xvii [ visual ] / [ location: hyperion hotel ].

[undoing.livejournal.com]

Good at talking about his feelings, Angel is not. He's bad with words as it is and that, coupled with his penchant for bottling, means that talking isn't so much not good as it's non-existent. He's more of a man of action and boy do his actions give away hints towards all that he's keeping inside under lock and key. Especially to those who know him well. There are three things Angel does when stress is starting to get the better of him: cook, tai-chi and draw. The former seems to be the most preferred, as people get free food out of it and the man's a damn good cook for someone who doesn't have the taste buds for the things he knows how to make. Right now, however, he's indulging the latter.

Angel sits on one of the red couches in the lobby of the hotel which, while still sporting signs of the damage he and Spike did to it during their duet earlier that month (namely the body-shaped holes through two walls as the desk wreckage had been cleaned up and cleared out), is actually pretty spotless. This may or may not be due to a certain brunette Slayer having not been around lately to trash it. His feet are propped up and there's a sketch book on his lap and a pencil in his hand.

He's good. He's really good, as is shown by the dragon he's currently sketching as he alternates between moving the pencil against the page and blending lines together with his thumb and fingers that are already covered in graphite in a telltale sign that he's been at this for a while now.

Several things are eating away at him and this is his way of trying to ignore that gnawing and focus on something else.

Comments

[ voice ]

[revivedqueen.livejournal.com]

Familiar.

[ voice ]

[undoing.livejournal.com]

He should.

[ voice ]

[revivedqueen.livejournal.com]

[ there's an almost amused inflection in her tone as she speaks. ]

Your little dragon.

[ voice ]

[undoing.livejournal.com]

[ angel chuckles a bit, despite himself. ]

There was nothing little about him, Illyria.

[ voice ]

[revivedqueen.livejournal.com]

[ and yet, even the biggest of warriors are so small, in her eyes. ]

Perhaps.

He was a tolerable opponent.

[ location: hyperion hotel ]

[glowingseer.livejournal.com]

She's feeling better, these days. It certainly helped that her friends were around, seemingly waiting on her hand and foot - but Cordelia had never been one to stay idle for so long, so she ventures out of her room and goes down to the lobby, intending to make herself a cup of coffee.

Apparently, someone forgot that they are currently coffee pot-less, at the moment.

She spots Angel at the lobby, and slowly makes her way towards him, in the meantime. "Hey," Cordelia greets him. "Whatcha doing?"

[ location: hyperion hotel ]

[undoing.livejournal.com]

"Drawing," is his answer, eyes still glued to the paper as he sketches away.

Angel probably should've looked into replacing the coffee pot and the other items that had been taken from the hotel during the rescue, but the thought hasn't crossed his mind, yet. Which may or may not be due to his blood diet and lack of need to use said taken objects.

[ location: hyperion hotel ]

[glowingseer.livejournal.com]

She takes a peek over his shoulder - and shudders. "Yeeee. Scary," Cordelia says, wondering why he's drawing a dragon, of all thi--

And then she remembers.

"Hey, is that your adopted pet dragon?"

[ location: hyperion hotel ]

[undoing.livejournal.com]

"Friend." Angel pauses to turn his head towards hers. "He was my friend. If anyone was a pet, I was his." And then he's looking back down at the paper, pencil moving against the paper again as he darkens the lines of the dragon's scales.

It struck him then that there was yet another similarity between himself and Spike here. They'd both been (or still were, where Spike was concerned) 'pets' to larger, more powerful beings who could've squashed them if they wanted to. He to the dragon and Spike to Illyria. He'd never noticed that before and it makes him grin a little and shake his head.

[ location: hyperion hotel ]

[stacked]

There are a couple things Faith knows for sure. Most of them are pretty fucking depressing, but topping that list is 'Angel is worse at this emotions shit than I am'. She bailed back to her apartment after everything went down, trying to give everybody space to deal with Cordelia. But if Angel's doing the sit around and mope shit, space is done.

It only takes her a little bit to get over the hotel, and instead of knocking or asking if she can come in, just enters anyway. "Dumbass." Nice greeting there Lehane, also: Succinct and about as subtle as a battering ram, that's Faith. She drops her duffle bag to the floor with a loud, clattering thump.

"Come on, get up."

[ location: hyperion hotel ]

[undoing.livejournal.com]

Having Faith show up at the hotel isn't all that surprising. That room's all hers and Angel already told her that she's free to come and go as she pleases, but the vampire's so lost in his delineations that he while he feels that familiar skin crawling sensation that screams Slayer at him, he doesn't completely register it or that 'dumbass' directed at him and it's not until she drops the duffel bag does Angel snap out of it. He jumps (accompanied with a less than manly sounding yelp that he will vehemently deny later) and the sketchbook and pencil immediately fall to the floor.

"Faith. Hi. ...what?"

[ location: hyperion hotel ]

[stacked]

Despite her worry-- and the awkward feeling of knowing Wes is around and having no freaking clue just how to handle that mess of screwed up issues-- she can't help but laugh at the yelp.

"Wicked manly there, big guy." Faith grins, hair brushing her back as she shakes her head. (Jesus, she needs to get that shit cut.) "You want a minute to calm down, or can we go?"

And by 'go' she means the euphemistic 'come on, kick my ass it'll make you feel better'. Like therapy, only with more bruising.

