Angel must have returned. Wesley’s first awareness came with a deep voice and a room temperature hand on his brow. Wesley let his mouth fall open and then closed, smacked his lips like a sleeping child. His eyes wouldn’t open. There really didn’t seem to be another means of communication. Angel’s proximity never changed, and Wesley wasted long moments wishing that he could groan.

“Is he showing any signs of waking?” Giles asked, sounding if possible even more concerned than before.

“Maybe. Can’t tell,” Angel said shortly. He was angry, and smelled faintly of blood and cordite. Gunfire, possibly. Wes twitched the little finger of his left hand, felt a brief surge of satisfaction. Couldn’t remember why he’d be lying partly in Angel’s lap.

“It’s very important that we assess his condition,” Giles was saying. “His … mental capacity, might have been damaged by the interference.”

“What? What does that mean?” Angel, growling. Wes wondered where the others were, Fred. Tried to feel grateful he hadn’t been left alone.

“All I’ve been able to determine is that somehow Wesley, by coming back to this time, in no way switched bodies. Do you understand?” And Wes could almost see Angel’s confusion, more quickly made the connection himself. Should’ve known sooner. “It’s like his later memories, his later personality has overwritten the Wesley that you know. Like a cassette tape that’s been recorded over. The old track is still underneath the new track, so the quality of the sound deteriorates with each new recording.”

“Like a copy of a copy,” Angel said slowly.

“Yes, quite,” Giles said, oddly pleased at Angel’s comprehension. “Only in Wesley’s case, the copying effect has resulted not in a deterioration of quality, but in a reduction of the available space. It’s nothing that would matter normally; we only use a small portion of our brain’s capacity.” Sounds like restless pacing. “Memory is stored as a form of RNA, and Wesley’s future RNA is in a sense layered over the previous record, so that twice as much space is used.”

“So when you added the visions …”

“Exactly, the process by which the visions interact with the human mind must require a great many more neuronal connections, enough that these newer connetions interfered with the brain’s other functions.”

“That doesn’t sound good.”

“Well, no. If we hadn’t removed the visions as quickly as we had …”

“What?” Angel’s hand went still, that preternatural stillness only the undead seem able to manage.

“He would have died,” Giles said quietly.

Both men were silent for a few long moments.

“But he’s okay now, right?” Angel asked. Wes felt a surge of impatience, rode it out with little other choice, wished they’d discuss Cordelia’s condition and quickly.

“Yes, he should be.” Could almost see him cleaning his glasses. “Of course we’ll know for certain once he wakes. I just hope--”

Wanted to move. Wanted to tell them that he could move.

“What?” Angel prodded. His hands were so tight.

“I’m not entirely certain that the memories, the ‘new’ Wesley, couldn’t have been damaged. Even in such a short time –”

“Then why did you, why him?” Angel broke in. He sounded as he hadn’t sounded since Buffy’s death. “Why him?”

“We didn’t know,” Giles said helplessly. “There was no way of knowing how the memories had inhered. I,” And paused for a breath. “As soon as I realized …”

“Yeah.” Recriminating. (Wes thought of Lorne. He could tell them. Angel should know better, Lorne should be nearby.) Could almost feel Angel’s stare, a wolfish sort of look with no mercy in it. “Giles, I can’t, I feel like I lost him once already, you know?”

“I understand,” Giles replied, very quiet and sad. “He’s not at all the happy young man he once was, is he?”

“Yeah,” Angel murmured. “Kinda miss seeing him smile.”

“Well, yes, quite.” Sound like Giles might be cleaning his glasses. Now wishing himself really and truly unconscious. “I find myself somewhat wistful for his days in Sunnydale, myself.”

“I thought you hated him in Sunnydale,” Angel said, echoing the very question in Wesley’s mind with a fairly accurate rendition of Wesley’s own surprise and, frankly, disbelief. Giles coughed.

“He was a bit of a prat.” Though said fondly it still stung. “But very certain, and very bright.”

“He used to fall over a lot,” Angel said as though confessing, and Wesley very deliberately began to make plans to kill them both as soon as he emerged from this wretched in-between state. “Slipped once on a bunch of spilled coffee beans, and apologized for it.” Knew the vampire was smiling, and Giles made a sound like a stifled laugh, and was just empty inside. “And he used to smile. Big, and goofy. Just, lit up the room.”

“What happened?” Softly asked, no pressure. “When did he begin neglecting himself to this degree?”

“He always did, kinda. Whenever there was a translation, or research, he just worked till it was done.”

