Title: The Watcher's New Clothes 2/7
Authors: Gail Christison and Ruth
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Post-Chosen. Everyone is stuck in a hotel en route to Cleveland and something keeps happening to Giles' clothes.
Pairing: No pairing. This is a non-ship story
Disclaimer: All the characters of BtVS belong to Joss Whedon and whoever else owns the right to make huge amounts of money out of them. No copyright infringement is hereby intended and as for profit, don't make us laugh. There' no use suing us as it won't even cover the lawyer's drycleaning bills.
Distribution: If anyone wants please ask either Gail or Ruth. At OMWF shortly, with Ruth's permission.
Thanks: To Gileswench for her super-quick beta
Feedback: oh, go on then ;-)

He opened the lid of the washing machine, relieved that the exercise was almost over, and began hauling out the contents.

Once the whole lot was piled on top of the washer lid, he stood staring at it incredulously. Xander's dark jeans and the various dark coloured underwear and socks had survived, but Andrew's motorcycle t-shirt, buff trousers, Xander's colourful shirt, and worst of all, his new t-shirt all now had a subtle pink hue added to the colours of each, and his new trousers which must have finished up resting against the offending object, looked rather like he'd murdered someone with an axe while wearing them.

Giles picked up Andrew's cheap red windbreaker and let loose with another string of expletives, this time the foulest, bluest curses he could think of, including several demon words for which there were no human equivalents, before hurling the item across the room. He should have realized. He'd been doing his own laundry for years...but he'd always been sane enough to buy items that were colourfast or permanent press, or, as he'd persistently been told by one and all...dull. Nothing whatsoever that could so thoroughly ruin an entire wash...

Still muttering, he threw the items that had survived into the big dryer, and after a moment's contemplation, his new pants and shirt. How else was he going to get back to his room...? He arranged the quarters in the slots and pushed the lever all the way in before starting the machine. Silence. He checked that it was plugged in and turned on, then went over the meagre controls. After another moment's thought he went hunting for a lint filter to empty, then made certain the door was closed and seated properly.

Nothing.

He sighed. Could anything else possibly go wrong...?

Right on cue he heard the chatter and the giggling. Chatter and giggling that was getting louder...

"Don't...!" He raised his voice just as the door flew open. "...Come in here," he finished limply and stood glaring at the two girls who'd frozen in their tracks.

Willow came to her senses first and hastily closed the door again. "Giles...?"

"Missing something there, Giles?" Buffy teased, trying not to giggle.

"Very funny. If you must know, I had a run in with a soft drink can and almost every machine in this place seems to hate me."

"Y'know this is all kinda Levis commercial-y," Willow mused. "All you really need is a big honkin' motorcycle waiting outside...."

Giles snorted. He remembered the ad campaign in question. "The young men in those commercials all had friendly machines, dry Levis and a suitably impressed young woman," he said crossly, stuffing the wet clothes back into the plastic bag. "If you would be so good as to find..." He stopped dead. Even if they had anything, he'd never fit into Andrew's clothes and Xander had nothing to spare anyway. "Damn!!"

The two girls looked at each other.

"Sorry," they said in unison.

"You want us to get Mrs Pottschalk to come over to fix the machine? One thing's for sure: you would definitely be appreciated," Willow giggled, unashamedly checking him out while he slightly bent over the wet clothes.

Buffy suddenly clued in, looked at her friend and elbowed her, not gently.

"Ow! What was that for?"

"Oops," She said innocently, then went back to her own study of the vision in front of them.

"So, boxers, not briefs, huh?" she said finally, a grin in her voice, and watched his shoulders freeze.

"If you two don't mind, there is such a thing as respecting someone's privacy," he groused, still trying to ram the soft drink cans in with the wet clothes.

"Hey, you could've warned us that we were in danger of being scarred for life, here," Willow protested, barely holding back more giggles.

"Yeah, Giles. Who knew that the biggest fun of the trip so far would be your Chippendale impression? You are so lucky none of the other Slayers got here first."

"He's lucky Xander didn't get here first," Willow added. "He could be catatonic by now...or...or..."

