“Oh my god, it's a total Casper-fest out there,” Xander proclaimed, coming through the door of Angel Investigations. He was inside and taking off his jacket before he noticed Angel standing behind Bren's desk, with Doyle standing beside him. Since he was ever so slightly translucent at the edges, Xander knew instantly he was late to the party. “Oh, hey, dead guy. I'm not talking to you, Angel – I'm talking to that guy.”

“I got that.”

“His name's Doyle,” Rogue piped up from the couch. She was holding a cup a coffee she almost never drank, making Angel wonder if she had absorbed a true caffeine addict at some point, but had only enough of the person still left to want to have it but not to drink it. Either that, or she didn't like her own coffee.

“Right. I'm Xander.” He looked momentarily confused. “Haven't we worked with you before?”

“Huh?”

“The last thing he remembers is his death,” Angel said, grimacing at the thought. Not a good night. Week, month, year.

"Oh. Shitty. I know how that is, if it's anything."

"You've died?" Doyle wondered.

"Kinda. Sorta. No, but ... kinda."

"Well, that answers that," Doyle said, looking away before rolling his eyes.

"Hey, I'm trying here." Xander got himself a cup of coffee, then asked, "So what's up with all the Sixth Sense extras?"

"According to Bob, it has something to do with a death god."

"A death god?" Rogue repeated. "How many are there?"

Angel wondered if he should tell her. Ultimately, he decided to. "Bob said there's three hundred and forty two, but I think he just made that number up."

"Bob?" Doyle asked, turning back to him. He was still fiddling with his cigarette. "You don't mean Maximum Bob, do ya?"

"Actually, yeah. You knew him?"

Doyle scoffed. "Knew him? Bloody hell man, all of West Hollywood pretty much belongs to him. He's a major player - and major trouble. Since when did you get mixed up with a guy like that?"

"It's a long story. But you're right, he's major trouble."

The door burst open again, and this time Bren and Kier came in, Kier as serenely beautiful as always, Bren a little more wide eyed with confusion. It was a warm day already, Los Angeles was in the grip of an early and hellish - no pun intended - summer, so Bren had opted to wear a sleeveless green muscle shirt that showed off the tattoos that marked him as a Chosen of the Gorgons: black vines tangled and draped his arms from hands to shoulders, a sleeve of black ink that, every now and again, out of the corner of your eye, seemed to ever so slightly move. People had complimented him a lot on his tattoos, seemingly never aware that that wasn't exactly what they were. "Holy shit, is hell full? There's ghost all over - and a ghost in the office. Sorry dude," Bren said, seeing Doyle.

Doyle noticed Bren's ruby red eyes, and asked, "Brachen?"

"Yeah, half."

"Awesome. I'm Doyle, the half breed that used to be here."

"Oh, hey! I've heard so much about you. Nice to meet you. I'm Brendan."

"Irish name too? Wicked." Doyle nodded his head towards Kier. "Got another vamp workin' for ya, Angel? I thought you were one of a kind."

"As it turned out, no."

"Actually, I'm Bren's boyfriend," Kier said. "I just help out from time to time. I'm not really an employee."

"A gay vampire? Actually, that makes all kind of sense. I always thought vampires were all a bit gay."

Angel looked askance at Doyle. "Pardon?"

"Oh, c'mon man. Do you only feed on women? Do you only turn women? Naw. And let's face it, the whole biting and sucking thing is kind of intimate."

Both Bren and Kier nodded. "It is, yeah," Kier agreed.

Xander started to laugh, but quickly hid his face behind his coffee mug. Angel shot him an evil glare, but that seemed to make his giggle fest worse.

As Bren took his usual seat behind his desk - and Kier took a post on the couch, out of the way of the window (shades pulled or not, he didn't seem to trust it, and who could blame him) - he asked, "Where's Giles?"

Angel was glad he'd given him an out. He'd have to give him a raise. "On his way. He picked a hell of a day to sleep in." Actually, Giles had a cold, proving that being a Watcher and all around wizard didn't necessarily save you from the cold virus. He had the previous couple of days off, so Angel hoped he was recovered by now, but he still sounded congested on the phone. It had been so long since he had any kind of Human illness he had completely forgotten what it was like, and how long they lasted. He wasn't sure if that was good or bad.

Bren was on his computer, calling up street web cams and confirming that the dead weren't just in L.A. but scattered all over, which honestly wasn't good at all. Local would be bad enough; global was nearly impossible. How the hell were they going to handle that? But then again, how did they handle a death god? That was all Bob's territory, not theirs.

