A/N: Let my just say right off the bat that I have nothing against Harmony nor Anya.
In advance, sorry for any false facts. I did research, but there were lots of different things said.
Breaks aren't fixed yet, so - -s will be good enough until I can think of something better. Damn to hell.

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Sitting at the bar of the Fruit Bowl, Angel nursed a bottle of some type of bubby citrus drink while drawing pictures on the bar with the small drops of water that had slid down the sides of the glass. Willow watched him from where she was serving someone else a drink.

When Spike had come in, requesting that the music be turned up and the lights dimmed, she had assumed that he was the one in the bad mood. This shadowed figure who had followed him in, seemed to have contradicted her assumption. Although it seemed to be less broody now he was tipsy.

Willow walked over so she was opposite him, and he looked up. "You want another candy water, or are you ready to switch over to the hard stuff now?"

"NO." Angel said quickly. "I mean… I can't have any hard stuff." He toned his voice down so it was softer. "I can get drunk enough with this, so I'll just stick with this." There was only a slight slur in his voice, but Willow realized that it was shaking more from emotion then liquor.

She smiled cheekily, on a mission to get his mood off whatever was bothering him and onto something else. "Spike tells me he's staying with you." She said while raising her eyebrow suggestively.

Angel nodded, not catching the innuendo. "Yeah, the press is hanging around his place so he needs somewhere else to stay."

"Actually," she smiled innocently, "he has a secret pad he usually uses."

"Pad?"

"Yeah, you know, a place. It's slang…" Willow blushed a bit. "Old slang, but slang none the less." Leaning over the bench, she dropped her voice. "You know, I think it's because he likes you."

Angel choked on his drink, causing Willow to grin cheekily. "W-What? NO. I mean, I-I." He shut his mouth and flushed. Willow giggled again, she had thought he would be a bit naïve but not that he'd react this entertainingly.

"I was joking, doofus." She lent over the bar so she could whack him playfully on the arm. "You do know he's bi though, right?"

"Yeah. I know." He looked over at Spike, who was grinding his body against another man's. Angel noticed the fluid movements coming from Spike and dismissed the flirty behaviour as the blonde just being himself. Angel slid off the stool and swayed slightly. He turned and ended up getting tangled in the chair.

When he finally stood, Angel flushed embarrassedly. "I'm j-just going to the bathroom."

"I'll stay here and guard your candy water." She laughed as she watched him leave. She had made conversation with him when he had been sober, and he seemed like a nice guy. "Spike!" she called out over the music. "Come here." She waved him over, and he gave the man he was dancing with a long and sexy kiss before complying.

"Yeah." He slurred.

"Spike," Willow stared innocently. "Angel's really nice isn't he? He's got a whole 'tall dark and handsome' thing going for him."

"Yeah. 'E's real sexy with 'e's man o' mystery persh… perls'naelty…"

"Personality?"

"Tha's the one." He didn't notice Willow trying not to laugh at his drunken pirate accent. "'E's very… Beddable."

Willow's eyes widened. "Bad Spike! Bad, bad Spike!" She grabbed Spike by his shirt and dragged him across the bar so she could slap him properly. He tried to protest, but she cut him off. "Don't you dare take advantage of him, don't you dare. He too good and pure and… and decent to be used and spat out by you."

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Harmony gently laid a bag of shopping down on the bench of her small apartment. She tried not to make much noise in case her boyfriend was asleep. Unfortunately he wasn't, and what was even more unfortunate was that her boyfriend was drunk. This wasn't unusual.

"Angelus." She said meekly. "I thought you'd gone out."

Her boyfriend, who preferred to be identified by his last name, was standing in the doorway clothed in nothing but leather pants. Angelus slammed the bottle of scotch on the bench next to the shopping.

"What's that?" He spat.

"It's shopping. You know, it's what you buy so you have things to eat." She said, as if talking to a child. She had learnt long ago that if she were feisty then he would be easier on her. If she was compliant he would taunt her to get her wound up, and then beat her down. If she was already fighting back then it cut out the first step.

