Kin of the Soul
Rated ADULT

Chapter One

Xander opened his eyes, closed them, and then blinked several times as fast as he could. Yeah, like that ever worked. Funny enough, all the freakish and hellmouthy things in his life didn't really care how fast he blinked, although it did amuse Spike. And then Spike and Angel would kill whatever was freaking Xander out, but there was definitely a lack of vampires in this scene.

"Um, Commander, I'm guessing he's not one of us," the blond one said, and Xander refused to even allow himself to think the name. This wasn't possible. Nope, not possible. Not happening, and if he just ignored it, it would all just go away.

"Paris, call the captain," Chakotay ordered. Oh yeah, that was definitely Chakotay, and Paris was definitely Paris and not some random blond guy. And Xander was standing in the middle of the Voyager bridge in his yellow pajamas with a guy pointing a phaser at him. Either he was having the most realistic dream of his life, or he'd just had a total break with reality. Odds were running fifty-fifty.

"Yes, sir," Paris agreed, tapping on that stupid table desk thing as he sat in the chair that always made Xander wonder what science fiction writers had against seat belts. As the recipient of many head traumas, he could say from experience that they were not fun. Nope, no fun at all. Hey, maybe he'd had another head trauma. That would explain the major weirdness.

Chakotay took a firm step closer, holding a hand out to the side to keep the ensign from shooting. "I'm Commander Chakotay of the Starship Voyager. And you are?" he asked Xander, and Xander opened his mouth without anything actually coming out. Giving up on words, he reached up and pinched his arm.

"Ow," he whispered to himself. Chakotay looked over at Paris with that same expression Angel had on his face a whole lot of the time... the look that said he totally did not understand what was going on.

"Perhaps it is deficient," Seven of Nine suggested. She stalked closer with that predator's gait and skin-tight suit that made Xander think naughty thoughts. Lots and lots of naughty thoughts--like what would happen if Seven of Nine, Buffy, and Faith all ended up in the same mud pit. Not that he thought about Faith like that. Much. Since she was technically the only person he'd ever had sex with--and since the sex had been remarkably not bad--his penis did tend to think about her, even when he was definitely not thinking about her. Only now, his penis was way more interested in thinking about Seven of Nine.

"Seven, stand down," Chakotay ordered.

"Come on Chak, let her have a little fun." Paris stood up and went over to lean against Chakotay, and Xander's eyebrows went all the way to the top. He so did not remember this episode. Paris rested his palm against Chakotay's chest, and Chakotay got this indulgent expression on his face as he looked at Paris fondly, and Xander knew THAT had never happened in the show.

"I should inspect him for weapons or deficiencies," Seven announced grandly, and then she was there with hands reaching everywhere. Her hand stroked up his sides before fingers slipped under his shirt and traced across his stomach. The Borg implants on her fingertips made him shiver. One of her eyebrows rose, and then her Borg hand darted down the front of his pajama bottoms.

"Hey now, that is inappropriate touching," Xander objected.

"I am checking you for weapons," she declared archly, her fingers wrapping around his cock so that Xander made a slightly unmanly squeak and grabbed her shoulders to keep from falling over. Oh yeah, Xander Jr. was totally into this fantasy. If this was some head-trauma induced fantasy, he was going to throw himself into way more headstones.

"That's not a weapon," Xander panted.

"We shall see," Seven said, and again that eyebrow rose.

"Okay, this is... this is way more real than my usual wet dream."

Paris laughed. "If this is a dream, do you mind dreaming us back home? I'm getting sick of Neelix's cooking."

"This isn't a dream," Chakotay said firmly. "And aren't you supposed to be piloting? There's time for this later, get your attention focused on your work Tom." Chakotay slapped Paris on the ass, and Paris gave Chakotay a look that Spike would have been proud of.

"This is officially freaky," Xander whispered to himself. "Freaky enough that I really think I need to wake up." He slapped himself hard across the face. The heat and sting made his one eye water.

"Hey, if you're into a little violence with your sex, I can help you with that," B'Elanna appeared out of nowhere, and Xander retreated fast enough that he slammed his hip into the computer panel. And damn that thing was hard.

"No, no violence with the sex. Me and Klingons are definitely on the no list," Xander babbled, holding both hands up in surrender as he tried to back up. He found his retreat blocked by Seven of Nine who snaked an arm around his waist and pulled him close to her body. His poor cock was getting all kinds of excited now, but his brain was definitely putting up warning signs. Unfortunately, the sight of hot women pretty much vetoed any rational thoughts.

"How do you know she's Klingon?" Chakotay demanded. Now he just looked angry.

"Report!" Captain Janeway strode onto the bridge, and why had Xander never noticed just how many scary women were on this ship? Of course, he'd never before been trapped between two of them with the third staring at him. A little scary... something along the lines of Cordelia or Faith... that was hot. Right now, even his cock was starting to think there were way too many scary women in the room. No wonder Paris and Chakotay had retreated to a nice safe homosexual corner of this universe. Xander's cock was starting to think about a strategic retreat.

"We have an unexpected visitor who just appeared on the bridge," Chakotay offered in a tone that was all military. Paris turned around to face front, but he had a wide smirk on his face.

"I believe he is deficient, but he is unarmed," Seven declared, her hands slipping under the elastic of his pajama bottoms.

"Hey, I resemble that remark, and trust me, I've been called deficient by way better than you," Xander complained as he shoved at her hands. It was a little like trying to shove Spike away, not that Spike ever grabbed his cock in one hand and reached down for his balls with the other. Oh, he offered, but there was definitely no Spike touchage. "And this is a dream. This is a dream or a hallucination. I just need to make myself wake up." Xander closed his eyes tightly. "Wake up wake up wake up."

He gasped and then found himself sitting up even though he didn't remember ever having laid down. And the weird just kept right on coming. Xander was sitting in a pile of red and gold pillows in front of a huge fireplace flanked by two statues of gold cats with diamond eyes. None of the lights were on, so the fire cast flickers around the room.

"Darling, you're awake," a voice purred. Xander twisted around and nearly swallowed his tongue as a woman in a tight black outfit sashayed toward him, black cat ears sticking up through her thick, auburn hair. Oh yeah, he remembered this. He used to watch old Batman reruns with Jesse and drool all over Catwoman. And she was just as drool-worthy now. She made an umming noise deep in her throat as she knelt next to him, handing him a glass of wine. "After that ridiculous prank of the Joker's, all of Gotham is blacked out. We'll have to make our own warmth."

"Um... I have absolutely nothing that I can say that doesn't make me sound crazy," Xander said. He took the wine and stared at it. This... whatever this was... went way past dreamland.

She laughed wildly, her fingers trailing up and tangling in his hair. "You are so delightfully unassuming, darling. I am so glad I traded in one do-gooder for another." A white cat ran over Xander's legs and then disappeared into the shadows.

"Okay, this... this is so not happening." Xander pushed her hands away and scooted backwards.

She cocked her head to the side and made a little whine in her throat. "Oh Xander, you know better than to make me angry." She opened her mouth and made a little rowr sound.

"Angel!!" Xander bellowed. That made Catwoman sit back, her eyes wide with surprise.

Xander scrambled to his feet and managed to drop his wine glass along the way. "ANGEL! Angel, where are you? I'm losing my mind here!" He backed up to the window, and he could see the dark city below him. It was hard to tell with the blackout, but that definitely looked like Gotham.

"Xander, are you unwell?" Catwoman asked.

"Oh, I am unwell like you would not believe. Angel!!! Angel, I'm losing my mind here!" Xander screamed at the top of his lungs, and two guys in yellow and black tiger striped shirts burst through the really garish, gilded double doors. They hurried to Catwoman's side, and now she looked outright concerned.

"Xander?"

"Nope. No, you are not even you. You are a television show, and I am losing my mind. Angel!!" Xander screamed as loud as he could, and Catwoman, her henchmen, and her scary-ugly bedroom shimmered and vanished into a sort of bland grayness. Xander spun around, but there was just a big old nothing in every direction.

"I'll have you know that I worked very hard on this wish. You are totally inconsiderate." Xander spun around again and found himself face to face with a demon. An unhappy demon. An unhappy girl demon, and this was not looking good. Blue veins and heavy wrinkles and folds covered a face that otherwise looked pretty humanish.

"Um, I'm sorry," Xander offered, not exactly sure what he was apologizing for, but he'd gotten used to that with Spike. Demons had all these weird rules in their brains, so you just had to apologize.

"You should be," she said firmly.

"And I'm perfectly willing to be even more sorry, only can you please explain what's going on?" Xander asked, doing his best to sound respectfully requesting instead of bossy or commanding or frustrated—all of which tended to not go over well with demons.

She crossed her arms over her chest and stared at him for a second. "I'm trying to give you love and happiness. This is not the kind of wish I usually do, so don't start thinking that I'm not good at my job. I'm great at my job. I can make a man's penis shrivel to the size of a Q-tip. I can make flesh fall off bones. I can turn a man into a gibbering idiot who drools on himself for the rest of his life."

From the intense expression on her face, Xander was guessing that she wasn't even kidding. "Impressive resume," he said with a weak smile. She looked at him with suspicion. "No, seriously. I mean, I know this vampire who loves to brag about his torture techniques, and he's never described anything that creeps me out as much as the penis shriveling, although the flesh falling off comes a close second. Heck, Spike and his railroad spikes just got bumped to third in my list of things I never, ever want to experience."

The demon nodded and actually managed to look a little happier. "Exactly. I am the best at what I do. A vampire certainly does not have the experience or the creativity to touch me."

"And what exactly do you do because if the plan was for penis shriveling, I'm hoping there's some sort of deal we can make."

"I do not make deals," she informed him primly. "I am Anyanka, vengeance demon and patron of scorned women. I've had men offer me jewels, wealth, power. I do not take bribes."

"Oh shit." Xander closed his eyes and sent up a quick prayer. Then he sent up a second and third one. He was so seriously in deep shit that he needed all the help he could get. "Cordelia," he sighed. "I swear, I did not mean to do anything to hurt her. I wouldn't ever—"

"Oh please," Anyanka waved her hand dismissively. "You let her publicly humiliate you. That is more class than most men show. Even if she called on me, I don't think I would have bothered with her because there are men out there far more deserving of my torture. Your mother called me."

"Mom?" Xander really wished Anyanka would bring back one of the fantasy rooms because he so needed to sit down. His head was spinning and reality was moving way too fast for him to keep up. "My mom called for vengeance on me?"

"No." Anyanka sounded really frustrated now. "She earned vengeance against your father. I offered to make your father's balls fall off or shrivel up into peas, or give him a good case of leprosy, but she insisted that her only wish was for you to find happiness with someone. So, I'm trying to find someone for you to be happy with. Now, I don't have all day, so you need to get with the program and start being happy." Anyanka touched her necklace and the two realities appeared on either side of them like ghost images floating in a fog.

On one side, Seven of Nine was pressed up against his back, B'Elanna standing in front of him with a predatory look on her face, and Paris looked like he was about to go pop some popcorn so he could enjoy the show. It was weird looking at a ghost image of himself with this look on his face like he was caught between shock and lust. It was a weird look on him. In the other scene, Catwoman was just starting to walk toward him, a whip hanging from her hip and her henchmen on either side. In that one, Xander looked way more alarmed, but from the way Catwoman's hand hovered over the whip, he had a right to be a little alarmed. "Pick one," Anyanka finally said impatiently.

"What? Why?"

"Because I pulled these from your mind. It's your mother's wish, but this is where you go to be happy, so go be happy in one."

"Wait... my mind? You're wandering around in my mind? Way with the creepy."

She rolled her eyes, and suddenly she transformed into an attractive woman with light brown hair and truly stunning eyes that were brown with just a touch of gold to them. "Like I care what a human is thinking about." She gave him a look that made it clear she thought he was stupid, but it was one of those looks where the person thinks you're cute-stupid. "I just need to get this wish finished."

"By making me happy?" Xander asked, just trying to make sure he'd actually heard this right.

"By making sure you're with the right person to make you happy. Your mother doesn't want you getting screwed by love the way your father screwed her. And can I just say that your father is a real bucket of slime? I've met chaos mages and slime demons I've liked more than that man."

"Hey, I know mass murders and demons that I not only like more, but that I trust more than him. He sold me," Xander quickly pointed out. "That was enough to drive me into therapy, so don't look for me to go defending the family honor here."

"I may shrivel his genitals just on principle."

"Go for it, only, can we not talk about it, because parents and genitals really should not ever be said in the same sentence." Xander made a disgusted face as he tried to wipe that image out of his mind. Anyanka gave him another of those fond-idiot looks.

"So, which world are you going to pick? I need to recycle the other one. I have other wishes I need to get to."

"Is there a door number three?" Xander asked hopefully.

"Do you want Faith?" Anyanka asked, and that was actually a serious look on her face.

"What?! No! I mean... no. She has issues, and her issues are way more issuey around me, and then her issues spill over into my issues, and the breeding of issues is very bad for all involved."

Anyanka was already nodding. "I got that from your memories. Like all men, you're weak when you masturbate, but at least you don't have those really gross fantasies where you think everyone else exists only to service your penis. Her needs have nothing to do with your penis. So, that leaves Seven of Nine, B'Elanna, and Catwoman. B'Elanna is the most attractive. I like her forehead. And she kills well, that's always a plus in a mate. But then Catwoman and Seven of Nine are good at killing, too. You have good taste in women."

For a second, Xander wasn't really sure what to say, because getting complimented on his taste in women by a demon was probably not good. It was about as disturbing as... well, as the rest of his life.

"Okay, as much as I have to admit that all of these women are incredibly hot. Seriously hot," Xander admitted as he looked around at the frozen scenes, "this isn't exactly the 'ever after' kind of relationship. This is more the 'giving the brain something to think about while the hand is doing its thing' kind of relationship."

Anyanka frowned at him. "I granted a wish. You have to be happy with someone."

"Hey, I'm happy now," Xander pointed out.

"You're happy with your hand. Your hand does not count as someone. And I will not have a failed wish on my record. That sort of thing can give you a reputation, you know. Eleven hundred years and I don't have a failed wish on my record, and I am not starting with you." She had her poking, pointing finger going now. "So, if you don't want forever with any of these women, we just start over."

The scenes faded into the fog, and suddenly Xander found himself at the center of three new images. In one, Chakotay was reaching out for him. Xander was dressed in an ensign's uniform, but from the look on Chakotay's face, he wasn't going to be wearing it for long. The second scene showed him standing on the bridge of the ship from V, and Diana the reptilian invader had her hand up his shirt. The third scene showed the Knight Rider guy pinning him up against a car.

"Hey, no, no, that is not right," Xander pointed at the Knight Rider scene.

Anyanka patted him on the arm. "Oh please. If you don't want a woman, then we have to find you a nice man or non-human. You know you had that fantasy about Michael Knight, and he's not that bad. He tried to get revenge on people who do wrong, and I like that." She nodded as if approving of him and Michael Knight doing it on the hood of the car, and that was from so far back in the denial box that Xander couldn't even bring himself to look at it. Nope, he was firmly focusing on Diana. At least she looked like a curvy woman... who ate people. And oddly, she wouldn't even be his first date to try and eat him.

"You do know this is not going to end well. I'm a mammal, she's a reptile. She's so going to eat me," Xander pointed out.

Anyanka tilted her head to the side. "She could make you happy until she ate you. It's not like she'd be your only relationship where the other person considered you a food group."

"And way to go with the disturbing," Xander sighed.

"I have other wishes to get to. I've provided five perfectly good scenarios, so why don't you pick one so that I can get on with the making you happy in love?"

"I'm just supposed to pick one?"

"Hey, I don't normally give options here. This was supposed to be a quick wishverse with you and B'Elanna and Seven of Nine having sex all over the Voyager, so you should be grateful that I made a housecall at all. Options... well, let me tell you, you will not find a whole lot of people I've given options to. Although there was the one man who I tied so that this sword was caught between his penis and his balls, and he had the option to cut off one or the other or starve to death. That was a good wish." She smiled, and even with her pretty, human face on, that was not a pretty expression.

"Creative," Xander said weakly.

She smiled brightly at him. "I was very proud of it. His wife wished that he had to make hard choices, the same way he'd forced her to choose between public humiliation and poverty. She was very satisfied."

"I bet." Xander swallowed and tried to figure out how he was going to get out of this one.

"I'm very good at my job," Anyanka told him proudly.

"So, you want to make sure that the wish really works out. I mean, if my mother wants me happy with someone and I'm in this fantasy that gets boring, that would be bad, right?" Xander asked.

