As the boys packed weapons and a change of clothes for spells, Willow leafed through transportation spells and anything referencing soul mates. Her bag was full of dusty, yellow-bound leather volumes by the time they entered the small craft terminal. She explained between breaths as they ran to the plane; there was no way to mass transport and it would have taken all of Tara and her energies in the old day to transport one. Giving up evil had it's downfall in this case.
But the airline was predictable and the flight safe; there were all manners of charms available for flight and even Chris, foregoing his religious disbelief, had taken to a little patron saint statue. The turbulence and storm began appearing as the plane circled Utah. No explanations were given by the captain, but the group had right to be tense. Oz opened the window shade and there were things riding the lightning bolts. Things that reminded Xander of something out of the Fantastic Four with fangs.
The left engines were the first to go. The plane plummeted downwards. The charm spells created a seal with the air and helped Willow to guide the plane downwards gently. The pilots' heads had been sliced by glass and the one other passenger was zapped with a weak Tabula Rasa spell as the gang slid from their seats and exited to the nearest town. It was an eerily calm mining community featuring exactly one YMCA and exactly one movie theatre. Dinner was some sort of fried steak truckers eat; although nobody had much of an appetite.
After the quick call from Oz, Spike readied Angel for any sort of driving moment and gently zipped him in a cargo bag so he wouldn't be zapped by anything and set around a wreath of incense to protect the darkened, fitted handicap van they had gotten for emergencies like these, although they had laughed while saying it, this was as ludicrous an emergency as ever. Tension filled the air as one van drove in the direction of the mining town about four hours out, for a sane driver. Salvation lay over the mountains he heard from Cordelia as he drove. Spike wasn't sure about all that. He'd just be happy to dream of something other than having his Angel back.
Terror lay across this canyon, Willow thought as she incanted protection and readied herself to understand what the gem's power would consist of. A useless wattage house across a rusty dam is where they met. Riddled with age and groaning with dust and cobwebs; it seemed perfect to culminate years of brewing emotion. Cordy hadn't let go of the gem since receiving it, not able to bear letting go of it as thought it were a child.
Spike had used half of his emotional strength just getting Angel to the building and Riley had to assist the feeble vampire. Angel lay gently on the cold floor; a disheveled mess in a canvas bag. Xander hadn't seen the vamp in several years and his first reaction was to run to hold him. Willow couldn't restrain herself and teared up slowly for the first time in a very long while.
Oz cleared his throat, knowing he had no right to be level-headed, but somebody had to be. "Hey guys, I know this is really not a happy time, but we came to save Angel right. We gotta dig deep right now, otherwise nobody is gonna be able to carry themselves out of this."
Xander knelt at Angel's side without speaking. Why'd I ever let you go? Xander wiped a spot of blood from his eye. "Please, hold on," he begged the specter of his former love. "Please, you must hold on."
Angel screamed as his head tilted and he recognized Xander, but only as Anorous. Willow moved Xander out of his direct line of vision, but not far beyond Angel's visage. She ordered Spike to a perch over by a window as she came out of her emotional stupor. Cordelia found herself at Angel's feet. The three made a conducted triangle. All the books that understand such ancient clear runes condone the use of the strongest weapon symbol, which is the triangle where poison and love are both concerned. Willow stood back and joined the others in off-side group as the clear gem began to glow.
"Something must be working," Cordy gasped. She shivered as she extended the glowing shard over Angel's body. She cried, shaking, and the tears dropped onto Angel's crumpled shirt.
Xander felt naked and raw for first time in a long while. "Willow, are there any words to this spell that you found?"
Willow shook her head. "None of the books can pronounce any of the incantations, not even what I could read of. But what seems to be clear is that the words come from the people connected. The words of his greatest enemy and greatest love will reveal these things. Your heart is the only one that knows the words of this spell."
Spike felt a hate rise up in him. "You bastard", he began as he spat out the window, "I've been chained to you for so many years. Most of the time it was lying in wait and learning your weakness, your fondness for altruism. In the early days, we shared blood and pain; torturing and preying on weak superstition. Seeing you like this; I know it can't be you. There's no sport or good coming from this. Wake up. You must breathe and eat. If you don't live; I can't live. Being on top of the food chain is horror without you."
A yellow beam extended from the top of Spike's hair to the soul of his feet and fed into the pale white chasm of a beam. Cordelia screamed as her hands begin to burn and she dropped the gem on Angel's stomach as she fell to her knees, looking at the blisters in stunned disbelief. Spike's words caused the gem to float of his own devices as his body and bones began to melt away. "Wake up, you bastard," he began to say as the gem sucked William inward without him even noticing.
The air stilled in the abandoned place as Xander began to weep. "How many lives?" Xander began to burn blue through his eyes.
Cordy rushed with pain racking her body, pushing Xander to the floor as her eyes flashed white. "No, Xander!" She screamed as she pushed him out of the beam's path. She wouldn't lose any more people, not to history or fevers or gems. Cordy began to melt as the gem caused Angel to sputter back to life.
Xander's knees buckled. "I wasn't it, then? All this time, and I wasn't his greatest love?" I should have known. The ruin turned pale green as Angel's eyes opened and the world changed before the remaining Scoobies, coming into place just as Cordelia seemed to melt into oblivion. The rust and ancient metal was replaced by a lush, dark forest speeding by. What they saw was the shadow of Angel darting about and a swift silver cloak chasing him. Arrows, sharp and merciless, spread around at different points. Angel darted into a church graveyard and tripped. Anorous menaced upon him.
"Demon called Angelus; you are charged with evil beyond all measure. State your case for innocence, if one there be." Anorous had a booming voice of judgment that shook like peals of doom bouncing off the canyon. "Tongue tied," this past Xander continued haughtily, "Have I made you fear your own existence finally, you petty killer?"
"I've changed," Angel tried to howl, but was cut down by a striking arrow with four claws.
Anorous hissed at the very idea. "Your kind never changes. The world is black and white Angelus. You shall not survive by my light's watch."
Xander was the first to move, a ghost inside the scene. He stood, suspended in time and morbid fascination, as he killed Angel, the repentant tortured man he had loved. Xander touched the arrows as Anorous pulled back the string and then Xander reversed the arrow so it would hit him.
"Love conquers all," Xander whispered as the arrow shot Anorous. Anorous' wound, his wound, bled the same sick green that Spike had seen in Angel's eyes.
"Four years of tireless effort," Anorous muttered in annoyed amazement, "how could this be the given end of fate?"
A copy of Willow appeared alongside Anorous in a silver robe. "Brother? This foul demon must pay for his treachery!"
All Anorous could do was grin as green blood began to flow down his chin and he fell. Willow saw the look in her eyes. Willow saw her hair turn as a bright as a flame. Willow stepped in front of the beam and deflected it toward the gem Cordelia had brought, breaking the ancient stone containing poisonous memories, presumably the bodies or spirits of Spike, Cordelia, and more than one flying incantation of despair.
In sympathy with her past self, Willow turned pale and collapsed on the other side of the Angel. The gem recollected the leafy territory inside of itself and bounced onto Angel's stomach where it rolled into a far crack and left to be flung down the mountainside. The triangle had been completed. Angel lay moaning in the center as he began crying sick green tears. Xander lay to his left, falling onto his knees in an emotional coma. And a pale Willow lay collapsed on Angel's right.
