Disclaimer: I own Vivien, the rest of them belong to Joss Whedon, FOX, Mutant Enemy, etc. etc.
Author's Notes: This is an IWRY-baby fic, completely AU, pretty much, but with twists. Most of it takes place twenty two years in the future, this is just the prologue...It's slightly B/A, but it's not really majorly shippy for any couples.
Spoilers: Major IWRY spoilers...I think that's about it...
Feedback: PLEASE, I crave it! If you send feedback I'll send Part 1...

Prologue

//January, 2000//

Light shimmered through the window, spilling across the table, across the beds, onto the carpeted floor of the dorm room. Buffy Summers lay on the bed and watched it fall, imagining a world in which that sunlight would not harm the man she loved. Knowing that that world had existed for a day. A day that had never happened, except in his mind, and hers. And one more place.

The door opened, and closed, interrupting her silent reverie, causing her to turn her blond head ever-so-slightly to regard the young woman that stood by the door now, regarding her with perpetually worried eyes.

She knew they worried about her, all of them, though Willow the most, because Willow slept near her at night, and heard her crying out as she wouldn't allow herself to do in the day, with the sunlight all around her. But they were all worried. Giles, Xander, her mother, Riley…even Anya. She couldn't tell what was wrong. She couldn't tell them that it was impossible to concieve of going on with a life that was so much less than what she could have had.

And now there was one more thing she couldn't concieve of. One more thing she had no idea how to say.

"What's the matter?" Willow asked for the thousandth time since Buffy had come home too early from her trip to LA and lay down on her bed and not gotten up. Not for a while anyway, a few days, a week maybe. Then she had gotten up, and gone through the motions for them, but they'd all known it didn't mean anything. There was a look in her eyes, like something inside her had died, and she wouldn't say what. Now though, she was back on the bed, unmoving again, and the deadness that had come over her face in the last two months was gone, replaced by something else—perhaps even more frightening. Willow couldn't name it, but she could worry.

And then the oddest thing happened. Buffy found herself sitting up, and reaching out her arms to her best friend, who ran into them immediately, and before the Slayer knew what was happening she was crying, really crying for the first time, and the words spilled out of her mouth, an insane, incoherent story that was only too true.

When she was done, she sat quietly, letting Willow stroke her hair.

"Is it true?" Willow asked in a whisper, silent tears running down her face as well.

"Every word," Buffy promised. "And now I don't know what to do. I don't know how to live without him." She pulled away slightly, just enough to look into Willow's eyes. "And I'm pregnant Will."

Willow gasped, her eyes widening and one hand came up to cup Buffy's cheek as the blond Slayer looked away, her eyes sweeping the small, neat room with sunshine spilling in the window.

"What are you going to do?" she asked. Buffy shook her head numbly and then stopped suddenly and took a deep breath, her eyes fixed squarely on the light. Light he would never stand in again. Light she could give their child.

"I'm going to keep it," she said firmly. She looked back to Willow. "How could I not? This baby…it's all I have. It's ours. Mine and his. It's like…a gift from the Powers That Be. One thing to remember that day by, as if I could ever forget it. One thing to embody all that perfection."

"Are you sure?" Willow asked. Buffy nodded calmly, her path suddenly very clear. "Are you going to call Angel?"

Buffy had been expecting the question. She avoided Willow's eyes as she answered, "No." Willow stiffened a little, whether in shock or disapproval Buffy didn't know.

"But—it's his baby too," she pointed out. Buffy shook her head, her expression slightly pleading as she turned it back to Willow.

"It would just make it harder for both of us. He doesn't know I remember. I'd have to explain why I didn't tell him and…and he'd come back. I know he would. Angel is too honorable to let me raise this baby by myself," Buffy explained.

"But isn't that what you want?" Buffy shook her head.

"Not on those terms. Of course I want to be with him but…it doesn't work with us the way things are. It never would. Being that close, both remembering what it was like to be closer—it would be hell. It would be torture, every second. And even if it wasn't—I'd always wonder if he really wanted to be with me. He left me Will. If he came back, it would be for the baby, not for me, and I couldn't handle that. I would start to hate him and the baby. I wouldn't have a real relationship with him, but I'd never be able to have one with anyone else either. Besides…he's doing well in LA. He's…happy there. As happy as he can be anyway. And he's helping people. I don't want to mess that up for him."

Buffy waited with baited breath, but Willow's eyes, when they looked back, were understanding. The witch squeezed her friend's hands.

"I understand. But how do you expect to keep him from knowing? Xander couldn't even keep quiet about Angel being in town, you think he'll be able to keep his mouth shut about you having his child?"

"Xander won't know," Buffy said firmly. Willow gave her a confused look. "Not about the baby, he'll have to know about that. But about Angel. No one will know. I'll say that I was depressed after seeing Angel. Everyone will believe that. And that I went out that night and got roaringly drunk. And that I slept with a man I didn't know and was so embarrassed the next morning that I left without finding out his name. Then no one will be able to question the dates, and no one will expect me to find the father. And no one will mention anything about Angel."

Willow stared at her, slightly shocked.

"You're really going to tell everyone that you're having a stranger's baby? Aren't you afraid of what people will think?" Willow asked. Buffy shook her head, the odd look entering her eyes again.

"It doesn't matter. I know that this baby was conceived through love. And she'll know it too somehow."

"She?" Willow whispered. Buffy shrugged, losing the look for a moment.

"Or he." Her eyes met Willow's. "Please, promise you'll never tell a soul?"

"Never," Willow swore. She kissed Buffy's forehead and put her arms around her best friend as the Slayer curled against her and closed her eyes. "I just want you to be happy. I hope this will make you happy."

Buffy let Willow rock her, shut her eyes to the sunlight, and sang silently to the baby in her womb, her living memory of the day that never was.

Part One

//September 2022//

The office was large and bright, and very neat except for the pile of papers and unsorted mail on the desk. Vivien McKeely arched an eyebrow at the picture presented—not a spot of dust on anything, but a desk that obviously hadn't been used in days, if not weeks—and closed the door of Angel Investigations behind her.

"Hello?" she called, taking a step into the office. "Mr. Angel?"

A sound came from the next room and suddenly the door into the next office opened, revealing a tall, broad-shouldered, very handsome man that looked to be in his mid to late twenties. They blinked at each other, his face frozen in some sort of shock, and hers just surprised—seeing as she'd found his card in a very old file, she'd expected him to be older. Unless of course, this wasn't Angel…

"You okay?" Vivien ventured after a moment, as the haunted look in his dark eyes didn't pass. She knew she was an attractive young woman, with short, dark blond hair and deep black eyes, but she didn't usually get this reaction. He started, his eyes seeming to focus again and he nodded.

"Sorry, you…look like someone I used to know. How can I help you?" he asked.

"Mr. Angel?" she ventured.

"Just Angel," he replied, nodding. She nodded in return, arching an inward eyebrow at someone named Angel—"just Angel." Not like he would be the weirdest person she'd ever met. She really shouldn't be talking. "Do you have a…problem?"

"No, no," Vivien assured him. He looked slightly crestfallen and her mouth turned up at the edge. "My name's Vivien McKeely, I'm here to ask you about the job. You're looking for a new assistant?"

"Yes, I am," he said quickly. "How did you hear about it?" Vivien shrugged. In truth, she'd heard her mother's best friend mention something and had remembered seeing the business card in her mother's old files. She'd dug it up and…and come. If Willow knew she was here, she'd skin her alive, or turn her into a toad or something. Luckily, Willow didn't know, and what she didn't know wouldn't hurt her. And Vivien was not going to be talked out of this one.

"I have sources," she said mysteriously, flashing him her brightest smile. His eyes looked slightly disturbed again, but then that was hidden behind an emotionless mask she had a feeling was his usual expression.

"Well, why don't you come into my office then?" he asked, gesturing towards the open door. Vivien nodded and walked ahead of him into the room, feeling a little awkward. This man had an odd air…as if he was as old as she'd thought he would be. But that, obviously, was impossible. Well, probably. She could ask Willow about it, but she didn't want Willow to demand why she wanted to know…

Angel followed her into the room and gestured for her to take a seat in the chair in front of his desk. She did so, settling her purse on her lap and glancing around. The room was just as neat as the outside one, with the added bonus of not being covered with papers. A clock sat beside an ancient Chinese vase and several little metal gadgets that Vivien wasn't sure she wanted to know about on the edge of his desk. Along the a variety of ancient swords, axes and crossbows hung. He sat down behind it and folded his hands in his lap, eyeing her. Vivien eyed him back for a moment, then started and pulled out her resume from her bag, handing it to him.

"Here's my resume. As you can see I graduated last year from UC Berkeley, on a full scholarship, but I've also been working since I was fifteen. I've had lots of experience as a secretary, and collecting information," Vivien explained as he read over the resume, his face still completely expressionless. She realized she was babbling and shut her mouth quickly. She really wanted this job. Just enough to talk herself straight out of the running. Though by the look of the front room, there weren't that many other applicants. Or maybe he was just really choosy.

Angel looked up finally, eyeing her. She eyed him back, her mouth pressed in a tight line, her hands clutching each other. She had given up wanting things in the last seven years. Well, for the most part. She'd pretty much taken what she could get. But she really wanted this. She couldn't even quite explain it to herself, but if this Angel did what she thought he did…She really wanted to help. She didn't even care what it paid. Much.

"This looks great," Angel said, a 'but' obvious in his voice, even to Vivien who had known him about two minutes now.

"But…" she prompted. He flashed a small smile at her and she smiled back involuntarily, though her heart was sinking.

"But this isn't exactly a normal detective agency. We deal with things here that aren't…well, I just need someone that's familiar with the area. I'm very sorry," he said, holding her resume out to her. Vivien blinked, laughing inwardly at herself.

"I am familiar with it," she replied quickly. "That is, if you mean demons…that is what you do here, isn't it? I was hoping…"

It was Angel's turn to look slightly stunned. He gave her a reappraising look, and his eyes narrowed as if he was calculating something.

"How do you know about demons?" he asked quietly. Vivien avoided his eyes and chose the easiest answer.

"My father was killed by a Mohra demon when I was fifteen," she said softly, almost telling the truth. He had been killed by a Mohra—or rather, about twenty of them. So it wasn't much of a lie.

"I'm sorry." She dared a look upwards and found that he really did look sorry, though his expression had hardly changed at all. How did he do that? She gave a tiny shrug, swallowing the lump in her throat at the thought of Kevin—her stepfather really, but she'd always considered him her real father.

"It's all right. I researched them a lot and…well, I know a lot about them. I can fight a little too. I've been taking Tae Kwon Do since I was little. I really want to fight them. When I heard about this job I thought maybe this would be my opportunity," she told him, everything but the first completely true. His dark eyes were understanding and somehow…familiar. She smiled suddenly. "Also, you really look like you could use some organization skills."

Angel smiled back, the shadows in his eyes nearly banished, and glanced out the glass pane into the front room. "Yeah, well my assistant since I founded the agency moved three weeks ago and her replacement wasn't up to the job. It's hard finding someone who is. Cordelia was amazing—well, she is amazing. She's just in New York now."

Cordelia, that's who she'd heard mentioned. Willow had been talking to Xander, her mother's other best friend. Guess who I heard from yesterday? Cordelia Chase, of all people. Turns out she's moving to New York with her family. I guess Angel's looking for someone to help him. I told her that we need all the help we can get on our end, we didn't have anyone to spare.

