Ha! I have survived the first round of exams this semester. More writing can hopefully happen now. Enjoy!
For a while, neither Buffy nor Willow spoke. Buffy was sitting on top of the covers now, hugging her knees and staring at the bedspread with unfocused eyes.
"Do…do you think Angel's going to go?" asked Willow eventually, looking apprehensive.
"I don't know," said Buffy. "Doyle said there are lots of people who need him in L.A. So unless it was a trick and he's not really a good demon—"
"He's a demon?" Willow interrupted, alarmed.
"Half-demon," Buffy amended. "He sneezed, and his face went green with these blue spikes all over it," she said, waving a hand in front of her own face to illustrate. "But he seemed okay, except for the whole Worst Timing of the Century thing."
"What do you mean?" asked Willow, puzzled.
Buffy opened her mouth to answer, closed it again, and went red. Willow's eyes widened, and she went even redder than Buffy. "Oh. Uh. So, do you think Doyle could be a bad guy?" she said awkwardly.
"I don't know," said Buffy. "I guess we'll have to find out for sure before anything else happens, but I kinda think he's not. A bad guy, I mean."
"What are you going to do if Angel goes to L.A.?" asked Willow tentatively.
"L.A. isn't that far away," said Buffy. Her tone was both hopeful and uncertain. "Dad and I still see each other a lot even though he's there. Not as much lately, though, but—" She broke off, embarrassed. Willow averted her gaze, sensing Buffy's discomfort.
"I just—," Buffy began again after a few seconds, her voice suddenly rather brittle, "I was sort of planning on…on moving in with Angel after maybe a semester or two in the dorms."
"Oh, Buffy. I'm sorry," said Willow, scooting closer and putting a hand on one of Buffy's.
"I never talked to him about it. I was going to wait until after graduation." She rolled her eyes wearily. "If, you know, we make it."
Willow smiled weakly, but soon, the thought of what was going to happen at graduation settled over both of them like a black cloud. "Have Giles and Wesley found out anything else about the Ascension?"
"Not that I know of."
Willow nodded vaguely. "You should talk to Angel, Buffy. If things heat up with the Mayor, you might not get a chance to for a while."
[o]
"So, you think these Powers are legit?" said Angel. He threw a punch, which Wesley blocked.
"Well, if the theory about their being in the angelic hierarchy has any basis in fact, then I rather think they must be," said Wesley, while Angel parried his retaliatory strike. "And they must have done something to earn themselves the association, even if it isn't accurate. After all, they certainly fit the profile," he went on, barely managing to duck Angel's fist. "If Doyle is to be believed, they have a strong interest in destiny, which tallies with the alleged role of the angelic Powers, as does working indirectly through messengers." He paused thoughtfully. "Do you think Whistler could have been working for them as well?"
"It wouldn't surprise me," said Angel. He moved forward unexpectedly and swept one foot between Wesley's to trip him, but Wesley countered it with one of the moves Angel had taught him before the second half of the conversation began, and then Angel found himself flat on the cement floor. As Wesley had already landed himself in a similar position five times in the past few minutes, he didn't quite feel that he had earned bragging rights, so he held out a hand and pulled Angel up without commenting.
"I don't see why they didn't just send Whistler again, though," said Angel as if nothing had happened.
"Perhaps he's needed elsewhere," said Wesley. He attempted a roundhouse kick but unintentionally aimed it slightly higher than the limit of his abilities, with the result that he nearly fell over and Angel easily avoided it. "If Doyle is getting these visions on a regular basis, it implies that he will have to be on hand for an extended period of time. That might not be possible for someone like Whistler."
"Good point," said Angel.
"Do you intend to go, then?" asked Wesley.
Angel said nothing. They sparred without speaking for so long that Wesley thought he wasn't going to answer. But then, when Angel was helping him off the floor yet again, he said quietly, "If there are people there who really need my help, how can I stay?"
"And Buffy?"
"She's needed here."
They wrapped up the sparring match, and Angel resumed his pacing from before while Wesley toweled the sweat off his face and neck.
"You know," he said, smirking slightly, "the distance will be considerably smaller than when you were in the Council dungeons, and even then you and she weren't completely apart."
"What," said Angel staring hard at Wesley, "are you saying you think I can leave Sunnydale without leaving Buffy?"
Wesley snorted. "There are people who have longer commutes to work than that, and they manage to get to their jobs and back every day. I imagine that all-consuming love would be a rather better incentive to make the trip than that."
Angel scowled at him for his slightly mocking tone, but felt considerably better about the whole thing all the same.
[o]
Faith felt full of restless energy. She liked being pampered by the Mayor, she really did, but she wished he would give her more work. All this luxury free time was putting her severely on edge. Taking out a vamp nest the other night (the vampires in question had spurned the Mayor's offer of employment) had helped, but not for long. With a noise of irritation, she threw her magazine aside and hopped down from the couch.
