Biiiiiiig thanks to Sockmonkeyhere for being my beta. Love ya!
Blah blah, I don't own any of the characters. ('Cept for Simon, Karen, Shannon, and Rob.)
-Clocky
Illyria floated, gargantuan and yet weightless in her true, albeit intangible form. She drifted above the town and the empty land that surrounded it, until she located the creature she had desired.
It was far easier to overcome than the Burkle shell; it whined and chewed at its belly, but eventually it died and the God King took over. Its soul passed on, and nothing lingered like Winifred Burkle had done. She turned the creature's fur her color blue, its eyes became cobalt; Illyria felt a rush of animalistic force from this beast's shell and howled to the waxing moon above.
She found herself moving towards Los Angeles in this coyote's form. Towards the only other place she had known in this world; the Wolfram and Hart building. While she disliked them, it was a place to start. This shell had been the beginning, but it would not suit her for long; she would need a more acceptable, more powerful shell. Perhaps she could even locate a Qwa Ha Xahn to replace Knox.
To Wolfram and Hart.
At some point during the night, Lorne had managed to get Angel up to his makeshift karaoke stage and cajole him into singing every other line of Journey's 'Don't Stop Believin'' with him. Angel had stood uncomfortably with his friend until slowly he got into it, and belted out the song in a booming voice that had several young girls whispering behind their hands. While Gunn unsuccessfully attempted to locate a videocamera for such an event, Fred and Spike got themselves suitably tipsy and stumbled back to the motel at around midnight, Spike clutching his seventeenth Corona of the evening.
Somehow, they had gotten semi-dressed into their bedwear, (Spike still wore his dark jeans and boots, and Fred had somehow gained an American Flag print shirt that she wore with floral pajama bottoms.) Spike had dropped into his own bed fairly easily, but Fred found herself momentarily lost in the dark, being far more susceptible to alcohol than her vampiric friend. She tripped over the corner of her bed and landed in with Spike, or more specifically, landing on top of him, eliciting an 'Oonf!' from beneath her.
Fred, giggling like a madwoman, ignored Spike's protests and curled her legs around his, clutched her arms around his waist, and laid her head on his stomach.
"You're comfy."
"Bloody hell, you can't hold your own."
"Nnnnope! And you owe me a hug, you know."
"Hug does not equate to you taking a kip in a bed with me, pet."
Silence.
"Fred?"
Quiet, just the even sound of Fred's breathing. Slowly, Spike too fell into a comfortable sleep.
And that was how Lorne found them at one in the morning; sprawled across the bed in various states of bizarre dress and cuddling. Lorne was almost positive that he had never even imagined Spike cuddling with anything, so the fact that he was snuggled up with one of Lorne's best friends was, if nothing else, a little peculiar.
Never one to bust up any sort of budding anything, Lorne slid the latch on the door. He jammied up and situated himself into Fred's bed, quite pleased with the way life was going.
"Mmf... Feigenbaum..."
"Nope, guess again."
Fred's eyes snapped open, and slowly she turned her head upwards to find Spike staring back. There was a pause, Spike's shockingly blue eyes glittering with mirth.
Fred let out a squeak and nearly leapt out of her skin, falling off the bed in the process. She groaned from the floor, and rubbed her head. "Oww... I'm so sorry! I didn't mean, in your bed, on you, I didn't mean to, um, heh..."
"Well good morning, Starshine, the world says hello. How much did you drink last night?" Lorne snickered from the doorway, where he held the lifeblood: Coffee.
"Enough to convince herself I was a pillow. No complaints here, pigeon, so stop your fretting, you'll give yourself a complex, or worse, end up like Angel."
From the floor Fred giggled sheepishly. "Sorry, is that coffee for me?"
"The java is for you and your pillow there; I don't know how much you drank but it was definitely enough." He handed the paper cups out, and Fred sipped at hers cautiously, feeling more awake. She crawled up onto her bed as Lorne disappeared from the room, his phone ringing.
"I didn't say anything silly last night, did I?" Fred blurted.
Spike grinned, that amused, snarky grin that affected not only his lips but eyebrows as well. "Nah, you're an... affectionate drunk."
"Oh God, remind me to never drink again, with my luck I'll end up in bed with whoever I happen to be near at the time. Not that it's, you know, bad to be in bed with somebody, when they're your friend an' all, but..." She sat her coffee on the night stand and stuffed her face in a pillow, her voice coming out muffled. "I'll be quiet now."
