Chapter 32
Buffy stared out the window of the penthouse at the bright LA sky. She had her arms wrapped around herself and the cold feeling that had settled over her in the last few days wouldn't leave. Not even the warm sun could touch her and warm her. Fred was gone. One of her only friends was gone. Willow, Giles, Xander.... They had all abandoned her. She only had Gunn, Wesley, Dawn, Angel, and Fred. But Fred was gone. Cordelia was gone. Two people who had believed in her the most were dead.
The Slayer touched the glass of the window and tried to feel the warmth of the sun. The specially made glass repelled the heat and all Buffy could feel was the cold. She had never felt more awful in her entire life. Fred was dead because of the call she had made. But it was more than that, too. It wasn't just her. Everything had been preordained. There was nothing she could have done to stop it. The consequences would have been too much. Thousands of lives for one person who she cared dearly about. But it was over now. The call had been made and Fred had died.
Now Illyria walked the earth looking like her friend. Wesley was stuck guarding the thing that had killed the woman he loved in front of his own eyes. Buffy knew how he felt. She had watched Angelus take over the man that Buffy loved and he had stuck around. He had tormented her with the fact that he was Angel. Or at least he looked and felt like Angel. And his memories. They had been Angel's too. Just one more thing to use against her.
The phone rang. Buffy grabbed it off the cradle and pushed the talk button. "Yeah?"
"Buffy?" Harmony asked.
"Yeah."
"Where are you at?"
"Upstairs. Why?"
"You have a board meeting today."
"I do?"
"Yeah. Remember? Angel reminded you yesterday and so did I."
Buffy looked down at the lounge clothes she was wearing. "I'll be down in a few minutes." She hung up.
***
Angel looked up as the private elevator dinged and Buffy got off. She looked completely polished in a black business suit that had traded the pants for a short skirt. Her top was a low cut, white camisole and her shoes had four inch tall heels with a cute bow and dot trim across the top of the shoe and they each had a single strap that buckled around her ankle. Her hair was down and wavy and her freshly cut fringe bangs were bouncy. She looked gorgeous.
She also stopped short when she realized there was no one there. "Um...." Buffy looked around the office. "I thought...."
"So did I!" Angel said. He was frustrated that no one had shown up. Not even Spike had come.
"And here I thought I was late."
"Well, you are, but.... So is everyone else."
Buffy walked a little further into the conference room and sat down next to Angel. "Well, I'm here. So, what's there to talk about?"
"Not much, really. I just wanted to check up on the rest of the team."
"What about Dawn?"
"She's.... I don't know. Maybe she's with Wesley."
"I'm glad we keep tabs on my little sister."
Spike walked in carrying a briefcase. "Where's the rest of the crew?"
"Apparently not coming." Angel said.
"But this is an important meeting."
"At least somebody...."
"My first official parley as a very loosely affiliated member of the.... what are we? Tell me we're not Scoobies."
"We don't have a...."
"A name? Well, that's probably for the best. You'd want to be 'Angel's Avengers' or something."
"'Angel's Avengers,' that's...."
"So what's on the agenda?"
"Uh, I have assignments for people...."
Spike popped a beer. "What? I'm listening. With beer."
"Forget it. You know what? This isn't a meeting. This is you being annoying." Angel got up and looked at Buffy staring out the window.
Spike picked up a stack of papers. "Hey, bullet points. Classy." He paused to read, then held up the paper to Angel with contempt. "Why am I always reconnaissance? I should get a decently flash gig like 'save the girl' or 'steal the emerald with the girl.'"
Angel put his hands on Buffy's shoulders, knowing exactly what she was feeling. "Handsome man, save me from the monsters."
"Exactly! Or.... What's that now?"
"That's the first thing Fred said to me. In Pylea. She was trapped, hiding, afraid. Nearly crazy. Crazy. But brave."
Buffy sighed. "We should never have let her come here. Bad things always happen here."
"Hate to break it to you, but bad things always happen everywhere. Besides, she wanted to be here. It was her choice." Spike said.
"Was it?"
"Bugger. You're fixing to do something stupid, aren't you?"
