Bent by the Powers (CHAPTER 1 REVISED! It can only get better!)
by Daniele-Marx
Disclaimer: I do not own BtVS or Angel, but the plot is from my own brain, and I just revised Chapter One. There is little difference, but it should sate any large questions you may have, but feedback would be nice. thank you.
~.Marx.~
Storyline: What would have happened if Glory had succeeded in killing all of the Scoobies but Buffy and Dawn?
~~~~
Cordelia stopped typing as she heard someone knock on the office door. Yesterday, Angel had begun brooding, and now Cordelia was starting to really worry for her once boss. He told everyone to basically leave him alone and they promised they would be back later. Fred hadn't appeared out of her room just yet, but he was sure he could get her to work with him soon. Gunn and Wesley had said they would be back later that night, but until then, it was just Angel and Cordelia occupying any office space today.
Cordelia stood and walked over to the entrance, opening the door. A gasp left her throat as she saw Buffy Summers standing there. The slayer was wearing the usual black coat and attire, but she was covered mostly with dirt as if she were a soul survivor of a war. Her eyes were distant and empty, devoid of thought or emotion as if she hadn't had a peaceful moment in days. Cordelia looked over to see if Angel had seen any of this, but opted not to call for him just yet. What was she thinking?! Of course it was terribly important! Cordelia steadied the voice in her head and took a swallow to recuperate. "Buffy, what's wrong?" Buffy grabbed someone's arm from behind her in the entrance, revealing Dawn and pulling her into the Hotel. Dawn was very unstable, but holding herself back like Buffy was. Cordelia was wondering why Dawn was wearing a tattered midieval gown, but turned her attention back to the slayer. She led the two into the office. "Buffy?" Buffy didn't answer and Cordelia shut the door. "What happened?" The next words were barely a whisper as if they were covered with a blanket of denial and pain.
"I need to speak with Angel." Buffy's voice cracked as if she had been malnourished. Angel had been sitting in his office with the door closed and Cordelia wasn't sure if he was wanting company.
"Why? What happened?" Cordelia watched as Buffy turned around, her eyes reddened as if trying not to cry. Buffy's face contorted and she forced it away futily.
"Everyone is dead, Cordelia."
"Dead? What do you mean, dead?" Cordelia was confused. Angel's ears perked up from his office. Buffy felt herself beginning to breathe a bit harder as tears began to threaten her composure.
"I mean they're dead." she panted at almost hyperventilating point. "Xander, Willow, Giles, everyone. Glory, she--" She fought to stay standing and put her hand up against the wall to steady herself; she held her stomach as if she were going to empty her stomach from anguish but seemed to hold herself back. Angel was out in the main room in no time, staring at Buffy. He was both surprised and horrified by her appearance, noticing an obvious limp in her usual style and grace, the way her eyes worked like a panic button, not seeing anything but fear and pain. It worried him greatly. Cordelia felt tears rise to her eyes, and she wiped them away lightly. "I couldn't save them..." Suddenly she broke down and, braced against the wall, leaned down to steady her breathing. Angel walked over to her and put his hand on her back, rubbing it soothingly. She let out a gasp of pain and he hesitated, lessening the pressure on her back.
"Glorificus?" Angel tried to hold his feelings at bay, but he knew it was not helping.
"She was too strong." The pain was evident in Buffy, and he looked at Cordelia. His mind strained as he heard her declare her weakness. Buffy began to force her breathing down and she stood up straight. Angel looked at Dawn, expressing his deepest regrets because he wasn't there to help. Dawn seemed a bit nervous since she wasn't expressing any emotion whatsoever; he guessed that she was scared of Buffy's reaction and was probably wondering why she didn't react the same.
"Take care of Dawn." He led Buffy into the office, and shut the door. It was darker in there because of the shades he drew and he took her into his arms, holding her; she responded and hugged him, feeling a sob escape her throat and all feeling leave her.
They stood like that for minutes.
Angel stroked her hair and felt her tense body slightly calm down. As soon as she did manage to do so, her body tensed up twice as fast as her breath caught. He knew Buffy's reaction to his rubbing her back was not something that could be overlooked in case Glorificus had managed to harm her greatly. Something was wrong. He needed to hear what happened. Parting her, he sat her down on the couch as he sat as well. She sat slowly back as if she were having some sort of chest pains, and she hoped he had enough reason to let her physical pain pass, but knew she was just literally holding her breath. "Tell me what happened." Buffy felt the tears start to stream down her face, and she sobbed as he held her close to him.
