Part 7:

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"Ah, Angel," Giles greeted the vampire. "Do come in."

The two men sat down on Giles' living room couch, two glasses of Scotch already prepared by the Watcher. Angel took but a moment to taste the drink, more out of courtesy than anything else. The alcohol slid smoothly down his throat, spreading a brief warmth through his cold chest, but did little to dispel his anxiety.

"I assume you did not call me over for a tasting," he said, setting down the glass.

"Quite correct. Where is Buffy?"

"She went to see Willow. Apparently there is some news regarding her and Oz' attempts to find a magical cure for his condition. I would have gone with her if not for your call."

"Good. Good."

Giles remained silent for a long moment, sipping his own drink. Angel didn't need to be a prophet to figure out what this talk would be about.

"You found something?" he finally asked.

"Yes. Yes, I did. I had to access some Council resources, I fear, but as far as they know this is about a vampire victim we have found, nothing worse than that."

Angel nodded, motioning for him to continue.

"It appears there has been a single case where a vampire fed his blood to a living human for a long time. Nearly a century, in fact. No names have been recorded and there are some doubts as to the accuracy of this account, but the symptoms described closely mirror what we have observed in Buffy so far."

There was no need for either of them to mention what these symptoms were. There were beneficial ones, certainly. Buffy would not have survived thirty years in the lethal environment of Hell without vampiric resistance to poisons Angel's blood had given her. It was also the main reason why, despite being roughly fifty years old, Buffy hardly looked any different than she had when they had originally gone through Akathler's portal. Her aging had been retarded to the point of near stand-still.

There were less welcome symptoms as well, though. The cosmetic changes Buffy had had to endure, her shifted eyes and elongated fangs, were but the most outward of them. There was her temper, which now carried a demonic edge, as well as the violent spasms she would have to endure if she went to long without Angel's blood.

And none of them knew what other changes might yet befall her. She was still taking Angel's blood at regular intervalls, she had to, and they both suspected it would cause them further grief.

"What can we expect then?"

The two men shared a long look, their shared worry over the long-term effects Angel's blood would have on the woman they both loved, though in very different ways, almost tangible in the air between them. Despite the knowledge that Buffy would have died in Hell without the vampiric traits Angel had shared with her, Giles could not help but hold a certain amount of resentment regarding the vampire and his Slayer as well.

Angel, for his part, still spent many an hour wondering if things wouldn't have turned out better if Buffy hadn't chosen to follow him into Hell. Still, both of them were pragmatic enough to put their issues aside and try to come up with some sort of solution to the problem that presented itself to them in the here and now.

"There is no telling," Giles began, "what effect Buffy's being the Slayer will have on the process. There is still a lot even the Council does not know about what it means to be the Chosen One. If she follows the same path as that single recorded case then the symptoms we have seen so far will only intensify with time."

"Her temper?" Angel asked.

"Among other things, yes. Her aging process will slow down further, her sensitivity to sunlight will become worse, she may even develop an aversion to holy objects."

Angel nodded, having expected as much.

"Will she become a full vampire?"

"No, that is about the only piece of good news I have found. Until and unless she physically dies she will not transform completely."

Angel wanted to sigh in relief, but somehow it didn't happen quite yet. There were too many worrying things still on his mind.

"How much of her humanity will we lose in the process?" he asked.

Giles closed his eyes, taking off his glasses to massage the bridge of his nose.

"We can't know for sure. The recorded case speaks of the victim growing more feral, more demonic, growing increasingly less compassionate and ... well, human. We have no idea, though, what kind of person this victim was to begin with."

"Buffy has told me she often feels conflicted," Angel said, "as if she has to fight the demonic presence within her blood for control."

"Has she lost control so far?" Giles asked, worried.

"Not as such, no. Her temper sometimes slips away from her, but she can usually rein it in again in short order. Her slip-up with Xander right after we came back was the worst of it."

"I'm glad to hear that. Still, we should assume the worst."

Angel nodded. For a long minute neither man said anything, both of them knowing what had to be said next. What they had to do next.

