"Immortal Beloved..." CXI...
PG-13
Disclaimer: If ya are fan-fic writers, where's your disclaimers? Disclaimers? We ain't got no disclaimers...I don' need to show you no stinkin'...No, Joss, no...I make no claims, put that thing down!
It's all yours and ME's...
Spoilers for Angel to the bitter end...Flee at once!...
Summary: Though the standard IB format, one of (111) versions of events following the end of Angel S5 episodes from "Girl in Question" through to "Not Fade Away" and beyond... (Not a continuous story, though some are multipart...)
The song, "I'm Confessin'..." was suggested by Ms. Rose Cooke...
Archived (soon) at the 'Normal' Buffyverse page of the Buffy Rebecca verse at -https://www.angelfire.com/zine2/buffyrebecca/index.html , scroll down to "Immortal Beloved" series
***
LA...2am...The attack of the Senior Partners' army, though insanely costly in terms of both personnel and material, was at last rolling to its inevitable conclusion...The tactical problem more the paucity of targets than anything else...Most of the damage having been inflicted through conflict among the various demon clans then by the common enemy, despite valiant fighting by said enemy...
"I'm confessing that I love you.
Tell me, do you love me too?"
"You!" a startingly harsh cry from the slight blonde figure caused the group of huge scale-covered demons to stop in their nervous fleeing from the site on which the more courageous...Or foolhardy...were converging...The final moment of triumph, for some, not to be missed...For those more mindful of personal safety, to be avoided like the plague that had killed the humans this particular set of demons had once been...One turned...And trembled on recognizing the speaker...
It's..Her...
Nice dress...She noted the elegant if somewhat rumpled gown...Guess she was in a hurry not to miss things...
"Are they still...Which way?!..." an tone not to be denied...
"Where are they?!!...So help me, if you don't..."
"Mercy...." the creature gasped, its fellows likewise cringing... "That way..." it pointed...
"Take me..."
"Ma'am?...I..."
"Take me or..."
"But...Arrrggghh..."
"Ok...You..." a point to the nearest survivor...
"Uh...Yes, ma'am...But, I think they're dust by now ma'am..."
"No...I'd know if he...If they were...Come on...You others, get lost!..."
An order obeyed with eager alacrity...
Geesh...The male called to duty as tour guide frowned at the small figure urging him on...
She musta teleported here...Why don't she just...?
"If we're too late you are gonna fry...!!!"
Right, speculate later, time of the essence...He hurried along...
"I'm confessing that I need you.
Honest I do."
"Need you every moment."
***
"Angel?..." A gasp... "Can you...?" A proffered stake... "I'm through...C'mon, poof...Take it, don't let them have the satisfaction...For God's sake, Liam..."
"I can't even see now, Spike..." a weary reply...
"Hey, soul boys!..." a cry from the merry band now surrounding them... "Where's your girlfriend and her buddies?...She too busy screwin' the Immortal to come?..." one witty fellow sneered, chuckling...Howls of laughter...
"Hey, Angel...You ready to see Hell again...No scenic route this time!..." another cackled...
"Look at him, he's blind!...Ha, ha...Arrrrggh..." sound of a body falling...
"Did I?..." Angel asked, trying to make anything out in the blackness...
"Nice shootin' for a blind man..." William patted him...Angel grabbed his arm, a tense hiss...
"Can you make it?...I'll try and keep them...Busy..."
"Angel...I'm minus one arm and my leg's about as broken as a vamp's can be...Thanks for the thought though..."
"You mean this?!..." one in the crowd held up part of an arm, hand attached... "Come on over and maybe I'll give it back!...Har, har, ha...!!" The crowd howled with glee...One looking back to sneer at the cowards fleeing the site of Evil's greatest triumph...You miserable...
Ummn...He blanched at the sight of the figures bearing down on them...
"My...God...It's...!" he turned to his mates...A horde of them turning...
"Outta my way!!!..." a harsh cry...The ranks parting, a number fleeing... "It's the Slayer!!..." a few cried... Others staring...No?...Oh...A few falling to their feet...
