40

Propositions and Proposals

Spike looked at Val and jerked his head towards his office, then went inside.

Val followed with dragging feet. He had the nagging feeling that Spike was going to fire him, although for the unlife of him he couldn't figure out why. He hadn't made any spectacular screw-ups lately.

As soon as the door shut, Spike began speaking.

"I'm gonna be out of commission for most of the day," he stated without warning. "I put Rogers in charge, but I want to make sure that you're ready to back him up."

Val was taken aback to say the least. It was the first time he could remember Spike ever conferring his authority on someone else. Or trusting him with some responsibility.

"Does this have anything to do with what's been going on with Angel?" he asked cautiously, fearing Spike might bite his head off for it, but wanting to know anyway.

"Didn't know you knew," Spike remarked, leaning back in his chair and putting his feet up on the desk. "Harm tell you?"

Val nodded. "Yeah," he mumbled. "It's not going to get her in trouble or anything, is it? Telling me, I mean."

"Can't see why it should," Spike replied. "But if Harm told you everything, then you know why I won't be about today. Gotta take a nice, long nap. Hopefully."

Val thought as hard as he could on the subject, and finally came to a conclusion that he didn't much like, but would probably be in everyone's best interests. His included. "I'll do it," he offered.

"What?" Spike's feet came down off the desk and his chair legs hit the floor with a resounding crash. Beyond that single syllable, he seemed to be incapable of speech.

"If.., anything happens while you're out of it," Val said slowly. "Then we're out our best fighter. I couldn't protect anyone from Angelus, I'm not that good. And as for the tranquilizer, all you really need to test it is a vampire, right?"

Spike nodded thoughtfully. "Sound reasoning," he agreed. "But I wasn't asking you to volunteer."

"I know," Val replied. "But I still think it ought to be me." He broke into a lopsided grin. "Maybe for once, I'll actually be able to make Harmony proud of me."

A grin tugged at Spike's lips as well. "You go along to R&D then," he directed. "I'll ring up Fred to let her know about the change of players."

&&&&&&&&

Eve perched on the front of his desk again. "Busy?" she asked.

"Very," replied Angelus, not even looking up from the papers he was studying. "I hope you don't think we have a relationship, Eve. Emotional scenes are so exhausting."

"I didn't," Eve lied. She had been secretly hoping that he'd be so enamored of her charms that that was exactly what would happen. "I did want to know what you had in mind for.., them." The final pronoun was full of venom.

Angelus finally bothered to look up. "You really hate them, don't you?" he remarked. "Never mind about my plans. I'll turn this place upside down soon enough."

"I want to help." It was uttered with complete sincerity, and when Angelus looked into her eyes, he saw a hunger he hadn't seen even when he'd been bedding her. It was a familiar look, a lust for revenge. That was something he could respect.

"What have they done to you?" All information, no matter what, could prove useful in the long run.

Eve's nose went in the air. "They act like they're so superior to me," she said bitterly. "Like I should get down on my knees and apologize for breathing the same air they do." She turned her gaze back to him, and this time, the look was a pleading one. "Please let me help. I want to pay them back for treating me like dirt."

Angelus dragged her across the desk and claimed her lips in a rough demanding kiss that had nothing to do with affection. "Sheathe your claws for now, kitten," he warned. "Just keep your mouth shut and go about business as usual. I'll let you know when I can use you."

"If you don't," she warned, lips still a hairsbreadth from his. "Then I'll stake you myself. You can keep such affections as you have, Angelus. But don't deprive me of my revenge." She moved away from him.

She was half-way to the door when he fired his parting shot. "I like the scarf," he commented. "Fashion statement?"

Eve ran a finger under the scarf that she had loosely tied around her throat. "I didn't want to answer any awkward questions about why I have a hickey with what appears to be fang marks in the middle of it," she replied lightly, and made her exit.

&&&&&&

Val eyed the hypodermic nervously. "I thought it was going to be used in a trank gun," he mumbled. Somehow, for some reason, that didn't seem quite so bad.

"You don't need the gun to deliver the dose to a willing subject," Fred said. "Why don't you lay down on the table? If this stuff works like I think it will, you'll be out before I can finish the injection."

He complied with her suggestion, but his eyes never left the syringe. "I thought Harmony said that it would only take a couple of drops of that stuff," he remarked. "That looks like a hell of a lot more than a couple of drops."

