The Adventures of Deadboy and Zeppo

Angel paced the room from the boarded up window to the dusty bed. He would have thrown himself in the chair, but his demon raged inside, and he didn't have the strength to still it. Xander Harris. Angel could feel his fangs itching to drop as he considered the fledge who was currently washing three layers of dirt off his body.

The water turned off with a screech of the pipes and Xander appeared in the doorway, his hands chained in front of him and a length of chain dangling to the floor. His face and chest were clean but his shoes still reeked of sewer and a long rust-colored stain down one leg of his jeans left Angel stone-faced in his attempts to quiet Angelus' hunger and rage. The boy who had challenged him could feed when Angelus couldn't. Angel nearly lost his silent battle.

"I told you to clean up," he snarled instead.

"Yeah, well this is as cleaned up as I'm getting as long as you're doing the chains thing, Deadboy."

Moving with inhuman speed, Angel grabbed Xander by the throat and pushed him back until the young vampire was bent backwards over the counter, the back of his head pushed against the mirror which reflected nothing.

"Don't call me that," he growled with a flash of fang.

"Yeah, right. Or what? You'll kill me? Let's be honest here because I'm thinking I really don't have a whole lot left other than honesty. You're going to kill me sooner or later anyway. Either you're going to get tired of having me around reminding you of what it means to be a vampire or you're just going to kill me because you always wanted to kill me... Xander... whatever. You wanted to kill whoever wore this face." Xander's babble stuttered to a stop even though he kept looking up angrily. Angel had to give the vampire some credit, it reeked of panic and fear, yet it refused to show that fear. He was surprised at how much like Xander the vampire who took his body had become.

"There are far more interesting things to do than dust you," Angel whispered, and Angelus celebrated in the back of his mind, sending images of Xander's broken body. "After all, I never did get to try out the chainsaw." Angel smirked as Xander paled and yellow bled into his eyes. The smell of terror intensified. "So, I told you to get cleaned up and you'll do it properly."

Angel reached down and grabbed Xander's legs, yanking them up so that Xander had to clutch at the counter as Angel ripped off both shoes before dropped Xander back down to the linoleum. Then he reached to Xander's waist and ripped the button and zipper open before yanking down on the denim.

"Should've known you'd be into the kinky sire stuff. Spike always said the stuff written in the watchers' journal was rot, but I knew you two always had a little too much significant eyeage going on when you were together." The scent of fear now filled the small room, and Angel ignored Xander's words as he turned the shower on and thrust the young vampire under the spray.

"Stay there," he snarled as he backed out of the bathroom, struggling to regain his balance on that edge of sanity which had been growing ever thinner lately. Doyle had told him that he would come closer to humanity by living among them, but lately he doubted. He turned his eyes upward as he resumed pacing the room and silently begged his friend to give him some sort of sign. He could feel his redemption slipping away like the sanity under his feet, but he couldn't seem to stop either.

And a dead Xander Harris in his shower, smelling of fear and submission and fresh blood... that wasn't helping matters. He stalked out of the unused room he had assigned to one newly turned fledge largely because of the huge iron ring set in the wall above the bed.

"Well?" Cordelia asked the minute he turned the corner into the main passage where he'd told her to wait. "He'd better not be washing down the drain as a pile of ash, Mister," she said both hands on her hips.

"He's taking a shower. I need to find him new pants," Angel said wearily as he moved down to the far end of the hall where his own rooms were.

"Someone lost their pants?" Angel nearly groaned as Wesley appeared at the top of the stairs. Ignoring the question he headed for his bedroom.

"Xander," Cordelia offered helpfully.

"Harris? Xander Harris is here?"

"Yep. Her Buffiness gave him the boot, and he showed up not long after sunset." Angel flinched at Cordy's casual dismissal of the pain this must have caused Buffy. He stopped in the middle of the hallway caught between wanting to call her and offer his sympathy and being terrified of talking to her and the constant loss he felt at the sound of her voice. At one point he had hoped that his redemption would come in time for him to reclaim that love, but now he knew it would never happen.

"Angel? You okay?" Cordy asked, and Angel started moving again.

"Fine," he answered.

"Oh yeah, because you'd tell us if you weren't, right?" she sarcastically bit back.

"Not now."

"Whatever. I don't have time to deal with your issues right now. Is Xander going to be okay? The gaping neck wound was a little intense."

"He's fine," Angel answered at the same time Wesley exclaimed, "Oh Good Lord. Is he all right?" Angel ignored the conversation as he reached his room and started digging through his clothes. Xander was almost the same size, he could certainly roll a cuff up once or twice and wear any of Angel's pants. The problem was that Angel wanted to find a pair of pants that he wouldn't mind turning to dust with the fledge if the opportunity arose.

"He's not fine. He's whiter than you, and he wasn't walking all that well."

"Perhaps we should consider taking him to the hospital," Wesley suggested from the doorway. Cordelia's derisive snort should have clued him in, but Wesley continued. "Was he attacked near here? Prehaps we should call Gunn."

"He was attacked in the kitchen," Cordy offered as Angel pulled out a pair of stone washed jeans Cordelia had given him. Faded jeans really didn't fit in with his image of himself, but he could see Xander wearing them.

"What?! Was the hotel invaded?"

