Emperor Xander
by Chaoseternus

Twenty-Five

Xander looked up concerned as Buffy slowly walked in through the door into the Library, interrupting his patrol report to Giles "Buffy what's up?"

Giles glanced up too, then straightened up swiftly, catching the look in his Slayers eyes, a look he recognised as the 'thousand yard stare'

"Monster," Buffy managed to spit out.

"Where Buffy?" Giles asked concerned, "and what did it do to you?"

"Mum and Bond… monster"

Xander shot Giles a half bemused, half scared look at that, "okay, there is a monster and it has your mum and Bond. Any idea where it is?"

"Mum… bedroom… Bond,"

"It has Bond and is in Mums bedroom?"

Dazed, Buffy shook her head no, "mum and Bond… bed… monstrous"

A startled look crossed over Giles face, and he hid his face behind a book to hide his smile.

"Okay Giles," Xander asked carefully, "whats up?"

"I do believe she burst in on her mum and Mr Bond in the bedroom," Giles replied calmly.

"Oh," a disturbed look crossed Xanders face, "they're old, they shouldn't be doing things like that, it's gross!"

Giles just shook his head bemused and walked away, leaving Xander to deal with a seriously grossed out and near-catatonic Slayer.

"Where has that scab gone?" Glory screamed frustrated, "if I have to go searching for him…"

"Most Glorificusness," a cowering form beside her said carefully, "there are some signs of a fight near the last place your most humble servant was known to be"

"A fight," Glory frowned, "who with?"

"Soldiers your most beautifulness," the cowering thing replied, gazing up worshipfully at its master, "bullets littered the ground around the fight and there was a tattered piece of his cloak left behind"

"So," Glory replied breezily, her eyes fading, the sanity in them slipping away once more, "my enemies have him. No doubt they plan on making him tell tales out of school"

"He would not betray your grace,"

"For his sake I hope so," Glory replied, slipping woozily, airily into a seat, "now bring me someone young and tender. Find him later…"

"Boss is pissed,"

Gerard snorted, "An agency of the United States Government tried to have her killed; I would be kind of pissed too,"

"True," Cosmo replied, "but at least she is getting somewhere"

"Yes," Cooper noted, "but I would love to know exactly who sent us the instructions of how to get into the NID mainframes"

Gerard snorted, "Wouldn't we all. Whoever it was, they were either on the inside or real good at their jobs"

"Good enough to crack into half the defence computers in the western world and have them send out a communiqué to all the Special Forces types?" Cosmo asked calmly.

Gerard froze for just a moment, and then grinned, "I do believe you have a point Cosmo, congratulations"

"Yea yea," he replied sarcastically, "so, you think it was them?"

"I think," Gerard replied carefully, "that if it wasn't them, they at least have a pretty good idea who it was"

"Just the thing to make a complicated situation worse," Cooper pointed out, "there actions were illegal as such we have an oath to uphold, we should bring them in. Flipside to that, those actions helped us and as much as I hate to say it, those vigilantes do good and necessary work"

Gerard shrugged, "their… situation has been passed up the chain. For the moment it's the problem of people who earn far bigger pay checks then we do"

"There he is," Cooper interrupted, "blue ford by the lights"

"Okay, I got him," Gerard commented a moment later, swiftly pulling the unremarkable car out into the traffic, following the blue vehicle Cooper had spotted, "Mr Simmonds, where are you headed?"

O'Neill grimaced as he stepped into the Library, he doubted, no, he hoped he would never get used to the thought of going to school kids whenever problems came to the fore, certainly not when those problems involved powerful beings who claimed to be Gods.

It rankled, he was an Airforce Officer, it was his job, his responsibility to keep the children of the nation, heck given his recent job, the Earth safe and yet, if it involved Sunnydale or Sunnydale type business at some point he would be answering to mere children.

They should be worrying about dates, about grades and about how they looked; they certainly should not be worrying about the continued existence of the earth and about saving lives whilst they were still in school.

But, they were and for the moment, he had little choice in the matter.

Didn't mean he had to like it though.

"Anything new on Glorificus?"

O'Neill shook himself out of his thoughts as he heard Xander speak.

"Yes," he replied calmly, carefully hiding his feelings for the moment, "Eva and the Twins managed to catch a break; we got a Scab waiting for interrogation"