Chapter Three -- Angel
Was it possible to hurt everywhere? Angel knew it was now. No other battle had put so many bruises and wounds on his body. Spike had called him a walking cadaver as he pulled the last sword from his back. Lucky for him. Spike didn't look any better than he did, but at least they were both still alive, undead, but still moving.
Illyria had fared much better, because she had on some type of body armor, so many of the blows delivered by the demons were just deflected.
They had somehow beaten them back though. Just the three of them. Two vampires and an ancient god who had been semi-neutered. They had been effective as a team. Not his team, but a team nonetheless. Gunn had collapsed in the first fifteen minutes. Illyria had put him somewhere safe while the battle continued. He was in a coma right then, somehow surviving until the battle's end. He just hoped that Gunn didn't linger on, become a vegetable like Cordy had.
Now Angel could lie down, rest and recover from his many wounds. The spell against demon violence was still in effect in the Hyperion from long ago (a year seemed so long ago to him right that instant). Hopefully no strays would get in and murder him in his sleep.
He was just fading off into slumberland when a voice came to him. He was dreaming, he was sure. The voice was ticked off.
"Get up stupid-ass."
There's only one person who ever called him that. And he wasn't talking about Spike.
"Why are you sleeping when there's so much to be done? Oh, that's right. I'm talking to Angel. Who just got his butt kicked because he didn't listen to me, that's who."
He opened one eye to look into Cordelia's lovely, yet angry face. Nope, he was dreaming. He turned over and closed his eyes again.
"Oh, no, you don't." Disembodied voices don't normally hit you. He groaned, thinking that he had rolled wrong on some injury he had received.
"You have screwed up so much I could scream."
"Already screaming," he said into the pillow. Cordy's presence in his dream was scary indeed. He hadn't dreamed of her in a while. Since she had given him that one last vision, he hadn't really dreamed much at all. His mind had been focused on one goal. Making the Senior Partners pay.
"I could scream louder but my throat hurts from yelling at the other two. You, I should just hit."
Another punch, this one to that nasty slice to his back that Spike had stitched up. And the way Spike stitched, he knew there'd be scares all over his body. Not that he didn't care. He was so scarred on the inside, he'd need them on the outside to match.
He'd lost them all. That's what he'd told Faith on the phone not more than an hour ago. Doyle, Cordy, Fred, Wes, probably Gunn. He'd let them all down. Ever since Doyle had died, he had promised himself that no one else would die because of his decisions. They'd all die old and happy. Now none of them would. He'd sacrificed each one of them, supposedly for the common good. Sacrifice the one for the many.
He knew that the job was not without risk, but his batting average was an abysmal zero. Spike survived in spite and Illyria was, hell, he didn't even know. Buffy did much better protecting her people than he did. Willow, Xander, and Giles were still walking and talking, even after battling the First.
He'd go on though. Had to. They're deaths would mean nothing if he didn't. But he'd never get close to anyone ever again. He'd go back to what he was before Cordy and Doyle had pinned him down that day in the office and said they were moving in. Literally. They had moved into that office and into his life and wouldn't let go.
Doyle's death had hit him hardest. Doyle's selfless sacrifice. Then Wesley had come along and had made him hope for more. That they could make a difference. Gunn and Fred had come and fit in nicely. Then Connor had arrived. He'd been the happiest vampire with a soul in the world. Or as happy as he could be without that pesky curse resurfacing.
Then it all came crashing down again. He knew he couldn't be happy, ever. Holtz reappeared, Cordelia left with Groo, and Wesley stole Connor. His life had never been the same since.
Every single person had been right in his or her assumptions. Holtz had every right to come after him. He'd killed his family for goodness sake. Cordelia deserved happiness with someone who could give her that, physically and emotionally. And Wes. Everyone had first thought that the prophecy wasn't true. Was placed there by Sajhjan to throw Angel off and put everyone in a tailspin. It was all true. All of it. Wesley was right.
