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whatdoyouthinkmyjobis · 7 years ago

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Hunters on the Hellmouth

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AN: Inspired by events in BTVS 7.15 “Get It Done.” This chapter references events that happened in GND 14, mainly, The First tricked a Potential into being his vessel and she later exploded. Here’s a cheat sheet for keeping track of the Potentials. Oh, and sex below.

Chapter 34: F Is For

Buffy had wracked her brain for hours before resigning herself to the hopelessness of her situation. Her head was still pounding when Willow handed her a large caramel latte. “I may have blanked on pretty much everything, but I’m sure I could persuade Professor Yardy that coffee is part of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Need.”

Willow nodded. “I’d put it in the safety level. Could you imagine people driving without coffee?”

“This entire semester was a failure. Again. I don’t think I’m college-girl, Will.” Buffy enjoyed her classes, if not the homework and papers. But a deeper worry than grades churned inside of her. A college degree was a key to certain futures, and lately, Buffy felt her desires for her future and the reality of the Slayer crashing against each other.

“Don’t be discouraged!” Willow said. “School has ups and downs.”

“Like that time you got an A minus?”

“Dark days, but no. Take this semester off. Deal with the literal Devil incarnate, and try again next semester.”

The next semester started in nine months, an incomprehensible time frame when Buffy could barely wrap her head around the events of the week.

“Besides,” Willow added, “you spent your big study day dealing with Astrid and Jada.”

After notifying Astrid’s Watcher that she’d been killed by The First, helping Sam’s (ex-)girlfriend and her addled aunt escape to somewhere safer had been practically relaxing.

“That's the problem though. When have I ever had a semester without a Potential-killer or a Professor Frankenstein or a super vamp? A smooth semester is practically Bigfoot.”

As they walked on, Buffy put thoughts of school aside and focused on what she could handle -- grocery shopping for the packed house, the upcoming birthday she hoped to ignore, her newly human ex now crashing in her basement.

“Why so glum, chum?” Willow asked.

“I keep thinking about Principal Wood,” said Buffy. She’d tried to avoid him in the week since he beat Spike. “I can’t imagine spending my life on a Mel Gibson movie-esque vengeance quest, only to discover the bad guy is in another castle.”

Willow scrunched her face and asked, “Is Mel Gibson playing Mario in this analogy?”

“Kinda picture him more as a Luigi,” Buffy sighed. “At least Wood left Spike alive.”

Willow threw disapproving side-eye over her coffee. Spike living in the basement was awkward for everyone. The main argument against him had been his attack on her months prior, but Buffy was certain that monster had been exorcised.

Then there was the lack of space and food. As it was, bedtime changed the living room into a sea of army cots and blankets. And it was a struggle to make sure dinner was something more substantial than cereal.

“How many did Giles say he was bringing back today?” Buffy asked.

“You know how there are numbers the human mind can’t comprehend, like the age of the Earth, the number of atoms in your body, or how many people are living in our house?” Willow sounded tired.

“Xander said he could take a few. We just have to decide on who to move.”

“What about Gabi?”

“Gabi’s growing on me; she’s just...Gabi. Besides, we can’t move her or Cloé will go back to crying all the time. I’ll probably move Naomi,” Buffy added.

“Aw, but she’s sweet!”

“She’s also avoided the porch since Annabelle. She’ll be more comfortable at Xander’s.” Buffy glanced at her friend and asked, “How about Dani? Stay or go? I may be crazy busy, but I’m not blind.”

“She’s not subtle either.”

“Are you crushing, or is this a one-way street?”

Willow sat down on a bench at the edge of campus where they watched pigeons fight over a half eaten bagel.

“I know it was Lucifer, not Tara, but it was still her face. Her voice. I’ve been dreaming about her ever since. The way the sunlight would hit her eyes and make them glow, like she was some sort of sea goddess. I keep smelling her sweater, and I’m worried the scent is going to fade. And if my memories of Tara slip away --”

Holding her friend’s hand, Buffy grasped for words. “Sweetie, you’ll always have those memories. Tara was -- is -- a huge part of your life. But I don’t think she’d want to be mourned forever.”

