Chapter 2

"I'm not exactly in my best fighting form right now." Angel said as he slouched a little more than usual. He was telling the truth fighting with Buffy had taken a lot out of him. Mentally and physically.

"Well... I'll tell you what. I'll let ya get one in for free. Come on soul boy, take a poke at me." Faith said with a smirk on her face. Angel decided to have faith in her honesty and lurched forward. Faith threw him against the wall behind her like he was nothing more than a rag doll that she'd gotten pissed off with. Except her demeanour when she was doing it was one of happiness at the prospect of a fight and boredom at the fact that Angel was in really bad fighting form at the moment. She turned to face him and laughed.

"Here's a tip soul boy: Never trust someone without a soul. I didn't think that a soul made you so stupid, but hey there you are. You can always be surprised by people with souls at the stupid things they do. I mean people without em can surprise you too, but more in an 'Ohmigod, you're drinking my blood' way." Angel curled up on the ground. The previous fight had taken more out of him that even he knew.

Faith walked over to him as he was getting up slowly from the damp dirty ground that was the alleyway. She stood over him, looking down at him with slight disdain but mostly glee at having a toy to play with.

"Aw poor baby. Here," She kicked him harshly in the stomach, "Let me help you up." Angel lay there for a second, trying to gather his almost non existent strength. Then he kicked her feet out from under her. Or he would've if she hadn't jumped to avoid his sweeping kick. He got up and threw a punch which actually connected with Faith's face. It, however, wasn't enough to wipe her smirk off of her face. She threw back another one of at least double the force.

"You're weak soul boy. Props for getting back up though. Even if that isn't going to last long." Angel spat out some blood and turned to face Faith only to be reacquainted with Faith's fist. He forced himself to turn back to Faith and she punched him again. This happened a few times until Angel saw his vision fading.

"You're just like a retriever, you keep coming back for more." Faith said in a slightly pissed tome. Then she grinned and delivered a shocker that broke Angel's cheekbone.

"I love it."

"Buffy." Angel had just been helped by Buffy with a gang of vampires. They both stood there, unsure about what to do.

"So..."

"How's Sunnydale?" Angel asked, getting the ball rolling in a sense.

"Blew up." Buffy answered. Short and sweet seemed to be her motto. Stressing the short here. Angel nodded and Buffy nodded. The she asked,

"How's the evil law firm?"

"Oh I undermined it last year."

"By undermined you mean...?"

"Killed the Circle of the Black Thorn. Which ruined Wolfram and Hart. At least in L.A." This was just met with some strange looks from Buffy which was in turn met with some shuffling about and hunching of the shoulders from Angel.

"So, why are you in L.A.?" Angel realised exactly how frank that was after it came out of his mouth. Buffy grimaced,

"Get right down to business. Right, I should've known you'd be all businessy what with running the law firm for the past year."

"Are you ever going to let that go?"

"What Wolfram and Hart? No never. You put yourself in the epicentre of all evil. And you worked with lawyers!" Buffy said the last sentence more being her letting off steam than actually meaning anything by it.

"I-I know but it was all so that we could undermine it." Angel said, trying to convince himself as much as Buffy that it was the reason behind it all.

"I'm sure it started out that way. I'm sure that that was the excuse you used. But you're not the same Angel that I knew. You're not the same Angel that I fell in love with. You're not the same Angel that I still love." There was silence in the alley as both parties tried to digest what Buffy had just let slip.

"Did, uh, I just say that out loud?" Buffy asked and Angel nodded dumbly.

"Oh-kay then." Buffy said and turned and walked off in the opposite direction to where Angel was standing. Angel just stood there dumb founded as if he couldn't believe what just happened.

Angel fell on the ground as Faith kicked his legs out from under him. She straddled him and said,

"Say soul boy, you reckon that any one cares if you die right here and now?" She punched him a few times and he finally managed to say,

"As many people as the ones that care if you die right here and now."

Their night of passion came with no forewarning. There was so much tension that everyone felt it. Especially after Buffy let slip that she loved Angel. They were out patrolling/searching for Potentials and Angel decided to be the one to bring up the topic first. Finally.

"I love you too."

"What?" Buffy said whirling around using probably what is the most shocked tone that anyone could muster.

"I lo-" Angel began again but was cut off quickly.

