Chapter 13: In Nomine Patri
Nineteenth Entry
I think it's been almost a year now. Steven visited me a dozen times, always with eyes watching him, making sure there was no plotting between us. The demons need me as leverage and they know it, but then again, that does not matter to me really. We will escape one day and that is certain, the demons can do nothing about that.
But for now I am pleased with my son. The child is in his teens now and he is, to my reluctant chagrin and his, a most promising Kluthu warlock. He listened to my directions and followed them to the letter. He is carefully studying the wretched demons and their magicks, slowly gaining their strengths… and making plans to exploit their weaknesses.
In addition he was also learning portals, an enterprise I was glad I had goaded him into. It seems that regardless of the lack of portals into and out of this world, the Kluthu know a substantial amount about them. Steven told me that our beneficent hosts were once exiles into this world, that they were once part of a massive demonic empire that stretched across countless worlds. They were exiled here which meant that this place was a prison world, theirs as much as ours.
Steven told me that they were banished here by their masters for supposedly trying to take control of the empire. They lost.
And so they are here now, waiting for a chance to return…
It never really ends.
That lie you tell yourself.
The moment you tell yourself one lie you've already created another one to take its place
Look inside yourself, Destroyer. There, you'll find the real hell.
Connor wasn't sure if the voices came from the TV, real people or from the cancerous insanity in his head but one thing's for sure, he wanted them gone.
Connor was sitting on the deck of the Starship Enterprise. He was wearing a Jedi outfit, complete with flashlights and light sabers. In front of him, seated on a beanbag, was Darth Vader.
"Uh huh." He said deadpan. "I have gone insane, haven't I?"
Vader took off his helmet to reveal Angel underneath. He looked at him with loving yet condescending eyes. "Hey son. How's life?"
"Great. Another imaginary voice in my head."
Connor gave up trying to ignore the voices in his head long after he got his memories back. With the understanding that resistance would only lead to accelerated insanity, he would strike conversations with these voices, but never for a second believed them. It was his little formula for staying sane. He would indulge the voices but as always, made it a point to never become attached to them.
Angel snickered a little at Connor's odd response. "Uh come on. Do you have to be surly all the time?"
"Only when I have voices in my head. Among other things, a lot of them seem to be popping up in my skull these days." Connor pointed a tired finger at Angel/Vader.
"You wanna talk about them?" Angel asked.
"Sure, why the hell not? I always wanted to talk to imaginary voices about the topic of imaginary voices."
Angel chuckled. "When did this all start?"
"Oh around the time I got hit by the bus. The first one to pop in was Jasmine. You remember her, right? Super power thing-y that wanted to bring love to the world and eat people. God, remembering all that is a bitch!"
"What did you do?" Angel asked again like a therapist.
"I ignored her, of course. Even though she was technically my daughter, I never did like her. Never did think of her as anything but a fragile reflection of my hopeful lies. All the things I've done for her, I did for Cordy. I always knew what she was. I never forgot what she really wanted… even when I was lying to myself."
"She reminded you of Cordelia?"
"Yeah, Kinda. After a while Jasmine got tired of saying things into my head. She disappeared only to be replaced by Cordelia. Every time I was with Tracy, I could hear her voice in my ear, her breathe, her scent. It drove me insane just thinking about her and at the same time wondering if she was just a dream and if not, if she truly loved me. A guy kinda gets scared thinking about that, you know. Wondering if his lover really loves him or not.
"You, know its kinda funny, talking about her. I once had this dream of her. In it, she and Darla were arguing. Next thing I knew they were killing each other, I mean ripping at each other, literally. Couldn't sleep for three days after I dreamt that. Lasted a few months after I got to college and me and Tracy broke up. Did you know I nearly got Tracy pregnant too? Thank God, those were only the memories. My parents would explode if they knew the things I could father."
Angel smiled a little.
"Yeah, I'm stupid but Cordelia was always there, just beneath the surface. She never did disappear. Neither, did Jasmine. Sometimes they'd come back in between other dreams. Like commercials. Every time I'd dream of Quor'toth or when some voice inside my head wanted to harangue me, they're there."
"Yeah?" Angel's eyes seemed curious.
"Yeah. He'd usually come in with a German accent. Dressed himself up as Van Helsing and told me to help him hunt bunnies and leprechauns."
"Leprechauns?"
"What can I say? I'm just that crazy." Connor was suddenly somber. "He was my father, Angel. Sure, he betrayed me but then again so did you, right?"
Angel seemed to flush with regret.
