Author: Roseveare, t.l.green@talk21.com
Rating: PG-13 (for violence, bad language and bad jokes)
Summary: "Of all the options I was weighing for the evening, being held captive by gangster demons alongside *you* was not exactly a feature on my list..." Wesley and Doyle are having a Really Bad Day.
Background: An episode of Angel: the Cyber Series, set in an alternate universe where Hero never happened. In the previous episode, Doyle almost died from a demon illness caught off Dinah, the demon child Cordy has been looking after. Wesley showed up in LA but has not yet met the AI team, only Harry. Read previous stories by various writers at http://www.haelen.org/cleocalliope/atcs/
Disclaimer: Joss and co own all Angel the series characters and concepts, not me. I make no profit from this. Yadda, yadda, yadda.
Author Note: Roseveare attempts to write action comedy. And original Buffyverse characters. Ye gods... just shoot me now.
Note: Marlon the demon would like to thank his agent, his mum, the inspirational stars of all those old classics, and the other nice people who made his guest starring role possible.
Rogue Demons
Part 2
It was a rough awakening. Rough hands on his shoulders - then falling, a short, dizzying journey that scrambled his senses even more than they already were. The floor smacked him in the face at the end of it. He lay still where he'd landed, eyes tight closed, trying to figure out what the hell was going on as a voice close by remarked, with an accent that set his teeth on edge, "I say, was that absolutely necessary?" followed by the familiar sound of a fist hitting flesh.
"Well, really..." muttered the aggrieved voice, then subsided as a demonic growl cut it off.
Wesley Wyndham Pryce, Doyle thought disgustedly. He remembered, now, the demons outside the bar, and Cordelia's demon-hunter friend showing up. God knew what the hell he'd been doing there. He also distinctly remembered shoving the address of the demon gang's base at the guy and telling him to clear off.
So much for that plan.
A heavily booted foot landed painfully in his ribs, and he couldn't repress a groan of pain. There was a snort and a snarl of, "Get up, halfbreed." Indignantly, he opened his eyes.
"What the f -" It was definitely a less than comforting feeling to wake up staring into the maw of a demon, and especially one grinning quite that toothily. The demon had bald yellow skin, which was mottled with blue patches here and there. A forked tongue hissed out between its teeth, which were... really sharp. Like bloody needles. Doyle hadn't the first idea what the creature was, but he was pretty glad he hadn't encountered one before and was certain he'd have been quite happy to have avoided that particular experience at all.
He looked away from it, dragging his gaze from its teeth not without difficulty. A couple of feet away, Wesley was standing nervously, his face pale and stretched into an expression of worry and pain. The reason for the latter, Doyle noticed with a wince, was because the demon which had a grasp on his shoulder actually had its claws sunk through the material of his suit and into the flesh beneath, little points of red soaking through his jacket. There was a large bruise on the side of his face, but other than that the demon hunter appeared to be in marginally better condition than he was himself.
They were, he saw, in the lobby of some grand sort of house - possibly the term 'mansion' wouldn't be an unreasonable description. Not exactly the usual sort of place you'd expect to find demons living.
The other members of the gang in the lobby were recognisable as three of the four from the video Angel had shown him, plus one middle aged human guy. He must've been driving the van or something, Doyle figured, although his impressions of the journey there were severely limited since he'd been drifting on the surface of unconsciousness for most of the time. As he was surveying the scene, another demon walked out of one of the interior doors that led on to the lobby. Kesh demon, he recognised instantly. Well, with a nose like that they were difficult to miss.
It currently had a handkerchief pressed to the end of it, which it sneezed into when it opened its mouth to try to speak. Its eyes were red-rimmed and puffy.
"You weren't kidding," the human guy laughed. "That dame really did do you over good. Well, never mind, Gary, we got us the hybrid, and... whatever this goof is."
The Kesh growled something unintelligible from the depths of the handkerchief. Wesley's expression turned positively thunderous at the description of him.
"What the hell's goin' on?" Doyle demanded, sitting up and trying to edge back from the yellow-skinned demon, only to find that his shoulders hit the wall after just a few feet.
The remaining demon in the room coughed almost politely. The noise drew his close attention to it for the first time - and then he wondered why he hadn't paid more attention to it earlier. It might not be the most fearsome-looking of the gang, but it was certainly... unique, as demons went. It was also, he noted from the way the others reacted, deferring to it when it spoke, the one in charge of the operation.
Doyle took in with some incredulity the dark grey suit the demon wore and the hat drawn down low over its eyes to cast its face into shadow. He - presumably it was a 'he' - looked for all the world like he was auditioning to be an extra in a thirties gangster movie. He was also chewing a cigar, and when he spoke he rolled his words around it in a gruff, affected style. "You boys would be here to facilitate our safe exit from this city," he said. "Play nice and do as you're told and you might get out of this alive." He chomped his teeth down on the end of the cigar and fell back into silence.
Doyle stared at him in disbelief. He gingerly used the wall's support to edge to his feet, so he wouldn't have to engage in conversation from the floor. "So, let me get this straight: you grabbed us so that Angel would let you get the hell out of town?"
