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buffyfic-digest       Wednesday, August 19 1998       Volume 02 : Number 309



In this issue:

       BUFFYFIC: Xander's Incredible Journey (4/?)
       BUFFYFIC: Xander's Incredible Journey (5a/?)

See the end of the digest for information on (un)subscribing to the buffyfic
or buffyfic-digest mailing lists and on how to retrieve back issues.

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Date: Wed, 19 Aug 1998 11:35:07 PDT
From: "Cutter Kinseeker" <[e-mail]>
Subject: BUFFYFIC: Xander's Incredible Journey (4/?)

TITLE: "Xander's Incredible Journey"
AUTHOR: Cutter Kinseeker
E-MAIL: [e-mail]
FEEDBACK: Yes! Yes! Yes! Tell me what you think, but constructive
criticism only please. No "it sucks" type messages.
DISTRIBUTION: Ask me first.
RATING: Mostly PG-13 for language and adult themes. A couple of parts
will be R.
DESCRIPTION: In the aftermath of "Becoming," Xander sets out after Buffy
and winds up "becoming" in his own right.
DISCLAIMER: I don't own jack. Correction--jack's probably the only thing
I do own. The rest belongs to Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, and the Frog
Network.
SPOILERS: Everything up to "Becoming".

S   S
P   P
O   A
I   C
L   E
E
R


Chapter Four
The Beginning of All Knowledge


        Xander packed as little as he felt that he could survive with,
fitting most of his life into a single backpack with room left over. He
went back over the items in his backpack: a few sets of clothes, his
mini-tape recorder, a couple of notebooks, his CD player, and a dozen
CDs. Tucked into the back pouch of the pack, wrapped in tissue, was a
bottle of holy water; nestled in beside it were a pair of stakes and a
large wooden cross. Leaving Sunnydale, he probably wouldn't have much
need of them, but better to be safe than sorry.
        All in all, it was pretty pathetic. Looking it over, he found
himself sliding once more toward sullen self-pity. He glanced around at
his room, the walls covered in posters and the floor in clothes; he had
spent most of his life surrounded by these four walls, so why didn't he
feel anything at all in leaving them?
        His parents were out of town--as usual--so there wouldn't be any
explanations, any big scene. Not that there would have been anyway. The
elder Harrises were notorious in ignoring anything that didn't fit their
world-view, and their precious Alexander running off across the country
in search of a missing vampire slayer certainly didn't qualify.
        To clear his head of the lingering doubts and get back on track,
he mentally reviewed the events of the last day--god, had it only been
one day? It seemed much longer...

