Title: In Their Shadow
Author: Robert Cox (smeghead_76@dodo.com.au)
Disclaimer: Buffy is owned by Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy productions. The Night's Dawn trilogy is owned by Peter F. Hamilton. At least until the copyright runs out, anyway. Since that won't happen for a long time at the least, I've just gotta hope that no-one takes offence.
Summary: Xander has been transported to the 27th century. Can he adapt to life in the future? Can he ever return home? And, more to the point, can the guy stay out of trouble for once?
Rating: M-15+ (Australian system)
AN: Thanks to Grossclout, who volunteered for beta-ing duties in the later parts.
AN2: There are a couple of non-standard methods of communication used in this story, represented as follows: Affinity and {Datavises}
Distribution: FF.net and XanderZone. Anywhere else, please ask first.
Feedback: Yes, please! After all, it's the only recognition a fanfic author gets...
By the time Xander had finished the tale of the origins of demons, everyone - including Ione - was staring at him in amazement. Joshua was the first to recover. "Woah. That's... quite an amazing story, Xander," he said slowly, obviously trying to come to terms with what he'd been told.
Ione shot Xander a hard glance. "Okay, now tell your story, Xander," she said, nodding decisively when he turned a 'do I gotta?' expression on her.
"All right, then," Xander sighed, and took a deep breath. "I was born in Sunnydale, and..."
Once he started, all signs of reluctance seemed to drop away. He skimmed over his life up to high school, making little mention of his home life - other to say, "It wasn't good." - preferring to concentrate on other details, such as meeting Willow and Jesse, and becoming firm friends with them. Details were only really added when he described first seeing Buffy - the story of how he'd hit a railing and fallen off his skateboard drew some chuckles once he'd explained what a skateboard was - and discovering the truth about Sunnydale's 'night life'.
Telling the tale of the Harvest and being forced to stake Jesse when he'd been turned by Darla saw his voice crack slightly - "And the worst thing was, it was caused by someone else's clumsy panicking shoving him onto the stake I was holding."
The Hyena possession and Halloween were glossed over, in favour of extra detail about the Master and the first time he'd saved Buffy's life - hell, he'd brought her back from the dead after she'd been drained by the Master. Angel drew some sharp questions, to which his response had been, "None of us knew until after the fact, and by then it was too late. Buffy had fallen in love with him, and she was awash with hormones."
Then something amazing had happened. A second Slayer had arrived. Kendra McPherson, who'd been Called when Buffy had died at the hands of the Master. After a few misunderstandings, such as nearly killing Angel before anyone could explain his situation, she'd settled in and joined the Slayerettes on their patrols.
From there, the story had moved to the attempted resurrection of the Master, the arrival of Spike and Drusilla, and then the major crisis that had been... Angelus.
Both Ione and Joshua were appalled by the severe stupidity committed by Buffy. "Yeah, she wasn't too bright," Xander explained. "But once again, hindsight proved to be perfect. We didn't know about the curse's escape clause until it was too late, although I can remember being curious as to why Giles didn't do any research.
"I don't know what pissed me off more - the fact that Buffy refused to stake Angelus, whining that she wanted 'her Angel' back, or that she just assumed that we were going to blindly support her in those efforts, ignoring the fact that it was all her fault." Xander sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "Willow supported her, which was a disappointment, but then again, Willow's always been a bit of a romantic."
His expression hardened. "I mean, for fuck's sake - Angelus was killing people left and right, including Kendra and Jenny Calendar, and here Buffy was, moping for her lost love. And just to make things even more intolerable, every time I said that Angelus should be staked, both Buffy and Willow would accuse me of being jealous!" Xander snorted before continuing, "I mean, sure, I had something of a crush on her then, but I'd like to think that I was mature enough to put getting the crisis of the day behind us before letting my hormones rule my head. I wish Buffy had done that."
Then the Judge had come to town. "For all of Giles' warnings about how dangerous he was, it proved to be fairly simple to defeat him."
