In his office at Wolfram and Hart, Angel stared at package on his desk suspiciously. He looked across at his be-suited visitor briefly, then opened the package with a sudden sure and certain knowledge of what he was going to find inside. Right in one. He sighed. “The Matrix.”
“The Ultimate Matrix Collection,” Andrew pointed to the cover of the box of DVDs. “It’s a limited edition, with figurine and collector's book.” He smiled happily.
“Figurine…?” Angel looked at him bemusedly.
“And collectors book.” Andrew looked at the box in awe. “Ten discs. Loads of extras, including audio commentaries and written introduction by the Wachowski brothers. Gee, I wish I’d bought one for myself…”
“Well, it’s… great. I… err… well, thanks.” Angel put the box carefully into a drawer of his desk. Maybe Gunn would like it… “Look, erm…” He gestured vaguely.
“Andrew.”
“Yeah, Andrew. Not that it isn’t good to see you again, but what exactly is so important? I mean, you – here – not just a phone call.”
“It’s sort of delicate.” Andrew leaned forward conspiratorially and gestured for Angel to do the same. Angel wasn’t convinced he wanted to hear what exactly the ‘delicate’ problem was from such close quarters. He eyed Andrew suspiciously. “I need you…” Andrew said quietly, “to find Spike.”
“Spike’s missing?” Angel sat back with a snort. “Is that all?”
“Well, he’s sort of… gone off without leaving a forwarding address.” Andrew shrugged. “There was a bit of a problem and he kind of… went.”
“Spike and problem – well, there are two words that seem to fit naturally together.” Angel sneered. “What did he do this time?”
“He didn’t do anything!” Andrew’s swift and emotional leap to Spike’s defence earned him a raised eyebrow from Angel. “It was Buffy!”
“Buffy?”
Andrew hesitated. “You heard what happened to Buffy, right?”
“The memory thing? I’d heard, yeah. Not good.” Angel looked away, shaking his head. There was a brief pause and then he looked back at Andrew. “But she still remembers me, right?”
“I suppose.” Andrew looked doubtful. “She doesn’t actually talk about you or anything…”
“Oh.” Angel looked decidedly crestfallen.
“I mean, she said before that now you’re working for Wolfram and Hart, you really aren’t to be trusted.”
“Well…”
“You’re persona non grata.”
“OK…”
“Gone over to the dark side.” Andrew had gotten into his stride. “Sleeping with the enemy.”
“All right already!” Angel snapped. Andrew gave him a hurt look and subsided. “I am not going to start to even try and explain things to you. You have no idea, OK? Let’s just leave it at that.” There was a moment’s uncomfortable silence while they both sulked quietly. Angel relented first. “OK, so what went down between Spike and Buffy?”
“Spike overheard Buffy saying something kinda… hard… but she didn’t mean it, I mean, not like that, not really, but he thought she did, and he got kind of uptight about it and he didn’t think Buffy wanted him around and so he… went, and we don’t know where he’s gone or where to start looking. But we think he should come back.” Andrew paused breathlessly. “Soon,” he added hopefully.
"'We' being?" Angel raised an eyebrow.
"Well," Andrew hesitated uncomfortably, "me and Dawn."
"And Buffy?"
"She wants him back, really she does, it's just she hasn't said... exactly." Andrew squirmed.
"Right." Angel sat back and folded his arms. “And where do I come in?”
“Well, you know… We just thought… what with Wolfram and Hart being this big, powerful, multinational, multidimensional, multi…” Andrew ran out of ‘multi’s “…thingy organisation, you could just sort of…” He grinned weakly at Angel “...find him?”
“Find him?” Angel looked at Andrew in disbelief.
“Well… yes…”
Angel folded his arms and considered Andrew. “Look, erm…”
“Andrew,” Andrew supplied again.
“Yeah, right, I knew that! Andrew. Things are goin’ down here; things are happening. You think I’ve got time to go chasing after Spike? Even assuming he wants to be found, I’m really not sure it’s for the best.”
“But… Buffy needs him!”
“Oh, yeah, right!” Angel snorted.
“They love each other. Theirs is a forever love,” Andrew said dreamily.
Angel was outraged. “Ours was a forever love! What they had was just… just… Ach! I don’t even want to think about it!” He threw his hands up in the air and turned away with a frown.
“Buffy loved Spike. She told you in Rome.”
“Well, she doesn’t anymore.” Angel turned back with a vicious smile.
“You’re mean.” Andrew pouted. “And jealous,” he added quietly.
