Part Two: I never liked you anyway

"I can not believe this," Buffy shook her head in disbelief at what was before her: another apocalypse. Like things couldn't get worse. Why was this happening now and why did Queen C, of all people, know about it before her.

"Buffy, would you just listen?" Angel raised his voice intensely, so that the inner circle of the Scoobies could enjoy that silence that they took for granted. The Slayer had been babbling off and on since she got back from patrolling, with Spike no less.

"Listen…to Cordelia Chase?" Buffy had to clarify if she heard him right. He was standing up for a girl he hadn't seen or talked to since some time last year.

"Yes. Cordelia Chase."

"No," Buffy frankly put, sitting on the bench beside the table and tossing her stakes aside.

"No?" Cordelia interjected, wishing to get a word into the heated conversation.

"That's right, Cordelia, no. I've got school, demons, Angel, Spike and oh yeah, my sister is a key; a big ball of universal energy that may explode at any time, day or night. So, no, my sister comes first."

"Look, this…"Angel snatched the scroll from the table and waved it in her face, "this is real." He paused, placing the cylinder back on the table and looking between the two.

Cordelia smacked his arm away and stepped through the invisible barricade between them. Things had to be said and she sure as hell didn't need a man, if she could call him that, in her way. Her old Queen C attitude needed to be unleashed.

"I don't need you standing up for me Angel. I'm not that scared little girl that you left seven months ago!" Cordelia snapped at him, meaning every word and hoping they would hurt him as much as he hurt her by leaving that night. Turning her attention towards Buffy, she geared up for a speech that she herself wasn't prepared to give. "Look, I know you don't want to believe me or Wes or this prophecy but it's true. It's so true."

"Why should I believe you? You've did nothing but made my life a living hell."

"Buffy, you live on the Hellmouth! And get over yourself. You are not the only supernatural being here and you are definitely not the only one affected by this," Cordelia paused, looking over to Angel again and seeing that the truth was finally coming out. "I am not going to stand here and justify myself to you. All you need to do is read." Cordelia picked up the entire scroll that Giles had unraveled on top of the table and tossed it towards her.

"I don't care if you like me or not, but there are bigger things happening here than you getting your way!" Cordelia backed away, walking back to the other side of the confided research space and grabbing another book, anxious to find out something more about the prophecy.

She couldn't stand it. For as long as she had known Buffy, and that seemed like forever, she had always gotten her way. But this time it would be different; this time Cordelia would get her way which meant the "End of Days" turned to just days and Angel.

Why did that come to mind? She really hadn't thought about if she wanted him back in her life or not. She was happy with her life; she had three heroes standing with her even though Lorne was still deciding if he wanted to play detective with them or not.

She now had Dennis too. The friendly phantom had kept her company at night, letting her watch all her bookmarked programs on television when she was around to enjoy them. She liked that about him but Dennis couldn't fill that empty place in her bed like Angel had.

Hating that empty feeling that overcame her when she went to sleep at night, she wanted to feel the warmth again like that night she slept in the arms of an Angel, literally. And when she looked at Angel now, with honey hues streaming rivers through his russet eyes, that feeling came back and left chills in her spine.

Cordelia popped out of her thoughts when the bronze tube hit the table, thrown by the hands of the Slayer.

"This, really, doesn't concern me," Buffy said condescendingly towards her old acquaintance. She was still in denial and she wasn't going to believe anything Cordelia said. "And I don't have to listen to this. I have more important things to worry about."

"I understand, Buffy, but this does concern you." Wesley poked his head from behind a book and informed her. "Have you ever heard of the Oracles?"

"What?" Buffy started on another outburst.

"Just answer the question Buffy." Giles urged her, standing from his corner of the store. "Answer the question," he insisted, his fatherly tone surrounding her and the other parties involved.

Buffy turned her attention back to Wesley and answered him, feeling Giles' gaze still upon her. "No." Buffy flipped her hair back and placed her hands on her hips secretly wondering why she was going along with this and answering her ex-watcher's question.

"But Angel has," Wesley notified the whole lot of them.

"So?" Her sassy attitude was on the verge of coming out again.

"The Oracles were…" Wesley prolonged the facts from coming out right away as he stepped near his old acquaintances and adversaries, stopping in front of Angel, who took it from there.