Anyanka frowned for a second. "You do have a lot of experience with excitement. But Voyager is in the middle of hostile space. There are lots of chances for you to get taken over by Borg or eaten by an alien virus." And boy didn't she just sound cheerful about that.

"Yeah, but I'll know it's not real, not like my life is real," Xander pointed out. "I won't be fighting to keep people I love safe. And I won't have a chance to make a real connection with someone in my world."

That seemed to make her think. "You aren't connecting with someone now."

"Only because I've been getting over Cordelia. I feel things deeply. I don't want to just go rushing into a relationship with the girl who serves coffee on the corner."

Anyanka frowned at him. "She's boring, and small. She is not right. Seven of Nine is far better for you."

"But I'll know it's not really Seven of Nine."

"I could wipe your memories."

"And then it wouldn't really be me, and since my mom wants *me* happy, that wouldn't really make the wish true, would it?"

"Oh please, I've screwed with people way more than that." She touched her necklace again and all the scenes vanished so that they were again standing in the middle of gray.

"You're 1100 years old, right?" Xander tried a new tactic.

"Yes??" She drew the word out, hissing it dangerously.

"Then giving me a little time to get my head screwed on straight is not such a big deal. I mean, you're pulling out heroes and villains, guys and girls, humans and non-humans. Face it, you can't give me the perfect partner because I'm so screwed up in the head I don't know what I want." Xander gave her his best pleading expression.

"Huh." She stared at him. "It is a strange set of fantasies."

"That's me, strange to the end. And if my mother's wish is for me to be truly happy with someone, well, you can't be expected to pick someone who would make me happy if I can't figure it out for myself."

"But I need to finish the wish," Anyanka said with a frown.

"And I would not want to ruin your record, but if you gave me a little time, I could work through some issues, maybe come to a better understanding of what I want in a partner." Xander tried really, really hard to not think about the fact that all he wanted to do was get back to his apartment so he could go running to Angel. Yep, he was going to hide behind Angel until he was ninety and his cock no longer worked. Anyanka frowned at him, and terror swept through Xander as he realized he was thinking about what he didn't want to think about and she could read his mind.

"A month," she said.

Xander snorted. She glared at him, and he put on his most polite smile. "Hey, it took me two years of therapy to work through my dad issues. I think it's going to take that long to work through any sexual identity issues."

She frowned again and her veins and wrinkles reappeared as she became a demon again. "One year. One year and I'll be back to finish your mother's wish."

Xander opened his mouth to argue, but he was suddenly standing in the middle of his bedroom. Slowly, he turned and tried to figure out what had just happened. The red numbers on his alarm clock read 4:56 am. His VCR was blinking 12:00. His soda bottle and cake plate were on the table next to his bed. It looked just like when he'd gone to bed. Xander walked over to the bed and sank down, weariness and terror both still pulling on him.

"Oh yeah, and I thought my life would get less weird after high school," Xander said to the air. Grabbing his robe off the floor, Xander headed for Angel's apartment. If it had been a nightmare, at least he could torture Angel by making him listen to the story... or the story with Michael Knight edited out, anyway. If Anyanka really did exist, they obviously had a problem. Xander really did not look forward to spending the rest of his life dodging Borg and alien viruses. And with his luck, he'd get infected by both within a week of being in the Delta Quadrant.

Chapter Two
Angel could feel the arms of the chair groaning under his grip, but he still couldn't get himself to let go. No wonder Xander was always having to fix things.

"Bloody hell, pet. You really are a demon magnet." Spike's words might have been teasing, but he was bouncing on his toes, which usually meant that violence was on the horizon. Spike's ability to control his demon might go far beyond most vampires, but he had limits, and the idea of a vengeance demon targeting their clan was beyond Spike's ability to control himself. Even now, his eyes flashed yellow.

"Hey, this is so not my fault." Xander was sitting on the couch, his head propped on the back while he stared at the ceiling. "Although the demon magnetness is way too unjokelike to be funny. And as someone who normally is all about laughing at the brutal truth of life, that's really saying something."

"Can't believe your mum--"

"Hey, there will be no blaming of the one decent parental unit I have," Xander said, cutting Spike off and tipping his head far enough to glare at him. For a second, Spike glared back, and Angel imagined that vampire instincts were pushing Spike to put Xander in his place, to remind him that he wasn't high enough in the hierarchy to tell Spike what to do. Angel tensed, fully prepared to act if Spike lost control. At this point, Angel could hardly blame Spike if he lost control because even with the soul, Angel was feeling pretty close to an edge himself. Their clan, their family, had been targeted by a dangerous demon who was threatening to take Xander away from them.

"Decent," Spike snorted. He threw himself back against the wall so hard that Angel could feel the floor vibrate with the force of the impact.

"She gave up a chance to make my father miserable just to wish me happy, that's actually..." Xander stopped and frowned. "That's actually making me feel way with the guilty about the lack of mother time lately. You'd think I'd have more time after graduating, not less."

Spike snorted again, making his opinion on the matter clear. But then, Spike wasn't the best at forgiving or forgetting. Angel leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees and gripping his hands together to avoid hitting something. He wasn't all that better, but for Xander's sake, he would keep his doubts to himself.

"I mean, I haven't been over since I helped her move to the apartment, how shitty is that? I've officially entered bad-son-land and set up residence."

"You've had classes, you've been helping train Riley, and you've been patrolling to give Buffy time to study. You're a little busy," Angel disagreed. Compared to the problem with their vengeance demon, Jessica Harris' issues were unimportant. He looked up and Spike was staring at him. Angel gave the smallest of nods. If Spike could find Anyanka, Spike had Angel's permission to rip the demon's head off and spit down her throat.

"It could have been a dream," Xander said with a lot of hope and not much confidence.

"Not bloody likely." Spike started pacing. "Could try and pair ya up with someone before the bint comes back."

This time it was Xander who snorted. "One, there's a lack of pairablility around here, and two, this is me. Me and love are like..." Xander's words failed him. "I'm not the sort to get the big romance. I'm more the type to hide in a closet or throw down on a hill." Xander's voice sounded so lost, so desperate, that Angel barely controlled a growl, and Spike flashed into full gameface. Angel was just grateful that Spike considered both women clan members or he'd have to worry about chunks of them washing up on shore. And that was the problem with letting Xander date anyone. If someone Angel's hadn't scent marked ever hurt Xander, Angel had no doubt that Spike would choose a long and painful death for them. Torture in the family was one thing, but torture from outside the family was not going to be tolerated.

Angel sighed, wondering when they'd fallen into the old patterns with him as the patriarch and Spike acting as enforcer. Oddly, his attempts to find his humanity through Xander seemed to have backfired a bit because he was also closer to his vampire self. Of course, that thought led him to wonder what exactly he'd been for all those years of wandering alleys eating rats. He hadn't been human or vampire, and he could see that now. But was it his human soul's love for Xander or his vampire rage at having his clan targeted that was driving the anger he could feel right now? If an innocent human was standing between him and Anyanka, Angel wasn't sure what he would do.

"You're a right treat, pet. I wouldn't mind takin' you in hand." Spike wiggled his eyebrows and stalked the couch, his body rolling in sinuous moves that made Angel's cock harden. He had grown entirely too close to his vampire nature, but at least he was leaning forward so Xander wouldn't notice. Spike, however, sniffed the air and looked over with a knowing smirk before turning his attention back to Xander. "I wouldn't mind at all." Standing behind the couch, Spike ran his hands over Xander's shoulders and down his chest.

"So not the time, Spike," Xander sighed.

"Oi, you're ruinin' the mood here, pet," Spike complained, but he leaped the back of the couch and dropped down next to Xander. "Keep it up, and you're going to make me think I'm not irresistible."

Xander reached over and patted Spike's leg. "Oh great god sexual prowess, I am in awe of your powers and way too freaked out to actually show my appreciation for your godly powers. Forgive me."

"Pillock."

"Bleach-head."

"Demon magnet."

"Way more than anyone should be," Xander agreed with a sigh. Spike looked at Angel, and Angel could feel the frustration building up. Usually Spike could distract the boy out of his moods.

"There's that bint in Finn's unit. Saunders." Spike sniffed, stretched and thunked his boots down on Angel's coffee table. His body radiated disapproval. Angel watched his boys, wondering when Spike had become so reasonable and when Xander had become so very used to discussions that were more about demonic instincts than human emotion.

"Wait, you want me to sleep with one of Riley's soldiers? Um, newsflash, you're not okay with me doing that as the whole disaster with Faith and Graham so totally proved. Unless you're lying and you really were just big with the jealous." Xander crossed his arms and glared at Spike.

"I'm not jealous," Spike snarled. Angel rolled his eyes. Spike was the most jealous and possessive vampire he'd ever met, but considering what Angel had done to him as a fledge, Angel could hardly blame him.

"Spike, would you want Xander to date Saunders if Saunders stayed in Riley's unit?" Angel asked. He knew exactly where Spike was going, but Xander obviously needed a little push. Spike looked over at him and frowned, like Angel had just lost his mind.

"Bloody hell no. Tell Finn to hand her over, and then have 'em date. She's a tough enough bird to keep Xander's interest. No offense, pet, but your taste in women in downright terrifying. Hell, I might have to turn her just to make her woman enough for ya."

"What?" Xander squeaked the word and just about flew off the couch. "No. No and more with the no. There will be no turning of people, and do you really think we can just walk up and say, 'Hey, Riley, we're confiscating one of your people'?"

"Well, yeah." Spike tilted his head the way he did when Xander said something particularly stupid. Angel just smiled and leaned back, watching as Xander's brain finally twisted itself around Spike's words. Spike didn't want him to date; Spike wanted to kidnap someone and just order them into Xander's bed. It was an easy and elegant solution for a vampire.

"Okay, way to go with the creepy. I am so glad I don't have a little sister because I would never let you in the same state with her." Xander threw himself back down on the couch.

"Wot?"

"Okay, the sad and creepy thing is that you don't know." Xander sighed.

Angel cleared his throat. "The first goal here is to find out more about this Anyanka. Since Xander's mother made the wish, there may be a way for her to unmake the wish."

"If you can get her to remember and/or believe that she actually met a demon. Sunnydale blindness runs strong in my family. It's sort of the opposite of having the force. It's like we have the anti-force so that we're extra special clueless when Darth Vader comes creeping around."

Angel nodded. Sadly, she really might not remember. "We can go to Giles and see if his books have any information on vengeance demons, and if we need to, we can go to L.A. Lorne usually has some good sources on anything demonic."

"Until then, I say we sit on him," Spike suggested, reaching out to pull Xander close. Angel wondered if Xander had any idea how serious Spike had been about taking Xander into his bed. He'd already asked permission and even made a few outrageous promises and bribes trying to get Angel to give him that permission. But if Xander knew, he sure wouldn't be comfortable doing what he was doing now. Spike had tugged a little too hard and Xander had landed half on Spike's lap and was now retaliating by trying to punch Spike in the gut. Spike fended off Xander's attack with one hand and held him down with the other. But at least the young man didn't smell like fear anymore. Now he smelled more like aggression and annoyance, two smells that appealed to Angel's vampiric nature.

"Some of us have class. We're going over architectural symbols today, so unless you want me to confuse our water lines for electrical lines and electrocute myself, you can not sit on me."

"Oi, can too."

"Angel!" Xander was stomach down over Spike's lap by this time, and he looked over to Angel for help. "Tell Spike to stop being a worry wart. I have a whole year before the crazy lady tries to kidnap me. And while you're at it, tell him he can't go kidnapping other people people."

"Bloody hell, he's the one who taught me how ta kidnap," Spike pointed out with a nasty smile in Angel's direction; however, Angel couldn't exactly deny the charge. He had taught Spike most of his bad habits. "Mind you, he was always taking the birds away and leaving me to bugger whatever guy we caught up in our snare, not that I minded." Spike landed a smack on Xander's butt, and Xander retaliated with an elbow in Spike's side. Angel really didn't think that Xander wanted to know how much vampires used physical confrontation and mutual attacks as a form of foreplay. Xander, however, looked a little frustrated at his inability to escape or even get a good hit in on Spike.

"Just to let you know, I officially told Anya that she scared me way more than you," Xander said. "I mean, penis shriveling? So much scarier than a little old railroad spike." Angel struggled to not grin at that counterattack. Xander was far smarter than he gave himself credit for, because that had gotten through all of Spike's defenses and scored a direct hit.

"You soddin' little runt. I've got a century of torture goin' for me."

"And she has a millennium. Millennium trumps century... I think." Xander looked over.

"It does," Angel agreed, watching as Spike glared even harder.

"I've cut men's bollocks off," Spike defended himself.

"Which is still not as much with the creepy as making them shrink to peas. And that doesn't even make sense to me, but my penis is voting that I keep far, far away from women to can do that."

Spike snorted. "Bloody hell, pet, if she's that scary, I'm surprised you didn't ask her out on a date."

Xander put his best punch right in Spike's stomach. Since Xander had started his construction classes, mostly out of a need to fix all the things Spike broke, he'd been putting on a lot of muscle. That still wasn't enough to make Spike even twinge. Xander just sighed and sagged down, obviously surrendering to Spike's manhandling.

"I hate hanging out with vampires. You guys do bad things to my manly ego."

Spike gave Xander a couple of swats on the butt before letting him go. Pushing himself up, Xander looked over at Angel.

"But I can go to class, right?"

Angel nodded. "That should be safe. Vengeance demons aren't known for breaking their word... they just..." Angel struggled to find the right word.

"Obfuscate?" Xander guessed, picking up on Blair's favorite word, a term that Faith had brought back from Cascade on her last visit. It'd taken Buffy two days to realize that Faith had been basically announcing her own lies right out in the open.

"Yes," Angel agreed. "Go get some sleep. We'll figure this out."

Xander nodded and pushed himself up. He smelled of weariness now, weariness and Angel's bloodmark. If they couldn't kill or distract this demon, Angel would follow Xander into whatever world where she sent him. And Angel had no doubt that Spike and Faith would follow him. One way or another, Angel was not going to lose his family.

"One week. I just want one week without the weird happening." With that, Xander wandered out of the room.

"Ya okay, Peaches?" Spike asked. Angel wasn't. He wanted to rip heads off. He wanted to eviscerate this Anyanka and wrap her entrails around her neck. He wanted to kill something and he had less than an hour before sunrise. He stood up and headed out the door.

"If we grabbed up Xander and the Saunders bint, we could get 'em together. He's randy around most any woman who's strong enough ta break him into pieces, and she's noticed him more than a few times," Spike commented as he followed Angel. Angel led up the stairs and to the roof. There was more chance of someone being flung off the roof and seriously injured, but less chance of being seen. "If we turn her, she'd be loyal."

"We don't turn people," Angel snarled. "Besides, if you touch her, he'll convince himself that it's his fault. He'll never survive that kind of guilt." Angel pushed the roof door open and headed out into the gray predawn air. Sunnydale sprawled out on all sides, the streetlights like rows of crops laid out in straight lines. Angel stood looking out and struggling with this own fury.

"You could take him." Spike inched out onto the roof, clearly reading Angel's mood.

"He won't have us."

"Bloody fuckin' hell. He'd have either one of us, Peaches. The boy isn't so far into denial that he can't be talked around it."

Angel spun around and backhanded Spike. The blow threw Spike across the roof and he had to grab an antenna to keep from going off.

"We aren't doing that to him."

Spike crouched, and Angel prepared himself for the counterattack, his cock already hardening. "Doing what? It's not like we'd treat him bad."

"It's not what he wants."

"How the fuck would you know? You never offered, did you?" Spike snarled the words, his body coiled for violence.

"No."

"Then call Faith back or make Cordelia come home from L.A. She shouldn't be off on her own, anyway."

"They have lives."

"They have a fucking clan." Spike leaped through the air, his hand reaching for Angel. Angel reached out to grab Spike, to throw him to the side. A half second too late, he saw the knife that Spike had thrown in advance of his attack. The knife sank deep into Angel's chest and delayed his defense just long enough for Spike to bowl him over.

"You'll pay for that," Angel snarled as he ripped the knife out and tossed it to the side.

Spike rolled and came up on his feet. "Counting on it, mate. So, is that the best you have?" Spike bounced on the balls of his feet.

Oh yeah, this is what Angel needed--an opponent he could put his hands on, that he could fight. He smiled slowly, fingering the blood that had soaked into his shirt before he licked it off his fingers. Spike went into gameface, his yellow eyes shining in the dim light.

"You'll learn, boyo," Angel promised as he leaped for at the boy. Spike danced to the side, breaking an antenna off and swinging it like a sword. Angel dove forward and under the weapon, tackling Spike by the knees.