“Hm. I see.”

“What? What does that mean?” And Angel suddenly sounded defensive, maybe a bit anxious.

“Nothing, I suppose,” Giles said musingly. “Just something to say while I think the matter over.”

“Oh.” Angel spoke softly, seemed stymied by the explanation, the fact of it, the ease of the offering. Wes very quietly felt his life falling apart. Wondered if he’d wake up this time. “So, what were you thinking?”

“That he really needs someone to take care of him. Or to make sure he takes care of himself.”

“Huh.” Angel was smiling now, Wes could hear it in his voice. “I was kinda thinking the same thing.”

It was intolerable. Died and gone to hell, this time, and with no escape. It was probably the frustration more than anything that woke his sleeping limbs.

“Hey, watch it!” Angel caught unawares, Wes’s left arm, his free arm swinging in a violent arc, Giles cursing and Wes came up off the bed, eyes finally open and gasping like breaking through to the surface.

“Wes?” Angel asked, eyes anxious even more so than his voice and Wes just blinked at him for a long moment, both wrists held tightly in Angel’s hands between them as though Angel thought he might still take a swing, and in just the relief of being present again Wes slumped back against the pull of Angel’s hands, Angel’s grip the only thing keeping him upright.

“How are you feeling?” Giles asked carefully, remaining a careful pace behind Angel, who hadn’t yet released Wesley’s arms. Wes turned his blinking sleep-stunned gaze toward Giles, meeting his eyes over Angel’s shoulder.

“How is Cordelia?” Wesley asked, feeling something of a familiar roughness in his voice. Its return was almost pleasing after so long an acquaintance.

“She appears to be fine,” Giles said reassuringly, Angel still watching him carefully, trap that might be ready to spring. Wes shivered, nodded. “She hasn’t had another vision as of yet, but Lorne’s prognosis is very hopeful.”

“I wouldn’t rely on it,” Wes said softly. “His talent can be … misled, by certain forces.”

“Do you think it likely at this time?” Giles had straightened up, one hand moving to adjust his glasses.

“It shouldn’t be possible, not yet,” Wesley allowed. “But it can be done. Lorne isn’t infallible.”

“It’s okay,” Angel said. Wes shifted, meeting Angel’s eyes, and Angel peered at him intently for a long, assessing moment, then carefully releasing him. “We’ll get a second opinion, alright?” Angel smiled encouragingly, that old dopey smile that said he was more concerned for you than for himself. Wes had to smile back, almost forgiving their conversation as he lowered himself back against the headboard.

Giles shifted next to them, standing uneasily, and Angel was staring at him with the uneasiest expression, and Wes frowned at both of them.

“You were smiling,” Angel said, a bit sheepishly having heard the unspoken question.

“Ah.” Wes’s turn to shift now, not sure what to say.

“What were you thinking?” Giles asked softly.

“I’m not sure.” Still in this odd confessional mood. Or just now in this odd confessional mood. Time was slipping in its moors, a bit. “I could hear you.”

“What?” Angel, confused.

“When?” Giles, a bit more wary, a bit more worried. “When you were unconscious?”

“I wasn’t,” Wes said easily. He was tired again, already. “Not entirely. Or not the entire time. It’s been the same since I … arrived.”

“I see.” Giles moved as if to clean his glasses, settled for adjusting the fit.

“I don’t,” Angel said quickly. “See what? What the hell does that mean? Is that a good thing?”

“It might actually be a good sign,” Giles said optimistically, not glancing over at Wesley’s skeptical glare. “If the future personality is that stable, it might not degrade over time.”

“That was a concern?” Wes said weakly, leaning back, his scowl lost to horror.

“No, hey,” Angel tried, touching Wes’s arm lightly. “It’ll be fine, Giles said. And anyway. I’m sure Willow can figure out a way to make this permanent. Um, if you want it to be. Permanent, I mean.”

“Yes, I rather would,” Wes snapped. “I do *not* fancy repeating my mistakes, not through ignorance.”

“Hey, it’s okay,” Angel said ineffectually, holding up both hands in a familiar plea for stillness, silence, less emotion. Wes could only glare at him, choke on the frustration because he would not tell this man (vampire) even why he wouldn’t tell him. Too much to risk.

“I could begin researching methods to stabilize the … merger,” Giles offered hesitantly. Wes steadied himself, drew a calming breath, then another.

“Yes, thank you. And,” he added quickly, as Giles turned away. “Could you send Cordelia up please? Or help me downstairs? I fear I’m not fit to walk.”