The Judge - a demon that could kill anyone with even the slightest trace of humanity in them - was at the Sunnydale Mall, in the process of regaining his lost power - when at full strength, he was capable of killing with a glance - Buffy interrupted him with a crossbow bolt to the chest.
Not even bothering to remove the bolt, the Judge sneered, saying that he could be harmed by "any weapon forged by man". Buffy's response had been, "That was then. This is now," before producing a Short-Range Anti-Armour Weapon (SRAAW) and firing it, blasting the Judge into pieces.
"I was the one who bluffed my way into the Sunnydale Armoury to get the rocket launcher, and do you think I got so much as a 'thank you' in return?" Xander snorted. "Not bloody likely!"
After several months of sick cat-and-mouse games from Angelus, punctuated by several inconclusive encounters, Buffy had fallen ill and collapsed during a fight with Angelus. "So of course it was up to me to save the day. Bloody hell, that sounded egotistical, didn't it? I was pretty amazed that I was able to subdue Angelus for long enough to get Buffy away from there. And when she was in the hospital, guess who shows up? That's right, Angelus.
"I basically told him to piss off, while trying not to show how afraid I was. I mean, I'd been stupid enough not to have either a cross or a stake on me, and there I was confronting one of the most feared vampires in history.
"So imagine my surprise when he left, calling me 'Buffy's White Knight' as he did. Maybe he thought I'd be insulted by that or something."
Not long after that had come Angelus' efforts to open the gates to Hell by using Acathla, which culminated in Willow's second effort to cast the soul curse on him. Buffy and Xander had gone to Angelus' mansion to stop the vampire, and to rescue Giles, who he'd captured and tortured in order to extract the secret of how Acathla worked.
Once Giles had been rescued, Buffy had been about to confront Angelus. By this time, it had started to sink in that Angel was not coming back. Before Buffy had left, though, she'd turned to Xander and asked, "Any words of encouragement from Willow?"
Decision time. Xander knew that Willow was going to attempt to recast the soul curse, but he also knew that if he said that, Buffy would hold back, endangering the world. Apart from that, he knew that Willow was only beginning to learn magic, and to top it off, had been injured.
Coming to a conclusion, Xander had looked Buffy in the eye... and lied his arse off. "She said to kick his ass, Buffy." Her shoulders had slumped slightly - obviously she had been holding out some hope of getting Angel back - and had gone to fight Angelus. Later, Xander heard that during the fight, Angel had gotten his soul back. But by then, Acathla had started to open. With no other choice, she'd run Angel through with her sword and pushed him through the portal... into Hell.
"She ran away after that," Xander told his enraptured audience. "She couldn't handle what had happened - personally, I think she couldn't handle what she'd done - and bolted, leaving the rest of us to do her job. Of course, her mother was devastated by all this. Fortunately, she came back in time time to start school when the summer ended."
During that year, another Slayer had arrived. Faith Williams, who'd been Called after the death of Kendra, and who'd also lost her Watcher to a particularly nasty Master Vampire named Kakistos, and was still suffering the emotional wounds, a situation not helped when the Council dumped her in what had to be the worst motel in Sunnydale.
Xander had wanted to help her, but then the amount of vampire and demon activity in Sunnydale had started to increase. Research didn't find any particular reason, apart from some vague prophecy about an 'Ascension', which was vague as to when, and said nothing about who or where.
Because Xander didn't have the time to try to befriend Faith properly - and no-one else in the group seemed particularly inclined to even try - she had started to slip away from the group, although there had been one occasion where he felt that he'd made progress.
It had been during yet another potential Apocalypse, when a demon group known as the Sisterhood of Jhe had tried to open the Hellmouth. Even though both Buffy and Willow had flatly told him to stay away, he'd turned up anyhow.
Only to see Faith being attacked by a group of the demons... and losing.
Acting purely on instinct, he'd crashed his car into the group, killing two of the three demons, and distracting the third one for long enough to allows Faith to kill it.
