Dark Xander Fic_A_Thon Story: The Valley of the Shadow
Title: The Valley of the Shadow
Author (link): Lori Bush (www.lwbush.com or http://lwbush.livejournal.com)
Gen/Het/Slash: Gen
Parings: None. Buffy and Xander friendship; Dawn and Xander friendship
Genre: Future fic
Story Warnings: I hesitate to call this dark, although there is drug abuse and many psychological disfunctions. It's more haziness with clearing skies in the early morning hours. Inspired by comments made by Nick Brendon at Dragon*Con.
Summary: Xander ran away to Africa, but it wasn't far enough, so he found another method of escape.
Xander wasn’t sure how he’d become some sort of Watcher’s Council celebrity. He wasn’t sure he liked it.
After several years in Africa, he’d finally come back to the nest, so to speak, and settled in at Watcher’s headquarters.
They all had. He was actually the last Original Scooby (and yes, it was pronounced around Headquarters with the capital letters included) to straggle back to the fold.
The first had been Buffy. Buffy was always first in everything Scooby. She’d had a bad breakup with The Immortal, whoever the hell that was, and come running back to Daddy Giles to lick her wounds and recover. He put her in charge of Second Generation Slayers - she did everything from assigning roommates to scheduling family visits, to training and work details. All Things Slayer was Buffy’s unofficial title.
Willow, the next to return, was actually All Things Administrative. It was surprising she wasn’t the magic go-to girl, but she’d declined that position, feeling that Kara, from the Devon Coven, who’d been doing the job, was more than satisfactory at the position. So Willow did maintenance schedules and grocery inventory and managed international communications, and was in all her nerd glory. Kennedy had come back with her for a while, but Kennedy wasn’t too good at just hanging around as One of Many, so soon she was off again - less of a breakup than a kind of fade away.
Andrew had been doing the job Willow took. He was eased out of it because Giles needed someone to be in charge of Slayer Recruitment in the field. Honestly, in the several years since the Slayer’s had all been activated, there were very few left to recruit, but every once in a while a new one would pop up somewhere, and someone had to go talk to them about the whole deal. Xander had suspected, when first told of this plan, that Giles just wanted a way to send Andrew far away, for as long as humanly possible, especially since a majority of the still unfound Slayers were turning up in Africa and the Far East. After having to spend three months training the younger man in the field, Xander was positive that was Giles’ motive.
As for Xander, - well, he hadn’t quite weathered the fall of Sunnydale gracefully. He’d spent a lot of his time in Africa, the time when he didn’t have a Slayer in tow, either drunk or otherwise chemically numb. He’d finagled prescriptions for anti-depressants and painkillers from almost every Red Cross doctor he came across, and since record keeping wasn’t as good in that line of work as it was in pharmacies in the States, he’d built up an impressive supply of ways to keep from thinking about Anya under the rocks, or his missing eye, or the many other things he felt like a failure for. When he had a girl to watch over, he was clean and straight, and poured all his focus into taking care of her, teaching her what he could, and getting her on whatever plane would take her to England and the Council Headquarters as quickly as he could. On his way out of the airport, he would pull out a pill bottle or a flask. Usually he wasn’t up to answering messages for the first few days after whatever girl it had been had left. After a few days, he dialed it back to leave him functional enough to locate the next girl, and so went the cycle for almost five years.
He lost weight, since he’d forget to eat for sometimes more than a day while he was stoned. He looked at least ten years older than he really was. He’d never really tried to keep in touch with anyone but Giles after the first few months, once the novelty of them being spread all across the globe wore off. And he only talked to Giles (or Andrew, more often) when things had to be handled at their end - “Here comes a new girl, have somebody meet her at the airport,” or “You heard a rumor of a Superwoman, where, now?” And then - “You’re sending Andrew here for WHAT?”
Then Andrew arrived for training in the fine art of seducing Slayers into the fold (and Xander laughed, for while he often mentally referred to his job that way, he couldn’t imagine Andrew managing to seduce anything into anywhere), and damn him, noticed that Xander wasn’t doing so well. And called back to England and reported that news.
Soon after the three months of training the new Slayer Retriever was over, a ticket to Heathrow appeared, hand-delivered, along with a note from Giles explaining that there was a position in the Council that he really felt only Xander could fill; would he come post-haste?
Kicking himself all the way across the ocean, he went.
Xander had learned early in his career in almost legal drug abuse that you don’t start taking anti-depressants and then just as suddenly stop. It was a fast track to bat-shit loco, no stopping at “Go” and no money incoming. He’d tried it, twice actually, and gotten his second type of the drug from the doctor he finally admitted it to. After a scathing lecture about following the directions on a drug’s label and reading all the warnings in the package (which Xander mostly registered as “bzzz, bzzzz, BAD!”), he was told that withdrawing from anti-depressants without a doctor’s supervision was dangerous, and maybe if the Prozac wasn’t working, he should try Elavil instead. And he had liked it a little better.
Thanks to several different doctors, he tried several different types, finally settling on Zoloft as the best for him. But while he discovered anti-depressants made him better, it didn’t give him the full mind numb that the Lortab he’d gotten for his sprained ankle did. Or that alcohol did. So each new doctor also got a new (or old, if he wasn’t feeling particularly creative) painful injury described in loving detail, for which he would get something with a bit more fog attached - Naproxyn, Percocet, Vicodin. His favorite was Dilaudid, but he had to come up with something pretty painful and convincing to get serious narcotics, even out of a field medic, so when he got those, he hoarded them for the really bad days. Besides, if he took them too often, the effects started to fade, and that was so not the idea.
He briefly wondered, on the plane while taking his regular daily Zoloft and washing it down with a rum and Coke and a Naproxyn (which was one of his pills with the lowest fog level, therefore safe, he felt, to take and still remain functional), if he should go back to school and study pharmaceuticals. He had about half the curriculum stuffed in his checked bags and his carry-on.
Giles himself was at the gate, and although he recovered the starch in his upper lip quickly, Xander could tell that whatever Andrew had told his boss hadn’t quite prepared him for the new, not-so-improved Xander Harris. He couldn’t really work up the effort to be offended. He had showered and shaved, and, well, yeah, he probably did need some less worn clothing and a haircut, but still…
“G-Man,” he provoked, half-heartedly.
“Xander,” the older man answered warmly. Xander held out his hand, but was shocked to be swept into a tight, not overly manly hug, although it did include a few of the requisite back-pats. “It’s not the same without you around,” Giles went on after they separated.
Xander lifted his brow. It probably wasn’t going to be the same with him around, these days, but he kept the thought to himself. “I, uh … bags,” he coughed out.
“Certainly,” Giles replied, picking up the carry-on and leading the way. “Baggage Claim is right this way. It may take a while - they always seem to delay the unloading on International flights.”
