The Road Before Us
By Misty Flores - mistiec_flores@yahoo.com
Rating: R - for violence, sexual situations, and some language
Genre: Angel/Cordelia - Buffy/Angel and Cordelia/Xander implied
Teaser: Years after the death of their true loves, a lonely Cordelia and Angel reunite to stop a new nemesis, and find themselves fighting a mutual attraction as they cling to the memories of their mortal lovers.
Disclaimer: Buffy/Angel are owned by Joss Whedon and the WB. the Highlander Concept is owned by Rysher Ent. No infringement intended.
Crossover: Sorta. Highlander - but honestly, only the concept is taken, you don't need to know the show or the characters. If any are used, they are introduced as one would introduce OC's. This is a BTVS/Angel story, after all.
Notes: I wasn't exactly sure which I should post this in, Buffy or Angel. The story contains Angel concepts and themes, but is written as an AU- taken directly after the proceedings in Season Two Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
Spoilers: Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Season Two
Series - The Winters Trilogy - but you don't have to read it to get it. Noted, those two stories are both Cordelia/Xander and Buffy/Angel - this story does NOT diminish that. But just so you don't get lost - better yet, just read. All your questions will - hopefully - be answered.
Personal Archive - Stoic Simplicity at www.wolverineandrogue.com/mistiec
--
Chapter One
--
The small lights flickered, their heat warming her face, as she barely contained her smile, darkness mingled with the little candles showing only shadows of her friends, her family, as she felt his hands gently massage her shoulders, the tone deaf singing almost too much for her ears.
"Happy BIIIRRRRTHDAAAAAY dear Cordeeeeeeelllliaaaaaaah-"
There was a deep breath in, as the cake was placed before her, Buffy's eyes shining brightly as she slipped into the chair across the table from hers.
"HAPPPY BIIIIRTHDAYYYYY-" * gasp * "Tooooooo YOUUUUUUUUUU!"
Cheers and hoots filled the air and she couldn't help but try to contain her laughter, palms cupping her mouth as she fought to control the giggles, taking in a breath and blowing out fiercely.
The lights flickered on and suddenly the faces of her friends were revealed. Buffy, the Slayer, eyes hued a beguiling blue, forearms resting against the table as she gave her that small, hidden smile. Never large, never huge - because Buffy still had her demons to fight, a fight that would never be won. There was always grief, tinged in the eyes of the Slayer - who had lost family, loved ones… mothers.
In the doorway, away from the light, in the shadows stood Buffy's soul mate, a vampire who even now, after a few years, kept to the darkness, even in the presence of his friends.
Giles, looking older and more dignified, resting in the couch, eyes blinking sleepily from his jet lag - coming in at the last second on a flight from England. Tired, his eyes still held the sad drawn look that came from losing the first to die - from losing Joyce Summers.
Willow and Oz were sitting side by side, in their arms a baby toddler, who had red hair and bright blue eyes, and who clapped and laughed and shrieked with the best of them.
And behind her, she could feel her own husband's presence, a young mortal by the name of Xander Harris.
Who was entirely too quiet to be considered anything but up to something.
"Xander if you even think about pushing my face into this cake I will kick your ass and shove my sword so far up-"
A large hand clamped over her mouth as Buffy quickly slid the cake out of harms way. "Now that's the Cordy I know and love," he quipped, placing a quick kiss on her cheek before moving around her and settling in the chair beside her, an arm slung around her shoulders.
"So tell us, Cor," he said, pushing the plates to Buffy, watching as Willow got up with the knife, preparing to slice and disperse the chocolate goodness. "What'd ya wish for? A night of Xander love?"
"You think I'd wish for that?" she shot back, eyebrow quirking. Willow hid a smirk and only shook her head,passing her the first piece.
"Seriously, Cordelia - what did you wish for?"
"I'm not telling."
"Oh, come on."
"Nope. It's bad luck, not doing it. We are an official casestudy for Murphy's law here, folks, I'm not messing with it."
Almost as if on cue, the telephone rang, clear and steady, cutting off the end of Cordelia's words.
Immediately she could see the frowns, the looks, and the jubilant feeling that had previously been dominant was now replaced by blatant worry and just a little bit of irritation.
"Uh… I'll get it."
