Part Three
Angel straightened up, reached around, and yanked the axe from his back. He grimaced in pain as he did so. Then he span and swung the weapon at the demon who had attacked him. The Host stood, frozen, watching the fight. As the strange demon landed a punch, and Angel stumbled, the Host shook himself out of his inaction and yelled something at the demon - in the demon's own language. Raccoon eyes turned and looked at him, and the Host threw his book straight at the demon's head. But it leaned to one side, and the book sailed past him, hitting the vampire squarely in the face, instead. Angel stumbled once more, the Host winced. 'Sorry!'
The demon swung it's axe at Angel, who kicked him down the stairs. The demon then yelled at the vampire, in the same language the Host had used - before it ran away. 'What did you say to it?' the vampire wanted to know.
'I said we come in peace. I don't think he believed me.'
'And what did he say to me?'
He said 'you shall not stop the golden child. The one for whom we have waited',' the Host translated, 'Lubber demons, they have a way with words!'
'What's a lubber demon?'
The Host explained the raison d'etre of the lubber demons. They were a fanatical sect who awaited a messiah that would usher in the end of all human life. Apparently, whilst it wasn't often spoken about in public, the theology of the lubbers was fairly popular amongst the demon underworld. A lot of demons were biding their time - waiting for the human pestilence to leave the earth to the old ones once more.
'So this mad scientist has this demon sect worshipping and protecting him whilst he tries to blow up the planet?' Angel asked, his prominent brow even lower than normal, as he tried to figure this out. 'Or what - what's he gonna do?'
'Let's get to his lab pronto and find out,' the Host suggested. 'It's pretty clear that we're dealing with a criminal mastermind.'
Gene had taken apart all his equipment at the lab, and carried it back home. He was now down in the basement of his apartment building, reassembling all the apparatus. As he pressed the buttons to get the lasers back on line, he began to sing to himself. 'All by myse-elf, don't wanna be all by myself - anymore', he hummed, as he worked.
Doyle and his lawyer had reached the entrance of the D.A's building. They shook hands one more time, before Mr. Lezumo took his leave. 'I know this is frightening, Francis - but this is a good deal- you should be happy about this,' the attorney told Doyle, just as he walked away. Doyle nodded - again, but didn't say anything - again. It seemed he had lost the ability to do anything but agree, silently. This awful thing that would happen to him was good news, he should be grateful...he was grateful that Lindsey had offered such generous terms - but he still couldn't manage to say it out loud. Every time he thought about having to spend three years locked up in prison, he felt instantly and utterly sick, and had to fight down a wave of rising panic. At this point in time - three years might as well be three hundred - all the things he would have to go through, all the experiences he would have to endure - before his eventual release… and then the plane back to Ireland was what awaited him at the end.
As he stepped through the doorway, he ran headlong into a tallish person who was moving very fast, their head down - reading something, as they walked. He glanced upward, to apologise, and then stopped - his mouth left hanging open slightly. It was Lilah Morgan. She also looked up, at the impact, as if to apologise ...and also stopped when she saw who it was whom she had run into. When she saw Doyle, standing in front of her, dressed in his suit, her face lit up with a cruel and vindictive smirk of pleasure. 'Well if it isn't Angel's half breed,' she said, still smirking.
He just nodded at her, 'Lilah'. He had no intention of rising to her goading - he had his own problems to deal with. He supposed, really, he should give her an earful over what she'd done to Angel - but his heart wasn't in it. Angel had made the choices he had - he was big enough and old enough to make his own decisions. He didn't need Doyle defending his honour. And if he did ...well, Doyle had problems of his own - and Angel had shown no interest in those. As far as the Irishman was aware, his former vampire boss still had no idea of the circumstances Doyle now found himself in. They were supposed to be friends. Brothers fighting for their redemption together. Doyle's mistake… he had no interest in getting into a argument with Lilah right now, not if Angel couldn't show even basic interest in him.
He made to walk away, but Lilah wasn't done with him. This was her first chance to gloat over the mongrel's downfall, up close and personal. Damned if she was going to just let him walk away.
'So, I guess you're here for a meeting about your ongoing legal troubles?' she smirked. She raked her eyes up and down him, taking in the suit. 'Is this your attempt at respectability, Doyle? Where did you find a suit like that - let me guess - the little girl got it for you? How did she take the revelation of your criminal past?'
