That Lonelier Place | Strung Out in Heaven

It's not exactly a click when everything comes together, when the world makes sense, because the world never truly makes any kind of coherent sense at all. The world is very stubborn and postmodern that way. No, it's more like those perspective pictures of profiles and vases, or smaller pictures that make up another image altogether, like the way you can only see one half of the whole until the other possibility is pointed out to you. The way it only ever looked like a vase until someone pointed out the face on either side.

Or maybe it's more like the subtler version of that trick, more like the old lady's face in the young, like the different interpretations of the craters on the surface of the moon. In Thailand they say there is a monkey sitting before a bowl in the moon. In Indonesia it's a crab. And yet even with the new knowledge all you can see is the familiar Man in the Moon, even with the paradigmatic shift you can only see the old lady, or the young, one image or the other lost to its counterpart. As though two interpretations cannot exist in the same space, not visually, not conceptually. It had to be one way or the other, to put it in its simplest terms. Either Holtz died or Angel would lose his son and Wesley would lose his second chance. The older paradigm defined this action as murder. After the shift, he could only see it as necessary.

He never left the hotel that night, after his great revelation (dare he say "epiphany"?), went about for a time feeling as if his head would come apart at the seams, pain a constant pressure that refused even to throb. Just cloudiness of purpose, and the pain. And if Angel sensed that something was wrong, the excuse of a cold was easy enough to produce. Fred even made him soup. Gunn didn't glare and cast aspersions on his manhood and moral character. But then, he never had in this time line. Not yet.

"Have we been to the ballet?" he asks Angel in a moment of uncertainty, watching the vampire for the least sign of unrequited love, seeing only a quizzical smile and hearing only honest curiosity in "No. Does that sound fun, do you think we should do that?" Angel as out of touch as ever, Wesley smiling helplessly and a little bit lost and only able to nod. Of course. Another thing that hadn't happened yet. It was living in two times, really, the plight of the Connecticut Yankee not quite so as amusing now that he's the one having to keep track of what has and what hasn't happened at this point in history. Retreats to the office until lunch time, ostensibly pouring over his books but unable to concentrate on anything other than the sound of Connor's soft, trusting breaths in the lobby.

And how many times would he have to tell himself it didn't matter before he could believe it. He remembered so clearly what had happened the last time. The first time. But here Angel still smiled at him without a shadow. Here he'd believed that Fred was the answer to his loneliness. So the fact that they would have abandoned him didn't matter. It didn't. He just had to make sure he was good enough this time. Nearly threw away the false prophecy, parchment already crumpling beneath his fingers before he drew a careful breath, spread the crinkling paper across his desk, sat back carefully in the cradling office chair. Ran his fingers across the damning words, thought about framing the damned thing.

"Hey, English."

He looked up at the familiar nickname, smiled reflexively, almost genuinely and Gunn crossed to the desk with a somewhat greasy sack of takeout. "Lunch," Gunn explained, setting the sack where the grease wouldn't harm any of the papers, propping one hip against the desk. Wesley stared up at him blankly for a moment, unable to remember a time when things had been this easy. Gunn began to frown, and Wes shook his head, sitting up quickly and shuffling the scattered research aside to pull the sack closer.

"Thank you," he murmured, opening the sack with a feeling of mild curiosity.

"No problem," Gunn said, showing no signs of moving and in fact settling in a bit more comfortably in his hipshot stance. "You doing okay?" he asked quickly, no more worried about subtlety than Cordy had ever been, really. Wes almost laughed.

"Tired, Charles." He smiled up at his friend, knowing the very real exhaustion would show. "I really will go home after lunch."

"Thought you always said it was 'dinner'," Gunn said pointedly, the final word in an atrocious English accent (and with a sick small jolt Wesley remembered the old ethnic banter, and finally caught in this white lie smiled weakly), still looking concerned enough to pry. "And I'll drive you home if you're not up to the bike, alright?"

"Yes, I," Still had the bike, hadn't bought the SUV yet. "Of course, thank you. I don't think."

"Man, now I know you don't need to be driving." And Gunn was laughing at him, but it wasn't cruel, and Wesley just blinked down at the crumpled taco wrappers, knew Fred had talked them into Mexican again and suddenly it didn't hurt anymore. He couldn't have her, but.

"Charles, I know I've been busy," he began, opening his first taco rather noisily to hide his tension. "But I thought maybe."

"Friday?" Gunn interrupted, and Wes waited for the rejection, waited for his friend to tell him he'd be busy, but Gunn said, "Cool. I still haven't kicked your Bandicoot-loving ass."

Could only close his eyes, try not to make too much of the routine, tried not to show his relief. "That's arse, you heathen," he managed, let Gunn leave on a laugh, let the tacos cool while he sat in closed-eyed solitude, shivering. Finally came to himself with a start, staring down at the taco in his trembling hands. A piece of lettuce fell to the waxed paper, and he took a quick bite.

