Ch.10

Dorian walked down from his room, leaving Sair behind. She was still recuperating from the previous nights' blood drain. She could still live with the bare minimum, but not at her best. That's why he did that to her all the time, so she would become used to it and be powerful.

He shook his head, he needed to find Mina soon, maybe he had given that Angel guy too much credit, but then again, they had started from scratch. He knew these things already, they did not. He was practical.

At some point he had wondered if that Spike character had told Angel of his encounter, if so, it would bring a few complications into his plan. Did Angel invite him along? If he did, he would just take care of him at the party. He gripped his cane a little tighter, remembering what damage the sword inside had done to the vampire, this time, he would finish the job.

The noise of the party came wafting up to his ears from the first floor. As he walked down the stairs, the people erupted in chatter and praise of his arrival. He smoothed the front of his tuxedo as he gave a half-hearted smile to all of the guests, his eyes prying through them as he tried to find Angel and possibly, the other vampire he fought before.

Deciding that he'd better not delay his official welcome and that he could have a better view from the podium he was to be at, he walked towards the front of the big ball room. As he went up the steps, the room went down considerably in terms of noise and when he came to the microphone, it was dead silent.

"Hello to you all and welcome to this fine charity ball in the name of the Sacred Heart orphanage," he spoke and paused as the audience clapped.

He spoke again when the clapping subsided.

"As you know," Dorian said as his eyes searched, "The Sacred Heart orphanage has been sheltering runaways and parentless children for over twenty years. It has sheltered many children and altered many lives as well as mine. When word came about that the orphanage was going to be demolished soon for quick profit and replaced with a movie theatre, I could not accept it. Such a wonderful place that has helped so many over the years was going to be wrecked for a quick dollar? Well I cannot let that happen, and I don't think you will either! So let's get this fundraiser started and get enough money to keep the Sacred Heart going for generations to come!"

After this speech, the audience erupted into an explosion of clapping. Dorian gave a fake smile and searched the crowd, he found them. He saw Angel half-heartedly clapping and the blond haired vampire, garbed in a black tuxedo so that he almost blended in with the others, was crossing the way to get to him. Spike looked like he had something important to tell Angel, what did he know? Dorian intended to find out.

He picked his way through the crowd and approached Angel from behind. He slung his arm around his shoulder.

"Hey, you made it! Great, hey, I gotta talk to you real quick. Come on," he told him.

Angel hesitated at first, but then gave in and walked with him through to the back of the crowd. Dorian stopped him at the back behind the stairs. No one was near there and it was in the shadows.

"Um, why are we here?" Angel asked.

"I don't really want anybody to know about my interest in the supernatural, think of what the press would say," Dorian answered without missing a beat, "Now, I just wanted to tell you."

Without saying anything more, Dorian unsheathed his sword and stabbed Angel through the stomach, pinning him to the wall. He stood back to see his work.

"Look," Dorian said, "I know what you are and what you're trying to do. And it's not going to happen. I am not going to let you ruin my dream. You are officially off of this case."

"What do you mean?" Angel said as he struggled to free himself, "What dream? Why are you doing this?"

"To create my own world," Dorian said as he ripped out his sword, "You're fired."

And with that, he sliced Angel in the face four times. Angel fell onto the carpeted ground and put a hand to his face that burned with pain and dripped with blood. The pain was so much that he passed out.

Dorian took Angel's kerchief out of his pocket, wiped his sword free of blood, and tossed it onto Angel's unconscious form. He sheathed back his blade.

Now to dispatch that other vampire, Spike.

Spike looked around, Dorian's sudden speech had taken his attention away from Angel momentarily, but when he looked back he was gone. He went by the drink table and drank a few glasses of champagne as he looked for his lost vampire in arms. He succeeded in finding nothing but blubbering old men, and stupid middle-aged people.

Spike decided that he would just go to Dorian's room and see what he could find. He could fill in Angel later. He set down his glass and walked over to the grand stairs. Better to leave when Dorian was gone and a lot of people weren't focused on him. He walked up the red carpeted steps and stopped at the landing at the second floor.

He scouted out all of the room numbers, trying to find six-hundred six, all to no avail. He went to the elevator, which thankfully had a directory, and punched the button to the correct floor. Then the elevator dinged upon its' arrival on the twenty-something floor.

