it..."

"Then why don't you explain it to me? I want to know."

Xander turned around almost violently and looked at her, with eyes that
had turned a furious and brilliant gold, grabbing her by her wrist so
strongly that is was almost painful to her.

Cordelia had to make an effort not to yelp, with surprise and fear. She
was looking at his face and, even when the only sign of his transformation
were his feverish golden eyes, she knew it was the vampire inside him who
was talking to her now.

The real him.

"You want to know, Cordy?" he asked with rage, and a tone that was full of
painful sarcasm. "You really want to know how it feels, to take a human
life? To feel it leaving a person's body, and the corpse turning cold in
your hands? To get hard when you rip a person's throat out with your fangs
and drink his blood?"

He continued, "Do you want to know how frighteningly attractive the
sensation is, of having all that terrible power at your very fingertips?
Tell me, Cordy, do you know want to know how it is to fight against that
need, that hunger every damned day of your existence?"

"Xander," she hissed, scared, "you're hurting me..."

The young vampire blinked, as if his brain was in need of a couple of
seconds to process her words. But, when they seemed to finally kick in,
the gold and red of his eyes quickly changed into soulful brown and he
freed his grasp on the brunette's wrist, as if the contact of her skin
against his were suddenly burning him.

"I'm sorry..." he said softly, shaking his head as if he couldn't believe
what he had just done. "I didn't mean to..."

"It's OK," she cut him while she rubbed her sore wrists, as unable as him
to look straight at his eyes in that moment. He tried to reach out for
her, but Cordelia stepped back from him and Xander remained quiet, looking
at her as if he had just been stabbed in the heart.

"Buffy was right about another thing," she whispered almost reverently,
"you're getting yourself into a deep dark hole, Xander, and I can't help
you out, not if you don't let me."

Xander looked at her in silence and opened his mouth to tell her
something, but closed it when he realized that he had no idea of what to
say.

Cordelia returned his awkward and uncomfortable look for a brief moment,
hugging herself so she could alleviate a little the cold she was suddenly
feeling, before walking away to retrieve her purse, which was on one of
the counters, forgotten when she had fainted.

"I'll leave you alone for a while so you can think," she told him without
turning around to look at him, not until she was about to leave the lab
area, then she just stopped and looked at him over her shoulder. "If you
need me, you know you only have to call me. I love you, Xander."

He just looked at her without saying anything at all, and Cordelia finally
sighed and went away, effectively leaving him alone.

"I love you too," he whispered a few seconds later, but she was already
too far away to hear him.

Very slowly, feeling that his legs weren't really strong enough to keep
him up, Xander let himself fall into the nearest chair, the air coming out
of his lungs almost painfully. Now that the anger was leaving him he felt
suddenly tired, drained and empty.

He was going to sink his face between his hands and have a good brood,
when he noticed some movement in front of him and raised his eyes to find
Elvis coming into the room and sitting down in front of him.

Without uttering a bark, the large dog tilted his head slightly to one
side, and looked at him with accusatory brown eyes.

"I'm a jerk, huh?" Xander asked with a growl.

Elvis woofed his agreement, gaining a weak smile from him, and finally got
closer to him, sitting down between his legs so the young vampire could
scratch his furry body. Doing so, Xander sighed again.

"A total and absolute jerk," he repeated, shaking his head.