"Yeah, Holtz is as much a part of my life as you and everyone else in my family. It's too bad he loved vengeance more than me." Connor's voice did not echo with anger or sorrow but pity, pity for his onetime father from Quor'toth.
"They're all here," Connor tapped his brain with two fingers. "Including all the memories, the ones you hid and the ones Holtz hid. They won't stop talking and they keep stressing me out. But don't feel bad about it, you're not my first dream friend and I certainly won't expect you to be the last. I had a few demon… acquaintances in Quor'toth and I'm expecting them to get in here sometime soon, new collections for the hell inside of me. And who knows, maybe even Fred, Gunn, Lorne and Wes might arrive soon then my brain can finally turn into a nice little train wreck. Yipppeee!"
"Connor…" Angel reached out to his son as Connor put his head on his hands and began to sob.
"I'm reverting, Angel, Quor'toth's coming back out. I thought that if I could find you, it would stop. The dreams, the guilt, the continuing darkness just behind the back of my skull. Those are the real reasons I was trying to find you. I'm scared of turning back to that… that thing. I know I was lying to myself but I did just about everything not to feel helpless, even if I knew it was a lie.
"But I can't find you. And now my head is getting worse." Connor burst out a yell and kicked the controls of the ship. "I'm losing my mind. There is apparently an upcoming demonic invasion, people are getting sick from some unknown disease, magic inspired disasters are blowing up all over the world and, to top it all off, my dad's dying!"
Angel waited until he knew Connor had spent all his rage.
"I'm sorry." Angel muttered at last.
"For what?" Connor asked.
"Everything. Lying to you. Kicking you out. I don't know. Somehow, everything that you've been through makes me feel that I'm partially guilty for. Like you're paying for my sins because I can't deal with it all on my own."
"You shouldn't feel that way, Angel. Yeah, you weren't all that. But whatever wrong I did, it happened because of me, not you." Then Connor added in a sadder voice. "I wasn't exactly the best son in the world."
"I wasn't the best father in the world either. I only wish you could forgive me?"
"Sure I do, dumbass. But only if you do to me too?"
Angel smiled. "Of course I do."
"Thanks. You're great."
"Likewise."
The two just sat at their chairs looking forlorn and lonely, feeling an empty hollow sensation that seemed to permeate the entire ship.
It was broken by Connor's attempt at humor. "I'm taking up law, you know."
"Figures," Angel snickered. "I destroy a demonic law firm and my son wants to become a lawyer."
"Must be Karma. You killed your human family. I tried to bury you under the ocean. You have a lot of crimes in your past and now you're doomed to never stop atoning for them." Connor smirked and looked at his father. "I like older women probably because you dated a seventeen year old girl."
Angel looked at Connor curiously. "How did you…"
"I was right!"
"Damn. Showed my cards."
"So? Who was she?"
"I'd rather not talk about it."
"I'll find out eventually. Come on, you should have known by now that secrets are bad. They lead to underwater diving and nasty end of the world type disasters."
"Her name's Buffy." Angel said with a tinge of annoyance.
"Buffy? Riiight, nice name."
"Yeah, Slayer."
"Vampire Slayer? Like Faith? You dated a vampire Slayer and you're a… Wow. And I'm supposed to be messed up. You do realize that those girls kill things like you, right?"
"Don't be a brat."
"I'm twenty. You should be saying 'don't be a dick.' So when did you…"
"Before L.A. Before you."
"Just drifted apart, huh?"
"No, it's not that. We just had to… We uh… It's complicated."
"Were there ever uncomplicated things in your life?" Connor smirked. "I was born from demons. Raised in hell. Fathered a hell god. Given false memories and then have my real memories restored and reminded that I'm a bloodthirsty warlock. I think I can handle complicated."
Angel sighed and began to relate the Buffy/Angel history: the curse, the suffering from a moment of true happiness, Angelus, the fall into a hell dimension, the return to this world and the eventual tragedy.
Connor listened attentively and muttered: "You loved her?"
"More than you could imagine."
"How about Darla?"
"No." He said with a calm voice void of any defensive resentment. Connor found it distressing that he accepted this with calm resignation.
"Cordy?"
Angel became sullen at the question. "Connor, please."
"Did you love this… Buffy Summers as you loved Cordelia?"
"Are you asking me if I loved Cordy more?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
Connor laughed wickedly. "Because Dad! Because! Because I need to know how close you came to peace and happiness. Because I need to know that one day I'll be able to go for my own peace of mind, knowing that there is such a thing as wanting a happy ending and getting a happy ending. Because I need to find myself one day not fighting myself, if I should continue fighting or not. Because I need to know that it's okay to be happy."
