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Part One
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'The light from the moon and the billions of sparkling stars covering the dark sky reflected in the glass windows of Los Angeles, giving the city the appearance of a mirage, a place of salvation for those whose thirst for forgiveness were too great to deny. Many were lost in its bright and colorful appearance and no sooner fallen victim to its illuminated illusions. All soon ended up using the fast-changing ways of life as a drug to paralyze themselves in vain hope to forget their past.'

Angel sighed and rubbed a hand over his eyes as he threw the hard-covered book against the wall. He had made a huge mistake by asking to borrow the book Cordelia was reading. True, it was somewhat better than the books Wesley owned, but not by much. The introduction had cut a little too deep.

When he first came to the city, he tried to use it as a way to numb his feelings for Buffy, the guilt from the lives he had taken and anything and everything else. Everyone thought he was the strong one, being able to leave the one person he had ever loved behind in order to achieve a better future for the rest of the world.

No one realized it, not even Buffy, but Angel knew he was taking the easy way out. He couldn't stand the whispers behind his back whenever the Scooby Gang thought he couldn't hear them, the angry glares Giles had been sending him. If looks could kill, Angel would have been a pile of dust within seconds with the watcher.

As for Buffy, he remembered mostly her eyes, such a rich shade of hazel that was almost too much to endure. Every time he looked into them, he felt lost. They seemed to sparkle brightly, even in the dark as they made love, an action that led to the horrible result that tore them and everyone else apart.

Afterward, those eyes that once shined with affection for him, filled with pity for the vampire who had even more innocents' blood on his hands. Every time they gazed at each other, he could only read one message in her eyes: "Poor Angel."

He could stand hatred, guilt, even at times the jealousy that raged inside of him whenever Xander stood too close to Buffy, but never pity. He didn't want that; he didn't deserve that. He was Angelus, the most brutal bastard in all the land, who had enjoyed the painful cries of his victims, the whimpering pleas of his prey, the sweet odor of fear rising from the mortals who he fed on and the sudden cut off shrill screams as he snapped their necks. Angelus would always be a part of him. Wasn¡¦t that why he told the groups of vampires who were going to war with Gunn¡¦s gang that the name was Angelus, instead of Angel?

Angel smiled as he sensed the growing brightness outside. Another torturous night passed, filled with patrol and a bit of reading. As a vampire, he really should learn to embrace the night; however, the memories only haunted him after sundown.

He closed his eyes, hoping the blissful slumber would soon come. Sleep was his only means of gaining some peace. As his eyes drifted shut, his other senses took over. He could smell the fumes from the cars that raced down pass the hotel, in a hurry to and from home. He could hear Cordelia's footsteps on the concrete floor as she approached her desk. The sound of her bracelets dangling against one another was the last thing he heard before he drifted off to sleep.

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Cordelia Chase was not a morning person, especially when it came to dealing with overdue bills and mountains of disorganized files. She dropped her bag on her desk and placed the mail and the coffee she brought earlier next to it.

A frown marred her face as she grabbed the letter opener from the top drawer while her other hand was bringing the cup of Starbucks coffee to her mouth. She sighed contentedly as she greedily swallowed a big gulp of the White Chocolate Mocha.

Cordelia winced and made a mental note of 'coffee hot' to herself when she felt the liquid burns her tongue. She sat down in her chair with a groan of frustration as she hastily cut open the first envelope she grabbed with the hard, smooth metal.

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Wesley held the door for Gunn with a disapproving frown on his face.

"So it ain't no gourmet! It's better than whatever your English ass was eating yesterday." Gunn held on to the bucket of KFC defensively before Wesley could start his lecture about unhealthy breakfasts.

"If you are going to insist on eating fried chicken for breakfast, can you at least not flaunt it in my face?"

"Too much fun to pass up." Gunn grinned as he took another bite, munching loudly with the purpose of further irritating his friend.

Both men were oblivious to the increasing frustration on Cordelia's face as she glanced at the electricity bill, then exclaimed with disbelief, "Four hundred and eleven dollars?!"