And it was the simplest thing in the world, really, to suddenly realize that he'd forgotten his Heidegger. All knowledge is interpretation, so of course nothing is fixed. After all, Wolfram & Hart wouldn't expend so much effort on ensuring the coming Apocalypse if it were set in stone, so utterly certain that nothing could go wrong. Something could always go wrong. He would simply have to make sure that something did.

The taco wrapper was crumpled into a compact ball and tossed into the sack, the other tacos ignored and he stumbled off in search of Angel, certain that if he could just talk to the vampire, plan a course of action, everything would be okay.

"Hey, Wes," Gunn calls out, sounding almost disconcerted but then Wesley had left his office rarely enough in the past few weeks that this would be something of an event. But Wes ignores the call, running up the lefthand stair (Bluebeard's latest wife to the tower) as quickly as he can manage. His hand shakes on the rail. He can hear Fred and Gunn talking, can hear his own name in their lowered tones, but it is only worry.

Everything was easier really if he only knew, held it in his mind that he was mad as a badger. Behave as though sane, keep those squirrelly thoughts to yourself. His approach to Angel's bedroom was equally cautious. Difficult to forget that he would see (soon, now, very soon) the vampire bloody-mouthed over the gently-breathing infant. Unless that was the dream. He had dream-vivid recollections of blood, in any case.

Angel's door was partly open, horror-movie just open enough to signify a cheap Hollywood danger. Safer than locked, of course, and he stepped through, thin-ice carefully though he was feeling rather more clumsy even than usual, disconnected from his body, horrifically alien in a Freudian-Other, all-brain sense. Angel knew none of this. Angel just looked up from Connor's crib and smiled, then frowned a bit once he'd scented the air.

"Hey, Wes, you doing okay?" Quiet concern, and Wesley nodded.

"Yes, of course." Step closer. "I just thought." Blink. Angel was frowning now. "Um. That we should discuss a plan of action, regarding Connor's safety." Blink again, and Angel had settled Connor beneath a blanket and was half a room closer. Wes started, stepped back.

"Wes." It wasn't often like this, Angel's voice. Low, and coaxing. Like Wesley might run. "What's wrong, really?"

"It's nothing, I'm just." Looked down. There were tears in his eyes, he knew. Empty hole in his heart where Fred used to be not helped at all by her continued presence. This Fred had never. "I'm fine."

A broad hand clamped around his arm; Wes looked up into Angel's eyes, and almost amazed to find concern there he swayed a bit. Angel caught hold of him with his other hand as well, watching him carefully as he kept him on his feet.

"Jeez," the vampire muttered. Wes let his eyes drop, his whole body sagging in Angel's grip but then he hadn't expected Angel to actually care for him in any timeline. But "C'mon, take my bed." and strong arms pushed and steered and supported him across the wall to wall carpet, and he let his eyes close, let himself rest for the first time in what felt like forever as Angel pushed him down into freshly-washed sheets. Ah, Wes thought, vampire senses, and then sleep.

He staggered awake out of a dream, nothing clear just a general panicking and error, heart fluttering in his chest like an unresolved murmur. He fought for one breath. Another. Hand at his throat because his dreams didn't understand that that hadn't happened yet. He slumped back against the headboard, feeling more exhausted than when he'd laid down, and saw Angel in his peripheral vision just after the shock would've killed him.

"Hey, Wes," Angel said quietly, trying for soothing no doubt as he moved from his armchair to the edge of the bed. "It was just a dream, yeah? You're okay."

"Yes." Still gasping but he made the effort to control his tone, to try for a smile. "I'm fine."

It seemed a genuine enough act to him, but Angel frowned. "You're not okay, Wes, you've been asleep for almost eighteen hours, you haven't been eating … What the hell is going on?"

"Eighteen hours?" Impossible that sleep wouldn't cure this ache, and he slumped a little further into the pillows. Angel edged forward a bit more, looking if anything even more concerned. "It's okay, Angel. I've just been," Transported back in time, no. Gifted with the Sight, no. Working on, ah yes. "Working on this prophecy, and Cordelia's headaches, so I might be under a bit of stress."

"A bit?" And Angel's hand was suddenly on his knee, heavy but not warm through the blanket. The nightmare still boiling smooth beneath sleep. "You're killing yourself, here. Look, Wes, it'll be okay. You'll see. The prophecy is done with, you took care of that. And Cordy's had the visions for a few years now, she can handle 'em. Hell," And Angel paused, smiling a little. "Her birthday makes the two-year mark, doesn't it?"