Unlike the old days, Xander remained quiet, unsure of what to say or how to say it. Giles filled the silence with cheerful chatter. “Naori is looking forward to seeing you again - she’s just finished her training and is soon to be assigned to a Watcher. Buffy would like your help with that process, since you do know Naori fairly well.”
Who the hell was Naori? Xander wondered, and then it clicked. The girl before the last one - from Zaire, almost blue-black in skin color, tall and spindly, really liked card games. Yeah, he knew who she was. Couldn’t say for sure he really knew her, but whatever. The drug and alcohol fog was lifting, but it was okay, since he had to be able to focus on Giles for a while, anyway.
“Actually,” Giles went on, oblivious to the other man’s silence, “that’s the new job we have for you. I’d like you to take over Watcher Administration. I’ve been trying to do it all myself, but with everything else on my plate, I feel it would be better served by someone exclusively handling that area.”
Xander barely held in his snort. Oh, yeah, you want me handling them. I can teach the young Watchers a lot, G-man. After your class in watching your Slayer die repeatedly, I can offer a course in mind-numbing chemistry for the recently bereaved. Or maybe not so recently, he reflected. Five years - how time flies when you’re drunk and stoned.
“You know, of course, that Dawn is finishing up at Cambridge.” He did. “You may not be aware, however, that for her senior project, she’s working as a translator in our services, while writing her thesis paper on The Use of Infinitives in the Interpretation of Mythological Works.” He wasn’t. One more old friend to be careful while around. It was going to be hard enough to avoid Buffy and Willow with them both right there, without Dawn in the mix. Of course, he might just have to clean up his act due to all the girls watching him and his new position. The shock at that thought kept him from hearing anything Giles said for a long period of time.
“I say, Xander, we’ve been watching the roundabout for some time - aren’t any of these bags yours?” The tone of annoyance in Giles’ voice finally shook him from his stupor.
“Oh, yeah.” He quickly retrieved both his bags, and nodded somewhat sheepishly to the Senior Watcher. “Sorry.”
Giles’ friendly voice was back. “But of course, you must be exhausted. You’ve been traveling over twelve hours. How inconsiderate of me, to be filling your head when you obviously need some time to recuperate. Forgive me.” A porter and a cart seemed to materialize out of nowhere, and Giles pointed to Xander’s bags and headed outside. “My car is nearby. One of the perks of being head of an international security organization,” he informed Xander dryly.
The car was warm and dry, although London appeared to be neither. Xander settled in, not knowing nor caring how far they were away from the Council building. “We’ve gone to the liberty of choosing you a suite,” Giles went on. “Actually, the girls insisted on choosing for you - I had little say in the matter. However, if it’s unsatisfactory in any way, please let me know.”
“Giles,” Xander interrupted, feeling as if it were the first words he’d spoken in hours, “Is it indoors?”
“Why, yes,” the other man replied, puzzled.
“Is the toilet indoors, and does it have hot water somewhere in the vicinity?”
“It has a lovely in-suite bath, and, oh… yes. I suppose it will seem the height of luxury to you after Africa, won’t it?”
“Eh, it wasn’t all tents, field rations and latrine holes, but my standards are a little lower these days than they used to be, and that’s coming from a man who lived in his parent’s mildewy basement for some time. I’m sure it’ll be fine.”
The two fell silent, and the next thing Xander knew, he was being shaken awake. “We’re here,” Giles informed him. “Let me show you to your room. Feel free to sleep in tomorrow - there’s nothing on the agenda for you, and I’ll run the girls off so they don’t disturb you.”
For the first time he could remember that he didn’t have a Slayer in tow, Xander stripped out of his clothing and fell asleep without taking or drinking anything, sleeping for the next sixteen hours straight.
~**~
The days that followed were foggy in his memory, and not because he’d taken a lot of stuff, but because he had a lot of stuff to take in.
He was introduced to more people than he recalled ever meeting during the past five years; smiled at, hugged and afterwards carefully avoided all of the girls; begun to familiarize himself with the computer and files that were the tools of his office; interviewed secretaries. He needed his wits about him while he got his bearings, so he pretended this was like locating and working with a new Slayer.
He still took the pills or drank himself to sleep every night, though, which he hadn’t allowed himself to do when shepherding a girl in Africa. Here there was no one’s life depending on Xander being able to wake up and snap out orders in an emergency, and he didn’t want to chance some of the dreams that did come during those periods he’d gone without. And if he were slightly groggy and a bit hung-over first thing every morning? It soon passed, he was still able to absorb information and read computer screens, and he’d never had a reputation as a morning person in high school, so it shouldn’t startle his friends. Actually, he pretty much never saw his friends, so - no big.
He must’ve been seriously groggy the day they’d done the physical, or he’d have avoided it at all possible costs. He’d even kinda forgotten about it when the summons came from Giles.
~**~
“What’s up Boss?” he asked almost cheerfully. “I have an appointment with your shrink in a bit to talk about the profiles on the trainees.”
“Xander,” Giles was polishing his glasses, which meant something was bothering him. “I - perhaps I should call Dr. Marseilles about this after all. We …” he looked up into the puzzled face of the younger man, and regrouped a bit. “Why don’t you sit down?”
“What’s up?” Xander repeated, somewhat less confidently than before. He hadn’t survived five years in Africa, particularly when partially incapacitated during some of that time, without a good instinct for when something shitty was about to hit the fan.
“Xander,” the older man began again, “are you in a lot of pain?”
“No,” he responded quickly. “I mean, the eye still gets these phantom thingies sometimes, and my shoulder isn’t very happy on damp or foggy days, but…”
“Then why the hell do you have traces of every form of known medication for pain in your blood?” Giles’ expression wavered, as if it couldn’t decide if it wanted to be horrified or angry, making him look mostly like he was about to burst into tears. He waved a piece of paper at Xander, which the younger man realized had to be some sort of report. “The lab actually accused of us trying to test them by mixing several people’s samples of the same blood type, because they’d never seen that amount of pharmacology in a single person’s results before. What in God’s name have you been doing?”
He considered lying for about five seconds. But honestly, he kinda liked the job that he’d been given, and was pretty tired of feeling bad all the time, due to the after-effects of the substances he’d taken to try to avoid feeling bad. On the whole, although he’d never be a real hero, he didn’t much want to be the real loser he’d seen in his visions before his almost-wedding, or the one he came home to in his father’s favorite chair every night during his High School years, either. For the first time in five years, maybe longer, he told the truth, both to Giles, and, he realized, to himself.
