I pull up in front of his house, the buzzing in my head so loud that there is simply nothing else. I knock on the door.

``Yea, it`s open come in.``

Thank the gods for pain medication and mortal stupidity, for the fools` notion of invincibility, for the soft rain that falls on my hair as I push open his door.

``Fuck!`` And even in his semi-drugged state he knows enough to curse, to stumble off the couch, to back away.

I smell his wound, the festering scent that I have inflicted. The smell of blood, and pain, and....That Which is Unfinished.

I wonder if he sees the dragon behind me too.

He is standing with his back to the wall. After his initial outburst, he now looks remarkably calm.

``What do you want?`` he asks me, eyes darting around the room. I stand well clear of any wooden objects, and wonder mindlessly if he has a silent alarm.

And why he doesn`t smell like fear.

``I don`t know.`` I answer, because it`s the truth, and he blinks those blue eyes at me, and I step closer.

He tries to back away again, but he is against the wall.

``You took everything you could, all right? You took my goddamned fucking hand. What more do you want?``

Angry. He looks so angry. But not afraid. Not afraid like...not like he should be.

``You deserved it.`` I tell him. And didn`t he? Didn`t he deserve what I did to him? After what he did to me, to mine?

``Oh, so you`re the angel of justice now, is that it? So goddamn wise and all-knowing. You don`t know *shit*, Angel. Not about me, not about yourself, not about anything. So get the fuck out of my house before I call the cops.`` Slight tremor in the voice at the end; could be the medication.

((Call the cops. Guess there is no silent alarm then. ))

I calmly reach over and pull the phone jack from the wall. I`m sure there are other phones, but he won`t be leaving the room to get to them.

``*I* don`t know anything? I seem to recall you told me everything, Lindsay. Your whole sorry, useless life...when was that? Oh yes, right before you went evil again and *tried to kill my friends*. ``

``I remember that too. I remember you mocked me, Angel. You listened to what I lived through, and my reasons for becoming what I did, and you fucking *mocked* me.``

``I didn`t mock *you*, I mocked your pathetic excuses for reasons. You sold your soul because you were hungry as a kid? Give me a fucking break, Lindsay. If that were reason enough half the country would work for Wolfrham and Hart. But see, they don`t. *You* do. And it`s because you`re weak and stupid, not because you had a depresing childhood. And that`s the same reason you turned your back on what I offered you.``

``So my reasons weren`t good enough for you, is that it? Hypocritical son of a bitch. *My* reasons for losing my soul were insignificant, huh? Well, tell me, All-Wise One, what exactly *is* a good enough reason for selling one`s soul? Poverty didn`t cut it with you, death didn`t cut it...let`s see...why did you lose yours again? Oh yea, a cheap fucking lay. And TWICE if I recall.``

I lean in closer and smack his pretty face. Once. Hard. With the back of my hand. From the looks of him, he hates that as much as I ever did.

I watch as the blood trickles from the corner of his mouth. Fresh wound opened. So many of them here. So many that my senses are overwhelmed with them. So many that I wouldn`t know where to begin...

I grab him by his collar.

``Does it end here?`` I grit between my teeth.

``What..does what..?`` He has no idea what I am talking about, but that is all right. I am not talking to him.

``I do this, I do this now, and this *ends*, yes? This is my ritual, and when it is done, you leave. Those I love are safe.. Safe from you? Safe from...from me? Yes?`` And I see against the backs of my eyelids, a small, curt nod of a platinum head. The dragon curls against my ankles.

A promise. The beast will savor this. It will be enough.

In moments I have Lindsay on his knees, his face is bloodied, and his chest is bare and bruised. He doesn`t try to fight me off, although his arms ...his good arm...is raised to defend himself against my savage blows.

I am holding back. The deal did not involve killing him. Just...breaking him. Just...((finishing what we`ve started)).

The powerful odor of mortal blood again, and the humming which times my fists. And still, still, no scent of fear.

``You`re not even afraid of me..`` I murmur...hauling him roughly to his feet, and spinning him to face the wall. I slam him against it, and he grunts. Blood trickles from his lips.

``You`d like that wouldn`t you? If I was? You`d fucking get off on that. But no. No, I`m not afraid,`` he spits. ``You`re *not* Angelus. Even I can tell the goddamned difference.`` A mirthless ironic sound masquerading as a laugh, then, ``Even like this.`` he nods toward the blood on the floor, the blood on his chest. ``I can tell. I know you`re not him, and I know I`ll walk out of here. So why should I be afraid, Angel? Why should I?``

But, oh, isn`t he a lovely sacrificial lamb? Lambs don`t know any better than not to be afraid either. They just follow you to that altar, bleating the entire time and rubbing their soft little heads against your leg.

