Chapter Two
Angel tried to ignore Fred fairly vibrating with enthusiasm in the passenger seat beside him as he made his way through the crawling sea of LA's Friday night traffic.
"I'm SO glad you asked us to come with you, Angel! It's been forever since I got out of the lab and actually *did* something! All day long it's bubbling and zapping and arming and testing and writing reports, rewriting, presenting, blah blah blah. I mean... not that I don't love my job – I do! Just... I miss my crossbow!"
A glance out of the corner of his eye caught her fondling the weapon in question (now modified with some electrical gadgets he couldn't identify) with a longing that was... pretty disturbing, actually. He quickly looked away, but couldn't help the mixture of pleasure at her excitement, and dread at what the seer had told him was coming.
"Yes, I have to second that sentiment," Wesley agreed from the back seat of the Belvedere. "As rewarding as our work can be, it's simply not as satisfying as being directly involved in making the world a better place."
Angel smiled. "You're welcome. I wouldn't do it without you."
In truth, he had considered doing just that. When Marvin had finished his story about the dimensional rift and the resulting demon, Angel had nearly jumped out of his chair, grabbed his sword, and dashed to hack off the rising Heliosum's head himself. But... knowing the others were feeling as impotent as he had been lately, locked up in their tower, fighting evil only in the abstract, he couldn't find it in himself to deny his friends the same satisfaction he was seeking.
Not to mention the fact that, if this thing was coming for him directly, he might need backup that he could trust. No matter what happened.
"Now, you say Marvin mentioned the Tar Pits boiling *and* burning, yes? Was the fire green perchance?"
Angel smirked at the memory of the gawky young psychic stumbling all over himself in his eagerness to share what he saw as "big news" to his esteemed boss. "He didn't mention it. Only the boiling, the Heliosum, and the girls."
"Hm," Wesley commented, and returned to reading the notes he'd downloaded onto his PDA.
"I still want to know what a class trip is doing at La Brea in the middle of the night," Fred mused. "I mean... you can't exactly *see* the sights in the dark." An idea dawned on her, "Maybe it's a class of *vampires*!"
"I don't think so," Angel chuckled, then quickly sobered, "The impression was that they were human. Maybe the demon lured them there to feed. What's important is that they are there, and they'll be a midnight snack if we don't help."
He didn't mention the urgency Marvin had emphasized was central to his vision – the sense that this single demon was merely a portent of larger events about to unfold. Or the fact that some wrong from his past would have to be righted in order to save the world.
He'd worry about filling them in once the innocents were out of danger.
~
Faith's comment about the situation was direct and to the point. "Shit."
"I probably would have gone with 'crap', considering the ten impressionable girls behind us," Buffy warned, "But, yeah... that about sums it up."
They, and the girls in question, stood around the lip of the steaming tar pit. The group represented the first graduating class of the Summers Memorial School for Gifted Girls – more popularly known amongst its members as the Slayer School – and tonight was their last field trip before "graduation".
It was convenient that one of Willow's visionary witch friends had pointed her in the direction of a scroll that contained a prophecy that warned of a particular pair of Slayers – and some other, as of yet unidentified 'Great Warriors' being needed to stop an unfolding series of events.
Starting with the violently boiling pit of black ooze before them.
"This is not good," Kennedy observed. Being one of the girls with the most training and experience, she wasn't actually a student, but had agreed to stay and help out with the day-to-day operations of the school. Ostensibly because she didn't have anything else to do... but Buffy pretty much knew better.
She glanced to a nearby boulder where the real reason hid, and hoped Willow was prepared.
"No, this is definitely not good," she agreed. A rumbling growl emitting from the pit shook the earth around them. "And it's about to get a whole lot worse!"
"Everybody get ready!" Faith shouted, "Fireboy's gonna pop!"
"Will?" the blonde Slayer called across the park.
Her best friend sprang up from behind the rock, eyes shining silver. "Ready!" She raised her hands to the sky. "Phim! Calvalis! Venium! Ashala!"
"Okay," Buffy took firmer hold of her sword and nodded toward its twin in Faith's hands. "We have to make that... connecting thingy through its head. With the swords."
"Conduit," Faith reminded her.
"Right. One entry on top of the head, down through the skull, the other up and through the throat."
"I'm Top," her sister Slayer said with a grin. "I'm gonna ride that sucker like Wood."