"The Oracles are the ones who told me that I was human," he explained. "They're a link to the Powers…like Doyle."

"Like I am," Cordelia whispered under her breath, so only Gunn who was sitting next to her would hear.

Wes turned around as he heard the trail of her soft voice linger. "What was that Cordy?"

"I was just saying that um…"

Joe Hardy also known as just Gunn piped and stood up for one of his best friends and seer. "Refocus back on the key word here people: were…was…had been…whatever," He paused between the words, not sure which one to use. "The Oracles were killed and the only link to the Powers we have is…" Gunn's voice trailed off like Cordelia's had as Wesley cleared his throat, reminding him of their promise to Cordelia: don't tell anyone. It was her thing; she didn't want anymore to know about the visions unless the Powers wanted them to know. Wesley and Gunn argued with her for a bit, but lost to the stubbornness of a seer and the forcefulness of a female. "Look, Oracles are gone. We got another link and even that link can't tell what's next."

"So, again, what does this have to do with me?" Buffy asked again, getting up off the bench and walking over to where Spike was. Leaning herself against him for support, she waited for an explanation

Cordelia watched as Angel's disgusted look grazed the PDA. Yep, always the Slayer's boy toy.

She hoisted herself up from the table again and picked up the scroll, pinpointing the section that detailed Buffy's involvement. "Heed to the sun…bla bla bla…here, she who is chosen shall harken a hero from the darkness. Through her gifts shall the souled one see his fate. By their connection shall the world be lost or saved. Can it get any clearer than that?"

Cordelia rolled up the scroll and crossed her arms, tucking the bronzed tube under one of them and stared back at Buffy as the infamous Queen C attitude came out to play.

"You're telling me that I caused this?" Buffy straightened herself up, disturbed that Cordelia would insinuate something like that.

"Do you know any other vampires with souls?" Cordelia asked the already pissed off Slayer.

"What about me?" Spike piped up from the counter behind Buffy, wondering if her would be considered souled or not.

"Spike, you're neutered, not ensouled." Angel clarified, leaning back upon the side desk that Willow and Tara were sitting at.

The silence was unbearable for all of them. Anger, resentment, guilt and loads of other emotions floated between them all. Buffy and her greater-than-thou complex flew out of the store and out into the dark, claiming that there were more demons to kill and Spike faithfully followed. They all smirked at the irony of her statement.

"Well, that wasn't awkward," Cordelia said, returning to her post at the table and angrily turning the pages of a grimy sixteenth century book said to have some sort of answers but so far there was nothing. Did she mention that she hated this plan of coming back to Sunnydale?

Angel watched her from across the room and secretly wondered why he ever chose Buffy over her. Of course eight or so months ago, he thought he was in love with Buffy. But most nights when he went to sleep after a night of fighting against Buffy or alongside her, he thought of Cordelia and that wasn't even the most confusing part of it all.

The confusing part was that he was supposed to be in love with Buffy. Wasn't he? Ever since the affair, he had tried to trust her but everything that she did made him second guess himself and wonder if she had cheated again. Then there was the thing with Spike, the weird and twisted friendship that had him permanently attached to her side like a Siamese twin.

Things had sure changed from that time until now. He would go to his job at UC Sunnydale as the historian and when nobody was consulting him about anything which was all the time, he wasn't thinking of Buffy or the latest demon that needed to be vanquished; he was thinking of Cordelia and the reason of why he left her sleeping in that bed by herself. Doyle's death had left her alone. Then he was there, providing his personal brand of comfort and then in the blink of an eye was gone.

Flashbacks came back to his mind: Cordelia cheering Doyle up after the bachelor party, inviting herself to stay at his apartment while hers was cockroach infested. And he couldn't ever forget her classic reaction when she first realized that he was in Los Angeles too: Are you still, you know, grrr? The thought of it still made him laugh and he found himself smiling in amusement.

"Something funny Angel?" Giles asked, pulling his aggravated fatherly look from Buffy's outburst to Angel's expression.

Angel looked over to the remaining team which consisted of Cordelia, Wesley, Gunn, Willow, Tara, Giles and himself. Xander and Anya had dubbed this evening a date and upon no circumstances were they to be disturbed. Angel secretly wished it was him having the quiet evening at home, but he seriously doubted if they were quiet.

