The Swan

"Love your masks and adore your failure"
-Manic Street Preachers

He lay, coiled around himself. His fingers sifted the little pellets of dust, which nestled on one side of his bed. He wondered, suddenly, why he bothered having a double bed. He always slept, alone, on one side of it, facing away from the lonely dark plain. In the morning, the opposite pillow was cold to the touch.

Today, his knees lay over the invisible barricade across the bed. They were cold, his whole body was cold, and his face was wet with inexplicably chill tears. He didn't make a sound. He'd had much practice at this. His chest barely shook. His body felt ready to sink into the void of dankness on the other side of his mind. Sink in, and never come back, just float through the darkness, let it swallow him. In this struggle of reality, there was so much pain. In the dark, but no, he wouldn't let his mind wander into that paradox.

The phone rang, and when he answered it, there was no creak in his voice to give away the unchecked tears.

"Wes?" It was Cordelia. "Where are you?"

"I'm just-" he began, and she broke in.

"Never mind, no one cares," she said quickly, "there's this demon, it is a demon, isn't it?" she said to someone on her end of the conversation. Wesley waited through the muffled response.

"Oh, Gunn won't shut up describing it," Cordelia said. "Apparently it looked like a yeti with bat's wings, anyway, you have to come; it's all full of emergencies-"

This time Wesley managed to break in to her thought-stream. "Yes, yes, I'll be there soon."

He sat still for a minute on the bed, trying to compose himself. He took off his tear-stained glasses, wishing he'd removed them earlier, because salt was so hard to clean from the lenses. He washed his face in cold water, pressing his head against the cool mirror. The sound, he had long known how to control, but the tears themselves were hard to stop. He'd never found a reliable solution. He washed his face again, and cleaned his glasses carefully, willing himself to feel better.

In the lobby of the hotel, he knew he'd been overly optimistic in expecting himself to recover so quickly, but he breathed in and out carefully, and listened while Gunn calm, but a little breathless, told him about the demon. He knew it instantly, even in his distracted state, and found the picture in a blood red book.

"The Syrna Swan," he said.

"Didn't look much like a swan to me," Gunn said. "Had the most disgusting smell."

"Well, yes, that would be because it lives in rotting urine," Wesley told him.

Gunn made a suitable face.

"It can be seen floating inside sewers and in polluted water."

"Explains why I found in the lake in that park. I think that water's got more barf and stuff in it than it does H2O."

"Did it look like a giant swan with bat's wings?" Wesley asked, biting the inside of his cheeks and silently cursing himself. Why, after all these years, did he still have such trouble composing himself?

"It had kind of brownish fur, I think, and big claws like an eagle, sort of, I didn't get that close to it. It looked a bit too big to handle," he said.

"Yes, they do tend to be fairly sizeable. They're relatively harmless, though," Wesley said.

"Really? Because I don't think much of the sanity of creatures that lives in piss."

"Well, that aside, they don't hurt people. Unless there's more than one we shouldn't get much trouble from it."

"We going to kill it though, yeah?" Gunn asked.

Wesley sighed thoughtfully. "Perhaps we should wait until it makes a nuisance of itself. They are relatively harmless…"

"Wait till it kills someone, you mean? I don't like that," Gunn said, and turned to look at Angel. "What do you think?" he asked him.

Angel, who had been staring at the upside-down picture of the Syrna Swan, sighed, and looked up. "Has it been known to kill people, Wesley?" he asked in an almost annoyingly kind voice.

"Yes, but only when defending its territory!" Wesley said quickly. "And if there's only one of it, it shouldn't do any harm. They fight each other for ground, and people could get caught in the cross fire, but they're very passive…" He realised his voice as higher than it should be and that he sounded more passionate than he really was. What did he care for this Syrna Swan?

Angel stood up. He was still looking at Wesley a little too kindly for comfort. "Then we should see if there's another one near by. Gunn? Do you mind checking?"

Gunn sighed. "I still say we kill it," he grumbled. "And how will I know if I'm not seeing the same one twice?"

"Well, they're hardly likely to be in the same place, are they?" Wesley said. "If there is another it's probably on the other side of town!"

