Title: Swan Song
Author: samluvsharrison (Marcy [DHCgirl])
Posted: 03-03-2003
Email: Libitzcrk@aol.com
Rating: PG
Category: Crossover BtVS
Content: C/A
Summary: As the First threatens to destroy the world, champions from LA and Sunnydale must unite in an effort to stop it.
Spoilers: Musings on the final episode of Buffy. Some Angel spoilers... Cordywise. Most is my speculation/imagination.
Disclaimer: The characters in the Angelverse were created by Joss Whedon & David Greenwalt. No infringement is intended, no profit is made.
Distribution: Take it.
Notes: Ok. This is going to be my fantasy crossover. And when I crossover, I go full force. We’ll shift to Sunnydale in part two, and eventually world’s will collide with (hopefully) quasi interesting results.
Feedback:
Thanks: Thanks go to my fabulous Beta reader Anni, who really helped me flesh this one out. Also like to give a nod to the new American Hi Fi cd “The Art of Losing” which played nonstop on my stereo as I wrote this story.Part 1
Wherever we go
Through the rain and snow
Through the sand and the sun
To whichever way the wind blows
Each of our hearts
Make up equal parts
And they’re bound by a cause
Facing the odds
As human lightning rods
We grow strong from our pain
Though we’ve gone a little insane
Together we’re one
And as one we’ll fall
However dark it seems
Don’t underestimate The Team
– Teen Idols
She’d grown up with fairytales.
She still remembered how it felt to fight off sleep as she waited for her parents to finally flip off the hall light, her eyes closed in the guise of slumber. When she heard the familiar click of the switch and her covered eyes registered the darkness she would shrug off the confines of her giant crocheted blanket and pull out the thin, hardcover book from where it would be tucked underneath her pillow. She’d fish the flashlight out from her bedside drawer and pull her blanket over her like a tent. When the flashlight clicked on it illuminated her makeshift cave of covers in a warm glow. Inside she was safe to lose herself in the large, colorful pages of her storybook.
Her mouth quirked as she thought of how life had a funny way of preparing you for the un–prepareable. She supposed she had always had a penchant for enclosure. And eventually she would trade one cave for another.
After Pylea she thought her faith in fairytales had been renewed. She had been rescued by honest to goodness good guys and welcomed into their ranks. Finding out there were real monsters in the world had been a small price to pay to discover that there were real heroes, too.
But now she watched as Prince Charming held Sleeping Beauty’s hands in his own, and truth veered from fiction. Because although Fred had seen him kiss her many times, her eyes remained closed.
Fred rested her head on the doorway. She knew she was witnessing a private moment, but she couldn’t tear herself away. When Wesley brushed past her and into the bedroom, she pushed herself off the frame and followed behind him.
“Angel” Wesley began, looking as serious as Fred had ever seen him. “I just got off the phone with Willow. It seems they need our help”
Angel didn’t even flinch. His eyes stayed on Cordelia. “I’m not leaving her” He said, his voice barely above a whisper. Wesley stepped forward.
“Angel” He began carefully, “I understand your reluctance to leave Cordelia. But this is very serious”
Fred looked at Angel. His eyes were red rimmed, and had taken on the wet glint of pain and exhaustion. Fred began to wonder if he heard Wesley at all.
“I know you don’t want to hear this, but she’s been in a coma for weeks now…”
“Wesley” Fred wearily interrupted. He didn’t need to say what was painfully obvious to everyone.
“I’m not saying its hopeless” Wesley quickly amended, “I’m just saying that there are extremely pressing matters that need our attention. Sunnydale is on the verge of collapse. And when Sunnydale goes, so goes the world”
Wesley wasn’t one to be overdramatic and Fred knew this. She found it hard to believe that somewhere things were worse than they had been in LA. If that were true, they definitely needed Angel.
“I’ll stay with her” Fred offered “I’ll call you the second anything happens” She could tell Angel was struggling. She knew that he hadn’t gotten over the shame of mistaking that evil being for Cordelia. None of them had. Fred knew that hindsight was 20/20, but when she really though about it – the amnesia, the manipulation, the Connor incident – she still couldn’t believe that they had been duped. Some genius she was. Couldn’t even tell her best friend from her evil doppelganger. Although, if she had been convinced that sudden change of disposition, murky motivation, and bizarre sexual partners was the sure fire formula for an evil replica, she probably would have locked Wes up too.
