Chapter Two: Walking Away From Murder
Lorne was walking sulkily out of the room after throwing his gun away. It disgusted him, that gun. He abhorred it now that it was no longer innocent. Now that it had been used. No, tainted.
This definitely wasn't his line of work anymore. He suddenly wished he was back in his bar serving the demons that wandered into it. He wished Holt had never blown the place up. He wished Angel had never knocked up the resurrected Darla. He wished too much.
The last words that Lindsey had spoken were still ringing in his ear.
"Angel kills me… Angel kills me…"
Lorne suddenly felt much older than he had ever felt in his entire life. So tired now.
He found himself wondering if any of the others were still living, unaware that, across the city, Angel was saying good-bye to Connor for what may have been the last time.
(Angel kills me…)
Lorne stepped out of the building and into the night. The sky was pouring rain down upon him in an annoyingly endless stream.
(You kill me!?)
The stars were glaring down at him from the sky. They seemed angry. Angry at him for what he had done.
(A lackey!?)
Lorne rubbed his hand, which still tingled from the gun's two jolts in it. He hadn't expected the jolts to be so bad, so powerful… so final. He had just committed an irrevocable act, and he felt infected by its horrid nature.
(No… no…)
Lorne walked on the sidewalk against the thin traffic. He could hear distant roars and knew what had begun. Angel and the survivors were in the alley right now, fighting their hearts out. He would never see them again. They would never see him again.
(You won't find me in the alley… in fact, you won't find me anywhere.)
Lorne jerked his head up suddenly as a group of cars came careening down the street. In the first one he could see the silhouette of an oddly familiar girl. Then the car was gone and dozens of military vehicles were streaming in its wake.
Lorne suddenly felt he should conceal his face, so he pulled his trench coat up enough to do so and looked back down at his feet. He had forgotten to keep himself hidden from the civilians. Luckily enough there had been none, which was a strange, and lucky, coincidence.
(That's all folks.)
Lorne closed his eyes tight. The line of cars had passed on now. Lorne had no doubts that they were speeding off to aid Angel. Somehow Angel had gotten one last call out, and goody for him.
Lorne would disappear into the darkness, thus fading from the story forever. He could feel it in his yellow, cartilaginous bones.
"Good luck Angel," he muttered under his breath while looking the general direction he believe Angel to be. "You're gonna need it."
(Angel kills me…)
He was still shaken up by the things that had happened over the past few months. Time-traveling, Spike coming to them as a ghost, Spike coming back to life, losing his trust for Angel and then half regaining it only a few hours later, the death of Fred and the arrival of Illyria, and, last but not least, him murdering Lindsey.
Such morbid actions were not for him. Not in his nature of song and dance.
(Wha--? Why'd you--?)
He suddenly remembered that look of realization on Lindsey's face with stunningly brutal clarity.
He continued walking, listening to the battle in the far distance, and the roaring of cars in the near distance. Everyone seemed to be far away from him suddenly. Too far. He felt like he was suffocating in all that open space between him and everyone else.
"You don't kill me."
Lorne's eyes widened greatly as he abandoned his stealthy approach to walking down the sidewalk and spun around to see if his ears had deceived him. They hadn't.
Lindsey was holding a gun to Lorne's head with his finger pressing the trigger ever so slightly.
"Angel kills me," Lindsey repeated himself. Lorne looked down and saw Lindsey clutching his stomach, which was bleeding profusely.
"Lindsey?!" Lorne exclaimed.
"YOU DON'T KILL ME DAMMIT!" Lindsey screamed and pulled the trigger just as Lorne darted to the side. The gun blast seemed exceedingly loud in the quiet street. "ANGEL KILLS ME!"
Spittle was rocketing out of Lindsey's mouth as he shouted at the open space in front of him with such intense rage that it shook Lorne to his soul. He didn't even try calming Lindsey down because he understood it would do nothing. Lorne had attempted to kill Lindsey, and now Lindsey was back to return the favor… with interest.
"ANGELKILLSMEANGELKILLSMEANGELKILLSME YOU DON'T!" Lindsey shouted as he pulled the trigger continuously, each blast causing Lorne to jump. "YOU DON'T YOU DON'T YOU DON'T!"
Then Lindsey seemed to realize no one was in front of him and lowered the empty, smoking weapon. "Angel kills me," he whispered. "You don't."