Giles' eyes flashed with irritation, even though he knew they didn't mean any harm. "Break a rib, perhaps, from laughing so hard?"

A giggle escaped from Buffy, surprising everyone in the room. She'd been so unhappy for so long they'd forgotten what it sounded like. She struggled for a moment to clear her throat and straighten, but after all the terrible things that had happened to them, the sight of Giles standing there all but naked, his eyes flashing and knuckles pressed into his hips in annoyance the way they did when he was feeling harassed at training, was just too much.

The giggle tidal wave rolled over and took Willow with it, engulfing them until they could barely stand up. Within a very few seconds, despite his best efforts, Giles' mouth was trying to pull into a smile at that very absurdity. Very soon the smile became a chuckle, then when Buffy and Willow staggered into, and held each other as they roared with laughter, he began to giggle too. The girls looked up at him then, saw that he was gone. Their eyes met and all three of them were swept into a grand concert of hysterics.

Eventually, and with many false alarms, all three of them subsided, gradually gaining control and all looking at each other, and all surprised to see the tears in each other's eyes weren't just from laughing. The atmosphere, and the silence grew very charged.

Then, finally, it broke.

Both women moved forward at the same time. The embrace was fierce on all three sides, Giles' state of undress completely forgotten as they pressed into his arms and he gathered them close, holding them fiercely...as though he could, somehow, protect them against the uncertainties each of their futures held.

"Oh...My...God."

Giles let go of the women as though stung and they turned to put themselves between him and Xander's and Andrew's view.

"What...what's going on here?" Xander managed in a voice pitched a couple of octaves higher than normal.

"What does it look like?" Buffy asked in a provocative voice.

"Buffy!" Giles protested in a strangled whisper.

Willow grinned mischievously. "Yeah, this is a private orgy, get your own."

"Orgy?" Andrew managed in a strangled squeak, his eyes desperately trying to see past the girl's curves to the occasional flash of black boxers and firm thigh.

Xander went three shades paler at the very idea. "Um...so not needing that visual right now, Will...like there isn't already enough trauma in my life. We were worried about the big guy," he explained shakily. "...I mean how long does it take to wash a few clothes with modern technology?"

"Worried about me?" Giles snorted. "I'm less than thirty feet away and you panicked about me being gone for what...?"

"And hour and seventeen minutes," Andrew offered timidly.

Giles opened his mouth to say something cutting then changed his mind. He understood. After all that they'd all endured, all that they'd lost, of course they were going to be terrified of losing what was left...

"I need some clothes," he said gruffly. "Andrew's bloody jacket bled out in the wash. Everything, except Xander's jeans and the majority of the underwear, is ruined."

"My shirt!" Xander exclaimed.

"...Is now a manly plaid over rose pink," Giles confirmed. "And my new clothes look like I sacrificed a goat in them," he added crossly, pulling the wet cord pants from the bag and holding them up.

Willow and Buffy looked at each other, pure mischief buzzing between them.

"Giles, we could buy you some new clothes," Willow volunteered. "You did get cash out of that machine by the donut stand, right?"

He stared at them, his mouth open, then gathered his wits and cleared his throat. "Trust you two to buy clothes for me? I hardly think so. Knowing the pair of you I'd end up dressed like Mick Jagger and singing like Barry Gibb."

"Trusting, isn't he?" Buffy smirked. "How do you know we wouldn't have gone on a tweed hunt? Jacket, patches in the elbows, vest, baggy pants, tie...sounding familiar...?"

Giles sighed. Yes, all too familiar. The other side of the 'buff cords and colourless t-shirts Giles'... More and more his statement to Ethan so long ago seemed to echo in his ears. Was that really who he was now...? *All* he was now?

He didn't know and he wasn't sure he wanted to know any more...

"Xander," he growled finally, making the girls jump out of the way, the teasing over.

The younger man stepped forward and took the folded notes Giles was holding out.

"Jeans, size thirty-four, plain t-shirts, comfortable, not tight, a jump...sweater of some kind and a shirt I can wear with the jeans without looking like a prat."

The younger man paused. "And may one know exactly what a 'prat' might look like...for to avoid Watcher off-pissing...?"

