Title: The Assistant, part 34
Author: Sweetdoggie
Email: (stirling_summer@yahoo.com)
Pairing: B/G
Rating: R
Summary: More about the Initiative
Spoilers: season 4
Disclaimer: No permission has been granted to use the characters. They are owned by their creator, Joss Whedon, Twentieth Century Fox, UPN, WB, and Mutant Enemy. This story is non-profit and is intended solely as entertainment. No copyright infringement is intended.
Buffy had finally recovered enough from the trip to feel hungry. She hopped up and followed her sister to the dining room where Joyce had laid on quite a spread in their honor. Buffy and Anna, having Slayer metabolisms ate enough between them to satisfy four hungry people. The girls chatted with each other all through dinner.
“So, Anna, did you notice right away that you had been Called?” Buffy asked her curiously.
“I felt stronger right away,” the child replied. “I didn’t’ know what was happening then my Watcher was killed in a car accident and I forgot about all the strange feelings for a while. They were going to put me in a home for orphans. I was terrified. I called the Council and they came and brought me to England. They knew somehow that I had been Chosen.”
“Hmmm. I didn’t know till Merrick found me and even then, I thought he was crazy.”
“How could you not know? I don’t understand.”
“Well, you know I was a lost Slayer, right?”
The other girl nodded.
“Think about it. Your normal fifteen-year-old girl doesn’t just wake up one morning and think, wow, I feel like a mystical being today.”
“How did he prove to you that you were a Slayer?”
“First he followed me around for a while. I figured he was just another pervert. He followed me into the gym one night when I was practicing cheerleading—just about scared the pants off me, let me tell you. He started on about the one girl in all the world thing—you know.” They shared a smile. “Anyhow, he finally convinced me to go with him to a cemetery by throwing a knife at my head. When I caught it, I decided to listen to him for five minutes. He had me sit on a new grave and a vampire came out practically on top of me. I screamed. Merrick tossed me a stake and I plunged it right into the vampire’s stomach.”
“Eeeeuw.”
“Exactly. Merrick said the heart was about six inches higher so I pulled it out and tried again. Got the sucker that time. I don’t need to tell you how shell-shocked I was. I was so freaked I could barely walk straight. Merrick took me home or I’d never have made it.”
Joyce looked up. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard this story before, Buffy.”
Her daughter grinned. “I got home and you and dad were fighting. I told you I’d been with some boy—I don’t even remember who he was now. Dad was all, ‘I don’t want her seeing that boy again.’ Huh, if he only knew!”
“You must have been so frightened. Not only to find out you were the Slayer and all that meant, but to find out about vampires and evil all at once.” Anna’s eyes were huge.
“It wasn’t one of my better moments,” Buffy agreed wryly. “How about you. You’ve staked vamps. Tell about your first time.”
“Because I am Council raised, it was different for me. I have known about the existence of the supernatural since I was a small girl—and in my country we are not so quick to disbelieve. We were out walking one evening and one of them attacked us. I had been training for this all my life but I was absolutely paralyzed with terror. I had never seen anything so horrible. My Watcher pushed me out of its path and they traded blows. I grabbed my stake and leaped on its back. It tried to brush me off by smashing me against a building. My stake went right through it’s heart, though I did break a rib. I was Called the next week and then Jan was killed. Since I came to England, I have averaged one or two kills a week. You know what they say about the Slaying business—ninety percent of it is waiting.”
Buffy exchanged a grin with Giles. “I’ve heard that.”
“I would like it above all things if you were to come with me on patrol some evening,” Anna invited.
“Sounds fun. Wait till you come to the Hellmouth. It’s a slow night if I don’t get at least two.”
Anna tipped her head sideways and looked puzzled. “I was under the impression that the Hellmouth is not so big a town?”
“About thirty-two thousand, not including demons, vamps and other oogly-booglies.”
“How can so many people die or disappear without the authorities noticing?”
