THE ANGEL CHRONICLES, Vol. 2

by Richie Tankersley

  Drusilla nudged him gently, her eyes glowing with anticipation.

  “Spike, the moon is rising. It’s time.”

  She melted against him as he wrapped a protective arm about her.

  “Too bad, Angelus,” Spike said smugly. “Looks like you go the hard way—along with the rest of this miserable town.”

  CHAPTER 22

  Buffy slammed Willy into the bar while Kendra paced restlessly nearby.

  “Honest!” Willy insisted. “I don’t know where Angel is!”

  “How about this ritual tonight?” Buffy said sharply. “What have you heard?”

  “Nothing. It’s all hush hush—”

  Kendra was growing more impatient. “Just hit him, Buffy.”

  “She likes to hit,” Buffy reminded the bartender.

  “You know,” Willy held up a tentative hand, “maybe I did hear something about this ritual. Yeah, it’s coming back to me. But I’d—I’d have to take you there.”

  Buffy let him drop to the floor. She started dragging him toward the exit. “Let’s go.”

  But Kendra hesitated “First, we must return to the Watcher.”

  “Excuse me?” Buffy stopped in disbelief. “While we run to Giles, the whole thing could go down—”

  “But, it is procedure—”

  “It’s brainless, you mean! If we don’t go now, Angel could be history.”

  “Is that all you’re worried about?” Kendra drew herself up indignantly. “Your boyfriend?”

  “It’s not all,” Buffy threw back. “But it’s enough.”

  Kendra looked disgusted. “It’s as I feared. He clouds your judgment. We can’t stop this ritual alone—”

  “He’ll die—”

  “He’s a vampire. He should die! Why am I the only person who sees it?”

  Kendra’s patience was at an end. As she squared off with Buffy, she saw the look of pure coldness on Buffy’s face. The facts had hit her hard, and Kendra knew it.

  He’s a vampire. He should die.

  Without another word, Buffy grabbed Willy by the scruff of the neck and shoved him ahead of her out the door.

  Frustrated, Kendra watched them leave. “Are you that big a fool?” she called.

  Buffy looked back at her one last time. With hatred and murder in her eyes.

  “Good riddance, then,” Kendra muttered.

  Buffy didn’t hear the parting remark. Her thoughts, her heart, her entire focus was on Angel.

  She followed Willy through a maze of dark streets. They were in the oldest section of town now, a veritable graveyard of condemned buildings, forgotten neighborhoods, and deserted shops. Leading her several more blocks, Willy suddenly stopped in front of an old abandoned church. He looked back at Buffy, then led her inside.

  Buffy found herself in a shadowy vestibule. Her footsteps echoed hollowly across the floor, and her breathing whispered harshly into the shadows.

  Willy guided her forward toward a thick bank of shadows in the corner.

  “Here you go,” Willy said. “Don’t ever say your friend Willy don’t come through in a pinch.”

  Buffy was right on his heels. She wasn’t expecting the shadows to part, wasn’t expecting the four strange figures who suddenly materialized from the darkness.

  Xander’s Mr. Pfister, the Police Lady, two of Spike’s henchmen . . .

  Before Buffy could react, they surrounded her.

  Willy turned to one of the vampires with an oily grin.

  “Here you go,” Willy said. “Don’t ever say your friend Willy don’t come through in a pinch.”

  CHAPTER 23

  The ritual was nearing its peak.

  Torchlight flickered through the church, reflecting eerily off grimy stained-glass windows. Shadows crouched in silent benediction across the floor. And as Spike swung the censer, breathing in its mystical smoke, he read grandly from the decoded manuscript.

  “Eligor, I name thee,” Spike intoned. His ghoulish vampire face was transfixed, enraptured with the evil of the spell. “Bringer of war, poisoners, pariahs, grand obscenity!”

  Angel and Drusilla stood before him. In the center of the high altar they stood swaying, face to face, tied tightly together by leather straps. Drusilla was gowned in regal black. Tilting her head, she gazed up into Angel’s face, her expression wild and dreamily expectant.

  “Eligor, wretched master of decay, bring your black medicine. Come restore your most impious, murderous child.”

