20. Offspring, Part I

"Full house," Doyle announced, laying his cards on the table with a tentative smirk. Aside from Penny, directly to his left, there were five other men seated at the table, none of which were men, strictly-speaking. In fact, only one of the five other players looked remotely human, and Doyle could tell by the stench of the guy, that looks could be deceiving. The other four didn't even come close.

They did have something in common, though. Every single demon in the room looked capable of leaping across the table and ripping Doyle limb from limb—and they all looked like they wanted to do exactly that. If it weren't for the fact that the table in question belonged to Penny, and therefore, he called the shots, Doyle suspected these guys would have already torn him apart, whether they could beat his hand or not.

"I fold." The human-ish demon grumbled, tossing his cards facedown on the table.

"Grrrrr." The large demon beside him made some kind of guttural noise and mimicked the gesture. There were a few other mumbles, some in English, some not, as the other demons followed suit.

Doyle swallowed nervously as he eyed the purple-faced beast sitting directly across from him. The thing looked like a cross between a Muppet and the Predator, with wide plumes of fur growing out of various parts of its anatomy, and hooded eyes that gave the impression it could easily rip Arnold Schwarzenegger in half. A hiss emanated from the creature and Doyle didn't need to speak its language to know it was threatening him with violence. Trying his best not to react—the last thing he needed to do was let these guys see his fear—Doyle hoped he hadn't made a fatal error in relying on Penny's protection this night.

"Give it a rest, Xenok." Penny said from his place beside Doyle. Leaning forward, he stubbed out a cigarette in a nearby ashtray and then tossed his own cards down on the table, which revealed his four of a kind. "Looks like it ain't Doyle's night, after all."

Reaching forward, Penny scooped the mound of chips toward his end of the table and began organizing them into colored piles. There was more grumbling from the other players, but it didn't sound nearly as hostile as it had been seconds earlier when it appeared Doyle was the winner.

The purple demon stood from his chair rather abruptly, training his bug eyes briefly on Penny before storming toward the exit, giving his chair a swift kick on the way out. It shattered into a pile of splinters, the perfect punctuation to the creature's departure. Doyle flinched, but Penny merely rolled his eyes, as if this was a common occurrence at the end of the night.

Doyle remained motionless in his seat as the other demons began gathering what remained of their own piles of chips—in most cases, there wasn't much. When all that remained in the room was a half dozen empty chairs, a thick plume of smoke and his host, Doyle finally let out a breath he hadn't been consciously aware he was holding.

"I should've warned you… winning would've been a stupid thing to do." Penny noted, keeping his eyes on his chips as he meticulously stacked them into towers.

Doyle snorted, pointing a finger at the impressive hand Penny spread on the table between them. "So, do I have to wait 'til ya leave the room to see your real hand?"

"Nah, the illusion'll hold even after I leave the room." Penny chortled in reply, placing his last chip onto the stack and then leaning back in his chair. "I'da been dead a long time ago if it didn't." He opened his jacket and reached into his breast pocket, where he procured another cigarette. He wasn't wearing his fedora this evening; therefore his modest set of horns was on full display. He held the pack out in Doyle's direction, but Doyle waved away the offer.

Penny popped his own smoke between his lips, lit it and then tossed his lighter down on the table beside his multiple stacks of chips. "You understand, I gotta keep the winnings. Being a suspected cheat's one thing, but I can't afford to have folks thinking I've gone soft. Unlike you, I don't have a vamp best friend to watch my back and, sue me, but I like breathing."

"I didn't come here for the money." Doyle reminded the other man with a glower.

Penny's eyebrows shot up and a curious smile fell across his lips as he studied Doyle closely. "Be honest, is this an invasion of the body snatchers situation? 'Cause no way you're the same Doyle I used to know. That guy would've insisted on taking the money and then run straight to the track to blow it. Those visions must be worse than I thought if you're that desperate for a cure."

Doyle shifted in his chair, and then reached for a nearly empty bottle of warm beer that rested on the table beside him. He didn't lift the bottle to his lips, instead spinning it in place and toying with the peeling label. "Somethin' like that." He muttered, unwilling to admit they were no longer his visions, which, in fact, made him even more desperate for said cure.

