"Immortal Beloved..." XCIX...
PG-13
Disclaimer: If ya are fan-fic writers, where's your disclaimers?
Disclaimers? We ain't got no disclaimers...I don' need to show you
no stinkin'...No, Joss, no...I make no claims, put that thing down!
It's all yours and ME's...
Spoilers for Angel to the bitter end...Flee at once!...
Summary: Though the standard IB format, one of (120+) versions of
events
following the end of Angel S5 episodes from "Girl in Question"
through
to "Not Fade Away" and beyond, this one's sorta notoriously south by
southeast...(C'mon, you're a Hitchcock fan, you get it...)
Credit for this one goes to Ms. Angela Dawson's
suggestion...Thanks...
Archived (soon) at the 'Normal' Buffyverse page of the Buffy Rebecca
verse at -http://www.angelfire.com/zine2/buffyrebecca/index.html
,
scroll down to "Immortal Beloved" series
***
Part V...
"This is unacceptable..." Matisse growled from his monitor
screen...Glaring at a seated Buffy and Henri...And the William they'd
led back through the tunnel Henri had taken to the grounds...Angel
left on the grounds, still unconscious...
Along with a fuming Dru, halted by her new employer's direct order in
mid-charge, and now seated in the same conference room with a
suspiciously cold eye on the Slayer...
Though an occasional rather warm one to the image of Emil on his
monitor...
"We'd agreed..." Matisse began...
"I still make the decisions here, Eric..." Henri cut him off... "And
if I wish to try and preserve a Champion of Light for future service,
you will abide by my wishes...My friends..." he waved at the various
monitors on which, with frowns, skepticism, or in the case of the
Countess, deep concern, Bauman, Emil, the Countess, and others could
be seen... "I am not offering Mr. Walthrop his existence gratis...I'm
offering him a chance to join us and serve Humanity..."
"Henri..." Bauman sighed from his monitor... "While I too regret the
loss of Mr. Walthrop...I fear for your wife's sake you have made a
grave error in judgement..."
"William's going nowhere, Doctor, if he refuses us..." Buffy
replied... "Henri merely wants him to know enough of us and our
purpose to make an informed decision..."
"And being such a noble soul...We can place full trust in any promise
of devotion he makes to us?..." Matisse, cynically...
"You can..." she eyed him... "I'm afraid he'll refuse us, but if he
agrees...You can trust him..."
"...as we trust you..." Matisse finished...
"The Slayer's betrayed us...I knew she wouldn't kill him..." Dru spoke
up from her chair across from where Will sat...
"I've already told you I'd deal with him..." Buffy said quietly...
"And if you all want me to when we've had it out with him, I
will...But this was Henri's decision and unless you want trouble with
me, Dru...You'll leave it to him..."
Dru, leaning forward in her chair, approached a normal flesh tone, but
eyeing Buffy's hand on the stake in her pocket, relented and sat
back...A sullen look...
"We gave you your chance, Countess...And clearly you've chosen him
over us..." Emil cut in from his screen, a quick glance to the
suddenly beaming Dru...Oh, Emil...
"Not at all, Emil...She was quite willing to dispose of him..." Henri
frowned... "Listen, friends...All I ask is ten minutes for the man who
saved us all...Surely, he deserves that much..."
"After compromising our work and threatening our continued
existence?...Surely..." Matisse, suavely... "Why then did we even
bother to try and dispose of him before?..."
"It's very simple..." Buffy said, a faint smile to Henri... "Before I
wasn't involved...Henri wanted to spare me...If possible...Which was a
mistake, sorry, darling...And why my vote is and will be to let me
give him peace... Though I'll abide by the majority's wish..."
"Foolish, foolish..." Feucher glared from his screen...
"None of you are in immediate danger..." Henri pointed out... "The
plutonium we needed for our operations is already secure, the rest was
meant to be left behind in any case..."
William avoided a glance at Buffy who gave him a brief cool look...
So...
"If it's any help to your busy schedules I'll not be buying..." Will
smiled cheerily at the screens, then over to Buffy... "So feel free to
move along..."
