When Angel could see again, they were all standing in a plainly furnished room. He looked over at the others, who looked as stunned as he felt.

That was when he realized that his hands were a funny color. They were kind of pale gray, which okay, wasn't all that different from normal, but...

He glanced at the others again.

They were all in black and white. "Okay, that's not good."

---

Angel looked slowly around the room. Not only was everything in black and white - he kept blinking his eyes like that might make things switch back to normal - but they were somewhere else entirely.

Their clothes were old-fashioned - dark trousers and white shirts for the men. Gunn even had a suit jacket, although it was clear from the line of it that it wasn't modern either. Gwen was wearing a dress like women used to back in the forties or some time around then; it was almost more like a suit than a dress, the skirt falling just below her knees.

"Yeah," Angel said. "Definitely not good."

"Hey, at least we're not breaking into song," Spike said, glancing around a bit nervously.

"Thank god for small favors," Gunn said dryly. "Anybody have any idea what's happened?"

"We're in the movie." Everybody turned to look at Gwen. "Don't you all recognize it?" she asked. "We were just looking at it on the screen."

"She's right," Wesley said, reaching down and picking a hat up off the desk. "It's The Maltese Falcon. We're in Sam Spade's apartment."

"How the bloody hell did this happen?" Spike went over to push one of the sheer curtains aside so that he could touch one of the windows, as if trying to prove to himself that they were real.

"Good question," Angel said and then blinked as he realized to whom he had said it.

"An even better question," Wesley said, turning the hat over in his hands, "is how do we get back?"

Spike opened the window, looked out, then closed it again. "Not through there," he said as he strolled back over to the rest of them. "Think there's a magic portal or something somewhere in this place?"

"If there is a way to get in, there should conceivably be a way back out again." Wesley looked around the room. "Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be labeled."

"Not too often that there's a big red button with a 'push me' sign next to it," Angel agreed.

Gunn snorted. "Yeah, and even if there was, chances are it'd be the self-destruct."

"Everybody, I don't know, look around for... something," Angel said.

"You mean a statue of a black bird about so high?" Gwen asked, gesturing with her hands. "Won't find it here, Slick. Not yet."

"I don't mean the bird," Angel said, following his own instructions and looking around, taking in the old-style furniture. Then he stopped and looked at Gwen. "You think we need the bird?"

Gwen shrugged. "That's what everybody was after in the movie."

"Yeah," Angel said, "But we're not in the - okay, everybody pretend I never even started that sentence."

"It's about as logical as any of this is," Wesley admitted.

"I prefer to pretend Angel never speaks most of the time anyway," Spike said.

Wesley gave him a look. "Spike, if you're not going to be helpful - "

"Wait a minute," Angel said, standing in the midst of all of them. "Where the hell is Connor?"

Gunn frowned. "*Now* you start caring about our temps?"

Angel's gaze flickered over to Wesley. "Yes. I'm a really caring boss, and right now I *really care* about where Connor is."

"Illyria isn't here either," Wesley pointed out. "It's possible that only those inside of the theater were affected."

"It's possible our entire city block was affected," Gunn replied. "Not like this freaky magic trick came with a manual. I say we get our asses out of here and Monday morning quarterback the details later."

"So we... what? Sit around here and wait for Sam's secretary to deliver the falcon?" Angel asked.

"She isn't going to deliver it unless she's told to." Gwen stepped over to the phone and picked up the receiver. "Somehow I don't think I'd make a very convincing Bogey."

Angel grinned a little bit. "Yeah, well." But before he could take the phone from her hand, Spike stepped forward and grabbed it. "Hey!"

"You want to do it that bad, fine," Spike said, looking at the numbers thoughtfully. "Only I'd think it'd be perfectly clear to anyone that you aren't Bogey; you're the fat man."

"I've told you a hundred times that shirt only shrank a little in the wash," Angel shot back.

Spike ignored him, staring down at the phone. "Doesn't work out so well when you don't know the girl's number."

Wesley rolled his eyes and held his hand out for the receiver. "Let me try."

"Yeah, okay," Spike said, handing the phone over to Wesley without complaint, which just verified that it was Angel he wanted to drive crazy.

Confidently, Wesley dialed a number and held the receiver to his ear, waiting for it to be picked up. "Hello?" he said finally when it was.

"Precious," Gwen hissed at him.

"Hello, precious," Wesley obediently said. "I'm sorry to disturb you at this hour but I have a rather important favor to ask."

"In the Holland box at the post office is an envelope with my scrawl," Gwen whispered to him, gesturing for him to repeat what she said.

Wesley did so, and with Gwen's coaching he continued, the words flowing more easily as he got into character. "In that envelope is a parcel room check for the parcel we got yesterday. Yes. Now get that bundle and bring it here PDQ. That's a good girl. Now hustle. Bye."

Gunn raised his hand. "Anybody else here feel like they just got a sneak peek of every one of Wes' dates with Lilah?"

