Rating: R for language
Archive: anywhere you like, just let me know
Spoilers: everything up to and including "To Shanshu in L.A."
Summary: Angel's attempt to keep his friends safe forever may lead them into the greatest danger of all.
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Captive of the Soul
by Yahtzee
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CHAPTER SEVEN
"He's coming around."
"If he isn't fully conscious --"
"Hearing's the first sense to return." A chime sounded twice. Angel opened his eyes, and wakefulness and light and something far deeper flooded into him all at once. Blinking, he looked up into the two faces above him -- Wesley's pale one and Father Augustine's dark one -- and felt an all-too-familiar moment of confusion. Where was he? Cordelia's living room -- strange, he wasn't supposed to be there. Oh, the exorcism; were they done?
And memory came rushing in. And then shame. Angel shut his eyes again. "Oh, God."
"Angel?" Wesley asked. "How do you feel?"
For a long moment, Angel could not reply, could not even open his eyes to look at his friend. "How's Cordelia?" he finally managed.
"She's all right," Wesley said gently. "Concussion, muscle strain in her back and, she says, one particularly nasty bruise. It's in an area she won't show me."
"And you?"
"I'm fine. Bruised my ribs again. That's all," Wesley said. "Please don't worry."
"Worry," Angel said, his voice cracking on the word. "That doesn't begin to describe it."
"Angel," Father Augustine said, "I realize that this is a difficult moment for you, but I must ask: do you wish to attempt the exorcism again? Because if you do, the sooner we try it --"
"No," Angel said. "It's not worth the risk."
After a pause, Father Augustine quietly said, "I agree. The demon within you spoke truth, Angel. It is in its rightful place. To attempt to remove it was --"
"Insane?" Angel asked, opening his eyes to accept the priest's condemnation.
Instead he saw Father Augustine shake his head slowly. "Courageous, I would say. But perhaps futile. And not worth risking innocent lives."
"Thank you for trying, Father," Wesley said.
Father Augustine shook his head slightly. "No need. I do my duty. If you need me again, do not hesitate to call."
As the priest bustled out, Angel slowly turned his head to look at Wesley, who was standing next to the couch, looking down at him with an unreadable expression. Finally, Angel said, "I don't know what to do besides ask you to forgive me."
"That's all you need to do," Wesley said. "Angel, listen to me: it's all right. Really. We knew what we were getting into."
Angel shook his head. "You told me I shouldn't do this. I did it anyway. And whatever you signed up for didn't include almost getting killed."
"After seeing Angelus again, I can tell you that I can't blame you for wanting to be rid of him once and for all."
"Him," Angel repeated quietly. "Where's Cordelia?"
"Asleep in her room," Wesley said, gesturing toward her closed door. "The doctor wanted her in bed. Of course, we've got to wake her every four hours to make certain her head is all right." He knelt beside the sofa and held out a small key. "Here. Let me get those cuffs off."
Angel allowed himself to be unshackled, looked at the cracked skin on his wrists as they were freed from their steel. "Is Kate --"
"Unharmed and unknowing," Wesley said. "Though I believe her suspicions have been heightened, if such a thing were possible."
"Great," Angel sighed. He sat up slowly and looked over at Wesley again. This time he was able to take in Wesley's pallor, the shaded expression in his eyes. "You need some rest," Angel said.
"Wouldn't mind that at all," Wesley said. "The sleeping bag is already out, actually. So if you wouldn't mind waking Cordelia in two hours -- she said she wanted to speak to you as soon as possible --"
"Wes, take the couch," Angel said quickly.
"No, no," Wesley said. "Not my turn." He paused before adding, "You don't have anything to make up to me."
Angel sighed and put his forehead in his hand. "Wes --"
"If you did have anything to make up to me," Wesley said, in a odd, rushed voice, "it would be because those things he said were real. And we both know that they weren't. And besides, it wasn't even you. And so there's no need to discuss any of it any further, is there?"
When Angel looked up again, Wesley was trying to smile. The attempt wasn't working that well, but in that moment it struck Angel as exceptionally brave. He could only reply, "No, I guess not."
"All right, then," Wesley said, his relief evident. As he stretched out on the sleeping bag, he genuinely seemed to relax; Angel watched him quickly drift into an exhausted, and hopefully dreamless, sleep.
Two hours of fitful napping and sinking dread later, Angel stood beside Cordelia's bed. She was splayed out on her back, long hair across the pillow, looking not unlike the figure he had so roughly shoved to the ground only hours ago. He reached out to touch her shoulder and gently shake her awake, but stopped when he saw the bruises on her arms -- the shadow images of his hands.
