You walk on the endless staircases of dust. They go up in a rectangular
design; you can see the darkening sky through the grimy skylight.
You pick up speed. You hear the voices through the thin planks that make up the walls.
"Oh, stop!" shrieks a female voice from a few flights above.
And then the scream that seems to go on forever.
A distant door slams as you break down the locked door from which behind the screams emanate.
It is a large room, with a black and white checkered marble floor, dusty from disuse; the two maroon chairs are stationed in the center, with a small table in between. Two sets of footsteps make their way through the dust to the center of the room. Only one set proceeds to the door on the opposite side.
Fred is leaning on a chair, sobbing hysterically. She turns when she sees you, and collapses to the floor in agony, a piece of wood lodged into her side. You kneel by her side and yank out the stake.
"Wesley..." she says and then she goes limp in your arms.
Gunn comes running into the room.
"What the hell- "
You point at Fred, and follow the footsteps that go towards the other door . And as you leave the room, and leave the dust of things not quite human, you know the prophecy was wrong. But... you know the prophecy was right as well. ~ B e f o r e . . .
You open the template in front of you and whisper the name of the book you want. You open it, but instead of reading the Nyracian Prose you requested, you find yourself reading the Nyazian Prophecies.
"This is the wrong text," you absently murmur as you skim through the prophecies. Nothing catches your eye until you reach the phrase 'the father will kill the son.' Warning bells ring in your head. Dimly you recall Angel mentioning this, then telling you to forget about it.
But you pay the words no more attention, and you proceed to the long and dry passages of the Nyracian Prose, immersing yourself in the familiar text, banishing lingering thoughts of uncertainty.
~
When Cordelia asks where Connor is, you are puzzled. Who is this Connor, and why does the name strike coldness into your heart? And why, when you try to think about the matter, do your musings drift away like smoke? You can't focus on these thoughts and you soon forget them.
But during one of your research sessions you come across a trinity of symbols: earthquake, blood and fire and you remember the name 'Connor' and the Nyazian Prophecies. This time you write down everything as a record, for you know you will forget again.
~
It takes intense concentration and self-control, but you manage to focus on the information you scribbled down. Angel had tossed around the words casually, as if both he and you were familiar with the term. Cordelia was looking for someone whom she assumed everyone knew. And you have holes in your memory.
It took you a long time to realize that you couldn't remember all of last year. If something came up that didn't quite make sense, you casually dismissed it and never considered there to be anything wrong. But now as you concentrate on the few clues you have, things fall into place.
Fred, Gunn and Lorne don't seem to remember either. When you try to bring up the events of last year, they brush you off and change the topic.
So you conclude that something must have happened last year, but for some reason, you forgot. And then you forget about this line of thinking until another event startles you into it again.
~ Someone must have cast a spell, you think, as you read the newspaper clipping you just found buried in your drawer.
The article is about a being named Jasmine, who should have won the Nobel Peace Prize for her accomplishment of world peace. There is a black and white photo of her surrounded by six people; Angel, Fred, Lorne, Gunn, yourself and a boy you cannot identify, although the caption calls him 'Jasmine's father.'
You place the article next to your forgotten notes on the Nyazian prophecies. Jasmine is no longer around, so something must have happened. If only you could constantly remember the clues you are pursuing.
~
The next time you remember is in the elevator. The earth has been shaking gently, aftershocks of an earthquake in Northern California, followed by a light rain. Impulsively, you enter the code that will take you to the White Room. When you step out of the elevator into the vast whiteness, you know you've been here before.
A panther stares at you from the expansiveness, his black coat a stark contrast to the white room. "I have questions," you say to the cat. "Do you have answers?"
You can almost see the cat grinning at you when the room shifts and swirls around you in a rainbow of colors.
The colors begin to slow, and stop at a business office. On the wall behind the secretary's desk are the words 'Wolfram and Hart, Hell Division.'
Wonderful, the panther has sent you to Hell to answer your questions. You start to look for a way out, but curiosity wins over. You stare at the secretary, who is patiently waiting for you to approach her desk.
"Miss Morgan has been expecting you. Go down the hall and to the third door on the left."
The secretary has dried blood caked all over her once beautiful face. She is clearly dead and unbothered by his stare, answering her phone in a perky voice, "Wolfram and Hart, Hell Division, how may I direct your call?"
"Thank you," you stammer, thrown off guard. Lilah has been waiting for you? You don't recall hearing about her death-but you knew she was dead.
You've never held onto your thoughts this long, you realize as you walk to Lilah's office. Hope rises in your heart; the answers must be coming.