"...She held onto me as she sent her minions on them. They had this power that not even Willow could match, especially when she and Tara worked together." A sob escaped her and she forced herself to continue but not cease her tears. "First went Anya, then Xander, Tara, Giles, Willow, and even Spike got beheaded but not before freeing Dawn..." Buffy felt a new wave of pain hit her chest, and she clenched her fists.
"Why Dawn."
"They got along. He didn't treat her like the rest of us had, like a child. She's the Key Glory wants so she can open the portals of all the dimensions. I wouldn't let her take my little sister away from me. But even though she's not my sister, her blood is mine, and we share the same memories. But Glory was planning to use Dawn's blood to keep the portal open..."
"And you stopped it?" Buffy felt the tears begin to dry and she wiped them from her eyes.
"She didn't get to perform the ceremony because we were pretty fast and furious. Giles had said that she wouldn't have the will to fight back if we stopped the ritual, but she didn't stop coming after us..." Buffy began to cry softly, but brought her hand up to stifle her tears. Angel reached out to the endtable and grabbed a hankerchief, giving it to her and pulling her into him. "Dawn could have died and it would have been all my fault because she was sent to me for protection..." Angel hesitated. "I should have fought harder, I should have tried harder. Now Willow's gone, Xander...Giles..." A pause. "...Death is my gift afterall..." Angel hesitated once again. Her tears resurfaced.
"Death is your gift...Who told you that." He stared at the opposite wall in his office, stroking her hair and listening to her as she wept.
"The first Slayer when I went to get answers in the desert...'Death is your gift' she said, but I didn't understand...I failed everyone by letting them die. I should've done something!" Buffy wasn't holding back the sobs anymore, and Angel held her to his chest. "I should've done something..." Angel felt remorse for not being there in the first place. Then something dawned on him.
"What about Riley?"
"He left a few weeks ago to work in South America for the Initiative." Angel felt angry at Riley suddenly for leaving like that, but knew something bad would have had to happen sooner or later; he didn't even like Riley, but settled for it anyway. "When Faith came back she somehow used magic to switch bodies with me..." Angel hadn't heard this before, and seemed intrigued suddenly by her words. "She used my body to get intimate with Riley, and he fell for it, thinking it was me. He didn't see anything wrong and couldn't tell the difference between us...it hurt so bad when he looked at me when I told him." Buffy seemed to get more upset about the whole ordeal as she thought about it, so Angel decided to change the subject. He knew he would have been able to tell her from Faith because he knew Buffy and knew what Faith had been capable of. She knew that, too, thus he didn't have to bring it to her attention, though it might have helped.
"Where is Glorificus?"
"I don't know. If she followed us, I don't know what will happen. I don't know if her minions would ransack mom's house for information on where I would be, but if she did, she might just be headed in this direction. I imagine she wouldn't think of that, but anything is possible."
"What were you planning to do."
"I wanted to find someone who would be willing to help me fight better. I need to train more, to beat her once and for all. I can't fight her like she is. Giles said it was possible, but she could only be beaten if she took her previous form, a guy named Ben. I'd have to weaken her so he could take over, then I'd have to kill him."
"That doesn't seem so hard." Buffy felt her anguish return, and she felt Angel touch her forehead. She wanted to get away. The pain in her back was fading with every moment she spend with Angel, but she knew she would have to heal with or without him. His arm protectively around her, she felt at peace, and that was something to start out with. She had remembered a name Giles had used once to describe the choosing of the Chosen One, and that had been, "The Powers That Be..."
"What?"
"The Powers That Be, what are they..." A pause.
"They are everything. They control our fate." Buffy remembered something about the conversation she had with her Watcher about the Powers That Be, and it was that they made things happen that would bring an overall reaction to a certain situation. One example he used was that there were currently two Vampire Slayers: Buffy and Faith. Buffy felt an urge to react out of anger back then, but she had learned to accept some of the things they had talked about.
"Do they make the impossible happen? Can they let things like this happen?"