"Oh Lord." Wes felt himself sway, felt Angel's hands catch him, keep him upright and on the bed. "When is Cordelia's birthday, how soon?"

"Friday." Angel frowning now, rather fiercely worried as he only got for Connor anymore. "You're supposed to pick up her cake, remember?"

"And what's today?" His voice was faint faraway, just an illusion he knew but a comforting one nonetheless.

"Jeez, Wes, do you need to go to the hospital?" Angel's hands flexing on his arms.

"What day is it?" he repeated, his own hands coming up to clutch Angel's wrists, aware that he was teeth-bared snarling.

"Tuesday." Closed off again, but Wes couldn't care, could only force himself out of the bed, Angel's hands still holding him down and, "Help me, damn you, get me downstairs!" Roaring now, Angel visibly startled and Connor crying in his crib, wailing, Wes swaying on his feet when Angel abandoned him to run to the baby. "Oh God." There was no way in the world to fix this. He was walking toward the door, he could see the corridor but this was the beginning of everything, Cordy's demon side, that was the beginning. Three days. Oh God.

"Shh, c'mon, I've got you." And then Angel was there, one solid arm firm around Wesley's waist, Connor in the crook of his other elbow. Angel steered them all through the door, and Wes looked across Angel's broad chest at the burbling infant. Connor was blue eyes wide awake, staring at him rather solemnly with one hand near his mouth. Wes blinked, helped Angel help him down the stairs. Couldn't let it have happened. Couldn't.

"What's going on?" Gunn, his voice echoing through the lobby. Wesley saw him only blearily, barely tracked his loping run up the stairs to take his other arm. Angel said something, and they helped him to the couch. Connor was staring at him through infant-blue eyes. The color would change as he aged. Fred hovered, Cordelia took his arm and asked him what was wrong. His right hand was still caught in Angel's shirt, his grip hard enough to ache. This would not happen.

"Cordelia." He stopped, looked at her. She was worried about him, she'd always been so careful of him before. He tried for a smile, failed miserably. "There's a problem with your visions."

"What kind of problem?" That was Angel, voice low, somewhat threatening though Wes knew that the vampire was only expressing concern. He still cared. Wes tightened his clutch on Angel's shirt. Everyone else was so quiet.

"Your headaches have been getting worse," he told Cordelia, and not waiting for her denial, "In three days you will have another vision. That vision will force you into a coma-like state. The next will kill you."

"Oh my God," she whispered. Fred edged a bit closer. That's right. She wasn't as comfortable with the group. Cordelia was pale. He couldn't move his right hand, and so caught her wrist with his left.

"We need to find a way to cure the headaches or to repair the damage ("Damage?" Gunn asked, voice sharp.) and we have very little time. Can we reach Giles or Willow?" Deliberately calm voice, he was still the boss, Angel solid and subordinate at his side.

"Um, yeah," Cordy breathed. He kept his gaze steady, determined if not hopeful. "I think Giles stayed in town, after …" She broke off with a glance to Angel, continued. "So, you have a plan?" And her eyes were so hopeful, so bright. "You can fix this?"

"I'm going to try." The words almost wouldn't come. He gentled his hold on her wrist, tried for reassuring if nothing else.

"What can we do?" Angel, carefully not moving because his friend apparently needed the comfort, cradling Connor, now sleeping, in his other arm. Wesley closed his eyes. "Wes?"

"I'll need components, for the spell," he said, staring at the dark behind his eyes.

"Great, get us a list," Gunn said, smile in his voice. Wes shook his head.

"I need to find the spell first." He felt Cordelia jerk, squeezed her wrist. "It would be advisable to contact Giles as soon as possible."

"I'm on it." Her voice was firm. He forced his fingers to let her go. Remembered her lying white against hospital sheets.

"Gunn, maybe pick up some food?" Angel said. Wes didn't see the gesture but knew that Angel was thinking of him. Something warm. "Something healthy."

"Sure thing. Anything you want?" Message apparently received, Gunn's voice as warm as this feeling.

"I'm not very hungry," he tried.

"Soup it is." And Gunn was gone. Fred went with him, as it should be.

"C'mon, let's get you to your office." Angel's hand cold against him, and he found himself staring at Connor again until he was lowered into his leather executive chair. He'd missed this chair. Angel sat down across from him, where the clients usually sat, Connor held protectively as always. "Wes?" Staring down at the false prophecy. "Wes, how did you know?"

"What?"

"About Cordelia?" Very serious, very grave.

"Angel, I." Almost couldn't say it. "Will you trust me?"

"I trust you, Wes." His eyes were very lucid, very clear. Wes flinched away, stared down at aged papyrus.

"Later?" he begged, very aware that he was begging. Finally a broken man. "Can I explain later?"

"Sure, Wes." Angel leaned back, settled himself in the chair to play with Connor's developing motor skills.