This time, however, Elvis was only able to whine in delight.



~~~~~~



She smelled like lilacs.

Michael raised his eyes from the food that was being served in front of
him and looked in amazement at the young waitress, whose perfume was the
source of that scent.

His mind was suddenly filled with images of a 1975 hotel room in Saigon,
one turned into a slaughterhouse, of a lost friend and the dead eyes of a
beautiful woman.

On the other side of the table, Joyce looked at him with a small frown on
her face. "Michael? Are you alright?" she called him softly, reaching over
the table to place her hand on the Frenchman's forearm.

The Immortal shook his head as if he had come out of a trance, and managed
to give her a self-conscious but charming smile.

"Oh mon dieu, excusez-moi, Joyce. I just thought..." he blinked
repeatedly, unable to explain what he had thought. "Never mind, what were
we talking about?"

Arching her brow but smiling, Joyce removed her hand from his forearm,
retrieving her fork. In spite of the sudden sea-sickness before, she was
feeling a ravishing hunger right now.

"You'd told me about the general rules of the Game, but there's something
I don't understand. What would happen if someone broke them someday? I
mean, what if two Immortals fought inside a church?" she asked.

Michael smiled and nodded softly. "Well, the truth is... I have no idea.
The rumor mill says that the last time it happened, it was in Pompeii,
five minutes before Mount Vesuvius erupted and buried the whole city in
molten lava."

He shrugged. "If you want my opinion, it's best that you just don't test
the limits of the Rules – ever."

Joyce laughed softly, shaking her head. Michael made it all look so easy
and simple, that she almost forgot that they were talking about the fact
that there was a lot of people out there whose only reason for living was
chopping his and Buffy's head off. She wasn't very sure she wanted to
really think about that.

"I don't know how to help Buffy with this," she confessed to her
daughter's new mentor. "As if her Slayer duties weren't hard enough, as if
she didn't have enough pressure on her shoulders... I don't know what to
do to make this easier for her."

"Love her," Michael told her succinctly, "support her, let her know that
she is not alone. I can teach her everything about fighting and staying
alive – but the rest, the reasons to keep on fighting, to keep on living,
I can't give that to her, she has to find them on her own. And she will
need you and the rest of her family and friends for that."

The Frenchman paused. "I've known Immortals that have tried to isolate
themselves from the rest of humanity," he said, thinking about one lost
young man he had found in a dirty alley of San Francisco. "As if erasing
all contact with the rest of society would make everything easier for
them, and the people around them."

"And that's not the way."

Michael shook his head, taking a sip from the glass of cold Heineken he
had ordered. "Only if you want to die alone."

They stood in silence for a few moments, as Joyce consumed her salad and
the French Immortal picked at his half-heartedly.

"There was something else I wanted to ask," the middle-aged woman finally
said, a little uncomfortably, "although I don't know if it's any of my
business..."

Michael arched his brow questioningly. "Please, go ahead."

"Alright, but please, tell me if it's too personal. You and your, uh,
fiancée..."

The French Immortal choked on his beer, coughing soundly as he quickly
brought up his napkin to cover his mouth and clean the twin streams of
golden foam that had surged from his nostrils.

He needed a couple of seconds to get his breathing under control and be
able to look at Joyce, feeling his ears turning red in a way they hadn't
been since his adolescence.

"Excuse me?" he asked in a high-pitched voice, much to the middle-aged
woman's amusement.

Not able to hide a smile at the much-older man's lack of comfort, Joyce
shrugged helplessly. "Well, I thought that you and Miss Curran..."

Michael nodded briskly, and with a nervous smile. "Oui-oui, yes, yes, she,
she, um, Miss Curran and me... we are... we are... I mean..."

"I told you to tell me if it was too personal," Joyce observed with a
risen eyebrow and a small smile.

Finally, Michael let his head sink down and shook it slowly, smiling
widely. "We've still not talked about that kind of arrangement," he said
with a sigh.

"Not that I have anything against marriage, it's just that we've not been
this close, I mean, involved for a long time. And, truth be told, neither
of our respective experiences with it has been what you could call...
fortunate."

"That bad, huh?"

Michael sighed, and shrugged politely. "She was married to a drunk and
abusive man, and my father-in-law tried to kill me on the day of my
wedding," he explained.

He avoided telling her that, after he beheaded Takeo Mushashi in
self-defense, his daughter, and Michael's bride-to-be, Aneko had committed
a ritualistic suicide. He just didn't want to horrify her any more than
what was necessary.

Joyce just blinked for a few moments. "I see... well, uh, I just wanted to
know how you feel about, well, about children."

Michael felt suddenly that the tie was too tight around his neck, and that
there wasn't enough oxygen in the air to feed his lungs. "Wh-what do you
mean?" he asked the middle-aged woman, playing with his napkin so she
wouldn't notice the shaking of his hands.

Joyce shrugged, her stare returning to her dish. "I've never talked about
this with Buffy. I know that with the kind of relationship she's involved
in, I mean with Angel's..." she fought to find the right words.

"Little problem with vampirism?" Michael offered politely.

"Yes, I guess you could call it that," Joyce nodded with a smile. "Well,
with that little... problem, she already knew that there weren't going to
be any children coming out of that relationship. And she's never really
talked about it, but I know that she still had some hopes of becoming a
mother one day," she looked suddenly uncomfortable, "you know, there are
other ways..."

Michael managed a soft, but amused smile. "Yes, I've heard some rumors
about that." She reddened, and the French Immortal patted her hand
knowingly. "We can't have children, and that's probably the worst price we
have to pay for the other... gifts we're born with. It's the most painful
one, I know that."

He sighed with resignation. "I guess it's different for a woman, but you
were right before. There are other ways and, in my experience, if you do
it truly and with the heart, the love you give and receive in exchange is
what matters in the end. It is what remains, no matter the blood ties or
the lack of them."

"In your experience..." Joyce whispered. "Did you...?"

"Adopt?" Michael asked, smiling warmly. He shook his head, his mind
suddenly filled with images from his past, some of them wonderful, some of
them sad and painful, but all of them special somehow. "It was a little
more complicated than that in my case, but yes, I was a father once."

She watched the emotions running through his handsome features, and
discovered with surprise something she hadn't realized. She had known
Michael Deveraux the Immortal and the fighter – but then she understood
that, beneath all that, there was also Michael Deveraux, a caring man.

But, somehow, she also noticed that there was something like a cloud in
his dark blue eyes. "There is a worse part in this, isn't it?" she asked
gently.

Michael nodded slowly, tracing idle circles on his plate with the fork.
"One shouldn't survive his own children. It's not right, for mortals or
Immortals."

He closed his eyes for a moment and grimaced, as if in pain. "When you
lose a child a part of you dies with him, something that you can't ever
recover. It's as if it vanishes into nothingness, leaving an empty spot
inside you and, everything you see makes that... spot bigger, more
painful. Every little detail makes you remember," he chuckled sadly,
"every song, every flower, every..."

When he shook his head and looked around as he tried to find the right
words, he saw him again, just as he remembered him, "...face."

He was standing on the other side of the street, looking at him with
half-closed eyes, as if he was trying to determine if they were real or
not. Michael thought that he heard Joyce calling his name, asking if
something was wrong.

But he wasn't able to be sure, because all his attention, all that he was,
was centered on the figure dressed with a long cashmere coat at the other
side of the street.

They looked at each other in silence as time seemed to stop, and the world
around them vanished into a blur of walking bodies, of faded colors and
moving lights and shades. And all the world around them went as silent as
a tomb.

It had to be a hallucination, his brain interpreting wrongly what his eyes
were seeing. Just a trick of the light and the shadows, changing a man's
features into the ones he wanted to see.

Michael closed his eyes and shook his head but, when he opened them again,
he was still there, waiting for him.

He had to be real.

Michael got up from the chair, his astonished expression turning into one
of wonder and his lips moving to pronounce his name.

"Damon?" he asked, so softly that nobody around him was able to hear him.

The man on the other side of the street smiled at him and nodded, as if he
was answering his silent question and Michael had to make an effort to
stay up on his suddenly weak legs. It was a miracle.

And then, the man at the other side of the street, the one that looked
exactly like his dead son, smiled once more at him, took a submachine-gun
out of his coat and, aiming at him, opened fire without any kind of
warning.



