Part Three: Foreseen
Buffy walked alongside Spike, the only vampire that she knew nowadays, pounding the tops of headstones as she passed them by. She wasn't really angry at everyone anymore but she still didn't like the fact that Queen C had shown back up in Sunnydale after swearing if off almost a year ago. Even worse was that her at-the-moment ex-boyfriend was taking her side.
So what if it was a prophecy? Not all prophecies came true…well, that was a lie. All the ones that she and her entourage had endured through the years came true. She watched as Spike walked beside her and felt the muted flame ignite the tip of his cigarette. If she smoked, she would be grabbing it out of his hand and inhaling it.
"Come on now, fess up. What's on that pretty little mind of yours?" Spike asked, inhaling the tobacco and exhaling a puff of smoke into the cool night air.
Buffy smiled over at him, thankful for the inquiring gesture but wasn't really sure if she should wanted to discuss this matter with him. But then again, he seemed to be the only one on her side right now.
"This have anything to do with the cheerleader?"
"It has everything to do with her and that stupid prophecy," Buffy huffed under her breath. "Did I mention that I don't like her?"
Smirking at that tidbit of information, knowing that if she wanted to, she could go on, Spike commented wryly, "More than once."
"I don't know…I mean the prophecy sure but why does she have to be involved?" Buffy paused, getting a hold of her feelings before she let them out in one breath. "I just don't trust her. She shows up, however long it's been after and tells us that the world is ending and to work on her clock…no, I don't think so. That's not how it works. And Angel, don't even let me get started on him."
"Please don't," Spike added, "I don't think I could stand another Angel saga for the fourth night in a row."
Buffy laughed at his comment. It was true. Every night they would go out and patrol and he would let her rant about her day at school, Dawn and more likely nowadays, Angel. It was just plain weird…talking to Spike about Angel and that was really starting to creep her out.
Turning to the side, she smiled more at him for no good reason at all. He looked back at her and blew out another puff of smoke as his cigarette dwindled down to its last clump of ash.
"I need to slay something," She stated, looking around the cemetery for her first victim of the night.
Spike watched as she scouted the graveyard for the undead and demon-y and as much as he wanted to join up with her and kick some ass himself, he purposely lingered behind. Contemplating all that was said in the past three hours, he ran the facts through his head. Prophecies were always around and just because this one came from the direction of the ex-May Queen, didn't mean that they should wave it off and go about their merry ways. It was a prophecy and the Chosenwas involved, no matter if she wanted to be or not.
"Behind you Slayer," he told her, not needing to look up from the dark grass he was staring at to know that an undead American was standing amongst them.
Buffy swirled around and gave the vampire a faux smile. Blond hair whirled in the wind as she flung her leg around, kicking him in the head and Spike watched as the reborn hit the ground. Dust filled the air between them and he could sense the ear to ear grin on her face.
"Feel better?"
"Yea, much better," she said and looked around the graveyard, searching for more, "got any more?"
Rumsfield Street never used to seem this long. It was a short street with a few businesses, a cluster of craftsmen-style bungalows. One of the many city cemeteries was down the way and it had a public park at the end. They had past the businesses and they were on the block of homes, yet the street still went on.
It seemed that they had been walking forever and he had been mumbling for longer. That's what Angel did nowadays, he mumbled. Mostly about nothing in particular, but tonight it was different, it was all about her tonight.
"I don't understand. Why didn't she call and tell me? Is she that stubborn?" Angel talked to himself aloud as Wesley and Gunn rolled their eyes for thousandth time. He had asked himself the same question over and over again for the last ten minutes and they were getting annoyed.
"Angel, man, stop," Gunn advised him, clutching onto the axe he had picked out of Giles' weapons collection and praying that he wouldn't have to use it before they left Sunnydale.
Angel kept yammering, he didn't care if they had heard the question a bazillion times, he just couldn't understand why she didn't call him. "Why didn't she tell me? Why?"
