Chapter 1.07
Sunday, May 12th, 2002

The scene looked like nothing so much as an extended family picnic. Buffy's mood, however, was far from jovial. In fact, murderous would be a far closer approximation to the truth. Willow found herself wondering how long the slayer had been deceiving herself about her true feelings for the vampire, for her to be so deeply affected. It was certainly hard for the Wicca to accept that until just over a week ago she, for one, had been oblivious to the on-off affair the pair had been conducting.

"Where the blazes are they? All they had to do was show up. We've hired a car, cleared out everything from our old rooms, raided the mall for enough cell phones for a small country, and bought lunch."

Buffy picked up a sandwich, knowing she should eat something, if only to provide an example for Dawn, but ended up putting it back down without even attempting to open the wrapping. Her fingers kneaded absently at her temples until she noticed Dawn's eyes following the giveaway gesture. The whole scene was just too reminiscent of the night that she and Spike had managed to get the sand, which was currently irritating her hands, on the blanket in the first place. Same sandwiches, same blanket, same cooler. Same company? Who knew when they would get him back.

Wesley tried to defend his former colleagues. "I'm sure they've just been held up in traffic or something. They are generally quite reliable."

"Yeah, when Cordelia's there to keep Angel's ass in line." Dawn couldn't help but betray her partiality.

"Dawn!" Buffy automatically started to go into lecture mode but stalled as she thought how, had he been here, Spike would have smiled with his lips, but laughed with his eyes, silently encouraging her sister in her vendetta against his grandsire. "Not constructive, okay?" she finished in a far softer voice than she originally intended.

"Like what you just said was?"

"Em, Buffy?" Willow nodded in the direction of the parking lot. "That wouldn't be Fred heading our way? She kinda hid the last time I was here."

Buffy and Wesley both turned as one to see the figure she was looking at. Even at a distance, it only took a fraction of a second for Wesley to pick out the differences. "She's too short, and her hair's too light. The way she moves isn't right either. Fred's more... coltish." Tara gave a knowing smile, wondering if the Englishman realised just how much he had given away to a group of people, who were almost total strangers.

The woman seemed to be heading straight toward them, and as she neared the group, she pushed her sunglasses up to rest on her forehead. Buffy figured the gesture was deliberate, removing the barrier that would have prevented the group from making eye-contact. The woman's ponytail hung down past her shoulders and was a couple of shades lighter than Dawn's. She wore a white camisole top teamed with faded blue jeans and a silver dolphin pendant, but her footwear was a concession to practicality; well-worn comfortable running shoes. She carried the biggest bag of Cheese Doodles that Buffy had ever seen in one hand, and they seemed to be out of place somehow, but Buffy couldn't think why. She seemed to be appraising the group as she came closer, as if she were trying to fit them to their descriptions, which of course, she was. Her blue eyes, fair skin and the smattering of freckles across her nose somehow seemed to fit with every stereotype of a Midwest farmer's daughter that Buffy had ever seen. Still, Buffy wasn't surprised when her accent turned out to be pure California.

The woman tossed the bag of chips underhand toward Dawn. "Clem sends his regards. He's waiting in the car with Lily. He prefers to avoid too much direct sunlight. He says putting on all that sun block is way too much like hard work."

The group as a whole, seemed to breathe a collective sigh of relief, but Buffy couldn't afford to take things on face value at the moment. "That still doesn't tell me who you are?"

"Lori, Lori Patton. You have to be Buffy, Dawn, Tara. Hear you play a mean hand of poker." She nodded to the members of the group as she said their names. "I'm afraid Clem couldn't remember your real name, just that Spike pretty much always calls you Red. And you, I know nothing about, at all," she admitted to Wesley.

"In case you're wondering why I'm here..." the woman shrugged. "Marie would say that I'm her assistant. The creeps at City Hall would say that I'm her secretary, and the reality probably falls somewhere between the two. More importantly, I'm her friend. Marie can't be here herself. She's got Rosa to look after, and as she put it, she's got court dates "up the wazoo". But anything an extra pair of hands or eyes, or an extra body can help with, I'm here for as long as you want."

"Do you know what you're getting into, here?" Buffy asked.

