Part Four
Angel's '67 Plymouth convertible was parked inside the garage of Henry's shop, waiting for it's full makeover. The garage door was open and Cordelia spotted it from outside and scuttled towards it. 'There is God!' she cried, 'Oh thank you, thank you thank you'. She climbed into the driver's seat, and started to look around, as the two men came up behind her. 'That's great,' Gunn said. 'Now you can just drive away, and we can call time on this on whole little adventure.'
'Just as soon as I find the keys.'
Gunn glared at her; then he turned on Doyle and glared at him, opening and closing his mouth as if he was thinking of things to say and then rejecting them, and then looking for new words. Eventually, he gave up and turned back to Cordy. 'You don't have the keys?'
'Well...I kind of left them in the car when I came in to save you and Doyle. I thought you were in danger, every second counted.' Doyle smiled at her, pleased that she had been so worried about him and so desperate to come to his aid. But Gunn was far less impressed with her heroics. 'You are one high maintenance chick, you know that?'
'Alright, everyone, let's just calm down, yeah? The keys must be somewhere.'
Cordelia was patting down the seats in annoyance, 'well, they gotta be somewhere.'
'You're killing me!' Gunn protested, gritting his teeth and raising his eyes to heaven. Doyle tried to calm him down: 'C'mon, man, it's not that bad. She didn't know someone would steal the car, she had bigger things to think about - like saving our lives. That's more important than a car, bud.'
Cordelia gave up looking and glanced towards the men: 'I don't suppose you know how to - you know - hot wire it?'
'Just because I know car thieves doesn't mean I am one.'
'Actually I was talking to Doyle. But you know, rather than being moral high ground guy, you could help me look.'
A jangling of keys made the three of them look up. 'Looking for these?' Deevak held them in his hand. He was massive, and ugly, with wrinkly greenish skin - though in places it seemed to have been torn off. He was big and ugly enough to not require any backup, but nevertheless he was surrounded with a group of vampires. It was then that Doyle realised what had bothered him when he had been here before. Just before his vision had hit, Johnny Red had given him one name -'Henry.' He raised his sword ready to fight. A slight nod from Deevak and a couple of the vamps crowded in on the half demon. Deevak wanted to kill Gunn, and he wasn't interested in the distraction that the smaller man might cause. Sword still raised, Doyle began to back away, not wanting to start to fight until he felt himself to be on better ground.
As the Irishman was pushed out of their group, Gunn glanced at Cordelia: 'Go' he told her, but she wouldn't. 'I'm not leaving you!' Her head swung wildly between the vamps cornering her friend, and the massive demon bearing down on the street fighter. 'How touching,' the demon snarled, 'a woman willing to die with her man.'
'Oh -he's not my man! He's just a friend ...and about the 'willing to die' part?...'
Backed into a corner, Doyle swung his sword and beheaded the first of the vampires. He then headbutted the second. It barely slowed the vampire down, and it swung it's fist hard into the half demon's face. Doyle was knocked to the floor, and as he landed, he felt the blue spikes shoot out from under his skin, in reaction to the pain. He shrugged to himself, and got up and re headbutted the vampire, this time in demon face. The spikes gouged into the vampire's face, goring his skin. It took a few steps back, clutching at his injured face, and Doyle used that moment to morph back into his human features and swing his sword.
...
'Damn!' Gunn said to Deevak 'I heard you was ugly but…'
'And you're the big, bad Gunn, I heard you were looking for me.' He reached out an arm and grabbed the young man by the throat, lifting him up into the air.
...
The vampire's arms, raised up to protect its face, had also managed to protect its neck from the swing of the sword. He was cut though, and he roared out in pain, as Doyle swung at him once again.
...
Cordelia used her axe to try and hit the massive Deevak, desperately attempting to free the suffocating Gunn. It just bounced straight off his gnarly skin, however, and the demon grabbed hold of her wrist to stop her from hitting him again. 'How does it feel to finally meet someone nastier that you are?' he asked the choking demon hunter.
'Stop it!' Cordelia cried 'you're killing him!'
The demon suddenly seemed to shudder and blur, and then he shrank downwards - morphing into Jameel the stool pigeon. 'Survival of the fittest bro!' he said to Gunn 'and right now, you aint looking too fit.'
...
The sword was now on the floor. Doyle was lying face down, scrabbling desperately to reach it. But the vampire was on top of him, and it was far stronger than he. He took a moment to stop reaching for the weapon, and elbowed the vampire right in the face. The vampire released him, momentarily, and he was able to scramble forward and grasp the hilt of his sword.
...