"Fuck." Spike drove an elbow into Angel's neck, and a bone cracked with a loud snap. Pain lanced down through Angel's body, setting every nerve on fire. Angel could feel his blood flow through his body, the vampire healing tingling through his chest. This was the heat the mimicked life, that made Angel feel alive. Angel smiled and sank his teeth through Spike's jeans and into the vulnerable flesh underneath.

Spike roared and brought his elbow down on the same spot. Spots appeared in Angel's eyes as the bone failed, the jagged edges driving deep into his shoulder. But there was blood in his mouth, filling his senses and feeding the healing powers that tingled through his body. Spike was weakening now, his hands clawing at Angel as Spike's blood dripped onto the roof and soaked the jeans faster than Angel could suck.

"Fuck," Spike repeated, but this time, Angel could hear the lust and need in that one word. He backed up, his lips still tingling from the salt and power of Spike's blood.

"Ye never were a fast learner," Angel pointed out.

"You're thick as pig shite if ya think this is going to discourage me," Spike said, that cocky grin still on his face. He pulled himself to his feet, and Angel circled, watching as Spike shifted, his body ready to defend himself.

"I figure I can still teach ye a lesson."

"I drew first blood," Spike pointed out. "Arm hurt, mate?"

Angel smiled sadistically. His shoulder hurt like hell, and he was caught between frustration that Spike had caused so much damage and pride that he'd managed to get in such a good hit. "Someone musta taught you well," Angel pointed out, still circling.

"Dru," Spike shot back.

Angel laughed. Dru couldn't have taught a fledge how to feed much less how to fight. Sometimes he wondered how she was doing now that she had cut herself off from them, but that was one problem he didn't mind avoiding.

Spike got a wry look on his face and shrugged. They both knew that most of Spike's early tricks were learned at Angel's side. "So, you plan on circling until the sun comes up? Maybe you need a lesson in what you do with that," Spike said, his eyes going to Angel's crotch. His own hand reached down to cup his own erection.

"Oh, I know what I want to do with it," Angel said. He darted forward, but Spike danced back out of his reach. Pretending that he was frustrated with the retreat, Angel continued to chase Spike who simply danced backwards, laughing. At least he laughed until his heel caught on the antenna he'd dropped earlier. Trying to avoid falling, Spike made an inhuman leap into the air. Angel timed his attack and plowed into Spike when he was in the air, just when he would have no leverage. They both fell to the ground, and Angel pinned Spike to the ground under him.

Spike growled, his legs coming up around Angel, but instead of trying to force Angel off to the side, Spike pulled him close. Angel showed his fangs, growling his own warning. Spike might enjoy trying to control this, trying to manipulate Angel, but Angel was not going to be manipulated.

"Fucking tyrant."

"And?" Angel challenged Spike, grinding his body down into Spike.

"And nothin'," Spike agreed as he arched his back and pressed his cock up into Angel. Angel smiled, his own demon crowding forward. Tilting his head just slightly to the side, Spike invited Angel to bite, and Angel did, driving his fangs deep into Spike's neck and pulling the blood from him until he could feel Spike slow, his movement growing languid instead of demanding. Only then did Angel pull back enough to pull Spike's jeans open, the hard cock immediately pressing up.

"Boyo, you come before me and—"

"Shut the fuck up and just bugger me, ya bloody bogtrotting—" Spike stopped when Angel flipped him so fast that Spike didn't have a chance to protect his cock from the rough concrete. "Fuck."

"I plan to," Angel agreed, pulling Spike's jeans down to his knees before driving his cock deep into that strong body that twisted and bucked below him. Spike growled his pleasure, struggling up to his knees and lifting Angel's weight with him. The first hint of the sun added a hint of danger and the need to finish quickly, so Angel drove in with brutal speed, reaching around to grab Spike's cock and pump him.

Spike arched his back and roared out his pleasure as he came, leaving Angel to thrust into that tight, spasming hole before he came. Angel sighed, knowing he should probably do something to punish Spike. A real vampire sire would take the skin off Spike's back for intentionally disobeying an order, but Angel just pulled out and rolled onto his side, exposing his own neck. Spike slipped into his arms and drove his fangs deep into Angel's neck, sucking so that Angel could feel the connection between them like a bright line of fire connecting their dead hearts.

Spike pulled his fangs out after a second. "He'd be happy enough in your bed," Spike said quietly as he settled next to Angel. They had a couple of minutes before the sun came up, and Spike didn't fight against Angel's embrace.

Angel thought about that. He thought about what he was becoming, of the blood spilled between him and Spike, of the way his cock hardened when Spike fought him. "It's not going to happen," Angel said firmly. He might not know himself anymore, but he knew that Xander didn't fit in this picture. He couldn't substitute Xander for Spike without feeling sick in his very soul. Xander deserved better than what Angel could offer.

But Cordelia and Faith hadn't offered him much better. Angel stared up at the gray sky, streaks of clouds just starting to appear as the sun approached the horizon. Birds were singing, warning of the coming dawn that Angel could feel in his bones just like he could feel the fear of failure settling into his stomach. He could protect Xander from a lot of things, but he couldn't protect him from dying—he couldn't find Xander the perfect love—he couldn't do so much.

Even now, with his demon sated and quiet, he still didn't know what to do. God, no wonder he had avoided living for a hundred years. Living was messy and complicated and Angel didn't have any more answers than Liam had back when he'd just tried to drink himself into a state of not caring—not caring that his father hated him and his mother cried over him and he'd been even less successful in love than Xander. At least Xander had girls who liked him. The girls Liam had favored had only favored him as long as his purse had coin. Without coin, he was just one more rejected lover vomiting on himself in the back alley.

"If nothin' else, we'll find this Anyanka and rip all her guts out." Spike said and then he pushed up and away from Angel. Angel sighed and pulled his pants up.

"Stop broodin' over it, Peaches. I'll even let you be the one ta rip her head off," Spike offered, grinning like a madman as he pulled up his jeans and then dashed for the roof door. Shaking his head and still not sure what they were going to do, Angel followed, closing the door behind him.

Chapter Three
Hear that?" Spike bounced on his toes and then froze before he looked over his shoulder and grinned at them. Sunnydale was quiet tonight, but it had been since the mayor had fallen, so Angel had a pretty good guess what was creeping through the distant bushes. "Up for muckin' about with the soldier boys?" Spike asked them.

Angel shook his head. Spike never was going to grow up, but Angel couldn't come up with any good reason for stopping Spike. Sometimes he wondered what he would have done with this version of William back before the curse. Back then, he'd been so focused on trying to impress Darla and convince the rest of the world that he wasn't some drunken loser that he had been remarkably bad at having fun. Even though Spike had toned down his violence to match the needs of his new clan with their inconvenient souls, Spike just delighted in fun. He delighted in fun as much as he'd once delighted in Drusilla, in watching her face when he brought her some trinket that temporarily lured her back from the edge of madness.

"You know, one of these days, one of them is going to catch you with a tazer," Xander warned.

"Oi, don't you have faith in me, pet?" Spike put on his best wounded expression.

"So much faith that I actually listen to you when you tell me that even the best prepared fighter has an accident sometimes."

"Yeah, but I meant you, not me, luv," Spike pointed out. He pulled a large insulated flask out of his jacket and downed the contents.

"Do I even want to know what that was?" Xander asked with a disgusted expression. Spike wiped his mouth and grinned. "No, no, don't tell me," Xander said, holding up a hand to stop Spike from describing whatever disgusting thing he was about to describe.

"Ice water," Angel told Xander. "And once he's dropped his body temperature too low for the sensors to register him, he's going to remind Finn that a hunter can't rely on his technology."

"Exactly," Spike agreed. "It's all about helping the sod, innit?"

"Or getting your jollies by trouncing them and then playing with them like a sadistic cat, only hopefully with less actual eating of the metaphor mice," Xander sighed.

"Same thing, pet. Last chance ta help me."

"Oh, I think I'll skip the soldier torture tonight," Xander said. Spike traded a concerned look with Angel before he shrugged and went darting off. Normally, Xander was more than happy to help play bait and beat up a couple of soldiers. Angel was starting to worry that Xander enjoyed it a little too much, but for last day or so, he'd been sticking close to Angel whenever he wasn't in class. He'd even fallen asleep on Angel's couch, and it wasn't difficult to figure out why.

"Any word from Lorne?" Xander asked. He walked so close that their arms brushed as they headed down the path.

"He has a lead on some books with references to Anyanka. Spike's going up to LA to get them tomorrow."

Xander nodded. "I called Blair."

"Does he know anything?" Angel hadn't thought to call Blair, maybe because he tended to think of the D'fatum demon as the expert on humans, not on demons. But he had at least as many connections to the demonic community as Lorne. Maybe more. Blair's uncle had been around for centuries.

"Blair says that vengeance demons aren't actually evil, more like issuey."

Angel frowned. "She shrivels men's genitals and gives them terrible diseases."

"Which they bring on by doing something really bad. And as someone who has never been genital-shriveling bad, I want to officially say that the universe sucks for putting me in her path. I've never done anything to warrant more than genital... and I'm stopping now, because that's kinda creepy to even think about. But anyway, Blair says that vengeance demons are actually humans who turn to trying to fix the balance of things, only they turn all demonic to do it, which is probably not the kind of fixing of things Father Peter would approve of. Every vengeance demon focuses on answering the not-so-nice prayers of one type of person, like Anya and her unhappy, screwed-by-love women. I wonder what kind of issues she had that she decided to take up penis shriveling for a living?"

Angel thought about that for a second. "I don't want to know," he finally said.

"Oh yeah. I'm with you in the land of blissful ignorance. I mean, Willow-issues and Faith-issues, and even you-issues with the whole guilt complex are enough for me. I don't even want to think about Anyanka-issues. I think Spike is the only issueless among us."

Angel managed to not choke on his own incredulity. Spike had enough issues to fit in with the rest of them; he'd just learned how to hide them a little better. The path widened into a small clearing. A park bench was sitting at the edge of an island of light, and Angel put his hand on Xander's back, guiding him to it.

"And this is totally making my head do the screwy," Xander said quietly as he sank down on the seat. In the distance, Angel heard a human call cut off sharply, but at least it didn't sound like Spike was doing any permanent damage to Finn's group.

"Xander?" Angel sat next to him, his hand on Xander's knee, offering comfort silently. While Angel often didn't know how to say what he was thinking, he found that a simple touch often allowed Xander to understand what Angel couldn't say.

"I was at class, and I kept looking at Brenda Bakersfield, wondering if maybe I could ask her out without making myself look like an idiot."

Angel cocked his head. "Isn't that normal?" he asked. While he'd been born before the custom of dating had really developed, from the television he'd seen, fear seemed normal.

"Yes, but then I started wondering if me liking her meant that she was more likely to be a demon because there's a long history of me and demons."

"There was Cordelia."

"Which is not big with the proving anything," Xander said with a shrug. "She scared that one vampire guy into not touching her during Slayerfest, and the fact that those demons couldn't tell Cordy from another slayer, so not saying much about her humanity. And then there's mummy-girl and preying mantis lady and Amy and Faith and Kendra." Xander swallowed, and Angel could feel the slight tremor in Xander's leg as that old memory washed through him. "You are seeing the pattern here, right?"

Angel didn't answer, but Xander did attract a fair number of demons and witches. Then again, unlike most males, he didn't immediately fight for the dominant position in a relationship. He didn't sprawl out, claiming as much territory as he could on the bench. He didn't jump into the middle of every conversation and dominate it. For demons, who often tended to be a little touchy on the topic, Xander would be one of the rare humans who did allow them to keep their own power. And for women like Faith and Amy who had been so badly hurt in the past, he was someone they could trust to not hurt them again. He was a good choice in a mate.

Angel ignored the way his chest tightened, hatred curling up in the center of it for whomever Xander chose.

"And then there is the whole issue of clan which is way more issuey with Spike around. I mean, I really felt bad for Graham because you know he did not deserve the whole smack down."

"He slept with Faith," Angel said, trying his best not to answer Xander's implied question. As far as Angel was concerned, Graham did deserve the injuries he'd received. Faith was stronger now, more centered after spending so many months with Blair, but she wasn't healed. He could see her pain in the way she diverted every question about her past with sexuality, in the way she looked to Angel or to Blair for approval. Xander never did that. Sometimes Xander seemed to go out of his way to try and annoy Angel, and Angel knew for a fact that Spike tried to annoy him. Faith's continued need for the protection of a patriarch suggested that her healing had only begun. So, if Graham was too idiotic to recognize that he was sleeping with an emotionally injured girl, he deserved every bruise and broken bone Spike gave him. That way, he wouldn't make the same mistake next time Faith visited.

"From experience, I'm guessing that she was sleeping with him way more than he was sleeping with her--not that there was any sleeping going on. Screaming and... I'm going to stop now," Xander interrupted himself, and Angel smirked as he could smell the gathering desire from Xander. "Stop sniffing me. That is so very high on the creep-meter," Xander said as he punched Angel's arm.

Angel captured Xander's wrist in his hand and held it. "I'm breathing."

Xander tried to jerk his hand away. "You don't breathe."

"Habit." Angel smiled at Xander, still holding his arm. Xander rolled his eyes and then yielded, allowing Angel to have control over Xander's hand. Angel held it for several seconds before giving it back.

"Issuey," Xander said softly. "And how long is Spike planning to take? We're supposed to be meeting with Giles."

Angel turned his attention to the distant sounds of scuffling. "It sounds like one of the unit is giving him a run for his money," Angel said as he heard the faint trails of two people still moving.

"Probably Riley. Riley's not bad."

"For a human," Angel agreed. He waited for that twinge of jealousy that Riley had finally taken the place he'd once wanted so badly. It didn't come. The soldier had no idea how strongly he smelled of Buffy, and for a second Angel wondered if Buffy's scent marking of her partner was intentional.

"There is nothing wrong with being human. Personally, I'm all in favor of humanity."

Angel didn't answer as he listened to the distant conflict. The better Riley got, the more Spike was going to feel a need to prove his superiority. The conflict might get out of hand. When two clans occupied the same territory, it wasn't unusual for the opposing enforcers to kill each other, and Angel couldn't expect Spike to ignore his instincts for too long. Xander was looking at him strangely, but Angel focused on the distant sounds and ensuring that Spike didn't accidentally break Riley.

"I should have brought my comic books or my text on retrofitting wiring in residentials." Xander leaned back against the bench and pushed his legs out in front of him. "Some of us can't hear well enough to enjoy the show, you know."

"Xander? Angel?" Angel had been concentrating so hard on Spike and Riley that he had not seen Buffy approach. Obviously Xander noticed his distraction because the boy was already smirking.

"Hey, Buff. We were going to come meet you at Giles', but we lost the third musketeer," Xander said cheerfully. "Pull up a bench." Xander scooted closer to Angel to make room for Buffy to sit next to them.

"No thanks. I'm actually just looking for Riley."

"Um..." Xander cleared his throat.

"Again?" Buffy demanded. "Angel, your brat is being exceptionally bratty."

"It is good training," Angel offered in way of an apology.

Buffy didn't look appeased. "After what happened with Graham..."

Xander interrupted her. "Hey! That was so not Spike's fault. I mean, he hears a woman screaming in the park in the middle of the night, and he reacted."

Buffy crossed her arms and shifted so that all her weight was on one leg. She looked like a school teacher about to scold Xander. She certainly didn't look like the child sitting in the sun and sucking on a lollipop as Whistler had once shown him. Looking back, he was embarrassed that he could have confused his desire for redemption with his desire for Buffy. The woman she was now, strong and confident and clearly annoyed... Angel could fall in love with her now if he allowed himself. He could have feelings for her without confusing his destiny and his love. However, their chance had passed. She deserved Riley who could grow old with her and stand by her side in the sun.

"So, Spike was being a good Samaritan?" Buffy demanded, not even pretended that she believed him.

Xander shrugged. "Hey, he is not a fan of raping. And he was probably hoping he'd found a rapist so he could have a good dinner, which I am not approving of, but in the grand scheme of life, antelope and rapists are on their own when it comes to predators."

Buffy frowned. This was one point on which the two would never agree, and Angel didn't want to see that conflict flare to life now.

"Spike was restrained considering the circumstances. A simple broken arm is nothing compared to what he could have done," Angel pointed out. Buffy frowned. She didn't like the logic, but she also didn't understand vampire culture well enough to know what had really happened. Angel wondered if Giles understood Spike's need to defend the clan now that Angel was leaving him to handle the duties normally performed by an enforcer. If he did, he had chosen not to explain it to the others.