"Wanna know what I think?" Penny asked rhetorically, taking a drag off his cigarette and puffing it out in a series of lazy O-shapes. "If you're willing to gamble with your life, then stop wasting your time with the middle-men. Go straight to the head honchos—grand prize, baby."

"Gambling is one thing; certain death is another." Doyle answered with a sigh, kneading his knuckles against his temple. "This your way o' telling me you've got nothing?"

Penny's eyes narrowed as he continued to try and read Doyle's thoughts. Finally, he gave up, sniffling as he flicked his cigarette ashes into a nearby ashtray. "Wouldn't have called you if I had nothing. But the something I got ain't exactly the thing you were looking for."

Doyle raised a brow. "What is it?"

"Right up your alley." Penny assured him, reaching into his breast pocket once again and this time procuring a folded piece of paper, which he placed on the table and slid in Doyle's direction. It appeared to be an address.

"No alleys in that part o' town, bud." Doyle observed, reading the inked characters on the small square of paper that corresponded with what he knew to be an affluent neighborhood on the west side. "Just what is it I'm supposed to find there?"

Penny extinguished his butt in the ashtray, coughing into his fist before he turned to stare Doyle right in the eye. "Ever hear of the Nyazian scroll?"

Technically, Doyle had never heard of the Nyazian scroll or the prophecy inscribed upon it. Not with his ears, anyway. Which wasn't to say that he didn't know about the scroll. In fact, he knew far more than he wanted to know. And he'd been expecting it to surface.

Anticipating. Or was it dreading? He really couldn't tell anymore.

He knew the Nyazian Prophecy was necessary to the mission; but was it a necessary good or a necessary evil? That was the part he wasn't so certain about. And the funny thing about prophecies was their proclivity to self-fulfill.

Even as he crouched in the bushes beside Wesley, peering up at the looming Brentwood mansion that supposedly housed a significant portion of the mysterious artifact… Doyle had to wonder if they should be pursuing the scroll at all.

Yes. The answer was obviously yes. If the prophecy was as dangerous as Doyle suspected, it was better off in the hands of Angel Investigations over Wolfram & Hart, or any other would-be scroll seekers. Not to mention that without the confounding prophecy, they may not be able to bring Connor into the world in the first place, which would make every action Doyle had taken over the course of the last two years—or purposely not taken, for that matter—entirely moot.

So, yes, retrieving the scroll was absolutely necessary. To not retrieve it would be negligent.

Wesley rustled the branches around them, as he brought his wrist up to eye level. He was dressed from head to toe in his best Mission Impossible get up. Black pants, black turtleneck, black knitted cap. It was as if he'd purposely chosen to dress up as a burglar. Doyle, on the other hand, sported his usual jeans, colorful button down and brown leather jacket. Between the two of them, Doyle felt he blended slightly better to their current surroundings.

Not that he could ever truly blend in Brentwood. Cordelia, on the other hand…

"Gunn should've been back by now." The Englishman noted, his eyes shifting to the large window just above their heads. "Do you suppose he was…?" There was an ominous gulp as his words trailed off.

"Eaten alive by a pack o' angry Dobermans?" Doyle suggested glibly.

"Oh, dear." Wesley muttered, his eyes growing wider. Breaking and entering wasn't exactly his forte.

Letting out a muted chuckle, Doyle shook his head. "Those steaks hadda be way tastier than Gunn. Besides, I didn't hear any screams o' agony. I'm thinkin' the tranquilizers did their job."

"Maulings aren't typically quiet activities." Wesley agreed, letting out a slight sigh of relief. He began pawing through his sack of B&E equipment, procuring a suction cup from the jumble of fancy electronic equipment and climbing paraphernalia that was poking out of the bag. "The alarms and vid lines are disabled—we have a twenty minute window before they reset. We should begin phase two."

Doyle raised a brow, but remained mum. Whatever happened next was bound to be entertaining, if not effective. He just hoped the entertainment didn't end with both of them behind bars.

