A Simple Act of Faith
Chapter 12

Vocah was meeting with Holland alone while Darla kept Lindsey distracted.

“He is unaware of what is to occur?”

Holland nodded.  “He has no clue.  He thinks that we are bringing back his dear sweet wife.”

“One of the good ones?”

Holland nodded.

“And he is unaware that the forces of darkness can never bring back what the powers of light have?”

“He’s to distraught over her death to realize.”

“Good,” Vocah replied.  “It’s best that they don’t fight.  I need all the information you have on the seer.  He must be put out of commission.  He will get a vision of what we are doing.  Angel must be alone.  He must be alone if we are to bring him down to us.”

“There is a problem—“

“What?”

“He has been assisting the slayer for the last few evenings.”

“What?” Vocah said, his voice growing slightly angry.

“We don’t think they have bonded.  I think she just needed help defeating two of our assassins.”

“How come they didn’t assassinate her?”

“Well, she is the slayer.  They’ve tried.”

Vocah looked even more angry, but to Holland, he always looked mad. “I want your assassins to get rid of her—I will take care of the seer.”
 

Faith was not sure what she wanted to do.  Part of her wanted to confront Lindsey, the other part wanted to go home and cry.  But she was the slayer; she had to hold it together.  She had to be strong both physically and emotionally.

She could not believe that Lindsey was working with Wolfram and Hart and that he had betrayed himself and the morals she had fought so bravely to keep for him.  She remembered when they met in Russell Winters’ house.  How sincere he had been on staying on the side of good.  Was that all gone?

In the end, she decided to go home.  She wanted to sleep on it before confronting him and she needed to think about the best way to do it.

It was dark when she got in.  Lilith was asleep.  Faith was glad the watcher was beginning to trust her.  She looked at the phone and picked it up.

Alex’s sleepy voice picked up after two rings.

“Hello?”

“It’s Faith.”

“Faith—“ Alex said, perking up.  “It’s almost four am.  Are you all right?”

“Listen—this is hard—Lindsey’s betrayed us.”

“What?” Alex said, there was shock in her voice.

“He’s been working with Wolfram and Hart for the last few weeks.”

“What ever for?” Alex said.  Her voice was more awake and more in shock.

“To get back at Angel—and they promised him Cordelia.  It has to be the reason.  It is the only one I can think of.”

“I can’t believe—have you talked to him?”

“Nope.  He doesn’t know we know,” she explained.

“We?”

“Doyle, Angel and Gunn.”

Alex did not say anything for a long time.

“He’s been working for Wolfram and Hart to do something to Angel.  You can’t tell him.  I don’t want you going to the office tomorrow, okay.”

“I can handle myself.  I went let anything slip.”

“Alex—please--,” she said.  “I don’t know how far Lindsey has gone.  He might have sold us all out.”
 

Instead of heading home or to the Hyperion, Doyle went to a bar.  He stayed there until 3am and had gotten very drunk.  He felt that this was partially his fault.  He had run off from Lindsey and Faith as soon as Angel got back his soul.  He could have always called in the visions.  He could have stayed with them.  Helped them get through this.  Maybe he could have made a smooth transition between them and Angel.

He laughed when he thought about that and about calling in his vision.

Hello Angel.  There’s a girl on Vine that needs your help.  Talk to you tomorrow.

The bartender looked at him strangely.  Although Doyle frequented this bar a lot, and the bartender liked him, he thought he was peculiar.

“Give me another,” Doyle said.

“Francis, I think you’ve had enough,” the bartender said.

“Nope,” Doyle said and laughed.  “I still remember that there is good and evil out there and people trapped in-between.  Jesus would have not liked this world.  People try and try to escape the darkness only to sucked back in.”

The bartender sighed.  Doyle was drunker than usual.  The bartender was used to Doyle’s rants about good and evil and vampires and demons.  Tonight was almost as bad as four months ago when he came in screaming that the vampires were killing his friends.

“The demons are going to steal their souls.”

The bartender was anxious to get home and had to use the bathroom.  He looked around the bar.  There were only about five men, all seemed to be on the verge of passing out.  He could easily slip out for a minute.

“Hey, Francis, watch the bar for a moment.”

Doyle nodded.  Maybe he could give up being a seer and a PI and become a bartender.

“Freddy, how much does this job pay?”

“Less than what you make now,” Freddy said and rushed to the back, unable to hold it in much longer.
Doyle wasn’t interested in the cash register, with Freddy gone, he poured himself another drink.  He left a fiver on the table.

He gulped it down and suddenly felt a shiver as the door opened.  He felt someone pass him by but when he turned around, no one was there.

“Just your imagination,” he said, pouring himself another drink.

As he took the bottle, he was hit by a shearing pain.  A vision was coming his way.  Doyle put the bottle down.  In it he saw a woman being attacked by a demon.  Hiding himself in his jacket, he turned into demon form, but a moment later it’s gone.  Luckily the bar had only passed out drunks and no one saw him.

Doyle took a deep breath.  He decided one more quick drink before contacting Angel.

