Title: To Hell and Back 1/4
Author: JR
Email: JRR42@yahoo.com
Episode spoilers: 2nd season
Disclaimer: Angel, Willow, et al, are the property of Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, and the WB. All characters are used without permission. This story is not intended to infringe upon any copyrights, nor is any profit being made from it.
Warnings: There are some Angel owies.
Notes: As always, thanks to Heather T. for beta reading. Thanks also to Marius, who's love and encouragement keep me writing.
And thank you so much to everybody who sent feedback. There’s nothing more important to a writer... (yup, that was a big hint ;-)
Archive summary: Despite Angel’s warning, Willow brings him back from hell.

For someone with almost picture-perfect recall, it’s difficult to cope with the fact that my memories of that time are so muddled. Of course, endless bouts of torture to a person’s body, soul, and mind tend to have that affect. Nevertheless, I’ll do my best to tell the story as I remember it.

It all started on a spirit-walk of sorts. Once Buffy sentenced me to hell, the demon that lived within me, the same one that was the source of my vampiric nature, was no longer bound to my body. Free at last, it took great pleasure in torturing me, both physically and emotionally, to punish my soul for keeping it in check for over eighty years.

After calling out a warning to Giles, the demon brought my soul back to where my physical body waited. It was disconcerting to see my body hanging there, suspended by the metal cuffs that bound my wrists together over my head. I could see the damage to my naked flesh left over from the demon’s last round of torture right before my soul was painfully reattached to my body.

Before I had time to recover from that gut-wrenching sensation, my demon was all set to punish me for my latest transgression. And, man, did it go town. For some reason, it decided to use the whip on me. There was a perverse smile on the damn thing’s grotesque face. In a way, it looked pleased that I had gone ahead and done something to anger it, as if it had been waiting for the opportunity to really have some fun at my expensive.

Oh, and it did. Lash after painful, bloody lash.

By the time it was through, it felt as if there wasn’t a single inch of unbroken skin anywhere from the back of my neck to the heels of my feet. It’s strange, now that I think back on it, but I don’t remember the pain as well as I do the tickling, itchy feeling of the streams of blood as it flowed across the bottoms of my feet. I guess by that point in time, I’d traveled down the pain-path so often that I was beginning to get used to it.

Either that, or I was finally losing my mind.

Don’t think I didn’t consider that last option when I saw the blue glow coming towards me. It was kind of hazy at first, a dim glow in the distance, but in the blackness of that place, even the smallest amount of light shined like a beacon. I can still remember thinking to myself: ‘Oh, good, Angel. You’ve finally lost it. Now, you’re seeing things.’

Needing to know if I was just imagining things, I tried to raise my head up from where it slumped against my chest. Big mistake. Hanging there like I was, my attempt to move caused what was left of the muscles in my back scream in agony. ‘Okay, bad move,’ I thought to myself as I rode through the torrents of pain wracking my body.

But the glow beckoned to me. Since any movement seemed to be out of the question, I was forced to make due with looking up from under my eyelashes. Like a neon sign illuminating a blackened street, what was once a soft glow quickly grew more intense as the source of the light came closer to me. Even with the length of a football field between us, I was blinded by it’s brilliance after spending so much time in almost absolute darkness. I closed my eyes, in part to shield them from the glare of the coming light, but mostly to prevent myself from seeing what I knew I would see when the source finally reached me.

I had failed.

Blue and white stars danced along my closed eyelids, the thin flesh of them not enough to keep the harsh brightness completely at bay. I felt like crying, knowing that she either never received or simply ignored the warning I’d tried to send her. To my immortal shame, for one brief moment, I was furious that I still had to suffer a brutal whipping for a message that never reached the person it for whom it was intended. But my anger faded quickly as she came closer. And when she finally reached me, all I could do was shy away in confusion.

“Angel!” Oh that voice. Shy, sweet, kind, caring, and about a dozen other adjectives that came nowhere near to describing the wonder that was Willow Rosenberg. But the one simple word that I would forever use in association with this girl was ‘friend.’

“Angel? It’s me, Willow. Angel? Can you hear me?”

‘Yes!’ my mind screamed. My voice, however, didn’t seem ready to play, yet. It was lost in the maelstrom of my emotions.

