Part Seventeen
"Everyone that I love goes away in the end."
-Johnny Cash, "Hurt"
A fresh trickle of blood ran down Angel's back, adding one more sticky-sweet tang to the reek that already filled the room. Angel shivered, and Cordelia said sharply, "Don't move." Her voice was muffled by the small flashlight that she was gripping between her teeth.
"Trying not to," Angel gritted. It was by a measure of will that he avoided asking Cordelia how she expected him to accomplish this with a couple of blades stuck into his back. Cordelia's voice in the few times that she had spoken had been sharper than a handful of rose stems, something less than inviting as far as conversation went. The newly minted Cordelia 2.0 might as well have come from another planet.
Cordelia leaned forward to get a closer look at her work, causing her breath to fan out across his back. Angel gripped the edges of his chair to control his shiver. The escaped pieces of Cordelia's hair glided, silken, across the back of his neck. "I think I see it," Cordelia said, her voice only a few inches away from Angel's ear. She twisted one of the knives and pain flared out from Angel's shoulder. The chair creaked beneath his fingers.
"Well, I feel it," he said, clenching his teeth. "Can you pull it out?"
"Hang on." Cordelia pulled one of the knives out and set it to the side. "Ewww." Angel couldn't control his jump as Cordelia's fingers probed into the wound. He lowered his head and ground his teeth together until the enamel was in danger of chipping away. "I know, I know," Cordelia said. "I'm hurrying."
"I can tell." Angel gasped as Cordelia's fingers widened the wound even further and abused nerves began to stridently lodge their complaints.
"Okay, I got it." There was a squelching noise, a sunburst of pain that had Angel gripping the edges of the chair hard enough to finally make the wood splinter beneath his fingers, and the pressure in his shoulder eased away. His skin itched, already beginning to close around the wound. "Gag me with a spoon," Cordelia muttered, setting the knife and bullet down next to the one from near Angel's spine and turning towards the sink. Angel twisted in time to catch her expression, equal parts dismay and pleasure, as actual water ran from the faucet.
"Will you look at that," Cordelia said. Her voice shook. "All you have to do to get the world back on its feet is be the very definition of soul-sucking evil."
"Flagg's time will come to an end," Angel told her. 'I promise,' lingered in his throat. Their particular unhappy history with that phrase killed it in its infancy.
Cordelia finished washing off her hands, tugged the last of her hair out of its ponytail, and splashed water across her face. She was redoing her hair when she turned to look at Angel again. "You're right." Her voice had retreated into a maddening politeness. Angel would have preferred that she begin yelling if it would at least mean quantifiable emotion. "But it won't be by your hand." Cordelia flashed him a smile as cold and sharp as a handful of diamonds. "Unless you happen to have an A-bomb. Do you?"
"Cordelia," Angel began.
Cordelia shrugged, managing to make even that innocuous gesture seem like a threat. "Didn't think so, but I figured I should ask, anyway. I don't know you quite as well as I used to think."
"Cordelia, I'm sorry," Angel said, believing the words entirely and knowing just as entirely that Cordelia would not believe them.
"You're sorry, Lindsey's sorry, the whole damned world is sorry," Cordelia muttered. She uttered a shaky laugh that was more akin to a wheeze and rubbed her hand over her eyes. Angel noticed that her fingers were trembling and the shadows beneath her eyes were dark enough to be mistaken for bruises. "For all the good that it does any of us. I just want to get out of town while the getting's good, okay?" There was a shake to her voice as she said it, like a woman who was contemplating some great and terrible idea for the first time and was still in awe of the fact that it was her everyday, mundane brain that had given birth to it. Angel thought he had a good idea of whose face flickered behind Cordelia's eyes, and it was not a palatable thought.
"No," Angel said. Cordelia flicked an acid look over him and opened her mouth as if she meant to let more flow off her tongue. That was all right; Angel had seen the pot of hurt simmering beneath her anger and fingered if he had one thing coming, it was that. But first she had to listen. "Not until you understand why I didn't come back."
Angel expected Cordelia to lob a Queen C special right back at him. He was surprised when she instead pressed her lips into a quick, firm line, eyes gleaming with what might have been avarice or tears and was in all likelihood a combination of both, and made a flicking gesture with her fingers. 'Hurry up and spit it out if you're ever going to.' She managed to seem even more imperious in silence than she could in speech. The set of Cordelia's shoulders was as brittle as new-blown glass, letting Angel know that any chance he had of not losing her forever lay rooted in the words he was about to say.
