Disclaimer: None of the characters in this chapter are mine of course nor am I affiliated with Fox, the WB, and Paramount and other agencies mentioned here.

Author's note: Now Not Fade Away was a good final episode, the only thing I hated it was that Wesley died, he was a character I hated alot, until he came to Angel and went through changes did I actually come to adore his character. Anyho, this is my first fanfic, I decided to use some things mentioned before in Angel for this story which follows up after the episode, there's alot of jumping back and forth between scenes and time lines in some of them so watch out. This is coming out of my head as I write it so please go easy on me!

The story involves some christian mythics(Angels and the devil to be precise) which I researched a bit before doing this story, so I integrated some of them into this story. There might be some tiny pieces of ideas I took from other fanfics such as names etc. Also ideas taken from previous movies/shows/stories you name it. Thanks to Aeryn Sun for her support and help. The story is divided into 3 Acts, it may come at a slow pace at times since I got all these emergencies coming at me day and night these days so this is something I do in my spare time. EDIT: I re-edited Chapter 1 a bit.

ACT I - Angel – The Awakening - Chapter 1

In a dim nightclub a green horned demon is singing,

It took all the strength I had

Just not to fall apart

I'm trying hard to mend the pieces

Of my broken heart

And I spent oh so many nights

Just feeling sorry for myself

I used to cry

But now I hold my head up high

And you see me

With somebody new

I'm not that stupid little person still in love with you

And so you thought you'd just drop by

And you expect me to be free

But now I'm saving all my loving

For someone who's loving me

The demon finishes the song and the audience applauds as he stands up and takes a sip out of his seabreeze.

"Wonderful!" An audience member calls out.

"Yeah! Let's hear it for Lorne!" Another yells out aloud.

Lorne sits down back on the stand with the microphone still in his hand and the seabreeze on the other and chuckles.

"Thank you! And now my next piece..." before he could finish his comment a young girl's voice cries out, a familiar voice, "Story time!" Some agreements are heard throughout the club. Lorne looked at his watch. It was 10:00pm, and if he was going to keep his promise about his story he better start now, for it was an extremely long one. Again he took another sip, "Alright munchkins, it is getting late and I don't wanna keep you kids pass your curfews he he."

Lorne realigns himself on his stand and takes a deep breath, "Now let's see...where do we start? I suppose we should start straight from the beginning huh?" Lorne scans the crowd and sees some anxious faces and continues, "Well actually, this story starts from a very long time ago, hehehe, um, how about a couple dozen millions of years ago? Ah how about the beginning of time then, before mankind, there walked on the Earth an ancient race."

In the crowd someone calls out, "Dinosaurs?" Chuckles are heard throughout, but Lorne corrects him. "No, way before that mister! They were powerful beings. They were...how do you say it? Ah yes! The seeds of the future, both good and evil, though of course, evil reigned in that time and many of those goodies left but kept a watchful eye over it. Later on another ancient race known as the Old Ones, the first demons, started to appear and rule the Earth. They were pretty much like us, fighting and killing each other all the time...well maybe I exaggerated that part a bit, but they were bent on killing each other all the time."

Flashback to an unknown time, ancient Earth is not exactly the same as present Earth. The sky is bright red, crackled with dark mystical energies sweeping through, and large winged creatures flying through the sky cawing, and seeking their prey in the endless sight of barren land. There were fields of green plants, trees, flowers but they were kept in protected gardens from the harsh elements with a river flowing between and scattered across the plane.

One particularly large garden was kept in the back of a large temple with two massive pillars at it's entrance where a very large army of knight-like demons stood, armed with long spears and large broad shields with thick armor and flanked by mounted demons on great reptilian-like creatures with the hissing of a dragon similar to the ones in the present era.

A large being walks toward the temple, flanked by his elite soldiers; his armor too is knight-like but with crystal silver-like armor with blue and rose streaks across it and shines with an invisible aura that entices you around him, a sense of hope and mercy. His many scarlet energy-like wings waver in the passing wind like a great flag and his face remains hidden within the darkness of his crystal helmet. Many speculated that he was a demon of pure energy and that the armor was what kept him in this realm, but no one dared to question that, for he was the Archangel Gabriel, one of the most powerful warrior-gods of the Demon Realm, the last one.

