Title: The Destroyer and the Key by Andrew Wells, Part I
Author: Oracleholly
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Connor/Dawn, Andrew
Setting: Angel S5 sometime between "Origin" and "Not Fade Away."
Prompt Set 1
Prompt #2 - Blood
Word Count: 1635
Disclaimer: None of the characters are mine, but I wish it were so.
A/N: A HUGE thank you to Ariel Dawn for the most awesome of betas and wonderful advice. The "Tale" is in italics, reality is plain text.

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Hello there, my dear readers. If you will, I would like to tell you a little tale I like to call: Connor, Destroyer and savior of Quortoth, Moroi child of Angelus and Darla and Dawn, Key to all Dimensions, sister of Buffy, Slayer of the Vampyres.

When last we left our hero and heroine, they'd just met under circumstances most dire. Our heroine had been accompanying your brave narrator and two young but strong slayers of the vampyres, the fiery Jessica and the demure Katherine. The graceful Dawn, older than history, yet trapped in the nubile body of a human girl recently turned eighteen, walked through the cemetery unafraid, despite her separation from her companions. Then three enormous, hungry vampires surrounded our young Dawn and captured her, holding her prisoner against the cool unyielding marble of a mausoleum.

"It was a monument, you dope. And I thought you stopped doing that anyway," Dawn interrupted. "And keep your perv eyes away from my nubile body Andrew, or I'll nubile your face!"

"I have… it's just that I need to get the story down for my Watcher's chronicles," Andrew replied.

"They're journals…not chronicles. And what the hell did you call Connor? A Mordeci?"

Shaking his head with an expression of pity, "No, my dear girl. He's a moroi, a living vampire."

"He's so not a vampire. Is he?"

"Let me finish the story and you'll see," Andrew chastised.

"Geez. I just know I'm going to be sorry for this later. Besides I can correct you when you get the story wrong."

"When have I ever gotten a story wrong?" Andrew pouted.

"Remember Faith battling a Vulcan?" she queried, her eyebrow raised.

"Oh yeah," Andrew turned down his eyes. "Well, that was an honest mistake. I miss Amanda."

"Random much? But yeah, me too."

"Okay, back to the story."

Dear Readers, our Heroine's situation was most perilous. Recognized by the leader of the vampyres as being the sister of Buffy, Slayer of the Vampyres, Dawn's life had become even more precarious.

"Oh please," Dawn said.

With fetid breath, the vampyre pierced the porcelain column of our heroine's throat. When suddenly our hero raced to her rescue. In a matter of seconds, all three vampyres were but motes of dust carried on the wind. Now unencumbered, our heroine took the proffered hand of our dashing hero, and finally their eyes met.

The fiery Jessica and the demure Katherine stood proud with your humble narrator watching this historic meeting. Before rescuing our heroine, Connor exhibited his prowess as the Destroyer by overpowering a cluster of vampyres threatening our two newly powered slayers and abetting your brave and daring narrator.

"Stop looking at me like that," Andrew whined.

"What were you really doing during all this? And remember I can find out from Connor. I have his phone number you know."

Andrew grumbled for a moment, before replying. "Alright."

Our hero had saved your narrator from certain death at the hands of a sultry vixen vampyress. Your dear narrator was in the process of being smothered by the enormous bosoms of this buxom foe.

"Ewwwww. Sorry I asked."

So our hero and heroine have met; both enchanted with the other. Upon learning our fair maiden's name, our hero immediately recognized who she was. To which our dear Dawn quipped: "How the hell do you know I'm Buffy's sister?" His reply was one of simplicity. "That's what the leader called you right? The Slayer's sister? Cordelia once gave me the family 411."

Relaxing, our lovely and patient heroine smiled and continued. "Nice to meet you Connor. Now, you've mentioned Faith and Cordelia. Just who are you?"

"Angel's my father."

"What?!" our heroine exclaimed, her shout resonating through the cemetery.

"You're bleeding. Here," answered Connor, holding out a handkerchief to Dawn.

"Huh?"

"You're bleeding. Your neck. I guess that vamp got a piece of you. You won't want to get blood on your blouse."

"Oh, right. Thanks," said Dawn as she pressed the crisp cloth against her skin in hopes of stemming the flow of blood. "So, you said Angel's your dad. How come no one told me? I thought vampires couldn't have kids."

"They can't… normally. I'm not normal," Connor said shrugging his shoulders.

"If Angel's your father, who's your mother?" Dawn asked. And that, dear readers, was but one of the tens of questions that arose from Connor's mere existence. Who was the mother of this hero, this destroyer? When did this unheard of blessed event take place? What did it mean? Who really was Connor?

