Chapter Text
“Man, I wouldn’t want to be in Spike’s boots this morning,” said Gunn, as he leaned forward and crossed his impressive forearms comfortably over the high edge of Harmony’s front desk. He was still a little tired from the night before, but he figured he was in as good a shape as the rest of the team. The human members, anyway.
“I know, right?” Harmony blew out an overly dramatic breath and rolled her eyes. Her fingers flew as she quickly redid the end of the French braid in her shining blonde hair. “I mean, I’m not surprised he wrecked another car, but the Viper? He never should have tried to chase down an Ar-gothsa demon all by himself when we were all leaving Cat and Fiddle, anyway. What would he have done if he caught up to it? Wes said that the only thing that can kill one is a virgin wielding a holy cantha gourd, while wearing a loincloth. And Spike only has one of those things!”
Gunn shook his head, recalling the scene from the previous night. “Yeah, and turns out it wasn’t even an Ar-gothsa after all. Just a run-of-the-mill dude training for a marathon with a lot of safety reflectors stuck on his clothes. Spike was lucky he didn’t decapitate himself when he slid the Viper into that dumpster.”
“Or me!” Harmony pouted. “He was supposed to be my ride home from the bar, but did he think about that when he just took off after that not-an-Ar-gothsa? No, of course he didn’t. And I had to ride home on Wesley’s lap! Do you have any idea how bone-y and awkward that was?” she said indignantly. “He obviously hasn’t gotten laid in a while!”
Gunn chuckled. “That might be a little TMI, Harm.” He glanced over at Angel’s closed office door. “Have you seen or heard from Angel, yet? I kind of want to make myself scarce for a while if he’s around.”
“He called and told me to push back his meeting with the Basmoonian cult. He had to go out to the impound lot and get his personal stuff out of what’s left of the Viper, first thing this morning.” As Harmony was answering Gunn, the elevator doors opened, and a very surly looking Angel stalked through the lobby, carrying a medium-sized cardboard box. Demons and humans alike stopped talking, and slunk quietly out of his way when they saw him. He seemed to suck the light right out of the room as he passed by Harmony’s desk.
“Morning, boss!” Harmony chirped nervously, as she widened her eyes at Gunn. Gunn said nothing, and just watched as Angel strode towards his office without even a glance in their direction.
“Harmony, blood!” he barked, as he angrily slammed his office door shut.
The perky blonde vampire grimaced, and then sighed. “Looks like it’s going to be a chipmunk kind of a morning,” she said, as she pushed her chair back and rose from her seat.
“Chipmunk morning?” Gunn turned back towards her and raised an inquisitive eyebrow.
“I found this lady who specializes in rare and hard to find blood,” Harmony said, as she slipped on her pink herringbone jacket. “Chipmunk blood is soooo expensive and hard to find, because they’re so small, but it’s super light and sweet, with these subtle salty undertones. I guess from all the nuts? And the sweetness is because of the cuteness? I don’t know. That extra sweetness is supposed to carry over into a vamp when you drink it.” She shrugged. “Anyway, I keep a secret stash in Lorne’s office for mornings like this. I slip a floater on top of his regular cup and voila! Less grumpy boss when he comes back out!” Harmony flipped her wrist and hand upwards in an extravagant gesture to emphasize the word ‘voila’ as she spoke.
“You’re drugging Angel with chipmunk blood?” Gunn asked her incredulously. “Does that actually work?”
“I’m not drugging him, Charles! I’m just…….elevating his mood a little.” She shrugged her shoulders. “It’s for his own good. And really, for all of our own good. He’s been the biggest grumpybutt lately, and I, for one, would like to keep my dental plan and my unlife, thank you very much. It can’t hurt to try something.”
“Hey, you don’t hear me complaining,” Gunn said, as Harmony walked briskly towards Lorne’s office, kitten heels clicking as she went.
_________________________________
Angel sat forlornly at his desk, head slumped in his hands. It had been a terrible night. The emotional rollercoaster of thinking Cordy was back, only to find out that she wasn’t, really, had left him exhausted. On top of that, he had gotten a phone call from Wes at one in the morning, telling him that Spike had wrecked the Viper. When he had gotten to the scene of the accident, he not only had to tell the team about Cordy, but he also had to deal with the police, a crowd of intoxicated onlookers, and a very overstimulated Spike.
Angel sighed and looked up at the box he had plopped down on the corner of his office desk. It was all he had left of the Viper. Well, he thought to himself, at least nobody else had been in the car with Spike, and even the jogger had just kept right on going, completely unscathed. And it was just a car, after all.
