"Family - Out of the Multitude"

Author: Vatrixsta Cruden
Contact: trixieangelsomething@hotmail.com
Disclaimer: Sheryl Crowe rocks our world with 'Riverwide,' a song that was simply too perfect for the feel I was trying to get off this chapter.
Dedication: To the insanely fabulous babes I owe beta to *g* I swear, I'm doing it tomorrow. Also, to everyone who has been going through withdrawals while real life has been so thoroughly kicking my ass. Thanks for writing/asking/whining/threatening/demanding/begging for more *g*
Notes: I've taken liberty with the time-frame in which Wes and Virginia broke up. They did not break up in Epiphany, but rather, ended their relationship shortly before Vamp Buffy hit L.A. Sorry for any confusion *g*
Thanks: To my fantastically wonderful awesome < insert more superfluous adjectives > betas. I’m sorry I never answer your mails promptly. *g*

I spent a year in the mouth of a whale
With a flame and a book of signs

There was nothing quite like the smell of worn, shitkicker boots.

Bundled into a pile in the corner of Lindsey McDonald's expansive office were a thousand-dollar suit, and a pair of fine Italian loafers. He'd always kept an extra change of clothes in the bottom drawer of his desk. It was cleansing, the act of pulling on his wifebeater, flannel shirt, faded blue jeans and cowboy boots. The shedding of one skin, to find the man he'd once been waiting for him beneath the pretense and greed and fear.

It was freeing, coming back to himself in this room where he'd bargained away his soul. Briefly, he recalled Angel kicking him in the gut while he sincerely apologized for not trying harder to save Lindsey. Had he been salvageable then, when he'd helped Angel betray Wolfram and Hart so long ago? Or had he needed Darla, all the baggage that she brought, to send him falling all the way down before he was able to break free?

If Lindsey were the kind of man who believed in 'what ifs?', he might have taken a moment to ponder how different the last year might have gone if only he'd told Holland to shove it that night that seemed like a century ago.

All his copying was done. Should Wolfram and Hart -- or anyone else, for that matter -- decide to end Lindsey's life, copies of both his and Lilah's files would be automatically emailed to every major newspaper in the world. He'd sent an inner-office memo to his superiors stating just that. Word was out, and the ball was in their court. If they let him walk out of here tonight, that meant he was free. If they didn't ...

There was still Buffy and her band of merry men to contend with.

Lindsey didn't have the strength to talk fast enough to save his own hide at the moment, so he snatched up the bottle of cheap whiskey he kept with his clothes in his bottom desk drawer, threw himself into his chair, propped his boot-clad feet up on his desk, and took a long, satisfying swig.

Perhaps today would prove to be a good day to die.

You'll never know how hard I've failed
Trying to make up for lost time

"I don't even know why you came," she hissed for the third time in twenty minutes.

"I'm beginning to bloody wonder myself," Spike muttered.

"You're just going to get in my way," Faith declared as they approached the offices of Wolfram and Hart. "Only reason Buffy didn't tag along is those freakin' vampire detecting shamans crawling all over the place."

"Yeah, and you go in there all alone, they kill you, and we still don't have any intel."

"Intel?" Faith mocked.

"Shut up," Spike snapped, angry with himself. He'd spent too much time with the Slayer's cardboard cutout boyfriend before the idiot had taken off.

"Heard another fine young man dumped Buffy on her ass. Looks like she really wouldn't sleep with you, even if you WERE the last man on earth."

"You're about two seconds from something very unpleasant."

"Watch it, Billy Idol. I've dusted newly turned vamps a hell of a lot more frightening than you, and they didn't annoy me half as much."

"Yeah, well, I'm guessing those fresh risers hadn't taken out two Slayers in their day."

"You insinuate you can kill me one more time, I might just have to get physical with you."

"You don't shut your trap, I might just have to make it three."

"Guess what?"

"What?"

"I got a new plan."

That said, Faith snatched Spike by the lapels of his black leather coat, and hurled him through the glass lobby doors of Wolfram and Hart.

