Brendan was grabbing the railing so hard he was surprised he hadn’t broken his own fingers yet. The crowd in the pit seemed to be churning from below, a violent scrum, and the only sign that Logan was still alive and fighting in there was the occasional flying limb - and Brendan had no idea if it was Logan responsible for that, or some other demon. There were more than a few that could have done it.

But a head flew like a tossed beach ball, and Logan surfaced, blood covered, wild eyed and snarling, claws flashing like a threshing machine; he looked just a tad demonic himself. He was slashing and kicking out at everything around him, not bothering with finesse, just disabling or destroying everything within reach. Demons grabbed his arms and held them back, but the demon that came rushing in got a solid kick in the chest that sent him flying in to a couple more of his friends. Another came in from the side, but Logan got his legs around the thing’s throat and twisted violently, breaking its neck.

The demons holding him had seen enough, and threw him down to the floor, where the demons piled on him like he was a free meal. Brendan looked away, not sure he could he could stand seeing any more, and the Ahtabai caught his eye. He was smiling, trailing a slender silver chain through his long fingers, and he said as an aside to one of his Frenik bodyguards, “Look at that dog. He’s going to fight until he dies. What spunk. They don’t make Humans like that anymore.”

Brendan wanted to go over and kick his scrawny ass. What a patronizing thing to say, and more so since if he lost this fight, he was fucking dead. What did he expect him to do, cower in a corner and take it?

Logan did keep fighting, although Brendan simply didn’t know how he did it. He was covered head to toe in blood, half of it his own and half of it from a variety of demons, and he couldn’t tell how injured Logan actually was. There was no way to tell from his actions, as he had gotten one arm free, and that’s all he needed. He sliced his way to complete freedom, and continued slashing through the horde - the pit had about an inch of blood in it now. But the scrum had thinned out appreciably, and the crowd was sounding more and more disgruntled and pissed off. The chant “Kill the Human!” had started up again, with renewed venom and vigor.

It didn’t matter to Logan; if anything, it spurred him on even more. Once again, a demon grabbed him from behind, but Logan snapped his head back hard, a reverse head butt, that broke the demon’s nose on impact. Logan spun free and sliced him in half straight through the middle.

The remaining demons teamed up on him, throwing him into the wall and trying to rip his limbs off, but that wasn’t going to work - they couldn’t rip through adamantium. When they tried to rethink strategy, Logan got free and cut the head off one of them. The other tried to break his neck, and got a claw right through his face, and out the back of his skull.

Brendan didn’t know how he was still going. He had a huge diagonal gash across his chest, the left side of his face was ripped open, exposing his teeth and jaw, his back was so ripped up it looked like it was made of hamburger, and most of the flesh was missing from his right forearm, partially exposing an adamantium coated bone. But Logan was still fighting, and there weren’t that many demons left. The “Kill the Human” chant was now more of a bitter grumble.

He sighed, relieved that Logan was probably going to survive this, but he could hardly stand to look at him. How could he keep going? In theory, a rapid healing factor was pretty cool, but in real life applications such as this, it seemed like a burden. His skin was peeled off his bones, and yet he was still going, still on his feet, and he could take even more damage, and would. Brendan was hurting for him at this point.

“This can’t happen,” one of the Freniks said. “A Human can’t win this.”

“He’s got it,” Giles said under his breath.

The last demon was another Ressik, and he went down hard, but went down he did. Logan left himself deliberately open to a gut shot, and as the Ressik tried to eviscerate him, Logan cut his skull in half, his primary brain node falling intact to the floor, on top of the remains of his former fellow contestants. Logan staggered back and hit the wall, bleeding from his face, chest, stomach, and arms, none of which looked liked it was healing. He was almost ankle deep in blood and offal now, and the stench was enough to make Brendan’s stomach flip flop, but if Logan wasn’t barfing, he wasn’t going to either.

He seemed to catch his breath, and turned to spit out a mouthful of blood and teeth. Logan then wiped the first layer of blood off his face, and after a moment straightened up. “Next,” he said, as blandly as a clerk at the department of motor vehicles.

Giles gaped down at him in shock. “Dear god. Either he wants to die, or he must have adamantium balls as well.”

The crowd had been stunned into silence once more, yet it felt even deadlier than before. “Send out the winners of the previous matches,” one of the Freniks urged his boss. “They’ll finish ‘im off. He can’t have much more left.”

