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Of all the times he'd been there, whether to work, to lurk, or to combat some mystical plot, Gunn had never, not once, known Wolfram and Hart to be quiet. Foreboding, hellish, occasionally sickly jubilant, but never this.
But since... Since the sarcophagus. Since Fred...
The air had grown still. Conversations had grown to murmurs.
A lot, Gunn knew, was fear, from the remaining evil adjacent staff that hadn't fled, that swore to demons and even to gods that they weren't involved with worshipping Illyria, but still didn't quite trust Angel not to stake them.
Or Wes. Or Lorne. Definitely not Spike. Or even Harmony, her jubilance stark in its sudden forcedness.
And not himself, Gunn supposed, even if he did try to keep a little more professionalism than the others sometimes managed.
Gunn had no real excuse to be going to the lab, though he'd likely come up with something if he tried. He'd almost found himself there without thinking, his feat beating the familiar pattern across septic-clean floors, until... There he was.
Not even the usual humming of electric, punctuated by the blips and pings of computers as they thought, not even the jerky whirr of a hard drive stumbling across an idea. Silence.
That was practicality, Gunn knew. The lab had been sterilised, everything turned off, cleaned, with lemon-scent spray and spells all at once, to make sure no traces of any evil lasted. But it still felt strange. And it made the absence of Fred's excitable babbling of science even starker.
"Probably the least evil place in the building, now," Gunn murmured, and traced his fingers across a workstation.
"Jury's out on that," Spike said, from a dark corner, and Gunn startled, stopped himself from swearing, and went to glare at Spike...
And found himself unable. Spike looked small, young, and somehow pallid, despite his usual ever-paleness.
"Demon hunter like you? Protector of the streets? Reckon you'd be wise to vamps lurking in the dark."
Now Gunn glared. "I'm an attorney now, I only hunt demons that spectacularly piss me off, and you're clearly harmless enough that I don't see you as a threat."
"Shame." Spike was holding a cigarette, but it was unlit, and he was slowly disintegrating it between long fingers. "Street protector is a lil bit cooler than attorney."
Gunn half-laughed at that, a short, huff of a chuckle. "Yeah, well, I could still protect the streets. I could do both. The less-Catholic Daredevil."
It was Spike's turn to laugh now. "What, that dick in the red leather? Armageddon fellow? Nah, you can do better than that."
Gunn half smiled, then thought better of it.
"Reckon you're here the same reason I am," Spike said, as soft as he got, after a few moments more of silence. "Silly girl. Standing next to some ancient old relic. Knew better than that." He looked up, then. And met Gunn's eyes for the first time in days.
Spike's were red rimmed, tired, and even now a little shiny.
Spike's voice was quiet. "I don't much deserve kindness. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m never about to bloody well roll over and let the world have its very fine way with me. But I know… I do know what I was. What I am. Know I deserve all I’ve got and worse. But Fred. Winnifred. She looked at me, and yeah, it was probably a fascinating problem to solve, my ghostly situation, but she tried. And she was nice to me. Just that. Such a simple thing.”
Spike laughed again then, but Gunn thought it could have almost been a sob.
“Funny thing is, a lot of the people round here, they love a gossip. And I’m not deaf, you know. Hell, half the rumours round here about big old boss man Angel, I’ve started, and yeah, that includes the one about his night with Elvis. But my point is, I hear things. All those stupid rumours about me having some bloomin’ big old fancy for her.”
“And did you?”
“Oh, Gunn, you’re meant to be the smart one! Actually smart, not that law gubbins they stuck in that head of yours. Course I bloody didn’t. Not that she wasn’t brilliant, but well, Fred was just a mate. A proper friend. Even when the world wasn’t endin’. Anya, suppose, sort of, but she’s gone now, too.
“But Fred…She was a friend. And she was nice to me. And she’s gone now, stupidly and quickly, and I could have done a million bloody things different and maybe she’d still be here, but it doesn’t matter because either way, she’s gone.”
Spike flicked away the shredded remains of his cigarette, noticeably nowhere near a bin, and suddenly looked a little embarrassed. “Been a while I’ve had one of those, is all. A friend. Yourself excepted, of course.”
“They’re not gossiping about us?”
“Pretty sure you mostly go for the ladies, though you’re welcome to prove us wrong.”
They shared a smile there, sad and small.
The silence returned, hung for a while longer, until it was Gunn’s turn to break it.
“I loved her. Not in the way they gossip about you loving her. Properly. A while back, I was… Completely in love with her. And she was me, you know? We were together.” It felt at once a lifetime ago, and something that was so recent and familiar Gunn could have reached out and found Fred’s hand clutching to his own.
“Never expected it, really. Fighting the good fight, life very much on the line every day, but then there it was. And I really did love her. Even when I didn’t know how, even when everything was going to hell - when wasn’t it? - it was there.”
Gunn paused. In his mind, he saw Fred, sitting across from him at a table outside a restaurant, wearing a silly cheap golden crown, with a smile bright as stars.
“Thing is, I keep remembering her smile. Her laugh. That babble she had when she was talking about something science-y that she was so damn excited about. And it’s weird, because… You know she spent five years in another dimension, right?”
Spike nodded, listening. “Heard tale of it, yeah. Lorne’s gaff.”
“Yeah, he didn’t love it there. But she was there. Five whole years, enslaved, living in a cave. And we brought her back, she came to our world, but… You and I both know, you leave those places. But you never really leave them, do you?”
“Not as much.”
“So she had that. She had that, in her heart, in her mind. She’d tell me sometimes, that when she was alone, she’d get nervous, that a hole would open up, suck her down, strand her somewhere else, even further.”
"Huh," Spike said, tilting his head a little. “You’d never have known it to look at her.”
Gunn nodded, “Exactly, exactly!” He resisted the urge to pace. “Even after that, after our relationship went to Hell, even after the Jasmine thing, even after every little horrible thing that happened to her… She’d still smile, and hum along to some Dixie Chicks record, and save all our asses. She still had her joy with her. And I find that pretty amazing. To go through all that, and still have joy.”
“You still in love with her, then?”
Gunn shook his head. “Nah. But yes." He breathed in, slowly. "I mean, sometimes. That’s the thing, isn’t it? People like that, you don’t just stop loving. Even when you do, when you break up, or you move on, fall in love again. You still get those days where they hang in your mind like a mist, and you think, ‘how lucky was I to know her, and how the hell could I ever find anyone better, and even if they don’t love you back, you’re glad to still have even had a smile from them.’”
Spike nodded. Gunn didn’t ask who he was thinking of.
“And I mean, I really did love her - always will - as a friend. One of the few people in this world I could trust. But mostly just… As Fred.”
“Hell of a girl.”
And they sat in silence. Comfortable silence, at last. Gunn knew he was crying, but then so was Spike, and somehow, that made it a little easier.
Later, after they had found Harmony, who had cried over never lending Fred the CD she meant to, and Lorne, who had a distant look, but embraced them all the same, and Wes, who had the sad smile of someone who wasn’t okay, but knew he wouldn’t be for the long run, so would smile anyway, and Angel, who just sat, quietly, and listened…
They had told stories, of Fred. Hilarious, and heartbreaking, and terrifying and moving all at once. Gunn had mostly listened, and reminisced, and finally, spoke.
“All those stories, all of her, all true, but… I think what I’m gonna remember the most. Her strength, sure, her kindness, but… she had such joy.”
Spike nodded at Gunn, across from the table.
“She was joy,” said Gunn. And they all remembered.