But they had Vivien. Who was now watching Angel with hope hidden deep in her dark eyes and wondering if she should ask how long it had been since he had founded the company.

Angel's eyes drifted back to her and he looked her over once more, assessing. "Don't you want to know about salary and benefits?" he asked.

"I don't care," Vivien said quickly, then cursed herself for being such an idiot. "That is…it is paid right?" Angel half-smiled, and nodded.

"Right. I paid Cordelia
15 an hour. You should be warned though, there's a lot of overtime. And it can be a very dangerous job."

Vivien grinned, elated at the pay (most of her jobs had been at minimum wage—
9 an hour). "I laugh in the face of danger," she grinned, quoting Xander. "Then I hide until it goes away…No, really," she finished hurriedly, seeing another odd look on his face, "I'll be fine with that. I'm used to danger. Are you offering me the job?"

"Will you take it?" Angel asked cautiously. Vivien nodded, slightly speechless now that she had what she wanted. Not that she usually didn't get it—when Vivien put her mind to something, she nearly always succeeded—but she usually didn't let herself want.

"When do you want me to start?" she asked, glancing at her watch. It was three in the afternoon. Willow wasn't expecting her until eight that evening, but she'd thought she would go visit her grandfather before going home…and packing her stuff she realized. She'd have to stop by the apartment building and tell the owner she definitely wanted the apartment.

"As soon as possible," Angel said, glancing at the pile of papers again. Vivien laughed softly.

"Well, I could put in a couple of hours now," she offered, calculating how long it would take her to drive to the apartment and then back to Sunnydale.

"That would be great," Angel said, standing up. He held out his hand and Vivien took it, surprised at how cold he was. Not that it was overheated in the office, it was nice and airconditioned, but she was still warm even in a very light weight calf-length dress. "Welcome to Angel Investigations. I hope you like it here."

Vivien stopped worrying about how cold he was and smiled up into his dark eyes, believing despite every instinct that screamed at her not to, that maybe she would.

*

"So I'll see you Monday morning," Vivien said, glancing up from her filing. She closed the cabinet drawer and stood up, ignoring Angel's offered hand.

"Right. Don't worry about the time, I'm not really an early riser," Angel said yet again. "If I'm not up, just let yourself in. You know where to start?"

"With the Ludman case," Vivien assured him. She picked up her purse and swung it over her shoulder and then walked towards the door. Angel watched her, none of the emotions he felt showing on his face as her small, slender body and the smooth, confident way she walked brought back memories of another blond young woman, so many years ago. She paused at the door and looked back, raising a hand to him with a little smile. Angel waved back and then she walked out, leaving him staring after her with an unsettled feeling.

She didn't really look that much like Buffy. Her hair was darker, her eyes completely different, her brow higher, her nose straight and aquiline, her mouth narrower. She was more of a classic beauty compared to Buffy's blond charm. But there was something…Angel brushed it off as stress and old memories, best forgotten. He'd been on edge lately, without Cordelia around to tease him into good humor or demand he tell her what was wrong that very instant. When Vivien had walked in and he'd thought he was seeing Buffy…it had just been a memory. A vision. Besides, Buffy surely looked different now. Twenty two years. Angel looked just the same.

He'd thought at first maybe Vivien was Buffy's daughter, though she introduced herself as a McKeely—after all, Buffy had gotten married, and he'd never known the name of the man. But her resume and the age obvious in her eyes and demeanor told him she was at least twenty one, probably older, and Buffy had only been married sixteen years before. Besides, he'd spoken to Buffy twenty two years ago, and there had been no mention of pregnancy, or even a boyfriend. They'd argued over the phone about Faith five months after she had come to L.A. and he had been human for a day that wasn't.

No, Vivien wasn't related to Buffy. He'd been a fool to think it. She was just another hurt young woman, trying to do what she could to fight the evil that had injured her. He'd seen too many of them in his time—hurt young women that was. Most of them didn't try to fight.

Angel sighed, though he didn't need to, and walked out of the front office, to his desk, settling down, staring at the clock that had once counted down the seconds until his humanity was gone. Oh, not forever. Someday, according to Wesley's translations of prophecy, he would live again. When was harder to figure out. It could be a month, or three hundred years when everybody he loved was dust, buried beneath the earth. What would be the point of humanity then?

Darkness began to settle over the office, but Angel paid it no mind. He was used to it. He wondered if this girl would last, if she would be able to take the pressure and deal with the horrors he faced everyday. Amazingly enough, he found himself hoping she would.

*

"Hi Aunt Will," Vivien said cheerfully, kissing the older woman's cheek as she brushed past her into the large, spacious house. She set down her bag on the couch and walked into the kitchen. Willow followed her, the distracted look she got so often when dealing with Buffy's daughter crossing her face.

"How did the job interview go?" she asked.

"Peachy," Vivien assured her, opening the fridge and helping herself to a bottle of carrot juice as she pulled herself up to sit on one of Willow's immaculate counters. "I started today."

"It's just secretary work?" Willow asked yet again.

"I swear. My boss seems really nice. A little…broody. You know the type? Tall, dark and handsome, can't go ten minutes without a scowl?" Willow's mouth inched upwards.

"I've met one or two. Would you get off the counter? I talked to your mother."

Vivien paused in the middle of a sip of juice, setting the bottle down with remarkably steady hands.

"She got to a phone huh?" she asked. Willow nodded.

"She sounded good. She asked about you. She was glad you were getting a job in L.A. She always liked it there."

"Apparently," Vivien muttered under her breath. Willow gave her a sharp look and Vivien hastened to ask, "Does she want me to bring her anything Sunday?"

"No, she said she's all right," Willow replied. Vivien nodded and hopped down from the counter, taking a long drink of the carrot juice and then starting out of the room. "Aren't you going to eat dinner?" Willow called after her.

"I ate on the way home," Vivien lied without looking back over her shoulder. "I'm gonna go read."

"Sure you're all right?" Willow called, standing alone in her spotless white kitchen, looking forlorn. Vivien didn't see her though, since she didn't turn around as she mounted the stairs to the room she had occupied for the last seven years, except during college.

"Fine!" Vivien yelled back, and disappeared into her room, unable to admit to the woman that had loved and cared for her since she lost both her parents at age fifteen, that she was never really fine at all.

Part Two

Vivien had been working at Angel Investigations about a week before she realized what was wrong. For one, her boss never came into the sunlight. And sometimes, when she watched him out of the corner of her eye, he didn't seem to be breathing. And he wouldn't let her drive him anywhere, he seemed to have some other mysterious form of transportation. One afternoon, she grabbed his wrist to pull him over to the computer to show him information on their latest case and she realized it. He had no pulse. He was not, in fact, alive at all.

Vivien dropped Angel's wrist like it was on fire and leapt back into the sunlight, pulling a stake from one of the concealed sheathes she'd stolen from her mother's old trunk.

"You're a vampire!" she shouted, brandishing the stake at him. Angel hung back, concern written in every line of his body.

"Vivien, I can explai—" he began.

"What?! Explain how you happen to be a blood-sucking demon living in a dead human's body?! God, I am such an idiot!" she raged at herself. Giles would strangle her with his bare hands if he realized what a fool she'd been. She'd walked right into his clutches. She'd trusted him completely. And now there was only enough sunlight to shield her while she stood directly by the window. There was no way she could get out the door without him grabbing her…

"You don't understand," Angel sighed. "I have a soul."

Vivien froze, eyeing him with trepidation. "That's impossible."

"It's not impossible. I was cursed by Romany gypsies. I was given my soul until I experienced one moment of true, pure happiness."

"When was this?" Vivien demanded, still not lowering her stake.

"1898. I spent almost a hundred years skulking around feeling guilty and then…and then I decided I needed to help. So I've been doing what I can to stop the spread of evil. It's the truth Vivien. If I wanted to kill you, I'd have had plenty of opportunities by now," Angel pointed out.

"So? Maybe you have some evil plan!" Vivien exclaimed. Angel watched her patiently.

"I can't make you believe me. But it's true. I drink pig's blood, in bags. You can go look in my fridge if you want to. I have not killed a human in…in a very long time."

Vivien noticed he did not say one hundred and twenty four years. Her lips tightened.

"How long?" she demanded. He stilled.

"In 1998 I…experienced a moment of true happiness. I didn't know about the clause in the curse. I turned evil again for four months, before my soul was restored and I was…sent to Hell as a consequence of my demon's actions."

"How do I know that won't happen again?" Vivien demanded, finding herself believing him against her better judgement. His eyes met hers, both dark, his completely grave, hers frightened and despite herself, a little pitying.

"I would never put anyone else in danger. The closest I have come to a women in the last twenty three years is working with one, as I do with you. Besides…there's only one woman that could ever give me true happiness, and she's long lost to me now," he murmured, his eyes disappearing into that other place she'd grown to know a little over the past week. Watching him, Vivien made a choice. She lowered the stake.

"I know a little bit about loss. I believe you. But don't think I won't hesitate to stake you if you show any signs of evilness."

"I would expect you to," he replied seriously. She stepped out of the light, eyeing him as if waiting for him to attack. He didn't. They stood, a yard apart, and watched each other warily with the same eyes, though neither noticed that part.

"Why didn't you tell me?" she asked finally.

"I should have, I'm sorry. I guess…I guess I thought you'd make a good employee and I didn't want to scare you away. I should have known you'd figure it out though."

"Good thing it took me thirty seconds to reach that stake or it would have been a lot less questions, a lot more dust," Vivien smiled. Angel gave her a tiny half-smile in return. She started.

"Here, come look at this," she said, beckoning him toward the computer. Angel followed, falling easily back into work mode. "I found our guy. Well, our demon. It's a Dust Demon. They're supposed to show up right before a drought. Enough water kills 'em though, so we'll just need to get a hose or something…The drought part kind of worries me. I guess it's always a drought here though…Seasonless Los Angeles."

"There are seasons here," Angel replied softly. "Just not the kind people expect."

"What seasons do you get here?" Vivien asked, curious. He looked straight at her.

"Seasons of less evil, and seasons of much, much more," he informed her. Vivien shivered at the tone of his voice.

"What season are we in?" she asked quietly. He turned to look back at the computer screen as he replied.

"We're just beginning the much, much more."

And Vivien, incongruously, thought of her mother, and all her predictions for the future.

*

//November 2022//

Hot. Fire. Burning, sizzling, engulfed in wave after wave of hot, dry fire.

They thought she was asleep. If she moved, if she whimpered, they would take her to the other room, away from the window, away from the breeze.

Sharp pain, shooting through, claws ripping, pulling, blood spilling slowly, life slipping away, away, away.

She didn't open her eyes. Didn't stir though the pain shot through her, a knife twisting, twisting, always twisting inside.

Glowing eyes, menacing, hot breath one more fire in a world of flames, snarls, laughter, horrible laughter echoing, down and down and down.

A tiny sound escaped her lips before she could stop it. A noise came from the door, it opened, they watched. She could feel them watching. She tried to still, tried to hold it in.

Pain ceases, heat clears, familiar dark eyes, sweet smile, warmth, adoration and life, happy, sweet life…ends, screams, eyes flashing with pain, claws ripping, tearing, screaming without end.

