DISCLAIMER: The characters of Mai-Hime do not belong to me! They belong to Sunrise or someone.

DISCLAIMER: The universe of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and all of the awesome lore connected to it belong to the amazing Joss Whedon. I would recommend having at least a basic knowledge of the Buffyverse to read this fic without confusion. Though honestly, if you are a fan of Mai-Hime and somehow have –never- watched Buffy, I recommend that you stop reading my fic and go watch Buffy instead because you've been missing out all these years. ^^ This fic won't really contain any of the characters from BtVS canon other than cameos, but a sequel fic will.

(Author's note: No particular pairings, but rest assured it is yuri-flavoured.)

(Author's note for nitpickers: In strict BtVS canon India, The Slayer previous to Buffy did most of her work in Japan. For the sake of my story, I'm making it so that her father was stationed in Germany instead of Japan, so therefore she would not ever have met Natsuki. So far everything else minus Natsuki's story continues as per BtVS canon.)

(Alright kiddies, this ends the legalese/authornote Spam. Please make sure you are buckled in good and tight and wearing all of the necessary protective gear. Also I ask that you keep any extremities inside the vehicle at all times as many of the characters bite. Packing snivel gear to deal with any angst is also recommended.)

A Slayer Forged

Hokkaido, Japan: Autumn 1990

Toshihiko Kanzaki carefully schooled his face to not show the elation he was feeling as he entered the state of the art facility of his business. As far as anyone in the public knew, the First District was researching and developing better lasers as well as experimenting with holographic technology. In reality the First District employed over a hundred powerful sorcerers along with experts on the history of all things magical, demonic or otherwise supernatural.

Kanzaki was the current head of a centuries old offshoot of a secret society known as the Watcher's Council. Kanzaki's branch of the Council believed that they should spend resources to attempt to improve the Slayer-line. The main branch of the Council, being run by cowards, believed that magical experimentation of this nature was simply too dangerous to risk.

Soon all the years of searching by Kanzaki's ancestors were finally going to pay off. They had managed to get a complete copy of the original ritual used to infuse the demonic essence into an exceptional girl to create the First Slayer. While they had not managed to determine the type of demon originally used, they were able to locate a demon that they believed to be suited in both physical abilities and temperament to be the source essence of a Slayer.

The Uelfur Demon was selected to supply the essence as its main food source was other demons. These wolf-like Demons from the far north were very strong, fast and remarkably durable. All of the qualities that were necessary to make a Slayer. Also an Uelfur Demon forms close bonds with the other members of its pack and is extremely protective of other pack members as well as their territory. Some of the less animalistic species of demons had even been known to use tame Uelfur Demons as guard animals. And what is a Slayer if not a glorified guard dog? The Demon was waiting in a temperature-controlled holding cell in the basement area of the complex under heavy guard until the Potential was secured. They had chosen a very young Potential from a small town in a rural area of Japan in hopes that the main branch of the Watcher's Council would not learn of the impending success of the ritual. Now all Kanzaki had to do was wait for his agent Nagi Homura to secure the girl so that they would be ready to perform the ritual next week.

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Nagi ran a delicate hand through his collar-length silvery hair, again trying not to laugh out loud at the idea that Kanzaki thought this plan could possibly work. Kanzaki had always been bad at reading people, but then Kanzaki while debatably as morally challenged as Nagi himself, didn't seem to realize that he was different from the majority of the population in those regards. Kanzaki didn't even consider the possibility that the girl's mother would turn the First District's offer down.

The offer was really laughable, a lame organized crime-style cliché. He was supposed to offer this woman, Saeko Kuga a large sum of money in exchange for her daughter. Granted it was an exorbitantly large amount of money and he was promising her that his organization would take excellent care of her daughter, but really how could even someone so dense as Kanzaki think the woman was going to fall for that one? Yes she was an unmarried mother, and that was a bit of a stigma; yes she and her daughter had to make do on very little in the way of money. But still they were surviving, not desperate. Saeko loved her little Natsuki, she wasn't a druggie or mentally ill. Nothing short of her death would be enough to "convince" her to hand Natsuki over to the custody of the First District, especially given the short timeframe that Nagi had to work with to secure the prize.

Fortunately for Nagi's position in the organization and most unfortunately for Kuga-san, Nagi could quite easily arrange for the young mother's death. All he needed was to do a little bit of magic, and then he would have the young Natsuki in his possession to take back to Kanzaki. His boss wouldn't even have to know exactly what had befallen the late Kuga-san. Oh not that he wouldn't suspect Nagi had done something horrible to the young mother. Nagi knew that even if Kanzaki knew for certain he would only offer a token objection, a formality of moral superiority over his more ruthless colleague. Kanzaki knew as well as Nagi did that there was no room for error with the timing of the ritual, and because of that they needed to get the girl through any means necessary using a method that would insure that no one would be looking for her. Thank good fortune for Saeko's stuffy traditional Japanese father who had disowned his daughter for giving birth outside of wedlock or this would prove more difficult.

The dark rainy night was perfect to make certain this spell aroused no suspicions. Nagi gazed out the darkly tinted window of the company limo at the deserted oceanside highway. The cliff had a guardrail, but it was flimsy and not very well maintained, not to mention Kuga-san was already driving recklessly away from Nagi's vehicle, frightened by their earlier confrontation outside of the retail store where she worked.

