Author's Notes: Hello, all! It's been a long, long time since I wrote anything for Angel or BtVS, so I'm not sure what to expect from you all, but I'm looking forward to sharing this with you! The idea for this story hit me in 2014 after I re-watched both series, and I've been working on this narrative on and off ever since. I have a complete rough draft written, so you needn't worry about an abandoned WIP. I have no planned posting schedule. I'll be uploading parts as I finish editing them, which may be slowly or quickly, depending on how busy I am in a given week. Though I had a little help in the beginning, I haven't had a beta for this in years. Any mistakes are my own. Along those lines ... I'm a little nervous, so be gentle, but I don't mind thoughtful/polite constructive criticism. Thank you so for any comments!
This is a post-NFA story. Barring further changes, it clocks in at about 75k words, told in 14 chapters. I don't read the comics, so they're not canon to this. Ship-wise this story primarily features B/A, but I'm big on canon, so C/A is not ignored, and it's treated respectfully.
To my GA fic fans who are wondering why I've suddenly jumped fandoms ... don't worry! I haven't abandoned you guys. I still plan to finish my WIPs there :)
Fire and Ice
Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.
~Robert Frost
Entropy (Angel)
Angel revels in savagery. He makes no attempt to bridle his killing edge. He needs it. The blood painted on his skin drives him. The cloying scent of death collecting in the back of his throat keeps him fierce.
He knows he's doing the right thing, even as Gunn's broken body is trampled by the first wave of demons, even as Illyria is bisected by a blade, and her corpse is thrown asunder, even as Spike's ashes run into the gutter, swept into eternity by the rain. Angel knows he's doing the right thing as he blocks and parries and stabs and swipes. Wesley, Gunn, all of them, knew going into this battle that death was nipping at their heels. Angel considered them consenting adults, and he doesn't have time to mourn.
The horde in the alley is mostly broken bodies, now, and he thinks he just might win this thing, though he's saved the hardest beast for the last. The dragon screams in the distance. Angel thinks he sees a plume of fire through the sheets of rain, and doubt encroaches, but he shoves it away.
He makes it to the end of the alley. His axe is gone, but all he needs are teeth and will, and he has both in abundance, because he's doing the right thing. He must be.
The Powers That Be sent him the memo. He's crippling the evil in his city. In the world. He's fighting the Apocalypse tooth and claw because he still hopes for the better, and he wants that for his son. For Buffy, no matter who she's with. For Cordelia, no matter where she is. For all the gawkers at their windows, watching now in frozen awe, their heartbeats a clamorous thunder. For everyone.
He's also fighting to prove a point: that there can be victory, even in losing, even if the fight never ends, because there isno winning or losing. It's all a matter of perception and perspective. He's learned that, now.
The last demon in the alley draws its last, pained gasp, and Angel permits himself a bloodstained, feral smile. A brief one. He isn't done, yet. He pulls a longsword from the lax fingers of the demon he just killed, and he turns. He blinks water out of his eyes.
The building at the mouth of the alley falls to rubble. The dragon perches on its newest conquest and roars. The cacophony makes Angel think his breastbone might diffuse to dust, as surely as if he were staked. He's deafened, startled out of violence and thrill, and plunged into frigid clarity.
He stares at a concrete graveyard. A swath of razed buildings stretches as far as he can see behind the one that just collapsed. He sees a maze of broken traffic lights and telephone poles, tangles of smashed cars, glittering broken glass, and a gas station in flames. People scurry for cover. They scream. A baby cries from somewhere distant, but there's a metal crunch, a horn honks for too long, and the wailing chokes into silence. He has no idea how many innocent people died while he fought lesser minions, but he knows the count is no small sum.
The dragon burned the forest to ash while Angel hacked at trees.
In that moment, Angel's conviction crumbles.
He is entropy. He is death.
He was duped.
Again.
The dragon leaps into the air and lands on the wet street, mere feet away. The ground shakes with the impact, and Angel almost loses his footing. Hot, fetid breath laves his skin as he rights himself. Razor teeth clack inches from his face, and Angel is afraid.
