Body

20

"Angel, can we talk?" Christina asks nervously.

He walked over to his fiancee. "Sure, what about?" he asks, wrapping his arms around her, noticing her nervousness.

"Let's sit." They do. "This is kind of strange for me to talk about. You'd think," she absently waved her hand in the air to indicate something or other.

"I'd think what?" Angel asks playfully.

"That I wouldn't be or have some experience or something, but I don't know much about this and it's never really come up, especially at home in New York and then when you brought me here I was so busy with Slayer duties--"

Angel interrupts her tense rambling. "You're not making any sense." He takes her hands in his and kiss her fingertips. "Slow down, take a breath and break up your sentences." He smiles.

Smiling back Christina takes a deep breath. "I don't mind sharing you with the ghost of Buffy."

Angel stops her. "You're not sharing me with anyone. Besides, Buffy's not dead to be a ghost," he says jokingly, trying to diffuse her worry.

Christina starts to ignore him, "But--," then changes her mind, "No. No.

"You're right. Buffy's not dead, but she is a ghost of your past. You haven't seen her in years and I don't know why--" she raises a hand to stop him from interrupting, "and I don't care why. What happened between you and The Slayer was long before I was born. But that's not my point.

"Angel, you can take your life, your entire existence, and divide it by Buffy. Before her you didn't know the limits of your self and soul and after her you knew. She was the first person you really loved for a century and a half and even though I know you've had feelings for other women besides her," Christi shakes her head, "there is no one like her." She wraps her hands around his, "And I can't compete, and I don't want to. I'm not going to try to make you forget, that'd be mean of me. Besides its impossible."

Angel is floored. Mentally, he has avoided his entire experience with Buffy. Half a century later it is emotionally difficult to deal with still. He simply buried it, but if Angel is honest with himself he can see Christi is right. Buffy has never left him, he has just ignored her presence. "So what are you trying to say?"

"Just that. I realize Buffy is..." she seems to not know where to go with this thought, "maybe I should just get into the 'but' of this whole thing.

"I don't mind sharing you and my life with the ghost of Buffy," here she stops and with serious gravity she says, "but she will not share my bed."

Angel objects. He would never bring Buffy's memory into their marriage like that.

Christi shakes her head. "No. There are simply too many similarities between me and Buffy." Her voice drops to a whisper, her eyes focused on their hands, "Whenever our first time is, it will be my first time and you will be my first" she looks up at him, "can you tell me that it won't remind you of her? that anything we do won't take you back to that moment?" Angel doesn't answer her. "At least I brought it up before the wedding." She lets their hands drop, pushes back her chair and stands.

Walking around the table Angel catches her hand. "Are you saying you want to break off the wedding?" he asks in a tense whisper.

She looks at him. A tear rolls down her cheek, out of his sight, "No, of course not. I love you." She kisses him on the forehead and leaves.

Angel touches his head and looks at the tear on his fingertips.

21

She was coming to. He sat there staring at her. Oh, she would be his prize jewel, and she had tasted so sweet. There, her eyelids were fluttering. He wondered how long he could keep her going like this, running her then feeding off her till she collapsed. She'd probably drop from exhaustion and anemia soon, besides there wasn't much night left. Well, actually that didn't matter, he could always run her around the warrens of the sewer system.

Angel bit his finger, causing a drop of blood to flow. He quickly wiped it across the bite wound. It disappeared. Christi woke up, weak, dazed and frightened.

"Aw, come on, petite, don't give up on me already," he said sarcastically.

True to the hidden Slayer within she was on her feet in moments. Angel noticed she was slower than last time. He grinned. She fled.

Lazily, Angel stood from his crouched position and followed the Slayer who never would be.

Crashing through brambles, ripping her clothes and scratching her face, Christina, too, wondered how long she could go on. Although Angel left no marks on her, she knew he'd been feeding. The first time comes vividly to mind. Christi tripped, crying out as her arms were scratched even more. She has lost more skin from her hands. They burn, but she ignores it. Even if Christi could outrun him, she is positive he can track her by the smell of her blood alone.

