See Part One for disclaimer and details. Thanks to everyone who has reviewed and sent feedback, please keep 'em coming.

***

Part Two: Awakening

Nob Hill, San Francisco, California

February 21st, 2000

Rupert Giles stared at himself in the mirror, and suddenly wondered where the bleeding hell the last twenty-five years had gone.

Sometimes he couldn't believe that he was now well into his forties, that he had spent over half a lifetime travelling with Ethan Rayne and constantly getting into one mess after another in their quest for power and riches. But the thought of abandoning his partner never occurred to him. Because as matters stood, who or what else did Giles have left in his life?

His grandmother had passed away years ago, and none of his other relatives even wanted to know that he was alive anymore. Rupert had no wife or children, and apart from his occasional dalliances when he was either drunk or stoned, Giles had never even thought about women that way ever since three years ago. That was when the sleepwalker demon known as Eyghon had come back into his life, unfortunately.

That had been a very nasty time for all the old gang, to be sure. Philip, Thomas, and Deidre had gotten together to talk about old times, and Thomas had had a VERY foolish notion about reclaiming their glory days. Eyghon had possessed him whole, and not long afterwards, the demon had killed Deidre and possessed her after Thomas's body became a puddle of slime. Philip had been smart enough to seek out his last two remaining companions and between them, the male trio had eventually managed to defeat the sleepwalker demon, even if Philip had lost his life during the battle.

Right now 'Ripper' and Ethan were here in the City by the Bay, trying to give Travers and his minions the slip once more. Even though Quentin was now the second-in-command of the Council, he still hadn't abandoned his pursuit of Giles and Rayne. Decades worth of personal effort was at stake, after all, and the dogged persistence of their adversary might have been admirable to the two fugitives – if it wasn't so damned annoying at the same time.

Giles wiped his face with the towel, and then went back to his bedroom. He had a lot of thinking to do.

***

Angel Investigations, Los Angeles, California

February 25th, 2000

Wesley Wyndham-Pryce tried not to listen as his co-worker, the incredibly sharp-tongued nineteen-year-old girl named Cordelia Chase, started ranting about their missing-in-action boss. He already had a headache, and didn't wish to add to it any more than he had to.

The British man suddenly wondered how on earth he had ever ended up here ever since graduating from the Watcher Academy, an event which had taken place not long after the California Hellmouth had been sealed. If he took the trouble to trace the path back in his mind, though, Wesley would have told you that it had all started with the Buffy the Vampire Slayer in Cleveland, and not what he had helped do to Sunnydale back in the 1980's.

After Merrick had been killed towards the end of 1996 and the blonde Slayer expelled from Hemery High School for burning down that vampire-filled gymnasium, there had been no Sunnydale for the Summers family to head off to. So Buffy and her mother Joyce had been shepherded into heading east to the other, less active Hellmouth in Ohio. Once they'd arrived, Robson had been dispatched there to be her new Watcher.

Unfortunately, the man had died not long after Drusilla and the vampire known as Spike, a.k.a. William the Bloody, had shown up in town. There had been no 'Scooby Gang' backing up the Chosen One, and Robson had been murdered when Spike had attempted to heal his mad sire of her affliction. A terrible weakness Drusilla had fallen victim to when a mob in Prague had done unspeakable things to her during the early 1990's.

Anyway, Wesley had been sent to take over for his predecessor during Buffy's junior year of high school. But Miss Summers had rejected his presence there in no uncertain terms, the headstrong and defiant girl deciding to quit working for the Council rather than have to deal with an inexperienced prat like him. And in one very simple and depressingly clever move, Buffy had told her mother about the "creepy guy constantly stalking her", so Wesley had had to hightail it out of town before the Cleveland PD tracked him down and threw him behind bars.

Quentin Travers had been furious about it, of course. He had persuaded the head of the Council to fire Wes from the organization, and not even pay for his airline ticket back to England. Thus, Wyndham-Pryce had become a 'rogue demon hunter', even though such a title had been completely iffy at best. Luckily for the ex-Watcher, though, he had eventually stumbled upon Angel and his female seer whilst on the hunt for an evil empath demon named Barney. And after the excitement was over, Wes had stayed on with the LA detective agency, taking the place of a half-Irish Brachen demon named Doyle.

Cordelia said to the Englishman, "We should call the police, fill out a missing persons report!"

"We can't do that yet. He's only been gone one night," Wesley told her. "And Angel CAN look after himself, you know."

