DISCLAIMER: The characters aren't mine. They're Joss'. Possibly with a nod to Marti, now, *cough*Godhelpusall*cough*.
TIMELINE: Pay attention, this is important. Because of the cliff-hangery endings of the shows, both of which I assume will flow straight into the next episode, this part is set during the eps rather than after. Buffy is napping after calling Ben to cancel, and Angel is dreaming after the sex and before the rude awakening. I expect the times don't match up, but it also gives me a neat explanation for why she finds out what's going on and doesn't even call.
SPOILERS: 'I Was Made To Love You', 'Reprise'.
SYNOPSIS: Buffy and Angel share more dreaminess. Follows the rest of the series, whch is at my site which I am plugging because I've just done it all up.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: The title of this part comes from a line in the very lovely 'You'll Never Walk Alone' which I think is quite appropriate for both their situations right now.
FEEDBACK: Would be loved and appreciated! This series is starting to stress me out.
RATING: PG-12 for language.

I just... want him.

* * * * *

I don't remember an awful lot about dying; or at least, my mind has blocked it out. Of course, I know there's a hell or six thousand, so it makes sense that there's a heaven. Or I just hope there's a heaven. Whatever: I don't remember visiting, no lights at the end of tunnels, no Celia and/or Grandma Beryl to meet me, no choirs of angels or anything. Just nothing. Black silence, like really late at night when you close your eyes and float halfway between being asleep and awake.

Nice place to visit, but you wouldn't want to live there.

Which is why it's so scary to contemplate that Angel is.

I could feel myself walking - making the movements of walking - but I couldn't see what I was walking on, if I was in fact walking on anything.

The moment I thought that, I was falling... feeling myself fall but without the points of reference you usually use, the scenery passing by... the landing.

Only where was there to land? You could fall forever, here.

They say if you have a dream of falling, the shock when you land stops your physical heart.

I don't know *who* exactly says it, but right then, where I was, it seemed a frighteningly plausible possibility.

Fall for long enough, and it gets to be kind of a good feeling. Adrenaline rush, I guess... the reason people bungee jump, or jump out of planes with only a flimsy parachute pack between them and certain death. I don't really get that mentality; it's so easy for things to go wrong, just for twenty, thirty, forty seconds on a high. When I go Slaying, I get some of that high. Maybe even more of it. I try my damndest to make sure things don't go wrong. I assume they all do, too.

But it doesn't always work, and sometimes there's no safety cord to pull.

Just the unforgiving darkness.

And a hard, painful bump as I connected with some kind of surface.

I felt rather than heard the footsteps, coming from far away: measured, heavy, relentless. And as they became louder, each careful step was answered by, and then synchronised with, a pounding thump, beating hard and unstoppable against my temples. I raised one hand muzzily to my head, propping myself up on the other and hissing at a burning in my ribs, distractedly noting that despite the insidious dark that surrounded and bathed me, I could see myself fine. My hand almost glowed as I gingerly touched my head.

I didn't register right away when the footsteps silenced, because it took a moment longer for the guy with the little hammers inside my head to get the message. Then it was gone, as quickly and inexplicably as it had arrived.

I sensed rather than heard or saw the presence behind me, and I took a minute to feel tentatively out. I'd expected Angel. And it was Angel. A roiling mixture of confusion, desperation and desolation that made me nauseous just to experience for a second, from the outside.

When I turned, slowly and almost fearfully, none of it was reflected in his demeanour, or - I squinted, because he wasn't glowing the same way I was - his eyes, which stared down at me... not without recognition, he knew who I was... more with a lack of desire to *see* me.

Worse than I've ever seen him, here or there... worse, in a completely different way, than even Angelus, because while I hated that cold mocking always in his gaze then, it was almost okay because it was *supposed* to be there. It made it easier to separate him from my Angel. This *was* my Angel, empty and sad, and I didn't know what I could do but send a quick, fervent prayer up to the Power that had saved him once, praying that this would be the worst. He looked ready to fold.

For the first time I could remember, I felt less than safe with him. Obviously discounting the demon-days... even that first time, when he was following me, I didn't really get a threat vibe off him. It just wasn't there. Even that nearly-last time, when he hit me, I still knew if I needed it, he'd take me into the safety of his arms and his protection. Now my Slayer senses screamed at being in a vulnerable position, sprawled at his feet, and I scrambled up, ungainly with disorientation.

It didn't help as much as it might have if he wasn't still about a foot taller than I am, but I felt more secure, as my gaze met his and my soul wailed for his; cheesy pseudo-romance words I shudder to say just to myself, but I felt it, I did... a slow, unconscious reaching from me, from my essence, to him, and a soft cry of despair and abandonment at the firm, brick-wall denial.

His gaze slid away.

I meant to say 'hi'. Or 'how are you', despite knowing however he was, it was bad. Something normal, anyway.

I guess his name is normal... but not the way I said it, questioning and breathy and little-girl-lost and demanding and with a throaty hint of tears.