Wesley put a supportive hand on Angel’s shoulder “She’d want you to go” He said. Angel bowed his head, bringing Cordelia’s hand up to meet it.
He whispered words that Fred couldn’t hear, and didn’t think it her place to. He kissed her palm lightly. He ran his thumb over the back of her hand.
Finally, he let her go.
As they packed, Wesley began the long story of the First Evil. How, after centuries of balance, it had been able to take advantage of a cosmic loophole. It had manipulated those close to the Slayer, driving some to kill others, and others to kill themselves. It had summoned a legion of super vampires who were virtually immune to conventional methods of extermination, and had gained the advantage on all parts of Sunnydale, save the Slayer’s house. Angel had been silent for most, but mentioned that he had dealt with the First before.
Fred hugged her friends goodbye and once again sent them off to save the world. She poured herself a glass of water and slowly made her way up the Hyperion’s stairs.
She sat down at Cordelia’s bedside. Fred took her friend’s hand in her own and involuntarily shuttered. It was so cold. A tremor of emotion ran though her body, and she finally allowed herself to breakdown in a wreck of tears.
A fallen hero.
A world in peril.
This was their story.
Fred silently prayed that this one would end happily ever after.
Part 2: Swans Crossing
Dawn pulled back the curtain and peered through the window at the world outside. It was hard to believe that it was the same town she had known all of her life. The whole block burned. Abandoned homes had been torched by a vamp attack hours before. They still smoldered, churning black clouds into the sky.
The sky. Dawn shuddered. That had been the most disturbing of events.
It wasn’t quite day and it wasn’t quite night. Instead the sky lingered a sickly orange color. It had been that way for three days. And with no sun in the sky, Dawn wondered how it managed to do that.
“You know, if it wasn’t a harbinger for impending evil and such, I’d think it was almost kind of pretty”
Dawn slowly shut the curtain and turned to Xander, who was offering her a comforting smile. Everyone had been on optimism overdrive just to keep morale at a low level. Dawn could tell that he was equally disturbed by the color, but she nodded in agreement anyway.
“C’mon” He said, wrapping an arm around her shoulder, “We need your help getting ready”
Dawn leaned into him, taking some comfort in his brotherly gesture, and allowed him to guide her towards the living room. She looked back at the window, and the chaos outside, and was for once thankful that Buffy had demanded that she stay in.
“Are you sure this is going to work?” Anya asked. She turned the glass bulb in her hand, and examined it with a weary eye. Sitting beside Willow on the couch, she had been attempting to help her organize the ingredients for their latest crack at attack. Truth be told, she was being more cynical than helpful.
Willow sighed. “Am I ever?” She answered, measuring out a greenish powder into a series of plastic bags. “Look. The First has stationed an army of ubervamps along the perimeter of the high school preventing us from getting in and stopping the newly reactivated seal. Until we close it again, it’ll just keep on popping them out”
“Like a gumball machine” Dawn offered as she left Xander’s guiding arm and sat down next to Anya on the sofa.
“Yeah, except instead of bubblegummy goodness, it spits out minions from hell”
“So…like a gumball machine of evil” Dawn reasserted with a smile. Willow shook her head in frustration, but was happy that the teenager was in relatively good spirits. This was hard on all of them. She knew that the longer they remained upbeat, the better it would be for their collective sanity.
A loud bang turned all attention to the front hall. Buffy and Spike lunged into the house with a desperate speed. Spike spun around and did his best to brace the door as the vampires slammed it from the other side. Buffy kicked a rogue vampire limb out of the way, and threw the elaborate system of locks into place. Satisfied, they ambled (or possibly limped) into the living room and were immediately met with looks of concern.
Both were noticeably beaten. Spike’s red shirt had been ripped down to the last button, and a fresh trail of blood streaked down from the corner of Buffy’s mouth. Spike produced a small satchel from his coat pocket and tossed it to Willow.