Perching on a flat sarcophagus, his "seen too much" oceanic blue eyes studied our heroine and her allies. After taking a deep, steady breath, he exhaled and revealed his secret. "Darla."

Now, it's time for a history lesson, gentle readers. Darla was a striking beauty of golden hair and blue eyes. Sired by the Master of the Order of Aurelius in the year 1609 in the colony of Virginia, she became the darling of the Master. Til, one fateful night in 1753 Darla encountered her "dear boy" in Galway, Ireland. Liam, once a drunken lay-a-bout, became the ruthless killer, Angelus. Together they cut a bloody swath through Europe, and after siring Drusilla the insane who in turn sired William the Bloody, Slayer of Slayers, Spike, Champion of Sunnydale, collectively they were anointed the "Scourge of Europe."

As you know, dear readers, Angelus was cursed with a soul after killing a favored daughter of a powerful tribe of gypsies. For near a century Angel, as he likes to be called now, wasted this "gift" until the Powers that Be stepped in and directed him to the newly chosen Buffy Summers, Slayer of the Vampyres. Seeking his own redemption, Angel …

"We know all this, geez. I was there and you weren't so stop talking about it. Yeah, yeah, yeah… I was eleven. All I heard was Angel this and Angel that. I never really liked him much. You know mom didn't either," Dawn interrupted. "And we know Angel dusted Darla around my eleventh birthday. Get on with it."

"Okay, okay. I was just trying to supply the background."

The evil law firm of Wolfram & Hart plotted to remove Angel as the thorn in their side. Learning of the unfortunate "happiness clause" in his curse, they hoped that he would once again submit to temptation, as he had done with Buffy. They believed, falsely, that if Angelus returned, he would be more pliable: that he would be on their side. Little had they studied the actual characteristics of Angelus and how he shirked anyone's authority but his own. I mean, my fellow readers, did they not study the abnormal dynamic of the Scourge? How the childe Angelus ruled over his sire, Darla, was unheard of in vampyre society.

The lawyers of Wolfram & Hart resurrected Darla in this endeavor. However, Darla returned as she was before the Master sired her - dying from syphilis. Angel refused to turn her, so in a surprise twist, Wolfram & Hart invited Drusilla the insane to sire her own grandsire.

"You know that's got to be the weirdest family tree ever. Even Deliverance has a less icky tree. It's like 'hey, I'm Darla the ho-bag. I'm my own great-grandmother. My mother is really my grandchilde. Spike, who was my great-grandchilde, is now my brother. Makes me want to hurl."

"It is fascinating isn't it? I mean look at Connor. His mother is not only his mother, but also his grandmother. And hey… neat… he would have been Spike's uncle and his own granduncle at the same time. I mean since Connor would be considered Drusilla's brother … it's making my head hurt," Andrew pouted.

"Think how Connor feels," Dawn said wistfully.

Andrew could tell that she was imagining just how Connor would "feel." He sighed as an image of a shirtless Connor next to a shirtless Spike crossed his mind. "Yeah," he sighed. His gaze caught Dawn's raised eyebrow, forcing him back to reality. Andrew cleared his throat. "Back to the tale…"

Connor was a child of prophecy - a child of two vampires, a Moroi. While mortal and seemingly human, he retained vampyrific strength without all the unpleasantness, such as an allergy to sunlight or the need to drink blood. Which I've been told tastes like a penny. To which I must say…yuck.

Dawn started to ask how he'd know and who'd told him, but then shook her head and kept silent.

His blood flows with the strength of the Aurelian line. As a mere babe, he was worshipped by a strange cult of vampires, was wanted for study by Wolfram & Hart, and was feared by the time-traveling, dimension shifting Sahjahn. Our hero, Connor, was abducted by the vampyre hunter Holtz, who had made a deal with Sahjahn to travel to a point in time where he could seek revenge on Angelus and Darla, and was raised in Quortoth, the darkest of dimensions.

Quortoth: the most desolate, hellish dimension. Demons never recorded by the human race rule this world. Imagine, if you will, walking on the surface of Mars with its red sands, steep mountains, and deep crevices and you get a sense of Quortoth. Here, our Destroyer honed his fighting skills. The sound of a phone rang through Quortoth.

"Oh hey, Giles… yeah, he's right here. Hold on."

I must place a virtual bookmark in our story, dear readers. But never fear, I shall continue the tale of Connor, Destroyer and savior of Quortoth, Moroi child of Angelus and Darla and Dawn, Key to all Dimensions, sister of Buffy, Slayer of the Vampyres at a later date.

"Andrew!" Dawn huffed.

"Okay… okay…" Grumbling Andrew grabbed the receiver. In his official "Watcher-in-Training" tone, Andrew answered, "Yes, Mr. Giles?"


La fin de scène.