The demon nodded smartly. "There's power of deduction for you. Give the man a certificate."
"Excuse me?" Wesley piped up nervously. "But if that's the case, you've made something of an error, I'm afraid. You see, I really don't think I should be here. Angel hardly knows me at all, and I'm fairly certain he -"
"Keep it down over there," the leader said. "Unless you want us to take you up on that insistence that you're surplus to requirements, friend." At his word, the demon holding Wesley flexed its claws some, then relaxed them again when Wesley silenced.
"So you figure you can threaten us and get Angel to sing to your tune?" Doyle asked, and winced - the gangster-speak appeared to be infectious. He had the beginnings of an idea, though. He blurted out, "Well, if you don't mind me sayin' so, that's a real dumb plan."
The yellow-skinned demon set its claws to his throat in a lightning move. It's claws didn't look any more friendly than its teeth. It growled, "How about a bit more respect for the boss, there?"
"Well, it is!" Doyle squeaked, trying desperately to melt back into the wall away from those needle-sharp points. He was definitely having doubts about this plan. "Y'see, now you'll just have upset him - Angel - 'cause you've made it personal. Your operation here, it's not like you're killin' and maimin' folks, he'd probably have let you clear outta town jus' fine. But now you've grabbed his people, an' Angel's real touchy about that. Didn't ya hear about what happened to Three-Eyed-Louis?"
"Three-Eyed-Louis?" After an initially mystified look, Wesley caught on. "Oh, yes. Why, it makes me shudder to contemplate. Nobody deserves that -"
"He made Angel lose his temper. He, uh... he pulled Cordelia's hair! Yeah. Yanked a big chunk right out. Man, you should'a heard the screams."
"Oh, yes. The poor girl was quite distraught -"
"An' as if what she did to him wasn't enough-" Doyle noticed with some satisfaction how the Kesh demon winced in between sneezes "-then Angel..." He let his voice trail off.
"You should have seen the result. Or on the other hand, maybe you shouldn't. Considering what you've let yourselves in for, it might be inappropriate to go into detail." Wesley shook his head sorrowfully.
"Jeeze, he's usually such a calm guy, too, for a vamp. But he just lost it. And then Louis..."
"Terrible. Wouldn't wish that on anyone."
"There wasn't enough left to fill a jam jar. They never did get it all out of the walls." Doyle shuddered dramatically, then smiled and nodded encouragingly around the circle of demons. "Oh, yeah, Angel looks after his people. I'd suggest you let us go right now. Maybe you've still got time to clear out, quick like."
The four demons and the human exchanged nervous glances. After a moment, the leader laughed.
"That was the biggest line of baloney I ever heard," he cackled, twirling his cigar in his fingers and nodding with what looked like approval, and a little respect. "Points for effort, but if we'd just wanted to get out of town we'd have gone already. No, we want to pull out, true enough - but it takes time, if you want to take it all with you." An expansive gesture encompassed the elaborate house around him. "You think we're going to leave all that we've built up here, do you? Think we're going to go back to living in a sewer or a slum like most demons settle for? No, my friend. We've got standards." He frowned at the demon which had its claws to Doyle's throat. "Let the man breathe, Tony. We need him breathing." He was reluctantly obeyed.
Doyle gratefully relaxed his painfully stiff neck. He shrugged to the demons' leader. "Worth a try, man." He wondered how much time they figured it would take to clear their stolen riches out with them - how long they meant to keep himself and Wesley for - and if they really intended to let them go at the end of it.
The human cleared his throat impatiently, "Can we get these guys to their new luxury accommodation now? We've got other things to do."
"Yes," the leader said decisively. He waved his cigar at the demons who held Doyle and Wesley. "Show them to their rooms."
"'Luxury accommodation'," Wesley repeated disgustedly, blinking in the darkness. The Trell demon who'd been mauling Doyle had dragged them down some stone basement steps and shoved them through a door before slamming it closed again and drawing several bolts to. It was chilly and there was only the tiniest crack of light from a grate high up in one wall - and his eyes hadn't adjusted enough to the darkness yet for that sparse illumination to be of any use.
"Huh," Doyle agreed, from somewhere to his left. "And I thought I told you to run," he added, with a certain amount of belligerence.
"I apologise for not being more fleet of foot than three extremely angry demons."
Wesley took a hesitant step forward and staggered on the uneven ground. He flung a hand out, searching desperately for support, and his fingers brushed against something that felt human. His grip tightened on a shoulder. Half-human, then, he amended as Doyle said, "Easy there, man," and caught his arm and helped him recover his balance.
Although he'd initially suspected this was all some sort of ploy the half-demon had engineered, Wesley was forced to admit to himself that the bruises on the side of Doyle's face where the demons had propelled him into the wall were a bit too extreme for a ploy. The note he'd tried to get delivered to Angel would seem to suggest that he'd been searching those demon bars for some purpose of the vampire's after all. And while he still didn't entirely trust him, he was perversely glad that he wasn't alone with these... people. It was clear that the group were certainly no friends to either of them.