“I don’t want to mourn forever, but how do you know when the mourning is over? It’s not like we have some calendar of crying with coordinating clothes like in ye olden times.”

Buffy’s worst breakup had been Angel, her high school sweetheart who guided her into Slayerdom. And she’d had to kill him. She still thought about the kiss before she ran a sword through him. She thought about it, but she didn’t cry. “I think mourning is over when you feel it’s over. Do you feel like moving on?”

“The idea kinda makes me woozy, and it’s not the good wooz. Even if I did feel the good wooz, I don’t know if it would be with Dani. She’s okay, and she’s here, but what I had with Tara was more intense than ‘okay’ and ‘here.’ I mean, she was my first…” Willow took a deep breath, then a smile bloomed across her lips. “The thing is, I loved Tara, but I also loved Oz. All of this death aside, I have a lot to sort through before I even know which way to move.”

“As long as all juicy details are provided, I’m there for you.”

Giles sat on the basement stairs with a well-earned mug of tea warming his hands. In the last few weeks, they’d added over a dozen more girls to the house, including the crowd of six he’d arrived with that afternoon. They were currently making themselves comfortable on the training mat while Dawn and Andrew set up their presentation.

The pair was becoming fluid in welcoming new girls and acclimating them to the house. Repetition would do that. Just as Giles was becoming comfortable with altering parents’ memories and ignoring the tears of children whose lives he’d saved by ruining them.

“Hi, I’m Dawn Summers. My sister is the Slayer. You’ll meet her later.”

“And I am Andrew Wells,” he said in an affected accent, “hero-in-training and resident chef at the Summers house.”

“You have a chef?” asked Ju, whose face was mostly obscured by thick, black bangs.

“He likes to be useful,” Dawn sighed, annoyed with already being off-track.

“Anywhoodle, we’re gonna make this quick so you can get on with your jet lag and culture shock,” said Andrew. “There are a few simple rules. One, don’t leave the house at night. The city is infested with vampires and The First will send them after you.”

Bianka, a pale Polish girl with strawberry blonde hair, raised her hand. “Are vee not safe here? Girl upstairs say you kill First.”

“You’re safe inside the house,” Andrew clarified hastily. “All those marks on the doors and windows keep out demons and vampires. As far as The First goes, we cooked some Storm Troopers, but the Dark Father is still very much alive.”

“Vot?”

Dawn jabbed her elbow in Andrew’s ribs before he could add to the confusion. “We’re working on it, which is why you’re here. Safe inside. Speaking of The First, remember that it doesn’t have a body, so it can’t physically hurt you. So that’s a good side. But in horror movie twist, it can appear in the form of any dead person. So if you see someone who you know is dead, tell someone.”

“The list of people who’ve died includes Buffy, Dean, Sam, and Spike,” Andrew added, pointing to three photographs and a stick figure drawing of a blonde in a black trench coat. The girls started to whisper. “Short story: they died and got better. None of them want to talk about it, so don’t ask for more details.”

Ginika, a girl with tiny knots of hair dotting her head asked, “These people are regular to the ‘ouse? How do we know if they’re real or not?”

“If you throw a pencil at them and it goes through them, they’re The First,” Dawn said with atonal brightness. “If they tell you bad stuff like, ‘You’re a loser’ and ‘Why don’t you give up?’, they’re The First.”

“Throw things and be positive,” Andrew repeated with a big smile and rainbow hand gesture.

“The rest of your safety stuff will be covered in training--”

“Hold up!” said a dreadlocked girl in overalls. “I came here for protection. Mr. Giles said I was in danger, and I already knew something was watching me. What the hell you talkin’ ‘bout training?”

Giles had told all of the girls about their calling as Potentials as well as the danger that awaited him, but at his current break-neck speed, he couldn’t promise they’d all comprehended his information dump.

He cleared his throat. “Rona, you are in danger because you are a Potential. You may become the next Slayer, so you need to be trained accordingly.”

“But I don’t wanna be no Slayer. I got plans, an’ they don’t involve vampires.”

“I’m not arguing that the system is fair. I’m simply saying we want you to be prepared,” Giles replied.

