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While I try to coax and cajole the muse to give me some more Fairytale, here's another part of my silly Angel Ensemble fic that might amuse a little.
On a more serious note, moonlitviolets has gone. I hope you read this, Sweetheart, and come back if you can. You were always so kind to me and I'll miss having you around. It's a sad day.
Title: Another Apocolypse for Angel
Author: mandarin226
Email: countessevilmh@yahoo.co.uk
Fandom(s): AtS
Genre: General
Pairings/characters: Ensemble
Rating: If you can watch the show, you can read this
Disclaimer: The characters depicted in this fantasy belong to Joss Whedon and his Associates. I have no claim on them; neither do I make money from taking them out to play with.
Summary: Angel accepts his destiny, but is reluctant to tell his friends of his impending return to Hell
CHAPTER SIX
When Wesley and the others returned to the hotel, Angel was sitting in a sofa with a big dusty old book on his knees. He looked up at them inquisitively. “What did Lorne have to say about the visions, Cordelia?”
Cordelia favoured him with a withering glare. “He didn’t get a chance to tell me anything; you wanted us back here so urgently. This had better be worth it.”
“Sorry, Cordy.” Angel was contrite. He wondered if the Host could have told Cordelia anything about the visions anyway, since he now knew that he was stuck with them until Saurgoth rose, and then after that the visions would be no use to him in Hell. Perhaps all Lorne would have seen for Cordelia would have been a blank picture, like the one he’d seen for him. “Maybe another time.”
“What is it, Angel?” Gunn asked. “Is it something heavy?”
Angel nodded. “It could be apocalyptic.” Angel told his friends, his voice deadly serious.
“Oh man!” Gunn breathed. “The End of the World heavy.”
“This was what the priest wanted to see you for?” Cordelia asked.
Angel nodded.
“Then we need to find a way to stop it, Angel.” Wesley was going into research mode already. “That’s why you wanted us to get back here so urgently.”
“I know how to stop it.” Angel replied.
“What do you need from us then?” Cordelia demanded.
“Any additional information you can find about a demon called Saurgoth.” Angel told her. “And I doubt this will be on the Internet, so its dusty old books, I’m afraid.”
Cordelia pulled a face; she hated ploughing through the musty old volumes in their extensive library. They all smelled like they’d come out of a crypt. Then she realized that most of them probably had. Yuk! Nevertheless, she got to work, as did the rest of them.
Soon, they were all pouring over ancient and battered tomes, coughing occasionally, or sneezing, as dust rose from the dog-eared pages.
“What kind of a demon is this Saurgoth?” Wesley asked Angel.
“The worst kind.” Angel told him. “A pure demon, the rise-up-and-wipe-out-the-world kind.”
“We’ve seen his kind before then, in Sunnydale. Good ol’ Mayor Wilkins and his delusions of demon grandeur.” Cordelia remarked. “We wiped him out.”
“True.” Angel conceded. “But I’m not sure we can use the same tactics with Saurgoth.”
“Oh.” Cordelia seemed a little disappointed. She, Angel and the rest of the Scoobie Gang, aided and abetted by the cream of Sunnydale High’s demon-ass-kicking students, had wiped out Mayor Richard Wilkins when he’d transformed into a pure demon during the senior years’ graduation ceremony. It hadn’t been easy, and they’d taken some casualties, but it had been a rip-roaring success, well planned and well executed. It seemed a pity to let all that experience go to waste.
They all read on in silence for a while, until Angel’s book crashed to the floor, causing the others to jump violently. They looked over at Angel, prepared to chastise him for scaring them, but Angel was slumped in the sofa, his body convulsing, clutching his head and grunting in pain.
“Another vision!” Wesley shouted, leaping to his feet and rushing over to the Vampire.
When Angel was capable of speech, his first words were “It’s not the Big One!”
Cordy, Fred and Gunn exchange puzzled looks as Wesley tried to get Angel to tell them more about the vision. “What did you see, Angel?”
Angel groaned as pain and nausea did their usual thing to his body. “Not the Big One.” He repeated. “It’s a Quarq demon; it’s attacking people in the subway.”
“What do you mean, Angel? Not the Big One?” Fred asked the Vampire.
“It’s not Saurgoth.” Angel replied.
“You mean when this thing’s about to rise you’ll see it?” Wes asked.
Angel nodded, sitting forward on the sofa. His headache had kicked in, but the nausea was dissipating. “In the meantime we have work to do.” Rising to his feet he swayed a little; Wesley and Gunn steadied him.