"...Yes." Angel listened to her breathing, and she paused. "I should have been there, I'm sorry...I was sort of stuck in an alternate dimension saving cows..." Buffy looked up at him oddly. Angel...saving...cows...? She didn't want to know...He looked down at her and she let a smile slip past her blank stare. She almost threw her reason out of the window as she looked up to meet those beautiful eyes, and their lips met gently. It felt as if their sorrows were being left behind, and Angel held her closer as she leaned further into him. It was a comfort, being in each other's arms, and they parted reluctantly. She flinched very slightly, and he looked at her as she blinked her eyes as if in physical pain. "You're hurt." Buffy felt nervous as Angel said this, and he touched her left set of ribs, thinking that Glory broke one. They seemed bruised in the front, but they would heal fast. "What happened..." He pressed in two ribs on the right side of her back at once, and her mouth flew open from horror, her voice failing her as her face went beet red. Tears streamed down her face as his hands left her and held her on the other side. No immediate reaction. Her pain came from her ribs, in which one appeared to be broken while another seemed to be cracked.
"What did she do to you. Show me." Buffy looked into his eyes, and he touched her back, making her wince and close her eyes tensely.
"There." She went to lean forward but Angel stopped her, holding onto her shoulders to prove his point.
"Don't do that. You'll end up hurting yourself more. Your back is hurt as well? Is it sore?" Buffy suddenly looked paler, and she shook her head no. She attempted to remove her coat, holding her breath so she could do so; she gave up when she couldn't hold back the obvious pain, and Angel held her more gently. He helped her lean forward very slightly to assist her with her coat, moving the jacket downwards and off her back and his eyes widening.
"It feels worse." she said as a sob passed through her throat.
"What do you remember?" He ran his hand very gently over a wound that was about five inches in diameter, and her shirt had been torn where the wound had been made. Her torn shirt had covered a bloody stain on her back; it was mostly dried already. The wound was right behind her heart, and he felt a mixture of fear and pain as he grazed his hand over the wound as lightly as he could. She winced and then shuddered.
"When she was holding me down, I felt my back ripping open; it felt as if she did it with her own hand..."
"We have to remove your shirt, the blood's already dried it to your skin. It's right behind your heart. She was trying to kill you."
"She told me she would do that. I didn't think she would do it, though. She didn't screw up my brain, at least."
"We should probably get you somewhere that can help, you might need surgery."
"I don't want to go to the hospital. I heal fast."
"I have a feeling that you can't heal this alone. I'm surprised you got here at all."
"Nothing was going to keep me from getting here...Not when I felt I needed you most." Angel brought up his hand to push some hair from her eyes.
"I should've been there. I am sorry."
"Please don't...The Powers let this happen, didn't they? Maybe they were trying to tell me something by letting a God kill the first friends I ever had..." Tears streamed down her face as she said this, but she didn't acknowledge them.
"I'll take care of you." Angel raised her chin to look into her green eyes.
"I need to train more..." Buffy felt her heart ache for her friends, a stitch of pain bursting through her back as she thought of Glory and what she did to end their lives. "I failed..."
"If you keep thinking thoughts like that, this will never get over and done with. We will train as soon as you are better. You helped me when I needed you, and I will be there when you need me." Buffy began to acknowledge the tears falling down her face, and Angel wiped them away, kissing her gently on the lips. The two turned their attention as Cordelia stood while Dawn seemed to panic. Cordelia began to stumble towards the desk. "A vision. Stay here." Angel got up and Buffy got up despite his words and the pain as he exited the room and followed. Cordelia was grabbing for some paper and a pencil, describing what she knew.
//"Tell the Slayer that I'm looking for her. I will offer a reward for her live body! The one who comes through for me will get to live! I'll keep killing until I get Buffy, Mark my words!" Glory grabbed a demon from the bar, and drained his brain, laughing as she felt the energy enter her. She was still in Sunnydale.\\
"Buffy! It's for you..." Buffy had stopped following Angel at the office door, where she clung to the doorknob for desperate support. Her vision began to distort and she unsteadily began to lean forward to try to keep her balance, but her grip, though strong, failed. She lowered to her knees while holding her stomach and then she felt suddenly tired. Angel looked at the note, then Dawn noticed Buffy's back as she leaned forward on her knees. Buffy began to breathe a bit heavily as she felt the pain in her muscles increase until she blacked out. Angel approached her and knelt down next to her, noticing the blank and empty stare and knowing that she was just taking a sabbatical from pain. It resembled being in shock, where your body takes away the pain for a total turnover of your muscle movement; it was also very peaceful.