~~~~~~



Angel had to run and walk down the rusty and trembling staircase that
nobody seemed to use, to get to Buffy before she walked out of the
warehouse.

"Wait!" he called her, making the blonde Slayer stop with her hand on the
knob of the small service door beside the main gate. "Where are you
going?"

"Home," she said succinctly, shifting uncomfortably under the vampire's
dark gaze. "And I'd like to be alone, I need to think."

Raising an eyebrow, Angel bit his tongue and nodded slowly. "That's OK,"
he said tensely, "I wasn't going to follow you in the middle of the
sunlight, anyway."

The Slayer looked at him with half-closed eyes, crossing her arms over her
chest in a defensively position. "Is there anything you want to tell me?"

Angel sighed, hiding his large hands in the deep pockets of his coat, and
shifted from one foot to the other, not really knowing how to start his
speech. "Don't you think you were a little harsh on Xander up there?"

She shook her head, as if she couldn't believe him. "I thought you would
understand what I'm trying to do, better than anyone."

The souled vampire went still, and half-closed his eyes. "What do you
mean?"

Buffy sighed and, closing her hazel eyes, massaged her temples tiredly.
"Listen Angel, don't misunderstand me, but the truth is that you know
better than anyone else how it is to live with a whole lifetime of...
mistakes on your mind."

Angel nodded, but said nothing. "I just don't want him to go through the
same thing, not if I can't help it." she said.

The vampire stood in silence for a whole second, before answering her.
"Have you stopped to think that maybe he wasn't so wrong? That maybe he
didn't make a mistake at all?"

Buffy looked at him in astonishment. "Are you defending his actions?" she
asked with incredulity. "I thought we were on the same side, Angel."

"First of all, there isn't any side to this," he told her a little more
harshly than what he intended at first. "I love you and Xander is my
friend, and yours too. And frankly, if after what he told us those...
people did, and I'm using the term 'people' very loosely, you still think
that they should have been treated with more kindness than what they
were..."