Spike exited the elevator, staying to the shadows to avoid the passer-by guests, and finally reached room six sixty-six. He stopped in front of it, and put his ear to the door to try and hear if anyone was behind it. His vampire ears heard nothing, it was dead silent. He tried to open the door, not too surprised to find that it was locked, and vamped out. Using his strength, he kicked in the door. It swung wildly from its' broken hinges until he stopped it to eradicate further noise being made.

He walked in silently, looking around for anyone else, and closed the door, well, as much as it could, being broken and all. The room was, surprisingly enough, very bare of anyone. It looked as if the room had never been occupied. Hell, it still smelled like a brand new room.

Spike went through the kitchen, living room type thing area, and even into the bathroom, but couldn't find anything or anyone.

"Agh!" he heard coming from the bedroom suddenly. The noise broke the silence so much that his ears felt as if they would bleed.

He fell back into the shadows and strained to hear another noise, but nothing happened. Deciding that he would be alright because he was already vamped out and ready to go, he walked into the bedroom. He was taken aback by what he saw. He saw the girl that he had seen two days before in the alley lying on the bed. He turned back to normal.

Thankfully, she was fully-clothed and asleep, so Spike wasn't worried. He took a few steps forward, toward the bed she was on, and heard the girl utter something inaudible in her slumber. Her eyebrows were furrowed, as if puzzled by a dream she was having. He stepped forward some more to hear what she was saying.

"Mister…….Dorian….sorry….I-didn't…mean..to…" was what the girl was muttering.

Spike cocked an eyebrow, what did this mean now? He looked and saw that the girl was absolutely pale. Upon further inspection, he found that her hands were unnaturally cold, actually, her skin was cold.

'What is this?' Spike thought, 'She's as cold as death itself….because she is dead. She's a vampire!'

This didn't make sense to him. Why did Dorian have a vampire in his room? Spike decided to put his thoughts to rest and get the girl out of here. Friend or enemy, this girl could be useful to them in their investigation. God, he was getting more and more like a corporate worker of Wolfram & Hart's by the day instead of being a vampire.

"What the hell are you doing here?" came a voice from behind him.

Spike suddenly turned to see Dorian who was standing in the threshold of the door to the bedroom.

"How the hell did you get behind me?" Spike blurted, he didn't pick up on his presence at all.

"I'm immortal, I've learned things over the years," Dorian answered as he unsheathed his sword from his cane, "And now, I think it's time I killed you."

Spike glared at him and tensed for a fight, his fangs elongating as he vamped out again.

"Ah, that little trick again, eh?" Dorian said, "It didn't work last time, what makes you think it'll work now?"

"Well this time, I'm really pissed off at you," Spike answered as he leapt for Dorian.

Dorian feigned to the side and Spike reversed his motion well enough to land a punch on his enemies face. Dorian reeled and slashed back with his sword. Spike dodged it and kneed him in the stomach. He then round-house punched Dorian in the face. Dorian responded by slashing at Spike in the chest, creating a cut across his white dress shirt.

Spike jumped back and looked at the damage done to his outfit, "You bastard! I liked this shirt!"

Dorian smirked, "Oh well…"

Dorian attacked Spike with more furious slashes. Spike having a harder and harder time in avoiding them until he tripped on something and fell back onto the wall near a window. Dorian raised his sword up, preparing to stake Spike in the heart.

"Farewell my friend, see you never again," Dorian said with a grin on his face.

"Mister Dorian!" Spike heard from the left of the room. They both looked and saw the girl sitting stark upright in the bed, staring at the two.

"Sair!" Dorian said suddenly, but was cut off by Spike tackling him and throwing him down on the ground.

"Not so tough now are you?" Spike said to him, preparing to deliver the worst of his wrath through a thorough beating.

"No!" he heard the girl cry and was suddenly tackled into the window.

It broke open in a spray of glass and they both fell twenty some odd floors to the cement below. It was a few seconds before either of them stirred. Spike got up to horrible pains in his face, he felt it and found it was pieces of the window that had scratched him during the fall and landing.

The girl did not stir. It looked as if she was dead, well, really dead. Spike got to a sitting position and shook some stray shards of the broken window off of his jacket.