"Buffy!" Dawn said; she seemed very pale then, and she sat down, her eyes not leaving Buffy's wound. Cordelia went over to Dawn and got her attention.
"It's okay, Dawn, we're here and we're going to take care of you."
"Both of you." said Angel, who lifted Buffy into his arms. "Don't worry. She'll be okay."
"Are you going to be okay?" Dawn looked as if she were going to bawl, and Buffy slowly came out of the trance-like state as if she had finally soaked up what was actually happening; her eyes slid shut as she realized what she just read meant. There would be raids on Angel's part if they found out where she was. She didn't reveal any of her thoughts, though, as she forced herself to look at her sister. Dawn looked frustrated suddenly as she remembered who did this to her sister, and made up her mind about something very vital. Friend or no friend, no one, not even Ben had a chance to repent for his demonic counterpart.
"Kill Ben, just kill him. I don't care anymore. He let it all happen. He had become a coward because of what he did, and now I only have a sister left."
"I will." The sun began to set and Buffy blinked as she saw the darkness, realizing something very harsh very quickly. While she drove Dawn down here she made sure Dawn rested, while she herself had not rested since the morning before, which was, when she had rested, four hours tops. She tried not to let it go noticed that she was tired. "I need to work on something, a plan, something..."
"You need to rest for now. You should after that long journey down here. Cordy, do you think Dawn can stay with you for the night?" Cordelia nodded. "Thanks. I'm going to try to fix her up." He lifted Buffy very carefully into his arms, trying to avoid the wound on her back and her ribs as he watched Cordelia lead Dawn out of the office to get back to her apartment. Cordelia glanced back to see them and led Dawn away, trying to start decent conversation but not knowing if she was going to get any kind of response. When they were out of earshot of the closed office door, Buffy groaned, and Angel kissed her forehead. "Just sleep, I'll protect you, I promise..."
How?...Buffy thought as she drifted into an uneasy rest.
~~~~
A/N: It would be a big help if someone could tell me who everyone was during the last Glory episode (in "Angel") and what they're like so I don't screw anything up. No, I'm not trying to be lazy, but there are just too many characters and I'm just learning, too slowly for comfort. I would be very grateful for the pleasantries. Thank You!
by Daniele-Marx
Disclaimer: I do not own BtVS or Angel, but the plot is from my own brain, and I just revised Chapter One. There is little difference, but it should sate any large questions you may have, but feedback would be nice. thank you.
~.Marx.~
Storyline: What would have happened if Glory had succeeded in killing all of the Scoobies but Buffy and Dawn?
~~~~
Cordelia stopped typing as she heard someone knock on the office door. Yesterday, Angel had begun brooding, and now Cordelia was starting to really worry for her once boss. He told everyone to basically leave him alone and they promised they would be back later. Fred hadn't appeared out of her room just yet, but he was sure he could get her to work with him soon. Gunn and Wesley had said they would be back later that night, but until then, it was just Angel and Cordelia occupying any office space today.
Cordelia stood and walked over to the entrance, opening the door. A gasp left her throat as she saw Buffy Summers standing there. The slayer was wearing the usual black coat and attire, but she was covered mostly with dirt as if she were a soul survivor of a war. Her eyes were distant and empty, devoid of thought or emotion as if she hadn't had a peaceful moment in days. Cordelia looked over to see if Angel had seen any of this, but opted not to call for him just yet. What was she thinking?! Of course it was terribly important! Cordelia steadied the voice in her head and took a swallow to recuperate. "Buffy, what's wrong?" Buffy grabbed someone's arm from behind her in the entrance, revealing Dawn and pulling her into the Hotel. Dawn was very unstable, but holding herself back like Buffy was. Cordelia was wondering why Dawn was wearing a tattered midieval gown, but turned her attention back to the slayer. She led the two into the office. "Buffy?" Buffy didn't answer and Cordelia shut the door. "What happened?" The next words were barely a whisper as if they were covered with a blanket of denial and pain.
"I need to speak with Angel." Buffy's voice cracked as if she had been malnourished. Angel had been sitting in his office with the door closed and Cordelia wasn't sure if he was wanting company.
"Why? What happened?" Cordelia watched as Buffy turned around, her eyes reddened as if trying not to cry. Buffy's face contorted and she forced it away futily.
"Everyone is dead, Cordelia."
