AND MILES TO GO
SLAYER CENTRAL, AFRICA
Buffy got out of the rental car and looked around, wondering where he was and hoping he wasn't off on another slayer hunt. It had been six long months since she'd seen him. They had exchanged letters and postcards and the odd e-mail or two and they had phoned at least once a week, they were re-building the friendship that they had once had but there were times she wished she could see him face to face. She missed that more than she would care to admit. So here she was in Africa, to see him, to ask him for his help, despite the fact that he had given so much. She was here to ask for more, because he was the only one that could do what needed to be done, and because she trusted him. She held up the letter to shade her eyes, to see where he was. She reflected on the letter for a moment, it was from Dawn. In it she begged for his forgiveness and understanding. Buffy knew she would get those, but she also knew that Dawn would never be on the receiving end of that particular question again, at least not coming from Alexander L Harris. Buffy remembered that morning with an almost brutal clarity; after all it was not every day you had to tell someone that they had just destroyed their own fondest dream.
ROME, THE MORNING AFTER
Buffy was in the middle of fixing breakfast when she first heard movement coming from Dawn's room. The night before Buffy had come home to find Dawn passed out and the other girls in various states of intoxication. She cleared out le regazze (young women) and put Dawn to bed, leaving a bottle of aspirin and a bottle of water by her bed and then went to sleep herself.
As expected, Dawn came stumbling into the kitchen a few minutes later, yawning and looking grumpy.
"Where are my friends?"
"I sent them home last night."
"Why"
"I didn't think you'd want them around this morning."
"Why not, they've seen me drunk before."
"Drunk has nothing to do with it Dawn" Buffy said, turning to her sister "do you remember your fourteenth birthday?"
"What does that have to do with anything?"
"Just answer the question, do you remember it?"
"A bit I guess, Mom got me socks like always and I remember you getting me a jacket I think."
"Anything else?"
"Yeah actually there was, I was feeling a little down because Mark Davis wouldn't talk to me or anything, so Xander took me aside and talked to me for a while, if I hadn't been crushing on him before, I know I was after that."
"And so you all just talked?"
"I guess, sometime in there he said something about if I was still single in five years he'd ask me to marry him, that way I'd always have a fallback plan if I never found a boyfriend."
"What do you remember about Xander and promises" Buffy asked.
"That he always keeps them" Dawn answered slowly, realizing that something was up "what's with the twenty questions Buffy?"
"You're the one in college; you should be able to figure it out" Buffy snarked at her and went back to finishing her breakfast while Dawn struggled to get her sluggish brain to work."
"Was Xander here last night" Dawn finally asked, trepidation in her voice.
Buffy just nodded.
"He flew all the way up here from Africa for my birthday?"
Again Buffy just nodded.
Dawn's eyes were darting around the room, looking for some evidence that Xander had been there. Finding none, she asked "is he still here"?
"No, he flew back last night."
"Why didn't he stay?"
"He didn't want to."
"Did he bring a present?"
Buffy nodded yet again.
"Did he ask me a question" Dawn asked a tremor in her voice.
And once again Buffy just nodded.
Suddenly, despite her hangover, Dawn was standing and yelling in rage "how could you Buffy, a guy I've cared about since I've been real asked me to marry him and you threw him out."
Just as suddenly Dawn found Buffy right in her face, the slayer's face had that stony set to it that she got when she was super angry but holding it back. "I didn't throw him out Dawn; he left of his own free will after. . . . ."
"After what" Dawn yelled.
Buffy just stood there, maintaining her silence.
"After what" Dawn said again, her voice barely audible, and then she realized the truth of the situation. "I said 'no', didn't I?"
"Actually you said 'why is it that only losers and geeks have any idea what romance is' then you ignored him."
Dawn slowly sank back into her seat; her head shaking in denial at the same time tears were coursing down her cheeks with the realization that her sister was telling her the complete truth.
Buffy came over and took her sister in her arms "I'm sorry Dawn, I truly am; but you know Xander, he's probably already forgiven you, but I doubt he'll ever forget."
