Divine Interventions (6/16)
Sep. 9th, 2005 07:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alixtiiHalf finished! Yay for me! ETA: I'm leaving this here just because I find it amusing that I have absolutely no mathematical ability whatsoever. (At least re: arithmetic; give me a calculator and an algebra or geometry problem and I'm fine.) Not that being three-eighths finished isn't an accomplishment in its own right.
Title: Divine Interventions (6/16)
Fandom: Buffy/Angel
Characters: Dawn, Amy, Cordelia, Ethan, Willow, Kennedy, and others.
Rating: The overall fic will include material up to and including NC-17; most scenes are considerably milder, though.
Warnings: Het, femslash, BDSM, noncon, underaged—but none of these as the main focus of the fic.
Warnings for this chapter: None.
Timeline/Spoilers: Takes place after “Why We Fight.” Spoilers up to “You’re Welcome.”
Summary: Unlikely allies team up to defend Willow against a resurrected foe and the worshippers of the dark god Osiris.
Notes: Thanks to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
spikendru for a great beta!
Previous chapter is here.
All chapters are in my memories.
Chapter Six
From the comfort that was the void, consciousness began to creep back in. With consciousness came the much more noticeable ebb and flow of pain. Slowly, Amy opened her eyes, only to find herself in familiar settings: her own bed, in her dorm room at UCLA. Of course, she was also staring into the face of Cordelia Chase, former SHS cheerleader and current Higher Power.
“I feel like shit,” she said. She could hear the hoarseness in her voice as she said it.
“You look it, too,” Cordelia answered, blunt as ever.
“Is everyone okay?’ Amy asked, trying to get up and then subsiding as a wave of vertigo passed over her.
“They’re fine,” Cordelia assured her. “Everyone who lived through it is doing fine. They’re all healed up and we were just waiting for you to wake up.”
“How long was I out?” She really didn’t want to know the answer to that question.
Cordelia shrugged. “A little more than a day. Believe me, that’s not so bad—take it from someone who’s been unconscious a lot longer than that.”
“Yeah, but I didn’t wake up a Higher Power.” She stretched, trying to work out the kinks that seemed to be all throughout her body. “Unless I’m an incredibly weak Higher Power.”
This got a smile even from Cordy. “No, you’re still tied to the mortal coil, for better or worse. They’re not done with you, apparently. Seem to think they can screw your life up even more badly.”
“What are our plans?”
“We need to leave,” Cordelia answered, “before Rack and the order of Osiris comes back again.”
Amy tried to get up again and found that this time, she could sit up without getting too dizzy. “Where are we going.?”
“We haven’t decided yet,” Cordelia said, holding out her hand to help Amy get up. “We were waiting for you.”
“Okay, I’m up. I’m up. Let’s get downstairs and we’ll figure out what we’ll do next.”
After a few steps, Amy was able to let go of Cordelia’s arm and walk by herself. She slowly made her way down the steps to the lounge where all the Wicca group members were waiting quietly—along with three other people, one of whom she recognized. “Dawn?” What was Buffy’s little sister doing there?
“Hey, Amy,” Dawn said. “Hi, Cordy.”
“Hi,” Amy answered uncertainly. “What are you doing here?”
“Same thing as you,” the girl answered. “Protecting Willow. Cordy, do you know what the Rite of Isis is?”
“Yes. Of course.” She opened her mouth, then closed it again. “No. Apparently not. They must have taken the knowledge when I incarnated, leaving me with seven thousand years’ worth of useless trivia. Part of the ‘no interference’ rule.”
“We really need to log a complaint with the management,” Dawn said, “because the Powers totally suck at their jobs. Present company excepted.”
“No, you’re right,” agreed Cordelia. “They majorly suck, as I know better than anybody.”
“So where are we going?” asked Amy, looking from the three newcomers to the rest of the Wicca group.
“Last plan was Brazil,” Dawn answered. “I don’t suppose you all have passports?”
“I’m sorta dead,” answered Cordelia. “I’m supposing a passport isn’t going to do all that much if I want to get out of the country.” She paused, staring at Dawn for a moment before adding, “You should go to Angel.”