"So, I took Faith back to the motel, with the intention of making sure she got back safely and helping her patch up her injuries. The plan hit a minor snag, though, since Faith was still riding the 'Slayer rush', and was pretty... anxious," he amended, with a quick glance at Genevieve that told both Ione and Joshua exactly what Faith had been anxious for.
"I managed to talk my way out of... doing what she had in mind - and to this day, I still have no idea how I managed that - saying that there was something else I had to take care of, and that I'd be back soon."
There hadn't actually been a 'more pressing matter', but one soon turned up in the shape of a zombie gang intending to blow up the Scooby gang - at that time desperately trying to keep the Hellmouth shut - by detonating a bomb in the school's boiler room.
"The only reason I found that out was the fact that I got car-jacked and forced to be transport for the zombie gang. After managing to take out two of the zombies, I wound up in the boiler room facing off with the gang leader over the bomb, which was ticking down from two minutes to go."
Xander had managed to talk the zombie into deactivating the bomb by pointing out that being blown to bits may not kill a zombie, but it'd make drinking beer with your buddies problematic, to say the least.
"After he pulled the wires leading to the detonator and timer, he opened the door... and there Oz was, all wolfed-out. Let's just say that the next day, Oz said that he was feeling 'strangely full'," Xander finished with a smirk.
He then returned to the motel, to find that Faith had recovered from her rush of blood to... parts south, and demanding to know how and why Xander had refused her advances.
"I told her that doing what she had had in mind might have been what she wanted, but it certainly wasn't what she needed. She, of course, demanded that I tell her what she needed, since I was so smart.
"I just looked her straight in the eye and said, 'A friend. Someone who cares for you for who you are, not what you are, and certainly not just somebody else who used and discarded you.' The look on her face was priceless. Apparently, her last Watcher had been the only person in her life who'd given so much as a damn about her, and when Linda died, it nearly destroyed Faith's... well, faith," Xander said with a light chuckle.
"But anyway, for a second, her tough-girl façade cracked and I could see the scared and lost little girl lurking underneath. So, acting on instinct, I grabbed her and hugged her. It was only after I'd wrapped my arms around her that I thought about the possible consequences of my actions. Fortunately, she didn't take offense... mainly because she was too busy sobbing into my shirt."
Faith had cried for nearly half-an-hour, while Xander made reassuring noises and... just held her. Drawing back, she'd said, "I bet you think I'm weak now."
That had come as a surprise to Xander, and he'd replied, "Hell, no, Faith. In fact, I respect you more for being able to express yourself like that. Hell, if I can put up with Buffy and Willow trying to treat me like a mushroom, I think I can endure the horrors of a Slayer crying into my shirt." Placing a hand on her shoulder, he'd added, "If you ever need a shoulder to cry on again, let me know, alright?"
Faith had nodded, and asked, "Mushroom?"
"They're trying to keep me in the dark and feed me a steady diet of bullshit," Xander had explained, which had caused a dangerous light to enter Faith's eyes.
"Fer Chrissakes," she'd snarled, picking up a slight Irish brogue as her agitation increased. "Why the hell are they doing that? Sure, Red's worried that you 'might get hurt', but the worst injury you've had is a broken arm. Surely, it's up to you to decide if you want in or not. Actually, I'm pretty damned impressed that you do want in, unlike B and me, who didn't get much of a choice in the matter."
Xander had shrugged, slightly uncomfortable. "When I fought out the truth about the local 'night-life', it was more a case of not being able to stay out... particularly after Jesse..." his voice had trailed off, but Faith had known exactly what he'd meant. Like herself, Xander had lost someone near and dear to the forces of evil, and had decided to do his best to ensure that it didn't happen to anybody else.
Looking at his watch, he'd said, "I've gotta go now, Faith. Do you think you'll be alright?"
In a way, this was a slight test. The 'old' Faith would simply say 'Of course'. Hell the 'old' Faith wouldn't have taken 'no' for an answer earlier. But the 'new' Faith had shaken her head and said, "Ever since Linda died, I haven't been able to sleep properly." Looking at him with a close to pleading expression, she'd added, "Can you stay? Please? No hanky-panky, I promise." The fact that she'd said this while unshed tears were brimming her eyes convinced Xander, and he'd stripped down to his boxers and climbed into bed with Faith, wrapping his arms around her in a protective embrace.