Lorne started backing away and kept doing so until his back hit the building behind him. He stood there, waiting for Lindsey's next move. Perhaps he was even hoping, in some part of him that his conscious mind didn't hear, that Lindsey would come after him and kill him.
"Angel kills me… Angel…" Then Lindsey seemed to come to some other revelation. "I need to go find him. The alley. Monsters. Demons. Armageddon. He kills me and I… I have to find him. H-He needs to kill me."
Lorne stood there awkwardly watching Lindsey as he stared at the ground, his unkempt hair hanging down over his face. For a moment Lorne felt total guilt about what he had done. For a moment he nearly felt friendship with his victim.
(You're not part of the solution.)
And then the moment was broken as Lindsey turned and limped away screaming his inarticulate jumble of emotions into the night with just a hint of sobbing beneath that.
Lorne looked at the retreating Lindsey and remembered that his last job was to kill Lindsey. That was the last thing Angel had requested from him, and if the Champion were to be deceased, that would be his dying wish. Lorne needed to kill Lindsey, but he didn't want to now; he felt too bad for the bastard.
"Another time," Lorne said, and then turned around and walked off down the street with his trench coat billowing out behind him and his face exposed to the wind and the eyes of any civilian. This wasn't his line of work anymore, but he still had to finish it at some time.
Meanwhile…
"I think we've gotten them all," Willow said as she trotted up to Buffy with her blood-covered sword glinting in the moon light. Buffy had a fleeting thought of Sting, Frodo's sword in the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, as it glowed to warn its possessor of the approaching threat of orcs. "Well, those that were here anyway."
"Good," Buffy replied. She hung her head then. She missed her lover back in Rome who everyone had come to know as "The Immortal", or something along those lines anyway. He hadn't come because he had broken up with her. Apparently he didn't like being buckled down to one woman for long. Oh well.
Then she realized something. "W-Was Spike just with them?"
Willow paused and started thinking. "I… don't think so."
"I could've sworn I'd seen him."
"There were four of them. You probably mistook Wesley for Spike."
"Yeah." Buffy didn't actually believe that. Something told her that Spike had indeed been with Angel, the black guy with the axe, and the weird blue demon that slightly resembled a member of the Blue Man Group. "I must've."
Xander ran up to them next in the alley that was knee-deep with dead bodies (not literally of course). "Okay," Xander gasped out of breath. "Did anybody else think they saw Spike back there?"
Buffy and Willow looked at each other. Willow looked worried and confused. Buffy imagined she had the same look mirrored on her own face. Xander looked back and forth between them, curious as to what was going on.
"It's impossible Buffy," Willow stated. "You saw him burning up. He couldn't possibly be here. He's dead."
"You saw me leap through that portal and die," Buffy began. "But I came back. And I came back after the Master drowned me."
!!!$%$%$%
Spike was drugged and his eyesight was bleary. He felt those military doctors digging into him, searching for any sort of poisonous substance that may have been on the blades that had cut him. He was worried they were gonna put the chip back in his head.
Bollocks. That bloody chip again. He wasn't sure if he could deal with it. Not that he wanted to drain anyone now that he was all pumped full of that richy goodness of soul, but it was such an irritating little gadget.
"AH!" Spike hollered his pain to the doctor that had just sliced his abdomen open entirely. He felt like he was being skinned alive. "Watch the organs!"
"Sorry," the doctor replied hesitantly, after jumping of course. He looked scared. Bugger was probably new to the whole vampire thing. Scared out of his mind he was. "I just need to get a better view, and, you know, you vampires can heal pretty well I hear. I also heard you enjoyed pain, too."
"There's a difference between good pain and bad pain you nitwit!" Spike screamed, his voice strained in pain. "This is bad PAIN!"
The doctor pulled a bullet out of Spike's stomach and looked at it questioningly. Spike looked at it. "I forgot all about that bug. Interesting story really."
Suddenly the flap of the medical tent flew open and a woman stepped inside. She had blonde hair and a bloody sword hanging by her side which glinted in the yellow light.
"Hello dot," Spike said dreamily. He was drifting into sleep from the drugs. "Never thought I'd be seeing you again."
"Spike?"
()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()
Hey, MorbidMan here. I hope you enjoyed this chapter. I never thought I'd get quite so many reviews for this story… but I did. Thanks to all of my reviewers.
Thanks for the suggestions as well. I was gonna bring Lindsey back even before it was suggested, but thanks for that one anyway.
