[fic] Ten Slayers Who Never Were (The Of All The Women In All The World Mix) Parts I - V
Today is nikitangel's birthday, and as I pretty much think she's the most awesome woman who ever awesomed, I wrote her a story. Because I suck, I only have half the story ready to post right now, but the rest is coming soon.
Title: Ten Slayers Who Never Were (The Of All The Women In All The World Mix)
Author: Carla
Disclaimer: Characters belong to the creators of the various tv shows, movies, and books.
Distribution: My site
Dedication: For Rebecca, of course, for all her wonderful awesomeness.
Spoilers: Buffy the Vampire Slayer season seven, Lost season two, and the end of Blue Crush.
Rating: 13+ for language
Summary: Into every generation a Slayer is born. One girl, in all the world, a chosen one. She alone will stand against the vampires, demons, and the forces of darkness. She is the Slayer.
Except now there is more than one.
(Fandoms in this half: Lost, Blue Crush, The Fast and the Furious, Full House, and The Baby-Sitters Club)
I. Ana-Lucia Cortez (Lost)
Goodwin is not a vampire.
Ana-Lucia isn’t stupid, he’s in the sun and he’s not bursting into flames, hence he’s not a vampire. It doesn’t matter, a giant stake - in this case, a wooden spear -- can kill a human just as quick - if The Others are human. Some of the other castaways, her others, think they’re monsters. Most of them don’t think such things exist.
Ana-Lucia absolutely believes in monsters.
She just knows humans can be horrible and dangerous and murderers, too. It’s worse when a person goes wrong, when there’s nothing else beneath their skin but what’s supposed to be there, except for that taint which makes them hurt people, which makes them kill.
Before the island, before she quit the force, before she was done with police academy, even, Ana-Lucia learned the world had secrets and kept them in shadows, defended with bright, shiny, pointed teeth.
She already knew the world was a nasty, dangerous place - sometimes, in some places. In others, it was wonderful, full of love and happiness. The trick was to find the line between the two, and protect it.
During martial arts, even though she’d sparred with the guy fifty times, Ana-Lucia forgot her own strength and broke Bobby’s arm. Except it wasn’t so much forgetting as suddenly she had all this extra power and she had no idea where it came from.
About a month later, this guy in his twenties, short, spiky red hair, kept a guitar close at hand and a stake in his belt, came to explain it to her.
Monsters were real, he told her over coffee. Vampires and demons and werewolves, all real. (Not all of them were monsters, he was quick to add, but a lot. Probably most.) There were apocalypses at least once a year, and, in order to save the world, some witch did a big spell - witches and magic were real, too, apparently - and changed a lot of girls. A lot of women.
She was way too old to be a Slayer. According to his story, most of them were young, teenage girls, or even younger, taken care of by a Watcher, usually old, usually male. Nothing sketchy about that at all, she cracked, and the guy, Oz, quirked his lips in a smile.
He asked her to join them, the Slayers were teaming up into a superhero squad and people who weren’t old men were rebuilding the Watchers. (He tried to put a positive spin on that, but when she asked if he was going to be a Watcher, or maybe was one already, he just laughed, and put his hand on his guitar. He was too many things already, he said.)
It sounded like a good thing, a team of super strong women, but Ana-Lucia already had a dream, and didn’t need a bunch of kids getting in her way. They were good kids, she smiled and nodded and agreed with Oz, but they weren’t for her.
She was going to save the world her own way.
Back home, that meant putting on a badge and carrying a gun. Here on the island, that means putting potential threats in pits and making sure she doesn’t lose another person, not one more goddamn - she crosses herself - person to the Others. ThemOthers. TheMothers.
At night, she dreams of vampires and witches and werewolves, oh my, and in her dreams, she can hear all the children she lost, reduced to babies, reduced to one slight cry and a flutter in the belly.
II. Eden (Blue Crush)
So there are vampires in paradise. Who freaking cares?
Eden’s got bigger things to worry about, like getting Anne-Marie ready for her next competition - it’s in Australia. Australia! A year ago, they couldn’t buy breakfast and now their plans include flights to Australia - and getting new boards ready to sell. Things like Penny still skipping school too often, and running around with the local boys. Eden really doesn’t care if she never finishes and gets married tomorrow, except that Anne Marie worries about her sister, and when Anne Marie’s upset, Eden fixes it.
