Impressions

by Doranna Durgin

  It was a connection Khundarr intended to figure out.

  Chapter Seven

  The next evening, three demon hunters stood outside Baskin-Robbins, manfully pretending it wasn’t just a little bit late in the season for after-dark ice-cream cones. Not that Angel would ever have ice cream under the beating sun again, but then he wasn’t sure he’d ever had it that way in the first place. He pondered his memories, trying to identify the first ice cream. All he could remember was the ice cream he’d had with Buffy, that brief day he’d had in the sunlight. The one no one else would ever remember. “What kind did you get?” he asked Gunn, uncertain of the garish colors, and needing something to take his mind off the increasing throb of emotion in the night.

  “Some Shrek thing,” Gunn said, as if it hadn’t been his choice at all. Nice try.

  As often happened, Wesley’s thoughts were off somewhere else entirely. “Cordelia said she thought the joggers and the Terminal Market thing were connected,” he said, taking a quick lick around the edge of his ice-cream cone. His glasses sat a little askew on his nose, and his cheekbone was taking on a fine purple edge—both courtesy of an earlier minor demon encounter. But things had been quiet since then. “I think she’s right.”

  Cordelia herself had spent the day in a haze, still groggy and so far blessedly free of visions; Wesley had checked the meds the clinic had given her the night before and suspected that their long half-life allowed them to interfere with any visions that might be lurking. Angel hoped they lasted a good long time.

  “Connected how?” Gunn said. “Other than the fact that we’re the good guys and we’re kicking demon butt?”

  “But it’s not the kind of demon butt we’d ordinarily find ourselves kicking,” Wesley said, adding a little feeble smile of acknowledgment to the two young women leaving the store as they each gave the trio an odd look. “Didn’t mean to say that so loudly…”

  “I don’t think they heard you,” Angel said. “I think they were looking at the ice cream all over your chin.”

  Wesley fumbled for a napkin. “You might have said—”

  Gunn said flatly, “Demon butt is demon butt.”

  Repairs to his appearance complete, Wesley said, “Not necessarily. You know as well as I that many of these demon clans are highly intermixed with human blood. Some of them even pass for human.”

  Angel thought of Doyle, winced at a loss that still felt sharp. “Yes,” he said. “Some of them do.”

  “And some of them are of little danger, anyway. Little more danger than your average human, that is.”

  “Your point being?” Gunn, still patently unconvinced, balled up his napkin and tossed it into a trash receptacle with absent pinpoint accuracy.

  “That’s who we’ve been fighting these past few days! The kind of demons we ordinarily wouldn’t encounter.”

  A fleeting echo of his own earlier thoughts passed through Angel’s mind…how the Slith demon might be feeling the same thing that he himself struggled with…how the normally mild creature would be less equipped to deal with such intensities. He didn’t want to say it out loud, not if the result was the kind of distrustful looks he’d endured from his friends since they’d marginally accepted him back into the gang. More than marginal, now, but he had the feeling it wouldn’t take much to change that.

  Except one never knew what tidbit of information would prove to be the key. This tidbit, maybe. Resigned to discussing it—revealing it—Angel opened his mouth—

  “I don’t buy it,” Gunn said, gesturing with his Shrek cone. “What about the Miquot? Damned thing grows its own knives from its arms, Wes. Don’t tell me it’s the shy wallflower type.”

  “No…,” Wesley said slowly, and Gunn raised an eyebrow, one that meant see? Undeterred, Wesley said, “But its behavior was still entirely out of character.”

  “Unless those joggers were a lot more than they seemed,” Angel agreed. Another time. He’d find another time to tell the others about the dreams. About how he’d had a hard time coming back from vamp-state the day before.

  Maybe.

  Or maybe he wouldn’t have to. Maybe they’d sort this thing out without a true confessions scene.

  Wesley shook his head, oblivious to Angel’s inner dialogue. “A background check revealed nothing.”