As Wesley slowly rose to standing position, Doyle followed suit. Both men scanned the expanse of the empty garden. It was a little strange that Gunn was nowhere to be found, but Doyle's preternatural demon senses didn't detect any reason to be alarmed. Nor were there any actual alarms blaring, which was also a good sign.

Wesley's brow wrinkled as he inspected the thick panes of glass that lined the window and then he eyeballed the inside of his suction cup. "Doyle… can I ask you a question?"

"If you're about to ask if I can pick a lock, I'd say that was something ya shoulda checked before we disarmed the place." Doyle scolded, hitching a thumb over his shoulder. "But, yeah, I could probably manage that door over there." Although he didn't often advertise his B&E skills, it was an area for which Doyle did have some experience. And it had to be a better plan than letting Wesley do whatever he was planning to do with that suction cup.

"That wasn't what I was—you think you can pick the lock?" Wesley interrupted his own thought as he registered Doyle's offer. His brows went upward and he gestured toward the back door that stood five feet to their right.

Doyle nodded his agreement of the new plan and the two of them returned to their previous position, squatting in the shrubbery. Wesley haphazardly jammed his extra-large suction cup back inside the duffle bag at his feet and then slung it over his shoulder.

The two thieves slowly began inching their way toward the rear entrance of the house. "My question's actually more of a… personal nature." Wesley continued his previously aborted thought as they swooshed through the low-hanging branches.

"How personal?" Doyle asked skeptically, as he studied the lock up ahead, which seemed basic enough.

"I'd say moderately so." Wesley clarified. "It's just… ahem. Well, you see, I'm in need of some advice. And of my current options for counsel, you seem the most logical—"

"Just ask the damn question, Wesley?" Doyle interrupted gruffly, as he finally got to the edge of the row of bushes and scooted closer to the back door. He could only hope that Wesley would arrive somewhere adjacent to the point sooner rather than later, otherwise their mission may very well become impossible.

"Fred." Wesley peeped in reply.

"Huh." Doyle replied dully, twisting his body around so that he was angled toward the blushing Englishman squatting beside him.

"I…" Wesley's lips moved into soundless shapes. He shifted his weight and then cleared his throat aggressively, starting the process over. The second time, he was able to form actual sounds. "Due to the, um… incident a few weeks ago… well, I suppose I'd like to make things up to her, in an effort to… you know. Anyway, do you suppose flowers would be appropriate under the circumstances? Or a meal, preferably in a fine dining establishment? Or should I start with something more subtle, like a limited edition copy of Steven Hawking's A Brief History of Time, which as it so happens, I recently obtained from—."

"Wesley." Doyle held up a hand to halt the other man's incessant babbling. Out of all the things he wanted to discuss with Wesley, the man's love life wasn't on the top of the list—or on the list at all.

"I'm prattling on again, aren't I?" Wesley replied abashedly.

"Little bit." Doyle agreed with a pointed raise of his brows. "And I dunno, man. I might not be the right person to ask for dating advice. Fifty percent o' my long-term relationships ended with me getting' walked out on. Actually, if ya count the time Cordy left me, it's closer to a hundred."

"No. Right. Of course." Wesley bumbled in reply. "It was silly of me to think you'd know any more about wooing Fred than I do."

"I know ya shouldn't use the word 'wooing'." Doyle mocked.

Wesley barely registered the dry retort. "Perhaps, Cordelia's a better choice to steer me in the right direction."

At that moment, the back door swung open, causing both Doyle and Wesley to lurch backward, landing roughly on their backsides. They stared panic-stricken at the looming figure in the doorframe.

"I got your direction right here, English." Gunn announced, gesturing to the apparently empty house behind him.

"You… How…?" Wesley stammered pointing dumbly to the inside of the house where Gunn stood comfortably, as if he belonged there.

Gunn shrugged. "Who needs locks when you got a million dollar alarm system and an army of attack dogs? Now you two wanna stop playing around in the bushes and help me find this ancient scroll thing before the 5-0 rolls up and hauls our asses to jail?"

"That's it. Don't pull your punches." Angel instructed, as Cordelia whipped her fists through the air, missing Angel's face by mere centimeters. "You're doing great."

