A/N:Anyone seen Lord of the Rings? OMG, that film was so cool! My friend- for some reason- cried at the end. Dunno why. But it was so good! Anyways, this is a Buffy fic, so it shall continue.
Disclaimer: Do you own Buffy? Nope, didn't think so. Neither do I. Only the plot etc.
Dedication: All you reviewers again! Thanx a million and a half for your reviews!
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Angel walked into the high school library the night after the fight in the graveyard, expecting and hoping to see Gracia. All he was greeted with, though were the twins sitting at a large table. Luke was hurriedly completing his Spanish assignment whilst Keisha was doing something on her mobile phone- probably a text message. He had entered the place so quietly that he had expected not to be noticed, but Keisha looked up immediately. A small smile spread across her pretty face, briefly brushing aside the tired kind of worry previously held there.
"Hi Angel."
Luke looked up, surprised. His expression was similar to what Keisha's had been. "Oh. Hey."
"Hi." Angel said. "Is Gracia here?"
Keisha frowned confusedly. "You didn't know?"
"Know what?" Now Angel was beginning to freak out. If something had happened to Gracia...if he had allowed some harm to come to her...
Keisha opened her mouth to speak, but she was struggling with the words so much that no noise came out. How could she explain what she was told that morning over the phone to Angel? Luke glanced at her and then at Angel, face grim.
"She's at the hospital." he stated bluntly. Keisha shot him a quick glare, wondering how he could just come out with it in four simple words.
"What?" Angel almost yelled, panic consuming him completely. "Is she hurt? What's wrong?"
"No," Keisha said. "No, she's fine. It's- it's her sister. Gracia said she fell and cut her wrist on some glass. They had to take her to hospital last night, and last I heard she was being checked out again. They're keeping her in for observations. We would have gone to visit, but they only let relatives in." She blushed slightly. "Which I guess you sorta are."
He turned to go, then looked back. "What name do I ask for?"
"Brianna. Brianna McCormack." Keisha stuttered, telling herself firmly to stop looking at those lovely eyes of his.
"Thanks." He left then, and she sighed quietly, looking back down at the screen of her mobile phone. She missed Luke's interpretation of the exchange, one that he had watched with raised eyebrows. He knew that he had been right before.
Then he wondered where Cecelia was. He didn't think that she of all people would want to miss out on a chance of having a go at Angel. For some unknown reason, she hated him even more than Keisha liked him.
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Angel reached the reception desk just as the woman behind it directed a couple (one of whom appeared to have broken their arm) to another part of the hospital. They left and the woman smiled at him.
"Can I help you, love?"
Had he needed to breath, his run from the school to the hospital probably would have winded him. "Yeah. I'm looking for someone admitted last night, a child. Brianna McCormack."
The receptionist turned to her computer and tapped something into the keyboard. She looked back up at Angel.
"I'll need your name and relation to the patient. Also some ID."
"Uh...I'm her cousin. My name's Angel."
"Angel what?"
"Um...Angel McCormack."
This seemed to convince the receptionist about 98%. "Can I have somw ID please? Just to check?"
"I...don't have any on me. Look, please, I have to see Brianna."
"Sorry," the receptionist shook her head regretfully. "No ID, no entry. Sorry, but I have to comply to the rules."
Her expression told her that she couldn't break the strict hospital rules. He sighed and nodded, moving away across the crowded waiting room to where he couldn't be seen clearly by the receptionist. When he was sure that nobody was looking, he quickly slipped into the door on his right and hurried along the corridors to find Gracia and Brinna.
It took him about five minutes to locate the children's wing, and he wandered along the brightly-painted corridor, alertly searching each room through the windows. Then he eventually reached the place he was looking for, just past the first children's ward.
It was a small room, with only one bed, a small cabinet beside it, and three chairs. From here, he could see a small person lying in the bed, and Gracia sitting in one of the chairs beside the bed. He slowly opened the door and came in as silently as he could.
Gracia was so absorbed in her own little world that she didn't realise the presence until Angel put his hands on her shoulders. She glanced up behind her and attempted to give him a tiny smile. She failed.
"Hi." she said softly.
"Hi Gracey. Are you OK?" Angel too kept his voice low.
