Title: Dying Days
Disclaimer: I only own the fic.
Pairings: BA eventually, other.
Timeline: Post-Chosen. Post the movie, but the sword of destiny (or whatever) was never on the show. Somewhere other in ATS.
Genre: Angst. Adventure. Other.
Chapter Summary: Constantine thinks. We get a brief look at his mind and past that we have never witnessed. A monk fights his way to safety.
Summary: An orb resurfaces from the past and old mysteries never questioned are brought to light.
Notes/Changes: in case you are wondering, this is a (Lady Vengeance)BTVS/Constantine xover. This includes my AU Highlander.
N/C: Buffy only visits the new Council, refusing to stay in the area of the scoobies for long. Only Faith knows of her; the others are distraught over her rare visits, but don't bug her about them.
N/C: The sword of Destiny was never part of the show.
N/C: I don't know how old he was when he killed himself, so I am just making it up. I am assuming that in the time post S7 btvs, it is during her 22nd year as Buffy Summers.
N/C: Buffy is still bitter at her 'friends'. Buffy and Spike never had sex. No Parker, and Buffy never had sex with Riley. Sanctuary happened differently-Buffy and Faith made up although the stuff with Buffy and Angel still happened. Faith came back with Buffy afterwards instead of going to jail. They became sisterly again but the scoobies never really accepted her back until S7ish.
N/C: When Buffy came back from the dead, only her, Spike, Faith, and Methos remembered Dawn. She wasn't there and there was no sign of her except for the items pertaining to her that Buffy had hidden secretly magically.
N/C: I am also assuming that the only way he knows to get in touch with her is through Methos or 'Adam.' Methos and Buffy are still close.
N/C: Readers: Just in case you're wondering, she (Buffy) didn't have a teacher. She trained in various places with various people and other masters, but she learned the basics and formed her own styles with precision and creativity using only what she knew and felt from her insanity and then when she killed herself, etc. But that's really self-explanatory.
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Chapter 1
LA, the city of angels
Constantine's POV
He doesn't sleep much. When he does, it is filled with the various nightmares. The memories of hell invade his mind and he wakes up using all his might not to scream.
On this particular night though, he could feel the forces gathering. Something was off, almost like when he was in Mexico. He had moved to LA soon after, hoping to get away from those particular memories. Although now, he could feel the first ones coming back.
His childhood was spent in LA, the city of angels, or devils as he commonly pointed out to himself. He spent hours walking the streets heading home from school trying to spare himself the thoughts of the people with ash for skin that looked towards him every time he spotted them.
It never worked though. He was 10 when his parents decided to put the loner of their child into a program to 'help' him. It made it worse though. Medicines and elixirs of bull shit were followed by shock treatments and needles. His mind went to mush. Finally, he committed the ultimate last deed. He killed himself.
When you die, God and The Devil judge where you end up. Either God takes your hand and you go to heaven, or the Devil pulls you down and you're torn piece from piece by the billions and billions of demons for eternity. There aren't supposed to be exceptions. But like every rule, it will be bent and broken until it is there no longer.
This is what happened to him. He killed himself. Suicide is an automatic ride to hell like self-sacrifice is an automatic ride to heaven. He landed in hell. When you're in hell, time on earth slows down. The farther down you go, the slower the earth rotates. He was there for a lifetime or more.
But he came back when the medics in the ambulance resuscitated him. He was no longer in hell. But he knew he would go back there. He killed himself after all.
And then she came. She found him. She understood what he didn't and needed to. The woman that found him looked nothing like he expected a fellow demon hunter to look like. He told her so one day, and she just smiled and gave him a small laugh. It was like she knew he would say that. She told him that she wasn't young at all. He didn't understand then. But he knew what she was speaking of now. Her voice hinted at wise old clues to things he knew he would never know, like a cliffhanger to a movie that would never be continued (or an unfinished fic that we all do).
He said that his nightmares, where he dreamt of hell, forced him to hold his tongue when they came back to him in the waning sleep that he got. They made him wake up and turn on the lights, walk the neighborhood and kill any evil demons of the kind he dealt with.