A couple of times during the night, Faith had woken him when she'd started squirming, obviously in the throes of some nightmare. Xander had tightened the embrace somewhat, more to remind her of his presence than attempting to restrain her. It had worked, as Faith had calmed shortly afterwards.
When Buffy and Willow had found out the next morning, they had not been pleased.
Xander had flatly told them that it was none of their business, and that nothing had happened, anyway. Faith backing him up had served to convince them of that, since the Faith that they 'knew' would have definitely informed them if something had happened. Xander had added that 'it was about damned time that someone tried to treat Faith normally'.
With that said, something close to a normal friendship had started to grow between Xander and Faith. Buffy and Willow still treated Faith with some suspicion - for reasons of their own - and the situation was not helped when Faith came within a heartbeat of accidentally killing a human at the tail end of a fight with a group of vampires.
"It was pretty amusing," Xander recalled. "The rest of us were in the library, frantically trying to find out what this 'Ascension' thing meant, when both Faith and Buffy burst in, dragging some poor bastard in, and arguing the whole time about whose fault it was that he nearly died. 'You nearly staked him'. 'Well, you threw him to me'."
The amusement had been short-lived. The man was Allan Finch, deputy mayor of Sunnydale, and he knew exactly who was to ascend, not to mention when and where.
Richard Wilkins the Third, mayor of Sunnydale, had turned out to be Richard Wilkins the First and Second as well, being over a hundred years old. To top things off, he was planning to rise to demonhood, and he was planning to do it at Graduation that year. With that dire announcement, both Faith and Buffy kicked their training into high gear, which left even less time for Xander to try to bring Faith into the group.
"That was bloody annoying," Xander said. "I know I wasn't the strongest or smartest of the group, but it was my choice to take part. And here they were, trying to keep me out 'for my own good', telling me that I should be 'fray-adjacent'. The only bloody thing they'd let me do was research, and that was damn boring, let me tell you."
Xander's mood hadn't been helped when Buffy revealed that Angel had returned from Hell.
"Only about a week after he'd returned, mind you," Xander fumed. "Call me crazy, but I think that if something like that happened to me, I'd tell everyone. Willow was torn between feeling happy for Buffy and worried about Buffy being able to control herself around him, Giles was pretty pissed off, which wasn't surprising given that Angelus had killed his girlfriend and tortured him, and as for me, well..."
Xander had come dangerously close to ranting, and Buffy had responded in kind, accusing him of jealousy now that Angel was back, giving him no chance with her. Xander had responded coldly that he was thinking with his brains, rather than his genitals and stormed out of the library.
"Faith was confused by the whole thing, since she wasn't around for the whole Angelus thing. When I explained it to her, her first instinct was to stake Angel. Somehow I managed to talk her out of it by saying that he might have changed for the better and that it'd be better if we kept an eye on both Buffy and Angel to make sure nothing like that ever happened again."
The Mayor had entered his 'hundred days' by this time, a period where he was invulnerable. Something that was proven when he confronted Giles in the library. Giles, enraged by his taunting, had impaled him with a sword, only to be told, "Now what sort of example are you setting for the young ones?"
Then they'd found out exactly what the mayor would Ascend to. With no choice, the Slayerettes decided to recruit and train the graduating class at Sunnydale High. With his soldier memories, Xander had been the best choice to work out the best way to defeat the demon and, reluctantly, Buffy and Willow had let him in on their plans.
He didn't gloat... too much, anyway.
The problem was, how to kill the Mayor? He was invulnerable now... and then Xander had asked an innocent-seeming yet crucial question. "Yeah, but will the demon be invulnerable?" Some hasty research had turned up the answer of 'no'.
Deciding on gross overkill, he'd decided to wire up the entire high school with explosives. Buffy would lure the newly ascended demon into the school, and Giles would do the honours - hopefully after Buffy had made good her escape. There was a solar eclipse expected for that day, so it was assumed that there would be vampiric minions of the mayor in attendance. That was what the school population - and incidentally, Angel - was mainly to fight.
