lirazel | Fic: More Than One Day

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Fic: More Than One Day

My last minute entry to this month's

good__evil. I couldn't not meet this challenge: this month is Cordelia Chase, my favorite Buffyverse character. Be prepared: unabashed Cordy-worship ahead and perhaps a bit of sappiness as well.

Title: More Than One Day
Fandom: Angel the Series
Designation: Good Cordy
Challenge:

good__evil June challenge: Cordelia
Rating: PG-13
Timeline: This takes place in the final two episodes of Angel: “Power Play” and “Not Fade Away.” Also, it completely ignores anything that might happen or be explained in the comics as I haven’t read them.
Disclaimer: Joss is boss and all that, and William Shakespeare is a pretty close second, with Buddy Holly coming in third. Joss owns the characters, Shakespeare owns all the quotes from King Lear, and Mr. Holly owns the closing quote and the title.
Summary: There’s more than one front to every war, and somewhere along the line, Cordelia Chase became a champion.

“Upon such sacrifices, my Cordelia,
The gods themselves throw incense.”

-- King Lear, 5.3.20

I knew it! I knew he’d gotten my message—I knew he would make the right choice. Didn’t I tell you, Jenny?

So it turns out you were right. The original vampire with a soul chose the side of good after all.

I could kill him, though, you know? Deciding to take over Wolfram and Hart when he knew what would end up happening. He should have known that you can never fight evil from the inside out.

He was trying to save his son, Cordelia. You know that.

Of course I know it. Of course he would. He’s Angel. But if I had been there, I wouldn’t have let him do it that way. We would have found another way.

He was trying to save you as well.

…I know. I wish I could be angry with him about it. The way he’s always has to make himself the martyr, sacrifice everything that’s his for everyone else, just like he’s about to do again…but I can’t.

Because that’s why you love him.

Yeah. That’s why I love him. That's why I love all of them--Wes and Fred and Gunn and Lorne: they're all like that.

So are you, Cordelia.

I'm not a hero.

No. You're a champion.

Cordy’s never been good at the whole stand-at-the-sidelines routine (even as a cheerleader on the sidelines of a basketball game, she was the star). Maybe she was never a hero like Buffy or a champion like Angel, and she sort of stumbled into the supernatural business on merit of being born on the Hellmouth, and the whole visions thing was more a messy, not-so-funny accident that was never actually supposed to happen….All of this may be true, but even in the days when she presented the world with the shallow, bitchy cheerleader personae, she had never been able to sit idly by. Of course, her actions may have been accompanied by tactless complaining about how terribly inconvenient it all was to her, but there were always, always actions.

Which was the problem the first time in heaven and remains the problem this time around. The first time, she’d been promised that she would do some good, work for the Powers and help people (and somewhere along the line she’d started actually believing in the whole “we help the hopeless” thing; they’d stopped being words and become a way of living), and the whole floating around glowing thing had been a direct betrayal of all of her expectations. This time, around, it was a little less surprising, if every bit as infuriating.

Doyle was there to meet her, of course, (and oh, wasn’t it good to see him again, to find him awkward and sweet and unchanged—still as much the winning loser as ever) and, much more unexpectedly, Jenny Calendar and Mrs. Summers. There was a quiet, sweet-faced girl hanging behind them, and it wasn’t till then that Cordy realized she’d never met Tara Maclay. Things got a bit heated when Anya showed up—she and Anya do not get along (not with wishes and Xander Harris in their past and tactless big mouths in their present)—but then there was Fred, and seeing her was like home again (even if she couldn’t bear to imagine how their boys must be suffering down there without their women to keep them in line).

It’s good to be with them, to get to know Doyle as she never really had the chance before, to see Jenny and Joyce as equals and recognize them for the strong women they were, to build friendships with Tara (and maybe even Anya), to take the time she and Fred never had had while alive for girl talk and giggles.

And really, it wasn’t so bad at first, to rest after having her body possessed by a demon (trust her: a coma is not a time of rest), and she was almost glad that she didn’t have to watch Angel brood around Wolfram and Hart, see Wesley turn into a shell constantly haunted by the demon in his love’s body, observe Lorne getting more and more caught up in the glitter, view Gunn rationalizing that this was the road he had to take if he was ever going to have anyone see him as anything other than the muscle (because, in heaven, when you don’t want to see what’s going on down on earth, you just…don’t).