That’s how she gets her, the teenage girl, Dawn, who seems pretty aptly named, the way she stretches out and basks in the sun, like she’s never seen it before. She probably hasn’t, not like this.
Tourists, and Eden snorts when she thinks it.
“It rains too much in England,” Dawn says and tips her head back. “I miss California.”
California’s a weak knock-off of Hawaii, but Eden doesn’t say so. There are plenty of thoughts she never actually voices, more she doesn’t say than does. Dawn doesn’t seem to mind her silence.
“Look, I know you’re busy, you have a whole life without monsters - that’s what you think, at least, but you’re wrong. They are everywhere, all over the world, even here. Especially here, where the hunting is so easy because of the large transient population.”
“You mean,” Eden says, her words drawn out slow, “that vampires like Hawaii because of the tourists?”
“Well, yes.” Dawn grins at her, but Eden doesn’t smile back, and slowly the expression drops from her face. “It’s easier to hunt people who don’t know the area and who won’t be missed right away.”
Tourists. This time, Eden snorts and rolls her eyes.
“Thanks for the warning, but I’m kinda busy. Unless you want to buy a board….”
“Eden.” Dawn sighs. “We need a Slayer here.”
“Guess you better put one on a plane then.”
“We need you here. Someone local, someone who knows where to look, where to hunt.”
“I told you, I’m not interested.”
“This isn’t about being interested! This is about being something special, about being a hero!”
“I don’t need to be a hero.” Eden’s voice is flat. “I’m giving you a lot here, listening to your stories, believing in your monsters, but I don’t need that. I don’t want that.”
Dawn closes her eyes and rubs her forehead.
“Look,” she says at last, “I can’t make you join us, I can’t make you do anything. But if you’re here anyway, it would really help if you took the time to slay a little. I don’t just mean it would help us, it would help you, too, and your family. Sure, vampires like tourists best, but that’s not going to keep your girls safe. Any one of them could get killed. Any one of them could be the person you could have saved.”
Dawn’s eyes are wide and bright, and there’s something about her, some sort of energy or personality, which appeals to Eden. No wonder she’s let her tell all these twisted fairy tales. No wonder she’s still listening.
“Eden, you could lose your family. I did, my sister died. My sister died protecting me.”
That’s why Eden’s in downtown Honolulu some nights, now, dressed in black pants and a tank top, stakes in her cargo pockets. That’s why she starts a martial arts class, and meets Dawn at her new apartment three times a week to train.
Anne Marie crawls into her bed sometimes, slips under Eden’s covers and puts her head on Eden’s shoulder. When she whispers, her breath is warm and her body soft where they touch.
Still, Eden doesn’t share her secrets. Anne Marie has enough to worry about without knowing the horror movies are real. Incredibly wrong, but real. There’s surfing and taking care of Penny and how to invest her money if there’s any extra.
Eden will worry about keeping Anne Marie alive. That’s just what she does.
III. Letty (The Fast and the Furious)
Goddamn vampires.
Letty brushes dust off her arms and shoves her stake down the back of her pants. There’s a dent in her hood that’s going to be a bitch to pop out. If she was back in L.A., with the Toretto garage stocked with all the shit a mechanic could want, it wouldn’t be such a problem, but she’s not.
Instead of being home, with ice cold Coronas, chicken fresh from the grill, and so much car talk she can barely stand it, how much she’s learning, how much she already knows, she’s in the middle of the goddamn country, the middle of nowhere, without a real city for probably two days. Maybe more.
To make things worse, she’s stuck with a bunch of kids, whining, overly-enthusiastic teenage girls who’re so strong they could probably throw her car over a house.
Course, she can now, too.
“Nice work.” Letty didn’t have to look up to know that voice, not after six months of training with her every day. Faith, Slayer extraordinaire, the last of those Slayers actually called the way it was supposed to happen, no magic - no extra magic - involved.