"What I'd like to know," Doyle said meaningfully, "Is how you happened to be outside that bar to get caught up in this anyway." There were several seconds of silence as he waited for a reply and Wesley swallowed, dry-mouthed, trying to think of one. "Were you following me?"
"I-" Wesley began defensively, and stopped. "Yes, as a matter of fact I was," he announced, beginning to get cross. The cuts on his shoulder were smarting furiously and staining his only decent suit, which wasn't improving his mood. He'd been beaten up, kidnapped, and now he was supposed to make excuses to a demon? A man could only stand for so much. "I didn't trust you. I am not, you know, in the habit of trusting demons."
The only reply to that was a slightly annoyed sigh.
"Anyway," he added, more subdued. "You wouldn't happen to have any powers or anything that could get us out of here, would you? You know, turn into a demon and break the door down?"
"Doubt it," Doyle snarled. There was a sound which was presumably his fist bashing on the door, which rang metallically in response. "Metal frame on it. Noticed that one as he shoved us in here. 'Sides, last I heard you were some kinda big bad demon hunter, with super watcher trainin' or somethin'. Can't you get us the hell outta here?"
It was Wesley's turn to fall silent. His eyes were starting to adjust to the darkness and he squinted, trying to pick out shapes. Shelves, he thought, studying the grey outlines. Shelves and boxes.
He picked his way through the shadowy obstacles, aiming for the window, the uneven floor under his feet treacherously trying to trip him and almost succeeding on more than one occasion. But when he'd finally negotiated the course and his outstretched hands hit the exterior wall of the cellar, it was only to discover that when he looked up, the patch of light was placed at least half again his own height above him. He sighed, turned around, and discovered he couldn't see anything after staring up into the bright daylight showing through the grill.
He stayed where he was, waiting for his eyes to adjust again, trying to pick out where Doyle was. It occurred to him that anything could be lurking in the darkness around him, and he shuddered at the thought.
"A peculiar set-up here," he remarked, simply needing to hear the sound of a voice. "Demons, living in a place like this. That human fellow must be their front." Although he'd entered the house with a coat bundled over his head, he'd caught glimpses of a wide, sunny street and vast gardens. A neighbourhood with money - film star territory, even. The demons' operation funded a life of luxury. "And as for that Girshak demon that seemed to be in charge..." He laughed half-heartedly at the image.
"Can't blame the guys for not wantin' to live in a sewer, I guess," Doyle said without enthusiasm. There was the sound of scrabbling movement from the same direction as his voice.
"What are you doing?"
"Lookin' for a light switch."
"Oh." Wesley felt his face redden, because it hadn't occurred to him to do so, but luckily it wasn't visible in the darkness. "Erm... Do you really think they'll let us go if Angel does as they ask?"
"I think their leader means it. Don't know that the others'd be too happy." There was a triumphant intake of breath, then a 'click', then a curse. More clicks, then a long sigh. "Bastards must've taken out the bulb. But, as I was sayin', it's academic anyway. That whole Louis thing might've been an exaggeration, but the truth is, Angel won't stand for a deal like this. He'll be in here swishin' his cape an' bashin' heads - it's just a matter of time."
"You seem to have a lot of confidence in a vampire."
"He's my friend. He's saved my arse more times than I can count. And hey, that reminds me, what the hell was it Cordy said about you and the Watchers Council goin' after Angel in Sunnydale?"
Wesley coughed uncomfortably, hearing the dissatisfaction in Doyle's tone and remembering his own errors in the events related to that one all too well. And what they had led to: Faith, a Slayer, a girl who should have been in his care, half-dead in a coma and probably to stay that way for the rest of her life. "Things were... different, back then," he said weakly. "We were different. I, I didn't know some of the things I do now. I thought of good and evil in absolutes, not degrees. And Angel wasn't this helper of the helpless he is now, either. He was - a distraction the Slayer didn't need. An impossible distraction. And he was a demon-"
Doyle snorted, and then sighed. "Come on Angel, man. Get me outta here?" he pleaded to the air in a weary, long-suffering tone.
"Of all the options I was weighing for the evening, being held captive by gangster demons alongside you was not exactly a feature on my list, either," Wesley snapped back huffily.
"No, I imagine makin' moves on Cordy was top of that particular list." There was more scuffling sounds, and Wesley's eyes had adjusted enough to pick out the half-demon, who seemed to have started his own investigation of their prison, carefully edging around the boxes and studying the blocks of shelving. Wesley noted sourly that he didn't trip even once, and wondered if the fellow couldn't perhaps see in the dark rather better than he could.
"What-? I assure you, my intentions towards Cordelia are purely friendly."
"Yeah," Doyle said darkly.
"I mean, that is, that they are merely friendly. Nothing more."
There was a silence. Doyle appeared to be closely examining a shelf. After a moment he said, with a strange inflection in his voice, "Uh, Wesley, do you know what this place is?"
"Well, my first guess would be a dark, smelly basement with who-knows-what hiding in the shadows."
"No, man." The Doyle-shaped shadow shook its head. "It's a wine cellar."