~**~
The girls, however, were another story. He didn’t actually want to lie to them. He’d really never wanted to lie to them - it was one of the reasons he worked so hard at avoiding them, even before. But now - now that he was undergoing a medically supervised detox program and counseling with Dr. Marseilles - he was actively trying to become a ghost in the halls of Watcher so he didn't have to make up stories about what his life involved. He didn’t want to be seen by anyone who might see them and mention they’d ever seen him. He honestly wanted them to forget he’d ever existed. He discovered he did have some pride, after all, and that it couldn’t take the blow of Buffy or Willow or Dawn knowing how weak he’d been. He had two choices - lie, or vanish. Africa was beginning to call him again, but he knew he couldn’t go back. He was stuck here. But they didn’t have to know that, or even know he was here, if he had his way.
He’d underestimated his girls, once more. It actually started with Naori. She’d been asking after him for a couple of weeks, wanting to “catch up,” according to her voice mails and the messages he’d received from his new secretary. He honestly knew in a place this size that he couldn’t avoid her forever. But he never expected her to double-team him, calling in the big guns.
Naori was too shy and proper to hound him in his personal quarters. But Buffy had no such problem.
“At first I thought it was just me,” Buffy stated without preamble when he’d opened the door to his suite at her insistent pounding. “And we have enough history, I kinda understood why you might not want to be all buddy again with me for a while. But Nannie? She’s your girl - you found her, had her half-trained before I ever saw her. And just like all your other Slayers, she thinks you hung the moon. It’s killing her that you won’t talk to her. What the hell’s your deal, Xander?”
During her soliloquy she’d made her way inside, pushed him down on to the couch, and ended standing over him, looking every bit as intimidating as only a little over a hundred pounds of superwoman could look to a man twice her size with a quarter of her power.
Xander could barely breathe. He needed a drink. Where were his pills? He was letting them down. His job was stressful, his day had been hard, and now he’d hurt someone who relied on him. He was useless, like his father had always said. He’d failed again. Oh, God, Anya had died because he wasn’t able to take care of her - he’d lost his eye because he was helpless, he…
“Hey, deep breaths, okay? You’re hyperventilating. Calm down.” A strong but small hand was rubbing circles on his back. “It’s okay. I’ve been there, and you just need to breathe deep. It’s okay.” The warm body beside him on the couch leaned into his side. “I’m sorry, Xand. It’s okay.” Her voice was pitched low, soothing and calming his panic.
He reached up to clutch at his pounding heart, but he felt himself getting back under control. “Whoa,” he panted, “That was new, and not so fun.”
Buffy’s hand was still rubbing his back. “Panic attack. I’ve had a few, and they’re no picnic. Sorry.” He looked her in the eye and she smiled weakly. “I should’ve known. Willow and I both fell apart right after we got back. Why shouldn’t you, too?”
Xander snorted, his mouth in gear without his brain engaged. “I’m actually finally getting back together - fell apart after Sunnydale crashed.” A half second after saying it, his eyes went wide. He’d worked so hard at avoiding the girls so he wouldn’t hurt them by lying, and instead her hurled the truth at Buffy like a stink-bomb, hurting her far more by telling her that.
He certainly didn’t expect her to just shrug. “We all did, really. Just couldn’t let it all go until we got back here to safety.” She looked up at him, studying his face for a moment. “You haven’t quite realized this is safe yet, huh? The only place where everybody’s hurt as much as you have, and everybody loves you in spite of the mistakes you made? You, me, Willow, Giles - we’ve all been there. But you still think you’re the only one, don’t you? Have you talked to Dr. Marseilles yet?” When he nodded, she grinned. “He give you pills? I got Paxil,” she confided.
“Zoloft - but I’ve been taking it for a while. Wait a minute - you mean we all melted down after the ‘Dale?”
“Well, Willow did a lot of her meltdown before we even left, y’know, ending the world and all, hers was more of a long crying jag than an actually full-blown, but I - and I guess you were, too, - I was too tightly wrapped to let go then. I was dancing as fast as I could, trying to keep the First from being the world’s very last apocalypse. Then I went to Rome, and shoved everything down so far it probably bottomed out in my empty grave back there in that hole. Finally woke up when the Immortal started making noise about how to make me live forever, too. I mean, cm’on - he was just a good time! I didn’t want to become Queen of the Damned to be with him. I didn’t even want to get a place together, and he was talking about forever, without the ‘death do us part’ thing. I panicked and ran back to my Watcher.” She chewed her bottom lip for a moment. “Then I had my long overdue meltdown.”
“Turns out Giles had found Dr. M when he’d had his own version of the stress-out in the midst of re-animating the Council. Did you know the big guy had a minor heart-attack?” Xander shook his head numbly. “Stress related, of course,” Buffy reported, “Doin’ much better now. The doc understands both the para-normal and the stress that knowing about it puts on the human psyche. He’s been a godsend. After he saw both Giles and me, he predicted that any other members of our team from the bad old days would probably need some help, too. But when Willow came back mostly okay, I forgot about that. I shoulda known you’d take it hard, too, especially after Anya…”
When he winced, she fell silent, and studied his face. “Oh, man,” she moaned, “I can be so dense. You blame yourself, dontcha? And me, I’m sure.”
He caught his breath for the automatic denial, but couldn’t get the words out. She patted his knee. “It’s okay - I get it. I blame me, too. But I was so busy being sorry Spike had to go up in flames and happy that all the people that meant the most to me - you and Willow and Dawn and Giles - all got out, I didn’t start thinking about her, and the Slayers that didn’t make it, and the Slayers I’d condemned to a life I’d hated, and all - well. Party hearty in Rome, and ignore the voices of the dead, and then I came back here…” Her voice faltered and faded away. She shrugged again after a moment. “Meltdown,” she finished matter-of-factly.
She perked up for a moment. “You know Spike’s still alive? Or undead? Or maybe not - Angel’s crew kinda got wiped out saving L.A. The reports on who walked away are sketchy. But he came back for some reason after he went up in flames in the basement there.” She saw a total lack of emotion on Xander’s face. “Just thought you should know. Whatever.”
“You don’t seem to care,” he said gruffly.
“Therapy’s pretty great,” she answered philosophically. “I understand what was going on with us now. And I’m able to let it go.” She smiled a bit sadly. “Angel, too.”
It just felt right to reach out and wrap her hand in his, and it drew a genuine smile from her. “It gets better,” she told him.
He wondered if it was obvious he didn’t believe her.
~**~
He’d like to say that in spite of his doubt, it got better right away, but his life was no fairytale, and therapy was no “happy ever after.” Some days it was hard work, and some days it didn’t seem worth it all. He’d find himself itching for a little plastic bottle, or mentally heading to the pub nearby. He’d reconnected with Willow, but they just weren’t the same people anymore, and although he would always care for her, he just couldn’t turn to her when he was starting to slip. Giles, although much more accessible than Xander would have thought for someone with such an important job, was still a busy man, although they got together no less than weekly, just to talk or play darts in the faculty break room, or even to go to concerts together, which Xander just marveled at, especially because he’d developed a liking for both Classical Music, and Classic Rock, thanks to his mentor’s interests and encouragement.