“I am not jealous of Spike.” Angel’s voice was a dangerous growl and Andrew winced and cowered away from him. Angel shrugged the tension from his shoulders, drew a steadying breath and contemplated Andrew’s resurgent pout. “Look, even if I wanted to, I just don’t have the resources right now. I’ve got way more important things to do than chase after Spike.” He shrugged. “Besides, I don’t want to. And it’s nothing to do with being jealous.”
“That’s a ‘no’, then,” Andrew said unhappily.
“Yes.”
“Yes?”
“Yes, it’s a ‘no’,” Angel spelt out patiently. “Go home. When Spike’s ready, chances are he’ll be back. Sadly, he’s not that easy to get rid of. Believe me, I’ve been trying to shake him off for the past hundred plus years.”
“Dawn will be so upset.” Andrew bit his lip nervously.
“Dawn will have to learn to live with it.” Angel picked up a pile of documents from his desk and shuffled them importantly. “Now, if there’s nothing else…?”
Andrew smiled uncomfortably. “Well, there is one thing.”
“What?” Angel sighed heavily.
“Well… you see I wasn’t sure where I’d be going after I saw you, so I only booked a one way ticket.”
“So buy another one back.”
“Thing is we kind of used Giles’ credit card and now it’s sort of all used up…”
“You need a ticket home?”
“And somewhere to stay in LA for a day or two maybe? And some spending money?” Andrew said hopefully.
Angel rolled his eyes and stood up. “C’mon.” He led Andrew out of his office.
Harmony was settling down at her desk having just returned from one of her infamous long lunch breaks. She looked up at Angel with a guilty smile. “Oh! Hi, boss. Look, I’m sorry I’m late, but they had this sale on at Kitson over on Robertson Boulevard, and there were these cute little kitten-heeled sandals, just like the ones Halle Berry was wearing in that Hello magazine photoshoot and, you know, I swear I saw Jessica Parker…”
“Harmony!” Angel held up his hands, and Harmony ground to a stop. “Look, I just need you to get…” He turned to Andrew, who was cowering behind his back. “What are you doing?”
“Andrew?” Harmony came from behind her desk and walked over to him. “Oh, my God! How are you?” She smiled widely.
“Harmony! Hi.” Andrew stepped back nervously. “I… I’m OK… You’re looking well.”
“Thank you!” Harmony beamed. “Just because a girl’s stopped breathing doesn’t mean she has to stop trying!”
Angel raised his eyes in despair. “Harmony, just get him whatever he needs, will you?”
“Sure, boss.” Harmony nodded. “Whatever he needs.”
“I…” Angel took a step backwards, almost falling over a still clearly unsettled Andrew. He heaved a frustrated sigh, turned on his heel and left them to it.
They watched the door of Angel’s office close with a slam that made them both jump, then Harmony turned to Andrew. “What are you doing here? We don’t have another crazy slayer on the loose, do we?”
“N…no…”
“So, how goes the watchering?”
“It’s going fine.” Now it looked like Harmony wasn’t about to bite him, Andrew relaxed slightly. “I’m just…sort of… visiting…” He paused, then looked at Harmony through narrowed eyes, smiling slyly. Angel wasn’t the only one with access to Wolfram and Hart’s databases: Andrew had a cunning plan. “Actually, I’m not working for the Council anymore. I’m working with Spike. That’s why I was here to see Angel.” He moved closer to Harmony, looked over his shoulder and tapped the side of his nose. “Top secret,” he whispered.
“Yeah?” Harmony’s eyes widened. “You’re working with Blondie Bear? I knew he was working for us now, or at least with Mrs Costa Bianchi over in the Rome office… I mean, how lucky is that? I would so love to go to Rome! All that Armani and Prada and Bulgari and…” she sighed dreamily then gave Andrew a puzzled frown. “But I hadn’t heard that you were.”
“Spike’s working for Wolfram and Hart? I mean… yes, Spike’s working for Wolfram and Hart. As am I.” Andrew struggled to keep the surprise out of his voice. On reflection, though, this news of Spike’s new employment was an unexpected bonus – if he was working for them, they must know where he was. Andrew’s cunning plan was developing nicely. “Like I said, it’s top secret. Only key personnel are allowed to know. Angel said you could be trusted.”
“I can? I mean, I can, yes. Wow.” Harmony was impressed. “I can so be trusted. Really I can!”
“I need you to get me a ticket.” Andrew put his hand on Harmony’s arm and led her back to her desk. “I need to meet up with Spike. I have some information for him. Some very important, very secret information.”
“Oh! You have?” Harmony sat back at her computer. “Well, OK. Where to?” she poised her fingers over the keyboard and waited.