A wail of horror echoed from her lips as she gave in to the terror and screamed.

*

Vivien sat up in her bed, staring around the darkness, the scream still echoing in her mind. Her breathing slowed finally as her eyes fixed on familiar objects around her small bedroom—the paper fan Kevin bought her when she was nine, the seashell lamp Willow gave her when she graduated from high school, the picture of her family, with her mother laughing, her arms wrapped around Vivien's waist, and Kevin trying bravely to fit his arms around both of them. She smiled sadly at the picture, for though she couldn't even make out their shapes in the darkness, she knew every detail of it, had stared at it so long that it was burned into her mind like a brand. What She Once Had. What She No Longer Had. That was how Vivien thought of things sometimes, pathetic as it was…

When she was calm enough, she slid out of bed and shed her pajamas, slipping on lightweight pants and a tanktop—the prediction of a drought had come true. The entire west coast hadn't had any rain for three weeks. Everything was drying up. And it was so hot. And it was November. She rain a brush through her hair—it barely reached her chin, her mother had always wanted her to grow it out—and grabbed her purse. She slipped on sandals and left the apartment without ever turning on a light. She was turning into a vampire herself, working for Angel.

Before she even knew what she was doing, she was driving to the office. She knew she wouldn't be able to sleep again, she never could after dreams like that, and there was work to be done. There was always work to be done. If there was one thing she'd learned in the last month and a half, it was that no matter what you did, you never stopped the demons. There were always more.

On second thought, she decided as she pulled into the parking lot at Angel Investigations, she'd known that a long time ago.

She gave a voice ID to the building security system and ran up the steps, unlocking the door to Angel's front office with a press of her thumb against the keypad. The door unlocked and she walked inside, turning on the lamp on her desk so she had enough light to work by, but not enough to disturb anyone. Sliding into a seat she turned on the computer and bent to open the file cabinet where their current cases resided. They (Vivien took a moment to wonder at herself…was she really part of a team now?) were tracking down a liosa demon that had been terrorizing Malibu, and trying to figure out where Wolfram and Hart were hiding their latest affiliate, Gurek, a particularly nasty fellow with a penchant for slicing and dicing important people.

She flipped the computer's voice off before it could start talking to her, in case Angel was asleep downstairs, and got to work.

*

Angel sat up in bed, staring around him at the darkness-that-wasn't. A scream still echoed in his head and he shivered despite the warmth (not that he felt it) and looked around the room. Knowing he wouldn't be able to go back to sleep (usually he didn't sleep this time of night anyway, he'd just been trying to adjust his schedule to coincide more with Vivien's) he slid out of bed and pulled on a pair of pants and a tank top, then padded out into his kitchen.

As he sipped a glass of blood and wondered what the Gurek was up to, he heard a noise from upstairs. Angel set down his glass and grabbed a small hatchet, tiptoeing up the stairs, wondering who had broken in and how they had gotten by the alarm.

He eased silently into his office. From the front office there was a faint glow of light and the sound of tapping on the computer keyboard. He shuffled forward soundlessly and then stopped when he caught a glimpse of blond hair. He relaxed and set down the hatchet, quietly opening the door to the front office and standing there, watching Vivien as she worked.

The young woman was completely absorbed in her task. He could barely see the computer screen, but she seemed to be cross referencing the attack sites with something…She didn't look up at him. He wondered if she knew he was there and trusted him, or if she hadn't even heard him come in. He hoped it was the former. With Cordelia…she'd always known he was a vampire. He hadn't had to worry about frightening her, because as far as he had ever been able to tell, she didn't frighten. At all. Vivien was a different story, though he wasn't really sure how. He didn't know if he scared her. He didn't know if anything did. She never really showed any emotions. Oh, she would smile, laugh even, look sad or hurt when they found something awful…but none of it really reached her eyes, which were altogether too dark, too old, for someone so young.

Youth, Angel recalled, was a relative thing. Buffy was proof of that. She'd had the strength of much older, more experienced people. But she'd also had the heart of a very young woman. With Vivien…he couldn't tell. There was something very familiar about her, but she was still so far away all the time. He never pressed, since he was usually more distant than she was, but it was a far cry from Cordelia, who said everything she thought without hesitation. He missed his tactless, fashion-wise friend of over twenty years, but he also had a feeling Vivien could become that kind of friend, if she would ever let herself. He wasn't really sure why he wanted her to open up—he wasn't interested in her romantically in any way. He just felt…fatherly towards her, he supposed. He worried about her. Humans didn't have the capacity to just shut emotions away. He could do it, but he'd had hundreds of years of practice. She hadn't, and he was worried.

It didn't make a lot of sense. When it came to humans, Angel's feelings often didn't.

He stirred slightly and she finally looked up, flashing him a bright smile. His heart ached, reminded of another bright smile from another blond girl…If anything of Vivien truly reminded him of Buffy, it was her smile.

"Did I wake you up?" Vivien asked, sounding concerned. Angel shook his head.

"What are you doing here? It's the middle of the night…"

"I couldn't sleep," Vivien explained. "I thought I'd come work. I cross referenced all the attacks with radiation levels, and there's a definite correspondence. It seems to create trails for a little bit right after the attacks too, which means the liosa must have a residue for say, an hour after it attacks, and if we keep a sharp lookout, we should be able to track it."

"Good job," Angel said, leaning against the edge of the desk. "How'd you find out about the radiation?"

"Well, I checked the autopsy reports, and there were some weird burns," Vivien explained, looking as if she were avoiding something. "I, uh, think I read it somewhere too."

Angel knew she was lying (he could always tell), but he didn't press. They had an unspoken agreement. He never asked about her family or her past, and she never asked about his evil days or his moment of true happiness.

Vivien yawned suddenly. "Coffee?" he asked. She shook her head, making a slight face.

"It'll be yucky by now. I could use some fresh air though."

"Let's go up to the roof. You've pretty much got this one figure out now…" Vivien gave him a tiny smile and shrugged, following him as he walked out of the office and up the stairs to the roof entrance. Though the building had been blown up twenty two years before, it had been rebuilt soon after and Angel had rented back the same rooms. He liked the view from the roof, and it saved getting more of those weird business cards Cordelia had designed…a slight smile twisted his mouth at the memory, as he opened the small door and emerged into the dark, hot night, Vivien close behind.

They walked together to the cement barrier and leaned against his, Vivien's eyes sweeping over the bright sprawl of lights, Angel's settling on the dark horizon.

"It's nice up here," Vivien said after a moment. "Do you come up a lot?"

Angel shrugged. "It's nice to see that there's other things out there. More to the world than just me and my brooding thoughts."

"A lot more," Vivien whispered, and fell silent, her dark eyes reflecting the lights below.

*

She didn't know what possessed her to say it. Maybe it was just the knowledge of how many people there were out there. How many millions, and she didn't know any of their names, and they didn't know hers.

"My father might be out there somewhere," she murmured. Angel gave her a startled look—well, what qualified as one for him, which was pretty much the same as all his other looks.

"I thought he—"

"That was my stepdad," Vivien explained, not looking over at him. "Kevin. My mom met him when I was three. He adopted me formally when I was six…I loved him. He was my father in all the ways that really mean anything. I used to look in the mirror every day, hoping to find one little bit of him, but there was nothing."

"What about your real father?" Angel asked steadily.

"I don't know," Vivien whispered.

"You never met him?" Vivien couldn't help herself; she gave a low, bitter laugh.

"I never even knew his name. Neither did my mother you see. Just some guy she met when she was drunk. And he could be out there now, never even imagining he has a daughter," Vivien whispered, sweeping one hand out to encompass the city.

"If he did know, I'm sure he'd be proud of you," Angel assured her in that quiet, solid way. For a moment, Vivien almost believed him over the ache in her heart, the need for someone who could be what Kevin had always been—a father, to take her in his arms and kiss her head and tell her it would be all right, someone who would always be there for her. At least, until he died. Vivien blinked and the image dissapeared, leaving her alone and cold in an eighty degree night, with a vampire at her side and a city spread out before her, bright and uncaring.

"You're sweet," Vivien said quietly. "A terrible liar, but sweet."

Beside her, Angel froze and she wondered what she'd said wrong this time.

Part Three

"You must be the new girl," a voice said from the doorway, startling Vivien awake from her nap on the desk. She sat up quickly, rubbing her eyes and regarding the tall, slender older woman who regarded her with frank curiousity. "Sleeping on the job already? Angel must really have lost his touch."

"Can I help you?" Vivien asked, pushing her hair back to see the woman better. She had long dark, wavy hair, without a hint of gray. Vivien couldn't guess her age, though if pressed she would say mid to late 30s, though that would be pushing it. This woman looked like she'd spent every moment of the last twenty years making sure that it would be pushing it. Her skin was unwrinkled, her eyes bright, and the arch of her eyebrow perfectly condescending. She was also impeccably dressed. Vivien felt nothing short of ruffled. After some sort of extreme brooding silence had fallen over Angel, she'd come downstairs and stayed the rest of the night working, and must have fallen asleep on her desk…

"Wow," the woman muttered under her breath. Vivien frowned.

"What?" she asked. The woman shook her head suddenly.

"You look just like—this girl I used to know…" She quickly resumed her annoyed air. "One would hope you could help me. What if I was a paying customer?! I bet Angel's in the red again." Vivien gave her a confused look. The woman rolled her eyes.

"I'm Cordelia Gunn. I worked here for about twenty three years. I made this place what it is," the woman stated firmly. Vivien's eyes widened. So this was Cordelia, the woman that had once known Xander and Willow…and maybe, Vivien thought for a second, her mother. Maybe that was who she'd reminded Cordelia of…They didn't really look alike, but Willow always swore there was something…

"Vivien McKeely," the younger woman introduced herself, standing up and holding out her hand. Cordelia shook it firmly, looking around.

"Well, it looks all right. Why were you sleeping though? Did Angel keep you up all night? I told him not to do that," Cordelia scolded. Vivien's mouth twitched up involuntarily.

"No, I—" She was cut off when the door to the inner office opened and Angel walked out. Cordelia grinned broadly and ran into his arms, hugging him. Vivien blinked at the sight. Angel, who looked about twenty five and was hard pressed to make an expression ever, hugging a woman who was probably forty, and as far as Vivien could see, defied description. When Cordelia pulled away she was smiling broadly, making her look even younger.

"You kept her up all night didn't you?" she demanded, poking him in the chest. He smiled, more broadly than he ever had at Vivien, and shook his head. She laughed at him and turned back to Vivien. "You shouldn't let him do that. Just cause he doesn't need beauty rest, doesn't mean the rest of us mere mortals—"

"Like you ever need rest to be beautiful," Angel teased her. Vivien blinked again, shocked at the sight of her brooding boss teasing someone. Cordelia preened.

"You know it!"

"So how's Gunn?" Angel asked. "And the kids? What are you doing here?"

"I notice you don't ask about me," Cordelia pointed out, mock-offended, then smiled. "Gunn is fine. He's got a whole new gang organized." She sighed. "He is even now out risking his neck freeing New York of the undead, I'm sure. And the kids are monsters, as usual. They miss you."

A wistful look crossed Angel's face for a moment. "I miss them too."

Vivien bit her lip, feeling like an eavesdropper watching something private. Angel and Cordelia obviously meant a lot to each other. As friends. She didn't really have any friends like that. Willow and Xander…but they were more like an aunt and uncle. Even in college she'd never gotten really close to anybody. She was always afraid to lose them. Or maybe just afraid she'd have to tell them the truth.