It took him longer to reconnect with Naori, but once he did, he found himself remembering how much he’d enjoyed his time in Africa with her. They told jokes in Swahili at the dinner table, and laughed all the harder because no one else understood them (although Dawn often had a secretive smile on her face, too). They played poker, and gin, and even double solitaire together. Sometimes they’d just go out and walk for hours, because they missed that form of transportation here on the fringes of a big, car-focused city. He’d just about figured out what Watcher he wanted to pair her with, but he kind of hated to make the decision, knowing that soon after that was done, she’d be sent away to an assignment, and it would be a long time before he saw her again, most likely.
The closest thing he had to an AA sponsor was Dawn, who’d apparently had a none-too-brief alcohol soaked period of her life during her first two years of college and had actually been to AA, and understood with startling clarity what it felt like to crave the numbing feeling so bad your body itched with it. They had a regular table at the Starbucks that was a mile walk from the Council Building, and would traipse off there no matter what the weather when she could sense he was about to slip, or sometimes when he’d come to her and admit his weakness was creeping back in. She teased him and flirted with him, but her social calendar was full, and he was only a little hurt when she said she was “so over” her childhood crush on him. But they had talked a lot, and she knew he didn’t feel ready for any kind of a real relationship just now, so she wouldn’t have pushed it even if she was still interested, he knew. He grinned when he thought about the time she’d told him not to lose her number, though, just in case he changed his mind.
But his anchor, his breathing room, his best friend? Buffy. She’d stood by his side since the night she’d figured out what was going on with him and why he’d been avoiding everyone he used to care about. She understood - after all, she’d done the same thing, except she had to go to Rome to accomplish it.
Her meltdown had been bulimia. She’d binge and purge with all the abandon he put into chemically neutering his feelings, and she did it under the watchful eyes of both the stupid Immortal and the overtaxed Council. It took a long time before Giles noticed - probably because she’d already been on her way to anorexia long before she started throwing her guts up to purge her emotions, so it was hard to see that she’d lost even more weight. It took her actually collapsing during a training exercise that caught her Watcher’s attention. Slayers just don’t do that. But she had, and he looked into it. Soon after, the now ubiquitous “Dr. M” that Giles had been seeing privately had come on board, and was soon counseling more than just the Eldest Slayer and her Watcher. Even just being a cog in the wheel of the machine that was keeping the world safe from evil monsters was a stressful job, after all.
They would never be carefree kids again, although there was the argument that they never had been. But ignorance and immaturity had been bliss, and neither excuse was available anymore to any of them. Life was tough; monsters were real; people died. None of it was fun. But they had a future, not just a past, and they had to live with that foremost in their minds.
Today he’d found himself having that very discussion with Buffy as they walked through the Council’s busy halls. How hope was the only thing that could keep you running, and how to avoid losing it. And then they were approached by a couple of young girls who were giggling and poking each other as they came down the hall.
They almost walked on by, but the pair stopped before them and stared, grinning nervously as if they needed something, and Buffy and Xander were supposed to know what. The former Scoobies stopped, and the four of them just stood there, looking at each other, for what seemed like a long, long time.
Just as Xander had decided to just step around the girls and keep walking, one of them spoke.
“Miss, uhm, Buffy?” there was a hint of the nervous giggle in her tone. “We wondered, uhm, Talia and I wanted to have your picture with Watcher Harris. And maybe our pictures, with both of you?” She thrust a camera phone out in explanation. “Do you mind?”
Xander could see Buffy’s mind churning, although he wasn’t sure why. Then he realized - these were some of her trainees, and she wasn’t sure of the girl’s name. “Certainly, Maggie,” she said slowly, looking vaguely relieved when the girl didn’t wince, “I can’t see why not.” She gazed at Xander in question, and he shrugged.
So he tucked Buffy under his arm and smiled for the camera, then took the phone and photographed Buffy with both of the girls. Then Buffy took the phone and photographed Xander with both of them, then with each of them in turn.
The girls examined each of the photos, thanked them again profusely, then took off on down the hall in a cloud of giggles and excited chatter. Buffy snorted.
“They’re so gonna erase the pictures of me as soon as they get back to their rooms.”
“Huh?”
“They had no interest in my picture, Xander. They wanted to snuggle up to you and get photographic evidence that they did it.”
“Huh?” he repeated, somewhat more forcefully
Buffy rolled her eyes. “Please. I’m their teacher and trainer. They see me every day. And what’s more, I hear them, every day. You are a Man of Mystery - part of the original crew, the first Watcher who chose to be one rather than being born into it, you disappeared for almost five years that no one seems to know much about, you have the power over who they get assigned as a Watcher, and you’re a hot, older guy. There’s whole worlds of fantasies and gossip and crushes that can be woven from that fabric.”
“Hot? Me?”
Buffy’s eyes went around again, and she grabbed his hand and began dragging him in the direction they’d been going before. “Trust you to only hear one thing I said. But yeah, you’re hot. You’ve got the weight thing back under control, you no longer look like one of those starving children in the late night ads, and I know you’ve been working out, ‘cos I see you in the gym. And the girls do too, by the way. Could you stop weight training during my sparring classes? I can’t get any of them to pay attention when you’re in there. But anyway, you’ve got silver hair at your temples, and laugh lines around your eyes, which makes you look distinguished where it would just make me look old, the eye patch is actually sexy and you dress nicely these days, and yeah, you’re hot.” She thought for a moment, and her tone became more serious. “We’re all kind of celebrities. We represent an era of Slaying that doesn’t exist any more. We’re the museum pieces, kind of, you, me, Willow and Giles. And Oz and Faith, too, when they're in town. Even the ones who survived Sunnydale, although they weren’t with us all along. Molly, Rona, even Andrew and Dawn. We’re different, and whether that’s good or bad is still open for debate. We just are, and they notice that.”
Her steps slowed. “And they want to be a part of that, any way they can.” She stopped totally and turned to look him in the eye, frowning. “Be careful. There may be ones that want more from you than a picture. They may even stalk you, or something equally disturbing. It’s common knowledge that you’re single, and there may be girls who want to cure that little problem, but more for their own reasons than for you. Don’t let someone else hurt you, Xander. You’ve been through enough.”
He looked back, seeing nothing but concerned sincerity in the blue-green eyes of his closest friend. “I won’t,” he responded solemnly. Then he broke into a grin and grabbed her arms, pulling her closer. “Maybe we should do something about that whole ‘single’ thing to put them off.” It was a running joke between them, and maybe when the time was right it wouldn’t be a joke anymore, but that was part of the “living for the future” and “hope” that they’d been discussing earlier.
She pushed at his chest half-heartedly. “In your dreams buster,” she answered.
“Every night, Buff. Every night.”
~**~
So not so much with the dark. Just couldn't get there this time, and I had to have a hopeful ending, too. Still wanted to participate, and I've been working on this since I abandoned my first, far more lame, effort.
