 |
 Beholder
by Rhi
Disclaimer: I don't own them. Mutant Enemy does. All hail Joss Whedon. Spoilers/Ships: This is AU. Angel/Buffy. Distribution: Sure, just let me know. Feedback: Is always nice. darkrhiannon@aol.com Rating: NC-17 for violence and sex. Author's Note: I wrote this in response to a challenge by Rehatha, but changed some of the parameters. This is set in BtVS Season Seven and Angel Season Four. Spike disappeared after Seeing Red and hasn't returned. Willow and Giles are back from England and living in Buffy's house. Xander and Anya are on better terms with each other. Cordy's not a higher being (gak) nor evil, just her usual self- centered self, and the visions still hurt. Connor and Angel aren't exactly close, but he lives near the hotel and drops in frequently in between sulking. Wes is back in the fold. I haven't bothered much with Gunn and Fred. * Cordelia hissed as the vision hit. It felt as if her skull would split from the pain. Through the fog, Cordelia saw a small blonde woman fighting an immense demon. Light scintillated off of panes of glass, momentarily blinding Cordy's inner eye and she realized that the woman, *it's Buffy!* seemed to be fighting the demon in a funhouse maze of glass. She watched as the demon fought the Slayer, both exchanging brutal blows back and forth. Despite their disparate sizes, they seemed evenly matched, and for a moment, Cordy wondered why the PTB would bother splitting her skull to send her a play-by-play of the Slayer winning. Just then the demon feinted, sliding one wicked claw toward Buffy's face. When she flinched back from it, it managed to grab her by the back of the head. With a roar that echoed through Cordy's head, the demon pivoted and slammed Buffy's face through the glass of six different mirror frames. Buffy went down in a shower of glass and blood. Cordy gasped. *My god, Buffy's dead!* But the vision didn't end. She watched the Slayer's back as she climbed slowly to her feet and realized that she'd managed to survive. The vision ended before Buffy turned around. *God, isn't that just like her…slam her head through glass doors and she just keeps on going. What is up with that outfit, though? Was she shopping at dykes-r-us again?* Cordy came out of the vision surrounded by the sturdy coolness of Angel's arms. Eyes closed, she groaned at the pain of the Sight still throbbing through her head and clutched gratefully at the body of her friend. *Mmm, he's built,* she thought distractedly, then opened her eyes to glare at him. "Like I really need to see play-by- play of your…" Doyle paced into the room carrying three huge boxes marked Nordstrom- by-mail and Cordy pulled rapidly away from Angel to run to Wesley instead. "They're here, they're here!" she squealed, jumping up and down. "I beg pardon, but what, pray tell, are `they'?" Wes asked skeptically. "My new clothes! Remember that photo shoot that I actually managed to attend, no thanks to you and these stupid visions that keep making me look like an epileptic? Well, they promised me the clothes from the shoot! Oh, my god, I can't believe it!!!" Angel smiled wryly at Wes and then turned to Cordy, who was wildly unpacking and looked as if she might burst from excitement. "So, Cordy, the…" "Aaaah!" Cordy collapsed and Angel darted forward to catch her, staring at her pale face as her eyes flickered back and forth rapidly. The vision was short—Wes barely had enough time to grab pen and paper before Cordy turned to him. "3rd and Ash," she groaned. "Smelly yuk demon, one horn, blueish green skin and slime. Why is it always slime? Eats little kids! Uck! Asprin!" "It eats small children and asprin?" Wesley queried. "No, dufus, get me asprin…now! Angel," she said, turning her head to look at him, "you don't need Wes on this, just take Gunn. Kill the demon with a sword, then have Gunn dump some coke on it. The acid will keep it from resurrecting." Angel settled Cordy gently on the couch and moved fluidly to his weapons cabinet, Gunn behind him. His mind focused on the upcoming battle and picking up a coke before he went. * One night later… "What kind of demon grabs people at carnivals, anyway?" grumbled the Slayer as she trekked through dirty paper and refuse left by the fair- goers. It was late, past 3 am, her least favorite time of night. Dusk was more fun, despite the large numbers of early rising vamps out prowling the streets. Buffy smiled to herself. Actually, that was probably why she preferred it. Dusk and pre-dawn were her best hunting times…more bang for her buck. Even the vamps tended to disappear in the middle of the night, though…they had either already hunted and returned to their lairs, or were waiting for careless humans to begin stirring before dawn. *Early vampire gets the worm…ewww.* This demon had been a pain in her ass for days now…ever since the carnival had come to town. She'd been extra alert on those nights and had actually managed to take out a nest of vamps that apparently traveled with the carnies and fed off of the local populations before moving on. It was a surprisingly slick operation…never take too many from one place and move on before getting noticed. She wondered angrily how many teens had "run off" in those towns, never to be seen again. No one would think to connect them with the carnival. She listened carefully. This demon breathed funny…a slushy snorting sound that carried surprisingly well on the night air. She tracked it past the now-shut-down ferris wheel and through the food court, redolent with the greasy smell of funnel cakes and curly fries. *Ick! This demon must have unbelievably high cholesterol.