"Dead? What do you mean, dead?" Cordelia was confused. Angel's ears perked up from his office. Buffy felt herself beginning to breathe a bit harder as tears began to threaten her composure.
"I mean they're dead." she panted at almost hyperventilating point. "Xander, Willow, Giles, everyone. Glory, she--" She fought to stay standing and put her hand up against the wall to steady herself; she held her stomach as if she were going to empty her stomach from anguish but seemed to hold herself back. Angel was out in the main room in no time, staring at Buffy. He was both surprised and horrified by her appearance, noticing an obvious limp in her usual style and grace, the way her eyes worked like a panic button, not seeing anything but fear and pain. It worried him greatly. Cordelia felt tears rise to her eyes, and she wiped them away lightly. "I couldn't save them..." Suddenly she broke down and, braced against the wall, leaned down to steady her breathing. Angel walked over to her and put his hand on her back, rubbing it soothingly. She let out a gasp of pain and he hesitated, lessening the pressure on her back.
"Glorificus?" Angel tried to hold his feelings at bay, but he knew it was not helping.
"She was too strong." The pain was evident in Buffy, and he looked at Cordelia. His mind strained as he heard her declare her weakness. Buffy began to force her breathing down and she stood up straight. Angel looked at Dawn, expressing his deepest regrets because he wasn't there to help. Dawn seemed a bit nervous since she wasn't expressing any emotion whatsoever; he guessed that she was scared of Buffy's reaction and was probably wondering why she didn't react the same.
"Take care of Dawn." He led Buffy into the office, and shut the door. It was darker in there because of the shades he drew and he took her into his arms, holding her; she responded and hugged him, feeling a sob escape her throat and all feeling leave her.
They stood like that for minutes.
Angel stroked her hair and felt her tense body slightly calm down. As soon as she did manage to do so, her body tensed up twice as fast as her breath caught. He knew Buffy's reaction to his rubbing her back was not something that could be overlooked in case Glorificus had managed to harm her greatly. Something was wrong. He needed to hear what happened. Parting her, he sat her down on the couch as he sat as well. She sat slowly back as if she were having some sort of chest pains, and she hoped he had enough reason to let her physical pain pass, but knew she was just literally holding her breath. "Tell me what happened." Buffy felt the tears start to stream down her face, and she sobbed as he held her close to him.
"...She held onto me as she sent her minions on them. They had this power that not even Willow could match, especially when she and Tara worked together." A sob escaped her and she forced herself to continue but not cease her tears. "First went Anya, then Xander, Tara, Giles, Willow, and even Spike got beheaded but not before freeing Dawn..." Buffy felt a new wave of pain hit her chest, and she clenched her fists.
"Why Dawn."
"They got along. He didn't treat her like the rest of us had, like a child. She's the Key Glory wants so she can open the portals of all the dimensions. I wouldn't let her take my little sister away from me. But even though she's not my sister, her blood is mine, and we share the same memories. But Glory was planning to use Dawn's blood to keep the portal open..."
"And you stopped it?" Buffy felt the tears begin to dry and she wiped them from her eyes.
"She didn't get to perform the ceremony because we were pretty fast and furious. Giles had said that she wouldn't have the will to fight back if we stopped the ritual, but she didn't stop coming after us..." Buffy began to cry softly, but brought her hand up to stifle her tears. Angel reached out to the endtable and grabbed a hankerchief, giving it to her and pulling her into him. "Dawn could have died and it would have been all my fault because she was sent to me for protection..." Angel hesitated. "I should have fought harder, I should have tried harder. Now Willow's gone, Xander...Giles..." A pause. "...Death is my gift afterall..." Angel hesitated once again. Her tears resurfaced.
"Death is your gift...Who told you that." He stared at the opposite wall in his office, stroking her hair and listening to her as she wept.
"The first Slayer when I went to get answers in the desert...'Death is your gift' she said, but I didn't understand...I failed everyone by letting them die. I should've done something!" Buffy wasn't holding back the sobs anymore, and Angel held her to his chest. "I should've done something..." Angel felt remorse for not being there in the first place. Then something dawned on him.
"What about Riley?"