"And he'll never ask me again, will he?"
"Not likely, you get one chance to burn him and that's it. I know that from experience."
"He never asked you out again, did he?"
"No he never did" Buffy answered "that summer when we tried to out tramp each other I wished he would on a constant basis, but he never did."
"So I've got to move on."
"Yeah ya do Dawnie" Buffy said as her sister dissolved into tears. Buffy sat there holding Dawn and thinking of her own missed opportunities until the younger girl cried herself out.
BACK TO THE PRESENT
"Can I help you" Buffy heard.
She turned to see a young woman, no young slayer; looking at her rather intently. "I'm looking for Xander" Buffy replied.
"Mr. Alex is training the young ones down in the dojo" the slayer replied "it is the second building on the left Miss. . . . ."
"Summers, Buffy Summers" she replied to the young slayer and held out her hand.
"I am Selene; do you want me to come with you?"
"Nah, I got it" Buffy replied and headed off. She would have known where to find Xander even without the directions; all she had to do was listen for the laughter. She opened the door to find Xander being tossed around by a group of ten slayers who looked to be between 12 and 15. Silently she watched as he told them what they should do and then had each one practice on him, insuring that they got the throw right. After they all had demonstrated it adequately he yelled "OK, pair up and practice for the next fifteen minutes, then do your five miles." He stood back and watched his girls work, love and pride evident in his gaze. As he watched his slayers, Buffy watched him. It bothered her to ask Xander what she was going to ask him, but she firmly believed it was necessary and as much as they would miss him here, they needed him somewhere else.
Eventually Xander called time and the young girls headed off for their run. Looking around Xander slowly walked over to Buffy "so what brings you to the dark continent?"
"A couple of things actually, first I've got to give you this or I'll never hear the end of it. Dawn really is sorry for what she said that night; I know it's not easy, but your forgiveness would mean a lot to her."
"And the other thing" Xander asked, pocketing the letter without comment.
Buffy took a deep breath "I need a watcher".
"For who?"
"For me."
"What about Giles?"
"Giles is head of the council; he doesn't have time to be a field watcher."
"Buffy, I'm flattered really, but Rome isn't . . . . ." Xander got no further as Buffy cut him off.
"I'm not going to be stationed in Rome anymore."
"Where are you going then?"
"Cleveland" Buffy replied "I guess I'm just a Hellmouth girl at heart."
"So what's the sitch?"
"Huh"
"I've gotta believe that there's more going on than just you need a watcher cause you're getting back in the game."
"Before I tell ya I gotta know Xand; my watcher, in or out?" Her tone softened a bit "Xand, I know you love it here and you're doing great work, but I wouldn't be asking if it wasn't important; I need you on this."
Xander looked at the petite blond for a moment or two, questions running through his mind like who would take over here, what about Dawn, and was Buffy coming out of retirement for a specific reason; but in the end the matter simply boiled down to the fact that one of his girls needed his help. "OK Buff, you got yourself a watcher, now what's the dire."
Buffy smiled and let out the breath she'd been holding "thanks Xander, as to what's going on; I can sum it up in one word, Robin."
"What's he doing?"
"Cleveland is a mess and he seems more concerned with council politics than keeping a lid on the Hellmouth. Giles called him on it the other day and he replied 'no one in another country can tell an American what to do on American soil'."
"It sounds like he's threatening the council if they don't let him play the game his way by his rules." Xander thought for a second or two "what about Faith."
"She left him about six months ago, that's when things started to spiral down quickly."
"Did she say why?"
"Not really, Faith and me aren't much for the girl talk. All I've heard are rumors and they all say that he's gotten wiggier the longer he's been in Cleveland. My guess is he can't handle the pressure."
Xander thought some more "so you and I are gonna take over Cleveland because we're American and loyal to Giles, right."
"That's the plan."
"What are we gonna do with Robin, take extreme measures" Xander asked nervously.
"Giles said that that's up to us, what do you think?"
