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Temps Perdu, Part Fourteen

Angel was explaining the situation to Connor, very carefully and at great length, and with a look in his eye that was making Buffy hurt inside. He was putting everything he had into trying to convince everyone to do something that was breaking his heart. It was hard to know if this was just a guilt trip gone crazy or if he honestly believed that to give Wesley back his memories was to condemn him to a padded cell. Wesley was looking deeply uncomfortable, squirming about in his seat and trying to think of somewhere to put his hands. He’d tried putting them in his lap, wrapping them around his chest, crossing his arms, until Giles had taken pity on him and given him a cup of tea to hold and sip. That had seemed to soothe him a little but it was still clearly not a fun day out for him to have his precarious mental health discussed in front of everyone; especially as he clearly couldn’t have felt saner.

Angel hadn’t wanted to drink blood in front of Connor but Connor had insisted, pointing out gently that the reason they’d called him in was because he wasn’t the Connor who couldn’t deal with Angel being a vampire any more, so it was okay for him to be a vampire.

Angel didn’t look at Wesley as he said: “…I think what happens is that every time something happens - something life altering, some loss or grief or shock - you can’t be the person you were before it happened any more; you have to go onto the next place, be the new version of yourself. Except that happened to Wes too many times in too short a time, and he just jumped the tracks; couldn’t remake himself again that fast and that completely.”

“Maybe he was.” Gunn looked up. “He was just still in the middle of a transition when the Senior Partners decided to end the world. He told me he was trying to adjust. That all the research he was doing on Illyria - that was part of the adjustment. We didn’t see what he was like when we - after he took - you know, when he wasn’t here. I saw him the once and he was in pretty bad shape. Was drinking pretty hard, all angry and bitter and didn’t want anything to do with us. But three months later he’s bringing Angel home, isn’t drinking, can talk just fine, and has got himself new clothes, a new haircut and a new evil lawyer girlfriend.”

Angel glanced across at Gunn. “Well, if you think sleeping with Lilah is the proof of a healthy mind…”

“Just saying. Wes has been to the brink a few times and he’s always come back. Just because he hadn’t managed it before you went into that hell dimension doesn’t mean he wasn’t going to if you’d given him enough time. And with all the changes he went through some things about him always stayed the same. He was always a Watcher. He was always in love with Fred. And he was always ready to forgive you any damned thing you did to him.”

“He didn’t forgive me for the mind wipe.” Angel looked at Wesley sadly.

“No, he lost his trust for you then,” Illyria said, not without a hint of triumph. “Then he and I were allies against you as we uncovered your deception.”

“Yeah, for five minutes, Blue.” Spike looked up from his glass of bourbon. “And we both know he did forgive him cause I remember you bending my ear about it for an hour at least. Wesley’s idea of making Angel suffer for stealing his memories and lying to his face was to not tell him the truth about his plans for Illyria and to spend some time with me. As punishments go it wasn’t exactly up there with trying to make him eat a pillow, was it?”

Wesley shifted uncomfortably and took another strengthening sip of tea. Buffy felt sorry for him. She almost mentioned the hell dimension, feeling the need to remind people that if Angel had mistreated Wesley on occasion over the years, it wasn’t a one-way street when it came to their friendship. Angel loved Wesley. That was the problem. He was so afraid of hurting him again, of not protecting him, of letting his own need for his friendship overwhelm Wesley’s need to be protected from his past mistakes and sorrows that he wasn’t thinking straight.

Xander said, “Can’t we just keep this simple? It was wrong to take Wesley’s memories away. You shouldn’t have done it. I don’t see a difference between this situation and that one except that no one did it on purpose. He’s still left flying blind with no way of recognising old enemies, or old friends, and a fraction of the skills he ought to have.”

“I can study,” Wesley said quickly. “I can work on my research skills and my fighting skills. I’m sure Illyria or Angel or Gunn or Spike would…”

Giles put a hand on Wesley’s shoulder and gave Angel a look that spoke volumes. He said gently to Wesley, “The point is that you already have that knowledge, Wesley. You’ve already worked very hard to attain it. It’s locked up inside your mind right now.”

Angel turned to Connor in desperation. “Connor, tell them it’s better not to have to… Not to have to deal with the things you can’t deal with.”

Connor sighed. “Okay. You all asked me here today so I could give my opinion and I suppose as someone who also lost his memory and got a second chance for a new life my opinion may be worth something. I’m grateful for what Angel did. I’m sorry that it hurt you guys. I wish he hadn’t taken me out of your minds as well. I’m sorry your heads were messed with to try to make me safer. I’m a saner, happier, better adjusted person today because I have a lot of false memories in my head that feel real to me and are real to me. They’re my reality. I may know that Angel is my father but I also know absolutely that the man I call ‘Dad’ is my father, that I have two sisters that I love. That I have parents who love me. However, I’m alive right here and right now, because Wesley gave me back my memories of who I was before. If he hadn’t broken the Orlon Window thing, I’d be dead, because having strength and speed isn’t enough in a fight. You have to have the instincts of all those other fights as well.”

“Wesley couldn’t fight worth a damn when he came to LA,” Angel said quickly. “But he learned. He’s a really quick study and we’d all help him. We’d make sure there were people with him. There are more of us now. Before there was just me but now there’s Gunn and Spike and Illyria. We won’t let any harm come to him. And he’s not supposed to be a fighter anyway. He’s the guy who does the research and comes up with the plan. He can stay here in the hotel, in the office, where it’s safer.”

Buffy couldn’t let that go. “Angel, you know how many times Giles has been hurt over the years. If you’re out there fighting evil, people are going to target your friends to get at you. I’ve had it happen to me way too many times for comfort.”

“That’s not going to happen.”

“And when Faith wanted to make you kill her, what did she do? Who did she choose? She didn’t tie you to a chair and slice you up with a piece of broken glass, did she? No, she tortured Wesley to get to you; to make you so angry you’d kill her for what she’d done to him. That’s what happens to Watchers. Take it from someone who has come in to find hers unconscious on the floor way too many times.”