He stared down at the daily agenda that Harmony had left out for him. Just another day in hell, written out neatly in pink glitter pen. Suddenly, the door to his office flew open and Spike strolled in, cheerfully whistling.
“What’s up, tall, dark and dismal? That was some night, wasn’t it? We haven’t had a night like that since we were back in Frankfurt.” Angel ignored him, picked up a pen, and continued staring at the agenda.
“Sorry about the Viper, mate, but lucky I wasn’t dusted, eh? You see what the top looked like? Could’ve taken my head clean off! That cop that was giving you such a hard time, he was a complete arse, wasn’t he? And sorry about your shoes, too. I may have had more to drink than I thought. Plus all that excitement. That pretty red headed bartender seemed up for it. Maybe I’ll go back-“
“Spike,” said Angel dangerously, “now is definitely not a good time.”
“Hey, what’s in the box?” Spike asked, as he walked up to Angel’s desk and started rummaging through it, pulling things out. “A Hawaiian shirt?” He held up a white fedora with a dark red band. “What the hell is this stuff, Angel? A box of ‘I’m-just-a-regular-human, nothing-to-see-here’ disguises?”
“That’s my stuff, Spike. Leave it alone,” Angel said sharply.
“Oh, these are brilliant!” He pulled out a pair of aviator sunglasses. “Do these go with the shirt? Like ‘Magnum PI’? Hey, you remember that bloody awful horsehair mustache you used to have sometimes, way back in the day?”
“I said, put it back, Spike! I mean it! Stop touching all of my stuff!” Angel stood up from his chair as Spike continued rummaging through the box.
“Where do you-“ Spike stopped and froze mid sentence, then burst out laughing as he pulled out a stick-on mustache. “Bloody hell, Angel! Still? What is it with you and mustaches?” He started digging frantically through the box. “You don’t have the mutton chops or those big sideburns, too, do you?”
“That’s it!” Angel yelled, as he sprang over the desk. “That’s enough! Give it back!” He grabbed at Spike, who narrowly avoided him, eyes wide with surprise.
“Angel, what the bleeding hell-“ Angel bunched the lapels of Spike’s leather coat in one powerful fist, and with the other pried Spike’s fingers away from the mustache that was still clutched in his hand.
“Hey! What the hell is going on in here?” Gunn said, as he dashed through the open door.
“He’s got my mustache!” Angel yelled, furiously digging at Spike’s hand.
“Well, he’s finally lost the plot, that’s what’s going on in here,” Spike said rationally, swatting ineffectually at Angel’s hand.
Gunn grabbed the back of Spike’s oversized leather coat and yanked him away from Angel. “Spike! Go down to the lab and see if Fred needs help with that Trask thing she was working on.”
“What? Me? He’s the one acting like a bleeding psycho. I’m completely innocent here! I’m a victim!” Gunn wrestled the squirming blonde vampire towards the door and shoved him out into the lobby, where a small crowd of onlookers had formed, probably curious to see if this was the day that Angel would finally dust Spike. The office betting pool had gotten up to over two thousand dollars.
“Now, Spike. Lab.” Gunn slammed the door and turned back to Angel, who was glaring at his now closed office door.
“Angel, just chill out. I know Spike can be a real pain in the ass, and he put you through hell last night, but it’s just a…..mustache?” Gunn’s eyes dropped down to the mangled bit of hair still clutched in Angel’s fist, and he raised an eyebrow in disbelief. He gracefully put up both hands, palms out, and began backing towards the door.
“Man, I’m not even gonna ask. I don’t want to know. I’m just going to walk away.”
_______________________________
Muttering angrily to himself, Spike stomped into the break room, past the Linethus demon who was mopping the floor.
“Stupid Cro-Magnon. Who does he think he is? Thinks he’s the big-swinging-dick-high-mucky-muck around here, an’ all he really is just a big dick. He thinks he’s better than-“ Spike’s leg shot out from under him, and he promptly ended up flat on his back in the middle of the wet floor. “Ow,” he said, after a moment of staring up at the bright lights on the ceiling, “bollocks, if this just isn’t a perfect day.”
“Oh, no, Mr. Spike, are you okay?” The Linethus demon said anxiously, as it extended a pudgy hand-like appendage. “I’m so sorry, I guess you didn’t see the ‘wet floor’ sign. I’m sorry.”