The Ahtabai regarded him with cold eyes. “And waste this potential?” A thin cellular flip phone seemed to materialize in his hand, and he held it up to his face like it had belonged there all along. “Hello. There’s been a very unusual development down at the pier. I have a fighter you just have to see to believe.”

Giles put a hand on his shoulder, gently steering him towards the exit. “He’s done it. We’re in.”

Terrific. Was Logan in any shape to enjoy it?

****

Outside, the demon crowd was loitering and talking of angry retribution, but if Logan had been selected by Brezakaran - which is what seemed to have occur - they couldn’t touch him without invoking the wrath of Brezakaran, which was something they didn’t want to do, no matter how much they hated him.

They walked out towards the end of the far end of the pier, towards the ad hoc parking lot, and Brendan didn’t know why until he saw one of the shadows move. Oh yeah, their back up.

“How’d it go?” Angel asked. It was night now, but he stayed within the shadows of a derelict cannery, so none of the crowd could see him. A mob snitch could be anywhere.

“He proved his ability to cut a man in half, and get his face burned off but remain conscious was no fluke,” Giles replied coolly. He was using a British type of sarcasm to cover up the fact that he really was kind of freaked out. And Brendan couldn’t blame him, because he was too. “He did it. The lieutenant was impressed, and seems to be arranging a direct meet with Brezakaran.”

Angel nodded, looking around warily. “Good. How is Logan?”

He and Giles shared a questioning glance before Giles admitted, “Slightly dismembered, but not willing to admit it. I’m sure he’ll be fine.”

Angel frowned at him in a slightly puzzled way. “Why don’t you care, Giles? This is weird for you.”

Giles gave him a look that was surprisingly scathing, and just a little bit angry. “Why? Because I know what he used to be.”

“An assassin.”

That seemed to briefly take him aback, but in that brief space of time, Giles only got angrier. “You knew then?”

Angel seemed resolute in the face of his inexplicable anger. “I’m not sure you know the entire story, Rupert.”

“The entire story? I’m all for people trying to make amends for their past sins, but there is a limit. At least you were a vampire, a soulless beast only good for killing. He is a Human being, he had a choice.”

“No he didn’t. He was brainwashed. Why do you think he has no memories of his past? They took them away from him.”

This had all the hallmarks of an uncomfortable argument, and the crowd had thinned out appreciably, so he decided to leave them to it. “I’m just gonna go see if he’s out yet,” he said, backing away. There was no obvious acknowledgement from Angel or Giles.

Well, those guys had some hidden issues, didn’t they? Giles called him “only good for killing”, and Angel didn’t even blink. And Angel even called him Rupert, which was weird, mainly because he had no idea that was his first name - he thought it was Giles! And Giles knew Logan used to be an assassin, and pretty much resented him for it, but Angel was right there - it wasn’t his fault. Giles may have been a demon expert, but he didn’t know a damn thing about how truly fucked up the Organization was, or Logan’s relationship with it. Maybe Angel could fill him in in a way that he would believe.

There was only one screener at the back door now, the red demon from before, his arm in a sling. Upon seeing him, he sneered, but Brendan decided to play it up, as that’s what Matt would have done. “So, enjoy seeing my client get dismembered?”

The red guy glowered at him. “Don’t piss me off, boy. You’re still breakable.”

“Come on, now. Give me some credit here. Do you think I’d represent just any old Human? C’mon, we demons have to have some kinda self-respect.”

“Get the fuck away from me before I-” he stopped, as the door opened, and Logan came out. Man, he looked like hell. He’d put his torn tank top back on, but it was soaked through with blood - most of his wounds hadn’t closed yet. Although it looked like at least half his cheek had grown back, as his teeth weren’t visible through the side of his face anymore, and his exposed arm was now covered with a bloody bandage that looked like it was once a bar towel.

In spite of the fact that he looked like a dead man walking, he shot the red guy a challenging look, a tacit “Try me”, and the guy didn’t. Well, he couldn’t, not if he was Brezakaran’s now, but also there was the very real possibility he could still kick his ass, in spite of his injuries.

Still playing agent, he exclaimed, “Beautiful job, bubbula! You even scared the hell out of me.”

Logan only grunted, but when they were out of ear shot, he whispered, “Bubbula?”

“Okay, that was too stereotypical, but I was in the moment. How are you?”

“I’m gonna pass out in a minute.”

Well, at least it was fair warning.

They made it to the end of the pier, and the argument must have been over, because Giles and Angel met them looking unruffled, like Brendan hadn’t left them debating whether Logan was an unrepentant psychopath or not. Angel was grimacing before he even saw him. “Jesus, how many demons did you have to fight?”