The question threw Xander for a moment, Buffy was actually asking his opinion, not trying to tell him what to do; it was unusual to say the least. "Why me" he asked.
"Huh"
"Come on Buff, there's dozens of watcher's that are from the US that would follow Giles lead, so I'm wondering why you want me."
Buffy's face bloomed red, the blush appearing as if by magic "well, because you're the most experienced field guy working for the council; I mean I don't know if you're up on the gossip and all but what you've done here Xander' people are using words like legendary and stuff. There isn't a watcher out there that isn't compared to you, especially after talking to one of your newbies. Not to mention you already have authentic Hellmouth experience."
"Accept no substitutes."
"I won't. You are a very good strategic thinker, and that's gonna be needed for this situation. I can adapt a plan on the fly pretty well, but I can't make a good plan, my stint as 'General Buffy' showed that a couple of years ago. That's a weakness of mine and I'm counting on you to cover it for me."
"So does that mean you'll be serving under me" Xander asked with a waggle of his eyebrows.
"No you goof" Buffy said as she smacked him in the arm then laughed as he made the exaggerated yelping noises and comments about slayer strength. "We'll be a team, so you'll be under me at least half the time" Buffy replied with an eyebrow waggle of her own. She then proceeded to ignore his comment of 'that can be fun too'. "Another thing is the fact that I know and trust you, things are too dire to go in with a watcher that I don't fully trust from the get go. Finally I know you'd do anything to keep the girls safe, including things that I could never even think about. I can be pretty mean when I want to be, but there are lines that I just can't cross, for several reasons. You can cross them when its necessary and I trust you enough to know that you won't come to like what you do at those times. I believe in you enough to think that you can do things that I can't and still remain essentially Xander."
Nodding at her answers; and blushing a bit at her praise, Xander went back to pacing for a minute or two. Finally he nodded to himself and looked up "first thing you do is call Faith, find out exactly what she thinks is up with Robin and which of the Cleveland slayers are likely to be loyal to him. Once we know that we know how many new slayers we'll have to bring in with us. Have him transferred here and arrange for some slayers that don't know him to be transferred here to make up for the ones we'll be taking with us. Make sure they're as senior as possible, but no one that was in Sunnyhell with us. Transfer the slayers that Faith thinks might cause problems back to England. That way Giles can keep his eye on em."
"Anything else?"
"Yeah have Giles also draft a letter firing Robin in addition to the transfer, if he won't go then we'll cut him loose."
"And what if he decides to make trouble?"
"Then I'll be forced to do one of those things you can't think about. You see it's all about power, that was one you nailed when you were talking to those Council jerks. And slayers are the living embodiment of power. If you all become public knowledge then the government will try to get you to do things for them, and force you if you won't cooperate. Not to mention that some will go the 'Initiative' route and see if they can dissect a slayer and see what makes her special or breed supersoldiers or some other crazy crap. Eventually you'll have to hide, go underground just to survive; and as far as I'm concerned that just isn't an option. So if the cost of these girls leading a fairly normal life is that Robin suffers a 45 caliber brain hemorrhage, then it's a price I'm willing to pay."
Buffy found herself hugging her Xander shaped friend, while remembering to moderate her slayer strength; she backed off a bit and looked up into his eye "and that's exactly why I need you for this and trust you to be my watcher."
"Why, because I'm willing to kill" his tone edging towards anger.
"No" she replied "because you would do anything to keep any slayer safe and you'd do it without a second thought."
Mollified, Xander returned to the very pleasurable pastime of hugging Buffy. After a moment or two he turned her loose and when she saw his face she realized that 'Xander in Chief' was now in the building. "OK Buff, you get on the horn and talk to Faith and Giles while I get this place prepped for a change of command."