He paused. "Well, I couldn't help wondering whether maybe you're the one
who's in a hole, and can't see what's happening around you."

The blonde Slayer looked at him, with a mix of hurt and surprise. Never in
all the time she had known Angel had she seen that hard, merciless,
expression on his handsome face. And never had she heard him speaking
about killing human beings, without any trace of remorse in his voice.

"Would you have also killed them?" she asked weakly, fearing the answer
more than what she had thought possible.

"No," he said immediately, "but only because that would have made me look
bad in your eyes, and that's something that, basically, I couldn't
possibly stand. But Xander knew that too – he knew that if you, or any one
of us, learnt about what he was going to do it would seriously hurt your
friendship."

"And still, he did it," Buffy said, as if that gave her the reason.

For Angel, it was completely the other way around. "Yes, he did what had
to be done, and he did it fast and clean. Sometimes, Buffy, you just have
to do what you have to do, no matter how much it hurts, and no matter how
much it costs you. And that's something you should understand, better than
anyone else."

The hurt in her eyes was like receiving a punch right in his stomach, and
he cupped her face between his hands before she could say anything at all.
"And that's what makes the both of you so special, so strong. That's what
makes you the best Slayer in history, and probably what made whoever put
Xander in charge of his team choose him."

At hearing this, Buffy frowned in confusion. "Whoever chose Xander? What
do you mean?"

Releasing her, Angel chuckled. "You have to be able to read between the
lines, Buffy. How did they know about the whole Ezrain ordeal? That kind
of thing doesn't appear on the Internet – and I don't think that they just
found out about it by coincidence, or reading a book two hours or so
before it all happened."

He paused. "Remember, not even Giles had a clue about it. Someone had to
have alerted them. Add to that all the equipment that they shouldn't have
access to, all the weapons, the way they act, like a military unit... and
what do you have?"

"A bunch of Tom Clancy fans out of control?" the Slayer guessed.

Angel chuckled. "No, there has to be somebody above them, some kind of
contact or support that they still haven't talked to us about."

"Like what? The government? The CIA?" she asked in a hushed tone, feeling
too much like a character from the X-Files.

Her vampire boyfriend shrugged. "I can't know that."

Buffy sighed. She was thinking that now that Angel mentioned it, the truth
was that it really made sense, although it gave everything a new and
unexpected twist. "I have to talk with Giles about this," she whispered,
more speaking to herself than to Angel.

The souled vampire nodded his agreement. "Go ahead, he's coming now."

"How do you know that?"

He shrugged and gave her a small smile, tapping his ear. "Vampire hearing,
I'm hearing his Citroen a couple of streets away. I wouldn't be able to do
it normally, but the sound of Giles' car is... well, unmistakable."

For the first time that day, the blonde Slayer managed a real smile and
the vampire smiled along with her. "Well, I better go now. We'll be in The
Library, so if you want to..." she began to say, feeling self-conscious
and blushing a little under his intense and dark gaze.

Trapping an errant golden lock behind her ear, she was caught by surprise
when Angel leaned down to place a short but loving kiss on her lips. "Mmm,
I, uh... will you join us later? We still have to figure all this out."

The souled vampire nodded, that curve of his lips that wasn't deep enough
to be a smile and that was so his, never leaving his expression. "Later,
I'm going to stay here for a while. I want to talk with Spike about
something," he explained to the Slayer's surprised face.

"Well, see you later, then."

With a soft nod, Angel stepped back, carefully avoiding the sunlight that
entered through the door when she opened it. After exchanging a last
silent look as their only goodbye, he observed as the Slayer left the
warehouse and disappeared into the blinding glow of the daylight.

Sighing, the souled vampire turned around, only to practically stumble
upon Cordelia. "Hey," he greeted her with a small smile, "I didn't hear
you."

And it was true, not even with his sharp vampire hearing had he been able
to notice her approaching. And he hadn't been that distracted. =Weird.=

"Yeah, well, I guess you had your mind on more important things," she
sighed, shifting uncomfortably under his gaze and crossing her arms over
her chest in a defensive position.

If he knew anything about Cordy and her body language, and he'd had the
time to learn during the years they had been friends, she was really
upset.

But he also knew that she wasn't very prone to bite her own tongue, and
liked to say what really was on her mind; so, when he didn't feel her
anger immediately directed towards him, he figured out that he wasn't the
main focus of it.

"Are you alright?" he asked softly.

The brunette looked at him from behind her long eyelashes, her hazel eyes
practically blazing with anger. "What do you think?"

The souled vampire licked his lips, and examined her through half-closed
eyes. "And Xander?"