"I was planning to come back," Angel said, letting the words stumble out and lay bare for the weak, twitching things that they were. Cordelia's eyebrows rose, the only part of her expression that changed. "I never, ever meant to abandon you. If I had known what was going to happen…" 'What if?' was a dark and winding road, difficult to turn back from once started upon. Angel gave himself a brisk mental shake before he continued. "Giles called me and said that Buffy was ill with Captain Trips. That much you were there for." Cordelia nodded and made another hurry-up gesture with her fingers.
Angel paused to gather the horror and chaos of Sunnydale into words before he continued. "Giles was right," Angel said, barely aware that his voice had dropped and that Cordelia was having to lean forward to hear him. "And wrong at the same time. Giles told me that Buffy was sick. He didn't mention that the entire town was dying right along with her. Willow died a few hours before I got there, and her girlfriend was refusing to allow anyone near the body."
More than refusing, was outright hexing, huge magickal bursts that knocked bystanders off their feet and sent blood rushing from her nose. It wasn't until much later that Angel learned that her name had been Tara. Willow's body was stiff and cold, her girl next door beauty shattered by the black swellings that had risen on her neck. Her red hair was the only life-like thing left on her body, and it had been rendered into an obscenity. Angel's nose could already pick up the rising smell of decay.
Tara cradled Willow to her body the way that Drusilla cradled her dolls, and the look in her eyes was not far removed from Drusilla's own. It was temporary for now, but Angel had the feeling that it wouldn't take more than a nudge or two in the right direction to make that expression sink its claws in a little deeper and decide that it liked the view.
"Leave her alone," Xander said at last, his own breath rattling like a loose muffler in his chest and bright spots of fever lighting up his cheeks. He swayed as he spoke, and Angel had to put out a quick hand to keep him from falling. The boy that Xander had been would have been quick to shake off any aid that Angel offered, however well-intentioned, just as he would have fought to the death the reclaim Willow's body. The man that Xander had become understood quite a bit more about the business of death. They left Tara to her silent, bloody grief in the dorms of UC Sunnydale and drove on to Giles's apartment instead, where Buffy had taken up residence when it became clear that Captain Trips was not like the annual flu outbreak and the Slayer was not immune.
Angel expected wisecracks or even bleak attempts at gallows humor from Xander. The silent, blank-faced young man who had taken his place and stared at the streetlights as they went by (perhaps wondering, as Angel did, how long they would continue to shine without human beings sitting at their controls) was foreign enough to make Angel wonder if the real Xander was not dumped in an alley somewhere.
"I guess the vampires will starve," Xander said in a musing, far-away tone. "That's good, at least." He glanced back at Angel. "Present company excluded, of course." He even sounded as if he meant it.
Angel focused on driving, eyes straight ahead and knuckles gleaming as his fingers gripped the steering wheel. On occasion he would see an overturned garbage can or a slumped form cast just far enough into the shadows for Angel to tell himself that it was not a body and almost believe it. Beyond that, Sunnydale was almost eerie in its normalcy, save for the fact that not a soul-or creature without-walked the streets.
"Like Mayberry," Angel muttered.
Xander snorted. "Crossed with a Wes Craven movie, maybe." He tilted his head back against the seat, throat working, and Angel could see dark shadows rising beneath his jaw. Xander closed his eyes and didn't open them again until the car was pulling to a stop in front of Giles's complex.
Angel listened to the ticking of the engine and let the seconds pass by as he stared up at the structure. A great many dramas had been played out over the last four years within that courtyard, those stucco walls. Few of the ones that Angel had been present for had been pleasant.
If Giles's phone call had been any indication, this would be the most unpleasant one of all.
"She's waiting for you, man," Xander said. There was a quiet respect to his voice that was definitely not a part of the boy that Angel had last seen.
Angel got out of the car, barely remembering to pull to pull the keys out of the ignition and shut the door behind him. Years of accumulated ghosts pressed against him as he strode up the walk, demanding his attention, and Angel ignored them all. They weren't Buffy.
In the end, it was always going to come down to Buffy.
Giles opened the front door before Angel had time to lift his knuckles away from the wood, as if he had been waiting on the other side for the sound of Angel's knock. His eyes roved over Angel from his boots upwards, and the memories pressed together like sharks after the scent of blood. "She's upstairs," Giles said, dispensing with the pleasantries and stepping aside so that Angel could enter.
Angel's "Thank you" was scarcely more than a puff of air as he darted inside, up the stairs, and into the loft. From the corner of his eye he saw Xander collapse heavily into the nearest chair as Giles handed him a glass of water.
Angel froze as he reached the top step, staring at the slight, ravaged figure being dwarfed by Giles's bed. Buffy was lying so very still, and it took Angel several seconds to pick up the sound of her heartbeat. Were it not for Buffy's pained, whistling breath filling up the room, Angel would have thought he had arrived too late.