I am silent for a long, long moment. I close my eyes, and I see it again. Doyle. Wesley. Cordelia. In the end, it will be Buffy, Willow...all of them, the death of all the innocents. And he`s not an innocent, is he? This man before me...He is...he is one of us. ((my brother))

This is a just deal. This is...meant to be.

Ordained. Ancient. Sacred. Blood sacrifice. The humming. Louder now. Singing. A chorus of Angels. There are Angels in Hell. I have seen them.

I watch the hairs rise on the back of his shoulders as my breath cascades over him, caressing, taunting. A dance. Brutal but compelling. Like all of this ``Ah, Linds,`` the whisper says, skirting his ear, his neck, ``You`ll leave this room tonight, yes,`` I know he can hear the smile in the sibilant, silken voice, which is mine..but not mine.... ``You`ll leave. But you most certainly *will not walk* out of here.``

And finally, at last, I smell the fear.

**

I have gagged him with a tie, and now he is tossed over the kitchen table, arms pinned behind his back, so that his shoulder blades form small wings just beneath his head of tussled curls. I tie his elbows together with my belt, but really, it`s protocol at this point. He isn`t going anywhere.

He is sweating, and breathing in loud gasps, his slim shoulders heaving with the effort of scarcely held control.

The scent of fear and sweat and ...roses. Somone had sent him roses. I close my eyes as I tear his loose fitting pants from around his waist.

Now he struggles, just a bit, just enough so that his writhing can`t be mistaken for anything other than an attempt at flight. ``Shhhhhhh......`` I whisper, running one finger down the midline of his spine, gathering the salty droplets of fear into a small pool at the hollow of his back. And he groans, with a mouthful of the silk.

The cry of a small, wounded animal. The call of prey.

I`m not sure when I get my jeans off, but I know that I am naked as I lay my tongue against the back of his neck, and I lick in long, wet strokes along his nape. I could drown in that scent, and.. I want to. He is not struggling now, but that`s probably only because I have a good fifty or so pounds on him, and he is still injured. And I am pressed against him, and he is pressed against a wooden table. Protocol again. Where could he possibly go to run from me?

Where could this pretty, arrogant, stupid boy possibly go that I wouldn`t find him?

And I realize I am asking him that out loud, my breath caressing his hairline, making small bumps appear there... ``What did you think would happen, Lindsay? Where did you think you were going to go?``

And he groans again, longer, lower, louder.

``You fucked with things you shouldn`t have, boy. You fucked with my family. You fucked with *me*. So yea, yea, you`ll be alive when I`m done with you. But you might just wish you weren`t.``

He is struggling in earnest, fighting me with every bit of strength and fear and rage he has in him. He is strong, and he is angry, and he is very, very afraid. But it is not enough, it is nowhere near enough; it cannot match my preternatural strength, my righteous indignation.

My fear.

And this is going to hurt. I think I say that aloud too. But I can`t really hear anything over his howl, muffled as it is by the silk and wrapping itself around my heart like the tight, wet, velvet heat of him around my cock.

I groan against his shoulderblades, pressing his arms back and together to lick the risen flesh, and elicit another strangled cry from his gagged mouth.

Those sounds....did you know that rabbits cry out? But only when they are terrified...as if the gods gave certain animals voices solely to herald their impending doom. He is making noises like that now. Delicate whimpers, and fragile moans, and he gives them up with each thrust of my hips, and each arch of his back.

He gives them up to me. So, yes, give it to me, let me take it, let me swallow it all, like I have always done, its not just the blood I swallow is it? It`s the rage and the hate and the pain and the desire and the goddamn fucking endless lonliness that goes on and on without end, and the lies, the promises, the secrets, the futures I can never ever have. So you take some Lindsay, you take some of it off me, you little fucking bastard, you take some, I am tired of it all...

So yes, this is for what you did to Cordelia, and this is for what you did to Wesley, and this is for what you did to my office, and my home, and my family, and my property, and this is for sending Faith, and this is for what happened between me and Buffy because of it, and this is for that goddamned loser she`s fucking now, and this is for the fact that I had to leave her, and this is for making me a goddamned fucking vampire, and this is for killing Doyle, and this is for my sister, and this is for my mother, and this is for Jenny Calender, and this is for the way Giles still looks at me after all this time, and this is for when I was ten and my father beat the living shit out of me for something I don`t even think I did, and this is for the lack of good fucking movies on TV at three AM, and this is for having those ridiculously blue eyes that remind me of when I was alive, and this is for the dark hair and the sculpted chin and cheeks, and this is for the pouty mouth, and this is for the slim hips under your 800$ suit, and this is for the tightest, most fuckable ass I have had in a long, long time.

