The Destroyer: 1.05: Pursuit
by filmtheory
“I’m slowing you down,” Angel said weakly. “You should leave me.” He couldn’t see his son’s eyes but knew that, if he could, he’d have seen the temptation to do just that. He’d see Connor thinking it over.

“Stop talking,” Connor said. “You’ll make it easier for them to find us.”

“I don’t know where they are,” a guard said into the radio. “They were heading for the exit, then . . unless-” the guard turned back toward the side hallway that lead to Angel’s room. As he did, Connor’s fist connected with his jaw, knocking the guard unconscious.

Another guard raised his weapon. Janice aimed the pistol and fired three shots into his face. Later, she would have nightmares and feel remorse. At the moment, she only felt relief that she fired first.

“We’re pulling up guards from the secure areas,” someone squawked over the radio. “But it’s pretty rough down here.”

“Containing Connor is the prime objective,” another’s voice followed.

“Something tells me if these people get in, they plan on uncontaining Connor,” another voice squawked.

“Less quips and more results, please.”

“These people?” Connor said questioningly.

Angel closed his eyes. He was both upset and relieved by their presence. “Slayers. Willow and Faith must have told her about you.” He smiled, overcome by a slight surge of joy at the knowledge that Buffy still, at least in some way, loved him. “I should have known she’d never abandon my son.”

“If only you could say the same,” Connor said.

A guard came into the hallway and fired at Janice. Without hesitation, Connor maneuvered between Janice and the guard and used Angel as a human shield. Angel grunted as he took the bullet. Connor dropped Angel and leapt forward, tackling the stunned guard.

“Connor, wait!” Angel shouted. But it was too late. Before the words were even out, Connor had already grabbed the guard’s head and snapped his neck. “Connor . . .” he stared.

“He would have killed us,” Connor said, walking back Angel.

“I . . . I know,” Angel said, looking down. He didn’t question the necessity of killing the guard. He was just concerned that his son still seemed able to kill humans so remorselessly.

“I think he’s back down in the lower tunnels,” someone called over the radio.

“I thought he broke out of a luxury box.”

“He may have doubled back.”

“Why would he head back to a more secure area?”

Connor took the blade back from Janice. “I’ll use this. Can you handle the that?” Janice nodded. “Try to use it only once for each person. Those things stop working after a few uses.”

Connor cut a small cut in his left wrist, then set the blade down.

“What are you doing?” Angel asked.

“You need to eat,” Connor said. He punched Angel with his right hand, then shoved the bleeding left wrist in his mouth.

Angel struggled at first, not wanting to feed from his own son. But he’d not eaten in days. Days during which he’d been tortured. His own need for any blood, combined with the potency of Connor’s particular blood, overwhelmed Angel and he began drinking. He took enough so that he’d be able to carry himself, then pushed his son away.

“Can you stand?” Connor asked.

Angel answered by standing. “We should head toward the area where they hold prisoners.”

“Are you crazy?” Janice shouted. “That’s where they can lock us up!”

“And that’s where Buffy will think we are. We fight halfway out, she fights halfway in, and we all go home a lot earlier.”

“Buffy better be all that Dawn says she is,” Janice said petulantly as she walked past Angel.

“She is,” Angel answered confidently.

*

The slayers didn’t have the firearms that the Wolfram & Hart guards did. They neither expected nor wanted to fight humans. Willow, Giles, and Dawn were using magic to provide a kind of fatality-free cover for the slayer, Buffy, Kennedy, and Faith, who’d breached the door and made it inside the hallways of Wolfram & Hart’s stadium.

“Which way to the kids?” Kennedy called.

“Wasn’t that long ago we asked that about her,” Faith mused. “Giles’s guy says it’d be the east wing underground. Anyone bring a compass?”

“Follow me,” Buffy said. Two guards popped out in front of her. She punched the first in a helmet, but the hit was hard enough that the guard staggered. Kennedy dropped on all fours and allowed Faith to use her as a springboard for a dropkick. Buffy beat the second guard down about the same time Faith finished off the first.

“There should be more guards here fighting us,” Buffy noticed. “They’re pulling back for someone.”

“They seem to think we’re on the other side of the building,” a familiar voice answered.

