I trace my hand lazily over the black ink markings on his back, questions in my mind, but not wanting to wake him.
"Hmmm?" comes a sleepy voice, and I wince slightly, feeling bad I've woken him after the days of no sleep he's gotten. Trying to recover from your final battle takes awhile. I should know.
"Shhhh. Go back to sleep," I whisper, and pillow my head next to his, wrapping my arms around his chest.
A rumbly sound reaches my ears, and I smile. If that isn't a self satisfied sound, I'm a monkey's uncle.
"What are you doing?" he asks, and turns over.
"Well, I was trying to not wake you, but the best laid plans…"
"I'm okay. I feel like I've been asleep for days," he tells me, and I touch the tip of his nose. "You have been. But, prophecy-coming-true aside, you've been busy. You need your sleep."
He puts one elbow under his head, giving me the crooked grin. "Buffy, I feel like I've been napping for 250 years. I've done enough sleeping. It's time to wake up." We try to be serious for a few moments, but the reality of what's happened sets in again, and we grin at each other like idiots.
Shanshu's this prophecy Wesley discovered what seems like a billion years ago. What it comes down to, is the 'vampire with a soul, if he helps enough people, will get his final reward and become human.' Guess he helped enough people. I'm not complaining here.
He wraps his arms around me now, and pulls me into his chest, sighing and closing his eyes.
"I never thought I would feel this again," he murmurs, and I sigh in return, agreeing completely.
If I had known I would get this as a reward for my slayer services, I would have slayed a litlle faster. Or tried to anyway.
A few hours later I wake again, and automatically reach for him. He's not there. I sit up, blinking into the brightness of the room, and see him standing by the window, wrapped in a terry cloth bathrobe I think belonged to my dad.
"Angel? What are you doing?"
His head turns toward me, and he gives me a smile. "Basking," he says, and I remember my usage of that same word so many years ago.
I get out of the bed, and throw on his discarded pj top. "Sun's nice, huh?" I stand next to him, and put one arm around his waist. "But you've been seeing it for a while now. What about all that necree…neco…whatever-tempered glass?"
He shakes his head. "Not remotely the same feeling."
I rub a hand on his back, and that gets me thinking again. About the tattoo there. It's still there.
"What?" he asks, and I try to blow him off.
"Nothing, nothing. I'm just, um, processing," I say, trying to throw a big word at him to throw him off. Nothing doing.
"Buffy," he starts, and I know I'm caught.
"I'm just thinking. About how much I know about you. And how much I don't know."
He frowns. "What do you mean?"
"Well, it's just…we've know each other for so long…but there's one thing I always wondered about," I say, and he raises his eyebrows.
"…Yes?" comes the reply.
"What's the deal with your tattoo?" I say in a rush, and he just gives me The Look.
"There's no deal. It's just a tattoo."
I face him, and give him MY look. "Bullshit, Angel. Everything you've ever done has a 'story' attached to it. Or a reason. So spill, buddy. You sleep with a girl, you marry her, you gotta tell her everything."
He sighs, exhasperated, and walks to the velvet chaisez lounge across from the bed. "That is one story that might take a while."
"So tell me," I say, and sit next to him, curling my legs underneath me, my arms clasped around my knees.
He faces me, and says, "Well, there was this time, back in the fifties…"
Los Angeles, 1950.
He wanders in a back alley, trying not to think of the proximity of the local blood bank, and how easy it would be to just sneak in the back and take what he needed.
His back stings, the newly done ink still healing. He needs blood to make it heal faster. Angel wonders if the tattoo will disappear altogether, or just heal correctly. He'd be slightly miffed it it didn't last. Getting the thing done wasn't the best experience he'd ever had.
Having done a favor for the artist, his buried alter ego had been pleased at Angel's choice to get the tattoo done as payment for services rendered.
The gryphon had been Angel's pick, but adding the 'A' to it was not something he consciously remembered asking for.
The wizened chinese man, known only as Hong to his customers and acquaintances, had smiled knowingly at Angel's choice of design, telling him, "Your heritage. Good idea."
Angel had lain on his stomach on the man's simple table, shirt thrown over the chair in the corner. He had expected it to hurt, but Hong, being an artist, kept it simple. In fact, the feeling was quite good, and Angel shut his eyes, laying his forehead on his crossed arms, a wave of exhaustion sweeping over him. Drifted off…not meaning too.
When he awoke, the ancient man was gone, and Angel's shirt was laid gently across his legs. He sat up, disoriented, shaking his head to clear it. Tried to look at his back, twisting his neck around to look at the tattoo. Could only see the edge of it.
As he was getting up, Hong had come back into the room, carrying a small bottle of red liquid, and wearing a smile.
"You like?" he had asked.
"Well, I can't really see it, so I'll take your word for it," Angel had replied.
"Ah, no mirrors. Right. Well, the gryphon came out perfectly, but adding the 'A' was a good extra touch."
"Wait, what? What 'A'?"
Hong stared at him, obviously confused. "The one you asked me to add when I was almost done."