Once I believed in things unseen
I was blinded by the dark
Out of the multitude to me
He came and broke my heart

The silver lining of this whole 'now I'm a vampire' thing, Buffy thought, was that she finally understood why Angel brooded so much.

The air in their bedroom had grown too oppressive to breathe. Normally that wouldn't bother her, not having to breathe herself, but for some reason, the desire to flee, to roam the streets, to be truly alone with her thoughts had been irresistible.

Buffy had grabbed one of Angel's shirts from the hamper -- he'd only worn it for a few hours, so it held his cool, musky scent, rather than his stronger, stinkier sweaty scent. Not that she minded the latter -- in fact, some of her favorite memories involved Angel and sweat and she was supposed to be organizing her thoughts, not indulging in unproductive daydreams.

With a sigh, Buffy began kicking a tin can in front of her.

It hadn't been the air or the temperature of the room that had driven her out. She hadn't felt a burning desire to get her thoughts straight, either. The simple truth was, Angel's presence was stamped on every surface. Even the bed she slept on evoked images she was as grateful for as she was driven mad by. There was too much of him in their room, yet when she'd sought to escape it, she'd donned one of his shirts, because she couldn't bear to have nothing of him at all.

For the last couple of years, she'd had what felt like nothing of him at all. Reading his journal, she'd come to realize nothing could be further from the truth. He had always been hers, body and soul, even if some cruel twist of fate forbade her to claim him. It was comforting, even now, knowing that they had always -- would always -- belong to each other. Separation didn't sever their bond; the loss of a soul couldn't break them. No matter whose soul, or how many times it went away. Death -- even final death -- wouldn't stand a chance. That knowledge helped some of the fear abate. It allowed Buffy to focus.

She would never lose him. He could die, turn to dust and blow away, and she would still feel him in a phantom heartbeat she no longer possessed.

Because she knew that so surely, it became all that much easier to be sure she would get him back. To know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that this was not the end for them. It would be so easy to let this be a final blow. Simple, to let the evil, demon side of Angel win. No one would blame her. They'd just say she couldn't fight for her love all over again.

But she would fight. She'd fight for their future, and in memory of their past. She'd fight because she needed him, and because he'd fought for her. She'd fight so that the smug bastard Angel had been turned into wouldn't win, and she'd fight because if she didn't, she'd probably curl up and die.

She'd fight because she wanted answers about a day she didn't remember in his diary.

Forcing a sigh out of her dead lungs, Buffy abruptly sat down heavily on the nearest convenient resting spot -- as it turned out, a bus stop. There were so many other thoughts that deserved to take precedence over her relationship with Angel. An entire day had gone by, and Buffy hadn't thought of Tara, or Anya, or Dawnie (her brain shied away from 'mom' -- even now, her conscious mind shied away from the fact that she'd murdered her own mother -- that way lay madness) once. Now, as her mind became convinced they would find a way to bring Angel back, her guilt kicked into high gear.

How could Willow and Xander stand to look at her, let alone act the parts of the true blue friends they'd proven themselves to be?

Anya had always gotten on Buffy's nerves. She'd gotten on =everyone's= nerves, even Xander's at times. Honestly, Buffy hadn't thought things between Xander and Anya were all that serious. Xander had always seemed to barely tolerate Anya when they weren't having sex, and Buffy and Willow had privately concluded that, once the physical, lusty draw wore off between them, that Xander would move on to someone less ... ex-vengeance demon-y.

In the same vein, Xander and Buffy had spoken about their confusion and -- however un-PC it was to say -- shock at Willow's new life. The friend Buffy had known for years (and Xander, his entire life) was just =not= gay. What had her relationship with Oz been, then? Willow and Buffy had talked a great deal, and she'd always expressed those tingly, lusty thoughts for the male of the species. For Buffy, her confusion had meant it was harder than it should have been to get close to the person in Willow's life whom she loved, and who loved her.