Buffy turned to face him, not daring to believe her ears. “Angel!” she screamed. She threw her arms around him and hugged him tightly. Even Faith was filled with a suppressed, Faith-like joy at seeing Angel.

“Escape now,” Kennedy said. “Reunion later.” She closed her eyes and said, “Will, can you hear me?”

“We have radios?” Janice asked hopefully.

“Not exactly,” Buffy answered.

“Magic,” Connor said bitterly.

“Forgot,” Faith said. “Kid doesn’t like magic.”

“Willow’s says she’ll signal me when we’re clear,” Kennedy said.

“Plan?” Angel asked.

“Run like hell,” Buffy answered.

Janice squealed suddenly as Connor grabbed her and threw her on his back. “You can’t run as fast as the rest of us,” he said, handing her the blade he’d cut form the demon in the arena. “Hold my sword for me.”

“We’re clear,” Buffy, Kennedy, and Faith said in unison.

“Magic,” Connor repeated, shaking his head.

The group ran as hard as they could while Willow, Giles, and Dawn filled the sky with fire. By the time the Wolfram & Hart guards realized that what they were seeing was a glamour, that there were no actual flames flying toward them, the entire team was loading into the two vans they’d brought. Even with their considerable abilities, the three couldn’t possibly have summoned the power needed for actual flames in that magnitude.

“Wait a second,” Faith said, grabbing Connor’s arm. He’d loaded Janice in the van, then turned to run.

Connor glanced back at Faith, the apology clear in his eyes. Faith just didn’t have time to react to it. He threw back a sharp elbow and nailed her in the forehead. Connor sprinted from the vans.

Angel began to climb out of the van, but Buffy grabbed him. “He can’t outrun the car, Angel,” she said.

“Yes,” Angel said. “He can.”

“Then we’ll find him. But right now we have to get out of here.”

“I’ll catch up with you,” Angel said as he leapt from the van.

Buffy was frozen with indecision just long enough for the van to peel away. “We’ll get them back,” Willow said as she drove away.

“We better,” Faith said, handing Buffy a severed ear that once belonged to Eve.

“It’s human,” Buffy said. “Where did you get it?”

“Connor’s pocket before he took off,” Faith said. “Wesley told me when Connor came to L.A., he took trophies like this.”

“Human?” Willow asked, hopeful that Connor might not have taken this particular trophy.

“Human,” Faith answered. “Drug dealer. But human.”

*

“Mr. Sirk,” Eve said as she walked into the office. Her left ear was bandaged.

Sirk did his best to control his facial expression when he looked up to see Eve. He probably would have been fine at 98% of the poker tables in America. But Eve could tell he was worried about her unannounced visit.

“Eve,” he said, before looking back down at his papers. “I was sorry to hear about what happened. Though I am somewhat upset you didn’t tell me you were holding Miss Jacoby when we spoke last.”

“Oh, come on Rutherford. You knew I had her.”

“I suspected,” he said as he signed off on a spending request. “I do hope the Junior Partners will be able to help you with the ear.”

“They’ve already arranged for me to get a new one,” Eve smiled. Two brawny men in suits stepped into the room behind her. “So, I think we need to have a talk.”

“About?”

“Your secretary called our travel agent to find out where I was. He asked for information on my plane ticket and the location of my rental car.”

“As I said, I suspected you had a lead in a very important case on which I was working.”

“And just after you find out where she was, your old organization hazards a full frontal assault against the compound where we were holding her.”

Sirk looked up and smiled slightly. He opened a desk drawer by his right hand and removed a sheet of paper. He left the drawer open.

“What’s this?” Eve asked, picking up the sheet of paper.

“A transfer request. I requested that the Junior Partners grant me custody of Janice Jacoby. However, I needed to know her location in order to request her. As you can see, Eve, the request was granted. So I didn’t really need any commandos to rescue the girl for me.”

“The girl?” Eve laughed. “Forget the girl. They got Angel. And his son. You’ve been in league with Angel since before he took out the Black Thorn. That’s why you disappeared.”

“I disappeared because you told me to do so after the red herring prophecy you had me give to Angel regarding the Shanshu prophecy.”