But she taught him what he knew, and something passed on to him. It was a burden. But he knew he was welcome in heaven as long as he didn't hate or kill someone thanks to the big experience he had in Mexico with the cop and a friend of his. He didn't have to worry about ending up in hell anytime soon. But he had to wonder why both heaven and hell wanted to claim him.
She knew after something passed through him. She called him nephew and boy and child when he was an adult. It didn't matter that she looked younger than before, despite what he knew. What mattered was that she trained and taught and trusted him. He had a gift, she told him, a gift for exorcisms. He hated dealing with that side of people, but it came in handy for deporting the bad guys back down.
He later discovered that she was like a holy object, a being in herself so special and good that the demons forced to stay in hell burned and smoked at her touch. He asked her how she did that at a young age. She joked that she bathed in holy water. He sometimes still wondered if it was true or not.
No, what kept him up were not nightmares or his own memories. They were Her long forgotten memories, the ones she told him not to ever remind her of. He knew why she wouldn't want to, for they showed her killing the evils he could wish to never get near of or witness. He was in awe at her fines, her savage brutality that snapped necks and ripped limbs from the body before the enemies knew what hit them. He could see the horror that she gave evil and smell the fear that the new, unsuspecting devils that ran parts of the earth felt for her. He could nearly feel her primal side revel with it, soak it up like a starving boy does soup.
These memories soon left him when he woke up screaming. He didn't know why she screamed. He only knew that she felt something so horrible and empty that there was nothing there, and he didn't know what it was. He had only felt it the last few years. But it haunted him still, just as it did her. But why would he know it was her memories when there was no face or time to point it out as? He didn't. He only knew it wasn't his own.
When he let himself think back on it, John sometimes found himself wondering if Jesus was the woman who helped him. But even he knew that that was a fake fact. She had told him all about Jesus as a human. That's a funny thought, the son of God being human. If that was true, then the way that he saw it, the devil would be his mother. But he knew Lucifer had all the parts of a man. He was an ugly psychotic bastard if he did say so himself.
He wiped the sweat from his face again after an old memory of the woman who taught him the truth. As he sat up and went to the doors and windows to check up on the new protection, he had to wonder how old she was to know everything she told him. Who was her teacher? He knew he'd never know. But he could wonder.
And her eyes still haunted him.
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He dodged traffic. His cape billowed in the wind and made him look like a small monster from a movie. The shadows of the night trailed him in darkness. His holy mission was important and he had to get his parcel to the right place before they came.
He knew they were after him, and getting closer every time he stopped. But he could not get out of this and he would not stop until all was right. So he traveled, looking for the new place.
He felt he was near now; figuring death would come for him as well soon. So he moved on. By some fraction of luck, he happened by an alley where multiple demons were speaking of the new place. He sighed and stuck around for a moment until he saw the shadows move. They were coming closer.
He spotted the invisible crescent moon on the side of the building while he was gazing at the sky, and he sighed. He was close now. But it was dark, and though he could avoid traffic, his sight did not pick up the demon coming towards him, faster faster until it plucked him from the road. His luck was with him though, and although his arms were becoming bloody, he struck out and the claws of the creature were forced to let him free.
He rushed to the closed gate to find it was electronic. He pushed the button and spoke into it, and there was an answering voice immediately. "Yes?" the voice asked.
"Hello? Yes-I need to come in. My name is Andreas. I'm a monk from India and" the scared voice alerted a few of the others on the other side of the com unit and someone buzzed him in.
There was a buzzing noise and the gates opened. As soon as Andreas was able to step through, he forced himself to wedge his way in as soon as possible. There were demons inside though as well and he dodged many creatures he dared not look upon.
But his luck was running low and something scraped across his back, pushing him to the ground. The floor is not a good place to be in a fight and before he knew what hit him, something was diving towards him, a terminal angle. He was bale to partially move though and his bloody arm was snapped, broken, unusable.
A few feet more and he was inside the double glass doors in the light where they could not hurt him. As shock over came his body though, he fell to the floor and dropped the parcel held in a square box the size of his upper body.
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TBC? Please Review.