Reshaping the Cookie Dough 2: Twenty/Twenty Foresight
A Buffy/Angel Story
by David Morris
Rating: PG-13 Some violence, a bad word or two.
Spoilers: I think that just to be on the safe side, one must assume that anything up to 'Chosen' in Buffy and the seson 4 Finale of Angel is fair game.
Summary: Angel-Slayer Inc. is having some trouble figuring out what their course of action should be when suddenly an ordinary man with an extraordinary power comes to them and begs for their protection.
Author's note on relationships: First of all, perhaps I should make it clear that love is somewhat secondary to the plot in my work. Nevertheless, Buffy and Angel will no doubt be trying to sort out what exactly their relationship is and in the process so will I. AS for Cordelia and Spike... Well Cordy's going to be in her coma for some time, and I'm not sure (despite the last line of my first story) what's become of poor William. They may come into play a little later down the line but right now, they don't matter. As for the rest of the cast, there are going to be some friendships combinations that you wouldn't normally see, along with one relationship I don't think anyone will see coming. No slash, however.You have been warned
Disclaimer: Does anyone actually think that somehow a humble scribe like myself would dare usurp these marvelous characters? Very well. Buffy, Xander, Willow, Faith, Giles, Angel, etc. are all the property of Mutant Enemy. However, in this story I am introducing a new character. Woe to he who dares using him without my permission.
Special thanks to Sarah, my beta reader.
In his long life Angel had seen many horrible things. True had been the cause of more than a few of them; but he had also seen a lot of things that he treasured. He had seen Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers dance. He had heard Enrico Caruso sing Mozart. He had seen Sarah Bernhardt play Camille. He had watched Sandy Koufax pitch (at a night game, naturally); and he had watched a sixteen year-old girl walk out of the light and accept her destiny.
Many of these things he had not appreciated at the time. Being tortured with a soul that remembers every awful thing you have ever done for a hundred years pretty much guarantees that you're not going to savor the flowers that bloom in the spring. However, they had come closer to captivating him than anything else had ever managed. But one of the memories that he cherished the most had occurred almost four years ago.
Early in his tenure in L.A., Buffy had found and brought to him the Gem of Amara, an ancient relic that gave the vampire the ability to walk out in the sun. After fighting for it, he had enjoyed his first day in the sunlight in nearly two hundred and fifty years. There were all kinds of joys that he took in, but the memory that he still held was watching the sun set over Los Angeles. The mix of colors---the oranges and reds and yellows---- was something that he had not appreciated even when he was alive. And now it seemed like some great thing that he could only begin to appreciate. Then he destroyed the ring and with it any chance of being able to see another.
That's what he had thought then. Of course not even he could see the future, but to be perfectly honest, if someone had told him that not only would he be able to see the sunset but do so every day, he would have thought they were insane. It wouldn't have helped their credibility if they had added that he would be looking through the special windows in his office at Wolfram and Hart. Or, as it was now known by the people who worked there, Angel-Slayer Incorporated.
Two months ago, after the epic battle with the Beast and Jasmine had finally ended, he had been so exhausted by what had happened that he had no idea what they were going to do next. When Lilah had come to him with the offer of the Los Angeles office of Wolfram and Hart, he had agreed mostly because he wanted to make the best possible choice for his son, but also because he had no idea what to do next. After fighting such a great evil, he didn't think that he could just go back to the Hyperion and waiting for customers to come through the door. Everybody had slowly been fitting in to working out of the building and trying to go back to fighting evil in their own way but they still did not been doing a great deal to figure out what direction they wanted to go in. That had probably been at least part of the motivation behind his decision to let Buffy and Giles work to set up the new Watcher's Council out of their offices.
