With Or Without You, Part 5/7

[lucy_ash]

Title: With Or Without You
Fandom: BtVS, The Night Stalker
Characters/Pairing: Xander, Angelus, Willow, Drusilla, Spike, Carl Kolchak
Rating: R for death
Concrit: Please, in comments
Disclaimer: They aren't mine.  Not yet.  But they will be, once I've taken over the world.  Bwah-ha-ha.
Warnings/Squicks:

• Death/turning of a major character shown
• Death of a major character off screen
• Self-mutilation

Summary: Willow held her breath.  Buffy, I thought.  Coming to save her.  Can't lose my Willow.  Not now.  Not ever.
Notes: The Night Stalker is the original and not the newer series.  When Kolchak is holding the cross, vampires react the way they would in The Night Stalker and not the way they would in Buffy meaning they are more debilitated by the cross than they would be in a normal Buffy episode.

Story index is here.


Angelus was, well holding court sounds lame but there really is no better way to describe it. We were in what would be called a conference room in a hotel today. The wallpaper, green with a pale pattern, had stood up over the years but smelled a bit moldy. Willow shone against it. Her bright green lace, which made the wallpaper look dull in comparison, left her looking more naked than, well, than being naked would have. I could have eaten her up. That bitch Drusilla was sniffing around her, jealous of Willow's beauty. They said she could see things. At the time I'd thought she knew Willow would take her place. Spike was on the outs. I'd figured, once Willow was turned, we'd be Angelus' favorites and Drusilla would be out as well. Unless Spike's plan worked but I already knew about Spike and plans so I wasn't counting on it.

Drusilla spun into the room and suddenly stopped. “They're coming to find us.”

Laughing, Angelus strode over and took her hand. “Who? Who's looking for us, Dru?”

“The Slayer teamed up with the monster hunter,” she singsonged.

Willow held her breath. Buffy, I thought. Coming to save her. Can't lose my Willow. Not now. Not ever.

“Monster hunter?” Spike asked from the shadows.

“The man in the ice cream suit. He's terribly funny,” she laughed. “Keeps trying to prove we exist only to kill us, in the end, instead.”

“When are they coming, pet?” Spike asked, stepping into the light.

She made snatching motions in the air: grasp, grasp, grasp. “It's going away. All gone.”

Catching my gaze, Spike gave a concerned glance over to Willow and then stared back to me again. Noting that Angelus' attention was on Drusilla, I replied with an short nod. I know Spike was using me but I didn't care because I was using him as well, to buy myself some time, just a bit. Just enough to turn Willow. Drusilla might be devoted to Angelus but, after I'd turned her, Willow would follow me.

Drusilla whispered something in Angelus' ear. I was too far away to hear it but Angelus turned to me, with a look of concern, and ordered me to take Willow back up to his room. I didn't think my chance would come so soon but the sooner the better as far as I was concerned. The night before, after I'd thought over what Spike had told me, that Angelus wouldn't keep the both of us, I'd gotten myself invited into a home. I'd have to carry Willow out through the sewers and then steal a car to get back there but we'd leave less of a trail for Angelus to follow that way. She'd be vulnerable, after I'd turned her, until after her first feeding. In the house, we'd be safe until she woke and then she'd have a whole family to choose from. The rest of them could help us while away the hours until night fell again.

Willow was strongly enough under Drusilla's sway that I wasn't sure she'd be quiet if we headed for the basement so I took her Angelus' room as he'd commanded instead. She'd be quieter on the way out after I'd taken care of her.

As I slipped into vamp face, she backed away from me. “Xander, what are you doing? Angelus won't like it.”

“He's not keeping us apart.” I grabbed her to me. As she fought to get away, green lace tore off under my hands. “Oh yeah, struggle baby. That just makes it more fun,” I said before sinking my fangs into her throat. Willow's life poured into me and I drank it all: warm, sunny days; innocent sharing ice-cream-cone nights; the yellow crayon; and desire, always her desire for me. She'd never want anything other than me again but this time I'd make sure she always have what she wanted.

Her heart was barely beating: lub dub... lub dub... It was time. I held her up, close to me, since she was too weak to stand on her own. Tearing open my shirt and cutting the skin was the most sensual thing I'd ever done. I couldn't wait to see what else sharing with Willow would be like. As I brought her mouth to the cut, I was grabbed from behind and Willow fell to the ground.

“No!”

“Yes,” Angelus whispered. He laughed as I struggled against him, taking me to the ground where he pinned me. Stretching my free arm out towards Willow, I couldn't quite reach. Her green eyes already looked dead. I bucked under him, trying to get up, trying to save Willow. I tensed up all my muscles, for one great push up against Angelus. He rode it out and laughed over me. “Trying to turn me on, are ye me lad? Listen to her.”

lub dub, her heartbeat... lub, dub, slowing... lub... dub... and then one final lub...

* * *

Towards morming, Xander left Angelus' room carrying his clothes, leaking blood and cum. I'd been close enough to hear Drusilla whisper to Angelus that Xander was planning to turn Willow. I'd had to stand there, unable to stop it, when Angelus set Xander up. And then he'd killed Willow, instead of Xander. Damned waste.

