The Price to Be Paid

by Lesera128

Angel fulfills the Shanshu Prophecy & gets his human life back, but Brennan makes a decision & intervenes, changing everything, when he suffers an accident that makes it clear the Senior Partners at W&H are trying to take it away from him. Bones/Angel crossover. AU. Sequel to "Toe to Toe"-"Barging In"-"Making Him Beg"-"Comfort on the Edge of Reason"-"The After Party." Complete.

1. Part I: The Need for the Bargain

The Price to Be Paid

By: Lesera128 & dharmamonkey

Rated: M

Disclaimer: Here we posit our normal rigmarole. No, we don't own anything from Bones or Angel... or anything else. Yes, we're wreaking what havoc we can with these characters that we don't own to create an awesome story. But, since it's only for the purposes of creative enjoyment and amusing distraction, we think we're okay. Are there any other questions? No? ::blinks:: , then—moving on...

Summary: Angel fulfills the Shanshu Prophecy and gets his human life back, but Brennan makes a decision and intervenes, changing everything, when he suffers an accident that makes it clear the Senior Partners at Wolfram & Hart are trying to take it away from him. Bones/Angel crossover. Very, very AU. Sequel to "Toe to Toe," "Barging In," "Making Him Beg," "Comfort on the Edge of Reason," and "The After Party."

Logistical Notes: For those who are familiar with Whedon-verse, this story assumes the events through the end of Angel's series finale ("Not Fade Away") and the comic-book "Angel: After the Fall" are canon. It ignores all other stories in the Angel chronology, including the BTVS Season 8 in comics. For those who are wondering, in Bones chronology, this story would take place shortly before the Gemma Arrington case as depicted in 5x16 - "The Parts in the Sum of the Whole" flashback or approximately one year before the events in 1x01 - "Pilot."

A/N: Dharmasera, Inc. believes they've set a record with this former one-shot. It's now a whopping 70k words long (approximately) which means it won't be posting in a single day like the previous pieces—that's the bad news. The good news is that we hope to post a part per day over the next week (or so) until it's complete. Now the might-be good news or bad news depending on your point of view: this story arc will now draw on a grand tradition established by Joss Whedon in BtVS and AtS, i.e., use of the flashback. For those who are unfamiliar, the rule with Whedon-verse flashbacks are that there are no rules except they are a-linear as hell. We know this will be frustrating to some, but if you can't take it in this piece, we can guaran-damn-tee you that you won't like it in the other three in this series. All we can say is...well, sorry. We're not changing. For those who dig it, read on...

UNF Alert: Seriously...since when has a Dharmasera piece ever not needed one of these? ::blinks:: Well, even if it doesn't apply to the first part (alas, sadly, it does not), we don't want to confuse ourselves, so we're leaving it here as a placeholder. Consider it an IOU for unf-age to come. It's not like you don't know that we're good for it anyway. So, now, moving on...

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Part I: The Need for the Bargain

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Once she'd landed at LAX, Brennan found herself in what she'd always imagined purgatory must be like—if she believed in the notion that such a place existed—for almost twelve hours. It had been only twelve hours earlier that her entire world had been turned upside down by a single telephone call. Her stint in her self-labeled purgatory continued for another seventy-five minutes between when she landed and when she finally arrived at her final destination. During those seventy-five minutes, she began to wonder how non-evil souls could leave such a place without becoming clinically insane from the overwhelming uncertainty and building anxiety that they faced as they waited for something, anything to break the stalemate that they were in—the same stalemate that had rendered them into such a state of unknowing and seemingly unending listlessness with which they began. After a time, she felt her respiration grow shallow once again as she teetered on the edge of another panic attack. Knowing that she could ill afford such an occurrence when she was as close as she was to her final destination—and whatever news awaited her there, for better or worse—Brennan attempted to use logic and reason to calm herself. Focusing on the tasks of disembarking from the plane, carrying her small overnight bag through the airport, and going out into the balmy summer air of a Los Angeles night in mid-July, she managed to hold off on the panic attack. Once she was settled into the cab, however, the battle she was losing with her growing anxiety continued to get worse. All in all, she was rather proud of herself that she had lasted as long as she had with only one panic attack to her credit. After all, it wasn't like most people could handle things any better than she had given the fact that for almost twelve hours, she hadn't known what was going to happen to her, when, where, or how.

After the cab she'd hailed at the airport began its slow crawl down Sepulveda Boulevard, traffic even at the late hour had continued to draw out the painful waiting game as if to torture her. She persisted in attaining her goal as the cab she rode in inched its way towards the intersections of Sepulveda and Wilshire Boulevards that would herald her entry into the heart of downtown L.A. By the time the cab deposited her in front of Good Samaritan Hospital, the Brennan had found that the only way she could keep from going crazy and not having a relapse on her earlier panic attack was to repeat the factual information she knew and keep repeating it in her head.

Good Samaritan Hospital had been founded in 1885, although the current hospital building which the taxicab was taking her to had actually opened in 1976. It was a teaching hospital with 408 beds. It was open twenty-four hours and was a Level 2 Trauma Center. That designation meant that it could provide comprehensive trauma care, although it would send its worst cases to the nearby Level 1 Trauma Center at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center or Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center.

So, he hasn't been transferred yet, a voice in her head reminded her. If he'd been that far gone, they would've transferred him to another hospital. But, they didn't. So, be logical about this, Brennan. It can't be good, but whatever it is, it can't be that bad either since they haven't transferred him to Cedars-Sinai or UCLA Medical Center. He's still at Good Samaritan, so that means something that isn't completely negative in its connotations.

Even still, logic aside, Brennan was too afraid to hope for the best, and so had continued preparing herself for the worst. After all, they'd waited three days to call her. She wasn't sure how to feel about that. In a way, that proved that things were just as they'd wanted them to be—private and between them and no one else. Then again, it's not like she could assign blame to any of the team members of Angel Investigations for not calling her. For the most part, no one even knew that he'd want her to be called if things had gotten that bad, and she kept telling herself, that was exactly as it should be.

But, as time had progressed, eventually one person had remembered her and had made the call. One person who knew something of her, something of them, had made the effort to find her number and call her. And, she knew, he must've done it for a single reason. The person who made the call had thought that Angel was running out of time and that she needed to come to say goodbye. He'd been out of it for three days. But, finally, the call had come...and that's how she knew it had to be bad if the person who dialed her number and gave her the news had made the effort to find and dial her number to give her the news. Yes, it had to be bad..

Very bad.

But, he's not dead, that same calm and even voice of rationality kept echoing in her head. It was, a small part of her noted with irony, the same voice that she often used when teaching her students. It was a voice of logic, rationality, reason, and authority. If he was dead, you would know it, it reminded her. You would feel it. But, since you don't, he's not. He's not dead.

He's not dead.

She clung to that fact like a life preserver as she pulled the strap of her dark brown leather messenger bag more tightly against her shoulder as she went down the long hallway that the reception nurse had indicated she needed to walk down in order to find one Bobby Kent's ICU room when she claimed to be his wife recently returned to L.A. from an out of town business trip she'd been away on when her husband had had his unfortunate accident. The antiseptic smell that assaulted her nostrils made her face twitch.

She hated hospitals. She hated them. They only meant death and loss to her. In her entire life, one that spanned more than five centuries, she'd never entered a hospital building for any positive reason or ever left with good news. For her, there were no happy reasons to visit such a place. She'd never had many friends, let alone any that had ever had babies. She herself had never been pregnant, and so couldn't think of a single reason why hospitals shouldn't be associated with anything but illness and pain and suffering and grief and death...and loss.

But, you haven't lost him yet. He's not dead, the voice sharply reminded her again. Trust yourself. You haven't lost him yet. No matter how bad it is, he still has to be alive because you'd know...you'd know if he was dead.

She walked in silence for a for more moments. Then, as she turned a corner, she could sense she was getting close. She could feel the familiar pull of Angel's energy, drawing her towards him as he always had. It was weak, but it was still there.

He's still alive, that annoying voice chimed in her head again as it simultaneously gave her permission to breath a small, albeit reluctant, sigh of relief.. See? I told you. I was right. He isn't gone. He's still alive.

As her thoughts rattled around her head, the feeling that she was getting closer to Angel grew stronger. And, if her instincts hadn't been enough to confirm to her that she finally reached the correct place, as she turned one final corner, a small sitting area that was located a few feet away from a nearby circle of ICU rooms did so when she saw a solitary figure haphazardly lounging on a chair, flipping through what looked to be an old issue of Rolling Stone. The lone figure, clad in a dark black leather duster, looked up from his magazine when he heard the sharp echo of Brennan's boots reverberating in the hallway, clearly unimpressed with what he was reading or, for that matter, what had previously interrupted him. However, upon seeing Brennan, his blue eyes widened slightly with curiosity as he watched her approach. Brennan had apparently piqued his curiosity to the point that he was willing to abandon the current focus of his attention when he haphazardly he tossed the magazine onto the side table next to him with a disgusted grunt as she came to stand in front of him.

Nodding at the magazine, he grumbled, "This magazine isn't what it used to be, you know." He rolled his eyes. "They've finally gotten around to doing a piece of a blog that Billy Corgan posted on the net about why the Smashing Pumpkins really broke up in 2000. That is, I think, a perfect example of why printed rags like this are gonna go the way of the dodo before the net is said and done with things."