  With black-gloved hands, Spike lifted the relic. He pulled at the base of the cross, unsheathing a hidden dagger. Stepping up to the altar, he bestowed a malevolent smile on the couple.

  He grabbed Angel’s hand, which was bound to Drusilla’s. He lifted both hands into the air, and his voice grew louder now, trembling with unrestrained passion.

  “From the blood of the sire she is risen! From the blood of the sire shall she rise again!”

  With one swift movement, Spike plunged in the dagger. The blade sliced completely through both their hands, binding them with a rush of blood and a supernatural force that flowed powerfully, frighteningly between them.

  Angel let out a tortured scream. Drusilla writhed in exquisite agony, savoring her wound.

  Joyfully, Spike clapped his hands, watching the magick sparkle and lance the air around them.

  “Right then!” he announced. “Now we let them come to a simmering boil, then remove to a low flame—”

  He whirled around as the doors behind him crashed open. To his dismay he could see Willy coming toward him and Buffy being dragged, surrounded on all sides by his evil minions. Spike stared at them in appalled silence.

  “It’s payday, pal,” Willy swaggered up. “I got your Slayer.”

  Spike snapped out of his shock. He advanced on Willy, seething.

  “Are you tripping? You bring her here—now?”

  While the two of them argued, Buffy frantically searched the shadows. At first she thought Angel wasn’t here at all, but then she spotted the altar with its grisly display.

  Buffy felt sick inside.

  Angel . . .

  Angel was so far gone, he didn’t even know she was here.

  “You said you wanted her—” Willy began, but Spike cut him off.

  “In the ground, pinhead! I wanted her dead!”

  Willy was getting nervous. “Now—now that’s not what I heard. Word was, there was a bounty on her, dead or alive—”

  “You heard wrong, Willy.”

  “Angel,” Buffy whispered.

  In the momentary lull, Spike heard her. He followed the direction of her gaze.

  “Yeah,” Spike’s voice dripped with false sympathy, “it bugs me, too, seeing them like that. Another five minutes and Angel’ll be dead though, so I forbear.”

  He paused for a moment. His face was mocking.

  “But don’t feel too bad for Angel. He’s got something you don’t have.”

  “What?” Buffy asked.

  “Five minutes. Patrice?”

  Immediately the policewoman raised her gun to Buffy’s head. Buffy steeled herself for the blast, but the explosion she heard came suddenly, unexpectedly, from another part of the room.

  The church doors burst open, one flying from its hinges as Kendra did a handspring across the floor. Before anyone could react, she smashed into the policewoman and knocked her down, dislodging the gun so it skidded away.

  “Who the hell is that?” Spike demanded.

  As his henchmen glanced around in confusion, Buffy shook them off.

  “It’s your lucky day, Spike,” she said.

  Kendra attacked him from behind. “Two Slayers!”

  Her punch sent Spike spinning toward Buffy.

  “No waiting.” Buffy punched him harder, spinning him back again.

  Kendra moved in for another blow, but this time Spike ducked, distracting her with fisticuffs as the policewoman headed for Buffy. Stilettos popped out from the sleeves of her uniform, gleaming wickedly in the torch
light.

  The other vampires closed in.

  As they made a grab for Buffy and Kendra, one of them pitched forward with an arrow in his back. Behind him stood Giles, crossbow in hand, flanked by Willow and Xander who were both armed. Xander let out a yell.

  “Hey, larva boy!”

  Mr. Pfister turned around. He fixed Xander with a bland smile.

  “That’s right,” Xander taunted. “I’m talking to you—you big cootie.”

  As Mr. Pfister started toward him, Xander raced for the foyer and shut the heavy oak door. Immediately Mr. Pfister shed his human form and collapsed into a squirming mass of worms.

  Xander and Cordelia were ready.

  As the worms began streaming under the portal, Cordelia jumped up to admire her handiwork. She’d spread a thick layer of liquid adhesive across the floor, and the worms stuck fast.

  “Welcome, my pretties,” Xander gave a mad cackle. “Mwa haa haa!”

  Immediately he began stomping. Cordelia hesitated, then began stomping, too—gingerly at first, but finally with unabashed enthusiasm.