"I'm no demon hunter or whatever, but I can look after myself most of the time, and I research stuff for a living. I can drive, and I gather with Spike gone, you girls have a bit of a problem with that, and yes, I know that we're looking at a big bunch of vamps, the like of which we haven't seen in Sunny D since Spike was running the town."

"Okay, Clem and Lily vouch for what you've told me, and you're in," Buffy conceded.

"Marie wanted to help out, too. Like I said, she's pretty much stuck in Sunnydale. She said to let you know that Dawn's welcome to stay with her for as long as it takes for you to get things sorted out, if that's okay with both of you."

Buffy gave her sister a wry half-smile. "You know you've got to go back. We can't afford for you to miss school with the whole Social Services thing and all that."

"It's okay, Buffy. I know you'll be happier with me safely out the way. And if that makes it easier for you to concentrate on getting Spike back, so much the better, but if there's anything we can be doing back in Sunnydale to help, I want to know."

"Marie said if you wanted to hop a flight, she could pick you up at the airport, or if you prefer, I can drive you back," the newcomer added.

"I don't suppose you happen to know the times for those flights?" Buffy asked.

"Every two hours at ten minutes past the hour. Last flight ten past eight. Last flight out before sundown ten past six."

"Okay, people," said Buffy as she began packing things back into the cooler. "Mohammed won't get off his butt and come to the mountain, then he can't blame the mountain if it pays him a visit. I vote we spare Clem the prospect of sunburn and move this meeting to the Angel's place."

"You really think he would come back here?" Connor asked. "Wouldn't that be really stupid?"

"Well, it's not so much that I think he would come back here, as I really don't know where else he would go," Gunn admitted.

Connor hesitated as they opened the doors leading from the hotel garden into the foyer. "They have been here. The others. Many of them and also something else. Something most foul. The scent seems old, but we should be careful."

The group cautiously checked out the ground floor before making their way upstairs to Angel's room. Gunn slowly turned the handle and pushed the door open, only to immediately start gagging and coughing.

Connor pushed the door fully open, and the other two followed him in. "As I said, something most foul." He gestured in the direction of Angel's bin, which was currently overflowing with viscera soaked clothing.

"Well this is all well and good, but who gets to wake him up?" Gunn asked.

"I'll do it," came a voice from the doorway. "I don't think we've got time to wait while you three start playing "One potato, Two potato"."

Wesley walked past the three Angel Investigations employees and grasped Angel's exposed shoulder, shaking it firmly. Almost instantaneously, Wesley found his had clenched in a painfully tight grip. For a fraction of a second, before Angel awoke fully, Wesley found himself matching wills with a golden-eyed demon. Then Angel's eyes turned to their more normal brown, though the glare he gave Wesley was no less cold. Wes met his gaze without flinching. Spike was right. He had nothing of which to be ashamed. He had acted as his conscience dictated, using the knowledge he had at the time as the basis for his decision. He had tried to check the veracity of the prophecy in every way possible before taking the drastic action he had deemed necessary. And Angel could go fuck himself if he thought Wesley Wyndam-Pryce was going to back down just because he put on a temper tantrum.

"You're not wanted here, Wesley," the vampire told him.

"That goes for all of us, English," Gunn added his support.

"Be that as it may, since I'm here to help tidy up Angel's mess, since we, by which I mean myself and your guests who are waiting downstairs, are only here now because you failed en masse to make any attempt to meet at the rendezvous which had been arranged and since of those present, Buffy is the party who has suffered most grievously so far in this campaign and she has requested my help, I will remain until such time as she might choose to dispense with my services.

Should you choose to take any form of responsibility for your actions in letting this situation come to pass, we will be pleased for you to join us downstairs. They do say better late than never." With that Wesley turned on his heel and left the room.

"Was he just speaking the same language as what we all speak?" Gunn asked.

"Give or take the odd phrase," Angel answered. "Do any of you have the least idea what he's talking about?"

"You mean you didn't talk to Lorne last night? He didn't call you?"

"No, should he have?"

"Damn straight, brother. And you probably didn't talk to your ex neither." Gunn picked up Angel's cell phone from the bedside table. After glancing at the screen, he checked the latest text advising him that he had a voicemail message. Giving the vampire a long-suffering look, he then accessed Angel's voicemail, upping the volume and holding the phone halfway between his own ear and Fred's. All four listened as Buffy gave a brief description of the situation as at the earlier part of the previous evening, followed by details of the rendezvous.