"Buffy," he replied, in a manner that was clearly meant to be echoing, mocking, but lacked any kind of heart or interest.

"What's wrong with you?" I demanded, regaining some stridency.

"What's been wrong with me for the last few months?" he flipped back. "Pay attention, Slayer."

Okay. Cryptic Guy has always been annoying. But there's always been a James-Bond-cum-Milk-Tray-Man aspect to it that makes it kind of sexy, or at least bearable.

But this so completely wasn't the time. I felt my hand ball up into an involuntary fist, almost able to feel his smooth skin under my knuckles. I curbed the impulse, with some effort; it's at least partly a Slayer/vampire thing, but it's not conducive to a healthy relationship. I settled for gritting my teeth.

"Darla," I bit out through the aforementioned gritted teeth. My jaw was starting to hurt.

"Yeah," he said. He wasn't looking at me, so it was hard to catch the quick downwards flick of his eyes, but it was there.

"What happened?" I said, stepping closer towards him.

I think I knew, on some level. Maybe I always knew what it would come to, this - thing with him and her.

"I had sex with her," he blurted. He met my gaze briefly, haunted and hooded and again with the familiar trace of guilt and plea for absolution.

"Why are you telling me this?" I said. My voice sounded eerily calm and slow.

I felt like a wronged wife confronting her husband with proof of his infidelity, forcing him into a quick, hunted admittance of guilt. I haven't been with Angel for over eighteen months, but that he was sleeping with someone else... still had this effect on me.

Is this how he felt, when I threw Riley in his face? If he did, then my objective - hurt Angel - worked. It's not even that he slept with another woman (kissed another woman, had his hands on another woman's body, called another woman's name), or that he slept with *Darla* (although hey! What the hell?). It's that we couldn't, and can't, and maybe if we could it would never have even come up, because he'd still be here with me.

It wasn't all of it, I know. But it was part of it. Because of his terror of becoming...

Oh God.

"Is it because I've got to be expecting a visit from Angelus soon? Is that why you're telling me" I said, my voice betraying me with a tremor. I can't survive Angelus again.

He didn't say anything, just stared at me guiltily.

"Is it?" I screamed, losing control in a rush. "Am I going to be killing you again?"

I knew without a doubt that this, what, who, I was raging at was the soul. Angel's soul meets me here. But if my understanding of the ether realms is right, it's entirely possible for him to have come from there.

Do not pass consciousness. Do not collect another day's worth of 'life'.

"Maybe you should either way," he muttered almost inaudibly.

That pierced the haze of panic that was filling my head. It's a luxury I don't really get in my life, panic. It's 'badness, react'; not much time to consider. Probably a good thing.

It pierced the haze and moved straight down to my right hand, barely passing more than primitive synapses.

I almost wouldn't have realised I'd done it, but Angel grimaced and raised a hand to touch the mark where I'd slapped him. It came up red, betraying the power behind my blow.

And that he'd fed recently.

On *her*.

I got right in his face, past 'furious' and into the clear, rational area beyond. "*Never* say anything like that to me," I hissed, holding his gaze in my burning one. "It's hard enough to kill *him*. I *won't* kill you."

No matter how blurred the difference between them gets.

"If you want to die," I continued, "fine. But *don't* ask me to do it for you."

Obviously, I didn't mean fine in the sense of yeah, go ahead... but I've felt like that myself. And that woke me up to thinking, for a moment, about why he slept with her.

I asked, my hard tone daring him to not answer.

"What does it matter?" he asked, his voice matching mine for harshness. "What does it have to do with you? What, you can fuck whoever you want but I have to stay alone?"

I stared at him, momentarily lost for words. Surprisingly, it wasn't the Angelus-esque taunt, the leering insinuation, that even bothered me the most (though I figured when I had time to process a little more, I probably wouldn't be delighted); it was him asking what it has to do with me.

It's having to do with him. And that means it's having to do with me. Doesn't he know that?

"You don't have to stay alone," I said. "I haven't. I haven't fucked everyone, but I haven't been alone." Oh, yeah. There it was. My palm itched for the feel of his cheek again. It calmed slightly when I picked up on his discomfort, the flash of remorse at what he'd said. "But you don't have to go to *Darla*." I spat her name distastefully. Considerable residual issues.

"I didn't..." he said, then sighed. "She was just... there and I wanted..."

"To get laid?" I snapped smartly, though a part of me threw a little celebration that he hadn't gone to her. She'd just been there and he'd...

Okay, maybe not so much bright side potential.

"To feel warm," he mumbled, sinking down into a crouch, his elbows resting on his knees.

"She's a vampire," I said precisely, looking down at his slumped back. "Vampires do not have warmth."

"She had more than me!" he cried, rising fluidly. His coat flapped for an instant with the rapid movement. "Everything did."

"So that's it? I said coldly. "First time it gets difficult, you get a little lonely and depressed, you go screw some evil?"