“I hope this was what you needed, ‘cause hell if I’m going back out there”
Willow emptied out the contents of the bag onto the table. Some talons. A small vile of blue liquid. A clump of black, wiry hair bound with a small tie.
“Yeah. It’s all here”
“What happened to you guys?” Dawn asked, reaching under the couch for the first aid kit. She popped it open and produced a bottle of Hydrogen Peroxide.
“Vampires. Both of the normal and supercharged variety. They’ve overrun the town.” Buffy said, easing off her leather jacket. Her now bare arms revealed a wealth of bruises and gashes. She sucked a quick breath through clenched teeth as Dawn began to tend to them with her damp rag.
“There are hundreds already, and if we don’t do something soon that number could get into the thousands within the next two days” Spike informed them, glancing back and forth between Buffy and Willow.
“In other words, your spell better work, Willow” Anya said, making a sweeping gesture at the mishmash of items on the coffee table.
“It will. If everything goes as planned, a containment bubble will materialize around the high school locking all of the newly produced vampires within its confines” Willow sketched out a visual aid on a napkin. It looked like a vampire snow globe.
“Ok, we contain them. Then what?” Xander asked.
“Then we find a way to kill them. Kill them all” Buffy said firmly. She turned to Willow. “Did you call him?”
The witch’s mouth bent into a tight frown “Yeah. There was a thing,” She said.
“What sort of thing?”
“I guess something happened in LA. Cordelia got really hurt…as in comatose. Angel was refusing to leave her” Willow looked over her friend, carefully. It was hard to gage how she was processing this information. When Willow had been in LA she had discovered some things…about Cordelia and Angel. She hadn’t had the heart to tell Buffy, but she knew it was only a matter of time before she found out.
“Geez, when it rains it pours” Xander said bitterly.
Buffy was silent for a moment and then asked “You said ‘was’. He changed his mind?”
Willow nodded. “Welsey managed to convince him to come. So we can count on their help. Wesley, Angel and Gunn”
“What about Connor?” The name felt weird in Buffy’s mouth. It was Angel’s son. She had been able to deal with a lot of things living on the Hellmouth, but Buffy still couldn’t wrap her head around that one.
Willow nodded again. “And Connor” She affirmed.
“Okay. Well let’s do as much as we can until they get here” Buffy began, trying her best to take control of the situation “Xander, you and Dawn try to get your hands on all the weapons we have. I want an ammo count. Willow and Anya, you two get this spell ready. Has Faith left already?”
Willow pushed her mystic ingredients to the edge of the table and propped up her spellbook on the open space. “Yeah. She’s taken all of the potentials to secure the totems around the high school. They’ll mark the barriers of the shield.”
***
Faith felt the pavement pound beneath her feet as she sprinted along the sidewalk. She gave a quick look over her shoulder to see the potentials struggling to keep up. They faltered beneath the intense heat of the orange sky.
“Let’s go, Girls.” She called out, growing impatient. “Everyone else gets to go out and fight the big bads and I get stuck babysitting the wannabes,” She muttered, finally stopping to give the girls time to play catch up. She ran a hand across her forehead. It came back wet with sweat.
When the group got to where Faith stood, they caught sight of the high school. There was a wall of ubervamps that circled the building. They were disturbingly identical; a sea of gnarled hands and serrated teeth.
“There are so many of them,” Kennedy said, in a mixture of fear and awe.
Faith’s mouth twisted into a smug sneer. This is what she was talking about. While she could tell the potentials were fighting with everything in them to keep from running from the monsters, she was battling back the urge to take them all on.
“That’s why we get to be discreet. Think you can handle that?” The Slayer dropped her bag on the ground and knelt down.
The potentials formed a tight semicircle around her. Faith looked back at the vampires.
Dust. You’re all dust.
***
Anya caught Xander in the front hall. She grabbed his arm and pulled him to the space next to the stairs.
“Xander, I think that we’re all seriously underestimating the power of the First” He felt her grip tighten.
“We’re doing all we can” He tried to assure her. He watched as she began to bounce on the balls of her feet, something that she always did when she was anxious.
