Buffy shot up in bed, sweating and gasping harshly for air. She felt hot and cold all over, her heart beating wildly against her chest. Strands of soaked blonde locks clung thickly to her face and shoulders, but her wild eyes weren't focusing on the nearest mirror, rather they were darting around the dark room as if a million insects were flying around.
Rationally she knew if she just slowly laid back and closed her eyes, she'd calm down and she would probably forget it ever happened in the morning. But she didn't want that to happen. She didn't want to forget about it in the morning, already there were too many things that she was forgetting.
It was just a dream, a nightmare, really, but it was so vivid in her tired mind.
Buffy remembered she was walking down a white corridor, the doors and walls were as impersonal as the floor or ceiling. The pale florescent lights of the hall sapped away the little life that dared intrude on the narrow walkway.
A hospital.
She just remembered walking, walking, then one door seemed brighter than the rest. Not whiter, but brighter, as if the space behind it had something alive behind it.
Far removed from the situation, she remembered seeing her hand come out and turn the knob, not really feeling the cool metal against her palm. Barely feeling the resistance a normal handle should have.
Beds. Rows and rows of generic beds were lined up, each one had a human sized lump under sheets that had been washed too many times. Her gaze traveled down the endless line, but when she moved her focus to the faces of those in the bed, all she saw was a blur. A brown-black, tannish blur.
On all the metal frames there hung a chart. She saw herself move closer to the nearest one, saw her arms descending toward the brown wood, stark contrast with the rest of the room, and saw herself see the words that were on the paper.
Angel.
Her eyes quickly darted back up to the person in the bed, but no matter how hard she tried, all she could make out was a blur.
Next bed, same chart, another blur. Crying now, the whole world was a blur, and everything she could see was just a big mass of white, there was no other color to be found, no Angel to be found.
And suddenly she was here in her bed, terrified out of her mind, almost paralyzed in her fear.
Jumping out of the sweat soaked sheets, she stumbled and almost fell as the fabric tangled around her legs, but she paid it no mind, fumbling violently through her drawers.
After a few minutes of frantic search, she collapsed, her back to the drawers, tears streaming down her face.
"I'm forgetting..." she whispered brokenly, hugging her knees tight to her.
Of all her possessions, the ones she held most dear were those that Angel had given to her, but she had nothing of him to see, nothing of his likeness to remember him by. She could still recall his scent, the feel of even his one night old stubble, but one day, what if she couldn't? She had no pictures of him, no sketches; nothing but her own memories. What if she forgot? What if she couldn't remember?
Buffy closed her eyes and pictured him in her mind's eye. Yes, there he was, as real as if he was standing right in front of her. She could recall every line of his face, every spike of his hair, she could remember all of it with perfect clarity and for a moment she was content.
"I'll never forget," Buffy vowed solenmly, "I'll never forget."
She closed her eyes and there was her Angel, smiling his little half smile, looking so beautiful in the soft moonlight. As often as he dreamed of his brow touched by the sun, he was simply breathtaking at night. How could she describe it? His dark hair, styled so carefully, a kind of organized chaos, an art form in itself. His pale skin that never blushed, that was always cool, except for when she warmed it. Everytime they touched, it was something incredibly soothing, like a cool washcloth on a fevered forehead; she never knew just how tense she was until Angel made her relax. His eyes, dark pools of ebony that were always so serious. They fixated on everything with an underlying glare, but for her, only for her, was there a softness. For her, all of him was softness.
She knew all her silly schoolgirl worries were unfounded, but still couldn't see why others didn't see it. It was stupid to have worried about his loyalty, his devotion to her, but she just couldn't understand, still couldn't understand why no one else saw what she did. He was dark and serious, but he was perfect, and he was her everything.
Now he was gone, but she wouldn't let him die. "I'll never forget..." she whispered one last time, before drifting off into an exhausted sleep.
Joyce Summers woke during the night to go to the bathroom. Rushing across the hall and through the cooler air outside her bed, she finished her business, and peered into her daughter's room on the way back. She always did when she could, after all, now that Buffy was only staying with her some weekends, she didn't have her little girl there to check in on often enough. She happily moved the door open a crack. The sight that met her broke her heart.