She didn't meet anything interesting on her way to City Hall—though, it being late afternoon with the sun still brightly shining, she hadn't expected much anyway. Two vamps were guarding the door to the Mayor's office. They leered at her. She made as though to lunge towards them, and they recoiled, terrified. She smirked and strode past them.
"Faith!" said the Mayor when he looked up from his desk and saw her. "What a pleasant surprise!"
She couldn't help smiling at him, but it didn't last long. "Boss, you've gotta give me a job," she said bluntly. "I'm going crazy sitting in the apartment."
The Mayor chuckled. "Actually, it's funny you should ask, because I've got two things I need you to do."
"More nests?" she asked hopefully, cracking her knuckles.
"Not quite," he said. He riffled through the stack of papers on his desk for a moment. Finding the one he needed, he leaned forward and passed it to Faith.
"Professor Lester Worth," she read in a snobby voice. Dropping that, she went on, looking up at the Mayor, "Who's he?"
"Someone who could give our enemies a lot of harmful information about me after the Ascension—though if everything goes according to plan, most of them will be part of the first course, but it's not a risk I'm willing to take."
"You want me to take him out?" asked Faith.
"That's right," said the Mayor, his eyes twinkling.
Faith tried to hide her sour expression but didn't have much success. Knocking off some old guy was definitely not her idea of the kind of intense, life-threatening assignment she'd been hoping for.
The Mayor seemed to know what she was thinking. "I know it might not seem very exciting, but that brings us to item number two."
Faith watched curiously as he opened his desk drawer and pulled out a small phial containing a clear liquid, which he handed to her. "What's this?" she asked, rolling it around between her fingers and thumb.
"Poison," he said brightly. "Completely harmless to humans, but for vampires, well, that's another story."
"Why would I want to poison a vamp when I could just use a stake?" said Faith, nonplussed.
"Well, with a stake, it's all over in a second. No pain, no suffering, just poof! You use that poison, and it'll be a crippling, agonizing death that takes its time."
"So who's the lucky vamp?" asked Faith, intrigued.
[o]
After Buffy finished eating dinner with her mom (who was relieved that she seemed to be doing much better than she had the previous night), she went upstairs, intending to get ready to set off for Angel's apartment. However, when she got to her room, she discovered that such a trip would be quite unnecessary. Smiling, she made her way over to the window, climbed out, and sat next to him on the roof.
"I was just about to come and see you," she said.
"Oh," said Angel, looking just as relieved as Joyce by her tranquil mood, though also a little puzzled.
"So I guess we need to talk," said Buffy. She winced at her choice of words.
"Yeah."
No actual talking followed this exchange, and Buffy winced again. Just when she opened her mouth to try to fill the awkward silence, Angel spoke. "I'm going to go," he said.
Buffy turned to look at him. "Doyle's the real deal, then?" she asked.
"Yeah," he said. "At least, I think he is. So does Wes."
"Okay," said Buffy, looking away again, "I know I shouldn't get all selfish and clingy about this when there are lives at stake, but these Powers that Be guys—what makes them think they can just hijack a person's life like this?"
"Like they did to yours?" asked Angel. Buffy remained silent, but his words struck a very deep chord within her.
"I threw my life away when I was human, in more ways than one," he went on. "I forfeited the right to choose my own destiny—if any of us has that to begin with. I've spent less than a tenth of the time since I died doing something worthwhile, and more than half of it destroying every life I could in every way I could think of. After all those years, you were there. You gave me a reason. Now they're giving me a purpose. If they still want me to fight for them after everything I've done, then I will. I have a lot to atone for."
Buffy looked at him, then away. "I'm a better person than I was before I became the Slayer," she said thoughtfully. "Sometimes I think everything would be easier if someone else had been called instead. I mean, it's hard. I'm fighting for my life every other night and sometimes people still get hurt no matter what I do, but…almost everyone I love I have because of it. I'd still be in L.A. if I wasn't the Slayer, so I'd never have met Willow, Xander, or Giles." She found one of his hands and wove her fingers between his, then looked up into his eyes. "And I would never have met you, Angel. When I look back at how I was before…my life was so empty. I don't know how I could stand it. Maybe that's what this will be for you."
"My life isn't empty now," he said lifting his free hand to touch her face. "Both of our lives changed when you were called."
"And now they're both changing again," Buffy sighed. "I just—I wish our lives were our own."
"What would you do if they were?" asked Angel. "If you had no obligations, no responsibility."
Buffy thought about it. "Probably the same thing I'm doing now," she admitted, chuckling. Somehow, that was very good to know.
"So," said Angel in a casual tone that was tinged with playfulness, "Wes tells me the commute from L.A. to Sunnydale isn't bad."
A smile spread slowly across Buffy's features until it lit up her whole face. "I'll keep that in mind," she said.
Okay, on second thought, the way this chapter originally ended didn't really fit with the overall tone and kind of trivialized it, so I deleted the last sentence. Instead, I'm just going to leave off there, with the pair of them sitting side-by-side on Buffy's roof (for some reason, I really love that image).