Cordelia swung again, thinking she'd be doing even better if she could actually connect with something, but that was the beauty of training with Angel. There was little danger of her actually connecting, and even if she did, it wasn't like she could hurt him. Or herself, since he didn't have any spikes, like certain other demons she'd trained with in the past.

A shuffle from the basement steps caused Cordelia to abandon her punch midway through its journey through the air. "Sure you don't wanna turn, Fred?" She asked their quiet onlooker. Lowering her fists, Cordelia tossed the question over her shoulder at the small woman who'd been restlessly watching the sparring match. "Could help with all that nervous energy that's kinda making me, y'know, nervous."

"Oh no. I'm pretty sure you'd beat me." She replied with a shrug, causing Cordelia to laugh at the oddity of Fred's reply. "I guess I am a little nervous," she continued. "I mean, it's not every day you hear the apocalypse might be coming."

"Clearly, you didn't grow up in Sunnydale." Cordelia remarked, exchanging a knowing glance with Angel.

"I wonder how precise the Nyazian calculations will be?" Fred wondered curiously, looking as if the wheels in her head were spinning furiously. "Will we be able to tell when the end is coming down to the exact nanosecond? Or will it be more of a ballpark figure, y'think?"

"I doubt we have anything to worry about." Angel replied easily. "These prophecies surface every now and then. 'Something terrible's coming.' 'The world will end.' In my experience, they tend to exaggerate."

"So, what you're saying is my boyfriend's out there risking possible incarceration for no good reason?" Cordelia asked grumpily. "We don't have the petty cash to bail one person out of jail, much less three. If Doyle becomes some guy's bitch for non-apocalyptic reasons, we're gonna have a problem here."

Angel's face changed, hinting at an edge of nervousness. Cordelia suspected it wasn't due to the apocalypse as much as her disapproval. "Um… well, it's still a good idea to check. Just in case."

"It would be way worse if we didn't even know the end was near." Fred excitedly babbled from her place on the stairs. "Imagine if we were just going about our daily business, like we had all the time in the world, and then, poof! It's all sucked right into a hell dimension. I think it's better to know. That way you can say your goodbyes and eat a few extra tacos at dinner, just in case it's the last dinner you'll ever eat—oh, and we can try and stop it, of course. That's sorta the main thing."

"Yeah, lucky us." Cordelia deadpanned in reply.

"It is a good thing we found out about it." Angel agreed. "Even if it doesn't pan out, we don't want something like this to fall into the wrong hands."

With that statement, Angel moved back into his fighting stance and waved Cordelia toward him to continue their combat training. She maneuvered herself into an offensive position, found her balance and raised her fists. As she prepared to let them fly, her eyes suddenly narrowed at the vampire opposite her. "Wait a sec—how did we find out about it? Is there some kind of apocalypse newsletter I don't know about?"

"It was a… source." Angel said after a beat. An awkward beat. A beat that reminded her what a terrible liar he was.

She swung her right fist without warning. "Who's source?"

Angel deftly danced out of her reach and then back toward her again, nodding for her to try again. "Uh..." He gave a little shrug. "Y'know, I don't remember."

Now she had definite confirmation that there was something Angel was not telling her. "Do you think I was born yesterday?" She baulked, eyeing him over the rims of her knuckles. "You might as well hold up a neon sign that says it was Doyle's source."

"Oh, that's right." Angel relented with an uncomfortable chuckle. "It was probably Doyle's source."

Despite the admission, Angel was still acting cagey, which made Cordelia suspect there was more to the story—more that Angel was trying not to divulge. Cordelia threw a sideways glance toward Fred, who seemed to be rather interested in the ceiling, signaling that even the newest member of the AI team knew that Doyle was up to something that Cordelia herself had not been informed about.

"That's odd, considering Merl's dead and Doyle isn't supposed to have any other sources." Cordelia mused with a scowl. "Did Wesley sign off on this? Because I certainly didn't approve an increase to our first aid budget!"

"It's not like before." Angel tried to laugh it off, but then looked like he was second-guessing himself. "Doyle's just… gathering information."

