Part Four


It was now the moment of truth. Upon nearing what was left of the apartment structure, Angel could hear what sounded like Spike yelling. Angel smiled, glad to see that he would have the element of surprise. It was obvious that this was not what the blonde vampire had expected. That was what made it so much fun.

Angel was startled to hear Buffy’s shout answer Spike’s. This was the last thing that he wanted. Buffy would be angry with him, no doubt, but what he did later... Angel didn’t even want to think about what Buffy would do when she saw how he was planning on acting. Oh well. Angel wanted to get rid of Spike and Drusilla for good and if this was the only way to do it, he was going to do it.

“My Angel,” a child-like voice whispered from behind the former vampire.

“Dru,” Angel greeted, trying his best to mimic Angelus in voice and body.

A slow smile spread across the insane vampire’s face. “Spike said that you were human again. I can feel that you’re alive.”

“I am alive, Dru. For now. But this life is incredibly boring. No power. No strength. I miss our wild nights together,” Angel murmured, stepping closer to Drusilla, his long strides billowing his low coat out behind him.

“Miss Edith told me that you’d come back to play with me. We had such wonderful fun together,” Drusilla said with a seemingly innocent voice.

“This can’t be happening.” Angel heard Buffy say.

Angel spun around on his heel, a mocking smirk on his face. He forced all of the emotion from his eyes as he beheld his love. “Believe it, Buff. I may be human now, but that doesn’t mean that the human Angel is anything like your Angel. Angelus O’Conor is not the man that you love. You’ll just have to learn to deal with that.”

The tears that he saw in Buffy’s eyes almost made Angel cave in. He knew that this would hurt her, but it had to be done. He needed to make sure that Spike and Drusilla were gone for good even if it meant hurting Buffy. Hopefully she would eventually come to understand why he had done this. Angel’s entire body stiffened when Drusilla came and wrapped her arms around his waist and placed her head on his shoulder. It was only momentary and Angel was able to relax before Drusilla noticed what had happened.

“I don’t fucking believe it,” Spike snorted. “I go through all that trouble to make sure that Lady Peaches makes Peaches human again and he starts acting like Angelus again. If I’d have known this, I wouldn’t have gone through the trouble of convincing her to come here and just left you as you were.”

“Now, Spike, that’s not nice,” Drusilla scolded him. “Making my Angel keep that horrid soul of his. This is my present and I want to keep it.”

Spike walked over and held his hand out for his lover to take. Drusilla quickly released Angel and glided towards Spike. “Does this mean that I’m forgiven, pet?”

Drusilla pretended to nip at the tip of his nose. “If I can have my party.”

“Anything for you, pet.”

The Slayer completely ignored the two vampires as they began to make out in the middle of the street. Her eyes were focused completely on Angel... Or was he Angelus? While everything about him screamed Angelus, there was something wrong. Angelus’ eyes neverheld the softness that they did now. When he wasn’t doing anything those eyes belonged entirely to Angel. There was pain in them and sorrow. As soon as their eyes met for an instant, Buffy knew that it was her Angel standing there. Even though it had only been a moment, she knew that it was Angel standing there and not Angelus. There was so much love in his eyes that it couldn’t be Angelus. Even Angel couldn’t mask that.

“You coming, Angelus?” Spike asked as he and Drusilla made ready to leave.

Before Angel could answer, Drusilla came over and slipped Angel’s arm through hers. “Of course he’s coming, Spike. He wants to come to my party.”

What happened over the next couple of hours happened too quickly for Angel to remember correctly. He had known going into this what Drusilla meant by “party.” Whenever Drusilla had a party, she and her guests went around feasting on as many humans as they could find. It was an enjoyable pass time if you were a vampire, but not if you were a human. Angel’s mind screamed in protest against the things that he saw his children do that night, but there was nothing that he could do about it. He had to make them believe that he was just as bad as Angelus when he was alive if this was going to work.

“I want to go to the factory,” Drusilla mused towards the end of her party.