Author (link): Lori Bush (www.lwbush.com or http://lwbush.livejournal.com)
Gen/Het/Slash: Gen
Parings: None. Buffy and Xander friendship; Dawn and Xander friendship
Genre: Future fic
Story Warnings: I hesitate to call this dark, although there is drug abuse and many psychological disfunctions. It's more haziness with clearing skies in the early morning hours. Inspired by comments made by Nick Brendon at Dragon*Con.
Summary: Xander ran away to Africa, but it wasn't far enough, so he found another method of escape.
Xander wasn’t sure how he’d become some sort of Watcher’s Council celebrity. He wasn’t sure he liked it.
After several years in Africa, he’d finally come back to the nest, so to speak, and settled in at Watcher’s headquarters.
They all had. He was actually the last Original Scooby (and yes, it was pronounced around Headquarters with the capital letters included) to straggle back to the fold.
The first had been Buffy. Buffy was always first in everything Scooby. She’d had a bad breakup with The Immortal, whoever the hell that was, and come running back to Daddy Giles to lick her wounds and recover. He put her in charge of Second Generation Slayers - she did everything from assigning roommates to scheduling family visits, to training and work details. All Things Slayer was Buffy’s unofficial title.
Willow, the next to return, was actually All Things Administrative. It was surprising she wasn’t the magic go-to girl, but she’d declined that position, feeling that Kara, from the Devon Coven, who’d been doing the job, was more than satisfactory at the position. So Willow did maintenance schedules and grocery inventory and managed international communications, and was in all her nerd glory. Kennedy had come back with her for a while, but Kennedy wasn’t too good at just hanging around as One of Many, so soon she was off again - less of a breakup than a kind of fade away.
Andrew had been doing the job Willow took. He was eased out of it because Giles needed someone to be in charge of Slayer Recruitment in the field. Honestly, in the several years since the Slayer’s had all been activated, there were very few left to recruit, but every once in a while a new one would pop up somewhere, and someone had to go talk to them about the whole deal. Xander had suspected, when first told of this plan, that Giles just wanted a way to send Andrew far away, for as long as humanly possible, especially since a majority of the still unfound Slayers were turning up in Africa and the Far East. After having to spend three months training the younger man in the field, Xander was positive that was Giles’ motive.
As for Xander, - well, he hadn’t quite weathered the fall of Sunnydale gracefully. He’d spent a lot of his time in Africa, the time when he didn’t have a Slayer in tow, either drunk or otherwise chemically numb. He’d finagled prescriptions for anti-depressants and painkillers from almost every Red Cross doctor he came across, and since record keeping wasn’t as good in that line of work as it was in pharmacies in the States, he’d built up an impressive supply of ways to keep from thinking about Anya under the rocks, or his missing eye, or the many other things he felt like a failure for. When he had a girl to watch over, he was clean and straight, and poured all his focus into taking care of her, teaching her what he could, and getting her on whatever plane would take her to England and the Council Headquarters as quickly as he could. On his way out of the airport, he would pull out a pill bottle or a flask. Usually he wasn’t up to answering messages for the first few days after whatever girl it had been had left. After a few days, he dialed it back to leave him functional enough to locate the next girl, and so went the cycle for almost five years.
He lost weight, since he’d forget to eat for sometimes more than a day while he was stoned. He looked at least ten years older than he really was. He’d never really tried to keep in touch with anyone but Giles after the first few months, once the novelty of them being spread all across the globe wore off. And he only talked to Giles (or Andrew, more often) when things had to be handled at their end - “Here comes a new girl, have somebody meet her at the airport,” or “You heard a rumor of a Superwoman, where, now?” And then - “You’re sending Andrew here for WHAT?”
Then Andrew arrived for training in the fine art of seducing Slayers into the fold (and Xander laughed, for while he often mentally referred to his job that way, he couldn’t imagine Andrew managing to seduce anything into anywhere), and damn him, noticed that Xander wasn’t doing so well. And called back to England and reported that news.
Soon after the three months of training the new Slayer Retriever was over, a ticket to Heathrow appeared, hand-delivered, along with a note from Giles explaining that there was a position in the Council that he really felt only Xander could fill; would he come post-haste?
Kicking himself all the way across the ocean, he went.
Xander had learned early in his career in almost legal drug abuse that you don’t start taking anti-depressants and then just as suddenly stop. It was a fast track to bat-shit loco, no stopping at “Go” and no money incoming. He’d tried it, twice actually, and gotten his second type of the drug from the doctor he finally admitted it to. After a scathing lecture about following the directions on a drug’s label and reading all the warnings in the package (which Xander mostly registered as “bzzz, bzzzz, BAD!”), he was told that withdrawing from anti-depressants without a doctor’s supervision was dangerous, and maybe if the Prozac wasn’t working, he should try Elavil instead. And he had liked it a little better.
Thanks to several different doctors, he tried several different types, finally settling on Zoloft as the best for him. But while he discovered anti-depressants made him better, it didn’t give him the full mind numb that the Lortab he’d gotten for his sprained ankle did. Or that alcohol did. So each new doctor also got a new (or old, if he wasn’t feeling particularly creative) painful injury described in loving detail, for which he would get something with a bit more fog attached - Naproxyn, Percocet, Vicodin. His favorite was Dilaudid, but he had to come up with something pretty painful and convincing to get serious narcotics, even out of a field medic, so when he got those, he hoarded them for the really bad days. Besides, if he took them too often, the effects started to fade, and that was so not the idea.
He briefly wondered, on the plane while taking his regular daily Zoloft and washing it down with a rum and Coke and a Naproxyn (which was one of his pills with the lowest fog level, therefore safe, he felt, to take and still remain functional), if he should go back to school and study pharmaceuticals. He had about half the curriculum stuffed in his checked bags and his carry-on.
Giles himself was at the gate, and although he recovered the starch in his upper lip quickly, Xander could tell that whatever Andrew had told his boss hadn’t quite prepared him for the new, not-so-improved Xander Harris. He couldn’t really work up the effort to be offended. He had showered and shaved, and, well, yeah, he probably did need some less worn clothing and a haircut, but still…
“G-Man,” he provoked, half-heartedly.
“Xander,” the older man answered warmly. Xander held out his hand, but was shocked to be swept into a tight, not overly manly hug, although it did include a few of the requisite back-pats. “It’s not the same without you around,” Giles went on after they separated.
Xander lifted his brow. It probably wasn’t going to be the same with him around, these days, but he kept the thought to himself. “I, uh … bags,” he coughed out.
“Certainly,” Giles replied, picking up the carry-on and leading the way. “Baggage Claim is right this way. It may take a while - they always seem to delay the unloading on International flights.”
