He started limping across the street, aware that that didn't do much for his macho image, but that eel/snake demon had ripped a melon sized hole in his leg, and it was taking some time for the muscle to heal itself. But at least it was healing; it felt like his left thigh was on fire. Adrenaline was speeding the process along, but he liked to think it was really rage doing the job.

He decided the snake demon thing had given him a clue as to where to look, and he turned out to be right. The remains of the alley where the snake had been led directly to another one, wider, more intact, that was only partially slick with water - mostly, it was slippery with blood.

Mostly demon blood, of a variety he had never smelled before. It looked like fuel oil, smelled like three month old cottage cheese, and while there were no bodies, there were body parts, bits of armor (?), and enough blood to keep an emergency room up and running for quite a while.

The smell was so rank and overwhelming it was hard to separate the scents, unless he was standing over a specific splash of blood. That's how he knew he was on the right track, because he was able to discern Gunn's blood, spattered on a far wall near a broken piece of chain link fencing. There was demon blood here too, but not enough to overwhelm it. "Guys?" He said, loud enough that they might hear it - if they were still conscious or living. "Hey guys, it's Logan, 'm here to help." Picking his way carefully over the slicks of blood, lopped off demon arms, split helmets, and shredded scales, he picked up another scent: an Old One was here? A diluted Old One - the scent wasn't as powerful or rank as he remembered. A half-breed? Bad enough, he supposed. "If there's any help to be had," he muttered to himself.

He kept following the alley, where the signs of destruction - holes in facades, broken asphalt, dumpsters crumpled like pop cans - eventually narrowed down. The blood never quite did, but he eventually caught the scent of Angel's blood.

In fact, there was a small trail of it, like breadcrumbs, that he followed to what appeared to be an abandoned warehouse. In some rubble leading up to it, he found, impaled on a broken sword, a part of a leather jacket. It looked like a duster, but it seemed narrow across the shoulders (even though it was split down the middle), and Logan knew before he even smelled the blood that this was not Angel's, but Spike's. Still, blood was good, right? If a vampire bled, it meant they weren't dust - no vampire could bleed to death.

Angel's blood continued into the warehouse, where its near wall had been completely obliterated, and inside, among the scattered armor and broken weapons was another snake demon. But even as Logan tensed for another hit, he knew he was wrong. First of all, this thing was more green than gray, and the smell of decaying flesh was almost stronger than the scent of blood. And there didn't seem to be a head on this thing, and it tapered down, which the eel demon hadn't. It was like ... it was like a sixteen foot long tail. Jesus Christ, what the hell had it been attached to - Godzilla?! No wonder he wasn't finding anyone.

Although it was hard to tell through the general demon stink, he was pretty sure Gunn was dead. He had smelled far too much of his blood in too many places, and he was just a Human (well, as far as he knew) - he couldn't bleed forever. Angel and Spike could, though, which was probably a good thing, as they were both runners up in the blood loss sweepstakes. The Old One/Human thing was an also ran, but he didn't know if that was friend or foe - you'd think foe. And he knew from some experience that Old Ones could bleed a whole hell of a lot and hardly even notice.

He heard movement, though, a rustle in the alley, and that's why he was prepared for the attack when it came.

He couldn't say what they were - they were wearing head to toe chain mail armor, helmets shaped like old samurai ones, but with face coverings, and they were armed with huge broadswords over three feet in length. They also smelled like last week's dishwater. The initial attack was by three of them moving in concert, heavy blades slicing through the air with an audible noise, as if tearing the fabric of reality itself.

He easily ducked the sword that tried to decapitate him, and kicked one of the Three Stooges in the gut, sending him stumbling back into the rubble, as he slashed up to meet a second sword, and his claw cut it in half. But it was a near thing; there was great resistance, as if the thing was adamantium plated, or perhaps just made of a metal nearly as strong.

He saw the sword of the third slashing downwards out of the corner of his eye, going for his injured leg, so he swung around completely, using his left hand claws to cut the fucker’s head completely in half. The sword dropped to the ground before it could hit his leg, but even with the top of his head missing, the thing remained wavering slightly on its feet.

The one with the broken sword lunged at him with it, but Logan spun aside, drove a claw into its throat, and ripped to one side, slicing his head clean off. This time the body fell away quickly, at the same time as its head.