"Anyway, I'm here to help," Cordelia was saying briskly.

"Help?" Angel asked.

"Help," Cordelia said firmly. "You might want to sit down for this one." Angel arched his eyebrows at her, but obediently sat near the desk. Cordelia glanced at Vivien and Angel nodded, indicating it was all right to talk in front of her. Vivien sat down too, still feeling awkward.

"Well?" Angel demanded.

"I had a vision," Cordelia said. Vivien stiffened, every muscle tightening despite her efforts to stay calm. Angel looked completely calm, totally unsurprised. She told herself to breath, but it wasn't really working.

"You could have told me over the phone," Angel pointed out. "That was our agreement."

"No this one," Cordelia replied grimly. She hesitated. "This is big Angel. That demon you told me about—Gurek?—he's here to distract you. Something bigger is coming. Much bigger."

"What?" Angel asked. Cordelia hesitated again. He sighed. "I've dealth with Apocalypses before. Will you please tell me what it is?"

"It's a demon. A real demon, like what the Mayor became after Graduation, remember? Not the normal hybrid kind." Vivien blinked. Now where did that sound familiar? She vaguely remembered Willow telling her some story about a mayor and graduation once when she was little, before her mother had heard and hushed Willow up. Buffy wouldn't let Vivien hear about anything related to demons. At all. There were huge parts of her mother's life she knew nothing about, all because Buffy was afraid something would happen to her precious little girl. Vivien's mouth twisted at the irony of that thought. Well, maybe Buffy had helped at Cordelia's graduation, maybe that's how Willow and Xander knew her…

"When?" Angel asked, still looking unruffled. "And where?" Cordelia glanced uneasily at Vivien.

"Can I talk to you alone?" she asked. Angel looked over at Vivien, his eyes a little apologetic, and then nodded, walking into his office.

"Sorry," Cordelia mumured to Vivien. "Personal stuff." She followed Angel in and shut the door and Vivien was left alone, again, with the knowledge that she would always be so.

*

"I trust Vivien," Angel said quietly when the door closed behind Cordelia.

"Oh I'm sure you do," Cordelia replied. "Seems like a nice girl. Reminded me a little of—" She broke off abruptly, but Angel knew what she'd been about to say. He sat down behind his desk.

"What is it?" Cordelia looked up and met his eyes, her own completely serious.

"It's Buffy. She has to help you fight this thing."

Angel's heart clenched, and his fingers tightened around the arms of his chair, but besides that, he had not reaction. "No," he said calmly.

"It isn't a condition!" Cordelia exclaimed.

"No," he repeated. "Buffy is forty one years old. Even a Slayer loses fighting ability by then. I will not risk her life with this. Besides, she's been retired for years. I will not pull her from her nice, normal life. And it would be too much, for both of us. We haven't seen each other in almost twenty three years. We're going to keep it like that."

"You don't understand Angel," Cordelia argued. "Buffy has to be there. I saw it!"

"Too bad," Angel nearly growled. He took an unneeded breath and settled back in his chair. "I don't even know where she is now. She could live across the world for all I know."

"Then call Giles! Or Willow! I have her number, she would know—"

"No."

"Angel—"

"No."

Cordelia shut her mouth tightly and glared at him. Their eyes locked in a battle of wills, hers flashing and furious and worried, his unyielding. Finally she slumped into a seat opposite him.

"This is the last thing you know," she said softly. "I think it is anyway. Wesley thinks so too, I called him. If you kill this thing, you could be human."

Angel froze, staring at her bent head, feeling an intense longing he thought he'd forgotten. But he shook his head and pushed it away.

"I don't need to be human. It doesn't matter. I won't pull her back into this. If needs be, I'll call on the other slayer."

"The Council would never let her come. She's their tool," Cordelia said bitterly. Angel shrugged, thinking of the young woman he'd never seen. The latest in a line of Slayers that had come after Faith died in prison all those years ago. They only lasted a few years now. The latest had been alive the longest; she'd been called three years before.

"Then I'll do it alone. You didn't have to fly across the county to tell me that you know," he said softly. She looked up and met his eyes and smiled fondly.

"Of course I did Angel," she replied, then her smile brightened. "Besides, what do you mean to tell you? I'm here to shop. Also, to do some ass when that demon tries to show up…" Angel smiled, despite himself, and leaned back, watching his last connection to humanity try to hide her fear.

*

Huge, encompassing, too big, too high, can't reach it, can't stop it.

She had learned to hide it well. She didn't even flinch when it came again.

Memory, torn away, beautiful child screaming, pain, nononononono.

It was hot out, but the trees were pretty, and the fountain—except the fountain was dry now. Everything was dry. And hot. Dry and hot. And the pain kept coming.

Heat, burning through skin, through soul, through mind, piercing fire swallowing everything.

She had to stop it. Had to fight it. Had to kill it.

Claws and teeth, huge, terrible, sharp, cruel, piercing, twisting, knives of pain, pulling apart, pulling away.

There.

Had to kill it.

Pulling, fighting, hands and arms, smashing, screaming, never enough, never enough, can't stop it, can't fight it, PAIN.

One name, a scream.

And then emptiness again.

*

Vivien knew something was wrong the second her cell phone rang. No one had the number except Willow, Xander and her best friend from high school and college, Kayla. And Kayla never called her anymore.

She fumbled for the button and wished she'd never been able to find it.

"Viv?" Willow's voice asked, sounding like she'd been crying. Vivien always knew. She'd heard the sound so many times—seven years ago, when Kevin died, when Buffy—and then again, two years ago, when Tara's spell was shifted against herself and she too was gone…

"It's me Aunt Will. What's the matter?" Vivien asked. And Willow told her, all of it.

"I'm in Seattle," she finished. "I have a huge meeting. I can't leave. You'll have to go by yourself sweetie. Xander's flying in tomorrow."

"What time?" Vivien asked, her mind functioning on automatic, as it had learned to seven years before.

"Early afternoon, he'll call you later with the details. I have to go love, will you go right away?"

"There's kind of a crisis he—" Vivien began, then cut off. "Right away," she promised.

"I love you," Willow whispered.

"Love you too. Bye," Vivien said, hanging up the phone. She stared at it, and at the desk, and at anything that came within her sight, just trying not to feel, trying not to be anything at all, least of all a girl with a mother. Or without one.

Angel walked into the room, about to ask about something before he saw her face. Before he must have seen how desperately hard she was trying not to cry.

"What's the matter?" he asked quietly, sincerely, walking over to stand beside her.

Vivien shook her head and tried to tell him nothing was wrong, but words failed. He knelt in front of her chair and reached up to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. "What is it?" he asked again. And for the first time in many, many years, Vivien broke down and began to cry.

"My mother," she sobbed, held tightly in his cold, but comforting arms. "After my stepfather died, she broke down, she started s-seeing things, visions, preophecies, people that had died years before…she started attacking people, not seeing them at all, but someone else. She had to check herself in to a mental institute. She was g-getting better, she was, but she had another fit and attacked the orderlies watching her and she broke one's nose and another's rib and she screamed my name and she kept screaming like she was dying and they had to put her in solitary and I have to go…I have to go by myself and see her and she isn't her she isn't my mother at all, but she keeps crying for me."

She'd never told anyone that. Not any of her boyfriends. None of her best friends (Kayla already knew). She'd never said it aloud. My mother is insane.

"Shh," Angel soothed, stroking her hair with one hand. She relaxed against him, silent tears running down her face, amazed at the feeling of safety in his arms. It wasn't sexual at all. She just felt…safe. She hadn't felt that way for a very long time. And in some ways, that scared her more than anything else. "Do you want me to come with you?" he asked, after her tears had stopped and she'd calmed down a little. Vivien pulled away enough to look him in the face.

"You don't have to do that," she said. "You have things to do, a lot of things, that demon and—" He put a hand up to silence her.

"There's time for that." His eyes darkened. "I know how hard it is to see someone…changed. You shouldn't have to do that alone. If it would help, I'd be happy to go with you."

"Nothing really helps," Vivien whispered, her eyes filling with tears again. "But this might. It might."

Part Four

The hospital was a large, beautiful building, with airy hallways and huge widows overlooking the gorgeous, elaborate gardens (currently withering from lack of water). The only indication that there was anything wrong with it's inhabitants was the twenty foot forcefield surrounding all the ground, barely visible in the sunlight, just a pale, shimmering wall.

Angel pulled up to the front gate and Vivien spoke briefly with the guard, who let them in. They parked in front of the manor house and walked silently into it's large white doors.

"Nice place," Angel commented as they stepped inside the front hallway.

"Only the best," Vivien said, trying to keep her tone light though she knew a hint of bitterness crept in. Angel watched her with concern. They hadn't talked much since her confession. He didn't want to scare her away, to make her thrust up the shields she'd obviously fought so hard to build up and keep strong. She, he guessed, was trying very hard not to let anymore of them crumble down, so she was quiet. Maybe she was just thinking.

What would it be like, Angel wondered, to see someone you loved more than life turned into a dangerous lunatic? He remembered as if it were yesterday, watching Cordelia lie in a hospital bed, convulsing with other people's pain, but that had only been for a day or two. He had been able to stop that. Who knew if anything at all could stop the deterioration of Mrs. McKeely's mind…Unless they were real visions. It wasn't impossible, since the woman's husband had been killed by a Mohra—a Dark assassin, indicating that he had been a Warrior—that she had somehow been opened to the inner vision of a prophet and simply hadn't been able to handle the visions. That was one of the reaons Angel had volunteered to come. The other, as he said, was to lend Vivien support.

She didn't look as if she needed it, but he could tell it was a façade. She walked confidently beside him, her head held high, her dark eyes clear, no hint of tears on her paler-than-usual face. But he was a master at hiding emotions, he could tell that beneath the cool, composed young woman was a scared little girl. And he wanted to help her more than he had wanted to help anyone in a very long time.

The woman at the front desk knew Vivien. She smiled gently at her.

"She's in High Security," she told her. Vivien nodded, obviously unsurprised, and pressed her thumb to a pad on the desk. It beeped and the woman nodded, then looked to Angel.

"He's a friend," Vivien said, then looked to her boss. "Press your thumb on there. They'll authorize you to go in upstairs." Angel did as he was told, marveling at the change from a time when the only locks had been opened with keys. The receptionist thanked them and Vivien turned away, walking quickly down the spotless hall, to a large elevator.

"It's the highest floor," she told Angel as they waited. He nodded, watching her. She noticed and gave him a tremulous smile. He didn't return it, but his eyes were steady and supportive. The elevator opened.

"Most of the time she's on the third level," Vivien explained as they began to go up. "They have windows there and beds…and they're allowed to go outside sometimes. The top level, only the doctors and certain visitors can go into, and it's just a bunch of padded rooms, with force fields around them so there's no chance of escape." Her voice was quiet and detached, completely impersonal as if she was a real estate agent explaining the facilities to a potential buyer. Angel didn't say a word. She leaned back against the wall of the elevator as it approached the top level and closed her eyes for a moment. When she opened them, they glittered with unshed tears. "You don't know how many times I've come up here. I stopped counting."

Angel reached out and took her hand as the elevator doors opened.

