Disclaimer: Please see Part 1, Chapter 1…

Sugar & Spice

Part 3

Chapter 2

"So kind of you to join us," snapped Angel as he passed by Harmony's desk at just before noon; he so did not need her crap right now when he had to pull off a master-strike against the Circle of the Black Thorn! "I need this lot cleared by five o'clock so get to it."

He stalked into his office and went to his desk, ostensibly going over some paperwork, but inwardly going over the details. As long as he could pull off the switch, everything would be alright…could he still go through with it if that part failed? He didn't dare bring Drogyn in, but he didn't need to. Drogyn would say: do it anyway, but then that's what heroes did – be heroic, sometimes stupidly so…

He looked up as Harmony sashayed in with his mug of blood and a sheaf of papers, dressed in an actual figure-concealing business suit again for the something-day in a row, instead of some usual flimsy frippery in OTT Barbara Cartland pink.

Placing the mug on his desk without ceremony, Harmony simply released the papers to drop into his in-tray. "They're all done. Sign them by three, because I'm out of here by five-oh-one-pm."

"What?" Angel plucked the top paper off and found that Harmony's recently acquired (and somewhat disconcerting) super, super-efficiency was still in play. "If you're bucking for a raise –"

Swaying towards the door she stopped dead and spun back, her eyes suddenly way too much like Spike's before his soul. "I have important priorities that supersede being your lackey, soul or otherwise. Get over yourself, Angel: it's not always about you, and the world does not always – in fact hardly ever - revolve around your unlife."

Angel surged to his feet; he didn't take that 'tude from anyone, least of all some blonde airhead – but as Harmony swept out Wesley came in, casting a glance at her as she sailed past before looking questioningly at Angel.

For the moment Angel re-prioritised. Harmony had just unwittingly summarised his way-too-late mini-epiphany about how the welfare of the sidekicks was just as important as saving everyone else, and he wasn't going to ignore the inadvertent reminder of how badly he had flopped in the 'Care and Feeding of my Friends' department.

Along with pretty much the rest of creation, Wesley did not approve of Angel handing that baby off to the Fell Brethren like a sack of groceries, and Angel knew the Englishman was worried about him. But as soon as Wes' knew the real deal, he would back Angel's plan – he had to; Angel needed someone to neutralise the threat of Cyvus Vail, and Wesley was the closest thing he had to his own Willow Rosenberg.

"Angel?" Wesley spoke softly, breaking in to Angel's momentary introspection; if the Scroll of Niamh was right, as he knew it was, he knew too well what weight it was that bowed Angel's shoulders, but he kept his face bland – Angel would throw himself on the fire, but he would never willingly allow his friends to so desperately sacrifice themselves. I wish I could tell you not to worry, and wipe away the nightmares that cloud your eyes, but it'll be all right, Angel. Although, I wish I could ask you not to replace me as your Watcher by that little berk Andrew Wells...

Utterly impossible; after the debacle with Connor, Angel would freak – everyone would freak – if he tried to drop even the most obscure hint. For the umpteenth time, he mentally kicked himself – Wesley Wyndham-Pryce, genius scholar, not, had worked out Sahjahn had brought Daniel Holtz 250 years into the future to kill Angel before Connor could be born and thus kill Sahjahn. So, why hadn't the notion ever occurred to him then that if Sahjahn could move a full-grown sentient being through time, then popping back and forth through several millennia like walking from one room to the next to swap and change and falsify a few key segments of the Niahzian Scrolls would have been a cakewalk? If only that possibility had occurred, a whole world of hurt could have been avoided, not least his very own throat-slashing-being-left-to-die-on-a-dirty-sidewalk of this ghastly arsehole of a city the other side of the world from home, in this upstart, ideas-above-its-station colony of the Empire, which was nowhere near as defunct as it made sure to appear.

"Uh, yeah, Wes, what is it?" Angel brought his attention back to the Watcher.

"Giles called me last night," Wes said, "he wanted me to let you know that Philip Hewitt's attempt against Dawn may have been a Harbinger."

"Of what?" Angel sat back in his chair, resisting the impulse to take a drink from his mug of Wesley's blood (with hint of otter); having the source standing in front of him was too tempting – they were going to have to winkle out the employee who was still dosing Angel's 'official' kitchen flask with Luaric at some point, though he/she/it didn't seem to have clued in that they'd been rumbled. But right now that individual was a minor irritant.