"Only by Mr. Attitude. If I hadn't walked in, Angel would have drained Xander." Cordy's words led Wesley to step back and begin radiating fear. Angel gritted his teeth as the odor stirred the demon that he had just quieted.

"Cordelia left out the part where Xander is already dead. She also left out the part where she invited a vampire into the hotel for a cup of blood and some kitchen conversation," Angel watched as the Wesley's wary stare transferred from him to Cordelia, but she stood there with her arms crossed, far more willing to endure the censure than Angel had been.

"He's a friend."

"He *was* a friend. He's now a vampire, and I thought you learned something from Harmony," Angel pointed out as he pushed past both of them to head back down the hall.

"Oh no. You do not just walk away from this, Angel. Xander was perfectly behaved down there and you are not going to kill him when he wants to die."

"Xander *wants* to die?" Wesley asked in a small, bewildered voice.

"So I should wait until he recovers and tries to kill us all before I do it?" Angel asked dryly as he turned around to face the two humans.

"I don't think Xander will..."

"And Buffy *knows* all this?" Wesley demanded.

"Stop interrupting," Cordy ordered with a backhanded slap to Wesley's arm. "And yes, Buffy knows this. She tossed him out after he got turned."

"But why didn't she give him his soul back?" Wesley asked with the pinched expression that meant confusion when he used it even though on any other person Angel would have thought it suggested constipation.

"Good question," Cordelia answered. "I would have found out except that someone interrupted us."

"Cordy, he is *not* Xander Harris. He is a demon who is using Xander's body as a disguise, a hiding place. You can't treat him like Xander or expect him to act like Xander." Angel pointed out with a sigh. Sometimes he wished Doyle had chosen a different successor because every once in a while Angel had trouble dealing with her stubbornness. Hell, he usually had trouble dealing with her stubbornness.

"He has Xander's memories, and he has a lot more of Xander than I would expect. Most fledges are more into the mindless grrrrr and he's still him. He has more personality than any fledge I've ever met, well except for Harmony. She was still pretty much Harmony, up to and including the betrayal because that is something Harmony would have done even as a human. But Xander was never like that; he was always loyal."

"Who's loyal?" a deep voice asked, and Angel closed his eyes and leaned back against the wall as Gunn climbed the stairs three steps at a time. Angel silently sent a curse to the universe, and he could feel his demon mocking him from within. Being around humans wasn't helping him become more human, it was just making his fangs itch.

"Xander Harris, one of the slayer's friends," Wesley offered.

"And why are we talkin' about him?" Gunn asked as he leaned on the banister.

"We aren't," Angel added.

"He showed up here tonight," Cordelia said at the same time.

"Rather a vampire with his face showed up here tonight," Wesley corrected her, and Angel felt a moment of affection for Wes who had sided with him.

"Oh no. Girl, you are not taking in another stray vamp. We stake them, remember?"

"You are not staking Xander," Cordelia insisted, and Angel remained silent despite his own frustration with her plan. If he didn't stay silent, he was going to say something that she'd spend the next five years making him pay for. Angelus flailed at Angel's cowardice. This time the demon sent up images of Cordelia's broken and bleeding body.

"And how are you going to stop me?" Gunn said as he stepped forward, and Angel managed to avoid the cringe. He'd lived with Darla long enough to know how much damage a woman like this could do. Even Angelus avoided thinking about what Cordelia would be like as a vampire.

"Don't try it, mister." Cordelia narrowed her eyes and stepped forward so that she was chest to chest with Gunn, and as Angel expected Gunn immediately started backing away from that aggressive and yet intimate contact. And of course the minute Cordy had him in retreat, he was lost.

"Xander was a perfect gentleman downstairs just like he has always been, and while I don't suggest having him babysit any time in the near future, you are not going to pull a Buffy and drive him away with your threats. Because if he doesn't feel safe here, I will make sure you never feel safe again." Angel just watched as Gunn's resolved crumbled.

"Man, I am out of here. If you guys figure out which side you're on, you give me a call. Otherwise, don't ask me to play friendly with the enemy." Gunn gathered the remains of his manhood and retreated down the stairs muttering about crazy white people, and Angel had a near overwhelming urge to join him in retreat. The three remaining members of Angel Inc. stood at the top of the stairs in silence as Gunn stalked out the front door.

"He'll be back," Cordelia proclaimed when the door closed, and Angel just started down the hallway again. He considered telling Cordy to wait at the junction of the two hallways, but he suspected that he'd lose that fight, and he didn't feel like getting humiliated in front of Wesley. Instead he led the two humans toward the room where Xander waited.

Angel's stride broke as he considered Xander's words from earlier. Kinky sire stuff.

Angelus both sneered and celebrated at the though of being a sire to Xander Harris. He considered all the times he had William broken and begging and crawling on the floor. Angelus fairly purred at the equal parts admiration and fear his youngest had held for him. He remembered the devastated expression on William's face as he had shown the boy over and over that the only vampire rule that mattered was the one that said a vampire could do anything as long as he was strong enough to defend himself from the consequences.

Oh yes, Angelus admitted that siring Xander would be even more satisfying than killing him, but Angel shivered in revulsion. Time to dissuade the fledge of that thought. Well, just as soon as he got rid of the two humans following after him. He didn't want to have a clan discussion in front of people who weren't clan.