The next three weeks had been spent in reassembling the forces of good. When Buffy had told the rest of the Slayers that they could either go back home or stay in L.A. and fight evil, it had taken most of them two days to make up their minds. Seven of the nineteen slayers had opted to return to their homes but had agreed to keep in touch with the rest of the group via their Watchers. The rest had agreed to stay here and help clean up the city, lured by the promise of homes, a comfortable work environment and a paycheck. Giles and Wesley spent their time trying to contact most of the watchers that they knew while simultaneously preparing a testing procedure for new watchers. Most of the Slayers in California had Watchers who were still alive and they had slowly been assembling here as well. They had emptied some of the more useless areas of the building and set up training facilities.
The rest of the Sunnydale group had worked it self into the Angel Investigation team. Robin and Faith had joined Gunn in the security department, along with four of the better slayers. Dawn and Willow had gone to work with Wesley in the magic and prophecies department. It had come as a big surprise to everyone at how quickly Dawn had picked up some of the older languages. Wesley said that she had a real flair for it. Three other slayers, including Kennedy had been enlisted by Willow to work in this particular field. Willow had said that Slayers should know this kind of stuff; Angel thought that the witch had enlisted them in order to spoon around with Kennedy. Xander along with the rest of the Slayers had joined Fred in the weapons department.
Before joining up, Xander had joked that maybe they should change the name of the business to Slayer Relief. "We can run as the nighttime fighting, slashing, beating up demons so that the helpless can rest medicine."
"Not bad." said Gunn. "We might have a little trouble fitting it on the business card, though."
"You've got business cards?" said Robin skeptically. They did, though no one was quite comfortable in wondering where they had been printed.
Willow looked at one. "What's that weird symbol on it?"
"Nobody knows." said Wesley. Angel had recognized it from being one of the first things that Cordelia had designed after coming to work with him, but he hadn't told it to anyone. Then it had hurt too much.
"DO we have to call the place Angel Investigations?" said Dawn. When everyone looked at her, she said: "You've got this whole operation now. Couldn't we call it something more... important?"
Angel had expected Wes and Gunn to raise some objection. Instead both had taken intentionally long pauses. He wondered if they still held a grudge from when, in the depths of a darkness he did not think he would emerge from, he had fired them and Cordelia.
"What name do you think would work?" said Wes.
"How about 'A Summers Place'?" Dawn spoke with a look of innocence on her face. Everyone groaned.
"That was so bad even I wouldn't make a joke about it." said Xander.
"Dawn, you try anything like that again I will have to hurt you." said Buffy.
"How about the White Lights?" said Fred.
"I think there's some kind of copyright infringement there." went Gunn.
"I still like Slayer Relief."
"How about we meet you halfway?" Angel spoke suddenly. "Something like 'Angel-Slayer Incorporated?"
There had been a long pause. Xander was the first to speak. "I think he may have something there."
And so Angel-Slayer Inc. had been established. Angel had wanted to thank Xander for helping him come up with the name but he had never been very good at talking with the young boy, and now things seemed to be even more awkward between them.
At first, Angel had thought that it had something to do with what happened to Xander in Sunnydale and that maybe helping get his eye fixed might help bridge the gap. That had been a series of problems in itself.
First they had tried to get it fixed through conventional medicine, but even the best surgeons in California agreed that it had been beyond repair. One of the doctors had offered to procure one from an organ bank, but with all the vivid memories of their last problem with them two years ago, Angel said scotched that. Willow had then tried an enhancement spell. She had used a basic spell to make a glass eye have the visual problems of his normal eye. That had worked too well. It had given him sight, but there was no way to control it. In other words ,when Xander took his glass eye out, it kept working; an experiment that could have ruined his vision in his other eye. Finally, Willow used another kind of magic to give Xander's remaining eye the power to see as if he had both eyes.
For a few days he had been more ebullient, but then he seemed to have fallen into another depression. He still fought and trained the other slayers, but he had seemed a little out of it. Normally a very talkative and funny person, he had become uncharacteristically quiet not only around Angel but also around the others. Furthermore, he had begun to spend a bit of his spare time by Cordelia's bedside. Angel thought he knew some of what he was going through, but given his relationship with Cordelia, he didn't think it would help improve his mood.
