The Highlander Factor

The door to the apartment burst off its hinges, flying several feet into the room and a string of frustrated curses accompanied its sudden arrival.

From his position at the desk with his back to the door, Wesley raised his eyes impassively to the wall in front of him. "Your invitation is revoked Angel, as you would know if you had bothered to speak to Gunn."

His simple statement was followed by another round of cursing from the hallway that was suddenly replaced by a deathly hush. Wesley leaned back in his chair and lifted his hand unconsciously to touch the scar on his throat. It had been over two months with no word from anyone at Angel Investigations, and he'd been hoping that it was over, that they had all decided to leave him alone. The silence was broken by quiet words from the hall.

"Wes? Wesley? I'm sorry. Just let me in. All I want to do is apologise to you, face to face."

Wesley stood up, purposely keeping his back to the doorway. "You can do that wit me me inviting you in. Oh, and by the way, I'm charging you for the door."

Then he turned and slowly made his way over to the open archway that separated the two living areas of his apartment. Although outwardly the vampire standing in the doorway looked calm and was standing quietly, almost humbly with his head down, Wesley couldn't help noticing that his hands were in almost constant movement, stroking the doorframe, and up and down the edge of his leather jacket. He was also balanced on the balls of his feet, not an unusual stance for a fighter but, he was...Wesley could only describe it as jiggling. Where had he seen that before?

"Come on, Wes. Let me in. I'm not going to hurt you." The ex-Watcher backed away slightly. There had been a definite snigger accompanying those words, and a rather frightening conclusion that may explain the subtle changes in the vampire's behaviour was starting to fall into place in his mind.

"I'm not goto lto let you in without protecting myself, Angel. So if you want to talk, you'll just have to wait until I'm ready to let you in."

He headed for the bedroom, nng tng the privacy only a wall and closed door could offer. As he entered the small room Wesley glanced back at the vampire just as Angel raised his head and he caught the glint of gold in his normally dark eyes. The sight was far from reassuring and, closing the bedroom door behind him, he hurriedly found his cell phone and punched in Gunn's number.

The phone rang once, twice, three times. "Gunn? It's Wesley."

"Wesley. Oh thank god." It was Fred and not Gunn who had answered. "Something really horrible has happened. Something got into the hotel and, and..."

Short, dry sobs started down the phone, and then Gunn's voice cut in. "Wes? Something has got Angel, and it's made a right mess of Spike. Left him hanging out to dry, so to speak."

Spike? Angelus' childhat hat was Spike doing there?

"Listen Gunn." Wesley's voice was hardly above a whisper, not wanting to alert the vampire out in the hall. "Listen carefully and don't interrupt me. Nothing has got Angel, he's here. He is also, I think, Angelus."

He ignored the swearing from the other end of the telephone and ploughed on. "I have no idea what has happened, but you have got to get out of the hotel. You must take Fred and leave. Go somewhere where he can't find you... No, I don\ant ant to know where. Just keep her safe because he'll be coming for you."

Again he paused, listening to Gunn's determined voice. "No. No, you are not coming here to dust him yourself. I don't care what he's done. Don't. Argue. Gunn. Just this once, listen to me. Get out. Get Fred out. If Spike's important, get him out too. Go somewhere Angel doesn't know. Somewhere he has no invitation to enter. Just go."

Wesley hung up, took a deep breath and dialled again.

A lightly pleasant female voice answered. "Wolfram and Hart. How may we be of service?"

"Put me through to Lilah Morgan...I don't care if she's in a meeting. Just tell her it's Wesley Wyndham-Pryce and I have an important package for her to collect."

He tapped his fingers urgently on the wall as he waited to be connected. Eventually, there was a click and Wesley heard Lila voi voice asking him what the hell was so important that it was worth dragging her out of a meeting.

"Lilah? You wanted Angelus; he's all yours. Get yourself down to my apartment and get the bastard contained. Oh, and one last thing Lilah, bring twice what you think you need, we're not dealing with Angel anymore."

With a deep breath, Wesley slipped his phone into his pocket. Now all he had to do was keep the Scourge of Europe interested enough not to leave without letting him into his apartment. Not the easiest of tasks. Opening the weapons trunk that lived under his bed, Wesley took out a crossbow, a sword and lastly three stakes, which he pushed into the back of his jeans. Taking another gulp of air, he stepped back into the living room. Now, if he could just avoid getting the vampire so angry he fired the apartment block to flush Wesley out....

He addressed the vampire, who still stood in the empty doorway. "I've thought about this encounter a lot, Angel, and I'm not letting you in until I've explained. You may well kill me when I do let you in, but at least I will have had the satisfaction of knowing that you heard all I had to say."

"Know all that. Forgiven you. Just let me in." The delay was obviously making it difficult for Angelus to keep up the deception. "Come on, Wes!" The vampire was virtually bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet now.

"No, you don't understand Angel, and you need to."