The father will kill the son. He was right all along. It wasn't until Angel had to strike Connor down, when he was going to blow up innocent people along with Cordy, to let him live that it struck him. If Wesley had succeeded that night, Connor would be a different person. He probably would not have known how to fight or maybe he would have with Wes around. Connor would have only been two. Gunn and Fred would be alive and together. And Cordelia wouldn't be poking him right now in the back to get up. She'd be alive and kicking, instead of in some grave, rotting away.
What he didn't expect the dream to do was feel so real. Cordy not only hit him, she pulled him over and sat down right on him, pinning him to the bed. He really didn't need an erotic dream right that instant.
"Just go away. I'm trying to sleep Cord."
"You are so not going to sleep right now. You just need to listen broody boy."
She was strong. Really strong right then. Maybe he'd just let the dream play out so he could get to that deep sleep where nothing could bother him.
"Open your eyes and look at me. They're not swollen shut. Figures that you would avoid having your face hit, pretty boy." Cordy slapped him in the face, hard.
"Ow. That hurt." Angel opened his eyes to see a furious Cordelia looking down at him. And he thought this dream would at least be pleasant.
"Get up. Get up." A hysterical Cordelia now. She stopped slapping and started punching. He had to grab a hold of her arms to make her stop. She was still chanting for him to get up.
"Stop, Cordelia. Right now." His command broke her. Tears streamed down her face.
"You so screwed up. Why don't you ever listen to me? None of you listened to me. And now look. You're all dead. That wasn't supposed to happen."
Angel sat up and took Cordelia in his arms. Her whole body shook with sobs of anguish.
"It's OK. It's alright." Angel held her until her sobs stopped. He rocked her until her body gave out and her head laid down on his shoulder. Holding her like that right then was not erotic in the least, but if the dream went better, maybe he'd forget what had happened in the last forty-eight hours.
He'd watched as each of his friends raised their hands to certain death. They all knew what was going to happen. He had even warned them. A suicide mission. Spike raised his hand first. He would, considering how many times he had already died. Didn't matter to him in the least. He always found a way around certain death. Wesley had been second. Suicide was not in Wes's agenda, but he wanted to die all the same. Just didn't want to do it to himself. The man loathed himself just as much as Angel loathed himself. Two kindred spirits. Gunn went along like he always did. Fight the good fight. Make the world a better place. He'd been a little shocked when Lorne had raised his hand. Lorne had changed in the last year. The funny man with a heart had become cold and hard. Angel had changed him. But he was loyal to a fault.
And Angel had sent each one of them to certain death. Wes's assignment had been the hardest. Both knew that Vail was stronger. Had seen that Vail was stronger, just as they both knew that Hamilton was stronger than Angel. But Angel had lucked out and Wes hadn't. Wes didn't have Connor coming to the rescue. Only Illyria, a little too late.
So now why didn't he deserve a nice, simple dream. He figured Wes would come back to haunt him. Make his life a living, or unliving hell. But it was good old Cordelia instead.
"You are such a butthead." Cordy's use of insults were welcome at the moment. Angel wanted to feel again, just a little. "I thought I was doing the right thing. I agreed to this and it didn't work. It's all my fault. It's all my fault."
The racking sobs threatened again until Angel pulled back and looked into Cordelia's eyes. They were swollen from crying. A stab to his so dead heart. He brushed damp tendrils of hair away to look at her fully.
"What's your fault?" This would be great, he thought. She probably broke some important thing in heaven or something.
"Everything that has happened. Connor, Wes, Fred, Gunn, everything. It's all my fault. I want to fix it. I can't fix it."
"What do you mean? None of that is your fault. Whatever that might be." Angel knew he was slow on the uptake, but which incident could she be talking about now.
"If I had been around physically as well as mentally when Wes had been working on the prophecy, none of this would ever have happened." Great. She blamed herself for something that Wesley did. "I could look at either one of you and figure out you were holding back. I wasn't here to do that. No one was talking to any one. I screwed up. Then I didn't go to him. It all started there."
