When the far-flung members of the Scooby Gang had been kidnapped by the fallen angel Belial, they had apparently been transported to Sunnydale in their own vehicles. This made their necessary exodus to LA that much simpler.
After a few hours of sleep to avoid exhaustion-related car accidents, they had all piled into their fleet of vehicles and taken to the freeway in a convoy. The only safe place for Angel and Spike was the back of Oz’s van, so that was where they sat, along with Willow, Tara, and, of course, Oz himself. Joyce and Xander rode in the Summers family car, joined only by Anya. Meanwhile, Cordelia and Faith rode with Giles—"Hey, nice wheels, G." "Yeah, when did you get rid of your toaster oven with wheels?"—leaving Wesley to drive Angel’s car home, accompanied by Buffy and Riley.
"Never tell him that I said this," Riley had said the first time he’d seen the car. "But that is just about the most incredible motor vehicle I have ever seen in my life." Then he had frowned. "But a vampire driving a convertible in a city famous for its sun? Doesn’t that reveal a certain degree of self-hatred?"
Buffy and Wesley had just looked at each other uncomfortably.
*
"Hi, Gunn."
"Angel? Where are you? What happened to you guys? I got to the hotel and the place was all shot up—Wesley and Cordelia! Are—"
"They’re okay. I’m the only one who got shot. We were captured."
"I figured that. What happened?"
"Well, we won—I guess—and everyone lived, and we’re on our way home."
"Bringing any guests?"
"About a dozen."
"Don’t do anything halfway, do you?"
"Listen. There’s something more important. One of the bad guys escaped. He’s an impostor of me, and he’s headed your way."
"That’s bad. How do we know when it’s the real you?"
"Well, it’s a long story, but I aged a few years while I was here. I have a few silver hairs now."
"That’s a bit hard to notice from a safe distance at night."
"Right. Uh, how’s this: don’t let me come near unless I have Cordelia or Wesley with me, and they’re holding a cross *in their hand*, so you know they’re not vamped."
"Sounds like a plan."
"Good. Meet you at the Hyperion?"
"I’ll be there."
"Good. See you then."
"See you then."
Click.
Angel hit the "off" button on his cell phone, and started to put it away, but Spike stopped him.
"Hold on a mo’. Aren’t you forgetting something?"
Angel took a deep breath. The mere presence of his childe was enough to make him want to throw the van door open. "What do you want, Spike?"
"The Slayer’s dad lives in LA, ya bleedin’ ponce. Better check with mum to see if he’s in harm’s way or not."
Angel held out the phone. "You do it, Spike. Joyce and I have some issues to work out, and the less we talk the better."
Spike stared at the phone, then at Angel, then back at the phone. Then he rolled his eyes in disgust and took it.
*
There was silence in the Summers car, and there had been since departing Sunnydale. Joyce kept her eyes on the road and said nothing, while Xander sat in the back and alternated between staring silently out the window and clinging tightly to Anya. Suddenly, "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" began playing from the front seat.
Joyce picked up her phone. "Hello?"
"Hey, mum."
"Spike?"
"Yeah. Listen, do you know if the Slayer’s dad is in town right now? ‘Cause if he is, we better call and warn him if we don’t want to find him on the floor of the nancyboy’s HQ. Angelus knows everything the poofter knew until they were separated, and that’s just the sort of thing he likes best."
"No, he’s on a business trip to New York." She paused. "This Angelus—he’s really that vicious?"
"Mum, I hate to say this, ‘cause I have a reputation of my own to uphold, but he’s about the most vicious there ever was. Other vampires were afraid of him. Even old, powerful ones. Even his own *Sire*. We’re in for a right nasty tussle, mum, make no mistake about it."
*
Faith and Cordelia sat on opposite sides of Giles’s back seat. They had been silent since the trip began, breaking the silence only to argue with Giles over the choice of radio station. Despite some truly inspired pestering, the radio had stayed on the oldies station where it began.
He had turned it off entirely when "Eve of Destruction" came on.
"Hey, Queen C," Faith spoke up, breaking the long silence.
Cordelia smiled sadly. "No one’s called me that for a long time."
"I just wanted to say that I’m sorry about…you know…"
"The elbow in the face?" Cordelia said. She watched Faith squirm for a moment before saying "Don’t worry about it. I’ve had worse."
"You sure?"
Cordelia looked at her sternly. "*Wesley* is the one you need to apologize to. Me, I was satisfied when you went to prison. If I’d still wanted revenge—which I didn’t—I would have called it got when I saw you on those crystals. I’ve been there myself—"
"Impaled on crystals?" Faith asked incredulously.
"No, a rebar."
"Oh."
"So I know how it feels, and it more than pays back for one punch in the face."
Faith smiled. "Thanks. Now, did that rebar thing happen when I knew you?"
"Oh, it was senior year," Cordelia said. "It was a real…mess…" She trailed off into thoughtful silence.