Angel paced the office, frowning at the clock on the wall. 8.10pm, it read now. And though it wasn't unusual for Doyle to be late, in the light of the attack on Cordelia earlier he considered that this time it could be cause to worry.
The sound of the telephone broke him out of his thoughts. He'd crossed the room in less than a second, to pick up the receiver and raise it to his ear before it could complete even half a ring. "Doyle?"
"It's Cordelia." She sounded worried.
It was infectious. "What is it? The demon again-?"
"Not a sign of the creep. No, Angel, it's Wesley."
"Wesley?" His brow creased at the unexpected mention of the name. What did the self-styled 'rogue demon hunter' have to do with any of this? "What's he done now?"
"He was supposed to be here, like over an hour ago. And he hasn't turned up."
"Maybe he's late?" Angel suggested.
"Ha ha. Hello! This is Wesley we're talking about here."
"Hmm. That's... odd. Because Doyle's not turned up yet either."
"Uh, Angel, he was doing the pub run, yes? Somehow I don't think the answer to that one is going to be any big mystery."
"I don't know." He fidgeted with the phone cord. He was slightly concerned at Cordelia's recent chilly attitude towards Doyle since the events of his illness. She'd looked after him, true, yet she had done it in a fashion that was distanced and sometimes even more brittle than she'd been back when she hardly knew him. "I think that since we know somebody's already been after you today - maybe there's cause for concern?"
There was a silence. After a pause, she said, in a small voice, "Oh." Another pause. "Well, he might not be in danger, right? Have you tried ringing Harry? They've been keeping in touch - she's been supplying him with the stinky herbs and mould and stuff to help his recovery. So maybe he popped around to her place."
"Okay. I'll check and call you back." He set down the phone and, after a brief search for Harry's number, dialled. She answered after several long seconds of ringing and seemed happy enough to hear from him, until he asked her if Doyle had been by recently.
"No," she said, and the worry crept into her voice. "He hasn't been here. Why? Is something wrong? You don't know where he is?"
Angel reluctantly explained the situation. She was worried already, and evasions at this point were not about to make her any less worried.
"Right," she said, when he'd finished. "I'm coming over. I'll help you look for him."
"That's not -"
"Don't you dare brush me off, Angel." Her voice had an edge of steel in it, for all that it was delivered with the mild tone of somebody ticking off a naughty child. "I've known him for a lot longer than you have. I can help."
"Okay." He gave in. "But - I'll be over at Cordelia's. I want her to be in on this too, and I don't want her walking over here alone, or leaving Dinah alone, after what happened earlier."
"Right," said Harry. "I'm on my way."
Angel sighed as he set down the receiver. He briefly contacted Cordelia to tell her what was happening, before snatching up his coat to head out to her place.
He'd barely taken two steps towards the door before the phone rang again.
Angel didn't look like a guy worried because somebody hadn't kept an appointment due to excess falling-down-drunkenness. Her eyes followed his brooding progress across the room, as he avoided the splashes of light cast by the last of the day's sun. She crossed to the window and pulled down the blinds. "What is it, broody-boy? A big dark cloud just descended over this whole apartment."
He didn't answer, just glanced towards the couch, where Dinah was sitting cross-legged and channel-hopping, pointing the remote at the TV like a weapon.
Something he didn't want Dinah to hear. Damn...
"Uh, okay... Dinah, honey, mama and Angel are going to go get some coffee. You stay here and watch..." she frowned at the screen. "Nosferatu?" She shrugged and pulled Angel after her into the kitchen, closing the door behind them and setting her ear to it, listening carefully for the small footsteps which would indicate they had a spy. But Dinah was evidently engrossed. She turned back to Angel. "Okay, what?"
"They called."
"What... who? Doyle and Wesley?"
"The demons. The gang. They've got them - both of them. They claim that if I don't co-operate they'll kill them. Their leader wants me to meet him to negotiate tonight."
Cordelia felt her mouth fall open in astonishment and snapped it shut quickly, trying to think through the *thud* of panic that slammed through her at Angel's words. "Oh, my G- hang on, why'd they snatch Wesley? What's he to do with any of this? You don't even like him."
"They must've seen him leaving the office. And, you know, I don't actually dislike him. I mean, I'd rather not see him disembowelled for getting involved in our business."
"Check. I definitely don't want to see any disembowelling. Of any party, thank you." She took a breath, trying hard to put the unwelcome visuals from her mind. "What is it you think they want?"
"Well, if they do know that Mr. Bates asked us to deal with them, I'd assume they probably want not to be dealt with."
She nodded slowly. "So what are you going to do? Go in there and kick their butts halfway to Tahiti?"
"It's... difficult." Angel frowned. "This gang, as far as I've been able to ascertain, they haven't killed anyone or caused any real harm. Except to the insurance of some of the big stores in the city, who can afford it. And, yeah, so it's wrong, but the bottom line is they're just thieves. And I can't exactly arrest them or arrange a punishment that's proportional to their crime. If the only other option would be killing them..." He broke off and, after a second's pause, admitted, "If they hadn't taken Doyle and Wesley and started playing dirty, I'd probably have been tempted to just tell them to get out of here fast."