Shaking her head, Rona stood up and hoisted her duffle over her shoulder. “Nah, you promised me an’ Gran I’d be safe here. Now you’s sayin’ it’s too dangerous to be out after dark, but you want me to bust up that danger? With what? You want me to poke it with a damn stick? Man, I’d be better off back in Flint.”

Giles scratched his chin as he considered the frightened girl before him. “If you want to catch a bus back to Michigan, you may, but you should have all of the facts first. For example, nearly all of my fellow Watchers are dead -- blown up or cut to bits. As I’ve traveled the world picking up Potentials, I’ve been too late for over a dozen of them. A couple were still warm as they lay in pools of their own blood. The last Potential who decided to leave the safety of the house was returned by The First with her throat missing. Just yesterday, The First intercepted another Potential at the bus station. She died. Now, would you like me to get you a bus schedule?”

Rona sat down.

Dawn tried to salvage her presentation. “Um, Buffy will be back by dinner to talk training with you. She may even take a few of you out on patrol tonight.”

Andrew lit up. “Now let’s talk about my favorite thing: The Wheel of Chores. Me, Dawn, and Willow put it together, so be nice to us.”

Buffy’s afternoon walk with her best friend had relaxed her, but the knots in her muscles returned the moment she and Willow entered the backyard. Where she’d expected to see her three squad leaders -- Grace, Dani and Gabi -- drilling the girls in combat basics, she instead found three Potentials smoking and laughing with Spike. She was only half surprised. New arrivals always seemed to throw off the schedule. Plus, she’d heard the girls whispering about the mystery man downstairs; she hadn’t had the time or energy to explain him to them yet.

She certainly didn’t have the energy or patience now. Buffy marched over to Kate, a sarcastic eye-roller from Ireland, and yanked the cigarette from the girl’s mouth. “Ever heard of cancer?”

“No, but I did hear a story about how we’re all fooked, so why’s it matter?” she asked, smoke curling around her glossed lips. Kate had been high on their success after rescuing Sam from The First, but Astrid’s death had sent her back to her neutral state of doom and gloom.

“You’re not fucked,” said Spike, apologetically.

Buffy grew hot with anger. “He’s right. You’re not fucked. I am. Have you noticed how there aren’t any full-grown, know-what-they’re-doing-with-life, briefcase-carrying Potentials here? Because you phase out. I stay alive, and you get too old to qualify for the Slayer Happy Meal. And I’m a bitch to kill, aren’t I, Spike?”

“Like a cockroach,” he muttered to the ground.

“You die,” said Eva, a pixieish blonde who’d arrived from France a week before.

Tucking her green hair behind her ears, Lys asked Eva, “Étiez-vous en train de lui dire de mourir ou de demander quand elle est morte?”

“Le petit homme n'a pas dit qu'elle est morte?”

“Andrew told us you died once,” Lys explained.

“Twice.” Buffy squeezed her fist and released, regretting her anger. She didn’t need to add her tension to theirs. Calmly, she said, “I don’t want to catch you smoking again, got it? Not a great habit for people who have to run a ton. Now get your butts inside.”

Buffy watched the girls slink back to the kitchen and huffed, causing her bangs to flop into her eyes. “What are you doing out here, Spike?”

He raised his hand to his lips, then dropped it. He hadn’t been smoking with the girls. “Enjoyin’ the sun.”

“Really?”

“Inside’s a sardine can. Given the ‘eightened fear since that girl exploded at the ��igh school, I thought I’d chat up the mini-yous out ‘ere.”

“They’re not me,” she said coldly. “And they’re also minors.”

Spike stepped back, hurt in his eyes. He peered at her, into her, in his familiar, intimate way. “Test didn't go well then?”

How did he know? How did he always know? Buffy bit the inside of her cheek, ashamed anew at the way she'd lashed out. “I'm just going to pretend F stands for footloose and fancy-free.”

“Or fighter.”

The anger rushed out of her. He was right. She had passed greater tests than Developmental Psychology or a packed camp of teenagers.

“Or flirt. As in don't. The girls don't need you distracting them.” The venom in her voice was gone. Some of the girls, who were otherwise good fighters, were hopelessly boy-crazy. Having the Winchesters as trainers had drawbacks.