She's right.

Christina was becoming entirely too easy to sniff out, but Angel liked the taste of adrenaline in his prey. Besides, who knew when he might get a Slayer to play with again? No, he was enjoying this too much. Too bad it would soon come to an end.

Angel could almost feel her in his arms, his mouth, her neck, drinking her dry. At the thought he let a maniacal laugh that sent Christi scurrying further into the brush.

There was something up ahead. Lights, maybe? If that's town I'm saved, Christina thought. With a final burst of speed that ate the last of her reserves, she ran for the lights. Maybe she was finally running toward the Festival Night carnival. Someone was bound to see her. She had to tell someone about Justina, had to show them where to find the body. The thought of leading a search party to her old enemy's body almost made Christina collapse, nauseated. She didn't like the girl, but she certainly didn't want her to die, especially not at the hands of a...a vampire.

She was so close. So close Christi thought she could hear the carnival ahead of her. People were laughing and screaming, enjoying themselves. They were so close, so close, so...

"Tsk, tsk, tsk. I thought you had more in you being a Slayer and all." Christina screamed, surprised and frightening. "Oh, did I scare you?" She'd collapsed in a crying, sweaty heap.

"Come on! I guess you wouldn't have made much of Slayer after all," Angel sneered at the sobbing form. "Guess I'm doing the council a favor." She was a pitiful sight. "Ugh!," he exclaimed in disgust. Angel bent down to pick her up by her left arm

As he lifted her, Christina slammed the heel of her hand into his jaw, knocking Angel back.

"Yes! I knew you had spirit." He had her down with a leg sweep before she could regain her bearings. Refusing to give up, Christi kicked Angel as he hovered over her prone body and rolled into a standing position.

"I'm not so easy to kill," she gasped out. She savagely rammed her elbow into his head. Angel fell.

It was a kick of pure rage that did her in. Christina tried to stomp her left foot on Angel's neck, crushing his throat and giving her time to run away. She didn't know what she was dealing with. Instead, Angel grabbed the moving foot, upsetting Christi's precarious balance and landing her on her back.

Angel was on her with preternatural speed. "I've always loved a woman with spirit," he said caressing the side of her face. "Now I get to drain it from you."

Mercilessly, he tore into her neck. Christina spasmed in pain, back arching as Angel strained her heart for every red drop it processed. Her mouth hung open as her eyes rolled back into her head.

In another life, this might have the tableau of two lovers in the woods, except here there was blood running down the woman's shoulder and breast.

22

Angel awoke, heart bounding, adrenaline pumping, mixed feelings of excitement and disgust rushing through him. It was becoming harder to tell where one feeling, one personality, left off and the other began.

Unconsciously, he reached over to her side of the bed. Hands brushing cool sheets, Angel recalled his return to the apartment.

Christina Prime was breaking through the door of the greenhouse as Angel walked in. With a high pitched laugh she cried, "Thought you could keep me here? Ha, ha, what you don't know about me is going to get you killed mortal, and I will have the pleasure of doing the killing!" Shocked, he stood stock still as Prime launched herself at him. Angel was sure it was instinct that made him defend himself rather than any conscious thought.

Whirling around, he grabbed one of the wooden stakes lying about the apartment. Laughingly, Prime batted it away. "Well that's another thing that's different," Angel said, desperately searching for another weapon. "Where's a torch when you need one?! They work on everyone!"

For the moment they were engaged in hand to hand combat as Prime backed him from greenhouse to the living room to study. Angel landed heavily on the woodstic work desk -- amazingly breaking it -- as the vampiress threw him across the room. He rolled over the wreck, throwing whatever he found in his hands.

"Ugh!" Prime screamed as a small bottle of Holy Water broke against her exposed shoulder.

"Yes!" Angel cried, mostly to himself. For some reason this only angered her. Christina Prime threw herself at him, her eyes flashing in fury, dilated into black holes. Instead of landing on him, Angel used her momentum to send Prime flying over his head into the wall. A nearby shelf of antique paper books and story tabstics collapsed.