One bright spot though. When Xander saw me, his lips a tight line and fury etched across his body, he gave me a decisive nod before stalking back to his room. Boy wanted his revenge.

* * *

“What do you mean I can't buy Holy Water?” I argued.

“Sir.” The prissy little clerk look shocked. “Holy Water isn't just sold to lay people.”

“Well, maybe I'm a priest.”

Giving me a officious smirk he added, “If you were a priest you'd know you can't buy Holy Water.”

“Where do I get it then?”

“You don't get Holy Water,” he snarked.

“Fine, fine. How much for just the cross then?” I asked, gesturing towards counter and the largest cross I could comfortably carry.

“Highway robbery,” I muttered on my way out of the store. It was getting dark and I still didn't know how I was going to find the vampires again. I'd thought about calling that Buffy girl but she'd made it pretty clear that, now that she knew where to start looking, not only didn't she need me but she thought I'd be in the way if we went looking together.

St. Francis de Sales Church had two advantages. It wasn't just a church but a school as well, one that Patrick, my best friend in high school, had attended, so I was at least slightly familiar with it, and it was close to the sewer line where I'd found the vampires two days earlier. The church looked just like a school against the night sky by the time I arrived but, inside, the candlelight and scent reminded me of the old days, of sneaking in to play pranks on Pat, who was a choir boy at the time. God but I'd been a brat of a kid.

I left a donation in a box labeled “For the Poor” to make up for taking the Holy Water before filling my bottles from the font. With all those lit candles, the place couldn't have been empty but I didn't see anybody until I'd safely gotten back to my car. Two, what I thought were men at first, one dark and the other blond, were dragging the priest out to a car. I was about to shout out when I got a good look at their faces, which were ridged just like the faces of the vampires in the sewers.

With no time to call anybody, I trailed the car back to a hotel, the Hyperion. I gave them a couple of minutes to get themselves situated before following them in but apparently that had been too much time since I had no idea where they'd gone. Ducking away from a noise sent me down into the basement where I found them arguing with the priest.

“What do you mean you can't bless the water? I looked it up. All you have to do is say some sort of a prayer over it. How hard can that be?” the blond one was shouting as I slipped in behind a pillar. Their faces were no longer ridged but they had on the same clothes as the two vampires had.

“It, it would be a sacrilege,” the priest stammered.

“What I do to you will be a sacrilege if you don't,” the other snarled as his face took on ridges.

The priest stood his ground. “Holy Water must not flow down a drain. I won't do it.” With fangs inches away from his neck, he added, “No matter what you do to me.”

“Think he can do it after we turn him?” the blond one asked.

They both turned as a large man answered from the doorway, “A dead priest can't bless Holy Water.” Ducking further behind the pillar, I grabbed the cross out of my bag.

A dark haired woman followed him into the room. As her eyes darted around, she warned, “Careful Daddy. Everything goes bad here.”

As the four vampires closed in on each other, I inched around towards the priest. “The man in the ice cream suit is here,” the woman said, turning towards me. As I held out my cross, all four crouched down, hissing at me with their arms up as if to ward it off. Fumbling for my camera, I dropped the cross. As the woman strode towards us, the priest grabbed me and dragged me out of the room.

“No, no, the exit's this way,” I shouted, pointing towards the left as he tried to drag me off to the right.

We'd made it up the stairs and out of the building by the time the woman caught up with us again. “Naughty, naughty,” she said. “Trying to turn my Daddy's bath into Holy Water. Nasty priest has to be punished.”

Reminded of the Holy Water I'd collected earlier, I pulled out a bottle and threw it at her. It slipped and landed between us but the glass broke, releasing the water causing her to hiss and back off, giving us enough time to get to the safety of my car. I tried to get my camera out for a picture but by then she'd made her way around the puddle and was stalking us again. With the priest shouting at me, I put the car into drive and raced away.

* * *

“You killed Daddy,” Dru screamed as she rushed for me, claws out to scratch at my eyes. Xander stood off to the side watching, apparently not caring which of us won.

Grabbing her hands was like trying to hold onto two snakes. Finally I shoved her to the ground shouting, “I'm your Daddy now.”

“No. You'll never be my Daddy. Never. Never,” she screamed. Grabbing the cross from beside her, the one that man with the strange powers of control had dropped, she screamed in agony as she shouted, “Not Daddy. Not Daddy. Not Daddy,” again and again and again.

“Dru. No.” I tried to get the cross away from her but she held it more closely and more tightly as I approached, screaming out an even more agonized wail.

“Please, Dru.”

“Go away. Go away. Go away.”

Turning towards Xander, I yelled, “If you don't care for her, I'll make your unlife a hell.”

Laughing bitterly, he said, “Worse than it is now? Impossible.”

“Go away,” she shrieked at an even higher pitch.

Not knowing any other way to keep Dru from harming herself, I fled with a quick growl back towards Xander. “Help her, please.”