A buzz came from the phone on his desk. "Mr. Angel." his assistant said. He had considered having the Wolfram and Hart employees just call him 'Angel' but somehow that seemed even creepier.
'Yes.'
'The board meeting starts in five minutes.'
It was interesting. When he had been in charge of what he now considered the original agency, he had never considered it necessary to meet with them more then once or twice a week. Now that there were so many of them (and considering that he was no longer in charge of anything) they had needed to meet every day in order to make sure that they weren't all getting involved with anybody else's project. Even now after nearly three weeks of meetings they still were having trouble getting everything together.
This normally wouldn't bother Angel if it were not for two things. First of all, no matter how much the current employees took his orders, he still could not escape the feeling that Wolfram and Hart was somehow still monitoring them. This was a very paranoid thought but he knew that Wesley and Giles (both of whom had their reasons for not confiding in him) suspected it as well. Besides, given everything that had happened over the last four years, a little paranoia did not seem that unwarranted.
Second, and far more troublesome, was that they did not have any direction when it came to what to do next. He couldn't say that he had enjoyed the last two years that much, but at least he had always known what he had been fighting. Furthermore, while demon attacks were back in full force, there was no real pattern to them. He knew that Buffy was feeling at loose ends as well. She had always been worrying about the next great evil---- even when that had been him---- but now that she was 'retired', she had been feeling rather aimless. The others were so busy at their new jobs that they didn't seem to feel the same way, but they had avoided speaking about it.
This wouldn't have bothered him so much if his time alone hadn't caused him to start thinking about matters of the heart. Four years ago, he had left Sunnydale because he had felt a love for Buffy Summers so deep that he could not be around her without feeling pain. They could not have a future together. His immortality and his curse had guaranteed that.
Then in L.A. he had run into Cordelia, the one member of the Scoobies he had not particularly liked being around. When she had come to work for him, he had thought it very likely that he might lose his humanity attacking her. But then she had changed. Doyle died and passed on his gift to her. Suddenly, she had become vital to his work. And knowing the pain that she went through because of her vision had made him care about her for the first time.
Over the next two years through highs and lows, Cordelia had taken on a role that he did not think would have been possible. Best friend. It was then, however, that things had become complicated. Throughout those years--- - after he fired everybody, when they had gone to Pylea, the birth of his son---- he had thought she was his rock. And then, he had thought he had fallen in love with her. Unfortunately, before he could tell her this, they had both gone on unexpected trips--- her to a higher place (at least that is what they had thought at the time), his to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean. Whatever opportunity they may have had disappeared that night.
He realized that he was probably holding everybody up and decided that he would begin walking towards the board room. He still brooded though. As anyone from Angel Investigations could have told the world, he could brood anywhere anyplace.
Now with Cordelia in a coma and Buffy working with him, he began to wonder. Had he really loved Cordelia? It had all seemed so certain and he had held to it all those nights he had spent hallucinating from hunger on the ocean floor. But as time had passed, he had wondered whether it had been case of misplaced affections. If you can't be with the one you love, love the one you're with.
All those years, he had cut Buffy out of his life. But he remembered the anguish that he had felt when he had learned that Buffy was dead. The joy that he had felt when he had learns of her resurrection. Seeing her after learning of this, it had taken every fiber of his being not to beg her to take him back. Soon after that, Darla's pregnancy and the birth of his son had driven thoughts of Buffy to the wayside. With Cordelia taking the role that he had never thought anyone would take---- foster mother to his child--- he thought that had added something to his feelings for her.
