Disclaimer:Highlander – not mine. Angel the Series – not mine. Any original characters and content – very much mine.

Thanks to Oxnate for beta'ing.

Dead Man Walking

By Alkeni

Chapter 7: Reflections

Some demons, despite many claims to the contrary, were very much like humans. Not all of them. A great many were utterly inhuman, with motivations no sane mortal could grasp, acting in ways that seemed utterly random to those whose perception was too limited to see things the way they did. The Old Ones, back when they ruled this earth, had twelve different senses, rather than the human five, and lived seven different lives at once, the same entity occupying seven forms at the same time. Wesley figured it would drive a human mad to simply try to comprehend how it would feel to exist in that state.

But some demons...well, their motives were so astonishingly human it was actually rather amazing. Jealousy, anger, ambition – all motives for many kinds of demons, even ones that didn't look that human to begin with. Or, in the case of these reptilian buggers, greed, pure and simple. And not even respectable greed, for gold, which was valued as a medium of exchange in most demon dimensions. No. They wanted dollars. Several million of them in this case, which is why they'd kidnapped Liam O'Leary – a minor occultist with a lot of money to spend on his hobby – and demanded his wife pay up.

Instead, his wife had gone to Wesley and his group for help.

Which was why he as busy in a sword fight with a saurian demon twice his size and strength – even with his boost from Alfonso.

Wesley ducked a swing and slashed with his own weapon, cutting into the demons arm just bit – the tough hide of its scales serving as an excellent armor. Wesley used the free moment he gained by the demon reeling back in pain to yell, "Jones, ground sweep, left flank!" From one of the many shadowed areas of the sewer tunnel they were in, Jones stepped out, a battleaxe in hand, and swung it with all his might at another of the demons, which had been preparing to dart around and hit Wesley from the side. Hawkins pulled a gun and went for a body-mass shot, the bullet only penetrating far enough to be annoying, however. At which point Wesley became too embroiled in his own fight, as yet another demon joined in on attacking him.

Immortality was great, but still, losing a battle was never fun, and if he died, his team was going to die before he had a chance to come back. Wesley slashed at the sword arm of one the demons, cutting its wrists and forcing it to drop the blade before crouching and rolling between the legs of the other one, standing back up directly behind it and pulling out his shotgun. With a pull of the trigger, flames burst from the barrel, as the Dragon's Breath rounds expended themselves.

Wesley had purchased them from Emil with the intent of using them on vampires – and they did their job on the front amazingly well – but the fact that remained, apart from breeds of demon specifically associated with the elements of fire or water, no one liked to be burnt. And not this lizard demon either. It screeched, falling back and yelling in its native language. Wesley didn't give it any chance to put the fires out or live through them and fire again, a grim merciless expression on his face.

Pump. Fire. Pump. Fire. Pump. Fire. That much fire and the demon was dead in seconds. Hawkins and Jones had finished with their demon and were coming over to join him on the last one.

It spoiled that by holding up its hands by way of surrender. "Look, wait, don't kill me." It dropped its sword, blood dripping from the cut Wesley had made on its arm earlier. It spoke accented English with a reptilian lilt – it wasn't an explainable auditory sensation, but the words just sounded strange. "I have money – you want money!"

"Money isn't the issue. We'll get money when we return Mr. O'Leary to his wife. Where is he?"

"Fucking – she sent you?" The demon took Wesley's raised eyebrow for a yes, "Look, he's at the Sunrise Motel, just outside of town. I've got the room key, I'm going to lower my hand and take it out and give it to you. I give it to you, and you don't kill me, okay?"

"Your continuation of life can be discussed after we get the key." Wesley said. The demon would've frowned if it had the proper facial muscles to do the job. It lowered one hand, and both Hawkins and Wesley had moved a few inches closer, their guns still pointed menacingly at the demon, hands on triggers. It pulled back a flag of skin over its torso, revealing a pouch. Jones actually winced in disgust a little, black pus oozing out as it reached a hand in and pulled out a metal motel key on a chain with one of those metal room number identifiers on it. It was just as covered in that pus.