Wesley jumped at the sudden noise, flinging his arms out of self-defense, an action that almost knocked over the bucket in Gunn's arms. "Good lord, Cordelia, what is the matter?"

She shot both men a dark glower that made them take a step back, the movement causing a thud as they backed up into the door. Gunn and Wesley looked like they were ready to run for their lives any seconds.

"I repeat, four hundred and eleven dollars!" She spat the number out the same way she had said the name of a child-eating monster few weeks ago.

"Heard you the first time." Gunn grimaced.

"You guys knew about the power crisis and the price raise, don't you?" Cordelia growled.

"Technically, it should be 'didn't you'..." Wesley corrected, but caught himself as the seer produced a low snarl in her throat.

"Didn't you?" she rephrased, emphasizing the 'didn't' and shooting Wesley a glare while the word was spoken. After seeing her co-workers nod in unison, she continued, "Apparently Angel didn't, since the bill is over four hundred dollars! Isn¡¦t darkness a key factor of brooding? And last time I checked, Angel was still Angel! And Angel broods!" She added after a short pause, "In the dark!"

"Cordy, I'm sure he has a reasonable explanation for all this..." Wesley soothed.

"And money," Cordelia added. "I just don't see how it is fair! Here I am, in these terrible jeans." she emphasized her point by standing up from her chair. "They don't even have a brand! Maybe they do, but it's a very small one and it is so plain that people would forget about it immediately! The only reason I bought them is because of the buttons!" She turned to her sides, showing them the two tiny buttons, which were working diligently to hold the pants up.

"It's the end of the world! Cordelia Chase is in a pair of non-namebrand jeans!" Gunn blurted out, missing the vicious look from Cordelia and the warning cough from Wesley. "And how does it stay up without help?"

Cordelia slapped away Gunn's hand as it was reaching to test the theory. "At least I don't wear sweats everyday."

"There's nothin' wrong with sweats!" Gunn retorted.

"There is something wrong when you wear them everyday!" She picked up a fashion magazine from her desk, part of the 'I'm sorry I fired you' present from Angel. "This is fashion!" She pointed to a blond model who was wearing a pair of leather pants.

"Let me see that! Those pants are made of alligator." Gunn threw the booklet back to Cordelia with a snort. "If this is your so-called fashion..." He reached for a piece of chicken thigh in the bucket he still held in his other arm.

"Oh my God! They are made of alligator! Ew!" She dropped the magazine on her desk with a frown.

"The world is definitely ending!" He turned to Wesley with a feigned fear and shock, "She's agreeing with me!"

"Oh, shut up already!" Came Cordelia¡¦s reply before Wesley could respond.

"Oh, shut up already." Gunn said in a valley-girl voice.

"Ohhh, you are so dead!" The words were barely audible through her gritting teeth and they were full of venom.

"Ohhh, I'm so scared." Gunn's imitation was completed with a fake shudder and a mocking whimper.

"All right, calm down and take a deep breath. Violence isn't the way to solve..." Wesley's speech was interrupted when a demon crashed through the wooded doors. "Anything."

It had purplish scales covering it from the top of its head to the end of its long, spiked tail. The demon was a frightening sight, not to mention to rows of sharp teeth peeking out under its thick, green lips and the crested claws on its hands.

"Is it really that complicated for them to learn how to knock?" Cordelia whined as she dodged behind her desk to pull out the weapons while Gunn and Wesley lunged at the intruder.

Wesley grabbed the wooden chair and smashed it against the beast's head. It shattered into pieces and he retreated quickly, searching for another weapon. One ruined chair a week was enough.

"English! Duck!" Gunn dropped the bucket of chicken next to Cordelia and rushed towards the fight.

"Be careful!" She yelled and threw an ax to him, which Gunn caught with ease.

"Always," Gunn replied as he avoided the punch thrown by the demon, and blocked a high kick with the handle of the ax.

"Get Angel!" His shout transformed into a groan when the demon's tail made contact with his chest, hard. Gunn was thankful for the fact that he didn¡¦t remove his jacket; its plastic substance prevented the spikes on the beast¡¦s tail from digging into his flesh. He dropped the ax when another blow landed on his back.