"He left a few weeks ago to work in South America for the Initiative." Angel felt angry at Riley suddenly for leaving like that, but knew something bad would have had to happen sooner or later; he didn't even like Riley, but settled for it anyway. "When Faith came back she somehow used magic to switch bodies with me..." Angel hadn't heard this before, and seemed intrigued suddenly by her words. "She used my body to get intimate with Riley, and he fell for it, thinking it was me. He didn't see anything wrong and couldn't tell the difference between us...it hurt so bad when he looked at me when I told him." Buffy seemed to get more upset about the whole ordeal as she thought about it, so Angel decided to change the subject. He knew he would have been able to tell her from Faith because he knew Buffy and knew what Faith had been capable of. She knew that, too, thus he didn't have to bring it to her attention, though it might have helped.
"Where is Glorificus?"
"I don't know. If she followed us, I don't know what will happen. I don't know if her minions would ransack mom's house for information on where I would be, but if she did, she might just be headed in this direction. I imagine she wouldn't think of that, but anything is possible."
"What were you planning to do."
"I wanted to find someone who would be willing to help me fight better. I need to train more, to beat her once and for all. I can't fight her like she is. Giles said it was possible, but she could only be beaten if she took her previous form, a guy named Ben. I'd have to weaken her so he could take over, then I'd have to kill him."
"That doesn't seem so hard." Buffy felt her anguish return, and she felt Angel touch her forehead. She wanted to get away. The pain in her back was fading with every moment she spend with Angel, but she knew she would have to heal with or without him. His arm protectively around her, she felt at peace, and that was something to start out with. She had remembered a name Giles had used once to describe the choosing of the Chosen One, and that had been, "The Powers That Be..."
"What?"
"The Powers That Be, what are they..." A pause.
"They are everything. They control our fate." Buffy remembered something about the conversation she had with her Watcher about the Powers That Be, and it was that they made things happen that would bring an overall reaction to a certain situation. One example he used was that there were currently two Vampire Slayers: Buffy and Faith. Buffy felt an urge to react out of anger back then, but she had learned to accept some of the things they had talked about.
"Do they make the impossible happen? Can they let things like this happen?"
"...Yes." Angel listened to her breathing, and she paused. "I should have been there, I'm sorry...I was sort of stuck in an alternate dimension saving cows..." Buffy looked up at him oddly. Angel...saving...cows...? She didn't want to know...He looked down at her and she let a smile slip past her blank stare. She almost threw her reason out of the window as she looked up to meet those beautiful eyes, and their lips met gently. It felt as if their sorrows were being left behind, and Angel held her closer as she leaned further into him. It was a comfort, being in each other's arms, and they parted reluctantly. She flinched very slightly, and he looked at her as she blinked her eyes as if in physical pain. "You're hurt." Buffy felt nervous as Angel said this, and he touched her left set of ribs, thinking that Glory broke one. They seemed bruised in the front, but they would heal fast. "What happened..." He pressed in two ribs on the right side of her back at once, and her mouth flew open from horror, her voice failing her as her face went beet red. Tears streamed down her face as his hands left her and held her on the other side. No immediate reaction. Her pain came from her ribs, in which one appeared to be broken while another seemed to be cracked.
"What did she do to you. Show me." Buffy looked into his eyes, and he touched her back, making her wince and close her eyes tensely.
"There." She went to lean forward but Angel stopped her, holding onto her shoulders to prove his point.
"Don't do that. You'll end up hurting yourself more. Your back is hurt as well? Is it sore?" Buffy suddenly looked paler, and she shook her head no. She attempted to remove her coat, holding her breath so she could do so; she gave up when she couldn't hold back the obvious pain, and Angel held her more gently. He helped her lean forward very slightly to assist her with her coat, moving the jacket downwards and off her back and his eyes widening.
"It feels worse." she said as a sob passed through her throat.
"What do you remember?" He ran his hand very gently over a wound that was about five inches in diameter, and her shirt had been torn where the wound had been made. Her torn shirt had covered a bloody stain on her back; it was mostly dried already. The wound was right behind her heart, and he felt a mixture of fear and pain as he grazed his hand over the wound as lightly as he could. She winced and then shuddered.
"When she was holding me down, I felt my back ripping open; it felt as if she did it with her own hand..."
"We have to remove your shirt, the blood's already dried it to your skin. It's right behind your heart. She was trying to kill you."
"She told me she would do that. I didn't think she would do it, though. She didn't screw up my brain, at least."
"We should probably get you somewhere that can help, you might need surgery."
"I don't want to go to the hospital. I heal fast."
