Ficlet: Does Forever Work For You?

[beer_good_foamy]

A couple of wins - yay! Thanks!



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Also, I just discovered that I completely forgot to post this here. It's something as unusual for me as a somewhat serious Angel ficlet. Originally it was an edited scene from an long but increasingly confusing fic I wrote and keep cannibalizing (Some Velvet Morning When I'm Straight came from that one too). Anyway, this got third place for the Angel month over at good__evil, so again - YAY!

Title: Does Forever Work For You?
Author: Beer Good (beer_good_foamy)
Rating: PG13
Word Count: ~650
Characters/Pairing: Angel/Buffy, Angel/Darla
Timeline: AtS s2/s3
Summary: Only in dreams...

Does Forever Work For You?

Tibet.

Serenity. Piece of mind. Calm.

Every day was made up of meditation, hard work, and lots of others who had come here to get away from something. No questions, no blame.

And every night he'd go back to his cell, lie down and -

Angel? Time to wake up.

Where was he? Dark, dank, stone slabs... a crypt. Another dead place, right, you never run out of those. Literally; as he looked around, he realised there wasn't a door. And he wasn't alone.

She was just a shadow, barely visible, lying on top of a large sarcophagus. As she seductively turned over on her side he caught a glimpse of golden hair and somehow he knew she was smiling at him.

"Buffy?" No answer. "...Darla?"

Can't even tell us apart anymore, huh? She sounded like two women laughing at once; one young, one very old. And the voices weren't coming from her, they were... everywhere. Not that it made any difference... I mean, we're both dead.

"You saved me... I'm so sorry I couldn't do the same for you."

Oh, but you saved so many, I mean that's gotta count for something, right? Handsome broody man saves damsels from monsters... Faces paraded before him, a long line of people he barely recognised anymore... Funny how it was always easier to remember the ones he'd killed. All of them are alive because of you. Does that make up for not saving me? Even after they brought me back? You said you loved me, Angel, but where were you? I needed help, I waited, but you never... A slight shift, the girlish voice growing huskier, more sensual. ...you never loved her anymore than you loved me, did you Angelus? You loved what she made of you, what she gave you... just like me.

"No. I love -"

Who?

"I love you, Buffy, and I would have given anything to help you..."

Laughter. Angel, the easiest thing in this world is to die, between the three of us we've done it enough times to know that you don't need any help with that. You keep on saving those who don't matter...

"They all matter. Every single one."

That what you keep telling yourself? Buffy's voice again, mostly. Because I gotta say, Champ, I don't see you torturing yourself like this over, oh, say... Miss Calendar, or officer Lockley, or any of the thousands of others you killed or allowed to die. It's always me, the one who made something of you, gave you a purpose... You were always useless on your own. Yet you couldn't save me from
(Wolfram & Hart)
(The Master)
(Drusilla)
(Glory)
(You)
(Me)
And no matter what you do, how many people you rescue, how much you sacrifice, you'll never be able to change that. In the end, you're always alone, right here with us. She stepped into the thin shaft of light coming from the ceiling, and he saw her face... what was left of it. Just death, bone and decay, and no matter how hard he looked he couldn't tell who she was now. Their voices were one and the same, echoing and doubling in his head. Come on, lover... give us a kiss.

"This isn't real. It's just a dream."

Oh, of course. Just keep telling yourself that every time you close your eyes. After all, you're immortal. You have an eternity to practice.

Every morning at breakfast, he'd look around at the other monks. He wondered if any of them had forgotten why they came here. He wondered if any of them slept.