***

        "Xander, you're not going anywhere, and that's final." Giles
finished his ten-minute-long rant, a record-setter for even the
notoriously argumentative Brit. The object of this rant sat passively at
the end of the library's conference table, having been both silent *and*
conscious for the past ten minutes--a record-setter for him as well.
        "Are you done?" asked Xander, his voice small and somehow dull,
as though all of his emotions had been bled out of him. His tone was so
bleak and pitiful that even Giles, furious as he was, paused for a
moment. By the time he recovered his wits, Xander had spoken again.
        "You do realize that you can't actually stop me, don't you? I
mean, sure, you can yell at me a lot and talk about what I can and can't
do, but in the end, it comes down to what I'm going to do anyway.
Doesn't it?" Giles recognized the tone in his voice from any number of
similar conversations with Buffy and almost gave up right then,
recalling how those particular arguments had gone.
        "I... I..." Giles stuttered for a moment, before continuing, "I
can call your parents. Yes, that's exactly what I'll do. I shall call
your parents, and-"
        "And what?" If Xander's tone had seemed detached before, now it
was downright cold. It was a voice Giles recognized as his own, the
voice he used when describing how the world would end, a voice he had
used to tell Buffy that she was going to die. "My parents are gone for
the week. By the time they come back, I'll be long gone. Short of
physical restraints, you can't do anything to stop me."
        Willow trembled slightly, seeing a Xander that was as unknown to
her as the most distant stranger, a Xander devoid of life, of love, of
light. Oz, sensing her discomfort with an almost animal accuracy but not
discerning the cause, moved closer to her to comfort her. Giles was
confused now; where were Xander's wisecracks, his jokes? Where was the
mocking child he had known for almost two years? Gone, as though he had
never been.
        Gone, like Buffy.
        Giles narrowed his brows in thought; somehow, Buffy's
disappearance was the key to all of this--this Whistler person, Xander's
changes, everything. And Xander? How could he be acting like this, going
after Buffy like some knight cavalier, giving them the cold shoulder,
unless... unless... unless what? Buffy's disappearance was the key,
Giles was sure. But Xander's behavior was that of a man condemned; how
did that track? Unless...
        Giles stood up straight, suddenly struck with an idea so
crystalline that he knew it had to be the truth. Xander's actions
weren't those of a man condemned--they were the actions of a man who had
condemned himself, a man eaten by guilt and remorse until only a shell
is left, a man so sure that he had committed a crime that he was ready
to sentence himself to death and enforce that sentence by means of slow
apathy. And Giles knew the crime Xander held himself responsible for: he
believed it was his fault that Buffy had disappeared.
        The older man sighed and removed his glasses, rubbing the bridge
of his nose. As adult as Xander often seemed, as calm as he was battling
the forces of darkness, Giles often forgot that he was actually little
more than a child. And as often as Giles was annoyed with Xander, as
angry at his juvenile humor and "slacker" attitude, the British Watcher
was just as often glad at the young man's presence for aid and
perspective. Where Giles would ignore practical concerns in favor of the
otherworldly, Xander was there to remind him that people still needed to
eat, to have fun, to live life.
        For just a moment, Giles pictured himself as Xander must see
him, and he was shocked at the image he got: stodgy, rigid, inflexible,
old. And he was saddened to realize that, much of the time, that picture
was correct; he *was* inflexible on many issues, he didn't have a
personal life, and he was decidedly older than Xander--to whom anyone
over twenty-five must seem ancient. The sad thing was, he could also see
himself at Xander's age and was more than capable of sympathizing; hell,
at that age, he was worse than Xander ever could be, and he had grown up
with far more advantages.
        Giles sat down, knowing that the time for the closed fist had
passed; there was no way that he could get through to Xander with
argument and blunt trauma. The time for the open hand had arrived;
Xander needed someone to listen to him, to understand him, and since no
one else was readily available, the job apparently fell to one Rupert
Giles, Assigned Watcher and Sunnydale High School librarian. Giles
opened his mouth and began to speak, letting the words come naturally.
        "Xander," he began, "I know you think that you did something to
drive Buffy away." Seeing the shocked look cross Xander's previously
impassive face, he knew he had hit the mark and continued before Xander