All the baby Slayers - Faith’s term - thought she was just the hottest thing around. Letty didn’t dispute the hot, though she meant it in ways those little girls wouldn’t understand, but she wasn’t gonna act like Faith was the fucking second coming.
“Yeah. Whatever.”
Faith crossed her arms just under her chest. “I don’t like this whole mentor thing any more than you, okay? But I’m stuck with you, so suck it up and accept the damn compliment.”
Letty twisted her head to the side and raised her eyebrows as she looked at her. “Thanks.” She could taste her own sarcasm, like the memory of engine grease on salty skin.
“You hungry?”
“I could eat.” A horse and a fucking half. She was starving, but wasn’t going to give Faith anything to use as a way to bond. Letty had heard her with the other girls, talking about how hungry she got after slaying, the way the pent up energy roiled in her body.
“Yeah.” Faith dropped her arms to her side, and then walked over and slung one across Letty’s shoulders. “Could fuck, too, slaying always makes me hungry and horny, you know.”
Letty choked on something that was a cross between a laugh and a snort. “That ever work for you?”
“What?” Faith asked, and twitched her hips. She really failed at innocence.
“That really bad pick up line.”
Faith squeezed her shoulders. “Who said it’s a pick up line? Just stating the facts, B.S.”
“Oh, uh huh,” Letty shoved her. “I am not one of those kids. Baby Slayer my ass.”
“It is a nice one.” Faith made a big show of leaning back so she could check it out. “Nothing baby-like about it.”
“Food? I thought we were going to eat.”
“Sure we are.” Faith stretched both arms overhead, showing off all the muscles, the curves, the tattoos. “And yes.”
“Yes?” Letty shoved her hands into her pockets and headed toward her car.
“Yes that line works, especially with Slayers wound too tight.” She bolted ahead of Letty, and smacked her ass as she ran past.
Letty grinned, followed her to the car, and slid behind the wheel. She’d show her wound too tight.
IV. DJ Tanner (Full House)
“Woah, baby.”
D.J. Tanner ducked when someone - something-went flying over her head. She immediately tracked it, confident her partners would watch her back. That’s what they did, the four of them, faced the four directions and trusted the others to take care of their quarters.
I’i’chor demon. Should have been called an Ichor demon, the way it dripped pus - she really hoped it was pus - all over everything. Dad would have a mop in one hand and a bottle of bleach in the other. She was surprised he didn’t make her bathe in the stuff when she went home for a visit.
It wasn’t easy, exactly, facing the demon, but she knew what to do and ran through her actions like as if she checked them off a list. Favors the overhand attack, weak in the side, stake to the forehead knocks it out, and finally cut off its head.
Something wet bumped into her ankle boots. Another I’i’chor head. That was another fact, they traveled in small packs, still no match for a bunch of Slayers.
“Gross.” She grimaced and kicked it away. “I hope that comes out of suede.”
“You okay, Deej?” Kennedy, their Head Slayer, wiped her hands on her pants.
“Five by five,” she said, and Kennedy burst into laughter.
“It sounds so wrong when you say that.”
“I’m fine, does that work better?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m also starving. Are we done here?”
“Sure, looks like we got the whole lot. Grab your team and let’s go.”
The four Slayers piled the bodies - still dripping goo - into a dumpster. The clean-up team would be along to set it on fire and make sure there was no trace of any supernatural activity. They cleaned well, but not as good as her dad.
D.J. sighed, and made a mental note to visit her family soon.
V. Claudia Kishi (The Baby-Sitters Club)
Sometimes I really miss Kristy Thomas.
Yeah, she was bossy, and hated fashion, and wasn’t boy crazy like my best friend, Stacey, but she was organized and driven. If she was around, this whole Slayer thing would be easier. Probably not safer, it would never be that, but it might not take so long and I’d have more time for my art.
Instead of painting (and sculpting and sketching and making my own jewelry), I hang out in cemeteries waiting for vampires to rise. How stale.
(That’s a word my friends and I made up back when we were members of this baby-sitting club. It means uncool.)
Of course, if Kristy was here, she’d find some way to be in charge and would make me post fliers - Need a Slayer? Call 800-CAN-SAVE and Reach Ten Experienced Slayers - and carry a vamp-kit.