* She turned the corner and saw the demon dart quickly into the funhouse mirror maze. "Swell. That thing is way too ugly to actually *want* to see its face in mirrors." Sighing, the Slayer followed the beast in and began wending her way through the maze. It was easy enough to do… they hadn't cleaned the glass and it was far from clean…covered with grimy handprints that fogged the surface enough that there was no chance anyone would walk into it. She paced forward, all senses alert for the beast, and came round a bend to an open area. *Probably the heart of the maze,* she thought, then ducked as a huge clawed hand swiped the air directly above her head. "Damn!" That was close…too close. Buffy rolled to face the beast, startled by her first good look at it. Once again, Giles's books failed to do the monster justice. Its claws were easily 6 inches long and they dripped with something viscous that just had to be poison. Buffy spin-kicked the demon backwards and it shattered the glass behind it. Snarling, it shook its head and charged at her, bleeding copiously from the pieces of glass now embedded in its thick hide. Buffy side-stepped neatly and stabbed at its slime coated back, but her stake slid harmlessly off the plates of scaly skin there. "That's not gonna work. Need something sharper…." Buffy lunged forward and grabbed for a large piece of the shattered glass. She ignored the flare of pain in her hands as it sliced her fingers and pivoted to thrust the glass spear deep into the demon's chest, just as it feinted, sliding one wicked claw toward her face. When she released the glass, now deeply embedded in its chest, she flinched back from it. The demon grabbed her by the back of the head with one scaly hand. With a roar, it pivoted and slammed her face directly into the mirror frames. Buffy went down in a shower of glass and blood. Pain, pain pain! Buffy could barely breathe through it as it exploded across her face directly into her eyes. She screamed in agony as the shattered glass penetrated her skin and the delicate membranes of both eyes. The world went black, but horribly, she was still conscious. The pain was unlike anything she'd experienced before—the loss of sight seeming to enhance rather than distract from it. Her wounded hands instinctively clawed at the shards tormenting her so cruelly and she sobbed in anguish as she pulled them from her face. Warm sticky fluid was pouring down the lacerated skin of her cheeks to choke her still-open mouth as she knelt in the splintered glass. *The demon!* Was it even now approaching, ready to gut her while she howled? Buffy forced her shaking hands away from her bloody face and climbed slowly to her feet, glass sliding and splintering further underfoot and threatening to send her falling back to the floor. She turned in the direction she thought the demon had been and took one tremulous step forward, probing with her toe and holding her bloody hands out before her in a futile attempt to guard against its next attack. She took another step, and another, her senses straining despite the pain that jarred her head at every footfall. Abruptly, her foot rammed into something, and she fell forward, catching her balance at the last second before she impaled herself on the glass she'd skewered the demon with. It was dead. *Thank god, thank god, thank god.* With her foe dead, Buffy's brief adrenalin rush faded and she sank to her bleeding knees by its side. Now that self-preservation ceased to be utmost in her mind, her hands went back to her face. *My god, I can't see. I CAN'T SEE! Please no.* She wept. * Giles crept stealthily through the abandoned carnival lot with Willow behind him. Buffy had allowed them to come along, but only if they held back. Given the virulence of the poison with which the demon attacked its victims, Giles was delighted to oblige. Anya and Xander approached them from the other direction. "Why do we have to be here now? There's no money anywhere," Anya complained, cuddling into Xander's tall form. "An, we're not here about the money. Though I really got taken the last time I played that baseball game…are you sure the carnies aren't demons, Giles?" "We've already established that the demon is not associated with the carnival, Xander. Please pay attention," the former Watcher chastised. "This is simply an ideal feeding ground for it. Now, if you've not seen anything, that way, I suggest we move toward that maze attraction. Perhaps Buffy managed to corner it there." The group moved toward the maze and split up to enter through both doors, not knowing where Buffy might have cornered the demon. Giles led Xander and, much to his annoyance, Anya, while Willow made her way in through the exit, a softly glowing ball of witchlight guiding her. Giles cringed from actually touching the smeary glass of the maze. The numbers of revolting little children who must have been through this made him loathe to brush against anything. The maze was not terribly complicated, much easier than the hedge mazes he'd grown up amongst. *Now those could be bloody difficult,* he thought reminiscently. The group reached the open center of the maze shortly and Giles made out countless shards of broken glass scattered across every portion of the floor. In the gloom, he almost missed the kneeling form of his Slayer next to the bulky body of the (he hoped) now-dead demon. Buffy seemed to be rocking back and forth and moaning, and Giles was immediately concerned that she might have been injured in some way. Just then, Willow appeared from the opposite direction, bringing with her the handy ball of witchlight. Willow gestured and it floated slowly center and brightened enough for all of them to see. "Buffy, are you