He stopped, his blue eyes glancing at the cover of the magazine, and then scowled lightly as he bemoaned, "I mean, the cheap bastards didn't even spring for a new photo shoot. They're just recycling pics they used from the Pumpkins' last tour for Adore in 1999." He shook his head and sighed. "I guess I should've known the whole rag was going to seed when they shitcanned the large ten by twelve format in favor of the standard magazine not too far back. I mean, for fuck's sake, you'd think a magazine with such a backwards-looking bias towards rock 'n' roll nostalgia would at least have the decency to stick with the old format for old time's sake. But, suppose not since they're just a bunch of unrepentant Baby Boomer tossers selling out to mass media marketing." He paused, glanced at the magazine again, shook his head, and then muttered, "I mean, what the fuck?"

For her part, Brennan stood quietly in front of him patiently waiting until he'd finished ranting for three reasons. First, she was still somewhat surprised and relieved that he was the only one that she was going to have to face and needed some time to let herself feel something positive after processing so many negative emotions during the course of her day. In truth, she'd expected—well, she wasn't certain whom she'd expected to see waiting there for her, but she hadn't expected it to be anyone that wouldn't ask questions or make things more difficult for her than they already were. It could've be any of them, she knew, and there was a small part of her that had dreaded who might've been at the ready to interrogate her as to her identity, her interest in Angel, and why they'd never really met her beyond one or two brief meetings several years earlier, if at all.

She'd expected to see the usual members of Angel's team—at least any of them who'd survived the final battle that had seen L.A. cast into hell for a year before it was returned to earth through no small effort of Angel's own doings. There had been casualties in that war—Wesley Wyndam-Pryce, most notably. The single person that Brennan might have been able to call a friend of her own—Winifred Burkle—was also no more. Now, an ancient goddess named Ilyria stood in Fred's place. Of course, that left Charles Gunn...and, Brennan suspected, Angel's son, Connor. She'd still yet to meet him, and for some reason she felt uneasy about potentially confronting the offspring of Angel and Darla.

Then, of course, there had also been the potential that, in addition to calling her, Spike might have reached out to the Slayer. That, perhaps, more than anything—besides the thought of losing Angel to death before she got there—was something that made Brennan the most apprehensive about coming to L.A. and going straight to the hospital with no foreknowledge of what to expect. Truthfully, Brennan didn't know how she'd react if and when she came face to face with Buffy Summers after all that time. There was still something to be said for having three thousand miles of a continental divide separating them. But, still, once Brennan got the call, she immediately decided she'd had no choice but to go since it was Angel about whom she was talking.

For him, she'd do anything...no matter how painful, no matter what the cost was to herself. For him, there was no sacrifice too small or too great she could make on his behalf. For him, she'd do what she had to do. She'd find somewhat to do what needed to be done. She'd find a way. For him, she'd do it...no questions asked.

Yes, for him—for him, she'd do anything.

It just happened to be the reality of fulfilling such aspirations that had jarred her a bit as she'd prepared potentially to confront his loss, and also doing so in front of an audience that might've contained such members as Connor and Buffy. However, when she saw Spike as the only one who would witness her arrival, she couldn't help but feel the overwhelming sense of relief and immense gratitude continue to grow with each minute she stood in front of him listening to his nostalgic rants about Rolling Stone magazine which suggested that perhaps, whether by luck or the force of some greater providence, Angel's condition was not as grave as she'd fearedse.

Still, as Brennan stood in front of Spike, she knew she still needed the verbal reassurance. Quite understandably, she was too afraid to trust what her instinct was already telling her before she heard it from him. Her piercing pale blue eyes stared at his for a long minute. She didn't say a word, but remained quiet as Spike looked at her, studying her. The vampire took in the sight of her tense body language and her silence and then nodded at her with a sigh, somehow knowing that which she needed to hear.

"He's okay," Spike said simply. "In fact, better than okay. He's awake now."

As soon as he'd spoken, the words he'd said seemed almost as if they had a magic of their own. It was almost as if he'd just lifted the weight of the world from Brennan's shoulders as she exhaled a long breath of relief that it felt like she'd been holding for half a day across a 3,000 mile transcontinental journey.

Thank you, a weaker and softer voice in her mind chimed. Oh, God...thank you.

She inhaled through her nostrils, and exhaled slowly through her mouth, repeating the process several times. After a couple of moments, finally able to move, she took a step towards the ensouled vampire that had been sired by Drusilla only a couple of decades after Brennan had taken up with Angelus, tilting her head as she asked, "Where is he?"

Spike nodded his blonde head in the direction of the nearby hall. "In with the Junior Bint," he replied. "Since he isn't much for talking yet, I think JB wants to take advantage of the silence." He stopped, cocking an eyebrow at Brennan as he added, "Then again, well, hell. I can't argue with the mini ponce there. He's got the right idea for once because I know I like the idea of taking advantage of the fact that McBroody can't aimlessly rant and ramble. I might just give the git a piece of my mind. Been wanting to share a few choice opinions with him actually, now that I think about it."

Spike crossed his arms across his chest as his lips curled into a smile, not paying attention to the look of amusement that crossed Brennan's face at Spike's comments about Angel's tendency to 'aimlessly rant and ramble' after the tirade he'd just gone off on about the mere annoyance he felt at a pop culture magazine.

"It's rather a nice change of pace knowing that I can give him the what for and don't have to listen to his endless prattle," the vampire continued.

After another minute, as he took in the sight of Brennan's still apprehensive body language despite the small smile that tugged at the corners of her tired lips, his voice softened just a touch as he tilting his head and continued, "You can go in and see him if you want. Gunn took the Blue Meanie back to the Hyperion so that they could get some sleep. That's why it's just me and the runtling on shift right now."

Brennan's eyes darted towards the hallway. There was a certain longing that flashed in them as she briefly considered his offer before it quickly disappeared. Shaking her head, Brennan refocused her eyes on Spike and then said slowly, "No, I-I...that is, I need to know first. Before anything else...can you tell me? What happened?"

The horrors that had played and replayed on an endless loop in her mind as to how and why Angel had ended up in the hospital briefly resumed in her mind. Pictures of random demons trying to tear him apart, minions of the Senior Partners crashing into his room at the Hyperion with broadswords, double-headed axes, and other sharp weapons, as well as local Angelino thugs with guns all rattled in her mind. She felt her breath catch in her throat again as she felt another surge of adrenaline cause her heart rate to increase and her breathing to go shallow once more as she paled slightly as she braced herself for whatever the answer to her question was.

Arching an eyebrow as the change in her bearing, he saw Brennan shake slightly even as she tried to maintain a physically neutral stance. His voice was still soft as he asked her, "You okay there, Elphie? You don't look so good. Maybe you should come over here and take a load off for a minute or two, huh?"

Wordlessly, Brennan stiffly walked and sat down on the same couch as Spike sat, taking the opposite end of what she knew by mere sight to be a very uncomfortable piece of furniture. Spike took that as a sign that things were worse than he'd initially thought because she did so without a word of protest.

She perched on the edge of the seat and then looked at him. "I'll be fine," she said. "I-I just...it was a long flight, and I'm tired. I wasn't working with a lot of information, and...I need to know what happened to him." She lifted her eyes to meet Spike's once more and then added in a quiet voice, "Can you tell me that? I-I...I need to know. Really, I need someone to tell me. Please?"

Nodding at her, Spike said, "Ten nights ago we were on a routine patrol. Gunn and the brooding ponce were going after a crew of vamps that had been attacking idiots as they left this same night club over on Guintess Street around last call. The word on the street was that they were particularly vicious tearing into any groups of revelers that included blonde females. We didn't know it at the time, but the crew had been hired by Wolfram and Hart to get Angel's attention. They wanted his attention focused in one area and figured if there was a string of petite blonde females who had been found sucked dry from extensive wounds to the neck that it might get his attention. I'll save you the more boring details, but suffice to say, their plan to get Angel all riled up worked quite nicely. He took it personally, although I don't really know why. I'm always telling the prat that he's got to learn to compartmentalize, but can he do that? Noooo. Absolutely not. He sees a few idiotic chippies that look like Goldilocks drained dry, and he takes it personally. I tried to—"

Spike saw a look of pain cross Brennan's face. It had been a good while since he'd seen her, but in that moment, as he watched successive waves of emotion flicker in her pale eyes—first dread, then relief, then resentful, if immediately contained, hurt—he knew immediately he'd hit a nerve with her. He remembered the last time he'd been truly reckless with her—more than a century earlier, in the spring of 1882—and what a mess she'd made of him then when she hadn't been as good at remaining in control of her emotions and not acting on her ire.

He stood in front of the fireplace, tapping his booted foot on the edge of the plush fibers of the Oriental carpet that sat in front of the large hearth space. Every minute or so, without trying to seem too obtrusive—or intrusive—he quirked his head just enough so that his eyes could dart to the opposite side of the room and he could see what she was doing.

Despite the hour, it was clear she hadn't yet dressed for the evening. Although her hair was styled, piled high about her head with tiny curls framing her face that was colored with makeup that served to make her striking features stand out even more, she still wore a navy blue silk dressing gown to clothe herself. As he thought about it, in the end, he supposed it didn't matter since he knew that a woman such as herself set fashion and rarely followed it. She still sat at her desk, obviously engrossed by the sheaf of onion skin paper that sat in front of her. Finally, she reached out, grabbed a pen from where it sat in its holder, and seemed poised to begin writing. However, instead of dipping it in the inkwell, she let her hand hover over the paper. Never looking away from her desk, the only indication that she'd noticed he'd spent the last hour checking on her was finally conveyed when she spoke.

