Episode 4:
A court is in session, a verdict is in
No appeal on the docket today
Just my own sin
The walls are cold and pale
The cage made of steel
Screams fill the room
Alone I drop and kneel
Silence now the sound
My breath the only motion around
Demons cluttering around
My face showing no emotion
Shackled by my sentence
Expecting no return
Here there is no penance
My skin begins to burn'My Own Prison', by Creed-
Darkness surrounded her, darkness engulfed her and she was more than willing to welcome it. She was more than willing to let darkness take the best of her, to let go all the pain, to give up.
Get up.
With a moan, she rose from the floor, which was wet with her own blood, and stood up, ready to face whatever she had to. There was a resolved look on her face, an unbreakable determination in her blood-red eyes. She wouldn't give up. Never.
For a moment, she thought that the wish-granter was smiling – but she could no longer trust her eyes, covered in blood as they were.
'You're strong. But are you strong enough for what is coming, vampire?'
Darla's lips curved painfully.
'Whatever it is, bring it on'.
Now there definately was a smile (or something that looked like one) plastered on the demon's (was it a demon? A god? Who cared?) face.
'As you wish, vampire'.
During that endless night, Darla had faced many horroful things. She had fought against demons that were thrice her size with her bare hands, she'd felt a thousand Egyptian beetles sliding beneath her skin, flames had scorched her skin, crosses had left burning marks on her arms and torso, and had suffered countless ways of torturing, but nothing had prepared her for this new horror.
In front of her, there was someone she'd thought that she'd never see ever again. Someone she'd hoped she'd never see again.
He smirked...or at least it looked like a smirk. With his facial expression, it was impossible to tell, even for her, who'd been the one who'd known him the most.
'My dear one. So long since the last time I saw your golden head, your vibrant face'.
She was stock still, uncapable of moving a single muscle, uncapable of pronouncing one single whisper. He walked towards her.
'You have been lost, my dear. I can see. I can see what they did to you' He took another step towards her. 'They threw you out of this plane, out of existence itself. You weren't thrown to Hell, no. It was infinitely worse. You were thrown outside, you were thrown into oblivion. And yet you were brought back, but they brought you wrong, didn't they?'
He growled. 'Silly, unworthy humans. They made you weak. You, who had once been a queen, were turned into a slave. A slave of their desires and needs. Like when you were mortal, remember? I pulled you out of your misery back then. I couldn't do so the second time.'
He was standing right in front of her now, so close that the breath he exhaled every time he spoke touched her skin.
'You overcame that. I was never so proud of you like I was in that moment. You showed them what you were. And you broke them into pieces'.
She opened her mouth, letting out a faint whisper. 'How...how could you see? The Slayer... She killed you, like Angel killed me. He told me...'
He shook his head.
'She turned my physical vessel into ashes, it's true. But she couldn't destroy the essence. I was too powerful for her'. She shook her head, in disbelief. 'It is the truth, my dear. Did you really think a mere Slayer would kill me, that she would destroy me completely? Me, who have survived crusades and entire armies of humans and demons, of powerful spirits and necromancers? No, Darla. I am one of the Ancient Ones. I cannot die like that. I was merely thrown out of my physical form, doomed to watch the events happening around me. But not forever. I knew I would come back some day. And that day has come'.
He leaned forward, softly putting her hair away, and whispered in her ear.
'And I have come for you. You were a queen once. You will be a queen again, by my side. Your power will be even greater than before, as I won't be trapped any more. I will give you power that will know no limits. The whole world will kneel before you'.
She shook her head. 'You can't do that. You're a ghost, you have no power'.
Instead of getting angry, his smile became more pronounced. 'I will show you'.
And he did. Darla's mind was filled with images of glory and endless power, of entire nations bent before her, of rivers of scarlet blood ready to fulfill her thirst...
If there was one thing Darla had always craved for was power. The power to make everyone obey her, the power to put herself above everybody else. As a human, she'd known no power. She had been used, first by Virginia's puritane society, then by Wolfram and Hart. Her life had been fragile, her future uncertain. But with power...with power, no one would dare to use her again. She'd use them all, and throw them away when it suited her. She would no longer follow orders, but her orders would be followed. Everyone would look upon her in terror and awe, like a god...
'And that isn't all, my darling'.
With a wave of his hand, he conjured a form...the form of a tall, dark, lean man. Not a man: a vampire. One she knew too well.
He looked at her and smirked, his eye-lined eyes evilly glinting. He kneeled in front of her.
'Here I am, milady. I told you I would claw my way back from hell to lay at your side'.
Darla stared at him. She'd believed she'd never see him again, and yet here he was, looking exactly like he had in their glorious days. She glanced at the Master, the magnificent images of power still in her mind, then she looked back at her Childe, and the images of power became greater than before. Because it would not be just her who would rule the world, her lover would be by her side, and who would be able to stop them both?
She looked at him in ecstasy, and his eyes fixed on hers...and then she saw it.
There was something wrong with his eyes. They weren't the way they were supposed to be.
They were empty.
She remembered those eyes filled with emotion, with sympathy, with love, even with fear. Fear of what might happen if everything went wrong, fear of losing her, fear of losing him.
