Disclaimer: All characters from the show are Joss Whedon's, and I am not making any money off of this (Lord knows), and etc…

Summary: The next generation of heroes may not think so highly of Angel & Co. One-shot unless otherwise asked. Please R&R!

Sequestered deep in the innards of New York City was a place where the sun never seemed to shine. No matter how bright the summer sky or how brilliant the winter morning, life seemed to exist there only because it had no other place to go, trudging along through hopeless hour after hopeless hour, in torment never-ending. No, it was not hell; not as most people think of it. But it may very well have been built from the same blueprints.

In a series of rooms nestled precariously in a condemned office building from the 1920's, life's only line of defense in that part of the city tried to live. One adult, a demon nearly full-grown, three teenagers, and a girl of twelve. Scraping by in four ramshackle rooms, surrounded by evil.

"Ah, the life of a hero," said Ivane dryly. "My compliments to the chef." He poked the "soup" suspiciously with a spoon. "What did you say this was?"

"Some kind of stew," Lilah answered, sitting down on the floor with a cracked bowl to join the others. "Nancy Gramn sent it over as a thank-you. She said there were tomatoes and, uh..." She swirled the thick liquid around. "Carrots."

Jenna and Niki made identical disgusted faces, and Kearm looked around as though hoping to see an excuse to leave. The room in which they sat was lined with cupboards, and although it was mostly clean, the dingy paint was peeling off the walls in splotches, the window was boarded up, and the floor sagged noticeably in the middle.

"You should be thankful." Carlotta, tall and thin with short reddish hair and Italian eyes, strode into the room. She was the Slayer. "If it wasn't for this, we wouldn't be eating tonight." They looked at her, disappointed but not surprised.

"So soon?" Ivane asked. The seventeen-year-old Watcher was the serious one, who seemed to think everything was his responsibility and blamed himself when things went wrong.

"Yep." Carlotta sighed, helping herself to a bowlful. "We'd better get our hands on something to eat soon."

Kearm surreptitiously emptied his bowl back into the pot. The less he ate, the more there would be for the others. Lilah caught him with her eyes and his dark blue skin went slightly darker in embarrassment. But she nodded knowingly. She didn't try to stop him, and she did not bring attention to what he had done. It shamed her to admit it, but Lilah Morgan had fallen so far in the world that she often found herself giving up her meals so that others could eat. Her appearance had not changed much, although her clothes were cheaper and less well-kept, and she had lost weight. It was in her face that the greatest change was visible; her eyes no longer radiated evil. They were still strong, still arrogant, scornful, hateful, or even cruel at times, but they had changed. Now, it seemed, she cared.

"...Lilah!"

Lilah shook herself.

"Sorry, Niki, what did you say?" she asked, turning to the little girl. Niki was twelve, but she looked eight. Lilah blamed her witch of a mother for that. She had pale, pale skin, almost the color of the white blond hair that was just beginning to grow back in the patches from which it had been pulled out.

"I said, why don't we tell stories, Lilah!" The little girl beamed up at her.

"Uh, sure, if you want to, ask someone to tell you a story." It felt odd, giving her permission to do something so simple. But Niki was very strange.

She was a genius, no doubt about that. She had taught herself to read around age three (she wasn't sure exactly when), and she remembered almost everything she read. She knew an extraordinary amount about demons and all sorts of other evil creatures, and understood things better than most adults. But emotionally, she was even younger than her twelve years. Her drug-addict mother had seen to it. When she felt intelligent, she could have been a Harvard graduate. At other times, she was four years old.

"Tell me a story, 'Lottie!" Niki cried. Carlotta sighed and shook her head.

"I can't think of a story right now, Niki," she told her, patting her on the head. "Not sitting in this place..." she looked around despairingly, "not like this."

"There are worse places, Carlotta," Kearm said softly. "Not to sound like a Sunday School teacher, but you should be thankful." Carlotta sighed again.

"Let's hear a story from Lilah," she suggested.

"Why me?"

"Because your stories are disturbing and depressing and true. I don't think I could deal with hope and happily-ever-afters right now."

Lilah knew what she meant. A cold, driving rain was lashing the walls outside, and the dampness had already begun to invade the network of rooms. She knew plenty of true stories for times like these. Times when the good guys were cold and hungry and knew perfectly well that the evil ones were warm and safe. Times when the good guys were nothing but a barely-registered blip on the bad guys' radar. Times when it seemed that all that was left of the good fight was a former demon slave, an orphaned Seer, a bitter, one-armed Slayer, two abused runaways and a lawyer who had once been the driving force behind half the evil in the Northern Hemisphere, and had then been pulled out of hell and turned to fighting demons for the sake of her former lover.

"Which one should I tell?"

"Tell us about... the corruption," Carlotta demanded suddenly. "The heroes you corrupted back when you were evil."

Lilah sighed and shook her head.

"The corrupted heroes. Oh, yeah, I remember them," she muttered. "Why would you want to hear about those guys? What a bunch of sell-outs. Acted all high and mighty, but hit them in a low moment and POW!" Niki jumped. "They leaped at the bait like it was a gift from God. Traitors. They wouldn't admit it, but it was what they wanted. To be able to give up, to rest, to take the easy way out. Sell-outs."

"Has it occurred to you, Lilah, that maybe they had a plan? That they thought they could beat the system from within? Or maybe they just didn't see the trap for what it was."

"Oh, they saw it all right. We knew they would take it. We knew they were desperate enough. We handed them damnation and destruction and they took it. They were corrupted and they didn't even realize it. They didn't know it would be better to die. God, what a bunch of traitors, Angel and his friends."