"Aren't you now?"
"I can't dad. Not with the things around me. And I know I can't walk away and let others fight this thing, because I know that it will cost me everything I hold dear if I just look away from what I know to be necessary for me to do! Dad," He shook his head in dismay. "If you gave them up as you gave me up…" he raised a hand to quiet Angel. "I need to know, dad. I need to know why. I need to know what was so important for you to cast aside everything good and happy and dear to you. I need to know that I won't have to do the same for the people around me. That no one I love will suffer because of who and what I am if I am to stay close around them. I need to be able to get out of bed one day and realize that all the hells and prophecies and demons won't matter a single bit, and that I could be happy and free to be with the people I love. Because if protecting all you love means letting them go… I… I don't think I'm strong enough to make that kind of decision."
Angel smiled proudly at his son, "You should rephrase your question, son."
"Why did you give up your happy ending?"
"Better," Angel said. "But you haven't gotten there yet."
"Why did you do the things you do?"
"Bingo." Angel straightened up and smiled. "If you had done the things I've done Connor, if you'd seen the pain and misery and terror that Angelus had done perhaps you might understand. I couldn't actually tell it to you in words but I think that I could come close if I told you that I did it all for peace of mind."
Connor raised an eyebrow.
"That girl… in the warehouse does she bother you in your sleep?"
"Yes." Connor said simply.
"Well I have a lot of things like that up in my own head. Only there're hundreds of them… not one . You could say I was trying to make up for all the wrong things I've done but then again you can't change something like that, not a single one. At first, I figured that if I could get enough good deeds I might be able to balance the scales. Like you, I was trying to find a way out of the nightmare."
"Not the same."
"Oh, yes the same. Just different reasons. I tried to fight everything that reminded me of my past - the demons, the darkness - but it wasn't that simple. I expected a purpose. Always, I expected that if I fought hell long enough and hard enough I might get out of the tunnel, away from my past. But every time I thought I could be absolved of everything that I've done as Angelus, everything just became more obscure and untrue. I ignored the gray areas of my every belief more than once. I came so close to turning into a Wolfram and Hart lackey." Then Angel looked Connor squarely in the eye. "Then I remembered the thing that inspired me to start my long struggle in the first place, and realized that the light at the end of the tunnel was not real. It was the light inside me that I kept seeing not some distant reward… and it would remain there if and only if I kept fighting the dark… a selfless existence was my
salvation. It was then that all of the gray became lost and there was finally clarity. I remembered suddenly that I fought not for a reward or happy endings, but for a chance to change who I was. Who I was, Connor, that was it. It was not about having, it was about being.
"How many good deed does it take to fix a wrong? How many lives do you have to save to make up for one death? The answer is that you can't. The person will still be dead and all the goodness in the world will not ease once person's agony. And when I finally understood that I kept going anyway, even without all the rewards. You want to know why?" Connor just stared blankly at him. "Because I have chosen to do so. Because every time I fight, every time I keep going I become someone who isn't Angelus, I become completely severed from my past. That doesn't mean I don't deserve the punishments for my past, it probably means I even deserve them more, but for what it's worth I've found peace with myself. In the end, the only real choice a man has is who he wants to be. I couldn't stop being that person that I've chosen to become, son. If I stop being that person I've become, then I am no better than Angelus again.
"It was, I figured out later, my reward: to be Angel. No other reasons. It wasn't Shanshu. But, then again, I didn't start out with a Shanshu. It just came later, and frankly, it made the gray areas grayer. I started out with a clear understanding of my reasons and convictions. I guess along the way, I just forgot."
"But now you remember."
"If you ever want to find out if you've completed your purpose in life Connor, here's the best advice I can give you: If you're still alive, it isn't. Along the way I've found happiness even love but I always knew deep down that I would never find a happy ending. So you'll just have to live for me on that one."
"Don't you… Don't you long to be human again?"
"Longing? Yes. All the time. But I would never choose to follow that path. Like I've told you. That path would make me despise myself and in the end I'll only end up hating myself and I'll be back to where I was before. I've chosen this life: wandering, aimless but complete."
"Why? Why did you give it all up?"
"Because I loved them. I became this person because I loved them… I gave up Buffy because I loved her. The only other person that could compare to the pain of losing her is you." Angel touched a tear coming down Connor's cheeks.
Connor was struck by the weight of those words and how it explained everything so simply yet so deeply. Love.