Buffy turned and looked at Spike. "Done it. Came back here." She snorted. "I've spent every day here lying to myself about making the world a better place."
"Welcome to the planet. We all paint on our happy faces every day, when all we really wanted is to pound the neighbor's missis, steal his Ben Franklins, and while we're at it, not think about the third of the world that's starving to death."
"I'm not saying that we can fix everything. I just.... I.... I have to do better. WE have to do better. The senior partners have a plan."
"Yeah, the prophecy. That ever-lovin' apocalypse you two keep going on about."
"Yeah, which apocalypse.... the one last year or the year before that? No, the senior partners are up to something now, and I'm not waiting for them to spring it on us. We're through operating in the dark."
"Ok, then. Might be easier if we knew anyone who had a direct line to the big guys."
"We do."
"Is that what you've been competing with Angel in the Brood-Olympics over? How to beat the Senior Partners?"
"Sorta. It's mostly kicking myself over the decision to.... Let Fred go."
"You make it sound like you fired her."
"Spike...."
Spike stood up and hugged her. "I'm sorry. I know it's tough for you."
"We need to talk to Eve."
"I'll get the car ready." Angel said.
"Sweetie?"
"Yeah?"
"Let me talk to her. You guys just stand back. I think she needs a woman to woman talk here."
***
"No way." Eve said. "Even if my connection to the senior partners wasn't completely severed, I'm done helping you."
"This isn't a negotiation, Eve." Buffy said.
"Ooh, I'm intimidated. What could you possibly do to me? I've been trapped in this house for weeks like a...."
"Rat? Snake?" Spike asked. "Beady little rat snake?"
"You're not trapped, Eve. You're hiding. Been there, done that. You know the second you step out that door, the second you don't have these symbols keeping you invisible to the partners, they're gonna zero in." Buffy moved in close to Eve and backed her against the wall. "So don't bother playing the pity angle. The only thing you care about is saving your own ass."
"The only thing I care about is gone. You two gave him up to the senior partners, let them suck him into...."
"Could do the same to you. I'll tell them how to see through your security system."
"You wouldn't...."
"Not if you tell me what I want to know."
The house started shaking as a deep rumbling sound was heard somewhere outside the door. "Oh, you bitch! You told them! You...."
"Wasn't us!" Angel said.
"Oh, God. They're coming. Please, don't let them take me. Please, I'll tell you. I'll tell you anything you want to know."
Buffy grabbed Eve and they ran out the balcony door. Angel and Spike jumped to the ground and Buffy tossed Eve over before throwing herself over. Spike caught Eve and Angel caught Buffy. They threw themselves against the wall under the balcony just as something came out of the doors above them. After a minute, the thing retreated and the four of them ran back to the car.
***
The elevator doors opened and Buffy and Angel got out followed by Spike and Eve. "Harmony!" Angel called.
"Yepper?" Harmony asked.
"Call security, put 'em on red alert. Nobody gets in this building without clearance from me. I want a guard at every entrance, every elevator, every stairwell. Cover the whole building."
"Ok, but you know how that never works...."
"Harmony!"
"On it."
"All right, stay with Eve. Anything gets past security, kill it." Buffy said to Spike.
"Where are you going?"
"To see my lawyer." Buffy headed to medical to see Gunn. She had visited him a couple of times, but he had been pretty unresponsive to her. Angel was behind her as she opened the door. She looked at him. "Let me do this." Angel nodded and leaned against the wall as she went in. "We have a problem." Gunn looked at her. "The Senior Partners found Eve. They sent something to take her out. I need to know if we have jurisdiction to protect her. What's protocol here?"
"I don't know." Gunn said.
"Right. Well, when you're through reading about important things like, um.... 'Trista and Ryan's big baby plans' maybe you can put some thought into it."
"I'm just not sure...."
"Stop. Gunn, you paid a high price for what's in that brain, so use it."
"There's a proviso in your contracts. Says that as CEOs of a Wolfram & Hart branch, you can invoke a rapio salvus order. Basically says you're taking custody of a wayward employee. It's not usually used for protection, but it should work."