Spike dropped his latest kill and strolled towards his lover who was now staring up at the stars in the sky and spinning round in circles. “We can’t go there, ducks. The factory got burned down, remember.”

Drusilla stopped her spinning and turned to face Spike. “Who burned down our lovely home? We were happy there.”

“The Watcher burned it down,” Angel supplied, his voice low as he stared down at the dead body. He was going to make Spike and Drusilla pay dearly for all these needless deaths. “I killed that little gypsy bitch of his and he came and burned down the factory.”

“Let’s turn Angel back into one of us,” Drusilla said, linking her arms around Spike’s neck so that both of them were staring at Angel. “Think of how dreadful it must be for him not to have any fun with us. Please, Spike my sweet.”

Even though it was against his better judgment, Spike nodded his head. There was nothing that he could deny Drusilla and she knew it well. Besides, it was likely that she would leave him again if he ever did something to upset her to the degree he had when he teamed up with the Slayer. “Do you want to or shall I?” Spike whispered in her ear.

“Let me. I want to make him scream.”

Angel didn’t like the sound of that one bit. There were two ways that a vampire could bite their victims. A slow, gentle puncture that barely brought any pain... Then there was the other way. The literal way of ripping their throats out. If Drusilla really wanted to make him scream, it was likely that she would do the latter.

It wasn’t until Drusilla’s face morphed from human to demon that Angel really began toworry. He had absolutely no clue how to get out of this one. Having seen Drusilla turn someone before, he knew exactly how she did it. The psychic vampire always hypnotized her prey before she actually changed them so that they couldn’t fight back. If Drusilla did that to him, he wouldn’t be able to stake her before she turned him.

Just as Angel had expected, Drusilla stopped when she was still an arm’s length away from him. She slowly raised her right hand as she locked her eyes with Angel’s. No matter how hard he tried to look away, Angel’s body refused to obey his mind. His mind kept screaming for his eyes to shut, but he only continued to stare into Drusilla’s now yellow eyes. That was the most annoying part of it all. He could see everything that was happening. Angel watched as Drusilla swayed back and forth, giggling as his body mimicked hers. Drusilla then closed the gap between them and placed her cold hand on the back of Angel’ neck and pulled it towards her mouth.

The pain in Angel’s neck when her fangs pierced his skin was nothing compared to the pain in his soul. He had been human! He had finally been given back his humanity and now it was being taken away from him only a day later. NOOOOOOO! Angel screamed in his mind. Fight back! Don’t let her do this to you! Stop her! Don’t let her turn you into a monster again! Angel’s mind continued to protest even as he could feel his body getting
weaker and weaker from blood loss. Every part of him felt woozy and he was barely able to focus on a single thought. Then suddenly the pain was gone and he could see Drusilla’s face in front of his.

“Time to drink, my Angel,” she whispered as she ran one of her sharp nails along her pale neck. A thin line of blood appeared when she pulled her hand away.

Angel tried to make himself pull away as Drusilla brought his head down towards her bleeding neck, but his body refused to obey him. Some part of Angel’s brain told him that if he didn’t drink he would die. The rest of him didn’t care. He would much rather die if it meant that he wouldn’t become a monster again. He would never hurt Buffy like that again.

Angel dimly heard Spike scream as he felt himself being yanked away from Drusilla. It hurt when he hit the ground, but he could have cared less. Just as his eyes began to slide shut, Angel watched as Buffy slammed a stake into the vampire’s long dead heart.

“Faith, keep Spike busy!” Buffy shouted as she watched Drusilla’s ashes fall to the ground. Not waiting for the other Slayer’s response, Buffy leaned over and lifted Angel’s body from the ground. The only logical thought running through her head was the fact that she needed to get Angel to the hospital. For the second time in as many days, he had been drained by a vampire and was in serious need of blood.

Buffy carried him around the corner to where Giles was waiting in his car. The Watcher quickly got out and helped Buffy lay Angel down in the back seat. Moments later, they sped around the corner, slowing down only enough to allow Faith to jump into the passenger door. Spike was still there, glaring at the retreating car.

