Title: Afterlife
Part title: Gone

Author: GMB loves Angel

Spoilers: Iwry (as always), the last four eps of Angel season 2, the bachelor party, Hero, the gift... that's kinda it...

Rating: PG-13

Timeline: A few months after the gift...

Authors notes: This fic series will go between two worlds. Here's my version of what happened after the gift... I admitt it I'm completely hung up in Pylea... Iwry happened a season after than it did in the show...

- What you deserve, I can't give you. A normal life…

- Normal? I'm the slayer, I'll never be normal…

- As normal as you can get…

- I want my life to be with you…

- I don't…

- I can't believe you're breaking up with me…

/a flash of light/

- I won't say good-bye…

- What..?

- I'm just gonna leave… Not now, after the battle. After everything's over, I'll leave…

/a flash of light/

- How much time?

- An other minute…

- A minute!?! No, it's not enough time… How am I supposed to go on, when I know what we had, what we could have had…

- You won't, nobody will know, but me…

- Oh, God, it's not enough time… I'll never forget, I'll never forget… I'll never…

Angel woke up. An other day. An other day without her. Three months had gone. Three long, cold, brutal months. Buffy's words were still clinging in his head. 'How am I supposed to go on..?' She was right. How could they ever go on? He remembered that day so clearly. If he hadn't given up, would she have been living now? A few months was all she had been given. Had he known her time left had been so little, he would have stayed human, giving them a nice ending. Instead he left, gave everything up. She died anyway…

His life had become a routine. Every morning he woke up from an other dream about her. It followed by him getting dressed and walking downstairs to yet an other day. As usual there was something wrong with the coffee, but it woke him up. He found a cup of blood in the freezer, which took away that awful coffee taste. During the day, Cordelia and Wesley called each other about 50 names each. Fred went out to get take out, which always included tacos in some way. Gunn came over about noon, which was followed by a vision. Two painkillers for Cordelia. Either a demon or a vampire, depending on what time of day it was, slaying of whatever it was, returning with Gunn and Wesley eyeing Fred and then it was back to sleep.

Angel went downstairs prepared for a day like that. He was right about the coffee. Wesley had bought the wrong type of coffee and it had filled up the filter, letting very little coffee get into the water and it tasted like bitter tasting water. Cordelia and Wesley was arguing on who looked the worst, some of the names came out. Fred came in with extra spicy tacos and coke. Gunn on the other had didn't come until 2 pm. Angle hadn't found a cup of blood in the freezer, because Fred had forgotten to stop by the butchers on her way there. She went out straight away and came back with a bag of blood for him. Then Cordelias vision arrived just in time, only that it didn't tell them about any danger as much as telling Angel to go see the oracles…

- The oracles, he muttered, not understanding anything. They hadn't spoken to him and he hadn't spoken to them for months… Ever since Doyle died and he had asked for them to return him…

- They said it was urgent. Take this with you, Cordelia answered, recovering from the vision.

She tossed him a few bronze cuffs.

- Where did you get those?

- Found them in one of the rooms upstairs earlier. Figured we'd keep them here in case they asked for a rendez-vu…

- You knew they were gonna send for me?

- No, but they aren't dead and you're the only champion, so I figured they would one day, so why waste money in a pawn shop, when you already have a gift..?

Angel shrugged and opened the front door, before a sunbeam told him what big mistake that would be. He turned around walking down the stairs to the basement and continued to the entrance to the sewers. It didn't take so long until he had reached the post office and also the gate to the lost souls. He muttered the same words, the same lighting of the fire and he was met with the same words as he always had.

- Come before us… lower being.

- Nice to see you too, he said, figuring he could at least make a twist out of it.

- What have your brought us, the female Oracle said.

- Gees, do you work out of a script of something?

Angel handed them the cuffs. The female took them, as usual. He knew what she was going to say. 'Lovely'.

- Lovely, she said. - Of the past, but valuable for the future, just as the issue we wish to address you.

- And what is it?

- Patience…

- I didn't come here to waste my day.

- Waste what? You have no pleasure of the day, and no longer of the night, you just do, but you aren't.

- What's that supposed to mean?

- You begin and end every day the same. You don't do any different throughout the whole day. You don't feel a bound to life anymore.

- Why should I? I have nothing to live for anymore. She's gone.

- You didn't see her anyway.

- You promised she would live.

- We merely promised that you could protect her if you wanted to with your powers. We have no control over them. We only control our side.

- Would she have lived if I had stayed human?

- That's for neither of us to know. What has been done can not be undone. We called you here to give you something.

- And what is that?

He didn't receive any answer. The female oracle turned around and turned right back, only with something in her arms. A baby.

- Who's that?

- Your daughter, Angel.

- I can't have kids. I'm a vampire. We can't have children. I left Buffy because I couldn't give her one.

- But that's exactly what you have, Angel. You gave her a child. That day didn't leave you with nothing, Angel. We hadn't seen it coming, but we don't take a life. We merely give when we're supposed to. This child was innocent. We couldn't kill her. She's for you to take care of, now.

- You mean, this is what Buffy and I could have together? You created her out of Buffy and me?

- We didn't create anything. We just let her live. She was born as any other child and now we give her to you.

- But…

- Good-bye, lower being…

Angel found himself outside the gate, with his daughter in his arms.

- But, how could she have been born? Buffy died 3 months ago. If she was pregnant, she was only 6 months along…

There was no answer. He was left there with the infant in his arms. She couldn't be more than a couple of days old. That didn't add up either. They said she had been born in the normal way, but then she had to have been more then three months old. He could see that this baby was a lot younger than that. Buffy was dead. Willow had told him that. She had seen the dead body, they had even buried her. Two months ago, he had been to her grave and said his good-byes…