Buffy's head was at a slight angle, her mouth barely open, and she was leaning against her dresser. But what Mrs. Summers focused on the most was the twin lines falling crookedly from Buffy's eyes to her chin, glistening faintly in the dim light. Joyce quickly covered her mouth to keep from making a sound; trying to keep her own tears at bay. She had never seen a sadder sight than her little Buffy so distraught.
And she didn't know what to do.
None of her parenting books had prepared her for the situation presented. There was no chapter titled "What to do When You Find Your Only Daughter Cries Herself to Sleep in the Fetal Position". Joyce just wanted to protect her. And she was at a complete loss at how to do it.
Faith glared at her drink. What was she doing?
A lot of people had made cracks about her lifestyle and her reckless behavior, but no on could ever say she let her personal life interfere with her slaying.
Kakistos didn't count, besides, she killed him anyway.
But that was because she had been lost. She didn't have that cop out this time. She knew exactly what she was doing and how unprofessional it was. How dangerous.
But id don't know how dangerous, she told herself, I don't know what he is, this could be the only way to find out.
Once she had convinced herself she was there for the sake of slaying, her scowl eased and she relaxed back into her chair. I'll just be careful not to reveal too much about myself.
"'Ello love."
Faith gasped, her lungs were on fire, her muscles burned in agony, sweat dripped down her spine.
And he had never felt better.
Spike pulled back a moment, letting her catch her breath, but she wouldn't have it and pulled him back down to her mouth. He slammed her up against the wall behind the Bronze. She grunted and wrapped her legs around his waist pulling him as close as her slayer strength could get him.
"Interesting," Spike panted.
"Mmph, what?" Faith murmured impatiently.
"If you want it rough, I can make it rough. Bloody chip doesn't care 'bout me if you want it," Spike told her with a grin.
"Really?" Faith said with a suggestive eyebrow raised.
Spike looked at her thoughtfully. "Maybe it's cause you're the slayer. Then again," he kissed her hard, "It doesn't matter. "
Giles rubbed his tired eyes and looked at the clock. Quarter to three. Doubtless Faith had forgotten to report tonight. He yawned and packed his thin briefcase with some reference book, then turned out the light. In the dark, he brushed up against one of the many desks in the library and one heavy volume fell with a dull thud.
Swearing, he picked it up and fumbled with the paper that had fallen out. Paper that had fallen out?
Panicked, Giles turned on the nearest light, cursing his own oafishness, hoping to god that the pages in the book could be some how reattached. Didn't he have a chum at Oxford who bound his own books...?
Giles looked down at the pages in his hand and blew out a huge sigh of relief when he found the paper was nothing more than a sheaf of notes that was left in the hundred year old book and the actual book was undamaged.
Weak with relief, he carefully set the old tome on the table, far away from the edge, and was about to set down the notes as well, when he realized he recognized the handwriting.
"Jenny?" he wondered aloud, look at what was written more closely.
Sledge hammers, Jenny thought, groaning into her pillow. Stupid neighbors and their promotion.
Oh, she had been as happy as anyone when she heard the news and went to the celebratory block party, but the subsequent renovation and constant before-dawn construction was enough to turn anyone into a grouch.
And now they pulled out the sledge hammers. Perfect.
"Jenny!"
Ok, Jenny thought sleepily, now that's new. She sat up and realized that accompanying the loud thuds was a very familiar voice yelling her name.
"Rupert?" she yelled. Or rather, she tried to yell. What came out was a kind of hoarse breath before her voice completely quit on her.
Jenny cleared her throat and said, "Rupert?"
She found her slippers and got out of bed, putting her favorite blue robe over her pajamas.
"Jenny!"
Apparently the assurance that she was home and awake AND going to open the door wasn't enough for him, Jenny though with amusement. Well, doesn't matter. See how her neighbors liked having someone waking them up at…THREE IN THE MORNING!
She stomped over to the door and practically threw it open. "Rupert! It's THRE—"
"What is this!" the librarian cut her off, pushing papers in her face. "What IS this!"
"What?" Jenny asked, pushing the papers away from her face, "What is what?"
"THIS!" Giles waved the papers wildly, poking a finger near the center of the mess. "This resembles a-a portion of a resurrection spell that was divined by the Emperor Jung in the early 1300's! And I found it in a book on the anatomy of various supernatural beings! What exactly are you planning here!"
