without a thought/voice/soul
by Vala

vampires will never hurt you
and if the sun comes up will it tear the skin right off our bones?

A stake through the heart and everything stopped. Everything. It wasn't peace. It wasn't reckless. It was black. It was white all at once. It was everything. It was nothing. It was nothing except a vampire suicide and the world would never weep for her.

turn her over
a candle is lit, i see through her. blow it out and save all her ashes for me.

Angel kept Darla's ashes in an old, cracked vase. Fred knew this because Cordelia knew this. Cordelia knew this because she had a side profession in snooping. Cordy thought it was weird but didn't tell Gunn and Wesley. Fred thought it made a certain sort of sense but she didn't exactly understand Angel's family tree.

Back in Texas she had a family tree made out of paper that her mother had worked so hard on. Mulling, researching, calling. It took her so long to complete it and she was so proud when she finished.

Sometimes Fred wondered if Angel ever considered making an actual family tree like her mother. It might be a whole lot less confusing if he did. Either that or it would be more confusing. Either way, it might be interesting in a Fred way.

emptiness is a mule
once upon a crime, with the radio on, i was trampled underfoot...

And once upon a crime, the world went crazy. Wesley finally figured that it might have something to do with Darla's death but it'd been months since she'd been killed. Wesley also said that the universe moved at it's own pace. That maybe it wasn't Darla's fate to die on the stereotypical dark and dreary night she had been staked by herself to save her son that never should have been. Maybe she was destined to die at some other time.

Fred still didn't exactly understand why the world had gone crazy just because of a vampire getting staked before she was supposed to. Wesley thought it might be part of a prophecy and Angel wanted to agree so badly. Fred could see it in his soul.

bring me to life
where i've become so numb without a soul, my spirit sleeping somewhere cold...

For once, Wesley was wrong. Alive. She was alive. Darla. Alive. Again.

From what she'd gotten from Gunn and Cordy's radical interpretations of what had happened, Darla had been resurrected more than the Slayer with the funny name. Cordy had called her Kenny and everyone laughed. Even Fred, though she didn't understand the reference.

Fred knew that if Angel had been there, he wouldn't have laughed. Angel never laughed.

nazi halo
take a souvenir and stop your staring...

Angel said Darla was fragile. Alive and human. Again. And again and again. It was like a neverending story of semi-eternal life cycles and Fred envied her. But she wanted Darla more than she envied her. It may have taken her a day and a series of moments, but Fred found her. Darla, the object of one of her (many) obsessions.

She had found her. Alive, human, fragile, confused, and heartbroken. Alive for tomorrow, human for her soul, fragile for revivication, confused for what her life really meant now, and heartbroken for her son that never should have been. Sucked through a portal into hell only days before.

Fred wondered if Connor was in Pylea but didn't mention that to Angel or Cordelia. And definitely not Darla. She could never ask Darla.

she blinded me with science
it's poetry in motion, she turned her tender eyes to me...

Darla really was fragile, like Angel had said. Or at least she looked it in the middle of that seemingly huge bed. Fred sat next to her, cautiously leaning over her to get a better look at her.

So beautiful for someone who was over four hundred years of age. Twice a vampire, three times a human. A contradiction to the modern science she had studied in school. Nothing like that kind of science.

i hurt myself today to see if i still feel the pain
what have i become, my sweetest friend? everyone i know goes away in the end...

Fred sat on that big bed Darla had been laying in only days before as she tried on the dress. Old, musky, and ivory silk. So flowy, so beautiful. Darla still looked fragile. Pale.

Human.

She eyed the bandages covering Darla's arms where the deep scratches and been before. Wesley said that being resurrected makes you crazy in the head. That you'll probably end up hurting yourself in order to see if you're real. Only in words that made him sound more British.

And then Darla turned to look at her. "What have I become?" she asked.

Fred had no words to answer that. She didn't know exactly what she was before and she didn't care. All she knew was that she was beautiful. And fragile. And alive. Her obsession.

holocaust - your eyes are almost dead
you're a wasted face, you're a sad-eyed lie, you're a holocaust...

Her eyes almost looked dead. Tell a woman that her son got sucked into a hell dimension and her eyes will look deader than you thought possible. Especially when you remember seeing her bright-eyed and sarcastic.

That's how Darla looked. Fred wanted to hold her. She'd never really held someone before but she supposed that she wanted to hold Darla. She was still fragile. And crazy. And dead in a emotional sense. Almost like Fred. Almost exactly like Fred.

i've got sunshine on a cloudy day
i've got so much honey, the bees envy me...

And so she held her and lied to them all. Angel, Cordelia, Gunn. Even Wesley. No, I don't love Darla. Really, Angel, I'm just tryin' to be nice. You know me.

She'd never hold Darla. Or kiss Darla. Or fuck Darla. Never fragile Darla, so alone and cold. Never her girl. She'd always wanted to say that. "My girl." Like that old song she used to sing along to back in Texas.

devil got my woman
woman i love, the woman that i love...

And the devil had her. Satan or something like that. Mama had always talked about how Satan could grab a hold of you and never let go but Fred didn't believe in that. She'd seen things worse than the devil. But something had her Darla by the soul. She could feel it. She could see it in Darla's eyes. How she wished she knew how to save her woman from the devil or demon that had her. It was like hell had grabbed her soul. Like it wanted her back.

 

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