  They both looked at him in surprise. He shrugged slightly. “I had time today. I was being thorough.”

  “You were being anal-retentive,” Gunn said, but his voice had taken on a more thoughtful tone.

  A trio of girls on skates zipped by, giggling as if by mutual accord. The ice-cream slurping manly men paused the conversation to watch.

  “We ought to get back to the streets,” Gunn said, still watching.

  “I’d like to point out that we are on the street,” Wesley said, also watching. Fumbling without looking, he threw his ice-cream-smeared paper napkin away.

  “Good thing Cordelia’s not here,” Angel said, with less watching than the others, and more imagining of Cordelia’s disdain. More distraction by…whatever-it-was.

  “What?” Gunn snorted. “Like she doesn’t do her share of ogling? She just uses her magazines.”

  “What is it about that?” Angel asked, thinking not of Cordelia at all—but of the false Angel. “Does she really admire those people, that life?”

  Wesley turned to look at him with some surprise. “Not as much as she thinks she does, I imagine. Naturally that lifestyle has a certain allure to it…but when push comes to shove, she’s got a good head on her shoulders.”

  “Yeah,” Gunn said. “She knows what’s important.”

  Angel said, “What?”

  As one, they turned looks of suspicion on him.

  “Hey,” he said. “It’s just a question. A fair question. What you admire in people…who you admire.”

  “Ah,” Wesley said. “Having trouble with what she said about that fellow who’s imitating you?”

  “Don’t go looking for any deep meaning,” Angel said, which they all knew meant yes. “Just answer the question. Who do you admire?”

  They looked at him a moment. Then Gunn said, “Lots of people. Like people from my neighborhood who work to make it better. Annie, for one. She makes some bad choices—like that whole Wolfram and Hart fund-raiser thing—but she has heart. She walks her talk.”

  Angel raised an eyebrow at Wesley, who said, “My turn, is it? All right then. Barney Clark.”

  Gunn said, “Who?”

  “The first man to have an artificial heart,” Wesley said. “He knew it wouldn’t save him. But he was going to die, anyway, so he did it for all the people who would be helped by it, not for himself.”

  Angel considered them for a moment, while as if by unspoken agreement they left the Baskin-Robbins storefront and headed back to the dark corner where they’d stashed their weapons. Angel shook his head. “This fake me…it’s just not right. He’s either got the wrong guy, or he’s imitating me for all the wrong reasons.”

  “So?” Gunn said easily. “You’ll find him and you’ll stop him. The end.”

  More understanding, Wesley said quietly, “This young man may know nothing of your history. He may simply admire what he sees today.”

  “Who I was and who I am…those aren’t two separate things,” Angel said.

  “I know that,” Wesley said, still quiet, still understanding. “But he may not.”

  Angel glanced at Gunn. “I guess I’ll find him and I’ll stop him. Then he’ll know.”

  Behind a garbage bin, beside an alley squatter, they collected their weapons. Not things to carry on the street…not when the street was still full of light and people. They tipped the alley squatter for watching the weapons—well, mainly for not rushing out to sell them—and headed toward downtown. “Maybe we should split up,” Wesley suggested, even as his phone rang.

  He answered it, listened for a moment, and then moved the phone away from his mouth to murmur an aside to Gunn and Angel. “It’s Cordelia,” he s
aid. “She’s had another—I am listening, Cordelia. You’re sure it was MacArthur Park—? Near the park. The post office?”

  He muttered a few soothing words Angel could have heard if he’d tried; already they were headed back for the GTX. When he finally tucked his phone away, he shook his head. “This is taking quite a toll on her,” he said. “Whatever’s inspiring this rash of visions, we’d better figure it out fast.”

  “What’re the goods on this one?” Gunn asked, casually hopping over the side of the convertible and into the backseat.

  “She says it’s the guy with the bowling ball bag—and another of our unidentified demons. Or rather, that it will be. I’m not sure how much time we have.”