But now things are happening again: Angel’s unveiled his big plan, all of the boys have made the decision to step up, and even in her incorporeal state, Cordy swears she can feel her blood pumping with the drums of the coming battle.

If she has to just sit here and watch this time, she swears she’s going to scream.

“As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods.
They kill us for their sport.”
-- King Lear, 4.1.36

No. No. Not Wes. This isn’t fair.

Death isn’t fair. It’s just the way things are.

Shut up, Jenny. You’re not watching everyone you love get picked off, one by one.

You’re not the only one who’s lost someone, Cordy.

Tell me this is going to make a difference. Tell me that this is going to be such a blow to the Senior Partners that it will take them centuries to recover. Tell me that this sacrifice is worth it.

You know I can’t. This is what courage is, Cordelia: fighting without knowing the outcome, and sometimes fighting knowing that you will lose. Loving light for its own sake, and fighting for it till the end. That’s the mission.

The mission steals so much. What will be left?

Love, Cordy. Love will be left. And love is sacrifice.

She loves Wes, but she doesn’t want to see him here. Not when she knows what it will mean to Angel, to Gunn (they’ve lost everybody, and what are they going to do now?). Not when it means there’s one of less of them down there to carry on with the fight. Even as she (not so) discreetly watches the lovely reunion between Wes and Fred, even as she embraces him herself, she can’t help but feel that this is wrong: all of them up here, doing nothing, watching as Illyria kills her marks, Spike saves the baby, Gunn takes out his vamps, Lorne shoots Lindsey (and then walks away, and at least one of them will escape from what’s coming, will be out there to tell the story), Angel (with Connor, who can no more fail to be the hero than his father) takes on Marcus Hamilton. The departed Scoobies and the former employees of Angel Investigations gather round, huddle close together as they watch it all unfold, holding their breaths as those they care about come so close to death so many, many times.

She had been so proud when Angel revealed his plan, announcing his intention to take out the Black Thorn, and because it was Angel, she never doubted that he would win. He might lose everyone he cared about in the process, but to Cordy, he had always been the incarnation of good (even when he sometimes forgot that himself), and she’s still optimistic (naïve) enough to believe that good will ultimately win.

But then there’s the alley.

And Cordy starts to think that they’re going to lose after all.

“What shall Cordelia speak? Love, and be silent.”

-- King Lear, 1.1.61

No! This isn’t right—they can’t die. Not like this. Not when…

Not when you love them so much? Nearly everyone is loved by someone, and still, bad things happen to people. It’s the way of things.

Shut up, Jenny. Shut up. If it was Giles down there—

You’re still part demon, Cordy.

What? Jenny, I don’t have time for this: they’re dying—

That didn’t change just because you died. That was a choice you made, a completely selfless one, and sacrifices like that are for all eternity.

What does this have to do with—?

Cordelia, your demon half let you absorb huge amounts of supernatural power, far more than any human being could handle. What you never had time to figure out was that it also allows you to direct that power. You are powerful beyond your wildest dreams.

…What…what are you saying? That I’m some kind of supernatural power converter?

I’m saying that you know what to do, Cordy. You know how to help. Love.

Jenny’s words just seem jarring, out of place, clashing up against the scene she’s watching unfold below: the four of them, the only ones left, gathering in that alley, in the rain, the ground around their feet already stained red with their blood. And for a few moments, all Cordy can do is feel helpless and furious at that helplessness.

But then they’re leaping forward, into the fight: Angel, Gunn, Spike, Illyria: a blur of beautiful motion: four graceful, deadly warriors, so different yet with one purpose. Four to face an army of thousands. The armies of hell.

And suddenly, Cordy does know what to do.