Spike couldn't remember laughing this much with anybody. She really was quite fantastic when she got all bent out of shape, worried over offending someone and babbling on like the Energizer Bunny.
"Relax, pet, no harm done."
From beneath the pillow, one large brown eye peered at him, and she muttered. "Okay... Boy, that's the first time I've had way too much since Lorne's Halloween party. And I didn't even technically get drunk then..."
"Better than pissin' on everything like Charlie."
She burst into giggles, and Spike was glad that she was no longer fretting over offending him in some way.
But in the midst of their mirth, Angel came through the door, still trying to pull on his shirt and looking hassled. "Get up, out of bed, come on, we've gotta go."
Spike sobered a bit. "What's the matter, Peaches? You haven't gelled your hair yet today, come now, must look our best."
Fred erupted into giggles again. Angel looked poised to make a crack about Spike's own hair but he seemed to mentally shake himself and point at the two of them. "Wolfram and Hart is on our tail; Lorne's friend from the city says they've got somebody who knows where we are."
Spike was out of bed and tugging on his shirt from the previous night before Angel got to 'Lorne's friend'. Fred was right behind him, bouncing around the room, gathering the few possessions they had accumulated in the month or so they had been there.
"Be outside in five."
"Are we going to say goodbye to Shannon?"
"No time, they could find us here any minute. Just hurry up, you two." Angel disappeared out the door.
From outside they heard Lorne talking rapidly on his cell phone.
"-horrible connection, babe, thanks for the heads up-Hello? Hello?"
Fred did a mental once-over of the room while Spike carted an arm full of clothing towards the van, which had been parked immediately before the door, back doors open. Satisfied that their meager accumulation of items was in the van, she scurried out the door, Angel and Spike leaping into the back of the van like two bizarre, black-clad frogs. Gunn in the front seat, Lorne at the wheel, like something out of a movie they peeled out of the parking lot with the doors of the van slamming behind them.
"Do we know who?" Fred's voice was shaky in the rumbling of the van.
"Not a clue. Lorne's friend is an interior designer for Wolfram and Hart's receptionist; she managed to weasel some info out him with a couple of drinks and a karaoke bar." Angel looked terribly tired, and extremely worried. Fred put a hand on his knee quietly.
Despite the tension, Lorne sounded proud. "Taught her everything I know."
"Who'd do it, though? Who knew where we were? Unless Shannon and those guys were lying to us. I don't think your friend Willow'd do it, man." Gunn peered from the front seat, light illuminating his face from the front windows.
"I don't think Shannon lied; she didn't even know she was a telepath until her sister googled it."
Gunn shrugged at Angel. "People have told crazier lies."
"Maybe someone saw us yesterday at the Fourth of July thing; Wolfram and Hart probably has spies all over the place." Angel laced his fingers in front of him.
Fred chewed her lower lip. "Or they knew all along... But if they knew, why get after us now?"
"Well the offices got pretty busted up when you last saw it, right, Angel? Maybe they had to repair and hire new staff. I mean, they may be multi-dimensional and have evil powers out the wazoo, but that still takes some time, you know?"
Angel nodded at Gunn, contemplating this. "Well if Wolfram and Hart is going strong again in LA, then it's time we head back to the Hyperion and start up where we left off before Wolfram and Hart. We take down whoever's after us, and get back to Angel Investigations."
Spike rolled his eyes so dramatically that Angel scowled at him. "You don't have to come with us, nobody's keeping you around."
Spike scoffed. "Unless you forgot; Those Senior Partner blokes hate me as much as you, we're tied for the Shanshu aren't we? We mess with reality just by existing. As much as I simply adore the thought of being outside your sparkling company, I don't much fancy being by myself on their hot list."
Angel said nothing, only stared at his steepled fingers.
While Angel Investigations burned rubber on the Interstate at around noon that day, a crew of sleek-looking people in black arrived in Cromwell, Arizona. Three of them sat in a booth at Shannon's diner, where Karen Clarke attempted to serve them lunch.
None of them spoke, only waved her away and sat there. Before Karen could sneer something at them, Simon pulled her away, quietly informing her that they didn't look like the kind of bikers she should mess with.