The big day had arrived, and the mayor had duly ascended, only to be blown to fragments along with the school when Buffy successfully carried out her part of the assigned mission. They had not only survived - they'd won, although some of the students had been killed in the battle. Determined to let the high points outweigh the low points, they'd celebrated their victory, then Angel dropped his bombshell.
He was leaving, headed for Los Angeles, and Cordelia was leaving with him.
"Buffy was crushed. After everything, Angel was leaving her. For the first time, I felt some respect for him. At least he could control his hormones, knowing what would happen if he didn't."
Oz had to leave after another werewolf attacked him, and was eaten in self-defence. Willow had been devastated, and Xander had done his best to comfort her. "Mainly because she, unlike Buffy, let me try to help her, instead of being all, 'oh, you wouldn't have any idea what it's like', which did wonders for my self-esteem, let me tell you."
Then had come the Initiative, a government agency set up to study vampires and demons. There had been two big surprises about them though - the first being that instead of being killed, vampires and demons encountered by the Initiative's commandos were captured wherever possible.
The second had been that Riley Finn, Buffy's boyfriend, was one of the Initiative's team leaders. "Which was worth a couple of chuckles," Xander said.
Throughout this, Xander had once again been pushed to the edges of the group. He'd used the time he now had free to continue his efforts to make Faith feel accepted. He was making progress, becoming fairly close to her, and was racking his brains to try to find her a better place to live than the fleabag motel.
Buffy's place was out, as the two Slayers didn't get along too well, and he wasn't sure as to how Buffy's mother would take it.
His place was out, for obvious reasons.
Willow's was also a no-go, since her parents would object.
Which left Giles. Careful sounding out had revealed that he was reluctant, which meant that for the time being Faith was stuck in the motel.
Still, for a while, things had seemed to be going reasonably well - including the shock of seeing Spike being captured and implanted with a chip that prevented him from attacking humans. "He'd always struck me as one of the brighter vampires around. Seeing him captured and de-fanged was a surprise, but a nice one. I, of course, acted with restraint and maturity and didn't tease him about it... too much, anyway," Xander said with a grin.
Then the Initiative's lead researcher, Professor Margaret Walsh, had revealed her secret. She'd already tried to take Buffy out of play, and now she revealed the reason behind all those captured demons. ADAM, a Frankenstein's Monster of demon and cybernetic parts, with the purpose to 'cleanse' the world.
Naturally, it had all gone pear-shaped. Killing Walsh and escaping, ADAM took his instructions one step too far, deciding that the best way to 'cleanse' the world was to kill every living thing, human or demon.
"Spike, naturally, took the chance to play both ends against the middle. He'd sell us out to ADAM, then come back and extort Giles with information about ADAM's activities. For some reason, Buffy refused to let us deal with Spike properly. 'He's being useful,' she'd say. 'He's trying to get us killed,' was my response. Naturally, she didn't pay the least bit of attention to me."
In the meantime, ADAM was continuing with his plans, sending out vampires to distract Buffy and Faith while he worked on what he saw as his instructions. The vampires did their job - after all, staking them was distracting the Slayers from what ADAM was up to - but Xander, Giles and Willow kept trying to find a way to defeat ADAM.
"The direct approach was a no-go, as both Buffy and Faith had fought ADAM, and been lucky to escape with their lives," Xander said.
In the end, it had been an off-hand comment from Xander that had provided the key to defeating ADAM. At the end of yet another 'research party', during which they'd found no real information to how to defeat ADAM, Xander had commented, "Pity there's no way of joining our strengths to fight ADAM."
Both Willow and himself had been flipping through various books, but Giles had drawn their complete attention when he'd exclaimed, "Of course!" and started rummaging through his bookshelf. Exchanging confused glances, they'd watched as Giles dragged an even-thicker-than-normal book from his collection and opened it.