The entire room was holding their breath, she saw it on their faces as they watched Xander pick up the phone, but the lump in her stomach had already dropped, and she felt nothing but resignation when Xander nodded, and then turned to her. "It's Claribel. For you."
She ignored the looks, the way Buffy tossed the fork on the table and leaned back in disgust, the way Oz looked away, then stood up to put baby Rupert, Ruppy for short, to bed.
"Hey, Clari, what's up?" she asked breathlessly.
"Hello, Chase, dear. I'm sorry to interrupt, I know you were looking forward to-"
"Just spit it out," she answered, running a tired hand along her forehead as she moved, turning her back against her group of friends.
There was a pause, but Clari, apparently used to this behavior, immediately began her news.
Cordelia listened, and finally nodded, hanging up the phone, knowing when she turned, she would see the same, passive faces she had come to regard as familiar.
A second, two, they all knew exactly what she would say before she uttered a word.
"I have to go."
"What else is new," Buffy muttered, and Cordelia rolled her eyes, a half hearted attempt to make light of the aching problem that was becoming more and more apparent.
"Oh, don't even go there, Buff, okay? I can't help this. You of all-"
"Guys! Hey!" Willow came forward, waving her arms as she stepped between the Immortal and the Slayer. "We've been through this all before. Hellmouth issues vs. Immortal Millionaire duties don't exactly mesh." She turned, took a breath, and gave Cordelia a crooked smile. "When will you be home?"
She could feel Xander's eyes boring into the back of her head as she slowly fingered the golden band on her third finger. "Soon."
With that she gave a smile, sad and dismissive, and then she turned, moving toward the door, picking up a long black coat and the sword that had lain forgotten beside it.
Willow began to clean up, motioning for Buffy to help her. Angel continued to stand in his shadows, watching her, very real sympathy in his eyes.
Only Xander came forward, eyes dark and sincere as he carried the half smile on his face. Her young husband, with the tousled brown hair, the little wrinkles around the corners of his eyes that signaled his descent into manhood, strong broad shoulders, deliciously, amazingly, mortal.
She watched him, her old rival, nemesis, comrade in verbal battles, with whom she had fallen in love with against her will, as a teenager, and loved with even more ardor after losing him for two years in her quest to understand her immortality, her destiny, and her fate.
"So… I guess… I'll be back," she said, a chipper smile on her face. He didn't smile back, and her own patented Chase smile faltered at the disappointment in his eyes.
"For once I wish you'd tell me where you were going."
He hated not knowing, he hated her name. Hated the fact she was now Chase Winters, multi millionaire, and Immortal, never knowing if the reason she was leaving THIS time was to engage in a battle to the death, or to handle a stock market crash.
"If I did would it make it any easier? You knew what you were getting into when you married me, Xander."
"I married you because I love you, Cordelia," he finally said, digging his hands into his pockets, looking like a lost little boy. "Because I want to be with you."
There was a sigh, a slump of her shoulders, and a lean forward to gently kiss his lips. "I'll be back, nimrod.I always come back."
She turned, away from her husband, away from her friends, boots clipping down the steps as she walked into the cold, dark night, sliding into the open door of the limousine waiting for her.
"The airport."
Tossing the sword on the leather seat next to her, she leaned her elbow on the window as the car swerved away.
The sight of Xander leaning against the doorway stayed with her all the way to Big Bear.
--
The cobblestone was wet, sleek.
Chase Winters stepped carefully, her umbrella swinging loosely from her right hand, black gloves keeping them from the cold. The white trench coat, though new, had not changed, and the clothes beneath it, white, sleek, and expensive, were cut only slightly off.
The hair was shorter, highlights were light blonde but not too light, and the face, despite the hundred years that had passed, had not aged one day.
She paused at the top of the hill, surveying London's cobbled streets, before turning, finding her usual place at the café and taking her seat.
Times had changed, war had come, famine had made its entrance, but for the 130-year-old Immortal, it was nothing but another passage.
The waiter paused by the table, and she barely acknowledged him as she crossed her legs, pulled out the small personal computer that lay cradled in the palm of her hand and began to speak into it, watching as the information downloaded across the tiny screen.
The barely visible speaker in her ear scuttled gently with static and with a tap on her ear lobe, she answered it.
"Chase."
"Ms. Winters. Good morning." Immediately the assistant on the other line began to rattle off the morning reports, and she listened, eyes watching the screen as the international trades, began to circle through.
