Triumphant Return To Heterosexuality
by kate

It was raining again in Los Angeles. Strange, sure, but the Hyperion Hotel had seen stranger in its days. A lot stranger. And the current inhabitants certainly weren't helping.

The main inhabitant, Angel, was currently lounging in the lobby, a small pile of newspapers scattered across the nearby table as he slowly made his way through the day's news. Wesley was doing just a small bit of research, reading up on an old book of prophecy he had found in a used bookstore in North Long Beach (tucked between a 1960s' geology textbook and a beat-up Jeanette Oake novel), and Gunn was in the back, double-or-possibly-quadruple checking the weapons. It was a quiet evening, and it was a rare and cherished thing.

So of course Cordelia stormed through the main doors, rattling the panes of glass in them. "Angel!" she shouted. "Angel, we got trouble!"

Angel stood, tensing for battle, then relaxed when he saw there weren't herds of demons following Cordelia's entrance. Wesley looked up from his books, and Gunn poked his head in from the back room, and all three of them just stared at Cordelia, who was currently trying to catch her breath.

"Um...Cordelia?" Angel said. "Trouble?"

Cordelia gasped, then held up a videotape. "It's all here..."

Angel took the videotape and looked at the label stuck to it haphazardly. "'Doc Angel's Exps' Dailies..." He frowned slightly, then, slowly, tried to reduce his contact to the minimum number of fingers necessary to hold it. "Cordelia...this isn't..." He swallowed. "This isn't your work, is it?"

"Look, just stick it into your VCR, okay?" Cordelia glared at him. "It's important."

"Cordelia, I don't know if I'm comfort--" Angel was quickly silenced as she grabbed the video from his hands and ran into his room.

"How do you turn this thing on?" she yelled.

Angel looked at Wesley.

Wesley looked back with slightly raised eyebrows.

Gunn snickered.

All three went into Angel's room.

Cordelia stood in front of the TV, tapping the empty box against her thigh absently as she stared at the glowing snow-filled screen. "Angel, I don't know how you hooked this thing up, but it isn't working."

Angel looked at the TV, and picked up the remote. He pressed a few buttons, looked at the TV again, then shrugged. "I don't know, Cordelia...maybe move a few wires or something?"

Gunn snickered, which appeared to be his new favorite thing to do, reached behind the TV, and the screen flickered to life, promptly showing Cordelia, nude, and lying on a metal laboratory table. Gunn stepped back, stared at the screen, then said, slowly and nastily, "Daaaaaamn..."

Wesley blinked a few times, and made a noise similar to a squeak.

Angel just stared at the screen, unable to make a sound.

Cordelia ignored their reactions, and began talking. "It's my new movie, where I go back to straight porn...they're calling it my "triumphant return to heterosexuality" or something like that...It's actually a really good role -- I'm a scientist, hell-bent on discovering the secret of immortality, and it turns out that semen from college boys keeps her young forever and then this sexologist...Oh! No, this isn't the part you want to be watching...." She grabbed the remote from Angel and hit fast-forward.

As she continued her calm discourse on the movie, the men stood there, staring at the screen as the show continued in high speed, men moving to surround Cordelia and masturbating at speeds that would surely cause chafing and a variety of strange burns. Wesley's head tilted slightly. Angel frowned. Gunn just winced.

"And then, see, it's a sequel to this one I first made when I became a star...but they can't come up with a better title than Doctor Angel's Experiments II and oh! Here's what I'm looking for!" She hit 'play' and pointed at the screen. "Look!"

The three men were already looking at the screen, but, now, they looked closer, and, as Cordelia turned up the volume, the fake moans and grunts seemed to fill the entire hotel. On the screen, Cordelia's face suddenly changed from the faux passion to pain, and she began to moan in earnest.

