Fan Fiction ❯ Quickened ❯ Whan That Aprill With His Shoures Soote ( Chapter 3 )

Quickened

by P.H. Wise

A Buffy crossover fanfic

Chapter 3: "Whan that Aprill with his shoures soote..."

Disclaimer: I don't own Buffy. I don't own Highlander. Please don't sue me. I'm only a poor starving writer. I have no money.

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The dilapidated church stood empty, its pews long since rotted to dust. The clear ringing tones of the minister who had once preached here had long since faded into memory. Broken stain-glass windows depicted a now fragmentary account of the Passion, and moonlight shone through the gaps.

Near the ruined podium a young woman stood at ease, her long blonde hair tied back in a loose ponytail. Her body language totally belied the baleful glare that she directed at her servants. They cringed. "I did ne wiste that myne devyse to parfornen neede grete hardynesse," she said, slipping in her anger back into her native mode of speech as she paced to and fro.

"Your pardon, my lady... what did you say?"

Alisoun tried not to grind her teeth. Carefully, she repeated herself, this time taking care to use modern English. "I didn't think my commands were all that complicated," she said, glaring at her flunkies. "Go forth, find the slayer, and report back immediately." She paused for dramatic effect. "Why is it then, that out of twenty some vampires that I sent out, only ONE has bothered to return?"

The vampire in question glanced about the room nervously. The hostile glares of his fellows did not encourage him. He smiled hopefully. "They have skiball, Lady Alisoun."

The young woman developed an odd twitch just above her left eye. "...Skiball?" she asked, her tone completely flat. "How am I supposed to find and kill the Slayer…" she paused as if to take a breath - though this was force of habit, and had not been necessary for her for many years. Anger crept into her voice as she continued. "… if myne minions woulde rather play SKIBALL than do my bidding!?"

"You might try the phonebook," the vampire suggested helpfully. "It's much easier than searching the city house by house, or just wandering around the streets until we find her."

Alisoun's twitch got worse. She produced a wooden stake from within her coat and quickly staked her unfortunate servant. As he burst into a cloud of dust, she placed her hands on her hips and turned to another vampire in her service. "What's a phone book?"

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"Well, I don't see why you have to paw through the remains of my place of business," said Anya, grousing sourly at the intrusion into her vengeance-demony plans for the day. "Why don't you dig through what's left of the old school? It's on the hellmouth, after all. I'm sure you'd find something useful there."

Xander exchanged glances with Buffy, and Dawn set her backpack down by what was left of the table that the scoobies had traditionally used as research space.

"Ahn," Xander began, with a very `patient' tone of voice, "the high school is a construction site just now. My crew's been working on it for a while now. And all of the books in the old library were destroyed in the fire."

"Does the juvenile delinquent have to be here too? I don't want any of my rubble stolen. It may not be much, but I might still be able to sell some of it."

"OK then," said Dawn, "Got it. No rubble-stealing."

That seemed to satisfy the vengeance demon. Or perhaps she had run out of things to say. In any case, she remained silent for the moment.

"So what are we even looking for here, Buff?" Xander asked.

Buffy picked up a very weathered ancient tome, which promptly fell apart, its pages fluttering everywhere. "...Anything. I can't be walking blind anymore. I need to know everything I can about immortals." She glanced through some of the fallen pages. "Demons, demons, demons. Hmm."

Xander scooped another book out of the rubble, this one in better shape than most of the others. He started to flip through it, and then dropped it a moment later. Every page was blank. "Must have been one of the books that Willow drained," he murmered.

"I still need to charge her for those," said Anya. "Do you think she'll pay for them when she comes back?"

Buffy shrugged. "I'm sure if you ask her nicely..."

Dawn nodded as she too began searching through the books. "What's a few books filled to the brim with the blackest of magics between friends?"

The four of them searched through what they could salvage of the books for the next few hours with little success.

"Hey! I found something!" said Xander, pointing excitedly to the page he was looking at. "It's on seven immortal sisters, or something."

Anya glanced at the book he was holding, and smiled faintly. "That's a Dungeons and Dragons sourcebook, Xander," she said.

"... Oh," he said, glancing at the cover before putting it into the `useless book' pile. "Of all the books to survive in good condition, why did it have to be that one?"

"I don't think you're going to find anything here," said Anya. "Giles never had any books on immortals. The Slayer isn't supposed to be a part of the Game, after all."

Xander blinked. "You could have said that, oh, I don't know, three hours ago?"