"Whatever." Buffy dismissed the whole thing with a wave of her hand. "I so know that someone is not big with the truth-telling, but Graham seems weirdly okay with the breaking and manhandling, so I'm not going to comment. Then again, he slept with Faith, so manhandling is probably not a problem for him. And that weirdly implies gross things with Graham and Spike, doesn't it?" Buffy asked, wrinkling her nose in disgust.

"It kinda does, Buff," Xander agreed with an equally disgusted expression. "There was some implied naughty in there somewhere."

"Ick." Buffy walked over and sat next to Xander. Angel noted that she sprawled more than Xander did. "And do I want to know what Spike is doing now, because the whole accidental implying of inappropriate is really doing not nice things to what I'm thinking."

"Okay, ew," Xander said softly.

"Seconding the ew," Buffy agreed. "I think my brain is all warped and broken. I walked in to see Giles the other day, and now all sorts of inappropriate things keep popping in when I really don't want them popping in. It makes me feel like a perv, but apparently my literature teacher is impressed with my ability to find a phallic symbol."

"You didn't..." Xander said slowly, his disgust not only clear in his voice but in his smell.

"Yes, Giles and Jenny, sitting in a tree, only it was Giles' kitchen table and that was not kissing. That was not even... and I am so not going there. I just didn't know that Giles' life came with a rating higher than mine. It seems wrong."

"He's an adult," Angel pointed out.

"And old," Buffy objected. "And I know I should be more mature about this, but I really just want to be squicked for a while.

"We can squick together," Xander offered. "Giles and sex is squick-worthy. I like to think that anyone over forty isn't doing that." Xander glanced over toward Angel. "Of course, I know I'm an idiot for thinking that, but sometimes I like to embrace my inner idiot."

"Embrace away."

"So," Xander asked after a long silence. "What's new with you guys?"

"Um, you know the roommate I said was a demon from hell?"

"Yeah?"

"She was," Buffy got a smug smile on her face. "I told them she was demonic, but they didn't believe me until she started sucking out my soul."

"She... what?" Xander nearly swallowed his tongue, and Angel sat up, his hand tight on Xander's leg. A soulless slayer was enough to cause his demon to rage and his instinct to urge him to pull Xander away.

"Yeah, but I kicked her ass and took my soul back. I wasn't the nicest person without a soul." Buffy shrugged. "I actually think Spike is nicer than me without the soul, so I will be voting no for any soul-sucking offers in the future."

Angel blinked, shocked that she would have faced such danger without calling for one of them.

"So, what's the sitch with you guys?" Buffy asked, and clearly she had recovered from the incident because she didn't even need to talk it through. Either that, or she had already done all her talking with Willow and Riley. Angel glanced at Xander, wondering if the boy missed being part of that inner group.

"I have a demon girl after me again," Xander offered.

"Again?" Buffy asked, and Xander tensed under Angel's hand, at least until he saw her expression.

"Very funny, Buff."

"There's a rule written somewhere. You get the demon girls, and I get the weird guys." Buffy was silent for a second. "At least, I used to. I'm really starting to think that me and Riley might actually have something."

"I hope so, Buff. You deserve something good. Besides, I was running out of loser jokes for your boyfriends." Xander just smiled when Buffy punched his arm.

"Oi, lookie what I found," Spike said cheerfully as he came into the clearing, pushing through the bushes and pulling Riley behind him. Angel could see that Riley had his hands tied, and Buffy was on her feet, stake out, almost immediately. Spike flashed into gameface, and Angel hurried to get up and between them.

"Spike," Angel warned as he hurried to take custody of Riley.

"Oi, bugger was hiding one of them tranq darts in his hands for after I caught him. If he isn't going to play fair, I'm not either."

"You never play fair," Xander said, while Angel took Riley's arm and pulled him away from Spike, Xander went to Spike's side.

"Yes, but I nearly got you, this time. I will take you down sooner or later," Riley said with confidence, and Angel was surprised to see that he wasn't all that upset about getting tied up. "You need to go cut the other guys loose," Riley suggested while Angel examined the ropes. Spike had been a little too enthusiastic, and it was going to be hard to get the ropes off without cutting them. Angel gave Spike a dirty look as he pulled his knife out. Spike just smirked. The smirk vanished when Angel didn't soften his expression.

"I'll go get 'em," Spike offered, and then he off into the woods again. Angel sighed. They were just lucky that Riley was good-natured about losing or this game really could get badly out of hand. One wrong move, and Spike was going to kill or rape the soldier; he was just too good as a fighter and his willingness to challenge Spike touched on too many instincts.

"Angel, are you going to let get him get away with this?" Buffy demanded.

"It's no worse than training," Riley said, waiting as Angel tried to cut the strands of rope without cutting Riley. "And the unit is improving."

"He tied you up!" Buffy objected, pointing at Riley's hands with her stake.

"So did my commander when I was taking covert evasions class," Riley said, and Angel was once more surprised at just how calm the soldier was taking all this. "Besides, I've seen Spike manhandle Xander just as much, so you can't convince me that he has any nefarious motive.

Angel paused. That was a dangerous assumption. Spike manhandled Xander because they were clan, family, and that gave Spike certain privileges. However, Riley belonged to Buffy, and the motives weren't the same.

"Riley," Angel said softly, not sure how to explain this. "I don't--" He stopped.

"What the ever-articulate one is trying and failing to say," Xander interrupted, "is that Spike is all about who has the power, and this may be a game as long as he ends up with the power in the end, but it really might not be all that gamelike if you ever won."

Buffy took an aggressive step forward, her body radiating danger and anger, and Angel had to take a deep breath and fight back the urge to pull Xander away from her. "Define ungamelike. Like he might refuse to come over and eat popcorn and play Monopoly with the rest of us?"

Xander flinched and looked at Angel as though seeking permission. But Angel didn't understand Buffy or her reactions well enough to know how to calm her down, and he could only trust that Xander would make the right decision about how much to share. "Um... I beat him once, and he pretty much spent the next week sitting on me. And I only won because Angel sorta cheated to help me win. But Ri, if you beat him, he's going to do something to remind you that he's way with the stronger. And trust me, he's always going to be way with the stronger, and the faster, and the fighting dirtier. He has a century of really dirty fighting behind him."

Riley looked at Xander for long, silent seconds, and Angel went back to work trying to cut the bindings. "Understood," Riley finally acknowledged. "I'm still going to try and win, but if I do, I'll accept the consequences of that."

"Riley!" Buffy objected loudly. Angel knew she had her own instincts, and every time Spike and Riley got into a conflict, she probably felt the need to stake Spike just as much as Angel felt the need to protect Xander.

"Buffy, they're our strongest allies. My team isn't up to their standards. Most of the unit can't take Xander, much less a master vampire or a serious demon. And that's after years of military training and covert ops work. I need the freedom to use the tools I have available to make sure we're as prepared for any emergency as we can be."

Angel cut the last strand, and Riley brought his hands around to the front, rubbing the wrists as he just stared at Buffy, waiting for an answer. Buffy looked at him and then turned to stare at the woods where Spike had vanished.

Buffy's hands twisted around the stake, rubbing the wood. "Xander, could Spike hurt them?"

Xander didn't answer right away. "Um... maybe?" Xander finally admitted.

"That has always been a danger," Riley pointed out. "Just like we might get killed trying to take down a demon or someone could target us because they want to establish a base of operations on the Hellmouth. But Graham said that Spike wanted to kill him, and he chose to back off and allow Graham to call for help." Riley took a step toward Buffy, raising his hand for a second as though he was going to touch her shoulder, but then he put his hands behind him and stood straight. "The danger that Spike could kill one of us keeps us on our toes; it reminds us that this war isn't being fought by humans, and we have to meet an enemy that's faster, smarter, and more adaptable than anything we've experienced during training. Buffy, if you tell me to pull the men back, I will order them to disengage the moment they identify Spike during any conflict, but I don't believe that's the best use of our resources."

Buffy shoved her stake back in the waist of her pants. "I really preferred it when I wasn't all adultlike. Because now, when I say 'fine', I'm going to have to live with the guilt if Spike hurts someone, and Angel, if that happens, I plan to get irrational and childishly vengeful all over Spike."

"Buffy, just remember that he has taken three slayers," Angel pleaded. He couldn't bring himself to say more because he honestly didn't know who he would want to win such a fight. He hoped he never had to make that choice.

"As long as he remembers that I've taken hundreds of vamps," she answered, and Angel thought that was probably as close to a truce as they were going to come. "So, are we going to Giles'? Oh God, we are going to Giles' and now I have to face the table of Giles. I don't want to face the table." Buffy looked at Riley in distress, and Riley cleared his throat, probably to kill a laugh before he held out his arm and gathered Buffy up. "Protect me from the creepy images that keep playing on the inside of my eyes," she begged him, turning her face toward his chest.

"I'll stay between you and the table the whole time," Riley promised.

"Between me and Jenny, too, please," Buffy asked. "Jenny, tables, wooden spoons, and all butter are officially on the list of things from which you must protect me."

Riley smiled and patted her back. "Always," he promised.

Angel watched them, the power now shifting so that Riley acted as protector, his arms around Buffy. It was uncomfortable. Angel shifted away, not sure how to deal with the sudden and inexplicable return of his childlike Buffy who was clearly not the dominant adult.

"So, we're off to see Giles, and Buffy, you so do not have room to talk. Let me tell you, living near Faith and Spike, I have a whole laundry list of things that I can no longer look at." Xander slipped his arm around Angel's arm and started pulling him down the path. "Washing machines, those clips you use to put laundry out on a line, and since we have no line, I'm not even sure why we had those clips, but..." Xander shrugged. "And then there's rope and hairbrushes and caramel sauce, and carrots, and considering that carrots were one of the vegetables that Angel could get me to eat without complaining, that was a major loss. However, I will never eat a carrot again without brain scarring memories."

"You don't sound too scarred by it," Riley commented, his arm around Buffy's shoulders as they followed.

"Oh, you have no idea. I've just given up pretending to be shocked," Xander offered. Angel listened as Spike raced through the woods just north of them to wait near the street. He didn't want to come up from behind where Buffy would be between him and the rest of the clan. Angel sighed. This situation couldn't go on forever, that's for sure. Angel just wasn't sure what he should do. He didn't want to take Xander away, but more and more he was starting to think he couldn't keep Spike here.

"Captain," a voice called out from behind, and Riley paused, watching as his three soldiers came up behind them. Saunders, the only woman in the unit was there. Angel looked at her with an appraising eye. It was Saunders who had called. "Sir, reporting back. Did you get him?"

"No, I got my ass kicked and then tied up," Riley answered without any rancor.

"Next time, sir," Saunders suggested, then she fell back to take a rear position. She wasn't right for Xander. Her voice was so annoying that he could never find love with her. Angel pulled his arm free from Xander's hold and rested it on the small of Xander's back, urging him to walk faster. The sooner they found out whether or not Giles had information, the sooner Angel could get Xander back home.

Chapter Four
They pulled into the parking garage, the brilliant sun of the late afternoon vanishing into shadows. And the chill didn't seem to have all that much to do with the sudden lack of sun. Los Angeles seemed like a pretty cheerful place from what Xander had seen as they drove through at 90 miles an hour, but this law firm's building seemed to suck up all the cheer and put out creep-vibes.

"Seriously not liking this place," Xander complained softly. Pulling into the first open spot, Angel cursed softly in Irish, which usually meant that he was going to find Spike, disappear, and show up many bruises and broken bones later. Irish Angel was pissy Angel, and pissy Angel took it out on Spike.

Xander got out of the car and wasn't surprised when Angel's hand came up around his neck, pulling him way too close for complete heterosexual comfort. Pissy Angel was also handsy.

"Peaches," Spike said, walking out from behind a pillar, his cigarette and his eyes glowing dimly in the shadows.

"What have you gotten yerself into?" Angel demanded. "Caught in a building, in daylight. I thought I beat this kind of stupidity out of you."

Xander knew there was major badage when Spike didn't even bother to verbally snipe right back. Instead he dropped his cigarette and crushed it under his boot with way more force than was really needed.

"Wankers took Cordelia."

For a second, Xander could only blink, his mind coming up with all kinds of stupid questions, like 'his Cordelia?' and 'who?' and 'how did Spike find out?' Luckily, Xander's brain had learned to disengage from the mouth when the less human members of the family were this worked up. Angel's eyes flashed yellow, and his hand tightened around Xander's neck to the point where it was almost painful. Xander made a little grunt, and Angel immediately loosened his hold, moving his arm so that it was slung over Xander's shoulders and still way too close for total heterosexual comfort.

"How many?"

"One vamp. Lots of other wankers." Spike turned and started walking, his coat billowing around him. Instead of following, Angel paused, and Xander could almost read the big idiot's mind. He could definitely read that stubborn expression.

"Oh no, no, there will be no leaving of the Xander. Besides, I will just follow you two seconds after you take me back to the car, so unless you plan to spend all night carrying me back here, I am not going to be left alone." Xander crossed his arms and glared.

"I could tie you up or lock you in the trunk," Angel threatened.

That only made Xander roll his eyes. "Oh please, something would come along and eat me, and you know it."

Angel sighed. "I should have left you at home."

"I would have followed."

"I could have tied you up there." Angel started walking towards Spike, an arm still around Xander.

"The house would have caught on fire. Admit it. Me and luck are not buds, not unless you count bad luck, and then it's not so much that we're buddies as it is bad luck is like the little brother who follows me around and makes me miserable. Or he's the big brother who follows me around and beats me up for fun. Either way, me and luck are not to be trusted in the same room together." And that brought another huge Angel sigh.

The elevator dinged open, and Spike went in, that weird bounce in his steps that suggested that either demons or drywall was about to get very broken. "Spike, who has Cordelia?" Xander asked as they went in. Spike pushed the button for the top floor, and then Xander couldn't really see anything else because he was physically shoved behind a wall of vampire.

"Wanker named Russell Winters. Vamp."

Yep, Spike was not really big with the talking when he was really pissed. Well, pissed drunk he talked a lot, but pissed angry, he turned all Oz levels of quiet.

"I thought you said she was safe." Angel had the cranky voice out.

"Thought she was. Winters was respecting the bloodmark."

Xander's eyes went big at that little bombshell. His vamps had bloodmarked Cordelia, which meant... he had no idea what that meant. He just knew that the bloodmarking was what made him smell like Angel and it was the reason that one minion had actually broken his own leg trying to abort an attack mid-lunge. It'd been weirdly amusing if you discounted the pain and writhing, and he really had been hanging out with Spike way too much.

"What happened?" Angel growled.

"She bloody went after him. Tried ta stake the bastard."

"Cordelia?" Xander asked in surprise. That was not like Cordelia. Cordelia was more the kind to sit on the headstone and point at whoever she wanted dusted. Queen C was more than just a random nickname. No random at all in that name.

"Yes, Cordelia," Spike snarled, his fangs making his accent sound all weird. "I fucking told her to drop it. I told her to stay away from him. Vamps feed; it's what we fucking do."

The elevator opened, and Spike stormed out, his coat looking mighty capelike in a red kryponite evil-coming-your-way kind of way. "Stay close," Angel ordered, and then he followed, leaving Xander to trail behind. They were in a fancy office building with wide windows, and Xander opened his mouth to shout a warning when Spike walked right through a patch of sunlight without the ugly-ass ring to protect him, but there wasn't even a wisp of smoke.

A secretary hurried out from behind a desk. "You cannot go in th--" She didn't get any farther before Spike drove a stake into her heart. Xander lost a step, horror making his legs lose the pattern of walking, but then the secretary turned to a dust statue with a surprised face, her skeleton showing for a millisecond before Spike charged right through her, scattering her ashes. Vampiric secretaries. That was... new and weirdly disturbing. Others moved to the side, and Spike closed in on an ornate double door. One kick, and the doors flew open.

"Where the fuck is she?" Spike demanded. Xander followed Angel into the room. There was a large conference table, and at the head of it stood a middle aged man with heavy features. Xander had no idea how he knew, but he was definitely calling that one a vamp. An older woman with her gray hair in a bun and a young guy with a smirky smile stood to one side.

"William," the vampire started around the table, looking like he might hold out his hand for Spike to shake, and the growl that came from Spike was enough to make Xander press closer to Angel.

The vampire changed his focus from Spike to Angel. "Angelus, your childe is not exactly well mannered. We are civilized here; we do not go charging into each other's lairs staking minions and issuing challenges."

"I dunna care what you want. I want my female back," Angel said, and Xander was calling that soft and silky tone an Angelus voice... a pissed Angelus voice. Sometimes Angel's inner demon was a little freaky, and they were definitely heading for the freaksome now.