injured?" Giles asked in concern when the Slayer's frenzied rocking was uninterrupted by the improved lighting. Buffy flinched from his words, stilled, then slowly rose. "Giles?" her voice was ragged, barely more than a hoarse whisper. "Please, help me." She turned to face them and Giles recoiled in horror. Buffy's lovely face was a ruin of blood and shattered glass, much still embedded in her delicate skin. Her hazel eyes were utterly obscured by blood and he realized with shock that she was blind. She reached one wounded hand toward him and collapsed forward to fall limply in the chaos of glass. * Sunnydale Hospital saw its share of horrific injuries, but the girl lying still and silent in the ICU was one of the worst any of the surgeons had ever seen. Despite painstaking repairs and nearly 16 hours of surgery, she was blind. The plastic surgeons had done their job well, removing every sliver of glass from her face, but the damage to the eyes was far too great. A corneal transplant was out of the question due to the scarring on the eyes themselves. The surgeons contented themselves sadly with mending as much of the cosmetic damage as possible and restoring the girl to at least some semblance of the beauty she'd clearly possessed before. She would still have extensive scarring around the eyes, but the rest of her face was miraculously untouched. Willow sat numbly outside the ICU room. With all that Buffy had been through since her resurrection, it was inconceivable that this was her reward. How could the powers let this happen? And what would the Hellmouth do to them all without a Slayer to protect them? She whispered under her breath, a delicate and utterly good spell of strength and healing to speed her best friend's recovery. It was all she could do for Buffy, and she feared it would not be close to enough. * Buffy lay silently in her hospital bed. The drugs they gave her wore off too quickly to dull much of the pain she was still caught up in. Her Slayer metabolism was just too strong. She laughed mirthlessly to herself. Too strong, but not strong enough to heal this. What use was a blind Slayer? She couldn't fight, couldn't protect her friends. She should have just stayed dead. * Buffy was moved to a regular hospital room quickly, once her preternaturally strong body healed the grievous wounds it had received. Her hands were stiffly bandaged over slowly fading scar tissue. She had kept them from her face, not wanting to know how hideous she must appear to those around her. The bandages around her eyes were lightened slowly, until only a thin gauze remained to protect her healing skin. She learned to feed herself, awkwardly at first, but with greater ease once the bandages on her hands were finally removed. She combed her own hair, brushed her teeth, and learned to dress herself without the use of her eyes. The doctors pronounced her fit to go home and she left with Giles, Willow, Xander and Anya at her side. No one suggested calling Angel. * "This is worse than high school, Giles," Buffy complained acidly. "Buffy, you have no choice in this. You need to learn Braille if you're to function. Your counselor from social services concurs. Since you refuse to deal with her, you shall have to study it with me. Come, we'll learn together." Buffy grimaced and dropped her sightless gaze to the large book on her lap, running the tips of her fingers over the raised bumps that everyone insisted spelled out words. She reached one hand up to push her dark glasses back up her nose. Now she knew why Giles played with his glasses so much. They were a pain in the ass, always sliding down her nose. But she didn't want her friends looking at her scarred eyes and pitying her. So she wore them. They hadn't left her alone for one minute since she arrived home from the hospital. The bandages were gone, the antibiotics, completed, yet they lurked, ever present, suffocating her with good wishes and care. Buffy felt like screaming, like killing something, like crying, but dared not do any of those things with her ever-present guardians. At least tonight, Xander, Anya and Willow had gone out together. They'd begged her to come with them, but Buffy had declined. Her remaining senses seemed to be getting stronger to compensate for her loss of sight, and she'd heard all of them gasp in dismay at her face when the final bandages were removed. She knew she must appear hideous…a freak. She couldn't be with them in public and not react when strangers recoiled from her in horror. So she stayed in the house and pretended to care about Braille. Giles saw the weariness on Buffy's face and sighed. His Slayer had been through so much. She'd died twice, she'd lost everyone she'd ever called family, every man she'd tried to love, and now this. He'd known the life of the Chosen was difficult, Hell, he'd told her that himself on too many occasions to count. But this, this was beyond anything he'd imagined happening to his charge even in his worst nightmares. "Giles," she whispered. "Could we stop for tonight? I'm…tired." "Certainly, Buffy," he answered. "It's only been three weeks. I don't expect you to learn this all in a fortnight. Why don't I help you upstairs and you can rest? Perhaps I could draw you a bath?" Buffy smiled gratefully in his direction and he smiled back at her, then realized that of course, she couldn't see him. He walked to her, took the book gently from her hands, and slid his hand under hers to help her to her feet. He knew that her hands and knees still pained her where the glass had cut into the muscle, but she didn't even flinch when she stood. *She's becoming adept at hiding her pain,* he thought ruefully, *even from me. But then, she's had years of practice.