Title: All Lost Souls (2/?) Author: Chris Kenworthy Category: First season Angel the series, Doyle Death denial, Cordelia/Doyle, Angel/Kate. Rating: AA Summary: Doyle is insubstantial, presumed dead, unable to communicate with anyone else. Can he still find a way to save the day? Disclaimer: Disclaimer: I have no rights to any character from 'Angel' or 'Buffy the vampire Slayer' or both. Distribution: Distribute anywhere you can! (Do tell me about it,though.) Archive: Hall of Fanfic - http://lavender.fortunecity.com/apocalypse/640/hall/ Check here for previous parts Feedback: Yes! Yes!! Feedback, any feedback!! Please? ;-) Spoiler: Up to "The Ring." As I swooshed my non-substantial way into Angel's office, twilight was falling, and already he had a customer. "That's nice," I thought aloud, since nobody could hear me anyways. "It's always a good sign when the walk-in client base is expanding... well, not when it means that more people are gettin' into trouble in L.A. But if it means word of mouth is gettin' around about my guys, and that Angel can get some more redemption in without Cordelia having to have visions..." I trailed off, and then told myself, "Shut up so I can hear what's going on." I'm talkin' to myself a lot lately, maybe because nobody else is speakin' to me. The prospective customer was a priest - an Irish Catholic monsignor no less, which was somehow nice. "What's wrong with the church?" Wesley asked. "It's..." The Father paused for a moment, then continued on, "It's haunted!!" "A haunted church??" Cordelia put in with a surprised look. "For how long?" Angel asked, always the guy of business. "Can you be sure that it's a haunting?" Good question to ask a priest, Angel man. "Since... since 1945, I believe," the priest told them. "I was not around in those days, but my predecessor at Saint George's, Father Matthew, told me the tale." There was a pause, and Angel prompted. "Could you tell it to us, Father Steven?" Father Steven nodded. "'Tis the ghosts of the McConnor sisters. Well, actually, they were not blood sisters. They were the wives to the three McConnor boys, who were drafted off to war against the Japanese." "Oh," Angel said quietly. Right - he had been around for all of them big wars, though I think World War II was in that period where he wasn't payin' much attention to the world around him. "Yeah," Father Steven said with a dutiful nod of his head. "None of the McConnor boys made it back alive. Lost in action, the telegrams from the Army said - their bodies were never even found. And the sisters... well, they took their own lives, right in the Saint George's sanctuary. Left a note, expressing their hopes that the Lord would, in his infinite mercy, absolve the sin of suicide from their souls and grant them leave to enter the gates of Heaven, for that if their husbands were lost, they had no more place in the mortal world." "It would seem, if they are now ghosts," Wesley pointed out, "that the Lord did not." Father Steven shook his head. "I believe that the Lord our father is truly infinite in mercy, and capable of forgiving truly any sin that his children may commit. The sisters, though, having grown up at the time they did, probably could not truly bring themselves to believe that. I am of the conviction that that is why the spirits of the girls continue to walk the Earth - they cannot bring themselves to believe that they are worthy of Heaven, yet cannot be doomed to Hell. So they will walk the Earth, perhaps, until Our Father calls all of his children home." Angel seemed to take a moment to digest this. "Do the ghosts of the sisters manifest themselves violently?" "Not normally," Father Steven said, again with a paternal shake of his head. "They are bitter and sorrowful spirits, Mister Angel, but the Church gives them peace and solace, as it does all believers. They are normally helpful - even protective of the parish. Saint George's guardian angels, as it were. But therein lies the trouble." Huh? "What??" Several of my friends chorus at once. "Well, you see, the parish building is not in good shape," Father Steven exclaimed. "In fact, it's falling apart at the seams, and we can't raise the money to renovate it. We've had an offer, though, on the property - quite a generous offer that would be enough to let the congregation move to a better facility. The buyer is a developer who wants to put a department store in the area - lots of good jobs - bring commerce into the area. The only catch is..." "That they don't want to buy a haunted property," Wesley exclaimed, seeing it. "Especially not one featuring overprotective ghosts who might go too far to keep the old parish building from being torn down." "That's it in a nutshell, lad," Father Steven told him. "The spirits of the sisters tumbled to the sale three days ago, and ever since no representative of the developer can set foot on Saint George's grounds without getting spooked. They even tried to scare me, after I tried to convince them that the sale was really the best thing for the parishioners. There's no reasoning with them." "So... why don't you just exorcise them off of the church grounds?" Cordelia asked. "You priest guys are expert in that, aren't you?" "Not all of us, I'm afraid," Father Steven said with a smile and a shake of his head. "The training I got at seminary had more to do with the nature of God and how to best counsel parishioners with marital difficulties than exorcisms, and that little about exorcisms was more theory than practice. Even so, the theory tells me that exorcisms are to get rid of demon spirits, not ghosts - not benevolent ghosts, at least. Most of them seek to send the spirit to Hell, and I would not do such a thing to daughters of the Lord, no matter the consequences to Saint George's." The priest shook his head, and continued. "Still, the texts do speak of a rare few, blessed by the Lord, who can help the spirits of the dead find their way. I was thinking of teleponing the Diocese office for help, but I wasn't sure if they could, if they might not laugh, even. Officially, the story of the McConnor ghosts is a folk tale, and I'm sure that the Diocese doesn't take it seriously. And then... one of my parishioners told me about a man named Angel, who's made it his business to help with, em, unusual situations like this. So, what do you say, Mister Angel - will you give my case a try? See if you can help me??" Angel shot looks over at Wesley and Cordelia. Wesley nodded. Cordelia piped up, "How much can you pay us... I mean, him, if