Title: Angels Deserve to Die
Rating: M for Mature
Character(s)/Pairing(s): Buffy, Cordelia, Jasmine, mentions of Groosalug, mentions of Harmony
Genre: Action/Adventure, Drama
Warning: Character Deaths aplenty, and lots of blood and gore.
Disclaimer: everything belongs either to the brilliance of Joss Whedon, or the macabre sense of humor of Quentin Tarantino
Author Notes: Okay, so I'm following the basic script of Kill Bill, so the Bride's name won't be revealed until one of the last chapters, even though we all know it's Buffy.
Chapter Summary: The Bride arrives at the home of #2 of her Death List Five.
ANGELS DESERVE TO DIE
Chapter One: "2"
Sunnydale, California
The truck pulled to a jerking stop on the shady, residential street, the young blond woman looking out the passenger window and up the lawn toward the nice, two story, suburban house. Her mouth set in a tight line, the woman who was once the Bride, turned off the engine of the truck and opened the driver's side door, climbing out and walking around the back before making her way up the lawn, completely ignoring the path, kicking over a child's tricycle. She reached the front door, her blond hair pulled back into a no-nonsense ponytail, and reached out a leather clad arm to knock briskly on the door. She glanced behind her to see if anyone had noticed her when she heard footsteps on the other side of the door.
"I'm coming." a female voice called from inside. "Harmony, you're almost an hour early." The woman continued as she pulled open the front door. She froze the moment she saw the Bride, who just glared at her. In the split second it took for the woman to register who stood before her, the Bride lunged forward, her fist connecting with the woman's face, sending her flying back into the living room. The woman recovered quickly, her short, dark brown curls bouncing around her now determined face as she took a fighting stance and blocked the next blow of the Bride's sudden onslaught. Powerful blows were exchanged, with the dark haired woman being on the losing side of the fight so far, being far weaker than an actual Slayer.
A sudden kick sent her flying back into a small end table, which shattered under her weight. Recovering quickly, the woman grabbed one of the broken table legs and swiped out, striking the Bride in the knee. Frozen in pain for the briefest of seconds, the Bride straightened, only to lean far back to avoid the club of wood being swung toward her head. With her superior reflexes, the Bride grabbed and twisted her target's wrist, causing her to drop the club. Continuing with her advantage, the Bride twirled in a circle, bringing the woman with her and using their combined momentum and her greater strength to throw her into the next room where she crashed painfully onto a metal and glass coffee table.
Groaning from the fall, the woman struggled to regain her senses, which proved useless as the Bride landed on her back. Using their current position to her advantage, the Bride wrapped her arms around the struggling woman and effectively began to stop her air supply. The woman struggled harder, clawing at the woman's face futily as the Bride choked her from behind. As her vision began to blacken around the edges, the woman reached out and around blindly until her hand came in contact with the handle of the fireplace poker. Acting swiftly, she wrenched it free from the toppled rack and swung it backward, hitting the Bride on the back.
Grunting in pain, the Bride loosened her grip slighty, just enough for the woman to slam her head backward. White starburst flashed behind her eyes as blood burst from her nose at the impact. Momentarily stunned, she offered no resistance as the woman gained her feet and kicked her in the chest, sending her crashing to the glass strewn carpet. The moment she started to rise into a sitting position, she received a fire poker across her face. Blinded this time by blood, as well as pain she lay there, stunned until her instincts kicked in, allowing her to roll to the side to avoid a potentially fatal blow that landed among the shattered remains of the coffee table. Recovering quickly, the Bride kicked the poker from the woman's hands before using her other foot to send her flying backward into the heavy bookcase that sat against the far wall. As the Bride struggled to her feet, the woman grabbed the edge of the bookcase and toppled the whole thing over. Right onto the Bride.
Struggling out from under the heavy wooden case, she just barely caught a glimpse of her target fleeing around the corner and further into the house. Tossing the heavy shelf aside like it was nothing, the Bride regained her feet and was in pursuit. She didn't see the woman in the short hallway, but there were no exits except for the open doorway at the end, so that's the way she dashed. She had just cleared the frame of the archway when she leaned back, narrowly avoiding the butcher knife the sliced at her neck. Twirling to saftey to avoid another strike, she reached out and grabbed the first thing she could: a spatula. Weilding it as a weapon, the Bride parried each of the woman's blows with the knife until a lucky slash opened the back of her hand and caused her to drop the utensil.