You open the gray door simply marked by the name 'Lilah Morgan' and step in.
She is sitting behind a desk in a windowless room filling out paperwork. When she sees you a wide smile comes over her face. She rises from her seat and walks to the front of her desk and seductively sits on top of it.
"Wes, so you've finally made your way here. Welcome to Hell," she purrs.
She is dressed in bloody and tattered clothes; her eyes black and bruised, scratches all over her skin. Your gaze is fixed upon her neck, where her obviously severed head meets her throat.
"I did that to you," you whisper to her.
Lilah smiles sadly.
"You remember the little things, don't you?"
"Yes," you say. "I remember the small things, but then I forget."
Lilah moves closer to you, until she is close enough to kiss. If it had been anyone else, you would have moved away, reclaiming your personal space, but with her it seems natural.
"I don't remember, but this seems familiar."
Lilah looks into your eyes mournfully.
"Just another thing that you don't remember, Wes. It's okay. What do you want?" she murmurs in your ear, her dead breath on your cheek.
You pull away slightly.
"You know what I want."
"You, me, broken furniture? Okay, maybe not."
"Tell me why I don't know who Connor is, tell me why the Nyazian Prophecies mean something, tell me where Jasmine went, tell me why I don't remember ever having a relationship with you."
"A deal with the devil isn't to be taken so lightly," Lilah chides.
"What deal?"
"You didn't make the deal, Angel did."
"He wiped our memories."
"Yeah, can you believe it? You, you're persistent. But since so much happened to you in particular, I guess it's to be expected."
"Put them back."
"Can't, lover, they're gone for good. But I can give you information. Better write it down; you'll forget it again."
~
When Lilah is finished talking, you are speechless with shock.
"So that's the story," says Lilah. "Comments, questions, complaints, they can all be directed my way."
It takes a few seconds for you to review your notes and regain your faculties.
"You've covered it pretty well." You pause. "Why don't the others ever wonder?"
"They're just not as naturally inquisitive and intelligent as you are."
Lilah gets up from her seat and snaps a file shut.
"I guess you'll be on your merry way now, slightly enlightened. To return to the Los Angeles division, go back to the secretary's desk, enter the elevator and punch in the code for the White Room, it'll take-"
You corner her by her desk.
" I'm not done yet. What about you...and me?"
Lilah reaches up and strokes your rough cheek.
"It's better if you just forget that anything could have ever happened between us."
"Did I... did we..."
"I don't know and it's too late to find out now. I'm never getting out of here, and you're never going to see me again. Let it go."
She leans into your arms and buries her face in your shirt.
"Let it go."
~
You walk through the world burdened with the truth. After your meeting with Lilah, you began to daily review your notes and are now able to hold onto the information for greater and greater periods of time. Soon you can remember all the time, but you only remember what she told you. You can't remember your experiences, but sometimes little things pop out of your erased memory and you add them to your notes. Like the lullaby you once sang to Connor, the type of lotion Lilah used, crashing through a window with Faith, the jar that contained Angel's soul.
You confront Angel with your knowledge once it is firmly anchored in your mind.
"I know what happened," you say to him the day Fred officially got together with Knox. It is foggy and dark outside, the same way you've been feeling for a long time.
"Then you know why I did it," he responds.
"And if I was able to find out the truth for myself, who says he hasn't done so as well? If my memories were so intense that they resurfaced anyway, his memories are just as deep, if not more so."
The ominous silence in the room lasts for a long time.
~
Time passes, nothing changes, but everything has changed.
You've grown apart from your friends, disgusted with their lack of questions and unchallenged acceptance of their inaccurate memories. They can't remember, not even if you sit down and tell them the whole story. You've tried. They sat through your lecture quietly, without batting an eyelash, then walked out of the room and promptly forgot you ever said anything. They will never remember.
You, on the other hand, remember more with every passing day. Your real memories trickle in lightly. You will never remember all your experiences, but your knowledge does not just consist of hastily scribbled notes anymore.
You glance down at the notes in front of you. You are reviewing the Nyazian Prophecies for the nth time, pouring over commentaries and possibilities, just like you presume you did when Connor was born.
The translations are iffy; words have multiple meanings in multiple languages, and reading with an emphasis on a different part of a word creates a completely different meaning. 'The father will kill the son' can be read in a slightly different, albeit completely grammatically incorrect way, meaning 'the son will kill the father.' But you disregard this, as the prophets typically used proper syntax.