Spike turned his head sideways to look at the stocky demon. “S’alright, mate. I’m fine.” He reached a hand up, and the Linethus used its thick, leathery tentacles to balance the weight of the wiry vampire as he was pulled to his feet. “Was my fault. I wasn’t paying attention to where I was going.” He futilely tried brushing at some of the wet spots on his leather coat with his hands.
“Here, Mr. Spike, let me get that for you.” The demon pulled a clean towel off of his cart with its tail and wiped down the back of Spike’s coat.
“Thanks, mate, ‘preciate it. Have we met before?” Spike said, with his arms outstretched, twisting around to try to see how his coat looked.
“Oh, no, sir. My name’s Gerald. I’m one of the custodians.”
“Well, good to meet you Gerald, just call me Spike. Unlike certain other pompous vampires, who shall remain nameless, I don’t need any obsequiousness to puff up my ego as high as my stupid hair.” Spike stalked over the refrigerator, roughly shoved aside a bunch of carefully stacked lunch boxes and neatly labeled Tupperware containers, then pulled out a large, dingy, grease-saturated Chinese takeout bag from the back that looked like it had been sitting in the refrigerator for months. He unrolled the top and pulled out a can of beer. “Care for one, mate?” he asked, ready to toss a can to Gerald.
“Um, no thank you, sir, I mean, Spike. I’m still working.”
“Suit yourself,” Spike shrugged and carried the beer and the bag over to a table, where he sat down in a chair, immediately cracked open the can, and proceeded to down half the beer at once. “Ah, that hits the spot,” he said, wiping the back of his hand across his mouth. “That wanker of a vampire could drive a demon to drink. Just yesterday I find out he’s telling people, important people, that he thinks I’m a hero, and today he’s treating me like rubbish again.” Spike took another long pull of his beer. “He runs as hot and cold as a bird who’s playing hard to get and thinks I’m trying to get into her knickers. It’s enough to drive a bloke batshit crazy, over the years.” He sighed, downed the rest of the can, and pulled another one out of the bag.“Sure you don’t want one, mate?”
“No, thanks,” Gerald said, as he slid back over to his mop and continued cleaning the floor. “It sounds to me like you two have a communication problem. Have you ever tried talking to him about how you feel?”
Spike snorted and popped the top of the second beer. “Our ‘communication’ consists of name calling and punching each other.”
Gerald nodded and kept mopping. “So, words of affirmation and physical touch. How about time together? What kinds of things do you do together?”
“Well, we did just take out an entire colony of flesh-eating Greetisk demons. Did you know they only eat living flesh? So even though those nasty beaks and talons shredded us to bits, at least they weren’t trying to actually eat us. Ripped old tall and mopey’s pants clean off him though, they did. Guess he’s still not a big fan of wearing knickers, either. Told him he should’ve worn the leather pants.” Spike paused long enough to take a long chug of his beer, and continued. “We usually get on alright when we’re killing things. Especially back in the day, when we were both evil, we liked doing that together.”
Gerald nodded sagely. “Quality time is supposed to be very important. It’s good that you both enjoy doing some of the same things together. Definitely a step in the right direction. You know, I’m reading this book by this guy who talks about all of this communication stuff. Lightening the load and gift giving are two other things he talks about. It might be helpful. You can borrow it if you want.”
“Lightening the load? Didn’t I just volunteer to take on that horde of zombies down in the basement all by my lonesome for him? So he could go traipsing off with his gal Friday to save the day and be the big bloody hero? And didn’t I nobly step in and offer to wear the amulet instead of him, so he could go back to his cushy desk job instead of having to worry about Sunnydale? Selfless, that’s me.”
Spike looked earnestly at Gerald with big, bright blue eyes, a picture of innocence. “Gift giving? I ended up giving him the Gem of Amara, which I later found out that the idiot smashed. See how appreciative he is?”
Spike slammed back his beer, grabbed another to put in his coat pocket, and then proceeded to carefully re-roll the top of the now empty take-out bag. He got up from the table, went over to the fridge, and carefully stashed and hid the container back behind the assorted lunch boxes. He turned back to Gerald with a wink. “I’ll just save that to restock later, then. Well, I’m off to the lab. Thanks for the chat, mate. It was good to meet you.” He tipped a finger off his forehead and sauntered out the door. “I’ll be seeing you around, then, Gerry.”
Gerald loaded his mop back into his cart and folded up the ‘wet floors’ sign. His shift was over, and it was time to head home. As he began slowly pushing the cart out of the propped-open doors he thought to himself, “ That Mr. Spike sure was nice. I hope he manages to work things out with his boyfriend.”