AN: Here's the new chapter, tell me what you think.
Be brutal. Thank you for the *cough* two reviews. I
greatly appreciate it. Yall better keep reviewing or
theres gonna be a smackdown, ya hear? Peace out
(dontcha love paradox people like me??) -emily
TWO: THE LIVES = THE DEATHS
Angel stopped. "What?" He asked softly.
"The guy this bint was looking for's name was Connor, Peaches. God, you have hearing problems or summat?" Spike asked, annoyed at the lack of information.
Angel shook himself. It couldn't be his son. There was no way. It would have to be some other kid in another hell dimension by the name of Connor. Dammit, there was no escape. It was his son. Who he had just given up. Then how could he have been in another dimension? It was impossible. But in other dimensions did these same rules apply? Or was this girl so special that she could carry the memory as well as he could of the boy, passing the message along to some who did not know him? Thoughts ran through Angel's head fast as the speed of light, and now he knew that he had to find this girl. Not just for her sake, not for the world's, but for his own. After all, he had made how many sacrifices for the world already? At least two.
~*~
Spike and Angel walked away from the corpses of what was now thirteen Dalarthen demons. Spike had killed the last when Angel had been pondering his sacrifices. Angel had responded with a glare, which prompted a shrug from Spike, and the two walked away together towards Angel's car.
Back at Wolfram and Hart, the two souled vampires walked into Wesley's office, where Lorne, Fred and Gunn lounged.
"Angel, you're back." Fred said, getting up off the desk where she'd been seated.
"What bout me, Fred? I'm back too, you know." Spike said, shoving his hands into his duster's pockets.
"Yes, that you are," Fred said, turning to Angel. "Did you find the demons?"
"We found 'em all right. Killed all but one, got the information we needed, and of course Peroxide here killed the last one when there could have been more information in him as to where this girl was being held." Angel said.
"'Ey! I was tryin' to help. Dalarthens kill...things." Spike replied defensively.
"So what did you find out? What'd the demon say?" Gunn asked Angel.
"He said that the girl put some kind of emotion or feeling there that changed things. The demons that were sent here from their dimension were trying to find her to remove it, not knowing that the same thing had probably happened in other dimensions. The demon said that she said she was from LA, which doesn't exactly help much. He said that this girl we're looking for wasn't the first to visit his dimension. He said that her mother had come also, but she wasn't pure enough for her purpose, so she was eliminated. Then this girl, her daughter, came into this, and-"
"And she was pure and had amazed all the demons there, blah blah blah." Spike added in. Angel nodded, and went on.
"He also described her appearance, he said her name was Grace. When he started to talk about her, something seemed to come over him. I don't know what it was exactly, some sort of enamoration. He said she was trying to escape some people called the Lives, and trying to find..." Angel trailed off.
Could he do it? Expose his son? They would never have to know that he was his son. Just tell them, try not to bring him into it too much. It wasn't that important. Yes it was. Tell them anyway.
"Trying to find who? Or what?" Wesley asked.
"A guy named Connor. We don't know anything else." Angel replied softly.
"Are you okay?" Fred asked the vampire, hand reaching out for his arm. Angel stepped back, rejecting it.
"Fine. I'm going to get some rest, find out more about the Lives, where they could be in LA. That'll lead us to her." Angel said, heading for the door.
"What about the boy? Connor. Should we look for some connection there?" Wesley asked.
"No. We can't find much on a first name. If she's trying to find him then that means she isn't with him, right? Therefore we couldn't care less." Angel said finally, leaving.
When he was gone, the remaining five looked at each other, confused as to Angel's suddenly darkening mood.
"So, what's with Sir Brood-a-lot?" Spike asked.
~*~
Angel entered his office, getting into his private elevator and taking the ride up to his apartment. He stepped out, and pulled off his leather jacket, tossing it over an armchair. He walked straight to his bar. Angel looked at his selection of hard liquor, debating his choice. He decided to cast off the hard stuff, he wasn't the best guy to get drunk. He opened up his refrigerator and pulled out a beer. Using a bottlecap opener, he opened his beer and took a long swig. He brought the beer over to his sofa, and sat down, frustrated. He took another drink. And another.