had a chance to interrupt. "I also know that you have already tried,
convicted, and sentenced yourself. I can see from the look on your face,
hear in the tone of your voice, that you consider yourself guilty of a
crime so severe that you deserve to die for it, that in your mind, you
are already walking down death row. All these things I know. Before you
begin to tell me that I can't know how you feel, that I don't understand
you, that that's not it at all, let me say this: I do know how you feel,
because I feel the same way.
        "How many times do you think I've asked myself in the last few
minutes, 'What could I have done differently? Could I have changed her
mind?' Do you think you have a monopoly on guilt just because you've
dealt with this particular guilt longer than me? I am her Watcher--I
should have seen it coming, should have known that she was hurting
inside. But I didn't..." Giles slowed, realizing that he wasn't just
talking about Xander's guilt anymore--he was talking about his own.
Before his rational mind could assert itself again and stop him from his
confession, he blazed forward. "But I didn't, and now I am left with
this guilt, this pain, the knowledge that I could have done something to
protect her from distress and did not. I am guilty of allowing someone I
care about deeply to be hurt, and for that crime-"
        "For that crime," Willow interrupted, "for *my* crime, for the
crime of causing pain to my friend, for the crime that is ours to bear
together, we deserve to be punished." Her eyes were slightly teary as
she continued. "In a just and fair world, we would be punished. But the
world isn't fair, is it? Because if we were punished, we would be able
to move on, to accept the pain and begin to deal with it. But we aren't,
and we can't, and the pain-"
        "The pain just keeps growing until I think I'll have to scream
or I'll burst," Xander said quietly, the suffering in his voice like a
jagged knife as he recited the words from his journal. "But I don't
burst... If I could, it would be so much simpler. I wouldn't have to
live with this pain, wouldn't have to live my life knowing that I had
hurt my friend... knowing... knowing..." Xander's voice broke off in
harsh sobs that echoed through the quiet library, swallowed up by the
emptiness around the table.
        The friends looked at each other for a moment, only a moment,
before they moved. Willow let go of Oz's hand and walked to the other
side of the table, where she put her arms around her friend. Cordelia
followed, not really understanding everything that had been said, but
knowing in her secret heart that Xander needed her at that moment more
than he had ever needed her before in their entire relationship. Giles'
sensibilities wrestled with his emotions before deciding in favor of
sentiment and embracing the three teenagers as though they were his last
anchor on sanity and reality. Oz felt out of place, knowing that he was
Willow's companion but feeling uncomfortable with her friends; finally
he walked around the table and awkwardly joined the hug.
        After several minutes, Xander's sobs subsided and the hug
reluctantly broke. He wiped away his tears and looked around thankfully
at his friends. He touched Willow's hand for a moment before turning and
giving Cordelia a small kiss on the cheek. He briefly lamented that he
and Oz had never become friends, knowing that if it hadn't been for his
own feelings for Willow, they could have been close buds. He even
managed to give Giles a lackluster smile before he started to apologize.
        "There are no apologies necessary, Xander," Giles informed him.
"I believe that all of us needed to release some of our guilt. Good for
the psyche and all that." Xander was amazed; in mere moments, Giles had
gone from snobby Brit to caring friend to psychoanalyst and back to
snobby Brit again. Sometimes Xander wondered if he would ever really
understand the man. Giles' face was serious again, though its craggy
features seemed somehow softer now. "Xander, you don't have to tell us
what happened to make you feel so terrible, but if you want to, you
can."
        "Yeah," chimed in Willow, "we all have problems, but sometimes
sharing them with our friends can make us feel better." All the others
looked at her, amazed that such a profound clichΘ could come from
someone so smart. Looking slightly sheepish, Willow shrugged. Xander
smiled again, a slightly more genuine smile this time; things were
finally getting back to a semblance of normality.
        "No," he said, his voice regaining a little of its usual warmth
and good humor. "No, I think I want to tell you." He looked around at
them all, his friends, knowing that no matter how he chose to say what
he needed to say, he would not be judged, would not be reviled, would
not be hated.
        "No matter how much I disliked Angel," he began, "it wasn't
until he lost his soul and became Angelus that I really started to hate
him..."

