Part 11
“I’m bored,” came the voice, for what felt like the 454th time that minute. Time passed slower in Skip’s dimension – this much was true – he’d just never been aware of how much time could actually drag when in the presence of an 18 year old girl. An 18 year old Cordelia Chase, to be precise. She was driving him crazy.
She’d watched through some kind of mystical whatsit as her older self poured way more angst on a situation than even she knew she had the ability to do and turned to Skip with fire in her eyes. “Are you seeing this?” She demanded, “Is your tiny, puny little demon brain registering what’s going on here?”
Skip had looked up, almost afraid for his life as her hands settled on her hips. He’d met demons by the score, yet none scared him as much as this version of Cordelia. “What?”
“Look at them!” She growled, yanking his mystical floaty TV thing and pushing it in front of him, “Just look.”
They walked side by side through the streets of Sunnydale, both not talking to each other, both frowning… Both lost in thought. The corners of Skip’s mouth twitched into what he hoped was a frown. He wasn’t sure what was pissing her off yet but he would – Cordelia being more vocal than most. “What happened?”
“You happened!” She snapped, “Or something happened! God, it’s like I can’t even have fun any more. Or at least the older version of me, anyway! For a while there it looked like maybe… I think she even smiled a couple of times but… Now look! Angstorama’s all round again. It’s like an episode of Passions only worse and that’s saying something.”
Skip sighed, “Didn’t I say you shouldn’t watch?”
“Which would work if that wasn’t *my* life she was ruining,” said Cordelia, pointedly, “I’m gonna have to moisturise for months to get rid of those frownlines. And those clothes! What good is a closetful of Prada if you’re gonna go round looking like you shop at PayLess?”
“In her defence,” Skip started, “She’s been through something these past couple of weeks.”
“Torture schmorture,” Cordelia frowned, throwing her hands up in the air, “She finally gets a little happy and she ruins it by telling him she’s going to die. What the hell is that?!”
Skip ran a hand over his face. This was way outside his area of expertise. He was told that if he sent Cordelia back, made her change the past then the future would just fall into place. So far, there was a giant question mark over both their heads – Angel’s and Cordelia’s. “What do you want me to say, Cordelia?”
“I don’t want you to say anything! I want you to start fixing it! You took me out of there and decided to give my life to the older way more sickeningly selfless version of me and she’s screwing everything up! How do I come back from that?”
For the first time that night, as the younger Cordelia looked at Skip, her mouth snapped shut. She didn’t speak again until she was sure what that look meant and had surprised Skip by her ability to read people, even then when she seemed less mature than her older self.
“You’re not sure I do.”
****
Cordelia’s heart felt bruised. It was a strange way to explain it, she guessed, since she’d been through so much these last few years. Losing all her money, Doyle, Angel during his Beige Let’s Hump Darla Period and then Connor when Holtz had kidnapped him to a whole other dimension.
Now this. Sunnydale again, to be precise. A future where the only thing she knew for certain was that her parents were going to soon run out of money – fast – and she’d have nothing. A couple of dresses, a Greyhound ticket, only this time the destination was going to be different.
She shoved her hands into her pockets as they walked, risking a glance at a stony-faced Angel every now and then to see if she could get what was going on underneath that overhanging forehead of his. So far, Cordelia had got nothing.
“So, uh, this is me,” she murmured, once they were standing outside her door. Her house was in darkness – Maria having long since left for the day, her parents floating somewhere in the Caribbean like their life wasn’t rapidly coming apart at the seams.
Part of her couldn’t believe she’d done that. Part of her was waiting for reality to kick in, for Angel to realise she’d lied, for Skip to show up with some quick-fix and her life to go back to normal. And the other part of her – the sensible part of her knew that this was her life now – there was no waiting. She watched Angel with a guarded expression, the way he would look anywhere but her eyes. “I guess I should–” she pointed indoors.
Angel nodded.
This was awkward. More awkward than the time he’d come back from killing a bunch of lawyers and being all morally ambiguous vampire guy. Even more awkward than the night after the ballet and thatt was saying something. This was– Downright unsettling, if Cordelia was honest, and she had no idea how to make it okay again. “I’ll, uh, see you around?”