His three brothers, Azrael, Raphael, and Michael, had left this realm long ago to serve a group of greater beings known as The Powers that Be but Gabriel remained. Gabriel too was once a monarch but his kingdom was destroyed by an alliance of rivalry warrior-gods who took advantage of his brothers' leave. They were bent on his destruction, to annihilate all Archangels, and each passing day he was anxious to make them pay for what they did to his temple and his beloved human "pets."

Unlike many of his kind, Gabriel was interested when these ape-like creatures began appearing on the horizon of this dimension, dim-witted and slow, Gabriel found that they quickly adapted to the harsh environment despite their weak physical capabilities and thrived. He came to love them and taught them the tongue of his kind, and they too learned that quickly. They proved to be strong warriors, despite being below the Wolf, Ram, and Hart if taught correctly but the most important thing of all was that these short-lived "humans" were neither demons nor powerful gods. They were simply mortals, neither purely evil nor good, a balance between the two. With each passing time, Gabriel began to learn a bit of their nature and their emotions such as love and hatred, so much different from the kind of love that he was accustomed to, the worship kind, and this is why he remained. He wanted to protect these fragile mortals and learn more about "love."

Gabriel protected a village of these mortals within his kingdom for centuries until one fateful day when his rivals appeared to overthrow him. The humans were the first to fall to their swords, their wails and cries would forever haunt Gabriel. He did the best he could to muster his army to defend them, but the enemy was too vast and too swift, for it was not one but six Old Ones that combined their armies in an attempt to destroy him. Lucifer, the fallen Archangel, led this alliance against him, and with him brought the five Elemental Gods; Metal, Earth, Fire, Water, and Wind.

In the ensuring chaos, Gabriel took what was left of his Elite Guard and headed into the desert with the enemy pursuing them for 45 days straight until he entered another kingdom of another great warrior-god, Illyria. Illyria was battling a rival that day and was under the impression she was winning for there was another large army ready to attack her exposed flank. Gabriel realized, although this army was much larger than his, that if he moved in quickly enough and stall the army it would eventually be pitted against the Elemental armies closing in on him, and he and his men would escape before Illyria could make a move on him. It was rare for Old Ones to be friends, they were always enemies, and he was not in the mood for a long fight.

Gabriel quickly moved his army, and intercepted the incoming army, filled with white-skinned smelly creatures wielding huge axes otherwise known as Ogres. This army was shocked when 10,000 Dragoon knights, Gabriel's elite mounted troops, suddenly came charging down on them, and in a single instant entire battalions of Ogres disappeared within the rampaging foot of the reptiles, followed by 500,000 spears. Their battle cry was awesome, and their might was strong despite being outnumbered, but their objective was not to win but to stall. Soon enough, the Elemental army, blindly pursing their prey like wild wolves clashed into the Horde army, which now turned their attention to and Gabriel used the time to escape.

With no enemy reinforcements, Illyria was able to eliminate her opponent swiftly with her massive strength and torn out his eyes so he could see his own mutilated face before slicing his head off and roared in triumph. The enemy army was overwhelmed with panic and fled quickly, but the Illyrians, Illyria's own army, left no mercy for their enemies and overran them, leaving no survivors. Now Illyria had noticed the flanking army's battle, and realized what had occurred, for she was no fool. 'No one should be allowed to enter and leave my kingdom without my acknowledgment!' she thought, and using her time-altering powers, she stood in front of a shocked Gabriel and his army.

"Who are you and what makes you think you could come into my kingdom without asking?" Illyria questioned the knight; her voice was loud, and filled with awesome power as it echoed across the barren lands. She felt an aura coming off of him, something she has not felt in a long time till it dawned upon her; this is a noble creature, an Archangel, I thought they left this dimension ages ago.

Gabriel took a deep breath and signaled his army to retire their weapons, the cries of battle between the Ogres and Elemental warriors could still be heard in the distance, but both armies were beginning to retire, and answered her.

"I am the Archangel Gabriel, my kingdom was destroyed by my rivals, and we were driven for forty-five days until we came into your kingdom. I saw your rival's army preparing to ambush you, so I took my men and stalled them until my pursuers caught up. This forced them to fight each other, and I planned on retreating quickly Your Highness." Gabriel placed his spear down as Illyria pondered his answer, his army is small, and can be eliminated quickly, though having a creature this powerful on my side would prove useful in the long run. I am a god to a god, this one is no different, and then she spoke.