"But there is only a couple of drops of the drug," Fred assured him. "The rest is sterile water. It makes it easier to inject all the drug into you. If I didn't have it mixed with the water, most of the drug would just remain uselessly on the inside of the syringe."

"I see," Val murmured. He was beginning to regret his attack of nobility. "Does the needle have to be that big?"

&&&&&&

Angelus caught the staff that Spike tossed to him. "No stakes today?" he asked teasingly. "If I didn't know better, I'd think you didn't trust me, Spike."

"You, I trust." This was said grudgingly, as if it caused Spike actual physical pain to say it. "But what I don't sodding trust is your reflexes. Yesterday was a bit too close of a call for my own personal comfort."

"And we wouldn't want you to be uncomfortable, would we?" Angelus mocked. At least around Spike, he could be himself, mostly. The long-standing rivalry between them afforded him the opportunity to take a few shots without it being in the least bit suspicious.

"You're in an awful damn good mood," Spike observed, starting to circle round him. "What gives? Somebody shove a feather up your ass?"

"You kiss your kids with that mouth?" Time to be a little more Angel-like, repulsive though the thought was. Besides, it was also another way to get under Spike's skin.

Spike reigned in his temper, with difficulty. "Speaking of kissing, why don't you kiss my ass?" He attacked.

"Kick your ass?" Angelus pretended to mishear him. "I'd be happy to. But aren't you getting a little tired of it? Or is that how you get off?"

Spike shook his head in mock-sorrow while dodging a blow. "I'd heard that even vamps can start losing their hearing when they get old," he remarked. "Bound to happen sometime, I guess. Don't you worry your poor, old head, Peaches. We'll take good care of you."

&&&&&&

"Have you got anything, Rose?" Wesley asked. He'd been in to check her progress almost hourly, since he was making none himself.

"A headache," she replied. "But nothing that can protect Angel's soul. This is so frustrating. I feel like I just want to throw something."

"I can't help you there," Wes answered. "But how do you feel about shooting something? I did say that I'd take you to the shooting range and teach you the basics of handling a firearm."

"I've shot a gun before," Rose pointed out. She stifled the queasy feeling she always got at the thought of Ahmed Al-Shere.

"I don't know how much Fred intends to streamline the model," Wesley admitted, pulling her out of her chair. "But it's still going to handle differently than that pea-shooter you fired before. You need to practice. If Spike's worst fears came true and you did end up shooting yourself, you'd probably die from an overdose before anyone could do anything to help you."

Rose allowed him to drag her along. "Aren't we being a little alarmist?" she inquired. "I mean, the Q'xlzr demon hasn't come up with any new leads. Maybe Havoc & Associates can't find anyone who can cast their spell."

"A little paranoia never hurt anyone," Wesley remarked. "And learning how to handle a gun is a useful skill. Especially in our line of work, Rose. What happened to your sense of adventure?"

"I didn't know I had one," Rose said with a sigh. "And if I did, I probably would have used it all up on Spike and the twins."

Wesley laughed at that one. "Come on, Rose," he said, voice still bubbling with amusement. "Let's go and get you acquainted with your new best friend."

&&&&&&

Gunn stopped in at R&D to see how the experiment was going and was surprised to see Val laid out on the table. "I thought that Spike was going to be the lab rat," he commented.

"Val volunteered at the last minute," Fred replied. "I think he hopes it will impress Harmony. He hasn't been doing too well on that score lately."

He gave the comatose figure another glance. "To be honest, I think I'm glad it's him rather than Spike," he remarked. "Spike may be a royal pain in the ass, but I'd sooner have him at my back in a fight than him." He looked over the electrical hook-ups. "How can you tell that he's really out and not just faking it?"

"Well, obviously we can't go by heart-rate and respiration," Fred answered. "Since vampires don't have them. But we can measure the brain waves, and when it comes to sleep patterns, theirs aren't any different than a humans."

"I'll take your word for it," Gunn conceded. "How long has he been out?"

Fred looked at an elapsed time display on the unit. "According to this, five hours now," she informed him. "He ought to be coming out of it pretty soon."

"If we can't figure out a way to get Angelus locked up in five hours," Gunn reflected. "Then I'd say that Angelus would be the least of our problems."

"Angelus is never the least of anyone's problems," Fred corrected him. "But five hours of course, is a give or take. Even vampires have slight differences in metabolism. And Angel is bigger than Val. The same dose won't keep him out for as long."

