Sample for watcher_pryce, S5
We’d joined Wolfram and Hart. I’m still not sure why, I do remember Lilah. I remember trying to break her contract and her telling me that fire didn’t burn anything. Otherwise it wouldn’t be ever lasting. And I recall that being my motivation for joining, trying to destroy her contract. But somewhere along the line that all faded away. Must like some of my memories seem to fade in time. I don’t even remember how I fell in love with Lilah, how she was killed or why I had left team Angel for a while there.
All I did know that there was this bitterness inside everytime I thought of it. And this sense of something being wrong where I couldn’t put my finger on it. It annoyed me, but each time I tried to figure it out, something else of great importance came up. We were all far to busy here. Fred and he lab, Angel and his new leadership role, Lorne and his entertainment. And then there was I, with my books that did all the work really. Most of the time I was busy doing Angel’s work since he really had no idea what he was doing.
I joined his meetings as well as my own, I went over his contracts when Gunn didn’t have time, I went over the finances, the budgets, warned him when he needed to talk with someone. Mostly Fred it would seem since she was going over her budget nearly every week. Then again, trying to eliminate all the evil that had been created in that laboratory was going to cost us a small fortune. Well, not us, the Senior Partners.
And then there was Cordelia. Still in a coma. I vaguely remember a reason why she’d be in that coma, but it seemed to drift in and out everytime I tried to think of it. Just as my thoughts about Lilah. Just like my thoughts of….a certain time last year. You’re a dead man, Pryce! Do you hear me! Dead! I know Fred visited her from time to time. Gunn came by less and less, to busy with is new job. Super lawyer complete with super brain. Combined with Fred’s intelligence I often wondered what I was still doing there.
Lorne made time every week, brought along some music and read to her from those fashion magazines and kept her up to date about the movie stars and such. Things I wouldn’t know about. Angel…Angel hardly ever came. I’m guessing it was to painful for him. He was withdrawing into himself I noticed. Sometimes he looked at me and there was this pain in his eyes I couldn’t place. He said things that made no sense either. Who do you think is the biggest betrayer? You for stealing his kid? Or Cordelia for sleeping with him? Sometimes I wonder if I wasn’t imagining things.
Those thoughts only became more and more when my….father visited. As it turned out it wasn’t my father, but by then the damage had already been done. I had shot, killed, my own father. Shot him nine times. Because he was threatening my family, Fred and Angel. You’d think one shot would’ve sufficed. No, I emptied the entire clip of my gun into him. Bullet, after bullet, after bullet….bang, bang, bang. And for that instance, for that brief moment when it turned out to be a cyborg? I was disappointed that he wasn‘t really my father. I *wanted* him to be that bastard, I wanted him to be dead.
I was the weakest link and they went gunning for it. Angel didn’t understand, nor did Fred or Gunn. Lorne might, but he’s…. a lover not a fighter as he keep saying. So that left only one other person. But she was in a coma and didn’t show any signs of waking up. Didn’t mean I couldn’t talk to her. Cordelia was the one I had always been able to talk to, no matter what. Sometimes she could be brutally blunt and tell you the truth straight to your face. But there was this subtle side to her that not many people had gotten to see. I’d been so privileged to have. The truth was, I missed all sides of Cordelia Chase and could use a real friend right about now.
Sitting next to her bed, I had taken hold of her hand and stared at the machines that told us she was still alive. Breathing, heartbeat, nutrition, the works. At least she could still breathe on her own. That was something, that was a spark of hope. It was late that night, I could still feel the blood that was never really there sticking on my hands. My head was throbbing with the blow it had been dealt by my…by that cyborg. But nothing hurt more then my heart when I realized that this thing could’ve very well have been my father.
I hated him. I never really knew that until now how much I hated him.
“Hi, Cordy,” I whispered softly, thumb rubbing over her hand. “I know it’s late but I just had to come talk to you. I…did something today and…I could really use your sharp tongue right now. You know, the part where you tell me to suck it up and move on? You see… I killed my father today. No, I’m not a liar…well…only partially one.” Swallowing hard, I smiled a watery smile and swallowed a sob. Even though there was no one there to hear, it was just embarrassing. “I really thought he was my father you know…and….I really think you ought to wake up now. You’ve lazed about long enough…”