***

        Back in his room, remembering his friends' forgiveness of him,
Xander's self-pity was broken. He smiled broadly, for no one's benefit
except his own, and walked out, closing the door tightly behind him. He
rechecked the velcro straps on his new cast--one of those easy-remove
space-age deals made out of plastic and stainless steel; the old plaster
cast he had before went the way of the dodo thanks to comprehensive
health insurance--and tightened it slightly, making sure he wouldn't
lose it in the hours ahead.
        Walking down the steps, he began to go over his plan to get to
Bakersfield, the first stop of the Greyhound bus that Buffy had left
town on. He figured that he would have to be out of Sunnydale by
nightfall--Sunnydale's streets weren't safe to walk at night, and he
wasn't thinking of muggers either--but he should be able to thumb a ride
within a mile of the city limits. If he got lucky, maybe he wouldn't
have to walk more than a couple of hours total.
        All in all, his glad mood had only one dark blemish--Cordelia.
After his confession, but before he had returned home, they had gone off
for some quiet time together. It was only a few minutes, but in that
short time, they had somehow managed to get in yet another fight...

***

        How it started, Xander had no idea whatsoever, but for some
reason Cordelia had decided to go off on him. Being completely clueless
on women in general and Cordelia in particular, Xander chose (probably
correctly) not to actually argue with her, instead just looking serious
and nodding his head in the appropriate places. Every now and again he
would catch the words "Buffy," "relationship," "us," and the phrase
"chasing across the country." At one point, Cordelia said something that
Xander didn't quite catch but seemed quite important to him.
        "What did you just say?" he asked.
        "Which part? The bit were I call you a dunderhead for chasing
across the country after Buffy, who is more than capable of taking care
of herself, no matter what some greasy little guy in a bad hat says..."
Sensing that the conversation was about to get away from him again,
Xander stated that it was the other thing she had said. "Oh, you mean
the part where I ask you *how* you intend to chase off across the
country after Buffy, who-"
        "You know," he interrupted seamlessly, "that's a good question.
My parents have the car--they're gone for the week, you know; some sort
of convention or something. How am I going to follow that Greyhound?
It's not like I can afford to bus it all over the state, let alone the
country, if that becomes necessary..." At this point, Xander was pretty
much talking to himself; sensing this, Cordelia butted in on his spoken
thoughts.
        "You could take my car," she said, her voice dripping venom.
        "Really?" Xander asked, so far gone into his own private world
that he didn't hear her tone.
        "No! Puh-lease! Don't you know sarcasm when you hear it? You'll
get my car over my dead body. Every time you're in it, it seems like we
get attacked by werewolves, or vampires, or werewolf vampires, or some
other icky thing!"
        "Oh, okay," Xander muttered, the wheels in his head too busy
turning to do more than acknowledge Cordelia's existence, and that only
peripherally.
        Cordelia voiced a small roar of outrage and stalked away from
her boyfriend, leaving him to stew in his own thoughts. Now that the
others understood his reasons and wouldn't stand in his way, he'd be
damned before he allowed Cordelia's insane jealousy to stop him. He
broke out of his contemplation, wanting to say something placating to
his girlfriend, but she was already down the hallway and out of sight.
        Xander sighed heavily; if it wasn't one thing, it was another.
He still didn't understand why Cordelia had decided to go out with him,
why she stayed with him despite his obviously strong feelings for Buffy.
Some time before, he had begun to get a sinking feeling that she
actually loved him; he had looked inside himself and found that while he
wasn't "in love" with Cordelia, he did love her, and for now that was
apparently enough for both of them. He realized that their angry passion
wasn't enough to keep them together forever--it was barely enough to
keep them together through each day--but both of them were satisfied
with the arrangement. For now.
        If Xander could have gotten inside Cordelia's head--and not
immediately shot out the other side--he would have found her reasons
much the same as his: an animalistic physical attraction; short-term
security; a sense of being in a war with only a few people to choose
from for companionship; a need to be accepted by someone. Underneath
that, however, was something else, something that would have surprised
Xander greatly: Cordelia did love Xander, and was gradually falling in
love with him as well. If asked why, she couldn't have given any
specific reasons, only that it was so.
        And that, in a nutshell, explained why it hurt so much when
Xander fawned over Buffy like a puppy and ignored her. Cordelia hadn't
understood everything that Giles and Willow were talking about in the
library, but she understood the idea of pain: pain was her boyfriend
being in love with another girl; pain was the idea of losing someone who
was so sweet and kind and generous, all the things she herself was not;
pain was seeing Xander's longing gazes after Buffy and never seeing the
same kind of look for her. Pain was Xander going off on some fool quest
that would probably get him killed--all for Buffy--and then Buffy coming
back, so that it would be like losing the person she cared most about in
the world twice.
        Yes, Cordelia knew about pain. And to cover it up, like a she
would cover a blemish if her perfect skin ever had one, she layered on
the disdain, the cruel face she showed the world; she would put up the
shield she had long used to protect herself--a shield called pride. To
hide the pain, all she needed was a shopping spree at Neiman-Marcus; the
simple joy she felt in shopping was almost always enough to balm any
wound, but not now. In the time she had been dating Xander, Cordelia had
acquired about three thousand dollars worth of new dresses--almost none
of which he had noticed--and it cheered her up barely any at all.
        So while Xander was planning out his hitchhiking route to
Bakersfield in the hallway outside the library, Cordelia was restraining
tears in the girls' room--and not doing much of a job.

