"You know why I like scotch?" Angel said suddenly, dangling a glass of scotch between two fingers in front of him. "It tastes like the sun. Or how I always thought the sun would taste."

They were sitting, once again, in the Dragon's Crown, side by side at the bar, and the silence needed to be broken. When the Doctor had told the Krik-Tars that he would take Angel home before returning for their judgment, if they chose (which...damn), Angel had assumed that that meant his real home.

Which was a reasonable assumption, given that they had landed in the Krik-Tars' actual cave-house. But no, when it was Angel's turn to be taken home, they had landed at the Dragon's Crown (a whole day later, no less), and though Angel had some objections to that implication, secretly he couldn't really deny it, either. He did spend a lot of time there.

So Angel had invited the Doctor for a drink and now he was starting to regret it. The Doctor had initially responded with an almost aggressive flash of teeth and a bright "Why not?" and after that had fallen into a dark, sullen silence. And that silence was a bitch to break.

It wasn't like there weren't any important topics to bring up. Should I tell you I think I kill you in the future? topped that for Angel. It was just that there wasn't a good way to bring it up and Angel was maxed out on heavy topics for the night. And with what the Doctor was going through, adding more seemed insensitive and a bit cruel.

But Angel was never good at small talk, either. The scotch tastes like the sun line was pulled straight out of his ass.

Hunched over the bar, his neck protected by the bunch of his leather jacket and his elbows resting on the counter, the Doctor tipped his as-of-yet untasted glass of scotch so that it caught the light; something he'd been doing since it had been given to him. "Isn't that going to taste like death for someone like you?" he asked.

"I'm pretty sure everyone dies if they taste the sun, not just vampires," Angel replied. "I was being…" he waved his free hand vaguely, searching for the word. Poetic and romantic both fit, but he didn't particularly want to use either.

"Yes," the Doctor nodded before Angel could settle on any substitute words. "More sun in a field. Warm. Comforting. Home."

"That's it," Angel agreed, pleased that that line had worked. "Warm with a bit of scorching. A bit of bite."

The Doctor twisted his glass in the other direction on the bar, grunting in acknowledgement.

Another dreadful silence fell and Angel was struggling to come up with some other bit small talk when the Doctor said, "So what are your plans now?"

"Plans?" Angel looked over at the Doctor in surprise. He had to have plans? Weren't things going just fine without plans? Well, they had been, until the Cole kid showed up. It seemed like that needed a plan. Trouble was, he was pretty sure he'd worked his way into the plan of buying milk for the next time the kid came over without even meaning to. He'd backed out of that nonsense when the Doctor had shown up.

Angel brought the glass of scotch to his lips and asked just before he took a sip, "You think I need a plan?"

The Doctor shrugged. "I just thought I'd make an effort," he said. He looked over at Angel for the first time since he'd sat down and raised an eyebrow.

Angel nodded thoughtfully. "I probably need a plan," he admitted. "But I don't know what it is."

"You said it involved milk," the Doctor said.

"That's the scarier plan," Angel replied. "The insidious one that you never see coming until it's in your fridge, waiting for a visitor that actually drinks it. I liked my other plan much better."

"Which plan's that?" the Doctor asked. He tipped his glass the other way. " This plan?" he asked his drink.

Angel set his glass down on the bar, but didn't let go of it. "The plan where I'm a big scary vampire who's too old and grumpy to be interesting to little kids."

The side of the Doctor's mouth twitched. "That won't work."

"I noticed," Angel said glumly. "Any advice?"

"There's nothing kids love more than scary, old, grumpy, but tolerant things." The Doctor shifted on his stool, leaning an elbow on the bar. "Have you tried telling them to do their homework, eat their vegetables, and clean their room?"

"God, I do not want to be their father," Angel replied, shivering. Two hundred years and he was still broken under the crush of that experience.

"And they probably don't want you to be," the Doctor said. "That's what I would do, if I wanted rid of them."

Angel let the idea sink in. It did make sense… It didn't feel good, though.

The Doctor bent his knee, balancing his foot on one of the rungs of the stool. "Maybe I should take one of them," he said. "I bet a kid would want to see the universe."

Now there was an idea. "Just don't take the kid with the mother that cares, though," Angel warned. "She would kill you without hesitating."

