Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters from Angel/Buffy. Any characters that are not from those shows belong to me.

Angel stumbled away from his latest kill. It would be his last – at this for this battle. He looked around wearily, running a bloody sleeve across his bloody face in a futile attempt to wipe the blood and gore away.

Gunn was lying several feet away, collapsed against the wall. He was dead. Angel closed his eyes, feeling a pang of grief. Would there be no end to these useless deaths? he wondered, even though, in his heart, he had known Gunn would die before the battle ended.

Illyria came to stand beside him. Her blue and brown hair now had several other shades mixed in it and... was that entrails? He decided not to look too closely. "They were many," she remarked. "And yet we won." She turned to look at the vampire. "Ironic, is it not?"

Angel nodded, too tired to speak. He couldn't see Spike, but then again all vampires turned to dust when killed... Despite what would have been expected, he felt a small amount of grief for the sarcastic vampire.

But no – ahead of him, beneath the body of one of the numerous demons, he saw a flash of Spike's bleached blonde hair. Of course he would still be alive – not Wes, or Gunn, but Spike! Spike, of all people!

"My pet has survived," Illyria observed. "I will go help him." She walked away, stepping on severed heads, broken weapons and God knew what else.

"Yeah, you... do that..." Angel mumbled, shaking his head. For some reason that he couldn't explain, he was happy that the strange being called Illyria had survived, apparently unscathed by the intense fight.

Angel looked up and saw the sun beginning to come up over the horizon. "Damn it!" he snarled, suddenly angry. After all this, he would not be killed by the sun! "Illyria, hurry," he called. "The sun's coming up!"

With those words, he turned, picked Gunn up and ran (well, it was more like a fast walk) down the alley, to the Hyperion. He wasn't sure why, but after he had taken over Wolfram & Hart, he had kept the hotel.

He stumbled inside the familiar glass doors just as his back began to smoke. He could only hope Illyria would bring Spike back in time... Or actually, that she would be too late and he would burn up.

Reverently, he laid Gunn on one of the couches outside his former office. That would just have to do for now, he thought, exhausted. Then he slumped to the floor, unconcious.

When Angel woke up, he found himself lying in his old room. "What...?" he mumbled, sitting up slowly – anything faster than slow would have caused him too much pain.

Illyria was sitting in the corner, which he found incredibly disturbing. "My pet is fine," she assured him gravely. "He is my guide now."

Angel's face showed his confusion. "I thought Wes..." Then he remembered. "Right," he muttered, swinging his legs off of his bed and standing up. "Where's Gunn?" he asked.

"Gunn and Wesley are in the entrance of this building," Illyria replied. "This grief... It tears at me, like some kind of parasite. Will it not leave me alone?"

Angel shook his head, not in the mood to explain things. "Ask Spike," he said, shuffling past and out into the hall.

Illyria followed him. "My guide is resting. His transformation into a human seems to have had some unexpected side effects."

Angel stopped. "Transformation?" he repeated disbelievingly. "But that wasn't an apocalypse!"

Illyria studied him with her large blue eyes. "He is human," she stated calmly. "I care not for old prophecies and what they have to say."

Angel felt his fists clench and forced them to relax. He had signed that prophecy away when he had joined the Circle of the Black Thorn, so it seemed fitting that it go to the other vampire with a soul – Spike, of course.

Illyria was still watching him. "Will you continue to stand there all day, or are you planning to move sometime soon?" she asked.

Angel sighed and went to the lobby to see the bodies of two of his dearest friends.