“Maybe,” Eve said as one of the men behind her reached into his suit jacket. “But I can’t take that chance. Sorry, Rutherford.”

The men in suits went for their guns. Sirk reached quickly into the open drawer by his right hand and pulled out his own gun. Sirk shot the first gunman, but the second got his pistol out and fired, hitting Sirk in the chest. Sirk fell back into the chair as excruciating pain ripped through his body. He concentrated with all his might to keep from dropping his gun.

Eve quickly backed out of the room as Sirk and the second gunmen took aim. Sirk fired first. He fired three more times, each shot hitting the second gunmen in the face. The gunmen dropped to the floor, dead. Sirk dropped form his chair to the floor and crawled toward the door.

“Mr. Sirk,” his secretary called as he ran into the room. “I’ll call an ambulance.”

“Thank you, Martin,” Sirk wheezed. “How very obliging of you.”

“But my name is Michael,” the secretary objected as Sirk fell unconscious.

*

Angel took a short cut and ambushed Connor by tackling him to the ground.

“Connor, you can’t keep running,” Angel yelled.

Connor kneed Angel in the stomach and pushed him off. “I don’t know. I can run for a real long time. Four days straight once.”

“I meant ‘run’ metaphorically, Connor.”

“You don’t think I can run metaphorically?” Connor said angrily as he delivered a punch to the face.

“Do you even know what ‘metaphorically’ means?”

“No,” Connor said angrily as he flipped Angel to the ground. “But that still doesn’t mean I can’t do it.”

“Connor, I . . . please just come with me. I . . . I can’t help but think that if you rescued me from that place, it must be because, deep down, you want things to be better between us. I want that, too. There are things I have to teach you. I need to know you’ll be okay when-”

“I’ll be okay,” Connor said sadly. For the first time, the veneer of hostility had gone some. “I took you out of there because I didn’t want you to die.” He backed away slowly. “But I still don’t want to be around you.” Connor turned and ran. Angel did his best to stand and pursue the boy, but he was too badly injured. He pulled himself to his feet and started limping for town. Hopefully he could make it to shelter by daybreak.

“He doesn’t want me around, but he wants me alive,” Angel said to himself. He shrugged. “It’s an improvement.”

*

“But Buffy, he grew up in a hell dimension!” Willow protested. She was sitting around the conference table with Giles, Faith, Buffy, Kennedy, Xander, and Dawn.

“And maybe there cutting ears of humans was considered good, clean fun,” Xander said. “But I don’t think he’s been hanging on to that thing for two years, Will.”

“I’m just saying we should have some understanding,” Willow explained.

“Here we go with the understanding,” Buffy rolled her eyes.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Willow snapped.

“Face it, Will,” Xander said. “You do have a habit of sticking up for the baddies.”

“Like who?” Willow was clearly offended.

“Let’s see,” Xander pretended to ponder. “The Chumash Indians who gave me the Syphilis. Spike when he had the chip but was still evil.”

“This isn’t really helping,” Giles interjected. “There can be no question that we need to find and restrain the boy, Willow.” Giles was interrupted when his cell phone rang. “Pardon me,” he said opening the phone.

“Will, do you think you could do a locator spell?” Buffy asked.

“Depends,” Willow asked. “What do we do when I locate him?”

“I beat his ass down and we bring him back here,” Faith said.

“We’ll try to do it without the ass beat down,” Buffy said.

“But we won’t succeed,” Faith said. “Kid’s stubborn.”

Dawn’s phone went off and she looked at it with a frown.

“What is with the phones today?” Buffy groaned. “Are we not having a meeting?”

“My call was about a rather difficult set back, I fear,” Giles said.

“That’s ‘bad news’ in American English,” Xander said.

“Rutherford Sirk has called for extraction from his undercover assignment,” Giles continued. “He’s activated Extraction Plan Martin.”

“Martin?” Faith said.

“My call is good news,” Dawn said, hanging up. She looked at Buffy and smiled. “We found Angel.”

“What about Connor?” Faith asked.

“No dice. But hopefully Angel can help us find him. They’re bringing him here.”

*

“I’m fine, mom,” Janice said over the phone.

“We thought you’d been kidnapped!”