***

        The next day, early in the morning, Xander ate a large
breakfast--leftovers, yummy--packed, and prepared to leave the house.
Purged of almost all of his negativity, Xander was amazed at how light
and free he felt. He didn't like it at all and put on his headphones to
drown out such happy thoughts. He made very sure that everything in the
house was turned off, left a note for his parents--a completely made-up
story that they'd never bother to check anyway--and left the house,
locking the door behind him. As the bolt slid home, he was gripped with
a sense of his own mortality, the idea that this might be the last time
he ever laid eyes on his home.
        He paused. His home? Was it really? Sure, he slept here, but
could he say that he had any real emotional connection to the place?
Searching deep inside himself, Xander found that the answer was "No."
One of his favorite writers had once said, "Home is the place that, when
you have to go there, they have to let you in." If anyplace he knew of
fit that description, he couldn't think of it at the moment. His
thoughts as dark as the sky overhead, Xander walked away from the house,
slipping the key easily and casually into his pocket.
        As Xander walked, the sky above became darker, more violent, and
his thoughts turned from such heavy topics as the nature of home and
family to what he was going to do if the storm broke while he was still
walking. He was so caught up in his own worries that he barely noticed
when lightning began to flash across the clouds and thunder rolled
across the low hills around town. So wrapped up in himself he was, that
he didn't even see the car until it was almost right on top of him.
        Speeding up from a street ahead and to the right, the car's
driver displayed a disregard for the speed limit and the law so blatant
that Xander instantly knew who was behind the wheel despite the tinted
windows. Screeching to a halt less than two feet from him, the car's
window rolled down and Cordelia's head popped out.
        "Are you going to stand there all day, or just until it starts
raining? Get in already!"
        The passenger's side door opened, and Xander jumped over the
front end of the car and slid easily into the seat next to Cordelia. He
looked over at her, smiled, and touched her hand. Smiling back, Cordelia
told him to take off his headphones.
        Still smiling, Xander told her that he would take off his
headphones if she promised not to play any of that dance music she liked
so much. Cordelia began to drive out of town, asking what was the matter
with dance music. Xander tossed back that there was absolutely nothing
wrong with dance music, except that it sucked; in his opinion, people
like Soundgarden and Stone Temple Pilots were real music. Cordelia made
a disparaging remark and asked that, if that was the case, why was he
listening to Pink Floyd? And was that Patsy Cline she saw poking out of
the backpack? Xander returned that there was nothing wrong with Pink
Floyd, and country music is the music of pain, and furthermore...
        And so it continued all the way to Bakersfield, both of them
loving every minute they argued.


END CHAPTER FOUR

______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 19 Aug 1998 11:36:42 PDT
From: "Cutter Kinseeker" <[e-mail]>
Subject: BUFFYFIC: Xander's Incredible Journey (5a/?)

