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Part Twelve –

//They come, they come, to build a wall between us//

            The revelation that Buffy's insane ravings could have been more than the drugs the initiative had pumped her full off was startling.

"So what do we do now?" Buffy asked quietly, turning to her watcher for support whilst simultaneously reaching for Angelus' hand.

"We research." Wesley prompted.

"Yes, while Wesley and I research Faith and Angelus could patrol." Giles suggested, Angelus nodded agreement.

"I can show you the library here if you like. It contains every reference to our order so there might be something of use." He paused. "There is a little, about Buffy and I."

"About us?" Buffy questioned.

"It's a little obscure, and I didn't think anything of it until I met you. The archivists are working on them now but…" He trailed off noticing Buffy's expression.

"Why can't I patrol?" Buffy asked sullenly.

"Since we haven't determined the cause of these visions, it would be best if you, and Willow where to stay out of harms way." Giles explained kindly. The meeting broke up quickly, Angelus sending Spike in search of Faith to join him on patrol and then talking the watchers to the library.

Willow and Buffy sat alone in the parlour silently assessing each other. "Why." Buffy started then stopped, suddenly uncomfortable. Willow looked up at her blue eyes meeting Buffy's green. "Why did they take me to that place." She paused "That was them wasn't it? The watchers were responsible."

"The council…" Willow bit her lip and turned away, guilt wracking her features. "They saw yourself and Faith as inspiration to the other slayers. They thought if they got rid of you then the others would follow the council, because 'rebelling didn't pay'." Bitter sarcasm was evident in her voice.

"Oh." Buffy tried to process it in her mind.

"Why didn't they just kill me?" Willow smiled at that.

"They've been trying for a long time, but you kept killing the assassins. The half-blood… your brother?" Willow questioned unsure.

"Doyle." Buffy smiled encouragingly at Willow uncertainty, then frowned again. "He had to leave, the council were trying to kill him because they thought he was corrupting me."

 "Not quite. The council just wanted to get rid of him, because his visions were warning you about the assassins they sent after you."

"Oh."

"When he left they thought it was enough, that he would be hiding and wouldn't be able to tell you about his visions. But you two stayed in contact." Willow drew in a deep breath. "They couldn't get rid of him, so they decided to use him against you. The vision he had before you were kidnapped was a fake vision sent by the council to trap you so the initiative could capture you."

"Are the initiative the…"

"Yes. They had a deal with the council… they wanted to capture a slayer and run tests on her eventually hoping to develop a breeding programme to create highly skilled warriors for the council."

"What was in it for the initiative?"

"I don't know. I think they just liked to mess with people mostly, when they captured you they were really interested in your link between you and Angelus, the pain tests were orchestrated to see if they had any affect on Angelus as well as you."

"Oh." Buffy intoned again. "Do you think that they hurt Angelus, he hasn't really talked about it."

Willow grimaced. "I felt what they were doing. I imagine he did. Truthfully feeling your pain while you were in there was enough to turn my pangs of conscious into a ticket to LAX."

Buffy nodded, sensing that Willow had shared as much as she was going to, at least that day, she stood up and motioned to the door. "Let's find you a room to stay in since we're under house arrest." Willow followed and they chatted easily as Buffy lead Willow up the stairs.

Angelus was tensed under the cover of darkness. Faith stood a little way in front of him make some joke with Spike while they waited for the forces of stupidity to attack them. It was pointless in some ways, Angelus reflected even bothering to patrol at all, the vampires in the area were all under his control and most of the demon population too. He relished for a moment the idea of going back to Los Angeles with Buffy, the area had been neglected while he was in San Francisco. Spike had done well while he had taken over the running of the hellmouth, but Angelus had received word that Dru had left him for a chaos demon, though Faith seemed to be distracting him from any pain of that loss well enough. It was faintly disturbing in a way, how domesticated his order had become. Years before when the past Master, Nest, had been in charge chaos had been the objective the reason for carrying on the line. Now it was simply about power and survival. Generations of slayers had killed off whole sections of their brethren, most of their European relatives were long dead, and in fighting had secured the death of the rest. Angelus had killed the Master and his sire, Darla, himself when they had decided to raise the demon Acathala and take the world into hell. It appeared he and Spike had been the only ones who had seen that the world was fine the way it was. That the hundreds of humans weren't vermin but prey, and the world would be a whole lot less fun without them.

A slight pang in his link told him he wasn't really that vampire anymore. The one who'd slain his sire and Master to make sure he had a constant supply of willing human flesh around him. He didn't hunger for and humans flesh except his own. Wanted nothing but to keep Buffy safe. He didn't revel in the kill anymore. When he had found out Buffy had left the hospital without him his first instinct had been to kill and torture those around him. But he had barely raised a fist to the minion beside him when Buffy's soul had told him not too. Her soul. Her soul… had infected him. Filed him with sweet love and longing and swept away his hunger for death and destruction and replaced it with a single desire for her. He received little desire from the kill now, though he had enjoyed ruthlessly killing every man that had touched her. A soft smirk played on his lips as he thought of the screams, perhaps her soul had not destroyed all the satisfaction of the kill inside him, after all.

A scream of pain down the link crippled him in a moment and he collapsed to the floor in agony. A cry wrenched from his lips as Spike and Faith rushed to his side. "Buffy." He gasped, struggling to stand as her suffering tore at his nerves. Faintly he heard Faith ring the mansion on her cell demanding what was wrong with Buffy. But he could barely make the words out through the blood pounding in her ears.

As soon as Giles received Faith's frantic message he dropped the phone and ran as fast as he could up the mansion stairs, jumping the stairs two at a time he felt the presence of Wesley close to his back. Rounding the corridor at the top of the stairs he sped through the corridors and skidded to a stop in front of the door to the room his Slayer shared with her vampire mate Angelus. He knew before he tried the door handle that it was locked and found himself throwing his shoulder at the door to try and break the lock. Wesley joined him, panting slightly from lack of breath holding a skeleton key, his fingers quickly worked the key in the lock and the door swung open before them.

Buffy lay on the floor, lacerations covered her bare skin and deep bruises marred her complexion around her wrists and neck, her pale features stood in stark contrast to the blood that pooled on the floor around two puncture wounds in her neck.