As they all looked at Giles, he grimaced. “Buffy does have a point, Angel. One can’t be associated with the Slayer or with a vampire with a soul on a mission to achieve redemption without becoming targeted by their enemies. The Mayor sent his minions to kill Willow, not Buffy. Caleb didn’t put out Buffy’s eye, he did it to Xander. You’ve admitted yourself that it was Cordelia and Wesley that both Faith and Vocah targeted when trying to get to you. If Wesley is in any way useful - and given the combined research abilities of the rest of you, I’d say he has already made himself invaluable - he is going to be targeted.”

“I can fence,” Wesley offered tentatively. “And I’ll train. Every day. I can get better.”

“You are better, Wes,” said Gunn gently. “That’s the point.”

“I don’t want to be crazy.” Wesley gave Buffy a begging look that made her want to feed him scraps. “I just want to be me.”

“But you’re not you, Wesley.” That was Connor and everyone looked at him in surprise. “You’re just parts of who you were. You’re missing half the things that make you - you.”

“So were you,” Wesley protested. “And you said yourself you are saner and happier.”

“I was raised in a hell dimension by a man I thought loved me, but who in the end loved vengeance more.”

Wesley said quietly, “I was raised by a man I knew never loved me. If you’re trying to say you didn’t have a stable happy home life at your back to help you through the crazy-making times - well, neither did I.”

“Holtz used to tie me to trees and leave me behind so I could hone my tracking skills.”

“My father used to lock me in the cupboard under the stairs with the rats and the spiders and no light if I made a mistake in a translation, or put my hands in my pockets, or didn’t stand up straight when I was talking to him, or broke anything, or dropped anything, or spilled anything, or did anything at all that wasn’t exactly what he told me to do, when he told me to do it, and not five minutes later. And in between locking me under the stairs and giving me extra lessons in everything for hours and hours and hours every single day, he told me that I was a useless hopeless clumsy idiot of a boy who would never amount to anything and would never ever make him proud.” Wesley had gazed unblinkingly at Connor as he spoke, but as he noticed everyone else’s shocked reaction, he hastily dropped his gaze, added rapidly, “I’m just saying that - I don’t have a lot of happy childhood memories to help me through the bad times.”

Giles looked across at Angel and said, “In case I didn’t mention it before, Angel, I take back what I said to you when you first came back from Askaroth. Wesley is better off here.”

Gunn said passionately, “Wes, man, I know you don’t remember, but you got your second chance already. It happened when you came to LA. You got the sister you never had in Cordy, and you got the brother you never had in me, and you got - I hate to admit it, but it’s true - the father you never had in Angel. That was your make over. That was when you got the family you’d never had before who loved you and who you loved. Right now, everything in Connor’s life is rosy, it’s true, but it’s not always going to be like that. I hope it is but the truth is his mom could get sick, one of his sisters could get run over by a truck, he could start taking drugs and get in over his head. Shit happens. To everyone. You can’t just press the reset button every time it gets too bad. You’re way ahead of Connor. He’s where you were when you first came to LA. He’s got people behind him now who he knows love him and that’s going to give him the strength to get through the bad times. Well, so do you.”

Buffy looked at Gunn in surprise. She was so used to seeing Wesley as Angel’s personal obsession that she sometimes forgot how much these other people cared for each other as well.

Wesley darted a glance at Angel who gave him a tragic look in return. They spent way too much time doing that. Buffy didn’t know whether to hug them both or bang their heads together. She gave Gunn an encouraging glance, wanting him to go on talking but he seemed to be done. She turned to Lorne and the green demon took a strengthening sip of something alcoholic before saying,

“Wes, my English muffin. You have Daddy Issues and no wonder; the man visited all his failures on you and set up your childhood like a crooked slot machine, so there was no way you could ever win. He programmed you for failure and the real miracle is that you overcame it as well as you did. But you did overcome it. You came to LA with nothing, knowing no one, and you made a success of your life here. Angel didn’t just offer you a job because you were hungry. Those of us who got all Lifetime Channel about you didn’t do it out of pity because Daddy never gave you anything on your birthday except more homework - ”

Lorne took another sip his drink, the ice cubes clunking “The point is, my lamb, that you overcame Daddy’s lessons in how to fail and you made a success of your life. And what Gunn said is absolutely true. I’m not saying that Angel should have won parent of the year for the way he treated Connor here when he was a teenage hellspawn, but he probably should have got a citation for the way he raised you and Cordy. He even obligingly went off the rails at just the right moment for you to realize that you could think for yourself, you could stand up to him, and you could do pretty well without him. And, cupcake, you did. I was right there when you reached that crossroads, the three of you. And you didn’t even hesitate. You staggered out of Caritas three drunken unemployed people with no path and by the time you’d shinned up that drainpipe you were Angel Investigations again. And you were the one who made that happen, right, Gunn?”

Gunn nodded. “Damned straight, Wes. You were the one who said we didn’t need Angel, we just needed to do what needed to be done. And we did it. The three of us.”

“You cast me out.” Wesley gazed at Gunn sadly. “You told me yourself. I screwed up. I ruined Connor’s life and Angel’s life. I robbed Angel of the only child he is ever going to have. I stole Connor’s childhood. And you all turned on me. And I believe that I loved you. I do. I even believe that you loved me. And I know that you must have been the first people who ever did. And I don’t know how I survived losing that. And I don’t want to remember how it felt.”

“The point is - we got through it.” Gunn leaned forward in his chair, willing Wesley to understand.

Angel looked around at them all. “He lost Fred. He lost the woman of his dreams.”

Buffy gazed at Angel. “I stabbed the man of my dreams and sent him to hell for a hundred years. Life sucks sometimes. That’s the way it is. It doesn’t mean I would have wanted to forget you forever.”

“You lost Cordy, Angel,” Gunn pointed out. “But you’re still here. Two years ago, I thought if Fred ever left me I wouldn’t be able to get up in the morning, well, she left me, she died, I played a part in killing her. I’m also still here and I wouldn’t want to forget a minute of knowing her. Are you going to put your hand on your heart and say you wish you’d never met her? She was the kind of woman you meet once in a lifetime and she chose Wes. And don’t tell me that doesn’t mean something because, damnit, I remember how it felt when she chose me. And aren’t you the guy who told Wesley that Fred was dead but he was alive and he needed to start acting like it?”