Two more beers and one hour later, Angel walked into his bedroom, pulling off his long sleeve black shirt and tossing it in a corner. He took off his pants, and climbed into his bed in his boxers. It was already dark, and his lights were all off, but despite the absence of light, it took him another hour to get to sleep.
Only two hours later, Angel was awoken by the sudden slamming of Spike's boot into the side of his bed.
"Mornin' sunshine. We got the address."
"Where is it?" Angel asked, sitting up quickly.
"Other side 'o town. We need to get ready and fill you in on all the dirt we got on these Lives guys and get over there tonight, righ' before sunrise. That's when this... well, just hurry up an'-" Angel moved to get out of bed. "No, stay there till I get out, Peaches. I don't need to be scarred or anythin'." Spike smirked and left the room, slamming Angel's door behind him.
"Morning, boss!" Harmony chirped.
"Not now, Harmony." Angel replied.
The blonde vampire picked up a bright blue coffee mug with a smiley face on it, holding it out to him. "I have your blood. Just the way you like it." She smiled.
Angel took the blood and headed for Gunn's office, where Spike stood by the door, waving for him to come in.
"You're welcome!" Harmony called over him. Muttering to herself, she sat back down at her desk. "Too busy brooding to notice me... almost as bad as my Blondie Bear with his stupid Slayer obsession..."
"Fill me in, guys." Angel greeted, taking a sip of his blood.
Lorne pulled out a sheet of notes. "Well, good morning to you too." He scoffed. "These guys, the Lives. They're a cult looking to destroy all dimensions possible for them to reach through a chosen one, probably our girl Grace."
"Cult of demons or vampires or humans, Lorne? I need specifics." Angel said sharply.
"Somebody got up in a bad mood." Spike sneered.
"Somebody was woken up by someone about to be staked if they don't shut up." Angel replied. "Keep talking." He urged.
"Well, we don't exactly... well, their leader, he's a demon, but the followers are... human. The text we found on them isn't too clear." Lorne said wistfully.
"But, they leave traces behind with each generation." Gunn added, handing Angel a sheet of paper.
"What kind of traces," Angel asked.
"A mark is burned into their leader's arm. There have been three hundred and forty one marks, this is the three hundred and forty second generation. The one predestined to succeed." Fred said, handing Angel another sheet of paper with a photocopied prophecy. Angel glanced over it.
"This is my prophecy. That Eve gave me." Angel said.
"There's a quickie version, with hilighted parts and translations in the margins." Lorne said, pointing to said translations.
"Good work, guys." Angel said, glancing down at the prophecy.
"Anyway, the Lives want this end of the world to come to pass because of the fact that they are brainwashed, or should I say bodywashed, when they get a certain tattoo. This is the tattoo. The mark is the mark of the generation they are to be in, and is the same mark that the leader gets burned into his arm when said generation ends." Fred said, showing Angel a picture in a textbook of the mark of the three hundred and forty second generation.
"And they're brainwashed because the leader wants this total destruction to go down." Angel finished.
"Exactly. But in order for this cult to work, they need to find a chosen one, like Lorne said before. So in each generation there's been a chosen one-" Gunn started.
"Where have I heard that before?" Spike said.
"If you're not going to help, then get out." Angel said sharply. "Now, what about this chosen one?"
"Well, there have been various problems with these girls. Some have been insane before coming into possession of the Lives, then some went insane while in possession of the Lives, others were impure-"
"Like Grace's mother." Angel finished.
"Yeah. Pure equals pure of essence, pure of soul, pure of body, blah blah. Anyway, there's always been something wrong with the chosen ones, impurity of some sort. One even got away, and a few of them have been killed by the, er, harsh tactics of the Lives." Wesley said.
"Harsh tactics? What are they doing, exactly?" Angel asked.
"I'll tell you in a minute." Wesley said. "Now, these girls are tortured, constantly. But only the torture that comes to mind when you hear the word is used upon them when they try to go against the leader's or followers' orders. But they go through torture each night, at sunset when they slip into a state of... well, from what we decoded, they get sucked into another dimension. Not always the same one. But each night they visit a hell dimension. Our time, they're only gone for maybe five minutes. Time in the hell dimension, they're there for longer. And it is very, very painful." Gunn said.
"What happens while they're there? I mean, why are they sent there? And how? Portals?"