Not letting up in her attack, the woman forced the Bride back against the wall and brought the knife down, only to be stopped by her opponents hand to her wrist. The woman's other hand lashed out and her fingers wrapped around the Bride's throat.
"What are you gonna use to attack me now?" the woman asked, lifting the Bride up somewhat and letting her feet kick wildly as her air supply ran out. "You're charm and quick wit?"
"Knerf." the Bride managed to squeeze out, earning a confused scowl.
"Knerf?" the woman repeated, still trying to force the knife into her opponent. "What the hell's a knerf?"
In response, the Bride realeased the arm holding her by the throat and reached behind her, quickly drawing a dagger and swiping it at the woman, who backed off to avoid a vicious cut. Spinning in a whirl of dark curls, the woman blocked the second swip of the 'knerf' and landed a kick to the Bride's solar plexus, sending her into the dining room and rolling over the wooden table. Lunging after her, the woman impaled the table a second after the Bride rolled to saftey, while the Bride forced her 'knerf' up through the table a few centimeters from the woman's face.
Cringing at the sudden appearance of the blade, the woman rolled off the table just before it was kicked over by the Bride, who ripped her knife free. Holding her knife out before her in a protective gesture, the woman backed up into the living room with the Bride following slowly.
"Come on, bitch." the woman snarled at the Bride, who swiped her knife at her, causing a return swing. As they stood in the wreckage of the living room, right in front of the large bay windows that looked out onto the front yard, a small yellow school bus pulled up behind the truck the Bride came in. The doors opened and a little girl stepped down, back pack on and lunch box in hand. The woman facing the Bride looked briefly out the window out of the corner of her eyes before focusing again on the Bride. As the little girl drew closer, walking up the lawn, the woman's eyes grew pleading. With a twitch beneath her eye, the Bride withdrew her knife in a split second and hid it behind her back in the same instant as the woman, just as the front door opened.
"Mommy, I'm home." the little girl called as she turned into the living room.
"My sweet, how was school?" the woman, this little girl's mother, said, a bright smile plastered on, at odds with the blood that covered half her face. Both her and the Bride were breathing heavily. The little girl, who couldn't have been more than five, spared the Bride a glance before turning her attention back toward her mother.
"Mommy, what happened to you and the T.V. room?" the little girl asked. Mommy paused for a second before continuing with her 100 watt smile.
"You know that demon-dog of yours?" she responded. "Well, she got herself into the living room and totally wigged."
"Nina did this?" the little girl said, surveying the damage as she took a step forward.
"Now, baby, you can't come in here." the woman said, holding out the hand that didn't have a knife in it's grasp. "There's broken glass everywhere and you could cut yourself." The little girl stepped back like her mother told her, but then focused her gaze on the bloodied blonde standing next to her mother. The Bride suppressed the urge to shiver. The little girl's eyes were seriously creepy, way older than they should be. The woman noted the visual interaction. "This is an old friend of mommy's that I haven't seen in a long time."
"Hi honey," the Bride panted, still trying to catch her breath after the breif battle. "I'm B****. What's your name?" The little girl remained silent. The smile slipped from the woman's face as she turned her head to look at the Bride.
"Her name is Jasmine."
"Jasmine." The Bride said, testing the name on her tongue. "Such a pretty name for such a pretty girl. How old are you, Jasmine?" Again Jasmine remained silent, just staring at the stranger.
"Jasmine." her mother said in a reproachful tone. "B**** asked you a question."
"I'm four." Jasmine replied in a neutral tone.
"Four years old, huh." the Bride said. "You know, I had a little boy once. He'd be around four now." The woman noticed the look on the Bride's face and quickly moved closer to her daughter, crouching down to look her in the eyes.