"Enough..." the elder Countess sighed from her screen... "Henri, you
have been a fool but so long as we have Mr. Walthrop and the rest of
us are safe...Let him have ten minutes, gentlemen..."
"I call for a vote of no confidence in the Count D'Vestigy..." Matisse
suddenly announced... "Who seconds me?"
"I..." Dru happily called...
"Ummn...My dear..." Emil hesitantly called to her... "I'm afraid
you're not a full Circle member...Yet..."
Oh...
"I second Matisse's motion..." Feucher said coldly... "Let us vote and
be done with this..."
"No..." Buffy said firmly...Eyeing each screen... "I said to give
Henri his chance...There'll be no vote until then...If there is, you
can consider your lives at risk..."
"It's little enough to ask for such a man..." Bauman, nodding... "I
support Henri and the Countesses D'Vestigy...Mr. Walthrop, I sincerely
pray you will listen to us..."
Several other reluctant voices gave assent...
"Very well..." a glowering, defeated Matisse... "But as a practical
man, I warn you...Idealism and this sort of sentimentality will be the
death of our cause..."
"Thank you, my friends..." Henri, rising, bowed slightly, then turned
to William...
"Mr. Walthrop...You believe us evil...Plotting
conquest...Even...Nazis...Which admittedly some of us have been
involved with...Either through relatives or even, as in my own case,
having briefly been members...Again, in my case for tactical political
reasons, not devotion to an insane ideology..."
"And it is true we have allowed our organization, the Circle, to be
perceived as having a neo-Nazi foundation...If only in order to make
possible the contacts we would need for our plans to succeed...A plan
which we only embark on with great reluctance and great
fear...Darling?..." he turned to Buffy who rose...
"We..." Buffy waved a hand to encompass the bank of monitors on the
wall from which various Circle members stared... "Are the Architects
of Fear..."
"That's from..." she began...
"I've seen it...I've watched every episode of classic "Outer Limits"
a thousand times...All day, every day in a crypt, remember?..."
William eyed her..."So that's your game then...The plutonium's to be
used to create panic...?"
"Not exactly..." Henri cut in... "We're not the monsters your American
friends would portray us as, Walthrop...But the world has fallen into
grave danger and needs to be rescued...Now that my wife has saved us
from Demonity, Humanity must be saved from itself..."
"You see I'm still in the saving business, Will..." Buffy looked at
him, a non-committal expression...
"By threatening to unleash nuclear terrorism?...Or will you give the
stuff to someone else and just sit back and wait?...Ah..."
He nodded... "That's it, isn't it?...You'll give the material to some
maniac...Let him threaten the world...And then, what?...Our fair lady
and her hubby materialize to trounce the fiend?..."
"Nothing so melodramatic, my friend..." Henri shook his head... "We
have offered material to a small group of fanatics but only enough for
them to make a single, minor weapon...Though we intend to make it
clear they could have had access to much more..."
"No doubt the world will accept the losses as necessary sacrifices to
have you as their leaders..." Will stared... "So Buffy and you do your
thing after New York...Or London?...Is leveled?..."
"The weapon this group will have access to is limited...And their
delivery system will be crude, Mr. Walthrop..." Bauman chimed in
now... "No great loss of life will occur even if they should succeed
in detonating it..."
"Unless of course bad timing should get the nuclear powers jittery and
firing off their stuff..."
"That won't happen, Spike..." Buffy shook her head... "Henri and the
rest of us have planned this out carefully...It's the illusion we're
after..."
"Yes..." Henri agreed... "Walthrop, imagine the effect on world
opinion even a minor explosion in a relatively unpopulated area by
such a group would have...Despite minimal loss of life, 9/11 a
thousand times over...And when the world learns that their governments
have not only failed to prevent the nightmare from taking form but
have allowed far more material to slip into the hands of such men..."
"Like you..." Will said...
"The world will clamor for security..." Feucher the politician noted
from his cautiously darkened screen, ignoring him... "And we will be
there to offer it...With both the Immortal and the Slayer as proof
that we can provide it..."
