Turnabout

"So, what? You think we can trust this guy? I mean, we are still talkin' about a vamp that's tried to kill you. Both you's from the stories I heard Cordy tell." Gunn hoisted his box into the trunk Angel held open.

"Something's not right here," Angel conceded.

"It's a demon motel, and we're here as a taxi service for one of those demons. I don't see much that is right."

"That's part of the problem. Spike's not acting like a demon." Angel slammed the trunk closed.

"You think he's playin' us?"

"Knowing Spike, I doubt it," Angel smiled ruefully, "I never was able to teach him an appreciation for strategy and subterfuge." He thought of the various ass-kickings that Spike managed to secure for himself through iiencience or impetuousness. "No. I'm more concerned about what's going on between him and Xander. They were never friends."

"You think he's trying to keep us from talking to this guy for a reason?"

"It's possible." Angel guiltily reflected on his experience of the boy and admitted to himself that Spike could easily be taking advantage not simply of Xander's deep and unspoken need to be wanted but of his corresponding need to have someone else take control. Both needs placed him firmly in the camp of someone Spike could manipulate easily. A flare of uncertain jealousy rose as images of the two men together came unbidden to his mind. Xander on his knees before Spike, obedient and desperate to please. Spike lashing out with fists or belt to give Xander the pain he craved.

Angel rubbed his face wearily, hoping to dispel the mental pictures.

"Angel? You alright, man?" Gunn scrutinized him.

"They should be ready to go." Angel pushed himself from the leaning stance on the car and began pacing.

"You gonna tell me what you think's goin' on?" Gunn watched him carefully.

Angel remained silent for a moment.

"I'm afraid Spike may be hurting Xander."

"Hurting?"

"But I'm more concerned that Xander may be letting him."

"Huh? You wanna clear that up for me?" Gunn moved to stand in front of Angel and stop the restless pacing.

"This place smells like human despair and pain. Not something I associate with Xander." Not even when I used the whip. Pain, yes, but excitement, arousal, and need, not despair.

"So what do you usually associate with this guy?" Despite himself, Gunn couldn't help but be intrigued to know what vamp senses caught that he missed.

Angel thought for a moment. "Sunshine. And earth."

Gunn rolled his eyes. "Forget it, man. Sorry I asked."

But Angel closed his eyes and reached into memories of years spent bickering with and fighting alongside Xander. "He was stability for the Slayer and the rest of the Sunnydale group. He's human. Utterly and completely human, and the rest of them aren't to some extent."

"That the earth part?" Gunn found himself immediately associating with this description. It wasn't too far off the ways that he thought of himself within the Angel Investigations group.

"Mm hmm."

"So what's with the sunshine smell?"

"Hope. Trust. Loyalty. More than any of the others, really. He's their stability, but he's also the heart." He glanced at Gunn. "Don't laugh. Buffy told me that one. It seems there was a spell they used, and Xander was the heart. I'm not sure what it means, but it struck me as right when she said it."

"And this is the guy that Spike doesn't want us to talk to? I'm beginnin' to see the problem. How you wanna play this?"

"We go along with him. For now." Angel clenched his jaw.

Gunn nodded and stepped out of the way as the pair walked back toward the motel.

Angel cleared his throat as he and Gunn returned to the doorway of Xander's room. Xander guiltily jumped back from Spike's embrace, but the vampire caught his hand before he could get too far away. Despite his embarrassment, the human appreciated the contact. After a brief squeeze he took a shallow breath and dropped the vampire's hand. Xander looked anywhere but at Angel as he gathered his coat off the bed and took one last look around the room. He didn't doubt that Spike had managed to fit everything he owned in the two cardboard boxes he had sent out to the car, so his search was cursory at best. He pulled his keys out of his pocket and dropped them on the center of his bed. Despite the squalor of the place, it had been home, and Xander couldn't help feeling once again the lack of stability that overwhelmed him at the loss of Sunnydale. It seemed that there would never be a place he could call home.

The other men remained silent as Xander followed them out the door, closing it with a final click. Awkwardness and an uncertainty as to what might be acceptable conversation ensured that the silence continued. The foursome had almost reached Angel's car when a dozen vampires stepped out of the shadows. A low voice purred through the night.

"How shameful Angelus. Have you forgotten your manners? I never took you for a common thief." The vampires stood back to let the figure through.

Suddenly the elusive scent that had been tickling at Angel's senses since arriving at the motel became a tangible memory. "Vi. What a nice surprise. I wouldn't have expected to see you here." Angel stepped in front of his companions, masking his shock and subtly indicating to them to stay back, "Paris not working out for you anymore?" Spike could feel Xander shrinking in on himself as the beautiful vampire approached.

