Title: Not enough
Author: Cyberwulf
Rating: 12s (PG-13) for implied torture. Tell me if the rating’s too low.
Disclaimer: Characters belong to Joss Whedon.
Spoilers: Passion, Becoming (I&II), Amends, Innocence, The Dark Age.
Summary: Angel reflects on what he’s done. Angel’s POV.
Feedback: Feed the Wulf! cyberwulf_1andonly@yahoo.co.uk

I never apologised.

I want to. Most of me wants to. I want to go to him, beg his forgiveness, explain that the last thing I wanted to do was hurt him. I want to tell him that I wouldn’t have had that happen to him, that if any trace of me, ME, was in the monster wearing my face, I would’ve stopped it. I want to say that.

But it just seems so hollow and pointless. As if an apology could bring Jenny back, erase the scars, make the nightmares go away and let him sleep at night. Don’t look at me like that. I don’t hang around watching him through the window. I know Rupert doesn’t sleep well because Drusilla didn’t. After I left her parents dead in her house for her to find, she sobbed in her sleep. When she found her younger brother’s body, naked, slit from neck to groin, she screamed in her sleep. And when I wrote her a letter from the young man she loved, arranging a meeting in a leafy glade, when she found his mutilated body dangling from one of the trees, she never slept again. She lay awake all night, clutching the blanket, mumbling and singing to herself. Angelus’ best work.

And he hasn’t lost his touch.

There are rooms in this house I don’t go into. I step through a doorway and I can smell Rupert – blood, sweat, fear, vomit. Librarian in the carpet. The single howl of agony I tore from him when I broke his fingers echoes through the empty halls. The memories hit me and I can see him, covered in his own blood, tears flooding down his face, and anger, anger so strong it made him tremble. I think his rage was the only thing that kept him going. I see him, and I hear my voice – only it’s not my voice – and the words hit me in the stomach, making me want to retch.

“ You’re only drawing it on yourself, Rupert.” Calm, almost apologetic, and I know I’m smiling. “ Just tell me. A few words and it’s all over. The pain will stop. What do you say?”

Something wet hits my face, and I close my eyes instinctively. His blood and saliva are sliding down my cheek. I feel myself change, my demon coming to the fore.

“ Not smart.”

My fingers close around a razor blade.

I stumble out of that room and close the door, both hands over my eyes, which are squeezed tightly shut, in a vain attempt to block out the memory. It never works. I know only too well what happened next. The light catches the blade as it bites into his skin. My mouth waters as the blood bubbles out and begins to trickle down his body. He’s trembling and there’s fear now, displacing the anger. I pull the blade along his skin, just deep enough to draw blood, not enough to severely damage anything. Not yet. I finish, stand back and admire my handiwork. I look up and he’s looking down at what I did, face white under the gore, eyes wide. He’s so scared. Angelus loves it. I refasten Rupert’s flies and pat him on the knee. I smile again, friendly.

“ Next time, I’ll cut it off.”

He threw up.

**********

I made Spike clean him up.

“ Where’s the fun if I can’t see my handiwork for blood and puke?” I laughed, before throwing a rag in my childe’s face. “ And no tasting, mind.”

Spike’s the one I can’t place in all this. I didn’t realise it at the time, but he was acting like a brake on me. All along, subtly keeping Rupert alive. “ What if he’s lying?” when we finally got it out of him and I wanted to kill him. I shake my head. It’s something I’ll never figure out: Spike, SPIKE, who earned his nickname through torturing his victims with railroad spikes, Spike, Slayer of Slayers, who called me an “Uncle Tom”, turns around and saves a Watcher from his soulless sire, who’s bent on sucking the world into hell. I almost laugh, the whole thing seems so ridiculous. A year ago, I’d never have thought Rupert would end up owing Spike his life.

Of course, a year ago, I’d never have thought I’d save Jenny Calendar’s life, only to take it away a few months later.

**********

The first time I saw Rupert, after I came back – that’s when it really hit me, what I’d done to him. Hell had seemed like an eternity. I forgot that it was only a few months for him. He looked right into my eyes. Pain, anger, pure hatred set his own on fire. I couldn’t hold his gaze. I said I was sorry to bother him. I didn’t know what else to say.

He laughed. Bitter, sarcastic laughter. I remember, I was surprised that he was so calm. He never raised his voice, not once. Not even when I looked up and found myself on the wrong end of a crossbow.

There are days I wish he’d shot me that night. But he didn’t.

I’d like to say things are gradually getting back to normal, but they’re not. Before all this happened, we were friends. He talked to me. Not just about the next apocalypse. About ordinary things, like his private life and his family. He invited me into his house. He trusted me.

He’ll never trust me again.

I walk into a room and he’s there, and I see it right away. He looks at me and for a brief moment I see a flash – just for a second – of his true feelings in his eyes. Then the emotional shutters come down and those green eyes go cold.

“ Angel.”

He’s civil to me and that’s it. He can hardly stand to be in the room with me. There’s a wariness now that wasn’t there before. His posture changes, and he flinches ever so slightly if I get too close. I try to keep out of his way.

I wish he’d do something. I wish he’d shout and scream and beat me into a bloody little ball hunched on the floor. I’d let him do it, too. It’s better than I deserve. But he doesn’t, and I know why. It’s the same reason he didn’t kill me that first night when I went over to his apartment.

Buffy.

She still loves me. I don’t know how or why, but after all that’s happened, she’s forgiven me. I don’t deserve to be loved like that. Rupert loves her too, and that’s why he tolerates my presence, swallowing all his raging emotions, keeping the agony he must feel every time he sees my face, the face of his tormentor, locked inside him. It’s for her.

He thinks we don’t care. He thinks we’ve forgotten, but I haven’t. His eyes betray him, and I want to tell him. I want to tell him that to look in those eyes and see the raw, searing agony that will never, ever go away, and to know that I did that – that’s the worst punishment of all.

And yet somehow it still doesn’t seem like enough.

-^)--)~