Even in a recorded message, Buffy's distress was apparent to all in the room, as was her willingness to use every tactic possible to get Angel's help. "Look, Angel. I know you can't exactly come play in the sunshine, but if you wait somewhere while the rest of your people check things out, we can all meet up. And I know you all blame Wesley for what happened with Stephen, but I need him to get Spike back, just like I'm going to need all of you. I'm playing an away game here, and I can't afford to lose. I know I'm asking a lot. And I guess, I'm as much to blame for letting her walk away that last time in Sunnydale, as you are for the time you let her walk away from LA, but she's gone too far this time, and not just with Spike.

Angel, I asked him what the deal with you two was. He wasn't exactly over the moon about it. It hurt his pride, but he told me. This is one instance where I'm not going to accept the Angelus line. You owe him. And I'm calling it in."

"He was right," said Connor. "It is your mess."

"Em, not that I want to interrupt," Fred began in her quiet way, "but am I the only one that's kinda worried about why Lorne didn't make that phone call and why Connor said he could smell that all these other vampires that had been in here, 'cause I'm guessin' that if Angel smelled like that when he got in last night, I kinda doubt that he was goin' to notice, and that probably means that they've got Lorne. At least, something stopped him makin' that phone call and there isn't a body, except we haven't checked his room yet, so maybe there is... Did Lorne say whether he was callin' from his room or from the desk? Maybe we should go check his room. D'you think?"

Lorne had made a point of listening out for the helicopter's comings and goings. After all, there wasn't much else to do. He appeared to have free rein. No-one had impeded his progress as he had explored the cabin, if you can call somewhere with twelve bedrooms a cabin, or the surrounding grounds. Unfortunately, his hostess hadn't been exaggerating when she had said that you would need a helicopter or a good four wheel drive to reach the place. She'd just neglected to mention that the four wheel drive in question would also need to be fitted with a winch. The cabin was situated on a... well, ledge was an accurate description, albeit slightly misleading as regards the scale of the place. It still conveyed the impression of the cliff face that rose up behind the cabin, and continued down to the ravine floor hundreds of feet below. Not that the geographical remoteness of the accommodation was the only reason they let him wander where he wanted. He suspected the low-jack they had fitted around his ankle also had something to do with it. All the windows and doors were protected with security shutters and only the main doorway was left uncovered. Somehow, Lorne didn't think this was to protect against burglars.

About the only thing he could say for it was that the acoustics were pretty darn good. He had stood at the edge of the cliff and belted out the first few bars of "Indian Love Call" from Rose Marie, but it kinda defeated the point of the exercise when you had to do your own answering. Over the course of the night, the helicopter had left, come back, and left again. Since its last visit, several of the previously vacant bedrooms were now locked up tight. Whether that was to protect who or whatever was inside, or whether it was to keep them inside was anyone's guess, though he suspected the former for the most part. Every hour or so, someone would check on one the rooms, unlocking it from the outside. Other than that they seemed to leave the room's occupants to themselves.

Currently, Lorne was keeping himself amused by tinkering on the baby grand in the main reception room. Far be it from him to wonder about how they had managed to get the thing up here in the first place, or to marvel at anyone coming all this way for the purpose of tuning it. As long as it was here, and he had vodka, cranberry, fresh grapefruit and ice, he would make the most of his little period of incarceration.

The guard appeared to do his hourly check, and Lorne decided it was time to belt out a chorus or two of "Release Me"

"Ah, shuddup!" bellowed the guard. "We ain't gettin' paid to listen to you caterwaulin'"

"Hey, I'll have you know I've been offered my own show in Vegas, sweet cheeks. Maybe the next time you get a vacation, you could be paying to hear me."

"Only if nobody kills ya first. Come up here and make yourself useful."

Lorne sighed, but he supposed useful was better than bored. He followed the man into the shaded room.

"Right, every hour, ya stick one of these in a mug," he indicated one of several bags of human blood. "Ya take this." He picked up a straw and stuck it into the mug. "And ya feed that." He shoved the mug into Lorne's hands and gestured to a figure that was not only strapped face-down to a gurney, but held down with numerous cuffs, chains and padlocks as well. "And don't get no ideas 'bout settin' him loose or offin' him, 'cause, either way, you'll end up dead as a dodo."