"Are you..." Wesley swallowed the 'okay' when the demon¡¦s hard fist made contact with his jaw. The strength of the monster and the impact he had when he dashed to help Gunn sent Wesley flying into a wall.

Gunn let out a hoarse cry as the tail of the monster tightened around his torso. The pain was unbearable; he could feel every single cell in his body tighten as they braced themselves for the suffering of his own ribs digging into his organs. Tears of agony threatened to stream from his clenched eyes, but he fought against the pressing blackness of unconsciousness with all his will. All the while, he was waving his arms as a signal for Cordelia to get away.

"Let. Go. Of. Him." Cordelia hissed as she snatched everything within reach and hurled them at the demon. It roared when the letter opener sunk into its arm, drawing a tiny drop of purple blood from its scaled skin.

Turning around abruptly and losing its hold on Gunn at the same time, the beast charged toward Cordelia. The foul stench of rotting flesh emanating from the demon made Cordelia gag, but not even the sight of rows of sharp teeth made her hesitate to fight.

"Take that!" She flung a piece of chicken thigh at it. The meat landed in the beast's open mouth. It swallowed the chicken reflexively.

With an agonized groan, the demon held its neck and stomach in pain, and began to gag, and then with a scream, it dissolved into a puddle of purple dew.

"Nice aim?" Gunn stood up slowly as he rubbed his chest with a look of bewilderment in his eyes.

"Thanks. I killed a..." She turned to Wesley, who was already flipping through a book. "What did I kill?"

"I believe it was a Feritas, they are savage demons who feed on humans."

"Surprise surprise." Gunn muttered.

Wesley continued on, "They are unbelievably strong, the only weakness they have is..." A light of understanding and amusement appeared in his eyes. "Chicken."

"Chicken? What kind of weak-ass demon is that?"

"The kind that just kicked your ass," Cordelia answered sweetly.

"Ha-ha! Funny. Not!"

"What's all the noise?"

All three turned to the source of the voice, a tired Angel rubbing his eyes in the shadows. Dark circles overshadowed his normally bright brown eyes.

"I killed a demon!" Cordelia announced proudly.

"Good for you."

"That's all you have to say? No pat on the back? No compliments?"

"Very good for you?" Angel scrunched his brows in distress when Cordelia sent him a deadly glare. "Gunn! What are you doing here so early? I thought you wouldn¡¦t be in till noon after last night¡¦s patrol." His eyes lit up as he found distraction.

"I have something that I thought you'd be interested in." Gunn reached into his jacket and pulled out a brown envelope.

"What is it?" Wesley asked; curiosity gleamed behind his glasses as the text in his hands closed with an audible thud.

"A documentary on Lindsey McDonald on exactly what happened when he was sucked into that big black hole of evilness AKA Wolfram and Hart."

"Hello? No TV!" Cordelia waved her hand toward the empty room.

"I can go get mine. It has a VCR attached to it. I'll be right back." Wesley scrambled out the hotel.

"So what happened with you and born-again-boy anyway? I thought you two were working together." Cordelia asked after few seconds of silence; she never liked silence.

"I don't know what happened, he left as soon as we got those people out," Angel replied, stifling a yawn.

"I'll tell you what happened," Gunn stood up and picked up the newspaper on Cordelia¡¦s desk. "I just saw it this morning." He flipped through the paper then held it up to a page with the headline of 'McDonald Scored Another Promotion.'

"What?" Angel almost tripped over the table in his haste and snatched the page out of the Gunn¡¦s hands.

Rage filled Angel¡¦s eyes as he read the article stating how Lindsey McDonald was now taking over Holland Manners' position after his co-executive, Lilah Morgan, was found dead in a head-on collision caused by a drunk driver late last night. It also briefly mentioned the massacre at the Manners residence and that the case remained unsolved. "But how could he accept it after seeing what happens to his friend?"