"So that's it?" Angel asked. "Now we just... wait?"

"We can continue looking for some other clue towards a way out, but," Wesley said, "essentially, yes, we wait."

"How did you know the number?" Gunn asked curiously.

Wesley shrugged. "I didn't. I guessed. And for the record Lilah was never that obedient."

"Well," Spike said, going over to the couch and sitting down. "Might as well get comfortable if we're going to be here a while."

Angel caught Wesley's sleeve and tilted his head to the side, lowering his voice. "You guessed?" he repeated.

"I was hoping that, given our circumstances, the act of dialing would be enough," Wesley replied.

"Any ideas how this could have happened?" Angel asked.

"Magic?"

Angel frowned. "Well, yeah, but I meant more specifically."

"That really depends on exactly what happened," Wesley said. "Whether this is a pocket dimension or a constructed reality or a mass hallucination - "

"You don't seriously think we're hallucinating, do you?"

Wesley tilted his head in a maybe motion. "Frankly, I like that option better than the 'we've suddenly been sucked into a constructed reality' option. The problem with constructed realities is that they can be deconstructed just as easily."

"What do we do if that happens?" Angel asked.

Wesley looked grim. "Let's just hope it doesn't happen."

"That's not an answer," Angel pointed out.

"I thought it a better answer than 'we all cease to exist.'"

"Just because I might not like it doesn't mean I don't want to hear it," Angel said, meeting Wesley's eyes.

Wesley held his gaze for a moment, then turned away. "No use dwelling on things we have no control over."

Angel gave him a hard look. "But what about the things we do?"

"You have something in mind?" Wesley asked.

"Sure," Angel said. "Your contract - "

"My contract is not the issue right now," Wesley said sharply. He took a deep breath before continuing in a calmer tone. "We do what we have to do. We make our decisions, and then we have to live with them." He smiled humorlessly. "Or not, as the case might be."

"Yeah, well... you're not alone there." Angel sighed. "Okay, so let's do what we need to do to get out of here."

As if on cue, there was a knock on the door.

Despite there being two people in the room with supernatural speed, it was Wesley who got to the door first to open it. "Thank you," he told the woman who was standing there, taking a rather large package wrapped in newspaper from her. "Sorry to spoil your day of rest."

"Not the first one you've spoiled," she replied without heat. "Anything else?"

"No," Wesley said. "Thank you."

She grinned at him. "Bye-bye, then," she said then turned and walked off.

Wesley closed the door. "Clear off the desk," he said, gesturing at it with his chin. Gunn was already there, setting the lamp down on the floor and sweeping everything else off.

"Let's get it open," Angel said as soon as Wesley set down the package. He tore away the paper quickly, Wesley's hands working at the other end, the others watching as they struggled to get the falcon out of the layers of material that surrounded it.

The paper layers seemed to be endless, but eventually they cleared enough of it off to reveal the black statue beneath.

"The stuff that dreams are made of," Wesley said ironically.

"Hopefully ours," Angel said, pushing the last bits of cotton wool out of the way as Wesley reached out and touched the statue. "Do you think - "

But there was no time to finish his question as the room tilted and spun away with a lurch.

---

As soon as Wesley's hand touched the falcon statue, reality - such as it was - spun away like a pinwheel in a hurricane.

When it spun back in, Wesley got a face full of water. He blinked and sputtered, but by the time he'd realized it was because someone had thrown her drink in his face the woman in question had already stormed out of the room.

He realized other things at the same time, such as the fact that he was trussed up rather like a Christmas goose. His hands were cuffed behind his back, his ankles were bound with rope and tied to another rope that went around his torso, keeping him from moving his arms or from straightening his legs. He was sitting on the floor, leaning back against the front of a sofa.

But most disturbing of all was that Angel and the others weren't there.

He wasn't alone, although considering the company he almost wished he were.

Pushing aside his worry for his friends as best he could, Wesley turned a cold gaze on the other person in the room. "I thought I told you to stay away."

Johanna, dressed in a stylish forties women's suit, smiled at him from her position sitting demurely on the coffee table in front of him. "And I told you, you can't run away from your responsibilities, even -" She gestured at their surroundings. "- into fantasy."

"I can assure that you any fantasy of mine would not include your presence." Wesley paused. "Well, living, at least."

"If it weren't for your obsession with Angel," Johanna continued, ignoring the threat, "we'd be overseeing the finishing touches on your office right now. Instead we're... here."

"As no one invited you, you have no one to blame for being here but yourself," Wesley said.

Johanna eyed him up and down pointedly. "Unlike some people, I take my responsibilities seriously. I don't go running off to play when I should be doing my job."

"Yes, you're very good at being at the Senior Partners' beck and call. Do you heel and roll over as well when they tell you to?" Wesley shifted and leaned back against the couch behind him in a futile effort to find a more comfortable position.

"You're not helping him, you know," Johanna said, not acknowledging Wesley's insults. "Having you there is nothing but a distraction. Takes his mind out of the game. You're something he can hold onto beyond what he should be paying attention to, one more thing for him to worry about losing."

