This is a response to Beloved Enemy's 100 Nights of Summer Xellos/Filia fanfic challenge- I'm going to try to do some of these, but I am still pretty new to writing fic, so I hope they are okay...

Disclaimer: I do not own these characters, or Slayers. I, in fact, own very little of anything.

Thank you for reading!

Prompt #48 You want me to wear *what*?

Xellos had grown accustomed to believing that he had no dignity. Pride, yes; style, absolutely…but dignity? He had assumed that the last shred of whatever dignity he had possessed had long ago been discarded in the endless maintenance of a façade of harmlessness. If he was honest with himself, his well-honed sense of humor often found puckish delight in silly antics, and if others underestimated him because of them, so much the better. In any case, dignity was not a term that came to readily to mind when referring to Lina Inverse and her party. To travel without dignity was to travel light, and to defend one's dignity was simply to provide an opening for attack.

But he was defending it now, violently. It was one thing, he reasoned, to change his physical being into that of a shapely woman, it was one thing to wear a fish person costume, it was one thing to soften and lift his voice to foppish whine, or to place himself in all manner of compromising and potentially embarrassing situations.

It was quite another to wear…The Item in Question.

Lina would have been in hysterics if she heard that Xellos was citing his 'dignity' as an excuse.

But he was. And the tall blonde in front of him was having none of it. She shifted her weight onto one full, shapely hip in a motion that dripped with disapproval and snarled at him, The Item in Question hanging off of a long, elegant hand.

"Don't you make excuses to me, mister," she hissed, "No one else will do it, the teachers are having a fuss, and Val has been crying all night because, and I quote, 'I can't enjoy the school festival if it doesn't have one.'"

"Why don't you do it?" he glanced around sharply for a means of escape. This had not been what he had in mind when Filia had begged ('begged' was a good word for it. Certainly better than 'coerced') him to help out with Val's school festival.

Filia, of course, was in charge of the festival preparations. She had truly blossomed with motherhood, and he was constantly amazed to see her transform into a warrior mother of epic proportion. When faced with teachers, schoolyard bullies, other mothers, pediatricians, Parent-Teacher Organizations, bake sales or fire drills, the naïve, bashful priestess was replaced by a whirlwind of organization and efficiency. She was on every committee, every chaperone list, and every disaster was duly passed off to her with the whispered sigh of relief that "Thank God, Filia is handling it!"

It was Xellos's personal opinion that she simply bulldogged every obstacle and left opposition stunned, hogtied, and wondering what had hit them.

He was not going to be bulldogged!

He continued desperately, "It would be cute on you! On me it would just be creepy! Do you really want to inflict that on school children? Why can't you wear it?"

"Because," and here Filia gave a long-suffering sigh and rolled her eyes heavenwards, "I'm already baking all the cakes for the cake walk, donating vases to the raffle and running the entire preschool nursery. I also have to present all the prizes while wrangling at least a dozen children." She glared at him, "Do you know how fragile human children are? I have to be very, very careful with them. They break so easily!"

"I'm not sure 'break' is the right word for it," Xelloss interposed pensively, "What you tend to do is more of a 'squish'…."

Filia gave him a look.

"I can't wear it if I'm caring for children. I need to have," she paused as if considering her words, "full range of motion. And I can't if I'm wearing…The Item in Question. Besides, I don't think it will fit over my hips. You have a much better figure than I do."

Xellos glared at her. "I'll have you know," he said, open-eyed, his voice low and dangerous with restrained anger, "That despite our, " he looked her up and down appraisingly, "cozy domestic situation, I am still one of the most powerful Mazoku in existence, the Priest-General of the Zelas Metallium, and if you think for one second that I am going to humiliate myself for your pleasure, you, my darling, have quite a lot of learning to do!"

After such a display of power and displeasure, Xellos was used to opponents fainting, soiling themselves or cowering in fear.

Filia just stomped a few paces closer to stare him full in the face. "You know," she said, her bright blue eyes locking with his steely violet ones, "You can be such a jerk! Give me one good reason why you won't wear it!"

The Item in Question lay draped haphazardly over the couch, but it did nothing to mitigate the complete disaster of its design. A pale purple and pink spotted crushed velvet unitard comprised the foundation, with a decadent splash of bright pink sequins and rhinestones tracing a shooting star from the left hip to shoulder. From the backside of the leotard hung a heavy, sparkling waterfall of glittery purple fibers tied together at the seam with a jaunty pink bow. There were matching patent leather pink thigh-high platform boots cleverly designed to look like hooves, and matching elbow length gloves. The whole glorious affair was topped by a towering horse headdress with coquettishly sparking cartoon eyes, an awkwardly braided purple mane and a two-foot-long, sparking pink horn.

It looked as though someone had found a five-year-old's candy-colored crayon fantasy and set about bringing it to life. Very, very literally.

It looked as though a fairy princess had vomited sparkles onto a taxidermied donkey.

It looked as though, through some abortion of nature, child's toy pony had grown up to realize his dream of being a low-rent burlesque queen.

"It's a Sparkling Unicorn costume," he hissed.

"It hardly has any glitter on it," Filia responded smoothly.

"But, Filia," Xellos nearly screamed, "It's a SPARKLING UNICORN COSTUME!"

"No one will know who you are under that headdress," Filia replied cajolingly, "Besides, if you wear this for me today," she whispered huskily, "I'll wear anything you want tonight."

...

... Perhaps a Sparkling Unicorn costume wasn't so bad.

And it would make Val happy…

And he'd always wanted to see Filia in black leather….or handcuffs...

The Festival was an incredible success, in no small part to an anonymous parent nobly biting the proverbial bullet and playing the part of the school's mascot, cheering the three-legged-races, doing petty magic tricks for delighted children, and presenting a blushing Filia Ul Copt with the school's appreciation award for her tireless efforts on the festival committee. The Unicorn was a smashing hit, although a few parents complained that the lap dance that accompanied his presentation of the award was hardly necessary and somewhat inappropriate for an elementary school audience. And scandal hit the Parent-Teacher Organization when it emerged that two mothers and one of the fathers had tried soliciting the Unicorn into indecent activities, but these events soon drifted away, like the streamers and popcorn and abandoned stands as the festival finished and families made their way home.

All the fuss went over Val's head as his mother tucked him into bed and kissed him goodnight. He sighed and drifted into dreams of a magic land where his mother laughed with unbridled delight, where unicorns pulled coins from behind his ears, where he could eat all the cotton candy he could stomach and win a three-legged-race and where all of his wishes came true.

AN: I feel really really sorry for subjecting Xellos to this, but I feel like Filia doesn't get enough victories in fic. Also, if you want to know what put the idea for the mascot into my head, simply google "unicorn costume" and prepare to be horrified.