How can I possibly explain what I was feeling at that moment in time? There just aren’t enough words. Euphoric comes to mind, as do exhausted and weary. Elation at the possibility of being released from eternal damnation. Fear that the demon would return and cut our reunion short. Terror at the thought of Willow being caught here and sharing a similar fate as mine. Love that she would knowingly risk so much to help me out of the sake of nothing but friendship. Guilt over the thought of someone so pure and innocent trying so hard to save someone so undeserving.

So. There we were.

Willow called to me once more, that time, touching my arm softly just in case I hadn’t heard her speaking to me. Bracing myself for the inevitable pain, I grimaced as I slowly forced my head up to look at my savior. The movement brought a gasp from her lips and tears to her shining green eyes.

“Will...ow,” I managed to whisper against the pain tearing through me. With the blue glow of the protection spell cast upon her, she looked absolutely radiant. I couldn’t help but think of how she resembled the descriptions of angels I heard as a child. But angels don’t belong in hell. Steeling my resolve, I put every ounce of determination I could muster into my voice. “Willow, you have to get out of here. Please.”

“Oh God! Angel. When y-you didn’t answer me...” She let the thought trail off, unwilling to say the rest aloud. “C’mon, we’ve got to get you out of here.” As soon as she finished that statement, she began reciting a spell in Latin.

When she completed the incantation, I felt the bonds holding my wrists give way. Without their support, I fell in an unceremonious heap on the ground, screaming uncontrollably in utter agony. The pain that radiated from the open wounds on my back was so intense, my vision faded to gray. Even Willow’s desperate calls sounded as if they were coming from a great distance.

It was her yelp of surprise that brought me back to full consciousness. Forcing my numbed and protesting muscles to cooperate, I looked up just in time to see a demon launch itself at Willow, only to disintegrate as soon as it came into contact with the blue aura that surrounded her. As the dust settled around us, we both sighed in relief.

That was quite a protection spell she had there, but I could see other demons coming out of the distance. The knowledge left me wondering just how long her spell would hold against such great numbers. Probably not long enough.

“Get out of here, Willow,” I all but growled at her.

“I’m trying to, Angel, but you’re not exactly helping me here...” she protested.

“Leave me. You’ve *got* to hurry, there are a bunch of demons headed this way.”

“I didn’t come all this way just to say ‘hi’,” Willow snipped. Although I knew she was capable of it, her sarcastic tone still surprised me. As she spoke, Willow glanced over her shoulder, her eyes growing comically wide as she took in the sight of the number of creatures bearing down on us. One glance was all it took for her to slide her arms under mine to assist me in standing.

I couldn’t prevent the cry of sheer anguish that escaped me when she tried to hoist me up from the ground. It only took a second for her to put the pieces together and lean over my shoulder to confirm her suspicions. With her proximity to my ear, the sound of her gagging at the sorry condition of my back was magnified. As horrified as she must have been by the raw and bloody sight of my abused flesh, it only served to increase her determination to get me out of there. “I am *NOT* leaving you here.”

“Please, Willow. I’m begging you, just go. They’re almost here,” I pleaded as the mass of demons headed our way bore down on us.

“Well then, you’re just gonna have move faster.” One look into her piercing green eyes was all it took for me to realize that she was serious. Willow was going to get me out of hell or die trying. However, dying would be a blessing in comparison to the fate that awaited her if she were to became trapped in that place.

It was that thought that forced me to move. Evidently, it wasn’t fast enough for her liking, since she tightened her grip around my chest and attempted to heft me to my feet. Despite my best efforts, I couldn’t hold in the hiss that escaped my lips as my torn flesh and aching muscles protested loudly.

“I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” she practically pleaded as her nurturing and survival instincts warred with each other. Between the two of us, we managed to get me up and mobile enough to start moving. Being male, I’m ashamed to admit that leaning against her petite body was the only thing that kept me from collapsing.

I had no idea where we were headed, but Willow seemed to know exactly where we were going. Of course, all my concentration was focused inward in a virtually useless attempt to control the pain I was experiencing. After only a dozen steps, I felt as if I’d just run the twenty-five mile in the Boston Marathon. Still, I did my humble best to hide my weakened condition from Willow. Not surprisingly, she saw right through my charade and began whispering words of encouragement to keep me going.