*

Vivien was more glad than she could possibly have put into words to have Angel's hand, cold as it was, holding hers as they followed Dr. Andrews, her mother's personal doctor, down the cool white hall. Her mother's room was at the end of a long row and Vivien tried very hard not to look around her as they walked. Though all the doors were solid and closed, and she couldn't see any of the other patients, she knew they were there. Other people, with families and stories and children. She could hear some of them, shouting, or banging around or singing…She felt Angel's hand tighten around hers and was very glad he'd come.

"She's quiet now," Dr. Andrews explained as they approached her mother's room. Sarah Andrews was a kind woman, Vivien had learned in the past seven years, and a very good doctor. But she couldn't help her mother. "I'm going to keep the shield up though, in case something happens." Vivien nodded, knowing from experience what that meant; her mother would he able to see and hear her, and vice versa, but they couldn't touch. After a fit as violent as this latest one, she'd be lucky if her mother could even speak to her…

"Just…stay with me?" Vivien asked Angel quietly as Dr. Andrews tapped out a code on the panel outside the door, and gave it a voice ID.

"I promise," he replied quietly and she gave him another tiny smile, the best she could do. After so long, after so many times, one would think she would be prepared for this, one would think it wouldn't matter, she'd have hardened her heart against the sight…but she hadn't. She couldn't. Her mother was beautiful, bright, laughing woman, not…

And then the force field shimmered and the white turned to clear and Vivien could see her. She was slumped against the side of her rectangular, padded, white room, curled up on herself, looking so tiny, the only thing visible besides her white pants and shirt (unremovable, so she couldn't strangle herself) a fall of blond hair.

"Mommy?" Vivien whispered. The figure inside the room stirred. Vivien swallowed and Angel's hand tightened again, though it was different somehow. As if he couldn't help himself, as if he too was seeing something frightening inside that room… "It's Vivien. How are you feeling?"

Slowly the blond head lifted and hair slipped backwards, revealing the curve of a jaw, and then a nose, and then blue-green eyes, hurt and frightened and seeing so much more than the white room around her.

"Viv?" her mother whispered, a small, heartbreakingly sweet smile gracing her lips. Angel's hand tightened again, painfully this time, but Vivien couldn't look at him, couldn't look away from the shadow of her mother. Her mother, whose eyes were moving, were turning, were fixed suddenly, on someone else.

"Mommy?" Vivien asked, but her mother didn't look back to her. Didn't move.

Buffy Summers McKeely looked at the man standing beside Vivien, staring at her with dark, haunted eyes, and whispered, "Angel?"

*

He knew the second he saw her hunched form. How many times had he watched from her window as she curled into a ball, rocking away her misery? How many times had he longed to stroke that shower of blond hair, to soothe away all the pain? But he couldn't touch her here. He tired to deny it, told himself he was imagining things. It couldn't be her. It was impossible. Vivien was too old, and Buffy—Buffy would never be in a place like this, shut away from life. It couldn't be her.

But it was. It was her. And his heart broke into a thousand pieces when she looked at him with haunted eyes and whispered his name.

He was vaguely aware of Vivien stiffening in surprise and he turned his head slightly when she jerked her hand away, though his eyes never lost Buffy's. He couldn't look away.

"Angel?" she whispered again, a little louder now. "Is it really you? This isn't another…another dream?"

"It's really me," he whispered, hard pressed to make words come. "It's…" He broke off, swallowing convulsively, staring through the force field to the tiny, slender figure of the woman he had loved with his heart, his soul…the woman he still loved, he admitted. Though maybe now he only loved the memory, not the woman at all.

She looked the same. There were a few small lines on her face, but for the most part it was still smooth. Her hair had no hint of grey in it, her body was still as slender and supple as it had always been. But her eyes…god, her eyes. There were no words for the terror, the pure living hell that those eyes had seen, no words for the pain reflected in them at each moment.

"Is he really there?" Buffy asked again, appealing this time to her daughter, who was standing watching them in shock, her face even whiter, her eyes huge and dark.

"Y-yes, of course," she said. "What's going on? Mommy, how do you know him?" She looked at Angel, her eyes accusing. "What's going on?" He couldn't answer, just shake his head, his eyes still devouring Buffy.

"Angel," she whispered again, then looked to Vivien and then back, her eyes widening in horror. Her body began to uncurl from it's fetal position. "No. No! You're not supposed to be here! You're not supposed to know. How do you know?"

"Know what?" Vivien asked, her voice rising, beginning to get slightly frantic. "Mom, this is Angel. He's my boss. I don't understand!"

"Your—?" Buffy cut off and settled back down slightly, her eyes going back to Angel. "You're really here? Why did you come here?"

"I didn't know Buffy," Angel explained softly. "I didn't know it was you." Buffy's eyes darted from him to Vivien and back.

"Then you're not here to help me?" she demanded, losing all softness in her voice and demeanor.

"Help you?" Vivien asked, glancing at Dr. Andrews. "Mom, I can't help you. We can't, remember?"

"He can," Buffy hissed, pointing at Angel. She pulled herself slowly to her feet, every inch of her body tense. "He can stop it. He can."

"Calm down Buffy," Dr. Andrews said, stepping in front of the shocked, tense Vivien. Angel stood completely still, unable to look away, unable to comprehend that this was Buffy, his Buffy, shut away from all light, shut away in a small white room.

"No!" Buffy shouted, becoming more agitated. "He can stop it! He has to!" She turned pleading, angry eyes on Angel. "Don't you see, you have to stop it! You have to save her!"

"Calm down," Dr. Andrews repeated.

"NO!" Buffy screamed, running at the doorway. Vivien gripped Angel's arm before she could stop herself, not sure whether she was afraid that her mother would get out, or that she would once more be smashed against an invisible wall. The latter came true of course, and Buffy was propelled backwards across the room. Vivien shut her eyes very tightly, but her mother didn't stop screaming.

"You have to *save* her!" she yelled, as Dr. Andrews typed in a code to put the door back on, and then hustled Vivien and Angel quickly back down to the end of the hall.

"Who are you?" she demanded pointe blank, turning to Angel. "Do you know her?"

"I-I used to," he said softly, still reeling. It hurt, like a knife in his gut, knowing that she was in there, that she couldn't even look at him without being swallowed by things that weren't there. Not Buffy. God, anyone but Buffy.

"What?" Vivien demanded. "How?" He gave her a slightly apologetic look, noting the betrayed, frightened darkness in her eyes.

"I knew her…a long time ago. I helped her when she was…still getting used to her job." Vivien's eyes widened as she realized what he meant, that he knew her mother was the Slayer. Well, a Slayer. There was another one.

"What kind of a relationship did you have?" Dr.Andrews asked. Angel met her light brown eyes, and then looked at Vivien, who was watching him with all the hurt fright of a little girl. He looked back to the doctor.

"A very, very hard one."

*

"I reminded you of her, didn't I?" Vivien asked as they drove back into LA in his convertible. Her hair whipped around her dark eyes, giving her a rather wild look. There was no wonder in that, Angel was surprised she was coherent.

"Yes. When I first saw you. You don't look much like her though."

Vivien swallowed. She'd always thought so herself. She wished that she looked a little more like her. Maybe then he would have asked. Maybe then she would have known. She wouldn't have made her mother relive twenty five year old memories. Not that she knew what went through her mother's mind. She would never know that.

"And I reminded Cordelia of her too. Cordelia knew her, didn't she?"

"Yes, they were in the same graduating class, same high school. That's how I met Cordelia."

"But you met my mother first."

"Yes."

Vivien looked over at him, not knowing what to think. Angel hadn't been very forthcoming about how he knew Buffy, mostly because if Dr. Andrews heard him talking about meeting her twenty five years before, and her being a Slayer, she probably would have slapped him in High Security too. He'd been very evasive.

"How did you help her?" she asked. Angel shrugged.

"I…patrolled with her sometimes. And I helped her fight the Mayor and the Master…well, I never helped her fight. She wouldn't let me. I held off the minions for her."

"The Master?" Vivien asked. He gave her a startled look.

"She never told you?"

"She never told me anything about her Slaying. She didn't want me to be involved in that world at all. She wanted me to be safe and ignorant," Vivien explained, a tiny bit of bitterness creeping into her voice again.

"Then why are you working for me?" Angel asked. Vivien gave him an even look.

"If you really knew my mother, you wouldn't have to ask."

He didn't. If there was one thing Vivien had inherited from her mother, it was the need to help. The need to fight. The need to do something to make the world a better place.

"Why didn't you ask if I was her daughter?" Vivien inquired after a few moments of silence. "I reminded you of her…why didn't you ask?"

"I talked to her the year you were born. She didn't say anything, so…I assumed you were too old to be hers," Angel replied, though there was something he wasn't saying, she could tell.

"I wonder why she didn't say anything," Vivien mused, staring out along the dark highway, thinking about the look in her mother's eyes when she'd seen Angel. And the look in his. And then she knew.

"You were lovers," she said. It wasn't a question. Angel didn't bother to deny it.

"Yes," he said softly.

Vivien's mouth tightened, and she counted the years. "She was the one that gave you true happiness," she breathed, wondering what had been between them all that time ago.

"Yes."

"You loved her. You still love her."

Angel didn't say anything at all. Vivien felt the sudden need to cry again, but not for herself this time. For Angel, who had just seen the only woman he'd ever loved reduced to an inmate in the prison of her own mind.

"I know how much it hurts," she whispered, "To see her like that."

Angel's free hand reached out and caught one of her own as they drove silently back into the City of Angels.

Part Five

When Vivien walked into work the next day, she found herself immediately enveloped in a warm hug.

"Oh my god," Cordelia murmured, hugging her tightly. "I knew you reminded me of her." Vivien blinked as Cordelia released her, surprised and still a little shellshocked from the day before. Cordelia looked less-groomed than before, though only by a little. Her eyes were slightly red, and she had less make-up on than before, plus her clothes looked like she'd been wearing them for a day, rather than like they'd just come out of a store window. She smiled brilliantly suddenly and looked twenty.

"Hi," Vivien said, bemused.

"Hi," Cordelia replied. "Angel told me. I hope you don't mind. I knew your mom in high school. Okay, so I kinda thought she was a loser but, we hung out anyway. Are you okay?" Vivien nearly laughed at the sudden change of subject, but was too tired and heartsick for that.

"I'm fine," Vivien lied. Cordelia arched her eyebrows at her. "Okay, not really fine…but I'm dealing."

"You are like Buffy," Cordelia muttered, stepping back so Vivien could pass her and put down her purse.

"Not that much," Vivien said softly, with a tiny, sad smile.

"Oh! I didn't mean like that," Cordelia said quickly. Vivien spun back around.

"I know you didn't," she replied, just as quickly. "That wasn't what I meant…" She trailed off and there was a slightly awkward silence. "Is Angel here?"

"He's downstairs," Cordelia said, waving a hand towards Angel's office, where Vivien knew a staircase led down to his apartment. She'd never been down there. She started to walk by, but Cordelia grabbed her arm and she turned back. "If there's anything I can do…or anything I can tell you about…I'd be happy to. I know Angel is hard to get a lot out of, but he means well and…and I could tell you anything you wanted to know…"

"I'm all right," Vivien said, forcing another smile. All of a sudden she felt like she did with Willow, except Willow never actually offered out loud to tell her things. Here was yet another not-exactly-aunt that knew so much more about her own mother than she ever would, someone who cared about her, more for her mother's sake than her own, someone who wanted her to be all right. She couldn't just be all right for them, even if she wanted to.

