He came home, finally, just before sunrise. She’d shut the blinds as he arrived, seconds before the light could fill the room and doom him. Then again, it looked very much like he and doom had been rocking the night away.

He staggered several steps into the room, then stumbled and fell to the floor. Hands and knees was an unfamiliar position and one he wrenched himself away from, much as LaCroix had wrenched him from his fevered connection with the… dark, or fair, or did it even matter? … seductress at Raven. No matter…as he struggled to his feet her unfaltering gaze pained him more than a harpy’s sharp-tongued accusations.

“What?” he hissed, barely recovered from the vampire lust LaCroix had torn him from, to Nick's unspoken gratitude. Gratitude? He’d cling to that delusion if she let him.

“Rough night?” she asked mildly, knowing nothing of the reality but everything of the possibility. She knew him well enough to know when something unexpected had been ignited, and was wise enough to keep it in perspective.

“Not now,” he gasped, “let me alone for a while.”

So she did, never questioning the need. But finally she went to him upstairs, where she’d let him be alone, where she found him sitting in the side chair refusing to look at the bed they shared.

“Tell me.”

He did. He told her about the lust averted at the last possible second (by LaCroix, who served the greater good by his own need to feel superior), he told her about the evil that found so ready a vessel simply by his presence.

“Bullshit,” she told him. “There's no ‘evil’ in you, no more than was ever in anyone alive or dead.”

He tried to control his frustration. Never would she admit the evil in him. Flaws, she said; minor failings, she told him. Nothing in him that hadn’t existed in humanity throughout eternity. And he longed to agree; he begged history to support him even as he was convinced his own history would never be equal to the task.

“What, then? What entered me when it left that man?” He wasn’t prepared to accept her answer, but the meanness that had been roused in him craved a response.

“How about doubt? It’s what always enters you when you’re thinking too little about the present. ” Meaning, he knew, that he was thinking too much about the past. “There's a big difference between doubt and evil," she went on. "Everyone goes head to head with their baser instincts now and then. . Doubt can help you give in and do something stupid, like tonight. Evil is a lifestyle. Hell if you were evil could Natalie love you? Could I?”

Touché. Still, it sounded naive to him. He sat there, not knowing what else to say.

"Look, you wanna be exiled to the sofa for a day or two? Will that make you feel better?" No reply. "For christsake Nick, you did something stupid, not evil."

“Even if you're right,when I give in to 'stupid' the damage can be epic. You know what I am. You know what I’m capable of. How can you treat it like it's just a 'guy thing'?”

She sighed wearily. “Maybe because I know when it comes to stupid, guys only differ in style." She yawned, rose, and tugged on his hand. "Come to bed, Bats. Let the 'evil' be sufficient unto the day, okay? We’ll figure it out tomorrow.”

He needed so much to believe her that he did as she asked. That she was forgiving him was obvious, and only a fool would question it. Deciding he'd been foolish enough for one night he followed her but kept to himself when they got in bed.

"Nick, come on," she coaxed him nearer and stroked his face. "Whatever you almost did tonight, you managed not to. I don't care who 'intervened'. You got a grip on your admittedly unique baser instincts, you wrestled 'stupid' to the ground, and you came home. Nobody knows better than me that there was a time when nobody could have stopped you, and you'd be gone for good. At least admit that much progress."

He was too exhausted to debate. Maybe she was right and he should let the evil be sufficient... he fell asleep to the sound of her heartbeat.

She stroked his hair and smiled ruefully to herself. He did in a weak and stupid moment what a million mortal guys do on any given day. It figures he'd define "stupid" as "evil of biblical proportions". She pondered this for a moment then laughed quietly and whispered to her sleeping prodigal, "Don't beat yourself up so much, Bats. It's just a 'vampire thing'."