Wesley stared at him for a long moment, breathed carefully and wondered why he couldn't see. Angel ignored him very carefully, and Wes blinked his eyes clear, turned to his bookcase.

It was the three-deep structure of texts spread across his desk. Spell-books on top, more obscure works beneath. The large majority of the spells were in Mandarin, pre-Qin dynasty and so in a dozen written dialects. There were a few texts in Hindi, one in an obscure Polynesian-native demon dialect (or anyway the demons were native to Polynesia, though the language itself bore a distinct similarity to Bantu) that he'd never learned, and there must be some connection between these cultures and a desire to become part demon. And then of course Summation texts on negating pain, Turkish spells for repairing the brain damage caused by concussion, various Gypsy causes of and cures for epilepsy.

There were a hundred possibilities. It was difficult to think, to choose. Cordelia interrupted to let them know that Giles was on his way, that Willow would be following as soon as she'd finished something. Gunn returned with a quart of soup from his (Gunn's) favorite deli, set it on top of the three-shelf bookshelf near Wesley's desk. Wes ignored both, dove under his desk for a survey of Etruscan demonology he remembered (twice-over) kicking away from his chair in a late-night fit of pique.

"Hey, boss-man, what's the plan?" Cordelia. Wes paused, grasped the scattered survey and climbed back into his chair. Her arms were crossed, she was glaring. He remembered enough to know these were signs of danger. Angel was watching him, too, calm and steady, Gunn less so at his side. A breath. Back to his spells.

"I need to either cure your vision headaches or turn you into a demon."

"What?!" She spoke in such extreme punctuation. He knew that once.

"I obviously would prefer the former, but anything to ensure your survival." And back into the text. Ignore her dismayed "I don't want to be a demon." Try to calculate the ramifications of either option, every option. Better to cure, obviously. Obviously. Change in brain structure? Change the nature of the visions? Skim a page, turn a page. New book, new language. Cordy was still there, a soft sobbing in the background. Angel as silent comfort. Skim a page, turn a page.

In Arabic and Hebrew the word for uncanny is the same as daemonic. Freud's postulated Other, the double formed first as a means to immortality, then later as a horrifying reflection of the same. Narcissistic though the thought may be, the Uncanny is still the Self. Just a different form, inherently daemonic if the Hebrew are to be believed. So what would literalization matter?

"Wes." Skim a page, turn a page. "Wes!" Angel. Wesley raised an eyebrow, not looking up from the neat rows of characters until Angel's hand blocked most of the paragraph. "Wes, eat your soup."

"Angel," there's no time. Closed his eyes. "Alright."

"Good." Angel sounded amazed that it had been so easy. Wes smiled, grabbed the container. Chicken noodle, Gunn's favorite, stone-cold. He drank it down anyway, fished out a noodle from the congealing broth and went pointedly back to his books. There was no time.

"Wes, goddamnit, would you." And there were broad hands on his arms, pushing him upright in the seat and he was looking into brown eyes in a face thinner than he remembered. He couldn't move his arms, and Angel was angry. Stuff of nightmares. But he didn't flinch, knew better. "Wes, this is important," Angel said to begin the usual speech. "I know it is, but you have to take care of yourself."

"It's never different," Wesley protested, and Angel shook him lightly.

"Yes, it is! This is, look, something is wrong, and you killing yourself isn't going to make it better." And something fierce and lovely in his eyes.

"It might."

"God." Sound of disgust, and Angel turned away, pushing away from him with enough force behind the move to roll his chair back a few paces. Wesley watched his stiff square back, glanced helplessly at another book. "Stop that." Angel hadn't turned around. "I know you're reading. Jesus."

"I have to." It had to be an explanation, was the only one he could give.

"Give me fifteen minutes, eat something real." A concession, if he chose to take it as such.

It was almost too much to deal with, really. Couldn't remember Angel caring this much the first time.

"I don't think I can," he whispered, and he didn't think he was talking about food, but Angel was saying, "Just try some more soup, maybe some crackers, that's all I'm asking." And what else could he do but nod.

Wearily, it was taken as permission, Angel levering him out of his leather executive chair (He'd missed that chair. It still smelled faintly of Angel.) and steering him gently through the doors into the lobby where he was once again deposited on the couch. Beginning to feel like an invalid.

"Now just stay there," Angel said, warily, like he might run. Connor was in his bassinet, apparently watching this action avidly, which answered that question. "I'll be right back with more food, don't try to go anywhere."

He caught Angel's hand, knew that he was a distraction, wondered where everyone else was and what they were doing to help Cordelia. "I'll be here, I promise."