I shudder just thinking about Kristy as a Watcher. That would be like giving her an army.
Sure, an army mostly made up of teenage girls, but Kristy practically overran Stoneybrook with a bunch of thirteen-year-old baby-sitters. (Two were eleven, but they couldn’t sit at night, and I think most of Kristy’s power trips happened after dark. I wonder if Kristy was a vampire. No, too many sports in the sunlight. She’d be terrifying as one, though. Must make sure it never happens.) Who knows what she could do with a bunch of girls who have super strength.
Definitely take over the world.
I don’t like to brag, but I’m the coolest dresser on my Slayer squad. Maybe of all the Slayers all around the world. I have long black hair and dark eyes. I’m Japanese-American and my friends back in Stoneybrook all say I look exotic.
With the other Slayers, I’m not so different. Two of them are black - I wish I could tell Jessi about them, I think she’d like black Slayers - one is from New Zealand and two are from China.
I used to wear all these really cool outfits, baggy men’s clothes, pants I’d painted myself, purple high-tops, things like that. Now I have to pay more attention to function, but form is still important.
I like fashion a lot. So while most of the other Slayers run around in t-shirts and cargo pants, I’ve managed to add fun little twists. I’ll wear cargo pants, because they’re good for hiding stakes, but then I’ll sew little lights into them. When we hunt vampires, I turn them off. But when we’re just out and about, I really glow, all sorts of bright colors.
The two pairs of earrings which are my current favorites are ones I made. One set is a little crossbow for one ear and a bolt for the other. The other is a tiny little vampire - I think he looks like Dracula - on one side and a stake on the other.
Maybe I should go into business for myself, haute couture for the fashionable Slayer.
Kristy would be useful for that, too. At twelve, she started her own business, and we lasted for a few years. It felt like much longer, maybe a decade or two.
My old friends have been on my mind a lot lately. I miss them. My squad has been in France for the past month, including a week in Paris, and it made me think of Stacey. She would have loved seeing the city, and I would have had more fun with her. The other Slayers liked it, too, but they didn’t appreciate it the way my best friend would have.
Don’t get me wrong, I want to help save the world.
It’s just, sometimes I wish they hadn’t forced me into this.
Happy birthday, Rebecca!
Title: Ten Slayers Who Never Were (The Of All The Women In All The World Mix)
Author: Carla
Disclaimer: Characters belong to the creators of the various tv shows, movies, and books.
Distribution: My site
Dedication: For Rebecca, of course, for all her wonderful awesomeness.
Spoilers: Buffy the Vampire Slayer season seven, Lost season two, and the end of Blue Crush.
Rating: 13+ for language
Summary: Into every generation a Slayer is born. One girl, in all the world, a chosen one. She alone will stand against the vampires, demons, and the forces of darkness. She is the Slayer.
Except now there is more than one.
(Fandoms in this half: Lost, Blue Crush, The Fast and the Furious, Full House, and The Baby-Sitters Club)
I. Ana-Lucia Cortez (Lost)
Goodwin is not a vampire.
Ana-Lucia isn’t stupid, he’s in the sun and he’s not bursting into flames, hence he’s not a vampire. It doesn’t matter, a giant stake - in this case, a wooden spear -- can kill a human just as quick - if The Others are human. Some of the other castaways, her others, think they’re monsters. Most of them don’t think such things exist.
Ana-Lucia absolutely believes in monsters.
She just knows humans can be horrible and dangerous and murderers, too. It’s worse when a person goes wrong, when there’s nothing else beneath their skin but what’s supposed to be there, except for that taint which makes them hurt people, which makes them kill.
Before the island, before she quit the force, before she was done with police academy, even, Ana-Lucia learned the world had secrets and kept them in shadows, defended with bright, shiny, pointed teeth.
She already knew the world was a nasty, dangerous place - sometimes, in some places. In others, it was wonderful, full of love and happiness. The trick was to find the line between the two, and protect it.
During martial arts, even though she’d sparred with the guy fifty times, Ana-Lucia forgot her own strength and broke Bobby’s arm. Except it wasn’t so much forgetting as suddenly she had all this extra power and she had no idea where it came from.