"Thank you. How do we...."
"I'll make a call."
"Thanks." Buffy started to go, but stopped. "Listen, Gunn.... I know you feel bad about your part in what happened to Fred. And you should. For the rest of your life, it should wake you up in the middle of the night. And it will.... because you're a good man. You signed a piece of paper, that's all."
"But I knew. Not about Fred, but.... when I signed, I knew there would be consequences."
"You know, the thing I've learned about atonement is: you never run out of chances.... but you gotta take them. You can't hide in some hospital room and pretend it's all gonna go away.... cause it never will." Buffy touched his hand and then walked out.
"So what'd he say?" Angel asked.
"Eve's under our protection. No one can touch her."
"And how's that work?"
"We invoke something."
"It's a ritual?"
"No. It just means that we say she's under our protection and Gunn's putting the word out. He used a lot of high tech words and it all went over my head, but I got the gist."
"So we're going to help her?" Angel asked as they walked into their office where Eve, Spike, and Lorne were waiting.
"We don't want to help her. But.... we will. Eve, you're under mine and Angel's protection."
"Thank the gods." Eve said.
"But, you know, I can take it away with one phone call. Convince me not to, Eve."
"How can I?"
"Let's start with something easy, huh? You." Angel said.
"Me?"
"What are you? What do you do for the senior partners?"
"I'm a liaison. I liaise. Look, what do you want me to say? I'm a leprechaun. I'm from Brigadoon."
"If I had a nickel for every time I heard that one." Spike said.
"There are layers upon layers at Wolfram & Hart, things you'll never understand. What am I? I'm a child of the senior partners, created to do their bidding."
"You're an immortal." Buffy said. "Why are you here?"
"To watch. Tell them what I see. Pass on messages to you two, if there are any."
"So you're, uh, middle management?" Spike asked.
"What are the senior partners, huh?" Angel asked. "What do they...."
"No idea." Eve said.
"Eve."
"Do you honestly believe the senior partners would let me have access to that information? Angel, for someone so old, you're so young. I only know what they want me to know and only when they want me to know it."
"You don't know anything?" Buffy asked.
"Maybe. Maybe I know a lot.... but I don't have access to it. It's locked in my head somewhere, and I don't have the key. Ready for the funny part? There was someone who could've told you everything you want to know.... and you let the senior partners take him away."
"Lindsey."
"Lindsey's dedicated years of his life to the study of the senior partners. No one knows more about them than he does.... what they've done, what they plan to do."
"I thought he was after me." Angel said.
"You're saying bringing Spike back, the fail-safe, that was all about the senior partners?" Buffy asked.
"No. It's about Angel, too. He really doesn't like you.... but he may know more about you than.... well, than you do."
"Which is why they snatched him up." Angel said.
"Yeah. They couldn't risk him and you having a sit-down." Spike said.
"And now.... what he's going through." Eve said.
"They didn't kill him?" Buffy asked.
"They would want him to suffer horrors. Lindsey is in some hideous.... awful hell."
"Hell?"
"Yes!"
"What kind of hell?" Angel asked.
"What do you mean?"
"There's thousands of different kinds of hells." Spike put in. "You got your fire hell, your ice hell.... your.... ice hell. Your upside-down hell."
"I don't care if he's in 'toy poodles on parade' hell." Angel said, getting agitated. "He's got information that we need."
"According to the girl whose only reason for being is to see her darling lawyer boy again." Buffy said.
"I'm not lying." Eve said, turning to Lorne. "Well, tell him I'm not lying."
"No one can fake it through the piña colada song. Not once the chorus kicks in." Lorne said.
"If Lindsey can tell us what the senior partners have planned, I want him." Buffy said. "You got a better idea how to do it, I'm totally open."
"Didn't say that." Spike said. "Just pointed out that this one sucks. We're looking for a hell dimension in a haystack. How are we supposed to know...."
Gunn walked in the office. "I know. And I can get us in." Buffy noted that Gunn was wearing street clothes, not his usual business suit. His head was shaven and he looked more like the pre-W&H Gunn of yore.
"Us?" Angel asked.
