Disclaimer: The title came from Disney's 'The Hunchback of Notre-Dame', so I don't own it, 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' and 'Angel' came from Joss Whedon, so I don't own them, and 'Charmed' came from Constance M. Burge, so that's not mine either.
Anyway, enjoy.
Feedback: It's here to be read; let me know that it has been
Teranika Meneldil: Well, Cole won't be showing for a while as himself, but I'm hoping the Angel/Belthazor match-up will go down well anyway…
pinkyblue-ice: Sorry about the delay
Panther28: Yeah, I know what you mean; I always thought that was a bit of a shame myself
CharmingStar: I apologise for delays, but I'm really trying to go as fast as I can
Sired-by-spike: Yeah, I've been waiting to write that bit for a long time, believe me…
What Makes a Monster?
"Where are they, where are they, where are they…?" Buffy asked herself, pacing the floor of Giles' apartment anxiously, constantly looking at her watch.
"Buffy, chill out; you won't be doing Angel any good if you have a heart attack!" Xander said, looking up at his friend.
"Oh, that's easy for YOU to say!" Buffy yelled, looking back at him. "You've always hated Angel's guts; you probably wouldn't even care if we never found him again! You know, when I consider everything he's done for us, and how little gratitude you've shown him for it, I could… I could scream!"
Anya looked over curiously at Xander. "You disliked Angel?" she asked, raising a curious eyebrow. "Any particular reason for that, or is it just that the world at large would far rather have sex with him than with you?"
"Hey!" Xander said, looking over at her, insulted.
Anya smiled and patted his arm. "Don't worry; I'm still more interested in spending the night with you."
"Bloody hell…" Spike groaned, as he stared up at the ceiling. "Why is it that all the women are more interested in the poof than the other male company?"
"Meaning that most women you met when you were travelling with Angelus more often went for him than you?" Willow said, smiling teasingly at Spike.
Spike seemed about to protest, but, in the end, he just growled at Willow and turned away. Then again, he couldn't have done much else; even if he hadn't been tied up, the chip in his head would have stopped him doing much more than growling at them all.
"Seriously though, Giles; are they ever going to turn up?" Buffy asked, looking over at her Watcher as she spoke. "I'm no expert when it comes to math, but it can't take them this long to get from L.A. to here, right?"
"Well, there are all kinds of variable factors involved, you know, Buffy," Giles said, taking his glasses off and rubbing them, evidently more than slightly flustered by his Slayer's impatience. "The traffic, their car, how they are as drivers…"
"We're here!" Cordelia's voice suddenly cried out as she entered Giles' apartment, followed closely by a tall, slightly older man with pale skin who the others could only assume was the 'Doyle' she'd mentioned earlier.
Looking around at the others. "So, the gang's all here, huh?" she asked, smiling.
Then a thought occurred to her. "Where's Oz?"
"Oh… he, uh, he left," Willow said, looking sheepishly at her old friend.
Cordelia blinked in surprise as she looked at the redhead. "He left!" she asked, sounding almost sorry for her old nemesis. "Why?"
"He, uh, wanted to learn how to control his inner wolf," Willow explained sheepishly. "This other werewolf had tried to make him her mate, and he, uh, wanted to figure out how to control the wolf to stop someone else like her getting under his skin so much."
"Oh," Cordelia said, uncertain how to proceed.
There was an awkward silence for a few seconds, and then Doyle coughed politely.
"So, uh, anyone going to introduce me?" he asked, looking around at the others in the room.
"Oh yeah, sorry," Cordelia said, looking back at him before turning to face the others. "Everyone, this is Doyle, our resident link to the Powers That Be; he receives migraine-inducing visions of people in trouble, we help them deal with the trouble, and, if all goes well, we get some money out of it." She shrugged. "Of course, sometimes it's a charity case, but there's always the occasional rich person in peril as well."
She looked back at Doyle. "To give you the essentials, the redhead's Willow, the old guy's Giles, the dork's Xander-"
"Hey!" Xander cried out indignantly, but Cordelia just ignored him and continued talking.
"-the blonde's Buffy, the other woman's an ex-demon called Anya, and…" She winced as she looked at the fourth male in the room. "And you already know who Spike is."
"Oh yeah," Doyle said, nodding in recognition as he looked at the platinum-haired vampire. "So, hear you're neutered now?"
"Oh shut up, you Irish twat," Spike grunted, turning his head around to look at the wall.
Buffy looked at the new arrival curiously. He seemed pleasant enough company- and the fact that he apparently helped Angel out in his new profession was also a good factor for her- but there was something about him that seemed… off, she supposed was the best term.