Eventually, they'd all managed to overcome whatever obstacles had been erected between each other. Buffy still wasn't sure how Willow ended up gay, or even if she =was= gay -- Buffy only knew that she'd loved Tara, and Tara had loved her, more than most couples out there. And Anya had been annoying and more outspoken than any one person had a right to be until the very end, but many months before her death, she had ceased to be a temporary fixture in Xander's life; someone the rest of them merely tolerated. The entire group had become family. They accepted each other, differences, idiosyncrasies, flaws, strengths, weaknesses and all. Their band of friends were as close to each other as Buffy had been to her mother, her father, and Dawn.

And Buffy had killed them. She'd killed dozens of people after she'd become a vampire, but five had been family. Five she'd loved. Five she mourned, in a personal, separate way, different from how she mourned the rest.

Finally, she began to understand the pain Angel had carried around all his life. His mother, his father, his sister, his friends -- everyone he'd ever known human. His weight was so much greater than hers, and he'd carried it for nearly three centuries. Then, just when he'd begun to form new human connections, to love, to let himself be loved, that terrible time in high school had fallen, and along with Jenny Calendar's death went Angel's chance to find a home with them.

That was something Buffy hadn't been able to admit to herself the entire year after Angel's return from hell. He would always have a home with her, but it hadn't been the same amongst her friends after his stint as a psychotic killer. Jenny's death had been the nail in the metaphorical coffin. It had taken Giles a good long while before he'd been able to sit in the same room as Angel without that vein in his forehead throbbing. Only after Angel left town, and Giles saw how much he'd loved Buffy, had he finally let go of the last of his resentment.

He hadn't told her so, of course, but Buffy wasn't as blonde as she looked, and Giles was easier to read than he thought he was.

Angel had found a new home, though, here in Los Angeles. He'd found a family with the people who'd always been outcasts in Buffy's life. The irony of Cordelia and Wesley being the two people closest in the world to Angel did not escape Buffy. Wesley and Buffy had gotten off on the wrong foot from day one. He was too pompous and imperious, and she was too bitter that Giles had been fired and so easily replaced by a man so obviously inferior to him.

Cordelia had been too ... Cordelia to allow anyone to get close to her. Her abrasive personality was only the tip of the iceberg, and had been easily overlooked when she and Xander had been dating. It had been Cordelia's shallowness, her inability to grasp the life and death situations they found themselves in daily that had been so hard to swallow.

Life in LA, life with Angel, had changed her. Besides, anyone who loved Angel as much as Cordelia did was perfectly all right in Buffy's book. Things between them weren't perfect yet -- Angel had shared the entire saga with Buffy one of the nights they'd lain in bed talking 'til sunrise -- but they were family, and no matter what issues lay between them, no matter how mad or hurt or disappointed or unfair they were ... family didn't change. Family was forever.

Buffy's family and Angel's family had started to meld. Even the black sheep of their respective clans -- Spike and Faith -- had been able to find some level of comfort amongst their ranks. Old wounds had been healing, and the new gaping, bleeding afflictions had begun to clot and cauterize.

Of course, in their world, there was no rest for the weary, and the wicked had been laying low for two whole months. Clearly, they had been overdue for a catastrophe.

Suddenly, Buffy's good state of mind so far as getting Angel back was concerned vanished into thin air. Mind numbing worry replaced it. They had been SO CLOSE to having everything, to having as near perfect a life as they could get, under the circumstances, and it all just fell apart.

She would not survive another of Angel's deaths.

When the dust in the field has flown
And the youngest of hearts has grown
And you doubt you will ever be free
Don't bail on me

"Are you busy, Ms. Rosenberg?"

Willow looked up at Wesley from where she sat on the floor of his office, and flashed him a tiny smile. He'd called her 'Ms. Rosenberg' for days after she'd arrived. During a moment of intense stress and worry over Buffy, she'd snapped at him to 'just call me Willow, already, 'cause hello, not like we're living in the Victorian age here'. After the night she'd gotten too drunk to make it back to her room under her own speed, Wesley had taken to calling her Ms. Rosenberg, with affection.