Buffy stared out the window of the penthouse at the bright LA sky. She had her arms wrapped around herself and the cold feeling that had settled over her in the last few days wouldn't leave. Not even the warm sun could touch her and warm her. Fred was gone. One of her only friends was gone. Willow, Giles, Xander.... They had all abandoned her. She only had Gunn, Wesley, Dawn, Angel, and Fred. But Fred was gone. Cordelia was gone. Two people who had believed in her the most were dead.
The Slayer touched the glass of the window and tried to feel the warmth of the sun. The specially made glass repelled the heat and all Buffy could feel was the cold. She had never felt more awful in her entire life. Fred was dead because of the call she had made. But it was more than that, too. It wasn't just her. Everything had been preordained. There was nothing she could have done to stop it. The consequences would have been too much. Thousands of lives for one person who she cared dearly about. But it was over now. The call had been made and Fred had died.
Now Illyria walked the earth looking like her friend. Wesley was stuck guarding the thing that had killed the woman he loved in front of his own eyes. Buffy knew how he felt. She had watched Angelus take over the man that Buffy loved and he had stuck around. He had tormented her with the fact that he was Angel. Or at least he looked and felt like Angel. And his memories. They had been Angel's too. Just one more thing to use against her.
The phone rang. Buffy grabbed it off the cradle and pushed the talk button. "Yeah?"
"Buffy?" Harmony asked.
"Yeah."
"Where are you at?"
"Upstairs. Why?"
"You have a board meeting today."
"I do?"
"Yeah. Remember? Angel reminded you yesterday and so did I."
Buffy looked down at the lounge clothes she was wearing. "I'll be down in a few minutes." She hung up.
***
Angel looked up as the private elevator dinged and Buffy got off. She looked completely polished in a black business suit that had traded the pants for a short skirt. Her top was a low cut, white camisole and her shoes had four inch tall heels with a cute bow and dot trim across the top of the shoe and they each had a single strap that buckled around her ankle. Her hair was down and wavy and her freshly cut fringe bangs were bouncy. She looked gorgeous.
She also stopped short when she realized there was no one there. "Um...." Buffy looked around the office. "I thought...."
"So did I!" Angel said. He was frustrated that no one had shown up. Not even Spike had come.
"And here I thought I was late."
"Well, you are, but.... So is everyone else."
Buffy walked a little further into the conference room and sat down next to Angel. "Well, I'm here. So, what's there to talk about?"
"Not much, really. I just wanted to check up on the rest of the team."
"What about Dawn?"
"She's.... I don't know. Maybe she's with Wesley."
"I'm glad we keep tabs on my little sister."
Spike walked in carrying a briefcase. "Where's the rest of the crew?"
"Apparently not coming." Angel said.
"But this is an important meeting."
"At least somebody...."
"My first official parley as a very loosely affiliated member of the.... what are we? Tell me we're not Scoobies."
"We don't have a...."
"A name? Well, that's probably for the best. You'd want to be 'Angel's Avengers' or something."
"'Angel's Avengers,' that's...."
"So what's on the agenda?"
"Uh, I have assignments for people...."
Spike popped a beer. "What? I'm listening. With beer."
"Forget it. You know what? This isn't a meeting. This is you being annoying." Angel got up and looked at Buffy staring out the window.
Spike picked up a stack of papers. "Hey, bullet points. Classy." He paused to read, then held up the paper to Angel with contempt. "Why am I always reconnaissance? I should get a decently flash gig like 'save the girl' or 'steal the emerald with the girl.'"
Angel put his hands on Buffy's shoulders, knowing exactly what she was feeling. "Handsome man, save me from the monsters."
"Exactly! Or.... What's that now?"
"That's the first thing Fred said to me. In Pylea. She was trapped, hiding, afraid. Nearly crazy. Crazy. But brave."
Buffy sighed. "We should never have let her come here. Bad things always happen here."
"Hate to break it to you, but bad things always happen everywhere. Besides, she wanted to be here. It was her choice." Spike said.
"Was it?"
"Bugger. You're fixing to do something stupid, aren't you?"