Janice gritted her teeth. “I just had a hard time with a guy who wanted too much from me. I needed to be alone for a while.”

“Oh, honey,” her mom said sadly. “You know you can talk to me about that.”

“No, I really can’t.”

“Yeah,” her mom insisted. “You really can.”

“I’m really, really sorry. But I kind of need to make up on some studying I blew off. Plus I’m going to need to jog an extra mile to burn off all the ice cream I ate.”

Janice got off the phone with her mother.

“Is she okay?” Dawn asked as she sat next to her friend.

“She’s better now that she knows I’m okay.” Janice looked around. “So . . . this Connor. What’s his deal?”

“The best I can describe him is that he’s like a male slayer,” Dawn said.

“But he had like . . . a human ear in his pocket.”

“He’s like a male slayer who’s a little crazy. But he’s essentially a good guy. Once we get him a shrink, anyway.”

“Why do I always go for psychos?”

“You like him?” Dawn smiled teasingly.

“Not so much now that I know about his ear-collecting hobby.”

“Un-freaking-believable!” Willow yelled. She was in the conference room, but her voice carried all the way down the hall.

“I better get back in there,” Dawn said.

By the time Dawn got back, everyone was flipping out.

“Completely irresponsible!” Giles shouted.

“You weren’t there,” Angel yelled back. “You don’t know what he was going through.”

“We would have been there if you’d have told us!” Buffy shouted.

“Willow and Faith were there,” Angel answered. “They saw him.”

“Whoah,” Faith said angrily as she threw he hands up. “Don’t even try to lay this off on me.”

“Or me,” Willow said. “I didn’t see any signs that he was unhinged.”

“I personally can’t go that far,” Faith said. “Kid was wound a little tight.”

“But homicidal?” Willow said.

“He . . . he wanted to belong,” Angel said.

“He wanted to belong?” Buffy said. “Fine. But he could have joined a cult. God knows L.A. has plenty of those. Killing people does not equal belonging.”

“He didn’t kill anyone!” Angel protested angrily.

“He helped to kill people,” Xander said. “It’s the same thing.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Faith shot bitterly at Xander. “Granted, helping to kill people is crossing a line. But there’re plenty of lines after that. Trust me.”

“Can we get back to the part where we were criticizing Angel,” Xander said demurely.

“Memory spells are bad,” Willow said, imitating Mr. Mackey from the show South Park. “M’kay?”

“I needed to do something,” Angel said.

“So you trusted your mortal enemies rather than your closest friends,” Buffy said in a cold, stern voice.

Angel’s voice squeaked twice as he tried to thing of something to say. “I . . . I didn’t think of that.”

“Well you should have,” Buffy said harshly.

Giles frowned. He’d need to talk to Buffy when this was over. She was obviously taking Angel’s going to Wolfram & Hart as a personal rejection.

Andrew burst into the room gleefully. “Angel! I can’t tell you how pleased I am that you’re alive!” He walked up to Angel and hugged him.

“Andrew, I’m afraid we’re quite a bit angry and disappointed at Angel for the moment,” Giles said. “So please stop hugging him.”

“Thank you,” Angel said, looking at Giles.

“I have excellent news, fellow warriors against darkness and evil and-”

“Andrew,” Giles, Buffy, and Willow all said impatiently.

“I found our tango,” Andrew said.

“You found us a dance?” Xander said. “Great. Because that’s exactly what we need.”

“Tango as in target,” Andrew said.

Faith sighed and grabbed Andrew’s shirt collar. She cocked her fist. “Use human English sentences or I start hitting you.”

“I’ve located Connor,” Andrew said.

“What?” Buffy shouted. “We have people scouring the area for him and you found him?”

“I have a friend who plays D&D with me online,” Andrew explained. “He lives in a small town in the San Rafael Mountains, not far from our Tango’s family.”

“Family?” Buffy asked. “I thought Angel was his family.”

“I believe he’s referring to the false family of whom Angel gave Connor memories,” Giles inferred.

“Three minutes ago,” Andrew said proudly. “Connor knocked on their front door.”

This story archived at: The Slayer\'s Fanfic Archive
The Slayer\\\\\\\\'s FanFic Archive - http://www.slayerfanfic.com/viewstory.php?sid=13948