"But it would still be a matter of hours, right?" Gunn asked a little nervously. He wasn't at all cool on the thought of having to tangle with a conscious Angelus. Especially knowing that it was also Angel. Trying not to do any serious damage to someone who didn't have a problem with doing some to you. A real good way to get your ass kicked.

Fred sighed. Gunn hadn't been the only person in here today asking pretty much all the same questions. "It would still be hours, Charles," she told him. "Of course, this is just the last resort. Hopefully, it won't come to this."

"I heard that," Gunn agreed. "What does that little line jumping up and down mean?" He pointed to the brain-wave display.

"It means that he's starting to wake up," Fred replied, going over the monitor and flipping a few switches. "Not to be mean or anything, but do you think you could leave now, Charles? I want to concentrate on Val, checking to see if there are any aftereffects from the drug."

"Sure thing, Fred," Gunn said amiably. He took another quick look at Val who was just starting to stir. "Don't forget to give him his lollipop."

&&&&&&

"Any word of radical changes at Wolfram and Hart?" Stenslow asked his assistant.

"None at all, sir," Travers replied. "It would seem that Angelus is maintaining the pose of Angel quite creditably."

"And his soul is locked up safely in the vault?" Stenslow queried. He wanted to make sure all was well with that precious crystal cube. He had too much riding on it for anything to happen to it.

"I oversaw it myself, sir," Travers assured him. "I also took the precaution of packing it in cotton wool to help insure that it would remain intact."

"Excellent," Stenslow approved. "And you've assigned twenty-four/seven surveillance on Angelus?"

"Yes, sir," Travers answered. "We even took the precaution of planting a bug in his office. So far, it's still there." His face looked disapproving at such laxness in security. All the offices at Havoc & Associates were swept for bugs twice a day.

Stenslow's eyebrows shot up. "Has anything of interest happened?"

"He's ordered files on the firm, and on you personally, sir," Travers informed him. For all the more inflection there was in his voice, he could have been commenting on the weather or reporting the time.

"Know who you're dealing with," Stenslow mused. "Let him read whatever he wants. No matter what he finds out, he'll learn that Cariadoc Stenslow is no one to be trifled with. Anything else?"

"Not really, sir," Travers said, a trifle apologetically. "Unless you count an encounter with their liaison to the senior partners."

"Encounter," Stenslow repeated. "You're going to have to be a little more precise with your language, Travers. Encounter could be interpreted several different ways. Did he meet with her, talk to her, or..,"

"From what could be determined from the tapes," Travers interrupted. "It would seem that he engaged in sexual relations with her."

Stenslow smiled. The infamous Angelus, feared and respected by so many. And when it all came down to it, still in many ways just a man, with a man's impulses. Thinking with his sexual organ. It was somewhere to start in the bargaining.

&&&&&&&

"How are you feeling, Val?" Fred asked solicitously, as she helped him to sit up. She had a recorder going so that she didn't have to take notes.

"Like I did the other day when Spike clocked me with a quarterstaff," he replied groggily. "What time is it, and how long have I been out of it?"

"Five point three nine hours," Fred answered, reading the numbers off the monitor. The time had automatically stopped ticking over when Val had registered as being conscious again.

"That long?" Val shook his head. He still felt a little foggy. "Maybe that's why I'm feeling hungry."

Fred nodded. "I thought you might." She handed him a thermos flask.

Val unscrewed the cap and sniffed it suspiciously. But when his senses registered it as what his system craved, he tilted the whole thermos up, gulping it down a little less than daintily. In only a minute or so, he had it drained.

"Thanks," he said. "I really needed that."

Fred handed him a tissue. "You really need that, too," she remarked. "Unless you want to explain another ruined shirt to Harmony."

&&&&&&&

As soon as they stepped in the lift up to their penthouse, Spike had Rose in his arms, kissing her vigorously.

"I see that a day's rest has given you plenty of energy," she remarked when he let her up for air.

"Didn't rest," Spike mumbled into her neck. "Valentine volunteered. He was the one who spent the day in dreamland."

"Not that I'm complaining," Rose murmured, snuggling into him. "But why the enthusiasm?"

"Do I need a reason?" Spike parried. His eyes locked with hers for a moment, and suddenly, it just seemed that the time was right. He dropped to his knees in front of her. "Will you marry me, babe?"