"Ah yes, I'd forgotten that delightful evening with your little brood," she winked at Spike. "I remember dear William's eagerness to sample what was on offer that night." Her voice turned to steel, "It would seem that his impulses have not been curbed any. He disrespects my house by handling my property without proper compensation."

"Your property?" Angel enquired politely.

"Alexander. He belongs to me. If you would like to negotiate, I might be persuaded to allow you to use him for an evening. He is still a bit inexperienced, but as I recall, breakings ins in has always been a particular delight for you." She sashayed closer to Angel, tracing her fingers down his chest. Gunn's grip on his crossbow tightened, and Spike shifted his demonic features to the fore. Angel struggled to remain calm, grateful for the fact that vampires couldn't blush.

"Yes, you would find Alexander quite a treasure. He is a born submissive. So responsive to punishment, to pain." She shifted her gaze to Xander's mortified face. "Definitely not a switch, however. The only time I ever had to give a refund was to a customer who asked the boy to tie him up and spank him. Seems he just couldn't perform." She exuded a sickeningly sweet sympathy.

Spike could feel the shame, despair, and terror rolling off his friend, and he knew that Viola reveled in it, which fueled his own rage at this demon who dared to claim Xander as her own. At the same time see sensed his Sire's uneasiness and suspected it had little to do with Viola's references to his proclivities as Angelus. Seems there was something else going on here, but he struggled to keep still and wait for Angel's cue, silently urging his Sire to make a bloody move and get Xander out of here.

"William." Angel kept his gaze focused on Viola.

"Yes, Sire?" Spike played the dutiful Childe to give the impression of a unified front. Inwardly, he made plans to remind Angel that he was no longer the all-powerful Sire, but for Xander's sake he allowed the older vampire to adopt the role.

"Take Xander to the car." Spike moved to obey, but Xander had trouble making hist wot work through his terror. He struggled to find a way to keep his friends safe. The vampires that Mistress Viola brought had not advanced any closer, but Xander feared the moment when all the posturing would dissolve into inevitable violence. Over him. He was powerless top itp it, and he knew it, but he still tried to step forward into the fray.

"Ah, ah, pet," Spike whispered low in his ear, "no throwing yerself on the sword this time. Angel knows what he's doing." He steered the man toward the waiting convertible with a bruising grip on his arm.

"You would risk discord between the house of Aurelius and the house of Teilenon over this human trash? This junkie whore?" Disgust warred with disbelief as she flung the insult after the retreating men.

"No, Vi. You initiated discord by taking what was already mine. I'm merely reclaiming him. Be grateful that all I intend to do tonight is reclaim him. By rights, you owe me compensation for the insult." Angel's conscience twisted under the strain of the statement. True, he had claimed Xander. If not completely or intentionally, the sexual encounter that left the human alive still marked the boy to an extent. But Angel couldn't look back on that single night without a measure of shame.

"He belongs to Aurelius?" Her eyes narrowed, "I found no claim mark on him. Have you become so human that you've forgotten how to mark a pet?" Scorn underscored her words though worry shot through her. The vague scent of Aurelius had surrounded the boy in the early days of his tenure at Earl's NiteLife, but she brushed it off when he willingly came first to Sang-Froid and then to her stable of prostitutes to pay for his addiction.

"I don’t need to mark family," Angel continued to use the same deadly polite tone.

"Family? He bears no Consort mark, and you forget the boy contracted himself to me. It appears he has no use for your abomination of a house." She flicked her fingers toward the waiting minions. "I will keep what is mine."

With Xander safely ensconced in the back of the car, Spike immediately joined Angel and Gunn in the resulting fray. The next several minutes passed in a flurry of limbs, fangs, and stakes resulting in a drastic reduction in minions. Spike in particular took enraged glee in ripping heads from shoulders when he considered that any one of these vampires might have touched his boy. The battle ended abruptly with Viola pressed against the hood of a car, one of Angel's hands around her neck and the other pressing a stake to her chest.

"I might have been persuaded to accept the sacrifice of your minions in retribution for your mistreatment of Xander, but your continued insults really pissed off my Childe." He glanced over at Spike's hastily covered expression of shock. "So consider the conflict between our houses ended." He pressed the stake home and brushed the dust from his jacket. He, Gunn, and Spike remained the only figures in the parking lot.

"Let's go." Angel gestured to the others, hoping to forestall questions from Gunn. Spike was already headed back to the car where he got into the back seat with Xander.