The last one stand slashed its sword quickly and violently, and Logan lurched back barely in time, as it cut through the air so close to his face he would swear he could feel the tip of the sword brush his cheek. Not enough to cut, but enough for him to feel the unnaturally icy chill that seemed to emanate from it; it traveled through his body like a bolt of occult lightening, and he shivered, his balls shriveling up and his lungs contracting from the frigid shock. What the fuck was up with that?!

He decided he really didn’t want to find out. The last demon came in slashing its sword from side to side, tossing it from one chain mailed hand to another with lightning speed, the blade reduced to a flashing blur. Still, Logan wasn’t impressed or concerned; he simply waited for a toss, and kicked the haft of the sword, sending it shooting straight up, and as soon as the demon lurched up to grab it, Logan rammed a claw into his chest and yanked violently through the thick, muscular torso, nearly cutting it in half.

Logan then jumped back so the sword hit the floor, as there was no fucking way he was going to touch it. But he was content knowing that, if he really wanted to, he could have caught the sword.

He stepped over the bodies - and weird cold swords - and headed for the front of the warehouse; he’d seen all there was to see here, and if anyone was still here, he’d know.

He’d gotten ten steps away when he heard the noise.

It was an odd squelching noise, like someone tramping through knee high muck in galoshes, and he glanced over his shoulder warily, afraid of what he might see.

Oh yeah, that was bad. Tendrils of pinkish-gray flesh extended from the demon body parts he had cut off, and extended to the bodies they had been excised from; they meshed, entwined like vines in a time lapsed film, tendrils reaching into bloody openings and pulling themselves back towards their native bodies.

The demons were putting themselves back together again.

“Okay, that’s new,” he muttered, and heard a noise near the front of the warehouse. Looking around, he saw two more chain mail demons (Shemp and Curly Joe?) had come to join the party. Great. “So whatta I gotta do to keep you fucks down?” He asked, aware he wouldn’t be getting an answer. “Burn you up? Shred you like coleslaw? Force feed you Twinkies?”

It was then that one of the pair of chain mail demons had his head grabbed from behind, and twisted so violently to one side that the crack of its neck was as loud as a rifle shot. And before its twin could react, one of the demon’s thick broadswords was rammed through its stomach and pulled straight up, out through the top of its head, completely bisecting it above the waist.

For a single moment, Logan thought that it was Angel and Spike making a timely appearance, but that moment died as soon as the bodies fell away, and he saw the diminutive silhouettes of what could only be the Weird Sisters standing there. The one with the sword tossed it to him, and it was reflex to catch it, but he did it haft first, and almost dropped it … except there was no cold biting into his hand. He could still feel it cascading down the blade, as if it were made of dry ice, but the handle wasn’t made of the same material.

“The-”

“- sword’s-”

“- enchanted. It’s -”

“- the only -”

“- way to kill -”

“ - them.”

“Ah. Thanks for the tip,” he replied, turning around and chopping all three of the stooges, who were just starting to get up. None of them had pulled themselves together enough to grab up their own swords and fight, so they were easy targets.

He heard the disturbing sound of something being driven into meat, a hard, wet noise, and he knew that they had used the other sword to kill the stooge with the broken neck. Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy. “So what the hell are these things?” He asked, turning back to face them. Maybe they weren’t Angel, but he had to admit - if only to himself - that he was actually somewhat glad to see them. Although hard to trust and freaky as all hell, there was no pair better to have at your back, which they had just proven.

“Heralds,” one said. Logan was mildly surprised that that was all he got.

“Heralds? How? Of what?” He considered that, tossing the sword away. “Like angels, only from the opposite end of the spectrum?”

“Angels -”

“- don’t -”

“- exist. Unless -”

“- you count -”

“- angel demons, but -”

“- they’re not very -”

“- nice at all.”

Angel demons? Did he want to know? Again, no, probably not. “Ya know what I mean.”

“We -”

“- do -”

“- and that’s - ”

“- close enough.”

Even though it was now patently obvious, he gestured to their blood smeared surroundings, and said, “So you missed the big party too, huh?”

“We -”

“- were -”

“- in Portland -”

“- we just -”

“- got back and -”

“- discovered Angel had -”

“- left us a message.”

“He said we should -”

“- be ready, and do the -”

“- right thing.”