"Yeah, fine. Just Brianna..." She trailed off and getured to the sleeping girl in the bed. Angel studied her. She was about eleven, untidy dirty-blonde hair fanning out over the pillows, face screwed up slightly in her sleep. She was still wearing her own pyjamas, and her right wrist (the one closest to them) was bandaged firmly. Gracia sighed and fiddled with the mobile phone in her lap. Angel realised it was probably what she had contacted Keisha on.
He pulled a chair close to hers and sat down, leaning down so that he could watch her bowed face. "Do you want to tell me what happened?" he asked gently. She nodded, and reeled off the previous night's events, right from when she got into the house. She found that it helped more to talk to him about what she had witnessed than it did to talk to hospital staff or her friends, or even her parents. She knew why. She had known Angel the longest.
"It was an accident," Angel said at the end of her tale. "There was nothing you could have done."
"But...but it wasn't..." Gracia frowned as she recalled each exact detail of Brianna's fall.
"She fell over. She happened to be carrying something dangerous. Nobody's fault, but she'll be fine."
"No. I'm not saying she fell. I'm saying she..." Gracia's face twisted as she desperately tried to think of a way to describe it. "She...she tripped."
"I thought her path was clear."
Gracia looked straight at him, eyes fierce and confused and lost and angry all at once. "Exactly. There was nothing there...that I could see." She sighed, shoulders slumping. "Oh Angel, I don't understand it. I know what I saw, but it can't be right. Can it?"
There was a long moment of silence before Angel repplied. "It sounds like witchcraft."
"You...you mean somebody actually meant to do this to her?" Gracia was clearly disgusted and appalled as she looked at Brianna quickly. She missed a flash of hurt in Angel's eyes as he thought, Just as I meant to hurt Mother and Father. And Patrick and Phyllis and Jane. And Grace.
"I can't be sure yet, but I'll find out. I know some people who would be able to tell me, but I'll have to phone them in the morning."
"Great." Gracia managed to turn out a bleak smile now. "Thank you."
"That's OK. You'll probably have enough to do anyway, what with staying here and all."
"No." She shifted, hugging her knees up under her chin. "Mum and Dad reckon I should go back to school as soon as possible. They're letting Brianna out in the morning. Anyway, the moment I get back, Cecelia'll be getting me back into the old routine of fight and insult."
"Is it really that bad?" His tone was concerned.
Gracia looked into the depths of how much he cared about her happiness, and felt helpless. How could she tell him about how hard she found it? How could she tell him about the spitefull barbs that the Watcher kept tossing at her about how 'terrible' she was doing? How could she tell him how impossibly tired she nearly always felt, how she was starting to find concentration in both studies and slaying difficult? She didn't want to worry him.
"No. No, really, I shouldn't complain. I expect other Slayers have had it tougher than me." Seeing that Angel wasn't convinced, she tried to change the subject with a joke. "I wish I'd brought the Slayer Handbook to read now. Give me something to do. Cecelia's intent on me finishing it, but TV is way more interesting." She tried another smile, but it was met with solemness.
Just then, Brianna began to stir, her injured wrist held out from her stiffly. She scrunched up her face then opened her tired blue eyes. She peered about the room in sleepy confusion before her gaze fell on the pair watching her. She attempted to sit up, without a whole lot of success. She let her skinny body drop back onto the bed fully.
"Gracia?" she murmured. "Where's Mum and Dad?"
Gracia stood up and went over to the bed, brushing back some of the blonde locks that were annoying Brianna by hanging in her vision. "I'll get them for you." She turned to say something to Angel and then to leave to find their parents, who she had sent off to the canteen.
The door softly clicked shut. Angel was gone.
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It was now long past midnight, and Keisha was dreaming again.
She had quite a lot of dreams. Some were pretty cool, some were horribly terrifying, and others were plain stupid. But she kept having this reoccurring dream, one that made no sense. That was the one that she was immersed in now.
She was standing- no, floating- in a comfortable-looking living room. She judged its purpose by the active fire place and elegant furniture. Three girls sat by the fire, chattering quietly. All had dark brown hair and dark eyes, and the eldest, who must have been about Keisha's own age, was seated with her back to the watching dreamer. She placed the other girls' ages at about five and three. The youngest was clutching a doll, rocking it to 'sleep'.