Giles looked pointedly from Andrew to Xander, the latter's gaze following his.

Xander shrugged sheepishly. "Gotcha," he said, and started to turn.

"Xander."

He turned back.

"One single item with so much as a pineapple on it and I'll strap you to the roof of the bus for the rest of the trip...do we understand each other?"

Xander half smiled, then swallowed, then nodded. "Absolutely. Boring Giles lives," he added, giggling again, and turning with Andrew to scramble out of the room before their ears could be singed by Giles' inevitable retort.

When the room had cleared, Giles sighed, aware that he wasn't going anywhere until Xander and Andrew had returned. And considering that between the entrance to the mall and the menswear stores there was a computer store, comic shop, a Warner Brothers outlet and two donut stands, he knew he was in trouble...

Willow was watching the crestfallen Watcher. "Y'know, Giles, I could..." she offered, gesturing toward the recalcitrant dryer.

His head came up, and for a split second Willow could see him actually consider it, especially since her encounter with the non-dark side of the force. Then he shook his head and sighed again. "However, the offer is appreciated." Then he half smiled at her before wandering over and dropping into the folding chair that went with the folding table.

Buffy was on the other side of the table, browsing the reading material.

Willow regarded them both: Buffy still tired and drawn from the stress of the last few months, not eating properly...or for that matter grieving properly over the people she considered that she personally was responsible for losing, and Giles, sitting there in nothing but his boxer shorts, with nearly as much dignity as if he was wearing a three piece suit and Gucci loafers.

It wouldn't hurt to...

"Giles!"

"What?" He stood up fast, knocking the table. "Willow?"

"Will, what is it?" Buffy was at her side moments after Giles reached her.

"I...I just tried to...and nothing happened."

"Tried to what?" Giles prodded.

"Just...just a pair of pants...nothing fancy...just the same as the ones you were holding up before...o-only without the goat sacrificing, y'know?"

Buffy got it. "A spell? You were trying to make Giles some clothes?"

Willow nodded.

"But nothing happened?" Giles added.

She nodded again. "D-do you think my power...? I don't feel like I've lost any...but what we did back there...it was so huge...Giles, I'm scared."

Giles raised a hand. "It's too soon to be frightened, Willow. You said you couldn't feel any difference?" he asked, the wheels visibly turning in his mind. "That would be...unlikely...if someone as powerful as you lost their magic suddenly. Have you tried to do anything else?"

She shook her head. "Not since...I've been awfully tired, and a little scared ever since, y'know..."

He smiled gently and nodded. "All right. Try something small. Something that won't strain you too much."

Willow focused on the idea of a robe, just like his old one, for Giles. Nothing happened. She shook her head miserably.

Buffy put her hand on her friend's arm. "You can do it. I know you can. Try something else." Both women looked to Giles, who nodded.

Willow's gaze settled on the dryer. Within moments of her silent incantation it jumped to life, causing Giles to hurtle over to it and open the door before retrieving the undamaged washing and throwing it in, closing the door and listening to it rumble to life again.

"It must have been a glitch," Buffy proposed. "A magicky glitch. Like you haven't fully recharged yet or something?" Willow looked at her friend with fond amusement and Buffy grinned back. "Whatever. I'm just glad you're okay, Will."

"So am I," Willow agreed fervently, "but that doesn't change the fact that Giles is still kinda naked."

Giles rolled his eyes, but he knew something was definitely going on. His magic was as atrophied as his taste in clothes, but even he could feel magic as powerful as Willow's...always tugging at the edges of his senses. There could of course be any number of explanations: dabblers in magicks who had unknowingly tapped into genuine power; natural magic leaking out of the earth, as it did in certain places, certain sacred spots used and re-used for ritual over the ages; some residual effect of the spell to share power among the Potentials and turn them into fully-fledged slayers. Unless and until there was proof of actual threat, the best course of action was simply to carry on as normal, and just *be aware*.

Normal. Now there was a word capable of a myriad of interpretations.