Still, she supposed that, if he was somehow managing to cope with Cordelia on a long-term basis, he must have some kind of superpower, right?
Plus, well, the visions and all.
Shrugging off that train of thought, she looked over curiously at Doyle, realising there was something she'd almost missed earlier.
"You know Spike?" she asked him. "How?"
Cordelia blinked in surprise. "Oz never mentioned it?" she asked.
"Mentioned what?" Willow asked, looking over curiously at the ex-cheerleader.
"The fact that Spike tortured Angel for a few hours to try and get the Gem of Amara when you sent it to him?" Doyle said, looking inquiringly over at Buffy. "He honestly never told ya?"
Buffy blinked briefly at that statement. Then she turned around to look at Spike, her expression suddenly overwhelmed by rage at the currently helpless vampire.
"You WHAT!" she yelled at him, causing the others in the room to rapidly turn around and try to ignore the voice that was suddenly tearing through the air. "We gave you Wheaties for your blood, and you tried to kill Angel to get a stupid RING!"
Spike swallowed nervously as Buffy started to walk slowly towards him, glexing her fingers as though wanting to tighten them around his throat, none of the others even seeming slightly prepared to stop her…
There was a knock at the door.
"Are you sure you've got the right place, Leo?" Phoebe asked, looking over at the Whitelighter as the three of them gathered around the door to the apartment. "I mean, this doesn't look like the home of anyone who'd fight demons for a living."
"And the manor does?" Paige asked, looking over at her sister quizzically.
Phoebe nodded. "Good point."
The door opened and a man looked out at them. He looked to be about ten years older than any of the sisters, in his early to mid- forties, wearing simple round glasses and dressed in grey slacks and black trousers and shoes, with a slightly receding hairline around his temples.
"Yes?" he said, looking at them curiously.
"Mr Rupert Giles?" Leo asked. The sisters had decided on the way down that he should be the one to take charge of the situation; after all, he at least knew a bit more about what kind of powers and abilities Sunnydale's defenders possessed.
"Yes, that's me," Giles said, raising a curious eyebrow. "And you are?"
"Leo Wyatt," Leo said, holding out his right hand as he indicated the sisters with his left. "This is my wife, Piper Halliwell, and her sisters, Phoebe and Paige. We have a… situation, shall we say… and we think you can help us with it."
"Really?" Giles said, sounding a bit curious despite himself, but doing a good job at concealing it. "Well, I'm afraid I don't know how I can help you; I haven't had an actual job since the school I worked at was blown up at the graduation party, and, well-"
Phoebe sighed; this wasn't getting them anywhere.
"It's a magical situation, Mr Giles," she said to him. "We know you're the Watcher to the Slayer, we know you have a witch in your group, we know that you used to have a werewolf and a vampire, and we need your help right now; a friend of ours is in trouble and you may be the only people who can help us."
Noting her sister's expressions, Phoebe shrugged. "Hey; the indirect approach wasn't working out, in case you didn't notice. What else were we going to do?"
Giles blinked in surprise at that outburst.
They know He thought to himself. They know about us? How?
He was instantly on the mental offensive, running through his options as he stared at the three women and one man standing in front of him, all looking anxiously at him as they waited for his decision. In most cases, he'd automatically assume they were demons or vampires trying to take them by surprise, but he doubted that was the case here; for one thing, it had taken so long for Cordelia and Doyle to get here that it was now daylight outside, so if the four of them were vampires they'd be dust right now.
The demon option was a possibility, but Giles doubted it; very few demons would actually try a stealthy approach where the Slayer was concerned, most just being so confident in their powers that they didn't even bother to come up with a decent plan of attack.
Besides…
Well, after their experience with Angel and Angelus, the entire gang had become pretty good at noticing the difference between something with a soul and without one, and the four people in front of him…
Well, their eyes held the familiar gleam that indicated the crucial difference between the man and the vampire.
Giles made his decision.
"If you come in, I'll be expecting a full explanation of how you know about us and what you need our assistance with," he said to them.
The one who'd revealed their knowledge- Phoebe, he recalled her name was- nodded.
"Sure thing," she said to him.
Giles sighed. I hope I don't regret this… he thought to himself, as he stepped aside to allow them access to his apartment.
Angel started at the small bag of blood in his hand and sighed. This was just pathetic; you'd have to be a newborn not to know this stuff was drugged up to the nines, and he was in no mood to get knocked out.
Honestly… give these guys a hand at the beginning and get captured by them at their end, he thought to himself. What a way to go…
He knew it was a long shot that these guys were connected to that 'Demon Research Initiative' that he'd been… 'recruited' by in 1943 to get that sub back, but, the way he saw it, the odds of there being another organisation on this scale that was dedicated to investigating demons was a bit of a long shot, whatever way he looked at it.