* Giles guided her carefully to the stairs. Buffy was learning to count steps around the house and her friends were learning not to move things, but the situation was difficult for them all. Just that morning, Xander had left his jacket on the stairs and Buffy had slipped on it and fallen. Xander had apologized profusely, but Giles had hated him in that moment, actually hated him, more for the look of shame on Buffy's face than for any actual hurt she'd felt from the fall. She was withdrawing further and further from them with every passing day and he was helpless to draw her out. Buffy moved slowly up the stairs, one hand gripping the rail tightly, the other feeling the wall. She was counting silently to herself, but Giles could tell. She reached the top and turned toward her room. "I'll just draw the bath for you, Buffy," he said. "Do you want vanilla?" It was her usual choice in scent, but one she hadn't bothered with since her return home. "Vanilla? Oh, um, yeah. Vanilla is fine, Giles. Make it hot, please." Buffy responded, turning toward her room. Once inside, she closed the door firmly before moving slowly to her bed. Buffy undressed and folded her clothes neatly, then moved toward the closet, which she'd left closed that morning. She opened the door on the left and reached down for the laundry basket there, placing her clothes carefully into it. Then she pulled her pajamas from the hook to the right and closed the door. She took two steps toward the bed and stopped when her knees brushed it. She laid the pajamas there and moved to the door of her room, pulling her long fuzzy robe from it and wrapping it securely around herself. She opened the door and counted steps to the bathroom. She could smell her favorite scent wafting on the steamy air. Giles spoke from the end of the hall, "Buffy, I've left everything I thought you might need on the counter to the left of the sink. Why don't you see…" he paused awkwardly…"feel what's there and tell me if you need anything else before I retire for the night?" Buffy nodded and walked slowly into the bathroom. In that moment, Giles desperately missed the darting grace with which she used to move. The slow, methodical pace she kept to these days seemed so very…wounded. Buffy reached her hands out tentatively over the counter and found soap, washcloth, towel, shampoo, conditioner and comb there. "This is fine, Giles," she called. "Thank you." She closed the door gently and hung her robe on the hook before gathering the bath things and stepping into the tub. The water was hot, as hot as her tears, as hot as the hell to which she'd sent her only love, as hot as the bile that rose in her throat at the thought of what she must do tonight. Sunnydale needed a slayer. A functional Slayer, not the crippled freak that she had become. Buffy bathed herself slowly, lathering the vanilla soap with her scarred hands and rubbing it into the washcloth. She ducked her hair under the water and washed it, turning on the faucet to rinse it briefly. She didn't bother with the conditioner. She stayed in the tub until the water was cool to the touch, as cool as the skin of her lovers, first and last. Fitting that her sterile life was bookended by death. She drew Angel in her mind's eye…the tall, powerful body, the huge but oddly graceful hands, so talented and gentle with her despite their size. The thought that she could never again gaze into his deep brown eyes and see the beauty that was her only love drew a sob from her. She muffled it in her towel, cut it off, lest Giles notice and come running. Buffy climbed from the tub, drained the water and set her things neatly into the basket on the side. *Mom would be so proud,* she thought. *Finally Buffy learns to put her stuff away.* She moved to the counter and picked up the comb, working it quickly through her hair, then placing it in the drawer. She folded her towel and felt for the towel bar, hanging it carefully before grabbing her robe from the door. She put it on and opened the door, realizing as she reached automatically for the light switch that she'd never even turned it on. Buffy walked slowly to her room, entered it and closed the door gently behind her, hanging her robe upon its hook. She walked to the bed and felt for her pajamas, pulling them on before moving to her desk. She felt around until she found one of her old, spiral bound notebooks from college. She'd had space left in all of them at the back…her note-taking abilities less than stellar, even after high school. She fumbled for a marker and ripped a page from the book. "Dear Willow and Xander," she printed as carefully as she could, feeling her way with her left hand as she printed with her right. It would be sloppy, she knew, but she thought it should be pretty legible. "I'm sorry. I love you both. Buffy" Her note to Giles was similar. She couldn't write much, it was too difficult to tell where her letters were going. She thought about writing to Angel, but couldn't bear the thought. It was night. He would be out helping people. She called his number carefully, her fingers finding the pattern on the phone's keypad without difficulty. How many times had she dialed that number only to hang up before it even rang? She had lost count years ago. Years before boys or keys or death or pain had separated them so surely that they could never regain the comfort of each other's arms. She listened to the phone connecting and ringing, one hand on the receiver poised to hang up if someone actually answered. But no one did. Cordelia's canned voice came on the line. "You've reached Angel Investigations. We help the hopeless. Please