A predictably, but painfully, long time later, Andrew and Xander returned with one big bag from the menswear store in full view, and two smaller ones from 'Captain Creature's Comix Collectorium' not very well concealed under their shirts. Giles' pointed glance coaxed an apologetic shrug from Andrew and a faithful promise to pay him back as soon as humanly possible from Xander.

"It's for morale. Andrew said he couldn't possibly live with the thought of owning every issue of 'The Fantastic Four's Galactic Glory' *except* number fourteen."

"Yeah," agreed his companion. "'Cause, even though the other ones are down in my Dad's basement, like in the uber-basement now, with the uber-vamps using them to..." He snickered. "...Wipe their uber-butts, it makes me feel that there's a part of me that's, y'know, *complete*."

Giles stared at him, opened his mouth to say...he couldn't think of a thing. After some more wallowing in incredulity, he gave up. He didn't even bother to ask Xander what *he'd* found so unmissable.

The contents of the large bag proved to be a pair of badly cut polyester navy blue slacks, a store brand thin t-shirt and a cheesecloth shirt, both also navy. A grey garment lurked limply in the bunched-up corner. Shooing the youngsters out to join Buffy and Willow, whom he'd persuaded to stand guard and not let anyone else in, he changed once again, noting with dismay that the trouser legs were a bit too short and the shirt hem wasn't even. He wondered fleetingly how many sets of these clothes he could have bought for the price of a rare comic book. Nevertheless he thanked the gods that he was at least covered, and remembered to thank Xander and Andrew also, with a good deal more sincerity than he actually felt.

The group held an impromptu pow-wow early that evening over dinner at the local burger bar, much to Giles' discomfiture. The greasy food gave him indigestion and the excited mass chatter echoed around the brightly lit, moulded plastic room so loudly that he had to stop himself from putting his hands to his ears and closing his eyes tightly. He was getting a sore patch on his neck from a rough seam, and was starting to wonder quite what his place was in the brave new world of the slayer sisterhood. If he even had one.

"We have to stay in shape while we wait: that's key." Kennedy was holding forth, hanging on Willow's arm with one hand and jabbing the air emphatically with the other. "Everyone can join me tomorrow morning for drill, eight o'clock sharp."

"Right after kit inspection," muttered Rona, rolling her eyes and earning a swipe on her uninjured arm from Buffy and a cool:

"You got a better idea, let's hear it."

They still weren't entirely at ease with one another and perhaps never would be, Giles imagined. The old adage about not being able to choose your relatives seemed to apply to slayers in spades. Look at Faith.

Rona shrugged. "Hey, I'm just sayin': those of us with a little more healing still to do, don't want to be extras in the remake of "Platoon" just yet. What do *we* do?"

Buffy spread her hands in a 'don't ask me' gesture. "No more army, no more General Buffy, remember? More like...Slayer local government, but without the garbage trucks...which is a shame really, because hey: transport outta here *and* plenty of trunk space to put the shopping."

The girls laughed - after the release of tension in battle and the ultimate relief of victory, their normal high spirits were coming to the fore again, despite the losses they had suffered from their number. Not that they would forget them soon.

"Maybe we're the next UN," put in Vi. " We could form a task force of Slayers, sort out the world's demon problems; weigh in with little pale blue stakes and keep the peace."

"Yeah. With a huge secretariat, in somewhere way cooler than Switzerland," enthused Dawn. "Like Venice or Monte Carlo. Or Timbuktu." She sounded out the last name with noticeable relish.

"Or London," piped up Angela loyally, thinking of home, but the rest dismissed it: "Always raining"; "Boring"; "Full of British people who hate foreigners"; "Not another Watchers' Council, *please*."

The last was from Buffy, and although, given her past experiences he could have expected it, Giles felt a knot of trepidation in his stomach at what more she might say on the subject.

"The Guardian told me that the Watchers were the continuation of the Shadow Men. They just wanted to use and control the Slayer's power because they had none of their own. We're not going to give it up to anyone. We don't need anyone to tell us what to do, how to fight; we can figure it out for ourselves. Together."

Giles glanced at the non-Slayers in the party. Dawn was nodding vigorously at her sister's words; Xander and Andrew, off to the side, were engaged in a contest to see who could hold the most fries in his mouth at the same time.

NEXT