'How do you know what's goin' on?' Doyle asked her, confused. Her smirk grew even broader. 'I represent the law, Mr. Doyle,' she told him, piously - or the Wolfram and Hart version of pious. 'It's my job to make sure it's upheld. To make sure that bank robbers and car thieves have to answer for what they did...of course, usually I'm the one defending them. But for you, I took a special interest and bat for the other team.'
'I don't understand.' He shook his head, and narrowed his eyes as he looked at her. He wasn't sure what she was saying.
'Oh, now - you know I've had a special interest in you since I discovered the Scourge's beacon - and the role you were supposed to play in destroying it. I did some background digging and ...my, my, my - what a chequered past you were concealing, Doyle! What a life you had led.' She shook her head, sadly, as if she was regretting his poor life choices on his behalf. 'As your actions began to interfere with company policy - getting in the way of the Senior Partners' schemes - I realised it was my moral obligation to draw the attention of the authorities to your crimes. That the perpetrator of several unsolved crimes was sitting right under Detective Lockley's nose - was 'helping the helpless' - making a mockery of law enforcement…' she tilted her head to one side, and fixed him with a hard gaze …'well, I just had to do something about that.'
'It was you…?' Doyle frowned, 'you're the one that told the police ...that gave them all that evidence …'
'You are guilty, half breed. You broke the law - you don't get to take the moral high ground now. Yes. It was me - I collected all that evidence, I spoke to your old contacts, I found photographs and CCTV footage of you committing crimes - and then it handed all over to the police...my duty as an upstanding, law abiding citizen...'
'You're doing all this to me just to get back at Angel?' Doyle asked. 'Isn't it enough that you killed Darla and drove him crazy? You gotta mess with me too?'
'Not everything is about Angel, Doyle', she told him, her voice like granite, 'This is personal. Payback. This is about you, yourself.'
'Me?' Doyle looked even more confused. 'Why me? What did I ever do to you?'
Did he really just ask her that? After everything he'd done or had caused to happen? She felt like tearing her prosthetic hand off and throwing it right at his face.
...
Behind them, inside the lobby of the building, Lindsey came down the stairs. He came to a stop as he saw his former colleague standing in the doorway, talking to the half demon seer who found himself in so much trouble. Lindsey listened carefully. He only caught the second half of the conversation - but it was enough to interest him. He hadn't realised that the evidence they were using to convict Doyle had come from Lilah - and not the police themselves. That needed to be looked into…. He ran back up the stairs, unnoticed by either Doyle or Lilah, and dialled Kate at work.
Angel and The Host entered Gene's lab. They found his equipment gone, and one of his co-workers examining the remains of the setup. 'Hey!' Angel greeted the physicist, 'we're looking for Gene Rainy?'
'So am I', the man said, looking up. 'Someone's taken his equipment.'
'What equipment?' the vampire wanted to know. The scientist shrugged, 'particle accelerators, propulsion batteries ...he was working on a time paradox theory. Accelerating specific particles out of our own continuum and into their own excised universe.'
'Come again?' Angel hadn't understood a word. But the Host had. 'Stopping time,' he translated.
'Which is impossible by the way,' the physicist pointed out.
'Right,' Angel nodded, 'but let's just say, for argument's sake, that he could do it - how would he do that?'
'Well - in theory - you focus the accelerators on a specific point, and if you can generate the correct velocity, whatever was in the field would just be removed.'
'Removed?'
'From our reality,' the scientist nodded.
'What would happen to it?' The Host asked.
'Nothing,' the man clarified, 'in the strictest sense of the word. Whatever is in the field would stand still forever in its own private universe.'
The two demons exchanged a worried glance. 'What would happen - just for fun - if someone cranked this into overdrive?' The green demon kept his voice casual, as he sought to find out the answer. He had a feeling he already knew.
'If the field were improperly contained - it would spill out - stop everything.'
So that was it. That was how the world would end - frozen in an eternal moment. A science experiment gone wrong. But they had to find who had the equipment - who it was that would trigger the time stoppage. 'Who has the keys to this place?' Angel asked.