Angel grimaced at Wesley apologetically. “I was trying tough love.”

Wesley shrugged. “Don’t remember. Don’t care.”

“But you should.” Connor rose to his feet. “Fred wasn’t just the woman you were in love with, she was your friend. She was a good person. So was Cordelia. The man I knew - he would have wanted to remember them.”

“That’s what we all keep saying!” Lorne threw up his hands.

Buffy looked up. “Is there anyone in this room who hasn’t been temporarily insane at some point? With grief? With anger? Who hasn’t done something incredibly stupid? Who hasn’t done things that they regret?” As no one put their hands up, she looked at Wesley. “That’s what life is, Wesley. It’s a lot of mistakes. Living with failure is what being a hero is all about.”

“I don’t want to be a hero. I want to be a Watcher and do some good. And I want to be sane.”

“You are a hero,” said Willow sadly.

Illyria said quietly in a voice unlike her own: “I walk with heroes.”

Spike flinched. “Blue, don’t. Wes doesn’t know what you’re doing and the rest of us who do can’t take it. And if he gets his memories back you’re going to… you’re not going to do him any good.”

Illyria turned her Siberian husky eyes on Wesley. “Fred would want you to remember her.”

Wesley faltered at her glance. “I’m afraid to.”

“Your father taught you to be afraid of fear. Only when you ceased to fear it did you gain strength and courage.” Illyria turned to Angel. “You know this to be true.”

Angel said, “I can’t lose Wes. Not completely. Not like I’ve lost Doyle and Cordy and Fred… I know I’m going to lose the guy he was but this way at least he’ll still be alive. It’s like with Buffy, walking away from her was the hardest thing I ever did, but it was for her sake, so she could have a better life, so…”

“You are in love with sacrifice,” Ilyria told him. “If you stay on this path you will turn aside from everything that does not promise death.”

“That’s the path Wes was on when we went to Askaroth. He’s on a different path now.”

“This isn’t a path, Angel,” said Lorne shortly. “It’s a siding.”

“I stole Tara’s memories,” Willow told him. “I did what you did, Angel. I wanted everything to be the way it was before we’d argued, so I tried to steal her memories of the bad times but then everyone else got lost as well. We didn’t know who we were. Spike thought Giles was his father. Giles thought Anya was his wife.”

Angel gave Giles a look of horror. “You thought you had a vampire son and a vengeance demon wife? And people say I have a problem with self hatred.”

“We didn’t know Spike was a vampire,” said Giles wearily. “And he was wearing…tweed.”

“Tara loved me,” Willow added gently. “But she walked away when I did that. She wouldn’t come back until I’d learned my lesson. But Wesley…”

“Was apparently the doormat to end all doormats,” Wesley murmured.

Willow gazed at him compassionately. “Maybe you just knew that Angel loved you and for you that was enough.”

Buffy winced as she saw Wesley’s childhood hitting him again, the sting of cruel words and the emptiness where affection simply wasn’t, and then the terrible seduction of it, being loved unconditionally by someone noble and good and brave and true; the father he had never had, the friend he’d never made before. Wesley dropped his gaze, putting the tea on the desk so he could avoid looking at anyone. “Perhaps it was.”

“You did lie to him,” Spike offered. “Told him you were okay about killing Blue here, when you weren’t. That was a kind of a little rebellion.”

“And you made him have an office in the elevator,” Gunn added. “When he came to work for us. And you made him make you coffee.”

“I did?” Wesley briefly looked relieved and then guilty. He darted a glance at Angel. “Sorry.”

Angel turned to Connor again. “You wouldn’t want to be who you used to be, would you?”

Connor was still looking at Wesley. “Wesley, if you were you, you would be hating not remembering Cordelia and Fred and all the good times and the bad times. You know, I have a lot of respect for Angel, I really do, but his view of you and reality were always two different things. He thinks like a father. That’s good. You need a good father in your life because it sounds like yours was pretty much a wash out, but if you were in your right mind right now you’d know that Angel isn’t the one with the plans, you are.”

Wesley looked up at once, shocked by that accusation. “I’m the one who stole the baby, remember? The one who ruined your life? The one who thought it would be a great idea to take Angel’s soul. The one who set Faith on the path to murder and then nearly got her killed trying to capture Angelus.”

“You did capture Angelus,” Connor pointed out. “And Faith broke out of prison because you asked her to. Your plan worked. Angelus killed the Beast, Faith captured Angelus. And my life isn’t ruined. I like my life. I’m glad my father didn’t rip out my throat when I was a baby because Wolfram & Hart were spiking his blood. I’m glad I wasn’t blown up in an explosion because Holtz decided to put a bomb under this hotel. What I remember about that last insane year was that whenever no one else knew what to do next, you always had a plan. You’d turn up with information no one else had, find a way when no one else could. Maybe every single idea you had didn’t work out, but you still had ideas when no one else did. If you’re too afraid of making another mistake to ever try anything new how are you ever going to do any good?”

“If you consider your duty in this world to be to opposing evil and doing good then you should be prepared to accept any risk to do so, including the risk of insanity,” Illyria told him unblinkingly. “Why are you more afraid of your own past than you are of death or demons?”

“If your memory was working right now,” Spike added, “you’d know that Captain Forehead over there could never plan his way out of a cardboard box.”

“And if Cordy was here she would have made you get your memories back a week ago,” Lorne added. “And, trust me, sweetpea, you would not have been opposing her. Angel could flounce all he liked, when Cordelia said something was happening, it happened. You’d know that if you were in your right mind.”

Wesley automatically looked across at Angel and Buffy sighed, because the real irony here was that Wesley was always going to be Wesley; with memories or without them, he was going to be the same guy, having the same skills, the same virtues, the same faults; unfortunately he was probably going to keep making the same mistakes, too, not remembering having already made them once before. And he was too convinced of his own record as a failure to want to have that past back. Not unless Angel told him it was worth having. He had to hear this from Angel as well as the rest of them and Angel wasn’t going to say it. Angel was never going to say it.

“Okay.” Buffy got to her feet. “I’m really bored with this conversation now and I think we should put it to a vote. Anyone here who thinks Wesley needs to get all his memories back raise your hand.”

