Pairing: Angel/Willow
Disclaimer: I don't own anything. Wish I did but I don't. BTVS belongs to Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy and Anita Blake belongs to Laurell K. Hamilton.
Distribution: Take it if you want it. Just email me first.
Summary: Willow dreams of Angel in Hell.
Feedback: Love it!
Spoilers: BTVS: season 3 and AB: NIC
Author Note: Story begins right after Willow performed the soul restoration spell. Anita Blake and Co. should show up in the next two chapters. Thanks for reading.
'Words with single quotation marks indicate thoughts.'
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~Prologue~
Large ominous dark clouds drifted lazily across the blood red sky casting shadows across the black granite surface of scorched earth. The ground was bare except for the lake of fire that seemed to go on forever and the countless of blacken charred bodies that writhed helplessly in its depths. The anguish cries of thousands of damned souls were deafening and Willow clamped her hands over her ears in a desperate attempt to block out the horrific sounds. A dark shadow emerged from the flames and stood motionlessly in front of her. His body was covered with blood, fresh wounds, burnt flesh and ugly jagged scars that marred his once smooth pale skin. Familiar dark brown eyes filled with pain peered into shiny emerald eyes wet with tears. Just as Willow was about to turn away from the horrible sight bloody fingers wrapped painfully about her shoulders and began to drag her into the lake of fire; and soon Willow's screams were lost among the sounds of thousands tortured souls.
Willow's eyes flew open as she shot up in her hospital bed. Wide terrified green eyes looked frantically around the small dark room. Willow's chest heaved as she struggled to take in deep shaky breaths. Her body trembled from the remnants of the nightmare as her heart pounded painfully against her chest.
Was it a dream?
But it felt so real. She could still feel the heat of the flames as it licked across her skin and scorched her flesh. The smell or brimstone, urine and decay still lingered in her nostrils causing her stomach to turn. But it couldn't be real. The spell worked. She was sure of it. So why did she dreamed that Angel was in hell? Tomorrow.tomorrow she would call Giles and ask him what was going on. "Tomorrow everything will be alright," whispered Willow shakily as she lay back on her pillow and stared blindly into the dark. "Tomorrow the dreams won't come."
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Angel was dead.
Now she knew the truth.
To be honest she had known the truth even before they had told her.
She had dreamt the truth night after night since the beginning.
There was no use in denying it anymore.
Angel was in hell and she had sent him there with his soul.
Not Angelus but Angel her friend.
Oh God! How could this have happened?
How could everything go so wrong?
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Willow had hoped that the nightmares would fade in time but they didn't. Each night she would dream of hell, wake up at dawn and replayed last night's horrors in vivid detail. Willow had tried everything she could think of from spells to prescription drugs, but nothing worked. Willow was desperate. There was no escape from the nightmares short from slitting her throat and she wasn't even sure that would have worked.
The nightmares were slowly killing her. She couldn't eat because everything tasted like ash. Sleep was something to be avoided and to indulge in only when she was completely exhausted. Willow looked and felt like a zombie. She was forever tried and weak. Her small frame was frightfully thin. dark circles surround listless green eyes and once vibrant red hair fell dull and limp about her sickly pale face.
Her friends naturally worried about her. But when they asked her if she was okay she would give them a weak smile and tell them that she was fine. They would then give her a worry look and shake their heads. Willow knew she was pushing them away but she just couldn't bring herself to care. There was nothing they could do anyway. This was her cross to bare, her punishment for sending her friend to hell.
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The dreams if you could call them that were more like out of body experiences where Willow would appear before Angel in physical form and they would face their tormentors together. The pain was real and Willow would scream for hours and hours much to the enjoyment of their tormentors. Time worked different there and in hell time was figurative. One night was like an eternity in hell and each night Willow would suffer for eternity in her nightmares.
But at least Angel and Willow had each other and they were both grateful for the little bit of comfort they could offered one another. It seemed to be enough just to have someone to share the pain and despair. One whispered word or a single tender touch was enough to quell their fears. Funny... Willow would have thought she would resent Angel for dragging her into hell with him or he would resent her for sending him there in the first place. But those brief moments of human contact meant the world to them and all was forgiven. They needed each other and their touch was a welcome warmth in a otherwise cold cruel world. They were just two lonely souls seeking what ever comfort they could find but in time it became something more.much more. Angel and Willow had become lovers in hell.
