"War Zone," Part IV

Wesley led the charge into the vampires' lair with Doyle and Cordelia only a few steps behind him. They could all hear voices and shuffling from the room up ahead, and the echoing footsteps of more bodies flooding into the room from all directions. Doyle didn't need to morph into his demon form to sense the presence of not only the entire gang of teenagers, but also the occupants of said lair.

Wesley slowed his pace as he came to the wide open area where Angel stood several feet away from a tall, dark-skinned young man wearing a dew rag. On one end, the vampires came creeping out of the shadows, and on the other, the teenagers stood their ground, weapons in hand. It reminded Doyle of a scene from that old film, West Side Story.

The only thing separating the two groups was Angel and his lone companion, who looked distracted, to say the least. The vampires' leader, balding and unassuming if he wasn't wearing his vamp face, was at the head of the pack. He stepped up to the young man tauntingly. "She was so sweet, your sister. So smooth going down, if you know what I mean. You wanted a war? Well, this is it."

Angel turned toward the vampires calmly, his back to the one who was clearly the leader. "Here's the deal. You can go."

"What?" The balding vampire leader asked, offended by Angel's audacity.

"If you go now—and I don't ever see any of you again—you get to live." Angel continued, without turning to the apoplectic vampire behind him.

"Are you high?" Bald-guy squawked.

Doyle stepped in front of Wesley, inching closer to the warring factions, making sure that Angel knew he wasn't alone—making sure the vampires knew Angel wasn't alone. A few of them took note of him, particularly from the human end of the room—the gang leader, in particular, trained his eyes on the three people who had come to back up Angel. Wesley and Cordelia each stood at Doyle's side, presenting a united front. They each had grabbed a weapon from the trunk of Angel's car. In Doyle's case, it was merely a stake, but both Wesley and Cordelia held crossbows that were now trained on the cluster of vampires.

Then again, Angel wasn't doing half bad on his own. "L.A. is my territory, you want to stay out of it for the rest of your eternal lives. These kids, my town, off limits from now on."

"Who the hell are you? You know who you're talking to, you fool?" Bald-guy challenged.

"The name's Angelus." Angel said, turning and staking the leader without missing a beat. "And I wasn't actually talking to you." Angel turned back to the rest of the supernatural crowd, spinning the stake between his fingers and giving a nearly imperceptible nod in the direction of Doyle and his other companions. "So, do we have a truce? Or do you wanna die?"

The vampires were left looking dumbly at each other, shifting uncomfortably in the silence that had settled in the wake of Angel's threat.

A member of the teen gang stepped out of the crowd. "Truce?" He addressed the tall man in the center of the room. "We can take 'em! We don't need no help from these fools."

The fools in question, were Doyle, Wesley and Cordelia who hadn't moved from their defensive stance. Angel had stepped closer to the gang leader, responding to the mouthy guy behind him. "Not without them taking a couple of you."

"Gunn, you came all this way, you're not gonna kill any vamps?"

Both Doyle and Cordelia turned their heads simultaneously, checking out the gang leader, now identified as Gunn. Doyle stared at the young man curiously, wondering if it was possible this person would play a significant role in their future. Under the circumstances, it seemed unlikely. Yet, there was something in Gunn's eyes—a haunted look that Doyle recognized all too well. Perhaps, he was a kindred spirit, a fellow warrior, meant to join their fight. Driven by his own loss, which still lay fresh in the ashes at his feet. "I already did." He said, keeping his eyes focused on Angel in a silent communication.

With that, Gunn turned to go and the gang members behind him followed his example. So too, the vampires retreated one by one until no one was left aside from Angel, standing still with his hands shoved in his pockets and his eyes trained on the floor. Wesley and Cordelia had lowered their crossbows and slowly followed as Doyle approached their boss in the center of the room.

"Good work, man." Doyle enthused. "Everyone walked outta here."

"Not everyone." Angel corrected, directing his eyes to the telltale pile of dust on the floor. "That was Gunn's sister. He staked her himself."

Cordelia and Wesley both wore grave expressions, and Doyle bowed his head in silent reverence of the fallen soldier. "That's rough, man." Doyle replied mournfully. "But, y'know, you can't save everyone all the time."

"No one knows that better than me." Angel said, giving Doyle a meaningful look and then walking away.


Doyle took the two paper cups of coffee from the street vendor, grimacing as they each burned his palms. Cordelia was beside him offering two insulation wraps. He slipped her cup of coffee into the wrap in her right hand and retrieved the other insulator for his own cup. They then turned away from the vendor and strolled quietly through the sunny park.

In typical L.A. fashion, it was 75 degrees and there was a cloudless blue sky above. Cordelia and Doyle had just dropped off the incriminating photographs to an extremely thankful David Nabbit, who had supplied them with yet another jaw-dropping check full of surplus zeros. Rather than head back to their stuffy little office, the couple had opted to stretch their legs and partake in a celebratory caffeine boost.

Doyle slipped his arm around Cordelia's waist, and spoke close to her ear. "Penny for your thoughts, love. I've never known ya to be the laconic type."

