"Not so sure about the honor part, but I'm one of the guests." Lorne replied. "I've been working with Angel for what seems like forever these days. None of it was official at first-he just came to me for a little advice from time to time. Which, granted, was a little painful since the guy cannot carry a tune in a bucket, but that's another story." He had to chuckle softly at the memory of Angel's butchering of "Mandy" and Wes, Gunn and Cordy's rendering of "We are the Champions"-a little bit better than the big man's but still comical- came to mind as well.
"The PTBs or whoever's in charge up there just kept making our paths cross for some reason or another, even though I'm a peaceful kind of guy myself. Before I knew it, I was pretty much one of the gang. And when they took over W and H, things became more official."
" It hasn't always been smooth sailing...took a lot of hits, lot of risking of lives back and forth for each other... but I can't say it was all bad. Angel and his team were and still are very good friends of mine, and I still miss the ones who are gone like crazy."
Lorne looked down at his drink, contemplative. He wondered what he would have thought way back then if he could have read far enough into Angel's and the others' futures to see where they'd all end up and how important they'd come to be to him.