Latte' with extra foam was placed beside her, and she thanked the waiter, Billy, with a nod and a smile. He smiled back, but again, didn't say a word to the business woman who passed by the table every day.
Her hair was sleeked back, and she paused once to smooth down a bang that fell forward, eyes flickering up to study the man who was sitting inconspicuously across the courtyard, also taking notes, the old fashioned way, on a pad, and paper, every day, for as long as she had been there.
No matter what time, there he was, as the years passed she had come to regard her shadow as her watcher.
Over the years, the faces changed, but the attitude didn't - always watching, never speaking.
Adhering to the unspoken rule, she never acknowledged him, just as he never acknowledged her, the keeper of her secrets.
She wondered when they started being so open, or perhaps no one else ever took the time to look. In her centuries she had dealt with her share of her kind, and only one, a dark-haired man with a husky voice and a strange kindness had ever commented on their followers.
Watchers.
A smirk floated on her lips as she watched him scribble down, and she wondered just how much he knew.
Different faces, all privy to the information of one Chase Winters, born Cordelia Chase, Sunnydale, California 1981.
Born into privilege, until high school, where she fell in with the Slayer, and her own Watcher's Council, fell in love with one Xander Harris.
Met her first death on prom night, driving too fast, and a little under the influence on a dark and stormy night.
Raised by Winters, an old Immortal with no emotions and no passion. Trained until he met his death by herown sword, the student killing the teacher.
Volumes containing Winters work revealed that he had loved her, and that it was an unrequited love, had handed everything over to her, on account she change her name to one Chase Winters.
Killed another Immortal, experienced another quickening when Magdalene met her own death by Chase's sword.
Returned to Sunnydale, California September 2001, where she reunited with her mortal lover Xander Harris, killed yet another Immortal, Clarisa…
And settled into domestic bliss - for exactly five years.
Cordelia's smirk faltered, and she took an unneeded breath, hearing the scratch in her phone that made her wince.
"Geez, Marney! That - can't you calm down!"
"Sorry, Ms. Winters - but you have to- the company's V.P.-"
"You can tell the VP that his company will go out of business without those permits, just like every other dealer in this area and we're the only one's who can secure the free trade pass. If they don't like it, they're free to take their business elsewhere."
And with that, she tapped her earlobe again, cutting off the conversation, plucking the tiny device out of her ear canal and dropping it into her pocket.
No more phone calls, no more contact, not today.
130 years old exactly, today.
Pursing her lips, the young Immortal gently scrolled through her data computer, pausing as her eyes flickered down to the one picture she kept inside, in the tiny niche labeled PERSONAL. Eight people - young, early thirties maybe : one blonde slayer, one redheaded witch, a dark vampire, a werewolf, a watcher, an immortal… her lips quirked. And a Zeppo.
Xander's smile was infectious, even in the century-old digitized picture.
Whoever would have thought she would have outlived them all?
Five years of domestic bliss, and they lost Buffy - in a fight, saving the world, like always.
The young Slayer was incredibly old, and Cordelia hadn't been there, fighting her own battles, in another part of the world - rushing to get back to aid the Slayer - but back too late.
Buffy Summers was laid to rest in the grave beside her mother's, with a tombstone that finished with the line `She saved the world a lot.'
Angel, her dark vampire, with the haunting eyes and brooding demeanor, had taken it badly, to say the least.
In a week, he was gone from their lives.
They never heard from him again.
Five graves, side by side, friends who had been young, healthy, grown old before her very eyes, while sheremained, losing the only pieces to her past one by one.
Wars, famine, a couple apocalypses, and Chase Winters never changed.
But she was never called Cordelia again, and she never returned to Sunnydale.
Snapping the picture closed, Cordelia dropped the tiny computer into her lapel, and stood, nodding to the waiter, who immediately charged her net account.
Walking past the inconspicuous watcher, her steps faltered, eyes boring into him.
He never looked up.
But he scribbled furiously.
Watching the placid face, she could stand the silence no longer.
"Asshole," she muttered, and walked away in disgust, leaving him to scribble down her response. Let him tattoo it on his ass, for all she cared.
--
Sunnydale, California, 2004
She didn't cry.