He waited for more, but that was apparently it. “That’s all? What was that supposed to mean?” Leave it to Angel not to say something simple like : “We’re outnumbered a hundred to one by all of Monster Island. You girls busy tonight?”

They both smiled faintly, with wry knowledge, and even though it was an essentially benign expression, they made it creepy simply by doing it in stereo, their odd eyes glittering in the extremely dim, pre-dawn half light. “He -”

“- expected -”

“- to die -”

“- and before -”

“- he killed all -”

“- his enemies. He -”

“- wanted us to beat -”

“- back Hell if he -”

“- failed. What does he think -”

“- we are? Good guys?”

“No, he thought you were an unstoppable killing machine, perverse enough not to want to join the home team.” Of course that was just a guess, but it felt right.

And he must have been, because their anemic smirks became full blown grins, a truly creepy sight, especially when the corners of their mouths moved up in perfect synchronicity. “You -”

“- know -”

“- us so -”

“ - well, Logan.”

That bothered him. He’d been in on this weird shit for too damn long.

The Sisters looked a bit different than the last time he’d seen them; they hair, usually a long plait hanging down to the center of their back, was now shoulder length and framing their eternally youthful and deceptively innocent young faces, making them look more like jailbait than ever before. But their lips remained gorged with blood, even when not in vamp face, and they still had a questionable sense of fashion - they both wore black vinyl jackets, purple paisley patterned velvet shirts, black pin striped pants, and platform soled red sneakers that were so clean they almost glowed in the dark. The one good thing about the Sisters? He always felt impeccably dressed compared to them, even when covered in demon blood.

He followed them out into the ruins of the alley, retracting his claws, only limping a little bit now. “Maybe he died, but he musta won, ‘cause somehow I think Hell would be a lot more than five guys and Anaconda.”

“Angel’s -”

“- not -”

“- dead.”

They sounded so certain it actually made him stop, almost stunned by the sudden sense of hope. “He’s not? Do you know where he is?”

“No -”

“- we -”

“- just know-”

“- he’s not -”

“- dead.”

Now he wasn’t sure if they were jerking his chain or not. “And how do you know that, exactly?”

“We’d -”

“- feel -”

“- it if-”

“- he died -”

“- he was our -”

“- sire and grandsire.”

It was something he wanted to believe, but how could he? It didn’t sound right. “Do all vamps feel when their “sire” dies?”

“No -”

“- but -”

“- we’re not -”

“- your typical -”

“- vampires.”

They had him there.

Even though the sun was coming up in increments, they insisted on staying with him until he reached the demon hospital, and he figured it was out of the desire to get in a good fight more than any actual concern for him, as … well, did they give a damn about anything? Well, maybe Bob; they seemed to love Bob. Oh shit, did they know about Bob?

The funny thing was, all the feeling of eyes upon him died as soon as he came out of the alley with the Sisters. In fact, he’d never had less of a sense of being watched in his life. Were other demons that genuinely scared of the Sisters? Come to think of it, maybe - maybe that’s why Angel actually called them: as soon as the denizens of Hell saw the Sisters waiting for them, they might retreat and just decide to come back on a better day. It was a funny thought at least.

Or maybe the Sisters stayed with him because they felt it too - an odd, inexplicable shift of psychic equilibrium, a feeling that something inexpressible was wrong, that something had violently changed, but whether it was for bad or for good was unknown. The world had just tipped suddenly sideways, and they were among the few that knew it, so they simply clung together, waiting to see if they would be among the survivors of the final, ending shift.

Or maybe the anodyne hadn’t really warn off completely yet.

He was fully healed up by the time they reached the hospital, but he had now had the weirdest pair of jeans on Earth (almost his whole left thigh, with its new, pink flesh, was exposed), and still smelled like molding bong water, thanks to that damn snake demon thing. The sky had lightened to violet, but the sun was still safely ensconced behind the horizon, so the Sisters were in no immediate danger of flaming on. At the entrance, since it was obvious they weren’t coming in with him, he wondered if he should tell them about Bob. “Uh, d’ya know -” he began, but they didn’t let him finish.

“When -”

“- you -”

“- find out -”

“- who hurt -”

“- our Bob, we -”

“- want in. We -”

“- want to make them -”

“- suffer. And we’re sorry -”

“- about Wesley. He was cute -”

“ - for a Watcher, and he -”

“- was afraid of us. We like -”

“- that in a man.”