Dawn creased her brow thoughtfully. "Anya, didn't you say you knew something about immortals before? When we first found out about this?"

Anya nodded. "Of course! I've been avenging wronged women for a long time. I've certainly cursed my share of immortals."

"So you can tell us what we want to know about them, and we don't need to search these books at all?"

Anya perked up. "Probably. I'm not an expert, but I've run into a few of them."

Buffy and Xander exchanged looks.

"We're dumb," said Xander.

Buffy nodded.

All eyes turned to Anya.

"Well, I suppose I can tell you what I know about them." The vengeance demon paused a moment as she gathered her thoughts. "Let's see. They're immortal, obviously. Unless you cut off their heads, in which case they're not immortal and they tend to die. Hmm. They'll heal just about any injury that's dealt them short of losing a body part entirely. Oh, and if one immortal cuts off the head of another immortal, they get all of their victim's power and knowledge." She paused. "Or was it skills and knowledge? Or maybe it was skills and mojo? I don't remember. Supposedly, they're all playing this game where they want to cut off every other immortals head until there's only one left, and that one gets something called `the Prize,' whatever that is. That's about it."

Buffy nodded thoughtfully. "Didn't you say something about `Slayers aren't supposed to be immortal?'"

Anya nodded. "Your being immortal is a clear violation of several treaties between the hell-gods and the Powers That Be."

"Treaties?" asked Xander.

"Well, a long time ago, the Powers That Be and the powers of darkness were openly at war. That was before my time, but I heard stories of battles between vast armies of demons and hosts of celestial beings that left huge trails of burning destruction in their wake. Most of the time they didn't fight here on earth, but sometimes it spilled over, and entire continents would burn.

"Eventually, they realized that if they were constantly fighting each other, they wouldn't be able to get much done, so they declared a cease-fire prohibiting that kind of direct action. One of the requirements of the treaty was that no immortal could be Chosen as the Slayer."

"Why not?" Buffy asked.

"Imagine a warrior with hundreds, or even thousands of years of training on top of fully developed slayer abilities."

Xander shrugged. "So she'd be a really really effective slayer. What's the big deal?"

"Well, the hell-gods certainly don't want THAT. The Powers That Be don't want that either, but for different reasons."

"Like what?"

Anya glanced at Buffy. "So Buffy, do you want to be the Slayer forever? You know how you were in Heaven before Willow and the rest of us ripped you out? How do you feel about never seeing Heaven again, and spending the rest of eternity stuck here on earth with nothing but endless battle to look forward to? Well, that and the pain of seeing everyone you've ever loved grow old and die. I guess you could make new friends after your current friends die, but then they'd grow old and die too."

Everyone got that horrible sinking feeling in the pits of their stomachs. Except for Buffy, that is, who was staring at Anya with open, unmasked horror.

"Unless someone takes your head, that is. In which case they take your soul and your quickening into them, absorbing all that you are and were, forever."

Buffy vomited noisily onto the broken floor of the shop, and Dawn glared openly at Anya.

Xander looked like he was going to be sick. "... OK, we get the point, Ahn. But you didn't need to go that far."

Anya's expression softened. "I'm sorry, Buffy. But it's important for you to understand the seriousness of your situation. Especially since, when the demon world learns of your immortality, there will be hell to pay. Literally."

They sat in silence for several long minutes, and both Xander and Dawn moved to embrace Buffy, who began sobbing noiselessly.

At length, Dawn spoke, and broke the embrace. "...Buffy? I think I might have found something."

Buffy looked up at her sister through tear-streaked eyes.

"It's a book on Angel before he became all soulful." She held up the page that she'd been reading. "Here, look at this!"

Buffy wiped her eyes and began to read aloud in an uncertain voice. "On valentine's day in 1894, Angelus nailed a puppy to the doors of..."

Dawn quickly interrupted. "The next part."

Visibly relieved, Buffy skipped a few lines and continued reading. "OK. 1894, in Italy, Angelus and William the Bloody ran into a being called `The Immortal,' who became their arch-rival in all the years that followed." She blinked.

Xander grimaced. "Much as I hate to say it... we should probably talk to Angel. If he knows more about whatever society the immortals have than Anya does..."

"Oh, I don't know anything about their society," Anya said cheerfully, "I just know that an immortal named Duncan MacLeod tends to get a lot of curses called down upon him by jilted ex-lovers. I've personally killed him at least ten times!"

