Pairing: None, in the biblical sense (but Angel/Other in the sense of a couple of people hanging out)
Disclaimer: Neither the song lyrics (used as section titles) nor title from "Children's Crusade" (both Sting's) nor the main character (Joss et al's) is mine. The other two are though. Yippee…
A/N: Feedback appreciated. (This is a challenge fic to write a BtVS/Angel story inspired by a Sting song/title.)
CHILDREN'S CRUSADE
*Midnight In Soho 1984*
As I walk these New York streets, I think of how many young lives have been lost here. From the sweatshop accidents in the early days of this century through to the drugs, guns and knives of today's gangs and sex trade: so many children... Lost. Forgotten. Needlessly.
I'm a creature of the night: a vampire. I am feared because I survive by the blood of the living. Ha. If only they knew. If only they could see that man has done more harm to his own kind in my lifetime than any of mine could have even dreamed. (Certainly more than I.) If only they knew that I haven't fed from a living human being in decades, and even then...
*Young Men, Soldiers 1914*
My last feeds were less than pleasant: some poor lads in a trench that had been all but obliterated. I knew they'd been dead a while: prob'bly killed by shellin' early that day or during the long hours of the night before. Their bodies, cold as me own, were still stiff from the rigor mortis, but had already been picked over for valuables and tags. Feedin' from them was a challenge without their hearts to pump the blood and of course, it was deplorable: desecratin' the bodies o' the fallen. But human blood even in that state is more satisfyin', more fortifyin' than that o' vermin, and (I told meself) they had no more use of it.
What've I become? Once a strong and powerful master vampire. The Scourge o' Europe. Feedin' on high society and relishin' every moment of it. Now, unable to bring meself to kill and yet feelin' immense shame at feedin' from the dead.
Even in me piteous state, I managed to find some desire for self-preservation and thus sought shelter for the day. (More from the sun than the artillery.) I found an abandoned farmhouse that seemed far enough from the fightin' to be safe for me to pass some time before continuin' west and away from the action... the destruction... the war.
So now, I settle meself in the dim loft away from the unforgivin' windows o' the main room, prepared for another day's sleep of awful dreams.
I am awakened by the sound o' frightened young voices. Boys, they are... Not much older than children at least. I stay hidden in the loft in the hopes they're just comin' to do a quick search o' the place and that they'd soon be on their way. But as they toss down their rifles and packs, I suppose they'll likely be here a while.
From my dark corner, I can see they're filthy and look half-starved, not unlike meself I think. They're so young, these two! British soldiers, I surmise from the uniforms, language and the accents.
As the smaller one removes his helmet, I am struck by how much he reminds me of William in the early days after he'd been turned: his tawny hair a sweaty mass, a crazed look in his wide blue eyes, the nervous joking tone in his voice... I wonder where William might be? Is he even alive?
I am quickly returned to the here-and-now by the smell o' fresh blood. One of these lads has been injured. He's bleedin'. Slowly, but steadily. As the minutes pass the scent becomes ever stronger as, I dare say, the young man weakens. The intoxicatin' odour floods me senses and cries out to the demon in me, as I struggle to remain in control and quiet.
Eventually "Wills", as I dub the smaller one, has bandaged up his mate, settled him on a bedroll and left behind his rations with the promise of returnin' with help.
I can tell from the other one's breathin' and the ever-increasin' aroma of blood in the air that he likely won't survive the night. He's sufferin' unspeakably from 'is injuries... and I, from breathin' deeply the heady scent o' the warm blood that oozes from 'is wounds.
When the sun has shifted enough for me to do so safely, I creep from my hidin' place to crouch beside 'im.
"What's your name, friend?" I ask in a low compassionate tone.
P'rhaps the man is delirious because he doesn't startle when I first speak. Instead he simply replies, "John," in a ragged voice.
Talkin' with 'im seems so strange. I've not really spoken to anyone in ages; yet here I am, talkin' with a man whom I suspect will soon become my first warm human feed in over a decade.
*Marching Through Countries They'd Never Seen*
We talk for what seems like hours. John tells me that the other boy (his cousin) brought him here when they were separated from their unit. He feels guilty that the boy had to take care of him after he was hit. It's because of John that the lad is here in the first place. By rights, he explains, his cousin should still be home with his mother and two sisters in some wee village outside of London. Barely 16, he was too young to enlist, but John had helped him doctor the paperwork.
I empathize with John as I think of me own William, and of poor Drusilla. Neither of whom, were it not for me, would be living the terrible life they are now... assumin' they're still alive.
Most of our time together, John spends with his eyes closed, occasionally tightenin' his lids as waves o' pain surge through him. He seems at ease talking to me, hearing a voice that reminds him --- however vaguely --- of home. I've maintained a fair bit o'me Irish brogue over the years so mayhaps 'tis the camaraderie of being with another Briton. Maybe just that we're alone in the French countryside and I speak English. Or maybe he's simply comforted by the knowledge he'll not die alone.
*History's Lessons Drowned In Red Wine*
'Tis been long dark when I get up to stretch me legs. I keep talkin' as I search the room for somethin' to offer John. He has his food rations, but I reckon what he really needs is a drink to ease his pain. In a cupboard, I find a bottle. John offers his army knife to op'n it, and in short order he's enjoyin' the soothin' comfort of the hearty red wine. My mouth waters in ghoulish anticipation of the thick red ambrosia flowin' through John's veins that'll soon be mine.
Some time before dawn he opens his eyes and searches me own in the dim light. 'Tis an odd look: sorrowful and hopeless. He pleads for me to end his sufferin', gesturin' to the sidearm still on the table. I have what I thought I needed: permission to take his life. But still I hesitate. I decide that before endin' this man's existence, he has to know what I am. How I will kill 'im. Has to know that his sacrifice in this land so far from home will 'ave a purpose. (I do, however, have some doubt that he'll find any comfort in the perpetuation of a vampire, but still... I need him to know.)
Initially, he thinks I'm windin' 'im up until I shift from me human mask. Me demon face frightens him. But still I speak in the same gentle voice, promisin' to do me best to find his cousin, whose real name I can't recall. (To me, he'll always be "Wills".) In that he seems to find solace and accepts this end.
*Poppies For Young Men, Death's Bitter Trade*
I did find "Wills", days later: a tangled mess of torn flesh and fabric. He'd been trapped in coils of barbed wire on a muddy battlefield that was a wash of blood and littered with so many of his young comrades.
Such a waste.
Three quarters of a century later, I would read that farmers and construction workers are still digging up bodies and unexploded artillery shells in those fields. Young men who, in the rain and mud, had been trampled by other soldiers, and horses and wagons (later, crushed by tanks). Buried for decades. Their families never knowing what had become of them.
I don't know what on Earth possessed me to go there, to the battlefields of Western Europe. As if the horrific images in my head of what I'd done in the century before hadn't been enough for me, I passed the mid-1910s in the war-torn poppy fields of northern France.
Oddly, the time I spent in that small cottage and the life I took there is one tiny shining light in the darkness that has been my life since the gypsies cursed me. There I found comfort in feeding, not only in fortifying my own body but also in helping another soul to find peace.