Him. Such a tiny, fragile little thing. She'd only held him once, under Angel's close watch. And when she'd seen him, she'd realised she'd never seen anything so beautiful, anything that perfect. And she discovered, or sensed, something much more powerful than power. She'd discovered the same thing that had made her go all the way to Africa and face all those trials. And she'd disovered why she couldn't fail.
'You're not real' She told Angelus. He looked up, shocked.
'I will be if you wish. If you wish it, everything will be like it used to. Better. Wish, and everything will be yours'.
Darla smiled.
'You've always been a terrible liar, even without a soul. I always believed you, though. But not anymore'.
In one quick move, she grabbed a piece of wood from the floor and tossed it through his chest. There was a look of utter surprise on his face before he turned into dust.
She stood still for what seemed an eternity.
'This wasn't how it was supposed to be. It was the other way around'.
She turned to face the Master, still clutching the improvised stake in her hand. Suddenly, he didn't look that imposing.
'But all your dreams of power? It was what you've always wished for...'
'Another time, another Darla' She said, as she crossed his heart with the stake. His body turned into dust and then, before her eyes, both his dust and Angelus' vanished.
Then she saw nothing but blackness.
When she opened her eyes and managed to stand up again, she saw someone she'd already met that night. Except that it wasn't really him...
'Angel?'
She would have recognized him anywhere, but now he didn't look at all like the Angel she'd known. He no longer looked like the savior of humanity, the invincible champion that had defeated evil so many times. His eyes were hollow, his face gaunt and way too pale, even for a vampire, his spine was bent and there were several marks on his skin, as if he had been punished endlessly. Darla thought he looked...broken. As if he had been through the worst hell of all.
'Stop' His voice sounded as if it came from somewhere miles away. 'Don't do this'.
She looked at him, disconcerted.
'But Angel, this is the right thing to do. I'm doing this for our child'.
He shook his head, a pained look in his eyes. 'No, Darla. You can't' Suddenly he looked frightened which made Darla shiver. When had been the last time she'd seen Angel like that?
'Why not?' She asked, but she was afraid of the answer.
He got a step closer. 'Because we've done so much evil...we've hurt so many... Even with a soul, you'd only destroy our child'.
Darla shook her head, horrified. 'You know I wouldn't do that, Angel! I can't harm him!'
But Angel merely shook his head, a sad look on his face...the saddest she'd ever seen.
'Yes, you can. And you will. It's in your nature'.
Darla's temper rose. 'What are you talking about?' She shot him a furious glare. 'Your nature didn't prevent you from saving humans!'
He chose not to reply, taking another step towards her instead. She didn't move, her hands clenched in fists. She didn't know what Angel was playing at, but she wasn't going to be intimidated by his cryptic speech. She had gone through too much to be stopped like that.
'You don't believe me', he said, in an even voice. It wasn't a question. 'Let me show you, then'.
Before she could react, he'd placed his hands on her forehead. And she saw.
Darla had seen many hideous things in the four hundred years she'd walked on the face of the Earth, and far too many had been provoked by herself. But this...this was beyond any horror her eyes had contemplated before.
Her hands were stained, stained in blood... their infant child's blood.
'No' She shook her head. 'NO!' She screamed, as infinite images of horror and grief appeared before her eyes. A million of possibilities were shown to her, all dreadful and terrible. In all of those alternate futures there was an End of Days...and her son. Sometimes dead, by her hands or not, sometimes hurt beyond repair, broken beyond nature. All of them horrendous and abominable, all of them more than she could take.
She fell to her knees, and burst into desperate sobs. 'No, no, don't let it be true' She cried, burying her face in her arms, more broken than she'd ever been before. Angel kneeled next to her and put a hand on her shoulder.
'I'm sorry, Darla', he whispered. 'But this is the way it is. You have to forget about all this'.
'But I-I don't understand. The soul was supposed to prevent me from...'
He shook his head sadly.
'Darla, you know better than anyone that the soul didn't prevent me from doing horrendous stuff'.
She knew. She remembered. All those lawyers dead by her hands, the look on Angel's face when he'd locked the doors... That night he'd given in and slept with her, hoping to lose his soul and end all the pain... The night they had created their child...
And the moment after...
She looked up.
'You returned. You returned to your friends, to your family... You were a Champion again'.
He shook his head again. 'That doesn't count...'
'Of course it counts! You've saved so many lives, you've helped so many souls...'
Suddenly, dawning comprehension hit her.
'This is another lie, isn't it? Like the Master and Angelus? Aren't your visions of terror the equivalent of all those visions of power?'
She rose to her feet and looked at Angel (or whatver it was) from above.
'You got it wrong. I would never harm my child. If that means being away from him, or even stake myself, by all means I'll do so. I've already showed I'm capable of doing so'. She took a step away from him. 'You're not real. You can't fool me anymore'.
As soon as the words came out from her mouth, the form of Angel vanished in a bolting light.
The blue, huge eyes appeared again.
'That was the last test, vampire. You have renounced your dreams of power, you have conquered your worst fears. You have nothing else to prove to me'.
'Now, which was your wish?'
Darla looked up, the blood no longer blinding her sight. Her face was resolved.
'I want my soul back'.