"Oh...Ow...fuck...damnit!" She fell back against the table angrily, then lifted her head to look towards the camera. "Keep fucking rolling, Erik!" There was a muffled voice from behind the camera. "No, I don't care about the footage -- you are paid to specifically listen to me and I'm telling you to keep the camera rolling!" She groaned again, then looked directly at the small video camera used for daily footage. "It's in Carson, at the mall, ugh, looks straight out of Jackie Brown, and it's...large...grey...scaled...something about small children, cravings, and, ew, blood." There was more muffled conversation, and Cordelia glared off camera. "What? Shut up, Erik. I'm busy. Yes! Keep fucking rolling!" She looked back at the camera. "Definitely Saturday, definitely trouble." She looked off camera again. "I'm keeping this video, Erik. Do you hear me? No, I don't want to hear you bitch! Talk to the fucking produce--"

Cordelia shut off the VCR, and looked at Angel, Wesley, and Gunn. "See? Demon. Carson. Sacrifice."

Angel looked down at the floor, refusing to look up at Cordelia, seeing her naked writhing come-soaked body even though she was wearing her usual brightly (verging on garish) colored clothing. "Um..." He paused. "Yeah." He paused again. "Cordelia, why did we have to watch that?"

Cordelia scoffed. "I was naked!"

"Um, yes," Wesley squeaked out, looking down at his shoes.

Angel just blinked, finally looking up at Cordelia.

"Hello, no pockets? No purse? No place to put the notebook I normally keep with me at all times in order to write down my visions?" She reached into her bag and picked up a small cloth covered notebook. "I had to do something..."

"Looked to me like you were doin' plenty..." Gunn said under his breath. When Cordelia's glare finally caught him, he looked at her defiantly. "What?"

 

Several days later...

Cordelia swore as she looked under her desk, scrabbling through boxes and stacks of papers. "Where is it...where is it..."

Angel strolled in from his rooms. "Cordelia, have you seen..." His voice trailed off he saw Cordelia on her hands and knees in front of him. "Um...Cordelia?"

"Where is it, Angel?" she said loudly, but muffled, her head still under her desk.

"Huh?"

"My tape! The dailies from Doctor Angel's Experiments II! I can't find it!" She stood up slowly, then looked at Angel, her eyes narrowing. "If I come in one day and you've gone soulless because you've been watching my tape, I'll..."

Angel sighed. "Cordelia, I don't have your tape. It's..." He searched for the words. "Tacky."

"Tacky?!" Cordelia screeched. "Are you calling me tacky?"

"No, I..." Angel was saved by the front doors opening.

"Gunn!" Cordelia shouted. "Gunn, where's my tape?"

Gunn raised his eyebrows, taken aback. "Well, damn, that's a welcome."

"Cordelia's tape's missing..."

"Oh that?" Gunn shook his head. "If I wanted pornography, Cordelia, I'd go buy something good..." He paused. "No offense."

"Right..." Cordelia said. She sighed and looked over her desk again. "I had it right here yesterday...put it down, was going to take it home, and..." She slapped the desk angrily. "Wesley!"

"I don't think Wesley would..." Angel said, trying to calm her down.

"He must have! He had my other video overdue for a month! He thought he could just get a bit more for free!" She stomped from behind the front desk, glaring at the two of them. "I don't know why I even bothered to bring it in! I could've taken it home, write everything down there, but no, I thought we were going to go save people, not steal videotapes for private masturbat...Wesley!" she said, her voice suddenly cheery. "Where's my videotape?"

Wesley was frozen as three sets of eyes fixated on him. "Um...I..."

"Don't lie to me, Wesley. You're horrible at it."

"Um...well...that is..." Wesley swallowed. "It's at home. I...uh...needed the details of your vision, and...well..."

Cordelia looked heavenward. "Nevermind. I don't want to know, and I don't want to hear. Just get it back to me intact..." She walked back towards her desk, then stopped suddenly. "And free of any fluids, please," she snapped out.

Her heels were the only sound in the hotel for a few seconds, then, everyone, collectively, shuddered at the thought.

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