"Um, no, nothing." Angel stuttered, straightening himself up and walking back towards the training room. "I'm going in back if anyone needs me." He offered the explanation before disappearing into the back and to be perfectly honest, he needed to gather his thoughts and sort out these emotions that someone seemed to arise whenever he thought of her. And somehow having Cordelia here, right in front of him just made him want to deal with them now.

The training room was dark and even though Angel could hardly see three feet in front of him, he knew his way around. He wasn't angry or sad but more frustrated and confused about things. He knew it had been over six months since he last saw Cordelia and he probably shouldn't have these feelings for a one night stand, but she wasn't a one night stand in his mind. He wouldn't think of it that way.

Placing his hand against its flat surface, he plucked a few knives from the wall, he darted them towards a tack board in front of him. Why were these feelings coming to him? From the moment he saw her come into the Magic Box with Wesley and the other new guy in her life, Charles Gunn, he felt jealous. He wanted to be the one by her side, the one she huddled to while the bullets flew past them all, lodging into bookcases about the store.

If you wanted that, you should've stayed, you idiot. Angel silently scolded himself and moved towards the tack board to remove the knives when the lights turned on. Charles Gunn was the one who stood in the doorway. He was the new guy, the one who Cordelia referred to as Joe for some reason. His dark eyes were wide open and he looked like a five year old boy on Christmas Day: excited and wow-ed about all the presents under the tree, in this case, weapons on the walls and in cabinets.

"Damn," he said, stretching out the word to emphasize that he was impressed with the collection.

"You like?" Angel asked, already knowing the answer based on the expression upon his face. He liked them; probably loved them from the first time he laid his eyes on them. Angel placed the knives back in their respectable positions on the wall and watched as Joe walked about the room, admiring each display that Giles had set up as a present to the Slayer.

Angel was the observant type and he could already tell that from only two second alone in a room together that Gunn loved fighting. He also could tell that he protected the innocent and thought the world of Cordelia. Strangely, he and Joe were more alike than he expected. Angel liked fighting, whether it verbal with Buffy or Xander or physical with Spike, he loved it, it kept him on his toes and he lived for it. It was part of what kept him going everyday.

Angel fought and tried to protect what he believed in. He believed in the good of people; the humanity and he cared about their souls. He and Buffy were similar in that way, they both were there for the mission. When he thought back on it now, he could've probably continued the mission in Los Angeles…with Cordelia. Why didn't you stay? Of course, if she would take him back would be a miracle and if he couldn't forgive Buffy, then Cordelia definitely wouldn't forgive him.

"Damn," Gunn stated again. Angel brought his attention back to Joe and observed his movements. He was still that five-year-old on Christmas Day unwrapping that BB gun that every other kid wanted. "I think I'm in love with Giles."

Angel smirked at the comment. If anyone else had heard that, Giles and Gunn would be the pit of a bad joke probably dubbed by Xander.

"I wouldn't mention that to anyone else if I were you." Angel advised the young fighter as he moved towards one of the tall weapon cabinets that housed the more commonly used swords, axes and crossbows. They were mostly for the Slayer's use, but Angel didn't care, it wasn't like she had etched her name on each and every one of the weapons. Pulling one of the swords from the back of the cabinet out, he swiped it across the air, making sure that he wanted to use this one against the dummy with already too many injuries to count.

"You train?" Gunn asked, watching Angel from the corner of his eye.

"Yeah, have to. Ex-vampire senses only go so far. Not as fast as I once was."

"So how's that working out for ya....ya know, being human and all?"

"Better than I expected. Of course, perfect happiness only lasts so long," Angel said, swiping the sword through the air again.

"I wouldn't know about that part." Gunn followed his sixth sense for weapons to the cabinet Angel had left open and searched through them, grabbing a sword similar to the one Angel had in his hands. "You game?" Gunn asked and lifted his sword up to Angel's and started to encircle him, ending up across from the ex-vampire.

Angel flashed back in his mind to the last time he had heard that popular phrase: Doyle. He was game then. He would always be game, but at this moment in time, it mean a totally different thing.

"Yo, broody…you game?" Gunn asked again, the south Los Angeles vampire hunter attitude on full blast.

"Yeah, I'm game," Angel declared as Gunn stepped forward to begin the dance that everyone referred to as fencing.