"Just looking through every single book in Angel's collection to hopefully find an alternative to the gypsy curse. My eyes are starting to get sort of crossy, though, so I'm thinking it's time to take a break."

Sighing, Wesley took a seat beside her. "I've gone through all the volumes Buffy gave me from Angel's nightstand. I must admit, I'm beginning to become disheartened."

"Beginning to become disheartened," she playfully mocked. "You're more British than Giles."

"And you're a mean, callous little girl," he informed her with a gentle smile.

"Not so little," she declared huffily.

"No," he agreed, thinking of all the trials that she'd had to endure over her short life, especially since she'd met Buffy. "Not such a girl, either."

She looked at him strangely.

"I mean," he hastened to clarify, "you're clearly female, but not... not a little girl. A woman, all woman. That is to say, a mature, level headed, compassionate =person= I might be able to discuss a somewhat upsetting personal matter with."

Nodding wisely, Willow put aside the book she'd been looking at and scooted closer to Wesley on the floor.

"I'm all ears. Except not literally, of course, 'cause, y'know, in our world, that's the kinda thing you have to clarify."

He smiled tightly, then decided it was best to simply blurt these things out. "My girlfriend, Virginia, broke up with me. Several weeks ago, actually, shortly after my birthday. Angel had just come back to us, and I didn't feel it was fair to bring my own small burden into such a delicate situation as our reunification with one another."

Willow tried to think of something to say in response. Unfortunately, the only thing that came to mind was an incredulous "you had a girlfriend?!" and she didn't think that would help the situation.

"I'm sorry," she finally said lamely.

"Yes. Me too," Wesley added wryly.

"That was the dumbest thing I could've possibly said," Willow sighed.

"No, no, it's all right. I did spring it on you completely out of the blue."

"Had you been seeing her long?"

"Several weeks," he admitted. "It wasn't a deeply serious relationship, but... I think that I loved her a little."

"That's almost worse," Willow confided. "Loving them a little. 'Cause at least, when you loved 'em a lot, there's usually memories and good times and heartbreaking sadness to deal with when they're gone. When there's only a little bit of love... I think it's harder."

"How so?" he asked, genuinely wanting to hear what she had to say. Imagine, Wesley Wyndam Pryce, seeking guidance from a girl barely old enough to vote.

"Well..." Willow moved on the floor again until she was facing Wesley. "When Oz left me, it felt like someone had removed my heart with a plastic ice cream scoop. It hurt that much. And I knew exactly how I was supposed to feel, because Oz was everything to me, we were Willow and Oz, and how was I supposed to just be Willow again? It was... it was simple. It hurt more than I could stand most of the time, but I never once had to wonder what I was feeling, or why I was feeling it."

"We were never Virginia and Wesley," he said sadly.

"See?" she said, bouncing up and down a little on the floor as she warmed to her improvised hypothesis. "You never had the chance to figure out what you'd be missing, so you can't miss it. And you miss her, because you feel like you should, but you didn't know her well enough to really understand what it is you're missing, or even if you're missing anything at all. You might just be missing her because you think you're supposed to."

"Are you saying my emotional trauma is all in my head?" he asked, a bit miffed.

"No," Willow denied automatically. Then she paused. "Well, yes. That's sort of high-handedy and insensitive of me, isn't it?"

"A bit," Wesley agreed.

"How 'bout we forget everything I just said, go down to the kitchen and get big bowls of chocolate ice cream?"

Wesley grinned like a little boy. "Chocolate has been known to heal all that ails a broken heart."

"And just to make it interesting," she said, scooping up a few volumes of text as she stood, "we'll bring the thousand-year-old writings and try not to spill on them."

And the tide rushes by where we stand
And the earth underneath turns to sand
And we're waiting for someone to see
Honey, don't bail on me

"Do you think I'm being unfair to Angel?"

"Okay, SO not the guy to be asking."

Cordelia rolled her eyes and plopped down next to Xander on the sofa in the Hyperion's lobby. It was thankfully deserted, save the two of them, and she was relieved. There was nothing she'd rather do less than go over the past few months of hell in depth, but the Brains had assured her there was nothing she could do to help Angel right now, and the Host's words kept playing through her mind.