Ms. Calender was struck dumb. She had never expected anyone to find those. "I-I…"
"I trusted you!" Gilles ranted, moving into the house. Jenny closed the door behind him, numbly. "I-I gave you the benefit of the doubt and-and you're dealing with deep and dangerous occult BLACK MAGIC behind my back! I don't know how I could've been so blind, not knowing you were planning something of this-this magnitude! I don't even know what this is!
"It's resurrecting a vampire!" Jenny screamed. "I…I thought…"
"A vampire!" Giles yelled. "Why in the world would anyone—oh," he stopped short. "You're t-trying to resurrect a, um, a vampire?"
"Yes," Jenny responded, not looking at him.
A million thoughts flew through Giles's head. He gaped for a few minutes before finally picking one, "H-have you had any luck?"
At that she did look up. This was strictly business, this she could handle. "First I looked up the original resurrection spells by my people when I encountered the curse they placed on Angel." There was a hard look in her eyes when she said, "They added a clause."
"A clause?" Giles repeated, confused.
"Yeah, apparently a life time of torment wasn't enough. The moment that Angel felt true happiness, just a moment would be enough, he would lose his soul and Angelus would be back," Jenny explained bitterly.
"Dear God…"
"So I had to get the original curse, the first one, without the clause. But that was even more ancient than the first. It took me a few weeks to decipher the first curse, that's how I found out about the clause. I took a random sampling of the text and basically created a program to decode the whole curse. From there I had to rekey the computer to…well, it's technical, but it took me a few months. So now I have the original curse to give Angel his soul back, permanently."
Giles was giving her his undivided attention, so she took a deep breath and continued. "Then I went to find the basic magics needed to resurrect a vampire. But I was shunned from my clan and it was difficult to obtain the necessary information. What I eventually found out was that the magics that they did have were incomplete--the spell was truly lost. So I searched other resurrection spells on various levels of the supernatural. Emperor Jung happened to be one of them, " the technopagan nodded to the paper Giles was still holding in his hand, "There were others, dozens of others, and despite their differences, they all had some things in common. So I jig sawed them all together and came up with a spell that should work."
"But a resurrection, that would kill any human who tries to attempt it," Giles breathed.
Jenny nodded, "It would, and it makes sense, a life for a life. And an immortal life would kill even another immortal. In fact it would be risky to use just a human life to perform a vampire resurrection. But even if all that could be found, there was another problem…"
"The soul," Giles said with sudden realization.
"The soul," Jenny repeated. "It would suck out the soul of anyone who tried the curse."
Giles took off his glasses and methodically wiped them. "B-but…what if you were to first resurrect the vampire and then restore the soul?"
"I thought of that. See, there's a way to keep the one who performs the ritual to die," Jenny explained. Giles was startled, he hadn't known that and was fascinated. "You can channel the magic and…deflect it. A lot like an offering, or that's how it's referred to in the ancient texts. It takes the life of an animal instead of a human, so it's still a life. In this case, it would have to be some sort of immortal demon. But it can be done. Only the amount of energy that's required drains the witch. It's preferable to death, of course, but…"
"…but you wouldn't be able to complete the second spell in time. You'd need a second witch," Giles finished. "This is…Jenny this is incredible. You've single-handed revived magics that were lost centuries ago. I-I don't know what to say."
Jenny blushed and didn't look at him.
Giles sighed, "I-I'm sorry I didn't trust you. It was wrong of me, I just…"
"I should've told you. I almost did when I found the curse, and then again when I deciphered the original curse, but every time there was so much that I had to do. And…there's one more thing," Jenny said slowly.
From the tone in her voice, Giles knew he wasn't going to like it. "What?"
"I tried for months to get around it, but even this was a huge stretch. In order to resurrect a vampire, you need his ashes. We can't get those. Or you need a piece of him, we can't get that either. So I was stuck. You can't just conjure a vampire from thin air, you have to have something tangible to create him from."
"Yes, it follows the basic law of magic. Everyone knows this, how did you manage to get around it?" Giles wondered aloud.
Jenny frowned, "I was sure there was nothing I could do, but I came across ancient folklore. An old wives' tale really. In it a prince wished so fervently for his princess that she appeared. Literally. But when he found she was nothing more than a part of him, like an arm or leg, he cast her off and they both lived half lives. But it got me thinking. If I could find someone who could imagine Angel with such perfect clarity that he would be almost tangible, then I could use the magic to bring back the rest of him. So, I altered the spell to make sure that it wouldn't be a part of the original host, but his own person. But..it still needs a host."