“That’s my point!” She exclaimed, and bounced higher “So what if we trap those vampires? They’ll just keep coming. And eventually the First will break the containment spell and we’re back to square one”
Before he knew it his hand was on her face. “An…” He said, softly “We just have to take it one step at a time. And when Angel gets here…”
Anya let out a quick scoff, and Xander’s hand jerked back. “Please. We have two slayers, a vampire, an army of potentials, and the most powerful Wicca on the planet and we still get beaten on a regular basis. So what exactly is Angel and his posse of three going to accomplish?”
At the sound of a cough, Anya and Xander both turned to the door. There stood the Dark Avenger himself, the other members of Angel Investigations right at his back. He looked amused.
“Good to know we inspire such large levels of confidence”
***
Faith rummaged through her leather sack and produced a small, twig like object. It was bound with a thin rope, and resembled a crudely drawn stick figure. She turned to the potential on her right.
“Ok, Holly, you are in charge of totem one. You wanna secure it at the base of the oak tree on the east side of the school” She said, pointing to a location on the large map Kennedy held open.
“Umm, actually my name is Molly” The potential corrected in a thick cockney accent.
Faith arched a daring brow. “Does it make you quicker, stealthier, and/or more capable?” She asked.
Molly thought for a moment. “No” She finally answered.
“Then this is me not caring” Faith deadpanned, “Now take the stick, and try not to die, k?” The potential’s stomach clenched. Avoiding Faith’s glare, she grabbed the wooden figure, spun on her heals, and set off to the other side of the school. Faith doled out the remaining figures with the barest of instructions and sent the rest of the potentials off to their jobs. She pulled the last totem out of the bag. She worked it over in her hands for a moment, musing about the importance of such a little thing.
Faith snapped the walky talky off of the clasp of her waistband and brought it to her mouth. She heard a sharp blast of fuzzy feedback as she pressed down on the button.
“Will, we’re almost set”
***
The first part of the plan was right on track.
“Roger” Willow answered back into her respective walky talky.
“An Alackerod orb?” Wesley asked, admiring the small glass globe. Willow took a minute to enjoy the geekiness of the situation. She liked having someone she could talk incantation properties with.
“It’ll be the object through which we channel the mystic barrier. It’ll work as our battery after that, allowing us to sustain the wall’s intensity” Willow explained. Wesley smiled in appreciation.
Connor strode past the two, weaving his way through the mass of people, eventually finding a bare spot against the wall perfect for contemplative leaning. From across the room Dawn spied the brooding boy wonder and was soon next to him.
“Hey” She said, trying her best to sound aloof.
“Hey” Connor returned.
“So, you’re a miracle child huh?”
“Yup”
“Cool”
Gunn laughed, observing the laconic exchange. Kids. He looked over to see Xander approaching him with a tray of crackers.
“Hey, man. Triscuit?” He asked, holding the tray up to Gunn’s face.
“No thanks”
Xander retracted the tray quickly, and set it down on the table. Gunn noticed that he wasn’t leaving.
“So…you work for Angel?”
“Yup”
“Cool”
Buffy carefully pulled the soiled gauss off of her arm. She hadn’t realized that the gash was so deep. She wiped it off and dressed it again. As she wound the thick, white tape around her bicep, she eyed the vampire across the room. She had been putting off the one on one conversation since he got there, but she knew she was just delaying the inevitable. She placed the tape roll back into the first aid kit and snapped it shut.
It was time.
“Angel?” Buffy cautiously approached the vampire. He had been silent through the entire briefing. His shoulder rested against the wall as he pulled back the curtains framing the window. He wasn’t looking. He wasn’t searching. He was waiting. For her.
Angel had always been the hero. For as long as she’d known him, he had always been the one to swoop in and save the day. He had never really needed anyone before. But as his eyes looked out on the large expanse of the city in ruin, Buffy knew that Angel was waiting for someone to save him.
“Thank you for coming. I know that it was hard for you to leave…” Buffy trailed off when she saw him flinch “But thank you” There would be time to talk later, she thought as she walked away. She just needed him to know that she appreciated everything he gave up to help her.