She focuses on Gunn, first—he’s fighting furiously, bravely, but he’s the most hurt, the most fragile of all, and it seems strange to realize that now, after years of everyone at Angel Investigations treating him like the muscle, he’s the only human left, and by far the most breakable. A poor abandoned boy who grew up on the streets and learned to fight to protect those he could (and she wonders, for the first time since Angel told her Gunn’s story, why none of them ever asked about the sister he lost), then a man who did the same. She remembers telling him, a long time ago (lifetimes ago, it feels now) that she was saving his life every minute. She’d never done a good job of it, but she has the chance now, now as she feels the life seeping from him, the pain ripping through his body.

She reaches out to the love (the warmth and peace and strength and courage and everything good and beautiful and true) that surrounds her (she’s floating in it, here in heaven) and feels it fill her up till she is certain that she must be overflowing with it, that light must be pouring from her pores. She sends it towards Gunn, feels the blood slow to a trickle, then stop all together, feels his wounds knitting themselves together, feels the strength start to return to tired muscles, breath to gasping lungs. Doyle steps forward, wraps his arm around her waist, and she somehow knows that though Doyle never met Gunn in life, he’s been watching him in death and loves him as he loves Angel, loves Wes and Fred and Lorne, loves Cordy herself. Gunn straightens, his wounds completely healed, and hurls himself toward the enemy with new ferocity.

It’s working.

Spike next, and she has to force herself to remember that he has a soul now. And then she remembers Tara telling her Spike’s story, the one that the quiet witch has been paying attention to even in heaven: he fought Buffy’s side, sought out his soul, died to close the Hellmouth and save the world, loves Buffy and was loved by her. And it’s enough, enough to make Cordy love him in this moment, though she only ever knew him as the vampire who breezed into Sunnydale and took over, who tortured Angel, who “taste-tested” her. He’s a champion, too, now (stranger things have happened, she knows). And maybe vampires can’t be killed by any of those weapons being used down there unless one chops his head off, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t slowed down now, struggling to keep fighting and block the blows raining down on all sides. But as Cordy pours her newfound love into him, his moves become more precise, his own blows less sloppy, and then Fred is there, holding her hand, and gifting him her own love, too. And he’s fighting, invincible, and shows no signs of stopping.

Now it’s Illyria, and for a moment, Cordy falters, thinking that there is no possible way that she could summon anything like love for this thing that stole (raped) her friend’s body. But then there’s Wes, laying a hand on her shoulder, and she knows what he’s thinking: that Illyria might have killed Fred, but she had also made this decision to fight and continued to fight even now, when she could have left, escaped. She had learned to care enough about a person to mourn Wesley’s death, and it’s that potential (that seed that suggests that she might someday be capable of selflessness and love) that Cordy finds that she can love in this moment. She heals the Old One’s wounds, imbues her with strength, sets her on steady feet again. And Illyria fights like the god she is.

Angel. And there’s no trouble with coming up with enough love for him: in truth, she’s almost afraid that she’ll send him so much that she’ll burn him to dust (love like fire, always). She trembles with the force of the love she feels for him, the love that Doyle and Fred and Wes are sharing with her, and she trembles for all the memories they share with him. She remembers all the thousands of times he put aside anything he might want for the good of others, how he carried on fighting the good fight despite the ghosts he had to drag around with him everywhere, how even when he slipped, he made the choice to turn again toward the road to redemption (the road that always threatened to burn him to nothing), and she feels ready to explode into a thousand pieces with the love she has for her lover-that-wasn’t-quite, for her hero, for her champion, for her very best friend. Angel had been her constant, her absolute truth since she ran into him at that party on first arriving in L.A.—a familiar piece of Sunnydale weirdness right there exactly when she needed him, and didn’t it feel good to know he was still the same (still grrrr). Always the same, her Angel: fighting and carrying on and standing up for good and light and those he loves.

And with her (their) love pumping through his veins, he slays his dragon.

Then everything down there is a blur, a blur of four champions fighting with inhuman strength and glory, slaying demons and monsters and all the armies of hell till the ground around them is slick with blood (they don’t slip), piles of bodies build up around them (they don’t stumble), the air is full of the cries of death (they don’t falter).

And suddenly, there is nothing.

Nothing but four warriors standing in the middle of a blood-soaked, corpse-strewn, stench-filled alley, whole and strong and pulsing, shining with love.