"Can't win little mortal!" she said pulling herself up. Angel's hand touched the cool handle of a knife. "You had me when the sun was shining but now the Evil Lady is down and you can't stop me."

It wasn't a knife, but his wife's silver letter opener. He'd bought it for her many years before they were married. She'd received a snail mail and had no clue what to do with it.

"Hey, Angel. Um I have something, a letter actually. Do you have any clue how to open it? I've only seen them in pictures."

He'd laughed. "Here try this," he tossed her a letter opener. "Slip it under the side and draw it across."

She did. "Thanks!" She threw her arms around him in a quick hug then left the mansion.

Now Angel drew it out of the confusion of papers, fully intent on using it to kill this creature that looked and sounded exactly like his wife. He rushed her, surprising Prime and knocking her to the floor. Angel held the blade to her neck and watched as her eyes dilated wildly in fear. "Give me a reason not to kill you. Yes, I kinda figured I could kill you with this. Tell me, do you stake werewolves in your reality?"

Prime was too frightened to reply. They'd never expected it be so hard to take over this world.

"Come on, I'd much rather just get rid of you and figure out how to get my wife back." He pressed the letter opener closer, "Then again, if you want to die, I'll be happy to oblige you."

"No! No, I can help you. I'm sure I can."

Angel fought memories of hearing his Christina pleading so, rare as it was. "How?"

"I...I can tell you what he's going to do next. I can tell you how he plans to take your world and how to bring the Master over with him even though--"

Angel cut her off, "The Master?! The Master is destroyed."

"He, he knows that. But he's figured out a way to bring him over without a host body in this plane."

"Get up," he said, moving back so Prime could rise without assistance. Angel kept the knife to her neck. Slowly, he backed her towards the weapon store. Maybe she got an idea of what Angel was planning, or maybe Christina saw an opening , but she slammed a powerful kick to his side. He doubled over in pain but held onto the letter opener. Prime grabbed one of the chains hanging in the closet and, using both hands, swung it at him.

Angel caught it -- painfully, but at the moment that was moot -- around his arm and yanked. Hard. With a surprised cry, Prime was pulled forward, into the point of the letter opener. It nicked the base of her throat causing a small bloom of blood that quickly grew and trickled down her chest.

"Now," Angel asked in a low growl, "are you going to cooperate or should I just get rid of you now?"

Prime nodded.

"Good enough."

She was still chained to a chair in the living room. She was probably hungry. He should see about her. He should see if she needed something. Maybe she was cold, maybe--

Maybe what?! She's a vampire not your wife, Angel told himself. Stop letting her appearance confuse you.

But it was hard. Especially after those dreams. Didn't the Oracle say that those dreams were important?

Angel got up and looked for a legal pad. There were a stack of the genuine paper pads around here somewhere. He had bought a bunch a few decades ago, or something like that. Now, where did Christi put them?

Thinking of Christi brought a stab of pain. His side was already sore from fighting Prime this morning, the emotional pain only made it worse.

He found them. They were sitting stacked, nice and neat in a corner of his rarely used genuine wood desk. I figure put all the real stuff together. I figure you'll find them eventually, Christi said with a laugh and shrug. Two memories and a dream were almost more than Angel could take. He sniffled, trying to concentrate long enough to get his thoughts down. The mid Twenty-First Century had brought a renewed interest in manliness. Not that any of that mattered. Angel was born during the late Nineteenth Century. Manliness was it, though his father had often believed his son Liam to be a disgrace.

But he was losing his concentration. On the pad he jotted down what he felt was important about each of his dreams. About halfway down he thought about Christi's dreams. One of them made her wake up screaming. The other two were much more unusual. She said she had...morphed? Changed shape without thinking about it?

Suddenly his expereience with the Oracle came back. Maybe his wife had dreamed an alternate reality? Had she been trying to help him unconsciously? She hadn't used her gift of channeling spirits in years. Usually they contacted her but since she'd used it once, to save Bishop. The spirits didn't seem to need to speak through or to her anymore. Maybe they had been trying this time, trying to speak to both of them.