"After your girlfriend's tongue-lashing?" she snorted with sarcasm. "Well,
let's just say that he's not in his most cheeriest state. What was Buffy
thinking? Does she think this is the best moment to antagonize him? Can't
she see the hard time that Xander is having with Faith's comeback?"

"She's worried about him," he whispered, avoiding the look of her eyes.

"What? A vampire with a bad conscience isn't enough for her?" Angel just
raised an eyebrow coolly, and Cordelia looked down in shame.

"I'm sorry," she said, passing a hand over her beautiful but tired
features, "that was like, totally uncalled for."

"Don't worry," Angel eased her pain, patting the brunette on her shoulder.
"Look, Cordelia, Buffy has good intentions, but she's a little... startled
by all this. You have to admit that it's all quite unsettling, and
surprising, coming from Xander."

The brunette closed her eyes, and shook her head sadly. "When are all of
you gonna understand it? He's not that Xander anymore. He's changed,
Angel, and in more ways than getting a new attitude and set of dark
clothes."

"And you feel comfortable with that?"

Cordelia shrugged, managing a weak and sad smile. "I have no option. I
loved him as he was then, and I love him as he is right now."

She walked past him, and opened the exit door. Before stepping out the
warehouse, she sent a last look to the tall vampire over her shoulder.
"Could you do something for me?"

Angel nodded softly. "Sure."

"Could you have a word with him? Right now it's like I'm not able to reach
out to him, and maybe he'll be more receptive to listening to you. After
all, you understand what he's going through better than any of us."

"I'll see what can I do," he told her. With a soft, almost imperceptible
nod of her head Cordelia walked out and, spotting Giles' Citroen, followed
Buffy's trail.