Xander's eyes were red with the tears, Willow was sobbing, forehead buried into her husband's shoulder, and poor Giles looked completely broken.
But Chase Winters didn't cry.
Eyes were dry, spectacularly dry, as she stood, watching as the casket was lowered into the ground, carefully.
Buffy's death, her funeral, one that her husband would not attend.
She saw Buffy everywhere. Her smile, her walk, the quips, the stakes.
The time she locked her in the basement with Xander.
The time she had been forced to wear Cordelia's suits.
When she held Willow's baby for the very first time.
Oddly, none of the times when she saved the world seemed relevant, all Cordelia saw were moments.
There was no tears in her eyes, and Cordelia wasn't sure exactly why that was. Her hand gripped Xander's, her face was drawn as she looked down at the casket, and as the dirt was pitched over it, she suddenly realized why.
It wasn't real to her.
Cordelia Chase did not accept what she could not see, Chase Winters made things happened, and Cordelia Chase and Chase Winters, would not have let Buffy die.
Too young, too tired, too loaded - five years of true love with a vampire and it was over in two seconds - because Buffy saved the world - again.
Cordelia knew what it felt like to die, she had done it often enough. Drowning, dragged by horses, lance through the heart, all a picnic.
But Buffy had given herself up as a sacrifice, to save a young child.
In the end, it was as simple as that.
And the darkness in the air matched the grief, and she swallowed, and again Cordelia wondered why she could not cry for her friend.
Everything inside her ached, tensed, and finally she gently let go of Xander's hand, and moved, back, away from the group, pausing when she saw the figure in the darkness fifty feet away.
Pushing fists into her coat, she walked silently, moving around until she stood next to him.
"You're not going to stake yourself, are you?"
The hulking vampire said nothing, watched the scene with dead eyes, never even acknowledging her presence.
She was quiet, Immortal standing beside the Vampire, not knowing what to say to the man who had just lost the love of his undead life.
He would continue living - what he called living without her.
Sucking in her breath, Cordelia suddenly knew why she couldn't cry.
Her hand trembled as she gently laid a hand on his forearm, eyes suddenly misty and her voice cracking slightly as she began, "Angel-"
He cut her off with a growl, and as the last of the dirt was placed over the box Angel jerked away, gone in two seconds, merging with the shadows.
Cordelia was left alone, watching from afar as her mortal husband and the remnants of her mortal family buried their friend.
She waited, looking back to where Angel, the centuries old vampire who had lost his wife and would go onthe rest of his life existing, and turning back she saw Xander.
And she saw herself.
It was only a matter of time before she became Angel.
And then the tears came, as Cordelia whispered to her lost friend, "Damnit Buffy - why couldn't it have been me?"
--
The bridge looking over the river was quiet, and Chase Winters watched, letting the London wind flicker over her, as she breathed in a sigh, smiling at the boats, moonlight dancing over the waves in tiny ripples.
The sword, a welcome weight, was encased against her hip, long trench coat hiding it gracefully, and she thanked the London weather for the inconspicuousness of it all.
Leaning over, she could barely see her reflection, thanks to a strobed light that moved over the river from one of the clubs.
It was odd, Cordelia Chase acknowledged, that now, in the future, her thoughts dwelt mainly of the past.
A rich spoiled bitch with great hair and witty comebacks now transformed into … this.
A hundred and thirty years would do that, she guessed.
The footsteps that walked toward her were barely sounded, but she heard it, waiting as the figure drifted to a stop.
There was no shiver, no ringing in her head that warned her of another of her kind, but an altogether different radar, a sixth sense she had developed over the years for the supernatural.
Demon's still abounded, and vampires, living in the chaos of the after war effects, had thrived.
But beheading worked beautifully, and Cordelia only smiled, keeping her eyes on her reflection.
Funny how good a little violence felt.
The voice that spoke, however, was not violent. It was soft and husky and a bit hesitant, and altogether too familiar.
"Cordelia?"
Cordelia's heartbeat jumped, rapidly accelerated, and it changed her breathing, as her stomach dropped to her ankles and she blinked. No one had called her Cordelia in decades - and no one would still be alive to think so except-
Her head whirled and her eyes focused and pinned the vampire standing ten feet away, dark and brooding and completely familiar.
"Angel?"
Document created with wvWare/wvWare version 0.6.7 -->