“Or sit, for that matter,” Angel muttered, reaching out to steady Wesley as he swayed a bit in place.

“Yes, absolutely,” Giles said. “I’ll ask her to come straight up.”

“Thank you,” he said again, unable to think of anything more pressing as he watched Giles stride easily to the door. Caught himself watching for signs of stiffness or age, and glanced away. And then it was just the two of them.

“You hungry?” Angel asked after a moment, apparently feeling the strained atmosphere even with his complete lack of social skills.

“You aren’t going to start in on that again, are you?”

“Yes,” Angel said with an almost comical firmness. “You need to eat, Wes. You’ve eaten maybe three times (“Four,” Wes corrected absently.) alright, four times since you … woke up, or time-traveled. Whatever. The point is, you’re human. And humans need food.” All said very sincerely, Angel peering intently into his eyes without shame or fear or the least remorse. Nothing Wesley had become used to seeing in those eyes.

“Angel, I can’t …” Couldn’t maintain the gaze, looked down at his own hands nervous one holding the wrist of the other in his lap. “I can’t deal with you being nice to me,” he ground out, voice as rough as ever though with emotion in this time.

“What?” Innocent. Had to remember that this Angel was innocent, that this Wesley was. “What do you mean? Wes?”

Is it the trauma of the encounter with death, or the ongoing experience of having survived it that haunts the longest? Every story is a double telling that oscillates between a crisis of death and a crisis of life. This time Wes stared at Angel with life-haunted eyes.

“I haven’t told you everything,” he began. “About what happens. Or, about what happened. In the other future.”

“Is this going to get complicated?” Angel asked plaintively. “I never really understood the movies.”

Brief memory of watching the trilogy with Gunn and Angel, Cordelia sleeping through the second and third. Bitterly disappointed when she missed the bits in the Wild West.

“A bit complicated, yes.” And he stalled out. Couldn’t say the words. His hand crept to his unscarred throat.

“You can tell me,” Angel said, all seriousness now. Every now and then he dropped the mask. Every now and then he cared.

“It’s, I don’t think.” He stilled himself, centered on a breath or a thought. His voice was eerily calm when he continued. “I thought the prophecy was genuine,” he explained, watching Angel. “So I tried to save Connor.”

“Well, that’s good.” Angel said. He didn’t see. Not yet. “Saving Connor is always the right move.”

“Except I failed.” Tried very hard not to laugh. “Holtz took Connor to a hell dimension (Angel’s eyes went wide,) and raised him to hate you (face twisting with pain or anger) and when he came back aged eighteen he tried to kill you and destroy the.”

“Enough!” The words came out like a roar, leonine with pain and Angel staggered back from the bed, Wes watching him still too calm. He was in shock, he thought, and Angel still shaking his head like the future might change.

“And it might happen again,” Wes said implacably, voice rising over Angel’s stifled moan. “It might not be me, this time, but the future might not be so easily changed. Fred, or Gunn.” He paused. “Or Cordelia. You survived me betraying you. What about them?”

Angel fell back into the armchair nearest the door, still shaking his head in tiny little movements that denied even Wes’s existence. Wouldn’t look at him. Wes couldn’t stop looking. Tear it all apart.

“You hated me, or you will hate me.” A slightly mad giggle escaped. “Tried to kill me. Justine slit my throat and took the baby, and you smothered me in my hospital room. Would you have stopped if I’d flat-lined, I wonder?”

“Stop it,” Angel whispered, glancing up at him with wounded eyes. Black and deep, tunnels to the center of him.

“But it’s the truth.” The words came too carefully now. “A year from now I’ll be running my own business sleeping with Lilah hating myself as much as I hate the world with Justine in a cage I built in my closet.” He was shaking.

“Who the hell is Justine?” Angel ground out.

“One of Holtz’s groupies. He has groupies, you know. His intrepid vampire hunters.”

“Are you crying?” Angel asked suddenly, finally looking up.

“No.” Wes touched the wetness on his cheeks. “Well, perhaps.”

“Well, stop it. You’ll get dehydrated.” Angel stood slowly, arthritically and moved deliberately to the bed, handed Wes his glass of water and a tissue and sat beside him not as if nothing had happened but as if he hadn’t really thought this through. Wes took the water gratefully, drained it in one long pull.

“This is a bit surreal,” Wes said, placing the glass back into Angel’s obliging hands. “I’d rather expected violence. Yelling, if nothing else.”