"No you're not," Cordelia said frankly, releasing her arm. Vivien blinked. This woman just kept startling her. Cordelia shooed her off. "Go on. I know you want to see Angel. He's awake."

"Thanks," Vivien whispered. Cordelia shooed her some more and Vivien went obediently. She walked quickly down the stairs, wondering if she should call out and warn him she was coming down, or if he would hear her…

He was waiting at the bottom of the stairs. "Angel," she said.

"Good morning. Did you sleep?" he asked. She almost smiled. Not "Did you sleep well?" or even "Did you sleep all right?" just "Did you sleep?" He seemed to know her more than she did at times.

"A little," she told him truthfully. "You?"

"No."

She walked slowly down the last few steps until she was face to face with him. What to say? He had a demon to combat. Her mother was slowly going more and more insane. He had loved her mother once upon a time.

"I have to leave early," Vivien said after a moment. "But I could come in tonight if you want."

"Are you going to see her?" he asked, his voice odd. She chanced a look at him, and then looked away again from the pain in his dark eyes.

"No. Well, maybe. I have to pick someone up at the airport. My mom's friend, maybe you knew him…Xander Harris?"

"I knew him." She looked up again and was surprised to find Angel's mouth turned up a tiny bit. At her startled look, he explained. "Xander never liked me. He thought I was bad for Buffy. He was right of course. He used to call me 'Dead Boy.' Has he grown up at all?"

"A lot," Vivien said, thinking of her almost-uncle. She smiled involuntarily at the thought of him antagonizing Angel. She could almost picture it. He used to be like that all the time; funny, irreverent, always a story or joke. Then, after Kevin died, he got quieter. When Buffy went into the hospital, he started having these long silences. He went to visit her all the time before he moved away. He'd regained a lot of his old self of course, but it was different now…he always had this sadness in his warm brown eyes. Vivien supposed they all did.

"You don't have to come in tonight," Angel said. "In fact, I would understand if you didn't want to…to continue working here…" Vivien was so shocked her head snapped up and she stared at him, oddly pleased to realize the oddness in his voice was regret, and hope and worry…

"Do you want me to leave?" she asked.

"No."

"Good, because I want to keep working here. Angel…it's all I have. It's all I can do. My mom didn't just randomly go off the deep end one day. They did that to her. All the demons, all the Dark…they did that to her. And I want to fight it. It's all I've ever wanted to do. I want to fight it with you," Vivien admitted, trying and failing to keep her voice casual. She had looked down again, and when she glanced up, she saw him looking very serious and almost…proud.

"If your mother…" he began, and stopped, searching for words. She waited, watching him. He put a hand up to her cheek and said softly, "She would be very proud."

Vivien told herself that he, like the others, probably only cared for her for her mother's sake, but it didn't help, and she kept on feeling warm inside all the same.

*

The airport was crowded with early Thanksgiving travelers, but Vivien managed to get to the gate in time to meet Xander coming off the plane. She gave a little wave and soon found herself, for the second time that day, enveloped in a large hug (though this one was a lot more bear-ish, and a lot less worried about wrinkling clothes).

"How are you?" Xander whispered in her ear, still hugging her. Vivien shook her head slightly, indicating she didn't want to talk about it, and he pulled away, picking up his duffel bag, which he slung over his shoulder. He never packed much for these emergency trips, He kept some clothes at Willow's house because he visited so often, so he just brought the bare necessities. He eyed her, and tilted her chin up so she was forced to meet his concerned brown eyes. "Hi Viv."

"Hi Uncle Xander," she replied, looking straight back up at him. "Thanks for coming."

"Of course." He said it like it was nothing, but Vivien knew it actually meant a lot. He had a life of his own, after all, a wife and children, and a job…Yet he would drop them all at a second to come support her…to come support Buffy. Who was her mother to all of these people? Vivien wondered. She knew why she loved her, but Buffy was her mother, she couldn't help it. Why did all of they? Why did she mean so much to so many people?

Vivien wondered if she would ever mean that much to anyone.

"Come on, let's get out of here," Vivien said as her eye fell on a young woman running into her parent's happy arms. Xander nodded agreement and understanding and they began walking out silently. After a moment, Vivien said, "I have to tell you something. It's about…Angel." Xander stopped abruptly and someone ran into him from behind. Vivien grabbed his arm and dragged him after her.

"What did you say?" he demanded, his eyes wide.

"Angel. I…well…he's my boss," Vivien said with a sigh.

"He's what?" Xander demanded, his voice rising slightly.

"My boss. He didn't know! And neither did I. He thought I was too old to be my mom's daughter, because he spoke to her the year I was born and she didn't say anything…so he never asked and I had no idea who he was, thanks to Mom's little edict about her past."

"How did you find out? And why are you working for him?" Xander asked, still obviously astonished.

"He offered to go with me yesterday to visit Mom. I-I didn't want to go alone. She recognized him."

"What happened?" Xander inquired in a cold, hard voice. Vivien looked up at him with sad, dark eyes, remembering.

"She wigged out. Not like that's anything unusual. I've been waiting to go back and see her until you came."

"Do you know why she wigged out?" Xander asked. Vivien had a feeling it was a rhetorical question, like he thought he already knew the answer. She gave an awkward shrug.

"She always does," she said quietly.

"He made her life a living hell!" Xander exclaimed. Abruptly he lowered his voice until it was so quiet only she could hear it. "He drank her blood. Of course she freaked out."

Vivien's mouth opened and closed in horror and she stepped back. "That's the scar?" she asked in a whisper. Xander nodded, old hurt clear in his eyes. He shook his head suddenly.

"She let him. I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that. It was a long time ago." Vivien shook her head, unsure what she was denying—that it had happened, or that it didn't matter anymore. Angel had drank her mother's blood. She gave a tiny, involuntary shudder.

"Why are you working for him anyway?" Xander demanded, moving on. "You know you're supposed to stay out of th—"

Vivien pulled her attention back to the present and her temper flared. "Do you stay out of it? Does Aunt Will? Did Kevin? No! What do you think it's like knowing there are terrible things out there, hurting and killing people and being forbidden to help stop them?! Now I'm helping. It's not Angel's fault, he didn't know. I overheard you and Aunt Willow talking about Cordelia, and I dug up his old business card, and I went, all right? And you can't make me stop. You have no right to make me stop!"

It was Xander's turn to look taken aback. Vivien knew he was shocked at her sudden change. She was always very good in their presence. Accepting whatever came along. Working hard to get what they wanted for her—a scholarship to Berkeley, a job, money to support herself and her mother…But that was because she never let herself want anything, so it never went against what they thought she wanted. But now she did. She wanted to fight. And they weren't going to stop her.

"I wouldn't try," Xander said softly after a moment, surprising her. They began walking again, through the crowded airport, though it felt like they were in their own little bubble, a separate world from the rest of the people. There were people right beside her that didn't know who her mother was. There were people all around her who didn't know that demons threatened every breath they took. There were people going home to their own problems, their own families, that would never know or care that she fought for them.

"Thank you," Vivien replied.

"I know what it's like," Xander said in an odd voice. "That need to do something. You mother tried to keep me safe, away from fighting, but I wouldn't. I followed her into a very dangerous place. And I killed one of my best friends—well, he had been. I killed what was left of his body. Buffy never tried to stop me after that."

"Thank you," Vivien repeated, and kept walking in silence.

*

It didn't fit. It just…didn't fit.

Angel paced back and froth through his apartment, thinking, unable to stop thinking, unable to stop seeing Buffy's eyes as she looked up at him, half-sane and hurting. And as they looked at Vivien.

There was something wrong.

He had not doubt she had loved her husband very much. He knew Buffy well enough to know that she would never have married someone she didn't want to spend her life with. But his death would not have driven her crazy. It couldn't have. She had gone through so much. One death would not break her, not while she felt she had something to keep living for. And she did. She had Vivien. He couldn't believe that Buffy would ever succumb to madness while someone needed her that much.

Of course, maybe she really wasn't as strong as he thought. Maybe she didn't have a choice. Maybe it was just the last straw, and she couldn't handle anymore.

But why would she tell Angel to "save her?"

There was something more.

Angel reached to grab his jacket and paused. What if this was all in his head. Willow would have thought about this by now, Giles would have tried everything…He was just overreacting. He just couldn't think rationally about this, not when it involved Buffy. As she'd once said, love makes you do…the wacky? But he didn't even know her anymore, how could he say what she was really like? She had been in a mental hospital for the last seven years.

He couldn't conceive of anything. Nothing but her eyes…

He grabbed his jacket, and walked out of his apartment.

To her.

*

Warmth, human and soothing, steady pulse, beating, beating, breathing, up and down, and warm and human, so perfectly human.

Angel. Angel had been there.

Clinging, whispering, sobbing, never let go, never forget, always hold on, forever, hold on and never let go of the memory, the sweet memory.

He had come.

Claws, ripping, tearing apart, prophecies shouted, screaming, pain, gone gone gone.

She didn't scream, even though the pain ripped through her.

Angel.

He couldn't go away again.

Part Six

He couldn't see Buffy through the door, but he knew she was there. There was, after all, no way to escape. Dr. Andrews watched him with quiet worry.

"She's sitting on the opposite wall, by the corner. You can't see her there."

"Please, can I speak to her alone?" he asked, looking away from the white room for a moment. She studied his face and then nodded finally.

"I'll be down the hall in my office. We have monitors on her, so I'll know if she's agitated or having a fit. If something happens, please come away and come get me?" the woman instructed. Angel nodded, indicating he would, and she gave him one last long look before walking back down the large, spotless hall. Angel turned back to the room.

"Buffy, it's me," he said softly, knowing she could hear him. Knowing she was listening. "I need you to stay calm. I have to talk to you about your visions, but if you become upset or yell I won't be able to, I'll have to go away. And I think it's very important I talk to you. Will you try and stay…"

"Sane?" a familiar voice asked lightly. Angel started and Buffy walked into view, standing erect, looking for all the world like a very tired, very hurt woman with her sanity completely intact.

"Wasn't the word I was going to use," Angel replied. Buffy tilted her head at him, watching him with a kind of quiet, bitter curiousity.

"Why not?" she asked.

"Because I don't think you were ever not," Angel told her seriously. She didn't move, her head still cocked sideways, her eyes deep and unfathomable.

"But you're wrong. I was. Maybe I still am." A tiny smile played on her lips and she turned away from him, pacing down the length of her cell and then back. "One would almost expect it you know. I'm surprised it didn't happen earlier. For instance, when I died. Or when my boyfriend turned evil and tortured me for months after I gave up my virginity to him. Or maybe when I was expelled from school, kicked out of my house, hunted by the police and forced to send the man I loved to hell. Or when I gave my life's blood to the very same man, who then left me. Or maybe when-when—" She stopped and spun around, shadows falling into her eyes in a room where there were no shadows. Angel ached at the sight. She looked so small, so alone, so completely hopeless. She swallowed convulsively and he wondered what she was going to say next. He knew where his mind went…but she would never know that. Never.

"What do you see?" Angel asked, before she could say anything else. Before she could hurt either of them more.