"One LONG night, during which he was supposed to check in with us and didn't," Miss Chase insisted. She didn't want anything to happen to the ensouled vampire, as this job was the former rich girl's only source of money until her movie star career finally took off. "And Angel's not someone who tans well, you know."

Wesley shrugged. "He's probably just holed up in a tunnel somewhere, waiting for nightfall."

"Maybe," Cordelia was starting to look angry. "But what if he's being tortured right now, and wondering what the hell's taking us so long to track him down? Come on, Wesley, we can't just sit around here on our asses! Well, I can't anyway!"

"All right, fine." Wesley went over to the weapons locker, deciding it would be better to get out of here rather than listen to the brunette's rants anymore. "I'll go see if I can find him."

"You're going to go look for that bookie?"

"He's the last person we definitely know Angel went to see," Wesley told her absently. "So that's as good a starting point as any, and better than most."

"Are we talkin' about the same bookie who's supposed to get his jollies by cutting off people's extremities?" Cordy looked a bit green, now somewhat worried about Wesley's safety. She had once been romantically interested in the man, before an utterly horrible kiss which had ended any prospects of a relationship between them right then and there.

Wesley opened a drawer. "That's why I'm taking this." He pulled out a crossbow. "Along with a few other things."

***

Somewhere in Los Angeles, California

Later that night

Xander Harris walked through the dark alley alongside his friend, Jesse McNally, keeping an eye out for trouble at all times.

Ever since the day that he and his mother had left Sunnydale, the Harris boy's life had gotten much worse instead of much better as one might have expected. Without a husband and provider, Jessica had had to get a job to pay the bills, but with her complete lack of useful skills all she could get was a crappy minimum wage waitress deal. The woman had been unable to make ends meet, and so eventually had resorted to the oldest female profession in the world in order to generate some extra cash for them to survive.

Unfortunately bad luck kept dogging her heels in the big city, and one day when Xander was eight years old, a knife-wielding maniac had stabbed Jessica in order to avoid paying for her 'services'. The surgeons had almost saved her, but after thirty hours, the woman was pronounced brain-dead and the life support machinery switched off when no adult next-of-kin could be found. Thus, her son had been put into the system, ending up in an orphanage on Plummer Street before getting farmed out to a foster family when he was nine.

That hadn't lasted long, though. Xander had run away after a certain – incident. And all things considered, it was lucky for him that Harris was used to waking up early, in order to be able to evade his foster father's groping hands.

The boy's terror at waking up to feel the person that was supposed to take care of him and protect him attempting to molest him instead, had been enough to make the young man always wake up before five o'clock in the morning, ever since.

His childhood hadn't been completely screwed up, though, fortunately. Xander had met a mechanic named Zeph by the time he was ten and the man had allowed the boy to crash at his auto shop garage on occasion, in exchange for free labour and the promise never to bite the hand that fed him by stealing Zeph's stuff. As the years passed, Xander had grown up and learned the mechanic's trade; which had proven very useful on occasion.

Like when it came to boosting cars for a joyride down to Santa Monica, or whatever.

"I'm telling you, I'll have the van fixed within the next week or so," Jesse insisted, dumping some more mezcal down in his throat. He, too, was the product of a broken home, even if he wasn't an orphan like Xander, and he had met Harris on the streets earlier this year. "All I need is some new brake pads – shocks, new tires, new engine maybe..."

"You're totally drunk, buddy," Xander told him. He didn't know why that bothered him. By this point in his life, Harris no longer remembered his father, even if the childhood feelings triggered by memories of whenever his dad got plastered were still there in his subconscious. Curiously, Xander did not remember Jesse or Willow or Cordelia from the ancient days of kindergarten anymore, either. It was simply too long ago, and too many other things had happened in his life since then.

"I know," Jesse chortled in reply to Xander's comment. "But when I get that car together, Cap'n Kirk-"

"Don't call me that!" Xander snapped, once again regretting that he had ever confided to his friend how he was a closet Trekkie.

"Whatever," Jesse smirked. "Anyway, bro, once I get the van mobile, let's bail, get out of this city."

"You wanna leave LA?" Xander asked in surprise, putting aside the annoyance. "How come?"

"It's a big world out there, dude," Jesse said, having another drink. "You gotta see it for yourself one day."

"Yeah, but-"

A fist with inhuman strength behind it sent Harris flying backwards, a bloodsucker in full game face punching his lights out after appearing out of the shadows and snarling incoherently. Then the vampire buried its fangs into Jesse's throat, draining him dry.