The father will kill the son. It's ironic; though this prophecy is false, it's come true in a roundabout fashion. Connor no longer exists; his father has wiped his memory away. The father has killed the son.
"How ironic," you whisper. "How ironic."
~
You've stayed at Wolfram and Hart this long because you're not quite sure where you would go. But you are ready to leave. You have no connections, no friends, no lover, and no self-respect. You reflect over these thoughts as Angel drones on about some demon or another at a department meeting.
Harmony runs in and disrupts the meeting.
"Boss! There's some man trying to muscle his way into the building again!He wants to see you-"
Angel is out the door, on his way to confront the latest monster that wants to make an evil deal. Idly, you wander after him and freeze when you see the man.
He is no man, just a grown boy, thrashing around and held in place by a pair of security guards.
"You!" he yells at Angel, snapping his jaws like an animal. "You! What did you do!"
You know the boy, you've seen him before, it must be-
"Steven," says Angel, moving forward to the boy, "Everything's going to be okay, calm down."
"Connor," you whisper.
"Who's Connor?" asks Fred. The commotion has drawn her, Gunn and Lorne out of their offices.
It is Connor.
"What the hell is going on? Why does Angel know his name?" questions Gunn.
It is Connor. Connor remembers. You are not alone. The reason for the memory wipe, the person who it started and finished with- Connor.
You step forward and shove Angel away.
"Your spell is officially, one hundred percent screwed up. Maybe you should stay away, try not to do any more harm."
"Maybe you should have stayed away in the first place. That would have been a lot less harmful," hisses Angel.
"I have answers for you," you inform the struggling boy. "Let him go," you tell the guards.
They release him and back away.
"Come on," you say, "let's find a place to sit and talk."
You lead him out of the building and ignore the stares of your ignorant colleagues. They will have forgotten about this incident within the hour, but you will not. You started this whole thing with your belief in the prophecies, and you're going to try to end it as best as you can.
~
"I just want to know what's wrong with me."
"You're looking for answers," you say to Connor.
You are walking down the street with him by your side.
"Yeah, just answers."
"What lead you to Wolfram and Hart? What made you think you could get answers there?"
"I don't know," says Connor. "I opened up the newspaper one day and I saw this article on a law firm. It had a picture of that guy in it, and I knew he had the answers. So I came."
"What do you remember?" you ask him.
"I don't. I try to think about my life before this year, and it just doesn't make sense. For awhile it didn't bother me so much, but it started to get worse. I think of weird things that are all sci-fi TV, but I can't think about them too hard or they go away. I can't remember."
"The same thing happen to me," you murmur. Then:
"Do you know who you are?"
"No," says Connor, trying to hide the moisture in his eyes.
"Who do you think you are?"
"Steven, Steven Card, the guy who rules at basketball and fails all his history tests, who tickles his little sister every night, hangs out with his friends. The guy..." Connor stops talking and chokes back a sob.
You look him in the eye.
"Do you want the truth? Do you want to remember what happened, however strange and far out it may sound?"
"Yes," says Connor, "I can't live in a lie."
You shouldn't tell him. You should knock him out and take him to Wolfram and Hart, have them re-wipe his memory and do it properly this time. But you can't. He deserves the truth.
And so you tell him. You tell him the same story Lilah told you. And so you come to regret it.
~
You find Connor in an abandoned old mansion, on the outskirts of a really bad neighborhood.
"Are you alright?" you ask him gently.
At first he did not believe your story. In fact, he forgot most of it. But you had given him your name and number and told him to call when he had questions. He calls you back a while later and you tell him the story again.
He talks to you daily now, absorbing the tale you tell, remembering more and more each time. He soon starts to bring up details that you never told him. He is coming out of his tightly woven web of lies, just like you did. But he does not react the same way.
His state of mind worsens as his memories grow stronger. Angel told you that Connor's mental state had been so bad that he had been about to commit suicide and take a room full of people with him when the memory spell was cast. Angel ordered you to stay away from Connor and let the memory spell stand.
"With or without my intervention, he's going to get some memories back. With my help, maybe he can keep himself together. Without it, we know where he's headed." And with those words, Angel sealed his mouth shut and let you do whatever the hell you wanted.
"No, I'm not," says Connor, tracing patterns with the toe of his shoe in the dust that covers the checkered floor. He pulls himself out of the maroon chair he's sitting in.
"Why don't they remember?" Connor asks again.
Them, the nameless them that haunt our dreams. You do not answer him. You've grown tired of repeating yourself.
"He's going to pay," says Connor with a wicked smile on his face.
You are silent for a while.