"Not portals. Only their soul goes to the dimensions, their bodies stay, having strange spasms because only a part of their soul is still rooted in their natural dimension, which is Earth. In the past there have been times where their entire soul goes, making them impure, making the generation fail, and making another one come along with another chosen one. The chosen ones for each generation, they have been predetermined by fate, the leader, we don't know, but they're already picked. When the last one dies, another comes around. At first they don't know it, but then they start to have spasms at sunset. It takes seven of these, or seven sunsets, for their souls to finally start going to different dimensions. The first seven times are like heart attacks that they survive. Usually the cult finds them before they start to visit other dimensions, and captures them, taking them wherever the leader says. There they wait until the chosen one has successfully visited every necessary dimension at least twice, which is the necessary amount needed for whatever the chosen one puts there to activate properly. When they are ready, and the girl's soul has been distributed, they take the rest of the soul away, using it in a spell and the final sacrifice of the leader to make all the visited dimensions...go boom." Fred finished, handing Angel her notes sheet.
"Let me get this straight. The Lives use an innocent girl's soul to be distributed among various hell dimensions, during which she is in an immense amount of pain, and when it is successfully done, they suck the rest of her soul out of her body and use it to destroy all dimensions, but not before she is destroyed?" Angel asked, voice thickening.
"Yeah." Fred said softly. The entire group was in silence for a moment.
"This has happened over three hundred and forty times, to over three hundred and forty girls?" Angel asked.
"Not successfully." Lorne replied in a serious tone.
"But it will be successful this time. With this girl."
"Unless you and Spike stop the Lives and rescue the girl, yes, it will." Wesley said.
"I might need more backup than just Spike. Gunn, Wesley, you two up for it?" Angel asked. The two nodded. "Good. Then how do we stop them?"
"They aren't done yet. With the final distributions." Fred said, pushing her glasses up on her nose. "The final apocalypse is supposed to occur in three days. But we should go now, to be, you know. Safe, about it?" She suggested.
"Good idea. How do we end this, though? Will the spasms stop when Grace gets out of the possession of the Lives? Or will it keep going on?" Angel asked.
"I don't know. I know that as long as the Lives don't get her in three days and use the remainder of her soul to be sacrificed, then the world won't end. I don't know if she'll continue to be transported." Fred replied.
"Well, we should go get her and find out."
TWO: THE LIVES = THE DEATHS
Angel stopped. "What?" He asked softly.
"The guy this bint was looking for's name was Connor, Peaches. God, you have hearing problems or summat?" Spike asked, annoyed at the lack of information.
Angel shook himself. It couldn't be his son. There was no way. It would have to be some other kid in another hell dimension by the name of Connor. Dammit, there was no escape. It was his son. Who he had just given up. Then how could he have been in another dimension? It was impossible. But in other dimensions did these same rules apply? Or was this girl so special that she could carry the memory as well as he could of the boy, passing the message along to some who did not know him? Thoughts ran through Angel's head fast as the speed of light, and now he knew that he had to find this girl. Not just for her sake, not for the world's, but for his own. After all, he had made how many sacrifices for the world already? At least two.
~*~
Spike and Angel walked away from the corpses of what was now thirteen Dalarthen demons. Spike had killed the last when Angel had been pondering his sacrifices. Angel had responded with a glare, which prompted a shrug from Spike, and the two walked away together towards Angel's car.
Back at Wolfram and Hart, the two souled vampires walked into Wesley's office, where Lorne, Fred and Gunn lounged.
"Angel, you're back." Fred said, getting up off the desk where she'd been seated.
"What bout me, Fred? I'm back too, you know." Spike said, shoving his hands into his duster's pockets.
"Yes, that you are," Fred said, turning to Angel. "Did you find the demons?"
"We found 'em all right. Killed all but one, got the information we needed, and of course Peroxide here killed the last one when there could have been more information in him as to where this girl was being held." Angel said.
"'Ey! I was tryin' to help. Dalarthens kill...things." Spike replied defensively.
"So what did you find out? What'd the demon say?" Gunn asked Angel.
