Playmate
Riley had only been back in America for three days when he heard the scuttlebutt about the new menace in LA. Apparently some hostile there, who had been classified as a 1, but was considered neutered for unknown reasons, had overcome those reasons and gone on a rampage.
Riley used his rank and pulled the file, but as it happened, he only needed to see the first three lines to realize exactly what had happened in LA.
Class: Humanoid Demon
Species: Vampire
Pseudonyms: Angel, Angelus
Angel. Buffy's ex-boyfriend Angel. And from the sound of it, he had reverted back to Angelus. Riley wondered briefly if Buffy knew about it, but he had to shove the thoughts aside. They were too new, too painful. Right now there was a job to do, and he had to do it- not for the military, but for himself.
Angelus easily slipped through the shadows of LA, the place which had become a second home to him. Angel had stalked the night looking for good to be done, but Angelus looked for mischief.
It wasn't like before, when all he wanted was the slayer, but he was as he had been decades ago, back when he and Darla and Dru ruled the world. Or, at least, their little corner of it.
There were people who wanted to use his knowledge, who wanted him to do things to help them, simply because they had known Angel.
Not the brightest bunch, these investigators. Even Buffy had seen the difference between Angel and Angelus. She kept trying to 'fix' them, to switch them, but she understood both of them. Intimately.
Angelus wanted someone back by his side in this new hell. He wanted a playmate - he wanted Darla, or maybe even Spike, in those few moments when the brat had been tolerable. He was tempted to find some sprightly looking lass or lad and turn them then and there, but then there would be all that tedious waiting for them to be reborn, and he wasn't sure how much time he had.
Eventually, he knew, his own Scoobies would track him down.
But to taste a night of freedom and darkness, and to share it with another...that would be a memory that could sustain Angelus for years when Angel resumed control of their body.
Perhaps he could find another vampire, one who was already turned, and demand their attention. In LA, new vampires were born every night, and there had to be one or two with a Dracula fetish who would obey any tall, dark, and commanding presence.
Of course, those were the kind of simpering idiots that would annoy him to the point of ripping their throats out within an hour of meeting them...
"So this is the great Angelus?" A strong male voice broke through the vampire's thoughts.
He turned, and saw a young man - the clean-cut, boy scout, apple pie variety - standing loosely at attention in military fatigues. "You've heard of me?" Angelus asked with false delight, "now however will I deal with that shock? That someone like you has heard of little old me... oh wait, that's right. I can just kill you."
"We didn't talk much last time, but I gotta ask; were you this witty before you turned evil, or did Buffy just have really bad taste before she met me?" Apple Pie asked, a snarl twisting his wholesome features. It took a minute, but the expression jarred Angelus's memories. This was the little GI Joe that Buffy took up with after he left.
"Buffy?" Angelus snarled. "The Slayer sent you instead of confronting me herself? I'm telling you, the girl's slipping."
"She didn't send me; doesn't know I'm even here," the boy admitted.
"Oh, so you're here alone? Going to destroy the big bad boyfriend from the past so that you can play the hero and get little blondie to bed? It's not that hard, just smile that pretty little wholesome smile of yours and she'll be tripping over herself to jump between the sheets. Surprised she waited this long, in fact."
Angelus was only mildly surprised when the boy pulled his hands from behind his back, revealing a gun and a crossbow loaded with stakes. "I'm going to kill you now."
"Lotta people've tried, you know, including your precious Buffy."
"She's not mine, not anymore." GI Joe admitted. "And besides, this isn't about her. This is about you, about me."
"You, me, and us, now is it?" Angleus smirked. "All grown up and wanting to fight in mommy's sandbox?"
"Not fight," he said softly, lowering his weapons slightly. "I don't want to fight. I want to understand."
Later he would blame his slowness on having spent too long with a soul, but it took Angelus a full minute to realize what the little boy scout was saying. "Well, suddenly my night just got a whole lot more interesting."
"What?"
"It isn't mommy's sandbox you want at all; it's daddy's. You want to take a little walk on the wild side, don't you? You wanna taste the dark rainbow, is that it?
GI Joe - what was his name again? - was still aiming his weapons in vaguely the right direction, but he obviously had no intention of firing them. Angelus dared to take a few steps closer.
"You came here, knowing you were going to find me, not Angel, and that's what you wanted, isn't it? You got a little nip of darkness with the stint in Sunnydale, and now you want the whole cake." A few more steps closer.
"St-stop! Stop coming closer. I will shoot you this time."
Angelus took another step closer, smirking again, "Your shaking hands and lack of action don't really lend credence to your order, GI Joe."
"Riley. My name is Riley."
"Riiiight! Right, Riley. How could I ever have forgotten?" Angelus laughed mockingly, knowing it would annoy Riley even more. "I'm honestly surprised it took you this long to switch teams."
"I'm not switching anything," Riley insisted, though his voice lacked conviction. "I'm just..."
"Just curious?" Angelus replied, "Just wanting a little insight into the darkness? Not ready yet to jump into the deep end? You think you've been swimming with the good guys all this time, taking out big bad demons like me? You might have been playing in their pool, soldier boy, but you were never on their side. You've always been closer to the hunted, not the hunters."
Riley's hands had fallen completely to his sides, and Angelus started to circle him, his eyes switching from that delectable neck and back to his once-innocent eyes.
"And here's the newsflash, Boy Scout, there's only one end, and it's deeper than you can even imagine. You've been treading water like a good soldier, but if you ever paused, you'd realize your feet can't even touch the bottom."
Riley swallowed, his Adam's apple bobbing with the motion. "I- I-"
"You want me to show you how deep the darkness goes?" Angelus whispered, his face inches away from the tanned neck. He could smell Riley's aftershave, could smell the starch of his uniform, and the spices from a country he had recently returned from. "You want me to pull you down?"
"Y- y- yes."
Angelus didn't respond, he just morphed and slowly sank his fangs into Riley's neck, savoring the taste of blood and sweat that mingled on his tongue. If only for the night, he had a new playmate.