Summary: Recover! Thank God for other people!

Crossover: Bastard!!, Slayers

Disclaimer: I don't own Bastard!!, Slayers, or Buffy the Vampire Shagger. Although, if the respective owners want to swap for a couple of CDs that's fine.

Feedback: Yeah, baby!

Pre-fic Comments:

The hardest part, for me, is making them different enough from canon that they're interesting.

* * *

Xander blinked, trying hard to stay awake.

"white hair?," he whispered.

"Uh, Buffy, I believe that Xander is in need of rest and recuperation, before explanations are given," Giles intervened.

The teenage mage grinned at the British watcher before promptly falling asleep.

"Mmmm... twinkies..."

Willow sighed as Buffy picked up Xander. "Yep, that's Xander."

* * *

Xander turned over, pulling the blanket with him. That was strange... normally it was his alarmclock waking him up, rather than sunlight. Either he'd pissed off the old lady, or he'd been really tired when he got home.

He rolled over the other way and fell onto hard linoleum. This woke him up the rest of the way quite well.

"What am I? Who am I? Where am I?," Xander asked, trying to extricate himself from the all encompassing blanket of doom.

"Easy there, Sauron," he heard Buffy say as she pulled the blanket off him. "You're human, Xander, and at the Library."

"Oh."

"Yeah, it's pretty 'Oh' worthy," Willow smiled. "I'm so glad you're okay, Xander! Your hair isn't quite so white any more, and Giles says that you should be okay--"

Xander got up, putting a finger to Willow's lips to silence her. "Easy there, Wills."

His stomach rumbled loudly. He blushed in embarassment.

"That's a new record, even for you Xander," Willow said.

Xander's eyebrows furrowed a moment. "What about when I was seven, at your birthday party at Burger King?"

"Nope."

"You sure?"

"Yep."

"Wow."

His stomach rumbled again. "I need foooood..."

He looked around. He was on a sofa in the Library, near the card catalogue. The door to Giles' office opened, showing the man himself.

"Ah, Xander," Giles greeted him. "I expected you'd wake rather hungry, so..."

The Watcher handed him a box of sandwiches. Xander grinned up at him thankfully. "Giles, you're a lifesaver!"

Not much was heard from him for awhile.

"Okay, that beats Mum's famous Takeout Recipe hands down," he grinned. "So... Master gone the way of the dodo?"

Giles nodded. "Quite. Avoid the Library floor, if you can, as it turned out that the Hellmouth and the Master was directly under it."

So?

Memory came back to Xander, of a collapsed cave with sunlight coming from above the earth.

"Oops."

He smiled sheepishly. Man, he was gonna cop hell.

"Er, that's alright," Giles said. "For some insane reason, Principal Snyder accepted my somewhat flimsy excuse of a gas leak."

"You've gotta be kidding," Xander blinked. "No one's that gullible."

Giles raised an eyebrow wordlessly.

"Okay, Sunnydale Denial in action. Gotcha."

"My Mum wants to see you, Xander," Buffy said. "She heard that you got caught up in the gas explosion, and she's worried about you."

"Cool! Can I stop over for tea?"

"Sure," Buffy said. She looked over at Willow. "You could come, and we could make a sleepover of it. Ah.... Sorry, Giles, but you're like way too old for it."

Xander waved that away expansively. "He was in on saving the world. He can stay for the pre-sleep videos and munchies."

"How exceedingly generous of you," Giles said. "I believe that it's currently three in the afternoon, so you may wish to ring and inform your mother now."

"It's THREE IN THE AFTERNOON?!," Xander yelled. "How the heck did I sleep that long?!"

"Dragon Slaves /are/ amongst, if not the most powerful black magic spell in existance," Giles said dryly. "Considering that you are still beginning, and that it was your first attempt, you're lucky that you have not remained comatose longer."

"When you put it that way..."

"Life doesn't get much better," Willow commented. "We've saved the world, and now we get summer vacay as pay."

"Ah... about that," Buffy said nervously, "I'm going to Los Angeles for a few months, to spend time with my dad."

"You can't!," Giles protested. "What about the Hellmouth?"

"It'll be fiiine," Buffy soothed. "You've got Black Magic Sauron here, Wicca Girl there, and they've got a Watcher. You'll be fine."

Xander frowned thoughtfully. "Buff, why're you calling me /Sauron/?!"

The Slayer shrugged. "Isn't he the bad guy in that Peter Jackson movie? You know, the black mojo dude?"

"If he got a clue and his underlings got a sense of style, I'd be all for it," Xander said. "But as it is, he's a necromancer and his servants look like they've been dead for centuries."

"He is?," Buffy asked.

"Sure is," Willow said. "Everyone's read the Silmarillion, everyone knows."

The Californian blonde shifted nervously, trying to think of a way to argue with Willow without insulting her.

"That's it, isn't it?," Xander realised, having a rare moment of epiphany. "You need a nickname for lil' ole me."

He smirked lecherously at Buffy.

Giles coughed, drawing attention to himself. "Er, given Xander's book and mentors contained therein, might I suggest taking a page from there?"

"Book vandalism? Way to go G-man! We've finally corrupted you!"

"Not that! I meant, given that one of the authors of Xander's manual is 'Lina Inverse the Dragon Spooker', I suggest that you nickname Xander as 'Xander Inverse the Vampire Spooker.'"

The teenagers paused to mull that over.

"I like it," Xander shrugged.

"Xander Inverse it is!," Buffy grinned.

* * *

Post-fic Comments:

Wrote this listening to Johnny Cash - American III, if anyone cares. Fairly good album.