TITLE: "Xander's Incredible Journey"
AUTHOR: Cutter Kinseeker
E-MAIL: [e-mail]
FEEDBACK: Yes! Yes! Yes! Tell me what you think, but constructive
criticism only please. No "it sucks" type messages.
DISTRIBUTION: Ask me first.
RATING: Mostly PG-13 for language and adult themes. A couple of parts
will be R.
DESCRIPTION: In the aftermath of "Becoming," Xander sets out after Buffy
and winds up "becoming" in his own right.
DISCLAIMER: I don't own jack. Correction--jack's probably the only thing
I do own. The rest belongs to Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, and the Frog
Network.
SPOILERS: Everything up to "Becoming".

S   S
P   P
O   A
I   C
L   E
E
R


Chapter Five
First Interlude

*...In which Giles is rebuked by his Superior, Willow faces her Fears,
Buffy runs from hers, Oz overcomes his Weakness, and two mysterious
Strangers appear...*


Part One: Giles
*...In which Giles is rebuked by his Superior...*

        "...But I'm telling you, I don't *know* where she is! I've been
trying to tell you that for the last half-hour!" Rupert Giles' anger and
fear showed on his craggy face, anger at the insistence of the
questioner and fear for the safety and well-being of his young charge.
The man seated opposite the middle-aged British Watcher sighed and shook
his head.
        "The Convocation knows that you are ignorant of Miss Summers'
current whereabouts," the man stated archly. Giles bristled at the idea
of being considered "ignorant" of anything, but kept his thoughts to
himself. "If you knew her current location, you would be on your way to
meet with her or else would be in contact with her. That is not the
question. The question is this: do you know *why* she left the
Hellmouth? Your reports to the Convocation have been regular and
complete in all regards--save this one. Is there something you have been
leaving out of those reports, Rupert?"
        *There are*, thought Giles to himself, *a great many things I
have left out of my reports, but I'll never tell you that, you
self-righteous little prick. And there must be some things you yourself
are "ignorant" of, or you wouldn't be wasting your time with me;
instead, you'd be off chasing Xander, wherever he is--you or your
lackeys anyway.* But these thoughts Giles kept to himself, locked in the
passages and corridors of his own mind. To the small, hard-edged man
seated across from him, he said only this:
        "My reports to the Convocation are as truthful as any Watcher's
would be."
        The small man grimaced, knowing that Giles' answer was not any
answer at all. He began to flip through the sheaf of reports in front of
him, again searching for any possible inconsistencies, any holes in the
librarian's story through which he might launch a renewed offensive.
Finally, after several long moments of silence, he opened a folder
containing Giles' most recent report, written and turned in less than a
week prior. The small man adjusted his reading glasses--he never wore
them except in private, with other Watchers, because he felt them to be
a sign of weakness--and commenced to review the file.
        "Here, it says that the Slayer abandoned her duties after a
battle between herself and an unnamed vampire of great strength who had
threatened to, in your own words, 'bring about a premature Armageddon
through the resurrection of the demon Acathla, a being capable of
drawing the world into Hell simply by inhaling. The vampire who
unearthed Acathla was destroyed fighting the Slayer, thus closing the
vortex to Hell and saving the world from an untimely doom.'" He stopped
reading the file and grinned humorlessly. "This would seem to paint Miss
Summers as quite the hero, now wouldn't it?"
        Giles' fury threatened to explode, and he almost attacked his
toadlike inquisitor on the spot. He forced his anger back, knowing that
however much temporary satisfaction he might gain in smashing the small
man's face, he would pay for it in the long run, both in terms of his
stature with the Convocation and in his (mostly) unsupervised
Watchership of the Slayer. So far, he realized, he had been fortunate to
have only one supervisor in the region; under normal circumstances, an
entire branch of the Convocation would be placed in the home city of the
Slayer, much like FBI field offices. It was a sign of how well-regarded
he was that they saw fit to only monitor him with one administrator. It
was just too bad that they had picked someone this officious and
offending to do it.
        "I would like to remind you that Buffy *is* a hero," Giles said,
trying his level best to both keep his true feelings out of his voice
and phrase his reply as respectfully as possible. "She is, after all,