"Oh, I was just thinking about those kids. I mean, I thought life was cruel to me—with the IRS taking away everything I had on account of Daddy's little tax issues—even my precious Palomino, Keanu... but, those kids don't have anything at all. Not even parents to royally screw them up." She looked convincingly melancholic as she spoke. "I knew homeless people existed, I guess I just never thought they'd be so young, or that it wouldn't really be their fault, y'know?"

Doyle smiled warmly at her, and gently guided her to an empty bench up ahead. "Ya thought they were all drunks, drug addicts and crazies, did ya?" He asked, sitting down and drawing her down beside him. She sat close, letting him keep his arm around her as they both settled in and sipped from their coffee cups.

"Well, if I'm being honest..." She answered with a guilty smile.

"Mmm." Doyle sipped his hot beverage, careful not to burn his tongue. "Everyone's dealt their own hand in the poker game we call life. Some are doomed from the start, others can manage to turn things around."

"Some bluff." She said jokingly, giving him a knowing poke in the chest.

"That's an accurate assessment, if ever I heard one." Doyle smiled, accepting the label. "And some are lucky enough to have those aces ready and waiting."

"I used to have that, but the aces went back to the dealer." She lamented, leaning back and extending her legs out in front of her. "So… I heard you tell Angel to ask that Gunn guy for help in the future. Does that mean he's gonna become our friend or something?"

"Or something." Doyle echoed. "He's meant to be a part of the team, as far as I can tell."

"But you're not sure?" Cordelia wondered. "His future with us isn't that clear?"

Doyle shrugged as he sipped absently from his coffee cup and took notice of a couple of squirrels chasing each other up a tree trunk across the way. "Nothing about the future is clear. It's all a guessing game. Just hope I'm guessing right."

Cordelia took that in, sighing softly to herself. She closed her eyes and laid her head back, letting the sun reflect off her smooth skin. Doyle sat relaxing beside her, his arm extended on the back of the bench behind her shoulders. It was a stolen moment of near-perfection—the two of them enjoying a beautiful day, without a care in the world. It wasn't liable to last long, but for now it was more than enough.

The silence passed comfortably, as Doyle drank his coffee and people-watched, but Cordelia broke it quite suddenly without opening her eyes or moving from her sunbathing position. "Would you mind if I prostituted myself out to David Nabbit?"

Doyle arched a brow. Although, he'd been feeling a little insecure when it came to Cordelia's interest in Nabbit's bank account, he found himself chuckling at what was clearly said in jest. "Ah... I was seriously considering doing the same thing myself."

She sat up straight, opening her eyes and tilting her head in Doyle's direction. "In that case, I approve wholeheartedly. Assuming I get a cut."

"Does that make ya my pimp?" Doyle countered, smirking at the mental imagery.

"I prefer business partner." Cordelia teased in reply. "Pimp sounds so dirty."

The laughter eventually died, allowing the silence to envelop them once again. Doyle felt her back brush against his arm, and the electricity flowed from her into him—that invisible force of nature that had brought them together and made it hard for them to be apart. He had been around long enough to know how rare it was to find chemistry like theirs, but he also knew that chemistry, while powerful, couldn't overcome certain obstacles. For Doyle, there was no doubt—he loved Cordelia, and would fight any obstacle to remain with her, but the fight would only go so far, if she wasn't on the same side of it.

"Do ya regret dating a guy without a penny to his name?" Doyle asked, his gaze landing somewhere in the grass beyond his feet. Although, it was a very real concern, he kept his voice purposely blasé.

She didn't answer right away, shifting her body so it was pressed up against his side, her head landed just below his chin. "You'll have several pennies to your name once you cash your next paycheck." She teased lightly, but the undercurrent of warmth wasn't lost on him.

"Ah... that I will." He said good-naturedly. "And I'm guessing it's high time I took ya out for a nice dinner that I actually can afford, yeah?"

"That would go a long way in the me-not-regretting things department." Cordelia agreed, lifting her head and turning to face him. The smile on her lips warmed him more than the sun overhead. His eyes were drawn to it and he leaned forward to place a soft kiss there. She surprised him by kissing him back more heatedly than he expected—a silent answer to his previously asked question. There were a lot of emotions he could glean from her kiss, regret wasn't one of them.

He pulled back and smiled down at her, enjoying the fire he saw in her hazel eyes.

"Alright, darlin', prepare yourself to be wined and dined proper-like. Friday night." He knocked on the side of his head. "Assumin' the Powers That Be don't say otherwise."

"Oh, they'd better not even think of ruining another date-night." Cordelia scolded the empty air over their heads, raising a threatening finger to the heavens. "Or they're gonna have something truly evil on their hands. Hell hath no fury like a Cordelia Chase scorned!"


A/N - *taps microphone* Is this thing on? Hey, lovely readers. It's been a while since I said hello and thanked you all for sticking with this one. We're in the home stretch now, with only two more episodes left of season one! I plan to have the whole thing posted before the end of the month. I know, I'm excited!