  “We’ll get there,” Angel said grimly enough to draw a look from Wesley—but only until he accelerated away from the curb, leaving Gunn to whoop in a sarcastic-sounding tone and Wesley to clutch the door frame as he sank back into the seat. Down South Alvarado they went, until they hit Seventh and took a sharp turn, the outside wheels definitely light on the ground. A quick couple of blocks and they rolled into the empty parking lot near the post office, parking slantways across three spaces.

  “Officer Friendly wouldn’t approve,” Gunn said sternly, jumping out of the car.

  “Officer Friendly seems to be missing this party,” Angel said, barely paying attention as he went into hunting mode—listening with the full scope of his hearing, fully attuned to the noises of the night. The ones that belonged, he ignored…and the ones that didn’t…

  …Like that harsh if distant scuff of shoe leather against asphalt…

  “This way,” he said, voice low, already moving. Heading between two close-set buildings, spilling out onto Bonnie Brae…he hesitated, heard a muffled word, and lit into full run, curving back into the next alley down and feeling himself go fang-face in the process. Not caring. Barging full speed between the two creatures scuffling in the alley and turning back on them with no plan at all—and not caring. Behind him—far behind him—Wesley shouted something. Something temperate, no doubt, something wise and restrained.

  Not caring.

  Just for once to feel again the unrestricted swell of strength and freedom and the power that was his. Uncontrolled…magnificent fury. Two beings were on the ground before him, each struggling to regain his feet. One a human, carrying a heavy leather bag…it should have meant something to him. The other not human, waving an extra appendage around as it attempted to regain its balance—and that should have meant something to him too.

  It didn’t.

  He knew only that he wanted to kill them both…and that he could. But…

  Heeding some tiny voice of sanity, he turned on the creature. Fellow demon. The thing roared something at him, met him in mid-charge; for a moment, they grappled like football players.

  The creature’s neck was thick and stumpy…well-muscled.

  Angel broke it.

  The human was nowhere to be seen. Angel took a step toward the back of the alley, casting his gaze along the roof tops. A scent on the breeze…familiar blood. He thought he saw a glimpse of dark, spiky hair, just visible as someone peered over the roof; he heard a definite swish of leather. A familiar noise to someone who so often wore a leather duster himself.

  “Angel!”

  That was Wesley…coming to a stop in the alley behind him. Annoyed, and about to demand an explanation.

  Anger swelled—

  No. Wesley was his friend. Gunn…Gunn didn’t want to be his friend, but he was a colleague. Angel closed his eyes, fought to find his center—the eye of calm in his personal hurricane. That calm which tucked his demon aspects safely away once again, so he could turn and face Wesley and Gunn without triggering wary suspicion.

  “What happened?” Wesley said, breathless from his futile attempt to keep up.

  “Angel hogged all the fun, that’s what happened,” Gunn said, coming to a stop on the other side of Angel, looking up to see whatever it was that had held Angel’s attention.

  Wesley scanned the alley, found nothing, returned his frowning gaze to Angel. “What was that it said…er, roared?”

  Angel shrugged. “Nothing in any language I speak,” he said. “Does it matter?”

  “One never knows.” Wesley glanced at Gunn, his frown turning to more of a puzzled expression as he sniffed the air. “Do you smell…it seems familiar…”

  “Oh yeah,” Angel said. “Watch where you step.”

  Gunn glanced down, jumping aside. “Hold on, isn’t this—”

  “The same substance I cleaned off the hotel floor just a few days ago,” Wesley said dryly. “It would seem that whatever they are, they’re still after the faux Angel’s client—whoever he is. I expect he’s around here somewhere. Or was.”

  “Faux Angel,” Gunn snorted. “I like that.”

  Angel eased down the alley, scouring old asphalt and tufty weeds and broken glass for any small piece of something that might actually mean something. Faux Angel. He didn’t like it at all. And he had to squelch annoyance at what he knew was coming next from Wesley, reminding himself once again that the feeling wasn’t all coming from within.

