Rating: soft-R
Summary: Angel and Fred grow closer, to the the dismay of the Fang Gang.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
"She could be the perfect partner
She could take it in her stride
She won't have to lead or follow
Perfect partner by my side"
- Jimmy Buffet "Perfect Partner"
1/9
Unlocking Doors
Snuggling against Angel, Fred carefully tucked the blankets around them, trying to make certain there were no spaces for cold air to get in. As far as she could see, the one and only drawback to having Angel as a bedmate was the lack of body heat.
On the other hand the too-cold-to-sleep period of the night, before Angel absorbed her warmth, was always the best time to talk.
Laying in the dark, her cheek pillowed against his chest, the feel of his fingers gently playing with the ends of her hair, Fred felt utterly and completely safe and at home. And it seemed like Angel felt the same. During that quietness he could be more open, as if he didn't feel the need for the walls he habitually kept around himself.
"Where are you from?" Fred murmured.
She automatically interpreted the slight ripple of his muscles under her head as a shrug. "Everywhere, I suppose," he said softly.
A faint puff of breath expressed Fred's lack of satisfaction with his answer. "Everywhere may be where you've been, but everyone's from somewhere. I grew up in Kentucky; for example."
"Ireland," Angel sighed. "A long time ago."
"Was it pretty there?" Fred asked.
"Beautiful," Angel said. "I didn't appreciate it then, but I remember it. The colors were so vivid in the day. Even the brightest moonlight shows everything in shades of gray."
"Were you a farm kid or a town kid?" Fred asked, nudging the conversation away from the negatives of being a vampire.
"It doesn't matter," Angel replied.
"Course it matters," Fred objected with an increasing level of animation. "That shapes how you look at everything."
"Becoming a vampire changes how see anything," Angel informed her.
"Angel isn't a traditional Irish name," Fred said, struggling for a safe topic. "How did you're parents come up with it?"
Fred felt Angel go rigid beside her, "They didn't," he said.
With a sigh Fred pulled away from him. Mostly things were relaxed between them, but sometimes, like tonight, no topic was safe. Apparently his human life was one of those things she was completely locked out of.
"My name was Liam," Angel said hesitantly. "I'm not him anymore, too much changed, but that was what my parents named me."
Fred relaxed back against Angel. "I was a farm kid," she began. "An only child. I used to follow my dad around and watch him fix things. I wanted to know how everything worked; that's why I majored in physics I guess."
As he listened to her ramble on about her childhood, Angel slowly relaxed.
Every now and then he reciprocated with an innocuous detail from his own
childhood.
2/9
Curiousity
"You want me to what?" Angel exclaimed loudly enough to draw Cordelia's attention away from the catalogue she was poring over.
"Change," Fred repeated. "I was wondering how it works when you do that."
"No," Angel replied.
"Why not?" Fred asked. "It's different here, it's just a face you make to scare people."
"I do not," Angel said immediately.
"Lawyer people who want to appraise the hotel?" Fred asked innocently.
"They're a special case," Angel muttered. "I want them to remember what I am."
"But it doesn't hurt you," Fred argued. "And I'm curious."
Cordelia shuttered but put down the catalogue. Fred's matter-of-fact-ness when it came to Angel being a vampire gave her the creeps. Sure she'd tried to deal rationally with the whole vampire thing once herself, and look what had happened. Really, the more human Angel acted the better, but still Fred's unique perspective did have its plus side. For instance, watching Angel react to Fred's declaration that fangs made no sense, evolutionarily speaking, for vampires and that logically they should have something more along the lines of a mosquito's beak.
Cordelia had never seen Angel look so totally put out, and it had only gotten better when the best argument in favor of fangs that Angel had been able to muster was the intimidation factor.
"It's not just 'making a face'," Angel was saying. "The demon's closer to the surface when I change."
"But you're always in control," Fred said.
"Barring drugs or perfect happiness," Cordelia qualified.
Fred gave Angel a look that clearly said he needed to answer her.
"Just changing doesn't threaten my control of the demon," Angel elaborated.
Fred smiled hopefully.
"But it's still bad," Angel added.
"Why?" Fred asked.
"Because caring about vampire stuff is bad," Cordelia said. "It leads to ickiness like obsessions about sires who should have just been staked and forgotten."