Wesley ignored the part of him that whispered that there was truth in what Johanna was saying. "I fail to see how my running an evil law firm dedicated to bringing Angel down would prove to be any less distracting."

"It's what you agreed to do." Johanna's voice got as sharp and loud as it ever did. "You made the deal. The Senior Partners do not take kindly to people who do not keep their promises."

"The Senior Partners knew who it was that they were making a deal with," Wesley snapped. "I never made a secret of my thoughts or feelings. It doesn't matter how many deals they ask me to make, be they sealed in ink, or blood, or Gremanthian demon essence, my allegiance is always going to be with Angel. If the Senior Partners expected that was going to change, then they are fools."

Johanna regarded him silently for a moment, then got up and walked away. "The Senior Partners don't care about your thoughts or feelings," she said as she stepped through a door across the room and to the left of the couch. She raised her voice so Wesley could still hear her. "Any allegiance you want to maintain in your unbeating heart is completely irrelevant as long as you do your job, which is to make Angel suffer. That's what you agreed to; that's what the Senior Partners expect. And if you aren't living up to expectations - " Johanna came back into the room. " - they can and will find others to do the job."

She walked back over to where Wesley was tied up. In her hand was a long, sharp knife.

---

The world flipped over a couple of times, everything going a little bit too fast, and when it stopped they were all left standing there blinking.

All of them except for Wesley.

"Where's Wes?" Angel asked, looking around, ignoring the fact that they were in different clothes than they had been - again.

"Wesley?" Gunn called, sounding a little bit ragged, like maybe the ride hadn't agreed with him.

There was no answer.

"Okay, I don't like this," Angel said. They were still in black and white, and it was daylight. At least the sunshine in black and white movies apparently didn't make vampires burst into flame.

"That's what you said last time," Spike told him.

"Yeah, well, I like it even less when people start disappearing." Angel walked around, but it wasn't like Wesley was going to be hiding behind some scrubby bushes or a big rock or anything.

"The clothes are good," Gwen announced, looking down at herself. She was dressed in men's trousers, boots, and a pale button-down shirt - also a man's. Her hair was pulled back from her face. "Authentic. Although the monochrome thing's going to get old really fast."

"Yeah, but shouldn't you be wearing some kind of frock with eight petticoats?" Spike asked, regarding his own trousers - complete with suspenders - and shirt with some irritation. "I'd better get my own things back when this is over with."

"Well, let's do whatever it takes to get this over with," Angel said. "Because whoever's little plan this is, they're need of some serious ass-kicking, and I want to be the one to deliver it."

"What makes you think this is someone's plan?" Gwen asked.

"Paranoia," Spike muttered under his breath.

Gwen gave him a look. "Seriously. Things like this happen to freaks all the time. It comes with the territory."

Angel shook his head. "Things like this don't 'just happen.' Trust me; there's someone behind this."

"Whatever." Gwen turned away, hands on her hips as she surveyed the landscape, such as it was. "I can't imagine why we ended up in a movie that's all about what paranoia and greed can do to people."

"Of course. Treasure of the Sierra Madre," Angel said, just as a sound he hadn't heard in years caught his attention. "Oh, great. Bandits."

Spike and Gunn both looked at him blankly, but at least Gwen knew what was going on as they watched a big gang of bandits, complete with horses, hats, and weapons, come thundering up the ridge toward them. "Okay, so we need to play along."

"I'm armed," Spike offered, pulling a pistol out from nowhere and waving it around carelessly.

"Hey, take it easy!" Gunn flinched away from Spike.

"Don't worry, mate," Spike said. "Know how to use it."

"Spike, shut up," Angel said. It came as natural as breathing once had. "What do we do now? Start a gunfight?"

"This isn't the O.K. Corral," Gwen told him, taking out a pistol of her own and looking at it. "We have to try to talk them out of it first."

"And then what?" Gunn asked.

"Then there's the gun fight." Gwen thought for a few seconds. "And someone has to get shot."

Angel turned and looked at Spike automatically.

"Oh, no," Spike said, backing up a step and holding one hand up in Angel's direction.

"Well it's got to be one of the two of you," Gunn pointed out. "For all we know, the effects of this are real. If someone's going to take a bullet, it should be someone who won't actually die."

"Just do it," Angel said to Spike.

"You're a vampire, too," Spike said. "Why's it got to be me?"

"Because I want to get this over with," Angel said.

"In that case, you do it." Spike stepped to the side and gestured. "Go on. It's all yours."

The bandits were still making their way to the top of the trail on the ridge just below, some of them leading their horses and others riding. After a minute of milling around and talking amongst themselves, three of them came closer, the one in the lead smiling and nodding his head.

"We are federales," he said. "You know... the mounted police."

Angel tried to remember how this was supposed to go. "Yeah? Where are your badges?"