He realised he was sounding too passionate again. Angel was looking at him oddly. Could he smell tears? Wesley wished he'd stayed at home.

Angel glanced sidelong at Gunn. "I can go," he said, peaceably.

"No, no, I'll do it, we wouldn't want to be killing poor innocent demons, would we?" Gunn said and left.

"I've never heard of them before," Angel said. "Are they very rare?"

"No," said Wesley. "They just have a hard time finding anywhere that's polluted enough."

"Look's like LA just reached a new low," Angel said, smiling faintly.

Wesley nodded; he couldn't come up with a reply, other than, "yes." He blinked rapidly and stared down at the small print in front of him. He read the words 'surprisingly docile', before closing the book.

"Wes?" Angel said, softly, so softly that Wesley could pretend not to hear him, he was suddenly terribly afraid that he might start crying again.

"I'll go and make sure Cordelia hasn't burnt anything," Angel said quickly, although the joke wasn't really true anymore. He left the room so fast that Wesley had a terrible suspicion that he knew Wes's eyes were pricking with tears.

That night he lay on his bed and masturbated, and sobbed when he came. Why? He thought. Why? His thoughts didn't move in coherent patterns, he didn't finish his questions. He let himself remember the horrible physical pain, the blood running down the back of his thighs. The humming in his head as the pain racked his insides. He was too ashamed too think about the other sorts of pain.

He slept fitfully, waking often to wonder when he would feel better. He could forget about it for days and days, and then someone would bring up sex, or he would have a nightmare, and he would cry silently, unable to forget the pain and the fear, and unable to remember.

The sun was falling over the stacks of books, and he was thinking much more clearly. The Syrna Swan's page lay open, and he was readying himself for a conversation with Gunn when he came in. Only Cordelia was awake, answering the phone in a fake cheerful voice, and offering him cups of the coffee she was drinking copious amounts of.

"Have a busy time last night?" he asked her, looking up from his book (which wasn't even demonology, it was poetry, and he felt like a guilty schoolboy reading it).

"Yes," she sang brightly, "it was great! Or sort of great, anyway, but nothing is ever really prefect, you know? I went out with this guy – I think, at least he said he was, a producer for a little Art Box company, he knew lots of people, anyway, and we went to this adorable little club."

"Oh yes?" Wesley said. He was interested, to a degree. He did like Cordelia, in many ways, and he certainly admired her.

"Yeah, and we went out for this drive to the ocean afterwards, with him and these other two men he knew. And then-" Suddenly her smile lost its grasp on her face. She was crying, tearlessly, her chest heaving and her eyes bright.

"Cordelia!" he said, startled, and went to her. He put his hands on her shoulders, but she didn't let him hug her, she stood still, her face ashen, sobbing loudly.

"Oh, God, Wes, oh, God, I'm sorry," she whimpered.

"It's all right, Cordelia, it's all right," he said soothingly. "What's wrong? What happened?"

"Oh, nothing, nothing," she said faintly, trying to push away from him. He gripped her wrist, her arm.

She began to cry helplessly now, and fell forward onto him. He cradled her, but after a moment she struggled away from him again.

"I'm fine, Wes, really," she said, vaguely pushing at her smeared eyeliner, rubbing her nose.

"You can tell me," he said. "You'll feel better." He did, suddenly, want to make her feel better. She looked small, and scared, sitting in front of him, and he desperately wanted to comfort, to make okay.

"In the car," she began, her voice stilted, almost childish, "in the car, him, and his friends, we drove out to the cliffs, some cliffs, it wasn't even nice there, and he said, 'look at the sea' and I looked."

She paused, her eyes begging Wesley not to make her continue, but he didn't move, except to hold her wrist a little tighter.

"And then he, he was putting on a condom, and I asked him what he was doing, and he said we were just going to have a good time, and then he pushed me down – and – and…"

She stopped, biting her lip, tears streaming down her face. He pulled her towards him, and she lay silently on his chest, tears and dark eyeliner on her cheeks, strands of her hair sticking to his unshaven chin.