“Ladies, can you continue with the research while we deal with this problem?” Wesley asked Cordelia and Fred.”
“Sure, Wes.” Cordelia nodded.
Fred reached out her hand to touch Angel’s arm sympathetically. “Are you sure you’re up to it, Angel.”
“I’ll be good as new in a jiffy, but thanks, Fred.” Angel told the girl, giving her a reassuring smile. Maybe “in a jiffy” was overstating it, but the after effects of the vision were beginning to fade, much to his relief.
Fred looked up into his eyes intently. Angel’s eyes always looked sad, but now Fred saw deep despair there, too. Something was terribly wrong.
Angel looked away from Fred, deliberately breaking eye contact. He knew with certainty that she had seen something was not right., but he couldn’t tell her; he couldn’t tell any of them that he was going back to Hell. Permanently.
Without another word, Angel grabbed his coat, and with Gunn and Wesley hot on his heels, he left the hotel to deal with yet another rampant demon. Fred stared after him, a disturbed expression on her face.
**
Angel and his colleagues leapt out of Angel’s Plymouth Belvedere GTX as it screeched to a halt a couple of minutes walk from the subway station Angel had seen in his vision. They covered the distance to the entrance quickly, where they were forced to feed the ticket machine with coins before they could make their way down to the platform via the escalator.
All appeared normal as they stepped onto the platform at the bottom. They had arrived in time. The three of them stood there, waiting for something to happen, trying to look inconspicuous. It wasn’t easy; they all looked on edge, for one thing, not bored as the handful of passengers standing on the platform did. Wesley might have blended in if he’d managed to look calm, but Gunn and Angel would stand out in a crowd anywhere, regardless of their behaviour. The passengers waiting for the next train regarded the trio with a mixture of curiosity and suspicion.
Something exploded out of the left hand tunnel, and it wasn’t the train. In a flurry of flailing feathered limbs, the enraged Quarq demon flung itself at the two women who stood nearest to the tunnel. Screaming, the women tried to back away, but the Quarq grabbed one of them in it’s taloned claws and would have sunk it’s beak into the flesh of her face if Angel had not taken a flying leap at the creature, snapping it’s head back and propelling it backwards.
The Quarq recovered quickly, launching itself at Angel. Its talons gripped Angel’s throat, piercing his flesh and drawing small rivulets of blood from the wounds, and its beak strained towards Angel’s face as the Vampire leaned desperately away from it. Clenching both hands into a single fist, Angel brought his arms up impossibly fast, breaking the Quarq’s grip, though the talons tore his flesh a little more; he ignored it.
Pressing his advantage, Angel brought his fists up again, catching the creature under what passed for it’s chin, then before it could recover, Angel released one of the daggers that nestled in spring-loaded sheaths he wore strapped to his wrists, under his clothing. The blade shot out of its sheath, and Angel plunged it into the throat of the Quarq demon. Green fluid bubbled out of the creature’s feather-clad neck, and it staggered before crashing to the ground where it lay silent and still.
The two women it had attacked screamed, backing away from Angel and the strange corpse he stood over. Without a word, Angel wiped the green fluid on the blade of his weapon off on the tattered clothing of the dead Quarq, re-sheathed it and turned away. He ignored the passengers, who stood and stared in shocked silence, unable to believe what they had just witnessed, and walked purposefully towards the steps that led up to street level. Gunn and Wesley fell in behind him, and the trio took the escalator back up to the street level hallway. None of them said a word.
They reached the exit that gave onto the street. Angel suddenly staggered backwards, clutching his head, and fell to the ground, convulsing spastically. Wesley and Gunn tried to hold him down, which wasn’t easy.
Despite the lateness of the hour there were still a few passengers coming into the station, and one of them, a man in his early twenties, came over to see if he could help. “Epilepsy?” He enquired sympathetically.
“Um…yes.” Wesley replied, still struggling to hold the Vampire down. “He’ll be fine in a few minutes. But thanks.”
“You want to be careful he doesn’t swallow his tongue.” The young man suggested, concerned.
Angel stopped convulsing, started groaning. He struggled to rise. “It’s Fred and Cordy!” He gasped. “We have to get back!”
The young man who had offered help and advice looked on in amazement. Gunn and Wesley smiled sheepishly at him as they helped Angel to his feet then supported him as he made his unsteady way out into the street. Two visions in such a short space of time had left Angel feeling very woozy, so Gunn drove back to the Hyperion with a great deal of urgency and more than a little trepidation.
