"Immortal Beloved XVIII..."

A shortie...

NC-17 (at least for my work)

Disclaimer: No, Joss, no...I make no claims, put that thing down!

It's all yours and ME's

Spoilers for Angel to this week...Flee at once!...

Summary: Ok, one more...Can't resist it...Aftermath of "Girl In Question..."

You may want to avoid this one, it's a bit nasty...But I resent the way the fellas were treated and until Joss improves that ending...Anyway it's certainly not as harsh as some tales I've seen posted...

***

LA...Wolfram-Hart tower...Angel's office...May 2004...Two weeks after the boys' return from Rome...

Angel giving final instructions to Wesley as he and Spike prepare to accept a rather unique invitation...Reluctantly, but curiosity having got the better of them...

"Hello?..." Angel picks up his buzzing cell phone... "Oh, hello, Giles..." William eyeing him...

What's that?...You think Buffy's got into trouble with His Benevolence?...Lost contact with her, eh?...

"You'd like us to go and see how she's making...er doing?...Well, Rupert...Under any other circumstances, I'd end this conversation by reminding you I still work at Wolfram-Hart and therefore it would be best not to have contact with me...Yes, I am still furious over Ms. Burkle, you cold-hearted, self-righteous...And I would suggest, under any other circumstances that you send Xander, Andrew, and a hundred...Oh?...Sorry to hear that...I liked Andrew..."

Andrew?...William blinked...The filthy bastard sob of an Immortal...!

"In any case Giles, since Willow saved me, my accounts with you and Buffy are squared...And I agree with your earlier suggestion that our groups remain on their own...As for William...Well, it's up to him...I'd be inclined to say you and yours are in his debt not vice-versa...However...You are in luck, this once...We've been invited to the Immortal's place...By His Benevolence personally and we've agreed to go..."

And when we get there, bloody vengeance!...Vengeance for our poor ole sot of an Andrew!...William roared...Spike!...Angel raised a hand...

"No, Giles...I won't call you back...But I will ask Buffy to...And perhaps William may wish to...Or one of us may feel like calling Dawn...Goodbye..."

***

The Austrian Alps...The well-fortified but incredibly beautiful castle-chateau of "The Immortal"...

A small...Well, actually rather large...Army of attendants and guards manning the place...The boys carefully searched and screened at each checkpoint...This time for once, allowed to pass...

"Gentlemen... 'THE Immortal'..." A distinguished butler allows them entry to the great hall of the castle...A youthful-looking...Except for the hard, cool eyes...man awaits them...The Immortal, the spitting image of actor Jude Law...A few guards around him...

"The noble Angel...The courageous, romantic William...Gentlemen, welcome..." the Immortal graciously waves them to chairs...They look round...Not for you know, of course...Just checking the defenses...

"I am sure you both realize that in addition to my personal strength and my guards here, there are multiple crossbows and other weapons trained on you from various hidden points about this room...I would recommend you refrain from any foolishness such as your friends attempted recently, to their sorrow..."

"Where is she?..." William glared... "You must have her prisoner, she'd never let her Slayers and friends be slaughtered like that..."

Hmmn...Well...The Immortal smiled...She might possibly wink at it...Now...

"But yes, she is here, of course...Though quite content, I assure you..."

Buffy?!...He called...A concealed door opened...Buffy, staring a bit blankly, dressed in a reasonably discreet maid's outfit stepped into the room, halting in the center, looking at the Immortal...Sir?...she asked quietly...

"Buffy?...Girl?..." Will called...Wait, Will...Angel held him back... "Yes, restrain our impatient poet, my friend...I do not wish to have to destroy such a rare and beautiful thing as a souled vampire..." the Immortal smiled...

"Buffy...We have guests...Please greet them in my name..." she turned to them...

"Welcome sirs....To the home of the Immortal, my Master...Please call on me for anything you require, I am at your service..." she gave a wan smile...

