Previously…
"You! Who are you! You're with the Watcher's Council aren't you?" she asked accusingly. "I knew that you people would come back! Didn't you get the message the first couple of times! I don't work for you anymore. I quit you back when the mayor was in town and I reminded you of the balance of power when you came to tell me about Glory. What did they send you to say?" she asked, roughly grabbing Harry by the shirt collar and slamming him against a headstone. She gave him a twisted grin. "What does Travers want to know now? How I died? How I clawed my way out of my own grave? Or is that too unseemly? Does he wanna know how Willow did it? Does he want to know if I came back wrong? If I did, does he actually think that he could kill me?" Buffy let him go, a look of savage triumph in her face. "Well you can just tell him to go to hell!"
"Erm" was all Harry could say. He could feel a bruise forming where she had grabbed him around the neck. "Who exactly is the watcher's council?" Not for the first time that night, Harry found himself wondering who is this girl?
Destinies Collide
"Oh." The look on the hapless boy's face told Buffy that he was telling the truth. She suddenly felt perplexed and embarrassed. It had seemed like a logical conclusion that he was a watcher. I mean, he had a British accent and everything! That almost always is a watcher alert!
Buffy ran a hand through her hair nervously. Everyone at the house had been pretty on edge lately. Recently, the Watchers Council had begun sending inquiries to the Summers household. After the Council had found out that not only had Buffy died and been replaced with a robot, but her witch friend and a bunch of mere humans had resurrected her, Buffy had been bombarded by "routine procedures" and probing questions from the watchers. As soon as one showed up at her doorstep, they got the boot. But before they were sent packing, all of Buffy's unwelcome visitors managed to ask questions about an issue that was still too fresh in Buffy's mind. "It is very important for us to know what type of dimension you ended up in. The case of a resurrected slayer has no precedent. We must know everything, where you woke up, how much you remember and whether you're at full slayer strength." She could almost see the opportunism in their beady eyes. An army of resurrected slayers, is that what they wanted? But Buffy could still remember the feeling of being ripped from Heaven and waking up in a little box that smelled of death and pressed in at her from all sides. She could never forget the terror and hopelessness of her resurrection, but she was trying to repress it. The querying watchers weren't helping the matter.
Buffy was still at a loss as to what to do with the bewildered boy. She wished she hadn't told him those things. Things she hadn't meant to say and things that whoever this kid was, no doubt wouldn't understand. She settled on asking the obvious. "So…are you evil?"
"Not that I'm aware of" replied Harry.
"Oh. Alright then." Buffy tucked her stake back into her jacket. What did it matter if he was lying? Buffy could kill him in 5 seconds if he tried anything. And she really didn't feel like picking a fight with someone. She wanted to go lay down on her bed and sleep. Or stare at the ceiling. Anything that didn't involve thinking.
"Then who are you? Don't you know that it's dangerous to hang around in graveyards at night? Especially in Sunnydale of all places. And wait, why did you call me the slayer?"
Harry sighed. He might as well explain what it was he was doing in Sunnydale. If she caused a problem, he could always perform a memory wipe on her. Harry explained his job description and told Buffy that he had thought that she was either a vampire or a potential victim.
Buffy nodded, this was understandable. It would be much harder for her to explain her reaction to him. But he didn't ask why she attacked him and she didn't supply an answer. Right now Buffy wanted to know about this wizarding world and why they thought they could horn in on her territory.
"You asked why that vampire called me the slayer? Well I guess you could say that that's my job description. The chosen one. The one girl in all the world chosen to fight the forces of evil." Buffy laughed at the end. How many times had she heard that speech before? Giles, she thought sadly.
Harry thought about his years at Hogwarts, finding out that he alone could kill Voldemort, or Voldemort would kill him. He had fancied himself an evil fighter, and on his down days wondered why he alone had shouldered the world's burden. Was that what Buffy's life was like? She too had been born with a destiny. Harry felt the self-centered side of himself creep in. Could a couple vampires here or there really compare to Lord Voldemort? Harry shivered just thinking of his snake-like opponent.
The two heroes sat side by side for a minute, thinking about their pasts. Buffy finally broke the silence. "Do you need a place to stay? It would be nice to have an ally, and my house is kind of command central anyway. We don't really have any extra rooms, but you could sleep on the couch if you liked." Oh shit, Buffy thought. Why had she said that? It had just slipped out of her mouth. Was it because she wanted to stop the awkward silence, or because she felt guilty about beating him up? Buffy didn't even know why she was still sitting with the kid in the first place.
Harry was flabbergasted. The girl who had just tried to kill him was now inviting him to be a guest in his house. Of course, the ministry had supplied him with a place to stay, but Harry found himself agreeing to stay with Buffy. What would he get himself into next?
Oh God, Buffy thought. All I wanted was to ponder my life in silence. How did I end up agreeing to take care of Junior Brit?
okay, sorry if that chapter was a little annoying, but I didn't really feel like having them do any more exposition than necessary.