"Buffy must stop drinking my blood," Angel finally said it.

Even speaking the words caused him almost physical pain. He was a man, but he was also a vampire. For the demon part of him the sharing of blood with his beloved was as intimate, if not more so, than sex. When she fastened her small mouth to drink at his neck, when he sank his fangs into her warm flesh ... in Hell it had been a piece of Heaven. The experience had not lessened any here on Earth.

"It won't be that easy," Giles said, tearing him out of his thoughts.

Angel knew that much. Buffy experienced violent withdrawal symptoms every time she didn't drink from him soon enough. Shivers, spasms, emotional outbreaks, loss of all rational thought. They usually managed to share blood often enough to prevent these attacks from happening and, even if they did, they subsided quickly once Buffy drank from him again.

Now they were talking about her never drinking from him again.

"Vampires usually feed their blood to humans to keep them under control." Angel looked at Giles. "The victims will do anything for their next fix."

"The records say as much," Giles agreed. "There are even stories of people dying because they didn't get another sip. It's quite ... unnerving."

"What about that case you mentioned? Did he or she stop drinking blood?"

"No, I'm afraid not. The victim, a man, committed suicide after his vampire master was killed. It appears he couldn't stand the thought of never drinking his blood again."

Angel took another sip of the Scotch. "Not a good omen."

"I think we agree that simply ... cutting Buffy off will not do."

"She is strong, but ... I don't know if she would survive it."

"How much blood does she usually take and how often?"

Something inside rebelled against telling Giles these intimate details of Buffy and him, but he quickly pushed those thoughts away. No matter the resentments the Watcher might hold, he was working to help them. To help Buffy.

"The amount is hard to measure, Giles. We share blood about every two days and ... we never timed it, I'm afraid. The experience ... time ceases to have meaning while we drink from each other."

The Watcher nodded, making some notes on a piece of paper he had produced from somewhere.

"We are entering virgin territory here, but I think our best chance lies with treating this as we would a normal drug withdrawal. You must try and lessen the amount of blood you share with her, Angel, as well as extend the time period between sharings."

"I don't know if the latter will be possible, Giles. Every time we go too long she goes into spasms. It's almost like clockwork."

A hard look came onto Giles' face. "Then I'm afraid we have no choice but to make Buffy endure these attacks for a time."

Angel rose, his demon face threatening to spill past his human mask. "No, Giles! Under no circumstances will I let her suffer like this."

Giles rose as well, not inching back from the enraged vampire.

"Angel, this will not be pretty either way! Buffy will suffer. There is no getting around that. Do you think I want her to? Do you?"

For a moment the vampire seemed poised to attack, but then visibly deflated.

"No, I know you don't want that."

Giles put a hand on his shoulder.

"This will not be easy for any of us, especially Buffy. It will hurt terribly. Maybe she'll even start to hate us. We must be able to endure. For her. It's the only way."

It's not the only way. A growling voice inside Angel's mind whispered these words to him. Let her continue to drink. Let her change. If she were human she'd be dead by now. You would have lost her decades ago. What do you care if she isn't as shiny human as her friends want her to be? She could be with you forever and you know she wants that, too.

Angel shook his head. That was the demon talking. He could hear him roar in pleasure every single time Buffy's sweet blood ran down his throat, a hundred times more intoxicating than Giles' Scotch. But he was not the demon. And if he did nothing than he would lose Buffy, lose the person she was.

That he could never do.

"I will talk this through with her," Angel said, regaining his composure. "We will try and limit the sharings as much as we can."

"Good! I will keep looking for some other way to cure her of the addiction, but I believe this is our best shot."

Angel simply nodded, leaving without another word. His thoughts were swirling with images of Buffy in pain, going through the spasms of withdrawal. He would have to do this to her. He would do this and withhold the thing that would make it stop.

"Maybe Hell will get the last laugh after all," he muttered to himself.

All the demons of the Inferno couldn't have dreamed up a better way to make them suffer.

TO BE CONTINUED