"That stuff – it isn't going to hurt us, is it?" Jones asked.

"That? Oh, that will strip the skin right off your body wherever it touches and burn right through to the bone." Wesley replied. He took the key, pus and all and grimaced as it set to work doing what it did, but his Quickening kept healing him. He'd explained aspects of his immortality to Hawkins, Jones and Diana, and demonstrated his impossible healing. He'd explained that he had discovered, upon dying for the first time, that he was part of a rare subset of humans were just...immortal. He'd not told them about the one way to kill him – slice off his head – because the less people who knew about that, the better. He rubbed the pus off the key, then turned back to the demon. "If I hear about you being back in Los Angeles, I'll give you the same treatment I gave your friend." Wesley told it tersely. "Understand?" The demon nodded slowly and then turned and scampered off. In as much as a creature as large as it was could be described as scampering, anyway. Wesley pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped the key completely of its toxic cover. "Free Mr. O'Leary, then return to base and have Diana close out the file." He tossed the now safe key to Hawkins, who caught it and nodded. He dropped the ruined handkerchief to the ground.

"Got it, boss." The two turned and went down one of the myriad of tunnels that made up the L.A. sewer system. Really, it was almost as convenient as the one in Sunnydale...Wesley shook his head. He wouldn't be surprised if urban planners the world over had a few Vampires on staff, unknowingly, working to make their hunting grounds a little more hospitable for them and theirs. It certainly seemed the only reasonable explanation, anyway.

Shrugging, Wesley turned and went down one of those tunnels himself.

AtS-HtS-AtS-HtS-AtS-HtS-AtS-HtS-AtS-HtS-AtS-HtS-AtS-HtS

"Why do you do it?" Wesley asked her, that night, after she rolled off of him and laid on the other side of the bed next to him, stretching languidly.

Lilah chuckled. "I don't hear any complaints. Besides, I could ask you the same, after all. You're good, I'm evil. Why do you do it?"

Wesley put an arm behind his head. "Not this. I mean, why do you work for Wolfram and Hart? Is it just the money, power and influence?" Lilah sat up and looked down at him, brushing a stray hair out of her face.

"Why the sudden curiosity? Thinking of saving me from the big, bad, evil law firm? Saving me from myself like some knight charging in on a white horse?" She chuckled again. "Its a futile effort, Wes."

Wesley shook his head. "I know I can't save you from yourself, Lilah. The only person who can do that is you. I'm just curious. I can understand being attracted to the money, the power, the allure of being without conscience. More so these days than I ever did before."

Lilah raised an eyebrow and put two fingers on Wesley's chest, walking them up towards his face slowly. "Oh? Attracted enough to finally take the employment offer? Work for Wolfram and Hart?"

Now it was Wesley's turn to chuckle. "Still at it, Lilah? I thought you'd have given up by now."

Lilah smirked. "Never." The game, the dance continued. Though Wesley did believe that she was still interested in recruiting him and thought he would be an asset to Wolfram and Hart, it was definite that she was making no real moves efforts on that front, anymore. "That's why we'll win, you know. In the end?"

"Oh? How is that, you figure?" Wesley sat up as well.

Lilah continued to trace patterns on his chest idly as she spoke. "Because long after you've given up, or assumed that you've won and had the celebration, we'll still be there, plotting, planning. Waiting for the moment to strike. Long after you've forgotten, we'll still be there." Wesley rolled onto her and pinned her to the bed, his hands holding her arms down.

"I've never been one for giving up, Lilah." He said, darkly. "What about you?"

She smiled, then licked her lips, slowly. "It can have its benefits, from time to time."