“Buffy…” Giles murmured. “I really don’t think that this is something that can be decided by a show of hands…”

Before Buffy had to go to the effort of thinking up an answer for him, Gunn, Xander, Willow, Lorne, Illyria, Spike, and with an apologetic look at Angel, Connor, had all raised their hands. Buffy turned to Giles. “See. It’s a landslide.”

“But…” Wesley began.

“Wes,” Buffy spoke sharply and was pleased to see that some residual training from Cordelia must have lodged deep as he jumped immediately. “Last time you hit bottom you were alone and you pulled through. This time there will be lots of us here to catch you. We will catch you. Think of it like a trust exercise and just let yourself go.”

“But…” Wesley darted another look at Angel. “I…”

Buffy glared at Angel. “Tell him you’ll catch him.”

Angel looked at her in dismay. “What if I don’t?”

Buffy rolled her eyes. “Where were you when they taught pep talks at leader school?”

“I don’t trust myself,” Angel insisted. “I was supposed to be the man who saved Fred from the monsters and in the end I was the one who carried her into hell. How can I tell him that I’ll catch him when I’ve dropped him so many times before?”

There was the crackle of something in the air, something dangerous and Willow rose to her feet, her red hair flickering in an occult wind. “No…” she breathed.

Xander darted a look at her. “Will, what is it…?”

She was already chanting, holding her hands up, eyes closed, concentrating with all her might. She flung up her hands, shouted something Buffy didn’t understand and the crackling faded, but then she turned to Giles. “They’re coming back. Coming here.”

Gunn was already on his feet. “Katorakan. He said it wasn’t over.”

Giles stood up too. “How long will the barrier hold, Willow?”

“Maybe half an hour.” Willow looked across at Wesley. “I can’t maintain it for longer than that.”

“The demon courts are unstoppable.” Gunn gazed around the hotel anxiously as if he expected it to break through at once. “If they want to come here, sooner or later they will.”

Spike had already snatched up a sword. “Screw the courts. They already made their decision. That bastard can’t take him back to Askaroth.”

“He’s appealed.” Gunn looked across at Giles. “We have to prove our case all over again.”

“I don’t understand.” Wesley looked between them in confusion. “What does it mean?”

With a sinking heart Buffy realized that this wasn’t the same Wesley who had been claimed by Angel before. This was a Wesley who didn’t remember giving Angel an oath of loyalty or feeding him his blood. This was a Wesley who didn’t remember any of the things that had dissolved that brand of ownership upon his chest. “It means you have to get your memory back,” Buffy said. “And now.”

“I can’t.” Willow looked up at them all and Giles saw the signs of strain upon her face. “I mean - I can’t do both. I think I can maintain this barrier for an hour, which gives the rest of you an hour to come up with a way to convince the court that they shouldn’t allow Katorakan’s appeal. But I can’t do anything else while I’m doing this…”

Giles and Buffy exchanged a glance and he read his own fears on her face. If the thought of that traumatized scarred Wesley going back to a Hell dimension had been horrifying the thought of sending this innocent unworldly Wesley to such a place didn’t even bear contemplation.

“Giles, can you…?” Buffy’s eyes begged him to be able to do this.

Giles had to be honest with her. “Buffy, even given the seriousness of the situation, I don’t think I can. Wesley’s memory wasn’t lost as a result of a memory spell which could perhaps be reversed simply. It’s a side effect from a completely different spell formulated by Willow. Now, she and I have gone over the original spell in great detail, and with sufficient power, we think that it can be reversed, but only by Willow. She is essentially going to have to coax Wesley’s memory back and I don’t have the skills to do that.”

“What about the coven?” Buffy pressed. “They have great power, don’t they?”

“Not as much as Willow,” Xander answered for him, and the young man wasn’t letting his pride in his friend overwhelm his judgement, he was absolutely right.

“What Willow did - when she absorbed all that magic from those books, that makes her unique. There is no one else in this world with as much power as her. It’s just fortunate for the rest of us that she’s learned to use it for good. For instance, no one should be able to delay the coming of a demonic tribunal, but she’s doing it right now. It falls to the rest of us to come up with a solution.”

Wesley looked at Giles for reassurance and Giles had an uncomfortable image of a trusting Labrador puppy being thrown to a bunch of hungry hyenas.

“He can’t go back there.” Angel’s brown eyes were wide with horror. He also looked at Giles as if only he could come up with a solution, and then evidently seeing the anxiety on Giles’s face, turned to their lawyer. “Gunn…?”

“Either he belonged to you before he went to that place or he belongs to Katorakan now.” Gunn clearly hated saying it as much as they hated hearing it. “Demon law is tricky but it’s also implacable. There isn’t a lot of wriggle room when it comes to human bondage.”

“We fight,” Spike insisted. “We’ve fought before.”

“Yes.” Illyria was already reaching for an axe. “We will destroy any who attempt to take Wesley from us.”

Gunn shook his head. “We’ve been through this and it won’t work. Demon courts can appear or reappear wherever they like. I doubt the judges are even going to be here in any kind of physical form. If they make their judgement then Wesley’s freedom is forfeit and he’ll be handed over to Katorakan however we try to stop it. I’ll just make the same argument we made before. Tell them Wesley pledged his loyalty to Angel, reaffirmed it in a blood oath, and Angel claims him as his property.” He winced apologetically at Wesley. “Wes, I know it sounds bad, but it’s the only reason you’re still here.”

“I know.” Wesley looked across at Angel. “Giles told me about it.”

“And do you understand it?” Gunn pressed.

Wesley looked mildly affronted. “I lost some of my memories, I know, but I don’t think I actually dropped that many IQ points in the process. I understand. If I hadn’t been deemed Angel’s legal property by the court the last time I would have been taken back to that hell dimension. Why do you think the appeal is likely to overturn the verdict of the court?”

“I’m not sure.” Gunn ran a hand over his shaved head. “I just have a bad feeling about this. Last time the proof came from you - you believed you belonged to Angel. This time…”

“I don’t.” Wesley looked across at Angel who sighed and looked tragic. Giles wondered if the vampire had the patent on tragic expressions.