"So..." Will turned to Buffy...A cold grin... "I was wrong back in
Sunnydale and the little friends were right...The megalomania has
finally reached the cerebral cortex, eh, Buffy the Law?..."
"It will happen one day, Spike..." she said quietly... "This way, we
can control when and where and use it to prevent the chaos and
suffering that must come to the whole world if the rot goes
unchecked......"
"By inflicting chaos and suffering...Very Angelus, Slayer...My
congrats..."
"There'll be no more loss of life than would have occurred in any
conventional attack...With luck, far less..." Bauman insisted... "And
the group we have selected can attack in its own country, nowhere
else...It's the fact that a nuclear device was used that will provide
what we need..."
"I'm sure your spiritual leader Mr. Hitler is touched by your concern
for human life..." Will smiled...
"Hitler is not our leader, sir...In spirit or otherwise..." Henri
frowned... "The Circle makes use of such fanatics to create an image
but they are mere cover to attract those we need for a time, to be
discarded later..."
"So you're just lovable Mussolini-level fascists, eh?..."
"At this stage in its development, Humanity needs order...Our
existence is in peril from ourselves..." Matisse said quietly...
"Whatever you may have been told or believe about us, our cause is the
highest..."
"Which is why, apart from loving my husband, I support them..." Buffy
said firmly... "I only wish we could persuade you to see...You oughta
know, Spike, that Henri wanted to offer you a place with us right from
the start...But I knew you would never agree, that soul of yours..."
"I'm an independently ornery cuss..." he nodded... "Even as Spike I
couldn't wear an armband and march in the parade..."
"And a romantic...Who never accepts defeat..." she said...
"Not till I am...Like you, girl...Till you decided to betray..."
"The Slayer stands for the protection of Humanity...That's what I'm
doing here...I've betrayed nothing..."
"...everything an American and free citizen should stand for...I was
going to say...Your job doesn't confer the power to decide or rule
arbitrarily, girl...And I think you and your new friends will find it
uphill work to seize power, however much people may panic for a
while...But I appreciate that you don't think it's any use to make me
an offer...Buffy..." his look saddened...
"You were a heroine, once...Can't you see where this is leading...Or
was I wrong that year to oppose your friends for you?...Have you
really convinced yourself you're God's infallible anointed?...
"I'm the Slayer...And the responsibility for protecting Humanity is
mine..."
"Mother Slayer knows best for the world, eh?...Considering you've
never been elected to or governed anything...Or even taken a college
course in political science... Rather a bold claim...Tell me how you
plan to solve the world's great conflicts, oh Queen?...By sleeping
with the interested parties?..."
She stood up and slapped him, hard...
"Countess...Mr. Walthrop..." Bauman tried... Dearest...Henri urged
her... "Fine..." she stepped back but remained standing...
"Or of course, kill them...You're good at that, too...Or were..." Will
said...
"Am still..." she replied, pulling stake...
"I see..." he smiled coolly... "Well, this is a sad parting of the
ways, Ms. Braun...I should warn you and your dear 'Dolf Jr, that I
have learned a few things since last we fought..."
"I told you to go home and not get involved here...I didn't want it to
come to this, but I'm protecting my family as well as Humanity here,
William..."
"Please...Stick to Spike, Slayer..." a grin... "You might feel bad
about murdering a human soul later, otherwise...Tell me is Angel next
on the list, nazi hit-lady?..."
"Sir..." Henri began...
"If I have to, yes...And I'll have a few bad nights...They'll pass..."
"Good to hear...As 'Dolf, Jr's Queen you'll have to have a strong
stomach...Shall we dance, Countess?..." he suddenly charged her,
swerving to the side to miss her swipe...
"No, Henri!..." Buffy, pushing him back, as Will sprang at her
again... "Guards!!..." Henri called...Echoed from her screen by the
elder Countess...
"Oh, my..." Dru started, looking up to the image of a worried Emil on
his screen even as she jerked her chair back to avoid Buffy's passing
as she counter-charged...
***
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