Author: InsinuoAnimus
Disclaimer: Know the drill, love the drill, use the drill. None of the characters are mine. Sorry.
Summary: The line between reality and fantasy are often blurred. If not invisible.
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{ like a madman laughing man at the rain
a little out of touch, a little insane
it's just better than dealing with the pain }
He had known.
He hadn't let onto the others that he had known, but deep down he had known. He didn't need to sing, he didn't need the powers that be to send a vision, he didn't need a psychic to tell him, because he had already known. It was a feeling that rumbled at the pit of his stomach. Spend these days as if they are your last. And it was true, wasn't it? For him, it had been his last days. For Gunn, too. Wesley wonders if Gunn had known too. Had Gunn known that he wouldn't survive the big battle? The final battle? Gunn had always known he would go out fighting. Gunn had told him that once, a time when they were the best of the friends, a time when Gunn called him English and Wesley found it endearing. Gunn had told him that he wouldn't die an old man, but he would die young, he would die fighting. Maybe it was the warrior in him that wanted to die a hero, or maybe it was just settling for knowing the truth, for not fighting against their fate. They wouldn't survive the final battle.
Him, Cordelia, Fred, Gunn. They had all been a part of the family, the circle of unexpected heroes, that fought with Angel. They fought with Angel, they loved with Angel, they suffered with Angel. But none of them made it through the final battle. One by one, they had all died. Only Wesley and Gunn had made it to the final battle. Wesley was the first one to go, he died in the arms of Illyria, staring up at the form she had taken, staring into the beautiful lie he had asked her for. Wesley was used to the lies by now, there had been so many lies that entered his life, it was almost hard to believe the truth anymore. But this lie, this lie was his favorite. Gunn would soon follow, he would be able to do what Wesley couldn't. He would be able to help Angel, if only a bit, fight in the final battle. He'd fight by Angel's side, try his hardest to fight against the darkness that threatened to swallow him. Wesley found that he wasn't jealous. He wasn't bitter that he couldn't fight by his friend's side. He wasn't bitter that he had died. He was done. He didn't want to watch all of his friends die, this way all he had to do was look up into the face of Fred and let it swallow him whole. She was the only one he had to see.
It had washed over him, crashed over him in painful waves. There was no white light, no your life flashing in front of your eyes, none of the ridiculous things people say when they supposedly face death in the face and fight it. It was fast and painful. It ripped through him like a tidal wave, buried him under it's strong current and kept him there. He didn't regret things, as most people do. He didn't find time to regret over his loss. He didn't regret losing Gunn. Wesley was sure he'd see Gunn, or maybe that was just another ridiculous thing people say, maybe you didn't see the people you loved, maybe you didn't see your friends after all. If he saw him or not, Wesley didn't regret losing Gunn. It was a quick realization, it ripped through him almost as fast as the waves did, he would do it all over again, if he had the choice. If it came down to it and Wesley was given the chance to do it all over again, he would still ruin his friendship to get the girl. It was selfish yes, but he didn't care. He would still stab Gunn, he would still have Gunn's blood on his hands, if he found out that Gunn had hurt her.
He'd do it all over again because loving Fred had been his reason for fighting as long as he did.
He'd do it all over again because there was no other reason for him. In the end, Angel hadn't been meant to be with Buffy, he hadn't been meant to be with Cordelia, hell he wasn't even meant to be with Nina. In the end, Angel had been meant to be with Connor. Even though he sent his son away, he was meant to be with his son. The words Holtz said all those years ago, the words that seem fresh to Wesley now, as if he had just heard them instead of reading them in a letter he had found while packing things up. The letter had looked old, he wasn't even sure how it was in one of their offices, but there it was, begging to be read. The words were still clear as day.
Your destiny lies with Angel. I know that now. You will have a better life with him. My only prayer is that I have prepared you well enough for whatever lies ahead. I trust that I have. Be brave.
In the end, Holtz's words had been true. For both Angel and Connor. In the end it wasn't about loving Buffy, it wasn't about loving Cordelia, it wasn't about loving Nina, it was about loving his son. In the end it was about that bigger meaning. Angel once had said if there was no bigger meaning in life then these acts of human kindness was all he could do. But Angel did have a bigger meaning, it was Connor. Just like Wesley had his bigger meaning, it had been Fred for him. Wesley imagines that he do what Angel did. If he could have saved Fred, Wesley imagines that he would swipe all their memories clean, he'd take away everything if it had meant saving Fred. In the end, Wesley realizes he's not all that different from Angel. In the end, it doesn't seem so bad to be like Angel.