The rest of these folks stationed themselves at various points in the town, and did not leave their posts, did nothing to conceal themselves or make any attempt to look inconspicuous. No one really paid them much attention, and those that did found themselves suddenly remembering something more important they had to do. An hour or so into this odd vigil, a man with slick hair and glasses arrived with what appeared to be an oddly off-color coyote by his side. The animal seemed to be leading him and his crew towards a dingy little motel near the outside of town.
Upon inspection, the room that had previously housed Lorne, Spike, and Winifred Burkle was empty, and the stoic animal cocked its head questioningly to the side. Scowling, the man cursed and spoke rapidly into a cell phone. The owner of the motel peered out the door and called the police about this bizarre congregation.
When they arrived, however, there were no strange people in black or odd blue dogs roaming the motel. There was nothing amiss in the empty room except for the appearance that whoever had previously occupied it had left very hurried and rushed.
The owner of the motel shrugged and looked confused; the occupants had paid up front six weeks for the room and the one beside it, they had only stayed for about a month. Perplexed, the investigator wrote up a report and told the rest of the station to watch out for blue dogs and men in black.
They told him to lay off the donuts.
Cromwell returned to its peaceful, unexceptional daily routine, none the wiser that anything odd had occurred.
Fred had missed the Hyperion dearly. In their absence it had gained a healthy layer of dust on most everything, and one of the windows on the bottom floor had a sizeable hole in it from a rock that now lay beneath the window, but besides that, it remained the same. Angel informed them as they entered the lobby that, during their stay at Wolfram and Hart, he had secretly bought out the hotel under a false name, using some of the resources they had gained.
"In case we had to, you know, ditch the evil law firm. I thought it'd be good to have a backup." He smiled wearily.
Gunn grinned. "Right on, big man! Figure most of us are pretty behind on our rents at this point."
"OH! That reminds me, what happened to all of my stuff when I... You know, was all... deadified?" Fred turned on her heel to look at Charles and Angel. Spike inspected the dusty counter.
"All got put in a storage place downtown. I think Wes put it all there."
"Yeah, I helped him move it down there. We can go pick it up if you want, Freddles, and take that visit to Doctor Rob. How 'bout it?" Lorne smiled.
"Ooh! Yes, that sounds great."
"One of us should go with you, in case something happens. A-and for heavy lifting." Angel added quickly, at the reproachful look he gained from Fred. "What? I worry!"
"You go 'head, man, Spike and me'll dust this place. Air it out."
"You want ME to dust? To clean and vacuum and, oh please tell me you're not serious, Charlie?" Spike looked scandalised.
Though with much complaint on Spike's end, he picked up a broom as Lorne, Angel, and Fred left.
"Bloody humiliating..."
The doctor's visit was an interesting affair. Doctor Rob turned out to be a Pockla Demon in a white coat and large round bi-focals. His long, spindly fingers were surprisingly gentle while inspecting Fred, running several tests, and X-raying her. Doctor Rob was mostly humanoid, mostly, but his head was devoid of any form of hair; even eyelashes, and it gave him a frightening reptilian look, combined with lids that closed sideways across his yellow eyes. Despite this, he had a rough, slithery voice that hid a definite intelligence and kindness.
Even though Angel said Pocklas had a penchant for keeping humans in their homes, whom they ate the extremities of and then regrew their captives' limbs.
"Miss Burkle, forgive me, but you are an enigma."
She smiled awkwardly. "Thank you?"
"Now, from what I can see, you've definitely gained some demonic organs. Stomach, intestines, and other digestive organs have been replaced with something that I've only read about in old medical journals. I don't mean to sound unprofessional, but these are things I've never worked with before. They are, however, functioning. So are your respiratory and circulatory systems."
He sifted through his notes on a clipboard, pausing in his speech. "You have gills, as you noted earlier, as well as two branchial hearts and a swim bladder. The branchial hearts move blood through the capillaries to the gills, and then it goes through your normal heart, full of oxygen."
"Oh my God, I'm a squid! What's a swim bladder?"
Doctor Rob nodded. "That's actually exactly right, just like a squid. A swim bladder allows you to regulate buoyancy in the water, so you don't waste energy while swimming. Miss Burkle, whatever it was that took over you, it made you capable of spending quite a lot of time underwater."
Angel lifted up one of the X-rays and looked at it. "You're a squid?"
