Stricken

Part Five


“Xander! Damn it, boy, would you calm down and get back here!”

Resisting the urge to do just that, Xander continued to run up the staircase, ignoring the whining wolf pacing in his mind that wanted to do nothing more than crawl over and lie at Angel’s feet.

No way, nuh uh. Get over it. It is not gonna happen!

He could hear Wesley mutter something and heard Angel start up the stairs behind him as he frantically grasped the door knob and yanked the door open, stumbling through. A heavy weight hit his back before he could take another step and he snarled as he hit the carpet face down.

“Get the hell off me!” he yelped, struggling under Angel’s body as the vampire pinned him firmly to the ground.

“We aren’t finished talking about this, Xander. Just calm down!” Angel growled against his neck and he shivered, pushing down the insane desire to tilt his head to the side in submission.

“I’m finished! I’m so finished. I did not come here so I could be Angelus’ little attack dog! I wanted to make sure I couldn’t hurt people, not ‘cause truly impressive carnage’! Not just carnage, Angel, impressive carnage!”

“Xander…”

Every muscle in his body quivered as he fought with himself, half of him wanting to relax and let Angel sink down against him, show his throat in trust and obedience and just let the vampire take care of things. The other half wanted to run, run fast and forget he had ever showed up in LA, because things just kept spiraling more and more out of control.

Tied to Angel and Angelus?

It was only his kind of luck.

To his horror, he felt his body start to relax against the floor and furiously started twisting in the vampire’s grasp, vision flashing as his eyes changed, giving him just enough strength to wriggle halfway out from under Angel. Turning the top half of his body around, he reached out and punched him hard in the jaw.

“I said get off me!” he snarled, heart beating rapidly.

Angel snarled back, face changing as he grabbed Xander’s wrist, then the other, holding them both tightly in one hand as he rose to his knees, jerking Xander up to face him. They crouched there like that, staring warily at each other, Xander’s chest heaving from the struggle, for a minute or two.

Angel finally shook away his demon visage and started speaking softly.

“I know this is hard but you came here because you had nowhere else to go. Running away now isn’t going to do anything except maybe get someone hurt.”

“I came here because I wanted you to kill me, not make me into some kind of killing machine,” he reminded Angel sulkily, trying to twist his wrists away from the firm grasp the vampire had on them but not getting too far.

Angel rolled his eyes, sighing.

“I am not going to make you into any kind of killer. Why in the hell would I want to do that? But according to what Wesley said, I might be able to help you control it.”

He paused, eyes narrowing at Xander. “And I’m still a little insulted that you thought you could show up here and I would kill you, easy as that. We never hated each other that much. What was I supposed to tell Buffy or Willow when they called looking for you? ‘Oh I killed him, but don’t worry, he told me to do it’?”

Xander had the grace to look a little ashamed, studying the pattern on the carpeted floor.

“I wasn’t really thinking much of anything at the time,” he admitted, before his eyes got wide and he looked back at Angel. “Oh shit! Willow and Buffy! I never told them I was leaving.”

Angel shook his head, asking, “You were coming here to die but didn’t even bother telling your two best friends that you were even leaving town? Do your parents know where you are, does Giles?”

He shrugged, saying quietly, “No one knows, my parents wouldn’t give a damn, anyway.” Looking across at the vampire, he admitted, “I should have told Wills something, anything, but I seriously wasn’t thinking at all, Angel. It’s insane, that first day before I turn, I’m surprised I even made it here. Fuck.. I just want it to stop.”

Feeling the wolf pace and snap its teeth in his mind at that, Xander tried to jerk away from Angel’s hold, the firm touch of the vampire making him feel his wolf more vividly, more intensely, instead of helping to calm it.

Angel wasn’t letting go, though, and pulled the hand holding his wrists upwards quickly, which would have worked if Xander hadn’t twisted and growled at the same time, losing his balance and falling solidly against the vampire’s broad chest.

He groaned almost inaudibly as the hard contact sent shivers of sensation down his spine, shaking his head to clear it. Trying to arch away from Angel’s chest, all he did was bring his thighs into contact with the vampire’s, causing the older man to jerk backwards, his hand tightening on Xander’s wrists.

“Xander! Calm. Down,” Angel gritted out, holding his wrists high until the command in the vampire’s voice made the wolf hunker down, tail between its legs in the back of his mind. When Xander stopped struggling, Angel slowly brought his hand down, lowering Xander’s wrists so that they were comfortably in front of him, allowing him to sit back on his heels instead of leaning against the vampire.

Which really eased some of the pounding in his heart, not that he wanted to explore the reason for that quite yet.

Didn’t he have enough to worry about, already?

“You’re going to bruise,” Angel murmured, and Xander felt the light touch down to his toes when the vampire’s thumb made gentle circles along the red skin around one of his wrists. His eyes widened and he jerked his hands back, resting them on his thighs as he stared at Angel.

The older man coughed and glanced away before looking back at him.

“Look, this is all as big a surprise to me as it is you, but I’d like you to stay. Wesley thinks this bond can help some and obviously no one in Sunnydale can help if they didn’t even realize something was wrong for over a month. Let’s just.. take it a day at a time, okay? Let us help you.”

He was so tired. All he wanted to do was lean on the other man and trust him to take care of everything, but he knew it had to be partly the wolf talking because Angel? Taking care of him? Should be a terrifyingly hilarious thought, not one that was starting to sound.. really good.

Xander nibbled on his lip for a moment, then glanced back up at Angel’s face, asking quietly, “Angelus?”

The vampire shook his head with a chagrined look, mumbling, “It’s always possible he might escape again, I won’t lie to you, Xander. But I was deliberately goading you earlier with him and I’m sorry for that. I didn’t know it would upset you enough to make you think you had to leave.”

He paused, looking Xander in the eyes intently. “As far as I can tell, Angelus has no control whatsoever over you and he won’t as long as I’m here. Okay?”

Nodding tiredly, Xander sighed, wondering if he was well on his way to yet another colossal screw-up. “I’ll stay, then. For now.”

“Good, that’s.. good. You need to get some rest now, we still have tonight and tomorrow night to start working on controlling the wolf. There’s half a dozen bedrooms upstairs you can pick from, just let me know which one you want.”

Angel stood up and held out a hand and after a moment, Xander let him pull him to his feet. They stood there awkwardly for a moment, looking everywhere but at each other, but Xander finally breathed a deep breath in and said softly, “Thanks. For.. ya know.. everything.”

Angel looked over at him, startled, before nodding abruptly. “No problem. Really.”

Xander fidgeted a second more, before turning towards the stairs leading to the second floor, pausing to ask, “Can I call Willow later?”

He started at the feel of Angel’s hand on his shoulder and turned his head back to see the older man standing behind him.

“Of course, Xander. You’re going to be staying here, make yourself at home.”

He breathed out and nodded, some of the tension knotting his stomach easing a little. Angel’s hand squeezed once before dropping and Xander smiled at him, turning back to walk up the stairs. Feeling the vampire’s eyes on him, he paused halfway up, glancing back to see Angel standing at the foot of the stairs, hands thrust into his pockets, dark eyes following him steadily.

“One day at a time?”

“Yeah. One day at a time.”