He's killed all the villains on his list, he's killed thousands of innocents in a matter of minutes, and he's killed his dearest friends. He supposes that's what the Senior Partners wanted all along. A power vacuum, mass casualties, and no one to pick up the mess.
He's sinking. He will be judged. Why didn't he see it before?
The dragon cocks its head and peers at him with reptilian eyes. A forked tongue snakes into the air, testing, tasting. Wisps of fire flicker from its nostrils as it breathes. It shifts its weight from left to right, claws scraping the pavement, but it doesn't strike.
For a moment, Angel wonders as he stands there, a bug before an oncoming windshield, why the delay?
He's not prepared for the killing blow.
The dragon's clubbed tail swipes him with the force of a rocket. Angel is flying. His longsword falls from his nerveless fingers. He has a moment of giddy weightlessness before the pain from his shattered ribs and sternum grinds his giddiness to dust. A strident roar shakes the earth. An unfurling blast of hellfire chases him through the air, but he slams into a wall before the fire catches him.
Brick crumbles. He slides to the ground. Flame pits the broken wall above his head, singeing his hair. And then the world snaps from the blue-black of rain to riotous red.
"-ngel?"
He can't move. He's confused. He's dizzy. He might vomit. Painful, white-hot flashes of color dance beneath his eyelids. His ears ring.
"An-"
Sound goes in and out. What little he can hear is distorted like he's listening to the ocean in a conch shell, and the voice is carrying on the wind from the beach. Something warm touches his cheek.
"-on, Angel. Wake u-"
He should worry, but he can't. He can't anything.
"-lease!"
The world goes away for a while.
When he flounders back to consciousness, another piece of himself comes with him this time.
"A-?" a disembodied "she" says.
He thinks of Buffy. He doesn't know when or how she might have gotten here. He doesn't know why he's hurt, what hurt him, or where he is. He doesn't care. But with a little imagination, he can answer one question. Who.
Buffy makes him feel safe.
He needs that feeling. He doesn't know why.
"Ang-!" she pleads.
Buffy. His nose is the only thing in his body that works, and he would recognize her anywhere. Dewdrops and roses, both thick and heady under the strawberry scent of her shampoo. A cocktail of scents that is unique to her.
She's not a figment. He didn't imagine her. She's real.
"Angel, pl-," she says. "-ort of sign. Anyth-"
He smells her fear. He smells death. She's clutching at him, shaking him. He hurts. He thinks his head might be in her lap. He manages to squeeze her hand. Sort of.
"Oh, thank g-"
Not a figment. Real.
"-open your eyes?"
No, he can't.
"Ca-," she continues, but he can't make out at least half of it. "-eak?"
His head is spinning, and all he can see is a kaleidoscope that shouldn't be there, even with his eyes closed. He moves his jaw a millimeter, trying to say something to appease her, but pain punishes him for his audacity, and he stills. The colors in the kaleidoscope sharpen as he suffers. His insides churn, and he really thinks he might be sick.
He lies still, lips parted as he scents her. Her thumb traces his mouth. He doesn't know why she's here, but he revels in the irrefutable evidence. He's crippled, but he's safe, and he lets himself drift.
When he gains enough sense to understand complete sentences, she's not speaking to him, anymore. She's not holding him. He hears a pounding that repeats over and over, like the ringing of a church bell. The sound isn't the same as the horrible pounding in his head.
Smash. "Stupid rubble," she mutters between blows. Another smash. "Stupid demons." Another smash. "Stupid kamikaze vampire who thinks." Smash. "He's." Smash. "Invincible." Smash. "When." Smash. "He's so." Smash. "So." Smash. Smash. Smash. "So not."
The pounding stops. She's panting. Her boots scuffle as she moves across glass and other broken things. She plops down next to him with a frustrated sigh. The heat of her body presses against his cold skin.
"Bu-," he manages. Lightning lances his jaw. A strangled growl clots in his throat, and pain seizes him.
"Hey," she says, relief flooding her voice, but he blacks out.
The next time he's awake, it's only long enough to roll onto his side and vomit.
His eyes work. Sort of.