"You weren't exactly beating down the door to check up on her either," Wesley clarified, his British accent echoing down the confined street as they headed towards the park.
Wesley was right. He wasn't beating down the doors to find out how she was, what she was doing or even if she was still alive. He assumed she was alright because she was Cordelia Chase and the Cordelia Chase that he knew once upon a time was strong and free-willed.
"Howlers…where do I know them from?" Gunn asked, cutting into his thoughts and trying to remember why their name rang familiar in his mind.
"Claws, smell like sulfur," Wesley tried to refresh Gunn's mind of the demons they had run into time and time again, but Gunn just stared back at him with a blank stare. "Tried to claw us to death."
"Oh yea…now I remember. Nasty things."
Not listening to the side conversation about the Howler demons that they would be battling in a short while, Angel still mumbled to himself, "Why didn't she tell me? Does she think that little of me not to call and tell me? Did she hate me that much?"
"Angel, stop," Gunn forcefully said again, actually making him stop in his tracks.
Angel looked up at his fellow swordsmen and asked again, "Does she hate me that much?"
"You don't know the half of it," Gunn stated as Wesley turned around in front of them. "And probably don't want to."
Walking up ahead again, the two men turned around after realizing that Angel was still behind them in the exact same spot. Walking back to him, they both had the gut feeling that this wasn't going to end until they let him go inside the wonderful world of vision girl with free admission.
"Angel, plain and simple, she fell for you. Then you left," Gunn simply put, not knowing how else to put the situation that they all were involved in.
"What did you expect Angel? You showed up right after her only friend in the world perished and left immediately the next morning," Wesley put in harsh words that rang true. "I found her at an underground auction house ready to have her eyes gouged out and she didn't care, she was going to let them take her eyes. All because the one man who she thought was there to rescue her left her all alone."
"You saved her?" Angel questioned him. The stickly ex-watcher he knew couldn't even hold an axe right the last time he had seen him. At least he knew now that Cordelia didn't tell them the whole story. She had kept it hidden as he did.
"We saved each other," Wesley said, trying to push Angel along so they would reach their destination before it was too late for their innocents to be saved. "While it is true that I may have had some feelings for Cordelia in the beginning, she is my best friend and I would do anything for her."
"That's why when she went all vision-wacky, we both saved her. Had to break into Wolfram & Hart and did I mention that that was fun?" Gunn pulled his attention back to Wesley remembering the diversion his team put up so the whole firm could stumble about and try and stake the vampire that was allowed on their premises. Pulling his attention back over to Angel, he explained further, "We need her just as much as she needs us," recalling all the adventures they had gone through, both demon-y and non-demon-y in his mind.
"Somehow, after you left her all alone, she still couldn't let go; kept thinking you were coming back," Wesley stated, taking tiny steps alongside them heading towards the park.
"You were all she could talk about," Gunn simply stated, watching his feet as they headed for the park that seemed to be miles away. "It was either about the hair gel or peanut butter in the bed."
"For hours upon hours."
"That turned into days," Gunn said as the ball bounced back to him for the conversation to continue, "Until…"
"Until? There's an 'until'?" Angel piped up, a small quiver in his voice as he heard that word. "There can't be an 'until', that means that she…"
"Got over you?" Gunn laughed at the notion. "We could only wish for that. We set her up on many dates, only to hear about how "his hair wasn't gelled" or "he's not the dark avenger" or my personal favorite, "he's not broody," two hours later," Gunn said, air quoting Cordelia's repetitive phrase that Wesley and him had heard one too many times.
Pulling his attention over to their surroundings, he noticed the tops of the tombstones spreading out into a vast darkness and into the length of the road. "Cordy didn't say anything about a cemetery, did she?"
"No she didn't and she probably didn't see it," Wesley offered the excuse for their seer.
"The cemetery has always been there," Angel told them of the northernmost cemetery in the town of Sunnydale. "So she didn't?"