Angel gave him raised eyebrows. "I fell asleep. I didn't ask you for anything." The old man frowned at him. "Well, someone asked me in your voice from your mouth to add the 'A' at the feet of the gryphon."
Angel had stood up, pulling his shirt on, quickly buttoning it. "Hong, if this is your idea of a joke…"
"No, Angel, no joke. Why would I kid you?" Hong answered, backing away slightly from the agitated vampire.
"I guess you wouldn't…I've gotta go."
"Wait, here, some blood! To heal….hello? Angel?"
The only thing to mark his passing had been the swinging of the beaded curtain over Hong's door.
Back at the Hyperion, Angel had stripped off his shirt and twisted around, trying to see the tattoo, and failing miserably. Angry, he decided to go out and eat something, not wanting to think of the implications of what Hong had said.
You asked me to add the 'A'. So I did.
But Angel knew he had been asleep.
Is he that close to the surface again?
He dives at a fat rat trying to scurry by, in a hurry to escape so obvious a predator.
No such luck. Angel breaks its neck, and drains it in one gulp. Slightly disgusted, he tosses the body in the giant trash pile next to the back entrace of the local Italian eatery. After what he's been used to lately, the rat's blood tastes like water.
Not a good idea to get too used to it, not good to remember the taste and how it makes you feel.
He plunges his hands into his pockets, and walks out of the alley, and heads toward his car. Griffith park is only a few miles away, and he needs a good quiet place to think.
Leg propped on a railing at the edge of the park, Angel smokes a cigarette and reflects. He watches the people milling about; little kids and their parents emerging from the observatory; young teens holding hands; families and single people and old people; all blissfully unaware of the dangerous monster that hides in their midst.
For years now he's tried to hide in plain site; associating with humans as little as possible. Helping a few helpless demons here and there if they can offer him something. The tattoo was a whim, he had honestly thought that it would fade completely once his skin healed.
Surprise surprise, it had actually stayed. Complete with added 'A'.
Egotistical enough, he thinks. Just like him.
But what frightens him enough to make his hands shake as he smokes, is the idea that Angelus is close enough to talk when he wants to. Close enough to make an apperance while Angel wasn't paying attention.
Has he gotten lax? Has he gotten too complacent? Has he started to enjoy the taste of human blood again…even if it's cold?
Anything but, he feels. So constantly on his guard, he literally has spoken with no humans other than his bellman at the hotel for the past month or so. Trying desperately to stay disconnected.
He's been feeling it again lately. The urge, the drive. The nasty hunger that rears its head when he's in one place for too long.
It takes advantage of his relative comfort and sneaks in, poisoning his environment and making it impossible to stay in one place for any length of time. Slips up, makes him kill one too many animals or make one too many trips to the blood bank. Makes people start to be aware of him.
And when that happens, he can feel Angelus boiling just below the surface, screaming in his mind take that one no one will miss her I need it can't you taste the heat the life the hot hot hot sweet wet blood and then he's on to another city or another state again.
Trouble is, he actually likes Los Angeles. Kind of his type of city. Sprawling, impersonal, easy to hide in. Except from the one being he really wants to hide from.
How do you hide from yourself?
A running noise reaches his ears, harsh panting and a hightened fear smell. Without warning, Angel turns to catch whatever thing is hunting him, vamp face having slipped over him without him thinking about it.
His hand shoots out a grabs it by the throat, starting to squeeze. A scream shakes his bloodlust, and as his face changes back, the little boy he is holding flails at his hand, trying to release his neck from Angel's grasp.
Horrified, Angel drops the child and stammers, "Oh, my God, I'm sorry, I thought you were something…someone else…are you okay?"
The kid drops to his feet, and pelts away, holloring for his parents. Angel knows now is the time to book it, and he does just that, hightailing it to his car before the kid's parents can get the cops.
He roars out of the parking lot, and heads for the freeway, quaking inside.
Now.
I stare at him, stunned into silence.
He stares at the floor, twisting his hands together.
"You…throttled a kid?" I finally ask.
"I didn't know it was a kid," he answers, visibly upset. "All I heard was running, and a thundering heartbeat. And it smelled like fear, so…I assumed something was attacking me, and tried to defend myself accordingly."
I stand up, pacing in front of him. "Okay, so back up a minute. You got the tat as payment for something you did for this Hong guy. But you fell asleep while he was doing it. When you woke up, the design had an added feature to it? One you didn't remember asking for," I pause, making sure I was remembering all the pieces correctly. He nods.
"And this bothered you so much because you thought Angelus was trying to emerge again."
He nods again, hunching miserably into himself. "You don't know how much I wanted every day just to let him, Buffy. I was tired of fighting it. Tired of feeling the weight of my soul. I was stretched to the breaking point. And he almost did when I grabbed that kid," he finishes.
"But there's something I don't get," I tell him, and looks up at me finally, and I'm shocked at the look in his eyes. It's like he's not even in there. I approach him, and touch his face gently.
"How was he doing this? I thought the presence of your soul was enough to weigh him down."
He sighs, and covers my hand with his. "I had been drinking human blood again, Buffy. His strength was returning."
Wait. What did he just say?
TBC.