leave a message." Hopeless. But they couldn't help her. No one could. Willow had tried, god knows, but her healing spells had only sped what the Slayer's own body was doing already. She couldn't restore lost sight. Buffy didn't blame her. "Angel," she whispered, his beloved name lilting from her mouth like one last kiss. "I'm sorry I haven't called before this. Sorry I didn't get to see you one last time before…anyway, I just…" her voice broke. "I just want you to know I wish you happiness and joy. I wish…I wish I could have seen your son in your arms. If I still had our ring, the heart would point in…always." She hung up abruptly, afraid that she'd said too much already. Buffy left the notes on her desk and rose from the chair. She walked decisively to her closet opened it, and reached for the chest that had remained untouched for the last month. The lid opened with practiced ease and she pulled out the tray and set it on the floor next to her. She reached in and felt carefully inside for…yes, there it was. Faith's knife. Buffy smiled mirthlessly at the irony. It had nearly killed one slayer in her hands. Now it could kill another. She laid it carefully on the floor by her scarred knees, lifting the tray and replacing it before she closed the chest. She grabbed the knife and rose to her feet, closing the closet door absently. She paced slowly to the door, counting steps and listening intently before opening it. Giles was in his room, her mother's old room, listening quietly to his ancient records. She smiled wistfully, remembering them together that night and her mother, looking like that Stevie Nicks woman in the long floaty coat. They'd seemed so young to her then. She walked carefully to the top of the stairs and inched her way down, listening for any sign that her friends had returned. All was silent. She made it to the kitchen, still counting to herself, trying to picture everything in her head. She unlocked the door and stepped out into the cool California night, closing the door quietly behind her. The porch steps should be…there. She sighed with relief. She'd not been out of the house since she'd returned from the hospital, and she hadn't been certain she remembered this properly. Three steps down into the backyard. She leaned against the post and placed the knife handle carefully between her knees, pressing them cautiously together to hold it steady. This was too messy to do inside, where her friends would have to clean up after her again. Better out here under the stars. The night was her time and she had missed it this past month, trapped inside where she'd never belonged. The Slayer needed to be free. Since that wasn't possible, and Faith was in prison, she'd free a new Slayer to take her place, to do the job she could no longer handle. Buffy grit her teeth and clasped her hands, then felt for the knife blade with her wrists. It was…there. She pushed inward with both wrists until she felt the sharp kiss of the blade, so like the kiss of fangs she'd once felt from her Angel. That gave her the strength to pull her wrists sharply upward. She knew she'd cut deep, nearly to the bone, and blessed Faith for having such a good blade. She felt the blood gush from the deep cuts and her head lolled back, her eyes closed as she sank into blissful calm. * Chapter 2 The phone rang, interrupting Giles's enjoyment of his classic Bread album. Snarling, he grabbed it off the receiver, hoping it hadn't awakened Buffy. God knows, she got little enough actual rest these days. He'd hoped she might start feeling better, but he knew that her sleep was plagued with dreams and nightmares over which he had no control. "Who is it?" he asked brusquely, his habitual manners lacking. "Giles, what the hell is going on?" roared Angel's angry voice. "I just got home to a message from Buffy, something about wishing she could see me one last time…" Giles dropped the phone with a curse and raced to Buffy's room. It was empty, as was the bath. He clattered downstairs, glaring hastily about the room. Empty. The kitchen was empty as well. He turned towards the front, then tried the backdoor, on a whim. It was unlocked. He stepped outside. Buffy sat propped against the post, a knife…Faith's knife laying next to her. An ever-widening circle of blood surrounded her and Giles felt his heart leap into his throat. He ripped his shirt from his body, tearing it hastily into strips as he lunged for his fallen, oh so fallen, Slayer. Cursing ineffectually, he tied the strips tightly round the deep gashes on Buffy's wrists, then lifted her tiny, too- light body into his arms. He carried her into the house and laid her on the couch, then reached fearfully for her neck to check her pulse. For a moment, he thought he'd been too late, but then, under his fingers he felt the faint pulse of life beating in her throat. He reached for the phone, dialing 911 quickly, then waiting for the ambulance to arrive. He hovered over Buffy as they started an IV, then scribbled a hasty note to her friends before climbing into his car to follow the ambulance to hospital. Buffy's condition, though drained, was not serious once she'd received a transfusion. It was only after Xander, Willow and Anya arrived that Giles remembered that Angel's phone call had begun the chain of events. What must the vampire be thinking there in LA? * "I still don't see why you have to go to Sunnydale *now,*" Cordy whined. "It's not as if I've had any visions about Buffy since last mon…" she shut up hastily, hoping that Angel hadn't caught that last part. "I have to go to Sunnydale to find out…wait…what did you just say?" He turned toward her abruptly and Cordelia was reminded