About a month later, this guy in his twenties, short, spiky red hair, kept a guitar close at hand and a stake in his belt, came to explain it to her.
Monsters were real, he told her over coffee. Vampires and demons and werewolves, all real. (Not all of them were monsters, he was quick to add, but a lot. Probably most.) There were apocalypses at least once a year, and, in order to save the world, some witch did a big spell - witches and magic were real, too, apparently - and changed a lot of girls. A lot of women.
She was way too old to be a Slayer. According to his story, most of them were young, teenage girls, or even younger, taken care of by a Watcher, usually old, usually male. Nothing sketchy about that at all, she cracked, and the guy, Oz, quirked his lips in a smile.
He asked her to join them, the Slayers were teaming up into a superhero squad and people who weren’t old men were rebuilding the Watchers. (He tried to put a positive spin on that, but when she asked if he was going to be a Watcher, or maybe was one already, he just laughed, and put his hand on his guitar. He was too many things already, he said.)
It sounded like a good thing, a team of super strong women, but Ana-Lucia already had a dream, and didn’t need a bunch of kids getting in her way. They were good kids, she smiled and nodded and agreed with Oz, but they weren’t for her.
She was going to save the world her own way.
Back home, that meant putting on a badge and carrying a gun. Here on the island, that means putting potential threats in pits and making sure she doesn’t lose another person, not one more goddamn - she crosses herself - person to the Others. ThemOthers. TheMothers.
At night, she dreams of vampires and witches and werewolves, oh my, and in her dreams, she can hear all the children she lost, reduced to babies, reduced to one slight cry and a flutter in the belly.
II. Eden (Blue Crush)
So there are vampires in paradise. Who freaking cares?
Eden’s got bigger things to worry about, like getting Anne-Marie ready for her next competition - it’s in Australia. Australia! A year ago, they couldn’t buy breakfast and now their plans include flights to Australia - and getting new boards ready to sell. Things like Penny still skipping school too often, and running around with the local boys. Eden really doesn’t care if she never finishes and gets married tomorrow, except that Anne Marie worries about her sister, and when Anne Marie’s upset, Eden fixes it.
That’s how she gets her, the teenage girl, Dawn, who seems pretty aptly named, the way she stretches out and basks in the sun, like she’s never seen it before. She probably hasn’t, not like this.
Tourists, and Eden snorts when she thinks it.
“It rains too much in England,” Dawn says and tips her head back. “I miss California.”
California’s a weak knock-off of Hawaii, but Eden doesn’t say so. There are plenty of thoughts she never actually voices, more she doesn’t say than does. Dawn doesn’t seem to mind her silence.
“Look, I know you’re busy, you have a whole life without monsters - that’s what you think, at least, but you’re wrong. They are everywhere, all over the world, even here. Especially here, where the hunting is so easy because of the large transient population.”
“You mean,” Eden says, her words drawn out slow, “that vampires like Hawaii because of the tourists?”
“Well, yes.” Dawn grins at her, but Eden doesn’t smile back, and slowly the expression drops from her face. “It’s easier to hunt people who don’t know the area and who won’t be missed right away.”
Tourists. This time, Eden snorts and rolls her eyes.
“Thanks for the warning, but I’m kinda busy. Unless you want to buy a board….”
“Eden.” Dawn sighs. “We need a Slayer here.”
“Guess you better put one on a plane then.”
“We need you here. Someone local, someone who knows where to look, where to hunt.”
“I told you, I’m not interested.”
“This isn’t about being interested! This is about being something special, about being a hero!”
“I don’t need to be a hero.” Eden’s voice is flat. “I’m giving you a lot here, listening to your stories, believing in your monsters, but I don’t need that. I don’t want that.”
Dawn closes her eyes and rubs her forehead.
“Look,” she says at last, “I can’t make you join us, I can’t make you do anything. But if you’re here anyway, it would really help if you took the time to slay a little. I don’t just mean it would help us, it would help you, too, and your family. Sure, vampires like tourists best, but that’s not going to keep your girls safe. Any one of them could get killed. Any one of them could be the person you could have saved.”
