Part I: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1096503.html
Part II: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1100922.html
Part III: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1104619.html#cutid1
Part IV: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1108537.html
Part V: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1112216.html
Part VI: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1124762.html
Part VII: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1134781.html
Part VIII: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1139412.html
Part IX: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1146552.html
Part X: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1155478.html
Part XI: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1164418.html
Part XII: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1173922.html
Part XIII: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1178885.html
Part XIV: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1182860.html
Part XV: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1186127.html
Part XVI: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1189171.html

“Um.” Xander cleared his throat. “Normally I’m all for vampire slayage, but I should just point out, she’s the Vampire Slayer. Tougher than normal, faster than normal, strong enough to leap… well, mausoleums in a single bound. She’s going to kill him. Correction: she is going to drive a wooden stake through his heart. And if that doesn’t kill him, she is going to probably take his head off. Taking heads off destroys most creatures,” he added with a shrug. “The ones that that doesn’t work for, well, once we had to steal a rocket launcher. Borrow,” he added hastily. “Borrow! The point is, if you don’t want Buffy decapitating this guy- hurry.”

Professor Valerian was staring at him. “You… she… what kind of world do you children live in?”

“Sunnydale,” Willow offered. “Although I don’t think, technically, we count as children anymore. Legally, sure, but I think around your second or third vampire or demon kill, you really stop being a child. And that means – oh, no, just hurry. We have to stop her in case he’s not really a vampire, although,” she caught her breath, grabbed Xander’s hand, and started running. “You know,” she called over her shoulder, as the professor and Magnolia took a moment to process that they were running, “if that makes you not a child, by that standard, Buffy is, like… Methuselah. Or maybe Methuselah’s older brother? Sister, obviously. I mean, really.”

“…Sunnydale.” The professor had caught up and was passing them by; Magnolia was keeping up with them. “That does explain a lot. I wonder why we weren’t warned?”

“Maybe nobody noticed? There’s a lot of nobody-notices going on with Sunnydale.”

“There’s a lot of… what?” The professor almost stopped. Willow and Xander did not. “What did you mean by that?”

“Talk later stop now.” The shout from around the corner made it look like they might already be too late. Buffy was making the little grunting noises she didn’t know she made, the ones that meant she was actually getting a work-out. “Oh, no, there aren’t actually for real monsters, demons, here, are there? Because I didn’t bring any of my kit.”

“Face it, our kit just keeps us from getting killed, Will.” Xander had gotten in a lot better shape this summer; he wasn’t even panting.

“Well, that’s a good place to start, don’t you think?” she snapped. “I like not getting killed. Us not getting ourselves killed, that gives Buffy less to focus on, and that’s good, too. Right?”

He held up his hands, tripped, caught himself on something, noticed that the something was someone, and fell quiet. Willow did, too. The something – someone – was a tiny blonde girl with perfect curls, an outfit out off the cover of Seventeen Magazine’s “All Pink All the Time” issue, and the nastiest smile Willow had seen outside of the Cordettes.

“Oh, did I get in your way?” she asked, as sweetly as one could offer to eviscerate someone.

“Oh, No, I got in my own way. Nice to meet you-”

The girl had already stopped paying attention. “Professor Valerian! This new girl is causing trouble.”

“Aggie,” Professor Valerian muttered. “Why am I not surprised?”

Willow didn’t care. She moved around the short girl and around the corner. Buffy was in trouble, or Buffy was going to get in trouble, and either way… “Oh. Oh my, you’re tall.”

Buffy was in a hand-to-hand fight with two people. One of them looked more like a Transylvanian reject than any Sunnydale vamp. The other was just ridiculously tall. And big. And Buffy was winning – but only just barely. She had her eyes closed, and she was doing a lot of throat shots, which in the case of the giant were spinning jump shots.

“Wow.” Xander leaned against a wall. “Watch her go.” He whispered; he probably didn’t need to. Buffy was pouring everything she had into the fight.

“I know,” the blonde complained. “She’s been at this for nearly a minute. When do you think she’ll give up and realize that she’s outnumbered and outgunned?”

“What, the Buffster?” Xander shook his head. “Not going to happen. And, besides, she’s not outnumbered anymore. I see three of you, three of us. So, what kind of demon are you?”

“I beg your pardon!” she huffed.

“Well, okay, you can beg if you want, but the question still stands. Because you’re cute and you’re talking to me, and that almost always means demon. Or bug-monster. Or hyena-creature, but that was pretty demonic…”

Next: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1220972.html

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