"Connor," you finally say, "It isn't his fault."
"Do you really believe that?" he says bitterly. "I don't think you do."
"It's my fault," you state. "I took you from him. It's because of me that you're fully grown two years after your birth."
"No," he says. "You're not responsible for my being. You're not the one who tried to raise me. You're not the one I want to hurt. It was so bad, and he made it worse."
What can you say? You mouth the same words over and over again, bearing the cross of guilt that Angel didn't want. Angel's been a monster, he deserves all the pain that comes his way. You were a pawn in a plot to ruin his life, and it ruined yours along the way.
"I used to hang out here with my friends," says Connor, shifting gears. "There was this rumor going around that some guy killed his dad here, and everyone was scared to come here, so we staked it out. Nice place, huh?"
"Yes, lovely," you say dryly, running your finger through the dust on the table in between you and Connor.
"It's part of the charm," smiles Connor.
The last vestiges of sunlight leak peak through the dark purple curtains covering the large picturesque windows.
"I've spent a lot of time here since the memory thing. Sat around a lot and looked out the window. It's like a second home here, sort of. Spent a lot of time here just thinking. A lot of my memories came back in this room." Connor is quiet for a minute.
"It's like I've lived my whole life here."
You sit side by side in the maroon chairs with Connor until the sun sinks below the horizon and out of sight. Night has fallen.
~
"Get up!" Connor yells at Angel, who is collapsed on the floor with a bullet through his shoulder. He clutches a gun tightly in his hands.
"Steven-"
"Don't call me that."
"Connor-"
"Don't call me that either. I don't have a name, or a life, or a past and future. Because of you!" Fred attempts to move to the door. Connor shoots at her. The bullet narrowly misses her cheek and embeds itself into the wall.
"No one moves."
Lorne, Gunn and Fred are transfixed in horror and confusion. You, on the other hand, know quite well what's happened.
The taut thread that connected Connor to rationality and sanity has snapped. He wants revenge, and he's going to get it.
He burst into Angel's office this time, having eliminated the threat of security, armed with a gun, and ready for just about anything.
Connor points at you.
"Wesley, you can leave. For at least remembering, and telling the truth, you can leave."
You consider the proposition for a moment and politely decline.
"No, thank you, I think I'll watch."
"Whatever you want."
Connor aims at Angel's head and starts to rant.
"You're despicable. All of you, not just him. How can you not remember the stuff that happened? Why can't you?"
The rest of his ranting blurs together into background noise, as your consciousness only focuses on Connor's form. Your heartbeat beats loudly in your ears, and everyone seems to move more slowly.
Will he kill Angel and the others? There is no telling what he is capable of in this current mood. An even greater question: Should you bother to save them? You've reached the point where you no longer care if they live or die.
The sound is turned back on abruptly, with the abrupt departure of Connor.
"-start with her," you hear him say as the door slams closed.
"He took Fred," yells Gunn like no one else noticed the same thing. "Who the hell was that kid!?"
"Somebody do something!" wails Lorne.
Angel is up and out the door before you can open your mouth to speak.
Lorne, Gunn and Fred all turn and look questioningly at you.
You smile bitterly.
"You heard the boy. You won't be wondering about this, in, say an hour or so, so I won't bother to enlighten you now. "
And then you leave the room to seek out the father, the son and the captive.
~
You go to the most obvious place you can think of: Connor's old mansion.
The rotting wooden door is partially ripped off its' hinges, and you can see the tracks of two footsteps in the dust. They are here.
You follow the footsteps through the rooms, into the basement, and up the stairs. There halfway up the rickety staircase that circles the landing in a rectangle, you hear the screams and voices.
"Oh, stop!"
You hurry to the room that you and Connor had most of your sessions in, the room with the checkered floor, and force your way in. Fred lies there with a stake in her side.
Gunn rushes in after you. You are impressed; you didn't hear him following you. You check Fred's pulse, and leave her dead body for Gunn to attend to. You are going to follow Connor's footsteps through the door on the other side.
The door leads to a balcony, overlooking the street. Connor is leaning dangerously over the edge.
"Where is he?" you say quietly.
"In the room," he replies.
"You killed him."
Connor never responds. Instead, he throws one leg over the railing and jumps.
You rush to the edge and try to grab him. But you are too late. Connor's body is on the street below, surrounded by cars and people.
The father had killed the son. The son came back and killed the father. The prophecy was right, and the prophecy was wrong.
The wind blows bitter ashes into your face from the room of memories and death. The crowds throng around the body, Gunn cradles Fred in the other room.