“Talk about a rush. He’s really pissed at you, B,” Faith informed her fellow Slayer as she turned around to face the back seat.

“She wants to mess with Angel, she’s got to deal with me,” Buffy said without looking up from Angel’s sleeping face.

“So I remember,” Faith said quietly, absently rubbing the back of her neck.

“Buffy, how is Angel doing?” Giles called over his shoulder.

“Breathing,” was all that the blonde Slayer replied.

Part Five

The first thing that Angel noticed when he started to come to the following morning was the constant beeping that he could hear to his left. He would have gladly
fallen asleep again if it hadn’t been for that beeping. Growling at the annoying sound, Angel began to swat at what he assumed to be his alarm clock. Then Angel remembered that he didn’t have an alarm clock. When he heard someone giggling, Angel cracked an eye open.

“Look who decided to come and join the living once again,” Buffy said as she sat down beside him on the bed. “How are you feeling?”

“Like I took a nose-dive off a ten story building. What happened?” Angel whispered hoarsely, noticing now that his throat hurt.

Buffy paused for a moment, trying to come up with the best way to describe what had happened the night before. Then it hit her. “You became Drusilla’s happy meal.”

Angel cocked an eyebrow in her direction. He had absolutely no clue what she was talking about. Drusilla’s happy meal? Then he remembered. The faces of the people that Spike and Drusilla had killed. Innocent people with their entire lives in front of them. Young and old. Men and women. No one had been saved from the insane vampire and her lover. And Angel had just stood there, watching as they begged for him to help them... He had just stood there...

“You should have let her kill me,” Angel whispered just loud enough for Buffy to hear. “I don’t deserve to live after letting all of those people die last night.”

Buffy felt her heart breaking when she saw how distressed Angel was. Someone like Xander would have said, “I agree completely.” But Buffy wasn’t like that worthless troll who like to make her decisions for her. She wasn’t going to let Angel feel guilty for something that wasn’t his fault. There was nothing that he could have done to stop the two vampires. Angel was human now and still weak from the amount of blood that his sister had taken from him. Add that to the fact that he hadn’t gotten much sleep and hadn’t eaten anything in over two hundred years and she was surprised that he had remained conscious as long as he had.

“That wasn’t your fault, Angel. They would have done all that whether or not you were there,” Buffy said as she stroked his mussed up hair. “Now I’m not going to let you sit here and brood. They’re going to release you later this afternoon then I’m going to take you back to the mansion. Faith is going to take over patrolling for the week so that I can help you get adjusted to being alive again. You are some serious need of healing time and I’m going to be there every step of the way.”

For the life of him, Angel couldn’t figure out what he had done to deserve someone like Buffy. He was a monster and should have stayed in the dark where he belonged. But no. Angel had dared to get a taste of sunshine. Even though he knew that it was wrong, he had let himself fall in love with the Slayer. Go beyond falling in love with her so that it was like a physical pain when she was away. Until a few days ago, Angel had thought that their love would never amount to anything. He had never been so wrong in his entire life. A life that he now had to spend with the woman that he loved beyond all reason. He was no longer a creature that belonged in the shadows, but someone who could walk in the sun. Someone who could grow old. Someone who could have children. Someone who could...No. Angel knew that she would never consider it. She was far too young to consider something like that. Best to let it lie. In a few years maybe, but not now.

“What are you thinking about?” Buffy asked, noticing the distant look in his eyes.

“What it would be like to be married to you,” Angel answered without even thinking. As soon as they words were out of his mouth, Angel’s eyes went wide. He felt like such a fool. She’ll never want to be anywhere near you now! Angel berated himself. Risking a glance in Buffy’s direction, Angel was shocked to see that she was actually smiling.

“You want to marry me?” Buffy asked, afraid to let herself hope too much. It could have just been the medication talking.

Very slowly, Angel nodded his head. “I do. I know that you probably don’t want to. You’re young and have a long life a head of you. I must be a fool for thinking that you’d want to spend it with a man who was a walking corpse until two days ago.”