He wrote it all down, lying on his stomach in the bed he shared with his wife. The one he would share with her again, soon. He promised himself. Besides, the dreams weren't done yet.

23

Angel circled Christina. Bound as she was it would have been pointless to follow him with her eyes. She didn't even bother trying.

This was becoming frustrating. She couldn't find anything in the Chronicles that seemed to help and, try as he might, Bishop wasn't any more contributive. She was up at 1 in the morning, worrying over something that Angel seemingly had control of. Did he? He certainly seemed to after his talk with the Oracles.

There was something she was missing about that, Hermoine was sure. Whatever it was, neither Angel or any of the Counsel members were forth coming. It just seemed as if no one needed her. As a Watcher she should be infinitely needed. She should be important. She should be useful. But no one had a use for her, at least not at the moment. Not even Mayja, her charge, needed her. It was slow in the Slaying world...except when it came to Angel.

Somehow, Hermoine felt connected to this problem though she had been put off the case, in a sense. Oh, she was sure Angel would have need for her again, and probably soon. (Hopefully someone would have need of her soon!) Still, it would not let her go. She supposed that was what made her a good Watcher. She was drawn in to a case or mystery and could not let it go until it was resolved...even when her specific help wasn't specifically needed.

Surely there was something she could do!

Sleep would be a nice change of pace. Hermoine laughed to herself. If she went to bed now she could get a good six hours in, more if she showed up at the library on time instead of early. Lately, however, she had felt the need for sleep less and less. Hermoine figured the stress of working on this was subsituting for sleep, making her body believe she didn't need it. That was probably it. It reminded her of finals back at university. Then it seemed she could run on junk food and caffeine for days with barely four hours of sleep in an entire week. She wasn't sure if those were the good days or simply the crazed ones of youth.

Hermoine gathered her notes, and thoughts, together to send Angel via email. Maybe it would be helpful. She wondered how he was getting along with that vampire double. It must be rather difficult, she thought with English stodginess. Some things just worked themselves into the brain despite trying to get away from them.

After sending the file, Hermoine stripped, pulled on a nightgown and crawled into bed. Her glasses went on the nightstand as did her pocket watch. Flicking off the bedside lamp, she fell into an almost immediate sleep...and dreamed.

She was such an enigma. He had never met women like her. Of course, there were so few women these days. He chuckled darkly to himself.

The laughter raised hairs on her neck as she shuddered. Everything was simply to eerie. Nothing was familiar and everything was. He was and he wasn't. Don't get caught by him. He is Other, the little voices in her head said. They began another lilting chant. It was almost becoming too much to bear, trying to keep a cool demeanor for this him while every nerve and psychic voice in her mind screamed danger. She was being torn.

He didn't see that, but he didn't need to. All he needed to know was she was safely chained to the floor and that she was starving. Hungry people were apt to do interesting things to assuage their need. Everything should be going well with his other. He'd trained her himself under the eye of the Master. There was none better. He decided to tell her so.

"But the Master's dead. Buffy killed him," she said. The first words out of Christina's mouth since waking.

"Only where you come from. Here, though Buffy," he sneered, "was the final element in raising the Master I made sure she didn't survive the ritual."

"Hello? Oh!" Hermoine turned, "Who are you?" she asked the man who seemed to appear in her peripheral vision, startling her.

He reached for her hand. Hermoine couldn't see his face. "I need you. Will you help me?"

"How, how can I help you?" she asked, stepping closer to see his face. It was hidden in the shadow of a hat. If she could just get a little closer...

But when she didn't seem to be any closer despite moving forward a good five paces. Hermoine wasn't sure how, but it was like he moved back as she stepped up, yet without moving at all. Maybe she wasn't moving at all?

The man held out his hand again. "Help me. I need you...Hermoine."

Then he turned and walked away. "Wait! Wait, how can I help you! How do you know my name?!" she called after him, futily.

He dissappeared into the fog....