"She attacked me. I never challenged the bloodmark. I have to say that I was surprised. I thought bloodmarking territory went out with gas streetlights."

"I do things the old way," Angel said as he stepped forward, his hand falling to the sword he had hidden under his coat.

The vampire raised his hands. "I believe in being more reasonable. For example, my lawyers here have prepared a document. It holds me free of any liability for minor injuries she may have suffered in my attempts to defend myself and it holds you personally responsible for any of Ms. Chase's actions after she is released, including any attempt to press charges or defame my character. Mr McDonald?"

The smirker stepped forward. "Lindsey McDonald, counsel for Russell Winters. If you would just like to sign--"

Spike darted forward and grabbed the lawyer by the shoulders, driving teeth into his neck so fast that Xander didn't have time to do more than gasp before Spike was feeding. Xander clung to Angel's coat in shock. Yeah, he knew that Spike fed, but knowing and seeing were definitely not the same. Lindsey's hands clawed at Spike's shoulders, and one leg kicked out, but then his struggles grew quieter. Xander held his breath, not sure what to think because killing bad, but this was a lawyer. This was a lawyer who worked for a vampire. Hell, this lawyer worked for a vampire who had kidnapped Cordelia, so there were layers on layers of bad there, but that didn't mean he wanted a front-row seat.

"Spike," Angel said softly. Spike raised his head, his lips red with blood. With a wicked smile, he dropped the lawyer on the table. From the groaning and weak twitches, the guy was still alive. He wasn't happy, but he was alive. A little part of Xander's brain wondered if Angelus was better at biting or something because the humans he'd seen Angelus bite on Christmas Eve had been way more into it than this guy. Then again, Angelus had left neat little holes, and Lindsey had a raw and sluggishly bleeding wound.

"I don't really care about lawyers and contracts. I want my human," Angel stepped forward to Spike's side, and for a half second, Xander was left a whole five feet away from his vamps. He quickly moved to a spot just behind Angel. He so should have stayed in the car, but he usually figured out that he was in over his head when his head was already six feet underwater, and he was sinking fast.

"You seem fond of your humans," Winters said, and now he looked at Xander.

"Hey, eyes to yourself, bub!" Xander complained. For the first time, Winters actually showed a little of his vampire nature, yellow eyes flashing at Xander. Angel moved and now Xander had a good view of his back.

"You shouldn't be worrying about my court. You should be a little more concerned about the fact that you have surrounded yourself with fools." Angel started moving. He walked in a slow arc with Winters at the center. Oh yeah, this was so going to go bad. Spike moved off to the side, and Xander retreated to a wall, his hand on his cinquedea. Angel reversed his direction and walked an arc toward the windows.

Winters watched, and that almost looked like worry on his face. "This isn't some cave where we challenge each other for territory. Your human attacked me. She interfered with my feeding, and I restrained her and waited for you to come collect her."

"Call and have her sent here." Angel reversed and paced back toward Xander. Spike held his spot near the table, but he was crouched, all bounce gone as he waited to explode into motion.

Maybe Winters finally figured out that he was chin deep in shit and sinking fast because he reached over and hit the intercom button on his phone. "Have Ms. Chase escorted to my office," he ordered. Angel smiled, but that was more the Angelusy smile of doom than anything Xander would want to see aimed at him. Winters was clearly an idiot, though, because he smiled back. "We can work things out. I can see where you might have taken this as a hostile act, even though I never meant it that way. She is the one who attacked me."

"If you canna defend yourself from a slip of a girl, you don't deserve to keep your unlife," Angel commented with that same amused expression that was seriously starting to freak Xander out. Angel tilted his head and considered Xander, his head tilted up while he scented the air. A half second later, Angel frowned--now that expression was all Angel with the doubt and the distress. Oh no. No and more with the no because Angelus was handling this way better than Angel would have.

"Yeah, buddy," Xander said, pulling Winters' attention to him before the guy noticed that Angel had gone all regrety. "If you feel threatened by a human, you are so not even worth the dust that you're going to get turned into. As a human, I'm officially saying that any vamp who feels intimidated enough to kidnap me is rating pretty high on the loser scale of unlife."

Spike bounced on his toes, clearly amused.

Winters snarled. "You are noth--"

"You do na talk to him. He is mine," Angel practically roared as Angelusy traits took front and center. The gray-haired lady made a little squeaking mouse-sound and retreated to the corner. Even the wounded guy managed to slide off the table and get himself half under it. Yep, there was one who knew how to keep himself alive in the middle of potential mayhem. Actually, Xander might join him under the table if things got really bad because that table was the only thing in the room large enough to provide any cover.

"I apologize." Winters had his hands up in surrender again. "I should have left her on the street. I would like to make amends. You're welcome to Lindsey. He's quite a good lawyer and if nothing else, your childe clearly enjoys the taste of his blood."

Xander expected outrage and arguments and threats, but Lindsey just sat under the table, his hand pressed to his injured neck as he watched silently. Oh, if Angel ever tried to offer Xander up as a peace offering, the vamp would never have a minute of peace again in his life, but Lindsey didn't even look particularly surprised or offended. The guy needed to find a new job, one with benefits that included a no-getting-traded-to-enemies clause. Although right now, Xander was thinking the guy would be lucky to get traded. Angelus had less of the creep going than these guys.

A knock on the half-open door interrupted the uncomfortable silence that had descended on the room. "Mr. Winters? We have Ms. Chase," a voice called out, but Xander couldn't see anyone. Yep, the smart ones were definitely hiding down the hall.

"Send her in," Winters called out. Someone must have given Cordelia a good shove because she came stumbling forward, hit one of the doors which was hanging from a broken hinge and then tumbled into the room. Her hands were tied, and without them, she ended up face down on the floor in an inelegant and unCordeliaish heap. Xander darted forward, his cinquedea out.

"You disgusting little troll," Cordelia complained, and Xander was seriously hoping she was aiming that at Winters and not him. "Seriously! What is your problem?"

"Pet, you okay?" Spike asked, his nose going as he scented the air.

"If loser boy would hurry up and cut me loose, I'd be fine."

"Hey, I'm working on it," Xander defended himself as he used his blade to slice through knots. Whoever had tied her up had been a little too enthusiastic, so he was guessing that she had been giving them a hard time.

She pushed herself up to her knees and pinned Winters with a very Cordeliaish expression. "He had to have minions sneak up on me from behind. What kind of a reject is too afraid to fight a human? And what kind of a reject goes after my friends? At least Spike goes after people who can fight back, but you have to use your money to trick girls and then you have your hired help hold them down. You couldn't get a fang into an orange without someone to hold the orange still for you. Even then, you'd probably miss."

"Oi, sounds like she has your number," Spike offered, and that bounce was back.

"She's disrespectful," Winters snapped.

"Not to me, she isn't," Angel pointed out as he started that slow pace again. The bounce vanished from Spike's step. "But then I've earned her respect. Do you truly target the weakest humans you can find? Do you truly require help in your hunt?"

Winters didn't answer.

Angel gave a slow, low laugh. "Oh boyo, what did I always teach you about vampires who couldn't hunt for themselves?" he asked Spike.

Spike smiled. "Ya said they weren't worth challenging. Ya said that no matter how many years they'd managed to survive, they were nothing more than glorified minions, and should be put down like one," Spike immediately answered.

"You dis--" Whatever Winters was going to say, he never finished it. Xander couldn't even tell if Spike or Angel had thrown the stake, but it was there in Winters' chest for half a second as the outline of the man in dust hovered in the air, and then it exploded.

The woman in the corner squeaked again. Angel looked over toward her, and for a half second, Xander worried about whether Angel was going to get all Angelusy on her too. Xander cut the last strand on the ropes around Cordelia's wrists, and she stood up.

"I don't care who you people are, but you leave my clan alone." Angel growled the words, and the woman nodded so fast that she looked like a bobblehead doll.

"Exactly! I warned you that you weren't vamp enough to challenge Spike and Angel, but oh no. You thought that surviving a couple of hundred years made you someone important. Loser," she told the pile of dust that had been Winters. With that, Cordelia dismissed them all with a sniff and turned to leave. She was one step out the door before Spike gave a colorful curse and darted out after her.

"Move," Angel said, gesturing toward Spike. Xander got up and hurried after him, leaving Angel to protect the rear. On the way out, the employees were still keeping to the sides of the hallways. Cordelia charged past them, her head high, and Spike kept close to her side, Xander right behind him.

Welcome to the big city, where instead of hanging out in cemeteries, the evil dressed up in suits and ties and had demonic secretaries. This was freaky, even for a hellmouth boy like him. They reached the elevator without anyone stopping them, and Cordelia pushed the down button and crossed her arms. She didn't look any more annoyed than she would have if someone had told her they had run out of her shoe size.

Angel rested his hand on the small of Xander's back, and the four of them watched as people peered from behind office doors and around corners.

"Evil lawyers. Kinda cliche," Xander offered.

"Cliches are born in truth," Angel sighed. "They want power and they think a vampire is the way to gain power."

"Vampires are the way to get dead," Xander disagreed. Then he looked at his weird little family. "Or the way to get pushed around and sat on and ordered to eat vegetables, which is still not feeling powerful," he amended himself.

Cordelia looked at him with that old expression of hers, the one that suggested he was an idiot, but she still liked him anyway. He hadn't seen that look since he had screwed everything up. Cordy shook her head at him.

"Guys, are we sure we're safe in an elevator?" Xander asked as the little bell dinged and the doors opened.

"I'm not walking down twenty stories," Cordelia insisted as she stepped inside, and that pretty much ended that discussion. A man in a suit was already in the elevator, and Spike reached in and grabbed him by his tie, flinging him out before he followed. Xander and Angel got on last.

The elevator music was pretty surreal as they rode down to the garage level. Spike's mouth was still stained red, and his coat was gray with vampire ash. Cordelia had her arms crossed over her chest in a pose that generally meant she was about to rip into the cheerleaders for not working hard enough, but her wrists were covered with angry red welts. Angel just... actually, Angel didn't have any emotion on his face at all, which generally did not bode well for whoever had pissed him off.

They got out in the garage, and Angel led the way to the car. "You're in the trunk," he told Spike. "And next time you get yourself trapped in a building with no sewer access, you'll have a lot more to worry about than an uncomfortable trip in a trunk," he warned. Spike didn't answer. He was busy glaring at Cordelia. Xander tended to wilt under that expression, and if he tried to stick up for himself, Spike usually just grabbed him and dumped Xander over his lap. It was hard to stick up for yourself when you were stuck over someone's lap. However, Cordelia just glared back at him.

"There are enough people in the world who deserve to get eaten. I wasn't going to stand back and let him eat girls I knew."

"You had no business challenging a master vampire," Spike snarled, his eyes yellow.

"You made your choice, I made mine," she told him archly. Cordelia could do a mean arch when she wanted to.

"He could have fucking killed you!" Spike pivoted and was nose to nose with Cordelia.

"Yes, he could have. Your point?" Cordelia had her sweet voice going, and Cordelia's sweet voice was about as scary as Angelus'.

"Argue about this later," Angel ordered. He opened the trunk of the convertible. "In."

Spike gave Cordelia one last growl before he got in the trunk, wrapping his coat around him.

"You could get a fucking van, Peaches," he complained, but Angel slammed the trunk.

"I could, but I don't want to," Angel answered as he went to the driver's side. "Get in the car."

Xander hurried to claim shotgun, and then retreated to the backseat when Cordelia turned her arch on him. Angel didn't comment on the seat shuffle because he was too busy trying to strangle his steering wheel with his bare hands. His knuckles were turning white. Xander knew that if he held onto something that tightly, he'd lose circulation and his fingers would go numb, but maybe vampires were different. Or maybe Angel was so angry that he didn't care.

They pulled out onto the street. The sun was starting to set, and the tall buildings cast long shadows over the road.

"You can't challenge vampires." Angel had on that calm before the storm voice, and for once, it wasn't Xander who had inspired it.

"I think I just proved I can." Cordelia stared at the buildings, turning her back to Angel, and if Xander were stupid, he'd get in the middle of this fight by pointing out that Cordy was just pissing him off more by turning her back to him. However, he liked to think he'd left his days of complete stupidity behind with textbooks and chalk dust and Sunnydale High.

"You were captured."

Cordelia shrugged. "So I'm not good at challenging vampires. It doesn't mean I can't do it anyway."

Angel made a noise that sounded like someone was smushing a hamster. Not even Xander had ever inspired that particular sound.

"You are such an idiot," Cordelia sighed, and she gave Angel one of those looks that she usually saved for Xander... and the kid who always ate glue in class. Yellow flashed in Angel's eyes, but Cordelia seemed a little less than intimidated. "Xander," she said, turning to him, and for a second, Xander knew pure terror. Demons and hellgods scared him less than the thought of getting into a fight between these two. "If Angel told you to let someone die, would you do it?"

Xander's memory flashed back to a night long ago when Angelus had slipped out, the feel of Angelus' hands on Xander, pinning him down, threatening him if he wasn't quiet while Angelus hunted and killed. "Um, I'm thinking I've already proved that's a big old 'no'." From Angel's flinch, he knew exactly what Xander was thinking.

"Exactly." Cordelia turned her glare back on Angel. "We are not children, and we do not do what we're told just because you and blondie back there think you have some sort of claim over us. Yes, Winters was leaving me alone, but I am not going to sit back and let him eat the prettiest and the smartest girls out there on the audition circle. Someone has to think of the future of the human genome here."

Angel was almost whispering in his attempt to not yell. "Cordelia, you could have been killed."

"I think I know that."

And the emotional dam broke. "Do ye want someone to rip your throat out and feast on your blood?" Angel shouted loud enough that even people who had their windows rolled up turned and looked at him in surprise and fear. Angel slumped down in the seat, and when the light turned green, he floored the accelerator. Xander noticed that the other cars let them get way ahead. Yep, no one wanted to try and drag race with the crazy sun-lovin' vampire.

Cordelia gave a big sigh. "I happen to think that my life isn't worth turning my back and letting someone like Winters take out girl after girl. I know these people. I go on auditions with them and suffer through really boring acting workshops with them, and I draw cartoon mustaches on their headshots when no one is looking, but I will not let some vampire eat them."

"Wait. Auditions? I thought you were going to acting college or something," Xander interrupted. Cordelia looked at him, and for a second, something that looked like doubt flashed across her face, which was weird because Cordy was many things, but she never had an ounce of doubt, not even when verbally shredding someone who so did not deserve it.

She shrugged. "Acting requires auditions. Besides, I need the money. My parents neglected to pay their taxes for the last several decades." Cordelia sounded so airy and casual that Xander knew she was totally putting on an act. And she didn't act all that well, so her going on auditions was probably not all that pretty. Then Xander started thinking of their last months in school. Cordelia had been grounded from her car and stuck hitching rides with Harmony or one of the college boys she dated. She stopped having the cheerleaders over to her house. She'd tried to get him to buy her prom dress. But he hadn't, and she'd still shown up in the most lavish designer dress in the history of all promming, which wasn't particularly surprising given that it was Cordelia... but...

"How long?" Xander asked.

Angel flinched, and Xander narrowed his eyes at that bit of evidence. "You knew!" Xander accused him. Angel didn't protest his innocence, so Xander punched the stupid vamp as hard as he could in the shoulder. Unfortunately, it wasn't hard enough.

"Oh please, get over yourself, Xander Harris. You didn't tell me about your night with Faith, I didn't tell you about Daddy's IRS trouble. That isn't exactly saying good things about our relationship."

"I told you about Faith," Xander said, not exactly sure how this had come back to him and his screw ups.

"No, you told me that night was 'disturbing.'" She made quotes with her fingers in the air. "Which means that you basically told me that there was something you weren't telling me. It's not the same."

Xander shrank back into his seat. Yep, Cordelia's nails were just as sharp as ever. Actually, he was surprised she hadn't talked Winters into dusting himself.

"None of this changes the fact that you should not be challenging vampires," Angel said, and thank god for him and his one-track mind. He pulled up in front of an apartment building with ugly square windows and square lines and the sort of modern architecture that Xander absolutely hated, even if it did make finding water lines ridiculously easy.

"And none of it changes the fact that I'm going to anyway," she answered sweetly. "You and Spike can play Daddy with Xander; I am not going to get ordered around by anyone, and don't think that paying my rent gives you any more rights than anyone else has on that front."

"Hey, they are not playing Daddy. I have a father, and trust me, if Angel or Spike acted anything like him, I would stake them. Or I would try to stake them. I would try and fail to stake them." Xander shrugged. He'd long ago come to terms with the fact that he was always going to be the physical weakling of the group. It helped that he could beat the snot out of at least some of the covert-ops trained soldiers though.