Buffy turned and looked at Spike. "Done it. Came back here." She snorted. "I've spent every day here lying to myself about making the world a better place."
"Welcome to the planet. We all paint on our happy faces every day, when all we really wanted is to pound the neighbor's missis, steal his Ben Franklins, and while we're at it, not think about the third of the world that's starving to death."
"I'm not saying that we can fix everything. I just.... I.... I have to do better. WE have to do better. The senior partners have a plan."
"Yeah, the prophecy. That ever-lovin' apocalypse you two keep going on about."
"Yeah, which apocalypse.... the one last year or the year before that? No, the senior partners are up to something now, and I'm not waiting for them to spring it on us. We're through operating in the dark."
"Ok, then. Might be easier if we knew anyone who had a direct line to the big guys."
"We do."
"Is that what you've been competing with Angel in the Brood-Olympics over? How to beat the Senior Partners?"
"Sorta. It's mostly kicking myself over the decision to.... Let Fred go."
"You make it sound like you fired her."
"Spike...."
Spike stood up and hugged her. "I'm sorry. I know it's tough for you."
"We need to talk to Eve."
"I'll get the car ready." Angel said.
"Sweetie?"
"Yeah?"
"Let me talk to her. You guys just stand back. I think she needs a woman to woman talk here."
***
"No way." Eve said. "Even if my connection to the senior partners wasn't completely severed, I'm done helping you."
"This isn't a negotiation, Eve." Buffy said.
"Ooh, I'm intimidated. What could you possibly do to me? I've been trapped in this house for weeks like a...."
"Rat? Snake?" Spike asked. "Beady little rat snake?"
"You're not trapped, Eve. You're hiding. Been there, done that. You know the second you step out that door, the second you don't have these symbols keeping you invisible to the partners, they're gonna zero in." Buffy moved in close to Eve and backed her against the wall. "So don't bother playing the pity angle. The only thing you care about is saving your own ass."
"The only thing I care about is gone. You two gave him up to the senior partners, let them suck him into...."
"Could do the same to you. I'll tell them how to see through your security system."
"You wouldn't...."
"Not if you tell me what I want to know."
The house started shaking as a deep rumbling sound was heard somewhere outside the door. "Oh, you bitch! You told them! You...."
"Wasn't us!" Angel said.
"Oh, God. They're coming. Please, don't let them take me. Please, I'll tell you. I'll tell you anything you want to know."
Buffy grabbed Eve and they ran out the balcony door. Angel and Spike jumped to the ground and Buffy tossed Eve over before throwing herself over. Spike caught Eve and Angel caught Buffy. They threw themselves against the wall under the balcony just as something came out of the doors above them. After a minute, the thing retreated and the four of them ran back to the car.
***
The elevator doors opened and Buffy and Angel got out followed by Spike and Eve. "Harmony!" Angel called.
"Yepper?" Harmony asked.
"Call security, put 'em on red alert. Nobody gets in this building without clearance from me. I want a guard at every entrance, every elevator, every stairwell. Cover the whole building."
"Ok, but you know how that never works...."
"Harmony!"
"On it."
"All right, stay with Eve. Anything gets past security, kill it." Buffy said to Spike.
"Where are you going?"
"To see my lawyer." Buffy headed to medical to see Gunn. She had visited him a couple of times, but he had been pretty unresponsive to her. Angel was behind her as she opened the door. She looked at him. "Let me do this." Angel nodded and leaned against the wall as she went in. "We have a problem." Gunn looked at her. "The Senior Partners found Eve. They sent something to take her out. I need to know if we have jurisdiction to protect her. What's protocol here?"
"I don't know." Gunn said.
"Right. Well, when you're through reading about important things like, um.... 'Trista and Ryan's big baby plans' maybe you can put some thought into it."
"I'm just not sure...."
"Stop. Gunn, you paid a high price for what's in that brain, so use it."
"There's a proviso in your contracts. Says that as CEOs of a Wolfram & Hart branch, you can invoke a rapio salvus order. Basically says you're taking custody of a wayward employee. It's not usually used for protection, but it should work."