"Right..." said Xander, "Like I was saying, if Angel knows anything about immortal society..."

Buffy nodded faintly, her nausea fading. "Then we should go for a visit. It's only, what, a two hour drive?"

"Well, I won't go visit him," said Anya. "I need to stay here and try to reacquire vast sums of money."

"Can you watch Dawn?" Buffy asked.

"I'm going with you," said Dawn.

"Dawn..." Buffy looked at her sister for a long moment. "... Fine. Xander, can you drive us? Me and cars still don't get along."

Xander nodded. "One round-trip to L.A., coming right up!"

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Another clear summer night hung over the idyllic town of Sunnydale. If death, horror, and things that go bump in the night could ever be considered idyllic, that is. The stars shone brightly above, even if they were a little difficult to make out on account of the local light pollution. This particular summer night found a gorgeous young blonde woman in a spectacular red dress standing outside the door of the Summers residence. Her hair was styled (she liked to be wearing wavy hair when she was killing humans), and she had even put on high heels for the occasion. Her flunkies, usually close by, were waiting in the limo that had brought her here.

Alisoun smiled. Life was good. Tonight, she would kill the slayer, and then she'd be able to get on to the more serious business that she had come to this backwater town to attend to.

She knocked on the door with three loud thumps of her tiny fists.

The door shuddered beneath the impact, and she waited for someone to come and answer it.

...

Waited.

...

And waited.

...

And waited.

...

"Hello?" she called, trying to peer into the house. "Anyone home?"

Silence.

Her smile faded, and she tried the doorbell.

DING-DONG.

...

DING-DONG.

...

DING-DONG.

...

DING-DING-DING-DING-DING-DING-DING-DING-DING-DING-DING-DING-DON G

She moved around to the front of the house to peer in through the windows. All was dark within. No movement - no one answering the door. "I show up to kill the slayer, and she doesn't even have the decency to be at home!?"

Alisoun's eye began to twitch.

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The scooby gang reached Los Angeles at around the same time that a certain blonde-haired woman reached the Summers' residence. Smog central hadn't changed much. The stars were concealed behind the thick layer of smog, and a cool breeze was blowing in from the coast, finally cutting through the day's lingering heat. Voices drifted faintly out of the open front door of the Hyperion Hotel as Buffy, Xander and Dawn approached the entrance.

"Lorne?" came the voice of a young woman with a Texan accent. "Lorne! Hey, it's Fred. I've been trying to get a hold of you."

None of the scoobies could hear the response. Buffy glanced at Xander. "I like it. It's nicer than his old building. Roomier, too, from the looks of it."

Xander shrugged. "I'm just wondering if maybe we should have called before we came down here?"

Buffy waved her hand dismissively. "Nah. It'll be fine."

"Lorne," came Fred's voice once more, "I know you're busy, but we really need your help. We had a lead but it, ah - kind of died. Did you talk to your connections? Have you heard anything about Angel or Cordy?"

The scoobies exchanged looks.

"Lorne!"

Another voice spoke then, this time belonging to a male. "Did he have anything?"

"No," Fred replied. "And who's fluffy? Are you fluffy?"

"He called me fluffy?"

"He said make sure... Wait. You don't - think he was referring to anything of mine that's fluffy, do you? Because that would just be inappropriate."

Xander, Buffy and Dawn stepped through the open front door of the hotel. The hotel lobby somehow managed to look... comfortable. Well, minus the occult symbol that someone had unsuccessfully tried to scrub from the floor. Fred - a lovely young woman with long brown hair - stood near what had once been the hotel reception area, the phone close at hand. The source of the other voice - a young African-American man with a shaved head and a smile on his face, stood a few feet away.

"Greetings, Fluffy - whichever one of you that may be," said Xander. The two hotel residents turned towards them with expressions of startlement. "We come in search of Mr. Tall Dark and Brooding."

Fred exchanged looks with the young man who stood by her.

"Angel's not in right now," said the young African-American, his expression guarded.

Buffy nodded. "We heard. You might want to keep your door shut. Sound travels far."

Fred gave an embarrassed smile. She exchanged looks with her companion, who shrugged.

After a moment, her companion strode forward to greet their visitors. "Welcome to Angel Investigations. I'm Charles Gunn. This is Fred. How can we help you?"

Buffy nodded. "I'm Buffy." She pointed towards Xander. "That's Xander."

"And I'm Dawn."

Buffy smiled faintly. "We really need to see Angel. Do you know when he'll be back?"