"Right. Mothers." The Doctor lifted his scotch to his lips. "And I doubt they would survive something like what happened today. Maybe it's better to just...not."

"Is that why you're...not?" Angel asked, glancing over at the Doctor.

"I asked her, didn't I?" the Doctor said. He drank the rest of his scotch with a single sharp jerk of his wrist. "It used to be easy. Even without mentioning time travel."

Yeah. Grief made everything harder. Like trying to walk across a shattered sheet of glass without getting cut. Eventually you learn to tell which pieces will cut the deepest and you avoid them with rules like Don't buy the kids milk for their tea .

"So how long has it been, then?" Angel asked. "Since your last companion?"

"Before the war," the Doctor said, wincing from the scotch.

Angel nodded. "It's been a while for me, too," he finally said.

The Doctor reached across Angel and picked up the bottle of scotch that had been left for them from the bar. "What sort of stupid ape would rather stay home than see the universe?" The Doctor waved the bottle at the universe - or at least the room.

"When your first destination includes a demon bar with a vampire in Ireland?" Angel shrugged. "Doesn't make sense, does it?"

The Doctor turned his head, squinting at the demons that occupied the bar. "I guess that isn't normal for this time period is it?" he said, just realizing that a demon bar was somehow different from the other bars. He turned back around and poured more scotch into his glass. "I didn't say 'let's go to a demon bar in Ireland.'"

"Yeah, but you kind of have that look," Angel replied.

"What look is that?" the Doctor said indignantly.

The Let's go to a demon bar in Ireland look? But Angel shrugged noncommittally and said, "Nothing. Never mind." He took a long sip of scotch, savoring it.

"I happen to have saved her, her mother - which I admit might have not been the best thing for the world - and her thick boyfriend. That tends to negate any and all fashion choices."

"Wasn't talking about your clothes," Angel said. He glanced at the Doctor's outfit and decided not to comment. He actually rather liked the coat, but he didn't want to admit it. And also, he was talking a little bit about the clothes. Angel wore his own leather coat because it enhanced his own similar that look aura.

"I'll have you know that I'm still getting used to the ears and will toss you into the nearest sun if you make any comment along those lines." The Doctor gave Angel a very pointed look that was just enough to make Angel wonder if he meant it.

"The ears are fine," Angel replied obligatorily. "I guess it's not so much the look as the vibe."

"I do not ," the Doctor said, "have a 'vibe.'"

"Everyone has a vibe," Angel replied, turning back to his drink. "Your vibe is kind of like mine."

The Doctor folded his arms. "How's that then?" he asked after a long pause. "Dead?"

"Worse than that," Angel replied. "Inaccessible."

The Doctor snorted. "Right," he said.

Angel shrugged. "Fine, then. Find yourself a companion."

No reply followed. The Doctor hunched his shoulders over the bar and returned to twisting his glass between his fingers. "The thing is," he said eventually, "I never really thought of you as inaccessible."

Angel snorted. "You're probably the first."

The Doctor shrugged. "Maybe I caught you at the wrong time… But you standing there in that field with that slapped-by-a-fish expression? And then you hit me. Nah. You've always seemed sort of honest to me."

"I guess it depends on who I'm talking to," Angel replied. "And who I am when I'm speaking."

"Should I be flattered?"

Angel considered the Doctor for a long moment. This was so far one of the friendliest conversations he'd had with someone in about two centuries. And he liked the Doctor. Despite certain annoying habits. And wasn't friendship where you don't mind being around someone despite their annoying habits? Angel was pretty sure he read that in a meme once.

Angel's mouth twitched in a smile. "If you want. Flattery feels nice."

"Oh, shove off," the Doctor said, rolling his eyes.

Angel chuckled and took a deep sip of his drink in response. When he set his glass down again and had let the warm bite slide pleasantly down his throat, he said, "In the spirit of accessibility, then, can I ask you a moral question? It's related to time travel."

The Doctor let out a laugh, only slightly more than a heavy exhale through his nose. "I wish more people would. Keep everyone out of trouble," he said into his glass.

Angel nodded. "If I know something that could save lives," he hedged, "do I have a responsibility to tell someone who can stop it so they could...stop it?"