Fred glanced back at Angel in time to see his eyes flash golden. "Oh. you do it when you're mad," she said. "That's why it's a bad thing."
After a short pause, she asked. "What does it feel like?"
"It's a rush," Angel said quietly. "In demon-form, I'm stronger, my reflexes are better, and I'm harder to hurt."
Fred nodded. "Is it like tensing a muscle or relaxing one, or do you change altogether."
Angel thought about it for a moment. "A little of all three, it's hard to explain. At first maybe something like tensing a muscle, then everything cascades, my skin shifts, my vision is different, it's not just better night vision the colors are different, my teeth reform, and once it happens it feels natural. Vampires generally consider that to be our real form, but even before I got my soul back I always preferred to look human. Still it is harder to go back to human form."
"Do your toes change?" Fred asked. "You're fingernails get thicker sort of claw like."
Angel looked bemused. "My toes?" he asked.
"Uh-huh," Fred replied waiting hopefully.
"I've never actually thought about it, let alone checked," Angel said, his tone disbelieving.
"Why not?" Fred asked.
"Because. they're my toes, why would I think about my toes?" Angel stammered, as if he simply didn't know what to make of this topic. He looked like he wasn't sure if he should start laughing or get really embarrassed.
He looked really cute that way; Cordy decided then realized she wasn't the only one who was appreciating Angel at that moment.
"I honestly have no idea," Angel admitted. "It's pretty much the last thing on my mind when I change."
"Bet ya think about it next time," Fred said with a mischievous smile as she leaned over Angel's chair and kissed him on the tip of his nose then turned and sashayed out of the room.
Cordelia laughed, but when she saw Angel's expression she stopped abruptly.
As Angel's eyes followed Fred's progress the confusion evaporated from
his expression, to be replaced with a warm intensity that excluded everything
from his awareness except the slender girl they'd rescued from Pylea the
year before.
3/9
Lecture
"Angel, may I speak with you?" Wesley asked.
Angel repressed a desire to groan; in the year and a half since Wesley had become the head of the agency Angel had quickly learned to both recognize and despise that politely phrased order.
The first time Wesley had decided to lecture to Angel about his behavior, past, present and future, the ex-Watcher had practically admitted he was doing it to get even with Angel for everything he'd put them through with Darla. Since Wesley had been shot and almost killed during that period, Angel felt he'd earned the torture and so he didn't complain about it. A few months ago he had even started trying to pay attention to the lectures again. But Angel was still quietly hoping that Cordelia would rescue him by having a vision.
After a last hopeful glance at Cordelia Angel closed the office door behind him then slumped in a chair and waited for Wesley to get on with it.
"It was brought to my attention that Fred has developed something of a crush on you," Wesley began, immediately capturing Angel's full attention. "It's quite understandable, people rescued from a life threatening situation frequently believe themselves to be in love with their rescuer. This hasn't been a real issue for the Agency before because we don't normally maintain contact with our clients after the case is complete; which is as it should be. However given the extended nature of Fred's time in Pylea, we couldn't simply abandon her to the wilds of LA."
"However; in retrospect, allowing her to stay at the Hotel showed a lack of foresight on my part and to make matters worse we've all been extremely lax in our efforts to see her reintegrated into mainstream society. In truth she's practically become a defacto member of the staff."
"Why don't you hire her?" Angel suggested. "As you said, Fred isn't most of our clients. She's been an asset, both with her talent for comprehending the supernatural through science, and besides Gunn and I are hopeless when it comes to research, so is Cordy if it's not found on-line. You could use the help."
"I'm quite capable of handling the research on my own," Wesley said irritably.
"Then hire her because she needs someplace to belong," Angel countered.
"That isn't a reason," Wesley said. "We should be discouraging her interest in the supernatural and getting her back into school."
"It was enough of a reason for me to hire you," Angel said quietly.
"Additionally," Wesley said raising his voice to override Angel's. "It appears that you are beginning to return Fred's feeling. And we all know where that path leads. The sooner you break things off with her the less damage you'll do."
"Fred is my friend, that's all we feel for each other," Angel said firmly. "The last time I checked I'm still allowed to have friends."