  “Die!” Cordelia shouted, stomping her cross-trainers into the adhesive. “Die! Die!”

  Xander gazed down at the squishy floor. “I think he did, Cordy.”

  They could hear the fierce sounds of battle coming from the other side of the door.

  They stomped harder.

  Not far from the altar Kendra was holding her own against Spike. She’d always been fast, but Spike was much more powerful. After several crippling blows he had her on the defensive, while Buffy was too busy with Police Lady to help. Buffy was using all her best moves but only narrowly escaping the slash of those deadly knives. She looked over at Kendra and yelled.

  “Switch!”

  The two Slayers moved back to back. As though some secret signal had been given, Buffy grabbed Kendra by the arms, and the two of them did a tandem flip. Kendra flew straight into the policewoman; Buffy landed right in front of Spike.

  “Rather be fighting you anyway.” Spike smiled.

  “Mutual.”

  The remaining vampire took a swing at Giles, knocking the crossbow from his hands. As the two of them started wrestling, Willow jumped on the vampire’s back.

  Buffy hurled Spike into the wall. As Willy tried to escape that way, Spike reached out and grabbed him.

  “Where are you going?”

  Willy’s mind raced. “There’s a way in which this isn’t my fault.”

  “They tricked you,” Spike guessed.

  “They were duplicitous!” Willy agreed, outraged.

  “Well,” Spike soothed him, “I’ll only kill you just this once.”

  But then he saw Buffy.

  She had climbed up onto the altar and was clasping the handle of the knife. She was trying desperately to pull it from Angel’s and Drusilla’s hands.

  Spike tackled her from behind. The two of them crashed to the floor.

  Seeing his chance, Willy bolted. He ran past Giles and Willow, who were finishing off a victim of their own.

  “Hold him steady!” Willow insisted. As Giles obligingly held the struggling vampire, Willow drove a stake through its heart. The vampire promptly exploded all over Giles. Willow hastily wiped the dust off Giles’s clothes.

  Willy heard the vampire scream as he died, but he kept on running. He nearly collided with Xander and Cordelia as they raced in to join the others.

  Beneath the organ loft, Kendra and the policewoman were still at it, full force. As Kendra once more managed to sidestep the knives, Police Lady shoved her, sending her back into a wooden beam. Kendra scrambled up again quickly. A fine sifting of dust settled down on her shoulders, and she glanced up at the loft. She could see now that the beam was supporting the entire organ loft, and that the whole thing was wobbling dangerously.

  In that split second of distraction, Police Lady lunged. She sliced Kendra’s arm, drawing blood.

  Kendra stared down at the sleeve of her shirt.

  “That’s my favorite shirt,” she said angrily. Then, thinking a moment, “That’s my only shirt!”

  She came at Police Lady in a hail of blows, finally knocking her under the organ loft at the back.

  Up on the altar, Spike had managed to get in a good, hard punch at last. While Buffy regrouped, he looked around at what was happening. He was clearly outnumbered. Pausing only an instant, Spike grabbed the dagger and pulled it out. Then he cut the bonds and caught Drusilla as Angel fell to the floor.

  “Sorry, dear, we gotta go.” Spike swept Drusilla into his arms. “Hope that was enough . . .”

  Seizing a torch by the altar, he hurled it at Buffy’s pals. The torch missed but fell to the floor, landing on a pile of old curtains. The pile instantly burst into flames.

  He had to get Dru out. Moving swiftly, Spike carried her to the rear of the church, back behind the fire and toward the organ loft.

  But Buffy had recovered now. Furiously she sprang to her feet, grabbing the censer and swinging it over her head, round and round.

  She threw it as hard as she could, clear across the room.

  It slammed into the back of Spike’s head.

  Stumbling forward, he hit the beam beneath the organ loft. A long, low groan vibrated through the air. And then the loft crashed down, burying Spike and Drusilla beneath it.

  Buffy stared at the spot where Spike had been standing. “I’m good . . .” she said proudly.

  “She’s good,” Kendra echoed, as though Buffy’s friends needed convincing.