Cordelia was still held in the vice like grip of Deevak, but she had one hand free, and she used that to rummage around in her purse. He wasn't even paying attention to her - more fool him. She pulled out her mace and - thankful that as Jameel the demon was more or less the same size as her - squirted the liquid straight into his eyes. He screamed out in agony, and dropped both her and Gunn. But the vampires began to circle, now, and Jameel morphed back into Deevak.
A screech of tyres announced the arrival of Angel and Wesley, the motorcycle slid under the garage doors sideways, and knocked down one of the vampires. In the same moment, Doyle was able to kill his own assailant and rushed back over to Cordelia. Angel took off his pink helmet, one of Deevak's vamps saw it and laughed. Angel looked down at the helmet, grinned, and then swung it upwards and smashed it into his face, using it to knock out the laughing vampire. He then turned on the next one.
Gunn took a swing at Deevak, but he missed. He tried again.
Cordelia and Doyle were pinned up against the side of the car by one of the vampires. The half demon had already taken out two by himself and his energy was waning, he didn't know he could manage a third. Cordelia used her axe, one more time, and swung it at the vampire, but he easily blocked her. The demon bore down on the two of them, Doyle tried to throw a punch, but he missed. Cordelia closed her eyes. And then she heard the unmistakable sound of a vampire turning to dust. When she opened her eyes she saw only Wesley, stood where their attacker had been, stake raised.
She smiled, gratefully, at the watcher, but then felt herself being roughly dragged sideways by Doyle. As she watched, Wesley then launched himself at a vampire wielding a crowbar, which had been just about to hit her.
...
Deevak had grown tired of allowing Gunn to throw punches at him, and he was now the one taking the offensive. The street fighter was having to duck and weave to avoid Deevak's massive hands, but he misjudged the timing, and was clipped around the head by the demon's green fist. He fell to the floor and Deevak moved in for the kill.
'Cordy! Axe!' Angel yelled. She threw it to him, and he jumped off the hood of one of the cars into a somersault. He caught the axe as he spun and then buried it deep into Deevak's skull as he landed. Deevak was felled and he toppled down beside Gunn: dead. Angel held out his hand to help the street fighter to his feet...
Angel and Doyle were pushing the car out of the garage. Once in the lot, Angel got into the driver's seat and tried to start it by popping the clutch. 'Is it gonna work?' Doyle asked. The vampire tried again - nothing.
Wesley ran out to them 'Angel -look, I've found your keys!' he was holding the key ring with a pen slid through, as if he didn't want to touch them: 'unfortunately this substance doesn't seem to be coming off them.'
'What is it?' Angel wanted to know.
'Demon blood ...or maybe demon puss… possibly both.'
Doyle pulled a face, and Angel held up his hands, refusing to touch the keys. 'Does anyone know how to hot-wire a car?' he asked. Yes. It turned out that -actually- Doyle did know how. Angel moved over onto the passenger side, and Doyle got into the driver's seat and pulled out the wires - looking slightly shamefaced at this outing of his criminal skill set.
...
Over by his pickup, Gunn was stood rubbing his throat. Cordelia walked up to him. 'Hey' he said.
'Hey.'
'Well...you finally saved my life, I guess I should say 'thank you'.'
'I guess you should.'
'You really been in three apocalypses?' Gunn wanted to know.
'Three that I knew about.' Cordelia clarified, 'one of which was being caused by Mr. Tall, Dark and Vampire over there. But my first ever apocalypse I didn't know what was going on. I was mainly just there as something for the vampires to snack on.'
'But you didn't get snacked on?'
'Not to date.'
'Damn girl!' Gunn actually sounded impressed, and Cordelia smiled. The sound of the engine coming to life, and cheering from the three men by the car, interrupted them briefly. 'So. If I accept that maybe you do know a thing or two about demons, do you promise to never try and save my life again?' Gunn wanted to know. Behind Cordelia - hot-wiring finished, Doyle walked up to the pair of them. 'The danger's over now, right. Deevak's dead. The Powers will let me have my life back?'
'Actually, bud…' Doyle started to say. Gunn groaned. 'Aww, man, don't tell me this aint over!'
'Deevak wasn't the threat I saw in my vision.'
'I thought you said your visions are 100% accurate?'
'They are,' Doyle told him, chuckling drily, 'they're just really cryptic a lot of the time.' Cordelia nodded to that, in agreement. 'They're totally lame,' she told Gunn, she lowered her voice to a stage whisper: 'but we try not to say that out loud so as not to hurt his feelings!'
'Yeah? So what's the real danger?' Gunn wanted to know.