A black halo pinches the edges of his vision, and even when he holds his gaze still, things wander to the left like they're spinning around him on a turntable. If he didn't feel so wretched, he might enjoy the novelty of this experience. He can't recall an injury ever wreaking havoc with his senses this much.
A buzzing fluorescent light flickers overhead.
She's dragged him away from the bloody mess he made in the other corner. The scent of it arouses his hurting body, and his demon stirs, all while his stomach churns. Her heartbeat thunders in his ears. He needs blood. Blood will heal him. Blood will make the world stop spinning. The very idea of blood makes him feel like throwing up again. He can't remember ever being so singularly enthralled and repulsed all at once.
Buffy kicks at a pile of rubble that may have been, at one point, a doorway. She kicks over and over. Bits and chunks of concrete, insulation, and sheet rock fall down to the floor with each strike. She pauses every few minutes to clear away the refuse she's loosened. She stops when she hears him growl, and her entire demeanor changes from Slayer-who-gets-things-done Buffy to the Buffy who wrapped his hand after Spike had stabbed him through with a knife. Her hair is wild, her shirt is torn, she has a black eye, and her skin is covered in bloodstained grime, but he thinks she's beautiful.
"Angel," she says, her tone a mix of reverence and worry. She slides to the ground next to him.
He stares, unblinking.
A spiderweb of cracks lashes out from a circular epicenter on the wall near where he lay before. He thinks that might be where the dragon threw him into the side of the building. Something fluid drips from a pipe beyond their prison. A demon's corpse is pinned where the ceiling has crashed into the floor at a slant. He and Buffy are trapped in a small triangular space that feels like a cave. This doesn't seem like the side of a building in an alley. He's pretty sure he hit brick on his fall, not sheet rock, so the cracks in the wall puzzle him, but a lot about this situation puzzles him.
Her fingers brush through his hair. Over his scalp. She avoids the half of his face that's throbbing. The gesture comforts him.
"You're really messed up," she observes. Her eyes are wet, and they glisten in the flickering light.
"Yes," he agrees through gritted teeth. Fangs, he realizes, as they press against his lips and break skin. He tries to relax and make them go away. He doesn't like to show them to Buffy. But he hurts, and he's nauseated, and he can't conjure the box in his mind that he likes to put them in, or the lock and key that he uses to keep them there. They're stuck in place. Blood pools at the corners of his mouth. He thinks about licking it off, but his stomach roils, and he can't stop thinking about it fast enough.
She must see the craving cross his gaze. "Are you hungry?"
His feelings on the matter are too complex to explain in monosyllables. He's learned that moving his jaw is agony. He thinks, maybe, it's broken or worse. Pulverized. "No," he says, only his tongue and lips moving. "Sick."
Her gaze softens. "I noticed that part," she says, equal parts wryness and sympathy.
He loves her for that. He loves that everything can be falling down around their ears, and she can still crack a joke and comfort him all at once. The world is spinning, but he holds on to the merry-go-round with all his might.
"You get .…" He winces. "Dragon?"
She gives him a funny look. She points at the demon crushed by the ceiling. "The Kevlar thingy is dead," she says.
"Kreplar," he says. He doesn't remember Kreplar demons in the alley.
She rolls her eyes. "Thanks, Giles," she says, but she's smiling.
"Drag-?" he says again. The last syllable falls off in a rasp, and her smile fades.
Her nose scrunches up in that cute way it does when she's perplexed. A shadow of suspicion crosses her face. "Angel, do you have any idea where you are?"
"No," he says, and this is the first time this worries him.
"But you know who I am?" she prods.
"Bu-" He swallows thickly. "Buffy."
A fleshy blur appears in front of his face. The predator in him feels the air shift. He knows innately that prey is within striking distance, not that he can do anything that resembles pouncing. Not that he would. Not that she'd let him, anyway.
"How many fingers am I holding up?" she says, but he doesn't know.
He can't focus on the space that close to his face. He can't focus much at all. His neck hurts. His head feels too big. He shuts his eyes, because the fluorescent strip snapping overhead is like a whip cracking against him over and over.
"Killed them," he mumbles.
"My fingers?" she says, her tone helpless and confused.
He curls into a fetal position, trying to shut some of it out. The light. The dizziness. Her enthralling, comforting, nauseating heartbeat.