Angel stared at him for a long moment. Wesley stared back, having little other choice though he began to wonder if he'd actually said what he thought he'd said. After a few long moments, something in Angel seemed to relax. He smiled, one of those smiles that lit up his face, the one Cordelia had termed 'goofy', and said, "Good, just, I'll be right back."

And then he practically ran down to the kitchen. Wes watched him go, black leather coat billowing heroically behind him, idly wondered if he'd attempt to slay the food before cooking it. But it was an idle thought. Wes sat quietly, something entirely unaccustomed rising within his comfortably numb chest, and waited.

Time passed, not much, not enough time to heat up a carton of soup. Fred drifted down the stairs, hair still damp, and smiled as she sat beside him on the couch. "How're you doing?" she asked, her manner encouraging. He shrugged, tried for a smile.

"Still tired, I suppose." She'd been like a bird in his arms, all long bones and fine, narrow, light stick-person when she collapsed in a spray of lung-deep blood.

"Well no wonder." Her hair was different, he realized. At some point she would start taking better care for her appearance, would curl and mousse and gel as if enough hair products would replace Cordelia. The memories provided almost a constant double vision. "With you working on prophecies, and this with Cordelia." She was painfully earnest, and he couldn't answer. Couldn't list the things he should have been doing. "Is she going to be okay?"

"I'm working on it," he breathed, missing the damage-induced roughness deep in his throat. She put her hand on his arm, gentle, barely present and barely comforting after the solid weight of Angel's hands. "It'll all be alright," she said.

And then Gunn came downstairs, also damp.

And the front door opened, distracting Gunn's gaze before the suspicion could form.

And Fred snatched her hand away as though she had reason to feel guilt.

"Giles is here!" Cordelia announced (holding open the door like a game show host and smiling as though for a toothpaste commercial), and stepped aside to let the older man step into the building.

Angel reappeared from the kitchen, soup close to boiling in his oblivious grip, to smile apologetically in Giles's direction.

And Gunn was now watching Wesley with something like wariness, unspoken, in his eyes.

First thing wrong.

"Oh bugger," Wes decided.

And the world slid sideways.

"Has this happened often?"

English accent, Surrey, well-educated. Giles had been called.

"How often?" Should Giles sound that surprised? Shocked, really.

And a further-off mumbling, a warm hand on his forehead flattening his eyebrows.

"Did none of you think to take him to hospital? Or to at least check for concussion?"

"He said he was okay," Angel said hesitantly.

"Is something wrong with him?" Fred asked. Gunn didn't say anything.

He decided that he must be awake. Debated not revealing that fact.

"Ooh, ooh, he's awake!" Angel. Well, damn it.

"Wesley?" Giles, that big warm hand slapping the flat of his cheek gently. He opened one eye, grudgingly. "Oh, excellent." The ex-Watcher was smiling. "Have you any idea what's happened to you?"

"Yes," he croaked, then moved to sit up. Giles raised one brow, but didn't force him to remain supine. Once upright the circle of his friends didn't seem so suffocating. "I'll be fine, Mr. Giles, do you know why you're here?"

Giles blinked at the abrupt subject change, nodded. "Cordelia explained the basics after you fell over, Wesley, what the hell is going on here?"

"Hey," Angel said quickly. "We shouldn't badger him," protective instincts fading as quickly as ever, "should we?"

"No, no," Giles acquiesced, for a wonder. "You're right," with a sharp look to Wes. "I'll just go over your notes, then?"

"I'll," he began, struggling to stand.

There was apparently a collective epileptic fit. However it happened, Wesley remained on the couch. He stared up at everyone, ears ringing a bit. Angel's hand firm on his shoulder. Giles's hand warm beneath his left collarbone. "I'll just sit here, then," he said weakly.

Giles smiled at him, Angel squeezed his shoulder gently, handed him the soup. It had cooled enough to drink, barely. Giles shared some sort of look (in an alternate universe he would call it paternally approving) with Angel, and stepped back to leave.

"Giles," Wesley said quickly, "You must understand, we only have until Friday."

"Yes, Wesley, I know." He seemed affable, if confused. "Cordelia was quite thorough in her briefing, actually."

"Yeah," Cordelia muttered. "I told him everything you told us. Visions blah blah headache yadda yadda …"

"She's kidding," Fred broke in quickly. She was smiling, looked a bit nervous. Charles's hand was large on her shoulder. Wesley blinked.

"I've narrowed it down to three or four (Angel's eyes began to brighten with hope.) dozen (And Angel slumped again.) spells on daemonic merging, epileptic cures, etc, but the list needs to be narrowed down," Wes began, but Giles interrupted him with barely-concealed impatience.

"I'll look over your notes," he said firmly. Full-on Watcher voice. Wesley shrank a bit. "You rest, and join me when you aren't ready to faint."