the Slayer. It is her destiny to be a hero, to stand against the
vampires, the demons..."
        "Yes, yes, I know. 'In every generation, there is a Chosen
One'--blah, blah, blah. Can every Assigned Watcher quote those words by
heart?" he asked sarcastically.
        "Well, yes, actually," Giles said, somewhat surprised at the
level of scorn he heard in the voice of his interrogator. The man was
talking as though he weren't a Watcher himself! Admittedly, he wasn't an
Assigned Watcher, but he was still of the Convocation, still sworn to
aid and protect the Slayers. For the last week, Giles had become more
and more puzzled at his coordinator's words and deeply concerned about
his actions. It was only in the last week that his superior's apparent
persecution of the Slayer had come to Giles' full attention. Before
that, he had simply assumed that there was a greater reason; now he
wasn't so sure.
        "Hmph. I'm not surprised in the least. Now, back to the report."
The small man's change of topic was so sudden that Giles was left unable
to interrupt. "You make mention earlier herein that the vampire who was
attempting to revive Acathla was allied with the vampires who killed the
nascent Slayer, Kendra. However, while you quite clearly name and are
obviously familiar with these other vampires--William the Bloody, aka
Spike, and Drusilla--you are always vague on the identity of the
ringleader himself. Don't tell me that a vampire of this level of power
and ability escaped your notice before now? Or that he simply cruised
into town and dug up Acathla for a lark? Please! What do you take me
for?" While sorely tempted to answer the coordinator's rhetorical
question, Giles stayed silent.
        "It is my belief--and thus the Convocation's belief--that you do
know the identity of this vampire and are hiding it for reasons unknown.
It is also my belief that this vampire had something to do with why the
Slayer has abandoned her post. Furthermore--" Giles could take it no
longer, and the words burst from him in a flood as he stood and pointed
an accusatory finger across the table.
        "How dare you! How dare you accuse me of dishonesty!" Giles had
indeed not told the whole story in many of his reports, but neither had
he ever directly lied. "How dare you insinuate anything against Buffy!
How dare you invoke the will of the Convocation to further your own
petty little plans! How dare you play the innocent when you yourself had
a hand in Buffy's disappearance! Why are you acting in this manner? Ever
since you became the coordinator for Sunnydale, you have been working at
cross-purposes with me, and I would like to know why!" His anger spent,
he sat back down and glared at the little man, who was staring in
shocked silence. Finally, the coordinator straightened his tie, cleared
his throat, and began to speak.
        "It is not your place to demand anything from me, Rupert. I am
the coordinator for this region. That makes me Convocation's spokesman
to all Assigned Watchers, not just for Sunnydale, but for all of
Southern California. If it weren't for the Elders' foolish decision to
leave you space, then I would have a proper administrative staff to
handle everything that goes on in and around this town, but I don't, so
I have to deal with problems personally.
        "As it stands, I have had to cover up every single incident we
have had since my posting here began, and I have had to do it all by
myself. In my own humble opinion, I have done a far better job than
anyone could have expected me to do under the circumstances. So don't go
asking me how 'I dare' anything; I have enough difficulties to deal
with, without my subordinates challenging me." He softened slightly--as
much as a cruel, ruthless toad such as himself could ever soften--and
started to speak again.
        "It is my opinion--and the opinion of a growing number of
Watchers--that we should start becoming more involved in protecting the
human race. That, instead of just watching and recording and training,
we should start waking society up to the danger that is all around them.
That, instead of wasting all of our considerable resources on protecting
just a handful of girls at a time, we should mobilize and militarize our
own people. That, instead of harboring a being as chaotic and
destructive as the Slayer, we should create a more organized front from
which to stop the so-called 'forces of darkness'... or possibly to work
a deal with them." Giles was sickened and enraged.
        "You're a collaborist!" he exclaimed, naming a long-rumored sect
of Watchers devoted to ending the battle with evil at any cost. That in
