His Eyes Are Watching God

Author: Ares

Rating:  PG 13?

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A mention to Lisa who wrote Monster in the Pit, which inspired me to write something dark. At least I hope it is dark, and if not, there is angst.

Thanks Lisa.

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As always, a hug for the magnificent Jo and her amazing beta skills, and inspiration.

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This is Angel’s POV. Other voices are in italics.

He sits, held down, the weight of his sins and hopes too heavy to shift, too painful to acknowledge, and so he ignores them, pretends they are not there, they do not exist and he is free. And yet, chains unseen tether him, hold him to this existence and will not let him go. His mind, unfettered, roams at will and does not return, and yet…

And yet, here he is, beneath the fathomless sky. Stars that glitter, wink and shine return his unblinking stare, careless and caring not. His back is broad, he falls back as slow as a snow flake drifting earthward, reclines until he is flat upon the rock - is the rock. It bears him and his pain, steady, Peter’s house of stone. A memory, it cuts and filets his soul, surfaces and leaves bloody footprints staining all that he is – was. Emotions are not allowed here inside where it is dark and cold. The frost rimes his heart, unused, a shrivelled piece of muscle, lifeless, frozen for eternity, has eternity to thaw, drop by bloody drop; but will not.

A sound nearby does not intrude; he is deaf and numb - dumb to all. He has no will to say…anything. He lies and waits and flies away.

A hand, cool and not, grasps at his, pulls and lifts until the view tilts and sways. The vault that is his mind denies, and then grudgingly accepts and raises eyes. The stars are leaving, running from a faint light, hurrying, and carrying him away. His feet know the way, are led and do not stumble; he retains all his grace. His voice is unheard, unused, unable, disabled.

A retreat, dark, warm and undeserving, the softness beneath his skin yields, sinks and he drifts. He does not feel the wool gently put upon his shoulders, he slumbers and screams inside. Slavering jaws gape and maul, his and his and theirs. The crack of bone, the spurt of arterial glory, fills his senses. Faces ruined and grotesque that smile and beg, and cry. There is one that captures his attention. Soft as a whisper, heat that scalds and his face becomes a canvas of life - and death. An eternity passes before he escapes and wakes. Here he does not remember, does not recall, cannot…will not. His eyes snap open, his mind is free of his choosing, and he smiles, almost.

The fiery warmth has fled, soothing black has come, hides his sins, sinner. He is back at Peter’s house, flat and grey, a stone, a rock, a pebble in the river that is. In his eyes, the stars reflect.

“He knows enough to walk to his rock,” an accented voice intrudes, almost. He denies it, will not flinch. The voice is his shame, his to wear and show what he was and is capable of.

“Why did you not call?” Silk and honey, power and sting, her words a scalpel, it slices and leaves behind scars unseen.

“I did.” Dismissal and hurt in two small words.

“When…?” The scalpel has turned, blunted. It becomes smooth, rounded and pliant; it massages the soul and whispers things that he will not hear. And yet -

“He was okay, his own soddin’ self. Took me by surprise, this did.”

“You should have called, he should have called.” This had nothing to do with the current state of affairs. She was referring to then.

The accent did not give her the fight she craved. “What did you think Buffy? All would be dandy? Kill a few hundred people, but that is of no consequence, he’s killed thousands, tens of thousands. What’s a few hundred more? What is one more?”

“Don’t!” Tears that make him bleed. She has cried a river, bright red.

“Don’t what? Tell it like I see it? A few hundred don’t count. His friends did. They were the ones that mattered.” When did he become concerned?

He finds that he is listening…he cannot escape the voice, her sound, it draws him, snares him in its silken web.

“He matters, he knows that.”

“Not to you, he doesn’t.”

The silence is deafening. It scours his ears and abrades his soul. He tries to flee…

“Did he say anything…before…?”

“Funny that! He said that he was waiting for a sign.”

“A sign?”

“Bugger if I know. It’s what Captain Forehead said.”

“And yet you care for him.”

“Yeah…well…I can’t let the old man fry. He sits here all night.  I dunno if he even knows when the sun is up.”

“Has he fed?”

“No… he’s not hungry.”