Buffy heard Angel's footsteps across the floor and shifted, turning her head towards him. She winced as the movement contorted the swellings on her neck. The fever that Angel could feel from the doorway was making her eyes gleam.
"Hey, beautiful," Angel said softly. Speaking too loudly might break the spell that hung over the room and kept his girl breathing. Angel settled onto the edge of the bed, taking Buffy's hand in his own. Her skin was thin and dry, so hot that it felt as if a steak could be fried in the palm of her hand.
Buffy's lips twisted into what might have been a dehydrated approximation of a smile and opened her mouth, but no sound emerged. There was a pitcher of water and an empty glass sitting on the bedside table. Angel filled the glass and held it up to Buffy's lips, supporting her head with his free hand as she tried to drink. Her throat spasmed, rejecting the liquid, and water ran out both sides of her mouth. She spit out the remainder and shook her head, emitting a low, frustrated cry of pain. Weeks later, that would be the hardest part of the story to recount. The way that Buffy had cried.
Angel began to pull the glass away, but Buffy shook her head again, placing a suddenly tremor free hand upon his arm. Superflu or not, there were still remnants of a Slayer's strength surging beneath her skin. They went in sips, one at a time with long pauses in between. Buffy managed a quarter of a glass before she had to beg off, at which point tears of pain had begun to run down her face.
"Giles didn't tell me that you were coming," Buffy said.
"I think he wanted you to have a pleasant surprise." Angel had smelled the scent that rose off Buffy's skin in waves many times before. There were only a few surprises left in her future, pleasant or otherwise. Angel's throat spasmed. "I came as soon as he called me."
Buffy's chapped lips split as she tried to smile, bringing pinpricks of blood to the surface. Angel tasted the copper on her mouth as he bent his head to kiss her, and felt the sickness rising out of her throat and into his. Buffy's attempt at reciprocation was clumsy, hampered by fever and dehydration, and still one of the sweetest kisses that Angel had ever received.
"I should be letting you sleep," Angel said after they had pulled away from one another.
Buffy shook her head as she tried to push herself up higher in the bed. Angel watched her fail twice before he braved her look and wrapped his arm around her shoulders to assist her. The amount of weight that Buffy had lost was shocking; to Angel she felt no more substantial than a doll. 'My God, there wasn't that much of her to begin with,' he thought.
"Don't wanna," Buffy said when she was resettled against the pillows. The 'I might not wake up' hung unspoken and unacknowledged between them. Buffy cast him a shy look from beneath her lashes, until Angel could almost see her fifteen year-old self lying in the bed instead. "I'm glad you came," she whispered. Angel didn't know if she was capable of speaking much louder. The swellings beneath her jaw looked like brooding gargoyles in the room's half-light.
Angel's hand found its way back into Buffy's, and he squeezed as hard as he dared. "You needed me."
Buffy dipped her head. Her hair, pulled away from her face into a scrunchie, caught the light from Giles's bedside lamp and threw it back in motes of pure gold. She lifted her free hand and used it to trace the planes of Angel's face, leaving scorching trails behind in spite of the fact that her touch was so light that Angel could have been imagining it. The gentleness had fled from her eyes by the time she had dropped her hand, and when she spoke again it was as the Slayer, reminding Angel that there were some places they could not go back to.
"How are things in LA?" Buffy asked. "Is Captain Trips there, too?"
"Not as bad as it is in Sunnydale." Angel ran his thumb across the back of Buffy's hand as he spoke. "But, yeah, there's been an outbreak. I think it's gone global by now."
A frown line appeared between Buffy's eyes. "I think I saw something like that on the news, but…" She shrugged. "Giles won't say for sure, but I think I've been delirious." A guilty look crossed over her face. "I know he didn't get that bruise on his cheek from running into a door."
Angel had seen no such bruise. Either Buffy had been ill for longer than Giles had mentioned, or she was delirious still. Angel kept his grip on Buffy's sweltering hand and said nothing.
The pillowcases rustled as Buffy settled back against them, staring at the ceiling until Angel thought she was drifting away from him. "We're not going to win this one, are we?" Her voice was dreamy, so far from her usual conquer-the-world tone that Angel's grip on her hand tightened beyond her control.
"Then we'll make damned sure that they're still talking about us when it's over," Angel replied.
"Well, it's something, isn't it?" Buffy's eyelids fluttered downwards.
Angel waited until her breathing evened out before he laid his palm against her chest to feel her pulse. He immediately wished that he hadn't. Buffy's breathing echoed and reechoed throughout the room, proof that she was hanging onto life still, but her pulse was erratic and faster than a bird's. Angel brushed a few loose strands of hair away from her forehead before he pressed his lips against the skin, willing four years of emotion into the gesture.
