“How was work?” Fred asked. She was rocking Thalia in the living room, giving Cordelia a break from taking care of all five children. Actually, Cordelia was never responsible for all five at once; the others pitched in constantly. As a result, she occasionally complained that she never saw her children. Wil and Angel were particularly attached to Mischa and Julian, although Xander, Fred and Wesley were quite fond of Rhiannon, Thalia and Alan.

“Not bad,” Xander replied. “They’re thinking about making me shift supervisor,” He added. The Raphe had been the first to find work in Syracuse, at a paper processing plant.

“We need the formula,” Oz murmured as he joined the pair. “Alan’s hungry.”

Xander grinned and picked the boxes up. “How’s Rhiannon?”

“Asleep,” Oz said quietly. “As are Julian and Mischa.”

“With the vamps?” Xander asked.

“Of course.” Wil and Angel had generously offered share their quarters with any and all of the babies—the room set aside for the cubs just wouldn’t hold five children. Now the basement ‘sky room’ was full of cribs, which held an ever-rotating array of infant werewolves. Either Angel, Wil or both could be found in that room, watching the children as they worked on a computer.

“Did I get the right supplement?” Xander inquired as he unpacked the case. “Bone meal, trace minerals, soy powder, milk powder, protein powder—although GNC looked at me funny for buying that much. I think they think I’m some sort of dealer.”

Oz grinned. “It’s all there.” Cordelia couldn’t feed all five infants, and human baby formula wasn’t sufficient. Now they had to mix up something stronger, using a recipe Oz and Wesley came up with together. It seemed to be working, since the cubs were growing like weeds and gulped the stuff down readily.

Xander left Oz in the kitchen, playing mad scientist. The Raphe wanted to check on the cubs and see how Cordelia was doing. He found her in the computer room, typing away with a snoozing Alan in her lap. “Hey, Xander. Didja find that place we talked about?” Cordelia asked as he entered.

“Yup,” Xander said, taking a seat. “Fred should like it; they want someone to fix their computer system and do an inventory. It’ll take years.”

“Tell her about it, then,” Cordelia ordered. She’d been trying to push some of the others out of the house ever since the cubs were born. At the moment, only Xander and Wesley were working, and it was difficult to make ends meet without dipping seriously into Angel’s money. They didn’t want to attract Wolfram & Hart’s attention, and they knew that most of Angel’s accounts were still being watched by the firm. That left them very few to use for emergencies.

“I will. There might be something for Oz at that place, too,” Xander commented. “They’re looking for a file clerk.”

Cordelia grinned and shook her head. If he wanted to ask his lover to work as a file clerk, fine. She’d love to watch. Alan began to stir, hunger waking him up. “Feeding time,” She muttered. “Could you ask Oz if he’d get a bottle ready?” She asked as she unfastened her shirt. The cub wouldn’t get everything he needed from her, although he got more than the others did. Alan was growing quickly, but he still had some catching up to do.

Xander left to tell Oz about the bottle and to give Cordelia some privacy. When he found Oz, the alpha was almost finished making up a fresh bottle. “You’re getting good at that,” Xander murmured, taking the bottle and a clean cloth.

“You’d better learn too,” Oz told him as they walked back.

“Why?” Xander inquired. “When you’re so good at it?”

“We’re all gonna have to wolf this time,” Oz replied. “For the cubs’ sake.”

Xander grimaced. “And someone’s got to make up the bottles. I get it. How long will you have to do that?”

Oz shrugged. “Until they’re old enough to learn control. Might be as early as ten or twelve.”

“Months?” Xander said hopefully.

“Years,” Oz corrected. “But it could be as late as sixteen.”

“That really sucks,” Xander groaned.

•••

“They’re hungry,” Wil whispered. Angel glanced up from his computer and studied the cubs.

“Yeah, they are,” He murmured. The dark vampire stood up and joined Wil at the cradles, reaching for Julian. “We should take them upstairs.”

“Fred had all the windows open earlier,” Wil reminded him. They loved their house, but it was full of windows. While Cordelia had thoughtfully chosen opaque blinds, when they were open during the day, the vampires still couldn’t move freely.

“Then we’ll tell her to close them,” Angel said. He picked up a baby monitor and pushed down the button. It was a model that could be used for two-way communication if necessary. “Cordy? The boys are hungry. Are any blinds open?”

Angel listened as Cordelia yelled for Xander. A moment later she replied. “Not anymore. Bring ‘em on up; we’ll get some formula started.”