Buffy felt like her heart was in her throat and wasn’t able to find her voice. She saw the pained look in Angel’s eyes when she didn’t answer and immediately decided to put an end to that. Pulling the tubes out of his nose, Buffy tossed them aside and placed her hands on either side of his face. “I would love to marry you,” Buffy whispered as she leaned to down to kiss him.

Leave it to a doctor to walk in at the most inopportune time. Just when the two of them were about to celebrate their engagement, Angel’s doctor decided to check on his patient. “You’ll have to leave now, miss,” the middle-aged doctor said once he had managed to get their attention away from each other. “I have to run some tests on Mr.O’Conor.”

Groaning against Angel’s mouth, Buffy kissed him again very softly. “I’ll be back soon,” she promised as she pulled away.

“I’ll be waiting,” Angel said, his eyes never leaving hers.

It wasn’t until Buffy left the room that she realized what had just happened. She and Angel had just gotten engaged. She was seventeen and engaged to a man old enough to be her many times great-grandfather. Willow would be thrilled, Giles would undoubtedly be flustered to say the least, her mother... Buffy didn’t even want to think about how her mother would react. Joyce didn’t even completely trust Angel yet and now her baby girl was engaged to him.

“Mrs. Angel O’Conor,” Buffy whispered to herself as she walked towards the cafeteria. She was willing to risk trying to hospital coffee if it meant that it would keep her awake. Buffy had stayed with Angel the entire night to make sure that Spike didn’t show up and take Angel again. She didn’t make it as far as the cafeteria, though. Buffy was stopped about halfway there by Willow who had two huge mochas in her hands. “Thank
god, Willow. You have no idea how much I needed one of these.”

Willow handed her friend the full one then the two of them started towards the waiting room. “Considering the fact that you’re smiling, I take it that Angel’s doing fine.”

Buffy took a sip of her mocha then nodded her head. “Definitely doing fine. Better than fine... Willow, if I tell you something, do you promise not to tell anyone else until I say that it’s okay?”

“May I never drink another mocha if I blab,” Willow said holding up the cup.

“How many of these have you had?”

“This is only my second,” the highly caffinated hacker said holding up two fingers.

Buffy smiled at her friend, already knowing that she was lying. The way that Willow was bouncing around in her seat suggested that this was at least her third mocha. Taking a deep breath, Buffy told her about what had happened when Angel had woken up. “Angel asked me to marry him and I said yes.”

Willow squealed with delight when she heard her best friend’s news, nearly dropping her ohh-so-precious mocha. “You’re gonna marry Angel!?! That’s great! Wait until Xander hears... Oh, you’re not talking to Xander.”

“No, I’m not,” Buffy said sadly. “I know that he probably had his reasons for not telling me that you were doing the curse again, but I can’t forgive him for what he did to Angel. If it had only been me that he hurt, I would forgive him in an instant. But he didn’t. Angel was the one hurt the most by this and I’m not ready to forgive him for that. He’ll just have to learn to deal with that.”

Even though she didn’t like it, Willow nodded her head. She could understand why Buffy wasn’t ready to forgive Xander. Had she been in Buffy’s place, Willow wouldn’t be talking to him either. Putting that out of her mind the two of them began making plans for Buffy’s wedding. That’s what they started off talking about, anyway. By the time that a nurse came to tell Buffy that Angel was asking for her, they were talking
about new ways to decorate the mansion for when the two of them were living together.

“Hey, baby. How...” Buffy’s voice trailed off when she saw that Angel was asleep. He looked so sweet that she just stood there for a while watching him. Buffy didn’t think that she could ever get enough of looking at him. The switch from vampire to human must have done something to stop the nightmares because he hadn’t had any since after the transformation. At least none that Buffy knew of. Just in case they weren’t,
Buffy walked over to the bed and crawled in beside Angel, gently easing her body up against his. Even in his sleep, Angel sensed her presence and turned towards Buffy, gathering her up in his arms as he drifted off into an even deeper sleep.