that whether Angelus was in control or not, Angel was still a big, bad, bloodsucking vampire. "I, um, I had a vision of her a while back." "When?" he bit out tersely, coming to stand directly before her. "About a month…the day I got my new clothes from the Nordstrom shoot!" Her voice lifted with excitement at her remembered enjoyment of that day. "And you didn't tell me because?" his voice was getting growlier, she noticed apprehensively. "Well, my clothes came and then I got that other vision and my head hurt and besides it's not as if she didn't get up after he hit her…" Cordy's voice trailed off into the ominous silence. Angel grabbed her by the shoulders and growled into her face, "Before who hit her? Who hit Buffy?" "Um, ouch, Angel, you're hurting me. The demon. The slimy one with the claws and the scales. But he didn't kill her…she got up!" Angel cursed under his unneeded breath and released his seer, stalking into the night without another word. * Willow, Xander, Giles and Anya sat in the waiting room at the ER. Buffy was stable, they knew that much, but her suicide attempt had drawn the psychiatric attending down for a consult, which was still going on. At last, she stepped from the room and motioned to Giles. "Are you related to Ms. Summers?" she asked. "I am her guardian, or I was," he answered. "You live with her?" "Yes, along with her friend Willow, who rooms in the house, as well," he added, trying to make the arrangement sound more normal and less… sordid. "Fine," she nodded approvingly. "Ms. Summers has not dealt with her blindness at all, and I believe this attempt was born out of despair, rather than a true desire to do harm to herself. I'm keeping her here for observation for a couple of days, but I will release her into your care, provided you think you can do a better job of it than you have been." "I…we will all work together to help Buffy however we may." She nodded brusquely, jotting indecipherable notes on her tablet. "May I, that is, is it possible to see her? Just for a moment?" "Provided you don't upset her. I have her on light sedation right now, but she's awake and alert. No more than 10 minutes." Giles nodded and stepped into the room. After the bustle of the hallway, the private room was quiet and oddly peaceful. Buffy lay silently in the bed, no expression on her face. Her bloodstained pajamas had been removed, and the hospital gown emphasized the pale, drawn features of her too-thin face. Her eyes were open and Giles realized he'd not seen them since she'd left hospital the last time. She'd hidden behind her dark glasses for nearly a month. "You can stop hovering, Giles," she said calmly. "I'm sure there's a chair by the bed." "How did you…" "Know it was you? I know your scent," she said. "Xander smells like Dial and Anya's perfume. Willow smells like strawberry shampoo and sage and sometimes other herbs depending on what spells she's been working on. You smell like tea and cream in the morning and like scotch after dinner, all mixed with wool and that aftershave you like so much." "Buffy," he said, drawing the chair near to her bed and resting one hand lightly on hers. "This isn't the answer. I know you've been depressed lately, but this isn't the answer." "Isn't it, Giles? I don't think you understood the question. I've waited, hoped that somehow, something might improve, but it's not and it's not going to. This is as well as I'm going to get and it's not enough, Giles! How can I protect them, how can I keep them safe? How many vampires have killed people since I went blind, Giles? Are you even keeping track? I'm useless like this. A blind Slayer. You should have slit my throat yourself, once you knew for sure. I'm worthless. I can't protect anyone this way. The world can't afford to have a blind Slayer. If I die, though, then a new one will be Called and she *can* protect them. It's the only way, Giles." Buffy twisted her hands within the soft restraints that held them in place. Giles knew that she could snap those restraints if she wished, snap them with the strength that coiled within her…the strength that, god help her, she wanted to gift to another. "Buffy, dear girl," he whispered. "I thought you were giving up, giving in. I had no idea that you thought…Buffy, the Slayers' line no longer passes through you. If it did, another would have been called when you died on the tower. The line passes through Faith now, don't you understand? Your death would have been for nothing, Buffy." Buffy jerked her head to stare at him with her sightless eyes. "But… Faith is in prison, Giles! She's not due to be paroled for years and years! What am I supposed to do till then? I can't see, I can't hunt, how can I protect them?" "You can't worry about that right now, Buffy, please. Just get well, get strong. We need you. We will always need you." He pressed a gentle kiss to her forehead. "Rest now, I must leave. We'll talk more after you come home." She listened as his footsteps moved out of the room and were lost to her in the noise from the hallway. Tears trickled from her useless eyes until she fell into a uneasy slumber. * Angel pulled his car into Buffy's driveway with a sharp jerk, then raced to the front door. No one answered the bell, no one responded to his pounding fist. Cursing, he stalked to the back, but was nearly knocked off his feet by the scent that greeted him when he rounded the corner. Blood. Her blood. The scent was overwhelming, powerful, and fresh. Angel ran for the steps and stopped in horror. Faith's knife lay on the porch. It glistened evilly in the moonlight and it sang to him of Buffy's blood, blood he'd tasted, glutted on, and never forgotten. A pool