Had they -- had SHE -- been too hard on Angel? Or, if not too hard, at least... too rigid?

"I know you and Angel are never gonna be best pals," Cordelia began.

"Got that right," Xander muttered.

"But you were getting along," Cordelia insisted. "You guys were forging some kind of almost friendship. Nobody has ever hated Angel as much as you--"

"I think those Wolfram and Hart guys have me beat," Xander protested.

"So if =you= tell me I've been... you know... unnecessarily mean to him, I'll have to believe you."

"Cordy, don't beat yourself up," Xander soothed, patting her back. "You're unnecessarily mean to everybody."

"Xander, I'm serious," she snapped. "When somebody hurts me, I lash out. I close myself up, I lock them out and throw away the key."

"Remembering," Xander assured her.

"I can't do that with Angel," Cordelia said softly. "I mean, putting aside the skull crushing visions for the moment... he's my best friend. He's my FAMILY, Xander. He's the one person in this world I trusted with everything I had inside of me, and he just... threw me away. Like I was nothing. And you know how well I react to being treated like nothing."

"Correct me if I'm wrong -- and please, no hitting -- but wasn't Dead Boy going through some serious emotional issues?"

"Darla," Cordelia rolled her eyes. "We told him she was trying to drive him nuts. You know, once we realized he wasn't already nuts."

"Again, without hitting -- let me get this straight: Everyone -- Angel included -- thinks he's losing his marbles when Darla starts doing NC-17 rated appearances in his dream. Fast forward a few months of mental and emotional torture, and Angel finds out she's really alive, human, and therefore salvageable, to boot. He goes all out gangbusters -- in an admittedly single-minded and obsessive way -- to bring Darla back from the dark side, only to have all his efforts peak while he's forced to watch Drusilla vamp the freshly saved Darla. Am I missing anything?"

"No," Cordelia answered in a tiny voice. Then, she narrowed her eyes. "And how the hell did you know all that?"

"We were becoming almost friends," he muttered, staring down at the ground.

Cordelia's eyes widened. "=Angel= told you all that?"

"He needed to talk to someone," Xander said quietly. "Someone who wasn't Buffy, or otherwise directly involved. He didn't want to dredge up stuff for you; stuff that might hurt you all over again, or make you mad at him."

"Okay, now that's really sweet and noble and unselfish of him -- but it's =exactly= the kind of thinking that got us into this mess to begin with! I mean, yeah, Angel isn't one to over-share -- but he NEEDS to share, Xander. We love him. We want to feel close enough to him to MAKE him talk when he needs to." She sighed, and stood, needing movement to get a train on her thoughts.

"He sits in the dark, and he =broods= about his problems instead of letting us help him. He only spends time with us or talks when he feels one of US needs it. Friendship isn't just supposed to be giving, it's feeling comfortable enough to take once in awhile. Angel has never felt comfortable with us, with ANYONE besides Buffy, and even her he managed to shut out most of the time, unless SHE needed him to talk.

"And he has this WAY about him. There have been times I've tried to talk to him, and he has SCARED me with his reaction. It's like I asked him to go for a walk at high noon or something. It's not for me, either, so don't you dare even THINK that, Xander Harris. If he was happy and perfectly fine being all closed off, then I'd say more power to him. I wouldn't like it, and I'd probably bitch at him about it for the rest of my life, but it wouldn't... it wouldn't HURT like this.

"Wesley said that if Angel didn't start wanting things from life, that if he didn't start living in the world, he'd lose himself. He's got this constant fight inside him all the time, and I get that, and he thinks I don't, although he's getting better. But is he getting better because he had some kind of epiphany, or is he getting better because we laid down the law, and made him work for it?!"

Xander stayed silent for a moment, hoping her tirade was at an end. When she collapsed next to him on the couch again, he breathed a sigh of relief.

"So it was a trust thing," Xander said at last.

