Title: Immortal Miracles

Author: Kristin Hulett Buffy and the Scooby Gang find out about the prophecy about Angel turning human, i.e. the Shanshu prophecy. Then they get some strange dreams and prophecies of their own.

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters on Buffy and Angel. I am only a lowly fan who liked the Angel/Buffy relationship and has my own ideas about the prophecy Wesley found. The only characters that are possibly mine are the members of the Council of Miracles (and Megan, in the epilogue). Meaning, don't sue me because what would you expect to get out of a 23-year-old without a job, driver's license, or anything that could possibly mean my family's rich. All you would get would be a lot of junk and a possibly psycho golden retriever.

Author's note : This part starts off at the same place the previous part starts off at.This part shows what's going on in Sunnydale while Giles is talking to Angel in LA.

Part Seven

Xander hangs up the phone. He then realizes that Giles had given him an order. He hurries out of his apartment, grabbing his jacket on the way out the door.

A few minutes later, he bursts into Buffy and Willow's dorm room. Buffy is sitting on her bed, thinking, and looks up when the door opens.

"Xander! What're you doing here? Is something up?"

"Huh? Oh, no. No! I just needed to know where Willow went. Have you seen her? Wait a minute, of course you've seen her, she was heading over here yesterday, and she lives here, so I'm stupid. Do you know where she went?"

"Um. She said she was heading to the magic shop and then Tara's. Why?"

"Oh, no reason. She was supposed to meet me." He is clearly lying and doing a bad job of covering it.

Buffy is wary. She can tell that there is something that Xander is hiding from her, but she can't do anything to find out what it is. "OK . . . If she comes back, I'll tell her you were looking for her."

"Well, I'll go see if she's at Tara's, and then I'll probably go home. Call me if you see her."

At this, Xander leaves the room, mentally yelling at himself for being so obvious that he's hiding something. Buffy goes back to trying to figure out how to tell Riley about the prophecy.

Xander exits the building and immediately runs into Willow. She acts surprised that he is at her dorm, but she also still seems a little angry about yesterday.

"What are you doing here?"

"Will! I was looking for you. Giles called me and told me to tell you that he's in LA, and is looking for Angel and will call me back with more information." The message comes out in a rush.

"What? What did you just say?"

"Giles called me from LA. He was going to look for Angel. He said he'd call me back when he gets more information." Xander speaks more slowly this time. When he is finished relaying the message, he pauses to wait for a response.

"Oh. OK. Well, I talked to Tara, and we're going to look for a spell to find out if Buffy's really immortal." Willow gestures that she's going to go inside. "Remember, we're not supposed to let Buffy suspect anything."

Xander nods. He says, "I know. Besides, Giles told me that, too."

"Fine. Be careful, and don't tell Anya. I don't think we can trust her not to say anything."

Xander is walking away while she says this. When she says her last sentence, he turns his head and looks at her. Then he turns it back and continues walking. Willow enters the building a minute later, after contemplating the new events.

Buffy is still sitting on her bed in the dorm room. She picks up a magazine and starts flipping through it idly. A few seconds later the phone rings.

"Hello?"

"Hi. It's Riley."

"Oh, hi! What d'you need?"

"We need to talk."

Buffy gets really quiet. After a few seconds, she speaks. "OK. But let me ask why. Answer me honestly."

"Last night, I was going on a quick patrol of the cemeteries on this side of town, like you asked me to, to double-check that we got all of the vamps there. Well, I ran into Spike." Riley starts to tell her the story.

Riley and Spike are facing off in the middle of the cemetery.

"Hello, soldier boy."

"Hello, Spike." Riley is speaking sarcastically. "Nice to see you here on this lovely night."

"I thought I might find you out here. You do whatever she asks you to, don't you? You're almost as bad as Angel, who was practically her lap dog." Riley flinches when Spike mentions Buffy's ex.

Spike continues talking, conversationally, almost as if he's talking to a friend, if he had had any. "Speaking of, I found out some juicy information concerning him and your honey." Riley doesn't respond, and Spike just continues talking. "I was kind of eavesdropping on a little meeting of the gang. You actually weren't there, as a matter of fact. Well, anyway, back to the story. They were talking about some dream or something that your little Slayer gal had had the night before. She said it had to do with Angel." At this, Spike pauses. He clearly is enjoying watching Riley squirm.

Riley finally can't take it anymore. "What? What was the dream about?"

Spike acts like he's considering whether or not to tell him. His sadistic side wins, and he answers Riley. "Some kind of oracle group said that Buffy's meant to be with Angel, and they were going to make her immortal, because of some prophecy. I left when I started to get bored with all the sappy details."

A series of emotions cross Riley's face. Finally he speaks, "It's not worth it to beat you." Riley turns around and stalks out of the cemetery, heading home.

"I couldn't sleep last night. I finally decided to ask you if it was true."

Buffy has sat through the entire story, and now she answers him, haltingly. "Yes, it's true. There is a prophecy saying that I am supposed to be with Angel. I'm not sure about the being made immortal. That's because there's a prophecy about Angel turning human and I have to be alive then so this prophecy . . ."

Riley cuts her off, rather rudely. "Well, I'm sorry you wasted your time on me. I'll give you up quietly as long as you don't ever try to speak to me again."

"But, can't we still be fr . . ."

"No. Goodbye." Riley hangs up.

Buffy holds the receiver to her ear for a second longer, as if she thinks it was a joke and soon someone will tell her. Then it hits her. She had waited too long to tell Riley and now she can't fix things. Right when she is hanging up the phone, Willow walks in the door.

"Hi, Buffy! Who was on the phone?" Willow sees the lost look on her friend's face, and realizes. "Oh. Riley found out, huh?"

Buffy just nods. "Yeah. Now I can't speak to him ever again." Then her face gets hard. "I ought to kill Spike for that!"

"Spike? Is that who told Riley? How does he know?"

"He was eavesdropping on our meeting." Buffy has by now gotten up and is heading to the door.

"Wait! Calm down. Killing Spike isn't going to help anybody. How about if I go and talk to Riley, explain the situation. You just stay her and try to calm down."

"It's not going to do any good. I already tried to explain to him. He wouldn't listen."

"Sit down. I'll at least try. If the door gets slammed in my face, then we can find a way to hurt Spike badly. OK? You stay here, watch TV, read a magazine. You know, do something relaxing." Willow leaves the room and closes the door behind her. Buffy wryly grins at the door and picks up her magazine to try and obey her best friend's orders.