Wesley launched into a full exposition of his role in Connor's disappearance, everything from initially finding the prophecy, through talking to the Loa outside the burger bar, and culminating with Justine stealing the baby and slitting his throat. He finished to an accompaniment of increasingly frustrated vampire in the public hallway. Having exhausted that subject he moved on to speak of his feeling's, the sense of betrayal and desperate hopelessness as hife ife bled away in the park, how he had hoped that Angel would at least understand, if not forgive. Finally, Wesley reted ted his shock at Angel trying to kill him in the hospital, and how he fervently hoped that this would not come over as a delaying tactic.

Silence. 'Damn, did he just say that out loud?

"Delaying me for what, Wesley?" All pretence now gone and in full game face, Angelus lunged at the door, only to be thrown back by the invisible barrier that blocked his He He grasped the doorframe with each hand and Wesley could see the wood splintering under his powerful grip.

"Fred and Gunn coming to rescue you, heh. I really hope Fred's coming, Wes. I love Fred; she'd make such a tasty snack and some decent company. What do you think? Do you like the idea of your little girl keeping me happy for the couple o' hundred years?"

Refusing to rise to the bait, Wesley zoned out the vampire's un-pleasantries and strained to detect any sign or sound of Lilah. There was nothing. Wesley shrugged, this wasn't what he'd planned, but at least Angelus' frustrated determination to hurt him psychologically was keeping him here and occupied. He must make a note of this somewhere. Angelus, when roused, was not perceptive. Persistent and arrogant in the extreme, but not overly alert to possible danger.

The taser bolts hit with no warning, and the vampire went down like he'd been pole axed. Seconds later he was bap, tp, three tasers were not enough to keep this demon in full blood lust out for long, and with the speed only a master vampire can achieve, he was on his feet and systematically destroying Lilah's forces.

From the corridor, Wesley could hear the sounds of fighting and a desperately shouted radio communication for immediate backup, until the call was abruptly cut off with a gurgling scream. Then there was quiet, the eerie silence only broken by the squawking of the radio. Wesley cautiously popped his head out of the doorway. The hallway looked like a riot in an abattoir. At least seven corpses and associated body parts littered the floor and walls, but of Angelus there was no sign.

Further down the hall another door opened and a white-faced Lilah peeped out. Wesley lost his temper; stalking up to her he grabbed her jacket and shook her, hard. "I told you to bring twice what you thought. Jesus Christ, woman! What did you think you were doing, taking a Sunday stroll?"

He was deeply shaken. Wolfram and Hart had been his best hope of getting the vampire contained quickly, and Lilah's over confidence had let them all down. Far from being contained, Angelus was now loose in LA and no good was going to come from that at all.

Lilah took a deep shuddering breath. "W-what was that? I've never seen anything move so fast."

"That, you stupid woman, was Angelus. Not the half-domesticated guy I used to work for. I suggest you imagine your worst nightmare and then keep on imagining...and your unbelievable incompetence has let him loose on this city."

*~*~*~*~*

He was bored. Dru had dragged him into this graveyard because the moon had told her that Daddy wanted to see her. After half an hour of watching her talking to a stone angel, he was so bored he decided to risk leaving her alone and explore. The open door of the church hall, with its white light spilling out into the night, attracted him and he found himself lurking in the doorway, watching the young people dancing inside. Then he saw her - long red hair falling in elegant waves over her dark forest green kaftan, her pale skin almost luminous even in the brightly lit hall. She must have sensed him watching her because she turned towards him. Green eyes surrounded by dark lashes met his and she untangled her arms from her dance partner and made her way over to the doorway.

"Bon soir."

He panicked. All the French Angelus had ever tried to beat into him completely left his head. "Um. I'm English, love. Parlez vous Anglais?"

She laughed a rich, sweet sound like honey and brandy. "A little. Hello. You want to join the party?"

"Are you inviting me?" Hey, this was better than watching Dru talk to statues. A whole church party all to himself.

She laughed again and put her hand out to him. As their hands touched, she shivered. "Froid. Cold. Come in. I will warm you. My name is Lizabet. What do they call you?"

"Spike." He answered as he followed her over the threshold.

There was blood on his hands. Blood on his face. His clothes were warm, wet and sticky from it. It was dripping from his hair and ran into his eyes. The lifeless body of the red head was lying at his feet, naked and spread-eagled, railroad spikes driven through ankles and wrists. Her genitalia blooded from the knife he had used, the blood and come mixing freely as they ran together from her opened body. He raised his yellow eyes to the dark heavens and roared his defiance, triumph and gle
~*
~*~*~*~

Spike rolled off the blankets, holding his gut and retching. His body was covered in sweat, his clothes clinging wetly to his body. The dampness in the front of his jeans and his still painful arousal testified to the vividness of the nightmare.

"Are you okay?" Fred, tousled from sleep, appeared at the bedroom door. Peering at her houseguest, through the gloom of the evening she saw he was lying curled up on his side near the wall, away from the makeshift bed.