Unlike the old days, Xander remained quiet, unsure of what to say or how to say it. Giles filled the silence with cheerful chatter. “Naori is looking forward to seeing you again - she’s just finished her training and is soon to be assigned to a Watcher. Buffy would like your help with that process, since you do know Naori fairly well.”
Who the hell was Naori? Xander wondered, and then it clicked. The girl before the last one - from Zaire, almost blue-black in skin color, tall and spindly, really liked card games. Yeah, he knew who she was. Couldn’t say for sure he really knew her, but whatever. The drug and alcohol fog was lifting, but it was okay, since he had to be able to focus on Giles for a while, anyway.
“Actually,” Giles went on, oblivious to the other man’s silence, “that’s the new job we have for you. I’d like you to take over Watcher Administration. I’ve been trying to do it all myself, but with everything else on my plate, I feel it would be better served by someone exclusively handling that area.”
Xander barely held in his snort. Oh, yeah, you want me handling them. I can teach the young Watchers a lot, G-man. After your class in watching your Slayer die repeatedly, I can offer a course in mind-numbing chemistry for the recently bereaved. Or maybe not so recently, he reflected. Five years - how time flies when you’re drunk and stoned.
“You know, of course, that Dawn is finishing up at Cambridge.” He did. “You may not be aware, however, that for her senior project, she’s working as a translator in our services, while writing her thesis paper on The Use of Infinitives in the Interpretation of Mythological Works.” He wasn’t. One more old friend to be careful while around. It was going to be hard enough to avoid Buffy and Willow with them both right there, without Dawn in the mix. Of course, he might just have to clean up his act due to all the girls watching him and his new position. The shock at that thought kept him from hearing anything Giles said for a long period of time.
“I say, Xander, we’ve been watching the roundabout for some time - aren’t any of these bags yours?” The tone of annoyance in Giles’ voice finally shook him from his stupor.
“Oh, yeah.” He quickly retrieved both his bags, and nodded somewhat sheepishly to the Senior Watcher. “Sorry.”
Giles’ friendly voice was back. “But of course, you must be exhausted. You’ve been traveling over twelve hours. How inconsiderate of me, to be filling your head when you obviously need some time to recuperate. Forgive me.” A porter and a cart seemed to materialize out of nowhere, and Giles pointed to Xander’s bags and headed outside. “My car is nearby. One of the perks of being head of an international security organization,” he informed Xander dryly.
The car was warm and dry, although London appeared to be neither. Xander settled in, not knowing nor caring how far they were away from the Council building. “We’ve gone to the liberty of choosing you a suite,” Giles went on. “Actually, the girls insisted on choosing for you - I had little say in the matter. However, if it’s unsatisfactory in any way, please let me know.”
“Giles,” Xander interrupted, feeling as if it were the first words he’d spoken in hours, “Is it indoors?”
“Why, yes,” the other man replied, puzzled.
“Is the toilet indoors, and does it have hot water somewhere in the vicinity?”
“It has a lovely in-suite bath, and, oh… yes. I suppose it will seem the height of luxury to you after Africa, won’t it?”
“Eh, it wasn’t all tents, field rations and latrine holes, but my standards are a little lower these days than they used to be, and that’s coming from a man who lived in his parent’s mildewy basement for some time. I’m sure it’ll be fine.”
The two fell silent, and the next thing Xander knew, he was being shaken awake. “We’re here,” Giles informed him. “Let me show you to your room. Feel free to sleep in tomorrow - there’s nothing on the agenda for you, and I’ll run the girls off so they don’t disturb you.”
For the first time he could remember that he didn’t have a Slayer in tow, Xander stripped out of his clothing and fell asleep without taking or drinking anything, sleeping for the next sixteen hours straight.
~**~
The days that followed were foggy in his memory, and not because he’d taken a lot of stuff, but because he had a lot of stuff to take in.
He was introduced to more people than he recalled ever meeting during the past five years; smiled at, hugged and afterwards carefully avoided all of the girls; begun to familiarize himself with the computer and files that were the tools of his office; interviewed secretaries. He needed his wits about him while he got his bearings, so he pretended this was like locating and working with a new Slayer.
He still took the pills or drank himself to sleep every night, though, which he hadn’t allowed himself to do when shepherding a girl in Africa. Here there was no one’s life depending on Xander being able to wake up and snap out orders in an emergency, and he didn’t want to chance some of the dreams that did come during those periods he’d gone without. And if he were slightly groggy and a bit hung-over first thing every morning? It soon passed, he was still able to absorb information and read computer screens, and he’d never had a reputation as a morning person in high school, so it shouldn’t startle his friends. Actually, he pretty much never saw his friends, so - no big.
He must’ve been seriously groggy the day they’d done the physical, or he’d have avoided it at all possible costs. He’d even kinda forgotten about it when the summons came from Giles.
~**~
“What’s up Boss?” he asked almost cheerfully. “I have an appointment with your shrink in a bit to talk about the profiles on the trainees.”
“Xander,” Giles was polishing his glasses, which meant something was bothering him. “I - perhaps I should call Dr. Marseilles about this after all. We …” he looked up into the puzzled face of the younger man, and regrouped a bit. “Why don’t you sit down?”
“What’s up?” Xander repeated, somewhat less confidently than before. He hadn’t survived five years in Africa, particularly when partially incapacitated during some of that time, without a good instinct for when something shitty was about to hit the fan.
“Xander,” the older man began again, “are you in a lot of pain?”
“No,” he responded quickly. “I mean, the eye still gets these phantom thingies sometimes, and my shoulder isn’t very happy on damp or foggy days, but…”
“Then why the hell do you have traces of every form of known medication for pain in your blood?” Giles’ expression wavered, as if it couldn’t decide if it wanted to be horrified or angry, making him look mostly like he was about to burst into tears. He waved a piece of paper at Xander, which the younger man realized had to be some sort of report. “The lab actually accused of us trying to test them by mixing several people’s samples of the same blood type, because they’d never seen that amount of pharmacology in a single person’s results before. What in God’s name have you been doing?”
He considered lying for about five seconds. But honestly, he kinda liked the job that he’d been given, and was pretty tired of feeling bad all the time, due to the after-effects of the substances he’d taken to try to avoid feeling bad. On the whole, although he’d never be a real hero, he didn’t much want to be the real loser he’d seen in his visions before his almost-wedding, or the one he came home to in his father’s favorite chair every night during his High School years, either. For the first time in five years, maybe longer, he told the truth, both to Giles, and, he realized, to himself.
~**~
The girls, however, were another story. He didn’t actually want to lie to them. He’d really never wanted to lie to them - it was one of the reasons he worked so hard at avoiding them, even before. But now - now that he was undergoing a medically supervised detox program and counseling with Dr. Marseilles - he was actively trying to become a ghost in the halls of Watcher so he didn't have to make up stories about what his life involved. He didn’t want to be seen by anyone who might see them and mention they’d ever seen him. He honestly wanted them to forget he’d ever existed. He discovered he did have some pride, after all, and that it couldn’t take the blow of Buffy or Willow or Dawn knowing how weak he’d been. He had two choices - lie, or vanish. Africa was beginning to call him again, but he knew he couldn’t go back. He was stuck here. But they didn’t have to know that, or even know he was here, if he had his way.