"Or maybe it¡¦s because he was afraid of ending up like his friend," Gunn said and shuddered at the thought of what could happen if Lindsey betrayed the firm when the punishment for failures was to become a human organ supply.

They all fell silent at the sentence, it made sense. The silence was broken when Wesley banged on the door with his elbow, asking for assistance with the TV and the door.

In less than five minutes, the TV was set up and everyone was seated ¡V Angel and Cordelia on the couch while Gunn and Wesley pulled chairs from vacant desks.

"Where did you get this?" Angel asked when the TV screen remained snow.

"A friend of mine. Who happens to be the janitor who cleaned out the office of the all mighty Holland Manners, and instead of burning the boxes of tapes like he was told, he looked through it, trying to find some potential blackmail material. He gave this to me. Early birthday present." Gunn answered as a small yet organized storage room replaced the previous screen.

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Four men were hunched around a cart; apparently sorting something, mail to be exact. Lindsey was among them, and he seemed to be the fastest one as well as the youngest. The man on screen couldn¡¦t be older than twenty years old.

"What are you guys doing tonight?" a man in his mid-twenties asked without lifting his head from his task.

"Tonight? I'll be lucky if I can finished this pile by tomorrow morning!" a deeper voice responded, poking at the heap in front of him with uninterested fingers.

"We all know that, Josh. How about you, Lin?"

"I'm having dinner with Alicia, thinking about popping the question tonight." Lindsey voice hadn't change much over the years, but his tone was different. It contained a sort of naive trust, trust to an unpredictable world to be predictable like the tides of the sea.

"Lucky bastard."

"Don't worry, Brad, you'll be the first on the guest list." Lindsey smiled a real smile, the ones that came from the heart, as he wrapped his work with a rubber band and dumped it in the cart. "Be sure to mail them out first thing tomorrow." He waved goodbye to his friends as he exited the room.

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"Guess Lindsey wasn't lying after all," Angel remarked as he stretched his long legs and then rested them on the table before him.

"Lying about what?" Gunn smacked one of Angel's limbs when it made contact with the back of his head.

"Brad, Lindsey's hand donor. He told me that he worked at the mailroom with Brad before he got promoted."

"Shhh." The seer waved an irritated hand at them as the earlier scene slowly faded out and a wide, well-lit room came into view.

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Lindsey sat in the tiny cot, which was next to the neatly tucked-in bed. He used his elbow to support his head, trying to get some rest, as his feet were planted firmly on the ground, ready for any sudden actions. The curtains around the bed made it hard to identify the patient in bed.

The lawyer's face carried an innocence in slumber he never allowed during the light of day. The man on screen was not the smug, confident lawyer that Angel knew nor the happy, naive young man they saw before. Instead, he looked tired and hopeless like a lost child.

"Alicia..." Lindsey mumbled softly as his body moved unconsciously to achieve a more comfortable position.

His eyes flew opened as the small beeping of the machine became a steady tone, and the once moving line gone steady. Disoriented, he jumped up and pressed the call button repeatedly.

When he leapt to his feet, the line of vision for the camera cleared, giving it a perfect view of the limp body on the bed. The woman's face was inhumanly white, yet beautiful; her figure slender and gracefully feminine in flowing frost blue hospital gown. Long, gleaming light brown hair that seemed to shimmer was swept back from her face and fell in waves to her shoulders as the cool air from the air conditioner played with the silky strands.

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"Darla!" Angel bolted out of his seat the moment he saw her face. Despite the difference in hair color and the obvious contrast in strength in both women, it was Darla. His sire, his obsession and, for what he thought, his love for centuries.

"Angel! I'm sure it's not Darla, it can't possibly be. This video was shot in 1998," Wesley pointed to the date on the left bottom corner of the screen. "And you staked Darla a year before in Sunnydale." The ex-watcher explained, "Logically, one would presume..."

"The last part is not making me feel any better!" Cordelia scowled.

"Why don't we just watch this? If he-who-usually-says-nothin' can keep his mouth shut long enough," Gunn said, sounding annoyed with all the noises with his eyes still glued to the TV.

