Author's Note: I told you I wasn't done.
X X X X X
In case you want it spelled out (and really, why wouldn't you?) what we had at this point was a fairly shaky recording of Aaron Echolls beating the crap out of Holly Takamura to get what he wanted.
Any competent defense attorney could point out half a dozen differences between what happened on the tape and what happened to Lilly, starting with the obvious point that Holly Takamura wasn't dead. Any competent prosecutor, though, would point out that this at least demonstrated, visibly, that Aaron Echolls had a nasty temper and was perfectly willing to use violence to get his way. Which you and I and the Adversary knew already, but the rest of Sunnydale was still blissfully unaware about.
Either that, or they'd been bought off, browbeaten, or fed to vampires.
In any event, with Xander continuing to play bodyguard (a lot better than nothing, even discounting any let's-pull-it-out-of-our-asses when we need to soldiering experience that he, and only he, seemed to have picked up from Halloween; at least, if Buffy ever acted like a simpering Englishwoman again, you're going to need to show me timings on your DVDs.), I went to the office, got out some paperwork on the off chance Dad dropped by and wondered what the hell I was doing, and proceeded to make three copies, because no matter who else hadn't followed me here from Neptune, Clarence Weidman had, and I wanted to be damned sure no one conveniently disappeared this evidence, the way Logan had gotten rid of the tapes back in Neptune on the first go-round.
Xander kept one copy, under strict instructions that if he ever showed it to anyone I would arrange for Sheila to kill him. I hid the master copy in my bedroom.
One of the other two was getting put into a safety deposit box next chance I got.
The third was going directly to Keith Mars. No, I wasn't going to hand it to him; living in Sunnydale has not, in fact, made me suicidal, thank you very much, and I'd promised him I was going to stay out of doing anything dangerous connected with Lilly's murder from here on out.
Yes, you know I was lying, I know I was lying, but Dad only suspected I was, and I'd prefer not to hand him any concrete proof, thank you very much. So I was going to mail it to him, anonymously.
Check that; Buffy was going to mail it to him anonymously. She and Giles were possibly the only two people in town whom Keith Mars couldn't intimidate.
And Dad vs. Giles in an angry-off? I wouldn't place bets either way. Yes, I've seen Ripper, but I'm also seen my Dad. Concrete walls would not stand in his way.
X X X X X
So, today. School. Ms. Calendar's reading me. I have the third tape nestled in my book-bag, and wouldn't this be a fine day for Herr Snyder to do an impromptu bag check.
Fortunately, he didn't.
I didn't have any new cases of my own, and thank goodness for small favors, because I think at this point, still in "Drusilla finds me interesting" recovery mode, I needed my plate to be emptier than it had been over that weekend, and Epimetheus, Lilly and the Adversary weren't going anywhere.
Thank goodness for bigger favors as well, because by my best judgment Ted, and Ted, were still a few weeks into the future, and don't think I haven't already considered scenarios where Xander, Willow or Cordelia come ask me to look into Ted Buchanan's background, because me? Obvious choice, when it comes to it. Detectives do the detectin' and Slayers do the Slayin'.
Would I get involved? Oh, hell, yes. Buffy and Joyce could do without the pain inflicted by that particular monster, no matter how good an acting job I thought John Ritter had done, playing a villain.
Pre-emptive strike? I wasn't sure. It might be too late already; I seemed to remember Joyce saying that she'd met Ted Buchanan a significant length of time before Ted the episode began. I'd have to give that some thought.
My job, per my unwilling wager with the Adversary, was to make things better, and I couldn't remember any lessons Buffy or her friends had learned from this particular episode. (Not that Joss was heavy-handed on such matters; the closest Buffy had ever come to a very special episode was I Only Have Eyes for You, and that was only because the WB had forced them to do that asinine PSA after the show ended.)
So this might make things better; but the only way to really make them better would be to find a way to spare Buffy pain while taking care to be sure Ted Buchanan didn't simply turn his attentions on the next woman to come down the pike. (That collection of bodies in his closet might be some help.)
Okay, now I was sure. Pre-emptive strike.
But not right this second.
No, right this second I had to deal with the angry brunette coming my way.
Why was she angry?
Well may you ask.
It probably had something to do with the several hours I'd spent with her not-boyfriend yesterday, while her hormones had kicked into overdrive.
This should be interesting: she was angry at me and couldn't tell me why – but she couldn't lie about it, either, because "not saying true stuff" wasn't her style.