He’d underestimated his girls, once more. It actually started with Naori. She’d been asking after him for a couple of weeks, wanting to “catch up,” according to her voice mails and the messages he’d received from his new secretary. He honestly knew in a place this size that he couldn’t avoid her forever. But he never expected her to double-team him, calling in the big guns.
Naori was too shy and proper to hound him in his personal quarters. But Buffy had no such problem.
“At first I thought it was just me,” Buffy stated without preamble when he’d opened the door to his suite at her insistent pounding. “And we have enough history, I kinda understood why you might not want to be all buddy again with me for a while. But Nannie? She’s your girl - you found her, had her half-trained before I ever saw her. And just like all your other Slayers, she thinks you hung the moon. It’s killing her that you won’t talk to her. What the hell’s your deal, Xander?”
During her soliloquy she’d made her way inside, pushed him down on to the couch, and ended standing over him, looking every bit as intimidating as only a little over a hundred pounds of superwoman could look to a man twice her size with a quarter of her power.
Xander could barely breathe. He needed a drink. Where were his pills? He was letting them down. His job was stressful, his day had been hard, and now he’d hurt someone who relied on him. He was useless, like his father had always said. He’d failed again. Oh, God, Anya had died because he wasn’t able to take care of her - he’d lost his eye because he was helpless, he…
“Hey, deep breaths, okay? You’re hyperventilating. Calm down.” A strong but small hand was rubbing circles on his back. “It’s okay. I’ve been there, and you just need to breathe deep. It’s okay.” The warm body beside him on the couch leaned into his side. “I’m sorry, Xand. It’s okay.” Her voice was pitched low, soothing and calming his panic.
He reached up to clutch at his pounding heart, but he felt himself getting back under control. “Whoa,” he panted, “That was new, and not so fun.”
Buffy’s hand was still rubbing his back. “Panic attack. I’ve had a few, and they’re no picnic. Sorry.” He looked her in the eye and she smiled weakly. “I should’ve known. Willow and I both fell apart right after we got back. Why shouldn’t you, too?”
Xander snorted, his mouth in gear without his brain engaged. “I’m actually finally getting back together - fell apart after Sunnydale crashed.” A half second after saying it, his eyes went wide. He’d worked so hard at avoiding the girls so he wouldn’t hurt them by lying, and instead her hurled the truth at Buffy like a stink-bomb, hurting her far more by telling her that.
He certainly didn’t expect her to just shrug. “We all did, really. Just couldn’t let it all go until we got back here to safety.” She looked up at him, studying his face for a moment. “You haven’t quite realized this is safe yet, huh? The only place where everybody’s hurt as much as you have, and everybody loves you in spite of the mistakes you made? You, me, Willow, Giles - we’ve all been there. But you still think you’re the only one, don’t you? Have you talked to Dr. Marseilles yet?” When he nodded, she grinned. “He give you pills? I got Paxil,” she confided.
“Zoloft - but I’ve been taking it for a while. Wait a minute - you mean we all melted down after the ‘Dale?”
“Well, Willow did a lot of her meltdown before we even left, y’know, ending the world and all, hers was more of a long crying jag than an actually full-blown, but I - and I guess you were, too, - I was too tightly wrapped to let go then. I was dancing as fast as I could, trying to keep the First from being the world’s very last apocalypse. Then I went to Rome, and shoved everything down so far it probably bottomed out in my empty grave back there in that hole. Finally woke up when the Immortal started making noise about how to make me live forever, too. I mean, cm’on - he was just a good time! I didn’t want to become Queen of the Damned to be with him. I didn’t even want to get a place together, and he was talking about forever, without the ‘death do us part’ thing. I panicked and ran back to my Watcher.” She chewed her bottom lip for a moment. “Then I had my long overdue meltdown.”
“Turns out Giles had found Dr. M when he’d had his own version of the stress-out in the midst of re-animating the Council. Did you know the big guy had a minor heart-attack?” Xander shook his head numbly. “Stress related, of course,” Buffy reported, “Doin’ much better now. The doc understands both the para-normal and the stress that knowing about it puts on the human psyche. He’s been a godsend. After he saw both Giles and me, he predicted that any other members of our team from the bad old days would probably need some help, too. But when Willow came back mostly okay, I forgot about that. I shoulda known you’d take it hard, too, especially after Anya…”
When he winced, she fell silent, and studied his face. “Oh, man,” she moaned, “I can be so dense. You blame yourself, dontcha? And me, I’m sure.”
He caught his breath for the automatic denial, but couldn’t get the words out. She patted his knee. “It’s okay - I get it. I blame me, too. But I was so busy being sorry Spike had to go up in flames and happy that all the people that meant the most to me - you and Willow and Dawn and Giles - all got out, I didn’t start thinking about her, and the Slayers that didn’t make it, and the Slayers I’d condemned to a life I’d hated, and all - well. Party hearty in Rome, and ignore the voices of the dead, and then I came back here…” Her voice faltered and faded away. She shrugged again after a moment. “Meltdown,” she finished matter-of-factly.
She perked up for a moment. “You know Spike’s still alive? Or undead? Or maybe not - Angel’s crew kinda got wiped out saving L.A. The reports on who walked away are sketchy. But he came back for some reason after he went up in flames in the basement there.” She saw a total lack of emotion on Xander’s face. “Just thought you should know. Whatever.”
“You don’t seem to care,” he said gruffly.
“Therapy’s pretty great,” she answered philosophically. “I understand what was going on with us now. And I’m able to let it go.” She smiled a bit sadly. “Angel, too.”
It just felt right to reach out and wrap her hand in his, and it drew a genuine smile from her. “It gets better,” she told him.
He wondered if it was obvious he didn’t believe her.
~**~
He’d like to say that in spite of his doubt, it got better right away, but his life was no fairytale, and therapy was no “happy ever after.” Some days it was hard work, and some days it didn’t seem worth it all. He’d find himself itching for a little plastic bottle, or mentally heading to the pub nearby. He’d reconnected with Willow, but they just weren’t the same people anymore, and although he would always care for her, he just couldn’t turn to her when he was starting to slip. Giles, although much more accessible than Xander would have thought for someone with such an important job, was still a busy man, although they got together no less than weekly, just to talk or play darts in the faculty break room, or even to go to concerts together, which Xander just marveled at, especially because he’d developed a liking for both Classical Music, and Classic Rock, thanks to his mentor’s interests and encouragement.