"Badges? We ain't got no badges. We don't need no badges! I don't have to show you any stinkin' badges!" The bandit was trembling with anger, eyes wide.

"Calm down there, Sancho," Spike said. "Although actually if you keep that up, you might burst a vessel. So on second thought, go ahead."

Gwen gave him a sharp look, then turned back to the bandit. "Better not come any closer," she said.

"We ain't try to do you any harm," the bandit wheedled. "Why don't you try to be a little more polite? Give us your gun, and we leave you in peace."

"I need my gun, myself," Gwen told him.

"They have plenty of weapons," Gunn said, looking confused. "What do they want with a few more?"

"That's not the point," Gwen said. "Oh, now we're supposed to shoot his hat. You want to do the honors?" She looked at Angel questioningly.

"What if we miss and blow his head clean off?" Spike asked.

"No way to know until it happens." Gwen shrugged.

"Right. Here goes nothing." Spike lifted his pistol and aimed it at the bandit and, to Angel's surprise, actually managed to... miss the guy completely, head, hat, and all.

"Great," Angel said. "Now what?"

"Keep going," Gwen said. "Maybe that's a detail that's small enough that it doesn't matter?"

It seemed like that might be the case, since the bandit was saying, "All right, all right," and backing off.

The bandits conferred briefly, then the leader came back, again shadowed by one of his friends.

"Look here, amigo," he said, looking at Gwen, obviously having singled her out as the woman - man - in charge. "You got the wrong idea. We don't want to get your gun for nothing - we want to buy it. Look! I have a gold watch with a gold chain..." His henchman stepped closer and held up the pocket watch, which even Angel could tell was a piece of junk.

"Oh, right! How stupid do you think we are?" Spike asked, talking over the bandit, who kept speaking like nothing was happening.

"Would you just shut up and go along with this like the rest of us?" Angel hissed at him.

"No, I'm keeping my gun," Gwen told the bandits.

The leader flew into a temper and started shouting, and Gunn, cool as anything, lifted up his pistol, took aim, and shot the pocket watch dead on.

"See?" Gwen said, smirking at the bandits. "My Gunn is definitely a keeper."

The bandit who'd been holding the watch gave an exclamation of amazement, and the two men quickly retreated back down to join the other bandits.

"Looks like we've got ourselves a fight," Gunn said, ducking down behind a boulder as the first shot rang out. "Get down, would you?" he said to Gwen, grabbing her wrist and yanking her down beside him.

"Yeah, everybody stay down," Angel said. "Except Spike."

"Fine," Spike said, giving in with more grace than Angel would have expected. "But in the next film, I get to kiss the girl."

In the magical world of westerns, Angel discovered, you never ran out of bullets. If he hadn't been worried about where the heck Wesley had ended up and if Connor was okay and how they'd gotten into this mess in the first place, it might have been almost fun. As long as he stayed behind the outcropping of rocks in front of him, none of the bandits' bullets came close to hitting him, and he managed to hit at least a couple of them while they ran back and forth like idiots.

"This is like shooting those little ducks that go back and forth at the carnival!" Spike called out. "No wonder the heroes always win in the movies."

They managed to kill a few more of the bandits, then the rest disappeared into the bushes. The horses must have run off, since there was no sign of them. "Hang on," Gwen said, and they stopped shooting long enough to realize that the bandits weren't shooting back anymore.

"Spike?" Gunn called.

There was no answer.

"That's... good and bad," Gwen said. "If he got shot, why are we still here?"

Angel kept low and went over to join Gunn and Gwen behind their boulder. "What happens next?" He tried to remember. "Someone has to go over and find him, right?"

"Yeah." Gwen looked at him.

Grudgingly, Angel nodded. "Okay. I'll be right back."

Carefully, he made his way across to where he'd last seen Spike. As soon as he wasn't behind the boulder anymore, the bandits started shooting again, and he could hear Gwen and Gunn starting back up, too, trying to distract the fire away from Angel, for which he was duly grateful. Just because being shot might only be temporary didn't mean he liked the idea.

Spike was crumpled on the ground behind a rock that didn't look tall enough to protect anyone, and Angel rolled him over, seeing immediately that half his throat was torn open by the bullet that had hit him. Spike groaned, his eyes opening slowly, and Angel, caught in the scent of the blood, couldn't help but reach out and touch it, slicking his fingertips with the coppery dark fluid that smelled the same even if it wasn't red.

Before either of them could say anything - if Spike would have even been able to say anything - the world flipped sideways with a lurch.

---

This time when the ride on the vertigo express ended, Gunn found himself in the middle of another room of the black and white, 1940s persuasion.

The only other person there was Gwen, and she stood in front of him fairly transformed. Instead of the grubby western gear of their previous incarnation, she was wearing something long and flowing that showed off her curves just right. Hair and makeup immaculate, she looked every inch a forties starlet.

She was also holding a wad of cash out to him. Gunn himself was holding a bottle of rum. He had no idea what movie they had popped into now, or what the scene they would have to act out to escape it entailed.