He nodded. Didn't protest the fainting remark. Tried not to see Angel's combined smugness (at getting him to sit still) and chagrin (at not being the one to make him sit still) out of the corner of his eye. Breathed in the steam from the soup. Tomato basil. Someone was learning. He drank quietly, and sat very still for some time, didn't respond as Gunn drew Fred off toward the stairs and Cordelia announced that she intended to help Giles with the filing system. Angel wandered off shortly after she gained entry to the office, moving stealthily to lean over the bassinet and play with Connor's grasping hands, making little cooing noises that had become familiar and less strange at one time.

Giles reemerged from Wesley's office, balancing cup and saucer across to Wesley's seat on the couch. "I made you some tea," he said quietly, taking the empty soup carton and replacing it with long-broken china. Wesley stroked the pattern with his thumb, watching the tea tremble light dancing across the darkened surface in his unsteady hands. Giles was watching the motion as well, eyes still and grave. Still as a grave. Wesley smiled.

"I don't suppose you've gone through my notes," Wesley asked leadingly. Sipped the gently steaming tea, closed his eyes as the warmth spread through him.

"Not yet, no," Giles said, watching him as though waiting for the first crack to appear. As shattered as this cup would be. "Wesley, I know we've never been what you would call friends," he began.

"No," Wesley agreed. The spreading warmth cushioned the reminder.

"However." Giles paused, looked down. "I am aware that something isn't right." Hint of the old scolding voice, librarian to his bones.

"You mean aside from Cordelia's impending death?" Dry as a desert, let a little of the bastard show.

But Giles just looked down, pressed the bridge of his nose beneath the requisite glasses. Wesley paused. Giles looked older, tired. You can't go back again. Not really.

"I can't ask you to trust me," Wes said very softly. "I haven't that right. But it isn't something I can explain just now."

"Like the fact you haven't any research on Cordelia's condition?" Giles snapped, then visibly forced himself to calm down. "I'm not trying to accuse you of anything, Wesley, but how do you know these things? According to your notes you haven't even finished this prophecy Angel says is no longer a problem."

"I stopped taking notes?" he tried. Took another drink of the rapidly-cooling tea. Looked down.

"Wesley." Giles stopped, sighed, looked for a moment as though he might start polishing his glasses. "I do trust you, and I'm aware that you've changed. I won't." Struggled with the words. "I would like an explanation eventually."

"Of course," Wesley agreed easily enough, not meeting the older man's eyes, feeling the pang of a trust already betrayed. "Once there's time," he added pointedly, glancing toward his office.

"Yes, quite." And Giles seemed to give up on something, resettling his glasses with a quick hand and standing easily. He turned away, paused. "I won't forget, Wesley." A warning.

"Neither will I," Wesley whispered. A promise.

Little else to do but think on the still-spinning couch. Angel couldn't take the visions, couldn't see the problem and respond at the same time. Gunn would in a few short years face the same problem as Cordelia, as would Fred. He thought briefly of adding the visions to his own time-addled brain, and began giggling uncontrollably. Angel came and sat beside him, silently, listening to him strangle on the mad laughter and apparently offering silent support.

It wasn't really that funny. Not really. He ran down within a few minutes, sat gasping at Angel's side. The vampire still didn't say anything. Just placed a solid hand on his knee, glanced over at him tentatively. In anyone else he would've said shyly. Wesley tried a smile, failed.

"I'm alright," he whispered. It wasn't true, but Angel didn't question that either, just turned his head to keep an eye on Connor without leaving Wesley. Wes bit his lip, not hard enough to draw blood, and drained the last cold sugar-sludged tea from the cup. Angel's hand squeezed his knee carefully. They were quiet, just the soft sounds of Connor's breaths and Giles rustling papers in Wesley's office. It was too much.

It was like living in some eternal lucid dream, with all its underlying taint of an impending, inevitable end. It was like waiting for a heart attack, a great weight settling down on him until his breaths came in desperate, shallow gasps. His eyes closed, and Angel's hand, heavy but not warm, was the only thing tying him to the real. "Wes?" he heard, and tried to calm himself. Angel's hand moved to his shoulder as though to hold him up, to hold him down. Wesley bit the inside of his cheek until it bled, swallowed the copper down. He was shaking apart, on the inside, where no one would notice. Something was wrong. Giles had been right. Something was wrong.

"Wes? Hey, Wes." Cordelia; her hand was on his cheek, moved to his forehead. Checking for fever. Her hand was warm, hot, something to flinch away from. He pressed further against Angel's thigh, somehow unsurprised to find himself partly in Angel's lap, Angel's hand on his shoulder still holding him together.

"Is he awake?" Cordelia said quietly.

"I can't tell," Angel murmured, squeezing his shoulder carefully, fingers pressing into the tendons.

"I should get Giles." She sounded so concerned.

