From Angel's Eyes: Part II

Darkness.
Guilt.
Agony.
"Buffy!" The scream of a tormented soul.
He belonged here.

Pain, pain -- a living breathing creature, it claws at him.
Lost in his guilt he almost missed her.

* * * * * * *

The road speeds by faster and faster. Taking her away from the pain. Leaving the heartache behind.

She nearly laughs out loud. As if the heartache she is feeling would somehow evaporate if she ran far enough away. Her lower lip trembles as the tears threaten again, beading on her eyelashes. Swallowing hard she fights to keep them from spilling over on to her cheeks. A slow tortuous journey. Swallow. Blink. Swallow. Blink. Her vision blurs and her throat burns with the unshed tears.

"Are you all right?" a gentle hand on her arm. The voice full of grandmotherly concern.

Buffy turns towards the voice just as the tears spill over. Swallowing the sob that lies just behind her lips she nods her head. "I'm fine, I'm just fine" she lies. She is anything but fine. Her hand reaches up to wipe away the tears, smearing her mascara in the process.

The woman reaches into her purse pulling forth a tissue and small pocket mirror. "Here," she says gently, placing the items in Buffy's hands.

Her kindness is nearly Buffy's undoing. Her heart twists. She longs to have someone hold her, wipe away her tears. Tell her everything is going to be all right.

Angel.

She whispers her thanks and holds the mirror close, wiping away the dark smudges from her cheeks and from beneath her eyes.

The woman watches as the young girl scrubs at her face. The pain is so evident within her that she finds her own eyes filling with tears. She's young, not more than sixteen or seventeen years old. Too young to have the weight of the whole world on her shoulders.

Buffy smiles her thanks, returning the mirror, glancing up as the woman's fingers tighten around her own. Her brown eyes are full of concern and they frown ever so slightly. An unspoken question and an offering of help.

For a moment his eyes stare back at her. Dark, with worry, concern and love.

She blinks and pulls back, her hand slipping from the woman's grasp. Her features tightening as her eyes grow dull. Hiding behind a mask of stone.Don't pity me. I don't need your pity. You don't know what I've done.

She turns her face to the window watching as the world speeds by.

A single tear slips down the woman's cheek.

* * * * * * * * * *

The memories returned slowly, sweet with their night of shared passion.

She was beautiful. Every inch of her a model of perfection in his eyes. Her initial fear replaced by infinite trust. So much love ... for him ... all for him.

Her kisses are urgent and demanding against his lips. Her breath like honey as it mingles with his own. His hands sliding against the delicate softness of her skin; breathing in the scent of her. His body, at last giving in to the demand, branding her his ... forever.

In the aftermath her eyes look at him full of love. Kissing her tender swollen lips, ever so gently. The shared whispers, held in each others arms. Her head nestling against his shoulder, eyes closing in sleep. Her hand slipping trustingly into his.

"I love you." Two hearts in perfect harmony.

"Buffy" he murmurs. His eyes closing against the pain evoked from the vivid memories. Tears slowly trickle down his cheeks as the onslaught continues.

He promised he would never hurt her. And then the nightmare began ...

The pain returns with savage intent offering no respite for his crimes. Tearing into him. Drowning him in guilt as he relives the pain he has caused her. His returned soul dying as he feels her tears again, seeing the torture he put her through. Falling to his knees, arms raised in supplication he screams her name. "Buffy! Buffy!"

Sobs wrack his body as the guilt devours him.

Tears, so many tears.

Unbidden to his mind Jenny's image rises, her eyes wide with fear, pleading for her life. Her desperate attempt to escape him thwarted at every turn. Giles comes to take her place. His face blind with grief and rage. Consumed with the need to wipe Angelus from the face of this earth. Theresa's innocent youth. Willow walking toward him without fear. Trusting him.

He sighs, his chin resting against his chest. Lost in his betrayal of their trust .

Lowering his head in his hands, Angel cannot shut out the image of her face. Her pain, her hurt. The heartache lying within the shadows.

Tormenting her ... it had been the icing on the cake. All those nights outside her window, listening to her call for him in her sleep. Forcing her to choose ... destroying her piece by piece, friend by friend, death by death. Pushing her into a corner with no escape except one.

The ultimate sacrifice ...

There had been no choice, he knew that now. His initial confusion over her actions replaced by the growing fear that the price extracted would be too great. The sacrifice her duty as Slayer demanded of her. Him.

Her anguish washed over him.

Angel knew her. He knew Buffy's need to run, to hide. To remove herself from a pain too enormous to face.

She would have run to him.