"Oh, come on - they're demons," Cordelia scoffed.
He just looked at her.
"Bad demons... oh, all right! So what do we do? I mean-" her voice sounded slightly choked to her own ears and she angrily tried to retain control over it. "They've got Doyle. Are they really going to kill him, or start chopping bits off or something? You said they haven't hurt anyone-"
"Not yet, anyway. But I've a reputation. They're desperate."
"Oh."
He seemed to think hard before he spoke next. "Do you care?"
"Excuse me?" she glared back at him in fury. "Of course I care. He's my friend. Wesley is, too - you think I don't care?"
"I didn't mean it like that," he said quickly. "I mean, you've been kind of... chilly... towards Doyle lately."
"Oh." She turned away, examining the woodgrain on the kitchen cupboards in minute detail so she wouldn't have to look at him. So he couldn't see her face.
"Is it the demon?"
"No. Yes." She hesitated, then swung back around to face him. "Maybe, a little bit - I don't know. It just all happened so fast, and I barely had time to think properly. I mean, he could have died, I wasn't exactly reacting normally. I did things I... maybe wouldn't have done, under normal circumstances."
Angel nodded slowly. "Too much too soon."
"I know I want him back. I don't want him hurt. I know I'm worried about him. But that doesn't mean anything. He's my friend. Of course I would feel those things. Right?" She searched his face, hoping he knew the answers, but he could only shake his head.
Of course. What the hell would a guy whose only liaison in a hundred-plus years had almost brought about the apocalypse know about relationship counselling?
"I think you need to decide that one for yourself," he said.
The knock at the door disturbed the intensity of the silence which followed his words, and Angel, with visible discomfort, turned his back on her and went to let Harry in.
"I don't see how that's supposed to help us in trying to escape," Wesley said irritably. He watched in vague disgust as Doyle finally gave up trying to uncork the bottle with his fingers or any of the available implements in the cellar, and - slightly self-consciously - turned demon and yanked the cork out using one of the spikes in the side of his face.
"It'll help 'cause I feel like crap, an' this appears to be the only anaesthetic on hand," Doyle muttered, as his face smoothed back to human and he upended to bottle over his mouth. After a long drink, he coughed appreciatively and held out the bottle to Wesley. "Hey, this is good stuff. You sure you don't want some?"
He eyed the bottle, contemplating demon-germs. "Somehow, I just don't think I do," he said flatly. "And don't come complaining to me when the demons gut you for consuming their stores of very expensive wine. Now, put the bottle down and see if you can reach the window if you stand on my shoulders."
"This is pointless. They wouldn't have put us in here if they didn't think it was secure. Besides, your shoulder's one hell of a mess, there, case you hadn't noticed."
Wesley gritted his teeth. "I refuse to wait around in the hope that a vampire will arrive in time to prevent me being slaughtered by demons. Now, I realise you don't like me very much and you're probably aware I don't particularly like you, but wouldn't it be nice if we could both get out of here before the demons decide to come and kill us?"
"I could use some help here," Wesley said, pointedly and slightly breathlessly, hanging from the bars of the grate and trying to find his footing on the pile of crates he'd stacked under it, which persisted in slipping away underneath his feet.
"What'd you expect?" Doyle snapped, from some distance across the room where he'd retreated to sit on a crate, nurse his new bruises and continue to consume what was left in the bottle.
"It was an accident! You did stamp on my shoulder, which you know full well was mauled not so long ago by demonic claws..." He felt his fingers slipping and desperately gripped harder. His toes caught the edge of the crates and he tried to balance himself again without knocking over the pile.
"I told you, that was an accident. I slipped-"
"Well, I slipped-" At that moment, his grip on the bars failed entirely, and for a second Wesley was balanced on one leg at the top of four large, precariously stacked wine crates. But only for a second. Until they started to, very slowly, topple over. "Oh, bloody h-argh!"
"Wes?" The irritating Irish voice floated over to him where he sprawled on the floor in a dazed, moaning huddle of pain. "Wesley, you okay?"
"Go away, demonic scum," he moaned.
"Uh, comin' from you I'm guessin' that'd be a 'yeah'."
He groaned his way to a sitting position and looked around at the scattered crates. He stood up, joints protesting loudly, and began to push them back into a pile again.
Doyle held up the bottle. "Are you sure you...?"
Wesley turned on him. He felt lousy. There couldn't be one square inch of his body that wasn't bruised and aching. His temper snapped. Audibly. "No, for Heaven's sake, I don't want a drink. Even if I did want a drink, which would be excessively asinine considering we're stuck in this basement and likely to be killed by demonic hoodlums any moment, I wouldn't want to share it with you. I seem to recall that's the fifth - no, sixth - the sixth time I have said as much, and now I'll tell you again, for the seventh and last time, no I do not want a bloody drink! Are we clear on the fact that I really don't want a drink?"
"Lighten up, Wes. There's nothin' worse than a morose drunk."
"I am not... drunk. I've barely had a few sips."
"If I were you, I wouldn't be advertisin' that part, man."