of it lay, barely disturbed and only hours old, in a nearly perfect circle on the porch. Someone had cut her, cut her deep, and from her message, he feared that she was that someone. Viciously suppressing the urge to reach his hand down and grab the knife, to taste her blood, dried but still irresistible, from its evil blade, Angel strode inside, just as the front door opened, spilling Xander (Angel snarled), Willow, Anya and Giles into the stillness of the Summers' home. "Dead boy," Xander sneered. "Great, nothing else could possibly go wrong now." Angel stalked to the young man and grabbed him by the throat. "Where is Buffy?" he snarled. "Angel, put Xander down at once," Giles ordered. "Buffy is fine. Well, perhaps not fine, but she's in no danger. She's in hospital… for observation. They plan to send her home within a few days. She's as well as can be expected and I'm quite certain she would not be pleased if you killed Xander in her living room." Angel dropped Xander with a snarl and paced after Giles, who was walking to the kitchen. "Scotch?" he asked as he pulled a bottle from the cabinet. "Giles, what the hell is going on? I got this cryptic message from Buffy, her blood is practically covering the back porch, and now you say she's in the hospital for observation? What happened?" Giles looked at the dark vampire. After Buffy had come home, he'd suggested calling Angel, but she had forbidden any of them to contact him. She didn't want his pity, Giles knew, and he respected her for her decision. He knew how much it had cost her, how much she wanted her ex-lover with her. He couldn't go against her wishes now, not if they were to work together. "Buffy was…hurt in a fight with a demon approximately one month ago. She felt that her capabilities as Slayer were sufficiently compromised that she should pass the power on to the next potential in training. She attempted to do so tonight." "Pass on the…Jesus, Giles, there's only one way to do that, she tried…" "To kill herself, yes, that's correct, Angel." Giles tossed back the scotch in the glass and poured himself another. "I don't believe she'll attempt to do so again, however. I pointed out to her that the line no longer passes through her, hasn't in fact, since Kendra was Called. Faith is the head of the line now, and only Faith's death can trigger a new Chosen One." "Faith is redeeming herself, Giles," Angel insisted. "I know you don't believe me, but she is!" "Whatever the situation with Faith is," Giles said, "Buffy is no longer involved in the line of Slayers. She is outside of it, an anomaly. I believe that now that she understands that, she will attempt no further harm to herself." "But Giles, what the hell is wrong with her that she would do that anyway?" Giles flinched from Angel's brooding regard. This was tricky. "I believe that for reasons known only to her, Buffy simply felt she could not go on any longer, Angel. You weren't here last year when we discovered that she'd been pulled back not from a hell dimension, as Willow believed, but from heaven itself. She was quite… traumatized by the entire experience. She hasn't been quite herself since then." "If you're talking about her fucking Spike, Giles, you don't need to protect her. My bastard offspring regaled me in glorious detail about his…conquest of my mate." "Spike? Oh, that was over months ago, Angel. No one has seen him since spring." "Regardless, Angel, I apologize for worrying you when you rang. Buffy will be fine. You can return to Los Angeles now if you wish." "I don't wish, Giles. I've stayed away for Buffy's good, but this mess convinces me that I was wrong, dead wrong about that. When we met after she…came back, she was so…distant, I thought she didn't wa… need me, but she sure needs something. The Buffy I knew would never have considered suicide. She kept me from killing myself when The First was tormenting me, she told me that "strong is fighting." I don't know what happened to her, but I'm going to find out." "I'll be at the hospital tomorrow night. Tell them to expect me. I *will* see Buffy." Angel turned in a swirl of black leather and stormed from the house. Chapter 3 Buffy had been moved to the fifth floor for observation. Her room was quiet and out of the way, and someone, Xander, she thought, had brought her a change of clothes and her dark glasses. She sat, facing the window. Earlier, she'd felt the sun on her face, shining through the glass, and had been glad that they'd pulled the drapes for her. Now, long after the sun's warmth had left her room, she remained there. Her door opened and she shivered in reaction. She knew who stood there, knew with every fiber of her being. He stalked almost silently into the room, snapping her light on as he entered, and his scent washed over her like a memory. Sandalwood and soap, with a hint of the musky maleness that had attracted her like a moth to a flame. She flinched from his unseen regard, then forced herself to remain still. "Buffy," he growled, his gaze resting on the stark white bandages that adorned both of her slender wrists. "What the hell did you think you were doing?" She continued staring out into the night, ignoring him. The dark glasses annoyed him and her unnatural calm annoyed him even more. He paced angrily behind her chair, wanting with everything in him to shake her out of her complacency to threaten her with violence for daring something so stupid and foolish. "I was…confused, Angel. Giles talked to me. I'm fine now, see? You can go home." "How dare you? You leave that god-awful message on my machine and expect me to, what, to go on my merry way? It doesn't work like that, Buffy, and you know it. Or you