They were all dressed strangely. Their dresses were of a strange fashion that Keisha had only ever seen in history textbooks. Long, flowing gowns of satin with wide skirts and square necklines and tight bodices. The sort of dress that Keisha knew she'd never even be able to walk in, let alone cart around all day.
Suddenly a door opened and a nervous-looking woman entered, wringing her hands. Her beautiful face was pale and her mouth was twisting as much as her hands. She began to pace across the stone floor, eventually stopping with a helpless expression turned towards the girls.
"Grace?" Her voice was heavily accented with old Irish. "Do you know where Liam is?"
The eldest girl turned, but in the opposite direction from Keisha, so that she still could not see her face. She brushed down her elaborate skirts and walked over to the woman.
"Mother, has he not come home yet? Do not fret, I am sure that he will be safe." she soothed. The anxious woman began to pace again.
"Oh, I just worry so much. If only he would do as your father says...he gets so angry with him. I'm sure it's not his fault though, I mean, he does try to be good..."
A noise came from outside the room, like a door opening, and the mother ran to meet the person. The younger sisters looked at the older girl.
"My angel has come home!" the youngest declared joyfully, getting up and racing as fast as her cumbersome dress would allow her after her mother.
"Is Liam really home?" the middle sister asked, as though she daren't believe it.
"It will be Father returning from work." The eldest sat back down, her tone honest and tired. "Liam won't be home until gone midnight as usual."
Then a series of lightning-fast images flashed in front of Keisha, overtaking the scene. The eldest girl crying whilst she prayed in a dark church. A hill. Blood. Two vampires, a blonde female and a dark-haired male, dressed in Victorian fashions drinking from tiny children. A small girl sitting alone by an institution window. The dark-haired vampire approaching what seemed to be a grotesque statue, grinning in evil delight. Angel hugging a petite blonde girl...
As always, Keisha awoke suddenly, turquoise eyes snapping open as she sat bolt upright. But this time she was not alone.
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Decided to leave it there for now, quadratic sequences await. Damn. Anyways, please review. FanFreak, please be patient. He may appear soon. ;-D So...you can review now! Thank you!
Disclaimer: Do you own Buffy? Nope, didn't think so. Neither do I. Only the plot etc.
Dedication: All you reviewers again! Thanx a million and a half for your reviews!
********************************************************************************
Angel walked into the high school library the night after the fight in the graveyard, expecting and hoping to see Gracia. All he was greeted with, though were the twins sitting at a large table. Luke was hurriedly completing his Spanish assignment whilst Keisha was doing something on her mobile phone- probably a text message. He had entered the place so quietly that he had expected not to be noticed, but Keisha looked up immediately. A small smile spread across her pretty face, briefly brushing aside the tired kind of worry previously held there.
"Hi Angel."
Luke looked up, surprised. His expression was similar to what Keisha's had been. "Oh. Hey."
"Hi." Angel said. "Is Gracia here?"
Keisha frowned confusedly. "You didn't know?"
"Know what?" Now Angel was beginning to freak out. If something had happened to Gracia...if he had allowed some harm to come to her...
Keisha opened her mouth to speak, but she was struggling with the words so much that no noise came out. How could she explain what she was told that morning over the phone to Angel? Luke glanced at her and then at Angel, face grim.
"She's at the hospital." he stated bluntly. Keisha shot him a quick glare, wondering how he could just come out with it in four simple words.
"What?" Angel almost yelled, panic consuming him completely. "Is she hurt? What's wrong?"
"No," Keisha said. "No, she's fine. It's- it's her sister. Gracia said she fell and cut her wrist on some glass. They had to take her to hospital last night, and last I heard she was being checked out again. They're keeping her in for observations. We would have gone to visit, but they only let relatives in." She blushed slightly. "Which I guess you sorta are."
He turned to go, then looked back. "What name do I ask for?"
"Brianna. Brianna McCormack." Keisha stuttered, telling herself firmly to stop looking at those lovely eyes of his.
"Thanks." He left then, and she sighed quietly, looking back down at the screen of her mobile phone. She missed Luke's interpretation of the exchange, one that he had watched with raised eyebrows. He knew that he had been right before.