I grinned my phoniest grin and said, "Cordelia. Hi. What can I do for you today? Death threats from one of your many jilted admirers?"
"Ha. Like I can't deal with them. No, I just want to know why the hell you dragged Xander off yesterday when he was needed so badly."
I smiled. "Let me guess. He wouldn't tell you."
"No!"
"And why are you so interested?"
"Because . . . he had more important things he needed to be doing."
Compared to Lilly? No, sweetie, he definitely didn't. But he didn't tell you – he can't – and I'm sure as hell not cluing you in.
"Come into my office," I said, gesturing towards the nearest women's room and reaching for my handy-dandy out of order sign.
"Nuh-uh."
"Okay, then," I said, pointing to the nearby custodian's closet. "We can use yours."
She gaped for a second; then her eyes narrowed and she said, "Fine," and half-dragged me to the women's room. I barely had time to slap the sign up before she said, "Okay. What do you want?"
"Want?" I said innocently.
"Knock it off, Veronica. You're not as cute as you think."
Time to get down to business. "Neither are you," I said.
"So. You know."
She didn't phrase it in the form of a question. Normally, when someone tried to get all vague on my like this, I would really turn up the 'cute' and say something about how I knew all sorts of things. I didn't really want to jerk Cordelia around, though, other than to the pro forma level I'd done already, to show her that she couldn't push me around no matter how much she really really might want to.
"Yes. I do."
"How?"
"I could make something about how you're not a very good storyteller and I picked it up in the subtle clues of you and Xander's body language," I said, "And by the way, you're not a very good storyteller –"
"I know," she said. "I hate lying, but it's not like I was going to blurt out the truth or anything."
"I'd ask why, but I know it's about your reputation," I said. "Trust me, though. Reputation? Not all it's cracked up to be."
"Well, you would say that," Cordelia said.
"Yes. I would. Doesn't make it any less true. It's not like I don't know something about being at the peak." Before Cordelia could answer, I said, "Anyway, that's not the important thing. I didn't find out because of my mastery of body language, though anyone who pays attention to the way you interact, would. I found out because I saw you drag Xander into a closet and didn't hear you either screaming at him or beating the hell out of him. Logical assumption, and no, I didn't eavesdrop; I get my kicks above the waistline, sunshine." Well, in this timeline, anyway.
"And what are you going to do about it?" she asked. Ah. She thought I wanted to blackmail her. I'm not going to insult your or her intelligence by saying that I'm above a little judicious blackmail, but I don't do it for personal gain or just to screw with people.
"Not a damn thing," I said. "It's enough that I know, and that you know that I know. But I wouldn't blackmail you. No matter what you might think, I like you. Or at least, I respect you. A lot more than most of the other idiots at this school, including the ones you hang out with."
"Really?"
"Really," I said. "You've never liked me, but you never pretended to like me. Around here, trust me, open hatred? A lot easier to deal with than phony friendship."
"Okay," she said, apparently still processing. Layers she might have, but she had a worldview, and in my inimitable manner I'd just kicked a couple of holes in it. She gets all the credit in the world for being able to realize that there was "more to Heaven and earth," but it did take her a few months to process. This wasn't so earth-shattering, but I imagined it might take her a couple of minutes, at least.
"So," she finally said, "You're not going to tell anyone?"
"I didn't say that," I said, and the look of horror, so recently gone from her face, returned with a vengeance. "I'm not going to blackmail you, I'm not going to reveal it to be mean, and I'm not going to spread it around for laughs. I probably never will. But if it becomes important – and you know my value of important –"
"Got it," Cordelia said, "So I really have nothing to worry about."
"No."
"Good," she said. "And now, just in case you thought I'd forgotten – what were you doing with Xander yesterday?"
"Not what you're worried about," I said, "And not your business, otherwise. It has nothing to do with you, or with Buffy's secret, I promise you. And I'm guessing you asked him already and he told you he couldn't tell you, or you wouldn't have come and asked me, instead, because I know you're smart enough not to think I'm easier to pry information out of than the guy you're making out with in a broom closet. So you're just going to have to deal with not knowing. At least for now."
She sighed, rolled her eyes, and said, "Like I was that interested anyway," and flounced out.
I'd like to say that was a load off, but the truth is, it's a load I hadn't even realized I was carrying until it fell off.
Such is my life. In any universe.
