Angel rejoined the others after sleeping for about six hours. To his disappointment -- but not surprise -- they had learned very little new information in that time.
The problem was, Quortoth was so inaccessible that there was very little information about it at all. And from what was known about it, no one would want to go there anyway; even the demons that inhabited it just wanted to get out. And as far as they could tell, the hole Sahjahn had opened in L.A. was the first of its kind in more than a millenium.
Xander had already gotten takeout for everyone, including some blood from the butcher for Angel and Spike. Some things never change, Cordelia thought, Buffy's still boinking the undead, and Xander's big important job is still running out for snacks.
But Angel's emergence reminded her of one other major issue that everyone else had overlooked until now. "Um, guys?" she asked, "Where are we all going to sleep tonight?"
That started a round of muttering and furtive glances -- the mix of exes and old grudges floating around the room were a recipe for disaster. Luckily, Giles came up with a solution: "My flat doesn't seem like home yet anyway, with most of my things still enroute from England. Buffy's couch would be just as comfortable to me. So I could stay at her house, and our new guests could take over my place for the time being."
After a moment, Angel quietly replied, "That's a very generous offer, Giles. But unless your place is really big, it's only a temporary solution. We barely packed anything other than books so we could be here as soon as possible. Lorne and Groo are getting some clothes and other things together down in L.A., and will be joining us tomorrow."
Cordelia nodded. "If the world is gonna end soon, I want my Groo with me. And Lorne's way better at getting information than Willie the Snitch ever was."
"Actually, Spike, and recently his friend Clem. have been our information gatherers in the demon community," Willow corrected her.
"Clem?" Angel muttered doubtfully.
"Clement, of the Nablith clan." Spike clarified.
Angel pursed his lips and nodded. "A Nablith. Not the toughest guys around, but a well-known clan, and trustworthy." He added the last with a significant glance toward Spike, who bristled at the obvious insinuation.
"Angel," Buffy said icily. "Spike's part of the team now. He's proven he can be trusted. I know you guys don't like each other, and probably never will, but no more cheap shots. Got it?"
Angel glared at her, and his lip curled in the beginning of a growl, but after a moment he conceded with a short nod.
Buffy then turned to Spike, and stood waiting.
"I didn't say anything!" he protested.
She walked up to him and poked him in the chest with her finger. "You called him Peaches behind his back, and I could tell you were about to say something typically Spike-ish when I stepped in just now," she replied archly.
Cordelia couldn't tell if the sound that came from Spike was a grumble or a growl. "All right," he said in submission. "I'll keep quiet. As long as he does, at least," with a defiant jut of his chin toward Angel.
* * *
In addition to Giles' offer, Anya ended up donating her cell phone to Angel, so that everyone could remain in touch. "Even if the trip's been postponed, I'm not going to leave Xander alone for a moment during our honeymoon time," she explained. The issue of where Lorne and Groo -- and, hopefully, Connor -- would stay was tabled until the next day.
At eleven, when everyone divided up and headed toward their respective beds, Buffy heaved a sigh of relief. She'd felt the need to touch Spike several times while Angel was present, and she'd had to cover it up by starting fake arguments, like the one over the "Peaches" comment. However, she made sure to apologize profusely to Spike as soon as they were alone at home; she was still getting over her guilt at the way she'd treated him for the past year, and didn't want to build up any more bad feelings or karma. He quickly forgave her -- after she followed up the apologies with a lot of kisses, of course.
Later, as they were lying together in bed, Buffy asked him, "Spike, tell me something I don't know about you."
Spike grinned. This was a little game she'd come up with -- when she asked that question, it was open season on all the stories he wanted to tell her about his past. He was aching to tell her the one about Angelus and that woman in Hong Kong with the plate of garlic chicken . . . but not this time. She'd apologized to him, without any prompting, and that was worth more to him than any giggles he might get at the Poofter's expense.
He thought for a moment, then said, "I fell in love with jazz back in the '20s and '30s."
"Jazz? You?" Buffy said with a giggle.
He nodded. "Jazz. Me. Mind you, I'm not talking about the innocuous, elevator-music jazz you hear on the radio these days. I'm talkin' King Oliver and the Creole Jazz Band, Louis Armstrong and the Hot Five." He laughed. "I thought Armstrong was a demon the first time I heard him play. Never thought a human -- other than a Slayer, of course," he said with a wink, "could have such fire inside of him. It was mad, brilliant, wonderful music, like nothing I'd ever heard before or since. There was as much sex and violence and revolution in that music as anything by the Sex Pistols or the Ramones." Then he laid back and started telling her about Paris in the Jazz Age.