Logan shrugged, and almost stumbled because of it. “No idea. They became a blur after the first seven.”

Brendan closed his eyes and counted all the ones he could see in his memories. Again, the only good thing about having an eidetic memory. “Including the single matches, twenty nine.”

Angel hissed a breath through his teeth, an exclamation all the more strange because he didn’t breathe. “Shit. They really were trying to kill you.”

“Better people then them have tried.” Not so much a macho response as a statement of fact in Logan’s case.

Giles got them back on topic. Brendan couldn’t tell if he was still giving Logan the cold shoulder or not. “The meet with Brezakaran - when is it happening?”

“I don’t know. Legolas told me that they’d come get me when the boss was ready to see me. He didn’t specify anything beyond that.”

Legolas? Must be the Ahtabai demon. Hey, come to think of it, he did look a bit like an elf …

“Where did you tell him you lived?” Angel wondered.

“I didn’t. I couldn’t tell ‘em I was stayin’ at Bob’s place, it would’ve tipped our hand, and I couldn’t think of a motel. Didn’t matter, though, he didn’t ask me. He just said they’d find me - oh shit, adrenaline’s gone.” And with that curious statement, Logan’s eyes rolled up in his head, and he pitched forward as if shot. Brendan grabbed his arm, but Angel actually caught him before he hit the pier, and he was glad, because he always forgot that Logan was a hell of a lot heavier than he appeared.

Even Angel seemed to struggle a bit as he slid Logan into position and hefted him up in a fireman’s carry over his shoulder, and Brendan got a good look at Logan’s back. He was still bleeding there too. “Okay,” Angel said, once he had Logan settled over his shoulder. He had blood on his hands. “How could he find him if he doesn’t know where he lives?”

The question was obviously aimed at Giles, who considered that a moment, staring at nothing. “Probably mystical tagging. It could happen to anyone who wins a match without their knowledge.”

Angel nodded, as if that sounded perfectly reasonable. “A supernatural GPS. So they could show up to get him at any time.”

Giles nodded in agreement, lips thinned to a grim line. “So we shouldn’t bring him anywhere that might blow his cover.”

“And I should stay away from him,” Angel agreed, with regret. “So where do we take him?”

“The church?” Brendan suggested. “It’s open to anyone, and it wouldn’t be suspicious.”

“The Stone Temple?” Giles repeated, mainly just to make sure. “Yes, that’s mostly a demon church. Should be fine.”

They headed off towards the place where Thrak was supposedly waiting with the cab, and Brendan brought up the rear, keeping an eye out for any blood that might be dripping from Logan and leaving a trail. If it was there, he couldn’t discern it.

There were times when he wished he could forget some things. This was, he supposed, one of those times.

9

Logan knew something was wrong right away, but he wasn’t sure if he cared or not.

He was laying on a bed in a small white room, with sunlight pouring through the single window. There was bird song outside, but it seemed to swell and fade randomly, with some native Canadian birds mixed in with ones native to South America and Japan. The walls were also generally bare, but occasionally something would appear - a painting, something impressionistic or perhaps a Japanese ink work - or an odd object, such as a neon palm tree or an oval mirror, but as soon as they appeared, they seemed to disappear like smoke. Sometimes the walls would change color as well, white changing to blue, then cycling to green, and switching to a pale violet before fading out to white once more. Only the window and the bed were unchanging. Curious. No, that was too mild a word - this was totally fucking weird.

He didn’t move, because he felt achy and tired, and strangely hot and weak. He was healing, wasn’t he? Yeah, he thought he could remember the demon pit fights, although everything got vague after the huge horde dog piled on him. After that, everything became a red, angry blur, and he was sure that he killed just about everyone he saw.

Suddenly he wasn’t alone, and it didn’t seem to be a surprise. Nor was it a surprise that it was Mariko, her hand cool and soft on his face, her scent comforting. Her long black hair tickled his face as she leaned over him, and her eyes, black and deep, seemed to bore into his. “I’m what you want,” she said, her voice lilting at the end, as if it was almost a question.

“Yes.”

She seemed to trace the contours of his face with her fingers, and he closed his eyes, enjoying the feeling, which was familiar and yet new. Yes, there was the problem.

He opened his eyes once more, and asked, “Are you real?”

“Of course I am.”