Buffy looked around the room. It buzzed with affable activity. It was a group of people from different lives and backgrounds all coming together for a common goal. All in the hero business. She made a mental note. Next summer, provided there was one, there should be a company picnic.
They deserved that much.
Part 3: “The Charge of the Bright Light Brigade” or “Rise”
The thick haze that seemed to seep from the orange sky had sent the temperature up to a suffocating 104 degrees. This proved not only detrimental to the living, but also to the dead that lay decaying on every street corner. There were no loved ones left to care for the grizzly victims of the vampires, so the bodies were left to rot, the oozing cadavers soon baiting a blitz of rats.
The blood pooled in the gutters of the streets, swirling with the contents of overturned garbage cans. The red river ran throughout the town, coalescing in divots in the road, and bringing with it a stench that stung eyes.
Buffy stepped through one such crimson puddle, her heal causing it to ripple.
The team walked the crumbling streets with an unflagging resolution. Buffy led the steadfast charge, flanked on either side by her ragtag army. The witch. The ex vengeance demon and the ex watcher. The two ensouled vampires. The key. The miracle child. The demon hunter. And, of course, Xander.
Together they formed a seemingly flawless ‘V’, their strides synchronized and their gazes focused.
They stopped feet from the high school.
Faith contacted Willow on the walky talky, informing her that she and the potentials had secured the totems and were holding their places.
Buffy held up a steadying hand. Her eyes ticked back and forth between the army of unaware vampires and Charles Gunn, who now had a large rocket launcher braced on his shoulder. She looked to Angel, who gave her a small nod. She wrenched her arm down and the bomb whipped through the air before colliding with the gymnasium wall with a deafening explosion.
In a matter of seconds, legions of vampires were on top of them: both pure and regular human-hybrid.
Wesley and Spike did their best to keep them away from Willow as she started to perform the spell. She raised her arms over her head and started the incantation. The orb she clutched tightly in her left hand began to radiate, the inside churning a cloudy purple.
Gunn swung his axe wildly at the approaching vampires. One caught him from behind, wrapping his large arms around his midsection. Gunn kicked himself off the ground and pounded his feet into two oncoming vampires. Using his forward momentum, he slammed himself down and pitched the vampire over his back, finishing him off with a quick stake to the heart.
Willow’s orb burned brighter. As she screamed the words, the thick air began to whip violently around the fighters. Anya looked down at the ground. It was beginning to tremble.
The pavement beneath Connor began to crack and fracture. The split soon zigzagged through the earth like a bolt of lightning. His feet were kicked out from underneath him as the ground pulled away from itself, creating a large chasm. Connor frantically struggled away from the abyss as it continued to grow behind him.
A vampire’s foot connected with his face, and he found himself tumbling backwards towards the edge.
“Connor!” Seeing his son in danger, Angel ran over to the precipice. He grabbed the boy and pulled him to his feet. A sharp pain shot through Angel’s back as the spiky hand of a supervamp made its forceful connection. As he lurched forward, the vampire dug a set of sharp claws into Angel’s shoulders and hurled him over the edge.
“Dad!” Connor screamed, as he watched his father disappear into the blackness. He ran over to the cliff and dropped to his knees, almost sliding off the edge himself. Below he saw Angel, knocked unconscious on a piece of rock that jutted out from the side of the gorge. His relief was short lived as a vampire’s thick leg swiped his midsection, drawing him back into the fight.
Spike grumbled, wishing that the witch would hurry up. As he struggled with a leather clad biker vamp over a large 2x4, he saw Willow’s orb begin to glow a dark green. The thin frame of the containment shield began to materialize, holding a new army of vampires off from the fighters. Spike finally ripped the board away and swung it with all his might. The vampire ducked Spike’s attack and lunged at Willow. He connected with her legs sending her to the ground, the light in the orb extinguished as it spilt from her hand. The vampire quickly scooped it up off of the grass and took off.
“We need the orb!” Willow yelled, watching the vampire make his quick retreat. Wesley was immediately on his heals, attempting to get a shot off with his crossbow. Willow cursed as the two vanished around the corner of the high school.