She backed up several steps, shivering, one hand passing over her stomach and then hovering there, clenching and unclenching.

"A demon," she whispered harshly, her eyes beyond him now, not even seeing him at all, but something not of this clean, white hospital. Something only her eyes could see. "Huge, and hot. It's always so hot. And it's breath feels like fire. It's so big, and-and I can't fight it. I can't stop it. And it's claws are so painful…and it kills her, every time. It rips her apart. And no one can stop it." Her eyes turned to Angel, but he had the feeling she didn't really see him at all, or at least, not as he was. "Will you stop it?" she appealed so quietly he had to strain to hear, even with his superior hearing. Silent tears ran down her cheeks and she looked like nothing so much as a little girl, a frightened little girl that wanted her mother, wanted to be held and comforted. He had seen that look in Vivien's eyes, he thought suddenly, but here was her mother, looking even more frightened, and unable to control it.

All of a sudden, it was gone, or she was, she she slumped to the floor, bracing herself up on her hands, her bright hair falling forward to hide her face as she shook silently.

He wanted to hold her so much. He wanted to run to her and tell her it would be all right, he would make it all right. But he didn't know if he could. But to watch her there, so hurt, so helpless…

"I will," he promised, and she stilled slightly and looked up at him with despairing eyes that knew him again. "I swear I will stop it."

*

"Where have you been?" Cordelia demanded when Angel walked into the office.

"Visiting Buffy," he replied, walking past her. She spun and stalked after him.

"What?! Why didn't you tell me? And what exactly, was that supposed to accomplish? In case you didn't notice, we have a demon to fight, and we don't know what it is, and we don't know how to stop it! And the Slayer that's supposed to be helping you is locked up inside a looney bin!" Cordelia shouted, throwing up her arms.

"She's not crazy," Angel said, softly but firmly as he draped his jacket over the back of his chair. Cordelia blinked. He turned to look at her. "Did the demon have claws? In your vision?"

"I already told you that," Cordelia said. "Remember, big long description? It's around here somewhere…" She turned to search his desk for a pad of paper and then stopped as he eyed her. She sighed. "Yes, it had claws. In fact, that was a large feature of the vision. Big 'ol sharp claws. Why do you ask?"

"Because Buffy has not had a mental breakdown. She's just been having visions." As Cordelia gaped at him, Angel went on, "She had them of lots of things—first of her husband's death. Mostly, one reacurring vision that gets stronger and stronger, and physically hurts her when it comes. Of this demon. I'm pretty sure it's the same one."

"So you just waltzed in there and she told you all about it?" Cordelia asked. "I thought she was all Psycho Girl."

"She has moments of calm," Angel explained. He looked away from his friend. "I-I think she was holding back. I could tell that there was something else going on…like she was in pain, or seeing things I couldn't, but trying not to show it."

"Well, this is great!" Cordelia announced cheerfully. "Vivien'll be happy." Angel gave her a blank look and she lost her smile. "What?"

"We don't know if it can ever be stopped, or controlled," he pointed out. "It may kill her, or drive her actually insane. It's much more intense than your visions Cordelia, and I think nearly constant. It must be slowly eating away at her sanity until she doesn't know what's real and what isn't. Plus…she keeps talking about the demon killing someone. She can't say who, just a girl, but…"

"But you think it might be Vivien," Cordelia said softly, her voice completely serious. Angel didn't reply, but she could tell by the look in his eyes.

"I promised I would stop it."

"Of course you will," Cordelia said gently. "We'll keep her safe Angel. We'll keep everyone safe. Did she give you more description? Do you think you can figure out what it is?" Angel nodded and she sighed in relief.

"Then let's start looking," she suggested, knowing she had to get his mind off of Buffy and her daughter. He nodded again and she put a hand up to his cheek, turning him to look into her eyes. "Angel, we will stop it. You'll see. And then we'll find a way to help Buffy."

"What if there isn't a way?" Angel asked, his eyes haunted, and Cordelia wondered what Buffy was like now, what she'd said to him; what he'd done to himself after seeing her.

"There will be," she promised with confidence she didn't have. "We'll find one."

*

"I thought you'd be up here," Vivien murmured as she stepped out onto the roof. Angel didn't turn to look at her, afraid she'd look too much like Buffy.

She wasn't insane. Not yet anyway.

"How's Xander?"

"He's all right. He's at my apartment. He wanted to come…to protect me or something…but I told him to mind his own business."

"What's up?" Angel asked. Vivien shrugged as she joined him at the edge of the roof.

"Find anything about the demon?"

"Yes actually. It's a leriki demon. Should be about thirty or forty feet tall, with claws the sides of swords and a very vicious temper."

"Oh. That's nice," Vivien said faintly, trying to picture it and then deciding it wasn't worth the effort. "How'd you find it?"

Angel hesitated. "I visited your mother."

Vivien stifferened beside him, not looking over, staring straight out into the darkness. "How was she?"

"She didn't rave at all."

"Oh. That's good then. I don't understand the connection…"

"Vivien, what your mother sees…they're visions, like Cordelia has, only more intense and longer. I think she sees herself actually there and can feel it and everything. That's why she attacks people, because she thinks they're the demon. She saw this demon, the same one Cordelia saw. Her vision helped me identify it."

Vivien held very still, feeling like if she moved, or breathed, she would wake up and find this was all a dream.

"Then she isn't insane?"

"I don't think so," Angel said quietly and Vivien closed her eyes, holding back something dangerous and amazing that threatened to pour over inside her. She took a deep breath and opened them again, to find Angel watching her with a very guarded sort of joy.

"Thank you," she whispered.

"All I did was see it," he replied. "It doesn't make it better you know. I don't know how to stop them and the visions are…probably driving her truly insane."

"I understand," Vivien said, her voice unsteady despite her best efforts. Angel reached over and tucked a piece of her hair back and unable to help herself, she leaned into him. His arm closed around her shoulders, strong and comforting and he held her as she shook, amazed at her own reaction.

"I just can't seem to control myself these days," she whispered into his chest when she could speak again.

"I know the feeling," he agreed. She smiled tremulously up at him as she pulled away, went back to lean against the railing and stare out at the wide city. She didn't think about anything. She didn't know what to think. Her mother wasn't insane. She wasn't insane.

She wasn't insane.

But would she be, soon?

Vivien closed her mind to the possibility. For one night, she wasn't going to think of all the bad things. For one night, she wasn't going to think about the way her mother looked even when she wasn't having a vision, she wasn't going to think about the forty foot tall demon with it's huge claws, or how much she trusted Angel even though she'd only known him for two months. She wasn't going to think about that.

For one night, she was just going to think about her mother's smile, and her eye's, once upon a time, how they had always sparkled. For one night, she was going to know that her mother had not broken, had just been bent. For one night, she was going to feel again, and she was going to feel good.

One night, that's all she wanted.

She knew beyond all doubt, that all the good feelings would go away the next day. They always did.

*

"Don't say it," Angel warned. A slow smile spread across Xander's face and he opened his mouth. Angel held up a hand. Vivien's eyes held daggers as she regarded her "uncle." Xander closed his mouth.

"Hello Angel," he said finally. Vivien smiled brilliantly at him.

"Hello Xander," Angel replied cordially. They stood eyeing each other for another long moment. Cordelia walked into the room and looked from Xander to Angel and then back to Xander. Then she threw up her hands.

"My god, look at you two! You're like a pair of five year olds! Come on, we have work to do!"

"Work?" Xander asked plaintively. Cordelia scowled at him and he held out his arms. She went into them and hugged him quickly. "Long time no see Queenie," he whispered.

"Yeah, well, I can't say I regret it Loser Boy," Cordelia shot back affectionately as she pulled away. Xander looked to Angel.

"And you say someone actually married her?" he demanded. Angel's mouth twitched up and Vivien supressed a giggle. "Lemme guess. He's a seventy year old banker that just likes to squeeze her ass?"

"Not exactly," Angel said as Cordelia glared.

"Sixty?" Xander tried.

"He's forty five," Vivien put in helpfully, Cordelia having told her that much. She'd also shown her a picture of the tall, black, rather handsome man. Xander sighed. "And a vampire hunter." Xander scowled. Cordelia looked smug.

"He also plays the stock market on the side," Cordelia added with a tiny smile. "I taught him, but he's shown quite the flair. Keeps me in Gucci, something you could never do."

"You kept yourself in Gucci back then," Xander snapped back. Vivien gaped. They had dated? You couldn't find more opposite people. Well, they were both good hearted, but besides that…Weird.

Angel sighed. They all turned to look at him. "We have a lot to do."

"I'll call Giles," Vivien volunteered. "He'll be happy to help." Angel nodded and looked to Cordelia and Xander, who were looking like teenagers again despite their status as middle-aged middle-class married parents.

"Donut?" Cordelia asked, snatching a box up from nearby and offering them to Angel and Xander. Xander snatched one immediately. Angel turned and went back into his office.

*

The day brought about nothing really helpful, except Willow's offer to try and hack into Wolfram and Hart's computer and see if she could get any information for them. Vivien called the hospital and found out her mother had been acting very calm lately, but had alternated between extreme activity—pacing up and down the walls of her room, over and over—and nothing, just lying on the floor, silent. Dr. Andrews didn't know whether to be happy she'd stopped screaming, or worried.

That night, as Vivien walked back up to the roof to find Angel and tell him that Wesley had called and there was no more news, she wondered too. She wondered if he had been right, if her mother was really sane at all, or if it had all just been wishful thinking. God knows, she'd wanted to believe it.

She reported her news quickly, and found herself unable to just go back downstairs. Xander was waiting for her to take her to dinner and then home for some much-needed rest. She hadn't been sleeping well, tossing and turning and waking up with the echoes of screaming in her mind.

It was almost Thanksgiving, she thought idly, staring out over the city. She didn't feel like giving thanks for much. Neither would most people—the drought was hitting everyone hard. Every plant in southern California had withered. Baths and showers weren't allowed, people just had to clean off in dry chemical sprays, and drinking water had been rationed.

Thanksgiving.

She wondered what her mother had been giving thanks for, all those years ago.

"Almost twenty three years ago my mother was out there somewhere," she mused, waving a hand around to indicate the city. "Getting massively drunk. Getting picked up by some random guy with dark hair and straight nose." Angel went very straight and very still beside her.

"What do you mean twenty three years ago?" he asked softly.

"Well she was here for Thanksgiving when I was conceived," Vivien explained. "I'm sorry, if it bothers you to hear ab—"

"No," Angel said hollowly, "It's all right."

She could tell it wasn't, though she had no idea why.

I think she was upset about something, she never wanted to talk about it," Vivien whispered, unable to stop herself. "Something about an ex-boyfriend." She stopped and looked over at him, her eyes wide. "Was it you? Did she see you that day?"

"Yes," Angel breathed into the hot air. Vivien shivered at the ice of the word and when he didn't say anything else for a very long time, she said good night and went inside. Angel didn't move. He didn't look after her. He just stared out at the night and remembered another one where he had stood here, hearing her voice whispering over and over again that she would never forget, as out in the city below she had made love to another man.

Part Seven

As it turned out, Angel didn't have time to dwell on the icy horror blooming within him. Moments later Cordelia ran up and informed him the police were calling. There were…things…downtown, and they couldn't stop them. They just kept coming, seemingly out of nowhere, and killing everyone in sight. Angel forgot his problems and ran to do what he could.

