Good Morning Sunnydale! Part One

This just a fun piece set around season two or thereabouts. This is my favorite time period. Buffy, Giles, Cordelia, Xander and Willow. And Angel as a good guy. I love Tara and Dawn and even Faith and Oz but I prefer the original five together. I've also made Angel a bit more "normal." Please read and review!

Buffy slumped in her chair. It had been a hard night and it was entirely too early to be up but Giles had insisted that it was important that everyone be in the library at five the next morning and she had been too tired to say no. And then when Angel had shown up in her room to pick her up, she still couldn't say no.

So here she was, in the library at five thirty in the morning, crabby, hungry and in dire need of sleep.

Angel stood behind her, softly kneading her neck and shoulders. "That feels sooo good," She cooed softly. "But if you really loved me, you'd carry me home, put me back into bed and keep doing it there."

He grinned down at her and said, "Work time, Buffy. Playtime is later." He sympathized with her, he had been up all night himself, talking with Giles following the patrol and even though vampires need far less sleep than humans, he was beginning to feel it. But this was more important. If Giles was right about his current theory, there could be a lot more lives at stake.

She turned her head slightly to look up at him and said, "Meanie!" And then she stuck her tongue out at him before slumping back to her original position. Then she looked up again, briefly, this time across the table and asked, "Xander, do we HAVE to listen to that? Wouldn't peace and quiet be so much more…. Um, peaceful and quieter?"

Xander shook his head and swallowed. "I'd love to help you out, Buff, but today's theme is strippers and we have to listen. It's the law." He carefully reached for another donut and at the same time turned up the volume a bit on his boom box, which was sitting next to the box of donuts. He moved carefully because Buffy already seemed to be angry with him and Cordelia was slumped against his shoulder, sleeping and if he woke her, that would make two girls angry with him and that was unlucky. Actually, he thought, if you want to get really technical about it, slayers count as two girls, and that would make three angry with him and that was definitely no good.

Buffy mumbled something under her breath so softly that only Angel could hear it and it made him blush. Willow blushed as well. She had no idea what Buffy had said, but if it made a 240 year old vampire who had seen and done everything a million times over, blush, it must have been pretty good. She also realized that she was sitting between the irresistible force and the immovable object and though tired and not really feeling up to her usual perky self-said, "Come on, Buffy. We could all use a laugh or two. Just ignore the parts where they exploit young women half their age for they're own twisted middle aged fantasies and the pursuit of the almighty advertising dollar. And ok, that's 90% of the show but the other ten- percent is sometimes funny. And give them a break, they're old, probably getting close to Giles' age. And the music they play is groovy!"

At that moment, Giles emerged from his office, carrying a platter filled with a teapot, a coffeepot and several cups. "Good morning, everyone," He said tiredly. "I'm glad you could all make it. And I apologize for the early start. And Willow, thank you for that remark about my age, it makes me feel much better about everything."

"You weren't supposed to be listening!" The red head said, defensively. "And anyway, I didn't mean you're old. I know it sounded that way but that's not the way I wanted it to sound."

Giles set the platter in the center of the table and said, "Don't worry, Willow, I know exactly what you mean and that scares me a bit because it means I'm spending entirely too much time with teenagers." He pulled up a chair and sat down. "Now, drink up, everyone, we can all use a dose of caffeine."

He stopped speaking and listened to the radio because the commercials had stopped and the announcer was on now and he wanted to hear the news.

"Good morning, Sunnydale!" The DJ shouted. "It's 5:37 and you're listening to the Matt And Denny In The Morning Show on Q 104.5 And wow, do have a big show today!"

His partner, Matt chimed in with, "And it just got a lot bigger. I was just handed a bulletin and whew! It's another one of THOSE mornings! Police have reported finding five bodies so far in greater Sunnydale this morning and there were so many 911 calls last night that the system locked up. We'll have more details in a few minutes when Karen, our newsgirl gets here…"

Denny interrupted him with, "What is the deal, Sunnydale? We left Cleveland to get away from big cities and high crime rates…well, ok, we were fired in Cleveland but it wasn't our fault! Those girls were naked when we got there! And that fire? It was an accident, it could have happened to anyone…"

"What my partner is trying to say, as he babbles on about ancient history that no one cares about," Matt went on, "Is that in the five years we've been here, Sunnydale has had a higher per capita murder rate than, well, just about anywhere. Ok, we're gonna play some music now while we go to the newsroom for more details, and don't forget, a little later we're gonna be crowning the proud new Miss Topless Sunnydale!"

Back in the library, the Scooby gang groaned in unison. They had seen the damage first hand and though the news wasn't really news to them, it was depressing to hear about it on the radio.

Xander was the first to speak. "I know it sounds bad," He said, slowly. "But think of how many it would have been if we hadn't been out there? And look at the bright side. We get a brand new Miss Topless Sunnydale! Aren't strippers the best?"

"Strippers are pretty good," Angel agreed, wistfully and then immediately thought, 'Gee, I wish I hadn't said that.'

Buffy stood bolt upright and turned till she was directly facing him. "You are SO gonna pay for that remark!"

Angel blushed again as he thought about how she was going to make him pay and wished that he could pay now. Willow shook her head wondering how Buffy did it. Not once but twice in the same morning, she made a vampire blush. What kind of secrets did she have that weren't available to other girls? Anywhere. She had even gone through all the sites that Xander had bookmarked on her computer and had yet to find anything that she thought would make a vampire blush.

Buffy turned around and sat again with an angry flourish. Xander smiled and said, "Isn't that just like a woman? Deadboy shows his first sign of life in over 200 years and a girl is right there, ready to snuff it out."

"Thank you, Xander…. I think," Angel said as he gingerly placed his hands on her shoulders again as if they were vials of nitroglycerin.

"You better keep doing that," Buffy said, softly, through clenched teeth, "And you better do it longer and better than you've ever done it before!"

Giles ignored the teenage insecurity and sniping and God only knows what else was going on in that exchange and said, "Xander, in his forthright and almost disturbingly insensitive way is right. There were tragic results last night but we made a difference and we can all be proud of that."

Xander beamed proudly. It wasn't that he needed the approval of an ancient librarian, but he didn't often get good reviews and good reviews were as good as strippers. And with his girlfriend still asleep, they were even harder to get. But then again, given what he had been saying and what had happened to Angel, maybe it was a good thing she was still asleep.