The events over the past six months had been even harder to sort out. What with the arrival of the Beast and what he had witnessed when Cordelia begun her plan to bring Jasmine forth---- her sleeping with Connor, her murdering all those people, stealing his soul---- he had not had time to sort out his feelings for her. With all of the havoc that Cordelia had ended up doing, he had forced himself to put aside his emotions. When he had thought he would have to kill Cordy, whatever anguish he had been willing to take on had been set aside by his feelings of what had to be done. Now he didn't know if he would ever get a chance to figure it out. After everything that she had done, he didn't know if he had any capacity in his heart to forgive her.
All of this seemed moot though. When he had taken the deal with Wolfram and Hart, the best medical care available that could be arranged for Cordy had been provided. But the prognosis was grim. Without any idea as to what had caused the coma, it was very difficult to provide any course of treatment. Furthermore, CAT scans of her head showed levels of brain damage that were considered lethal in normal people. The doctor (who apparently didn't know that she was part demon) said he was amazed that she was alive. Under normal circumstances, a DNR order might have been considered. The problem was she wasn't on life support. She was breathing fine and the rest of her body was functioning. The only thing wrong with her was the coma. The doctors said that barring a miracle, she would remain in this vegetative state indefinitely. It was only because Angel had seen miracles that he thought she might have a chance. SO far, it had not happened.
He had therefore had to put his feelings for Cordelia aside in order to keep going. Adding to the confusion was what had happened when he had gone to Sunnydale last month. Seeing Buffy for the first time in two years had awakened feelings that he had thought were dead. And despite the fact that he knew she loved Spike, he knew that there was some feeling still in her heart for him.
Right now, neither was in any shape for any kind of relationship. He knew that if he had wanted to, he could have taken advantage of her vulnerability, but that was the sort of thing Spike would have done. But he hadn't. Because all the problems that he had when he left Sunnydale were still there.
Really? One word, shanshu. He hated that voice in his head that revealed unpleasant truths sometimes. All right, yes it was possible that he would become human again. And yes, this came pretty close to being an apocalypse, so it might be sooner rather than later; nevertheless.
There was no 'nevertheless.' There were just possibilities that he had never thought he'd be able to consider. And there was no point on dwelling on them right now. Not with so much work to be done.
With that he walked into the boardroom.
Rating: PG-13 Some violence, a bad word or two.
Spoilers: I think that just to be on the safe side, one must assume that anything up to 'Chosen' in Buffy and the seson 4 Finale of Angel is fair game.
Summary: Angel-Slayer Inc. is having some trouble figuring out what their course of action should be when suddenly an ordinary man with an extraordinary power comes to them and begs for their protection.
Author's note on relationships: First of all, perhaps I should make it clear that love is somewhat secondary to the plot in my work. Nevertheless, Buffy and Angel will no doubt be trying to sort out what exactly their relationship is and in the process so will I. AS for Cordelia and Spike... Well Cordy's going to be in her coma for some time, and I'm not sure (despite the last line of my first story) what's become of poor William. They may come into play a little later down the line but right now, they don't matter. As for the rest of the cast, there are going to be some friendships combinations that you wouldn't normally see, along with one relationship I don't think anyone will see coming. No slash, however.You have been warned
Disclaimer: Does anyone actually think that somehow a humble scribe like myself would dare usurp these marvelous characters? Very well. Buffy, Xander, Willow, Faith, Giles, Angel, etc. are all the property of Mutant Enemy. However, in this story I am introducing a new character. Woe to he who dares using him without my permission.
Special thanks to Sarah, my beta reader.
In his long life Angel had seen many horrible things. True had been the cause of more than a few of them; but he had also seen a lot of things that he treasured. He had seen Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers dance. He had heard Enrico Caruso sing Mozart. He had seen Sarah Bernhardt play Camille. He had watched Sandy Koufax pitch (at a night game, naturally); and he had watched a sixteen year-old girl walk out of the light and accept her destiny.
Many of these things he had not appreciated at the time. Being tortured with a soul that remembers every awful thing you have ever done for a hundred years pretty much guarantees that you're not going to savor the flowers that bloom in the spring. However, they had come closer to captivating him than anything else had ever managed. But one of the memories that he cherished the most had occurred almost four years ago.