"He said that the girl put some kind of emotion or feeling there that changed things. The demons that were sent here from their dimension were trying to find her to remove it, not knowing that the same thing had probably happened in other dimensions. The demon said that she said she was from LA, which doesn't exactly help much. He said that this girl we're looking for wasn't the first to visit his dimension. He said that her mother had come also, but she wasn't pure enough for her purpose, so she was eliminated. Then this girl, her daughter, came into this, and-"
"And she was pure and had amazed all the demons there, blah blah blah." Spike added in. Angel nodded, and went on.
"He also described her appearance, he said her name was Grace. When he started to talk about her, something seemed to come over him. I don't know what it was exactly, some sort of enamoration. He said she was trying to escape some people called the Lives, and trying to find..." Angel trailed off.
Could he do it? Expose his son? They would never have to know that he was his son. Just tell them, try not to bring him into it too much. It wasn't that important. Yes it was. Tell them anyway.
"Trying to find who? Or what?" Wesley asked.
"A guy named Connor. We don't know anything else." Angel replied softly.
"Are you okay?" Fred asked the vampire, hand reaching out for his arm. Angel stepped back, rejecting it.
"Fine. I'm going to get some rest, find out more about the Lives, where they could be in LA. That'll lead us to her." Angel said, heading for the door.
"What about the boy? Connor. Should we look for some connection there?" Wesley asked.
"No. We can't find much on a first name. If she's trying to find him then that means she isn't with him, right? Therefore we couldn't care less." Angel said finally, leaving.
When he was gone, the remaining five looked at each other, confused as to Angel's suddenly darkening mood.
"So, what's with Sir Brood-a-lot?" Spike asked.
~*~
Angel entered his office, getting into his private elevator and taking the ride up to his apartment. He stepped out, and pulled off his leather jacket, tossing it over an armchair. He walked straight to his bar. Angel looked at his selection of hard liquor, debating his choice. He decided to cast off the hard stuff, he wasn't the best guy to get drunk. He opened up his refrigerator and pulled out a beer. Using a bottlecap opener, he opened his beer and took a long swig. He brought the beer over to his sofa, and sat down, frustrated. He took another drink. And another.
Two more beers and one hour later, Angel walked into his bedroom, pulling off his long sleeve black shirt and tossing it in a corner. He took off his pants, and climbed into his bed in his boxers. It was already dark, and his lights were all off, but despite the absence of light, it took him another hour to get to sleep.
Only two hours later, Angel was awoken by the sudden slamming of Spike's boot into the side of his bed.
"Mornin' sunshine. We got the address."
"Where is it?" Angel asked, sitting up quickly.
"Other side 'o town. We need to get ready and fill you in on all the dirt we got on these Lives guys and get over there tonight, righ' before sunrise. That's when this... well, just hurry up an'-" Angel moved to get out of bed. "No, stay there till I get out, Peaches. I don't need to be scarred or anythin'." Spike smirked and left the room, slamming Angel's door behind him.
"Morning, boss!" Harmony chirped.
"Not now, Harmony." Angel replied.
The blonde vampire picked up a bright blue coffee mug with a smiley face on it, holding it out to him. "I have your blood. Just the way you like it." She smiled.
Angel took the blood and headed for Gunn's office, where Spike stood by the door, waving for him to come in.
"You're welcome!" Harmony called over him. Muttering to herself, she sat back down at her desk. "Too busy brooding to notice me... almost as bad as my Blondie Bear with his stupid Slayer obsession..."
"Fill me in, guys." Angel greeted, taking a sip of his blood.
Lorne pulled out a sheet of notes. "Well, good morning to you too." He scoffed. "These guys, the Lives. They're a cult looking to destroy all dimensions possible for them to reach through a chosen one, probably our girl Grace."
"Cult of demons or vampires or humans, Lorne? I need specifics." Angel said sharply.
"Somebody got up in a bad mood." Spike sneered.
"Somebody was woken up by someone about to be staked if they don't shut up." Angel replied. "Keep talking." He urged.
"Well, we don't exactly... well, their leader, he's a demon, but the followers are... human. The text we found on them isn't too clear." Lorne said wistfully.
"But, they leave traces behind with each generation." Gunn added, handing Angel a sheet of paper.
"What kind of traces," Angel asked.
"A mark is burned into their leader's arm. There have been three hundred and forty one marks, this is the three hundred and forty second generation. The one predestined to succeed." Fred said, handing Angel another sheet of paper with a photocopied prophecy. Angel glanced over it.