Speaking of which, Angel - and from the way he looked at the door, Kier - heard faint singing, but it was a few more seconds before the others could make it out. "- you wasted life, why wouldn't you waste the afterlife ..."

Finally, the door swung open, and Bob made his entrance, followed by a grumpy looking Logan. A bit of a surprise, but in retrospect Angel realized he would bring Logan with him if he intended to take on a god. No matter that he was outclassed and overmatched; Logan never said die. He might actually die first. (And would probably still come back. You had to give him credit for superhuman tenacity.) "G'day L.A., how's the dead men walking? Hey, Doyle! How's it hanging?"

Doyle didn't answer. He was staring in wide eyed horror at Logan, and suddenly jumped behind Angel, as if using him for a Human shield. Actually, he moved through him, an always disconcerting feeling of a cold wind passing through his bones. "Holy fuck! You brought Wolverine? Are things that bad?"

General surprise seemed to sweep the room, but no one was more surprised than Logan. "You know me?"

"You know him?" Angel echoed.

"Fuck yeah! You don't? The mutant assassin? Everybody in the demon underground knows him. The Human equivalent of a neutron bomb."

"Shouldn't that be threshing machine?" Bob asked, with a sunny smile. For some reason - the weather, perhaps? - he was wearing loud blue floral patterned surfer shorts, and a pale blue tank top with the words "I'm gonna eat you!" beneath an inexplicable cartoon of a roaring orange with teeth. He had mirrored sunglasses perched up in his blond highlighted brown hair, and had a day's worth of stubble dusting his cheeks, giving him the look of a surfer who got lost on his way to Malibu. Angel assumed he'd be wearing flip flops, but no, he was completely barefoot. Angel would have wondered how he didn't have broken glass and needles sticking through his feet, except this was Bob - he could have given himself titanium soles. He was an energy being after all; the body was mostly just for show.

Logan gave Bob a nasty sidelong glance. "I didn't know I was that well known."

"In some circles," Doyle admitted warily. After a moment, he asked, "So you're not here to kill us all, then?"

"No," he snapped irately.

"Hey, he's a good guy now," Rogue said.

Doyle looked mildly disbelieving at that pronouncement. “Like Angel?”

“Yep,” Bob said, flopping down on the sofa. “We're all good guys here. Most of the time.”

“It's very situational,” Rogue said, getting into the spirit of things. Unlike the others, she was still almost all covered up, with only the V neck of her long sleeved t-shirt showing any skin. She still wore gloves and jeans, although in some nod to the weather the gloves were very thin silk.

“Where's Naomi?” Bob asked.

“Her Aunt in Ottawa is ill. She went up to take care of her, but she called the day before yesterday, and thinks she'll be back by next week.” It had been unusually quiet, all things considered, so Naomi returning to Canada and Giles taking sick days didn't seem like a big deal. Now it seemed like a big deal. It figured the shit would hit the fan when you were least able to deal with it.

Bob grimaced. “Damn. Electrical discharges can disrupt ghosts. She could have kept them at bay.”

“It's not like ghosts can attack ya,” Doyle said.

“Poltergeists,” Angel noted. “They can get violent.”

Logan cleared his throat, and pointed at Bob. “He can make 'em disappear. Why are we even discussin' this?”

Doyle gave Bob a curious look. “You can make 'em disappear?”

“Sorta. Um, I'm a god.”

“Bullshit!”

“No, really. I kinda got kicked out of the god fraternity, they tried to make me forget I was a god and put me in a Belial demon body, yada yada yada, long story short, god. Not a popular one, mind you, but I'm only the patron saint of liars, so I'm not required to do a lot of heavy lifting.”

Doyle was still looking at him skeptically, and turned to Angel for confirmation. “He shitting me?”

“Sadly no.”

“Well, fuck. No wonder no one would touch you.”

“I have a rather pungent aftertaste,” Bob agreed.

“We didn't need to know that,” Xander said, mock shuddering.

“Hate to interrupt the playful banter, but do we have any idea what we're gonna do next?” Kier interjected.

“Thank you.” Logan replied.

Bob stretched somewhat theatrically, and put his arms behind his head, as if relaxing. “Yeah, I'm thinkin' we need to go to the Below. If a death god is gonna hide out, away from other gods, they could hardly do better than Below.”

“Below where?” Xander asked, obviously confused.