"And that host would have to be Buffy." Giles finished unhappily.
"Yes, she's the only one would have the knowledge," Jenny said.
"L-let me see if I understand. You have gathered and created the spells to both resurrect a vampire and then restore his soul. But in order to do that you need Buffy to imagine him, and then another witch to conjure the spell. If all you need is a witch, I could perform the magic," Giles volunteered.
Jenny shook her head. "It's not that simple. I don't even know if I could perform it. This is such a powerful spell that unless you've been training along these exact lines of magic, it would tear you apart from the inside. I've been training for the last two years, ever since I realized I needed to perform this spell. Even if you were an extremely powerful mage, you'd still have to be training specifically for this. I can't let you."
Giles didn't look happy, but he accepted her expertise in the matter. "So the only thing that stands between a successful resurrection of Angel is the consent of Buffy and another witch?"
"Yeah!" Jenny exclaimed in surprised. "T-that's all that's left. I can't believe it's almost done…"
Giles smiled at the happy surprise on her face. "Well, I believe I need to have a word with Buffy tomorrow. Will you accompany me? This might be the most…convenient time to reveal your background to her."
Jenny was surprised and a little afraid. What would Buffy think of her now? She had become close to the slayer, being a part of Giles's life and the blonde's slaying duties for so long, would that change? Never know until you try, she thought, grimly.
"Alright," Jenny nodded, "I'll see you tomorrow."
"Excellent," Giles said. "Please try to get some sleep, I'm sorry I woke you." He left, but not before giving her the brightest smile she had seen in a long time.
She closed the door and whispered, "Oh boy."
Angel stared blankly at the fire, the only source of light in the dim room.
There were so many things that were running through his head, he just needed to get them all organized and manageable. He was back in Sunnydale, that in itself was a lot to take. His mission had everything to do with the life he hid from and the person he had to face was Buffy's replacement.
Was her watcher Giles? How did he feel about all this?
Angel looked around the room sadly, even this building he bought with her in mind. She'd never seen it, never been in it, but he still thought of her. He wasn't sure he could do this. He had to do something, fight, protect—anything but sit and remember everything he didn't want to. He really wanted to do was go to her house, just because he felt as though he needed…something. Everytime he passed a graveyard he instinctively looked for her and when he couldn't, he caught himself searching the gravestones.
Damn vampirism, he cursed, pacing the room restlessly. He couldn't go out during in the sun, but everywhere by sewer was just out of the question. Angel stared hard at the familiar fire.
No matter where he went or what happened, fire was always the same. Even though he couldn't really feel the warmth on his skin, it gave him that small bit of comfort knowing that simply by having it there, everything else in the world was a little warmer.
What he wanted was to go back to LA where he wouldn't be haunted anymore. Finally he crouched in front of the stone fireplace, watching the flames jump up.
"I miss you," he whispered quietly, "God I miss you."
With that he closed his eyes painfully and curled upin front of the fire like a kitten, waiting for the sun to go down.
Xander scanned the Bronze nervously. After a few violent interactions with his former best friend, and at least one very violent nightmare, he was nervous everywhere he went.
Willow, however, didn't seem to be having that problem. She was staring dreamy-eyed at the stage, or rather, the lead guitarist on the stage.
What's she doing with a band-guy anyway? Xander asked bitterly. Everyone knows what they're like.
Oz looked at Willow and smiled a small Oz smile which caused Willow to practically split her face in half by grinning back. Xander scoffed at his table.
Sometimes he really missed Cordelia, he wished she hadn't been so impatient and understand why he was so concerned about a friend. Sure Anya had been more than a friend for a little while, but that flame quickly burned out when she discovered life outside of high school and quickly dropped him for other more supernatural creatures. But they were both gone and he was still here, the bitch of every construction worker in Sunnydale. Maybe it was time he got over it, he thought, eyeing a pair of blondes he recognized from a former history class.
Oz was incredibly content on stage, doing exactly what he loved doing with his own personal Willow nearby…life couldn't get any better.