"Only a little bit. But it's really quite fantastic. The powers you say she exhibited before the creature left, those were a side-effect of the creature itself, I think, since Miss Burkle's skin is not undamageable, and she's not super-strong. We saw that with the tests."
Doctor Rob went about peering at a few more images and notes, and the other three peered at Fred, in turn, Fred peered at her stomach, lifting her shirt a little to prod her belly button.
"You're gonna be a hoot at pool parties, girlie."
"I can't believe Illyria did all this to you... I know you were hurting that day, Fred, but... If this is what was going on..." Angel looked down.
"You did what you could, Angel. I don't blame you or anyone for what happened. Y'all did the right thing, not dragging her back to the hole place. Hurt's over, I'm better." She smiled.
"Oh, also, Miss Burkle, your reproductive system seems to have altered slightly."
"What!?" she squeaked. "But we didn't do any tests for that!"
He laughed. "No, no, the X-ray, look," he held it up to the light. "See this here? It's more common with, again, something along the lines of a cephalopod. You might lay eggs in the future, rather than have live birth."
There was a bizarre silence in the room, and the Pockla Demon was quiet, gentle. "I'm saying this now, not because we're expecting something or want to do experiments, but because really, Miss Burkle, I don't know what could happen to you with what this Illyria did to you. I'd like to keep a very close eye on you should anything new happen. All I can do right now is tell you what you've got inside you. It's all functioning, it's just different and connected in new ways."
It was on that note that they left with a pile of X-rays, Fred quietly looking over them in silence. The somber air was only broken when they pulled up to the storage facility, and realised Angel's offer for heavy lifting turned out to be a moot point, as it was daylight.
When Fred had picked out a room at the Hyperion, she dragged the boxes of her worldly possessions in by herself. The labor was distracting, as was rearranging the room to her liking. She refused help from the others, and they busied themselves with other activities to clean up the hotel, shooting furtive glances and muttering the new information of her innards having been all rearranged and kerbobbled.
She shoved the room's small desk up against the curved corner of the room, and the double bed went further against the wall, but left the majority of the room as was.
Then, she dug into the boxes, tearing them open and inspecting her things.
Books, books, books, movies, pillows, blankets, clothing-AHA!
Her personal items were located in a box that was labeled for Christmas decorations. Inside were her notebooks, a photo album, jewelry, identification, a few stuffed animals (Feigenbaum included.), and her glasses.
The first thing she did was pull out the old purple rabbit and hug him close to her chest. She heaved a deep sigh. She fiddled with his tattered ear, smiling.
"Feigenbaum, you will not believe the day, no, sorry, not day, last few months I have had."
"So that's Feigenbaum?"
She jumped, looking up from her kneeling position in front of the box; Spike stood leaning against the edge of the door frame, looking curious.
"Spike, hi. Yes, this is Feigenbaum. He's my oldest friend, in the respect that I've known him longest. You and Angel kind of go waaaay past oldest for my friends."
Spike snickered in response, waited by the door, expectantly.
"Oh! Come in, sorry, forgot."
"No worries. Find everything well enough?"
"Yeah, it's all here." She leaned on the edge of the box lightly.
"So... Peaches said you're a squid?"
She frowned. "Illyria did a lot more than take me over."
He took a spot on the carpet next to her. Her frown grew larger. "There's something wrong with me... I was so sure... I was crazy and then not, for a while. Five years worth of crazy, gone, and then she took everything out of me and replaced it with things that science can't explain. And this time I can't listen..."
She wasn't sure why, but Spike was so easy to talk to, even when what she said made no sense. The time in Cromwell had Spike spending time chatting with her, joking and watching movies with Lorne. Once, he mocked Titanic's ending, while a scandalised Lorne looked on, ( "'I'll never let go, Jack!' Really? Really you won't? Because it looks like you just cracked the ponce's hands off and he's sinkin' into the ocean! You let go, Rose, you let go!" ) and she had laughed like she hadn't laughed in a long time because she realised that Spike was completely right; Rose was a dumbass. His sudden friendliness was odd; sure he'd been kind enough when he was a ghost, but after that, he'd kind of... stopped spending time with her, down in the lab. He'd gone off to do his own thing, and only hung around to irritate Angel. Fred didn't know what prompted this sudden attention, but she wasn't about to complain.