X X X X X
My encounter with Cordelia meant it wasn't until lunch that I could really sideline Buffy, or catch up with Ms. Calendar, for that matter. Willow caught me between classes and said that Ms. Calendar wanted to see me at lunch.
I told her thanks, and asked her to see if she could have Buffy drop by as well. Yes, I'd seen Buffy, but the high school press had kept me away. (No, not Duncan; the crowd. Duncan and I were getting along, at this point, but that was about it. No recurrences of what happened in Neptune yet – and there would be none, no matter what he might hope.)
I did have the opportunity for a quick conversation with Sheila. I told her about my threat to Xander, and she just nodded and said, "'scool. Be happy to do it, manhunter. Be the chance to try out the newest spell. Kind've like throwing a punch only without havin' to touch what I'm hitting. Broke a couple of boards already. You should see it. 'sfun." Sounded like a form of telekinesis, and one I don't remember Willow Rosenberg ever mastering.
"I appreciate your enthusiasm," I said wryly, "But I don't actually want you to kill him. Just scare him. And probably not even that."
"You ruin all my fun," she said, but didn't really seem unhappy.
"It's what I live for," I said.
I gulped down my lunch, dodged a sophomore who looked like he wanted to hire me (like I said, too much to do at this point), and headed to the computer lab.
Ms. Calendar and Buffy were both there.
"Veronica," the computer teacher said. "Good. You're here."
"Yup," I said. "Here I be. Hold on one sec."
Then I motioned to Buffy to follow me; out in the hall, I handed her the tape and asked her to mail it to my father.
"Wouldn't it be easier for you just to hand it to him?" she asked.
"If I wanted him to know I'd discovered it, sure," I said.
"Ah. Gotcha." She didn't ask, though she was clearly dying to.
"It has to do with a case," I said.
"Ah," she said, this time apparently understanding.
When I moved to re-enter the room, she stood there. "Come on," I said. "I have secrets, but this isn't one of them."
To her credit, Ms. Calendar didn't ask. One suspects she had more important things on her mind, but I suppose it's possible she was deathly curious and just that good an actress that she wasn't letting on. In either case, she just said, "Well, I predicted you, like you asked. Used every method I could think of, and every method any of my technopagan friends on line could think of, that didn't involve human or animal sacrifice. I rolled dice, threw bones, asked the stars, did the tarot; if you can think of it, hell, if you can find it in a dictionary, I tried it. About the only thing I didn't try was asking Cecil Adams."
"Well, if anyone would know, he would," I said.
"Cecil who?" Buffy asked.
"The Straight Dope." Ms. Calendar said. "And no, there's not a gay dope anywhere, at least not connected with Adams. He's a smartass from Chicago who answers pretty much any question posed to him." She shook her head. "Anyway, that's not really important right now. The long and short of it is, nothing worked. Or at least, nothing worked like it should. The bones fell in patterns that don't exist; the tarot cards kept blowing away before I could complete a pattern – and I was inside at the time – and the stars told me absolutely nothing coherent. Nowhere could I get a straight answer." After a second, she said, "Well, that's not entirely true. There is one method that worked. But even that didn't work well."
"What was it?" I asked, suddenly curious.
As she reached into a desk drawer, Ms. Calendar said, giving the lines a dramatic reading, "Will I ever be able to predict Veronica's future?" Then she shook her head sadly. "Sorry, Veronica," she said, pulling out a Magic 8-Ball and showing me the window. "My sources say no."
"I'm not sure whether to laugh or cry," I said. Buffy, for her part, seemed confused.
"Join the club," Ms. Calendar said. "When the only thing giving you a straight answer is a child's toy, it's time to give up. But this does confirm everything Drusilla said. You are nonpredictable."
"The word she used was Anakha," I said.
"Anakha. Eddings. Seems about right," Ms. Calendar said. "I'm imagining you freak out the Powers the way you did Drusilla." She stood up. "My advice would be to make the most of it."
"Huh?" I asked.
"You may be thinking of this that it makes you some kind of freak," Ms. Calendar said. Buffy bristled, and the teacher added, "No insult. Really, Buffy. You should know me better than that. I'm saying to look at it differently. Think about it. Everyone else we know, has some kind of destiny. Even if it's the kind that can be avoided or resisted. The future is completely unwritten for you. Make the most of it."
Which would have been a very nice, heartening pep talk, if only I couldn't (figuratively) see the Adversary behind her, tapping on an imaginary wristwatch.
Still. This could be helpful information. I wasn't sure how, but it could be.
I'm destiny-free. Really.