It took him longer to reconnect with Naori, but once he did, he found himself remembering how much he’d enjoyed his time in Africa with her. They told jokes in Swahili at the dinner table, and laughed all the harder because no one else understood them (although Dawn often had a secretive smile on her face, too). They played poker, and gin, and even double solitaire together. Sometimes they’d just go out and walk for hours, because they missed that form of transportation here on the fringes of a big, car-focused city. He’d just about figured out what Watcher he wanted to pair her with, but he kind of hated to make the decision, knowing that soon after that was done, she’d be sent away to an assignment, and it would be a long time before he saw her again, most likely.
The closest thing he had to an AA sponsor was Dawn, who’d apparently had a none-too-brief alcohol soaked period of her life during her first two years of college and had actually been to AA, and understood with startling clarity what it felt like to crave the numbing feeling so bad your body itched with it. They had a regular table at the Starbucks that was a mile walk from the Council Building, and would traipse off there no matter what the weather when she could sense he was about to slip, or sometimes when he’d come to her and admit his weakness was creeping back in. She teased him and flirted with him, but her social calendar was full, and he was only a little hurt when she said she was “so over” her childhood crush on him. But they had talked a lot, and she knew he didn’t feel ready for any kind of a real relationship just now, so she wouldn’t have pushed it even if she was still interested, he knew. He grinned when he thought about the time she’d told him not to lose her number, though, just in case he changed his mind.
But his anchor, his breathing room, his best friend? Buffy. She’d stood by his side since the night she’d figured out what was going on with him and why he’d been avoiding everyone he used to care about. She understood - after all, she’d done the same thing, except she had to go to Rome to accomplish it.
Her meltdown had been bulimia. She’d binge and purge with all the abandon he put into chemically neutering his feelings, and she did it under the watchful eyes of both the stupid Immortal and the overtaxed Council. It took a long time before Giles noticed - probably because she’d already been on her way to anorexia long before she started throwing her guts up to purge her emotions, so it was hard to see that she’d lost even more weight. It took her actually collapsing during a training exercise that caught her Watcher’s attention. Slayers just don’t do that. But she had, and he looked into it. Soon after, the now ubiquitous “Dr. M” that Giles had been seeing privately had come on board, and was soon counseling more than just the Eldest Slayer and her Watcher. Even just being a cog in the wheel of the machine that was keeping the world safe from evil monsters was a stressful job, after all.
They would never be carefree kids again, although there was the argument that they never had been. But ignorance and immaturity had been bliss, and neither excuse was available anymore to any of them. Life was tough; monsters were real; people died. None of it was fun. But they had a future, not just a past, and they had to live with that foremost in their minds.
Today he’d found himself having that very discussion with Buffy as they walked through the Council’s busy halls. How hope was the only thing that could keep you running, and how to avoid losing it. And then they were approached by a couple of young girls who were giggling and poking each other as they came down the hall.
They almost walked on by, but the pair stopped before them and stared, grinning nervously as if they needed something, and Buffy and Xander were supposed to know what. The former Scoobies stopped, and the four of them just stood there, looking at each other, for what seemed like a long, long time.
Just as Xander had decided to just step around the girls and keep walking, one of them spoke.
“Miss, uhm, Buffy?” there was a hint of the nervous giggle in her tone. “We wondered, uhm, Talia and I wanted to have your picture with Watcher Harris. And maybe our pictures, with both of you?” She thrust a camera phone out in explanation. “Do you mind?”
Xander could see Buffy’s mind churning, although he wasn’t sure why. Then he realized - these were some of her trainees, and she wasn’t sure of the girl’s name. “Certainly, Maggie,” she said slowly, looking vaguely relieved when the girl didn’t wince, “I can’t see why not.” She gazed at Xander in question, and he shrugged.
So he tucked Buffy under his arm and smiled for the camera, then took the phone and photographed Buffy with both of the girls. Then Buffy took the phone and photographed Xander with both of them, then with each of them in turn.
The girls examined each of the photos, thanked them again profusely, then took off on down the hall in a cloud of giggles and excited chatter. Buffy snorted.
“They’re so gonna erase the pictures of me as soon as they get back to their rooms.”
“Huh?”
“They had no interest in my picture, Xander. They wanted to snuggle up to you and get photographic evidence that they did it.”
“Huh?” he repeated, somewhat more forcefully
Buffy rolled her eyes. “Please. I’m their teacher and trainer. They see me every day. And what’s more, I hear them, every day. You are a Man of Mystery - part of the original crew, the first Watcher who chose to be one rather than being born into it, you disappeared for almost five years that no one seems to know much about, you have the power over who they get assigned as a Watcher, and you’re a hot, older guy. There’s whole worlds of fantasies and gossip and crushes that can be woven from that fabric.”
“Hot? Me?”
Buffy’s eyes went around again, and she grabbed his hand and began dragging him in the direction they’d been going before. “Trust you to only hear one thing I said. But yeah, you’re hot. You’ve got the weight thing back under control, you no longer look like one of those starving children in the late night ads, and I know you’ve been working out, ‘cos I see you in the gym. And the girls do too, by the way. Could you stop weight training during my sparring classes? I can’t get any of them to pay attention when you’re in there. But anyway, you’ve got silver hair at your temples, and laugh lines around your eyes, which makes you look distinguished where it would just make me look old, the eye patch is actually sexy and you dress nicely these days, and yeah, you’re hot.” She thought for a moment, and her tone became more serious. “We’re all kind of celebrities. We represent an era of Slaying that doesn’t exist any more. We’re the museum pieces, kind of, you, me, Willow and Giles. And Oz and Faith, too, when they're in town. Even the ones who survived Sunnydale, although they weren’t with us all along. Molly, Rona, even Andrew and Dawn. We’re different, and whether that’s good or bad is still open for debate. We just are, and they notice that.”
Her steps slowed. “And they want to be a part of that, any way they can.” She stopped totally and turned to look him in the eye, frowning. “Be careful. There may be ones that want more from you than a picture. They may even stalk you, or something equally disturbing. It’s common knowledge that you’re single, and there may be girls who want to cure that little problem, but more for their own reasons than for you. Don’t let someone else hurt you, Xander. You’ve been through enough.”
He looked back, seeing nothing but concerned sincerity in the blue-green eyes of his closest friend. “I won’t,” he responded solemnly. Then he broke into a grin and grabbed her arms, pulling her closer. “Maybe we should do something about that whole ‘single’ thing to put them off.” It was a running joke between them, and maybe when the time was right it wouldn’t be a joke anymore, but that was part of the “living for the future” and “hope” that they’d been discussing earlier.
She pushed at his chest half-heartedly. “In your dreams buster,” she answered.
“Every night, Buff. Every night.”
~**~
So not so much with the dark. Just couldn't get there this time, and I had to have a hopeful ending, too. Still wanted to participate, and I've been working on this since I abandoned my first, far more lame, effort.