They do not remember, and they never will.
~ Finito
You pick up speed. You hear the voices through the thin planks that make up the walls.
"Oh, stop!" shrieks a female voice from a few flights above.
And then the scream that seems to go on forever.
A distant door slams as you break down the locked door from which behind the screams emanate.
It is a large room, with a black and white checkered marble floor, dusty from disuse; the two maroon chairs are stationed in the center, with a small table in between. Two sets of footsteps make their way through the dust to the center of the room. Only one set proceeds to the door on the opposite side.
Fred is leaning on a chair, sobbing hysterically. She turns when she sees you, and collapses to the floor in agony, a piece of wood lodged into her side. You kneel by her side and yank out the stake.
"Wesley..." she says and then she goes limp in your arms.
Gunn comes running into the room.
"What the hell- "
You point at Fred, and follow the footsteps that go towards the other door . And as you leave the room, and leave the dust of things not quite human, you know the prophecy was wrong. But... you know the prophecy was right as well. ~ B e f o r e . . .
You open the template in front of you and whisper the name of the book you want. You open it, but instead of reading the Nyracian Prose you requested, you find yourself reading the Nyazian Prophecies.
"This is the wrong text," you absently murmur as you skim through the prophecies. Nothing catches your eye until you reach the phrase 'the father will kill the son.' Warning bells ring in your head. Dimly you recall Angel mentioning this, then telling you to forget about it.
But you pay the words no more attention, and you proceed to the long and dry passages of the Nyracian Prose, immersing yourself in the familiar text, banishing lingering thoughts of uncertainty.
~
When Cordelia asks where Connor is, you are puzzled. Who is this Connor, and why does the name strike coldness into your heart? And why, when you try to think about the matter, do your musings drift away like smoke? You can't focus on these thoughts and you soon forget them.
But during one of your research sessions you come across a trinity of symbols: earthquake, blood and fire and you remember the name 'Connor' and the Nyazian Prophecies. This time you write down everything as a record, for you know you will forget again.
~
It takes intense concentration and self-control, but you manage to focus on the information you scribbled down. Angel had tossed around the words casually, as if both he and you were familiar with the term. Cordelia was looking for someone whom she assumed everyone knew. And you have holes in your memory.
It took you a long time to realize that you couldn't remember all of last year. If something came up that didn't quite make sense, you casually dismissed it and never considered there to be anything wrong. But now as you concentrate on the few clues you have, things fall into place.
Fred, Gunn and Lorne don't seem to remember either. When you try to bring up the events of last year, they brush you off and change the topic.
So you conclude that something must have happened last year, but for some reason, you forgot. And then you forget about this line of thinking until another event startles you into it again.
~ Someone must have cast a spell, you think, as you read the newspaper clipping you just found buried in your drawer.
The article is about a being named Jasmine, who should have won the Nobel Peace Prize for her accomplishment of world peace. There is a black and white photo of her surrounded by six people; Angel, Fred, Lorne, Gunn, yourself and a boy you cannot identify, although the caption calls him 'Jasmine's father.'
You place the article next to your forgotten notes on the Nyazian prophecies. Jasmine is no longer around, so something must have happened. If only you could constantly remember the clues you are pursuing.
~
The next time you remember is in the elevator. The earth has been shaking gently, aftershocks of an earthquake in Northern California, followed by a light rain. Impulsively, you enter the code that will take you to the White Room. When you step out of the elevator into the vast whiteness, you know you've been here before.
A panther stares at you from the expansiveness, his black coat a stark contrast to the white room. "I have questions," you say to the cat. "Do you have answers?"
You can almost see the cat grinning at you when the room shifts and swirls around you in a rainbow of colors.
The colors begin to slow, and stop at a business office. On the wall behind the secretary's desk are the words 'Wolfram and Hart, Hell Division.'
Wonderful, the panther has sent you to Hell to answer your questions. You start to look for a way out, but curiosity wins over. You stare at the secretary, who is patiently waiting for you to approach her desk.
"Miss Morgan has been expecting you. Go down the hall and to the third door on the left."
The secretary has dried blood caked all over her once beautiful face. She is clearly dead and unbothered by his stare, answering her phone in a perky voice, "Wolfram and Hart, Hell Division, how may I direct your call?"
"Thank you," you stammer, thrown off guard. Lilah has been waiting for you? You don't recall hearing about her death-but you knew she was dead.
You've never held onto your thoughts this long, you realize as you walk to Lilah's office. Hope rises in your heart; the answers must be coming.