* * *
"Xander?"
"Yeah, Ahn?"
"That was a very nice thing you did this morning, supporting Buffy's decision to help Angel. I know how much you dislike him."
Sigh. "I don't know, Ahn. I think disliking Angel is more of a habit than anything else these days. At first, I admit it, I was jealous that Buffy chose him over me. Plus, there was the whole vampire thing. Later, when he fell off the soul wagon, I hated him for hurting Buffy, and Willow, and killing Miss Calendar. But it's been almost three years since I've seen him; after all this time, and hearing Cordy talk about all the things he's done . . . if I can learn to be friends with Spike, I should at least be able to tolerate Angel." Smirk. "But I still plan on calling him Deadboy every now and then."
"Xan, you hadn't talked to Cordelia when Dawn called this morning." Pause. "It's the baby, isn't it?"
Grunt. "Yah. You and me . . . we've been talking about having kids a lot lately. And when I think about Angel's baby, any baby, stuck in a Hell dimension . . . well, let's just say that it's a good thing I've learned my lesson about punching walls. This place is pretty solid, and I'd probably break a knuckle or something."
Troubled look. "I know. I feel the same way, and I don't understand it. Just thinking of that baby makes everything go all crazy in my head. Is it some kind of magic?"
"No, Ahn. It's humanity. Willow told me something during her freshman year, when she was taking Psych 101: taking care of children is hard-wired into our brains. That's why it's so hard to ignore a crying baby; when you hear it, your brain screams at you that you have to do something about it.
"But I don't need a psych course to know that even if I hated Angel with all my heart, I'd still try to rescue his kid. That's what makes us different from people like whatshisname, Holtz."
"Oh," Pause. "Xander?"
"Yes, Anya?"
"I'm going to stop taking those pills tomorrow."
Gurgle. "You sure?"
"I'm sure, Xander."
Kiss. "I love you, Anya."
"I love you, Xander. Father of my children-to-be."
Pause. "Um, Ahn? Children? As in plural?"
"Xander, I don't want to have an only child who's maladjusted and antisocial. Two children at least. Maybe three or four, if we make good-looking ones." Innocent, contented smile.
* * *
"Hmph, I should've known. Slept all afternoon, and now brooding all night."
Angel gave his Seer a withering look. "I do have a lot on my mind, Cordy."
Her face softened. "I know you do, Angel. And you know I feel terrible about what's happened to Connor. But you can't do anything about it by sitting around and thinking about it. You still have several days' worth of rest to make up, so please just get some sleep and do your thinking tomorrow with the group when it might do some good."
"Maybe. In a little bit." His expression changed a little. "Fred and Gunn settled in?"
Cordelia grinned. "Yeah. You should've seen Fred's face when she realized we were offering the two of them the big bed." She giggled. "I guess they haven't actually gotten to the hot-and-steamy part of their romance yet, and what with Fred spending five years in Pylea and who knows how many more buried in her books, I think Gunn's got the purest virgin in the world on his hands."
"But they still took the bed, right?"
"Yeah. Even if they're not planning to get groiny any time soon, Gunn's too big to fit on the couch, and I'm sure he'd much rather share a bed with Fred than you or me."
"Well, I think I'd sleep on the floor either way, and I bet you'd want to stay out of that bed as well. Remember, this used to be Xander's place."
There was a moment as Cordelia processed that, then her faced screwed up into a disgusted grimace. "Eeewwww! Thanks a lot, Angel! Now I won't be able to even look at that bed!"
He actually laughed a little at that, and Cordelia was startled to feel her heart flutter a little. Angel in one of his power-broods was entirely unworthy of notice, but when he laughed or smiled, she would flash back to high school, when she had it so bad for him. Of course, she hadn't known he was a vampire at the time, much less a vampire who went psycho if he did the horizontal mambo with anyone he actually cared about, but still . . . when he smiled, and those brown eyes warmed up, it was "Hello, salty goodness," all over again.
Then she realized what she was doing. No! Bad Cordy! You've got a boyfriend! You are not even going to think about pulling a Xander on Groo! And there's no way in Hell you're going to even begin to consider kissing the undead, even if he is the hottest vamp this side of Antontio Banderas!