"Now, sweetheart, me and mommy's friend got some grown-up talk to talk about." the woman told her daughter. "So I want you to go upstairs and go to your room until I tell you to come down." Jasmine looked slowly from her mother to the Bride, only to have her mom loose her temper and snap her fingers directly in front of her daughter's eyes. "Jasmine! Upstairs, now." The woman said, her 'mommy' voice gone and replaced by one backed by steel. The little girl cast one last glance at the Bride before leaving the room and heading up the main staircase to her bedroom. Both women stayed standing in the wrecked living room and waited until they heard the door close. A breath they both were holding was let out and the woman turned to look at the Bride.
"You want some coffee?" she asked nonchalantly.
"Sure." the Bride answered. The woman relaxed her tight grip on the butcher knife and moved toward the dining room, pushing the front door closed on the way into the kitchen. Moving a bit slower, the Bride resheathed her blade and pushed the door the rest of the way closed.
This chic Sunnydale homemaker is Theresa Bell, her husband Dr. Lawrence Bell, although how the Groosalug got the title of doctor I'll never be able to figure out. Anyway, when we knew each other five years ago, she was known as Cordelia Chase. Her code name was Delphi, quaint because she was an Oracle for the Higher, or Lower, Powers. Mine: Reaper. Not original, I know, but I still have the highest body count of The Whirlwind, with the exception of Angel. I actually specialized in things considered unkillable or already dead. Probably because I was a Vampire Slayer and all. But anyway, back to my point.
Five years ago she, along with the other members of The Whirlwind, took part in the murder of nine innocent people in a wedding chapel in Cleaveland, Ohio. The only thing is, she should have killed ten. I'm betting she's already thinking that right now.
"Still take cream and sugar, right?" Cordelia asked as she tossed a rag at the Bride, cleaning up her own wounds with a dish towel.
"Yeah." the Bride responded as she used the rag to bind the slice on the back of her hand. While Cordelia fiddled with the coffee machine, the Bride perched herself on one of the stools of the island in the middle of the kitchen. "So, I gotta ask." the Bride spoke up. "You and Groo." Cordelia turned to look at her. "Jasmine. How?" Referencing the dark skin of her daughter.
"Mystical pregnancy." she explained as she placed the coffee before the Bride on the island. "You know how those things turn out. Never predictable." The Bride nodded in agreement. Cordelia and the Bride both sipped their coffee for a minute on opposite sides of the island before the Sunnydale housewife spoke up. "How did I not see you coming? I'm a seer, remember. You shouldn't have been able to get the drop on me."
"I picked up a few tricks since I woke up." the Bride responded. "But that aside, you must have expected me. After what happened to Willow."
"Yeah, Angel called personally to let me know what was happening." Cordelia confided. "Just wishful thinking on my part, I guess." She pasued, taking a large gulp of her coffee before looked once again at the Bride. "So, I suppose it's a little late for forgivenss, huh?"
"You suppose correctly." the Bride responded coldly, taking another sip of her coffee, giving dead eyes to Cordelia, who's facial features immediatly hardened.
"Listen bitch, I need to know if you're gonna start any more shit around my baby." Cordelia snapped, her hand slamming down on the island, mere inches from the butcher knife she placed down earlier.
"You can relax." the Bride said calmly. "I have no desire to murder you before the eyes of your child."
"Huh." Cordelia said, coming down off her anger. "That's being way more rational than Angel led us to believe you were capable of being."
"Rationality isn't in my lacking collumn." the blonde said back. "Just mercy, compassion and forgiveness."
"I fucked you over." Cordelia said, leaning back against the kitchen sink. "I fucked you over bad. I wish to the Powers I hadn't, but I did and I can't change that." The Bride remained silent, her eyes dead. "But it's been five years and I've changed. I know I don't deserve your mercy or your forgiveness." She walked over and plucked a picture of her daughter from the fridge. "But I beseech you for both on behalf of my daughter." She finished, holding the picture of her daughter before her enemy.
"Bitch." the Bride snapped, watching as Cordelia flinched slightly. "You can stop right there. Just because I have some small moral qualm about killing a mother before the eyes of her child, doesn't mean that parading her around in front of me is going to bring about a change of heart. You and I have unfinished business. And not a Goddamn thing you've done in the past five years, including getting knocked up, is gonna change that."