“Don't worry. I think we both know Angel’s the vamp into shagging teenagers.” Spike smirked.

“You were all with the sweet a moment ago. Where did William go.”

Spike laughed, low and rich. “William is gone, love. Good riddance. My demon, too. Still sorting out who’s left.”

Spike had been met with trial after trial since getting his soul back. He had been unfortunate enough to be the first creature Lucifer encountered when he rode the angel wave to Sunnydale. He’d become a cosmic punching bag, but she knew another, grander side of Spike.

“You want to help? I need leaders, fighters, people who can train teenage girls to kill vampires. You in?”

“Damn right, I’m in.”

“Be ready at eight,” she said before heading inside.

In the kitchen, Dawn was arguing with Willow about Ella, a techno-pagan from Australia who’d arrived a week prior. Since a few of the Potentials showed magical prowess, Willow was giving them additional tutoring. Ella was gifted beyond all of them.

“I don’t care if she doesn’t want to cook. It’s her turn,” Dawn insisted.

“If she says she can’t, then give her something else to do!” Willow replied, loud enough to draw the attention of several other girls.

Buffy’s stepped in between them spoke quietly so the other girls couldn’t hear. “Infighting is not on my list of needs, like, ever.” She looked over Willow’s shoulder, where Ella stood, arms crossed. “If you don’t know how to cook, Andrew can teach you. We can get another person to help, too. It’s just really important that everyone pitch in, you know?”

The girl sighed. “I know how to cook, but I can’t help with a big meal. Can’t clean up after it. Probably can’t eat it.”

This rang a bell. Buffy had noticed her sneaking away when the other girls were eating, but had yet to ask her about it. “Why? You have to eat to stay strong.”

“I eat! I eat my own food. Your food is too dangerous. I’ve killed two vampires in training no problem, but peanuts or dairy? That’s the end of me. If that means I clean the loo twice as often, fine. ”

Dawn turned away, embarrassed.

Buffy nodded. “Thanks for the compromise, Ella. Dawn, will you rearrange Andrew’s chore chart for Ella’s allergies?”

Buffy pointed at a pale strawberry blonde. “You, newbie, help Andrew.” She left before she could get angry again. Hopefully Dawn and Willow could make up without her.

In the living room, a group of girls were teaching each other their favorite dance moves. Buffy noticed Grace sorting out a squabble between Lili (always Lili) and Verusha over whose shirt was whose. Leticia, Cloé, and Gabi, giggling so hard tears streamed from their faces, bounced on the pillows and blankets piled on the couch. In the corner, Dani whispered with a pretty new girl. The girl (woman? She looked older.) had an explosion of dark curls and a small toy in her hand.

The dining room held a stack of folded cots that reached Buffy’s shoulders. Despite the cramped conditions, three girls were squished in at the dining table attempting to do homework.

Heading upstairs to find Giles, Buffy practically tripped over Mio, Jabulela and Naomi folding laundry on the steps.

“Bathroom’s busy,” Naomi said cheerily. The bathroom was alway busy.

Buffy nodded, catching a glimpse of the two girls from Mumbai, initially chilly towards each other, doing each other’s hair in the bathroom.

Giles was on the phone, pacing in her room, the one place off-limits to the Potentials.

“Miércoles, si. Gracias, Padre.”

“Padre?” she asked when he hung up. “Have you been keeping secrets?”

“No,” he said, swapping the phone for a file, “it seems I need to fly to Spain tonight. Three girls managed to make it to an abbey outside of Barcelona. There were five of them originally…”

“Oh.” Much as Buffy hated being trapped in a house overrun with strangers, she didn’t envy Giles for his nightmare.

“Anyway, I should be back in time for your birthday on Sunday.”

“Shh!” She grabbed the file from Giles’ hand. “We’re keeping that one super secret. No way it won’t add to the weird.

“Tell me about the new girls.” She flipped through the notes. Ginika from London. Ju from Toronto. Bianka from Wroclaw -- the strawberry blonde she’d told to help with dinner. The dossier said her English wasn’t the best. Good luck, Andrew. “Training?”

“Ginika has several year’s worth. Julia, Holly and Rona were completely in the dark, while Ju and Bianka have over a year between them. Julia, at least, runs a dojo with her husband--”

“Her what?!”

