~*-*~
Angel and Spike, being the strongest, carried Katherina and Bianca into the Hyperion and continued down towards the pool below. Fred screwed up her nose as she stared at the figures leaving.
"It's strange you know. Spike and Angel always refer to each other as family, but they look nothing alike."
Wesley frowned.
"Of course not Fred. They're not biologically related."
"Well I know that! I'm just saying is all."
"Riiiight."
"You know what? You all better not listen to a word I say. When I start to talk nonsense and get dizzy when I'm doing it, I know I should get some sleep."
She turned to her boyfriend and planted a huge kiss on his face. Due to the fact she was nearly asleep on her feet, Fred was completely oblivious to proverbial knife she was twisting in Wesley's gut as she continued the overly sentimental display with her boyfriend.
"I'm going to hit the hay. It's been a long day for me."
"I'll be down here. Wes and I will help the vampires out with the mermaids."
He frowned.
"There's a sentence I never thought I'd say. Well, you go on ahead. Get some sleep, work up your strength for later."
"You betcha!"
With that Fred went up the stairs, leaving the two men, and boy, alone in the lobby. The temperature immediately dropped to freezing.
"I don't like it."
"What's that Connor?"
Connor gestured at the two of them.
"What you're doing. I don't like it. Pretending to be friends."
"We're doing this for Angel's sake little man."
Connor walked off towards the kitchen in a moment of disbelief. He stopped to answer Gunn.
"Don't pretend to know what's good for my father. I know you think I'm naïve, and I agree that don't know much, but I'll tell you what I do know. Keeping up this false display of friendship can only end in disaster. No good can come of lies."
With the men well and truly told off, he left. It was fair to say that they both felt ten inches tall. Having your mistakes pointed out to you was one thing, having them being pointed out by a person that hadn't been in existence for year was quite another. Gunn and Wesley decided to go help Spike and Angel with making the pool habitable. Or at least they would have, had Angel and Spike not reappeared from downstairs.
"What are you doing? I thought you were working on the pool."
"We got bored."
Angel glared at Spike as he was lounging about as though he owned the place.
"Correction. Spike got bored. I came to ask you for help."
Gunn and Wesley agreed to help with the rehabilitation of Katherina and Bianca, but Angel never heard a word. The whole time he grew more and more furious with his cocky childe, who was inspecting his weaponry.
What the hell is he... That's *my* broadsword! Don't you dare touch my... there he goes again. That's my favourite pair of mini axes, and he's playing with them... Oh I hope you press the wrong switch on that crossbow and kill yourself boy...
"Angel, are you preoccupied with something?"
Angel snapped out of his anger momentarily to answer Wesley.
"What? No. You guys go down, I'll join you later."
With that, Gunn and Wes left to go downstairs, finally giving Angel a chance to talk the annoyance that went by the name of Spike.
"These are your weapons huh? They're nice."
"Of course they're nice. They're mine."
Spike put the crossbow he was inspecting back and moved to look at a rather interesting mace, until Angel slapped his hands away.
"Spike, do you have to touch everything?"
"Just getting a feel for things around here. Sorry if I'm tainting your precious weaponry with my unworthy hands Your Graciousness."
Angel allowed himself to ignore the mock reverence in order to remember his own time under the sea.
"I miss being pampered."
"I'll bet."
"How long was I down there?"
Spike frowned.
"What, you don't know?"
Angel's tone grew colder and more reflective.
"Course not. Whilst I was in that iron tomb, I lost track of time. I could tell whether or not the sun was up but you can only cope for so long. The days fade into weeks, into months, into years. If someone else had found me I'd be able to estimate if they looked say ten years older. And you're not a good guide, considering you don't age... What are you sniggering at?"
"You."
"Why?"
"Hate to break it to you, but you've been gone two, maybe three months tops."
Pause.
"That's it?!"
Spike nodded.
"Damn! So I take it I didn't miss much then."
"Only Brazil winning their fifth World Cup. The final was against Germany. Man, that was a weak game."