Buffy grimaced. "That's... great. Just get it through the brain, okay? We have to pass the current through the spinal stem. I've got the underside." She gestured the students and Kennedy back away from the pit. "Don't fire unless it gets out of the goop. This'll be hard enough without enchanted arrows in our butt."
The younger women barely had enough time to take their positions before the pit exploded in a rain of fire and burning tar. The protection spell Willow cast on them deflected the searing, stinking slop, sending it spewing everywhere.
The Heliosum shot upward into the storm with a roar that shook the night. Faith and Buffy exchanged a look, then leapt at it with matching battle cries.
The fight had begun.
Faith landed squarely on the monstrosity's thick, scaly neck just as Buffy's grappling hook lodged in its jaw and the mechanism yanked her upward.
As she flew, she didn't think. Didn't worry about the danger to the girls – this was a training opportunity that didn't come along every day. A simple slash and bind. She didn't worry about Faith, riding the thing like (no, no, no going there!) a bucking bronco from Hell as she positioned herself to pierce the armored skull with her enchanted sword. And she certainly didn't think about the fact that she was dangling fifty feet above the ground and inches from a slimy, gaping maw packed with 13-inch teeth.
She never thought about much of anything, anymore. She just went with the flow, lived her life, and did what had to be done.
With a warrior shriek that would put Xena to shame – only less yodel-y – she thrust the sword upward into the Heliosum's throat with all her strength. She felt the armor give, sending rocking vibrations down her arms. Heard the creature roar and Faith scream, "YES!" as the swords connected. Also heard Willow's preternaturally loud chanting in the distance. The demon thrashed, flinging her upward toward its mouth as it fell. She felt her skull make contact with teeth, a searing wave of electricity as the spell broke free, then felt and heard no more.
~
A wave of dizziness slammed into Angel just as he was pulling into the parking lot. He jerked the wheel to the left, jamming on the brakes... just in time to black out.
When he came to, he found Wesley beside him, leaning in the driver's side door, and Fred hovering from the passenger seat, both looking worried.
"Angel, are you all right?" Wesley asked.
"Fine." He tried to shake off the dizziness. "Something hit me. We have to hurry," he muttered, still confused and disoriented from the blow. The trio jumped from the car, weapons and Binding Orb in hand, and dashed toward the park entrance.
"Darn!" Fred complained as they skidded to a stop. "It's dead already."
It certainly was. The scaly carcass was more than fifty feet long, probably weighed in at several tons. A horned cousin of Godzilla... that was already melting into a small lake of brown goo.
"Where are the girls?" Wesley queried.
Angel glanced around the park... and froze.
A few yards away from the decomposing demon, a clutch of young women knelt, hovering around something he couldn't see at their center. But he was filled with dread, nonetheless, and remembered the blast of pain he had suffered upon their arrival. A suddenly very familiar sensation of connection he had long forgotten existed.
Angel began to run. One of the girls spotted his approach.
"Crap! Fed, five o'clock!"
A second woman looked up, the firelight glinting off her red hair. "That's not a Fed! It's Angel!"
Faith glanced up just as the vampire slid to a stop beside them. "Shit," she cursed for the second time that night. The Slayer got to her feet. "Hey, Big A. Long time no see."
He stood there, staring in horror at Buffy's still form. It was like something out of a nightmare – one he'd had so many times over the years, he could no longer count. He was stunned to silence with sudden regret... for all the things he'd never said, because he always thought there would be time for them later. When Buffy was cookies and he was sure of his own place in the world and able to let go of his resentment over Spike...
"Angel, she's fine. Just a jolt from the spell," Faith promised.
"No," he muttered softly, more in response to his own dark and panicked thoughts than what the Slayer had said.
Fred touched his arm, making him startle. "Angel? Should we start the binding?"
He nodded absently, and managed to force himself to move through the small crowd to kneel beside Willow, who held Buffy's still form in her arms.
He couldn't, however, make himself look away.
"She's fine, Angel," the redhead affirmed. "She hit her head, that's all. Just give her a minute."
Despite the reassurance, and his trust that Willow knew what she was talking about, his heart squeezed tightly in fear.
A minute? He'd give her forever. He'd promised he would, the last time they spoke. Was it too late to discover if he'd ever get to keep that vow?
As if she'd heard his thoughts, her eyes fluttered open and locked onto his like they'd never looked away two years ago.
"Angel?" she whispered.
For the first time since the last time he saw her, he smiled. And meant it.
~
TBC...
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