Chapter 4: Thoughts and Revelations
By: Hope
"Bloody hell." Spike said to himself. He had been following the scent of his grand-sire for the past twenty minutes, only to find himself standing on the beach, facing a very very deep ocean.
"Spike?" Spike jumped back out of shock from hearing the voice. He quickly scanned the area, he hadn't sensed anyone around there before and it was the same now, besides the fact that there was a sodding voice talking to him. He had expected to go crazy from the soul and everything else, but he didn't expect it to happen this soon. "Spike." The voice said again, more urgent.
"Oh great. I'm going to turn into bloody Drusilla with the voi- -"
"Spike."
"Hey, wait a tic. I know that voice." Spike said to himself, trying to place the almost cheery female voice.
"SPIKE." Spike turned to his left and this time he saw this bright light come out of nowhere and then slowly turn into Cordelia Chase.
"Cordelia Chase." Spike said to himself as though he was pleased that he recognized this girl. She was probably the only person in this town that he hadn't hurt. No, Spike didn't remember eating her family or her boy- - -he had been the reason why she was impaled three years ago. He had come back to Sunnydale, drunk and wanting revenge on Dru for leaving him. In the process of doing so he had kidnapped Willow and Xander, who then cheated on and were caught by their significant others. "God!" Spike yelled, grabbing onto his head with his hands, almost forgetting Cordelia's prescense there totally, not to mention the fact that she was glowing. "Is there one bloody person in this world that I didn't hurt." He continued to rave, now kicking the sand, then finding rocks and throwing them as far as he could, trying to release his energy, hoping the memories would leave with them.
"SPIKE." Cordelia said impatiently, watching the blonde vampire kick the sand and talk to himself. After Cordelia said his name a few more times he calmed down, facing her again. He didn't look like he had aged a day since she had last seen him, when he was torturing Angel.
But he was different now, she could sense it. Maybe it was one of those freaky demon powers that she was just finding out she had but if it was or not, she could sense good in him. Spikey here had a soul. "First of all, what are you doing here, second, when the hell did you get a soul, and third, I need your help in getting Angel!"
"Huh?" Spike stood there, dumbfounded that she had seen through him so quickly. How did she know that he had a soul? Was it that obvious? Spike began coming up with random theories in the 5 seconds of silence between them, until he remembered that she had just turned into Cordelia, the form that he recognized at least, from a light.
- - - -
Giles sighed as he took his glasses off of his face and
began cleaning them, probably for the fifth time that hour. The coven had never
kept Willow alone for this long and it was beginning to worry Giles. He and
Willow had been in England for the past few weeks.
The coven had given Giles the powers under only a few conditions, one of them being that they would care for Willow, stripping her of her powers and teaching her how to fit back into society, along with....with punishing her for her actions but no matter where Giles had gone with Willow, she would be punished for the horrible things that she had done in the past few days.
Before they had left, everyone's goodbyes had been short. No one knew how to react to Willow, whether they should still fear her or just pity her. She seemed broken now, her green eyes which were once full of hope and joy, were now empty as though her spirit had been sucked right out of her.
"Mr. Giles." The soft voice interrupted Giles's train of thought. He turned towards the door and put on a weak, greeting smile for the woman. "They're ready to see you now." She said as she opened the door even wider and let him pass through, closing it behind him.
- - - - - -
She had to catch up with him. She could do this. She was
strong now and she wasn't going to let this vamp get away just because he had
been a marathon runner when he was human and Dawn wasn't sure if she would be
able to follow him much longer, her knee had begun to throb out of pain from all
of the running.
She clutched the stake tightly in her right hand, making sure not to drop her only weapon. Buffy was a block or so behind her, facing 4 vamps of her own and before she could argue with Dawn about going off to chase a vampire alone, not sure if he had backup or anything else.
He made a sharp right turn into a deserted alley, almost causing Dawn to run right past him but she turned around and ran into the alley, still following him. To her surprise he had stopped about 20 feet in and had her back facing her.
"Okay...maybe not such a good idea." Dawn said to herself as she slowly walked up to the vamp, hoping that he wasn't aware of her tip-toeing up to him, stake in her arm, ready for the kill.
Slowly sneaking up to him, getting closer with each step, Dawn was thinking of what to do, how to respond to him if he did a certain thing or...
A hand grabbed her neck from behind, lifting her up at least 3 inches from the ground. She dropped her stake and tried desperately to become free of the hand that was now strangling her. As she squealed, the vampire that she had been following turned around and smiled at her attacker. "Told ya I'd get you a slayer." He said, obviously proud of his accomplishment.
"Slayer?" Dawn was able to squeak out, now almost running out of oxygen completely.
"She seems a little weak for a slayer." The vampire that held onto her stated. He threw her against the wall of the alley and walked up to her, examining her. "This isn't a slayer." He said.
The vampire that had been strangling her looked like he was a weight lifter before he was turned. He was very tall, which only added to her fear of him. He turned around and walked over to the other vampire, full of anger. "I told you to get me the slayer, not a kid." He said angrily, slowly walking up to the vampire.
While he was doing this, Dawn searched the ground for her stake, thinking it was her only hope of getting out of the situation without Buffy coming to her rescue. She silently began to crawl over to the stake, which was only 10 feet to her right at most. Right when she grabbed it, four other vamps walked into the alley.
"Get the slayer?" The tallest vampire asked.
"No." Vamp #1 said, now forgetting that he was about to kill the other vampire. "He got the wrong one. He just got us a little girl."
