Part 8:

"Why don't you come in?" Angelus asked in a decidedly too-friendly tone, motioning for Cordelia and Xander to enter. It took a moment for his words to penetrate the fog that had descended over Cordelia's mind as she kept staring at Buffy, or what was left of Buffy. Tearing herself loose, Angelus' words registered.

She briefly looked at Xander, who was looking at her as well. From the corner of their eyes they saw that several demons had appeared at both ends of the corridor. Guards, no doubt. It seemed there was no point in running.

Xander walked in first, giving Buffy a long, tortured look as he walked past her. His hand briefly made as if to touch her, but then flinched back. Cordelia moved to follow him, but stopped when Buffy tried to make some sort of sound through her sewn-shut mouth. Which only caused Angelus to slap her.

"What did I tell you about speaking?" he asked, chiding her as one would a pet. "Besides, without that sharp tongue of yours I'm afraid you'd utter nothing but garbage anyway."

Cordelia paled, but somehow managed to walk on. Seeing Buffy like that had shaken her to the core and she could feel the brittle thing that was her sanity shiver. She didn't know how long she would be able to hold it together anymore.

The room behind the doors was a large and ornate throne room, stretching away in all directions. The ceiling was impossibly high above their heads, the room seemingly vaster than the entire base of the tower had been. The walls they could see were adorned with artwork and sculptures, gold and treasures were heaped in various spots. In regular intervals people were chained to the wall as well, none of them moving. The entire room was eerily silent.

Angelus walked past them, his demonic features impossible to read.

"I thought I'd finally quenched that rebellious streak of hers," he muttered, talking more to himself than anyone else, it seemed. "One would think that having your arms and legs cut off would make you somewhat calmer."

Looking over at Xander, Cordelia saw that he was trying to keep himself under control. His hands were shaking, curling into fists again and again. He probably would like nothing better than to attack Angelus right now, but knew that it would be pointless. The vampire would only tear him into shreds. It wouldn't kill him, but they had just seen that there were things a lot worse than death.

Angelus stopped, slapping his ridged forehead. "Oh, where are my manners. Would you like anything to drink? To eat? Ah, Cordelia, Xander, it is so nice of you to drop in. Again in your case, Cordy."

He looked at her as she wondered what he meant. "I have to say, you look a lot better than the last time I saw you. And here I thought I had gone too far with you."

"You dirty bastard," Xander muttered.

"What do you mean, too far?" Cordelia asked, not understanding. "I was never..."

Suddenly Angelus was right in front of her, so fast she hadn't even seen him move. One of his claw-like hands grabbed her chin, painfully holding her still as he looked into her eyes.

"Oh, the wonders of the human mind," he mused. "The last time I looked into these nice, shiny eyes of yours there was no one home anymore. But it seems you got better. Tell me, how much do you remember of the fun we had? Did you blank it all out or just the juicier bits?"

"Let go of her," Xander yelled, trying to attack Angelus. Without even looking the vampire brushed him away, sending him crashing to the floor where he crumbled into a motionless heap.

Something clicked in Cordelia's mind. She remembered how Xander had caught himself earlier when he had told her about seeing her as one of the prisoners. She remembered how lines of prisoners were led into the tower, looking a hundred times worse when they came out again. All that, coupled with Angelus' words...

Dear God, she had been here before. At the hands of this monster. That was why she had felt such subconscious panic upon seeing this place. Her entire body shivered, remembering things her conscious mind did not.

Was it true then? Was she really amnesiac? Had she made up some kind of alternate sequence of events in her mind simply to escape from the horror of the real world? Was all this actually real? Until earlier she had refused to even consider the possibility, but now...

"Will you share this time?" a new voice asked. One that was horrifyingly familiar. "I never get to have any fun around here."

Cordelia's eyes widened. A new vampire had entered the throne room. Like Angelus and all the others there was not a trace of humanity remaining in its appearance, but the voice, coupled with the strands of red hair still adorning its demonic head, told her all she needed to know.

