The Wheel
Disclaimers: See part one.
Part Nine
Willow went to speak to Cordelia and Wesley, leaving Angel alone once again. Not that he minded; he was already *alone.* Why not make it a literal and not just an emotional truth?
The talk with Willow had done him some good. Probably it had helped her as well. Then there was the soul searching – the dreams and desires – that Angel had faced in that place between life and death. Still, something in his world had been irrevocably shattered; an empty place would always remain.
Left alone in the silent mansion, Angel tried to calm himself through the familiar exercise of Tai Chi. As his body moved through the forms, his mind wandered. He’d told Willow he only had small regrets left, but that wasn’t entirely true. He still had one major regret – that Buffy had never known the full impact she’d had on his life.
Angel had lived without Buffy in his life before…if you could call it that. Existing was closer to the truth. Barely existing off the blood of rats, Angel had been so caught in his own pain to be numb to anything else. It had taken Buffy…just a glimpse of her strength and heart…and the light of her life had removed some of the shadows from his. He could feel again, and there was no turning back. It was because of Buffy that he was the…man he was today.
The part of his soul that she had touched pained him, though it no longer screamed in her absence. It simply cried, a soul-deep keening. Angel knew its tears would never be silenced.
He was just finishing his exercises when Giles made his early evening appearance. As they exchanged brief greetings and Angel excused himself to get cleaned up, Giles looked at him in concern.
“What?” Angel asked on his way out of the room.
“You’re not pushing yourself too hard, are you?” When Angel didn’t immediately reply, he continued. “You’ve been in bed for over a week, Angel. You don’t want to harm yourself. We’ll all need strength for what’s coming.”
“And what’s that, Giles?” Angel asked, standing stiffly in the doorway.
“I’ll explain when everyone gets here,” he said.
By the time Angel had gotten cleaned up, fed, and returned to the main room darkness had fallen and the gang had gathered. Xander and Anya sat next to each other on the couch, Willow a little ways over from them. Cordelia and Wesley sat a bit apart from the rest of the group, as they had always been. Riley sat in one chair, looking uncomfortable and out of place. Giles stood beside the couch. All turned to look at Angel when he entered.
“You’re here,” Wesley said. “Looking better, I see.”
“Feeling better, thanks,” Angel replied, taking the last seat. He looked at Giles expectantly. “What’s going on, Giles?”
Giles leaned against the arm of the couch. “We were just waiting for you before we began,” he said. “Usually I’d try and start off easy, exchange pleasantries and all that, but there’s no time for that.”
The urgency in Giles’ voice was enough to make everyone sit up a bit straighter and pay close attention.
“The Cult of Spikura,” Giles began, “is actually many different types of demons. Fanatics, all of them, dedicated to bringing about Hell on Earth. Literally.”
“Just once,” Xander muttered, “I’d like to meet a demon *not* dedicated to the end of the world.”
“Hey, I wasn’t!” Anya protested.
A look from Giles silenced her. “Unlike other attempts,” Giles continued, “the Cult of Spikura does not seek to end the world all at once. Instead, they prefer smaller rituals, gradually bringing more of Hell here, constantly growing in strength and numbers. You have all certainly noticed the steady influx of demons lately.”
“So, how do we stop them?” Willow asked. “I mean, when…we…stopped their last ritual, they just turned around and performed it a couple of days later. How do we stop them for good?” Unspoken was what they had lost to prevent that ritual. None of them wanted Buffy’s death to be in vain.
Giles sighed. “Their rituals are spread out so as to have the least chance of failing, but there is one… Call it the point of no return. If we can’t stop it, they’ll be invincible until Hell rises. If they can’t perform the ritual, though, then neither they nor anyone else will be able to end the world in this manner again. They must perform the ritual on top of the hellmouth, and the hellmouth will be closed for good.”
The entire room was silent for a long moment as they took this all in. So, they were headed back to the hellmouth itself. It would be like coming full circle, saving the world from the burned out shell of the high school. Appropriate, somehow, that the last battle for the fate of the Earth be back where they had fought and planned together so often.
It was Riley who finally spoke. “When?”
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