"As for my part," Giles said from the front seat. "I agree with Cordelia. You never did anything to me, personally. And if you need to talk to someone in what is sure to be a trying time for you, then I am here to listen."
"What about Buffy?" Faith asked. "Won’t she need you?"
Giles caught the undercurrent in the question. Perhaps there was some resentment left. More likely, Faith still didn’t feel quite secure in her new place in the Scooby Gang. Surely it must seem to her like such affection could be taken away at any moment. Most likely, it always had been before. The thought broke his heart. Suddenly, he could barely remember her as the Slayer, a being of lethal power. Suddenly, she was just a girl who had been hurt, betrayed, and abandoned too many times. "Buffy is like a daughter to me," he answered carefully. "But a father can have more than one daughter."
She laid a hand on his shoulder, and when he glanced into the rear view mirror, he saw her wiping at her eyes. "Thanks, G," she said softly.
"Giles," Cordelia interrupted sharply. "There’s a rest stop up ahead. Could you pull in?"
Giles sighed. "Yes, Cordelia."
*
It turned out that several other members of the Scooby Convoy also had calls of nature to answer. Joyce, the last one out of the Ladies’ Room, commented on how quickly the younger women had been in and out.
"We spent years hanging out in graveyards fulla monsters all night, Mrs. S," Faith explained. "How long would *you* want your pants around your ankles?"
"Although I think those bathrooms might have been scarier," Willow added.
"Agreed," Oz said as he joined the group.
"What’re *you* complaining about, wolf-boy?" Faith scoffed. "You can stand up."
"And I’ve never been more grateful for it."
It turned out that most of them, not having eaten since the previous evening, had other needs to be taken care of. The one restaurant that the rest stop had to offer—a McDonald’s—suffered an immediate, if minor, rush. There was a momentary problem when Tara was told that this particular McDonald’s didn’t sell Garden Salads, but Oz offered to eat the meat bits out of a Chef’s Salad, and all was well again.
They all decided to eat outside—if the two vampires sleeping in the van were any indication, Angelus probably wasn’t causing any immediate damage at the moment.
Buffy, the first one out, had sat down at a table with her legs stretched to the other side to save at least one seat for Riley, when Cordelia approached.
"Can we talk?" Cordelia asked.
"No," Buffy snapped. "I know that I owe Angel at least three or four different apologies, and I’ll do it. But right now, I’m still trying to get my head straight, so I don’t need a Cordelia Chase ‘Somehow This Is All Buffy’s Fault’ lecture."
"That’s okay," Cordelia said, sitting down. "You’re getting an entirely different lecture."
"The word ‘no’ means nothing to you, does it?" Buffy said. "It’s a good thing you’re not a man."
"Just listen, will you?" Cordelia said. "I only need a minute."
Buffy subsided, settling back and glaring. "Go on."
"Look, no one says you don’t have a right to be angry," Cordelia said. "Hell, no one could really fault you if you *never* forgave them."
Buffy’s glare started to fade. "But…" She prompted.
"Remember Senior Year?" Cordelia said. "I refused to even listen to Xander’s apologies for months. I wouldn’t even come near you guys unless the world was at stake—and sometimes not even then. I didn’t find out about the Sisterhood of Jhe until Angel told me about it sometime last year. And when I did come near you, I tried to hurt you as much as I could."
"That’s true," Buffy agreed. "I do remember some bystanders getting caught in the crossfire."
"And I’m sorry about that, but I’m trying to get to my point."
"Which is?"
"I spent Senior Year alone. My Cordettes didn’t want me back, and I rejected all of you. Because Xander and Willow hurt my pride."
"And your gut."
"And my gut. Look, my point is, they were genuinely sorry, but I wouldn’t accept their apology, and it cost me. I spent senior year alone, rather than with some of the best friends that a person can have. People who would have stood by me even when I lost my money. I don’t want the same thing to happen to you."
"Don’t worry, it won’t."
"You should talk to them now."
Buffy shook her head. "I can’t."
"In case you don’t remember," Cordelia said sternly, "We’re going up against Angelus. We don’t know if everyone’s coming out."
"Then I’ll have to live with the regret," Buffy said. "Right now, I am thirty-one flavors of messed up, and if I try to talk to them, I’ll probably say or do something that I’ll regret even more. But I will accept their apologies when they give them "
Cordelia considered that for a moment, then nodded. "Fair enough," she allowed. Then she glanced over her shoulder and noticed that the rest of the convoy was starting to filter out of the building in twos and threes. "Oh, no!" Cordelia leaped to her feet. "I can’t be seen like this! I have a reputation to uphold!"
"A reputation for what?" Buffy smirked.
"Hating you," Cordelia retorted tartly as she turned toward another table.
"Cordelia?"
She turned halfway back. "Yes?"
"Thanks for caring."
Cordelia smiled, just a little bit sadly. "There are things that *make* you care, Buff. And some of them have happened to me since you knew me. Still, you’re welcome."
With that, she sat down at another table as the other members of the Convoy began to arrive.
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