Incarnate: Prologue: Helping the Helpless
by Timan
Angel sat uneasily in his chair. He fiddled with the items on his desk. This is an annoying habit he picked up when ever he had to deal with the strange requests of his new staff. Across from him stood the other two members of his team.
First there is Doyle. A couple of months ago Doyle came to Angel claming he was sent buy the higher entities know as the powers that be. He claimed that these beings gave him visions of people in danger and it was Angels job to save them. To Doyle’s dismay the visions were accompanied by the mother of all migraines. Angel’s doubts about Doyle were resolved when he helped save a girl from a billionaire vampire. Which brings us to the second member of the team.
Cordelia Chase. Formerly the Sunnydale high school “it” girl, now aspiring actress, she muscled herself into running angels business after the rescue from the Vampire.
“I’m . . . I’m sorry,” Angel asked hesitantly, “Could you repeat that?”
“I want to change the color of the office.” Cordelia replied chirpily
Angel rubbed his forehead in a mixture of confusion and frustration. He looked up at the dark haired girl.
“I don’t understand. What’s wrong with the color of the office?”
“Hello! Morbid much!” Cordelia replied loudly, ”We want a office that says ‘hi, welcome, we will gladly help you’ not ‘high we specialize in beheadings’.”
“She’s right Angel-man. Brown and brick might be good for the brooding hero but for us normal folk it’s kind of depressing.” Doyle commented
Angel looked at the both of them in utter confusion. He pushed a few more things around his desk.
“Okay . . . so what do you recommend?” he asked
Cordelia smiled. From her purse she threw down a large paint color chart. She sits on the corner of his desk and started to turn the samples.
“Well, as you know, I’m a summer. So I though we could go with a brighter color. Like an emerald or a light crimson maybe even go for a nice sun flower yellow . . .”
Angel began to panic. He has fought some of the darkest evil in the world; he survived being sent to a hell demotion, he stopped the mayor of Sunnydale ascending into a pure demon. But even that wasn’t enough experience to survive dealing with Cordelia Chase.
“I don’t look good in Yellow,” He replied weakly, “can I at least pick the color?”
Cordelia laughed at him.
“You’re kidding right? No offence Angel but if we went with your choice in colors you’d need to bring in more clocks because we would never know if it was day or night. Plus, basic black, not the most inspirational color for happy workers.”
“Well I for one am putting my vote in for emerald.” Commented Doyle
Cordelia flashed him a look. Doyle shrugs.
“What, I’m Irish, can’t I be a little patriot . . .”
His sentence was cut short by the blinding pain. He grabbed at his head and dropped to his knees. He was having a vision.
A teenager running . . .
A vicious fiery demon . . .
A brutal attack . . .
A corpse . . .
Doyle gasped as the pain subsided. Angel rushed from behind his desk and stopped Doyle from falling.
“What is it? What did you see?” He asks anxiously
“A teenager, not sure if it’s a boy or girl, their going to be killed by some huge demon.” Doyle said painfully
“Where are they?”
“Down town. Somewhere near East 7th street and Pacific Avenue.”
Angel grabs his Jacket. And slings it on hero style.
“Cordelia go through the police database see if you can find any match on the teenager in Doyle’s vision. I’ll head out to east 7th see what I can find.”
As the pain clears in Doyle’s head so does the vision. He sees one more thing that he didn’t notice before.
“Wait, Angel!” he calls out, “you’re not going to find anything there.”
Angel turns back to Doyle. Doyle slowly climbs back up onto his feet. He looks at the brooding hero.
“This vision. It’s five years old.”
Angel sat tensely on the corner of the desk of Detective Kate Lockley. An L.A.P.D. contact he made through another case, across from him Doyle stood scratching his head defeatedly.
“I don’t get it why would the powers that be send you a vision of a murder that already happened?” Angel asks the Irishman
“Perhaps the murder wasn’t the end of this demons plans,” Doyle replied, “He could have something in the works or it could be an annual thing, like a holiday, but with more violence. All I know is we need to find this teenager then maybe we can find out its plan.”
Detective Lockley returned with a stack of victim reports. She placed them on her desk and sat down. Brushing away a few stray strands of blond hair she gave the files, one by one, to Angel.
“These are the victims of the unsolved case around 1994 that matched your description. In all of them the torso of these kids were horribly mutilated,” She said, “at first it looked like a wild animal attack but when calls came in from all over the city . . .”
Angel examined the files. He showed them to Doyle who would look at the photo and shake his head.
“Mind telling me what you’re looking for.”
“A case came in recently that may have a connection to one of the murdered kids.” Angel replied deep in thought
Angel opened the second last victim report. He opened his eyes wide. Doyle couldn’t help but notice the look of shock that crossed his face. He showed the victim report to Doyle.
“Oh yeah. That’s the one.” Doyle exclaimed
Kate looked at the both of them with confusion.
“Angel?”
“I need a copy of this file.” Angel ordered
“Sure . . . okay.” She replied as she took the victim report to the copier
Doyle looked at his employer carefully. When something spooks the unspookable you know you have a problem.
“Hey Angel. You okay? You look pale, well, paler.” Doyle said
“Are you sure that’s our kid?” Angel replied with deep concern
“Yeah, what’s the problem man?”
“The problem, Doyle, is that that kid is not dead.”
Back at Angel investigations HQ Cordelia was humming happily to herself as she did some filing. She was only halfway through her index finger when angel burst through the door closely followed by Doyle.
“Whoa hey! Where’s the fire.” she exclaimed
Angel stood in front of her with a look of concern on his face.
“What’s wrong?”
Angel shook his head softly then looked up at Cordelia.
“Cordy. Start packing we’re going on a trip.”
“What? Where are we going?”
“Sunnydale.”
“Oh.” Cordelia replied disappointed, “Can’t demons ever murder somebody in Las Vegas?”
She looked into the Vampires eyes and was struck by the sudden sadness.
“Angel? What is it?”
Angel sighed and handed Cordelia the copy of the victim report. After looking at it for a moment she glared at Angel.
“Okay, very funny, now show me the real one.” she snapped
Angel’s expression didn’t change. Cordelia furrowed her eyebrows. As she read the report her eyes began to fill with tears. She threw down the report and covered her mouth in shock.
“Oh god.” She said in shock
“I’m sorry Cordelia.” He replied softy
She picked up the report again and re-reads to see if she was imagining any of it.
“This can’t be right” replies Cordelia.
“I’m sorry to say it is.” Doyle comments, “That is the kid from my vision.”
Angel stroked his chin thoughtfully. There wasn’t much time so they had to move quickly. He looked at his team.
“Cordelia, organize us a place to work in Sunnydale. I’ll contact Rupert Giles. If this thing is real then Buffy Summers is in real trouble.”
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