"What?" Wesley inquired, not knowing what Angel was asking about: Cordelia or the cemetery.
"Get over me? She didn't, did she?"
"Did you get over her?" Gunn asked, stopping in the street.
"What?"
"Ever since we got here, you been asking about her, staring at her…did you get over her?" Gunn swung around his axe for emphasis, wanting to know if he or Wesley could put their trust into a man who hurt their seer.
Angel fiddled with his sword that he brought along, not knowing what to say. He never really thought about it before. He didn't think he was into her until she resurfaced and even then he was having mixed feelings of guilt combined with desire and all that came in between.
"That's what I thought," Gunn assumed and left the conversation at that. They continued down the darkly lit street, the gumshoes taking notice of the rather large cemetery in the small town while Angel contemplated his status with their seer. Angel finally brought his gaze up to street level and looked around his surroundings just as Gunn turned to Wesley and said, "Damn, this is a long street. Are you sure it was Rumsfield?"
"Cordelia saw it."
"And Cordy's visions are never wrong," Gunn finished the phrase that they had been saying forever.
Angel, Wesley and Gunn scampered up the road hurriedly to get to their destination to guard the gang of innocents that the Powers told them were to be saved. Dark clouds filled the sky and the only luminance on the long path was two lonely street lamps that looked like they were from the seventeenth century. Rusted inside and out, the city still managed to keep the lit and standing.
Shadows from within the cemetery caught Angel's eye and caused him to momentarily stop thinking about Cordelia, her vision and what he was going to do about reconnecting with her. Gunn and Wesley walked up ahead, intent on getting to their innocents and demons before it was too late, but Angel stalked behind and kept an eye on the shadows that danced in the night.
They were vampires, one at least. The other shadows ran behind, like they were trying to catch up with it.
"Guys," Angel beckoned Gunn and Wesley's attention.
"No time Angel, Howlers up ahead," Gunn stated, not caring about whatever beckoned the ex-creature-of-the-night's attention from deep within the graveyard.
"Not even vampires?"
"Unless they're vampire assassins from Wolfram & Hart, we can afford to let them by."
"At least for now," Wesley added on to Gunn's statement. Angel didn't like it: leaving one, possibly three vampires out on the loose to kill and raise havoc but the Howlers were just as important, if not more.
The Slayer and Spike were out patrolling as well, he had to remind himself. Shrugging his shoulders, he ran ahead to catch up with the sleuths. They were almost at the entrance to the park, but upon hearing the screams from inside, utilized the legs they had and sped up, reaching the north end just as the Howlers were set to attack. The Howlers stopped from mauling their victims when they and the rest of the state of California heard Gunn's echoing whistle. "Howdy boys, long time no see."
Angel watched as Gunn raised his eyebrows, obviously ready for a fight or two. Putting his thoughts of Cordelia aside for the moment, Angel lifted his sword to start the massacre as the Howlers started walking towards them. "We gonna do this?" He questioned the sleuths' intentions. He wasn't scared, no, never, but with yellow bubbles foaming at the their mouths, the Howlers weren't his first choice of demons to kill.
"Hell yeah," Gunn answered as his axe lifted up and charged towards the demons, not waiting for another quick question from Angel to stop their plan of destruction.
The night was finally settling in the horizon over the town of Sunnydale. The three heroes walked side by side down the last length of Main Street as neon yellow goop plopped off of their clothes onto the dark pavement.
"This way," Angel pointed out, rounding a curved part of the street that lead straight to the front door of the Magic Box. All three were tired after hacking up Howlers and trying to explain to the supposedly badass gang what those things exactly were. Gunn fed them the unbelievable story of aliens from outer space and that the three of them were the real men in black. And much to Angel's relief, they believed it.
Opening the door to the now closed, but still trashed Magic Box, Angel looked around for Cordelia. He didn't know how he was going to approach her, but he had to…he had to talk to her.
"Everything go alright?" Giles asked as he let the broom lean against the bookshelf and brought his attention to the threesome standing on the landing.