From the time I stood up, I’d left an arm wrapped around her slender shoulders. At first it was mostly for balance, but as we forged ahead, I rested more and more of my weight against her. Not that I had much of a choice in the matter.

My exhaustion seemed to increase exponentially as we pressed onward. Every ounce of energy I possessed was called into play as I forced one foot to move in front of the other. The forgiving oblivion of unconsciousness beckoned me with each pace, and to this day, I still have no idea how I managed to keep from falling into it’s welcoming arms.

Willow, however, was aware enough for the both of us. Every now and then, a demon would launch itself at her, but the protection spell held fast. The only problem was that every contact with one of the creatures weakened the field of protection. It wasn’t overly noticeable, at least not to the demons. After a half a dozen or so of them exploded into clouds of dust, the rest of the pack learned to make their pursuit from a careful distance.

Finally, the gate appeared before us. Unfortunately, so did ten large demons. The old witch Willow had enlisted to open the gate was undoubtedly preventing any of the minions of hell from crossing to the other side, but on this side of the portal, Willow and I were on our own.

“Almost there, Angel.” Willow whispered.

I struggled for a moment to raise my head. The Herculean effort left me gasping in pain, but I still managed to get some words out of my mouth.

“Now what?” I asked as we continued our run for escape.

There was no hiding the panicked look on Willow’s face, but I’m pretty sure I was wearing a matching expression. I felt more than saw Willow turn her head to catch a glimpse of what lay behind us. From the gasp that escaped her, I guessed that the view to the rear was even worse than what was waiting in front of us.

She looked up at me for a moment, and I could see the question in her wide, green eyes. As much as I wanted to help, I was in too much pain to focus on finding a way out for us. I guess she must have seen the helplessness in my eyes.

Biting her lip in concentration, Willow put her powerful intelligence to work on finding a solution. Talk about thinking on the run. Possibility after possibility was conceived, pondered, and discarded before she seemed to settle on one.

“Angel, do you think you can stand? O-on your own, I mean?” The slight quiver in her voice was her only betrayal of the nervousness she was feeling.

“Yeah. But not for long.” I hoped she knew that I wasn’t going to be much use in a fight.

As the thought came to me, I realized the my own escape was unimportant. I couldn’t allow Willow to risk being caught down here for eternity. With the last of my mental reserves, I steeled myself to one simple thought: buy Willow time to escape.

Unaware of my unilateral decision, Willow had formulated a game plan of her own. Stopping our progress suddenly, she looked me dead in the eye. “When I say ‘go,’ run for the gate, okay?”

I didn’t like what I saw very much. After making sure I had my balance, Willow took a half step away from me. Taking a deep breath to focus herself, she squared her shoulders. The action would have been more comforting if she’d been able to control the tremors of fear that were coursing through her body.

“Will...” Before I could even finish her name, she left me standing on my own while she charged head-long into the group of demons that prevented our escape.

It was a magnificent move, one that even Buffy, in her prime, would have been hard pressed to equal. With all the grace of a dancer, Willow dove onto the slick ground. With the momentum she built on her sprint, her body continued to slide, even as she twisted her legs to maneuver.

Arms and legs reaching out to their fullest length, Willow skidded into the cluster of demons who stood shoulder to shoulder to block our path. Like a bowling ball crashing into waiting pins, five demons dissolved into dust as Willow’s protective aura came into contact with their legs. Move completed, she pushed herself into a low crouch before shouting at me to make a run for it.

Cocky with the success of her action, Willow didn’t seem to be aware of the fact that taking out five of them at once had significantly weakened the spell that protected her. The bright glow that surrounded Willow had faded considerably when she touched the now-dusted demons. And sure enough, I wasn’t the only one that made that particular connection.

Just as Willow gave the signal for me to run, the pack of demons that had been chasing behind us ran forward. Some of them attacked me directly, but the majority moved ahead, either to attack Willow or more selfishly, to attempt escape into the real world. I did my best to keep fighting despite the scratches and tears I could feel inflicted upon my back, legs, and arms, but my movements were clumsy at best. With a last burst of speed, I drunkenly lurched to Willow’s side.