Dawn nodded, biting her lip. “Buffy and Giles don’t trust him anymore, but everything seemed fine when I was here at Christmas. Do you know about Christmas?”
Cordy nodded. “Evidently that knowledge doesn’t give us a tactical advantage. Oh, well: I guess insane vampires aren’t going to be our secret weapon.”
“That’s good,” said Amy, looking from Dawn to Cordelia and trying to figure out what the hell they were talking about. “So we’re going to Wolfram & Hart?”
“Just you and Dawn,” Cordelia answered. “It’s probably not a good idea for an entire coven to traipse through the place.”
“You’re not coming?”
Cordy shook her head. “Angel has his own path he’s on now,” she answered softly. “Showing up now would upset that path.”
“Okay,” said Dawn. “Better get this over with. You ready to go, Amy?”
Amy nodded. Even in the last few minutes she had regained a considerable amount of her strength. She still wouldn’t be able to cast a spell any time soon, but Goddess willing, she wouldn’t have to.
* * * * *
Dawn and Amy entered the huge white lobby of Wolfram and Hart. The receptionist studied Dawn, then turned to Amy. Her eyes ghosted over for a moment, and then regained their color.
“Miss Madison, it’s a pleasure to see you again. How may I help you?”
Dawn stared at Amy, who shrugged in response. “They do my taxes,” she told her. “That’s it, I swear.”
Dawn sighed, but turned back to the receptionist. “We need to see Angel.”
“I’m sorry, but Mr. Angel is a very busy—”
Before Dawn could even react, Amy grabbed by the receptionist by her lapel. “You see this girl? She’s the sister of the original Slayer, and a representative of the Watcher’s Council. And I know you know who I am and what I can do. So unless you want to see this place in ruins once again, after going through so much trouble to rebuild it just last year—”
“We have wards,” the receptionist insisted, “defenses, magical shields.” Amy flexed her fingers demonstratively. “Okay, okay. You’ll have to see his secretary. Upstairs, on your left.”
“Thank you for your help,” Amy said, letting loose of the receptionist’s shirt. “Have a nice day.”
When they were a safe distance up the steps, Dawn turned to Amy. “What would you have done if she had called your bluff?”
Amy shrugged. “Absolutely nothing. I don’t have enough juice yet to actually cast a spell.”
“Wow. Whatever you did must have been some powerful stuff, to leave you dry and empty. What happened?”
“We were attacked, by the Order of Osiris. The high priestess was sending out some pretty strong dark magicks, and I had to hit back to protect the coven.”
Dawn whistled. “That must have been quite a battle.”
Amy didn’t answer. How to explain?
They made the left at the top of the stairs, only to have their names screamed out at a higher pitch than Amy thought possible.
“Dawn? Amy? This is so cool!”
Amy blinked. “Harmony?” How many more dead Sunnydale High alumnae would she run into before all this was over?
“What are you doing here? It’s so great to see you, just like old times!”
Amy watched as Dawn extricated herself from Harmony’s hug, then used that opening to get out herself. “Harm, you tried to kill me. You used me as bait.”
Harmony’s smile collapsed into a frown. “Why does everyone keep on bringing that sort of thing up?” she asked.
“We need to see Angel,” Dawn answered, changing the subject. “It’s important.”
“Sure, whatever, go on in. He’s just arguing with Wesley about some prophecy or something. You know, we should really do lunch or something. Catch up on everything; it’ll be a thing.”
“Some other time, Harmony,” Dawn said, making her way past the blonde vampire into Angel’s office. Amy followed as closely as possible.
Inside, the two were indeed having some type of heated debate. “We just don’t have the resources,” Angel was saying.
“Angel, this is not just a line somewhere in some third-rate prophecy that we can afford to ignore. This is an entire passage in the—” He noticed the girls and stopped. “Dawn, it’s nice to see you.” He looked at Amy and cocked his head, in thought. “You’re the girl who turned herself into a rat.”