Angel felt a small cramp in his gut. He hadn't heard that name in ages, and it wasn't welcome now. “Do we absolutely have to?”

“Fuckin' 'ey, that's a bit hardcore, isn't it?” Doyle exclaimed. “How you gonna get there?”

“My bar is a nexus point,” Bob said. “It exists simultaneously in several different dimensions at once.”

“What's goin' on here?” Rogue asked.

“What's Below?” Logan asked. “Another dimension?”

“Yes and no,” Bob told him, unhelpfully. “It's basically a shadow city, one that exists parallel to this one in every respect. Ever wonder why the world isn't actually overrun by demons? There really isn't enough Slayers and do gooders to hold back the tide. The truth is, given the choice, most of the demons prefer the Below: a world where demons are the majority and there are almost no Humans at all. Sometimes people accidentally end up there, but they don't last long.”

“So it's a demon Earth?” Xander asked, looking astonished. “I think I've been there. They have a Sunnydale High School, right?”

“I'm not sure I can go,” Angel told him.

Bob looked at him with his electric blue eyes, and Angel could feel the look piercing through his skull. “Oh dear. Now why would you go and do something like that?”

It was funny, but both Logan and Doyle looked between them with the same head gesture, although Logan looked more pissed off. “What?” Logan asked first.

Angel was going to say it, but Bob spared him from it. “Angelus killed the Emperor of the Below and took over for a few months. He killed ... what, a few thousand?”

He shrugged and shook his head, not actually sure, and Rogue, Kier, and Bren were just gawking at him in shock. Xander rolled his eyes, and asked, “Man. Is there anywhere where Angelus wasn't a complete dick?”

“Why'd you only stick around for a few months?” Logan asked, with a sort of casual gruffness. This news didn't surprise him, and it was possible he had something similar in his past. That was one thing they had in common: a long bloody trail of dead bodies behind them.

He didn't want to admit it. It wasn't something he had thought about in decades for a very good reason, but he didn't see a way out of it. “He got bored. And there weren't enough people to feed on.”

Doyle seemed gobsmacked. “You – Angelus – ruled a dimension for a while? Seriously? And got bored with it?”

Wow, he thought he felt bad about it before everyone knew about it. He looked down at Bren's computer, pretending he saw something interesting there, ignoring the looks he was getting from everyone but Logan and Bob. “Put that way, it sounds horrible.”

“Okay, so here's what we do,” Bob said, sitting forward and changing the subject. He was giving him a pass, at least for now, and Angel wasn't sure if that was good or bad. “Logan, Bren, Kier, we're gonna go to below and see if we have a death god living incognito there. The rest of you guys will stay here and get geared up to fight the inevitable zombies.”

“Zombies?” Xander complained. “I hate zombies. They should wear those little pine tree air fresheners like necklaces.”

“”Why would I stay here?” Rogue complained. “What can I do against zombies anyways? I'm comin' with you guys.”

“Humans really shouldn't go there, love,” Bob told her, not unkindly.

“Logan's goin',” she countered. “Besides, I'm with you. Who's gonna fuck with me?”

“Fair point,” Logan said.

Bob sighed and then shrugged. “Fine. It's a bit of a sausage fest anyways. Might be good to have a woman around.”

“I could go with ya,” Doyle offered. “I might actually be able to touch stuff in Below.”

Bob nodded, standing up. “You might.” He looked at Angel, and said, “We'll be back soon. In fact, if I don't time this right, we'll be walking in the door at the same time we're walking out. You gotta love time differences in other dimensions.”

Logan gave Rogue an almost paternalistic look, and asked, “You sure about this?”

She nodded. “I don't like zombie films anyways. I can't imagine the real things are any better.”

“They're a bit worse,” Logan admitted, surprising her. What, she didn't know Logan had fought zombies before?

Leading the way out, Bob started singing again, raising his voice to the rooftops. “I was waiting, oh I've been waiting, long enough to take this town. All the way down -”

As soon as Doyle, the last member of the procession, followed them out (through) the door, Xander asked, “What is with the singing?”

Angel was forced to shrug. “I dunno. I've never figured it out.”

And since Bob was with them, he knew he had no reason to be concerned about them. In the Below, Bob would probably be even more powerful, if that was even possible. But mutant or not, Logan and Rogue were Human, and they were walking into a nightmare city, where Humans were a delicacy not unlike caviar.

And he had no idea how the city had recovered after Angelus's reign. He hoped it was better, because there was no way it could be any worse.

Was there?