Giles gave her his grave news face.

Buffy flipped open Julia’s file, and was greeted by the face of the woman who’d been whispering with Dani. The Potential was twenty-two, married and -- Buffy’s heart skipped a beat -- Julia had an infant. A little girl.

Julia had the life Buffy could never have.

Snapping the folder shut, Buffy swallowed hard. “Spike’s joining my pod tonight.”

“Do you think that’s wise?”

“What else are we going to do with him? I’ll take Bianka, Ginika, Kate, Kimberly, Shakti, Wook, and Udoka. We’ll put our Spanish-speaking girls with Sam. Except Gabi. I need her and Dani to get the latest newbies up on their weapons training.”

“Didn’t Fernanda go out the day before I left for France?” Giles asked

“And she nearly got herself killed. Gotta get back in the saddle or on the bike or whatever non-motorized travel you chose.” Buffy was suspicious that Fernanda had a little crush on Sam, but with the language barrier, he was the best suited to train her. “I know I should know this, but I’m totally fried. Who speaks French?”

“Natively: Jabulela, Lys, Eva. Violet and Shakti speak it as a second language. Ju speaks some, but I doubt you want her out so soon.”

“None of them are Molly-levels of boy crazy, are they?”

“That would be difficult,” Giles sighed. “How is she doing, by the way?”

“At least a week in the hospital. Maybe two.” Buffy hoped Molly’s Potential state would speed her recovery from her burns.

She ran through the names in her head again. “Okay, leave Ju for weapons training. Put the French-speakers with Dean; Vi can translate. Give him Shakti, too. Voila! Three functioning squads.” Functioning felt like a stretch.

Buffy tossed the files on the desk and headed for the door. “You can give the others the destiny speech again, right?”

“Buffy!” Giles called out before she left. “How was your day? Did your examination go well?”

She watched his mouth move but had to hear the words a few times before understanding she needed to respond. She’d already shut the door on school. “Uh, I guess. I have to get downstairs, meet the new girls and all.”

Buffy had only wanted one thing for her birthday, private time with Dean. Instead, they’d spent the weekend moving ten girls into the Winchesters’ apartment and another half dozen to Xander’s. At least it was easier to get time in the bathroom.

As promised, Giles had returned Sunday night with three emotionally -- if not physically -- scarred Potentials. He had forgotten it was her birthday.

Monday morning started with tears. The last time someone had cried so much in Buffy’s makeshift office, it was because their parents were divorcing. Starting a new school barely ranked by comparison, but Magda’s big tears probably had less to do with math class than survivor’s guilt.

Buffy handed her another Kleenex. She’d thought putting Magda in school this quickly would help her, give her something to think about other than the slaughter on the train. Now she wasn’t so sure. “Listen to me, you did the best you knew how to do. It’s not your fault no one from the Watcher’s Council found you. It’s not your fault you were picked for this. Most importantly, it’s not your fault that those other girls died.”

Magda, who had just arrived the night before, was untrained. The only reason she’d survived the Bringer attack was because the girls she was with, Betje and Sophia, had eight years of training between them. Betje and Sophia’s Watchers and two Potentials had died in the attack.

“The-they were def-f-fending me. I do not know f-fighting.”

“But you know surviving. That’s all you need to do today: survive. You have all the same classes as Dawn, Cloé and Sophia, so you won’t be alone, okay?”

The girl nodded and wiped a black streak of mascara under her eyes. “Sophia is nice. She share with me candy bar.”

“If you need anything, I’m here all day. Now, go wash your face, take a deep breath, and go pretend Algebra makes sense.”

Once Magda was off to class, Buffy pulled out a worn journal Giles had brought back from his travels. It was his first journal as her Watcher, and he’d been hesitant to let her see it.

“There’s very little about you I haven’t changed my mind on,” he had explained, “in some cases a few times. Please, do not think this is the entirety of my view of you, Buffy.” She’d taken the journal with a smile, vowing to cry into her pillow and hold every word against him.