"If it is your hope," she said, pronouncing each word in the clipped but patrician dialect of West London that had colored her speech for centuries, "to expedite my decision-making process, then I assure you, further annoying me will not help you achieve that goal. So, I would suggest that you cease in your fidgeting."

Unable to help himself, the young vampire's razor-thin patience suddenly snapped. "Oh, for bloody sakes, Brennan," he complained. "I'm sorry!"

At his outburst, Brennan lifted her head and finally looked at her visitor. Tilting her head, she kept her voice even as she commented, "Yes, I believe you conveyed that point earlier."

"I said I was sorry," he repeated. "And, it's sincere. Please, I swear." He paused, looked at her, hands outstretched in supplication, and then asked, "Don't you believe me?"

"I'm sure that your desire to procure the end result that you believe will be achieved should I accept your apology is sincere, yes," she nodded. "Otherwise, I doubt very seriously that you'd put yourself through such humbling measures."

"Groveling, love," he nodded at her with a level eye. "Let's call a bloody spade a bloody spade, shall we? We both know I'm groveling."

Brennan considered his point and then tilted her head in concession of his point. "Touché, William."

"I'm sorry," he repeated. "I'm sorry I did what I did, and I swear to bloody hell that I'll never do it again."

"Mmmm hmmm," Brennan said, her blue eyes staring intently as she considered the fact that either William was a very different sort of man than his grandsire or she should've considered the option she'd used with the younger vampire to bring Angelus to heel. "And?"

"And..." he began, struggling to know what she wanted. At last, his eyes fell on the spectacular flower arrangement that sat in a vase on the coffee table in front of him. Pointing at it, he said, "And, I mean it. After all, if I wasn't sincere, I wouldn't have shelled out all the brass those roses cost me." He paused again, and then asked, "Darla said you like flowers. That's why I-I...well. Do you...do you like the roses?"

Glancing at the two-dozen blood red roses, Brennan smiled as she realized how inflamed Angelus's ire would be if he saw the beautiful flowers in her bedroom, and she told him that they were from Spike. She knew from her recent conversations with Darla—who'd had a nasty spat of her own with Angelus a few weeks earlier over the usual grist that fired their most tumultuous arguments, i.e., Darla's allegiance to the Order of Aurelius and the Master—that the timid and starry-eyed poet that Drusilla had sired had been fighting with Angelus over the latter's rutting with Dru. In a way, she wondered if that was also a contributing factor as to why William had finally ended up on her doorstep if he had been talking to Darla as he claimed. She didn't put it beyond her friend to suggest that if William wanted metaphorically to stick it to Angelus there would be no better way to do it than by getting Brennan to let him tumble her a time or three. The idea tickled Brennan. Glancing at the expensive roses, she made a mental note to move them to the bedroom the moment William left. Looking back to him, she nodded, "They're very pretty."

"And, the chocolate?" he asked, nodding at the box that sat next to the roses. "My mother...well, she...my mum knew quality things because she was a lady—just like you. And those chocolates are from her favorite confectioner just off of Old Bond Street. They're really quite good, and not cheap either—"

Cutting him off, Brennan nodded, "I'm sure they're fine."

"Then, please," William nodded. "Please. I can't stand it anymore. It's been three weeks. Please. Just tell me whatever you want me to do so you'll get rid of it, and I'll do it." He paused and then said, "If the flowers and chocolate aren't good enough...well, bloody hell, normally I'd offer to kill someone for you, but Darla said you like to handle your own dirty work—and are pretty good at getting what you need to get done when it needs to get done, too—so tell me what else I can do. 'Cause I'll bloody do anything if you'll just get rid of it."

Standing up, Brennan abruptly came towards him. She took in the full sight of her handiwork as William turned towards her. A single straight thin, five-inch horn jutted out from the middle of his forehead. The effect was quite comical, she had to admit.

Seeing her look at her handiwork, William winced. He knew he'd been in trouble the minute he'd walked into the sitting room to find Darla staring at him for a couple of seconds before she smirked and said in her uniquely husky, slightly nasal voice with its colonial accent, 'Is that a horn sticking out of your forehead, love, or are you just happy to see me?' His hand had flown up to his brow and he'd suddenly realized why his head seemed to ache, and it wasn't from too many Islay single malt whiskeys, which made sense considering he hadn't suffered a hangover since he'd been sired by Drusilla. No sooner had Darla fallen into a fit of laughter when Angelus walked into the room, threw his head back and began to snicker. 'I told ya, Darla,' he'd said. 'Wee Willie there doesn't have much to offer you, love, even if he tries to make an advert of it and puts it on proud display in the middle of his fuckin' forehead. You and Dru best stick with real men, mmm? And leave the boys to their wee toys.'

He cringed at the thought of all the teasing he'd endured at the hands of his grandsire, most of it suggesting that the dimensions of the horn corresponded perfectly to the dimensions of William's cock, and he swore Drusilla had lost some interest in him since the night he'd shown up with his horn. He'd spent quite a lot of money and time traveling the dusty back alleys of London to try to get other witches and warlocks to remove it, but to no avail. To his forehead it had been stuck, and all of the magicians he'd seen seemed to agree, to his forehead it would stay attached until he got the original practitioner who'd cast the curse to remove it.

Thus, William had finally done what Angelus had never been able to do unless physically compelled, and even then such a display of behavior was fleeting in its nature. He'd swallowed his pride, spent a terrible amount of money on roses and chocolates, and gone to Brennan to apologize sincerely. That was how he'd ended up in front of her telling her his tale of woe since she'd cursed him three weeks earlier and why he was truly sorry he'd acted the way he had.

"Please, Brennan," he begged. "Please, get rid of it. I can't...the amount of bloody razzing I've taken about it since you gave me this horn—and I don't just mean Angelus, although that git has given me more than my fair share—it's getting embarrassing. No self-respecting vampire takes me seriously. One look at the bloody horn, and they all almost end up wanting to dust themselves from hysterics. And the cock jokes? Well, I can take a lot, but not this. Not anymore. I just can't take it anymore. So, please. Just tell me what you want me to do to get rid of it and consider it done."

Brennan considered his words and then crossed her arms. Giving him and assessing stare, Brennan said, "Angelus tells me you're something of a poet."

The single statement caught William off-guard. However, he knew it would not be in his best interest's to leave the witch's question unanswered. Looking down at his feet, he shuffled a bit as he answered, "Yeah, I am."

"And, I assume you're familiar with whom Roderick McLean is?" Brennan questioned him.

As soon as she said then name, William's eyes snapped up to meet hers. "That effin' prat? Of course I know who he is. Every poet and writer who's been in London for more than five minutes knows who the effin' wannabe Scots wanker is. What a fuckin' attitude."

"And, his poems?" Brennan asked. "Are yours better than his?"

"Fuck, yes!" William answered. "I may not be Keats or Shelley or Byron, but I'm far and away better than that tosser'll ever be, ten times over and then some."

"Fine," Brennan nodded. "Then I expect you to write me a poem that's better than the one he wrote for the Queen before he took that shot at her last month." She then narrowed her eyes. "And, of course, it goes without saying that if you ever mention anything about me, my tits, and Angelus in the same sentence ever again, you'll think the horn you got was a lucky momento of our acquaintanceship, and I guatantee you'll wish you still had it since you'll be missing one of your other more important protruding members. Understood?"

William looked into the witch's eyes. As he studied her, he again thought for the first time that perhaps the two of them weren't so different—fools as they were for Angelus and Drusilla respectively if they were making themselves as crazy as they appeared to be over their respective vampire-lovers. However, he knew that now was not the time to raise such an issue. Still, he couldn't help but feel a strange affinity and true type of respect for the witch that he would never underestimate as a dangerous and intelligently wicked creature every again. Instead, he merely nodded, "I understand. No more jokes about you, my grandsire, or your most respectably luscious titties there. Yup. Got it."

Flashing him one more look of warning, Brennan held his gaze until he nodded in contrition. Even as she raised her hand, said a few strange words in a soft voice, and a ball of blue energy flew towards William's head, circled once, and then made the horn sticking out of the middle of his forehead disappear, William realized that he needed to be more careful around Brennan...and might be able to even learn a thing or two from her about how to piss off his grandsire if he was lucky.

Spike watched Brennan's rigid jaw grind from one side to the other and back again as her eyes smoldered at hearing the reference to Angel's old lover, the Slayer who'd captured Spike's own immortal heart over the years. His forehead creased as he remembered how many times he'd wondered without ever really being able to understand why his grandsire had fallen so spastasically head over heels for the young Slayer when he had women like Darla and the more urbane, sophisticated, wealthier and powerful witch like Brennan to tempt him. It had never made any sense to him and was just one more among a myriad of reasons he considered Angel to be an unredeemable prat.