He screams with the realization that Buffy would blame herself for this turn of events. She tended to take circumstances beyond her control as personal failures. A failure on her part to live up to her slayer duties. Buffy would push herself sometimes to the brink of exhaustion, believing she could keep the world safe.

Their time together had given her the small slice of normalcy she longed for. He kept her in tune with her human frailties. Refusing to let her take the necessary risks alone. Saving the world didn't mean sacrificing herself but it did mean sacrificing him.

He was after all a vampire, a creature of the night. A demon who long ago relinquished his right to be human. He chose the dark path he followed. Once intrigued by Darla's promise of immortality he shunned death when it lay at his door. He never dreamed the price for life would be this nightmare existence he now endured.

He never dreamed he'd fall in love.

He loved her.

From the moment he had first set eyes on her. He felt a connection deep within himself. A force so strong it was impossible to ignore. The empty void had been filled. He hadn't understood it then, he didn't now. To be truthful he had long ago stopped trying. He couldn't imagine his existence without her. However unnatural that existence was, she was a part of his world and he hers. A perfect fit.

It had never been his intention to get so close to her. He had only hoped to keep her safe, offer advice from time to time. Help to stem the flow of evil as his brethren permeated her world. An unconscious effort on his part to atone for the atrocities of the past.

But from the beginning she had broken all the rules. She had weaved her way into his heart. The Slayer had looked beyond the demon ... and found an Angel. The gypsies may have cursed him with the return of his soul but she gave him back his humanity. Forgiving him his past. Pulling him from the dark despair that encompassed all his waking moments, penetrating into his nightmares. Within her arms he had found refuge.

She loved him.

He fought it. Keeping his distance, pushing her away. And still she persisted. Breaking down his resolve, wearing him down as he fought a losing battle. Like a moth to the flame he was drawn to her. Finding a multitude of reasons to be at her side.

In the end he succumbed, too battle weary to fight any longer. Despite his better judgment he fell in love with her.

Angel closed his eyes, shutting them tight as her face came into view again. Her eyes swimming with tears. The eloquence of her love shining from their depths, a reflection of his own.

Angel saw it all again. The last image of her seared forever in his mind. Her eyes full of love, the anguish on her face ... and the imminent death of her spirit as she sent him to hell.

* * * * * * * * * *

She hurt. A hurt so deep it shut out everything else. Her world lay in ruins, destroyed by her own hand. The joy in life savagely stripped from her. All she had wanted was a normal life. And now what little normalcy she had clung to she'd lost. What was the point? Everything she touched she destroyed.

The glass is cool against her forehead and Buffy closes her eyes, willing her mind to remain empty. No thoughts, no images shattering the little moment of peace she has found, however fleeting. But she can't keep them at bay forever. They haunt her, awake or asleep.

Squeezing her eyes shut she embraces the darkness as it seeks to claim her. She no longer has the strength to fight the demons set out to destroy her. Her savior, Angel, is lost to her forever. No curse or spell can bring him back. She walks with the dead.

Sweet oblivion. Opening her arms, she welcomes it.

* * * * * * * * * *

Angel can feel her slipping away. The connection between them so strong even the gates of hell can not separate them. She was giving up the fight, her strength ebbing. Her spirit dying. The reason for living gone.

Trying to obliterate the pain is as useless as trying to wipe the joy of loving her from his mind. He can't do it. So intertwined are their souls; her pain was his own.

He was in real danger of losing her this time but not from some vampire or Tarakan assassin, not some dark power rising from the hellmouth. No, this time he was in danger of losing her to something he had never thought to protect her from. Herself. That she would somehow take on the guilt he carried as her own. He had never counted on that.

"Buffy." Her name is little more than a whisper on his lips. He is cold ... so cold ... even the fires of hell can not chase the chill from his heart. She needed him. He needed her. "It wasn't your fault my love, none of it is your fault. It's always been me ..."

She would not destroy herself because of him, he would not let that happen. He would find a way out of hell if he had to make a pact with the devil himself.

"I'll find a way back to you sweetheart, I'll find a way back to you." An angel's solemn vow.

"I love you."

* * * * * * * * * * * *

  Startled from sleep, heart beating rapidly in her chest, Buffy blinks, her eyes slowly adjusting to the inky blackness surrounding her. She is exhausted. The battle raging within her sapping her strength. The cold hand of despair clenching once again over her heart, drawing the guilt and painful past to her like a magnet.      

Moments ago Angel's voice had filled her head, his remembered whispers, * I love you*, striking at her heart, dragging her from sweet slumber to reality. How long will the nightmares go on? How long before she can forgive herself for what she had to do?      

Wearily she leans her head against the window searching the night for some kind of solace.      

"Angel ..."

  In the far off distance a small pinpoint of light appears on the horizon ... beckoning.

end

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