Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters… it's all so sad. Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy own it all.

From The Desk of Angel

Sunrise

(This takes place after the events of ANGEL Season 4 Finale "Home")

"Waiting for the sunrise." If anyone asked me, that's what I'd tell them. Not that anyone did of course. I'm alone in my office now.

My office. Not the one in the Hyperion that's dim and warm, and smells like old books and dust. That's behind me now. You'd think that after all this time, all these years, I'd be use to change. That it wouldn't bother me to pick up and move and never look back. But it does this time.

Not that the old hotel has a whole lot of great memories for me. I wonder how the realtor will explain the giant pentagram that's still visible on the lobby floor? Oh well, not really my problem. I do have problems, but that one isn't mine anymore.

Dawn is coming. I can feel it just below the horizon though the sky is no less dark than it was. And I sit and wait for it, in my office with the curtains thrown back, completely exposed to it. Of course, I'm not worried because my office is now inside Wolfram and Hart- the belly of the beast. Fitting somehow that the light can't touch me here.

"The beast's belly...doesn't that usually mean you've been eaten?" Yep, I was going to march in here and tell them they could kiss my vampire ass. That they didn't have anything I needed or wanted. But it wasn't me that needed what they had, it was Connor. And how could I not give him what he needed? And now he's gone and I get the fabulous resources of Wolfram and Hart. It only cost me everything. No, scratch that. I lost my son- again- and I've lost the comfort of anyone even remembering that he existed. But when I think about Wesley, Fred, Cordy, Gunn and Lorne I realize that I have so much more to lose in this deal. It's only a matter of time before the bill comes due. What will I do when it does? I've been alive for too long not to know when I'm being given enough rope to hang myself. Wolfram and Hart couldn't destroy me, so they are going to let me destroy me. I get that. I knew it then but I made the decision anyway. Because there was no other way.

So I wait for the sunrise, and through the necro-tempered glass I'll watch it in all it's glory. I've paid for that much at least.

The First Day

(This takes place right after the dual season premier of season premier "Convictions" and "Just Rewards")

"I'm from Wolfram and Hart." Everytime I say it, it sounds bad. I hear it, it's my voice... and it's just Wrong. Capital "W".

But it's all "Wrong"- everything about Wolfram and Hart... Everything with my team... Spike... SPIKE! God, he's the most wrong of all the wrong things. No, actually THAT'S wrong. I'm the most wrong of them all .

They all think I'm being broody. That this deal we've struck with Wolfram and Hart is stuck in my craw. That I'm angry because I can't help Cordy. And now Spike shows up and I'll have to deal with him somehow. Well yeah, ALL that... and then there is what they don't know. And hell, I don't even know what it is they think they know. I can't exactly walk up to one of them and say "Oh by the way, how do you remember your life this past year?" I can't talk to any of them about Connor or even how Cordy really ended up comatose. My friends believe in a lie and I'm the one who gave them that lie... so yeah, I've got stress.

We were all surprised and leery of Gunn when he told us what he let Wolfram and Hart do to him. But inside I know I'm a hypocrite. We both made deals with the Devil- but at least he's up front about his. His decision may ultimately effect us all, but he only changed himself. I took it upon myself to change all their lives without their knowledge. I know how I would react if I found out someone had done that to me so I pray they never find out what I did to them. I wouldn't expect them to understand or forgive me and I wouldn't ask... because in the same circumstances I'd do it again.

So, tomorrow, when I have to say "I'm from Wolfram and Hart." it will still sound wrong but it will be necessary. And I will help the hopeless with the resources I have. I will protect the innocent from the most evil of our evil clients and I will try to keep my poor deceived friends safe. I don't know if The Powers That Be are still guiding me, but I still have a mission- a path. So I'll keep on it until I get to wherever it leads. Hopefully it's not a dead-end.

Ok, so maybe I'm a little broody.

Spike

(This takes place right after the dual season premier of season premier "Convictions" and "Just Rewards")

Guilt. If you let it, guilt can rise up and swallow you whole. Make you weak and helpless and keep you from doing what you need to do. Yep, it sucks all right.

When I first got my soul back, all I'd done as Angelus came to me with crystal clarity and I was horrified. Horrified that I'd done those things, but also horrified that I felt guilt over doing them. I understood very well Darla's disgust with me- a vampire who felt bad for killing! I was disgusted with myself. I wanted to be what I had been... but I couldn't.