He remembered how, even after having the charm dispelled, he'd been so angry at Angelus, he could still feel his blood boil over what the elder vampire had done to him simply because he could. Spike had seethed for weeks afterwards, watching his grandsire through slitted eyes, plotting his vengeance. Spike's expression soured as he thought of how badly things had turned with his sire, Drusilla, whom he'd loved, and how it sickened him to hear her moans and cries as she shared her bed with Angelus. His feelings of humiliation waxed into a deep loathing, and he swore he would exact retribution, if only for the sake of his own honor. "If you really want to make him suffer," Darla had told him, when he'd sought her out after learning that she was still fighting with Angelus over her going to answer the summons of the Master, "there's one thing you can definitely do." He recalled with a smirk how he'd made it a point to cross Brennan's path as often as he could, and how he'd often watched, coming there to seek inspiration for the poem that she'd demanded of him. He grinned as he remembered how he often saw her nude silhouette from the street below as she undressed behind her gauzy inner drapes and how that had made him lust after her even more. It had made it a pleasure more than a necessity really, when he remembered how he'd called on her a week later with another two dozen long-stem red roses to barter his entrance to her presence with the promised poem of his penitence firm in hand. His smiled faintly as he thought of how her cheeks and ears had flushed a deep scarlet when she read the poem he'd penned—which turned out to be a lover's lament about his grandsire and the woman he longed for—a woman, by the by, other than Brennan with whom Angelus had been creasing the sheets when he was not tumbling with Darla and his childe, Drusilla.

In the end, that—more than anything else Spike could have done to or take from Angelus—had caused his grandsire the most misery.

Realizing he'd stopped mid-sentence as he got lost in a gush of old memories, he retreated from the thicket of his own thoughts. Spike blinked a couple of times and refocused his attention on telling her the rest of what had happened to Angel that had resulted in his accident without causing her any more inadvertent angst.

"Anyway, it turns out the vamps were just decoys," he continued with a firm nod in her direction. "Their job was to bang us up and tire us out—which the bleeding tossers did right well for four bloody nights. Then, instead of hanging back to regroup like Gunn and I wanted to so we could recoup, Angel insisted we go back out on short rest. But he thinks he's the la-di-da'ing friggin' grand poobah, so out we bloody went did and that was five nights ago. Turns out that the vamps—who were ready and waiting for us once again—were just being used as cover to lure Angel into running smack dab into the lair of a Ry'car'm demon." He stopped his retelling of the pertinent details to see if Brennan understood the significance of what he'd just shared with her. When she continued to look at him, her face still devoid of emotion, he decided to err on the side of caution. Nodding at her, he explained, "Now, I don't know if you've ever had the pleasure in your travels, Elphie, but in case you haven't, it's a fairly nasty spot of business."

Brennan's brows knit and she shook her head slightly, and her lips parted briefly as if she were going to say something. But after a few moments, she held her silence, urging the vampire to continue with a sharp upward jerk of her chin.

"These Ry'Car'm types are real buggers," he explained. "When you first see 'em, they don't look like much. Five feet, six, maybe five feet eight inches tall. Fairly solidly built—perhaps thirteen, fourteen stone. Nothing freakish, just husky, thick-necked buggers with creepy bloodshot, fiery-orange eyes, like they've got some kind o' liver disorder, ya know? So McBroody and DJ Grumpy see this guy and think, 'Big fuckin' deal, we can take this tosser and be done in time to catch the ten o'clock news.' Well..."

Brennan blinked and reached up to tuck an errant lock of hair behind her ear. "Let me guess," she said grimly. "There was more there than meets the eye."

Spike sighed and shook his head. "Aye," he confirmed. "So Angel and Gunn rush in with the usual complement of swords and battle axes ready to turn ol' Pumpkin Eyes into mincemeat pie. Excellent plan, except—according to Gunn—the second they get within arm's-length of the bugger, those eyes flashed an' all of a sudden, this guy's lovely skin gets dry and crackly, then turns to full-on scales. And I'm not talking about little cute Geico gecko-type talking lizard scales. No, sir'ee. We're talking armadillos-on-fuckin'-steroids layers of armored plate. The sword and battle axe bit didn't do fuck all—just bounced off, more or less. And this wee tosser may have had to look up to make eye contact with the brooding ponce and his grumpy homeboy, but he was strong, and that was even before he opened up his mouth and showed his would-be pearly whites were really three rows of fangs on the top and matching ones on the bottom sharpened to points. He apparently had really bad breath, too—damn near caused Gunn to pass out from the sulfuric fumes when the bugger opened his mouth. But it wasn't just his napalm-breath that was strong—as soon as Gunn moved in, the bugger reached out, grabbed his forearm and gave 'im a wee squeeze with his hand, and..."

Spike nibbled the inside of his lip as he saw the witch's face blanch.

He shrugged and said, "Angel, strong as he is...he didn't stand a bleedin' chance, love."

He stopped again, mentally cursing himself when he saw Brennan wince at his description of the demon they'd faced, particularly since the demon had almost been successful at doing what no one else had been able to do in over 250 years despite many better people trying to accomplish the same goal—killing Angel. But, still convinced that Brennan might developed have some weird magicky mojo way to read his mind or some other way to find out if he was holding back on her, Spike again decided honesty in this particular case was the best policy. Waiting for a moment so that she could compose herself, it was only when she looked back at him expectantly that he continued his story.

"Anyway," he said. "We got separated in the melee of the vamps leading us to the demon's lair...and, well, not to put too fine a point on it, but being the headstrong idiot that he is, the tosser formerly known as Captain Forehead talked Gunn into not waiting for backup until I caught up with them in the center of the lair. He said they couldn't wait since the demon had another hostage he was threatening to kill if Angel didn't fight. There was a girl—seventeen or eighteen, tops—another young blonde twit that the vamps had picked up from the street earlier that night and left for the demon to use as bait. Of course, 'cause he always has to be the effin' hero, Angel went in to save her, Gunn followed, and the two of 'em ended up hashing it out with the Ry'car'm demon by themselves. They did manage to save the girl, but Gunn got a broken arm...and, well, the ponce ended up gettin' himself tossed out one of the building's third floor windows. He, ummm...he fell and..."

Spike's voice trailed off for a minute as he tried to figure out the best way to tell Brennan the rest of what she needed to know without telling her too much. Finally, he made the choice to be honest, but to keep things as simple as possible and only give her more specific details if she asked the right questions. "He hit his head and was out of it for a while. By the time I finally figured what was what, the Blue Meanie had found me, and we were trying to decide the best way to find out where Don Quixote and Sancho Panza had gone. Eventually—"

He paused as he remembered how he and Ilyria had stumbled upon Gunn cradling the unconscious Angel. They found the tall, young demon-hunter sitting there cross-legged on the pavement with Angel's lifeless body draped over his lap, brushing a lock of blood-matted hair off the ex-vampire's forehead before his hand moved to Angel's neck as he felt for a pulse despite his own injuries. When Spike looked down at the pair, he cringed at the sight of Gunn's shirt, which was soaked with blood from where Angel's lacerated scalp had brushed against his chest. Then his eyes swiveled and he saw the way Gunn's free arm dangled uselessly across Angel's hip, bent at an unnatural angle a couple of inches above the wrist.

Tilting his head back at Brennan, he shook his head slightly, almost as if to push the images that echoed in his mind away before he continued, "When we finally found them, Gunn was gettin' up to try to hold off the demon. Ilyria took care of him in short order...pretty awesomely too. By then, Angel had already been out for ten, maybe twelve minutes. Then, Ilyria, in what was truly an emasculating display that I'm going to highly enjoy telling Angel about now that he's deigned to rejoin the land of the living, picked him up like he was a sack of spuds. A little bit after that—I'm not sure when, pet, since things kinda started to blur, sorry—we got him to the closest hospital that we could find, i.e., here. When the admitting nurse asked me who he was as they were wheelin' him in...well, the best I could come up with was Bobby Kent. I didn't want to use his real name just in case the Senior Partners were already getting ready to send in some followup heavy hitters to finish the job. But, as far as I know, they either don't know the demon failed, and Humpty Dumpty didn't get his shell cracked for good, or they're just biding their time. In any case, that's why we've been on shift here, watching out just to make things stay on the up and up."

He studied her for another minute, trying to figure out what she was thinking as he finished telling her the information she'd wanted him to give her. When she looked away from him, lost in her own thoughts, he couldn't help himself as he added, "You know, the name I gave them? The hospital wankers? When they asked who he was? And, I told 'em Bobby Kent? For some bloody reason, it stuck in my head that this is where RFK choked it, and so I went with it." He stopped, shook his head, and then waited until Brennan was looking back at him. When they made eye contact, blue eyes locked on blue, he told her, "You know I wouldn't have called you if I hadn't thought it was pretty bad to begin with, Elphie. At the time, we had no clue he was gonna wake up. That's why...well, you know. That's why I finally made the call to you."

Letting out a slow breath, Brennan nodded, "I know."

"There was..." Spike's voice trailed off, as he suddenly realized how he was initially going to say his next thought might not be the best choice. Taking a few seconds to debate if he should censor himself or not, eventually he decided to say fuck it and went with his original turn of phrase since it seemed, at that point, that Angel was going to pull through. "You know," he began. "It turns out that since he's been de-vamped, the Senior Bint doesn't have quite as hard a noggin as we all thought he did," he explained. "He cracked it pretty good. I think there was some kind of closed fracture or other, but it turns out the busted skull was the least of his problems, and was the swelling that we've been waiting to come down. For a long while, we didn't know how it was gonna go and things looked pretty bad." Spike shrugged and adjusted the collar of his leather duster. "We really didn't expect him to take this type of turn though...not yet. Not now."