Between Willow’s unnatural aura and the spell protecting the gateway to hell, the demons were disappearing pretty quickly. There was a cloud of dust in the air that made seeing farther than a foot in front of us impossible. I heard a sound, an outraged growl, come from the right of Willow. Acting on instinct, I tried to place myself between my friend and the threat bearing down upon her.

I never made it that far.

What happened next is really nothing more than a blur in my memory. With lightening swiftness, Willow used all her strength to shove me towards the waiting gate. The moment her small hands connected with the shredded flesh of my injured back, I began howling in agony. I guess I’ll never know for sure whether it was the waves of pain, or passing through the magical field of the gate, or maybe a combination of both; regardless, I only experienced the vertigo for an instant before my entire world went black.

It’s a long story, one that doesn’t need explaining at this point, but about fifty years ago, I once fell into a well. Trapped by cold water and the slick, algae covered sides of the well, I spent days down there before I managed to escape. One of the most disconcerting things I recall from the experience was how the acoustics and the water played havoc on my hearing -- distorting and contorting all sounds into pure gibberish.

As I returned from the comforting darkness, I heard the same kind of noises. The similarities confused me even more than I already was. But underneath the miscellaneous sounds I heard something unmistakable, something both alluring and comforting at the same time.

“mmffmm...thump...he’s...thump...angelus?..thump... thump...thump...Angelus?...THUMP...Angelus?...THUMP... THUMP...THUMP.”

The voice was familiar, but it still took me a moment to place it. Giles.

“Angelus? Wake up, Angelus!”

Oh, I was awake, but every scrap of control I had was focused on only two things: the amazing agony I was in and controlling my first impulse to kill and feed from the source of that nearby heartbeat.

“a-way. get away...from me.” My voice was no more than a hissing whisper, but fortunately, Giles quickly recognized that I was deadly serious.

“Angel?” the librarian’s voice asked shakily. I could manage no more than a jerky nod of my head in acknowledgement. I could hear the echoing heartbeat draw nearer to me and despite my pain, felt an overwhelming impulse to attack the source of it. “Let me...

“NO!” It was hard to tell who was more shocked by my outburst, but my voice rapidly lost it’s initial strength as the tide turned from rigid self-control to pure, basic self-preservation. “Need...to feed...can’t...control...”

I could almost feel the moment the proverbial light bulb went on over Giles head. Without another word, I heard the sound of that tempting heartbeat retreat. Only then did the distant sounds of two other beating heart in the vicinity register in my thoughts.

To be total honest, I was in the process of gathering what little strength I had left to go in search of a food source when I heard Giles’ footsteps as he returned. The Watcher was cautious enough not to get too close this time. I heard a thud as something fell to the floor next to my head.

Opening my eyes, I found myself looking at two pints of bagged blood. Like a lion attacking it’s prey, I managed to ignore the fire in my back as I reached for one of the bags and savagely sank my teeth into it. I must have been a little out of practice, since my initial attempt to piece the protective plastic failed, but it didn’t really matter to me. I was just too damned hungry to care.

When I did breech the thick bag, the taste of the blood was like ambrosia despite the unnatural refrigerated coolness. The second bag emptied as quickly as the first, but it still wasn’t enough. Although the two pints took the edge off enough for me to maintain control, the blood loss caused by my wounds kept my hunger at dangerous levels.

For the first time since waking, I looked up and around at my environment. The library was both familiar and new at the same time. Just how long had I been gone? Time for questions later. First I needed to take care of more pressing business, like thanking the person responsible for bringing me back.

Groaning as pain shot through me, I somehow managed to roll myself on my side so I could look for Willow. My eyes passed over Giles to note the presence of the old witch and Amy Madison, but there was no sign of the girl who had managed to bring me back from hell. Where was she?

With some trepidation, I brought my eyes up to look directly at the person closest to me, Giles. The librarian looked tired, even more worn out than he had when I saw him in his apartment on my ‘spirit walk’ with my demon. Time had obviously not been kind to the man -- losing his girlfriend and his slayer in short order left his face haunted by what he perceived as his failures. His expression was unreadable, neither the anger nor shock I had been expecting. This man had every reason in the world to hate me, and frankly, I was surprised he’d managed to restrain himself from staking me outright.