He smiled sadly up at her as the ceiling turned colors once more, fading from brown to yellow. “No you’re not. If you were really her, you’d have slapped my arm for asking that. And your eyes aren’t right; they’re too dark. You forgot the pupils.” He still let his fingers trail up and down her arm anyways, enjoying the soft feeling of her skin. As simulations went, she was quite good, but far from perfect.

Still, this fake Mariko wasn’t perturbed that he wasn’t buying her act, or by the fact that the room continued to shift around them. “But she’s all you want. She’s in the dark spot of your mind.”

“Why does the room keep shifting?”

“Your memories are slender; it’s not enough to work by. All we can see is her.”

We? He had no real experience trying to figure out how many mystery people were in his head at one time; usually there was just the one. He wondered why Bob’s energy hadn’t discouraged them, but the more he thought about it, the more he realized that that slight glow of blue in the back of his mind wasn’t there anymore. Had Bob withdrawn his energy from his mind? Why? Couldn’t he have warned him he’d have no further protection from telepaths? Well, it was too late to worry about it now. “Who are you?”

“We are messengers. We are here to offer you her.”

He was sure he’d heard her wrong, then feared he hadn’t. “What? What the hell do you mean offer me her? She’s dead.”

“The dead can always be brought back. Of all people, you should know that. We can bring her back, as she was.”

She kept her cool hand on his face, and he had a sudden urge to rip it off and break it in half. But he was still too tired to act upon it. “Only demons can be brought back like that, gods and demi-gods and demi-demons. You can’t bring back a Human.”

The fake Mariko gave him a slow, sharp smile that was far too knowing to be warm. “We can bring back anyone. There are no limits.”

He didn’t believe her; he couldn’t afford to. “At what price? What do you want from me?”

She laid down next to him, resting her head in the hollow of his neck, and they both watched the room change. She remained warm and soft, and almost lifelike. “Nothing now. But when we ask you to do something, you must do it. If you do, we will bring her back. That’s all.”

Bullshit; complete and utter bullshit. (But what if it wasn’t?) “You’re a messenger for whom? Who is making this offer? How will I know you when the time comes?” He was starting to respond to her, even though he knew she was a fake, even though part of him wanted to snap her neck for using Mariko as a weapon against him. But he was still too tired to move. Which was probably not a coincidence.

“You will. Consider our offer well. We won’t make it again.” The fake Mariko raised herself up on her elbow to look down at him, her hand moving slowly across his chest, and she gave him a soft kiss on his cheek. He thought he saw the darkness in her eyes move, slither like snakes in the shadow, and he felt a shock of recognition, even though he wasn’t sure how. He’d seen that before? Where?

He woke up, only to regret it instantly. Her scent lingered in his nostrils, as if she’d just been there, and his stomach knotted with a terrible desire, followed by a wave of sorrow and rage. He sat up, but regretted that too, as his back was still healing, and it fucking hurt. His head felt fuzzy too, and he was sure that if it wasn’t telepathy, it was something like it.

For a moment, his disorientation was complete. He was in a gray, sunless room, the walls looked like granite, and there was no furniture at all, save for the day bed he was in and a small side table, upon which sat a clear plastic tumbler full of water. As soon as he felt strong enough, he slid to the edge of the bed, and after sniffing the water to make sure it was just that (yes it was), he gulped it down. It helped wash the taste of blood out of his mouth, and his throat was dry anyways. He’d probably need lots more liquid to make up for the blood loss.

Unwrapping the impromptu bandage on his forearm, he saw that it had mostly healed, the skin covering the would pink and smooth, the hair not grown in yet. He dropped the blood soaked towel on the floor, and only when he started his injury survey did he realize that someone had stripped him of his bloody clothes; he was down to blood spattered boxer shorts. Was he wearing boxer shorts when he got dressed this morning? Or yesterday. What day was it?

He got up and looked around the room, but his clothes were nowhere to be found, nor were any others. Were they bringing them in later, or did they want him to go naked? He supposed he should see for himself, since this place didn’t smell familiar.

The door fit flush into the wall, and there was no knob; it just opened on its own as he approached. Although he had parsed the air beforehand, he carefully looked down both sides of the hall, confirming he was alone. The hall was white and narrow, textured with stucco, and to his right it dead ended at a high window covered with heavy blue velvet curtains. On the left side, the hall curved away, and he followed it, wondering what the hell this was supposed to be. There was some vague déjà vu from when he woke up in Xavier’s mansion, but not much; he had a sneaking suspicion that this was a natural extension of the pit fight.

But he was in another mansion. The hall led to a wrought iron stairwell that curved around and down in a delicate helix towards a wide white and gold marble floor. Since that seemed to be the main floor, he went down the stairs, the iron cold on his bare feet.