He had asked her if he should ring anyone, the police, perhaps, and maybe a friend of hers. He had said she should take off as much time as she needed. She had looked at him strangely.

"God, Wes," she'd said. "It's not like it's a big deal. I swear, I'm fine, really."

"Cordelia?" he said, questioningly, vaguely, hopefully. "I'm not going to forget about it, you know," he'd said, almost unkindly, as she'd turned away to fix her make-up, shutting him out.

He was hopelessly unsure of what to do. Tell Angel, perhaps? She was closer to Angel than she was to him, Wesley thought, but he discarded it. It was too personal. As he looked at the picture of the otherworldly Syrna Swan, he reflected that at least this had distracted him from his own worries.

"Dunno if I found another or not," Gunn told him, coming in. "I saw one again, but it might've been the same."

"Was it much farther away?" Wesley asked, turning the page of the book.

"No, not really. Same sort of area," Gunn said. "But still. They could be squaring up to attack or something."

"No, we would have heard about it if they had. Trust me. When they fight, they get even larger," Wesley told him.

"Bigger?" Gunn asked. "But the thing was as a big as a boat! And the smell!"

"Aside from that, they're perfectly harmless, unless threatened. It'll probably go back into the sewers shortly."

"Well, we'd better kill it before it does," Gunn said. "Don't want it hurting anyone."

"But, Gunn, they don't hurt people! They're just animals, albeit unusual. They're docile, and they're no more intelligent than a robin. You wouldn't kill a robin, would you?"

"Robins are tiny. You should have seen the size of this, English. You wouldn't be protecting it if you had," Gunn said.

"Angel?" Wesley turned. "What do you think?"

"Well, Wes did say it was harmless," Angel agreed. "I say we leave it. Unless it causes any problems."

"Unless it kills someone you mean!" Gunn exploded. "What, you think whoever it hurts doesn't matter? I say we get it before it does any harm."

"Gunn, would you kill a dog because it might bite someone?" Wesley said.

"That's different," Gunn replied. "Dogs don't kill people."

"Sometimes dogs do," Wesley said. "And this might, too. But the chances of it killing someone are as high as the chances of an average terrier."

"Okay, Wes," Angel said. "We won't kill it. Not yet, anyway."

Gunn muttered something, but didn't do anything else. He shrugged. Wesley pulled the book of poetry out from under the table and quietly began to read.

Cordelia came in and sat on the table in front of him after the other two men left. "So you're not killing the big smelly yeti?" she asked, wrinkling her nose.

"No, we're not, it's harmless," Wesley said again, closing the book quietly, and looking it up at her.

"I'd kill it because of the smell. If you'd been near Gunn when he came in, you would too," she said.

Wesley laughed. "Maybe I would. I'm lucky not to have had to encounter the stench."

"Mm," she sat oddly silently for a moment. Wesley noticed that her eyeliner was still messy.

"What I told you…before, you won't tell anyone, will you? I mean, you don't need to, I'm fine, it's not like it was rape or anything."

Wesley looked at her. "No, I won't," he said, at length. It was rape, he knew, it was hard to deny it. But he too denied a lot of things, and he understood how it was easier to pretend.

"It wasn't," she said, again, with a very faint smile.

"Alright," Wesley said softly, "alright."

She nodded, and she looked at him for a second, and for a second he thought he understood something more, and then she turned, and left him alone.

The Syrna Swan glided through the water, like a ghost ship. Despite the stench, it was almost beautiful. It had a towering, swan's neck, with a giant, dark beak, toothless and glinting like ebony. Its creamy yellow fur covered a rotund body, immense, like a dirty yeti. Its wings rose above it, darker than the sky, leathery and bat like, and crowned with venomous green talons.

Its eyes were no more intelligent than a sparrow's in its elegant head. They flicked onto Wesley, and then continued moving, across the moth eaten grass by the lake. Wesley covered his nose with his hand, and continued staring at it. He was one of the first people to sight a Syrna swan in perhaps two hundred years, and he wanted to make the best of the opportunity.