"Aye-Aye sir" Buffy replied, snapping off a salute. For the first time since she'd decided on this course of action she felt good; Xander was with her and the problem would be handled, end of story. She knew it could get a little messy, but in the end it would be handled, she had promised Giles after all.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Buffy couldn't believe how tired she was, and this had been a good day; well good in the fact that there had been no deaths and only a couple of injuries. Ever since she and Xander had arrived it just seemed like there was one crisis after another and that was draining and taxing, but it was also wonderful. In her entire life, Buffy had never felt so needed, so vital. She was helping the girls cope with life as a slayer, teaching them to work better as a team and leading by example when it came to the nasty work. She didn't remember Sunnydale being this bad, but when she was living in Sunnydale she had been a teenager, and teenagers could repress very well, not to mention the fact that Sunnydale was a much smaller city than Cleveland. Idly Buffy wondered if the constant action was what had finally gotten to Wood. That thought took her back to when she and Xander had shown up on the Cleveland doorstep with three of Xander's African slayers in tow.
Buffy had thought they'd planned for every possibility from grudging acceptance to outright defiance; but they weren't ready for what happened. She and Xander had walked into Robin's office and tersely explained to him that he was being relieved and the man had broken down into tears of gratitude. He told them that he had felt overwhelmed for some time, and that these feelings had caused the erratic behavior that had driven Faith away. When Buffy asked why he hadn't said anything Robin said that he was the son of a slayer and had been raised by a watcher, if anyone should have been able to handle the pressure it should have been him; so in the end his pride had prevented his asking for help. This was something Buffy understood so she sent Xander to meet the girls and get the layout of the house and all of the other relevant details together while she talked to Robin. After a couple of hours, and some not so flattering stories of Buffy's past, the two came out of the office; both better prepared for what lay ahead. From what gossip they heard, Robin was doing an excellent job in Africa.
Since then, both Buffy and Xander had been busy beyond measure, they had training to conduct, contacts to be made and a house full of slayers to get to know; all of which were full time occupations. But things were coming, the group of three African slayers now blended seamlessly with the four that had been here when they arrived. The leadership had been augmented by the addition of Michael Travers (Quentin's surprisingly pleasant and highly competent nephew) who was also a minor league warlock. He handled teaching the slayers basic spells, sigals and ancient languages. Xander taught basic demonology, strategy and tactics. Buffy taught them to fight and work together because she remembered too well what happened when she had tried to be a lone wolf. All three of them comforted the slayers when they needed it, they held the young girls when they were homesick or feeling overwhelmed by school, they supported their slayers, doing everything they could to make their lives as normal as possible.
It had taken almost two months to get to the point where they didn't feel like they were playing catch-up ball. The word was already out on the street that the slayers had a new attitude, and a lot of things that had been ignored were now drawing lethal fire. Now was the time, Xander thought, to formally introduce themselves to the demon community. Buffy had scoped out the demon bars, all six of them, and now Buffy, Xander and their four senior slayers were about to re-assert their authority. As they approached the first place, Buffy could tell that the four slayers were nervous; they kept eyeing each other and their weapons so she decided to lighten the mood a bit.
"Now remember, just because they'll give you something to drink doesn't mean you have to drink it, this is so not the time to decide to become a boozehound."
The four junior slayers relaxed and Xander shot her a look of gratitude. It surprised her, although it shouldn't, how good a team she and Xander made. They complimented each other well, and worked flawlessly together, heck after all the years they'd been working together it was about time that happened. The other thing that surprised her was how he could change in an instant, one minute he was an amiable goof, then suddenly he was a serious customer, capable of damn near anything. It occurred to her that Xander was nearly as much of a mystery now as he was when she had met him; every time she thought she had him pinned down he revealed a facet of himself that she hadn't even guessed at.
The approached the first bar, appropriately named 'The Hellhole' and suddenly there was a bouncer in their way.
"Members only" he grunted out.
Xander walked up and in a conversational voice said "you can open that door or you can spend the next few days in the ICU; your choice."
The gorilla looked at Xander then the five girls he was with then back at Xander again "my mistake sir" he grated out and opened the door.
They went in slowly, and discovered the bar was everything its name said it was. They paused for a second or two as Xander analyzed the situation and deployed his slayers appropriately; then stepped up to the bar. "Got a sec" he called to the bartender.