************************************************************************

“Tonight, we attack! Tonight Angelus and the Slayer will die!” Spike shouted to the throng of vampires gathered before him. It was safe to say that the peroxide-blonde vampire was more than a little upset about Drusilla’s death. And he knew exactly who was going to pay for it. The two who were the most responsible. “Angelus is still weak and the Slayer won’t be able to protect both him and herself. We kill them both and leave their bodies for the Watcher to find.”

While all of the younger vampires were more than eager to take on the Slayer and her lover, the older ones weren’t quite as willing to risk their lives for Spike’s revenge. Of course they wouldn’t say that out loud. Spike was their leader and they couldn’t openly defy him.... Of course they didn’t have to actually participate in the death of the former vampire and the Slayer. They could just sit back and watch.

Part Six

“I don’t see why I have to ride in one of these stupid things,” Angel mumbled as Buffy wheeled him down the hall. “I am perfectly capable of walking. It’s not like Drusilla broke my legs. She just tried to drink my blood.”

“Do you wanna say that any louder, honey? I don’t think that the people on the top floor heard you,” Buffy said good-naturedly. “Besides, it’s hospital policy. Once we get out of here you can start walking on your own. Okay?”

Even though he wasn’t entirely too fond of the idea, Angel nodded his head. “Couldn’t you have gotten me discharged before sunset. I wanted to watch it with you. My first official sunset in a whole lot of lifetimes.”

“Tomorrow,” Buffy promised. “We’ll watch the sun rise and set. How’s that sound?”

“Anything the lady wishes.”

Neither was really surprised to find a cab waiting for them in front of the hospital. Buffy had given Angel the excuse that her mother was working late at the gallery, Giles was waiting for a new shipment of books to arrive and that Willow didn’t have a car of her own. Still a little out of it from the drugs, Angel hadn’t noticed that Buffy hadn’t mentioned Xander once all day.

“Out! I want out of this chair now!” Angel declared as soon as they were out of the hospital. “My legs work so let me out!”

Buffy leaned over and kissed the top of Angel’s head. “You certainly aren’t acting your age, Angel.”

“And just how am I acting?” Angel asked, tilting his head back so that he could see her face.

“Like a guy,” Buffy teased, leaning over to kiss his waiting lips. “A nice, normal guy. My guy.”

“Always.”

The newly engaged couple were so wrapped up in each other that they didn’t pay much attention to where they were going. They were happy just being together. And Buffy hoped to keep it that way. She didn’t want Angel to suspect the part that was waiting for him at her house. Angel had never been much of a part-goer, but that didn’t matter in this case. Buffy had every intention of celebrating his return to the human race. Besides, her mother was less likely to over-react if there were other people around when they told her about the engagement. Or at least she hoped so. It wouldn’t be very good for Joyce to murder her future son-in-law only hours after they had become engaged.

“Um, Buffy, I don’t think that this is your house,” Angel commented when he saw where the car had stopped. He was now wishing furiously that he had paid more attention to where they were going because something was obviously wrong.

Noticing what Angel already had, Buffy turned to the driver. “Hey, buddy, this isn’t where I told you to go. I specifically said-”

The growl coming from the cab driver stopped the Slayer in her tracks. Her panic didn’t really begin to set in until she looked out of the windows of the taxi and saw that they were surrounded by at least a dozen vamps in game face. Reacting without a moment’s thought, Buffy grabbed a stake from her sleeve and quickly shoved it into the heart of the vampire driving the cab. Even as he was turning to dust, she jumped into the driver’s seat and hit the door lock button. It wouldn’t keep the other vampires out, but it would buy them some time.

“Angel, are you all... Angel, what are you doing?”

“Dealing with Spike,” Angel said as he exited the cab. Before the door as even shut, a group of vampires surrounded him and began to drag him towards their master.

This was much easier than Spike had expected. He had thought that his sire would have at least put up some kind of a fight. Something was wrong, but at that moment Spike choose not to care. “I had hoped that she would have killed you,” the blonde-hair vampire said angrily.

“Like that little bitch could do anything right,” Angel sneered.

“Bastard!” Spike cried, backhanding Angel across the face.