Despite its size and its smell, it looked fragile, delicate, like a flimsy sculpture. It lowered its head and dabbled its beak in the putrid water. Wesley had thought of taking a photograph of it, like a desperate bird watcher, entranced by a rare species, but he couldn't think how he would explain it to the film developer.

There's probably only one or two like it left, Wesley thought, filled with awe, and it is so beautiful. He smiled at the swan despite himself, and watched it glide past him, farther along the lake.

"It is so fucking weird," he heard a voice behind him say. "D'you believe me now, that it exists?"

"Yeah, yeah," another person said, a teenage boy, "but I still say you're high, Dee, but now I'm right there with you."

"No way," Dee replied. "No one hallucinates the same thing. Ever."

"Then I'm in your trip," the boy said, giggling. "Your trip stinks," he added, pinching his nose.

"Be normal, I wanted to tell people. Think we could sell our story?"

"No way, Dee," the boy said. "Who's gonna believe two druggie teenagers?"

Dee flopped down on the grass. "It smells but isn't it fucking pretty even though it's weird?" she said.

"Whatever you say," the boy replied, and lay down beside her.

Wesley took one last look at the ethereal swan, and walked back up the path, not wanting the two people to see him.

Cordelia was in his flat when he got home.

"I'm sorry," she said, "it's just that I have a key, and it was kind of dark – well, I mean…" she broke off, staring at him desperately.

"It's okay, Cordy," he said, washing his hands in his kitchen sink.

"Oh my God, you stink!" Cordelia said. "You've been looking at that swan thing, haven't you?"

"Yes, yes I have," Wesley said smiling. "I think I need a shower."

"I think you do too," Cordelia said. "God, why did you want to go near that thing?"

"It was quite captivating, actually," Wesley told her. "I couldn't help myself."

"Freak!" Cordelia said, good- naturedly, turning on his TV.

When he came back into the room, she had her knees drawn up to her chest, her eyes blank. There was an ad turned to mute on the screen. Wesley turned off the set, and Cordelia looked up at him. Her eyeliner was smeared underneath her eyes from crying, it looked like goose-shit over her cheekbones.

"What happened?" she said, her voice so soft it was barely audible. The silence in the room after her words deepened. Wesley could feel an ache in his throat, and drops of water rolling down his back from his newly washed hair.

"Wes?" she said softly. "I don't know."

He sat down beside her. "Don't you?" he asked.

"Yes, I can feel it, it inside me, but, but, I don't remember, don't know," she whimpered.

He began to cry, helplessly, tears coursing silently down his cheeks. "Neither do I," he said, "neither do I."

Cordelia leant against him, and he cried into her hair, onto her cheeks. The lights were off, and the darkness pressed heavily against them. He held Cordelia tighter and was so glad of her warmth, of not being alone.

He didn't know how or when, he realised. What had happened to Cordelia, what had happened to him? There were dark places in his mind, and words that ached and dragged on him, and a memory of himself, lying still between the trees, with blood running down the back of his legs, and endless tears, and not being able to make a sound.

"It's over," Cordelia said, suddenly, and he realised that she had had her own thoughts, too, meandering through her head.

Wesley nodded, and perhaps she felt the movement above her. Cordelia's hair still smelt like the ocean, but tomorrow she would wash it. She slept beside Wesley on the unused part of his bed. There was a barricade between them, somehow, still, but at least they could hear each other breathe in the darkness.

Wesley was wrong, and the swan was dead by ten pm the next night. It killed a boy, a junkie, and Angel, Gunn, and he went out to the lake in the silent, empty park, armed with arrows and axes.

Perhaps it is the only one left in the world, Wesley thought, as it glided silently toward them, its stench rising up as it fixed them with its stupid, trusting gaze.

Angel shot it in the neck, and silently it slumped in the water, its elegant body floating across the black lake's surface, its ebony beak glinted darker than the depths, as it lay, still and silent and dead.

Gunn caught Wesley's eye as they walked back, leaving the swan's carcass ready to float into the sewers, and rot.

"We had to," he said, not unkindly. "We had to."

::AtS fanfiction: I don't own anything that isn't mine. My beta is gone and I'm very very sorry for mistakes::