But in the end, all these thoughts, all the memories, all the good byes he didn't say, they just leave his mind. As he's pulled further under the current, none of it matters. All emotions, memories, thoughts, everything that made up a human, it all leaves him as if it was never truly there to begin with. It suddenly doesn't matter anymore. The way his father always berated him, always made him feel less of a man, from the time he was a child to a grown adult, it doesn't matter. His failure at keeping the Wyndham-Pryce name alive, his failure at being a good Watcher, it doesn't matter. His heartache at losing Fred to Gunn, his betrayal and utter foolishness about the false prophecy and Connor, it doesn't matter. Justine slitting his throat, leaving him to die in that park across the street from his apartment, it doesn't matter. Angel trying to kill him in the hospital, being cast out of the family, being left all alone and having nothing to do but turn to his darkness and Lilah, it doesn't matter. The End of Days, finding about Cordelia, Jasmine, the move to Wolfram and Hart, watching Fred and Knox, finally having Fred only to lose her, gaining Illyria, finding out about the memory swipe, Connor returning, destroying the box of memories, the apocalypse, none of it matters. It's all gone. None of it seems to reach to him anymore.
That's how he knows he's truly dead.
It's nothing like he imagined it. The darkness it never goes away. It's pitch black all around him. His memories are no longer there, just little fragments here or there. Wasn't that how it had been for Illyria? Fred's memories were gone, but there had been those little fragments. Fragments of memories he knew were lingering around in his mind. Fragments of memories that were recognizable. Little fragments of his time with Angel and Cordelia, his friendship with Gunn. There are bigger fragments, parts of his memory that have more of a pattern, that linger longer than the others. Those are memories of Fred. But then there are fragments of memories he doesn't recognize. Fragments of dislocated memories of a life he's not sure is his own but has an odd familiarity to it. Some fragments line together like pieces of a puzzle, some of them, when put together, make one whole memory. The memory of a scar that will forever tell a story he doesn't want to listen to.
But fragments are just fragments and in the end, he can't hold onto them. He lets them go with the painful realization that he might never get them back. He was never a religious man, but he had gone to church with his family when he was a child, his father had tried to mold him into the future version of him, he had tried to save his already damned soul by going to that church every week. Wesley had heard all the versions of what heaven and hell were. He even remembered Angel's version of hell. Angel's version had been the most fearful one of them all, he remembered seeing the emotion flicker across Angel's face, but the words do not come to him now. Angel had said words that night, but Wesley can't remember them. He can't remember much of that night now. Had he comforted Angel? Or had he just stayed by his side, letting the silence wrap around both of them? He does remember someone telling him that when you die it's almost as if you are being offered another chance. That couldn't have been Angel. For one Angel wasn't as optimistic, secondly Angel had not been offered a second chance, he had cheated death, he never gained life, he just continued to exist. Whatever had been said about death, the layers of hell (his mind flickers to Lilah giving him a book, the name of it he can no longer remember, the apprehension of Lilah's gift doesn't come to him either), the destruction of human life and the passing of the soul, all of that doesn't seem so real anymore. He was not a religious man, but he had been strong in his belief that some of it existed. But it didn't. When Wesley died, he faded into the dark.
But colors had stopped existing a long time. They stopped when Fred no longer smiled at him.
The last thought Wesley remembers is if it's possible to have his soul move on, since it died when Fred did.
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"Wesley."
The familiar Texan accent pushes past the walls and resounds in his head. For a moment he thinks his cynical thoughts about religion and the process of death and moving on, his utter lack of belief in the after life, was harsh. Because he hears Fred's voice. He moves slightly and finds he's not as uncomfortable as he was before. He almost feels... cushioned. Wesley frowns and secretly strikes out another theory of how when you die your body, soul, all pieces of what you are scatters and there is nothing left, he lets out a breath when he hears Fred's voice again, saying his name. There goes another theory of not needing to breath once you die. Or perhaps he didn't, maybe it was just a reflex. Wesley moves again and through the thick fog that seems to wrap around his mind, he opens an eye, squints painfully at the light, then opens the other eye.
"There you are." Fred says in that soft tone of hers. Wesley watches the smile that spreads over her face. He smiles weakly at it and brings his hand up to touch her, he wasn't aware he could so, but maybe he had made it to heaven after all and he had created this image. Of Fred. He wasn't sure if he would see her, he had another theory (quite a few of them) that maybe he wouldn't see her because of Illy-- his mind flickers for the rest of the name but it doesn't come to him. In fact he doesn't remember where his train of thought was going. Frowning again, he realizes his hand never made it all the way up to it's destination, in fact his whole body felt incredibly heavy. After a few tries, he is able to bring his hand up and before it can reach it's destination, Fred touches it softly, her eyes glancing at it with a tired look.
That's when Wesley sees it too. A thick white gauze wrapped around his left wrist. Bandaging. He wasn't aware this was part of the image he created. His blue eyes fixate on the bandage, then his eyes travel up to the bracelet that rest above the bandage. Turning his hand away from Fred, he read the bracelet.
Pryce, Wesley.