AtS-HtS-AtS-HtS-AtS-HtS-AtS-HtS-AtS-HtS-AtS-HtS-AtS-HtS

Roger Wyndam-Pryce had once told his son – well, the boy he called his son. Wesley knew that he couldn't, if he was an immortal, be the biological child of the man he'd grown up calling his father. It was actually quite satisfying to know that. Immortals were all foundlings, he knew. Wesley had often wondered, in the months since his first death, just how he'd ended up at the Wyndam-Pryce household. If his mother still lived, he'd have asked her, but these days the only person who lived in his family's substantial estate was his father, when he wasn't at Council Headquarters in London.

Wesley shook his head and returned to his previous train of thought. Roger Wyndam-Pryce had once told him, when he was young, that reflecting on the past, and chewing over your regrets and failures was a one-way ticket to insanity. Of course, then the man had gone on to raise Wesley on a diet of going over his every failure in excruciating detail, and never once rewarding his successes with the love and acceptance he'd so desperately wanted. As always, as everyone who'd ever been part of the council, Roger Wyndam-Pryce had been a hypocrite of the highest order. From Travers and his cronies on down to himself and Rupert Giles, so had every Watcher. It was almost a requirement. It probably was, on some cosmic ledger out there.

Like so much of his so-called father's advice, Wesley had completely ignored that little tidbit. Once again, he was reflecting. Lilah lay asleep next to him, a state of affairs that be liked and hated. The roiling turmoil of emotions he had when it came to her were better left untouched, unconsidered. So, instead, because...well, maybe he was a glutton for punishment, he was thinking back to Sunnydale again. Still, it was an unhealthy train of thought, and so he forced himself to get off of it. He turned his head to look at Lilah. She was as beautiful asleep as she was awake, and even asleep she still gave off her 'beautiful and deadly'...vibe, for lack of a better word.

It was the dance they danced that kept her coming back, he considered. She was past the point of thinking she could seduce him into working for Wolfram and Hart with actual seduction and its related activities. Well, unless she was secretly possessed of a degree of stupidity he'd never seen her display. As much as he enjoyed the sex – and it certainly seemed she did too, though the woman was nothing if not a consummate actor and liar. Now isn't that a pleasing thought, Wesley? He thought to himself.

Even if he made the assumption she enjoyed it as much or nearly as much as he did, he doubted it was the reason – or at least, not the main one – why the two of them found themselves together nearly every night now. This was the first night that she'd stayed in his bed, though. Either she'd left first, once they were done, or he would tell her to leave. Tonight, he'd not wanted her to leave, and she'd seemed to express no interest in leaving either.

The dance they danced was an odd one. She was fully, unapologetically evil, and he actually envied how clear cut her worldview was. Even Angel lacked a worldview as straightforward as hers. The only person he could think of that was so certain of the line between good and evil – and where everyone and everything sat in that continuum was Buffy Summer's friend, Xander Harris. Cordelia came close, but she was still slightly 'crooked' in her worldview.

Lilah possessed a sharp wit, and every carefully chosen word was a puzzle in itself. The two of them were different, and the same, on a number of levels. He found himself actually glad, to his own surprise and mild worry, that she was immortal. Her line of work was almost certainly going to end with a violent death for her, either from within Wolfram and Hart, or from without it. And the thought her being dead – and staying dead – bothered him more than he liked. Not only was she the enemy, in the abstract sense, but caring that much, about anyway, was not something he wanted to do, not so soon. The people who you cared about the most had the greatest power to hurt you. A trite cliché, but like all clichés, entirely true. Sometimes, clichés did say it best.

He didn't care about her that much, not yet, and he certainly didn't imagine that he ever would...then, when he'd first started working alongside Angel, he'd certainly not expected to become friends with the man – or turn down a chance to return to the Council, in favor of continuing to work with a vampire, soul or no. Life was funny like that. The future was unpredictable, to say the least.

Whatever it was he felt for Lilah, on any level, it would happen on its own, and he found that he didn't care enough to try and steer it, or stop it before anything happened. He had enough regrets, and since Wesley fully intended to live as long as he possibly could, he didn't want to accumulate more.