"While I eliminate those who cross into my kingdom you have brought me great victory over my enemies and for that I will spare your lives." Gabriel sighed in relief, but tensed when he realized that the Illyrians were surrounding his men, their weapons ready to strike. "But," Illyria continued, "You shall swear allegiance to me and fight under my name! You shall be my warrior!"

Gabriel and his men looked at Illyria shocked, swear allegiance to her and become one of her soldiers? She has no care for humans...but then again she has no care for anything as long she has power. Illyria does not wish to persecute anyone at all as long as they remain passive. Gabriel looked around again, if I refuse, my men will die a meaningless death, I have lead them this far, and I will not let them die this way. My brothers will hate me for serving an Old One who does not believe in our cause, to restore balance to this world, but then I have lost all purpose by remaining on this Earth, perhaps the humans are safer this way if I serve under Illyria, and slowly rose and took his sword, the Illyrians inched closer, but then he kneeled down in front of Illyria.

"I Gabriel..." Gabriel uttered and cursed silently for what he was about to do, "swear allegiance to you and myself and my men will fight and serve under you till death!" The knights, who fully trusted Gabriel and would follow him to the end, announced, "Till Death! Long live Illyria! God- King of this dimension!" and stomped their spears repeatedly to the ground shouting, "Hail!" The knights' spears' stomp and shout could be heard miles. Illyria smiled. 'Excellent' she thought, 'These elite troops will serve me well,' She turned around and headed back to her Temple, followed by Gabriel and the others.

Gabriel sighed as the memory passed him as he continued walking towards Illyria's temple, it's been many years since that day, but I've done a lot more good than I would've been able to do, now that I serve Illyria. But in the end, was it the right choice?

Gabriel had been able to secure a new village for the remaining survivors of the humans on the borders of the kingdom, and kept a close watch on them. Illyria was disgusted by this, noting that they were muck at her feet, but he was able to convince her to keep them by having them become her acolytes, and that kept Illyria from eliminating them. It's been easier though, Illyria has been growing stronger everyday that almost everyone else now fears her, even he began respecting her.

Though he was now disturbed, rumors had it that Lucifer and his minions had been gathering allies and forces secretly, but he could not prove them to Illyria. If it came down to war, both Illyria and himself would be outnumbered ten to one. While Illyria and himself were powerful warriors, the Elemental Gods' strength were equal to his, and Lucifer is Michael's, his older and stronger brother, opposite. His troops were also elite, the best of the best, though they could not handle a force ten times their size and the thought of losing more of his beloved humans struck something inside him. He had learned a lot from them though; their tricks and sneakiness on surviving, and Gabriel integrated this into their defenses for he knew it would prove useful in the long run.

Gabriel entered the temple, and headed to the altar when, "Your highness!" Gabriel and his lieutenants turned, it was one of his scouts, and he was out of breath though but was able to muster his strength to talk.

"I have spotted a massive army hiding on the outskirts of our borders. Another is camped a medium-sized distance from the human camps," the scout took in another breath, "and I spotted the five flags, they've been deployed around the kingdom." Gabriel and his lieutenants stood there shocked, the five flags represented the Elemental Gods! It was a sign of deployment and war, and was mystical in a sense that it gave the Elemental warriors some sort of super charge that made them deadly in combat.

"Are the armies mobilizing?" Gabriel asked.

"Looks like their about ready to, if they do now, they'll be upon us before nightfall" the scout replied.

Gabriel turned, his back to his scout and pondered, I guess now's the time to see how well these human tricks really do work. "Alpha, mobilize our forces and inform Illyria what is happening, she must know. Go!" Gabriel shook Alpha's soldier, and he left quickly.

Then he turned to Omega, "Inform the humans what has happened and tell them to set-up their traps." Omega turned and quickly left, but Gabriel grabbed him and drew close to him, "The moment they reach half-way, I want half of them to die!" Omega nodded and left, the rest of his army began to mobilize into formation. I will stand my ground and fight to the death. For Illyria, I shall protect her even after death, I will not fail her!

Lorne sat back and continued his story. "So anyways, a great big battle was to take place but for enough of the introduction. Let's cut to the cheese now, back to L.A., present day."