  Buffy turned back to the altar. As the others watched through the thickening smoke, she knelt beside Angel, cradling him in her arms. She lay one hand gently upon his cheek. She stroked his face, his neck, his hair, trying to comfort him, even though she wasn’t sure he could even hear.

  “It’s gonna be okay,” she promised, over and over again. “It’s gonna be okay . . .”

  Angel’s eyelids fluttered open. “Buffy?” he whispered.

  Buffy’s eyes filled with tears. Kendra moved in next to her.

  “Let’s get him out,” Kendra said quietly.

  Together they supported Angel and headed for the door. The fire blazed behind them, growing in intensity, creeping slowly toward the rubble of the organ loft.

  CHAPTER 24

  As Willow entered the school lounge the next day, she spotted Oz at the snack machine. His arm was in a sling, and as he saw her come in, his face instantly brightened.

  “Oh. Hey,” Oz greeted her. He took a box from the machine and held it out to her. “Animal Cracker?”

  “No, thanks,” Willow smiled. “How’s your arm?”

  “Suddenly painless.”

  “You can still play guitar okay?”

  Oz shrugged. “Not well, but not worse.”

  They started walking down the hall. Oz was having trouble getting his box of Animal Crackers open. Willow was trying to decide how to say what she wanted to say.

  “You know,” she took the plunge. “I never really thanked you.”

  Oz looked mildly alarmed. “Please don’t. I don’t do thanks. I get all red and I have to bail. It’s not pretty.”

  “Then forget about—that thing,” Willow nodded. She took the box from him, opened it up, and handed it back again. “Especially the part where I kind of owe you my life—”

  “Look,” Oz interrupted, embarrassed. He pulled a cookie from the box. “Monkey. And he has a little hat. And pants.”

  Again Willow smiled, amused by his avoidance tactic.

  “Yeah,” she said. “I see.”

  “The monkey is the only cookie animal that gets to wear clothes, you know that?” Oz informed her, and then in the very next breath, “You have the sweetest smile I’ve ever seen.”

  Willow was pleasantly startled, but Oz kept talking.

  “So I’m wondering,” he gave a slight frown, “do the other cookie animals feel sort of ripped? Like, is the hippo going, man, where are my pants? I have my hippo dignity.”

&
nbsp; Laughing, the two of them continued down the hall.

  Xander was heading down the hallway, too, when he spotted Cordelia. As their eyes made contact, each one turned and headed in the opposite direction. Then Xander stopped. He turned back around and ran to catch up with her.

  “We need to talk,” Xander said seriously.

  Before Cordelia could answer, he hustled her into an empty classroom.

  They stood apart from each other—a good distance apart. Both folded their arms.

  “Okay,” Xander began, “here’s the deal. There is no reason for us to run every time we see each other in the halls.”

  “Right.” Cordelia nodded emphatically. “Okay.” She thought a moment, then added, “Why shouldn’t we run?”

  Xander took a deep breath. “What happened. There is a total explanation for it—”

  “You’re a pervert?”

  “Me?” Xander looked shocked. “I seem to recall that I was the jumpee, my friend—”

  “As if! You’ve probably been planning this for months—”

  “Right. I hired a Latvian Bug Man to kill Buffy so I could kiss you!” Xander’s tone was incredulous. “I hate to burst your bubble, but you don’t inspire me to spring for dinner at Bucky’s Fondue Hut.”

  “Fine,” Cordelia fired back. “Whatever. The point is, don’t ever try it again—”

  “I didn’t try it! Forget the bugs. Just the memory of your lips on mine makes my blood run cold—”

  “If you dare breathe a word of this—”

  “Like I want anyone to know!”

  Cordelia tossed her head. “Then it’s erased?”

  “Never happened,” Xander said firmly.

  “Good.” Cordelia smirked.

  “Good!”

  They fell wildly into each other’s arms.

  Outside Sunnydale High, Buffy and Kendra were walking toward the street.

  “Thank you for the shirt,” Kendra said. She was wearing one of Buffy’s tops, and it fit surprisingly well. “It is very generous of you.”

  Buffy smiled at her. “Oh, hey, it looks better on—well, me, but don’t worry.”

  There was ease between them now, a comfortable sort of camaraderie. Kendra even smiled at the insult.