It wasn't exactly like it would have happened in another version of history, but it was close enough and just as lethal.

Tossing the male corpse aside, the undead thing headed straight for Xander, who was unconscious from the sheer power of the blow to his head. But on occasion, even a Harris can get lucky: and the soulless vampire suddenly found itself encased in a paralysing mucous that had been shot out of the nose of a Fyarl demon, just as it leaned down for its next meal.

"Like to crush. Crush now?" the Fyarl asked Whistler, who was standing alongside it.

"Knock yourself out," the messenger shrugged as the demon instantly whooped and hollered, pounding on the vampire who had killed Jesse until it was dust. It then lumbered off after Whistler paid the hulking creature for its services, and the short man in the hat dragged Xander off to his Chevy Impala not far away.

***

Somewhere north of Hyperion Boulevard, Los Angeles, California

A while later

Xander slowly came to with the worst headache of his entire life. "Ugghh – wha' happened?" he muttered.

"Good question, kid," Harris heard a stranger's voice with a broad Queens accent say. Blinking, the male teenager straightened up in the passenger seat and turned to face Whistler, who was staring at him with an indecipherable expression on his face. "Don't think you're gonna like the answer, though."

"Huh? What do you mean? And who are you?" Xander automatically reached for his knife, only to find it wasn't there.

"Name's Whistler. Well, lately it is," the balance demon shrugged slightly, tossing Harris his knife as a show of trust. "And what I meant was, right now your buddy's dead. Sorry, but I showed up too late to save him. As it was, I barely had time to save your tokus before you joined him in the afterlife."

Harris could tell that Whistler wasn't a liar; it was all in the eyes. So a whirling maelstrom of emotions instantly went through Xander's mind, even as a black hate was suddenly born in his heart for whoever had killed his only friend. "Who did it? Did you happen to catch a name? Or even a look at the guy's face, that'll do for now."

"Well, that's the thing, kid," Whistler nodded slowly, deciding to tell the truth selectively. He could already tell that the boy was filled with the desire for revenge, but this had to be handled carefully in order to channel his feelings into a useful avenue for maintaining the balance of good and evil. "I did get a look at who killed your friend. But I don't think you'd believe me if I told you what he was."

"Huh? Why not?" Xander demanded at once.

"Because the world you live in? It's just a sugar-coated illusion, bottom line," Whistler said bluntly, uncaring of the look on Xander's face. "I'm thinking I need to show you the real world before you start off on your little revenge crusade."

"Thanks for saving my life," Xander said brusquely, making as if to get out of the car and leave the nut job behind.

"I'm serious!!" Whistler's voice thundered within the vehicle, startling the male teen for a moment. "Now come with me. And whatever you do, don't freak out, okay? I need you to be focused for this."

With that, the messenger got out of the Chevy and began to cross the road. Xander was still in two minds about it, but eventually decided to follow Whistler on the off chance the guy actually had some useful information on who had killed Jesse. As Xander followed the balance demon into an abandoned building and down some stairs, he heard the sound of voices and music.

( What the hell? ) Xander asked himself. ( What is this place? )

"This is a karaoke bar," Whistler said without looking back, as if reading Xander's mind. "One catering to a very special class of clientele. What the hell, kid – it's a better place than most for me to do this. Now come on, I've got something to show you."

Frowning and grumbling about having to hand over his knife to the bouncer, Alexander Lavelle Harris froze in shock at the sight of the karaoke bar's patrons. They were – monsters, there was no other word for it. Creatures out of childhood nightmares, or at least other children's nightmares. His own childhood had raised the bar quite a lot on what actually constituted a nightmare, after all.

"Yes, they're demons. No, you're not dreaming. And yes, you're safe here in Caritas," Whistler impatiently answered all the questions running through Xander's mind. "This joint has got an anti-violence magic spell cast on it, so it's neutral ground – a sanctuary for everybody, good and evil alike. The owner of the place, that guy over there?" Whistler pointed towards the green demon with red horns calling himself Lorne. "He insisted on it. 'Cause as you mighta guessed, he's not from around here."

"What the hell is all this?" Xander choked out, staring around the club and its occupants. "If I'm not dreaming, how the heck can this be real?"

Whistler sighed; he really wasn't looking forward to this part. "Lemme tell you a story, kid. Basically, this world is a lot older than you know..."

***

Caritas, Los Angeles, California

February 26th, 2000

'Completely freaked' was a good way to describe the current mental status of a young man whose entire world had been shaken to the core ever since the midnight hour.