Another nod.
Cordelia went to open her door, wondering if this was really what Skip’d had in mind when he’d sent her back here as Angel’s fingers closed gently around her wrist. She swallowed and turned back to him, the dull look in his eyes replaced with a sudden intensity that made her heart thump. “Angel?”
“If I could change it,” he started, “Would you–?”
“In a heartbeat.” She answered softly, unable to force herself to lie to him about this, “But I guess that’s what sucks about it.”
Angel dropped her wrist at that. He stood and watched as she slipped inside her house, heard the soft thump as she leant heavily against the door, her breath hitching. She was crying.
A moment later, Angel turned away, her words lifting him. In a heartbeat...
****
Over the course of the next couple of weeks, Cordelia flung herself into her schoolwork so hard, she was surprised she hadn’t left more bruises. She stopped hanging round with Buffy and her big group of Slayerettes.
Had called quits on the training she insisted she do with Giles – put her time to similar use and trained herself, remembering things Angel had shown her, taking lessons at the local gym.
The only time she visited the library was when schoolwork demanded it and even then she only stayed a few minutes, avoiding the questioning looks of a worried Giles.
Most of her clothes didn’t fit any more. It wasn’t that Cordelia was neglecting herself, it was that she was training now, getting fitter. Eating was a luxury that she only sometimes afforded and people had noticed. Her mother, for example, who’d bought a boatload of Band Candy last week and told Cordelia that if she wasn’t wearing her clothes, someone should.
Cordelia hadn’t said a word about that, though the trauma of seeing her mother in skin-tight leather wasn’t one she’d wanted repeated. When asked by Buffy if she’d known this was going to happen, Cordelia had replied along the same lines, telling her that if she’d known? She really really would have stopped it.
She’d seen Angel once since that night outside her house. She’d been jogging her way past the Espresso Pump, almost floored Angel for a second time that year with a round-house kick when he’d startled her, but this time he was too fast. He caught her leg and set her gently down, smiling somewhat tentatively as he rubbed the spot she’d hit last time.
“What are you, deficient?” she asked, annoyed at the way he’d caught her off guard, “We’re in Sunnydale and you skulk out of the shadows to scare the begeesus out of me? I’m way way too young for a heart attack.”
Her gaze softened as she took him in. He looked like– Well, hell, actually. Looked like he hadn’t slept in about a month. And by the looks of things he was taking in her appearance too, his gaze raking down her body until his smile settled to a frown.
“You’re getting thinner,” he accused, eyes flitting back up to her face.
“Just the compliment every girl needs to hear,” said Cordelia, waving him off, “You off to meet Buffy?” She kept her voice carefully neutral. Buffy had a spring in her step these days that Cordelia could only envy.
Angel shook his head, “Patrol.”
“Alone?” Cordelia’s surprise was palpable. They usually patrolled together.
He didn’t answer. Either he was meeting Buffy later – way later – and just didn’t want to admit it, or there was something going on. Something Cordelia would love to know about but never ask. “So, uh…”
She frowned. They’d never been good at small talk – not together. It had always been comfortable silence or the big Cordelia-trying-to-get-Angel-to-spank-his-inner-moppet conversations. Not small talk.
“How’s school?”
Cordelia looked up, surprised, “Are you making small talk?”
“Trying.”
“It’s okay,” she nodded, “Still a little weird though and I’m so very much not loving having to take Mr. Finkle’s Math class again. The guy spits at you from halfway across the room. Pays to be early and get a back-row seat I guess.”
Angel chuckled, staring at her for a little too long. “Buffy said you’re not there much now.”
“She did?” Cordelia raised an eyebrow. With everything that’d been going on these past few months, she was surprised Buffy mentioned her at all.
“Well I kinda figured that if I’m really changing stuff I have to, like, start how I mean to go on, y’know? And I wasn’t around much anyway, not before we graduated.” Okay, so that was down to Xander and Willow and their little indiscretion but Angel didn’t need to know that.
“So what happens after you graduate?”