"Howlers got hacked…all is right in the world," Gunn said, wiping off the axe with a spare towel that Giles had laying over on the desk. "Just a normal night in the life of Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys," he added just to put a smile on his and Wesley's faces.
"Where are the girls?" Wesley inquired, his glasses coming off his face and being thrown on the surface of the cluttered table.
"Willow and Tara went to pick Dawn up from her friend Janice's and then went home. Cordelia is in the back," Giles paused, looking towards the door, "doing Lord only knows what."
"With all do respect, Rupert, Cordelia isn't the same girl you once knew," Wesley told his old mentor as he took a seat on the bare bench.
"Yea, that girl has got a mean left hook, trust me on that," Gunn added into their conversation as he laid his axe across the table and took a seat next to Wesley.
"Understood; we all change Wesley," Giles lingered, his gaze still focused on the half open door to the training room. "She's so…"
"Strong," Angel finished for the elder watcher, himself staring at the open door to the training room. He could hear clanging for a moment and then it stopped. His attention was pulled back to the present room as the front door opened again, the bells chiming as Buffy and Spike walked in all laughing and chum with one another.
All Giles could do was let out a heavy sigh and pray that patrolling went as planned and Spike didn't drag her off to another kitten poker game again. Gunn polished off the sword that Wesley had used and grouped it together with the axe that lay across the table and looked down at all the open books, hesitating about getting back to the research mode that they had been in for the past seven months already.
Angel reached over the table, grabbing the weapons and pausing slightly for effect. "I'm gonna go talk to her," he announced, silently seeking approval of Wesley and Gunn before he made any kind of move. They both nodded in unison, wishing him good luck in their inner thoughts.
"Talk to who?" Buffy asked, interested in the plot of this story in itself.
"Not now, Buffy," he begged her not to start. He knew that she knew who he was going to talk to and for once she didn't have a say in it.
"What are you going to talk about? The latest Paris fashions?"
"At least it would be better than any of our conversations," he stated, continuing to moved towards the training room.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Not now, Buffy," he told her in a tone that told her she was getting in his way. Angel tightly clenched the blade of the sword he was carrying and entered the dimly lit room and caught eye of a silhouette in the center of the room, punching the dummy that Giles had bought for Buffy. Throwing down the weapons onto the couch, the temptation was greater than he anticipated.
He had talked about her all night, thought about her all night and now, as she still punched and kicked the dummy, sweat beading on her brow in a white tank top that he assumed was under her sweater that she wore earlier in the day, he couldn't help it: he wanted her.
Striding up beside her, he caught her arm as she went to smack down on the cheap imitation leather hanging from a string and swung her body around to his. He held her in his arms for a moment, her body damp from the sweat of the workout. He could feel the heat arise between them as she set her hand upon the fabric of his long sleeved shirt. A fair gold twinkled in her eyes as she looked up at him, probably wondering what the hell he was doing.
He wanted to kiss her and he knew the consequences of that: him getting slapped, her packing up with the Hardy Boys and returning to Los Angeles without a chance of him seeing her ever again. But the tiny little demon sitting atop his shoulder told him to screw the consequences…and he did. Slowly, he lowered his mouth to hers and captured her lips. A mix of velvet with silky wet smoothness covered his own mouth, caressing back with equal desire. She broke the kiss off, backing away from his lips and his embrace and touched her lips with her fingers. He waited for the slap on the face, but it didn't come.
"Wanna tell me what the hell you were thinking?" She yelled, outraged and confused as to why he would even think that he could do that.
"I…I don't know, but…"
"But what Angel?" She snapped, clearly not interested in an excuse.
"You kissed back."
"I kissed back? No, I don't think so, I know when I kiss back and I didn't kiss back," Cordelia skated around the fact, knowing she did but didn't want to admit it. His lips had tasted so fine and melted into hers, like they were meant to.
"You kissed back Cordy."