Logan shook his head, and almost - but not quite - smiled. It seemed far too soon for jokes (if that was actually a joke - maybe it wasn’t), but it was an almost welcome surprise, especially coming from the terror twins here. “Yer a coupla weirdoes,” he accused half-heartedly, even though it couldn’t have been more true.

Their only response was to smile and salute in unison, which was quite possibly their creepiest choice of response ever. He was so very glad they were - well, in a technical sense - on their side.

Once inside, he was almost knocked down by the scent of so much contrasting demon blood, but it still wasn’t as bad as what he smelled in that alley. He found a Persaid demon in medical greens, and asked her where he

could find Bob’s room. She looked slightly startled - like she didn’t know Bob was here, or was surprised a Human was? - but after consulting a chart, pointed him towards the “intensive” ward. He passed bloody demos on gurneys lining the hall; most of them were dead, or would be soon. A passing nurse who looked Human but smelled demon asked if he needed assistance, staring at the hole in his jeans and the blood that had run down his leg before it had healed. He told him he was just visiting, and moved on.

Going past a private waiting room, he thought he heard canned music, but it made him pause in shock. In a normal hospital, you might get Muzak in the elevators; in this one, Slipknot’s “Wait and Bleed” was raging quietly in the restricted access lobby. Demons could have the weirdest sense of humor.

Bob’s room was restricted access as well, but he must have passed muster, as the door hissed open for him, retracting inside itself like a “Star Trek” door. Pretty cool.

What he saw inside wasn’t. Bob was laying in a pale blue hospital bed, surrounded by machines that he was connected to by electrodes and hair thin wires. His bare chest was exposed by pulled back sheets, revealing a huge, weird black symbol branded on his chest, burned into several layers of skin. The mark of Typhon, he presumed.

“Logan,” Helga said, immediately coming up and embracing him. He hugged her back tightly, and wished he could think of something profound or comforting to say, but he couldn’t, so he didn’t say anything at all.

They held the embrace for an entire minute, and then Helga held him back slightly, small green nose wrinkled. “Haven’t you been rolling in filth? Demon trouble?”

“I went to check out the Hyperion, and ran into a pissed off Kaa from the Jungle Book. I also met a few Heralds.”

She looked surprised. “No shit? Fuck, you shoulda called me.”

“It was okay. After I got rid of Kaa, the Sisters showed up.”

“Oh good, they’re still around?” She then paused, briefly taken aback. “I can’t believe I’m happy that the Sisters are around.”

“I know how you feel. Now we know the world’s fucked up.” He cupped her face in his right hand, belatedly realizing there was still blackish demon blood on it. Oh well, at least it was dried. “You look exhausted. Why don’t I get you home?”

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, obviously tired but not quite ready to go. “I shouldn’t. I should stay here and -”

“And what? We’re gonna have to go out and play bounty hunters - there’s nothing we can do for him sitting around here like premature mourners.”

She sighed heavily, sadly, and let her chin drop to her chest. “I know. It’s just so fucking shitty.”

“Oh yeah.”

She then looked up, her eyes suddenly bright with hope. “Wait a sec. You still have some of Bob’s energy in you, don’t you?”

“Yeah … why?”

“Maybe … I don’t know, maybe he can pull it out of you, or maybe it will be a shock to his system. Or, at the very least, maybe you can communicate with him.”

She was grasping at straws and they both knew it, but what if there was a chance, no matter how slim, that that could work? “Well … what do I gotta do?”

“Umm …” She broke away from him, but grabbed his hand and led him to Bob’s bedside. “Can you control the energy?”

“I have no fucking idea.”

“Well, try. And grab his hand - I think physical contact is necessary if this is going to work.”

He sighed, wary but game for (almost) anything. She let go of him and stepped back, so Logan had room. Why? Did she think he was going to jolt backwards as if struck by lightning, maybe explode the machinery? (Oh, he had to think of that now, didn’t he?) “Okay, Bob, if you’re in there somewhere, you’re gonna have to help me figure this out,” he said, wiping the demon blood off on the intact leg of his jeans.

With some reluctance, he braced himself, and grabbed Bob’s cold, still hand.