"You want to go back in time and warn someone?" the Doctor clarified.

"Kind of..."

The Doctor shook his head. "Short answer: no."

"I wouldn't mind the long answer," Angel said.

The Doctor poured more scotch into his glass even though he hadn't so much as taken a drink from it. "The long answer," he said, "is: it depends. There are rules and nuances. Levels of risk of blowing up the universe or changing the timeline to something worse. Or just changing the timeline, which is just as bad for most people. People hate change and they have a hard time believing that different isn't worse ." He picked up his glass from the counter and turned on the stool, leaning back and balancing his elbows on the counter in a relaxed position. "Problem is, if it goes south, no one will turn up to clean up the mess." He lifted the scotch to his lips and took a drink, swallowing hard.

Because there were no more Time Lords to do it. Right.

Although arguably, the one Time Lord left to fix the fallout would be present and invested in fixing it… "You said it depends," Angel said. "When would it be right?"

The Doctor lifted the glass again, but lowered it without taking a sip. "The safest example is when you know that you're supposed to. Like if you were to see yourself from the future warning the person, so you go back and do the same. Essentially closing the loop. What you want is a very clear path of cause and effect."

Angel nodded slowly. There definitely wasn't a clear path of cause and effect, here. The future Doctor hadn't made any indication that he knew what Angel was going to do before Angel decided to do it. He'd been struggling for an answer to save Angel's life just as much as Angel had. If Angel told the Doctor about the incident now, the Doctor could have planned ahead; stored up jars of his own blood beforehand to give to Angel when the thingamawhatsit broke.

Which meant that Angel hadn't told him. Wouldn't tell him. Or maybe he would and risk the consequences.

"What if it's an attempt to right your own wrong?" Angel finally asked.

Another flash of that slightly mad smile. "No one ever goes back in time to do anything else," he said.

Angel managed half a smile of his own. "Of course…" he agreed. "And what if there's no clear path of cause and effect but it's an easy thing to prevent. What if they just need one...tool?"

"But if they had that tool the first time, would you have warned them?" the Doctor raised an eyebrow at him. "Being technically easy to change doesn't mean it's less damaging to the timeline. Often, small events that can be changed for big outcomes cause more damage. Like knocking down a load bearing wall." He let out a sigh and unhooked his heel from the stool to swing it along the side. "What is it that you want to change?"

Angel shifted uncomfortably in his seat. "The death of a friend. Probably." Angel figured the probably worked for both the death part and the friend part.

The Doctor looked away. He focused back on his glass of whiskey. "I'm sorry," he said.

Angel nodded. "Yeah," he agreed. "Me, too." Silence fell between them, deepening as Angel realized that that was the end of the conversation: the Doctor's answer was no. No, Angel should not try to save the Doctor's life. Angel wondered if the answer would change if the Doctor knew it was himself they were talking about, but he knew that wouldn't make the answer right. Just biased.

"Okay…" Angel said finally. "Thanks." Angel swallowed, the sharpness of the decision not to try to save a friend's life feeling almost tangible in his heart and throat.

Another silence fell, but it seemed deeper and somehow less uncomfortable. Or, yes, uncomfortable but in a personal misery sort of way instead of awkward sort of way. Maybe that was better.

"It would be interesting," the Doctor said, leaning his shoulder in Angel's direction like he was going to nudge him, but never actually make contact, "if someone asked to go back and fix someone else's mistake." He lifted a shoulder and added quickly, "I'd probably still say no but it would be novel."

"Really?" Angel asked, also looking out at the people of the bar. "In all your time traveling, no one's asked to fix something they didn't start? The Holocaust? Wars? Nothing?" Angel's faith in humanity wasn't very high, but it had been high enough to expect that.

The Doctor waved his free hand indifferently. "The Holocaust," he said dismissively. "Sure, people ask, but I think they know the answer before they do. If it could be done, wouldn't it have been done already? It's existence is self-proving."

"But if no one asks because it hasn't been changed, it'll never get changed," Angel pointed out. He looked over at the Doctor. "Hey, can we go fix the Holocaust?"

That made the Doctor smile. Something a little less mad. He lifted his shoulder again. "Nah. Not without blowing a hole in the universe. Sorry."