Whistler had told Xander many things earlier on within Caritas, not the least of which was the true history of the planet. He had also pointed out the various types of demons present, before indicating one of the few vampires within the establishment. The news that this was the type of creature which had killed Jesse had not gone down well with his human companion. Xander had studied the bloodsucker's demon face carefully, before launching into a series of questions.

Whistler had given him the Reader's Digest version of their strengths and weaknesses, before eventually leading Harris up to the stage of the karaoke bar. Horribly embarrassed, Xander had nonetheless managed to sing his favourite country and western song before Whistler had dragged him over to talk to Lorne.

"Well, pilgrim, gotta say – that was quite a performance. Not quite up to the standards of Willie Nelson or Waylon Jennings, of course, but still," Lorne said to his newest client with a smile.

"What can you tell us?" Whistler asked impatiently. He didn't know why this kid was so important, and why the Powers had earmarked him for Whistler's personal attention. Thus, he was hoping the anagogic demon could give him some answers.

Lorne, a.k.a. Krevlorneswath of the Deathwok clan, turned to face the balance demon. "Sorry, but there is such a thing as client confidentiality. If you want me to spill, then YOU have to wait outside."

Whistler looked exasperated but did as he was told, figuring he could get the truth out of Xander later. Lorne then looked to Harris and said, "Well, cupcake, I got some good news and some bad news for you."

"What's the bad news?" Xander asked straightaway, that was simply the type of person he was here and now.

"Your friend's definitely dead, and – you're not supposed to be here. I saw it, clear as day," the Host said apologetically.

"Huh? What's that supposed to mean?" Xander asked, looking confused. He was also suspicious of what this demon's intentions really were, not that he could be blamed for that right now.

( Okay, obviously, baby steps are required for this one. ) "Look, what I do here in my club – it's sorta like this." Lorne held up his left hand as he tried to explain. "Most people are supposed to be here in life." The green demon then held up his right hand, a few inches away from his left. "But for some reason or other, they're there. Basically, when people sing for me, I see enough so that I can put them back on the path they're supposed to be following." He then clapped his hands together to emphasize the point.

"But you, on the other hand..." Lorne fully outstretched his right arm, shaking his hand to show where he saw Xander was in life. "By the sweet sounds of Aretha, you're like way over here! Best as I can tell, something happened to you thirteen years ago that darn well shouldn't have-"

"Thirteen years ago?" Xander interrupted.

"You ever heard of a place named Sunnydale, studmuffin?" Lorne asked him.

"Yeah, it was a town up north that got destroyed in a big earthquake back in the Eighties," Xander replied, even though he was annoyed by the nickname.

"It was a lot more than that, my little strudel; it's where you were born. Sunnydale was the town built on the mouth of Hell, a vampire Shangri-La if there ever was one," Lorne told him in no uncertain terms, ignoring the look on Xander's face. "And from what I saw, well – even though I don't know why, it's where you and a whole lot of other people should have been right now. I'm sorry, but everything that's taken place ever since you were six years old – your mom and dad dying, the attempted rape by your foster father, even seeing all those people get murdered in that drive-by shooting when you were fourteen? All that shouldn't have ever happened to you," Lorne told him sadly.

Xander was openly gaping at the lounge demon by this point. "How did you...?"

"I told you, I saw it when you sang. I also saw your future, by the way." Lorne started scribbling down an address on a scrap of paper. "Here. You gotta go to this place, tonight. Right now. That nosy balance demon waiting for you outside, tell him to take you there – and don't pay any attention to whatever cryptic nonsense he may try to tell you along the way, either. Even though this Whistler character saved your life, it was because the guy was under orders to do so – and his agenda may not entirely mesh with yours."

"Wait up, Whistler's a DEMON? And he had orders to save my life – from who?" Xander demanded in disbelief.

"The Powers That Be," Lorne said simply.

"The Powers that be what?" Xander asked in confusion.

"Never mind. Just go, go!" Lorne gave him the bum's rush out the door. As he re-entered his club, the Host of Caritas was glad he'd been able to avoid telling his client the good news regarding the reading. Because he figured this version of Xander Harris definitely did not want to eventually become the newest member of Angel Investigations.

***

A squalid neighbourhood somewhere in East Los Angeles, California

Not long afterwards

"Well, I'll be damned," Whistler said mostly to himself, as he and Xander stood amongst a crowd of humans looking down into a demon fighting pit. "What the hell's HE doing here?"