Hiding his hands in the depths of his coat's pockets, Angel let out a long
and tired sigh, as he started to walk towards the elevator. Thinking about
Cordelia's words, about the truth in them, and about how sad it was that
he was the one that could understand Xander best.



~~~~~~



Kyle had been walking to his bedroom, immersed in his own thoughts as he
turned the recent events back and forth inside his mind, when the door of
Crystal's room opened. A slender hand then emerged from the shadows of the
interior, grabbing him by the shoulder.

Caught off-balance, the tall Texan couldn't do much more than to allow
whoever was on the other side of the door to drag him into the darkened
bedroom and, stumbling over his own feet, he practically fell into the
red-haired witch's arms.

"Whoa!" he exclaimed with surprise and amusement, taking advantage of the
situation to surround Cris' slender figure with his larger arms, as a
wicked gleam came to his eyes. "I've often dreamt about you doing this,
but I never thought you'd actually go ahead and do it sometime."

The witch looked up at him with annoyance and was about to say something,
when a soft and polite cough called their attention.

Turning his head around, Kyle found Rachel sitting on the edge of Cris'
bed, her long and jeans-clad legs crossed and an amused smile on her
sensual lips. "Sorry, dude, but you're not alone here."

"I don't mind," he said with a wide and playful grin, still without
releasing the witch's body. "I've had this dream too. It's one of my
favorites, now that I think about it."

With a grimace of distaste, Crystal finally managed to struggle out of
Kyle's embrace and glared at him with her deep jade-green eyes. "You
really are such a child."

The Texan arched his brow. "You say that as if it was something bad."

At that very moment, the sound of a toilet being flushed came from the
room's bathroom and Spike came out, still zipping up his pants. Kyle's
humor immediately descended a notch. "Did I say dream? I meant nightmare."

"I love you too, Cowboy," the peroxide-blonde vampire growled at him,
letting himself fall onto the bed as if it was his, and propping his
bleached head on one hand. "Well?"

"Well, what?" Kyle asked, clueless.

"Well, how did everything go between Xander and Buffy?" Rachel clarified,
rolling her brown eyes. "Did the blood hit the walls?"

Spike chuckled amusedly. "I love that expression."

Ignoring him, Kyle just shrugged. "It depends on your point of view, I
guess."

Cris crossed her arms over her chest, and looked at him patiently. "And
what's that supposed to mean?"

"That after accusing the boss of being a cold-blooded murderer, at least
she didn't actually kick him in the nuts," he said matter-of-factly.
"Anyway, he tried to explain to her how things were last Sunday, but she
didn't seem to get the point."

"Did he tell her anything about..." Rachel shook her head, searching for
the words, "...well, you know, about the organization."

Kyle shook his head. "Nope, lips sealed tight as a tomb. Although I'm not
sure that was a good idea. Maybe if she knew about it, she'd understand
things a little better."

"Or maybe she'd 'ave a bloody stroke," Spike growled. "Y'know, it's an
idea damn 'ard to digest."

"Yeah, tell me about it," Kyle agreed with a nod, "if someone had told me
a few years ago that I would end up working for..."

A pounding on the room's door made him stop, at that very moment. Arching
his brow and sending a questioning look to the rest of his companions,
Kyle opened it, revealing Angel's tall figure on the other side.

"Hi," the souled vampire said with a tight, compromised smile. "I heard
some noise in here and I thought that, well... that you would be... here."

Spike had to make a real effort not to burst out in laughter. "Nice
deduction, Sherlock!"

Angel just sent a hostile look toward his childe, before centering his
attention back on the tall Texan in front of him. "Anyway, I was wondering
if you'd know where Xander is. I-I'd like to have a word with him."

Kyle just looked at him, with a severe lack of amusement in his bright
blue eyes. "Why? You think that he didn't get enough of that from your
girlfriend?"

Sighing, the souled vampire shook his head. "Believe it or not, I'm not
with Buffy on this – well, not all of it, anyway. I just wanted to make
sure that he was alright, but he wasn't where we left him with Cordy."

"Then I don't know where he is," Kyle shrugged.

"Still in the building," Rachel told him, "I can still feel him, but if
you weren't able to find him when you were coming here, it's 'cause he
didn't want you to find him. Just leave him alone for a while, Angel."

The souled vampire nodded slowly, although his personal opinion was
against the Immortal brunette's advice.

From personal experience, he knew that loneliness was rarely a help for
any kind of troubled spirit, and never served to improve the feelings of
guilt.

For him, it had only served to dig a deeper grave for himself than the one
in which he had been buried when Darla killed him.

"Can I talk with you then, Spike?" he asked his childe. "In private."

The bleached-hair vampire blinked in surprise and looked at each of his
teammates, who just returned to him the same blank stare he guessed he
must be wearing on his face at that very moment. "Me? Why?"

His sire rolled his dark eyes, before looking back at him with boredom.
"Can I or not?"

"Sure, come to my office." Getting up from the bed and sending a last look
to the rest of his friends, Spike motioned for Angel to follow him and
they walked to his private bedroom. The bleached-hair vampire held the
door open for his sire to come in first, following and closing it behind
him.

Arching his brow and making an effort not to grimace, Angel took a look at
the bedroom's... decoration, for want of a better term. "It's nice to see
that some things never change," he whispered.

As usual, it seemed that a tornado had passed through Spike's room. The
bed was unmade, and the crimson satin sheets covering it were so tangled
up that it looked as if he had just gotten up from it.