He then stared at Brennan again, itching to ask a question that had long burned in his mind to seek an answer for, but one for which he'd never had the courage to ask either Angel or Brennan. When he again saw the witch's piercing blue eyes staring at his in keen assessment—as if she noted the way he was probing but, with a firm pursing of her lips, refused to divulge anything—he again lost what nerve he had to speak the single question that had remained unasked by him for some many years. Instead, he went with a more roundabout way, trying to see if he could unsuspectingly lure her into volunteering the answer to his question herself. "You know, Elpie," he said. "It was almost as if once you were on the move, he somehow knew he had to get his sorry arse in gear and get on with the getting on of waking up. He only came out of it a few hours ago, otherwise I would've called as soon as we knew anything. But, you were already in the air by that point, and—"

Brennan considered Spike's words, an eyebrow arching as she again thought on the interesting observation he'd made about the timing of Angel's finally waking up. However, knowing now was not the time to think on it, she filed the thought away for future reflection. Instead, she concentrated on the here and now of the moment she was in, swallowing once, before she reached out. In an uncharacteristic move that probably revealed more emotion and more vulnerability than she'd intended, she lightly touched Spike's hand as she said, "Thank you for remembering to call me, William. It...it means a lot."

He flashed her a strange look at the use of his old name, and he couldn't help but smile faintly at hearing her use his so-called Christian name that no one in about a century had called him by. He arched an eyebrow slightly as he thought about the times he'd crossed paths with her over the years, going all the way back to London when he'd first made her acquaintance at a dinner party thrown by his great-grandsire, Darla. Dressed in finery to rival Darla's own, Brennan had caught his eye immediately because on account of her unique sense of style—always fashionable, but always sporting a certain distinctive flair of her own.

But more striking than the clothes she wore was the piercing glint in her eyes and the way her glossy lips curved in a faint smirk as she moved from conversation to conversation. Spike grinned at the thought of what else he'd seen those glossy lips do when he'd accidentally walked into the room that had served as his grandsire's office and found those lips working Angelus over before he'd used his forearm to swat her mouth away from his cock, grunted as he jerked her into a standing position, turned her around, bent her over his desk with a low growl and proceeded to plunge into her again and again. He knew she'd had some sort of encounter at some point with Angelus because of an off-hand comment he overheard Darla make once, but it wasn't until decades later that he realized that the witch was more than a one-time or even occasional lay for his flamboyantly promiscuous grandsire. Spike thought about what he'd seen after the W&H Halloween party a couple of years before, and seeing Angel's hips jerk and his eyes roll back in his head as she used those same lips to suck him off in his office as Lorne slept off his mystical hangover in the corner. He still wasn't sure how Angel managed to get laid with a woman who meant as much to him as Brennan did, without unleashing Angelus, given the rather tender (if nauseating to him) words he'd heard his grandsire utter to Brennan in the office that night before Spike had left them to their business. He shrugged to himself, sure that, whatever it was between Angel and his witch lover, it was more than merely an arrangement based solely on the need to fuck one another's brains out or a relationship of any other type of convenience.

Still, he nodded at her in gentle encouragement as he said, "You should go see him, Elphie. See for yourself what I'm saying is true. We both know you won't feel better until you do. And, I'd be happy to kick the runtling out if you want some alone time."

Shaking her head at the thought of potentially finally confronting Connor after all this time, in addition to the fact that she wasn't certain if she was ready to see Angel in the weakened state she knew he'd be in given his room was in ICU, Brennan struggled to find a good explanation to justify declining Spike's invitation. At last, she said, "No, I—I need...his chart. I need to see his chart first, I think."

Almost as if he'd conjured it, Spike reached into his duster and pulled out a rumpled looking goldenrod document envelope. He had gotten to know her well enough over the years to know she'd never be satisfied with hearing his second-hand redux of a doctor's explanation of Angel's condition, so he'd finagled a way to get his hands on the primary source materials. Proffering it to her, he said, "It doesn't have the latest notes from this morning, but if you want them, I'll get them. Just say the word." He shifted his hips on the waiting room couch as he recalled the private consultation he'd had with the lovely ICU nurses, Oksana, in a supply closet in order to secure a copy of Angel's chart, and discovered how truly convenient a garment scrub pants were when time and space were at a premium. He savored the thought for a few moments, losing himself briefly in the image of the Ukrainian beauty's bare ass before blinking it away and bringing his focus back to the worried-looking witch seated next to him.

Brennan stared at the envelope for a minute, took it with a shaky hand, opened it, pulled out a stack of photocopies, and then began to read. Instantly, words like 'comminuted fracture'...'closed head injury'...'tear in the dura mater'...and 'increased intracranial pressure' jumped out at her. Brennan didn't know how long she sat there going through the notes. It was a long enough time period, however, that her back was starting to ache when she finally gathered up the stack of black and white photocopies that Spike had somehow procured and shoved them back into the envelope.

In all the time that she'd sat there reading the chart, Spike hadn't moved a single inch. When she looked up at him, he finally nodded, "Wotcher, Elphie."

Taking a deep breath, Brennan said, "He's really awake?" She tilted her head as she nodded, "I mean, you saw him with your own two eyes? He's really awake?"

"Awake?" Spike asked.

Brennan slowly nodded.

"Yeah," he confirmed. "Awake, definitely. With it? Not really. He still isn't getting why it's taking him so long to heal if he's been here for almost a week. I think everything's still there, he's just a bit outta sorts. He's kinda forgotten the whole Shanshu thing that made him human again post-apocalypse."

Spike's eyebrows went up and his forehead creased as he recalled standing at the door as Buffy Summers walked into the room to see Angel. He'd been fuming ever since he'd seen the big doors to the Neuro ICU swing open and a familiar, green-eyed blond stride through the doors with determined steps, hardly slowing to acknowledge him with a curt nod before making her way to Angel's room. As soon as he overcome his initial surprise at seeing her there, he'd to suppress the overwhelming desire to stuff Connor's head down a toilet and jumped up to follow her in the room. Angel's dark brown eyes had just fluttered open for the first time just a couple of hours earlier, and so Spike found himself standing at the door to Angel's room, watching and listening as Buffy sat down in the chair next to the bed. Angel had blinked a couple of times, then turned his head to regard her with a furrowed brow and his usual sign of puzzlement—holding the tip of his tongue between his lips, a gesture so stereotypically Angel that it gave Spike a measure of hope to see him use it—before he opened his mouth to speak. "Bren," he said in a raspy voice. "What are you doing here? I'm sorry, lass, I...I just...I'm sorry...but, I...I-I..." Angel's voice trailed off as he narrowed his eyes and stared at the woman seated at his bedside. "Bren?" he whispered again. "No, Angel," she'd said. "It's me, Angel. It's Buffy. I'm here." His glazed over eyes blinked a few times before he'd rolled over and merely asked, "Where's Bren?" Buffy's green eyes hardened and her face blanched, then flushed with anger as she stood up and stormed out of the room without saying another word to Angel.

"He forgot a lot of things," Spike said vaguely.

"But," Brennan said as she wet her bottom lip with her tongue. "He's going to be okay?"

"Yeah, love," Spike nodded. "This time, sure. Eventually. Never fear. All too soon Captain Prat will be out making my life and others hell with that brooding signature style that only he can pull off as either a vamp or a human. Why?"

Suddenly, Brennan stood up and gathered her bag to her chest even before Spike had finished speaking. "I-I...I just needed to know for certain that he's going to be okay."

"He'll be right as rain, Elphie," Spike said, giving her a strange look. "Come on, love—don't take my word for it. We both know you don't have to trust me." He jerked his head in the direction of Angel's room. "Why don't you go see for yourself?" he asked, his words edged with a plaintiveness that he'd never heard in his own voice. "I'm sure—"

"No," Brennan suddenly snapped, shaking her head as she cut him off with a sharp look. When she looked at Spike, any of the previous vulnerability and weakness that he'd seen had disappeared. In it's place was a rather cold and calculating demeanor that made Spike remember just how dangerous a woman Brennan could be if and when she chose to be. It made him feel uneasy, and feeling that feeling just served to annoy him even more. But, wisely, he bit his tongue as Brennan continued speaking. "That is...if he's going to be okay, then I-I..." Her voice only faltered for a moment. When she spoke again, her words were confident and impenetrable. "He doesn't need to know I was here," Brennan told him. "He'll hate it if he knew I was here," she said with a nod. "I-I...thank you for letting me know, Spike. I appreciate it more than I can say, but...I have to go now. I need to be somewhere."

She turned to leave, and even before Spike could call out her name or register a response to her actions, Brennan was gone.

---

She'd never felt fear when she stood in the presence of evil, and that, perhaps—among many, many other things—was what had made Him want to possess her so badly.