Angel turning to a William now down on one knee, struggling to hold the stake he'd offered Angel to his heart with his remaining arm ...Buffy?...
"In your eyes I read such strange things,
but your lips deny they're true."
"Will your answer really change things,
making me blue?"
***
"I was afraid someday you'll leave me.
Saying: "Can't we still be friends?"..."
"Back!...Outta the way!!..."
"Buffy..."
"William!...Angel!..." The horde had now completely parted to let her through...Most eyes on her, several looking at each other in confusion...What?...Why?...
"Buffy..." Will whispered...
The crowd of demons parting now at the back to let a small, bespectacled, death-'s head of a 'man' through... "Are they dust yet?...What's going on here?!!..." he demanded, shoving his way through... "Mr. Joseph, sir...She's here..." one of the crowd called to him... "What?..."
She stood before the two vamps now, an appraising look...Then a weak smile... "You two don't look so good..."
"Never...better..." William gasped out...
The crowd beginning to regroup, murmuring to each other...Silenced at a glare from her...
"What...?" she knelt by him... "No kiss for your girl?..."
He suddenly grabbed at her... "I knew you'd come, girl..."
"Sorry..." he gasped... Feeling himself slipping away... "So sorry, love..."
Her look, over his shoulder, a strange mix of harsh gleam, moderated by a sudden startled, nervous uncertainty...
"But if you go, you know you'll grieve me.
All in life on you depends."
"Am I guessing that you love me?
Dreaming dreams of you in vain."
"William..." she whispered as he collapsed round her into dust...
"Dammit!...Dammit!!..." Joseph screamed as he broke through to them...Angel falling to the ground now as well, ashes in seconds... a faint "Nina..." on his lips...
She rose...
"You!..." Joseph hollered... "What have you done?!...What were you thinking?!..."
She gave a harsh glare at the little 'man'...
"They're dead...We've won...Lets go home..." she said coldly...
"Our chance to destroy their souls...Drag them to despair and Evil..." he fumed... "That one brief half-second when we could have triumphed over them eternally...How could you have let it slip?..."
"He knows...They know...They'll be hurt...Leave it at that..."
"Hurt?...Hurt?!...Well, thanks...All this effort...This whole year to try and recover something from our defeats...Avenge your defeat, my dear..." he glared... "All for nothing...You had his soul in your hands...One word and you could have won him to us...Maybe Angel as well..."
"He wouldn't have broken...It was pointless..." she shrugged...
"They died content...You let them die content?!..."
"He knows now she didn't come...That's victory enough for us...Lets go..."
"But he also knows now why she didn't come...Dammit, you knew we had only one shot to destroy him...Both of them..."
"He wouldn't have believed me...You and your partner the Immortal are fools...The plan was doomed from the start...There was no point in going on with it..."
He eyed her...No....It couldn't be...
"You...You're...With that foolish romantic nothing of a soul..."
She sighed... "I slipped up once in an immortal existence...Kill me...If you think you can..."
"No...I can't...But I can see you're kept drained of energy and tortured in Hell for the next ten thousand years!!..."
"I can use the rest...Shall we go?..."
"You're the First Evil...Evil, pure and unadulterated...How could you do this?!!..."
"Look...You and the Immortal suggested I take her form and hang with him when he got the soul...You and he got me her body...You recommended I make this last try to break him...I can't help it if something of her..."
He stared at her...
"I don't know..." she hesitated... "Just...For that one moment when he reached for me...And was so sorry he couldn't stay...So sorry for me..."
"I was Buffy..."
"Heartwarming...If you weren't our only hope of turning the Slayer Corps..."
"No..." she sighed... "I don't think so...He wouldn't like it..." she whipped the stake she'd taken from William's ashes into her...Buffy's...body...
A glow of blue light beside Joseph as he and the huge crowd stared at the dead Slayer's body...
She...The one who'd guided her gasped..."She was...Corporeal...?"
"Sir..." the young woman just arrived turned to him... "His Benevolence is dead...The First has betr..." She stared at the body...
"I'm confessing that I love you,
over again."
***