Turning back to the spell ingredients lay out on the carpeted floor of limo, Nagi sat down cross-legged inside the circle he had drawn earlier. Luckily this spell wasn't dependant on the particular locations of the object being teleported or the place it was being teleported to. It only required the proper sacrifice, a lock on the essence of the object to be teleported, and that the caster be strong enough in conviction that his will be done.

Lifting the dagger from the floor he gazed at the bound girl across the circle from himself. She was a bit older than Natsuki and thankfully spoke no Japanese. He figured she was probably the child of some tourist that had gotten separated from her family. Her curly black hair fell into ever fearful, teary blue eyes. When she had first been kidnapped she had been unruly and loud, lashing out at her captors. That had been until Nagi had broken a few of her fingers and gagged her. Surely if her body was ever found it could cause an international relations incident for Japan, people being shocked to hear of tourists being randomly taken hostage and tortured for who knows what reason… but her body would not be found so it was no problem.

Effortlessly chanting the Latin phrases of the spell as though he spoke the language every day, Nagi casually drew the sharp dagger across the girl's throat. Not deep enough to sever anything too seriously and make her bleed out before the spell was complete, just enough to get the blood for the ritual and to make it look very serious. After all, he had threatened Kuga-san that her daughter would die a horrible death if she didn't hand the girl over, and that is what she would see as soon as this spell was complete. And he would have Natsuki.

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Saeko attempted once again to wipe the uncontrollable tears of fear and anger from her eyes as she continued to drive down the deserted dark cliff highway towards her parents' home. She knew they didn't want to hear from her, but she hoped that they wouldn't really turn her away with how scared she was tonight. She would not have believed that there were people so cruel living here in her small town as that little gnome that had threatened her and her daughter this evening.

Seriously, what kind of monster offers you the ultimatum of give us your daughter for money or you'll both die a horrible death? She had called his bluff and gotten in her car preparing to go home. But then she felt uncomfortable with the idea of going back to their deserted apartment just the two of them. What if that sick little man had friends and they followed her home? In a moment of panic she had instead taken the highway out of town towards her parents' house, hoping that her dad would offer her protection. Even though he had thrown her out of his house over five years ago when she had started showing signs of her pregnancy but no signs of a husband.

Now she was having second thoughts again about heading to her parents' house. Maybe she should have just gone to the police with the threat, even though she had been worried that they wouldn't take her seriously. At least Natsuki wasn't the type of child to be crying in her car seat in the back, even if the sweet little girl had been picking up on her mother's stress. Her sweet Natsuki with her long dark hair, adorable snub nose and gentle black eyes that always were so joyful whenever Saeko was around, as though she was someone truly amazing.

Her little daughter was a handful, always so full of energy and getting into all sorts of trouble at preschool or whenever her back was turned for a minute. Whether Natsuki was climbing trees, fearlessly chasing down dangerous looking dogs to pet or running up to sketchy looking people with motorcycles, raising her daughter had been a stressful adventure so far. However, Natsuki was truly the best thing that had ever happened to her, she would not have done anything about the last six years or so differently; no matter how badly Natsuki's father had treated her, leaving when he found out she was pregnant... at least he did one thing right. Natsuki was her sweet little angel.

Gazing back into the rear-view mirror Saeko gasped out loud in horror. She couldn't breathe. There was so much blood, dripping down her angel's neck. Somehow Saeko managed to get enough breath into her lungs to scream out in anguish, jerking the steering wheel to the side. She barely noticed as the car crashed through the flimsy guardrail, as the feeling of freefall as the car plummeted over the cliff was indistinguishable from the sinking feeling she already felt. The cold of the water seeping into the car, or the inability to breathe anymore as it closed over her head caused her no fear, and certainly no more cold or breathlessness than the thought of a world without Natsuki in it. I'm so sorry my Natsuki, I will always love you my sweet, brave girl.

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Nagi carefully dabbed at the small amount of blood coming from his nose with his handkerchief, that spell had required a bit more power than he had anticipated. Still though he couldn't argue with the results. The mother was dead, and he had his prize.

Glancing at the new guest in his car he had to admit to being impressed at the difference between this Potential and the ordinary girl that he had kidnapped for the sacrifice. Even when the first girl had been angry, she had also been terrified. But this tiny little thing who was smaller than the curly haired girl only glared at him with cold black eyes. He could see the rage in them, but the child didn't attempt to scream or run, just kept her eyes on his. Those hard eyes betrayed no fear as finally she spoke, her high pitched and quiet child's voice flat of emotion, having a warrior's steel despite her age. "Where is my mother?"

Nagi attempted to smile sincerely at the little one, a difficult thing for him to pull off. He had always been told that his smile looked like a smirk, and his words always sounded slightly sarcastic. "Your mother has given you to us to look after, she said she could not take looking after you any longer, you are too much trouble."

The little girl scoffed at him, "You lie. My mother needs me, who will protect her if I'm not there?"

"Don't worry Natsuki, my people will look after your mother for you and make sure nothing ever happens to her." His dark brown eyes glinted in the moonlight. Turning away from the glaring little girl he called up to the driver to head towards the First District HQ. When he glanced back at the little girl he noticed a suspicious shine to her eyes, as though she were getting ready to cry, but when she saw him looking again her jaw clinched and she was again glaring at him, allowing no tears to fall. A warrior born indeed. I know that Kanzaki said we should pick this one as she is unlikely to be in line to be Chosen, but that is hard to believe looking at this little thing! Magnificent she is, our little Natsuki.