"You're deluding yourself Angel," Wesley said. "Last year's difficulties kept us from noticing Fred's developing infatuation with you or we'd have done something about it long ago. But just because we failed to notice it right off doesn't make it any less of an issue now. If, as you say, you don't feel that way about her, well I suppose we don't have to concern ourselves with another Angelus incident, but that doesn't make it right. It wouldn't be fair to Fred to lead her on."
"Now Cordelia said David Nabbit is having a party, I want you to encourage Fred to go with Cordy. That will give her a chance to spend more time with regular people. In a week or so Cordy and I will start helping her to find a place of her own. Between now and then you need to explain to her that there is simply no possibility of a relationship between the two of you."
4/9 Party
Fred tugged at the hem of her dress. Rationally she knew it wasn't any shorter than the rags she'd worn in Pylea, but no one in Pylea looked at her like the guys at this party were looking at her. It made the skirt feel very short indeed and she wished she hadn't let Cordelia talk her into getting it.
In fact she wished she hadn't let Cordelia talk her into coming to the party at all, but Angel had said it was a good idea so Fred had agreed.
She felt that coming to the party was a good compromise measure, since he'd also decided that they wouldn't be sleeping together anymore and that she fully intended to argue about. That time, when they were falling asleep together was too precious to Fred to give up, especially when Angel couldn't come up with anything they hadn't already discussed as a reason why. When compared to that, the party hardly seemed worth thinking about, let alone arguing about. However, now that she was there, all Fred wanted was for it to end. all these people, and none of them real. They jabbered on about celebrities and such endlessly, leaving everything real at the door.
They were here to see and be seen, to find or be found. Fred knew beyond all doubt she didn't belong here. She seemed to remember that this hadn't been a problem in the old days before Pylea, when she had found herself in one of these situations back then everyone else had only had to take one look at her to know she didn't belong and then they left her alone. Unfortunately Cordelia's choice of clothing and her efforts with Fred's hair and make-up had effectively camouflaged her and now she had to deal with all these people who thought she was like them.
With a feeling of relief, Fred spotted a guy who looked as out of place as she felt. She sat down beside him, hoping the invisible bubble of not belonging that surrounded him would extend to herself as well.
"H.Hi, um." he stammered.
"I'm Fred," she introduced herself holding out her hand to him.
"David," he replied taking it awkwardly. "David Nabbit, technically your host. Mostly I try to stay out of my guests' ways. .I saw you come in with Cordelia, are you a friend of hers?"
"I work with her," Fred explained.
"You. wow," David exclaimed. "That's really wow. Are you, like a witch or something?"
"A physicist specializing in dimensional portals and magic," Fred explained. "I do research on general demon phenomena too. What do you do?"
"Oh. me? I um. I'm the head of a multi-billion dollar software company."
"You are? I used to be into computers. That was seven years ago, but then there was the wholebeing dumped into a medieval-equivalent society without even electricity, so you can just forget about computers; I got rusty. After I got used to being back I asked everyone.well Angel, Cordelia, Wesley and Gunn, if UNIX still existed, they'd never heard of it."
David half smiled. "Oh it's still around, in fact."
From across the room Cordelia smiled contentedly at the sight of Fred and David Nabbit engaged in an animated conversation. She'd know this was a good idea, Cordelia thought as she refocused on her own conversation.
"So. um. I really liked talking with you. and . um. would you like to. I don't know. go out to a movie. maybe. sometimes?" David stammered.
"Could Angel come too?" Fred asked.
"Oh." David said, shoulders slumping. "I. guess it would be cool if you brought the whole gang. I like hanging out with them."
________________________________________________________________
"Why'd you blow off David?" Cordelia asked as the two girls made their way home. "You looked like you liked talking geek with him. Sure he's a little strange, but he's nice and about your speed socially, plus no-kidding, richer than Midas."
"I don't feel like that about him," Fred said.
"You might if you gave him a chance," Cordelia said bluntly. "Really
the chances of you developing feelings for David are about a bazillion
times better than the possibility of you and Angel having a future. First
off, Angel is never going to really get over Buffy. Second, if he did fall
for you he'd loose his soul and then we'd have to kill him or be horribly
tortured by him before he killed us. You're much better off with David
or anyone else really. Angel's a really sweet guy and beyond gorgeous,
but he's strictly off limits romantically, so you'd better just get over
whatever idea you've got about him in that department."