“Yeah,” said Amy, feeling more than a little foolish. “That’s me. I got better.”
Wesley nodded. “Quite.” He turned to Dawn. “I suppose you’re here about the same thing I am? Reports of hundreds of thousands of undead creatures—vampires, zombies, ghouls, you name it—converging on Brazil. A troubling passage in the Tradescan Codex. All seeming to revolve around one witch we all know named Willow Rosenberg.”
“What do you want me to do?” asked Angel. “Fred’s working on that case with the children. Lorne’s busy trying to get a movie made out of that show that was cancelled last year, the one with cowboys in space. We have clients to serve, Wes. There are other battles that need fighting.”
“Angel,” Dawn broke in, “if Willow goes dark again, she’s going to make Angelus look like Snidely Whiplash. We need help.”
“What do you want?” Angel asked. “Our attentions have to be here.”
“Just a jet,” Dawn answered. “We need transportation to Brazil so we can deal with the situation there. And total privacy as to whom we put on the jet.”
“I want to go with them,” Wesley said automatically.
“No,” Angel said just as unhesitatingly. “I need you here.”
“Doing what, reading prophecies about apocalypses you won’t let me stop? This is my field, Angel. This sort of thing is why we have a mystical research department.”
“Help Fred.”
“Fred doesn’t need my help. She has a staff. She’s made that very clear.”
Angel stopped. “What does that mean? Is this about Knox?”
“No, you bloody imbecile,” Wes said, finally exploding. “It’s about saving the world!”
Silence lingered between the two figures until Angel finally answered. “You can compare notes with Dawn before she leaves,” he said, calmly. “But I need you here. That’s final.” He turned to Dawn. “The jet’ll be ready in a couple hours.” He handed her a piece of paper. “Give this to the people at the gate; we’ll never find out who you brought on with you.”
Dawn nodded. “Thank you, Angel.”
“You’re welcome,” Angel said, sitting down behind his desk and opening a file. “Give my love to your sister.”
TBC. . . . here
You might also want to try my fave TV episode first line meme. There's a lot of eps left unguessed, including some Buffy/Angel/Firefly.
Title: Divine Interventions (6/16)
Fandom: Buffy/Angel
Characters: Dawn, Amy, Cordelia, Ethan, Willow, Kennedy, and others.
Rating: The overall fic will include material up to and including NC-17; most scenes are considerably milder, though.
Warnings: Het, femslash, BDSM, noncon, underaged—but none of these as the main focus of the fic.
Warnings for this chapter: None.
Timeline/Spoilers: Takes place after “Why We Fight.” Spoilers up to “You’re Welcome.”
Summary: Unlikely allies team up to defend Willow against a resurrected foe and the worshippers of the dark god Osiris.
Notes: Thanks to
spikendru for a great beta!Previous chapter is here.
All chapters are in my memories.
Chapter Six
From the comfort that was the void, consciousness began to creep back in. With consciousness came the much more noticeable ebb and flow of pain. Slowly, Amy opened her eyes, only to find herself in familiar settings: her own bed, in her dorm room at UCLA. Of course, she was also staring into the face of Cordelia Chase, former SHS cheerleader and current Higher Power.
“I feel like shit,” she said. She could hear the hoarseness in her voice as she said it.
“You look it, too,” Cordelia answered, blunt as ever.
“Is everyone okay?’ Amy asked, trying to get up and then subsiding as a wave of vertigo passed over her.
“They’re fine,” Cordelia assured her. “Everyone who lived through it is doing fine. They’re all healed up and we were just waiting for you to wake up.”
“How long was I out?” She really didn’t want to know the answer to that question.
Cordelia shrugged. “A little more than a day. Believe me, that’s not so bad—take it from someone who’s been unconscious a lot longer than that.”
“Yeah, but I didn’t wake up a Higher Power.” She stretched, trying to work out the kinks that seemed to be all throughout her body. “Unless I’m an incredibly weak Higher Power.”
This got a smile even from Cordy. “No, you’re still tied to the mortal coil, for better or worse. They’re not done with you, apparently. Seem to think they can screw your life up even more badly.”