Angel cut him off, as he knew the full 90-minute commentary was about to spiel from Spike's mouth.
"You know I don't care for soccer Spike."
"Angel, it's "football" not "soccer"! You've been spending too much time with the Yanks my friend."
The cavalier insult may not have meant much, but it was enough for Angel to access the internal anger that had been caused by Spike these past few days.
"I'm not your friend. Which brings me to the all-important question. What are you doing here?"
"What do you think? I came here to rescue you! Save you from the perils of the mighty ocean and return you to your rightful place, defender of all that is good and just in Los Angeles."
"Wow. Sarcasm. Because you don't do that often."
"I'm serious!"
Angel didn't pick up on the sincere way Spike answered his monotone reply. He was still far too angry for that.
"Spike, the only times you've ever come to me were either to drain my blood, beat me up or torture me, so forgive me for not being forgiving."
"Seriously Angel, I needed your help in a non fatal way. So I come to L.A. only to find you, well, lost. With a son I might add, and I seriously have to talk to you about that."
The mention of the word 'son' was enough to pull a rather hungry young boy out of the kitchen. Connor didn't let himself be noticed by the arguing vampires, but he did keep listening in.
"Oh no. Don't you turn this on me, we're talking about you here."
"Angel? Darla?! What the hell were you thinking?!"
Angel began to pace up and down. The conversation was moving away from Spike and on to him, and he wasn't at all comfortable with it.
"I was in a bad place."
"I take it that place was out of your mind?"
For a moment Angel was about to start defending himself, until he remembered that he was not the one who was supposed to be questioned.
"I don't see how this is relevant. It doesn't affect you."
"I just thought you'd have better sense than to put the universe at risk when you slept with Darla."
"Universe? Stretching it just a bit there."
Spike counted off his fingers as he spoke, and Angel had an answer for everything. Not a good one grant you, but one nonetheless. Of course he didn't say anything out loud, as he was never one for truly sharing his feelings. It was a consequence of being alone for as long as he had been.
"Erm, let us not forget your last unsouled outing. You caused a countless number of deaths,"
You hypocrite.
"You tortured the Watcher and he hasn't forgotten about that too,"
Like you've never done the same...
"You put the fear of God into my Nibblet,"
"Your Nibblet"?
"And if it wasn't for me and Buffy you'd have sucked the world into hell!"
Angel couldn't take any more.
"Thank you very much Spike. That's just lovely. Throw all of my mistakes in my face, play the guilt trip when you know very well that I can't retaliate in kind. What would you know about it anyway? Guilt and remorse are nothing but words to you! You have no idea what I have to go through every day! Listen boy, don't play those games with me because you won't win. You'll never win. You can't beat me because I will always be better than you. So don't even try. You're worthless Spike. You're nothing. Nothing, and you know it. That's all you are and all you ever will be. An evil soulless thing."
Then Spike did something unexpected. He laughed. It wasn't a laugh of joy, or amusement. It was a laugh of pain. A laugh at the sheer irony displayed before him. He laughed purely because he couldn't cry. He'd cried so much, and he couldn't cry now. He was tired of crying. So all Spike did was laugh. He laughed for so long it was uncomfortable to watch. By the end it had become nothing more than an insane giggle. Spike giggled his way out of the door and sat out in the courtyard, where he continued to laugh.
As Angel stared with contempt at the retreating form moving out of the door, Connor decided that he'd heard enough.
~*-*~
Author's Note: As you can see, totally serious with the regular updates! Thank you so much people for all your reviews. [starts crying] You like me! You really like me! [stops crying] Seriously though... (Me? Serious? Never!) this fic was so much fun to write, I just hope it's fun to read too! I'm even starting to get a sequel into my head... which is scary. But I won't get that even down on paper until my exams are over (Anybody else in the UK taking their A-Levels? I know your pain. In fact, same goes for AS's and GCSEs. SATS?! Peh. You're getting off easy...) and I'm talking end of June. That said, the sequel's a def.
But once again, thank you so much! You have no idea how much your opinion means to me...