“I’ve thought about it some,” Buffy admitted. “First, we’re a bedroom community for LA. People come and go all the time so if somebody disappears in a bad way, nobody can tell the difference from people who just up and go. America is a very mobile country. People move all the time—not just to a new neighborhood but across the country, so there are always people just passing through. If somebody doesn’t actually reach their destination, most people wouldn’t know or care. By the time somebody does start looking, the trail is cold. The murder rate is very high—the people that get noticed. There was a murder my first day of school in Sunnydale.”
“It didn’t hurt that the mayor was behind many of the disappearances himself,” Giles added. “He wanted to be a demon and that requires many human sacrifices. He had trained the police to look the other way. In addition, I believe the innate magic of the Hellmouth makes people not look at things too closely. After a time, you just accept.”
“Very true, Rupert, but don’t forget that the Hellmouth actually attracts demonic activity. We import quite a few of our undead,” Merrick noted.
Buffy nodded. “Angel, Spike, the Gorches, the Master—even the Anointed One came from somewhere else.”
“Angel? He is the vampire that loves you?” Anna shuddered. “I cannot begin to imagine how that must make you feel. Do you think he is sincere?”
“Oh yeah. Not a doubt in my mind that Angel loves me. Or at least, he’s obsessed with me in what, for a vampire, might be construed as a positive way.”
“How very disturbing,” the younger Slayer murmured.
Buffy agreed.
They dropped the shoptalk and spoke about life in England, the new baby, Wes, Willow and Xander, the house, school and the prospects for Rupert to find a new job.
“Actually, I’ve been offered two positions. One is head curator of the Sunnydale Museum of Natural History and the other is as an assistant professor at UC Sunnydale. I could take either and still get a nice discount on Buffy’s tuition as the museum has affiliate status with the campus and its one of their perks.”
“Which one are you interested in?” Joyce asked him.
“Both have distinct benefits. If I were at the museum, I would be in a unique position to preview artifacts for supernatural manifestations, whereas if I worked on campus, I would be able to spend more time with Buffy.”
“I told him to compromise,” Buffy explained. “Take the museum job and teach the occasional course at the university.”
“Seems like a good mixture, Rupert.” Merrick began to help Joyce clear the table.
Anna stood and began helping as well. “I must do my homework now. Perhaps you can help me, Buffy?”
“I doubt that very much, Anna. Not much of a scholar.”
“It is hard to think sometimes, is it not? I find it difficult to sit still in my classes sometimes, though I love physical education.”
“No! Really? Tell me you don’t have women coaches with chest hair?” Buffy demanded.
Anna giggled. “It is most amazing! However did you guess?”
“I think it’s a given—you know, certain things always go together, like peanut butter and jelly or ham and eggs. In this case, its masculine-looking female gym teachers and girls PE.”
Joyce rolled her eyes and sighed mightily. “I was hoping to keep Anna a little less cynical for a while, Buffy.”
“Mom, please. Next thing you’ll be saying you don’t want us to talk about boys.”
Merrick looked up. “Oh no! Buffy she’s only twelve. Surely that whole ‘boy thing’ doesn’t start quite that early?”
“I’m nearly thirteen!” Anna protested. “Besides, there is a very cute boy in my maths class. His name is Robbie Winston. He has red hair and freckles all over.” She took a deep breath and released it noisily. “He’s so cute!”
“I liked a red-haired boy when I was your age,” Buffy admitted. “Mom, do you remember Timmy Carson?”
Joyce dropped her head in her hands and groaned. “Please, don’t remind me. That was the beginning of the boy craze,” she told John. “Suddenly, we had to have designer jeans and cool name brands of everything.”
Buffy hid a grin. “Well, I didn’t want him to think I was tacky!”
Merrick put his head down on the table before setting up to look at his youngest charge. “You are absolutely not dating until you’re thirty, maybe thirty-five. I can’t go through that again!”
Anna pouted at him. Rupert chuckled. “Ah, how very young they learn feminine wiles and how little equipped we poor males are to withstand them!”