And in heaven, four more, tied to the four below with the bonds of love that never fail.

We won.

Yes. You did.

But the battle isn’t over, is it? Theirs—or mine.

It never is.

You know, I always thought the whole point of heaven is rest and floating around on clouds strumming harps and stuff.

No, you didn’t, Cordelia. You knew all along. The point of heaven is love.

Yeah. I’m getting that. And as long as there’s love, there will be something worth fighting for.

Always.

"I wanna tell you how it's gonna be:
You're gonna give your love to me;
Love that lasts more than one day;
Well, love is love and not fade away...."

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Huh? I'm extremely confused as the sequence of the begining, and it's completely a bit offish, but I lke that you said Cordy was a champion. She is like the Burger King logo, "BREAKFAST FOR CHAMPIONS!"

--

All of this may be true, but even in the days when she presented the world with the shallow, bitchy cheerleader personae, she had never been able to sit idly by. Of course, her actions may have been accompanied by tactless complaining about how terribly inconvenient it all was to her, but there were always, always actions.
Oh the words of COrdy so well expressed, pressed together in such a tight package.

Oh now I understand the sequence, of Cordy dying, I really should read that summary. I love the greetings of all those heroes and champions, Joyce and Jenny, and you mentioned Doyle. My heart nearly meted.

--

I love all the little sequences of King Lear. Cordelia posed as the daughter, and what a depthly meaning to be "a heart of a lion" because in simple terms, that's what Cordy can be expressed as.

--

*swoons* No I've completely understand the orange sequence, that it's Jenny and Cordeilia in a momentum of peace and revelatoin of every detail. Oh that's lovely. That's beyond lovely. That's lovely in the sense that it can't even be poetic anymore.

--

And Cordy starts to think that they’re going to lose after all. My bones completely chilled when I read that.

How heart-wrenching it is to see the whole world nearly collapse in a moments peace, and they just watch as everyone around them crumbles and dies and it's all painful.

I have goosebumps now. *sighs*

--

I need anti-depressents. Now!

Oh how robotically .. hardened Jenny sounds. Just so blastedly ruimned by this, and so willing to accept it in all it's little deatils. Oh wow. Oh wow. Oh wow.

I might never understand this line, but I think I'll still adore it no matter what.

I’m saying that you know what to do, Cordy. You know how to help. Love. In most truths it holds.

--

I think in all rationalitiy, most people would suspect Angel to be the first that Cordy helps, no? But I like the persppective of WHY she choses Gunn first, because it's so heart-breakingly true that Gunn is the most human left. And it's so gratefully hurtful, but raw and just so good.

And then Spike, and you can almost feel Cordelia's excitement when it's repeated "It's working! It's workiung!" and it's like a wonderous thing, that she doesn't have to stay helpless and watch as everyone she loves crumble around her and just decay away.

I luuurve Coredeli'as feeling towards Illyria. She raped Fred's body. Stripped her of her life, and she wants to hate her for that, but in the light that she's still fighting, she chose to fight, she still offers her love, and her help. That's so wildly descriptive that in minimal words, I am in love already.

And Angel, all wrapped up for the last, the best for last. I dunno, I can't ... I can't describe it, I can't, I can't, I can't. It's all deadened my sesn and ... mos tof my vocabulary. *sighs*

--

“I wanna tell you how it's gonna be:You're gonna give your love to me;Love that lasts more than one dayWell, love is love and not fade away…”
Then it's finished, wrapped up so nicely.

Sorry it was confusing at first--but at the same time, I really did want to just leap into it without a lot of background. Maybe not the best choice.

Oh the words of COrdy so well expressed, pressed together in such a tight package. I'm thrilled that you would say that. Seriously.

Honestly, how could I have not mentioned Doyle? Our lovable little half-demon Irishman. *huggles him*

I need anti-depressents. Now! Ha! Sorry!

In most truths it holds. That's certainly what I think, anyway.

But I like the persppective of WHY she choses Gunn first, because it's so heart-breakingly true that Gunn is the most human left. And it's so gratefully hurtful, but raw and just so good. So glad we agree.