Angel shrugged. "Thought I'd try."

"I appreciate that," the Doctor said. He twisted his glass, tilting it to catch the light.

Angel took a deep sip of scotch that finished off his glass. He set it aside until he decided he wanted a refill. "So," he asked, "how often are you tempted to go back and fix mistakes? The ones without universe-exploding consequences?"

The Doctor looked over at him, his eyes sharp and noticeably blue. "If I got on that ride, I'd probably never get off." He lifted his glass to Angel and downed the rest of it in a large gulp. Wincing, he twisted enough to set the glass down. "Tinik was right. We need to move forward through time."

"What about changing something so you can move forward?" Angel asked. "It's not too late to go back for Rose, right?"

The Doctor slumped a little deeper into his coat, his arms bent at what was probably an uncomfortable angle with his elbows still supporting him on the bar. "She has to look after her boyfriend ," he grumbled, rolling his eyes.

Angel raised an eyebrow. "If she's so codependent as to prefer looking after her boyfriend to traveling all of time and space - even despite your vibe - I think you'd be better off looking elsewhere anyway, then."

"I did leave out the time bit. It's a real selling point." The Doctor pulled himself up. "Maybe you're right. Better off without. Look at you. You're fine."

Angel snorted. He wasn't fine. He knew that. He was managing at an emotionally safe distance. But he was content there, and wasn't especially interested in changing things. "Try the time bit," he advised. "Just throw it out there, and if it still doesn't work, then forget it."

The Doctor nodded, his eyes scanning over the booths on the opposite wall. "Maybe I will," he said quietly.

They fell into another silence and Angel began earnestly debating if he wanted another glass of scotch.

"What about you?" The Doctor asked just as Angel was making up his mind to reach for the bottle. "Going to keep those kids around?"

Angel shrugged with more nonchalance than he felt. "They like my stories," he said. "But you know, the mother that cares found out what I am, so she might not even let her kid come visit anymore. Maybe I should just let fate decide through her."

The Doctor grunted something of an agreement. "I wouldn't fight a mother," he said. "Too scary." They fell into another silence, but Angel noticed that this one was comfortable. More comfortable than so many of the silences in his life lately. "But if she doesn't," the Doctor mused, adjusting his position to sit up, "telling stories...it can be nice. When you retell them to someone that young...they get edited. It's like rewriting the past. Just for a bit."

Angel swallowed. "Yeah," he said quietly. It was. "But what happens when they get older?"

"Do what's good for 'em," the Doctor said.

Angel paused briefly. "Shun them?"

The Doctor let out his burst of laughter. That single "Ha!" that contained all of his amusement. "Shunning people makes you seem mysterious. That makes them come back. Tell them the truth. Tell what they don't want to hear but need to hear for their own good. If that doesn't get rid of them..." he paused, considering. "Well, maybe by that point you won't want to."

Angel's stomach clenched at the thought. He wasn't ready for that. He swore he never would again. "I should move," Angel said.

"Or you could do that," the Doctor agreed. "I do that all the time."

"You take people with you," Angel said. "That kind of defeats the point."

"Only if time travel really does tip the scales in my favor," the Doctor said. He pushed himself up, standing from the stool and started to pat at his pockets.

"If it doesn't," Angel said, "will you come back and tell me not to buy that milk?"

He pushed his hands into his pockets. One emerged with what looked like a wallet and after a moment, the other hand pulled out a carton of milk. Condensation still dripped on the side of the carton. "Here," he said, holding it out. "If I have to, then so do you."

Angel reached out and took the carton, wincing at the cool wetness. "You are a bastard," he muttered.

"Yeah," the Doctor sighed. He swiped the wallet over the payment screen on the bar counter. It beeped pleasantly. He held out his hand to Angel. "Consider it revenge for that brain-muddling spell."

Angel winced again and took the Doctor's hand. "I'll accept that," he agreed. "Good luck."

"And you," the Doctor replied. They shook on it and the Doctor stepped away, toward the back of the bar where the TARDIS had parked.

A/N: Thanks for reading, everyone! The series will continue with Pull to Open; where the Doctor and Angel become temporary roommates. And yes, that is the whole plot.