"So... am I supposed to be selling you this bottle?" he asked.

Gwen blinked slowly, looked at the bottle Gunn was holding, then looked around the room, studying the décor. "I think," she finally said, "I'm offering you my last thirty dollars in an effort to talk you out of taking on a dangerous mission."

It wasn't an obvious answer. "You know where we are then?"

"Your hotel room on the island of Martinique." Gwen slid the money into her cleavage. She saw him looking and gave him a knowing smile. "We're in To Have and Have Not."

"You sure?" It wasn't a movie that Gunn was familiar with.

"Pretty sure, yeah." She moved away from him, wandering around the room and touching various things.

"So you know the scene, then?"

"Oh yeah. It's pretty famous actually."

"Nobody has to get shot do they?" Gunn asked suspiciously. "Because we're kinda short on people that can take a bullet without it ruining their day."

"No." Gwen smiled in that way she had that made Gunn wonder if he should be worried or if he should be thanking his lucky stars. That smile fit her clothes and the setting perfectly. "There's no shooting in this scene."

"Good." He paused, looking down at what he was holding. "Do we need this bottle for anything?"

Gwen shook her head. "Not that I know of. Why?"

"Because if we're going to keep going through this weird-assed shit I could use a drink. How 'bout you?"

"Hell, yes."

Gunn opened the bottle and then went looking for a couple of glasses, but came up empty. Shrugging, he took a swig directly from the bottle, relishing how it burned on the way down. It may have only been movie rum, but it had a real nice kick to it.

He offered the bottle to Gwen, who took it and settled on the edge of the desk in the middle of the room, pushing aside some tools laid out there. She took her own swig from the bottle, and Gunn found himself watching the long line of her throat as she swallowed.

"You know," she began, holding the bottle back out to him, "when you asked me out, this wasn't exactly what I pictured us doing."

"Don't look at me." Gunn took the proffered bottle and sat in the chair by the desk. "I had a whole dinner and dancing thing planned. You're the one who wanted to stay and watch the old movies instead."

Gwen sighed. "You're right," she said. "My bad. I forgot exactly what kind of weirdness magnet Angel is."

"You think this is Angel's fault?" Gunn asked with a frown. He took another drink and handed the bottle back.

"Not the way you're thinking. But he's as much a freak as I am, and I'm not talking about being a vampire or having a soul. He attracts weird shit the way I attract lightning." She nudged his leg with her foot. "Come on, you have to admit that stuff just seems to happen around him. How much weirdness would you have gone through if you weren't hanging with Angel all the time?"

"There was weirdness before I met Angel," Gunn said defensively.

"But not *as* weird, I bet," Gwen said. "Gunn, look at what's happened to you just that I know about - you've seen the sun go out and fought a guy made out of rock, your ex got taken over by the queen of ancient blue punk demons, you got a brain dump full of lawyery goodness on the advice of a talking panther and - "

"I got killed and brought back to life by Electrogirl?"

Gwen smiled. "That, too. Fortuitous but heart-stopping first meetings aside, don't you get tired of it all? Day in and day out with ancient evils and suns going out and threats of the end of the world every other Wednesday? Don't you ever wish for something else?"

"Not really, no." Gunn took another drink as he considered his words. "Someone has to deal with all the weirdness so that the normal people can keep on being normal."

"And that someone has to be you?" Gwen asked softly.

Gunn shrugged. "The mission's part of who I am. I get in trouble when I forget that."

"A bona fide hero right down to the bone, huh?" She was smiling at him again in that way that simmered with heat and held just a touch of little-girl wistfulness that had attracted Gunn to her in the first place.

"Don't know about hero," he said with another shrug. "Just a guy who does what needs to be done."

"Helping the helpless?" Gwen slid off the desk and onto Gunn's lap, her weight warm and pleasant against him. "I suppose there are worse vices for a guy to have."

"You think helping people is a vice?" Gunn asked as Gwen took the bottle back from him and took another drink.

"Helping people is a good thing, very noble." Her tone was deadpan, though her eyes glinted with amusement.

"You're just humoring me now."

"I'm serious!" Gwen insisted. "I like that you give a damn. Not many people do anymore. It's just..."

"Just what?" Gunn asked when she trailed off.

"You ever thought of doing it another way?"

Gunn frowned. "What do you mean?"

"You can't tell me that all of Angel's baggage doesn't get in the way. You've got the brawn and the brains to be successful at helping people alone." Gwen slid a hand inside his jacket in an absentminded caress. "If you go out on your own - "

"Whoa. Wait a minute," Gunn broke in. "You want me to leave Angel Investigations?"

Gwen shook her head. "I just wondered if you ever considered alternatives to working - "

Gunn cut her off cold. "No. Angel and Wes and the others... we're a team. You don't just abandon your team."

"Okay."

"Okay?" Gunn frowned at her. "That's it?"