"I love you, Buffy," Angel said as he pulled away-
---
Cordelia twitched, the only sign of emotion that she had made yet.
---
-but Buffy was already too far under to hear him.
Xander was curled into his chair, eyes closed, when Angel descended the stairs. The bruise-dark swellings beneath his jaw were twice as pronounced as they had been an hour before, and Angel hated to look at them for more than a few seconds at a time. The apartment reeked of impending death.
"In here." Angel turned and saw Giles standing in the kitchen, putting the finishing touches on two enormous mugs of tea. 'Finishing touches' meant generous helpings of scotch rather than sugar or milk. Under the circumstances, Angel already considered his blood alcohol level to be too low by half. He accepted the mug that Giles offered with thanks.
"You can see why I called you," Giles said, taking a gulp of his tea without bothering to let it cool. If the scalding liquid caused him any measure of pain, he didn't show it. There were brilliant spots of color rising on Giles's cheeks, and Angel didn't' think that they were a result of alcohol. Not with the heat that he could feel radiating off the other man from feet away.
Angel took a drink from his own mug, savoring the burn that traveled down his esophagus and set up ship in his stomach. "How long has she been sick?" he asked.
It was a bitter expression that tightened the lines around Giles's mouth. "She began to show symptoms ten days ago," he said, "and has been forced to take to bed for the past week. Xander, you see, began to appear ill only yesterday, and I fear that he will be unable to keep to his feet past tomorrow. It's her Slayer power. Every time that she verges on death, it rallies and brings her back. Not enough so that she can beat it, mind you. Being a Slayer only gives her enough strength to…prolong her agony." If Giles gripped his mug any harder, it was going to shatter and send shards of porcelain flying into his fingers. Angel took it from him and set it down on the counter.
"Does the Council understand any of this?" Angel asked.
Mention of the Council rekindled the rage behind Giles's eyes rather than alleviating it. "Oh, no. Rooting out the cause is not nearly so interesting to them as exploiting those who happen to be immune."
Angel thought of Cordelia and the remarkable health that she continued to show, in spite of being in close contact with Captain Trips from all sides. "There are definite cases of immunity, then?"
Giles snorted and reclaimed his drink. Angel suspected that it was neither his first nor his last. "Most likely less than one percent of the total population," he said. "As fast as the disease is spreading, there is no time to create a cure based upon the immune systems of those who do happen to be resistant, and the Council knows it. However, they are taking the same attitude towards the immune that they take towards the Slayers: if they cannot understand it, then they must either control it or destroy it." Giles made a short, bitter sound and swirled the remains of his tea. Angel doubted that such an admission would have come out of him if he had been sober. "They'll be dead and buried soon enough, I suppose." Giles's throat worked as he tilted his head back and drained the last of the tea. "Sad to think that the legacy of the human race comes down to this."
The air in the apartment became amazingly thick from one moment to the next, rising up and threatening to choke Angel even though he needn't inhale. "I need to go for a walk," Angel said, setting his mug down on the counter and heading for the door. The defeat that lined Giles's face did nothing to pull him back. If Angel was willing to be perfectly honest with himself, it might even have spurred him on.
"Mind the dawn," Giles called to his back. Mild concern, but it was more than he would have shown the year before.
The door snicked shut behind Angel just in time to muffle the sound a crash and broken crockery from within the apartment. Unless Angel was mistaken, Giles had hurled his mug against the kitchen wall. Had Angel's hands not been empty, he might have gone back inside and joined him. He walked further into the courtyard, tilting his head back to stare at the sterile sky. "You sons of bitches," Angel said, scarcely aware that he was speaking aloud. "Is this what you had planned all along? Dangle hope in front of me, tell me that someday I could-" Angel cut himself off. "That someday I would make a difference, just to pull it away? Tell me that she was going to die if I stayed human, so that you could kill her, anyway?" Angel stared up at the stars for a long time. His voice was raw when he finally spoke again. "Any fight you want to throw at me, I'm ready. I'll take it. But I can't stop what you won't give me some way of understanding." The stars winked down with malicious cheer until Angel swore and turned away.
Angel walked until the dawn whispered warnings along his skin, making it back to Giles's with moments to spare. Xander had transferred himself from the chair to the couch, his neck beginning to look puffy and unnatural and a steady stream of mucus running from one nostril. Giles had foregone tea altogether and was halfway through the bottle of scotch. And Buffy lay cold and stiffening in the bed upstairs.
The world was enveloped in a soft, dim grayness that lasted for a very long time.