"You kill me!? A lackey!? No… no… Angel kills me…" - Lindsey "Angel"
Lorne was walking sulkily out of the room after throwing his gun away. It disgusted him, that gun. He abhorred it now that it was no longer innocent. Now that it had been used. No, tainted.
This definitely wasn't his line of work anymore. He suddenly wished he was back in his bar serving the demons that wandered into it. He wished Holt had never blown the place up. He wished Angel had never knocked up the resurrected Darla. He wished too much.
The last words that Lindsey had spoken were still ringing in his ear.
"Angel kills me… Angel kills me…"
Lorne suddenly felt much older than he had ever felt in his entire life. So tired now.
He found himself wondering if any of the others were still living, unaware that, across the city, Angel was saying good-bye to Connor for what may have been the last time.
(Angel kills me…)
Lorne stepped out of the building and into the night. The sky was pouring rain down upon him in an annoyingly endless stream.
(You kill me!?)
The stars were glaring down at him from the sky. They seemed angry. Angry at him for what he had done.
(A lackey!?)
Lorne rubbed his hand, which still tingled from the gun's two jolts in it. He hadn't expected the jolts to be so bad, so powerful… so final. He had just committed an irrevocable act, and he felt infected by its horrid nature.
(No… no…)
Lorne walked on the sidewalk against the thin traffic. He could hear distant roars and knew what had begun. Angel and the survivors were in the alley right now, fighting their hearts out. He would never see them again. They would never see him again.
(You won't find me in the alley… in fact, you won't find me anywhere.)
Lorne jerked his head up suddenly as a group of cars came careening down the street. In the first one he could see the silhouette of an oddly familiar girl. Then the car was gone and dozens of military vehicles were streaming in its wake.
Lorne suddenly felt he should conceal his face, so he pulled his trench coat up enough to do so and looked back down at his feet. He had forgotten to keep himself hidden from the civilians. Luckily enough there had been none, which was a strange, and lucky, coincidence.
(That's all folks.)
Lorne closed his eyes tight. The line of cars had passed on now. Lorne had no doubts that they were speeding off to aid Angel. Somehow Angel had gotten one last call out, and goody for him.
Lorne would disappear into the darkness, thus fading from the story forever. He could feel it in his yellow, cartilaginous bones.
"Good luck Angel," he muttered under his breath while looking the general direction he believe Angel to be. "You're gonna need it."
(Angel kills me…)
He was still shaken up by the things that had happened over the past few months. Time-traveling, Spike coming to them as a ghost, Spike coming back to life, losing his trust for Angel and then half regaining it only a few hours later, the death of Fred and the arrival of Illyria, and, last but not least, him murdering Lindsey.
Such morbid actions were not for him. Not in his nature of song and dance.
(Wha--? Why'd you--?)
He suddenly remembered that look of realization on Lindsey's face with stunningly brutal clarity.
He continued walking, listening to the battle in the far distance, and the roaring of cars in the near distance. Everyone seemed to be far away from him suddenly. Too far. He felt like he was suffocating in all that open space between him and everyone else.
"You don't kill me."
Lorne's eyes widened greatly as he abandoned his stealthy approach to walking down the sidewalk and spun around to see if his ears had deceived him. They hadn't.
Lindsey was holding a gun to Lorne's head with his finger pressing the trigger ever so slightly.
"Angel kills me," Lindsey repeated himself. Lorne looked down and saw Lindsey clutching his stomach, which was bleeding profusely.
"Lindsey?!" Lorne exclaimed.
"YOU DON'T KILL ME DAMMIT!" Lindsey screamed and pulled the trigger just as Lorne darted to the side. The gun blast seemed exceedingly loud in the quiet street. "ANGEL KILLS ME!"
Spittle was rocketing out of Lindsey's mouth as he shouted at the open space in front of him with such intense rage that it shook Lorne to his soul. He didn't even try calming Lindsey down because he understood it would do nothing. Lorne had attempted to kill Lindsey, and now Lindsey was back to return the favor… with interest.
"ANGELKILLSMEANGELKILLSMEANGELKILLSME YOU DON'T!" Lindsey shouted as he pulled the trigger continuously, each blast causing Lorne to jump. "YOU DON'T YOU DON'T YOU DON'T!"
Then Lindsey seemed to realize no one was in front of him and lowered the empty, smoking weapon. "Angel kills me," he whispered. "You don't."