There was a brief silence as they each drank. Wesley had gotten Doyle to open a separate bottle for him, which he'd done to the tune of an irritable tirade of "What, so ya think I'd give ya demon mites, huh?" and the like.
"What's it like?" Wesley said finally.
"What's what like?"
"What's it like being a demon?"
Doyle stared at him for a moment before letting rip a disgusted snort. "What's it like being an asshole?" he growled back.
"No, I mean, really. What's it like? I never actually had the opportunity to converse with..." He hesitated at the extremely peeved expression on the half-demon's face. "What's it like?"
"'Really'?" Doyle said with heavy sarcasm. He sighed and raised the bottle to his lips: downed an enormous gulp, gasped and wiped his eyes. "It sucks, man. What do you think? I lost everythin' when I found out... every damn thing that'd ever mattered stopped matterin' anymore. Wasn't human. Couldn't live as one... couldn't live with Harry..." He stopped abruptly.
Wesley sighed and nodded slowly. He knew what it was like to have your expectations suddenly and drastically changed. "Yes," he said softly. "I see. I understand. I apologise for raising the subject."
"What, did you recently find out suddenly and unexpectedly that you were a demon?" came the acidic reply.
Wesley shook his head. No, only a failure, he thought. "No, but I was fired. All my life, all I'd ever wanted... all my father ever wanted for me... all I'd trained for... was to be a Watcher. And then they fired me." He hesitated and his hand shook holding the bottle. Maybe Doyle was right. Maybe he was a little drunk. He was definitely morose. "And the worst thing is, I deserved it. It was my fault. Faith... that poor girl. I failed her, failed them. Useless..."
"Faith?" Doyle prompted.
He shook his head. He wasn't going to go into that. "I made some terrible decisions," he said. "They were right to sack me."
"Now, I think you're maybe bein' a little hard on yourself," Doyle said, slightly awkwardly. "I mean, yeah, you're an irritatin' bastard, that I can't deny, but..."
"I'm an 'irritating bastard'?" Wesley repeated sourly, with disbelief. "I am? Well, having spent several hours locked in a dark cellar with you, I feel I am qualified to say - that is, frankly, if you're calling me irritating, all I can say is..." He sighed and thought about it for a few seconds before concluding, glumly, "I'm doomed."
"Drink to that," muttered Doyle, raising his bottle.
They clinked bottles. In the darkness, it proved a somewhat messy manoeuvre. Wesley shook out a wine-drenched hand with faint disgust.
"I did mean it, you know, about Cordelia," he said, shortly.
"Yeah, okay." Unconvinced.
"It was just one date, barely more than a flirtation. It's over. I... suspect that she was rather winding you up, you know. But, I assure you, I have no designs on her whatsoever."
"She was windin' me up?" Doyle asked, sceptically. After a moment, he allowed, "Now you mention it, she has been kinda funny lately. Okay, I'll buy it. But that still doesn't mean I like you." He fell silent for a moment, then snickered. "Heh. Harry had a thing or two to say about you, by all accounts."
"She did?" Wesley remembered the pretty ex-Mrs Doyle and perked up hopefully.
"Don't get ya hopes up. Wasn't that kinda thing." He chuckled to himself and Wesley, irritated, wondered what it was he was remembering with such glee. Doyle's mirth didn't last for long, though. After a moment, he squinted suspiciously at Wesley, and his expression grew visibly thunderous even in the darkness.
"My wife...?" he snarled. "You...?"
He'd flung the bottle aside, smashing it on the floor in half-drunken rage, and was reaching for Wesley's throat when the cellar door creaked open, blinding them with artificial light from the bulb in the corridor outside. The demon silhouetted in the doorway stared down at them and took in the scatter of bottles around them. He turned and hollered back up the stairs to his fellows: "Shit, Gary, didn't I tell you the wine cellar was just stupid!"
Angel felt his jaw drop in astonishment at the sight of the demon which stepped out of the shadows to greet them as they drew up to the arranged rendezvous point, an alley beside a cafe. He hadn't seen many movies, but even he recognised a walking film noir gangster cliche.
"You're late." It was difficult to tell what kind of demon lurked underneath the hat and the dark-coloured overcoat. The muffled growl emerged, almost inaudibly, from the dark depths between the hat and the upturned collar.
"Traffic," Angel said. "This is LA." In actuality, it had been the great debate with Cordelia about the necessity of somebody staying behind with Dinah, and arguing out the finer details of just who it should be, which had taken most of the time. "Which of us studies demons?" Harry had said, quite reasonably. "I can help." Angel had been about to stick his neck out and agree with her when Dinah's panic attack and cries for mama had decided the matter conclusively.
The demon raised its chin from the obscuring shield of its collar and nodded slightly. "Right. Well... we meet at last. Angel." He inclined his head in a sort of acknowledgement. He nodded at Harry, too. "Doll-face. Since I'm liking the view, I'm thinking to skip the complaints about you not coming alone."
"Doll-face?" Harry repeated quizzically. Angel knew her just well enough to recognise the danger in her tone that the demon missed. Her eyes narrowed. "What have you done with my husband, you... you overdressed pantomime freak?"