TBC
On a more serious note, moonlitviolets has gone. I hope you read this, Sweetheart, and come back if you can. You were always so kind to me and I'll miss having you around. It's a sad day.
Title: Another Apocolypse for Angel
Author: mandarin226
Email: countessevilmh@yahoo.co.uk
Fandom(s): AtS
Genre: General
Pairings/characters: Ensemble
Rating: If you can watch the show, you can read this
Disclaimer: The characters depicted in this fantasy belong to Joss Whedon and his Associates. I have no claim on them; neither do I make money from taking them out to play with.
Summary: Angel accepts his destiny, but is reluctant to tell his friends of his impending return to Hell
CHAPTER SIX
When Wesley and the others returned to the hotel, Angel was sitting in a sofa with a big dusty old book on his knees. He looked up at them inquisitively. “What did Lorne have to say about the visions, Cordelia?”
Cordelia favoured him with a withering glare. “He didn’t get a chance to tell me anything; you wanted us back here so urgently. This had better be worth it.”
“Sorry, Cordy.” Angel was contrite. He wondered if the Host could have told Cordelia anything about the visions anyway, since he now knew that he was stuck with them until Saurgoth rose, and then after that the visions would be no use to him in Hell. Perhaps all Lorne would have seen for Cordelia would have been a blank picture, like the one he’d seen for him. “Maybe another time.”
“What is it, Angel?” Gunn asked. “Is it something heavy?”
Angel nodded. “It could be apocalyptic.” Angel told his friends, his voice deadly serious.
“Oh man!” Gunn breathed. “The End of the World heavy.”
“This was what the priest wanted to see you for?” Cordelia asked.
Angel nodded.
“Then we need to find a way to stop it, Angel.” Wesley was going into research mode already. “That’s why you wanted us to get back here so urgently.”
“I know how to stop it.” Angel replied.
“What do you need from us then?” Cordelia demanded.
“Any additional information you can find about a demon called Saurgoth.” Angel told her. “And I doubt this will be on the Internet, so its dusty old books, I’m afraid.”
Cordelia pulled a face; she hated ploughing through the musty old volumes in their extensive library. They all smelled like they’d come out of a crypt. Then she realized that most of them probably had. Yuk! Nevertheless, she got to work, as did the rest of them.
Soon, they were all pouring over ancient and battered tomes, coughing occasionally, or sneezing, as dust rose from the dog-eared pages.
“What kind of a demon is this Saurgoth?” Wesley asked Angel.
“The worst kind.” Angel told him. “A pure demon, the rise-up-and-wipe-out-the-world kind.”
“We’ve seen his kind before then, in Sunnydale. Good ol’ Mayor Wilkins and his delusions of demon grandeur.” Cordelia remarked. “We wiped him out.”
“True.” Angel conceded. “But I’m not sure we can use the same tactics with Saurgoth.”
“Oh.” Cordelia seemed a little disappointed. She, Angel and the rest of the Scoobie Gang, aided and abetted by the cream of Sunnydale High’s demon-ass-kicking students, had wiped out Mayor Richard Wilkins when he’d transformed into a pure demon during the senior years’ graduation ceremony. It hadn’t been easy, and they’d taken some casualties, but it had been a rip-roaring success, well planned and well executed. It seemed a pity to let all that experience go to waste.
They all read on in silence for a while, until Angel’s book crashed to the floor, causing the others to jump violently. They looked over at Angel, prepared to chastise him for scaring them, but Angel was slumped in the sofa, his body convulsing, clutching his head and grunting in pain.
“Another vision!” Wesley shouted, leaping to his feet and rushing over to the Vampire.
When Angel was capable of speech, his first words were “It’s not the Big One!”
Cordy, Fred and Gunn exchange puzzled looks as Wesley tried to get Angel to tell them more about the vision. “What did you see, Angel?”
Angel groaned as pain and nausea did their usual thing to his body. “Not the Big One.” He repeated. “It’s a Quarq demon; it’s attacking people in the subway.”
“What do you mean, Angel? Not the Big One?” Fred asked the Vampire.
“It’s not Saurgoth.” Angel replied.
“You mean when this thing’s about to rise you’ll see it?” Wes asked.
Angel nodded, sitting forward on the sofa. His headache had kicked in, but the nausea was dissipating. “In the meantime we have work to do.” Rising to his feet he swayed a little; Wesley and Gunn steadied him.