Not that I would have blamed him in the least, but there would be time for that later.

“Willow?” I rasped questioningly.

As the name left my lips, Giles’ glance darted past my prone body, and biting back a groan of pain, I slowly twisted to follow his line of sight.

The portal the old witch had created was still there, it’s blue glow brightly blazing in the dim artificial light of the library. Squinting against the brightness, I barely managed to make out what appeared to be a group of demons just on the other side of the gate. In the center of their unholy little circle lay an unmoving Willow Rosenberg.

‘NO!’ My mind was screaming in denial, but the only sound that could make it’s way past the terror that choked me was an unintelligible cry of anguish. No! Not after she’d risked so much for me. I knew better than anyone what fate awaited her if she became trapped on the other side, and I wasn’t about to leave her there.

For the first time in what seemed like forever, I was able to ignore the pain of my own injuries as I levered myself rather unsteadily to my knees. That, however, was as a far as my rubbery legs would take me. Good thing my mind had a manual override, allowing me to put my body on autopilot.

Like an toddler, I slowly crawled towards the portal, my need to get Willow out of there giving me the fortitude to keep moving despite the pain of the wounds my movements were reopening. There was a noise in the distance, but I paid little attention to it, ignoring it as one would an insect at a picnic. The distance between myself and the gate seemed to grow longer with each painful ‘step’ I took.

“Angel! Stop!” Only when I felt Giles’ hands on my shoulders holding me back did his words finally penetrate the sheer force of my determination. I growled menacingly at the librarian, but to my surprise, he merely stared back at me with the infuriatingly patient look of his.

“...don’t understand...can’t leave her...” I managed. Giles opened his mouth to respond, but it wasn’t his voice that replied.

“She is safe...for the moment. Merely unconscious. There is nothing you can do, Vampire.” Somehow I found the old witch’s words less than comforting.

“What happened?” I directed the question to Giles, preferring to deal with someone that knew and cared about Willow almost as much as I did.

“Apparently Willow’s protection spell was momentarily weakened during the fight. When she pushed you through the portal, one of those creatures attacked her, destroying itself in the process, but not before it clawed her arm. It would seem that she managed to somehow reinforce the spell before she passed out, either from pain, exhaustion, or both.”

“We’ve got to get her out of there,” I insisted as I gathered together the energy to move again.

“Listen to me, Angelu...Angel.” It looked as though my return was going to take some getting used to in more ways than one. “The spell used to open the gate is very specific. Only Willow is allowed to pass through it from this side...”

“But I came through it as well...”

“You came *out* of it,” Giles corrected. “Should you attempt to cross back through, you *will* be trapped in hell for all eternity. There will be no second chance to attempt this again.”

I looked at the Watcher in pure amazement. Why on earth would he be so concerned about me after the things I did to him? It didn’t make any sense.

“But...it’s Willow stuck in there!”

“Yes, it is.”

“Then let me get her out of there.”

“Would you really throw the chance she’s given you away so uselessly? There is still time for her to wake up of her own accord. If she doesn’t come around before the portal closes, then we will send you back to retrieve Willow.”

Ah, there is was. I knew that air of British disdain couldn’t stay hidden forever. Giles made his feelings perfectly clear on the matter. In the end, Willow’s life was much more important than mine.

And he was right.

Things happened quickly after that. Completely unwilling to let Willow out of my sight for any length of time, Giles and Amy finally relented in their attempts to move me to the couch in his tiny office. We reached a truce of sorts when Amy moved all the cushions from the sofa out to the main part of the library to form an impromptu mattress for my battered body.

Giles even scrounged up a pair of sweat pants for me to wear. With all the confusion, I never even noticed that I’d been bare-assed naked since before Willow found me. Of course, once I realized that I’d been displaying my ‘assets’ for all and sundry -- and in the high school library of all places -- I was just a little embarrassed. And Willow...knowing how shy she is, I couldn’t believe that she even managed to look me in the eye, let alone support me as we made our way back. Then again, we both had other things on our minds at the time.