"You know, I really think he loves you."

"What, who?" It's becoming harder for you to pay attention.

He laughs at you. "My other self, who else. I keep getting these snippets of his memories of you two." He's on your level, in your face now, "Such tender, mushy, souled feelings," you can feel his surprisingly warm breath carressing your eyelashes and cheeks. His voice takes on the soft purring quality that's always drawn you in and you fight it. Does he know? you wonder. He gently places his index finger on ur lower lip, outlining it, he whispers, "Don't worry, I would never bring Buffy to our bed."

You jerk back letting out a short explosive breath. Jumping up with preternatural speed, he turns away from you, his laughter ringing from the high walls.

"See," this other Angel yells to no one, "I knew that wasn't coming from me!" He turns. "I knew it," he says, softer this time. There he is, in your face again, almost faster than you can follow him. His fingers reach out to caress your cheek and you jerk away. Or at least you try to. You forget that he is not your love with your love's human weakness. He is a vampire and he holds your chin with an iron force. You growl at him.

Angel chuckles darkly at you making you shudder. "She was like that too. Just discovering her Slayer strength," you want to tear away from his voice from his eyes, "she fought me like a little hellcat." He laughed again, "I suppose that's a compliment considering I've fought a few hellcats."

You are becoming enthralled, you can feel it. Vampires don't enthrall their victims, says the part of your mind that stays rational despite any situation, at least not the ones I know about. But you know it, your becoming enthralled. Bewitched, your mother might say, jokingly. I have to stop staring into his eyes. You don't know how you know that, but you also know it's true.

He's just talking now, almost as if you are best friends, and except for the not-quite painful grip on your chin you might believe it.

The Slayer walked into the library, "Hey, whatcha beamin' about Minny?"

"Don't call me Minny, Mayja. It isn't my name," Hermoine said, pushing up her reading glasses.

Slamming textbooks on a woodstic counter Mayja commented on Hermoine's glasses.

"I happen to like my glasses."

"Just wondering why you don't wear contacts or get surgery or something. I mean, it's so common now. Like, you're the only person I know who even owns glasses that they, well, need. I mean, it's so mudo."

"Mudo?"

Mayja rolled her eyes, exhasperated. "You know, like you're so behind. It means it's old fashioned. I only say it all the time."

"I'm sorry I don't pay attention to every change in slang you kids go through." Even the rebuke couldn't erase the smile playing at her lips. For a moment she sat staring at a stack of books in the recently redone library. Some of the high school's alumni, remembering what it looked like before the 1999 fire, had financed refurbishing the library. Despite new neuro-net terminals there were actual books made of real paper resting in woodstic versions of the destroyed wood shelves.

"Come on. Let's spar."

Mayja abused the weight bag, but it could take it. "So," she said between high roundhouse kicks, "who's the guy?"

"What?!" Hermoine's breath was being forced out of her lungs as Mayja kicked the bag, and her. The bag might be able to take the abuse, but she wasn't sure she'd be able to. "Lets, lets stop for now, alright?"

"Yeah, sure. Hand me that water?" She wiped her sweat off with the back of her hand.

Hermoine rolled her eyes and grabbed a towel wiping the sweat pouring down her face. She grabbed the water and took a swallow.

"Hey! That was for me."

"You have two legs, get your own. Some of us aren't lucky enough to have slayer endurance."

"So, what's with the goofy grin from earlier. Well, not really goofy," she rambled, "but for you -- you know all that English uptightness and everything -- that's a pretty goofy look. So who is it?"

Hermoine shrugged. "It's not a guy per se, but a dream --"

"Oo! a hot dream, almost just as good. Tell me all about it."

" -- oh why am I telling you anyway."

"Wh-why do you want," you ask. Your voice sounds far away, even to yourself. "Why are you doing this to me?"

He is so close you are breathing each other's air. He no longer holds you physically, but you are in his power. "Because I want to torture my souled human self. I want Angel to watch you walk willingly into my arms, to your death." He laughs as you struggle against your visible and invisible bonds.