And this is for making me do this. And this is for making me do this. And this is for making me do this!

Damn you.

And I realize I`m speaking aloud again, because I can hear my voice, over the rush of his blood and the pounding of his heart and the sounds of flesh on flesh. Crimson streams running down the back of his legs and the front of mine, and I want it, I want it...

I want it all....

How could I not want him right now?

How could I not need him, the way he needs me...needs me to stop hurting him, to let go of his arms before his shoulders dislocate, to stop pounding myself inside of him before he breaks in two...

How could I not love him right now? Right here. When he fills my vision, when he has become my world, when he is all I can see, and smell and taste?

I have spent so long as Raphael, and I am weary of it. Let me be Makkiel for you, dear boy, let me be your Angel of Punishment, oh let me, let me love you this way, and I promise you...I promise...

I reach around his body and smile, feeling the hot, hardened length of his cock as it jumps and twitches in my palm. I struggle to remember his human frailty, but the invocation of dichotomy is so loud... Mortal and beast, pleasure and pain. Let me take you, let me show you...

That it`s one and the same.

I`m whispering to him again, and he is melting in my hands. Of course he is; after so much pain, who wouldn`t squirm into a hand which offers only pleasure? After so much fear who wouldn`t arch against a caress that offered blissful release? Ahh yes...don`t fight this, it doesn`t make you weak...it doesn`t mean you wanted this....

No..no not at all....

Protocol anyway.

It`s all the devil`s etiquette.

``Come on,`` I whisper in his ear, licking the ridge of flesh and nibbling along his earlobe...I haven`t even bitten him yet.

Until now.

Until I sink my fangs into his pulse, and the artery spurts its coveted drink into my eager throat... and that is all it takes, of course, what else could it possibly take... ...the wind rushes past my ears and my own veins thunder with the release, and for one brief, shining, blessed moment....

....I had wanted it to last a bit longer, but he can`t, he`s human, and they are so fragile, they are so goddamn fragile...

And this one is one of mine. With word, with deed, with bite and blood and cum..

But when I tear my mouth away he is coming in my hands, and I wonder...what sort of a man was weaned on such pain? What kind of a life makes the rape and bite of a vampire into a moment of ecstasy by comparison?

I let him go. He sinks to the kitchen floor in a wet bundle of grief and blood, his breath coming in hiccupped hitches, his face stained with tears, his arms still twisted behind his back.

For a moment, I simply stare down at him, waiting to feel.....something.

Anything.

Please.

Then I turn away, and walk toward the bathroom.

**

The water runs over me, and I can feel it...little pin pricks of cold and hot, of pleasure and discomfort...assuring me that I am not hallucinating, I am not dreaming, I am awake..I am awake, and I have done it.

I bang the back of my head against the cold tile, a rythym for rocking, for singing, for....fucking...and the blood starts to seep out of my scalp. I can feel that too. Yes, I am awake, this was real....I am ....

//Eu sunt monstru//

//I am a monster//

I raped a man.

``Can`t exactly rape the willin`, mate.``

I jump, and nearly lose my footing in the slippery tub.

``Why are you still here?`` I don`t even think I open my eyes. I wonder if I even opened my mouth. But he`ll hear me. He always does.

He steps closer to me, he doesn`t need body heat to announce the closeness of that lean, musced form. The one which I have known, so intimately, for so long. Almost as well as my own.

``Ah, pet. This isn`t over. What makes you think this is over?``

Oh. I rape someone and now I`m 'pet`. Dubious honor to be certain.

``Because you *promised* me it would be. I did what you wanted...what you both wanted. I did it. Now you leave me alone.`` Where is the authority in that command..? I wonder.

``Ah, pet, don`t carry on so. You`re almost there. Not quite though. The man came in your hands, Sire. Sorta negates the whole `breakin him` concept.``

My eyes fly open at the title. `Sire`. Last time he addressed me that way I was chained to a ceiling with seven hot pokers in my side. He grins at me, as if to say, no hard feelings....and he is fully dressed. Standing in Lindsay`s shower, in a duster and boots. The water pours over him, collecting in small, clear droplets on his platinum hair, his square shoulders. He looks so..clean. He smiles at me again.

I glance at the bathmat. The dragon sits, sated, waiting, hungry, bored...who can tell?

``Go. Away.``

But before I can wonder where the authority is in that command, he is pressed up against me, and his tongue is running in small, almost lazy circles over my lips, and they part, because they have to, because he might be fully clothed, but I am not, and he might be calm and collected, but I most certainly am not, and because I know, for mercy`s sakes, I know what it is in *my* lousy, stinking, fucking unlife that makes the cold, illusory kiss of an enemy still better than the alternatives.