The vampires that had previously been held back by the force field now joined the countless others in the fight. Buffy, Spike, and Connor took on the brunt of the supervamp attack while the rest tried their best against the regulars. It was becoming clear that they would not be able to hold off the vampires long enough to try the spell again.
“Willow!” Gunn yelled “You gotta call Faith!” He sidestepped a punch, and dusted his opponent.
Willow scurried on her hands and knees to where the walky talky had fallen. Inches away, she watched in horror as a vampire crushed it with the weight of his boot. Willow jumped to her feet. Her hand shot out in the direction of a nearby oak tree. A large branch began to splinter, and then finally ripped loose of the trunk. “Ackpirsar!” She instructed, and the branch shot through the air and into the vampire’s chest.
“Buffy!” Dawn yelled as she struggled with a vampire, “We can’t hold them off much longer! They’re too strong!” The vampire struck her across the face and sent her crashing to the ground.
“Keep fighting!” Buffy commanded, consumed in purpose. She could do this. She could take them all on. Her limbs began to feel as though they were on fire as she threw herself at an onslaught of vamps.
She sent a powerful roundhouse across the knobby face of a vampire. It hissed and stumbled to the side.
“Is that the best you’ve got?” She taunted. In a flash the vampire swept his sharp nail across her body.
Buffy staggered backwards, dumbly looking at the gash on her arm. The vampire took advantage of her dazed state and shot around, grabbing her from behind. As his rough hands began to tighten around her neck, her gaze darted around the streets. Everywhere the vampires had control. She heard Anya scream out in pain. Her ears pounded.
Her friends were losing.
She was losing.
The grip became tighter, and Buffy felt her eyes bulge. She clawed at the vampire’s hands, desperate for air, but his hold remained firm. Her legs swung wildly beneath her as she continued to struggle. She was the Slayer. The words echoed in her mind like a mantra. There was too much at stake for her to be beaten. The words soon became softer, her motions slowed and her eyes glazed over as she felt the effects of asphyxia settle in.
She closed her eyes.
She had failed the world.
Flash
Buffy dropped her knees, suddenly released from her noose. She pawed the wet pavement as she gasped for air. The thick smog poured into her lungs, but she sucked it in greedily. At her hands she saw dust. Everywhere dust. There was no screaming, no fighting. It was silent.
Buffy slowly lifted her head. There, to Buffy’s amazement, was Cordelia Chase. She stood strongly on a set of stilettos. Her olive blouse hung loosely off of her squared shoulders and her gray skirt stopped mid-thigh. Her hair, noticeably shorter and curling in around shoulder’s length, swept across her face. A series of bracelets wrapped up above the hand that firmly held a long broadsword while the other gripped the duffel bag slung over her shoulder. Her skin still seemed to hum with a residual glow.
“Sorry we’re late” She said, breezily “Between my coma and Fred’s driving it took us forever to get here”
Fred peeked out from behind her friend, smiled and waved. The group stood stunned, no one quite sure what they had just witnessed. The former May Queen had just exploded with light, blinding amounts of it pouring from her flesh. As Dawn looked around she noticed that there were no vampires save Spike. Anywhere. Finally, Gunn stepped forward.
“Cordy! My Girl! My ace in the hole!” He beamed, pulling her into a hug. “Nice to have ya back”
As if on cue, the group rushed the seer. Greetings and thank yous mixed together into a pleasant din. All became quiet again when Buffy stepped up in front of the late arrival.
The Slayer raised her eyes to meet the seer’s. She looked at her with unnerving stillness. “What was that?” She finally asked.
Cordelia shrugged. “Just a little thing I do” She said, waiting to see what the reaction would be. It seemed like forever before the next thing happened.
Buffy’s icy disposition quickly melted away leaving a warm smile. “Glad you could make it” She said, pulling Cordelia into a grateful hug. Cordelia chuckled in relief, and squeezed back. They pulled apart, registering the changes in each other with silent appreciation.
“Cordelia…?”