Then he wondered where Cecelia was. He didn't think that she of all people would want to miss out on a chance of having a go at Angel. For some unknown reason, she hated him even more than Keisha liked him.
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Angel reached the reception desk just as the woman behind it directed a couple (one of whom appeared to have broken their arm) to another part of the hospital. They left and the woman smiled at him.
"Can I help you, love?"
Had he needed to breath, his run from the school to the hospital probably would have winded him. "Yeah. I'm looking for someone admitted last night, a child. Brianna McCormack."
The receptionist turned to her computer and tapped something into the keyboard. She looked back up at Angel.
"I'll need your name and relation to the patient. Also some ID."
"Uh...I'm her cousin. My name's Angel."
"Angel what?"
"Um...Angel McCormack."
This seemed to convince the receptionist about 98%. "Can I have somw ID please? Just to check?"
"I...don't have any on me. Look, please, I have to see Brianna."
"Sorry," the receptionist shook her head regretfully. "No ID, no entry. Sorry, but I have to comply to the rules."
Her expression told her that she couldn't break the strict hospital rules. He sighed and nodded, moving away across the crowded waiting room to where he couldn't be seen clearly by the receptionist. When he was sure that nobody was looking, he quickly slipped into the door on his right and hurried along the corridors to find Gracia and Brinna.
It took him about five minutes to locate the children's wing, and he wandered along the brightly-painted corridor, alertly searching each room through the windows. Then he eventually reached the place he was looking for, just past the first children's ward.
It was a small room, with only one bed, a small cabinet beside it, and three chairs. From here, he could see a small person lying in the bed, and Gracia sitting in one of the chairs beside the bed. He slowly opened the door and came in as silently as he could.
Gracia was so absorbed in her own little world that she didn't realise the presence until Angel put his hands on her shoulders. She glanced up behind her and attempted to give him a tiny smile. She failed.
"Hi." she said softly.
"Hi Gracey. Are you OK?" Angel too kept his voice low.
"Yeah, fine. Just Brianna..." She trailed off and getured to the sleeping girl in the bed. Angel studied her. She was about eleven, untidy dirty-blonde hair fanning out over the pillows, face screwed up slightly in her sleep. She was still wearing her own pyjamas, and her right wrist (the one closest to them) was bandaged firmly. Gracia sighed and fiddled with the mobile phone in her lap. Angel realised it was probably what she had contacted Keisha on.
He pulled a chair close to hers and sat down, leaning down so that he could watch her bowed face. "Do you want to tell me what happened?" he asked gently. She nodded, and reeled off the previous night's events, right from when she got into the house. She found that it helped more to talk to him about what she had witnessed than it did to talk to hospital staff or her friends, or even her parents. She knew why. She had known Angel the longest.
"It was an accident," Angel said at the end of her tale. "There was nothing you could have done."
"But...but it wasn't..." Gracia frowned as she recalled each exact detail of Brianna's fall.
"She fell over. She happened to be carrying something dangerous. Nobody's fault, but she'll be fine."
"No. I'm not saying she fell. I'm saying she..." Gracia's face twisted as she desperately tried to think of a way to describe it. "She...she tripped."
"I thought her path was clear."
Gracia looked straight at him, eyes fierce and confused and lost and angry all at once. "Exactly. There was nothing there...that I could see." She sighed, shoulders slumping. "Oh Angel, I don't understand it. I know what I saw, but it can't be right. Can it?"
There was a long moment of silence before Angel repplied. "It sounds like witchcraft."
"You...you mean somebody actually meant to do this to her?" Gracia was clearly disgusted and appalled as she looked at Brianna quickly. She missed a flash of hurt in Angel's eyes as he thought, Just as I meant to hurt Mother and Father. And Patrick and Phyllis and Jane. And Grace.
"I can't be sure yet, but I'll find out. I know some people who would be able to tell me, but I'll have to phone them in the morning."
"Great." Gracia managed to turn out a bleak smile now. "Thank you."
"That's OK. You'll probably have enough to do anyway, what with staying here and all."
"No." She shifted, hugging her knees up under her chin. "Mum and Dad reckon I should go back to school as soon as possible. They're letting Brianna out in the morning. Anyway, the moment I get back, Cecelia'll be getting me back into the old routine of fight and insult."