"A spell..." Angel frowned... "I thought you didn't use magics..." I don't, the Immortal grinned...This was the work of Europe's finest neurosurgeons...

"I'm sure your friend William can appreciate the life-altering potential of neurosurgery...And being physical, rather than mystical, it is, I'm afraid...Irreversible..."

Buffy...Please show our guests proper hospitality...he turned to her...She nodded...And unbuttoned her blouse, kneeling before the boys...

"Sirs...Please accept the hospitality of the Immortal...I am here for your pleasure..."

"You soddin'..." Will tries to step forward...An electrical field hurls him back...The Immortal smiled coldly...Buffy remaining on her knees, waiting...

"You see, my friends...I do wish to spare your lives...I could have had him killed just now Angel..." the Immortal noted calmly... "But I wish you to live...And spread the word of my triumph...Over the Greatest of the Slayers..."

"We're going to kill you, you son of a bitch..."Angel replied quietly...

But she came to me voluntarily, Angel...She accepted my love, knowing I had no soul and could not be trusted to have pure motives...Her arrogant confidence in her abilities destroyed her...

"More to the point, her foolish failure to see how vital her network of support...The friends and family who, alas, arrived too late this one time to save her...Were to her past victories...I studied her for years, you see...Rejoicing in her victories as much as you did...For it made her all the more appealing a challenge..."

Her abilities, though spectacular, were not that far from those of many past great Slayers...She had learned to tap her strength better but what made her unique was that she, of all Slayers, had retained her connections to the world...She had others, people whose abilities, though humanly-limited, I came to respect and admire...These people were her true unique strength...The key to defeating her was to persuade her to detach herself from them...At least to some extent...

"And by exerting all my charms...And taking a considerable cue from you, young William...I persuaded her to accept me as her lover and to come here...Where my physicians did the rest..."

"You bastard!...You ruddy fiend!...You cowardly, little... I would never, in my worst have played a Slayer that way!...You...Unsporting...Ungentlemanly..."

Though it does remind of this one time, back in me crypt...he thought...But hey, she was a consenting partner then...

Mr. Walthrop...The Immortal bristled a bit at the Ungentlemanly crack... "You are over-excited...Buffy...Our guests seem to feel the offer of your favors is insincere...Please reassure them of the sincerity of your desire..."

"Gentlemen...Please...I want to please you...Please..." Buffy eyed them...Moving forward towards William...

"Stop this, you son of a bitch!!...Buffy, stop!...Please, girl..."

"Too late, young William...Much too late...But don't despair completely...I mean to return her to you...As my gift...You and Angel will bring the positive proof of my triumph to the world...Buffy?..." the Immortal called to her... "Mr. Walthrop, the blonde young man, is rather shy...Please be a little more forward in encouraging him...Do not take no for an answer...After all, you will soon belong to him..."

Yes, sir...She nodded and rose... "Mr. Walthrop...Please...Don't refuse me..." she was on him in a second...Forcing him to the floor...

***

Well...Angel eyed William as they raced through a hail of arrows, the confused guards desperately trying to recover order...And find someone to give orders...

The boys scaled a steep ledge, dropped several hundred feet to the snow-covered mountain valley below...And paused to get bearings...

"At least we got him...Buffy is avenged..."

Yeah...Will sighed...Weeping suddenly...Will...Angel pats him..."There wasn't anything we could do for her...You heard what Wes said over the phone after we cleaned out that hall...Nothing can reverse that surgery...And we would have got her shot, trying to take her back through all those guards...Only lucky he gave her to you before we killed him or she'd've wiped the floor with us for sure..."

I'll let Giles know where she is, the guards will all flee soon after they loot the place I'm sure and he and his Slayers can take her...Put her in a safe place somewhere...

"Besides...She wanted to be left to live her own life...She'd moved on and didn't need us any more...Right?..."

I suppose...Will nodded...Shame, though...

"She still shags fairly well, though lacking a certain something now..."

***