A/N: Hope everyone had a nice easter. This chapter took a little longer than I planned because it's a little... okay, who am I kidding, a LOT angsty. I know this is supposed to be an angst story, but it's something I'm not entirely used to writing, so it took a while to get my head around it. Anyway, there'll be a little more action in the story from here on in (hopefully). But for now... enjoy. Read and Review if the spirit moves you.

'Angel,' the voice said again, this time closer. Angel looked up to see the brunette bending over him, looking concerned. 'Hey. You okay, big guy?'

'Faith?' Angel asked, uncertain. 'Is that you?'

'Yeah, it's me. Large as life and twice as hot,' Faith answered. She glanced at her two companions before looking back to the vampire with concern. 'You okay, Angel? Did you bump your head or somethin'?'

Angel looked away and closed his eyes. Had he been sent out of one version of hell and into another? Or was this the real world Cordy wanted him to come back to?

'Angel,' this time it was Buffy's voice that spoke. 'We've been looking for you for weeks. Where…'

'Weeks?' he asked.

'Yeah, we heard about the showdown going on here in LA,' Faith replied. 'Figured we'd grab us some of the action. But we got here too late. Party was already over, and you were no where to be found.'

Suddenly Angel hung his head, and the two slayers and the witch were surprised to see tears on his face. 'I remember. I remember everything now. We lost.'

'Angel?' Buffy asked, concerned. 'What happened? Where were you?'

'She said I was in hell,' Angel replied, not looking at her. 'But it was dressed up like heaven.' He looked around him. 'She was wrong. This is hell.'

'She who?' Buffy wanted to know. He didn't seem to hear her.

'No, Angel,' Willow said soothingly, 'this isn't hell.' She looked around the alley at all the blood and destruction and almost reconsidered her statement. 'It might look that way, but…'

'Angel?' Buffy said softly. She took a step towards him, and to her surprise he almost cowered from her. 'It's okay. Just tell me, what happened. Where were you?'

A noise interrupted her. A not so distant roaring.

'B, we'd better get out of dodge. The natives are restless and Angel's in no condition to be in the middle of a fight,' Faith said.

Angel looked up at the sky. 'I didn't slay the dragon, did I?'

Faith shook her head. ''Fraid not, big guy. Plenty of time for that later.'

Buffy offered Angel her hand. He looked at it, hesitating. 'Are you really here?' he asked.

'Yes,' she replied. 'Come on, let's get out of here.'

The Scoobies had made the Hyperion Hotel command central on their first day in LA. They had brought around forty slayers with them, the most they could muster at a moments notice, having only received word of the impending apocalypse when it had already started.

A thousand memories flooded back to Angel as he walked through the doors of the hotel and into the lobby. He hadn't been back there since they took over Wolfram & Hart. He hadn't been able to muster the courage. Every memory of that place was tied up with Cordelia. As he entered the lobby, he involuntarily looked over towards her desk and he felt like someone had ripped open his chest.

Rupert Giles and Xander Harris were sitting in the office, both in full research mode. Angel was somewhat surprised to note that Xander no longer had the use of both his eyes.

'Angel,' Giles said with surprise. 'We were beginning to think we'd never see you again.'

Angel glances around the lobby. Several girls were sparring, others reading. 'Slayers?' he asked.

'Yes,' Giles replied. 'We took as many as we could here for what we assumed would be the apocalyptic battle. But I'm afraid…'

'You missed it?' Angel cut in. 'Don't worry. You didn't.'

The others looked confused. 'Angel, a huge battle took place. LA has become a war zone,' Giles said.

'LA's been a war zone for a while now, on and off,' Angel replied. 'And that wasn't the apocalypse, because all the chief players of the apocalypse are dead. That battle was payback.'

'Payback for what?' Willow asked.

'My team took out the members of the Circle of the Black Thorn,' Angel replied. 'The Senior Partners didn't appreciate it.'

'The Black Thorn?' Giles asked. 'I'm afraid I've never…'

'Secret society, the Senior Partner's instruments on earth. Exclusive club of demons who control the apocalypse, like I said.'

'And you killed them?' Buffy asked.

'My team did. So Wolfram & Hart rained hell down on us.'

'And it's still raining,' Willow said. 'I've been sensing dimensional portals opening a couple of times a day. That's why we were in the alley.'

'You've been going out every time a portal opens?'

'No, I sensed something different about that one,' Willow replied. 'Something familiar.'

'Me?'

'No, it…' she glanced at Buffy for a moment. 'It kinda felt like Cordelia, actually.'

Angel looked away. 'Cordy's dead.'

'Yeah, we know Angel,' Xander said sharply. 'What? You couldn't pick up the phone and let us know? Was that beneath you in your lofty office building?'

'I'm sorry. I didn't… I wasn't exactly thinking straight. And I got the impression you guys wouldn't want to hear from me. Something your friend Andrew said about me being the enemy.'

'Yeah, well you not clueing us in doesn't help you in that department,' Xander bit back.

Angel didn't try to defend himself. He simply hung his head.

'It's been nearly three months!' Xander looked ready to tear chunks off the vampire.

'Xander,' Giles said sharply. 'This isn't the time.'

'How did you find out?' Angel asked the Watcher. 'About Cordy?'

Giles replied by holding up the leather bound book he had been reading. Angel recognised it. One of Wesley's journals. 'I received a package just before I left England for LA. Wesley sent me all his diaries for the past five years, along with a scroll.'