Early in his tenure in L.A., Buffy had found and brought to him the Gem of Amara, an ancient relic that gave the vampire the ability to walk out in the sun. After fighting for it, he had enjoyed his first day in the sunlight in nearly two hundred and fifty years. There were all kinds of joys that he took in, but the memory that he still held was watching the sun set over Los Angeles. The mix of colors---the oranges and reds and yellows---- was something that he had not appreciated even when he was alive. And now it seemed like some great thing that he could only begin to appreciate. Then he destroyed the ring and with it any chance of being able to see another.
That's what he had thought then. Of course not even he could see the future, but to be perfectly honest, if someone had told him that not only would he be able to see the sunset but do so every day, he would have thought they were insane. It wouldn't have helped their credibility if they had added that he would be looking through the special windows in his office at Wolfram and Hart. Or, as it was now known by the people who worked there, Angel-Slayer Incorporated.
Two months ago, after the epic battle with the Beast and Jasmine had finally ended, he had been so exhausted by what had happened that he had no idea what they were going to do next. When Lilah had come to him with the offer of the Los Angeles office of Wolfram and Hart, he had agreed mostly because he wanted to make the best possible choice for his son, but also because he had no idea what to do next. After fighting such a great evil, he didn't think that he could just go back to the Hyperion and waiting for customers to come through the door. Everybody had slowly been fitting in to working out of the building and trying to go back to fighting evil in their own way but they still did not been doing a great deal to figure out what direction they wanted to go in. That had probably been at least part of the motivation behind his decision to let Buffy and Giles work to set up the new Watcher's Council out of their offices.
The next three weeks had been spent in reassembling the forces of good. When Buffy had told the rest of the Slayers that they could either go back home or stay in L.A. and fight evil, it had taken most of them two days to make up their minds. Seven of the nineteen slayers had opted to return to their homes but had agreed to keep in touch with the rest of the group via their Watchers. The rest had agreed to stay here and help clean up the city, lured by the promise of homes, a comfortable work environment and a paycheck. Giles and Wesley spent their time trying to contact most of the watchers that they knew while simultaneously preparing a testing procedure for new watchers. Most of the Slayers in California had Watchers who were still alive and they had slowly been assembling here as well. They had emptied some of the more useless areas of the building and set up training facilities.
The rest of the Sunnydale group had worked it self into the Angel Investigation team. Robin and Faith had joined Gunn in the security department, along with four of the better slayers. Dawn and Willow had gone to work with Wesley in the magic and prophecies department. It had come as a big surprise to everyone at how quickly Dawn had picked up some of the older languages. Wesley said that she had a real flair for it. Three other slayers, including Kennedy had been enlisted by Willow to work in this particular field. Willow had said that Slayers should know this kind of stuff; Angel thought that the witch had enlisted them in order to spoon around with Kennedy. Xander along with the rest of the Slayers had joined Fred in the weapons department.
Before joining up, Xander had joked that maybe they should change the name of the business to Slayer Relief. "We can run as the nighttime fighting, slashing, beating up demons so that the helpless can rest medicine."
"Not bad." said Gunn. "We might have a little trouble fitting it on the business card, though."
"You've got business cards?" said Robin skeptically. They did, though no one was quite comfortable in wondering where they had been printed.
Willow looked at one. "What's that weird symbol on it?"
"Nobody knows." said Wesley. Angel had recognized it from being one of the first things that Cordelia had designed after coming to work with him, but he hadn't told it to anyone. Then it had hurt too much.
"DO we have to call the place Angel Investigations?" said Dawn. When everyone looked at her, she said: "You've got this whole operation now. Couldn't we call it something more... important?"
Angel had expected Wes and Gunn to raise some objection. Instead both had taken intentionally long pauses. He wondered if they still held a grudge from when, in the depths of a darkness he did not think he would emerge from, he had fired them and Cordelia.