"I heard you." Buffy snapped.

"Oh." Angel said, after all he had to say something. And 'oh' seemed to serve him pretty well.

"What do you mean you love me too?" Buffy said as if there was some trick to it. As if it was all just to make her believe something that wasn't true.

"I mean I love you too. That night when you said..." Angel began again and was cut off by Buffy... Again!

"Yeah, what about it?" Buffy asked snappily.

"I love you too." Angel said with this simplicity yet there was also this certain truth and honesty behind it that just made it seem so real. And it made Buffy even more pissed.

"Would you just... Stop saying that." Buffy held up her hand and turned away. As if she didn't want to confront what kept on getting presented to her. And it was true. She didn't want to confront it. She didn't want to confront their feelings.

"Why?" Angel being truly puzzled is a sight to behold but hey, love does strange things.

"Because."

"Because why?

"Just because." Don't you love those answers that don't answer everything? It seemed to be Buffy's topic for the questions Angel as asking. Like before she was trying to avoid confronting feelings.

"But why-?"

"Because if you say it again I'm going to find it too hard to keep away from you. Too hard to not touch you every second of every day. God. It's already hard enough." Now look what's happened, Buffy's had to confront her feelings. She felt herself let some depression take her because of the truth of the previous outburst. Hell, she welcomed it. They kept walking in silence until they got to Buffy's hotel.

"I'll walk you up to your room." Angel said at the lobby and Buffy just walked into the elevator, not bothering to argue with him.

When they got to the door of her room they stood there unsure. Angel was the first to speak, knowing that if someone didn't talk soon they'd be here for a very long time.

"So... Goodnight." Angel said and they stood there. He turned away but Buffy's hand on his stopped him. They both looked at her hand and then when their gaze lifted finally they were all over each other. They somehow made it into the room and collapsed onto the bed. (Tribute to 'I Will Remember You' with the hand on hand thing)

"Oh yeah soul boy? You trying to pull a fast one on me? Well you tell me this, how exactly am I going to die?"

"From guilt." Angel said. Faith looked at him with a sneer on her face but then it changed to confusion in her eyes and just the slightest trace of fear. Then she got off of Angel and staggered a few steps down the alley before falling to her knees and crying out. Her head bent over and she gasped in pain. When she looked back up there was a light that went through her eyes and she looked around bewildered.

In the middle of the night Angel sat up in bed and felt a pain grip him. He crawled out of bed and onto the balcony where he made a slight whimpering noise as he attempted to hold his soul and body together and said only one word,

"Buffy." Then it was all over. Angel was gone.

Faith saw Angel and her eyes widened. She scrambled to her feet and took off out of the alley and onto the street. Angel looked after her sadly. He knew what she was going through and he knew he couldn't help. Not right now. Not until she asked for it. And that wouldn't happen for a long time. She still had to be tormented with memories first. But hopefully it wouldn't come to that.

Angel picked up Buffy and carried her out of the alley. Back to his warehouse where the Scooby gang were. Back to where they could fix this all up in some way. There was one thing that they could do that Willow had found but to do it they'd need Buffy and Faith. At least they had one of the two.

Ensouling Faith had been necessary because she was a lot stronger than Buffy and she needed to feel something bad if she hurt the people around her otherwise they'd all be dead. They'd give her a few hours to calm down and then Angel would go out hunting for her. Maybe hunting was the wrong word. More of a search than a hunt.

As Angel walked to the warehouse he had a heavy heart. This would take some doing and he knew Willow could do it but could he? That question was still to be answered and hopefully the answer would be yes but if it wasn't... Then all was lost and he would have to do what he found it impossible to do earlier.

He walked over to where Willow was set up with the complex ingredients all around her. This spell was going to be bigger than even the one that they'd used on Buffy to bring her back to life. Willow looked up at Angel as he walked in with Buffy in his arms. She got up from her kneeling position and guided him to a circle in which there were chains that were secured to the floor. Angel lay Buffy inside the circle and started to chain her arms and legs to the floor.

When he was halfway he paused and tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear. He stayed like that for a second before shaking it out of his system and moving onto securing her legs. He could feel the hesitation creeping into his system and his thoughts and he knew he wouldn't last long not like this. So he just shut everything off as best as he could.