He feels her staring at his back. She rubs her hand in a soothing path along his bruised spine. "I'm gonna keep working on this doorway," she says, and the pressure on his back shifts as she makes some gesture he can't see. "You just … rest for a bit." He can tell she struggles for the right words. "Okay?"
Her hands leave him. She shoves to her feet. He hears her brushing plaster off the knees of her pants.
He sleeps.
For some reason, whatever's happened to him allows him to perform complex math. He can add two plus two and get seven, and it all makes sense. Using this kind of thought process allows him to get the idea that he can stand and help her move rubble out of the way. He's strong, and the two of them together might make faster progress. As theories go, it's not his worst one.
He doesn't get much beyond sitting up. He moves like some sort of logy sloth, and by the time he's upright, he thinks he might be sick again. He rests with his undamaged cheek pressed against the sheet rock.
"It's okay," she says between kicks. "You can provide moral support."
He's still sitting up and staring blankly, legs curled underneath him, when he hears a heartbeat that isn't Buffy's. More than one, actually. On a good day, dealing with lots of people at once can still be a trying experience if he's not in the right mood. On a bad day like this, though, it's torture.
The living are a screaming chorus that he can't shut out, and the awful duality of hunger and queasiness nearly bowls him flat. He presses the back of his hand against his fangs, sinking his teeth into skin. The predatory need to bite is assuaged, and he feels better, not that better is good. He's disgusted with himself, but at least the thought of killing them all is buried by this empty satisfaction and the agony in his jaw. He keeps his fangs sunk into flesh as a coping mechanism. He trembles.
"B!" calls a familiar voice through the rubble. There's a distant tapping, scraping sound. "You in there?"
Faith came to Los Angeles, too, he realizes. He's torn between joy and shame. He wonders if the other heartbeats are other slayers. The squeezing in his gut says yes. One slayer is hardly noticeable unless he's paying specific attention, but bunches of them in the same spot are uncomfortable.
He wonders if they all came to help. All of them think he's evil. He can't disagree anymore. They wouldn't help him perpetrate destruction, but he imagines they'll help him repair it. If they don't stake him, first, that is.
"Here!" yells Buffy. "We're in here! We got the demon!" Her shout echoes through the claustrophobic space, and it makes Angel cringe. Everything in his skull is still pounding, even after she's stopped kicking the debris in the doorway. He bites harder into his hand. The whole side of his face is screaming at him. Blood he can't afford to lose oozes down his wrist.
"We?" Faith says. "Are you with the big guy, too? We've been lookin' all over."
"Yeah," Buffy replies, "Angel's here, but he's hurt, so he's not talking much."
Somebody snorts with laughter, and Angel thinks it sounds familiar.
"Hey," Buffy says, scowling on his behalf. "At least he usually makes sense. He's totally not doing that right now."
She turns to him with a hopeful, teasing grin that fades when she sees what he's doing. She stares at Angel's bloody hand. He doesn't think he's ever acted this subhuman in front of her before. There's no horror or disgust or judgment loitering in her gaze, but if he were human, his cheeks would flame. He can't let go, even with her staring. He needs it. He's got his hand in a death grip like a lion strangling a gazelle, and he needs it. A growl of pain he can't seem to stop vibrates in his throat.
"How many of our girls are out there?" Buffy asks, unperturbed.
"The whole cavalry, why?" Faith says.
Buffy shifts her weight. "Angel's all wiggy. Send some away."
Nobody asks what Buffy means. There's mumbling discussion on the other side of the debris pile, and then the sound of retreating footsteps. The thundering heartbeat chorus beyond the door eases to a quartet, and the warning tingle of nearby slayers recedes.
Angel can almost think again. His jaw throbs. The skin on the back of his hand is ragged as he shakily drops his arm into his lap.
"Sorry, A," Faith says. "You guys had a lot of people worried."
"How long have we been missing?" Buffy asks.
"Twenty hours, give or take," Faith says.
Angel is floored. He can't think of a time he's been unconscious that long without being drugged.