"This is my prophecy. That Eve gave me." Angel said.
"There's a quickie version, with hilighted parts and translations in the margins." Lorne said, pointing to said translations.
"Good work, guys." Angel said, glancing down at the prophecy.
"Anyway, the Lives want this end of the world to come to pass because of the fact that they are brainwashed, or should I say bodywashed, when they get a certain tattoo. This is the tattoo. The mark is the mark of the generation they are to be in, and is the same mark that the leader gets burned into his arm when said generation ends." Fred said, showing Angel a picture in a textbook of the mark of the three hundred and forty second generation.
"And they're brainwashed because the leader wants this total destruction to go down." Angel finished.
"Exactly. But in order for this cult to work, they need to find a chosen one, like Lorne said before. So in each generation there's been a chosen one-" Gunn started.
"Where have I heard that before?" Spike said.
"If you're not going to help, then get out." Angel said sharply. "Now, what about this chosen one?"
"Well, there have been various problems with these girls. Some have been insane before coming into possession of the Lives, then some went insane while in possession of the Lives, others were impure-"
"Like Grace's mother." Angel finished.
"Yeah. Pure equals pure of essence, pure of soul, pure of body, blah blah. Anyway, there's always been something wrong with the chosen ones, impurity of some sort. One even got away, and a few of them have been killed by the, er, harsh tactics of the Lives." Wesley said.
"Harsh tactics? What are they doing, exactly?" Angel asked.
"I'll tell you in a minute." Wesley said. "Now, these girls are tortured, constantly. But only the torture that comes to mind when you hear the word is used upon them when they try to go against the leader's or followers' orders. But they go through torture each night, at sunset when they slip into a state of... well, from what we decoded, they get sucked into another dimension. Not always the same one. But each night they visit a hell dimension. Our time, they're only gone for maybe five minutes. Time in the hell dimension, they're there for longer. And it is very, very painful." Gunn said.
"What happens while they're there? I mean, why are they sent there? And how? Portals?"
"Not portals. Only their soul goes to the dimensions, their bodies stay, having strange spasms because only a part of their soul is still rooted in their natural dimension, which is Earth. In the past there have been times where their entire soul goes, making them impure, making the generation fail, and making another one come along with another chosen one. The chosen ones for each generation, they have been predetermined by fate, the leader, we don't know, but they're already picked. When the last one dies, another comes around. At first they don't know it, but then they start to have spasms at sunset. It takes seven of these, or seven sunsets, for their souls to finally start going to different dimensions. The first seven times are like heart attacks that they survive. Usually the cult finds them before they start to visit other dimensions, and captures them, taking them wherever the leader says. There they wait until the chosen one has successfully visited every necessary dimension at least twice, which is the necessary amount needed for whatever the chosen one puts there to activate properly. When they are ready, and the girl's soul has been distributed, they take the rest of the soul away, using it in a spell and the final sacrifice of the leader to make all the visited dimensions...go boom." Fred finished, handing Angel her notes sheet.
"Let me get this straight. The Lives use an innocent girl's soul to be distributed among various hell dimensions, during which she is in an immense amount of pain, and when it is successfully done, they suck the rest of her soul out of her body and use it to destroy all dimensions, but not before she is destroyed?" Angel asked, voice thickening.
"Yeah." Fred said softly. The entire group was in silence for a moment.
"This has happened over three hundred and forty times, to over three hundred and forty girls?" Angel asked.
"Not successfully." Lorne replied in a serious tone.
"But it will be successful this time. With this girl."
"Unless you and Spike stop the Lives and rescue the girl, yes, it will." Wesley said.
"I might need more backup than just Spike. Gunn, Wesley, you two up for it?" Angel asked. The two nodded. "Good. Then how do we stop them?"
"They aren't done yet. With the final distributions." Fred said, pushing her glasses up on her nose. "The final apocalypse is supposed to occur in three days. But we should go now, to be, you know. Safe, about it?" She suggested.
"Good idea. How do we end this, though? Will the spasms stop when Grace gets out of the possession of the Lives? Or will it keep going on?" Angel asked.
"I don't know. I know that as long as the Lives don't get her in three days and use the remainder of her soul to be sacrificed, then the world won't end. I don't know if she'll continue to be transported." Fred replied.
"Well, we should go get her and find out."