Dust Thou Art
by Jeanne Rose
Part 8
Doyle set his mug on the counter with a contented sigh. "Ah, that went down proper." He indicated Angel's untouched drink. "What's wrong? Not thirsty? Or were you hankering for something thicker?"
"No." Angel took a token sip. The beer was nearly tasteless, as all human food was to him. He wondered how Doyle had talked him out of a nice quiet evening of sitting alone in the dark.
"You ought to get out more often," Doyle commented, as if reading his mind. "Get a taste of the world, remember why it's worth saving."
Angel looked around at all of the people drowning their sorrows in alcohol, only to wake up with hangovers on top of their troubles the next morning. "And this is supposed to remind me?"
"Folks relaxing after a hard day's work, friends getting together for a round of beer, guys meeting girls." Doyle downed another swallow of scotch, grimacing appreciatively. "It's all in how you look at it, what you know how to see. Take death, for example." Doyle shifted in his chair, and a green amulet slid out from under his jacket. "You've been dead so long you don't know how to see it for what it is. I, on the other hand, am just beginning to appreciate it."
"And how am I supposed to see it?"
Doyle lifted the chain with the amulet over his neck and laid it on the counter between them. "You think you've got a problem, dealt to you by those nasty scheming lawyers. But what you really have here is an opportunity."
"An opportunity for what?"
"Penance. Atonement. Redemption. That's the name of the game for folks like us."
"What do you mean?"
"How many do you think you killed? Over a thousand, right? Well, maybe a thousand deaths will help even the score a little."
Angel froze, stunned by this possibility. "You mean . . . this was sent by the Powers?"
"Everything happens for a reason, don't you know."
Doyle finished his drink, then picked up the stake lying on the counter next to the amulet. His eyes bored into Angel, intense with compassion. "You ready?"
Time stretched. Finally Angel nodded. Without breaking eye contact, Doyle shoved the stake into his heart. The world dissolved around a pair of kind blue eyes.
* * *
"I don't buy it." Wesley stared across the kitchen table at Angel, who looked back at him just as intently. Angel's face was hollow with exhaustion, but a new serenity shone in his eyes.
"It doesn't matter if you buy it," Angel answered. "This is my problem, and now that I understand, I'm not going to fight it."
"You're saying you think that the Powers That Be sent this amulet to be some form of punishment, of expiation? That some good will come of enduring these nightmares?"
"Yes."
"But how can you be sure? What makes this illusion any more reliable than the others?"
"This one was different. It made sense. Doyle was my link to the Powers. He would be the one to explain how this works."
"And what if this thing is just playing games with your mind? Using what you fear, what you love . . . and what you want most."
Angel looked away. "Did you know that death is the punishment for murder in nearly every culture? It makes sense that this is how I should pay for what I did."
"All right," Wesley conceded. "Maybe you do deserve to die. Maybe you even deserve a thousand deaths. But how will that help anyone? It won't bring back the ones you killed."
"No." Angel stared at the table, then finally looked up. "But maybe I can earn forgiveness."
No, no, no. It felt wrong, he knew it was wrong, but in the short time he had known Angel, Wesley had begun to get an inkling of just how deep his hunger for forgiveness ran.
"Angel, the fates didn't do this. Those sniveling lawyers at Wolfram and Hart sent the amulet, and I find it difficult to believe that the Powers That Be should choose them as a tool." He took a deep breath and played his ace. "But I think I may know why they sent it."
Cordelia picked at Wesley's offering of Chinese take-out. She had opened the windows and pushed back the curtains of every room in her apartment, letting the evening breeze flow through. It was a refreshing change from the confined spaces in which Angel lived.
"Are you saying that it's not really an evil sea dragon, it's just snacking on people because it's trapped here?" she asked.
"Yes. We may not have to kill it. If we can break the spell that's binding it here, set it free, it will probably head back out to the deep Pacific as fast as its fins can take it. Problem solved."
"Won't it attack ships or stir up storms or something?"
"Unlikely. If none of the National Geographic teams have ever found it, it's probably very good at hiding."
"Which begs the question of how Wolfram and Hart found it."
"And what on earth they are planning to do with it." Wesley speared a steamed pork dumpling with his chopsticks and took a bite. "Unfortunately, I'm not sure how much help Angel is going to be. He's become convinced the amulet was sent by the Powers That Be as some sort of punishment, and that going along with it will help him earn forgiveness for his evil vampire days."
She shrugged. "Well, maybe it will. It makes sense in a twisted, Puritan kind of way. In case you haven't noticed, our Angel wrote the book on how to beat yourself up with guilt."
"That's the problem. I'm afraid he's being deceived."
"By who?"
"By the magic of the amulet. By his own desire for redemption."
"Have you found out anything else about it?"
"No. Only the one reference so far."
"Well, then, let him have a few nightmares. Maybe it'll take the edge off that eternal guilt complex, and we'll end up with a boss who's a little easier to live with."
Wesley gave up in exasperation. He ate the last spring roll in two bites, then said, "Tell me about Doyle."
Cordelia sighed. "He was an extremely annoying alcoholic little Irish half-demon that Angel and I cared about very much."
"He was the one who had the visions."
"Yeah. And I much preferred it when he had them rather than me."
"So he was the one who first brought Angel real hope that the Powers That Be were aware of him and willing to use him in their cause."
She nodded. "I guess so. It hit him pretty hard when Doyle died. He felt responsible, though of course there wasn't really anything he could have done. The Oracles said Doyle's sacrifice redeemed him, from what exactly I'm still a little unclear on. But it didn't seem to make Angel feel much better."
Wesley set down his chopsticks. "No wonder he's taken this dream to heart." He began stacking the empty containers. "Still, I think I'm going to stay the night at the office. I have a bad feeling we haven't seen the worst of this yet."