You open the gray door simply marked by the name 'Lilah Morgan' and step in.
She is sitting behind a desk in a windowless room filling out paperwork. When she sees you a wide smile comes over her face. She rises from her seat and walks to the front of her desk and seductively sits on top of it.
"Wes, so you've finally made your way here. Welcome to Hell," she purrs.
She is dressed in bloody and tattered clothes; her eyes black and bruised, scratches all over her skin. Your gaze is fixed upon her neck, where her obviously severed head meets her throat.
"I did that to you," you whisper to her.
Lilah smiles sadly.
"You remember the little things, don't you?"
"Yes," you say. "I remember the small things, but then I forget."
Lilah moves closer to you, until she is close enough to kiss. If it had been anyone else, you would have moved away, reclaiming your personal space, but with her it seems natural.
"I don't remember, but this seems familiar."
Lilah looks into your eyes mournfully.
"Just another thing that you don't remember, Wes. It's okay. What do you want?" she murmurs in your ear, her dead breath on your cheek.
You pull away slightly.
"You know what I want."
"You, me, broken furniture? Okay, maybe not."
"Tell me why I don't know who Connor is, tell me why the Nyazian Prophecies mean something, tell me where Jasmine went, tell me why I don't remember ever having a relationship with you."
"A deal with the devil isn't to be taken so lightly," Lilah chides.
"What deal?"
"You didn't make the deal, Angel did."
"He wiped our memories."
"Yeah, can you believe it? You, you're persistent. But since so much happened to you in particular, I guess it's to be expected."
"Put them back."
"Can't, lover, they're gone for good. But I can give you information. Better write it down; you'll forget it again."
~
When Lilah is finished talking, you are speechless with shock.
"So that's the story," says Lilah. "Comments, questions, complaints, they can all be directed my way."
It takes a few seconds for you to review your notes and regain your faculties.
"You've covered it pretty well." You pause. "Why don't the others ever wonder?"
"They're just not as naturally inquisitive and intelligent as you are."
Lilah gets up from her seat and snaps a file shut.
"I guess you'll be on your merry way now, slightly enlightened. To return to the Los Angeles division, go back to the secretary's desk, enter the elevator and punch in the code for the White Room, it'll take-"
You corner her by her desk.
" I'm not done yet. What about you...and me?"
Lilah reaches up and strokes your rough cheek.
"It's better if you just forget that anything could have ever happened between us."
"Did I... did we..."
"I don't know and it's too late to find out now. I'm never getting out of here, and you're never going to see me again. Let it go."
She leans into your arms and buries her face in your shirt.
"Let it go."
~
You walk through the world burdened with the truth. After your meeting with Lilah, you began to daily review your notes and are now able to hold onto the information for greater and greater periods of time. Soon you can remember all the time, but you only remember what she told you. You can't remember your experiences, but sometimes little things pop out of your erased memory and you add them to your notes. Like the lullaby you once sang to Connor, the type of lotion Lilah used, crashing through a window with Faith, the jar that contained Angel's soul.
You confront Angel with your knowledge once it is firmly anchored in your mind.
"I know what happened," you say to him the day Fred officially got together with Knox. It is foggy and dark outside, the same way you've been feeling for a long time.
"Then you know why I did it," he responds.
"And if I was able to find out the truth for myself, who says he hasn't done so as well? If my memories were so intense that they resurfaced anyway, his memories are just as deep, if not more so."
The ominous silence in the room lasts for a long time.
~
Time passes, nothing changes, but everything has changed.
You've grown apart from your friends, disgusted with their lack of questions and unchallenged acceptance of their inaccurate memories. They can't remember, not even if you sit down and tell them the whole story. You've tried. They sat through your lecture quietly, without batting an eyelash, then walked out of the room and promptly forgot you ever said anything. They will never remember.
You, on the other hand, remember more with every passing day. Your real memories trickle in lightly. You will never remember all your experiences, but your knowledge does not just consist of hastily scribbled notes anymore.
You glance down at the notes in front of you. You are reviewing the Nyazian Prophecies for the nth time, pouring over commentaries and possibilities, just like you presume you did when Connor was born.
The translations are iffy; words have multiple meanings in multiple languages, and reading with an emphasis on a different part of a word creates a completely different meaning. 'The father will kill the son' can be read in a slightly different, albeit completely grammatically incorrect way, meaning 'the son will kill the father.' But you disregard this, as the prophets typically used proper syntax.
The father will kill the son. It's ironic; though this prophecy is false, it's come true in a roundabout fashion. Connor no longer exists; his father has wiped his memory away. The father has killed the son.