"Willow," she whispered.

Angelus seemed less than pleased to see her, letting go of Cordelia to face the newcomer.

"What did I tell you about barging in?" he asked, sounding genuinely angry. "Don't you have a pet to walk?"

The 'pet' appeared form behind Willow, a huge wolf which she led on a thick chain fastened to its spiked collar. The wolf growled deep in its throat, foam at its mouth. One look into its all too-human eyes sufficed, though, for Cordelia to realize who that was.

"Oz," she managed, choking up on the word.

With a groan Xander came to, but froze as he saw the two monsters that had appeared while he was out. Did he know...?

"Xander," Willow shouted with joy. "I thought you'd crawled under a rock for good. It's great to see you again."

"Willow," he whispered, his voice clearly telling that he was only now realizing who the vampire was. Turning to look at Angelus, he growled almost as menacingly as the wolf just had. "You damn bastard, haven't you done enough already?"

Angelus sighed in annoyance. "Xander, dear boy, believe me! If there was one thing I could undo... anyway. Since you're already here," he looked at Willow, "be a dear and take these two to the dungeons. And don't lay a hand on them! That pleasure I reserve for myself."

"But I just want to..."

"NOW," Angelus thundered, causing Willow to flinch.

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Neither Cordelia nor Xander were in any state to put of resistance. Willow and Oz led them down some stairs and into a dank cell, where they were chained to the wall. Several other shapes were already there, chained in similar fashion, but all of them seemed unconscious (or dead? Was that even possible in this place?) and didn't react to their presence at all.

Willow left, not without telling them once again how great it was to have them back. The bubbliness of her voice contrasted sharply with her demonic appearance. After she was gone both humans were silent for a long time before Cordelia found her voice again.

"This can't be real," she whispered, trying to convince herself. "This isn't how it happened. Somehow I can still make it right."

"I'm sorry," Xander just said. "I was hoping... maybe I actually thought..." He fell silent again, out of words.

"Faith," Cordelia continued, oblivious of Xander's words. "Maybe she's here somewhere. Kendra died before the world went to Hell, so she was called as the Slayer. Maybe she can do something."

Unless, of course, there was no Faith. If she had just imagined everything that had gone down, then maybe Faith had never existed outside her own mind. Or maybe there hadn't been time to call a new Slayer before Akathler swallowed the world.

Maybe there was no hope at all.

"Willow," Xander muttered. "Oh, Willow, I'm so sorry."

"Don't be sorry for that bint," a new voice wheezed.

Cordelia, torn out of her thoughts, looked over at what she had originally assumed to be a pile of rags or something. The pile moved now, revealing a body beneath it. A decidedly non-human body. A vampire. Only this vampire looked like someone had fed it into a meat grinder. There seemed to be no bone unbroken and no piece of skin left unblemished.

"She's got it better than the lot of us," the vampire said, its voice carrying a very British accent.

"Spike," Xander cursed. "I had hoped you at least would be gone."

The broken vampire laughed, but it seemed to cause him quite a bit of pain. Cordelia could now see that he was also chained to the wall, though the chain had more slack than hers.

"So Spike?" she said, trying to ward off the despair she felt clinging at her mind with some scathing remarks. "Angelus still pissed you betrayed him?"

Spike growled, but of all the growls she had heard today it was by the far the least menacing of them all.

"Bloody poof," Spike muttered. "Told him sending humanity to Hell was a bad idea, but did he listen? No! And now I'm stuck here with you two losers. Just fabulous."

Looking at him, Cordelia estimated that Angelus must have tortured him for decades to get him into such a sorry state. Still clinging to some left-over hope, she decided to ask some questions.

"Spike, how did it come to this?" she asked. "What happened that day in the mansion? How did Buffy lose?"

Spike looked up at her, his feral eyes gleaming with some left-over defiance. Then he sighed, though, sinking in upon himself.

"Oh whatever," he said. "Might as well pass the time until Peaches comes back for his next round of jollies."

TO BE CONTINUED