His mind thankfully breaks the chains that bind him to that deadly voice. He soars into the heavens, the dark star of his sins tears him into pieces, and he shatters, unable to resist that irresistible force. It is always the same, this feeling, this annihilation, their love. One of many names; she has the honour; she is top of the list. He cannot, will not remember the others: yet. He is a shard, a sliver of self, floating weightless in the emptiness of space, in the empty between the stars.

“Angel?”

He plummets, almost, at her voice and her touch. Every cell in his body screams, fool! Beware! He has done this thing. Petty he knows. Champions do not have the luxury of wallowing. They do not have the luxury of despair. To mourn, to grieve, to retreat, that is the prerogative of lower beings. Champions have to suck it up, take it on the chin, and take it like a man. He is not one, or ever will be. They knew, those fucking Powers That Be. They had to have done. They were omniscient, all seeing, all knowing. He was – is – a pawn. No more, says he.

“Angel. I am here.”

She cannot be, should not be. He is worthless, less than a mote of dust. She is the sun, the moon. He is the thing that howls, the beast that prowls the universe, in the deepest of night, he is eternity unrelenting. He is tired of it and yet cannot change. They saw to that.

“Tell me why!”  He cannot find the words, his mouth will not work, and she is not asking for his voice, she asks another.

“There was this family.”  Stop! Do not! He cannot listen. He tries to flee and the chains that bind him pull tight. He attempts the stars. They stare back and tie him down.

“We were too late…It was bad. The demons had one kid, still alive, his family a mass of blood and bone.”

He stares up at the stars and defies them, forces them back until all he sees is the emptiness between. He soars and disintegrates, becomes molecules in space. Ashes to ashes, right? It is what he is, will become. The voice, relentless, unheeding, bares his pain. He refuses to listen. He knows the words, he wrote them after all.

A warmth, not of Hell fire and Damnation, tugs at the whisper he has become. Once again he regains form and finds himself at St Peter’s. His head does not turn to know that *she* is there. A glow rests upon his heart where her golden locks lie. Each breath she takes, each one is his. Her form fits and he feels a sob forming. His chest tightens. Who’s?

He cannot close his eyes, it will do no good. That photographic memory betrays and shows all.

A splash, a caress, a breeze that burns, brushes his features, and tells him he is too late. The child, no more than two, squeals and is silent, his blood pulses, arterial spurts colour the walls and stripe his flesh. There are five demons, left over monsters from the army of doom - his doom. He does not need Spike to kill, maim and dismember. The boy does his share and stands back at the fury that is his. His foot slips in gore as he despatches the last, intestines join other macabre pieces on the floor. The family of humans numbers seven, their sightless heads testament to a horrible fate. He stumbles away, the other following, asking “what next?” in subdued tones.

It is not the carnage - it pierces and numbs – he drowns under water, scalding and ice, scrubbing the taint, the stain, the taste! The babe’s blood, his dying breath, lapped up on dead man’s lips, tasted and found to be ambrosial. He is the monster, the thing that all men fear, the bogeyman that comes for you in the night. He will not, and knows he cannot, change. He hates that he savoured the blood, all the while pretending he is, or should have been, their saviour. This is when he decides, no more!  He wants a sign, anything. It is to be all or nothing. He puts down his sword and drops his mantle.

This is what she does to him. It is why he cannot live without her, and why he does.

“What are you looking at?” she whispers, her voice vibrating against his chest.

He finds he has vocal chords for the first time in weeks. Only she has that power.

“I’m watching God.”

This is what he does. He contemplates the heavens and watches for God. He watches and waits. He waits to see what God will do, what God has in store for the likes of him. He, a Godless creature, unloved, unwanted, watches and waits, dares God to do his worst because his best has already passed and left him wanting. He cannot, will not go there again, dare not, he will not survive. His mind has returned, and the amazing woman beside him makes a liar out of him.

Green eyes stare up at his but he does not see. He is still watching God.

Buffy sees nothing but the stars reflected in Angel’s eyes, and she smiles. He has spoken, she has that power, still, and she rests her head where it has always belonged.

It will be several days - or nights - before the damned creature that is Angel realises that God has answered.

The End.

Feb 2006

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