Dawn’s eyes are wide and bright, and there’s something about her, some sort of energy or personality, which appeals to Eden. No wonder she’s let her tell all these twisted fairy tales. No wonder she’s still listening.
“Eden, you could lose your family. I did, my sister died. My sister died protecting me.”
That’s why Eden’s in downtown Honolulu some nights, now, dressed in black pants and a tank top, stakes in her cargo pockets. That’s why she starts a martial arts class, and meets Dawn at her new apartment three times a week to train.
Anne Marie crawls into her bed sometimes, slips under Eden’s covers and puts her head on Eden’s shoulder. When she whispers, her breath is warm and her body soft where they touch.
Still, Eden doesn’t share her secrets. Anne Marie has enough to worry about without knowing the horror movies are real. Incredibly wrong, but real. There’s surfing and taking care of Penny and how to invest her money if there’s any extra.
Eden will worry about keeping Anne Marie alive. That’s just what she does.
III. Letty (The Fast and the Furious)
Goddamn vampires.
Letty brushes dust off her arms and shoves her stake down the back of her pants. There’s a dent in her hood that’s going to be a bitch to pop out. If she was back in L.A., with the Toretto garage stocked with all the shit a mechanic could want, it wouldn’t be such a problem, but she’s not.
Instead of being home, with ice cold Coronas, chicken fresh from the grill, and so much car talk she can barely stand it, how much she’s learning, how much she already knows, she’s in the middle of the goddamn country, the middle of nowhere, without a real city for probably two days. Maybe more.
To make things worse, she’s stuck with a bunch of kids, whining, overly-enthusiastic teenage girls who’re so strong they could probably throw her car over a house.
Course, she can now, too.
“Nice work.” Letty didn’t have to look up to know that voice, not after six months of training with her every day. Faith, Slayer extraordinaire, the last of those Slayers actually called the way it was supposed to happen, no magic - no extra magic - involved.
All the baby Slayers - Faith’s term - thought she was just the hottest thing around. Letty didn’t dispute the hot, though she meant it in ways those little girls wouldn’t understand, but she wasn’t gonna act like Faith was the fucking second coming.
“Yeah. Whatever.”
Faith crossed her arms just under her chest. “I don’t like this whole mentor thing any more than you, okay? But I’m stuck with you, so suck it up and accept the damn compliment.”
Letty twisted her head to the side and raised her eyebrows as she looked at her. “Thanks.” She could taste her own sarcasm, like the memory of engine grease on salty skin.
“You hungry?”
“I could eat.” A horse and a fucking half. She was starving, but wasn’t going to give Faith anything to use as a way to bond. Letty had heard her with the other girls, talking about how hungry she got after slaying, the way the pent up energy roiled in her body.
“Yeah.” Faith dropped her arms to her side, and then walked over and slung one across Letty’s shoulders. “Could fuck, too, slaying always makes me hungry and horny, you know.”
Letty choked on something that was a cross between a laugh and a snort. “That ever work for you?”
“What?” Faith asked, and twitched her hips. She really failed at innocence.
“That really bad pick up line.”
Faith squeezed her shoulders. “Who said it’s a pick up line? Just stating the facts, B.S.”
“Oh, uh huh,” Letty shoved her. “I am not one of those kids. Baby Slayer my ass.”
“It is a nice one.” Faith made a big show of leaning back so she could check it out. “Nothing baby-like about it.”
“Food? I thought we were going to eat.”
“Sure we are.” Faith stretched both arms overhead, showing off all the muscles, the curves, the tattoos. “And yes.”
“Yes?” Letty shoved her hands into her pockets and headed toward her car.
“Yes that line works, especially with Slayers wound too tight.” She bolted ahead of Letty, and smacked her ass as she ran past.
Letty grinned, followed her to the car, and slid behind the wheel. She’d show her wound too tight.
IV. DJ Tanner (Full House)
“Woah, baby.”
D.J. Tanner ducked when someone - something-went flying over her head. She immediately tracked it, confident her partners would watch her back. That’s what they did, the four of them, faced the four directions and trusted the others to take care of their quarters.