"I am not his father," Angel growled. "But if he tried to challenge a master vampire, I would lock him in his room for a month."

"You don't have that option with me," Cordelia said as she got out of the car. "And seriously, Angel, pull your head out of your ass because if he lets you lock him in his room and sit on him and generally torture him with anally retentive over-protective tendencies... well, there are a limited number of relationships where someone will put up with that. I'm just saying," she finished. And then she gave both Angel and him one of her looks that proclaimed their stupidity. Then she turned her back and walked toward the building without another word.

"Fucking go after her!" Spike shouted from the trunk, his words muffled by the upholstery.

"She's going to make up her own mind." Angel practically growled the words, and then he accelerated right into the path of a Volvo that had to brake and swerve into a turn lane. Oh yeah, Angel was going to be a joy tonight, that's for sure.

Chapter Five
"Hello, house of madness, chief straight-coat puller speaking," Xander answered the phone.

"Xander?" The man on the other end was sounding stressed enough that Xander tried to sit up; however, Angel grabbed his ankles.

"Don't spill the popcorn," Angel growl-whispered.

"This is Xand-man," Xander said to the man on the phone, giving Angel a dirty look. Angel glanced over, his hands still holding Xander's legs down across Angel's lap, the popcorn bowl perched on top, but at least he was interested.

"It's Graham."

"Graham?" Xander had trouble processing that one because Graham had been huge with the avoiding of them ever since Spike had beat the snot out of him for sleeping with Faith. "What's up?"

"I think I need some backup."

Angel took the bowl and moved it to the table so that Xander could finally sit up. Spike had been sprawled over his end of the couch, but now he leaned forward. Then again, Spike was probably hoping for a chance to beat Graham senseless again.

"Buddy, any demon with any self-respect takes the night off to watch stupid horror films and eat popcorn and make inappropriate complaints about the lack of realism in blood spray," Xander said slowly. "Are you sure you aren't trying to slay a trick-or-treater?"

"I'm sure." Graham sure sounded big with the sureness, and he wasn't one to lose his head during a fight. "Buffy and Riley went to a party, but I lost Riley's signal. When I went to the house to investigate..." He stopped, and Xander could pretty much guess what the problem was. Yep, Sunnydale was good at making people worry about the crazy-making... or the crazy-assuming anyway since most of the crazy turned out to be real.

"Trust me, I've dated a praying mantis and a mummy, I've seen talking dolls and invisible girls. Graham, whatever you're going to say, you are not even approaching my levels of weird." Yep, Xander watched the Twilight Zone when he wanted that warm, fuzzy feeling of home and all things familiar, because his life was pretty much one big Hellmouth Zone.

"I heard screams, and when I tried to get in the house, the house swallowed the door and I was left looking at solid siding."

"Ah fuck. What the hell is wrong with demons today, mucking around on fucking Halloween when they should be home spawning or somethin'." Spike was up off the couch and grabbing at his coat, and Angel was right behind him.

"Where's the house?" Xander asked, tilting the phone a little to make it easier for the others to hear.

"The Alpha-Delta house on the north side of campus."

"On it," Spike said as he headed for the door, and Xander was so not asking how Spike knew where the frat house was. Then again, loud music and lots of drinking tended to attract Spike.

"Graham, we're on our way. Call Giles and see if he and Jenny can provide a little magical backup because people-swallowing houses might not be something you can kill with a sword," Xander said. Not even waiting for an answer, he hit the disconnect button and shoved his cell phone in his pocket. He wasn't more than two feet from the couch when a hand on his chest stopped him.

"Where do you think you're going?" Angel demanded.

"Um, with you. Seriously, Angel, lay off the hair gel. It's sinking in." Xander tried to detour around Angel, but Angel was the original immovable object when he wanted to be.

"You're not going."

"Give it up, you are not the boss of me even if you and Spike like pretending bossiness. Well, you actually don't have to pretend the bossiness part because you have that down, but being bossy does not make you the boss." Xander frowned, fairly sure that he had lost the logic of that argument somewhere in the middle.

"You're not going."

"And you can't stop me. Not unless you plan on standing here all night and letting Buffy get killed." Xander crossed his arms and glared. For a second, Angel stood there, a silent statue without a single emotion on his face. Then the stoic cracked and he made that weird cringing, snarling expression that meant he was really and truly pissed.

"Stay behind me." Angel turned and headed for the door. Spike was there, leanin' against the wall and watching with a smirk. "Shut up, Spike."

"Oi, didn't say a word!" Spike sounded offended, but he was still smirking. "If your knickers are in a twist over Xander, take it out on him, luv. Take it out all over him. It's bloody unhealthy taking your frustrations out on the wrong person, innit it, Xander?" Spike turned to him. Xander was not so stupid to miss the fact that the two vamps were talking about something other than frustration, but he was not getting in the middle of whatever weirdness they had going.

"This is me staying out of this." Xander followed Angel out to the car, refusing to even pay attention as Spike and Angel had one more little sniping war. They definitely enjoyed torturing each other.

By the time Angel pulled up in front of the frat house, he was almost strangling the wheel. Yep, as soon as everyone was safe, Angel was going to take Spike up to the roof and beat the snot out of him. He might throw him off the roof if Spike didn't stop with the weird references that weren't making any sense.

"Angel, Spike, Xander." Graham stepped out from behind a tree. Xander had to give the guy a whole lot of credit because his arm was still in a sling, and he didn't look more than a little totally terrified of being around Spike. Xander would have been running for the hills by now. "There was a woman screaming at the window, but I couldn't break the window to get to her." Graham looked over his shoulder at the very normal looking house... normal except for a definite lack of door where there should be a door.

"We'll get them." Angel pulled a crowbar out of his backseat and strode up to the house. Raising the crowbar like a baseball bat, he swung with all his might. Xander flinched, expecting to be picking glass shards out of Angel's arms for the next week, but the crowbar hit the glass and rebounded with a dull thudding noise.

"What the fuck?" Spike demanded. He hurried up the walk and practically yanked the crowbar out of Angel's hand. Angel just surrendered it and stepped back, watching as Spike attacked the window like a madman, the blows bouncing off until finally the crowbar flew out of Spike's hand and sailed up and over a tree. It hit the neighbor's house, and the long metal arm sunk deep into the wood siding.

Angel looked up at it for a second. "You're buying me a new crowbar."

Spike glared.

"Well, that was totally and completely not helpful." Xander climbed out of the backseat of the convertible and looked at the frat house. "Okay, so what's the next step?"

Before either vamp could admit total defeat, a little red truck pulled up behind the convertible. Giles got out of the passenger seat. "I take it that you haven't had any luck?" Giles asked.

"We just got here," Spike snarled. Giles didn't seem to notice though. While Jenny got out of the driver's side, he reached into the back of his truck and pulled out a chainsaw.

"Bloody hell, why don't you carry one of those, Peaches?" Spike demanded with a little bounce, so Xander was figuring all was forgiven. Angel just reached over and casually punched Spike in the arm hard enough to make him stumble to the side.

"Rupert, if this is magical, I should--" Jenny started to say. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail, and she had cat whiskers painted on her face. But then Giles was wearing a big ugly sombrero, so the whole night had a surreal vibe going.

"Jenny, as soon as we get inside, you may do whatever you like. However, I am going to find a way to reach Buffy." Without another word, Giles pulled the cord on the chainsaw and it roared to life with puffs of smoke. Walking up to the front, Giles shoved the chainsaw into the wood where the door should be. The whole house shivered as though in pain, and the sawdust flew. In just a couple of minutes, Giles had hacked a rough opening into the side of the building.

"Coming?" Giles asked, and he had more than a little of Spike's destructive glee in his voice, and with the chainsaw in his hand, he was slightly scary. Most of the time, Xander had trouble thinking of Giles as anything other than the school librarian, even now that the school was a big smoldering pile of ash. However, right now, he was looking like someone who might summon a demon. Jenny sighed and shook her head, but she hitched up a bag over her shoulder and followed him.

"You stay close," Angel growled at Xander before he headed for hole in the wall. Just as he reached the house, a woman came screaming out through the hole, her hair writhing with snakes.

"Bloody hell," Spike said as he watched her run. "Someone obviously didn't get the memo about demons taking the night off."

"Note to self. Demons need better secretarial staff," Xander agreed. Angel was already stepping in through the hole Giles had made, and Xander followed. He was barely in the door when a skeleton with one eye raised a knife to attack. Xander pulled his cinquedea at the exact same time that Angel kicked out, his boot hitting the skeleton's pelvis, making the bones fly apart and rattle to the floor.

Xander felt himself pulled backwards, and he just about skewered Spike before he realized his vamps were doing their normal overprotective thing. Angel looked over, his eyes yellow with anger. "Keep the retreat open."

"Got it," Spike agreed. Angel followed Giles and Jenny up the stairs, and another teenager went screaming by them, her face literally missing and the screaming sound just floating out from her body. "Fuck," Spike breathed, and he pulled Xander a little tighter.

"Okay, not to be obvious man, but neither one of us can fight worth shit if you're playing snuggle bunny," Xander whispered. Spike gave him a narrow-eyed glare, but at least he let Xander go.

"Don't leave me! Don't leave me!" Willow's voice echoed through the hallways. Xander looked at Spike for a moment, panic making his mouth go dry.

"No," Spike said firmly. Ignoring that order, Xander turned and darted up the stairs. To be honest, he really thought that Spike was going to catch him in two seconds, but he heard a vicious curse and the crashing of boards behind him. Turning around, Xander found a hole in the stairs, the edges looking suspiciously like teeth.

"Spike?"

"Stay back!" Spike yelled from somewhere in the basement. "Get Angel."

Xander looked around for something he could use as a rope or a ladder, but there was a big old nothing around. They had chains in the trunk of the car, but Angel had the keys. "Um, getting Angel. Right. Hold on," Xander called down. Looking down, he could see a flame burst to life and then Spike's vampire features were highlighted in red as he lit a cigarette.

"I'm fine, pet. Don't get your knickers in a twist and keep your head about you." Spike clicked his lighter off, and all Xander could see was the end of his cigarette floating.

"No twisty knickers. Got it," Xander agreed. "I'll be right back." Xander backed away from the hole and looked up the rest of the stairs to the second floor. Rushing into the house seemed so not-stupid two seconds ago, and now Xander was seriously reconsidering that decision. But Willow had needed help. Pushing aside the fear, Xander moved more slowly up the stairs, his cinquedea held up in a defensive pose.

Willow's scream filled the house, and Xander ran toward the sound. Willow came running at him, her hands flying around her head as a million little fireflies tried to eat her face. "Willow!" Xander ran to meet her, but she went running right past him and right past the top of the stairs and she kept running until she reached the far end of the hallway. "Willow?" Xander called as he chased after her. "Willow, random running bad." Xander watched as she ran into a door and fell to the ground. "And random stopping worse." Luckily most of the weird lights had gone right on through the door and vanished.

"Xander?" she looked up at him with teary eyes. "Is it really you?"

"Um, demons, weirdness, potential death—where else would I be?" he asked with his best goofy smile. Tears slipped down her face, but he knew her well enough to know that they were tears of relief. He held his hand out for her, and she let him pull her up.

"My magic is not working all that well."

"Um, I noticed," Xander agreed as he watched a little spark fighting to escape a tangle of red hair. "What do you say we find the door out?" Xander turned around to lead her back to the stairs, only to find a blank wall behind him. "Okay, that was not there two seconds ago."

"The house doesn't want us to escape," Willow whispered.

Just then, as if to agree with Willow, the house rumbled, "Release me. Release me!"

"Creepy frat boy sound system?" Xander asked hopefully. Willow shook her head.

Xander was feeling the beginnings of a good old-fashioned panic when Spike came striding down a new hallway that had opened up at a ninety-degree angle to the old one. "Right then, leave her," he snapped. Walking past Xander, he caught Xander by his left wrist and yanked Xander away from Willow.

"But, but!" Xander spluttered.

"Xander! Don't let him take you away!" Willow wailed as she chased them down the hallway. But Spike was dragging him so fast that Xander couldn't do anything more than stumble behind him and try to not stick Spike in the ass with his cinquedea. Spike was in a bad enough mood already. Without a word, Spike kicked through a door, the wood splintering under the force.

Behind the door, someone screamed, and then Spike dragged Xander into a room crowded with college boys and girls.

"Spike!" a familiar voice called out. Xander looked up to see Riley and Angel, both with very confused expressions.

Spike didn't answer; he snarled and dropped into a crouch in front of Xander.

"Spike?" Angel growled the name and stepped in front of Riley, who was looking about as confused as Xander was feeling.

"Not clan!" Spike snarled and tilted his head up as though he was sniffing the air.

"Leave him!" Angel's face rippled into his vampiric ridges.

"I'll eat his entrails!" Spike let out a roar that seriously creeped Xander out. He looked to Angel for help, but even with his vampiric features, Angel looked confused. Riley looked just flat out dumbstruck.

"Bloody hell. No fucking way is that supposed to be me," Spike said from the other side of the room. Wait. What? Xander looked around in confusion, and sure enough, there were two Spikes. One was standing near Buffy at the far end of the room looking confused, and the other was right in front of Xander doing his impression of a mindless fledge.

"This is new and weirdly disturbing," Buffy offered.

"Buffy!" Riley smiled, clearly relieved. He started heading across the room, and that's when feral Spike charged, his roar making the people crowded around the perimeter of the room cringe and cry out.

Xander gasped when Angel stepped forward and staked Spike, the dust exploding all over a pentagram drawn on the floor.

"Oi! You staked me! That was bloody unnecessary!" the other Spike complained as he strode across the room.

"That wasn't you," Angel said. "You weren't that bad even as a fledge."

Spike just snorted, and Xander couldn't quite figure out if that was a 'damn right' on the part where he'd never been that out of control or a 'how dare you' on the part where Angel had staked a vampire that looked weirdly Spike-like. While Riley hurried to Buffy's side, Angel walked to Xander and gave him a look that made it perfectly clear that they would be having words later about Xander's inability to stay near the exit.

"Willow was screaming," Xander said in his own defense. "Willow!" Xander turned back to the door, but the door wasn't there. Only then the door was and Willow came barreling through. "Get them off me! Get them off!" She was waving her hands around her head, but the flock of firefly lights was already gone. Oz stood up, and hurried over to her. "Willow. It's okay. They're gone."

"What's gone?" Buffy asked.

Oz just shrugged.

"Exit, stage left," Xander suggested, but when he turned, the door Willow had just come through was gone. "Or not."

"The house separated us. It wanted to scare us," Oz offered quietly. Xander couldn't really disagree with that logic.

"But—we got away." Willow looked up at Oz with this big-eyed hopeful expression, and all Xander could think was thank god that wasn't him. No way would he want to live up to the pressure of being the guy who got that look. That was a look that made it perfectly clear that Willow expected Oz to be able to fix the world. Oz turned and Xander spotted the nametag with "GOD" in block letters. He couldn't help it, a snort of laughter escaped.

"Sorry. Inappropriate time for humor," Xander apologized.

Buffy was already shaking her head with amusement. "Only you, Xander. But we aren't away. We got rounded up here. Why?"

"I'm guessing the big honking pentagram has something to do with something," Xander suggested, pointing down to the floor with the end of his cinquedea.

"Good guess," Buffy agreed. "This is why we never go anywhere without weapons. And you thought I was being all paranoid girl." Buffy used her elbow to nudge Riley, but from the startled look on his face, she needed to watch the slayer strength on those elbows.

"I think it's from this," Angel held up a book, an old book. He flipped the pages open. The house shivered and grumbled "Release me!" even louder than before. "It's the Mark of Gachnar," Angel said after finding what he was looking for.

"Oh great, another summoning. Do we not have enough demons already that we have to go borrowing them from other people?" Buffy asked.

"Hey, some of us like our demons," Xander replied. "And that came out really, really wrong, didn't it?"

"Just slightly," Buffy agreed.

"But it was effective distraction from the terror," Oz offered. Xander smiled at the peace offering.

"Release me!" the house bellowed. The walls shook and shivered until dust rained down on them from the roof and the random teenagers along the walls screamed in terror.

Angel looked up from the book. "It's feeding on our fears in order to bring itself into the world."

"So, we close our eyes and clap and say we DON'T believe? Okay, I don't think this thing is going to fall for the Tinkerbell approach," Xander offered. "That Spike-thing was real. And strong."

"And good-looking," the real Spike offered from his spot against the wall.