"Ah, yes, I understand that," He said, his voice deeper and softer then it normally was; smoothed out by the burning alcohol that had slid down his throat earlier that day, "but what I don't understand, is why you bought these." He reached into the bag and pulled out a bandage and some cream.

"Well, why do you think I bought them?" she snapped, bracing herself for the attack.

He smiled in a way, which in the animal world, was normally accompanied by several rows of serrated, pointy teeth and an equally pointed fin. Taking a few fluid, catlike steps he pinned her against the wall, pressing his body against hers.

It wasn't sexual in anyway at all, nor was it threatening which was probably why she found it so intimidating. It was a simple reminder of where she was, what she couldn't get out of, and that he owned her to the point where she wouldn't know what to do if he ever left her.

"You deserve it, you know. Every mark I leave on that body," he pressed against her a little more, "should be kept exactly where I left it. I am an artist, and you are my canvas. Nothing more."

Angelus took a step back, removing the pressure from her body, but only leaving a small gap between them. Harmony got that familiar feeling of being alone, with no way to hold herself up but a wall with no grips. She wanted his body back against hers. She also wanted to act out, but couldn't bring herself to do it.

He just chucked at her, and she got the feeling that every emotion she'd felt had been planned. This was what was killing her; the control he had over every single thing in her life. She couldn't leave him though, and they both knew it.

He smirked, turning his back on her. "Get rid of it before I come back." He commanded before grabbing a suitcase from a shelf and walking out.

Once he'd left the dingy building, Angelus lit up a cigarette and walked down the street with his hands in his pockets and his chin up high. He walked around until he found a back alley, but it wasn't like the other ones.

Angelus refused to have sex with Harmony. He knew that if there were no sex in their 'relationship' then his attitude towards her would hurt even more. So he'd picked up another bottle of scotch from a shop, and chain-smoked a bunch of cigarettes before coming to the alley of some of the most beautiful prostitutes in the city.

There she was, another of Angelus's projects. A prostitute with blonde ringlets, and the only alley whore who had her natural hair, had been Angelus's hooker of choice. She was proud, and thick-skinned, and hid her excessive fragility. To top it off, when they had sex he could see in her eyes the contempt she held for both her job and all males.

She didn't use her real name, but no prostitute he knew had the same name on her belt or necklace as on their birth certificate or drivers licence. She called herself Anyanka, so said the tattoo on her butt and the plastic, silver dog tags around her neck.

He paid her more then her normal customers, and went into the building to which the alley was positioned in front of through the back door, of course.

In her room Anyanka lay on the bed and pleasured herself while Angelus watched from the chair at then end of the bed. After that Angelus would ride her, pulling a knife from a holster up his sleeve, which he carried for a number of reasons. He would then use the knife to cut the palm of her hand and then come while watching the blood ooze from her flesh.

It was mechanical, and played out routinely, mainly because Angelus didn't come for the sex… at least not just for the sex.

From a plastic lined pocket of his jacket, the only garment he was wearing, he produced a chloroform soaked cloth. Placing it to her mouth, she breathed in and it worked it's twisted magic on her. She never fought it, because when she snapped out of it she could never see anything out of place, there was just a bandage around her hand.

Angelus sat down in the chair, pulled a sketchbook from his suitcase and turned to a page with an uncompleted sketch of Anyanka. It would have been a beautiful sketch, if it weren't drawn in her blood with a fountain pen.

It was her, arching up in the way she did when she came. With her hand between her legs and her hair a mess, she really was quite beautiful, and detailed.

Looking over at Anyanka, Angelus noticed something he hadn't before. Her hand was still bleeding when it had usually stopped by now. He put the sketchpad, as well as the pen, away before standing and approaching her. She was paler, and had a slight sheen of sweat.

He slowly put two and two together; chloroform could damage the kidneys and increase white blood cells.

He smirked, liking the thought that he was poisoning her from the inside out. He lifted the scotch bottle and took another mouthful of the burning liquid.