Fred and Gunn exchanged looks again. Buffy got the impression that they probably did that a lot.

"...We don't know," said Fred.

Buffy's smile faded. "Did he leave any way of contacting him?"

Gunn shook his head. "We haven't seen him all summer. You're Buffy?" He gave the slayer a speculative look. "As in Angel's ex?"

Buffy nodded. "That's me," she said cheerfully.

"Huh," said Gunn. "I thought you'd be taller."

"People always say that. Why do they always say that?"

"Well Buff, you gotta admit that for a Slayer, you don't have the most impressive stature."

Buffy shot Xander a dangerous glance.

"But what you lack in stature, you make up for in..." Xander trailed off, fumbling for words but not finding any.

"Keep digging."

"Hey Buffy, I'm taller than you," Dawn said with a wry smile.

Fred laughed. "It's nice to meet y'all. Make yourselves at home. We don't get many visitors here. Except every day, I mean. But those are a little different. They're here because we help the helpless, and not just to visit." She went on like that for about a minute, leaving Xander and Buffy with incredulous looks.

"There's two of them?" Xander asked.

Buffy shrugged.

"Well," said Gunn, "Like I said, we don't know where Angel is. He was last spotted over on the bluffs. But we might be able to help you anyways - what do you need?"

"Where do you keep the books?"

"The books?"

"Yeah. Mystical tomes. Demonology. Spellbooks. That sort of thing."

Gunn seemed to consider his response for a long moment. He seemed to have his doubts... but at length, he shrugged and headed off towards the office that had once belonged to Wesley. "Right this way."

"Well, shall we hit the books?" asked Buffy.

"Let's shall," said Xander.

As Gunn led Buffy and Xander off to hit the books, a boy about Dawn's age came walking into the lobby, absently brushing his hair out of his eyes. He glanced at Dawn, then to Fred, and then back to Dawn, this time obviously checking her out. After a moment, he smiled.

"Conner! Where have you been?"

The boy - Conner - glanced at Fred. "Out."

"We were worried."

Conner nodded. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't run off alone. You'd think I'd know that by now."

Fred smiled.

Conner glanced at Dawn. "Hello," he said, doing his very best to show her a charming smile.

"I'm Dawn," said Dawn, blushing faintly.

"As you may have heard," he said, gesturing towards Fred (who was doing her best to look like a vaguely disapproving mother), "I'm Conner."

"Can't say that I see any family resemblance."

Fred looked confused for a moment, and then blushed. "Oh, no. I'm not his mother. He's Angel's son."

Conner's smile melted away.

Dawn blinked. "Huh?"

"Not that Angel's his mother either. Because of course Angel couldn't be his mother. That'd be Darla."

Conner gave Fred an unreadable look.

"How exactly can two vampires have a kid?"

"I think it involves a dusty old prophecy, if that helps," said Gunn as he came back into the lobby. "Listen, um..."

"Dawn."

"Dawn, right. I got the other two set up in the other room. If you want to join them, feel free. Otherwise, I'll bet that Conner here might be willing to show you around."

Conner nodded.

Dawn looked towards the room where Buffy and Xander had set up, then to Conner. She smiled. "Lead the way."

As Conner led Dawn up the grand staircase, the phone rang, and Gunn was quick to answer it.

"Angel Investigations."

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"That's Fred's room," said Conner, pointing to the room immediately to their right as the walked down the corridors of the Hyperion hotel. "My room is over there." He pointed off in another direction.

Dawn nodded faintly, clearly bored with the tour, but making the best of it nonetheless.

Conner grew faintly uncomfortable. "Sorry. I'm not much good at giving tours."

"No, it's ok! You're doing great." Dawn paused, trying to think of what to say. "So... do you have any ghosts here?"

Conner shook his head. "Nah. I hear there was a Thesulac demon living here for a while, but they killed it before they moved in."

"Oh, I know that one. It's like a fear demon, right?"

"More towards the paranoia, I think."

"Right."

They walked on in silence for a few moments, neither one particularly comfortable with the other.

"So... you're Angel's son. When did that happen?"

"Less than a year ago."

Dawn blinked. "A year ago?"

Conner smiled wryly. "I'm not as old as I look, I guess."

"Me neither. So what's your story?"

"Besides being the only son of two vampires?" Conner shrugged. "Grew up in a demon dimension where time flows differently. You?"

"Turned into a human complete with memories and a family by a couple of monks to keep this psycho-bitch named Glory from using me to destroy the world."