"Nothin' wrong with you, pet. Nothin'. I know a fair bit about things bein' wrong on the inside. Spent the better size of a hundred years with a lady far more messed up 'n you." He tipped her chin up with one finger, looking serious. His tone was firm, a little intimidating, but he spoke quick and sure of what he said.
"I feel crazy again. Everything was so good, but now everything's all..." she fluttered her hands a little, sitting Feigenbaum in her lap. "But I'm not. There're so many changes so fast, and... I don't know. You don't get it, I know. I'm not making sense."
Though what she said was the opposite, he DID understand. "Pet, Dru made way less sense'n you. Y'managed to keep all the freakin' out away while we were hiding, but now things are slowing down an' you see what's going on. But there's nothin' wrong with you, pigeon. Not a one sodding thing."
Fred sunk into quiet tears, and after a moment, let her head fall onto Spike's shoulder. Spike stiffened, then slowly relaxed and placed his arm around her. She began to talk, about Pylea and about dying, about being crazy and then not, all the way up through the Illyria fiasco and now her jumbled insides. She wasn't asking for help or his view on the subject; she just wanted to say it all and vent. When she was finished, her eyes were bright and clear; Spike brushed the tears away and grinned.
"Right, all that out now, feelin' better? I think you need a pick-me-up. And I don't mean to be forward, but you happen to have a dashing big-bad in your room, all alone." Spike waggled his eyebrows.
She laughed and whacked him on the arm, but that was just what Fred had wanted to hear from him. He stood and helped her up, and together they began unpacking Fred's items. Fred located the clothing box before Spike could get hold of her more personal underthings; she had a few things that really should never see the light of day, or Spike's eyes, anyway. She'd never live it down.
They talked of various things. Fred told amusing anecdotes from college, surprising him indefinitely when she talked about pot and underpants tag around campus. She flushed at the mention of the activity, and explained that whoever got tagged had to take off an article of clothing. "Luckily," she added. "I'm a pretty quick runner."
"Pity that, pet."
"Shush, you, gimme that box there."
Spike went on about his own time being crazy; trapped in the basement in Sunnydale, and told some heavily watered down stories of his exploits from before he had a chip or a soul. By the time they were finished and stood back to admire their work, Fred heaved a massive sigh.
"I feel better. Wish you'd been there in Pylea, I would have talked you outta your mind, but I wouldn't have gone crazy."
"Oh, thanks, Fred," he snorted, sarcasm just plain dripping from the sentence.
"I mean it, well, not the you going nutty thing, but... We could have kept each other sane, I think."
Spike smiled and spread his arms. "Give us a hug, I apparently owe you."
"You do! Back when you were a ghostie!" Fred wrapped her arms around the vampire, sliding them under his coat and up his back.
And maybe arms clung a little too long, and fingers clutched a little too tightly, and maybe...
They pulled back, Spike uttering a mild cough and gesturing at the room. "Y-you could do with a few plants, I'd wager."
"M-maybe a Ficus..."
"S'a Ficus?"
Unbeknownst to the two stuttering companions, Lorne peered into the room from down the hall. Oh! But were the two of them just dripping with romantic tension. He wanted to leap from behind and start a chorus of 'My Heart Will Go On'. But no, better let them get on with it in their own time. Still, Lorne liked what he saw; their auras were flickering around all red, pink, and purple, spiking out and wanting to touch, to feel. There was fear and uncertainty, (mostly from Spike.) plenty of guilt coming from Fred, but it was definitely there. Even them not singing, he could see it. Rather than pounce on the two of them, he whistled jauntily into the lobby, where Angel was behind the counter checking over paperwork that had remained in the hotel. Perhaps things would continue going swimmingly.
Knock on wood.
Illyria sat on her haunches and glared at the CEO. She had learned very little of him, save for a few details. He was a sorcerer, not a very good one, but a sorcerer nonetheless. He was a demon with a pointy ears and vivid red skin, long black hair tied behind him in a loose ponytail. His name was Silas, and Silas was the son of Cyvus Vail, the one who'd killed Wesley.
It had taken a great deal of restraint to not rip his throat out upon meeting him.
"I'll keep my word, Old One, but you need to remember your part of our bargain."
