Author's Chapter Notes:
This story will weave itself all through Angel season 5
I awoke from my dream with a start. My breath hitched as I sat up. I was trembling and covered with a sheen of cool sweat. It was the twenty fifth night in a row I had had the same dream.

I glanced around my bedroom in the small London flat I was sharing with my sister, Dawn. The fact that I even called it a “flat” showed I’d been in London to long. I missed home. We had lived here for a little over a month. It had all been paid for and not by us. Somehow, that made it a lot less real. From my vantage point on the bed, I could see the snow falling outside my window. Such a peaceful sight, that. After California, snow was an amazing novelty. Dawn had been so excited to see the snow. We both were. It brought us a kind of comfort in its normalcy. But not tonight, not for me.

My first impulse on awakening had been to call out to Dawn sleeping in the next room and tell her about my haunting nighttime apparitions, but somehow, I couldn’t bring myself to do that. Sure, she would come in and I could talk about it, about him and it might even make me feel better for a little while. But what would it do to Dawn? She missed him too. He had become her friend while I was gone, dead really, and continued to be when I was emotionally unavailable. It probably even began before that. It wouldn’t be fair to get her hopes up. It’s not like it was real. I closed my eyes as I tried to bring my breathing back under control. I thought back to the dream in question.


Alright, I thought to myself, the dream seems to take place in a large office. Fancy upscale office. It’s daytime; there is light streaming in through the large floor to ceiling windows. I can see Angel leaning against his desk, which means this dream happens somewhere in Los Angelus. This must be the office of Wolfram and Hart. If I look to Angel’s right, I recognize Wesley, one of my former watchers, and to his right is a pretty, petite brunette I don’t know. To her right seems to be a green-faced demon of some sort and then a handsome black man in a suit. The petite brunette walks out to the middle of them and begins to speak.

“Is this gonna be our lives now? Fighting our own employees, our own clients? Are we really gonna do any good?” she asks. She looks distressed and I’m not sure what they are talking about. I guess that Angel’s “Fang Gang” has taken over Wolfram and Hart. They’re fighting clients? That seems counter productive.

Angel answers, “Yes, we are. We're gonna change things. We came to Wolfram and Hart because it's a powerful weapon, and we'll figure out how to wield it.”

Wesley looks nervous and adds, “Or kill ourselves with it.”

The girl says flatly, “Yay, team.”

Angel stands up. “No, sooner or later they'll tip their hand, and we'll find out why they really brought us here.” He picks up an envelope off his desk and begins to walk toward his office door. When he falls even with his friends, he turns back to them. “Meanwhile, we do the work...our way, one thing at a time.” He tears open the envelope and an amulet falls to the floor. “We deal with whatever comes next.”

The amulet begins to glow, more and more brightly with each passing second. Everyone is backing up towards the door. Particles come flying out of the amulet to assemble in front of Angel’s desk. A strong wind is sweeping around the room, blowing papers off of the desk. A guttural roar fills the air as the particles form a skeletal shape, then muscles, then flesh, then clothing, as the recognizable form bends at the waist clutching his arms to his stomach and looking about wildly.

Wesley’s soft voice echoes in the silence. “Spike?”




The first twenty four times I had had the dream, I thought it was my heart calling out for my lost lover, giving me some impractical hope that I could some day see him again, but this time was somehow different. Everything in the dream was sharper, clearer. It just felt so real. And really, what are the odds I would have exactly the same dream for almost a month?
Sitting in my bed, hugging my knees, I remembered the dreams I used to get. Back when I was the only Slayer. The ones that used to come true. There hadn’t been tons of them to begin with, but enough that this could be one of them. Wishful thinking maybe, but wasn’t it possible?

Suddenly, I was plagued with self-doubt. I couldn’t call Giles to see what he thought of my dreams. Even after realizing Spike had died to save us, save me, he still wasn’t convinced that he was a good man. And, truth be told, I was tired of the Spike bashing that happened even hours after he had saved us. When the Scoobies got together, as infrequently as that happened now that we were spread across the world, it was still like a major sport. I was starting to think there was a point system and possibly medals that I was unaware of. Neither Xander nor Giles would give up on what they thought Spike was and always had been. A monster.