“Angel was going to have you… The courts told Angel he should get you… Kind of a demon law identity chip, you know…”

“Branded with his mark of ownership,” Wesley said it calmly. “Giles told me about that too. Apparently I agreed to it.”

Angel grimaced. “I know it sounds bad, Wes, but…”

“Actually it sounds pretty sensible to me.”

Giles looked at Wesley in surprise and saw that they were all doing the same thing. Lorne put his head on one side. “Sweetpea, are you…?”

Wesley took a deep breath. “I don’t want to go back to a hell dimension and be…demon food. I want to stay here and…not be demon food.”

Giles said quietly, “Wesley, what are you saying?”

“The version of me I was before knew Angel better than I do. He thought it was a good idea. Of course, he seemed to be clinically insane. However, one thing I do have to agree with him about is that the kind of friend who will dive into a hell dimension to try to save you, when he’s already suffered in a hell dimension for a hundred years, is not the kind of friend that comes along every day. But I can’t say I - as a Watcher - exactly relish the prospect of giving over my legal ownership to a vampire, albeit one with a soul.” Wesley looked at Connor. “You’re his son, what do you think?”

“I think you can trust Angel.” Connor answered without hesitation. He looked across at his father. “I do.”

“Even though he stole your memories? Changed reality?”

“Because of those things too. Because he makes mistakes and he’s sometimes really immature for someone who’s had a bicentennial but he wants to do what’s right and he wants to keep the people he loves safe; even if it means giving them up.”

“Yes, I got that loud and clear.” Wesley looked across at Angel and took a deep breath. “Angel, I’ve been thinking about what you and everyone else has said, and I think you’re wrong. I think if I get my memories back I’ll be insane or I won’t, but I’ll be me. I think I’ve been cowardly about avoiding my past and I think most of the advice you’ve given me since I woke up has been faulty. I also think I’m probably more glad than not that I met you. Perhaps if and when I get my memories back - presuming I’m not being used as a demon barbecue instead - I’ll let you know.”

“This is very touching,” Giles said, “but we do have the small problem of you becoming the subject of a probably very ugly custody battle in the next thirty minutes.”

“I’ll make the case. Cite some precedents I can relate…” Gunn broke off as Wesley shook his head.

“They told Angel if he didn’t get me branded with his mark of ownership they were going to take it amiss, didn’t they?”

Gunn sighed. “Yeah, that was pretty much it.”

Wesley shrugged. “Then we’d better get on with it.”

Giles said hurriedly, “Wesley, you do realize that if you do this you will be conferring certain…rights of ownership to Angel that cannot be rescinded?”

“They’re not conjugal rights, are they?” Wesley looked across at Angel.

The vampire grimaced and everyone exchanged awkward glances.

“They are?” Spike demanded.

Gunn looked uncomfortable. “It’s demon law, Spike. It makes Wesley his property to do with…as he likes. Kind of like marriage before women had any rights, you know.” Everyone evidently did as Giles saw that he wasn’t the only one pulling a face at the prospect.

“And Angelus presumably? Wes would be his property too?” Spike rolled his eyes. “Find another way.”

“There isn’t one that I know of,” Gunn admitted.

Angel gazed at the Watcher. “You’re going to have to trust me, Wes. And - you don’t know me, I know - but I promise you I won’t - I would never…”

“But Angelus could and will.” Giles regarded Wesley levelly. “I’m not minimizing the gravity of your current situation, but as Spike has pointed out you will technically belong to Angelus should he re-emerge.”

“So?” Connor put in. “It’s not as if Angelus only…exercises his conjugal rights with people who belong to him, is it? Didn’t he pretty much exercise his conjugal rights with anyone who didn’t run away fast enough for about a hundred and fifty years? So, what difference does it make if Wesley legally belongs to him or not? He can’t kill Angelus anyway. The guy tried to choke him half to death just for the fun of it and Wesley was still all fired up to capture him alive. He let the guy throw him off some scaffolding rather than blow his head off.”

Wesley looked embarrassed. “Oh dear.”

“You’re a good friend, Wes,” Angel reassured him.

“And you’re a bit of a doormat,” Spike added helpfully.

“Not helping,” Buffy told him.

Wesley looked across at Gunn. “We were friends, yes?”

“Yes.”

“And you know my legal situation better than anyone else?”

“Yes.”

“Well, as my lawyer what do you advise me to do?”

Gunn looked across at Angel, sighed, said, “I can’t believe I’m saying this but… I think you should trust Angel.”

Wesley nodded. “Thank you.” He turned to Lorne. “And you’re my spiritual adviser. The one who wants me to find my true path again. What do you think I should do?”

Lorne also glanced across at Angel, took a sip of his drink and then conceded the point. “Given my current state of semi-disillusionment with the prominent browed one, I’m also a little shocked at myself, but I have to say that I agree with Gunn. I have very little faith in Angel’s judgement these days, but I do have every confidence that he loves you. Of course, he loved you when he tried to suffocate you with a pillow and when he stole your memories so you may not think that’s worth a lot but…”

Wesley only nodded and turned to Giles. His expression had been calm when he looked at the other two but in turning to Giles there was a flicker of the fear he was feeling, the desperate need for advice, guidance, help, and, perhaps, affirmation and praise from someone who was probably as close to being a father figure in this situation as he was likely to get.

Angel looked across at Giles and his face fell. He clearly thought there was no way that Giles was going to advise Wesley to trust him and didn’t even blame him for it. “Are there any dimensions where demon law doesn’t apply?” he asked Gunn. “Somewhere we could portal Wes too until we can find another loophole or…”

“Giles…?” Wesley gazed at the man intently. “What do you think I should do?”

Giles met his gaze calmly. He still had doubts - and everyone in the room except Wesley knew just how little he liked this solution to the problem - but he was careful to keep them from his face. “The question, Wesley, is what do you think you should do?”

“I think I should trust Angel,” Wesley answered so quickly that Angel positively gasped, despite not needing to breathe. “It feels natural to trust him. It feels safe trusting him.”

Giles smiled at him gently. “Well, then I think you should trust your own judgement. I, for one, have every faith in it.”

Spike got to his feet, tossing a cigarette onto the floor and treading on it. “So has anyone mentioned to Wesley in all this affirmation and bonding that it’s going to hurt like hell?”