"Of course it was a trust thing!" Cordelia snapped. "How was I supposed to know he wouldn't do it again? I swore after you fell onto Willow's lips that I'd never care about anyone that much again. And now here I am, caring about Angel even more than I ever cared about you then!"

"Gee, feelin' the love," Xander muttered.

Cordelia winced, and covered Xander's hand with her own. "Xander... I didn't mean it like that. I'm... I'm better than I used to be. I understand more than I ever did, and yeah, I've still got some growing pains to go through, but... I actually like who I am now. And that's because of Angel. I trusted him more than anyone in my life, loved him more than anyone in my life, and he just... didn't care. And that hurts. More than anything else could. Not to mention the visions he stuck me with.

"So you tell me. How should I have reacted? What should I have done? Jumped like a puppy the moment he snapped out of it and remembered the people who loved him? Just forgive and forget without seeing any real, hard evidence that it wasn't going to happen all over again? Because really and truly, Xander, it would kill me a second time."

"I had no idea you felt this way about him," Xander admitted. "I mean, I knew you guys were close, but--"

"You just assumed I was too shallow to feel that much about anyone," Cordelia finished for him. She looked down at the ground. "Do you know why I stopped hammering him and let him be my best friend again?"

"I figured it was because he was trying so hard. You know, with the cooking and general care taking. He really seems to care, more than he used to. Or maybe he's just showing it better."

"He bought me clothes," Cordelia mumbled.

Xander blinked. "Come again?"

"A whole new wardrobe," she continued. "Beautiful, expensive clothes I hadn't been able to buy for myself in years. Pretty shallow, right? I say I've changed, but all it takes to buy my forgiveness is a few strips of designer fabric."

"I don't know. I guess that depends on whether it was really the clothes that did it."

Cordelia smiled, wide and grateful, then threw her arms around Xander's neck and hugged him tightly. Pulling away after a moment, she tucked her hair behind her ears and once again focused her gaze on the floor.

"He was warning me about something, trying to play protector again, after I told him we weren't friends anymore."

Xander made a hissing noise. "Harsh."

"I didn't mean it," Cordelia defended. "At least not much. I guess... part of me was sort of testing him. I wanted to see how much he'd take before all his good intentions flew out the window and he decided we were more trouble than we were worth. That I was more trouble than I was worth."

"You're deeply in need of psychological help," Xander informed her.

"I yelled at him for giving my clothes away. He used my old clothes that I'd left at the hotel as a way to get close to this woman who had a connection to Wolfram and Hart. I made it sound like him giving away my clothes was the most vile offense he'd made against me, and you know what he did, Xander? He =heard= me. He heard me, and he bought me clothes, and it's not the clothes that made me okay with him again -- fabulous though they may be -- it's what they represent."

"Him hearing you," Xander clarified.

"Listening to me," Cordelia agreed. "And doing something that was repellent to him -- shopping for women's clothing -- all because he didn't want me to be mad at him anymore."

"And did it work?"

"Yeah. Sort of. I guess."

"As long as you're firm."

"We were getting there," Cordelia snapped. "And then Buffy went all Basic Instinct with fangs and the reasons I was still miffed at Angel went right out the window. He needed me to be his family, and not be mad at him while he dealt, and that's fine. I'm okay with that. I'm okay with him needing weeks to focus on Buffy. I'm perfectly all right with him putting aside all the issues between us in favor of bringing Buffy back from the dark side, but now..."

"Now he's over on the dark side himself, and you're angry that you won't have a chance to resolve everything, in fact you've never even apologized to him once in this whole mess, and now you're afraid he'll be lost to you forever."

Cordelia stared at Xander for an entire minute.

"When the hell did you get insight?"

Xander grinned. "We're not sure. We think it might have happened over the summer."

Smiling slightly, Cordelia sat back against the couch and nudged Xander's calf with the tip of her shoe. "However it happened... thanks. I needed to vent."

