"Do
you hear that? That is the sound of inevitability. It is the sound of
your death."
– Agent Smith, 'The Matrix'
I.
Lilah
strides through the garage until she reaches her car. She gets in,
adjusts the mirror and makes a point of double checking it. She's
about to pull out of her parking spot when a cold hand grabs her by
the neck.
"Congratulations on your promotion," says
Angel pleasantly. "I know it took a lot of plans to make it
there. Dealing with Darla isn't easy either, but you did a great
job."
Lilah gasps and jerks around to face
him.
"Angel..."
"No more begging,"
he says, leaning closer and lightly stroking her cheek. "We're
done with that."
He leans back in the seat.
"Drive
the car," he orders. Lilah shakily pushes the gas pedal and
drives outside. It is dark outside,
"Drive faster,"
he says curtly. Lilah drives faster and begins to turn left at his
command.
In the middle of the turn he grabs her and covers her
eye. The car is going to fast to stop in time, and it crashes head on
into a building at seventy miles per hour right.
Lilah is
chopped to death when the engine comes into the front seat. Bits of
her body fly all over the street along with shards of glass. Angel is
lying in the back seat, badly injured as well, but the engine missed
him, and his body is still intact.
He glances at Lilah's
remains and drags himself out of the car.
"She got what
she deserved," he whispers to the darkness overtaking him. "And
that was a pretty creative death."
II.
Angel slams
the door shut. The noise reverberates in the silent room; the silence
of terrified lawyers about to die and exuberant vampires about to
kill. Darla smirks and moves towards the nearest person and thus the
massacre starts with that first death-cry.
Amidst the loud
screams of terror and agony, Lilah runs to the door and tries to pry
it open, along with the rest of the group. But it is locked tight.
Darla and Drusilla plunge into the throng, throwing people
everywhere. A body comes flying her way, smacks the wall and sinks
down to the floor, leaving a bloody trail behind.
Within a few
seconds, there is a pile of dead bodies on the floor. She pauses for
a millisecond, then dives into it, burying herself under the corpses,
playing dead.
Darla and Drusilla continue their massacre for a
while longer, until they are finished with everyone.
"Damn
it," says Darla. "That was all too quick."
Lilah
can hear Drusilla slurping her fingers from under the bodies.
"But
Grandmummy, where's that pretty girl? I saw you kill your Lindsey,
but not her."
"You're right Dru. Where is she?
Lilah, oh Lilah?"
Darla steps right on the pile of bodies
and her spike heel sinks into Lilah's thigh. She makes a faint
squeak. Darla grabs her leg and drags her out of the pile.
"Why
Lilah! We missed you."
"Lilah, Lilah," says
Drusilla dreamily, "you naughty girl."
Lilah tries
to speak, but Darla's hand snakes around her neck and cuts off her
breath.
"Going to offer us a deal? Too late," says
Darla snarkily. Then she twists Lilah's head and laughs when she
hears the sickening crack of the neck, dropping the corpse to lie
with the rest of her colleagues. She helps Drusilla over the bodies
and rips the door off its hinges. They deliberately trample the
bodies, and Darla ruthlessly thrusts her heel into Lilah's head.
She tilts her head to view the results.
"She was very
pretty," says Drusilla mournfully.
III.
Lilah
stands up, her hands shaking as she clutches a gun aimed at Nathan
Reed. The guard knocks her over before she can shoot. He roughly
drags her up and holds her wrists in a tight grip.
"Lilah,
you knew it would come down to either you or Lindsey. He won. You
lost. It's over. Take her away," Nathan orders the guard.
Lindsey flashes a smug smile at her as the guard drags her out of the
room and Nathan congratulates Lindsey on his survival.
She
knees the guard in the groin. He loses his grip as his knees collapse
and she breaks free.
But she doesn't make it far; a second
guard draws his gun and shoots her through the chest. He stands over
her as the first guard slowly recovers.
"Well, here lies
the bitch queen of Wolfram and Hart," he says sarcastically.
"Hank, get up already and help me carry her to the
morgue."
IV.
Gavin shoves Lilah onto the desk and
punches her in the mouth.
"I don't take orders from
women," he yells at her, close enough for Lilah to smell his
disgustingly minty breath. "All they want to do is order people
around. You especially love to do that."
He hits her
again.
"Stupid-dominating-whores," he bellows in
between blows.
Lilah's hand desperately searches the desk
for a weapon. Her fingers encounter a paperweight. She lifts it up
and weakly brings it down on the back of Gavin's neck. He seizes
the paperweight from her weak grasp and smirks at her as he brings it
down onto her forehead. The blood splatters all over the desk, but
Gavin is smiling too broadly to notice.
"One women down,
the world to go," he declares.
V.
Wesley's hand
shots out faster than Lilah can draw back.
"Do you want
to find out what it feels like to have your throat slit?" he
snarls, his cold eyes boring into hers, his hand lightly squeezing
her neck.
"Let go of me," spits Lilah.
"Oh,
am I frightening you? I'm dreadfully sorry," sneers Wesley. He
pulls her closer, till his lips are almost touching hers. Then she
sees a flash of silver and Wesley's hand is off her throat, and the
blood is staining her gray Armani suit.
Wesley watches her
sink to the floor in cool satisfaction, the blood streaming over her
fingers as she clutches her neck.
"Don't worry,"
he tells her. "It'll be quick. I cut deep."
He
leans in closer and there is almost a note of worry in his
voice.
"You did want to find out how it felt?" he
asks earnestly.
VI.
Lilah unloads her gun at the giant
Beast that stands in front of her. But the bullets ricochet off of
him and embed themselves in the wall. The Beast ignores the bullets
and tramps over to her, grabbing the gun and crushing it like a piece
of paper. He grabs her by the torso and tosses her onto a desk. One
claw extended, he shoves it into her abdomen and probes around like a
doctor examining a patient. Lilah screams as loud as she can, but it
makes no difference, everyone on this floor is dead.
"No
agreements or contracts," rumbles the Beast. He shoves his claw
deeper in, and rips out her stomach. He proceeds to rip out her
intestines, her liver and spleen, her kidneys and everything else
until he reaches her heart. By then Lilah is silent and limp, looking
like a dissection gone wrong.
He holds her heart in his big
stony hand, mesmerized by the warmth and blood. Then he squeezes it
until pulp drips out from between his fingers.
Then he moves
on to capture his next victim, leaving Lilah's empty body on the
desk, treading on her organs and squashing them.
He tracks her
guts all over the carpeted floor.
VII.
Lilah runs down
the hallway, clutching her bleeding side and panting hard. She can
hear Angelus tramping around, calling for her.
"Lilah,
you can't hide for long. I can smell your blood... Have I ever told
you that you smell pretty good? You'll probably taste as good. I
always knew I'd get to kill you..."
Angelus appears in
front of her, courtesy of some twisted backway. She whirls around and
runs for the stairs. She rapidly leaps down them, and trips over a
piece of wood sticking out of the rail.
She tumbles down the
stairs, only coming to a halt at the bottom. Angelus casually follows
and stands over her.
"What's wrong, Lilah, can't run
anymore?"
She does not respond and Angelus comes
closer.
"You knew you were going to die. It was
inevitable. But you're just giving up like this; that's so
pitiful."
He savagely kicks her over and looks into her
blank eyes.
"Damn it!" he yells. "I didn't
even get to torture her a little bit!"