“Ladies, can you continue with the research while we deal with this problem?” Wesley asked Cordelia and Fred.”
“Sure, Wes.” Cordelia nodded.
Fred reached out her hand to touch Angel’s arm sympathetically. “Are you sure you’re up to it, Angel.”
“I’ll be good as new in a jiffy, but thanks, Fred.” Angel told the girl, giving her a reassuring smile. Maybe “in a jiffy” was overstating it, but the after effects of the vision were beginning to fade, much to his relief.
Fred looked up into his eyes intently. Angel’s eyes always looked sad, but now Fred saw deep despair there, too. Something was terribly wrong.
Angel looked away from Fred, deliberately breaking eye contact. He knew with certainty that she had seen something was not right., but he couldn’t tell her; he couldn’t tell any of them that he was going back to Hell. Permanently.
Without another word, Angel grabbed his coat, and with Gunn and Wesley hot on his heels, he left the hotel to deal with yet another rampant demon. Fred stared after him, a disturbed expression on her face.
**
Angel and his colleagues leapt out of Angel’s Plymouth Belvedere GTX as it screeched to a halt a couple of minutes walk from the subway station Angel had seen in his vision. They covered the distance to the entrance quickly, where they were forced to feed the ticket machine with coins before they could make their way down to the platform via the escalator.
All appeared normal as they stepped onto the platform at the bottom. They had arrived in time. The three of them stood there, waiting for something to happen, trying to look inconspicuous. It wasn’t easy; they all looked on edge, for one thing, not bored as the handful of passengers standing on the platform did. Wesley might have blended in if he’d managed to look calm, but Gunn and Angel would stand out in a crowd anywhere, regardless of their behaviour. The passengers waiting for the next train regarded the trio with a mixture of curiosity and suspicion.
Something exploded out of the left hand tunnel, and it wasn’t the train. In a flurry of flailing feathered limbs, the enraged Quarq demon flung itself at the two women who stood nearest to the tunnel. Screaming, the women tried to back away, but the Quarq grabbed one of them in it’s taloned claws and would have sunk it’s beak into the flesh of her face if Angel had not taken a flying leap at the creature, snapping it’s head back and propelling it backwards.
The Quarq recovered quickly, launching itself at Angel. Its talons gripped Angel’s throat, piercing his flesh and drawing small rivulets of blood from the wounds, and its beak strained towards Angel’s face as the Vampire leaned desperately away from it. Clenching both hands into a single fist, Angel brought his arms up impossibly fast, breaking the Quarq’s grip, though the talons tore his flesh a little more; he ignored it.
Pressing his advantage, Angel brought his fists up again, catching the creature under what passed for it’s chin, then before it could recover, Angel released one of the daggers that nestled in spring-loaded sheaths he wore strapped to his wrists, under his clothing. The blade shot out of its sheath, and Angel plunged it into the throat of the Quarq demon. Green fluid bubbled out of the creature’s feather-clad neck, and it staggered before crashing to the ground where it lay silent and still.
The two women it had attacked screamed, backing away from Angel and the strange corpse he stood over. Without a word, Angel wiped the green fluid on the blade of his weapon off on the tattered clothing of the dead Quarq, re-sheathed it and turned away. He ignored the passengers, who stood and stared in shocked silence, unable to believe what they had just witnessed, and walked purposefully towards the steps that led up to street level. Gunn and Wesley fell in behind him, and the trio took the escalator back up to the street level hallway. None of them said a word.
They reached the exit that gave onto the street. Angel suddenly staggered backwards, clutching his head, and fell to the ground, convulsing spastically. Wesley and Gunn tried to hold him down, which wasn’t easy.
Despite the lateness of the hour there were still a few passengers coming into the station, and one of them, a man in his early twenties, came over to see if he could help. “Epilepsy?” He enquired sympathetically.
“Um…yes.” Wesley replied, still struggling to hold the Vampire down. “He’ll be fine in a few minutes. But thanks.”
“You want to be careful he doesn’t swallow his tongue.” The young man suggested, concerned.
Angel stopped convulsing, started groaning. He struggled to rise. “It’s Fred and Cordy!” He gasped. “We have to get back!”
The young man who had offered help and advice looked on in amazement. Gunn and Wesley smiled sheepishly at him as they helped Angel to his feet then supported him as he made his unsteady way out into the street. Two visions in such a short space of time had left Angel feeling very woozy, so Gunn drove back to the Hyperion with a great deal of urgency and more than a little trepidation.
TBC