"Hold it right there Mr. I-leave-my-friends-so-I-can-finally-get-some, one, you don't have the right to call me that. Only my friends can call me that. Two, I didn't kiss back so drop it."
Angel leaned himself against the pommel horse that was flush with the wall and watched as she slowly paced around the dummy, who looked like it had taken enough of a beating for one night. She was graceful even when she was furious; swift kicks floated through the air and hit the dummy with a force that made him swing from side to side, thanking the Powers up above that it wasn't him. She had gotten good over the past months, probably thanks to the experienced demon hunter Charles Gunn more than Wesley, even though the ex-watcher could hold his own if needed.
"Why didn't you call me?" he asked quietly as Cordelia steadied the dummy punching bag so she could hit it again. It was a question that had run through his head all night and Wesley's retort of the phone not ringing off the hook on her end either as well.
"Why?" Cordelia paused, mad at him for basically everything that had happened and was yet to happen. "Why didn't I call you?" She went on, getting even more offended that he would ask such a question as she repeated the question thrice. "Why didn't I call you? Oh, let's see Angel, probably because you really didn't have a right to know. You walked out on me…twice!"
"Cordy, I have more than a right to know…"
"It's Cordelia to you, Angel," she corrected him in a harsh tone, hating the sound of her nickname rolling off of his tongue; he definitely didn't have a right to call her that. He lost that right a long time ago.
"Doyle was my seer…" Angel said, his voice becoming increasingly intense.
"Then he was mine," she snapped at him. "Are you forgetting that you left us with a city full of demons and orders from the Powers that needed to be filled?"
"I know I left, Cord…elia," he stuttered on her name as he saw the glint of anger in her honey hued eyes.
"You left us so you could get boned with as Doyle put it a sweet little blonde thing. And no matter how you look at that Angel, it was wrong!" Cordelia yelled a little bit louder at him. She paused again and tried to regain her thoughts that were scattered all over her brain and between the heat rising. "And it's not like my phone was ringing off the hook either."
Cordelia smacked her palms against the punching bag in front of her, letting out a bit of anger that was directed towards Angel. "You expect to come back here and start talking to me like we're friends, but guess what? We're not friends. You can't do this…you can't pretend like nothing happened, because it did," Cordelia punched the dummy to the side and walked closer, getting in his face. "It happened, and you weren't there."
"Cordelia, I don't know what to say to you. Sorry doesn't seem enough,"
"You're right, it doesn't and it isn't enough. It will never be enough," Cordelia stepped back and got some space between them. Space was good, it was needed. Brushing the loose hair out of her face and tucking it behind her ear, she was tired; tired of everything. She hadn't even been back in Sunnydale for a day and already she was homesick. If she were in Los Angeles, Dennis would be cooking her dinner and she would be getting a chance to watch a movie of some kind that she had been itching to see. But no, she was here…with Angel. In a dark training room. Arguing about stupid visions.
"How long have you known?" Angel paused, slowly looking up at her, "about the visions?"
"Seven months, two days and three hours," Cordelia rattled off a ballpark time frame just to put a halt on this conversation. She didn't want to argue with him especially about visions. "Why did you leave?"
"You know why I left,"
"Not the first time, the second time," she asked, backing up to the other side of the room and sitting down on the couch. Like the vision question laid on his mind, that question haunted her dreams and she couldn't go to bed without thinking of it. "Why did you leave?"
Angel walked towards her, eyeing the spot beside her that was empty. She was mad and he didn't blame her, he felt the same way because she didn't call and tell him about the visions, but she needed to hear something on his part. The "I-don't-know" line just wouldn't do.
He wanted to tell her that it was for the same reason as the first time, but that would be another lie. He regretted his decision now; coming back to Sunnydale to be with Buffy. Even though a man would never admit it, an ex-vampire who's been getting back in touch with his human emotions could: he was scared, scared of facing the morning after a one night stand, even though he still couldn't and wouldn't think of it that way.