The closer he got to the main floor, though, the more he could catch glimpses of the furniture below. He saw Tudor style sideboards and cupboards, Art Deco style chairs, and old Hollywood memorabilia, including a glass framed poster of the Bride of Frankenstein in the foyer. At best, the style could be called eclectic, but it was all indicative of someone who had more money than taste. He wasn’t too surprised to find a life sized werewolf model from some horror movie or another tucked into the corner leading to the drawing room. A bright Southern California sun was pouring in through all the windows, none of which were covered, so at least he knew he wasn’t dealing with a vampire.

He heard a voice faintly, and followed it, feet padding silently on the cool, smooth floor. “ - than two million and a cut of the back end, it’s an insult,” the man was saying. Since Logan heard no response, he guessed he was talking on the phone. “Yes, go ahead and tell Bill I said that. I’m not negotiating further until that’s set in stone. Got it? Love you, darling.” There was then the dull click of a cell phone being flipped shut, and a slight breeze led him to an open patio door, where a gauzy ivory curtain billowed in the anemic wind.

Clearing the curtain aside and stepping out, he found himself on a tiled patio in front of a massive swimming pool, full of water too blue to be natural. In a padded chaise lounge, beneath a huge umbrella springing from the center of a clear plastic table, was the guy he mentally dubbed Legolas the night before. He was a tall, slender demon, and now dressed in nothing more than blue swimming trunks, he looked even leaner. His skin had a slight golden undertone that seemed to glow in the reflected sunlight. He looked back at him, his fluffy white-blond hair looking moussed to the point of surrender. (Wasn’t his hair a different color last night?) “Well well, good morning, champion,” he said, with a false amiability. “You healed up nice, didn’t you? Sure you’re not part demon?”

“No. Where the fuck am I?” He couldn’t consider a guy in swim trunks a threat, ever. He didn’t know why, but that was that.Give him a death ray, and he would have felt the same way.

Legolas just smiled at him, but it was a kind of phony Hollywood smile that never reached his eyes. “You’re in my house, and welcome to it. I hope we didn’t teleport you out of any place interesting, but judging from your state, I kinda doubt your were partying. Hell of a thing last night, huh?”

He stared at him. What, did he think he didn’t recognize that voice? “Let’s make it interesting.”

The demon had the good manners to grimace, but he didn’t seem terribly sincere. “Nothing personal, hon, it’s just you gotta keep the audience happy, you know? If the audience doesn’t respect you, it can’t love you.”

He just glared at him, unable to believe this. “You’re a fucking agent?! You are, aren’t you?!”

He shrugged expansively, slender hands held apart, and he got up from his lounge chair with a strange, alien grace. “Guilty as charged. But hey, it’s Los Angeles - every other person is in the business. Speaking of which, have you ever considered movies?”

Okay, things had gone from annoying to surreal. “What?”

“You’re deliciously cut, and you have a kind of macho energy that’s very retro. I mean nowadays, the metrosexual thing, the loose sexuality, is very hip. But if you have the charisma, you can make the ‘70’s macho thing so unhip it’s hip, if you know what I mean. You just have to be careful not to go too caveman, or too belligerent. One Crowe is enough, and frankly, Penn is too old to make it work for him, but he’s still trying -”

He shook his head and turned away. “I’m leaving.”

“Don’t be like that, slugger,” the demon agent said with an annoyingly light but chiding tone. “The boss is coming over to see you.”

That made him pause and turn back. Jackpot. “The boss?”

“Yep. So you might want to clean up. You hungry? I’ll have Carlotta whip up something. And you know, I’m serious. We have no big action stars, and you don’t really need acting chops for films like that. You’d be perfect! And, you could do your own stunts, ‘cause look how fast you heal! We just have to keep this whole mutant thing under wraps, ‘kay? ‘Cause the public just isn’t down with that. What’s your full name?”

He scowled at him. Why did people like him assume everyone wanted to be in show business? Maybe agents were a specific demon breed - that would explain a hell of a lot. “Heywood Jablowmi,” he snapped, stalking back through the open door and into the mansion. He supposed he could go back upstairs and find some clothes somewhere in one of the upper rooms. Whether or not they’d fit would be a different story entirely.

He heard Legolas click his tongue like a ticked off librarian. “Now that is just crude. But you know, we could make that work for you -”

Oh Christ. Could he keep from killing him before Brezakaran showed up? That would be the million dollar question.