"Yeah." Angel was patting his shoulder, sort of petting it and Cordelia perched on the edge of the sofa near the curve of his rib cage, taking his right arm and hugging it to her stomach, only then lacing her fingers in with his.

"Angel, what's happening to us?" She sounded terrified now, and her fingers tightened painfully around his hand. "What's wrong with Wes?"

"I don't know." Angel said, openly frustrated. Wes felt a movement like Angel might be shaking his head. "Everything seemed to come as a part of everything else. It's all --"

"Part of the same thing," Cordelia finished for him. "My visions, Connor, Wes getting sick. It's all related, isn't it."

"I think so," Angel allowed, fingers tightening on Wesley's shoulder almost painfully. Wesley managed some small sound of protest, and he squirmed in their hold without much hope of escape. Angel loosened his hold but didn't let go, and Wesley relaxed.

"Is he waking up?" Cordelia asked anxiously, her hand going again to his forehead. Checking for fever, but her hand seemed to hot, like sunlight, and he turned his head towards Angel's cooler belly.

"I don't know, I can't tell."

"Maybe we could ask Lorne."

"Would that help?" Painful to hear the sudden hope.

"Has he fainted again?" Giles, and the office doors shutting softly. "He needs to be in hospital."

"Maybe," Angel muttered, not moving.

"He's not waking up," Cordelia said to Giles. "Maybe we should take him to the hospital." To Angel now, brief fascination that he could tell the difference. "Maybe Giles is right."

Giles was silent, but Wesley could imagine the looks being exchanged.

Sound of the front doors. "Hey, Wes okay?" Gunn's voice, concerned again. Something tight within him unwound a bit.

"Gunn," Angel said, his voice suddenly commanding, playing boss again. "Where's Lorne? He hasn't been home all week."

"He said something about rebuilding his club. Decorators, or something." Gunn's voice sounded a shrug. Careless.

"Get him back here, fast."

"I don't know, man. I'm not exactly his favorite person right now." Gunn shuffled his feet a little, the sound soft on the lobby tiles. "I'm part of the reason that this is his third renovation, ya know?"

"It's for Wes," Angel insisted. "He'll come."

"Yeah." Could almost see Gunn nodding, accepting. "I'm on it." And gone again, quick squeak of his trainers across the lobby and the outer doors slammed behind him.

"Not the hospital?" Cordelia snapped.

"Who's Lorne?" Giles asked. "A mystical healer?"

"Something like that." Angel paused, and Cordelia's hand flexed around his. "I don't think this is physical."

"What are the symptoms?" Giles said, stepping closer.

"He's not waking up. That's a coma," Cordelia said, sarcasm probably covering her concern.

"But he's responsive to pain," Angel said. "It's something else."

"Yes," Giles said distractedly, very close now. And then there was a thumb in his eye, and he was staring blearily at Giles. "Wesley?" Giles asked carefully. Wesley tried to speak, but there was nothing. Giles's thumb released his eyelid, and Giles was saying "I think you're right, this isn't physical, not exactly. If anything, it reminds me of severe magical exhaustion." A pause. "Has Wesley been performing a great many spells, or."

"Not that I know of," Cordelia shrugged.

"No," Angel agreed.

"He's been working really hard," Cordelia tried. "Maybe he's just tired?"

"No. It's something else," Giles said quietly.

"Is there something you can do to, I dunno, snap him out of it?" Angel asked.

Giles made a soft considering noise. "Possibly. But it would be healthier for him to sleep it off. He must've been doing something."

"He," Cordelia began hesitantly. "He knew those things about my headaches getting worse. I didn't tell him. I didn't tell anyone."

"And he was so sure when the next vision would be," Angel said slowly, as though putting something together.

"Is there some kind of spell that could let him see the future?" Cordelia asked.

"Not precisely," Giles said. "Any such spell allows only a glimpse of possibilities. No one has only one possibly future. At most he would see choices."

"But there is a spell," Angel repeated, in that way of clarifying things he was sure would annoy him.

Wes found himself in that place where it was easier to hurt than to move.

"Yes," Giles confirmed wearily. "There is a spell. Had he tried any manner of prescience spell, future-telling, foresight, what have you, it would have taken a great deal of energy. This type of spell deals with time. And time is always difficult, slippery. It takes power, and concentration."

"And if he screwed it up?" Cordelia whispered.

"He'd be dead." Giles sighed. "Obviously he's far more experienced than I recall."

"Or I. Me." Angel stopped, took an impatient breath. "I mean, he didn't build up to this, you know? He's not exactly all double double toil and trouble over here."

"Huh?" Cordelia.

"That is odd," Giles conceded. "There should have been some sign. Unless he is possessed of far more power than we knew. If it had been dormant, and he accessed it somehow …"

And listened to them wend further and further from the truth.