Angel took his hand away and whispered, "Cordelia?"
She stirred immediately, opening her eyes wide. "Angel. You're back."
"If that's what you'd call it," Angel said. "How do you feel?"
"Good," Cordelia said, slowly propping herself up on one elbow. "The vision does not blur; the head does not hurt more. So I'm good. In a couple minutes, I have to walk around some. Gonna help with that?"
Angel looked down for a moment, then knelt by the side of the bed. "Cordelia, I'm so sorry."
"It's okay," she said, reassuring him as quickly as Wesley had. "I meant what I said to that -- that -- bully. He can say what he wants, do what he wants, but he's the weak one, Angel. Don't forget that."
There isn't any he, Cordelia. There's only me. That's what you don't want to understand.
That was what Angel wanted to say. But the need in her eyes kept him silent. She needed to believe that Angelus was some prisoner in a cage, who came out to rattle the bars now and again. He knew, by now, that she could never accept that the demon was much or more a part of him than his soul. Wesley, who had every reason to know better, persisted in the belief too -- despite all his education, all his evidence. And Angel needed to let them believe what they wanted to believe, because that was the price of his acceptance here -- his home, his friends, everything that made his existence worthwhile. No matter how many times he undermined their friendship, it could always be rebuilt on the foundation of this one, simple pretense.
Angel would have thought that you could not build happiness upon a lie. But, as he nodded at her and saw her trusting face spread into a genuine smile, he decided he had been wrong about that.
"You were terrific," Angel said. "That took guts, luring me close like that."
"Many unkind and true things have been said about me over the years," Cordelia sighed, "but never that I lacked nerve."
"True and true," Angel said. "Can I do something for you? Do you need -- breakfast? Juice? The July Vogue?"
"Nah," she said. "I still have some serious catching up to do with the sleep. We'll take our stroll, and then it's back to REMsville for me."
Angel returned her smile as he reached up to brush a bit of hair from her face. And that moment -- the intimacy of it, the nearness of their bodies, their faces, here in her bedroom -- reminded him that not everything could be put away so easily. "We ought to talk about what I said -- what he said about the two of us."
Cordelia visibly flinched, but she did not hesitate before she answered, "I know nothing's ever gonna happen with you and me. I always knew that. So it's not like I had my hopes up or something."
"No, it can't ever happen," Angel said. "That's my misfortune. It shouldn't be yours."
Cordelia sighed heavily and said, "I HATE Gypsies." Her voice was so sincere that Angel had to laugh for a moment. She brightened at the sound and smiled at him with a touch of her old playfulness. "I mean, think about it. I'd make you so happy so fast we wouldn't even have time to blink before your soul was outta there."
Before he could talk himself out of it, Angel leaned forward and quickly kissed her forehead. "I don't doubt it."
*****
"Are you any closer to your answers?"
Angel gratefully looked away from the cross at the front of the church to see the nun sitting placidly beside him. "How do you know I'm looking for answers?"
"Everyone is," she said. "And I would imagine that you have more questions than most."
They sat side by side for a while longer as Angel stared the cross down once more. How long had it taken him to acquire the maturity, the courage to do this? A century? More like two --
He'd left Cordelia and Wesley at the apartment. Cordelia was staying put in bed, although she had recovered sufficiently to flip through her Vogue and gripe about missing her commercial audition that afternoon. Wesley had roused enough to cook dinner for her; in the process, he had been inspired to rearrange a few things in the kitchen and had awakened Dennis' ire. After some pots had been thrown around, they had all three agreed that the time to divert their money toward separate apartments had come. "Dennis really needs his space," Cordelia had said from behind her bed tray, so easily that Angel knew, if it were up to her, the two of them might have camped on her floor forever.
But those days were ending. Angel told himself to think little of it. He had long ago given up believing that anything was permanent. Besides, he needed a little space of his own.
Maybe that explained why he'd ducked out of the house tonight. But he was not sure why he had come here, unless it was to challenge himself this one last way. To prove he had at least this much control, and that he could keep staring up at that cross.
"No matter what I've done, what I try to do, it still turns me away," Angel said. "What answer should I take from that?"
"Does the cross turn you away?" the nun said. "Or is it something within you that turns away?"
"It doesn't seem to make much difference," Angel said. "And I know that you spoke the truth before. This is the symbol of God's love. And this love that's supposed to claim the whole world -- there's no place in it for me."
"God's love comes to us in many forms," the nun said. "And it comes to everyone. The challenge is to recognize it."
"I don't know about that," Angel said, turning away from the cross at last. He pulled his coat around him as he rose to go. "God understands what I am."
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THE END
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