The demon tipped its hat back slightly, revealing more of its face. Ironically raised eyebrows of rigid scales shadowed surprisingly mild eyes that were set in a face of hard, armoured, ruddy-brown skin. "Husband, huh? I can't deny my disappointment, ma'am. Which one would that be? The halfbreed? Or English?"
"The half-Brachen," Harry snapped, and didn't mention that they were technically no longer married. She folded her arms across her chest crossly, defensively. Angel suspected that, after being burned twice, being hit on by another demon wasn't going to go down well at this stage in Harry's life.
He sighed, growing impatient, and made an effort to get the conversation back on track. "What do you want, anyway? I kind of take a dim view of people who kidnap my friends and employees, you know. So would you care to tell me exactly what all of this is about?"
"Simple enough, my bloodsucking fiend." The demon casually lit a cigar and spoke around it, seeming to enjoy the perplexed expressions of his audience. "Me and my buddies, we got a good thing going on in this town. We don't want to leave - but we're prepared to. This is the deal: we stay off your turf, you just show a little patience while we move ourselves out. Once we're all set, you can get your pals back nice and safe, and that'll be the last you ever see of us. We just wanted ourselves a little insurance, you understand. You don't precisely have a reputation for doing our kind any favours. Kapeesh?"
"So, let me get this straight. You want me to stand back and do nothing while you and your cronies move on to continue terrorising people someplace else?"
"Congratulations, we have a brain," the demon said, with dry sarcasm. "Who says vamps are all dumb?"
"No deal," Angel growled.
"W-what?" For the first time, the demon's composure was shaken enough for them to see through the act. His voice came out in a mellow tone quite different to the affected tough-guy drawl, and the cigar fell from his hands in surprise. Clearly he hadn't anticipated a refusal. Then he recovered, stamped on the cigar, and the act was back. "Angel, pal, it's a sweet deal..."
"I said no deal. I'm not running some territorial protection racket, here. I fight evil. And just because I can't see it doesn't mean I'm happy to let it continue elsewhere."
"Evil? Who said anything about evil? Just a little stealing from the rich, is all we're doing. As evil goes, it ain't exactly up there with bloody mutilation and murder. And don't you care about the well-being of your friends?"
Harry was also looking at him with some concern, as though wondering whether he'd lost it completely.
"You don't have anything to gain from killing them," Angel said darkly. "Oh - except for the part where I hunt all of your gang down and kill you, slowly and nastily, one by one. No, I don't think you'll kill them."
Harry's gaze was shifting between them, and she couldn't have missed the hostility in their face-off. She stepped forward, intervening, the glow of a streetlight falling full on her face. "Can't we talk about this reasonably, without the macho posturing?"
The demon turned to look at her again, and froze. The shadow which hid its features focused on her intensely for several seconds, before he said, slowly, "I know you, don't I?"
"What?" Harry stared blankly back.
"You." He pointed a clawed finger at her, but it wasn't a threatening gesture. "You're an academic. Pro-demon rights. I saw your presentation the other week - from the shadows at the back of the room, of course."
And he dropped the theatrical hostility in an instant, snatching up Harry's hand in both his own and proceeding to shake it enthusiastically. "I'm Marlon," he said, with a vaguely ingratiating and wholly smitten smile. "I can't believe I didn't notice it was you, but... well, the light was bad, and I've never really seen you very close before..."
"What... wait... stop... Let me go!" Harry seized back her hand and massaged her fingers, glaring sourly at the demon. "Now, what the hell is going on?"
'Marlon' looked taken aback, as though not quite sure how to handle her reaction.
"I get it," said Angel, trying to suppress laughter at Harry's utter confusion. "You - Marlon, you mean you're a fan?"
The demons dragged Doyle and Wesley up out of the cellar and through the airy foyer they'd been in earlier into an elaborate, plush sitting room. There, they were flung aside with a violent shove and an angry growl of "stay there and shut up" from the yellow-skinned demon Wesley had said was a Trell. This time, even Wesley seemed to have the sense not to kick up a fuss.
Doyle swore as he collected still more bruises from his impact with the wall. This just wasn't his week. He felt dizzy and light-headed and if it hadn't been for the fact he suspected he'd be feeling his bruises a whole lot more if he hadn't, he might have started regretting that drink as the fuzz of partial intoxication clouded his attempts to think.
All thoughts of strangling Wesley had been pushed to the back of his mind, for the moment at least. Harry... Honestly, the guy was... No. Stop it. He needed to focus.
Something had happened. The demons were angry, and it wasn't just about the wine. Something had gone wrong. Looking around the ranks of the demons, Doyle noticed their leader wasn't among them. He must have tried to deal, and maybe he'd discovered the hard way that Angel wasn't the dealing sort.
"We should kill them and get the hell out of here," the human guy said. Instead of his earlier driving overalls, he was dressed now as though about to set out to some sort of formal dinner, in an elaborate velvet dinner suit, and he was nervously holding a gun.
"We're not leaving Marlon," the Kesh demon, Gary, growled from behind his handkerchief.
"Marlon's dead by now. We have to clear out before the vamp comes to finish us."