Looking up, he'd seen their confused expressions, and explained his actions. "An enjoining spell. What it does is take the strengths of a group of people, and imbue one member of the group with those strengths." Seeing their blank expressions, he'd gone on to explain, "Imagine a person with the strength of a Slayer-"
"Two Slayers, G-man," Xander had interrupted.
Giles had shot him a nasty look at his use of the hated 'G-man' epithet, which had simply bounced off Xander's hide. Sighing, he continued, "Quite, Xander, but I feel I should mention that that would have rather... unpredictable effects."
"Huh?"
"Anything might happen, Xander," Willow had translated. "It might be twice as effective, it might not work at all, and bad things might happen."
"Oh... okay."
Giles had continued, "Imagine a person with the strength and agility of a Slayer, Willow's magical abilities, and my knowledge of the individual demon parts that make up ADAM's body."
Xander had nodded, and asked, "What can I contribute?"
Giles had been somewhat surprised at Xander's unexpected offer, while Willow's expression had said, 'Not a lot', tinged with sadness. After some careful thought - and some polishing of his glasses - he'd said, "Actually, Xander, there is something you can provide. The entity needs someone to provide the emotional balance... the 'Heart'... as it were. I believe that you would be suited for the role."
Both Xander's and Willow's jaws had sagged towards the ground, and Xander had been the first to recover. "Great! I'm in then... errr... is there anything we should be made aware of before we commit ourselves to this?"
"Actually, there is." If anything, Giles' polishing of his glasses had picked up speed - a sure sign that he was agitated. "There is no recorded instance of this procedure ever having succeeded. In fact, every time it has been attempted, it has failed rather... spectacularly."
Xander and Willow had understood the implications of that rather clearly. Once again, it had been Xander who had recovered first. "Is there any other way to do this, G-man?"
It had been a sign of how serious things were when Giles didn't even react. "Not that I can see, Xander."
Xander didn't hesitate for a second. "I'm in," he'd said, with Willow not far behind. "But we'd better stick with the one-Slayer contribution. This thing is going to be hard enough to pull off as it is." Willow had looked at him in amazement, for two reasons. The first was the fact that he'd made the connection that quickly. The second was his ready acceptance of the fact that either Buffy or Faith wasn't going to be able to contribute.
When they'd informed Buffy and Faith, they'd immediately started arguing as to which of them was going to be the Slayer to contribute. The decision came from a totally unexpected quarter, though...
"Buffy," Xander said firmly.
Faith had turned on him, furiously demanding to know why. "She's got more experience at this gig, Faith," Xander had said calmly, placing a hand on Faith's shoulder. Both Buffy and Willow had shot incredulous glares his way, which he ignored. "And there's an important job I want you to do. While this thing is going on, the three of us aren't going to be able to drive our bodies, and we're going to need someone to look after them for us. You're the person I'm going to trust with that responsibility, Faith," he'd added earnestly and with complete sincerity.
Faith had been struck dumb by the sheer trust he'd placed in her. Acting on impulse, she'd wrapped her arms around him, and said, "I won't let you down, X-man," while fighting back tears.
Xander had stroked her hair gently and replied, "I know you won't, Faith." After a brief squeeze, he'd let her go and stepped back. "Let's go."
In the end, the spell had worked, and ADAM was defeated. Xander's trust in Faith had been repaid, as during the fight with ADAM, a couple of his minions had happened to stumble across the inert bodies of Xander, Willow and Giles. If not for Faith's staking them, their spirits would have been trapped in Buffy's body, with unpredictable results.
Once again, a Big Bad had been defeated, and life in Sunnydale returned to what passed for normal.
Unfortunately for Xander, this involved the attempts by Buffy and Willow to push him away, much to Faith's disgust. "Why do you put up with it, X-man?" she'd asked one night at the Bronze.
Xander had shrugged. "Dunno," he'd said. "Actually, my putting-up-with-it tolerance has just about reached its limits. Apart from that, I can't just step aside, knowing what I know. It might not be a destiny thing like you and Buffy, but... it's just something I have to do," he'd finished.