The sweat pants served another, more important purpose in the grand scheme of things. Although Giles and Amy did their best to tend to the deep gashes in my back, I was still bleeding. Perhaps it was some residual effect from being in hell, but my vampire healing factor was working more slowly than usual. Regardless, the continuous blood loss left me pitifully weak and shivering cold. My requests for a shirt or blanket were denied as the cloth for either would only aggravate my injuries.

In the end, there was little they could do to help me. The whip had torn through my flesh like scissors cutting through paper. Given the danger in being a part of the Slayer’s ‘team,’ Giles kept a well-stocked first aid kit -- I’d seen emergency rooms with less supplies on hand -- but neither he nor Amy had the medical know-how to deal with injuries of that nature.

What I needed was blood.

It is the life-force of every vampire; strengthening us, allowing our accelerated healing factor to kick into high gear. In my present condition, I had already bled out more than the two pints that I’d ingested. I needed a refill and fast before instinct won the battle over my control.

“Giles,” I whispered weakly from both hurt and shame, “I...I need to feed again.”

At the sound of my quiet words, both Giles and Amy took a involuntary step back, both aware that a hungry vampire reached for the most expedient food source. I did my best to convey with my eyes that they weren’t in immediate danger, but at the same time it was going to become a serious issue in the near future.

“I...I don’t have any more on hand,” Giles admitted.

Truth be told, that he’d had any in the first place surprised me, but the more I thought about it, the more it seemed logical. As the ‘adult’ in the Slayer’s world, it was up to the Watcher to be prepared for the worst. Having either Buffy or any of her friends vamped would certainly qualify on that condition. But it still didn’t solve my current problem.

“The blood bank. I’m registered there as a hemophiliac.”

As I made the suggestion, Giles’ eyes darted over to the glowing gateway. Willow was still unconscious, unmoving and unmolested by the demons hovering over her. It was clear that the Watcher was unwilling to leave his library, despite knowing the dangers of allowing me to remain unfed. I could almost see the wheels turning in his head as he considered his options, until he finally settled upon a course of action.

“What name?” Giles asked.

“What?” I stammered, thrown by the question.

“I’m assuming you aren’t listed there under ‘Angelus the Vampire’.” You gotta love that understated British sense of humor.

“Reece. Ryan Reece.” I supplied as Giles moved towards his office. It was a good thing the blood bank kept somebody on staff twenty-four hours a day, and the way the Watcher played up the urgency of my ‘condition,’ the night person promised to have six pints ready and waiting for immediate pick-up.

With my acute sense of hearing, I heard the librarian dial another number only to slam the phone back down while muttering something about the uselessness of answering machines. “Damn the boy!”

Ah. Well now I knew who he was trying to reach. Xander had that affect on a lot of people. “Giles, try Cordelia’s.”

Surprise-filled eyes turned to me as my words reached the office. I did my best to shrug at the unspoken question I read on Giles’ face. Hopefully, there would be time later for explanations, but for now, the Watcher did what was suggested.

“Cordelia, this is Rupert Giles. Forgive me for calling at such a late hour. I hope I didn’t wake your parents....Out of town?...Yes, I see....Yes Cordelia...Oh, the reason I’m calling is...well...is Xander with you?...”

Keeping one ear trained on the conversation, I couldn’t help but stare through the portal. It wasn’t right that I should be safe when the person who risked so much for me was lying there helpless on the other side of the gate. She looked so tiny there, crumpled and still. So vulnerable, and yet so beautiful at the same time. What I wouldn’t have given for her to wake at that moment, to rise and confront the demons that stared at her with such grotesque fascination. I wanted to charge back through the gate and wipe those perverted leers off of every one of their horrifying faces...

The sound of the phone being returned to it’s cradle dragged my thoughts back to the matter at hand. The call was longer than I expected. From Giles’ side of the conversation, it was clear that Xander was less than thrilled and more than a little confused by the Watcher’s request, but in the end he agreed once Giles promised a full explanation upon his arrival.