Of course seeing the slightly annoying Xander get rejected by Amy and Joan was pretty amusing too.
After the set, Willow rushed up to her boyfriend and gushed. "you guys were great! I can't believe how great you were! And I'm not just saying that cuz I'm your groupie—hey! I'm a groupie of my boyfriend! My boyfriend who's in a band with groupies!"
Oz bent down and kissed her as she was pausing to draw a breath.
"W-what was that for?" Willow asked, dazed.
Oz shrugged, happily. "I like you as my groupie."
Willow beamed up at him. Remembering her pep talk with herself earlier that evening in the bathroom, she mustered up some courage and asked, "Will you, uh, will you like me as your groupie on Friday night at my parents' house?"
Oz was a little surprised at first, then he smiled to put his girlfriend at ease. "I like you as my groupie anytime." His smile changed into a thoughtful look. "Any day but Friday through Sunday this week. Relatives."
"Oh," Willow frowned, "That's ok."
"If it helps, I'll still be liking you as my groupie," Oz consoled.
His redhead rewarded him with a smile. "It does. So, relatives?"
Oz nodded. "Including my new cousin Jordy," He grabbed her coat and handed it to her. At her questioning look, he said, "Ice cream."
Used to his wordless ways, Willow just took her coat and they left the Bronze, hand in hand.
Watching from the corner, Xander seethed when he saw their intertwined hands swinging merrily between the couple.
"Agent Finn!"
Riley, in full military uniforn got up and stood at attention. "Yes, ma'am?"
Professor Maggic Walsh walked in front of her agents, looking as severe as she got. "Have you and your team managed to capture the hostile?"
Riley felt the urge to lok down at the floor in shame, but he kept his eyes level. "No, ma'am."
As predicted, his commander's eyes blazed. "What is it's status?"
Gulp. "We believe it to be...terminated, ma'am."
Commander Walsh was practically spitting fire. "Terminated?"
Riley fought to keep his voice from quivering. "Yes, ma'am."
"Nothing further, you are all dismissed!" There was a bit of a scuffle as everyone tried to race for the door without making it seem as though they were racing for the door. Riley didn't even bother, knowing full well he wasn't leaving with everyone else. "Agent Finn, a word!"
As soon as everyone had left and the double doors were securely closed, the Commander turned to her favorite agent. "Finn what happened? You know this hostile was vital to the project and yet you failed in capturing it."
"I'm sorry, ma'am. My team performed their best, we carried out the formations perfectly, but the hostile knew what we were going to do, as if he learned from our last capture," Riley said.
Commander Walsh frowned severely at her clipboard. "You said it was terminated, if your team didn't terminate it, who did?"
Riley shook his head. "I don't know, ma'am. That's what puzzles me. There was a girl the hostile attacked, but she seemed terrified. Very cooperative, she stayed out of the way, didn't make any noise, but when the team regained consciousness, she was no where to be seen and a large puddle of some gel-like substance was on the grass."
"Did your team gather a sample?" Walsh asked eagerly.
"Uh, no, ma'am" Riley winced.
She put down the clipboard. "No? It did not occur to a single member of your team that the puddle that replaced your hostile may have components linking the hostile to his death? Or at the very least that it would contain some vital information about the hostile itself?"
Riley tried very hard to swallow the large lump in his throat. "No, ma'am."
Walsh looked as though she were about to explode, but she took a deep breath and picked her clipboard back up. "Alright, Agent Finn. You are dismissed. In the future, please try to remember to collect all the evidence possible."
"Yes, ma'am." Riley refrained from bolting out of the room like his immature comrades, no matter how angry Walsh was. He'd better give the heads up to the rest of men, she'd be impossible to deal with for a week.
Walsh closed her eyes and breathed deeply through her nose. It was alright, despite the demon's high intellectual capacity, he wasn't quite what she was looking for in terms of strength. A minor set back in the project. It would continue as planned.
Confident that everything would be alright, she flipped a few pages and checked what was next on the list.
"A werewolf," Walsh muttered to herself. "Interesting..."
Alright, so I finally updated. I wanted to really speed up the storyline, because the chapters are getting longer and if I didn't do something interesting in them, you'd all fall asleep on me. So what do you think? I have half of the next chapter typed up and most of it written, so there will be more soon. Think of it as a New Years present. REVIEW!