Distribution, disclaimer, and summary can be found in the first chapter.

--

As the group reached the Hyperion, Connor sat Angel on the ground and opened the sewer entrance to the basement. While Gunn climbed ahead, Connor and Spike lifted Angel from his shoulders and feet.

"Okay guys, push him through!"

Connor and Spike clumsily shoved Angel through the small manhole, failing at trying to be careful of Angel's still open wounds. His newly-formed arm began bleeding from the rough handling, making Gunn's grip slick and making the task more difficult.

"Got 'im!" Gunn yelled down and finished pulling Angel up by himself. He returned to the hole and reached his hand to the darkness. "Alright, grab my hand and I'll pull you guys up."

A blur—Connor jumped through the manhole, scaring Gunn backward a few feet. Spike jumped through next and stood beside Connor.

"Don't worry, Charlie boy. Us supernatural types—we can manage to get through a simple hole in the ground."

A crash sounded from the hotel lobby.

The group looked at each other, silently checking to make sure that they weren't just hearing things.

Gunn looked to Spike, "You should go see what that was."

"Me?!" Spike incredulously asked. "If he were awake, Angel woulda gone, so I'm voting for Junior 'ere ta go."

"Coward," Connor whispered under his breath and walked over to the door. Leaning his ear against it, he listened once more for the crash he heard before.

"Ahh!"

The sound of a solid, connecting punch.

A growl.

Some words—another language. Latin, maybe?

Screams. Human.

Metal on metal—swordfighting?

"What is it?" Gunn watched Connor's facial expressions change with every sound he heard.

"Stay here and guard Angel," Connor commanded. "Spike, let's go."

Connor cracked the door open and pressed himself flat against the wall. Soundlessly, he slid to the nearby corner and peered around it. A battle raged in the lobby. A dozen green demons, covered in armor, fought another dozen or more humans, who had no weapons in hand. For the most part, the humans proved that they could handle themselves in battle, but the occasional foreign slur released a slew of magic upon the demons, weakening them when it appeared that they were gaining the upper hand.

A blue streak shot out of the hand of one of the humans, and as she turned, Connor saw that it was the watcher that they had questioned earlier that day.

"Spike, look."

Surveying the entire scene, it wasn't tough for Spike to figure out what was going on. "Watchers. All of 'em. Old watchers."

"Ever seen the demons before?"

"Mohra demons. Angel's got a few entries about 'em in his journal."

Connor looked at him in surprise, "You've read his journals?"

Sheepishly, Spike looked away, "There's not much ta do when you're just a freakin' ghost."

They turned their attention back to the scene before them.

"You think they're fighting over Dad?" Connor whispered.

"Probably—but I don't know why. Not like he's anything special. Just another vamp with a soul. Hell, I got me one. Had it for a couple a years."

"You're wrong."

"'bout what?"

"About Dad. There is something the Powers see in him!"

"You didn't even like the man for the majority of your unnatural life! How is it that you are callin' me wrong?"

The blunt statement sunk in for a moment, and Connor was speechless to reply. His silence blended with the quiet that seemed to pervade the room.

"So you think the Powers got a plan?" Spike's line of sight was far from Connor's eyes. "You know, it'd be nice if they could step up right now."

Evidently, the duo's argument had gotten everyone's attention, and both demons and humans were looking at them with hunger in their eyes.

--

The fanged quartet quickened their pace long ago, trying to get outside the city, trying to outrun the sunrise. The underground maze seemed to go on forever, but they were finally near its exit. Darla, though usually at Angelus's side, lagged in back. The initial pleasure at Drucilla's gift wore off quickly, and she immediately grew tired of carrying herself on one good shoe.

Angelus noticed her impatience and allowed William and Drucilla to lead for the moment.

"Darla, don't be cross wit' me, love. Give us a smile, and I'll buy ya a new hat." Angelus coyly threw his boyish smirk her way, hoping that it might elicit the slightest mischievous twinkle in her eyes.

He got his wish. Not only did she smile her biggest smile, but she stopped and turned her head to give her a finer view of her silhouette.

"Dat's my girl."

"No." A simple retort.

"No?" he asked, confused at the word.

"Your girl does not enjoy sewer frolicking…" Her smile disappeared. "…and breaking the heels off of her especially expensive shoes!" With that one word, she promptly flung her heel-less shoe at her childe with all of the vampiric force that her arm could muster.

As he nursed the blow to his stomach, he missed the sight of Darla furiously removing her other shoe and sending it at him as well. Looking up, he watched in slow motion as the shoe spiraled through the air and landed, heel first, on his temple—the blow sending him sprawling to the ground.

William and Drucilla giggled at the end of the tunnel.