'Only Gene', the man replied, 'even maintenance can only come in when he's in there.'
'No sign of a forced entry,' the Host noted. The scientist wrinkled his nose up in confusion at that. 'Why would Gene take his own equipment?' he asked. But Angel shook his head, 'the question is where would Gene take his own equipment?'
In his bedroom, Gene set up the containment field. He put mirror panels around the bed, and placed the switch on the nightstand. This was where he and Denise would spend perfect, blissful eternity. When he was finished with the apparatus, he smoothed down the bed sheets and then lay a single, red rose on the top. Then he went into the living area and set the table, lighting candles ready for their big night.
Cordelia, Wesley and Gunn stood outside in the grounds of the palatial estate. They had seen no sign of the monster so far, and were snooping for clues. 'Here! what's this?' Cordelia called out, kneeling down on the grass, 'we've got footprints. Just outside this big - conservatory - thingy.'
'Solarium', Wesley told her.
'Bless you.'
'It's a special sun room … the kind of room for someone who likes the warmth.'
'Gee - 'cause we don't have enough of that here in L.A,' Cordelia pointed out. Wesley squatted down beside her and began to analyse the markings in the wet soil.
'So is this the demon's footprints or what?' Gunn asked, 'are we on the right track yet?' But Wesley shook his head, 'hmm - these footprints are small - and the toe is rounded...it's impossible to say for sure without seeing the demon...but...'
'So we still got nothin'?' The street fighter, swung his homemade axe over his shoulder and blew his cheeks out. 'We gotta find something soon - I want those big tubs of cash we were promised.'
Cordelia got back to her feet, brushing the mud off her knees, as she did so. 'It's all squelchy round here,' she noted, 'my pants are ruined, my shoes are ruined ...can we go back inside now?'
The watcher nodded his acquiescence, and the three of them entered the house, through the solarium. Cordelia sniffed, 'Does it smell kinda funky to you?' she asked. Gunn smelled the air, experimentally, 'well it's a different kinda funk to the one we got in our office - but -yeah - it don't smell right.'
'Hmmm,' Wesley frowned.
'What 'hmmm'?' Cordelia wanted to know.
'It's just interesting - that smell - foxglove and..' he sniffed 'hellebore - I should say, interesting combination. I think we'd better go upstairs - check out the families bedrooms.'
'Snooping in rich people's rooms? Though their things?' Cordelia's eyes lit up in delight, 'I love my job!'
As night had fallen, Angel was relieved that he could now drive his own car. The Host was relegated back to the passenger seat. He watched the vampire drive with keen interest. 'Oh, so there's another gear after that number two thing?' Angel gave him a dark look. 'Relax!' The Host told him, 'I'll pay for a tune up ...unless the world ends - then I guess I'm off the hook.'
'Well if it saves you some money, then I guess it's a good thing.'
The Host sighed in frustration, 'you know this whole sour puss thing is really starting to grate. You know what your problem really is? Are you listening?'
'Do I have a choice?'
'Your heart's not in it anymore.'
The vampire rolled his eyes, 'I don't have a pulse so, technically, I don't have a heart.' But the Host shook his head, 'and if someone drives a stake through it, you don't have anything anymore. Believe me, buster, your heart counts.'
'I have no idea what you're babbling about,' Angel told him.
'Yes you do', the Host disagreed. 'Tell me - if the world ends tonight, would it really - in your heart of hearts - be such a terrible thing?'
Angel didn't answer. Instead he stared straight ahead, and concentrated on the road.
'Now - now sweetie,' the Host sounded sympathetic. 'Is that a fun place to be?'
'I think you should shut up, now,' Angel warned him, still staring straight ahead. But that made the Host laugh out loud. 'Have you met me? I'm the Host - I never shut up! You pushed your friends away. You went from helping the helpless to hunting down the guilty. Blood vengeance is a luxury of the lesser beings. You're a champion. At least - you were.'
Angel finally took his eyes of the road to glance at the demon beside him. 'What do you want me to tell you?' he demanded.
'Everything!' the Host threw up his hands to emphasise his point. 'What's in your heart. Why you stopped caring. You know, the whole ball of wax, so I can help you get back on your path. No need to rush - we got time. Though - you know - not a lot.'