'He must have known he wasn't going to make it,' Angel said sadly.

'Angel?' Faith spoke up. 'Wes didn't make it, did he?'

Angel shook his head. 'No one did.'

He looked at Buffy, seeing realisation dawning in her eyes. He looked away, the final moments of the battle assaulting his mind.

The battle raged all around them. Angel had lost count of how many demons he had killed, but they kept coming, like an endless sea. Illyria destroyed demon after demon, propelled by the grief she didn't understand or know how to control. Gunn fought like a champion, but Angel could see he was fading fast. He wasn't going to make it. As that thought crossed his mind, it became fact. Taking advantage of a moment's unsteadiness, a demon grabbed Gunn from behind. Angel charged forward, cutting down several demons in the process, but he was too late. The demon snapped Gunn's neck and the warrior of good fell to the ground, dead.

Angel let out a guttural yell and launched himself at the demon, cutting him in half before the creature could even think about a defence. Then Angel looked down at his fallen comrade's body and silently added him to the list. Doyle, Cordelia, Fred, Wesley. Charles Gunn. All champions. All gone.

Angel lost track of Illyria in all the carnage, but he did have one last glimpse of Spike. In his element, the vampire looked almost gleeful in the battle, cutting through as many demons as Angel had. He had just beheaded a Grogon demon when, out of nowhere, the dragon swooped. A flash of flames set Spike a light. In the fireball he had become, Angel could almost see him mouthing the words 'Oh, bollocks!' before he turned to dust as was no more.

'Spike,' Buffy said. She knew he was gone. She had sensed it when they arrived in the alley immediately after the battle. She just hadn't accepted it until now.

Angel sat in the hotel's garden staring into space, trying to ignore the smell of jasmine that served as another reminder of what he had lost. He wondered where it had all gone wrong. Things had been bad even before he accepted Lilah's offer of taking over Wolfram & Hart.

What had set all this death in motion? Was it Cordelia's ascension as a higher power? Wesley's betrayal when he took Connor from him? His one night of madness with Darla? Cordelia receiving the visions in the first place? Doyle's death? The simple act of moving to LA in the first place? His misguided belief that he could actually make a difference? Or had all this been set in motion the moment he died in an alley in Galway, only to be reborn as Angelus?

Whatever the cause, he knew that it was all down to him. He was supposed to be the champion. He was supposed to protect them all. Now, he was the only one left. He had failed his friends. And he couldn't help wondering if this was his punishment for all the death he had caused in his very long life. Maybe the mission he had been on for so long didn't make any difference. Maybe, in the end, all the Powers wanted was to take everyone he loved away from him. Make him experience at least a fraction of the pain and loss he had caused. If that was their plan, then it was working. Angel had never felt so alone. He had never experienced such pain.

Buffy approached the brooding vampire with some hesitation. He seemed broken, more lost than she had ever seen him.

'Hey,' she said softly, sitting by his side.

'Hey,' he replied, not looking up.

'I'm sorry about your team,' she told him sincerely. She couldn't imagine what she would do if she lost everyone she cared about in such a short space of time. Losing her Mom had been devastating, but she still had Dawn, Giles, Willow, Xander, all the other people she loved to see her through it. Angel had been left with no one.

'Yeah,' he said. A thought dawned on him. He looked up, and Buffy saw not only grief, but sympathy in his eyes. 'I'm sorry about Spike.'

The sincerity of his voice startled her. Angel and Spike had never gotten along as far as Buffy could tell. Certainly their rivalry over her affections had put them at odds. Sure, they had fought side by side for the past year, but Buffy honestly never expected Angel to acknowledge how Spike's death might affect her.

Brushing away a stray tear that had appeared on her cheek, she replied, 'I mourned for him after Sunnydale. Even when Andrew told me he was alive, I didn't really allow myself to believe it. But… it would have been nice to have seen him again, before…'

Angel started to nod, and then reconsidered. 'I don't know, Buffy. 'One last goodbye' meetings are a double-edged sword. On one hand, you finally get to do or say what you needed to but… the wounds it opens up… Sometimes I wonder if it's worth it. And if we truly love the other person, they know it, without us having to say it.'

'You're getting profound in your old age,' Buffy teased him gently. She got the distinct impression he was talking about himself as much as he was her, and couldn't help feel a pang of… jealousy, maybe.

'I was always profound, Buffy,' Angel smiled sadly. 'You just weren't paying attention before.'

She bit back a retort. Everything that had happened in the past few years had made her really re-evaluate her life. And she knew, deep down, he was right. She never really knew him. She only ever saw what she wanted to see, whether it was the good or the bad. She had never really understood his mission. Understood what drove him. Understood the man underneath the vampire. Only one woman had. It was then that she understood that he wasn't only mourning the loss of his team, but loss of the woman he had clearly loved.

'I'm so sorry about Cordy,' she told him, tears welling up in her eyes. With that one statement she knew she was letting him go. She had ceased being the love of his life. Someone else had taken that mantel and, deep down, after what she had read with sceptical eyes in Wesley's diaries, she knew that Cordy was the right person for the job.

Angel bent his head again, and Buffy thought she saw tears on his face. Leaving him to his private grief, she got up and went back to her team.

To Be Continued... Coming next: Giles starts to translate the scroll (which, wouldn't you know, happens to be ANOTHER prophecy), Angel goes in search of his son and the reason behind Angel's return starts to become clearer.