"What name do you think would work?" said Wes.
"How about 'A Summers Place'?" Dawn spoke with a look of innocence on her face. Everyone groaned.
"That was so bad even I wouldn't make a joke about it." said Xander.
"Dawn, you try anything like that again I will have to hurt you." said Buffy.
"How about the White Lights?" said Fred.
"I think there's some kind of copyright infringement there." went Gunn.
"I still like Slayer Relief."
"How about we meet you halfway?" Angel spoke suddenly. "Something like 'Angel-Slayer Incorporated?"
There had been a long pause. Xander was the first to speak. "I think he may have something there."
And so Angel-Slayer Inc. had been established. Angel had wanted to thank Xander for helping him come up with the name but he had never been very good at talking with the young boy, and now things seemed to be even more awkward between them.
At first, Angel had thought that it had something to do with what happened to Xander in Sunnydale and that maybe helping get his eye fixed might help bridge the gap. That had been a series of problems in itself.
First they had tried to get it fixed through conventional medicine, but even the best surgeons in California agreed that it had been beyond repair. One of the doctors had offered to procure one from an organ bank, but with all the vivid memories of their last problem with them two years ago, Angel said scotched that. Willow had then tried an enhancement spell. She had used a basic spell to make a glass eye have the visual problems of his normal eye. That had worked too well. It had given him sight, but there was no way to control it. In other words ,when Xander took his glass eye out, it kept working; an experiment that could have ruined his vision in his other eye. Finally, Willow used another kind of magic to give Xander's remaining eye the power to see as if he had both eyes.
For a few days he had been more ebullient, but then he seemed to have fallen into another depression. He still fought and trained the other slayers, but he had seemed a little out of it. Normally a very talkative and funny person, he had become uncharacteristically quiet not only around Angel but also around the others. Furthermore, he had begun to spend a bit of his spare time by Cordelia's bedside. Angel thought he knew some of what he was going through, but given his relationship with Cordelia, he didn't think it would help improve his mood.
A buzz came from the phone on his desk. "Mr. Angel." his assistant said. He had considered having the Wolfram and Hart employees just call him 'Angel' but somehow that seemed even creepier.
'Yes.'
'The board meeting starts in five minutes.'
It was interesting. When he had been in charge of what he now considered the original agency, he had never considered it necessary to meet with them more then once or twice a week. Now that there were so many of them (and considering that he was no longer in charge of anything) they had needed to meet every day in order to make sure that they weren't all getting involved with anybody else's project. Even now after nearly three weeks of meetings they still were having trouble getting everything together.
This normally wouldn't bother Angel if it were not for two things. First of all, no matter how much the current employees took his orders, he still could not escape the feeling that Wolfram and Hart was somehow still monitoring them. This was a very paranoid thought but he knew that Wesley and Giles (both of whom had their reasons for not confiding in him) suspected it as well. Besides, given everything that had happened over the last four years, a little paranoia did not seem that unwarranted.
Second, and far more troublesome, was that they did not have any direction when it came to what to do next. He couldn't say that he had enjoyed the last two years that much, but at least he had always known what he had been fighting. Furthermore, while demon attacks were back in full force, there was no real pattern to them. He knew that Buffy was feeling at loose ends as well. She had always been worrying about the next great evil---- even when that had been him---- but now that she was 'retired', she had been feeling rather aimless. The others were so busy at their new jobs that they didn't seem to feel the same way, but they had avoided speaking about it.
This wouldn't have bothered him so much if his time alone hadn't caused him to start thinking about matters of the heart. Four years ago, he had left Sunnydale because he had felt a love for Buffy Summers so deep that he could not be around her without feeling pain. They could not have a future together. His immortality and his curse had guaranteed that.