She woke up just as he finished securing the last lock. She looked up at him with big eyes.

"Angel?" Angel faltered but he refused to look at her. He got up and walked away with a slouch and trying not to hear Buffy or think about her. They stayed like that for the next two hours. Willow was sitting in the centre circle with her eyes closed and chanting Latin under her breath, getting ready for the big spell by summoning some of the gods and calling upon some other deities and so on.

Then Angel went hunting for Faith.

"Faith," Angelus punched Faith, "Faith," Angelus punched her again, "Faith." Angelus punched her again. She fell to the floor, her consciousness about to make a trip elsewhere. Angelus picked her up with one arm so that she was dangling off of the floor.

"I feel so left out." He punched her again and then just let her sway there.

"You really should've told me that you were back." He punched her in the gut this time and she automatically curled over and started coughing and wheezing.

"I could've prepared a welcome party with balloons and clowns and dead people and knives and flame throwers and other torture devices." Angelus mock sighed.

"Ah well." He punched her again, "This will have to do."

Angel found her crouched in a corner of an abandoned building. He approached her carefully. She looked up at him and he saw the frightened look in her eyes that was so familiar. She looked like a scared hurt animal that had been backed into a corner. And he approached her like she was. A scared hurt animal that is.

She looked at him with such pain in her eyes that was a lot more than she had been harbouring before when she was human and had accidentally killed the deputy mayor and then done all of those bad things to all of the people that were close to her. Or closer than anyone else had managed to get anyway.

Angel crouched down in front of her and asked,

"Does it hurt?"

"Yes." Faith whispered in return and Angel asked,

"Do you want it to go away?" A glimmer of hope flickered through Faith's eyes and she said in a slightly louder tone than before,

"Yes." Angel offered her his hand at her reply.

"Then come with me." He said in a soft voice and a reassuring look in his eyes. Faith was too beaten, too tortured to protest. She just took his hand and let him pull her up. He guided her, with her clinging onto him like a young child to her father, to the warehouse.

"Faith?" Buffy asked in a little girl's tone of voice. Faith turned her head but when she saw Buffy she closed her eyes in the pain of remembrance and turned away.

"Faith? What's wrong?" Buffy asked but Faith didn't reply. Buffy knew what was wrong in that instance and began to struggle against the chains that held her down tightly again.

Angel sat Faith down in the circle on the other side of Willow, opposite of Buffy. He chained her down slowly and tenderly. At the widening of her big scared eyes he reassured her that it was just a precaution and that he would be toting some chains of his own as well. And that she could trust him. That this was Angel speaking and not Angelus. Angel who had helped her before and was helping her now. She just nodded and let him chain her down to the floor. (AN: She's still in shock here so that's another reason she's letting him do this)

He then went to the circle in front of Willow and lay down, Willow chaining him up to the concrete floor. After a joke about it looking kinky at which Angel tried to force a smile and Willow knew it was faked. She just said it was okay and the he shouldn't force a smile for her. This of course brought about some disagreeing from him and insistence that she was worth it to which she smiled brightly and brushed it off. When her cheery face disappeared from view any attempts of smiling disappeared and he returned to no expression brooding face.

He lay there and tried not to become too sure that this was going to work. Magic could not be relied on but this was a last chance. If there was going to be any way of saving the two slayers from being vampires for the rest of their eternal lives then it would have to be this way. And only this way.

Angel felt the cold concrete seep through his clothes and his own body temperature sinking to the temperature of the concrete. He closed his eyes as he felt his body temperature dip lower and lower. He felt a small breeze pass by and a whisper of a promise that it would warm him only to leave as quickly and softly as it came.

Angel listened to the quiet words of Willow and when she stopped and he heard the clinking of Willow using a lighter he knew that the main spell was about to start. He tensed slightly on the floor and tried to prepare himself but he knew, inside, that he really couldn't prepare himself for this. What was going to happen was going to happen. And hopefully what was going to happen would be in his favour. In all of their favours.

Willow began the spell and Angel felt his stomach sinking. It wasn't that he was feeling bad or down or that this wasn't going to work. It was that his whole body felt like it was sinking. He was sinking, sinking down into oblivion, sinking down and down and down...

TBC

Let's see how this spell works eh? Move onto next chapter quickly and calmly peoples.