“I know.” Wesley began to take off his jacket.

“You do?” Angel looked at him in confusion.

“I was researching it. The other me - the me I was before. The book was still open in the bedroom. I retrieved it a few days ago after Giles told me… I thought I should know what I had been so willing to let myself in for. Given how much it looked as if it was going to hurt I figured I must have trusted you a lot.”

“You did.” Angel gazed at him, obviously moved.

“Yes, well, I was naked in bed with you, for a start, that suggests a high level of either trust or infatuation and I’d rather think it was trust - just for the sake of my self respect.” Wesley led the way into the hotel lobby while the others followed him.

Giles lingered behind to look at Willow. She was clutching the chair on which she was sitting, face set, pale, sweat beading her brow. “Is there anything I can…?”

Willow looked up at him, and although he knew that she was a witch of incredible power, she still looked so very much like the little girl he had first met in the school library that his heart turned over with a mixture of love and concern for her. She managed a wan smile. “It would be nice if it didn’t take too long.”

Giles nodded. “We’ll be quick.”

Buffy squeezed Willow’s shoulder gently and said rapidly to Giles, “What does this ritual thing…? You know…? Does Wesley have to be naked?”

“Please god, I hope not,” Xander murmured. He pressed a kiss into Willow’s hair and said, “Do you want me to stay?”

She shook her head. “Just - try to make Wesley safe.”

“Only the area of his body that is going to be…marked needs to be unclothed, so, no, I see no need for nudity.”

Buffy grimaced. “That sucks.”

Xander glanced at her. “Can we not talk about sucking in conjunction with Wesley being naked in front of me?”

“Still trying to hang onto those tattered remnants of heterosexuality?” she said sympathetically.

“Probably an exercise in futility in the present company but I’m still giving it the good old college try.”

“Given that all the women you’ve dated have been demonic fiends of some kind or Cordelia, I’d kind of think you’d want to just bow to the inevitable and set up home with Spike.” Buffy patted him gently on the shoulder. “Or there’s Andrew. He has such a crush.”

“Wow, a choice between listening to Spike talk about his old kills or Andrew telling me everything - and I do mean everything - about 'Star Wars'. Who could ask for more? I’ll ask Willow to gay me up the second she’s finished holding off that mystical demon court.”

“Before you do that, Xander,” Wesley observed to him coolly, “Would you mind fetching the book that’s in my room?”

“If it means I don’t have to watch you taking your shirt off? Gladly.”

Spike and Illyria were circling Wesley curiously. The vampire put his head on one side. “So, where do you want it - out of sight or easily accessible? I mean, do you want to have to explain to every bird you meet that you’re actually the property of Broodypants now or would you rather wait until she’s really intimate with you and hope that if she’s got that far she’s not going to be put off by a little old tattoo on your ass?”

“It’s not a tattoo,” Wesley told him. “It’s a brand - a mystical and painful one. And I’d like it somewhere on my upper body, thank you, and nowhere that I need to…sit on. I’d also like a drink of something alcoholic, if you would be so kind. About 40% proof sounds about right.”

“Most sensible thing you’ve said all day.” Spike went to get a bottle of whisky from the private store he was guarding so jealously from everyone else.

Illyria put her head on one side speculatively. “It would be more seemly if Wesley were made my property. I outrank the vampire in every way.”

Angel opened his mouth to tell her what he thought of that plan and then turned to Wesley. “Your choice.”

“Doesn’t fly legally,” Gunn said at once. “Katorakan is appealing the decision the court made about Wes being Angel’s property. We’re trying to prove the court’s decision was the right one, not that Angel has sold him on to Illyria.”

As Illyria came as close to flouncing as Giles thought it possible for an Old One to do, tossing her blue hair back petulantly, Wesley looked a little plaintively at Angel who said hurriedly, “I wouldn’t do that. Sell you. Ever.”

“I’d get that in writing if I were you, mate.” Spike handed him a bottle of scotch. “There you go, Bruichladdich full strength. That’s about 57% proof. A few gulps of that and you’re not going to be feeling anything except possibly how cold the floor is when you keel over on it.”

Xander came down the stairs and handed the book to Giles. “Looks nasty,” he murmured, pointing to the illustration.

Giles grimaced. “Well, these old woodcuts were often rather… Do we even have these ingredients?” The illustration did indeed look both nasty and disturbingly homo-sadistic. Clearly these old woodcutters needed to get out more, or possibly got out rather too often.

Wesley nodded. “I must have asked Willow to get them for me. They were under the bed next to the book. Sorry, Xander I should probably have…”

“That’s okay.” Xander shuddered at the illustration in the book then gave Wesley a reassuring smile. “No problem at all. I’ll just go and get them.”

Angel looked at Xander in confusion and then worriedly came over to look at the book. He gazed at the illustration and then recoiled. “We can’t…”

“Angel, it’s just a brand,” Wesley told him quickly.

“Burnt into your skin.”

“Kind of what a brand is, cheese scone,” Lorne pointed out.

Wesley unbuttoned his shirt and then looked around for a chair to hang it on. Connor took it from him gently, saying, “You’re doing the right thing, Wesley.”

Wesley’s shoulder blades were painfully visible, as was his scar tissue, but Giles noticed that Buffy was eyeing Wesley’s leanly muscled torso appreciatively. He nudged her reproachfully and she did have the grace to look a little guilty. “I was only looking,” she muttered defensively.

“Could you do the right thing a little more quickly?” Willow called from the next room.

“We’re doing this as fast as we can, Will, I swear,” Buffy called back. She looked at the picture in the book and then pulled a face at Giles. “Icky.”

“I’m sure it doesn’t look so bad when the one being branded is…willing.” Giles looked at the bound figure in the woodcut, all twisting spine and screaming mouth, and hoped that it wasn’t quite as painful as it looked there.

Lorne was already busy mixing something with a mortar and pestle from his own stash of ingredients. “This is going to take the sting right out of it, sugarplum,” he promised Wesley.

Gunn said, “Can I not watch?”

Angel looked at him in confusion. “Aren’t you going to do it?”

“Are you kidding me?”

“Well, you’re the lawyer. Don’t you have to make sure it’s done…legally?”