The man just nodded his head in Xander's direction and finished pouring up whatever he was in the middle of, then came over. "What ya need" he mumbled out.
"Just wanted to say hi and introduce myself" Xander said "I'm Xander Harris, head Watcher here in Cleveland. How's it going?"
The man's eyes suddenly jumped to Buffy and the other girls, and then back to Xander; it was clear he was nervous. "Harris huh, thought you were still in Africa; must be some serious shit going down if the tea crowd moved a big gun here."
"Nah, just a time for some new blood here; as for serious shit, you hear anything and give us a call then we play softball when we come here, otherwise. . . . . ." He left the statement hanging, implying what would happen if word got back that information hadn't been passed on.
The bartender swallowed hard at the look in the Watcher's eye and nodded "Sure, anything serious and I'm on the phone" he agreed quickly, just wishing that the watcher and his chicks would leave soon.
"Thanks" Xander said, slipping the guy a card with their number on it; Xander then proceeded to turn to the bar's clientele and introduced himself as well.
As soon as he was done, a Vrickla demon stood up and bellowed "screw you watcher, you've got no power he. . . . ." It couldn't finish its statement due to the knife that had suddenly appeared in its throat. Disbelief was clear on the demon's face as it collapsed in a heap on the floor.
"Thanks Buff" Xander said, turning to his blond companion then he faced the bar and asked "any other comments".
Silence greeted this inquiry and the slayers and their watcher left.
In two other bars, similar scenes occurred but in the fourth one, someone decided to start a free-for-all. The brawl took on the usual form with the slayers forming a perimeter with Xander watching their backs and the demons that wanted no part of the action slipping out while the bartender just cowered and hoped that the damage to the bar wasn't total.
Things had achieved a type of stability when suddenly that stability was disrupted. Harrah, one of Xander's African slayers was fighting both a Fyarl demon and a Mrochek demon when the Fyarl caught her with a hard right fist as she was leaning the wrong way and Harrah went down.
Buffy was sure that Xander would jump in and was already compensating for his charging in when she heard two whooshes followed by two thunks and both demons had suddenly sprouted silver hatchets out of their foreheads, gifts from Xander. The Fyarl went down with the wound frothing and the Mrochek was disabled long enough for Harrah to get back into the fight.
Buffy's pause of surprise a the fact that Xander had stayed back and not thrown himself into the fight cost her a nasty hit on the forehead, but she shook it off and resumed pummeling her victim du jour. Pretty soon everything that had felt like fighting was down and dead, except the slayers of course.
Buffy and Xander were checking for nicks and wounds when suddenly Buffy felt herself being shoved and heard Xander bellowing "Down". This was followed by the sound of two quick gunshots followed closely by another shot much closer.
By the time she had regained her equilibrium Buffy could see that some vampire had waited until everyone was focused elsewhere to pull a gun and start shooting. But now all the vamp was doing was standing by a table in the back, gun pointing toward the ground, a look of surprise on its face. Buffy followed its gaze back to Xander who had thrown himself on top of the two slayers that had been in the line of fire, then the watcher had obviously pulled the rather large revolver that was in his hands and shot the vampire between the eyes. She watched as Xander slowly stood up, never taking his eye off the vamp and asked "everyone OK"?
The other four slayers said that they were fine, Buffy was about to do the same when she felt a pain in her calf; a rather intense burning sensation. She looked down to see that there was a hole in her pants, and that the lower part of her pant leg was turning red. She looked up at Xander, her eyes bulging with fear and said "I think I got shot". Saying this she unceremoniously dropped to the floor and tried to get a look at the wound without tearing her pants. Xander told the other slayers to watch the vamp gunman and his friend and came over to Buffy his eye wide with concern.
"Is it just the leg Buff?"
"Yeah, everything else seems to be fine, my shoulder's sore but that's from a Lokash that was a little too frisky."
Xander just nodded then pulled a knife and much to Buffy's dismay, slit the leg of her pants and pulled it back so he could get a look at the wound. "How is it" she asked.