“I don’t know,” Cordelia shrugged, “But that’s kind of exciting. In a total I-want-to-curl-up-in-a-ball kind of way. I guess I’m a little freaked by it.”
“Because you know what could happen,” Angel nodded, “Understandable.”
Cordelia sighed. When Angel had asked if things would be different if he changed it… She thought he might go ahead and actually try and change it. Not that she wanted him to. She’d protested that ’til she was blue in the face – in front of her mirror, lying in her bed. No good could ever come of her and Angel moving on after Graduation.
Getting to LA, meeting Doyle, Gunn, Fred… Her mouth twitched in exasperation. “Yeah. But that’s my deal, remember?”
“Cordy–“
“I’ve gotta go, Angel,” she told him, taking a step backwards. She had things to do anyway – discussions with her parents, a big-ass assignment to write for English. “I’ll talk to you soon, okay?”
And that had been that. Conversation over, small-talk ended, finished with. Considering the way it had gone, Cordelia was kind of glad she hadn’t seen him since, even though she missed him. She missed him so much sometimes it was weird not trying to see him, but she was getting by.
She was even kind of getting used to not being back home and seeing her friends every day until she saw Wesley in the school corridor looking more than a little lost, a bruise darkening the bottom of his eye.
He stood in front of a gaping Cordelia, smiled what he hoped was his most disarming smile, and asked, “Excuse me, could you point me in the direction of the library?”
“Wesley?” She blinked, completely forgetting that they’d never met before his arrival in Sunnydale. Damn.
“Ms. Summers?”
“What? Eww–I mean, no,” said Cordelia, finding old habits dying hard, “Why would you think I was Buffy?”
“Mr. Giles didn’t send you?” He looked perplexed. Cordelia wanted to hug the crap out of him.
“Oh… Yes! I mean– Welcome to Sunnydale.” Cordelia flustered, wondering what he was doing here. Giles hadn’t been fired yet, had he? Then again, she wasn’t exactly in the loop on these things. “You’re going to see Giles?” She asked, leading him down the corridor.
“We’re… Old friends.” He nodded, following dutifully behind her. His gaze lingered on the way her mouth turned upwards at the corners, like she was half-amused. It was almost like she recognised him from somewhere, though he couldn’t think how.
He’d never met anyone quite like her and he’d only been in her presence for a couple of minutes. “I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name, Ms–“
“Chase,” she smiled, “Cordelia Chase.”
“And you teach here?”
“Huh? Oh, God no. I’m a student,” she told him, holding the library door for him and noticing how he almost had heart failure. Whether that was her admission at being a student (and consequently jailbait back here) or the fact he hadn’t held the door for her, she’d never know.
“Giles?” He popped his head up from beneath the library counter and smiled at Cordelia before letting his gaze settle on Wesley, “Watcher Version Number Two,” she told him, lingering at the door, “Is something going on?”
Wesley paled a little, “She knows what we are?” A student, no less. He’d thought her job merely a pick-up and drop-off one, not that she’d be well-versed with the fact that they were both Watchers.
“Wesley, meet Cordelia,” said Giles, coming round to the other side of the counter to shake his hand, “She’s– Somewhat of a special case, I suppose.”
“Damn right,” Cordelia grinned, though if he thought he was deflecting her question at the possible happenings of Sunnydale, he was wrong, “Have you been fired?”
Both sets of eyes widened. It would be funny if Giles didn’t look so traumatised, “Fired?!” He spluttered, “What on earth makes you think that–“
“Breathe, Watcher Boy,” Cordelia held up a hand, “It’s not like you two get together all that often, is it? Besides, you see one Watcher, you think ‘fine’. You see two? You think ‘replacement’ and he does look a little younger than you.”
Giles frowned, “Thank you for that observation, Cordelia, will there be anything else?”
Cordelia sighed. She knew when she was getting the brush off. “Okay, but if it’s anything world ending? I have a right to know, since I saved us from that Judge guy.” With that, she turned and pushed open the library doors, heading out.
Wesley blinked, “Remarkable.”