Task completed, Giles returned to the library proper to check on everybody. The old witch had been very quiet since I first woke up, not speaking since she reassured us of Willow’s safety. She was holding on for the moment, but was beginning to show the first signs of fatigue due to the incredible amount of concentration it took to keep that gate to hell open and protected. As for Amy, I think she was a little shell-shocked from the whole ordeal, but she was hanging on the best she could.

“How did you know that Xander would be at Cordelia’s?” Giles asked as he returned to my side. I searched his voice for any sign of suspicion, but the only thing I heard was simple curiosity. Oh, well, it looked like we had some time to kill, so to speak.

“I was there earlier.” With that I launched into a sketchy admission of my demon-chaperoned visitations. To his credit, Giles listened with an open mind. Then again, after everything he’s experienced in Sunnydale, he can’t afford to be much of a skeptic.

“So that was you I heard speaking in my apartment tonight. I thought perhaps I was dreaming.”

I didn’t elaborate any further. I know I should have told Giles the rest -- about Jenny Calendar’s message, about Buffy’s whereabouts -- but as time passed, I was getting weaker and my bloodlust was rising rapidly. Where the hell was Xander?

“G-Giles, g-get back,” I practically panted as I struggled for control even as I changed into my ‘game’ face. My eyes closed in relief as I saw him comprehend the problem and pull Amy away with him. “Stake.” It was the only word I could manage, but my meaning was clear: I would rather die than hurt him again. Certain that the Watcher and I were on the same wavelength, I began eyeing the gate, trying to determine if I would have the strength enough to make it to the portal before the last vestiges of my willpower gave way to my hunger. If I was going back to hell anyway, I wanted an attempt at rescuing Willow to go down as my final action.

“Did somebody here order the O negative supreme with anchovi...what the hell?”

I think that was the first (and hopefully the last) time I was grateful to hear that voice. Of course, Xander’s eyes were trained on the huge, bright portal so he didn’t realize that I was back. Cordelia was another matter, though.

“Angelus?” She asked as she rounded the corner of the table that hid me from the entrance of the library. Her tone was a mixture of fear and astonishment, but it was my name that brought Xander running to her side.

“Holy shit!” Xander gasped. Had I not been fighting the urge to sink my fangs into his neck, I probably would have been laughing at how wide his eyes got when he saw me. “Is he Angelus or Angel? How did he get here? What happened to his back?”

The questions was directed at Giles, so that’s where the answer came from as the librarian relieved Xander of the cooler he carried. Like before, a bag of cool blood was tossed in my direction. A part of me was slightly offended at being tossed food like a seal at an aquarium, but I didn’t even bother to snarl in displeasure as I rose painfully to a sitting position.

I could hear Giles retelling the tale of the evening’s events as I emptied the first bag like the starving creature I was, but something odd happened when I picked up the second. As before, I had trouble piercing the plastic of the bag. Try as I might, I couldn’t remember ever having trouble with them since the blood banks switched from glass bottles to the more easily transportable plastic.

Hearing me growl in frustration, Cordelia, either out of pity or more likely, fear of bodily harm, called to me as Giles continued his story. I barely spared her a glance, but there was no mistaking the disgust etched into her features. As Angelus, I enjoyed watching the horror on people’s faces when I fed, but with my soul anchored to my body, I hate myself for needing to drink the blood. When the taste of it hits my tongue, my self-loathing becomes all-consuming. I see the need for blood as an addiction, a weakness that I am helpless to overcome, something that I don’t want anyone else to witness. Therefore, feeding is normally a strictly private thing in my life. At that moment, though, I was past caring about what any of the others thought.

“Angel. Here.” A ball-point pen flew through the air and landed not far from my head. Driven by hunger, I ruthlessly poked a hole in the bag and brought it to my mouth, totally uncaring of the blood that spurted out over the library floor and me. I was getting ready to start on the next bag when Xander’s furious eyes turned in my direction.

“YOU SON OF A BITCH!” he raged. “You left her behind? Fucking coward!” Xander launched himself at me with a cry of righteous anger.

The stream of curses continued as he shook me by the shoulders. Overwhelmed by a combination of guilt and temper, I was about to fight back when the oddest feeling came over me. One moment I was totally angry, and the next, I was breaking out into a cold sweat, my skin going clammy while my stomach rolled. To a vampire, nausea is more a state of mind than a physical ailment. It had been well over two hundred years since I had experienced the sensation, and if you ask me, a couple of centuries in between wasn’t long enough.