Guilt breeds more guilt and I'm a prime example of that.

Which is why Spike bothers me so damn much. Sure, it's not like we were ever buddies. Even when I was evil, he was Dru's plaything, nothing more. And I can't even think about this "thing" he had with Buffy.

But of everything there is to despise about Spike, what gets to me the most is that he got his soul back- but doesn't seem to have the guilt part to go with it.

Three weeks in a basement, mumbling to himself like a nutcase and then he's FINE? Where was THAT program when I got mine back?

Maybe it's because he asked for his back and mine was a punishment. Maybe The Powers That Be or whoever is responsible thought a vampire who was actually asking for his soul back was pathetic enough.

But what about the guilt? It should still be there. I've come to the realization that no matter how much good I do now, the guilt for what I did then is always going to be with me. Hell, the guilt for things I've done to do good, is always going to be with me. Remember what I said about guilt breeding guilt?

So... where is Spike's guilt?

Champions

(This takes place after "Hellbound".)

Fred said that Spike is a champion... just like me. I didn't argue. I've heard that word so many times, been called it and I've never argue with it. For awhile I might have even believed it was true, but mostly it's just been a word. Now they are calling Spike one. Why? Because he saved the world and sacrificed himself? Because he's a vampire with a soul? Sounds familiar.

I want to argue that he's nothing like me, that he's done everything for selfish reasons. He saved the world, yes, but he did it for Buffy, not for the good of mankind. He fights on the side of good, but he does that because that's where Buffy is. He's done some petty things...Ran around here distracting Fred with his problem when she was trying to help with finding Nina. And I wonder, would he have saved Wes or Gunn if our friend the doctor had grabbed one of them instead of Fred? I'd like to point these things out to all or them and tell them he's a fake. That just because he's a vampire with a soul, it doesn't make him good and it doesn't make him a champion.

But if I do that, how long before they start looking at me?

Why am I a champion? How long after I got my soul back did I pull myself out of sewer and become a "champion"? Too long. And why did I do that to begin with? Buffy. Where would I be now if I'd had walked away from Whistler?

I can point at Spike and tell them he's a charlatan but then I will call attention to myself... and we are more alike than I will ever admit outside my own thoughts. My road to redemption began the same way, and for the same reason, that his has.

Whether for guilt or love, what does it matter WHY he's on the side of good... so long as he is. Maybe I need to step back and acknowledge that outside my own head. Maybe I should give him more of the benefit of the doubt that this isn't going to be a passing fancy with him. And that I can turn my back on him once in awhile without waiting for the stab.

Of course having your back turned is how you usually get bit in the ass.

Perpetual Torment

(This takes place after "Destiny")

So Spike beat me. So what? Bound to happen just by the odds. How many fights have we had, how many times did I beat him down... so... it had to happen sooner or later.

Of course, none of those other fights mattered. None of them was to determine one of our destinies. And when it came down to it, I choked.

I fought him as hard as I could and he won. First time and only time it mattered... and he won. Gunn says that it doesn't matter, doesn't mean anything because the cup was a trick. No one got to Shanshu. It was a joke. The only thing Spike beat me too was a mouthful of warm Mountain Dew.

But it matters to me. The fact that the cup wasn't real doesn't take away the fact that we both thought it was. We fought as though it were real... and I lost.

I can shake off the "what if's" but I can't shake the "what's it mean." Because it means something. Sirk said that the one who drinks first was meant to. And sure, the cup was a lie but what he said wasn't. The one who is destined to Shanshu, will. No matter how hard I try, I can't stop myself from thinking that maybe Spike wanted it more. I can't bring myself to think that he deserves it more because then I have to think about all the reasons why he doesn't deserve it. How many he's killed, lives ruined by his rampages... which makes me think about the reason for THAT. And that reason is me.

So instead I'll go with "he wanted it more." Which doesn't make me feel any better really, because how could he want it more than me? That means something too now doesn't it?

And let's not forget that I don't know who set this fun little exercise up, or why.

Great. More to brood about.

Sides and Trust

(this takes place after "Damage")

Buffy doesn't trust me.