She’d asked to see it because she wanted to know how spun always-together Giles had been when he’d started as her Watcher. There were obvious differences. She was already the Slayer by that time, and her first Watcher, Merrick, had been murdered. Most importantly, there had only been one of her. Even so, she felt the journal would give her a peek into Giles’ mindset and methods that memory couldn’t provide.

The first few pages were Giles’ gleeful anticipation of her arrival. He had assumed the Council had been in touch since Merrick’s death, and that she knew he had been assigned as her new Watcher. The day she started school in Sunnydale, his journal read, “I had been lead to believe the Slayer is a paragon of discipline and duty. She is at peace with her destiny and gives herself over to the cause no matter the cost. This is not the case.

“I have spent the entire day surrounded by teenage girls. The Slayer is a teenage girl, a mystifying sort of creature who varies from age to age, continent to continent, culture to culture, and apparently hour to hour. No amount of destiny and duty will change this overnight.

“Though a gifted fighter, Buffy seems wholly uninterested in training. She would much rather run off with her friends in childish pursuits of what they refer to as ‘hang time.’ This adherence to friends and the social structures of the natural world is highly unusual.”

“That’s me, Unusual Girl,” she muttered.

She was deep in the journal when a voice interrupted her. “Miss Summers, may I see you in my office for a moment?”

Buffy looked up to see Principal Wood leaning against the edge of her cubicle, jacket unbuttoned, as casual as a person who had recently beaten an ex-vampire to a pulp could be.

Journal still in hand, she followed him into his office.

“Coffee?” He gestured to the chair across from his desk.

Having been up most of the night with Magda and company, she desperately wanted another cup. “No, thank you.” Though Wood’s story was no longer a mystery, she still found his piercing, dark stare unnerving.

“Two more new girls today,” he noted.

“Three. We have three, but one has already graduated.”

“Ah.” He leaned back in his chair and stared at her as if he was regarding a complicated piece of art. “How many started at Sunnydale last week? Six? Eight?”

“Fuzzy vagueness sounds right.”

“We certainly have the space,” he said. Several dozen families had moved out of town over winter break. “Buffy, do you know why I hired you?”

“You believe I can make a difference? I’m too tired to cliche.”

“I hired you because you’re the Slayer, and Sunnydale High’s death rate is the stuff of legend. In these few months, you’ve saved several students both from the typical evil creatures and from the everyday pressures they face. You’re good at this, at guiding kids.”

All this time, she’d been flying by the seat of her pants, doling out advice with no knowledge of its impact. “You think so?”

“You’re a good leader, which is why I’m firing you.”

“Excuse me?”

“You have a houseful of Potential slayers who need guidance. You can’t give them what they need if you’re here all day.”

“But most of them are here during the day. And you know what teenagers love? Eating. How can eating happen if work isn’t happening?”

“You’re resourceful. Besides, with the sudden downturn in legit enrollment, I can’t justify keeping you on.”

“But I need --”

“You need to be the Slayer.” He opened one of his drawers and handed her a purple sack and three small books. “Speaking of, my mother’s Watcher gave her these when she became the Slayer. I guess technically, they belong to you.”

She opened the bag and pulled out a small metal figure shaped like a man either dancing or writhing in pain. “Modern art? Great,” she muttered.

“I’ll get you a box,” he said, opening the door for her to leave.

Buffy, box at her feet, was sitting on a planter near the parking lot when Dean pulled up. He rolled down the passenger window and called out, “Hey sexy, need a lift?”

Her face flicked between amused and upset as she climbed in with her box and slumped against his shoulder.

“Is that a fired box?”

“Yep.”

“Want me to kick Wood’s ass?”

“Yes, but don’t,” she sighed. “Can I hang out with you today? I don’t want to go home.”

“Do you want a frou-frou coffee before or after you tell me what’s up?”

“Before.”

She barely looked at him as she sipped her latte, her frown sinking into her skin, her bones. He didn’t press. For once, they had hours alone, so he held her hand and waited. By the time they pulled up to his work, she’d filled him in on the details.

“Now do you want me to kick his ass?”