"What else is there?" She leaned forward, reaching to set the bottle on the desk behind Gunn. "I asked; you answered."

"And you're okay with that?" Gunn tried to ignore the tiny voice inside that was whispering that he wasn't sure he wanted her to be.

"Why wouldn't I be? There are plenty of worse things a guy could be than loyal." She slid her arms around his neck. "Although next time we go on a date, it's not going to be a team event."

Gunn grinned and rested his hands on her waist. "Guess I have to remind you again that it was your idea to -"

"Yeah, yeah, all my fault. You're not going to let me forget that, are you?"

"Not for a while. I mean I had made plans and everything." He tried for an air of mock pathos, which didn't seem all that successful considering that Gwen's reaction was to laugh.

A moment later, Gunn re-evaluated how successful he was, because he had to be doing something right to get kissed like that.

Gwen tasted just the same as he remembered, like the air just after a thunderstorm overlaid with the taste of the alcohol they'd been drinking. "I promise we'll follow your plan the next time," she said with a smile when she pulled back.

"So there is going to be a next time?" Gunn asked, leaning in for another kiss.

Gwen let him almost succeed before pulling back, still smiling. "Ask me again when we get out of here. Speaking of which," she stood up and Gunn immediately missed her weight on his lap, "you ready to blow this joint?"

"Yeah," he replied, firmly squelching the urge to suggest delaying for at least a few more kisses. "What do we do?"

"I'll take care of my part," Gwen assured him. "All you have to do is what I tell you to."

Gwen headed over to the door, then half turned back towards Gunn, shooting him a sultry look from under her lashes. "You know you don't have to act with me, Steve. You don't have to say anything, and you don't have to do anything." Turning away again she took the last few steps to the door. "Not a thing." She threw a coy look over her shoulder. "Or maybe just whistle." Gwen opened the door and took a step out before turning back one more time with a smile that raised the temperature in the room by several degrees. "You know how to whistle, don't you, Steve? You just put your lips together and... blow." One last wink and she was gone, closing the door behind her.

For a long moment Gunn just stared at the door before he remembered his instructions: do what he'd been told to. When he did, it didn't surprise him at all that he naturally gave a wolf whistle.

His last thought as this reality spun away was that when they were out of here he might just have to ask Gwen to show him that movie; it might give them some interesting ideas.

---

Wesley eyed Johanna's knife but was careful to keep his expression as neutral as possible.

"Just what exactly do you mean?" he asked.

"I meant exactly what I said," Johanna replied. "The Senior Partners are not known for their patience. They're not going to sit around waiting for you to do your job. They'll give that job to others." She paused dramatically. "In fact, they already have."

"What?" Wesley stared up at her and then, deciding he would be damned if he was going to continue this conversation while lying at Johanna's feet, he strained against his bonds and managed to pull himself up onto the edge of the sofa. He couldn't straighten up because of the rope that went from his ankles to around his chest, but psychologically this was a much more comfortable position.

His mind had been turning over what Johanna had said the entire time he'd been struggling onto the sofa and, as happened sometimes, everything just clicked into place. "You're talking about the Haunters," he said with utter certainty.

Johanna inclined her head in agreement. "Perhaps they're a bit... blunter than the Senior Partners would prefer, but they do know suffering and punishment." She stepped closer, raising her knife, and Wesley tensed. "They will do until something with more finesse comes along. Or -" She took another step, and the knife came down towards him... to slice through the ropes binding him. " - until you take over like you're supposed to."

With the ropes gone, Wesley was able to straighten up and pass his still-cuffed hands down over his legs and feet so that they were in front of him instead of behind his back. He wondered if he could find something to pick the lock on the cuffs but didn't see anything that would work in his immediate vicinity.

Getting up, he moved away from the sofa, ostensibly to look for a makeshift lock pick, but he only made it a couple of steps before coming to a slow halt.

Without turning around, he asked softly, the words feeling heavy and dire as he spoke them, "What happens if I do the job full time?"

"The Haunters will be called off. The Senior Partners believe in letting the talent do their jobs. They won't get in your way..." Johanna paused meaningfully. "...as long as you're doing something to get in the way of."

Wesley moved a bit further away and stared unseeing out into the night. The cuffs chafed and made his skin itch, but he knew that finding a lock pick wouldn't make any difference now. He was going to continue to feel their weight long after they were removed.

The sound of a car pulling up came from outside and headlights shone through the window, making Wesley blink.

"That would be Canino and the rest of the goons," Johanna informed him in a pleasant voice. "They're the ones who tied you up. I'm sure they're looking forward to picking up where they left off."

"Lovely," Wesley muttered. This day just kept getting worse.

"They're going to be coming in here in a few minutes, so if you don't want to see if you can actually die deader than you already are, I suggest that you make use of that door there." Johanna nodded towards a door just to the left and slightly behind where they were standing. "Go outside, but don't do anything for a count of twenty."