It's not the first time. Knowing how her life is and how my un-life is, it probably won't be the last time. I heard what Andrew said and I would have really loved to pop his head off for it. But that wouldn't have changed the fact that what he said was the truth. Buffy doesn't trust me. She doesn't think we are on the same side anymore.

And what can I say about that? That since taking over Wolfram and Hart, I've done good? That I've prevented things that I couldn't have prevented without the resources I have now? That I can make a difference that I couldn't have made before? It's all true... every word of it is the truth.

Cordy said once that Angelus lies with the truth. I guess now I do too.

The grey area seems to stretch on, widening every day that I sit behind that desk and Spike is out doing my job, as he put it. Eve tried to kill me and I'm forced to take it in stride, and watch while my team-my friends- take it a bit too easily in stride. They seem too well adjusted... but on the upside, at least they do seem to trust me. Now I wonder what that says about them.

It hurts that she doesn't trust me.

It scares me that I don't trust me.

The Apple

(This takes place after the first 12 episodes of Season 5, starting with "Conviction" and ending with "You're Welcome")

When Eve gave me that apple, I took a big bite- because I knew where the worm was. Wolfram & Hart was evil, but we could change it.

What a crock. A worm is a worm. You can't make it be anything else. The more you hack it into pieces, the more worm you have to deal with.

I'm pretty sure I knew that at the beginning. I made a big speech to the others about how we were going to make a difference- I think I still had hope. But now I'm more convinced that I was, at best, protecting them. At worse, deceiving them more. Keeping them from thinking too hard and long about what it is we've done... what I've done.

I've been waiting for one of them to ask me how we got here. I'm worried that they will... and even more worried that they haven't. They do their jobs, towing the company line, happy in the "grey area" that we now inhabit. I've done the math, I've stacked the good we've done against the "compromises"... No matter what, it hasn't balanced out for me.

I cut off the head of an employee who was killing virgins. But I let the son of a bitch running a slavery operation AND who hid a deadly virus inside his own son's body, live.

I killed the head of my security team because he tried to kill me. But Eve attached a coma inducing parasite to me and she lived to tell the tale. Yep, I remember that we helped Nina and killed the Necromancer, contained Pavayne and stopped Dana's psycho slayer rampage without killing her. So I asked myself, what are those? Marks in our "good" column when we have to let something evil slip by?

And what about those parasite induced dreams. Doesn't take Freud to figure out I'm having trust issues. Feeling lost- I know it- and not trusting my friends to help me come back. Sometimes a cigar is a cigar and sometimes a stake in the heart is a stake in the heart. Although he doesn't remember it, Wesley's betrayed me before... Gunn and Lorne let them mess around in their heads for God's sake! Fred... sometimes she gets a look on her face, and I just know she's going to ask. But then she goes back to work in her lab.

They've changed and I don't trust them. But since I'm the one who brought them here , and every move I make might be playing right into the Senior Partner's hands, how can I trust me?.

It's a common theme it seems. And why not? Spike has apparently been doing what I'm suppose to be doing. Spike! I can't even count the number of ways that's wrong. The crazy thing is that he's not even at the top of my list of worries. Andrew was right when he said we already have enough problems. Whoever sent the cyborg wanted to control me. The Slayers, while perhaps not exactly against me, certainly aren't with me. I didn't even want to think about what would happen if the time came when Buffy thinks that greyness has become a bit too dark.

So I had enough of that color. I decided that it was going to be black and white from now on. That I couldn't do this anymore. I was quitting and going back to where I belong.

And then Cordy woke up.

I was lost. This whole time I've been floundering around in this mess without my guide. Doubting the Shanshu prophesy, even while daring to hope it might still be real... because without Cordy, The Powers seemed so far away. Like they didn't care anymore or didn't exist. All my doubts were overwhelming me, keeping me from remembering who I am... But she reminded me. She showed me the way, again. Made me believe in myself and showed me that I still have a path.

She woke up because I AM where I belong. I just needed her to show me that. Needed her to look at me and see what I was so that I could see that I STILL am what I was:

I'm Angel and I beat the bad guys.

Wolfram and Hart is evil but I'm not. I can say that we will do good and not doubt it because I know it's the truth now. Because Cordy believed it was true.

And now she's gone.