"Spike!" he heard from his right. He looked and saw Angel holding his face and running towards him.

He came to a stop in front of him and helped him to his feet.

"We've gotta get out of here," he told him and then looked to the unconscious girl on the ground, "Who's this?"

"The girl that was with Dorian earlier," Spike told him, "I think we should take her with us."

"What?"

"She might have some information, she could tell us something."

"Alright," Angel said as he picked up the girl and started off running.

"Wait!" Spike said, "Can't we take the limo?"

"Do you see it around?"

"No."

"Then come on!!"

Spike sighed and started running after Angel.

Dorian looked out his broken window, his hand held on the bottom of the pane. He saw the two vampires kidnapping his vampire daughter. His creation. His work.

He gripped the bottom pane, the glass cut into hand and the blood seeped out Dorian grit his teeth.

'You may have won this time,' he thought, 'But I will prevail in the end!'

Ch.11

Angel finally reached the garage to the firm. He walked towards the elevator, Spike was trailing behind him, panting for breath.

He turned to him.

"Come on," he told him, "It isn't that long of a run."

Spike came to a stop, "A small sprint isn't that long of a run. A couple of blocks, isn't that long of a run. But thirteen bloody miles is a bloody marathon!!"

"No," Angel panted, "A marathon is twenty-five miles now come on!"

Spike sighed, but then nodded as he went over and hit the button to summon the elevator. Angel lowered the girl from the position over his shoulder he had her to where he held her in his arms. His right arm at her bent knees and his left supporting her shoulders and neck although her head fell back.

He stepped into the elevator, which had suddenly opened, and turned to Spike after it started to ascend.

"So," he said, "What connection do you think Dorian has to this girl?"

"I don't know," Spike said as he lit up a cigarette, the stress of night's events getting to him, "This is just getting more and more complicated."

"Well, look on the bright side," Angel said, mistaking Spike's comment to relate to the case and not the girl, "Now that we have her, she might be able to tell us something."

"Like what?"

"Well, why Dorian wants to find Mina. What she has to do with Dorian and what he's up to."

"I don't think you're gonna get that much out of her," Spike said, "After all, she tackled me out of a twenty-something story window just to protect him."

Angel shrugged and the elevator dinged upon its' arrival at the floor they wanted to go to. They stepped out and were greeted by Fred.

"Hey, how'd the party go-who's this?" she asked as she looked at the girl in Angel's arms, "Friend of yours?"

"No," Angel shook his head, "One of Dorian's though."

"Looks like she's dead."

"That's because she is," Spike intervened, "She's a vampire."

"What?" this time coming from Angel and Fred.

"She's too cold to be a human and pale, but she's alive," Spike said, "I just know it."

"Well," Fred started as she quickly looked over the girl, "She doesn't look like she's been feeding….at all."

"Do you think we can put her somewhere safe until she wakes up?" Angel asked her.

"Yeah, you can put her in the lab."

"Make sure you restrain her," Spike said, "I received a nice tackle earlier, I don't want to see you get hurt."

Fred smiled, "Right, bring her this way."

Angel followed Fred down to the lab and lied her on the cot that Spike had laid on when he was injured earlier.

The girl looked so pale and sickly that Angel truly wondered if she could be a vampire. Maybe just a very sick human. Or something else.

The girl had small scratches on her face, probably from the fall, but was all otherwise looked uninjured.

"Maybe a freshly turned vampire?" Angel asked Fred as she started to put restraints on the girls' wrists connecting to the cot.

"I don't know, but do you want me to help you out with your injuries first?" Fred asked.

Angel had forgotten about his wounds, but the one in his stomach had already mostly healed and the cuts on his face were right behind, "No, I'm fine. The girl probably needs more help than I do anyway."

"Maybe," she said as she secured the girls' wrist farthest from her and then picked up the one closest, "Whoa."

"What?" Angel asked.

Fred turned the girls' wrist carefully so that Angel could see it. He looked at the small childish hand and found purpled cuts that were barely starting to heal. They were wide gashes across her hands and looked pretty ugly.

"My God," Angel said, "Do you think Dorian did this to her?"

"I don't know," said Fred, "But I'll figure out soon enough."

