CHAPTER 52: DEMONS TO SEE, PEOPLE TO KILL


Angel woke up abruptly after a few restless hours of sleep filled with nightmares. Well, any normal person would call them nightmare. Anyperson at all would. He dreamt of Buffy and himself and the time they had spent together, the things they had done together… the hunt, the kill, the terror. His demon enjoyed it. He enjoyed it. Not exactly something he could divulge to the people around him.

He hadn't thought he would be able to sleep at all, but the events of these last few weeks had obviously taken their toll. He quickly got to his feet, a little disoriented. He could feel the heat of the sun outside, shining against the thick curtains. He couldn't hear anybody else moving around in the house, so Faith and Gunn must still be asleep.

As soon as he stepped into the main room, he felt the strong scent of fresh human blood. Instantly he felt a pang of concern – she couldn't have snuck in under his nose and hurt someone, could she?

He followed the scent through the room and as soon as he pulled the curtains to the atrium apart, he saw her. Propped up against the wall her blank, dead face turned in his direction, empty eyes staring at him. She couldn't be more than fifteen or sixteen. Her long, shining hair was neatly arranged to show off the bite mark on her neck. Angel realized that the girl was sitting almost exactly where he – Angelus – had had Buffy cornered during their swordfight almost three years ago. She could have died then and there – she didn't, but Angel was pretty sure that the irony behind the placement of this body was well planned. After all, he had taught her well. An artist must pay attention to detail.

Carefully avoiding the deadly rays of morning sunlight he grabbed a blanket and threw it over the girl. He stood there for a minute, pondering. Yet another person, barely more than a child, would never make it home. Her friends and family would never see her alive again. This death might not be by his hands directly, but it was close enough. Upon hearing footsteps, he turned and went back inside, meeting a sleepy-eyed Gunn.

"Hey man," he greeted. Angel nodded silently. Gunn's gaze traveled past Angel and out into the atrium, settling on the covered body.

"Is that…?" he began.

"Yeah," Angel said tiredly. "A welcome back present I guess."

-


-

Buffy strode slowly, as silently as she could through the reeking sewer tunnel. Not that the smell of sewer had ever been her favorite, but it was definitely more impenetrable and stinky with a vampire enhanced nose. Ew.

She would have preferred to drive the dark metallic green Porsche that she had stolen before she left Los Angeles – but with the sun being up, there wasn't much of a choice. She had recon do to, demons to meet. She had heard Angel talk about meeting up in the Little Shop of Horrors at noon, she wanted to be as close as she could – to pick up what they were saying if possible.

She wasn't stupid, and as much as she hated to admit it, Angel could be pretty much as clever with a soul as he was without one when he put his mind to it. If that meekly version of him found even a smidge of something that could restore her soul and ruin her plans, he wouldn't give up until it worked. That was something she definitely wanted to nip in the bud. In fact, she was currently considering who to… "nip" first. She smirked to herself. These private pep moments almost made the mucky walk worth while.

She was heading to a tunnel close to Tracy Street. The Traklah demons had told them to meet up with them in what had been the nest of a Ghora demon. Until they came along, that was. Now it was the former nest of an ex-Ghora demon.

The night when the ritual could be performed was quickly approaching, and everything had to be ready. Buffy knew that Angel already knew her plans – it had been his to begin with, after all, and therefore, she had to take measures to ensure that he couldn't sabotage her hell gate opening fun. With any luck, he would already be back at her side as the first demon made its way out of the Hellmouth into the world.

Of course, first she would have to find another way to bring her demon back. Jenoff had failed miserably in taking Angel's soul and had ended up being cut apart and packed up like beef jerky. Incinerated beef jerky. Not that it had really surprised her. If you need something done properly, you have to do it yourself…

This should be the place. She crept soundlessly to the opening in the tunnel and peeked inside. Just as she thought; the five demons were there, waiting for her. She hadn't met them before, but they looked just like what Angelus had mockingly described. They were big – at least eight feet tall, green and scaly with pointed ears, uneven sharp teeth with big canines protruding from their mouths and claw like hands. Pretty much the look of a run of the mill demon, she had slain hundreds of creatures similar to these in her day.