Gene set a bowl of salad down on the table, and then - beside Denise's plate - he put down a wrapped jewellery box. He checked his watch.
Doyle stumbled into the dingiest demon bar he knew of. This was all a setup - everything that had happened to him. It wasn't his past catching up with him, it wasn't his rightful path of atonement. The end of his life - the second end of his life - as he knew it, was being brought about by a vendetta. A personal crusade of Lilah Morgan's. And he couldn't - for the life of him- work out how he was important enough to anyone to warrant a personal crusade being launched against him. He was a nobody. Of no interest to anyone - except maybe Cordelia. But somehow he managed to turn a person more powerful than him against himself - and now he was paying the price for that. His nothing of a life was over - ruined. He ordered a glass of whisky, and downed it, before calling for another. That one was drunk just as quickly. When the bartender returned to fill his glass for a third time, Doyle told him to just leave the bottle.
Cordelia entered one of the bedrooms, and went straight to the wardrobe, running her hands across the expensive material - eyeing up the designer names. She sighed. She missed this. Her whole childhood she had longed to live in L.A - that close to that many shoes! But now here she was, penniless - with only nine pairs of shoes to her name. And only four of those were a designer to brag about.
She squatted down to take a closer look through all the shoes that were lined up on the closet floor. Manolo's, Dior, Dolce and Gabbana - even a cute little pair of Chanel flats. She picked them up and examined them - what she saw made her frown. They were caked in mud. These shoes must have cost over $300, why would anyone just throw them - dirty - back into a closet? Why wouldn't you get them cleaned? Especially in a family this rich - where it was likely that some poor underling was paid specifically to clean shoes? This poor treatment of an important designer product just didn't make any sense.
She picked them up and left the room, looking for Wesley, 'Hey, Wes - I think this might be important!' she called down the hall. She heard a noise behind her and turned around to see who it was, 'Wes?'
It wasn't Wesley.
The Wainakay demon was bearing down on her, massive and muscular, his feet webbed - his claws sharp. His expression - angry. Cordelia screamed. She dropped the muddy shoes to the floor - and ran…
Angel drove on, seething in silence. The Host sat beside him, singing to himself, biding his time. Every so often, the vampire would throw an irritated glance in the demon's direction. But the demon took no notice. Eventually, Angel cracked. 'You wanna know what my problem is?' he demanded, 'I'm screwed. That's my problem. I can't win! I'm trying to atone for a hundred years of unthinkable evil. Newsflash! I never can! Never gonna be enough. And now I got Wolfram and Hart dogging me! It's too much! Two hundred highly intelligent law school graduates working full time to drive me crazy. Why is everyone so surprised that it's working? But no it's 'Angel why are you so cranky? Angel you should lighten up. You should smile. You should wear a nice plaid'. '
'Oh honey, not this season', the Host smiled at him.
'Redemption', Angel spelled it out, 'Darla had a shot at it. They took that from her. Now I have to hunt her down and kill her. I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna kill her and then I'm gonna burn that law firm to the ground. My crew - they couldn't handle that. That's good - it shows they're still human.'
'Or half human,' the Host pointed out, 'but still ...you kinda left them all out in the cold... and Doyle -well he's…'
'It's a lot colder in here, believe me. They're better off fired. Whatever you're gonna say about Doyle - he's better off too.'
The Host shrugged. 'If you say so. But it won't always be this way. The song changes. Unless, of course, we don't get there in time. In which case - you'll be stuck in this crappy mood forever - and I shudder to think -'
'We'll get there,' Angel said, glancing at his watch.
'Look out!'
Angel glanced back up to see a figure stood in the middle of the road. His car ploughed straight into them, and they hit the hood and were thrown up into the air - crashing down on the road behind. Angel slammed on the brakes, and the two demons got out of the car and raced back to see who they had hit. They turned the body over. It was one of the lubber demons. As they straightened up they saw more lubber demons melt out of the shadows and begin to converge on the pair of them. Each lubber demon carried an axe...
There was a knock on the door. Gene checked his hair in the mirror, and then opened it, welcoming Denise inside. 'Hi.'
'Hi.'
They both stood there uncomfortably. 'You look uh…' Gene began to say, and then he changed his mind. 'Happy anniversary.'