This particular opportunity was no different when she called Him forth. Initially, He'd been somewhat surprised that she'd even summoned Him since it had been so long for her since they'd had any type of meaningful exchange—a century or more, by her reckoning, even though that time for Him had passed in the blink of an eye. Still, He'd been surprised when she conducted the ritual to bring Him forth, and He'd seen her standing in the middle of her living room, her wooden floor defaced by her a chalk-white pentagram, a haphazard salt circle, and a ring of lighted white pure beeswax tapers in which she stood in the middle of. The surprise alone was enough that He'd have stayed long enough to listen to her proposal even if He hadn't missed her in some way, this one woman who'd been one of the smartest and most skilled creatures of her type that He'd ever trafficked with and so desperately wanted to possess. When she'd found a way to meet the letter of the bargain He'd struck with her centuries before, and yet abscond with her soul no closer to being His than it was before, He'd been furious, and He'd made it His business to find a way to beat her. He knew that she was no different than other beings, mortal or otherwise, in that she had a weakness. Once He realized what that weakness was, He patiently waited for the right opportunity to exploit it, swearing He wouldn't let her slip through His fingers again.

Mine, He swore. You will be mine yet, Mistress.

For her part, Brennan let her adrenaline and logic and rationality keep her fear from even registering in her conscious mind as she explained why she'd called Him, what deal she wanted to make, and why He should ultimately agree to her proposition given how little it might appear that He'd benefit from exerting any effort on her behalf whatsoever. He was quiet for a minute, as He considered what she'd said, His bright red eyes surveying her. Her blue eyes met His, refusing as ever to be cowed, and her blatant challenge to Him even as she asked for something from Him made Him smile before He finally spoke.

"You make a persuasive argument," He said in a cultured voice that Brennan had come to know all too well over the years. "But, you still haven't answered the one question that you have to know that I would ask before I'd consent to make any new bargains between us, Mistress Brennan." He paused and then gave her what He knew was an even more charming smile than the last one had been as He asked, "Why should I do this for you?"

Brennan had been expecting the question for some time. And, as a result, she had several answers ready to give Him when He asked, even though she hadn't known until that exact moment which one she would use to try to sway Him to agree to her proffered plan.

"Because," Brennan responded simply. "It's always been all about the deal with You. And, we both know that I caused You great ire when I found a way to fulfill the terms of our original contract before the original five hundredth anniversary of that bargain, and in so doing, thwart what You thought would be an easy conquest of me. We both know that You never expected me to find an evil immortal to whom I'd willing give part of my soul and who wouldn't actually try to destroy me with it before the deadline was up. I both surprised and greatly aggravated You when I met the requirement, and You weren't able to select a keeper as you'd originally intended. Thus, from a certain perspective, I won and You lost. Whether You want to admit that or not, it's the truth, and it's irked You all this time—so much so that You've been biding Your time to figure out a way to punish me. That's why You tortured Angel for a hundred years when You had the chance, isn't it? You've tried to get to me through him before, but You ultimately failed at that too because he wouldn't give me up." She stopped, taking a confident step closer towards Him and said, "But, now? Now? Well, now things are a bit different, aren't they?"

"How so?" He asked with a subtle tilt of His head in her direction that showed He was listening very carefully to every word she said with clear interest.

"So, that means...you're interested in what I have to say?" Brennan blinked at Him as if such an answer was blatantly apparent.

He continued to study her for a minute or two and then nodded. "I'm always interested in everything about you, Mistress Brennan," He responded simply. "And, I have been since before you were a metaphorical twinkle in those very blue eyes that your quite cunning, if very tedious, father has always had—particularly since it's been so long since you and I've conversed, let alone made any deals. So, yes. Say your piece in full since you know that I'm listening. You have my complete and undivided attention, I assure you."

Again, red eyes met blue. Again, Brennan refused to back down. At last, however, when the heavy silence between the pair began to wear thin, Brennan conceded that she needed to give into His request if she ever wanted to make any progress towards her goal, as distasteful as the prospect of doing what He wanted in any way, shape, or form galled her. "Very well," Brennan nodded. "If You agree to this, then while it's a small bargain, it's one that won't take any significant time, effort, or energy on Your part. It's a trivial thing, for You, and we both know that. But, despite how simple a thing it will be to You to do, what You'll get from it in return is not inconsequential. If You do this, we both know that I'm now giving You a chance to exact a certain amount of retribution against me since You know what doing this will do to me. I'll be hurt, I'll be in pain, and the only person I'll have to blame is myself. And, You'll get to witness all of that, which we both know is something that You've always seemed to enjoy. It's something to be savored for You, I'm sure, the paltry and egotistical human witch rendered low finally...and by her own hand over a thing as trivial as her feelings for another human being." Tilting her head as she took another step towards Him, she added, "You can't honestly tell me that the offer, as I've presented it to You, doesn't have a certain...attractiveness to You, even if the deal is minor compared to some of the larger ones we've struck in the past."

He stared at her, His red eyes narrowed as He licked his lips. Brennan felt her heart flutter and her face quickly paled as she gazed with trepidation into His face, which had suddenly turned stony, His expression unreadable. She swallowed, closing her eyes as she tried to steady her thundering heart. She knew He knew her state of mind though she kept her lips pressed into a firm line. Angel could smell fear from a half mile away. She knew that The One, a figure of incredible power that He wielded on a cosmic scale, could sense her fear rolling off of her in waves. Worse, she knew, was the fact that He knew her desperation, that she would not have summoned Him had she believed there was some other way to accomplish her goals. That He knew her fear and her desperation made each even more acute. She felt a sickening dread roiling in her belly as she awaited His response.

He was quiet for another moment before He wagged His brows, then shrugged and asked, "Why?"

Brennan quirked an eyebrow and stared at Him blankly for a minute before she said, "What do You mean why? I don't understand. I just told You why."

He shook His head with a wry smile and corrected her. "No," he said. "The question isn't why do you think that I would strike this bargain with you. What I want to know is...why would you try to make this deal...for him?"

Brennan was quiet for a moment, and then despite her best efforts to keep it from happening, her brow furrowed slightly as a small bit of emotion cracked her face. She knew it was pointless to lie to Him in that moment—particularly as she suspected He knew it anyway, but was making her say it just to hear it—so she simply told Him the truth.

"Because...I love him."

His bright red eyes stared into her cool blue ones for a moment as He contemplated her answer. He was quiet again for several minutes before He exhaled slowly and finally said, "What you would do for him—it's a great cost to bear, merely for the sake of an emotion you feel...merely for love? Especially when you know what you'll be giving up and as long as you understand that while I most certainly can do this, there's no guarantee it will work...last for as long as you want it to, Mistress Brennan. There's no guarantee that once I weave such a spell as to how long it will last. The chances that it would be forever are almost nil. Surely you know that."

"To see him safe and happy," she replied slowly. "It doesn't matter what the cost is to me. Whatever it is...it would be worth it. And, I have to believe that for however long it lasts, it will be longer than if I just sit back and didn't do anything. Because, we both know that if nothing is done, he'll be dead within a year." She swallowed and looked down at her feet, then raised her eyes again to meet his gaze. "Probably sooner," she said.. "So, yes. Whatever the cost is, I believe that it's worth it."

When she'd finished speaking, He inclined His head towards her. He then nodded slightly before speaking again. "You speak for yourself in that last sentence, of course," He told her. "But...what about him? You take great personal choice out of his hands if you make this deal," He said thoughtfully. "We both know your own powers are no small thing. Surely there must be other options you've considered. I'll grant you the Wolf, the Ram, and the Hart are no small trio of enemies for anyone to have, let alone a mere mortal such as him. But, if you care about him as you say you do, we both know, my dear, that you're no mere mortal. We both know that you possess a very considerable set of skills of your own that could be levied against them in his defense. So, since that's the case, why not simply consult with him? It's true he's not as powerful as he once was since he's fulfilled the terms of the Shanshu Prophecy and now has shuffled back into his mortal coil back once more, but surely together, you might be able to foil their efforts to exact retribution against him. Why not take what chances you can with that?"

"Because," Brennan suddenly snapped as she took a step towards Him. "That's not a risk I'm willing to take with him. I can't take a chance with him. Not where he's concerned. I can't. I won't. I've almost lost him so many times..." Her voice trailed off as she felt a wave of nausea wash over her, then she shrugged and continued. "I can't even keep count anymore, but we both know the close calls have increased exponentially since the year he spent in hell with the rest of Los Angeles when the Senior Partners at Wolfram and Hart consigned him there. But, now that he's actually managed to thwart another one of their traps, it's only a matter of time before they come at him again, with something even worse than before, and eventually they will succeed. They don't suffer fools any more than You do. He pissed them off with what he did, how he handled things, and that's made it personal for them in the past year even more than it had been before he went to work for them. So, we both know that they'll keep coming at him, striking at him through any means they can. And, we've also both been around long enough to know that since they've made him public enemy number one, and since he's mortal now, he's even more vulnerable to their powers and influences than he was before, so it's only a matter of time before they succeed. You know that they'll find a way to make certain he never lives and gets a chance to enjoy what he's always wanted—a normal life."

Brennan felt a burning in her nostrils but closed her eyes and took a deep breath as she pushed the emotions down and away. "Make no mistake," she said. "I've thought about all the options, all the potential alternatives." She thought about the long conversation that she'd had the night before with another powerful witch, a friend she'd known for centuries and loved like a mother, and how she'd come away with a heavy heart but sure of what she had to do when they'd parted ways. "I wouldn't be here, with You, if I had any other viable choice. I'm doing what I have to do to protect him. I refuse to let him die. I refuse...I absolutely refuse to lose him again. After all that's happened to him, You're damn right that I'm going to do everything that I can to ensure that he finally gets the chance to live the life he's earned. The Powers that Be said he'd done enough when they granted him his life back. He has his life once more, and he deserves nothing less than to live it to its fullest...even if he's too damn stubborn to realize it himself by walking away from the fight. So, I'm going to do whatever I have to do to protect him and see that he's happy."