"I say we start trying random doors before they vanish," Xander said turning toward the only remaining door in the room. Angel caught him by the wrist and pulled him back so hard and fast that Xander oomffed against Angel's chest, which was good because Giles came bursting through, chainsaw in hand, Jenny trailing closely behind.

After that, Xander and his vampy family retreated to a corner and watched as Giles and Jenny read the book, Buffy accidentally finished the summoning by destroying the symbol, and she then squished the itty-bitty demon that emerged.

The house shivered once and then went silent.

"Bit of a build up for nothing," Spike complained as they all wandered back out to the car. College kids were swarming out of the building now that the exits had reappeared and the monsters had turned back into plastic bits and bobs.

"Not if he'd had enough fear to grow," Angel pointed out. "Besides, the night isn't over. We're going to talk about someone's inability to follow orders." At first, Xander thought he was the only one in deep shit, but then Angel's look turned to include Spike.

"Oi, I tried to bloody stop him. Damn stairs collapsed under me, and I couldn't get out of the basement until the slayer showed up. What I want to know is who the fuck conjured the feral version of me in there."

Xander frowned. "Conjured?"

Spike leaned against the car and pulled out a cigarette. "That house wasn't pulling random bogeymen out of the closet. It made the slayer face a hundred vamps all comin' up out of the ground at once, so I figure one of you conjured that handsome devil."

Xander frowned as he thought about that for a second. "Willow did."

"Willow?" Spike looked at him like he'd lost his mind, but Xander nodded.

"She needed help, and when the not-Spike pulled me away, she was yelling for him to not take me away from her."

Spike rolled his eyes. "That bint has a possessive streak about as wide as any vampire I've ever met. That's one that I sincerely hope never gets turned. So, whose fear was I watching in there when that doppelganger went for the soldier boy's neck?" Spike made the answer all-too obvious as he glared at Angel. Xander turned to face Angel, waiting for the denial. Instead Angel had a look on his face like he'd just found a rotting Hot Pocket in the microwave after a weekend trip to L.A. just because Xander had forgotten to take it out. Not a good look.

"You think Spike's going to go all fledge-like on Riley?" Xander asked.

"It could have been Riley's fear," Angel said entirely too quickly. Xander wasn't sure how Angel had survived a couple of centuries because people who lied that badly usually got eaten alive and spit back out during high school. For an adult to be so pathetically bad at lying was just pathetic.

"Wanker doesn't know enough to be afraid," Spike disagreed. "So, we going to talk about this or just ignore it?"

"Why would he even be afraid of that?" Xander asked Spike. When Angel got that pinched expression, he was never good at sharing information. However, Spike was perfectly willing to share all the gory details, even when Xander didn't want them.

"Vampire politics, pet. When two clans come into conflict, the two enforcers usually clash. The masters only get involved if it’s a full-out war."

"Okay, I'm still missing the meaningful part in the middle with all the meaning because that is not making sense."

"Riley could get lucky," Angel said, his voice clipped. He also turned his back and immediately went for the car. Xander scrambled to get in before Angel could leave them to walk.

"Wanker," Spike complained as he barely got in the car before Angel pulled away from the curb. "Do you really think I'd ever be threatened enough to want to seriously challenge that soldier-boy? I didn't snap Graham's neck." Spike leaned back and gave Angel a very smug look.

"And Buffy?" Angel asked.

"What about her?"

"She's growing up. She's becoming powerful. How long will it be before you feel a need to test your strength against her?" Angel was staring straight ahead, but Spike looked around, clearly confused.

"Spike?" Xander asked softly.

"Oi, not looking to fight the slayer. Mind you, I wouldn't mind taking her on if she started something, but I'm not looking to send my unlife tits over arse. Not again. Just look at the trouble you two got into last time I left you lot alone."

Angel flinched, but then Angel usually flinched when someone brought up anything Angelus-related. "Clans don't normally live this close, I'll give ya that. Are you feeling a need to challenge the slayer?" Spike asked as he studied Angel's profile, and now Xander was seriously freaked out. Buffy and Angel fighting was just a big old no.

"Of course not," Angel snapped.

"Right then, so we share territory with the soldier boys. Maybe we'll get lucky and something really big and nasty will come creepin' out of the Hellmouth and we'll have a chance to play before the soldier boys and their toys come barging in. Whoever summoned Gachnar might still be out there." Spike sounded so damn hopeful. "Maybe I should start comin' to more of these parties. If they're going to move up to demon summoning, I might be able to find a good fight. Actually," Spike looked over his shoulder at Xander, "with the demon summoning, I'm bloody surprised they didn't invite you over. You always seem to end up in the middle of all things demonic, luv."

"Okay, being a townie is one thing," Xander said with a snort, "but being the sort of loser townie who clings all over the college-bound and crashes their parties? That's a little too pathetic, even for me. Nope, I will sit back in my vocational tech classes and wait for their college-bound toilets to break and their college-bound electricity to fail and their college-bound cars to leave their pathetic little asses by the side of the road, and then I will force them to worship me as the fixer of all things broken. Behold the mighty power of the townie!" Xander held his arms up like a boxer winning the final round, and Spike laughed.

"You tell 'em, mate. It's not like you can fix the telly with poetry."

Xander frowned at that particular example, but then Spike winked at him. Yep, so not unintentional irony. Xander stared off into the dark for long minutes. They were passing a graveyard, but he could only see row after row of tombstones. Other than Buffy's demonic roommate, there hadn't been any serious threat at all. Spike had taken to patrolling the waterfront for human nasties and disappearing for days at a time just to avoid the sheer boredom. And Xander's voc-ed school wasn't the best what with all the money going to the university.

"Um, guys," Xander asked as Angel finally pulled up in front of the apartment complex.

"Yes?" Angel turned to look at him.

"Why are we still here?"

For a second, the two vamps exchanged curious expressions.

"Why are we still in Sunnydale?" Xander repeated as he waved his hands toward the generally quiet little town around them. "Face it, Giles could have done the rescuing tonight, because there's not exactly a big bad around. Angel's afraid that Spike is going to eat someone, Spike is bored, and I'm stuck in a town that's so small that the world is divided into townies and stuck-up college kids. Why? I always swore that when I grew up, I'd see the world—I'd move on, and this is not feeling moving-onish."

Xander looked first at Spike and then Angel. Slowly, Spike's expression turned into a smirk. Angel just had that face that kinda defined gobsmacked.

"You want to leave?" Angel asked. "You want to leave Buffy and Willow?"

Xander looked around at the quiet street, the short, fat apartment building, the distant street light with its sickly yellow glow. "I guess I'm wondering why we're staying. Angel, I love Buffy and Willow, but I'm not part of their life. I don't know. I just feel like—" Xander wrinkled his nose. He didn't know what he felt like, but he didn't feel like he belonged here.

"Our boy's done gone and grown up. We did a fine job with him, didn't we Ma?" Spike asked in a joking tone as he slapped Angel on the shoulder. Angel glared at him. "Oi, trust me, you were the mother figure around here," Spike said, but he also vaulted out of the car before Angel could hit him.

"Right then, I say we pull up stakes and axes and head for L.A." Spike pulled out a cigarette and took some time to light it.

"Why L.A.? I mean, they have a really good construction school there, but those are slightly dime-a-dozenish."

"Yeah, but I'm bloody tired of driving three hours every time Cordelia wants someone to look handsome on her arm," Spike said, and then he turned fast enough to make his coat billow before he headed into the apartments. For a second, Xander could only stare at the door as it slowly drifted closed.

"Did he just suggest he's dating Cordelia?" Xander asked weakly.

Angel got out the car and just shook his head fondly as he headed into the building.

"Seriously? Okay, I'm ... I'm so very glad they can't have kids. That would be terrifying."

"I think that's why they like each other," Angel pointed out when he reached the door. He pulled it open and waited. "If it upsets you—"

"No, no, it just creeps me out a little," Xander said as he went through the door first. Angel's hand landed on his back, but after tonight's incident, Xander expected extra touchy-feely Angel for a little bit. So, L.A. with Lorne and Cordelia and construction school. Xander felt a twinge of regret at the idea that he would be leaving Willow and Buffy and his mom and her new apartment with the tiny refrigerator and her new love of making him cookies when he came to visit. But he could still visit. Growing up meant moving on, and even with all the little threads tying him to this place, it was time to move on. Sunnydale didn't fit him, and it didn't fit his family, not any more.

Chapter Six
"Ladies, gents, and demons of every kind, this is choice number three and a personal favorite of mine!" Lorne practically sang the words as he pushed through the double doors to the Spanish colonial building.

It had some nice details like stucco walls—although big chunks of plaster were falling off—a front courtyard, a terra cotta tile roof, ornamental fenestration, and decorative iron trim. Xander was so busy focusing on the bones of the old lady that he didn't notice that Angel had stopped in front of him. Okay, so he kinda noticed after hitting Angel's back. He had to grab Angel by the waist just to keep from falling on his butt.

"You've got the position backwards, pet," Spike offered with a laugh and an eyebrow wiggle as he looked from Angel to Xander. Xander yanked his hands away from Angel's ass and glared at Spike. Yep, Spike had officially gone on high alert for inappropriateness lately, and Xander could only guess that dating Cordelia was as frustrating for Spike as it had been for him. However, from the fact that Spike and Angel were still disappearing and reappearing with torn clothes and stupid smiles, Xander so thought that Spike would be less frustrated.

Blair made a sound that might have been a laugh strangled in the middle. "Man, I have never known two people who ran into each other as much as you two. Seriously Freudian. Seriously." Blair detoured around Xander, his hands held up in an expression of exaggerated surprise, before he followed Lorne into the building.

"We aren't buying this place," Angel said, his voice tight with emotion, and Xander frowned. That was sounding like Angel's 'don't fuck with me' voice, and yeah, home hunting was big on the annoyingness scale when you needed a home for a whole clan of people with sexually inappropriate habits, but he hadn't thought Angel was that out of patience yet.

Spike stopped looking around the weed-covered courtyard and looked over at Angel. "Peaches?"

"Problem?" Faith asked. She moved closer, her hand moving toward her jacket where she had more serious weaponry than Xander had seen hidden inside a coat since the last Highlander marathon. By giving up the hooker look, she'd picked up lots of new places to hide really sharp swords and knives and brass knuckles.

"No problem." Angel may have said no problem, but he was using his big-freaking-problem voice, which was not inspiring the confidence. "We should look at the next place."

"I'll get Blair." Faith darted around Xander to get into the hotel, and Xander recognized the sheer panic on Angel's face about a second too late to make a grab at her. And with Xander between them, Angel grabbed at her only to get tangled up in Xander. Xander clung to Angel's arm just to avoid falling, and getting knocked around was starting to become not only a theme but an annoying theme.

"Get her!" Angel said, his hands reaching out to steady Xander. Without a word, Spike darted past them and slammed through the double doors hard enough to send them slamming back into the wall. The thunderous crack suggested he'd done more than just cosmetic damage.

Xander opened his mouth to ask just what the hell had Angel wound tighter than a coil, but Angel was already running for the hotel, dragging Xander behind. Oh yeah, the big stupid vamp was not in a rational, sharing sort of mood.

"Now Sweetcheeks, I am not suggesting that you actually run a hotel," Lorne immediately started when they got into the lobby of the old building. Stone arcades led away into the deeper areas and an art-deco vibe met rococo details in a way that bordered on truly and disastrously tacky, but still managed to look kinda cool.

"Get her out," Angel snarled, and now he was using his big-freaking-problem voice and had a yellow-eyed glare going. Xander opened his mouth to demand some sort of explanation, but a rough chuckle suddenly filled the room, circling around them like a cold wind. Xander gasped as he was pushed back behind Angel so fast that his arm ached where Angel had grabbed him. Then he spotted the wavering air drifting down the wide staircase looking like a big blob of water hovering above the stairs.

"What the fuck?" Faith yanked her arm out of Spike's grip and took a defensive stance with her big freaking huge sword already out. Xander reached for his own cinquedea.

"The realtor left this bit out of the advertising." Lorne was already backing up, his green hand pulling Blair with him.

"Whoa. Okay, I'm voting for running away," Blair whispered.

"I second the running and raise some girly screaming," Xander agreed.

"Too late," Angel said grimly, but he wasn't looking at the waterish blob that was closing in—he was looking at Faith. One glance in that direction, and Xander did a double take. Faith had reversed her position and was holding her sword out to ward off Spike.

"What the fuck are you doing?" Spike demanded, but Xander noticed that he was keeping himself away from Faith's sword.

"You're talking about me with her, aren't you?" Faith demanded. Spike looked over at Angel, and from the look, Spike had no idea what was going on. Faith's voice grew dangerously soft. "You found another bed warmer, and that's all I ever was, wasn't I? Does Cordelia keep your prick all warm now?" She leered unpleasantly.

"Bloody hell, what the fuck crawled up your arse and died?" Spike demanded.

"I should have fucking known." Faith's face twisted into something ugly. "That whole story about wanting me to help pick the place, about wanting me to be a part of the clan again, that's all another fucking lie. What, did someone want a quick fuck? Does someone want to play Daddy and spank the bad, bad slayer?"

Blair took a single step forward. "Faith? Whoa there. You are seriously freaking me out."

"And you have to be fucking gay," she said as she poked a finger in Blair's direction. "Or maybe I'm just too old for you. Maybe you like 'em when they're so little that you can suffocate them with the stink of alcohol when you lay on them. Maybe you like to hear a little girl cry. Is that your game? Is that why you don't want to fuck me now that I'm strong enough to defend myself?" Faith stalked toward Blair, the sword up. Blair almost tripped over his feet as he backed up, and Angel reached out and grabbed Blair, pushing him back toward Xander.

"Hey, I have an idea. Maybe we could put the man-skewering sword away," Xander said hopefully.

Instead of putting it away, Faith swung it in Xander's direction. "It's your fault. It's your fault I lost my family."

Faith's face was twisted with pain, an expression that drove the air out of Xander as fast as a fist in the stomach. Yep, he was officially going to hell. He knew Faith was big with the sex issues, and yeah, he only knew about the whole sex and father issues after he slept with her, but he was still so hell bound. He'd slept with a rape victim. He'd slept with a rape victim who'd only wanted a little reassuring, and sex and rape victims were not big with the healthy mixing, at least not without a little therapy. A little voice whispered warnings in the back of his head. No way would Faith ever forgive him for that. Because of him, she had lost the only safe haven she'd ever had. He couldn't even blame her if she wanted to go killing him, but the feeling that she was going to kill him? That was definitely getting way stronger.

"You're trying to kill me. I know you are. I know I'd kill to not lose our family, and you are way less with the mentally stable than I am," Xander accused her.

"Oh man. Right now, no one is getting a passing grade on the mental health portion of this outing," Blair said as he backed away.

"Faith, Xander," Angel started, his voice low and quiet, "you can't listen to the whispers. They aren't real. You are both family, and you always will be." Angel reached for Xander, but he darted backwards. If Faith was going to try and kill him, no way did Xander want to be too near Angel. Angel was a vampire, and vampires had this whole thing going where they respected the strong. And no way was Xander ranking high in the strength category, not unless he was getting compared to Buffy's idiot soldier boys. Nope, Xander was the weak link, and in vampire families, the weak link got eaten. "You are not eating me!" Xander said as he pointed from Angel to Spike.

"Don't even play that game." Faith sounded furious and oddly unemotional at the same time, which was a pretty damn good trick. "He's always going to side with you. You both just want to find a way to get rid of me. Spike was the only one who had any use for me, and now he can just stick his cock in Cordelia, can't he?"

"Fucking hell. Someone better tell me what the bloody fuck is going on or I'm going to set this whole place on fire!" Spike exploded. Xander watched Spike's anger with a cold fear in his guts. Spike was dangerous. He didn't even understand Spike half the time, and why did he live with someone who he didn't understand when that person considered humans one of the five essential food groups along with Weetabix and onion rings?

"It's a Thesulac demon," Angel said softly. "Faith, the voice you hear, the whispers, they're lying to you."

"No way, man." Blair started backing away, shaking his head slowly. "You're just trying to pull us all in. You hold out this clan like there's some chance for us to fit in, but no way. You're going to yank all of it away. Totally unfair. And then we'll be alone... again." Blair sucked in a breath. "The minute we're out of the room you're talking about how we don't fit in. This is your idea of a mind game, isn't it? Angelus was always one for playing mind games."

Faith was already shaking her head. "No. It's more than just a mind game. I fucked up too damn much. You know, I think I know how to fuck up less now, but I fucked up too much with you. I fucked Xander, and you won't ever forgive me for that. He won't forgive me. Fuck. You shouldn't forgive me." Faith raised her sword. Xander blinked as his brain tried to figure out that statement. In his universe, Faith didn't feel guilt for much, and she didn't ever feel guilt for the whole sex in the graveyard incident. If he brought it up, she either complimented him on his driving around curves or just ignored him, and both reactions made him a little twitchy.