When Gunn woke from his nap, it was to the vision of Wil, Angel, Fred, Cordelia and Xander bottle-feeding his children. He grinned and retreated into the kitchen to get some coffee. Even with all their help, five kids was a lot of work. Five kids, five sets of dirty cloth diapers, five sets of bottles, five cribs to keep clean… “At least it wasn’t six,” He told himself.

“Or seven,” Wesley said as he came in through the kitchen door.

“Don’t even think about that,” Gunn warned. “Five is more kids than all eight of us need. Did you go by the grocery?”

“Yes,” Wesley assured him. “I simply need some assistance in emptying the car.” Gunn nodded and followed the faun outside, where the car was parked.

•••

Angel felt Wil bump into him as the blonde rolled over in his sleep. The dark vampire grinned and reached for his lover, figuring that it was time for Wil to wake up. “Angel?” Wil murmured as the brunette teased him into wakefulness.

“Hmm?” Angel hummed. It was quiet, they were alone and he missed having Wil in his arms. One or both of them was always busy with the children these days.

“Did you lock the door?”

“Everyone’s asleep,” Angel reminded the blonde. Wil must have believed him, because he turned in Angel’s arms and pressed a soft kiss to his neck.

“They’d better be,” Wil swore. Then he began to move, sliding his body along Angel’s. They both moaned softly, lips meeting as they twined together.

“Jelly!”

“Wiw!”

*flop*

*bam!*

“Bloody hell!” Wil pulled the top sheet tight around himself while Angel claimed the blanket. Julian and Mischa had launched themselves into the bed, burrowing into the comforter. “I take it you didn’t lock the door,” The blonde spat at Angel.

Angel looked bewildered. “They were asleep!”

“Jelly?” Julian said tremulously. “You mad?”

“No, Julian, I’m not mad,” Angel assured the tiny boy. Julian was immediately mollified and crawled into Angel’s lap, winding his fingers into the blanket. There was no way the werewolf cub was going anywhere.

Meanwhile, Mischa was doing very much the same thing to Wil. “Wiw, ‘Wian said it snowed!”

Wil gave up on keeping the child out of his lap and hugged the boy tight against him. “Of course we can—right after you eat dinner and put on some warm clothes.”

“Can we have a snow fight?” Mischa inquired innocently.

Wil frowned. “Who do you want to fight?”

“Ree and Sho!” Mischa declared. “We can get Fran too!”

Angel shook his head. “It’s not good to have snowball fights,” He began. The two boys immediately began to tear up, lower lips trembling. They *wanted* a snowball fight.

Wil thought quickly. “We have to build a fort first. You should get Fran to help you, though. He’s really good at that sort of thing.”

“Do we *have* to bath?” Julian asked Angel. He *hated* baths.

“Yes,” Angel confirmed. “But the sooner you go upstairs and take a bath, the sooner you can go outside in the snow.”

That seemed to do the trick; both Mischa and Julian bounded out of bed and ran for the stairs. Once they were safely in the main part of the house, Wil leapt out of bed and grabbed a pair of pyjamas from the nearest dresser. Angel followed suit, pulling on clothes before the boys decided to visit again. Once they were both dressed, Wil led the way up the stairs. “The way I see it, Angel, we have two options.”

“Which are?” Angel asked.

“Either we put a lock on the basement door, or we start sleeping in pyjamas. The safety gate isn’t keeping them in their room anymore.”

Angel scowled. He didn’t like either idea, but he’d rather sleep in clothes than not be available to the cubs. “Fine. Pyjamas.”

•••

Cordelia knew exactly what had happened as soon as the vampires reached the kitchen. It was obvious; Wil was swimming in Angel’s black satin pyjamas, while Angel looked rather cute in Wil’s considerably less roomy, light green ones. “Get dressed in a hurry?” She asked as she handed a banana to Rhiannon.

Angel glanced down at himself and swore softly. “I guess it’s too much to ask that we teach them how to knock?”

“Oh, they already know how to knock,” Cordelia replied. “They knock over everything.”

Wil smirked at the seer as he heated up his and Angel’s dinner. “I thought Xander and Oz would be home by now,” He commented as he handed Angel a mug.

“They’re on their way, with Wesley and Fred,” Cordelia stated. “And they’re having to walk. The snow’s too deep for the cars.”

“How much fell?” Wil asked as he glanced out the window. It was caked over with snow, so he saw nothing.