"Quiet!" Angelus shouted and roughly struggled to his feet, wiping the blood from his brow.

The giggling stopped.

Surprised at the silence, Angelus returned to nursing his wounds. "Well, dat's ne'er worked b'fore."

Darla stepped forward and gently rested her hand on Angelus's shoulder; he recoiled at the touch. "Damn it, woman, have ya not beaten me enough fer da day?"

"Angelus, look."

William and Drucilla stood at the would-be exit to the tunnel…the boarded…the nailed…the closed exit to the tunnel. The last remnants of moonlight faded behind the thick boards; the vampires could smell the dawn coming.

Gripping one side of a board, Angelus pulled and yelled for help, "William, pull de o'der end!"

For one brief moment, William actually listened to his grandsire and tugged at the boards alongside him.

"They're not moving!"

Angelus glared at him, "Pull it!"

The board budged less than half an inch and stopped with no better having been done.

"Thinking of leaving?"

The vampires turned to see that the mob had finally caught up with them, and they were capable of quite efficient traps.

--

"Well Shiny, as a matter of fact, yea—we were thinkin' o' leavin'," Spike sarcastically retorted to the Mohra demon who dared to speak up.

"Where is Angelus?" the watcher from before demanded. Paranoid, she looked back and forth between Spike and Connor and the Mohra demons. "We cannot hold them off forever, and neither can you."

"Where one of us falls, ten will arise," a Mohra growled.

Spike dismissed the threat, "Yea, yea, whatever. You stay over there or we'll start crushing red sparkly things, got it?"

The demons collectively snarled, and Connor looked to Spike. "You know what you're doing, right?"

Spike shrugged ambiguously and waited for one of their enemies to make a move.

The watcher spoke first. "We can protect you, protect Angelus." She knew the Mohras' patience was going to eventually grow thin, and if she and her fellow watchers were going to live through the fight, she would have to make a deal.

Connor flinched in surprise, amazed that she would cave so easily. "We can't trust you; you're trying to kidnap him, and we're not that stupid." He glanced at Spike, who was beginning to think it over. "Well, I'm not anyway."

"Hey!"

After quickly throwing an apologetic look Spike's way, Connor straightened his wrist, releasing the dagger that he concealed in his sleeve.

Spike shifted into vamp mode with a smile, "Gotta love the way the kid thinks."

Splitting the Mohra demons into thirds, Connor cornered himself with a handful, leaving Spike and the remaining watchers to split the rest of them.

"We can help each other!" the lead watcher yelled as she conjured a protective shield around herself.

Connor threw a Mohra off of his back and, straightening himself, used his dagger to swiftly jab at the jewels on another two demons to either side of him. "I think I'm doing just fine here. Yup, no watchers needed."

"Same here," Spike said, head-butting the demon in front of him. The demon disappeared in a stab of blinding light, and Spike turned his playful attention to the next one.

The watcher shot a fireball at a demon, rewarded with the same effects that Connor and Spike received, and continued her negotiations. "This isn't a game you know." Another fireball sent a Mohra reeling into another blinding mess. "You have to make a deal with one side. Good or evil. Right or wrong. You cannot play both sides anymore."

"So you guys are good now?" Connor rhetorically invited as he polished off another three demons with a roundhouse kick and two more jabs of the dagger.

"We were always good," she replied and released another spell, one that confused Connor. With a flurry of green lights, it wiped out the Mohras surrounding her, and she was able to move to help her fellow watchers in finishing their opponents.

Spike scoffed loudly and began jabbing wildly at the demons surrounding him, "Well, let's see: you wouldn't help save Angel from this virus thing once, which…I don't care, but you almost got the slayer killed too many times for me to try to count…while I'm not sober." He punched at his last two Mohras and ran over to help Connor, not bothering to stay to watch the demons vanish.

With a yell, Connor flipped behind the two adversaries in front of them and held them in place for Spike to crack their jewels. That task done, Connor effortlessly tossed his dagger behind him, stabbing his last Mohra in dead center of its jewel.

The watchers, many of them beaten and bloody, stood on the landing of the front entrance. Seven of them made it through the brawl, but some of them, Connor knew, wouldn't make it through the night. She would though.

"Connor, we have to ask you for your father's body." She held her gaze firmly set on Connor's own, barring the one instant that she spared to visually plead with Spike. They would have to see the truth in her eyes. "We will burn this hotel to the ground if we must."

Spike looked over all of the watchers standing before them, threatening them with their magicks. The shallow, flat look in their eyes told him that they weren't lying—they were prepared to do whatever they had to in order to complete their task.

Another bind, Spike thought. Could definitely use one of Angel's miracles right about now.