Chapter Ten
The two vampires entered the hotel, the blonde heading up the stairs to his room to make good use of his personal punching bag while his sire went over to his office. When Angel opened the door, he found his lover waiting for him. Giving the brunette a kiss, he noted the troubled expression on her beautiful face. "What's wrong CC?"
"Where's Spike?" Cordelia had been running over the events at the shop for the last thirty minutes as she waited for the vampires to return and while she was sure the woman she had seen was indeed Willow, she wasn't sure whether to tell the blonde. He had been so strongly affected by the hacker's death that the seer didn't know how he would react to the news and thought it would be better to investigate further before he was told.
"Upstairs, why?" Closing the door, he sat next to his secretary, trying to figure out what was going on.
Deciding that the best approach would be to just tell him straight out, she looked him straight in the eye. "I saw Willow."
Sadness filled the chestnut pools. "Willow's dead, CC."
"I know that, but I saw her. Alive. Tonight at the shop, when I was getting the herbs, I saw her. She looks a lot different, and I think she goes by Ash now, but it was her, I know it was." By now, the former cheerleader was pacing the large office as she explained what had happened less than an hour before.
Angel listened intently as she described the events that had transpired at the small store. When she was done with the short narrative, he shook his head, not quite sure what to make of the situation. Willow had died five years ago, in Spike's arms in a dark alley in Sunnydale. Her body had been taken to the city morgue shortly thereafter. And yet Cordelia swore the girl she saw was the same Willow Rosenberg.
*But how is that possible? Cor said she wasn't a vampire, so how can she be alive?* The sound of his childe descending the hotel stairs prevented further thought or discussion, but the dark-haired vampire was determined to figure out what was going on, and who exactly his lover had seen at that shop. Before he was able to make any more plans, that bleach blonde poked his head into the office.
"I'm gonna go for a stroll, see if I can't find any demons to pummel, wanna come Pops?" Angel nodded in agreement and gave his seer a quick kiss before joining Spike in the lobby. The younger vampire grinned at the girl's look of disappointment.
"Don't worry Mum, I'll have him back in no time." Chuckling at the young woman's muttered curses at the hated title, he led his sire out into the warm night.
Duncan swore bitterly as he followed the two immortals into an alleyway. He and Ash had been on their way back from the cafe when they had been intercepted by the man who had mistakenly challenged his companion. Many individuals had been misled by the girl's young age and petite form, thinking she would be easily defeated. Had he not known her, he might have thought so as well, but he did know her, and he knew what she was capable of. Her mortal background had prepared her well for her life as an immortal, add to that her magical power and innate fighting abilities and she was a fierce opponent indeed. She rarely used magic when she fought, opting for straightforward combat. However, when in dire straights or when up against someone who did not fight fair, she would make use of her mystical skills.
She may have only been immortal for five years, but she had begun her training much sooner, if only in the form of her experiences with the slayer. She also had the advantage of having Death himself as her teacher for this never ending test of survival. Methos, oldest of immortals, former Horseman of the Apocalypse, had personally guided her into her new life.
The two had separated three years ago, and she had traveled extensively before finding herself in LA where she had sought out the Scotsman on the advice of her friend and instructor. She was more than capable of defeating a foe two centuries her elder, but she was still young and relatively inexperienced.
This fact was barely evident, however, as she began to fight the older immortal, and Duncan positioned himself at the mouth of the alley to keep watch. It was good that he did so, for within five minutes two figures could be seen approaching the three immortals. The fight still appeared to be a stalemate, both combatants quite evenly matched even with the prominent age difference.
As the two men got closer, Duncan experienced the strange sensation that signaled the presence of a vampire. As he expected, the two men where the same ones that had been in his shop that evening. They obviously heard the sounds of the battle taking place in the alley, appearing to prepare to step in. The Game's unwritten code strictly forbid participation of any individual other than the challenged and the challenger, and so Duncan placed himself between the men and the dueling pair to prevent them from interrupting. Of course, they would not be able to physically disrupt the fight, Ash always constructed a magical barrier to prevent such an occurrence, but they could still distract her, an action that could very well prove fatal.
Spike and Angel had been walking for over twenty minutes when their superior hearing picked up the faint sound of clashing metal. Quickening their pace, they found themselves in front of an alley where two people were locked in battle. Before they could go any further, they were intercepted by a tall man effectively blocking their path. Angel recognized the owner of the small antique shop and was about to push him to the side so that he could join the fight when the man shook his head and placed a restraining hand on his chest.
The man looked both vampires squarely in the face. "I'm afraid I can't let you interfere." The words were colored with a slight Scottish accent.
Ignoring him, Spike walked past but made it only a few steps before running into an invisible wall much like the barrier that kept a vampire from entering a home. "What the fuck?"