"Even if it means you're giving up your own happiness?" He countered, His words precise and purposeful, said in that moment to elicit as strong and painful a response from her as possible.

Brennan's jaw tightened as she nodded. "Yes," she replied. "As long as they have memory of him...if anyone has any memory of him as still being alive, then I know that Wolfram and Hart will find some way to come after him. And when they do, they will unleash all the weapons at their disposal to destroy him. So, yes, even if I have to give up my own happiness to save him...then, yes. It's a sacrifice I'm willing to make."

For a split second, the thought crossed her mind—and not for the first time since she'd bound herself to the idea of going to Him for assistance—that maybe once all was said and done, it wouldn't be so bad anyway. The pain she'd feel would be temporary, because once the spell took effect, she wouldn't remember him so there would be no loss or emptiness to which her pain could attach. The thought brought her a momentary feeling of relief.

However, Almost as if He could hear it, his thin lips curled into an evil smile on His devious face, revealing some of His inherent cruelty before He spoke again. "Ahh, no, no, no," he tsked her. "Not so fast there, Mistress Brennan."

"What?" she blinked up at Him.

"You make assumptions that you shouldn't," He said with a shake of His head. "If I agree to do this—and I'm not saying that I will—but if I do, then who said anything about everyone, including yourself, forgetting him would be the way I would choose to fulfill the terms of your proposal?"

A pained looked crossed Brennan's face as her heart began to race. "But, I-I..."

"You didn't think I'd make it that easy for you, did you?" He asked, laughing as He reveled in the turmoil she was feeling. "You won't forget. No," he said as He looked her straight in the eyes. "No, of course you won't forget. If I did that, it would be too easy—and too simple." He laughed. "No," he said. "If I do this thing you ask, the one person who will most assuredly remember every painful detail will be you, my dear. After all, when you love someone and want to do something to protect them as you claim, surely you know that there's always a risk. There's always a burden. There's always a price to be paid. So, no, you won't forget, Mistress Brennan. You'll never forget. You'll remember everything. Besides—"

He paused for a beat before He continued, an open-mouthed grin on his face as he saw her face blanch at his words.

"Just in case the minor fact escaped you," he said. "You know if I agree to the terms of this deal, his possession of your thumetikon means he will have to be near you. He may not be an immortal anymore, but even I can't break the terms of our original deal. You gave it into his keeping, and into his keeping it will stay."

"I-I..."

"It's an odd twist, I'll grant you," He said, cutting of her halting response. "I can't really recall there ever being such a loophole where an evil immortal acted as a custodian of such a thing, but in the course of such custodial acts, he became a mortal before he'd relieved himself of such an onerous task as the one with which he'd originally been charged." He stopped, trying to see if He could recall such a situation. After another minute, unable to do so, He shrugged His broad shoulders, and then commented, "It should be interesting to see what the unintended consequences will be from that little wrinkle that the Powers that Be—irksome, nagling interferers that they are and have always been—have seen fit to toss into our understanding with one another since I believe I'm not telling any tales out of school that your tie to the once and future ensouled vampire has been fated by them."

He shot her a devious grin that revealed He knew more about the subject of Brennan and Angel than what He was saying—or at least wanted her to think so. He seemed to confirm her assumption when He added in a taunting voice, "Of course, that's another story for another time, I think."

"Fine," Brennan told Him, anger flushing her face as she nodded at Him, unable to any longer suppress the frustration she felt at being toyed with in such a manner. "I knew You wouldn't make this easy, so that's fine. Do what you want to me—"

"Oh, have no worries on that account, Mistress," He laughed. "I'm going to. One of these days, I promise, I'm going to. But, for now...let's settle on the finer points of this deal, hmmm?"

"I agree," she nodded. "So, let's talk terms."

"Agreed," He responded simply as He slightly inclined his head in concession to her suggestion.

"Then, let's start with the simple things, shall we?" Brennan began. "I get what I want for him, which you already know. You get to see me suffer because I'll be the only one who remembers who he is, and I'll have to live with the fact that he has no memory of who I am...or what we were, what we had with one another, and that I have no one to blame but myself for the position I'm in every time I see him. I believe that about covers it all, don't You?"

"Indeed," He replied with a twinkle in his eye. "But, there's more to it than that, my dear. Surely, you know that."

"There always is with You," Brennan scoffed with a roll of her blue eyes. "What else?"

"After a suitable period of...readjustment," He began. "He'll find his way back to you. He won't be able to help himself. He'll be drawn to you because of his unwitting guardianship, no matter what set of circumstances that bring him to you in his new reality. He'll find a way to come for you, to find you, to know you."

"But?" Brennan pressed, suddenly feeling a twisting sensation in her stomach as if the shaky floor on which she stood could give out at any second, letting her freefall into an unending abyss of blackness below.

"But," He said with a dark chuckle. "You take great actions to contravene his own free will on this day. As you know, Mistress, that is no small thing. As such, in this—as in all things—there must be balance."

"What kind of balance?" she asked, arching an eyebrow in clear suspicion of what He was about to tell her.

"The fine print, so to speak, in our deal is this," He said as He took a small step in her direction.

Suddenly, Brennan knew He wasn't being cruel or vindictive or even taunting her in the malicious ways He'd always enjoyed teasing her over the years. His matter-of-fact shift in demeanor told her that He was telling her the simple truth of things as He spoke in that moment—no more and no less.

"The bit of magic I'll weave for you will accomplish everything that you've stipulated and more. But, it will only be effective—it will only hold, so to speak—as long as you never again impose your will on him unilaterally. You must never again take away from him what you've stolen on this day. You must always bow to his choices, his preferences, his decisions from this point on, and if you don't—whether it's in five days, five months, or five years or more from now—well, if you don't, that'll be it. Your actions will render our deal null and void. At the point that you once again take the onus of choice from him, at point, he'll remember everything...and he will no longer be safe from Wolfram and Hart. People will begin to remember him again and will wonder what happened to Angel, and eventually, someone will come looking for him. Maybe it will be a friend, more likely it will be an enemy." He shrugged noncommittally. "Who can say for certain? But, in either case, after that occurs, it's only a matter of time before Wolfram and Hart will find him, and they will kill him. More importantly..."

He paused, narrowing His eyes as He smirked at the rigidly pained expression on her face.

"He'll know what you did to him. He'll remember everything. He'll remember how you betrayed him, how you stole the greatest gift any human being has from him—free will, Mistress Brennan. He'll know that you acted in selfish and self-centeredness because of what you wanted."

"No," Brennan shook her head furiously as she felt her cheeks flush at His implication. "I'm not doing this for me. It has nothing to do with what I want. It's...it's just for him. For him. That's all. I'm doing this for him."

"For him?" He asked again. "Or, because of him?" He paused, His face retaining its thoughtful look as He added, "It's a fine distinction, I grant you, but an important one nonetheless." Looking up at her, He waited for her to say something. When Brennan remained tight-lipped, He shrugged again. "Ahh, well. In either case, it's an important part for you to consider before you sign your name on the dotted line so to speak. Because, and well—you can take this for what it's worth since I'm not exactly a man, but..." He stopped, looked down at Himself, and then shrugged. "Well, you get the point. But, anyway, as a man? I know that, as a man, if the woman who allegedly had been in love with me for as long as you claim to have loved him took away from me what you're taking from him, I doubt that I could ever forgive such a woman for such a brutal and blatant transgression against me. And, as we both know that I know something of him...knowing the type of man he is? Well, I know this man of yours—fairly well, since we spent many years in one another's company, in fact." He grinned and cocked his head to the side as he licked his lips. "I know him to be a man of great loyalty and a stubborn sense of honor. Foolishly stubborn, in fact."

He rolled His red eyes, then laughed sardonically. "In any case, every man has his breaking point, yes? Even this one, who seems to have a penchant for loving stubborn women—particularly those who inevitably betray him by euphemistically stabbing him in the back. Yes, you're both like that, you know. He loves you, you claim to love him, and then once you've betrayed him, I somehow always end up dealing with you all on more than one occasion in the end. So, I feel fairly confident when I say that I highly doubt Angel will ever be able to forgive you, either. This thing you do, if he ever finds out what you've done, I daresay it might destroy everything you've built with him. All of it, Mistress. So, think carefully. Nothing's final yet. All we've done, as far as I'm concerned, until signatures are affixed, is to have a delightful chat here. Nothing more than that need occur today. You can still walk away." He lifted his blazing red eyes to meet her in challenge. Once again, as He knew she wouldn't, Brennan didn't look away. Giving her a sly smile, He continued, "But, if you don't want to walk away, I just want to make absolutely certain you have full knowledge of the risks of your proposal. You know me—I'm all about the deal. But, I like My deals to be fair—all of them...above board, so to speak. They are all beyond reproach. So, consider this our period of full disclosure. And, now that I've fully disclosed the proverbial fine print to you, Mistress Brennan, I ask you—do you understand?"

"Do I understand what?" Brennan asked.