The crowd parted to reveal Angel. He took a tentative step forward, his hand clutching his bruised rib. Cordelia’s bottom lip quivered and then her mouth broke into a blindingly bright smile. “Angel!” She said, rushing to him. He scooped her up into his arms and held her as if she would be ripped away at any moment.
For the first time in what felt like forever the world was still. The warriors looked on silently as two of their own clung desperately to each other amidst the heaps of ashes.
***
Wesley finally had the vampire cornered in the alley behind the theatre. He smiled smugly as he watched his opponent futilely search the wall behind him for escape.
“I believe you have something that belongs to me,” He said, raising his crossbow.
“Come and get it” The vampire sneered. He tossed the ball carelessly into the air and caught it with an ineffectual hand. Wesley stopped in his tracks. The vampire set the orb behind him, and beckoned the ex watcher to make a move.
Wesley stepped forward, and in a flash the vampire was behind him, clutching his collar in a wet, slimy hand. He spun Wesley around and pushed him up, causing his back to grind against the cold concrete wall.
Wesley watched in horror as the vampire produced a switchblade from his studded leather jacket, flicking it open with a small wrist movement. He ran the blade along Wesley’s cheek, drawing blood. The vampire slowly brought the blade to his mouth, and ran a greedy tongue along the crimson edge.
“Sweet” The vampire crowed, his voice like gravel. He brought the knife to Wesley’s heart. “Let’s see how you like it”
Wesley set his jaw and braced himself. Suddenly, a stake burst through the vampire’s chest. Wesley fell to his feet, an explosion of ash before him. The brown dust soon disappeared to reveal the proud stakeholder.
Wesley blinked wildly. He couldn’t believe his eyes. There, before him stood Lilah Morgan.
“Lilah?” He finally managed to choke out. She smirked slightly, and dusted some of the vampire remains from her blouse.
“You were expecting maybe Blade?”
“But you’re dead. I buried you myself” Wesley cringed at the thought. The day they had come back to the hotel to find the lawyer dead in a pool of her own blood. He had taken responsibility for removing her corpse. He had owed her that much at least.
“Yeah, thanks for that by the way. Three feet of dirt was a bitch to climb my way out of”
Wesley shook his head, still lost. “How?”
“Perks of the job. Some people get a 401k, I got a reanimation clause in my contract. Thank God I got that promotion before that whole Beast ordeal,” She explained. She thought for a moment and then added “By the way, Cordelia’s a psychotic killer” She rubbed the gauss on her neck.
“We figured it out. Eventually”
Lilah laughed. “Apparently one stab too late for me” She said with a certain amount of lightheartedness. Wesley supposed if your death didn’t stick, you were allowed to be relatively flip about it.
“Why are you here?”
Lilah grabbed a large briefcase from the ground. “I brought you these,” She said, handing it to him.
Wesley flipped it open. Pages upon pages of writing. All in color coordinated folders. He looked up at her in confusion “What…?”
“It’s all of our resources on the First Evil. It’s pretty comprehensive. I guess the senior partners liked to know who signed their paychecks, if you know what I mean” She finished with a shrug.
Hope flickered in Wesley’s eyes and a small grin played on his lips. “This is fantastic” He said, rummaging through the papers like a kid at Christmas. Lilah felt herself smile in spite of herself.
“We should bring it to the others at once” He said, snapping the briefcase shut. He began to walk towards the high school when he heard her say, “I’m not going with you”
Wesley stopped. “Lilah…” He said, turning back to her.
“Welsey, we both know I don’t belong there. Besides, with Wolfram and Hart out of commission, I’ve used up my one and only get-out-of-death-free card”
“I suppose” Wesley softly agreed.
Lilah closed the gap between them. She was a woman who spent her life distancing herself from others. Now she was standing so close to him, and Wesley understood the significance of this gesture.
“You know, I lived my whole life using people. I’d take what I needed and toss them to the side. You were different. I just wanted you to know”
He watched silently as she turned and walked away. Part of him wanted to stop her, and he was sure part of her wanted him to as well. But they lived their lives on different sides of the fight, and that was a truth that simply could not be ignored.
He looked down at her final gesture. The briefcase.
Wesley knew the world’s salvation was locked somewhere inside.
Continue on...