They always did.
Five vampires had risen from the cemetery. All lusted after her blood. He had turned his head in her direction and caught her smile. Alone she might have been afraid, but he was at her side again; stake in hand. Five against two became bad odds - for the vampires.
As he charged forward, his demon eyes glowing in the darkness, a vampire lunged for her. "Oh come on!" she told the creature. "We've only just met. Didn't your mom ever tell you that hickeys come after a date?" The vampire growled. She moved fast, hopping into the air and delivering a short kick to the demon's head. She landed to face another vampire leaping at her –not a problem- she fell onto her back, holding her stake upright…
"Angel?" she asked, breathing hard but relaxed.
"No problems here!" he shouted back as he staked his first vamp of the night. "You?"
She thrust an elbow into a vampire's nose. "Pretty good." The newborn fell back on a tombstone. She ran it through.
In what seemed like only a few minutes it was all over. They'd won, until the next fight of the patrol anyway.
He smiled
as he looked at her again. She hadn't even broken a sweat. She looked as
pretty as ever even in her now ripped jeans and vest.
But then Buffy would always be the most beautiful thing in his world – her wide smile, her gentle eyes. In over two centuries of life, Angel knew that he had always loved the sixteen-year-old. And he knew that he always would.
"Where next?" he asked her.
"School campus, then home," Buffy said. "That last one was quite the Mr stamina."
The Slayer got up from her tombstone and moved closer to him. "Hang on a sec," she whispered affectionately.
Then, Buffy kissed him with more passion and love than he could ever have dreamt of.
Were it not for the fact that Angel knew he was dreaming…
As he woke, Angel could sense that it was day. He couldn't sleep any longer; the dreams were becoming more and more frequent. They were also becoming more torturous for his heart.
He needed her so badly now.
He had been grateful for the fantasy though. It sustained him. If he could no longer battle on for Whistler's "Powers That Be" then he could battle on for the Slayer's love come the day that she arrived. Come the day that she would save the godforsaken town of Sunnydale.
Come the day that she would save him.
Frowning, he got dressed, took out his battered old first edition of "Of Mice And Men" from his small bookshelf, and sat down in his armchair.
Night was still hours away. Reading it again would kill the time…
***
Xander smiled at Willow from his desk. She didn't appear to notice.
Again.
Now he was really worried for his friend, she hadn't exactly known Jaclyn. Sure, she had a right to be freaked out after seeing the girl's dead body, but it wasn't as if they'd been friends or even familiars. This was going too deep for Willow. She wasn't dealing and if she wasn't dealing then she was leaving herself open to feeling worse about things than she already did.
Something he wasn't prepared to let happen.
"Geez, somebody's got to do something about Willow man!" Jesse kept his voice to a low hush as he leaned over his desk.
"I hear ya Jesse," he replied sadly. "But you can't just shake her out of something like this. Seeing a dead body like that's a serious wiggins."
"Mr Harris? If you've something important to say then I'm sure that the class would be most interested."
Xander turned back around to face Mr Millar. "It's nothing sir…"
The bell rang for lunch.
Xander collected his textbooks together. Then he stopped – Mr Millar had called Willow over to speak with him. Willow just nodded in response to his every word. She looked even more miserable once the talk was over.
"Willow, hey Will! Wait up!" he called as the girl walked out of the classroom.
Willow held her head down as she moved along to the drinking fosset.
"Work with me Will," Xander said imploringly. "Talk? You remember how to do that, right? The talking with the English?"
Willow took a sip of water and brushed her hair from her face. "Xander…I…" she said frailly.
Oh man, Willow… "Hey, its okay. C'mon what you need is lunch – or at least that's what my stomach wants – and somewhere quiet. C'mon I'm now your unofficial councillor and I don't know any of those big old words that your real one does so you won't have to listen to me as much."
Willow smiled thinly. "Okay…."
"That's my Willow," Xander said cheerfully, kissing his friend lightly on the cheek.
Willow shed a faint tear as Xander put his arm around her back. He really wanted to try to help her but he would never understand what was prolonging her pain. The fear…
The fear of what was in her mind when she first looked upon Jaclyn. The dark sense of wonder she felt when viewing the physical evidence of death itself. In an instant she had begun to understand more about life than any science texts could ever hope to teach her in a lifetime of education. She understood how fragile it all was. She understood the cold, still, beauty of death. In death there was a peace. A peace so strong, so binding that it could never be broken. It was a peace that had made her afraid of dying. A peace she wanted to avoid but also a peace that she wanted to feel.
With the paralysing horror that she had experienced in those briefest of moments had come a profound confusion. But Willow now knew one thing if nothing else. She wanted more knowledge.
Knowledge of death…
Beep…beep…beep. The sound was the first he could make out. The sound of syllables rapidly became the second. The question was his location. Where in blazes was he?
"…I think he's regaining consciousness," said a youngish brunette woman.
A tanned
man in a white coat smiled at the brunette. "About time. Mr Giles? Mr Giles,
Can you hear me?"
"Yea…yes…where?" he asked.
"You're in Mercy Hospital, Mr Giles," said the woman, she was a nurse?
"…Hospital? Th…the morgue...the vam…"
"Take it
easy, Mr Giles. You've had a pretty rough time…" The man was a doctor.
"How did
I get here?"
"A young man brought you in about three days ago," the nurse informed him.
Giles flexed his hand. He was on a drip. "A… young man?"
"You're lucky the guy found you," the doctor replied earnestly, "The injuries to your head were bad enough but the anaemia in your blood could have killed you if he hadn't driven you here."
Giles felt realisation dawn. "Three? Three days?"
"You've been in a mild coma, if a coma can be mild," the doctor explained jokingly. He seemed a fairly young man, early thirties at the most. "Seriously though, you were out cold. For a couple of hours I didn't think you were gonna wake up, not this year. You've gotta have some guardian angel looking after you."
"The man? What did he look…look like?" Giles groaned. He was starting to regain his feeling as well as his mental awareness.
"Black leather jacket, no shirt, black pants, black shoes – I only caught a glimpse of him but he wouldn't give his name," the nurse recalled. "And he was pretty pale, I mean he didn't really look ill but he was pale. Early-mid twenties…"
"Pretty good description," the doctor teased. "Between you and me Mr Giles I think Nurse Griffith only noticed him because he was what most women might call 'studley.' Or that's what I heard. Anyway, I've got other patients to attend to now. But I'll be back. "
"If you
need anything use this beeper," the nurse held up a device in her hand and
smiled warmly. "I'll be around later."
The two left his room.
Giles closed his eyes. He was well aware that he shouldn't be doing so. He should have been dead, and dead three nights ago at that. But he wasn't. He was in a hospital bed, grateful for the revelation that he continued to breathe while his thoughts centred on his saviour. On his "guardian angel" as the doctor had so unknowingly phrased it.
Angelus had saved his life.
Why are you doing this Angel? The Watcher pondered. The vampire was becoming ever more confounding. He wanted his trust and would do everything in his power to have it because he claimed that needed his help. His had been the voice begging for him to live. "You go now and everybody goes with you! Hear me Watcher? If the Master…" Angel had told him. "You go now and everybody goes with you…" Giles repeated to himself. "But who or what do you call your Master, Angelus…."
It was a quandary. Rupert Giles had never much liked unanswered questions or puzzles. He wanted to know everything. And he would.
Even it meant making a pact with a devil.
A devil with an angelic face…