Lorne started backing away and kept doing so until his back hit the building behind him. He stood there, waiting for Lindsey's next move. Perhaps he was even hoping, in some part of him that his conscious mind didn't hear, that Lindsey would come after him and kill him.
"Angel kills me… Angel…" Then Lindsey seemed to come to some other revelation. "I need to go find him. The alley. Monsters. Demons. Armageddon. He kills me and I… I have to find him. H-He needs to kill me."
Lorne stood there awkwardly watching Lindsey as he stared at the ground, his unkempt hair hanging down over his face. For a moment Lorne felt total guilt about what he had done. For a moment he nearly felt friendship with his victim.
(You're not part of the solution.)
And then the moment was broken as Lindsey turned and limped away screaming his inarticulate jumble of emotions into the night with just a hint of sobbing beneath that.
Lorne looked at the retreating Lindsey and remembered that his last job was to kill Lindsey. That was the last thing Angel had requested from him, and if the Champion were to be deceased, that would be his dying wish. Lorne needed to kill Lindsey, but he didn't want to now; he felt too bad for the bastard.
"Another time," Lorne said, and then turned around and walked off down the street with his trench coat billowing out behind him and his face exposed to the wind and the eyes of any civilian. This wasn't his line of work anymore, but he still had to finish it at some time.
Meanwhile…
"I think we've gotten them all," Willow said as she trotted up to Buffy with her blood-covered sword glinting in the moon light. Buffy had a fleeting thought of Sting, Frodo's sword in the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, as it glowed to warn its possessor of the approaching threat of orcs. "Well, those that were here anyway."
"Good," Buffy replied. She hung her head then. She missed her lover back in Rome who everyone had come to know as "The Immortal", or something along those lines anyway. He hadn't come because he had broken up with her. Apparently he didn't like being buckled down to one woman for long. Oh well.
Then she realized something. "W-Was Spike just with them?"
Willow paused and started thinking. "I… don't think so."
"I could've sworn I'd seen him."
"There were four of them. You probably mistook Wesley for Spike."
"Yeah." Buffy didn't actually believe that. Something told her that Spike had indeed been with Angel, the black guy with the axe, and the weird blue demon that slightly resembled a member of the Blue Man Group. "I must've."
Xander ran up to them next in the alley that was knee-deep with dead bodies (not literally of course). "Okay," Xander gasped out of breath. "Did anybody else think they saw Spike back there?"
Buffy and Willow looked at each other. Willow looked worried and confused. Buffy imagined she had the same look mirrored on her own face. Xander looked back and forth between them, curious as to what was going on.
"It's impossible Buffy," Willow stated. "You saw him burning up. He couldn't possibly be here. He's dead."
"You saw me leap through that portal and die," Buffy began. "But I came back. And I came back after the Master drowned me."
!!!$%$%$%
Spike was drugged and his eyesight was bleary. He felt those military doctors digging into him, searching for any sort of poisonous substance that may have been on the blades that had cut him. He was worried they were gonna put the chip back in his head.
Bollocks. That bloody chip again. He wasn't sure if he could deal with it. Not that he wanted to drain anyone now that he was all pumped full of that richy goodness of soul, but it was such an irritating little gadget.
"AH!" Spike hollered his pain to the doctor that had just sliced his abdomen open entirely. He felt like he was being skinned alive. "Watch the organs!"
"Sorry," the doctor replied hesitantly, after jumping of course. He looked scared. Bugger was probably new to the whole vampire thing. Scared out of his mind he was. "I just need to get a better view, and, you know, you vampires can heal pretty well I hear. I also heard you enjoyed pain, too."
"There's a difference between good pain and bad pain you nitwit!" Spike screamed, his voice strained in pain. "This is bad PAIN!"
The doctor pulled a bullet out of Spike's stomach and looked at it questioningly. Spike looked at it. "I forgot all about that bug. Interesting story really."
Suddenly the flap of the medical tent flew open and a woman stepped inside. She had blonde hair and a bloody sword hanging by her side which glinted in the yellow light.
"Hello dot," Spike said dreamily. He was drifting into sleep from the drugs. "Never thought I'd be seeing you again."
"Spike?"
()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()
Hey, MorbidMan here. I hope you enjoyed this chapter. I never thought I'd get quite so many reviews for this story… but I did. Thanks to all of my reviewers.
Thanks for the suggestions as well. I was gonna bring Lindsey back even before it was suggested, but thanks for that one anyway.
"You kill me!? A lackey!? No… no… Angel kills me…" - Lindsey "Angel"