Xander could feel his hands tremble, the cinquedea shook, the weight of it fighting him, but anger rose up and crashed through him like a wave, and he brought his weapon up. Yeah, Faith might talk about the whole sex thing had been her fault, but Xander knew the truth. So if she was lying it was because she was about to take a shot at killing him, and she wanted to get Angel on her side first. Xander focused on Faith, his anger making him want to charge into a fight with her even though he knew he was so getting his ass kicked.

The bit of air that had turned to a waterish blob thickened until a vague human outline appeared. "I don't remember ordering take-out, but I like what you brung me," an amused voice offered. "Absolutely delectable. The paranoia is all there, right under the surface and I just have to scratch off a thin layer of common sense." The form shimmered and then a demon with a pale, diseased face and black cloak appeared at the bottom of the stairs.

"You fucking wanker. This is your doing, innit?"

"Guilty as charged. This place has always provided such pleasant feasts. So, who is going to feed me their fears first?"

Spike stretched his neck one way and then the other, a prelude to a fight that Xander had seen a hundred times. "You want a fight, mate? First come, first killed." Spike's vampiric features rippled as they came to the front, and he became the beast who wasn't human. Xander watched the inhuman movements, the gleeful anticipation of violence, the yellow glare. This was a predator and Xander was definitely more preylike than predatorlike.

"Everyone listen to me." Angel looked around, and Xander watched him suspiciously. "This demon is feeding you your own fears. We are all clan here... we are family. You have to focus on that." Xander frowned, Angel's words making no sense because he knew he and Faith wanted to kill each other. He wasn't sure why, but he knew they did. He raised his cinquedea.

Angel turned toward the demon and pulled his own sword. "You had your last meal here a long time ago. You should have gotten out when you had the chance." Angel circled around to one side while Spike stalked in perfect counterpoint. Xander shook his head, struggling to clear his thoughts. This was familiar. Angel and Spike moved together by moving apart, forcing the target to split his attention. Only the demon wasn't splitting his attention, he was looking at Faith.

"Got out? Now, why would I wanna do that? When the room service in this hotel is still excellent. Paranoia is like fine wine. Only now, you've brought me a whole new vintage, something hearty with the," he sniffed the air deeply, "aroma of anger and insecurity and paranoia. Oh, this one is special."

Faith was frozen, her sword pointed toward the ground, and she didn't even react to the tentacle snaking out toward her.

"Faith, duck!" Xander yelled. When she didn't react, he leaped forward and brought his cinquedea down on the tentacle, hacking the tip of it off. The demon roared and Angel and Spike attacked at the same time.

"Sweetcheeks, I would suggest you come away from there," Lorne suggested from the doorway. Yep, he was ready to run, but he wasn't running yet. Considering the guy was basically a bartender and lounge singer, Xander didn't exactly expect him to stick around and fight the good fight.

"I'm not leaving Faith," Xander yelled. The room was full of sound without meaning, a roar like the wind only without wind. Faith's sword was now pointing at the ground, and she was almost trembling, so Xander could only hope she wasn't going to stab him through the back.

"Neither of us are," Blair said as he appeared at Faith's side. "Faith, can you hear me?"

Xander set himself in front of Blair and Faith and defended from tentacles that kept snaking toward Faith as Spike and Angel attacked in a flurry of swords and fangs. Spike darted in, using his bare hands to rip part of the demon's cloak and one of his tentacles off, but the demon reached out with a second tentacle, wrapping it around Spike's neck. Raising Spike up, he shook until Spike's hands dropped to his sides. Then the demon slammed Spike's head into the floor several times, each one making a dull thudding noise. With bare hands, Spike ripped at the tentacle until his hands were red and the tentacle was frayed.

On the other side, Angel used his sword to sever a couple of tentacles which writhed on the floor behind him. A third tentacle snapped at him like a whip, and Angel rolled, coming to his feet so near a cluster of tentacles that Xander shouted. Angel drove his sword down through two of the tentacles, pinning them to the floor beneath. A stray tentacle whipped out toward Xander, and he took a swing at it. He missed and sunk his sword deep into the wood. Unfortunately, that meant he was stuck trying to retrieve it.

Blair yelled, and Xander glanced over his shoulder to see Blair getting dragged toward the demon. Oh yeah, they were getting their asses kicked. For a second, Faith stood there, her face still twisted by fear and confusion.

"Blair, hold on," Xander yelled. That made Faith blink, her head tilting to the side as she slowly swung her gaze over toward Blair. Xander was still fighting with his weapon, but Blair was holding his own. He'd grabbed the edge of the built-in circle-couch-sitting thingy, and he was kicking the tentacle with his free leg.

"Blair?" Faith sounded dazed.

"A little help would be good!" Blair kicked at the tentacle and then shouted as a second tentacle grabbed his free leg.

Xander pulled harder at the stuck sword. "I'm coming! I'm coming!"

When Faith exploded into movement, Xander instinctively huddled down, still half-expecting her to attack him, but she leaped over him and sliced the two tentacles that had captured Blair's feet. Spike had fought his way free of the tentacle that had been strangling him, and he darted to Faith's side.

"Right then, you got your head on straight or are you still doin' your best impression of Dru?"

"Don't fucking start with me," Faith warned. Spike smiled widely and danced to the side before darting in and punching at the demon's main body.

"We got our girl back!" Spike called out.

"Watch the flank!" Angel growled before throwing a knife at the demon's head. The thing hit and then just stayed stuck there without slowing the demon down much.

"I am watching it, wanker!" Spike leapt over a number of tentacles, and just how many tentacles did this thing have?

The demon turned his face toward Faith. "You are my creature. I can taste your despair like fine chocolate."

"Fuck you," Faith said grimly. She leaped up into the air so fast that she could have been a vampire. Bringing her sword down, she hit him straight on the top of the head, her sword passing through bone with a deafening crack. Her sword kept moving until it hit the collarbone, and blood sprayed out. The Thesulac screamed and then in a blinding white pop of light, it was just gone.

Xander's sword finally came out of the floor with a screech of metal against wood.

Spike backed away, stretching and bouncing on his toes. "Don't rightly remember house hunting being all this fun before."

"Shut up, Spike," Angel replied. Walking over, he pulled his own sword out of the floor, and Xander flinched at the fingernails-down-a-chalkboard sound that made. Angel looked over at Blair. "You aren't part of the clan? I'm just playing a mind game with you to make you think you're part of the clan?"

Blair snorted. "Oh man, old history. I could have told you I had abandonment issues. But that... whoa. There is never a dull moment with you people, is there?" Blair sounded okay, but he was half lying on the couch thingy, and he didn't look ready to get up any time soon.

Angel walked over and offered Faith a hand. She had fallen to one knee when the demon went 'poof' and now she looked up at him for several silent seconds before putting her hand in his and allowing him to help her.

"I was going to..." Faith stopped.

Angel got his guilt look going. "I know. I was here a long time ago. The demon feeds people their worst emotions, and even now I could feel the pull."

Spike snorted, and Xander realized that he understood exactly what Spike wasn't saying. Why had he ever thought Spike was too dangerous for him to be around?

"Yeah, yeah, but some of us don't always have our evil side going," Xander told Spike. "If your big, bad evil side comes out to play, you're pretty much still Spike. Now me? I was all prepared to do battle with Faith, not that battling Faith makes any sense because I was feeling guilty about the whole sex thing even while I plotted murder, and that is making sense of the not-even kind."

"You were feeling guilty?" Faith looked at him like he had just grown another head.

"Hey, I have a right to some guilt here," Xander defended himself. And Faith was still looking at him like he was growing more and more heads with every passing minute. "I knew you were all with the issues, and I still slept with you. I didn't even ask you why you wanted to sleep together or take two seconds to figure out your recent weirdness probably had something to do with it. I get to carry a little guilt for that," Xander pointed out. He really hated saying things like that out loud, but his therapist had been right about one thing: the more he said it, the less it hurt when he thought about it.

"So, you think I'm broken?" Faith had gone from confused to angry in less than a second, but at least this time she didn't have her homicidal face going.

Xander might have defended himself, but Blair interrupted by making one of his weird little noises. "With your definition of broken, we're all fitting in that category," he told her.

"Oi!" Spike objected.

"Do not make me repeat some of the stories Uncle Saul has told me." Blair held up a finger in Spike's general direction, and Xander was amazed at how fast that shut the vamp up. Oh yeah, Blair had some good stories in there somewhere. "Anyway," Blair said, exaggerating an eyeroll as he turned his attention back to Faith, "I have major abandonment issues. I love Naomi, but she was a little on the flaky side, and the whole part-demon ancestry did a real number on me. My own grandfather, Naomi's dad, tried to kill me when I was just out of diapers because he was convinced I was some spawn of Satan come to bring the end of the world. Seriously, that will give you issues. So, Naomi took me on the road, and we are not talking about an exactly stable environment. And you should have seen Xander when I first met him. Angel actually convinced his parents to sell him to a vampire, and he was so not dealing. Totally not dealing." Blair gave a shudder. "I first met Angel during his rat-eating period, and after seeing both you and Angel at your worst, Angel wins on that front."

"Hey! I wasn't that bad," Xander defended himself weakly before dropping on the couch next to Blair. Yeah, he'd been pretty screwy in the head after that.

"And I knew this demon was here, at least I knew sixty years ago that I left him to prey on all the humans in this building." Angel looked up at the stairs that led to the guest rooms. "He preyed on my fear that I wasn't one of them. He turned them against me, and then he convinced me to walk away and let all these people die. I had finally started sleeping in a bed and exchanging a few words with humans as I passed them in the hall, and after I stayed at this place...." Angel closed his eyes.

"You ended up back in alleys eating rats," Xander guessed. Pushing himself up, he closed the distance between them and leaned into Angel. Angel nodded as he moved his arm to catch Xander in a one-armed hug.

"I did."

"Right then, so you lot are all fucked up. Now that we have that sorted, what I want to know is why this thing is still hanging around an empty hotel." Spike's words made them all look at each other in confusion.

"She wouldn't be," Angel said softly, and from the tone, whoever the 'she' was, he was thinking she definitely was, whatever the 'was' was. Without an explanation, Angel bounded up the stairs, and Xander ran after him. From the thundering on the stairs behind him, they had the whole company following. "Her one fear was of being trapped, of being sent to jail and being locked in somewhere. She couldn't still be here." Angel pushed open a door, and an old woman turned to look at him.

"Judy." Angel breathed the word.

"I don't hear them anymore. - Are they gone?" The woman's eyes looked around, and Xander knew right away that her train didn't pull all the way into the station anymore. She had that vague spaced out look that Grandmother Lavelle had a few weeks before she'd just dropped dead.

Angel carefully moved to right in front of her. "Yes, they're all gone," he promised.

The old woman must have finally seen Angel because she smiled. "It's you."

"Yeah, Judy. It's me."

"You look the same."

"I'm not the same. I shouldn't have left you here. I'm so sorry." When the old woman reached for Angel's face, he caught her hand and held it.

"They killed you - because of me. I killed you." A tear slipped out. Xander had no idea who this woman was and what she had done, but he could feel her pain and guilt like a living creature in the room. Nothing a person did ever deserved this kind of punishment.

"No. You were afraid, and you turned them against me, but they made their choices. They chose to try and kill me, and I chose to leave you here alone when I knew how afraid you were. This was all the demon's fault." Angel released her hand, and she raised it up and cupped his cheek. Xander felt a stab of something cold as he watched Angel's face soften as he looked at her. Okay, he was guessing former lover. Former screwed over lover who had done her best to screw Angel, but in real life, that was the way most love stories went.

"He kept them from the door. He told me I'd be safe. Am I safe?" She looked around as though expecting someone to attack her. Then again, considering how many of them were armed, that wasn't all that weird. Xander quietly slipped his cinquedea back into its sheath and he noticed Faith did the same with her sword.

"You're safe. No one has been looking for you for a very long time." Angel turned to face them. "She stole money after she was fired for having a black grandparent. Back then, a black person passing for white was scandalous. She came here looking for a place to hide, and this became her prison."

Spike pulled out a cigarette. "Fair enough, but why the fuck do we care?"

Xander hit Spike in the stomach at the same time that Faith backhanded him across the arm. "Wot?" Spike demanded in a tone of voice that suggested he was the injured party.

"Man, you so have issues. I'm not stupid enough or strong enough to hit you for them, but you so have issues," Blair muttered softly. He moved to Angel's side. "Did you say your name is Judy?" Blair asked softly.

The old woman nodded. "Can I go outside now?"

"How long has she been in here?" Xander whispered soft enough that, hopefully, she wouldn't hear. Angel and Blair were carefully helping her stand.

"Looks like the late forties or early fifties," Spike said as he looked around the room. He totally had his normal tone of voice going. Yep, you could count on Spike to have lots and lots of sympathy for any family members who were neck deep in shit. Xander was starting to think Cordelia might even be one of the neck-deep people who Spike was going out of his way to care for, but you just could not ask him to care about random humans.

"Can I feel the sun? I haven't felt the sun in so long."

"It's night, so you'll have a wait a little while for the sun," Blair soothed her. "Angel, I think we should contact social services. She's going to need care."

"I..."

"Forget it. You have enough taking care of your humans," Blair cut him off, but he kept his voice that same soft sing-songy tone that Xander normally associated with his kindergarten teacher who used to read them stories in that voice. Angel and Blair slipped out of the room, supporting the old woman between them.

"We're never going to find a place at this rate," Spike complained, and then he followed. Of course, knowing Spike he was just looking for someplace he could smoke without Angel yelling at him about human lungs and cancer.

"Xander." Faith stopped him with a word as Xander turned to follow Spike out the door. "Thank you."

"Hey, I was 'getting his sword stuck in the wood' boy, so go thank Spike and Angel. They were the ones actually making a difference," Xander answered with a shrug. For a second, Faith just looked at him, emotions flickering on her face so fast that Xander couldn't really identify them before they were gone.

"No, it's not that." She took a deep breath. "I really wanted to kill you down there."

"Hey, I was just as big with the wanting, although I'm guessing that if it came down to it, I would not have been doing much of the actual killing. I would have been more with the dying."

Faith broke eye contact, and Xander choked off a desire to babble, to fill this awkward moment with words—with any words—just to avoid the sudden seriousness that had invaded the room. Or maybe the seriousness had stayed when Blair and Angel had helped the old woman out. Xander was pondering the odds of a serious demon hanging around when Faith finally cleared her throat.

"You put your back to me."

"I did?" Xander looked up at her.

"When the demon attacked, you knew I wanted to hurt you, and you still put your back to me. Your first thought was to defend me, and I think that's what gave me the ability to see through the demon's lies. Your only thought was to defend me, so I knew he was lying."

"Well, um..." Xander cringed, "my first thought was to kill you. My second thought was to defend you because even if I thought you were going to kill me, you were still family."

"I was going to kill you." Faith's voice rasped with guilt. She actually had to clear her throat.

"I got that," Xander agreed. "You'd be surprised at how many people have tried to kill me. Actually, you'd be surprised at how many people I like have tried to kill me. Did I ever tell you how Angel and I really started getting to know each other? Let me tell you, he totally wanted to kill me." Xander smiled at her. Slowly, she smiled back. Something hard and jagged that had been lying between them all this time without Xander ever noticing melted.

"Angel wanted to kill you? No way. You have that boy wrapped around your finger," she said. She shoulder-bumped him, a gesture she hadn't used with him since before the whole disaster. Actually, she hadn't touched him at all since that weird night when she'd decided that throwing him down and having sex was a good way to deal with her issues.

"Oh yeah," Xander agreed. He bumped her shoulder back before heading for the door. "Angel was all Buffy-whipped back then. Anyway, I was coming home from the store and I got jumped by these vamps..."

Xander told her the story as they headed down the stairs. Judy was wandering around the lobby, touching objects as if she had never seen any of them before. Apparently the telephone was a wondrous thing. Blair was hovering at her side. Lorne was busy describing how perfect the basement was and trying to convince Angel that he didn't need to run a hotel, but if he just let some of Lorne's clients stay inside his clan lair for a night or two, they would bring a nice tribute to show their appreciation. Spike was standing by the door smoking and just looking disgusted that his beautiful fight had degenerated into this. Yep, this was his family. It was definitely time for the move to LA, and Xander suspected that Lorne was wasting his breath. From the way Angel was looking around, he was already planning on where he wanted the furniture.

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