Two leaps forward, three steps back and they were doing the waltz. But this dance was a little less waltz-y and a little more cha cha-y. Their blades kissed each other and slid down the reflective metal causing the sound to pierce each of their ear drums. Angel thought of this as the perfect opportunity to reacquaint himself with a certain brunette that held onto his soul.

"So, how'd you meet Cordelia?"

"You're quick," Gunn stated, personally thinking that it would take Angel just a few minutes longer to bring the subject up. "Wes owes me a Franklin."

"You bet on me?"

"No, we bet on Cordelia."

"Who wins?"

"She does. She has a way of swindling us out of our rightfully earned money. Says it's an emergency and she needs it, then the next day we see her in a brand new outfit."

"Hmmm."

"The Ring." Gunn stated, clanging the sword against Angel's and dancing the cha-cha about the room.

"The Ring?" Angel inquired, not sure what he meant by the statement.

"That's where I met Cordelia and Wesley. She got a…they got a case while my crew got their asses stuck in that thing," Gunn paused, catching himself before he spilled her secret and then went on to reveal what The Ring actually was. "Twenty One was an Octavian match where demons battle demons…to the death. Some of my crew got their asses stuck in the ring and like a twisted fairytale come true, Evening Edition Barbie in her stiletto heels came to the rescue." Gunn stopped his blade from swinging again and held off Angel's advance, trying to predict whether the ex-lover who Cordelia swore she was over would say anything in between the clangs and two step.

That's when he heard the scream. Her scream. Gunn's grip on the blade loosened and he let it fall to the padded floor below. She was screaming and that only meant one thing in Gunn and Wes' world: a vision.

Gunn raced out of the room and Angel followed behind, not fully comprehending what was going on but like Cordelia had told Gunn once, he was a curious ex-vampire.

Everyone was gathered around her. Wesley was at the top, trying to steady her seizure-like twitches while Willow, Tara and Giles loomed over her, wondering what the hell was going on like Angel.

Gunn rounded the table and tried to help Wesley help her up, but she didn't want up. She laid there still with her eyes closed tightly and clutched onto Wesley's writing hand like there was no tomorrow. Oh, how true that statement rang in Gunn's mind.

"Okay, Joe's here. Come on girl," Joe gently helped Cordelia up and set her on the edge of the table bench. Wesley grabbed a pad of paper from the table and started to flip through it, in search of a blank sheet to write down what she saw.

"Pain…killer…"

"Painful killer demon…" Wesley spoke as he wrote and looked up at her, wanting more information.

"Pain killer, whiskey, anything!" She corrected him in a harsh tone, rubbing the bulging vein that felt like it was going to pop out of her skull any minute. "I'm going to kill Doyle…" Her softer voice replaced the harsh one as Tara quickly returned with some aspirin and a glass of water.

"I'm going to need so much more than this," Cordelia threw the tiny tablets into her throat and swallowed, not needing the glass of water that the kind witch brought for her.

"What did you see?" Wesley asked, crossing out the 'painful killer demon' on the pad of paper.

"Oh my God…" Angel softly said from behind them all. He finally put all the pieces of the puzzle together…simple math really, but he wasn't a mathematician. She had inherited the visions from Doyle. She was the vision girl…the link to the Powers.

"You're going to Rumsfield Street…north side, by the park. A gang will be there, but they're not the threat…yellow, claw-like hands…shit, howlers. They're howlers…" Cordelia recalled the things she had seen in her head and leaned into Gunn's frame.

"What was that? And how do you know that?" Giles asked quickly, pulling off his glasses and placing his hands on his hips.

"That was a vision," Cordelia paused, trying to pull her eyes open to stop the pictures from playing in her head. "A mind-splitting, brain-damaging, all night 'Freddy vs. Jason' marathon in your head vision," she elaborated, taking the bottle of aspirin that Tara brought to her once again and pulling out eight or nine tablets this time, just in case.

"Thanks Tara," Cordelia offered Willow's girlfriend a faint smile and looked back to Wesley and Gunn. "What are you still doing here? Gang going to get massacred by howlers! Go! And take broody with you." She added, twirling round in the table as she watched Frank and Joe walk up the landing and towards the door. "You're going to need all the muscle you can get."

"You're the link…" Angel stood in front of her on the other side of the table, still stunned from what he just witnessed.

"Yes! I'm the freakin' link Angel! Now just go!"