  It couldn’t be. He couldn’t handle it if this was all him—

  “Was it necessary to kill it?” Wesley said. “It might have led us to our impersonator.”

  “My impersonator,” Angel said. “It was a demon, Wesley. It was attacking someone. I didn’t stop to ask why—I just stopped it. I can’t help it they’re so damn fragile.”

  “I rather doubt that they are,” Wesley said, packing a lot of meaning behind it: You were out of control. “And under the circumstances, I think it’s more important than ever that we try to identify its language, and what it might have said. Especially since”—and he cast Angel another look in the darkness—“we had no chance to get another look at it.”

  Gunn stared off back down the alley. “How about we just take a look at that one?”

  Hardly more than a dark lump in the night that blended against the deep shadows of the building, something moved.

  “It’s over near the remains of the first one,” Wesley murmured—although when he took a step, the dark lump moved sharply, alert and wary.

  “Checking out the demon goo,” Gunn said. “I could circle back behind it—”

  “It won’t be here that long,” Angel said shortly. It was, in fact, making its exit, a slinking retreat along the side of the building. He couldn’t let that happen—it was the time for answers. He deftly appropriated the small but heavy war ax from Wesley’s hand, hefted it—and even as Wesley cried a protest, flung it at the barely discernable figure.

  There was a thunk—not metal sinking into flesh, but blunt weight bouncing off it. A hit, but he’d misjudged the distance, hadn’t compensated with his grip so the weapon rotation would bring it blade first into its target. The demon shouted in pain…and ran.

  Wesley turned on him, no longer restraining his anger. “Are you trying to turn every possible clue into goo? What on earth is the matter with you?”

  “I was trying to stop him, not kill him,” Angel said, emotion thrumming against his soul like the heartbeat he no longer had. Once released, it didn’t ease…didn’t ebb into the night as it should have. No respite here.

  Gunn ran to where the demon had been, grabbing up the ax. “Doesn’t look like you did either. I’ll tell you this much, though—if this particular puddle of demon had one of those odd stone things, it doesn’t have one anymore.”

  “That’s what his companion was after?” Wesley said.

  “If it had anything to be after at all—besides us,” Angel said, and shrugged, so much more casual on the outside than on the in.

  “Well, we can’t ask him, can we?” Wesley said as they went to join Gunn. “We can’t ask either of them.”

  Angel stopped, blocking Wesley’s path. “Let it go, Wesley,” he said softly. Dangerously.

  Wesley met his gaze for that moment, searching it. Looking hard.
Obviously shaken, but not letting it turn him away. Finally he lifted his chin somewhat, the smallest of acknowledgments…and no indication at all if he’d found what he’d been looking for.

  More or less oblivious as he prowled around the entrance to the alley, Gunn said, “Fr’nnglekakggh. I think that’s what he said. You think Lorne might recognize it?”

  Angel said evenly—far too evenly, with too much effort to keep it that way—“Let’s find out.”

  Chapter Eight

  “Fr’nnglekakggh,” Wesley said with evident concentration as he stood by the Caritas bar, fresh off their most recent encounter with the mystery demons. A nearly human bartender—Barbie doll proportions, long and luxurious red hair, skimpy costume, catfish feelers beside a lamprey mouth—slid behind Lorne to make change at the register.

  “I think it was more like fr’nnglekakkkh,” Gunn said, spitting a little in the process and clearly distracted by the skimpy costume.

  Angel listened with half his attention, uneasy in the crowded nightclub. In the background someone onstage warbled a song he hadn’t yet been able to identify. Behind the songbird, customers spilled across the stage, taking what seating they could find.

  Someone jostled him from behind, and he whipped around just shy of fang-face, his glare enough of a warning for anyone.

  “Lighten up, bub,” said the hefty man who’d bumped him. He wore a mechanic’s shirt with the name BIFF embroidered over the pocket and his belly stressing the buttons. The pale blue color played nicely off the lichen-like colors of his skin.