Angel shook his head, and didn’t say anything for a long moment. Wes waited, breath bated, managed not to giggle insanely.

“I don’t know what to think about this,” Angel began, examining the bed’s coverlet fiercely. “I mean, it hasn’t happened. And maybe it won’t happen, so I shouldn’t blame you for it or just wait for it to come crashing down on us …”

“So what should you do?” Both hearing the unspoken ‘what should I do?’

“Would you stop crying?” Angel snapped.

“Sorry, I don’t seem to be able to help it.” Wes shrugged, and dabbled with the tissue a bit more. It was already sodden.

“Look, I don’t hate you.” Still a bit huffy, but the sentiments were welcome. “I just don’t know what to think. I don’t know if I know you anymore.”

Wes swallowed. Waited for the rest.

“I’m not sorry you came.” And for the first time since Wes had woken in this strange hell, Angel’s eyes were clear, and he meant what he said. “Hey, come here,” Angel murmured, and pulled Wes to him so that he was laid awkwardly across the vampire’s lap, face pressed against the front of Angel’s shirt and it soaked up the tears that wouldn’t stop falling.

“I am sorry to be a bother,” Wes said into Angel’s flat belly.

“No bother,” Angel said, voice easier now, lighter. As if he’d made a choice.

They were both quiet for a few minutes, until Wesley’s tears stopped, and he sat back up in the bed, feeling mildly embarrassed but still everything was as though through thick cotton batting. Could barely feel it at all.

“Thank you,” he said politely, accepting the fresh tissue from Angel, who looked faintly concerned now but prepared to let it drop.

“How do you feel?”

“Much better, thank you.” Heard the repetition too late, and shrugged.

“You don’t have to keep thanking me,” Angel said, twisting his mouth into a wry little grin.

“I know.” Wes paused, poked at the cotton batting. “I want to.”

“Then you’re welcome.” Angel was smiling now, what Cordelia called his goofy grin.

“Hey, Wes!” And speak of the devil. He smiled nevertheless, her grin irresistible as always. Giles followed her through the door at a much more sedate pace, Angel stepping back quickly as she flung herself at the bed.

“Cordy,” he yelped, throwing up his hands to fend her off as she came in too fast for a hug. The moment thoroughly broken, and Angel had retreated to a corner to watch.

“You’re okay,” she was saying repeatedly, her voice thick with tears. After a moment she leaned back and just looked at him, until he began to feel a bit nervous. Then she hit him. “You big jerk! You could have died, you idiot.”

“I didn’t?” he tried, and immediately cringed before her glare.

She replied, but he let the familiar words wash over him like a warm gentle wave. Everything still felt less than resolved, but Angel was, he hadn’t … It had felt like being offered forgiveness, for a moment.

The desire to live necessitates imagining a future, imagining that you will continue to live and to an extent imagining some form of progress, an ideal future. Assuming that life continues and gets better. So what then comes of knowing your future?

“We end world peace,” he told no one while they (clustered in the lobby) ate Chinese takeout straight from the red and white cartons, only Fred eschewing chopsticks and Wes fenced safely between Angel and Giles on the couch. Giles choked on his lo mein, but the conversation eddied away from them.

Angel was quiet, not eating, eyes fixed on Connor in his bassinet though speaking to Wesley. “Should we have?”

“I’m not sure,” Wes said musingly, though he’d thought about it (many times) before. “Peace at the cost of free will? Begs the question: does free will cause conflict, war, racism, rape, murder.” He’d picked up a piece of cashew, fell silent to stare at it without seeing.

“Would you do it again?” Giles asked.

“Yes,” he said immediately, fiercely.

“It’s enough,” Angel said.

“It has to be,” Giles said, a lighter echo.

“Does it?” he asked listlessly. “I think I should leave.”

Bit of a bombshell, perhaps, but he’d never intended to coddle them. Cordelia shocked and almost disappointed, Charles as bad, Angel just silent and wounded and obviously having decided the entire debacle was his fault alone. Wesley felt almost nostalgic for a moment, remembering the days when Angel took responsibility for everything. Somehow easier, then.

“Just a vacation, right?” Cordelia kept asking, and Giles looked a little too grateful when asked if Sunnydale might need one more researcher. Wesley couldn’t remember Willow being the skeptical one, and worried that he was already changing things. Worried even more when he wrote out the list of upcoming cases and their solutions, translating the passages they would need and leaving everything in a single file, in chronological order, having never figured out Cordelia’s filing system.

A/N Title taken from Lear.