Angel's attention was too focused on the young woman, successfully holding her own against an opponent much larger than herself to notice his childe's dilemma. The girl's appearance matched perfectly with the description Cordelia had given him of 'Ash'. He tried to make out her face, but she was moving too fast and was shrouded in heavy shadows.
The blonde soon forgot the force field as he became enraptured with the superhuman speed and complexity of the fight. The two combatants made use of the entire alley, executing maneuvers with their blades so fast the vampire was hard pressed to follow the movements.
As the three supernatural beings watched, the woman faltered almost imperceptibly, providing the larger man the opportunity to kick the sword from her hand, leaving her unarmed. She responded before the weapon hit the asphalt, dropping into a squat and sweeping his feet out from under him with her right leg while drawing a small dagger from her left boot.
As the man lost his balance, she stabbed the small blade into his leg, but with her arm occupied, was unable to fully block his backhanded swing to her face. Staggering from the force of the blow, she tried to kick out with her left foot but couldn't break through his defenses and he used it to his advantage, lunging forward and driving his blade into her stomach and then withdrawing it.
Spike was momentarily taken back to that day five years earlier when he had watched another redhead receive a similar wound in a different dark alley. He forced himself back to the present, forcing down the searing pain at the memory, watching the woman in front of him hit the ground, blood slowly soaking through her black tank.
She rolled away from her opponent's weapon, picking up her own sword from where it had landed in the back of the alley before jumping back to her feet. As the man lunged again, she sidestepped, and catching his blade with hers, twisted quickly, throwing his sword into the air.
Without taking her eyes from her adversary, she caught the handle, plunging his own weapon deep into his chest. Releasing it, she left the sword imbedded in his heart as she spun, her blade cutting through the air and her assailant's neck. His head fell to the ground as she hit her knees, her left hand covering her bleeding stomach.
As she knelt on the asphalt, clutching her wound, the faint streetlight fell on her face, exposing it to the vampires' gaze. "Willow!" Angel took an involuntary step forward, calling out to the witch.
Spike took an unneeded breath as he stared into the face that had haunted his dreams. Before either could do anything else, sparks of electricity struck the young woman, causing her to jerk and twitch. The bursts grew larger and more frequent as they bounded off the alley walls and force fields, centering on her petite frame. She slumped forward as the energy ceased, collapsing, her sword clattering to the pavement.
The magical barrier at the mouth of the alley held strong, even as her crimson blood poured forth from the hole beneath her ribcage. The entire situation was far too familiar for the blonde, and he was unable to move from his position. Angel was not suffering the same fate, and Duncan watched him pound on the invisible barrier as the elder vampire attempted to go to her side.
"She's fine. She just needs to recover." Duncan had been quite surprised to hear the vampire yell his friend's former name, realizing that they must have known her when she was mortal, a fact that would surely cause a problem and most likely require explanations. He wasn't sure how she would handle that, knowing she very rarely mentioned anything connected to her past, the subject obviously not a pleasant one.
Angel watched, horrified as the girl paled with blood loss, her eyes fluttering shut. "She's dying!" He didn't understand why this man was not letting him help her.
Spike soon broke from his stupor, and felt the pain twisted in his gut as he looked, once again at the dead body of the woman he loved. The pain turned to rage as he grabbed the unknown man by the throat and slammed him into the brick wall. "Get rid of that bloody thing," the vampire growled, gesturing towards the force field.
"I can't."
A sharp intake of air from the alley drew the blonde's attention before he could respond. Letting go of the man, Spike rushed to his sire's side and the two vampires struggled to comprehend what they were seeing. Willow was slowly pulling herself to her feet, a low moan escaping her lips. "Well, that was fun."
Her voice dripped with sarcasm, void of the light cheer the duo remembered from so long ago. She looked up and they were shocked by the blank stare in the now dull green eyes. The innocent luster was gone from the emerald pools, in matching with the harsh lines of bitter experience that marred her beautiful face. The firm line of her lips was in total contrast to the smile that had almost always lingered there in the past.
Shaking off the last dredges of discomfort and fatigue that so often followed a death, she blinked the haze from her vision, and sheathed her beloved katana in the hidden scabbard she'd sown into her leather jacket. Walking over to the immortal's body, she roughly pulled the sword free and mentally lifted the corpse into the nearby trash bin, not in the mood to dispose of it further. Dismissing the force field with a wave of her hand, she walked right past the two vampires and handed the weapon to her fellow immortal.
"Here, you might want this one, looks like it might sell for a couple bucks." Glancing over at the gapping vampires indifferently, she spoke steadily and with no detectable emotion. "Why don't you take them back to the shop? I've got a feeling they're gonna want to play twenty questions and I don't feel like discussing it here. I'm just gonna go home real quick and change, that asshole got my clothes all bloody and ruined my tank. I'll meet you there." She started down the street, throwing the last comment over her shoulder, leaving two speechless vampires behind her.
End Chapter Ten