After a while Connor spoke as he shook his head. "I'm not like you, Angel. I can't choose to give up all that is good in my life just to become someone that has a peace of mind. I realized that in the warehouse when I should've saved that girl. You don't understand what my family means to me. My friends. The people I live, work, and study with. They're my…"
"Holy Grail," Angel cut off. "A long time ago, a girl named Buffy was like that to me too." He took a black and white picture from his sleeve, the one Connor found in storage. "Cordelia was like my anchor, she made me feel that I wasn't fighting for nothing. Always, she was there to remind me of the path I had taken. She made me feel that the things around me were real and that the gray was as real the darkness and the light. It was she that made me keep going. I loved her for that." He sighed. "But Buffy… she was something else. She was the one- true kind, you know. You could say she showed me this path, helped me find the person that I had always wanted to be. She started me on this and at the end of it she was there. Beginning and end. She was my reason and she was my humanity. She was my happiness. Everything that I had ever wanted of paradise was with this girl.
"Your mother, Darla was like a wild high, an adrenaline rush that ended with a bloody and sobering agony. Cordelia was like a rock to keep me focused on who I really was. But Buffy, was like the place beyond the darkness, beyond the cause for all the pain and misery. She was something real. Probably the closest I got to heaven. Until you came along, my every hope for happiness in life and the rewards of a long and bloody battle as well as whatever humanity I had in me was tied with her. And in the end I gave her up. I gave them all up… As I gave you up. I loved each of these women in different ways and in different degrees. But in the end they no longer mattered because I chose to be someone who couldn't be with any of them. Or anyone. I became alone. This may be hard for you to understand but I guess this is just me, Connor."
"Every guy dreams of going home, dad," Connor muttered.
"What?"
"Every soldier since the dawn of time wants to go home. To their wives. To their parents. To their children. Your life dad…" Connor began to cry. "I can't even imagine… I lost my family!" It was Connor Reilly that shouted, not the Destroyer.
"No you haven't."
"Oh please!" Connor retorted. "We both know that that isn't true." A shadow seemed to consume his face. "What will happen to me?! I'm not like you, Angel! I can't and I'm afraid to be like you! Your sacrifices! Your choices! It's all too much for me, man! I can't! Someday a girl will come along and then a family, friends, a home… All of them will be my reason. Are you telling me that I can't choose to have any of that?"
"No one's asking you to. This world will fall and die or it will continue to live but no one will ask you to choose anything… It didn't do so with me… And it won't with you. Things happen around us and we can only act a certain way. Just find out who you really want be Connor… That's the only thing you are really responsible for… In the end choices are harder to accept than fate or destiny."
Connor seemed to accept this and finally spoke to a patiently waiting Angel. "Can I at least ask you where you are now?"
"Please! You're talking to a figment of your imagination!" The image of Angel only smiled and he was suddenly walking through a gaping hole in the Enterprise . He was walking out into space, no longer wearing the Darth Vader costume but his own leather coat.
"Wait! Don't go!" Connor yelled. Angel just kept walking. Connor ran for the hole but the distance seemed to increase and Angel's figure was growing smaller and smaller. Connor's body was being devoured by a pack of demons. "Don't, Angel! Come back! I can't do this! I can't do this alone!"
"Good bye son," Connor seemed to hear a faint echo of his father's voice. "Your time will come. Sahjahn, Jasmine, they'll be footnotes in your life. Your real test is coming but you must choose… I'm proud of you, Connor, never forget that. You're far stronger than you think. You'll come through in the end. You'll see."
Connor kept running for the hole that was now just a bright light. He stopped only when he stumbled on something and he tried to stand up, as he did he found himself suddenly plunging into darkness...
As he plunged all he could remember next was a man offering him some cheese.
Sometimes, I feel like I'm Neo.
Okay, well except he didn't get hit by a van and brought to a law firm…
But you know, there're similarities… kinda.
Seeing the World for what it really is,
Being stripped away of everything you know to be true,
Being plunged into a new reality.
I've experienced that many times…
And they all suck!
When Connor woke up he knew he had been dreaming again. The words and the conversations and the discoveries were all pieces of information he already knew. The dreams, he thought with awe, somehow helped him piece together those facts to create a picture. And always he knew that whatever dangers and mysteries await him, he knew that he had all the facts.
All that was missing now was to piece it together. He felt it there, that ominous sensation of a terrible purpose. He knew it but he didn't know it. The pieces gave him glimpses of it. And because of what he knows of what he can dream, he was suddenly afraid that this road was taking him somewhere that he doesn't want to be and he wouldn't be able to escape until it was too late.