“I’m not doing it.” Gunn stepped back and put his hands behind his back. “There are some things I don’t do to my friends when I’m sober. One of them we don’t need to talk about and the other one is branding painful mystical symbols into their flesh.”

“I thought Angel would do it.” Wesley looked at him in confusion. “Don’t you have to be the one to do it?”

Angel backed up so fast he stumbled and landed hard on the banquette. “Me? No! I’m not… I can’t… Anyway - Giles should do it. He’s the one with the magical skills.”

With a sinking feeling, Giles saw everyone turn to him with expressions of relief on their faces, and a muted chorus of agreement. Quickly scanning the spell for a get out clause, he felt the relief wash over him. “Sorry, Angel. It does have to be you. You’re branding him as your property.”

“Or I could have sold him to Illyria.” Angel darted a look at the Old One. “She’d take good care of him. And if she claimed her conjugal rights, I mean, would it really hurt…?”

“You’re pathetic,” Spike told him. “And what are you being so squeamish about anyway? You used to burn your name into people for fun.”

“And that would be why I don’t enjoy doing it now,” Angel told him through gritted teeth.

Wesley looked at him in disbelief. “Angel, what did you think this ceremony would entail?”

“I thought Lorne and Gunn could take you off to some magical tattoo store and then you’d come back with it on you and I wouldn’t have to watch it.”

“How can you be such a wuss?” Buffy demanded. “You used to eat babies.”

“But I don’t any more.” Angel darted a look at Connor.

“Could somebody please claim Wesley as his legally binding property?” Willow called from the office. “I can’t hold them for very much longer.”

Spike plucked the book from Giles. “Okay, enough pissing about already. I’ll do it.”

That was the impetus Angel needed, who immediately snatched the book from Spike and took a deep breath. “I’ll do it.” He turned to Giles plaintively. “What do I do?”

Spike smirked at Gunn behind Angel’s back. “He’s so easy sometimes.”

Giles held the Vessel of Ithinios - a rather tatty looking old cup of dubious provenance in his opinion - into which Angel had to drop the ingredients that Xander handed to him from the bag.

“What’s with all the nails?” Xander enquired. “You’ve got half a hardware store in here.”

“They’re the iron from which the mystical…” Seeing Angel’s expression, Wesley said, “Um…object is going to be forged.”

Giles tried not to be distracted by Illyria pacing the room in agitation, murmuring to herself that it made no sense that she, a god king of the universe, should be troubled by a trifling injury to one so far beneath her. But the way she jerked her head round to gaze at Angel, hissing: “Why is the half-breed taking so long?” suggested those human emotions were still giving her a problem.

Spike was standing by with the bottle of whisky in the manner of a trainer with a towel outside a boxing ring, while Lorne was murmuring a quiet incantation over his own little after-branding ointment. Gunn had cravenly retreated to the office door where he could watch from as safe a distance as possible. Xander was handing over the ingredients as they were needed but looked as if he were regretting not following Gunn’s example, while Buffy was watching with a kind of fascinated horror.

Angel solemnly dropped in the nails - while Giles held the book under his nose so he could read the incantation from it as he did so - then added the various ingredients from their incongruously price-tagged clear plastic bags. Giles couldn’t help thinking that he and Anya had packaged their own eye of newt in a way that was considerably more in keeping with the solemnity of ancient magical rituals. These people had actually used dayglo orange price labels. That was just tacky.

“Is this one the sage or the deadly nightshade?” Xander enquired.

“Taste it and see,” Spike suggested.

Giles plucked the belladonna from Xander and handed it to Angel, before pointing wordlessly to the verse he was now supposed to be reading.

“You’re doing fine, Angel,” Wesley told him in a tone more appropriate to encouraging one’s first born to take his first unaided baby steps.

Angel snatched a breath he didn’t need, shook some belladonna into the cup and read the next line in a jerky toneless voice. Giles just hoped the mystical powers to which this invocation was being made weren’t too fussy about the performance skills of their magical practitioners.

Giles handed him the sage and pointed to the next line. Angel shook the sage into the cup, darted Wesley an agonized look, received an encouraging pat from Buffy, dutifully dropped a pinch of demon mercury onto the mix and then looked around for help.

“Your blood, Angel,” Wesley reminded him.

“Oh yes.” Angel hastily took the knife Buffy held out to him and slashed his palm, letting six drops of his blood sizzle onto the mix. He spoke aloud the incantation and immediately a flash of purple flame enveloped the ingredients. Giles thought, not for the first time, that the Latin constructions used by some of these ancient necromancers really were appalling, and wondered why they hadn’t just stuck to English. However, on looking into the bowl they all saw the ring that was in the place where the herbs and nails had so recently been.

“You have to do it quickly, Angel,” Wesley warned him. He turned around and knelt on the banquette, gripping the back of it tightly.

“Here, mate.” Spike held the whisky bottle to Wesley’s lips and the man gratefully gulped down two mouthfuls. Spike withdrew the bottle and looked at Angel. “Well, come on…”

“Angel…” Buffy nudged him hard. “Not wanting to sound all Nike here, but just do it.”

Angel grabbed the ring, slipping it onto his finger and turning to Wesley purposefully. At the sight of his bare back, he faltered again and Buffy nudged him again. “Quickly!”

Gritting his teeth, Angel pressed the ring into Wesley’s right shoulder. Wesley tried very hard to stifle his gasp of pain but Giles saw his knuckles whiten on the banquette as the ring burned its way into his skin. Giles could smell as well as hear his flesh sizzling and entirely sympathized with the way Xander had gone abruptly green around the gills. Even from his safe distance, Gunn grimaced in sympathy, while Lorne was hovering nearby anxiously. Then abruptly the ring dissolved into Wesley’s skin and Angel stepped back clumsily, saying, “Wes? Are you okay?”

There was a moment’s silence before Wesley unclenched his teeth enough to say, “Peachy.” He grabbed the whisky bottle from Spike and drank deeply before thrusting it back into his hand and gingerly straightening up, wincing as he did so. “Well, let’s never do that again.”

“I’m sorry, I…” Angel looked at him plaintively. “I didn’t want to.”