5/9
Insomnia
Restlessly Angel tossed and turned. He glanced at the clock beside his bed and groaned. Five in the morning was definitely well into what should be his sleep cycle, but he just couldn't relax.
The room echoed with stillness and emptiness. It was cold, silent and dead in here and he hated it. The locked door silently accused him, he hated shutting Fred out, but it was the only way he knew to tell her no that would work when he didn't actually want her to do what he said.
Without ever meaning to he'd done it again. He'd let someone get too close and now she was paying the price for his unworthiness. Hadn't he learned his lesson with Buffy?
With a sigh Angel gave up on sleep. He decided that as long as he wasn't going to be sleeping he might as well try to get something done. If he remembered correctly there were several weapons in the armory that could use a little attention.
As he walked toward the stairs Angel noticed an excess of light and automatically switched to a more stealthy approach. He glanced at Fred's door to be sure nothing was threatening her then began his decent.
Angel relaxed halfway down the stairs once he saw Fred sitting curled up on the couch, the light from the laptop's screen softly illuminating her face as she studied it intently.
"You too?" she asked, not looking up from what she was doing.
Angel felt himself smiling; Fred always knew when he was near her, and, for no rational reason, he loved that she did. "Hmmm?" Angel asked.
"You can't sleep either," Fred clarified.
Angel sighed, not wanting to go for another round of why them sleeping together was wrong. Somehow Fred always won the arguments but he still couldn't concede his position. "What are you doing?" he asked instead.
"FreeCell," Fred replied. "It's a computer game, I'll teach you."
Happy to be off the hook, Angel sat down beside Fred.
"The point is to move all the cards to those four spots. Watch me," Fred instructed.
After she finished her game Fred handed the computer to Angel and curled up half in his lap to watch him play.
"You want to go for the aces first," she advised after a few minutes.
"I don't think this is even possible," Angel complained after the sixth time the computer informed him that there weren't any legal moves left.
"Only fill up the spaces up to if there aren't any other options," Fred yawned.
Angel twisted sideways on the couch so she could lie down more while still using him as a cushion. Contentedly Fred rearranged his arm so it was draped over her shoulders.
"I won!" Angel exclaimed about fifteen minutes later.
Fred's only reply was a soft exhalation of air.
Angel tenderly brushed a tendril of dark hair off her face, then set the computer aside and leaned his head back against the couch.
He'd take Fred up to her room in just a minute, Angel decided, but he
didn't want to move just now. Everything felt so peaceful. He'd put her
to bed in just a few.
6/9
Awakening
Angel woke with an angry snarl as Fred's warm weight was suddenly snatched from his arms. As he opened molten-gold eyes the first thing Angel saw was a cross shoved in his face. Violently he slapped it aside, and then froze at the sound of a familiar voice raised in pain.
Fully awake now, Angel looked around to see Fred struggling fearfully in Wesley's arms and Cordelia cradling a soon to be bruised arm, whimpering with pain.
Fred drove her elbow decisively into Wesley's gut, breaking free of him and dashing to Angel's side. From the protection of his presence she glared furiously at the other two humans.
"He's evil, get away from him!" Wesley warned.
"I'm not evil," Angel snapped, shedding his demonic appearance. "Cordy, I'm sorry, I thought you were a threat to Fred."
"You thought I was a threat?" Cordelia exclaimed. "What do you think I thought coming in and seeing you all entangled with her?"
"Fred was teaching me some stuff on the computer," Angel sighed. "We just fell asleep, it was perfectly innocent."
"Plus being none of your bee's wax!" Fred added furiously.
Comparing you two could get us all killed and possibly end the world, I rather think it is our business," Wesley said in an arch tone.
"Pfft," Fred breathed dismissively.
Wesley retrieved a folder from the very bottom of the file cabinet and gave it to Fred. "I think you need to understand the shear malevolence of the entity you're toying with," he said angrily. "Perhaps that will teach you a little restraint. As for you Angel, there's no excuse for your actions."
"I didn't do anything wrong," Angel said defensively.
"Open your goddamn eyes and look where this is going!" Wesley snapped.
"I'm not some teenager, thinking with my hormones," Angel growled back. "So you can save the lecture."