"Best guess, a sort of medium-range Big Bad." Wes perched on the arm of one of the easy chairs in front of Angel's desk. "He didn't use the bat-phone because of how late it was and they've nothing really concrete as of yet. There are a few texts that speak about a couple of significant Big Bad events going down. Alternatively it could be a lone operator trying to strike at Buffy through Dawn and be a Harbinger of nothing but that individual's enormous stupidity in attacking the Key – and the Slayer's sister."

"Evil isn't known for it's joined up thinking," Angel acknowledged, "thankfully."

Wesley inclined his head; rather than banding together with the First Evil to destroy the Slayer line, Wolfram & Hart had provided Buffy Summers with the amulet that would destroy its efforts because it didn't fit with their agenda – of course, they had intended that Angel become their slave/puppet through it, not Spike, but the end result was the First Evil's defeat. That was Evil's greatest weakness – persistent confrontation and competition over co-operation and collaboration.

"What if…?"

"Angel?" Wes prompted.

Angel looked at Wesley anxiously. "Wes', what would happen if Dawn…died. Was killed, whatever?"

Wesley stared at the ceiling for a long moment as if giving the question the full contemplation it deserved, which also served to hide his eyes. Angel was acutely perceptive – when he wanted to be – and since he himself had kidnapped Connor from under not just Angel's nose but Lorne, Cordy, Gunn and Fred – none of them slouches when it came to having 'something is squirrelly here' radar, he knew Angel would never again make the mistake of letting that discernment drop very far when it came to himself.

Angel could hear the too-rapid beat of a lying person's heart and smell the perspiration caused by deceit and great big fibs. Reassuring Angel that his daughter-in-law to-be wouldn't be dying any time in the near future was impossible without being forced to explain how he knew that or that Dawn would become Angel's daughter-in-law. So, like Joe Friday in Dragnet, it was best to just stick to the facts – and maintain tight control over his respiratory functions, which was easy; one of the few benefits of growing up with Roger Wyndham-Pryce as a father had been harsh but effective practical training in keeping his heartbeat, breathing and suchlike steady in line with his external Stoic composure as any symptom of distress had only caused more paternal berating and expressions of what a massive filial disappointment Roger's older son was to him.

"To be honest, I doubt very much. Yes, Dawn is the Key and yes she has unusual mystical abilities – she's not a Slayer, but she has super-strength for starters, maybe even more powers will develop when she gets older," and her and Connor's kids are probably going to rock – mom was an all-powerful ancient cosmic energy being and dad's the son of two vampires, and both of them are Champions of Light in the making. How's that for breeding, Roger Wyndham-Pryce?

"So - no mystical equivalent of thermonuclear detonation?" Angel sought reassurance.

"Probably not; Dawn is a very strange human, but she is human." Wesley assured him. "Besides, considering how well protected she is by Buffy, Willow, Giles, Xander, Faith…an army of Slayers…"

"Good to know," Angel relaxed, though more because it reminded him that Connor was doubtless also able to access that same protection - not that it wasn't both weird and worrying, given that Connor's firstborn child had been Jasmine. His son - miraculous progeny of two vampires - dating Dawn Summers, the Slayer Queen's baby-sister-stroke-once-upon-a-time-all-powerful-energy-being…Yeah, right, like that's a coincidence.

"Hey?" Gunn stuck his head round the door.

"What's up, Gunn?"

"Just wondering where Spike is?"

Wesley glanced at the clock. "He's not here yet?"

"Haven't seen him all morning," Gunn said.

"Spike's a law unto himself," Angel said dryly, "besides Harmony didn't stroll in until nearly noon. I think we can do the Math –"

"T.M.I." Gunn closed his eyes. "Still, I gotta say, if she's back doing the horizontal Lambada with Blondie Bear –"

"Gunn, please, no scary visual place this early in the day," murmured Wesley with a wince.

"Sorry, but she has been the epitome of efficiency." Gunn pointed out. "If he has that effect on all his gal-pals, maybe we should put him to stud in the steno-pool."

"Again, the scary visual," Wesley commented. "On that note, I have work to do."

Gunn and Wesley left together, Angel noting with relief how they walked side-by-side; Wesley had forgiven Gunn for signing Illyria's sarcophagus through Customs in a way that Gunn would never forgive himself, but that extra sensitivity of conscience would only benefit Gunn.

Continued in Chapter 3…

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The Cat's Whiskers