I shook my head to clear those thoughts away. I had to focus on the dream. Was Spike in Los Angelus? Could I bring myself to call Angel and ask? I got out of my bed and began to pace my floor. I didn’t want to deal with the tension of that situation. I played the happy phone call in my head. ‘Hey Angel! I was wondering if Spike by chance has sprung out of any amulets lately. If so, would you mind if I flew in to see him?”

Angel wouldn’t understand. He still believed, after all this time, that I was in love with him. That someday I would be ready and I would run into his arms and we would live happily ever after. But it was only there, that day at the Hellmouth that I realized what it was to love. As I watched my lover sacrifice himself to save the world, many things became clear to me, including the knowledge that although I loved Angel, I was no longer really in love with him, not in the everlasting, be all end all type of way. I never wanted to be with him, not again, not after knowing real love. Fiery, passionate, adoring love. I had to find out what was going on.

But I didn’t know anyone else at Wolfram and Hart. I was a good guy. I didn’t really have the contacts as far as evil law firms go.

Wait! Wesley! I began bouncing nervously on the balls of my feet, a purely Spike gesture in nature. I mean, sure, Wesley and I hadn’t had the best interactions in the past, but I doubted he would ignore me, or think me totally insane. Granted, he wasn’t a watcher anymore, but he still had all the training. And he was in the dream, so if it had happened, he would know. I glanced at my clock. 2:30 am. So, I figured with the eight-hour time difference, it would be 6:30 in L.A. I might still be able to catch him in his office. After all, weren’t evil law firms still open after dark? Made sense.

I dialed information and asked for the L.A. branch of Wolfram and Hart. I was connected almost immediately.

“Wolfram and Hart, how may I direct your call?” an impatient female voice quipped at me.

“I need to speak with Wesley Wyndam-Price,” I said, trying to act professional. At least, as professional as I could considering the time. I am better at acting like an adult when I have had more than an hours worth of dream-plagued sleep.

The voice said, more harshly this time, “I’m just walking out the door. You should call back during our office hours...” Guess secretaries don’t have to work late.

“Look,” I interrupted her, “I am calling long distance from London where I was awoken from my sleep by a prophecy.” A little white lie wouldn’t hurt. “I need to speak to Wesley, immediately. Just direct me to his office, and if he isn’t there, I’ll try another time, but I’m already on the line. It doesn’t hurt to check to see if he’s there.”

I was proud of myself for not threatening her. A few months ago I would have. I like to think that I’ve grown, as a person. I haven’t even beaten anyone up for information in months. Yay, me!

The line made a clicking noise and I thought she had hung up on me, but then some horrible hold music came on the line. This truly was a lawyer’s office dealing with extreme evil. Only someone with no soul could listen to that horrific noise. I was about to give up and try back once it was morning in L.A. when a cheery female voice picked up the phone.

“Wesley Wyndam-Prices’ office.”

The voice sounded familiar, and it caught me off guard. “Um, is…is Wesley there?” I stammered.

“He just ran out to grab us some food. We’re working a late night here.” The cheery voice imparted. “He should be back in twenty minutes or so. Should I have him call you, Ms…?”

“Buffy Summers,” I answered automatically. Then I realized that giving my real name to a law firm that specialized in the badest badies in bad town may not have been the most intelligent course of action.

There was silence on the line. “Buffy?” came the confused voice, “like Angel’s Buffy? Like the Slayer everyone talks about? From Sunnydale?”

I smirked. “I haven’t been Angel’s Buffy in years, but yes, that’s me. Slayer formerly of Sunnydale”

“Oh my gosh, Miss Summers! It’s an honor to finally speak with you. Angel has talked about you the entire time I have known him. My name is Winifred Burkle. Call me Fred,” the woman gushed.

I smiled at her enthusiasm and replied, “And you can call me Buffy.” Suddenly, I knew where I had heard her voice before. The dream! She had been in the room when Spike materialized. If it had truly happened, then the woman I was currently on the phone with would be able to tell me if my lover was running about in L.A. “Fred, I need to ask you something very strange and horribly important. Has anything really strange happened there at Wolfram and Hart lately? Like an apocalypse maybe, or, I don’t know, a vampire’s essence rematerializing from an amulet?” I was reaching and I knew it, but I couldn’t beat around the bush. My whole life’s happiness might depend on her answer. Off course, if she had no clue what I was talking about, she was going to think I was very odd. An apocalypse is one thing, but a vampire springing forth from an big ugly necklace? Oddly specific.

It was a moment before she responded. “How did you know about the amulet?” she asked softly.





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