Then in L.A. he had run into Cordelia, the one member of the Scoobies he had not particularly liked being around. When she had come to work for him, he had thought it very likely that he might lose his humanity attacking her. But then she had changed. Doyle died and passed on his gift to her. Suddenly, she had become vital to his work. And knowing the pain that she went through because of her vision had made him care about her for the first time.
Over the next two years through highs and lows, Cordelia had taken on a role that he did not think would have been possible. Best friend. It was then, however, that things had become complicated. Throughout those years--- - after he fired everybody, when they had gone to Pylea, the birth of his son---- he had thought she was his rock. And then, he had thought he had fallen in love with her. Unfortunately, before he could tell her this, they had both gone on unexpected trips--- her to a higher place (at least that is what they had thought at the time), his to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean. Whatever opportunity they may have had disappeared that night.
He realized that he was probably holding everybody up and decided that he would begin walking towards the board room. He still brooded though. As anyone from Angel Investigations could have told the world, he could brood anywhere anyplace.
Now with Cordelia in a coma and Buffy working with him, he began to wonder. Had he really loved Cordelia? It had all seemed so certain and he had held to it all those nights he had spent hallucinating from hunger on the ocean floor. But as time had passed, he had wondered whether it had been case of misplaced affections. If you can't be with the one you love, love the one you're with.
All those years, he had cut Buffy out of his life. But he remembered the anguish that he had felt when he had learned that Buffy was dead. The joy that he had felt when he had learns of her resurrection. Seeing her after learning of this, it had taken every fiber of his being not to beg her to take him back. Soon after that, Darla's pregnancy and the birth of his son had driven thoughts of Buffy to the wayside. With Cordelia taking the role that he had never thought anyone would take---- foster mother to his child--- he thought that had added something to his feelings for her.
The events over the past six months had been even harder to sort out. What with the arrival of the Beast and what he had witnessed when Cordelia begun her plan to bring Jasmine forth---- her sleeping with Connor, her murdering all those people, stealing his soul---- he had not had time to sort out his feelings for her. With all of the havoc that Cordelia had ended up doing, he had forced himself to put aside his emotions. When he had thought he would have to kill Cordy, whatever anguish he had been willing to take on had been set aside by his feelings of what had to be done. Now he didn't know if he would ever get a chance to figure it out. After everything that she had done, he didn't know if he had any capacity in his heart to forgive her.
All of this seemed moot though. When he had taken the deal with Wolfram and Hart, the best medical care available that could be arranged for Cordy had been provided. But the prognosis was grim. Without any idea as to what had caused the coma, it was very difficult to provide any course of treatment. Furthermore, CAT scans of her head showed levels of brain damage that were considered lethal in normal people. The doctor (who apparently didn't know that she was part demon) said he was amazed that she was alive. Under normal circumstances, a DNR order might have been considered. The problem was she wasn't on life support. She was breathing fine and the rest of her body was functioning. The only thing wrong with her was the coma. The doctors said that barring a miracle, she would remain in this vegetative state indefinitely. It was only because Angel had seen miracles that he thought she might have a chance. SO far, it had not happened.
He had therefore had to put his feelings for Cordelia aside in order to keep going. Adding to the confusion was what had happened when he had gone to Sunnydale last month. Seeing Buffy for the first time in two years had awakened feelings that he had thought were dead. And despite the fact that he knew she loved Spike, he knew that there was some feeling still in her heart for him.
Right now, neither was in any shape for any kind of relationship. He knew that if he had wanted to, he could have taken advantage of her vulnerability, but that was the sort of thing Spike would have done. But he hadn't. Because all the problems that he had when he left Sunnydale were still there.
Really? One word, shanshu. He hated that voice in his head that revealed unpleasant truths sometimes. All right, yes it was possible that he would become human again. And yes, this came pretty close to being an apocalypse, so it might be sooner rather than later; nevertheless.
There was no 'nevertheless.' There were just possibilities that he had never thought he'd be able to consider. And there was no point on dwelling on them right now. Not with so much work to be done.
With that he walked into the boardroom.