Cordelia Chase wasn't a one night stand or a friend with benefits and she never would be. Truth was that there were no words to describe Cordelia. She was brutally honest, beautiful, passionate about whatever she set her mind to and as Angel sat down beside her, he felt his heart jump as she made eye contact with him again. He was scared of what would've happened: to him.
"Angel?" Her quiet voice said his name in a soothing way that made him want to kiss her again.
"If I told you that I didn't know, would you believe me?" He asked back, leaning back onto the couch's worn leather.
"No."
"Then I don't have one. But that doesn't explain why you didn't call," Angel elaborated. He used to be her friend and his brain couldn't quite grasp the fact that she didn't call him. "You had…"
"Wesley," she cut him off before he could go on, "I had Wesley and then I had Gunn and geez Angel…you were the one thing I had left in the world and you left…twice!" Cordelia got up from the couch and swirled around, staring at him, "Was the sex too boring for you?" Cordelia let it out, her voice increasingly louder.
Disgusted at the man sitting in front of her, Cordelia turned back around and faced the open door. What was she doing? She wanted to tell him everything…about the demonic spawn babies, the auction house, Jhiera of the Oden-Ta clan that burned people from the inside out and even about Lindsey McDonald trying to go straight but she didn't, feeling that he didn't have a right to know. If he had been there, he would've witnessed everything first hand and been a part of her life instead of just part of her daily dreams.
Her eyes drifted back to him from the open door, deciding it was time to get out of the silenced training room and into the light where her friends were at back to him. His face was saddened a bit, looking like his world had disappeared from right before him and she wanted so much to walk up to him and kiss him, make the sadness go away, but she didn't.
What was happening to her? She wanted to kill him for leaving her like that and yet she still wanted to love him and confess everything. She wanted to rush up to him and kiss him and make love to him all night long. But she couldn't take this, she had to get out of this room all because she didn't trust herself if she stayed just two more seconds.
She started for the doorway, knowing she had to get out of this room. Heck it would be better if she could get out of this store and out of this town. Don't look back, don't look back, she reminded herself to resist the temptation; it was hard not to look back, she just wanted to see if he was sitting in the same position or running after her, like she imagined so many times.
She stood her ground, slowly taking tiny steps to make her exit more dramatic for him. She had gotten her hopes to high, she thought. She came to Sunnydale with hopes that he would finally see what he was missing out on, but with his lack of running after her factor, she tossed that thought out of her mind altogether.
"Cordelia," his voice was just above a whisper and just enough to make her swing around, her shoulder-length hair flying in the wind for another dramatic effect. She stood still, waiting for something else to come out of his mouth and praying that it wouldn't be another sorry excuse that he had thought of in the two minute time frame.
"What is it Angel?" she asked quietly too, letting a sigh as she looked at him walking her way. He was getting close, too close. Comfortable was two feet away from him, but when he was two centimeters away, it was unbearable.
"I'm sorry, for everything," he started to apologize to her and reached for her hand that gripped her jeans pocket ever so tightly. Inching closer to her moment by moment, they felt each other take a deep breath as neither were prepared for what came next. "I can't ask you to forgive me, because you probably wouldn't, but I can ask you to try," Angel said, his fingers drawing particularly nothing in the palm of her hand as he brought it near his face.
"Angel," she started to speak, but was cut off by an affectionate kiss in her palm. The touch of his lips on her skin made her heart skip a beat and then stand still. How could this be happening? She was so mad at him for what he did but she was getting swept away by just one kiss that told her he was sorry. If he kissed her again, she would kiss back and wouldn't deny it. She wanted him to kiss her this time. She could almost feel her heel pop because she wanted it so bad. But this was too much, way too much. Removing her hand from his, she pulled it back behind her and stepped away.
"Everything all right in there?" Giles' question echoed into the training room and lingered among them. They both stood silent, not sure what to tell Giles or to say to each other. Things definitely weren't okay, if anything they had just gotten more complicated.