With those final comforting words, the goon made his exit and left Lorne and Spike alone.

Spike raised sleepy eyelids to watch Lorne as he brought the oversized mug over. The vampire managed a wry grin, even though he winced as the movement set off another wave of pain from his chip. He corrected himself. From the hole they had left when they took out his chip. "Sso," he still slurred slightly from the last remains of the drugs in his system. "Wasn' a nightmare. Really was a lounge act doing a five-hundred decibel rendition of 'Look Homeward,' bloody 'Angel' in the next room."

"'Fraid so, sweetie."

"Always thought Johnny Ray was underrated... but I never did like that one for some reason."

It was several hours and not a few blood packets later before the drugs had cleared Spike's system enough, and the blood he had drunk allowed him to heal enough to manage a proper conversation. Once he'd got as much information as he could about where they were, who else was there and what was going on, as best the anagogic demon could tell, conversation turned to another matter.

"I gather from your honey bun, that present circumstances not withstanding, congratulations would be in order... again."

"Yeah, we've got plenty to celebrate lately. Least we will have once I get out of here. What event exactly are we commemorating now?"

"The whole psychic bond, Ring of Fire, deal."

"Ring of Fire?" Spike asked.

"So I borrowed from Johnny Cash. Let him try to sue me. It sounds better than "Ever-encroaching inescapable passion that may or may not prove fatal or cause insanity," which, by the way, is the literal translation from Pylean."

"And I'm sure if I was from Pie-lee or wherever, then I wouldn't have to ask you to explain again, in English, this time."

"Well, see, we have this sort of similar ritual that some people do back home. At least, how you do the ritual isn't exactly similar, and we won't go into that, but when both the participants have been trained to use their empathic abilities, you sort of get the same result?" Lorne glanced across at Spike waiting for an indication that he was following so far.

"They call it... Okay, I call it the Ring of Fire, puddin', 'cause there ain't no way out. There's just you and her. At first you're kind of feeling your way. The bond lets you relate to each other in ways you didn't think were possible before, and it makes you feel kinda warm inside, sort of like standing a few feet from a bonfire on a cold night at the beach. Over time, you get to know each other, maybe better than you know yourselves. The flames burn that bit brighter and closer, and you learn things you'd rather were kept secret. The fire starts to burn, to hurt. Compared with how things are between the pair of you, it's like the rest of the world could burn right up and you might not even notice, and maybe you'll get so wrapped up in each other that you'll let it do just that. Your girl comes with a heavy destiny and nothing good'll come of it if she neglects a sacred duty."

"You think I don't know that? You think I don't try to help her?" Spike interjected.

"Sure you do, sugar. You'd do anything for her. But what happens to the world if she feels the same way about you? And what happens to the pair of you if she doesn't? What if, somewhere down the line you find out that all that's holding you together is passion? If you can't both see all the bad, as well as the good, and love each other still, then it'll destroy you just as easily as it can purify. You two signed up for the emotional equivalent of the auto de fé. And until those flames close right in around your feet, there ain't no way to tell whether the pair of you are going to burn up like tinder, or be tempered like steel."

Lorne took a sip from his drink and treated Spike to a contemplative look.

"Back home, it's kind of reserved for all these noble champion types, 'cause, truth to tell, most people don't want to know that much about anyone else, and if they do, they don't want them knowing all their little secrets. It's got to be one of those great kyrumption things before anyone would be nuts enough to try it, but they say if you don't wind up hating each others guts so much that you either go insane or destroy each other, then you can both draw great power from the union."

"Well. Isn't that quite the cheery little thought? Y' know you almost make me wish that whatever Dru has planned to break the bond would work... Except for one little thing."

"And what's that?"

"Buffy. She wears my mark and I wear hers. Dru can cut chunks out of my hide until you can't see a single tooth mark and it won't change anything between us. If we have to do the ritual all over again, we will, because I realised a long way back that Buffy will always be drawn to the flames, and for her, I'd walk through the nine circles of hell and take a detour to heaven besides."

"Well, cup cake," Lorne drawled. "Let's just hope it doesn't come to that... Not that you wouldn't cut quite a dash."