"What are you talking about? And who's he?" Xander demanded, glancing at his demon companion. Harris wasn't in the best of moods right now, both because the atmosphere kinda reminded him of the movie "Mortal Kombat," and because there were too many questions the balance demon had refused to answer on their way over here.

"It's a long story, kid. But that vampire down there? Last time I saw him, he was a useless rodent in Manhattan. I thought the odds were that he'd have staked himself by now," Whistler replied. He then grimaced as Angel, who was fighting a demon named Val Trepkos, caught a wooden staff blow directly on the head.

"But I thought you said vampires didn't do that sort of thing," Harris looked confused as Soul Boy performed some pretty impressive gymnastic moves to stay in the game. A lot had happened tonight, and Xander was finding it kinda hard to keep all the information he'd acquired straight.

"Yeah, well, Rat Breath's different. He's the one and only vampire with a human soul in this world," Whistler said shortly, as down below Angel got the upper hand in the battle. "That means technically, he's actually a good guy..."

The messenger for the Powers trailed off, as both he and the human teenager watched Angel suddenly get off Trepkos, throw the fighting stick aside and walk away. The crowd instantly booed loudly. For his part, Val got back up and kicked Angel in the back. Anticipating an end to the fight the crowd quickly started chanting, "Killing blow! Killing blow!"

As Trepkos started to beat up on Angel, who wasn't even trying to block any of the punches anymore, Xander frowned. He had officially decided earlier on that he didn't like vampires in any way shape or form, but something about this guy not even trying to fight back bothered him. "Uh, so, shouldn't you be helping him or something?"

"That's not my job, kid," Whistler said frankly. "I can only help whoever the Powers tell me to help, and he ain't on my list anymore. So, unfortunately, as far as I'm concerned, Angel's on his own."

Down below Trepkos pulled back his fist to finish Angel off, who was in pretty bad shape by now. Demon and vampire stared at each other as the crowd kept yelling, "Killing blow! Killing blow!" But to Xander's amazement, Trepkos lowered his arm and stared up into the stands, a cold and menacing expression on his face. The crowd instantly fell quiet.

"Uh-oh. This don't look good," Whistler said nervously. "Harris, I think maybe it's time we departed the premises." He pointed at a man named Darrin McNamara, who was running the entire demon gladiator show. "Oh, crap, I betcha that guy's gonna off both of 'em now!"

Sure enough, the guards raised their weapons in command to McNamara's orders. But at that moment Wesley showed up out of nowhere, holding a gun on Darrin. "Call them off!"

"Screw you!" Darrin shouted, just as the doors to the pit burst open and the former demon slaves, now freed, began to storm the area.

The human crowds instantly started to scream and run for it. Xander lost track of Whistler as he was heaved along in the rush, and he ended up not far away from Wes and Darrin as they tussled for ownership of the gun. Harris looked around for the exit...

BANG!

Xander felt a white-hot bolt of fire lance through his shoulder, as he grunted in pain and fell to the ground. ( Shit, that hurt! )

Luckily, he wasn't trampled in the stampede as a Good Samaritan grabbed him up and said worriedly, "Oh my God, you've been shot! That bullet would have hit me – I, I gotta get you to a hospital-"

"No hospitals," Xander grunted to Cordelia, for it was she. "They gotta report gunshot wounds to the cops, and I'm not..."

The former car thief wasn't able to finish his sentence, as he collapsed out cold from the shock and blood loss. That encounter with the vampire which had killed his best friend earlier tonight played a major role in Xander's lack of physical endurance, unfortunately.

***

The residence of Ben Maxwell, Durham, North Carolina

The same time

Ben was now fairly concerned about his state of health, even though a recent medical exam by one of his colleagues had assured him that there was nothing physically wrong that anybody could detect. The 24-year-old man had told his friend about the two recent blackouts he'd suffered, even though he didn't know what had happened when Glory had emerged from her prison. The host for the hellgod was worried about a possible tumour or aneurysm, even though the neurological examination looked fine and he was most likely just suffering from the stress of the job.

( Yeah, right, ) Ben thought to himself cynically. ( That's easy for them to say. Damn it, six years of med school and nothing like this ever happened! So why the hell would I start suffering from blackouts now? )

Ben had no answer for this question, at least not yet. But the Knights of Byzantium and Glory's worshippers, who were both currently looking for the one whose body contained Glorificus, certainly did.

TBC...