Seeing her chance, Dawn quickly ran up to Vamp #1 and staked him and the marathon running vampire, who was still in shock from seeing the guy he thought was going to kill him turn to dust. Without even turning to see the new vampires, Dawn quickly ran further into the alley, hoping that she would be able to hide.
"C'mon boys!" The lead vampire yelled. "I think we found us some food." They all ran after her. Running further and further, almost reaching the exit, an opening to another main road, Dawn realized that no one was chasing her.
Dawn stopped running and turned around, not sure what to expect. She had thought without a doubt that the vampires would chase her out into the streets so she was very curious why they had stopped following her. The only thing that she could think of was that Buffy had found them, leading Dawn to run back down into the alley.
When Dawn saw the vampires, there was only one left and it wasnt her sister fighting them. It was a boy. But from what she saw she would think that he was a demon before thinking he was human. He was attacking the vampire at almost lightning quick speed, with punches and blows that looked as strong as a vampire's.
He kicked the last vamp against the wall and quickly ran up to him and staked him. His eyes searched the alley, spotting Dawn last. Then Dawn saw his face.
"STEPHEN?" She blurted out.
"Dawn?"
Thats when Buffy showed up, assuming that Stephen was now a blood sucking fiend.
- - - - -
Xander put down his construction helmet as the whistle that
told all of the workers the day was over went off. He sighed and wiped the sweat
off of his forehead with his arm. His crew had been working on rebuilding his
old highschool for a week or so now, and they were doing it at an amazing
speed.
Xander had tried to convince his employers to have the highschool built somewhere else, trying to tell them that this was a bad area. But when he had done that they ignored him, as most people had a tendency of doing. So Xander had gone along with it, bringing Anya to the site when no one was working there so that she could spit out a few incantations to try and keep the building safe. Xander was in charge of the crew that was working on the library and the surrounding area. He found it kind of ironic. He had helped destroy this place three years ago, and now here he was rebuilding the place where so many things had happened. "Its like, hey look, thats where I ate the school's mascot, thats where a clown attacked me, thats where the cafeteria lady tried to kill me!" He had said to Anya a few days earlier.
He was beginning to patch things up with Anya. He didn't know if they would ever be able to have a relationship like they did before but for Xander, any relationship with her was better than none. It killed him to think about everything that he had done to her, to all of his friends, in the past year. Xander could tell that Anya missed him, almost as much as he missed her. But he had left her standing at the altar. He deserved anything that she did to him....minus her having sex with Spike. They had had a fight about that after Willow left...
Willow...Willow was Xander's best friend ever and it had pained him to see her leave so soon after everything had happened. Giles had promised him, and everyone else, that it was in Willow's best interest that she leave that soon. Xander believed him and promised Willow that he would tell everyone how sorry she was, since she wasn't able to see anyone else, Giles and Anya had been the first people to find them, Buffy and Dawn hadn't arrived until Willow and Giles were already gone...using the last of Giles's magic to teleport to England. Xander wasn't even sure if Dawn had wanted to say goodbye to her, remembering that Willow had threatened to turn Dawn back into the key.
Anya honked the horn of her car, seeing that Xander had stopped walking and was just staring at what would be the school in a few months, probably remembering things that had happened. She took the keys out of the car and got out, walking up to Xander. "C'mon. I closed the Magic box early so I could pick you up. Now lets go." Anya said, not liking to wait.
Xander's car had been in the auto shop for the past few weeks, Xander was hoping that they would be able to just fix it up quickly but it seemed that they were going to take their time so Anya had ended up driving Xander to and from work until his car was fixed. "Yea." Xander said, still looking at the school. He took a breath and looked at Anya, giving her a weak smile. "Sorry."
- - - - -
"Hellooo?" Fred popped her head out of the office and saw
Lorne standing at the front door with a suitcase in his left hand.
He dropped the suitcase and smiled at her as she stepped out of the office and almost ran up to him. "Lorne!!"
"Yea, I'm back." He said as they hugged. He searched the hotel for any signs of Connor. Connor had been the reason why he had left and he wasn't too fond of the idea that he would have to see him again. But according to Fred and Gunn, Angel, Cordelia, *and* Connor had all gone missing, leaving alone. Angel had done so much for Lorne in the past few years, he might have gotten his bar ruined more than Lorne could count but he was still a friend and Lorne liked having friends, especially when they weren't missing. "I'm here to help."
- - - - -
"A son?" Spike laughed after hearing Cordelia's story of
how and why Angel was where he was. "And Darla sacrificed herself for him?"
Spike continued to laugh at everything that had happened to Angel and the rest
of the Fang Gang in the past year. It seemed that Darla, who Spike had
remembered as one of the baddest of bads, had also gained part of a soul, her
son's...
"Yea, I didn't believe it either." Cordelia said, suddenly remembering why she had begun to talk with Spike. "But the point is, I need you to help me get Angel out!" Cordelia said.
Spike stopped laughing and looked at her. "Alright. Just tell me what to do." "I need you to dive down under and find him. You don't need to breath so that won't be a problem." Cordelia started.
"Wait, wait, wait." Spike interrupted. "How am I supposed to bloody find Peaches?" Spike asked as he looked at Cordelia, waiting for an answer. "Oh yea, thats why you need me." She said, remembering everything that she had gone through in the past few weeks. "I can uh....turn into this light thing and guide you to him, and make sure you don't explode or anything from diving in the wrong way, I'm not too sure how that works with a vampire." She said, mostly to herself.
"Alright." Spike said as he took off his shirt and shoes, throwing them to the side. Cordelia was still surprised how much he had changed. But one of the things that didn't change about him, that she could sense, was that he was doing all of this for Buffy.