The walls were covered with what could only be described as Spike's
peculiar concept of personal decoration; although, for Angel's taste, a
huge Union Jack and a 'Sid Vicious' poster hanging from the walls were a
little too teen-like.

Not to mention that almost every available surface was hidden from view,
with the most diverse items. A greasy and presumably empty box of pizza
here, a half-consumed bottle of Jack Daniel's there, a pile of unlabelled
videotapes on top of the VCR and the TV...

As Spike cleared a chair by the radical method of taking the clothes piled
on it and throwing them on the bed and sitting down on them while lighting
a cigarette, Angel dared to flip through a stack of magazines that he had
left on a bureau.

A 'Penthouse', a 'Celebrity Skin', another 'Penthouse', an old 'Green
Lantern' issue, a 'Hot Video News', a new 'Penthouse', a... he blinked,
surprised, and took a second look at the magazine in his hand, horrified.
A 'New England Journal of Poetry'?!?

=Weeeird,= he thought, carefully leaving the magazine where he had found
it, hidden between all the pornography.

"Well, mate," Spike got his attention as he exhaled a cloud of blue-gray
smoke, "what do ya wanna talk about?"

"Are you alright?" Angel asked with a small frown and, at his childe's
confused face, he tapped his own lower lip, indicating the place where
Kyle's ring had broken his skin. "What happened?"

Absent-mindedly testing the cut with the point of his tongue, Spike shook
his head as if it was unimportant. "Just a little misunderstandin' with
the bloody Cowboy."

Angel raised an eyebrow with incredulity. "And I thought that you were all
one big happy family."

The bleached-hair vampire just looked at him coldly. "Whatever you wanna
say, spit it out now, mate."

Leaning back against the wall, Angel observed his childe with half-closed
eyes before actually speaking, considering his thoughts before turning
them into words. "Tell me what happened last Sunday."

Spike looked at him with surprise, then a slow and amused smile crossed
his thin lips and he chuckled animatedly. "And why should I do that?
'Cause o' your pretty face?"

The older vampire sighed, shaking his head. "Listen, Spike, I know that
there's a lot of bad blood between us, both literally and figuratively
speaking... and I know that we're not going to be best buddies in the near
future, and probably never will be."

He continued, "But I also know that you care about Xander in your own way,
the same that I do in mine. We have to help him, we can't allow him to end
up like..." he looked at him in silence, before ending his phrase,
"...like either of us."

Boring into him with his cold blue eyes, the bleached-hair vampire took a
deep drag from his cigarette and stood up to retrieve the bottle of
bourbon from his bedside table.

After unsuccessfully searching for a clean glass, Spike just brought it to
his lips and took a long gulp from it, wiping his lips with the back of
his hand afterwards.

"He ain't like us," he said, without turning around to look at his sire,
"even if he lost his soul, he'd never be like we are... or were, or
whatever you wanna think. He's better 'n that."

"I know that," Angel said simply and, breaking away from the wall, walked
close to him, took the bottle of Jack Daniel's from his hands and
swallowed a good portion of it himself, feeling the amber liquor warming
his usually cold insides. "But Buffy was right about one thing, he's
sinking down and he's not even noticing it."

Spike just snorted, shaking his head. "You 'ave no idea, and neither does
that Slayer girlfriend o' yours. You wanna know what 'appened last Sunday?
OK, mate, just ask."

"After the acolytes killed the driver of the school bus and kidnapped
those kids, what else did they do?"

Sitting down on the edge of the bed and leaning back against his twisted
pillow, Spike took a new drag from his smoke and used those brief seconds
to gather his thoughts.

"They'd sent a second team to the building and, while the first one took
the bus and the kids, they eliminated the security guards in the tower and
silenced the bloody alarm. Then they drove the bus into the underground
garage, took the kids to the top floor and began to prepare the ceremony.
Did Xander tell you about the teacher?"

Angel nodded softly, but didn't say anything. Spike just resumed his
recollection of the events.

"We – I mean Xander, Kyle, Rachel and meself – we were the ones who found
'er. Or what was left of 'er, to be exact. She'd been a damn beautiful
woman, but what them bastards left behind barely resembled a human body."

Angel knew that his next words were going to be painful, but he also knew
that he had to say them if he really wanted to understand what has gone
through his childe's mind that night. "Was it any worse than anything that
either of us have done in the past?"

The bleached-hair vampire just looked at him darkly, from under his dark
eyebrows. "I'm not gonna lie to ya and say that I'm the most righteous
bloke in the world, Angelus, but it weren't the same."

He continued, "And yeah, it was worse – them guys didn't do it 'cause it
was gonna help 'em in their project, or because they thought it'd make 'em
look better in Satan's eyes or somethin'. They raped and tortured the dumb
bint just to kill time, 'fore it was their turn for the ceremony. Just to
'ave a little fun."

The older vampire nodded, and Spike smashed the butt of his cigarette on a
hand-made ashtray that looked like the one a little kid would make for his
Dad on Father's Day.

"You still have the ashtray that Drusilla made for you on your birthday?"
Angel inquired gently.

Taking it from the surface of the bedside table, Spike slowly turned it
around between his fingers, tracing its contours with his fingertips,
caressing the smooth clay surface. "Do ya remember the day she gave it to
me? She was so 'appy, so proud of what she'd done for me..."

He couldn't help but smile when he turned it around and, after throwing
the ashes into a more-than-full basket, read the engraving on the bottom,