Then his face changed, and she no longer needed to hold on to her hormones. He was back into brood mode. "Speaking of our ex's. I know there's something going on. Between Buffy . . . and Spike." He nearly spat the other vampire's name.
Cordelia flushed. There was no point in denying it. "Yeah. She . . . she told me about it. It's complicated."
He growled. "I can smell him all over her, and vice versa. How complicated can it be?"
That was when the cell phone rang, with the "conference call" tone.
* * *
Buffy: "What's going on? Who called? What's the matter?"
Xander: "Calm down, Buff, it was me. Nothing's attacking; Rachel just came in and asked me to call everyone right away. I'm handing the phone over to her now."
Rachel: "I think I've found something significant. Not only for the Apocalyptic crisis, but for Angel's missing child as well."
Giles: "Really? So the two are connected after all?"
Rachel: "I think so. The evidence is a little thin, but . . . I was reading !Kannl's book in bed, trying to make sense of some of the passages, when I idly wished I could just find what I needed. And then all of a sudden, I knew what page to turn to turn to.
"Remember what I said about !Kannl putting his thought-patterns into the pages of his book? Well, I think it goes a lot further than anyone ever imagined. This book has a purpose and a will of its own -- or rather, it has !Kannl's purpose and will; it wants to be read and understood, and if you let it, it will guide you to what you need to know."
Angel: "So what do we need to know? And what does this have to do with Connor?"
Rachel: "Well, that's the strangest part. The page that I came to was toward the end of the book, and loosely translated, it reads, 'If you're reading this, something is wrong and the Balance is in danger. You may use the following ritual to call on the Guardian of the Balance for guidance.' And there's a short ritual on the same page. On a hunch, I thought about Connor, and asked the book to take me to anything about him. I got to the same page."
Giles: "So we can hypothesize that Connor is crucial to solving the current crisis, and Sahjahn's interference has jeopardized everything. Does anyone know who this 'Guardian of the Balance' may be?"
Buffy: Groan. "I have a hunch. Angel, remember a certain short, annoying demon with lousy fashion sense who's even worse with the Cryptic Guy routine than you were?"
Angel: Bigger groan. "Whistler."
Giles: "Who's Whistler?"
Angel: "Long story. Too long for a cell phone conversation."
Buffy: "I'll give you the rundown in the morning, Giles. But for now, let's just say that he's never the bearer of good news."
Rachel: "I knew we wouldn't be doing anything until tomorrow morning anyway . . . but I didn't want everyone to go to sleep thinking this was all hopeless. I hope I didn't wake anyone . . . "
Chorus: "Not me."
Angel: "Rachel, I wouldn't care if you'd woken all of us up at four in the morning. Thank you. This is the first lead we've gotten, and with any luck Whistler will be able to tell me how to get my son back."
Giles: "I quite agree, Miss Melville; we all needed some good news. Thank you for allowing us to end the day on a hopeful note."
Rachel: "Thank you, all." Pause. "Rupert, when are you going to give in and start calling me Rachel?"
Various Scoobies: Snickers.
Tara: "Giles, she's only going to keep at you until you do it, you know."
Willow: "Besides, when you go all formal on her, you start to sound like Quentin Travers."
Giles: Harrumph. "Very well. Thank you . . . Rachel. And good night." Click.
Willow: Giggle. "I knew that would get him."
Rachel: "Thanks, Willow. I was beginning to wonder what it was going to take."
Dawn: "Awww. I was beginning to wonder how far she would go."
Willow: "That was why I stepped in; I didn't want her to do something that would give poor Giles a heart attack."
Rachel: Laugh. "Good night, everyone. And pleasant dreams."
Chorus: "Good night."
* * *
Everyone (except Tara, who had to put in an appearance at work) was at the Magic Box early the next morning. As Rachel had said the night before, the ritual itself was short and simple: no circles or mystical ingredients, just a vocal plea to the Powers that Be to send the Guardian of the Balance to guide them. Since Angel was a Champion chosen directly by the Powers, they quickly decided he would be the best one to actually speak the words.
But when he did, nothing happened. No flash of light, no cloud of smoke, nothing.
"Are you sure you pronounced it right, Angel?" asked Rachel.
His answer was drowned out by the bell on the front door.
Giles turned to Anya, "I thought you had the 'Closed' sign up."
"She did."
Everyone turned suddenly toward the voice.
Faith was standing in the doorway.
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