"Just a graze" he answered, relief evident in his voice "you probably won't even have a mark two days from now."
"Good, then we can go shopping so you can get me a new pair of pants to replace the one's you just destroyed."
"I destroyed them, what about 'Billy the Kid' over there?"
"Well I doubt he has any money, and you're getting paid the big bucks being a watcher and all, you can afford it. Mr. Marksman there" she waved at the vamp "can't even afford a leather jacket, so I doubt he could afford to buy me a pair of pants." Xander gave her a bit of a smile, then as he looked at the vampire it seemed like his face changed, or maybe just hardened. She watched surprised as he stood and faced the bloodsucker.
Xander's shot had hit the vamp between the eyes and the .357 hollow point had blown most of the creatures brain out the back of its skull. Once they saw his face the two African slayers pulled their sisters back; they had seen things like this before and knew what was coming. The pistol in Xander's hand roared twice more, hitting the vamp in each wrist. Its left hand was torn completely off, while the right one hung limply from a bit of muscle and skin; the pistol it had been using just hit the floor and lay there. Xander took a step and his pistol rang out twice more, blowing both the vampires knees out and the creature fell to the floor.
Buffy could see that the amazing regenerative powers were already at work, repairing the hideous head wound, unfortunately it was just repaired enough that the thing could feel pain, and absolute agony was reflected in its eyes. Despite that, Buffy couldn't find it in her to feel sorry for the thing.
Xander finished walking over to the fallen vampire and its friend, one on the floor and the other still sitting at the table and looking like it would rather be anywhere else in the world at the moment. Xander fired once more into the fallen creature's groin, and said conversationally to the other vampire. "I understand that you're the bad guys and we're the good guys; you try to kill us and we try to kill you, I really understand that."
Buffy could see that Xander was reloading as he spoke, and she realized that her friend wasn't there anymore, this was Xander the Watcher. She had seen him a couple of times before, most notably when he had told Buffy he would kill her if Willow was hurt. In a way it was more frightening than when Giles let Ripper out to play, because Xander was under control, appearing more rational, his threats were calm promises and not bluster and bombast. This was the Xander she had heard about, the one that had killed every member of a Demon tribe because it had broken a promise and nearly gotten one of his slayers killed. The one that had gutted mages, dismembered slavers and annihilated any threat to his girls. The one that tales were whispered of in the dark places of the world. Buffy knew that demons were scared of her, but that they were absolutely terrified on the one-eyed Watcher; it probably would have bothered her more if Buffy hadn't had that rage aimed at her once or twice.
"But see here's the problem" Xander continued "if you all start using guns, then we're just gonna start having to use bombs and flame throwers and stuff like that and pretty soon it's gonna be nasty. So I want you to pass on a message for me, ya think you can do that?"
The other vamp just nodded, looking even more terrified than it had before.
"Good" Xander said "now pass along that if I ever see or hear about a demon pointing a gun at a watcher or a slayer" he pulled the trigger, sending a bullet into the chest of the vamp that was on the floor "then I will personally kill not only them" the gun fired again "but every member of their family" another shot "their clan" and another "their friends" and another "and anyone human or otherwise that helped" the gun fired one last time and Xander reached down into the mess that had been the vampires chest and pulled out it's undead heart. "Do I make myself clear" he asked as he pulped the heart with his bare hands and the vampire finally dusted.
Again all the other vampire could do was nod.
"Fine then, you can go" he gestured with the pistol; as the creature scurried out the back door he turned to his slayers goofy grin back on his face and laughter in his eye and asked "so back to the house for ice cream or do you want to hit one last place?"
Everyone decided that ice cream sounded pretty good right then so the six of them headed out into the Cleveland night.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
After ice cream, and everyone winding down, Buffy tried to go to sleep, but she wasn't having any luck. She got up and put a pair of sweats on, and went to find Xander. She knew that he'd be beating himself up for letting the dark part of himself out in front of the girls, so she figured it was up to her to make him see that it wasn't such a bad thing. Buffy knew that at times like this, Xander retreated to his workshop; it was a shed behind the main house that held all of Xander's tools and wood. He had made it clear that it was a Y chromosome only kind of place and while Buffy generally honored his wishes, she also knew that some times you had to break the rules.