As dawn broke, Cordelia and Xander supported him back into his office. The fight had been long, and bloody. Angel had taken quite a few cuts and bruises and he was relatively sure one of his ribs was broken. It would heal overnight but…it was painful.

"They're trying to weaken us," Cordelia said, pacing back and front in Angel's living room.

"It's working," Xander put in, looking up from the bandage he was trying to secure over a long, shallow cut down his arm.

"Let me," Cordelia snapped, swooping down and snatching the tape, fixing up the bandage. Vivien watched them all from the edge of the room, wondering what she was supposed to be doing. They were all old pros at this sort of thing. She hadn't been allowed to help fight, which, though it chafed her, she knew was the right decision. She'd never fought a real demon, much less several of them, and it would have distracted the others if they'd had to watch out for her.

"The demon's power is growing," Angel said quietly. "And we still don't know how to fight it."

"How did you kill the last one? The…mayor?" Vivien asked, piping up.

"We blew it up," Xander replied. "Buffy lured it into a building we'd rigged with explosives and…kaplooey."

"But we don't know where it's gonna show up," Cordelia said, releasing Xander's arm and eyeing her work. She nodded and began pacing again.

"Or if we could lure it inside," Xander added. "Much less blow up a random building."

"We need to know what it wants," Angel said.

"To eat people?" Xander suggested. "Just a random guess there…"

"If we know what it want," Angel continued, "We'll know where it will be. And I think there's more to it than there was with the Mayor. Why the drought? Why these early attacks? It's after something."

"How are we supposed to figure that out?" Vivien asked.

"Well who would know?" Angel asked, very quietly. Vivien gave him an odd look. He obviously already had a person in mi—She knew, suddenly, what he was thinking. Cordelia and Xander reached the same conclusion at the same time.

"Buffy," Xander said, voicing what they were all thinking. Angel nodded.

"Once visiting hours start, we'll have to go talk to her. Or I will. Can someone drive me?"

"I will," Vivien heard herself volunteering. Angel nodded, his dark eyes looking up to catch hers. Xander stood up and walked over, putting a hand on Vivien's shoulder and she turned to give him a small smile. Angel felt a pang, somewhere deep inside her, watching Vivien. She wasn't Xander's daughter…but she wasn't his either. And she never would be.

But she could have been…She could have been…

*

Vivien tried to sleep, but it was nearly impossible. There was something, lurking just on the edge of her consciousness…and idea, or an answer or something…or maybe just a feeling. A feeling, that she'd determined never to have. Once, right after her mother had gone into the hospital, she had locked herself into her new house in Willow and Tara's house and cried for two days and refused to eat. At the end of the two days she'd determined that she wasn't going to feel anymore. She just wasn't. She thought if she didn't feel anything, she could never be hurt.

But the she went and saw her mother. And feeling nothing became impossible. So she decided just to feel little. To hide what she really felt. Never to let anyone see it, because then they could use it to hurt her. Like one of her boyfriends in high school, when she had admitted where her mother way…She shuddered at the thought, turning restlessly in her bed. She'd been successfully hiding her true feelings for years. Why was it so hard now? Why did she want to run to Angel, her mother's ex-boyfriend for god's sake, a vampire, and cry in his arms? She hadn't even been like that with Kevin. Though she'd never really had much to cry about when he'd been alive…

There was more to it than that though. She felt like she knew something, and it was just waiting for her to grasp it. But she couldn't.

After two hours of tossing and turning, dozing off for a few moments only to wake with a start, her throat tight and her eyes wide and horrified, she got up. She pulled on her mother's favorite embroidered silk robe and tied it loosely, walking out into her small living room. Xander slept the sleep of the righteous on the couch and didn't even stir when she tiptoed past and out the door, heading quickly down the stairs to pick up the paper and yesterday's mail. She let the door close as she slipped out onto the front steps, hoping that her voice wasn't too hoarse from just waking up to give an ID. As she pressed her thumb to her mailbox and waited for it to open, a young man came to stand beside her. She glanced over at him through the falling down strands of her loose bun. He was handsome, and breathing (she found herself checking everyone now) and he kept giving her sideways glances. She found herself wishing she didn't look like such a mess, but then she thought if they didn't find some way to stop this demon, the guy and the whole neighborhood could be decimated soon, and she stopped worrying about her appearance.

Wow, that was a downer. Well, she should be used to them by now. She didn't know why she ever worried about her appearance anymore. Or anything, for that matter. Maybe, she reflected, as she spoke into the box by the door and it opened for her, she should just give up. She never seemed to be able to help anything, after all. Why did she even try?

Because she had to. Because if she could save even one person's life, it would be worth it.

For a moment, Vivien understood her mother very well.

She kept walking up the stairs, prepared to face one more day.

*

"Could I talk to her alone?" Angel asked as they walked down the now-familiar white halls. Vivien blinked, looking taken aback.

"I guess…" she said, looking confused. He caught her hand and they stopped, turning to face each other.

"Just for a minute. I have to talk about some things with her…things that you don't really need to here."

"You can…talk to her?" Vivien asked in a whisper. Angel's eyes were full of compassion as he caught the hurt in her own.

"I could the last time I came. She was…comprehensible anyway."

"Oh. I used to be able to more. Lately…she can't really talk to me at all. She always…I don't know, she just won't," Vivien said softly, her eyes leaving his, gazing away, catching a faraway look. He squeezed her hand.

"I'm sure she'll be able to. You'll see. I just have to see her a little first, by myself."

"Okay. I'll go wait at the end of the hall," Vivien offered, tilting her head in the appropriate direction.

"Thank you." She nodded again and released his hand, walking around without another word. Angel watched her go, her back straight and hurt, and then turned and walked the rest of the way down the hall with Dr. Andrews. She didn't ask him any questions, just "opened" the door for him, and walked back down the hall. Angel stood in front of the door, knowing Buffy was once again beyond his line of sight.

"It's Angel again," he called. "I have to ask you more questions."

"Why?" Buffy asked, walking into his line of sight. She was hugging herself and rubbing her arms, as if she was cold, and she looked even smaller and younger than before.

"The demon you see…it's really coming. Soon." Angel wished he could have been less blunt, seeing her face go from pale to completely white, seeing her step back in horror. "I'm sorry Buffy but…but I need to know everything you know if we have a chance of fighting it. I mean if I—"

"We," Buffy interrupted. Angel blinked at her.

"What do you mean?"

"We have to fight it. I have to help Angel. I have to." She sank down the ground, still rubbing at her arms. "I have to."

"You're in no condition—" Her head snapped up, her eyes blazing and he almost took a step backwards, but kept himself where he was.

"I am the Slayer," she hissed. "I have seen this thing in my mind for seven years. I have to fight it Angel."

"I won't let you die too," he said firmly.

"But will you let her?" Buffy asked in a harsh whisper. She crumpled slowly to the floor, laying, slightly curled, her hair bright against the white floor, her eyes dark in her pale face. "That's what you're doing if you won't let me fight. She'll die. She always dies." She closed her eyes and her body shook once as she lay there. Angel wanted to run to her, to gather her into his arms…and then he remembered what she had done while he agonized over the loss of her, and he made himself stand still.

"Vivien?" he asked.

The shudder of her body was enough to answer his question, though it hadn't really needed answering. His heart chilled. He wouldn't let that happen. For Buffy…for Vivien herself…He would not let her die.

She could have been his.

Thinking of her, of the young woman with the big dark eyes and rare, bright smile, that hid what she felt beneath fragile shields and wanted so very much to help people, he realized something…

It didn't matter. It didn't matter that she could have been his, that she wasn't. All that mattered was that she was her. A beautiful, amazing young woman with a life ahead of her that Angel would make sure she knew. She would not die. He would not let her.

That didn't make it any easier to think of Buffy with another man, not even someone she loved, just some man. Any man. Any man in the world could give her a child, except Angel.

"Why will it kill Vivien? What does she have to do with any of this?" Angel asked finally, trying very hard not to think about it.

"She's special Angel," Buffy whispered, opening her eyes, but not moving from the floor. "She has…something to do. I don't know what. She has a destiny, I suppose. I hate that word. I wanted so much to keep her safe."

"You couldn't keep her locked away from danger forever," Angel pointed out.

"I tried so hard when I didn't even know…and then I did and there was nothing I could do. There's nothing I can do," Buffy said, in a whisper, his body shudding again. One hand began clenching and unclenching. Her eyes weren't on Angel, they were somewhere else. What was she seeing now, he wondered? The same thing? The demon again, killing her daughter? What would that be like? To see that, over and over again? To feel that? He would be surprised if she wasn't crazy now, truly insane. No one could live through that and be unscathed.

"So it will come after Vivien?" Angel asked. "Do you know when?"

"Before the rain comes again," Buffy whispered, not really speaking to him. "He will come. He wants to kill you Angel, and Viv. He wants to end the bloodline forever. He's been sent…"

Bloodline? Angel frowned, wondering what she meant by that? Unless she meant lines, as in his and Buffy's. Which was entirely possible. She wasn't exactly paying attention to grammer at the moment.

Buffy moaned softly and then sat up straight suddenly, staring at him with unseeing eyes. "When the moon rises full and the land cracks with heat, he will come. One last task, which shall be the undoing." She slumped, all energy seeming to drain out of her at once.

"Thank you Buffy," Angel whispered. She shook her head and he wondered how drunk she'd been that night, if she'd spoken to the man the next morning, if he'd been handsome…Well, obviously. Vivien was very beautiful.

God, the thought hurt so much.

"Did it hurt that much?" he asked, before he could stop himself. "Just seeing me for a few minutes. Was it that bad, that you had to go drink yourself into oblivion to forget? Was it so supremely horrible that you had to sleep with the first man you came across to…forget?"

Buffy flinched, like she'd been hit, and raised oddly triumphant eyes to him. "You don't understand," she whispered, but there was no pleading in her voice, just wonder.

"Understand what? Why you needed a human body that night to keep you warm and safe? The hell of it is I understand all too well."

"No," Buffy shook her head and raised one hand in an impatient gesture. "Not that. You don't…understand. How can you not see it?"

"See what?" Angel asked.

"Her."

"I see her."

"No," Buffy whispered. "You never do. Have you ever looked into her face Angel? Just stared, wondering at how amazingly beautiful she is?"

"Yes," Angel whispered, admitting it to himself.

"And you still don't see," Buffy whispered to herself.

"See what?" Angel asked.

"Her father." Slowly, Buffy stood up, and walked towards him. All his anger, all his bitterness began to fade away, replaced with the knowledge of her pain, the knowledge of her sweetness.

"How could I see that? I never knew him." Buffy's lips twisted up in a tiny, bittersweet smile as she shook her head, now only a foot away, separated from him only by the force field holding her into the prison she had created herself, in her own mind.

"Maybe not," Buffy whispered, lifting a hand as if she could touch his face, and then letting it fall. "Maybe you never did. But you know what I see every time I look at her?"

"What?" Angel asked in a whisper, his dark eyes devouring her, unable to look away, entranced by her. Buffy's blue-green eyes filled with tears.

"Whenever I look into my daughter's eyes, all I see is that they're yours too." Angel stood frozen in shock, staring into the wide, bright eyes, so different from Vivien's. Buffy trembled, and whispered, "Angel, she has your eyes."

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