So these were the guys that would sacrifice themselves for the ritual. Buffy couldn't quite decide if it was stupid or honorable. She settled on stupid. No fun in being a sacrificial lamb. Putting on her cockiest smirk, she sauntered towards them. At first they stiffened but soon they relaxed, seeming to know who she was.

"Hey boys-beings, whatever the hell you might be. Rumor has it you're the ones a girl should talk to about the up and coming apocalypse."

"You be childe made from Angelus?" one of the demons began in faltering English. Buffy frowned. Amazing, demons that were too stupid to even learn the language properly actually thought they would be able to pull off the end of the world? None of them seemed like the leader either. Maybe they had been counting on Angelus leading them? Strange. Something about that didn't sound right either.

"Yeah, that's me," she replied lightly.

"Good. We did plans. You help." Buffy smother an unnecessary sigh, trying not to show her irritation.

"Yeah, sure. What should I do?"

"You will only wait until we have amulet of Proserpexa, she who was mighty demon." Buffy nodded slowly, indulgently. Angelus had told her about the amulet.

"And the reason why I can't fetch the amulet? I'm kind of bored here and, no offense, I think I'll get there faster than you. Just point the direction and I'll be on my way."

"You be impudence," one of the demon's said. "You do this then sun do dust from you." Buffy glared at him.

"Gee, how could I forget that? Oh wait, I didn't! I could always wait until tonight."

"You will do nothing. The one who will search amulet arrive tonight. Until then, we collect precious blood from Scourge."

"Yeah, about that…"

"Us know. The Scourge has left us. His blood still is in your veins. It will do."

She smirked. She hadn't known that her blood could act as Angel's. Not there hadn't been ways around it even if it couldn't. She would simply have gathered a little Bloody Mary minus the Mary from her lover somehow, but this sure was easier.

"In that case," she held out her arm, "where do you want it?"

One of the demons handed her a dark ceramic vase and a dagger.

She put the sharp blade to her palm and made a deep cut. She watched the cut as it reddened and blood welled up, making a sharp contrast against her pale skin. She closed her hand to help the blood to drip into the vase. After a while, when it was full, she put the cork back into place, handed the vase back to the demons and closed her wound by licking it, savoring the rich taste of blood.

"You come with us. Highness will come soon. You greet Highness, you behave.

Buffy furrowed her brow. "So, this 'Highness' of whom you speak so… badly. And, who you evidently consider more suitable for the amulet digging business… Who is it?"

"Highness be almighty. Highness be above all. The Beast. The God." Buffy sighed, making a dismissive gesture with her hand. The worst of the worst, baddest of the bads, evilest evil of all the evils – yada yada, she had heard it all before.

"Yeah, right, sure. Whatever. That's very unique and all. A name, maybe?"

"Highness is the magnificent Glorificus."

-


-

"So; where do we start?"

Willow was the one that uttered the simple but well justified and necessary question. She, Giles, Xander, Anya, Cordelia, Gunn and Wesley all sat around the big table in the Magic Box. Spike was perched on the countertop to Giles' dismay, but since the shop wasn't open for business at the time being and because they had much, much more important things to discuss, he had wasted little energy with trying to get the vampire away from there. Faith stood propped up against a book shelf. Angel was pacing back and forth, his face pulled into his usual scowl.

He was edgy, restless. He wanted this over with. At least he wanted to be out there, not cooped up inside sitting on his hands and waiting around for nightfall like a useless fool. He wanted not to be around all of these people day in and day out. Not to be around their coursing blood and pounding heartbeats and Xander and his pestering. It was in the boy's nature to mock, scoff, taunt and remark, always had been, but he had no idea how close to the abyss he danced every time he did it with him. Angel knew. Very well.

The stress of the situation, the forced vicinity to all these people practically around the clock, the impending doom, dead people piling up, Buffy roaming the town a soulless monster, dreaming of being back at her side as soon as he closed his eyes – the whole thing was getting to him.

"We have two priorities," he said, still pacing. "We need to capture Buffy, and we have to make sure the ritual to open the Hellmouth can't take place."

"Yeah, that'd be the goals," Gunn pointed out. "How about a plan to make it happen?" Angel was silent for a moment, seeming to think, or maybe pulling himself together.