Wesley could hear the sound of car doors opening and closing outside. "I guess I have no choice, do I?" he asked, the words coming out sharp and bitter as he headed for the door so indicated.

"You have choices," Johanna told him; she was regarding him coolly when Wesley glanced back over his shoulder at her. "Just none without consequences."

"In the end, it's the same difference, isn't it?" Wesley replied in a soft voice.

Another sound from outside pushed Wesley into moving, going through the door and along the side porch as he had been told. Almost against his will, he found himself silently counting.

When he reached twenty, there was a scream from inside the house; Wesley had a split second to see the men out front running for the door, and then reality once again spun away.

---

When everything settled again, Angel looked down at his hands and saw that they were still in black and white. "Damn it."

"Don't know why I'm surprised," Spike said, sounding resigned. "I told you shooting me wasn't going to work, didn't I? We're right back in the same bloody film."

"Only with less blood," Angel said. Spike was right, he realized; even with his sketchy memory of the film, he could see they'd just moved ahead in the timeline. "Um... where'd Gunn and Gwen go?"

"Better hope for their sakes it's not into Casablanca," Spike said, looking around. "Not much of a happy ending there."

Angel noted the flickering campfire and the burros tied up off to one side of the trail. It was nighttime, but even still everything just looked so strange without color, even the gun in his hand, which wasn't the same one he'd been holding before.

"This isn't getting any more fun." Spike crouched down in front of the fire.

"And every time we switch scenes we lose people," Angel said with a worried sigh.

Spike snorted. "Doesn't bother me. Maybe next time I'll lose you. Least then I won't have to listen to your stupid blathering anymore."

"Give it a rest, would you?" Angel said, rubbing the back of his neck and trying to remember what the hell was supposed to happen in this scene.

"You're the one who needs to give it a rest," Spike said.

Angel frowned. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"Means that you're focusing on the wrong thing, like usual." Spike poked at the fire with a stick. "You get all caught up in one part of the big picture, and then you don't see any of the other stuff that's going on around you."

Turning in a slow circle, Angel surveyed the landscape before looking at Spike incredulously. "Spike... we're in the middle of nowhere, in a movie. We're in black and white. There isn't anything else going on around us."

"Wasn't just talking about now," Spike said. "You get your bleeding eyes focused on one goal - whoever that might be - and then forget everything else."

Angel sighed, wishing that Spike would just shut up for once and let him think. "Can we save the psychological analysis for later - or preferably never - and concentrate on getting out of here?"

Spike stood up. "Are you actually asking for my help?"

"Well, you are the only one here," Angel said, then he turned his head and looked at the burros, gesturing at them. "Although maybe they'd be more help than you."

"Hey! I let myself get shot last time to get us out, for all the good it did," Spike said. "Maybe that's why we ended up in the same sodding film again."

"Maybe you didn't get shot enough," Angel said, tightening his grip on the gun he was still holding.

"Maybe you didn't get shot enough," Spike retorted, not backing up but still watching him warily. "Just because it's your name on the bloody marquee doesn't mean you're the one in charge, you know."

Angel cocked the hammer and pointed the gun at Spike. "Maybe not," he said. "But I'm the one holding the gun." There was a blur, and the gun went off as Spike tackled him, knocking both of them to the ground as Spike tried to pry the weapon out of Angel's hands. Angel shoved him and rolled, but Spike clung like a leech, rolling with him, still trying to get the pistol out of his grip. Letting go with his left hand, Angel punched Spike in the face, feeling the satisfying jolt of pain and crunch of cartilage as he hit Spike's nose. Spike growled but hung on, getting a knee free and suddenly, unexpectedly, slamming it into Angel's balls.

All the fight went out of Angel in a rush as he groaned and curled up. When he managed to glance up, Spike had the gun pointed at him and blood running down over his upper lip.

Spike licked at the blood and shrugged his shoulders, resettling his shirt. "I'm done taking orders from you. This time we do it my way."

He pulled the trigger twice, and the explosion of pain in Angel's shoulder sent him reeling.

---

The world stopped spinning and righted itself again. Angel couldn't help but probe his shoulder for a wound he no longer felt and knew he'd find no evidence of, even as he noted that, wherever he was, it was nighttime. The air was thick with a wet, heavy fog.

He heard a sound behind him and started to turn, saying, "Damn, I thought maybe this time I'd finally get rid of you," to Spike. "And if you ever shoot me again..."

But it wasn't Spike. "I don't think I've ever shot you," Wesley replied. "Unless you count the Belial demon impersonating you, or those tranqs back when you were being Angelus... You're still in full possession of your soul, I trust?"

"As far as I know," Angel said. "Wow, am I glad to see you."

"Likewise. I take it you've had a less than pleasant sojourn?" Wesley asked. "Involving shooting?"

"Involving Spike," Angel said grimly, figuring that pretty much said it all. "What about you?"

"Just conversation. Although there were handcuffs and rope involved." Wesley gave the faintest ghost of a smile. "I think I would have preferred to have been shot."