And every night after waking from her nightmares Willow would wail in anguish because she had left him behind to suffer alone. It felt so very wrong like she had left a part of her soul behind and Willow suffered a whole new kind of hell. But tonight it will be different. Willow had found a spell and she was going to save Angel even if it killed her. It was a win win situation. Either she saves Angel or she will be joining him in hell permanently.
~Part: 1~ (Angel's POV)
Even with a soul Angel wasn't always what you would call a good man. Before he was turned he was drunkard, a cheat and a lech. He was a man of few morals and a many vices. As a human he lived for the pursuit of women and mead. So it was only fitting that he should die the same way he had lived, drunk outside a pub in the bosom of a pretty woman and like a fool he didn't even put up a good fight. He had willing sold his soul to the devil for a quick lay. He was a sorry excuse for a human and his soul was damned way before he was turned. So Angel surmised that maybe he did belong in hell.
But his sins could not compare to the atrocities committed at the hands of Angelus. As a vampire he was sadistic, malicious and cruel. He reveled in the screams of his victims and wallowed in their blood. Angelus was a monster and they had special place in hell for people like him.
Angel should have known that eighty years of penance could not make up for the evil he had done. Oh Angel had hoped but it was all a lie. Hope had a funny way of distorting the truth. It tends to dull the past and brighten the future. Now he knew that redemption was impossible for a man like him.
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He had caused so much pain in the world and it seemed those he claimed to love were no exception. There have been only four important women in his long existence and each one had known suffering by his hands. The first was his Ma, a strong proper Irish woman who had done her best to raise her rebellious son and as a reward for her pains he had killed her on his first night as a vampire. Darla was next. She had made him her childe, taught him how to be a vampire and enjoy the hunt. She suffered a similar fate as his mother when he put a stake through her cold black heart. The third was Drusilla, his beautiful dark childe, who he had raped and tortured until she had lost her mind. Then there was Buffy who (as incredibly as it may sound from a two hundred and fifty year old vampire) was his first love and he had repaid her by breaking her heart.
And now there was Willow to whom he had committed the worst betrayal of all. Angel didn't think he was capable of such cruelty that would rival his demon's until he had dragged Willow kicking and screaming into hell. He still didn't know why he did it. Maybe he did it out of desperation or spite or maybe just because she was there. It's difficult to think straight when you're being burned alive by hell's fires, but whatever his motives were he didn't regret his actions. Oh Angel supposed he should feel bad but hell had a tendency to harden you against the suffering of others. What was the point? Angel was already suffering eternal damnation and he needed her. She was his salvation, the light in the darkness.
He truly did loved Buffy but Willow was his life now. He had shared countless of life times with her in hell and would suffer through countless more. They had seen each other at their lowest point striped naked, bruised and vulnerable with all there emotions bare, raw and exposed. They would whisper words of comfort to each other and when the torture had become so unbearable that they lost the ability to speak or even think, reduced to babbling unintelligible creatures that were less than human and nothing more than a bundle of raw nerves they would communicate through touch; and in their touch was a wealth of information. They would share their bodies and lose themselves to the sensation and in each other. They could only feel and it was more powerful than words, it was primal, basic and real, the bare essentials of the soul.
And Willow's soul was beautiful and pure. It was true miracle that something so beautiful could exist in hell where everything was ugly and obscene. It made her so very special. She was pure in a sea of corruption. The only light in the never ending darkness. She was peace when none can be found. She was a innocent among the damned and for the first time Angel realized the true horror of what he had done. He had committed the worst sin of all. He had captured an angel and dragged her down with him into the deep murky depths of hell. But if he had a choice Willow would stay with him forever because he was and always will be a selfish bastard with or without the soul.
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But of course angels don't belong in hell and Willow couldn't stay forever. So Angel holds on until she fades away like a ghost in a dream. The light goes out, the cold empty darkness creeps back into his soul and Angel feels the acute edge of loneliness like a sharp knife in the gut. Sometimes Angel thinks she was never real, a mere figment of his tortured mind because nothing so beautiful could have possibly existed here. But then he remembers the quiet sound of her voice, the taste of her skin and he knows that for a short time he had something wonderful and beautiful. And he also knows when the pain and despair becomes unbearable she will return and he finds a way to endure.
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