stilljustandrew | (no subject)

"Light can be arranged," Jonathan returns with a faint smile. "Nothing lives here, by the way. This dust's been lying for years."

"I figured," he says, scuffing a foot along the dusty floor -- and sneezes in the cloud he kicks up.

"Bleah. How'd you know about this place?"

"It was our headquarters," he says quietly. "In the other place. Not Watcher headquarters, I mean... Angel."

"Angel?" He blinks, unshipping his backpack and putting it down on the floor to start rummaging through it. "Isn't Angel in LA?"

"I guess he is here." Jonathan shrugs. "Back there, he was in New York. You and I worked with him, and Spike, and a guy called Gunn, don't know if you'd have met him here."

"Charles Gunn, yeah, he was there in LA that one time. And Spike?" His voice rises slightly with something like hope.

"...what about Wesley Wyndham-Pryce? And Krevlornswath, and what was her name, Fred Burkle?"

"Spike too," he agrees. "Lorne went his own way, some stuff happened. And Wesley and Fred, that was before my time with them, but... they died."

"...oh."

He looks down.

"Yeah, they're ... they're dead here too. I think so's Gunn."

"What happened?" he asks, voice low. "Was it the demon battle?"

"I think so, yeah." No louder. He's stopped rummaging. "I never got all the details."

"I think they'd all have died in my world, too. If it wasn't for Milliways."

Andrew looks up in the dimness. His eyes are adjusting to the dark, but even so he can barely see Jonathan's face as a pale blur against shadow.

"What about Milliways?"

"You and I got forewarned," Jonathan tells him. "There was a version of Faith in the bar, she'd already had it happen and she told you. So we... raised a small army and went to help."

"We raised an army?" He's smiling, a little awed. "Wow. And they just ... volunteered? To help us?"

"Yeah," is the simple response. "Faith knew some of them, some were Bound and bored... nobody took much persuasion."

"Wow," he says again, a little quieter, lowering his head again.

"So, uh. Light?"

"...light," Jonathan remembers, a little sheepishly, and casts the spell. It's a simple one, it only takes words.

"Thanks," he says, as the diffuse glow spreads, and starts taking supplies (acquired at Milliways) out of the backpack and setting them up on the dusty floor: a flat golden bowl, a few silk bags of herbs, a box of matches.

After a moment or two, he glances up and then quickly down again. His tone's casual on the surface, but effortful.

"This, uh. This remind you of anything?"

He can't just mean a pop culture reference. Not with that tone in his voice. Jonathan looks at him carefully.

"The old days?"

"Yeah."

He's looking into the backpack at the last object he needs, and can't make himself reach for it.

Jonathan walks over and leans past Andrew to look into the backpack.

He thinks he can guess what he'll find there.

He's right.

It's a knife -- the small silver-bladed kind for use in cutting up herbs.

Andrew doesn't look up.

"It's okay," Jonathan says quietly, reaching down to pick up the knife. "I know you wouldn't fall for that again even if it was here."

And he places it, firmly, in Andrew's hand.

His hand closes unsteadily on the knife, holds it for a moment, then sets it down along with the rest of the items.

"I miss you." It's not much more than a whisper.

"I know." If the circumstances were different, he might hug him, but something tells him that move has to be Andrew's. "And if there was something I could do to help..."