"Thank you. How do we...."
"I'll make a call."
"Thanks." Buffy started to go, but stopped. "Listen, Gunn.... I know you feel bad about your part in what happened to Fred. And you should. For the rest of your life, it should wake you up in the middle of the night. And it will.... because you're a good man. You signed a piece of paper, that's all."
"But I knew. Not about Fred, but.... when I signed, I knew there would be consequences."
"You know, the thing I've learned about atonement is: you never run out of chances.... but you gotta take them. You can't hide in some hospital room and pretend it's all gonna go away.... cause it never will." Buffy touched his hand and then walked out.
"So what'd he say?" Angel asked.
"Eve's under our protection. No one can touch her."
"And how's that work?"
"We invoke something."
"It's a ritual?"
"No. It just means that we say she's under our protection and Gunn's putting the word out. He used a lot of high tech words and it all went over my head, but I got the gist."
"So we're going to help her?" Angel asked as they walked into their office where Eve, Spike, and Lorne were waiting.
"We don't want to help her. But.... we will. Eve, you're under mine and Angel's protection."
"Thank the gods." Eve said.
"But, you know, I can take it away with one phone call. Convince me not to, Eve."
"How can I?"
"Let's start with something easy, huh? You." Angel said.
"Me?"
"What are you? What do you do for the senior partners?"
"I'm a liaison. I liaise. Look, what do you want me to say? I'm a leprechaun. I'm from Brigadoon."
"If I had a nickel for every time I heard that one." Spike said.
"There are layers upon layers at Wolfram & Hart, things you'll never understand. What am I? I'm a child of the senior partners, created to do their bidding."
"You're an immortal." Buffy said. "Why are you here?"
"To watch. Tell them what I see. Pass on messages to you two, if there are any."
"So you're, uh, middle management?" Spike asked.
"What are the senior partners, huh?" Angel asked. "What do they...."
"No idea." Eve said.
"Eve."
"Do you honestly believe the senior partners would let me have access to that information? Angel, for someone so old, you're so young. I only know what they want me to know and only when they want me to know it."
"You don't know anything?" Buffy asked.
"Maybe. Maybe I know a lot.... but I don't have access to it. It's locked in my head somewhere, and I don't have the key. Ready for the funny part? There was someone who could've told you everything you want to know.... and you let the senior partners take him away."
"Lindsey."
"Lindsey's dedicated years of his life to the study of the senior partners. No one knows more about them than he does.... what they've done, what they plan to do."
"I thought he was after me." Angel said.
"You're saying bringing Spike back, the fail-safe, that was all about the senior partners?" Buffy asked.
"No. It's about Angel, too. He really doesn't like you.... but he may know more about you than.... well, than you do."
"Which is why they snatched him up." Angel said.
"Yeah. They couldn't risk him and you having a sit-down." Spike said.
"And now.... what he's going through." Eve said.
"They didn't kill him?" Buffy asked.
"They would want him to suffer horrors. Lindsey is in some hideous.... awful hell."
"Hell?"
"Yes!"
"What kind of hell?" Angel asked.
"What do you mean?"
"There's thousands of different kinds of hells." Spike put in. "You got your fire hell, your ice hell.... your.... ice hell. Your upside-down hell."
"I don't care if he's in 'toy poodles on parade' hell." Angel said, getting agitated. "He's got information that we need."
"According to the girl whose only reason for being is to see her darling lawyer boy again." Buffy said.
"I'm not lying." Eve said, turning to Lorne. "Well, tell him I'm not lying."
"No one can fake it through the piña colada song. Not once the chorus kicks in." Lorne said.
"If Lindsey can tell us what the senior partners have planned, I want him." Buffy said. "You got a better idea how to do it, I'm totally open."
"Didn't say that." Spike said. "Just pointed out that this one sucks. We're looking for a hell dimension in a haystack. How are we supposed to know...."
Gunn walked in the office. "I know. And I can get us in." Buffy noted that Gunn was wearing street clothes, not his usual business suit. His head was shaven and he looked more like the pre-W&H Gunn of yore.
"Us?" Angel asked.