Smacking His lips as He relished outlining the terms of the deal for her, He said, "I just want you to understand, Mistress Brennan...if you ever, in any way, ever again contravene his free will, everything that you've sacrificed All the pain and suffering you went through for him? All the pain and suffering he'll have endured because of you? Well—all of it...all of it will have been for nothing if you ever unilaterally impose your will on him in any way, shape, or form ever again. The magic I wrought will be undone, reality will shift back, and he'll remember what happened. And, once that occurs he'll still be in danger, and moreover, I do believe he'll be less than pleased to know what you'll have taken, what you'll have stolen from him really once the world right's itself for him...assuming, of course, he's off strong enough stuff that he'll be able to put his world back together once the stopper that's preventing him from falling down the long and winding hole to Wonderland is pulled out from under him. That, my dear, is what I'm attempting to discern if you understand.."

"That won't happen," Brennan said firmly. "I don't need to worry because I won't let it happen. I'll never hurt him again like that. I don't care what I have to do, but I won't give him this life just to tear it away from him at some later point."

"Be careful," He cautioned her again. "Think carefully. Be certain that you understand the risks. It's not as if I suggest you'd do it intentionally. Indeed, I think if and when it occurs, it will be far from intentional. I think, in a moment of weakness, you'll give in and destroy all the good you're trying to do for him in this thing you ask of Me. Can you really say that you're strong enough to ensure that you never do what could hurt him even more than if he died at the hands of Wolfram and Hart? Really? Because, remember, you'll do this knowing that even though you'll eventually see him on some kind of regular basis, I'd imagine. You'll be near him, and all the while, you'll be the only one who knows what truly has been between you. You'll have to live with the fact that he has no memory of you...no memory of what has happened...or what he thinks or feels about the situation...of the things you've shared, you and him, over the many decades you've known him. Can you really shoulder that burden for the rest of his life? More importantly, how will you cope with how things have changed by that point? He'll seek you out, it's true, but how and in what way? And, what type of person will he be by that point? What ties will he have made to other people and places and things of which you'll have nothing to do?"

He saw Brennan's brow furrow at His words as several thoughts flashed in her mind. She felt her heart clench in her chest as she imagined him waking up in another woman's bed, his arm draped over someone else's shoulder, as he murmured softly to her with a smile that she knew he reserved for her alone. She pictured him sitting in a diner across from a shaggy-haired little boy with his same warm chocolate eyes, drinking a milkshake while a laughing blonde woman—the same one he'd woken up telling 'I love you'—stole French fries from his plate with a gleeful chortle. She felt a stabbing feeling in her chest as he looked up at her, blinking the moment their eyes met and then looking past her, his gaze soaring over her shoulder as if she were nothing and no one.

The pain was so much, for a second, her world spun. However, quickly, logic reasserted itself with a cold vengeance. She blinked and shook away the hurtful thoughts and the painful emotions that came with them.

I've got to stop this. I-I can't do this to myself. If I keep thinking of it like that, then I'll never be strong enough to do what I have to do, she told herself. I know...I know in my heart, this is the way it's got to me. It must be this way. This is the only way to save him. He's no chance otherwise.

Nodding in apparent sympathy, He added in a quiet voice, "Really, as to answers for all those questions, who can say what might or might not happen for you and between you two? It's a terrible gamble to take with something that you say is so precious to you...especially when you'll be suffering so much."

Brennan slowly licked her lips and then shrugged, "Even still," she began in response. "If I didn't suffer, You wouldn't make the deal because there would be little in it that would be attractive for You. That's a fact of which I was well aware before I even summoned You here. So, really, if that's the best You can come up with to try to talk me out of this, You're wasting Your breath."

His red eyes narrowed again, then He smiled with a nod and said, "Very well, then. You know, specifically, what my terms are. I've said all I need to say in that context. Now, it is your turn, Mistress Brennan. So, now, let's hear it. What are your terms?"

"He's protected from Wolfram and Hart," she said instantly. "He's shielded. People will remember him, but when they start to wonder where he is and what he's doing, their thoughts will be deflected. No one will ever come looking for him. No one will ever seek him out. Anonymity will give him protection. He gets back everything he lost—his life, his son, his job, his happiness...all of it. He finally gets to live the life he's earned. He doesn't have to look over his shoulder for the rest of his life. He gets...he finally gets to be free. He gets to be free and to be...happy." She stopped for a moment, considered what she'd said, and then nodded, "That's it."

"My, my, Mistress Brennan," He suddenly said as he gave her a strange look. "How you've changed since first we met so many centuries ago. You used to be so...well, so...driven, so...Machiavellian, really, the way you brokered with not just Me in your striving for power, wealth, and status for yourself. Why, I remember a young woman who would do anything she needed to do to get to where she wanted to go. I know you haven't forgotten. Don't you remember when you used to have no qualms about removing any obstacle, killing anyone who so much as dared offend your cultured sensibilities in the slightest merely because you could." He paused, giving her a disdainful look before he continued. " Now, that cold, ruthless woman I knew so well..." He arched an eyebrow and shook His head in sad amusement. "But my...what have you done with her, my dear? Have you grown soft, these last hundred years, tinkering around in the dirt with the rotten, empty shells of the dearly departed? Surely that hasn't given you empathy...understanding...sympathetic emotions, as such. In a word, dare I say it, a heart?"

Brennan was quiet for a moment and then said, "What do you mean?"

"You're becoming quite sentimental in your old age," He said. "So noble, so self-sacrificing...and all for his freedom and happiness." He chuckled, pausing after a minute and then said, "Such emotions from one such as yourself are almost...well, inspiring."

Unable to help herself, Brennan rolled her eyes again, clearly unimpressed with His observation as she responded, "Somehow, I think you'll make do."

"No," He said, shaking His head with a snort. "In the end...it's true. You've inspired me. So much so that..." He paused and gave her another malevolent smile. "Well, I think I have one additional term I'll be adding to the bargain."

"What?" Brennan asked, her heart speeding up as she felt as if the Sword of Damocles was about to drop down on her head. "What else do you want?"

"I think...yes, as my final condition," He smiled. "I'm going to give you a gift, Mistress Brennan. I'm going to give you a very selfless gift just because you've...inspired me. You're selflessness for him...for the man you love? So, I want to give you a gift."

"What?" Brennan repeated, her voice heavy with caution. "What is it?"

"Twenty-four hours," He told her with a sharp nod. "I think...yes. Definitely. You'll get twenty-four uninterrupted hours with him before he forgets and everything begins anew." Smiling at her again, He added, "Isn't that generous of me?"

"Hardly," Brennan said, her brow furrowed hard as she stared at Him with hate clearly burning in her cool blue eyes as she immediately realized what He was truly doing by granting her such a 'gift.' "You're just doing that so that I'll have to tell him, aren't You? You know...You know I won't be able to see him and not explain what I did if I see him, so in the end, You already know that such a happenstance will only bring me more pain in the end than happiness."

Shrugging his large shoulders, He said, "You wound me, Mistress. Here I was thinking that I was being generous, but if you want to think I do this to hurt you, well then—" He stopped as He leveled a hard stare at her and finished His sentence. "Who am I to stop you from thinking that? In either case, those are my terms. Take it or leave it."

Clenching her fists at her side, Brennan gritted her teeth before she spat, "You know damn well I'll agree."

A burst of flame suddenly appeared in front of her as a parchment in red ink that she knew to be blood waited for her signature.

"Very well then," His voice boomed. "I think, unless there's something I've forgotten, that we're agreed. Now, I believe you know the way this still works," He said as He waited for her to make her choice formally. "Feel free to take all the time you wish to read the fine print—it's all there. No tricks, no gimmicks...it's all written out just as we've agreed."

Slowly, Brennan turned towards the parchment, and after she'd read the terms and found there was no dishonesty present as He'd assured her, she took out her silver dagger, slowly pricked her forefinger on its tip, and then signed her name in blood using her index finger. As soon as she was finished, the glowing velum burned brightly once and then disappeared in another fiery flash of light.

"Good," He told her, again smiling malevolently at her. "Good then. Consider the bargain struck. It's done."

Brennan nodded once, a sad but satisfied smile on her face. Red eyes glowed as she turned around and began to chant the ritual that would close the conduit that had allowed their communication, knowing their business was at an end now that the bargain had been struck.

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-tbc-

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A/N2: Well, we don't know if anyone had expected that or not. Now, ladies and gents, this is, as they say, the point where things get...well...interesting. *blinks innocently*

As ever, constructive criticism/feedback is appreciated (with an emphasis on constructive). To be honest, we long ago realized this story arc is either a love it or hate it sort of thing. (Crossovers in particular, even more so than even the most AU of AU pieces, are this way.) Most people who hate it have stopped reading, and we think that's the best for all involved. But, if you're still one of the ones out here, grumbling that you don't like such and such because you just don't like it? Well, okay. Fair enough. To each his own, right? But, do us a favor and yourself. No need to let us know. Such comments are chucked in the proverbial fireplace anyway, so...yeah.

To all the rest, who are liking the journey we've taken you on thus far, we thank you in advance and promise that Part II (Angel and Brennan reunite in D.C. after his accident) is forthcoming shortly.

In the meantime, we wouldn't mind hearing what the reaction is to this latest, well, development. For those who are on Twitter, we also suggest you check out the female star of our story WitchyBren. She's quite amusing in her take on Angel, their relationship, and the world at large. If you're on Twitter, and like our Angel(us)/Brennan arch, she's definitely got the inside track on things, so don't forget to follow her. That said, until Part II posts, thanks!