"Is it really that bad?" His tone was concerned.
Gracia looked into the depths of how much he cared about her happiness, and felt helpless. How could she tell him about how hard she found it? How could she tell him about the spitefull barbs that the Watcher kept tossing at her about how 'terrible' she was doing? How could she tell him how impossibly tired she nearly always felt, how she was starting to find concentration in both studies and slaying difficult? She didn't want to worry him.
"No. No, really, I shouldn't complain. I expect other Slayers have had it tougher than me." Seeing that Angel wasn't convinced, she tried to change the subject with a joke. "I wish I'd brought the Slayer Handbook to read now. Give me something to do. Cecelia's intent on me finishing it, but TV is way more interesting." She tried another smile, but it was met with solemness.
Just then, Brianna began to stir, her injured wrist held out from her stiffly. She scrunched up her face then opened her tired blue eyes. She peered about the room in sleepy confusion before her gaze fell on the pair watching her. She attempted to sit up, without a whole lot of success. She let her skinny body drop back onto the bed fully.
"Gracia?" she murmured. "Where's Mum and Dad?"
Gracia stood up and went over to the bed, brushing back some of the blonde locks that were annoying Brianna by hanging in her vision. "I'll get them for you." She turned to say something to Angel and then to leave to find their parents, who she had sent off to the canteen.
The door softly clicked shut. Angel was gone.
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It was now long past midnight, and Keisha was dreaming again.
She had quite a lot of dreams. Some were pretty cool, some were horribly terrifying, and others were plain stupid. But she kept having this reoccurring dream, one that made no sense. That was the one that she was immersed in now.
She was standing- no, floating- in a comfortable-looking living room. She judged its purpose by the active fire place and elegant furniture. Three girls sat by the fire, chattering quietly. All had dark brown hair and dark eyes, and the eldest, who must have been about Keisha's own age, was seated with her back to the watching dreamer. She placed the other girls' ages at about five and three. The youngest was clutching a doll, rocking it to 'sleep'.
They were all dressed strangely. Their dresses were of a strange fashion that Keisha had only ever seen in history textbooks. Long, flowing gowns of satin with wide skirts and square necklines and tight bodices. The sort of dress that Keisha knew she'd never even be able to walk in, let alone cart around all day.
Suddenly a door opened and a nervous-looking woman entered, wringing her hands. Her beautiful face was pale and her mouth was twisting as much as her hands. She began to pace across the stone floor, eventually stopping with a helpless expression turned towards the girls.
"Grace?" Her voice was heavily accented with old Irish. "Do you know where Liam is?"
The eldest girl turned, but in the opposite direction from Keisha, so that she still could not see her face. She brushed down her elaborate skirts and walked over to the woman.
"Mother, has he not come home yet? Do not fret, I am sure that he will be safe." she soothed. The anxious woman began to pace again.
"Oh, I just worry so much. If only he would do as your father says...he gets so angry with him. I'm sure it's not his fault though, I mean, he does try to be good..."
A noise came from outside the room, like a door opening, and the mother ran to meet the person. The younger sisters looked at the older girl.
"My angel has come home!" the youngest declared joyfully, getting up and racing as fast as her cumbersome dress would allow her after her mother.
"Is Liam really home?" the middle sister asked, as though she daren't believe it.
"It will be Father returning from work." The eldest sat back down, her tone honest and tired. "Liam won't be home until gone midnight as usual."
Then a series of lightning-fast images flashed in front of Keisha, overtaking the scene. The eldest girl crying whilst she prayed in a dark church. A hill. Blood. Two vampires, a blonde female and a dark-haired male, dressed in Victorian fashions drinking from tiny children. A small girl sitting alone by an institution window. The dark-haired vampire approaching what seemed to be a grotesque statue, grinning in evil delight. Angel hugging a petite blonde girl...
As always, Keisha awoke suddenly, turquoise eyes snapping open as she sat bolt upright. But this time she was not alone.
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Decided to leave it there for now, quadratic sequences await. Damn. Anyways, please review. FanFreak, please be patient. He may appear soon. ;-D So...you can review now! Thank you!