She walked through the dark back yard and opened the shed door as quietly as she could. The place was warm and the smell of freshly worked wood was comforting 'just like Xander' Buffy thought. He was making stakes, but not ordinary ones. He had taken casts of all the slayers hands and was customizing the regular stakes so that each slayer had at least one stake that fit perfectly in her hand. It was just a very Xander thing to do.
Buffy didn't say anything; she just sat in a nearby chair and watched Xander work. She knew Xander was aware of her, he didn't miss much after all; but he just kept on working with the lathe, customizing stakes. Finally he turned the tool off and looked over at Buffy; it was obvious he was trying to determine what kind of mood she was in. It bothered Buffy a bit that he constantly seemed to expect to be yelled at or chewed out, but she knew that it was most likely a product of the way he'd been raised; she had talked to Willow a couple of times about Xander's childhood.
"I'm sorry you all had to see that" he finally said.
"I'm not" Buffy replied. She then had to bite back some very inappropriate giggles at the look of incredulity that was on his face. "Listen Xander, I won't lie to you and say that what we saw wasn't ugly; but in a weird way it was re-assuring as well. For every slayer that was there and even the ones that stayed back here it just confirms the lengths you'd go for any of us. The thing is every slayer already has an idea about that. Do you have any idea about how many requests Giles gets every month from slayers begging to have you as their permanent watcher? And that's all slayers, not just one's that have been with you before; because they've all heard the same stories that I have and I've got to tell you I'd want you as my watcher anytime, anywhere."
She could see from the expression on his face that Xander had no clue as to how he was thought of outside of Africa. "Do you remember that Justin guy that was with you for about six months"? Xander nodded. "Well he's in charge of Watcher training, and he was using you as the model of what a Watcher should be. And that's why I wanted you here. Mike is going to learn from you and then head on and show other Watchers how it's done because there is no training like Hellmouth training. And the same with the girls, we're gonna rotate the ones that were here already to different locations and they're gonna pass on the lessons they learned here as well. Then we'll keep cycling the senior slayers through here until every major station has a slayer with Hellmouth experience because there isn't any substitute for experience like that."
She could see that Xander was amazed at the passion of her outburst and the scope of what she was trying to do. After a moment or two he said "that's some plan ya got there Buff, a little ambitious but I like it. I'm just. . . . ." his voice trailed off as he blushed.
"What" Buffy shot back "you or Giles are the only one's allowed to make plans for the future. I'm doing this Xander because I'm tired; tired of slayers dieing due to poor training or lack of experience, tired of watchers who don't know how to lead or how to admit their flaws, tired of all the death and suffering and pain that comes with this gig. So if our being here doing what we're doing makes things a bit easier for everyone else, if doing this keeps slayers alive longer; then I've got to think it's worth the price, how about you?"
She could see a lot of thoughts flicker across Xander's face, waxing and fading as he thought about what she had said, but she could see one finally dominate until it suffused his entire being. "Buff, I've seen you through a lot of stuff, I've seen you great and I've seen you awful, I've called you my hero, and I've called you . . . . well a lot worse; but I don't think I've ever been prouder to call you my friend than I am right now. If you want me, then I'm here as long as you'll have me; no matter what you need me for, even if it's just to make the stakes."
Buffy sagged in the chair a bit "thank God, cause I don't think I could do any of it without you."
Xander took a couple of steps over and knelt down in front of her, so they were eye to eye "you'll never be without me Buff, never again."
"You promise" she asked with a slight blush in her cheeks.
"Yeah, I promise" he replied, shooting back a warm grin and the obligatory eyebrow waggle.
"I'll hold you to that Xander Harris" she said and pulled her friend into a warm hug.