He closes his eyes as people start banging on the rubble from both sides. What sounds like crowbars and swords and other screeching, scraping metal things on one side, Buffy kicking on the other. Between two slayers and a host of digging tools, they level what Buffy didn't already have clear. Angel has no doubt that Buffy alone would have gotten them out in another six hours or so, but he's grateful for the intervention.
People rush into the tight space, and Angel is overwhelmed. He presses against the wall, his eyes closed. He smells fresh blood, and no amount of nausea can stop him from reaching for the thermos dangling in front of him. It's plastic. His fangs make funny clanking noises as he tries to bite it before he remembers to sip, and then he's chugging so fast it's gone in a matter of seconds.
The blood is pig, and it's not fulfilling. He wants more, but then he doesn't want more. The heartbeats in the room cease their siren call, becoming only background noise. There's no duality, now. He only feels sick.
Someone takes the thermos from his trembling hands. He looks up.
Cordelia smiles down at him. "You're so lucky I had a vision, buster."
He can't think of anything to say.
She looks to the man standing next to her. "I'll get his left; you get his right?"
Wesley nods. "Yes, of course."
They both move to grab Angel's arms when Gunn intercedes and takes over for Cordelia. Angel is pulled to his feet before he can form a coherent thought. Vertigo yanks on his legs like an undertow. He's not supporting any of his weight. Wesley grunts, and Gunn stumbles. Cordelia reaches out to help steady them all.
Angel shakes, not sure what's going on. He inhales through his teeth, expecting what he smells to tell him a different story than what he sees, but when their scents rush across the back of his throat, he knows unequivocally that they're all real. They're all here. And they're all living.
He thinks, for the first time, that his brain is well and truly banjaxed.
He's lying somewhere in that alley where the dragon smashed him, and he's dreaming up all his favorite people. He's fantasizing, and he's so far gone, he doesn't know he's fantasizing. Or he does, but he doesn't care, because he loves what he's made up for himself. At the same time, he's sinking, because he knows, now, that he never left the alley, Buffy never came for him, and Faith is back in Rome, too.
"You're all dead," Angel protests, confused and trembling.
"See," Buffy says. She's leaning on Faith. "He's not making a lot with the sense."
"He does seem rather bell rung," Wesley says, his tone more than a little worried.
"Howdy, understatement," Cordelia adds.
Angel wants to respond. He does. But he's barely keeping himself conscious, and he wants to be conscious. A hand waves in front of his face. He's so discombobulated that he snaps at it. His fangs click closed over empty air, and he snarls.
"Hey!" Cordelia shrieks.
"Yo," Gunn says. "Let's not taunt the injured, starving vampire. I wanna keep my neck intact."
"I wasn't taunting him," Cordelia protests, and the look on her face shifts from indignation to horror. "He wouldn't eat you!" She makes an impolite gagging sound. "And anyway, yuck!"
"Cordelia," Wesley says calmly, "I think it's safe to assume he's not quite himself. Now, shall we?"
Angel tries to walk. They pull him through the doorway they cleared and out into dark sewer. This isn't the alley where he fought the dragon. Rubble is strewn everywhere. Things have collapsed.
"The earthquake messed up some of the tunnels, or we would have gotten here sooner," Cordelia says, answering the question he didn't ask.
Waste sloshes at his feet. The stench is overwhelming. He makes it less than an eighth of a mile before he can't make himself go anymore, and all they're doing is dragging him.
"The tunnel to the hotel is blocked, B," Faith says as they stop near a ladder. The paint is chipping and rusty metal shows through. She points to the ceiling. "The van's parked up there."
"Any thoughts on getting this two-hundred-twenty-five pound deadweight to the top of that?" Gunn says, peering dubiously at the long climb.
Angel wants to help. He wants to climb, but he knows he'll make it two rungs before the dizziness claims him, and he falls. Maybe, not even that far.
He loses track of himself as they discuss their options. Their conversation is a comforting murmur. His eyelids are heavy. His neck hurts, and his head is throbbing. The blood he drank roils in his gut.
He drops his face, the good side, against Wesley's shoulder, and Angel can hear a beautiful thump-thump, thump-thump, thump-thump through the soft cotton collar of Wesley's t-shirt. The cadence of it numbs the pain. Wesley. Alive. Angel makes a rattling noise.