"Maybe we should figure this out some other time," Cordelia said, anger behind the snark. "Right now we should worry about making him better."

Giles sighed. Wesley could sympathize. "Determining what precisely is wrong with him would help us to make him better." The last few words slightly mocking. "But in any case, he does need rest, and I have work to get back to."

"I could take him upstairs," Angel offered. "That'd be easiest."

"Duh," Cordelia, happier now. "Want some help?"

Nah," Angel said, and his arms moved to curl around Wesley's back below his arms and beneath his knees. He was lifted easily. "I got it."

He was conscious of his head cradled against Angel's shoulder, of the flex of powerful muscles smooth-gliding through layers of wool and leather, of Angel holding him close, safe, unnecessary breaths soft against Wesley's hair. Cordelia's heels were loud against the lobby floor, and she was saying something that he heard as though from very far away, her footsteps fading as Angel carried him farther up the stairs.

The front doors opened, and Gunn said to the room at large, "Lorne's on his way, and let me tell you he was not happy to see me."

Angel paused, turned, revealing no strain in continuing to hold Wesley's weight. "Gunn, send him up when he gets here?"

"You got it," Gunn said, closer now but they were already topping the stairs and leaving behind them Cordelia's impatient "Why isn't he here now?" and Gunn's softer answer, only the defensive tone retained.

Didn't particularly remember being laid upon Angel's bed, being folded into the sheets, didn't remember the point at which his mind finally quieted enough to let him rest.

Remembered being shaken awake by gentle hands and a crooning voice, blinking up into devil's eyes and a sickbed smile.

"Rise and shine, muffin," Lorne said, surprisingly subdued in both tone and appearance. Or perhaps not surprisingly so, considering. "Ready to sing for Uncle Lorne?"

He was still blinking the blur from his eyes, didn't respond to the remark though Angel muttered something about that being the sickest thing he'd ever tried to not imagine, just stared up at Lorne and tried to remember if letting the demon know would change anything.

It was a temptation, powerful, to pour out his grief like rotting flesh, all his madness and fear and terrible, terrible knowledge. Felt an old Clapton lyric slip beneath his thoughts, and caught himself staring up at Lorne almost fearfully, eyes too wide, able only to wait for an involuntary disclosure. Could only remember Lorne as a friend, knew he didn't deserve the burden of knowledge. His heart sank, settling hollow inside as Lorne's eyes widened, lips parting, almost like the last time Wesley had accidentally allowed a reading.

Wesley flung up a hand before Lorne could speak, said hoarsely, "Angel, wait outside."

"Wes?"

"Now," he ground out, not looking away from Lorne, that same damn line running even now through his head. Heaven's door, indeed.

Angel shuffled out into the hall, kicked-puppy in a way Wes had seen once too often, shutting the door behind him softly. Wes kept his burning eyes on Lorne, watching the demon read him, watching the growing fear and panic.

"We need to talk," Wesley said very quietly because sometimes the quiet was more frightening than a scream.

"Yeah," Lorne said, dazed. "We sure do." And scooting away from where Wes had levered himself up against the headboard. "What the hell is going on here?"

"I'm from the future," Wes said plainly, and it was a relief, a release, but one unenjoyed as to keep Lorne from running he very quickly said, "You know I'm telling the truth, I can sing if I need to."

"No, that's okay," Lorne snapped, fingers trembling to his left temple. "I think maybe I need a visit to my lady of the sea breeze before you cry me a river."

"Are you alright?" Wes asked, using his client voice, his brooding!Angel voice, soft and coaxing and not at all judgmental.

"No, I'm not alright!" Lorne yelled. "The future? You mean all that, that four horseman shit is going to happen?"

"Not if I can stop it."

"Stop it. You." Lorne shook his head; when he turned back he was calmer, voice almost kind. "Pumpkin, I saw what's coming, and I don't think James Bond could spy a way outta this one."

"But I know what's coming," Wes insisted, leaning forward on shaking arms. "I know what it is and I can find a way to stop it."

"And now I know, too."

"Shouldn't change anything."

"Or I could help." Ignored Wesley's immediate head-shake. "You need help, you need to tell them, marshal the troops, sound the trumpets, send for the cavalry!"

"Too dangerous. I don't want to risk any of you."

"Wesley."

He looked up. Lorne was uncommonly serious, eyes grave with knowing. "What?" he said, voice rough.

"That was exactly the mistake you made last time."

Stopped breathing for a moment.

"That's what you read?" he whispered.

"Yeah, sugar."

Nodded, then. "You're sure?"

"Sure as suicide."

"Alright."

A/N Chapter Title taken from "Ashes to Ashes" by David Bowie. My thanks to Scribblemoose for her work as first-reader and beta.