“Cordelia?” Giles smiled a little, “You don’t know the half of it.” He ignored the way Wesley’s eyebrows rose, his expression turning a little more serious, “Have you heard anything?”
“No,” Wesley answered, his shoulder’s slumping, “Nothing. According to reports both Faith and Kakistos got here a few days ago but my contacts have heard nothing else. Yours?”
Giles shook his head, “Not much else, I’m afraid. I talked to Buffy about it this morning and she’s agreed to do the rounds, see if she can find something.”
“I’d appreciate that,” said Wesley, worried, “I wasn’t sure who else to call.”
“Calling the Council could have been detrimental to Faith’s well-being at this point,” Giles observed, leading Wesley through to the office and glancing pointedly to his cheek, “She’s unstable.”
Wesley sat down on one of the chairs against the wall and ran a hand over his face, wincing as he caught his eye, “After what she’s been through, who can blame her?”
Giles frowned. Hearing of the passing of a Watcher was never easy, but when it had been as brutal as Ms. Williams’ it was even harder. “She was there?”
Wesley nodded, “That’s why I’m so worried. She was aloof at best when I showed up but now…”
“We’ll find her,” Giles assured him, knowing that was all he could do right now.
****
“I’m not a fucking animal!” She screamed, “You can’t keep me in here!”
Faith was going nuts. She was on the wrong side of a wall of impenetrable glass, housed with a bunch of fucking demons no less, all in separate cells, being fed through a little hole in the wall that gave her water and bread every now and again. She’d done her time in juvey hall when she was a kid but this? Was a worldful of different.
For one, she was supposed to be fighting the things she was in here with, not hanging round in her big glass cell and watching them kick the shit out of their walls too. For two, those army types that grabbed her would walk past every now and then toting some serious weaponry should one of them try to escape and that wasn’t the half of it.
Every day at what Faith figured was the same time, they’d release some gas into the room. Every day, Faith held out for as long as she could but resistance was futile. It always ended up the same – her strapped to a bed all docile and shit while they poked her and prodded her with needles.
Faith hated it.
She’d reached Sunnydale three nights ago, had flown out of Boston like a bat out of hell when her new Watcher had shown up. Stuffy guy – seemed relatively okay until Faith realised that he was just another someone to lose. She’d cleaned him out – quite literally. Punched him once and wiped his clock for a good hour and a half, before heading off with everything he had in his wallet.
Buffy Summers. She’d heard him say the name a fair few times, knew of the only other living Slayer in existence down in Sunnydale and… That was where she’d headed. Determined to meet someone else like her, to meet the one girl who’d died and lived to tell the tale.
Faith, however, hadn’t reached her target. She’d been jumped while chasing some random vamp and though she was ashamed to admit it? They’d totally pulled one over on her – pulling out taser guns and slapping her down so hard, her head had actually rung for two days.
That just pissed her off more.
She heard the swish of the main doors opening and flung herself against the glass again, hoping this time it would bend and break under her weight. When it didn’t, Faith lifted herself, blood trickling down from a gash against her forehead.
She opened her mouth to scream some obscenity and froze as a familiar figure was wheeled into the cells.
At that point, the fight left Faith and she shrunk back, away from the glass as the gas started coming through again. “No,” she murmured, even when she saw Kakistos being wheeled into another cell.
Faith was terrified.
****
“A Slayer?” Forrest repeated, “I thought that was just a myth. Somethin’ these freaks told their offspring to make ’em go to bed on time. You sure she’s not just a demon?”
Riley shook his head, gravely, working his jaw where she’d clocked him three nights ago. “She’s no demon. Way I hear it there’s two in existence. One lives in Sunnydale, this one–“
“Just passing through?”
Riley nodded, “And when she wakes up again, we’re gonna have one pissed off Slayer on our hands.”
“You see the way she threw herself at that glass?” Forrest muttered, whistling long and low. He certainly didn’t wanna be the one to let her out in the open again.
Riley nodded again. He’d seen that. But he’d also seen the way she’d reacted when she’d laid eyes on the weird-looking vamp they’d caught the night after her and hands down, no exceptions, he’d never seen anyone look that afraid.