Just as his hand grabbed the bottle, a vision hit again.  This time with more intensity.  Before it could end, another one hit and then another.  It wasn’t the same visions, just a string of them.  They kept on coming.

Doyle dropped the bottle.  It smashed into a million pieces on the floor.  Doyle fell off the stool into the shards of glass, but nothing was more painful than the dozens of visions that were hitting him at the same time.
 

Angel was frustrated when he walked into the Hyperion.  It was different than what he felt before. He felt confident in his abilities again.  He was the one doing wrong, it was other people conspiring against him.

And the biggest conspiracy was waiting for him on the stairs.  She looked as beautiful as the day he saw her in the alley.

“Hello, Darla,” he said.

“Angelus,” she said, coming down the stairs.

“You know I could stake you right now or at least get you arrested for trespassing.”

“You won’t,” she said.  She smiled.  “I am not threatening you or your cheerleader.  I just came to talk.”

Angel chuckled.  “Talk?  Right?”

Darla walked over to him.  She touched his arm.  He pulled away.

“Don’t shy away Angelus.”

“I’m on to you.  I know what you put Lindsey up to.”

Darla smiled at him.  “Poor boy, he does not know what he is about to unleash.”

Angel looked at her strangely.  “Unleash?  What are you going to do to him?”

Darla did not give an answer, instead she said. “I miss you Angelus.  I know you do too.  I know you can never have your cheerleader.  Am I such a bad consolation prize.”  She said, pulling him closer.

He looked her over.  He always had a pang for her.  When he was Liam, still had a soul and saw her, he was instantly attracted to her, but it wasn’t like what he felt for Buffy.  He would go to the ends of the earth for her.

“No,” he admitted.  Even though he knew Lindsey was setting him up, what Lindsey had told him was not far from the truth.

“Then be Angelus,” she said.  “If I knew how 100 years ago how to get you back, I would have done it.  In an instant.  Anything to get back my darling boy.”

Angel shook his head.

“The soul was filthy,” she explained.  “Get rid of it.”

“That’s not it,” Angel said, taking her wrist.  Sometimes he did wish he could make the pain go away, but that pain was needed.  It was needed to give him the energy to do right. “I could make love to you all night.  We could do it a million times, but I’m keeping my soul because I don’t love you.”

Darla looked a little hurt, but since she did not have a soul, it didn’t faze her.

“We could try,” she said.  “We were together for 150 years.  You must have loved me.”

“I didn’t have a soul,” Angel said and smiled.  “And you can’t love without a soul.  That’s what the curse meant.  I could never love, despite having the tool for it.  Get over it, Darla.  I don’t love you and never will.”

Darla still looked a little mad.  They were interrupted by the phone ringing.  Angel went over to the desk, leaving Darla standing by the stairs.

He picked up the phone, while keeping most of his senses on Darla.

“Yeah--  What?  I’m his employer.  I’ll be right there.”

Angel hung up the phone and turned around.  “I supposed you know what that is all about?”

Darla did not say anything.

“Darla, this would be a good time to leave because if you are not gone in five seconds, I will stake you.”
 

Faith was woken from a nightmarish sleep.  It had been only two hours since she went to bed.

“Faith!” said Lilith’s very concerned voice.  Faith suddenly got up.  Her heart was racing.  This was it.  They had finally gotten to Lindsey.

“What?  What!” she cried out.

“Angel’s on the phone.  It’s Doyle,” Lilith said.  “He’s in the hospital.”
 

Alex had gotten to the hospital before Faith.  She lived closer.  There was no sign of Lindsey, but they did not expect him nor did she expect anyone had called him.

“Hey,” Faith said.  Lilith followed her.  “What is it?  What’s going on?”

“I don’t know,” Alex said.  “The doctors won’t let me see him.  They say family only.  They think he has some kind of skin disease or he’s on drugs.”

“Skin disease?” Faith said.

“His demon side,” Alex explained, her voice calm, but slightly shaky.  “I think he must be stuck in demon form.”

“How dreadful—“ Lilith said and she stopped talking.  Angel appeared from behind the double doors.

Faith ran up to greet him.  Lilith felt weird.  Had Faith been talking to Angel?  She looked like she had no anger towards him.  Lilith knew Angel had a soul, but he also knew he was still a vampire.

“What is it?  What’s going on?” she said.

“It’s the visions,” Angel said.  “For some reason he keeps getting visions over and over again.”

“How?  Why?” Faith asked, confused.  For a moment she felt utterly alone.  She wanted Lindsey to show up tell her everything they knew about him was wrong and he was here for her.

“I don’t know.  There is a mark on his hand.  It’s the mark of Vocah.  He brought me back.  He’s planning on bringing something else.” Angel paused.  “I saw Darla.  She let it slip that they are going to raise something that will harm Lindsey.” Angel said.

“Oh god,” Faith said.  “What should we do?”

“With Doyle this way, I have no connections to the powers that—“

“You have one,” Faith said.  “Alex, Lilith stay here and watch Doyle.  We have some singing to do.”

“Singing?” Angel said and made a funny face.
 

Chapter 13

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