She began tending to the girls' wounds and Angel began to go upstairs.

"Wait," Fred called after him, "I found some stuff on Dorian at the hotel."

"What?" Angel asked as he turned from the stairs to face her.

"Well, seems that he owns it through other means. He didn't buy it, but he received it in a vampires' will. Apparently, after a vampire met her untimely end, she left everything he had to Dorian. So, Dorian got the hotel, millions of dollars, and whatever else that was left to him."

"How did the vampire die? Accident? " Angel asked feeling like he was onto something.

"Um, a murder. Someone snuck into her room and staked her through the heart, she ultimately died then."

"Did they ever find the murderer?"

"No, since it involved a vampire and a death like that, it would have been easy to overlook a lot of clues or things to help out with finding one," Fred replied as she turned from the girl on the cot, "Do you think Dorian did it?"

"Could be," Angel replied, "It did have a lot in it for him."

"Hm," Fred thought but then suddenly remembered something, "Oh, Wesley found something on Mina Harker. He told me to tell you guys as soon as you came back from the party, it's important apparently."

"He didn't tell you what it was?"

"Nope, I think he was too excited or busy," she replied.

"Well that works," Angel said, "Is he still in his office."

"Pretty sure."

"Thanks, and do you think you could call me when the girl wakes up?"

"Sure."

"Thanks again," Angel walked upstairs and saw Spike sitting on the steps to the stairs that led to the upper floor.

He looked up at Angel's entrance, "So how's the girl?"

"Don't know yet," Angel replied.

"Well, soon enough, right?" Spike said as he got up and walked towards the elevator, "I'm going home. If you need me, my phone will be unplugged so tough luck Peaches."

And with that, he walked in and the doors closed.

'Great,' Angel thought, 'Now I just need to talk to Wesley.'

He walked warily down to Wesley's office and saw the guy he was looking for hovered over an old book of sorts, his glasses poised at the edge of his nose, threatening to teeter off.

"Wesley," Angel said as he leaned on the side of the door leading into his office, "Fred told me you found something."

"Yes!" he said as if suddenly remembering and regaining the initial excitement of when he first found whatever he wanted to show Angel, "Yes, yea. I've found out what Dorian is and where Mina Harker is."

"Really?" Angel was getting just as happy with this discovery, "What? Where..?"

"Um, alright. I looked in every sacred book I could find, rummage, and think of and found this," he said as he turned the book that he was currently looking at towards Angel.

Angel walked forward and looked at the pages, there were countless words in another language or scribe or something, he looked up, "What does it mean?"

"Well, it's basically a record of different creatures, demons, vampires…Like a glossary of unworldly things."

"Yeah…"

"Well, here it talks of an everlasting one. One that does not die, nor fade with time. One that keeps as if he were the same."

"In essence, like everlasting youth? A vampire?"

"Well, that was what I first thought, but then it goes into a more detailed description. One that knows only gray for it is the color of his appearance. He knows not of a change. Always gray, never black, only the soul is."

"The soul is black?" Angel asked.

"Meaning an evil to come," Wesley explained, "Like the person doesn't know it's coming. And then they say that this person or thing feels pain but never feels the scars. Maybe an inference from when Spike fought him. You said that he said the wound healed faster than a normal vampire?"

"Something like that, yes."

"Well, this could be it. And plus the name fits."

"Gray," Angel said.

"Yes," Wesley agreed.

"So what is it?" Angel asked.

"An immortal, one that can never die," Wesley answered.

"Great," Angel said, "So we can't kill him?"

"Not by any means that I can find."

"Well, try to keep on it. I have a feeling that whether we like it or not, he's gonna try something."

"The next Apocalypse perhaps?"

"Hey, everyone else is doing it nowadays, what's stopping him?"

Wesley sighed and then remembered something else, "Oh, and Mina's address? I found it. It's the most current and one that is kept up."

"Where is it?" Angel asked.

"Arizona, in Litchfield Park," Wesley said as he gave Angel a piece of paper, "She owns an apartment there."

"Thanks," Angel replied, "I'm just gonna get some sleep and I'll decide for further action tomorrow."

"Alright," was the reply he got before Wesley poured himself into the book he had again.

Angel walked out of his office.

That was an end to a long night.