"I thought I heard something." She started back when he lifted his head, but a year working for Angel allowed her to see beyond the yellow demon eyes to the tortured soul underneath. She moved slowly forward, stopping only when a growl emanated from the figure on the floor.

She put out a tentative hand, not daring to touch. "Spike? It's me. Fred. I won't hurt you, I promise."

The growling slowly stopped, only to be replaced by hacking sobs. She moved forward, saw that the vampire's human features had returned, and that cold tears were streaming down his face as he hugged himself and rocked slowly back and forth. Quietly, she sat beside him and pulled him towards her, encasing him in the warmth of her arms, his tears chilling her shoulder.

"Hush. Hush." There was something in his eyes that reminded her of how she had felt sometimes in Pylea, something broken and destroyed, and someone who felt terribly, terribly alone. Eventually, half-coherent words punctuated the sobs.

"I-I killed her. I killed her. I killed her. She was a kid and I killed her. She trusted me. Invited me to join her, and I took her and broke her, and raped her, and tortured her and killed her." Quiet. "And I enjoyed it. It was fun."

Fred tightened her hold, gently stroking the heaving back; absently noticing that the skin had healed in the days that had passed since Angelus' attack. "It was the demon that killed her, the demon that enjoyed it. You can't blame yourself for what the demon did."

"No. Not just the demon, the man. The man enjoyed it." Spike pulled away from her arms and turned to the wall, raising his arms to cover his face. "I can still feel her. Her warmth around me while I took her. She fought so hard but I didn't stop. The demon didn't care. All it ed wed was the blood. It was the man who took her, enjoyed her."

Fred froze. Angel had never spoken of the nightmares he suffered, but she had lived in the hotel with him for almost a year. She knew that there were some days when he did not sleep and others when he awoke screaming. Equally he had never spoken of Angelus, the demon that shared his body and how the two of them coexisted. She had seen that human blood aroused the demon within him, but couldn't even start to comprehend where the man she respected ended and the demon she feared began. This was new and frightening information, if what Spike was claiming was true for him then maybe it was also true for Angel. Could he have enjoyed the things Angelus had done? She did know that after the nightmares and the days spent pacing the floor of his room, he was desperate for a case, driving himself harder and fing ing with renewed vigour.

"How can I live with that? How can I live knowing that I am as bad as the demon? Even worse than it?" Spike started to bang his head against the wall.

Fred took a moment before answering. Really there was nothing comforting she could say. He was right. How could the man live with that?

"You're right." Spike stopped and looked back at her, his drawn face questioning.

"You can't live an ordinary life knowing those things. If you were human you would be in prison. That isn't possible. Instead you have a prison of your own making, your soul. I don't know if you will get the same redemption as Angel, but I know that trying to make things right will help. It's too late for the people you killed, but by fighting with us, or with the Slayer, maybe your soul can live with what the man has done."

She stood quietly and walked into the kitchen leaving the vampire staring after her, an unfathomable look on his face.

When she returned carrying two mugs, coffee for herself and pig's blood for Spike, she found him pulling on his jacket, his boots already laced. "Where do you think you're off to? You're not anything like well enough to be going out."

He looked up, surprised. He hadn't expected her to be back so soon. "I need to find him. Not sure what I'll do when I do find him. But we need to know where he is and what he's doing."

He turned towards the door then hesitated. "About before?" His voice sounded harsh. "I'd appreciate it if you don't tell anybody. Bad enough I'm a vampire; they'd never trust me if they heard that."

"Can we trust you, Spike?"

The vampire stood straighter, pulling his shoulders back. "With your life, pet. I'm on the good guys side now, remember?" He walked out of the door; the only trace of the hideous injuries he had suffered was a slight limp in his left leg.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*

"Hello?"

Willow sat at the top of the stairs not listening to Dawn who was answering the telephone.

"Hey, Angel. Buffy's not..."

It had been a difficult summer with the coven and the experience had left her shaken to the core.

"You don't? Okay..."

Even at the height of her powers, she hadn't really understood what she had been capable of.

"Things are all right, I suppose. Hey, Willow's back. Do you want...?"

The coven had left her with no room for doubt.

"No? She's better, sort of, just..."

And they told her she would just have to learn to wit with it.

"We could? Shopping? That would be soo cool."

Have to live with torturing and flaying a man alive.

"This weekend? Yeah, that's doable."

And nearly destroying the world.

"I'll talk her into it. Believe me when I say, no one can withstand the Dawn whinge..."

It was all inside her, they said.

"You have never been on the...Oh, then."

And they had helped.

"Buffy? I'll leave her a note. She's away until Sunday night, some sort of sales training rally thing for the Double Meat..."

But what she really needed was someone to talk to.

"Friday night then, at the bus station."

Someone who understood what it was like to live with a monster trapped inside them.

"We'll see you Friday."

Someone like...

"And Angel? Thanks, we need this, all of us, especially Willow."

Angel.