“What are our plans?”
“We need to leave,” Cordelia answered, “before Rack and the order of Osiris comes back again.”
Amy tried to get up again and found that this time, she could sit up without getting too dizzy. “Where are we going.?”
“We haven’t decided yet,” Cordelia said, holding out her hand to help Amy get up. “We were waiting for you.”
“Okay, I’m up. I’m up. Let’s get downstairs and we’ll figure out what we’ll do next.”
After a few steps, Amy was able to let go of Cordelia’s arm and walk by herself. She slowly made her way down the steps to the lounge where all the Wicca group members were waiting quietly—along with three other people, one of whom she recognized. “Dawn?” What was Buffy’s little sister doing there?
“Hey, Amy,” Dawn said. “Hi, Cordy.”
“Hi,” Amy answered uncertainly. “What are you doing here?”
“Same thing as you,” the girl answered. “Protecting Willow. Cordy, do you know what the Rite of Isis is?”
“Yes. Of course.” She opened her mouth, then closed it again. “No. Apparently not. They must have taken the knowledge when I incarnated, leaving me with seven thousand years’ worth of useless trivia. Part of the ‘no interference’ rule.”
“We really need to log a complaint with the management,” Dawn said, “because the Powers totally suck at their jobs. Present company excepted.”
“No, you’re right,” agreed Cordelia. “They majorly suck, as I know better than anybody.”
“So where are we going?” asked Amy, looking from the three newcomers to the rest of the Wicca group.
“Last plan was Brazil,” Dawn answered. “I don’t suppose you all have passports?”
“I’m sorta dead,” answered Cordelia. “I’m supposing a passport isn’t going to do all that much if I want to get out of the country.” She paused, staring at Dawn for a moment before adding, “You should go to Angel.”
Dawn nodded, biting her lip. “Buffy and Giles don’t trust him anymore, but everything seemed fine when I was here at Christmas. Do you know about Christmas?”
Cordy nodded. “Evidently that knowledge doesn’t give us a tactical advantage. Oh, well: I guess insane vampires aren’t going to be our secret weapon.”
“That’s good,” said Amy, looking from Dawn to Cordelia and trying to figure out what the hell they were talking about. “So we’re going to Wolfram & Hart?”
“Just you and Dawn,” Cordelia answered. “It’s probably not a good idea for an entire coven to traipse through the place.”
“You’re not coming?”
Cordy shook her head. “Angel has his own path he’s on now,” she answered softly. “Showing up now would upset that path.”
“Okay,” said Dawn. “Better get this over with. You ready to go, Amy?”
Amy nodded. Even in the last few minutes she had regained a considerable amount of her strength. She still wouldn’t be able to cast a spell any time soon, but Goddess willing, she wouldn’t have to.
Dawn and Amy entered the huge white lobby of Wolfram and Hart. The receptionist studied Dawn, then turned to Amy. Her eyes ghosted over for a moment, and then regained their color.
“Miss Madison, it’s a pleasure to see you again. How may I help you?”
Dawn stared at Amy, who shrugged in response. “They do my taxes,” she told her. “That’s it, I swear.”
Dawn sighed, but turned back to the receptionist. “We need to see Angel.”
“I’m sorry, but Mr. Angel is a very busy—”
Before Dawn could even react, Amy grabbed by the receptionist by her lapel. “You see this girl? She’s the sister of the original Slayer, and a representative of the Watcher’s Council. And I know you know who I am and what I can do. So unless you want to see this place in ruins once again, after going through so much trouble to rebuild it just last year—”
“We have wards,” the receptionist insisted, “defenses, magical shields.” Amy flexed her fingers demonstratively. “Okay, okay. You’ll have to see his secretary. Upstairs, on your left.”
“Thank you for your help,” Amy said, letting loose of the receptionist’s shirt. “Have a nice day.”
When they were a safe distance up the steps, Dawn turned to Amy. “What would you have done if she had called your bluff?”