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Spike looked over at Angel, whose eyes were fluttering open.

The other man groaned as he was pulled from his dream. Wait. He frowned as he tried to remember what it was, and came to the conclusion that it was a memory, and a horrific memory at that. He had made her sick and destroyed the lives of two women.

It was lucky Spike had pulled the car over when he'd seen Angel was waking up. It was also lucky that when he retched, Spike quickly lent over, flung the passenger door open and helped Angel out of the car.

While he violently puked, Angel was vaguely aware of an arm holding him steady, and a hand rubbing his back between his shoulder blades.

"You a'right, mate?"

"Spike?"

"Yeah." He gently straightened Angel up.

"We're in a car."

Spike couldn't help but laugh at honest confusion. "Yeah, we're in a car… I figured that you'd want to be with your family, so we're heading out to Sunnydale. I packed some of your clothes." He had the decency to blush, but Angel didn't really notice.

"There are some other things I need." Said Angel, almost immediately. "The portrait of Ford, some art stuff, and a box." He leant his head back and closed his eyes.

"You're not going to puke again, are you?"

"It's in the bottom draw of my bedside table, with a dragon carved on the top." He said, referring to the box he never travelled without. Spike, though completely in the dark as to why, agreed to return to Angel's apartment. While turning the car in a sharp U-turn he tried to remember at what point he had misplaced his selfishness.

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Angelus opened his eyes and immediately felt confused. He had been drinking, so logically he should be hungover. He saw the answer as to why when he blinked the sleep away from his eyes. He had an IV drip in, and as the smell of disinfectant started to assault his nose, he groaned.

"Liam? Have you woken up?"

He rolled his head to the other side and spotted Jenny Calender, sitting in a chair with a four year old asleep at her feet. She gave him a small, yet genuine smile and put a hand on his shoulder.

"Hi, mum."

Her smile brightened "Hey, sweetie." They sat in silence for a few moments before she spoke again, and broke the tension. "What have you done to yourself?" She asked cautiously, with a tinge of disappointment colouring her vowels. Angelus closed his eyes and Jenny saw he was intent on not answering the question, so she continued filling the silence.

"Can you believe it's taken me four years to track you down, even with private investigators working for that entire time? You haven't gone to the hospital before now, or to the doctors or pharmacists. You've been looking after yourself." She frowned slightly. "You have been looking after yourself, haven't you apart from the alcohol thing?"

"Yeah, mum, I have." He opened his eyes and looked at the sleeping boy. "Who's he?" Angelus asked, with honest curiosity and confusion in his voice.

Sadness shadowed her eyes for a second as she looked at the steadily breathing lump of four year old. "When you left, a week after your father died, I was three months pregnant." The look of a mothers love crossed her face " This is your little brother, Alexander Harrison Angelus."

"He's got dad's curls."

Jenny bent down and searched in a material bag, but Angelus noticed she was also taking the opportunity to compose herself. She retrieved a box with a dragon carved on the lid. Inside it contained her greatest passion, and it was something that she had only shared with Liam and her late husband.

"I'm getting remarried." She whispered. "He doesn't like things like these. I could keep them hidden, but I think you need them more then I do. They're all recharged and cleansed, each in its own silk pouch." She looked up at him, a slight look of fear on her face. "Do you still-"

"Yes. To whatever that question was." He smiled and sat up when she pulled out two pouches. "You can have them all, but I think you need these two at the moment. Calming, uplifting, innocence, creativity, purpose…" She trailed off.

"Aquamarine." He said.

"You remember." She handed over both the pouches. "The other's Citrine."

"Cleanses the organs of poisons, promotes emotional clarity and self-discipline."

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That was the last day he went by the name Angelus. He started behaving sensibly and almost never got on anyone's bad side afterwards, earning him the nickname 'Angel'. He stayed and re-bonded with his family before moving back to LA.

He had kept in contact, but it would be nice to see them all again in person.