I really am so glad you ended up liking it. I struggled with this story quite a bit, but I just love Cordy so much that I couldn't not write it. Thanks for the lovely review, hon!

Sorry it was confusing at first--but at the same time, I really did want to just leap into it without a lot of background. Maybe not the best choice But maybe that's the more mystery to it. It keeps the mind struggling and then it finalkly all snaps back together, and that just makse it fun.

Honestly, how could I have not mentioned Doyle? Our lovable little half-demon Irishman. *huggles him* It's like neglecting a small chlid! *huggles*

Ha! Sorry! *SOBS*

I really did enjoy it. Lots. Loads. Like ... I like it in illegal doses.

every time you post a fic (and I must say it has been a lot lately!) I always have to read the whole thing before I do anything else and I always find it wonderful!

Anyway I just finished on of my own fics, for Elle and Adam!

http://community.livejournal.com/sylarloveselle/43942.html#cutid1

Yeah, I've been writing pretty furiously lately; it's a wonderful feeling.

I always have to read the whole thing before I do anything else and I always find it wonderful! Wow. I really can't think of a kind compliment--thanks so much!

Elle and Adam are definitely the love.

I know! I love them, it's been awhile since I wrote the pair but all of your Elle and Adam love made me pick them up again!

I'm glad to be able to inspire you in any way!

Oh, that was beautiful. I absolutely love the idea of Cordelia healing them all, through love, from all the way up in wherever the ~~hell~~ heaven she is, surrounded by everyone else who's ever been a part of the mission, and oh. It's so magnificent. You portray love with the truest words.

Thank you so very, very much. This fic meant a lot to me (Cordy means a lot to me, despite the way the show pretty much assassinated her character), so I'm so glad to hear that you liked it.

You portray love with the truest words. *blushes* Again, thanks so much for your kindness!

Cordy means a lot to me, despite the way the show pretty much assassinated her character

THIS. I can't even watch Season 4, and even though I love Season 5, every time Cordelia's not in the opening credits, I die a little inside.

Oh, and you're welcome. ;]

WHAT'S UP GIRL. LIKE I COULD PASS UP THIS SHIT.

Maybe she was never a hero like Buffy or a champion like Angel,

THIS BREAKS MY HEART. OH, CORDELIA. also, her in heaven makes me so happy. soothes my tortured fangirl soul.

(trust her: a coma is not a time of rest)

WRITE THIS.

The mission steals so much. What will be left?

Love, Cordy. Love will be left. And love is sacrifice.

SHAKING, CRYING, REPEAT. OH GODS.

she’s almost afraid that she’ll send him so much that she’ll burn him to dust

OH OH OH OH OH.

AND ENDING WITH THAT LYRIC. MY HEART.

LAUREN.

MY HEART.

OH HAI. I'm so very, very glad you liked this because it was one of my least-popular fics (by which I mean it didn't get much love, not that it got hate) so I was never sure if it was good? But I LOVE that you liked this! Thank you!

Also, I have another Cordy fic called "Take Five" that flat-out isn't any good, so you can ignore that one. It was much better in theory than in execution and I wouldn't recommend it to anyone.

LOL MAYBE I'LL READ IT TOMORROW ANYWAY.

solution to all of this: MOAR cordy fic from you, missy!

NO DON'T. Ha!

I should write more, shouldn't I? This would require rewatching AtS, though, and I'm not sure that my heart and my feminist mind could take it....

JUST WATCH UNTIL THE END OF S3. that's what i did. well, i watched the beginning of s4 because GWEN and WES/LILAH and FRED/GUNN but i got to the episode where gunn kills that dude so fred won't and couldn't even watched it, peaced out, watched you're welcome, went back to s1. fy.

This is a good plan.

Though there are quite a few episodes in S5 I like quite a lot that I might watch again....

Gwen should have been made a regular. She was AWESOME. Also, gorgeous.

gwen should have been a regular. when she was brought up in that meta post you just made about the mainpain i was so full of GWEN GWEN GWEN GWEN. i kept waiting for her to come back and be awesome. so sad.

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Fic: More Than One Day

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