I realised, way back somewhere in the part of me that has the positive feelings, that I wasn't helping, but I needed this in a way I couldn't describe... wanted to pour out my anger on his suffering shoulders. Xander may really believe in my wonderful heart, but when it comes to Angel, it's not so wonderful; it's hampered by the certainty that he'll love me anyway. So far, at least.

"It's always difficult," he said, coming out in a little righteous wrath. "You've got no idea what it's like to try for this distant promise, alone except for all the memories..."

Many of which she features in.

"You're not alone," I insisted, able to be quiet, think more, feel more, in the face of his bleak anger. What's the saying? There's always the lover and the loved in a relationship? This was the sane and the mad, swinging erratically.

He indicated his head. "I am in here. Apart for the demon. Here whispering to me. Always. We're the same thing."

"You're not," I said. His old fear... to be like the thing he remembers reveling in being. He thinks he is with as much ferocity as I know he's not.

"Close enough," he said tonelessly. "The darkness is there. The demon just uses it."

Natural, human darkness... that's different. It's more frightening, more imaginative. 'There but for the grace of God go I'. But easier to control. It's inherent enough in the Slayer for me to know that. It's inherent enough in Angel for a denial to be useless.

"But you knew that," I argued. "You've always lived with that. You control that."

"But everybody lives with it," he said. "It never hit me before... there's no good, you know? Or they'd all be angels."

"Who?" I said, lost. If he started babbling, I would probably end up resorting - again - to the physical violence I dearly wanted to avoid; it wouldn't solve anything, and it might take him from me totally.

I won't lose him to this. He's better than it. We're stronger than it.

"People!" he said impatiently. "Humanity. It's just... awful. All the evil in their hearts."

I've seen enough human monsters to not have a ready comeback to that. Maybe there just isn't one.

"Humanity is pretty bad," I said softly. "Collectively. You helped individuals. Saved the soul of each person. They weren't evil."

Even Faith wasn't all evil, in the end. It was *me* who was down on her, and he saved her. He made her want to change. And that's just one I know about. I felt a sudden, sharp conviction, as if it came arrowing in from outside me, that he had to believe that again. That he could help people. He never was really big on the self-belief.

"They may not be angels," I went on, not seeing any response in him, but warming to my subject, "but if... if they were evil, they'd be demons, you know? And not even all of them are so bad."

"I am," he said, very quietly.

I reached out, tentatively, and after a moment of hesitation he let me take his hand.

"You're not as bad as you think you are," I said carefully, unwilling to dissipate the sudden, fragile peace that had descended from the echoey darkness.

"Worse," he said, but he didn't let go of my hand. I tried to concentrate on sending him good vibes down the connection. It's weird how you'll start to believe in things while you're in a tight spot: like an atheist who prays as their plane spirals downwards. This felt as serious.

"No," I said firmly.

"It all stopped having a point a long time ago," he said, his gaze fixed on mine. The confrontational had gone from both of us. I know Angel was a Catholic when he was human; I felt almost like a priest, hearing his confession. It had that kind of quiet peace to it.

And maybe salvation at the end of it, though I don't think there's anyone can grant that to him but himself.

"Then when Holland made me see there was no winning..."

Who the hell was Holland?

No matter; opening.

"That's not why we fight," I jumped in smoothly. "We fight because there are things worth fighting for. You told me that as well... it's given me strength through a lot of hard fights."

"What do you fight for?" he asked me softly.

I thought about it.

"Other people," I said eventually. "So they don't have to. So they don't even have to know there's fighting to be done."

"Is that best for them, though?" he said. "Is it fair to them? Is it fair to you?"

I didn't have to think about that.

"No, it's not," I said honestly. "But it's who I am. I can't *not*. And there's a part of you that can't not, either... even on a vengeance gig, you did some helping. That's who you are."

And there it is. No big revelations about my nature, none about his. Nothing we hadn't thought a thousand times and never needed to say.

We fight because that's who we are.

"Something a little more concrete would be nice right now," he whispered.

"Family," I said without hesitation.

"I don't have any anymore," he said, simply, but not without sorrow.

"You can," I assured him, a little excitedly.

"Yeah?" he said, with the familiar bittersweet half-smile I hadn't seen on him, for so long. His grip got fainter, and I looked up in alarm to see him fading inexorably.

And then I remembered.

Maybe all he would do was float around for eternity, thinking about it and wondering - seeing me still? I don't know - and watching the demon that wears his body commit atrocities.

"Where are you going?" I said, desperately and uselessly clutching tight to the hand that disappeared from my very grip.

"Angel?"

He just looked at me unfathomably, fading slowly, becoming colourless and dull against the stark black of the surroundings I hadn't noticed since he stepped in.

My last image of him was standing, grey and transparent and alone.

As if I was the one moving away from him.

"Angel!"

Go to the next story Say I'm Only Dreaming

Send feedback to Esmerelda

Back to the Fanfiction Archive