And he is pushing me back against the smooth porcelain, and I am letting him. Letting him kiss me in places he hasn`t in over a centruy and a half, letting him call forth all those noises from my chest and my throat, letting him nibble and suck..and ...*gods* bite...yes, that too, no no no permission asked or granted...letting him do all of it, because...

maybe it will take all this away...and maybe I will just wake up from a dream and it won`t have happened...and maybe...oh oh oh...maybe if he drinks enough I just won`t wake up at all...

His hungry mouth leaves my neck and I know I cry out in disappointment. I can feel him smile again as he licks a wet, chilly trail down my stomach to my cock...evidence...scene of the crime....

I gasp because his mouth has always been....always....

And I open my eyes to watch him...shameless I am, I don`t deserve such pleasure, but give it to me anyway....give it all to me...I`ll take it...I want it...I need you...need...

And the scream is ripped from my throat, because it`s not him...its`s not human...or vampire...it`s beast...it`s that *thing* and I didn`t want this..no I didn`t want...

get off of me get off of me get your horrible goddamn claws out of my stomach and your yellow tongue off my thighs and don`t fucking touch me and don`t fucking lick me and I`m not you and you`re not me I have a soul I know who I am I know who I am and I won`t let you I won`t .....

Banging my head against the tile again, spilling more useless blood.

And then my cool, sticky semen across my own hand, and my tears across my face.

**

I return to the kitchen, and he is still there. ((where else would he be? where can he go?)) Still laying across the floor in a silent heap, hands behind his back, twisted mass of wet silk in his mouth.

I reach down, and he flinches...once..just once.

I pull the gag out of his mouth, and he sucks in a deep, hungry breath, but that is all.

I unbind his elbows, and he doesn`t move at all. Just lays there, with his good arm, and his bandaged arm behind his back.

How could they think he is not broken?

I pull him into my arms, and scoop him up like a child, carrying him toward the bath. That`s when I see it. His eyes. Screaming their blue at me. Full of rage and malice and hate and the call of revenge. Strong enough to do it. He is. Look at those eyes.

They were right.

Far from broken.

I run the water again, filling the tub this time, and he just sits, on the floor, in the corner, cold cobalt blue on me, seeing everything, seeing nothing.

Then I pick him up again and place him in the tub, and he turns that gaze to my face. And I fear *I* might break. But of course, I don`t.

Instead I pick up a washcloth, and begin to gently clean him, squeezing water on his damp curls, and his smooth neck, and his soft, almost hairless chest. I rub the soap over the cloth, not him, and the cloth over his body...I don`t touch him....I am not going to actually touch him...

His eyes squeeze shut, and the tears start to flow between the long, sooty lashes, huge, salty droplets,

//silent witness bear.//

By the time I lather the soap in his hair, he is sobbing uncontrollably, and I say nothing, I do nothing, just keep washing him, just keep cleaning him, just keep...

wondering what could have happened to him in the past that was so unspeakable that it took gentleness to finally...break him.

I close my eyes, and I see them...walking out the front door of this apartment. The dragon on a rhinestone leash, and he is leading it, and he turns to look at me, over his shoulder, and he winks...once. Then the door closes behind them.

I am alone.

I dry Lindsay off, and rummage through his drawers for something to put him in. He stands like a child, a doll, those huge, crystal tears sliding down his face while I tend to him. I carry him to the bed, and deposit him gently in the middle of it. He looks startled behind the uneven gulps, and I realize he expects me to get in next to him.

But I don`t. I pull the blankets up over him, I turn the lights down, and I walk to the door. When I look back over at him, the tears haven`t stopped though his eyes are still shut. It isn`t until I stand in the doorway that I feel them on me again.

I close the door.

**

``Cordelia,`` I whisper; she is sleeping in the hospital bed, the sheets starched and white, and smooth. Wesley sleeps in the chair beside her. His face is purpled and I can smell the blood from his healing wounds. Her wounds do not bleed, but I can smell them anyway.

I pretend I cannot.

She opens her eyes and looks at me, and she smiles; she sees only her friend, only her ..Angel...and Wesley rouses too, and he takes the bundle from my hand...

He places the fresh pink roses in the water pitcher.

And I realize that for the first time since I cut off Lindsay`s hand, I cannot hear the humming in my veins.

And I pray, I pray to anything that might listen to me, to the Christ child on the wall above her bed, to any and all the ancient gods that still give a good goddamn about me and my people....I pray that the two mortals here will never, ever hear that sound.

~Finis