"Anytime. And don't worry about not getting Angel back. The Buffster is kicking it into high gear, and I can guarantee when she's this determined, nothing keeps her from her objective. And right now, she's gunning to bring Angel home." A comfortable silence passed between them for a moment, before Xander patted the couch excitedly. "Say, onto brighter topics -- have you worked up the nerve to ask Gunn out again?"

"No," Cordelia groaned. "I don't know what's wrong with me. I am not shy. I am the opposite of shy. But when it comes to him, for some reason, I'm totally unable to charge right in and claim him as a Queen C territory."

"But you said the first date went great, and it was almost a week ago."

"I know," she moaned, pressing her face into the back of the couch. "It was wonderful. He was sweet, and he treated me like a princess even though he knows me well enough to know better."

"I don't know. I think you deserve to be treated like royalty. At least by the man lucky enough to be with you."

"Insight =and= charm. This summer was very good to you."

"I'll tell you my secrets, plus a bonus lesson on tact if you get up right now and ask Gunn out again for tomorrow night."

"Deal," Cordelia declared as she leapt up and raced out of the room.

Xander smiled and sat back against the couch. At least his friends could have a shot at a happy love life. He wasn't sure if, after Anya, he'd be able to love anyone like that again.

Ah, well, he thought sadly as he heard Willow make her requisite squeaking/moaning sound from the kitchen, at least there would always be chocolate.

With a tiny smile, Xander got up off the couch and headed toward his oldest friend. There was, after all, nothing chocolate couldn't make at least a little better.

In the morning you wait for the sun
And secretly hope it won't come
But time washes everyone clean
Buddy now, don't bail on me
Don't bail on me

"At last we meet, Mr. Bond."

Lindsey glanced up to find the other Slayer -- Faith, he remembered from the brief meeting they'd had while she slammed his colleague's forehead onto a table -- standing in the doorway next to a blond guy that kept rubbing the side of his head.

"Mr. Bond?" Lindsey asked, smiling slightly.

"Always wanted to say that," Faith explained. "And I figure me and Spike getting through all the little traps you lawyer boys laid out deserved a lifelong ambition to be realized."

"You got past the lobby," Lindsey stated dumbly, impressed.

"Got past your vampire detectors, too," Faith said proudly.

Glancing at the man who'd been quiet since their arrival, Lindsey said, "You're a vampire."

"Got it in one," Spike said with a smirk.

"Oughta tell the bosses their vampire hunters suck big time. They didn't lay a hand on Spikey here."

"Yeah, no thanks to you, ya whacked out lunatic," Spike muttered, gently probing the side of his head.

"Oh, get over it. Like you've never been thrown through a window before."

"You know, I don't think you appreciate me very much," Spike declared haughtily.

"You're right. I don't appreciate you. Feel free to storm off in a huff, cupcake." Faith turned her attention back to Lindsey. "You get to come with me." Her gaze roamed up and down his body, taking in the decidedly un-lawyer-like attire. "What, did Armani finally come out with a Redneck line?"

"Façades can be so suffocating," Lindsey confided.

"What the hell does that mean?" Faith asked, but before she could receive an answer, a siren -- different from the one that had been blaring since a vampire breached Wolfram and Hart's border -- began to sound.

"That's the hit squad," Lindsey explained. "After Angel's visit today to retrieve Drusilla, Wolfram and Hart updated its policy on vampire intrusion." His grin was a bit unstable. "Got an inner-office memo. Didn't really pay much attention to it, I was kinda busy copying files."

"What's the new policy?" Spike asked. For the most part, conversation between mortals bored the hell out of him -- except, of course, when said conversation involved threats to his personal well being.

"Kill on sight."

Faith let out a sound caught between a cackle and a chortle. "Sucks to be you," she informed Spike.

Spike began to sputter with righteous indignation he was sure he had a right to.

Lindsey's smile became a little wider, and a little more unstable. "Also, to terminate anyone unfortunate enough to be standing in the same vicinity of the vampire in question."

River is wide and oh so deep
And it winds and winds around
I dream we're happy in my sleep
Floating down and down and down

She could hear his bones calling out for her.