“Is that all you’ve got, little man?” Angel asked, purposely trying to provoke Spike. “That didn’t even hurt. I’d thought you’d be able to take me now that I’m human. Guess that I was wrong, Spikey.”

As Angel had hoped, that got Spike right pissed off. He ordered the other vamps to release Angel and took on his sire himself. Still in the taxi, Buffy couldn’t believe what she was seeing. What the hell does Angel think he’s doing? she wondered, still
debating whether or not to go out there. When Angel went down after a solid right hook from the vampire, Buffy’s decision was made for her. Despite what he may like to think, Angel wasn’t up to this yet.

“Spike, what do you think you’re doing to my fiancée?” Buffy asked as she stepped out of the cab, stakes in both hands.

That caught Spike off guard and allowed Angel to bring him down with a quick kick to the back of his knees. It was only momentary, for platinum vampire rolled over pinning his sire to the ground under him. When he went to go bite Angel’s throat, Angel brought his head forward, slamming it into Spike’s forehead. The blow left both of them a little dazed, but it gave Angel time to kick Spike off of him and get to his feet. Everyone else gathered just outside of the Sunnydale limits just stood there watching as the former Scourge of Europe battled with William the Bloody. Unlike in the movies or on TV, the good guy wasn’t winning this time. Still weak from all of the blood that he had lost in the past two days, Angel was barely holding his own.

Not wanting to let this go on any longer, Buffy jumped in and began to attack Spike when Angel went down again. A roundhouse kick to the stomach followed by two quick punches to his face had Spike down on his knees clutching the sides of his head. A loud growl erupted from Spike’s throat as his face changed into the demon’s. He was on his feet in seconds, attacking with all of his anger. Buffy was equally pissed
off by this time, remembering the sound of Angel’s quiet voice on the cell phone as Spike mocked them in the background.

“Come on, Spike. You normally last longer than this,” Buffy teased as she knocked the vampire to the ground once again.

Spike kicked at Buffy’s feet, bringing her to the ground with him. In the blink of an eye he had her pinned to the ground beneath him. “Now who’s having the hard time, Slayer? Taking care of your bloody puff’s making lazy. Normally you’d take out at least half of my boys before facing me one on one. Actually, I’m glad that you didn’t. Now there’s more of them left to use your boytoy as a juice box.”

“Nice. Try. Spike,” Buffy grunted as she heaved the slender vampire off of her. The heat of the battle upon her, the Slayer was shocked to see her opponent vanish before her eyes in a cloud of dust. What shocked her even more was who she saw standing where the vampire had stood only moments before. The other vampires, seeing that their master had been destroyed, quickly vanished into the night.

“Xander? What are you doing here?” Buffy cried, still in a state of shock.

Xander rubbed absently at the back of his neck before meeting his friend’s eyes. “I wanting to go apologize to Angel for what happened then I saw you guys leaving so I trailed you. Once you started pummeling Spike, I got Angel into my car and came back to see if I could help... Did I help?”

Buffy nodded her head furiously, a huge smile pasted on her face. “Thank you, Xander. For helping Angel... And I’m sorry for over-reacting like I did yesterday. It just wasn’t a good day and I know that it’s no excuse because you probably did the right thing not telling me about Will doing the curse again. I would have just gotten distracted and Angel would have probably done something that I probably would have regretted. If I was even alive to regret it. I know that this is no excuse, Xand, I really do, but I hope that you’ll forgive me for acting like that. If you don’t I perf-”

Xander quickly cupped his hand overtop of Buffy’s mouth in order to keep her fromtalking any more. “Buff, I love you, but please shut up. You’re babbling.”

“Right. Sorry,” Buffy said meekly. “OH SHIT! The party! We’ve got to get out of here! You said that Angel’s in your car, right? Since when do you have a car? Do you even have a license? Not that I’m complaining if you don’t. I was driving quite a bit a few nights ago and I sure as hell don’t have a license. You’d think that my mother would let me go and get my license, but noooo. I’m not responsible enough....”

On to the Epilogue