chap·ter·three

Wes recognized the neighborhood as one they'd rid of a vamp nest a few months before, while Angel was in Sri Lanka after Buffy died. It felt like years since he and Charles were truly friends and Fred was just the crazy girl holed up in a cave of her own making. That was before he'd fooled himself into thinking he loved her, or that he could love her.

If he was perfectly honest with himself, there wasn't enough of him to give to any woman, really. He was devoted to Angel and his cause - helping the helpless, averting apocalypses wherever they might arise, and keeping him on the straight and narrow so that he might some day recieve his reward and shanshu. It was why his relationship with Virginia had withered and died, even if Angel had been out of the equation at the time. Sometimes he thought that perhaps it had been his destiny all along, that his training as Watcher and consequent failure in Sunnydale had been simply to prepare him for his real duty, as right hand to the vampire with a soul.

A scream brought him out of his thoughts; feminine and frightened, he knew it had to be Fred. While she sounded scared witless, she didn't sound as though she was in any pain, and Wes breathed a sigh of slight relief. He jumped, startled, as his cell phone rang. He removed it from its holster and glanced at the caller ID. Gunn, Charles, it read, and whatever relief he'd felt was replaced by cold dread as he answered the call.

"Aren't ya gonna come up and play hero?" Angelus taunted. "Got a damsel in distress up here who swears on her mama's teats you're gonna come busting in to rescue her any minute. Wouldn't want to disappoint your precious little southern belle, would you?"

"I'm not a complete fool," Wes remarked dryly. "I would never be so stupid as to assume you'd let either of them go alive without the proper motivation."

"I got motivation coming out my ears, Wes. I'm gonna offer you a trade."

A trade sounded like a trap, but Wesley was silent, waiting to hear the terms.

"I'll let the girl go if I can have you instead."

~*~

"You say a word to him when you pass him, he's dead before you make it to the pavement," Angelus smiled broadly at Fred, whose eyes were wide with fear and guilt. She had very little confidence that Angelus would keep Wes alive for long, anyway, and then he'd probably just come after her again or something, but she was allowing Wes to buy her freedom at the cost of his own. Survival of the fittest, she thought sarcastically. Darwin would be proud. She nodded, refusing to meet his eyes.

"Hey," he growled, grabbing her chin and forcing her to look at him. "Don't think I won't know. Don't think I won't wrap his intestines around your fragile little neck until you can't breathe, Fred, and don't think I won't take my time fucking you while you struggle for your last breath. You're a little skinny for my tastes, but it's been a long time, and you know what they say about ports and storms." His face shifted, and there was a very sharp, burning pain in her shoulder as his fangs pierced her skin and the dizzying feeling of her blood rushing away.

The next thing Fred was aware of was opening her eyes to see Cordy and Lorne looking down at her with concern evident on their features. She nearly jumped out of her skin when she saw Angel, but she could tell by looking in his eyes that it was him, and not his evil doppelganger, and she relaxed. "He's got Wes," she said mournfully. "And Charles -"

"We know, sweetie," Cordy said softly, stroking her hair.

"But, Charles -" Fred protested.

"Hush, dumpling," Lorne piped up, tipping a potion against her lips. "Drink this." She was desperately thirsty, and she downed the cold but foul draught quickly, grateful for the oblivion it provided.

~*~

"This isn't real," Wes said, and his voice echoed and distorted around him.

"It's a telepathy spell. I don't have long, Wes, so you've got to listen," Angel whispered inside his head. "Lorne can't maintain it for more than a minute or so."

Wes frowned. "How do I know you're not one of his games?"

"Just hang on, Wes, okay? Hold on, hold fast, no matter what. Don't let him break you." Angel pleaded. "I - Connor needs his Uncle Wes. We just need you. I'm coming for you, I promise."

"Come on, English, you crackin' up on me?" Gunn asked, grinning wolfishly despite a large yellow-purple lump on his forehead. "Look, man, how we gonna get out of this mess if you ain't got all your, what you call em? Facilities."

"Faculties," Wes corrected reflexively, without thinking. "I was just talking to -" he cut off abruptly. "Where did you come from?"

"My mama, way I understand it," Gunn replied. "Come on, now, you're the man with the plan. You didn't come in here blind, did you? You gotta have an idea how to get us out."

"Yes, well." Wes cocked his head to the side. "That's an interesting laceration on your forearm," he observed. "Looks rather like something - or someone - tried to take a bite out of you."

Gunn grunted. "Big bad got the munchies - power trip'll do that, I guess - and here I was lookin' a whole hell of a lot like a walking salad bar," he shrugged. "It ain't nothin' but a bitty bite."

~*~

"No, Charles!" Fred screamed, sitting bolt upright. "God, no!" Her shoulders shook as she sobbed.

Cordy squeezed her hand. "It's okay. Wes is with him, he'll be fine now."

"You're not letting me explain," Fred said, in a tiny voice. Of course Cordelia didn't understand. She hadn't been there, hadn't seen him laying there, his body motionless and cooling slowly. "Charles... he's dead."