Her inner sense of self-preservation tried to keep her away. Buffy knew going after Angel now, when she had no backup, was a bad idea, capital B. Apparently, his body, like hers, didn't care that he was soulless. It recognized her, it recognized its mate, just as hers did his, and she didn't really have a choice in the matter.

They'd shared blood dozens of times now. Granted, most of the time had been while they were both soulless, but it didn't matter -- blood was blood, and they were bonded, whether Angel's evil demon wanted to admit it or not. Angel had always shared a bond with her -- before, however, it had been a bond between their souls. Her ability to sense his presence had never had anything to do with him being a vampire. She'd been able to sense him because he was Angel.

Sharing blood had merely amplified that old feeling by a billion. Her skin was itching and raw, pulled too tight over muscle and sinew. She'd stopped at Caritas to feed while she was wandering the city. The Host had been noticeably absent, and Buffy was glad for it. Given what Angel had told her about his big green friend, Buffy was willing to bet he would have been able to sense exactly what she had on her mind, and no doubt he would have talked her out of it.

I should be talking myself out of it, she thought sternly. Her last meeting with Angel hadn't gone all that well, and to assume it would be any different, just because he'd had some time to think things over, was ridiculous.

The demon was fully in control of his body. Even if he did feel exactly what Buffy was feeling, he would never admit to it. Angelus was smart and cunning, but he was also a few apples short of a fruit salad. The demon's hatred of her almost eclipsed the soul's love.

If that were all she knew about the man she loved, Buffy might have been able to ignore the needs of her blood and turn around. However, having been stripped of her humanity herself, Buffy knew a few things Angelus likely wasn't admitting. The demon -- the soulless, killing fiend -- loved her, too. It wasn't a healthy love, and it certainly didn't possess the blinding purity and adoration Angel held for her -- but it was still love.

Messy, ugly, uncompromising obsession that, because of Angel's normally ensouled state, had twisted itself into a parody of love. Soulless, Buffy had felt the same emotion for Angel. It hadn't made her angry to love him, though. Only his refusal to accept that they were meant to be together, his refusal to embrace his inner darkness, had angered her.

Shivering at the inner darkness Buffy was still terrified to admit she possessed, she turned a corner and froze. An abandoned warehouse sat not twenty feet from her, and she knew, just as she knew exactly what Angelus was feeling -- the anger and confusion and insanity and desire and helplessness -- that she had found him.

Buffy crept around the side of the building and scaled the wall with supernatural speed. The boards were loose on top of the roof, and she pried one up just enough to peer into the darkness. A few candles were lit around the center of the room, and Angel sat next to Drusilla on some kind of crate thing. He had his arm around her. Buffy felt her demon rise to the surface and she forced it down like Angel had taught her to. "It just takes time, love," he'd soothed her when she hadn't been able to immediately control the thing that lived inside her. "You'll get the hang of it. Remember, you didn't like fighting with a sword at first, either."

'I want him back,' she thought, holding in a sob. 'I don't want him like this, coddling the insane killer he made. I want my Angel.'

Whatever she was feeling, whatever bond they shared, she had to fight it until they figured out a way to restore his soul. She would use her perfect understanding of Angelus' state of mind, not to try to reason with him, which would prove futile, but to maneuver him for the time being, until she could get =her= Angel back.

Decision made, Buffy began to slowly creep away from the center of the roof...

...however, she misjudged how much weight she could apply to a particularly unstable board, and went crashing three stories down, only to land with an unnaturally loud 'thud' that, no doubt, would have left her with broken bones had she still been human. 'Yay for being dead,' she thought blearily as she forced her eyes open.

"Well, well, well," Angelus murmured, the side of his head pressed just so to the side of Drusilla's, "what have we here, precious?"

"A pretty little girl's come to play with us," Drusilla said happily.

"Oops," Buffy squeaked, a feeling of dread coiling inside the pit of her stomach, "clumsy me."

Tell ma I loved the man
Even though I turned and ran
Lovely and fine I could have been
Laying down in the palm of his hand

The End

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