Connor had been sitting still on his chair for the entire vigil since the previous night. Laurence Reilly's condition was critical and seriously in danger the night before. Kit and his mother were also tense, praying in the hospital chapel for quite some time. They had come back only a few hours ago since their rest at home. Laurence had been unconscious, in a state of peril just like the other cases all over the world. Connor wasn't doing better than the Reilly women. His mental discussions and illusionary flashbacks were slowly augmenting the stress and fatigue brought on by the never ending anxiety of the dangers that surrounded him. Fighting demons and apocalypses wasn't supposed to be his job but oddly, he knew that it was.
He now knew that he could not walk away. A war was coming and the easy choices would cost him everything that he loved. He had to fight, for his family and his loved ones; for his memories and for his peace of mind. It might not seem safe or sane to the typical person but then again, Connor's life had never been typical. It all seemed laughable but not really.
Connor was walking peacefully along the hospital corridor when he picked up a familiar scent. He followed it until he found what he was looking for. He grabbed Lawin and ducked into a broom closet, slamming him against the wall.
"Why in God's name won't you leave me alone!"
Lawin was choking but Connor didn't care. He applied more pressure. He stopped only when he saw Lawin raise a piece of paper with a symbol on it.
Connor looked at it and loosened the pressure but made sure that Lawin couldn't move.
"Find anything new?" Lawin asked with a sardonic smile.
"There are more demons here than in Quor'toth." Connor retorted with the same sarcastic tone. "And you?"
"Oh, not much. I went to a mutual acquaintance." Lawin raised the paper again and gestured for Connor to take it. "He told me you might want to take look at this… Something about your dad."
"Which dad?" Connor looked like he wasn't impressed, but he seemed very close to killing Lawin.
"Both of them."
"This better not be another damn joke."
"No, it isn't. I promise. Remember Malachi?"
"Weirdo man? Yeah. What about him?"
"That guy knows a lot more than he's letting on. He wants you to listen to some things he has to say."
"Right. So you're working for him now? No more Ancients. Moonlighting with other people? Why didn't he come here and talk to me himself?"
"Don't know. He told me things, things that made me want to listen to him… But before he goes further, he wants you to come along. Don't ask me why. That guy's a freak. Just listen to his offer. He knows about our most recent activities - how we're screwing up from one demon hole to another. He knows something about this disease and even more about the Horde."
"I already know about the disease. It's Kluthu. Does he have a cure?"
Lawin looked at the rooms with the patients infected by the demonic plague. "I don't know. You'll have to ask him that yourself."
"I know enough about the disease. All I care about now is a cure for my dad!"
Lawin gave Connor a smug look. "I'm just the messenger. Whatever you decide, you'll listen to me first goddamit! You saw those other patients with the disease?"
Connor released Lawin, got out of the broom closet and kept walking down the hospital corridor. Lawin followed the other guy, two steps behind. "Two of them were girls. See, the news lately? The places hit by the disease have girls on their list, young girls in their teens and twenties."
"Right, sick girls get you hot. Got it. Now, go away." Connor snapped.
Lawin stopped then blurted out two words. "They're Slayers!" Connor looked over at him with a look of surprise. "There've been a lot of Brits running around here lately."
"The girls that are among the ones hit by the plagues are Slayers. At least the ones that have been reported by the Watcher's Council. God knows how many more are sick out there."
"Slayers," Connor muttered. "That's impossible. There is only one Slayer."
"That was before." Lawin then related the events that followed the activation of the scythe.
"Holy shit!" Connor thought about an army of Faiths. He was struck by the power of it, and then he blushed at something that came into his mind.
Lawin, something's wrong. He's not suitably surprised.
He said holy shit. He seems surprised enough to me.
Boy, I am telling you that….
Lawin ignored the Scion and focused back on Connor. "Malachi said he has an idea of how to fix this but he wants us in it together. Don't argue with me. I'm just bringing the message. He said something about him not being seen. I don't know. Come with me to his place, he'll explain in detail the nature of the plague and how we may stop it." Lawin could see that Connor still had reservations, so he dropped the bomb. "There's also another thing Malachi wanted me to give you."
Lawin handed the piece of paper to Connor. It had the symbol of the Blackthorn on it. "A lead to Angel," he said.
Connor looked up at him. Lawin was preparing for a difficult question but all that Connor asked was: "Hundreds of Slayers, huh?" His eyes were suggesting something else at the thought of a hundred super heroines.
Lawin smiled.