This is dedicated to those of you who watched the show.
May 10th, 1998
Xander smiled in contentment as he finished getting dressed, realizing that only the eventual completion of the School and Camp remained of his and Willow's interim plans.
The new ISP, small publishing company, security equipment and services firm had been up and running since the beginning of May, and the barely-reputable variations of businesses to take advantage of the looting of vampire nests had just broken even with the necessary capitalization costs for legitimizing their activities. Between Willow, Selma, and Jenny Calendar, they'd managed to piece together bits and pieces of struggling or defunct companies along this section of coast, and turn them around financially into going concerns, and had even bought the Oxnard, Santa Barbara and Sunnydale daily newspapers as of last week.
Strange thing, they'd run into a lot of little problems with the Mayor's Office, allegedly that the seeming 'regionalization' might result in Sunnydale being just like everyone else. He'd publicly assured everyone that he hoped to consolidate production expenses in order to ensure all three news organizations could continue. Further, the young entrepreneur had told them that each would remain independent, with very few changes, the largest being that as the costs of the three college publications in the three cities were threatening to close their highly-considered, but slightly expensive journalism programs.
He'd been questioned about the tendency of the students to be a bit raucous, and he responded that he'd met with the college presidents to where they'd fund maintain the single faculty position that from the business side would be considered 'section editor' whose main responsibility other than a better status quo, would be to ensure the students realized that they were in a real newspaper that professional journalism, not particular causes of the moment. Also, Xander told the radio, television and news reporters that showed up, he hoped to work out similar 'apprenticeships' between his businesses and any flagging programs of worth at the educational institutions.
"Selma?" Xander called out as he came down from the apartment upstairs into the coffee shop downstairs that would open in another ten minutes.
"Yes Captain," the currently-in-robot-form AI responded as she placed his usual small breakfast in front of him with the 'paper' and looked over the daybreak report that Selma put together from all of their information sources, jokingly called by the group, the Lambert Letter. "And if I might ask, when did we get a cat?"
"A cat? I don't know, you better ask Willow."
"Ask me what?" the mentioned redhead replied as she came down from her own adjacent apartment. They'd decided in spite of being emancipated, to wait until they were going together for a year before officially shacking up, even if they usually fell asleep together from work, or watching movies or such.
"When'd you get us a cat?"
"Me?" she said, picking up and petting the darker-colored tabby-patterned Manx cat. "He's a nice kitty…yes he is…yes he is…"
"Willow, if you want to keep the broody-looking cat as a pet, that's fine. But please don't expect me to clean up after him. Come to think of it, he does have a big spacing between the ears—you should call him Angel."
Willow chuckled, then looked at the cat, "How would you like that Angel?"
The cat seemed to meow happily and began to purr.
"Oh," Xander brought up as he glanced over some more information on the report, "You better go get him his shots and get him fixed—"
"Roooowr…" the cat indignantly muttered at Xander and glared, causing the three humanoids a moment of pause. Xander looked at the cat. "Well you at least need your shots."
The cat seemed to think about it and went back to demanding petting from Willow, who smiled and obliged.
"I guess we better call him Angel; the two of you seem to be getting along the same."
"Hmm, that reminds me…Selma, if none of us let him in…where did you find him?"
"He was sitting next to the printer this morning. I'm running a diagnostic now…as I don't remember sending a print command."
"You better check the date, this one's for tomorrow," he commented as he turned a page, "And we'll need to talk to some of our people. This has me doing things I haven't done yet."
A low whine more suited to a canine came from the cat as it jumped up on the counter and padded over to sit on his paper. It looked Xander in the eyes, then picked up a paw and seemed to tap the date.
"I think it's trying to tell you something, Xan," Willow considered. The cat looked at Willow and purred. It then moved off of the report, waved the paw in a circle at the pile of papers, and tapped the date again. Willow decided to clear things up. "Okay, Angel, four meows if you understand us."
The cat meowed four times. The three humanoids looked at each other, not quite sure how to proceed. Selma thought just a little faster.
"There's a correlation between the report and the date?"
The cat purred but stayed where it was.
"It's tomorrow's date…"
The cat started purring before she could continue.
"It's…tomorrow's report."
The cat moved over and began to happily purr and rub up against the 'woman.'
Xander picked up the report, and looked at it again. He looked at the cat, which moved halfway towards him.
"So is this a one-shot deal?"
The cat moved its head in a negative fashion.
"What's the catch?"
The cat picked up a paw and seemed to point at him.
"Um, I'm the only one who can use the information?"
The cat seemed to pause, then nodded.
"What are the limits on this?"
The cat moved to the nearby register, pointed at it, and shook its head.
"I can't use it to make money."
The cat nodded.
"Um, what if a demon business comes along and does a hostile takeover? Can I use the information to do good first even if it ends up making me money?"
The cat looked at the ceiling, then at Xander, and nodded very slowly and gravely.
"So I can make money, but only if the primary reason is to take care of bad stuff showing up in this paper or life-saving?"
The cat nodded more.
"Did you use to be a person?"
The cat didn't move.
"Not allowed to tell?"
Big nod.
"Okay…new rules. No being around the women when they're naked or very scantily clad. And no following into bedrooms. No getting 'inter-species weird' or I will get you fixed. Just like I'd expect any other guy around here to be a gentleman. Fair enough?"
The cat nodded.
"Do you hit the printer button every morning to get this mystical version to pop out?"
The cat nodded.
"If something happens to you, do the papers stop if we don't prevent it by the next day?"
Another nod.
"Do you stick around all day as opposed to disappearing into the ether?"
Another nod.
"Important question: do you eat cat food?"
The cat looked unimpressed, perhaps even dour.
"Selma, if we feed the cat some of what we eat, can you do the vitamin thing to keep him healthy?"
"Indeed I can."
"That work for you…Angel?"
Another nod.
"If a demon or vampire comes in, would you be able to tell from smell or whatever?"
A pause, then a nod.
"Depends on what kind?"
A nod.
"If you get extra-friendly with other cats, would that result in the first real bunch of intelligent cats?"
A blank and almost annoyed look.
"One more rule … You're the mouser around here. That's your chore other than meowing about demons in here."
The cat nodded.
"Okay. We'll give this a try for a while and see. Deal?" he held out his hand to the cat, which lifted his paw and they shook on it. "Cool."
Alexander Lambert smiled at Selma, kissed his fiancée and headed out with the report to see what would come of this 'early edition' of the Lambert Letter.