“No,” she said, this time with a half smile. “He’s not wrong. Slayer comes first, but it’s not like being the Slayer means I’m ready to run Buffy’s Halfway House for Protected Teenagers. The electricity and water cost money. They need food and blankets and soap. And dear God, they need deodorant! Did you know that’s not a thing in some countries? Not to mention, some of them have nothing. Last night’s arrivals? Literally the clothes on their backs. And Lili is from, like, the armpit of Estonia and keeps stealing from the other girls because everything she has fits in a backpack. Jabulela washes the same Catholic school uniform every night and wears it again in the morning.”

Dean had grown up poor, poorer than he’d understood as a child, but some of the Potentials were lucky if they had enough dirt to rub together. Not for the first time, he felt being the Slayer was less of a superhero calling and more of a crapshoot punishment.

But anger would have to wait. “Didn’t Giles say some of the Potentials’ parents offered to help?”

“Yeah, and they’ve been sending money, but it doesn’t come close to covering everything.”

“Can you ask for more?”

Buffy sighed. “‘Hey! It’s that stranger who has your daughter. I’m going to need more money for pizza rolls.’ No way that doesn’t sound like a terrible ransom note.”

Dean shrugged. “Pot pie instead of pizza rolls? It’s a comfort food.” A plan to hustle pool in LA all weekend half formed in his mind. “Anyway, I got it covered.”

“Legally?”

“Legally.”

“Safely?”

“Beggars and choosers, babe.” If Sunnydale’s citizens shifted from trickling exodus to pack-and-grab panic, looting would become too easy of an option to ignore.

He lead her upstairs to a recently vacated apartment he’d spent all morning painting. His boss believed all the people leaving town were merely a winter trend, and by spring people would be looking for places to live. Dean disagreed, but he was paid to paint.

“Maybe we could key his car?” Buffy pondered, tossing her purse and coat in the middle of the room.

“What?”

“Wood. The more I think about it, the angrier I get. I don’t need him to look out for me. If work and slaying was too much, I would have said something.”

“No you wouldn’t,” he laughed. “You’d just keep wobblin’ with that globe on your back.”

“Not like I can put it down,” she grumbled. “Besides, if he wanted to help, he could have -- crazy idea -- volunteered to help. But nope. He jumped straight to a backhanded firing.”

“Flaming bag of dog shit,” Dean said as he poured the paint.

“Is that your new nickname for Wood, or your suggestion for swift retribution?”

“Both.”

Loading his roller, he started the second coat of paint. “Can I help?” Buffy asked.

He smirked at her khakis and black turtleneck. “Not really dressed for it, Girly.”

She cocked her head to the side -- her signature I don’t like what I’m hearing move.“Got another roller?” A moment later she was painting beside him, stripped down to only her black panties.

He managed to resist for half an hour before they collapsed into a pile of paint-flecked limbs, their sweat-slick bodies cooling in the afterglow.

Spreading her fingers over his chest, she purred, “Being unemployed isn’t so bad.”

“Told ya work was overrated.”

Before the priest stood a young brunette -- fourteen, on the cusp of womanhood -- with a crushed windpipe and a handprint-shaped bruise on her throat. A handprint that fit the priest perfectly.

Caleb picked up the leftover wine from communion and guzzled it. Some Catholics believed the wine turned into the blood of Christ. He liked the idea of the blood of a deity running down his throat.

He smiled, slick and satisfied. “She was the first little whore I killed. You got a point in showin’ me this?”

“You have a long history of doing God’s work, Caleb,” said the specter.

Caleb pinched out the candles in his sanctuary, enjoying the sizzle and hiss of his flesh. “Keepin’ the world clean of uppity women is God’s highest calling. And who are you, ghosty?”

“I’m one of God’s angels. He has a job for you. There is a houseful of uppity women who need to be put in their place.”

The killing visions had been flooding his dreams. Girls screaming. Crying. Blood soaking through their dresses. He’d wake up from them hard and aching. Surely, this was a sign. “I am a willing servant if you will but show me the way.”

I have a slight plot hole regarding The First and "Amends." I was going to fix it in this chapter with a phone call between Angel and Buffy after she's read Giles' journals, but I feel very crunched for time. Being a new mom (and being sick all the time, thanks winter), I don't have as much time to write. I'd rather get you this chapter with a minor plot hole than hold on to it for another six months.

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