Acting on impulse again, Faith had reached across the table and grabbed Xander's hand. "You do something of your own free will that me and Buffy are forced to do as a 'destiny thing'. That really impresses me, X-man," she'd said, giving his hand a gentle squeeze.
"Thanks Faith," he'd replied, gently squeezing back. "That means a lot to me, it really does."
Not long after that night, Buffy had stepped up her efforts to exclude Xander from the slay-age, starting to call him 'useless' and a 'liability'. Faith had been appalled, but unable to break through the blonde Slayer's obstinance. Xander had just...
Plastered a completely blank expression on his face, turned on his heel and left, as the two Slayers began to argue loudly.
Later that night, he'd stumbled into Willy's, which surprised the 'regulars', since he'd been alone and drunk. No-one made a move towards him though, as his expression was a duplicate of the one that had caused Angelus to back off - one that said, 'If you want to try something, you'd better hope that it works first time, 'cause that's the only chance you'll get'.
Flopping onto a bar stool, he'd handed Willy a fifty and said, "Scotch. Neat. And keep it coming until that runs out. I'll work something out from there."
Willy, his expression even more weasel-like than usual, hadn't said anything, instead simply handing Xander a shot glass.
Xander had been on his third drink - and reaching that area where he was feeling no pain - when the sounds of a crowd cheering had filtered through the alcohol-induced insulation around his brain. "What's going on, Willy?"
"Nothing, kid. It's just..." Xander's expression had spoken of painful death unless Willy quit the bullshit. "I've got a basement, where I stage pit-fights twice a month. All fights are to the death, and the winner gets a cut of the bets placed."
Xander had nodded, and stood up. "Show me, Willy." Once again, protests had been stillborn, and Willy had wordlessly led Xander to a curtained-off alcove behind the bar which, when pulled back revealed a set of steps leading down to the basement.
The basement turned out to be a fairly large room - it had to be, since the roped-off area in the centrer took up a fair proportion of the space - whose walls were crammed with bleacher-style seating packed with a mix of vampires and demons, with the occasional human here and there. The air was full of the cheers of the crowd backing their chosen fighter, and placing bets. In the ring, two demons that Xander was unfamiliar with were slugging it out.
A twisted grin had appeared on Xander's face. "I think I'm going to find this interesting."
****
"...and after a couple more visits, Willy suggested that I start participating. I though, 'What the hell' and agreed." Xander took in the appalled expressions of his audience. "What else did I have? My oldest friend and the person I'd called 'my Hero' had basically rejected me. Giles was too busy with training Faith and Buffy to try to help, and Buffy and Willow basically ignored all efforts by Faith and Dawn to try to talk them around."
Louise visibly shook herself. "But surely Faith would have tried something," she protested.
"She did," Xander admitted. "And looking back on it, I must have been in a bad way to not to have paid any attention to her. Then again, maybe some part of my mind was telling me that some of it was for her."
"What do you mean by that, Xander?" Ione asked.
"Well, she was still at that fleabag motel, and every time I won a fight, I'd give some of the winnings to her so that she could pay the bills and manage to eat. After a while she stopped telling me that I'd be killed one day, and simply started accepting the money I gave her. Of course, she did start insisting that one day she was going to pay me back. Maybe she was trying to kick my sense of self-preservation into gear. After all, money's no use to a dead man," he finished with a slight smile.
"Oh, I don't know about that," Joshua commented, thinking about the possessed, who'd been the souls of the dead returned to take over the living.
"True," Xander agreed, thinking about vampires, who were demons who'd taken over a dead body.
Joshua shook himself, and noticed the drinks, which had been untouched during Xander's story. "I think this calls for a toast," he said, motioning for everyone to pick up their glasses.
"You don't have to do this, Joshua," Xander protested weakly, but was over-ridden.
"Yes, I do, Xander," Joshua replied. "To Xander," he said formally, "who has stood up to the forces of darkness..." He paused before suddenly grinning wickedly, before continuing in a more normal tone of voice, "... and given them the finger, and kicked them in the nuts."