[ location: hyperion hotel ]

[undoing.livejournal.com]

Angel just glowers at her in response to her pointing out his rather girly yelp. For someone who was so full of grace when he was fighting or pulling off inhuman feats, he sure was awkward as all sin when he wanted to be. (Or didn't want, as was the case, here.) That glare is exchanged in favor of confusion once she asks if they can go - not entirely missing her point, as this is Faith and he can guess at her meaning and understand that the Wes factor must be making for a lot of discomfort with even being in the hotel, if only just by the door.

"Go? Go where?" He asks, for clarification's sake.

[ location: hyperion hotel ]

[demonologist]

Wesley comes through from the office, he has his sleeves rolled up and it's clear he's been doing some tidying. He spies Angel drawing and quirks an eyebrow at him.

"Please tell me that's not a sign that Darla's here in Taxon."

After all the excitement of rescuing Cordy from the clutches of The Master and Drusilla, the last thing they need is more of that kind of drama.

[ location: hyperion hotel ]

[undoing.livejournal.com]

Angel looks up at Wesley, confused by his statement about Darla being here in Taxon. While such wasn't impossible, given Taxon's habit of completely ignoring timelines, he would've known. He would've felt it if he hadn't seen evidence of it on the tablets and he doesn't understand why Wes would think that-- Oh. He looks back down at the sketchbook in his lap and realizes that it's what tipped Wesley off to a possible Darla arrival, being that he'd went a little obsessive with drawing his sire. (Okay, 'a little' may be a bit of an understatement.)

He holds the sketchbook up and turns it around so that Wes can see the dragon that he was sketching that isn't Darla.

[ location: hyperion hotel ]

[demonologist]

"Ah."

He's profoundly relieved and peers more closely at the drawing.

"Not a very good likeness of Darla, though, is it?" There's a glint of humour in his gaze and he strides over to the couch, taking a seat nearby.

"So, how are you holding up, Angel? Cordelia seems better. More her chipper self."

[ location: hyperion hotel ]

[undoing.livejournal.com]

It's odd, being asked about Cordelia, the person, when he's drawing Cordelia, the dragon. He doesn't offer up that little bit of information, though. It would take some explaining and that's starting towards the end of a story that Wesley doesn't even have the beginning to, let alone the middle. Information dropping like that would only cause confusion that's not needed.

"Me? I'm...fine. Just fine." A lie. Not that he's putting much effort into that or that he expects Wesley not to be able to tell. "Cordy's better. Healing. She'll be okay. She always is."

[ visual ]

[oppositeofhero.livejournal.com]

"You do that regularly, do you?" Tony manages to sound almost impressed by the quality of the drawing. "Might consider making money off those. Could be a good source of income."

Not as good as weapons technology, of course, but Tony leaves that part out. Everyone's got to make their own way in the world, anyway.

[ visual ]

[undoing.livejournal.com]

He hesitates with the pencil on the line he's currently darkening at such a suggestion. Once upon a time, back when he'd had a heartbeat and lived in a world where the closest thing to a computer was a printing press, he'd toyed with the idea of doing this for a living, but of course, his father had shot that down. ...but, those kinds of thoughts were ones that were less wanted than the ones he was trying to avoid.

"Sometimes, if I'm in the right mood." Or wrong mood, as is the case here. "It's more of a hobby than anything else."

[ visual ]

[oppositeofhero.livejournal.com]

"Hey, don't be knocking hobbies," Tony replies with a smirk. "Sure, they're not money-makers but they're okay to have." He watches Angel continue his work, or what he can see of it, anyway, more because it's something to do than something he's fascinated with.

Of course, his whole speech about not downplaying the benefits of hobbies is mostly a bunch of hot air. He likes his comfortable lifestyle (not that it's carried over to Taxon... not yet, anyway), and he's aware that he needs money to keep that up. But telling Angel that probably isn't a good idea, so he keeps his mouth shut about it. "Doesn't take a genius to see you've got talent." Or maybe it does. Tony's smirk grows wider.

[ visual ]

[undoing.livejournal.com]

Okay to have. He supposed so. Not that his father had agreed, back in the day, but that had been a different time where priorities weren't what they were in the here and now. Angel hated that he could see the logic in his father's decision to forbid him from indulging in the one thing he'd actually been good at when he was alive, but he hated the man even more for not letting him try. It was hard to feel sorry on some days for what he'd done to his father after he'd been turned into a vampire with that weighing down on him, but no-one ever said Angel was a saint. A champion of good, yes, but perfect? Certainly not.

Angel looks up at the feed on the tablet, catching that smirk. He sees confidence in it. "But, you are," he ventures, not entirely sure if he's guessing right. "A genius. Right?"

[Location: Hyperion Hotel]

[bigbad]

"We ought to do something about these walls," Spike says, stepping in through one of the holes. Oh, Angel's drawing. That's never a good sign. Not that it takes a genius to guess what's probably on his mind.

He walks over behind Angel. When he sees what Angel's drawing, he starts laughing.

[Location: Hyperion Hotel]

[undoing.livejournal.com]

Angel tilts his head back to properly glare at the other vampire. "Oh, don't even start with that, Spike."

[Location: Hyperion Hotel]

[bigbad]

Spike shakes his head, still smirking."Drawing old girlfriends again?"

[Location: Hyperion Hotel]

[undoing.livejournal.com]

That drawing of the 'old girlfriend', along with the whole sketchbook, is used to smack Spike upside the head. "The dragon was a he. He. And get your mind out of the gutter."