"Now really, Wesley, it wasn't that bad, was it?" came a feminine voice from behind Wesley off in the fog a little ways. As Angel looked, he saw Johanna step close enough to be visible. "I did let you go after all."

Angel frowned, stepping unconsciously closer to Wesley. "What the hell is she doing here?"

Wesley barely shot a glance in her direction. "Annoying me."

"Other than that," Angel said, crossing his arms in front of his chest and waiting for the woman to answer for herself.

"I *am* Wesley's liaison with the Senior Partners," she reminded him with a patronizing smile. "When there's business to take care of..."

It took a lot of self-control not to grab her by the throat and shake some real answers out of her, but Angel managed to keep his temper down to a mild flexing of his hands. "You have something to do with this?"

Johanna shook her head. "This isn't my doing. I'm only here because Wesley is."

Deciding that if Wesley was going to ignore her he would, too, Angel took Wesley by the sleeve and led him a few steps away. The fog was so thick that it was hard to see more than four or five yards in any direction. "You been with her all this time?"

"Unfortunately. And you've been with Spike?" Wesley frowned. "What about Gunn and Gwen?"

"I don't know. They were with me and Spike in, um, the Sierra Madre, or something. And then it was just me and Spike. And guns." Angel frowned. "And burros."

"As long as the burros didn't have guns..."

"They wouldn't be able to shoot them anyway," Angel said, miming holding a pistol with a hoof by curling his hand into a fist.

Wesley smiled a little at that, but it quickly faded as he looked around them. "No burros here. Although, if this is the movie I think it is, there are Nazis."

Angel looked around, too, noting the airplane hangar for the first time. "What is this, Casablanca?"

"That would be my guess."

"So, what, we just wait around for the airplane to take off? I mean, there's not a heck of a lot that happens here," Angel said.

Wesley was looking off into the fog. "There was one thing." He turned to meet Angel's gaze.

Remembering what this scene was about, Angel frowned. "I don't think we should split up."

"We really don't have much choice, you realize," Wesley pointed out.

"What, so one of us has to get on a plane and leave?" Angel shook his head. "No."

"No? Just like that?" Wesley asked, shaking his head in turn. "Angel, you know things are never that simple. Sometimes you have to do things that may not look like a good idea at the time but end up being for the greater good in the long run. You know that; you left Sunnydale for the greater good. Or for the good of Buffy, at least."

Angel realized what Wesley was trying to say, and he didn't like it. "That was different," he said. "I'm not walking away from this. From you. I won't."

"Even if I ask you to?"

"You're going to ask me to just walk away? Lose *another* member of the team? That's not..." Angel shook his head. "No. Wesley, no." Wesley ignored the denial. "Better for Ilsa to have stayed, then? Not give a damn about helping to stop the forces of evil from taking over the world?"

"That's not the point," Angel said.

Wesley made a show of looking around them. "Considering where we're standing, I'd say it's very much the point."

Angel shook his head again. "No. Do I need to keep saying it?"

Wesley sighed and ran a hand over his face tiredly. "Angel, you got out. You fought on your own terms and hurt them more than they ever considered you could. You have the potential to hurt them even more, but you have to stay free and unfettered to do so. You can't afford any distractions from the good fight. Right now, that's what I am for you."

"You're part of the good fight," Angel said. "An important part."

"My part," Wesley immediately countered. "Not yours."

"Being part of Wolfram & Hart's not the way to fight," Angel said. "Wes... we can get you out of it. I know we can. Just give me a little more time - "

"This is what I was talking about," Wesley interrupted him. "You shouldn't be spending so much energy thinking about me. Not when you have so many other things you should be focusing on."

That sounded a little too much like what Spike had said earlier, but Angel still tried to dismiss it. "I can focus on this and other things, too."

"No, Angel," Wesley told him implacably, "you can't. Not without compromising things that shouldn't be compromised."

"So you're saying I should just turn and walk away?" Angel asked. "You really think I'd do that?"

"You know it's the right thing to do," Wesley said, "if you'd just think about it."

Angel's chest felt tight. "You want me to go?"

Wesley shook his head. "This isn't about want. We're dealing with things that are too big to bow to what you and I might want." He smiled a little. "The problems of two people don't amount to a hill of beans and all that."

He wanted to be able to tell Wesley that that was bullshit, but he knew it would be a lie. Slowly, he forced himself to say, "I guess if we don't want to be stuck here in this scene forever, I'm supposed to go get on a plane, huh."

Wesley nodded. "It could be worse," he said after a moment. "Spike could be Laszlo."

"I don't care about Spike," Angel said, meeting Wesley's eyes.

Wesley didn't look away. "This isn't about want," he said again, more softly.

"Yeah," Angel said, wanting to believe that much, if nothing else. "Okay. I'm going." He didn't move.

"Angel..."

"I'm going," Angel snapped, and this time he started to walk away.

The fog closed around him, swallowing him up so that he hardly noticed when the world tilted around him.