“Well, the thing is… I don’t…” Andrew hesitated. The cunning plan reached a new level of cunningness. He glanced around then bent closer to Harmony. “I need to know if his whereabouts are on the system. I know where he is, but does Wolfram and Hart?” He gave her a slow wink.
Harmony looked at him. “Well, duh! Wolfram and Hart always know where their employees are, silly!” She began typing on the keyboard, frowning at the screen. “Look! He’s in LA! Right here! Well, would you believe it? He didn’t even come and say hi!” Harmony pouted. “Oh – wait. That’s not how you spell Spike…” She tried again. “There!” She sat back in triumph. “He’s over in...” she frowned at the screen “Is that name for real?”
Andrew peered over her shoulder. “Ah, yes. It’s a small town. In Europe…” he took a brave stab.
“It sounds Russian to me.”
“It is.” Andrew put on his best knowledgeable voice and made a mental note to look it up in the atlas. “Russia is now Europe.”
“They moved it? Wow!”
“It seems you do have the most recent information.” Andrew straightened up. “Now, if you could just organise the plane ticket…”
Harmony peered at him suspiciously. “You know, I’m not sure the boss said anything about a plane ticket.”
“I think you’ll recall his words were ‘get him what he needs’.” Andrew reminded her. “And I’m sure Spike will be very pleased to hear of your co-operation,” he added as Harmony hesitated. “Perhaps we could get you to help us on one of our secret assignments.”
Her eyes widened. “Me and Blondie Bear? Oh, wow…” Harmony drifted off into a vision of herself in a slinky Galliano dress and Jimmy Choo shoes, her pearl-handled pistol ready, sitting by Spike in an English sports cars speeding through the night, pursued by a gaggle of desperate villains driving a… well, something large and black anyway. She gave a happy sigh and turned back to her keyboard. “OK – let’s see what we can do.” She paused. “Hey! Why not use the jet? I think it’s free…”
“No!” Andrew put in quickly. That may be pushing things a little bit too far. If Angel found out he could probably have the jet turn around and head straight back, and Andrew really didn’t want to have to face up to one extremely cross vampire, ensouled or not. “No. No corporate jet. We need to work in secret, remember?” He tapped the side of his nose again.
“Why do you keep doing that?” Harmony frowned at him
“What?”
“The nose thing. You keep doing this.” Harmony tapped her nose to demonstrate.
Andrew gave a long suffering smile. “You silly, silly child. All the secret agents do that.”
“Yeah? Not sure I ever saw that James Bond do it.”
“Pshaw,” Andrew sneered. “He’s not real.”
“You don’t say,” Harmony drawled. She shook her head and turned back to the keyboard. “You’ll be travelling First Class, I guess…”
“Naturally.” In for a penny… Andrew thought, as he watched Harmony. “Oh, and then a flight back to London.” He thought a little longer. “And I’ll need local currency… and a car to the hotel.”
“You sure that’s that all?” Harmony said dryly. She shook her head and looked back at the computer screen. “Oh, look! There’s a flight tonight. You’ll have to change… four times…” She sounded doubtful.
“Tonight is good. And changing planes will put them off the scent.”
“Them?” Harmony was wide-eyed.
“Them.” Andrew nodded wisely.
“Oh… them!” Harmony shook her head in admiration. She turned back to the keyboard, typed for a few moments then smiled. “OK! All done!” She reached over to the printer and handed Andrew a sheet of paper. “Here is your e-ticket. You’re down as a Wolfram and Hart emissary, so you won’t need to bother with silly visas and body searches and things. Have a good trip.” She hesitated. “Andrew…?” She smiled nervously and looked down at her hands. “You know, now that Blondie Bear is working for Wolfram and Hart and all, do you think he’s maybe given up on that… sick thing for the slayer?”
“The slayer? Oh, you mean Buffy?”
“Yeah, Buffy.” Harmony sneered. “I mean, what he ever saw in that ugly, skinny, overbearing…” she struggled for a suitably insulting description “unfashionable creature… And that big ‘I am the Chosen One’ act of hers? So unattractive in a woman!”
“Overbearing, yeah.” Andrew backed away a little smiling nervously. “Well, thanks, Harmony. Best be off!”
“Oh, OK. Give Spike a big hug from me!” Harmony called after him as he retreated. “Tell him…” The door swung closed behind him and Harmony sat back with a disappointed sigh. “Tell him I miss him,” she said quietly. She sat staring blankly at her computer for a long while, then smiled. “Blondie Bear working on secret missions! Wow!” Smiling happily, she picked up a bottle of nail varnish and proceeded to touch up her polish. Well, really, a potential secret agent couldn’t be seen with chipped nails.
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