I Just Want To Be Normal

After a rather disturbing conversation earlier in the evening, Parker and Isabel had returned to Isabel's room to dreamwalk Bel.

Parker took a seat on Xander's old bed, her feet curled up beneath her. "You're sure about this?"

"I'm sure," she nodded.

Isabel stretched out on the bed, last year's yearbook open to a picture of Bel, and placed her hand over the image. Too keyed up about what she might find, it took a long while for her to fall asleep. But eventually she did.

	On the floor above, the Source slept. Being evil was tiring work. Inside him, what remained of Bel's battered spirit slept as well, bound in chains that bruised and cut his flesh. It was to his dreams that Isabel came, but the dreams matched the reality. He was on his knees, bloody and broken, thick chains binding him to a stone wall. He looked up as Isabel approached. "Isabel?" he said weakly. "What are you doing here? You shouldn't be here!"
	Isabel wasn't sure what she expected to see. But it wasn't this. "Christ Bel," she exclaimed, dropping to her knees next to him. "What's going on?"
	"Get out of here, Isabel!" Bel said urgently. "He'll kill you and I can't stop him!"
	"Who's he?" Isabel asked, studying the chains and wishing like hell she could actually do something. "What's running around wearing your face?"
	"The Source," Bel said, and pain stabbed his head. It still hurt even now to try to say it. "The Source of All Evil," he finished in a whisper. "My former liege."
	"You can never do things simply. Why couldn't it have been a nice simple little ghost or something?" It sounded flip even to her own ears, but it mostly just a sign of how nervous she was. Isabel remembered what little Bel had told her about the Source. "Okay, I"m not leaving you here like this. So how do we get you to be the one in charge?
	Bel wearily shook his head. "It's too late. I'm not strong enough to stop him," he said. "You have to get out of here. If he finds you here, he'll kill you."
	"Bullshit. You're strong enough. What's going to happen if you don't stop him?" she asked. "What do you think he'll do to Phoebe? To all your friends."
	"He already has hurt them," Bel said bitterly. "And I couldn't stop him then. He's too strong."
	"So what am I supposed to do? Just walk away and leave you here?" Frustrated, Isabel banged her fist against her leg. "And how are we supposed to stop him?"
	"You can't," Bel said miserably, already defeated. "He's the most powerful demon the Underworld, and now I am him."
	"No you're not. If you're here like this, it means he's out there. There has to be way to separate the two of you. Think damnit." She closed her eyes, trying to think of something.
	"The only way to stop me is to kill me," Bel said. "He's not at full power yet. He needs to do rituals to do that, and to destroy what's left of me here." He tugged uselessly at his chains. "It's too late for me, Isabel. I'm dead already. But you can save yourself."
	"So I'm just supposed to go and kill you? And then tell your girlfriend that gee, sorry, he was possessed by the Source of All Evil? Yeah, that'll be a fun conversation." But that made her think. Maybe if she got Phoebe? Brought her into Bel's dreams with her?
	Bel winced at the mention of Phoebe. "You have to," he said. "I can't control what I'm -- what he's doing. Get Angel. Get Piper. Anyone with power. Before it's too late. You don't know what I've already done...."
	"I know some," Isabel said, thinking of Anders and whatever the hell was going on there, then she remembered some of the other weird events of the last few weeks. "Oh my god, whatever it was that kidnapped Angela, that attacked Buffy? Cally? That was him?"
	Bel dropped his gaze. "And Dr. Wilson. And Piper, Veronica, and Cam. And he's going to do much worse."
	"Then I'm going to leave and I'll get help and we'll figure out a way to stop him," she promised. "And get you out in the process. Because I don't leave my friends behind."
	"You can't save me, it's too late," Bel said, shaking his head. "He's right." The voice was Bel's, but this time it came from behind Isabel.
	"Oh crap," Isabel muttered. In the movies this would be the part where the heroine stayed and traded witty banter with the bad guy. But this wasn't the movies and Isabel was going to get the hell out of there. "I'll be back," she promised Bel quietly, before concentrating on waking the hell up.
	"You're not going to get away that easily," the Source snarled, making a grab for Isabel. But she was gone. No matter. He could find her easily enough.