Giles peered at the brand on Wesley’s shoulder, disconcerted by its neatness. It involved some mystic sign that he didn’t recognize, a feathered detail from Angel’s own tattoo, and an ‘A’ in a vaguely Celtic style, all in an area the size of a two pound coin. “It’s surprisingly tasteful,” he assured Wesley.

Spike also looked at it curiously. “Yeah. Could have been worse. It’s not ‘Angel wuz here’ or anything.”

“It’s actually kind of pretty,” Buffy said. “In a - demonic brand of ownership kind of way.”

Wesley looked over his shoulder at Spike. “Can I…?” Spike handed over the bottle and Wesley took another deep swig before handing it back. “Lorne, did you say you had a…?”

“Right here, crumpet.” Lorne gently pressed down on Wesley’s head so he bent over again and tipped some of the purplish liquid in his mortar onto the mark.

Wesley gasped and Spike quickly gave him the whisky bottle again. “Hang onto it, I would.”

When Giles looked around, Gunn was edging forward anxiously. “Is he…?”

“He’s fine,” Giles assured him.

“No thanks to the vampire!” Illyria strode over, darted a quick look at Wesley’s shoulder and then hastily averted her eyes.

“All thanks to the vampire, Illyria.” Wesley looked around for Gunn. “Is this enough? Does this make me Angel’s property in a way that can’t be disputed?”

Gunn edged forward another couple of paces. “That was… I can’t take too much of that…”

“It’s just a legal procedure,” Wesley pointed out reasonably.

“A totally pervy one!” Xander countered. “We all saw the bending over, and the burning, and the holding down and the squirming, right?” Noticing that everyone was looking at him in confusion, he said, “I’ll just…check up on Willow.”

Gunn darted the briefest glance at Wesley’s shoulder and then grimaced and looked away. Angel rolled his eyes. “I had to do it and now you can’t even look at it? You’re the legal expert. Tell me if it’s…legal.”

Gunn risked another look, pulled a face and then said. “Okay, Wesley’s legal. I mean - legally yours. I mean - can we not go there?”

“Great legal expert you turned out to be,” Spike told him. “Lorne? Is it kosher? Or is Angel just going to have to do the Watcher right here?”

Lorne dabbed carefully around the brand. “It looks perfect to me.” He reached out and patted Angel gently on the shoulder. “You did good. Now perhaps you’d like to sit down before you throw up or pass out as I never think that’s a good look for a dark avenger.”

“Here you go, Dad.” Connor gently led him to the banquette so he could sit down next to Wesley. “Put your head between your knees. Although if you really want to faint like a girly would you mind cutting your head so I can practise my stitching?”

At the sight of Connor’s unrepressed grin, Angel straightened up, saying with some dignity, “There will be no fainting like a girly.”

He and Wesley looked at one another and Wesley handed him the whisky bottle. “Thank you.”

Angel drank deeply and then handed it back. “You’re welcome.”

Wesley took another swig. “Let’s not go to any more hell dimensions.”

“Good idea.” Angel took the bottle from him again.

“That’s fifty dollars a bottle,” Spike pointed out.

“Bill me,” Angel told him, drinking deeply. “And then bite me.”

“You’re not even savouring it! You’re drinking it like it’s blended. Wesley, tell him to savour it. Or someone give the philistine a bottle of Bells. How about some blood? I’ll get you some blood.”

As Spike almost sprinted in the direction of the refrigerator, Angel handed the bottle back to Wesley. “This isn’t bad. Kind of mossy. Which kind is it again?”

“It’s from Islay.”

“I’ve been there. Did the Western Isles tour with Darla. Everyone tasted peaty and kind of salty. Made me thirsty.”

Wesley took another drink and then looked up at everyone who was hovering around them. “Oh, thank you all by the way.”

“Here.” Spike thrust a beaker of blood at Angel.

The vampire held onto the whisky bottle and sniffed the blood suspiciously. “It’s cold.”

“If you think I’m microwaving your blood for you, you wanker…” As Angel took another deep and unappreciative gulp of Spike’s single malt, he snatched back the blood. “Fine, just this once I’ll put it in the sodding microwave for you, but you owe me a bottle of Bruichladdich and I’m not settling for anything less than fifteen years old.”

Gunn looked at Wesley in concern. “You doing okay?”

Wesley nodded. “Lorne’s magic potion is taking most of the sting out of it and Spike’s whisky is dealing with the rest. I think we should tell Willow to let them come. Either this has worked or it hasn’t but there’s not really anything left to do now except find out and there’s no point in her exhausting herself any more than she already has.”

Giles hurried to tell her, and found Xander rubbing her back soothingly. She was clearly hanging on by her fingernails, the strain of warding off that court colossal. “It’s done, Willow,” he said gently.

She looked up at him. “I can’t seem to… If I let them through and they take him anyway…”

“They won’t.” As Giles said it he realized that he believed it. “Wesley has found his path again. And he is as much Angel’s Watcher as I am Buffy’s. Not just a calling but a life’s work. It’s a terrifying thought but it’s what we are. What we do.”

Buffy hugged him. “I like what you are. I like what you do. Except the nagging part. You could give that up.”

Giles smiled at her. “I think it’s part of my indefinable charm.”

Willow exhaled and sat back, Xander crouching next to her to steady her. “They’re coming,” she said. Xander took her hand in his and squeezed it gently.

Giles looked across at Angel and Wesley who were still sitting side by side on the banquette passing the whisky bottle back and forth, Gunn, Connor and Lorne clustering around them in concern, Connor peering at the wound with all a teenager and future doctor’s curiosity, Illyria gazing at Wesley with her habitual unblinking intensity, Spike hurrying up with the warm blood in the beaker, telling Angel what a wanker he was and how everyone was thinking it, he was just the only one that said it.

“Let them come,” Giles said. “I don’t believe any court, demon or otherwise, can lay any kind of claim to Wesley now. He’s made his choice. Those are the people and this is the place that he’s chosen.”

Willow sighed regretfully. “And I was hoping you and Wesley would…with the cricket and the umbrellas…”

Giles looked at her in concern. She seemed so disappointed. “What, Willow…?”

She darted a guilty glance at him. “Nothing,” she said hastily. And then the air rippled and crackled as the demon court landed in the lobby of the Hyperion.

***