Gunn jumps an inch and almost lets go. "Since when the hell does he do that?"
"Um," Buffy says. She clears her throat after several nonsensical false starts. "Sometimes. Just .…"
"Vampires purr?" Wesley says. "That's fascinating."
"Kinda wicked," Faith says. "Like a big, evil cat."
"Jus' don' pet me," Angel slurs.
"Dude," Faith says with a hearty chuckle. "You made a joke," she continues, punching him lightly in the arm. Even as light as it is, the impact makes him sway precariously. "Right on."
"Joke?" he manages, the word faint like it came from miles away.
Faith snorts. "Never mind."
He wonders if he'll be adding swooning to his list of novel experiences for the day. He's been knocked out before, he's felt like crap and lain down, and he's been woozy enough to fade in and out, but he doesn't think he's ever just collapsed. He swallows, pressing his face against Wesley's shirt as he forces the subject sound of their conversation to cease.
His legs are boneless. His whole body is shaking. From strain. From trauma. From shock. He wishes they would let him lie down in the muck if they're just going to stand here and snark about his embarrassing bodily functions.
"So, affection, huh?" Cordelia says with a doubtful tone.
"Not like sex," Buffy rushes to say, and Angel almost thinks he prefers the idea of fainting, because then he wouldn't be working so hard on standing, or listening, for that matter. "Just … you know. Friendly."
"Then how come I've never heard it before?" Cordelia wants to know.
"Well, he's usually in his right mind," Buffy says. "Wait. That came out wrong."
Gunn laughs. Somebody smacks somebody else.
"Canwego?" Angel says, three words becoming one. The world around him feels like it's pulsing. "Please." He blinks, and for a fuzzy, weightless moment, he's not sure he'll open his eyes again. "Orlemmesit."
The conversation veers back to the problem at hand. Something is said about a rope.
Angel drifts.
He knows none of this can be real, no matter what his nose and his ears and every other sense is telling him. He lets himself enjoy the hallucination while it lasts. It's better than dying alone in an alley. At least this way, he has some company on the way to hell.
He has no idea they're tying the mentioned rope around him like a harness until he's lifted off the ground. Buffy has her arm around his waist as she climbs the ladder beside him. Faith is pulling at the top. Wesley pushes Angel's feet from below. The rope grinds into his armpits as Faith pulls him upward, adding a new sentence of discomfort to his novel of pain.
Once he gets used to this, he spaces out again.
It takes them a long time to move him up the ladder.
Faith yanks him through the manhole by his shirt collar. A searing bath of sunlight gives way to primal terror. He's mindless. He feels the fire burbling underneath his skin as his body begins to boil. He tries to back away, but Buffy's there, holding him in place, and then Faith is there, too, trying to keep him from bolting. No matter how strong he may be when he lets the demon win, he can't fight off two slayers when he can barely find the presence of mind to walk.
"Sorry, sorry!" he hears Buffy say. She's crying. "Get the blanket!"
His insides squeeze as he senses another unknown slayer in the area. "Got him!" the stranger yells as he's tackled. He falls over with the impact, and he doesn't move as he's smothered in a thick cocoon of cotton. The third slayer climbs off of him.
The army of heartbeats from before converge - more slayers - but he's too traumatized to do more than lie there. They pick him up as a unit, and they settle him into the back of a van that smells like WD-40. He's content to lie there while his head spins, and his stomach churns, and his skin slowly stops burning.
Buffy sits on the floor next to him. He feels the warmth of her hand soak through the blanket. The engine rumbles. Doors slam. Seat belts click. The van creeps forward, and everyone chatters happily.
He doesn't want to sleep. He doesn't want to lose them all again. He sleeps, nonetheless.
He wakes up in the shower. He's propped up on a plastic chair. Buffy's leaning over him, and she's wiping blood away from his face with a teal-colored washcloth. She dabs the wet fabric like she's afraid to touch him for fear of causing hurt. He wants to tell her he's already hurting so much that a little more won't matter.
"What-?" he says, blinking. He realizes he's naked. She's naked, too.