"Even if this never goes any further than last night, I think you need to take a good long look at your emotions," Wesley said icily. "Perfect happiness is such an imprecise term and I don't wish to be cruel Angel, but from what I've seen you're already flirting with disaster."
Angel drew a strangled breath as his already pale complexion faded to a grayish-white.
Wesley looked almost as stunned as Angel by what he'd said, but before he could collect his wits to add anything Angel spun on his heel and disappeared into the Hyperion's basement, slamming the door behind him.
"There's never a drocken gully around when you need one," Fred announced
glaring at both Wesley and Cordelia then hurried after Angel.
7/9
Graveside
"Come on Slayer, you need to deal with this," Spike said when Buffy balked at the cemetery gates.
Since Buffy's return from the dead she and Spike had an unspoken arrangement where he patrolled the cemetery where she'd been buried and Buffy never went near the place.
Buffy paused a moment to gather herself then resolutely followed the peroxide blond into the cemetery. "So what's up?" she asked.
"Just look," Spike replied drawing her after him.
Buffy froze at the sight of her former boyfriend sitting huddled on the ground, splattered with blood shirt and shoes both missing. She didn't notice as Spike quietly slipped into the shadows, leaving her alone with Angel.
Slowly Buffy approached, she couldn't imagined what was wrong or how she was going to break the not-dead-anymore news to him, or how she could help, she just knew she had to be there for him.
Hesitantly she rested her hand on his bare shoulder.
"Buffy," he greeted her, his soft voice sounding unsurprised, not even alive.
"Hi," Buffy said sitting down beside him. "You want to talk about it?"
"Whistler warned me," Angel said. "When I first decided to help you, he told me the more I lived in the world the more I'd see how apart from it I was. He was right. I can look through the windows, see what it is that I gave up when I chose to follow Darla into that alley; love, friendship, life, warmth, family. I understand what those things are now; I never did before, not even while I was still human. But I can't have them. Wesley was right, perfect happiness isn't a precise thing. It doesn't actually have anything to do with sex. Just because I felt that way when we made love doesn't mean that I'll necessarily feel that way again the next time I sleep with someone..." Angel paused for a moment. "And even if I never have sex again it doesn't guarantee that the curse won't break again. I just can't tell how happy is too happy.
"Please don't be suicidal again," Buffy pled.
"No," Angel said. "It didn't work so well last time. The PTB want me as their warrior, I guess I've got a duty. Honestly, I want to help, no one deserves to feel like this. Besides it won't be forever, there's a prophecy; someday, when the powers are done with me, I'll be human. I can't really picture it right now, but it's nice to know it'll be over someday."
Buffy shuttered at the tired, emptiness in his voice. The way he said that; she knew that he wasn't looking forward to being human; he was looking forward to being dead. It hadn't been so long since she'd felt that way herself.
Buffy wrapped her arms around Angel and pulled him close.
"Even now you're still warm," Angel comment wonderingly, then his body went stiff. "I can't be around you," he muttered. "You still make me feel better, even when you're dead."
Buffy almost fell because of the speed with which Angel pulled away
from her, disappearing into the darkness like a ghost.
8/9
Hurricane's Eye
Disclaimer: Characters and Premise are borrowed from the show "Buffy, the Vampire Slayer" and "Angel".
Cordelia watched in open-mouthed shock as, seventy-two hours after he'd vanished into the tunnels beneath the Hyperion, Angel opened the basement door and walked across the lobby.
He was still dressed only in the slacks he'd been wearing when she and Wesley had discovered him asleep on the couch with Fred. The only change in his attire was the addition of a layer of blood and grime.
"Cordy? Are you still there?" Willow's voice asked.
Cordelia put the phone back to her ear. "Angel just walked in," she said. "I guess he's okay."
Angel disappeared up the steps to his room without a word of explanation for his absence or his current condition. Fifteen minutes later he came back downstairs, after having showered and dressed.
"Have we gotten any new cases?" Angel asked dully.
"Not really," Cordelia hedged nervously, then in a rush she added. "Fred's missing, she went in the tunnels after you. Now no one can find her, but don't worry, she came back to the hotel to change clothes sometime yesterday. We didn't see her, but the old outfit is in the hamper and a new one's missing from the closest. So I don't think she's hurt or anything. Wesley and Gunn are looking for her as we speak."