He suddenly heard someone starting to walk towards his 'cell', and looked up to see who it was.
It was two young men, apparently about college age, dressed in combat fatigues and carrying the taser weapons that had stunned Angel last night. In fact, now that Angel saw their faces, he recognised them from the team that had captured him last night…
He froze.
He'd seen one of them before that.
The one on the right; the tall, blond-haired one that made him think of a couple of farmers he'd killed in his time as Angelus. He'd seen him last night, talking to Buffy while she'd shown every appearance of enjoying the conversation…
Oh shit, Angel thought to himself.
Then he smiled. Now that he thought about it, maybe he could use that to his advantage later on…
"Get up, freak," the farm-lookalike said, raising his gun. "You've got an appointment in the Auditorium."
Angel rolled his eyes. Did that guy think he was being intimidating or something? Honestly, Xander was more intimidating than this guy, and he didn't have the so-called 'benefit' of military training to help him.
Still, he wasn't interested in getting zapped by those guns again. Throwing the bag of blood off to one side, he stood up, stretched slightly, and waited a few moments until the shield in front of the cell went down.
Walking out of the cell, Angel was positioned in front of the two men and, tasers pointing at his back, was made to walk forward, all the while wondering what all this was about.
Eventually, the other man (The one Angel hadn't seen talking to Buffy) spoke.
"You know, you should count yourself lucky, freak," he said to Angel, contempt filling his voice. "Most of your kind that we get in here don't do anything more interesting than die. At least you'll actually be able to help us in a way that you'll enjoy."
Angel didn't reply. It wasn't worth it; something told him that they'd just hit him for 'daring to speak to his betters' or some disgustingly elitist remark like that. At least the Scoobies actually treated demons with respect; he got the impression these guys thought demons as a whole weren't worth the air they… He checked himself, realising that didn't technically include him, and amended the thought to 'space they occupied'.
"Here we are," the 'farmer' said, stopping in front of a large metal door and tapping some buttons on a panel beside it. The door opened, and Angel, the guns still pointing at his back, was slowly pushed through the door.
As soon as he was in, the door shut behind him, the soldiers on the other side. Looking around himself, Angel realised that he was in what looked like some kind of training room; there was no actual furniture within it, but there were several targets on the walls and empty racks that looked like they normally hold some kind of gun on the walls.
But what am I doing here? Angel asked himself, looking around as he tried to find a clue. True, baring the door that he'd come in by and another door opposite, the room didn't seem to have any visible means of entry or exit, but they couldn't just have transferred him to another cell; this seemed too elaborate for that. There was something else going on here…
"GAGH!" Belthazor yelled, as another searing burst of pain spread across his temples, thwarting his efforts to shimmer yet again. He was starting to get sick of this; after nearly a century, was this how his sins were going to catch up with him? By sticking him in some cell to live with his memories until he died or was killed by these guys twisted experiments?
Well, it could be worse… he thought to himself.
Then two men carrying what looked like more of those taser guns appeared in front of his 'cell', aiming the weapons at him as the energy wall separating them fell.
It's worse, Belthazor thought to himself. Given his current depleted condition, lacking both his shimmering power and his energy balls, he doubted he'd manage to last in a fight for very long, especially given the firepower those guns seemed to possess.
But, to his relief, they didn't seem to want to kill him. Based on their gestures (Based on their earlier attitudes, he was prepared to bet they considered themselves superior to demons, so didn't think him worth talking to), they wanted him to walk in front of them, presumably to take him somewhere else.
Sighing, Belthazor stood up and began to walk; even if it was just another cell, at least he'd probably get some exercise. Getting up, he began to walk along, the guns in his back. Neither of the two men even bothered to talk to him, although Belthazor wished they would; not out of a need for conversation, but mainly just to find out how they regarded him. Scum, a threat, or what?
Then he reached a large metal door, a code was entered on one side, and he was shoved through it before it slammed behind him.
He briefly scanned his surroundings- some kind of training room, but devoid of the weaponry that he would have expected such a place to have- and then his eyes fell on the only other person in the room; a handsome man, apparently in his late twenties, dressed in a black leather duster, black trousers, and a dark red shirt. His heightened senses recognised the man as a vampire, but he identified the man's face from memory.
"Angelus," he said, loud enough for the vampire to hear.
The vampire looked back at him and shifted into its demon face, fangs bared.
"Belthazor…" the Scourge of Europe said, growling in his throat.