A/N: Brace yourselves, I'm about to destroy your long held fanon beliefs. Unless, of course, you've already read Death and Taxes. You might want to read that now since I'm not going to explain why I think differently than most on this subject. Please read to the end before you flame. I welcome flames, but I prefer that they be well informed flames.

Chapter 6.

"So Xander, when we get there, are you going to show them what Death is really capable of?" Willow asked as they walked. They were in the warehouse district and the sun was setting. She needed to talk just to calm her nerves. They were all a little jumpy after finding Angel's apartment empty despite the sun still being up.

"Huh?"

"Death. You know, the guy you dressed up as last Friday." she went on.

"Oh. Well, hopefully not." Xander cast a sideways glance at Buffy. "And for the record. Methos wasn't Death."

"Sure he was." Willow defended. "I can quote you the line. 'Do you know who I was? I was Death. Death — Death on a horse.'"

Xander shook his head. "And do you remember the rest of the scene? Methos was trying to goad the Highlander into a fight. Either to take his head right there and give him the strength to defeat the others or to give him the fire to fight against the invincible Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. So he lied. Because among the Horsemen, he wasn't death. He was Victory. 'I looked, and there before me was a white horse! Its rider held a bow, and he was given a crown, and he rode out as a conqueror bent on conquest.' I can tell you for a fact that Methos favored white horses and always carried a bow. A practice I should really take up again."

"Why haven't you yet?" Buffy broke in.

"Too much other stuff to do. Besides, relearning the bow will take a whole lot longer than the sword. It's not like swinging a sharpened hunk of metal around. The bow takes real skill to use properly. Which is the real reason it fell out of favor compared to guns. The time required to train a bowman was immense compared to the time it took to train a musketeer."

"If you weren't Death, then who was?" Willow didn't want to let it drop.

"'I looked, and there before me was a pale horse! Its rider was named Death, and Hades was following close behind him. They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine and plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth.' The rider of the pale horse was always Kronos. He was the one that kept the other three of us in line because we all feared going up against him. Kronos was Death because everyone that went up against him, died. Methos was Victory. Silas was Famine. The man could eat. Caspian was Conflict A.K.A. War. Almost every fight that started amongst us involved him as an instigator." Xander said.

Willow grinned from ear to ear. "Oh, man. When I post that to the Highlander fan-forums tonight, people are going to freak!"

Xander chuckled. More power to her there. If she was posting it to the fan-forums tonight that would be because they all made it back safe and sound. Something his instincts were telling him might not happen easily. "Just don't tell them that Methos told you so."

"We're here." Buffy announced. "And it looks like someone left the door open for us."

Daytime was a very boring time for the newly risen Ford. Everyone in his little club was either dead or insane. Because that was apparently what happened to vampires when you drained all the blood out of them; they looked like death warmed over and went batshit insane. He had been tempted several times during the day to release Angel from his bonds and let him run out into the sunlight. But he wasn't sure he could take the other vampire 1-on-1 even like this and so he waited for his backup to rise from the dead.

Finally, the sun set and Chantarelle rose smoothly from the dead. Much more regally than he had. Then he heard a familiar voice from outside.

"We're here." Buffy announced. "And it looks like someone left the door open for us."

The others weren't waking yet and he had no idea when they would either. He knew two vampires wouldn't be a match for the Vampire Slayer. He needed to stall for time.

"Help me unlock his chains." he whispered to Chantarelle. He was suddenly very happy that he hadn't rashly killed the desiccated vampire out of mercy or boredom.

Angel made one lunge at Ford, but was quickly beaten back by the two vampires. He retreated up the stairs quickly after that.

"And now we wait. With any luck, Buffy will kill her friend, making her that much easier for us to kill." Ford explained to his childe.

They heard the shambling of boots on the metal staircase before they saw anything. Initially, Xander had thought it was a zombie, but then he saw the fangs and realized it was a vampire. A vampire that looked disturbingly similar to those pictures you see of Holocaust victims. His skin was taught and gray over muscles that had shriveled to a fraction of their size in life. And clothes that had probably once fit him, looked five sizes too big for him now. Xander readied his sword. Dusting this thing would be a mercy.

Willow got out of the way to one side and Buffy readied herself to attack from the other side in case Xander's initial attack failed. She took one last glance at the vampire before moving aside. A mere instant later, realization hit. The vampire was wearing the exact same clothes that Angel had been wearing yesterday. And his hair was the same length as Angel's, though it was matted to his head instead of sticking up. "Xander! It's Angel!" she called as Xander started his blow.

Time seemed to slow for Xander as he heard Buffy's cry. He found it hard to believe that Buffy could tell that looking at the near mummy charging at him. But he decided to believe her anyway. He couldn't pull his blow now. He would be run over and drained before Buffy could do anything about it. Instead, he turned his hands just a bit and slid a leg back so that when the vampire reached him, it got a conk to the noggin that sent it sprawling away from him; instead of the beheading blow it had been about to receive.

"Hold him!" Buffy ordered.

"You hold him!" Xander shot back. "I'll settle for not dying at your insane boyfriend's hands. Or, more likely, mouth."

Willow noticed that when Xander was stressed, he sounded a lot like Methos.

Buffy fought against the insane vampire for a minute before Xander rushed in and staked his foot to the ground.

Buffy glared daggers.

"What? Now you can restrain him." Xander shrugged off the glare. Once that was accomplished he went on. "Great. Now what are you going to do with him?"

"We have to help him!" Buffy cried, holding her struggling boyfriend in a full nelson.

"Staking him would be a mercy." Xander said.

"We're not staking him." Buffy growled.

Xander called over his shoulder. "Willow, if I'm ever turned... soul or no. If I look or act like that, please stake me."

Willow just swallowed and nodded. She wasn't sure if she would ever be that strong, but she'd try her best for Xander.

"Listen. I'm going to take Angel back to the Library. Hopefully Giles can help him. You guys stay here and guard the door until I get back." Buffy decided.

"Okay, first of all – no. Secondly, keep your voice down." Xander dropped his volume to demonstrate. "Anyone still in there can hear every word you just said and now they know your plans. Besides, there's no way Willow and I are going up against whatever did that to Angel without any intelligence, a good plan, and Slayer backup. And before you ask, no, we're not dragging Angel back for you either."

"What do you want me to do?" Tears streamed down the Slayer's face as she held her struggling boyfriend.

"We'll follow you. You can take him back to Giles, but whatever is down there will probably get away. Or you can leave him here. You take out your anger on whatever did this to him while Willow and I will take care of him and then follow you down." Xander offered her her options. "It's your choice."

A/N: I've already given my reasoning behind Methos not being the horseman Death in the story Death and Taxes. Read that if you'd like to understand why I decided that was false. Although, one additional reason I remembered, Methos was never, ever referred to as Death ever again in the series.

A/N2: Angel looks like a Holocaust survivor because that's what Spike described about vamps that don't feed for long enough and it's logical. It's very likely that when Angel came back from that hell-dimension that he looked similar. Except that the logistical realities and CGI limitations meant that they couldn't make him look that way for a TV show.