used to. What the fuck happened to you in heaven that you treat us like this now? Huh? Look at me when I'm talking to you, god damn it!" Buffy turned her head and he stared at the damned glasses, wondering what was going on behind her hidden eyes. She cocked her head at him and smiled grimly. "Angel, you told me before, you have a life in LA and I'm not in it. I accept that. I was just, I'm sorry, I shouldn't have called you, shouldn't have bothered you. I apologize. I was wrong." He was so angry he felt as if the demon might rip its way out of his skin standing there. He couldn't look at her anymore, picturing her lifeless body left behind, *again,* like so much offal. He wanted to shake her, to knock some sense into her, to kiss her and fuck her and force her to scream his name and promise to never ever do anything so foolish again. But he couldn't and the tension was driving him mad. "I can't stay here and look at you like this, you selfish bitch! All calm, as if nothing has even happened." "Then go. I'm not stopping you," she replied, turning back to the window. "I like to look at the stars, they're so peaceful and calm. Go home, Angel. Go back to LA. I won't bother you any more." "You're a coward, Buffy Summers, a hypocrite and a coward!" Angel growled in fury and stormed from the room, moving down the hall so fast that he nearly bowled over two doctors and a nurse. He seethed all the way down in the elevator and continued to curse and mutter as he strode through the now pouring rain towards his car…*pouring rain… pouring rain…stars…she likes to look at the stars…to look…dark glasses…no, it can't be.* He turned and raced back into the hospital, ignoring the elevator for the stairs…he was faster than an elevator any day. He burst back into her room, her once-again-dark room and saw her leaning her head against the window, her glasses discarded on the chair behind her. He flicked on the light and thought, for a moment that he'd been mistaken, then she turned, startled by his abrupt entry and he glimpsed the sheen of tears on her face. She reached quickly for her glasses, but missed and knocked them to the floor. He watched as she knelt awkwardly and reached her hands out, searching…searching blindly in the brightly lit room for the glasses directly in front of her. Angel backed into the door and closed his own eyes as he sank to the floor. He groaned in pained horror. "No. Buffy." Buffy found the glasses at last and pushed them quickly onto her face, standing and turning away from him to face the window again as she did so. He watched her back shake with suppressed sobs, heard the quick intake of her breath before she forced herself back to the deadly calm with which she'd faced him earlier. "Did you forget something, Angel?" She was staring up, he realized, staring where she thought his face would be if he were standing instead of crouched in denial on the floor of her hospital room. And now he understood her actions completely. Now they were perfectly in character for his love…his Slayer. She couldn't fight like this and she couldn't live with herself if she didn't fight. For all her years of experience fighting demons and vampires, Buffy was literal minded to the point of stubbornness. She would have seen only one way out, one way to renew the Slayer Line. And she took it. He stood and stalked to her, putting one hand up to touch her face. She flinched from the unexpected touch and he pulled the dark glasses gently away. Her face was nearly untouched, except for her eyes. The scars there were livid and angry looking, a bright purple-red. Her once-hazel eyes were visibly scarred as well, a haze of scar tissue that obscured their color and clearly allowed no light within. His golden girl, his love, whom he'd left so she could walk in the light, would now walk only in darkness. "I don't want your pity, Angel. I don't need your pity. You said your piece, it's no less true, you can leave now," she said coldly, the edge to her words belied by the tears dried upon her still-lovely face. "I'm not going anywhere, Buffy," he said solemnly. "You told me…" his voice cracked for a moment. "You told me that if you still had our ring, that the heart would point in…always. Or didn't you mean that?" "I didn't mean it," she lied, tilting her face away as if, even now that she could no longer see him, she couldn't look him in the eye and lie. "I was stupid and melodramatic. I…I shouldn't have called at all." "I can see the truth in your face, little liar," he growled. "Don't try to deny it. You are my mate until we are both dust and beyond. You shared your soul with me and I will not release you because you think…" "I think what," she broke in. "That you had a child with another vampire? That you left me, left this "freak show," she gestured at her face, then turned abruptly away from him. "It's really a freak show now, Angel. I know how awful I look, I know how revolting the scars are. I can hear my friends talking when they don't know I'm can hear. I don't need your pity and I don't want you hanging around the crippled girl like some lovesick puppy." "Look I'm really tired now, and I have to pass my psych evaluation tomorrow or they won't let me leave. Could you go please?" She walked haltingly to the bed and he cringed to see her feeling for it with her fingers. "I'll leave…for now. But I'm not leaving Sunnydale. We need to talk, Buffy." He placed her glasses gently in her hand and tipped her face up to his own. "I didn't even notice," he quoted at her, before kissing her lips as gently as a breeze. Then he strode out, switching off the lights once more and leaving her alone in the dark. To be continued… |