you're having money troubles?" Father Steven frowned. "What are your going rates? If you try, but have no success, I suppose I could scrape up a hundred dollars for your time. And if the deal goes through with Everoll... say, six hundred?" Cordy blinked. "Sounds good to me." Father Steve had to go soon after that, signing a contract before he left. Angel, Cordelia, and Wesley met to discuss plans after he was gone. "The first step, clearly, is to visit the parish and see if we can witness the activities of the sisters first hand," Wesley pointed out. "Yeah," Angel agreed. "Maybe even try to make contact." "Well, I've got an audition in the morning," Cordelia announced. "And I've been fronting the office all day while you slept, big boss," she reminded Angel. "Anyone mind if I go home and get some beauty sleep?? If I have a vision of impending disaster, I'll beep you." "Sure, go," Angel said with a smile that had only a trace of resignation. "Wesley and I will poke around in the church by ourselves." "Just think what I'm missing," Cordy quipped, as she swung up her bag and left the office. Okay, what do I do now? Hang out and watch Angel and Wesley investigate a haunting or follow Cordelia? Oh!! I could try making contact through Dennis again. (I figure I have the best shot when someone else is actually in Cordelia's apartment - since Dennis doesn't seem to have a very good memory. It's best if someone's right there to spot any erratic behavior or anything. The thought of watching while Cordelia got ready for bed was just a pleasant, (if somewhat socially unacceptable,) bonus. Once we had driven to Cordelia's building and climbed up the stairs to her floor, though, (both of which were very tiring exercises of alignment with the real world - orienting on Cordelia's car well enough to stay in it, the way she drove, and getting up the stairs by phasing into each stair, one at a time. It's much easier when I can just orient on a floor or patch of ground and leave it at that.) So, I was too tired to do much with Dennis. I waved at him, and shouted at him a bit, but left it at that when he didn't react. Cordelia, meanwhile, had finished a bit of a late-night snack, (raspberry juice and low-fat crackers... like the girl needs low-fat anything,) and looked like she was really about to turn in. She swung the bedroom door closed, turned on the stereo in the middle of a gorgeously sad song... oh, was this the mix-tape she had been making yesterday? Sad songs... oh, boy, Princess. Once again, I felt really bad for the way I'd left her. And now, Cordy was taking off her clothes. I knew that I should take off, but I couldn't bring myself to do it right at the beginning. The 'only thrill I get anymore' excuse still works, right?? Almost, I could imagine that Cordelia knew I was here as she took off her dressy jacket and hung it up, (hung it up? She hung something up?? What happened to the girl I could point at and say "you think I'm a slob? She's much more of a slob than I am.") Then the blouse got undone, button by excruciating button, and shrugged bouncily off. The shirt, in contrast to the jacket, got thrown somewhat halfhazardly in the direction of a used clothes hamper, but I couldn't even guess as to whether it got in. I was frankly too busy staring at Cordy in her bra. Next, the skirt came off, with a snap and a push it pooled about her feet, and Cordelia stepped out of it, wearing only her underwear. I took one last look at the incredibly beautiful splendor and vamoosed, giving her some long-overdue privacy. When I next poked my head through the wall, she was dressed again... kind of. She had put on a silky, skimpy nightie that I didn't recognize, and was sitting on the bed and brushing out her long, dark auburn hair. I smiled while I looked her over, as I always did, but soon the pleasure of watching gave way to fatigue. "Hmm... mind if I sleep with you, babe?" I joked. Sleeping, especially sleeping with any kind of comfort, is another of the things that takes a good deal of practice when you're ethereal. Like a lot of things, it comes down to how I orient myself with the objects surrounding me. Normally, when you're resting comfortably, whatever it is that you're lying on or sitting on compromises with your body, moving out of the way as it supports. Right now, though, I can lie down on top of a bed, but since the bed won't give under my weight, it would feel as hard as rock. Not too much fun, let me tell you. That was the way I was sleeping for the first few months, though. Normally when I got so tired that I didn't care. Recently, though, I've discovered the trick of it. You have to virtually sink into the couch or whatever, so that part of you is passing through it, thus increasing the area that gets support. Really hard to do, especially while you're asleep, but I've figured it out now. You still need something really soft and comfortable. Cordelia's bed looked perfect, and not just because it had Cordelia in it. Plus... being close to Cordy, feeling in touch with her, made me feel better about everything. Lying down next to her in her bed... was about as close to heaven as I was likely to get in the middle of this hell. So, once Cordelia had finished brushing her hair, turning down the volume on the tape player, and switched the light off, while she was arranging herself in the bed, I lay down on the side of it that she had left me more room on, and immediately started to drift off. Boy, I was tired. How long was it this time I had stayed awake?? It's so hard - to keep track... I was walking... and I bumped into a crystal wall. Okay... turn around... there were three passages walled in crystals leading away from here. I picked the right-most route and hurries on, breathlessly running, searching for something but not quite sure what it was. I bumped into the walls a few times, and tripped, but kept on going. Suddenly, there it was - a door right ahead of me. I turned the knob, pushed the door open, and gasped in surprise. An elegant, richly furnished room was there. Cordelia sat at the dresser, in front of the mirror mounted on top of it. Spilled perfume bottles and makeup containers surrounded, and she was trying to put them back into a vanity chest. "What??" she exclaimed, catching sight of me. "Doyle... what are you doing here? You can't be here... you're dead!!" To be continued... ===== Chris Kenworthy http://lavender.fortunecity.com/apocalypse/640/ ICQ# 13902767 AOL-IM Screen name: ChrisKenw0 "This above all, to thine own self be true."