"How ironic," you whisper. "How ironic."
~
You've stayed at Wolfram and Hart this long because you're not quite sure where you would go. But you are ready to leave. You have no connections, no friends, no lover, and no self-respect. You reflect over these thoughts as Angel drones on about some demon or another at a department meeting.
Harmony runs in and disrupts the meeting.
"Boss! There's some man trying to muscle his way into the building again!He wants to see you-"
Angel is out the door, on his way to confront the latest monster that wants to make an evil deal. Idly, you wander after him and freeze when you see the man.
He is no man, just a grown boy, thrashing around and held in place by a pair of security guards.
"You!" he yells at Angel, snapping his jaws like an animal. "You! What did you do!"
You know the boy, you've seen him before, it must be-
"Steven," says Angel, moving forward to the boy, "Everything's going to be okay, calm down."
"Connor," you whisper.
"Who's Connor?" asks Fred. The commotion has drawn her, Gunn and Lorne out of their offices.
It is Connor.
"What the hell is going on? Why does Angel know his name?" questions Gunn.
It is Connor. Connor remembers. You are not alone. The reason for the memory wipe, the person who it started and finished with- Connor.
You step forward and shove Angel away.
"Your spell is officially, one hundred percent screwed up. Maybe you should stay away, try not to do any more harm."
"Maybe you should have stayed away in the first place. That would have been a lot less harmful," hisses Angel.
"I have answers for you," you inform the struggling boy. "Let him go," you tell the guards.
They release him and back away.
"Come on," you say, "let's find a place to sit and talk."
You lead him out of the building and ignore the stares of your ignorant colleagues. They will have forgotten about this incident within the hour, but you will not. You started this whole thing with your belief in the prophecies, and you're going to try to end it as best as you can.
~
"I just want to know what's wrong with me."
"You're looking for answers," you say to Connor.
You are walking down the street with him by your side.
"Yeah, just answers."
"What lead you to Wolfram and Hart? What made you think you could get answers there?"
"I don't know," says Connor. "I opened up the newspaper one day and I saw this article on a law firm. It had a picture of that guy in it, and I knew he had the answers. So I came."
"What do you remember?" you ask him.
"I don't. I try to think about my life before this year, and it just doesn't make sense. For awhile it didn't bother me so much, but it started to get worse. I think of weird things that are all sci-fi TV, but I can't think about them too hard or they go away. I can't remember."
"The same thing happen to me," you murmur. Then:
"Do you know who you are?"
"No," says Connor, trying to hide the moisture in his eyes.
"Who do you think you are?"
"Steven, Steven Card, the guy who rules at basketball and fails all his history tests, who tickles his little sister every night, hangs out with his friends. The guy..." Connor stops talking and chokes back a sob.
You look him in the eye.
"Do you want the truth? Do you want to remember what happened, however strange and far out it may sound?"
"Yes," says Connor, "I can't live in a lie."
You shouldn't tell him. You should knock him out and take him to Wolfram and Hart, have them re-wipe his memory and do it properly this time. But you can't. He deserves the truth.
And so you tell him. You tell him the same story Lilah told you. And so you come to regret it.
~
You find Connor in an abandoned old mansion, on the outskirts of a really bad neighborhood.
"Are you alright?" you ask him gently.
At first he did not believe your story. In fact, he forgot most of it. But you had given him your name and number and told him to call when he had questions. He calls you back a while later and you tell him the story again.
He talks to you daily now, absorbing the tale you tell, remembering more and more each time. He soon starts to bring up details that you never told him. He is coming out of his tightly woven web of lies, just like you did. But he does not react the same way.
His state of mind worsens as his memories grow stronger. Angel told you that Connor's mental state had been so bad that he had been about to commit suicide and take a room full of people with him when the memory spell was cast. Angel ordered you to stay away from Connor and let the memory spell stand.
"With or without my intervention, he's going to get some memories back. With my help, maybe he can keep himself together. Without it, we know where he's headed." And with those words, Angel sealed his mouth shut and let you do whatever the hell you wanted.
"No, I'm not," says Connor, tracing patterns with the toe of his shoe in the dust that covers the checkered floor. He pulls himself out of the maroon chair he's sitting in.
"Why don't they remember?" Connor asks again.
Them, the nameless them that haunt our dreams. You do not answer him. You've grown tired of repeating yourself.
"He's going to pay," says Connor with a wicked smile on his face.
You are silent for a while.
"Connor," you finally say, "It isn't his fault."