The voice that spoke to him was guttural, lips that were meant for howling moved in vague humanoid fashion, and teeth meant for ripping and tearing clattered when she spoke. "I too' yer wharr ther were. Yer alterri'g da barrrgai'."
Oh but did she hate communicating with this beast. Silas let out a howl of laughter at her attempt to sound imposing, as he had been doing since they had met out in the desert.
"How the mighty have fallen. You would take my form, except then I wouldn't return you to your full strength. Pity, Old One. But our bargain stays; you find me Angel and his friends, I give you a new body and all those lovely little powers you lost."
"I carrna' larca' therm larke thers."
"True, true. A body who can communicate, and who is capable of blending into a crowd..." Silas thought for a few minutes, inspected a few stacks of paper before pulling one out and reading over it carefully. "Perfect. This one was intelligent enough to read the fine print on his contract; he won't have the same problem you ran into with Miss Burkle." Silas pressed a button on his intercom and spoke clearly into it. "Trevor, join me in my office, will you?"
"Yes, sir."
When the young man arrived and stood before Silas, the CEO gestured at him. "This is Trevor Billings."
"Parrrferrct."
The coyote seized up, eyes rolling into the back of its head as it collapsed on the floor, shaking before it went still and was truly dead. There was a brief pause of confusion, then a blast of air rocked Trevor backwards, and he coughed, landing on his bottom.
Protesting, Trevor seemed to understand that he had not been called into his boss's office so he could get a promotion. Silas watched, intrigued with the whole thing as over a period of hours, Trevor spasmed in pain on the floor, moaning and going progressively more insane before he died. The man that stood up had blue hair and scaly-looking blue streaks along his hands and face, his eyes gone stony and cobalt. Illyria straigtened his tie and glasses, then spoke to Silas. "I will find them, and then you will give me what you promised."
"That I will, Old One."
The blue on Trevor disappeared and was replaced with his old appearance. Illyria brushed himself off and left the room, the building. Silas pressed the intercom, peering at the dead coyote on his floor.
"Loretta, send up Janitorial, and find me a new case manager."
"Yes, sir. By the way, your six o'clock cancelled for tomorrow, and I taped American Idol for you like you asked."
"You're a peach, Loretta."
Silas steepled his fingers and looked thoughtfully out the windows. Revenge for his father's death would be easy; once he'd found Angel and his friends, he'd merely use the delightful little documents he held in his possession to bring them to Wolfram and Hart. Then... well then the real fun would begin.
The mopy little spirit that wandered the halls of his building and looked morosely into the laboratory was back in his office.
"Wesley, you look awful. Can't you get any sleep?"
"If only you'd let me rest..."
"You know, I was thinking about saving this little chestnut for later, but what the hell, you could use a pick-me-up. Did you know that Winifred Burkle has returned to this plane? More than that, she's alive these days, I hear." Silas' smile was wide and cruel.
Contrary to what Silas had hoped the reaction to be- grief, self-loathing, hatred - Wesley actually perked up and smiled, he straightened his glasses, his entire figure seemed to brighten. Silas scowled.
"Is she? Well... Well." Wesley looked out the window at the sun in the sky. "Well, then, I suppose the world is brighter today."
"Don't expect it to last too long."
"You don't know her. Fred is far stronger and braver than you will ever know."
Silas moved to stand beside Wesley looking out the window, and gestured to where the Old One was walking briskly through the courtyard. "Even the most powerful of creatures can be tamed, Mr. Pryce."
Wesley's face flickered with understanding, but he said nothing, only crossed his arms and peered out the window. Finally, he spoke. "How?"
"Your contracts. Most every employee of Wolfram and Hart signs a contract when they're hired; usually the less important employees don't get the little bit of fine print that requires you to tie your spirit to the Wolfram and Hart offices. Hence why you are here, and why the Old One felt memories and feelings of Winifred Burkle. She wasn't destroyed, like she should have been; she was torn apart and scattered." Silas watched Wesley out of the corner of his eye.
"Always a loophole..."
Silas was quiet for a time, then an idea clicked in his mind and he smiled. "Loopholes are all well and good, Mr. Pryce. But this is a law firm, we specialise in ironing out the loopholes, which we've managed to do with the contracts of your friends. You may already be trapped here, but I have different fates in mind for them."
Wesley stiffened, and Silas smiled. The seeds had been planted, now he had only two things left to do before the finale: set his traps, and wait.