Fighting the queasiness was a real battle, one that I lost rather quickly -- along with a good portion of the blood I’d just ingested. But, as they say, every cloud has a silver lining. It was difficult to say who was more surprised; me over being sick, or Xander, who just happened to be ‘in the line of fire’.

“Uu-gghh. Oh man! That’s disgusting!” As long as I survive, I will never forget the look on Xander’s face at that precise moment. I tried to laugh, in spite of the fact that my stomach was not quite sure it was finished revolting against the blood I’d consumed, but something was wrong.

The sudden pain in my chest made me forget all about the turmoil in my stomach. What else could gone wrong? And what was happening to me? I felt as if an elephant had just decided to sit down on my rib cage, and before long my vision started to dim. I could vaguely hear Giles asking me what was the matter as my brain scrambled to find the source of the latest problem.

The synapses in my brain all fired at once, and with the last flicker of my consciousness, I struggled to recall knowledge that I’d had no need of since the day I was changed. Like an old car engine being turned over, there were a couple of false starts before my body remembered just what it was supposed to do. Never one to do things half-way, I braced myself as best I could...

...and drew in my first breath in over two hundred and forty years.

The rush of oxygen I inhaled seemed to push the darkness back, so I took another breath, and another, and another, until finally, my lungs took over without having to be reminded. I was breathing! Honest-to-goodness breathing!

“H-how...w-what...Angelu...Angel?” Giles might have been the only one to actually speak, but Xander, Cordelia, and Amy were all staring at me openmouthed with shock.

I tried to answer, but I’d long ago forgotten how to force air past my vocal cords to make sounds. See, vampires don’t have any breath, so how exactly we speak is as much of the ‘magic’ of our condition as our accelerated healing abilities. I don’t think any of us know how it actually works, only that the demon within us gives us the power of speech...

...oh, by all that’s holy.

I don’t have a demon within me any longer. I haven’t had one since I was trapped in hell. When Willow got me out, the demon had just tortured me then left me hanging while I recovered from my wounds. It was still back in hell, restrained by the spell the old witch had cast over the portal she’d opened.

What did this mean? Was I human again? Wanting to test my theory, I tried to shift into my game face. No matter how hard I focused, I could sense that the transformation was incomplete, but just to be certain I brought my hands up to my face to confirm my suspicions with touch.

Too many questions were floating around in my head, questions that needed to be answered immediately, and to ask them, I needed to be able to talk. Hesitantly, I experimented, doing my best to recall just how the whole process worked. A few indecipherable squeaks came out before I managed to say anything intelligible.

“G-giles? What’s...happening to me?” I asked, hoping that I wasn’t going crazy.

“At first glance, I would venture a guess to say that you are becoming mortal again.”

Okay, I wasn’t insane, it was really happening. I was *alive.* No more drinking blood. Sunlight! I could walk about freely during the day. I could live!

And I could die. Really die. Old age-kind-of die.

As the realization sank in, I began to actually panic. Kind of ironic, considering just how many times over the past two centuries I childishly wished for that very event to occur. What was that old curse? Be careful what you wish for. Well, I got it, and the very notions scared the shit out of me. Momentarily overwhelmed by my own fear, I automatically responded by sucking in huge lungfuls of air.

“Angel. Angel! Calm down, you’re going to hyperventilate.” When Giles’ words failed to reach me, he grabbed my shoulders and began shaking me just as Xander had done only minutes earlier. “Angel! Slow, deep breaths.”

I know my eyes must have been wild as I trained them on the Watcher. His chest and shoulders were steadily rising and falling as he attempted to guide me by example. Tasking myself carefully, I followed his lead, finding that the cleansing breaths not only kept me from overtaxing my body with oxygen, but also helped me to focus enough to calm myself.

“Does this mean I’m gonna have to start calling you ‘Reanimated Boy’?” Xander’s ill-timed humor earned him scowls from both myself and Giles. I was in the process of preparing a sarcastic comment or two of my own, when an unexpected voice call out across the library.

“The child is waking.”




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