"Do you really believe that?" he says bitterly. "I don't think you do."
"It's my fault," you state. "I took you from him. It's because of me that you're fully grown two years after your birth."
"No," he says. "You're not responsible for my being. You're not the one who tried to raise me. You're not the one I want to hurt. It was so bad, and he made it worse."
What can you say? You mouth the same words over and over again, bearing the cross of guilt that Angel didn't want. Angel's been a monster, he deserves all the pain that comes his way. You were a pawn in a plot to ruin his life, and it ruined yours along the way.
"I used to hang out here with my friends," says Connor, shifting gears. "There was this rumor going around that some guy killed his dad here, and everyone was scared to come here, so we staked it out. Nice place, huh?"
"Yes, lovely," you say dryly, running your finger through the dust on the table in between you and Connor.
"It's part of the charm," smiles Connor.
The last vestiges of sunlight leak peak through the dark purple curtains covering the large picturesque windows.
"I've spent a lot of time here since the memory thing. Sat around a lot and looked out the window. It's like a second home here, sort of. Spent a lot of time here just thinking. A lot of my memories came back in this room." Connor is quiet for a minute.
"It's like I've lived my whole life here."
You sit side by side in the maroon chairs with Connor until the sun sinks below the horizon and out of sight. Night has fallen.
~
"Get up!" Connor yells at Angel, who is collapsed on the floor with a bullet through his shoulder. He clutches a gun tightly in his hands.
"Steven-"
"Don't call me that."
"Connor-"
"Don't call me that either. I don't have a name, or a life, or a past and future. Because of you!" Fred attempts to move to the door. Connor shoots at her. The bullet narrowly misses her cheek and embeds itself into the wall.
"No one moves."
Lorne, Gunn and Fred are transfixed in horror and confusion. You, on the other hand, know quite well what's happened.
The taut thread that connected Connor to rationality and sanity has snapped. He wants revenge, and he's going to get it.
He burst into Angel's office this time, having eliminated the threat of security, armed with a gun, and ready for just about anything.
Connor points at you.
"Wesley, you can leave. For at least remembering, and telling the truth, you can leave."
You consider the proposition for a moment and politely decline.
"No, thank you, I think I'll watch."
"Whatever you want."
Connor aims at Angel's head and starts to rant.
"You're despicable. All of you, not just him. How can you not remember the stuff that happened? Why can't you?"
The rest of his ranting blurs together into background noise, as your consciousness only focuses on Connor's form. Your heartbeat beats loudly in your ears, and everyone seems to move more slowly.
Will he kill Angel and the others? There is no telling what he is capable of in this current mood. An even greater question: Should you bother to save them? You've reached the point where you no longer care if they live or die.
The sound is turned back on abruptly, with the abrupt departure of Connor.
"-start with her," you hear him say as the door slams closed.
"He took Fred," yells Gunn like no one else noticed the same thing. "Who the hell was that kid!?"
"Somebody do something!" wails Lorne.
Angel is up and out the door before you can open your mouth to speak.
Lorne, Gunn and Fred all turn and look questioningly at you.
You smile bitterly.
"You heard the boy. You won't be wondering about this, in, say an hour or so, so I won't bother to enlighten you now. "
And then you leave the room to seek out the father, the son and the captive.
~
You go to the most obvious place you can think of: Connor's old mansion.
The rotting wooden door is partially ripped off its' hinges, and you can see the tracks of two footsteps in the dust. They are here.
You follow the footsteps through the rooms, into the basement, and up the stairs. There halfway up the rickety staircase that circles the landing in a rectangle, you hear the screams and voices.
"Oh, stop!"
You hurry to the room that you and Connor had most of your sessions in, the room with the checkered floor, and force your way in. Fred lies there with a stake in her side.
Gunn rushes in after you. You are impressed; you didn't hear him following you. You check Fred's pulse, and leave her dead body for Gunn to attend to. You are going to follow Connor's footsteps through the door on the other side.
The door leads to a balcony, overlooking the street. Connor is leaning dangerously over the edge.
"Where is he?" you say quietly.
"In the room," he replies.
"You killed him."
Connor never responds. Instead, he throws one leg over the railing and jumps.
You rush to the edge and try to grab him. But you are too late. Connor's body is on the street below, surrounded by cars and people.
The father had killed the son. The son came back and killed the father. The prophecy was right, and the prophecy was wrong.
The wind blows bitter ashes into your face from the room of memories and death. The crowds throng around the body, Gunn cradles Fred in the other room.
They do not remember, and they never will.
~ Finito