"No, no. You can't say that. You had to live your own life."
"What, with the puppy dog. You and I both know that was wrong, wrong. I should have realized that right when Groo walked in that door. Always thinking of myself instead of you guys."
"Sometimes we need to think about ourselves, even a little. You had to find out about your feelings for Groo."
"Right. Right about the time that I had feelings for you too. Right at the time Connor was just a baby. I knew Wes was having trouble, but I just ignored it. I thought it was just Fred and Gunn. And even if it was just their relationship, then I should have been there to comfort him. Instead, everything went terribly wrong. Our family is shattered and I don't know how to put it back together."
The tears came again. But this time Cordy got a handle on them. Angel could already feel that his shirt would take quite some time to dry after Cordy had spilled so many tears down the front of him. But he didn't mind. What he did mind was her train of thought. Or his train of thought in the dream. Cordy was not to blame. He was.
"It was my fault, Cordy. I let everything else in my life slide but Connor. I was blinded by him. His miracle. I should have seen the signs that something was wrong. Don't blame yourself."
"Sounds like there's enough blame to go around then. So what happened this time, huh?" Cordy's eyes dried. Her eyes bored into him. "I gave you one little vision, and you go all broody on everyone and don't tell them what's going on. Oh, and then you tell them a couple of days before the apocalypse thinking that they actually had a choice to join you. You really think that worked?"
Cordy slowly got off Angel's lap. Angel missed her closeness, but her tone of voice was a warning. The performance before was just a precursor to what she had to say. She'd let him have it with both barrels.
"You closed yourself off. Remember how well that worked for you when Darla came back from the dead. Wolfram and Hart almost won that time too. You are definitely not Plan Boy. Haven't you learned from your mistakes? You're plans usually consist of going in and hitting things. Don't you know that doesn't work? I am so angry with you right now. It wasn't supposed to happen that way."
Angel didn't know what to say. His subconscious was beating up on him now. He'd never know what he should have done differently. He knew that he should have done everything differently.
"Remember after Doyle died, and Wes joined. You didn't want to get close to anyone else, but you did. When they tried to drive me crazy with the visions and blew Wes up in your apartment, you told me that we mattered more. Yeah, you went in and pounded on the bad guys a bit, but we mattered. If you don't have your friends, then does it really matter how many bad guys you defeat? You at least needed to tell Wesley and Gunn. You owed it to them. How many times did they have your back? They had no backup. Wesley died alone, Angel. That I will never forgive you for."
Cordelia was right about it all. He'd made some decisions and they had all turned out wrong. He didn't even know if the end result had been the end result he had wanted. He didn't know how much the Senior Partners were hurt. He just knew that his family was gone. The only family that had ever mattered.
"I'm sorry, Cordy. I thought I was doing the right thing." When Connor had disappeared into that hell dimension, Angel had sat, stunned for days. Now, he cried. Cordy was there for him. Both times.
"You have to fix some of it, Angel," Cordy told Angel as she held him. "I might know how to fix some of it. I might know how to bring Fred back."
Angel pulled away and looked at her. "Are you serious? Her soul is gone."
"I tell you. The three of you are so gullible. Why on earth would you believe some demon doctor? Why wouldn't he lie to you?"
"Spike tortured him."
"Big deal. Look, we need to work on this. It won't be perfect Fred back, but Illyria will have to share."
"Put her back in her body? How?"
"Wes is working on that right now."
Angel shook his head to clear the cobwebs. This wasn't a dream. Cordy was sitting there, talking to him, right in front of him. "What?"
"Do you really think that we'd just die? Come on, how many dimensions do you think exist out there?"
"I've only been to a couple, so I really don't know," Angel said to her, not really knowing the answer.
"Just because that icky demon killed Wes doesn't mean he's not still around. Come on, this is Wes we're talking about. Shot, stabbed, throat sliced. Takes a licking, keeps on ticking. Just in this case in a different dimension. You up for it?"