"I'll find her," Angel said. Then disappeared back into the basement.
A little over an hour later he came back with Fred in tow. The dark haired girl's eyes were red from tears and her lips were pressed in a tight line. She glared angrily at Cordelia then ran upstairs to her room, the sound of the door slamming echoed through the hotel.
Angel flinched. "Tell her I'm sorry," he said. "I'm going to go patrol for the rest of the night. I'll have the cell if you have a vision or if we get a client." With that Angel turned around and left again.
Not ten minutes later Gunn and Wesley straggled through the front door. "We didn't find either of them," Wesley said, his voice guilt strickened.
"It's okay," Cordelia said. "Well not really, but Angel's back. He found Fred and brought her back. She's in her room, not speaking to us. He's out patrolling and acting all weird, even for Angel."
Over the next few weeks a pattern established itself; Angel patrolled LA's streets from dusk to dawn, stopping only if he was need to deal with a vision or other case. During the morning he slept for an hour or two while the cell phone recharged, then he'd leave. Since returning from Sunnydale, he'd decided that the tunnels beneath LA need patrolling during the day.
Fred, despite everyone's best efforts to stop her, frequently followed Angel on his self-appointed rounds.
The only trace of emotion anyone ever saw Angel display was the frustration trying to keep Fred from placing herself in danger caused him. Other than that his manner was detached and distant, eerily calm even when he fought. Cordelia was worried; even Lorne hadn't been able to explain his new outlook; when Angel had sang at Calatias for one of their cases Lorne had blacked out. After the green skinned demon had regained consciousness he'd told Angel that the souled vampire needed to face whatever it was that had him terrified and the sooner the better. Cordelia just couldn't see how terrified could ever possibly describe Angel, let alone now. Robotic seemed closer to accurate.
As for the rest of them, they tried to carry on with running the agency.
Wesley was a stammering, uncertain, guilty mess, even worse than he'd been
back when he first showed up in LA. Cordelia and Gunn both felt like they
were living in the eye of the hurricane; sure it was quiet now, but you
always knew the other side of the vortex was coming.
9/9
Grey
"Angel," Wesley said quietly, intercepting the souled vampire at his door.
"Vision or case?" Angel asked.
"Cordy, Gunn and I are going out tomorrow night. Perhaps you'd join us?" Wesley stammered.
"No," Angel replied sliding past Wesley and into his room. "I can't."
"I'm sorry," Wesley said stopping the door from shutting behind Angel.
"Why?" Angel asked.
"For what I said," Wesley clarified. "I had no right."
"You were right," Angel corrected. "She makes me feel. Fred isn't afraid of me, not even of the demon. Not because she doesn't understand what she's dealing with. She saw that thing I became in Pylea, of course she understands what I am, but she'd still not afraid. She thinks I'd never hurt her. Fred believes I'm strong enough to control it and she trusts me."
"Fred trusts me, Wesley," Angel continued his voice tinged with awe. "Her eyes are wide open, I haven't deceived her in any way and she can still trust me. Do you have any idea of what that means to me?"
"You were right Wesley, I don't know what perfect happiness is exactly, but when I hold her I'm at peace and that's not what the Rom intended for me. I can't betray the trust Fred puts in me. I'd rather die than hurt her. Still it isn't as simple as you think it is. For a century the curse was stable, but it didn't keep me in agony all that time, after the first few years it just left me numb. Then Buffy came along and taught me how to feel again. It was incredible, even when I thought the pain of it would kill me. I've found the highs balance the lows. Only it's not just Buffy and Fred who make me feel; it's all of you. When you're in danger I worry for you, and when it's over and you're still alive, I'm happy. When Cordy told me we weren't friends anymore it hurt and when she forgave me I was happy. At what point does happiness become perfect happiness?"
"The only way I know to be safe is not to feel at all."
"You don't have to worry though, I won't walk away from Cordelia's visions, not again. I want to help people, besides it's the only way to end this."
"Angel." Wesley began to protest only to have Angel gently but firmly move him back and shut the door in his face. Then he heard the soft click of the lock being engaged.
Defeated, Wesley turned and walked down the stairs, he didn't even notice
Fred standing silent and still in the alcove, her expression both determined
and intensely thoughtful.
- - - - - - -
THE END