"Easy for you to say," snarled Tony. "You never had to live in a sewer. We ain't going back to that."
The remaining demon, the one Doyle had assumed was mute, or at least couldn't speak English with that vastly misshapen mouth, forced out an awkward, clicking protest through a jaw clearly not designed for anything but biting big chunks out of flesh. "Marlon-said-to-pick-up-and-go-if-something-happened." It indicated Doyle and Wesley. "And-to-leave-them-alive."
Doyle blinked in surprise at this policy.
"I'm not leaving them alive," the human said, his hands fidgeting unconsciously on the gun. "They piss me off. Especially the prissy English one."
Wesley, he noticed, opened his mouth to protest and then obviously thought better of it.
"Oh, sure," Gary said sarcastically. "Give the Vampire Avenger a reason to chase us down across the breadth of the continent, why don't you?"
"That'd be difficult for a guy who disintegrates in sunlight," Tony pointed out. "Guy like that needs to stick close to a home base. I'm with Mr Hanley. We got to deal out some payback if we're gonna quit." He patted the human's shoulder with a clawed hand; the guy smiled tightly. The two of them glared at the remaining two demons in an incongruous solidarity.
Doyle warily exchanged glances with Wesley, who was looking extremely worried. The ex-watcher's eyes caught his gaze and flickered to the French windows set into the wall a few feet to their left. Though clearly locked, they had vast decorated glass panels and only the slightest delicate ribbon of a frame. Through them could be seen a small patio and, beyond it, the dense trees and shrubbery of a tropical-style garden. Wesley's message was clear.
Doyle shook his head minutely in reply. Right now, the demons were too close, and Hanley had that gun. They'd never reach the window. He mouthed 'wait', barely forming the words with his lips, afraid the gang would see, and he tried desperately to think through all the fog in his brain.
"In fact," Hanley said slowly, "I don't see why we should go at all. There's four of us. This guy's just one vamp. We can deal with him."
"We had this conversation before," Gary snapped. "Word is, this guy knocks 'em down like dominoes. Marlon said -"
"Marlon, Marlon... Marlon's gone. Marlon always was overcautious, anyway. The guy thought too much. I say we run the show our way now." Tony's claws sprang out and he took a step towards Wesley, who nervously backed off as far as he could and finished up, whether by accident or design Doyle wasn't sure, with his back almost flat against the window.
"Now, hang on a minute, I'm still not convinced this is sensible."
The remaining, unidentifiable demon gave a click of irritation, while Hanley snorted and Tony spun around to glare at Gary. Doyle took the opportunity to follow Wesley's lead and sidle closer to the window.
"Either you're with us or against us, Gary," Tony said, with menace.
"Then I'm with." The answer was reluctant, resigned.
"We-have-to-get-these-two-out-of-the-way-before-the-vamp-shows-up."
The demons and human exchanged glances and nodded collectively in agreement. Hanley raised the gun, then glanced at Tony, who shook his yellow head and grinned a grin full of needles. The message was clear. He'd do it: he enjoyed it.
Doyle looked at Wesley. "This is all your fault," he said belligerently.
"M-me?" he squeaked in indignant defence. "And how is this my fault, might I ask? They were after you. You got me involved in all this..."
"Well, if you hadn't stuck your poncey watcher nose in..."
"Well, excuse me, but I beg to disagree. I rather think this is all down to you, you stupid... stupid demon! If it hadn't been for you dragging your feet, we might have escaped the cellar. This is all your fault."
"Why, you..." Doyle growled and launched himself at Wesley, while the demons looked on with bemused amusement. Hanley folded his arms across his chest, leaning back slightly and enjoying the spectacle with a relaxed smile.
Doyle's left hand closed on Wesley's throat at the same time as his right closed on a nearby chair. In a quick, violent motion, he hurled the chair over his head and through the window, and leaped after it even as the glass was still shattering outwards, hurdling the mass of jagged shards still clinging to the base of the frame, desperately throwing his hands up to protect his eyes.
He hoped Wesley was fast enough to follow before the demons caught him.
He landed hard on concrete, tripped over the broken frame of the chair: fell, and rolled. A second later, Wesley almost landed on top of him.
They staggered to their feet as Hanley's gun went off, taking a chunk out of a palm tree less than a foot away from them. Doyle shoved Wesley off into the tropical undergrowth and followed after him at an awkward, slightly drunken run. He heard the demons cursing, because the sound of gunshot might cause someone to call the police, and the gun wasn't fired again.
There was a clatter of glass and a thud as somebody else jumped through the window, and Doyle ran faster, fronds of vegetation whipping at his face. He cursed the size of the garden. If they could just get out of there, into a public space, then they might be safe-
A weight collided with his back and smashed him face-down flat onto the ground. He struggled, spitting dirt, trying to throw off whoever had tackled him, but they were much heavier than he, and their weight pinned him down effortlessly.
He heard a familiar snarl as he felt needle sharp claws cut into his arm. Doyle felt the demon's breath on the back of his neck, and remembered those rows and rows of thin, spiny teeth.
"Say goodbye," Tony hissed into his ear.