"Bringing Buffy should take care of all our problems at once," he said. "If we can restore her soul our biggest problem will be gone, and we won't have to worry about the demon's opening the Hellmouth."

"You sure about that?" Angel shrugged.

"They need Buffy's or my blood, it won't work without it. That's what the demons told me." He stopped for a minute. "It's just... there is something that bothers me about all this."

"What?" Cordelia asked urgently. "We don't have time to play the cryptic guy game."

"The demons. They were Traklah's."

She stared blankly at him. "So?"

"Traklah's?" Wesley cut in. "Are you sure?" Angel nodded. "How odd."

"Evil demons wanting to open the gates of hell? Not odd. Not even unusual. We've seen it before, remember," Cordelia said, looking at Angel.

"Traklah's aren't big thinkers," Wesley tried to explain. "They're big and strong, adjust easy to all forms of climate and accommodations, but I wouldn't consider them for a project this big. They usually follow someone… well, more intelligent demons. One could think of them as mercenary, ready to work for anyone offering a good deal."

"They're just flunkies," Angel summarized. Wesley nodded.

"Indeed so. I don't see them putting an event as big as this to motion by themselves. Frankly I think it's more believable that there is someone else acting as the leader." Angel nodded. He had come to the same disturbing conclusion himself.

"Maybe Deadboy here isn't telling us the whole story," Xander suggested with a hint of bitterness in his voice. "Maybe he hired the big-brawns. Would explain it." Angel shot him a sharp look.

"No, that's not it," he snapped. "I didn't think about this until just recently."

"Angel, these demons…" Wesley went on, ignoring the ever growing tension in the room, especially between Angel and Xander. "Was it you and Buffy who sought them in the first place, or was it perhaps the demons that came looking for you?"

"Buffy wasn't even in on it in the beginning. I overheard the demons talking about what they were going to do, the next day I tracked them down… come to think of it, they seemed very willing to let me in on their planning. Maybe a little TOO willing."

Wesley frowned. "Hm. You weren't… suspicious?" Angel shrugged uneasily and shook his head.

"Traklah's are stupid, and we were gonna betray them anyway."

"'Course he wasn't suspicious," Spike chimed in. "Angelus opinion of himself sticks up higher than his hair. Flies higher than Dru's bloody stars, it does."

"Okay, so your blown up self-reliance told you that the demons simply would cut you in on their apocalypse… because, what? Because you're so scary, or because it would be an honor to sacrifice their own lives and give you the credit for it… Watch out Einstein, this boy is one fire!" Cordelia scoffed.

"Angel," Wesley said. "Do you realize what this means?"

"Yes," Angel pointed out. "I do, but I suppose you're going to explain it anyway."

"It means that we are possibly about to face something even worse than Buffy and the opening of the Hellmouth, namely the leader of all of this. Assuming that you, or Buffy for that matter, only were wanted because your blood is the final ingredient in this ritual and the Traklah demons only are the muscle, and the sacrifice… I wouldn't want to know who is leading this whole operation. Whomever, or whatever for that matter, it is it certainly has to be powerful." Everyone nodded in agreement.

"Well, since this big evil hasn't made itself known yet, we can at least hope it only wants to open the Hellmouth…" Angel began.

"Excuse me, I must have heard that wrong. It sounded like you said 'only open the Hellmouth'," Cordelia asked. "Like that's not enough?"

"I mean – if that's all it wants, we can stop it by getting to that amulet and destroying it as soon as possible." He looked at Wesley. "What do you think, Wes?"

"Sounds about right," he agreed. "How do you suggest we approach the situation?"

"I don't think we should split up. I don't have to spell out for anyone what Buffy will do as long as she is loose – but until we put a definite stop to the ritual, everyone is in danger. Not just of the Sunnydale residents, but the world. We need to find out where the amulet of Proserpexa is buried." He looked in Giles' direction. "Any hope of finding that out before sunset?"

"Er, ah, perhaps. If we assume that the amulet is buried in the same spot as the temple, it shouldn't be too difficult to find it." Giles turned to the gang.

"Research time then," Willow said, already on her way to the ladder that led up to the shelves holding Giles' private collection of books.