shaking his head. 'To my Spike, with love from his Dru.'

"You made fun o' her for bein' so... human, ya made 'er cry," the British
vampire practically whispered, although his tone didn't carry the sting of
recrimination that Angel expected. "I think that was when I started to
'ate ya."

"I made a lot of mistakes with her," Angel said without looking straight
at him, "and with you. I'm sorry."

Spike left the ashtray in its place and shook his head, his chiseled
features hard and resolute. "I don't want your excuses, Angel, I ain't
never wanted or needed 'em. What you did, what I did, it's in the past and
I've never liked lookin' back over my shoulder."

Feeling more uncomfortable than what he had in years, the souled vampire
couldn't do anything else than clear his throat and try to return to the
previous matter of conversation. "What did you do then – after finding the
body, I mean."

"That ain't important," Spike said, patting his pockets in search for a
new cigarette. "What's important is what Xander did."

Angel frowned at hearing this. "What do you mean?"

"Our main objective was to recover them stupid kids alive and intact
before stopping the ceremony and, up until that moment, he was supposed to
be the one who was gonna take care o' that. But, after seeing the... body,
he changed the plans. He sent the Cowboy in 'is place, and went to finish
those guys off 'imself."

Then Spike finally found a half-emptied package between the tangled
sheets, and smiled blissfully. "He did a pretty damn good job with 'em, by
the way, if you wanna know my opinion."

The dark-haired vampire crossed his arms over his chest and frowned, a
little confused. "Why would he do something like that?" Angel asked more
to himself than to his childe.

"Are you jokin'?" Spike said, exhaling a thick cloud of smoke after
lighting his smoke. "It's 'cause he felt that it was his bloody
responsibility, because he blamed 'imself for it, because we weren't able
to stop 'em sooner..."

He paused. "Although we only knew what was gonna 'appen a couple of hours
'fore it went down. And although there wasn't anythin' else that we coulda
done than what we did, he still blames 'imself for not bein' able to save
that woman."

He snorted. "And now he blames 'imself for what he did in order to avenge
'er. And if I know 'im, he'll be blamin' 'imself for makin' ya girlfriend
angry with 'im. He's into a bloody spiral of stupid self-blamin'... 'n in
my opinion, it's all your fault."

Angel blinked in surprise. "Mine?" he asked in a high-pitched, surprised
voice.

"Bloody hell, yeah!" Spike said, almost laughing. "On account of for years
you were his only example on 'ow good a vampire could possibly be, and now
he's doin' his best to be just like ya. I've done what I've can to show
him 'ow wrong that is, but I ain't 'ad much success. The lad is beyond
redemption on that..." he finished with a sad sigh.

"You're a jerk," Angel growled at him, a smile curving up the corner of
his mouth nevertheless.

"Yeah," his childe admitted, smiling back at him with contentment, "but
I'm a lovable jerk."

"And how did you know about the ceremony and the kidnapping of the
children?" Angel asked suddenly and point-blank, almost catching Spike
off-balance.

The bleached-hair vampire just looked at him through half-closed cold
eyes, measuring his next words. "We was warned about it."

"By who?" the dark-haired vampire asked tentatively.

"By a source," the blonde-haired one answered matter-of-factly.

Angel grunted, shaking his head. "And that source was?"

Spike raised his legs to the bed, laying them on it and crossing his hands
under his head to use them as a make-shift pillow. "One that you dunno
about."

His sire sighed with resignation. "We're not getting anywhere this way,
Spike. Who do you work for?"

Letting a sharp smile cross his lips, Spike looked at him sideways and
with malice. "What makes ya think we work for somebody?"

"I'm not an idiot, no matter what you believe," he added before his childe
could voice his opinion about that. "I can put two and two together; but
frankly, you're the piece I can't fit into the puzzle. You never liked to
follow other people's orders, if I remember correctly."

"Maybe it was just that I 'adn't found the right boss," he answered
pointedly.

"Spike..."

"Listen, Angelus," Spike said, sitting up on the bed, "even if I could
answer ya question, and I can't, I wouldn't do it. That's not 'ow we do
things around 'ere, there's a chain of command and I follow it. And that's
it."

"As I said, that doesn't sound like your style, not at all."

"Hey, it works," Spike shrugged with disinterest, biting his tongue not to
tell him what he could shove his opinion up. "Anyway, if you wanna know
somethin' about that, you'll 'ave to ask Xander about it, it's not my
story to tell. And some things are better kept under the carpet for
everybody's sake, if ya know what I mean."

Angel was beginning to get really angry at his childe's attitude and,
walking closer to him, he leaned menacingly over his shorter figure and
looked down at him with a hard and no-nonsense stare.

"Have it your way, Spike. I'm inclined to believe you're doing the right
thing – but I'm warning you, if Buffy or if any of my friends get hurt in
any way because of your group's web of lies, I'm gonna be a very
pissed-off Master vampire, and I'm going to want your skin first."

The bleached-hair vampire raised a cool eyebrow, the shadow of an amused
smile lurking on his thin lips. "Is that a threat, mate?"

"No," his sire practically growled, breaking away from him and opening the
door, "it's a promise, Spike. And you better remember it."

The door was slammed closed with so much force that the whole room seemed
to shake with the impact. Well, the whole room with the possible exception
of Spike, who just arched his dark brow and took a drink from the bottle
of bourbon, swallowing it with a grimace when the alcohol practically
burned his throat.

"You don't know what you're gettin' into, Daddy," he growled at the closed
door. "You 'ave no goddamn idea at all."

~~~~~~


To be continued...