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Nurses flew into the room, pushing Lindsey aside. "Sir, you need to leave! Now! You're only in the way," an older nurse said, gently leading him out the room.

The door was closed soundly the moment Lindsey passed the threshold, leaving him with nothing to do except to stare at the bold, black room number, 117.

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"That's it?" Angel asked while staring skeptically at the black screen.

"Nope," the only female in the room answered as images began to appear. The setting changed to the hallways.

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There Lindsey stood, forehead pressed to the cool and hard steel doors with tears of worries in his eyes. He blinked the droplets from his lids and let them fall down onto the perfectly polished floor.

"Lindsey." A sincere voice found its way to grieving young man's ears.

"Mr. Manners!" The younger man's words were clearly filled with surprise.

"I heard you are having a bit of a...problem. And I have a proposition to offer you that will solve all of your difficulties within days."

"Not to sound suspicious, sir. But why?"

"Because you have potential and skills. I trust my instincts and they are telling me that you are the person we need on our team."

"And under what circumstances will I be receiving this chance to express myself in the firm?" Even though he was inexperienced and his words were almost timid, Lindsey was not carefree; he had a look of knowledge in his eyes, the kind that could only be learned from hard life style.

"Nothing, just your loyalty to the firm. We'll also be offering you a half-million dollar bonus which I believe will proven to be helpful to..." Holland pointed with his head, "your fiancee's condition. By the way, congratulations."

"Thank you. There is no catch?"

"None, all we ask are your loyalty and discretion to your clients, nothing you don't already know. In fact, you can read over the contract."

"I understand and once again, I really appreciate this opportunity sir."

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"Well, I'm bored! I knew he would sell his soul for money." Angel stretched lazily with a knowing smile on his face as he got up.

"Where do you think you are going? It ain't over," Gunn demanded, feeling his friend's efforts were being unappreciated.

"Don't you want to find out about that Darla look-a-like?" Cordelia lifted up her long legs to block her former boss' path.

"Not leaving, need breakfast." The souled vampire left using his inhuman speed and made it back to his spot in less than thirty seconds. Just in time as the surroundings transformed into the room again.

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Lindsey talked hurriedly and excitedly as he shared the news with Alicia. In contrast with his excitement, she had a look of distress on her pale face.

"I don't think it's a smart idea. Linds. It sounds too good, especially for LA."

"Don't you think I know that? But I'm willing to do anything if it means you get a chance to survive."

"Even selling your soul? Lindsey, I've seen lawyers from that firm and they don't have a sense of right or wrong."

"If it means you get to live, then yes," Lindsey stated firmly. As he watched her immobile face, his face began to be filled with vulnerability and doubts appeared in his eyes. He automatically began to withdraw the hand that had been resting on top her frail digits.

"Even your soul?" she questioned again, wanting her lover to have time to let her words sink in.

Sky blue eyes clouded with confusion and seriousness as the owner cautiously rethought the whole situation.

"Lindsey, may we see you for a moment?" Holland and another suited man knocked gently on the door.

"Sure, I'll be right back." Lindsey stood up and left the room, but not before he planted a kiss on Alicia's forehead.

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"This is better than Passions," The ex-watcher remarked aloud as the scene switched smoothly to the hallway then the camera in the hall recorded the three men from Wolfram and Hart entering an elevator. After a few seconds of blackness, it showed the crew of Angel Investigation a tiny, yet spacious chamber.

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Lindsey held the door open for the elder men and closed it behind him. He waited until the others were seated then asked, "What can I do for you sir?"

"Nothing, yet. Here's the contract." Holland motioned for his colleague to hand Lindsey the folder.

Azure eyes skimmed the words neatly typed upon the snow-white stationary before them. The blue in his eyes changed many shades as he mouthed the words silently. Content that what he read was indeed what he was promised; Lindsey signed the bottom of the papers with a flourish. Having his complete attention given to the contact before him, he failed to notice the person who just entered the room.

"Lindsey, there's someone I would like you to meet. Lindsey, Glory. Glory, Lindsey."

:: Part Two ::