"Do I really have to remind you, of all people, that Doyle's old sources were bookies, loan sharks and fellow gamblers, the majority of which, he owed money to?" She snapped in reply. "You really think he could just go and round up some hot tips on the apocalypse without owing something to somebody?!"

She swung wildly, venting her frustration with her full strength… and she made contact! "Oops!" She cried as her fist unexpectedly connected with Angel's nose, sending him reeling around with his back to her. His shoulders hunched up defensively and she could see that he'd raised his hands to his face. "I'm sorry. Are you okay?"

Angel turned to her with a slightly too-tight smile and a casual wave of his hand. "I'm a vampire. You can't hurt me."

"It's not about the money." Cordelia clarified, seeing that Angel was fine and seguing back to the topic at hand. "Doyle could get hurt. Or worse."

Angel nodded, acknowledging that the concerns she had were real and that he wasn't as oblivious to them as he was portending. "Trust him, Cordelia. He wouldn't let what happened before happen again—neither would I." His brow furrowed slightly and he tentatively touched the bridge of his nose. "Am I swelling?"

Rolling her eyes, Cordelia took a step closer to inspect the damage she'd inflicted on Angel's face. She swatted his hand away and took his cheeks into her hands, guiding his face up toward the light so she'd have a better view. "I think that bump was always there." She observed, twisting his head slightly in the other direction to continue her examination.

"Bump?" Angel echoed, his brow furrowing deeper as he reached up to feel it for himself. His fingers brushed over hers, which were still cupping his face. "There's a bump?"

As Cordelia continued to squint up at Angel's non-injured nose, she heard the familiar rapid thud of footsteps descending the basement stairs. The sound of Doyle's voice soon followed. "Ah… hey."

"You're fine." Cordelia assured Angel, releasing his face from her grasp and redirecting her attention to the half-demon leaning over the banister, who looked white as a sheet, which was to say, only slightly whiter than usual. "And you're not in jail."

"Did you get the scroll?!" Fred piped in eagerly from her seated position at the very bottom of the staircase.

Doyle's gaze had been fixed on Cordelia, briefly shifted to Angel, and only after an extended beat did he finally turn to acknowledge the woman seated just below him; he seemed surprised to see her there. And then his disposition altered, as if Fred's unanticipated presence was more of a relief than a shock. His head shook nearly imperceptibly as he cleared whatever mental cobweb he'd just walked through.

"Yeah, we got it." He finally answered, gesturing up the stairs behind him. "Wes could actually use your help with the translation bit, if you're up for it—sounds like there's just as much math as there is language."

Fred jumped up without hesitation and began rushing up the stairs. "I'm great with nanoseconds!" She cried right before disappearing into the lobby above.

As soon as Fred had swooshed by, Doyle's curious eyes migrated back in Cordelia's direction. "Everything a'right down here?" He wondered, as his eyes continued to volley between his girlfriend and his best friend, perhaps sensing the slight tension in the air.

"Peachy." Cordelia answered too-quickly, turning her back on Doyle. She wasn't looking for a confrontation at the moment—it would be better for both of them if she continued to digest the information about his dalliances with old sources while she punched someone she couldn't hurt. Her gaze found Angel who was still standing in the center of the mats, gently wiggling his nose. "Ready for round two?"

Angel's eyes opened wide with objection, but then he caught Cordelia's agitated expression and nodded reluctantly. "Uh huh."

"Then put 'em up!" Cordelia chirped, raising her own fists and bouncing back and forth as she'd seen professional boxers do on TV. Angel followed her instructions, albeit not quite as enthusiastically.

From over her shoulder, Cordelia could hear Doyle shuffle uncomfortably on the staircase, probably feeling like the third wheel she'd just made him out to be. "'Kay, guess I'll just… be upstairs."

Even after he'd made his announcement, she knew he lingered there for an extra moment, watching as she and Angel began their sparring match once again. She half-expected him to continue with a running commentary the way he usually did, but instead the only sound she heard was his slowly retreating footsteps and the slight hitch of the door at the top of the stairs as it closed behind him.