"I have a feeling that you can't heal this alone. I'm surprised you got here at all."
"Nothing was going to keep me from getting here...Not when I felt I needed you most." Angel brought up his hand to push some hair from her eyes.
"I should've been there. I am sorry."
"Please don't...The Powers let this happen, didn't they? Maybe they were trying to tell me something by letting a God kill the first friends I ever had..." Tears streamed down her face as she said this, but she didn't acknowledge them.
"I'll take care of you." Angel raised her chin to look into her green eyes.
"I need to train more..." Buffy felt her heart ache for her friends, a stitch of pain bursting through her back as she thought of Glory and what she did to end their lives. "I failed..."
"If you keep thinking thoughts like that, this will never get over and done with. We will train as soon as you are better. You helped me when I needed you, and I will be there when you need me." Buffy began to acknowledge the tears falling down her face, and Angel wiped them away, kissing her gently on the lips. The two turned their attention as Cordelia stood while Dawn seemed to panic. Cordelia began to stumble towards the desk. "A vision. Stay here." Angel got up and Buffy got up despite his words and the pain as he exited the room and followed. Cordelia was grabbing for some paper and a pencil, describing what she knew.
//"Tell the Slayer that I'm looking for her. I will offer a reward for her live body! The one who comes through for me will get to live! I'll keep killing until I get Buffy, Mark my words!" Glory grabbed a demon from the bar, and drained his brain, laughing as she felt the energy enter her. She was still in Sunnydale.\\
"Buffy! It's for you..." Buffy had stopped following Angel at the office door, where she clung to the doorknob for desperate support. Her vision began to distort and she unsteadily began to lean forward to try to keep her balance, but her grip, though strong, failed. She lowered to her knees while holding her stomach and then she felt suddenly tired. Angel looked at the note, then Dawn noticed Buffy's back as she leaned forward on her knees. Buffy began to breathe a bit heavily as she felt the pain in her muscles increase until she blacked out. Angel approached her and knelt down next to her, noticing the blank and empty stare and knowing that she was just taking a sabbatical from pain. It resembled being in shock, where your body takes away the pain for a total turnover of your muscle movement; it was also very peaceful.
"Buffy!" Dawn said; she seemed very pale then, and she sat down, her eyes not leaving Buffy's wound. Cordelia went over to Dawn and got her attention.
"It's okay, Dawn, we're here and we're going to take care of you."
"Both of you." said Angel, who lifted Buffy into his arms. "Don't worry. She'll be okay."
"Are you going to be okay?" Dawn looked as if she were going to bawl, and Buffy slowly came out of the trance-like state as if she had finally soaked up what was actually happening; her eyes slid shut as she realized what she just read meant. There would be raids on Angel's part if they found out where she was. She didn't reveal any of her thoughts, though, as she forced herself to look at her sister. Dawn looked frustrated suddenly as she remembered who did this to her sister, and made up her mind about something very vital. Friend or no friend, no one, not even Ben had a chance to repent for his demonic counterpart.
"Kill Ben, just kill him. I don't care anymore. He let it all happen. He had become a coward because of what he did, and now I only have a sister left."
"I will." The sun began to set and Buffy blinked as she saw the darkness, realizing something very harsh very quickly. While she drove Dawn down here she made sure Dawn rested, while she herself had not rested since the morning before, which was, when she had rested, four hours tops. She tried not to let it go noticed that she was tired. "I need to work on something, a plan, something..."
"You need to rest for now. You should after that long journey down here. Cordy, do you think Dawn can stay with you for the night?" Cordelia nodded. "Thanks. I'm going to try to fix her up." He lifted Buffy very carefully into his arms, trying to avoid the wound on her back and her ribs as he watched Cordelia lead Dawn out of the office to get back to her apartment. Cordelia glanced back to see them and led Dawn away, trying to start decent conversation but not knowing if she was going to get any kind of response. When they were out of earshot of the closed office door, Buffy groaned, and Angel kissed her forehead. "Just sleep, I'll protect you, I promise..."
How?...Buffy thought as she drifted into an uneasy rest.
~~~~
A/N: It would be a big help if someone could tell me who everyone was during the last Glory episode (in "Angel") and what they're like so I don't screw anything up. No, I'm not trying to be lazy, but there are just too many characters and I'm just learning, too slowly for comfort. I would be very grateful for the pleasantries. Thank You!