'You,' Doyle told him, simply. 'How you live your life. You don't just face danger, you create it. And believe me, bud, a know a little something about that. You're on a self destruct mission and I've been there. You need help.'
'From you?'
'Pfft!' Cordelia interjected 'What's he gonna do? Saving people from themselves, that's my gig.' Gunn groaned, loudly 'aww, man, no - spare me from the crazy chick!'
'Hey! I worked on Doyle 'til he gave up his severe alcoholism and his moping about the whole 'half demon' thing. I got Angel to introduce some colour into his wardrobe and I even got Wesley to stop being so incredibly uptight ...that one's still a work in progress.'
'You know guys only do what you tell them to, to get you off their backs', though, right?'
She didn't take offence. 'Whatever works - I always know best, and as soon as everyone else accepts that, the easier things will be.'
'So you're gonna be on my case, now?'
'Until you don't need me.'
He opened the door to his pickup and made to get in. 'Hey!' Cordelia shouted, he looked back at her. 'How about that thank you?' Gunn smiled at her, sheepishly, and she smiled back. He got in his truck and drove away. Doyle wrapped his arm around Cordelia, and the pair of them made their way back to the car.
Outside Cordelia's front door, she and Doyle were saying goodnight. As usual, it was taking far longer than was strictly necessary, and they were finding any opportunity to spend a few more moments of the day with each other. Cordelia had her hand on the door handle, like she was planning to go inside any moment, only she wasn't. 'I should get inside,' she said, 'Dennis will be worrying.'
'Yeah, it's been a long day.'
She took her hand back off the handle, and turned back to him, 'Do you think Gunn will be OK, now?'
'Now he's got you on the case? He won't dare not be, Princess.' They both laughed. 'You know you were amazing tonight, Cordelia,' he told her, 'the way you saved that girl's life… and the number of times you tried to hit someone with an axe. Y'know, you're really somethin'.'
'Ah - you're not so bad yourself,' she said to him.
'I'm not?'
'No - you killed, like, 4 vampires tonight and hot-wired a car - though I'm filing that with 'getaway driver' and 'knows how to use a blowtorch' as things that I just don't wanna know how you know how to do them.'
'It's a long and murky tale ...none of it pretty.'
'But on the plus side you're a total hero with those visions. Except for the complaining part.'
'And let's not forget I scrub a mean floor!'
She laughed again: 'You know, you looked kind of cute in those rubber gloves.'
'I didn't know you were into that sort o' thing, Cordy!'
'Ew!' She sounded delighted and disgusted in equal measure, as she laughed at him, 'I didn't mean like that!'
'So, y'mean I don't have to invest in pink rubber bondage gear for when we take our relationship to the next level?'
'Please- please do not do that.' They smiled at each other again, and then stood there, not really knowing what to say next, until the door opened as if by itself. Doyle looked up at it. 'You'd better go inside, Dennis is waiting for his woman.' She reached out and took the handle again, pushing the door wider open, but before she went in she stopped and turned back to him once more. 'You know what I said to Gunn in the truck before? I only said it because he was being such a chauvinist. I am, you know.'
'What?' he didn't understand.
'Yours.' She smiled at him, shyly, and then went inside.
Angel walked into the hotel of the lobby feeling totally beat. He was exhausted and he ached, and his hair was messed up from that stupid pink motorcycle helmet. But then . there was Darla, ready to make everything better. 'You look tired,' she told him, 'what's wrong?'
'Nothing.'
She walked over to him, and placed her hands on his chest, looking up into his face: 'Did you save any lives today?'
'Some.'
'Did any of your friends say thank you?'
'Not exactly.'
'That's so typical' she said softly, 'you know next time I see them, I'm going to say something.'
'No it's fine.'
'It isn't. You give and you give and you give. You take care of so many people, who takes care of you?' He smiled down at her: 'you do.'
'That's right,' she said, and she began to pull him over to the red sofa in the middle of the lobby. He dropped down, bonelessly, and lay back. She began to take his sweater off, 'just let Darla take care of you,' she crooned. She kissed him. 'How's that?'
'Good.'
'I'm just getting started,' she began to kiss her way down his bare chest. 'I always know how to please you.' He closed his eyes and smiled to himself, as he felt Darla's fingers trace their way down his bare skin. 'All you have to do is let me,' she said, and kissed the hollow of his neck. She looked down at the sleeping vampire: 'I could just eat you up,' she told him.
A/N Next time, Angel decides to ring the changes, for once, by rescuing a damsel in distress down a dark alleyway ; ) Part one of Episode four - 'Untouched' - coming soon. Ah, telekinesis, the power of moving things with one's mind...