itself wouldn't have been so bad, except that the collaborists were
certain that evil was destined to win, so coming to an arrangement was a
tenable proposition. Giles' expression was somewhere between disgust and
hatred, his fists clenching an unclenching convulsively. If his
coordinator was a collaborist, who knew who else might be? And if his
coordinator had revealed himself, then it could only be to invite him
into the sect.
        "Don't say it like it's such a bad thing," the small man
rebuked. "It's not like we would actively betray the Convocation--we
just have somewhat different ideas about how it should be run."
        "You are a fool," Giles spat. "There can be no 'arrangement,' no
'deal,' with beings that see our species only as food or playthings!
Surely you can see that!"
        "I see no such thing," his opponent replied smoothly. "All I
know is that, as it stands, we are only stemming a tiny portion of the
tide of death and destruction that faces our planet. Certainly, the
worst of it is concentrated in two or three places, but how long until
it spreads? How long until the Slayers aren't enough? If it gets any
worse, society will fall apart completely and then where will we be? No,
our only chance to survive is to comply. Until the day when my faction
is in power, I will continue to serve the Convocation's current Council
of Elders--but I don't have to like it."
        Giles frowned at the little man's double-talk. He knew that he
was dealing with someone to whom any level of logic would be ignored,
processed through his own twisted perceptions. In short, Rupert Giles
knew that he was facing a fanatic.
        "Believe as you will," he said, doing a poor job of keeping the
contempt out of his voice, "but if I recall correctly, the Elders do not
take kindly to your 'faction'. Indeed, didn't the last Council brand you
all traitors?" Seeing the look on the other's face, he continued, the
low menace in his voice obvious. "I am going to take you before the
Council, and I am going to reveal you to them. And then you can kiss
your position, your power, everything, good-bye. I swear, I am going to
destroy you!"
        "Destroy me? With what? A bunch of unreasoning fears about the
collaborists? Accusations that I've abrogated my duties? Where's your
evidence? You have none." With that, he crossed his arms and smiled
smugly, but the tic at the corner of his eye betrayed his true fear.
"Besides which, you'll never get in to see the Council without going
through the proper channels--and I *am* the proper channels."
        "Then I suppose," Giles measured his words carefully, "that
there is nothing else for us to say to one another."
        "No, not until your next report." The small man stood up and
brushed off his lapels, then began to collect the folders. Giles stood
up as well and approached him.
        "Not even then, I should think." A surprised look came over the
other's face, quickly replaced by one of cocky self-satisfaction.
        "Will you be resigning then? Terrible shame. Just--"
        His false concerns were cut off in midsentence by a quick,
powerful blow to the kisser. With a cry of pain, his hands went to cover
his face, blood spouting like a geyser from his badly broken nose, his
glasses flying away and landing on the floor. Giles drew his fist back
again, and a second strong blow to the head drove the small man to his
knees, the crunching sound of a broken jaw echoing through the quiet
library like someone stepping on rice. Giles was tempted to lash out
again, to break the weasely creature before him, but his rational mind
asserted itself once more and he restrained his anger.
        "Fucker!" screeched the coordinator, his shattered jaw
undoubtedly the reason why the word came out as little more than a roar
of anguish. "You're going down for this, you Limey bastard! I'll see to
that! The Convocation will hear about this!" With that, the injured man
ran out of the library as fast as he could manage, presumably headed to
his office to call for an ambulance.
        "I certainly hope so," Giles said to the empty library, "because
then I'll be able to tell them all about you, and how you've been
abusing your position. I'll tell them all about how you are the true
reason behind the Slayer's disappearance, and then I will tell them
about the resurgence of the collaborists. So, I do hope that you run to
the Convocation with your tail between your legs." He looked at the
broken glasses on the library floor and picked them up.
        "Oh, yes, Snyder, I certainly hope you do."


END CHAPTER FIVE, PART ONE

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