“Four feet since nine this morning,” Cordelia told them. “A lot more than they predicted. I’m guessing everyone will be back in an hour or so; they’re taking it slow so no one gets hurt.”

“Sounds about right,” Angel murmured. “Where’s Gunn?”

“With Fran and Siobhan,” Cordelia replied. “Watching movies.”

“Shrek again?” Wil inquired.

“Nope, Fantasia. So you two are taking the kids out into the snow?” Cordelia continued. “Good luck. They’ll disappear in all that stuff.”

“We’ll carve out something safe for them,” Wil assured her. If there was that much snow, maybe they could make tunnels or a cave system. If they watched the cubs carefully, they could play for hours.

•••

By the time Xander, Oz, Fred and Wesley got home, Angel and Wil were well into building a cave system, complete with forts, for the cubs. The cubs themselves were helping, carrying snow around and tussling now and then. It was clear to all observers that the vampires were having at least as much fun as the cubs were, and that the children were running out of steam. Gunn and Cordelia picked them up one by one as they got drowsy, cleaning them up and putting them to bed. At two years old, the kids were full of energy and never seemed to stop. Thus, the entire house was impressed that the vampires had managed to wear them out.

“That’s the last of them,” Gunn murmured as Cordelia took Mischa inside. “Wil?”

The blonde appeared a moment later. “Yeah?”

“They’re all asleep,” Gunn said quietly. “Thanks.”

Wil grinned. “It was nothing. I’ll go get Angel.” The dark vampire was somewhere in the depths of their snow tunnels, working on some sort of fortress for the cubs.

What Wil found was quite impressive. Angel had carved steps winding up to the surface, where the older vampire was sitting, staring up at the stars. “Look at this,” He told Wil as the blonde joined him. “It’s…”

Wil looked around. The world was white, right up until the sky started. Then it was pitch black. “Yes, it is.”

Angel turned to study his childe. “They’re all asleep, aren’t they?”

Wil nodded. “We can go inside now.”

“In a minute,” Angel replied. He reached for Wil and pulled the smaller man into his arms. Wil tilted his face up to accept Angel’s kiss, sighing at the tender contact. There hadn’t been early enough of this, not for a long time. Midnight emergencies, noon crying jags, marathon rocking and singing for fussy babies…

Angel didn’t realize he was pulling at Wil’s clothes until the younger vampire was almost naked. The blonde didn’t seem to be complaining; the cold didn’t bother him unless he let it. Still, Wil thought that if he was going to be exposed to the elements, so was Angel. That was how the dark vampire came to be equally unclothed, naked on the pure, white snow.

“Gods,” Angel whispered as he laid Wil out on the snow. His lover glowed, almost as pale as the snow. Angel fleetingly damned himself for being darker, for sullying the pure vision of Wil spread out and open on such a backdrop. It was like seeing him in their bed, only more so. The black night above them, the moon heavy but not yet full. He moved to cover Wil, pressing him down into the snow as they kissed again.

Wil rolled them over and over, caking snow in their hair as they sank deeper into the snow, getting caught up in it, falling into hidden caves and hollows. Snow showered on top of them, burying them in a sea of white-black as the moon’s light was cut off. Still they kissed, Angel now thrusting against Wil, their cocks aligned and straining. Heat built between them, the product of skin-on-skin friction. It melted tiny bits of snow, causing water to trickle down their sides. That water just froze on their backs and thighs as it cooled, giving a sharp cold edge to their frantic mating.

Angel pressed his face into Wil’s shoulder as he came, spilling cool seed between them. Wil arched, thrust once more, and joined him, panting softly. They lay there in the snow, still completely buried, until Wil began to shift around a bit.

“What?” Angel murmured, tightening his hold on the blonde.

“You might like having snow in your arse, but I don’t,” Wil snapped. Angel laughed.

“Fine, we’ll go in,” Angel conceded. Wil looked around for their clothes and realized they were two feet from the surface and covered in snow.

“Maybe we should just dig our way to the house,” The blonde recommended. “It’s certainly going to be easier.”

Angel looked up one more time and agreed. Chances were, if they tried to walk on top, they’d just fall in again. “Lead the way.”

Wil quickly found a tunnel they’d carved and led Angel back to the house. They waltzed through the kitchen, ignoring Xander and Oz’s catcalls. In fact, it was only Cordelia’s voice that stopped them.

“So *that’s* why the neighbors called asking about the men’s clothes scattered all over the yard,” She said, grinning. “Way to go, boys. Did you give her a good show?”