I’i’chor demon. Should have been called an Ichor demon, the way it dripped pus - she really hoped it was pus - all over everything. Dad would have a mop in one hand and a bottle of bleach in the other. She was surprised he didn’t make her bathe in the stuff when she went home for a visit.
It wasn’t easy, exactly, facing the demon, but she knew what to do and ran through her actions like as if she checked them off a list. Favors the overhand attack, weak in the side, stake to the forehead knocks it out, and finally cut off its head.
Something wet bumped into her ankle boots. Another I’i’chor head. That was another fact, they traveled in small packs, still no match for a bunch of Slayers.
“Gross.” She grimaced and kicked it away. “I hope that comes out of suede.”
“You okay, Deej?” Kennedy, their Head Slayer, wiped her hands on her pants.
“Five by five,” she said, and Kennedy burst into laughter.
“It sounds so wrong when you say that.”
“I’m fine, does that work better?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m also starving. Are we done here?”
“Sure, looks like we got the whole lot. Grab your team and let’s go.”
The four Slayers piled the bodies - still dripping goo - into a dumpster. The clean-up team would be along to set it on fire and make sure there was no trace of any supernatural activity. They cleaned well, but not as good as her dad.
D.J. sighed, and made a mental note to visit her family soon.
V. Claudia Kishi (The Baby-Sitters Club)
Sometimes I really miss Kristy Thomas.
Yeah, she was bossy, and hated fashion, and wasn’t boy crazy like my best friend, Stacey, but she was organized and driven. If she was around, this whole Slayer thing would be easier. Probably not safer, it would never be that, but it might not take so long and I’d have more time for my art.
Instead of painting (and sculpting and sketching and making my own jewelry), I hang out in cemeteries waiting for vampires to rise. How stale.
(That’s a word my friends and I made up back when we were members of this baby-sitting club. It means uncool.)
Of course, if Kristy was here, she’d find some way to be in charge and would make me post fliers - Need a Slayer? Call 800-CAN-SAVE and Reach Ten Experienced Slayers - and carry a vamp-kit.
I shudder just thinking about Kristy as a Watcher. That would be like giving her an army.
Sure, an army mostly made up of teenage girls, but Kristy practically overran Stoneybrook with a bunch of thirteen-year-old baby-sitters. (Two were eleven, but they couldn’t sit at night, and I think most of Kristy’s power trips happened after dark. I wonder if Kristy was a vampire. No, too many sports in the sunlight. She’d be terrifying as one, though. Must make sure it never happens.) Who knows what she could do with a bunch of girls who have super strength.
Definitely take over the world.
I don’t like to brag, but I’m the coolest dresser on my Slayer squad. Maybe of all the Slayers all around the world. I have long black hair and dark eyes. I’m Japanese-American and my friends back in Stoneybrook all say I look exotic.
With the other Slayers, I’m not so different. Two of them are black - I wish I could tell Jessi about them, I think she’d like black Slayers - one is from New Zealand and two are from China.
I used to wear all these really cool outfits, baggy men’s clothes, pants I’d painted myself, purple high-tops, things like that. Now I have to pay more attention to function, but form is still important.
I like fashion a lot. So while most of the other Slayers run around in t-shirts and cargo pants, I’ve managed to add fun little twists. I’ll wear cargo pants, because they’re good for hiding stakes, but then I’ll sew little lights into them. When we hunt vampires, I turn them off. But when we’re just out and about, I really glow, all sorts of bright colors.
The two pairs of earrings which are my current favorites are ones I made. One set is a little crossbow for one ear and a bolt for the other. The other is a tiny little vampire - I think he looks like Dracula - on one side and a stake on the other.
Maybe I should go into business for myself, haute couture for the fashionable Slayer.
Kristy would be useful for that, too. At twelve, she started her own business, and we lasted for a few years. It felt like much longer, maybe a decade or two.
My old friends have been on my mind a lot lately. I miss them. My squad has been in France for the past month, including a week in Paris, and it made me think of Stacey. She would have loved seeing the city, and I would have had more fun with her. The other Slayers liked it, too, but they didn’t appreciate it the way my best friend would have.
Don’t get me wrong, I want to help save the world.
It’s just, sometimes I wish they hadn’t forced me into this.
Happy birthday, Rebecca!