"Look, you have every right to want to get even-"
"Oh no," the Bride interupted. "To get even, I'd have to tie you down and go upstairs and kill your little girl, and wait for the good Dr. Groo to come home and kill him. Actually, to get completely even, I'd have to do that right in front of you before I killed you. That would be even for me."
Cordelia recovered quickly. "So when do we do this?"
"It all depends." the Bride said, sliding from her stool to tower... over the island. Why did she think that was a good idea. Cordelia was taller than her in flats. But the Reaper was good on her feet. "When do you want to die? Tomorrow? The day after tomorrow?"
"How 'bout tonight?"
"Splendid. Where?"
"There's a baseball diamond where I teach Jasmine's little league team." Cordelia offered. "We meet there tonight around two thirty dressed all in black, your hair in a black stocking. We won't be bothered. Now..." she smiled in satisfaction as the Bride flinched when she raised her coffee mug. "I have to prepare Jasmine's cereal."
"It's funny really." the Bride said, backing away from the island and leaning against the far wall. "I know Angel always said that you were one of his best ladies with an edged weapon, but I always thought he meant a katana, not a butcher knife." She took another sip of her coffee. "That whole zen, Buddhist, Japanese weaponry thing was your scene, right?"
"Fuck you, bitch." Cordelia threw back, throwing some sass into her movements. "We all know about your issues with lover boy. So you can take all that jealousy and shove it up your ass."
"Jealousy?" the Bride asked with a condesending snort.
"Yeah, jealousy." the snarky, sassy housewife responded. "Jealousy that I'm better than you with a katana, and jealousy that your boy took such an interest in me. Gotta sting, right?" The humor drained from the Bride's face.
"Weapon of choice? If you wanna stick with your butcher knife." The Bride issued her threat. Cordelia half turned to look at her, smile on her face, her hand in the box of children's cereal.
"Ooh, scary." she said in response to the barely concealed threat. She spun around, hand ripping a pistol out of the box of cereal. "Scarier." She shot three rapid shots, all of which missed due to the Bride's Slayer reflexes. Quick as a viper, the Bride launched her coffee cup at Cordelia, who dodged the incoming ceramic projectile. Just as she was getting her bearings, the Bride's 'knerf' embedded in the middle of Cordelia's chest. A choked gasp forced itself out of her throat as a mixture of drool and blood fell from her lips. Slowly, ever so slowly, Cordelia's body slid down the wall and to the floor, where her body gave one last jerk before she drew still entirely. The Bride loomed over her body, a look of cold satisfaction on her face. She reached down and jerked out the knife, before unwrapping the makeshift bandage from her hand and cleaning the blade of the knife before tossing the rag over her corpse.
As she stood up and resheathed her knife, she heard a noise behind her. Whirling around, she saw Jasmine just standing there, staring at the macabre scene before her. The Bride took a deep breath before looking the little girl in the face.
"It wasn't my intention to do this in front of you, but believe me when I say, your mother had it comin'." The Bride moved toward the second entrance that led back to the front door. She turned back and looked at the little girl who still just stood there. "In a couple of years, if you still feel raw about it, come find me. I'll be waiting."
With those last words, the Bride left the kitchen, walked through the damaged dining room and out the front door. Across the yard to her truck she went, wiping at the stray tear that ran down her face. Once she was within her truck again, she picked up a notebook from the passenger seat and opened the page to reaveal a list of names, which read as follows:
THE DEATH LIST FIVE
1. Willow Rosenberg - witch - The Black Hope
2. Cordelia Chase - oracle - Delphi
3. William Pratt aka Spike - vampire - The Bloody
4. Faith Lehane - slayer - the Rogue
5. Angelus - vampire - the Scourge
Taking the black pen that was attatched to the cover, she bypassed the crossed out name of Willow Rosenberg before she crossed out Cordelia's name on the list before closing the book again, already making plans to take out the next mark on her list.
Author's Note: quick note. In my head, the whole chapter took place in the Summer's residence of Sunnydale, where Buffy lived the entire length of the show.
Press Me
\/