Amy shrugged. “Absolutely nothing. I don’t have enough juice yet to actually cast a spell.”
“Wow. Whatever you did must have been some powerful stuff, to leave you dry and empty. What happened?”
“We were attacked, by the Order of Osiris. The high priestess was sending out some pretty strong dark magicks, and I had to hit back to protect the coven.”
Dawn whistled. “That must have been quite a battle.”
Amy didn’t answer. How to explain?
They made the left at the top of the stairs, only to have their names screamed out at a higher pitch than Amy thought possible.
“Dawn? Amy? This is so cool!”
Amy blinked. “Harmony?” How many more dead Sunnydale High alumnae would she run into before all this was over?
“What are you doing here? It’s so great to see you, just like old times!”
Amy watched as Dawn extricated herself from Harmony’s hug, then used that opening to get out herself. “Harm, you tried to kill me. You used me as bait.”
Harmony’s smile collapsed into a frown. “Why does everyone keep on bringing that sort of thing up?” she asked.
“We need to see Angel,” Dawn answered, changing the subject. “It’s important.”
“Sure, whatever, go on in. He’s just arguing with Wesley about some prophecy or something. You know, we should really do lunch or something. Catch up on everything; it’ll be a thing.”
“Some other time, Harmony,” Dawn said, making her way past the blonde vampire into Angel’s office. Amy followed as closely as possible.
Inside, the two were indeed having some type of heated debate. “We just don’t have the resources,” Angel was saying.
“Angel, this is not just a line somewhere in some third-rate prophecy that we can afford to ignore. This is an entire passage in the—” He noticed the girls and stopped. “Dawn, it’s nice to see you.” He looked at Amy and cocked his head, in thought. “You’re the girl who turned herself into a rat.”
“Yeah,” said Amy, feeling more than a little foolish. “That’s me. I got better.”
Wesley nodded. “Quite.” He turned to Dawn. “I suppose you’re here about the same thing I am? Reports of hundreds of thousands of undead creatures—vampires, zombies, ghouls, you name it—converging on Brazil. A troubling passage in the Tradescan Codex. All seeming to revolve around one witch we all know named Willow Rosenberg.”
“What do you want me to do?” asked Angel. “Fred’s working on that case with the children. Lorne’s busy trying to get a movie made out of that show that was cancelled last year, the one with cowboys in space. We have clients to serve, Wes. There are other battles that need fighting.”
“Angel,” Dawn broke in, “if Willow goes dark again, she’s going to make Angelus look like Snidely Whiplash. We need help.”
“What do you want?” Angel asked. “Our attentions have to be here.”
“Just a jet,” Dawn answered. “We need transportation to Brazil so we can deal with the situation there. And total privacy as to whom we put on the jet.”
“I want to go with them,” Wesley said automatically.
“No,” Angel said just as unhesitatingly. “I need you here.”
“Doing what, reading prophecies about apocalypses you won’t let me stop? This is my field, Angel. This sort of thing is why we have a mystical research department.”
“Help Fred.”
“Fred doesn’t need my help. She has a staff. She’s made that very clear.”
Angel stopped. “What does that mean? Is this about Knox?”
“No, you bloody imbecile,” Wes said, finally exploding. “It’s about saving the world!”
Silence lingered between the two figures until Angel finally answered. “You can compare notes with Dawn before she leaves,” he said, calmly. “But I need you here. That’s final.” He turned to Dawn. “The jet’ll be ready in a couple hours.” He handed her a piece of paper. “Give this to the people at the gate; we’ll never find out who you brought on with you.”
Dawn nodded. “Thank you, Angel.”
“You’re welcome,” Angel said, sitting down behind his desk and opening a file. “Give my love to your sister.”
TBC. . . . here
You might also want to try my fave TV episode first line meme. There's a lot of eps left unguessed, including some Buffy/Angel/Firefly.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-01-19 02:46 am (UTC)*dead of funny*
(no subject)
Date: 2006-01-19 02:54 am (UTC)eyWMEzWlaVwWuS
Date: 2014-04-11 05:28 am (UTC)