"Oh," said Conner. He waited a beat before continuing. "You win."

Dawn smiled.

"So you're, what, Fluffy's sister?"

"Buffy."

"Right."

"Yeah, she's my sister. She's cool."

"Conner!" came Fred's voice from down the hall.

Conner turned towards the sound of the familiar voice. "Yeah?"

Fred approached the pair, holding a plate with two sandwiches and a glass of milk. "Brought you a snack."
"I'm not hungry."

"You're always hungry."
"What is it?"

Fred held up the plate. "Bologna. I brought one for you too, Dawn."

"No tomatoes?" Conner asked.

"No tomatoes."

Dawn took one of the sandwiches. "Thanks."

Conner reached for the tray, and Fred pulled it back. "What do you say?" she asked.

Conner looked at Fred. "Thank you."

"You're welcome."

He quickly grabbed the sandwich off the tray and tore into it.

"So how do you like the hotel, Dawn? Is Conner being a gentleman?"

Dawn nodded, and there was laughter in her eyes. "It's pretty cool. I wish I could have seen the Thesulac demon, though. What was it like?"

Fred shrugged. "Before my time."

Conner looked thoughtful for a moment. "Is he still mad?"

"What do you think?" Fred asked.

"Sorry."

Fred shook her head. "This boy has been through more than I can imagine," she said, speaking to Dawn. "Taken away by a vampire hunter named Holtz, and raised in a hell dimension..." She began speaking to Conner. "It must have been horrible. I know you're still hurting but - I promise, it's not nearly as much as you're gonna hurt for what you did to your father."

Conner stopped chewing his sandwich and looked up at Fred.

Dawn's eyes widened in shock as she watched Fred push a tazer up against Conner's chest and fire it off. Conner arced back in pain, and then fell to the ground.

Dawn began screaming a moment later.

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"Dawn, calm down."

"But she!" Dawn shrieked, in near hysterics. "She just jabbed him with the... for no reason! She just walked up and zapped him!"

"Dawn," said Buffy, looking into her sister's eyes, "Conner's the reason that Angel's been missing for the past three months. He put Angel in a box and then threw him into the ocean."

Dawn's expression was one of horror. "WHAT!? Why... why'd you let me go with him!? I LIKED him!"

"We didn't know," said Xander. He glanced towards the office, where Gunn and Fred were interrogating Conner. "They didn't know either. At least, they better not have."

"They got a phone call just after you went upstairs," said Buffy. "It was Wesley. You remember Wesley, right?"

Dawn nodded faintly. "The berk. Right."

Buffy's lips twitched into the faintest of smiles. "You heard about that? Well anyways, Wesley found Angel and is bringing him here. They should be here any minute. They still don't know what happened to Cordelia, but Fred and her boyfriend are trying to get that out of Conner."

Dawn visibly calmed, although she still seemed fairly distressed. She glanced towards the office. "... it's just... he seemed so NICE..."

Buffy sighed. "They always do."

The doors to the hotel opened, and in came Wesley and Angel. Except... wait, that was WESLEY? Dawn stared at the former Watcher in open shock as he strode confidently through the double doors, with one of Angel's arms draped over his shoulder as he helped the ensouled vampire down the steps into the lobby. Fred and Gunn came rushing out to meet them.

Wesley glanced towards Fred and Gunn. "I believe you're looking for this."

Angel raised his head weakly.

"Angel," said Fred, her voice filled with concern. "Oh my God."

Gunn and Fred hurried forward to help Wes take Angel over to the settee. Angel dropped onto the settee with a groan, his head rolling to the side against the headrest.

"Buffy...?" he asked weakly.

Wesley followed the line of Angel's gaze, and blinked. "Buffy?" he asked.

"Wesley," said Buffy with a nod. "When did you go all Marlboro Man?"

Wesley smiled, be it ever so faintly.

"So is he gonna be ok?"

Wesley nodded. "In time - maybe."

"Buffy..." Angel called, reaching towards her.

Buffy sat down next to him on the settee. "Long time no see," she said.

A look of distant amazement came to rest in Angel's eyes as he stared at the Slayer. He squinted, as though trying to see her clearly. "Buffy?" he asked. He sounded as though he didn't quite believe his eyes.

"I'm here."

Angel visibly relaxed, and his eyes slowly drifted shut. He fell over sideways, his head in her lap. And there he rested.

"I'm here."

(END CHAPTER 3)

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