This can't be real, but he sees. He hears. He feels.
She smiles at him. "Welcome back," she says. "Feeling better?"
The water spiraling into the drain is dark with dirt and gore. The spray is warm and beats down on them like rain. The air is thick with steam.
He touches his face. He feels normal teeth and a normal brow line until midway across his left eyebrow. It's not misshapen, but it doesn't feel solid, and the pain when he touches it is excruciating. Spots form in his vision as he blinks. He yanks his hand away.
"No more game face," Buffy says, confirming his observation without judgment. "You fixed it about an hour ago."
He doesn't remember. He's not hungry at all. He doesn't remember feeding enough to sate himself, either, but he knows he did because he's full, and it's not sitting that well.
"Your jaw is looking a lot better," she adds.
He opens and closes his mouth experimentally. There's still pain, but it's an ache, not a knife stab.
The water pelts them. He stares at her. She had a black eye before, but she only has a yellowing skeleton of a bruise, now. She has beautiful eyes. They speak a million words to him, even when she says nothing at all. She loves him. She hurts for him. She's worried about him. She doesn't judge him. She doesn't mind the demon. He doesn't understand how she can look at him like this after he was such a monster, but seeing her staring at him without revilement is something that he needs right now.
"Buffy," he says.
"Yep," she replies. "That'd be me."
"Why aren't you in Rome?"
She blinks. "I'm gonna go out on a limb and say you're still broken."
Water plinks against the shower basin.
"I don't understand what's going on," he whispers, barely audible above the rush of water. His voice breaks. "They're all dead. I killed them. You're not here."
"Angel, you hit your head with a very hard wall," she says slowly. Her tone is soothing. "Your skull on the left side of your face is mush. I know this is really confusing, but you're okay, and I'm okay, and everybody is okay."
He gets the feeling she's assured him of this several times before. "Cordelia and Wesley-"
She presses her index finger to his lips. "They're both okay. Gunn is okay. Fred is okay. You didn't kill anybody, Angel. You just hit your head. Stop with the power freaking, already."
He senses no deceit.
She stoops and wraps her arms around him before he can ask another question. He lets himself sink into her embrace. She's so warm, and he hasn't seen her, not all of her like this, in years. He doesn't know why this moment with her is happening or how, but he can't bring himself to lodge more than a token protest. Her fingers run through his wet hair. She kisses him. He kisses her.
And then he can't participate anymore, because his head is spinning like a top, and he's nauseated again. He doesn't think he'd still be upright if it weren't for the chair. She turns off the water and wraps a fluffy towel around him.
Together, they hobble out of the steamy bathroom to a bed. His sense of balance is still in shambles, and Buffy does most of the work to move them across the plush carpet. He recognizes the décor in the room. It's not his penthouse at Wolfram & Hart, but he's too sick to care about it right now. She takes the wet towel away and helps him lie down. She pulls a blanket over him.
"Don't go," he says. "Please."
"Wasn't planning on it," she replies with a yawn as she crawls into bed next to him.
The ceiling is moving at a slow tilt like the sky on a horizon, and he's glad he doesn't have to stand or move or be sentient anymore. She rests her head on his shoulder, and he wraps his arm around her. She's a puzzle piece that fits. He can't comprehend how he survived five years without her. He has no idea why she's here, why she's loving him when, mere days ago, she was happy on another continent with the Immortal, but he can't say no, and he's unwilling to call it wrong, even though he knows it is.
"Mmm," she purrs. "This was a long day."
"Yeah."
"Hey." She punches him playfully in the arm as she looks up at him with doe eyes. "You were asleep for most of it."
"You'd be dead if we traded places," he says.
Her fingers scrunch against his skin. She kisses him. "I know."
He listens to her breathing, and he imitates it. Her skin is hot, and he soaks it up.
"I guess I should thank you," she adds. "You know. For taking one for the team?"
"You're welcome," he mumbles. He's drifting. He's not all there when he says, "I love you," but he still means it, and he falls asleep hoping furiously that this isn't something he's imagined.
Deep in his heart, though, he knows he's still in the alley with the dragon.
He's still dying.
He's still alone.